A good film--no lie

"Jakob the Liar"
Overall Rating: ***½


If I were to try to combine two movies' ideas into a new movie, two of the least likely choices would be "Life is Beautiful" and "Good Morning, Vietnam." That, however, seems to be what the makers of "Jakob the Liar" were striving for--with mixed results.

Jakob Heym (Robin Williams) is a resident of the Warsaw Ghetto in 1944. While waiting to see a Nazi officer about a curfew violation, he happens to learn--from a radio broadcast and a map on the wall--that the Russians are just 400 kilometers (250 miles) away. When the officer lets him go, however, he's hardly off the hook--since he can't get back to the ghetto before curfew. Forced to sneak in through a railroad yard, he encounters Lina (Hannah Taylor-Gordon)--a young girl who has escaped from a train bound for a concentration camp. As if hiding and caring for Lina weren't enough to turn his life upside-down, when he tells the news to his friend Mischa (Liev Schreiber), word gets around. Suddenly, Jakob--who people believe has a radio--becomes a hero to the ghetto residents.

Robin Williams is wonderful. Williams is without a doubt one of Hollywood's greats--with such films as "Good Morning, Vietnam," "Dead Poets Society," "Good Will Hunting," and "Patch Adams" to his credit. Williams' portrayal of Jakob Heym is very funny in places, very touching in others, and very effective all around.

The supporting cast is also generally good. Two highlights are Liev Schreiber and Armin Mueller-Stahl. Schreiber is very good as Mischa, a somewhat dimwitted but amiable ex-prizefighter. Mueller-Stahl is also excellent as Professor Kirschbaum--a noted cardiologist forced into factory work who provides moral support to Jakob, and manages his own heroic moments. (Interestingly, according to the Internet Movie Database, Mueller-Stahl was in the 1974 German version of this movie.)

The story is also endearing. Heym's unexpected and unwanted status as hero make a likeable character even more sympathetic. The filmmakers successfully made the ghetto residents appealing--mainly with dark humor, exemplified with such exchanges as "The Russians are bombing us!"/"This is the good news?" You care about these people.

Unfortunately, "Jakob the Liar" begs for comparison with "Life is Beautiful." It isn't fair to say that "Jakob the Liar" is imitating "Life is Beautiful." Whether it actually is is debatable, since it could just as easily be the other way around: "Jakob the Liar" is based on a book that was written before either movie was made, and there was an earlier film version. The similarities between the current "Jakob the Liar" and "Life is Beautiful" (a jocular Jew hides and cares for a child while surviving under the horrendous conditions the Nazis inflict) constantly remind those who have seen both that "Life is Beautiful" is a better film all around.

The story of "Jakob the Liar" isn't as tightly woven as it might be, either. For instance, Lina's character seems to be an afterthought, seldom interacting with other characters and apparently also believing in the non-existent radio, though she lives with Heym and would seem to be more likely to know it wasn't real. Another frustrating element was the way the ending is handled: there's one sequence that clearly happens, then another sequence of events, and finally a sequence clearly imagined by one of the characters. The middle sequence explains what happens to most of the characters, only it's not completely clear whether Jakob is imagining it or whether it's what happened to them.

"Jakob the Liar" is certainly suitable for teens, but probably isn't a good choice for younger children. The only real concern is the violence--there are on-screen murders, a graphic torturing sequence, and a number of on-screen suicides. The overall effect is very intense, and parents may want to use caution with younger kids.

I hate to say it, but "Jakob the Liar" was a little disappointing to me, partly because Robin Williams--while extremely good here--has done even better work in the past, and partly because there are so many similarities to "Life is Beautiful"--a much better film. The description of "disappointment" may be true, but it isn't really fair, since "Jakob the Liar" was actually a good film.


Title:"Jakob the Liar"
Release date: September 24, 1999

MPAA rating: PG-13
Overall rating: ***½

Aprox. run time: 120 min.
Director: Peter Kassovitz
Writers: Peter Kassovitz, Didier Decoin, Jurek Becker (novel)
Stars: Robin Williams, Hannah Taylor-Gordon, Liev Schreiber

Original URL: http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Mansion/7045/JakobLie.htm
Added to blog site: 7/28/09

Winning streak

"Blue Streak"
Overall Rating: ***½


When reviewing "Entrapment," I commented on the similarities to "Topkapi"--most notably, the use of a roof entry and dropping into the building to get the jewels. "Blue Streak," likewise, uses the same method of operation--climbing down into the building (through an elevator shaft, this time). Yet, when one of the thieves spits into the elevator shaft ("for luck"), I couldn't help but think it was mocking the earlier efforts. Sure enough, the thieves in "Blue Streak" commit a crime that certainly makes a mockery of crime everywhere, and when the robbery ends, so do the similarities to the earlier films.

Miles Logan (Martin Lawrence) is a jewel thief. However, when his partner in crime turns against the gang, he is forced to hide his ill-gotten $17 million diamond in a construction site, and let the cops arrest him. When he's finally released from prison two years later, he returns to the completed building--a police station. He soon realizes he can only enter the building as a cop, so he brushes up on his cop TV shows and buys some fake papers. The only trouble is that if you act like a cop in a police station, people will expect you do to police work.

"Blue Streak" is hilarious; the jokes run practically the length of the film. It's mostly low humor: citing two jokes (used in the previews--though not the best in the film) as examples, there's the scene where Logan, in hot pursuit of a suspect, stops momentarily when he sees a naked woman. Then there's the scene where Logan tries to prove that he speaks Spanish--only to be told that what he said was "I have a big cat in my pants" (accounting for the bad grammar, that translation is close enough). The best jokes revolve around the central joke: Logan--because he knows how real crooks think and work--is a better cop than the real police. On the more slapstick and special effects side, if you long for flying cars a-la "The Dukes of Hazzard," you will enjoy the climactic car chase. All around, there are few dull moments.

In a big way, Martin Lawrence is the sole comedian--practically all the other actors play straight man for him. His overwrought character works very well. Lawrence, however, doesn't just tell jokes--he succeeds in making his character likable--not an easy task, considering that he plays a thief turned con artist. One actor who goes beyond playing straight man to Lawrence, however, is David Chappelle; playing Tulley--one of Logan's former partners in crime who gets arrested by Logan.

So, what's not to like? Mostly, what's not there. "Blue Streak" isn't particularly thought provoking in any way--there's no real theme, just chaos. After the film is over, that's it--nothing to think about, only jokes to reflect on. I also have mixed feelings about a jewel thief as hero. It works better here than in "Entrapment" or "Payback," but while I was mostly rooting for him to get away, part of me also wanted him not to.

"Blue Streak" has its share of bad language and innuendo, and there are scenes involving drug smuggling. There is also some violence--though mostly fist-fights, there are two on-screen killings (one in self defense). The sexual content is limited, and no nudity is seen by the audience. Parents may also be concerned that the "hero" is a thief. "Blue Streak" is probably a bad choice for young children, but is probably OK for teens (bad driving aside); PG-13 is a reasonable rating.

So, what's the report? No need to call the cops--except maybe for crowd control. "Blue Streak" is no crime, but it is a riot.

Title: "Blue Streak"
Release date: September 17, 1999
MPAA rating: PG-13
Overall rating: ***½
Aprox. run time: 94 min.
Director: Les Mayfield
Writers: Michael Berry, John Blumenthal, Steve Carpenter
Stars: Martin Lawrence, Luke Wilson (plays Carlson), David Chappelle


Original URL: http://www.geocities.com/reviewsbyjohn/BlueStrk.htm
Added to blog site: 7/26/09

It's a miracle: a courageous movie.

"Stigmata"
Overall Rating: ***½


Horror films aren't usually my scene. As I mentioned in last week's review, however, the recent horror films aren't usual. Calling "Stigmata" a horror film doesn't seem completely accurate. On the other hand, there isn't another term that seems right, either. Regardless, "Stigmata" looked interesting based on the previews, and it turned out it was interesting.

Father Andrew Kiernan (Gabriel Byrne) is a priest and a scientist. His job is to investigate suspected miracles for the Vatican. Sent to Brazil to investigate what turns out to be rust stains, he takes a side trip to the village of Belo Quinto--and finds what seems to be a true miracle. Unfortunately, before he can investigate further, he is reassigned by the church authorities. His new assignment is Frankie Paige (Patricia Arquette). She is exhibiting stigmata--wounds like those Christ received on the cross. Her baffling case seems to be another genuine miracle--only how will the church take the news?

The biggest problem with "Stigmata" is that it tends to be confusing in places. For instance, while they carefully explain what qualifies as a stigmata wound, Frankie is also crying tears of blood--which, according to the movie, isn't such a wound. Another confusing point is why a character goes to the top of a building and sits on the edge of the roof. There's another instance where Frankie addresses a priest by the wrong name--while her use of the name is significant, there is no explanation of how she knew it. Granted most of the confusing points tend to relate to supernatural phenomena--but even a priest saying "that's inexplicable" would be more satisfying than simply leaving the audience to wonder. The end is also a little unsatisfying--a major conflict is left hanging (text in the final credits only implies it will remain unresolved for decades).

I also have some qualms about the pervasive subtitles. Most of the film is in English--including some scenes that take place in Vatican City. This prompts the question of why they use Italian on the street outside, but shift to English when they get in the Vatican. Many sequences, however, involve lines spoken in Portuguese, Italian, and Aramaic. There are some subtitles that are difficult to see--both because they flash by quickly and because of the background. The total effect is somewhat jarring.

On the plus side, "Stigmata" holds your interest. While the story has some loose ends, you can still follow the plot. The story remains suspenseful--nothing comes out of the blue, but it isn't predictable, either. Its unexpected turns, coupled with good special effects, make the movie scary when the filmmakers intended. Better still, "Stigmata" is an original idea, and a thought provoking one at that. I can't say what the film's main "what if" question is without spoiling the plot, but it doesn't blindside you, since the possibility is suggested earlier in the film.

The cast also delivers good performances. Gabriel Byrne is fine as Kiernan, who has investigated so many faked miracles that it's starting to hurt his faith. Better still is Jonathan Pryce as Cardinal Houseman--he makes a very menacing villain. Patricia Arquette is best. Her character goes through a crisis of faith; Arquette, following a star performance in "Goodbye Lover" delivers a performance that is just as good here. The great contrast with the earlier role highlights the scope of her abilities all the more.

Parents should almost certainly screen "Stigmata" before taking children to see it. There is a great deal of strong language, some sexually suggestive scenes, and some nudity. The depictions of the stigmata wounds are very graphic, and there is some violence. Parents should also be aware that the film depicts supernatural events (both miraculous and demonic) and questions organized religion.

The debate over whether science and religion are mutually exclusive is hardly settled--as the recent controversial decision in Kansas to drop evolution from the state's biology curriculum proves. With "Stigmata," Hollywood deserves some credit for making any statement on a difficult issue, more for an intelligent statement, and more still for putting it in an entertaining context.


Title:"Stigmata"
Release date: September 10, 1999

MPAA rating: R
Overall rating: ***½

Aprox. run time: 102 min.
Director: Rupert Wainwright
Writer: Tom Lazarus, Rick Ramage
Stars: Patricia Arquette, Gabriel Byrne, Jonathan Pryce

Original URL: http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Mansion/7045/Stigmata.htm
Added to blog site: 8/4/09

Houston, we have a problem

"The Astronaut's Wife"

Overall Rating: **

This seems to be the summer of off-beat horror films. Previews for "Stigmata" and "Stir of Echoes" are strange, to say the least. As for what's out now, "The Blair Witch Project" uses unseen supernatural forces and an unseen budget to a generally good effect. Then there was "The Sixth Sense," a magnificent film about a child who sees ghosts. On the other hand, we now have "The Astronaut's Wife," a film that doesn't really get off the ground.

Jillian Armacost (Charlize Theron) is an astronaut's wife, but when her husband Spencer (Johnny Depp) is involved in an accident in orbit, her life is turned upside-down. Though Jillian spends some panic-filled hours waiting for the news, she soon learns that her husband will recover. Not everything is all right, however. Fellow astronaut Alex Streck and his wife Natalie (Nick Cassavetes and Donna Murphy respectively), die under mysterious circumstances soon after the accident in space. Spencer, too, is strangely changed, taking a job with an aerospace firm in New York City, refusing to talk about what happened in space, and generally acting in a menacing manner. Perhaps she's imagining things, but he seems like a totally different person.

"The Astronaut's Wife" is very good at building suspense, and the movie has more than its share of scary scenes. It also has a few witty lines--the one that comes to mind immediately is Jillian's sister's comment, "Men are like parking spaces--the good ones are taken, the available ones are handicapped." Unfortunately, there is just too much film between these successful moments. The pace is agonizingly slow. Sometimes, such as when we wait for news about Spencer after the accident, this works. Mostly, it only makes the film drag.

The big problem is that the threatened alien invasion isn't all that ominous. Their plan seems to be to build advanced planes for the U. S, Air Force and parent children. Vaguely, it seems that there's a method behind their madness, but only vaguely. The extremely small invasion force is hardly the most menacing extraterrestrial army created. With nebulous goals of world domination, and equally arcane methods of accomplishing those goals, "The Astronaut's Wife" makes the aliens in "Independence Day" (who simply want us to die) seem profound. What do the aliens want? How do they plan to get it? "The Astronaut's Wife" doesn't answer these questions--so the result is that it seems advanced aliens are coming to Earth solely to terrorize an astronaut's wife. The desire to keep their plot cryptic makes it practically non-existent.

On a technical level, the film has tons of problems. The film is filled with bizarre camera angles; they add nothing and become annoying. The worst problems are where it depicts things that would be scarier if left unseen. The depiction of what happens in space--done in flashback--works against the movie since part of what makes it scary is that we don't know what happened. A final special-effects flourish in the climactic battle is also totally out of place--the alien we see doesn't go with the mostly psychological horror the film uses elsewhere--and winds up being distracting.

"The Astronaut's Wife" isn't suitable for children. The violent and sexual content are both fairly strong--though much more is implied than actually shown. There is one extremely graphic on-screen suicide. There is also a great deal of strong language. The thematic content may be too frightening, as well.

"The Astronaut's Wife" has an interesting premise, and tries to remain enigmatic. Its execution, however, is a disaster, and the end result leaves "The Astronaut's Wife" lost in space.

Title: "The Astronaut's Wife"
Release date: August 27, 1999
MPAA rating: R
Overall rating: **
Aprox. run time: 109 min.
Director: Rand Ravich
Writer: Rand Ravich
Stars: Johnny Depp, Charlize Theron

Original URL: http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Mansion/7045/A_Wife.htm
Added to blog site: 7/26/09

Arab meets Viking

"The 13th Warrior"
Overall Rating: ***


When the novel Catch 22 was first written, it was titled Catch 18; unfortunately, around the same time, another book was coming out that also had the number 18 in the title. A last minute change to avoid a similar title altered Heller's book--and ultimately the language. In contrast, rather than avoiding using the same number in two separate films, Hollywood went out of its way to do it. A few months ago, the interesting movie "The Thirteenth Floor"--based on the novel Simulacron 3--was released; now, we have an adaptation of Michael Crichton's Eaters of the Dead--retitled "The 13th Warrior."

In "The 13th Warrior," Ahmed Ibn Fadlan (Antonio Banderas) lived in Baghdad in the Middle Ages--until the Caliph forced him to become an ambassador to the unknown lands to the north. In his travels, he encounters a Viking camp. He is introduced--an awkward affair because only one member of his party (a cameo role by Omar Sharif) and only one of the Vikings speak Greek, their only common language--and shortly afterward, a messenger arrives from another village seeking help. When a prophecy demands that one member of the band of warriors going to assist the village not be a Norseman, however, Ahmed soon finds himself drafted into a Viking army--sent to defend the village from a threat so terrible that the Vikings won't even speak its name.

If you've been waiting to see Vikings do battle on the big screen, wait no longer--for there hasn't been a finer movie all year on that count. Medieval battles blaze across the screen in a stunts and special effects feast. Action sequences abound. There is little doubt that this is the film's main marketing point--and it is very successful in this regard. There is a level of technical care that many recent special-effects movies lack. There are no obviously computer generated effects; if they used computer animation, they used it well. Nor did I catch any fake looking stunts. The technical level is generally very high.

The story also holds your interest. All right, it's Beowulf minus Grendel and his mother, but with an Arab added. It still works better than you'd think. Arabs aren't used to Viking funerals, Vikings aren't used to scimitars--so the culture clash produces some humor. Putting aside the unlikely traveler, if there are any anachronisms, I didn't catch them. One other nice touch was the way the film demonstrated Ahmed learning the Vikings' language: the dialog starts out being entirely in the Vikings' language, and gradually, more and more English words are interspersed until the conversation is in English.

Unfortunately, there are also many problems. The mysterious attackers, for instance, only come on foggy nights. This is so they can use darkness as a cover, and frighten their victims more. What it really means is that many of the battles have some sequences that are inadequately lit; as dependant as the film is on the battles, this is really detrimental. The film also leaves too many aspects of Viking culture as a mystery; I suspect that Crichton used Ahmed's point of view to explain the Norse culture to outsiders--but the movie doesn't always take this opportunity. Some mysteries might serve to make the Viking culture seem more alien--but there are fairly important points that are never explained--such as why Ahmed can't use a Viking broadsword at one point (going so far as to make his own scimitar)--but can use one later on. Another point that bothered me was how quickly Ahmed learns the Vikings' language; once we get past the camp scenes where he learns it (an apparent timespan of a few weeks), he seems to have as perfect a command of their language as the Vikings themselves. Another thing that is never explained is where the enemy forces come from--we learn what they are, but not why they're attacking or where they originally came from.

"The 13th Warrior" isn't really suitable for children. The only problem is violence, but the violence is pervasive and extremely graphic.

In the final analysis, "The 13th Warrior" is a decent special effects film. If you want to see fighting Vikings, you'll want to see "The 13th Warrior."


Title: "The 13th Warrior"
Release date: August 27, 1999

MPAA rating: R
Overall rating: ***

Aprox. run time: 103 min.
Director: John McTiernan
Writer: William Wisher, Warren Lewis, Michael Crichton (novel)
Stars: Antonio Banderas, Omar Sharif

Original URL: http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Mansion/7045/13War.htm
Added to blog site: 8/5/09