Cleveland

My Friend Dahmer

Link posted on by moviebloke

(USA 2017)

“You don’t have to suffer to be a poet,” said writer John Ciardi. “Adolescence is enough suffering for anyone.” Even the most notorious evildoer was once just a kid, and infamous cannibal serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer is no exception. My Friend Dahmer portrays him as a gawky teenage reject struggling to find a place where he fits.

Bath, Ohio, in the mid-1970s: young Jeff (Ross Lynch) is a high school freshman who lives with his parents, chemist Lionel (Dallas Roberts) and Joyce (Anne Heche), and his little brother, Dave (Liam Koeth). It’s a normal middle class nuclear existence, except for his mother’s mental illness, his parents’ bickering, and his odd pastime of collecting roadkill and dissolving the carcasses in a vat of acid his father gave him. There’s also his obsession with a rather bearish jogger (Vincent Kartheiser) Jeff frequently sees running past his house.

Jeff’s not making it at school, where his classmates look past him, probably because he’s so fucking weird. Out of apparent fearful concern for his loner son, Lionel demands that Jeff make some friends after he discovers a collection of bones stashed away in Jeff’s hideout in the woods.

Jeff fakes an epileptic seizure in the cafeteria at school and attracts the attention of Derf Backderf (Alex Wolff) and his friends, Neil (Tommy Nelson) and Mike (Harrison Holzer), who get a kick out of him and his antics. They start hanging out with Jeff and form “The Jeffrey Dahmer Fan Club,” a front for pulling pranks because they can get Jeff to do anything — even finagling a meeting with Vice President Walter Mondale (Tom Luce) on a class trip to Washington, D.C.

Jeff seems to be connecting to others for the first time, but his disintegrating home life throws off his progress.

Adapted from Cleveland artist Derf Backderf’s graphic novel, screenwriter and director Marc Meyers eschews gore and focuses on psychology, examining what may have happened to send Dahmer where he ended up. His approach is surprisingly empathetic and understanding without making excuses. Backderf offers unique insight that Meyers uses wisely. The acting, particularly that of Lynch and Wolff, lends a sensitivity that initially might seem unwarranted if not unworthy of the subject. The story here is sad, really: no gore, no murders, just a weird kid whose home life is falling apart.

My Friend Dahmer is a mix of teen comedy and tragedy that ends immediately before his first murder. It’s much better than I anticipated.

With Adam Kroloff, Brady M.K. Dunn, Michael Ryan Boehm, Cameron McKendry, Jake Ingrassia, Ben Zgorecki, Kris Smith, Jack DeVillers, Gabriela Novogratz, Miles Robbins, Joey Vee, Susan Bennett, Maryanne Nagel, Andrew Gorell, Katie Stottlemire, Carmen Gangale, Sydney Jane Meyer, Dave Sorboro, Denny Sanders

Production: Ibid Filmworks, Aperture Entertainment, Attic Light Films

Distribution: FilmRise, Altitude Film Entertainment

107 minutes
Rated R

(Gene Siskel Film Center) B

http://www.myfrienddahmerthemovie.com/#1

The Asphalt Jungle

Link posted on by moviebloke

(USA 1950)

I expected crime noir classic The Asphalt Jungle to be something of a cheesefest: stiffly acted, overly melodramatic, and maybe a bit hamfisted in its morality, like The Hardy Boys for adults of the Greatest Generation. Thankfully, John Huston’s film adaptation of W.R. Burnett’s 1949 novel is none of that.

No sooner is Doc Riedenschneider (Sam Jaffe) out of the big house when he hatches a plan to do what he does best: steal. Like, a million bucks or more in jewels from a jewelry store (not Jared’s). Yes, a jewel heist. He pitches his plan to Cobby (Marc Lawrence), a two-bit gambling bookie, who puts him in touch with Alonzo Emmerich (Louis Calhern), a rich but shady attorney. Emmerich buys in, not just providing financial backing but also agreeing to handle disposing the booty for cash.

Doc assembles a crew of petty thieves consisting of a “box man,” or a safecracker (Anthony Caruso), a driver (James Whitmore), and an all-important “hooligan” (Sterling Hayden) to execute the plan. The heist goes off without a hitch, mission accomplished. It’s smooth; uneventful, even. That is, until a stray bullet accidentally hits one of the crew members.

This is where the plot gets really interesting, as human nature and a slew of bad decisions rear their ugly heads. It doesn’t help that at the same time, sundry troubles that have been brewing alongside all the planning are coming to a boil. Soon, it’s every man for himself in a sticky web of deception, doublecrossing, and death.

The Asphalt Jungle is an exquisitely layered and calibrated drama that’s tough to turn away from — and tough not to appreciate. Written by Huston with Ben Maddow, the screenplay is tight. The characters — a collection of urban lowlife thieves, thugs, private detectives, crooked cops, and good looking dames — all have dimension. Interestingly, what would probably be the most intense scene in most movies — the break-in — isn’t; the intensity and the drama come from what happens after that. A manhunt that ends in Cleveland and an attempted swindle serve as the ticking clock here. This is the perfect thriller for a hot summer night in the city. Bonus: The Asphalt Jungle features a young but unmistakable Marilyn Monroe in one of her earliest roles.

In 2008, the United States Library of Congress deemed The Asphalt Jungle “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry (https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing/).

With Jean Hagen, John McIntire, Barry Kelley, Teresa Celli, William “Wee Willie” Davis, Dorothy Tree, Brad Dexter, Helene Stanley, John Maxwell, Strother Martin, Jack Warden, Tim Ryan

Production: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Distribution: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

112 minutes
Not rated

(Music Box) A-

Noir City

https://www.warnerbros.com/asphalt-jungle

They Live

Link posted on by moviebloke

(USA 1988)

“I’ve come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass…and I’m all out of bubblegum.”

“I’m giving you the choice: either put on these glasses or eat that trashcan.”

“Brother, life’s a bitch. And she’s back in heat.”

— Nada

Director John Carpenter has done a few good pictures that probably will have an audience long after he’s gone; They Live isn’t one of them. At least, not in a good way. B-movie cult fodder all the way, They Live is a somewhat delayed and really heavy-handed reaction to ’80s conspicuous consumption. Based on Ray Nelson’s 1963 short story “Eight O’Clock in the Morning” and subsequent comic strip, Carpenter’s screenplay, written under the pseudonym Frank Armitage, is founded on a decent premise; it just doesn’t go where it could have.

Nada (Roddy Piper), a migrant construction worker who’s seen better days, picks up a job in downtown Los Angeles. He notices some weirdness going on with a television station that seems to be connected to a church across the lot where he and other homeless people have set up camp. His coworker Frank (Keith David) doesn’t want to hear about it. No one does.

One morning, Nada comes into possession of a pair of sunglasses. When he puts them on, he sees subliminal messages everywhere. A billboard with the tagline “We’re creating the transparent computing environment” says “Obey” with the glasses on. A travel ad beckoning, “Come to the Caribbean” says “Marry and reproduce.” “Men’s apparel” says “No independent thought.” Signs all around him order one to consume, conform, buy, watch TV, submit, sleep, do not question authority:

They Live Obey.jpg

Even the dollar bill has a different message: “This is your god.”

What’s worse, some people are not what they appear to be. At all. They aren’t even human — they’re skeletal reptiles, a kind of mutant species of Sleestaks or something:

They Live.JPG

What the hell is going on? Who are these things? What do they want? As Nada tells Frank, they ain’t from Cleveland.

I remember seeing They Live at the theater when it was new. It was okay. Three decades later, it’s still okay. It’s a lot sillier this time around, though. The whole thing gets off to a good enough start, but the momentum peters out just before midpoint. Carpenter — or anyone, for that matter — can get only so much mileage out of this story. They Live feels like 40 minutes of material stretched into more than twice that amount of time.

The denouement is not just predictable but anticlimactic, and the perspective here is adolescent at best. The lines are cringeworthy, falling painfully short of the Arnold Schwarzenegger zingers they aim to be. The acting is pretty bad, especially David and Meg Foster, both of whom are as stiff and lifeless as a dead gerbil. Surprisingly, Piper and his mullet are the best thing about They Live; Piper isn’t enough to carry it, though. And that wrestling scene in the alley is inane — misplaced, unnecessary, and too long, it adds nothing except maybe ten minutes to the running time.

The worst thing about They Live is that it seems Carpenter was serious — nothing here reads as tongue in cheek to me.

With George “Buck” Flower, Peter Jason, Raymond St. Jacques, Jason Robards III, Lucille Meredith, Norman Alden, Norm Wilson, Thelma Lee, Rezza Shan

Production: Alive Films, Larry Franco Productions

Distribution: Universal Pictures

94 minutes
Rated R

(iTunes rental) D+

http://www.theofficialjohncarpenter.com/they-live/

My Blind Brother

Video posted on by moviebloke

(USA 2016)

Robbie (Adam Scott) and Bill (Nick Kroll) are brothers. Robbie is an overachieving athlete—attractive, admired, and blind. He’s also kind of a dick in private. Bill dutifully assists Robbie with his athletic endeavors, holding a string to guide him as he runs marathons and rowing in front of him with a blowhorn as he swims. Admittedly lazy, Bill fantasizes about being disabled and having everyone wait on him while he watches TV all day.

WARNING: Potential spoilers ahead!

One night while their parents are fawning over Robbie after a race, Bill goes out by himself for a drink at a local bar where unbeknownst to him a memorial is being held for a guy who was killed when a bus hit him. Bill meets Rose (Jenny Slate), who’s crying because she feels guilty about it—she dumped him right before it happened. They introduce themselves: she’s a “superficial narcissist” and he’s “lazy and judgmental.” They talk, and she tells him she wants to be a better person—maybe helping baby elephants in Africa or something. Rose ends up going home with Bill. In a very uncomfortable scene, she extricates herself from his room and takes off the next morning, roughly declining Bill’s request for her phone number.

Soon after, Robbie hooks up with a volunteer to help him with swimming, something Bill doesn’t want to do. Turns out, there’s a spark between Robbie and this volunteer—who Bill discovers is Rose.

Writer and director Sophie Goodhart does a capable job on both fronts, even if My Blind Brother takes a little while to get its stride and feels a bit like a TV show. The story moves steadily once it gets going, though the ending is predictable—including its reveal of how Robbie lost his sight. There are more than a few genuinely funny moments here. I love that all of the characters are detestable, or at least nothing to aspire to, for one reason or another—even Robbie, who from an outside perspective seems inspirational with his fundraising through athletics. It doesn’t take long to see that he’s lame, right down to the same flimsy joke about looking beautiful that he repeats to every woman (because he’s blind and can’t see, get it?). Slate does neurotic frazzled really well. Charlie Hewson as blind stoner GT and Zoe Kazan as Rose’s quick and loyal but cynical roommate Francie both add a breath of fresh air. Filmed in and around the West Side of Cleveland, Ohio—where I grew up—I immediately noticed exterior shots in Tremont, Lakewood, and I’m pretty sure Rocky River.

85 minutes
Rated R

(Facets) C+