Ed's Review Dot Com

IFC Productions, Detour Filmproduction,

Ellar Coltrane, Ethan Hawke, Patricia Arquette, Lorelei Linklater

Mom (Patricia Arquette) and Dad (Ethan Hawke) have been divorced, but they still want to share raising their young son Mason (Ellar Coltrane) and his sister. This film is Mason’s story, following his life and development (and relationship to his parents) over the years from him as a young boy until he go away to his Freshman year in college. It’s a peek at the family events, changes, challenges, and other happenings during Mason’s young life.

This movie was filmed over a 12 year period using the same cast in order to actually have the people grow older as time really passes. This is a really touching story. Through different years in his life he grows closer to one parent or the other as dynamics change as people change. As you would expect, Mom does most of the child rearing, and Dad comes in on the weekend to treat the kids and bring presents much to the dismay of Mom. We literally get to see Mason grow up before our eyes as the years pass. One warning, this is a LONG movie. It runs almost 3 hours and you might do well to break this up into a couple viewings. Also, there is not a particular beginning or end, nor is there a real point to the story. This project is more about peeking in and watching the changes in everyone as the years pass. Sometimes it annoys me when there is no point, but just a camera pointing into someone’s lives. In the end, Mason goes away to live in the dorm in school, and the credits just roll. But on the other hand, this film has a very interesting concept to begin with, so it didn’t annoy me so much to just have it end without an point. I started this movie late in the evening, and stuck with it all the way to the end. I found it very interesting and was very caught up in the changing relationships. This is a very unusual movie, and is very worth the 2 hour and 45 minute investment. I think this is a good one to watch if you’ve ever been a son, or a mom or dad. I recommend this one.

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Screen Australia, Screen Queensland, Blacklab Entertainment,

Ethan Hawke, Noah Taylor, Sarah Snook, Freya Stafford, Cate Wolfe, Christopher Kirby, Madeleine West,

The Barkeep (Ethan Hawke) is actually a Temporal Agent (an undercover government group that uses time travel to go back and fix problems in time). He meets a young man named John (Sarah Snook) who tells him her story of how she was raised as a orphaned girl, but she was actually born with both sexes and a problem in her only pregnancy forced the doctors to choose on her behalf to turn her into a male. But the Barkeep is interested in recruiting her as a Temporal Agent and having John/Jane help him in fixing things so that he could capture and thwart the “Fizzle Bomber” who was causing havoc in the city. This complicated time travel journey is a complex film, based on the 1958 short story “All You Zombies” by Robert Heinlein, a well known science fiction piece that has taken decades to come to the screen.

First off, watch every minute of this film. It is very slow starting, and hard to pick up all the details you need to solve they mystery. The moment I finished it, I wanted to restart it, but I waiting until the next morning and watched it again. It’s an awesome, mind-blowing story. I am a sucker for time-travel stories, but this one really had me going. Many people miss the primary purpose of the story, but the title is Predestination. So the main focus is how no matter what we want to change, we end up on the path we’re supposed to. That doesn’t mean going back in time doesn’t change the future, but the world levels out in the end. The story is very complex, and the relationship of all the characters are important to understanding the story, but it’s a very cerebral and well constructed story. Ethan Hawke is really fantastic in this film, but Sarah Snook completely steals the show. Her performance is certainly Oscar worthy, and compared to Cate Blanchett playing Bob Dylan in “I’m Not There”, Sarah is 100 times better. This actress has impressed the heck out of me.

As teens, we spent many weekends and evening talking about the paradoxes and the possibilities of time travel. This story has a lot of paradoxes in it, and you can argue from now till eternity over the validity of the theories. But this movie is about Predestination, not about time travel paradox, and you’d need a time machine to have enough time to finish discussion about whether or not it’s even possible. Don’t waste you time with that, but enjoy this story for the wild and intriguing Sci-Fi treasure it is. There is certainly enough other topics in this movie to discuss. This is certainly one of my favorite films of the year and one that will make me think for a while! Now I can’t wait to read the original story!

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Universal Pictures, Platinum Dunes, Blumhouse Productions,

Lena Headey, Ethan Hawke, Max Burkholder, Edwin Hodge, Adelaide Kane, Tony Oller, Rhys Wakefield, Tom Yi

The world has grown bigger and badder, and the population of rowdy trouble-making gangs and punks has risen to a level where the government has determined that for a 12 hour period once every year, there should be a night called “The Purge” where the baddies can release their pent up energy and enjoy stealing, killing, raping, and just about any depravity without any interference. Hospitals and ambulances do not respond, the Police are all holed up safely at home, and there are no emergency services of any kind, and everything is legal. One suburban family is relatively well off, and they’ve installed a security system that is impenetrable. It turns out the husband sells such systems, much to the dismay of the rest of the neighborhood who feel like they have given all the money in the neighborhood to him for similar security systems. But though they think they’re safe, when a man arrives screaming for help, they accidentally take in the target of a gang of bullies. The situation escalates as they decide how to deal with the situation that none of them make live through the night to witness.

The Purge is one of those movies that appeared interesting to me when I saw the previews. Then it came and went like a flash. I saw a preview for the sequel, The Purge: Anarchy, and it made we wonder if the original had ever come out. I found that I had totally missed it somehow. I wanted to see it for curiosities sake prior to seeing the sequel. So I dropped it into my queue. I was pleasantly surprised by this film. It’s short, and to the point, and the concept is rather unique. The Purge is suspenseful and really creepy. It’s edge of your seat suspense. It’s not really overboard on the horror element, but has lots of scenes of people sneaking around and hiding out. The acting is pretty good. Lena Headey and Ethan Hawke are really good, and the whole setup is filled with dread. I was happy I took the time out to watch this film, as it was rather unique in the way it dealt with the subject. It certainly is a long night waiting for the dawn.

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Dark Castle Entertainment, After Dark Films,

Ethan Hawke, Selena Gomez, Jon Voight, Rebecca Budig, Paul Freeman, Bruce Payne, Ivailo Geraskov, Dimo Alexiev, Velislav Pavlov, Kaloaian Vodenicharov

Brent Magna (Ethan Hawke) is a washed up race car driver whose wife has been kidnapped by a mysterious foe who calls every shot. He steals a car and heads off on a high speed chase following the commands of the villain who is giving him every turn. But when he gets hijacked by a young girl known as “The Kid” (Selena Gomez) the two team up to try to defeat the evil villain before it’s too late for his wife.

I should have hated this film. I’ve even seen it nominated for the Razzie for worst picture with Selena Gomez nominated as worst actress. I actually enjoyed it. I’m not sure why, but it was an exciting story, and I think Selena did a great job in this role. She played what she was given, and she’s supposed to be some hacker kid nerd, which she pulled off pretty good. The action was good, and though the ending was really silly, I thought, the rest of the film was interesting. I enjoyed the high speed driving, and the suspense. There are some ridiculous premises of how the guy can know what he does, and give them the commands, time after time, at the last second, but that’s part of the fun of the film. You can’t watch a chase film and expect it to be totally realistic any more than the crazy car commercials with “expert drivers on a closed track” are realistic. But if you just go into it watching the speed and the tension, it’s a half way decent film. I’m not sorry I chose to watch this one, and I think they did a pretty decent job.

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Millenium Films

Richard Gere, Don Cheadle, Ethan Hawke, Wesley Snipes

This is a well told story about 3 cops.  Each has a different problem and is in a bad way.  Richard Gere’s character is a week from retirement and burned out and just tired.  Ethan Hawke is trying to be a good cop and support his family, but no matter what he does, he can’t seem to get ahead.  Don Cheadle has been undercover for so long that he’s not sure who he is anymore.  The three come together at the same place and the stories come together in a fairly predictable, but still very exciting way.   The nice thing about this movie is that it is a great character study.  You get to learn enough about the characters to understand the reason behind the choices they make.

I must say I’m a bigger fan of the character’s in this movie, than the actors themselves.  I haven’t seen such a good performance out of Richard Gere in a long time, and I’m a big fan of either Ethan or Don, but perhaps it’s a tribute to the writer and the director to get such good performances out of this bunch, because the characters are really well developed.  Not the greatest movie of all time, but I enjoyed watching it.

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