Review of It's Complicated"

Things aren't really all that complicated in "It's Complicated."

Everyone's white.

Everyone's fabulously wealthy.

The kids are perfect.

Every meal is a feast.

And dessert is lavender-honey ice cream.

Give me a break.

In "It's Complicated," writer-director Nancy Meyers ("Something's Gotta Give") spins a fantasy that makes "The Lord of the Rings" look like a documentary.

The fantasy is obviously aimed at baby boomer females, and while there's nothing wrong with targeting that audience, this film has the feel of the California wealthy tossing crumbs of hope to the teeming masses, who can only wish they had the life up on screen.

The life up on screen belongs to Jane (Meryl Streep), mother to three grown children with straight teeth and no apparent means of livelihood. Maybe someone pays them to sparkle.

Jane owns an incredibly successful bakery, her home is more an estate than a house, and she gets together every week for wine with her three bestest friends, where they gab and move the plot along.

The only thing Jane doesn't have is a husband; her ex, Jake (Alec Baldwin), left 10 years back. He's now married to a beautiful younger woman (Lake Bell), cue the boos and hisses.

But while attending the graduation of their youngest sparkling offspring, Jake and Jane find themselves having fun. And then they find themselves in bed. Suddenly, Jane is her ex-husband's mistress.

And wouldn't you know it, along comes another fabulously wealthy guy, Adam (Steve Martin), with eyes for Jane.

By the way, Adam is an architect who is designing the kitchen of Jane's dreams. Never mind that the kitchen she already has is just a bit smaller than a gymnasium.

So, to recap, ladies: You can be an awesome cook; your kids can be perfect; you're sexier than that younger woman; you can run your own business; fabulously wealthy and attractive men will vie for your attention; and you can get a kitchen the size of the Taj Mahal. In other words, you can have it all, even at this late date.

Doesn't that seem just a bit desperate?

The truth is, Meyers knows how to write good comic scenes, and there are plenty of them in this film. And it's freaking Streep, Baldwin and Martin -- so, of course, they're wonderful and funny.

But all this grand talent goes to waste in what is essentially a morally repugnant work.

Why did all these people have to be so rich, especially considering the harsh economic realities of today?

Wouldn't Jane's moral dilemmas have played out just as well if she was a struggling single mom popping dinners into the microwave?

Do all the children have to glow so irritatingly -- couldn't at least one of them have a minor problem, or at least a personality?

And couldn't even one meal look less like it took Martha Stewart two weeks to prepare?

The massive unreality of "It's Complicated" keeps it from ever connecting on anything but a broad comic level. By drenching the film in what can only be called wealth porn, Meyers assures its ultimate superficiality.

But then maybe that's the idea. Toss the peasants some crumbs while charging 10 bucks a ticket. In the end, Nancy Meyers will most likely get what she wants -- an even bigger kitchen.

Review of "Up in the Air"

Ryan Bingham likes floating above it all, disconnected.

He spends a good deal of his time in airplanes, flying overhead the world far below, and he loves the detachment. He has no close ties to other people and few possessions although he obviously makes good money.

Because when he does set down on the ground, he's darn good at his job. Bingham, you see, is a contractor employers bring in to lay off their workers when they don't have the hearts or guts to do so themselves.

He's got a script down that applies to just about any worker anywhere. He has the tone of a consulting doctor just before surgery -- calming, assured. He hands you a folder with suggestions for your new life ahead.

And then you're out the door. And he's back "Up in the Air."

Director Jason Reitman brings such splendid balance and nuance to Bingham's story that you can't hate the man; indeed you end up pitying him. And George Clooney brings such overpowering charm to the character that you can believe he has charged right through life with a soul as empty as his rarely visited apartment.

But then two women enter Bingham's world, and things begin to unravel. Both are mirrors of his own self, and eventually he's shaken by what he sees in those reflections.

The first is Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga), a fellow businesswoman who also logs countless miles in the air. They meet cute, comparing air and hotel perks, then fall into a breezy series of meet-you-in-Miami quickies that slowly develop into more than either bargained for.

The second woman is Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick), a recent grad hired by Bingham's firm who has come up with an even more cold-hearted way to effect layoffs -- via a computer monitor.

If her plan goes into effect, Bingham will lose his ability to fly endlessly on the company card, so he convinces their boss (Jason Bateman) to let him take her out on the road to learn the realities of their business.

Soon enough Bingham is confronting some realities himself -- about his work, about the distance he keeps from others, about all those hours logged far from the earth below.

Reitman's juggling act here is impressive, because even as "Up in the Air" is indeed a film about layoffs and corporate brutality -- he uses interviews with many people who've lost their jobs throughout the film, including some from Detroit -- at the same time it's fun to watch a good deal of the time.

That's because, against that backdrop, Reitman is playing out a classic romantic comedy with Bingham and Alex, and a coming-of-age story with Natalie.

Indeed, the incredibly natural Farmiga, best known for "The Departed," offers Clooney his best onscreen chemistry of the decade -- the two are like tennis partners batting banter back and forth across the screen, their eyes awash all the while with attraction.

Please, somebody put these two in a movie again.

Kendrick, meanwhile, scores the breakthrough of the year as the over-assured Natalie, whose confidence begins to come undone the moment she has to travel out and actually meet people with Bingham.

Reitman co-wrote the script with Sheldon Turner, adapting Walter Kirn's novel. Obviously Bingham's job took on greater importance as the current recession began ravaging American families.

But in the end, this isn't a movie about the economy -- it's about the importance of connection, the value of grounding, the ultimate need to be tethered to something or someone. Jobs, lovers, friends, they offer these ties, and when one fails the others take on even more importance.

As Ryan Bingham discovers, if you fly alone, you may eventually drift off beyond the clouds, where oxygen is scarce and the sky turns dark. "Up in the Air" makes you want to cling to the earth.

Best of the decade in film

The Detroit News

Best drama: "Michael Clayton" (2007) Writer-director Tony Gilroy's gripping look at corporate corruption had top-flight performances from George Clooney, Tilda Swinton and Tom Wilkinson.

Best sci fi film: "Avatar" (2009) James Cameron takes special effects and cinematography to a whole new level while still dealing with serious themes in this grand space yarn.

Best comedy: "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan" (2006) Comedian Sacha Baron Cohen took to the streets in character as a clueless foreign reporter and ended up with an outrageous comedy that offered a scathing view of modern society.

Best romance: "Lars and the Real Girl" (2007) This touching and funny story about a shy young man (Ryan Gosling) in love with a life-sized doll was full of heart, and the cast -- " Emily Mortimer, Patricia Clarkson, Paul Schneider, Kelli Garner -- was superb.

Best horror film: "The Descent" (2005) Writer-director Neil Marshall turns a women's caving expedition into a hellish nightmare, beginning with faint whispers and then letting the blood flow.

Best independent film: "Kill Bill: Vols 1 and 2" (2003-2004): Quentin Tarantino hit a delirious high with this epic about a female assassin (Uma Thurman) out for revenge, also offering David Carradine his first good role in years as the title character,

Best musical: "Moulin Rouge" (2001): Director Baz Luhrmann's skillful and dazzling mix of classic pop songs and Bohemian romance, starring a stunning Nicole Kidman and surprising Ewan MacGregor, started the decade off on a high note.

Best fantasy: "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy (2001-2003): Director Peter Jackson epic recounting of the fantasy classic was endlessly inventive, visually splendid and filled with great characters and huge action sequences.

Best art house film: "Mulholland Drive" (2001): David Lynch's story of a young actress trying to survive in Hollywood reached logic-defying emotional crescendos while introducing the unknown Naomi Watts.

Best thriller: The "Bourne" movies (2002-2007): Writer Tony Gilroy, directors Doug Liman and especially Paul Greengrass, and star Matt Damon, showed that the thriller genre can leave you gasping for air even as it grapples with serious themes.

Male movie star of the decade: George Clooney, who brought long lost charm to leading man status while making some of the best films -- " "Michael Clayton," "Syriana," "Up in the Air," "O Brother Where Art Thou?" and "Good Night, and Good Luck" among them -- that hit theaters. All while doing humanitarian and political work.

Female movie star of the decade: Angelina Jolie, certainly the most high profile movie star alive. But Jolie is more than just a sex symbol, she's also an actress who's managed to bridge serious work ("A Mighty Heart," "Changeling") and action stardom ("Wanted," "Mr. & Mrs. Smith," "Lara Croft"). Blend in her humanitarian work, all those kids and Brad, and she owned the decade.

Director of the decade: Steven Soderbergh, the filmmaker who bridges the ever-widening gap between studio films and independent art productions with the greatest ease. Soderbergh delivered major blockbusters like "Erin Brokovich," "Traffic" and the "Ocean's" movies while still working on curious oddities like "Bubble" and "The Girlfriend Experience." Nobody straddled and symbolized the split nature of modern filmmaking like Soderbergh.

Review of "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call -- New Orleans"

The Detroit News

Nicolas Cage is out of his mind in "The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call -- New Orleans." And it's wonderful to see.

Working with quirk thrusters set on full, Cage almost makes you forget all the oatmeal-dumb, quasi-thrillers he's done in recent years. "Bad Lieutenant" brings back the Cage of "Raising Arizona," "Leaving Las Vegas," "Adaptation," even "World Trade Center," an actor with purpose and fire in his belly.

It helps, of course, that his character really is out of his mind. Cage plays Detective Terence McDonagh, a cop covering up the pain from a back injury with copious amounts of substance abuse while investigating the bloody murder of a Senegalese family in post-Katrina New Orleans.

McDonagh has a prostitute girlfriend (Eva Mendes), an alcoholic father (Tom Bower) with a near-equally alcoholic wife (Jennifer Coolidge), and a nasty tendency to hallucinate iguanas in tense situations. His gambling debts are mounting, he uses his badge in all the wrong places, and he seems to be forming a bond with murderous drug dealers.

Cage was born to this, and director Werner Herzog lets him run wild. The result is a jittery, outrageous black comedy-thriller that (thankfully) bears no resemblance to the overcooked 1992 film "Bad Lieutenant," which starred Harvey Keitel.

This lieutenant isn't seriously bad at all; he's just kind of fried to the eyeballs, a situation Cage plays up by consistently popping his out as far as they can go, usually while barely controlling a Joker-like giggle spasm. There are a lot of times when the audience just has to laugh along with him.

"Port of Call" is a dizzy, demented delight, and a must-see for fans who've been wondering whatever happened to Nicolas Cage. He's still got the electricity; he's just got to find better switches.

Review of "Avatar"

The Detroit News

I have seen the future of movies, and it is "Avatar."

No, that's a bit much, let's try...

This changes everything.

Again, a bit much. How about...

"Avatar" raises the bar. By about 10 feet.

Writing negative movie reviews is easy. Writing positive movie reviews is hard. Which means writing a review of "Avatar" is going to be really, really hard. Because James Cameron's alien world epic "Avatar" may well be the future of movies, it might change everything and it sure as heck raises the bar by at least 10 feet.

It is a dazzling spectacle that makes virtually all other special-effects blockbusters seem like awkward toddlers. In imagination, vision and execution suddenly every other action film looks like it was drawn with crayons.

Beyond that, though, it's also a rock-solid space yarn, revisiting themes -- man vs. nature, our self-destructive instincts, corporate malfeasance -- that Cameron explored in his sci-fi classics "The Terminator," "Aliens" and "Terminator 2: Judgment Day."

And don't despair, romantics, there's more than a bit of "Titanic" love in this otherworld saga as well.

Of course, the love is between giant blue creatures with tails. But those giant blue creatures come to feel as real as any characters you've ever seen on film.

And that is the great accomplishment of "Avatar": It immerses you in a fantasy world like no other film ever has just by the sheer visceral power and beauty of its images. Seen in 3-D, as it should be seen, it surrounds you like no other movie has been able to. Which means that when Cameron turns the action jets on, this thing rocks like AC/DC at full volume in 1979.

In the future, man has set up a colony on the distant planet of Pandora to mine a valuable mineral found there.

Unfortunately, the greatest source of the mineral lies beneath a large village of the planet's indigenous species, a race of blue giants called the Na'vi who live at peace in their forest, at one with the environment.

A scientist (Sigourney Weaver) has devised a way to integrate with the blue folk. By blending Na'vi DNA with human DNA, she has developed big blue bodies that remain empty of consciousness. When a human brain is remotely plugged into one of these "avatars," it takes over the body.

Thus a wheelchair-bound Marine named Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) becomes whole again. And he is sent to blend with the Na'vi, to learn their weaknesses, and to bring what he learns back to Col. Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang) and his corporate boss (Giovanni Ribisi), who plan to wipe out the village.

But Sully soon finds himself taken with the Na'vi, and especially with his guide within the tribe, the wondrous Neytiri (Zoe Saldana, in certainly the best CGI performance ever). And his faith in the mission begins to crumble.

Yes, this is a movie in which humans are the bad guys and the aliens are the good guys. But Cameron makes sure to allow that personal salvation transcends race or species.

There are some minor quibbles to be had here, especially in the film's opening moments as characters are laying out the premise. A voiceover might have worked better than awkward dialogue. And a Na'vi group prayer-chant thing veers too close to feeling like a bad "Matrix" moment.

But such concerns last scant seconds as the wonder of Pandora, the beauty of the Na'vi and the story's momentum sweep you up and away.

As much as "Avatar" is a singular achievement, it also brings hope to our blockbuster age of film, where big, loud and usually dumb action movies dominate the business. It reminds us that big, loud and great is possible, while breaking exciting new ground in terms of the sensory possibilities of film.

Audiences want event movies, there's no avoiding that. "Avatar" sets a new standard for those events.

Hopefully the future does indeed begin here. And maybe this does actually change everything.

One thing's for sure. The bar has now been raised very, very high.

Review of "Invictus"

A work of flawed majesty, “Invictus” nonetheless has one of the most interesting storylines of the year and one of the greatest whip-up-the-energy sports finales in film history. It leaves you cheering, drained and inspired.

Most of that inspiration comes from South African leader Nelson Mandela -- and not because of rousing speeches, his time spent in prison or personal charisma.

"Invictus" is the story of how a political leader tried to heal his severely divided country rather than further his own political ambitions.


That Mandela turned to popular culture -- in this case sports -- to affect such healing shows great prescience and much understanding of the human soul, as well as a huge willingness to go against the tide of opinion. It was, clearly, a stroke of genius.

Director Clint Eastwood lays the story out slowly -- too slowly at times, but when he gets where he's going, he's going great guns.

We initially see Mandela (played convincingly by Morgan Freeman) as he is taking office, the first elected black president of the long-racist country of South Africa. The economy is a mess, many blacks live in tin shack ghettos, but Mandela immediately grasps that his country cannot move forward until blacks and whites learn to respect one another as equals, forgive old grievances and work together.

Most politicians would immediately call for a fact-finding commission, followed by a legislative investigation that would then produce a 300-page report in four years that no one would read.

Mandela, instead, decided to back the country's rugby team.

South Africa already was set to host the world cup of rugby. Mandela figured it could become a unifying time for the nation if the somewhat weak national team could actually make it into the quarterfinals.

There was only one problem -- the rugby team was supported by whites; blacks hated it so much they'd show up to boo.

But Mandela invited the team's captain, Francois Pienaar (Matt Damon), to tea and forged a bond. Then he made it obvious to the entire country that he was supporting the team, showing up at matches where the crowd was overwhelmingly white.

To be sure, this was not the end of racism or problems in South Africa. But it may have been one of the beginnings of an eventual end.

Eastwood tries his darndest to keep Mandela's halo from becoming blinding, making it clear that his private life is tragic even as his public life is a success. But it's hard to get around.

As are some of the seemingly trite but likely true stories of slow reconciliation -- the way Mandela's black and white bodyguards come together, the rugby teams' impromptu clinics in impoverished black neighborhoods. Chances are it happened, but it feels dramatically familiar.

The director isn't helped by some wooden dialogue in Anthony Peckham's script, adapted from the book by John Carlin. And some of the music choices here -- ouch!

But when Eastwood is finally on the charge in the film's great finale, he delivers in a way only a master director with a sense of scope can. You may not end up a fan of rugby, but you will be a fan of this rugby team.

In the end, "Invictus" is a sure crowd-pleaser with a wonderful message; nothing wrong with that.

Review of "Brothers"

The Detroit News

You think you're prepared for "Brothers" -- love triangle, siblings, missing prisoner of war returns to domestic chaos, all the stuff you get from the previews and commercials.

You're not prepared. Because "Brothers," which clings closely to the fine Danish film by Susanne Bier that it's based on, does not go to expected places in expected ways.

You're also not prepared for the guts-on-the-table performance that Tobey Maguire brings to the film. Once one of the most promising young actors of his generation, he's spent most of the past decade in a Spider-Man costume. Well, he's back in the real world now, and he attacks his role here with heretofore undisplayed power.

Maguire plays Capt. Sam Cahill, a straight-arrow soldier going back to war in Afghanistan just as his troubled brother Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal) is getting out of prison. Their stiff father (Sam Shepard), a lifer in the Army himself, is filled with pride over Sam and filled with animosity toward Tommy.

Sam is leaving behind his loving wife Grace (Natalie Portman) and two daughters (Bailee Madison, Taylor Geare). Grace generally disapproves of Tommy as well, because he gives her plenty of reason to do so. But Sam remains his brother's friend and ally at all times.

When Sam is in a helicopter that's shot down over enemy territory, the Army assumes he has perished along with all his fellow soldiers. But Sam has survived along with green Pvt. Joe Willis (Patrick Flueger), and they have been taken captive by the enemy.

As far as Grace and the rest of the family know, though, she is now a widow and Sam is gone. And eventually Tommy starts coming around, bringing buddies over to build Grace a new kitchen, and getting to know Sam's daughters.

Before too long, as Sam is being tortured in the mountains, his children form a bond with their uncle -- who's a lot more fun than their ramrod straight father ever was -- and Grace does as well.

Meanwhile, Tommy finds a sense of stability as a father figure and begins to live responsibly. Then the traumatized Sam is rescued. And he returns to his once-cozy domain to find his brother has, in some ways, taken his place.

Again, director Jim Sheridan ("In the Name of the Father," "In America") has wisely elected to stay with the basics of the original film, although certain characters and situations are new. He and screenwriter David Benioff have, however, made this a most American-feeling film.

The casting here is superb -- sparkling newcomer Carey Mulligan has a small but essential role, the ever-dependable Clifton Collins Jr. plays Sam's commanding officer, Mare Winningham shows her usual grace as the boys' stepmother, and the young girls are particularly touching (Sheridan has a way with kids).

As you'd expect, Portman and Gyllenhaal bring their characters to life with heart and intelligence.

But the film belongs to Maguire, as it should. Yes, it's another film about the awful cracks that run through the minds of some soldiers returning home, and another portrait of a man bearing an unthinkable burden. Don't come to this movie expecting chuckles.

Sheridan and Maguire orchestrate things perfectly here, running a line of tension through the film that explodes at the end, just as it should.

War never ends. Soldiers come home, adapt, move on, hopefully prosper. But the horror of the battlefield lives on in their veins evermore, and easily spreads outward to family and friends.

"Brothers" captures that cold reality, one we too easily and conveniently ignore. It's a challenging, disturbing film to watch. It should be.