Movie Review: Parkland (2013)

Genre: Historical Drama  

Director: Peter Landesman  

Starring: Zac Efron, Marcia Gay Harden, Paul Giamatti, Billy Bob Thornton, Jacki Weaver, James Badge Dale, Ron Livingston, Jeremy Strong  
Running Time: 93 minutes  

Synopsis: The film covers the events of November 22, 1963, when US President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, and the immediate aftermath. The multiple perspectives include dressmaker Abraham Zapruder (Paul Giamatti), who inadvertently captured the shooting on his 8mm camera; nurse Doris Nelson (Marcia Gay Harden) and doctor Jim Carrico (Zac Efron), who frantically tried to revive the President at Parkland Hospital; the shooter's brother Robert Oswald Jr. (James Badge Dale) and mother Marguerite (Jacki Weaver); and Agents Sorrels (Billy Bob Thornton) and Hosty (Paul Livingston) of the Secret Service and the FBI respectively.

What Works Well: Steering clear of conspiracy theories, this is a fascinating recreation of famous events from less famous vantage points. Writer and director Peter Landesman allows the well-known incidents (the shooting itself, the swearing-in of Vice President Johnson, the Kennedy funeral service) to play in the background or in the corners of the screen. He is more interested in the peripheral yet essential stories of what happened at the hospital, the sudden imperative to keep Johnson safe, the frantic search for a lab to process the Zapruder film, the emotional impact on Zapruder himself, the guilt and self-questioning consuming the men entrusted with protecting the President, and the unwanted boulder of infamy landing on Robert Oswald's life. Small details, including grandkids in the first few frames of the Zapruder film, skull fragments in the emergency room, and the unceremonial wedging-in of Kennedy's casket into the plane for the flight back to DC, transform grand history to intimate reality.

What Does Not Work As Well: By definition this is an events-driven narrative without a central role (Zapruder and Robert Oswald come closest) and no singular focus.

Key Quote: 

Dallas Police Detective, to Robert Oswald: If I were you, I'd consider changing my name. I'd pray I never needed the help of the Dallas Police Department or the federal government again. I'd pack your things and your wife and those two children of yours, and I'd move as far from here as I could. I'd never come back, even to die. But that's just me.

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Movie Review: Knox Goes Away (2023)

Genre: Crime Drama  

Director: Michael Keaton  

Starring: Michael Keaton, James Marsden, Suzy Nakamura, Al Pacino, Marcia Gay Harden  

Running Time: 114 minutes  

Synopsis: John Knox (Michael Keaton) is a veteran professional assassin who completes assignments with his partner Muncie (Ray McKinnon). Knox is diagnosed with rapidly progressing dementia, and soon afterwards botches a job, leaving behind unintended victims. Then his estranged son Miles (James Marsden) reappears, asking for help to clean up a messy murder. With detective Ikari (Suzy Nakamura) closing in, Knox has to find a way to assist his son before he completely loses his mind.

What Works Well: Michael Keaton directs himself in a thoughtful end-of-the-road drama, where health degradation, professional decline, and personal regrets merge into one final resolution. As director, Keaton demonstrates an eye for interesting angles, while the Gregory Poirier script is admirably interested in all the characters, including Knox's once-a-week mistress (Joanna Kulig) and the detectives sifting through ill-fitting evidence. Jolts of action and violence add a sometimes gory spark, while Al Pacino and Marcia Gay Harden (as Knox' ex-wife) contribute a classy touch to the cast.

What Does Not Work As Well: The complex central plot generates plenty of tactical machinations but with annoyingly opaque objectives, despite easy-to-discern intent.

Key Quote:

Knox: I'm getting worse every hour...it's like a curtain coming down.

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Movie Review: Desperate Measures (1998)

Genre: Action Thriller  

Director: Barbet Schroeder  
Starring: Andy Garcia, Michael Keaton, Marcia Gay Harden, Brian Cox  
Running Time: 100 minutes  

Synopsis: Desperate to find a bone marrow donor for his sick son, San Francisco-based FBI Agent Frank Conner (Andy Garcia) breaks into a governmental database and identifies prison inmate Peter McCabe (Michael Keaton) as a match. A multiple murderer serving a life sentence, McCabe eventually agrees to be a donor, but only because he has an escape plan in mind. Connor has to recapture McCabe and keep him alive, with help from Dr. Samantha Hawkins (Marcia Gay Harden).

What Works Well: Andy Garcia and especially Michael Keaton bring substantial levels of commitment to their roles, in performances that well exceed the strength of the material. The scenes of mental dueling between Connor and McCabe carry a buzz sorely lacking from the rest of the film.

What Does Not Work As Well: An outlandish but interesting-enough premise is wasted on generic chases and tired close calls, with most of the action set within a prison/hospital complex. One criminal is repeatedly able to outsmart an army of law enforcement officials, and only Connor as the scrappy agent-with-a-personal-cause can save the day. Opportunities to explore character backgrounds and moral dilemmas are diligently ignored in favour of sappy servings of father-son dialogue.

Key Quote:

Peter McCabe: You have to appreciate the irony. After all these years of being locked up, I'm given the opportunity to kill again. A cop's kid, too, and all I have to do is sit right here.



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Movie Review: The Mist (2007)

Genre: Horror

Director: Frank Darabont

Starring: Thomas Jane, Marcia Gay Harden, Toby Jones

Running Time: 126 minutes

Synopsis: After a severe storm, a mysterious mist creeps into a New England town. Artist David Drayton (Thomas Jane) and his young son Billy are at the local supermarket when residents start to suspect the mist is hiding something deadly. Others at the supermarket include assistant manager Ollie (Toby Jones), three soldiers from a nearby army base, an assortment of locals, and religious fanatic Mrs. Carmody (Marcia Gay Harden). Murderous creatures emerge from the mist, the trapped shoppers start to turn on each other, and David has to keep Billy safe and chart a potential path to survival.

What Works Well: Writer and director Frank Darabont adapts the Stephen King novella into a high quality horror fest. The menacing introduction efficiently sets the scene and introduces the key characters, and once the carnage starts, societal fragmentation competes with disgusting overgrown critters for most disturbing impact. The pace is unrelenting, unleashing searing commentary on the fragility of civilized behaviour and the warp speed retreat into tribalism. The ending is suitably soul crushing. 

What Does Not Work As Well: The creatures look better from a distance than up close, and Thomas Jane's limited range means he is unconvincing as an artist and exposed during the more emotional scenes. 

Conclusion: The worst monsters are hidden from view.



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Movie Review: Into The Wild (2007)

A survival drama, Into The Wild is one young man's journey of self-discovery, existential peril emerging as the price of absolute freedom.

23-year-old Chris McCandless (Emile Hirsch) hitchhikes into Alaska, then sets off into the wilderness on foot with minimal supplies, determined to live free and survive off the land. After crossing a river he stumbles upon an abandoned old bus and makes it his base. In various flashbacks, his story is revealed.

Chris is from an upper middle class Virginia family and a graduate of prestigious Emory College. His excellent academic record qualifies him to enter law school. But tension is high between him and his parents Walt and Billie (William Hurt and Marcia Gay Harden), who are cold, materialistic, argumentative, and secretive. In contrast Chris and his sister Carine (Jena Malone) are close.

After graduating Chris donates his remaining college fund to charity, destroys his identification cards, and embarks on a cross-country trip, cutting off contact with his family. He assumes the name Alex Supertramp and sets Alaska as a target. Along the way he meets an aging hippie couple (Catherine Keener and Brian H. Dierker), a combine operator (Vince Vaughn), a young couple from Denmark, a budding folk musician (Kristen Stewart), and a lonely old man (Hal Holbrook). His journey includes a Mexican detour before he makes it to Alaska, where survival will be both exhilarating and difficult.

Based on a true story as documented in the book by Jon Krakauer, Into The Wild recreates an audacious escape from imposed social structures. Writer and director Sean Penn goes big to represent an ambitious vision unconstrained by rules, with grand landscapes filling the screen, nature an often imposing presence dwarfing humans. A running time of 148 minutes underlines the operatic themes of Chris' quest for freedom.

The scale does threaten to overwhelm the content. Stripping away the romanticism and literary quotes, this is also the small story of one young man abandoning his privilege, imposing despair on his family, and chasing an ill-advised definition of freedom in a naive and anti-social interpretation of happiness. Various levels of mystique can be layered upon the cross-country journey, but the uneasy sense that Chris was a troubled young man prevails.

Emile Hirsch's portrayal of a determined traveler combines intensity with swagger, while Hal Holbrook adds lonely poignancy. The individual chapters and various en route encounters break down the journey into manageable morsels, but the collective is stronger than the individual. Despite some attempts to inject profundity, precious little is genuinely memorable or meaningful in Chris' interactions with assorted hippies, tourists, geezers and lost souls.

Carine's narration and childhood flashbacks reveal the home environment despised by Chris. Walt and Billie are professionals providing every opportunity for their children, although their marriage is always one argument away from rupturing. A family revelation could have been perceived as a sordid scandal by a son in his formative years. Frequent family meetings are the worst atrocity imposed upon Chris and Carine, and by most measures the McCandless household as portrayed is typically troubled but far from a hellhole.

Into The Wild is left with impressive grandeur overwhelming foundational issues. The journey is scenic, the survival ordeal harrowing, the ending fateful, but the origins are underdeveloped.



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Movie Review: Grandma (2015)

A drama-comedy character study, Grandma is an engaging story enhanced by provocative characters and excellent performances.

Elle (Lily Tomlin) is a fifty year old (or so she claims) grandmother, ex-poet, unemployed academic, lesbian and staunch feminist. Following the death of her long-time partner, Elle is now breaking up with the much younger Olivia (Judy Greer) after a four month relationship. Elle's granddaughter Sage (Julia Garner) shows up unexpectedly seeking help: she needs more than $600 to pay for an abortion scheduled later that day.

Elle is also broke, but she decides to help by trying to collect money from a variety of sources. The pair visit Sage's boyfriend Cam (Nat Wolff), Elle's bookstore owner friend Carla (Elizabeth Peña), tattoo artist Deathy (Laverne Cox) and Elle's lover from a long time ago Karl (Sam Elliott). Finally, Elle and Sage have to gather up their courage to also seek help from Elle's daughter and Sage's mother Judy (Marcia Gay Harden), a perpetually high-strung businesswoman.

Written and directed by Paul Weitz, Grandma is a compact 79 minutes delving into the world of a fading scholar. The film is a showcase for 76 year old Lily Tomlin, who dominates the screen with a caustic performance as Elle. This grandma is bitter, foul-mouthed and proud of it, her life reduced to no debt, no apologies, and not accepting nonsense from anyone, and Tomlin brings her to life with gallons of bravado.

With no wasted scenes, the story is small and personal but also elaborate enough to explore relevant themes for Elle's generation, from the abortion question to the status of feminism and exactly where the battles for women's rights have landed. Weitz steers a delicate course, avoiding any sense of moral high ground or preachiness. Elle may have lived on her own terms, but her life is cluttered with the wreckage of her decisions, including an unfulfilled career and, closer to home, broken relationships with daughter Judy and former lover Karl. Elle achieved independence, but far from triumphantly.

The film cruises through the interactions Elle initiates in her quest to find the money Sage needs, and  grandma's world is revealed through the eyes of the granddaughter, oscillating between resigned, panicked and horrified by grandma's behaviour. Weitz challenges the millennial to assess whether the paths paved for her by the warrior women of the 1960s and 1980s are worth following. Julia Garner is excellent portraying a young woman forced to understand, all too closely, where she came from, but still inquisitively looking for her own trajectory.

Sharp and feisty, Grandma is worth knowing and does not overstay her welcome.

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Movie Review: Miller's Crossing (1990)

A gangster drama with neo-noir elements and a mean streak of humour, Miller's Crossing is a character rich story about the sordid but engrossing business of crime.

Mobster Leo O'Bannon (Albert Finney) rules an unnamed city during the Prohibition. He refuses the request of fellow gang boss Johnny Caspar (Jon Polito) to kill bookie Bernie Bernbaum (John Turturro). Caspar believes that Bernie is an unethical cheat when it comes to fixed boxing bouts, but Leo is in love with Bernie's sister Verna (Marcia Gay Harden) and wants to maintain the peace. Leo's second in command Tom Reagan (Gabriel Byrne) is unsuccessful arguing that liquidating Bernie is a cheap price to pay in order to avoid a conflict with Caspar.

What Leo does not know is that Tom, who is saddled with gambling debts, is also carrying on a steamy affair with Verna. Leo does suspect Verna enough to have her followed, but things start to get complicated when the tail shows up dead in an alley. Meanwhile Caspar is fed up with taking orders from Leo and a full-fledged violent turf war erupts between the two. Tom and Leo have a public falling out, and with Caspar appearing to gain the upper hand in the fight to control the underworld, Tom joins Caspar's inner circle.

Directed by Joel Coen and written by his brother Ethan, Miller's Crossing builds slowly but surely to some magnificent peaks of tension and drama in the criminal world. Deploying a measured pace, grim aesthetics and a narrative that smoothly swerves with divided loyalties and suspect alliances, the film works both as a salute to the genre and a memorably unique story.

Inspired by the novels of Dashiell Hammett, the canon of gangster films and sharing some man-in-the-middle story principles with the likes of A Fistful Of Dollars, the Coens create a matter-of-fact world where the mobsters own the law and the politicians, and the prize at the heart of the struggle for power is nothing less than economic control of an entire city. The film does not question the reasons behind this reality; with a combination of jarring violence and sharp wit, Miller's Crossing proceeds to reveal the cunning, conspiracies and collusion required for survival and success in the world of mob rule.

Leo and Caspar will settle their conflict with bullets rather than votes; Tom just has to find a way to navigate and manipulate the dirty war without losing his head, no easy task when he is sleeping with the boss's girl. A black fedora becomes a symbol for loss and death, while a cold blooded crime in the titular forest clearing provides a neat twist and a reminder for Tom that there is a price for everything, but sometimes others pay to play. Verna is a classic woman desired by many but truly attainable by probably none, and her magnetism tugs at the raging egos to make every dangerous situation worse.

Miller's Crossing is punctuated by manic action scenes, ranging in scale from raids and battles involving hordes of cops and gangsters exchanging hot lead from blazing Tommy guns, to quiet one-on-one showdowns prolonged to reveal the fragility of life. Tom's one big advantage is that he is smarter than everybody around him, and particularly wise enough to stand close to power but not cling onto it. In a world gone crazy with killings, Tom slices through the drama using brains instead of brawn. Reluctant to use a gun, he also counts on the incompetence of the goons supposedly running the show to wriggle out of tight spots.

Gabriel Byrne carries the role with requisite intensity, an intelligent man working overtime to design outcomes in a shifting landscape. Albert Finney, Jon Polito and John Turturro humanize a trio of enduring gangsters circling each other looking for the duplicitous kill. Marcia Gay Harden pouts her way through the role of Verna, fully understanding her influence but not feeling any better for it. A woman in a man's world gone mad has every reason to want to land on the winning side of a merciless conflict.

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Movie Review: Magic In The Moonlight (2014)

A romantic comedy set in the world of magicians and psychics, Magic In The Moonlight lacks wit, charm, chemistry and charisma.

Europe, the 1920s. England's leading magician Stanley Crawford (Colin Firth) performs under the elaborate stage disguise of the mysterious Wei Ling Soo. Engaged to Olivia (Catherine McCormack), Stanley is a pragmatist who refuses to believe that there is a God or any mystical forces in the world. His friend and fellow magician Howard Burkan (Simon McBurney) pleads with Stanley to travel with him to the south of France to help debunk young American Sophie Baker (Emma Stone), who is stunning rich families with her psychic powers and an apparent easy ability to communicate with spirits.

Stanley agrees and connects with Sophie and her mother (Marcia Gay Harden). Sophie is already being hotly pursued by the love-smitten Brice (Hamish Linklater), the son of a wealthy socialite seeking Sophie's help to connect with her dead husband. Sophie immediately impresses Stanley with her psychic abilities, and he is unable to discern any untoward tricks. He starts to believe that maybe there are mystical forces in the world, while falling in love with Sophie. An unfortunate incident with Stanley's Aunt Vanessa (Eileen Atkins) proves to be an unexpected turning point.

Written and directed by Woody Allen, Magic In The Moonlight hints strongly that Allen's tank is beginning to run on empty. There is never any moment in this film that does not appear contrived, and the actors don't appear to even be trying to pretend that they are anything other than modern day performers having a frolic in 1920s costumes.

The script is shorn of any intellect, humour, or even substance, descending quickly into lazy monotony, with Stanley repeating about half a dozen times his treatise about disbelieving in anything mystical. And when he falls in love with the doe-eyed Sophie, his transformation into a walk-on-air believer in all things spiritual is sudden to the point of ridiculous, Firth unable to do anything with the blunt material except ham it up into embarrassing over-emotion.

Allen may be trying to say something about existentialists being naturally miserable and the extraordinary benefits of believing in greater powers: why mess with spiritual beliefs if they achieve happiness among the believers, and isn't love the greatest proof of something beyond life's mechanics. It's a decent message, but delivered with an abject absence of finesse.

There is enough talent among the cast to salvage a few droll moments, and the countryside settings and cinematography look idyllic and appealing. But unfortunately, Magic In The Moonlight's greatest trick is making 97 minutes feel twice as long.

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The Movies Of Marcia Gay Harden

All movies starring Marcia Gay Harden and reviewed on the Ace Black Movie Blog are linked below:

Miller's Crossing (1990)

The First Wives Club (1996)

Desperate Measures (1998)

Space Cowboys (2000)

Mystic River (2003)

Mona Lisa Smile (2003)

Into The Wild (2007)

The Mist (2007)

The Maiden Heist (2009)

Parkland (2013)

Magic In The Moonlight (2014)

You're Not You (2014)

Grandma (2015)

Fifty Shades Of Grey (2015)

Knox Goes Away (2023)

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The Movie Star Index is here.

Movie Review: Mona Lisa Smile (2003)

A winds-of-change drama set at Wellesley College in 1953, Mona Lisa Smile tackles women's issues as attitudes transition from a post-War focus on domesticity to the initial rumbles of feminism.

Moving from California, Katherine Watson (Julia Roberts) joins the faculty of the prestigious all-women Wellesley College near Boston as an Art History teacher. In her early thirties, Katherine is already considered dangerously close to being past the age of marriage. Katherine becomes friends with her landlord Nancy (Marcia Gay Harden), who has grown too old too soon after losing her husband, and roommate Amanda (Juliet Stevenson), the independent minded College nurse. And while she finds her students phenomenally smart and well-educated, the entire focus of their lives is on finding a husband before finishing college.

The students include Joan (Julia Stiles), who has potential to study law at Yale should she choose to look past a future as a housewife; Betty (Kirsten Dunst), the most privileged of a privileged bunch and already planning her wedding; Giselle (Maggie Gyllenhaal), a free spirit seeking plenty of sexual adventure and harbouring a deep crush on Professor of Italian Studies Bill Dunbar (Dominic West); and the plain Connie (Ginnifer Goodwin), who is considered least likely to snag a husband.

Katherine tries to instill in her students a greater sense of ambition, urging them to look into futures that could offer something different than husbands, kids and housework. She faces a significant backlash from both the students, who have been raised with predefined expectations, and the College administrators, who do not take kindly to Katherine challenging time-honoured traditions. Katherine also has to sort out her personal life, with Bill taking an interest in her, and her California boyfriend Paul (John Slattery) seeking a commitment.

Directed by Mike Newell, Mona Lisa Smile delves into the status of women as they see themselves. With plenty of intelligent characters at interesting crossroads in life, the film never lacks for variety, opposing viewpoints and conflict.  The script (by Lawrence Konner and Mark Rosenthal) manages to create an academic environment where minds are free to explore big questions about the future, the value of education, and the ambitions of women relative to society's expectations. There is no shortage of perspectives, and the film does a fine job of challenging both old and new attitudes.

Katherine Watson is a catalyst for change, holding on to her principles and not afraid to shake the established structure. Some branches will fall on her head and she will learn as much as she will teach. Mona Lisa Smile gets the pacing of history right, and Katherine discovers that grand societal changes do not come easily or quickly and for every two steps forward there is at least one step back.

The film also has a couple of neat tricks up its sleeve, with a couple of curves in the road ahead for the students over the course of their one year interaction with Katherine. Betty and Joan in particular will find their trajectories disrupted by Katherine, and not in the way that they could have expected. With her mother represent the prevailing feminine power elite, Betty will have the most heated clashes with Katherine, encounters that will change them both. Joan holds the most promise as being open and able to disrupt the status quo, but Katherine will learn the most about the pace of change from Joan's journey.

The film engages because Katherine and her students are women worth knowing in any era, and it is refreshing for a film to feature a cast of uniformly smart women, elevating their discourse and sparring to a refreshingly educated level. They still poke and needle each other and push each other's buttons, but within a context of striving to achieve either the aspirations of the past or the promise of the future.

Filmed on the Wellesley College campus, Mona Lisa Smile tries hard to recapture the 1950s at a New England campus for the elite. But there is a lingering sense of slightly modernized setting and attitudes. Julia Roberts contributes to this by not trying too hard to change a pre-established persona that is strongly linked with a more recent era. Kirsten Dunst, Julia Stiles, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Ginnifer Goodwin represent some of the best young acting talent assembled into one film, but they also go only so far in being convincing as 1950s daughters of what would become the Greatest Generation.

The tension between a woman's outward smile and her internal dissatisfaction gives the film it's name. Mona Lisa Smile does not necessarily provide all the answers, but does perceptively ask some of the questions at the heart of modern social evolution.

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Movie Review: The First Wives Club (1996)

A sharply written comedy about the pitfalls women face in middle age, The First Wives Club is an often hilarious film with a superb cast in top form.

After graduating from college as best friends, Annie (Diane Keaton), Brenda (Bette Midler), Elise (Goldie Hawn) and Cynthia (Stockard Channing) drift apart and pursue their lives. About 25 years later, Cynthia commits suicide after her husband leaves her for another, younger woman. Annie, Brenda and Elise reconnect at the memorial service, and discover that they are all being badly treated by their men.

Brenda dedicated her life to her family, only for her husband Morty (Dan Hedaya), the owner of a chain of electronics stores, to leave her for the much younger Shelly (Sarah Jessica Parker). Elise became a famous Hollywood star and helped her husband Bill (Victor Garber) establish himself as a producer. He now wants a divorce and has his eye on young starlet Phoebe (Elizabeth Berkley). Annie, an accommodating apologist still tolerating the nagging of her mother Catherine (Eileen Heckart), wants to desperately believe that she has a salvageable marriage to husband Aaron (Stephen Collins), a marketing executive. But she also discovers that he is having an affair with their joint therapist Leslie (Marcia Gay Harden).

Driven by anger and a desire for revenge, the three women band together to heap misery on the men. Deploying Elise's financial clout and with help from interior decorator Duarto (Bronson Pinchot) and New York socialite Gunilla Garson Goldberg (Maggie Smith), Brenda tries to find a way to manipulate the naive Shelly and bring down Morty's retail empire. Annie joins forces with her daughter Chris (Jennifer Dundas) and tries to manoeuvre her way into a position of influence at Aaron's marketing firm. Elise does her best to ensure that Bill gets very little from their share of the assets. But the ladies soon clash among themselves and realize that revenge alone may not provide the satisfaction that they seek.

Directed by Hugh Wilson and written by Robert Harling and Paul Rudnick, The First Wives Club is a snappy riot. The film generates its laughs from the strength of its likable characters, and successfully steers clear of cheap gags. While some set-ups are unfortunately quite contrived (for example, the ladies end up descending a building on a barely-controlled window cleaning platform), most of the film's energy is derived from the angst of real women grappling with the unfairness of life.

Elise: You think just because I'm a movie star, I don't have feelings, well, you're wrong! I do have feelings! I'm an actress! I have ALL of them!

And while the film is first and foremost a comedy of empowerment, it also has a lot to say about the ghastly treatment handed out by men as they approach middle-age, find success and dump the women who helped to get them there. There isn't a sympathetic main male character anywhere to be found (the hapless Duarto comes closest), and while the men are driven by blind lust and the superficiality of good looks, women are presented as both allies (Gunilla, Chris, Catherine) and back-stabbing, gold-digging enemies (Phoebe, Shelley, Leslie).

Brenda: Where's Shelly?
Morty: In the car.
Brenda: Glove compartment?
Morty: Trunk.

The dialogue exchanges are a particular highlight. Almost every conversation, jab and retort is polished to a shine and dipped in irony, sarcasm, or venom. They don't always work, but most of them do, and in the hands of the brilliant cast, the film becomes a showcase for clever verbal sparring and timing excellence.

Elise: You've got some nerve! I drink because I am a sensitive and highly strung person!
Brenda: No, that's why your co-stars drink!
Elise: I am not a DRUNK!
Brenda: Oh really? Let's examine the evidence! Look! All bottles! And gallon jugs!
Elise: I had GUESTS.
Brenda: Who, Guns N' Roses?!

Watching Keaton, Hawn and Midler bounce off each other is a delight, and the screen glows with what appears to be a genuine rapport as they share equal screen time. Hawn happily represents the youth obsessed culture of Hollywood and allows herself to play with the extremes of injections, face lifts and plastic surgery. Midler embrases the frumpyness trap of middle age motherhood, while Keaton carries the flag of women with the crying need to believe that everything will work out., and who stand ready to take all the blame when they don't. All three evolve out of necessity into take-charge women ready to dish out pain, and the film rides on their wave of transformation.

The supporting cast is unusually deep, with Sarah Jessica Parker sparkling as the hilariously dim Shelly. The likes of Ivana Trump, Ed Koch, Gloria Steinem and Kathie Lee Gifford make minor guest appearances, and J.K. Simmons appears in a bit part.

Ivana: Ladies, you have to be strong and independent. And remember...
Elise: What?
Ivana: Don't get mad... get everything.

The ending goes searching for a greater meaning and falters a bit as it moves away from the core premise. Although The First Wives Club is not necessarily perfect, this group of fun-loving ladies is well worth joining.

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Movie Review: Mystic River (2003)

The story of a grisly murder that reawakens a horrific childhood calamity, Mystic River is a grand tragedy and a spectacular film. Clint Eastwood directs the drama with the ever simmering tension of unfinished business, and a magnetic and exceptionally deep cast delivers excellent performances.

In a working class Boston neighbourhood, three boys playing street hockey are interrupted by a predator who drives up their street, pretending to be a police officer. Two of the boys, the tough Jimmy and street smart Sean, talk their way out of trouble; the more innocent Dave is bundled into the car, abducted, held captive and sexually abused for four days before finally escaping.

Twenty five years later Dave (Tim Robbins) is married to Celeste (Marcia Gay Harden) and has a young boy of his own. Dave has a lumbering, uncomfortable personality, still very much carrying the scars of the abuse he suffered as a child. Jimmy (Sean Penn) appears to have put a life of crime behind him and is now married to Annabeth (Laura Linney). Sean (Kevin Bacon) is the only one of the three to have moved out of the old neighbourhood, and he is now a police detective, recently and inexplicably abandoned by his wife.

Jimmy's teenage daughter Katie (Emmy Rossum) is shot and then killed by mysterious assailants; on the same night Dave returns home soaked with blood and claiming that he had to kill a potential mugger. Sean and his partner Detective Powers (Laurence Fishburne) are assigned to solve Katie's murder. But the grieving Jimmy is not waiting for the police investigation; he calls on his old underworld buddies to uncover the identity of his daughter's murderer. With Sean and Powers applying pressure, Celeste is not sure which part of her husband's story to believe. Their world once again shattered, Jimmy, Sean and Dave hurtle towards another life-changing encounter with the strange forces of destiny.

Sean Penn (Best Actor) and Tim Robbins (Best Supporting Actor) won the Academy Awards, but all the cast members deliver outstanding performances, filled with nuance, flickers of understated emotion, and smoldering anger, agony or rage. As secrets of the past threaten to break into the open, the characters often say what they need to in order to actually hide what they are thinking. Screenwriter Brian Helgeland, adapting Dennis Lehane's book, creates tough personalities that are frighteningly real in their behaviour, with traits that are only gradually revealed as the present collides with the past and fate comes calling.

Towards the end of Mystic River, the unseen power that women hold over their men surfaces, as both Celeste and Annabeth step out of the shadows to play pivotal roles in their husbands' fortunes. Linney as Annabeth has just the one key scene, but it's unforgettable as she chillingly reassembles her husband's self-worth and pride, readying him to fight on, as he has always had to.

Clint Eastwood approaches the peak of his directing career, knitting together a story that connects two tragedies across a span of a generation. His style is calm in the midst of emotional storms, the cameras discretely capturing a proud neighbourhood filled with strong characters in heart wrenching turmoil. In addition to co-producing, Eastwood also contributed an evocative music score.

Mystic River meanders expertly past the often untold stories of pain and suffering that hide behind many nondescript windows, a searing reminder that life can offer up challenging choices at any time, and the smallest decisions can have the most devastating of consequences.

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Movie Review: The Maiden Heist (2009)

Three security guards at a New York City art gallery are infatuated with the pieces that they are entrusted to protect. Roger (Christopher Walken), nearing retirement, is mesmerized by The Lonely Maiden, a French painting of a melancholy woman on the beach. Charles (Morgan Freeman), old and lonely, is equally enthralled by the painting of a woman with cats. George, a strung-out former Marine proud of his involvement in the Grenada invasion, is obsessed with a bronze statue of a naked warrior -- so much so that George strips naked and mimics the statue's pose when he thinks no one is watching.

When the gallery decides to ship all three pieces to Copenhagen as part of a revamping of the collection, the three men decide to steal the artwork, keeping their favourites for their own enjoyment and shipping fakes to Denmark. Not much goes according to plan, and most of what goes wrong is thanks to unwitting interference by Roger's wife Rose (Marcia Gay Harden), who just wants Roger to take her on a Florida vacation.

The Maiden Heist has the definite feel of a small movie pulled together by three veteran actors and one veteran actress, coming together to create an amiable film almost for their own enjoyment. Director Peter Hewitt, whose other credits are lightweight titles like Garfield (2004), stays far out of the way and allows his stars to have fun. Freeman and Walken emphasize the understated elegance of wisdom, Macy and Harden emphasize the overacting, and the quartet manage to create a reasonable balance.

The Maiden Heist clocks in at exactly 90 minutes including the credits, and while the brisk length has its advantages in terms of pacing, it also means that all the characters are drawn with the broadest of brush strokes.

The catchy music score by Rupert Gregson-Williams has a definite French film tinge to it, playing off the heritage of The Lonely Maiden and Roger's obsession with French art.

The Maiden Heist is enjoyable for the work of Freeman and Walken, two old heads capable of enriching a simple story with entertaining layers of satisfying charm.

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