Afterlife, Part 1: Wandering

DEAN (B) - Each generation gets the "Garden State" it deserves. Boomers had "The Graduate." Millennials get the mopey but affecting "Dean."

Comedian Demetri Martin (a member of Gen X) plays younger in a story he wrote and directed about a young New Yorker set adrift after the death of his mother. Dean is a comic artist who goes on a jaunt to Los Angeles to change his mood and ostensibly advance his career.

Martin has a deadpan style in the mode of Jason Schwartzman, with a sweep of hair across his forehead and an ironic grin occasionally crashing his blue mood. Dean has a meet-cute with at an LA party with Nicky (a subtly effective Gillian Jacobs), the latest version of the manic pixie dream girl.

To Martins credit, he does not take the relationship between Dean and Nicky on a predictable path. Both actors are quite charming in a classic Mumblecore method. Each delivers sharp lines while staying rooted in character.

In a subplot, Dean's father, Robert (Kevin Kline), is fumbling his way around widowhood, somewhat snapping out of his mourning period (it's been about a year) by making time with a cute real estate agent, Carol (Mary Steenburgen), his own manic pixie dream woman. The geriatric romance feels forced, though Kline expertly delivers a fine twist, another clever plot misdirection.

Martin cranks up the quaint by illustrating the frame often with his own actual comic drawings, which explore themes of alienation and death in respectful New Yorker style. They not only knit scenes together, but they occasionally pack an emotional punch -- or offer droll comic relief.

The filmmaker brings this all to a head with a reckoning over this father-son mourning. But he stumbles a few times -- his timeline doesn't really make sense, and the threatened sale of Dean's childhood home feels rushed and cartoonish. But there is genuine heart in this big-screen debut (as with Zach Braff's 2004 milepost). The male relationships are finely sketched -- especially the plotline devoted to Dean's friend's profound love for a cat. And the banter throughout is winning.

It remains to be seen whether this little labor of love will engender the same backlash its predecessor eventually suffered.

BONUS TRACK
Typical retro gloominess from the soundtrack -- another "Garden State" echo. Here is Rick Hayward with "Find Yourself Sometime":


 

That '90s Uplift: Fidelity

LANDLINE (B+) - Filmmaker Gillian Robespierre re-teams with her comic star, Jenny Slate, for a follow-up to 2014's winning "Obvious Child."

Here, they flash back to the 1990s for a period piece about a pair of young-adult daughters who find out that their father is cheating on their mother. Fine performances lend a boost to a sometimes flat script by Robespierre.

Slate is Dana, who is stuck in a dull relationship with Ben (Jay Duplass, solid as always) and, in a moment of weakness, cheats on him with an ex. She and her sister, Ali (Abby Quinn) are stunned when a file on a floppy disc popped into the family's Windows 95 setup uncovers a file of their father's mash notes to another woman.

John Turturro is nice and loose as their father, Alan, who gets nothing but putdowns and rebuffs from their mother, Pat (Edie Falco). He's a writer with more aspirations than published works. Their interplay is finely sketched.

Slate is a delightful leading lady, a Gilda Radner for the new millennium, chastely silly and adorably sexual. She feels underused here as she effortless drives the plot across a zippy 97 minutes.

Robespierre is a little too cute and self-aware with her period details -- telephone booths, CD listening stations, dial-up internet. At one point, Pat refers to Ali's app -- meaning her college application. Dana tosses out a random Urkel imitation (perfectly delivered by Slate). The movie's ending is abrupt and off-key.

But the cast makes it all feel lived-in, and Robespierre and Slate are now two-for-two.

Doc Watch: Moving Images

THE B-SIDE: ELSA DORFMAN'S PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPHY (B+) - This elegant examination of the life and work of large-scale Polaroid portraitist Elsa Dorfman is as much about the process as it is about the person. Documentary legend Errol Morris does his typical deep dive into a topic, and it can be fascinating at times.

Morris ("The Thin Blue Line," "The Fog of War") trains his camera on the elderly Dorfman as she shows off pictures from her flat files, and he delves into the contraptions she uses to produce large-format portraits, such as her standard 20x24 or even bigger pictures. She would always take two photos -- one for the subjects, one for her files -- and had a habit of writing captions on her copy, which helps Morris craft a narrative.

Dorfman, who worked in Boston and Harvard Square, is a simple woman with no deep insights into her process or the subjects she covered, which included Allen Ginsberg and Bob Dylan. (An answering-machine message from Ginsberg on his death bed is chilling.) She is not interested in looking into anyone's soul. She's not searching for deep truths or the very essence of the people sitting for her camera. She's not working on a higher plane, like the Chicago portrait photographer Yvette Dostatni or a celebrity photographer like Annie Liebovitz. She has simply snapped a lot of pictures of many people over the years.

But Morris beautifully captures this dying art. (A detailed explanation of Dorfman's work with Polaroid can be found here.) He is a filmmaker compelled to preserve the history of still pictures with his moving pictures, in several senses of the word.

JOAN DIDION: THE CENTER WILL NOT HOLD (B-minus) - Joan Didion, one of the pre-eminent chroniclers of life in the second half of the 20th century, gets a sympathetic profile from her nephew, the actor Griffin Dunne. The power of her excerpted writings here rescue this from being a trifling home movie.

Didion, now in her 80s, is an engaging (if seemingly forgetful) subject, though the glamour of her charmed life can get tedious at times. (She and her husband, the novelist John Gregory Dunne hosted many New Hollywood types like Warren Beatty and Steven Spielberg at their Malibu home in the 1970s.) And the filmmaker injects himself into the proceedings too often. He also seems to dwell a bit much on the gloomy side of things -- the deaths of John Gregory Dunne and the couple's adopted daughter, Quintana, which inspired one of her more recent best-sellers, The Year of Magical Thinking.

Talking heads include stalwarts Calvin Trillin and Hilton Als of the New Yorker. Archival footage transports us to the heady '60s and '70s. Dunne uses the Ken Burns scan technique to linger over old photos, including the iconic image of Didion posing in front of a white Corvette Stingray. That talented writer is a fascinating figure, but you get the sense that her nephew came along just a little too late to fully engage her and craft a compelling biography.

THE REAGAN SHOW (C+) - Four filmmakers team up to comb through the footage shot by the Reagan White House, which chronicled the first modern TV presidency. This 74-minute overview feels like a lost opportunity.

We start with the premise that Reagan's team was inordinately obsessed with image and optics. That's not a revelation. Nothing surprising is exposed here.

The filmmakers traipse unimaginatively through the 1980s in chronological order, telling a rather shallow story of a shallow man. While we're reminded about the manipulative nature of the White House during that time, neither Reagan nor his wife and minions come off as nefarious here. If anything, the emphasis on his extended arms talks with Mikhail Gorbachev serve to reinforce the cowboy hagiography of the 41st president.

There are flashes from the past that resonate in the present -- reminding us both how quaint those times were and how devious and depraved the current administration is in the era of 24-hour news and Twitter. It's a depressing reminder of the beast that Reagan's handler birthed and the depths to which we've descended since. This film gets no credit for jogging loose such observations.

BONUS TRACKS
Jonathan Richman, a friend of Elsa Dorfman's, contributes two fine tunes to the soundtrack, starting with "Because Her Beauty Is Raw and Wild":



And from 2001, "Her Mystery Not of High Heels and Eyeshadow":


 

From the Vaults

THE KILLING (1956) (B) - Stanley Kubrick's first film as writer and director is a classic film noir centered around a racetrack heist. What might have been cutting edge 60 years ago now feels dated and a bit formulaic.

The venerable Sterling Hayden stars as Johnny Clay, the leader of a ring of criminals and insiders hoping for a big payday. Johnny's fresh from prison and itching to get back in the game.

Kubrick's mix of noir and cinema verite and his smooth camera techniques surely seemed ground-breaking at the time. Sixty years on, it can come across as chatty and hokey. The racetrack scenes are intimate and exciting. And the dialogue, credited to Kubrick's co-writer, the novelist Jim Thompson ("The Grifters"), snaps with wisecracks.

Marie Windsor (whose resume includes such titles as "The Beautiful Blonde From Bashful Bend" and "Cat-Women of the Moon") sizzles as sassy Sherry, the bored wife of bit player George (character actor Elisha Cook Jr.). Sherry is two-timing the feckless George with hunky rival Val Cannon (Vince Edwards), who hopes to intercept the big haul. Windsor just tears up the screen as she tears down George and tears into Val, and she knows how to curl up on a bed.

Kubrick has the tools here, but his story is rather run-of-the-mill. The 85 minutes zip by, but it's not the best noir or the best heist film you'll see.

LA NOTTE (1961) (B+) - Sharp and stylish, this gem from Michelangelo Antonioni follows a novelist and his wife as they meander, together and apart, around Milan's social scene.

What must have seemed revolutionary in 1961 -- documentary-like street scenes, a shambling narrative -- doesn't seem so insightful more than half a century later. Marcello Mastroianni is Giovanni Pontano, a hot young novelist who is already jaded by the literary circles he circulates in. Jeanne Moreau is his bored wife, Lidia. Monica Vitti -- Antonioni's muse from his masterpiece of the year before, "L'Avventura" -- pops up in the second half as a melancholy temptress, too subdued to succumb to a fling.

Giovanni and Lidia wander around Milan over the course of 24 hours, beginning in the hotel room of a dying fellow writer and randomly passing through a nightclub featuring a limber dancer who can balance a wine glass like no one you know. The second half lingers at a lush formal garden party, where an industrialist lures Giovanni to a cushy job and the guests struggle with existential angst amid the delicacies and riches.

It's all hip and provocative. These days, though, it's almost a bit quaint.

BONUS TRACKS
Marie Windsor with Elisha Cook Jr. in "The Killing":



Here Hayden catches her snooping:

Summertime Blues

WATER LILIES (2007) (B+) - Yet another coming-of-age French film, this one infused with heart and soul by Celine Sciamma, a table setter from a decade ago on her road to Tomboy (2011) and her masterpiece, "Girlhood" (2014).

Here we have teenage synchronized swimmers jockeying for friendship and the attention of the generic boys on the other side of the pool. Young Marie (Pauline Acquart) has her sights on the star of the girls squad, Floriane (Adele Haenel). Marie is shy and underdeveloped, while Floriane is beautiful and pouty, constantly swarmed by boys. Marie's best pal Anne (Louise Blachere) is chubby but less shy, gunning for the cutest boy around.

This sets up an odd, fairly chaste love triangle among the girls as they toy with each other's emotions and compete for affection. Acquart is the anchor of the movie. Her Marie isn't so much tomboyish as immature and inexperienced. Acquart has an old-school Kristy McNichol to her demeanor and a puppety jangle to her twiggy limbs.

Floriane may like running off with boys, but she shows little actual interest in them as either friends or love objects. She subtly invites Marie's attention, showing much more affection for Marie than she does for the trail of frustrated boys she leaves in her wake. In a provocative scene, Marie considers agreeing to help deflower Floriane, who needs to tend to her reputation for fear that she'll one day be discovered a virgin.

It's hard to tell if this is genuine lesbian lust or merely puppy-love curiosity, an inevitable outgrowth of summer ennui. Sciamma isn't shy about showing off the coltish frames of her three leads, but she makes it clear -- mainly in the clunky pool scenes -- that these are kids still growing into their skins.

Where Sciamma bathed "Girlhood" in sultry blues, here she flashes her style with a club scene drenched in a menstrual red. It's a summer of exploration for the girls, and sometimes these things get messy.

The Magic Kingdom

THE FLORIDA PROJECT (A) - There is a thread running through Sean Baker's latest film that injects both giddiness and dread. It's a lot like life itself.

Baker has emerged as perhaps the most talented director of our time by examining the ennui of trashed-out adults in "Starlet" and "Tangerine." Here he mixes in children, romping around southern Florida on the tourist-trap outskirts of "Disney World." It's a technicolor trip, a story with style and heart.

Baker assembles a cast of mostly newcomers, held together by Willem Dafoe as Bobby, the put-upon manager of the two-tone purple motel that will look familiar to anyone who veered a little off the beaten track in search of a cheap night's stay. Bobby has met his match in Moonee (Brooklynn Prince), an utter hellion and ring-leader of her "Little Rascals" gang, running havoc around the motel and taking off on adventures with a "Stand by Me" vibe. Moonee is a scamp, a grifter and a total smart-ass. Little Prince turns in a mesmerizing performance that will thrill you and scare you, in turns. She is a once-in-a-lifetime discovery.

Moonee's mother, Halley, barely in her 20s, is still a brat herself and totally unqualified to raise a child. Always broke, she sends Moonee off to a restaurant where a friend works and sneaks takeout food to Moonee. Halley and Moonee hawk perfume to tourists, but there also will be underhanded ways to make money, actions that can't help but raise red flags with child-protective services. As Halley, the tattooed Bria Vinaite (discovered on Instagram) has the slacker drawl, heavy lids and acne-scarred complexion of a drug addict, along with the heart-shaped lips of an inexperienced seductress. Baker captures the fraught mother-daughter relationship beautifully, finding unsettling ways to document their respective sociopathic tendencies.

Dafoe brings just the right level of resignation to his role. He is sympathetic and sometimes amused, but he also is an adult who must do the right thing at some point. When he shoos away a likely child predator, his own menace is palpable.

Meantime, Baker's visual flourishes explode all over the big screen. The Florida sky is bright, and scenes are slathered in primary colors -- bursting with blues and reds, purples and tangy orange. In one scene, Moonee and her pals romp through a shaggy field of grass that nearly glows in neon green.

Nearly every scene draws laughs from the antics of both the kids and the adults (including the wrinkled old regular who likes to sunbathe topless), but the humor always crackles with a frisson of foreboding. This is exhilarating filmmaking that embeds itself into an underserved community. It is a thrill ride that almost certainly would be banned at Disney World.

Doc Watch: Bizarro World

ABACUS: SMALL ENOUGH TO JAIL (A-minus) - The decorated documentary filmmaker Steve James -- who set the bar in the modern era with "Hoop Dreams" in 1994 -- embeds with the Sung family to tell the story of their battle with the New York District Attorney who prosecuted them for questionable mortgage-lending practices during the housing crisis a decade ago.

As a title card at the end of the movie points out, this dinky bank in New York's Chinatown was the only bank, big or small, to be prosecuted for questionable lending practices -- thus the title, a play on "too big to fail." Some shady things were going on at the bank -- corners were cut, individuals went rogue -- but did it all rise to the level of high crimes?

James -- also known for "The Interrupters" and another all-access portrait, "Life Itself" -- seems a part of the Sung family, for better and for worse. Thomas Sung and his wife and daughters open up for the camera and allow him to film intimate moments as we watch them stuggle against the prosecutor throughout the litigation, up through the verdict and beyond. There is not enough journalistic distance here, but James has no pretensions of objectivity. Which isn't to say that he doesn't give DA Cyrus Vance plenty of opportunities on-screen to deny suggestions that his prosecution is misguided at best, racist at worst. (His adversary, the attorney for the Sungs, runs rings around him.)

Journalist Matt Taibbi sums up the situation perfectly when he notes the power of the Manhattan DA versus a family-owned bank situated "between a couple of noodle shops in Chinatown." James conveys a strong sense of community. He draws sharp portraits of Thomas Sung, a proud man pushing 80, and his three distinct attorney daughters, two of whom worked at the bank and a third who actually worked in Vance's office when the indictments came down -- but who quit her job to devote the next couple of years to defending her family's name. Multiple scenes eavesdrop on their conversations as they gather around the dinner table.

The daughters emerge as the bank's champions, determined to fight this case to the bitter end. It helps the viewer to not cheat and look online to see how the verdict came in. Regardless, this film is not about winners and losers; it's a stinging examination of a family of small-business owners standing up to power. What James lacks in impartiality, he makes up for with heart.

DAVID LYNCH: THE ART LIFE (C+) - Not what you might expect. This documentary consists almost entirely of the avant garde director David Lynch ("Blue Velvet," "Twin Peaks," "Mulholland Drive") musing about his art-school days.

It took three filmmakers to produce this thin, obtuse profile, apparently competing with each other to cultivate an artsy aesthetic to go along with the legendary filmmaker's ramblings. Dying to see David Lynch smoke in slow motion, lost in thought in a swirl of clouds? You're in luck here. At one point, Lynch seems to lose his train of thought in the middle of telling a story; the tale goes nowhere and he goes on to another one. Why include that?

The best part of "The Art Life" (Lynch's term for the creative process that has gifted him with a rather charmed existence) involves Lynch's noodlings over his art projects as his disembodied narration drones on and on. He is still an active visual painter working in mixed media. Archival footage from his art school days also provide perspective. Clips from his early films are fun to glimpse.

But don't expect any serious discussion of his films (aside from the seminal "Eraserhead") or any deep insights from a rather ordinary man who has created some extraordinary works of art.
 

New to the Queue

Fading fast ...

Frances McDormand leads a powerful cast as a grieving mother, in the latest from Martin McDonagh ("In Bruges," "Seven Psychopaths"), "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri."

A documentary about one of the great chroniclers of the second half of the 20th century, "Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold."

Here comes another comedy doc, this one a profile of the profane former voice of the Aflac duck, "Gilbert" (Gottfried).

Carey Mulligan and Mary J. Blige star in a postwar drama from Dee Rees ("Pariah") about black and white families struggling to survive on a farm, "Mudbound."

Our gal Greta Gerwig ("Frances Ha") directs a semi-autobiographical film, with Saoirse Ronan as her teen-aged avatar, "Lady Bird."

From writer/director/star Ana Asensio, the harrowing tale of a day in the life of an undocumented immigrant, "Most Beautiful Island."

A documentary about a 91-year-old Holocaust survivor closing up her seamstress shop, "Big Sonia."