Ed's Review Dot Com

A+E Studios, Big Indie Pictures, Killer Films,

Kevin Kline, Dakota Fanning, Susan Sarandon, Max Casella, Jane McNeill, Bryan Batt, Matt Kane, Patrick St. Esprit, Jason Davis, Ric Reitz

As the film opens, Errol Flynn (Kevin Kline) has been reported to have died in the arms of his 4th wife, a young girl named Beverly Aadland (Dakota Fanning). Beverly’s mother, Florence (Susan Sarandon) is at the airport to meet her daughter when they are confronted by a host of reporters trying to get a glimpse of the girl who was with the famous actor when he died. The premise of the story is Florence’s attempt at fame herself, and perhaps the Hollywood mother a bit too push trying to get her daughter’s career going, has met a writer who wants to interview her about her daughter Beverly and the last days of Errol Flynn. The book is done without Beverly’s knowledge or consent, but via flashback, we get to see the entire story from the very beginning up until the time the book is released.

This is a biographical story. It seems that’s all I’ve been seeing lately, which is a bit odd, but that’s what it is. This is a bit sordid, but I must admit Susan Sarandon did an amazing job as Florence the Hollywood mom, who though she didn’t push her daughter into engagement with a movie star knows to have a thing for very young girls, she certainly enabled it when she had a chance to stop it. Kevin Kline is perhaps not the perfect choice for Errol Flynn, although he did a decent job of the role and kept it interesting. This is not his story anyway. Dakota Fanning, on the other hand, always seems to get into these roles. She’s playing a girl of 15 who has a fake birth certificate and is actually in the chorus line at Warner Brothers as a pretend 18 year old when Errol picks her out of the chorus and makes his predatory advance toward her. It is a bit creepy of a role, and I was never quite comfortable watching it, although I suppose since it’s really her mother’s view of the story, we have no way to know what’s true and what is the mother’s fantasy of the whole thing. All in all, it’s a bit slow, and painful to watch, and is not superbly done, but for an independent film, and a biography of the glory days of Hollywood after all, it’s not all bad. After watching the film, I researched some of the facts, and it seems like it was rather devastating time for Beverly, and despite her pleas to her mother, Florence just had to go through with the book for the fame and notoriety. It is a tragedy and a love story, and I don’t think any of the people in the story can be totally blamed for what happened, even the old lecher Errol Flynn himself who really seemed smitten by the girl, and certainly had the means to make it happen. This is a look at the seedy side of the old Hollywood studio days when movies were king.

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Fox 2000 Pictures, TSG Entertainment, Annapurna Pictures,

Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro, Bradley Cooper, Édgar Ramírez , Elisabeth Röhm, Dascha Polanco, Isabella Rossellini, Diane Ladd, Virginia Madsen

Joy (Jennifer Lawrence) is loosely based on the true story of Joy Mangano, a successful early TV marketer who built an empire on her own inventions. Joy is struggling with a broken family and trying to survive with all the crazy occupants of her house, when she determines to set out to make and sell the self wringing mop that she invented. Borrowing money from her father’s new beau, and he ex husband and even taking a 2nd mortgage on her house she sets out to pull off this miracle, but wading her way through the rough storm of the ruthless business world is about to take her down.

This is a loose biographical film based on the real Joy Mangano, but of course a lot of poetic license has been taken. Jennifer delivers a really stunning performance as the harried mom trying to make the best out of all the trouble, and Bradley Cooper is pretty decent as an executive at QVC who gives her a chance or two. Robert DeNiro offers some support as well as her father, giving advice right and left, but not being very coherent most of the time. All in all it’s a comedy of errors, and though it’s not a truly wonderful film, due to the weakness (I think) in the script itself, these actors did the best the could with a kind of flawed script, I think. Still, I did find it entertaining, and did not hate it like so many did. I didn’t find it boring, and to be honest, Jennifer Lawrence, I though, really nailed the role. She is really getting good these days. I found it pulling me into the story and enjoying the stages poor Joy had to go through to get tough enough to survive in this harsh environment we know as business. I recommend this film, and thought it wasn’t a bad film at all.

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Annapurna Pictures, Likely Story, Media Rights Capital,

Channing Tatum, Steve Carell, Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Michael Hall, Sienna Miller, Vanessa Redgrave

In 1999 the news screamed out the story of the richest man in history to be convicted of murder, when John DuPont (Steve Carell) heir to the DuPont chemical fortune was sent to prison for murdering David Schultz (Mark Ruffalo) in the driveway of DuPont’s guest house where he and his wife and children were living. The Schultz bothers, older brother David, and younger brother Mark (Channing Tatum) were a couple of the best gold medal winning wrestling champions in US History. This film is Mark’s story of how we met John DuPont and John’s efforts to buy his way into Olympic wrestling in a effort to maintain a level of importance. He opened the Foxcatcher facility and trained many US Olympic wrestlers there with the help of the Schultz brothers. This is the story of what happened and though we may never know why it happened, at least it is an interesting tale of the events of that day that shocked the country when the new came out.

This is an interesting biographical film. Like most Hollywood versions of true story, it is based upon the events that happened, but not absolutely true to all the facts. What we have though is a very strong cast acting their way through a fascinating story. Steve Carell was even nominated as best actor for his performance, a very somber role for the usually funny Mr. carell, but certenly within his wheelhouse for sure. Channing Tatum gave a really strong performance as did Mark Ruffalo. Even Vanessa Redgrave gave a charming performance as John DuPont’s mother, even though it’s very short. It is still a great performance. Critics of the film call it slow. It does certainly plod along, and at 2 hours and 15 minutes, it probably could have been shorter, but I didn’t find it boring at any point. The time was well used to develop the characteristics of each of these characters, and with the star cast, it takes time to fully develop that. In the end, even at over 2 hours running time, it feels like we’ve missed some of the facts, and it was off to Wikipedia to learn more about the story. I give credit to the writers, directors, and producers for presenting a great feature film on the subject, and am really impressed with the level of acting that went into it. I found it an interesting story, and recommend this film to those who enjoy biographical historical tales that are stranger than fiction.

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LD Entertainment, Affirm Films, Columbia Pictures,

Joseph Fiennes, Tom Felton, Peter Firth, Cliff Curtis

This is the tale of Lucius (Joseph Fiennes) a ranking Roman Tribune who was present when Jesus was crucified on the mountain. He was a witness to the death and burial in a tomb of the body. Under orders from Pontius Pilate (Peter Firth) after the urging of Caiaphas (Stephen Greif), Lucius orders guards around the tomb for three days to assure the the followers of Christ do not manage to steal the body to make people believe he has risen from the dead as he promised. When the body is missing, Lucius sets out to find the followers and solve the mystery, but he is certainly not ready for what he is about to learn.

This is a good solid film that covers the story of what happened after the resurrection of Christ and the following days until the Ascension and beyond when no one knew what was really happening. It is a historical tale and a biblical story, but seems to very well done. The story isn’t preachy in the least, and seems to feel much more like a documentary based on Lucius’ point of view. There are some outstanding characters. Kudos to Stewart Scudamore as Peter, who does a magnificent job. In fact, all of the characters are very good. The story is solid, somewhat “Hollywood-ized” at that, but still a very solid film. This is a film that could be enjoyed as a Roman historical drama without the buying into the religious overtones at all, but this was really made for the Christian believer who would enjoy the events following the crucifixion up through the Ascension. The cinematography is excellent, and the feel of the Holy Lands is very real. This is a wonderful story and this is a film that you might want to see, just for the experience that it gives you. I highly recommend this film for families and people of all ages.

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Conglomerate Media, Lensbern Productions,

Thomas Ian Nicholas, Jon Heder, David Henrie, Jodie Sweetin, Armando Gutierrez, Arthur L. Bernstein, Ayla Kell, Hunter Gomez, Taylor Gray, Kate Katzman, Flora Bonfanti

Based on the book of the same name, this film follows Walt Disney youthful dreams and plans through the hard years starting out as an animator and following his dreams through several huge failures before discovering a little fellow named Mickey and making the famous statement that “It all started with a mouse!”

I really enjoyed this film very much. I have always been a fan of Mr. Disney, especially since I was born at the right time when he was reaching the peak of his success. I was one that ran home from school every day to get there in time to watch the Mickey Mouse Club on TV each afternoon. During the years I worked at the studio, when I would walk through the Legends Plaza I would stop at the plaque with Annette Funicello’s name and handprints, as Annette was my first celebrity crush when I was 10 like everyone else my age. I have heard the early stories of Walt’s difficult life, and his attempts to learn the animation business that was just starting. He was taken advantage of by much wiser and more crooked corporate folks and learned the hard way that the only way to survive was to own his own content, a lesson that he never ever forgot through the rest of his too short life. Thomas Ian Nicholas did a superb job as Walt, and I was duly impressed. Jon Heder played Roy Disney, and was Jon Heder. Many people did not care for Jon’s portrayal, but Roy was not a very vibrant character in real life either, and was the much needed money man who kept Walt’s fantasy from soaring out of control and crashing and burning. Roy kept Walt under control and often held him back from being too out there by bringing it back home many times. There are so many stories and anecdotes from Walt’s life, so keep in mind that this is a very focused look at a decade from the time Walt set out on his own to be an animator until the first Mickey cartoon was finally shown. It does not cover the big animated successes, Disneyland, the Burbank studios, Disney and all those things which are very well documented in many other films, particularly Disney’s own “The Reluctant Dragon” which shows the whole process in great detail at the new studios in Burbank (at the time). This film looks at live in Marceline, and Kansas City, and Walt’s first Laugh-o-gram studios. It follows the trip to California and the final setting up of the Hyperion Ave studio. Most of the time the guys worked out of a garage. It also helps us to get to know many of the early guys who worked with Walt to build his studios, many of which were lifetime friends and companions, and some who back-stabbed him and left to work for other companies. No one was as successful in the end as Walt was, but there were many hard times along the way. This film is available for streaming now that it’s been released on DVD and is easy to find. Aside for the great historical information, the film is also a heart-warming story of how sticking to your hopes and dreams can pay off with lots of hard work and willingness to fail before you can succeed. This was an excellent film, and I highly recommend it to all who may be interested.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog