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"Lady Bird:" A Soaring Triumph

3/30/2018

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​The protagonist, Christine “Lady Bird” McPherson, wearing her typical expression of world-weary, adolescent angst (Lady Bird, Gerwig, 2017)
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by Megan Hess

At this point in history, most of our iconic coming-of-age films – movies like The Graduate (Nichols, 1967) or Rushmore (Anderson, 1998) focus on a male protagonist. But, as they say, the future is female, and Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird (2017) is helping to bring a female presence more prominently into the genre.
In the afterword to Full Dark, No Stars, his 2011 collection of four short novellas, Stephen King makes a differentiation between literary and genre fiction that could also apply to film. According to King“….literary fiction usually concerns itself with extraordinary people in ordinary situations,” while genre fiction in the classic sense focuses on “ordinary people in extraordinary situations.” (528). Like many coming-of-age dramas that precede it, Lady Bird doesn’t fall into either category. The situations and the people in them are both ordinary. (In fact, I think it’s Gerwig’s commitment to the ordinary that lost her Oscar glory. In a less sensational Oscar season, she would have better chances.) But, it’s a vibrant, vulnerable, unforgettable rendition of the regular. Christine McPherson (Saoirse Ronan) is average, but constantly trying not to be. She’s dramatic, irritating, and idealistic; a girl who wants things she doesn’t deserve and doesn’t know how to get…in short, a typical teenager. It’s easy to see yourself in her – even if you’ve never been a teenage girl enrolled in Catholic school in California in 2002. The film takes place over Lady Bird’s senior year of high school, a period where she experiences a lot of big firsts – and has big expectations for those moments. The film’s universal message is great for teens to hear – and for the rest of us to remember: Sometimes your biggest wants have the most unexpected outcomes. 

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​Lady Bird with her short-term boyfriend and co-star from the school’s production of Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, Danny O’Neil (Lucas Hedges) (Lady Bird, Gerwig, 2017)
​I’m still of the opinion that Brooklyn (Crowley, 2015) is Saoirse Ronan’s best performance so far, but she still did an excellent job in this film. I saw a little bit of Briony Tallis, her character from Atonement (Wright, 2007), in Lady Bird – mostly her frustrating self-centeredness and naivete. She also had a great supporting cast to bolster her performance. The mother-daughter relationship between Laurie Metcalf and Ronan felt painfully authentic for me – the thrift-store scene in particular. It was a little sad to see her lose out in the Best Supporting Actress race, as much as I love Allison Janney and really enjoyed her performance in I, Tonya (Gillespie, 2018). Beanie Feldstein’s character Julie makes a great best friend\sidekick for Lady Bird; their relational arc and dynamics flavor the plot. While the twist with Danny is a bit predictable, it’s interesting nonetheless. His character reminds me of Paulie Bleeker in Juno (Cody, 2009). I’m appreciating Timothèe Chalamet in hindsight because I didn’t realize it was him on first viewing. His love scene in Lady Bird isn’t as controversial as the infamous “peach scene” in Call Me By Your Name (Guadagnino, 2017), but it’s character-development fodder, and gives him one of the best lines in the script: “You’re gonna have so much unspecial sex in your life.” (It’s a little dark and pessimistic, but true, I suspect, for many….)
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​Kyle (Timothèe Chalamet), Lady Bird’s other love interest in the film. (Lady Bird, Gerwig, 2017).
​The stellar cast and commitment to realism means there’s little to complain about with Lady Bird. I wish they hadn’t shown the car scene in the trailer because it lessened the impact of the scene in context. I also would have liked a more concrete ending, but I usually balk at ambiguous movie endings as a rule, so that’s not a problem specific to this film…. It’s not incredibly diverse – racially, sexually, or otherwise – but that could be a setting and time-period factor. Class difference and gender are Gerwig’s main concerns, and she handles them well. I appreciated the grace, tact, and subtlety she used with the religious themes and subject matter in the film; Catholicism in particular often gets demonized or mocked in popular media (not without cause, but still…) and she avoided any sort of that from a filmmaking lens, taking a neutral stance.
In our big-budget blockbuster world, stillness and authenticity aren’t always valued, but Lady Bird shows their power in narrative. It also highlights the importance of women’s stories. Overall, Lady Bird is the kind of film I can’t wait to watch again, one capable of resonating with many people. The memories and nostalgia of adolescence it evokes for older viewers – meaning, anyone out of high school - won’t necessarily be the rosy, happy kind, but they’re worth reflecting on post-watch. Teens – those in the thick of it, who can most directly identify with Lady Bird – will likely have a different take, but can still enjoy the film. I look forward to the woman-centric coming of age films it’s destined to inspire, and hope they’re just as honest. 
​Works Cited
King, Stephen. Full Dark, No Stars. Pocket Books, 2011
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Hail to the King: a review of Black Panther

3/23/2018

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By Bill Friedell
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Ten years and eighteen movies into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Marvel Studios released Black Panther (Ryan Coogler, 2018).  Following not long after Captain America: Civil War (Joe and Anthony Russo, 2016), T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman) returns to his home nation of Wakanda, a technologically advanced African nation that was never touched by western colonization,  to be crowned king after the recent passing of his father, T’Chaka (John Kani), after succeeding in a ritual rite of passage. At the same time, Erik “Killmonger” Stevens (Michael B. Jordan), with the help of Ulysses Klaue (Andy Serkis), sets out to find the nation of Wakanda and take control of the country and it's vast resources.
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Black Panther is easily Marvel’s most thematically rich and substantive movies. It follows very much in the vein of the Captain America movies in terms of their tone and how it looks at political themes. It explores the ideas of what it means to have power, identity, and isolationism. Director Ryan Coogler brings in real issues like the African diaspora, through the story of its villain, Eric Killmonger and dealing with the idea of isolationism and what the duties of a country in a privileged position should do when faced with helping others beyond its borders. Where Captain America: Winter Soldier (Joe and Anthony Russo, 2014) looks at themes of security verses freedom and Captain America: Civil War deals with the limits that should be set on those who protect us, Black Panther looks at what it means to do the right thing when it comes to dealing with injustice, particularly in terms of racial injustice. The way it does this is through the world of Wakanda and the various views of the characters who inhabit it. Characters such as Nakia (Lupita Nyong'o) who thinks that Wakanda should be giving relief to other countries, while the leaders of the tribes that make up Wakanda want T’Challa should focus on being a king and tending to his own people, rather than be a warrior and pursue Klaue. The dilemma for T’Challa, as well as being the main question of the film is, what is the best way to rules? How can T’Challa do what is necessary to be a good king and remain a good man?

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Wakanda
The world of Wakanda is a beautifully portrayed, filled with its own traditions, technology, economy, and government.  The opening of the film gives us the history of Wakanda through a unique sequence like Wonder Woman (Patty Jenkins 2017) similar to telling the history of the amazons, while still being unique and beautiful. Jenkins nods back to classical paintings, whereas Coogler forms his sequence out of a world made of shifting sand. Coogler’s third outing as director is just as stellar as ever. Anyone who has seen Creed (Ryan Coogler, 2015) will love the use of single takes in two particular action sequences. Probably the most aesthetically beautiful sequences are in the spiritual plane where T’Challa’s ancestors reside. The use of color, particularly purple was dazzling and tranquil. The score and soundtrack also impress, mixing hip hop, rap and African music combined with orchestration, helping to sell the world and identity, while also celebrating black culture.

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Left: Eric Killmonger (Michael B. Jordon). Right: T'Challa/Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman).
In terms of performances, there are many standouts. Everyone in the cast shines. Michael B. Jordan as Killmonger is probably the standout among a whole cast of memorable characters and performances. Killmonger is easily on of the MCU’s best, if not very best villain they’ve ever had. You understand and sympathies with his motives and in some ways can even agree with him to an extent. However, you still see the faults that make him a villain, much like Magneto from the X-Men movies. Jordan's introduction scene has you glued to his character from the get-go. Serkis is also a lot of fun, but Jordan is the most substantive and interesting. Serkis may get more laughs and has the bigger personality, but Jordan grabs you the minute he enters, instantly drawing you in, making you want to follow his story, whereas other marvel films see the villains as necessary plot points or roadblocks for the hero. Instead of being another world ender for reasons that don’t have any bearing on the themes or journey of the hero, Killmonger causes change in T’Challa and Wakanda. He isn’t just a bad guy to beat up and continue the norm. The hero is changed for the better because of the arrival and challenge of this villain.

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Left: Nakia (Lupita Nyong'o), Center: Shuri (Letitia Wright), Right: Okoye (Danai Gurira)
Two other stand outs are Danai Gurira as Okoye, leader of the royal guard of female warriors and Letitia Wright as Shuri, T’Challa’s genius sister. These two were scene stealers both in action and in conversation. Everyone turns in great performances. So much so, that Chadwick Boseman can be overshadowed at times, considering the more subdued, more serious nature of his character. But Bozeman grounds the world and works well off each and  every character, balancing the cast and giving it a center.
 
While there are familiar elements in Black Panther, fighting a villain with a costume and powerset that perfectly matches the hero, and a big climax, the movie makes it all its own and finds twists and spins to make it it’s own. Its voice is all its own, which is something that Marvel has been improving with as well as being cohesive with the other films, especially last year. With unique directors telling different kinds of stories with the superhero genre like Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 (James Gunn, 2017) and Thor Ragnarok (Taika Waititi). Coogler brings his own story and style stunningly in Black Panther. It works as a stand alone film and shows us that there is still new types of characters, worlds, and conflicts when it comes to the superhero genre that can be explored.

Works Cited
Coogler, Ryan, director. Black Panther. Walt Disney, 2018.
Coogler, Ryan, director. Creed. MGM and Warner Brothers. ​
Gunn, James, director. Guardians of the Galaxy. Disney, 2017.
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Jenkins, Patty, director. Wonder Woman. Warner Brothers, 2017. 
Russo, Anthony and Joe Russo, directors. Captain America Winter Soldier. Walt Disney.
Russo, Anthony and Joe Russo, directors. Captain America Civil War. Walt Disney, 2016. 
Waititi, Taika, director. Thor Ragnarok. Walt Disney, 2017.


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Facing the Music: The Callbacks of T2: Trainspotting

3/4/2018

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By Bill Friedell

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While many film fans are tired of sequels that happen long after their predecessor(s), these tend to vary in quality and relevance. T2:Trainspotting (Danny Boyle, 2017) takes advantage of its twenty-year gap to create a meaningful look at growing older, nostalgia, facing the past, and moving forward. It was left ambiguous at the end of the predecessor film, Trainspotting (Danny Boyle, 1996), if Mark Renton (played by Ewan McGregor) will truly go the straight and narrow after stealing 16,000 pounds from his associates/friends; Spud (Ewen Bremner) Simon, aka Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), and Begbie (Robert Carlyle) made in a heroin deal. T2 explores the idea of nostalgia through revisiting these characters twenty years later. We see what has changed for the group - and, more importantly, how they didn’t change - and how in, retrospect, the changes didn’t do much to help themselves out of their self-destructive cycles of addictions and poor life choices. But, what’s most impressive was the use of callbacks that aren’t empty but have relevance.
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In the opening of T2: Trainspotting, we see current-day Mark Renton running on a treadmill as a montage of images flash to the beat of “Shotgun Mouthwash” by High Contrast, climaxing with Renton falling on the ground in the middle of a busy gym (which we find out later was caused by acute coronary insufficiency) and the music grinds to a halt. Now, if you don’t remember (or haven’t seen) Trainspotting, the movie opens with young punk heroin addict Renton and his friend Spud running away from the police, climaxing with Renton falling on the floor, getting high. Comparing the two scenes, there is a lot going on. One of the motifs in this opening is the callback to the ending shot of Trainspotting; as Renton walks toward the camera, ready to go straight and join society, the camera blurs, effectively blurring the reliability of Renton and calling into question his reliability. However, the way T2: Trainspotting represents this scene is by starting the shot blurred and making it clear. This points us a harsh truth by removing the ambiguity of the original film. Renton did try to go clean and did, but now he will be brought out of his delusion of self-betterment and be forced back on a quest to confront his past.

But he can’t at first. Renton returns to his old home, he goes through his records, selecting an Iggy Pop soundtrack. But, he finds himself unable to play it. The beginning of “Lust for Life” hardly even starts.
 
One scene that encapsulates Renton’s view of the past and how it relates to the present is through a direct reference and update on the “choose life” monologue (Trainspotting: left, T2: Trainspotting: right) that opened the original movie. Renton explains to Veronika (Anjela Nedyalkova), Sick Boy’s girlfriend and business associate, what “choose life” means. Originally an antidrug slogan, Renton and Sick Boy appropriated it and turned it into a joke. At first it seems silly enough. Even the beginning of “Lust for Life” plays with the lighter hearted parts of the monologue, referencing “designer lingerie, designer shoes” and Facebook and Snapchat posts meant to “spew your bile to people you’ve never met”. But then it gets darker with each new spin Renton puts on it, culminating in him revealing his dissatisfaction with not only the world, but himself. We see Renton in an empty bed, a reference to his upcoming divorce. We see his grief over the loss of his mother mirroring a shot seen when Renton first returns home; it is the exact composition of the shot without her from earlier in the film, except his mother is there and Renton is young, fresh from Trainspotting.
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This allows us to feel what Renton was experiencing from his point of view, at least from someone who has seen Trainspotting. The next thirty years he will supposedly have after his surgery seem like a nightmare and existential crisis to him because he sees that the twenty years away from his old life as a heroin addict were just as wasted as the time he spent clean. We get a true glimpse of what he has experienced since we last saw him and get greater context to the scene previous. People who had not seen the first movie would probably identify with Veronika, the new person POV who is listening to a forty-something year old man pour out his misery and regret.
Renton sees no other alternative or direction to go, so he instead leans back to the time and people he felt most alive with, stating, “he can’t think of doing anything better”. A study was conducted on nostalgia at the University of South Hampton defines nostalgia as such:​ “Nostalgia is about close others (family members, friends, partners), momentous events (birthdays, anniversaries, vacations), and settings (sunsets, lakes). It is a self-relevant emotion (as the self is invariably the central character in the narratives) but also a social emotion (as the self is almost always surrounded by close others). It is also bittersweet, albeit mostly positive. And it is triggered typically by aversive conditions, such as negative affect or loneliness” (Tierney).


This idea is bought into a particularly harsh light at a train station out in the green where Renton, Sick Boy, and Spud, were dragged to in the first film by their friend Tommy (clip above). They are there in memoriam to Tommy, who died in the first movie. There’s duality in the nostalgia. There is legitimate joy. But there is a distance that Sick Boy even comments on: “Nostalgia. You’re a tourist to your youth. Just cuz you had a near death experience that left you feeling warm and fuzzy. What other moments will you be visiting?”. It’s his selective memory that seems to be part of Renton’s problem. He wants to remember the good times but has yet to make peace with the not-so-fuzzy parts. Renton got their belated friend Tommy hooked on heroin, who eventually died young because of it.
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Throughout the film, it is clear to Renton and the audiences that none of the characters Renton left behind have changed (at least not in too meaningful a way). Spud is still a junkie despite having an ex-lover and child. Begbie may be out of jail (broken out) with a son with good prospects, but is still a raging, foul-mouthed, violent man who couldn’t be more petty and willing to drag his son down the same path he took himself. Simon (Sick Boy) is still getting into trouble with the law, despite getting a partner in crime (Veronika), and has graduated from heroin to cocaine. They are stuck in a cycle. And so is Renton. He has come back and now wishes to participate in Sick Boy’s newest hair-brained scheme. He has nothing better to do with his next thirty years.​
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Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor), then (Trainspotting, Danny Boyle, 1996)
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Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor), 20 years later (T2: Trainspotting, Danny Boyle, 2017)
So, Renton decides to move back into his childhood house and live with his father, who he embraces - a sign of acceptance, literally embracing and making peace with his past (clip above) before going back to his room. He can finally listen to the music and have it feel like it is young, despite being a forty-year old dancing in his childhood room to Iggy Pop. As he leans back, grasping the music, we cut back to young Renton leaning back, taking in the euphoria of whatever he smoked. But instead of falling over, he dances. He “faces the music” of his past and has embraced it. As a New York Times article titled, “What Is Nostalgia Good For? Quite a Bit, Research Shows” written by Tierney. “A quick way to induce nostalgia is through music, which has become a favorite tool of researchers. In an experiment in the Netherlands, Ad J. J. M. Vingerhoets of Tilburg University and colleagues found that listening to songs made people feel not only nostalgic but also warmer physically” (Tierney). He has finally begun to actually mature. He no longer flees from his past but embraces it. Mastering it. The camera then pushes back, like a speeding train, as the credits rol1, symbolizing the moving on the characters. 
 
What sequels from years later forget is that references need to have purpose. It’s easy to get an emotional reaction out of telling the audience to remember what the original did. This movie knows it cannot recapture the glory days of 1996. So, it leans on tackling the past and realizing that Renton needed to return to this structure in order to break these characters, and himself, out of their destructive cycle. The journey of Renton in T2: Trainspotting is the story of a man confronting his past and learning to both embrace it and move forward. Nostalgia can be a source of healing and closure.
 
Works Cited
 
T2 Trainspotting. Dir. Danny Boyle. Sony Pictures Entertainment, 2017. DVD.                       
 
Trainspotting. Dir. Danny Boyle. Polygram Filmed Entertainment, 1996. DVD.
 
"Nostalgia Group Members ." Index | University of Southampton. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Feb. 2018.
 
Tierney, John. "What Is Nostalgia Good For? Quite a Bit, Research Shows." The New York Times. The New York Times, 08 July 2013. Web. 25 Feb. 2018.         
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Earth under Siege: A Review of Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters

3/1/2018

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Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters (Seshita and Shizuno, 2017), while it falters in character development, is a fairly entertaining film with an intriguing premise, theme, and an ambitious animation style.

The film tells the story of Haruo Sakaki (Chris Niosi), a young man who lost his parents to an attack by the monster Godzilla as a child. He lives on-board a spaceship with a colony that escaped the destruction that monsters brought to the Earth. However, refusing to give up hope on humanity’s true home, Haruo, with the help of an alien priest named Metphies (Lucien Dodge) and a group of his childhood friends, vows to reclaim the planet and defeat his childhood nightmare. Thus, the colony mobilizes on the now-forested Japan where Godzilla continues to roam, along with other monsters that lurk in the shadows and in the depths of the earth.​
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Godzilla chasing Yuko Tani and another colonist through the forest
Planet of the Monsters crafts a version of Godzilla that emphasizes the monster as an indomitable force of nature beyond humankind’s control. The Godzilla of this film is the evolution of plant-life on Earth that evolved and adapted via natural selection and took over the planet. Meanwhile, Godzilla’s first incarnation in Gojira (Honda, 1954) depicted it as an allegory for the World War II nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It breathed atomic gas and set fire to Tokyo during its reign of terror, representing the horrors that human’s own invention brought on itself. However, Planet of the Monsters continues to expand the discussion on humans and their relationship with nature and technology by putting a twist on Godzilla’s origins. As Godzilla is a sentient collective of evolved plant-life, it represents the notion that humanity has abused an ecosystem that is not their own, and nature will find ways to take it back. Even though Haruo and his team make great strides in fighting off the monsters, they have yet to see the true extent of nature’s full power in rejecting humankind’s technology and civilization.
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Godzilla, in his original 1954 incarnation, terrorizing destroying pylons near the shores of Tokyo
Unlike many other Japanese anime, this film was created using three-dimensional models and environments as opposed to the conventional two-dimensional style. 3D models can have jarringly low frame rates, making characters appear stiff and move in an awkward, choppy fashion. Such has been the case for animated shows such as Knights of Sidonia, a Netflix exclusive, and the 2016 adaptation of the manga Berserk. While the frames do appear slightly choppy, the lighting, textures, and overall designs of the colony’s mechs and the monsters make up for it. The 3D animation especially helps with the appearances of the monsters on Earth. Godzilla and the rest of the creatures have very rocky, earthen, and almost alien-like textures, making them appear all the more terrifying and strange. This look would not have been achieved as well had it been rendered in 2D.
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Godzilla firing a beam of energy from his mouth with dazzling lights all around him
The major fault that holds this movie down is its underdeveloped cast of characters aside from the protagonist. While Haruo has a very clear arc, in which he goes from a rash, rage-filled upstart to a responsible and driven leader, the supporting cast does not have much development. There are the building blocks for development set in place with characters such as Yuko Tani (Cristina Vee), the granddaughter of a man who died trying to colonize another planet at the beginning of the film. Metphies also serves as the film’s voice of reason, who sees beyond humanity’s arrogance and desire for control, and furthers the themes of nature taking back what humans have claimed as their own. However, the film mostly focuses on Haruo’s personal growth and unyielding desire to fight Godzilla, leaving most of the other characters without much depth. As this film is the first of a trilogy that Toho Animation plans to release within the next three years, perhaps the rest of the cast is left intentionally undeveloped for now. Planet of the Monsters ought to complete its character's personalities and tie up most of its loose ends, even if it is only the first of three more films.
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Haruo trying to convince a pod full of older colonists not to leave the colony until they find a habitable planet.
Overall, Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters is far from a ground-breaking experience, lacking substantial character development, but it offers some insightful commentary on the arrogance of humankind, has a solid, visually-pleasing art style, and promises even more revelations and developments for its sequel.
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