Weekend Mullings - Roofman | John Candy: I Like Me

It seems like an odd time of year to release a movie like Roofman. We're in the middle of spooky season, and getting towards the end of the year, when all the real Oscar hopefuls tend to get their theatrical runs. Roofman fits into neither of those categories. Instead, it's a pleasant enough romantic crime comedy, the kind that makes you smile more than it makes you laugh.

Based on a true story, Channing Tatum stars as Jeffrey Manchester, a serial thief who breaks into a series of McDonald's restaurants by chopping holes in their roofs, locking the staff in the cooler - though not before making sure they all have their coats on - and stealing from the safe. He is ostensibly doing this to support his wife and three kids, but once he's arrested and jailed, they break ties with him. Upon escaping from prison, he hides out in a Toys R Us, and eventually develops a romantic relationship with Leigh (Kirsten Dunst), an employee who has no idea who he really is.

Channing Tatum is quite good as Manchester, able to meet both the emotional and physical aspects of the part - he's a guy living in a toy store, so of course there are scenes of him kicking balls around, crawling around to remain undetected, and bashing Tickle Me Elmos in rage. But he also has to garner audience sympathy since he is ultimately a guy who, in the course of multiple armed robberies, threatened the lives dozens of people, even if his goal every time was to avoid any physical harm.

Dunst plays well against him as a single mom charmed by this mysterious stranger. And thankfully, she never comes off as naive or desperate for believing everything he tells her about his life. She's just a good person who chooses to believe in the good in others. The last third or so of the film takes place during Christmas, which is really when it should have been released. I can easily see this becoming one of those unoffensive cinematic diversions you put on during the holidays when trying to find something the entire family can enjoy. 

The documentary John Candy: I Like Me, now streaming on Prime Video, looks at the life and career of the comedic actor probably best know for his roles in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles and Uncle Buck, though I first became familiar with him as a kid watching syndicated re-runs of SCTV. And I will never forget seeing the opening of the sketch below for the first time; it cracks me up to this day.

I bring this up because it's somewhat unfathomable to me that there may be people out there who are not familiar with John Candy or his career, and I suppose one goal of this doc is to rectify that a bit. Which is why I was a little disappointed that there weren't more extended clips from his TV and movie work illustrating just how hilarious he was. 

The bulk of the documentary features interviews with his children, his widow, and those who worked with him, and they all paint him as a very kind and lovable man. (Bill Murray opens the film trying to think of one bad thing to say about Candy, and comes up short.) But he was also a man who faced terrible trauma as a child - his father died at the age 35 from a heart attack, ON Candy's fifth birthday - and it's clear he never fully came to terms with that.

There are also plenty of clips from TV interviews, the bulk of which feature interviewers commenting on Candy's size and weight, and those are pretty brutal to watch. Director Colin Hanks also chooses to open the film with Candy's death and funeral in 1994, then bounces back in time to his youth, while using a kind of countdown clock that ticks off the years, which just creates a sense of dread as those years get closer to 1994. It's a weird and off-putting gimmick. As a tribute to John Candy, the doc is fine. But as an in depth look into what made him special, it's lacking.

Weekend Mullings - Weapons | It's Never Over, Jeff Buckley

Perhaps I shouldn't be comparing the films of Zach Creggar with those of Oswald Perkins, but coming out of Weapons, Creggar's follow-up to Barbarian, that comparison rattled around in my mind. They've both released some very buzzed-about horror movies, but so far I've appreciated the work of one way more than the other. Both have an obvious love for the genre, and can craft a creepy scene. But only one has managed to balance the horror and the comedy in their films, and the clear winner there is Creggar.

But what probably set-off the comparison is that there are a few small things in Weapons that are very similar to a few things in Perkins's Longlegs, but where I found Longlegs to be derivative, predictable, and rarely scary, Weapons had me cringing in my seat, and I could never really guess what was going to happen next.

I think it's best to go into it knowing as little as possible, as the story is laid out in chapters that eventually complete the puzzle of just what has happened to the 17 kids in a small town who all decided to leave their homes at 2:17am one night, and vanish into the night. (Scoring this scene with George Harrison's song "Beware of Darkness" turns the moment into a poetic nightmare.)

That all of the students who disappeared were in the same class immediately places their teacher, Justine (Julia Garner), under suspicion, especially by Archer (Josh Brolin), the gruff father of one of the missing kids. That Justine has a drinking problem and unresolved issues with an ex (Alden Ehrenreich), who is also a police office, only complicates matters. 

Other characters who make up the chapters in the story include the school's principal (Benedict Wong), a junkie in town (Austin Abrams), and wildest of all, a character played by Amy Madigan, who I promise you will not recognize when she first shows up.

Weapons has creepy dreams, jump scares, gore, but best of all, a sense of humor that is well placed throughout, and that's probably where some people may take issue with Creggar's approach. But I've always preferred horror that has a good sense of humor, and Weapons wields its humor well.

I'm not the only person who can say Grace, Jeff Buckley's only studio album, has gotten them through some rough life events. I mean, it contains two of the greatest breakup songs ever written, "Last Goodbye" and "Lover, You Should've Come Over," and perhaps the best version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" ever recorded, so of course it has. And when an album plays such a big part in your life, it's often easy to think, well, everyone in the world must know about it too.

But I do wonder if the kids making TikToks backed by "Lover..." actually know anything about the man behind the song. Perhaps the new documentary It's Never Over, Jeff Buckley will change that. 

Director Amy Berg's approach doesn't really do anything new with the genre, but what is unique is that the movie examines Buckley primarily through the eyes of three women in his life, his mother, Mary Guibert, who raised him after his father, musician Tim Buckley, left them to pursue fame, and two girlfriends, one who was there at the beginning of his career, and one who was there closer to the end of his life.

His story is also told through Buckley's own words, using clips from archival interviews, and most poignantly, long voicemail messages. The one he leaves his mother shortly before he died proves he was probably a soul just too good for this world.

Weekend Screen Scene: Carol Doda Topless at the Condor, Riddle of Fire, Late Night with the Devil

It's odd to think that there is not a time in my life when I was not aware of Carol Doda, even if it was just knowing there was a giant sign of a lady with blinking boobs to be seen any time the family ventured to North Beach. But that was just part of the joy of growing up in San Francisco in the 1970's and 1980's. 

The new documentary Carol Doda Topless at the Condor aims to expand that awareness past the City limits and decades past by centering Doda as a cultural revolutionary, even if she didn't necessarily see herself that way. Co-directors Marlo McKenzie and Jonathan Parker utilize previously recorded interviews with Doda herself (she died in 2015), along with commentary from fellow North Beach performers, and a few cultural academics, and pair it up with an impressive amount of archival footage and photos to help flesh out a portrait of Doda, who was notoriously cagey about her personal life. 

It's definitely entertaining seeing Doda's trajectory from cocktail waitress, to go-go dancing cocktail waitress, to featured dancer, to the country's first topless dancer (kind of), to topless and bottomless dancer, the uproar all of that caused, and her ultimate status as a San Francisco icon (the city's other "twin peaks"). But I actually found some of the stories shared by her fellow entertainers even more enjoyable. (I can't believe I was too young to check out the stripper with the pet monkey!) 

Carol Doda Topless at the Condor is less about Doda and more about the cultural shift she helped spearhead, intentionally or not. And while it left me wishing I could know a little more about the woman herself (the interviews they do include show she was a really witty woman), as a portrait of San Francisco in the late late 1960's and early 1970's, it's tops.

The 1970's were also brought to mind while watching the indie gem Riddle of Fire, even though the film is contemporary. Shot on 16mm, in gloriously yellowish tones, the movie looks and feels like a b-movie of that era, perhaps something that may have played as the second film in a double feature with a live action Disney movie in 1977.

When I tell you it is an epic fairytale about three kids on a quest to find a blueberry pie for their ailing mother, it probably sounds pretty saccharine, even though that is in fact the bare bones plot. But these adolescent kids also ride dirt bikes, carry paint ball guns, swear occasionally, and are in search of this pie because it's the only way their mom will give them the password to the TV so they can play the new video game console they stole. Along their quest they also run afoul of a gang of poachers, lead by a possible witch, who puts their lives in danger.

Not so saccharine!

I was enchanted by this oddball film, and director Weston Razooli's commitment to its unique tone. The rural Wyoming setting is photographed beautifully, and the soundtrack brought to mind scores by Tangerine Dream and Goblin (along with an actual needle drop from the film Cannibal Holocaust). Letting three actors under the age of 14 carry a movie is always a risky move, especially for a first time filmmaker, but I was really impressed by the performances Razooli got from Phoebe Ferro, Skyler Peters, and Charlie Stover. Sure, at two hours long, Riddle of Fire could have used a bit of trimming, but I was also a little sad to see the adventure of Alice, Jodie, and Hazel come to an end.

The 1970's strike again with the horror movie, Late Night with the Devil,  about a talk show that had one really, really horrifying Halloween special back in 1977. 

The film is presented as a mockumentary about a fateful episode of Night Owls with Jack Delroy, a late night talk show constantly competing against the success of The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. After tragedy befalls host Jack Delroy (played to perfection by David Dastmalchian), he attempts a comeback with a Halloween episode featuring a medium, the author of a book about a demon possession, and the possibly possessed girl, and a former magician-turned-skeptic who's there to debunk it all.

The parts of the film that are the "actual" episode of the show are absolutely terrific, with the production design, late night style jokes, and performances completely nailing the tone. Which is why it's so disappointing that the movie doesn't stick with that, instead inserting "behind the scenes" footage supposedly shot during the show's commercial breaks. This footage makes absolutely no sense on a practical level (why was it shot? Why does it involve multiple cameras? Why do none of the performers ever acknowledge it's happening?) and also completely disrupts the realistic feeling of the TV show. 

The whole "mockumentary" set-up is also pretty much dropped for an ending that goes off the rails, but, ironically, could have worked perfectly had they stuck to the premise. Still, enough of the movie succeeds that I can forgive it its trespasses, even while hoping for an alternative cut that just features that Night Owls with Jack Delroy Halloween episode of 1977.

Weekend Screen Scene: The First Wave, Zeros And Ones, Freeland

Watching a documentary about a recent traumatic event - and one that hasn't really ended yet - may not be everyone's entertainment of choice, but in some ways, the events in The First Wave almost feel like ancient history; a glimpse into the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, back when the political divide centered on the disease wasn't quite so endemic.

Director Matthew Heinema was given some pretty intimate access to some of the patients, doctors, and nurses in one of the hardest hit hospitals in New York, and the images and testaments are often difficult to watch. Doctors at the breaking point because everything they know about treating and saving lives too often just doesn't seem to work; patients struggling to recover and gain the most basic functions back, like breathing. It's heartbreaking, but also filled with life affirming moments that make the documentary bearable.

Seeing such images and stories now just makes me wonder if seeing them a year ago could have made a difference. If this country really saw just how horrible things were, over and over on their nightly news, could things have ended up different?

The First Wave is currently playing in select theaters.

Abel Ferrara's new film Zeros and Ones opens and closes with video messages from its star, Ethan Hawke. In the opening message (which was filmed before the movie was made, and was actually used as a promo to gather investors for the film), Hawke talks about being a lifelong fan of Ferrara's, how impressed he was by the script for Zeros and Ones, and how the movie is perfect for these times.

What follows is a confusing and murky mess that will probably only satisfy Ferrara's most devoted fans. Hawke plays twin brothers, a soldier and a revolutionary, both in a locked down Italy under terrorist threat. Filmed during the pandemic, Ferrara takes advantage of the abandoned streets and the real masked and armed military. Add in a relentlessly droning score, and he effectively manifests a genuine feeling of unease, I'll give him that. But the film as a whole is a bit of a headscratcher, and if Hawke's closing video massage after the credits roll is any indication, he feels the same way.

Zeros and Ones is currently available to rent online.

The legalization of marijuana across much of the country has certainly been a happy development for cannabis fans, but what about the small pot growers who relied on their own growing and distribution chains? It's not exactly easy, or cheap, to go legit. The indie drama Freeland is a portrait of one such grower in Humbolt County, Califorian. 

Krisha Fairchild, who was instantly memorable in the 2015 film Krisha, gives an equally impressive performance as Devi, an independent pot grower who is forced to make tough decisions about a future that she's just not prepared for. Directors Mario Furloni and Kate McLean definitely capture the beauty of Northern California, and how idyllic it can be to essentially make a living off your land. But I also appreciated that they didn't shy from depicting the paranoia (that is certainly not helped by getting high on your own supply) just such a lifestyle can result in.

Freeland is currently available to rent online.

Weekend Screen Scene: Fauci, Everybody's Talking About Jamie, Language Lessons

One may initially assume a documentary focused on Dr. Anthony Fauci, coming out right now, is a case of filmmakers exploiting a terrible moment in history. But work on the National Geographic-produced documentary Fauci started before the pandemic even began. And frankly, I can't imagine the film would be quite as compelling as it is without the addition of our more recent history.

It's a good introduction to the man and his long career with the National Institutes of Health, with Fauci telling most of his own story, and family and co-workers filling in some color. The film jumps around in time, with the primary focus given to his work during the AIDS crisis and the current Covid-19 pandemic, reminding us that Fauci has always had people screaming for his firing. The difference between then and now is when AIDS activists were demanding that Fauci be fired, they still believed in science, and were demanding expediency in research and drug development. A far cry from the reasons some Americans think he should be fired now.

I don't think Fauci is going to convert any of his detractors, but for anyone who really didn't know much about him before this past year, it's both an entertaining and illuminating documentary. (And I hope it gets an Academy Award, just to piss of his haters.)

Fauci is now playing in select theaters and will begin streaming on Disney+ on October 6th.

Everybody's Talking About Jamie, the new film based on the stage musical of the same name, which in turn was based on the short documentary Jamie: Drag Queen at 16,  is, and I hate to say it. a drag. And not in the way I'd expected.

And I really hate to say that about a movie that is so earnest, and has such an uplifting message! Max Harwood gives an engaging performances as Jamie, a gay teenager in Sheffield, England, who wants to become a drag queen, and debut his new persona at his school's prom. But there is nothing surprising about how the school, his classmates, and some of his family initially react to this goal, or how it all turns out. A musical about an outcast who's eventually accepted and celebrated? I've never seen that before!

And, again, I feel terrible having such a negative reaction to a story that was actually true, but if any of the numbers were engaging, or the songs particularly memorable, I'd be singing a different tune. It's a strangely inert musical. Plus, Jamie's one moment of actual drag performance, while good, is woefully brief. What Jamie needs is more Mimi Me and less woe-is-me.

Everybody's Talking About Jamie is currently playing in select theaters and will begin streaming on Amazon Prime on September 17th.

I first noticed Nathalie Morales in the (woefully underappreciated) TV series The Middleman, and I've enjoyed her in everything I've seen her in since. She makes her directorial debut with Language Lessons, a comedy co-written with co-star Mark Duplass, making the best of pandemic production constraints by setting up a storyline that requires the two stars to perform for the camera, but not together. She plays Cariño, a Spanish teacher offering lessons over video chat, and he's her initially reluctant student.

Despite the gimmick requiring them to remain separated in their own little square boxes, the two have good chemistry, and the film provides genuine laughs while also hitting some unexpected emotional notes. Hopefully this little film gives Morales the chance to do something even bigger.

Language Lessons is currently playing in select theaters.

'They Shall Not Grow Old' Brightens A Dark Past

Pictured left: Not Walt Disney

When I was in college, I saw the short film A Trip Down Market Street for the first time. The mini documentary is a real time, unedited look at pre-quake 1906 San Francisco. The camera is mounted to the front of the cable car as it captures people, cars, and horse-drawn carriages weaving and bobbing out of the frame before it reaches the end of its journey, when the cable car, and camera, does a 180. Newsboys then gather in front of the cable car, mug for the camera, and the film ends.

Watching it was a revelation; it felt like the closest thing to time travel we'd ever be able to experience. Because there's nothing staged about the footage, it captures the feeling of life at the time better than most photographs and film reels from the era can. I had a similar feeling watching Peter Jackson's World War I documentary They Shall Not Grow Old, as if I were seeing a part of history with clear eyes for the first time.

Jackson is able to capture this time travel feeling in ways that are quite different from A Trip Down Market Street. This is not a real time, cinema vérité, glimpse into the past; it's very carefully constructed. Jackson and his crew took over 100 hours of archival footage from the British Imperial War Museum, edited it into a rough narrative, cleaned it up, colorized it, and time corrected it, getting rid of the jerky motion inherent in early 20th century film. Sound effects were also added (the din of artillery fire and bombings is a constant), as well as some dialogue (lip readers were utilized to figure out what was being said in the silent footage). Add 3D to the mix, and you've got perhaps the most immersive look into the Great War that's ever been produced. (Archival black and white footage filmed off the battlefield, in England and the French coast, bookends the film.)

The process is not, however, flawless. CG techniques are sometimes used to define soldiers' faces that have likely blurred and softened in the original old film stock, and the effect is often uncomfortably cartoonish. And it has to be said, there's something slightly ghoulish about meticulously colorizing the wounds on a dead soldier so that the blood is just the right color of darkening red.

What helps the film rise above mere visual effects spectacle are the voices of over 100 WWI veterans that narrate it. The humanity of those voices paired with the reality of the soldiers, marching, fighting, and goofing around like any modern solider might is a powerful reminder that they were indeed real men and boys, and not just silent faces lost to history.