Category Archives: Movie Review

And the Award Goes to… The Women’s Race to the Oscars

While this is ski season for my husband, you’re more likely to find me tucked away in a movie theater, and this season I have had the pleasure of seeing several movies that have garnered many Academy Award nominations—all starring women in lead roles…

Lady Bird – a coming of age movie featuring two strong female performances—Saoirse Ronan as young Lady Bird, and Laurie Metcalf as her mother. Directed by Greta Gerbig, this quiet film balances vulnerability with raw, simple emotions and warmth.

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri – a dark character-study involving a mother struggling with an unsolved case involving her daughter. As usual, it’s star, Frances McDormand delivers a powerful performance as a woman who is clearly not easily defined.

The Post – yet another movie with a female lead, starring Meryl Streep who must be getting tired of the endless nominations. While this true story is compelling, and painfully relevant still today, even with the casting of Streep and Tom Hanks, the storytelling falls a bit flat.

The Shape of Water – arguably, the quirkiest of the movies nominated, with an endearing and understated performance by Sally Hawkins. Part fantasy / love story, The Shape of Water also stars Octavia Spencer as Hawkins’ partner-in-crime. Both are up for Oscars.

I can only speak for the movies and performances I have seen, so my Oscar predictions are…

Best Actress:

Frances McDormand  /  Three Billboards

Best Supporting Actress:

Laurie Metcalf  /  Lady Bird

 

Best Director:

Guillermo del Toro  /  The Shape of Water

(But I’ll be thrilled if Greta Gerbig wins for Lady Bird)

 

Best Picture:

Lady Bird


 Bonus Prediction…

Best Animated Movie

Coco (Delightful & insightful, the best to come along since Toy Story 3)

The Oscar telecast is Sunday, March 4 on ABC, so there’s still time to catch a movie or two.  Pass the popcorn!

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

60-Second Movie Review

With my background in marketing, I couldn’t help but be intrigued with a movie centered around three billboards. Less about advertising, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri is a dark tale centered around an unsolved case involving a rape and murder of a young woman in a small town in the South—where racism and hate run rampant.

Written and directed by Martin McDonagh, Three Billboards stars the great Frances McDormand as Mildred, a mother who is beyond frustrated with the local police force after months pass without her daughter’s case being solved. With help from three billboards expressing her anger, Mildred sets off a chain of events that pull the town into even deeper despair.

Tough, gritty and painful, Three Billboards is also darkly comical at times, and reminiscent of Crash. With no definable good vs. bad, Three Billboards is best as a character study, with raw performances from McDormand, Woody Harrelson and the rest of the cast. This Oscar-worthy film will also spark animated conversations with moviegoers. You may need a drink after this one.

Ypsilanti Mental Institution Setting for Dark Comedy Starring Richard Gere

THREE CHRISTS OF YPSILANTI, a movie starring Richard Gere, is currently premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival. In case you caught that last word in the movie’s title, you are correct in assuming that it is in reference to the city in Michigan which is located southeast of Ann Arbor, and home of Eastern Michigan University.

Based on a true story, and adapted from a book written by Milton Rokeach, the movie is set in the 60’s, and tells the story of a doctor who is treating three schizophrenic patients in the Ypsilanti State Hospital, each of whom believes he is Jesus Christ.

Two things…

How did I not hear about Richard Gere starring in a movie based on a true story that took place in Ypsilanti?! And how did I miss the book? While the movie is currently playing in Toronto, I certainly hope we’ll be able to see it closer to home. How about it, Waterfront Film Festival, or new theatre opening soon in Downtown Kalamazoo? Also starring Peter Dinklage and Julianna Margulies, THREE CHRISTS OF YPSILANTI should, if nothing else, deliver with great acting.

But more incredible, how in the world is it that I have never heard about the Ypsilanti State Hospital? The mental institution opened in 1931 and was designed for care of the insane and stayed open until 1991. The property was later demolished in 2008. As a frequent visitor to mental institutions, I’m surprised that I never spent time in the lobby of the Ypsilanti State Hospital, and more surprised that my mother wasn’t a guest at this fine establishment.

THREE CHRISTS OF YPSILANTI is described as an American drama / dark comedy… sounds right to me.

MLive article on the movie, along with a photo gallery of the Ypsilanti State Hospital can be found at http://bit.ly/2xbPHkI

The Glass Castle Review

And what the movie got wrong.

When I look at the Jackson Pollock painting, Autumn Rythm, I see a frantic chorus of dancing energy. Some fans of his work see a darker tone in the brushstrokes, while others call B.S., seeing his creative effort as gimmicky and without merit. No one viewpoint is right or wrong. It’s all in how you look at it, and what you draw from it.

The same can be said for the film adaptation of The Glass Castle. This bestselling novel by Jeanette Walls served as a popular read for many book clubs, and resonated with many readers who grew up in dysfunctional families. Film adaptations of popular books are often met with mixed reviews. While a book can delve deep into a story, the movie version must choose between what is essential and what elements can be left out without affecting the essence of the story.

In Walls’ memoir, she takes readers on a crazy ride that was her childhood. Along the way, we get to meet and understand her parents—a father who is an alcoholic and a mother suffering from mental illness. They both are fighting their individual demons, leaving the children to raise themselves. It can be safely said that neither should have had children, and together they make a toxic pair.

However, in the film adaptation, the decision was made to make Walls’ mother a secondary character—focusing instead on Jeannette and her rocky relationship with her father, portrayed in the film by Woody Harrelson who superbly expresses the angst of a man fighting his addiction.

What did the film get wrong? By erasing the mother’s struggle with mental illness, Naomi Watts as Jeannette’s mother, Rose Mary, is left portraying a character that lacks the depth and bite found in the novel, leaving a character that transcends into little more than wallpaper. It’s time for mental illness to be a front-burner story, and the film adaptation of the memoir misses on this point.

Like a Jackson Pollock painting, The Glass Castle movie will probably generate applause from some and the shaking of heads from others.

60 Second Movie Review

Heidi McCrary