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See it in 70mm!
Oppenheimer Offers a Rare Chance to Watch a Film… on Film.
Universal Pictures Throughout his career, director Christopher Nolan has generally traversed worlds of science fiction along with serving up a trilogy of Batman films, though not without his detours. With Oppenheimer, Nolan returns to less-traveled ground with a nonfiction-based narrative.
Once again, the setting is WWII. In Dunkirk, he crafted a boots-on-the-ground narrative of soldiers fighting one of the war’s most famous battles. With Oppenheimer, the struggle is not on the battlefield, but in the halls of science, telling the story of one of the 20th Century’s most controversial figures: J. Robert Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy), director of the Manhattan Project and “father of the atomic bomb”.
Far from a simple defense (or, for that matter, a repudiation) of the man, the film seems to genuinely try to stand back and take an observational approach, sharing the story of a deeply flawed man who does what many of us would: answers his country’s call to help end a horrible war.
Universal Pictures What’s most fascinating to me is that the film doesn’t limit itself to what might seem the “‘obvious” story of the race to develop atomic weaponry (though that is a big part). It’s the aftermath – the weight of guilt, voice of conscience, and even the interrogation that serves as the wraparound – where the story strikes its most intriguing and human chord, as Oppenheimer shifts from a creator of atomic weaponry to a vocal critic.
As usual for Nolan’s films, the narrative is smart and engaging, the scope grand, and the cinematography luxuriant. Shot on large-format 70mm IMAX and 65mm Panavision film, it’s another testament to Nolan’s love for film – actual film – as a medium. It’s a love that I share.
Unfortunately, thanks to the stranglehold of digital projection, in most places it’s virtually impossible to watch movies on film these days unless you’re blessed to live near one of a handful of specialty theaters – The New Beverly in L.A., Pennsylvania’s Mahoning Drive-In, or an Alamo Drafthouse are among the few places left to experience the joy of seeing a movie projected on film.
It’s only with the arrival of a new film by the medium’s biggest proponent directors – Christopher Nolan and Quentin Tarantino (owner of the aforementioned New Bev) – that the average American can watch a film projected – particularly a brand new one.
When my screener started, I was delighted to see that it was projected on film (I didn’t know this in advance), but the audience quickly realized something was up: it was without sound. This continued on for some minutes, and when the sound was restored the film was not restarted despite an employee announcing to us that it would. The projection was also not properly masked, with the top of the screen bleeding over into a visible black bar rather than terminating in a crisp edge.
I can’t deny it was somewhat frustrating.
Universal Pictures And yet, despite these problems, I loved having the increasingly rare experience of seeing an actual film print screened. The characteristic rich appearance of the film was a delight, reminding me it had been too long since the last (in my case, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood).
Unfortunately a substandard projection won’t be (and hasn’t been) a unique experience – it’s practically a dead art thanks to not only digital technology but general corner-cutting in presentation. Hopefully these initial pains will subside after projectionists work out the kinks and get the rhythm of what to do. But hearing of projection issues like the ones I experienced might have viewers wondering if they’re better off just watching the film digitally.
And to you, I entreat: watch it on any film format if you can. Not only for the experience, but to show that yes, there is still an interest. We want to see films on film.
Preferably with quality projection.
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NYAFF 2023: GLORIOUS ASHES
The 22nd annual New York Asian Film Festival takes place between July 14 and July 30. For more information, click here.
It is a relatively simple task to describe many, if not all, of the things that happen over the course of the two-hour runtime of Bui Thac Chuyen’s Glorious Ashes. But the whys prove to be slightly more elusive… possibly by design, possibly by ignorance. Still, it’s a potent piece of cinema that accomplishes what it sets out to do…mostly.
The film opens at the wedding of Nhan (Phu’O’ng Ahn Dao) and Tam (Ngo Quang Tuan), a pair of gleeful young newlyweds, overjoyed at the prospect of starting their new lives together. Significantly less pleased is Duong (Le Cong Hoang), a sulky guest who gulps down shot after shot, barely seeming to acknowledge the relentless chattering of his ostensible date, Hau (Bao Ngoc Doling), who even in recounting to him the moment she fell for him, manages to slip in a couple of digs about his itinerant nature.
Somehow, against all odds, this leads to a drunken tryst on a boat that qualifies as one of the most pitiful sex scenes in the history of cinema, a soul deadening spectacle that starts with Hau removing Duong’s headlamp, blinding her as he pumps away, and ends with her hilariously rolling out of the boat and disappearing under the water after Duong calls out Nhan’s name and starts crying as he climaxes.
And, to be clear: these two events take place roughly twenty seconds apart.
As we all know, sex that terrible can only have one result, and nine months later, a daughter is brought into the world. Duong and Hau, who have since gotten married, delve into parenthood without having resolved any of the issues underlying their cursed union. Duong deals with things by constantly retreating to his hideaway on the sea, while Hau becomes increasingly obsessed with Nhan and her happy marriage. But if her jealousy proves unhealthy, then she shouldn’t worry; eventually, fate conspires to give everyone absolutely terrible coping mechanisms.
From its very opening moments, writer-director Bui Thac Chuyen signals the curiously opaque nature his film is going to take; it is not a work that is overly at pains to meet you halfway. The dialogue, when it occurs, trends towards the unilluminating, even when they’re saying things that should feel illuminating. The opening wedding is a perfect example: when we watch Hau and Duong, the dialogue and the body language are both saying different things. And then their faces are saying something else on top of that… which itself changes from moment to moment, making it tricky, if not impossible, to find one’s emotional footing.
We might think we can tell what they’re thinking. But we can never be sure. And lingering in that liminal sense of unknowingness casts a spell that’s difficult to articulate, but equally difficult to deny, if you’re willing to give yourself over to it.
The Not-Quite-Quadrangle of Nhan and Tam and Duong and Hau is Not Quite Contrasted with the… complicated story of Khang and Loan.
Khang (Thach Kim Long) has just returned to Thom Rom after serving time for the attempted rape of Loan, an act which the villagers believe caused Loan (Ngo Pham Hanh Thuy) to have a mental breakdown… though her response when she overhears some of her fellow villagers discussing the situation, while it reads one way in the moment, becomes far more ambiguous upon later developments.
Unable to face the villagers (or Loan specifically), Khang hides out with The Monk (Mai The Hiep), an old friend who is, in fact, an actual monk. It remains unclear exactly why Khang has returned to a place where it will be impossible to put his past behind him. At one point he claims to want to be a monk, but only in the context of him talking about how he is failing to live up to the standards expected of him. And things become no more clear for him or us when Loan starts showing up on the Monk’s front door, in search of…well, it’s not even clear that she knows.
It’s not entirely surprising to learn that the basis for Glorious Ashes comes from two short stories Tro Tan Ruc Ro and Cui Muc Troi Ve (both by Nguyen Ngoc Tu), because if nothing else, the film certainly has the texture of two short stories: aside from taking place in the same village, they don’t connect in any meaningful way. The Nhan stuff is domestic melodrama that takes a turn for the tragic, and then the somewhat inexplicable. Ultimately it’s about people who can’t let go of the past, and fail to find non-destructive ways to come to terms with their present. While the way the Loan subplot resolves itself, or fails to resolve itself, almost makes it feel like something akin to a shaggy dog joke, or (to be more charitable) a koan in cinematic form. Which is not what one might expect from the weighty themes on display.
But instead of making the movie feel disjointed, it somehow just adds to the mystique of it all, providing a lighter contrast to the somehow simultaneously feverish and matter-of-fact chain of events in the main story.
I won’t pretend that watching Glorious Ashes was an easy experience; as many moments as I found mesmerizing or compelling, there were an equal amount that were just confounding or obtuse to no benefit. And, as always in these situations, I have to be open to the possibility that there’s a cultural disconnect, and I’m projecting a sense of cryptic-ness that simply wouldn’t be there if I were more informed on the comings and goings of Vietnamese society. But overall, I cannot deny the spell that watching it cast over me. For every moment I mentioned here, there are ten more I wish I had the time, space, and presence of mind to try and unpack.
The filmmakers have taken what should be a simple story, and complicated it not by adding more story, but by really and truly playing into the idea that the human psyche is a complex, inexplicable mechanism that not even the owners have a grasp of. It’s a high risk, high reward strategy. And for me at least, it was rewarding.
…Mostly.
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OPPENHEIMER is Christopher Nolan at His Most Haunted Best
Pictures Courtesy of Universal Pictures How do you make a film where the result is ultimately known before the audience even steps into the theater? This was classically the dilemma for many directors and writers who attempt to tackle world events, especially historically mammoth ones that the end result is a foregone conclusion. James Cameron tackling the Titanic sinking comes to mind. Of course Cameron’s approach was to wrap a fictional narrative around the historical event, giving you a manufactured viewpoint through which to see the inevitable horror as it looms large.
In his latest, and best, film, Christopher Nolan tackles a somehow even larger historical event: the creation of the atomic bomb, under the leadership of enigmatic theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer. From the first frame, you know where this story heads, and the heavy shadow it casts over the history of warfare ever since. Or at least you think you know how the story goes.
But Nolan’s magic trick, as is often the case, is not in the story he is telling, but more precisely how he chooses to tell it. Yes, the audience is never curious if Cillian Murphy as Oppenheimer and the other fast-talking physicists behind the Manhattan Project will succeed in their task. Of course they will. But by bending time over on itself, not dissimilar to how he did in Memento, Nolan masterfully reframes the life of Oppenheimer, presenting his life previous to the bomb, and his tortured, guilt-laden life afterwards. By injecting his puzzle-box logic, best demonstrated by films like Memento and The Prestige, Nolan is able to get past the pure facts of Oppenheimer’s life to avoid the danger of creating a dry, if compelling, portrait of an individual, playing less like book report or documentary but as a psychological study of what it must feel like to doom humanity to an endless nuclear nightmare.
Which is not to suggest that Nolan’s portrait of “Oppie” is especially flattering. He is regularly displayed as an absent father, philanderer, conceited and difficult to get along with. He sympathizes with leftist politics, but also pragmatically is never a joiner, seeing any ideology as too incomplete to earn his full support. Time and again it is highlighted how Oppenheimer is more interested in theory than reality, conceiving the atomic bomb as a necessary evil to beat the Nazis to it, but also unable to accept his own culpability in creating a weapon of war. It’s not a bomb, after all; it’s a gadget.
The other pole of the film is Lewis Strauss, a connected businessman, Navy admiral and advocate for increased nuclear weaponry, played in a career-highlight performance by Robert Downey Jr. Strauss’ part of the story is told throughout, in black-and-white segments where he is facing a confirmation hearing to be placed on Eisenhower’s cabinet. But previous encounters with a post-bomb Oppenheimer, increasingly a critic of further nuclear proliferation, threaten to rattle his confirmation. And there is another mysterious interview that an elder Oppenheimer is subjected to, the full reality of which is not revealed until the film’s final act, but also is a matter of known historical record. This is one of those cases where the less you know of Oppenheimer’s life, the more the film’s unfolding of the narrative will grab you.
Thus is the odd crossroads that Nolan as both writer and director is attempting to balance. The events he is depicting as of upmost importance, amongst the most tragically significant in the history of human development that we all still live in the aftermath of. But by grounding the story on Oppie, and those in his immediate orbit, it allows for the human drama to meet the unimaginable weight of the moment. As it tumbles towards the inevitable, and we see the building of Los Alamos, the eventual detonation of the Trinity bomb, and the bombing of Japan in the name of ending World War II, we are deep under the skin for Oppenheimer. His immense guilt, his sense of shame and concern, is written across Murphy’s taut expression.
Murphy and Downey are far from the only exceptional performances in the film. Josh Hartnett puts in his own career best performance as Ernest Lawrence, a partner of Oppenheimer who turns his theories into practical results, and challenges his friend to keep his left-leaning politics to himself if he wants to have a hand in stopping the Nazi war machine. Emily Blunt tears through her scenes as Robert’s oft-suffering wife, who turns to alcoholism in the wake of having an unavailable, unfaithful partner. Matt Damon gives grounded warmth to Leslie Groves, Oppenheimer’s military liaison and often comic foil. There are a scattered few other surprising cameos throughout, including a previous Nolan collaborator making a one-scene appearance in the most scathingly critical depiction of an actual American president ever committed to film.
L to R: Robert Downey Jr is Lewis Strauss and Cillian Murphy is J. Robert Oppenheimer in OPPENHEIMER, written, produced, and directed by Christopher Nolan. But for all the star power is best implemented by the man at the helm. This is unquestionably Nolan’s finest work to date by a healthy margin, combining his love for meticulously plotted playful filmmaking to a much more ambitious subject matter than he has ever tackled before. What’s more surprising is just how much humor and humanity is able to inject into it as well; especially the scenes between Oppenheimer and Groves are intentionally and effectively funny, lending credence to the camaraderie of their unlikely relationship, but also releasing the valve slightly. There are moments of horror alongside moments of triumph, often in the same breath; Oppenheimer is an exhaustive exploration of every angle of the atomic age as we think of it. It is both amazing and terrifying to imagine we are capable of this.
By taking seriously the precise imagination that led us there, Nolan and Murphy’s depiction of not just this moment but the totality of that weight creates an inescapable guilt, pain and a longing for retribution that is impossible to achieve. It lingers in the cracks of one remarkable person’s psyche, but also creates space for our own reflection and anxiety, a sense of the world teetering on the edge, and all of us are hopeless to stop it. Even those that are at the very front lines.
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BARBIE Review: Pink Power vs. the Patriarchy
Greta Gerwig takes us on a magical, and meta journey to Barbie Land, and beyond
Since 1959, Ruth Handler’s totemic creation has made Mattel corporation a global name. More so, Barbie has served as an inspirational figure to many by breaking away young children from the confines of playing with baby dolls, and playing to positions of motherhood. Her various iterations over the years have showcased the potential for girls to grow up to be whatever they set their minds to. While some see the toy as outdated, and contrary to female empowerment, writer/director Greta Gerwig tackles this contradiction head-on, with a feature that takes the memories of this plastic portrayal of perfection, and looks at her meaning in the world today.
A gleeful prologue paying homage to 2001: A Space Odyssey gives way to the pink, palatial splendor of Barbie Land. A diverse, matriarchal society drawing from 60 years of Mattel’s figurehead releases, and her accessories of course. Barbies galore, fulfilling every position of responsibility and achievement you can imagine. President Barbie (Issa Rae), writer Barbie (Alexandra Shipp), physicist Barbie (Emma Mackey), doctor Barbie (Hari Nef), diplomat Barbie (Nicola Coughlan), lawyer Barbie (Sharon Rooney), and mermaid Barbie (Dua Lipa), to name but a few. Vying for their attention are the Kens (led by Ryan Gosling, but also including Simu Liu, Ncuti Gatwa, John Cena, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Scott Evans) companions in orbit of their Barbies, jostling for attention, and peaking if their existence is even acknowledged. There is also Allen (a marvelous turn from Michael Cera). In their midst is stereotypical Barbie (Margot Robbie) who, after living a series of perfect days in a perfect world, enters an existential crisis. One featuring cold showers, burnt waffles, flat feet, cellulite, and thoughts of death.
She is sent to consult with “weird Barbie” (Kate McKinnon), who diagnoses the problem. Someone in the real world is troubled, and is channeling their angst into playing with their stereotypical Barbie doll. The result, an opening of portal between reality and Barbie Land, one that needs closing before irreparable harm is caused. Barbie, with Ken (Gosling) in tow, sets off on a quest to find the person she is psychologically connected to, heal them, and break the bridge between their worlds. Arriving in LA, they find that the female led utopia they came from is a stark contrast. Struggling with an unfamiliar world and it’s rules, Barbie finds help in Gloria (America Ferrera) and her teen daughter Sasha (Ariana Greenblatt), as she looks to evade a a team of Mattell executives (led by their CEO (a fittingly farcical Will Ferrell) who are desperate to put Barbie back in her box and prevent the unraveling of reality. Meanwhile, Ken’s head is turned for the first time by something other than Barbie, as his exposure to the power and patriarchy of this male dominated world opens his mind to different ways of thinking, and through him looks set to corrupt the pink paradise they came from.
A fantastical plot, one reminiscent of The Lego Movie, or The Truman Show, where barriers of reality are broken down, leading to self-awareness and growth. From the wild and wacky fun of Barbie Land, to the fish out of water humor as this duo hit LA, there’s an air of chaotic unpredictability, something enhanced as the film veers from comedy to musical, to metaphysical rumination, to dropping truth bombs, incisive social commentary, and even managing a cracking shot at the Snyderverse. Gerwig’s direction balances these components superbly, driving the film forward with a crackling energy and wit. The script, by Gerwig and partner Noah Baumbach is surprisingly meditative at times, as it gets to grips with a rather meta-meditation on what Barbie means, in terms of her past, and present day, and by extension reflecting the state of equality and feminism in what is still a male dominated world.
Fueled by neuroses as much as frivolity, Barbie comes to a generation of women dealing with a loss of innocence, discontentment with adulthood, and aspirations not becoming reality. The oversimplification of the Barbie line is that if you dream it, you can be it. Gerwig doesn’t deny that, but does point out the caveat that “these are the obstacles in the way”, with the added reassurance that these Barbies/women all achieve what they each set out to do, as long as they champion each other in the process. The film also adds balance by opening up this female utopia to critique thorough highlighting this underclass of Kens. Male figures whose reason for existence is barely fleshed out (“my job is….beach”), or entirely wrapped up in his associations or possessions. It taps into a bit of that male rage about being unseen or emasculated, and where blame should really be directed. A simple facet of this toy’s existence, but a concept that neatly taps into the roots of many male insecurities. Beyond holding a mirror up to our present day, the film also takes plenty of shots at Mattel itself, highlighting the faux feminism of this men-led industry, as well as some of the more crass aspects of Barbie’s past. This includes some failed versions of the dolls that stirred up plenty of controversy in their day, we’re looking at you Midge and Skipper. The film manages to have it both ways, leveraging these things for laughs, while also highlighting the inappropriateness of them, and the wider context of progress we’ve made, and what we still need to do.
At the core of the film, is Barbie. She is often positioned as a comedic foil to many of the other characters in the film, but there is a deftly realized arc for her here. Beyond the blonde bombshell image, Robbie brings an energy, warmth, and vulnerability to the character, making her (eventually) as three dimensional and empathetic as Gerwig’s Lady Bird or Jo March. Ryan Gosling’s Ken steals the show with a comedic performance for the ages, a masterclass in timing, physical humor, and using vacuousness to speak volumes. Another standout is the winsome performance by Ferrera who embodies a Barbie fan from a bygone era, but still gets to let rip with a barnstorming speech that cuts to the core of the expectations that surround women in their everyday lives. We could spend all day extolling the supporting cast and the flashes of brilliance they bring to a line or a look, as well as write entire books on the achievements of the production crew. Costume designer Jacqueline Durran’s manifestation of retro outfits, Sarah Greenwood’s production design (featuring glorious visual gags and Barbie related Easter eggs, and Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt’s sugary score (and accompanying pop star contributions) add up to to a pitch perfect presentation. Beneath this veneer of pink the film never loses sight of it’s universal theme of self-worth. We’re all (k)enough, we just need to realize it.
After the brilliance of Ladybird and Little Women, Greta Gerwig continues her record for crafting richly compelling, smart, and distinct films. Barbie feels imbued with both a sense of creative freedom and also social responsibility. This is not a sell-out, it is a filmmaker, assured in her voice and vision, bringing it to bear on the most unlikely of properties. A pink, progressive powerhouse of a film that leverages star power and a palpable love for this doll, into a wildly entertaining work.
Barbie hits theaters on July 21st
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MAGNIFICENT RUFFIANS – Shawscope Vol. 2 – Roundtable Reviews
Cinapse is all about cinematic discovery. This Shawscope Volume 2 column is, therefore, a watch project for our team, and guests, to work through this phenomenal set from Arrow Video. These capsule reviews are designed to give glimpses of our thoughts as we discover these films for ourselves. Some are kung fu cinema experts, some less so; all are excited for the adventure.
The Hong Kong-based Shaw Brothers Studio cranked out a staggering number of feature films over its lifetime. With worldwide influence continuing to this very day, their contributions to cinema are myriad and undeniable. Arrow Video has curated a second volume of titles; an intentional way to wade into the deep waters of the Shaw Brothers. Beyond capsule reviews, our team also offers thoughts on the set curation and bonus features. Watch along with us, join us in the comments, or reach out on social media (linked below) if you’d like to submit your own
Ed Travis
“I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind”. – Ecclesiastes 1:14. Ecclesiastical in nature, Magnificent Ruffians is a proper heroic tragedy in kung fu form. Another Chang Cheh joint starring the Venom Mob, star Lu Feng looms large over this title as the callous villain Yuan. Taking place in a latter era of history where rifles and cannons have entered the picture and the kung fu masters of old are desperate even for a bite to eat; Yuan reigns supreme as the master of the Golden Sword who also happens to be fabulously wealthy. Yuan has taken to welcoming desperate martial artists into his compound under the guise of employment, only to smite them down in a single strike of his Golden Sword. He justifies it as a voluntary weighing of martial arts skills, but Yuan’s wealth and privilege and dominant abilities have hardened his heart and blinded him to the humanity of those around him. To Yuan, everything is meaningless under the sun, and like the many insane holders of power in history, he seems unstoppable. Enter our titular ruffians, almost none of whom will survive this clash. Aimless with the loss of their family businesses thanks to the introduction of firearms to their culture, our impoverished heroes eke out an existence by eating at restaurants they can’t afford and trading off on who takes the resultant beating. It’s grim stuff, but it resonates as a kung fu class conflict. One of our heroes (Lo Meng) is doing his best to keep his family business open amidst dirty handed tricks by Yuan to take over the only remaining business he doesn’t already own. It’ll all culminate in a tragic battle between my guy Phillip Kwok and another accomplice teaming up to bring down the villain Yuan. As is typical of many of these titles, when that final fight ends, the credits will roll. It all comes down to that final fight and just about everyone we’ve come to care about will lose their life before the end. Chang Cheh is famous for his gore and bloodbaths, but Magnificent Ruffians does a good job of painting a picture of relevance and infusing its hard-hitting action with class-driven anger and philosophical malaise. Few of these Shaw Brothers films have left me thinking about the futility of a violent death or the tragic impact that massive cultural change can have on those left behind the way Magnificent Ruffians has.
Dan Tabor
Magnificent Ruffians is another brutal Chang Cheh/Venom Mob beat’em up whose setup felt like a Kung-Fu horror film.
Taking place in post industrialization China, “Kung-fu men” no longer hold the status they once did; since travel by boat or train has taken the bandits out of the equation, and armed escorts are no longer needed. This has the Shaw Brother equivalent to Patrick Bateman – the wealthy bored psychopath/businessman/Kung-Fu master Yuan Ying Fei (Lu Feng) luring fighters to his home only to then fight them to the death. This all changes when the sister (Annie Liu), of Guan Yun (Lo Mang) who runs the only other armed escort service in town catches his eye. To take Guan Yun out of the equation, Yuan Ying Fei recruits and begins to groom a group of homeless and mischievous Kung-Fu masters (Venom Mob) to do his dirty work by killing off Guan Yun, so he can get the girl without getting his hands dirty.
While narratively a bit clunky, as most of these Venom Mob films tend to be, this one has a really strong through line, once all the setup is in place and the characters are introduced. While the titular Magnificent Ruffians start off at odds with the head strong Guan Yun, they soon not only befriend him but consider him a brother at arms by the end of the film. That dynamic between the Ruffians and their target really locked me in and invested me just in time for that incredibly impressive third act battle. The choreography and stunt work in that last 20 minutes is pure Chang Cheh bloody chaos and it’s the perfect ending that makes this one of the better Venom Mob films.Justin Harlan
Even though this is a Venom Mob film and a solid one at that, I am suffering from a great deal of Kung-Fu exhaustion. Having watched at least one Shaw film a week for quite a few weeks in a row, I need a break. Thankfully, we’re taking a bit of a break for a couple weeks due to family vacations and such on our team, so that break should help me feel renewed and refreshed for out next installment, for which I am thankful.
However, I must at least note that I appreciate these back to back Cheh/Venom flicks have helped keep me from full on Shaw stroke, as both have been really fun once I’m able to regroup and get my mind to the right place for more classic Kung-Fu.
As noted above, the story is certainly a bit clunky, but it never lacks the fun punch that we’ve all come to expect from Cheh and his gang of martial arts madmen. In fact, this particular film, due to several great fight scenes and some stellar interludes between various members of the Mob, may have vaulted to my favorite of this collection and is probably in the top 5 Venom films for me. I am particularly fond of Lu Feng and Phillip Kwong in this one, both playing their particular roles pitch perfectly.
Ruffians is honestly a blast and I can’t wait to return to it down the road when I’m a bit less burnt out on the genre. Yet, even in this current state, I really enjoyed this previously undiscovered Venom Mob gem.
And We’re Out.
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TALK TO ME is Full of Nerve-Shredding Terror
YouTubers Michael and Danny Philippou helm a potent and propulsive debut that doesn’t skimp on scares or sincerity
All stills courtesy of A24. “Talk to Me.”
It’s a phrase that begs for connection, to be heard. It’s a sentiment that’s just as easily shared among those who are still alive as much as it is between the living and the dead. And it’s the driving ethos as much as it is the animating line of Michael and Danny Philippou’s breakout festival chiller, which features a group of rebellious Australian teens who stumble upon ghostly possession as a novel new party high.
Mia (a magnetic Sophie Wilde) is two years removed from the suicide of her mother. Frustratingly disconnected from her father, Max (Marcus Johnson), Mia instead finds solace in her tight-knit friend group–notably her bestie Jade (Alexandra Jensen), Jade’s younger brother Riley (Joe Bird), and their single mom Sue (Miranda Otto). Mia also champions the budding romance between Jade and Mia’s ex Daniel (Otis Dhanji), as much as it visibly pains her to do so. At Mia and Jade’s age (and despite Sue’s no-BS efforts), there’s always a house party to spirit off to if things get tense or awkward, full of drugs and alcohol. But Mia’s latest drug comes in the form of a mummified plaster arm, which aloof party animal Haley (Zoe Terakes) claims came from a medium who could talk with the dead.
The rules are effectively simple: light a candle, hold the hand, and say “Talk to Me,” and the dead appear. Allow them in for possession, and you’re granted a 90-second high like never experienced before. Blow out the candle, and that’s that. The results, often a hit on their Snapchat stories, are terrifying as much as they are exhilarating–complete with sclera-black eyes, slamming doors, and other jolts. When the repeated experience teases the possibility of reuniting with her mother, however, Mia can’t get enough–an addiction that may spell doom for Mia and her friends as they let in powers far beyond their control.
A modern horror banger full of propulsive, terrifying sequences, Talk to Me is an effective first feature from the brothers Philippou, collectively of their hit YouTube channel RackaRacka. The scrappy energy of their slickly-produced homegrown VFX bonanzas channels well to feature filmmaking, stretching the limitations of their budget to focus on gut-churning practical effects that wisely never linger too long on camera, to innovative cinematography that translates a demonic possession into a motion-tracking, reality-detaching experience. Like the best chiller directors, the Philippous never aim to repeat the same scare twice–mining their suburban Australian locations for the frights that may linger around every corner.
However, it’s not the indie ingenuity behind the filmmaking that makes Talk to Me’s scares so effective–it’s the sharp, insightful focus on how each of these terrors are borne from the emotional investment we’re encouraged to place in these characters. While we’re given an eye-popping/gouging opening sequence to hook us, there’s plenty in Mia’s tragic past and present to win us over and earn our unease long before the paranormal plaster hand enters the picture. The weaving of a “cursed object” tale amid themes of substance abuse, suicidal ideation, and the perils of whatever dumb adventures we all get up to as teens is skillful and nuanced without falling victim to the trappings of other elevated horrors that feature capital-T Trauma as the real monster. As much as the experience of connecting through the hand exposes Mia to gruesome sights, it’s less terrifying than embracing the truth that her mother isn’t coming back.
This craving for connection further extends to the Philippous’ treatment of the afterlife: existing on the same spectrum of desperation as Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Pulse (far more understated, just as effective), the specters of Talk to Me exist in a perpetual fleshy throng of viscera and sinew, desperate to feel anything resembling the sensations they took for granted while they were alive. Their manifestation in the real world, forcing their victims to do everything from making out with dogs to increasingly disturbing acts of cranial abuse, is all the more chilling when we consider their desperation to feel is just as cosmically valid as the craven attempts of the living to reach out to their departed loved ones.
The well-rounded cast of youths are all quite talented, effectively dramatizing the sheer boredom of their age where, in a world where death by all sorts of frightening possibilities has become a mundane baseline, communing with the dead via a disembodied hand seems like a natural plan for a Tuesday night. Sophie Wilde in particular is such a find, playing up every sequence of nerve-shredding terror with a wide-eyed fascination amidst her repulsion. Wilde grounds the audience in every moment of boundary-pushing desperation, allowing the scares to hit even harder during Talk to Me’s most anxiety-inducing moments. Zoe Terakes’ Haley is also welcome comic relief, honing into the teenage drive to stand out by way of doing what others can’t or won’t for attention–even if it means pretending to know the storied lore behind something frighteningly out of your realm of understanding. Miranda Otto is the veteran of the cast, and her role as mother Sue is a much-needed adult counterpoint to the teen shenanigans throughout. She knows every single trick her kids can pull, isn’t afraid to call them out on it, and–most importantly–she recognizes that sometimes her kids need to get in a bit of trouble in order for them to learn from it, much like a child touching a hot stove. As relatable as her methods may be, however, it also provides the foundation for Talk to Me’s weightiest moments of gravitas as her grief helps these kids realize just how out of their depth they really are.
An explosive and chilling debut from Michael and Danny Philippou, Talk to Me is a stylishly-made scare-fest whose potent themes linger like the best nightmares long after the credits roll.
Talk to Me hits theaters on July 28, 2023 courtesy of A24.
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NYAFF 2023: BAD EDUCATION
The 22nd annual New York Asian Film Festival takes place between July 14 and July 30. For more information, click here.
Say what you will about Bad Education, but you cannot say that it doesn’t try to warn you about the kind of squalid little corner of reality we’re going to be exploring right off the bat.
The very first images we see are close ups of mouths in the process of grinding up a plateful of prawn, discarding the heads like so much biological refuse. Followed by the methodical, surgical dissection of a live lobster, writhing and leaking his own innards as a voice-over muses on the percentage of good and bad people in the world. Followed by a passionless backseat fuck that is interrupted by the crashing of a beer bottle thrown from the roof of an adjacent building by some pesky youths who proceed to take a group leak into the remaining empty bottle.
Han (Edison Song), Wangb (Kent Tsai), and Chang (Bernt Zhu) are recent graduates, and self-proclaimed best friends, though it’s not difficult to detect a trace of class-based resentment towards Wang, whose parents are a rung or two up the economic ladder compared to his buddies, and who is the only one headed to university in the fall. To cement their brotherhood, Chang proposes a bonding ritual wherein they all share a dark secret that they’ve never told anyone before. That he chugs the aforementioned bottle of piss beforehand will prove, in retrospect, to be the least of the poor life choices that unfold from here on out.
Bad Education is not a film of twists and turns as such, but the secrets exchanged and the fallout that ensues are still best left to the discovery of the audience. Part of the sick fun of the whole endeavor is in the way the film shifts gears and the title takes on multiple meanings accordingly. What’s meant by the ‘Bad’ part of the title is fairly clear from the outset, but up until the very end it is never fully clear who is the educator and who is being educated.
Taiwanese megastar turned debut filmmaker Kai Ko maintains a truly impressive mastery of tone that eludes filmmakers with far more experience; he proves dexterous in shifting from suspense to comedy to drama. It all flows seamlessly, or at least takes the viewer by surprise while always seeming inevitable in retrospect.
Mind you, taking the journey, which is ultimately rewarding, first involves girding yourself against the opening 20 minutes, which require no small amount of fortitude for the uninitiated. Some very dark, very disturbing things are presented to us as viewers, and while it’s not a mere exercise in shock value, it plays its cards so close to the vest that some viewers might be tempted to fold before the last hand is dealt. But it’s that very commitment to the bit that makes the film such a bracing, enjoyable experience. It shifts from psychological near-horror-to romp- to coming of age parable without invalidating anything that came before, and all flows in a shockingly seamless manner.
To that end, our leads are given a rather daunting task: to alternate between extreme states of being at the drop of a hat, without telegraphing which parts are real and which are just for show. And then when the circumstances change and they’re thrown to the wolves, to reverse course and do almost the exact opposite: trying to hide their true nature and laughably incapable of bluffing anyone. Kent Tsai probably takes first chair as the character whose journey is most pronounced, but Edison Song also makes an impression as he peels back layers of menace, cowardice, resentment, and self-loathing.
When it comes to the bad guys, the improbably named McFly Wu makes the most of his somewhat limited screen time as a debt collector who finds himself consistently baffled at how much stupider his night can get. And Leon Dai makes a powerful impression as Mr. Hsing the gangster at the end of the line; with less deft handling, his monologuing while methodically preparing sushi could come off as warmed-over Tarantino, at this point a pastiche of a pastiche of a pastiche. But his cool, effortless manner really sells the bit, and — for all his heavily signified malevolence — he somehow winds up being the moral authority, the only one with the sense of self to be in a position to teach these three idiots the lesson they’ve been trying to avoid all night long.
The Bad Educator, if you will.
(I wouldn’t, personally; but you do you.)
But without question, the performer who deserves the award for Best In Show is the absolutely hilarious Chang Ning, billed only as Drunk Lady. The details of how she gets involved with the errant youths are best left unrevealed. Suffice it to say Ning takes a character that could (and most likely does) read wildly problematic on the page, and infuses them with a fierce and loopy kind of full-force commitment that, against all odds, make you laugh when the proper reaction is more likely outrage.
The edge that Bad Education dances on is, to a certain line of thinking, a merit in and of itself; there are filmmakers who dream of being able to get away with what casually gets tossed off here. But it succeeds where most of them fail, which is due to a very simple reason: for all the trappings of misanthropy and nihilism that the opening seems to gesture towards, there is a genuine emotional core here. It isn’t grotesquerie for the mere sake of it, but a mercurial, hard to pin down piece of genuine entertainment gesturing towards a larger point of responsibility, brotherhood, and class resentment. The emotional core at the heart of the piece is entirely real, and, in fact, entirely relatable, even if the events in question are something else entirely.
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NYAFF2023: LIVE ACTION SHORT FILM COLLECTION
The 22nd annual New York Asian Film Festival takes place between July 14 and July 30. For more information, click here.
Once again, festival season is upon us and once again for this writer, that means a return trip to the New York Asian Film Festival, inarguably one of the highlights of my cinemagoing year, and a not-so-hidden gem in the field of Tri-State, international film programming.
Presumably, you all already know how festivals work, and the proceedings are well under way, so let’s just dive right in, shall we…?
The Festival has been experimenting in the past few years with adding new formats and unique showcases for new and innovative Asian filmmakers, and one of the more recent additions is a short film program. I was lucky enough to start off this years’ festival experience with the live action shorts, and here is a decidedly less than short recap of what I saw:
A slight yet amusing sketch about a scam artist and his hapless son and their misadventures with a memory erasing device. Writer-director Le Lam Viens’ Fix Anything invests its wacky sci-fi proceedings with a fun antic energy and no small amount of style. Le Hong Giang gives an enjoyably over the top performance as the ever-hustlin’ dad, and there’s a jaunty score by Felipe Salas Sandoval, but don’t expect much more than a swift and entertaining 15-minute romp.
It’s always nice when a thing can surprise you without involving a twist, and there was a moment in A Roadside Banquet that seems to come completely out of left field. This odd little venture about a little girl coming to terms with no longer being the center of attention after her little brother is born, set against the backdrop of a massive family gathering, mixes surreality and heart in ways I was not expecting, and which proved most delightful.
Before then, there exists a certain amount of tension, a sense of unease lingering just beneath the joviality of everyone, that leads the viewer to wonder where this could be going, how things could very quickly, and very tragically, go wrong. It could potentially be a spoiler to say that nothing goes wrong. But I’m only comfortable revealing that because it feels just about impossible for anyone to predict what happens instead.
But instead of running the risk of saying too much about a short that delights in its unexpected corners, I’ll simply say that I like the way writer-director Peiqi Peng gestures towards a sweet, if slightly corny Hallmark commercial style ending, only to subvert it with a beat that’s slightly thornier and more ambiguous without totally invalidating the sense of catharsis. And also that the dad’s ponytail is absolutely unforgivable, even before he’s implied to be kind of a knob.
It’s really going to sound like damning with faint praise, but the best part of Infant is how short it is. A premise this simple has been used as the backdrop of roughly a hundred thousand introspective indies, and generally fails to validate its own length. But the pace at which Infant unfolds means the things that might drag in a longer narrative speed by; no sooner has Marat placed his ad than he gets a call from an old friend of his mom’s, who he meets in the next scene, who gives him his mom’s phone number, which he calls in the next scene, which… you get the idea.
Instead of lingering in the spaces where a longer film might plod from point to point, writer-director Karash Zhanyshou takes an almost impressionistic approach, which gives the film a texture that, again, would most likely prove indulgent in a longer work. And the advantages serve not only the story, but the lead performance as well: giving what is, by virtue, an inward, recessive performance, Uulu is able to assay his character with a quiet sadness that works in the moment, but is by its nature a bit one note. It’s an unmistakably good performance of a character with whom keeping a more extended company might have had diminishing returns.
In fact, it’s really only the ending that lets down the fort, when Marat receives a visit from Aziza. There’s a moment where Aziza makes a request, the implications of which are fairly obvious. And if the film had ended right there, it would have made for an impactful and thought provoking character study. But instead it goes on to make things thuddingly explicit, very much to the detriment of the overall film. A little more trust in the audience would have gone a long way.
Trusting the audience, as it happens, is actually one of virtues that make Maryam Mirs’ Sweet Refuge such a pleasurable experience. And this is no small feat, taking into account how firmly it sits on a foundation rife with potential for didacticism; grand, sweeping statements about the old ways versus modernism, about cultural assimilation, about technology. So what proves most delightful is there’s an inherent decency and kindness to all the characters that defy any attempts to make a statement. The conflict between an old-fashioned Syrian immigrant baker (Laith Nakli) and a social media savvy Indian baker whose treats trend towards the vegan, gluten free, sugar free side of things could very easily have become a metaphor, but in the end it’s about people, and human connection, and is all the stronger for it.
An entirely different approach to the theme of human connection can be seen on display in Neo Portraits. In the year 2046 (Wong Kar Wai reference? You be the judge), a teen still mourning the recent death of his mother, must deal with that loss in a time where companies have convinced people that digital recreations of their dearly departed are basically the same as them never having left.
Of all the films in this collection, this is the one that feels the most like it could be successfully expanded into a full-length film. But that’s probably to be expected, given the possibilities inherent in its high concept, science fiction premise. Indeed, one of the prime assets of the film is how well it fleshes out its hypothetical near future with subtle world building touches. There’s a moment where a class of students is asked to share their memories of a recently passed acquaintance, and the way they start gesturing at an invisible menu is equal parts funny, sad, and chilling. Even as it traffics in some very heavy themes, coming in at a mere 20 minutes allows filmmaker Gazebo to dash off an appealing sketch as opposed to an in-depth portrait (sorry), and the overall experience is enhanced by such a lightness of spirit.
Not quite a horror film, but horrific in its ruthless sense of plausibility, Gwai Lou’s bleak and unsettling yet effective Malaysian entry Kumbang casts a very different pall than any other short film in this collection. It tells the story of two hardscrabble kids (Syahim Rafiq Syazwi, Muhd Ikhliel Amree) in search of internet fame and fortune, and its (arguable karmic, given the opening) cruelties feel more realistic than one would want to admit. Syazwi and Amree are very good, and the music by Annabel Tiu is fantastic, but… yeesh, man.
On a lighter note…
Despite being very entertained, I’m afraid I don’t actually have all that much to say about Lee Seung-ju’s darkly comic romp Resellers, in the sense that it’s hard to write about comedies without ruining the best parts. But it really brings the laughs, and carries itself off with no small amount of skill and dexterity; in fact, it’s so fleet and deft in its screwball execution that they almost trick you into buying the idea that there’s a proper code of conduct for selling cigarettes to high school students, before both pulling the rug out and twisting the knife.
In fact, in any other collection, a short like Resellers would probably be the clear winner in terms of fun. But as I’ve mentioned more than once already, this batch of shorts has a remarkably high baseline of quality. Which is to say that when it comes to sheer, unadulterated entertainment value, there’s no question about it: All Your Fault, Producer takes it in an absolute walk.
Ga Eun Kim plays the producer in question, a long-suffering set presence who seems to take the blame for every mishap that occurs on set, regardless of her actual culpability. But when an unexpected event (which unfolds with hilarious abruptness) threatens not just the production, but their lives, all eyes turn to her as their potential savior/willing sacrifice. After all, that’s what a producer is for, right…?
All Your Fault is kind of the platonic ideal of this sort of thing; it gets in, crams in all the gags it can think of, and gets out with a piece of ruthless comeuppance that would land very differently if the film lasted long enough for you to care about the characters. As it stands, they get to be very funny cartoons, some of whom die in very amusing ways, and that, as they say, is that.
Readers who have any familiarity with my work, or perhaps just movies and TV in general, know that 99% of all child actors are awful. But there’s enough evidence in this series of shorts to lead me to wonder if the inherent awfulness of child actors is a decidedly American affliction. All told, five of the ten shorts have prominent roles for one or more children/teen performers, and there’s not a single weak link among them.
But perhaps the most impressive child performance in any of the five, and possibly all the films, might be Taranom Kazemi’s deeply conflicted Ava in Mohamed KamalAlavi’s piercing, resonant Pufferfish.
A young girl in Iran, Ava spends the majority of her time at a birthday party of her cousin Pooya silently agonizing between the things that bring her happiness and the idea of what constitutes being a “good girl,” as represented by visions of a trio of scolding old ladies capped with angel wings, a recurring motif that starts out knowingly comical and not-so-gradually shifts into pointedly oppressive. The interesting tact that Pufferfish takes is to internalize the conflict; refreshingly, Ava’s parents and the people around her bristle against the restrictions being ‘advised’ for them; and, to a person, vocally encourage her to engage in the things that bring her joy. And though it flirts with darkness, in the end it pulls back from the brink, valuing quotidian experiential filmmaking over polemicals, and catharsis over didacticism. It shouldn’t be a rarity that this is the case. But it kind of is, for the west. And watching this, one can’t help but feel that it’s kind of our loss.
And lastly, I’m not going to pretend that I didn’t deflate in the opening moments of Will You Look At Me, which consisted of narration over home movie looking footage, detailing the speakers’ decision to spend the summer in his hometown making a movie. To all the world, it looked like yet another indulgent, navel-gazing documentary. Fine if you like that sort of thing, but it tends to leave me cold.
So I wound up shocked at just how quickly my attitude went from ‘just get through it’ to it being an early contender for highlight of the festival. And that was before I found out it wasn’t even a documentary at all.
The short details the efforts of a queer young filmmaker (Yunxue Kim) to connect with his mother (Kangmin Huang), who suffice to say, does not approve of his sexuality or his chosen profession in the arts. And yeah, I was fooled. I’m not even sure if director Shuli Huang intended to fool anyone, but that first conversation, where he methodically deconstructs his mother’s every argument against his choices, while still utterly failing to make her see where her blind inability to sever herself from tradition is the direct cause of her own unhappiness, just felt so real that I immediately bought in. And he caps it off with an edit that creates an absolutely perfect visual metaphor.
You’d think discovering it was all staged would be a disappointment. And yet, if anything, it makes things all the more impressive. It’s not a perfect film; the second confrontation, even before I knew it was autofiction, felt a little too “reality TV”; it was entirely plausible as an exchange, but the hysterical nature of it seemed a disservice to the subtlety of the earlier scenes. It simply felt like too much of a big climactic moment.
Which… whoops, it actually was.
Still, there are worse problems a film can have than not sticking the landing, and Will You Look At Me manages to avoid all of them while using a format where the margin of error tends to be very, very large. I’m sure I’ll see other great films in this years festival, but I’ll be surprised if one surprises me quite as much as this one did.
Then again… that’s kind of the point, isn’t it…? It’s certainly the reason I keep coming back year after year: the ever present possibility that I’m going to see something new and exciting, have the opportunity to enter worlds I’ve never experienced before. These ten shorts, all of them quite good in their own unique ways, are as solid an example of this as I can imagine. More proof, if any was needed, that a short visit can be just as enjoyable as an extended stay.
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OPPENHEIMER is a Stunning Dissection of Apocalyptic Guilt and Glory
Cillian Murphy and Christopher Nolan turn in career-best work in a complex portrait of an iconic and infamous physicist
Stills courtesy of Universal Pictures. To J. Robert Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy), the atomic bomb was supposed to be the weapon to end all war–unleashing the possibility of destruction so large it would hopefully stop humanity in its tracks and pull it back from the brink of self-destruction. Decades removed from the surrender of Germany and Japan, however, America has continued its own ideological war for self-preservation in the fight against Communism…placing a target on Oppenheimer’s own flawed, conflicted life as the U.S. Government votes to confirm his security clearance. With the threat of the “Super” H-Bomb looming at the start of the Cold War with the Soviet Union, no minutiae of Oppenheimer’s life is safe–including all associations romantic, professional, political, or ideological.
“No one is on trial here” is a common refrain throughout Christopher Nolan’s stunning three-hour opus about the director of the infamous Manhattan Project. However, nothing could be further from the truth as warring ideological factions fight for dominance over it–placing the life and reputation of one of America’s most morally complicated scientists in the crossfire. Through one man’s impossible choices in the name of scientific progress and global unity, writer-director Nolan examines how the road to hell is self-laid with the best of intentions; how the noblest pursuits are perverted in the name of ruthless self-interest; and how the sum of history is more often than not a desperate rationalization by the guilty, far from any futile sense of objective truth.
It’s a heady, thematically complicated picture that also happens to have some of the most riveting blockbuster sequences of 2023 so far, thrillingly realized by Nolan and his regular collaborators including cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema and composer Ludwig Göransson. Nolan and van Hoytema depict Oppenheimer’s world as one of constant chaos, brimming with atomic-level instability that’s on the brink of implosion at any minute. To escape the madness swirling around him, Murphy’s Oppenheimer obsesses over making sense of life’s paradoxes and incongruities–finding solace not just in his fellow scientists, but in eventual experimentation that brings his constant visual cacophony to a larger, far more destructive scale. Göransson’s score is a dazzling sonic equivalent, full of thrumming synths that tease out the discoveries at hand, finding their decibel-topping release at moments of “triumph.” They’re jaw-dropping, practical-FX-driven sequences that toe the line between the real and experimental, sneaking in Malickian visual flair amidst sequences befitting an Aaron Sorkin courtroom drama. What’s wilder, I’d gauge that 90% of Oppenheimer is in full IMAX aspect ratio–treating a cold gaze or sudden betrayal with as much graphic reverence as an atomic explosion or a majestic European vista.
Oppenheimer’s marketing campaign has lured in audiences with the promise of depicting one of America’s most fiercely debated scientific and wartime acts through the lens of one of its most championed blockbuster directors. In a much more satisfying sleight of hand, however, the majority of Oppenheimer is a series of two-handed interrogations–one very much in the public eye, one in the bureaucratic shadows–allowing Nolan to return to the claustrophobic psychologically-charged interiors of his Following and Insomnia days. While the creation of the bomb is what may get audiences in seats–it’s Nolan’s fascination with the weaponized ideals at play in the aftermath of the atom bomb’s creation that rightfully dominates the mammoth runtime of Oppenheimer. These sequences, however, still retain a thrilling pace and captivating visual sense–cross-cutting across multiple decades and perspectives to make each scene feel electrifyingly riveting and current. Nolan recognizes there’s just as much suspense to be found in the tiniest details of an actor’s performance as there is in an eagerly-awaited explosion–and the film’s meticulous editing by Jennifer Lame mines each of the film’s performances and enriches them to their most explosive potential.
Equally weaponized is the film’s murderers’ row of supporting actors, with Nolan impossibly managing to give each of them a moment to steal the spotlight from Cillian Murphy. Part of Oppenheimer’s thrill is not knowing just who might pop up next, with Nolan pretty much using these actors’ presence in modern pop culture as an emotional shorthand for the roles these scientists and officials played in their own era. Robert Downey Jr.’s charisma casts an increasingly dubious spell in his portrayal of Atomic Energy Commission leader Lewis Strauss, whose shepherding of America’s nuclear program reveals itself to be less about global scientific progress and more about American dominance. Kenneth Branagh’s Neils Bohr and Tom Conti’s Albert Einstein are jovial yet brow-furrowed mentors and colleagues to Oppenheimer. Matt Damon is ever a pragmatic optimist as Lieutenant General Leslie Groves, the military brass tasked with herding whatever nuclear physicist he can find to the project at Los Alamos–wholly placing his trust and political clout in theoretical science if it means bringing an end to the bloodshed of World War II. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Gary Oldman, Casey Affleck, and Dane DeHaan turn in soft-spoken, menacing performances as President Harry Truman, Colonel Boris Pash, and Major General Kenneth Nichols–jaded or bloodthirsty men in power who flash smiles like knives in the pursuit of their single-minded goals, often at the cost of Groves, Oppenheimer, and the scientists at their disposal. There’s even room for a complicated and moving turn by none other than Josh Hartnett as a member of Oppenheimer’s Berkeley faculty who recognizes and confronts his colleague’s self-destructive behavior–chiding how Robert sees both scientific progress and Communism as paths to global unity as America seeks to use the former as a weapon against the latter. Not to mention further appearances by literally everyone including Benny Safdie, James Urbaniak, Jason Clarke, Macon Blair, David Dastmalchian, Christopher Denham, Alex Wolff, Jack Quaid, and Matthew Modine.
Rounding out the cast are Emily Blunt as Kitty Oppenheimer and Florence Pugh as Jean Tatlock, both driven and complicated figures in their own right who challenged Oppenheimer as much as consoled him throughout his life. Like the other fleeting characters throughout the picture, Kitty and Jean reveal more about Oppenheimer than themselves–although both Pugh and Blunt strive to give their characters a depth outside of being defined by Murphy’s leading role. Both women possess the same flaws as Robert–notably an impulsive mania that externalizes into behavior toeing the line between charisma and obsession; however, American society (then and now) allows men like Oppenheimer to frame such antics as part of their genius, while women like Kitty and Jean are forced to keep such inner turmoil repressed in order to maintain a patriarchal order. It’s Kitty who forces Oppenheimer to confront his own naïveté as a scientist; it’s Jean that provides Oppenheimer with a mirror to his own ego. But unlike past female roles in Inception or The Prestige, where women feel more totemic than anything else, Nolan seems acutely aware of the unfair sacrifices women like Kitty and Jean are forced to make in the name of others’ progress. Blunt’s ferocity in particular shines throughout Oppenheimer’s second half, as she questions the black-and-white nature of Americans’ hunt to root out Communists via her own lived experiences. However, one can’t help but feel like both Blunt and Pugh are underutilized throughout, perpetually in the crippling shadow of Murphy’s egomaniac scientist. Also notably portrayed is scientist Lilli Hornig by Olivia Thirlby, who is framed as a role-bucking participant of the Manhattan Project who eventually leads an internal charge against the eventual usage of scientists’ bomb research on civilians when the end of the War is already in sight.
For all of its stacked supporting cast, however, Oppenheimer can also be seen as Christopher Nolan’s love letter to Cillian Murphy, a collaborator of Nolan’s since 2005’s Batman Begins. Arguably his largest theatrical leading role since 2012’s Red Lights, Murphy’s increasingly gaunt stare is in nearly every IMAX-sized frame of Oppenheimer. The actor tackles the challenging role with steely resolve, charting an overwhelming journey from manic optimism to haunted fatalism with near-imperceptible tics and stares. It’s an incredibly committed performance that grounds Nolan’s film in a compelling emotional journey even as it navigates the complexities of theoretical physics and Washington political intrigue in addition to its bombastic set pieces; it’s a performance that even saves Oppenheimer during some of its more questionable artistic choices, notably its nude scenes of Murphy mid-interrogation in a more flat-footed illustration of Oppenheimer’s psychological vulnerability. With van Hoytema’s square frame, performances in Oppenheimer evoke the gravitas of silent-era features; with an unerring gaze on Murphy as Oppenheimer struggles to make sense of the world, it’s breathtaking how Nolan and van Hoytema make the world ripple and shake around their lead actor. There’s rarely a frame in Oppenheimer that doesn’t juxtapose Murphy’s cool demeanor with the raging of the natural world around him–a pairing that frequently externalizes the moral apocalypse a man like Oppenheimer faced the majority of his life.
In regards to its claustrophobic capturing of a morally-conflicted moment in history, Nolan’s Oppenheimer has more in common with films like Son of Saul as it does with the scientific hagiography of something like The Right Stuff. Nolan and Oppenheimer make no qualms about acknowledging the devastation the Manhattan Project wreaked not just upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but also in the following decades. In its second half, it allows the film to pivot away from the noble efforts of bringing together the world’s top minds in pursuit of a common goal into how that idea of unity itself became a weapon of national self-interest. There’s a raw suspense Nolan finds in the battle for self-preservation the film’s characters face, one where alliances only last as long as they’re useful. In an ideologically bloodthirsty world as this, Oppenheimer’s position is an impossible one, as the physicist tasked with the scientific discoveries that may end thousands of lives to save countless more. Where Oppenheimer soars is the emotional collapse in the aftermath of this journey–when it becomes clear that, despite Oppenheimer’s dreams of creating a weapon to end all weapons, the atomic bomb isn’t seen as a last resort but the first step towards a fabled self-made armageddon. It’s a reality that Oppenheimer as a film is wholly convinced of, with each character either feebly denying its prospects or crumbling under the weight of their complicity in bringing such a future closer to reality. A jaw-dropping sequence where Oppenheimer applauds the efforts of Los Alamos scientists marks the chilling duality of this response–echoing, of all things, Bob Fosse’s Cabaret in how people confront their own impending atrocities with stoic resolve, sobbing guilt, or vigorously-applauding enthusiasm.
For all of its technical wizardry and bravura performances, Oppenheimer’s greatest strength is in how it confronts and embraces the necessary reckoning for historical moments such as these. There’s natural posturing about the scruples involved in the choice to create a bomb and pick its targets, but even then such moral preening comes from those who take such reductive stances towards atrocities as a validation of their own unyielding and equally-destructive sense of nationalism. Through an intricate journey of moral justification and sincere optimism, Oppenheimer peels away thin veneers of moral righteousness until we are left with the idea that we are just as capable of our own self-destruction as we are of our possible redemption; everything else is just moral window dressing. The responsibility for what comes next is as much in the hands of those watching Oppenheimer as it was for the man it portrays–and by balancing this world-ending terror with the idea that we can still come together in the name of progress, Nolan hopes (perhaps in vain) that we’re as much creators of worlds as we are destroyers.
Oppenheimer hits theaters on July 21, 2023 courtesy of Universal Pictures.
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THE MIRACLE CLUB Travels Familiar Territory
Photo credit: Jonathan Hession. © themiracleclubcopyright 2023. Courtesy of Sony Pictures
Classics.The Miracle Club stars a formidable cast; Kathy Bates, Laura Linney and Maggie Smith play characters from the same neighborhood in Dublin (in an unusual turn of events, American actors play Irish here instead of the other way around). It’s 1967 and their local church is sponsoring a bus to Lourdes, holy site of Saint Bernadette’s vision of Mary. Friends Eileen (Bates), Lily (Smith) and Dolly (Agnes O’Casey, Starz’s Dangerous Liaisons) enter a talent contest in hopes of winning two free tickets. Younger Dolly is mother to Daniel, a small redhead who doesn’t speak; Lily and Eileen’s troubles are less visible. Meanwhile Chrissie (Linney) has returned to town after a 40-year absence.
These noteworthy performers – even newcomer O’Casey – do their best with the material. Stephen Rea and Niall Buggy (Mamma Mia!) add some lighthearted moments as husbands left to fend for themselves as their wives go on the trip . The vibrant cinematography, eye-catching costuming and thoughtful production design make for a movie that is pretty to watch. The bright tones of Chrissie’s outfits and Dolly’s neon dresses pop on the screen.
Photo credit: Jonathan Hession. © themiracleclubcopyright 2023. Courtesy of Sony Pictures
Classics.The script, however — written by a team of three men — lacks a distinct voice, and the dialogue can be clunky. While the film explores themes of prejudice and forgiveness, the tone verges on maudlin instead of something more subtle. The “mystery” of Chrissie’s departure from her home country is predictable, and the clues given throughout are far too obvious.
The Miracle Club feels like something we’ve seen before. For that reason, it could be a comforting watch for some folks. But even when the film touches on challenging topics like suicide or the loss of a child, the filmmaker’s preference for corny and manipulative emotion makes it difficult to truly connect with the work as a viewer.
The Miracle Club opens in theaters nationwide on Fri, July 14.
