Crazy Heart (2009)

First the good news -  The original music starring Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett was the best part.  All the songs gave the story a nice arc.  

 - otherwise, it was a tired story about "Bad Blake" (Jeff Bridges) , a George Jones type figure, fading from prominence with the help of an alcohol and related problems.  The withdrawn old man falls in love with Jean (Maggie Gyllenhaal), a young reporter and grows up.  Hero's journey complete.

Another Six Degrees of Colin Farrell, who was a good part playing Tommy Sweet, the new country bro who is the nemesis of Blake, his protege who eclipses the old man's success.  

* * * of 5    Best Actor for Jeff Bridges.

Moon (2009)

Sam Rockwell stars as "Sam" a space dweller on the Far Side of the Moon, working for a private mining company.  Deployed for 3 years, he's coming to the end of his tour and is getting antsy.  On a outing to one of the mining outposts, named Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, he suffers an accident and wakes up in the infirmary, being tended to by GERTY, the computer (voiced by Kevin Spacey).

He later discovers there is another person on the space ship, his twin, although he does not recognize him as such.  It turns out that the private forces of evil are cloning Sam.  GERTY is the  overseer of such activities.

Very reminiscent of 2001:  A Space Odyssey with the talking computer, the spare space ship, and the foreboding sense of what the future might actually look like.  A selection of the 2009 Sundance Film Festival, it certainly had the look of that.

However, it was a very thin version of 2001.   * * of 5.

A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood (2019)

On the heels of Won't You Be My Neighbor, a documentary, comes this other version which is "based on a true story" but takes a quite different look.



Tom Hanks stars as Fred Rogers, and Matthew Rhys (Lloyd) is a journalist send to interview Mr. Rogers.  Lloyd is a hard-hitting investigative journalist and tries to size up Mr. Rogers  as someone who is not what he appears.  But Mr. Rogers turns out to be better than promised and helps to transform Lloyd into a better adult.   What starts off as 400 words of fluff turns into 10,000 words of self help.

A nice story to wrap up a 40+ year career of Mr. Rogers Neighborhood.

* * * * * (no bad movie with Tom Hanks)

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (2011)

Starring Ewan McGregor as Fred and Emily Blunt as Harriet, this is a somewhat stereotypical
a middle aged loser meets RomCom.



I might call it a true romantic comedy, between a man and a fish, or perhaps the two men, Fred and Sheik Muhammed (the very handsome Amr Waked).   Harriet and her boyfriend Robert are in 3rd place.  Harriet and Fred are the least appealing couple ever.

Directed by Lasse Hallstrom, his signature languid and mystical style is apparent throughout.

This was a homework assignment for church so one of the discussion questions is the question of faith, whether you believe in transporting fish to the desert, and not wild fish but farmed fish.  Fred starts off very doubtful but the power of the Sheik's money proves a strong incentive for everyone that controls Fred.

What else was sterotypical?  The British invasion of the Middle East, the rich sheik who buys whatever he wants, the terrorism, the working woman who can't find love, the middle aged loser, the bossy politico(a) [Kristen Scott Thomas].

The bright point?  No bad movie with Emily Blunt in it.

* * * of 5

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

The original 3 Mad Max movies were a little ahead of my time - probably they were rated R.  So I was not so keen to hurry and see this 30 years later.

My loss - this was super exciting, like a comic book come alive, not in a Marvel sense, but like a graphic novel.  Most of the plot was somewhat derivative of movies I was not familiar with so I just settled in for the ride.

Max is a prisoner of war of Immortan Joe, who controls a kingdom protected by his armies.  He has a harem of wives.  He tasks Furiosa (Charlize Theron) to take the War Rig from one place to another.  But when she goes off track, he finds out that Furiosa has taken his wives to break them out.  He sends his armies on wheels to get them back.

Max (Tom Hardy) is taken into battle as a "bloodbag" for the skinheads Nux and Slit, who seeks glory in death in battle.  Of course Max escapes, and is picked up in the War Rig which is chased for the rest of the movie.

Incredible stunts, vehicle chases, explosions, etc. make this an exciting chase.  Like 1917, its a movie constantly on the move.  Good character development makes this a fine watch.

* * * * *  (highest)

Clue (1985)

At our book club my friend Martha said "Clue is my all time favorite movie".  So, having not seen it, it was available on Amazon Prime.

Based on the classic board game, we have the familiar characters of Col. Mustard, Professor Plum, Mr. Green, Mrs White, Mrs Peacock and Miss Scarlet.  A closed door murder in an old gothic house on a dark and stormy night.  The butler Wadsworth summons each person there, giving them an alias.  He says they are are related somehow and it turns out they are all being blackmailed to hide a secret and that gives them a motive for murder.

It was an inventive way to turn the game into a movie.  In this case people starts dying at the hands of the familiar weapons, the knife, the candlestick, the rope, the pipe, the revolver and the poison.  And there are many room and passageways between them to give a number of solutions as to "Whodunnit".

Certainly campy and somewhat slapstick, it was evocative of the comedy of those days - Mel Brooks, Rocky Horror, Monty Python.  The casting was done with most characters in upper middle age, a much different look than today.  Witty dialogue and rambunctious action made it kind of fun to watch.

Very clever ending.

* * * * of 5

Ocean's Eleven (2001)

A fun little heist movie -