Author: Cliff Gold

The Goldfinch (Ansel Elgort, Oakes Fedley, Finn Wolfhard, Nicole Kidman, Jeffrey Wright, Sarah Paulson, Luke Wilson) – One of the most highly anticipated film adaptations of the year is The Goldfinch.  Based faithfully on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Donna Tartt, The Goldfinch is a brooding, long soap opera that loyalists to the book will love.  In other words, if you liked the book, you will like the movie.  But if you didn’t read the 700+-page novel, you will likely be disappointed.  That appeared to be the consensus at the advanced screening I attended.

The basic story is that our protagonist, Theo Decker, survives a terrorist attack on the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York that killed dozens, including his mother.  As he awoke in the ashes of the explosion, he takes the famous Carel Fabritius painting, The Goldfinch, which is presumed destroyed.  Taken in by rich socialites in the wake of his mother’s death, he becomes part of the family, which includes his friend, Andy.  Andy’s repressed mother (played by Nicole Kidman) protects Theo, identifies the child’s trauma, and even gives him prescription sleeping medication.  When Theo’s estranged and derelict father, Larry (Luke Wilson), finally shows up to take his son to a new home in Las Vegas, the boy enters a new life.  In Vegas, we meet a new cast of characters, including Larry’s self-centered, smart-alecky girlfriend, Xandra (Sarah Paulson), and a new schoolmate, Boris (Finn Wolfhard of Stranger Things).  Both Xandra and Boris are drugheads with Theo becoming a willing addict.  Boris is bold but he is also regularly beaten by his Russian father.  In short, everyone in this film is damaged.

When Theo realizes his father is using him to get to the money left to him by his mother, he flees back to New York.  He shows up at the doorstep of an antique restorer, Hobie (Jeffrey Wright), whose niece, Pippa (Ashleigh Cummins), received a head injury in the museum explosion, which also took the life of Hobie’s partner.  Hobie teaches Theo the antiques business where the young man proves to be a brilliant marketer and front man.  But one day, he misrepresents a piece of furniture as an antique to the wrong person, who reveals the fraud and, through amazingly implausible research, reveals that Theo stole The Goldfinch.  It’s here that the movie actually develops some pace.  All this takes about an hour-and-45-minutes.  Up to here, it is all mood, piano music, and lethargic pace.  Suddenly, things happen.

Theo gets engaged to Kitsey (she is Andy’s sister), his soulmate, Pippa, returns from England, and Boris shows up in New York.  Theo’s addiction drives him down; Boris reveals the biggest secret of the movie; Hobie delivers a lecture; and The Goldfinch goes missing. The mood pic becomes a thriller in Act III, and all I can think about is how much better this movie would have been if 30 minutes had been taken out of the first two acts.

Director John Crowley (Brooklyn) stays way too true to the novel to the detriment to the movie. He lingers on the character development in the way a novel might.  All the viewer wants to do is to skip 200-300 pages and get right to the good stuff.

The Goldfinch had a real chance to be a good movie but the award-winning novel doomed its cinematic possibility.  The best acting belongs to the unknown actors, particularly those playing Theo and Boris.  Kidman is better as the repressed mother than the aging widow (she actually ages way too fast).  Wilson and Paulson are both miscast.  Jeffrey Wright is wonderful as Hobie.

Previewed in the past week at the Toronto International Film Festival, the movie has garnered generally poor reviews.  This film will not do well at the box office.  However, it is a must-see for people who slogged through the 700 pages of the book because they will generally feel satisfied that Crowley and Company were true to the novel.

Mike Wallace Is Here (Mike Wallace) – This feels like a no-holds-barred documentary about America’s most feared journalist/interviewer.  Wallace, who started out as a pitchman and game-show host, morphed into a disciple of Edward R. Morrow and Don Hewitt as well as a colleague of Walter Cronkite, Harry Reasoner, Morley Safer, and the rest of the 60 Minutes team.

His direct and occasionally obnoxious interview style cowered world leaders, celebrities, and unwitting victims.  A call from Wallace or his producers stoked fear in some of the most powerful people in the world.  He interviewed most of the world’s most important politicians and exposed despots and scandals.  His reputation was legendary.  His stamp on journalism was undeniable.

Behind the scenes, he was a self-admittedly crappy father.  He was married enough times that he avoided the question in interviews.  Where Mike Wallace Is Here showcases the intrepid reporter’s most famous interviews and his early career, it glosses over most of his personal foibles.  Whether you love this documentary or dislike it probably revolves around whether you think it gives Wallace a pass on his personal life.  I don’t think it ruins it at all.

Israeli Director Avi Belkin objectively presents the journalist who Americans know as the beating heart of 60 Minutes through all of its formidable run from 1968 through his death in 2012.  But the film also chronicles the impact of the death of his 19-year-old son, Peter, in a mountain-climbing accident in 1962.  It shows interviews of Wallace by Barbara Walters, Morley Safer, Dinah Shore, and Merv Griffin, which expose the real Wallace.  A central theme of the film is that Wallace’s on-air personality was largely constructed – first as an actor, game-show host and product pitchman and later as a hard-nosed, relentless interviewer.

This is a flawed man with a huge ego who eventually suffered depression so deep that he almost killed himself.  He changed the way Americans get the news.  He left a wake and a legacy.

Premiered at Sundance earlier this year, Mike Wallace Is Here is a compelling, penetrating documentary worth finding.

Where’d You Go, Bernadette (Cate Blanchett. Billy Crudup, Kristen Wiig, Emma Nelson) – Cate Blanchett is one of the world’s most versatile actresses.  She has won two Academy Awards (Blue Jasmine, The Aviator), has been nominated for four others, has played in ensembles (Bandits is my favorite, Oceans 8 not so much) and carried films herself (Elizabeth, Carol).  She has worked with many of the best directors and famed actors/actresses.  She is in a handful of the best actresses working today.

As Bernadette Fox, she assumes the role of a reclusive, former world-renowned architect who quit the business after designing two of her dream projects.  She is married to Elgie (Billy Crudup), a highly successful computer engineer whose company was bought by Microsoft, where he works after uprooting the family from L.A. to Seattle.

Bernadette blames her lack of career ambition on the move, spending most of her day putzing around their 9,000-square-foot mess of a mansion.  The inside is a disaster; leaks are everywhere (almost every Seattle scene is rain-soaked); and the outside of the vast property is a tangle of vines and limbs.  Clearly, the Foxes bought the house for Bernadette to re-design but nothing much seems to be happening.

Elgie and Bernadette’s daughter, Bee (newcomer Emma Nelson), is a brilliant middle schooler looking forward to going to prep school just like her parents (yes, this is a tale of rich people).  But all is not right at home.  Bernadette is clinically anti-social and she is hated by her neighbors (most notably Audrey, portrayed by Kristen Wiig).  She does impulsive things with implications for others.  She does little for herself, relying instead on an online personal assistant located somewhere in Asia.  The only person she has a meaningful relationship with is her daughter, who adores mom more than her often work-absorbed father.

The movie opens with Bee, having achieved all “A”s in school, reminding her parents that they promised to let her choose her gift for this accomplishment.  Naturally J  she decides the family should go to Antarctica.  And away we go …

The trailer would have you believe that this is a comedy.  It’s not.  Bernadette is zany, unstable, unhinged, bombastic, blunt and loquacious. But she is falling apart.  Her husband seeks psychiatric help for her, which results in an unsuccessful intervention.  Then the plot turns ridiculous (as if it hadn’t already).

Bernadette escapes from the house, consoles herself with help from the dreaded neighbor, Audrey (really?) and decides to go to Antarctica on her own … without letting anyone in her family know.  Of course, Bee and dad chase after her.  The rest is an unlikely journey into self-reflection that eventually leads to a happy ending (sorry for the spoiler … but not really).

As good as Blanchett is, the movie is actually borderline awful.  Cameos by Laurence Fishbourne, Steve Zahn, and Megan Mullally can’t save it either.  Five-time Academy Award nominated director Richard Linklater, who also co-wrote the screenplay from the novel by Maria Semple, doesn’t work his magic here at all.  His 130-minute film is well-paced if nothing else.

With mediocre audience and critical reviews, Where’d You Go, Bernadette won’t do very well at the box office.  I promise you won’t hate it though.  It just doesn’t come close to living up to the hype.

David Crosby: Remember My Name (David Crosby, Cameron Crowe, Jackson Brown, Graham Nash) – By all accounts including his own, David Crosby was a jerk – an addicted, loud-mouthed, self-absorbed, obnoxious, talented a**hole.  Now in his late ‘70s, Crosby is sober, repentant, and trying hard to understand why he has survived when so many of his contemporaries haven’t.

He is still making music, having a resurgence as a songwriter and solo performer.  Instead of the great arenas and stadiums of the world where he prospered as an original member of The Byrds, Crosby Stills & Nash, and Crosby Stills Nash & Young, he is now playing small venues across the country.  He has released several new albums that feature his signature voice singing his own folk-tinged songs.

Crosby will always be remembered as an artist firmly planted at the epi-center of the rock ‘n roll universe in the pivotal mid-60s to mid-70s.  He was among the first singer-songwriters to inhabit the legendary Laurel Canyon section of the L.A. hills.  He found Joni Mitchell singing in a coffee house in south Florida and brought her to Laurel Canyon to make music and make love.  He befriended Cass Elliott, Stephen Stills, Jackson Brown, Brian Wilson, Jimi Hendrix, and virtually every artist who invented the California music scene.

As this fine documentary reveals, virtually none of those people, if they are still alive, have a good thing to say about the man.  He has pissed off every one of them, including his “brothers”: Stephen Stills, Graham Nash, Neil Young, and Roger McGuinn.  As Crosby says in the film “None of them will talk to me today.”

Yet he is a compelling character.  He was a part of the seminal American super-group, the Byrds.  When Mama Cass introduced Crosby and Stills to ex-Hollies lead singer Graham Nash, it took “40 seconds” of singing together to realize they were about to create music history.  And then, Stills’ former Buffalo Springfield bandmate Neil Young joined the group … and music was never the same.

The documentary, conceived largely by Cameron Crowe (who interviews Crosby in the film), tells the history of the times, Crosby’s relationships, his musical journey, his many health issues, and his relentless search for the meaning of his life.

For music fans, this is a must-see film, an unabashedly candid “behind the music” look at a complicated man who helped define the counter-culture generation.

Official Secrets (Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode, Ralph Fiennes, Rhys Ifans) – Keira Knightley isn’t just the beautiful angel from Love Actually anymore.  She proved that in Atonement and The Imitation Game and reinforced it here in Official Secrets. She carries a film that feels more political than dramatic.

Set in the run-up to the Iraq War following 9/11, Official Secrets follows Katherine Gun, a translator/analyst for the British equivalent of the NSA.  In her job, she reviews documents and listens to intercepted conversations from other governments, individuals and bad guys.  She then reports what she reads and hears.

One day, she and her colleagues receive a memo indicating that the U.K. and the U.S. have agreed to use surreptitious means and disinformation to convince countries on the U.N. Security Council to support a resolution to endorse a war with Iraq.  Gun, who had been following the fervor for war against Saddam Hussein, clearly believed that the rhetoric used by Tony Blair and George W. Bush was not supported by intelligence facts that she knew.

Faced with knowledge that a covert effort was underway to secure a UN resolution that would provide “cover” for Bush and Blair, she decided to turn over the memo to a friend who was part of the British anti-war effort even though she knew it violated the Official Secrets Act. Clearly naïve, she assumed that the memo could be used to kick-start an investigation by the British news media, which it did.  When journalist Martin Bright at The Observer printed the memo verbatim, however, all hell broke loose within her agency as the search for the leaker began.  She admitted it was her … and her life changed forever.

Knightley plays Gun as a super-serious, principled zealot who felt compelled to break the law in the hopes she could save lives by trying to stop a war.  But the film comes off as politically motivated, not nuanced. We all know now that the rationale for war – that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and connections to Al Qaida – was either a product of bad intelligence or deliberate deception.  The film clearly endorses the latter, which reduces its impact.

Directed by Gavin Hood, who also helmed Eye in the Sky, another political film about the use of satellites and drones in war, Official Secrets is an almost good thriller.  It feels like he couldn’t decide if he wanted this to be a journalism film like All the President’s Men or a courtroom drama like Denial about a professor who faces a court battle against a Holocaust denier.

Knightley makes Official Secrets watchable but, because Gun’s actions did nothing to stop the war, less than compelling.

Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood (Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie) – Every Quentin Tarantino film evokes powerful reactions from moviegoers.  Love him or hate him, Tarantino always pushes the boundaries.  His films are always creative, beautifully photographed, impeccably researched, and violent.

Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood is a period piece but, more than that, it’s nostalgic.  If American Graffiti transported you back to your high school years, Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood drops you right back into 1969, one of the most pivotal years in modern history.

Set in this backdrop is the buddy story of actor Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his stand-in Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt).  Rick was the star of action movies and then a TV show in the ‘50s who now guest stars as “the heavy” on all of the most popular TV shows of today.  We get to see clips of shows like Mannix and The FBI and hear music from Neil Diamond to hard rock.  Plus, we get to go to the Playboy Mansion and meet some of the biggest stars of the day, like Steve McQueen (Damian Lewis in a totally unrecognizable cameo) and Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie).

Rick’s career is fading; Cliff is basically his go-for, chauffer and companion.  As the parts dry up, Rick reconciles himself to go overseas to star in Italian “Spaghetti” westerns, a gig his manager/agent Marvin Schwarzs (Al Pacino) tells him is his last chance at stardom.

Meanwhile, Cliff picks up a stray hippie girl who hangs out at the site of the old Spahn Ranch, which often served as a movie set in the good-old days.  It is here that he has an uncomfortable reunion with George Spahn (Bruce Dern), the guy who owns the ranch, and ends up fighting with one of the few dudes at the ranch.

This seeming diversion in the buddy film sets up the climax of the movie.  Rick returns to his home in the Hollywood hills from Italy with a wife in tow, tells Cliff that their days as partners are ostensibly over, and the calendar turns to August 9, 1969, the date that Charles Manson’s gang killed Tate and others.  But this is a Hollywood fairy tale, not history.  The final scenes are fun, violent, and vintage Tarantino.

To those who skip Tarantino films because of the violence, don’t worry.  This isn’t violent until the end and, by then, it is almost comical.  For those who skip his movies because they are weird, go anyway because this one is so nostalgic that it is totally absorbing.  At two-hours-and-40-minutes, it’s long but not boring.

Leo and Brad are exceptional right up to the “cookie” during the credits.  Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood had the biggest opening weekend ever for a Tarantino film, and it deserves it.  While I try to convince my wife to see it, make sure you head to the theater soon to re-live 1969.

Blinded by the Light (Viveik Kalra, Kulvinder Ghi, Meera Ganatra, Aaron Phagura) – Bruce Springsteen fans: Mark August 14, 2019, down for the opening day for Blinded by the Light, titled for the Springsteen song that appeared on The Boss’ first album and which became a #1 hit by Manfred Mann’s Earth Band in 1976.

Blinded by the Light, the movie, is a slice-of-life film set in Britain in 1987.  Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister; the economy was in recession; and anti-migrant sentiments were running high.

Javed (Viveik Kaira) is a normal high school student with an interest in writing and a desire to sample all the tastes of life a teenager craves: a girl, friendship, parties, and self-satisfaction.  But Javed is Pakistani, and he feels different than other kids.  He looks different; has a domineering father; dodges racial slurs and physical threats; and lacks confidence.

By chance, he bumps into Roops (Aaron Phagura), an Indian high schooler who tells him that his life would be immeasurably enhanced by listening to two Bruce Springsteen albums/cassettes. Just as things become unbearable at home, he puts on Springsteen, which permanently changes his life.  As his life evolves, we hear and see (on the screen) Springsteen’s lyrics, which seem a perfect match for Javed.  As he embraces The Boss, he gains self-confidence.  He finds his first girlfriend.  Encouraged by a nurturing English teacher, he submits his first piece to the high school paper.  He proposes a Springsteen-only radio show to the program director of the high school radio station.  His writing improves.  And his teacher submits an essay of his to a national contest.

But at home, things are getting worse.  His father loses his job; his mother is forced to sew until after midnight to meet the household bills; and Javed must work to contribute to the family’s finances.  As his father becomes depressed over losing his job, he tightens the reins on his rebellious son.

The rest of the story is actually quite familiar except for the way Javed’s direction evolves through Bruce’s lyrics.  Is Javed Born to Run? Does he have a Hungry Heart? Or is he Blinded by the Light? You’ll need to see the movie to find out.

With no recognizable stars, this witty, clever movie was inspired by a true story.  Gurinda Chadha, who also directed Bend It Like Beckham among other films and documentaries, helmed the film and co-wrote it with her husband, Paul Mayeda Burges.

Though very predictable, Blinded by the Light will thrill Springsteen fans while taking the audience through a fun ride through adolescence.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco (Jimmie Fails, Jonathan Majors, Danny Glover) – Some films defy categorization.  The Last Black Man in San Francisco qualifies.  It’s lyrical, idealistic, breezy, amusing, surrealistic, and hopeful.  It’s also sad, revealing, intense, and dreamlike.

At its heart, TLBMISF is a buddy pic set in the city by the Bay.  Jimmie Fails plays Jimmie Fails, a young, intelligent black man living with his would-be playwright friend, Mont (Jonathan Majors), and Mont’s elderly, blind father (Danny Glover in what amounts to a cameo).

Like many great films, TLBMISF peels back the plot in layers.  We’re well into the film before we understand why Jimmy and Mont travel regularly to a stately house on Golden Gate Street where Jimmie performs outdoor clean-up, painting, and other chores when no one else is around.  Mont goes along, sketching the home and the people who enter his life while supposedly composing a play.

The house is within site of the Golden Gate Bridge in a well-kept neighborhood far from the hood where the guys live, a sidewalk preacher rants, and a quintet of brothers hang.  In fact, the five guys appear rooted to their spot on the block across from where Jimmy and Mont wait for the bus to take them to Golden Gate.  These guys are friends with Jimmy and Mont but not exactly.  Jimmy and Mont are different because they have jobs, they have purpose, they have hope.

As the plot becomes clearer, we find out that Jimmy used to live in the house on Golden Gate with his parents.  His grandfather, “the first black many in San Francisco,” built the house after returning from World War II, and Jimmy is committed to keep it pristine, perhaps hoping to one day move back in.  The current occupants catch Jimmy in the act of sprucing up the place and just want him gone.

The plot turns when the current occupants are forced to leave the house in a prolonged family dispute.  Jimmie moves in, becoming a squatter and doing all he can to ensure he gets to stay there.  He fills the home with furniture that his aunt took with her when the family was forced to sell it years before.  He dreams of spreading out on the couch and reading the paper while occupying a home he finds out is now worth in the vicinity of $5 million.

Before long, Jimmie has returned to the happiest time of his life; a time when his parents lived together, his father wasn’t a hustler and his mom wasn’t living down in East L.A. with a different guy.  The memory of his grandfather singlehandedly building the best-looking house on Golden Gate gives Jimmie purpose and hope in a city that seems to have passed him, his friends, and his family by.

I’ll leave the storytelling here.  I termed this film lyrical earlier, largely because it moves in a very lilting fashion to the inevitable crescendo when one of the owners returns, a real estate agent takes over the listing, and Mon finally finishes his play (called The Last Black Man in San Francisco) and presents it in the make-shift theater Jimmy builds in the house. Then comes the plot twist and the uncertain ending.

The film is totally unique.  The characters are far from stereotypical and even seem out of place.  The photography is a bit fantasy-like more than gritty.  The camera angles are surprising and creative.  The music is unexpected – not hip-hop and gritty yet not soulful and R&B. Everything about this movie feels ethereal.

Fails stars and co-wrote the autobiographical film with Director Joe Talbot, his longtime friend and collaborator.  It won the 2019 Sundance Film Festival Directing Award as well as a Special Jury Prize for Creative Collaboration.  The Last Black Man in San Francisco is one of those films everyone should see but one you may not love the way I did.  It isn’t showing in a lot of theaters so you’ll have to look hard to find it.

Pavarotti (Luciano Pavarotti) – Documentaries seem to be all the rage these days.  Free Solo and RBG were box office smashes (by documentary standards) last year.  Echo in the Canyon and The Biggest Little Farm look like hits already this year.  But this year’s big doc may be Ron Howard’s Pavarotti, a love letter about the great tenor.  More than any opera singer since Enrico Caruso a century before, Pavarotti made opera cool in the latter part of the 20^th century.  With his larger-than-life personality and crystal-clear voice, he became a worldwide sensation, performing everywhere from rural outposts to massive stadiums to outdoor parks.

Howard manages to piece together decades of film — often grainy and amateurish – with deeply personal interviews with the Maestro’s ex-wives, former mistress, daughters, peers (Placido Domingo, Jose Carreras, and several sopranos), and admirers.  He weaves biography with taped performances from the time Pavarotti was a promising young singer through his waning years.

In fact, Howard presents Pavarotti’s life as opera.  A man of great passion – for opera, for women, for food, for children – Pavarotti lived large.  And he died painfully.  Howard manages to make the audience feel the highs and the lows of Pavarotti’s personal and professional lives.

But I warn you: the film is long.  It proves that even great directors can fall in love with their own films.  Howard could have spent less time in the run-up to stardom to get us to the fantastic success of his middle years and the explosive teaming with Domingo and Carreras as The Three Tenors.  His death is handled beautifully as is Pavarotti’s heartfelt charitable endeavors in concert with Princess Diana, Bono and many others.

Even if you don’t love opera, you will enjoy this stunning documentary.

Echo in the Canyon (Jakob Dylan, David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Graham Nash, Michelle Phillips, Tom Petty, John Sebastian + many more) – Folk-rock music defined much of pop music after the “British Invasion” of the mid-60s.  In many ways, folk-rock is uniquely American.  The center of the folk-rock world was in Laurel Canyon, a section in the hills of Los Angeles not far from Beverly Hills and the Sunset Strip.

Music pioneers like the Byrds (David Crosby, Roger McGuinn most notably), The Buffalo Springfield (Stephen Stills, Neil Young, Richie Furay), and The Mamas and the Papas (John and Michelle Phillips, Mama Cass Elliott, and Denny Doherty) settled in there along with singer-songwriters like John Sebastian, Carole King (newly arrived from New York), Jackson Browne, Graham Nash (The Hollies), Frank Zappa and Joni Mitchell.  Brian Wilson and the rest of the Beach Boys lived close by.  Even the Beatles and Elton John visited.  Laurel Canyon was like a commune for aspiring musical artists.  Life was free; drugs were everywhere; and money soon became plentiful.  Lou Adler became the producer and hits guru. There has never been anything like it since.

Echo in the Canyon is a combination documentary and concert video.  Vintage clips of these artists are punctuated with interviews of many of these aging rock stars and even a now-deceased Tom Petty.  At the center of the film is Jakob Dylan, son of Bob and lead singer and songwriter for The Wallflowers.  He is the interviewer and clearly gained the trust of these sometimes-temperamental musicians.

Dylan gathered some of today’s stars, too, including Beck, Fiona Apple, Norah Jones, Jade Castrinos, and Cat Power, to examine the music of the mid-‘60s and perform covers of some of the hits of the day.

For those of us who recall the ‘60s as the decade that defined the music of our lives, Echo in the Canyon gives us a first-person account of the glory that was Laurel Canyon through interesting and candid interviews (David Crosby admits he was an a**hole).  For our kids, it allows them to see some of their generation’s artists singing the songs that played in the parents’ homes.

Unusual for a documentary, Echo in the Canyon is getting a fairly wide release, having started in LA and New York but expanding to other cities this week. Its early per-screen box office results are exceptional. Look for it at your art-houses and perhaps at a few multiplexes, too.  For baby boomers, it will revive memories of innocence, protest, the sexual revolution, and music that made you think and feel.