Joy (2015)

Joy is easily the deepest and most powerful movie David O. Russell has ever made. Building on his success with The Fighter, Silver Linings Playbook, and American Hustle, Russell takes a more focused and intimate approach to telling the story of Joy Mangano and the Miracle Mop.

Russell's previous efforts have been enjoyable, but none have been as daring as Joy. Russell inverts many tropes associated with success stories - and even tropes established within Russell's own canon. 

Robert De Niro plays Joy's (Jennifer Lawrence) father; in an inversion of his loving father character in Silver Linings Playbook, De Niro's character is perhaps the most despicable person in the film, but Russell reveals this gradually. In a similar vein, the most loyal and compassionate character is her ex-husband Tony (Edgar Ramirez). 

By now, most people expect a certain level of sweetness and romance in a Russell film starring Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper. Joy, however, does not really have any romance in it, but there is a romantic feel permeating the entire film. Although there are no romantic relationships, there is an emphasis on the essence of romance: the guileless effusion of emotion, dreams, and magic that is so fragile, yet so intrinsic to childhood - and is so easy to lose in adulthood.

One of the key visual motifs in the film is memory and the process of resurrecting memory. The film opens with a curious prologue, which is actually a scene from a soap opera that we learn soon after is one of Joy's mother's obsessions. Buoyed by the opening to Eric Clapton's "I Feel Free," which functions as a bookend to the opening and closing of the film, the film then cuts to Joy as a child playing in the snow. Her grandmother (Diane Ladd) narrates the film, which posits the narrative as a story of childhood and, more important, of maturation whose process depends solely on never forgetting the bright-eyed dreams of childhood.  

Indeed, childhood is the key theme of this film and in many ways its star. This opening memory of Joy playing in the snow is also how all of the principle characters in her family are introduced, suggesting a connection among snow, family, childhood, memory, and success. When Joy describes a paper house she designed and created herself, we see that this early childhood impulse to create is not only Joy's defining characteristic but also one that she has lost as an adult. In perhaps one of the most moving shots of the film, Joy's grandmother explains to child Joy that one day she will be a success; this idea, we come to see as the film cuts to adult Joy, is truly the driving force of this film - not the mop or even the monetary success she enjoys later. Joy is about success as a continuous process, one that begins early and that must be revived in adulthood if one is to achieve it. 

Throughout the film snow is a sort of shorthand for childhood, success, and memory, and all of these elements appear sequentially, usually prompted by something as simple as a Christmas light or a snowflake. Indeed, most of this film occurs in the snow, and the snow imagery becomes ubiquitous as Joy's invention grows more successful. This metaphor is not about success itself, but about Joy's reclaiming of her childhood dreams and aspirations. Additionally, the snow imagery appears increasingly in the context of Christmas, which again functions as a shorthand for childhood dreams and magic; what is more magical to a young child than Christmas? 

Easily the most moving sequences in the film - and the ones that have stayed with me since first viewing Joy in the theater back in January - are Joy's dreams in which her childhood self essentially asks her adult self when she abandoned them. Russell's use of dream sequences and visual imagery is a new step for him, and he handles it with beauty and emotion. These sequences felt reminiscent of early Ken Russell in their embracing of visual symbolism and fantastical imagery. Truly, David O. Russell's films have always been realist, which is ordinarily a trait I have enjoyed: Part of the beauty of Silver Linings Playbook, for instance, is its ordinariness. Joy has a similar universal relatability, but it also isn't afraid to skirt the supernatural or the eccentric. The grandmother, known simply as "Mimi," narrates the film posthumously; at her funeral, she appears at Joy's side and holds her hand for a moment. These touches brought an emotional pull to the film that is definitely new territory for Russell. 

Jennifer Lawrence's acting is in top form, and she is surprisingly quiet in this film. In direct contrast with her characters in Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle, her portrayal of Joy relies mostly on her eyes and her whispers. Indeed, when Joy is angry, her voice drops to the point where it is barely audible. I found this far more effective than any yelling or crying could possibly be. 

Another satisfying trait of this film is the emphasis on women and matriarchy. The film is bursting with veteran actresses: Susan Lucci, Isabella Rossellini, Diane Ladd, Virginia Madsen, and even Melissa Rivers playing her late mother Joan. Changing generations of women, and what each woman has passed on to Joy in her life - including her daughter - is another key theme that is woven into the fabric of this childhood theme. Although Joy has a son, he is almost absent from the film; instead, Joy's daughter is with her throughout this journey, as are her grandmother, half-sister, and mother. In almost every scene, Russell has a shot of the daughter's reaction, and it represents a powerful bond between Joy and Christie and, more important, between generations of women. Joy apparently puts even more pressure on herself to succeed not only to revive her childhood self, but to show her own child that dreams are not foolish and can be attainable no matter the circumstances. 

Joy was marketed as a comedy, and I have no idea why. There is little to laugh at in this film; it is almost completely humorless, which is again quite a departure for David O. Russell. To me, Russell is a throw-back to Golden Age Hollywood, his films reminiscent of George Cuckor, Frank Capra, and Billy Wilder. Of course, it is important to remember that each of these directors, especially Wilder, made subversive comedies. No matter how cheerful or hilarious a Cuckor or Wilder or Capra film might be, there is always an underlying seriousness. It's a Wonderful Life might be the ultimate Christmas movie, but its whole plot encompasses a man who has decided to commit suicide on Christmas Eve. Adam's Rib might be a sly comedy about two lawyers, but it is a ferocious critique of 1940's gender politics. And as for Billy Wilder...well, every film he ever made bordered on the dark and the cynical, no matter how light (Sabrina, Some Like It Hot) or dark (Ace in the Hole, Sunset Boulevard). Russell is certainly following in this tradition, but he is also bringing his own style to the table, one that continues to evolve with each film. 

Overall, Joy is a deep, thought-provoking film that probes into the most sheltered and suppressed yearnings of its characters and its audience. There is a profound emotional connection within this film that cannot be overstated. I am excited to see what Russell creates next, but I also think Joy will be remembered as a classic and a turning point in Russell's canon. 

Grade: A+

Chariots of Fire (1981)

You know the theme song. The riveting bass, the lilting melody: no matter how unfamiliar one is with Chariots of Fire, one knows the music. 

A (slightly fictionalized) story of Britain's 1924 Olympic track team, Chariots of Fire still stands as not only one of the great sports movies, but also as one of the great costume dramas. For the uninitiated, here is the trailer: 

As a child, I adored Chariots of Fire. My father first showed it to my brother, sister, and me when I was about 6 years old. I loved it so much that I used to tell people I was going to be a track star like Eric Liddell when I grew up. When playing in the backyard, I would take my mother's garden shovel and dig a small hole like the runners do in Chariots of Fire prior to their races. I was convinced Eric Liddell was the greatest runner of all time. When my dad informed me Liddell's records had been broken, I was crushed. 

It has been years since I last watched this film--more than 20--and seeing it again as an adult was a true treat, especially because so much of the film's sociopolitical issues went way over my head when I was a child. 

A story of two rivals, Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell, this film is really about the loneliness and exploitation that come from being an outsider. 

Harold, a Jew, yearns to be accepted as an Englishman, but the anti-Semitism of upper-crust British society holds him back. As he tells his girlfriend (and later wife) Sybil, "They lead me to the water, but won't let me drink." From the moment we first see Harold, he is berated, gently but cruelly, for being Jewish. Yet, he does not accept this treatment at all. For him, as for Liddell, who I will get into momentarily, running is both a balm and a defense. Harold's talent as a runner, his heretofore unsurpassed speed and agility, are as he himself puts it a "weapon" against the stigma and prejudice directed toward him for being a Jew. That is, his talent is unsurpassed until he races Eric Liddell. 

Liddell, the film's dual protagonist who is also an outsider, is a Scot who must run for Great Britain. A pious man, Liddell's principles are put to the test in one of the more moving scenes of the film. After arriving at the Olympics and learning his race will take place on Sunday, Liddell refuses to run. He is forced to meet with several aristocrats - the Prince of Wales among them - who all attempt to coerce him to run despite his principles. In the end, Liddell's teammate Lord Lindsay offers to swap races with Liddell. While it is easy to dismiss Liddell's reasoning as religious zealotry, his religious beliefs actually have little to do with the actual conflict. His being Scottish puts him at odds with the British aristocracy's expectations; his status as an outsider fuels the tension here, but is also the true source of the stigma he receives, much like Harold. 

These two characters and their relative experiences as outsiders within British society - and more specifically on the Olympic team - are at the heart of this film and are what drives the emotional pull. 

Harold replays the loss over and over...

Truly, one of the most moving scenes of the entire film and one that has stayed with me since childhood is when Harold loses to Liddell. It is Harold's first loss, and we first see the race in real time. After that, the glorious Vangelis score nails the overwhelming self-flagellation Harold puts himself through as he recounts the race over and over. The sound in this sequence is brilliant, allowing the audience first to hear the actual sounds of the race, then silence just before the Vangelis music crescendos. This brief moment of silence allows us to feel the utter distress Harold feels as he loses. After that, the repetitive sound of the arena's chairs being closed up echo over the music. Harold is the only person in the arena as this sound grows louder, making his replaying the race in his head that much more palpable. At the risk of overstatement, I cannot think of another film that captures so movingly how it feels to lose. 

The film is framed like a memory. The opening scene is of Harold's funeral in January 1978, and Lindsay is giving the eulogy. As Lindsay says, only he and Aubrey Montague remain of the 1924 team, and only they remember the true Abrahams. It then shifts to that famous and magnificent slow motion scene with the theme: 

Soon after, the film goes to Aubrey, who is writing to his parents from Paris just before the Olympic games begin. In yet another layer, the film shifts to 1919 when Aubrey and Harold meet as they arrive at Cambridge as freshmen. These many layers to the film's narrative in a way excuse the historic errors (Liddell learning of the Sunday races when he's getting on the boat, Harold marrying Sybil Gordon instead of Sybil Evers, etc.) as they can be accounted for by the narrators' now nostalgic memory. Moreover, one of my favorite scenes is when Harold has dinner with Sybil for the first time. Although in real life Harold married another woman named Sybil who also happened to be a singer and met her ten years later than the movie portrays, the tension between movie-Sybil, played with elegance, grace, and intelligence by Alice Krige, and Harold fuels a large part of the drama and enriches the film's themes--the losing scene being one of the best examples. The fact that it is recounted through so many layers of memory actually makes the drama richer, for we as humans tend to remember younger days with fondness and romance. 

Beyond the characters and conflicts, this film stands out in every aspect of cinema. The costumes are perfection, for which Chariots of Fire rightly won an Oscar. The acting is also stellar, especially Ben Cross, who captures Harold's arrogance and insecurities with gusto, bringing some passion to a character that could have been just another dude in a sports movie. Cross's portrayal of Harold is layered and matures so beautifully as the film progresses. 

Ian Charleson, who played Eric Liddell to such infinitesimal preciseness that he even mimicked Liddell's breathing style as he ran, died of AIDS in 1990 when he was only 40 years old. Since his death, British theatre presents an annual Ian Charleson Award that recognizes new actors under the age of 30. Named in his honor, the award is most prestigious. His performance in Chariots of Fire is memorable and offers a sensitive yet noble counter to Cross's more fiery Harold. 

Altogether, Chariots of Fire is an immaculate experience. More than just a sports movie, the film encompasses several genres at once - biopic, costume drama, coming of age story - and manages to combine so many disparate yet joined themes that explain what it means to be human: love, winning, losing, proving one's worth, holding to principles, and yearning to belong. 

Grade: A+

Raging Bull (1980)

Last night I watched Raging Bull for the fifth or sixth time (I have lost count), and I still have at best mixed feelings about it. From a directing standpoint, an editing standpoint, an acting standpoint, a cinematography standpoint--truly, any aspect of filmmaking--Raging Bull is a masterpiece. However, there is something missing from the film for me that weakens its pathos and overall emotional pull. At just over two hours, it feels much longer. It is a beautiful film in many ways, but may also be the most violent film Martin Scorsese has ever made by a tremendous margin. 

Released in 1980, which was the same year of David Lynch's The Elephant Man, Robert Redford's directorial debut in Ordinary People, and Sissy Spacek's lovely performance in Coal Miner's Daughter, Raging Bull certainly was in good company. I've seen all of these movies and enjoy them all for different reasons, but Raging Bull is the one that haunts me the most, and not for necessarily good reasons. 

The film chronicles real life boxer Jake LaMotta's rise and fall in his boxing career, and it is a brutal, agonizing decline. Robert De Niro, whose performance is perfection here, got into incredible shape for the boxing sequences, then gained over 60 pounds to play LaMotta in his later years. It is a breathtaking transformation and one that anyone even mildly interested in acting or film must see. He captures LaMotta's anger, stupidity, paranoia, and (in my opinion) personality disorder flawlessly. One of the most perfectly shot, edited, and acted scenes is his final fight with Sugar Ray Robinson. If you've never seen this film before, you must watch this:

The editing in this scene is brilliant. Spike Lee points out that one of the greatest things about this movie is the boxing choreography, and it is perfect. The cuts of the lights, the punches, the blood--we learn so much about LaMotta as a person through these boxing sequences, and none more than in the clip above.

Although Raging Bull is recognized as one of the great collaborations between Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese, many people fail to realize this was the first in a long and masterful line of collaborations between Scorsese and Thelma Schoonmaker, who is without a doubt one of the great editors of the sound era. If you feel I'm overstating, just watch this interview with Scorsese and Wang Kar Wai in which they both gush over Schoonmaker's talent (13:00 minutes in):

Since 1980, Thelma has edited all of Scorsese's movies and now practically has a telepathic relationship with him. She's been nominated seven times for Best Film Editing, and she's won three Oscars--the first of which was for Raging Bull (The Aviator  and The Departed were her other wins). For some reason, every self-described feminist I know who is interested in film does not know anything about Schoonmaker, which bewilders me and speaks to how much editors are overlooked, especially women. In any case, Scorsese and Schoonmaker's collaboration on Raging Bull is nothing short of ingenious. The cuts on the Sugar Ray sequence are of course only one small example.

This film also marks the first collaboration between Scorsese and Joe Pesci. Anyone who is familiar with their later work, particularly Goodfellas and Casino, knows that in the Pesci-De Niro relationship, De Niro plays the calm one and Pesci the psychopath. In Raging Bull, the relation is much the opposite, with Jake LaMotta as essentially a paranoid, narcissistic psychopath (he is a "raging bull") and Pesci as the slightly more level-headed brother. Truly, Raging Bull is an American Othello, with LaMotta constantly suspecting and punishing his Desdamona, played by an extremely young Cathy Moriarty. 

So, with all of these accolades, why do I dislike this movie?

It's complicated. The first time I watched this film was in the midst of my and my brother's obsession with Scorsese's Goodfellas, which you can read about on my "About Me" page. We were in love with anything even remotely associated with Scorsese and wanted to see Raging Bull as soon as we knew what it was. I still remember Burt and me watching it on an old TV in our living room and both of us feeling...confused by the end. I don't know what I expected, but I do remember feeling let down. Because I was only about 17 at the time, it is easy to dismiss my initial reaction to youthful ignorance. However, I've watched it since then several times and always carry that same feeling of...disappointment. After watching the film last night, I am finally able to articulate that disappointment. 

Jake LaMotta is a character consumed by violence; it defines every fiber of his being: his masculinity, his passions, his home life, his career, his treatment of his family. He is a man who is drowned in violence, defined by it, driven by it, aroused by it. As a result, every single scene of the film is at the very least tinged with this violence. Watching the film last night, I felt emotionally exhausted only thirty minutes into the movie, and it was then that I realized why. 

The film puts you inside the mind of a man--a "raging bull"--whose obsession with violence permeates everything about him, and it fills the audience with anxiety, fear, and trepidation. You have no idea whom he is about to attack, what he will break or destroy, or to what extent he will explode. He is a ticking time bomb in the most extreme. If you look at other Scorsese protagonists, this is not an unusual characteristic; in fact, it is quite common. Johnny Boy in Mean Streets, Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver, Nicky in Casino, Tommy in Goodfellas--all of these guys are on the brink of explosion. For me, the difference is that LaMotta was not only a real person (this is a biopic, after all), but his anger and intensity feel so real. It is because of this constantly pulsing violence throughout the entire film that I believe Raging Bull is the most violent film Scorsese has ever done.

I can only speculate about how men feel watching Raging Bull, but for me as a woman, I feel anxious and tired the whole time. Although I have never been in a violent relationship, I have been on the receiving end of that kind of attitude LaMotta exudes: women as property, women as sexual objects, women as things. Indeed, every woman alive (and most girls) have been subjected to sexual harassment at some point (usually quite frequently), and the Jake LaMottas of the world are the ones we fear most of all. 

One scene in particular that made me feel queasy--in a way it did not when I was a teenager--was toward the end. LaMotta has a club and is quite fat and creepy at this point. He walks around the club kissing girls who may or may not be underage as a way to "test" and see if they are 21. I had to stop the film and walk around for a moment to calm down; De Niro's performance in that scene is so real, it provoked memories of every creepy, lecherous old man I've met at practically any social function: The ones who walk over to girls, sometimes still teenagers, and attempt to flirt by asking, "What's a pretty little girl like you doing here?" That familiarity and the underlying violence beneath it--sexual violence, violence that we as an audience know LaMotta is not afraid of using to get his own way, violence that threatens any woman who does not adhere to his idea of women as property--actually scared me; I say that without hyperbole. 

When we learn in a subsequent scene that one of the girls was only 14, and LaMotta is arrested, I had trouble sympathizing with him. In fact, I really have no sympathy for his character throughout the film, which I think compromises it. Although it is true almost Scorsese's entire filmography is about "bad people," I do not have trouble identifying or feeling interested in the protagonists of his other films, even the gangster pictures or The Wolf of Wall Street. Raging Bull, on the other hand, leaves me feeling nothing but revulsion and mercy when the final credits come. I don't really feel bad for him at all and struggle to empathize with anything that happens to him. 

One thing I would like to add is that over the years, critics have accused Scorsese of being misogynist, but I find that misguided at best. In Raging Bull, you are put inside the mind of a misogynist, and it is a creepy, unsettling place to be. The film, and almost all of Scorsese's movies, is an indictment of many of the things we associate with masculinity: violence, treating women like property, domination. There is nothing in this film indicating Scorsese endorses this behavior, but he forces you to experience it. I suppose this is one reason why I find this film so emotionally draining. 

All in all, Raging Bull is an exhausting, laborious movie to watch, but there is much to admire about it. I can see why people love it, and I do appreciate the many artistic elements of it; that doesn't mean I enjoy watching it. 

Grade: B+

The Theory of Everything (2014)

I had put off watching The Theory of Everything for a while; the subject matter seemed incredibly depressing, and I was not in the mood to watch yet another biopic upon its release. The market was flooded with biopics last year, and this year's potential Oscar contenders appear to be continuing this trend. Moreover, as a Michael Keaton fan, I felt reluctant to watch the film that beat him at the Oscars this past year. In case you missed it, here is the trailer:

Putting my reservations aside, I finally watched The The Theory of Everything this evening and believe it might be the stuffiest, dullest, and most sanitized biopic I have ever seen--not to mention the only one in which the lead actor is in about one-third of the film. Yes, you read that correctly: Eddie Redmayne, who won an Oscar for his portrayal of beloved astrophysicist Stephen Hawking, was actually not in the film that much. The real main character? Hawking's wife, Jane, played with blandness and dispassion by Felicity Jones. 

There is little to admire about this film. The cinematography is the usual teal and orange combination that has saturated so many second rate productions these days. The oranges are aggressively orange, the blues aggressively blue--and poorly lit. There was only one scene that I felt was well shot, in fact, which was when Stephen and Jane kiss for the first time after viewing fireworks--an over used and predictable symbol, certainly, but one that was visually appealing. If only the actors' chemistry had matched the imagery. 

Eddie Redmayne's performance felt true and did provoke strong feelings of sympathy and sadness, but is that really what we want from a movie about a beloved figure with a severe disability? Do we really want to pity Stephen Hawking, or do we want to learn about the man--his thoughts, fears, anxieties, joys, and all of the inner workings of his brilliant mind? I'd take the latter, but this film indulges so deeply in the former that it ultimately feels like an experiment in making people with ALS as pitiful as possible. Yet, the film also failed to arouse much, if any pathos. An exercise in cliches, The Theory of Everything is insulting to Stephen in many ways. But I'm getting ahead of myself. 

As a feminist, I certainly yearn for woman-centric films; however, I felt this movie did itself a disservice by focusing so little on Stephen Hawking as a person and instead concentrating most of its energy, storytelling, and themes on Jane's life as drudgery because she married and altruistically cared for her husband. There are many scenes without Stephen and we are expected to sympathize with Jane for being trapped in a marriage with few rewards. Without question, Jane--and all caretakers, for that matter--suffered truly; however, the film robs Stephen of his humanity by not allowing the audience to understand how he must feel. It's a misconception to believe the caretaker suffers more than the person with the disease. As I watched the film, I kept wondering how Stephen must feel (and have felt in real life) about the horrendous changes his body endured; I wanted to know what was going on in his mind, but the film denies us even a glimpse into his experiences and accidentally fulfills a prediction made by Stephen's doctor. When he is diagnosed with ALS, the doctor explains that Stephen will still have thoughts, but "no one will know what they are"; indeed, we the audience never really do know what they are. All you are actually expected to feel (or know) is a romantic thrill over Jane meeting Jonathan and finding love again--an insult to Stephen Hawking, for certain.

Another flaw in the Jane/Stephen depiction is the lack of any chemistry whatsoever between its leads. Eddie Redmayne did do an excellent job playing a man whose body is deteriorating so rapidly and severely, but his costar seemed bored to be there. I found their romantic scenes together unbelievable (in the true sense of the word, not the superlative), and I stress "romantic" rather than "love" because love, and all its complexities, is perhaps the most interesting part of Stephen's life that was completely sanitized in this film to a distressing and irritating extent. 

After Stephen is diagnosed with ALS and he and Jane marry, we are shown a montage shot to resemble a family movie, but this montage skims over their wedding, early married life, and birth of their first child all in a matter of about 90 seconds. I do not at all mean this in a pornographic way, but the refusal to explore Stephen's sexuality (or anything else about his internal thoughts) hurt the film tremendously. Again, I kept wondering how he felt about himself and his wife: What insecurities did he have? What was his attitude toward intimacy? What was their married life like in the beginning--how they communicated, spent time together, worked, talked, interacted? How did they handle the ways his body changed? How did he feel about becoming a father in addition to beating the two-year prognosis he was given? How were the later years different? There are endless questions that the movie refuses to explore. Even when the film implies Stephen has fallen in love with Elaine, his nurse and second wife, we are still denied any exploration of his feelings. True, there are a few humorous comments about how Stephen's, um, "ability" is now "automatic" and we learn he likes to read Penthouse, but there is nothing substantive or honest about this portrayal. The births of his other children are handled with similar stuffy distance, which irritated me and, in a way, is an insult to Stephen Hawking: we can't learn anything about his fears, desires, or emotions in general because, gasp!, he's in a wheelchair; we see Stephen the ALS patient, not Stephen the man. I kept mentally comparing this film to My Left Foot, which is by no means a perfect film, but one that does honor Christie Brown's life more honestly and respectfully than this film does Stephen Hawking. 

The movie actually left me unsettled, and I finally realized why hours later: the film objectifies Stephen. We do see the world partly through his perspective...until his diagnosis. After the doctor tells him no one will ever know his thoughts, Stephen becomes an object of pity and scorn and is portrayed as a burden on his wife and family and everyone around him. Indeed, the way we learn ALS is serious is because we see his friend's reaction: Stephen explains what ALS is when his friend comes to his dorm room. As Stephen speaks, the camera focuses on his friend's face and his friend's growing fear and sadness; we identify with the able-bodied character and no longer with Stephen. We feel upset because the friend is upset--not because we understand how Stephen feels. The entire film is like this, privileging the able-bodied perspective over Stephen's, making this one of the most egregiously offensive films to people with physical disabilities, including Stephen Hawking. 

In short, this movie is a lifeless, bloodless, and ultimately disparaging morass of dishonest emotion and cheap attempts at pity. I respect Eddie Redmayne tremendously as an actor, but this film really is beneath his talent. I do look forward to his work in the future and believe he has a long and rewarding career ahead of him, but I hope this is not the one role that will define his entire filmography. 

Grade: D