Grade: B minus

Jojo Rabbit: Consider the Nazi, Through Childish Eyes

Jeremy BeckReviews
Taika Waititi and Roman Griffin Davis in "Jojo Rabbit"

The rise of the Third Reich is such a blight on the world’s history, it’s no wonder we keep making fun of it. Sure, there are plenty of sober cinematic reconstructions of the era, so many that the Holocaust drama has practically become a genre unto itself. But the genocidal horror of Nazism is so obscene, so incomprehensible, that unless you’re Steven Spielberg, it can seem impossible to confront head-on, like staring into a black sun. Maybe it’s better to approach this unspeakable atrocity askance, to attack its ugliness and brutality not with outrage and solemnity, but with cleverness and mockery.

Or maybe it isn’t. Certainly some viewers will take umbrage at Jojo Rabbit, Taika Waititi’s comedy-drama-satire-coming-of-age-whatever, which is set in Germany in 1945 and which unfolds with an impish tone that, while hardly seditious, is decidedly less than utterly respectful. I’m not here to tell you what you can and can’t get mad about, but I will suggest that this awkward, weirdly sincere movie is too eager and silly to be truly offensive. Its parodic vision of Nazis as bumbling stooges feels like an appropriate portraiture, not so much trivializing evil as acknowledging its senselessness and banality. And so, my problem with Jojo Rabbit isn’t that it tries to be funny. My problem is that it isn’t funny. Read More

Read more

The Lighthouse: Stormy Weather, Madness on the Horizon

Jeremy BeckReviews
Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe in Robert Eggers' "The Lighthouse".

A punishing movie whose bits of greatness are obscured by a fog of auteurist pretension, The Lighthouse is a deeply frustrating experience, a tantalizing work that defies explanation and categorization. It defies enjoyment too; as technically impressive and formidably confident as it may be, it isn’t much fun to watch. But it does carry a genuine personality, the imprint of a director who refuses to sacrifice his bizarre vision for the sake of more quotidian values like accessibility. Or, you know, coherence.

That director is Robert Eggers, whose first feature, the terrific horror movie The Witch, blended creeptastic folk-story terror with silky filmmaking craft. It also featured characters speaking in period-specific dialect, a trick Eggers repeats here, though the setting has been bumped up by a few centuries to the late 1800s. The screenplay, which Eggers wrote with his brother Max, is laden with old-timey jargon—“aye” in place of “yes”, “ye” instead of “you”, etc.—which enhances the film’s already-ornate degree of detail. Assuming, of course, you can understand what the hell they’re saying. Read More

Read more

Ad Astra: Distant Papa, Can You Hear Me?

Jeremy BeckReviews
Brad Pitt in "Ad Astra"

Early in Ad Astra, James Gray’s searching, often astonishing, deeply frustrating new film, a man finds himself sitting alone at a kitchen table. A woman, whom we presume to be his wife, enters the background of the frame and starts to walk into an adjoining room, then stops and tilts her head to look at her husband. At this point, most directors would pull focus from the man to the woman, allowing us to discern her expression, be it pensive, affectionate, or disapproving. Gray, however, keeps his camera trained on the man in the foreground, watching his impassive features as he remains still, refusing to turn and look at his spouse. The woman leaves the room as she arrived, a blurred outline: hazy, indefinite, unknowable.

In terms of plot, this is one of Ad Astra’s least essential scenes. But it’s still a revealing moment, demonstrating both its director’s purposeful technique and his thematic and visual priorities. The man at the table isn’t just the movie’s main character but our sole point of entry. He appears in every scene of the film and conveys its lofty ideas, whether through his wistful demeanor or via one of his numerous, egregiously unnecessary voiceovers; here, he informs us that he is focused on his mission to the exclusion of all else. Yet while Ad Astra aspires to be both a bold adventure and a poignant character study—a somber interstellar epic that explores the mysteries of the universe by way of one man’s scarred psyche—its more accurate embodiment is the blurred outline of that faceless woman. With his customary craft, Gray has made a sweeping study of humanity that, despite its strenuous efforts, never feels especially humane. Read More

Read more

Avengers: Endgame: Marching to the End, and Back to the Beginning

Jeremy BeckReviews
Heroes assemble in "Avengers: Endgame".

In one of the very first scenes (spoiler alert!) in Avengers: Endgame, Tony Stark—marooned in deep space, with hope and oxygen levels dwindling—beams out an interstellar valediction that doubles as a cinematic prophecy. “This is going to be one hell of a tearjerker,” declares the playboy inventor who more than a decade ago donned a metallic suit and launched the mother of all franchises. Setting aside the industrialist’s dire circumstances, the supposed catalyst for those tears is right there in the title. After 11 years, 21 movies, dozens of costumed characters, and billions in box-office grosses, Endgame is designed to bring the Marvel Cinematic Universe to a close.

Whether this in fact brings tears to your eyes is a matter of personal taste, but what cannot be denied is the enormity of this enterprise. Endgame, again directed by Anthony and Joe Russo, is an absolutely massive movie, so full of stuff—fights and flights, flash-forwards and leaps backward, deaths and resurrections, callbacks and cul-de-sacs—that its three-hour runtime seems almost slender. It may not be the best superhero movie ever made—in fact, I’d wager Tony’s conspicuously placed Audi against it—but it is unquestionably the biggest. Read More

Read more

The Aftermath: He’s a Good German. Or at Least, He’s Good-Looking.

Jeremy BeckReviews
Keira Knightley in "The Aftermath".

Quality acting may not be able to make a bad movie good, but it can certainly make a silly movie less silly, and more watchable. The Aftermath, James Kent’s sober and strenuous adaptation of Rhidian Brook’s novel, is in many ways unpersuasive, with clunkily conceived characters, overly decorous presentation, and dubious politics. But its performances, particularly those of Keira Knightley and Jason Clarke, are exemplars of craft and commitment. With elegance and poise, they take a soapy, soggy romance and lift it into the realm of juicy, entertaining melodrama.

This is nothing new for Knightley, who has made something of a career out of elevating prestige period pieces with her cut-glass precision and simmering feeling. Just last year, she applied her considerable talents to Colette, helping turn what appeared to be a stodgy biopic of feminine awakening into a bawdy, sexy romp. Unfortunately, The Aftermath lacks Colette’s sense of impish fun; nor does it move with the same directorial alacrity that Joe Wright brought to his excellent collaborations with Knightley (Pride & Prejudice, Atonement, Anna Karenina). It is instead decidedly tasteful, with a gentle score, a lacquered production design, and a profound fear of offending anyone. Read More

Read more