Sundance ’16: Equity

Remember Facebook’s over-hyped, under-performing IPO? Naomi Bishop certainly does. However, she is more haunted by the recent blockbuster IPO she was not able to land for her firm. She hopes to get back on track with the initial offering for Cachet, a vaguely sketched out internet privacy company. It’s so private, nobody really knows what is does. Regardless, it should be money in the bank for Bishop, but some of her closest colleagues are out to sabotage her in Meera Menon’s Equity, which screens during the 2016 Sundance Film Festival.

Bishop is under pressure from her dim-witted blue-blooded boss to generate revenue the way she used to or resign herself to career stagnation. Consequently, Bishop is in no position to help her under-compensated and increasingly resentful assistant, Erin Manning. She has fun hooking-up with Michael Connor, a hotshot in her firm’s trading division, but she is right not to trust him. He is about to bolt to a rival firm, so he is looking for inside information to hobble her IPO.

It is not clear whether it is good or bad timing, but Bishop happens to re-connect with Samantha, an old classmate now prosecuting securities crimes in the U.S. Attorney’s office, just as the Cachet IPO starts to turn sour on her. (Since she works for the government, she can’t even afford a surname.) Of course, it was no coincidence. Samantha was not so subtly digging for dirt on Bishop’s firm.

Absolutely everyone in Equity is rotten to some extent, which is actually refreshing. Screenwriter Amy Fox never tries to gin up phony moralistic outrage by cutting away to the widows and orphans who stand to be dispossessed due to the characters’ shenanigans. In Equity’s world, when you play with vipers, you are likely to get bitten. It’s as simple as that.

Anna Gunn really gives it her all as Bishop. She can go from earnest glass ceiling exhibit A to snarling office nightmare on the turn of a dime. She looks like she is a part of this world, though not necessarily comfortable within it. Co-producer Alysia Reiner avoids all the usual crusading prosecutor clichés as the smart but ethically nuanced Samantha. However, her co-producer Sarah Megan Thomas’s Manning is a rather blandly vanilla, which gets a bit problematic when her sharp elbows are supposed to come out. Frankly, the extent of Connor’s villainy seems shortsighted and arbitrary, but James Purefoy clearly enjoys his dastardliness, which counts for a lot.

Even though Menon and Fox would probably be delighted if Equity led to tighter securities regulations, it would be dashed difficult to legislate against the kind skulduggery on view here. The fact that it does not immediately lend itself to teachable moments and online petitions makes it one of the better thrillerish financial dramas of recent vintage. Recommended on balance, Equity screens again early this morning (1/30) in Park City, as part of this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Momentum: Olga Kurylenko’s Action Chops

Alex Faraday and her accomplices thought they were simply stealing diamonds from a Cape Town bank vault, but they also inadvertently scooped up an ominous MacGuffin. You might wonder why a corrupt U.S. senator would keep an incriminating flash drive in a South African safety deposit box. Better yet, you might wonder why he kept it at all. Regardless, Faraday has it, so his goons will do whatever it takes to get it back in Stephen S. Campanelli’s Momentum (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Kevin Fuller lured Faraday back into thievery with the promise of a big score, but he never fully revealed the nature of the game he was playing. However, she figures it out pretty quickly when the American senator’s British enforcer, Mr. Washington, kills Fuller while she is hiding under the bed. Obviously, this puts Faraday in a tight spot. She is already wanted for capping a freelancer Moss brought on board when he started menacing the innocent bank customers.

Evidently, Fuller was manipulated by Washington into stealing the chip and the diamonds from the super-secret vault-box, which makes no sense whatsoever, but here we are, so what can you do? If you are Faraday, you keep one step ahead of Mr. Washington, while doing her best to protect Fuller’s ingrate widow and her young son.

Basically, Momentum has one thing going for it, but it is significant: Olga Kurylenko as the action lead. She was the best part about Philipp Stölz’s middling Erased and here she fully realizes that potential. Kurylenko displays terrific action chops and even does some credible whatchamacallit . . . acting. James Purefoy’s Mr. Washington has a decently loathsome presence, but he would arguably work better as a secondary villain rather than the antagonistic lead. Instead of filling that void, Morgan Freeman literally phones it in as the senator, who only exists to give orders on his cell phone. Yet, the biggest problem is Adam Marcus & Debra Sullivan’s screenplay, which has the brains of a punch-drunk kangaroo.

To give Campanelli credit where it is due, the initial heist scene is tight, tense, and mysterious. It utterly puts to shame the utterly shameful Checkmate. However, after Faraday’s big entrance, the causes and effects no longer make much sense. Still, the fight scenes, shootouts, and chases are all rather appealing in an old school, down-to-earth way. Campanelli keeps the pace cranked, but Kurylenko’s steely badassery is the film’s trump card.

Although there are some appealingly gritty action scenes, the film ultimately panders to the lowest, most vile conspiracy theory paranoia, so good job ending on a buzz-killing note. Therefore, as a dramatically mixed bag that implodes down the stretch, it is hard to recommend Momentum, despite Kurylenko’s best efforts. For her diehard fans, it opens tomorrow (10/16) in New York, at the Cinema Village.

Solomon Kane: Puritans Kick Butt

Yes, it’s been said before, but it bears repeating—don’t pick a fight with the Puritans.  Seventeenth Century ruffians are particularly advised to give a wide berth to a reformed killer with a satanic price on his head.  There will be a fair amount of dark fantastic swashbuckling as Robert E. Howard’s hero searches for redemption in Michael J. Bassett’s Solomon Kane (trailer here), which wayfares into theaters this Friday.

Kane was once a warrior so ruthless, he sort of accidently made a pact with the Devil.  When Scratch’s minions come to collect, the adventurer is a bit freaked.  Taking refuge in a monastery, Kane converts, pledging to never take another life.  With the forces of darkness still pursuing him, Kane’s presence is rather bad for business, so the penitent sets out to confront his destiny.  He finds it with the Crowthorns, a truly Christian family of pilgrims.

When his traveling companions are attacked by a demonic militia, Kane watches helplessly out of obedience to his oath.  However, when they carry off the eldest Crowthorn daughter, Kane pledges to rescue her, even if it costs his very soul.  Yet, Kane will find her fate is intertwined the secrets of his past, as we would expect.

If nothing else, Kane is a nattily accessorized action hero.  Although some liberties are taken with his origin story, Bassett taps into something powerfully archetypal in his depiction of the menacing Puritan.  His script treats concepts of damnation and redemption with deadly earnest, which is appreciated.  In a way, SK is a far more effective Evangelical film than those made for the express purpose of proselytizing.  There is also a fair amount of hack and slash.

James Purefoy is about as good fit for Kane as one could hope to find.  He is no Ryan Gosling or Reynolds, thank the merciful Heavens.  Quite good in the superior Ironclad, he is equally credible here both in the action scenes and brooding like a man accursed.  Adding further heft, the late great Pete Postlethwaite memorably portrays the dignity of faith as William Crowthorn.  Max von Sydow is also very Max von Sydow as Kane’s noble father, seen in flashbacks.

Yet, when you get right down to it, SK ought to be more fun than it is.  The religious overtones are actually rather distinctive, but the film just gets bogged down too often.  There are simply too many scenes of Kane riding through forests, while the climax over-relies on Harry Potter style magical pyrotechnics.

Still, Bassett was definitely onto something in Kane.  Howard readers should appreciate how well he captured that sense of ancient corrupting dread.  Not perfect but a worthy effort, Solomon Kane is recommended for Howard fans and more adventurous Evangelical audiences when it opens this Friday (9/28) in New York at the AMC Empire.