Festive Season Viewing

Two festive season films releasing today in South Africa are: Ben is Back and Mary Poppins Returns. The former is for adults, the latter suitable for the whole family.

Far from sentimental, Ben is Back explores some of the difficulties that this time of year can bring. Ben (Lucas Hedges), a drug addict,

unexpectedly turns up on his family doorstep on Christmas Eve. While his mother, Holly Burns (Julia Roberts), is very happy to see him, it is obvious that Ben’s sister (Ivy – Holly & Ivy …) and stepfather are far from happy to see him. Ben has caused problems for his family on previous Christmases. After a heated debate the family agree that Ben can stay for just 24 hours – but only if he remains under his mother’s watchful eye for every minute. Thereafter he must return to rehab.

What could go wrong? Predictably, everything does go wrong after Ben goes out in public and has a run-in with former druggy friends. During the fraught 24-hour period that follows viewers get to see the really grim aspects that go with drug addiction: guilt, desperation, crime, lying, remorse, weakness, drug dealing, family love and pain, and even death. The final scene of the film gives a double meaning to the film’s title ‘Ben is Back’. The acting is good. Julia Roberts is especially believable as the loving, tough mother, prepared at once to distrust and to believe in her son. A very good, if sobering ‘Christmas’ film.

Mary Poppins Returns – although not specifically about Christmas – is nevertheless a lovely film that families will enjoy watching during the Christmas holidays. Emily Blunt plays Mary Poppins.

In the original tale based on the book by P L Travers, Mary Poppins arrives unannounced to help the Banks family. In this sequel, Michael and Jane – who were children in the first story – are now grown up, and their parents are dead. Michael is a struggling artist who works in a bank, and is a widower with three children. Jane has followed in her mum’s footsteps and spends her time attending workers’ rights rallies. More than that Michael and Jane seem to have inherited their parents’ absentmindedness and ineptitude. It is the children who are pragmatic and mature. Nevertheless, they are just children and the imminent repossession of their family home is a big problem. It is at this crucial time that Mary Poppins floats down from a gloomy London sky and sings her way into the family. With each song she teaches the children life-empowering lessons and once they have learnt and grown she quietly leaves again.

There is lots of bouncing, flying, floating, adventure, and entry into other worlds. The characters encountered, and the songs Mary Poppins sings, teach the children how to look at things differently, how to use their imaginations, and how not to take things at face value. These life lessons are a little different to the typical Disney message ‘believe in yourself’. They’re more realistic.

Mary Poppins Returns follows very much the same formula as the first Mary Poppins story and may be a little boring in parts to modern viewers. Emily Blunt is just perfect as Mary, though: prim, very self-assured, poised, beautiful and melodious. Mary Poppins Returns is a lovely film with which to end 2018. And the lessons learnt are worth taking into 2019.

Happy viewing this festive season.

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Reels and Real Life

The thrill of my recent trip to New York began on the flight there when I watched the film Goodbye Christopher Robin. Already

Winnie-the-Pooh and friends at the New York Public Library January 2018

screening on international circuits, the film only releases in South Africa on 16 March 2018. I enjoyed this depiction of how author Alan Milne came to create the Winnie-the-Pooh stories and was delighted, therefore, to come across a brand-new exhibit of the original Winnie-the-Pooh toys when visiting the New York Public Library the day we arrived. There in a glass cabinet, in the children’s book section of this vast and beautiful library, sat Winnie, Piglet, Eeyore, Tigger and Kanga – all recently restuffed and nicely spruced up.

Goodbye Christopher Robin shows the developing relationship between playwright A. A. Milne (known as Blue to his son) and his son Christopher Robin (nicknamed Billy Moon and acted by the very cute Will Tilston). Further, the film depicts how, during an enforced time together in their ‘hundred-acre-wood’ estate, Blue and Billy Moon come up with the Winnie-the-Pooh characters’ names and the imaginative story millions of people know so well today. The unexpected fame and fortune that followed publication unfortunately came at the expense of the ‘real’ Christopher Robin. As a result Milne refused to write any more Pooh stories – in an effort to repair the father-son relationship. Despite this sobering biographical account the movie didn’t take away for me the magic of encountering gentle Pooh and his pals.

Me and Pooh

Another film I saw onboard (it’s a long flight to New York from South Africa) was the documentary We Will Rise. The film shows former-first lady of the USA, Michelle Obama, together with actress Meryl Streep, journeying to Morocco and Liberia where they meet girls from disadvantaged backgrounds. Obama’s mission was to encourage these young ladies in their efforts to overcome enormous obstacles to be educated. The documentary wasn’t comprehensive and seemed to err more on the side of publicity than practicality. But it did serve to underline Obama’s (and Streep’s) concern for women, for education, and for Africa. With the present US president’s recent utterances on Africa as ‘sh*thole countr(ies)’ (see http://bit.ly/2D4Pks5 for further reading on this subject), I was struck by the contrast between the two presidencies. Trump’s remarks took on a further bigoted, hypocritical and inexcusable tone for me when, a day after arriving in New York, I visited the New-York Historical Society. This museum explores the history of New York and includes a 20-minute film of the process. In virtually the opening lines of the film the narrator states that New York was built on three pillars – one of which was slavery.

The confluence of (movie) reels and real life really makes you think sometimes…

Michelle Obama and the We Will Rise programme

 

 

Suffragette comes highly recommended

Suffragette, as the title implies, is a film about the Suffragette Movement in Britain. It is set in 1912, almost a decade after Emmeline Pankhurst founded the organisation in 1903. Importantly, this story focuses on the working women’s struggles to obtain suffrage (the right to vote).

Poster source: http://www.people.com/article/suffragette-movie-poster-carey-mulligan-meryl-streep

The working class aspect is crucial to the plot as it shows the layers of oppression suffered by women at this end of the social spectrum. The main character, Maud Watts (Carey Mulligan sporting a cockney accent), is the person who best represents the effects of these injustices. Maud’s journey into and with the Suffragette Movement and the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), forms the basic outline of the film. She is therefore the “representative” of others like her and her experiences give us a good idea of what it took for women to eventually be granted the vote in Britain in 1918 (for women over 30) and 1928 (for women over 21).

Streep is brilliantly awful in August: Osage County

A review by Brenda Daniels

August: Osage County is a story about relationships. Relationships within a family and a group of close friends. It is set during a stiflingly hot August in Oklahoma. A hot, dark, airless house. A story of three parakeets, subtropical birds used to heat, who died in the house. Both house and birds are symbols of heat, a theme that pervades throughout the action.

The film, based on a play by the same name, stars Meryl Streep as Violet Weston, the powerful, unlikeable matriarch of the Weston family who is dying of cancer. Right near the beginning of the story Violet’s husband, Beverly (Sam Shepard), goes missing and is found dead, having committed suicide.

This precipitates a gathering of the family – three daughters and their families/partners – and close friends. The rest of the film depicts the characters’ faulty inter-relatedness and their dysfunctional lives.

Streep is brilliantly awful as the mother, wife and friend who proves to be the antithesis of what her role demands. She is harsh, confrontational, abusive and mean – the product of a hard life – exhibiting a toughness that has helped her survive thus far.

She turns that toughness onto her family, testing each one in turn to see if they can “stand the heat”.

All three daughters, Barbara (Julia Roberts), Ivy (Julianne Nicholson) and Karen (Juliette Lewis) suffer their mother’s cruel tongue, but it’s Barbara who seems to be the strongest and therefore most able to withstand the barrage of abuse.

Roberts is good in this serious role, although there are times when her angry outbursts seem too staged.

As the action progresses family secrets spill out and each character’s struggles are revealed. This kept me engrossed and thinking right to the very end and beyond. More than that, it was the multi-layered, complex characters and how they related to one another that held my attention.

A meaty, thought-provoking film, August: Osage County releases at Ster Kinekor Classic Theatres countrywide in South Africa on Friday 14 March. It carries an age restriction of 16L.

Julia Roberts at the Torronto Film Festival opening of the film, 2013 (Source: Creative Commons)

A stage enactment of August: Osage County (Source: Creative Commons)

 

Lead up to the award ceremony: Cinema Nouveau Announces Pre-Release Screenings of Three Multi-Nominated Oscar Contenders

Each of the three pre-release titles, August: Osage County, Nebraska and Philomena, will have one screening each at 8pm on 24, 26 and 27 February respectively, at the four Cinema Nouveau theatres at Rosebank Mall in Johannesburg, Brooklyn Mall in Pretoria, Gateway in Durban and the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town. Bookings are now open for these three special pre-Oscar screenings.

The talented Meryl Streep, who is no stranger to the Best Actress category, is once again nominated in this category for her role in August: Osage County, which will be pre-released at the four Cinema Nouveau theatres on Monday, 24 February at 8pm. Another big Hollywood name, Julia Roberts, shares the screen with her in this film and is up for Best Supporting Actress.

On Wednesday, 26 February at 8pm, Cinema Nouveau audiences are transported to another American state with the pre-release of Nebraska. With an impressive six Oscar nominations, for Best Picture, Best Actor – Bruce Dern, Best Supporting Actress – June Squibb, Cinematography, Best Director – Alexander Payne, and Original Screenplay, this black-and-white masterpiece explores another complex family relationship.

With four Oscar nominations – Best Picture, Best Actress – Judi Dench, Best Original Score and Best Adapted Screenplay – Philomena plays on the Cinema Nouveau circuit at 8pm on Thursday, 27 February. It releases nationally on 28 March.

When former journalist Martin Sixsmith (Steve Coogan) is dismissed from the Labour Party in disgrace, he is at a loss as to what to do. All that changes when a young Irish woman approaches him about a story of her mother, Philomena (Judi Dench), who had her son taken away when she was a teenage inmate of a Catholic convent. Martin arranges a magazine assignment about Philomena’s search for her son that eventually leads to America. Along the way, Martin and Philomena discover as much about each other as about her son’s fate, as their basic beliefs are challenged.

Cinema Nouveau audiences can watch these films and make their predictions before the winner of “Best Picture is announced during the early hours of 3 March.

The full list of nominees vying for this prestigious award are: Gravity; Captain Phillips; American Hustle; Dallas Buyers Club; Her; Nebraska; Philomena; 12 Years a Slave; and The Wolf of Wall Street.

For more information and to make a booking, visit www.sterkinekor.com or www.cinemanouveau.co.za. Call Ticketline on 082 16789.

The 2009 Academy Awards (Source: Creative Commons)

The 31st Academy Awards (Source: Creative Commons)