Movie Review: The Age Of Adaline (2015)

Genre: Romantic Drama  

Director: Lee Toland Krieger  
Starring: Blake Lively, Michiel Huisman, Harrison Ford, Ellen Burstyn, Kathy Baker  
Running Time: 113 minutes  

Synopsis: In 1937, 29 year-old Adaline Bowman (Blake Lively) was trapped in frozen water and struck by lightning, causing her to stop aging. To avoid intense scrutiny, she consequently relocated every decade and assumed a series of fake identities. In 2014, Adaline is in San Francisco and preparing for another move when she attracts the romantic attention of wealthy literature benefactor Ellis Jones (Michiel Huisman). Her daughter Flemming (Ellen Burstyn), who is now in her 80s, encourages her mom to take a chance on love. But when Adaline meets Ellis' father William (Harrison Ford), her history catches up to her present.

What Works Well: The fantasy dream of eternal youth is explored through a dreamy romance, delving into the complications of not growing old as time moves on and all others age. Co-writers J. Mills Goodloe and Salvador Paskowitz expose the difference between surviving for eternity and living towards an end with welcome pragmatism, allowing the sad loneliness of a life unsynched from society to surface within an unusual love triangle. Harrison Ford is the standout presence in a talent-rich cast, and attractive San Francisco locations (with some Vancouver subbing) add the necessary gloss. 

What Does Not Work As Well: The second act romance elements meander into languid territory, and what should have been a climactic conversation occurs off-screen.

Key Quote: 

Adaline: Tell me something I can hold on to forever and never let go.

Ellis: Let go.

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Movie Review: Dad (1989)

A family drama, Dad tackles issues of aging and the complex dynamics between fathers and sons as well as husbands and wives.

In Los Angeles, elderly couple Bette and Jake Tremont (Olympia Dukakis and Jack Lemmon) are living out their retirement, with Bette controlling every last detail of Jake's life. As a result he is  disengaged, disinterested and utterly dependent. When Bette suffers a heart attack, their son John (Ted Danson) a Wall Street executive, flies in to help his sister Annie (Kathy Baker) and her husband Mario (Kevin Spacey) care for Jake.

John has not seen his parents for a few years and is shocked at Jake's emotional deterioration. With Bette in hospital, he sets about reviving his dad's spirit and love for life. Gradually Jake perks up and starts to take a much more active role in his own well-being. But more changes will impact Jake's promising rejuvenation: Bette returns home; John's wayward son Billy (Ethan Hawke) arrives for an unexpected visit; and an unwelcome health diagnosis will all play a role in the family's happiness.

Directed and written by Gary David Goldberg and based on a book by William Wharton, Dad enjoys a committed Jack Lemmon central performance, but is otherwise emotionally all over the place. With an intimate focus on familial matters the film is not many notches above standard television fare, but Lemmon at least ensures that great big-screen acting resides at the heart of the melodrama.

The film rides a nauseating emotional rollercoaster and crams too many sudden health turnarounds in less than two hours. Jake Tremont goes through about two and a half jarring down and up cycles in his physical and psychological well-being, dragging his small family along as he navigates up the mountain from the depth of despair to the giddiness of seemingly great health only to start another descent that precedes yet another climb. As a result Goldberg loses grip on what the film is intended to convey, with obscure and complex medical and psychological issues barely described before being allowed to run loose.

And Jake's health is far from the only matter of consequence: Dad also tries to explore the dynamic between a domineering wife and a submissive husband, an issue that probably deserved more exposition that it receives in the gaps between Jake's yo-yo health. And with John for the first time experiencing the fragility of his father's health, he reassesses his relationship with his own son Billy, and the film includes some decent side-quest scenes as the next generation attempts to avoid the same mistakes.

Ted Danson provides decent support, but is not helped by a script that never explains how he can suddenly shift gears, mentally and pragmatically, to be away for so long from his high-powered Wall Street job. Danson also struggles when the script demands strong displays of emotion, which are never his forte.

Dad offers some substantive topics, but overburdens its own capabilities.

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The Movies Of Kathy Baker

All movies starring Kathy Baker and reviewed on the Ace Black Movie Blog are linked below:

The Right Stuff (1983)



Dad (1989)

Edward Scissorhands (1990)



Inventing The Abbotts (1997)



The Cider House Rules (1999)



The Glass House (2001)

Cold Mountain (2003)



13 Going On 30 (2004)



Last Chance Harvey (2008)

Too Big To Fail (2011)

The Age Of Adaline (2015)

Remarkably Bright Creatures (2026)

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The Movie Star Index is here.

Movie Review: Edward Scissorhands (1990)

A dark fantasy drama with a mean streak of humour, Edward Scissorhands is a fiercely original treatment of the comfortably familiar fitting-in theme.

The film is set in a suburban subdivision located at the base of a mountain, with a Gothic mansion on top looming over the quaint houses. On a snowy night, an old lady tucks her granddaughter in and recounts a story that happened years ago, triggering a film-long flashback. Avon lady Peg (Dianne Wiest), a subdivision resident, is having a bad day, and with nothing to lose decides to head up to the mansion to try and make a sale. Inside she finds the place empty except for a frightened young man called Edward (Johnny Depp), with large scissors for hands. Edward was created by The Inventor (Vincent Price), who died before he could complete Edward and provide him with proper hands. Peg feels sorry for Edward and takes him home. Peg's husband Bill (Alan Arkin) and son Kevin are initially stunned but accept Edward as a new member of the family.

Edward is scared and his massive scissor hands cause plenty of accidents, but with Peg's help he slowly starts to adapt to suburban life. The gossipy neighbours, including the over-sexed Joyce (Kathy Baker), are fascinated, and Edward becomes a local celebrity when he demonstrates artistic talent for sculptural hedges, trimming the fur of pet dogs, and providing the women with stylish hair cuts. When Peg's daughter Kim (Winona Ryder) returns from a camping trip, she is initially horrified to find Edward in her room, but gradually Kim and Edward develop feelings for each other, which is bad news for Kim's aggressive boyfriend Jim (Anthony Michael Hall).

Directed and co-produced by Tim Burton and written by Caroline Thompson, Edward Scissorhands is a dark masterpiece. With brisk pacing Burton unleashes his irresistible fantasy on a comically idealized suburban world stuck in an undefined hybrid of the 1950s and 1970s, with every house sporting a bright monochrome paint job. The mansion on the hill, of course, stands in stark contrast, the brooding outsider bathed in black, dark blues and darker greys.

Peg and her neighbours go about their business of pursuing the American dream, the women left at home during the day to gossip and cause mischief while the men drive to work in the morning and come back in the evening with army-like discipline. Edward is dropped into this immaculately manicured world, and his dream is just to be part of the human family. Not too tall and definitely not superficially handsome, Edward is pasty but enigmatic. Remarkably, he is generally accepted as is, and only the complications caused by affairs of the heart cause him grief.

The central themes of belonging, finding a home, and stumbling upon love run through the film. Once Kim makes her appearance the candle of romance flickers to life, but the darkness also seeps in, with Edward causing unintended grief by wanting to love and be loved. The film suggests that the ability to care and love is fundamentally human, and a non-human invention such as Edward can live alongside humans but will struggle to share in the true fulfillment brought upon by mutual passion.

Burton makes use of plenty of clever point-of-view shots, particularly from Edward's perspective, to highlight the experience of the newcomer with an incomplete skill set. Whether it's Peg being excessively nice with her make-up kit or Edward trying to capture any vegetable to eat at dinner, Burton frequently invites the viewer to live in Edward's shoes, dramatically enhancing the film's impact even in the smallest moments daily life.

Johnny Depp launched his career with his portrayal of Edward. It's an unforgettable performance centred on almost silent pathos. Depp's understated expressions convey sadness, fear, panic, bewilderment, anger and sometimes happiness, and later on he captures what it means to find wistful infatuation and a potential first romance. Wiest represents middle America's capacity to display a big and welcoming heart, while Ryder does well in a quick transition from callous to caring. Kathy Baker plays neighbour Joyce for broad laughs, as intended.

Edward Scissorhands delivers on all its multi-genre promises, mixing drama, humour, fantasy and romance with an emotionally satisfying cutting edge.

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Movie Review: Cold Mountain (2003)

A sprawling epic of the Civil War, Cold Mountain is an old-fashioned grand romance set against the backdrop of a brutal war, with classic themes of hope, survival, and the ultimate triumph of the human spirit against barbarous adversity.

Reverend Monroe (Donald Sutherland) and his daughter Ada (Nicole Kidman) relocate from the deep South to the small town of Cold Mountain, North Carolina, where the crisp air is healthier for the Reverend's ailing health. Ada is immediately attracted to the quiet and awkward but resourceful outdoorsman W.P. Inman (Jude Law), and although few words pass between them, there is an undeniably mutual attraction. The Civil War breaks out; Inman joins the Confederate Army, along with most of Cold Mountain's men. For the next several years, Ada's life becomes one long patient wait for Inman to come back to her. She writes a stream of  letters, hears little in return, and lives on nothing but hope and the memory fragments from the few moments they shared prior to the war.

Inman's journey home rivals the Odyssey. He is blown up by Union troops outside Petersburg before surviving a meat grinder of a close-quarters battle, only to be shot in the neck in a subsequent skirmish. Nursed back to health, he defects the Confederate Army before encountering the lascivious Reverend Veasey (Philip Seymour Hoffman). Inman is eventually captured as a defector, but another skirmish with Union soldiers leaves him wounded, abandoned and chained to a gang of dead men. He is rescued again and healed by a recluse living deep in the woods. Inman next encounters the young widow Sara (Natalie Portman) and her young infant, and helps her to fend off marauding and starving Union troops before continuing his long walk home.

Meanwhile, Ada is holding on to the forlorn hope that Inman will one day return to her, and struggling to survive on her own after her father dies. Knowing nothing about running a farm, least of all how to stay alive in the harsh Cold Mountain winters, Ada is near starvation when the spirited and resourceful Ruby (Rene Zellweger) arrives at her doorstep, and the two gradually become a formidable team, surviving and thriving against the elements. The biggest threat to their well-being emerges in the form of the self-appointed Confederate home guard, under the leadership of the power-drunk Teague (Ray Winstone), who sees the Civil War as his opportunity to reclaim his family's long-lost land holdings in Cold Mountain.

Nicole Kidman manages to glow like a Hollywood star even when close to starvation, her performance adequate without being memorable. Kidman is more comfortable in the scenes when she is taking charge or falling in love, and a lot less believable as a struggling woman depending on the charity of others to survive. Jude Law, having just survived another blood-flows-in-the-streets battle in Enemy At The Gates finds himself back up to his knees in gore, and his performance is all about the determination to survive in the name of love, fending off the grim reamer countless times in his quest to fulfil his destiny with Ada.

More interesting than the two leads are two supporting actresses. Renee Zellweger won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her feisty Ruby, a bundle of positive energy that still makes plenty of room for seething anger at her father's neglect. Even more engaging is Natalie Portman, her brief 15 minutes on the screen as Sara leaving a lasting impression. Her pleading with Inman for platonic comfort in her bed is the most searing metaphorical scream of horror that the movie offers against the devastation caused by war.

The supporting cast is deep in talent, and in addition to the sage Donald Sutherland and lustful Philip Seymour Hoffman, the likes of Kathy Baker and Giovanni Ribisi provide continued texture.

Director Anthony Minghella and cinematographer John Seale mix lavish shots of surreal natural beauty in all seasons with horrific scenes of war, and Minghella keeps the drama surprisingly nimble despite the complete lack of any humour or relief from the overwhelming sense of doom surrounding both Ada and Inman.

Cold Mountain never shies away from portraying the harsh natural and man-made challenges that stand in the way of happiness, but it also never veers from the journey to ultimately find the warmth that emanates from the well-meaning human spirit.

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