Grade: B plus

The Martian: Lost in Space, But Not in Spirit

Jeremy BeckReviews
Matt Damon is alone on Mars in "The Martian"

The Martian is a movie about a man stranded on a deserted planet, first left for dead, then scrambling frantically to survive. You might think, from this brief and terrifying description, that it is a horror film, or at least a gritty survivalist fable—Cast Away in space, or Gravity on barren land. Yet the most surprising and satisfying thing about The Martian, which is based on a best-selling novel by Andy Weir and is directed with characteristic competence by Ridley Scott, is how much fun it is. Certainly, there are moments of dread, and the protagonist continually faces the prospect of imminent death. But for the most part, this film is warm, inviting, and even comforting. There may be gravity on Mars, but The Martian feels positively buoyant.

It doesn’t start out that way. In a brisk and chaotic prologue set on the red planet, a group of astronauts led by Commander Lewis (Jessica Chastain) attempt to fight through a storm of swirling debris. During the squall, a piece of equipment breaks loose and slams directly into the chest of Mark Watney, catapulting him off into the desolate distance. After a desperate search, Lewis has no choice but to abandon hope, and she and her crew hightail it out of there before Mars can claim five additional victims. Read More

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Z for Zachariah: A Garden of Eden in a Land of the Dead

Jeremy BeckReviews
Margot Robbie is the last woman on Earth in "Z for Zachariah"

The apocalypse has long fascinated filmmakers, and no wonder. From the black comedy of Dr. Strangelove to the commercial satire of Dawn of the Dead to the blunt-force survivalism of I Am Legend, the concept of the end of the world yields fertile cinematic soil for eager directors to till. But the marvel of Z for Zachariah, Craig Zobel’s solemn and soulful third feature, is that it isn’t really about the end of the world at all. Certainly, it recognizes the starkness of its reality, but it shows only the barest of interest in exploring the origins of its inciting event. (The sum total of its exposition occurs when a character muses, “Maybe something with the weather patterns.”) Instead, Z for Zachariah uses the apocalypse as scaffolding to explore a genre that is far more cataclysmic: the domestic melodrama. Zobel doesn’t care how civilization collapsed. He wants to know how hearts break.

Not that this lush and expressive film is remotely lacking in ghoulish imagery or toxic atmosphere. From its opening moments, which follow a hooded figure clad in Hazmat gear prowling through a barren landscape, Z for Zachariah silently communicates the calamity that has befallen the planet. That figure is Ann (Margot Robbie, an Australian giving her best shot at a Southern accent), the lone remaining denizen of this unhappy valley that’s located somewhere in Southern Appalachia. Ann’s hair initially appears lank and her face is caked with grime, but this isn’t one of those cheesy uglification jobs, and her natural luminescence quickly shines through because, you know, Margot Robbie. One day, this solitary looker spies John Loomis (a terrific Chiwetel Ejiofor), a civil engineer wandering a dusty road in a comically oversized “safe suit”. He futzes around with a Geiger counter and then, upon confirming that the air is uncontaminated, strips off his suit and lets out a bellow of euphoria, tears streaming down his face; with that, in less than 30 seconds and without uttering a single syllable, Ejiofor makes his character’s agony and ecstasy known. Indeed, John is so excited by having finally found a safe environment that he stupidly wades into a nearby pond without first testing the water, which is, Ann frantically informs him, radioactive. Read More

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Phoenix: Back from the Dead, But Something’s Off

Jeremy BeckReviews
Ronald Zehrfeld and Nina Hoss dance with deception and death in "Phoenix"

Suspension of disbelief is typically a viewing requirement at the multiplex, not the art house. Superhero movies and science-fiction flicks are expected to stretch the boundaries of reality in ways anathema to dialogue-driven dramas and period pieces. Phoenix, Christian Petzold’s electric, implausible anti-love story, is the type of muted, modestly scaled film that you wouldn’t expect to ask audiences to take a giant leap of faith. But it does precisely that, hinging on a conceit that, if rejected, threatens to topple the entire enterprise. If you refuse to accept the cornerstone of Phoenix‘s vertiginous plot, you may struggle to find rapture in its supple technique and vast emotions. But if you surrender yourself, you are likely to become intoxicated by its smoky beauty and limitless longing.

I strongly urge you to try your best, though my urgings are insignificant compared to those of Nina Hoss. A German-born actress best known to American audiences as one of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s weary spies in A Most Wanted Man (and also the anchor of Petzold’s sobering Cold War film, Barbara), Hoss delivers a transcendent performance as Nelly, a concentration camp survivor who was shot in the face during the war (in a wise decision, the details of the shooting are never explained), and who begins the film wrapped in bandages. She’s returning to Germany with her friend, Lene (Nina Kunzendorf, perfectly crisp), in order to undergo facial reconstructive surgery. When the doctor asks Nelly whom she wants to look like, she demands that he return her to her original self. “You won’t look exactly the same,” the surgeon warns her, and the subtitles for that line might as well be accented in bold. Read More

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The Gift: A Thriller of Victims and Villains, But Which Is Which?

Jeremy BeckReviews
Joel Edgerton stalks Rebecca Hall and Jason Bateman in "The Gift"

In an early episode of Seinfeld called “The Male Unbonding,” Jerry finds himself trapped in an unwanted friendship with a childhood chum named Joel (Veep‘s Kevin Dunn), a selfish and fatuous oaf who fancies himself Jerry’s best bud. Eventually, Jerry can no longer bear Joel’s boorish behavior, and he attempts to “break up” with him; this leads to Joel blubbering in public, followed by Jerry swiftly backpedaling, then spending the remainder of the episode inventing excuses (choir practice! tutoring my nephew!) to avoid seeing him. In theory, this pattern of evasion continued indefinitely, but because Seinfeld was an episodic sitcom, Joel was never heard from again. Still, I’ve often wondered: What might have happened going forward between these two self-involved men? Would their asymmetrical friendship have faded naturally, with Joel gradually taking the hint? Or would something else—something more traumatic—have occurred?

The Gift, Joel Edgerton’s dark and disturbing thriller, plays like a twisted version of “The Male Unbonding”. It examines the process by which adults attempt to extricate themselves from undesired relationships, but it also refracts that process through a fun-house mirror. In “The Male Unbonding”, Jerry gamely suffers through Joel’s antics, repeatedly rolling his eyes, always accompanied by a chorus of laughter. In The Gift, the eye-rolls have given way to cold stares, and the laughter has been replaced by screams. Read More

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Magic Mike XXL: Forget Your Day Job, It’s Time to Party

Jeremy BeckReviews
Channing Tatum and co. are back for "Magic Mike XXL"

A few months ago, I saw a movie about an inveterate warrior who gets pulled back into a turbulent conflict, and who uses his ingenuity and physical prowess to triumph in battle. A few days ago, I saw another movie with a similar storyline, about a legendary figure who grudgingly returns to the battlegrounds of his past, relying on both his cunning and his skill to achieve immortality. And while the two films are undeniably different—Mad Max: Fury Road is about a life-or-death struggle set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, whereas Magic Mike XXL is about a stripper performing in Myrtle Beach—their dissimilarities, from a filmmaking perspective, are almost incidental. The traits that made Mad Max: Fury Road such a sensation—the no-holds-barred attitude, the revelatory practical stunt work, the palpable swagger—apply with equal force to XXL. Both worship at the altar of cinematic excess, and both thrill their audiences with their verve and dexterity. It makes little difference that, while Max faces a hail of bullets, Mike is bombarded with “a tsunami of dollar bills”.

In conventional critical terms, Magic Mike XXL might appear to be a bit thin. It has no real plot to speak of, it is not especially interested in character development, and it is positively disdainful of plausibility. Certainly it lacks the lacerating bite of its predecessor, which benefitted from Steven Soderbergh’s artistry, expertly camouflaging a wolf’s tale of loneliness and manipulation in the sheep’s clothing of glamour and decadence. (For this sequel, Soderbergh has passed directing duties on to his longtime assistant, Gregory Jacobs, though he returns as both cinematographer and editor, working under his usual twin pseudonyms, Peter Andrews and Mary Ann Bernard.) But virtually none of this matters. XXL doesn’t have time for trifling concerns like plot and character, and watching the movie, neither will you. You will be too busy cheering its electric set pieces and succumbing to its infectious spirit of euphoria. Read More

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