Movie review by Greg Carlson

The indomitable Laura Poitras adds to her fascinating filmography with “Risk,” a years-in-the-making (and unmaking) portrait of WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange, beginning prior to his retreat into the embassy of Ecuador in London under threat of eventual extradition to the United States. Less immediate and urgent than her Oscar-winner “Citizenfour,” “Risk” continues the filmmaker’s investigation of the post-9/11 conditions of the widespread and largely unchecked illegal surveillance state and the often shocking countermeasures of whistleblowers like Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden, both of whom factor significantly in this film.

The principal portrait, however, is made of Assange, and the 2017 version presented by Showtime differs from the original cut that Poitras debuted at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival. Anyone with an interest in the ongoing saga of WikiLeaks presumably knows the broad strokes of much of the timeline presented in “Risk,” but Jim Rutenberg’s April 9, 2017 “New York Times” article offers an indispensable explanation of the substantive way in which the movie changed following its premiere. Rutenberg writes of how allegations of sexual misconduct leveled at “privacy activist” Jacob Appelbaum, a man with whom Poitras was briefly involved, triggered modifications to the film.

In “Risk,” Poitras narrates entries from what she refers to as her “production journal,” revealing ways in which she must constantly sort out issues stemming from the interpersonal relationships that have developed from the highly unusual circumstances of her years-long production process. A number of critics have voiced concerns about the kind of access Poitras has enjoyed with this circle of subjects, questioning the limits of journalistic objectivity, such as it is — especially in light of Poitras disclosing in the film her romantic relationship with Appelbaum.  

In the “Washington Post,” Alyssa Rosenberg asks several important questions, including “Should I interpret this disclosure as a blanket statement of belief in women who come forward with sexual assault allegations? Do I trust Poitras less for getting involved with one of her subjects, or more for her transparency? Do I see Poitras primarily as a journalist or an artist or something in between, and depending on which one I choose, how should this revelation make me feel about her work?” That last question won’t bother the viewer who recognizes all approaches to filmmaking — fiction, nonfiction, cinema verite, advocacy, editorial, journalism, etc. — as constructed texts.

Positions of visual philosophy and moviemaking ethics aside, Poitras manages a feat of penetration most documentary filmmakers would envy. Assange’s transition from sprawling countryside estate to the narrow, cell-like compartments of the embassy is fascinating, especially when the typically icy and unflappable celebrity works out with a personal trainer in a space the size of a large closet or agrees to be interviewed by Lady Gaga. “Risk” ends by bringing the viewer up to date, fleetingly, on the terrifying saga of Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential election contest between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Poitras concludes this particular story prior to revelations that Assange and WikiLeaks provided direct advice, help, and support to the Trump campaign, and then lied about doing so. Perhaps that tale will be told in a future film.    

Movie review by Greg Carlson

On the occasion of the Netflix release of “One of Us,” veteran filmmakers Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady shared with writer Kate Erbland some of the self-imposed “rules” to their formidable approach. The documentarians indicated that potential subjects must offer rare and special access. They also make sure that the content includes “observational, verite material” along the order of high-stakes events unfolding in the here and now. The directors expect that the “characters be different by act three.” Participants in the film do not see footage during production and are not allowed “any editorial input.”      

“One of Us” follows three individuals who have left or are in the process of leaving the strict community of New York City’s Hasidic Jews to which they once so inextricably belonged. Etty, no longer willing or able to suffer physical and emotional violence at the hands of her husband, fears the loss of her seven children and struggles with the potentially catastrophic financial burden of a protracted court battle in which the deck appears to be stacked against her. Teenage Ari yearns for knowledge of the greater, wider world. He gushes about the singular thrill of exploring Wikipedia. Finally, Luzer has tested the waters in Los Angeles, where he hopes to find work as an actor (his passion born from clandestine viewings of forbidden movies).

The emotional weight of the film — and its most chilling drama — resides in the sections focused on Etty. Etty (her last name deliberately withheld) attends a support group called Footsteps, but it becomes clear as time passes that defiance of the Hasidic leadership is a seemingly Sisyphean endeavor. As David Edelstein points out in his essay on the film, the Hasidim “…do not believe that secular laws should affect them.” The portrait of Etty emerges as the film’s centerpiece, and she alone could easily have sustained interest for an entire feature.  

For so many audience members, “One of Us” gets close to something that would otherwise be foreign, hidden, and obscure. And yet, the filmmakers locate universally human desires and experiences to which anyone can relate. Overt vilification of the leadership within the patriarchal structure of Brooklyn’s orthodox community is withheld, although the vast majority of secular (and scores of religious) viewers won’t require much persuasion to imagine that the treatment of Etty, Ari, and Luzer is brutal and unfair.

One of the most intriguing scenes in the film records an interaction between Ari and an older community member at a playground known to be a popular hangout for youngsters who like the location’s free wifi access. The elder, unknowingly providing Grady and Ewing with the title of their film, asks Ari, “Are you one of us?” The question is sincere, since Ari has cut his payot but still wears a yarmulke. The exchange is a vivid demonstration of just how difficult it can be for a member to leave as well as a specific reminder of the painful feelings of abandonment and rejection that accompany the liminal state when one is neither completely in nor completely out.

Movie review by Greg Carlson

On her biggest canvas to date, filmmaker Dee Rees paints a vivid picture of two American families in “Mudbound,” a deeply satisfying drama based on Hillary Jordan’s 2008 novel. Adapting the screenplay with collaborator Virgil Williams, Rees skillfully weaves a tale that dissects and addresses race, war, poverty, alcoholism, adultery, post-traumatic stress disorder, and other substantive themes. She does this with tremendous confidence and focus, retaining the novel’s multiple narrators and infusing each significant character with the fullness of human contradiction and complexity.

The two principal groups of relatives, one black and one white, are linked together by their commitment to a tough patch of cotton farmland in the Mississippi Delta in the years surrounding World War II. Both clans, the McAllans and the Jacksons, face hardships and humiliations, but the specter of Jim Crow additionally burdens the latter. Sharecroppers always a step or two behind the poor McAllans (for whom they labor), the Jackson family is led by Florence (Mary J. Blige) and Hap (Rob Morgan). The land they work has been purchased by Henry McAllan (Jason Clarke), who moves with his wife Laura (Carey Mulligan), their two daughters, and his noxiously racist father Pappy (Jonathan Banks) into a spartan hovel with no running water.

In his review of the film, Justin Chang notes, “The radicalism of ‘Mudbound’ thus lies in its inherently democratic sensibility, its humble, unapologetic insistence on granting its black and white characters the same moral and dramatic weight.” This balance is achieved not only through the physical proximity that binds the Jacksons and McAllans despite the social conventions of systematized segregation that prevent anything approaching open affection or neighborliness, but also through the rich details of the unspoken rules of behavior in the Deep South. Chang also remarks that Florence “commands more authority and respect in her household than Laura does in hers” — another example of the highly detailed way in which Rees explores the intricacies of gender.

The two matriarchs are additionally connected to one another in ways specific to womanhood. Florence is simply not in a position to say no when essentially conscripted to come work for Laura following a whooping cough scare. Outwardly less demanding than either of their husbands, the women find ways to assist one another that carefully exist within strict, unspoken guidelines. But as Emily Yoshida astutely notes, “Without the aid of institutionalized slavery, and seemingly without knowing it, Henry and Laura have completely co-opted their neighbors’ lives,” which in one sense is even more insidious than the visible, open racism spewed by Pappy.

Rees directs all the members of her talented ensemble to uniformly impressive work. Garrett Hedlund as Henry’s brother Jamie and Jason Mitchell as Florence and Hap’s son Ronsel — the two men who see combat — eventually move to the center of the action. Both return to the United States following military service, and their unique and peculiar experience, accompanied by firsthand knowledge of instant, brutal death, allows the pair to form an unlikely friendship. Loyalty to kin brings them home, but in a very real sense made achingly tangible by Rees, it’s too late: the bigotry, ignorance, and narrowness of the community suffocates these two souls, and the longer they remain on the farm, the more the stormclouds of tragedy gather.

Movie review by Greg Carlson

With the critical phenom “Lady Bird,” Greta Gerwig makes good on her stated desire to “offer a female counterpart to tales like ‘The 400 Blows’ and ‘Boyhood.’” A shimmering coming of age chronicle featuring another tremendous performance by Saoirse Ronan, “Lady Bird” is steeped in a kind of nostalgia for the recent past without ever knuckling to the overly familiar. Ronan’s smart, original Christine “Lady Bird” McPherson is an heir to Molly Ringwald’s unforgettable 1980s heroines. And like Andie Walsh and Samantha Baker, Ms. Lady Bird projects that exquisite mixture of sharp-tongued wisdom and frustrated naivete.  

You needn’t have been in your teens around the turn of the most recent century to feel the tug of Gerwig’s beautifully realized period piece, but the filmmaker’s visual and audio selections will thrill viewers who acknowledge the lifeforce of the teenage soundtrack. From the drive-in platters of “American Graffiti” to the John Hughes-favored beat of sparkling British pop by OMD, the Psychedelic Furs, and the Smiths, the right song selection can cement the bona fides of a cinematic love letter. In Amanda Petrusich’s “New Yorker” essay “Greta Gerwig Somehow Redeems Dave Matthews Band’s ‘Crash Into Me,’” the author delivers a solid defense of the inclusion — in two key places — of the 1996-1997 song. That track, along with Justin Timberlake and Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, walk the tightrope of ironic kitschiness and earnest affection.

Gerwig’s original, whopping 350-page script existed under the working title “Mothers and Daughters,” and the filmmaker gets tremendous mileage from ideal mom Laurie Metcalf as the tough-love matriarch holding everything together while the rest of her family members struggle to chart a positive course. Metcalf’s Marion McPherson applies her skill as a psychiatric nurse to the delicate homefront issues facing laid-off husband Larry (Tracy Letts) as he struggles to find work. The tug-of-war between Marion and Christine/Lady Bird is at the heart of the film, and conveys the depths of resentment and irritation (and love) between parent and child (Marion: “I just want you to be the very best version of yourself.” Lady Bird: “But what if this is the best version?”).  

Reading between the lines of Lady Bird’s anti-Sacramento application essay, the surprisingly forward-thinking Sister Sarah Joan (Lois Smith) recognizes the student’s potential, and will go easy on her following a Bride of Christ prank that most movie nuns would never tolerate (the gung-ho coach recruited to direct the school play is treated much more broadly). Gerwig mostly downplays the private parochial school angle, shifting focus to Lady Bird’s education in romance. Scenes with hot-list actors Lucas Hedges and Timothee Chalamet are highlights, and if Lady Bird wasn’t so utterly and completely captivating in all her other elements, you might wish to see additional interactions with the flawed beaux.

Gerwig launches many of the expected devices of the classic teen film: dual suitors, should-I-stay-or-should-I-go college choices, a mistreated best friend (complete with righteous forgiveness/make-up opportunity totally rocked by the awesome Beanie Feldstein), alcohol-related rites of passage, prom dresses, virginity-loss experience, and so on. The director, however, casts a sympathetic eye on the lot, making “Lady Bird” a sumptuous exercise in personalizing and particularizing the universal.

Movie review by Greg Carlson

Sean Baker’s gorgeous “The Florida Project” skitters and scampers like the attention span of its tiny protagonist Moonee (Brooklynn Prince), a six-year-old wonderer/wanderer who lives with her mom in a sketchy motel imaginatively named the Magic Castle. Situated on the fringes of Disney’s Orlando empire, the Magic Castle houses many souls who may be down but are not entirely out. Resident manager Bobby (Willem Dafoe) is the caretaker who takes care — a decent human being often acting as the enterprise’s Saint Christopher, watching out for the itinerant, temporary inhabitants who pay their rent in cash.

Baker expands on the mesmerizing qualities he brought to 2015’s “Tangerine,” his breakout feature that transcended the buzz of being captured entirely on a trio of iPhone 5s smartphones. This time, the eye-popping 35mm motion picture photography by Alexis Zabe heralds the saturated muchness of Moonee’s point of view. Along with the novelty architecture of Orange World, Twistee Treat, and the tourist trap souvenir shop adorned with a massive wizard, the vivid landmarks that populate “The Florida Project” reflect the make-your-own-fun curiosity that is juiced more than a little bit by the lack of adult supervision.  

In an interview with Max Cea for “Salon,” Baker’s longtime collaborator Chris Bergoch explained that he pitched the movie’s premise to Baker after he spotted “kids playing whiffle ball in a motel parking lot, at the edge of the busy highway” while on his way to visit his mother in Kissimmee, Florida. Bergoch, who co-wrote and co-produced “The Florida Project,” recognized the juxtaposition: children unable to afford the Magic Kingdom were experiencing an equal amount of merriment. That spirit translates to the movie: in one hysterical scene, “punished” Moonee and her friends take just as much pleasure cleaning up a vehicle as they did spitting on it.

“The Florida Project” is one of the best films of the year, and in their roundup of top titles for “Vulture,” critics David Edelstein and Emily Yoshida echo the sentiments expressed by Bergoch: an “insistence that joy, no matter how fleeting, be accessible to everyone regardless of socioeconomic status.” Bobby’s unflappable stoicism never veils his genuine concern. In one scene, he chases off an interloper who exhibits a potentially predatory interest in the Magic Castle children, but Bobby is equally committed to the welfare of his guests in the day-to-day grind of broken ice machines, power outages, and police visits.    

Deep into the film, when things are looking particularly bleak for Moonee’s mom Halley (Bria Vinaite), Bobby claims that he doesn’t want to be Halley’s father. As the limits of Bobby’s benevolence are challenged, “The Florida Project” builds to a sensational climax. A brilliant piece of editing and story construction that begins with a simple shot of Moonee in the bath is equaled only by the film’s astonishing final minutes, a guerilla-style, fair use exclamation point that for some viewers will call to mind “Escape from Tomorrow.” Baker’s ends, however, speak to a different agenda, and “The Florida Project” joins the list of great movies in which the innocence of childhood crashes into the hardships of growing up.   

Movie review by Greg Carlson

Putting to good use his affinity for period detail, filmmaker Todd Haynes tackles Brian Selznick’s 639-page “Wonderstruck,” with a screenplay adapted by the author. Weaving together a pair of New York stories that take place half a century apart, Haynes exploits the most cinematic possibilities of Selznick’s visually inclined novel. Many movie fans will respond favorably to the movie’s dialogue-free homage to silent-era entertainment, a major component of the film aided by Carter Burwell’s terrific score, Edward Lachman’s stunning photography, and Mark Friedberg’s lovely production design. Others will cozy up to the twinship of the compound narrative — even if the surprise that links 1927 and 1977 is figured early and easily.

In 1977, twelve-year-old Ben (Oakes Fegley) loses his ability to hear when a lightning strike jolts the telephone line. His mom (Michelle Williams) has died in a car accident, and Ben yearns to track down the father he never knew. Fifty years earlier, Rose (Millicent Simmonds) skips out on her guardians and makes her way to the theatre where movie star Lillian Mayhew (Julianne Moore) rehearses a play. The ensuing structure of the film carefully rhymes, echoes, mirrors, and parallels the two strands until they inevitably intersect in the final act. Moore plays more than one role and Haynes marks another rewarding collaboration with his longtime friend. Williams, however, is painfully underutilized; one keeps hoping she will feature in flashbacks that never materialize.

That cross-cut approach works effectively, although a minor pang of disappointment may settle once the action eventually centralizes the 1977 adventure. Both Ben and Rose, for reasons that come to be explicated, are magnetically drawn to the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan. The allure of publicly exhibited artifacts and curiosities assumes a position of thematic prominence as the story unfolds, and several characters work in some capacity or other in the realm of institutional curation, collection, and/or design.

The museum as motif works its charms, and echoes of “From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler” resonate here much as they did in “The Royal Tenenbaums.” Equally as valuable is the manner in which Haynes builds a subjective experience that takes the viewer inside the perspectives of Ben and Rose. The soundscape, the score, and the lengthy stretches in which few words are spoken especially complement the 1927 world inhabited by Rose. Simmonds, like the character she plays, is deaf. “Wonderstruck” is sound-designed for audience members who can hear. But Haynes admirably and capably projects dimensions of Rose’s experience.  

“Wonderstruck” ultimately works better than “Hugo,” Martin Scorsese’s 2011 take on Selznick’s “The Invention of Hugo Cabret.” Both films, however, labor overtime to instill a sense of awe that might rely too heavily on plot mechanics and technical showmanship than on richness of character. They are also highly reflexive valentines to cinephilia, and “Daughter of the Storm,” the movie-within-the-movie that features Moore’s Mayhew as a Lillian Gish-like presence dealing with peril ala “Way Down East,” “Orphans of the Storm,” and “The Wind,” flickers to life with such intensity, one longs to join Simmonds in the audience to screen the entire thing.     

Movie review by Greg Carlson

Noah Baumbach’s “The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected)” comforts fans of the filmmaker like a favorite quilt or a pair of old slippers. Sterling production and an all-star cast could attract the uninitiated to the film’s home on Netflix, and longtime appreciators will laugh and wince at many of Baumbach’s favorite observations on family rivalries, aging (un)gracefully, and personal and professional failures. Centered around a meaty performance by Dustin Hoffman that soothes the sting of the majority of the legendary actor’s work over the past decade plus — including multiple Fockers and Kung Fu Panda turns — “The Meyerowitz Stories” smartly balances the universal and the specific.

Hoffman’s Harold Meyerowitz, a cantankerous sculptor who never received the level of fame he thought he deserved, stares down the twilight. An oft-wed professor enthralled by the sound of his own voice and the weight of his opinionated pronouncements, “the Dad” — as he is called by his current wife — withholds affection, plays favorites, and repeats old jokes with the expectation of slavish devotion. Son Danny (Adam Sandler in his most heartfelt and affecting performance since “Punch-Drunk Love” in 2002) and daughter Jean (Elizabeth Marvel), are used to living in Harold’s shadow. Half-sibling Matthew (Ben Stiller) returns to New York after years of self-exile in California.   

Several critics have pointed out the superficial similarities between the “bad dads” patriarchy of Hoffman’s Meyerowitz and Gene Hackman in Baumbach collaborator Wes Anderson’s “The Royal Tenenbaums.” The structural parallels manifest most acutely in the heartache experienced by adult children coming home and still seeking love and approval from their father. The Meyerowitz kids don’t share the stylized expressionism of Anderson’s one-time child geniuses, whose brilliance “had been erased by two decades of betrayal, failure and despair,” but Baumbach has long explored the rough terrain of broken marriages and difficult parenting.  

Despite the dominating presence of the Hoffman, Stiller, Sandler trio, many of the great joys of “The Meyerowitz Stories” are attached to Grace Van Patten as Danny’s daughter Eliza, Marvel’s Jean, and Emma Thompson as Harold’s dipsomaniac spouse Maureen. None of the women are granted the screen time or depth of characterization afforded the central group of men, but each makes the most of what’s on offer. Van Patten, whose impressive work in Adam Leon’s captivating “Tramps” hinted at things to come, radiates an insouciance that secretly masks Eliza’s desire to follow in her grandfather’s artistic footsteps (Anthony Lane calls her “a sort of cool Cordelia” to Harold’s “neighborhood Lear”).

Eliza’s first-year Bard film class assignments, a series of experimental hard-R shorts ripe with tongue-in-cheek pretentiousness and pissed-off critiques of sexual double standards, provide one of the movie’s funniest running gags. As art school parody and source of awkward group viewing, Eliza’s movies — populated with Little Red Riding Hood, the Big Bad Wolf, and the hermaphroditic superhero Pagina-Man — comment indirectly on the theme of growing up and moving on. Later, in a fascinating scene that Anne Cohen has incisively deconstructed, Jean reveals a secret from the past that triggers a curious reaction by her brothers. That chapter of the film introduces additional food for thought on issues of gender dynamics, and will bring some viewers back for second and third looks.           

Movie review by Greg Carlson

Veteran “American Masters” producer and series creator Susan Lacy, whose access to subjects and breadth of knowledge is the envy of scores of documentarians, looks at Steven Spielberg in a nearly two-and-a-half hour long portrait for HBO. Simply titled “Spielberg,” the movie is surprisingly safe, conservative, and risk-free. Populated with an endless supply of close-up talking heads and anchored by the famous filmmaker’s own on-camera commentary — with many of the anecdotes offered up for what feels like the umpteenth time — Lacy’s result plays like the television equivalent of the Eagles’ multi-platinum greatest hits collection.

For cinephiles, the make-it-or-die-trying determination of the nerdy kid who sneaked and bluffed his way (“print the legend”) to a Universal gig as the youngest ever contract director at a major Hollywood studio is familiar. Really familiar. Even so, an undeterred Lacy’s first in-depth dive is “Jaws,” and the resulting re-cap sets the tone for the remainder of the show. Sustained Jawsmania has already given birth to Laurent Bouzereau’s 1995 making-of doc, Erik Hollander’s 2007 “The Shark Is Still Working,” and Jamie Benning’s 2013 “Inside Jaws,” but the mogul and the great white shark are like peanut butter and jelly: unthinkable to separate, despite the oceans of existing records.

And so it goes. “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” form a one-two punch between a “movie brats” roster breakdown accompanied by home-movie film and a note on Spielberg’s magic touch with child actors. The latter, punctuated by a behind-the-scenes clip of the director’s grimace into the camera while comforting a sobbing Drew Barrymore, recognizes the fraught terrain of emotional manipulation by directors looking to acquire the perfect shot by any means necessary. A thought from Leonardo DiCaprio hints at a more complex exploration of the matter, but Lacy moves on.

More big dogs are lined up for veneration, with “Schindler’s List” and “Jurassic Park” each receiving predictable scrutiny, but to her credit Lacy introduces a few unexpected surprises. A short but refreshing account of “1941” is one early, albeit rare, example that Spielberg could stumble hard. Even more satisfying is the way in which Lacy covers the director’s inability and/or unwillingness to dig more deeply into the relationship between Shug and Celie in “The Color Purple,” as Spielberg blushes at the very notion that his adaptation could have included the mirror scene. Ultimately, any more serious considerations of race and sexuality fail to make the cut.                  

Lacy also skirts most charges of Spielberg’s tendencies toward sentimentality, but a handful of acknowledgements, including one by Tom Stoppard, turn up. A lukewarm appraisal of whether massive commercial success and blockbuster appeal preclude the possibility of artistic merit hovers at the fringes, and J. Hoberman — one of several critics invited to participate in the movie — tantalizingly assesses the value of Spielberg’s apparent humanist neutrality in “Munich,” referring to the filmmaker as “the Hollywood equivalent of a public intellectual.” It is also during the section on “Munich” that Lacy demonstrates Spielberg’s potent sense of spatial orientation. Without specifically invoking Hitchcock or mentioning the privileged viewer, Spielberg argues soundly on behalf of suspense.

Overall, however, Lacy pays very little attention to Spielberg’s directorial technique ala the “pure cinema” discussed by Kevin B. Lee in “The Spielberg Face.” Thematic approaches, especially those concerned with divorce and the dissolution/reunification of the family fare much better, and Lacy makes excellent use of Spielberg’s sisters Nancy, Anne, and Sue, as well as father Arnold (currently 100 years old) and mother Leah Adler (who died in February), to underline the biographical touches to which Martin Scorsese alludes when describing Spielberg’s oeuvre as deeply personal.