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Charlie Wilson's War (2007) [R] ****

A film review by James Berardinelli for ReelViews.net

It's a curious thing. Whenever this much talent is assembled for a motion picture, the result inevitably seems to be a letdown. And to say that Charlie Wilson's War is topheavy with talent is to understate the matter. The cast features three Oscar winners and two nominees. The director has been nominated five times and won once. The writer is a multiple Emmy winner. The cinematographer has a couple of Oscar nominations and the composer has six. Almost against the odds, however, Charlie Wilson's War does not collapse under the weight of expectations. In fact, it meets them squarely without flinching. With its rapid pace, smart screenplay, and top-notch acting, this is one of the 2007 Oscar season's most appealing and compelling adult motion pictures.

The screenplay, penned by veteran writer Aaron Sorkin, is based on George Crile's biography of Congressman Charlie Wilson, who is credited as being one of the architects of the United States' covert war against the USSR in Afghanistan. While the film takes liberties with some of the details, the broad strokes are accurate. It's fascinating to look back at the pre-Taliban era and see some of the factors that led to the country's becoming destabilized. While the Taliban is never mentioned (it did not come into power until some six years after the conclusion of the events in this movie), it casts a long shadow over events that unfold during Charlie Wilson's War. It is impossible to watch this movie without considering the natural progression of events after the Soviet retreat.

When the film begins, Charlie Wilson (Tom Hanks) is the Democratic Congressman from Texas' Second District. Known more for his love of parties and beautiful women, Good Time Charlie becomes aware of the situation in Afghanistan shortly after being named to the Defense Appropriations subcommittee in 1980. The budget for covertly opposing the USSR in Afghanistan at the time is $5 million. Charlie places a phone call and orders it doubled. But, as he learns from his friend, socialite and right wing mover-and-shaker Joanne Herring (Julia Roberts), that's not going to be enough. Charlie ends up on a whirlwind tour of Pakistan, where he meets the President (Om Puri) and walks through the refugee camps. He returns to Washington with renewed determination to open up the coffers and get the freedom fighters (Afghan Mujahideen) weapons that will enable them to bring down Soviet helicopters. With the aid of CIA operative Gust Avrakotos (Philip Seymour Hoffman), Charlie begins a campaign that eventually leads to the U.S. diverting more than $500 million of aid to Afghanistan.

Politically based stories of this sort run the risk of coming across as dry; that's not the case here. Director Mike Nichols keeps this fast-paced film moving and Sorkin peppers the screenplay with one-liners that vary from amusing to laugh-aloud funny. Charlie Wilson's War is justly classified as a drama, but someone could be excused for thinking it's a comedy. The film is more insightful, incisive, and intelligent than any of the many other current Middle East-themed motion pictures. Equally as important, it doesn't play politics with a loaded deck. This is not a repudiation of the totality of America's Afghanistan policy, although it makes it plain where the biggest error lay. Ironically, one could argue that the film's point validates aspects of the current Iraq strategy.

As the acting foundation of Charlie Wilson's War, Tom Hanks gives another fine performance, although it's not the kind of meaty role one normally associates with nominations. He shows fundamental changes to Charlie's nature as the man changes from a good ole boy (reminiscent of J.R. Ewing) to someone with a conscience. Hanks is perfect for the role. No matter how questionable a character's ethics, we always want to side with him if he's played by Hanks. That's currency in the emotional bank, and it works perfectly with Charlie: a disreputable individual who develops into something more. Philip Seymour Hoffman is the standout, shamelessly pilfering nearly every scene he's in, whether he's breaking glass, shouting at the top of his lungs, or uttering heartfelt profanities. If Hoffman gets nominated for his performance it's going to be deserved. Amy Adams, delightful as always, is Charlie's ever-faithful assistant. Ned Beatty plays Doc Long, the chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee. Emily Blunt shows up briefly and memorably. If there's a negative, it's Julia Roberts. Either she's miscast or her heart isn't into acting, but this is an example of plastic and ineffective acting. There's little here of the fire and passion that earned the actress a statuette for Erin Brockovich. It's a shame, but it doesn't hurt the movie too much - Roberts is only in a handful of scenes.

There's some interesting musical stuff going on as well. Composer James Newton-Howard has borrowed the He Shall Purify chorus from Handel's Messiah and put it to good use. This is perhaps the first time any song from the oratorio has been used as a battle anthem. One could argue that it simply fits the mood but, considering the words (He shall purify the sons of Levi, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness) and the context in which the song is employed, there is a strong element of irony here. It's a pretty subtle thing so many viewers won't get it.

With so many movies working on auto-pilot, it's easy to forget the pleasure of a well-written screenplay, and even easier to forget how good things can be when a director of Mike Nichols' pedigree brings the script to life. The film has it all: suspense, drama, and humor. There's a brilliant scene in which Charlie is conferring with Gust and his aides keep interrupting with news about his involvement in a cocaine scandal. The deftness of timing necessary in this scene is the kind of thing that would have Charlie Chaplin smiling (as is the punch line, which involves a bottle of whiskey). Sorkin's screenplay is clean and crisp and not muddled by an overt political agenda (surprising, since Sorkin is openly political). From start to finish, Charlie Wilson's War is an unrelieved delight, and it works even better for those who understand the bridges that took us from the withdrawal of the Soviet Union from Afghanistan to 9/11 and beyond. [Berardinelli's rating: 3.5 stars out of 4]

Labels: biography, comedy, drama, history, Tom Hanks, war
IMDb 70/100 

MetaScore (critics=67, viewers=67)
RottenTomatoes Averages (critics=82, viewers=74)
Blu-ray 
Berardinelli's review 

 

Waterloo Bridge (1940) [NR] ****

A film review by Derek Winnert.

Director Mervyn LeRoy’s 1940 vintage black and white MGM romance Waterloo Bridge is a sweet, tear-jerking winner, although it cries out for Technicolor when Joseph Ruttenberg shoots it in black and white. Though Vivien Leigh wanted Laurence Olivier and not Robert Taylor as her co-star (It’s a typical piece of miscasting… I am afraid it will be a dreary job), she later stated this was the favorite of her films. So did Taylor.

Universal Pictures had hired James Whale to film the controversial material about a woman forced into prostitution in WWI in 1931 as Waterloo Bridge, starring Mae Clarke and Douglass Montgomery, but were unable to re-release the movie after the US Production Code was enforced in July 1934.

But in 1939 the MGM studio bought the rights to the 1930 Robert E Sherwood play from Universal and a year later, in 1940, MGM remakes the story as a partly updated, topical one, with a carefully smoothed-out plot about a London ballet dancer and the English upper-crust officer who is smitten with her after meeting by chance on Waterloo Bridge during an air raid.

The movie unfolds in an extended flashback narration as the officer revisits Waterloo Bridge in WWII London on his way to fight to France and recalls himself as a young man in WWI and meeting Myra, whom he had planned to marry.

Vivien Leigh (in her follow-up to 1939’s Gone with the Wind) is appealingly sweet and vulnerable as Myra Lester, the young woman who is fired from her corps de ballet job as a ballerina and falls into street-walking prostitution, believing her fiancé to be dead. However, Robert Taylor (unable to conceal his American accent) is less impressive, merely handsome and dashing as the officer, Roy Cronin.

The material is just as soppy and outmoded as before, but the plush, sumptuous MGM production and Leigh are extremely attractive and beguiling. And the piece is sleekly crafted by director LeRoy and producer Sidney Franklin and their team, helping to make it a big hit in its day, taking nearly $3 million (it cost $1,164,000). Today’s audiences may view it more skeptically, but it is still a classic of its kind.

Also in the cast are Lucile Watson, Virginia Field, Maria Ouspenskaya, C Aubrey Smith, Steffi Duna, Janet Shaw, Janet Waldo, Virginia Carroll, Leda Nicova, Florence Baker, Margery Manning, Frances MacInerney, Eleanor Stewart, Jimmy Aubrey.

Waterloo Bridge was Oscar nominated for Best Music and Best Cinematography. It is probably the first Hollywood film to have WWII in its story. The screenplay is by S N Behrman, Hans Rameau and George Froeschel, and the music score is by Herbert Stothart.

A third film version of Sherwood’s play, Gaby, followed in 1956, with Leslie Caron and John Kerr.

Blogger's comment: I found the story a little less appealing knowing Myra had become a prostitute after having lost her position with the corps de ballet, because she had chosen love rather than duty and had missed a ballet performance. Also, she could have reached out to Roy's mother, who had tried to befriend her, but did not. Finally, the British military uniforms were not authentic at all. 

While Waterloo Bridge may have been the first WWII romantic drama, there have been countless others. Two that come to mind, and links to their blog reviews are:

The Very Thought of You (1944) Eleanor Parker, Dennis Morgan

Every Time We Say Goodbye (1986) Tom Hanks, Cristina Marsillach


Labels: drama, romance, WWII, tragedy
IMDb 77/100
MetaScore (critics=73, viewers=72)
RottenTomatoes Averages (critics=83, viewers=82)
Blu-ray

The Man Who Knew Infinity (2015) [PG-13] ****

Film review by Martin Liebman for blu-ray.com on August 9, 2016

The pursuit of mathematics -- busily scribbling out formulas and sorting out large masses of figures -- doesn't necessarily translate well to the screen, at least not in the same way other, more visually driven and easily understandable pursuits can light up a movie. Mathematical heroes are likewise less enticing, at least from the outside looking in, than other heroes in movies where heroic actions are more immediately praiseworthy and, perhaps more important, understandable by the general audience, even considering other graceful and artistic pursuits such as music composition or painting. That's why the mathematical genius mini-genre tends to focus almost exclusively on the people behind the formulas rather than the number crunching itself. Films like A Beautiful Mind and Good Will Hunting are now joined by the less dynamic but equally touching The Man Who Knew Infinity, a title that doesn't roll off the tongue as well as its peers but that aptly describes the subject's seemingly limitless mathematics knowledge that impresses his peers, though not before prejudice interferes with genius. The film, from Director Matthew Brown, and starring Dev Patel and Jeremy Irons capably paints its picture, lacking real novelty but offering a genuine insight into one of math's most gifted minds and how the mathematics world responded to it.

Srinivasa Ramanujan (Dev Patel) is a mathematical genius. But that doesn't get him anywhere. He's self-taught and doesn't understand all of the how's or why's of mathematics. He just knows. Without a degree, he cannot land a job. Without a job, he cannot support his wife (Devika Bhise). When he sends evidence of his mathematical genius to Cambridge University, work which appears to disprove complex work done by Mathematician G. H. Hardy (Jeremy Irons), he's invited to the school but is not particularly welcome. His heritage and presence angers those around him. His inability to precisely prove his findings frustrates Hardy. But the two forge a bond, which becomes a friendship. As Ramanujan's work begins to earn him the respect of others, a new adversity will challenge him far more deeply than any he's faced before.

Understanding the intricacies of the mathematics which propels Ramanujan to Cambridge is not in the least bit critical to either enjoying the movie or discovering its greater purpose. The math sounds good, rolling off character tongues in graceful and learnedly literate ways. It looks enticing in shots revealing Ramanujan's notes and formulas, but all of it is merely a driving force to a greater story, support details that set the stage but don't define the narrative. Indeed, The Man Who Knew Infinity is less a story about purely mathematical minds -- certainly those concepts are what draw the men together, a shared passion for, and intimate understanding of, numbers -- and more a tale of discovery, friendship, and common pursuits overcoming common prejudice. In that way, the movie is hardly novel. Many before it have explored similar themes and ideas. The Man Who Knew Infinity does it capably and does it justice, though, with an honest, sincere, and heartfelt exploration of the relationship between Hardy and Ramanujan and the latter's contributions to his field but also his contributions to the hearts of his colleagues.

The movie is well assembled, nicely saturated in its time period which is important to its historical accuracy but of secondary importance to the central, human-value details that drive it and create through it a timeless tale of friendship. Brown's direction is steady and unobtrusive, allowing his cast to emote and define the movie more so than any cinematic techniques which do enhance, but in no way supplant, the performances. The film is made by those performances, including terrific efforts from both Dev Patel and Jeremy Irons as mathematical geniuses and, as the film progresses, colleagues and friends. The performances, like the movie's structure and themes, make use of the language of mathematics and the actors effortlessly and believably integrate their knowledge thereof into the film, but it's beyond the numbers where their work shines. Both leads demonstrate a deeper command of the relationship the characters build, and of the place and time, which is critical to the way it begins and evolves. They also reveal the more intimate understandings that extend beyond the externalities of the world around them, understandings that are nurtured in the heart. The film enjoys several fine key support efforts, notably from Toby Jones as Hardy's closest colleague at Cambridge.

Labels: biography, drama
IMDb 72/100
MetaScore (critics=56, viewers=73)
RottenTomatoes Averages (critics=63,viewers=74)
Blu-ray

As Time Goes By (TV, 1992-2005) [TV-PG] *****

Late in 1952, Lionel Hardcastle (Geoffrey Palmer) a young second lieutenant in training with the Middlesex Regiment meets nineteen-year-old nurse Jean Pargetter (Judi Dench). They spend three months together during which they fall in love, and then Lionel is posted to Korea. He writes to Jean immediately:

1st Battalion
The Middlesex Regiment
BFPO3
February 10th ‘53

My Darling Jean
England seems so far away
and I miss you terribly. This is
the first chance I have had to
send you my address here in
Korea.
Do write back straight away
my darling…

However, Lionel doesn’t receive a reply and he incorrectly assumes Jean wants to forget him. She never receives his letter and incorrectly assumes he wants to forget her. And so he never writes another letter to her and she never tries to find his address in Korea.

Thirty-eight years pass. Jean marries, has a daughter Judith (Moira Brooker), her husband passes away, and she opens a secretarial service Type For You. Lionel meanwhile has gone to Kenya and started a coffee plantation, married and divorced, sold the plantation and moved back to London.

He has written an autobiography about his years in Kenya, titled My Life in Kenya, however his publisher Alistair Deacon (Philip Bretherton) wants him to make some edits, so he contacts Jean’s secretarial service, and Judith, who works for her mother, becomes his secretary. He invites her out for dinner, goes to Jean’s Holland Park row house, where Judith lives with her mother, and meets Jean. They don’t recognize each other immediately but each one suspects who the other one is, and later, when they meet again in the lobby of Lionel’s hotel, it becomes clear, and they realize how young and proud and stupid they were, so long ago, when they each let the other one go.

Their story is a poignant, slightly bittersweet romantic comedy-drama about two former lovers who reunite after thirty-eight years, and try to determine if they can recapture their youthful passion and exuberance, or if it is too late. They understand that they have been given a second chance, but it is a new relationship they must create, based on their nearly forty years of life experience apart, and their bittersweet regrets of the years they missed. Their story echoes the wish many of us have later in life, that we could go back and experience again the passion and possessiveness of those first weeks and months of a love affair.

The cast is uniformly excellent, and the writing has the perfect blend of the comedy that finds itself in a variety of domestic and work-related situations, and the drama that accompanies the search for love, not only for Jean and Lionel, but for her daughter Judith, for his publisher Alistair, and for Sandy (Jenny Funnell) who begins as a young employee at the secretarial service and becomes a live-in member of the Pargetter-Hardcastle family, and, really, a second daughter to Jean and Lionel.

Labels: comedy, drama, romance, rom-com-faves
IMDb 83/100 
RottenTomatoes Averages (critics=tbd, viewers=tbd) 
DVD 
britbox 

The Last Rifleman (2024) [PG13] ****

A film review by Brian Orndorf for blu-ray.com on Nov. 6, 2024.

The Last Rifleman shares the same story as 2023’s The Great Escaper. In that picture, Michael Caine portrayed an elderly World War II veteran sneaking out of senior home captivity to participate in a ceremony recognizing the 70th anniversary of D-Day. The new film puts Pierce Brosnan in the role, handling old age makeup and general physical stiffness to portray the determined man, who’s bringing plenty of emotional baggage with him on the journey. The tales aren’t completely identical, but there’s enough similarity to inspect, yet The Last Rifleman is the more poignant endeavor, offering less time with travel experiences and more moments of guilt and pain hitting the main character as he embarks on an ambitious quest to reach France on his own.

Artie (Pierce Brosnan) is a 92-year-old man living in a senior care center, trying to remain attentive to his wife, Maggie (Stella McCusker), who’s fighting dementia. When Maggie passes away, Artie faces a host of memories, including time with his wife and Charlie, a dear friend from long ago. Discovering special letters in Maggie’s belongings, Artie decides to participate in an upcoming D-Day memorial service, requiring some quick thinking to get past the staff. Now out in the open world, Artie has to find his way to France, embarking on a series of travel adventures where he meets various people looking to help the military veteran reach his final destination. Juliette (Clemence Poesy) is part of this support chain, as the French mother is also dealing with troubles, responding to the older man’s quest to confront his past.

Artie can’t escape the horrors of war. It invades his dreams, returning to a time of confusion and tremendous fear in the British Army, surrounded by elements of violence as a new soldier. He’s no longer a young man, snapped back to his reality as a senior citizen facing an extensive list of medical needs, including management of his diabetes. Artie tries to be there for Maggie, comforting his wife of 68 years, but she remains in a fog, calling for Charlie when her husband hopes to reach some part of her mind. Maggie’s death inspires Artie’s actions in The Last Rifleman, left on his own to face issues rooted in his past, using the D-Day gathering to confront mistakes that aren’t immediately understood in the screenplay by Kevin Fitzpatrick. In fact, it takes a long time to reach a confrontation, with most of The Last Rifleman devoted to the journey to Normandy.

Travel isn’t easy for Artie, who’s frail but determined to reach his destination. Setbacks are common, as the character manages time on a train, a bus, and a truck, gradually making his way into France. The Last Rifleman details interactions along the way, including a young man who bonds with Artie over a shared love for composer Ennio Morricone. A truck driver is attentive to Artie’s diabetic behavior, and a longer stretch of screen time is devoted to Juliette, a Frenchwoman traveling home with her children. She helps Artie get past an expired passport and enter France, and the pair use their day together for confessional purposes, as the mother is processing medical issues. The Last Rifleman also explores life at the senior care center, where resident Tom (Ian McElhinney) contacts journalist Tony (Desmond Eastwood), informing the writer about Artie’s amazing mission, which soon becomes news across the country.

The Great Escaper was interested in comedic experiences. The Last Rifleman remains a softer, melancholy film, following Artie as he gets closer to the source of his anguish, also meeting an American soldier (the late John Amos, in his final role) who puts their shared service into perspective. There are more encounters to come for Artie, who eventually hitches a ride alongside ex-Nazis also trying to find sense in the war, making the philosophical line, living with ghosts, the dominant mood of the picture. The feature isn’t a tear-jerker, but something deeper when handling the true costs of combat and the stain of horrible mistakes. Brosnan gives a fine performance to help director Terry Loane, playing the strain of aging and the slow leak of communication as Artie starts to discuss his past with others. It’s the best work he’s done in some time, getting The Last Rifleman to a place of mournful reflection befitting an unusual (and partially true) story of closure. [Orndorfer's rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars]


Labels: drama, war, WWII 
IMDb 66/100 
MetaScore (critics=tbd, viewers=tbd) 
RottenTomatoes Averages (critics=62, viewers=86) 
Brian Orndorfer review