[ad_1]
ALL THE BEAUTY AND THE BLOODSHED
**** Having interviewed Edward Snowden from his Hong Kong hotel room, Citizenfour director Laura Poitras is used to making difficult films. But her new documentary, which captures the life and art of photographer Nan Goldin, accomplishes more of a poetic feat. Poitras introduces us to Goldin first as a protester against the OxyContin-peddling Sackler family and their prominence as art museum donors. Then, the film becomes a flood of childhood memories, centering on how Goldin’s older sister’s personal rebellion presaged her own. Poitras then changes pitch again and ushers us into Goldin’s transformative photography, rhythmically re-creating her iconic slideshow format and showcasing her No Wave-era Polaroids of frank sex and queer life. All the while, you can feel (but not see) Poitras sitting in a room somewhere with Goldin, exploring all her wisdom and unhealed wounds, while still leaving silence within this unlikely amalgam of an issues doc, biopic and formally fitting artistic testament. The slow revelation of the film’s title poignantly proves that Goldin’s life runs too deep, too heated for conventional reconstruction, which makes her a perfect subject for Poitras. Neither image-maker will stand for denial. Point the camera and look. NR. CHANCE SOLEM PFEIFER. Cinema 21.
VIOLENT NIGHT
*** In this holiday season’s bag of cinematic gifts, director Tommy Wirkola (Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, the Dead Snow franchise) has offered up one hell of a stocking stuffer. Violent Night stars a flawless David Harbour as a drunk and sullen St. Nick anguished by the commercialization of Christmas. While going through the motions of home-invasion gift deliveries, he stumbles upon mercenaries led by “Scrooge” (John Leguizamo) who are holding a wealthy family hostage for the $300 million located in their basement, for some reason. Santa’s sympathy for the youngest hostage, Trudy (Leah Brady), snaps him into going medieval on these villains by tapping into his dark origins, which we learn nothing about. Violent Night skillfully re-creates the gruesome fun of R-rated action comedies like Super and Kick-Ass, but without any emotional consequences. For a movie that asks its audience to accept such a wild premise, it underuses its creative license in every aspect but the kills, yet still delivers a riotously fun spectacle starring a lovable, murderous, man bun-sporting Santa Claus trapped in a mediocre story. R. RAY GILL JR. Bagdad, Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, City Center, Clackamas, Eastport, Evergreen Parkway, Laurelhurst, Lloyd Center, Mill Plain, Oak Grove, Pioneer Place, St. Johns, Studio One, Tigard.
EMPIRE OF LIGHT
** It’s taken a couple of decades, but Sam Mendes has finally become a British filmmaker. Born in Reading, England, the Oscar-winning director spent the first phase of his career besotted with Americana: gangsters, fast food, suburbia, Marines, you name it. Yet with Skyfall, Spectre and 1917, he thoroughly embraced his Britishness—and with its tea, neat suits and repressed feelings, the 1980s-set Empire of Light might be his most English film yet. Olivia Colman stars as Hillary, who falls in love with Stephen (Micheal Ward of Lovers Rock), her much-younger co-worker at a movie theater on England’s South Coast. The entire movie could have been devoted to their romance, but Mendes’ screenplay wolfs down more melodrama than it can handle. Hillary explodes with self-incinerating emotion, then vanishes; Donald (Colin Firth), her cruel boss, quits offscreen; and the skinhead rally that shatters the theater’s doors is over as swiftly as it begins. Narratively, Empire of Light is a mess, but it’s also too tidy for its own good (Stephen impresses Hillary not only with his sexual prowess, but his ability to perfectly bind a bird’s broken wing with his sock). When Mendes made American Beauty, Alan Ball’s triumphantly salacious screenplay left little room for prettified sentiment, whereas Empire of Light gets suffocated by lacquered elegance. It may be filled with ravings about the power of cinema, but it’s anything but cinematic. R. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Fox Tower.
MEMORIES OF MY FATHER
** Dr. Héctor Abad Gómez certainly deserves a tribute. In the ‘70s and ‘80s, the Colombian college professor and public health advocate fought tirelessly for the poor of Medellín, despite violent political pushback. According to his son’s memoir, Abad Gómez was an endlessly affectionate father as well. But director Fernando Trueba’s adaptation flattens the doctor’s achievements and humanity into an unwieldy, lovesick ballad from son to father—with a style that’s often cheesy and sometimes just plain shoddy. The director best known for the Oscar-winning Belle Époque (1992) applies epic scope to young Héctor’s childhood through his post-college years, going so broad (with certitude that we care about unestablished and unimportant side characters) that any hope of dramatic tension fades. Sometimes it’s not even clear why young Héctor is part of this story at all. High-toned arthouse tropes—like toggling from color to black-and-white—add little, while gleaming cinematography meant to convey golden memory instead creates a digital blur. As Dr. Abad Gómez, Javier Cámara’s performance descends from mildly interesting to serviceable as the movie refuses to let this activist experiencing intense conflict appear conflicted. Some children view their parents as gods, but why should the film of their life follow suit? NR. CHANCE SOLEM-PFEIFER. Living Room.
[ad_2]
Source link