Secret Agent Gal Movie Reviews

The Fighter ***1/2

 

A dysfunctional mother and son take center stage in The Fighter, based on the true tale of Lowell-born prize fighter Micky Ward. 

The Fighter is being released on DVD this week.

Christian Bale and Melissa Leo are so powerful here that their dysfunction eclipses Micky’s triumphs in the ring.  Both supporting actors won Oscars and Golden Globes.

Mark Wahlberg’s muted rendition of the main character is less than memorable, although he is in peak physical condition. Wahlberg worked out and practiced boxing for four years in preparation.

Bale and Leo’s formidable pair are complemented by the punch of Amy Adams’ tart barmaid Charlene, who becomes Micky’s girlfriend and insists that he surround himself with smart, healthy manager and staff. With Micky’s presence an afterthought, The Fighter lurches, disjointed.

Bale plays Dicky Eklund, Micky’s crack-addicted half-brother and onetime “Pride of Lowell” who supposedly knocked out Sugar Ray Leonard.  Dicky has been Micky’s hero since childhood.  Leo (so electric in Frozen River) becomes Alice, a Black Widow Spider of a mom. Her performance is nothing short of Oscar worthy.

Bale became skeletal for the film. Dicky hangs out in a dilapidated crack house with drug-addled friends, leaping from a back window more than once to flee the tirades of his enabler mom.  Dicky barely makes it to Micky’s practices, even though he is supposed to be his trainer.  After his prison release later in the film, Bale strides down the middle of the street, a store bought “welcome home” sheet cake in his arms. It’s one of two pivotal moments in The Fighter.

Chain-smoking Alice presides over a household of nine adult children, with a creepy band of seven sisters that can rival the entire Addams Family clan.  Her husband George (Jack McGee) dodges his wife’s iron skillets and verbal jabs.

Alice is Micky’s longtime manager, and bands with Dicky to urge him to accept the last-minute substitution of a heavier, stronger fighter (“Otherwise no one gets paid.”)  Clearly mom favors Dicky, barely noticing the brutal beating that Micky has taken after the lopsided match.

 

Charlene believes in Micky more than he believes in himself. She shows up on his doorstep after the humiliated fighter stands her up for their first date.  Adams (Doubt; Junebug) continues to display her impressive range, facing off against Leo and the sisters. Her explosive confrontation with Dicky is the film’s second turning point.

Micky finally gets his due in later fights, although his name isn’t even spelled correctly on his warm-up jacket. The film’s boxing scenes are bloody but not too visceral.

The best that can be said of Wahlberg’s performance is that it is understated. Wahlberg’s Micky is meant to convey a strong, centered man who learns to believe in himself as the craziness of his family plays out around him.

The real Micky and Dicky appear in The Fighter’s closing credits with evident brother love. Perhaps Ward’s contentious family did help him become a great junior welterweight pro boxer.    

The toxic family that stays together has been featured in recent films like Winter’s Bone (2010) and City Island (2009). In Rocky II (1979), Sylvester Stallone moved on to start his own family.

If you like The Fighter, you might enjoy: Conviction; Winter's Bone; True Grit.

The Fighter   2010  /  R  /  1 hour, 54 min

Cast Overview:  Christian Bale, Mark Wahlberg, Melissa Leo, Amy Adams

Director: David O. Russell

Genres:  Drama, Thriller

The King's Speech *****

 

The stakes could not be higher as Colin Firth portrays King George VI in The King’s Speech, a historical drama about a remarkable friendship and personal triumph over disability during one of history’s darkest hours. Tom Hooper’s film humanizes British royalty along the lines of The Queen (2006) and The Young Victoria (2009).

The King's Speech won Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Writing (Original Screenplay), as well as a Spirit Award for Best Foreign Film. Firth won an Oscar and a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor.

Firth suffers from a devastating stutter. After his father dies, his profligate brother (Guy Pearce) steps up and soon abdicates the throne amidst scandal. The new king will be required to speak publicly – often to an entire nation. Winston Churchill (Timothy Spall) informs him that England’s declaration of war against Germany is inevitable.

The King's Speech swept many prizes, including a Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Film Ensemble, and a Spirit Award for Best Foreign Film.  

Firth is nominated for Best Actor. He also won Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild awards for this role.

Firth is called upon to be a leader just as he’s ready to surrender. His wife (Helena Bonham Carter) has accompanied him to every speech therapist imaginable. Nothing has worked. In the excruciating opening scene, Firth is red-faced and furious, attempting to speak with a mouthful of marbles under a doctor’s direction.

Geoffrey Rush often steals the show with earthy, raucous humor. Lionel Logue is a bold Aussie and failed actor with plenty of experience coaching severe stutterers. In order for the treatments to work, Logue insists that the future king come to his speech studio in a rundown London flat. They must become “equals” and eventually friends. “Call me Lionel,” he insists.

Logue is no doctor. He doesn’t pretend to be. What he does share is ample wisdom and skill as the two men – a commoner and a royal – spar and get acquainted. Bertie, as the king’s family calls him privately, confides in Lionel about early childhood fears and his father’s cruelty.

 

Firth and Rush revel in their weighty roles, playing off each other superbly. Logue is as bold and expressive as the king is restrained and proper. Logue shares a warm and plain spoken relationship with his wife (Jennifer Ehle) and two sons (Dominic Applewhite and Ben Wimsett).

The speech coach brings just the insouciance needed to puncture the fears of the sensitive king. His is the perfect foil to royal stodginess. Bertie must learn to relax his tongue, breathe fully, and even lie down on the floor to loosen his diaphragm.

In one moving scene, Bertie shares a bedtime story with his adoring daughters Elizabeth and Margaret (Freya Wilson and Ramona Marquez). His wife, the future Queen Mum of England, looks on. Elizabeth is destined to succeed her father to the throne one day.

The king’s family and close associates cheer him on during a riveting three minute speech at the BBC. Logue accompanies Bertie into the sound booth, coaching him with silent care as the king urges the nation to stand together at the start of World War II.

Director Hooper is known for his Emmy Award winning miniseries John Adams (2008).

The film received an “R” rating due to a single scene where Firth spouts a string of expletives, desperate to vent his anxiety and express himself at last.

If you like The King's Speech, you might enjoy: The Young Victoria; Another Year; An Education.

The King’s Speech 2010 / R / 1 hour, 58 min

Cast Overview: Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Helena Bonham Carter

Director: Tom Hooper

Genres: Drama, History

Black Swan *****

 

Natalie Portman surrenders herself in Darren Aronofsky’s psycho-sexual thriller Black Swan. In a film of many superlatives, it is Portman who catapults it to greatness with her best performance ever.

Ballerina Nina Sayers has sacrificed her childhood, her mind, body and soul to the dance. Of late, she is keenly focused on the coveted Swan Queen role in Swan Lake. Slavishly supporting Nina is her mother, former ballerina Barbara Hershey (stupendous here).

Portman won the Oscar for Best Actress, as well as Golden Globe, Spirit and Screen Actors Guild awards for this role.
 
Black Swan swept the Spirit Awards, winning for Best Feature, Best Cinematography and Best Director.

In his new production, ballet director Thomas Leroy (ever driving Vincent Cassel) has raised the bar. The lead must play both the White and Black swans. Nina can play the virginal White Swan in a heartbeat, Leroy says. Can she manage her seductive, lascivious counterpart? He doubts it.

As The Wrestler (2008) reveres the male sportsman, Black Swan pays bold homage to the female dance artist. Both Aronofsky films show art consummated at the expense of the individual. In order to achieve wholeness, the Dark must roar alongside pure intention and high ideals without destroying them.

It’s striking how little self worth Nina really has. Brainwashed, she believes that being a perfect dancer is all. As little girl/woman, Nina lives sheltered in her mother’s Upper West Side apartment. Her bedroom is filled with stuffed animals and ballerina music boxes. Portman reveals a determined dance martyr who cracks her joints, hobbles on bloody, split toenails and purges regularly to stay thin.

Life, indeed reality, is what we make of it. Nina careens insanely in waves, relentlessly pushed by her own ego, her mother, the demanding Leroy, and wiley understudy Lily (ravishing Mila Kunis). As if this weren’t enough, she reels with guilt over the “retirement” of former company star Beth Macintyre. Winona Ryder wrings the last drop out of Beth, utterly used and violently crushed.

 

Audiences will lose track of what is real and unreal in Nina’s paranoid hallucinations. Portman has honed the self-destructiveness of Lauren in Heat (1995), and sustains it throughout. Action never lulls as Aronofsky depicts Nina’s inner and outer demons. The rousing cadences of Tchaikovsky billow like a sea beneath this adult fairy tale.

Kunis melds Lily’s smoky cattiness with just enough sisterly charm. Nina surrenders to her new friend. Knowing Lily is like walking through a dank museum basement filled with the Female’s dark artifacts: competition, raw hunger, erotic satiation.

Nina’s Black Swan emerges at last. She parties all night prior to morning rehearsal. Sex is her birthright, seduction her innate power. It’s a classic theme elevated by Portman, a revelation of both Hindu goddesses Kali and Lakshmi. Destruction becomes liberation as light and beauty shine. Portman performs most of her own dancing.

Cassel advances upon his prima ballerina to push her onto dangerous new ground. He transcends sexual harassment as he is able to control desire. “That was me seducing you. It needs to be the other way around,” he says.

Hershey’s needy innocence gives way to a mother’s overbearing rage, then morphs into teary adulation.

Several masterstrokes ensure the film’s success. Mark Heyman and John McLaughlin rewrote Andres Heinz’s original script to focus on Nina’s psychology. Cinematographer Matthew Libatique follows Nina and the action closely, making subject larger than life. Digital effects complement cinema verite. Blood flows. Feathers sprout.

Benjamin Millepied of the New York City Ballet choreographs. Clint Mansell created Black Swan’s rousing musical score. Much of the film is set in Lincoln Center.

In real life, Portman fell in love with co-star and choreographer Millepied. The two are engaged and expecting their first child, a boy, this year.

Creation. Destruction. Sacrifice. Black Swan’s ending will leave audiences yearning for Nina to embrace herself wholly.

If you like Black Swan, you might enjoy: I Am Love; The Ghost Writer; The Other Woman.

Black Swan 2010 / R / 1 hour, 48 min

Cast Overview: Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis, Vincent Cassel, Barbara Hershey, Winona Ryder

Director: Darren Aronofsky

Genres: Drama, Thriller

Precious *****

 

Precious (Gabourey Sidibe) is a viciously abused teen who is obese, functionally illiterate, and pregnant for the second time by her father in Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire.

Her mother Mary (astounding Best Supporting Actress Mo'Nique) is as pathetic as she is brutal, blaming Precious for her own failures and for "stealing" her man.

Director Lee Daniels has taken the rich, stark material of Sapphire's novel Push and evoked from his actors the emotional depths and truths that transcend race and class. The character of Precious may be familiar to many viewers. A foul-mouthed girl who seems defeated by life, she is not easy to be around. On this level the film is bound to raise awareness about sexual and emotional abuse. Compassion cannot be far behind when we recognize a survivor.

Both executive producers Tyler Perry and Oprah Winfrey have stated that they are survivors of sexual and emotional abuse.

Just when one thinks Precious' fate cannot get any worse, a ray of light appears. Ms. Blu Rain (Paula Patton) is an alternative school teacher who leads a small class of Harlem women preparing for the GED. Patton offers a turning point in the girl’s life. "Push yourself," she urges Precious, creating hope and inspiration in an urban desert. The excellent supporting cast, in particular the women in Precious' class, add a realism that is unforgettable.

Mariah Carey plays Mrs. Weiss, a concerned social worker. In one of the most powerful and disturbing scenes, Precious’ mother devolves while the social worker referees a meeting between mother and daughter. Sapphire appears briefly as a daycare worker.

Viewers who stay tuned through these hellish scenes may find the finale transcendent. Superb direction and acting make Precious and her violent reality worth watching. Once you witness her world, you may never be the same.

If you like Precious, you might enjoy: The Blind Side; The Soloist; Rabbit Hole.

Precious   2008 / R / 1 hr, 49 min

Cast Overview: Gabourey Sidibe, Mo'Nique, Paula Patton, Mariah Carey, Lenny Kravitz, Sherri Shepherd, Nealla Gordon, Xosha Roquemore, Chyna Layne, Angelic Zambrana, Stephanie Andujar, Amina Robinson, Nia Fraser

Director: Lee Daniels

Genres: Drama

Crazy Heart *****

 
  

  
  
Best Actor Jeff Bridges stars as Bad Blake, a burned out country musician, in the moving drama Crazy Heart. Bridges is so good portraying Blake's struggle with alcoholism and his regrets about the son he abandoned that it hurts.

The singer’s gigs across the Southwest, including a bowling alley, reveal a barren landscape of disappointment, self-loathing and shame. He seems unable and unwilling to understand his bad luck. Blake sings from deep within his soul, but even loyal fans who remember him from years ago are unable to overlook his teetering mental and physical state.

Maggie Gyllenhaal, a great actor, was miscast here. The relationship between her character Jean Craddock, a Santa Fe writer, and Blake was just short of believable, perhaps because of Gyllenhaal’s girl-next-door personality. Blake’s efforts to atone for his sins by playing father to Jean’s cute 4-year-old son Buddy (well-played by Jack Nation), and Gyllenhaal’s willingness to leave him unattended with Blake, are achingly real.

Crazy Heart focuses mostly on the singer’s downward spiral, and would have benefited from an earlier emphasis on Blake’s transformation and songwriting. Similar films that develop the theme of stardom and addiction more effectively are The Wrestler and Walk the Line. All these films ask the question: Do life struggles deepen one’s creativity, and even make art possible?

 

The film is loosely based on the life of late Country Music Hall of Famer Hank Thompson, as portrayed in a novel by Thomas Cobb.

Producer and co-star Robert Duvall is earthy and brotherly as Blake's best friend Wayne. Colin Farrell deftly plays Tommy Sweet, Blake's former student who's now more popular than his teacher. The soundtrack by T-Bone Burnett and Ryan Bingham includes Golden Globe Best Original Song winner The Weary Kind (sung by Bridges) and Crazy Heart (sung by Farrell). Yes, both actors can sing!

If you like Crazy Heart, you might enjoy:  True Grit; Blue Valentine; Two Lovers; The Town.

Crazy Heart  2009 / R / 1 hr, 52 min

Cast Overview: Jeff Bridges, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Colin Farrell, Robert Duvall, Tom Bower, James Keane, William Marquez, Ryan Bingham, Paul Herman, Rick Dial, Beth Grant

Director: Scott Cooper

Genres: Drama, Indie Drama, Romantic Drama, Music, Drama Based on the Book