The World Made Straight: To Live and Die in Appalachia

The very thought his ancestors might have been Unionists during the Civil War is almost too much for a rural white slacker like Travis Shelton to process. Yet, he slowly comes to learn family and land holdings (or lack thereof) had as much to do with one’s wartime alignment as geography for 1860s Appalachian citizens. In fact, he becomes preoccupied with a notorious Confederate massacre of Union POWs while getting ensnared in a contemporary feud during the course of David Burris’s The World Made Straight (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Shelton’s prospects are limited, so when he stumbles onto a secluded marijuana grove in the backwoods, he foolishly decides to start harvesting it himself. He manages to sell one uprooted shrub to Leonard Shuler, a disgraced former school teacher who now deals dope for Carlton Toomey, the plant’s “rightful” owner. Despite Shuler’s warnings, Shelton pushes his luck, blundering into the bear-trap laid out for him.

To avoid trouble, Toomey spares Shelton’s life, but a cold war soon develops between them. Moving in with Shuler, Shelton becomes something of his student, learning the tragic local Civil War history, as well as the particulars of drug dealing. For a while, Shelton seems to reassert control over his life, but Shuler’s drug addled girlfriend Dena is a destabilizing wildcard, whom he knows will always betray him for a fix.

Despite all the guns and drugs, Straight offers a considerably more nuanced portrayal of the hardscrabble South than you typically see on film. It has a strong sense of the region and the 1970s era, forgiving most of its characters’ sins as products of their depressed economic circumstances and the depressing environment. It is also rather tricky to categorize, consisting of maybe three parts naturalistic drama and one part thriller. Regardless, it never feels exploitative, even when rather disturbing things happen on-screen.

After watching Noah Wylie mug through the Librarians series openers, it is nice to see he still has something like this in him. He is terrific as Shuler, convincingly balancing grit and nebbishness. Frankly, it is also somewhat remarkable how completely English actor Jeremy Irvine disappears into the role of Shelton. Since he is sometimes irresponsibly impulsive and other times passive, Shelton is a tough protag to get one’s arms around, but Irvine always comes across quite genuine, nonetheless. Still, he understandably wilts when confronted with the intense villainous force of Steve Earle’s Toomey. He conveys some frighteningly human dimensions to the hill country kingpin, who could have easily descended into caricature.

In fact, there are a number of cards screenwriter Shane Danielsen’s adaptation of Ron Rash’s novel might easily have overplayed, such as vaguely ghostly influence the historical massacre exerts on Shelton, but he maintains a balanced hand instead. As a result, it is a much better film than most viewers will expect. Recommended for those who appreciate dark Southern morality tales, The World Made Straight opens this Friday (1/9) in New York at the Quad Cinema.

The Librarians: The Television Film Franchise Goes Weekly

Flynn Carsen is a librarian Kramer would approve of. He does not spend a lot of time putting newspapers on big wooden sticks for cheapskates trying to save a quarter and probably doesn’t even know the Dewey Decimal System. Instead, he spends his time tracking down magical items to keep them out of the hands of potential evil-doers. The protagonist of TNT’s hit television movie franchise The Librarian is now a recurring character in their new regular series, The Librarians, note the plural form, which debuts with back-to-back episodes (The Librarians and the Crown of King Arthur and The Librarians and the Sword and the Stone) this Sunday (promo here).

Carsen has two last names and twenty-two college degrees. The perennial student was chosen by “the Library,” the mystical apostolic successor to the great Library in Alexandria, now hidden beneath the Metropolitan Public Library in New York. Having held his own in a series of adventures, Carsen is rather put out when the Library recruits Col. Eve Baird, a no-nonsense counter-terrorism operative to be his Protector. However, he will reluctantly accept her help when the shadowy Serpent Brotherhood starts assassinating all the weird genius rivals he beat out for his current globe-trotting gig. In fact, the only former candidates still surviving are the three oddballs who never made it in for their interviews.

Jacob Stone is an unassuming laborer in the Oklahoma oil fields, who writes scholarly articles on medieval art and history under an assumed name. Ezekiel Jones is a thrill-seeker, who likes to steal the things Stone writes about. Cassandra Cillian has savant-like powers of memory and superhuman computation, but it might be linked to the tumor that will eventually kill her. Together with Carsen and Baird, they will track down several Arthurian relics the Brotherhood needs to control the magic they intend to let loose upon the world.

The Librarian one-offs might have been popular, but they must have skewed toward a decidedly younger demographic. While the premiere episodes, directed in a straight forward manner by Independence Day producer Dean Devlin, never descend into outright slapstick, the dominant acting style practiced is decidedly broad. This is especially so for Noah Wyle’s Carsen and hammy John Larroquette, joining the Librarian world as Jenkins, the curmudgeonly manager of the Library’s branch office (evidently in Portland of all places), who is clearly being set up to serve as the Giles-Watcher to the three new recruits. However, Rebecca Romijn demonstrates decent action chops and an appealingly down-to-business screen presence as Baird.

The villains are not bad either. Matt Frewer returns to chew a bit of scenery as the Brotherhood’s immortal overlord, Dulaque and Lesley-Ann Brandt’s unfortunately named Lamia is a promising femme fatale. It is hard to judge from just two episodes, but John Kim and Christian Kane at least seem comfortable in the parts of Jones and Stone. In contrast, Lindy Booth may need some time to figure out how to breathe life into Cillian, a passive naïf character written somewhere between a door mouse and door mat.

Guys of my generation probably would have loved this show when we were twelve years old. There is magic and adventure, but it feels old fashioned in a 1980s network television kind of way. To an extent, it is like the Friday the 13^th series, with fantasy trappings instead of the supernatural horror (it also lacks the evil antiquing show’s distinctive vibe). It is harmless and might serve as a productive stepping stone for Romijn, but it will underwhelm most adult genre audiences. For franchise fans, the first two episodes of The Librarians debut on TNT this Sunday (12/7).

Jaglom’s Queen of the Lot

Hollywood is the world’s capitol of insecurity. It is the perfect place for Maggie Chase. Do not bother talking to her about the craft of acting. She is too busy tracking her google standing. Yet, there is an outside chance she might reluctantly examine her life choices while serving a DUI house arrest in Henry Jaglom’s Queen of the Lot (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

More-or-less a sequel to Jaglom’s Hollywood Dreams, Chase (formerly Chizek) has sort-of-kind-of made it. A poor man’s Cynthia Rothrock, she is the star of the popular down-market Red Wrecker action series. However, Chase’s low self-esteem and alcohol are a bad mix. While serving her ankle-braceleted sentence in the home of her manager-partners Kaz and Caesar, Chase’s PR team makes her a tabloid sensation. She even has entrée into the glamour of old school Hollywood through her boyfriend Dov Lambert, a scion of a legendary mini-mogul. Yet, her inconvenient attraction to Dov’s younger brother Aaron, a writer and self-described failure, complicates Chase’s single-minded pursuit of her shallow goals.

As required, Tanna Frederick is convincingly needy and superficial as Chase. At times she almost rivals Sidney Falco from The Sweet Smell of Success in her cravenness, but Aaron Lambert still sees something in her worth pursuing. Indeed, ER’s Noah Wyle is the big news of Lot, bringing surprising depth and edginess to the younger brother. His scenes with Frederick bristle with uncomfortable honesty.

Once again, Jaglom assembles an intriguing supporting cast, including Zack Norman (best known as Danny DeVito’s crocodile admiring cousin in Romancing the Stone) as Kaz. Perhaps most appropriately, Peter Bogdanovich plays Pedja Sapir, a well-regarded director who has not made a film in years. (Though perfectly fine in the role, wouldn’t everyone prefer to see him making a new film of his own?)

Often sharply amusing, Lot has little of the sappiness of Irene in Time, Jaglom and Frederick’s last collaboration. Its old-fashioned jazzy soundtrack (much in the tradition of Woody Allen films) is also a considerable improvement. Presumably another of Jaglom’s scripted-and-improvised hybrids, Lot is somewhat uneven. Still, the humor is smart and consistent, while Wyle and Frederick exhibit legitimate on-screen chemistry. A considerably above average skewering of Hollywood for the hardcore indie scene, Lot opens this Friday (12/3) in New York at the Quad Cinema.