Miracles from Heaven

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Patricia Riggen/Starring: Jennifer Garner, Kylie Rogers, Martin Henderson, Queen Latifah, Eugenio Derbez and John Carroll Lynch

When I first saw the trailer to director Patricia Riggen's Miracles from Heaven, I thought the syrupy drama/earnestly spiritual story would be an ideal punching bag for this usually fair-minded blogger. After all, I hadn't beaten up on anything in awhile and was itching to bully some poor, unfortunate, shamelessly hokey film. If you've seen the trailer or movie, you too might feel it had it coming. But after seeing the film, I began to feel like a hungry mastiff picking on a toy poodle. Yes, the movie is a schmaltzy eye-roller but does that give me the right to pick on a movie about a terminally sick girl who hasn't long to live and who is as sweet as cotton candy? A girl whose mother will sacrifice everything to keep her living one more day? A girl whose family is so spiritual they host post-Sunday-service gatherings at their home and make the Apostles look like seedy, creepy, jail-house rapists?
Pause for conscience check...

Yeah, what the hell.

Based on author Christy Beam's book of the same name, Miracles from Heaven is a purportedly true story about said terminally ill little girl and her struggle to survive her dire predicament. But the movie isn't just about her seemingly miraculous story but also the mother; Christy Beam (played in earnest overdrive by Jennifer Garner); who never gave up searching for a cure for her daughter. Of course a movie that is practically a billboard for faith usually has a character whose faith is tried in adversity and comes to doubt God's plans. Beam makes an ideal candidate.

Kylie Rogers, who plays Anna Beam with a God's-little-soldier sincerity, feels sharp pains in her abdomen. Her parents; Christy and Kevin (Martin Henderson), begin to worry about Anna's inability to keep food down and her frequent bouts of nausea. After seeing several specialists--all who insist Anna is fine--Christy begins to despair and worse, begins to lose her faith in the higher power she has heretofore never questioned. Though her husband remains unwaveringly faithful, she quite rightly questions why God would visit such horrible suffering on her innocent child. The question is also posed to the community's spiritual leader; Pastor Scott (John Carroll Lynch), who can offer her no succor or satisfactory answer.

Becoming angry and frustrated with doctors who misdiagnose Anna's problem and who virtually ignore her distended stomach, Christy learns of a gastroenterologist specializing in children's illnesses in Boston named Dr. Nurko; a sought after physician whose waiting list is a year long. With Anna in tow, Christy flies to Boston hoping to secure an appointment. Though Christy's efforts to see the doctor are Herculean, she is nevertheless rebuffed. And while Boston proves to be a fruitless endeavor, Christy and Anna meet an African-American woman named Angela (Queen Latifah, in the most thankless, useless and forgettable role of her career) who befriends them and for one day becomes their Bostonian tour-guide.

After returning to Texas, Anna's condition worsens while Christy's faith ebbs further. A chance opening in his schedule brings Christy and Anna back to Boston, where they finally meet Dr. Nurko (Eugenio Derbez). We immediately see from his bedside manner and requisite Elmo tie that his rapport with the children is that of Patch Adams; in other words; superhumanly swell and caring. But though Dr. Nurko offers his expert diagnosis--Anna's lower intestines are twisted, leaving her unable to digest food--he can do little for her but make her comfortable.

The two return to Texas as Christy and Kevin's anxieties swell. A pivotal moment in the film unfolds when Anna and one of her sisters climb a tree in the family's yard (the phoniest-looking tree seen on film since The Wizard of Oz.) When the branch begins to give way, Anna tries to reach the safety of the trunk only to fall inside its hollow interior. A major rescue operation is undertaken and an unconscious Anna is rushed to the hospital. But she recovers from her fall and days after being released, Christy and Kevin notice her distended abdomen has vanished. They immediately return to Dr. Nurko, who finds she has miraculously recovered but cannot account for her cure. Lacking an explanation, he attributes her recovery to what is commonly referred to as spontaneous remission. Ecstatic, Christy says to Dr. Nurko; "you're saying that my little girl fell from the tree, hit her head just right and was suddenly cured...well Doctor, that's impossible." A more pertinent statement might have been; "you're saying God gave my daughter a horrific intestinal condition, ensured she suffered horribly, then made her fall from a tree, nearly breaking her neck, at which point he finally tossed her a bone and cured her...well Doctor, that's the Almighty for you..." But that statement never crossed her mouth.

As we might expect, happiness is showered on the Beam family. And is Christy's faith restored? Well, golly-gee, what do you think?

Of course the real reason for this film to exist is to push the God-did-it solution for Anna's problem. Anna explains to her mother and father that during her tree ordeal, she had an out of body experience, followed by the white tunnel thing and ultimately, contact with his divine-ness, who told her she would be healed. No one seems to consider the possibility that the experience was a hallucination caused by an oxygen deficiency to the brain. No, God intervened and saved the Beam's precious little ray of sunshine (but all the Syrian children who have drowned trying to migrate to Europe are hardly a consideration in the Creator's skull apparently.).

An absurd waste of celluloid like Miracles of Heaven has enough production value to pass for a feature film but movies of this ilk (Heaven is for Real and God is Not Dead) exist only to push the Word; entertainment is an afterthought. What distinguishes this film from the aforementioned is its cast, which has enough name actors to pass for a movie. I can't help but feel sorry for Jennifer Garner and Queen Latifah, who must somehow sell characters that have not a ice-cube-in-hell's chance of being taken for real people, though they represent real people. I give credit for Garner for doing her best not to condescend to the material even though playing it straight and earnest didn't do her performance much good. I can only hope her paycheck was sweet.

The only film that will most likely be worse than this toe-jam is the forthcoming God is Not Dead 2. So many films in this Season of Swill dealing with Christ and God and not one of them worth a damn...actually, they are worth damnation.
This film should only be played in places of worship during Sunday services, not multiplex screens; otherwise, someone might get the impression the film means to entertain rather than proselytize. If this flick really is a Miracle from Heaven, then what do you call a curse from Hell?

Knight of Cups

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Terrence Malick/Starring: Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Natalie Portman, Wes Bentley, Brian Dennehy, Antonio Banderas, Armin Mueller-Stahl and Cherry Jones

Terrence Malick has certainly earned his place in the American Directorial Pantheon. His visual stylings can be breathtaking, as in Tree of Life and films from his past, like Badlands, Days of Heaven and The New World meld his stunning visual aesthetic to powerful drama. But in his new film; Knight of Cups, as in his last film To the Wonder he seems to have become tethered to a storytelling mode that has become self-parodying. Many of the storytelling elements seen in his last few films are conspicuously present here: whispery voice-overs, protagonists drifting through beautifully surreal urban and desert landscapes, and fantastic images that almost overpower the narrative. Though opinions on the Tree of Life were ferociously polarized, I myself found it to be moving and ambitious but with Malick's follow-up projects, he seems to have become smitten with a style that is no longer new and visionary. His new movie carries all the aforementioned stylistic tics without breaking any new ground. Only the characters have changed.
If the film has a selling point, it's in its striking images, but two hours of incomparable beauty without a solid narrative feel like Koyaanisqatsi. I don't know that I want to see one more Terrence Malick film where a character walks slowly through the desert; contemplating whatever they're supposed to be contemplating while a mumbly voice-over whispers stuff like "find your way through the darkness." That which seemed so poetic in Tree of Life now seems almost satirical. Mr. Malick, thou hast drawn from the same well once too often.

The film, to its credit, doesn't follow conventional plotting, but tries to paint a portrait of a man through a series of images rather than dialogue and action. The man; Rick (Christian Bale), is a Hollywood something or other (forgive me if I missed what may have been obvious to you); actor or writer; I couldn't tell. Having failed in his marriage to a doctor named Nancy (Cate Blanchett), Rick finds himself lost in a world of Hollywood excess. Images of bacchanalian chaos in Los Angeles mansions and nightclubs, where Rick wanders among the beautiful bodies like a ghost, are a common sight.

When Rick isn't a presence at parties, we see him in various locations around Los Angeles, engaged in thoughtful walkabouts. I don't know that I've ever seen a film set in the City of Angels look lovelier. The skyline, streets, and the beaches we've seen in a million other films suddenly seems new and strange. Malick's brilliant cinematographer, Emmanuel Lubezki, who has also done fine work on Alejandro Innaritu's recent films, makes Los Angeles seem otherworldly. My guess is he accomplished this visual feat with a wide-angle lens.

We also see Rick's brief relationships with a series of women; none of whom seem particularly exceptional save for their looks. It is me or does every respective shot of the women consist of frolics on the beach or inside apartments? The only woman of any substance is Nancy; a doctor who we see treating the less beautiful citizens of the city. The only real dialogue we hear Rick share with any woman is also with Nancy, who still suffers emotional wounds from their failed marriage.
And finally we meet Rick's brother Barry (Wes Bentley) and his father Joseph (Brian Dennehy), who can never be in the same room together unless they're bickering. Again, we never really hear them interact, we only see them in various phases of their troubled familial relationship. We can see Barry bears more rancor for his father than Rick and isn't shy about expressing it. Toward the end of the film Rick seems to achieve some sort of reconciliation with his father, while Joseph; atoning for his failures as a father and husband, seeks spiritual absolution.

As Rick drifts from woman to woman, we see one has fallen deeply in love with him though she be married: Elizabeth (Natalie Portman). How do we know she's in love? Because we hear say as much in her own whispery voice-over (yes, everybody in this film has a whispery voice-over; even Rick's goatee--no, not really) and because she too (sarcasm alert) runs along the beach.

So, do all the beautiful images, which encompass city-scapes and southern Californian deserts and Las Vegas and Rick's innumerable women and the film's scant drama cohere into anything resembling a poignant whole? You be the judge. Do we care about Rick, who never seems to work but has plenty of time to chase women and walk around aimlessly? I can't say I did. Can a man be said to have troubles when he can partake of legions of sexy, beautiful women who come and go like the tide? If he was suffering, it wasn't obvious to me.

Malick's film is a lot like the women Rick romances; great to look at but superficial. But an hour and a half into the film, even the beautiful images, like the women, become tedious. Malick certainly has made great films and may again if he takes leave of the style he can't seem to let go of. Knight of Cups isn't an embarrassment but it falls well short of being an achievement.

10 Cloverfield Lane

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Dan Trachtenberg/Starring: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, John Goodman and John Gallagher Jr.

It is always a treat when a plot doesn't immediately reveal secrets but slowly teases them out; keeping the audience on tenterhooks. It is even better when a story seemingly reaches some kind of resolution, only to shift into a higher gear; revealing a larger problem the protagonist must confront. 10 Cloverfield Lane, the smart and thrilling new film by first-feature director Dan Trachtenberg, does just that. Just when the heroine, Michelle (wonderfully played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead) thinks she's overcome one terrifying ordeal, a more frightening problem presents itself. Trachtenberg's film, which bears only a titular resemblance to the 2009 film produced by J.J. Abrams, feels like two halves of two good films spliced together to form one really good one. His film is a mix of several genres, all of which form a seamless, effective narrative.

The film doesn't dawdle as the story's pace carries us quickly along. Michelle has just broken up with her boyfriend and has left their home behind. While speeding away, she finds her car has been violently forced off the road. Upon awakening, she finds one knee in a brace and herself chained to a wall in what looks like a basement. She also finds herself in her underwear and hooked up to an IV while her belongings are in sight but out of reach. Using the IV stand, she is able to collect her possessions, including some matches, which she uses to light a fire, which she thrusts into the ventilation duct in hopes of drawing attention from someone on the outside. Hearing the sound of heavy footsteps, the door to her locked room opens jarringly to reveal her captor; a rotund man named Howard (an exceptionally creepy John Goodman) who calmly informs her that he saved her from the wreckage that was her car. Frightened and unsure of Howard's intentions, Michelle begs for her own life. She also asks for her freedom while promising not to inform the authorities about her abductor. What Howard explains to Michelle is particularly strange, as he insists that something catastrophic has occurred outside; a nuclear attack that has rendered the outdoors irradiated and uninhabitable. He also tells her she is safe inside a survivalist bunker; a refuge of his own design built specifically for the predicament in which they find themselves.

The next day, Michelle finds she is allowed to leave the room and upon doing so, she meets another occupant; a youngish man approximately her age named Emmett (John Gallagher Jr.), who wears one arm in a sling. She asks if he too was kidnapped but he insists his presence is strictly voluntary; as he begged Howard to allow him entrance into the bunker. He also mentions having done work for Howard in the past.

As Howard introduces them to the larger living area of the self-contained bunker, questions about his motives dog Michelle and Emmett (as well as the audience). Is Howard on the up and up; has a nuclear exchange with the Russians really come about or has an alien presence he refers to as "martians" arrived for colonization? Michelle naturally remains suspicious and is horrified to hear Howard tell Emmett that an excursion outdoors won't be possible for one to two years with the supposed, widespread radiation. Her suspicions about Howard's claims are further fed by the rumbling sounds she hears emanating beyond the bunker.

Though odd, Howard seems reasonably stable until a dinner conversation between Michelle and Emmett prompts a violent outburst. During his angry tirade, Michelle manages to steal his keys to the outer doors and later, during a tense exchange between she and Howard, she manages to temporarily trap him inside her bedroom while she hurries to unlock the outer doors. A terrific, nail-biting scene where Michelle desperately tries to remove the various locks to the outer doors with Howard in hot pursuit is particularly thrilling. When she shuts the inner door behind her, Howard begs her not to open the outer door. But when she looks through the window, she doesn't see carnage and a devastated landscape but sunshine and cornstalks swaying in the breeze; though moments later, a woman approaches the glass. As she pounds desperately on the window, demanding to be allowed inside, Michelle notices facial injuries, as if the woman had been exposed to radiation. Horrified by the woman's appearance and her violent, angry pleas, she returns inside, satisfied that Howard's claims have been corroborated.

At this point, the story becomes deliciously complicated. Not only must Michelle and Emmett contend with a violent, paranoid psychotic but with a world that may no longer exist as they knew it. The idea of characters being held prisoner by a madman and nuclear fallout makes a multiple-crisis plot irresistibly fun. But the screenwriters cleverly dole out more surprises and mysteries as the story unfolds. Again, we're left with more questions about what might actually be happening in the outside world and what other motives Howard may have for keeping Michelle and Emmett imprisoned.

The tension between Howard and Emmett and Michelle comes to a head when he discovers the two have been secretly designing an environmental suit from a shower curtain and plastic soda bottles. A shocking development makes it necessary for Michelle to plot an escape, which eventually propels the story from the horror genre to something conspicuously sci-fi. The surprise awaiting her (and the audience) is unexpected.

To reveal more about the story would be criminal, for much of its dark charms involve the element of surprise.

A chunk of praise for Trachtenberg's terrific film can be awarded to John Goodman and Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who bring their brilliant best to their respective roles. One may hope the role of Michelle is a breakthrough career move for Winstead, who has yet to crack the hard nut of stardom. She is perfectly cast for the part of a smart, resourceful, and tough woman; one who deals with every setback and harrowing development with pluck and grit. Goodman, ever the pro, is deeply creepy as Howard.

Trachtenberg, in his directorial feature debut, shows an old hand's talent for staging action. His camera work is taut, economical and to the point but he crafts suspense and horror from a story whose genre leanings are never fixed.

10 Cloverfield Lane is nice little pastry for Mid-March. One can only hope it finds an audience before super-hero films begin to trickle into movie houses. An imaginative, well-conceived flick deserves as much screen-time as Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice will undoubtedly receive. If that $250 million juggernaut can deliver a worthwhile cinematic experience, we'll know it soon. We already know what Dan Trachtenberg can do with a meager $5 million budget and a talented cast. Imagine what he could do with a Jupiter-sized budget.

Gone But Not Forgotten: Wim Wenders' Alice in the Cities (1974)

Director: Wim Wenders/Starring: Rudiger Vogler, Yella Rottlander and Lisa Kreuzer

I have had the very good fortune to catch a Wim Wenders retrospective at the local cinema and though I've seen a number of the German director's films over the years, one I hadn't had the pleasure to see previously is Alice in the Cities. Wender's gem from 1974 is not a film that comes to mind when his oeuvre is usually celebrated or discussed but it contains many visual and dramatic elements that would come to characterize his later work. As in this and later films, we find restless, peripatetic souls, wandering the physical landscape, searching for something abstract; a meaningful connection to the world or perhaps something more personal; a rapprochement with estranged loved ones.

In Alice, a German journalist named Philip (Rudiger Vogler) is diverted from his goal of returning to his native land from New York by a young girl whose mother has temporarily placed her in his care. Unable to find a connecting flight to Germany, he and the woman; a fellow country-person named Lisa (Lisa Kreuzer) become kindred, home-bound souls who find their only way to their homeland is via a non-connecting flight to Amsterdam. Philip's decision to return home is borne of an unfortunate meeting with his angry American editor, who is incensed that an overdue article has yet to be submitted. After looking over and rejecting Philip's random Polaroid shots of his American travels, the editor sends him away after exacting a promise that the article will be completed when he returns Germany.
Meanwhile, Lisa, fresh from a break-up--one among several in her recent past--intends to return home with her daughter Alice (Yella Rottlander) but warms to Philip as their plight becomes a shared ordeal.

But before they can catch their next day flight, Lisa entrusts Alice to Philip; hoping to reconcile with her boyfriend before returning home. With the understanding that Lisa will meet Alice and Philip in Amsterdam, the two parties part. What is supposed to be a temporary arrangement becomes prolonged when Lisa fails to meet them. With meager, economic means and a deadline looming, Philip is nevertheless committed to waiting with Alice, though they linger for a few days before setting off for Germany, where they hope to find her grandmother. With little or no useful information as to where the grandmother might reside, Philip can only draw on Alice's vague, childhood memories as the means to a viable lead. In doing so, the two begin an offbeat Odyssey that leads them on the road through small, German towns in all manner of conveyances. In their meanderings, the two learn to tolerate one another, become mutually sympathetic and eventually glean something meaningful and ultimately joyful from their haphazard union.

Throughout the film, Philip's Polaroid camera becomes a device with which to help him retain images from his travels but, as he unfortunately discovers, his photos prove to be frustratingly inadequate surrogates for his deep, visual impressions.

In seeking overnight shelter the night before his departure from New York City, a friend summarily rebuffs his pleas but listens to Philip's laments about his travels; how everything "seems the same after New York City," the monotony of motel rooms; the "sickening radio" and "inhuman television" and how it all "almost made me lose my senses." She explains that his senses and sense of identity had already been lost long before and his pictures serve as feeble proof of his objective sensual experience. But as the story unfolds, we see the the snapshots become less frequent, particularly during his time with Alice.

During their time together, wandering from town to town, Wenders shows us not only the road's poetic potential but also the more mundane moments, as Alice's frequent bouts of hunger and thirst begin to try Philip's patience.

An attempt to locate Alice's grandmother by leaving her with the police comes to naught as she escapes their care to rejoin Philip. With an endless capacity for patience, Philip drives Alice along, hoping to find her grandmother while following the flimsiest leads that often lead nowhere. But as we see, the journey is important for what comes of the two travelers time together. For Alice, her seemingly simple quest may fulfill wishes for an absent father while Philip's problem demands a more convoluted solution.

In an American version of this film, the story would morph into something heartwarming and sentimental and young Alice would become cute and lovable and most likely precocious, while Philip's abstract quest would become nothing more than a man's need for family or a trite lesson about living-life-to-the-fullest; hackneyed ideas commonly pedaled in Hollywood films. But Wenders never lets sentimentality creep into his story nor does Alice become a cutesy little waif. Nevertheless, it is touching to see Philip become a kind of father who cares enough for Alice to drive hither and thither and go to nigh any length to help her find her grandmother.

The ending is upbeat but hardly cloying. It seems the most significant photographs taken in the film aren't from Philip's Polaroid collection but from photo booth shots of he and Alice together. So what is Wenders' film itself? Is it proof of our sensual experience or is it the photo-booth pictures; a document of something more meaningful? Or both?

With Alice in the Cities, Wenders reaches for poetry and finds it in an unassuming story. Rudiger Vogler and Yella Rottlander make a memorable pair of itinerants; their outstanding performances and Wenders' camera, which transports us from Texas to New York to Amsterdam to rural and urban Germany, make for an intoxicating road-trip. The stark, black and white visuals compliment Wender's brand of realism, which sometimes carries a tinge of the surreal. The film is easily as good as Wenders later films, which tend to garner more praise and attention.
For Wenders, the road is revelation; a means to free oneself from psychic manacles but who one shares one's travels with may be the most important aspect of the journey. Philip's time on the road becomes significantly more meaningful when Alice becomes becomes his sidekick.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Glen Ficarra and John Requa/Starring: Tina Fey, Billy Bob Thornton, Margot Robbie, Martin Freeman, Alfred Molina, Christopher Abbott and Cherry Jones

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot; militarized code for WTF, is also the new film by directors Glen Ficarra and John Requa, which is based on journalist Kim Barker's The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan. I have to admit that I wasn't eager to see the film. Tina Fey, who plays Ms. Barker, has proven to be less funny in her big screen forays than her television ventures. The other strike against this movie is its subject matter. I have to say I've had my fill with films about the Afghan War and don't relish more, though I had just seen Danish director Tobias Lindholm's excellent Afghan War drama A War only days before. Ficarra and Requa's film is a comedy/drama hybrid, though it skews more to the latter as the story unfolds. WTF isn't much of a drama and I can't remember laughing or even smiling during the film's comedic moments. Though a story of a journalist covering a war has comedic potential, Ficarra and Requa's can't coax anything funny from the material. I haven't read Kim Barker's book, so I can't comment on its qualities or lack thereof but I hope the film is an aberration. The film doesn't seem to be about anything more than self-absorbed, privileged, white, western journalists and their silly romantic lives and careers rather than the bloody conflict itself. Little in the film is taken seriously; everyone seems buffoonish though nothing is very funny and no one is very amusing.

Barker is deployed to Afghanistan by her paper after her bosses decide sending single journalists is preferable to sending those with spouses and kids. The fact that Barker has a serious boyfriend doesn't factor into their decision. We know from the outset that her time in Afghanistan will place a terrific strain on her relationship.
With her mind full of anxieties about her boyfriend and the task ahead, she arrives in Kabul and is met by her driver and interpreter; Fahim (Christopher Abbott). She is driven to the mostly-male media compound; a lively hive of journalists seeking stories, danger, after-hours drinking and sexual decompression. Upon meeting an Australian peer named Tanya (Margot Robbie), Barker is immediately asked if her security team is available for sex, which serves as a kind of initiation into the fast and loose culture that prevails on the premises. In explaining the advantages of being outnumbered by men, Tanya tells Barker a woman who isn't a catch back home becomes a sought-after prize in female-deficient Afghanistan. Committed to her boyfriend, Barker finds fending off aggressive advances by male colleagues and Afghan men alike to be a daily struggle.

As the story unfolds, we meet other characters who play a part in Barker's experiences. She becomes acquainted with Iain MacKelpie (Martin Freeman); a Scottish Lothario who is at odds with Kim's bodyguard Nic (Stephen Peacocke, who resembles a buff Hugh Grant); General Hollanek (Billy Bob Thornton), who allows her to tag along with his soldier's operations, and Ali Massoud Sadiq (Alfred Molina); an Afghan public official who Barker must charm to gain access to key interviewees and inaccessible places. But she finds she must also resist his advances, which are persistent and frequent.
The theme of a woman at the mercy and admiration of men is supposed to make Barker empathetic to the Afghan women, who endure the same.

We see some of Barker's reporting acumen while she rides along with Hollanek's units. During a road-side ambush, she quickly grabs her camera and works her way toward the front line of the firefight, which earns her the General's admiration. Later, after the General's unit becomes frustrated with what they believe is a Taliban mission to keep a village well from becoming operational, Barker encounters a group of women who take her aside to inform her of their culpability in the well's destruction. As Barker explains to the General shortly thereafter, the well denies the women the pleasure of gathering at the river for conversation and gossip. Subsequently, the general leaves the well in a rubble-strewn state of disrepair. The scene is supposed to highlight how the military is often ill-trained to deal with many aspects of foreign cultures, particularly the needs of women; which Barker is able to gain insight to in her unique role as a female reporter.

But aside from that interesting scene, the movie seems to focus almost entirely on who is sleeping with whom and who is trying to sleep with Tanya and Barker. Scenes of dancing, drinking, and partying journalists become almost a default visual.

But other issues eventually come to the forefront. Time away from her boyfriend leads to an incident where Barker catches him with another woman while on Skype, which seems inevitable. Rendered single, Barker becomes the romantic target of MacKelpie; the unlikeliest of seducers. As time passes, the two slowly become an item until MacKelpie invites her to return to Scotland with him, which she begins to consider.

Barker learns from her superiors at her paper that the war is rapidly losing its value as something news-worthy, which forces her to search for more compelling stories and interviews. The competition to find a juicy scoop becomes fierce, as Barker becomes the victim of Tanya's story-grabbing machinations. Furious, she returns home to face her boss; who, to her surprise, isn't a man but a woman named Geri Taub (Cherry Jones).

Having become accustomed to her bizarre life in Afghanistan, which she calls "the new normal," Barker grows weary of the scene, which leads to sweeping changes in her career and romantic life.

One might think the story would be irresistibly entertaining, but even though its source material is drawn from true-life accounts, there is nevertheless something tired and overly familiar about the story and characters. It isn't that Tina Fey is miscast or her acting skills aren't up to the challenge. What was surprising about Fey's performance wasn't its comedic aspects but the fact that she has dramatic aptitude. I can hardly fault her for the film's flaws. Billy Bob Thornton, though only onscreen occasionally, proved to be a fun and quirky presence and one of the film's best features.

So what is wrong with the film? It isn't funny, for one. It isn't an affective drama either. The Afghan world is purports to be partially about doesn't seem like a real place but something half-imagined and half-realized. No one in the film seems to give a damn about the country or people, who are engaged in a war that won't end. I didn't really want to know that much about Barker, whose life is supposed to be dramatically altered by her experiences though we don't see any evidence of such. Apart from feeling guilt about a soldier whose maiming she feels responsible for, nothing about her time in Afghanistan seems to matter much. All that does seem to matter is her career.

In reading the New York Times Arts section this morning, I noticed that the film fared badly at the box office, while the animated family feature Zootopia cleaned up. I don't normally pay attention to box office tallies but it seemed fitting that the film should lose out to a kid's flick. I happened to see Zootopia with my daughter over the weekend and found it to be a more pleasurable experience. Yes, I know they are two very different kinds of movies but being that I always prefer adult films to anything animated should tell you something about my estimation of the film. Somehow the animated characters seemed less cartoonish.

A War (Krigen)

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Tobias Lindholm/Starring: Pilou Asbaek, Tuva Novotny, Dar Solim and Charlotte Munck

Chances are, Denmark's Oscar submission for the Best Foreign Film category at the Oscars won't enjoy a wide release, which is a pity. Director Tobias Lindholm, co-writer of the excellent Danish film The Hunt, may not have won the Oscar for his gripping A War, but it is no less powerful than its formidable competition. The film's dramatic tension and its intricate, gray, moral landscape, resists a simplistic, manichean interpretation. Nothing in the film is as simple as its deceptively prosaic title.

Company Commander Claus Michael Pedersen (powerfully played by Pilou Asbaek) leads his Danish NATO army unit in its dangerous, Afghan deployment. As Pedersen deals with the day to day perils of his command, his wife Maria (Tuva Novotny) contends with his three children at home; one of whom is becoming increasingly difficult in school. It is clear Pedersen's deployment is exacting a costly toll on his wife and family.
But for Pedersen, the problems at hand betray a more dangerous immediacy as the Taliban wage deadly aggression against the allies and his unit. Early on we see a mine savagely and graphically maim a soldier. Impatiently waiting for a rescue chopper to arrive, Pedersen's medic is unable to save the mortally wounded soldier. In another scene, we see a Danish sniper and spotter observing a Taliban on a motorcycle with a child. After collecting a mine, the Taliban uses the child as a shield against sniper fire. The human shield problem comes into play later during an attack in a village, when Pedersen is warned the Taliban are using civilians as shields. Faced with a wounded soldier in need of medical attention and the enemy's withering gunfire, Pedersen issues a call for an airstrike on the enemy; a decision that will have significant ramifications later. In an earlier scene, Pedersen's decision to send an Afghan family away from the unit's protected sanctuary; in spite of an interpreter's plea, ends tragically. The family becomes vulnerable to Taliban reprisals, which inevitably follow shortly thereafter. For Pedersen, no order issued ever seems to be free of ethical or moral entanglements.

Following the airstrike in the village, the unit returns to routine operations only to find Pedersen has been summoned home to face a judge advocate for killing civilians in said airstrike. The sticky issue of not having had clear and positive identification of the enemy becomes a damning detail in the charges leveled against him. The latter half of the film becomes a riveting courtroom drama as Pedersen and his lawyer face damning, seemingly incontrovertible evidence that threatens marital stability and the family's cohesion.

What is particularly fascinating about the story are the decisions Pedersen is forced to make as Commander and how each command decision carries elements of callousness and compassion, as well as right and wrong. Each order results in civilian deaths in spite of their purpose to eliminate the risk of further casualties. The inherent entanglements in his decisions are lost on the trial prosecution, who only consider the morality of murder and not justifiable, exculpatory evidence. Pedersen is hardly innocent but he is no bloodthirsty sadist. He also isn't guilty, for the impossible calculus in determining who lives and who dies is unjustly thrust upon those in command. Only in war are the boundaries between wanton murder and justifiable aggression vague and often indeterminate.

Maria's fierce determination to see her husband home with the family becomes an interesting issue during the trial, as she becomes willing to overlook the murkier side of her husband's service in order to have her husband home. Her struggles with her son make the trial verdict extremely critical.

Pilou Ashbaek and Tuva Novotny capture the shadings of their respective characters and are superb in their understated performances. We often see the military family dynamic in American films; seldom do we see how the same situations affect other cultures.

The film aims for and achieves a tough realism that is typical of Danish cinema. The harrowing combat scenes contrast sharply with the quiet intensity of the courtroom.

A War was part of a fine batch of Best Foreign Film nominees. Though I feel I've seen more than my share of documentaries and narrative films on the Afghan and Iraqi wars, Lindholm's film proves one more isn't necessarily too much if the material is distinctive. His film definitely stands apart.

Embrace of the Serpent (El Abrazo de la Serpiente)

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Ciro Guerra/Starring: Nilbio Torres, Jan Bijvoet, Antonio Bolivar, Brionne Davis and Yauenkü Migue

Colombia's Oscar-nominated submission in the Best Foreign Film category; Embrace of the Serpent (El Abrazo de la Serpiente), was easily one of the best films of 2015 (it arrived too late to make my favorite film list). Based on the diaries of German explorer Theodor Koch-Grunberg, director Ciro Guerra's wondrous black and white film is both ethereally beautiful and at times brutal in its depiction of the insidiousness of white man's contact with South American Amazonian cultures. Koch-Grunberg was an ethnologist dedicated to documenting tribal cultural life but he also zealously pursued what is known as yakruna; a plant sacred to Amazonian tribes. The yakruna plant was said to possess extraordinary healing properties.

Though sympathetic to tribal cultures, Grunberg was also a part of Europe and America's incursions into the Amazon jungles, which included exploitative rubber harvesting and missionaries that preempted local religious customs with coercive Christian conversion.

In Guerra's film, the narrative slides casually from the past; early 20th century to the future--40 years later and back again. Scenes in the past feature Grunberg (Jan Bijvoet), as he seeks the elusive yakruna plant. Joining his search is his assistant Manduca (Yauenku Migue); a tribesman Grunberg rescued from a rubber plantation. In Grunberg's search for yakruna, he meets a potentially hostile tribesman named Karamakate (the younger version played beautifully by Nilbio Torres). Karamakate's wariness of white men is due largely in part to his tribe's decimation at the hands of rubber plantation barons, who force him to live alone and on the run in the forest. Grunberg's first encounter with Karamakate is in a malarial stupor and with Manduca's prompting, the native treats him by blowing a powdery substance up his nose. We never really learn the nature of the substance (powder from coca plants--cocaine?) but it allows Grunberg the physical means to continue on.
The sight of Manduca in slacks and a button down shirt rouses Karamakate to rage; believing Grunberg's companion has sold out to the white man and given up on the tribal way of life. Manduca explains that Grunberg isn't like the other white men who have slaughtered and enslaved the local population in their greedy pursuit of rubber tree resin but his liberator and friend. Together the three men begin their search for the plant though Karamakate is reluctant to allow another white man to exploit the rain-forest's botanical life for personal gain.

Guerra's film articulates well the horrors of the white man's presence in Amazonian South America. As Karamakate, Grunberg and Manduca make their way on rivers, they encounter the death and devastation visited upon the indigenous tribes. Upon arriving at a mission, the three encounter a gun-wielding monk who mistakes them for plantation operatives and nearly shoots them. The mission is populated by converted locals who have become enslaved by Christian dogma. While staying at the mission the three men hear a monk savagely whipping a young child. In an attempt to stop it, the monk is fatally injured; prompting their hasty flight. Another disturbing encounter involves a frightened and nearly hysterical, one-armed native who has escaped the brutal rubber tree barons; his face showing clear signs of mutilation. After he discovers Karamakate has tipped over the resin receptacles around the tree, he frantically replaces them before begging to be shot.

The early Grunberg/Karamakate scenes show a burgeoning friendship; one of mutual trust and occasional jollity. When Grunberg pens a heartfelt letter to his wife, his expression of longing inspires guffaws by Karamakate and Manduca, who find the idea of a man becoming sentimental about a woman comical.
We see Karamakate is puzzled by Grunberg's tendency to carry his unwieldy possessions with him; often imploring him to throw everything away. Grunberg's encumbrances contrast sharply with Karamakate's two possessions; his characteristic necklace and his spear, which doubles as a dart gun.

As the tribal way of life begins to vanish with the white man's protracted presence, Guerra ensures the impact is visceral. When the three men happen upon on a nearly deserted, military outpost, they find the dissolute soldiers are happily incapacitated but Karamakate notices yakruna flowers have been cultivated and used for their hallucinogenic qualities. Furious, he sets fire to the flowers and the tree they encircle.

Forty years in the future, an aging Karamakate (Antonio Bolivar) is sought out by an American explorer named Evan (Brionne Davis), who has used the diary of Koch-Grunberg to conduct his own search for the yakruna plant. We see the elderly, bald Karamakate has retained some memories of his lost tribe's lore as he draws patterns and pictographs on a rock wall. As he draws, he is approached by Evan in a canoe. Evan, like Grunberg before him, asks Karamakate for his help in locating the yakruna plant while holding a copy of the German explorers travel diaries. Looking over his drawing, Karamakate expresses his regret that he cannot remember the significance of most of what he has drawn. With a weary resolve, he agrees to help Evan and like times in the past, the two men embark on a journey that will bring them into contact with the depredations of earlier white visitors, including what looks like crucified, skeletal remains.

Their encounter with another missionary; one who claims to be Jesus Christ, lands them temporarily in a cell. Later, they witness the missionary's megalomaniacal descent into madness as his delusions reach a fever pitch. The scene reminded me of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Kurtz's own power-mad behavior. As the film and the journey near their ends, the last yakruna plant is discovered. Denying Evan the prize he seeks, Karamakate nevertheless allows him to feel its hallucinogenic potency. The visual spectacle it inspires might remind one of the trippy imagery in 2001: A Space Odyssey or Altered States.

It is easy to draw a parallel between the yakruna plant and Karamakate, who are both the last of their kind.

The white man's devastation of the forest and the eradication of tribes and culture provide the film its moral power. Rather than depicting the white man's impact on a village or whole population, he shows us how one man's world (two really, if you count Manduca) becomes nearly obliterated, and in doing so, Karamakate's story serves as the whole.

Guerra's affective use of black and white film gives the story a timeless quality; the present and past dissolve into a deliberate ambiguousness that serves the story well. Guerra's cinematographer David Gallego captures the edenic beauty of the Amazon; the waterways and mountains; showing us a place where nature persists in spite of the white man's intrusive presence.

The film's show stealer is Nilbio Torres, who embodies Karamakate's endangered humanity; a defender of nature who sees the white man's destructive designs as his and the peoples of the Amazon's demise. His hunting skills and his ability to identify the healing attributes of Amazonian plant-life make him the master of his domain where both Grunberg and Evan seem like bumbling infants.

Embrace of the Serpent is a film that leaves you in quiet awe but is so good it leaves you excited enough to want to share it with others. It is beautiful and elegiac; a celebration of man and his intimate connection to nature; a dirge about what has been and could be lost.