Foxcatcher

A true crime story that rings about as true as a soap opera plotline, a character study of flat, unvarying characters, and a drama that aims to say a lot but doesn’t even manage the dramatic part, Foxcacher is one bad movie. Nearly every element of it is done poorly, turning what could have been an interesting tale (and it is an interesting story) into a sleepy, depressing bore of a picture.

The story is that of John du Pont, the heir of a wealthy family who founded a wrestling training center in the late 1980s that attracted the Olympic athlete brothers Dave and Mark Schultz. Nearly a decade later, this arrangement ended in a tragic murder. The film sets to explore why this happened (highly speculatively, I should add), focusing mainly on Mark Schultz (Channing Tatum), who despite his success still feels trapped in the shadow of his brother Dave (Mark Ruffalo). When rich fan of the sport Du Pont (Steve Carell) offers to sponsor him and provide him the space to train, he sees his chance to make a name for himself and takes it. Things start well enough, but eventually Du Pont’s demons turn the relationship toxic.

Tatum is one of the few positives in the picture, with the convincing physicality of a wrestler and a terse intensity that’s effective. His snarl and facial features convincingly convey jealousy, inadequacy, pain, and drive without even saying a word. It’s an interesting view at the darker elements of an athlete’s competitive spirit, rather than the uplifting inspirational stuff too often seen in sports movies.

Carell’s acting, on the other hand, seems to consist of little more than latex and Valium. His publicized prosthetic nose seems engineered to always look like he’s looking down it (it doesn’t help that he seems to tilt his head back in half his scenes), as if to suggest some element of class conflict (further exploration of this theme is not as unsubtle but equally simplistic). Every delivery of his is weak and tired. When it’s his character’s time to show some emotion or intensity, he comes off like Brick Tamland from Anchorman, only not funny. Except for one scene (albeit unintentionally), in which he and Tatum share cocaine, and the tone can’t seem to decide if it’s a dark turning point in the story or a tender moment between the two.

The film plays up the latter angle, that Schultz and Du Pont are sort of kindred spirits trying to escape the shadow of their families, and it just rings so false. Even if you don’t know the ultimate outcome, it’s highly obvious from the second the two meet that something about this relationship is off. Every bit of pathos between the two is empty and forced, draining the narrative of any emotional resonance and the final tragedy of any weight. And it’s kind of a moot point, but the conflict that leads to such an end—mommy issues between Carell and Vanessa Redgrave’s little-seen crusty, proper snob—is pretty passé plotting, as well.

The movie is obviously angling to be a prestige picture, and has all the aesthetic trappings just begging for award show recognition: actors undergoing physical transformation, dead serious highbrow subject matter, a somber piano score (as if relentless dreariness automatically translates to dramatic depth), those not-quite-slo-mo sequences with no sound to emphasize emotional intensity. But like Carell’s Mr. Burns schnozz, these trappings can’t conceal the fact that what’s underneath is subpar. With its bad melodrama and simplistic analysis of characters and events, Foxcatcher is the macho male equivalent of a bad Lifetime movie.

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

I guess you can’t really blame the studio for wanting to stretch The Hobbit into three high-grossing movies, especially considering the project’s hefty price tag. But from a narrative standpoint, the trilogy could have easily been trimmed quite a bit and condensed into just two films. That fact is more apparent than ever in The Battle of the Five Armies. Even though it’s by far the shortest of Peter Jackson’s six J.R.R. Tolkien adaptations, it still seems unnecessarily long and inflated.

After the first two entries, there isn’t a whole lot left from Tolkien’s novel to film besides the eponymous battle. The movie does wrap up the cliffhanger involving the dragon Smaug (voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch) from last year’s film (a little anticlimactically, unfortunately). It also brings to conclusion all its added-on prequel elements leading into the events of Jackson’s other trilogy, which are promptly forgotten once finished (makes you wonder why they even bothered with them in the first place). Otherwise, its focus is squarely on the battle, pitting the Dwarves of Erebor and their kin against the Elves of Mirkwood and the remaining citizens of Lake-town, then all of them against two armies of orcs, trolls, and other nasty servants of Sauron. When the sides aren’t engaged in combat, the characters are discussing and priming for battle, or glumly reflecting on those lost in it afterward. And any dangling subplots are either finished on the battlefield or left in the dust without a satisfactory completion.

Even Bilbo (Martin Freeman) is somewhat brushed aside. Instead, the driving character arc is that of Richard Armitage’s Dwarf king Thorin, whose lust for riches ignites the whole conflict. Herein lies the only bit of substance in the picture, exploring the character’s madness of greed. A great sequence—probably the only use of special effects that doesn’t involve fighting or destruction—hauntingly illustrates his sanity lost in (quite literally) a sea of gold. This turn, however, is more than a little jarring. Thorin was a tortured but honorable character in the first two films, but is suddenly cold and paranoid in this one. His downfall festers a little too quickly to believe. It’s little matter, though, as he just as quickly reverts back to action hero mode to join in the combat.

The battle scenes are reasonably entertaining, if not nearly as impressive as those we already saw in Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy (not sure if it’s the high frame rate or the 3D, but the armies look more obviously like CGI). Eventually, though, it gets a little tiring as it goes on and on and on. You can really feel the filmmakers reaching to expand every element they can to justify a third movie, and the final result is very bloated. And while Jackson is good at staging a memorable action sequence, a couple here—a swordfight on ice (seriously), and especially a duel inside a structure as it falls to pieces faster than a Jenga tower—reach a stratosphere of ridiculousness only someone with unlimited money and no one to tell them “no” could possibly reach. By the time the film finally reaches its end, there's more of an exhausted relief than emotional or narrative payoff.

Contrast that with The Lord of the Rings’ long but very satisfying final chapter The Return of the King (deletion of Saruman aside), and you have the biggest difference, I think, between Jackson’s two trilogies. The Lord of the Rings had an epic scope while still making time to tell strong character stories, in addition to being a great action and special effects spectacle. The Hobbit trilogy has ultimately been only a spectacle. It was an enjoyable spectacle with a lot of fun stuff (the second movie The Desolation of Smaug being the best of them). But while its big brothers are film classics, The Hobbit rings a little hollow, this entry most of all.

The Theory of Everything

The Theory of Everything doesn’t actually delve much into the theories or scientific work of Stephen Hawking. Mentions of his work are peppered throughout, but on the whole, this isn’t a look at the brilliant mind the general public knows. Its focus is on the man they don’t, specifically the trials of his disease and its effect on his family life. On account of the talents involved, it’s a wonderful, emotional portrait of that life.

Based on the memoirs of Hawking’s first wife Jane (played by Felicity Jones), the film depicts their meeting as students at Cambridge in 1963. That same year, Stephen (Eddie Redmayne) is diagnosed with motor neuron disease, but the two get married nonetheless. Despite his physical deterioration over the years—from unable to walk, to unable to move at all, to eventually unable to speak and having to rely on his famous vocal generator—they manage a mostly happy life, having three children and trying to live like a regular loving family. But in addition to his ever-worsening disease, the marriage is tested by both of them developing feelings for others, her for their mutual friend (Charlie Cox) and him for his live-in nurse (Maxine Peake).

Redmayne is almost uncanny as Hawking. Besides looking so similar, his physicality in the role is very convincing. Every step of his character’s regression, from just initially affecting his walking motion to full paralysis, looks as authentic as the real thing. It’s excruciating, at times physically painful to watch, as well as saddening. He also displays the real Hawking’s ability to express emotion through tiny, subtle facial movements. Also deserving of praise is Jones, who’s a pillar of strength as his wife. And yet, her performance is likewise an exercise in subtleties, suggesting great pain and emotion, even inner torment, despite never breaking on the exterior. Even though it’s always measured and restrained in its expression, the film’s main dynamic between the two is one of great feeling.

In addition to the performances, the movie is also a beautiful film, with lush visuals and cinematography despite its intimate scale. Often in biopics, form takes a backseat to performing; it’s more about the actors than narrative. Not so here. Instead of a cliff note representation of Hawking’s life, director James Marsh instead frames things as a relationship drama. Such gives the picture an engrossing pace even with its decades-long scope. And instead of piling on the sentiment, Marsh lets the emotion simmer and fester and come to fruition naturally.

It’s sometimes a heartbreaking film, but it’s also a host of good emotions, most of all uplifting. And it’s all the more effective because the film understates Hawking’s fame. The real Stephen Hawking is an inspiration because despite his debilitation, he’s not only an accomplished man of science but a bona fide celebrity (the man's been on The Simpsons and Star Trek, among other things). The Theory of Everything is inspiring because it shows such limitations don’t stop one from having a full, happy, intimate human experience, either.

South Park, "#HappyHolograms"

Briefly, the first few minutes of this episode seemed like, after flailing last week between so many seemingly unconnected threads, the story was finally zeroing in on the point is was trying to make. Turned out that grasp was short-lived, as the episode kind of crashed into another big meta mess. It wasn’t as big a mess as last week, but it was far from a great episode.

It kind of forgets about the Randy/Lorde subplot without much conclusion, and doesn't explain what the deal was with all the holograms of celebrities. The one arc it does wrap up was Kyle’s loneliness from his brother Ike watching PewDiePie and parents being glued to their social media instead of sitting together and watching TV as a family. A rather sly commentary on the nature of technology taking over our lives for viewers who remember when people lamented that television was replacing quality family time. But, that was all relegated to the very first scene.

Kyle’s solution to bring his family together again is participating in a big Christmas special, and along with all the subplots (and in some case, instead of them), the episode crams in segments from that fake special, all narrated by Cartman’s online alter-ego. All this did was make things murkier. Matt Stone and Trey Parker should have just done another episode like “Mr. Hankey’s Christmas Classics” if they wanted to do a spoof of seasonal specials (they could have even continued with the interconnectedness of the whole season with acts referencing each episode). But then, none of the Christmas skits were all that funny, settling for just a lame extension of a sight gag involving Iggy Azalea, and a Bill Cosby joke that could have been so-awful-it’s-hilarious but was badly executed.

The one element that did click was the reference to all the recent police killings that have dominated the news. At first dealing with it with the understated, passive ruthlessness of which the show is sometimes capable, the episode builds on the joke to make a very biting comment on institutional racism. It would have been interesting if the show made a whole episode on that subject, but alas, it was only a small part that shined in an overall scattershot episode.

As a whole, my feelings about this season are lukewarm at best. I can’t really say if the show’s getting worse, as throughout its run there have been bad episodes mixed in with the good (“Pip” comes immediately to mind). But, none of the good ones were great, and the bad really seemed to stand out. Maybe it was harder to move on from a bad idea because all the episodes were connected, or the fact that the continuing narrative experiment didn’t quite work. That’s what I’m hoping, at least, that and that this season isn’t the first sign of a decline. Still, this is the first year where my feelings overall weren’t positive.

The other (sort of) Tolkien film trilogy

Next week, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies will conclude Peter Jackson’s trilogy based on J.R.R. Tolkien’s novel, and may be the last Tolkien adaptation we see for a while. But audiences may be surprised to know that in addition to the New Zealand director's six movies, another Tolkien film trilogy already exists. Well, kind of.

A whole generation before Jackson turned his homeland into Middle-Earth, two different parties produced three animated features that, together, adapted The Hobbit and all three volumes of The Lord of the Rings. They can only loosely be called a trilogy, though, as the three don’t consistently sync with one another. As for their quality, let’s just say Jackson has no competition to fear for the definitive motion picture portrait of Tolkien’s world.

The Hobbit (1977)

Tolkien’s novel is sometimes classified as a children’s book, though it’s been enjoyed by readers of all ages. However, in the hands of Rankin/Bass Productions (most remembered for their perennial Christmas specials), the tale was tinkered specifically for youngsters in this TV movie. As such, several characters and plot points are simplified, reduced, or eliminated. Bilbo (voiced by Orson Bean) talks us through every step of the way, lest the little ones watching lose track of things. Gollum and the orcs look more amphibious than hideous, and Smaug is only slightly more threatening than Pete’s Dragon. There’s very little scariness or battles, but plenty of singing (much of it adapted from the book’s songs). For what it is, it’s a decent production, but viewers above the age of, say, six or seven will likely find it flavorless and unengaging. It might also be hard to keep a straight face if you’re a South Park fan, as the main theme sounds an awful lot like a song about a certain gerbil.

True to the book, though (truer than Jackson’s version with all its added-on prequel elements), there’s little mention of the events to come in The Lord of the Rings. That story would be told the following year, albeit by a different studio, in...

The Lord of the Rings (1978)

Contrary to the kid-friendly tone of Rankin/Bass' The Hobbit, the first film adaptation of Tolkien’s seminal trilogy was the work of cult animator Ralph Bakshi, best known for his more adult-oriented features in the 1970s and early 80s. Bakshi’s style heavily utilizes rotoscoping, a process of animating over live-action footage. He’d employ this technique more successfully in other movies around the same time, but the results here are mixed, and that’s putting it nicely. Some of it is quite good (a few of the more impressive sequences clearly inspired scenes in Jackson’s adaptations). Some looks like a badly colorized black-and-white movie (the Balrog in the Mines of Moria is particularly awful). We do get a decent if highly compressed adaptation of The Fellowship of the Ring, but the narrative crumbles when it moves onto the events of The Two Towers, becoming hard to follow even if you know the story.

The film ends partway through the second book, and Bakshi intended to make another movie finishing the trilogy. That didn’t happen, leaving the task of resolving the story to...

The Return of the King (1980)

Rankin/Bass took a second stab at Tolkien with another telefilm, but it can barely be called an adaptation of the trilogy’s final book (and really doesn’t work as a follow-up to Bakshi’s picture, either). Legolas and Gimli are cut completely, and even Aragorn is marginalized, despite being the king mentioned in the title. Instead, the storyline is reworked into a sequel to The Hobbit of three years prior, and mainly follows Frodo (Bean, again) and Sam’s (Roddy McDowell) long walk to Mount Doom. Sounds simple enough, but the production’s selective elimination of significant plot points leaves so many scraps of story that become tangled and confusing. The few darker elements from the book that made it in are extremely watered down (the Ringwraiths are less terrifying than the average Scooby-Doo villain), or undercut by incredibly lame musical numbers. If they don’t get stuck in your head, this one’s completely forgettable.

South Park, "#REHASH"

This season isn’t actually the first time South Park has featured a continuing narrative. In addition to some two- and three-parters, there have been moments where episodes hint at an ongoing in-show continuity. The season has been much more deliberate and upfront about it, though. And this episode, which attempts to tie all the pieces from the season together, ends up making an absolute mess.

It’s hard to really nail down any one thing that the plot is about. It features Randy returning as Lorde and having a personal crisis over sexualizing his (her?) image (as well as digs at Iggy Azalea, Nicki Minaj, and Miley Cyrus for doing the same), Cartman imitating YouTube star Pewdiepie, Stan and Kyle feeling out of touch with Ike and other younger kids' interest in YouTube commentary videos, and musician holograms on the loose. Yes, the show that makes waves for being so timely is not only making jokes about something from two-and-a-half years ago, but also trying (and failing) to mine humor from Michael Jackson jokes that are close to a decade out of date.

There’s not much that’s funny, and not much of a point, either. If there’s one at all, it’s that Trey Parker and Matt Stone hate today’s pop culture. However, they're not only simply rehashing the great 2011 episode "You're Getting Old" (badly, I might add), but they're revealing that their own outlook is even, shall we say, crappier than Stan's was in it. If Kyle and Stan speak for Stone and Parker (and as the show’s voice of reason, I think it’s fair to say they do), then the show’s creators are coming off like grumpy old men, this episode nothing more than a wrinkly fist of rage at kids these days.

At one point, a nameless evil corporate character says that “commentary is the content.” Judging by the tone of this episode, I’m guessing Stone and Parker disagree. But if they feel that way, why did they make a whole episode so devoid of humor or substance and settle for just trashing current entertainments they don’t like? Maybe there is a point, and we’ll have to wait and see what it is next week (between the abrupt ending and the fact that this whole season has been connected, I’m assuming the season finale will conclude everything). But it’s going to have to be a great episode to make up for this pitiful penultimate chapter.

Big Hero 6

When Disney bought Marvel five years ago, there was a widespread fear among comic fans that all its storied characters would get a cutesy kiddie makeover. So far those fears have been unfounded, all the company’s adaptations being very faithful to the comics and catering mainly to the grown-up superhero fan. At least, until now. But if Big Hero 6 is what happens when a Marvel product gets the Disney treatment, all those worried fans should eat their words. Turns out the people working for the Mouse know what they’re doing.

Based on a somewhat lesser-known Marvel team, the film follows Hiro (voiced by Ryan Potter), a teen with an impressive knack for robotics living in the city of San Fransokyo (think a cross between Tokyo and San Francisco with a little futuristic anime thrown in). He hopes his newest invention, a batch of tiny robots that takes the shape of whatever the controller thinks, will be his ticket to get into a prestigious technology university. But a tragic series of events leaves his brother Tadashi (Daniel Henney) dead and his invention in the hands of a masked villain. To protect the city from this madman, Hiro teams up with his Tadashi’s school project, a medical bot named Baymax (Scott Adsit), and his other university pals.

Like Pixar’s The Incredibles, the movie is clearly written by people who love and get superheroes. It’s not quite on the level of Pixar’s great film. While The Incredibles was a smart deconstruction of the superhero mystique as well as a family drama, Big Hero 6 is keeping it simpler and just having a ball spoofing the genre. Its parody, however, actually does everything about a superhero movie, particularly those of Marvel Studios, very well (speaking of which, don’t forget to stay after the credits). The narrative is a solid origin story that establishes the main characters flawlessly. The action is PG-friendly but still as good as any live-action superhero film (its animation not so far off from the CGI of many blockbusters), and the look is much more colorful and imaginative. And Disney has its eyes on the big picture, as the various supporting characters all have potential for spinoff projects.

It’s also got a wonderful sense of humor. Most of it comes from Baymax, who despite his place in the narrative quickly becomes the star of the picture. Even though he looks designed with easily mass produced toys in mind, the cuddly android turns out to be one of the funniest Disney characters in at least a few years. His physical comedy and unknowing deadpan are quite amusing, the latter containing a refreshingly sweet innocence rather than cynicism. He’s the one who makes the movie, although there’s plenty of other laughs from the rest of the goofy hero team, as well as a few really funny riffs on the genre itself.

The superhero movie renaissance may be getting long in the tooth (and will only get longer still with all the upcoming projects from Marvel and DC), but Big Hero 6 feels almost fresh and new. Maybe it’s because it’s so much fun and imaginative instead of dark, brooding, and overly serious (it’s a nice respite for fans before the darkness that will be Avengers: Age of Ultron next summer). And even if you don’t really like superhero movies or are just sick of them, it’s still a great family film, one that does not have any songs that you'll come to despise like a certain other Disney hit.

South Park, "Cock Magic"

This episode at first appears to be not what you think from the title. But, eventually, it becomes exactly what you were thinking. It's so bad that I’m actually angry at myself for laughing at one part; surely, I'm better than this! The show can certainly do better, too.

The title actually refers to an underground sport the boys get involved with that's like cockfighting, except instead of killing each other, roosters are forced to play the card game Magic: The Gathering. The show has made allegory out of stupider scenarios, but there’s none to be had here. The episode settles for pretty obvious and lazy double entendres. Eventually, Randy, the show’s go-to character for everyman idiocy, even acts out the most obvious one, over and over. At best—and this is being very, very generous—it’s like a small gag from a better episode stretched out to fill 30 minutes. In fact, it plays like a typical random, less-funny-when-it’s-acted-out gag from—Brace yourself!—Family Guy, despite South Park’s established contempt for the Fox cartoon.

But that scene with Randy at the birthday party had me howling, in spite of having nothing good to say about the rest of the episode. Maybe it’s because it took me back to the show’s best years around the turn of the millennium, before it was such an issue-focused show, or at least when it only tackled issues as fodder for the most vulgar, line-crossing, and hilarious humor on TV. This one wasn’t anywhere close to as good as any of those classic episodes, but it connected with the immature teenager in me.

That aside, this episode offers nothing. Not only nothing in the way of humor, but not even much of a narrative or reason for even animating the thing. It screams of either desperation or laziness. At the very least they could have stolen from The Simpsons again; that show filled time with nothing and created a classic gag.

South Park, "Grounded Vindaloop"

There are two things I’ve always wanted to happen on South Park. One is for the ever-evil Eric Cartman to really get what’s coming to him. This has happened once or twice, but because of his constant evil deeds and the fact that he gets away with most of them, it will never cease to be satisfying to see it happen again. The other is for Butters, the show’s pure, oblivious child who’s frequently victimized by outside forces as well as his overbearing parents, to finally snap and let everyone and everything that’s ever tormented him have it.

We got a taste of the latter last night, and it was oh so sweet. Sure, Butters was swiftly put back in his sad place. But as a longtime viewer who’s seen the character befallen by many tragic events (and laughed until I couldn’t breathe at them), seeing it even happen at all was a little cathartic. Hell, just seeing Butters sock his awful father in the groin would have been enough for me. Everything else he did on top of that was just a bonus. And the fact that the audience only hears it made it even funnier, for some reason (I guess the old horror film adage about what you don’t see being more effective also applies to comedy in some cases).

It was a great Butters moment, and also a strong initializer for an overly (and I’d guess intentionally) complex plot about virtual reality. At the onset, it seems like Cartman’s just leading Butters astray once again (Butters not realizing his rampage is actually taking place in the real world). But a turn of events reveals that it’s actually Cartman who’s stuck in virtual reality. Or maybe it’s Kyle. Or Kenny. Or none of them. The twists and revelations keep piling on and don’t make lot of sense. But I think that’s the point. In fact, the plot isn’t just unreasonably difficult to follow, but the instances where the characters somewhat break the fourth wall by staring at the audience and cursing them seem downright hostile to the thought of us trying to figure it out.

Nothing that came after was quite as funny as Butters letting loose, but the episode was still fun. The deliberate confusion was a great satirical takedown of convoluted brain-twister sci-fi movies, and a few elements that at first seemed repetitive and not very funny—the twists on top of twists, Steve from Customer Service—eventually grew on me, as they actually tied into the plot very well. And as for that ending, I really did not expect that.

Interstellar

It’s fitting, perhaps, that Christopher Nolan’s picture about mankind stepping into the unknown is also a step up for him as a filmmaker. Don’t get me wrong. He already was very good before, both technically impressive and exhilarating in his direction, and highly intellectual in his screenwriting. He’s made at least one great film (The Dark Knight), and no bad ones. But up to this point, they’ve mostly been breakneck-speed cinematic freight trains, their tone ranging from tense to frantic. 

Interstellar has the amazing, imaginative visuals and masterfully crafted exciting sequences that Nolan always delivers. What sets it apart, however, is that the director slows things down. Whereas all his previous films left little room for anything that wasn’t a necessary part of the whole, here, Nolan takes time for little things. Things like long shots to just sit back and take in the beauty of what’s onscreen, or small plot details that say so much about the future he put on film. More so, taking it slow allows for scenes of mood and atmosphere (even though it’s in space), and the characters to showcase feelings not of the adrenaline-fueled variety. That’s the most important thing, as it gives such an ambitious, broad space epic an emotional intimacy.

The film takes place in a future that’s unspecified but doesn’t look too far off from right now. Earth has a dire food shortage and, in the corner of American farm country where most of the earthbound action takes place, things look like the Dust Bowl. Through a series of strange events (which I won’t describe so as not to spoil a single thing), failed astronaut-turned-farmer Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) discovers that NASA, thought to have been disbanded years before, is working in secret on a mission to save humanity. A wormhole appeared near Saturn a half-century prior, and the plan is to send astronauts through it to find a new planet for mankind to colonize. And Cooper is chosen to lead the mission.

The picture is quite a meticulous, impressively constructed vision. The ambiguity of just how close this future is to our present gives it a frightening prescience; with all the talk of catastrophic climate upheaval, what's onscreen seems like a very real possibility of where we're headed. Several small lines and throwaway details hint at a fully developed world with fascinating, and alarming, implications. Once things leave Earth, the technology and science in the film have a strong authenticity. More than just adding realism, it makes everything seem plausible when the plot travels to places beyond our scientific understanding, even if the results seem a little more fiction than science. Strictly scientific or speculative, though, everything that happens is interesting and riveting, and brought to life with incredible effects. And regular Nolan collaborator Han Zimmer’s score is a great one, capturing the vastness of the void of space in a beautiful musical tapestry. The movie elicits comparison to 2001: A Space Odyssey, and while it’s not as open-ended or ambiguous as Stanley Kubrick’s picture, the visual awe and sense of wonderment are comparable.

There’s even one crucial element where it bests Kubrick’s film: humanity. The cast includes veterans like John Lithgow and Nolan favorite Michael Caine as well as current stars like Jessica Chastain and Anne Hathaway, all of them very good. McConaughey is the one that shines, however, arguably giving the strongest performance yet in his recent hot streak of great roles. As Cooper, he embodies the charismatic All-American hero archetype of movie astronauts, a characterization that seems to be by design. But in more private moments, he’s not a melancholy sci-fi protagonist who waxes poetic in strenuously written monologues. His emotions are the plain, real type emblematic of a father’s love. He breaks down and cries from missing his daughter (played by Mackenzie Foy as a child, Chastain as an adult), and it feels real, not scripted. Plotting at the familial level goes beyond just giving the hero motivation and adds a desperate urgency to the characters’ mission. In comic book sci-fi, we‘re always sure the heroes will prevail even if they seem down and out early in the story. In Interstellar, every mistake, every setback, every wasted second could mean the end of the human race, and with it the ones we love. And yet framing it this way reveals an irony about our species, which the movie makes sure to point out at one point.

Nolan’s films are never short, and this one is his longest yet at almost three hours. Yet, it never drags or loses its grip on the audience, and never ceases to fascinate with its ideas or stun with its visuals. If anything, it could be even longer; it could be extended to four hours or even multiple movies, further exploring the future bits we only see in the background and elaborating on a few fast-moving subplots, and it wouldn’t be boring. But while all that is what makes it great science fiction—probably the best pure sci-fi production since Blade Runner—it's the affecting narrative strength at the human level that makes it a truly great film.

South Park, "Freemium Isn't Free"

I’ve never been one for electronic games that consist of performing the same action over and over and over. For me, the monotony not only fails to ignite any addictive feelings, but doesn’t even manage to be fun for more than a few minutes. There have been many occasions where I’ve played Tetris or other repetitive games and either just quit or intentionally lost the game because I got bored quickly.

So, watching this episode, I sympathized less with Stan, who’s shown to be addicted to the new Terence and Phillip mobile game, than with the other three boys who tell him the game is terrible. I, too, just don’t get how people could become addicted to similarly pointless, substance-free games like Candy Crush, or Farmville, or any of the mobile and Internet timewasters that have gotten so many users addicted the last several years. I also very much agree with the Canadian government’s long descriptions about how the freemium business model blatantly and unethically preys on addictive aspects of consumers’ behavior (also, “freemium” is the second term this season that I hadn’t heard before watching).

True, the episode was almost all soapbox, and frankly I probably enjoyed it because it was relating to me an opinion I already had. But to be fair, Trey Parker and Matt Stone don’t beat us over the head with their opinions. The tone is obviously very negative toward games that charge people for full access, but they mostly let the shadiness of that business model speak for itself. I just have to wonder: Is addiction to these types of games really as much of a problem as life-destroying addictions like gambling and alcoholism?

It’s no matter, though, as the episode had several good bits of humor that mask any not-so-strong points its trying to make. I was happy to see the show’s smart, sensitive Satan return as the voice of reason (the most unsubtle way possible for Stone and Parker to make their opinions on such games clear), and the Canadian jokes made me laugh, whereas I most often find the Canada plotlines really stupid. There was a line from Jimmy that was kind of mean but also very clever and funny. And although I’m not sure the show was too apt in its comparison of pay gaming addiction to alcoholism, the fake “drink responsibly” ad was hysterical and spot-on.

South Park, "The Magic Bush"

Meh.

Tonight’s episode kind of epitomizes where South Park is at this point in its existence. By that, I mean both what’s good about it—the in-the-moment timeliness, the cutthroat satire, the brilliant ability to allegorize an issue using the surreal and disgusting—but also the negatives, namely how all of those things sometimes come at the expense of humor.

The plot has the devious duo of Cartman and Butters getting their hands on a drone, which they fly around town and use to photograph one character’s mom undressing through her window. As is to be expected, Cartman shares it with the world, leading to the town to deploy their own drone fleet to protect the neighborhood. When they start abusing power, a new fleet comes in to police them, and so on and so on.

It’s obviously putting forth the issue of allowing the powers that be to protect us by forfeiting our privacy. But the stronger point is made about the recent privacy debate in the wake of all those celebrity photo leaks. The woman exposed in this case (the mother of minor character Craig) is less a victim than an object of leering to the men in South Park, who are all fixated on her private features and not the fact that her privacy was invaded, much like how the media is blaming said celebrities for taking revealing photos instead of condemning the hackers who released them. Her unashamed retort that what her body looks like is beside the point, that what matters is the fact that she was exposed against her will, has some real pathos to it, but, alas, falls on deaf ears.

It makes a good point, but is it worth the cost of the episode not being funny (and for that matter, even if the point is a good one, is it the duty of a cartoon to make it?)? The only joke is the repeated, unfunny description of the Craig’s mom’s private parts. Really, that is the only joke, as the episode left little room for more by getting overstuffed with so many points about privacy, the celebrity leak controversy, police militarization, and even some flat spooky thriller elements.

Maybe it was just a bad joke. If it had been a better one, maybe it would have worked. There have been many episodes recently where the show was topical and very funny, and next week, it could very well tackle a current issue or fad while making us laugh. Still, would it be so bad to have a simple funny episode that doesn't make a point once in a while? Like, say, a light, carefree half hour about body hair and cannibalism?

Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

A once-great artist getting one last chance to regain their former glory is a familiar narrative on the silver screen. But Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman is not like any such films that have come before. I’m still not sure what it is, exactly, but one thing it’s definitely not is a genre cliché. It’s also not a superhero picture at all, despite starring a few people who’ve played superheroes. Or maybe it is. You’ll have to decide for yourself.

Michael Keaton stars in the movie as Riggan Thomson, a has-been actor famous for playing a superhero called Birdman twenty years prior to the picture (one hopes that, despite the obvious similarity to Keaton’s turn as Batman over two decades ago, his career since has been better than his character’s). To try to resurrect his career—or rather, to leave his most famous character behind and gain the professional acclaim he’s always sought—Riggan has written a play, which he’s also directing and in which he's playing the lead role on Broadway. It’s not going well, as the preview run is beset by accidents, cost overruns, fevered performer egos, and the fact that the general public still only associates him with Birdman. On top of everything, he’s also grappling with an inner voice reminding him of his former glory and predicting the play will fail. And he also has some sort of telekinetic powers, apparently.

But that’s just on the surface. And at that surface level, it’s a pretty entertaining and revealing look behind the scenes of a theatrical production in semi-real time, albeit with some touches of the surreal that build until going for broke in the final act. There’s much more going on, however. As for what exactly that would be, that’s up to the viewer to decide.

Dig a little deeper, and the film says a lot about the entertainment industry and culture. Some fleeting reference is made to the recent glut of superhero movies, and it’s funny. But the film delves in short little moments into other areas of the arts, such as the fallacy of critical or genre snobbery (one scene where Riggan confronts Lindsay Duncan’s snooty theater critic feels like a collective, cathartic middle finger on behalf of all artists to every critic who's ever written a bad review), or the grandeur of considering art “important." On the more macro level, the picture is a rather melancholy exploration of the difference between fame and artistic respect, and how one doesn’t necessarily beget the other. The events onscreen erase the lines between reality and fantasy, but the pathos is very real.

Yet, in spite of that, the movie isn’t at all depressing, but a lot of fun. For all the ambiguity of what it all means, the whole thing plays as a very funny comedy. It’s also quite a well-casted piece of work. Keaton guides us through the strangeness we’re witnessing like a pro. He’s got the zeal of an artist doing their passion project, but unlike his character who’s crashing and burning, he’s nailing it on every level. Every bit of comic timing, every dramatic turn, and every moment where we’re not sure what’s going on, he’s compelling. Also notable is Edward Norton as a talented but difficult actor, with equal emphasis on both qualities. He’s the most unlikeable character in the film, egotistical and antagonizing in many ways. But his skill is beyond reproach; whenever it seems like he’s letting his guard down and revealing more about the character, he does something to rebut the perception the characters (and the audience) have of him. Emma Stone has a grounded frankness as Riggan’s daughter, representing his anchor to the real world (as well as, perhaps, the voice of truth, or at least the public consciousness). And Zach Galifianakis plays it straighter than his Hangover persona, but is hilarious as the play’s lawyer/producer. 

The film is also impressive on a technical level. In the hands of cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, a recent Oscar winner for Gravity known for lengthy unbroken shots, the movie is seamlessly shot and edited so that most of it seems like one long take with no cuts. The result is a pace that's breathless and rousing even in the slower moments. Between that and all the happenings onscreen to ponder, Birdman is always interesting and entirely watchable no matter how weird it gets.

Constantine, "Non Est Asylum"

Most people probably only know the character John Constantine from the forgettable 2005 film. That’s too bad, because the DC Comics warlock is a great character, not at all like Keanu Reeves’ tired, dreary performance. But it’s not at all surprising he was watered down (and changed from British to American). His comic Hellblazer is quite dark and often brutal, its protagonist rather misanthropic, and its sociopolitical edge rather untenable for a mass Hollywood product.

So, what of the new NBC incarnation of Constantine? Well, at least they let this John Constantine (Matt Ryan) be British, though the network took away his chain-smoking privileges, which upset some longtime readers.

The series’ first episode begins with the title character in a British mental hospital, hoping to learn that his visions of the occult are all in his head. Of course they’re not imaginary, as he soon finds out. After giving up on his treatment, he heads to Atlanta to seek out a young woman (Lucy Griffiths) who has undiscovered supernatural abilities and is being hunted by some sinister force.

There’s good and bad to talk about here. Among the good, Ryan is probably the best John Constantine that network television can give us. He’s got the character’s dry, funny deadpan and cynical, disaffected shell that lets just the right amount of a more sensitive interior show. Most importantly, the show incorporates the rather important character trait of being haunted by a soul he couldn’t save. And the supporting roles have strong veteran players, such as an authoritative Harold Perrineau as a guardian angel and Jeremy Davies as a meek hacker who shares in Constantine’s pain.

On the bad side of things, the show is a little more like the movie than the comic in all the wrong ways. At its best, the comic has seen its share of sophisticated writing and compelling drama. The show, so far, consists mostly of routine action, simple jump scares, and special effects that aren’t very good even by broadcast TV standards. And given, it might be because the writers decided to drop a character after the pilot was finished, but the whole thing just seems like a standard monster-of the-week show.

The program deserves a chance because at least they’re trying to be respectful to the character. But I don’t have the highest hopes of it ever living up to the Hellblazer comic, not just its highly intelligent plotting and depths of depravity, but also its wicked sense of humor. For all its heavy subject matter, the comic is often laugh-out-loud funny. The show so far doesn’t have such a sense of humor, which could really help make up for its shortcomings.

Fury

The opening of David Ayer’s World War II picture establishes the brutality of the characters in the aftermath of battle when the film suddenly cuts to black, as if to deny the viewer any sense of hope or triumph, little though it may be. The screen then fades in to a makeshift Allied camp where the soldiers are all dirty and exhausted, spent to the point that they look less like human beings than just empty bodies. This isn’t the “Good War” that we see so often from Hollywood, where combat is almost secondary to soldiers hanging out, and even if the battles are bloody there’s still a strong sense of righteousness. Fury is war at its barest, simplest level, just one group of people killing another.

The setting is Germany in April 1945, when the Allies were marching across the country, and the depleted German forces were conscripting kids to fight. The film depicts this through the eyes of the crew of a Sherman Tank whose nickname gives the movie its title: the leader Staff Sergeant “Wardaddy” (Brad Pitt), three hardened vets who’ve been with him the whole war (Shia LaBeouf, Michael Peña, and Jon Bernthal), and a green young soldier (Logan Lerman) brought in to replace the fifth crewmember (we don’t see his death, but do get a glimpse of the gruesome aftermath). Even though the war is nearing its end, Fury’s crew and their division still face resistance and bloodshed as they take enemy territory one town, one field, or one patch of road at a time.

The battle scenes are very well done, edited superbly to add the claustrophobic horror of being enclosed in steel on top of the intensity of combat. But much of the fighting is of a different breed than most war movies. Most battle scenes post-Saving Private Ryan consist of the characters surrounded by chaos on all sides. Here, there’s a methodical monotony to the combat. Soldiers die on both sides until one is either wiped out or surrenders, then the victors just move on. No punches are pulled with the blood and gore, but also, the film doesn’t linger on any of the carnage. Death is just a part of the routine in war.

The cast has a terse earnestness that’s appropriate, and frankly, they seem more realistic because they don’t display any of the hailed warrior clichés like brotherhood or nobility. They have a certain camaraderie, but it seems out of familiarity and necessity to stay alive more than anything. They’re abrasive to one another and get on each other’s nerves. The film’s “come together” moment is less a display of togetherness than a mutual acceptance of inevitability. The few bits of humor are pitch black and do little to cut the bleakness of their situation. Even in the few breaks from battle, such as a brief interlude in a German town, they are broken. They share stories about what they’ve seen to counter the “Good War” myth, but much of the acting doesn’t need words. It’s all in their faces: their expressions, their glum, empty glares hinting at the unimaginable. It’s so simple but very convincing.

Simplicity is what makes the picture as a whole so effective. There’s no mention of the politics or ideologies clashing in the war, and aside from the 1945 date given, no reference to events hinting at the light at the end of the tunnel. It’s just the grim reality of the front line, all guts and nothing even looking like glory. And rejecting anything more than that only makes it more timeless.

South Park, "Handicar"

In its depiction of disabilities, South Park walks a very fine line. When it does touch on the subject, usually through the disabled characters Jimmy and Timmy, the show mostly displays a positive message of inclusion rather than pity. But, those same episodes get a lot of laughs at the expense of the characters and their, shall we say, slowness (both physical and the other way). That was most exemplified four years ago in “Crippled Summer” (the one with the summer camp for disabled kids not-so-subtly named “Lake Tardicaca”), and it’s highly evident once again in this episode. It’d be mean and disgusting if the show were less clear in its message of acceptance

This episode features two returning characters from that previous episode: Nathan and Mimsy, the scheming rival of Jimmy and Timmy and his dim-witted lackey, respectively. This time, they’re trying to sabotage Timmy’s nascent ridesharing app, clearly based on Lyft and other such services. Their plans find allies in several transportation entities, from rival apps and regular taxis that are losing business, to car companies whose luster is fading. But, of course, every one of their attempts blow up in their faces.

This episode has things we’ve already see on the show, and not just the same cartoony territory as “Crippled Summer.” The commentary on ridesharing services is almost word-for-word the same free market stance that's been featured before (well, not word-for-word, but it was so similar that it registered with me mentally as a such). But the episode hammers the point home by featuring Tesla, a company facing what arguably can be called legal sabotage in our world, as one of the bad guys trying to shut Timmy down. It’s a move whose brilliance is commendable; I mean, how many shows can intertwine such cartoonish slapstick with legitimate legal commentary? This isn’t just timelier than other shows, it’s much smarter. And yet it doesn’t overwhelm the episode so that it becomes preachy at all.

It’s the cartoon stuff that kind of lost me, mostly because the show it was spoofing—Hanna-Barbera’s Wacky Races—is one I am not familiar with. But that’s okay, because Mimsy and Nathan’s continuous slipups are quite funny, even though deep down I know I shouldn’t be laughing (especially one scene that you’ll know when you see it). I also enjoyed the little things: the Matthew McConaughey running gag that seemed pointless until a redeeming payoff, and a split-second jab at Ben Affleck, adding to the inexplicable running feud Trey Parker and Matt Stone have had with the actor throughout the show’s run.

South Park, "Cissy"

Well, I certainly misjudged Randy’s brief appearance “disguised” as pop singer Lorde last week. Turns out it was actually the starting point for a scathing rebuke of the teenage musician. As it played out, it made for one of those episodes where the show actually made me feel a little bad for laughing, probably even more so than any other time where that was the case.

It was just part of the episode’s larger theme of gender identity. Specifically, how the subject pertains to going to the bathroom, as Cartman claims to be transgender just so he can use the girls’ bathroom at school. Of course, the right he claims to use whichever toilet he wants only pertains to him and becomes a problem when other students call him on his BS.

Cartman makes it easy to laugh at because, like always, his position is untenable to the extreme and purely self-serving. The satire on gender issues cuts so deep, however, that it could almost be taken as not satirical at all. I mean, I’m pretty sure Matt Stone and Trey Parker are targeting people who are opposed to transgender rights by reversing roles and making characters who are cisgender (a term I and I’m sure many others haven’t heard until tonight) the victims of discrimination. But at surface value, the storyline could be seen as vindication of a scenario transphobes might really fear. Just because I understood what they were trying to say doesn’t mean other people will.

The Lorde subplot (she’s really Randy in disguise, and he invented her so he could use the women’s restroom at work) was less ambiguous. Sure, they were making fun of a ridiculous real hoax, and there were a few backhanded compliments for the singer. And the episode ends on a very pro-trans note. But the vibe of the whole Lorde spoof felt to me like they were basically calling her transsexual in the way an immature high-schooler uses gay slurs as insults. It’s one thing to poke fun at someone’s work (I loved the joke that enough Auto-Tune makes Randy’s lame everyday singing to himself sound exactly like “Royals”), but this was just mean.

I guess it’s okay that I laughed—cracked up, really, at both plots—because I got the satire, and because I’ve laughed at other things on the show that were as bad or worse. At least that’s what I’ll tell myself.

Gone Girl

**POSSIBLE SPOILERS HEREIN**

What is it about a David Fincher film that always stands out? Certainly he’s skilled at creating a dark and tense atmosphere, but there’s another factor to his work: psychology. The director always takes time and manages to get into the heads of his protagonists so the audience can feel their state of mind and truly understand their reactions to events unfolding around them. This, I think, is what makes a Fincher thriller so unsettling and effective, more so than any gloomy filmmaking techniques, jump scares, or (in the case of Seven) gory violence. It’s also why he’s still good when he steps outside of the thriller genre and tackles regular characters, such as Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network (however accurate that movie might have actually been). 

His latest film Gone Girl, adapted for the screen by Gillian Flynn from her bestselling novel, seems like it’s going to be a little of both, at least for a while. The eponymous girl is Amy Elliott-Dunne (Rosamund Pike), who disappears from her Missouri home on her anniversary. Her bar owner husband Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) appears detached and a little too unemotional about the ordeal, and certain subsequent events start to arise suspicion. As more revelations about Nick surface and the community turns against him, the film alternates with passages from Amy’s diary detailing their relationship falling apart. It begins to seem a little apparent where the plot is going, but it’s still a compelling narrative about the unraveling of a marriage, mostly thanks to Affleck for excellently creating the most awful husband ever put on film. Or at least he seems that way because he comes off like a slimy person you might actually encounter, not an exaggerated movie character.

But oh, do things take a sharp, brutal turn. Where we think the picture is going turns out to be dead wrong, and where it actually goes is much more horrific. It’s a jarring, shocking twist, and the story keeps building on it to crazy degrees. In the hands of some horror schlock-master or cheap thriller flick hack, it might all seem excessive, and it probably still is here. But Fincher slowly travels to each new depth like a calculating master of tension, never giving viewers even a brief reprieve, even when it ends. The film isn’t jump-from-your-seat scary, but you’re never at ease watching the horrifying plot unfold.

As much credit is due to Pike as Fincher. She at first appears so sweet and sad, her marital trials and misfortune earning her the audience’s sympathy and her husband their ire. But when the truth is revealed, she really hits it out of the park. At her worst, she’s a cold, unstoppable incarnation of pure hate and destruction (think Anton Chigurh with a principle and without the cattle gun). Unusual for a Fincher film, in her we get a peek inside the mind of the sinister force at work instead of its victims or its chasers. What’s there is truly twisted and frightening because it only makes sense to her. Never once does it seem like her actions have a justifiable point. And yet, we empathize with her. She not only manages to manipulate the other characters into believing she's the pure, doe-eyed domestic angel, but we the audience almost almost forget about everything she does and buy it ourselves. It’s a great villainous performance that doesn't fall under the “love to hate” cliché; Pike just makes you feel queasy and uncomfortable and so unclean. Affleck's character, who unquestionably does bad things and could have been the bad guy in many movies, comes off as almost saintly by comparison.

Admittedly, if you think about it, the film is much better than it should be. It doesn’t really offer any insights on marriage, abandoning the subject completely when the thriller plot gets going. Speaking of which, that thriller plot contains some things that only happen in pulp crime stories, and Amy's master plan becomes a little less realistic the more extreme it gets. The exploration of the media plays more like parody than allegory (though that doesn't make it any less entertaining, particularly Missi Pyle's nth degree riff on a certain crime show pundit). And contrary to some analyses, it doesn’t really make any great statements on feminism. As a matter of fact, taken seriously, it can arguably be considered antifeminist, if not misogynistic.

But, so what? The movie’s made with such quality, so adeptly directed and masterfully acted that none of that hurts it at all. In fact, knowing that it's not completely grounded in reality might make it a little easier to stomach. No matter how dysfunctional your relationships might be, chances are they’re not as bad as this.