NEIL AND PREY

A Merry Christmas to all! Check out my reviews, online at Phoenix Magazine, of Song Sung Blue...

...and Anaconda...

...now in the multiplexes.

ONE PADDLE AFTER ANOTHER

In the multiplexes on Christmas Day:

Marty Supreme--The Marty here is Marty Mauser, a Lower East Side kid of the early '50s. The supremacy in question is at, of all things, table tennis, or ping pong. He is already an insolently prodigal talent at the sport, with designs on becoming a world champ.

Marty himself wouldn't limit his supremacy merely to table tennis; he's already intolerably cocksure about his ability to do pretty much anything he wants. Even though he could, by his own estimation, "sell shoes to amputees," he despises his job in his uncle's shoe store, regarding it as far beneath him. When some journalists in London point out a retired has-been movie star (Gwyneth Paltrow) of the Norma Shearer or Grace Kelly sort, now respectably married to a rich businessman, he decides to seduce her, not because he's ever heard of her--he hasn't--but because why not?

Directed by Josh Safdie from a script he wrote with Ronald Bronstein--loosely based on the exploits of real-life table tennis master Marty "The Needle" Reisman--this film chronicles a little less than a year's worth of Marty's chaotic, farcical yet sometimes sinister misadventures. The task of reviewing it gives rise to glib descriptions like: It's as if Joseph Heller, Philip Roth, Mordechai Richler and David Mamet were locked up together and forced to write a sports movie without being allowed to sleep.

This doesn't quite do Marty Supreme justice; the movie is a true original. But it gives a hint of the flavor. It's a comic, shocking, inspirational epic of midcentury Jewish hustling. And it's built around another jolting, instant-classic performance by Timothée Chalamet in the title role.

Although he's ably supported by Paltrow, Fran Drescher, Abel Ferrara, Kevin O'Leary, Odessa A'zion, Sandra Bernhard, Emory Cohen and many others, it's Chalamet's party on an acting level. Pasty and zit-pocked, his Marty is somehow both shameless and recklessly heroic, a liar with a streak of the sociopathic--he may carry a touch of Sammy Glick from What Makes Sammy Run? as well--alongside a passionate sense of self-regard and integrity. I couldn't help but root for him.

Safdie's storytelling is similarly expansive. The movie delivers antic, slapstick violence, eroticism and tragedy while sustaining a unified tone. Marty can make scandalous quips about the Holocaust, and minutes later Safdie gives us a bizarre Holocaust flashback that's disturbing and moving. Safdie uses anachronistic musical selections, yet he maintains a sense of period. It's a remarkable achievement.

It's also a very loud, abrasive, unrelenting movie--even though it covers months, it has almost the feel of real time--and I wouldn't blame anyone who found it a bit much. But it explores a great subject: brash, self-promoting American hustlers. And it gets at a great truth: that for better or worse, brash, self-promoting American hustlers have a way of getting what they want. For a while, at least.

ROBBED

It's been a week since the arrival of the wretched news that Rob Reiner and his wife Michele were murdered in their home in L.A.

This news would have been a gut-punch in any case, but it was magnified coming on the heels of several days of high-profile violence, like the shootings at Brown University in Providence and the antisemitic massacre at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia.

It was magnified further, of course, by the President's loathsome online response, in which he stated that the Reiners deaths were caused by "the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME, sometimes referred to as TDS."

Although it now appears that the perpetrator was a family member and the crime had nothing to do with the President or with Reiner's politics at all, the President seems to have jumped to the conclusion that it was the act of one of his followers, similar to what happened to Nancy Pelosi's husband.

I admit that this thought crossed my mind as well.

What's astounding is our Scumbag-in-Chief's suggestion that it was Reiner's own fault if some MAGA maniac did this to him. It's an epic achievement in the annals of blaming the victim.

Even many of the President's supporters seemed to find this disgusting, and grateful as I am for anything that moves the needle with them, I have to wonder--this is what did it? Diasappearing people off the streets, extra-judicially blowing up boats, turning our back on Ukraine, you got no problem; making the tragic death of a beloved Hollywood star all about him is the bridge too far?

Also: "Trump Derangement Syndrome?" Enough with that crap. It's not a thing, when applied to opponents of the President. It's another attempt by the President and his followers to use grown-up words without the intellectual equipment. Just to be clear: there is nothing whatsoever irrational, let alone deranged, about being horrified, sickened, frightened and enraged by this President.

As for Reiner himself, it turns out he's one of those celebrities so ingrained in our collective experience of pop culture that we may have taken him for granted. For those of us who came of age during his long run as Mike "Meathead" Stivic on All in the Family, he was more like a family member than an actor.

Then he switched to directing, and rolled out, arguably, the most successful string of durable, quotable popular hits in American movie history: This is Spinal Tap, Stand By Me, The Princess Bride, When Harry Met Sally..., Misery, A Few Good Men and The American President. He certainly proved he was far more than just Carl's son, or Archie's son-in-law.

A day or two later came word of the passing of a far less prominent show business figure: actor, collector and "gorilla man" Bob Burns, at 90.

I interviewed Bob in 1999 for what turned out to be maybe my favorite story I ever got to do for the Phoenix New Times. I chatted with him several more times thereafter but never managed to get to Burbank to see his famous collection. But his book, It Came From Bob's Basement...

...has been on my shelf since 2000; he repeats the same story in it that he told me about a troubling experience he once had in Phoenix. Really nice guy.

RIP, Rob and Bob.

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE; THE MOODY BLUES

Opening today:

The Housemaid--Desperate for a job, Millie, played by Sydney Sweeney, applies as a maid to a rich young housewife and Mom, Nina, living in a spacious Long Island manse. At first Nina (Amanda Seyfried) is impossibly nice, friendly and welcoming, but within a day of starting the gig, it's clear she's given to scary acting out. Her hubby Andrew (Brandon Sklenar) is both hunkalicious and solicitously apologetic for his wife's behavior, while their daughter Cece  (Indiana Elle) is aloof, to say the least. There's a creepy groundskeeper (Michele Morrone) skulking around as well, glaring at Millie but not speaking.

Also, the door to Millie's snug little A-frame garret bedroom locks from the outside, not from the inside.

All of this would be more than enough for most people to see that they should get the hell out while the getting is good on day one. But director Paul Feig and screenwriter Rebecca Sonnenshire, adapting the smash 2022 novel by Frieda McFadden, give Millie understandable reasons to stay in her place. Both Nina's outbursts and the attraction between Millie and Andrew escalate.

This feels something like a contemporary spin on the "hag horror" classics of the '60s, like Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte, and also of later domestic thrillers like The Hand That Rocks the Cradle and Single White Female. Feig tightens the tension skillfully and then, in the last third or so of the film, executes a pretty good twist.

It's probably a hair longer than it needs to be, and it's hard to say how much scrutiny the plot logic could bear. But it's a polished production, the three leads are improbably pretty, and the rip-snorting gothic comeuppances of the homestretch are satisfying. I understand it's hard to get good help these days, but on balance, this Housemaid gets a good letter of reference.

Then again, before I start complaining that The Housemaid is too long, maybe I should consider it in comparison to...

Avatar: Fire and Ash--On the long list of James Cameron's strengths as a filmmaker, knowing when to quit is notably absent. Toward the end of Cameron's 1994 True Lies, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis kiss while a mushroom cloud erupts in the distance behind them. Most directors would grasp that this meant the movie was over; Cameron insisted on one last grapple on a harrier jet. He's like a little kid who wants to keep playing army when it's time to go home for dinner.

This trait--and I'm clearly in the minority for considering it a weakness--reaches an apex in this third Avatar epic, Avatar: Fire and Ash, which runs to well over three hours, well over an hour longer than Citizen Kane. It's the next clash between exploitative colonizing humans and the Na'vi, the tall, tailed, blue, holistic, new-agey inhabitants of the lush, idyllic distant world Pandora. I'd say it was the climactic clash, but apparently two more sequels are planned.

As someone who liked but didn't love the first Avatar, back in 2009, and also as one who tends to get grumpier the longer a movie runs over two hours, I must admit I wasn't the ideal target audience for this. So perhaps it carries extra weight when I say that I found it...well, too long, certainly, but still a compelling sci-fi spectacle, loaded with grand scenes that recall sources as venerable as the New and Old Testaments.

The dialogue isn't poetry ("Dude, they're fighting!") but the dialogue isn't the point; the shimmering, immersive visuals and mythic yarnspinning are what the movie is for. In the last hour or so I was fully invested; I wanted to see the good guys win and the bad guys lose.

Among many others, Sam Worthington, Stephen Lang and Sigourney Weaver--particularly good as a starry-eyed young Na'vi--lend their voices and motion-capture presences to the movie; Giovanni Ribisi, Jemaine Clement and Edie Falco are amusing among the humans. But easily the most striking performance is by Oona Chaplin as Varang, a hissing warrior Na'vi who sides with the earthlings against our heroes. She's fierce and seductive.

The Na'vi always remind me of blue-skinned Anne Coulters; nevertheless they have a certain glamour and sexiness. My favorite Na've trait was their ears; I love how they move expressively when they speak, or even change expression. If there was an Oscar for best ears, Fire and Ash would be a shoo-in.

GOV STORY

Opening today:

Ella McCay--Emma Mackey shares initials with the character she plays here. The heroine of this latest from writer-director James L. Brooks is the Lieutenant Governor of an unnamed eastern state. When her boss, the beloved incumbent "Governor Bill" (Albert Brooks) is poached by the President--probably not our current President--for a cabinet post, Ella finds herself swept into the Governor's office, even though she comes across like a nervous college freshman at a job interview.

Narrated by Ella's aide Estelle (Julie Kavner), the movie explores the title character's wacky challenges and less wacky, more serious family dysfunctions, past and present. In flashback, we see her obsessively philandering father (Woody Harrelson) and long-suffering mother (Rebecca Hall) leave her to be parented by her adoring, fretful Aunt Helen (Jamie Lee Curtis). In the present, we see her hustler husband (Jack Lowden) go bonkers over the potential power and perks of Ella's new position.

We see her trying to navigate how to respond to her implication in perhaps the most inoffensive political scandal imaginable. And we see her trying to reconnect with her brilliant but reclusive younger brother (Spike Fearn), who suffers from severe anxiety disorder.

This hectic, haphazardly structured movie rattles along from one strand to another and back in the usual Brooks manner, warm and eccentric and open, with appropriate reserve, to the potential for human growth. I think what Brooks is after here is a sketch of what a genuinely virtuous person in modern American politics might look like; a Ms. Smith Goes to the State Capitol. Ella is a sort of American political Princess Myshkin or Doña Quixote, a hapless knight caught up in a whirlwind despite the most unimpeachable of intentions.

It's a great idea, and I enjoyed Ella McCay, but I'm not sure it hangs together convincingly. In part this has to do with Mackey's youthfulness, and the callow and somewhat ditzy nature of the character. The role requires somebody who can play both teenage and thirtysomething; Mackey is perfectly believable as the first, not so much as the second.

Also, not all of the plot strands pay off. The relationship between Ella and the ever-reliable Curtis as Aunt Helen is fully realized; so is the connection between our heroine and Brooks (Albert), hilariously weary as the pre-emptively compromised Governor Bill, and with Kavner's Estelle, and with Kumail Nanjiani as her stolid, loyal State Trooper bodyguard. But the scenes with Harrelson as the squirrelly Dad come off like a dead end, they don't really offer anything unexpected or add anything much to the story.

It's possible that movie's best, or at least most interesting, episode is one in which the title character doesn't appear. When Ella's troubled brother braves going outside to visit a former girlfriend (Ayo Edebiri) with whom he wants to re-connect, and the two struggle mightily to get around their tics and defenses to communicate the simple truth that they like each other, it feels like the essence of exasperating romcom complications boiled down to a single scene.

ROLL OF A LIFETIME

Now in the multiplexes, from Fathom Events:

Merrily We Roll Along--Fanatics of Stephen Sondheim don't need, and anyway wouldn't listen to, advice about whether or not to go see this. Directed by Maria Friedman, the film captures her revival of the musical, starring Jonathan Groff, Daniel Radcliffe and Lindsay Mendez, that sold out its Broadway run starting in 2023.

With music and lyrics by Sondheim and a book by George Furth, based on a '30-era play by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, the show recounts the long relationship between three dear friends, composer Frank (Groff), lyricist Charlie (Radcliffe) and novelist and critic Mary (Mendez). The gimmick is that it traces the story backwards, starting in the mid-70s with Frank as a jaded Hollywood bigshot, estranged from Charlie, and working back until we see the trio's callow, idealistic aspiring days in the late '50s. Love, unrequited and otherwise, ambition, neglect, compromise, disillusionment and resentment are all seen in full bloom before we see their seeds being planted years earlier.

The first Broadway production flopped in 1977. But the show eventually developed a devoted cult across several successful revivals around the world, before triumphantly returning to Broadway at the Hudson Theatre under the Brit Friedman's direction (and revisions). The version that opens in the multiplexes this weekend consists of footage shot from three performances in front of audiences near the end of the run in June of 2024, with some close-ups shot during the afternoons. As a result it isn't just a blunt recording of a performance; Friedman's agile, on-point direction makes it a cinematic experience.

Characteristically for Sondheim, the songs explore timeless, often painful human situations in bright, frenetic patter-song lyrics. They're so manically precise that they could seem facile at times, but Sondheim's direct emotional honesty holds glibness at bay. So, here, do the performers. The supporting cast is full of knockout Broadway workhorses, but Groff, Radcliffe and Mendez are all sublime, with Groff bringing a particularly enraptured intensity to Frank.

It's possible that the timing of the shoot also added to the emotional charge of the movie; we're seeing actors at the end of a run, saying farewell to a smash that's also likely to be one of the better pieces of material they're ever going to get to do. The tears we see running down their faces probably aren't just acting.

Now available on HBOMax:

The Family McMullen--At the end of the 1995 indie fave The Brothers McMullen, the debut feature of writer-director Edward Burns, the major characters seemed more or less happily paired off. This thirty-years-later sequel shows us the mess that divorce, death, kids and life in general has made of those well-plotted courses. For award eligibility, the movie played for just one day in the multiplexes in October; The Wife and I caught it here in Phoenix in a theater empty save for one other couple, but now it's available for streaming.

It begins on one Thanksgiving and closes on the next. The host for the first dinner is the long-divorced Finbar "Barry" McMullen (Burns), an apparently successful writer, to judge by his palatial Brooklyn home. Much to his dismay, said home gets invaded after dinner by his relations, like his sad-sack brother Patrick (the likable Michael McGlone), a mawkishly sentimental, piously practicing Catholic who's reluctantly also in the process of divorcing.

Barry's son Tommy (Pico Alexander) then moves back home to pursue an acting career, followed by Barry's daughter Patty (Halston Sage) who has broken off, or at least temporarily paused, her engagement because the fiancé wants to experiment with more sexual partners. She soon meets her first childhood crush, a handsome Greek-American plumber (Sam Vartholomeos) who makes her wonder if maybe the fiancé isn't on to a good idea.

Meanwhile Barry and Patrick's widowed sister-in-law Molly (Connie Britton) plans to sell the  cherished, frozen-in-the-'80s McMullen home back on Long Island; she also crosses paths with an old crush (Bryan D'Arcy James) from her married days. And Barry learns that the mother of her son's new love Karen (Julianna Canfield) is Nina (Tracee Ellis Ross), an old flame of his. If you're guessing that those two re-connect...

...well, you'll just have to watch and see. Driven along by Seamus Egan's sprightly Irish flute score, The Family McMullen is, like the Brothers, extremely low-key and mild, and I found that to be just what I wanted. The characters gently rib and mock each other over a palpable undercurrent of love and an openhearted desire to be decent, and if nothing terribly dramatic, or even terribly farcical, happens to resolve the plotlines, that relaxing atmosphere itself becomes part of the movie's charm.

It may be that The Family McMullen will have particular appeal for those who came of age as moviegoers during the '80s and early '90s. Burns makes overt visual and verbal references to such faves of the era as Moonstruck, When Harry Met Sally and (most hilariously) GoodFellas, and the whole movie, with its crosscutting storylines, its voice-over asides and its use of a holiday as a framing device, seems heavily indebted to Woody Allen's Hannah and her Sisters. It's grimmer to imagine where Allen's characters might find themselves, thirty-some years later.