The Alto Knights

Last night I went to see The Alto Knights with my nephew.  I was very intrigued by the idea of having the same actor play the two main characters but I eventually found this gimmick to be incredibly tedious.  Frank Costello and Vito Genovese (Robert De Niro) were once childhood friends who got their start in the criminal underworld as bootleggers.  The hotheaded Genovese is forced to flee the country in order to avoid a double murder charge and this leaves the more diplomatic Costello in charge of their organization.  While World War II keeps Genovese trapped in Europe, Costello legitimizes much of their business, which makes him and members of their organization very wealthy, and he also takes an interest in politics and the charities organized by his wife Bobbie (Debra Messing).  When Genovese eventually returns, he wants to go back to business as usual and to expand into narcotics but Costello strenuously objects to this.  They each vie for control of their organization until Genovese orders an unauthorized hit on Costello, which he survives.  The rest of the narrative, which is convoluted and moves at a glacial pace, focuses on how Costello attempts to leave organized crime and retire.  This is a true story that culminates in a raid that brings organized crime to the attention of the FBI but I didn't find it very compelling.  I actually found it very confusing because there are a lot of secondary characters and they are not developed very well (one very important character is assassinated in a barber shop and I didn't know who he was or why his death had such an impact on the organization until I researched it after the movie).  Even though De Niro does a good job differentiating the two characters (it is amusing to see him play off himself several times when the two characters sit down for meetings), I found it very distracting because I always had to wait until the character spoke to determine who was who.  The best thing about this movie is the 1950s production design, especially all of the cars, but the archival footage does get a bit old.  I would only recommend this to fans of gangster movies but there are definitely better ones out there to watch instead.

Note:  My nephew told me that he could tell I was bored watching this because I kept fidgeting.

Jazz vs. Celtics

Last night I went to another Utah Jazz game with my friend Angela and I had a lot of fun even though the Boston Celtics beat them pretty soundly.  I think there were twice as many Celtics fans than Jazz fans (a conservative estimate) at the Delta Center and that made it really interesting because they were very vocal whenever their team scored (and that happened often).  The Jazz won the opening tip off and Collin Sexton scored with a jump shot.  One minute later he got a nice three-point shot to put the Jazz ahead 5-0.  I joked that this would be the only lead the Jazz would have during the whole game and, sadly, I was right!  Boston went on to score six three-point shots out of their first seven baskets and they ended the first quarter firmly in control leading Utah 35-18.  The Jazz really struggled with offensive rebounds but they stayed competitive in the second quarter to end the first half down 60-51.  The Jazz battled back in the third quarter with three three-pointers from Sexton and a nice shot from Keyonte George to cut Boston's lead to 71-69.  Then Jayson Tatum (a lot of people sitting near us were wearing his jersey) scored 19 seconds later and that sparked a 13-0 run to put the Celtics up 89-75 at the end of the quarter.  Sexton, who ended the night with an impressive 30 points, and George tried to keep it close in the fourth quarter but Payton Prtchard scored 10 points to lead the Celtics to a 121-99 victory.  It seemed like the only fans in the arena at the end of the game were wearing green!  It has been hard to be a Jazz fan this season (we have the worst record in the entire NBA) but it is always fun to go to games with Angela!

Snow White

I was really interested in the new live-action remake of Snow White because I wanted to determine for myself if the online furor about it was warranted.  Now that I have seen it I can say that some, but definitely not all, of the criticism is unfair and I actually liked it.  A young Snow White (Emilia Faucher) is taught by her parents, the King (Hadley Fraser) and Queen (Lorena Andrea), to be kind and fair to the people of the kingdom but darkness comes when her mother dies and the King marries a temptress (Gal Gadot).  She becomes an Evil Queen after the King is lost in a faraway war and keeps Snow White (Rachel Zegler) locked in the castle as a servant.  The Evil Queen becomes jealous when her Mirror (voiced by Patrick Page) tells her that Snow White is now the fairest one of all so she commands her Huntsman (Ansu Kabia) to kill her and bring back her heart.  He releases her in the forest, instead, where she meets seven dwarfs and a bandit named Jonathan (Andrew Burnap).  When the Evil Queen learns of this deception, she attempts to kill Snow White herself with a poisoned apple but the spell is broken by Jonathan and love's first kiss.  The seven dwarfs as well as Jonathan and his bandits help Snow White become the leader the King knew she could be and she defeats the Evil Queen.  In my opinion, the story is quite faithful to the original (more so than I was led to believe) but I did really like the updates, including the development of the romance between Snow White and Jonathan before the kiss happens and the defeat of the Evil Queen by Snow White's kindness to the people.  I loved Rachel Zegler's charismatic performance and I really enjoyed the new songs, especially "Waiting on a Wish," "Princess Problems," and the romantic "A Hand Meets a Hand" (fun versions of "Heigh-Ho" and "Whistle While You Work" are also included).  The CGI animals are absolutely adorable and the scene where Snow White meets them in the forest is enchanting.  However, the GGI for the seven dwarfs is really creepy!  Their eyes are realistic but their faces are cartoonish and I couldn't get past how weird that combination looked whenever they were on screen.  Gal Gadot is terrible because some of her line readings made me want to laugh (not in a good way) and her singing is even worse (although I did like special effects in her transformation into a hag).  This is not the best live-action remake I've seen (Cinderella holds that title) but it is not as bad as people are saying and I recommend giving it a chance.

Last Breath

My sister recommended the movie Last Breath very highly to me so I braved a snowstorm to see it last night.  I really enjoyed this riveting true story about a group of saturation divers who repair underwater pipelines in the North Sea.  Veteran Duncan Allcock (Woody Harrelson), taciturn and unemotional David Yuasa (Simu Liu), and rookie Chris Lemon (Finn Cole) are deployed 100 meters beneath the surface for routine repairs when their support vessel loses power, and the dynamic positioning system fails, during a storm.  This causes the vessel to drift away from the dive site while David and Chris are underwater.  David is able to make it to safety on the diving platform, known as the "bell," but Chris's umbilical cord is snapped leaving him untethered without a communications link to the surface, power for his light, and, more importantly, air to breathe.  He is left with only ten minutes of air from his auxiliary tank while David, Duncan, and the crew on the ship mount a desperate attempt to rescue him.  This is very straightforward without a lot of embellishment but it is still incredibly tense, almost unbearably so, and there were several times when I was on the edge of my seat and holding my breath.  The hand-held underwater cinematography, atmospheric lighting, and dramatic sound design add to the sense of claustrophobia and terror.  The performances are solid and I really enjoyed seeing all of the technical aspects involved in this highly dangerous job, particularly the pressurized pods the divers must live in for the entire duration of their rotation.  I definitely recommend this taut thriller, especially now that it is available to stream.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child in Los Angeles

Over the weekend my sister Kristine and I went on a quick road trip to Los Angeles to see Harry Potter and the Cursed Child at the Pantages Theatre and we had so much fun!  I saw this show several years ago in San Francisco when it was performed in two parts so I was really intrigued to see the new production and my sister, who is a huge Harry Potter fan, was even more excited to see it for the first time.  We both loved it because it is absolutely magical!  It is nineteen years after the Battle of Hogwarts and Harry Potter (John Skelley) now works for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, his wife Ginny Potter (Trish Lindstrom) writes for The Daily Prophet, Hermione Granger (Ebony Blake) is the Minister of Magic, and her husband Ron Weasley (Matt Mueller) manages Weasley's Wizard Wheezes.  Their children Albus Potter (Emmet Smith) and Rose Granger-Weasley (Naiya Vanessa McCalla) are on their way to Hogwarts when the story begins.  Albus soon forms an unlikely friendship with Scorpius Malfoy (Aidan Close), the son of Harry's nemesis Draco (Benjamin Thys).  They are drawn together because they are both unpopular and bullied.  Albus is bothered by his father's notoriety and feels that he is a disappointment while Scorpius is plagued by unfounded rumors that he is really the son of Lord Voldemort.  They feel that they have something to prove so, with the help of Delphi Diggory (Julia Nightingale), they steal a time-turner from the Ministry of Magic in order to go back in time to save Cedric Diggory (Caleb Hafen) from his fate.  This has unintended consequences and now Scorpius must enlist Hermione, Ron, and Severus Snape (Larry Yando) to help him go back in time to change the future back.  However, Delphi has her own reasons for wanting Cedric to return and compels Scorpius and Albus to use the time-turner once again to restore the alternate timeline which leads to an epic confrontation in Godric's Hollow.  Even though this new version is close to three hours long, there are obviously some elements that have been removed from the earlier one but I honestly didn't miss anything.  The biggest changes I noticed were that the Dementors appear on stage rather than fly through the audience (I was a bit disappointed but my sister still thought they were really cool) and the relationship between Albus and Scorpius is more romantic than I remember.  I really loved the touching story about father-son relationships, the fun performances (my favorite was Close and my sister's was Mackenzie Lesser-Roy as Moaning Myrtle), and the iconic costumes and sets (fans of Harry Potter will immediately recognize the Gothic architecture, the House Banners, and the moving staircases at Hogwarts) but the way the magic is staged is what makes this show so amazing!  Seeing the students run through Platform 9 3/4, use their wands, travel by flue powder, and drink polyjuice potion caused the audience to gasp out loud but the duel between Harry and Draco and the transfiguration scene received spontaneous applause!  The staging of other scenes is also very clever, particularly when Albus and Scorpius jump off the Hogwarts Express, when they emerge from the lake, and when they are separated by the moving staircases.  Even the choreography used by the ensemble to move set pieces on and off stage is incredibly dynamic!  The show is absolutely spellbinding (pun intended) and I am so glad that I had the chance to see it again, especially with my sister!  It will be on tour in various cities through 2026 (I hope it eventually comes to SLC) and I highly recommend getting a ticket if you have the opportunity.

Note:  I had to drive through a severe snow storm and my sister had to drive in Los Angeles traffic.  I'm not sure which was worse (although we still had the best time on this trip).