Drama

Re-released on Home Video: The Last Samurai

/ / Home Video
  • Title: The Last Samurai
  • IMDb: link

The Last Samurai

Released in theaters in 2003, director and co-writer Edward Zwick‘s film stars Tom Cruise as a former U.S. Army captain slowly drinking himself to death while hiding from the ghosts of his past and the massacre of Indian tribes in the American West which his intelligence helped facilitate. Brought out of his stupor by his former commanding officer (Tony Goldwyn), Nathan Algren is given the opportunity to travel to Japan and instruct the Imperial Japanese Army in modern warfare to suppress a samurai uprising.

Through a twist of fate Algren is captured by the samurai and taken deep into the mountains where he spends the winter as a guest of Lord Moritsugu Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe) and living in the home of a woman (Koyuki) who his actions have turned into a widow. Algren and Katsumoto’s unlikely friendship is the cornerstone to the film as the pair learn, despite cultural differences, they have far more in common than either initially realizes.

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Gugu Mbatha-Raw is the Belle of the ball

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Belle
  • IMDB: link

BelleInspired by the 1779 painting of mixed-raced aristocrat Dido Elizabeth Belle (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) beside her white cousin Lady Elizabeth Murray (Sarah Gadon) with whom she was raised by her uncle William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield (Tom Wilkinson), Belle is an interesting look at a woman who grew up in lavish luxury but still searched long and hard for her true place both within her family and the wider world to whom she was seen as (at best) an outcast.

With no diary to draw directly from and only scattered reports of what the woman’s life would have been like under her uncle’s roof (such as not being allowed to dine with guests), screenwriter Misan Sagay certainly takes liberties with the story. At its best Belle is a strong character drama although it also devolves at several points into a time-period-specific romance novel. The rougher moments of Sagay’s tale are saved by the terrific performance of Gugu Mbatha-Raw who infuses the character with passion, strength, and a dogged determinedness which serves her well (but also gets her into spots of trouble).

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Transcendence

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Transcendence
  • IMDB: link

TranscendenceThe question about Transcendence isn’t if its eventual flaws will eventually cause you to lose interest but when. I’ll admit I was surprised, despite the ridiculous nature of what screenwriter Jack Paglen‘s script considers science, that by relying on some intriguing ideas and a solid cast the film kept me interested far longer than I expected. Of course that was before the movie went completely off the rails and crashed in a hideous and head-scratching mess.

Putting human intelligence in a machine is hardly anything new. Well before the invention of computers and the Internet sci-fi and horror authors were playing on the idea. The premise Paglen begins with is sound enough as several of the leaders in artificial intelligence are attacked by an a quasi-religous, sorta anti-technology (but not really) terrorist group. Although Will Caster (Johnny Depp) survives the initial attack, with only months left to live his wife (Rebecca Hall) and best friend (Paul Bettany) use their combined research to create an artificial intelligence out of his mind.

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The Family

/ / Home Video
  • Title: The Family
  • IMDB: link

The FamilyAfter mixed success in the low-rent action genre, writer/director Luc Besson turned his attention to dark comedy with 2013’s The Family. The results of an American mobster (Robert De Niro) and his family (Michelle Pfeiffer, Dianna Agron, John D’Leo) in Witness Protection in small town in Normandy, France, is actually better than some of Besson’s other recent efforts (such as Taken 2).

Centered mostly on the family’s inability to adapt to new surroundings yet again after being forced to relocate by the FBI agent (Tommy Lee Jones) in charge of their safety we see several instances of “The Blakes” using violence, intimidation, and even explosives to get what they want.

De Niro has fun with the mobster’s selfish actions involving attacking both a plummer and the head of a local chemical plant polluting the water supply while working on memoirs no one in the FBI ever wants to see the light of day. He even agrees to speak at a local film debate where his real personal experience comes in very handy.

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Noah

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Noah
  • IMDB: link

NoahObsessed with the story of Noah since he was 13 years-old, writer/director Darren Aronofsky finally sees his vision of a quasi-fantasy/religious take on the biblical tale of the Genesis flood crash into the big screen today like a tidal wave. Sadly, as the characters of Aronofsky’s films usually learn, obsession leads to trouble.

Noah is certainly a labor of love and quite a bit of talent went into the creation of Noah, the ark, and the flood which washed away the sin of man from the face of the Earth. Equally certain, despite the skill on display both in front and behind the camera, is the fact that Noah is a mess on the level of Waterworld. Its grand expectations and epic scale simply can’t find a way to balance its stark character study of a man fighting to do the will of his God against the film’s more fantastical and sci-fi elements which include fallen angels in the form of giant rock creatures, the existence and use of magic, and never-ending storyline that keeps going long after it’s jumped the rails and taken a nosedive into the watery abyss which consumes so many (nameless) characters.

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