This is, officially, the 1,000th post in the history of this blog. It isn’t, actually – I’m pretty that doesn’t count since-deleted posts, most of them quite minor – but let this take the official title.
The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021) – ****
It’s fitting I kicked off 2022 at the movies with Joel Coen’s adaptation of Shakespeare, not just because it’s a fine film, but because the year began with a snowstorm and temperatures in the teens, bringing to mind the porter’s great line “This place is too cold for Hell.” It’s also a play with which I have a personal connection, having been part of the crew for a college production which allowed me to drink in the dialogue at length, and gave rise to one of the most memorable moments I’ve had in my theatrical life.
See, for the scene where Macduff’s family is murdered, we took a baby doll and put a thin piece of wood in its neck, so that one of the murderers could “snap” it to grisly effect. During a performance for the local high schools, the actor playing the murder did so—and the whole teenage audience gasped, before bursting into laughter, hopefully at the extravagant hideousness. The actor milked the moment by letting the doll drop contemptuously into a basket. I do love the theater so.
My father also taught Shakespeare at the college level for decades, and I was taken to many productions of his plays growing up, giving me a special affinity for them—though my father has long expressed some reservations about Macbeth itself, namely on the grounds that the text we have might be only an edited version of Shakespeare’s original. (He does, however, hold the Ian McKellen-Judi Dench production in very high regard.) In any case, it’s one of my own favorites.
This version embraces stylization, with handsomely spare settings shot in dreamy monochrome by Bruno Delbonnel (the influence of German Expressionism is obvious), low-key special effects to enhance scenes like the appearances of the witches, or Lady Macbeth burning her husband’s letter and watching it flutter among the stars, a stark score by Carter Burwell, and a brisk presentation of the text, trimmed from the comparatively compact original, and delivered with vigorous purpose.
The performances are uniformly excellent, with Denzel Washington showing how perfectly he can play both kingly command and tragic confusion, speaking the lines with increasing confidence as Macbeth’s ambitions destroy him, culminating in a very fine “I will not yield.” Frances McDormand is a comparably strong Lady, viciously committed to putting her husband on the throne but crushed by the weight of their bloody deeds (although her sleepwalking scene suggests she might yet have her wits about her). Hunter is a wonderfully grotesque witch(es), her guttural growl of a voice and spindly physicality being a queasy delight, especially when she utters the incomparably grotesque line “Finger of birth-strangled babe/Ditch-delivered by a drab.” She also plays the old man whose apocalyptic speech ends with “Tis said they eat each other,” allowing us more time to appreciate her.
There’s fine support from Alex Hassell as Ross, whose role is developed and expanded here to make him a much more complex figure, as manipulative as the Macbeths but not seeking the spotlight, from Corey Hawkins as a sternly righteous Macduff (Moses Ingram is quite solid as his Lady), from Brendan Gleeson as a quietly noble Duncan and Harry Melling as a suspiciously wide-eyed Malcolm, from Bertie Carvel as Banquo and Stephen Root as the quirky porter.
If there’s a quibble I have with the film, it’s that a few scenes are too rushed, even allowing for the briskly-paced approach. The killing of Macduff’s family, the appearance of Banquo’s ghost, the porter’s speech, the death of Macbeth…none are badly handled, but they should’ve been among the film’s highlights, and fail to make the maximum impact. Perhaps I’m basing this more on my own devotion to the material, but what more can a critic bring to the table than their own experience?
There’s still a great deal to appreciate here. The fight between Macbeth and Siward, where he manages to disarm the younger man without a weapon of his own, because, after all, no man of woman born can kill him. The moment between Macbeth and Duncan before the latter’s murder, adding to the ambiguity of Macbeth’s guilt. Ralph Ineson as the Captain, delivering his message to Duncan before swooning from his injuries. The dagger speech, delivered by Washington as he strides purposefully towards a door with a dagger-shaped handle. The use of fog to enshroud the characters and settings. And so forth.
Where The Tragedy of Macbeth will fall in the canon of Shakespearean cinema I cannot say; I cannot even say where it will fall amongst the adaptations of Macbeth itself, having not yet seen any others (not even the Michael Fassbender-Marion Cotillard version, mainly because it was given only a limited release). But by virtue of how well it conveys the language and how well it renders the material as a film in its own terms, it should hold up pretty well.
Score: 89
Khartoum (1966) – ***½
In 1966, Khartoum met with a limited and rather odd reception from the awards groups. The BAFTAs nominated Ralph Richardson for British Actor and the art direction, while the Academy nominated it for Story and Screenplay. Not the cinematography, sets, costumes, music, or sound, as one might expect for a lavish historical epic, only the writing, generally regarded as secondary to such films. True, 1966 was hardly a great year for original scripts – all five Best Picture nominees were adapted – and Khartoum found itself in mixed company: the trendy, ambiguous Blow-Up, the trendy, romantic A Man and a Woman (which won), the acerbic Billy Wilder outing The Fortune Cookie, and the survival drama The Naked Prey, especially odd since it’s a mediocre film with little dialogue. But did Khartoum just benefit from a weak field, or did the writers see something truly worth nominating in Robert Ardrey’s script?
In the Sudan in 1883, Mohammed Ahmed (Laurence Olivier) declares himself the Mahdi, the “Expected One” who will rule the world in the name of Islam. Leading a growing army, he destroys an Egyptian force led by British Col. William Hicks (Edward Underdown), sparking a public outcry. British Prime Minister William Gladstone (Ralph Richardson) wants to cut Britain’s losses but is persuaded to approach Maj.-Gen. Charles Gordon (Charlton Heston), a popular hero who previously brought peace to the Sudan, ending the slave trade there. Gladstone is hesitant, but meets with Gordon, who correctly guesses that he’s being sent as a gesture, and only to evacuate the Europeans and Egyptians of Khartoum.
Nonetheless, he agrees to go, is made Governor-General of the Sudan, and tries to secure the help of Zobeir (Zia Mohyeddin), a former slaver whose son Gordon executed, but is coldly refused. Urged to return, and despite the warnings of his aide, Col. Stewart (Richard Johnson), who works as much for Gladstone as for Gordon, Gordon goes to Khartoum and is greeted as a hero. Determined to force the government to send him reinforcements, Gordon digs his heels, even meeting directly with the Mahdi in the hopes of resolving matters peacefully. Despite their personal respect for one another, each is firmly dedicated to his ideals, and much bloodshed must follow. Before the end, Gordon has accepted his impending death, knowing that he will be regarded as a hero for standing firm – something the Mahdi understands all too well.
Khartoum dramatizes and simplifies matters, softening Gordon’s eagerness to be martyred and his volatile personality, making the Mahdi a bit more ruthless than he actually was, and having them meet face-to-face, when in reality they only corresponded through couriers. (Reputedly, on reading the script, the Mahdi’s grandson pointed this out, but noted that they should have met.) But it stays decently close to the facts, tragic though they are, the only consolation at the end being a reminder that “a world with no room for the Gordons is a world that will return to the sands.”
For “the Gordons,” I suppose, one may read “idealists” or “persons of conscience.” Of course, Gordon took a huge gamble and lost, but was it worth the effort? To him, perhaps, but he’s openly unafraid of death, hoping his willingness to die will make his opponents less eager to kill him. Those around him are more pragmatic, including Gladstone, who openly rejects “a British obligation to police the world” – words which echo all the way down to the War on Terror. For that matter, the film was only a year or two too early to really reflect what was happening in Vietnam, but the parallels are definitely there. (The British and Egyptians did eventually overthrow the Mahdists, but cui bono?)
The film touches on the questions of how to balance expediency and principle and how public opinion influences government policy – for better or worse. It’s a frequently cynical film; there’s no doubt that Gladstone and his ministers are using Gordon as much as he tries to use them. After their meeting, Gladstone quips “God go with you – and I don’t envy God,” both a dig at Gordon’s religious convictions and the futility of his mission. The film can’t help but acknowledge that Gordon and the Mahdi are both wholly sincere, the Mahdi outright asking the difference between their respective senses of purpose. Here, the Mahdi is more willing to shed innocent blood than Gordon, but given who Gordon works for, any savvy viewer will know he has little room to speak.
The film doesn’t delve into these themes deeply enough to become truly great, but there’s food for thought in between the scenes of Cinerama spectacle, which are reasonably well-staged (Yakima Canutt was the second-unit director) and handsome to look at, with lush cinematography and strong production values; it’s especially baffling The Oscar got nominated for its sets and costumes instead. I’m quite fond of Frank Cordell’s score, which in true roadshow fashion has an overture, entr’acte, and exit music to shine undiluted. But Basil Dearden’s direction lets the film down; more experienced with contemporary character pieces, Dearden does well enough in the conversational scenes but shows little affinity for spectacle.
The cast all do solid work; Heston was always well-cast as an exemplar of righteous convictions, but he’s able to show the weight on Gordon’s shoulders just as effectively, Olivier, though somewhat miscast (he’s definitely drawing on his performance as Othello), provides an undeniably imposing and fascinating presence, and Richardson is a fun, crotchety Gladstone, despite too little screen-time; indeed, there are hints that the film was trimmed down to its relatively brisk 136-minute running time, though who can say if it was the characters or spectacle that suffered. But at least they saved the great line, delivered by Gordon to his theologically inquisitive servant Khaleel (Johnny Sekka), “I must inform you…as delicately as possible, that I am not Jesus Christ.” That line has stuck with me far longer than any of the expensive, explosive battles.
Score: 81
Passing (2021) – ****
It’s oddly fitting that I follow a film which put a white man in blackface with a film that deals with the subject of passing for white. It was filmed in black-and-white, and from the start you realize it needed to be; as it is, there’s been debate on social media as to whether Tessa Thompson or Ruth Negga could “pass” in real life, and it’s the stylized shades of monochrome cinematography which preserve the vital ambiguity of just obvious the main characters’ blackness is. That Thompson and Negga are both biracial only enhances it – and on a meta level, so does the fact that writer-director Rebecca Hall is herself biracial, but where Thompson and Negga have historically played black characters, Hall has played white ones. It’s no great surprise that was she drawn to Nella Larsen’s novel, or displays such an affinity for it as a filmmaker.
In 1920s New York, Irene Redfield (Thompson) encounters Clare Bellew (Negga), a childhood friend who has been passing for white her entire adult life. After meeting Clare’s openly racist husband John (Alexander Skarsgård), Irene does not respond to Clare’s letters, but when Clare finally calls on Irene at her Harlem home, revealing her sense of relief at not having to pass for once, they rekindle their friendship. But as the vivacious Clare makes an impression on Irene’s friends and her husband, Brian (André Holland), it stokes Irene’s own insecurities about her identity and her marriage, and with the looming threat of John learning Clare’s secret, matters build to a tragic climax.
I wrote “events,” but changed it to “matters,” because so much of the drama in Passing takes place in Irene’s psyche, such as her mounting anxiety that Brian is conducting or desires an affair with Clare, and in small details that only become clear on reflection or further research. In the opening scenes, for example, it’s not immediately clear that Irene, while shopping for gifts for her children, while taking a taxi, while taking tea in a fancy hotel, is passing for white. It’s in these scenes that the film proves the necessity of its being shot in black-and-white; while any viewer familiar with Thompson as a performer would know she’s a woman of color, with the monochromatic imagery, lit to evoke an especially sultry summer day, her skin looks very light indeed.
This awareness allows one to appreciate the full depth of Thompson’s performance. We realize just how much is going through her mind, what she fears might happen, what assumptions those around her are making. They assume she must be white, because if she wasn’t, what’s she doing in stores where white people shop and restaurants where white people dine? Likewise, no one guesses that Clare is passing who doesn’t already know, not even John, who gives her a racist nickname because her skin has darkened since they married, but never suspects she might be anything but Caucasian.
But Thompson is excellent all the way through, showing the gradual deterioration of Irene’s frame of mind, subtly showing the pain she feels at her son’s disrespect, at Brian’s insistence on discussing the truth about racism in America, at all the things in her life that she wants to control, including the people around her, slipping quite out of her control. And Negga is just as good as Clare, showing the vivacity which makes her so magnetic, revealing without slipping just how unhappy she is with her supposedly happy life, and how little compunction she feels about putting herself first, past, present, and future. (It’s definitely hinted that Irene’s fears about Clare and Brian are a projection of her own suppressed attraction to Irene.)
Holland is also very strong, adding dimensions to Brian beyond the unsupportive-husband archetype; not only are we aware of how Irene’s behavior has put strain on the marriage, but of the strain that being a black man – and especially a father – in America places on him. On the other hand, if Skarsgård isn’t the weak link in the cast, he doesn’t overcome the weakness of John as a character; he’s so bluntly racist it verges on the comical, especially in the generally understated atmosphere the film creates, and in the climactic scenes, what should be a harrowing display of anger falls a bit flat. That Skarsgård seems to be wearing the same beard he wears in the upcoming The Northman (which looks a bit out-of-place in the 20s setting) doesn’t help.
There are other lapses in Hall’s script; having not read Larsen’s novel I can’t say if the source or the adaptation is to blame, but there were points where it wasn’t clear how much time had passed, or just how much the relationships between the characters had developed in the interim. These are fairly minor quibbles in a film that’s really quite well crafted – Eduard Grau’s carefully managed cinematography and Devonte Hynes’ score, which makes extensive use of a piano theme which seems bright and cheerful but hints at discordance underneath, are especially noteworthy – but they do weaken it, as do the last two minutes or so, which merely soften the impact of an effectively ambiguous climax.
Indeed, I originally had Passing as a very high ***½, but after further reflection and weighing the strengths – especially the acting, and especially the work of Thompson and Negga – I realized that it is, after all, a low-level **** film in a year already crammed full of them. Some years are just good to us. And so are some films.
Score: 87
Caterpillar/Kyatapirā/キャタピラー (2010) – ***
CW: sexual assault, domestic violence.
Last week, I saw Wife of a Spy, which dealt with a woman whose husband, appalled by the actions of the Japanese government in Manchuria, planned to expose them, even at the cost of war. Initially horrified by his choice, she comes to embrace it, and is willing to face mortal danger alongside him. Here, we have a woman whose husband is all too happy to go to war, and who comes back maimed – without his arms, legs, voice, or hearing – and she is initially horrified by him, but comes to embrace him, both literally (his sex drive is very much intact) and figuratively, if not emotionally, then as part of her duty to the Emperor, since he is now viewed by their neighbors as a “War God.”
There are several layers of irony at play, not least of which is that the husband, Kyuzo Kurokawa (Keigo Kasuya) was an abusive bastard before the war, and enthusiastically assaulted Chinese women in the course of it – indeed, it’s fairly clear by the end that his injuries were incurred in the course of one such assault. He’s sent home with medals and a framed newspaper article about his glorious sacrifice, and his wife Shigeko (Shinobu Terajima) carts him around so the townsfolk can admire him, but even aside from his being personally unworthy of acclaim, what is there to glorify in such a fate?
Obviously, Dalton Trumbo’s Johnny Got His Gun comes to mind, but aside from Trumbo’s hero being sympathetic, the source material for Caterpillar actually predates Trumbo’s novel by a decade; it’s based on Edogawa Ranpo’s short story “The Caterpillar,” written in 1929, and having not read it, I can’t say what war, if any specific war, it deals with. But director Kōji Wakamatsu unequivocally uses the material to tackle the Second Sino-Japanese War and World War II, using stock footage of real devastation to underline the horrors which resulted from that mindset which swept Kurokawa off the war, and moves his neighbors to deify him on his mutilated return.
But the real protagonist of the film is Shigeko, who must deal with a vast array of emotions and pressures, being expected to care for her husband with perfect selflessness, even as he constantly begs her for sex (the mechanics of which are not left to the imagination) and demands more than his share of their food. At times, she revels in the attention his deification brings them, shows pride in his glorification, and consoles him in difficult moments. At others, she is weary of his sexual appetite, frustrated by his stubborn attitude and the challenge of communicating with him, and embittered by his past abuse.
Terajima gives a rather good performance, not leaning too far in any one direction, but showing the exhaustion created by her situation. And Kasuya gives quite an impressive physical performance, especially considering that, as far as I can find out, his physical status was created entirely with special effects. With little dialogue (he only speaks in flashbacks; in the present-day scenes he can only grunt and moan), and being able only to move his head, he suggests a vicious, greedy man who, eventually, cannot defend himself against an awareness of his own cruelty and what it cost him.
As worthy as that and the other themes at play are, the script (by Hisako Kurosawa and Masao Adachi) doesn’t develop them smoothly. Despite running a fairly brisk 84 minutes, the film, especially in the middle, grows fairly repetitive, and large chunks of time pass – the film seems to begin around 1940, and ends with the end of the war – without a cohesive sense of how the Kurokawas change and adapt, or fail to. It’s not entirely clear what spurs the realizations which horrify Kyuzo towards the end, or drive him towards his final act in the film.
And aside from the impressive makeup and prosthetics on Kasuya, the film’s low budget (around $125,000) works against it; the digital cinematography is flatly lit, and the print I watched looks like a mid-90s videotape, with hard-to-read subtitles to match. Wakamatsu’s direction is adequate, but aside from the flashback scenes, the staging and camerawork is nothing special. He does do well with the ensemble cast, especially the potentially problematic character of mentally-handicapped villager Kuma (Katsuyuki Shinohara), whose guilelessness provides a satisfying counterpoint to the absurd attitudes of those around him.
Absurd is really the word for Caterpillar, not in a detrimental sense, but in the sense that it shows how tragically ridiculous the notion of military glory is, how hideous behaviors are excused or even encouraged in warfare, and how veterans are put on a pedestal which at once denies them their humanity and imparts all the wrong lessons from their example. It’s a flawed and deeply unpleasant film, but an intriguing one throughout.
Score: 72
Don’t Look Up (2021) – ***
Spoilers.
Late in Don’t Look Up, Dr. Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio), his student Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence), and her boyfriend Yule (Timothée Chalamet) are driving to buy groceries for a dinner with Mindy’s family which might prove the Last Supper of humanity. “Till Then” by The Mills Brothers comes on the radio, with these lyrics emphasized: “Although there are oceans we must cross/and mountains that we must climb/I know every gain must have a loss/so pray that our loss is nothing but time.” But rather than let the lyrics speak for themselves, Mindy recites them, and rather than tell him to shut up so she can hear them, Dibiasky silently listens and smiles.
That sums up the film for me, despite not being satirical or farcical, because it explains what could’ve spoken for itself, taking a potentially moving moment and diminishing it by…well, what is it trying to do? Show that Mindy is nattering pointlessly, but since the end is nigh, Dibiasky doesn’t want to sour the mood with a confrontation? Or does she appreciate his chatter? I didn’t.
To be sure, I appreciated the film more than I expected. Honestly, between the trailer and the reviews, I expected to hate it; yes, it was earning awards attention – a NBR Top 10 mention, four Globe nods, six Critics’ Choice – but plenty of films I’ve disliked managed as much. Then, a meme cropped up which said:
“Don’t Look Up” portrays the media as complicit, incompetent, and not fit for purpose.
The media gives “Don’t Look Up” bad reviews.
Got it?
I really hope someone was paid to come up with that, because it’s multiply ridiculous. The media isn’t the main target of its satire; the government and military-industrial complex are. The satire of the media in the actual film is really pretty mild. The reviews come from a wide array of sources, not a monolithic “media.” And films more pointedly critical of the media, like Richard Jewell, have earned generally favorable reviews.
Or I could just ask which is more likely: that the mixed-to-negative reviews are because it cuts too close to the bone, or because it’s not very good? Even among my acquaintances, it’s provoked a wide array of responses, from active dislike, to praise, to in between. But how many of those who give the film high marks, critics and casual viewers alike, cite its inherent qualities, as opposed to its timeliness? I’m entirely sympathetic to its frustrations – but that doesn’t make it a good movie.
Is the problem the central allegory? Well, extinction via comet-strike, compared to extinction via climate change, is like death by decapitation compared to death by cancer. Is the problem the character of President Orlean (Meryl Streep, not at her best), a strange simul-skewering of Hillary Trump, but too much a clown to be scarily amoral and too mild to be offensively outrageous? Is the problem that Dr. Teddy Oglethorpe (Rob Morgan), the level-headed director of the Planetary Defense Coordination Office, entrusts Mindy with explaining the situation to Orlean, despite his obvious crippling anxiety and reliance on arcane data – such that Orlean and her arrogant son (Jonah Hill) can’t take him seriously – or that Mindy will later become a moderate celebrity and gain some hollow cachet?
Is it that Dibiasky, ostensibly one of the heroes, tends only to make things worse by giving her righteous anger free rein, or that McKay can’t seem to decide if screaming at people is futile or the only chance one has at being heard? Is it Mindy’s fling with a vacuous morning-show host (Cate Blanchett), which jeopardizes his marriage to June (Melanie Lynskey), or the fact that, come the aforementioned dinner, June quite readily forgives him, having no other arc? Is it that Mindy, based on the whole scope of the film, is its hero, despite being cowardly and ultimately ineffectual?
Is it Mark Rylance’s dreadful performance as tech billionaire Peter Isherwell, which buries a few good dry-comic moments under an annoying voice, false teeth, and other affectations, or the fact that performances like Morgan’s (he steals his scenes through pure understatement), Ron Perlman’s as a demented war hero given to incredibly un-PC quips, and Chalamet’s as a cheerful slacker with a sweetly genuine sense of faith, are undermined by the overlength, muddled structure, and surfeit of subplots?
Is it the glut of dubiously relevant stock footage? The hypocrisy in chastising society’s over-investment in celebrity gossip while packing the cast with stars, like having Ariana Grande play a pop star whose personal dramas captivate the world, who treats Mindy like shit, and who joins his cause late in the film, providing a pop song (“Just Look Up”) which might earn Grande an Oscar nomination? The depiction of human stubbornness and the refusal to face facts, but the failure to question how these faults proliferate?
Is it that Mindy and Dibiasky ask why people aren’t “terrified,” as if that would do any good? Is that McKay doesn’t seem to make up his mind whether the problem is poor communication or a failure to listen? Is it that he portrays the comet-denial faction as one-dimensional parodies of the MAGA faction, failing to interrogate how it came to be, or what draws a person to it? Is it that the film has so few really likable or even multi-dimensional characters that it’s not clear if it thinks humanity is actually worth saving, even if it could be?
Is it the attempt at an affecting climax, when I contend that a truly daring satire would’ve seen the Earth saved by Isherwell’s ridiculous plan to break up the comet and mine it for minerals, leaving us with the horrifying notion that the best thing happened for the worst reason? Or is that so much of what happens in the film happens because the characters behave as the plot demands, rather than as human beings?
Am I missing the point by focusing on the film as a film, rather than on the message? I contend that, as McKay chose the medium of a dramatic film to convey it, the shortcomings of the film – and there are many – undermine that message. I’m on board with it, of course, but First Reformed and my beloved Melancholia tackle the themes of looming apocalypse, callous denial, despair and desperation, and the solace of human connection far, far more effectively.
It’s not a bad film. The score is excellent, DiCaprio is okay, Lawrence is solid, and there are genuinely funny moments throughout. But for all its self-importance and shouting, it says so little that’s new or insightful, that I doubt it’ll move the needle for any climate-change skeptics. And even if it does, that doesn’t make it a better film.
Score: 69
And with that, I’ve seen all ten of the NBR Top 10 films for the year. Here’s how I rank them:
- Licorice Pizza (5th overall)
- Dune: Part One (6th)
- The Tragedy of Macbeth (7th)
- The Last Duel (9th)
- Red Rocket (14th)
- West Side Story (15th)
- King Richard (28th)
- Belfast (31st)
- Nightmare Alley (44th)
- Don’t Look Up (47th)
That’s six **** films, two mid-high ***½ films, one mid-high ***, and one mid-low ***. Not too bad, although I’m afraid that two of the better films on here – Last Duel and Red Rocket – are the least likely to get significant Oscar attention. But we shall see.
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