Damn Right I Got the Blues

MA RAINEY'S BLACK BOTTOM (A-minus) - Viola Davis is a force of nature around which everything swirls in this blues allegory from Roaring '20s Chicago, focused on one day in the recording life of Ma Rainey and her swingin' band. Playwright August Wilson's dialogue shakes, rattles and rolls, from snappy one-liners to gut-wrenching monologues.

Wilson ("Fences," also starring Davis) presents a stark dichotomy in the ways southern blacks of the era handled the white men looking to keep them down. For Ma, she's all swagger and threats, knowing she has a unique talent that translates into money for the record labels and recording studios, and she wields that (temporary) power like a cudgel, whether it's driving a hard bargain over a day's pay or demanding the perk of ice-cold Coca-Colas for her refreshment. She treats her manager and the studio owner like trash, makin' 'em wait just to make 'em wait, as if they are beneath her -- and they put up with it.

On the other hand, we have hornman Levee (Chadwick Boseman), an aspiring songwriter/bandleader, who goes the deferential route, hoping to shmooze his way into a position of power or influence. With his $11 shoes and his smooth talk, he is convinced that he can rise to the level of equal, but you can sense his downfall coming early in the proceedings.

Director George C. Wolfe shows a sure hand visualizing the screenplay as adapted by Ruben Santiago-Hudson. The 94-minute production speeds by like a locomotive, with a crackling supporting cast tossing in fills with the cadence of an experienced jazz combo. Taylour Paige is especially arresting as Ma's kittenish girlfriend, whose flirtations threaten to get a few people in big trouble. While Boseman (looking gaunt a year or so before his death from cancer) has the flash and the passion here, it is Davis who just smolders with resentment, spitting out Ma's grievances and philosophies. Here's her take on the blues:

White folks don't understand about the blues. They hear it come out, but they don't know how it got there. They don't understand that's life's way of talking. ... The blues help you get out of bed in the morning. You get up knowing you ain't alone. There's something else in the world. Something's been added by that song.

And Wilson's dialogue -- crafted in the 1980s and looking back a half century -- resonates to this day, offering insight into our modern shallowness and ignorance. The piano player Toledo (a pitch-perfect Glynn Turman), an advocate of pride and self-determination for African-Americans, explains the ways of denial and idiocy: 

"Some mens is excited to be fools. That excitement is something else. I know about it. I done experienced it. It makes you feel good to be a fool. But it don't last long. It's over in a minute. Then you got to tend with the consequences. You got to tend with what comes after. That's when you wish you had learned something about it."

Who is the delusional one in this stage play? Ma knows that her leverage ends the second her voice is recorded on vinyl, and that she'll have to ramp it back up the next time. Meantime, she has a backup option, knowing that she can fill seats throughout the South at her live shows. But with Levee, there's a sadness and fatalism about his aspirations (and his backstory explains why this is so), and you detect that in Boseman's desperate eyes and empty boasts. Those are just two of the ways for these two souls to get by in the world. Wilson knew it all too well 40 years ago, and we live it still.

GIVING VOICE (B+) - This companion Netflix documentary studies the students taking part in a national competition involving monologues from August Wilson plays. These kids are so full of passion and good cheer that it can't help but radiate off the screen and into your heart.

Viola Davis and John Legend are among the executive producers, and Davis' "Fences" co-star Denzel Washington sits in as a talking head, but it is the high school students who steal the show. We meet bright youngsters from Chicago's inner city as well as from Seattle, Los Angeles, Dallas, Atlanta and elsewhere. They are Juilliard-bound phenoms whose names are likely to become familiar a few years hence.

But for now, they are wide-eyed theater geeks who make their way from local competitions to the big stage in Broadway for a final showdown in 2018. This breezy reality-show feature celebrates Wilson's work and plumbs the depths of his exploration of black America in the 20th century. And it's a perfect distillation of how timeless that work is. These kids give you hope for the future, and the film is a welcome break from the doom and gloom of the day, with a refreshingly analog diversion for the next generation.

BONUS TRACK

The title track from "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom": 

"Ma Rainey" was our traditional Christmas Day Mainstream Movie. It sneaks into the top five among the 16 films we've scored at our annual holiday outing:

  1. Up in the Air (2009)

  2. Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (2004)

  3. Dreamgirls (2006)

  4. Charlie Wilson's War (2007)

  5. Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (2020)

  6. Little Women (2019)

  7. The Fighter (2010)

  8. American Hustle (2013)

  9. The Shape of Water (2017)

10. La La Land (2016)

11. The Wrestler (2008)

12. Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)

13. Young Adult (2011)

14. This Is 40 (2012)

15. Holmes & Watson (2018)

16. Into the Woods (2014)

Government Watchdogs

COLLECTIVE (A-minus) - This documentary could serve as a bookend to the era of the Romanian New Wave, with its horrifyingly real examination of that country's health care system, which was fictionalized back in 2005 with "The Death of Mr. Lazarescu." Here, director Alexander Nanau and co-writer Antoaneta Opris get the inside scoop -- by following a crusading journalist and a progressive health minister -- regarding the aftermath of a deadly concert fire, in which more people died later of bacterial infections in the hospital than were killed by smoke inhalation at the event.

This starts out celebrating the power of investigative journalism, tailing along with Catalin Tolontan, the editor of a sports publication, and his dogged crew, as they keep asking questions about why victims of the fire continue to die in what quickly is discovered to be a scandalous lack of sanitation at the country's trauma centers. But what starts out as a real-life "All the President's Men," shifts gears at the  midpoint and pivots to Vlad Voiculescu, a young health minister who has good intentions but little clue how to turn this corrupt post-communist ship around and overcome the graft that allowed a chemical company to water down its anti-bacterial product.

Voiculescu's charms wear off quickly, and the film spins its wheels along with the health czar, eventually winding down to an uninspiring conclusion. This project had all the markings of a true eye-opener -- and the smuggled video of a horrific lack of care certainly shocks the conscience -- but it loses its momentum in the second half and falls short of perfection. The journalists were more interesting than the bureaucrat.

CITY HALL (B) - Frederick Wiseman long ago burnished his reputation as a master storyteller, one of the pioneers of fly-on-the-wall documentaries, and he is closing out his career (he is now 90) with tedious process stories that have examined the administration of a university ("At Berkeley") a New York neighborhood ("In Jackson Heights"), small-town life ("Monrovia, Indiana"), the public library system ("Ex-Libris") and now the inner workings of the city of Boston. "City Hall" -- a four-and-a-half-hour marathon -- is one of the better products amid a motley bunch in the past decade.

This one is another mixed bag. There again are a lot of low-level meetings that dwell on the minutiae of budgeting and priority-setting. Wiseman is obsessed with diversity -- nearly every scene touches on race issues in some way -- and while that is understandable when sketching out a city with Boston's sketchy history, the theme becomes suffocating. You would think that Boston is now the most culturally aware city in the world. By the end, you get the sense that Wiseman is over-compensating here and that we are not getting a full-bodied profile of Boston.

He also overdoses on the city's second-term mayor, Marty Walsh, a child of Irish immigrants who comes across as truly progressive, a product of the union movement. There seems to be no event too small or obscure for Mayor Marty to hobnob with the citizenry. 

Some scenes work, others don't. The best tend to appear in the second half. We spend about a half hour with a city-facilitated meeting between minority residents of a poor neighborhood and the entrepreneurs looking to bring in a marijuana dispensary. Meantime, when we can drag Wiseman's crew away from the conference rooms, we go out in the field to watch a street crew, 311 operators, a meter maid, a code enforcement officer and a pest inspector toil away to keep the municipality humming. And Wiseman luxuriates in the physical details of Boston with some magnificent establishing shots, a montage of which would make a pretty good short film in itself. 

I managed this one in three chunks. It is on a par with "Ex Libris," and doesn't suffer from the utter drudgery of "At Berkeley" and "Monrovia, Indiana." It does help to have a star to focus on.

BONUS TRACK

From "Collective," a jaunty tune from the Alternate Routes, "Nothing More":

Zombie Compromise

WE ARE LITTLE ZOMBIES (A) - This debut feature is a modern masterpiece about the way we live -- or fail to live -- seen through the eyes of four sharp 13-year-olds. This visual roller coaster comes from music-video veteran and ad man Makoto Nagahisa, and he infuses this story of four mopey kids with color and energy and wordplay.

The main hero is Hikari (Keita Ninomiya), whose parents died in a bus crash while touring strawberry fields and who has always been emotionally stunted and unable to cry, turning to video games, which give this movie its "Scott Pilgrim"-style theme. Three others also lose their parents -- involving a gas explosion, suicide, and murder -- and these four orphans meet at the crematorium and decide to hang out at Hikari's house. However, Hikari's mean aunt, who claims custody of him, cramps their style, so they set out on their own and decide to form a bubblegum-punk band.

Little Zombies features Hikari on shaky vocals, Ishi (Satoshi Mizuno) on drums (including a wok rescued from the burnt remains of his family's restaurant), Yuki (Mondo Okumura) on bass, and Ikuko (Sena Nakajima), the only girl, on keyboards. They get discovered by an older teen in a junkyard, and they become instant pop idols, mainly from the catchiness of the title track and hummable lines like, "We are zombies but alive." They are, ironically, "totally emo," to the max. (At one point they get compared to the Shaggs, which is apt.)

The film is flooded with nihilistic utterings from these numb young teens in this "story of four unemotional people":

• "Reality is too stupid to cry over."
• "Everything that matters to me disappears."
• "Despair is uncool."
• "I've always been good at being invisible."
• "All parents are cheats."
• "I'm sad but not in pain."
• "Are you dead inside?"
• "Future, money, courage, love -- don't know what they are."
• "Punk sucks."
• "You let your emotions show. Watch it!"

Ikuko snaps photos on an old-fashioned disposable camera, but she never develops the film. To her, it's more about the performance art in the moment, a shield against nostalgia. "If I look at the photos, I'll have to remember," she says. "All we have is now."

Because the kids are rudderless, this two-hour journey turns into a road film, with the kids metaphorically searching for the sources of their damage and seeking out whatever video-game enemy they can vanquish in order to feel human again. Each kids is eminently likeable and watchable, with filled-in back stories and wounds we can identify with.

This is all thrown together my Nagahisa, a true mix-master. His visuals pop, but he's much more of an auteur than some run-of-the-mill video director with a short attention span. He is in full command from beginning to end. He tests different senses -- using sound and camera tricks to play with the ideas of Hikari's sight and hearing, as if subjecting him to a medical examination. Whereas Edgar Wright's "Scott Pilgrim" skewed more silly than straight, Naghisa plumbs true emotional depths, without sacrificing fun (like a baseball scene that devolves into an homage of the Monkees). (Here is a link to an interesting interview with the director.)

And it's the kids who deliver. Ninomiya, especially, as Hikari seems to be the John Lennon of this troupe, and his little shoulders are more than capable. From the striking opening scenes to the gorgeous ending, this is a story to be savored.

ZOMBIELAND: DOUBLE TAP (C-minus) - Hard to believe there was a time, in the post-"Shaun of the Dead" era when ironic wisecracking zom-coms were appealing. The original "Zombieland" was 11 years ago, and the sequel trickled out late last year, coasting on the first one's laurels. The core four zombie hunters return here -- Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone, Jesse Eisenberg and Abigail Breslin (the latter an afterthought here).  

This starts out with a tedious montage of CGI-abetted quality kills, most in slow motion, reminding us that the genre, at least a decade past its spoil date, has been reduced to pure pulp. The original director and writers return to beat the dead horse they shot the first time. Each actor doubles down on his/her character's quirks. Only occasionally does the script evoke a gut laugh.

A couple of ideas offer glimpses of a fresh take. Zooey Deutch shows up as a boy-crazy dumb blonde, and she stands out among the retreads with her valley-girl update for the millennial crowd. And an inspired scene introduces Luke Wilson and Thomas Middleton as doppelgangers for Harrelson and Eisenberg, respectively, and the on-screen twinning of the two neurotic freaks -- Eisenberg and Middleton -- is both a brilliant comedic marriage and a meta joke on itself. And yes, sadly, Bill Murray eventually shows up. And it all culminates in a truly sappy, almost Hollywood ending (if you can believe that), as if the stakes were no greater than a "Beach, Blanket, Bingo" romp.

BONUS TRACKS

A music video of the theme song of Little Zombies:

Our title track, from Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet:

 

Moving On

 

THE LIFE AHEAD (B+) - An elderly Sophia Loren anchors this melancholy but hopeful story about a mother hen to prostitutes who takes in a wild street kid and forms a bond with him. What could have been a sickeningly sweet Hallmark-level movie about a cultural/generational clash instead strikes at the human marrow of relationships in the hands of director Edoardo Ponti (Loren's son) and a trio of writers interpreting a book by Romain Gary. 

The film opens with Loren's Holocaust survivor Madame Rosa getting mugged by preteen street kid Momo, and before you known it, the pair are thrown together under Rosa's roof with a couple of other children hoping that their mothers will come retrieve them someday. Rosa's health is starting to slip, and she becomes prone to fits of catatonia.

But she shares a secret lair in the building with Momo, and the two bond over their respective emotional traumas and the basic human desire for connection and nurturing. When she informs him about her experience with Auschwitz, it sounds so foreign to him that all he can merely recite back to her is a homonym: "House witch." 

Momo matures and bonds with another boy in the house, but he also still works the street, selling drugs. He retains a dark outlook, holding out little hope that any of these prostitutes will return to retrieve their children. "I'm not going to suck up to happiness," he vows.

But happiness seeps through in this thoughtful story about a woman (no mere stereotypical hooker with a heart of gold) at the end of her life offering glimpses of optimism to a budding young man just figuring out his own path. The seaside town is captivating, and these two actors -- along with quietly effective supporting cast members, young and old -- are a winning odd couple

THINGS TO COME (2016) (B) - Mia Hansen-Love meanders a bit with the story of a middle-aged woman who placidly observes all of the guideposts in her life starting to unravel. With Isabelle Huppert in the lead role, this drama is rescued from a mild case of ADHD.

When it rains, it pours. Nathalie's marriage is stale. Her mother -- a whiny former model/actress -- is entering a mental decline. Her scholarship is out of date. And she has settled into a bourgeois lifestyle that raises the eyebrows of her radical students and one former student, Fabien, (a terrific Roman Kolinka) who is now choosing to live further off the grid. 

Nathalie does gain a cat out of this whole deal, and more important, she realizes the upside of having your life slowly unravel -- it can be liberating. With her classic placid demeanor, Huppert portrays a woman going with the flow and looking on the bright side. 

This movie follows in sequence from Hansen-Love's previous character studies -- a teenage girl in "Goodbye First Love" and young adults in "Eden." This one is not as sharp as the first but more focused and effective than the second.

BONUS TRACK

This Woody Guthrie nugget stands out during a car trip with Nathalie and Fabien in "Things to Come":

Lives on the Edge

 

CROCK OF GOLD: A FEW ROUNDS WITH SHANE MACGOWAN (B) - Like its subject, Julien Temple's documentary about the Pogues frontman is sloppy and disjointed but oddly satisfying. The video veteran cut his teeth on punk, first chronicling the Sex Pistols during their moment of glory, and Shane MacGowan will forever be linked to that scene, where he got his start as a famous local fan and then a band leader himself, first with the Nips and then the Irish traditionalists the Pogues.

It might be a chore to get through the hot mess of the first half hour, which takes us back to MacGowan's childhood in Tipperary (introduced to beer and cigarettes at a tender age by aunts and uncles), with the use of re-enactments, animation and faux-vintage footage. It takes about half the film, nearly an hour, for MacGowan to hit his 20s and form the Pogues, the band that would launch him to stardom and the brink of overdose by the end of the '80s. But that early anthropology is necessary, helping to explain MacGowan's mental health struggles and addictions.

Temple is like an alchemist with ADHD here, cutting up old audio interviews to let MacGowan narrate his own life over constantly shifting images. Temple also features vintage and current video interviews with MacGowan, which serve to chronicle his physical decline to the point of being a drooling drunk in a wheelchair. Johnny Depp, an old pal of the Pogue, is a producer here and insists on inserting himself into the proceedings as a drinking buddy, which comes off as both irresponsible and pathetic.

MacGowan's wife and family weigh in to add depth to the personality profile, though we don't hear from bandmates. (They famously kicked him out of the band in 1991 but welcomed him back for popular tours in the aughts.) The glory of "Fairytale of New York" is celebrated. (It is claimed to be the most popular British Christmas song of the 21st century and reportedly earns MacGowan a cool half million dollar a year.) Gerry Adams, the former Sinn Fein Irish resistance leader, stops by for a visit with MacGowan to reminisce about their bomb-throwing days fighting for Irish independence.

Like I said, this is all quite the Irish stew of rock 'n' roll lore, and you might not have the tolerance to sit with this subject for two hours. But credit goes to Temple for taking this hot mess and finding some gravitas in this portrait of a broken soul who wrote some of the best songs of the Heyday of the Planet of Sound.

THE BEE GEES: HOW CAN YOU MEND A BROKEN HEART (B+) - This sympathetic HBO documentary gives due to a musical group that proved its mettle during multiple eras in popular music and which was much more than three brothers in tight pants singing disco songs in falsetto. With a broad sweep from the '60s to the '80s, we see the brothers Gibb transform from Beatlesque skiffle rockers from Australia to R&B balladeers to dance-era legends to mature songwriters for adult-contemporary artists. 

Rather than chameleonic opportunists shape-shifting for various eras, Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb had serious chops as pop-music artists and a keen ear for soulful hooks that worked across genres and modes of a given day. This documentary shows them to be serious studio rats who wrote their songs together as they recorded, producing some of the most iconic hits of the '60s and '70s.

The film, endorsed by Barry Gibb and his brothers' widows, goes heavy on the family dynamics, including addictions and breakups. It tells fascinating little tales, including the role label-mate Eric Clapton played in encouraging the boys to follow his lead and record their 1975 comeback album in Miami (staying at the same house at 462 Ocean Blvd.), as well as the magic they conjured up when asked two years later to provide the core songs for the iconic "Saturday Night Fever" soundtrack. Bandmates and producers (including the transformative Arif Mardin) are finally given their due for their contributions to the '70s sound.

An odd amount of weight is given to Chicago DJ Steve Dahl's "Disco Sucks" counter-movement that popped the disco bubble by 1980; the filmmakers exploit that moment as a catchall shorthand for the general racism and homophobia that beset the club scene and its pulsing beats. But by that point in the film, the narrative has gone so deep into the Bee Gees' musical dynamic and their oeuvre that nothing can dim the glitz of their success. A final shot of the mature Bee Gees harmonizing on "Run to Me" might even bring a tear to your eye.

ZAPPA (C-minus) - God bless Frank Zappa. I'm glad he was in the world for a while (alas, only 52 years), but I'll never understand the appeal he had as a composer and performer. This two-hour documentary (from "Bill & Ted" actor Alex Winter) definitively confirms that I'm not really missing any secret message. Rather, Zappa comes off as a modestly talented but determined and prolific musical noodler who probably was a borderline workaholic asshole, if I'm reading between the lines of the talking-head interviews. His roles as a champion of the First Amendment (battlingTipper Gore and the lyric nazis) and as cultural ambassador for Vaclev Havel's Czech Republic get a gloss that adds nothing really new to the legend.

I can imagine even Zappa diehards straining to sift through the tedium of dumb home movies from the '60s and '70s, an era when video cameras were a novelty and the most creative reaction to having one trained on you was to stick out your tongue, make a face, flip the bird or drop your pants. Oh, those edgy hippies and veritable Mothers of Invention! There's nostalgia and then there's just blatant wastes of celluloid. None of the live performances sampled manages to approach any recognizable level of coherence. If anything, Zappa sports that disdainful sneer onstage more often than expressing any joy in connecting with a crowd.

I kept an ear peeled and my mind open for the musical genius to congeal and finally manifest itself. It doesn't help that Winter chops the music up into snippets that squelch any full appreciation that might be possible. The best example of compositional talent comes from about two minutes of the Kronos Quartet slicing through one of those typical pieces that sound like they come from a bad horror movie. Zappa, an ardent warrior for art over commerce, himself (twice) acknowledges that the music he recorded was done merely so that he could listen to exactly what he wanted to -- and if anyone wanted to buy it and listen too, then he'd be happy to ship a copy to them. We see his massive home-vault archives, which come off as obnoxious self-indulgence rather than an intriguing trove of hidden gems. You might even read the glint in his eye as a signal that his whole career was one big performance-art piece daring you to think the music was good.

So I finally feel like I'm off the hook. I'm not missing anything. "Don't you eat the yellow snow." Thanks for the advice. Rest in peace.

BONUS TRACKS

By 1989, Shane MacGowan had mostly checked out of the Pogues (this was the time of his infamous "Fuck you and your fucking Batman" phase), but they propped him up for this video tribute to '60s stomp rock, "Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah":

Here's that snippet of "Run to Me" from the Bee Gees:

And the best part of the Zappa doc was the song over the closing credits, "Watermelon in Easter Hay":

Black and White

 

THE FORTY-YEAR-OLD VERSION (A-minus) - Radha Blank explodes on the cinematic scene with this life-affirming autobiographical diatribe about art and race, as well as a valentine to New York City. Blank plays a version of herself, on the brink of 40 and having nothing to show for the past decade trying to live up to her 30 Under 30 acclaim.

Blank, a struggling playwright, finds an affinity for rapping but doesn't trust herself to dive into that competitive young person's world. A local proprietor of beats, named D (Oswin Benjamin), does believe in her, but her instinct is to fall back into her familiar world of the stage, where she alternates between getting her baby, "Harlem Ave.," staged and mentoring high school students in acting.

This tension is further frazzled by Blank having to capitulate to a white producer and white director in order to get even a watered-down version of her vision to Broadway. Blank uses a rather broad brush to portray the white characters as villains, but the actors, including Reed Birney as the bullying producer J. Whitman, overcome that handicap with a solid dose of energy.

In fact, Blank's forte here is her casting (shout-out to casting director Jessica Daniels), from Benjamin's sullen but big-hearted mix-master to the spirited high school kids (especially Haskiri Velazquez as Rosa); Peter Kim as Blank's childhood pal and flummoxed manager Archie; the character actors who play a Greek chorus of street people (a nod to Spike Lee); and Blank's own brother as her brother. Blank and Kim have such a natural connection, it would not be surprising if she really was his beard for the prom back in the '90s. This is a powerful collection of performers who sink their teeth into Blank's earthy script, and they orbit the appealing author who presents herself with an attractive mix of self-deprecation and fuck-you gumption.

The main distraction here is the black-and-white palette Blank chooses, a conceit that seemed tired when Lee and Woody Allen served it up in decades past. Blank and cinematographer Eric Branco have a deep appreciation for New York, both the street life and the enclosed spaces (they shot in Blank's own cramped apartment). But the colorless visuals both drain the life out of a colorful story and create a distracting artifice that feels as artificial as the play-within-the-film that Blank so decries as a compromise. Still, this is a thoroughly entertaining slice of life from a fresh, confident voice.

BONUS TRACK

There are a lot of fine beats and some nods to old-school rappers, but this Quincy Jones track, "Love and Peace," offers a dose of calm inside the storm:

 

A Bad Connection

 Two more movies that have been dwelling in my queue for the better part of the millennium finally inched to the top:

THE HOLY GIRL (2004) (A-minus) - This fascinating observance of human nature turns the table on the story of the schoolgirl and the creep. This gem from Argentina is from Lucretia Martel, who would go on to make "The Headless Woman" and "Zama."

Sixteen-year-old Amalia (Maria Alche) becomes infatuated with Dr. Jano (Carlos Belloso), who is in town at a medical convention being held at the rundown hotel owned by Amalia's family. Amalia is introduced to Dr. Jano while in a crowd after he luridly rubs his crotch up against her. Miffed but not repulsed, she doesn't play a victim's role but rather shows concern for Dr. Jano's perversion. 

Meantime, Amalia's mother, Helena (Mercedes Moran), oblivious to the intrigue, welcomes what she takes as Dr. Jano's flirtations. And that's the game. The three actors do the rest. Alche imbues Amalia with both longing and playfulness, as she frolicks with a best friend but longs to be part of the adult world. 

INTIMACY (2001) (C+) - A modern concept -- two adults get together once a week for a zipless, wordless tryst -- never gets off the ground in this acting class by a young Mark Rylance. Jay is a failed musician, trying to run a bar, and is getting over the callous dumping of his wife and kids. He turns to Claire (Kerry Fox) for their Wednesday romps in his dumpy London bachelor pad. 

When Jay gets curious about Claire's life, obvious complications ensue. He gets to know her husband, Andy (veteran character actor Timothy Spall), and their son while attending Claire's small theater gigs. Side stories between Jay and his acquaintances muddy the waters.

Director Patrice Chereau worked the script with Anne-Louise Trividic, adapting the stories of Hanif Kareishi ("Venus," "My Beautiful Laundrette"), and something gets lost in the translation here. Rylance and Fox don't have adequate chemistry, and it gets to be a chore watching these two mopes snipe over what looks like unsatisfying sex. The chopped-up Anglo-rock soundtrack (David Bowie, Nick Cave) is a distraction. In the end, it all falls flat.

People of Earth

BABY GOD (C+) - Like its subject, something is decidedly off about this documentary chronicling a folksy 20th century obstetrician who secretly used his own sperm to impregnate dozens of patients, creating a legion of progeny. Director Hannah Olson seems more interested in creating a mood than in lining out a concise narrative of one man's obsession with duplicating himself.

Olson is all over the place in tracking down the spawn of Quincy Fortier, the Las Vegas doctor who died in 2006 at 94 and who spread his seed vast and wide. This creates some serious issues of heritage for the dozens (or more?) who must come to terms with how they were conceived and deceived. Principal among them is Wendi Babst, who is, conveniently, a private investigator but who struggles to convey a linear story. 

Even in the trailer, you can tell that Olson favors artfully crafted establishing shots and vintage clips. Late in the proceedings she attempts to drop another bombshell about Fortier, but it's awkwardly handled and questionably sourced. This one probably is better suited for a run-of-the-mill "20/20" TV special -- just the facts, ma'am -- than an art doc.

IDIOCRACY (C+) - They say that, as amazing as his music was, it was never as good or as dimensional as it was in Mozart's own head. The same might be said of the idea of "Idiocracy," Mike Judge's warning about America's dumb future -- the execution could not possibly match the way this sounded in his own brilliant brain. That, and a movie about idiots tends to be pretty idiotic.

Call him a prophet, but Judge ("Beavis and Butt-head," "Office Space," "Silicon Valley") was ahead of his time in predicting the coming idiocracy. He had the good taste of placing events 500 years into the future, the result of generations of nonstop reproduction by the endlessly horny lesser intellects and the dithering of egg-headed elites about wanting to wait for the just right time to finally have that one precious offspring. (The opening scenes setting up the conceit is the best part of the movie.)

Otherwise, this features Luke Wilson and Maya Rudolph as average schmoes who, after a botched military experiment, wake up five centuries later to find that they are by far the smartest people alive and that American culture has deteriorated to grunts and farts. Having a pro wrestler in the White House might have been funny back in the carefree aughts, but after four years of a reality-show presidency, our tolerance for such flip gags might be too strained for this nostalgia trip. What was a diverting lark in 2006 seems better suited now as a long sketch rather than a dragged-out feature film. This one came and went quickly after it was released, and it's probably best left as a shorthand pop culture reference but left buried in its time capsule. 

Doc Watch: A Democracy, If You Can Keep It

 

SOCIAL DILEMMA (B+) - This sharp documentary about the dangers of social media and the growing specter of artificial intelligence brings together some smart people who have been at the forefront of developing the technology that has enslaved us over the past quarter century. Director Jeff Orlowski gathers an impressive roster of mostly former tech whizzes and executives from Facebook, Twitter, Apple, Google, Instagram and YouTube, as well as ethicists and investors, to issue this warning from the present about the sins of the past and the potential perils of the future.

Tristan Harris (ex-Google) is the star, the one who best articulates the serious nature of the algorithms that breed addictions among the billions of users on the planet. He talks in easily digestible Ted Talk modern aphorisms. Also on board is the incisive Jaron Lanier, a pioneer in virtual reality and a tech philosopher, who most keenly and urgently conveys the horrors of social media.

The tricky part here is the running dramatization that is threaded throughout the film, featuring a typical teen who represents the perfect target for those monetizing the internet. It features Skyler Gisondo ("Booksmart") as Ben, the zombie teen, and -- believe it or not -- Vincent Kartheiser (Pete from TV's "Mad Men") in a triple role (standing side by side by side) as the embodiment of the AI algorithms, seen manipulating  clueless Ben. The dramatizations can be effective at helping us visualize the tricks used by AI to make us think we are acting independently rather than falling for computer gimmicks; but they can also be cloying and annoying. 

But the message is compelling here, and the point is taken. 

THE EDGE OF DEMOCRACY (B+) - Petra Costa, the daughter of left-wing activists, lines out the past 20 years of Brazil's politics, chronicling the rise and fall of the workers party in the nation's vulnerable democracy. It is an intimate story for Costa, and her bias is obvious in this polemic, for better and for worse. 

This plays like a liberal memoir, as Costa has personal (even familial) connections to Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who served from 2003-11, and his hand-picked successor, Dilma Rousseff, who did not make it through her second term, having been impeached and convicted in August 2016 -- both victims of a zealous prosecuting judge (literally investigator, judge and jury) who linked them tenuously to corruption in the oil industry. 

What resonates throughout the Americas, especially in the United States, was how the Mitch-McConnell-like head of Brazil's upper chamber orchestrated what looked like a coup and opened the door to Jair Bolsonaro, the former military dunce who waltzed into office on Donald Trump's coattails in 2018. That gradual evolution toward a growing wave of angry right-wing populism comes off as ominous and eerie, especially when wrapped in Costa's luxurious, melancholy visuals. 

Costa creates lovely, spectacular images, and she has incredible insider access to Lula and Rousseff. Not knowing much about Brazilian politics, I assume that there's a whole nother side to this story; though, to Costa's credit, she does not shy away from the missteps of the left -- for example, she notes that Rousseff skulked out of office with a 9 percent approval rating. 

"Edge" shares a strong kinship with "The Other Side of Everything," the tone poem about life after the breakup of Yugoslavia. But whereas "Other Side" was unapologetically personal, Costa's piece seems more eager to be taken seriously as a definitive documentary on the subject -- when we know that a more dispassionate observer would tell a more balanced story.

Modern Love

THE OVERNIGHT (2015) (B+) - The Duplass brothers recruit the reliable Jason Schwartzman to anchor this dark comedy about a couple new to Los Angeles who get lured into the relationship intrigue of a quirky husband and wife. Writer-director Patrick Brice delivers this long night of debauchery in under 80 minutes, making his sharp point and not overstaying his welcome.

Alex and Emily (Adam Scott and Taylor Schilling) struggle with their sex life as they move to L.A. from Seattle to raise their preschool son. On a visit to the park, their son meets a playmate, and the father is Kurt (Schwartzman), who invites the pair to pizza dinner as the house he shares with his wife, Charlotte (Judith Godreche) and their boy. The wine flows with the pizza, but they soon turn to the harder stuff, along with weed, and before long inhibitions start to slip.

Kurt is a free spirit, and Charlotte is French, while Emily is uptight and inexperienced, and Alex is insecure about his manhood. Brice, in classic Duplass style, takes a specific circumstance that requires unique characters to react in realistic ways and sets loose a group of substantive actors on the material. Each actor delivers here, led by Schwartzman's over-confident Kurt (he is especially proud of his artwork, composed entirely of colorful renditions of various anuses). Scott can be hit-and-miss, but he keeps it under control here as a man genuinely excited to have his worldview expanded. Schilling (who was the drag on "Orange Is the New Black") is laid back but affecting, while Godreche is a wild card. It is an ensemble that clicks in a simple but effective exercise in storytelling.

HAPPIEST SEASON (C) - Generic in every way, starting with its title, this Christmas bauble about a closeted lesbian bringing her "friend" home to meet the family wastes a strong cast on a string of cliched scenes. It's a disappointing sophomore effort from Clea DuVall, who had broken out of her role in the "Veep" cast to debut as a writer-director with "The Intervention" in 2016.

As with her first film, DuVall is blessed with a talented cast, which is the only saving grace here. Kristen Stewart (doing her classic mope, only as a bleach blonde here) is Abby, who plans to ask her girlfriend, Harper (Mackenzie Davis from "Tully" and "Izzy Gets the Fuck Across Town"), to marry her when they go home to Harper's family for Christmas. Except Harper fails to divulge fully that she lied about coming out to her family, and so Abby reluctantly agrees to pose as Harper's orphaned roommate.

Let the high-jinks ensue! The problem is, this made-for-Hulu concoction simply cannot rise above some of the lamest rom-com tropes, with cardboard stereotypes dotting the supporting cast. Allison Brie and Mary Holland overdo it as the sisters of Harper competing for the love of their ambitious father (Victor Garber) and the acceptance of their over-wound mother (Mary Steenburgen). Abby even has a wise-cracking gay best friend (Dan Levy), while Harper has a distrustful rival back home (Aubrey Plaza). That's quite a power-hitting cast, and they can often be fun to watch, but DuVall simply drops the ball and phones in a trite script and wince-inducing scenes stretched out over 100 bloated minutes. (Be prepared: This is another one of those movies where every character learns a life-changing lesson literally overnight.) In sum, this is the very definition of couch-coping during the holidays.

BONUS TRACK

Our title track, from Bowie, crisp as ever:

Soundtrack of Your Life: Inescapable

An occasional feature in which we mark the songs of our relative youth as played over public muzak systems and beyond.  

It's been quite a month of reminders that my generation is having its moment in the sun when it comes to easy listening offerings at grocery stores, banks and post offices. It started in early November during an early Sunday stroll through the produce section at Trader Joe's, kicked off by the enigmatic Morrissey at the height of his powers and followed by a couple of '80s college-radio staples. 

The first batch:

Date: 8 November 2020, 8:20 a.m.

Place: Trader Joe's

Song/Artist:  "Tomorrow" by Morrissey

Song/Artist: "Mexican Radio" Wall of Voodoo

Song/Artist: "Making Plans for Nigel" XTC

Irony Matrix: 3.8 out of 10

Comment: Once again, I find myself performing my consumerist chores before the sun is warm on a Sunday morning. What an '80/early '90s block party that was spun by the virtual DJs who run Trader Joe's marketing division. I imagine Morrissey has endured into the generation of millennial emo hipsters, but Wall of Voodoo and XTC are almost certainly as much a mystery to that cohort as they are to the Boomers and above. This triptych put me in a chipper mood, and I probably bought a few more unnecessary staples than I had intended to when I walked through the door and picked out a $3.99 bouquet of flowers. Mission accomplished, corporate America!

Next:

Date: 12 November 2020, 11:20 a.m.

Place: First Financial Credit Union

Song:  "Last Nite"

Artist: The Strokes

Irony Matrix: 4.3 out of 10

Comment: The homeowners insurance on our rental property did not get fully paid by our credit union that holds the mortgage -- zoot, alors! First-world problems, don't'cha know. While we were waiting in the lobby area for Daisy to come down and get to the bottom of it, the sound system pulsed with this turn-of-the-millennial alternative juggernaut. The Strokes appeared on "Saturday Night Live" recently (we are just so in the pocket these days), and the boys seemed a bit bored and low-energy (though they've mostly kept their hair). But on the stereo speakers of Albuquerque's downtown community financial institution, it was the end of the Clinton era all over again. Hey, Daisy, better have IT check for those Y2K bugs!

And, finally:

Date: 28 November 2020, 11:12 a.m.

Place: U.S. Post Office (Airport)

Song:  "Whip It"

Artist: Devo

Irony Matrix: 4.7 out of 10

Comment: I received a certified letter in my capacity of president of the Silver Hill Neighborhood Association (how much adulting can a grown man stand in the same month?), and to pick it up I had to visit the airport post office. After standing in line in the exterior lobby and inching forward over the course of about 10 minutes, I finally gained entry to the enclosed window area. As I handed by ticket to the honorable public servant, I noticed this Devo hit at an appreciable volume emanating from the sound system. Now, there was a time 40 years ago, at a similar turn of a decade, when the very idea of Devo was so revolutionary that the band's music could create a spontaneous combustion of an oil fire in Ronald Reagan's hair. Even for us late-teen self-identified punk-adjacent wannabe hipsters, Devo were fucking out there. Now, though, their big underground hit is a beloved mainstay of classic-rock radio rotations. Such radical progress we have achieved in these past four decades.

And, now, on with the countdown:

And we all have heard "Whip It" a thousand times. So let's end with a clip of Second City TV's "Brooke Shields Show," featuring Catherine O'Hara as the bratty teen model, with a snippet of performing her version of the Devo classic:

Soviet Reunion

RED PENGUINS (B) - This is quite the ribald tale of the time some Americans thought it would be good, after the fall of the Soviet Union in the early '90s, to purchase a stake in the Russian Red Army hockey team. Lawlessness ensued.

The star here is Steven Warshaw, a lawyer and marketing savant, who relocates to Moscow to start working his magic among the ragtag remnants of the communist era. He implements the equivalent of nickel-beer nights and stripper entertainment between periods. But he must also deal with some shady figures -- some holdovers from the previous administration and some "entrepreneurs" popping up in the newly liberated economy of Russia.

Warshaw, working on behalf of the American owners of the Pittsburgh Penguins, says he expected a certain level of graft but was shocked at the avarice that suckled from the organization. Mob activity was suspected. One holdover, general manager Valery Gushin, still has a glint in his eye as he fondly recalls the Wild West era. While there's fun to be had here, you get the feeling that the playful presentation is glossing over some real harm that resulted from this culture clash. 

Bonus sighting: Longtime Chicago Blackhawks announcer Pat Foley signs on to overdub some play-by-play over some of the archival footage.

THE RUSSIAN FIVE (B-minus) - You'll need to be more than a casual hockey fan to appreciate this documentary about the Detroit Red Wings' early 1990s assemblage of elite Russian hockey players, which unleashed the international model on the NHL. But if you do appreciate the sport (or did back then), you likely will enjoy this heartfelt portrait of those core five players and the championship run they engineered along with longtime North American captain Steve Yzerman.

Newcomer Joshua Riehl produces a slick and warm retelling of a notable era in the NHL while humanizing each man through archival footage and present-day interviews. Random celebrity guest here is actor Jeff Daniels, a lifelong Red Wings fan (and Central Michigan University alum), who conveys the joy the depressed city felt in building toward its first Stanley Cup championships since the postwar glory of Gordie Howe and gang.

Former general manager Jim Devellano is on hand to explain how he transformed the team from the lean 1980s under new ownership to expending draft choices on the stars of the Red Army team who were no guarantees to cross over to the West. At some point, tragedy strikes at the height of the celebrations, and the narrative is leavened with genuine emotion, providing a layer of gravitas to this labor of love.

BONUS TRACK

"Red Penguins" has a lively soundtrack, including this nugget, "Start Wearing Purple" by Gogol Bordello:

Active With the Activists

CRIP CAMP (A-minus) - A bit of a head fake, this documentary about an upstate New York summer camp for handicapped children back in the 1950s, '60s and '70s focuses more on the later activism of some of the camp's alumnae who went on to fight for disability rights. By the end, it is a powerful celebration of their dedication to the cause that led directly to the Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990.

The stars are Judith Heumann, the clear leader of this disability-rights movement, and Jim LeBrecht, an AV geek at Camp Jened who went on to carve out a career as a sound editor and mixer (in film and theater), who co-directs here with Nicole Newnham ("The Rape of Europa"). Archival footage is crucial here, as we get to spend quality time with the camp's residents in the late 1960s, as they let their hair down and raise their consciousness. It is a joy to watch the young people from a different era find a home among others who could understand their situation.

Heumann would go on to recruit some of her former Camp Jened pals to conduct a sit-in at the San Francisco offices of the federal department of Health, Education and Welfare, eventually convincing the nascent Carter administration to enforce laws that the Nixon/Ford administrations had ignored. Her dogged devotion to the cause would culminate in the ADA under the first President Bush. The scene of people with physical challenges crawling up the steps of the Capitol in 1990 to drive home their message packs an emotional wallop as a symbol of decades of struggle.

She, LeBrecht and others are interviewed in the present day to discuss their lifelong triumphs and challenges. The tone throughout is upbeat but not sappy. The title is unfortunate, but the outcome is a success.

I AM GRETA (A-minus) - This is an incredibly intimate portrait of the teenage climate conscience of the world, delving into her world of instant celebrity among admirers who often seem to not be listening to her urgent message. What impact, if any, will Greta Thunberg or this documentary have on the health of the planet?

The day after we watched this, inspired by the passion and commitment of this Swedish 16-year-old, we noted news reports that lifetime pol John Kerry, about to turn 77, is Joe Biden's idea of an inspired choice to be America's climate envoy. Turn, turn, turn.

What's amazing about this film is the extremely close access the filmmakers (led by director Nathan Grossman) have arranged. It almost feels overly intrusive, considering the Asperger's that Greta deals with. We see her and her doting father as they travel Europe by train, hobnob with dignitaries, and then take a harrowing boat ride across the Atlantic (beware of viewer sea-sickness) for her triumphant appearance at the United Nations in New York.

But that rare intimacy with the subject is the selling point here. We become familiar with Greta's mood swings and the loneliness of her journey, even when she is mobbed like a rock star at rallies. She obsesses over the grammar of her speeches, and she often has to be reminded to eat something. She has the air of a tragic Shakespearean character or a suffering saint from biblical times. And this doesn't seem to be a put-on for the camera. Instead, it's an insightful character study and a helpful time-capsule moment that will be interesting to revisit years and decades hence.

BONUS TRACKS

"Crip Camp's" soundtrack leans a little too heavily on Boomer icons like the Grateful Dead and Neil Young, but there's no denying the beauty and power of Bob Dylan's "Tomorrow Is a Long Time."

And a centerpiece in "Greta" is Billie Eilish's "End of the World":

Not to be confused, for better or worse, with the Skeeter Davis classic:

New to the Queue

 Coming out the other side ...

Chloe Zhao ("The Rider") recruits Frances McDormand for a tale of economic destruction, "Nomadland."

A documentary about journalists and activists battling for answers in the aftermath of a fatal fire at a concert in Romania, "Collective."

A profile of the wild man from the original cast of "Saturday Night Live," "Belushi."

Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman star in a musical period piece, based on the August Wilson play, "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom."

Julien Temple devotes two hours to the pathetic saga of the self-destructive leader of the Pogues, "Crock of Gold: A Few Rounds With Shane MacGowan."

And one more rock doc, this one about the revered avant-garde musician and composer, "Zappa."

Auto Parts

Two films that have been sitting in my queue for the better part of the millennium finally rise to the top:

SWEDISH AUTO (2006) (B) - This charming little film follows the exploits of a quiet small-town mechanic who has a fascination with a beautiful violinist before realizing that another woman is obsessed with him. This variation on the classic love triangle -- albeit it highly platonic -- provides a first-time director the chance to sketch out an intriguing character study.

Lukas Haas (a child in "Witness," an adult in "Inception") plays Carter, such a dutiful worker that he seems to be more of a favorite of the garage owner than the owner's son. He likes to watch Ann (Brianne Davis) perform, whether she is on stage in concert or just visible through her apartment window. Meantime, the cute gal at the diner, Darla (January Jones, before "Mad Men"), has a keen interest in Carter, and they eventually start hanging out. 

Writer-director Derek Sieg ("Hot Air") sets this tale in Charlottesville, Va., giving everything a dull grey tint -- all except the vintage magenta Saab that Carter lovingly restores. In a brisk 97 minutes, Sieg gives a long leash to Haas and Jones as they mumble their way into each other's arms (for the longest time I was trying to figure out if her character's name was Donna or Carla). Carter feels compelled to rescue Darla and her mother from the clutches of an abusive step-father, and he is working on a particular Swedish auto that might just be the vehicle for all of them to escape their drab, unfulfilled existence.

ELDORADO (2009) (B) - This quirky little road movie brings together a gearhead and a junkie as they meander across Belgium.  Bouli Lanners writes, directs and stars as Yvan, the connoisseur of American cars who arrives home one day to find scrawny Elie (Fabrice Adde) hiding out in Yvan's home after having broken in and trashed it looking for money to finance his next score. 

After this meet-cute, Yvan agrees to drive Elie to the French border where Elie's parents live. Along the way, they interact with outre characters, including a psychic and a nudist who is the namesake of actor Alain Delon (and who has his own director's chair with his name emblazoned on it). Lanners -- both as actor and director -- infuses the narrative with equal parts whimsy and melancholia. Elie seems doomed from the start, and Yvan, while well meaning, is really working out his own personal issues rather than giving selflessly to help the next generation.

The random acts of oddity pay off in the end, when the pair suddenly have to tend to an injured dog, and neither has a clue what to do, partly because neither one really seems to care about the animal's suffering, perhaps too focused on their own internal turmoil. Lanners is wise to trim this down to a zippy 80 minutes, the perfect size for it to hustle along to an indifferent but satisfying conclusion.

BONUS TRACK

Lanners opens "Eldorado" with Yvan crusing the open road in his vintage Chevy wagaon to the tune of the Milkshakes pounding out "Ida Honey (Tell Me You'll Be Mine)":

Doc Watch: The Beat

 

THE GO-GO's (B) - This slick Showtime production focuses on the origin story and early phenomenon of the only all-woman band in history who played their own instruments to have a number-one record. The Go-Go's themselves -- even the spurned members who missed out on the glory days of the '80s -- are game for this exercise, making it an endearing time-capsule opening.

Australian director Alison Ellwood shows a deep appreciation for the band's early years, drawing out heartfelt memories from the band members about their dues-paying in and emergence from the Los Angeles punk scene of the late 1970s. Ellwood also allows each woman's personality to flourish, and we are treated to distinct moments from each popster, all of them now in their 60s. Jane Wiedlin is as perky as ever, but she reveals some dark emotional issues that she has only recently come to terms with. Charlotte Caffey, the other main songwriter, who looks like she never aged, unfurls some rough tales of her heroin addiction. Belinda Carlisle still has the whiff of diva (and maybe a little cosmetic surgery). Gina Schock, the drummer, still seems to have a bit of a chip on her shoulder about being paid the least. And rhythm member Kathy Valentine seems to be perhaps the most well adjusted after all these years (though her creation story involves joining the band in late 1980 and learning the bass parts during a cocaine binge).

The documentary goes hard on those early years, including a harrowing trip to Maggie Thatcher's London just before they exploded into fame -- and really, there isn't much of a thread to follow beyond the band's third album, which showed them already starting to lose their footing as early as 1984. This film makes an argument for these women as pop-punk troupers who had some serious songwriting chops, despite their place in history as many folks' favorite guilty pleasure. In fact, songwriting stories from Caffey and Wiedlin are some of the highlights here.

Admirers include Miles and Stewart Copeland, members of Madness and the Specials, and, god bless her, MTV veejay Martha Quinn. And, maybe secretly, you.

HORN FROM THE HEART: THE PAUL BUTTERFIELD STORY (2018) (B) - This biography of the white bluesman who broke out in Chicago in the 1960s feels like a doted-on labor of love and turns out to be a workmanlike study of another troubled rocker. Butterfield, a Hyde Park native, habituated black blues clubs of Chicago and studied at the feet of Muddy Waters and others.

He was praised for his spirited harmonica playing and soulful voice, and he assembled a tight crew of musicians in the '60s and '70s, including Elvin Bishop on guitar. Bishop and a host of former friends and colleagues -- including keyboard wizards Al Kooper and Paul Shaffer, drummer Sam Lay, saxophonist David Sanborn, and backup singer Clydie King -- heap praise on Butterfield as a true blues soldier, making this a rather hagiographic portrait. An ex-wife and son are on hand to put Butterfield's personal demons -- drugs and alcohol -- into perspective.

Butterfield spent much of the '70s living among the Woodstock, N.Y., royalty of Dylan and the Band and the diehards, like Happy Traum, featured here. He seemed devoted to his craft, and it's a shame that he couldn't keep his act together. Director John Anderson (who is apparently preparing a follow-up documentary about the '60s Chicago blues scene) ably mixes archival footage with talking-head interviews that have a crudeness suggesting 1980s videotape. If you don't know much about Butterfield's story, don't run off to Wikipedia; try this instead, and appreciate the arc of one man's life.

BONUS TRACK

One of my favorite covers is the Pixies' version of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band staple "Born in Chicago":

The Go-Go's' debut album predated the dawn of MTV by just a few months, and they were a natural match, such as this cheapo video for "Our Lips Are Sealed," which was made for about $6,000 left over in an IRS Records budget for the Police:

Showgirls

 

RED DOG (B) - This is a highly entertaining cinematic memoir of life among strippers, but it too often feels like a cheat and a bit of inbred revisionist history. Luke Dick, a country songwriter, draws memories out of his mom, Kim, and her fellow partiers at the rowdy Red Dog in Oklahoma City, where he was hell-raised in the late '70s and '80s.

Kim is a pistol, not shy about finally letting loose with all the tawdry details of the sex-and-drugs-soaked life she turned to at the tender age of 14. Fat and chain-smoking now, she still has a glint in her eye and a quick wit, leavened by a resignation -- perhaps even a detente -- about the course of her life. A few of the other surviving dancers, enjoying a more sober middle-aged existence, share their stories, and we also hear from good ol' boys who enabled this entire existence, including a tough-talking former bouncer and a regular who was married to Kim and previously to one of her friends.

There should be a social contract which holds that whatever happened in the '70s stays in the '70s, whether it was Vegas or Oklahoma City. All of these folks behaved very badly (it's almost impossible to keep track of all of Kim's husbands and Luke's stepfathers), and you get the sense that time and slick filmmaking techniques (including the occasional cutesy animated re-enactment) are helping gloss over some serious sins. We learn of only one true victim of lifelong drug abuse who did not make it past 50 -- the legendary Nasty Cathy -- but there had to be others whose lives were trashed by the degradation of the day. Cathy's soft-spoken son, now about 40, shows up here -- his puppy-dog eyes barely shielding the emotional pain he must still be processing -- to reveal the harrowing details of his upbringing and estrangement from his mother. He insists that he turned out pretty OK, but you have to wonder if he's just putting on a brave face for the camera.

Luke Dick gives writer-director duties to first-timer Casey Pinkston, but he is the interviewer and narrator, and he fills the soundtrack with his own compositions. Either man could have whittled this project down closer to 90 minutes (it runs an hour 45), and the result would have been sharper and better focused. There is no denying that this is a raunchy reminiscence of a long-gone era, when adults behaved particularly poorly; you just have to wonder if this playful piece of performance art is giving us anything near the real story.

YOU DON'T NOMI (B) - Much has been written in the past quarter century about the 1995 spectacle "Showgirls," the notorious NC-17 spectacle from the exploitation factory of pulp writer Joe Eszterhas and Euro-trash director Paul Verhoeven in their follow-up to "Basic Instinct." More does not need to be written here. In watching this documentary purporting to deconstruct the pop culture sensation that resulted from the big-screen saga of one Nomi Malone (the ill-fated Elizabeth Berkley, having grown up from "Saved by the Bell"), I wondered more than once: Are we overthinking this movie?

Like "Red Dog," "You Don't Nomi" is an entertaining romp through some bygone bare-breasted sleaze, this time up on the big screen. But first-time director Jeffrey McHale is not interested in a simple I (Heart) the Nineties VH1 tribute to a trashy film; rather, he wants to do a philosophical deep dive into whether the widely panned release was truly crap or whether it was somehow brilliant -- or, get this, whether it was some sophisticated needle-threading auteurist attempt to produce brilliant crap of a lineage from Cecil B. DeMille and Busby Berkeley (no relation). Principal among the over-thinkers is Adam Nayman, who actually wrote a book about "Showgirls" with the egg-headed thesis of "It Doesn't Suck." 

Nayman and others expend millions of more brain cells than actually went into the movie about a small-town gal who navigates the dog-eat-dog world of Vegas to become the top showgirl. The film starts out reminding us that the easily mockable story and direction -- leading to a career-killing hysterical performance by Berkley -- is, indeed, as laughable and horrific as we remember it. That intro undercuts later attempts to convince us that it is us who are too shallow or mean to understand or appreciate this inadvertent masterpiece.

Berkley remains convinced that she was participating in a feminist howl (by orgasmically flopping in a swimming pool like a wounded dolphin?), but Verhoeven, shown in recent footage, does everything but wink at the camera to let us know he was merely indulging his male perversions, as we are constantly reminded throughout "Nomi" with clips from Verhoeven's previous and subsequent films, which drive home his simple-minded view of the battle of the sexes. (To his credit, Verhoeven is shown in archival footage appearing in person to accept his Razzie awards, the first director to ever have done so.)

Director McHale explores the metamorphosis of "Showgirls'" place in pop culture, with various stage productions that put it on a plane with "The Brady Bunch" and "The Rocky Horror Picture Show." He chooses not to show the faces of his talking heads, leaving them to perform their analysis in voice-over, which makes it harder to keep track of who is who -- though it allows for the showing of that many more clips from the film, thus upping the tits-per-frame ratio throughout. 

In sum, this is an interesting trinket to drop during the Me-Too era, and I'm hardly qualified to weigh in with much depth. I've already joined in overthinking this blip in cinematic history. I remember going to see it. I recall how appallingly awful it was (though props to the mesmerizing Gina Gershon for thriving and surviving), and I've tossed out glib comments about it over the years. And I'll admit that, for an hour and a half, it was kind of fun to recall, like the cast of "Red Dog," a different era, when we didn't always have to pay for our sins.

New to the Queue

And then things got really dim ...

It's looking like a long dark winter, so I'll make room for a 4.5-hour mega-doc from Frederick Wiseman ("Ex Libris," "In Jackson Heights," "At Berkeley"), his take on the inner workings of Boston's government, "City Hall."

Another veteran, Werner Herzog, makes too many movies for us to keep up with, but one of his new releases looks positively gorgeous, "Fireball: Visitors From Darker Worlds."

We'll check in with one of the voices of the Homeland generation, our world's climate conscience, "I Am Greta."

A debut comic buddy movie, "The Climb."

It may turn out to be sappy, but we're drawn to the return of Sophia Loren, directed by her son, in "The Life Ahead."

That '70s Drift: Soul Music

 

HARRY CHAPIN: WHEN IN DOUBT, DO SOMETHING (A-minus) - This is a surprisingly insightful and entertaining biography of the '70s storytelling singer and avid activist in the area of world hunger who set the table for rock-star benefits in the '80s. Even if you have mocked his hit song "Cat's in the Cradle" for decades, it will be tough to deny the power of his personality and his life story, which was cut short by an auto accident in 1981.

Newcomer Rick Korn brings passion to this project, as if inspired by and seeking to match Chapin's thoroughly electric personality and drive. Coming from a musical family (his dad was a noted drummer, and Chapin and his brothers first performed as a folk combo), Chapin stood out for his songwriting abilities and his winning personality. 

A bidding war broke out in 1972, and Chapin splashed big with the story song "Taxi." He peaked in 1974 with "Cat's in the Cradle." I'll admit, I never got over those songs, which I would sample from my brother's vinyl copy of "Greatest Stories Live" (1976), and both of those songs, featured in the documentary, still hit squarely in the solar plexus. (The film works in a montage of pop-culture mock tributes to "Cat's in the Cradle" over the years, led by "The Simpsons.") Even if the average viewer wouldn't have that much buy-in, there is no denying the compelling nature of this film.

A documentary should be measured by how thorough and entertaining it attacks its given subject, and Korn certainly leaves little unexamined here. Chapin co-founded World Hunger Year (WHY), and he devoted half of his concerts each year to benefits for various charities and non-profits. (He seeded Michael Moore's Flint Voice publication in 1977). We hear from family, colleagues from the world of charities (seeing the continued benefits of Chapin's work to this day), and from other celebrities, including Billy Joel (who opened for Chapin on one of the piano man's early tours) and a rather snotty Bob Geldof, who manages barely a back-handed compliment for the pioneering work Chapin did. Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, who helped shepherd legislation through Congress during the Carter years, also waxes on about his old friend.

But it's the extensive footage of Chapin (including home movies from his childhood and early years performing) that round out the portrait of a man as a performer and a driven human being. As the film's title, taken from his mantra, suggests, Chapin seemed to have a keen sense of how short life can be, and his fervent drive to "do something" to help others pours from the screen.

AMAZING GRACE (C+) - You want to love this filmed version of a gospel concert given by Aretha Franklin in a church in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles in 1972, but you can understand why Sydney Pollack's original effort back then was scrapped and mothballed. Alan Elliott, a composer (not a filmmaker), tries to salvage the footage and turn it into a documentary, but the result is a mish-mash of scenes that cobble together footage from two days of shooting.

Now, the music, with the Rev. James Cleveland and the Southern California Community Choir in support, is amazing. And the album itself was recorded and released in 1972. Franklin's version of the title track is other-worldly. Her voice can still give you chills.

But the visuals are disappointing. There is no narrative coherence here. Apparently Mick Jagger and some of the Rolling Stones showed up on the second day, so we get multiple cutaways of his mug. We see Pollack mousing around with a camera. And there's a lot of sweating by Franklin and the reverend. But Franklin evinces little personality throughout the film (she doesn't talk to the audience until the very end) and quite frankly looks like she doesn't want to be there. As either a concert film or a historical document, this falls flat.

Doc Watch: Perceptions and Deceptions

 

EPICENTRO (A-minus) - Hubert Sauper is guided by his senses as much as his sensibilities. He devastated us with "Darwin's Nightmare," a bleak examination of our destruction of Earth, and he more recently immersed himself with the culture of Sudan in "We Come as Friends." Here he plunks himself and his camera into the heart of Havana to study a narrow slice of life among Cubans.

Even more than his previous films, Sauper reaches for mood as opposed to any sort of true polemic. He appears to be on the side of the children of the revolution, building his narrative structure around the colonialist propaganda that has dominated Cuba since the 1898 Spanish-American War ("Remember the Maine!"). He is aware of the myths created, particularly through his own medium of cinema, and his film here reflects it more than dismantle it.

The genius of the film is the deep dive into the lives of a handful of subjects, including some adolescents who serve as conduits for the Communist Party line, now several generations removed from the 1959 overthrow of the Batista regime. The kids are smart and charming, a rarity in film. Several other characters, including street-smart Clarita, help sketch out the social structure of Havana and the hustle that is everyday living. Actress Oona Chaplin is on hand to provide theater and musical interludes. Sauper, meantime, soaks up the sights and sounds (waves crashing ashore burst wildly like fireworks), and in doing so he making no judgments as he observes both the poverty and the progress of Cuban society. He wonders: Is this utopia, and if so, how can you tell? Here the sum is greater than its parts as we are left with a mesmerizing mix that fills our senses.

AN HONEST LIAR (2015) (B) - James "The Amazing" Randi died last month at 92, so we revisited this overview of his life's work as a magician and debunker of frauds. Randi is a captivating subject, a former escape artist now bent over and grey from age but still full of spit and vinegar, and still admired by his younger acolytes. 

This workmanlike documentary spends a lot of energy on Randi's rivalry with Uri Geller and with his dismantling of the scam televangelist Peter Popoff. But the final third takes a turn when it explores the mysterious immigration saga of Randi's longtime companion Jose Alvarez. It raises the idea of deception to the whole next level.

A bevy of talking heads are on hand to sing his praises, including Penn Jillette and Alice Cooper (Randi used to play executioner at Cooper's concerts, "beheading" the glam rock star). Clips from Johnny Carson's "Tonight Show" and from "Happy Days" place Randi firmly in the pop culture milieu of a bygone era. This is a loving yet clear-eyed tribute to a distinct individual.

General Grumpiness

 

MY DOG STUPID (B) - Alternatively cutting and cute, this adaptation of a John Fante novel by French director Yvan Attal never really settles on a consistent tone as it explores the psyche of a writer who regrets the wife and family he created 25 years ago, an entire brood he blames for the fact that he has never written anything good in that quarter century of domestic purgatory.  

Mourning the death of his dog at the teeth of a neighboring cur and cherishing his last remaining link to his bachelor past (a sports car), Henri (director Attal himself) mopes around, lamenting the lack of sex with his lovely wife, Cecile (the always wonderful Charlotte Gainsbourg), and the mooching of his four children, mostly adults now, who still live with them in the beach house bought with his successful first book. He pines for a certain spot in Rome, where he first found his muse but never could recapture it.

On a rainy night, a big, dumb, horny dog appears on their doorstep and refuses to leave. The huge, wrinkled monster vigorously humps the daughter's boyfriend and is soon dubbed Stupid and tagged with a reputation for gay sexual assault. This childish and somewhat offensive theme -- Henri likes to take the dog places and threaten people with canine assault, har-de-har -- is a lame construct that persistently drags down the proceedings. A few other contrivances -- like Cecile ghost-writing term papers for their intellectually dim son -- give this a sitcom feel at times.

But the more clever idea is that while Henri finds the dog annoying, his children really despise Stupid and begin, one by one, to move out of the house. Bonus! The problem is, Henri and Stupid are further alienating Cecile, piercing even her defenses of a bottle of wine each night to wash down her anti-depressants. Henri had better be careful of what he wishes for. He may yet find out that the freedom of bachelorhood is not as fun when you are pushing 50 and wandering around a big empty house.

This mid-life crisis gets Henri writing again, but at what price? This is a charming little tale -- it makes you want to read Fante's novella (one of two under the title West of Rome, a title that gets playfully mocked here). And Attal and Gainsbourg are perfect together. It could just use a lot less silliness. 

BONUS TRACK

From late in the film, this melancholy version of "And I Love Her" from Brad Mehldau:

  

Road Worriers

 

I'M THIINKING OF ENDING THINGS (B+) - If only Charlie Kaufman had a good editor or perhaps a collaborator who could tell him when it's time to quit while he's ahead. He had a much better batting average as a writer than as a director (compare "Being John Malkovich" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" with "Synecdoche, New York" and "Anomalisa"), the difference between getting A's and getting B's. 

Here, he follows a couple on a trek through a blizzard to meet his parents while she is contemplating "ending things," which likely is a reference to breaking up with the shlub or -- and this is where some viewer might relate -- simply flinging the passenger door open and jumping to her death. Our Gal Jessie Buckley ("Wild Rose"), identified in the credits as Young Woman, because, this being another Kaufman fever dream, her name and identity (and clothing) will change during the course of a full two-and-a-quarter hours. She is figuratively being held hostage -- in the car and relationship -- with Jake (Jesse Plemons from "The Game"). Her thoughts open the dialogue of the movie, and they will essentially narrate the proceedings throughout.

But Kaufman is playing a mind trick here, as is apparent as the narrative unfolds. Long car trips through this treacherous snowfall dominate both ends of the film, with a bizarre intermezzo where we actually meet Jake's parents (Toni Collette and David Thewlis, both struggling to find just the right absurdist tone), who change ages throughout the dinner visit, from newlyweds to death-bed invalids. It doesn't take long to figure out that this movie is more about Jake and his embarrassment over his roots and his insecurity in the relationship.   

If Kaufman has focused more on the car scenes and trusted his two actors to talk out their relationship -- albeit using obscure pop-culture reference to make the filmmaker's points -- this would have been a fascinating study of two millennials coming to grips with what they have created. But the detour to the silly parents feels like a drag. And then Kaufman, for the ending, off-roads it into some truly rough terrain, as Jake insists on making a pit stop his old at high school.

The film peaks with an interpretive dance in the hallways featuring two younger and idealized versions of Jake and his girlfriend. It's at that moment that Kaufman might have had a masterpiece in the making. But then! He doubles and triples down on this bizarre fantasy sequence, dive-bombing into old musicals, lifting dialogue verbatim. Before long, for reasons perhaps only Kaufman can explain, we eventually see an elderly janitor strolling the hallways with a diseased pig. By the time this wraps up, it all feels like a missed opportunity -- at the service of Kaufman's idiosyncrasies -- and all that work that Buckley and Plemons put into this gets tossed aside and marginalized. 

It's a shame, because when "I'm Thinking of Ending Things" is good, it's very good. But when the air starts to seep out of it, it's difficult to go back and appreciate those good parts.

THE LOAD (2019) (B+) - This nugget from last year takes us back to 1999, when NATO was bombing Serbia in support of Kosovo, as we follow Vlada (Leon Lucev), who drives a truck from Kosovo to Belgrade not knowing what he's carrying in the back compartment. Don't ask, don't tell, as the era advised.

For much of the trip, Vlada is joined by 18-year-old Paja (Pavle Cemerekic), a free spirit who looks more toward the future (and perhaps an escape to Germany) than Vlada, who is haunted by the past and worn down by a decade of war in the former Yugoslavia. Vlada carries with him his father's lighter, which was a booby prize from World War II. The inscription on the lighter, from 1958, marks the 15th anniversary of the Battle of Sutjeska, which was somewhat of a last gasp by the Nazis and Italians against the Yugoslav resistance.   

Vlada and Paja take a detour to a tiny Serbian town, where, while they are crashing a wedding party, a couple of punks steal the lighter out of the truck. Vlada tries to chase them and ends up at Popina Memorial Park, which features large triangular structures with big holes cut out of their middles, allowing them to appear, from the proper perspective, to be nested within one another (below).

In this way, Vlada, beaten down by the endless slog of war and under siege by the new generation of Allies teaming up under the NATO banner, is journeying through the past, to a time when the valiant Serbs (led by Tito, the future communist Grand Papa of Yugoslavia) dispatched the bad guys and made the world safer. Vlada eventually returns home to his wife and son, and the film ends on a grand story that Vlada tells to his son about Vlada's own war-veteran father and that father's brother, who did not survive that battle of Sutjeska. It's a powerful, heart-warming allegory that in itself is worth the price of admission here.

Much of the film can seem like a tedious road trip, with not much action or explication. We never definitively find out what's in the back of that truck, but your first guess is probably a good one, and writer-director Ognjen Glavonic (in an impressive feature debut) wisely refuses to spell out everything so literally. As Vlada, Lucev cuts a hulking shaggy presence, resembling a gruff cross between Joaquin Phoenix and Jim Belushi. He figuratively carries the weight of this film on his shoulders, and he makes you care about this melancholy deep dive into the horrors and the cycles of war.

  

Reckless Disregard

FEELS GOOD MAN (B) - This is an entertaining but disturbing documentary about the internet meme surrounding Pepe the Frog, a dopey little comic-book character that got co-opted by white supremacists. Thankfully, it revolves around Mark Furie, the character's creator, who deals with the ups and downs of this internet tussle with deadpan bonhomie. 

The problem is giving any oxygen, let alone this month, to horrible racists, whether they recklessly endanger others overtly or whether, like some here, they just troll away in a basement thinking it's all a little game. One observer boils down our current predicament with troll culture this way: "What they want is for you to be scared by the threat and be mocked for being scared in the first place. The point is to cause that kind of psychic anguish, and they draw a great deal of pleasure from that." 

Exactly. So why even give them the pleasure of trafficking their theories -- whether mocked or not -- in this documentary? That's a good question I pose. Well, there is the idea that exposing such things attacks it with the sunlight that serves as a disinfectant in a democracy. Plus, here, the filmmaker, newcomer Arthur Jones, devoted several years to this subject, and he has a winning rapport with Furie, who is quite the sympathetic indie artist. And there is a story arc here that might warm your heart, if you are a fan of underdogs who persist in the name of what's right.

Then again, you might be overwhelmed with such hate that you'll turn this off after 30 minutes. Let's try to stay hopeful. 

CLASS ACTION PARK (B+) - This HBO documentary revels -- perhaps a bit too much for modern sensitivities -- in the sheer recklessness of the under-supervised water park that opened in Vernon, N.J., in 1978, and is fondly remembered for its disregard for the safety of the hordes -- mostly teenagers -- who went wild there every summer throughout the '80s.

Directors Seth Porges and Chris Charles Scott III commit to the spirit of some mythical lost age of innocence, where grifters got away with shady business practices as long as pre-internet youngsters with mops of hair got to party unsupervised. So what if a few people got maimed, paralyzed or killed? You've got to break a few eggs, as we used to say. The owner of the place, Eugene Mulvihill, is treated as an exotic, mysterious grifter with zero morals.

That said, this might be the epitome of a guilty pleasure.  So many veterans of Action Park, hitting middle age now, revel in their memories, and it's easy to get swept up in their reveries. Comedian Chris Gethard ("Don't Think Twice") is the star here, unrelenting in his appreciation for having survived his experiences. Other former park workers -- it was mostly teens working there, supervising mostly teenage customers -- reveal the naughty goings-on that were permitted. Others analyze the crazy water-park rides (such as a crude loop-de-loop) that were mostly jerry-rigged and certainly not blessed by any lawyers in advance.

It's not until the second half that we hear from a family -- and only one -- that lost a young loved one to the horrific lack of safety measures. Maybe it's the passing of the decades ("tragedy plus time"), but it feels like the filmmakers pay just enough respect to the victims to justify such a ribald, tightly constructed documentary treatment of a lost era.

BONUS TRACK

From "Feels Good Man," a track from Daniel Johnston, "Some Things Last a Long Time":

New to the Queue

Spinning out of the turn ...

Jim Cummings, who burst out of the gate with "Thunder Road," curates Robert Forster's final performance in "The Wolf of Snow Hollow."

We fear that Sofia Coppola might be driving through a rut, but we're open to Rashida Jones and Bill Murray going over the daughter-daddy thing in "On the Rocks."

A retrospective and a warning for the future: "David Attenborough: A Life on Our Planet."

A splash of a debut by Radha Blank, "The Forty-Year-Old Version."

Another debut effort, this one from Cooper Raiff, who stars in this college version of "Before Sunrise," "Shithouse."

1940 to 1980 to 2020

Looking forward to the 3rd of November? Maybe the 5th?

John Lennon, here for 40 years, gone for 40.

And an anthem for 2020:

Mild, Mild West

FIRST COW (B+) - This might be the lightest of Kelly Reichardt's tales of Americana, but it is deeply satisfying nonetheless. It is a film about friendship, an Old West caper touched by whimsy and melancholy.

Reichardt is, arguably, the best storyteller working in American film, who has previously explored manifest destiny ("Meek's Cutoff") and the interplay of same-sex platonic relationships ("Certain Women"), even friendships between human and animal ("Wendy and Lucy"). Here, in Oregon in 1820, a cook, Otis "Cookie" Figowitz (John Magaro), befriends an unintentional outlaw, King-Lu (Orion Lee), as they develop a scheme to steal, by cover of night, the milk of the first cow ever brought to the territory, the prize animal of Chief Factor (Toby Jones). With it they make Cookie's signature buttermilk biscuits that sell like hotcakes, well enough to advance the pair's dreams of heading to the big city of San Francisco. That's essentially the entire plot, which unfolds methodically over two hours.

With sparse, effective dialogue, Reichardt is in no hurry here. The cow itself doesn't show up until 50 minutes into the film. When she does, Cookie treats her like a cherished mate, calming her in the middle of the night and assuring her that her milk is beloved by all. Magaro and Lee have a modern casualness to them. Reichardt doesn't seem to be signaling gay undertones here (though when they meet King-Lu is hiding naked, and the men do make house together in a shack -- and there is, of course, the references to San Francisco), but rather truly aims to focus on a pure male friendship. In a way, this could be a prequel to Reichardt's seminal 2006 film about a reunion in the woods, "Old Joy."

Alia Shawkat appears in a cameo at the beginning, in a scene drenched in foreshadowing that pretty much tips Reichardt's hand at how this whole thing will end for our devious duo. But here, it's about the journey, not the destination. The characters seem to be signaling to its modern audience with time-traveling code. "History isn't here yet. It's coming, but we got here early this time," one of the men intones to the other. "Maybe this time we can be ready for it. We can take it on our own terms." Message received; patience rewarded.

BONUS TRACK

Lovely, spare music from William Tyler babbles like a lazy river throughout, with "A Closing" over the end credits: