Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark: 2022

Thursday, December 22, 2022

The Banshees of Inisherin plus Short Takes on a collection of some other cinematic topics

These Irish Eyes Aren’t Smiling

Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke

I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) when they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative.

“You see, you can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”

(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the same name)

December 21, 2022—News Flash! In celebration of the Winter Solstice (and because I’m tired of staying up so late each time getting these long-winded-reviews posted, using a balky computer that's going in for servicing very quickly so I'll be awhile in replying to any comments), Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark will be taking a break for a week or 2, but we’ll see you again in early January 2023. Have the Happiest of Holidays (whatever you celebrate) to everyone until then!

The Banshees of Inisherin (Martin McDonagh)

rated R 114 min.

Opening Chatter (no spoilers): Despite a strong curiosity to see Avatar: The Way of Water (James Cameron), along with the many others who propelled it to $134.1 million in box-office-receipts in domestic theaters on its opening weekend, $441.7 million globally, the rapid rise of COVID variants in my San Francisco area is continuing to keep this now-75-year-old-body away from large public gatherings (birthday last weekend; my wonderful wife cooked me a marvelous steak dinner [with great wine from friends] so we didn’t have to risk virus-exposure in a restaurant; I stirred up one of my impactful mai-tai’s which probably met my maximum alcohol consumption for the next couple of months; fortunately, everything’s starting to feel back to normal now, whatever “normal” is), so Nina and I tuned in for a freebie to Disney+ (rents for $3.99 on many other platforms) to watch again the original Avatar (Cameron, 2009)—the All-Time worldwide income champ at $2.9 billion—which still looks magnificent, even though it’s “merely” in HD rather than 3-D as we originally saw it. For reviewing purposes, though, I turned to a recently-arrived-streaming option (on HBO Max, free to subscribers) for the Irish tale of The Banshees of Inisherin which reunites director McDonagh with his In Bruges (2008) stars, Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson, about 2 old friends whose relationship comes to an abrupt end, with further (somewhat gruesome) complications manifesting afterward. Also, here are links for the schedule of the cable network, Turner Classic Movies, which gives you a wide selection of older films with no commercial interruptions and the JustWatch site which offers you a wide selection of options for streaming rental or purchase. If you'd just want to see what reigned at the domestic (U.S.-Canada) box-office last weekend, go here.

Here’s the trailer for The Banshees of Inisherin:

(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge it; activate

that same button or use the “esc” keyboard key to return to normal size.)

If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $ (as well as recognizing those readers like me who just aren’t that tech-savvy). To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid these all-important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters with colors plus arrows:

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

What Happens: The events of this film occur on the (fictionally-named) island of Inisherin (shot on the actual island of Inishmore), a tiny place off the west coast of the larger island of Ireland in 1923 where the Irish Civil War raged on the Irish mainland between the Provisional Government of Ireland, representing the Irish Free State following the Irish War of Independence (begun in 1919, eventually liberated 26 southern Irish counties from the United Kingdom in 1921 but kept them within the British Commonwealth; the 6 counties of Northern Ireland still remain within the present structure of the U.K.) and the Irish Republican Army who saw the new structure as not fitting the intentions of the declaration of the Irish Republic in 1918 (I’m vying for a free draught of Guinness beer if I can use the words “Irish” or “Ireland” the most times in one sentence. How am I doing?). The Civil War (which stopped in a 1923 ceasefire but no official ending treaty even to this day) doesn’t seem to have led to any conflicting factions on Inisherin, but there’s a more interpersonal battle going on between our 2 protagonists, which makes up the bulk of the narrative within this film.

For years local, noted fiddler Colm Doherty (Brendan Gleeson) has shared a close friendship with Pádraic Súilleabháin (Colin Farrell), highlighted by a daily meeting at the pub for a pint (or more, maybe) until the day that Pádraic comes to Colm’s home at the normally-appointed-time, finds he won’t answer the door-knock, goes to the pub where Colm finally shows up but rejects any further interaction with Pádraic because Colm, in his advancing years, wants to devote whatever of his life he has left to composing music, doing actions for which he’ll be remembered; further, he now says he finds Pádraic to be dull, is wasting precious time in daily conversations with him for 12 years that have achieved nothing (in a later scene Pádraic counters that he’s just trying to be a good friend, trying to be nice in the face of this rejection which brings the rebuttal from Colm: centuries after their deaths no one who was just “nice” is remembered at all, whereas great artists like Mozart live on in our awareness even centuries later). Pádraic’s stunned by this, expresses his displeasure to his sister, Siobhán Súilleabháin (Kerry Condon), who attempts to confront Colm on her brother’s behalf, saying sure he’s dull but so are most of the people on this island, yet her attempts are for naught. Pádraic then gives Siobhán an additional reason to be frustrated with him as well (she’s already upset that he keeps allowing his pet miniature-donkey, Jenny, to frequently wander into their home) by inviting their friend Dominic Kearney (Barry Keoghan) to stay with them because the young man’s having constant conflicts with his brutal policeman father, Peadar Kearney (Gary Lydon). Siobhán says Dominic can stay for one night only, but even then he makes quite a pest of himself with his irritating remarks. Soon Pádraic’s confronted by angry Peadar for listening to his son’s accusations, slugs Pádraic; Colm helps his former friend onto Pádraic's wagon, rides a bit with him, then leaves.

Another cloud in Pádraic’s increasingly-overcast-sky comes from strange Mrs. O’Riordan (Bríd Ní Neachtain), a snippy woman who darkens things further by predicting there will soon be 2 deaths on the island (there’s also a caustic shopkeeper, Mrs. McCormick [Shelia Flitton] who cares only for useful gossip which Pádraic can’t provide so he's dismissed). Within all of this turmoil (may not seem like much to us, but it’s quite upsetting for Pádraic, given the normally-placid-expectations of life in this essentially-closed-community; they can hear gunfire from the Civil War, but there seems to be little interaction between residents of their island and the mainland). Pádraic continues to try to re-establish his connection with Colm which further frustrates the older man to the point where he tells Pádraic to either leave him alone or Colm will use his sheep shears to cut off one of his own fingers for each intrusion. Neither Pádraic nor Siobhán can quite believe Colm would do such a self-destructive act, but Dominic just notes that even missing a finger Colm could still play his fiddle. Later, at the pub one day a drunken Pádraic confronts Colm then tries to apologize, only to find a bit later that the man’s come to the Súilleabháin home, thrown a severed finger against their front door.

Next, Dominic tries to make romantic overtures to Siobhán who’s totally uninterested, decides she’s fed up with her unfulfilled life on the island, moves to the mainland to take a library job. Colm finishes a new tune called “The Banshees of Inisherin” (even though he admits there are no banshees there), which opens him up to consider rekindling the friendship with Pádraic, until the latter admits he tricked a musician friend of Colm’s into leaving the close-knit-world of Inisherin. ⇒In intense anger, Colm cuts off the remaining fingers of his left hand, throws them against Pádraic’s door again, but this time Jenny tries to eat one of them, chokes to death. Distraught Pádraic blames Colm for the donkey’s demise (although it truly was an accident), tells him he intends to burn down Colm’s house the next day, which he does after first bringing Colm’s dog outside even as he looks through the window to see Colm sitting amongst the flames (we’ve also seen Colm in confession where he tells the priest he has no remorse for his decisions, so the fire scene may imply something about Purgatory or even worse). Peadar’s soon on his way to Pádraic’s home but is distracted by Mrs. O’Riordan who takes him to a nearby lake where he sees Dominic’s dead body. Next day Pádraic goes to the beach with Colm’s dog, surprisingly finds the old man there. Colm apologizes for Jenny’s death, says the destroyed house has ended their feud, but Pádraic says their troubles would be over only if Colm died in the fire. Colm leaves with his dog, even as nothing is resolved.⇐

So What? This is a simple story to watch—although some of the involved events defy easy, rational explanation—which I likely wouldn’t have done anyway when it was theatrically released back on October 21, 2022 (because then [like now], I was avoiding theaters due to COVID, until I finally relented at Thanksgiving for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever [Ryan Coogler; review in our December 1, 2022 posting]), but I was confirmed in that earlier decision thanks (now, no thanks) to a review from my local San Francisco Chronicle cinematic guru, Mick LaSalle, who said: “But what McDonagh comes up with doesn’t illuminate his premise, but rather seems like a smoke screen to cover the fact that there’s nothing here to illuminate. McDonagh employs cleverness to distract you from the movie’s essential emptiness.” I don’t always find agreement with LaSalle’s positions, yet he seemed convincing enough in his review that I basically put The Banshees … way to the back of my mental queue, that is until I once again last week added to my ongoing postings (considerably farther below) the Metacritic sites where they tally critics’ Top 10 lists and various awards nominations/wins for 2022 releases. As I looked over those still-in-progress-accumulations I was quite surprised to see (at this “press” time for me at least) that in the noms/awards listings … Inisherin ranks as #2 for Best Picture, McDonagh’s at #4 for Best Director, Farrell’s way ahead for Best Actor, Gleeson’s a solid #2 for Best Supporting Actor, Condon’s solidly in the lead for Best Supporting Actress, just as the screenplay (original in this case) is also currently at #1, while the critics overall have it as #3 for the year. So, this seemed like a solid investment of viewing time after all, now that it’s available for streaming, a decision I’m so glad I made. Although, I admit, upon a first viewing the slow-moving but increasingly-grotesque events might seem like an odd experience for so much lavish praise (I’ll cite some of that in this review’s next section), so it might help to get further insights into what’s going on here, although I’ll leave it up to you if you want to allow Spoilers into your awareness of what’s occurring before you’d see the film for yourself (with a strong encouragement from me to seek it out).

If you’re willing to risk Spoilers (or decide to see The Banshees … first, then watch the 2 videos I’m recommending right now) then I’ll first note this one, an 8:01 statement (ad interrupts at 5:00) that explores what the ending’s all about, followed with more depth from another one, an 8:03 analysis (ad interrupts at 5:56) which gets more into the background of Irish folklore; the connection of banshees to death (so that their mere presence is unsettling, even before they begin wailing about the recently departed) along with the consideration of Mrs. O’Riordan as a banshee, given all the trouble she prefers to be associated with; and the concept that this bitter feud between old friends is an allegory for the Civil War where former Irish allies are now killing each other (the narrator of this second video has a thick [at least for me] Irish accent, though, so you might want to use the YouTube CC button on the lower right of the screen to bring up helpful closed captions). Adding to this allegorical-argument is the translation of “Inisherin” to simply mean the “island of Ireland,” so it seems that McDonagh is quite clear here on what he intends rather than the film being the “cinematic void” proposed by Mr. LaSalle (telling me that in this case, back in late October I should have been more persuaded by another local San Francisco-area-critic, Randy Myers: “[… a] darkly humorous parable [… that] echoes the disharmonious, jagged-edge times in which we live. […] It’s certainly one of Farrell’s finest performances and like the film itself, his loneliness sticks in your craw like an oft-recited Irish limerick.” The working out of events here may be more ambiguous than you’d care for in a fully-resolved-conclusion, but the unexplained aspects give you plenty to mull over (maybe over some mull wine—or, even better, a glass of Guinness) long after the credits have rolled.

Bottom Line Final Comments: It’s not just me and Randy out here in the Nancy Pelosi-realm of the Left Coast disagreeing with Mick (whose knowledge of cinema I respect, despite my occasional rejection of his decisions); let me note how the overall-CCAT's in league with us, as Rotten Tomatoes reviews hit the significant 97% positive realm while Metacritic's average score is at 87% (clearly one of the highest responses shared by me and them of 2022 releases, with only their average score of 91% for Tár [Todd Field; review in our December 1, 2022 posting] any higher [Tár is another fat 4-star response from me as well]). Even with my initial hesitation based on LaSalle’s (bone-headed?) dismissal, I should have known better given McDonagh’s marvelous successes with In Bruges—also starring Farrell and Gleeson—plus the astounding Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017; review in our December 7, 2017 posting), winner of Oscars as Best Actress for Frances McDormand, Best Supporting Actor for Sam Rockwell, and nominations for Best Picture, Original Screenplay (McDonagh), Film Editing, Original Score, and another Supporting Actor nom for Woody Harrelson. I’d say this filmmaker’s still absolutely well on target with The Banshees …, even if certain well-established-critics don’t really seem to fully realize what he’s presenting here.

Others, though, are quite complimentary, such as the Chicago Sun-Times Richard Roeper: “[…] Gleeson and Farrell once again are pure movie magic together, with Gleeson’s gruff and rugged and imposing persona the perfect counterpart to Farrell’s handsome and wide-eyed transparency, which at times borders on the, well, the not-too-bright. Earnest, but not too bright,” or Entertainment Weekly’s Leah Greenblatt: “Banshees, with its Kelly-green vistas, warbled shanties, and blithe obscenities ("feck" [not 'fuck'] is a noun, an adjective, and sometimes a verb), could easily come off as the kind of Irish burlesque we've seen many times before; instead, the movie turns out to invert cliché as much as it embraces it.” The Banshees … might still be found in a theater in your vicinity (165 out of the 960 at its height after all these weeks, where it’s made only about $8.8 million in box-office receipts from domestic venues, $19 million worldwide, though), but it’s likely more accessible (if you’re a subscriber) via streaming on HBO Max, so if its odd story finds some appeal for you I’d highly encourage you to check it out. For this week, however, as I amble off into a bit of a rest from my all-too-frequent-late-night-postings, I’ll leave you with my usual closure of a Musical Metaphor, although I may not be as accurate this time as I normally try my best to be with these aural choices.

Honestly, if I knew traditional Irish music better (I don’t think “Danny Boy” or “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling” exactly fit with this film’s content)*—but I did hear a good bit of marvelous tunes of that type on a trip to the Canadian Maritimes a few years ago—or even contemporary options (probably U2 has something relevant, but I don’t know what it is), so I’ll turn to my best-known-Irish-musician, Van Morrison, but even with him I don’t have an extensive knowledge of his catalogue (although I’ve seen him in marvelous concert a couple of times—and, yes, I know he’s from the North, raised a Protestant at that [not religious now, it seems], unlike with the film’s focus on the Republic, but he had nothing to do with establishing a U.K.-E.U. border, so I’m just listening to his music and appreciating it); therefore, I’ll take something that may resonate somewhat with the mysterious banshee undercurrent of this film to give you “Into the Mystic” (from his 1970 album Moondance) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZ59spYH9mk with its references to being “born before the wind / Also younger than the sun […] And I want to rock your gypsy soul / Just like way back in the days of old / And magnificently we will float [unlike Colm and Pádraic] / Into the mystic.” Well, maybe I just wanted to hear that “foghorn whistle blow" again or just use a song I know my magnificent wife, Nina, is always glad to listen to (happy to note her [who, by the way, also has a small amount of Irish DNA, about as much as me—see just below], given she’s one of the few regular readers of this blog who ever gives me any feedback on it, despite Google telling me thousands of you out there read these reviews each month), so if I’ve accomplished that, even if these southern Irishmen don’t care for a Belfast musician, at least something’s functioning better here than the sustained acrimony between Colm and Pádraic, though I do greatly encourage you to see what these oddities are up to.

*It’s a bit sad I don’t know this culture better than I do, as several DNA tests have shown me to have at least a minimal dose of Irish heritage, but don’t assume anything about my background simply based on my surname of Burke because I’m adopted; however, my adoptive father was about 75% Irish although he had no interest in such, not even a plate of corned beef and cabbage (which I could easily eat at least once a month, so maybe that’s my limited-heritage-verification after all—by the way, I’m also trying to win another pint of Guinness for incorporating the longest, unnecessary asides ever into a film review; I think my chances are pretty good as I slip into the Mystic myself for awhile).

SHORT TAKES

That’s all for my critical commentary this week (which usually reminds me of some parting lyrics from Pink Floyd’s "Time": “The time is gone, the song is over, thought I’d something more to say,” or maybe R.E.M. knows me even better [from "Losing My Religion"]: “Oh no, I’ve said too much / I haven’t said enough”), but whether you agree with any of that stuff or not I’ll offer you one more opportunity to be in unity with an attitude that would benefit all of us, James Taylor’s "Shower the People" (on his 1976 In the Pocket album), because we should “Shower the people you love with love / Show them the way that you feel / Things are gonna be much better/ If you only will.” We’re now sailing through divisive times; it could be a smoother ride if we’d only help each other a bit more.

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:

We encourage you to visit the Summary of Two Guys Reviews for our past posts* (scroll down to the bottom of this Summary page to see some additional info about you wacky critic, Ken Burke, along with contact info and a great retrospective song list). Overall notations for this blog—including Internet formatting craziness beyond our control—may be found at our Two Guys in the Dark homepage. If you’d like to Like us on Facebook (yes?) please visit our Facebook page. We appreciate your support whenever and however you can offer it unto us!

*Please ignore previous warnings about a “dead link” to our Summary page because the problem’s been manually fixed so that all postings since July 11, 2013 now have the proper functioning link.

AND … at least until the Oscars for 2022’s releases have been awarded on Sunday, March 12, 2023 we’re also going to include reminders in each posting of very informative links where you can get updated tallies of which films have been nominated for and/or received various awards and which ones made various individual critic’s Top 10 lists. You may find the diversity among the various awards competitions and the various critics hard to reconcile at times—not to mention the often-significant-gap between critics’ choices and competitive-award-winners (which pales when they’re compared to the even-more-noticeable-gap between specific award winners and big box-office-grosses you might want to monitor here)—but as that less-than-enthusiastic-patron-of-the-arts, Plato, noted in The Symposium (385-380 BC)—roughly translated, depending on how accurate you wish the actual quote to be—“Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder,” so your choices for success are as valid as any of these others, especially if you offer some rationale for your decisions (unlike any awards voters who blindly fill out ballots, sometimes—damn it!—for films they have never seen).

To save you a little time scrolling through the “various awards” list above, here are the 2023 Golden Globe nominees (if you even care about them after all of their recent controversies); The Banshees ... as Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy (hard for me to agree on this classification; seems more of a drama where those mutilations/deaths are concerned) as well as individual nominations for Farrell, Condon, Gleeson, Keoghan, McDonagh, along with Best Screenplay - Motion Picture and Original Score are G.Globe recognitions for this oddball film.

Here’s more information about The Banshees of Inisherin:

https://www.searchlightpictures.com/the-banshees-of-inisherin/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pj8b0Jsm2JQ 9:48 interview with director-screenwriter Martin McDonagh and actors Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson)

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

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-banshees-of-inisherin

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Thursday, December 15, 2022

Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio plus Short Takes on Emancipation and some other cinematic topics

“There are no strings [or chains] on me”

(title taken from a song in the Walt Disney animated feature Pinocchio

[Supervising Directors Ben Sharpsteen and Hamilton Luske, 1940])

Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke

“You see, you can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”

(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the same name)

Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio (Guillermo del Toro)

rated PG 121 min.

Opening Chatter (no spoilers): As a matter of fact, there won’t be any Spoiler alerts in this posting because any version of the Pinocchio story (unless it’s some drastic revision, as with the Kubrick/Spielberg collaboration A.I. Artificial Intelligence noted just a bit below) is already too well-know to be coy about, while the contents of Emancipation are largely based in history (as well as the ending being too obviously necessary given the intention of the film), so I don’t feel I’m ruining anything for viewers who haven’t yet seen one or both of the contents of my comments this week. That said, I’m still avoiding theatrical attendance due to the recent surge of COVID variants in my San Francisco area, which does keep me away from a few choices I’d like to see—The Menu (Mark Mylod), The Fabelmans (Steven Spielberg), Empire of Light (Sam Mendes), and, of course, the upcoming Avatar: The Way of Water (James Cameron)—so I may have to wait for streaming to catch up with them, but streaming’s already set me up for the next posting with options such as She Said (Maria Schrader) and The Banshees of Inisherin (Martin McDonagh), so we’ll see what pops up here next week. For this week, streaming’s given me one marvelous experience with … Pinocchio (Netflix) along with a grim-but-intriguing one in Will Smith’s shot at audience redemption after his 2022 Oscar debacle with the escaped-slave-story of Emancipation (Apple TV+), so please read on for more details. Also, here are links for the schedule of the cable network, Turner Classic Movies, which provides you with a wide selection of older films with no commercial interruptions and the JustWatch site which also offers a wide selection of options, for streaming rental or purchase. If you just want to know what reigned at the domestic (U.S.-Canada) box-office last weekend, go here.

Here’s the trailer for Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio:

(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge it; activate

that same button or use the “esc” keyboard key to return to normal size.)

What Happens: This film’s inspired by Carlo Collodi’s fairy-tale-novel, The Adventures of Pinocchio (1883)—as was Disney’s Pinocchio—yet both of these cinematic adaptations borrow what they wish from the original but either leave out or transform other elements (you can read a plot synopsis of the book here). In this version by del Toro, the setting’s transformed from the 19^th century to the 20^th century years of WW I and its aftermath into the 1930s so he could incorporate the rise of Fascism in Italy during that latter time, making commentary on that sociopolitical reality that bears no connection to the original, just as Disney’s version eliminates some of the more violent aspects of the book.* So, in this most current version of the Pinocchio story (I didn’t see Disney’s recent live-action-remake of their animated classic [Robert Zemeckis, 2022], despite the casting of Tom Hanks as Geppetto [and a free screening, given I’m already a subscriber to Disney+], due to the horrid OCCU response—Rotten Tomatoes 27% positive reviews, Metacritic 38% average score; a plot summary shows it mostly following Disney’s previous cell-animation-version, pretty much telling me all I need to know), done in magnificent fashion with stop-motion-animation (usually shot 1 frame at a time with minimal movements to the objects being photographed each frame, but here each shot lasted for 2 frames so you get the equivalent of 12 frames per second rather than the usual 24, but somehow that further enhances the visual quality of this presentation). We begin with narration from a bug, Sebastian J. Cricket (voice of Ewan McGregor), who tells us about an old Italian carpenter, Geppetto (David Bradley), during WW I (seemingly around 1915) where he’s working on a large crucifix behind the altar of the local church, enjoying the company of his much-younger boy, Carlo (Gregory Mann)—we learn nothing of the mother, nor why there’s such a large age-difference between father and son—until their village is bombed with Carlo dying, because he ran back into the church to retrieve the “perfect” pinecone he wanted to plant, as much of the building was destroyed.

*If you have an abundance of useless time to kill you might want to visit this site where you can download a (46 page!) copy of my “Cinema 2001: Despite Hobbits, Hallucinations, and Artificial Sweetners [Oops! Misspelled, should be “Sweeteners,” but nobody, including me, caught it back then; way too late now], Kubrick Re-Emerges,” published in the academic Journal of Visual Literacy back in 2003, about what I consider the creepiest Pinocchio story of all, A.I. Artificial Intelligence, Steven Spielberg credited as director yet the concept’s long in development by Stanley Kubrick, whose influence I think shines through in a story about a robot boy who survives the end of Earth’s humans only to be given a grand wish by another Blue Fairy, but what he chooses just echoes the solipsism he learned from being around us, a morbid-indictment of what little remained of humanity.

Disconsolate Geppetto buries the boy, plants the pinecone by his grave, spends most of his time grieving at the gravesite until one night years later (mid-1930s) when the tree’s now grown, drunken Geppetto chops it down, drags it to his shop, cuts it up to carve from it the head, torso, and limbs of a boy puppet with the joints clumsily put together before the old man passes out. We see Mr. Cricket’s been living in a hole in the tree while trying to write his masterpiece (a talented insect, but don’t forget this is a fairy tale); when he comes out, he sees the appearance of a Wood Sprite (Tilda Swinton)—this film’s version of the traditional Blue Fairy character—who confers life on Pinocchio with the promise of turning him into a real boy if he leads a wholesome existence, further appointing Cricket as his conscience with a future wish available to him if his guidance proves positive for this now-animated-puppet who needs no strings to move around, with plenty of action around Geppetto’s quarters as this new being has the energy and rapid-curiosity of a puppy or kitten (“Everything is new to me” he sings [yes, this newest ... Pinocchio is often a mediocre-musical, much to my disinterest]).

When Geppetto comes to on the next morning he’s initially frightened of this sentient puppet but soon comes to accept his surrogate son, although he attempts to lock him in a closet while the old man goes to church. Pinocchio escapes, though, comes to be with Dad which unsettles the other parishioners and priest, seeing this living puppet as the work of the devil. Next day, Geppetto sends Pinocchio off to school, but he’s distracted/encouraged by Count Volpe (Christoph Waltz) and his henchman monkey, Spazzatura (Cate Blanchett), to join Volpe’s puppet-circus where he’d be a star attraction, convincing the bedazzled-wooden-boy to sign a binding contract. Geppetto shows up when his son doesn’t come home, the men struggle, Pinocchio’s thrown into the road, hit by a car. In his version of the afterlife, Pinocchio meets the Wood Sprite’s sister, Death (also Swinton) who tells him he’s immortal but when he “dies” he must wait in this other dimension until an hourglass finishes dropping its sand, plus each time he comes back there he’ll have to wait longer. When he returns to the living, Pinocchio stays with Volpe’s circus, both to make money to give to Geppetto and to avoid being recruited into the town's Fascist army, run by the local Podestà (Ron Pearlman).

Geppetto and Sebastian Cricket go looking for Pinocchio, but while at sea they’re swallowed by a huge Dogfish; at the circus Pinocchio learns Volpe’s not sent any money to his father so during a show he sings a nasty parody of a patriotic song, offending special guest Prime Minister Benito Mussolini (Tom Kenny), resulting in Pinocchio being shot, dying again. When revived, Pinocchio’s taken by the Podestà with other young boys to a training camp where they’ll be turned into soldiers (rather than donkeys as in other versions of this tale); Pinocchio befriends the Podestà’s son, Candlewick (Finn Wolfhard), a shy boy trying to please his belligerent father, then stands up to him upon Pinocchio’s urging, but the camp’s bombed, killing the Podestà, throwing Pinocchio away to where he’s confronted by Volpe, who ties him to a cross, ready to burn him. Spazzatura intervenes, they all fall over a high cliff into the sea, Volpe dies while Pinocchio and Spazzatura are swallowed by the Dogfish, reuniting them with Geppetto and Cricket. After a clever escape through the giant fish’s blowhole (involving Pinocchio consciously telling lies so his nose will grow, allowing all to traverse it to freedom), the Dogfish comes to eat them again so Pinocchio detonates a nearby-floating-mine, killing both fish and puppet. However, this time in the afterlife Pinocchio demands of Death to go back immediately to save Geppetto, which he does by breaking the hourglass, but this means another death will be permanent. Back in the sea, Pinocchio gets Geppetto to safety on land, yet dies in the process. The Wood Sprite appears to grant Sebastian his wish, which is to return Pinocchio to life as a real boy. She does it (although his appearance doesn’t change), but as time goes on Pinocchio outlives Geppetto, Spazzatura, and Sebastian (we find Cricket’s been narrating all of this from the afterlife), so Pinocchio finally sets out alone to see what new situations await him.

So What? I’ve seen a lot of stop-motion-animation movies in my ongoing-time, all of which provide some level of fascination with how inanimate objects can seemingly be brought to life, but this one is highly-successful above most of the rest of its ilk because while what we watch on screen is the result of filmmakers carefully moving puppets and other objects a fraction of an inch for each exposure so that what we see when the final result’s projected seems as life-like as human beings photographed in an actual interior/exterior setting, what this … Pinocchio offers in its visuals looks like it’s been carefully crafted in exquisite computer graphics, yet that tool was used only to create the sea in which the Dogfish swallowed several of our protagonists, so I encourage you to watch this short video (8:14) about how this unique triumph of animation came to be conceived/executed. As a boy, del Toro saw the Disney Pinocchio, became fascinated with it, then when he evolved into a successful filmmaker he wanted for years, since at least 2008, to make his own version of the story, done in stop-motion (a process which would situate it between Disney’s 1940 hand-drawn-version and their 2022 mostly-live-action-remake, enhanced with computer-generated-imagery as needed).

But, del Toro also has a long-standing-anti-Fascist-attitude which he wanted to incorporate into his Pinocchio tale, so he moved the principal time-frame into 1930s Italy where he could explore a thematic current of Italian citizens, including their children, falling under the cult of Mussolini, either through a blind sense of nationalism, fear of retaliation if they didn’t go along, or just a mindless-bandwagon-effect of being a part of this new identity. Essentially, what del Toro presents here is an argument this new strong-willed-Pinocchio (even when driving Geppetto a bit crazy with his streak of independence) is the one in this story who thinks for himself, acts on his decisions as best he can manage to understand them (he’s still a child with a developing consciousness, after all) unlike most of those around him who are the true puppets in this scenario, mindlessly going along with the cult of Il Duce (“The Leader”) during these years prior to WW II (this article explores these ideas in depth).

Despite Pinocchio’s decisions toward disobedience at times (sometimes to the advantage of himself or others, such as his conscious lying to greatly extend his nose, providing a means of escape from the Dogfish), he also tries to help a few acquaintances shake off the errors of their ways, especially Candlewick and Spazzatura; ultimately, he gives his all on behalf of his father, even knowing the fate that likely awaited him in the process. This is a stunning film to watch, with useful messages to boot, even if there’s an ultimate sense of sadness in its end, but there we’re left with this real boy (though he still looks like a puppet, so there’s no exploration of how he’ll be received in any social setting he'll visit, a further complicating-twist to this narrative-construction) now completely free of other direct obligations to those closest to him. Guillermo del Toro says this is not a film especially for children (although they can still learn a lot from it with some adult guidance); hopefully, the aspect of the child we once were, still somewhat residing in our adulthood, will best respond to this heartwarming story.

Bottom Line Final Comments: If you’ll look in the Related Links section far below you’ll find I’ve added information about how 2022 films/movies have, so far, made impacts in the tallies for various nominations/awards or critics’ Top 10 rankings. While the only impact for what I’m reviewing this week is … Pinocchio for Best Animated Feature (Emancipation, explored just below, isn’t any sort of contender even for the quite-impressive-cinematography, which may just be part of a continuing backlash against anything associated with Will Smith, part of the aftermath of rejection for his infamous Slap Seen 'Round the World when he hit host Chris Rock in offense to a joke Rock made about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, at the Oscar ceremony last spring, moments before Smith got the Best Actor prize for King Richard [Reinaldo Marcus Green; review in our February 3, 2022 posting]), the CCAL’s been extremely supportive of del Toro’s latest creation, as RT gives it a whopping 97% positive reviews, the MC folks counter with an 79% average score (1 of only 8 of the 62 2022 releases both they and I have reviewed this year at 79/80% or above [the highest one—91%—is a strong Oscar-contender for Best Picture, Tár {Todd Field; review in our December 1, 2022 posting}]). While this … Pinocchio had a limited theatrical release on Nov. 24, 2022, it’s primary accessibility is on Netflix streaming (free for subscribers), so if you’re willing to pay for at least a month of that platform ($9.99-$19.99, depending on what level of service you want [ignoring the $6.99 option including ads, yuck!]) with whatever else they have you might want to watch in addition to this animated masterpiece (even if it does drift off a bit too much into anti-Fascism commentary—not that there’s anything ultimately-wrong in such attacks) I highly recommend you watch Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio for both its amazing cinematics and its clear “do the right thing” heart-message.

As you know (or should, if you’re a regular reader of this blog), I try to end each review with a Musical Metaphor that speaks one more time (in a lyrical manner) to what’s just been explored, this time with an easy choice as Sebastian J. Cricket gives a lovely departure under the closing credits with “Better Tomorrows” at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBXAJlGGcTM using wonderfully-optimistic-lyrics such as “My dear father loved to say / Mop your tears and mend your sorrows / To not drown your soul wishing for better tomorrows […] So let the world go how it goes / Open your arms to better / Open your arms to better tomorrows,” even when the todays are challenging/ miserable/atrocious as Pinocchio and Geppetto had to endure in this ultimately-uplifting-tale. Yet, given del Toro’s fascination with the long-ago-Disney-version, I can’t help but use a song from it, “Give a Little Whistle,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAyAM4T0pqc (audio needs a boost),

because as Jiminy Cricket would remind us: “When you get in trouble and you don’t know right from wrong […] When you meet temptation and the urge is very strong […] always let your conscience be your guide!” That’s a consistent message through most versions of the Pinocchio story I’m aware of as well as excellent advice for all of us, even if our heads aren’t (or don’t seem to be) made of wood.

SHORT TAKES

Emancipation (Antoine Fuqua) rated R 132 min.

Here is another one of those “inspired by a true story” narratives, this one about an actual slave named Gordon but usually called Peter on a Louisiana plantation in 1863 with awareness of the Emancipation Proclamation which should have granted his freedom, but it’s yet to be recognized in his world so he sets out to escape to join Union soldiers to bring freedom to others.

Here’s the trailer:

On a Louisiana plantation in 1863 lived a man (Will Smith) named Gordon but called Peter whose actual story (5:47 video) inspired this film, using fictional details plus what little we know about him, whose “fame” largely rests with a photo of his horribly-scarred-back that helped reveal the horrors of America’s “peculiar institution” as the Civil War continued to grind on until April 9, 1865. Peter, torn from his wife and children, was sent to work on a Confederate railroad but—aware of President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation (Jan. 1, 1863) which freed slaves in the rebellious states, an order ignored in the Old South—when forced to throw lye on a mass grave, Peter staged his own rebellion, killing slavers around him with a shovel, then heading for the Union army in Baton Rouge through the swamps, dealing with alligators, bloodhounds, and vicious tracker Fassel (Ben Foster). After harrowing days of Peter’s ordeals Fassel catches up, but the hunter’s shot down by Union soldiers. Peter’s taken to a regiment of former slaves where he joins up as they push through Rebel lines, finally getting back to Peter’s old plantation where he reunites with his family. For those who, for whatever reason, have a blasé attitude toward the vicious reality of slavery in the U.S., Fuqua’s presentation should be all the history we need of both the inhumane cruelty of owners along with determination of those who challenged their cruel fate, even though odds of escape were rarely in their favor. It’s mostly a grim film to watch, shot generally in atonal B & W, although some scenes have an overall blue hue, some shots have hints of color in fields or faces, all of which implies a connection to photography of the time (atonal, monotone, or enhanced by after-the-fact-coloration), with Smith doing an admirable job throughout as a beaten man rejecting a fate of being beaten down (more Oscar-nomination-worthy for me than the Best Actor prize he got last spring for King Richard).

However, the OCCU’s generally not impressed—the RT reviews are merely 45% positive while MC’s average score is just a bit higher at 54%. Perhaps The Washington Post’s Ann Horniday can arbitrarily speak for the unimpressed: “But the aim of expanding on an indelible portrait — and packaging it within the confines of big-screen entertainment — has a curious reverse effect. The bigger frame has reduced one of the most world-changing images of the last three centuries to something familiar, generic and strangely less potent.” However, I’m a bit more in line with Variety’s Peter Debruge: “This hero — rendered immortal by that photo but representative of thousands forgotten by history — was committed to putting an end to the system that had brutalized him so.” Emancipation was released in some theaters on Dec. 2, 2022, but I know little about that; if you want to see it your best bet will be streaming on Apple TV+, where it’s free to that platform’s subscribers.

My path to a Musical Metaphor here’s a bit convoluted because I wanted to honor Emancipation with something reflective of its content so I thought about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1963 March on Washington speech where he referenced an “old Negro spiritual” that included lyrics such as "Free at last, free at last / thank God almighty we are free at last," so I tried to see if I could find the hymn, which I think I did at this site, but I couldn’t locate a performance of it, with this one being the closest I could find (if anyone out there can lead me to a better version, please let me know). However, in addition to trying to use something that would not only speak to the content of Emancipation but would also come roughly from the time of Gordon/Peter’s hard-won-victory, I also kept thinking of something more (relatively) contemporary (yeah, I know, it was obviously written around 1968—see just below—but that’s still more current than 1863), which is The Who’s “I’m Free” (on their 1969 album Tommy) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dedOsVHrMio (from the 1975 movie soundtrack of the same name as the album [Ken Russell]). Now, I sincerely hope that I’m not being offensive by linking a story about a horribly-abused-slave making life-or-death-struggles to free himself from cruel bondage to a record album/stage play/movie about a boy so traumatized by the homicidal-struggle between his WW II-wounded-father and the man his Mom later takes up with that the kid becomes blind, deaf, and unable to speak, then later overcomes his maladies as he turns into a failed cult leader; however, for me some of the song’s lyrics such as “I’m free, I’m free / And freedom tastes of reality / I’m free, I’m free / And I’m waiting for you to follow me […] But you’ve been told many times before / Messiahs pointed to the door / No one had the guts to leave the temple!” also speak to Civil War-era Peter’s situation of knowing he’s been unjustly enslaved (as well as horribly physically abused), who shows incessant determination to escape from his rotten life while encouraging others to join him initially, then becoming part of the Union Army whose goals included fighting their way to Southern plantations to bring the long-delayed-news of emancipation to those whose enforced-servitude was still kept in place by the abominable overlords.

If you’re still with me on my additional use of The Who’s song—from the part of the famous rock-opera where protagonist-Tommy rejects his self-imposed-isolation from the world—you might also appreciate this 1968 performance by The Who at NYC’s Fillmore East from months before the album was released, which in spirit and costume reminds me of the part of their set we see (also with a song from Tommy; sorry this video’s more blurred than it should be) from the famous 1969 festival in Woodstock (doc by Michael Wadleigh, 1970). Either way, Gordon/Peter’s free, a grand cause for celebration, even if we don’t know what became of him during those final years of the war.

That’s all for my critical commentary this week (which usually reminds me of some parting lyrics from Pink Floyd’s "Time": “The time is gone, the song is over, thought I’d something more to say,” or maybe R.E.M. knows me even better [from "Losing My Religion"]: “Oh no, I’ve said too much / I haven’t said enough”), but whether you agree with any of that stuff or not I’ll offer you one more opportunity to be in unity with an attitude that would benefit all of us, James Taylor’s "Shower the People" (on his 1976 In the Pocket album), because we should “Shower the people you love with love / Show them the way that you feel / Things are gonna be much better/ If you only will.” We’re now sailing through divisive times; it could be a smoother ride if we’d only help each other a bit more.

I haven’t seen several of the films on those two "Best of 2022" polls just above nor had I even heard of the new Sight and Sound poll's #1, Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (Chantal Akerman, 1975) as it begins it’s 10-year-reign, so I guess I’ll wander over to HBO Max (free to subscribers) or Apple TV+ ($3.99 rental) to see just what all 3 hr. 22 min. of it are about (although a summary makes it sound like a fascinating mix of mundane and shock). Just for the record, my # 1-of-all-time is still Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941), which came in as #3 on this year's S & S critics' poll—after reigning from 1962 through 2002—(Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo [1958] dropped from #1 in 2012 [... Kane was #2 then] to #2 this year). However, S & S also polled directors who chose 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968) as #1, Citizen Kane as #2, The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972) as #3, with Jeanne Dielman ... coming in at #4, tied with Tokyo Story (Yasujirö Ozu, 1953), Vertigo at #6 (they also put my #2, Persona [Ingmar Bergman, 1966] as tied for #9 with Wong Kai-wai's In the Mood for Love [2000]), so I do find myself in great company at various times.

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:

AND … at least until the Oscars for 2022’s releases have been awarded on Sunday, March 12, 2023 we’re also going to include reminders in each posting of very informative links where you can get updated tallies of which films have been nominated for and/or received various awards and which ones made various individual critic’s Top 10 lists. You may find the diversity among the various awards competitions and the various critics hard to reconcile at times—not to mention the often-significant-gap between critics’ choices and competitive-award-winners (which pales when they’re compared to the even-more-noticeable-gap between specific award winners and big box-office-grosses you might want to monitor here)—but as that less-than-enthusiastic-patron-of-the-arts, Plato, noted in The Symposium (385-380 BC)—roughly translated, depending on how accurate you wish the actual quote to be—“Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder,” so your choices for success are as valid as any of these others, especially if you offer some rationale for your decisions (unlike any awards voters who blindly fill out ballots, sometimes—damn it!—for films they have never seen).

To save you a little time scrolling through the “various awards” list above, here are the 2023 Golden Globe nominees (if you even care about them after all of their controversy recently).

Here’s more information about Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio:

https://www.guillermodeltorospinocchiomovie.com/ (click on the 3 little lines in the upper left

for more info)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Nr92kG0krI (9:40 interview with director Guillermo del Toro)

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

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/guillermo-del-toros-pinocchio

Here’s more information about Emancipation:

https://www.apple.com/tv-pr/originals/emancipation/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4O1DgGnmIJM (21:53 interview with actor Will Smith

about this film and his horrid 2022 Oscar situation [ads interrupt at 8:50, 14:0, 18:56])

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/emancipation_2023

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/emancipation

If you’d rather contact Ken directly rather than leaving a comment here at the blog please

use my email address of kenburke409@gmail.com—type it directly if the link doesn’t work.