Dear Jodie - Calvary

Dear Jodie,

I'm so glad to be back in the saddle as we say in Texas, and what a saddle!

It would be so easy to make a movie about a pedophile priest. Wouldn't take anything at all. As an old Catholic myself a priest once told me in confession that I was going to hell for masturbating while he, it was later discovered, provided private lessons to the alter boys on the ways of the sexual world. I had trouble reconciling that.

Still do.

Then again, a friend of mine told me of her very first confession, oh-so-worried how she was going to confess her biggest, most baddest, most horribleist transgression. She decided to go for it.

"Bless me father for I have sinned, I hit Sister Gabriel in the butt with spitwad."

She smiled telling me of the near uncontrollable laughter behind the screen, letting her know for good and all that priests were human beings too.

She still attends mass with her family with a healthy attitude toward priests and nuns.

Ah, all of this as preface to my impressions of "Calvary," a movie, not about a sexual predator, but a good, decent priest who endures the confession of a man threatening to kill him because he is good, and because the priests who abused him in his youth are either dead already or long gone. Vengance on the innocent. What a splash that would make with the Church! We walk the road of Calvary with Father James through his daily, mostly unsuccessful, rounds with this threat hovering over him like storm clouds.

Writer and director John Michael McDonagh put the movie in the hands of the actors, and they came through brilliantly. Brendon Gleeson shined bright as Father James with Chris O'Dowd as the perfect foil. I also enjoyed Kelly Reilly's performance as Father James's adult daughter, a living symbol of the good Father's troubled past.

Their conversation on forgiveness stays with me even as I drink my morning tea.

That the end is determined because Father James is honest regarding his personal feeling for a personal tragedy versus his detachment regarding the huge wrongs of the Church just tears at me ... and makes me think.

The final scene is perfect. Can we can tell a little about ourselves by what we think is said behind the silence?

Maybe.

Hard to watch, but a haunting, amazing movie nevertheless.

10 out of 10

I can't wait to read your view, Jodie!  Read Jodie's review HERE.

Dear Jodie - The Lion King

Dear Jodie,

I wanted to LOVE The Lion King, both when I saw it in 1994 and again just a few days ago.  I wanted to LOVE it, but only REALLY LIKED IT.

There was nothing wrong with The Lion King.  The animation was amazing, the story was classic (Hamlet-esque), the actors were . . .

Ah, therein lies the rub.  You said it wonderfully in your review, Jodie.  James Earl . . . Mufasa.  I'll extend that to Jeremy (Klaus Van Bulow) . . . Scar.  I had real trouble getting past that beautiful bass voice of James Earl Jones being that of James Earl Jones, and the reprise of Jeremy Irons' most famous line of his Oscar winning performance in Reversal of Fortune "You have no idea."  Add Ferris Bueller --- Simba -- and it pulled me completely out of the movie (both in 1994 and 2004), except for those amazing scenes you mentioned.

Back in the Golden Age of Disney, the producers rarely used name actors in the roles, much less stars.  They used solid actors whose names wouldn't take away from the characters.  A more modern example is Frozen.  The only actor who I was familiar with was Kristen Bell, and her only vaguely.

As a result, I stayed with the story.

But that's by the way.

I know that I'm being unfair here, but a movie about the circle of life invites comparison with other movies with the same theme.  The movie I'm thinking of (also Disney) is Bambi, a movie I grew up with, a movie that saved the life of a couple of deer the times my father took me deer hunting, a movie that would be on my top 10 movies of all time.

I will say that the opening was brilliant, far and away the best musical number in the movie.

All of this aside, it is not fair that I do not have the same emotional history with The Lion King that I do with Bambi, but that's the way it is.

I have no doubt that I will watch The Lion King again, Jodie.  I have friends with kids who LOVE it.  Hell, I have friends who LOVE it.  I have no doubt I will really like it.

Since my view of the movie has less to do with the movie itself than my own whims and caprices, I'm giving it a solid 8 out of 10.

It really is an excellent movie!  Wonderful opening!  I really liked it!

What did you give it, Jodie?

Read Jodie's review here.

Dear Jodie - Schindler's List

Dear Jodie,

Schindler's List was a difficult movie for me to watch which is why last night was the first time I'd seen it in twenty-one years.  As bad as things looked on film, they were logarithmically worse in real life.

I obviously don't know that first hand, but . . . well, let's say that I began my education on the Holocaust with a substitute teacher in Junior High School back in 1970.  She had escaped from Auschwitz as a young girl along with her brother and told us of her escape. She even showed us the tattoo on her left forearm.

About the atrocities inside the camp, she remained silent, but told us of how she and her brother took refuge in a convent until the nuns could arrange for transportation out of the country and eventually to the U. S. where an aunt and uncle took them in.

An older priest retired from Poland to our parish in 1970. Fr. Francis J. Gabryl (pictured above) had survived both the Auschwitz and Dachau concentration camps.  He became a leader in the Dallas Polish-American community until he returned to Poland in 1985.  And, was acquainted with a younger Polish priest named Karol Wojtyla who later became the first Polish Pope, more recently known as Saint John Paul II.

I'll tell you an amusing story about when I went to confession to him one of these days.

I digress!

If someone had told me that the man who directed the Indiana Jones Movies, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and ET would direct a movie like this, I would not have believed it.

But Steven Spielberg showed great depth, and a more-than-amazing ability to get out of the way of the story he wanted to tell, and THAT is the brilliance of his directing in this film.  Never once does he comment on the horrors of the Holocaust.  He shows them and allows them to speak for themselves.

I love (and hate) this story of how profiteer Oskar Schindler (beautifully portrayed by Liam Neeson), a member of the Nazi Party, slowly changes into a man who spends the entire fortune he made to save nearly 1,100 Jews . . .  known after WWII as Schindlerjuden (Schindler Jews).  I love that it happened, but hate that it needed to happen.

To his credit, Spielberg doesn't try to answer the question of the change.  He shows that the change happened, but not the why.  Though the movies shows the line Schindler had to cross in the form of the little girl in the red jacket . . . a red jacket in a black and white movie. You can better answer the why, Jodie, but I see Oskar Schindler as a complex man who, himself, cannot see the change.

In terms of acting I would be remiss if I didn't mention the wonderful performance of Ralph Fiennes as the despicable Commandant Amon Goeth. He played it straight without unnecessary histrionics. He let the actions of the character define the character.  Here, too, Spielberg demonstrates that he profoundly understands the difference between cartoon evil (Raiders of the Lost Ark) and true evil.

I shed tears a number of times during this movie, had to turn my head at others because the many shootings looked all-too-real, and literally spent the last bit of the film weeping.  When Itzhak Stern (Ben Kingsley in a GREAT performance) presents Schindler with a the letter proclaiming his deeds in saving the lives of so many, and with the gold ring engraved with the Talmudic quotation, "Whoever saves one life save the world entire" I wept!

I also wept at the end as the actors playing the roles of the survivors walk with their real-life counterparts to place stones on the grave of Oskar Schinder, culminating with Liam Neeson placing two roses on the grave.

Oh, Jodie, this movie is a solid 9 out of 10, and one I can't imagine watching again.  Of course, I won't have to.  I'll never forget it!

What did you think?  Please tell me this was not an easy movie to watch!

Read Jodie's review here.

Dear Jodie - As Good As It Gets

Dear Jodie:

Like you I just saw As Good As It Gets once in 1997 and not again until the other night.

Like you there were things I did not get the first time that tolled loudly the second time.

Unlike you, I was 40 when I saw it the first time.

In 1997 the performances, particularly Jack Nicholson, Helen Hunt, and Greg Kinnear, rang loud and strong. I was not surprised in the least that Jack and Helen won Oscars for their wonderful portrayals, and wondered why Greg Kinnear didn't win anything.

I was surprised that it won Best Picture because the movie, at the time, didn't work for me as a whole. As a Romantic Comedy it didn't completely work for me because I didn't get the Happily-Ever-After feel at the end of the movie. Though Melvin is greatly improved, even, as you mentioned, forgetting to lock the door 5 times, and even deliberately stepping on the crack, I didn't see him "cured."  Even though Carol is more accepting of his fewer and fewer misanthropic slip-ups, I didn't get the feeling that she would be completely accepting of him as an obsessive-compulsive misanthrope.

I didn't get the happy ending in 1997, and that disappointed me.

That was the point I didn't catch until the other night. It wasn't a happy ending.  It was a happy beginning.

The movie, then, is not a Romantic Comedy. It's a movie of the redemption of four people:  Melvin, Carol, Simon, and ... yes, Spencer too.

All four get another chance thanks to . . . Verdell?  Yes, Verdell is the catalyst of the story.

This movie has as much in common with A Christmas Carol as with any Romantic Comedy you can mention.  That was what I missed in 1997.

That is where I caught it just the other night, and was delighted that I did.

If I had any criticism, I would love to have had just one thing (other than the hitting the hands when he missed the notes playing piano) of what made Melvin a misanthrope who wrote 62 romance novels?

I get that it happens.  In the history of music, Johannes Brahms was known in his own time as a "grouch," yet he wrote amazingly romantic music.  Stravinski described Sergei Rachmaninoff as "a six and a half foot scowl," yet Rachmaninoff's music is heartbreakingly romantic.

It's the why I wanted.

I won't ding it much for that, though.

My favorite line of all of the great lines was in the psychiatrist's office. "How can you diagnose someone as having obsessive-compulsive disorder and yet criticize him for not making an appointment?"

Like you, I give it a 9 out of 10.

Thanks, Graham!

Read Jodie's wonderfully insightful review here!

Dear Jodie - E. T.

Dear Jodie,

When you gave me the first choice of Graham's top 10 (11 . . . E.T. was an add-on . . LOL) to review, I immediately gravitated toward E. T.  To be honest, it took some courage to make that choice.

As I mentioned to you, I saw E. T. once back in 1982, and not again until . . . now.  It just ended five minutes ago as I write this.

And here I am wondering why in hell did it take me 32 years to watch it again?  Let's see if I can figure out why, because I will proclaim, with tears rolling down my face, that E. T. (technically titled E. T. the Extra-Terrestrial but does anyone really care anymore?) is one of the best movies ever made!

In 1982, I already had my Bachelor of Arts degree in English, and was working on my Bachelor of Arts degree in Theatre (yes, with an "re" rather than the usual American "er") at the age of 24.  There is no room for sentiment when you are pursuing a degree in "THEATRE."  Or when you're 24 struggling to fit in . . . somewhere.

We studied Ibsen and Chekhov and O'Neil and went DEEP into human depravity and tragedy and failure and lust and gluttony and all of the seven deadly sins.

One day, my mother asked me to accompany her, my brother, sister, and . . . OH NO! my grandmother . . . to see E. T.  NOOOO!  I can't like this movie!  I just can't!  It's not Ibsen!  It's not Chekhov!  It's not that brilliant American playwright Eugene O'Neil who brilliantly managed to write a brilliant four-hour play (A Long Day's Journey Into Night) without one speck of humor, not one smile's worth!

I liked E. T. in spite of myself, and had the audacity to mention it to a couple of theatre buddies.

They indulgently shook their heads with a smirk, "There are no real actors in this movie!  There's no Olivier!  There's no Gielgud!  There's no Guinness!"

I reached out so hard, "There's a Barrymore!"

That went over like a fart in Church.

Later, my jaw dropped when my grandmother wanted a video copy as soon as my brother could make one for her.  I loved her dearly, but my maternal grandmother was one of the hardest human beings I've ever known.

Really!  E. T.?  You want E. T, Mama Drue?  You, who had never liked a movie that didn't have Roy Rogers or Gene Autry in it?

The decades slipped by Jodie, and I never watched it again, despite the fact that it's a movie right up my alley . . . as you know from reading my reviews.

I'm watching it again this afternoon (to make up for lost time), and I will laugh just as loud and ridiculously, I will cry just as hard, and fist-pump just as enthusiastically.

I started writing this review an hour and a half ago, and have since found an interesting perspective on E. T. (keeping in mind that I have not yet read your take, Jodie).  Apparently, in 1997 my favorite critic Roger Ebert sat down with his grandkids to watch it.

You can read his account of that experience here.  It's magical.  As is the movie!

Oh!  What is my take on the acting?  Simple.  It was what it needed to be . . . and that, by definition, is perfect!  :-)  Especially E. T.!!!  And Henry Thomas as Elliott!!!  And Drew Barrymore as Gertie!!!

And, I would be remiss if I didn't mention that the amazing movie is from the imagination of Steven Spielberg.

I will not presume to offer a rating since this is one of the best ever made!

Please link to Jodie's review here, and I can't wait to read it!

Dear Jodie - Here's to the late Shirley Temple

Dear Jodie,

On February 10 of this year, Hollywood lost a legend, Shirley Temple. I'm sorry I didn't see this until a week ago.  I am saddened, not just because Hollywood lost its darling of the 1930's, but because the US lost one of its great citizens.

We all know "On the Good Ship Lollipop," but how many knew that she was the US Ambassador to countries such as Ghana and Czechoslovakia working closely with Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and George H. W. Bush.

All under her name "Shirley Temple Black."

How many remember that Shirley Temple was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1972, and that after her modified radical mastectomy announced it to the world.  The magazine McCall's interviewed her in February 1973 making her one of the first prominent women to openly speak about breast cancer.

When my sister was born, my father longed for her to be "the next Shirley Temple."

A number of times, my father would wake me early on a Saturday morning to catch a Shirley Temple movie on the late show.  Though I longed for the sleep I'm glad to say that was one thing I could share with my father.

You can find the CNN tribute here.

RIP Shirley Temple Black. You will be missed!

Dear Jodie - Z is for Zack and Miri Make a Porno

Dear Jodie,

There was a baseball umpire named Dutch Rudder . . . uhhh . . . that would be Dutch Rennert.

Never mind.

If Zack and Miri Make a Porno was LESS raunchy, disgusting, and perverse it would have been offensive.

Writer/director Kevin Smith evidently believes in the old adage, "If you're going to fall off the ladder, it might as well be the top rung."

He's on the top rung, Jodie, but he doesn't fall.  Take those three adjectives, raunchy, disgusting, and perverse and add charming, sweet, and sentimental to them and you have Zack and Miri Make a Porno.

I've never been a big Seth Rogan fan, but he knocks this one out of the park. (Does that work for cricket as well as baseball?) And I just love Elizabeth Banks in this one, too!  Both go for it with gusto and make it work.

I can't quote any real dialogue or it would look like this...

"I'm going to (blank) my (blank) in your (blank) and (blank) your (blanking) (blank) off."

I suppose I could say that Seth Rogan's (Zack) comment "Oh, I use Ex-Lax" was a helluva setup line for . . . ugh!  Followed just a bit later by Deacon's line, "I'll tell you what just happened in there!  That chick frosted me like I was a (bleeping) cake" is about as close as I can . . . come (sp?).

I laughed so hard at times I didn't know whether I could catch my breath. And I rooted for Zack and Miri to get beyond the porno until tears rolled down my face.

What I loved about Seth Rogan in this movie is that he is the average Joe who gets the beautiful girl, and the beautiful girl doesn't see him as the average Joe.  Being an average Joe myself (or a little below average), I like that.  I can certainly dream, even at my age.

Ultimately this movie is about two best friends taking it to the level they were meant to.

Kevin Smith goes for it in his movies.  Love him or hate him, he holds nothing back.  I mean here is a writer/director who cast Alanis Morissette as God (Dogma).

I loved this one.  I shouldn't have but I did.

I'll definitely watch this one again!

And I would be remiss if I didn't post the link to my favorite song in the whole movie, the one that really punctuated Zack and Miri risking it all.

You can find it here.  From this page, you will be able to link to a version with some highlights from the movie.  I just can't post it here.  :-)

8 out of 10.

What did you think, Jodie?  I'm really curious, because this is one you put on the list!  :-)

And let me publicly thank you for reviewing these movies with me this month.  I've had a great time! Back to our regular review routine in May!

Read Jodie's review here.

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