Good luck Leo Grande
(“Good Luck to You, Leo Grande”, Sophie Hyde, 1h37l)
A retired teacher, now alone, decides to explore the greatest unknown of her life: good sex. Having spent a lifetime with a man who never really satisfied her, Nancy pays for the company of a young escort with perfect features who uses the name Leo Grande. During their encounters, Nancy will come to know her body as she never dared to imagine; but together, many more locked doors will be opened before her (and within her).
A film of the demanding «two actors, one space, one and a half hours» style, with Emma Thompson and Darryl McCormack occupying the full range of the frame and cinematic space for the duration of the film. They play with care, emotion and a much-needed -generous- dose of charisma two people who, in turn, they in turn play. They pretend to be someone else, covering up the fact that they have huge gaps in their lives and in their relationship with the world(s).
Sophie Hyde films a delightful two-person dramedy with grace and ease, without at any point the narrative becoming repetitive or the pacing belly-aching. It relies so heavily on Katie Brandt's succulent text, which patiently unfolds the quest of two people who don't even know they're in the process of a quest. As much as it is on the performances, particularly of Emma Thompson, who uses her body (sometimes uncomfortably, but gradually in a more confident way) and her expressive face (her eyes at times giving the impression of becoming huge, her smile hiding different levels of melancholy or contentment each time) to create not only a delightfully recognizable and vivid heroine, but also a perfectly unexpected cinematic experience.
It is a common mistake that a film like “Leo Grande” can easily be likened to a one-act play or something that «you won't miss anything if you watch it at home». Such reasoning is a completely false generalization. Thompson's interpretive techniques, which manage to breathe life into her complex heroine in remarkably subtle ways, are purely cinematic. The humor, the constant groping of the space between the two characters, the tender sexuality of the piece; all are elements of an emotionally intense, terribly sweet and human experience that deserves to occupy all the space it deserves around the viewer. It's a hearty, fearless endeavor that deserves your attention, especially at a time when beautiful, adult cinema is under constant questioning.
The Perfect Boss
(“The Good Boss / El Buen Patron”, Fernando Leon de Aranoa, 2h)
The boss of a weighing machine factory is waiting for a visit from a committee of excellence awards that will determine the image of the company - and by extension of himself, because as we all know, we live in a society. When a number of things are in danger of going wrong, the boss will not hesitate to risk everything, even his personal relationships and ties, in order to save the good name of the shop.
A well-crafted black satire of capitalistically distorted social mores, with a Javier Bardem who perfectly and delightfully supports this role of a man who manages to possess both power and a dimension of misery in his covert brutality. Without necessarily leading to some formidable crescendo or radical realization, the film nevertheless manages to never quite feel like an obvious or formulaic product. It has the edge and darkness where it needs to be. These elements played a part in this year's triumph at the Goya, the Spanish Oscars that is, where it won that of Best Film and five others.
That it was Spain's choice for the Oscars over Almodóvar's great “Parallel Mothers” is obviously a paranoid decision, but even if “The Boss” in no way has the artistic touch of a Pedro Almodóvar, it occupies a space of its own, one of post-“Breaking Bad” workplace angst.
Lightyear
(Angus McClain, 1h40l)
The movie that Andy (of Toy Story fame) saw as a kid and became his favorite, making him want the Buzz Lightyear toy like crazy. In this space adventure, Buzz embarks on an intergalactic journey that leaves him alone in a time foreign to him; until he finds that the companionship he's been searching for is there, even if it doesn't seem fearless at first.
A cynical extension of the “Toy Story” brand with a space adventure that quickly becomes boring and unnecessarily complicated for its intentions. The film is marketed as the ‘90s film a little boy loved in 1995, but there's absolutely nothing in its tone, pacing or content that feels consistent with that period. Despite its various glimpses (the mechanical kitten is the film's obvious, delightful mascot), “Lightyear” ultimately only keeps the emotional core of a typical Pixar film (a montage early in the film feels like a less organic version of the classic opening of “Up”) and delivers an adventure of the sort that, if this were really the ‘90s, would have been shot as a straight-to-video sequel, a la “Return of the Jafar.”.
After the wonderful, character-filled, colorful, idea-filled, and life-like coming-of-age stories “Luca” and “Always in Red” that were creative high points for the studio, “Lightyear” is probably placed at the very bottom of the Pixar rankings.
High Optics
Dior's couturier is nearing the end of her career and when a 20-year-old girl tries to steal her handbag one day in the subway, she decides not only not to get her into legal trouble, but also to help her by making her her assistant.
Some prefer it hot
(“Some Like It Hot”, Billy Wilder, 2h12l)
During the Prohibition period, two musicians in need of their next gig find themselves chased by the mafia out of nowhere and are forced to follow a female orchestra after disguising themselves as women. The next stop on the tour will lead them/them to a series of unexpected events: One (Tony Curtis) will swap one disguise for another (of a bachelor aristocrat) in order to win the heart of a gorgeous colleague (Marilyn Monroe, real-life emblem), while the other (Jack Lemon) will find himself in the crosshairs of a totally persistent suitor.
Legend Billy Wilder at the height of his wit, inventiveness and rhythmic mastery in the making of his films. There's not a second to spare or sag in this exemplar of comic storytelling and timing, with Curtis, Lemon and Monroe sparkling every moment on camera, no matter what they say, or what they don't have to say. A classically stilted chase of disguises and misunderstandings is ultimately revealed in a deeply philosophical (despite its entirely lightweight wrapping) role-play on the relationship between the sexes and, more importantly and more broadly, between humans and the quintessentially human self.
Each individual episode of the film claims a special place in the great bible of cinematic comedy, but the crescendo in particular is a magnificent narrative unraveling: Wilder manages a complex maze of situations that unfolds before our eyes in a subtle gesture, without us having the slightest idea what he's done-and how. On top of this apparent simplicity, he gives us one of the most iconic and philosophical finales in mainstream American cinema, completing a film that over 60 years later (and despite its daring subject matter) stubbornly-even absurdly!-refuses to age or fall behind whatever era we're living in. It's something of a miracle, but then again, there's a reason it remains perhaps the top comedy in cinema history.
The Express Stranger
(“Strangers on a Train”, Alfred Hitchcock, 1h41l)
Two men unknown to each other on a train, a theory of the perfect murder: You do mine, I do yours, and no one can make the connection since no one has a motive. A classic piece of Hitchcockian filmmaking (which inspired the sardonically delightful “Throw Mom off the Train”) shot with a perfect sense of rhythm and suspense, with the camera constantly following looks and body language and the characters filling the frame. As Hitchcock builds tension on nothing but how the players in an absurd criminal game react to their often suffocating cinematic spaces. Masterful, full of atmosphere and suspense.
Thodoris Dimitropoulos
