Maverick

 Maverick (1994)

Starring Mel Gibson, Jodie Foster, James Garner, Graham Greene, James Coburn, and Alfred Molina 

Directed by Richard Donner

Written by William Goldman

Click here for my Letterboxd review

The RyMickey Rating:  D

The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane

 The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane (1976)

Starring Jodie Foster, Martin Sheen, Alexis Smith, Mort Shuman, and Scott Jacoby

Directed by Nicolas Gessner

Written by Laird Koenig

Click here for my Letterboxd review

The RyMickey Rating:  C+

Taxi Driver

Taxi Driver (1976)

Starring Robert DeNiro, Jodie Foster, Albert Brooks, Harvey Keitel, Leonard Harris, Peter Boyle, and Cybill Shepherd

Directed by Martin Scorsese

Written by Paul Schrader

Click here for my Letterboxd review

The RyMickey Rating:  A-

Movie Review - Elysium

Elysium (2013)

Starring Matt Damon, Jodie Foster, Sharlto Copley, William Fichtner, Alice Braga, Wagner Moura, and Diego Luna

Directed by Neill Blomkamp

While Elysium takes place in the mid-22nd century, the basis of its plot shows us that the battle between the haves and the have-nots hasn't changed much 150 years from now.  Of course, rich people are bad, poor people are good, and there's no middle ground.  If you buy into this conceit you're probably a liberal, you may enjoy Neill Blomkamp's flick, but I found this dystopian future (so many dystopian futures lately in film) tiresome and obnoxious.

By the late 21st century, Earth has become diseased and polluted.  With the run-down land, Earth's wealthiest inhabitants fled to the space colony of Elysium in order to continue their way of life.  Elysium is just like Earth used to be except for the fact that this controlled environment drifts along through space.  Down on Earth, Max (Matt Damon) is a hard-working guy who's had his share of trouble with the law.  He ends up getting into a horrible accident at work in which he is exposed to a large amount of radiation which only gives him three days to live.  Rather than spend it on the hell that is Earth, he decides that he's going to try and do all he can to get to Elysium.  An associate named Spider (Wagner Moura) agrees to help him, but first he asks that Max steal some information from a powerful executive (William Fichtner) that will allow Spider to possibly take control of Elysium.  Through some convoluted nonsense, Max ends up undergoing a surgery that gives him a powerful exoskeleton that protects him when he goes to meet the exec and...yeah...I'm just gonna stop there, because can you top the notion of a powerful exoskeleton?

Seeing as how Max is trying to bring down Elysium (or at the very least make it more open to the general populous), many on Elysium aren't happy about this including Elysium's Secretary of Defense Delacourt (Jodie Foster).  Foster employs some weird accent (part South African-part Annoying) and couples that with some awkwardly-mannered jerky movements that make her presence off-the-charts odd (and not in a good way).  Toss in a weirdly overacting Sharlto Copley as some Elysium agent living on Earth who attempts to take out Max and Matt Damon ends up looking like one of the best actors ever to grace the screen in comparison.

Elysium looks ragged and worn-down from the outset (which I guess is the point), but it couldn't even visually intrigue me to make up for the lukewarm story and horrid acting.  It certainly doesn't help that the overarching theme of "rising up to defeat the man" felt tired and irksome.  Neil Blomkamp may have had success with the Best Picture-nominated District 9 (which I thought itself was overrated), but this just felt like more of the same in all aspects and it pales in comparison.

The RyMickey Rating:  D

Movie Review - The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane

The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane (1976)

Starring Jodie Foster, Martin Sheen, Alexis Smith, and Scott Jacoby

Directed by Nicolas Gessner

***This film is currently streaming on Netflix***

A Jodie Foster horror film?  That notion enticed me enough to watch, but I found The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane just all around odd.  Granted, the weirdness perhaps kept my interest piqued a bit longer than I expected, but the whole thing felt like an (off-) off-Broadway play simply filmed for the screen in terms of set-up, dialog, and directing.

Thirteen year-old Rynn (Jodie Foster) is incredibly (and I mean incredibly) wise for her age.  When we first meet her, she's greeting Frank Hallet (Martin Sheen), the adult son of her landlady, who barges into her home and uncomfortably attempts to entice Rynn into believing she should become his girlfriend.  I'm saying that all too nicely...Frank is an alleged child molester and a known creep around town.  However, the cops have never been able to pin any crimes on him.  Nonetheless, Rynn gets out of that situation by yelling for her father whom she says is in his study.  However, and herein lies the central mystery, Rynn's father has been dead for several months.  He's left her with the necessary things to stay alive, but she must continue to pretend he's still around in order to avoid being taken into foster care.  Needless to say, Rynn finds herself doing what's necessary in order to maintain her current lifestyle...even if that means doing things that would place any "normal" person in jail.

Story-wise, I feel like there could have been something here, but the character of Rynn is just too wise for her age.  The only reason it's even remotely believable is because Foster always has exuded a wise aura, but even she can't fully succeed here.  Maybe if Rynn was a seventeen year-old, I could have stretched my imagination a bit, but at thirteen, I just don't see the realism in this.  And that's ultimately a big problem and the film's downfall.

Foster, as I mentioned, is good in one of her early roles and Martin Sheen is undeniably creepy, but they can't save a story that just doesn't ring true.  It doesn't help that Nicolas Gessner filmed this almost like a stage play with a severe lack of imagination in his camera work.  This by-the-books basic direction reeked of low budget tv movie of the week rather than feature film.

The RyMickey Rating:  C-

Movie Review - Carnage

Carnage (2011)

Starring Jodie Foster, Kate Winslet, Christoph Waltz, and John C. Reilly

Directed by Roman Polanski

Based off a Tony Award-winning play, Carnage graces us with a quartet of wonderfully talented actors in a showcase for their skills.  However, the film which takes place in real time mostly within the confines of the apartment of Penelope and Michael Longstreet (Jodie Foster and John C. Reilly) should have felt more claustrophobic than director Roman Polanski is able to provide.  It's not that a movie like Carnage which is essentially four people talking with each other for eighty minutes should be "tension-filled", per se, but as the film progresses, there should be an ever-escalating sense of excitement...a building towards something grand at the conclusion.  It's not that the ending of the flick disappoints, but the roller coaster ride the film should have provided was full of too many valleys and not enough hills.

After their two sons get in a tiff on the playground resulting in one striking the other with a stick causing damage to two teeth, the aforementioned Longstreets get together with Nancy and Alan Cowan (Kate Winslet and Christoph Waltz) to try and patch things up.  Things begin quite civilly, but it's soon obvious to both parties that despite being on their best behavior, the "adults" here are really just play-acting, trying to put on their best fronts.  As criticisms of the others' parenting skills begin to be bandied about as if they were deadly bullets, the two couples begin to devolve into children fighting on the playground, albeit with a much better vocabulary.

Carnage certainly succeeds because of the four actors onscreen.  The very nature of the project calls for the quartet to be viewed pretty much the entire time (one would assume in the play, the actors would never leave the stage) and each holds their own with no one overshadowing anyone else.  It's always nice to see Jodie Foster onscreen (which actually happened twice this year with this and The Beaver) and here she's at her most neurotic.  It doesn't help her character that John C. Reilly as her husband tries to be the peacemaker rather than stand up for his wife.  If I had to choose a standout star from the bunch, it would have to be Reilly who has the comedic chops for a role like this.  In the end, he seems the most relatable to me (perhaps the reason why I liked him the most) in that, at times, his character appears to spout what the audience is feeling about these childish adults.

Kate Winslet is also wonderful as the uptight Nancy and she works very well with Christoph Waltz who continues to prove that he is quite adept at dark comedy (a category in which one could certainly place 2009's Inglourious Basterds).  Carnage is a film all about about personal interactions and it is pivotal that the cast mesh and flow together which is successfully achieved here.

However, something about the flick doesn't quite click and I have to think the problem lies in the direction since the blame certainly doesn't fall onto the actors.  I have to wonder what this story plays like on a stage where all four actors are present all the time.  In a film, we cut away to certain reactions and only every so often are treated to shots with the entire quartet in our field of vision.  If we had that stage-like ability to constantly be mindful of all four actors, I have to wonder if the edge-of-your-seatness of the "what are they gonna say next" tension inherent in the script would be elevated.  Of course, Roman Polanski wasn't going to shoot the movie with nary a one shot of of an actor, but it simply further goes to prove the difficulty at times of transferring plays to the big screen.

This isn't to say that Carnage is a failure.  It's far from that.  There are many laughs to be had and for sheer acting talent, the film is recommendable.  But if the film has done anything, it's made me desperate to want to see the film performed by a talented stage ensemble (**cough**I'm talking to you, University of Delaware Resident Ensemble Players**cough**).

The RyMickey Rating:  B-

Movie Review - The Beaver

The Beaver (2011)

Starring Mel Gibson, Jodie Foster, Anton Yelchin, Cherry Jones, and Jennifer Lawrence

Directed by Jodie Foster

I've said this before in a previous review of one of his films, but what Mel Gibson does outside of a cinematic setting is one thing...I still like him greatly as an actor (and director, for that matter).  In The Beaver, Gibson's first foray into acting since his most recent meltdown in which he berated his girlfriend, the actor takes on a role that seems rather suited for him in his current situation -- a depressed guy wanting to hide away from the world.  Although married to a seemingly lovely wife (Jodie Foster) with whom he has two sons and despite being the top exec at a promising toy company, Walter Black is in a funk.  Seriously forlorn, his wife Meredith kicks him out of the house, unable to deal with his lack of attention to his family.  While throwing away some of his belongings in a dumpster, he comes across a beaver hand puppet, which, after he places it on his hand, becomes Walter's sole way of communicating with other people.

Right off the bat, The Beaver has an incredibly odd premise that seemingly would lend itself to comedy (or dark comedy at the very least).  However, this is where the Jodie Foster-directed film ends up faltering the greatest.  It's obvious that the ultimate goal of the flick was to find a balance between drama and humor, but the comedy never really made itself known.  Foster simply can't foster the humor and it creates an uneven tone that never works itself out.

It's unfortunate, really, because Mel Gibson is actually pretty darn good here.  Perhaps by studying the accent of his Edge of Darkness co-star Ray Winstone, Gibson's rough-around-the-edges British accent that he spouts whenever speaking as the puppet is spot on.  But there's certainly more to his performance than an accent.  This'll sound corny, but there was something in Gibson's eyes in this movie that just said all that needed to be said.  While Gibson was spouting the Beaver's lines, the eyes of Walter were displaying what the character truly felt -- a man struggling with trying to find who he once was and how he possibly could have sunk so low.

While I placed a bit of the blame on Foster above, I think the film's biggest problem is a script that just doesn't quite know where it wants to go.  To me, this thing would've worked infinitely better as a clever short 30-minute flick, but when the movie tries to expand its landscape by delving into the life of Walter and Meredith's eldest son Porter and his burgeoning relationship with the school valedictorian (Jennifer Lawrence) who has troubles of her own, the whole thing falls flat.

There's part of me that wants to tell you to rent The Beaver simply because Gibson's performance is worthy of viewing.  However, heed the warning that you won't really be seeing a quality film to go along with it.

The RyMickey Rating:  C-