Laws of Man, Co-Starring Harvey Keitel

The U.S. Marshals Service was created to enforce and protect, rather than investigate. In addition to pursuing Federal fugitives and serving warrants, they provide security for missile silos and Antarctic stations. Unfortunately, these two Marshals are no Sam Gerard (from The Fugitive). They are deeply flawed, but at least they are both military veterans (one during WWII, the other in Korea), so when the bad guys declare war on them, they know how to return fire in director-screenwriter Phil Blattenberger’s Laws of Man, which releases tomorrow in theaters and on VOD.

Frank Fenton and Tommy Morton are Marshals, but they dress like Hoover-era Feds. The abstaining Fenton also acts like a Mormon, which should help him in hardscrabble Utah, but not with their first target, the deranged criminal family of Crash Mooncalf. They try to settle matters with a hail of bullets, but instead Morton plugs the old man right between the eyes. He considers that a result, whereas the justice-minded Fenton admonishes it as a mistake. The warrant for Benjamin Bonney (never explicitly identified as a descendant of Billy the Kid, but that would make sense) will be more difficult.

Again, Fenton and Morton demonstrate tactical superiority over Bonney and his three sons (one of whom seems to be invisible), but the grizzled old killer was already way ahead of them, having quashed their warrant. Frankly, the humiliations that follow are not credible, because threatening a federal officer is never legal under any circumstances. However, it prompts some serious hardcore seething from the tightly wound Fenton. Obviously, someone is protecting Bonney and the local head of the FBI field office, Galen Armstrong seems like a likely candidate, since he practically walks around with a sign around his neck that says “bad guy.”

Nevertheless, the first forty-five minutes or so work pretty well, because of how Blattenberger shows the two Marshals working together and relating to each other. They both clearly carry a great deal of baggage, but Morton adopts a live-for-today attitude, whereas Fenton ruminates over the past—deeply and often.

Laws of Man also benefits from a colorful supporting cast, including some big names squandering in brief throwaway roles, like James Urbaniak as a gas station proprietor and Graham Greene as the fatalistic (or maybe just bored) sheriff. However, Harvey Keitel is delightful to watch chewing the scenery as Cassidy Whittaker a traveling revivalist priest, sort of in the tradition of Orange County ex-hippie Evangelicals who still retained some stoner tendencies, who were much more prevalent in the 1970s. (It is an entertaining performance, even if you don’t know what I’m talking about.)

Lies We Tell: Where Two Englands Intersect

The legal age for marriage in the United Kingdom is a reasonable eighteen, but it is allowed for those as young as sixteen, provided there is parental consent. Apparently, that consent is easily granted within the Islamic “South Asian” enclaves in cities like Bradford. That is something an Irish-Anglo chauffeur probably never considered very much, until he takes a protective interest in his late boss’s Pakistani mistress, who finds herself at odds with the misogyny of her family and community in Mitu Misra’s Lies We Tell (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Demi Lamprose always told his chauffeur Donald, the only cheating husbands who get caught are the ones that do not love their wives enough to sufficiently cover their tracks. Presumably, he also thought enough about Amber to want to shield her from the shame such an affair would cause her Muslim family. It falls on the loyal driver to clean out the love nest, where he has the unfortunate duty of breaking the bad news to Amber. It is an awkward meeting that get even more awkward due to an unlikely chain of circumstances. However, when Amber reaches out, asking Donald to take care of some revealing photos on Lamprose’s phone, trust starts to develop between the two.

Donald and the viewers soon learn Amber is already a half-pariah in her community, despite her education and legal career, because she divorced KD, a rising Bradford gangster she was forced to marry when she was sixteen. She certainly had her reasons. However, in an act of sadistic parity, KD is now determined to marry her freshly sixteen-year-old sister Miriam—and her parents are only too happy to consent.

LWT is a scrupulously realistic film, which is terrifying. There is no way to sugarcoat the truth of the matter. Misra is depicting customs and behavior that is flat out misogynistic and essentially tribal in nature. Lest viewers have a kneejerk reaction, it should be noted Misra grew up in Bradford’s immigrant communities, but as a successful entrepreneur-turned filmmaker, he developed a wider perspective.

Granted, there are some first-time filmmaker mistakes to be found here. For instance, there is a pretentious bit of business at the end that is sure to elicit laughs at exactly the wrong time. However, the whole of this film is far more important than a few scattered parts like that. Indeed, some of the dialogue rings with significance, as when Amber’s mother accusingly asks why she always judges the family by British standards. We can see she wants to reply: because we are British and live in England, but she obviously knows that would be a mistake.

Sibylla Deen is terrific as Amber. It is a tough role, because sometimes the character is selfish and unlikable, but Deen really gets at her underlying vulnerabilities and makes her human. Gabriel Byrne reliably anchors the film as Donald, really lowering the boom in key moments. Having Harvey Keitel so prominent on the posters is somewhat deceptive, since Lamprose dies after the first five or ten minutes, but he is fine during the time. Jan Uddin’s KD is certainly a fierce villain, but Manzar Sehbai gives the film heft and complicated dimension with his powerful performance as Amber’s cowardly father, Zulfikar.

It is unusual to find on-screen a completely platonic relationship between two attractive and mature adults, played by the likes of Deen and Byrne, but that central relationship is what so distinguishes Lies We Tell. It is a very good film and an eye-opening reflection of “multicultural” British society as it is lived today in urban centers, like Bradford. Highly recommended, it opens this Friday (2/2) in New York, at the Cinema Village.

Chosen: Harvey Keitel’s War Story

If only the Warsaw Uprising had ended this happily. Although initially caught off guard, the National Socialists destroyed everything in their path to put down the insurrection, ultimately including the Great Synagogue. Still, there was nothing to lose and much to gain from their heroism. The Polish and Jewish resistance get the sort of victory they deserved in Jasmin Dizdar’s Chosen (trailer here), which starts its better-late-than-never release today in Southern California.

The old crusty grandfather will finally tell his beloved grandson Max about the tremendous courage he witnessed during WWII. He pretends to be discussing a fellow Jewish Hungarian named “Sonson,” but right from the start we can tell he is modestly describing his own exploits. Sonson (as we shall still refer to him) was a late recruit to the partisan cause, because he was preoccupied with his fragile wife’s safety. When the new Jewish exclusion laws demanded her eviction from the hospital, despite her recent cancer diagnosis, it sealed Sonson’s fate as well.

On her deathbed, he promises to find and rescue her sister Judith, a resistance fighter recently deported to Auschwitz. As a man of his word, Sonson sets off to Poland (hoofing it in eight days), where he joins up with the Warsaw Ghetto resistance, in hopes their contacts can turn up a lead on Judith. Naturally, he becomes an inspiring commander in the process.

If you can get past the historically dubious uplifting conclusion, Chosen is a pretty solid little war movie programmer. Essentially, it is like Defiance with less mud and grime or a stripped-down and more straight forward Inglorious Basterds. The warfighting scenes are surprisingly presentable for such a presumably low budget affair and a whole lot of National Socialists get killed, so there is a good deal of vicarious payback.

Granted, Luke Mably is not exactly a younger analog of Harvey Keitel, who plays his older self, but he has suitably slow-burning presence and decent action cred for the righteously driven Sonson. Keitel essentially phones in the Princess Bride narrative wrap-around, yet he is still intriguing to watch on screen. Emerging international Romanian star Ana Ularu (I’m an Old Communist Hag, The Paper Will Be Blue) plays Judith with grit and sensitivity. However, most of the rest of the resistance are largely armed extras.

Technically, the real Warsaw Ghetto Uprising ended on a downer note, but reportedly many of the survivors were deported to Treblinka, where they played key roles in a subsequent revolt at the concentration camp. Their story would make a heck of a movie. For what it’s worth, Chosen is not bad either, but it is still probably better suited for VOD (having already been released on multiple platforms) than a full adult theatrical ticket. Regardless, it opens today (12/16) at the Laemmle Town Center in Encino.

Rio, I Love You—But I Know You Can Do Better

Rio de Janeiro has the world’s coolest sidewalks. You can also hear terrific and wonderfully diverse music performed throughout the city. With that many musicians, there must be a million stories in the Naked Rio. That is why the sketchy, fragmentary nature of the latest installment of the “Cities of Love” anthology franchise is so frustrating. Even the romance is under-quota in a bunch of people’s Rio, I Love (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Despite the Rio setting, most of the characters are American, British, or Australian, so do not waste time looking for a Seu Jorge walk-on. It isn’t there. However, the opening “Dona Fulana” is a bit of an unfortunate outlier, featuring a Brazilian cast in the dubious tale of a plucky old woman who explains to her respectable grandson who much happier she is on the streets than living a life of hypocrisy. Remember that next time the UHO scam artists hit you up for money on the subway.

Paolo Sorrentino’s “La Fortuna” sort of works as a mordant little twist noir, but it never really establishes why the wheelchair bound husband has reason to believe things will work out as they do. Still, it shows off a side of Emily Mortimer we rarely get to see. Arguably, Fernando Meirelles’ “A Musa” is the most successful segment. It also happens to be entirely dialogue free. Stephen Elliott’s “Acho que Estou Apaixonado,” a tale of an Australian movie star recklessly climbing Sugarloaf Mountain is less accomplished, but at least it is fully developed and provides some lovely scenery, along with a bizarre Bebel Gilberto cameo.

John Turturro’s deliberately overwrought “Quando não há Mais Amor” just doesn’t work, even with the French retro-pop stylings of Vanessa Paradis. Guillermo Arriaga’s “Texas” falls nearly as flat, but throws in an element of exploitation for additional discomfort. Im Sang-soo’s “O Vampiro do Rio” has tons of style and promises great potential, but it is over practically as soon as it starts, as if the producers could only secure him a twenty-four-hour visa. Likewise, Carlos Saldanha’s “Pas de Deux” is lovely to look at, but maddeningly fragmentary. Dittos for José Padilha’s “Inútil Paisagem,” which has some nice looking shots Wagner Moura hang-gliding and not much else.

At least, Nadine Labaki closes the film on a relative high note, perhaps because there is actually a concept behind “O Milagre.” Of course, the notion of Harvey Keitel appearing as himself is a strong foundation. While in Rio filming a ridiculously melodramatic Thorn Birds rip-off with Labaki, Kietel is convinced to literally play God over the phone with a terminally ill boy. As usual, Keitel is highly watchable and he develops good chemistry with Labaki and the rest of the cast and crew of the film-within-the-film.

This is the third of producer Emmanuel Benbihy’s city anthologies, following Paris and New York, with Tbilisi already on deck. Frankly, the Georgian capital seems like an unlikely setting for the frothy series, but maybe that is a good thing. Hopefully, all the contributing filmmakers came with fully conceived concepts ready to go. In contrast, after watching Rio, we can only guess many of the constituent directors assumed the city would inspire them and just decided to wing it. Still, it all sounds great, thanks to the music of Gilberto Gil, Chico Buarque, Celso Fonseca, Bebel Gilberto, Cartola, Maucha Adnet, and masters like Jobim and Villa-Lobos. Seriously, you might try watching it with your eyes closed. The soundtrack is highly recommended, but the film is way too inconsistent and patchy. For diehard Brazilophiles, Rio, I Love You opens this Friday (4/15) in New York, at the Landmark Sunshine.

The Congress: Ari Folman Channels Stanislaw Lem

Polish science fiction master Stanislaw Lem deftly satirized Soviet utopianism in The Futurological Congress. For his modernized riff, Israeli filmmaker Ari Folman uses Hollywood as the new evil empire. It is a smooth substitution. In the very near future, the movie business will take exploitation to even greater technological heights, as Robin Wright learns first-hand when she plays herself in Folman’s The Congress (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Lem’s novel may have provided the seed of inspiration, but you not find his well traveled hero Ijon Tichy. Instead, Wright will attend the conference in his stead, but first we will witness the final days of her acting career. Despite her early success in hits like The Princess Bride, Folman’s Wright turned out to be difficult to work with, frequently dropping out of high profile roles at the last minute. While she always claimed it was for the sake of her ailing son Aaron, her frustrated agent really knows it is fear and a lack of confidence that sabotaged her career.

However, Miramount has a final offer to make. For a lump sum payment, they will digitize Wright and program her into all the hit movies she was never shrewd enough to accept. Evidently, this is the way the business is going, so she reluctantly accepts. Twenty years later, she is the biggest star in the business, but nobody recognizes the real Wright. Accepting an invitation to speak at Miramount’s Futurological Congress, Wright plans to challenge their questionable ethical priorities from the podium. However, to get there, she must travel into Miramount’s animated city of avatars. Unfortunately, little things like the nature of time and reality will complicate her plan.

Frankly, the first fifty minutes of live action could have easily been condensed. In fact, by the time the film finally switches over into animation, Folman seems so eager to go off on a fantastical romp he never fully establishes the rules and boundaries of his chemically induced world of cartoon avatars. Still, it all looks spectacularly trippy.

Granted, Folman’s Congress is a bit of a narrative mess and it lacks Lem’s subversive bite, but it is fully stocked with fascinating ideas and surprisingly effective performances. In one of many intriguing side-plots, Folman puts a Matrix-like spin of Otto Preminger’s Laura when Dylan Truliner confesses to Wright he fell in love with her while working as the animator manipulating her digital image.

As Al the agent, Harvey Keitel delivers a monologue end all monologues, while Paul Giamatti (who could have advised Wright on playing a meta-meta version of herself, having done something similar in Cold Souls) adeptly brings some stabilizing sensitivity and dignity to the film as Aaron’s kindly Dr. Baker. Whether as an animated avatar or in the flesh, Danny Huston also makes a dynamite villain as Miramount (great name) studio boss Jeff Green.

Most importantly, The Congress’ animation is wildly cool and colorful, with enough thinly disguised cameos and visual quotes to reward dozens of repeat viewings. In contrast, the Wright family drama gets tiresome the first time through, especially when it comes to poor, pitiful Aaron, whose bland personality seems to be degenerating along with his sight and hearing. Nevertheless, Folman puts so much crazy ambition up on the screen, it more than compensates for the occasional lapse into Lifetime melodrama. Recommended for fans of cult science fiction and animation, as well as Lem readers who enjoy being scandalized, The Congress opens this Friday (9/5) in New York at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center.