Hacksaw Ridge

Hacksaw Ridge is garnering a lot of attention for the outstanding performance of Andrew Garfield and Mel Gibson's direction so, of course, I wanted to see it.  This late in the run, it was only being screened at one theater late at night but it was definitely worth the effort.  It tells the extraordinary true story of Desmond Doss (Garfield), a Seventh-Day Adventist who feels compelled to enlist in World War II despite the fact that he refuses to kill or even handle a firearm.  He hopes that, as a conscientious objector, he will be allowed to be a medic.  However, during basic training, he is tormented by the men in his company and his commanding officers, Sergeant Howell (Vince Vaughn) and Captain Glover (Sam Worthington), try to have him discharged.  Later, his company is sent to the Pacific to relieve the decimated troops in the Battle of Okinawa.  When his company is forced to retreat, Doss goes back to rescue the wounded, ultimately saving 75 men, many of whom called him a coward.  There is also a secondary story involving Desmond's courtship of a nurse named Dorothy (Teresa Palmer) that is very sweet.  This movie is absolutely incredible and the battle scenes are intense and unrelenting (I've heard that veterans who have seen it describe it as very accurate).  Garfield is incredible and the scenes of him being bullied and beaten during basic training are quite affecting and his scenes with Dorothy are adorable.  I was also very impressed by Hugo Weaving's performance as Tom Doss, a man shattered by the events of the First World War who must watch both of his sons enlist in a new war.  This movie is difficult to watch (I liken it to Saving Private Ryan) but the story of one man's courage is definitely compelling and I highly recommend it.

Collateral Beauty

On Wednesday night during winter break, I went with my sister to see Collateral Beauty (why, yes, that was my third movie of the day!).  This movie has been much maligned by critics but both Marilyn and I enjoyed it.  Howard Inlet (Will Smith) is a New York ad executive who credits three abstractions for his success:  love, because everyone needs it; time, because everyone wants more of it; and death, because everyone fears it.  After the tragic death of his young daughter, he retreats from the world and begins writing letters to these abstractions.  His colleagues Whit Yardsham (Edward Norton), Claire Wilson (Kate Winslet), and Simon Scott (Michael Pena), worried that his behavior is costing them clients, hire three unemployed actors to personify these abstractions.  Aimee (Keira Knightley), Raffi (Jacob Latimore), and Brigitte (Helen Mirren) portray Love, Time, and Death, respectively, and not only bring peace to Howard, but help Whit, who is struggling with his relationship with his estranged daughter; Claire, who laments the fact that she has spent all of her time focused on her career rather than starting a family; and Simon, who is battling terminal cancer.  One of the reasons I loved Manchester by the Sea, which also deals with the loss of a child, is that the grief is not magically abated at the end of the movie for a happy ending as it is in Collateral Beauty.  However, while the final scenes are contrived, they are also quite affecting and they did bring tears to my eyes (Marilyn was a blubbering mess).  I really enjoyed all of the performances, especially Mirren who was incredibly funny.  I recommend that you see Collateral Beauty for a feel-good movie to lift your spirits (but see Manchester by the Sea for a gritty and honest portrayal of grief).

Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto

I interrupt my regularly scheduled commentaries on the movies I saw over winter break to tell you about the wonderful concert I saw last night at Abravanel Hall (and suggest that you go here to get a ticket to tonight's performance of the same program).  The Utah Symphony began with Symphony No. 2 by Charles Ives.  Ives is a quintessentially American composer and, just like the European composers who referenced epic myths in their works, he used the folktales and melodies of New England with which his audiences would have been very familiar.  Modern-day audiences enjoy finding all of the references (I was only able to recognize "America the Beautiful").  I really enjoyed this piece, especially the second movement which featured a beautiful theme played by a solo cello.  After the intermission, the orchestra played Variations for Orchestra by Anton Webern.  I was unfamiliar with both this piece and this composer and, on the surface it seemed very discordant, but underneath it there was a sort of beauty in the chaos.   Then came the piece I had been looking forward to all week: Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto.  I really love the Russian composers in general and Tchaikovsky in particular and this piece is brilliant.  I absolutely loved it, especially the second movement because it is so passionate and mournful with a lovely theme played by a solo clarinet.  Violinist Noah Bendix-Balgley performed it magnificently (there was thunderous applause after the first movement).  I find it ironic that the violinist for whom the piece was composed declared it "unplayable" because Bendix-Balgley made it look effortless.  He favored us with an encore by playing a piece by Bach which was lovely.  I thoroughly enjoyed myself last night, despite having a terrible cold.  Ugh!

Note:  My movie commentaries will resume tomorrow.  There are three more!

Nocturnal Animals

The second half of my double-feature was the strangely compelling psychological thriller Nocturnal Animals.  Amy Adams plays Susan Morrow, a successful, but profoundly unhappy, Los Angeles gallery owner.  She receives a copy of a novel written by her ex-husband, Edward (Jake Gyllenhaal) and slowly becomes obsessed with it.  This film has a story-within-a-story as the novel is acted out as Susan reads it.  In the novel, Tony Hastings (Jake Gyllenhaal), along with his wife Laura (Isla Fisher) and daughter India (Ellie Bamber), is hijacked by a gang of thugs, led by Ray Marcus (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), on a remote road in the West Texas desert.  His wife and daughter are forced into the gang's car and are eventually raped and murdered.  Tony works with Lt. Bobby Anders (Michael Shannon) to find the culprits but there is not enough evidence to convict them so they end up meting out their own kind of justice.  Because the novel is dedicated to her, Susan believes that Edward wrote it for revenge because she left him for another man and aborted their unborn child.  She is also strangely attracted to Edward again but, like the character of Tony, Edward ultimately gets his revenge.  This is film-noir at its best with lots of Hitchcockian moments which kept me on the edge of my seat.  To be sure, it is quite strange (the opening alone may be off-putting to many) but I couldn't take my eyes off the screen.  Adams, Gyllenhaal, Shannon, and Taylor-Johnson (who is nominated for a Golden Globe) give outstanding performances and Tom Ford's direction is visually stunning.  I highly recommend it (but it is weird).

Moonlight

Last Wednesday I spent the day at the Tower theater, a small art house theater in the ninth and ninth district of SLC, for another double-feature of films garnering Oscar buzz.  I began with Moonlight, an achingly beautiful coming of age film about a boy searching for his identity in modern-day Miami.  The film explores three pivotal moments in the life of Chiron, beginning when he is a shy and withdrawn child (Alex Hibbert) known as "Little."  His mother (the brilliant Naomie Harris) is a crack addict and he is bullied at school when he is befriended by Juan (Mahershala Ali) who tells him that he gets to decide what kind of life he will have.  Little spends more and more time with Juan, viewing him as a mentor, until he learns that Juan is a drug dealer who supplies his mother.  Next, we see the teenage Chiron (Ashton Sanders) who is the target of a particularly cruel bully at school and an increasingly abusive mother.  He becomes friends with Kevin (Jharrel Jerome) and they become intimate.  Kevin betrays Chiron when he is forced to beat him in a hazing incident.  Finally, the adult Chiron (Trevante Rhodes), now known as "Black," is a tough, hardened, and disillusioned drug-dealer.  In an incredibly poignant scene, he makes peace with his mother who is in rehab and reunites with Kevin (Andre Holland).  It is a difficult film to watch but it does end with hope for Chiron.  I was particularly struck by Hibbert's portrayal of Little Chiron, especially the scene where he boils water by himself to take a bath.  It was heartbreaking for me to watch Little Chiron because he reminded me so much of Sean when he was little.  I loved this beautiful film and I highly recommend it.  However, the subject matter might be difficult for some.

Lion

Another film that is getting a lot of Oscar buzz is Lion so I saw it after the screening of Jackie in a double-feature (I love spending the day at the Broadway).  This film tells the incredible true story of one boy's journey to find his home.  Five year old Saroo (Sunny Pawar) accompanies his older brother to look for work but falls asleep on a bench in a train station.  His brother leaves him there telling him that he will be back for him soon.  Saroo gets on a train hoping for a more comfortable place to sleep but the train begins moving with him trapped inside.  The train stops in Calcutta, thousands of miles from home, where Saroo wanders the streets for months before being adopted by an affluent Australian couple (David Wenham and Nicole Kidman).  Twenty years later Saroo (Dev Patel) embarks on a course in restaurant management and meets a group of Indian students who spark his meager childhood memories.  He becomes obsessed with finding his family by using Google Earth.  I love the scene where he finally finds his village and, as he uses the satellite to view the streets, there are flashbacks of him as a child running along those same streets.  I also love the very poignant scene between Patel and Kidman when Saroo tells his adopted mother that he has been searching for his birth mother (made even more affecting by the fact that Kidman is an adoptive mother herself).  I did find Rooney Mara's role as Saroo's girlfriend to be rather superfluous.  She breaks up with him when his search becomes obsessive and has a tearful moment with him when he finds his family but she doesn't do much else to advance the plot.  There is the predictable reunion scene between Saroo and his mother followed by actual footage of the real-life Saroo with both his mothers but I found these moments to be very well done and incredibly heart-warming.  I really enjoyed this film and I highly recommend it.

Note:  Throughout the entire film, I kept wondering why it was called Lion.  When the reason was explained in the epilogue, it brought spontaneous tears to my eyes.

Jackie

I love this time of year because this is the time when the Broadway screens all of the films generating Oscar buzz.  No one is getting more buzz than Natalie Portman for her performance in Jackie so this film was high on my list to see over winter break.  It follows Jackie Kennedy (Portman) in the days after her husband's assassination through flashbacks during an interview given to Theodore White (Billy Crudup) for Life magazine.  We see Jackie during the immediate aftermath of the shooting in Dallas, witnessing the oath of office administered to Lyndon Johnson (John Carroll Lynch) aboard Air Force One, telling the children about their father's death, making preparations for the funeral, and leaving the White House after her efforts to restore it.  Through it all, Jackie expresses her profound grief and demands that JFK's legacy be protected.  Portman gives the performance of her career and I literally could not take my eyes off her. She physically resembles Jackie Kennedy but it is the voice which sells the performance, particularly during the filming of the White House tour.  I was also struck by the scene between Jackie and a priest (John Hurt) where she discusses JFK's infidelities and the scene where she drunkenly relives her shining moments in the White House by going to each room in the clothing she wore for those occasions.  The score by Mica Levi is incredibly stirring but it is the use of the music from the Broadway musical Camelot that is especially dramatic.  I highly recommend this film for Portman's brilliant portrayal of the enigmatic former First Lady.

Passengers

I have had the best winter break ever, spending the majority of my time in darkened theaters.  In fact, in between Christmas and New Year's Day I saw ten movies (including La La Land for the third time and Rogue One for the third time).  I will write about them this week and I'll start with Passengers, which all of the girls in my family saw downtown at the Gateway the day after Christmas.  I found this movie to be incredibly entertaining and we all really enjoyed it.  Jim Preston (Chris Pratt) is in suspended animation aboard the starship Avalon on a journey to the colony Homestead II when a catastrophic event inadvertently awakens him 90 years too early.  The starship is equipped with every conceivable luxury (for the passengers to enjoy after they awaken three months prior to landing) and, at first, Jim enjoys himself.  He tries to figure out how to put himself back into suspended animation but soon realizes that there is no way.  He does, however, learn how to awaken others.   Distraught at the thought of living out his life alone, he becomes obsessed with passenger Aurora Lane (Jennifer Lawrence) and makes the agonizing decision to wake her up.  As they grow closer, the ship begins to slowly malfunction.  Will Aurora learn of Jim's duplicity in her awakening?  Will they be able to repair the malfunctioning ship?  This is a sleek and stylized sci-fi thriller with incredible special effects, especially the pool scene when the ship loses gravity, but the romance is also quite affecting due to the chemistry between Pratt and Lawrence. I also really enjoyed Michael Sheen's performance as Arthur, a droid bartender (the scenes where Jim talks to Arthur reminded me of similar scenes in The Shining).  My Mom, my sisters, Tashena and I had a great time watching this movie and I recommend it for what it is: escapist entertainment (If you want a more philosophical exploration of space travel, see Arrival).

2016: Year In Review

This year has definitely been one for the books!  I can't believe everything I was able to do and experience this year!  Here are some of the highlights.

Snowshoeing Trip

Sundance Film Festival

Camping Weekend

Avalanche Road Trip

Theatre Trip to NYC (Wicked, Hamilton, Finding Neverland, The Lion King, Les Miserables, The Phantom of the Opera, She Loves Me, and Waitress)

Weekend at Bear Lake

Road Trip with Sean (Four Corners Monument, Grand Canyon National Park, Zion National Park)

Adele Concert in Chicago

Adventures Down Under (Melbourne, Alice Springs, Kangaroo Sanctuary, Hot Air Balloon over the Outback, Uluru, Great Barrier Reef, Kuranda Rainforest, Sydney Harbour Cruise, Sydney, Whale Watching, Beautiful South Island of New Zealand, Milford Sound, Hobbiton, and Auckland)

Weekend of Hockey in Toronto

The highlight of the year was definitely getting to see the original cast of Hamilton on Broadway!  That is an experience I will never forget because I anticipated it for so long and it exceeded my expectations in every way!  What an amazing year!  I am thinking that 2017 might be a bit quieter but the beauty of a brand new year is that you never know what to expect!  Happy New Year!

All That Jazz

Last night I took Sean and Tashena to a Utah Jazz game.  We started the tradition of seeing a Jazz game over the winter break last year and, ironically, the Jazz played the same team, the Philadelphia 76ers, as last year!  The Jazz have been playing really well lately (we are currently fifth in the Western Conference) so I have been looking forward to this game, my first this season!  Sean and Tashena are always so much fun to be around and it ended up being a great game.  The Jazz started well, leading by as many as nine in the first quarter but then they let the Sixers slowly catch up to them and went into the half down by one point.  The lead went back and forth during the third quarter but the Jazz had their way with Philadelphia in the fourth, outscoring them 30-9.  Utah won the game 83-100 and it was pretty exciting, especially when the Jazz hit five three-pointers in the last quarter!  There was a large and rowdy crowd in attendance and the three of us had so much fun!

Note:  I finished my Harry Potter marathon right before the game.  I always cry when Harry asks his parents to stay with him as he faces Voldemort in the last film.

Christmas 2016

Christmas this year was absolutely wonderful.  We began on Christmas Eve with the traditional opening of Christmas pajamas.

On Christmas morning, Sean gave me strict orders to be at the house at 8:30 but I was a little bit late because of the snow (I actually got stuck in the driveway).

Sean got a lot of games for his Xbox One, a new TV, and a cool chair for playing his games.

Tashena got a new bed and lots of clothes.

Marilyn made quilts for Sean and Tashena in the Bountiful High School colors.  Tashena was really excited because she can take it on the bus to her away games.

I got a Fire Stick, bluetooth speakers, lots of movies, and some new boots.

After opening presents we had a fabulous dinner of chicken cordon bleu.  Most of us had naps after dinner (Sean played with his games) then we played a mean game of shanghai rummy (Tashena won).  In the evening, Kristine, Marilyn, Tashena, and I went to see the movie La La Land.  I was a little bit worried because I had really talked it up but Kristine and Marilyn loved it (Tashena kept asking me when it was over).  It was a great day!

Note:  For the record, I have now seen La La Land three times!