Patriots Day

Director: Peter Berg
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Kevin Bacon, John Goodman, J.K. Simmons, Michelle Monaghan, Alex Wolff, Themo Melikidze, Michael Beach, James Colby, Jimmy O. Yang, Rachel Brosnahan, Christopher O' Shea, Melissa Benoist, Khandi Alexander
Running Time: 133 min.
Rating: R

★★★ (out of ★★★★)

Depending on your opinion of very recent real life tragedies being brought to the big screen, Peter Berg's Patriots Day will either be a heavily anticipated or nervously dreaded experience. That the end result is positive can mainly be attributed to the realism and tension he brings to the sensitive material, which recreates an attack and subsequent manhunt sure to have many on pins and needles despite everyone's full knowledge of the outcome.  There are about two or three sequences in the film that are not only eye-opening in terms of the little nuggets of information provided, but in their depiction of both the disappointment and eventual triumph of the human spirit all within the span of a couple of days.

The usually inconsistent, over-the-top Berg shows surprising restraint, with star Mark Wahlberg taking on a semi-fictional role that's not only right in his wheelhouse, but firmly rooted in his own hometown, reminding us the gravitas he brings when properly cast in a part to suit his strengths. The entire picture is essentially broken down into sections, with character sketches sprinkled throughout. The attack, the shootout, the hostage situation, the manhunt, and most controversially, the interrogation.

While the tragedy occurred only four years ago, it's startling to consider just how much has already been forgotten about that day and in the hours leading up to 2013's doomed Boston Marathon. It's an excellently made, respectful encapsulation destined to be unfairly picked apart and unpacked due to the director's politics. But in this case, skeptics are reading into something that just isn't there. As the unnecessary mini-documentary that closes the film shows, Berg's film definitely conveys a point of view, but it's far from political and one you'd hope everyone shares.

When something like this happens, the immediate reaction should be anger and outrage, with any compassion reserved for the victims and their families. In fact, it's so obvious that you'd have to heavily question the need for the non-fictional epilogue closing the film, restating with real life accounts what was already conveyed in the preceding two hours. Whether it was a preemptive defense against unfair critics ready to slam the right-skewing filmmaker for even taking the project, there's no need for anyone to feel guilty for making or watching this. It's worthwhile, both for history and opinion, thankfully done well enough to leave little room for heated debate over its merits.

It's April 15, 2013 and injured Police Sergeant Tommy Saunders (Wahlberg) is returning to work the Boston Marathon after a recent suspension, looking to prove he's put his issues behind him, taking marching orders from Commissioner Ed Davis (John Goodman). But when two bombs are detonated near the finish line of the race by Tamerlan Tsarnaev (Themo Melikidze) and his younger brother Dzhokhar (Alex Wolff), chaos and bloodshed erupt with the surviving victims being taken to local hospitals. Couples such as spectators Jessica Kensky (Rachel Brosnahan) and husband Patrick Downes (Chistopher O'Shea) are separated and unaware for hours whether their spouse is even still alive. With FBI Special Agent Richard DesLauriers (Kevin Bacon) taking over the investigation and working in conjunction with Boston Police, they begin to close in on their suspects. But the brothers won't go quietly, inflicting more damage until eventually being brought down by the law enforcement and citizens of a tough city who band together under the worst circumstances imaginable.

Berg does an admirable job setting the table for what's to come, introducing characters who we know, or maybe even specifically remember, play roles in the tragedy. Some are given more screen time than others, but a clear emphasis is put on law enforcement and Wahlberg's Sgt. Saunders, a composite of various real-life officers on duty that day. Told directly in a chronologically coherent way, title cards count down to the start of the race and the direct aftermath in the following hours are laid out as a compelling police procedural. It's hard to think of a box that goes unchecked, or a moment where are memory isn't jogged as to certain details that made the headlines, but without the specificity we get here.

The information we're privy to is especially insightful when concerning the actions of the bombers both leading up to and directly following the attack. It's also kind of frightening, as the perpetrators take center stage in a manner that could easily turn off those already made uncomfortable by the very idea of this film existing. We see their preparations, sloppy game plan for escape and the surprisingly tough fight they put up against Boston's finest. And of this is viewed through a likely accurate prism that shows them hanging out and arguing like brothers separated in age usually would. Tamerlan's clearly the mastermind and aggressor, taking his younger brother along for the ride, poisoning his mind a little more, a detail supporting the narrative running through the news at the the time.

From the recreation of the crime scene to painstaking video recognition techniques, a step-by-step process is shown to explain how the authorities went from literally no information to putting an entire city on lockdown until eventually descending upon the single surviving terrorist hiding in a neighbor's yard. If there's any issues with the film, they'd stem from it being so caught up in in the intriguing nuts and bolts of the event and its aftermath that it can sometimes come across as too rote or mechanical. It's a strange complaint considering Berg's the director, but this still works better as an action thriller than a historical drama. While the revolving door of major and minor characters makes it harder to be invested in any of them for lengthy periods, Wahlberg, Bacon and a couple of others get to shine through in their roles, with the likes of Goodman, Michelle Monaghan and an effective J.K. Simmons (as nearby Watertown Police Sergeant Jeffrey Pugliese) trying to leave an imprint in lesser ones, the former unfortunately saddled as a stereotypical worried wife to Wahlberg's hero.

Ironically, it's two sequences centering around forgotten supporting players ignored by the media that land the biggest emotional blow. The first involves the bravery of carjacking hostage Dun Meng (Jimmy O. Yang), who summons a strength from inside that few could likely access during such an ordeal. On the other end of the spectrum is the jaw-dropping interrogation of Tamerlan Tsarnaev's loyally subservient, radicalized wife, Katherine Russell (Melissa Benoist) at the hands of Khandi Alexander's nameless "The Interrogator." That's who she's actually listed as in the film's credits and after you view the controversial scene (the best acted of the entire picture), you'll know why any other name or description couldn't possibly do her justice.

Since Berg lays everything out so logically it becomes an even bigger question mark as to why he chose to tag on a mini-documentary at the end of a faithful adaptation of events that hardly needs it. Where a quick glimpse at the real people posing with their onscreen counterparts, or even a simple graphic or title card onscreen updating us on those involved would more than suffice, we instead get something you'd more likely find as DVD extra, assuming that medium were still thriving or relevant. While it's unfair to entirely dismiss it or his intentions, the answer as to why Berg would make such a creatively questionable choice proves he has no agenda other than to pay tribute to the survivors and law enforcement. And as far as agendas go, that's a pretty good one to have.
  

Source Code

Director: Duncan Jones
Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga, Jeffrey Wright, Michael Arden, Scott Bakula 
Running Time: 94 min.
Rating: PG-13

★★★★ (out of ★★★★)

Well, it took twenty years but I finally got my Quantum Leap movie. There's nothing quite like watching your favorite television series of all-time provide the inspiration for what turns out to be your favorite film of the year. Frustrated as I was that I couldn't catch Source Code in theaters, I was reassured by those who knew me that when I eventually did see it, I'd flip out. Good call. Director Duncan Jones has already proven himself an expert at intelligent science fiction storytelling with his 2009 masterpiece Moon and this just might be even better than that, despite advance buzz shoehorning it as some kind of mainstream action thriller. The ideas this contains are as huge as in that smaller-scale film and that it's so skillfully disguised amidst a 94-minute lean, mean pulse-pounding thriller is not only a credit to Jones' direction, but a multi-layered, Rubik's Cube of a script by Ben Ripley that deserves placement alongside the greats in the time travel genre. And as someone who's seen just about every time travel movie made and every scenario presented ad nauseum, that isn't faint praise. Make no mistake that this probably couldn't have been made had there been no Quantum Leap, but also don't underestimate how much Jones adds, and how well it'll play for those who have never even seen an episode of the cult 80's series starring Scott Bakula and Dean Stockwell. This takes an already perfect premise and updates it, adding twists and turns, as well as timely elements of tragedy and human interest that make for an unforgettable viewing experience.

Captain Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a American soldier returning from a tour of duty in Afghanistan who suddenly awakes to find himself on a commuter train traveling to Chicago, not as himself, but school teacher Sean Fentress, a man whose body he's "leaped" into and is occupying. That morning the train will explode, killing everyone on board and Colter is told via Captain Goodwin (Vera Farmiga) that he's been recruited as part of an experimental computer program created by Dr. Rutledge (Jeffrey Wright) called the "Source Code," which enables the user full access to the last eight minutes of a person's life. Not exactly time travel, but "time re-assignment" since the big catch is that there's nothing Colter (as Sean) can do to prevent the catastrophe in what's essentially a computer generated alternate timeline. His mission is solely to gain information on the identity of the bomber to prevent a larger future attack and he's being sent back as many times as is necessary to do it. With each eight-minute trip he learns more about the passengers and with the help of Sean's girlfriend Christina (Michelle Monaghan, comes closer to solving the crime, even as he's continually kept in the dark as to Goodwin and Rutledge's true motivations, as well as his own personal history.

Given that Colter must repeatedly re-live and re-play the same scenario over the course of the film, there's that temptation to compare this to Groundhog Day, which milked a somewhat similar premise for comedic effect. You could, but it would be inaccurate since it never once feels like we're watching the same scenes over and over again, nor is there anything the protagonist can do to actually alter history, one of two huge deviations the script makes from the Quantum Leap template. Jones doesn't spoon feed us any information and trust viewers' intelligence enough to dive right into the scenario from the very first frame, spilling out the revelations at a perfectly timed pace. There's a lot we don't know for a good stretch of time and occasionally Colter knows even less. Between trips, he's hauled up in a cockpit interrogated by these military bureaucrats who offer few answers, no leads and give little explanation of anything that's happened, yet coldly expect everything possible from him in return. The look and feel of these scenes are eerily reminiscent of 1995's sci-fi mind-bender 12 Monkeys, in which an unwilling time travel participant is also cruelly taken advantage of and at risk of being sacrificed for a greater good.

The events on the train never feel like a repeats but rather different sides of an expertly crafted Hithcockian puzzle in which the audience must pay attention to each subtle detail with the possibility they could come into play later, and a few do. Nearly the entire film takes place in a single location and Jones squeezes an unbearable amount of tension out of each passing moment, taking full advantage of every corner of the frame, each passenger and every one of their tiniest actions. There's a darkly brilliant twist that comes into play at almost the half-way mark that I can't reveal, but it changes the game completely, yet somehow still feels organic to the story and raises the stakes higher. Jones' deft handling of the material sends it over-the-top but if Ben Ripley's ingenious spec script (justifiably ranked as one of Hollywood's top unproduced screenplays), which offers up impossible questions, then somehow manages to logically answer all of them concisely, isn't Award-worthy, I don't know what is. The terrorism and thriller aspects also interweave seamlessly with the more sci-fi driven elements, giving the story the same timely, human interest undercurrent that became the hallmark of Quantum Leap during its run. When we finally do meet the bomber he doesn't disappoint, more than exceeding all expectations of frightening everyday creepiness.

While watching it's almost impossible to stop and consider performances are being given as the action moves at such a brisk clip it feels as if you're on a ride with the characters, rather than a witness to great acting, but we are. Gyllenhaal has to play crucial scenes out of order more numerously and differently that in any other kind of film because of the complicated narrative framework. Because this is an action thriller and the story and direction seem to be the stars, it's easy to overlook just how much work he has to do in what's at its core a character driven piece that rests on his authenticity in the role. He's a worthy successor to Scott Bakula and fills his shoes, which just might be the highest compliment I'm capable of giving anyone. At first, Farmiga and Wright seem like they'll just be playing talking heads but the info that comes out, the deeper and more complex their characters and performances as them become, especially Farmiga's toward the third act. As for Wright, he's got this crazy mad scientist thing down pat and it's fun watching some of the campy choices he makes with his vocal delivery and mannerisms, while still maintaining a dark, twisted edge. Monaghan delivers as Christina, the only part that seems like it could be filled by anyone else, but that doesn't mean another actress would necessarily click as well with Gyllenhaaal, with whom she shares every scene.

Going in, I was aware of the Scott Bakula cameo, but even knowing a little about the nature of it couldn't prepare me for how awesome a moment it was to hear the voice and have him and the show acknowledged in such a meaningful way at the most crucial point in the film. I can probably speak for most hardcore Quantum Leap fans in saying I was pinching myself that Jones openly acknowledged the influence, inducing that feeling of excitement absent since the show left the air in 1993. And wait until you see what happens in the final eight minutes. Too many promising thrillers are victims of silly studio-driven concessions to send audiences home happy and rake in more cash, but this isn't afraid to go dark and leave you thinking hard. Supposedly, there's an alternate ending floating around somewhere but I have little desire to see it since this one is perfect, providing just enough closure, but leaving more than enough to ponder and debate afterward. I'm still not sure I even completely understood it, which is a good thing, as its structure definitely lends itself to repeated viewings.

It seems at every year at about this time I throw my arms up in the air complaining about the lack of quality films, until something comes a long and kicks me in the face, reminding me why I still bother. This kicked me hard. As someone who's always had a sneaking suspicion Quantum Leap could serve as the perfect jumping-off point for a feature if the right creative choices were made, it's great to finally see it happen, adapted and tweaked to embellish the original conceit and open it up cinematically. While Jones proudly wears those influences on his sleeve, what's most impressive is how it still remains completely fresh and original, far smarter than audiences and critics have given it credit for. Rich in ideas and brilliant in construction, Source Code easily ranks among the most ambitious  science fiction efforts in years and is one I can't wait to revisit soon. Rather than a review, it feels like I should instead be writing Jones a "thank you" note for briefly resuscitating my favorite show and letting its ideas realize their full potential on the big screen.

Somewhere

Director: Sofia Coppola
Starring: Stephen Dorff, Elle Fanning, Michelle Monaghan, Chris Pontius, Simona Ventura
Running Time: 98 min
Rating: R

★★★ ½ (out of ★★★★)

With fewer and fewer stories left to tell, there's thankfully still many ways left to do it if you're skilled enough. Sophia Coppola's minimalist approach isn't for everyone, as single scene or shots can linger endlessly, making even the most patient viewers wonder if the film was edited at all. And that's the thing with mood pieces: You have to be in the mood to watch them. With Somewhere, Coppola favors the stripped down, bare bones style she employed in her three previous features but manages to drop the volume down even lower. Those who didn't care for The Virgin Suicides, Lost Translation or Marie Antoinette will find this even more frustrating but it deserves mention alongside them, which is to say it's very good and will likely age well. And like those, it's equally brilliant and infuriating at the same time, its flaws as endearing as its strengths. Think of it as Lost in Translation meets The Wrestler meets The Brown Bunny meets an art house version of Entourage or Californication. While she's yet to release a work as impressive as peers like Fincher, P.T. Anderson, or Aronofsky and her output's more polarizing, she's been nothing if not consistent, extracting unexpected career peak performances from the likes of Kirsten Dunst (twice), Scarlett Johansson and Bill Murray. She does it again here this time with another even more unlikely suspect and again proves few are as capable of using visuals and music in a movie as effectively. All-around, it's very similar--some would say too similar--to her previous efforts, but that's fine by me.

The film follows, at least for the first couple of minutes, a black Ferrrari as it continuously laps a racetrack. Its driver is famous actor Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff), whose solitary excursions in that car represent the only forward momentum in his life.  Hauling himself up at the famed Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles, where he's nursing an arm injury and doing press interviews for his latest action film with an unhappy co-star (Michelle Monaghan), we can assume from their brief, awkward interactions, he slept with at some point. Despite having booze, pills and women at his beckoned call at seemingly every hour of the day and enjoying unparalleled professional success, he's an emotional zombie giving the term "going through the motions" a whole new meaning. Bored, absent and detached, he actually falls asleep twice during his interactions with women, the first time almost inexcusably during a twin strippers' pole dancing routine set to the Foo Fighters' "My Hero" that's so compellingly, brilliantly awful it could probably wake a corpse. The unexpected arrival of his 11-year-old daughter Cleo (Elle Fanning) changes his plans, as her mother, with whom he shares custody, disappears without giving an indication as to when or if she'll return. With little choice but to bond with her, they grow closer and he must decide whether this lonely, empty lifestyle is really for him.

The startling similarities between this and Coppola's previous two films won't be lost on anyone. Once again, she returns to the central theme of loneliness and isolation in the face of fame that characterized Lost in Translation and Marie Antoinette. Admittedly, the hard knocks that come with being rich and famous isn't exactly the kind of topic that gets audiences on your side, but that's not her job. If this is what she knows and wants to explore then by all means she should. If she didn't actually explore it that would be a problem but this isn't a carbon copy of Lost in Translation, despite them both sharing a hotel setting and the plot of a depressed actor at a crossroads. There's actually a lot less going on here. From the opening scene right up until the end, not a lot is said, but somehow you're keyed in to exactly what's going on from moment to moment. The film's style encourages its characters, the visuals and the two central performances plenty of room to breathe, very often mimicking the aimless, trance-like state of its protagonist. Yet despite being told nothing and having to figure out this guy for ourselves, it's a strangely pressure-less experience to sit through, offering relief from the burden of being inundated by too many details. If Coppola's an expert at anything, it's letting the visuals, music and acting speak for itself. Unafraid of letting scenes linger past the point they typically should (or we're used to) to convey a mood, a practice session at an ice rink goes on twice as long as you'd expect and is all the more memorable for it.


Stephen Dorff is the perfect empty vessel, as Coppola tries to do for him what Aronofsky did for Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler (this film's working title could have easily been The Actor) by taking an actor's personality (or maybe lack of it) and wrapping everything else around it to fit. Maybe that wasn't the intention but Dorff's passivity is so convincing it could have fooled me. It's only speculation how much personal experience he channeled to get inside Johnny's head and while Dorff's career or life, from what we know, isn't in the dire shape Rourke's was, an artsy, meditative character study still isn't something we'd usually associate with the B-list star of Blade and Cecil B. Demented.  He ends up being pretty good at it. Elle Fanning (now a threat to surpassing her older sister as the family's breadwinner) gives Cleo a poise and intelligence beyond her years while still maintaining the naivety of a little girl faking obliviousness to her father's severe shortcomings, chipping away at his indifference. She knows what's up, and how Fanning subtly shows it is what makes the performance. The final scene is a keeper and well-earned, telling us all we need to know while leaving enough behind for us to fill in the rest.

Movies like Somewhere are the ones to watch out for because they seem at first to be inert, or worse, about "nothing," but have this way of staying with you because they end up being about much more than just their plot, which in this case is familiar.  I hate judging a director's current work against their previous efforts but it's almost impossible to view this film in any way but through the prism of her others, completing a quadrilogy of loneliness that started with The Virgin Suicides. Strangely, despite coming really close, she hasn't made a movie as compelling as that one again, but is instead effectively carving out career that builds on the themes she introduced in it in memorably divergent ways. Say what what you will about Coppola, but she's as one of the few filmmakers working today whose new releases are, for better or worse, accompanied by an "event" feeling because of their distinctive style. Somewhere meets that expectation, which is really the most that could have been asked of it.

Mission Impossible 3

Director: J.J. Abrams
Starring: Tom Cruise, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Billy Crudup, Ving Rhames, Michelle Monaghan, Jonathan Rhys Myers, Keri Russell, Maggie Q
Running Time: 126 min.
Rating: PG-13

*** (out of ****)

Before seeing Mission Impossible 3 I remarked to someone that I didn't think I've ever seen a bad Tom Cruise movie. That streak continues. M:I:3 is less complicated than the other films in the series, is much more focused and adds a human element to the story that the other two lacked. Plus, it has a great villain, which always helps. It's probably the best in the series. That's not to say I necessarily want to see another one and it's unlikely we will since Cruise was fired from Paramount after this was released, (more due to his offscreen antics than the earnings of this film). Still, it would be a shame if people avoided this for that reason because accomplishes everything it sets out to do quite well.

I.M.F. agent Ethan Hunt is now retired from the field and spends his days training up and coming agents like Lindsey Farris (Keri Russell). When Lindsey is kidnapped by dangerous arms dealer Davian (Oscar winner Philip Seymour Hoffman) Hunt is drafted back into action and ends up getting more than he bargained for when the life of his new financee (Michelle Monaghan) is also put at risk. To save her he has to retrieve the mysterious "rabbit's foot." To the script's credit, we never find out what the "rabbit's foot" is . All we know is that it's incredibly important. I really wish more films would do this. It's so much more effective when the filmmakers don't reveal that information because whatever it is will just pale in comparison to what the viewers imagine it will be.

At the center of the story is the question of whether someone is Hunt's line of work can even have a normal relationship with somebody and there are some good scenes with Cruise and Monaghan that support it. This is an improvement over the other Mission Impossible films in that it dares to raise questions about anything. Of course, the story is beside the point. It's just an excuse to have some terrific action scenes and chase sequences and I assure you there's definitely no shortage of them. There's a great sequence at The Vatican where Hunt and his team have so many costume changes I almost lost count and a chase scene/shoot out on a bridge that will blow your mind. There's the memorable introduction of a bomb that detonates inside your head as well as the return of one of my favorite elements of the MI series: the use of masks. It's a special treat here as we get to see Seymour Hoffman do a dead-on Cruise impersonation. This guy didn't win an Oscar for nothing and it's a thrill to see him ham it up in a villainous role like this, a nice change from the usual character driven roles we see him in all the time. It makes a big difference when an actor of his caliber is cast and it's great seeing him having such a good time with it. I also liked the interplay with Hunt and his I.M.F. Team and if you don't know who Maggie Q is, you definitely will after this movie. She makes an entrance at a party you won't soon forget.

M:I:3 has some twist and turns and the movie effectively starts it's first scene at the end and then works backwards showing us how we got there, adding a heightened sense of importance to the proceedings. This is the feature directorial debut of Alias and Lost creator J.J. Abrams and he proves him himself more than capable of making the leap to big budget action without missing a beat. Tom Cruise is often taken for granted as an actor and this special edition DVD features a montage of all his films and it's really amazing when you look back at his output. We also find out on a "making of" feature on the disc that much to the director (and probably his agent's) horror he does actually perform much if not all of his own stunts. You could argue he should be contractually obligated to given the insane salary he commands per picture, but the fact remains few actors do all their own stunts. There's also a commentary track on the disc with Cruise and Abrams that's entertaining enough, as it's defintely fun to hear how they did some of the more spectacular action sequences. While my expectations couldn't have been lower heading into M:I:3, I found it was a fun, exciting way to spend two hours.