Flawed Men and the Women Who Loved Them

I saw two films in December at the Landmark Embarcadero which portrayed deeply flawed men who achieved greatness in their respective fields.

Hyde Park on Hudson starring Bill Murray & Laura Linney; directed by Roger Michell; (2012) - Official Website
Hitchcock starring Anthony Hopkins & Helen Mirren; directed by Sacha Gervasi; (2012) - Official Website

Hyde Park on Hudson tells the story of Franklin D. Roosevelt (Bill Murray) and his relationship with Margaret Suckley (Laura Linney).  Suckley was FDR's sixth cousin and mistress.  What was it with FDR and his cousins?  Eleanor Roosevelt was his fifth cousin, once removed.  Suckley was FDR's companion and lover for over a decade.  If the film is to be believed, their relationship was on open secret known to the press, the White House staffers, Eleanor Roosevelt and others.

Much of the film takes place in June 1939 when King George VI and Queen Elizabeth of the United Kingdom visited FDR's country estate in Hyde Park, NY.  FDR, of course, is park of Hyde Park Roosevelts whereas Teddie Roosevelt and Eleanor are descended from the Oyster Point Roosevelts.  King George VI is the monarch portrayed by Colin Firth in The King's Speech.

King George's visit was an attempt to shore up American support for the coming war with Nazi Germany.  The war wouldn't officially start until September 1939 but the imminence of the war was apparent to all observers.  Hyde Park on Hudson portrays FDR as cavalier about the issue.  FDR seems to be sizing up King George as if to determine if the King is worthy of his support.  The King's willingness to be photographed eating a hot dog is the pivotal moment in Anglo-American relations if Hyde Park on Hudson is accurate.

FDR is often considered one of the greatest American presidents but Murray portrays him as henpecked and in need of feminine comfort in order to discharge his responsibilities.  FDR's private secretary, Marguerite LeHand (Elizabeth Marvel), acts as gatekeeper, procurer and sometime mistress.  Eleanor Roosevelt does not turn a blind eye towards her husband's dalliances.  She actually forms friendships with LeHand & Suckley.  It's implied that her sexuality at this point in their marriage is exclusively sapphic.  She views LeHand & Suckley's ministrations as beneficial to her marriage and country.  Suckley is caught unaware of the full extent on LeHand's services to the president.

There are times when I laughed at the incredulity of some of the situations.  Just before King George's bite heard around the world, FDR insists Suckley join the First Couple & the Royal Couple at the head picnic table as act of contrition.  You see, the evening before Suckley had caught FDR cheating on her with LeHand.  Technically, he was cheating on his wife with LeHand but I guess he was cheating on Suckley, once removed.

I forgot to mention the most powerful woman in FDR's life - his 83 year old mother, Sara.  In the film, FDR spends considerable time juggling the demands of his wife, cousin, secretary and mother while probing the British sovereign's haughtiness with paintings, alcohol and food.  It all seems ridiculous if you think about it for long but the film is amusing.  Murray doesn't quite do an impression of FDR.  He loses himself in the role which is more than he usually does.  Murray's character always seem to have certain similarity but in Hyde Park he completely subsumes himself in the persona of FDR.

The supporting actresses keep the film moving nicely.  I've been a fan of Laura Linney's I saw her as Dede in Tale of the City (it's already been 20 years since that miniseries aired).  Marvel's LeHand is the juiciest character in the film.  Suckley is a shy and withdrawn whereas as LeHand is self-assured; more so than one would expect from a private secretary...unless she was intimate with her boss.  Olivia Williams as Eleanor, Elizabeth Wilson as Sara Roosevelt & Olivia Colman as Queen Elizabeth are memorable.  Colman plays Elizabeth as bitchy & uptight.  Fortunately for Western civilization, her husband ate that hot dog over her objections or we would all be speaking German now.

If you don't take Hyde Park on Hudson too seriously (i.e. recognize it as a comedy), it's an entertaining film.

§§§

The scenes in Hitchcock are more believable because Alfred Hitchcock was such a larger than life character.  Documenting the making of Psycho, Hitchcock show how personally invested Hitchcock was in the film; both emotionally and financially.  The film is based on Stephen Rebello's Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho.  Psycho was based on Robert Bloch's Psycho with Norman Bates partially inspired by Ed Gein (aka The Plainfield Ghoul), a serial killer who tangential behaviors are numerous and ghoulish.

In Hitchcock, the Master of Suspense has hallucinations where he speaks with Gein during the production of Psycho.  Hitchcock really kicks into gear when we get see Anthony Hopkins do his Hitchcock imitation.  More closely matching Hitchcock's distinctive speech patterns than Murray in Hyde Park, Hopkins does seem to be doing more impersonation than interpretation.  With such an iconic personality, I don't know if Hopkins could have chosen a different route...although Murray.  However, these are two different films.  Whereas Hyde Park seems as though it would be better suited for serious drama, it strives for comedy.  Hitchcock with its flamboyant characters would be better suited to comedy but strives for drama.

The heart of Hitchcock is the relationship between Hitchcock & his wife, Alma Reville (Helen Mirren).  We see their power struggles within the marriage and their coping mechanisms.  Reville, Hitchcock's most trusted film advisor, scripted and edited all his films.  She chafed at having her own identity and considerable talents overlooked in favor of her husband, whom she help immensely.  Hitchcock had some peculiar interactions with his leading ladies.  Not necessarily sexual but sexualized, Hitchcock fell in love with his leading ladies and attempted to control them while Reville looked on, reining in his more bizarre behaviors but allowing him to fetishize his actresses to the creative benefit of his films (and detriment of their marriage).

Hitchcock is self-conscious of his weight and jealous of the men who pay attention to his wife.  Reville resents the attention her husband lavishes on his female actresses and suffers from low self-esteem in comparison to the ever younger and beautiful women being cast in his films.

Coming off the success of North by Northwest, Hitch is anxious to try something new and quickly champions Psycho despite the source material's macabre and outré elements.  Unwilling to find financing, Hitchcock mortgages his house.  From there we see him increasingly under pressure from the stress of the film production and the suspicion Reville is having an affair.  Along the way, Scarlett Johansson shows up as Janet Leigh.  I didn't think she looked or sounded much like Leigh but Johansson was sexy and magnetic like I remember Janet Leigh.  James D'Arcy as Anthony Perkins, has a smaller role in Hitchcock but captures Perkins/Bates much more accurately...at least, accurate with my expectation.  Hitch bullies and teases Perkins as he knows about his closeted sexuality.  Toni Collette as Hitchcock's assistant and Jessica Biel as Vera Miles have smaller but memorable roles.

Like the best Hitchcock films, Hitchcock has a cheeky sense of dark humor which serves it well.  I  enjoyed Hitchcock quite a lot.  It's not a great film but it is a thoroughly delightful one.

§§§

Landmark Theaters have been running a "no cell phone" PSA before its screenings for a few month.  The spot feature Hitchcock admonishing the audience to not use cell phones.  The footage in the ad comes from Hitchcock.

Moonrise Kingdom & Monsieur Lazhar

While visiting my father in Las Vegas last week, we saw Moonrise Kingdom and Monsieur Lazhar.

Moonrise Kingdom starring Jared Gilman & Kara Hayward; with Bill Murray, Frances McDormand, Bruce Willis, Edward Norton, Tilda Swinton, Jason Schwartzman & Harvey Keitel; directed by Wes Anderson; (2012) - Official Website
Monsieur Lazhar starring Mohamed Saïd Fellag, Sophie Nélisse & Émilien Néron; directed by Philippe Falardeau; Frech with subtitles; (2011) - Official Website

§§§

Prior to Moonrise Kingdom, I had only seen one Wes Anderson film - The Royal Tenenbaums.  All the other films are missing from my viewing experience - Rushmore, Bottle Rocket, The Darjeeling Limited & The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.

Having seen Tenenbaums and read about his other works, I knew what to expect - large ensemble cast, detailed characterization, quirkiness, etc.  That describes Moonrise Kingdom.  I wasn't quite ready for the deadpan delivery which each character employs.  That wasn't the case in Tenenbaums. 

Whereas Tenenbaums gently showed adults and their many flaws, Moonrise Kingdom is about first love...between two strange kids...on an isolated New England island in 1965...with a hurricane bearing down on them.  The flawed adults are there - detached parents (Murray & McDormand), martinet Scout leader (Norton), coldly efficient Social Services (Swinton), etc. but the focus is on the young couple (Jared Gilman & Kara Hayward). 

Gilman is Sam, an orphan & rogue Khaki Scout who goes AWOL from his summer camp to runaway with his love.  Suzy is the eldest daughter of a passionless couple of lawyers who live in a lighthouse on the other end of New Penzance Island.  Prone to listening to Benjamin Britten records and stealing library books, Suzy has kept her epistolary relationship with Sam a secret.

Using Sam's wilderness survival skills, the couple elude the Scout troop and island police chief (Bruce Willis) who are tracking them as if they were fugitives.  Along the way, the adults learn more about themselves than the kids do.

Quirky in spades, Moonrise Kingdom has a gentleness about it.  It's also a bit surreal with its hyperidealized version of mid-1960s New England.  The entire cast is effective although one must look for subtle nuances over their affectations.  Kara Hayward, in particular, looks as though she could do well in adolescent roles.  She remind me a little of Amy Landecker although Hayward's eyes are not as piercing.

Hank Williams songs are frequently playing on the radio in the background throughout the film.  "Kaw-Liga", song instantly recognizable for its tom-tom beat and Williams' warbling, is repeatedly played.

§§§

Monsieur Lazhar also deals with children except they are coping with a beloved teacher's suicide.  Monsieur Lazhar is also an indictment of the Canadian public educational system although the Montreal school in the film would be the envy of most US public elementary schools.

The film opens with 5th or 6th grader Simon finding the body of his teacher, Martine Lachance, hanging in the classroom before school.  She has committed suicide.  Her entire class is traumatized by the event and the school reacts per policy - psychologists brought in, counseling available to the students, etc.. 

Unable to find a replacement teacher, the principal is approached by Bashir Lazhar, an Algerian immigrant who was a teacher in his homeland, to take over Lachance's class for the rest of the school year. 

Lazhar encounters cultural and emotional barriers with his class.  Lazhar has trouble adjusting to the highly regulated manner in which he must teach - no touching of students, no administering of medication such as aspirin or sunscreen, no Balzac, etc..  Oddly, he doesn't seem concerned with the students addressing him by his first name which seems to be the norm at his school.  First name usage seems indicative of the school which is fairly progressive.  Lazhar's requirement that the students' desks be aligned in straight rows is viewed as quaint by the other teachers.  His school is all about engaging the students on their terms.

The two main students Lazhar interacts with is Simon, a troublemaker who seems to be acting out as a coping mechanism for Lachance's death and Alice, who was Simon's best friend before the incident.  Alice appears to be the most well-adjusted of the kids, writing a mature essay expressing her feelings about her teacher's death.  Lazhar wants to use Alice's composition as the starting point for group discussion in the class.  He feels the by-the-book response by the school is not allowing the children to properly grieve.  His suggestion is dismissed out of hand by the principal.

Lazhar knows something about grieving.  Lazhar is seeking political asylum in Canada.  His wife wrote a book critical of the government and extremists in Algeria.  Lazhar moved to Canada ahead of his family to set things up.  The day before she was to leave for Canada, Lazhar's wife & children were killed when their apartment building burned down.  The Canadian government is challenging his immigration status on the grounds that it was his wife who was in danger and that Lazhar can be safely repatriated to Algeria without concern for his safety.

Lazhar keeps his immigration status a secret from the principal as it would have disqualified him from his job.  Not only that but Lazhar was not a teacher in Algeria.  His wife was a college instructor but he was a restaurant owner.  One of the frustrating aspects of the film is that Lazhar doesn't fully explain why he takes the risk of falsifying his credentials and risking deportation in order to get the teaching job.  It's implied that his empathy for the children dealing with a shocking death is his sole motivation but that isn't really explored.

As the school year progresses, most of the children in his class respond well to his methods with Alice becoming his favorite pupil.  Simon is the major exception.  He carries around a photo of Ms. Lachance but has drawn angel wings and a hangman's noose around her neck.  When discovered, Simon is given further counseling. 

Simon and Lachance had a troubled relationship.  It is revealed that Simon accused Lachance of inappropriate contact (a peck on the cheek which may or may not have happened).  Simon's accusation may have been the straw that broke Lachance's back.  Lazhar is dumbfounded as to why a teacher would in a classroom on Wednesday night.  Simon thinks the answer is that she knew he would be the first person to discover the body because he had milk delivery duty on Thursday morning.  So Simon is carrying around a lot of guilt and resentment towards Lachance which he can't cope with.  Lazhar, having trouble adjusting to life without his family and in a strange land recognizes a kindred spirit in Simon. 

Monsieur Lazhar was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at this year's Academy Awards.  With Monsieur Lazhar, I have seen four of the five films nominated for this year's Best Foreign Language Film.  The other three films were Bullhead, Footnote & A Separation (winner).  The film I have not seen is In Darkness.

Évelyne de la Chenelière, the playwright who wrote Bashir Lahzar (the play which the film is based on), plays Alice's mother - an airline pilot who is frequently out of town due to her work. 

Sophie Nélisse & Émilien Néron are outstanding as Alice & Simon, respectively.

The American Battle Royale and the Japanese Hunger Games

Back in April, a few weeks after The Hunger Games was released, Jesse Hawthorne Ficks hosted the highly anticipated screening of Battle Royale as part of his Midnites for Maniacs series.  The Japanese themed triple-feature (officially subtitled "Growing Up Too Fast") included Lost in Translation and House.  I stayed for for Battle Royale and Lost in Translation, having seen House before.  The screenings were at the Castro.

Lost in Translation starring Bill Murray & Scarlett Johansson; directed by Sofia Coppola; English & Japanese with subtitles; (2003) - Official Website
Battle Royale starring Chiaki Kuriyama & Takeshi Kitano; directed by Kinji Fukasaku; Japanese with subtitles; (2000)

Never having seen a Sofia Coppola film (although I have heard much about Marie Antoinette), I was anxious to see her most celebrated film.  Lost in Translation won an Oscar in 2004 for Best Original Screenplay and was nominated for Best Picture; Coppola was nominated for Best Director and Murray for Best Actor.

Lost in Translation has the look and feel of a Jim Jarmusch film which is shorthand for saying the film has a minimalist and contemplative tone.  Two years after Lost in Translation, Murray would essentially duplicate his performance in Jarmusch's Broken Flowers.

Murray plays Bob Harris, an American movie star in Japan to film a Suntory Whiskey commercial.  Scarlett Johansson plays Charlotte, the wife of a photographer (Giovanni Ribisi) on assignment in Japan. Both are staying at a luxury Tokyo hotel.  When Charlotte's husband takes a short assignment outside Tokyo, Charlotte is left to herself for several days.  Bob & Charlotte quickly strike up a friendship.  Initially based on their shared nationality, Lost in Translation veers towards a May-December romance but never quite gets there.  Disoriented in a foreign culture, the two cling to each other emotionally but they have issues (large and small) which impede the romance.

Part romance/part comedy/part drama, Coppola does her best Jarmusch impersonation.  In fact, I think her screenplay is better than any Jarmusch film I've seen.  Bill Murray shines as the soft-spoken Harris.  Murray infuses his character with poignancy and coaxes relatively subtle humor from his fish-out-of water circumstances.

§§§

If I had only seen Lost in Translation that evening, I would have considered the night to be supremely satisfying.  However, Lost in Translation was only the first course.  "Growing Up Too Fast" is too encompassing to be of much thematic guide.  The character arc of Scarlett Johansson's Charlotte is about as far away from Chiaki Kuriyama's character in Battle Royale as can be.  Kuriyama, best known as Gogo from Tarantino's Kill Bill: Vol. 1, filmed Battle Royale three years earlier.

Ficks referred to Battle Royale as the Japanese Hunger Games but noted that author Suzanne Collins claimed she had not seen Battle Royale prior to writing The Hunger Games. There are similarities though. Battle Royale is set in a future where societal order has broken down.  Adolescents are out of control (it's a variation of the old JD exploitation films).  Each year, the worst behaved class is chosen for Battle Royale which is a televised fight-to-the-death match.  The students are pitted against each other and must kill to survive.  They have collars which will explode if there are more than one person alive on the small island where the competition takes place.  Each student is given a bag with unknown contents.  The contents may be weapons, surveillance equipment or a pot lid.  To spice things up, they throw in a a few ringers - winners from past Battles Royale.  Sounds vaguely familiar, doesn't it?

Battle Royale has a few wrinkles which set it apart from The Hunger Games. Since most of the contestants have gone to school together, they bring long-established alliances and rivalries to the battle. Battle Royale focuses on human nature and the breakdown of civilized behavior as one confronts a kill-or-be-killed situation. The Hunger Games seemed to focus on larger issues of totalitarianism and the subjugation of people. The simple analogy I would make is Battle Royale:Lord of the Flies :: The Hunger Games:1984.

Battle Royale is extremely graphic and would likely earn a R rating in the US.  More gleeful in depicting the carnage, Battle Royale seems to owe much to J-Horror black comedies.  It doesn't seem to inspire to more than what is shown on the screen; whereas The Hunger Games has higher aspirations.

As they might say in the UK, Battle Royale was a bloody good time.  The standout scenes was a sequence where five or six girls have holed up in a lighthouse.  They turn on each other but not before touching on every stereotypical feeling of teenage angst and frustration.

§§§

It was my intention to see The Hunger Games quickly after Battle Royale to make a comparison. Film festivals got in the way and The Hunger Games' continued box office success enabled my procrastination.  I didn't see The Hunger Games until nearly two months after seeing Battle Royale.

The Hunger Games starring Jennifer Lawrence & Josh Hutcherson; with Woody Harrelson, Donald Sutherland & Elizabeth Banks; directed by Gary Ross; (2012) - Official Website

I saw The Hunger Games at the Century Tanforan.  It was my first time in that theater.  The theater looks like any other Century venue with the familiar murals.  The Tanforan had some interesting old-time movie poster in the main corridor to set it apart slightly.  During the previews, they advertised a bunch of classic films screened digitally at Century Theaters including Citizen Kane.

Jennifer Lawrence looked nothing like her Winter's Bone character.  I wasn't quite sure how I felt about her taking the lead role in The Hunger Games.  I was very impressed with her performance in Winter's Bone.  Lawrence shows quite a bit of range from Ree Doll to Katniss Everdeen.  The Hunger Games is about as good as you can expect from a big budget Hollywood film.  I'm a little surprised when I hear about schools organizing trips to screenings of the film but have to admit that the film offers many teaching opportunities for young people.  I wonder how many kids (and parents) recognize the universal themes in the film and how many were fascinated by the gladiatorial aspects.

Not quite living up to the hype, I read the novel after seeing the film and as usual, preferred the novel.  Told solely from the perspective of Katniss, the novel offers an intimacy of Katniss which is diluted in the film (which presents a multi-perspective).  Katniss has a vulnerability and at the same time, a strength of character which is revealed through her inner thoughts.  This is lacking in the film which focuses more on the decadence of the Capitol and the barely concealed socio-economic commentary.

Did I prefer Battle Royale to The Hunger Games?  I can't answer that because the two films were different enough to appeal to different people or in my case, different moods.  Both were well made and entertaining films.  If forced to choose, I'd recommend seeing Battle Royale and reading The Hunger Games.  Then again, I hear there is a manga version of Battle Royale...