Review: Terrific and Amazing "ARMAGEDDON TIME" Doesn't Have Time for Sentimentality

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 15 of 2023 (No. 1904) by Leroy Douresseaux

Armageddon Time (2022)

Running time:  114 minutes (1 hour, 54 minutes)

MPA – R for language and some drug use involving minors

WRITER/DIRECTOR:  James Gray

PRODUCERS:  Marc Butan, James Gray, Anthony Katagas, and Rodrigo Teixeira

CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Darius Khondji

EDITOR:  Scott Morris

COMPOSER:  Christopher Spelman

DRAMA

Starring:  Anne Hathaway, Jeremy Strong, Banks Repeta, Jaylin Webb, Anthony Hopkins, Ryan Sell, Andrew Polk, Tovah Feldshuh, Marcia Haufrecht, Teddy Coluca, Richard Bekins, Dane West, Landon James Forlenza, John Diehl, and Jessica Chastain

Armageddon Time is a 2022 coming-of-age drama film from writer-director James Gray.  The film is inspired by Gray's childhood experiences growing up in Queens, New York.  Armageddon Time is a coming-of-age story about family and about the American Dream and who can have it.

Armageddon Time opens in Queens, New York City, 1980.  It introduces Paul Graff (Banks Repeta), a Jewish-American boy who is entering sixth grade at Public School (P.S.) 173.  He befriends Johnny (Jaylin Webb), a rebellious African-American classmate.  Johnny was held back a year and gets harsher treatment from their teacher, a white man named Mr. Turkeltaub (Andrew Polk), when they both joke around in class.  Paul is interested in becoming an artist, and he often disassociates from his schoolwork and draws pictures instead.

Paul lives with his somewhat financially stable family of Jewish heritage.  His parents, mother Esther (Anne Hathaway), and father Irving Graff (Jeremy Strong), are well-meaning, but are strict.  His older brother, Ted (Ryan Sell), teases him.  Irving has a temper and is prone to hit his children, especially Paul, who exasperates him.  Esther and Irving discourage Paul's artistic ambitions, but his maternal grandfather, Aaron Rabinowitz (Anthony Hopkins), encourages him.

However, Paul begins to discover the harsh reality of life.  Aaron tells Paul of how his own mother escaped antisemitic persecution and pogroms in Ukraine, eventually landing in London before coming to the United States.  Paul gets into trouble with Johnny and ends up at the private school, Forest Manor Prep School, while Johnny quits school and deals with the foster care officials who are looking for him.  Although Paul lives in a world privilege, he is forced to confront family troubles and a world of inequality and privilege.

I am totally in love with Armageddon Time, although I'm not as in love with its title.  This is also the first film directed by James Gray that I have watched.  The film takes its title from a 1979 single by the British band, “The Clash,” entitled “Armagideon Time.”  It is a cover version of the same song by Jamaican reggae musician, William Williams, that was also released in 1979.  Armageddon Time also includes a few scenes featuring a fictional version of Fred J. Trump, Donald Trump's father, and one scene featuring Maryanne Trump, Donald's sister.  Character actor John Diehl plays Fred, who is a famous businessman and financier/patron of Forest Manor in this film, in all his real-life sleazy glory.

Jessica Chastain is superb in her one scene as Maryanne, who is portrayed in Armageddon Time as a United States Attorney and as one of Forest Manor's most famous alumni.  [In reality, Maryanne Trump was an Assistant United States Attorney in 1980 and would go on to be a United States federal judge from 1983 to 2019.]

James Gray's inclusion of the Trumps, who were part of the world in which Gray grew up, his unflinching desire that Armageddon Time not be nostalgic or sentimental.  Gray presents Paul Graff as a kid who lives inside a bubble – an idealized version of the world.  Paul's estimation of his family's worth and social position are larger and more grand than they really are.  The film's narrative acts not only to wise-up the naive Paul, but to also fill in the gaps of his knowledge of how the world operates – its unfair racial inequality and its propensity to hand out “raw deals.”

If Armageddon Time has a dominant theme, it is that one must survive to have a good life.  If this film has one big fault, it is that Paul's black friend, Johnny, flits through the story as if he were a ghost or a wraith, when it seems obvious that he is very important to the narrative, the plot, and the resolution.

Gray's cast is a big part of why this film really works.  First, Anne Hathaway is so beautiful that even as a harried mother and housewife and worried daughter, she is radiant.  Jeremy Strong is Oscar-worthy as a hard-working, beat-his-kids-asses, Jewish dad.  Ryan Sell strikes the right notes in a small role as Paul's brother, Ted.  Banks Repeta as Paul and Jaylin Webb as Johnny really sell a friendship that, on the surface, seems like it could not, would not, and should not work.  [I think this entire cast would soar even higher if this story were told as television series.]

I would be remiss if I did not mention Anthony Hopkins as Paul's grandfather, Aaron.  This film would not work without him.  Armageddon Time is one of the few coming-of-age films that I have seen that absolutely refuses to be sentimental and is zealously free of nostalgia.  In Aaron, Gray embodies the film's desire to eschew good and evil in favor of depicting survival versus unfairness, inequality, and callousness.  Hopkins conveys in Aaron the good sense that Paul lacks and must learn, which is to figure out when to fit in and when to fight.

I had not heard of Armageddon Time until I was perusing the “Charter on Demand” channel of my Spectrum cable account.  The trailer for this film that Charter was showing was quite convincing, and I felt as if I had to see Armageddon Time because it was made for me.  I hope that James Gray is able to go ahead with plans to direct a semi-sequel to this film, using much of the same cast.  Even if that does not happen, Armageddon Time is a gem, a blunt and genuine coming-of-age story that willingly embraces the truth that growing pains are indeed painful.

9 of 10

A+

★★★★+ out of 4 stars

Monday, March 27, 2023

The text is copyright © 2023 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog or site for reprint and syndication rights and fees.

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Review: UNCUT GEMS Offers Surprising Performances from Its Cast

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 28 of 2021 (No. 1766) by Leroy Douresseaux

[This review was originally posted on Patreon.]

Uncut Gems (2019)
Running time:  135 minutes (2 hours, 15 minutes)
MPAA – R for pervasive strong language, violence, some sexual content and brief drug use
DIRECTORS:  Benny Safdie and Josh Safdie
WRITERS: Ronald Bronstein and Josh Safdie & Benny Safdie
PRODUCERS:  Sebastian Bear-McClard (p.g.a.), Eli Bush (p.g.a.), and Scott Rudin (p.g.a.)
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Darius Khondji (D.o.P.)
EDITORS:  Ronald Bronstein and Benny Safdie
COMPOSER:  Daniel Lopatin

DRAMA

Starring:  Adam Sandler, Lakeith Stanfield, Julia Fox, Kevin Garnett, Idina Menzel, Eric Bogosian, Judd Hirsch, Keith William Richards, Tommy Kominik, Jonathan Aranbayev, Noa Fisher, Jacob Igielski, and Abel Tesfaye (The Weeknd)

Uncut Gems is a 2019 crime drama film from directors Josh Safdie and Benny Safdie.  Director Martin Scorsese is one of the film's executive producers.  Uncut Gems focuses on a fast-talking New York City jeweler and gambling addict who risks everything in hope of staying afloat and alive.

Uncut Gems opens in 2010 in the Welo mine in Ethiopia where Ethiopian Jewish miners retrieve a rare black opal from the mine.  The story moves to 2012 where we meet Howard Ratner (Adam Sandler), who runs KMH, a jewelry store in New York City's Diamond District.  A fast-talking businessman, Howard is also a gambling addict, and he is struggling to pay off his gambling debts, which include the $100,000 he owes his brother-in-law, Arno Moradian (Eric Bogosian), a loan shark.

Howard's personal life is also in shambles, as he is estranged from his wife, Dinah Ratner (Idina Menzel).  Dinah insists on sticking to their plan of getting a divorce after Passover.  Meanwhile, Howard's relationship with his girlfriend, Julia De Fiore (Julia Fox), a KMH employee, is also up-and-down.  Still, Howard believes that all will be well when he gets that rare black opal that the Ethiopian miners found.

Things start to fall apart when Demany (Lakeith Stanfield), an intermediary who recruits clients for Howard, introduces him to NBA player, Kevin Garnett (Kevin Garnett), of the Boston Celtics.  Suddenly, holding onto and selling the opal takes on a life-or-death significance.

Audiences may pull for Adam Sandler's Howard Ratner and even root for him simply because he is the lead character in Uncut Jewels, but the truth is that Ratner is worthy of pity more than he is of sympathy.  He has a terrible case of “problem with immediate gratification.”  He is a gambling addict, and one gets the idea that he is addicted to seeking his own satisfaction.  He is vain, venal, narcissistic, and self-absorbed, and he tells lies the way people breathe air.  However, this all leads to a last act of the film when the pity that one might feel towards the pathetic Howard turns to sympathy.

Sandler gives one of the best performances of his career, and although many commentators thought that he deserved an Oscar nomination for his performance in Uncut Gems (which he did not get), he had a better character arc in 2005's The Longest Yard.  Still, Sandler proves in Uncut Gems that he can deliver a surprising performance that can even shock audiences.

However, I find the most fascinating character in this film to be Uncut Gem's version of the real-life former professional basketball player, Kevin Garnett.  Garnett fashions a version of himself that is more complex, darker, and more nuanced than the player people know from his long career in the National Basketball Association (NBA), which lasted 21 seasons from 1995 to 2016.  I could watch an entire film featuring this Garnett.

Overall, the Safdie Brothers deliver in Uncut Gems a crime drama like no other, and with screenwriter Ronald Bronstein, they offer a cast of interesting, even off-the-beaten path characters.  Actress Idina Menzel is known for her big smile and her ability to belt out a song, but here, she takes the script's Dinah Ratner and makes her a salty woman who is utterly disinterested in her wayward husband, Howard's conceited charisma.  Menzel's Dinah would set it off before she'd let it go.

The usual impeccable Lakeith Stanfield is impeccable – as usual, and I wish there was more of his Demany.  Abel Tesfaye, better known as the Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter, The Weeknd, goes meta to turn in a delightfully edgy and smutty version of himself.

I don't know if I would recommend this film to fans of Adam Sandler's comedies, especially the raunchy and juvenile ones.  Still, the Safdies and Sandler create something so different that I think movie audiences that like to take a dare sometimes will find a dark jewel of a movie in Uncut Gems.

7 of 10
A-

Wednesday, March 17, 2021


The text is copyright © 2021 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog or site for reprint and syndication rights and fees.

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Review: "Barton Fink" is Something ... Else (Happy B'day, John Turturro)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 72 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux

Barton Fink (1991)
Running time:  116 minutes (1 hour, 56 minutes)
MPAA – R for language and some scenes of violence
DIRECTOR:  Joel Coen
WRITERS:  Ethan Coen and Joel Coen
PRODUCER:  Ethan Coen
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Roger Deakins (D.o.P.)
EDITOR:  Roderick Jaynes (The Coen Brothers)
COMPOSER:  Carter Burwell
Academy Award nominee

COMEDY/DRAMA/THRILLER

Starring:  John Turturro, John Goodman, Judy Davis, Michael Lerner, John Mahoney, Tony Shalhoub, Jon Polito, and Steve Buscemi

The subject of this movie review is Barton Fink, a 1991 period drama co-written and directed by Joel Coen and co-written and produced by Ethan Coen, although both brothers likely shared in producing and directing the film.  Barton Fink focuses on a renowned New York playwright who is enticed to Hollywood to write film scripts for a film studio only to discover hellish truths about his new job and home.

In 1991, The Coen Brothers, co-writer/director Joel and co-writer/producer Ethan, took the Cannes Film Festival by storm with their film Barton Fink, winning the Golden Palm as Best Picture and the award for Best Direction (an award that Joel has since won twice more).  John Turturro also won the Best Actor award for his role as the title character.  As much as I like the Coens' work, this is by far my least favorite film of theirs.

In 1941, intellectual New York playwright Barton Fink (John Turturro) moves to California to write a B-movie script for a major studio.  His new boss, Jack Lipnick (Michael Lerner) wants that Barton Fink touch for a new Wallace Beery wrestling movie.  Fink takes up residence in the Hotel Earle, a rundown establishment with a sheen of faux-grandeur.  He eventually meets his neighbor, the blustery, strange, and mysterious Charlie Meadows (John Goodman), who claims to be a traveling insurance salesman.  Although he meets many interesting characters, Fink is busy fighting writer’s block, and his new home becomes a hell for him as his deadline to deliver a script looms.

The first warning to a viewer before he sees Barton Fink is that the film is surrealistic, a situation in which the story contains lots of symbolism.  This is not standard, linear filmmaking, so the viewer has to closely watch the film for visual hints and listen to the soundtrack for audio clues to understand the story in lieu of having literal, obvious story details.  Don’t read this sentence as it may spoil the surprise of unraveling this film’s mysteries:  Hotel Earle is hell, the hell in which Barton suffers writer’s block, and Charlie Meadows is not only a killer, but he may well be “the devil.”  If you try to take this film literally, you will find it atrocious and boring.  Creative people, especially writers, will certainly understand, through Barton, the intense frustration that writer’s block can cause a scribe.

Still, for all its pretensions to art and its portrayal of the intellectual’s strong need to produce “something good,” Barton Fink is a misstep.  I will give a hearty nod to the Coens' ambitious intentions.  The acting is very good.  It’s less technical and more show.  It’s flamboyant and colorful and immediately describes the characters to the audience, none of this serious method stuff, just old-fashioned, grand pretending that fills the screen.  I really liked the film’s element of suspense and mystery.  The hotel is automatically creepy, but it’s nothing compared to the unusual landscape of the relationship between the characters.  One thing that certainly kept my interest was trying to figure out what these people had going on amongst themselves.  I could understand when two people were connected, but the joy was figuring out why they had a relationship.

Overall, the film is slow and occasionally plodding, especially in between moments of drama and intrigue, but the brothers have a way of waking you up just when you think that their film is loosing steam.  I recommend this to fans of the Coens’ films and to people who like that different kind of film that is called “art,” the ones that are about something other than just entertaining you.

No sirree, Bob.  The Coens might entertain you, but never at the cost of giving you cheap candy, not when they can use their talents to make a complicated confection, even if the end result doesn’t quite taste right.

5 of 10
B-

NOTES:
1992 Academy Awards, USA:  3 nominations: “Best Actor in a Supporting Role” (Michael Lerner), “Best Art Direction-Set Decoration” (Dennis Gassner and Nancy Haigh), and “Best Costume Design” (Richard Hornung)

1992 Golden Globes, USA:  1 nomination: “Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture” (John Goodman)

1991 Cannes Film Festival:  3 wins: “Best Actor” (John Turturro), “Best Director” (Joel Coen), and “Palme d'Or” (Joel Coen-won unanimously)

Updated:  Friday, February 28, 2014

The text is copyright © 2014 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this site for syndication rights and fees.

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Review: Giamatti, Hoffman Golden in "Barney's Version"

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 58 (of 2011) by Leroy Douresseaux

Barney’s Version (2010)
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: Canada
Running time: 134 minutes; MPAA – R for language and some sexual content
DIRECTOR: Richard J. Lewis
WRITER: Michael Konyves (based upon the novel by Mordecai Richler)
PRODUCER: Robert Lantos
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Guy Dufaux
EDITOR: Susan Shipton
COMPOSER: Pasquale Catalano
Academy Award nominee

DRAMA/COMEDY

Starring: Paul Giamatti, Dustin Hoffman, Rosamund Pike, Scott Speedman, Anna Hopkins, Jake Hoffman, Minnie Driver, Bruce Greenwood, Rachelle Lefevre, Thomas Trabacchi, Clé Bennett, Saul Rubinek, Mark Addy, and David Cronenberg, Denys Arcand, and Atom Egoyan

Barney’s Version is a 2010 Canadian film based upon the 1997 novel of the same title by Mordecai Richler. A comedy and drama, Barney’s Version looks at three decades in the life of a picaresque character and his three wives.

Impulsive, irascible, and fearlessly blunt with a foul mouth, Barney Panofsky (Paul Giamatti) is a Jewish Canadian television producer who drinks hard, smokes too many cigars, and is a rabid hockey fan. He owns Totally Unnecessary Productions, which produces a long-running soap opera, “Constable O’Malley of the North.”

At the age of 65, Barney looks back on his life. There is success and wealth, but there are also many mistakes and failures. Underlying his story are three wives: Clara “Chambers” Charnofsky (Rachelle Lefevre), a free-spirit who loves free love (and Barney’s friends); the second wife, Mrs. Panofsky (Minnie Driver), a talkative, self-centered Jewish princess; and Miriam Grant (Rosamund Pike), the love of his life who gives birth to his children. Also part of Barney’s life story is Bernard “Boogie” Moscovitch (Scott Speedman), a drug addict and failed writer who gets Barney in trouble with the law.

Barney’s Version is marked by some good performances, and, in particular, a topnotch lead performance by Paul Giamatti, who won a Golden Globe for his portrayal of Barney Panofsky. Dustin Hoffman, as Barney’s father, Izzy Panofsky, gives one of those robust, fragrant supporting performances that stand out from the other supporting performances. Like many films that make extensive use of flashbacks, however, Barney’s Version ends up looking like an interesting highlight reel rather than a fully developed story that is, in turn, about something or that is built around a solid thematic structure.

I’m not saying that Barney’s Version is not a good movie, but simply that it seems like no more than bits and pieces of a larger story about one of those great fictional characters that grab a hold of our imagination. By the end of Barney’s Version, I thought, “This is good, but there is more. Something is missing.” Still, movie lovers who love character dramas will want to try Barney’s Version.

7 of 10
B+

NOTES:
2011 Academy Awards: 1 nomination: “Best Achievement in Makeup” (Adrien Morot)

2011 Golden Globes: 1 win: “Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy” (Paul Giamatti)

Friday, July 08, 2011

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Review: Oscar-Nominee "Munich" Asks the Uncomfortable Questions (Happy B'day, John Williams)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 4 (of 2006) by Leroy Douresseaux

Munich (2005)
Running time: 164 minutes (2 hours, 44 minutes)
MPAA – R for strong graphic violence, some sexual content, nudity, and language
DIRECTOR: Steven Spielberg
WRITERS: Tony Kushner and Eric Roth (based upon the book Vengeance by George Jonas)
PRODUCERS: Kathleen Kennedy, Barry Mendel, Colin Wilson, and Steven Spielberg
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Janusz Kaminski
EDITOR: Michael Kahn
COMPOSER: John Williams
Academy Award nominee

DRAMA

Starring: Eric Bana, Daniel Craig, Ciarán Hinds, Mathieu Kassovitz, Hanns Zischler, Ayelet Zorer, Geoffrey Rush, Gila Almagor, Michael Lonsdale, Mathieu Amalric, Gila Almagor, and Lynn Cohen

Steven Spielberg’s Munich is set in the aftermath of the real life massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. The story follows a secret assassination squad, led by a former Mossad (Israeli version of the CIA) officer named Avner (Eric Bana), assigned to track down and kill the 11 Palestinian terrorists and operatives, whom the Israeli government suspects of having planned the Munich attack. The film focuses on the personal toll this mission of revenge and retribution takes upon the team, and in particular, Avner.

Many have argued that Munich has taken both sides in the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, but I must have missed something because I didn’t see it that way. I viewed the film as a narrative that with medical precision shows how much it costs men to engage in one act of murder after another. This isn’t about a war where the fighters kill (mostly) faceless men. Avner and his associates (which includes the new James Bond, Daniel Craig, playing a gung-ho, American cowboy-type, Israeli named Steve) have to hunt these men down. In that way, they get to see them as more than targets. Yes, they may be murderers, and clearly they involve themselves in operations aimed at killing Israelis in terrorist attacks, but these aren’t dogs that Avner and his team are hunting. Eventually, killing people and endangering innocents (collateral damage) gets to be too much for them. The explosions, the gore, and most of all the finality of death – always watching, knowing, and talking to people they have to kill.

Avner misses his wife and child, and he begins to mistrust his Israeli bosses, in particular Ephraim (the truly astounding chameleonic actor Geoffrey Rush). Eventually, Avner and his team find themselves competing against American interests, the CIA, and Soviet interests, personified by the KGB, who protect and provide both material and financial support to some Palestinian terrorists. So many of the parties involved see Avner’s mission as some kind of game, a war game for sure, but still a game of capture and defend territory. There are platitudes galore about striking back and sending a message, but in this narrative, only Avner understands that this is dirty work, expensive dirty work. The costs will run into the millions, and will also cost many lives – lives that must often be violently snuffed out if one side is to win and/or survive. One has to wonder what the result of terrorism and the retributive answer to it will be. As one of the characters concludes, “There is no peace at the end of this.”

Still, through Munich, one can tell that Spielberg clearly believes that Israel had to answer the Munich murders with retribution (as do I). He also clearly loves Israel. At one point in the film, Avner’s mother (Gila Almagor) says of the founding of Israel that they (Jews) had to take the land because no one would give it to them, and that they needed a place on earth where Jews could live with other Jews. Spielberg may very likely believe this, but in Munich, he uses film to question Israel using swift retribution for every attack against it, although I don’t think that Israel has always answered every attack against it.

Perhaps, that is why the film meanders. It’s too long, and on just a few occasions it is too preachy – a few of those being embarrassingly preachy. Munich’s resolution is also soft – if there is one. I get the point that the director wants to say that there are no easy answers for this situation, but in saying that, the movie lumbers towards the end like an out of shape and slightly over weight athlete. Munich does indeed take a side (Israel), but the movie wonders about the other side (the Palestinians). Spielberg doesn’t really try to have it both ways, but he muddles the water enough with differing points of view. Still, what is one the screen is outstanding, powerful, and mesmerizing. I could have an adjective field day, but with its engaging performances – Eric Bana is rugged, handsome, and shows his soul with this performance – and taut action (the assassinations are as riveting as anything in the best war and action movies), Munich is must-see cinema for any Spielberg fan and any fan of cinema.

8 of 10
A

Saturday, January 07, 2006

NOTES:
2006 Academy Awards: 5 nominations: “Best Motion Picture of the Year” (Kathleen Kennedy, Steven Spielberg, and Barry Mendel), “Best Achievement in Directing” (Steven Spielberg), “Best Achievement in Editing” (Michael Kahn) and “Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score” (John Williams), and “Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay” (Tony Kushner and Eric Roth)

2006 Golden Globes: 2 nominations: “Best Director - Motion Picture” (Steven Spielberg) and “Best Screenplay - Motion Picture” (Tony Kushner and Eric Roth)

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Review: "A Serious Man" for Serious Coen Fans

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 42 (of 2010) by Leroy Douresseaux

A Serious Man (2009)
Running time: 106 minutes (1 hour, 46 minutes)
MPAA – R for language, some sexuality/nudity and brief violence
DIRECTORS: The Coen Brothers
WRITERS/PRODUCERS: Ethan Coen & Joel Coen
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Roger Deakins (director of photography)
EDITORS: Roderick Jaynes (Ethan Coen & Joel Coen)
COMPOSER: Carter Burwell
Academy Award nominee

DRAMA/COMEDY

Starring: Michael Stuhlbarg, Richard Kind, Fred Melamed, Sari Lennick, Aaron Wolff, Jessica McManus, and Peter Breitmayer

The most recent Academy Award-nominated film from the Coen Brothers (Joel and Ethan) is A Serious Man. This drama and black comedy centers on a Midwestern professor whose constant and unchanging life begins to unravel during a series of unfortunate events.

A Serious Man is set in 1967 in an unnamed Midwestern town. Professor Lawrence “Larry” Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg) is a physics professor at a quiet Midwestern university. One day his wife, Judith (Sari Lennick), bluntly informs Larry that she wants a divorce because she has fallen in love with a pompous acquaintance, Sy Ableman (Fred Melamed). In truth, Larry seems to be having problems with all his family: his unemployable brother Arthur (Richard Kind), who sleeps on his sofa; his son Danny (Aaron Wolff) a pot-smoking, discipline problem who shirks Hebrew school; and his vain daughter Sarah (Jessica McManus), who steals money from his wallet in order to save up for a nose job. With all these torments, Larry struggles to be a righteous man – loyal to his family and his faith – a serious man, so he turns to his Jewish faith for answers… with wildly mixed results.

A Serious Man is an odd comedy; at times bleak and at other times surreal, the narrative is thoughtful and philosophical. With humor, both grim and sparkling, Joel and Ethan tackle life’s big questions about family and morality and also about the role of faith as a place to find answers.

A loose take on the story of Job (the Old Testament figure from the Book of Job). A Serious Man sometimes seems like a torture chamber, contrived by the Coens to allow themselves to experiment. They want to speculate about how a successful middle class man might react when everything goes wrong and it seems as if the world, existence, and God have turned against him. To that end, they get a magnificent performance from Michael Stuhlbarg as Larry Gopnick, who turns what could have been a caricature into a mesmerizing everyman who crosses racial, ethnic, and religious boundaries. If this film has a long life, it will be because of Stuhlbarg who made this Jewish intellectual from another era seem like a universal figure.

Sometimes, this movie can be almost too bleak and too belittling of its characters to sit through. Like most movies from the team of Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, however, A Serious Man is beguiling even when it seems intolerable, but worth seeing.

7 of 10
B+

NOTES:
2010 Academy Awards: 2 nominations: “Best Motion Picture of the Year” (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen) and “Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen” (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen)

2010 BAFTA Awards: 1 nomination: “Best Screenplay – Original” (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen)

2010 Golden Globes: 1 nomination: “Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy” (Michael Stuhlbarg)

Wednesday, June 09, 2010

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