A New Twist on an old Con

Listen up, all you yegs: Rian Johnson, the writer/director who brought film noir back into style with 2005’s Brick is back, this time adding his magic touch to the con film. If Brick was his Maltese Falcon, than The Brothers Bloom is his The Sting.

Johnson has a knack for snappy dialogue and wonderful characterization, and is an extremely literal director, a phrase that here means he’s obsessed with storytelling. There’s a touch of Wes Anderson’s style is Johnson’s second picture, but the sheer cinematic joy is all his. Besides, there’s something to be said for a film whose two main characters’ names are Stephen and Bloom, the centerpieces of James Joyce’s Ulysses.

The best thing about The Brothers Bloom is the characters; no doubt about it. The plot is a fantastic ride of twists and turns, but it’s the actors and the unique characters they play that are the real money in this con caper.

Mad props to Mark Ruffalo and Adrien Brody as Stephen and Bloom, respectively, for bringing devilish wit and humanity to the titular characters. Stephen is all action and smarts, an author of “dead Russian writer” proportions who uses real life to spin his stories into cons. Bloom just follows his brother’s lead, immersing himself in whatever character his brother has written for him, which leaves him feeling like a man without a life.

That is, until Stephen sets his sights on Penelope (Rachel Weisz) – a rich orphan who collects hobbies in her massive New Jersey mansion – as their final con, setting into play a rich tapestry of events culminating in a conclusion at once witty, shocking and heartbreaking. That’s all I’ll give as far as the plot goes – it’s a ride one has to go on for themselves.

The leading ladies are the real thieves in this one, stealing practically every scene they’re in. Weisz is a sweet, sexy wonder full of mischief and childlike excitement that leaps right off the screen as has you jumping up and down for joy. The scene where she describes how best to not get cheated will performing a series of elaborate card tricks will knock you down flat.

Save an explosion of applause for Rinko Kikuchi, who plays a nearly silent Japenese wonder criminal named Bang Bang. Kikuchi already proved she could act in Babel, but her comic turn here, which is at times as melancholy as it is erotic, better land her some more starring roles, pronto. She’s the spice that makes Bloom really sizzle.

For a break from all the summer blockbusters, The Brothers Bloom is just the ticket. It’s like running through the sprinklers after days of going to the pool: fun, fast and full of moving life. What else is summer all about?

"What's That in the Sky?"

Not only is Pixar’s latest film, Up, a magnificent piece of art, but the title lends itself to all manner of fantastic puns that describing soaring, flying, and the sky’s the limit. Fortunately for the viewer – and unfortunately for the reviewer – these turns of phrase don’t do the film justice by a long shot. It wasn’t quite as good as Wall-E for me (blame that on being a sucker for romance) but it comes within a hair’s breadth of matching it.

In the hands of any other studio, a film about an old man – Carl Fredricksen (Ed Asner) – who ties a bunch of balloons to his house so he can float down to South American to fulfill a promise to his dead wife, could have easily turned into a farce or just plain schmaltz. In this studio’s able hands, it instead becomes the wonder film of the summer. No other picture will dazzle your senses, pop out your eyes visually and still manage to be uproariously funny and moving at the same time.

The plot is pretty simple, as stated above. I should mention that Carl picks up a passenger on his journey, one pudgy wilderness-camper named Russell, who provides much of the film’s more obvious humour. Add in a delightfully adorable talking dog named Dug, and you’ve got a live one on your hands. There are plenty of laughs and thrills to delight both children and adults – and how many so-called “family films” can actually achieve that?

The real power of Up is its focus on the realities of life. Pixar’s films have never talked down to kids, and have often handed down pretty heavy subjects to those in the single-digits. In that regard, Up may be Pixar’s darkest film to date (the opening of the film – a dialoguess story of a married couple’s life - is one for the time capsule, despite its darkness), but by showing viewers that life can be cold and hard sometimes, the filmmakers only increase the power of the love and life that carries the movie along. This isn’t just film making for children – it’s a movie for people, in the grandest tradition of the term.

In a summer full of movies that promise wonders galore (Terminator, Harry Potter, Transformers), Up is the real wonder; a film that never lets its magic get in the way of the human story. Tie a balloon to it and let it fly you away.

The Edge of Love Review

Let’s get one thing straight: Keira Knightley has it all. She’s a damn fine actress, she’s got the pretty in spades, she can sing and she can quite literally light up the screen – as she does in the opening scene of her latest film, The Edge of Love, based on the life of Dylan Thomas. I submit that if Scarlett Johansson is this generation’s more intellectual Marilyn Monroe, than Knightley is our more sensual Audrey Hepburn (if you think that’s crazy, consider that Kinghtley is slated to play the lead in a new version of My Fair Lady). Just like Hepburn, even if the material isn’t all it should be, she still manages to shine.

Alas, sub-par material is the case in Edge. Being billed as the “next Atonement” – it isn’t – is setting the bar pretty high, and the movie doesn’t quite make it. I place less blame on the actors - Sienna Miller, Cillian Murphy and Matthew Rhys – and more on the writer and director.

The main hang-up is that the movie never gets a strong foothold on what the story is, which causes the same problem for the audience. I felt like the director John Maybury couldn’t quite decide if he wanted to tell the story of Welsh poet Thomas, or the women who loved him, and so instead he tried to do both, without pulling either off. The film felt directionless and meandering, which is okay when you have such pretty images to look at – not just the actors, but the beautiful cinematography – but it holds a movie back from having any lasting impact. Personally, I was more interested in the women who loved him than Thomas himself (that may be because I don’t know much about him, and the fact that out four, Rhys’ performance was the most lackluster), but just picking a story to tell and running with it would have grounded the movie. Its like they were trying to make a more serious Shakespeare in Love, but couldn’t decide on what to focus on – the man or the love.

As for the acting, there was a lot that was glossed over, or just not conveyed. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what would make Rhys’ callous, uncharming Thomas so irresistible to Miller’s Caitlin and Knightley’s Vera. It couldn’t have just been that he was a poet, but I never saw what it was. Miller’s acting was fine as Thomas’ lose canon of a wife, but a glimpse into her more vulnerable side would have done a lot in the way of creating empathy. Despite the shady character build up, I was still surprised by Thomas’ sudden turn into utter douche-baggery near the film’s end, which seemed to me out of left field.

Murphy as William, a WWII “hero” does an admirable job, even if it’s odd seeing him in a not so creepy role, and he and Knightley play well together, but there wasn’t enough of them to really sell it for me. Blame that on the film’s lack of focus.

To be honest, though, this is totally Knightley’s show, and while the performance certainly isn’t flawless (her Welsh accent comes and goes and we never see the moment where she really falls for Williams) she’s got the fire that keeps the film burning, even if it’s a slow burn.

Just like falling in love, its not enough to just go to the edge, but you have to commit and jump. The Edge of Love does just what it says: gets to the edge, but can’t quite make that final leap.