Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark: October 2018

Wednesday, October 24, 2018

The Oath

Oh Beautiful for Specious Skies,

For Amber Distilled Grain

Review by Ken Burke

The Oath (Ike Barinholtz)

“Executive Summary” (no spoilers): (This has been one of those weeks I forecast a couple of postings ago where I only had time to get to 1 new theatrical release [although around various other activities, including watching some important—to me—baseball and basketball games, with some outcomes I actually liked, I was able to view one worthwhile new TV movie—My Dinner with Hervé {Sasha Gervasi, HBO}, featuring an excellent performance by Peter Dinklage—and re-view a no-contest-5-star-classic, Cries and Whispers {Ingmar Bergman, 1972}, the rare foreign-language-film nominated for Oscar’s Best Picture {beaten—no surprise, as these 2 epitomize artistic film vs. entertainment movies, even when the latter deserves praise for its own accomplishments—by Hollywood-favorite The Sting, helmed by George Roy Hill, who also topped Bergman for Best Director, Best Original Screenplay}, winner of the Best Cinematography Oscar for Sven Nykvist]. What I’m reviewing here doesn’t begin to compare to Cries …, but while the latter is timeless in its tragic passion The Oath is extremely timely in its assault [in more ways than one, although infused with a lot of humor as well] on the contemporary U.S. sociopolitical scene, taking place in what seems to be a slightly-alternative-universe [we hope]). Chris is a strident left-winger trying to keep his cool (not easy; he’s hot-tempered) as Thanksgiving dinner with conservative family members approaches, although his biggest concern is a nationwide Loyalty Oath which has a signing deadline of Black Friday. What you’d expect at the dinner confrontation quickly occurs (largely because Chris can’t keep his mouth shut except when chewing his food), but the real drama (a deadly switch in tone from comic aspects up to this point) comes on Friday when a couple of enforcer-volunteers from the Citizens Protection Unit question Chris, leading to scenes of tension, fear, some blood, plus more of the blatant obscenities we’ve been peppered with already. Obviously, this film isn’t for everyone—it’s not even playing in many theaters yet—but if you give it a chance (now or likely soon on video) you’ll get a good dose of how our current sociocultural divides could take even worse directions, giving us all good reason to prevent that by working civilly with each other rather than always easily assuming the worst motivations about those we disagree with.

Here’s the trailer: (Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge it; activate that same button on the full screen’s lower right or your “esc” keyboard key to return to normal size.)

(Although, be warned, this is a Red Band trailer with lots of the film’s R-rated language; if you’d like to watch one a bit more sanitized try this [but keep reality in mind if you choose to pay for this film]:)

If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but as this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film—or want to save some bucks—to help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters like this:

⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.

What Happens: Chris Powell (Ike Barinholtz), an ultra-left-winger (obnoxious about it too, easily angered, ready to launch into tirades about anything or anyone not meeting his definition of propriety) White guy married to Kai (Tiffany Haddish, with a more serious role here than usual for her, although she gets some laughs in an early scene when she manages to turn Chris’ most-recent-fuming into foreplay after she tells him to take off his shirt)—a Black woman whose values are as liberal as his but who usually offers more measured reactions than he does—parent of a couple of young mixed-race-kids, is nervously preparing for Thanksgiving dinner with his family which he anticipates to be another disaster because of previous clashes with his generally-moderate parents, Eleanor (Nora Dunn) and Hank (Chris Ellis), considerably-more-conservative-brother, Pat (Jon Barinholtz [Ike’s actual sibling]), although his sister, Alice (Barrie Brownstein), agrees with Chris’ politics, she just doesn’t want to join him in battling Pat (we might assume her husband, Clark [Jay Duplass], would also support Chris but he’s out of action, sick with the flu for most of this story until he makes an important appearance at the end). Chris doesn’t do himself any favors with Pat’s girlfriend, Abbie (Meredith Hagner), either, at first mistakenly calling her “Katie”—Pat’s previous love—which she takes offense at until Chris is so angry at her and Pat he doesn’t care what name he uses as long as it’s mixed with obscenities (this is an obviously-R-rated trip through family trauma, mostly because of aggressive-language-insults, although some physical violence later on results in scenes of minor bloodshed not pleasant to watch, even within the context of a political satire). While these left vs. right-arguments could happen without much encouragement (obviously they have before), there’s a much-more-pressing-situation during this Thanksgiving (where each day of the developing week is announced with huge graphics, loudly-ominous music) because the President is “requesting” all Americans to sign a loyalty oath to him and the country by no later than Black Friday, something Chris vehemently opposes even as he (correctly) assumes several family members have readily done so (even his likeminded close friend at work signed because of negative pressure personally and professionally against those whose refusal is seen as unpatriotic—Chris finds the whole concept a bold movement toward U.S. fascism; while we never see the President and his spokeswoman on newscasts looks nothing like Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the Trump-implications couldn’t be more obvious, which would surely be a selling or repelling point for this film, even as all in this family struggle display unsavory attitudes).

Because Chris is a news junkie (Kai makes him promise he won’t break away from the Thanksgiving meal for updates) from left-leaning-MSNBC-type-reportage while Pat and Abbie get their info from Fox-ish sources, we can’t be sure what’s really happening nationwide during this extended holiday weekend (possibly 74% of the country’s signed the Loyalty Oath or maybe that’s exaggerated propaganda), but what’s clearly real is there are protests against the Oath in major cities where a Black Congressman’s been arrested for burning a copy of this divisive document (Chris is also on fire about this, citing the man’s First Amendment rights), possibly some protesters have been killed by members of the Citizens Protection Unit (a volunteer branch of Homeland Security) which Chris says is essentially a latter-day-Gestapo while Pat and Abbie say any dead protesters deserved to die (obviously, no political position in this [hopefully] alternative universe is immune from extreme depiction so as to allow the tensions to break in a furious manner as we finally reach that fateful Friday). Chris even gets into hassles with Dad over how to use the TV remote in an attempt to turn off the escalating clashes on-air, with the device too complicated for the old man to easily figure out, his impatient son trying to wrestle it away from normally-quiet-but-increasingly-frustrated Hank (reminding me of unspoken friction with my own father when I’d go back to Texas to visit, him reminding me where every light switch was in every room, although except for some outbursts from him about the Vietnam War or protesters at political conventions [“Why aren’t they at work?”] in 1968, 1972 we never argued politics—largely because I didn’t want to get into conflicts like what we have in The Oath, especially when my mother was constantly expressing her opinions about everything [many of which I didn’t agree with] so I could see arguments from their only child weren’t going to result in anything much better than what happens in the Powell household). Their problems all come to a head at the long-dreaded-dinner, with the ultimate explosion resulting from Chris learning both Kai and Alice have signed the Oath, not because they agree with it but to protect their children from ostracization, or worse from the CPU, although that’s no excuse for Chris who takes his meal to the car, then falls asleep there overnight.

⇒Next day, just when you’d think things couldn’t get worse after all the obscene insults hurled back and forth on Thanksgiving, a true nightmare arrives in the form of 2 CPU guys coming to the house (without a warrant, Chris declares, although I’m not sure they operate with warrants anyway)—calm squad leader Peter (John Cho), hot-headed-partner Mason (Billy Magnussen)—to question Chris about a charge he’s interfered with someone wanting to sign the Oath, which he denies but quickly assumes Pat and/or Abbie made the accusation (they angrily deny it, especially her; one of my viewing companions thinks it was the friend from Chris’ office, as reasonable a speculation as any). Given Mason’s belligerence (easily matching Chris), along with his statements about how it takes bold guys like him to protect this country when all-talk, no-action guys like Chris are what’s bringing us down (echoing an angry old man berating immigrants in a restaurant where the Powell family was eating on Wednesday night), it’s no surprise (although very troubling, if these CPU men are acting as government agents) Mason gets physically-confrontational with both Chris and Kai, leading Hank to grab the fireplace shovel, clobbering Peter with it (yet, he’s not clear why he didn’t hit Mason), leading to Chris then using this tool on Mason too, knocking him unconscious as well, so Pat (now more supportive of his brother) ties Mason’s hands behind him, Chris takes his gun.⇐

⇒The family’s now united in a quandary over what to do next (at least the kids haven’t witnessed any of this as Chris had Eleanor take them to a nearby-neighbor’s-home), but they get no help from Chris and Kai’s lawyer (overseas, bad phone connection, about to climb a mountain) nor any sustained action from Peter who wants to be reasonable but keeps passing out from his concussion. Mason comes to, is more insulting than ever, secretly frees himself with a pocket knife, almost fatally plunges it into Chris’ chest only to be saved when Pat Tases him (after accidently zapping Kai first, which turns her disposition to fury when she recovers). Anger and panic are flowing all around now as Chris talks privately with Kai and Alice about killing both Mason and Peter, then dumping their bodies in the woods, but the women convince him to work with Peter who says they must release Mason; they do, he grabs the gun but is subdued again, then tied up more thoroughly while still spewing verbal bile, threating to take action against Chris’ kids when he’s free. In response, everyone but Peter encourages Chris to shoot Mason, which he’s ready to do when Clark rushes in, says "Turn on the TV” (just like how my parents called me to do the same with no further explanation when the 9/11 attacks happened in Manhattan). When they do they find the President has resigned (no reason given yet) followed by the VP/now-Prez halting the Oath program, including any actions being taken against those who haven’t signed. As this all wraps up, Chris and Pat drive Peter and Mason to a hospital that night, Peter reveals Mason has anger-management issues that got him fired from previous jobs, Chris declines to learn who filed the complaint against him, Mason quietly accepts his returned gun (my friend also said the bullets should have been given to Peter, but I guess Mason’s subdued response implies he’s standing down from his earlier hostility level). Finally, Chris returns home to enjoy a piece of pie with Kai.⇐

So What? On a weekend (and following days) where I had time to see just one film I took the advice of my local critic-guru, Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle (which sometimes pays off, sometimes doesn’t, especially in circumstances where I’ve ignored his dismissals to find myself thoroughly satisfied with something on-screen he found no value in), to choose—from among a few other possibilities, any of which might have been worthwhile—The Oath because of his claims "It's one of the best movies of the year" […] ‘The Oath’ is very much this year’s ‘Get Out’ equivalent […] If anything, the new movie is more pointed and incisive.” While I can’t fully agree with the last part of that evaluation (I wouldn’t say The Oath is more impactful than Get Out [Jordan Peele, 2017; review in our May 11, 2017 posting]; for me, they each have specific strengths, although I find the latter—in being even more outrageous than The Oath—to be a slightly better cinematic experience overall), I’m glad I settled on this one (as did my regular viewing companions who, admittedly, haven’t all always been fully overjoyed with my picks; this time they found our weekly cinematic exploration to be at the very least a fascinating, if blundering-about at times, commentary on what we’re living through as another crucial election day approaches) because its exaggerations of our current sociopolitical situation aren’t all that extreme (possibly serving as a warning as to the sort of future this nation—and others who are following our lead [Or are we following theirs? The various dictators President Trump seems to admire, believe, kowtow to were all in power before he was elected, although certain Eastern European ones seem to have gotten bolder in their rabid nationalism since he’s taken office]—could descend into if we don’t do more to keep this current imperial Presidency better under control); its violence is shocking (including, literally, with the Taser) but easily believable within the context of widening divides all through our society as civility erodes when oppositional forces clash (I’m not just talking about the knee-jerk-chants at Trump rallies either; lots of violence has also come from the masked antifa movement, degrading resistance into anarchy at times); its resolution is the stuff of political fantasy in the immediate, unexplained action of this fictional President but, again, not all that removed from reality if governmental-control shifts at least partially back to the Democrats after this November—along with whatever emerges from the Robert Mueller investigations—with newfound-pressure on Trump to provide Congress with currently-restricted-documents and halt his agenda of socially/environmentally-destructive policies.

(Just in case you think Kai doesn't know proper "bird" calls, all she's doing here is showing
the obnoxious CPU guys that she's married to Chris as they begin their interrogation.)

The Oath is obviously not something that’s going to alter a lot of predetermined minds (including my own)—on both sides of our political spectrum, because our main lefty, Chris, while proven correct in his concerns about the fascist potential of the CPU also exemplifies liberal-knee-jerkiness (a malady I try to repress in myself, although not always successfully as you can probably tell by some of my comments in this and other reviews of mine) in his quick assumptions about his family’s motivations, becoming just as rigid in his own ideas and responses as he accuses his less-progressive-relatives of being in following their own beliefs—but if it can serve as a slowly (not too slow, hopefully, though not helped with its current marginal levels of critical support, theatrical availability; more on that just below) discovered fan favorite it might at least ignite some awareness of how this current cultural animus* is leading our society (and any who do emulate where we currently seem to be headed, with hopes no one will be beheaded in the process) toward inevitable physical chaos to accompany the policy and attitudinal wars we’re already engaged in. Even if potential viewers of The Oath don’t turn to movie theaters to find enlightenment on important, impactful issues of the day, though, maybe there’s just the pragmatic value of getting advice on how to keep upcoming holiday gatherings such as Thanksgiving from exploding into intra-familial-warfare, even if it’s just the acid-verbal kind rather than actual battles as Chris' crowd experienced.

*That is, the idea of animus understood as “hostility,” as in “animosity,” not necessarily Carl Jung's concept of the unconscious masculine side of a woman, although even that definition contains the inference of unleashed power which could lead to aggressive bullying or destructive acts rather than thoughtful, constructive results. (But, as detailed in this link, Jung’s original ideas clearly reflect some influence from his sometimes-colleague, Sigmund Freud, in presenting the positive aspect of the animus in a woman as being rational, logical thereby calming her passion-fueled-emotions which could lead to her being self-centered, bitchy; the author of this link, however, sincerely tries to enhance those retrograde aspects of Jung's animus idea—and anima, the unconscious female side of a man—but if you care to explore this proposition within Jung’s study of universal archetypes in the human psyche you would need, as that link-author encourages, to read in much more detail on animus—and anima—to better understand what I’ve grossly simplified here.)

Bottom Line Final Comments: As noted above, I thank Mick LaSalle for encouraging me to see The Oath (my juror’s opinion’s still out on it being one of the best of 2018, but it’s certainly intriguing, relevant, worth time and attention no matter what your politics may be—in that there’s lots to both offend and reaffirm you, conservative or liberal), which might well never have happened had I also checked the usual suspects of critical consensus where I find the reviewers surveyed by Rotten Tomatoes offer only a marginally-supporive 59% of positive reviews while those at Metacrtic emerge as astonishingly-close (rather than being notably more negative) with their 58% average score. Audience response hasn’t been all that embracing either, as this film’s been in domestic (U.S.-Canada) release for 2 weeks but has generated only a pittance of ticket sales—$258 thousand—although playing in just 300 theaters nationwide doesn’t help much (that’s up from the opening weekend of just 10 venues so maybe a slow rollout's in process, although there’s little momentum nurturing such a strategy along). Its position on the chart moved up doubly since its debut, going from #42 to #21 last weekend, but given the hefty presence of (along with audience response to) Halloween [2018] (David Gordon Green) with $90.5 million worldwide income in its release weekend, A Star Is Born [2018] (Bradley Cooper; review in our October 11, 2018 posting) with $201.7 million worldwide, Venom [2018—to clarify this isn’t the character’s previous appearance in Spider-Man 3 {Sam Raimi, 2007}] (Ruben Fleischer) with $461.8 million worldwide (the latter 2 in release for 3 weeks, all 3 playing in almost 4,000 domestic theaters, all 3 needing a bit of PR clarification these are new productions despite sharing the titles of long-ago-releases) certainly The Oath will never achieve such coverage nor ticket sales, but rather than offering us frightful or romantic escapism it provides biting satire (to go along with biting down on that turkey dinner, at least until Chris storms off to the driveway) directly addressing the cultural clashes currently rending the fabric of whatever level of tolerance was slowly building in the U.S. over the past few decades, while weaving in as much humor as these serious circumstances can allow especially when death could become an option as tensions mount for the Powells on Black Friday.

As you scores of faithful readers well know (even the ones Google cited for awhile as being from an Unknown Region; I guess they’ve improved their mapping software since then or it was just another area now annexed by Russia [seriously, I do get regular hits from Russia, mistakenly thinking this blog’s a voting booth, I guess]; if you scroll to the very end of this posting you’ll find a tally of where readership’s come from over the previous week, so if it interests you feel free to check weekly tallies at the conclusion of other recent Two Guys posts*), I usually conclude each review with a Musical Metaphor to offer final commentary from the perspective of some popular song (you wouldn’t expect me to use an unpopular one, would you?). For The Oath I considered something from Pink Floyd’s The Wall album (1979) but, after briefly hearing a bit of Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On” (from his 1971 album of the same name) while leaving the chiropractor’s office recently (neck issues from mild concussion after too-strenuous-exercise/dehydration-blackout all healed but lower-back-issues [just from being almost 71] are ongoing) I decided to go with that one instead, at https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPkM8F0sjSw (a live 1972 performance intercut with some inner-city-footage) because even though it came at a time when the lyrics were referencing deaths and social upheavals due to the Vietnam War or urban riots it’s still relevant today in our fragmented society, shown truthfully even if in extreme fashion in The Oath, where “You know we’ve got to find a way To bring some lovin’ here today [… because] We don’t need to escalate […] Don’t punish me with brutality Talk to me, so you can see Oh, what’s going on.” Of course, just reading about this film may bring up too much tension about the metastasizing-social-divides we’re facing, so maybe I should just end musically the same way as The Oath, with a simple-but-lively-instrumental from a different Mason, Mason Williams’ "Classical Gas" (found on his 1968 album The Mason Williams Phonographic Record), followed by a couple of hope-to-raise-your-spirits-ditties from him (possibly stirring giddy optimism—in me for sure—about a real-world-Presidential abdication [as much of a fantasy as that may seem, but hope springs eternal]), 2 of his “Them” poems (from The Mason Williams Listening Matter 1964 album), "Them Lunch Toters" and "Them Hors D'Oeuvers". I'm posting this on Unity Day, October 24, 2018 when we're all encouraged to practice kindness, acceptance, inclusion, so I hope Mr. Williams helps you stay happy, well into the next time we meet.

*But, when I opened my Google stats to start posting I found the Unknown Region’s back again. Whoever you are, wherever you are, Two Guys in the Dark greatly appreciate your ongoing support.

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:

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Here’s more information about The Oath:

https://www.theoath.film/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTgVmISkBIo (2:16 short interview statements from writer/director/actor Ike Barinholtz and actors Tiffany Haddish, Meredith Hagner, Jon Barinholtz)

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_oath_2018

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-oath-2018

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If you’d rather contact Ken directly rather than leaving a comment here please use my email address of kenburke409@gmail.com. (But if you truly have too much time on your hands you might want to explore some even-longer-and-more-obtuse-than-my-film-reviews—if that even seems possible—academic articles about various cinematic topics at my website, https://kenburke.academia.edu, which could really give you something to talk to me about.)

By the way, if you’re ever at The Hotel California knock on my door—but you know what the check out policy is so be prepared to stay for awhile. Ken

P.S. Just to show that I haven’t fully flushed Texas out of my system here’s an alternative destination for you, Home in a Texas Bar, with Gary P. Nunn and Jerry Jeff Walker. But wherever the rest of my body may be my heart’s always with my longtime-companion, lover, and wife, Nina Kindblad, so here’s our favorite shared song—Neil Young’s "Harvest Moon"

—from the performance we saw at the Desert Trip concerts in Indio, CA on October 15, 2016 (as a full moon was rising over the stadium) because “I’m still in love with you,” my dearest, a never-changing-reality even as the moon waxes and wanes over the months/years to come.

OUR POSTINGS PROBABLY LOOK BEST ON THE MOST CURRENT VERSIONS OF MAC OS AND THE SAFARI WEB BROWSER (although Google Chrome usually is decent also); OTHERWISE, BE FOREWARNED THE LAYOUT MAY SEEM MESSY AT TIMES.

Finally, for the data-oriented among you, Google stats say over the past month (which they seem to measure from right now back 30 days) the total unique hits at this site were 4,517 (as always, we thank all of you for your support with our hopes you’ll continue to be regular readers); below is a snapshot of where and by what means those responses have come from within the previous week:

Thursday, October 18, 2018

First Man and The Old Man & the Gun

A First and (alas) A Last

Reviews by Ken Burke

I indicated in my last posting I might only be able to review 1 film per week for the next month or so, but I was able to see 2 of them recently so here’s more than originally intended this time around.

First Man (Damien Chezelle)

Executive Summary” (no spoilers): As we’re once again in “based on a true story” territory I can’t see what could be a spoiler, given it’s common knowledge Neil Armstrong and his astronaut team were able to successfully accomplish history’s first landing on our moon in 1969 so I’m not going to designate any of the review below in my typical spoiler fashion (although I’ll still state my standard explanation of how that works, just for the record) because the only thing you might not know about this historic event is how conflicted the astronauts and their families were about that dangerous enterprise, but such inner-turmoil serves as background context for the more overt events of this film so there’s nothing really to hide from you there either). Essentially, this is how NASA pushed itself into completely unknown territory in the 1960s by inventing technology, making bold steps toward conquering the substantial challenges of space travel—losing a few lives in the process—with the quest culminating in the July 1969 landing of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin as the first humans to walk upon our distant lunar surface. There’s plenty of tension along the way in this extremely well made, engrossing film, as well as a grand sense of personal accomplishment as success of these missions depended not only on following carefully-worked-out-protocols but also responding spontaneously to unforeseen dangers that could easily have aborted even more of these missions in similar tragic manners than those which actually occurred, horrible in their happenings but relatively few given the numbers of U.S. space flights successfully accomplished before Apollo 11 ever blasted off from Florida. Despite the occasional-roller-coaster-aspects of spaceships in peril, though, most of what happens in the flow of First Man is of inner-contemplative-nature, cautiously-brave-men dreaming of conquering the stars while realizing death is just one unanticipated crisis away. Marvelously acted by Ryan Gosling as Armstrong, Claire Foy as his wife, and the entire cast, this film merits your attention, easily found in thousands of theaters.

⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.

What Happens: Despite idealistic pronouncements by President John Kennedy, the U.S.A. space program was notably behind the efforts of the Soviet Union in the early 1960s so NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) heads found it imperative to realize JFK’s goals of landing a man (no women in the astronaut corps in those days, but they would come later) on the moon, safely returning him (and his crew) to Earth. This story traces the true exploits of Neil Armstrong (Ryan Gosling) to become that historical moonwalker, beginning with footage in 1961 of him as a jet pilot challenging the upper reaches of Earth’s atmosphere, barely able to keep his X-15 plane (and himself) intact before landing safely (what's shown in the photo above's from a different, not-so-celebrated-result) on the Mojave Desert (with plenty of point-of-view bouncing closeup shots from inside his cockpit, making it clear to us both the danger he faced and the disruptive-reality of such a traumatic event, further enhancing our admiration for his piloting skills when he’s able to tame such a technological-bucking-bronco). While there are a lot of important dates (and significant individuals) in the U.S. space program of that era noted throughout the next 2/3 or so of First Man’s 141 minutes, what really matters is what’s happening inside the mind of Armstrong as he simultaneously grieves the loss of his 2-year-old-daughter, Karen (Lucy Stafford), to a brain tumor and asserts his willingness to be part of a mission to accomplish the first-ever-moon-landing within a few short years, requiring Neil to move his family—wife Janet (Claire Foy), son Rick (Gavin Warren)—to Houston where he undergoes rigorous trials designed to determine his ability to withstand both the physical and psychological rigors of space travel (burdens further accentuated throughout the film by the horrors of test pilots killed in trial runs, the terrifying deaths of the Apollo 1 astronauts on the launching pad due to a freak fire in their capsule bringing collective sorrow to these close-knit-space-program-families, living near each other as well near Houston). Armstrong had faced his own crisis when his Gemini 8 capsule almost crashed upon atmospheric re-entry after a successful test of a docking mission with another spacecraft, requiring him to take difficult manual control of his ship even in opposition to instructions from his ground-based Mission Control.

(Full disclosure: This photo's from the actual Apollo 17 mission [1972 , the last one], but I use it to show how
well Chazelle's captured the reality of moon landings in his film because this could easily be from First Man.)

Neil’s chosen to lead the Apollo 11 mission (then survives an almost-fatal-crash testing the lunar-landing-vehicle), this introverted man faces the dual challenge of being publicly optimistic ("pleased") theoretical science will support him, privately terrified it could all go wrong. He pulls back from Jan, facing her anger before blasting off, forced to admit to his sons (Luke Winters now as Rick, younger Mark [Connor Blodgett]) he might not return from this dangerous endeavor. Just as we’d been rocked around in claustrophobic-inner-capsule POV shots in other danger scenes, we also get plenty of that just above the moon’s surface, further emphasized by fuel running low even as anticipated landing areas prove to be unusable fields of large boulders. Finally, a flat enough spot occurs, with Neil and (more outgoing) fellow astronaut Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin (Corey Stoll) able to say “The Eagle has landed,” then Neil cautiously descends the Lunar Module’s ladder onto the moon July 20, 1969 with a camera broadcasting his historic words: “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”* We then get a bit of lunar exploration by Armstrong and Aldrin, including a wide shot of one of them standing by the American flag (even more controversial, I’m afraid, than the grumbling over no shot of them actually planting that flag is the “justification” naysayers of this historic event can now make about how there was never a moon landing at all [just a staged film to drum up support for a space program not as successful nor triumphant as claimed to be], given how even more convincing this footage looks [admittedly, not shot on the moon] than the grainy 1969 visuals). After Neil drops Karen’s little bracelet into a crater, followed by a successful return to Earth, the 3 crew members (Michael Collins [Lukas Haas] orbited the moon while the others descended; they then linked up with his module for the long trip home) stayed in quarantine for a month in case they picked up any microscopic intruders. Jan visits, but she and Neil are separated by a large glass wall (seemingly with no telephone contact, which we’d expect to see even in an ordinary jail-visit-scene of another context [yet related to this story]). She comes in, still looking angry (probably because of the strained manner in which Neil left for the moon trip), although they seem to emotionally connect, “touching” hands on each side of the restrictive glass.

*The intention was supposedly "A small step for a man ..." but that preposition didn’t transmit so this odd statement lives on, repeated in First Man with no attempt to clean up this presumed error.

So What? In one sense, First Man succeeds by evoking aspects of previous outer-space-exploration films: to cite a few examples, in The Right Stuff (Philip Kaufman, 1983) we have a skilled pilot (Chuck Yeager [Sam Shepherd]) almost dying because of atmospheric conditions battering his airplane, followed by NASA astronauts bringing great successes for the emerging U.S.A. space program capped by John Glenn (Ed Harris) as the first American to orbit Earth; Apollo 13 (Ron Howard, 1995) presents an almost-fatal-flight-situation which nearly results in the deaths of astronauts just a year after Apollo 11’s triumph; even the fictional Gravity (Alfonso Cuarón 2013; review in our October 9, 2013 posting) is relevant here, where a series of seemingly-impossible-heroic-actions under great duress result in calamity being avoided. However, unlike the ultimate sense of victory accompanying those films, First Man surrounds its triumphs with a constant sense of impending doom or post-mission-regret, both to emphasize/verify how continually-dangerous these extra-terrestrial-flights were for all the brave men (and, later, women) who endured these technological challenges where everything constantly depended on precise calculations, split-second-timing, clear-headed-thinking when problems arose and to depict Neil Armstrong not as some confident rah-rah-warrior of the skies (as Glenn was shown in The Right Stuff) but as a man haunted by personal tragedy, nagging doubts this perilous mission to the moon could be pulled off as planned, a self-imposed-distancing from his family leading to his departure from Jan being much more tense than you’d expect from a loving couple: a sense of lingering anger from her, trepidation from him in that final shot in the isolation ward where they slowly, hesitantly make minimal contact through the glass wall separating them. My first reaction to all this was to feel almost as removed from what I was seeing (and expecting to be impacted by, knowing how well-reviewed it is) as Armstrong was from most everything around him, sensing the Gemini 8 near-disaster scene was running on too long, forcing us to slog through this sense of impending-failure as our space program inched its wary way farther out from the known realm of Earth’s atmosphere, delaying for a sense of eternity what would seem to be the film’s intended-focus on the all-important moon landing. Even when it was all over, I still wasn’t completely as caught up by it as I assumed I should be, even though Nina, my wife and alert-viewing-companion, found herself easily enthralled by it all.

What finally brought me around to full appreciation of First Man was thinking about a song I’d heard many decades ago, sung by Alan Damron (a first-rate troubadour from Texas) at the Kerrville Folk Festival* sometime in the mid-1970s about how “a man named Armstrong walk[ed] upon the moon.” I’ll talk more about the specifics of the song in this review’s next section below, but for now I’ll just say its lyrics helped me better understand Chazelle’s approach focusing on the dread, the uncertainty, the inner conflicts lurking in the backstory (and the psyches) of these supposed unflappable heroes who set out on voyages as scary, unpredictable, yet hopeful as those of sailors centuries ago who found our planet to contain its own unknown regions (except, of course, for the people who’d already lived there for millennia). This film gives a balanced comparison between how astonishing it was for these 3 men to fly a lunar landing module to an historic landing culminating those decades of preparation (along with the deaths of those sacrificed in this process of progression through the previous Mercury, Gemini, Apollo programs) vs. the sense of misplaced priorities from some on Earth who felt all this effort and financing could have been better spent on helping humans right here on this planet rise above their constant generations of poverty, rejection, desperation. That’s a problem we’ve yet to overcome as a species, trying to best decide how to allocate limited resources when the stakes are so high in both directions (heal the planet we’re on now before it becomes truly unlivable or find a sustainable process for establishing human extraterrestrial colonies to save us from the demise of our current home from human-inflicted-wounds); it’s a difficult decision which we can only hope will find some answer before all alternatives have been exhausted (yes, I have no doubt climate change is real; more so, it's deadly).

*Sadly, Damron died at age 66 in 2005, but you can see him in action here at the 2001 finale of the famous (in central Texas anyway), still ongoing Kerrville Folk Festival (an event begun in 1972, originally produced by Rod Kennedy—noted in this video as their 30^th anniversary rather than just their 30^th festival, but I can attest things are often different in Texas from standard conceptions or measurements), although I’d say Damron’s best remembered for his rendition of the traditional Irish ballad "Nancy Whiskey", a great, easy sing-a-long, even if you’ve never heard it before. He also managed Kennedy’s folk club, The Chequered Flag, in Austin where sometime in the late 1960s my close friend/musical collaborator/roommate Jerry Graham and I once performed on a Sunday night open mike session, nervous as hell but well-received by the crowd; however, we had to first prove ourselves in a private audition to Damron, who graciously accepted us upon his stage.

Bottom Line Final Comments: Like anyone else who was alive during that summer of 1969, I doubt I’ll ever forget where I was while watching the televised moon landing as Armstrong made his historic descent down that simple-but-crucial-ladder. (For me, it was at the apartment of good friend Mike McMurtry in Austin, first seeing the science-reality of an eons-old-dream-come-true on a small screen, then stepping out onto a balcony that July night, looking up at the moon itself, knowing full well this was a near-unmatched-moment in human history, a sight hopefully always to be remembered—even as sociopolitical unrest rattled our Earth, with the American nation largely united in triumph over the Soviets by our accomplishment on a faraway-orb but so divided back home, a tribalization of opposing values still in conflict today, even to the point of the harsh criticism leveled against this film for not showing American astronauts explicitly planting our flag on this lunar surface, as if we owned it in the same way European explorers claimed ownership of the Americas simply because they saw themselves as superior to the civilizations already entrenched there long before most Europeans even accepted the world as round rather than flat.) But the embrace of history fades over time, so a somber exploration of what such explorations really offer our conflicted/possibly-doomed species (as long as political decisions keep being made on the premise of fossil-fuel-profits and climate-change as a “hoax”) can turn a reasonably-successful-box-office-debut ($19.1 million domestically [U.S.-Canada, trade alliances notwithstanding] plus $10.4 million internationally) into a distant 3^rd place finish behind the continued embrace of a mutant superhero (Venom [2018], [Ruben Fleischer]), which in 2 weeks has racked up $148.7 million domestically, $236.5 million in other markets), making it sadly clear how flamboyance over substance continues to dominate what happens in our local cinemas—which might not be so bad a situation if movies weren’t the primary means by which many members of younger generations learn history, as long as it’s dramatized for maximum audience appeal. First Man may well be remembered when awards season gets into full swing (critics are quite high on it, with those surveyed at Rotten Tomatoes offering a healthy 88% positive reviews while those at Metacritic come in with a highly-supportive [for them] 84% average score), but its probing into the existential reality of fear of failure haunting the 1960s space program may result in its own fading from future embrace when compared to such celebratory fare to be found in presentations like The Right Stuff.

OK, enough yapping about what’s ultimately the enduring impact of First Man vs. how it may be hard to handle for those who want to see Neil Armstrong as a warrior out of ages-old-tradition personifying American imperialism into a vastly-removed-realm from Earth, so let’s bring this to a close. As alluded to above, this review’s Musical Metaphor—my standard device for wrapping up whatever’s gone before in a review—is “Armstrong,” a song by John Stewart (replaced Dave Guard in the Kingston Trio, performed with Nick Reynolds and Bob Shane under that heading 1961-1967 [which means I saw him in Las Vegas in 1964 at one of the only shows I could get in at age 16 while traveling through there with my parents]; he also wrote “Daydream Believer” for the Monkees in 1967) from 1969 in response to the historic lunar landing, then re-recorded by him (for his 1973 Cannons in the Rain album) so what I have here for you is a combo of those versions at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-LkWM16atk (illustrated by just a photo of an astronaut on the moon, presumably Neil but could be Buzz [one of them had to take this shot]; however, if you’d prefer just Stewart’s 1969 original here it is, along with another single photo of one of those first moonwalkers and the "essential" American flag [which may help calm down those—such as President Trump—upset First Man didn’t emphasize the actual planting of this flag, as if claiming Earth’s only celestial-satellite for the U.S.A., although such jingoism clearly isn’t what this film’s all about]). The song notes problems/struggles all around the world while also acknowledging the grandeur of the moon landing, giving some hope such an accomplishment might find resonance in overcoming Earthly troubles as well, reflective to me of the thoughtful aspects of First Man, even as I’ve read this song—like the current film—was criticized for not being “patriotic” enough, as if we can never get beyond the thinking of “zero-sum games” where there must be winners and losers instead of events just being able to celebrate triumphs as global expressions of humanity’s progress, hampered as it may be by countless other areas where progress struggles to merely exist.

The Old Man & the Gun (David Lowery)

“Executive Summary” (no spoilers): Here too we have a narrative based in fact, but there are reasonable places in the review just below to save you from spoilers because the events of bank-robber/escape-artist Forrest Tucker aren’t nearly as well known as Neil Armstrong’s walk upon the moon so I’ll offer appropriate warnings to preserve the pleasant surprises of this odd-but-intriguing-story of a man who loved to commit crimes just for the pure pleasure of it, often following up his heists with clever ways of escaping from jail allowing him to continue his outlaw-life unencumbered by such annoyances as prison sentences. This specific slice of his somewhat-fictionalized biography takes place mostly in and around Dallas, TX in 1981 as this sophisticated criminal balances blatant-but-successful bank holdups with a budding romance as he becomes attracted to a local widow who has no idea he’s serious about how he earns his comfortable living. Add in a local cop who’s determined to bust Tucker and his “Over-The-Hill-Gang” out of pure spite and you have something in the vein of Bonnie and Clyde without all that violence. Despite supportive reviews this movie’s not playing widely just yet (or maybe ever), but I do encourage you to find it if you can, both for its whimsical nature and for Robert Redford's announced acting finale.

Here’s the trailer:

Before reading any further, I’ll ask you to refer to the plot spoilers warning far above.

What Happens: As with the film above, this one’s based in fact, although it defines itself as “This story is mostly true,” about a guy who delighted in pulling off simple-but-effective-robberies, then achieving unforeseen escapes from confinement in response to the various times he was caught in the act. While I can’t say how much liberty has been taken with the truth here, what we learn about Forrest Tucker (Robert Redford) is he’s a man of advanced years living in Ft. Worth, TX across the street from a cemetery (although he treats this as another of the jokes about his freewheeling life, unlike when I lived next to a huge graveyard in Queens, NYC in the early ‘70s which gave me a sense of dread—appropriate, considering how my job there, along with my first marriage, played out). Tucker delights in robbing banks, done in a lighthearted, respectful way as in this movie’s first scene in 1981 where (sporting a fake moustache and his constant dark blue suit) he simply strolls into his chosen location, shows a teller his pistol so she quickly fills his briefcase with cash, races out to avoid the pursuing cops (sometimes he works with his long-time-buddies Teddy Green [Danny Glover] and Waller [Tom Waits], but they mostly get a couple of strong scenes apiece, not all that crucial to the overall narrative). Following this most-current-robbery, Tucker’s speeding along I-35 (seemingly in Dallas, rather than heading south for Austin [my choice, but that relates to my life post-NYC, which we’ll discuss another time]) when he sees a woman with a nonfunctioning pickup truck so he stops to help, although neither knows much about cars. Soon, he and she, Jewel (Sissy Spacek), adjourn to a diner where he learns she’s a widow with a nearby-horse-ranch plus an open attitude toward this charming guy she’s just met although she doesn’t buy his story he’s a traveling salesman. Oddly enough, he admits his “career” is bank-robbery, which he explains in detail how to be successful at, although she assumes he’s kidding which he encourages lest she break off their budding friendship immediately. From here, much of the movie continues in a familiar pattern with Tucker robbing banks (sometimes assisted by Teddy and Waller when the venue’s more challenging), courting Jewel, then finally intersecting with our other main character, Dallas police Detective John Hunt (Casey Affleck)—with his Black wife, Maureen (Tika Sumpter), 2 mixed-race-kids (having lived in Dallas in 1981 I can testify how bold that situation would have been back then)—who’s mortified he was in one of Tucker’s banks with his young son but had no idea there was a robbery happening until Tucker was long gone, vanished into the rain.

Due to some razzing about the incident from his colleagues, Hunt determines to catch this suave, charming thief (and his accomplices, collectively now referred to by Hunt and the news media as the Over-The-Hill-Gang) whose exploits are now seen to form a pattern across several states all the way to California, with TV interviews of Hunt’s intentions bringing in the FBI, essentially telling Hunt to take a hike (to which he responds he will … until he breaks the case—although he’s taunted by Tucker’s latest heist when the old man leaves a note on a $100 bill for him). ⇒Actually, Hunt does discover Tucker’s identity but it’s purely by chance because he gets a letter from the robber’s estranged daughter, Dorothy (Elisabeth Moss), in San Francisco, telling the cop descriptions of this thief sound like her dad, whom she feels should be locked up because of the disrupted childhood she suffered due to him (although her mother continued to love this rogue until her death). By this point, things are getting serious between Forrest and Jewel (he’s even looking into quietly paying off the mortgage on her ranch), but as they’re eating in that favorite diner one night Tucker notices Hunt’s also in the place so he confronts his adversary in the restroom, each laying down mutual challenges. After Tucker drops Jewel off back at her home he returns to his place only to find Teddy already there with a bunch of cops ready to pounce so he drives away frantically, finally commanders another car from a frightened woman to race back to Jewel’s ranch where he starts to ride away on one of her horses but stops when he sees a fleet of cops racing up to her house. Seemingly having given himself up to spare her any problems about him, he serves his assigned time (not escaping as he normally did, even from San Quentin), until she happily picks him up upon release. They stay together for awhile (he tells about his 16 previous escapes, which we see brief bits of in a series of flashbacks), but the criminal calling’s too strong in him so he leaves her house one day saying he’ll return soon, calls Hunt to imply he’ll be back in action, followed by closing graphics telling us he robbed 4 banks in 1 day before being captured again, smiling all the way.⇐

So What? The Old Man & the Gun makes for a pleasant story, based on the life of an actual career-criminal/prison-escapee, Forrest Silva “Woody” Tucker (1920-2004, so if the guy Redford portrays continued to live off-screen after that final capture noted in the ending-graphics [unclear when he was last caught as we don’t know how long he was in jail following his 1981 arrest] he may have been able to accomplish the 18 times the real guy says he slipped out of custody [along with 12 unsuccessful attempts, not noted in the movie, except maybe that was why he was in long enough for his marriage to deteriorate—along with the reality that he apparently never came back to his family whenever his term for that particular conviction was done, either officially finished or through another planned disappearance]), who was actually married 3 times, had 2 kids, yet none of his wives knew about his criminal acts (he married using fake names) until convictions interrupted the marriages, with his final capture in Florida in 2000 leading to his death while incarcerated (as reported by David Grann in The New Yorker, but most of this article's information isn’t revealed to us in The Old Man …, presumably to not clutter up the storyline of the brief part of Tucker’s life we get to share [for his final Florida robberies he was also more well-armed than the single pistol toted by this movie’s Tucker, probably making him a bit more dangerous along with being charmingly courteous, as depicted by Redford]—you can get more specifics on movie vs. history here). ⇒Besides, the whimsical situation of Tucker leaving what could have easily been a satisfying life with Jewel (for many men his age, I’ll easily speculate) because he’s so compelled to rob banks just fits nicely with the movie's pre-release-announcements this would be Redford’s last acting role so both performer and character go out on a high note here as The Old Man … rolls its final credits.⇐

Bottom Line Final Comments: Critics are solidly behind The Old Man & the Gun also with RT’s positive reviews at 89%, MC’s average score at 79% (high for them as most of what both they and I have reviewed so far this year show their average rarely getting above 80%, even if it remains difficult to figure out how some of those numbers are assigned to the reviews). However, audiences haven’t been so receptive to Redford’s finale with a domestic gross after 3 weeks in release a measly $1.7 million; playing in only 228 theaters doesn’t help much either, so obviously Fox Searchlight wasn’t expecting a big response, despite the well-established-careers of the major stars. (Admittedly, the only one of this older generation to win an acting Oscar is Spacek [Coal Miner’s Daughter {Michael Apted, 1980—the only press junket I was ever sent to L.A. to cover; an amazing weekend even as Tommy Lee Jones was an intimidating-interviewee as usual, softened by a marvelous concert at a Sunset Strip club where Spacek, Loretta Lynn, and Levon Helm from the cast performed}], yet younger-Oscar-winner-Affleck [Manchester by the Sea {Kenneth Lonergan, 2016; review in our December 8, 2016 posting}] and other more-trendy-inclusions such as Moss or John David Washington as Affleck’s boss, Lt. Kelley, haven’t drawn in the potentially-curious either). I’ll admit The Old Man … is more genial, casual, relaxed (especially where bank-robbery-plots are concerned) than most of what topped its 15^th place showing last weekend, but for those of us with wrinkles to match those of the older stars on screen, this is an enjoyable way to spend an afternoon, especially when given substance at the end of how Tucker was able to prove himself one of the greatest escape artists since Harry Houdini. That may not be enough to entice you into a theater, although I certainly hope you give it a look in some video format someday when you start wondering whatever happened to the charming screen presence of Robert Redford (which is all I have left of him anyway, given I attended 2 years of his Sundance Film Festival without his presence at either one because he was working on something needing to be finished for release both times).

My Musical Metaphor this time around is Neil Young’s “Old Man” (from his 1972 Harvest album) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=An2a1_Do_fc&frags=pl%2Cwn (a song originally about Young and the elderly caretaker, Luis Avila, of a large ranch Neil had recently bought) because—in a strictly metaphorical sense (work with me on this)—it feels like the young Forrest Tucker speaking across the decades to his much-more-aged-self we see in this film, reminding the “old man” that “I’m a lot like you were,” just as we see in that montage of flashbacks near the end of our story how this guy was not only driven to commit crimes throughout his time on Earth but also challenged himself to escape from the penalties of his actions, with such constant disconnection from all aspects of society that he couldn't sustain his marriage or his parenthood (leading to his capture in 1981 due to that disenchanted-daughter) nor even a life he’d clearly tried to settle into with Jewel, causing him to “Live alone in a paradise [of his own compulsions] That makes me think of two [despite his inability to accept that two-ness, leading to] Love lost, such a cost [so he’s more comfortable with circumstances that] Give me things that don’t get lost [mostly his success with bending social mores to his own victories so, ultimately, despite what he thinks he might find in a relationship he has to admit it] Doesn’t mean that much to me To mean that much to you [Sorry, Jewel. So, as with this posting’s title and explorations, those ultimate loners such as Armstrong and Tucker can say] I’ve been first and last Look at how the time goes past But I’m all alone at last Rolling home to you.”

I’ll be rolling along as well but do hope to see you again next week (presumably, for both of us) with another dose of Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark. But before I go, this old man’s been hit with a wave of nostalgia due to all this focus on aspects of the ‘60s-‘80s so I’ll offer you one more Metaphor tune, this one in tribute to the departures of Neil Armstrong—died 2012—(along with moon exploration, at least for the time being), Alan Damron, Forrest Tucker, and the end of Robert Redford’s on-screen-career with another Texas troubadour, Michael Martin Murphy, singing "Cherokee Fiddle" (on his 1976 Flowing Free Forever album), about other departures of certain ways of life also about frontier themes (which should include space travel and bank robberies, although the musician in this song gets his money honestly for the nutrition of “good whiskey,” whether named Nancy or Jack [I’ll also testify it “never lets you lose your place,” as I have its companionship moving into early morning hours each week posting these reviews]). I’m not “gone forever,” though; I'm just putting my keyboard back in its case for awhile. See you later, buckaroos.

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:

*A Google software glitch causes every Two Guys posting prior to August 26, 2016 to have an inaccurate (dead) link to this Summary page; from then forward, though, this link is accurate.

Here’s more information about First Man:

https://www.firstman.com (click the little 3-line-box in the upper left corner for more specific areas within this site)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8u2pyskQKcU (15:19 interview with director Damien Chazelle, actors Ryan Gosling [with a tiny bit from] Claire Foy, and actual Armstrong sons Mark and Rick)

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/first_man

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/first-man

Here’s more information about The Old Man & the Gun:

http://www.foxsearchlight.com/theoldmanandthegun/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMGxdjFVUDc&frags=pl%2Cwn (18:59 interview with director David Lowery and actors Tika Sumpter, Casey Affleck, Danny Glover, Sissy Spacek, Robert Redford [producers Jeremy Steckler, Jim Stern, Julie Goldstein, Anthony Mastromauro are also introduced but aren’t part of the interview session])

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_old_man_and_the_gun

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-old-man-the-gun

By the way, if you’re ever at The Hotel California knock on my door—but you know what the check out policy is so be prepared to stay for awhile. Ken

Finally, for the data-oriented among you, Google stats say over the past month (which they seem to measure from right now back 30 days) the total unique hits at this site were 4,363 (as always, we thank all of you for your support with our hopes you’ll continue to be regular readers); below is a snapshot of where and by what means those responses have come from within the previous week: