The Substance: A Review (Review #1872)

 

THE SUBSTANCE

The body positivity movement has its challenges in The Substance, a wild exploration of the dark side of beauty standards. The Substance will divide viewers in terms of its visuals. I found it neither horrifying nor brilliant, more lukewarm of a film that will thrill some and appall others.

Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) has been a star for decades and is currently hosting an exercise program. She is still quite attractive, but she is also 50, so her show's producer Harvey (Dennis Quaid) cooly informs her that they need to go younger. That is bad enough, but while distracted when seeing her billboard sign taken down Elisabeth is in a car accident.

At the hospital, she is told that she is physically fine, but she is still emotionally weak. It is here that she receives a flash drive labeled The Substance with a telephone number on it. After some hesitation, Elisabeth calls and is given a sales pitch on a process that will make her younger and hotter.

The process itself is simple: she will inject herself with The Substance, which will create a younger version of herself. Elisabeth will be The Matrix, while her clone will be The Other Self. They are not two different people but are one. The Matrix will be in a state of suspension for seven days while the Other Self lives, then at the end of the seven days they switch places, no exceptions.

Elisabeth goes through the procedure and out of herself emerges Sue (Margaret Qualley). Sue becomes an instant hit with Harvey, promptly creating her own exercise program that is hipper and hotter (the various shots of Qualley's body more for arousal and physical fitness). At first the balance is maintained, but one night Sue cheats when on a one-night stand and extends her time by a day. That causes Elisabeth to age a bit. Soon, as Sue's successful career starts building up, she starts extending her own time at Elisabeth's expense. When Elisabeth does emerge, she delves further into depression as her own looks start collapsing. Things come to a head when Sue is selected to host a New Year's Eve special. With Elisabeth now conscious and a freakish looking woman, she is set to destroy the arrogant Sue. However, things go awry for both of them in horrifying ways, ending in a literal bloodbath and a new creation: Monstro Elisasue, who unleashes hell on a horrified world.

The Substance divided the audience at the screening that I went to. One man, who had been laughing for parts of the film, shouted out that it was awesome and started applauding. His female companion immediately snapped, "Don't clap, that was f***ing disgusting". Another pair, both men, were also split. One man was dead asleep for most of The Substance and the other merely remarked, "I'm glad that's over". I figure that this encapsulates how many will find The Substance. Some will find it all outrageous to hilarious. Others will find it as grotesque as Monstro Elisasue, if not more. 

For myself, I found The Substance surprisingly unoriginal in certain ways. The screenplay by director Coralie Fargeat drew elements from The Invisible Man, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde, The Elephant Man and even from the Love & Monsters episode of Doctor Who. For some time after finishing The Substance, I kept wondering what Monstro Elisasue reminded me of. Eventually it hit me: the Abzorbaloff from Love & Monsters. The final creature looks similar to John Merrick with a bit of the Doctor Who monster. Like with the Invisible Man, you have a chemical that changes your appearance and drives you bonkers. Like with Jekyll and Hyde, you have someone with different personalities who has others unaware it is the same person. Like with Dorian Gray, you have the eternally youthful, beautiful and sensual Sue living out her carefree to decadent lifestyle while the real Elisabeth is locked away, aging and becoming physically corrupt. Even the efforts to kill Sue (the painting) ends disastrously.

Granted, the last comparison is not exact since it is Dorian Gray's moral corruption that appears in his locked-away painting versus Elisabeth's mere physical grotesque decay. However, I think that The Substance covers a lot of familiar themes from past works that its blending of them sticks out. 

That does not make The Substance a terrible film by any stretch. I appreciated the logic in the film in how Elisabeth and Sue are One, at least until the very end when Elisabeth is fully conscious and sees Sue disparage Elisabeth on television. Over and over, the mysterious voice behind the seedy Substance office reminded both of them that there is no "she" when one talked about the other. They were not separate entities, but one person who was not obeying the clear rules. 

The Substance is very overt about its ideas on how we value the new, hot, young things at the expense of the old. Elisabeth's neighbor Oliver (Gore Abrams) pounds on Elisabeth's door when Sue is creating the chamber in which to hide Elisabeth's body. Once the door opens and he sees that it is the younger and attractive Sue, he immediately melts and becomes besotted. I am hard-pressed to think that Fargeat naming the Quaid character "Harvey" is a coincidence. Men treat Sue far better than they do Elisabeth save for Fred, a high school classmate of Elisabeth who is still quite taken by her. 

The comparison between Elisabeth and Sue is clear, if perhaps a bit heavy-handed, when both encounter Troy (Oscar Lessage). Troy was Sue's one-night stand for whom Sue broke the seven-days pattern. When an aged Elisabeth comes upon him on his bike, he rages at her to move out of the way. Here, I can see why Troy yelled at her, as she was blocking his path. However, I sense that The Substance wants to show us how Troy treats women based on looks.  

The performances of the three leads were strong. Demi Moore has good moments of quiet rage and regret early on. It is interesting that Moore's best moments are when she is not speaking. Whether it is being withdrawn when she cannot answer Fred's texts due to her distress at her aging appearance or the near meltdown when she keeps altering her looks when preparing for that date, Moore does well. She keeps an appropriately blank expression as Harvey, snide and unaware, tells her they are firing her on her fiftieth birthday. 

As a side note, Demi Moore is currently 61.

She is matched by Qualley as Sue. It is difficult to impossible not to note that Qualley is very beautiful and attractive. I hope though that her skill in showing the vanity, fear and ultimately terrifying and terrified nature of Sue's decisions is not lost. Qualley does an excellent job convincing us that Sue is initially Elisabeth only to attempt to be someone else. 

As a side note, Margaret Qualley is currently 29.

Dennis Quaid is devouring every moment in his deliberately over-the-top performance as Harvey. He is meant to be outrageous and cartoonishly exaggerated. As such, Quaid was pitch perfect in his role.

As a side note, Dennis Quaid is currently 70.

The Substance makes much use of focusing on Qualley's physical appearance whenever we see her on her Pump It Up exercise show. The various shots are not about exercise but eroticism, but that I think was the point. Sue's show was more overtly erotic than the more bland and standard Sparkle with Elisabeth exercise show. The overall look of both shows reveals the contrast between them: the more traditional Sparkle with Elisabeth versus the almost pornographic Pump It Up with Sue.  

The message on the destructive nature of beauty standards and the desire for eternal youth is clear. I can even congratulate the film for touching on how men too sometimes struggle with these issues (it was a man who introduced Elisabeth to the substance, and she meets the older version later on). At times though, I thought the message was overdone. "Pretty girls should always smile," Harvey tells Sue before her New Year's Special, oblivious to how she is physically falling apart. I figure this is a variation of the "smile more" line that women are told as a put-down. 

It is surprising to me that The Substance starts with a great montage of Elisabeth's rise and descent on her Hollywood Walk of Fame star but still was exceptionally long. I think The Substance is longer than it should be. 

As much as some, I imagine, loved the Monstro Elisasue section in all of its graphic glory, I thought it went on too long. I did not think it was monstrously graphic or shocking. I think it actually veered towards funny and intentionally over-the-top. That does not make me think that it could not have been cut down a bit, both in how it looked and how long it lasted.

The Substance will disgust some, thrill others. I think it is the Monstro Elisasue section that will be the deciding factor. While I was not horrified by it, I also was not impressed by it. I appreciated what it was doing and what it wanted to say, but I think people are exaggerated on their praise. Good, not great, be forewarned that The Substance is gory. Your level of tolerance for The Substance, like beauty itself, is in the eye of the beholder. 

DECISION: C+

The Prime Minister. A Review

THE PRIME MINISTER

In the Victorian era, the dominant political forces were Her Majesty's Prime Ministers, the rivals William Gladstone and Benjamin Disraeli. It says much about how history remembers them that while the latter has had at least three film and television biopics, the former hasn't even had one. The Prime Minister should be judged, in part, on when the film was made. With a correct central performance, The Prime Minister does not give us a great deal about the Earl of Beaconsfield but manages to do a respectable job.

Young foppish dandy Benjamin Disraeli (John Gielgud) is a young man in a hurry, at least on the artistic side. While he does have an interest in politics, he is unsure if he should devote his life to this line. He finds a champion in Mary Lewis Wyndham (Diana Wynyard), the widow of a Member of Parliament who finds Disraeli's writings thrilling. Pity that she did not know what Disraeli actually looked like until she inadvertently gave him a coach ride where she intended to formally meet him. Horrified by this unintended encounter, she flees and temporarily withholds her support.

The man of destiny, however, cannot and will not be denied. With the ascension of Queen Victoria, Disraeli now finally enters political life. He also enters marriage to Mary, with them having fallen in love with each other. Dizzy at first bombs his maiden Parliament speech and thinks he is destined as an also-ran. An unexpected mentor in his political frenemy Lord Peel (Nicholas Hannon) helps him overcome his initial stumbles. He then continues to face off against Gladstone (Stephen Murray) for the direction of government. Dizzy continues to rise in Conservative Party politics, with Mary forever on his side. He even has the tacit support of Queen Victoria (Fay Compton) who looks on Dizzy as a friend. Eventually, Disraeli triumphantly rises to Prime Minister, bringing peace through force in shrewd moves against the Germanic/Slavic union what would reduce Britain to slavery.

The Prime Minister was released in 1941, when the British Empire faced its greatest crisis. As such, there is something vaguely if not overtly propagandistic in the film. At one point, Disraeli insists that the Germans and Russians should be confronted rather than appeased. Appeasement to autocrats (in this case the Kaiser and the Czar) would be disastrous. One must not be afraid to use force for peace, Disraeli argues. It is not a stretch to see that Disraeli railing against appeasement to autocrats spoke more about the Second World War than it did about the Russo-Turkish War. When Disraeli is insisting that force is sometimes needed for peace, Gielgud is almost looking directly into the camera.

The message is clear: The Prime Minister is aimed at contemporary audiences who needed reminding of what Britian was and needed to be to fight on. As such, The Prime Minister loses a bit of its intended subject matter. We do not get much about what drove Dizzy to take on politics.

We do see a bit more of Disraeli the man. John Gielgud was more interested in stage acting than film acting early in his career, which makes The Prime Minister a bit of a surprise. He is a bit theatrical in the film, prone to great poses and grandiose movements. However, I imagine that this is how the real Benjamin Disraeli was, someone who thrived in being a bit over-the-top. Therefore, I do not think badly of Gielgud's performance.

The grand manner to the acting, however, does plague a lot of the performances. Pamela Standish is briefly on screen as Princess Victoria right before she is told that she is now Queen. I found her declarations of love for country rather overdone even for the occasion. I was surprised to find that The Prime Minister has Benjamin Disraeli being a silent witness to Victoria receiving the news that she is Queen. This is, I think, ahistorical, but I do not begrudge this detail. It does add the requisite drama.

Diana Wynyard is again rather grand and dare I say worshipful of Dizzy in the later scenes. To be fair, she was better early on, where she was allowed to be slightly cooky and coquettish as the Widow Lewis Wyndham. She also gets a long illness to milk as an actress, so there is that. 

One element in The Prime Minister which works well is the makeup work. You do believe that Benjamin and Mary Disraeli are aging. You also have a very convincing look to Gielgud's Benjamin Disraeli. 

I found The Prime Minister respectable, a bit dry, trying to build up a case as to Dizzy's greatness. However, in the back of my mind I remember that The Prime Minister was less about Benjamin Disraeli and the Victorian Era than it is about Winston Churchill and the Georgian Era of George VI. While not a definitive portrait of the Earl of Beaconsfield, The Prime Minister is an acceptable choice.

1804-1881

DECISION: C+

This is Joan Collins: The Television Documentary

 

THIS IS JOAN COLLINS

Despite having a career that has lasted for over fifty years, and despite being one of the last surviving stars from the so-called Golden Age of Hollywood, Dame Joan Collins is known for one television role: that of scheming villainess Alexis Carrington on the primetime soap opera Dynasty. Far from being disgruntled by that, Collins is actually quite thrilled by all that Alexis has brought her. It saved her from bankruptcy. It made her internationally known. It even got her a favorable court decision, but more on that later. This is Joan Collins, the documentary of her life, tells the ups-and-downs of the then-89-year-old, unvarnished, with lots of humor and some regrets.

Joan Collins narrates her own story, telling us right from the start that this is her story and will it her way. Her way is to go over scrapbooks as well as old interviews and clips from her filmography, reminiscing about figures living and dead. 

She starts with her showbiz background (Collins is fond of referring to her line of work as "showbiz"). Her father was a theatrical agent, her grandmother Hettie was a performer in "comedy and dance" as Grandma Hettie's photo states. Pushing to train as an actress, Collins went to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA) and aspired to go into the theater. The lure of three hundred pounds a week, however, got her into film, which RADA disdained. Soon, she finds a mentor in Laurence Harvey, but also a loathsome first husband in British film star Maxwell Reed.

Collins reveals that her first outing with Reed was date rape. Out of a mix of naivete and shock, she marries him, finding him increasingly grotesque. Fortunately, Hollywood calls, and with a chance to flee. None other than Marilyn Monroe warned her about the Hollywood wolves, like Twentieth Century Fox's head Darryl Zanuck. He literally chased her down Fox's halls, pinning her and telling her "You need a real man, honey, a real man" until a makeup artist came along and saved her from Zanuck's clutches. 

Her career hit a certain level of success but not as big a star as everyone hoped. Then came her second husband, musical star Anthony Newley. Marriage, children and a pause in her career left her temporarily fulfilled, until it didn't. Enduring Newley's rampant infidelities, she eventually found her third husband, American businessman Ron Kass. She also found herself facing financial and career crises. Those paled to the greatest crisis in her life: when her daughter Katyana was almost killed in a car accident and required a long recovery period.

It is at what was a low point, even to the point of almost filing for unemployment benefits, when a television role was offered to her. Collins did not know what Dynasty was. She was told only that the character of "Alexis" was a bitch, but super-smart. Channeling her memories of Ava Gardner, Collins took the part and ran with it. A pair of divorces, a fifth husband with whom she has stayed with for twenty years despite the thirty-two-year age gap and the great tribute of a damehood all encapsulate Collins' extraordinary life and career.

Dame Joan Collins has a great sense of humor about much of her career. By her own admission, she called herself a "utility infielder" at the studio. When a film could not get Gene Tierney or Susan Hayward, she observes, they turned to her. Collins has no delusions that her cinematic output will merit many if any Criterion releases. While the nadir may have been Empire of the Ants, she also notes that Empire of the Ants is now a cult film. Whether she notes this with actual pride or genuine puzzlement is a bit unclear. 

When looking over a This is Your Life episode of her life in a recording booth, the host calls her "controversial". "Why was I always controversial?", Collins remarks to us. "What did I do that was so controversial?" A pause later, she remarks, with a touch of slyness, "Just had a few boyfriends. Got married a few times". Shortly afterwards, when recounting her failed efforts to shave a few years off her age when promoting her comeback role in the adaptation of her sister Jackie Collins' book The Stud, she almost laughs at the hysteria the discovery of her true age unleashed. "You'd think I'd murdered a convent full of nuns", she wisecracks. 

Her reminiscences of the people she got to meet, work with, bed with and almost bed with are fascinating. At one party, she saw Paul Newman, James Dean and Marlon Brando sitting together. The Method Actors, she remarks. Brando tells her that acting is a bum's life. Why then did he act if he found it all rather silly and unfulfilling? "Money, doll. Money," Brando replies. She remembers Gregory Peck as the most elegant of her costars but calls Richard Burton a neanderthal who pursued her but got nowhere. She had a brief affair with Ryan O'Neil while married to Newley and came dangerously close to doing the same with Senator Robert F. Kennedy. 

Some of her observations are now amusing to her; she thought her The Virgin Queen costar Bette Davis terrifying and a bully on set to young actresses. Others are sad. Remembering her encounter with Marilyn Monroe, she first described her as looking nondescript until Monroe began talking to her about her experiences with the Fox studios. "You know what they said about me? That I was passed around like hor'dourves". Soon, Collins understood why Monroe was so brilliant with her mix of allure and vulnerable. When she learned of Monroe's death, she grieved for Monroe's pain. She also looked back on with sadness on the raincheck she had with Bobby Kennedy when she learned about his assassination.  

The worst one, however, was when her daughter Katie was almost killed. If memory serves right, she asks quietly, "Do we really have to talk about this?" when remembering how close her daughter came to death. 

Her marriages bring mostly mixed memories. She detests Reed and Peter Holm, husband Number Four. She does not harbor anger or resentment against Newley or Kass. She even worked with Newley in stage and screen adaptations of her beloved Noel Coward. While still horrified at the Felliniesque film Newley made about their marriage, she finds that life is too short to hold anger against the father of two of her children. 

For the most part, however, This is Joan Collins is her looking back with mostly amusement. Looking over her Playboy layout, she remarks, "These are filthy", but it is hard to know if it is said with tongue in cheek, adding that it was the only cover for which she got paid. 

She relishes going over when the publishers Random House sued her for the return of her book advance. At first, she was faltering on the stand and was coming close to losing the case. She was advised to go back on the stand and "become Alexis", the steely but with panache villainess the world loved to hate. The next day, she channeled her alter ego to great effect. When asked about whether she had once titled her book Athena, Collins nonchalantly stated on the stand that at one point she called it Hitler's Mistress. "That is a pretty good Alexis line," Collins observes.

Collins, perhaps more than other actresses from that Golden Age, knows that the public does not want its stars to be like us. "I wonder where the mystique has gone now. I wonder where the glamour has gone," she says. While today's actresses may want to be relatable, Collins holds firm to the notion that stars are something different. She even has positive feelings for Wall Street's villain. "I like Gordon Gekko", she says shyly, which might be the most controversial thing Dame Joan Collins says in the documentary.

Concluding her retrospective, Collins remarks, "But who wants reality?". There's too much of it, and that is not what the public pays you for, she notes. Joan Collins may never rank among the greatest actress of all time, but I think Dame Joan Collins knows it, is at peace with it, and lives the life she loves. This is Joan Collins makes one like Joan Collins, even if we will always hate Alexis Carrington, albeit hate her with glee. 

8/10

Last Summer (1969): A Review (Review #1870)

 

LAST SUMMER

The joy and pain of burgeoning desire are revealed in Last Summer, one that showcases the darkness in the bright summer light.

Friends Dan (Bruce Davison) and Peter (Richard Thomas) come across a beautiful, nubile girl distraught over an injured seagull. The girl, Sandy (Barbara Hershey), manages to talk them into helping her save the seagull, and soon the three of them are inseparable while they spend summer on Fire Island.

There is little for them to do and virtually no adult supervision. Dan and Peter are very attracted to Sandy but are both virgins, so they fumble their way around her. Sandy is openly flirtatious with them, even allowing them to simultaneously fondle her at a theater. 

Into this mix comes Rhoda from Cleveland (Catherine Burns). She is younger, less sophisticated and shy, but eventually the three take her under their wing. Rhoda and Peter start bonding, even expressing romantic feelings towards each other while Dan and Sandy start drifting towards the other. However, an almost forgotten prank of using Sandy as bait for a computer dating service reemerges when she gets a response. Luring the older and unaware Anibal Gomez (Ernesto Gonzalez) onto the island, they get him drunk and leave him to be attacked by a group of thugs. Rhoda, who was pushed into being part of the prank despite her objections, is distraught by the whole thing. As the summer comes to a close, Rhoda is ganged up by the three of them, leading to a shocking act.

Last Summer is surprisingly ahead of its time in showing the lure of a beautiful young woman for corruption and the destructive force of absent parents. Long before both Challengers and Kids revealed the dark side of young lust, Last Summer was looking at these people teens, filled with desires and with no adults around. One at times forgets that their parents are absent save for a scene where we see them from afar. I think director Frank Perry and screenwriter Eleanor Perry (adapting the Evan Hunter novel) wanted us to see this foursome as removed from the adult world yet being adult in their behavior. 

The film has no score save for the end, the only music coming from the records played. There is one montage of Dan, Peter and Sandy washing each other's hair that does have music, though it comes from the record they are playing. I think this gives Last Summer a slightly more documentary-like feel to it. It is as if we are observers in this world.

The film does wonderful in the contrast between the bright summer sunshine and the dark actions of Dan, Peter and Sandy. Credit should also be extended to how Rhoda's end was startling without being graphic. There is no pounding music to punctuate her horror and shock. We sometimes get her point of view, seeing the menacing looks of Dan and Sandy. Even Peter snaps, "Do it!" when Sandy pushes Rhoda to take her bikini top off.

Last Summer is quite well acted. Catherine Burns received a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for her performance as the tragic Rhoda. No doubt her monologue where she talks about her mother's drowning was what helped get her the nod (losing to Goldie Hawn's comic turn in Cactus Flower). In a long, unbroken sequence, we see Rhoda slowly talk about the circumstances leading to her mother's death. The mix of regret and anger and continued grief hits the viewer hard. Rhoda holds our attention throughout this long scene. 

Shortly afterwards in the same scene, Rhoda tells them, "I spit on my mother's grave," insisting that "she had no right to die like that and leave me alone". Burns, who made only two movies after Last Summer and did mostly television afterwards, is heartbreaking as the unglamorous Rhoda. Again, while her final scene is not graphic, it is still shocking. Perhaps it is more shocking because it is not as graphic as it could have been.

Last Summer has a young cast that would go on to have long careers. Long before he was condemned to be the eternal goody-goody John-Boy on The Waltons, Richard Thomas displayed a darker, more dangerous side as Peter. Ostensibly the kindest of the bunch, Thomas' Peter appears genuine in his growing love for Rhoda. His scenes with Burns are filled with surprising tenderness and innocence. However, when he is with Sandy and Dan, we see Peter as equally cruel. 

Peter is a fascinating character, one who becomes whatever the person or people he is around are. Tender with Rhoda, mean with Sandy and Dan, Peter is a tragic though ultimately despicable figure. Thomas made one both like and detest Peter. It is a credit to his acting skills, particularly at a young age. It is perhaps sad that he ultimately became so good at playing good and eager young men that he was not given much chance to show how good he could be.

Both Davison and Hershey too exceled in their roles. Davison's Dan was more open about his desires, willing to show that he was darker, crueler, easier to lead astray. Hershey did not make Sandy into a villainess or femme fatale. Instead, Hershey made Sandy into a thoughtless, careless person. She was capable of caring: her motives in saving the seagull were good. However, she could also be careless to cruel in her benevolence. She thinks nothing of hoodwinking the innocent Anibal into a date with Rhoda. She is quite bullying with the seagull when it does not do as she thinks it should. She pushes Dan and Peter into a great cruelty against Rhoda. Sandy, beautiful but also monstrous, is well acted by Hershey. Hershey also looks like a young Mary Tyler Moore, which helps sell the idea that Sandy is genuinely well-meaning, almost sweet, but who turns dark. 

If I see a flaw in Last Summer, it might be that the symbolism of the seagull is pretty much beaten to death. We get a parallel story between the trio and the seagull with the trio and Rhoda. That would make Rhoda the human seagull in a sense. It is not wildly overt, but it is there, and it does seem a bit heavy-handed. 

Last Summer is well-acted, directed and written. Moving well at a brisk 97 minutes, the film manages to still have quiet moments, mostly with Burns. The innocence of youth, crushed by their own actions, is well-filmed in Last Summer. 

DECISION: B-

Am I Racist? A Review

AM I RACIST?

Since the tumult of 2020, the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) movement has grown to ostensibly address issues like systemic racism. Anti-racism is embraced at the highest levels of academia, politics, even religion. Some, however, see all this as in turns a scam and a way to promote division rather than inclusion. Conservate commentator Matt Walsh looks on the DEI movement in Am I Racist? where he both mocks the champions of the anti-racist movement and allows them to mock themselves, albeit unwittingly.

In his faux-serious manner, Walsh ponders on whether he is a racist given how almost everything nowadays is seen through the prism of race. He starts by attending a workshop headed by Breeshia Wade, author of Grieving While Black. The cost is $30,000, though whether the cost is Ms. Wade's fee or the cost of the session is unclear. Seeing some of the session, Walsh is discovered to not be "Steve" and is asked to leave.

Sensing that he needs a disguise to enter spaces he would not be welcomed in, Walsh dons a disguise consisting of a bad wig and skinny jeans. Surprisingly, this faux-hipster look manages to hoodwink all sorts of DEI and anti-racist experts and activists. He takes a one-on-one lesson with anti-oppression consultant Regan Byrd (at $2,500). He gets insight from Dr. Sarra Takola (a bargain at $1,500), who sparked "conversations about race" when she had a verbal altercation with two white male Arizona State students for making her and others "feel unsafe". Walsh even throws in Jodi Brown, the relative of two black girls whose family sued Sesame Street for racial discrimination after the costumed character of Rosita did not high-five the children. The price for her brief appearance? $50,000. 

As a side note, Ms. Brown did not know the race of the person who played Rosita. Also, her appearance in Am I Racist? which was less than five minutes if that, is more than my annual salary.  

Walsh continues his journey in character. We look in at a Race2Dinner soiree ($5,000) where white women are wined and dined and told how racist they are. He mockingly campaigns in front of the Washington Monument to have passersby sign a petition to rename it the George Floyd Monument (and manages to get signatures). He reenacts the attack Jussie Smollett claimed to have survived. He eventually creates his own faux-anti-racist workshop, Do the Work (a common phrase in the DEI movement), where he manages to get people to curse out his alleged uncle who appears infirm and some of whose participants, albeit looking slightly confused, come close to agreeing to self-flagellation.

Inserted are brief conversations with ordinary people both black and white who have a simple message: love each other, noting how we all bleed the same. What conclusions will Walsh reach at the end of his merry romp through DEI and anti-racism?

Before the film was even released, Am I Racist? featured what I suspect will become an infamous moment. White Fragility author Robin DiAngelo (charging $15,000 for the interview) already looks odd when she goes through a metaphorical self-flagellation over the hypothetical problem of over and under-smiling at a person of color. Then we get to the widely reported moment when Matt (he uses his real first name this time) brings in Ben, a black man, and literally gives him cash in front of DiAngelo as reparations for slavery.

Ben, though he's obviously in on the gag, takes the cash. DiAngelo, looking befuddled and stating that she thought the whole thing was weird, eventually states that she too can go get cash. We then see her go to her purse and present Ben with $30 (knocking her fee down to $14,970). That ought to make up for those 400 years of oppression.

DiAngelo can make the case that she was duped. I do not begrudge her that, in a sense, she was pressured by expectations to "do the work" no matter how bizarre. However, she ultimately agreed to give a random stranger money and make such a generous gesture based on the recipient's race. I doubt she would have given Walsh or his Daily Wire cohort Ben Shapiro money. I'm not even sure that I, someone of Mexican descent, would get DiAngelo to open up her wallet. 

Ultimately, she was responsible for her own foolishness. No one physically forced or threatened her to do such a bonkers thing. 

Am I Racist? has a major flaw, and that is Matt Walsh himself. He cannot help himself in attempting to force audiences to think he is funny. The situations and answers that the various experts give are funny in their nonsensical manner. One of the "rename the George Washington Monument to George Floyd Monument" signers literally shakes Ben's hands and apologizes to him. 

Walsh could have let the speakers and situations speak for themselves, letting the gobbledygook and oddity of some of their actions show them for the fools and charlatans Walsh holds them as. However, Walsh simply could not resist making himself the center of attention. A case in point is the Race2Dinner scene. Disguised as a masked waiter (as Race2Dinner is segregated by race and gender in the spirit of diversity), he overhears hostesses Regina Jackson and Saria Rao hold court and express such views as how Republicans are Nazis and "this country is a piece of s**t". 

It is hard to know whether the crashing dishes from Walsh are out of genuine shock at overhearing this, perhaps anger, or calculated for a more "comedic" punctuation mark to Rao's words of healing. Later on, while still masked and in his fright wig, he essentially crashes the dinner, inserting himself into the conversation. 

Walsh clearly believes himself to be funny. He ends up coming across as slightly smug and obnoxious. This is clear at the Wade seminar, where he constantly interrupts to present these faux messages of solidarity and almost openly antagonistic in his fake sincerity. I found Wade and the participants to be civil in how they dealt with "Steve". Granted, calling the police on him was over-the-top, but on the whole, it is Walsh, not the seminar attendees or Wade, who looked bad. 

I also think it was a mistake for him to carry on the fake disguise when talking to ordinary people. He did not come across as funny and worse, insincere. The best section in Am I Racist? is when he talks to a repairman from British Guiana named Milton. This quiet, unassuming man loves America and has never seen the overwhelming racism the press and anti-racist activists insist that he endures. Infinitely patient with Walsh's schtick, he merely laughs softly when told about DiAngelo's book and ideas. He does not have time or interest in them. The only book Milton reads, he tells us, is the Bible, even offering Walsh one of the Bibles that Milton keeps in his car. In a brief conversation, three black women talk about how they grew up with white people and saw themselves as being one community.

Some of the scenes in Am I Racist? are so bizarre that one cannot believe that everyone involved are not actors doing parody. The participants at the Wade seminar. The white woman excoriated at the Race2Dinner for "tone policing" her black husband when she asks him to not be so loud. The barely intelligible man at the biker bar; those who managed to sit through Walsh's fake Do the Work seminar (the film shows some leaving in disgust or out of a belief that it was all idiotic). I do not think it is faked. I do think it looks like something out of Impractical Jokers except that they look to all be in on the act. They aren't, as Hate Crime Hoax author Wilfred Reilly (who would probably be more on Walsh's side) is similarly hoodwinked and befuddled by the hipster persona Walsh presents him with. That these are real people who think the Washington Monument should be renamed in honor of George Floyd is astonishing. 

Walsh does better when showing us the literal high cost of these struggle sessions. How Ms. Brown can justify making $50,000 for sharing her story on how a person in a Muppet outfit inflicted racial pain on her family would be interesting to hear. Seeing the massive amounts of cash made out of DEI instructions and seminars show it to be less about racial reconciliation and more about financial benefits. His summation on how neither side should be condemned to bear either white guilt and black victimhood is good.

Both the white bikers and the black women in Am I Racist? made almost similar statements on how both would bleed the same color if cut. Love one another is how they see things. That wisdom from average people is greater and deeper than the various anti-racist and DEI activists who rake in millions to keep racial divides open. Am I Racist? would be better to take a more serious look at how these activists can be utterly nonsensical. We can have endless conversations about race, but all that talking has apparently not helped make things better. 

Am I Racist? has good moments of humor through people's foolishness, but a little more focus on the people and less on Matt Walsh would make it a better project. 

DECISION: C+

La Bestia Debe Morir (The Beast Must Die) (1952): A Review

 

LA BESTIA DEBE MORIR (THE BEAST MUST DIE)

The tragedy of revenge takes hold in La Bestia Debe Morir (The Beast Must Die), the Argentinian adaptation of a pulpy crime drama. With strong performances, The Beast Must Die feels longer than it actually is but is still worth exploring.

Jorge Rattery (Guillermo Battaglia) has been poisoned at his lavish home. Whodunnit? Is it his abused wife Violeta (Josefa Goldar)? What about his young stepson, Ronnie Hershey (Humberto Balado)? Perhaps his sister-in-law, the glamorous actress Linda Lawson (Laura Hidalgo)? There are suspects to throw around, much to the consternation of investigator Nigel Strangeways (Ernesto Bianco). 

A surprise suspect has emerged: crime novelist Felix Lane (Narciso Ibanez Menta). While he was not there at the time of Rattery's murder, Rattery's lawyers have in their possession a diary where he set out his murderous plan. Those plans, however, are the culmination to target a wicked man who is connected to Felix, who uses that pen name rather than his actual name of Frank Carter.

We now learn in a long flashback how things came about. Carter, a widower, is happily raising his son Martie (Eduardo Moyano) while his career as a detective writer is flourishing. On Frank's birthday, Martie goes to buy his father some cigarettes. Tragically, a reckless driver killed Martie, leaving Frank thoroughly devastated. Slowly emerging from his grief, Frank soon seeks out his son's killer.

A chance encounter with an old woman leads him to Martie's killer. The woman recounts how, some three months earlier, her favorite film star suddenly appeared at her door. Like Felix, this woman and her traveling companion had car trouble. She was not about to lose the opportunity to have her favorite actress autograph her picture. That actress? Linda Lawson. Soon, Felix pieces together what happened.

Rattery is abusive towards everyone, caring only for himself and not above flaunting his mistress in front of his wife and her husband. Linda, at the time of the accident, pleaded with Jorge Rattery to return to the scene of the accident, but Jorge did not care. Using his cache as a mystery novelist, he soon woos the unaware Linda to get to Rattery. Felix, however, learns of how abusive and monstrous Rattery is. However, would he follow through on his murderous intentions or will someone else beat him to it? Twists and turns abound until we return to where we started. Here, we find that death is both the end and not the end for those affected.

As La Bestia Debe Morir is an Argentine film, the very English names did not feel jarring. Many Europeans went to Argentina, so a Jorge Ratterty, Linda Lawson or Felix Lane would not be so out of place. I do wonder though why they opted to keep other names, particularly the small role of Nigel Strangeways. 

As a side note, I do admit to giggling when we learn that Ronnie's last name is Hershey. 

I was surprised to find that La Bestia Debe Morir runs around an hour and a half. That is because the film felt far longer. I put this down to director Roman Vinoly Barreto (who cowrote the screenplay with the film's star Menta). They opted to start with the murder, go a little into the investigation, then go into a long flashback sequence that told us how we got to this moment. 

That, overall, worked well. However, the film still felt as if it took a long time to get back. I think it has to do with early scenes of the crime investigation as well as some of the flashback scenes establishing the father-son dynamic. I think some of that could have been at least trimmed to get things going.

There are, however, many aspects of La Bestia Debe Morir that are quite good. Director Barreto has some wonderful montages and fades that impress. There is the montage of the shell-shocked Frank/Felix listening to the various reports on his son's death. His increasing rage at his son's killer, coupled with his powerlessness about it, make for an impressive scene. 

The actual killing of Martie is also well-shot. With Silvio Vernazza's music playing, we see Martie's shocked face, the car coming closer, and then a quick shot of the ocean crashing onto the shore. It is perhaps not subtle, but very effective. Another effective moment is when Frank returns to Martie's room. With no music, the camera moves around it, giving us Frank's POV, almost as if he wants to absorb every bit of what is left of his son.

La Bestia Debe Morir has some excellent performances. Menta gives a quiet grace and sadness as Felix. He is quite restrained in the role, even when confronting the gleefully villainous Jorge. There is something to be said about how clever both Menta and the adaptation of the Nicholas Blake novel (the pen name of Cecil Day-Lewis) are. After Jorge maliciously joins in to mock Linda's pet name for Felix (The Cat, as in Felix the Cat), Felix makes his contempt clear. Felix quips that it must not be hard for Jorge to be called "Rat" for "Rattery" (the Spanish for rat is "rata", so the pun still works).

Battaglia relishes the evil of Rattery, abusing everyone around him either verbally or physically. What makes him a good villain is that he knows he is evil. A great villain genuinely thinks that he is a good but misunderstood guy. Battaglia played Jorge as someone fully aware that people think him evil, but he does not care. Hidalgo may have come across as a bit over-the-top as Linda Lawson. She did, however, also display a genuinely caring woman caught in a terrible situation.

While her part was small, Milagros de la Vega as Madame Ratterty, Jorge's mother, elicits hate. Her scene where she tries to bully poor Ronnie into admitting his mother murdered her son then cooly demanding Felix help her up impresses one with how much of a bitch Mrs. Rattery is.

La Bestia Debe Morir is a moral tale. It shows how revenge can ultimately kill and hurt more people than intended. It has a sad ending, one that shows the tragedy of one man's wicked ways. A well-made film, La Bestia Debe Morir is worth looking over. 

DECISION: B+

Viva Villa!: A Review

 

VIVA VILLA!

I was wary when I heard that Wallace Beery was playing Francisco "Pancho" Villa in a biopic. While the casting is still a bit jarring, I was surprised at how much I liked Viva Villa! thanks to some excellent work in front and behind the camera.

After seeing his father killed by a wealthy landowner, young Pancho Villa kills that landowner and flees into the night. Decades pass, and now the adult Pancho Villa (Beery) has come to keep his war against the powerful going. He may have found a surprising ally in Don Felipe (Donald Cook), who seems sympathetic to the peons' plight. Also sympathetic is Don Felipe's sister, Teresa (Fay Wray), who is also quite attractive. 

There will be no romance between Villa and Teresa however for a variety of reasons. First, Villa is married, though exactly to how many women is a subject for debate. Second, sequestered American reporter Jonny Sykes (Stuart Erwin) warns Teresa not to wave at Villa, which for some reason is his cue to make his moves. 

Finally, there is the growing Mexican Revolution itself. Villa finds a hero in another Pancho of sorts: the elegant intellectual Francisco Madero (Henry B. Walthall). Madero is sincere in wanting to improve the lot of Mexicans like Villa, and the general takes a liking to his little man. With that, Villa agrees to use his men to overthrow the dictator Porfirio Diaz and make Mexico great again. Villa also commandeers Sykes to be his personal de facto press agent to the world.

Villa has military successes, culminating with the capture of Ciudad Juarez. However, he is also reckless, disobedient and ultimately pushed out of both the revolution and Mexico itself. Exiled in nearby El Paso, Villa is devastated and angry when he learns that Madero has been assassinated. It is now up to Pancho Villa to restore the revolution and punish those who went after his little buddy and hero. It means a falling out with Felipe and Teresa, a falling out that will have ultimately deadly consequences for some of them.

It would shock no one that Viva Villa! is wildly historically inaccurate. Villa, for example, was never President of Mexico, which the film has him as. Villa's assassination was more than likely political rather than personal. It is surprising that Viva Villa! opted for this retelling of history given that Villa had been killed in 1923, a mere nine years before Viva Villa! premiered. 

However, I think Viva Villa! was not interested in history but in a mix of mythology and even comedy. On those levels, the film is a great success. 

The Villa in Viva Villa! is almost a sweet innocent, not buffoonish per se but with a few quirks. He could be menacing, even psychotic, like in Beery's first scene. Sweeping in to avenge the unjust killing of peons, he storms into the kangaroo court with their corpses, sitting them down to serve as a "jury" against the wealthy landowner who had them killed. Villa from time to time mockingly addresses the jury, asking them what they want him to do. It is clear that Villa is enraged at the extrajudicial murders and will hold those responsible to justice. Beery, to his credit, makes Villa here eerily dark and dangerous.

However, for most of Viva Villa! Wallace Beery makes him almost endearingly sweet. He, for example, explains to a general why he won't follow the orders he's been given. "You give me orders that I like, fine, then I do what you say. Otherwise, I do as I say". Beery as Villa does not say this in a belligerent or angry when he says this. Rather, he says this in an almost apologetic and sweet manner. It tells us that Pancho Villa is not a terrible man. He's actually a bit of an innocent, one who kills but who also is quite pleasant.

We see this also when he is President. Complaining loudly that his ministers do nothing but talk about the budget rather than the land reform he and Madero wanted, he berates them for not having the money for anything. However, he, Pancho Villa, has come up with his own brilliant and logical solution. He merely has printers literally make more money. If you need money, you just make more money. Villa goes so far as to arrest the printers who dare ask for payment. The logic of hyperinflation escapes the President. The adding of doves to the currency rather than the bulls he demanded, however, does not.

Beery's Villa does have something of a moral nature. He, for example, agrees to assault a town because Sykes had already reported that he had, and Villa does not want to disappoint a friend. He also chides two of his men for trying to take some treasures home when he decides to resign the Presidency. However, Ben Hecht's screenplay gives this a bit of humor when Villa himself takes a gold bull. We do not dislike Villa for this brazen act of hypocrisy. Instead, given how Beery has played Villa, we end up finding it endearing. 

Beery has a warmth and again, sweetness when it comes to Villa. I think people now would fiercely condemn the casting of Wallace Beery as Pancho Villa, and to be fair his stabs at an accent do fall short. However, thinking on it, I think General Villa would have been tickled at the idea of having a major star at the time like Wallace Beery play him. Giving Beery credit where it is due, he did a good job if it was to show Pancho Villa as a bit of a charming, childlike rogue.

There is a running gag of him marrying almost every beautiful woman he meets. The one he could not get is Teresa, though not for lack of trying. Few people would try a pickup line like, "Are you in the Revolution too?".

Walthall was nobility itself as the moral, idealistic Madero. Wray's Teresa was excellent: sincere in her concern for peons that eventually morphed into contempt for her former ally Villa, albeit due to his actions to avenge Madero. Leo Carillo balanced menace and mirth as Sierra, Villa's second-in-command. Sometimes cruel, sometimes silly, Carillo did an equally strong performance.

One of the highlights in Viva Villa! is the cinematography. The film had two cinematographers. One of them was Charles G. Clarke. The other was James Wong Howe, who could go on to be ranked among the greatest of all time. While it is difficult to impossible to know who shot what, I think we can pick out the scenes that Howe filmed. In particular are the night scenes when Villa is ordering the killing of the Federales. The use of shadows to counter the killings is beautifully filmed. My sense is that this scene, some dance hall numbers, and Madero's introduction were made by James Wong Howe. I may be wrong, but they are well-shot.

Viva Villa! is open about being more fiction than fact. Its opening title crawl says, "It is fiction woven out of truth and inspired by a love of the half-legendary Pancho and the glamorous country he served". A legend in his own time, Villa's myth grew right after his death. It is a legend that will not fade into history and one enhanced by Viva Villa! While it may not be history, it is entertaining, and I think even the General would not object to that. 

1878-1923

DECISION: B-

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice: A Review

BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE

This is the Age of the Nostalgia Sequel, where we have to have a sequel on an old film from decades past. We had Twisters. We had Ghostbusters Frozen Empire. We had Mean Girls (though to be fair, that was the film version of the musical which was based on the film). That is not even going into prequels and remakes, such as The First Omen and The Crow. Now we have Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the sequel to a thirty-six-year-old film. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is probably not the worst film of 2024. It is probably not even the worst Nostalgia Sequel of 2024. It is, rather, a pointless waste of time, with so much going on that ultimately nothing happens. 

Lydia Deetz (Winona Ryder) is now the hostess of Ghost House, where she communicates with the dead. She is startled when she has visions of her old nemesis Betelgeuse flashing. These visions do not concern Lydia's producer/boyfriend Rory (Justin Theroux) a great deal. However, Lydia learns from her stepmother Delia (Catherine O'Hara) that Lydia's father Charles has died. Lydia, Delia and Rory now go to Charles' funeral and have to pick up Lydia's estranged daughter Astrid (Jenna Ortega) up at her prep school.

Astrid is still hostile to her mother ever since her father Richard disappeared in the Amazon. She is more appalled when Rory takes the opportunity to propose marriage to Lydia, insisting that it be at midnight on Halloween, a mere three days away. Astrid makes friends with local boy Jeremy (Arthur Conti), who is not what he appears to be in more ways than one.

Someone who is what he definitely appears to be is Beetlejuice himself (Michael Keaton), determined to get his slimy fingers on Lydia. He has his own issues with the sudden return of his ex-wife Delores (Monica Bellucci), out for revenge after he chopped up her body due to her trying to literally suck his soul when both were alive. She is wandering around the halls of the afterlife, as are Astrid and Jeremy. Will the dead Richard (Santiago Cabrera) be able to save his daughter? Will Delia find that those asps are not as safe as she thought? Will Beetlejuice get his mortal woman?

I have never been one who held Beetlejuice as this masterful film. It is a fine film, entertaining and quirky. However, I never joined the cult around it, or of any film made in my lifetime. With that being said, I am surprised over how Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is being made out to be some delightful romp and nice throwback to the beloved original. In reality, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a hollow, pointless film, with various plots wandering around in total confusion and conflict. 

In my plot recap, I did not mention Willem Dafoe as Wolf Jackson, a B-movie action star who is now a cop in the afterlife pursuing Delores. Why is that? Well, it is because for long stretches of a surprisingly short film, he is pretty much forgotten in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. I had actually forgotten that Delores was in the film at all as well. We learn about Delores' backstory through Beetlejuice himself in a faux-Italian film scene, which to be fair was not terrible.

I pause to note that Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is only twelve minutes longer than Beetlejuice. Despite that, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice feels infinitely longer than the first one. I put it down to the fact that the sequel has so many characters that feel so unnecessary. I figured the Jeremy/Astrid subplot alone could have been enough for one movie. The Delores subplot alone could have been enough for one movie. The conflict between Lydia and Astrid alone could have been enough for one movie. Yes, you can combine one or two of those, but all of them do not mesh into a cohesive whole. 

The alleged twist with Jeremy is so obvious that I wrote in my notes "Jeremy--are parents dead? Him too?". I wonder if screenwriters Alfred Gough and Miles Millar (with a screen story by Gough and Millar along with Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter writer Seth Grahame-Smith) watched Toy Story 2 and/or Toy Story 3 before working on Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. When Betelgeuse's minions escape into the real world (another subplot that I do not think was resolved), I got flashbacks to the original Jumanji. 

As a side note, when we get to the second wedding attempt from Betelgeuse to Lydia, I wondered what exactly happened to the influencers invited to the wedding ceremony. I won't bother wondering why the wedding had to take place at midnight on Halloween or why Father Damien (Burn Gorman) would agree to any of this. I also won't bother wondering why MacArthur Park, of all the songs in the world, is the one used for a variation of the Day-O (Banana Boat Song) scene in Beetlejuice. I like to think that "Father Damien" is a nod to The Omen, but honestly, I think that is giving Beetlejuice Beetlejuice far too much credit.

I was genuinely surprised that the various subplots were resolved shockingly quickly. The Jeremy subplot was solved so fast that perhaps the film should have ended there. The Delores subplot was equally resolved so quickly that it all seemed pretty pointless to be there at all. The absence of the Maitlands from Beetlejuice Beetlejuice was shockingly lazy. "We found a loophole" that let them move on, Lydia says. What was that loophole? How did it come about? Beetlejuice Beetlejuice was not going to tell us. It only had to give us some reason, no matter how vague, to explain away that they were not there. It was pretty much insulting, and I do not know why Beetlejuice fans just went along with it. 

I could not shake the idea that Beetlejuice Beetlejuice could have gone in so many different ways, explored so many different routes, but opted instead to go everywhere and nowhere. 

I do not think that there was much in performances. I might exempt Catherine O'Hara, who did her best to be that wacky artiste not totally aware of things. Michael Keaton too did well as Betelgeuse, even having a bit of a romp when discussing his life with Delores. I did, however, wonder if Winona Ryder was genuinely shocked to be in the film, for there was this look of desperation to her performance. Justin Theroux knew the character was dumb and played it that way. Willem Dafoe was just happy to be working, and I don't think cared if he was necessary. 

Perhaps some begrudging credit should be thrown at director Tim Burton for going out of his way to not include the disgraced Jeffery Jones in the film. Yes, his character died, but we got a Claymation reenactment of his final moments and then his dismembered corpse popping in and out sans reason. Ortega played the part of the insufferable Astrid correctly, so there's that. Conti, to his credit, at least left open the idea that Jeremy might be a lot of things. Is he a ghost himself? Is he a living person who, like Lydia, can speak to ghosts and might be unaware that he can speak to them or that his parents might be dead? Is he a ghost that is unaware that he is dead? 

Again, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice could have gone so many different ways. Why it opted to go the way it went is to me, a sign that it did not care.  

The one part that I thought was clever was the Soul Train section. I will leave it to readers to decide if having soul music playing while black people dance and a vaguely Don Cornelius conductor lead the actual Soul Train to either Heaven or Hell is a stereotype. However, at least that seemed to be a clever bit.

Apart from that, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is just there. What it is, what it wants, I can't guess at. Yes, at least it is way better than Argylle.

Seriously, of all the songs in the world, MacArthur Park? 

DECISION: D-

Reagan: A Review (Review #1865)

 

REAGAN

How one feels about Reagan, the biopic on the 40th President, might, more than likely will, depend on how one feels about the man himself and what he represents to the viewer. Those who love the Gipper will adore the film. Those who hate the Great Communicator will despise it. It is unfortunate that most cannot get past their own feelings on the man and his ideology to see the film itself. Respectful without being too reverential, Reagan is a positive though placid look at one of the most consequential Presidents in living memory.

Reagan uses the framing device of Russian Communist Andrei Novikov (Alex Sparrow) visiting former KGB operative Viktor Petrovich (Jon Voight). Novikov wants to know why the Soviet Union fell. Petrovich tells him the story of how he had been tracking Ronald Reagan (David Henrie as a teen, Dennis Quaid as an adult) since at least from his time as a Hollywood actor and president of the Screen Actors Guild.

Petrovich repeatedly warned the Politburo that Reagan was dangerous. He had a mix of firm anticommunism with a religious bent that made it a crusade. He'd even earned the mocking nickname of Crusader from Petrovich. Reagan was a generally affable fellow, mixing with other Hollywood personalities and firmly allied with the SAG until he saw that the Communists were trying to muscle in on them. This began his shift to the Right. Reagan's commitment to his political causes cost him his first marriage to Jane Wyman (Mena Suvari). However, hope came when aspiring actress Nancy Davis (Penelope Ann Miller) turned to Reagan for help in getting her name removed from a blacklist when she was confused with another Nancy Davis. From that, a romance blossomed.

Reagan soon started moving up in the political world, first as Governor of California and then after a thwarted effort in 1976, the Presidency four years later. His assassination attempt and dealings with the Soviet Union brought about the eventual collapse of the Iron Curtain and the Communist dictatorships in Eastern Europe. However, Alzheimer's would soon take over, leading to his death.

I am not surprised at the divide Reagan has between critics (21% positive) and audiences (98% positive). My sense is that professional reviewers are seeing Reagan through their own biases on the subject. Some, no doubt, do find elements in Reagan that are worthy of criticism. I too will do that. However, I also see this, or any film, based on what it is attempting to do and whom its target audience is. Reagan is for those who do not think he or his views are demonic.

As a side note, I have lived long enough to see Reagan and both Bushes described as "literally the New/Worse Than Hitler", so there is that.

I see Reagan as something of comfort food for conservatives and center-right individuals who do not want either a long lecture or a hagiography closer to Southside with You (91% and 71% positive from critics and audiences respectively). The question that I ask is, "Is Reagan (the movie) terrible?" not "Is Reagan (the man or his ideas) terrible?"

Reagan is not a hagiography in that it does touch on some controversial matters. It does not shy away from Iran-Contra. It gives time for a montage of negative reactions from those opposed to him in the 1984 reelection. In a nice montage to Genesis' Land of Confusion (itself an anti-Reagan song), we see teens and young adults dancing while also noting the various protesters opposed to his lack of action on AIDS or nuclear disarmament. That Reagan tackles these subjects at all is a plus to the film.

I can see where Reagan made a few wrong turns. The framing device was a mistake in Howard Klausner's adaptation of Paul Kengor's The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism. Perhaps opening and closing Reagan with this conversation would have worked. Going back to it over and over again cut out the flow the film gets into. A better use might have been if Petrovich had been lecturing a group of students about the fall of the Soviet Union.

In fact, I think Reagan might have done better if it had focused on his war with Soviet Communism instead of attempting to put almost every part of Reagan's life in the film. It starts getting bogged down, and sometimes one feels like one is rushing through things. Take for example the character of Dana (Derek Richardson). Starting out as essentially a Hippie for Reagan (he shows up unannounced on their yard, disheveled with long hair and a vaguely stoned-out speaking style that understandably alarms Nancy), we next see him coming to the White House as a speechwriter, still wearing casual wear in the Oval Office. Reagan might have done well covering these events through his eyes.

Instead, characters come in and out so quickly that you rarely if ever get a sense of who they are. Things went so fast that I was surprised to read that Creed frontman Scott Stamp appeared as Frank Sinatra. I didn't realize Sinatra was even in the movie. If not for my own knowledge, I would not know who "Trumbo" or "Holden" were when Ronald and Jane were at a nightclub. Other incidents, such as his speech at the Brandenburg Gate or an amusing moment when he shushes a group of protesters who greeted him with silence, are nice. However, they again show that Reagan tried to pack too much in.

The reason Reagan is not getting a negative review from me is due to a few factors. At the top of them is Penelope Ann Miller as Nancy. She did a standout job in the role. Miller made Nancy into a genuine person, neither the overprotective power-hungry shrew nor the zombified political spouse. I was genuinely moved when Nancy is at the hospital after the assassination attempt. The mix of fear and hope that Miller shows was effective. Credit should also be given to the makeup work on Miller, who looks convincingly like the former First Lady. Her scenes with Dennis Quaid really do well in selling their great love story. 

As the title character, I think Dennis Quaid had a difficult task. Ronald Reagan had a distinct speaking manner and voice, trained from decades as a radio announcer and actor. As such, Quaid could do only so much in his interpretation of the role. I think he did as well as he could, which is not a slam on his performance. There were times when he sounded more like Ronald Reagan and less like Dennis Quaid. Other times, it was the reverse. There was, again, only so much he could do with the script he was presented. On the whole though, Quaid was a serviceable Reagan. 

The scope of the film did not let David Henrie do much as the younger Reagan. That is a shame since he could have done well in Reagan: The Early Years. While I think Miller was spot-on as Nancy Reagan, I was not convinced by Suvari as Jane Wyman. Dan Lauria was good in his small role as House Speaker and Reagan frenemy Tip O'Neill, one moment bon vivant with Ronnie, the next being fiercely antagonistic. John Coda's score was an error, not so much in that it was bad but that it was dead set on being stirring when it might have done well to take a "less is more" approach.

Reagan is, I found, a film that is perhaps not as in-depth as it could have been but not filled with fierce fury and hatred for its subject either. It may not be the definitive portrait of the man behind the myth. It does serves as a good primer into this man, loved and hated in equal terms then and now.

Ronnie, we hardly knew you...

1911-2004

DECISION: B-