Mud Spins a Modern Day Fairy Tale to Reaffirm The Importance of Storytelling

Mud Theatrical Poster

Title: Mud
Genre(s): Drama
Director(s): Jeff Nichols
Release Year: 2013

If there’s a director that can already be considered one of the best of the past couple years, it’s Jeff Nichols. Shotgun Stories was a simple, but engaging tale of the importance of family and the destructive nature of blood feuds, while Take Shelter took a more lyrical approach to telling the story of a man slowly unraveling before our very eyes. The beauty of his stories are that they carry a significant meaning which feel masterly done, and always deliver incredible performances from his cast. Mud is no different, as Nichols demonstrates the importance of storytelling under the guise of a slow-moving southern crime drama.

When Ellis (Tye Sheridan) and Neckbone (Jacob Lofland) travel to a remote island on the Mississippi, they encounter a fugitive running from bounty hunters. Known only as Mud (Matthew McConaughey), he asks for the assistance of Ellis and Neckbone in order to meet with the love of his life, Juniper (Reese Witherspoon), and run away together. The film’s story is slow-moving, but one can’t help but feel like each piece is necessary, and even if it isn’t, it’s definitely entertaining to watch. Nichols knows how to portray family strife and people suffering from an internal dilemma so well, that it all comes off as rather effortless, especially when you have a cast that is more than able to present the emotions necessary. And when the story begins to feel like a fairy tale, it doesn’t wind up feeling as jarring and contrived as one would expect. Instead, it threatens the fairy tale structure in order to thrill, surprise, and intrigue the viewer while still providing the obligatory happy ending.

The Way, Way Back Paints a Light-Hearted Portrait of a Broken Home

The Way, Way Back Poster

Title: The Way, Way Back
Genre(s): Comedy, Drama
Director(s): Nat Faxon, Jim Rash
Release Year: 2013

Alexander Payne’s The Descendants was an enjoyable look at a man trying to raise a family while his wife is in a coma. That should have been a rather depressing affair, but Nat Faxon and Jim Rash helped Payne write a script that wasn’t too morose for audiences to get behind, winning them an Oscar for best adapted screenplay. Now Faxon and Rash have also moved into the director’s chair, without the aid of Payne, for The Way, Way Back. The comparisons to The Descendants will be hard to avoid, and subsequently, the comparisons to an Alexander Payne script is also inevitable because this film feels way too light-hearted to garner any accolades, but still manages to retain some of the dramatic weight which makes the film worth seeing. It quickly becomes clear that The Way, Way Back doesn’t have the gall to go anywhere too emotional, but instead keeps its distance so the entire family can enjoy the charismatic cast and charming dialogue.

You’re going to get vibes of Little Miss Sunshine throughout the movie as Duncan (Liam James) channels his inner-introvert, and subsequently his inner-Paul Dano, to become an uncomfortable presence on screen, but justifiably so. His mother, Pam (Toni Collette), has recently separated from his father and is now dating Trent (Steve Carell in a douche-performance that thankfully never reaches the scumbag levels of The Incredible Burt Wonderstone). Together, Duncan, Pam, Trent and Trent’s daughter, Steph (Zoe Levin), go on vacation to Trent’s summer home in a small town by the beach. It is there where Duncan comes out of his shell with the help of Water Wizz Park’s staff, including Owen (Sam Rockwell), the manager of Duncan’s home-away-from-home. Once again, Faxon and Rash have taken us to a summer locale and given our main character a change in lifestyle to deal with. The difference here is that humor trumps drama in this first-time directorial effort, with nothing exactly ‘fresh’ happening except the idea of a water park being somebody’s secret love affair.

The Great Gatsby Beats On Against Luhrmann’s Bombastic Current

The Great Gatsby Poster

Title: The Great Gatsby
Genre(s): Drama, Romance
Director(s): Baz Luhrmann
Release Year: 2013

Say what you will about Baz Luhrmann, he has a distinct style – one that may very well be a bit too much for many to take in. Regardless, it’s this eye for flair and the over-dramatic which makes Luhrmann a perfect choice to tackle another adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby (a book with which I have been enamored since first reading it). Perhaps what the previous adaptations were always missing was this hyper-stylized world that perfectly embodies the lavish lifestyle of Jay Gatsby (played exceptionally well by Leonardo DiCaprio). Though sometimes distracting, both aurally and visually, The Great Gatsby is in many ways the most faithful adaptation of Fitzgerald’s classic tale of the American dream, but also almost too literal for every theme to land.

Who Gatsby is, and what makes his story so extraordinary is one of the reasons Luhrmann is such a perfect choice to adapt this novel. His stylistic flourishes, and eye for the melodramatic is what makes his adaptation work so well. Through the perspective of Nick Carraway, our faithful narrator (though we learn early on he, like any decent writer, is a degenerate alcoholic), we learn all about the story of Jay Gatsby, and why he lives the way he does. Daisy Buchanan (Carey Mulligan), the “beautiful little fool” that is married to Tom Buchanan (Joel Edgerton), is the focus of Gatsby’s attentions but I can’t help but feel that the film lacks in hitting the emotional resonance which Gatsby’s motivations are supposed to conjure.  The unfortunate thing about The Great Gatsby is that Luhrmann and Chris Pearce wrote a very literal adaptation that sometimes misses the mark on delivering the emotional goods. Is this a problem with remaining too close to the source material, or is it that the often times pretentious visuals and soundtrack take away from the impact of scenes? In my opinion, it’s the former, because the latter half of this film feels like a calmer version of the crazy parties that litter the first half, proving that the visuals are not always the problem.

43 Reasons to Avoid Movie 43

Movie 43 Theatrical Poster

Title: Movie 43
Genre(s): Comedy
Director(s): Bob Odenkirk, Elizabeth Banks, Steven Brill, Steve Carr, Rusty Cundieff, James Duffy, Griffin Dunne, Peter Farrelly, Patrik Forsberg, Will Graham, James Gunn, Brett Ratner, Jonathan van Tulleken
Release Year: 2013

Oh January…a time of year noted for the often sudden realization of how empty one’s wallet truly is, and for when film studios release films they have little to no faith in. While we’re coming quite close to this year’s midway point, it’s safe to say one film from said month has stood out for its devilishly putrid qualities. Few films in recent memory have elicited such a foul response from both the public and critics alike, but be alarmed; Movie 43 is worthy of such ferocious, disheartening claims. To further illustrate this, here are 43 reasons as to why this star-studded dud is…well, such a stinky, foul and gag-inducing dud.

(NOTE: All observations are based on the UK cut. There will be spoilers to better understand this film’s incompetency.)

1. What does Movie 43 mean? Don’t ask Peter Farrelly! He was probably too drunk!

2. A scrotum does not constitute a joke.

3. A scrotum dangling from one’s neck, being dipped in soup and on a baby’s head to another’s displeasure, is also not a joke.

4. 6 minutes is entirely too long for a sight gag with no punchline, especially one involving neck testicles (Nesticles?)

5. The overarching storyline which “connects” these vignettes is painfully unfunny and worse than anything else in the film.

6. Someone being forced to wrongfully exclaim their love for “sucking dicks” does not constitute a joke. Contrary to a popular belief, it does not get funnier the 10th time around either.

7. Anna Faris expressing her desire to be defecated on is not a joke. It’s sadly quite probable.

8. Poop jokes and gags featuring uncontrollable gas and bowels are so late 90s.

9. In its first 3 sketches, Movie 43 repeatedly confuses poop and testicles for comedy more than any other film this year.

10. There are more than 3 sketches. About 4 times as many.

11. Veronica, perhaps the film’s least obnoxious sketch, doesn’t amount to anything. It features an impressive total of one chuckle-worthy line.

12. “You know who’d be perfect in a Batman sketch? Why, Jason Sudeikis!”

13. Uma Thurman in a theatrical release that ISN’T directed by Tarantino = Warning Sign #1

14. Katrina Bowden in a theatrical release that ISN’T Tucker & Dale vs. Evil = Warning Sign #2

To The Wonder Is a Beautiful Allegory to Love, But a Snoozefest Overall

To The Wonder Poster

Title: To The Wonder
Genre(s): Drama, Romance
Director(s): Terrence Malick
Release Year: 2013

With 2011′s The Tree of Life, I was completely confused by the positive reception it had received. It felt like a Terrence Malick film, designed only for Terrence Malick to enjoy. With To The Wonder, nothing has changed, except that Malick has eradicated any interesting ideas from his previous film and boiled it down to one over-arching theme: love. How does that love manifest itself? Where can we find it? Is it guaranteed that we will find it? Unfortunately for To The Wonder, it is too broad of a topic and most of the characters are not developed enough to truly appreciate their situations. Because of this lack of development, the film ultimately becomes a series of beautifully shot scenes, that are just as enigmatic and ambiguous as love itself.

Following a handful of different characters, To The Wonder utilizes each one to portray some aspect of love. Olga Kurylenko plays Marina, a woman in France who has fallen in love with Neil (Ben Affleck) and decided to follow him back to Oklahoma to try and start a life there with her daughter. Neil is reclusive in manner, talking very little and tries to avoid being too emotional. In fact, very rarely do you actually see Neil’s face, where most often the camera will only make its way up to his mouth, but more often focusing on  his back. So even if Affleck was acting, Malick wasn’t having it. However, though Marina feels like the main character, Neil is the one who we follow more often, even though he primarily just drifts in and out of scenes. There’s also a priest (played by Javier Bardem) who is having problems instilling faith in his patrons because of his own lack of love for what he’s doing. He has so many questions for God, and he sees so much turmoil going on around him that he can’t seem to be hopeful.