The Ides of March (USA) Directed by George Clooney Written by George Clooney; Grant Heslov; Beau Willmon Starring George Clooney; Ryan Gosling; Evan Rachel Wood; Phillip Seymour Hoffman; Paul Giamatti; Marisa Tomei; Jeffrey Wright; Max Minghella; Jennifer Ehle

Directed by George Clooney, the script is based on the play Farragut North by Beau Willmon (who shares screenwriting credit with Clooney and his partner Grant Heslov). Focusing on presidential candidate/ Pennsylvania Governor Mike Morris (Clooney), Ides is reminiscent of similarly solid political dramas like Primary Colors (1998); The Candidate (1972); The Contender (2000); Manchurian Candidate (1962); The Best Man (1964); and State of Play (2003/2009).

Clooney is clearly at home with the material, and the story naturally reminds us of the many real life presidential candidates who have dealt with public scrutiny under the intense national media spotlight. Ideas about special interest groups/PACs and the accepted quid pro quo nature of the beast are woven in nicely to a fairly standard morality play. With visuals from Alexander Payne regular Phedon Papamichael, the mis-en-scene is nothing less than rock solid - the look just right, the dialogue crackling with insider talk and topical references.

Clooney’s Hollywood cache can be felt in the knock-out cast he manages to assemble, one that includes Ryan Gosling as media expert/2nd in command, Stephen Meyers; Evan Rachel Wood as intern Molly Stearns; Marisa Tomei as reporter Ida Horowicz; Paul Giamatti as opposition campaigner Tom Duffy; Jeffrey Wright as Senator Thompson; and Phillip Seymour Hoffman as campaign manger Paul Zara, and as one might expect given the pedigree of the cast and the director’s background as an actor, the performances are all top-notch.

While it’s easy to enjoy the snappy dialogue and the swift pace of the plot; and, while the talents of the cast create an anticipation regarding the promise of potential greatness in each individual scene; Ides is a rare example of a film that might have benefited from more run time. Its through-line is so strong that’s it’s as if we miss out on some prime opportunities to savor the actors and the spot-on world being portrayed, and one can’t help but wish there was a bit more digressive meandering, and perhaps less reliance on the rigid structure of conventional genre.

The end result of the admittedly slick end product is that there is a feeling of never having gotten to the heart of characters played by Jeffrey Wright, Marisa Tomei, and Phillip Seymour Hoffman, for instance - who all seem equally as potentially interesting as our leads. This is not to say that Clooney and Gosling are not well suited for, or compelling in, their archetypal roles. Clooney, again, looks right at home as Morris - a well-spoken politician with a quick mind and easy smile, a man accustomed to working people and cultivating his image at all costs. Gosling’s Steven, despite his relative experience, is still an innocent, maintaining the belief one can mix idealism with the very cynical, dirty game of campaign strategy, still under the impression that he can carefully manipulate the degrees to which he compromises his personal integrity.

Restraint and minimalism are not often qualities associated with the Hollywood product, and so both should probably always be applauded when employed. Clooney the man has a number of strengths that help make him the effective mini-mogul he is, not the least of which being good taste. The films he has thus far elected to direct are reflective of this quality, each a thoughtful handling of subject matter with some meat on the bones.

Perhaps it is unfair to criticize or penalize a film for not showing off all the members of its phenomenal cast to the fullest, or for having strong, lead actors in minor roles in the first place, and perhaps asking a film that is financed by Hollywood, and essentially affixed to genre, to become something more is also unfair. There is, after all, the old axiom about leaving them wanting more. Still, it might be the very quality of the elements contained in this cinematic stew that raise the stakes and automatically promise something more, and in the end this very good film leaves one feeling feeling somewhat unsatisfied, as if this were part one of a two part mini-series that leaves one anticipating a next installment that will never come.

Directed by Jean Luc Godard  Written by Jean Luc Godard

Eighty one year old Jean Luc Godard continues his ongoing dialectic about the collapse of traditional cinema (and, for that matter, Western civilization) in his latest video essay - the form which has dominated his career for some twenty five years.

It is difficult to pinpoint the parameters of documentary or narrative film, or define what specific forms are better suited for museum installation or film festival circuits as opposed to delivery in mainstream theaters/ V.O.D and the like. Is it the structure of a piece (or lack thereof) that should determine the method of delivery, or is the very narrowness of our expectations responsible for marginalizing avant-garde/non-traditional cinema in all its auspices in the first place?

One thing is for sure - it is only Godard’s reputation (related to the marketplace he despises) that allows a film like this a wider (though, obviously, still limited) audience, but at this point it is not as if the master has suckered anyone in. Complaining about the obtuse particulars when it comes to Godard is akin to bemoaning the methodology in the latest from Lars Von Trier or David Lynch. One can debate the merits of the individual pieces, but the embrace of surrealism and disavowal of some of the accoutrements of traditional cinema have been clearly established.

Regardless of the exact definition of what makes a film a film (and whether or not this question is at all relevant), Godard long since took to blasting cinema for its failures. Well over half of his career has now been dedicated to attempting to de/re-construct the form. His varied subject matter over the course of this pursuit has included repeated attacks on capitalism/consumerism and intellectual explorations of art in its many forms - music, painting, literature. Underlying all of the highly politicized work is, or course, a search for illusive truth, although inaccessibility (at least to many) is often a result of the deliberate opaque quality of the finished products arising from this path.

Broken into three distinct sections, Film Socialisme begins with a cruise ship floating on Mediterranean seas. Immediately, we are hit with Godard’s first use of HD, the footage resembling his vibrant, saturated color in something like Made in The USA. As if to provide a direct contrast to some of this stunning photography, however, the director also employs visuals that seem shot with a cell phone camera. Godard further infuses the section with a host of noise, distortions, and unconventional cuts, and throughout the film he also gives us oddly incomplete English sub-titles (for the French, Arabic, German, and Russian) he has termed Navajo English, consisting of a series of nearly incomprehensible phrases/key words that keep an audience guessing as to what is being said.

In Part One we float around the ship in a kind of dream state, listening to snatches of indecipherable philosophizing from some of the white passengers, the the dark skin workers, and a narrator (with several strange asides about Jews; a references to YouTube; and a bizarre appearance by Patti Smith thrown in for good measure). The feeling evoked is that of randomness, and the flatness of the grotesques populating the boat call to mind the Rive Gauche death walkers of Last Year in Marienbad and the like.

Part Two more rootedly focuses on a family of radicals consisting of two children and their parents based in a gas station in rural Southern France. The disaffected elder daughter and her more animated younger brother put their parents through a kind of test, asking them a series of serious questions about life and the world. As we see various shots of a llama and a donkey, seemingly family pets, two women arrive at the station and proceed to film and record sound. The overall effect is reminiscent of Godard circa the late 60s with characters (again emotionally flattened) speaking in political tract with odd surrealistic flourishes added to the mix. Part Three diverges from any attempt at narrative, and instead employs free flowing montage to show us a history of various political events across a handful of European countries in conflict. This format is recognizable in Godard’s better known essays of the recent past, most notably his series: Histoire du Cinema.

If one doesn’t speak French you must be satisfied with the dribbled bits of information being conveyed by the silly “Navajo English” (basically a series of words). While clearly intentionally alienating, it seems an angry, provincial, and arrogant tactic on the part of the artist. Otherwise, why have the subjects/actors speaking in a recognizable language at all, or why not manipulate the actual sound dialogue as opposed to merely the subtitles? In his defense, Godard the socialist does not preach inclusiveness when it comes to film. As always, his intended audience is exclusively the intellectual elite. It is worth noting, however, that in this case Godard is intent on excluding only those who do not speak his native language.

The work is at times visually beautiful, dreamy, and even vaguely intriguing in its challenging way, while simultaneously being overly precious, unnecessarily shrouded by device, and ultimately, barely cohesive. Of course, Godard could care less what anyone thinks, which is perhaps partly the point, though to what ends?

Hugo (USA) Directed by Martin Scorcese Written by John Logan Starring Asa Butterfield; Ben Kingsley; Chloe Moretz; Sasha Baron Cohen; Emily Mortimer; Ray Winstone; Christopher Lee; Michael Stuhlbarg; Richard Griffiths

For the past twenty-plus years, Director Martin Scorcese’s career could be described as an unending search to make big, Hollywood films of any and all sorts. With Hugo he manages to touch yet another base, rendering a 3D kids offering that seems to borrow liberally from the spirit of Spielberg and the literal past work of Jean Pierre Jeunet, a director who might have actually made the film this one aspires to be.

Screenwriter John Logan (The Aviator; Gladiator; Coriolanus) adapted Brian Selznick’s popular 2007 children’s novel The Invention of Hugo Cabaret, but the end result is neither as whimsical, quirky, nor funny as it endeavors to be. Starring Asa Butterfield as the Dickens-like Hugo Cabret, an orphan living in a Paris train station clock-tower in the 1930s, the story involves the boy’s connection with a retired film director/toy store owner Georges Melies (Ben Kingsley), and his bookish charge Isabelle (Chloe Moretz), who is also an orphan.

While we know why the film is set is France and yet has characters speaking English, big budget/American box office considerations get no quarter here, and do not mitigate discussion involving the films’ overall merit. The fact is films of this kind, set in a non-English speaking country, but having characters inexplicably speaking the language (often, as here, with a British accent) always have issues with a lack of authenticity.

At 128 minutes, Hugo also has pacing issues aplenty, and is probably twenty minutes too long. Stretching to create mystery where there is little, extended run time is devoted to multiple long scenes where young Hugo mourns his dead father (Jude Law) with passages of expository dialogue. Though Scorcese effectively opens with one of his classic tracking shots, the majority of the many chase scenes seem overextended. There are even issues with some of the 3D effects - i.e. a train wreck where we never see the train jump the tracks; shots going from extreme 3D close-ups to wide shots that seem off kilter.

While the supporting cast is made of up wonderful actors, they are, by and large, underused, particularly in the case of Emily Mortimer, who is barely allowed to speak. While long interludes are devoted to Sasha Baron Cohen’s mugging, other potential story-lines (unlike, for instance, Jeunet’s Amelie) are left entirely unmined, missing out on multiple chances for genuine whimsy and romance. Where shorter, concise passages of the world within the train station might have created a richer, more verdant playing field, Scorcese seems intent on finding ways to use the 3D at his disposal, and unfortunately his employment of such often seems stretched, and winds up coming at the expense of story and further character development.

There is no doubt that there is an essence of classic children’s films being referenced (and only referenced) here, and Scorcese’s vast film knowledge (as well as long time collaborator Dante Ferretti’s skill) contributes to a well designed physical setting, and there is pleasure to be had in journeying around the station and onto the Paris streets. Skilled cinematographer, Robert Richardson, moves the camera with expected ease, and while the technology gives the viewer a fuller, more detailed look at the nooks and crannies of Hugo’s odd world, in only a few places (some interesting close-ups; the cinematic world of Melies) does it pay significant dividends.

Clearly there is a personal statement being made with Scorcese as real life classic film champion and preservationist, and this element of the story seems particularly overwrought, self-serious, and on the nose, with the message pounded home in a misguided, logy third act. Though the fantasy sequences with Melies and his glass studio are exceptionally evoked, this preachy theme eventually takes over the film, further distancing the supporting characters (until a final cribbed from Wes Anderson), and most tragically, minimizing Hugo (the one person we truly care about), his budding relationship with Isabelle, and his search for connection with his father. While in theory the automaton is a nice device linking the old director with Hugo and his Dad it too reads as something flown in from A.I., and never lives up to its magical promise.

While Moretz at times seems vaguely uncomfortable in her role, Asa Butterfield is excellent as the titular Hugo, and his presence helps makes Hugo more watch-able than it might otherwise have been. Ultimately, while the film has its charms, some elusive key ingredient seems buried in a relative morass of form; strain to employ this hot, new technology; and didactic personal statement from the professorial director. While the film contains all the prerequisite trappings and clearly wants us to be moved, wowed, and enchanted, it somehow fails to actually elicit those reactions.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (BRIT) Directed by Tomas Alfredson  Written by Bridget O’Connor; Peter Straughan Starring Gary Oldman; Colin Firth; John Hurt; Ciaran Hinds; Toby Jones; Tom Hardy; Stephen Graham; David Dencik; Benedict Cumberbatch; Simon McBurney; Kathy Burke

Based on the well known 1974 spy novel by John Le Carre (who serves as one of the executive producers), Tinker Tailor is directed by 46 year old Swede Tomas Alfredson (Let the Right One In). With a bountiful cast consisting of some of Great Britain’s finest male actors, the film boasts a brilliantly rendered portrait of the early seventies, the monochromatic palette awash with greys, browns, and steely blues reminiscent of a gloomy London day that never ends.

Originally done in 1979 as a seven part BBC mini-series (famously starring Alec Guiness), this spy thriller has all the twists and turns one would expect - so many, in fact, that in lesser hands the plot may well have become a muddled mess. Alfredson is up to the challenge though, and much of the success is owed to an expert editing job that crisply and smoothly journeys between countries, story-lines, and time with alacrity and style, a monumentally challenging task given the sheer number of characters and intricacy of the plotting.

Gary Oldman (in what may be the finest performance of his career) handles the character of the taciturn, bespectacled George Smiley (who appears in no less than eight of Le Carre’s books) with pleasing understatement. Oldman has been known to love an actorly flourish or two, but here we never see him stray from the captivating stillness he establishes as the rather dour British intelligence (referred to as MI6 or The Circus) career man accustomed to serving as a mere a cog in a vast bureaucratic machine.

The plot if full of cold war intrigue involving double agents on either side, but what is most compelling is the keenly observed world laid out before us, and a cast that embodies characters immersed in and socialized to a life that is both mundane and exceptional - average men who go about their duties in the way an accountant or a postman might, except that in their profession kidnapping, blackmail, and assassinations are the norm. The global implications of their work, however, does not make them any less cynical or disappointed - in fact, perhaps moreso.

From images of Smiley swimming in a lake with his glasses still on; to the yellowed institutional corridors of The Circus headquarters; to the over-sized period recording devices placed in claustrophobic residences, Alfredson takes great pains to establish an environment that permeates throughout. One might compare the effectiveness of the look to a recent film like Fincher’s equally well designed Zodiac, or the British Red Riding trilogy, in terms of their evocation of the seventies; washed out worlds of opaque drudgery.

Populated with hunched shouldered, trench coated individuals who seemingly duck into dark doorways to escape the elements as much as their proverbial tails, one can feel Alfredson’s Scandanavian roots and notice the correlations between this and the superb mis-en-scene of his previous Let the Right One In, another bleak story delivered with the biting snap of a bone-jarring draft. Even as we observe the smoky office Christmas party interspersed throughout -  the holiday sweaters, libations, and festive music do little to thaw the icy tundra of moral compromise or hide the sinister roiling of duplicity bubbling underneath.

Bouncing from Moscow to London to Budapest, and fluidly weaving multiple languages into the mix, the film is truly an international thriller made for thinking adults, simultaneously plodding and compelling. Here, the machinations involved with the investigation of operation Witchcraft are not telegraphed and/or fully explained, which keeps one endeavoring to put together the puzzle. This approach works in the film’s favor and makes the few pure action sequences that much more meaningful and impactful.

John Hurt as section leader Control; Colin Firth as Bill; Toby Jones as Percy; David Dancik as Toby; and Ciaran Hinds as Roy round out the senior group who are all potentially involved in trading secrets to the Russians. Kathy Burke, Tom Hardy; Benedict Cumberbatch; and Stephen Graham are also a part of this exceptional cast. The script was written by Peter Straughan (The Debt; Men who stare at Goats) and his late wife Bridget O’Connor, who died of Cancer in September of 2010. The film is fittingly dedicated to her.

Young Adult (USA) Directed by Jason Reitman  Written by Diablo Cody  Starrring Charlize Theron; Patrick Wilson; Patton Oswalt; Elizabeth Reaser; Jill Eikenberry; Mary Beth Hurt

The Juno team of director Jason Reitman and writer Diablo Cody re-assemble for Young Adult, starring Charlize Theron as thirty seven year old divorced ghostwriter, Mavis, who steels away from her life in big city Minneapolis to return to her hometown (fictional Mercury) with hopes of re-kindling a relationship with her married high school boyfriend Buddy (Patrick Wilson).

At thirty four, Reitman continues to cement his position as one of Hollywood’s best, and Cody again provides a witty script with a bevy of pop culture and cool/nerd girl references that make her quick witted, fast- talking, snarky brand of humor sing. While Ellen Page brought a knowing, hipster irony as the female lead in Juno, here our hero is much less self-aware. In fact, Mavis is a thoroughly misanthropic, non-introspective, nasty, shallow, and largely unlikable character, which is partly what makes the film as a whole, and specifically Theron’s performance, so much fun. To buttress the events on screen, we hear Mavis’ voice in narration as she attempts to write the last installment of the young adult novel series she has been responsible for (but alas, doesn’t bear her name), that serves as a parallel for her disintegrating life.

Though Cody by now has a well-deserved reputation as a writer who loves a good wise-ass comment, some of the best moments in Young Adult can be found in places where Reitman/Cody settle for Mavis’ faces and eye rolls as opposed to one liners. Like a petulant tween, Mavis is disgusted by all things family, small town, and quaint - except, of course, when it comes to the torch she carries for Buddy. The way she justifies this seeming contradiction to herself is by deciding that she is rescuing Buddy from his loving wife, nice home, ad sales job, and new born baby, and that their getting back together will aid him in escaping what she deems his doomed, small time existence. While the blonde Mavis totes a Pomeranian in a bag, and is clearly a bit of a princess, Theron et. al. never allow the character to veer into Paris Hilton caricature.

While there have been countless films made about people suffering from arrested development returning to their home towns, many of them involving an organized reunion or major event (wedding, funeral), Reitman/Cody avoid much of the conventional genre build up. The self-medicating Mavis is entirely too narcissistic and unactualized to realize what she is actually after, and her myopic focus keeps her from much socializing with the commoners. Hearing she was in town, her mom Hedda (Jill Elkenberry) has to physically track her down to see her, and the one friend she makes, the physically and emotionally damaged Matt (Patton Oswalt), must endure an attitude directed at him bordering somewhere between weary condescension and outright disdain.

While the excellent Theron is obviously physically stunning, she is around the same age as the character, and naturally her age has begun to show in places on her face. This is a good thing. And whether it’s the beauty treatments Mavis undergoes, the extensions in her hair, the application of make-up, or the careful selection of outfits, one sees the calculation and work it takes her character to maintain her looks. For Mavis, image concerns and petty spats rule the day - she is at thirty seven, but as one character states, she is still a “psychotic prom queen bitch.”

There is an overall breeziness to the mostly comical events, though Mavis’ compulsive hair picking is far from a light detail, and it is merely an outward manifestation of the serious anxiety/depression that plagues her. Not much is said about her divorce, but Mavis’ father (Richard Belkins) matter-of-factly states at one point, “I like him,” and “he’s a nice guy,” in reference to her ex, and one gets the impression that it was Mavis who opted out of the marriage in some way. There are telling moments too, like when Mavis rather plainly states, “I’m an alcoholic,” and her parents (mom Hedda is played by Jill Elkeberry) think she is joking, or when she asks Buddy’s understanding wife Beth (a special needs teacher) what the faces of certain emotions look like on the chart she uses for her kids, and then says words to the effect of, “what about when they don’t feel any?”

As the ex-stripper Cody (the former Brooke Busey) is a successful, divorced (though now re-married and a mother), thirty three year old female writer who moved from a small town in Minnesota (she was from Chicago) to the big city it’s impossible not to draw comparisons between her and the character. In ways stated and not, there are themes at work here about the nature of fame and success, and how the superficial trappings of the same do not always bring personal contentment or satisfaction.

Shot by Reitman’s go to DP Eric Steelberg (Juno; 500 Days of Summer; Up in the Air), the naturalistic visuals paint a portrait of small town America dominated by the mediocrity of bland suburban dwellings and corporate chains. While there is a degree of personal change or discovery enmeshed in Mavis’ story, thankfully the writer and director refuse to sell out the theme. The film contains some well constrained satire about the uniformity of this world, and of everyday working/middle class existence in general, while recognizing the importance of the basic connections and stability most human beings ultimately seek. These truths exist simultaneously whether Mavis ultimately “gets it” or not.

Our Idiot Brother (USA) Directed by Jesse Peretz  Written by Evgenia Pretz; David Schisgall  Starring Paul Rudd; Zooey Deschanel; Emily Mortimer; Elizabeth Banks; Rashida Jones; Adam Scott; Steve Coogan; Hugh Dancy; Shirley Knight; Kathryn Hahn; T.J. Miller; Matthew Mindler

Jesse Peretz worked with lead Paul Rudd in the less than successful The Chateau (2001) before the latter became one of the go to guys for big budget comedies. Peretz also made the little seen The Ex (2006), starring Zach Braff and Amanda Peet. With Our Idiot Brother, the director takes a step forward, getting quality performances from an excellent cast, and doing something rare these days - creating a comedy containing characters that at least resemble actual human beings.

Too often the state of movie comedy seems to demand that we settle for either gross out stuff for the high school set, or absurdist parodies that often have a number of funny moments, but ultimately suffer from believability issues owing mostly to a lack of plausible character and plot development. Our Idiot Brother is not to be confused with more nuanced, darker offbeat recent offerings like Greenberg or Cyrus, and it doesn’t have the laugh out loud high points of films like Step Brothers and Get Him to the Greek, but it does manage to remain in a realistic realm while providing a number of laughs.

The basic family set up resembles PT Anderson’s Punch Drunk Love, with an emotionally repressed man-child belittled and steamrolled by strong, aggressive female siblings. The ‘joke’ (ala countless dumb guy comedies) is that heavily bearded organic farmer Ned actually has a lot of down home wisdom and life experience that his three emotionally confused sisters (Zooey Deschanel; Emily Mortimer; Elizabeth Banks) could learn from, if only they could stop judging him and shut up a second that is. We know where this will end, though somehow that doesn’t completely detract from the fun to be had getting there. Sticking strictly to genre conventions is always limiting, though Peretz et al do a reasonable job of creating enough nuances to keep things flowing.

At the open, Ned sells a small amount of weed to a uniformed cop, which winds him up in jail for eight months. The scene verges on the implausible, and immediately one is left wishing the screenwriters (a duo that includes the director’s sister Evgenia) had simply made him a part time weed dealer instead of pussyfooting around it. Rudd does a good job breathing life into a mostly stock character, though the opening arrest and his subsequent incarceration is only the first of several plot points - including his interactions with his p.o.; his walk-in on brother-in-law Dylan (played by a wasted Steve Coogan) -  that stretch the believability of Ned’s naivete to ridiculous proportions.

Deschanel and a dark-haired Banks (who has appeared in five films with Rudd), in particular, do well bringing their own unique energy to the mix, and a nice supporting cast includes Coogan; Adam Scott; and Hugh Dancy. Kathryn Hahn and TJ Miller too are particularly effective as Ned’s fellow hippie ex Janet and her new boyfriend Billy. Our Idiot Brother is a basically well constructed, well-cast entry, though one can’t help but wish those involved had been able to push the envelope a little more and stray off the beaten path.

Martha Marcy May Marlene (USA) Directed by Sean Durkin  Written by Sean Durkin  Starring Elizabeth Olsen; Sarah Paulson; John Hawkes; Hugh Dancy; Brady Corbet; Louisa Krause; Julie Garner; Adma David Thompson; Maria Dizzle (Katie); Christopher Abbott (Max)

Twenty nine year old Sean Durkin writes and directs his first feature - a story about Martha (Elizabeth Olsen), a young woman who manages to escape an isolated cult farm in upstate New York, and is then haunted by her experiences as she attempts to re-adjust to everyday life.

The film caused a splash at Sundance, with awards going to the director and his twenty two year old lead, plaudits that prove to be deserving. Despite its low budget origins and limited locations, Durkin demonstrates a steady hand, and a cast containing the likes of John Hawkes (as cult leader Patrick); Hugh Dancy (as brother in law Ted); and Sarah Paulson (as older sister Lucy) are uniformly strong.

Younger sister of the famous twins, Mary-Kate and Ashley, Elizabeth Olsen gives the kind of breakout turn that comes along about once every year or two when an actor emerges from virtual obscurity to give a performance with the kind of breadth worthy of a quality veteran. It’s the kind of thoughtful, low key job marking the best work there is - behavior with invisible seams, on camera thought that never feels forced or contrived, emotion deriving from a true place as opposed to seeming divorced from on screen events.

Part of a producing team/company who made the indie Afterschool (2008), Durkin is also clearly a director on the rise. Broken into two sections - Martha’s experience at the cult told mostly in a series of flashbacks; and the initial days when she returns to real life, moving in with her sister and new husband into their expensive Connecticut vacation rental by the lake. Durkin manages to merge these two time frames - Martha in the present, beset with waking and sleeping dreams of the near past that intrude on her attempts at adjustment. Though this is a psychological drama, Durkin refuses the conventions of genre, and instead underplays the events, recognizing the emotion underneath the surface, but never punctuating Martha’s inner demons, or the domestic turmoil at play.

Paulson and Hawkes, two excellent actors who were both part of the cast of the late, great HBO series Deadwood, do their usual strong work. Though it’s difficult not to draw comparisons to famous real life types like Charles Manson, David Koresh, and Jim Jones, Hawkes seems to avoid the trap of impression, underplaying the role by straying from his soft spoken countenance only in several key moments, the power of his portrayal arising out of the very banal, methodical nature of his control. In a similar way, Paulson’s Lucy is a woman holding on to tremendous repressed guilt over not caring for her sister when their mother died, and the perfect life she and her seemingly not so kind new husband have precariously embarked upon becomes threatened by Martha’s strange, disruptive presence.

The inner workings of the cult feel nicely researched, with Patrick preying on the subjugated young women and exhorting militaristic like control over the men. These sections could have easily become didactic with a less skilled storyteller attempting to inform the audience all he/she knows about cults, but instead the scenes feel organic and grounded, and bits and pieces of life on the farm are delivered in a series of non-linear memories that never feel disjointed, confusing, or manipulative.

The camera loves the doe-eyed Olsen, and she rewards our interest by never forcing or pushing, but rather relaxes into her role, making even scenes with her sitting, or staring, or speaking one or two lines mean something. Yes, she is emotionally dulled, and in various stages of brainwashing throughout, but she remains compelling primarily because she is never “playing” at these various states. This ease also allows her personality to poke through in small ways, giving hints at what she may have been like previously.

In fact, all of Durkin’s characters are given the breadth to be actual human beings, and are not just one thing - particularly in the case of Lucy, who exhibits generosity toward, and concern for, her sister, but also demonstrates streaks of self-absorption and pettiness. One is left with the distinct impression of a woman with a less than intact interior life trying to piece it together. Martha’s presence seems to shine a flashlight on the tentative construct of who she has become, and several comments made by Martha wind up cutting to the heart of Lucy and Ted’s insecurities.

Durkin shows the same deftness with the dance that takes place between Martha’s dream and waking states, which are melded with her present and past life. Though there are obvious questions about Martha’s emotional fitness, the director doesn’t rely on showy camera tricks or visual effects to illustrate this concept - Images, Sisters, Three Women, or Repulsion this is not. Present, past, and dreams are played straight, and while Durkin often employs cuts that have us unsure of where we are as move to the other world, the transitions are handled smoothly and modestly, and have the effect of placing us alongside Martha as she bounces back and forth inside her head.

The title comes from Martha’s name (Martha); the name given to her by Patrick (Marcy May); and an alias used by the cult’s female residents when people from the outside call the farmhouse (Marlene), though metaphorically it could stand for the many facets of any human being/the multiple parts of self - what we tell ourselves; what we show the world; and how the world perceives us.

Margin Call (USA) Directed by J.C. Chandor Written by J.C. Chandor Starring Kevin Spacey; Stanley Tucci; Jeremy Irons; Paul Bettany; Simon Baker; Demi Moore; Zachary Quinto; Penn Badgley; Mary McDonnell

Margin Call comes to us at a time when protesters throughout the country are demonstrating their disgust and outrage over a financial/political system that has disregarded the needs and general well-being of the average working person.

If HBO’s Too Big to Fail was an attempt to portray the collapse/near collapse of multiple Wall Street investment firms and the governments role in attempting to prevent systemic wide failure; documentaries like Inside Job and I.O.U.A. to provide a more intellectual delineation; then Margin Call, like Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, is a stab at focusing on players in a particular firm, in this case one that arrives at a realization prior to the actual fall, that their situation is dire, forcing them to make decisions about whether to disclose this information or try to survive at all costs.

Margin Call seems to assume a basic understanding on the part of the audience of what happened with the American economy, and makes little attempt to explain the mortgage/credit swab/de-regulation/derivative issues at the heart of the crisis, instead distilling the massive, multi-layered problem by referring to an unseen graph demonstrating that the company has exceeded the margins of acceptable risk. Were the film to have been released before the general public became aware of the basic details of what went wrong economically throughout the world, this lack of explanation might have been a major problem, but we know, we get it, so the film does us a favor by cutting to the proverbial chase.

We open with a scene with a group of professional head choppers storming into the trading floor of a large financial firm. The scene is reminiscent of recent offerings like Up in the Air and The Company Men. One of the employees to go is risk management head Eric Dale (Stanley Tucci), who after nineteen years of service is informed he will be given a severance package and summarily escorted by a security guard while he cleans out his desk and exits the building. On the way out Dale hands a zip drive to his underling Peter Sullivan (Zachary Quinto, one of the producers who brought the film to screen), a late twenties trader, who we later learn has an advanced engineering degree from MIT (Dale was also an engineer in a previous life). Sullivan investigates the contents of the drive, learning that Dale’s work (which he had yet to finish) essentially means the firm is on the verge of going under, information which sets off a series of events involving the highest branches of the company.

The cast is excellent, with Penn Badgley (as Seth); Paul Bettany (as Will Emerson); Kevin Spacey (as Sam Rogers); Demi Moore (as Sarah Robertson); Simon Baker (as Jared Cohen); and Jeremy Irons (as John Tuld), along with the aforementioned Quinto and Tucci, representing a chain of employees making anywhere from a lowly two hundred fifty k per year to, in Tuld’s case, eighty nine million. As represented by these individuals, the film smartly makes clear what is possible in this world, and there is an ongoing theme having to do with the idea that these men (and women) dedicate their lives to a pursuit that produces nothing of tangible substance.

The company has been compared to Lehman’s, and Irons’ characters’ name is evidently a combination of Lehman’s chief Dick Fuld and Merrill’s John Thain, surnames that seem as equally made up as the amalgamated version. It is certainly easy, though, to compare the actions of the fictional company to any number of the multi-billion dollar firms that, with the governments help, essentially cheated one another, and the public, out of billions of dollars in worthless assets. It is interesting to hear the executives up the chain talk about not understanding the very models that define their business, a nod towards one of the many interesting facets at the heart of the actual crisis.

Thirty seven year old writer/director J.C. Chandor previously worked in real estate, and his father was employed by Merrill Lynch for forty years. He certainly seems to get the patois and milieu right. Chandor’s approach is interesting - he doesn’t demonize the individuals as other films of the type have had a tendency to do - if there is viciousness, it emerges more as a kind of chilly ambivalence, an acceptance that each decision, each strategic move, merely represents business as usual. Even a character like Sam, one we’ve seen before from Kevin Spacey, seems to be motivated more by his unspoken anger over being passed by for promotion in favor a younger man than by some deeply felt moral outrage. He, and several of the characters, including Sarah, and Eric, appear as upset about their warnings being ignored by those above them, than by the sickness infecting the entire system.

The proceedings are played out with impressive restraint, especially considering the pedigree of the cast, and the obvious temptation for a first time director to let the veterans ‘act’ (only Spacey is indulged with several showy moments, including an entirely unnecessary mini- subplot). There is more than a little resemblance to a film like Glengarry Glen Ross (which was based on the Mamet play), which also had an ensemble cast of excellent male actors, and at times showed the limits imposed by its origins. Though Margin Call was not derived from an existing work, its relative low budget (reported at 3.5 million) shows in the films’ lack of scope, a quality that (like Glengarry) results in a somehwat claustrophobic vibe (the action mainly takes place in the building), but in the end might work in its favor, as does the compressed time frame of events.

Though the Glengarry comparison (further highlighted by the presence of Spacey) is impossible to ignore, here, the boss/wolf bears little resemblance to Alec Baldwin’s uber male Blake, and there is no screaming, yelling, and/or threatening. Irons plays his role as a genteel, laid back commander who has been through the wars, refusing to let anyone see him sweat as he loses hundreds of millions of dollars overnight. Here, the death blows come with smiles and offers of coffee, and are explained in the most reasonable, logical way possible. Here, one gets one’s throat cut without out ever seeing the knife.

Melancholia (FR/GE/DAN/SWE)  Directed by Lars Von Trier Written by Lars Von Trier Starring Kirsten Dunst; Charlotte Gainsborough; Kiefer Sutherland; Alexander Skarsgard; John Hurt; Brady Corbet; Charlotte Rampling; Cameron Spurr; Stellna Skasgard; Udo Kier; Jesper Christensen

Fifty five year old Lars Von Trier’s latest is perhaps less shocking and controversial than his previous, Antichrist, but make no mistake, it is no less strange.

Gone is the low grade, naturally lit video from his Dogma-ish days; gone too are the undressed, chalk-lined studio sets of Dogville and Manderlay (though a third in the supposed Land of Opportunities trilogy was supposed to follow). Stylistically, the ten million-dollar plus Melancholia is closest to its immediate predecessor, because although the same epic/nasty fairytale feeling is no longer present, there is a kind of dark, other-wordly romanticism to this film as well, where people behave as if engulfed by some invisible fog (comparisons to Resnais’ Last Year In Marienbad (1961) would not be unfounded). Von Trier attempts to break the spell, and perhaps ground the film in the present by using a lot of shaky handhelds, but this only serves to further contribute to this bizarre, though compelling, mix.

In fact, shot with high end Phantom and Alexa digital cameras, the film begins with a gorgeously designed super slow-mo credit sequence (from Cinematographer Manual Alberto Claro), set to Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde, that includes lead Justine (Kirsten Dunst) in her wedding dress, visible electricity shooting from her fingertips, the ground collapsing between a mother and son’s feet, and muscular horses pulled by some imaginary force. It’s like some kind of dark work of fine art, classic rock album cover, or high end Elle shoot come to life.

The sequence is a prelude of things to come as in short order Justine will speak about her severe depression, describing the feeling (to paraphrase) as being akin to moving in molasses. Horses will play a prominent role in the film as well, and we will also discover that a planet named Melancholia is hurtling toward earth and may or may not pass our planet by. Privy to the strange events in the open, we as audience know that it will hit its mark, and so we also know that whether they believe it or not the characters are shortly facing the end of civilization.

Post credit sequence we cut to bride Justine (in her dress) and her new, tuxedo clad husband Michael (Alexander Skarsgard), who, two hours late for their own reception, pull up in the back of a limo with a driver who has a lot of difficulty parking. From the start, there is something odd about the way all of these people behave (not to mention the lack of explanation as to why children in the same family have completely different accents), even when they are supposedly acting normally. It is often difficult to determine where the line between bad writing/acting/directing and genius intersects with any artist who creates highly stylized work, though this has not prevented the lead actresses in Von Trier’s last two films from winning acting awards at Cannes. Judging Von Trier, however, through the prism of standard narrative filmmaking is basically impossible, in the same way that doing so with David Lynch is. One must instead digest the piece as a whole, allowing for rules only as they exist within the framework of the altered universe of the individual piece itself.

No matter what one feels about Von Trier as a public figure or a filmmaker (his many criticisms of The United States despite never having visited; his depiction of sexuality; his use of religious iconography; recent Nazi comments at Cannes, etc.), this polarizing artist has the ability to both confound and astound. There are times in Melancholia when the actors actions seem absurd, the entire enterprise nearly laughable, and yet there are at least as many others where the power and talent of this singular artist are revealed to be of the highest possible quality.

Kristen Dunst as advertising copywriter Justine has never been better playing a woman suffering severe, debilitating depression. Though critical response to her work varies, Dunst has always embodied a kind of dulled, passive persona akin to a surfer girl on opiates. Here it works perfectly, unveiling a character with a kind of disaffected aversion to life itself. In a role originally offered to Penelope Cruz (whose conversation with Von Trier reportedly led to him writing the script), Dunst might have redirected her career with what is obviously her finest work to date.

Broken into two parts, with Part One (titled Justine) basically involving the wedding - a strange, lavish, all night affair at the palacial residence of sister Claire (Antichrist lead Charlotte Gainsborough) and husband John (Kiefer Sutherland), who has flipped the bill for the entire event (filmed in Sweden, we are not told where we are supposed to be). Part Two (titled Claire) naturally centers on Claire, her husband, and son Leo (Cameron Spurr) -  Claire’s attempts to assist Justine with a depression that leaves her barely able to function, and also deal with the impending possibility of the approaching end of the world.

During the wedding, bad behavior abounds, and it becomes obvious that the mother of the bride, Gaby (Charlotte Rampling) is seriously unstable herself. The source of much of her bitterness and vitriol, ex-husband/father-of-the-bride, Dexter (John Hurt), is no prize either. Justine’s new husband Michael seems like a simple schmuck, in whom Justine appears to be not very interested, or at least not nearly as much as she should be. Obnoxious boss Jack (Stellan Skarsgard) offers Justine a promotion at the wedding, and then immediately demands she deliver a tag line for a company ad campaign before the night (yes, her wedding night) is up. All around Justine are people trying to decide her happiness, and dictate her future, for her.

The events at the wedding have a kind of random quality to them that could be seen as mirroring mental illness (everyone seems in varying degrees, off), but as the film continues it becomes easier to directly connect behavior to Von Trier’s obviously negative view of the human condition, as well as his longstanding battle with his own clinical depression. The story evidently arose out his experiences in therapy, and ideas about depressed people being better able to handle the apocalypse, and the through line to the Justine’s character, is impossible to ignore.

Gainsborough is, as always, excellent, matching Dunst in intensity, her extreme devotion to her sister complicated and exacerbated by myriad forces - her concern and intense love for her son, the pressures of an overbearing, fastidious husband, and an increasing fear verging on panic that all of their lives are in imminent danger. At one point she exclaims to Justine, “sometimes I really hate you,” and the line has the feeling of emotional truth that has not always been easy to decipher in Von Trier’s work. No one could miss the searing pain demonstrated by Dunst, however, particularly when she is so devastated (basically catatonic) that she cannot get into a bath, or eat her dinner. She is an oppressive force to all around her, and on some level knows it, but is helpless under a power greater than herself.

As the film pushes toward its conclusion in part two, Von Trier is able to further elucidate (if one can use that word) his world view (or at least his view filtered through his personal depression) by way of his doppelganger Justine. Predicting doom with the assurance of someone possessed with psychic powers, she espouses a kind of nihilistic, cynical, angry, and altogether dire view of human kind. This bleak outlook extends to her inability to feel empathy for her sister’s grave fear and final desire to make the best of the worst of situations.

The metaphor of the approaching planet Melancholia is, of course, a stand-in for the all encompassing, all ascendant domination of mental illness - an affliction with the power to wipe out one’s own individual humanity. And still, when the hour approaches, there is a nod toward that very humanity, as if even Von Trier couldn’t help himself in admitting to the gap of sunlight threatening to poke it’s head through the darkness.

The Descendants (USA) Directed by Alexander Payne  Written by Alexander Payne; Nat Faxon; Jim Rash Starring George Clooney; Shailene Woodley; Amara Miller; Nick Kraues; Beau Bridges; Robert Forster; Judie Greer; Matthew Lillard; Patricia Hastie

Throughout the filmography of Director/Co-Writer, Alexander Payne, there are identifiable recurring themes running though the work. Infidelity, death, aging, loneliness, middle-aged men in crisis who haven’t lived up to their own expectations of themselves, and a variety of other big ideas are woven into the tapestry of everyman social satires with scenes chock full of awkwardness and embarrassment. Payne is a skilled craftsman when it comes to creating films depicting various sub strata of (specifically midwestern American) life, giving his unyielding, cutting, though never fully misanthropic view of the people who populate this world.

Like his three previous films, The Descendants is based on a novel - this one by Kaui Hart Hemmings (who has a cameo in the film), but the departure for Payne is that for the first time he strays from his home state setting of Nebraska (the book and film are set firmly in Honalulu, and Kauai, Hawaii). The story focuses on Matt King (George Clooney), an attorney with a size-able trust fund he doesn’t use, who is mostly of Caucasian ancestry, but also distantly related to a native 19th century island princess. When Matt’s wife Elizabeth (Joanie in the novel), played by Patrice Hastie, is involved in a freak boating accident that sends her into a coma, he is forced to juggle a lucrative pending land sale for his enormous extended family (he is the trustee and the decision is his), while playing sole parent to his two troubled daughters, seventeen year old Alex (Shailene Woodley), and ten year old and Scottie (Amara Miller).

Clooney is Clooney, and despite the movie star looks manages to give off the air of a boring, middle aged man who has settled, perhaps too willingly, into his life of quiet desperation. While his wife’s coma, and the the news that follows that she will not recover, are obviously the inciting events dominating the film, what winds up motivating much of the action is the revelation that she had been unfaithful, and his subsequent quest to track down his wife’s lover. The pressure he is under is compounded by the imminent day of decision regarding the sale of the family’s vast private, undeveloped land, a deal most of his relatives have ravenously pursued since (as many of them are not in the same financial position as Matt) it will dramatically improve their lives.

Perhaps the strongest aspect of The Descendants is the examination of a well-off family that was clearly imploding before the tragedy. We hear about Matt’s wife’s trouble with drinking, and her pursuit of dare devil activities; Alex’s problems with drugs and penchant for older men; and Scottie’s emotional issues (those these are less well defined). Matt has been neglecting his family for some time, immersed in his work, emotionally checked out, and feeling powerless to contend with the domineering, erratic females who surround him.

Hawaii is ably photographed by Payne regular Phedon Papamichael, and we are privy to an array of beautiful scenes of nature - ocean, beach, rain, lush greens. Native Hawaiian music dominates the score, and there are obvious ideas here about the importance of respecting unsullied lands, and native culture, as well as clear efforts made to represent the island in an authentic way, though no real time is spend with any full blooded native people, who wind up merely as backdrop as the tale of these “Haolies” unfolds. If possible, the film feels like it gets the details right and at the same time misses out on some kind of important essence of the spirituality that is so important to the island.

It is not that this is anything less than a quality Hollywood film - something there is definitely not enough of nowadays, and many scenes involving Matt interacting with his daughters; Alex’s dopey friend, Sid (Nick Krause); and in-laws, Scott (an excellent Robert Forster) and Altzheimer’s sufferer Alice (Barbara Southern) are spot on, as is Matt and Alex’s entire search for closure in seeking out the man who cuckolded Matt. There is something very James L. Brooksian about the film - nothing subversive or particularly new to be found (Citizen Ruth it ain’t), but a nice story coupled with solid performances.

The Descendants also brings to mind a film like Up in the Air, made by a director, Jason Reitman, who might be a younger version of Payne. The difference being that the wider social issue in that film (namely, the employment crisis) felt more connected to both real life and the main narrative, and thusly less tacked on (though ironically it was). Here, the land sale plotline unfortunately feels too often like a device that isn’t completely integrated in the family drama/comedy we see unfold. The real emotion in the piece lies there, manifested most acutely by several excellent scenes involving Clooney and eldest daughter Alex (Woodley is the surprise and consistently good throughout) that feel particularly raw.

Though undoubtedly the film feels lived-in - no small feat, and a mark of a strong, experienced director in control of his material, there is ultimately some connection missed between the two story-lines that renders the final product a bit flat. With that said, Descendants will likely get plenty of recognition come awards season.