Alan Rapp

Inside Llewyn Davis

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Inside Llewyn Davis
  • IMDB: link

Inside Llewyn DavisOver the years the Coen Brothers have used setting, music, and tone to tell a variety of tales. Lacking the broad comedic strokes of Burn After Reading or the darker undertones of No Country for Old Men and their True Grit remake, the brothers’ latest is a more straightforward and personal character study of life of a struggling artist. Thinking over their filmography you can say the Coens have produced funnier, stranger, more disturbing, and perhaps even more memorable films, but this immersive drama ranks as one of their best.

Set primarily in the Greenwich Village folk music scene of 1961, Inside Llewyn Davis follows the life of Llewyn Davis (Oscar Isaac), a known and liked (or at least tolerated) folk singer in his small circle and a real son of a bitch to nearly ever single person he knows. Over the film’s 105-minute running-time we witness Davis nomadically travel with his guitar, a carton of unsold records, and a friend’s cat as his only prized possessions.

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Saving Mr. Banks

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Saving Mr. Banks
  • IMDB: link

Saving Mr. BanksWritten by Kelly Marcel and Sue Smith, and based off pieces of the life of P.L. Travers (Emma Thompson), Saving Mr. Banks is half of a really good film. The story is broken into flashbacks of Travers’ childhood and decades later when Walt Disney (Tom Hanks) was attempting to buy the rights from the author’s children’s books to make Mary Poppins.

Although there is much to enjoy in the later Disney years (despite the oversimplification of Travers’ stubbornness) the film gets bogged down in the weight of the constant flashbacks which may offer a peek at the real story that first created Mary Poppins on the page but ignores much of the life story of the woman who wrote her.

The scenes involving the young Travers’ () drunken but imaginative father (Colin Farrell), troubled mother (Ruth Wilson), and larger-than-life aunt (Rachel Griffiths) fall in the realm of Dinsey-ized melancholy, but the scenes in California between the equally stubborn Disney and Travers provide its magic.

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American Hustle

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: American Hustle
  • IMDB: link

American HustleFor this 70’s tale of con men (Christian Bale and Amy Adams) in over their heads writer/director David O. Russell reunites with Silver Linings Playbook stars Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence. Part character study, part insane and over-the-top adventure, American Hustle offers audiences one of the year’s best films.

After a brief introduction to Irving Rosenfeld (Bale) and his mistress and co-conspirator Sydney (Adams), the pair are busted by up-and-coming FBI hot-head Richie DiMaso (Cooper) who decides to use the pair to pull in even bigger fish. Regardless of danger or consequences, and against the orders of his boss (Louis C.K.), DiMaso pushes Irving and Sydney into going after both the mob and local politicians, beginning with Mayor Carmine Polito (Jeremy Renner) who is interested in rebuilding Atlantic City.

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Worlds’ Finest #18

/ / Comics

Worlds' Finest #18After finding a way to temporarily de-power her out of control partner by dunking her in the East River, the Huntress still has to continue her search for the the super-powered tattoo killer (who DC Editorial has unfortunately decided to name “Tats”) who has a personal vendetta against the city’s more glamorous population. Meanwhile, Power Girl continues to try and get her bearings and come to grips with the fact that her powers are now completely out of control.

Because so much of the issue is spent resolving the cliffhanger and Huntress finding a way to stop her best-friend from going nuclear in the middle of the city, little progress is made in the search for their killer. However, the issue does introduce the woman’s boss, a priest of the demon Xazdi whose gifts have allowed her to wreak havoc in the city.

As always the best parts of the comic are the interactions between our two heriones which we get quite a bit of to both open and close the issue. I’m not sure where this Tats/Xazdi storyline is going but I’ll keep sticking around for more of Helena and Kara who next month are finally going to earn their first annual. Worth a look.

[DC, $2.99]

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G.I. JOE: Special Missions #10

/ / Comics

G.I. JOE: Special Missions #10The new four-part arc of the JOE’s Special Mission Force focuses on taking down Destro before he finishes perfecting his deadly new version of B.A.T. To do so Scarlett decides to pull Copperback out of maximum-security prison and enlist her help to track down the man responsible for killing Copperback’s father. Of course it doesn’t take long for the former Cobra operative to turn on Scarlett and her team and the ruins of Destro’s former stronghold.

I’m all in favor of a Destro-centric arc, and G.I. JOE: Special Missions #10 does a great job of selling me on the dangerous wild card Copperback represents. However, I am a bit confused when exactly the arc takes place as Destro just fell out of favor with Cobra (in fact Cobra Commander himself just led a raid of the weaponer’s home).

Despite the timing and continuity problems (why is the Baroness all of the sudden wearing a completely different version of her basic costume?), I’m looking forward to see where writer Chuck Dixon takes things from here. Worth a look.

[IDW, $3.99]

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