Love Lies Bleeding plus Short Takes on a cluster of various other cinematic topics

Thelma and Louise Redux … Sort Of

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) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative.  However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, though better options may be on the horizon.  (Note: Anything in bold blue [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)

My reviews’ premise: “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 song’s name)

7/31/2024—I have medical procedures (kidney stones) scheduled for next Wednesday and Thursday (8/7-8/8/2024), so my next posting may well end up on Thursday afternoon or night.

 Love Lies Bleeding (Rose Glass)  rated R  105 min.

Here’s the trailer:

        Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size; 

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

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: (If you’re as dense as I am sometimes [if so, you have my deepest sympathy] you might not realize when first watching this movie how some of the crucial family connections exist so I’m going to just clarify them from the start rather than literally reciting events as the plot unfolds, because it took until close to the end of my viewing to understand clearly the Langston family structure as well as Daisy’s past affair with Lou.  Even with that clarification, there’s a lot of plot to recall here, so let’s dive in.)  We’re in some near-desolate area of New Mexico in 1989 where Louise “Lou” Langston (Kristen Stewart), a no-secrets lesbian, runs a gym.  Into this bleak environment comes Jaqueline “Jackie” Cleaver (Katy O’Brian) from Oklahoma; she trains in the gym to pump herself up for a bodybuilders contest soon to be held in Las Vegas, NV.  When Jackie first came into town, though, she needed a job, so to get a good word for her situation from randy JJ (Dave Franco), Lou’s brother-in-law, to hire her as a waitress in the bar that’s part of a shooting range owned by Lou Sr. (Ed Harris), father of Lou and JJ’s wife, Beth (Jena Malone)—see, I told you there are a lot of details to pick up on—Jackie has sex with JJ in his truck, soon leading to that needed job.  At the gym, though, Lou turns her attention to Jackie, who reciprocates in some steamy sex scenes as well as accepting Lou’s offer of injected steroids in the butt to aid her rapid, ripped muscle-enhancement.

 One night as Lou and Jackie are having dinner with JJ and Beth, the other women become aware of how abusive he is to his wife.  Lou confronts JJ, but he counters by telling her about his tryst with Jackie which, as JJ intended, angers Lou.  As she and Jackie are driving home Lou berates Jackie for having sex with a man, orders her out of the car but lets her back in when Lou notices a couple of FBI guys are nearby (we’ll get to why she’s concerned about them shortly).  The next day Lou finds Beth's in the hospital after being badly beaten by JJ.  Lou Sr. also comes to the hospital where his estrangement from daughter Lou is evident, although he promises to care for Beth.  When Lou spouts off to Jackie how she wants revenge against JJ, Jackie—pumped up on steroids—rushes over to his house, literally beats him to a pulp, which horrifies Lou though she quickly acts to cover up the murder.  They wrap JJ in a rug, haul him into the back of his pickup, which Jackie drives following Lou in her truck.  Before they can get out of town, however, they’re stopped at a red light when up wanders Daisy (Anna Baryshnikov), Lou’s former flame, who notices Jackie, oddly, in JJ’s truck while encouraging  Lou to re-connect (to no avail).  Out in the no-man's-land countryside Lou steers them to a ravine where in the past she’d helped Lou Sr. kill and dispose of his business rivals.

 They push JJ’s truck into the ravine, douse it with gasoline, set it on fire.  The next day Lou cleans up JJ’s place while Jackie continues with her muscle-building and steroid intake, with her growing agitation leading to a confrontation with Lou, after which Jackie walks out, hitches a ride to Vegas for the contest.  During the event, though, she hallucinates vomiting up a full-size Lou as she actually vomits on the stage, ending her hopes of winning the event so she makes things worse by attacking one of the other contestants, sending her off to jail.  Back in NM, Daisy gets enough circumstantial evidence against Lou and Jackie to force Lou back into a relationship with her.  However, Lou Sr. bails out Jackie, sets her up to kill Daisy, which she seems to do just as Lou and Daisy are arriving at Lou’s place, but then, panicked, Jackie goes to see Lou Sr. but is knocked out from behind.  Lou avoids saying much to those FBI guys, calls Dad who tells her he’s going to have Jackie sent to prison for a double homicide; however, she counters by telling Dad she’ll rat on him for his illegal operations if he turns on Jackie so he hangs up in anger.  ⇒Lou cleans up Daisy’s body but is attacked by Office Mike (David DeLao), a guy on Lou Sr.’s payroll; nevertheless, she kills him, then goes to Dad’s manor where Beth’s recuperating but quickly turns on Lou for her involvement with JJ’s death.  Still, Lou forces her to reveal Jackie’s location so she’s soon free, told to run by Lou.  Then Lou Sr. shows up, shoots Lou in the leg, tells her Mom’s not dead after all, she just left him because of his criminal activities, with Lou’s cooperation.  However, before he can do any further harm to Lou, Jackie comes back grown to enormous size (? Maybe this is a visual metaphor for how physically powerful she’s become on steroids?), pins down Lou Sr., almost kills him, but just leaves him for the cops to arrest.  Lou and Jackie drive off but are shocked Daisy's still alive in the back of their truck so they stop, Lou strangles Daisy and dumps the body off the road while Jackie sleeps.⇐

So What? For the past several months  (pretty close to a year, actually) I’ve found the number of unique hits to this blog have been in the 4,000-5,000 range while back in September of 2023 my monthly total was 57,916!  I really have no idea what’s caused this steep drop-off.  (Unless my occasional snide comments about Donald Trump pushed away readers, but, then again, I have a hard time imagining MAGA devotees would be perusing this blog anyway.  Yes, I know that after the assassination attempt on Trump we’re all supposed to be more civil in our political commentary, but given how short-lived Trump’s “Unity” approach was as he’s now shifted his snarky commentary from Biden to Harris, I don’t think I owe him any more respect than I used to, which was a complete zero.)

 Maybe back in last Sept. my choices of things to review, including going on the 5 stars-record with a couple of older classics, simply attracted more readers: Wings of Desire (Wim Wenders, 1987; review in our 9/7/2023 posting), Blow-Up (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1966; review in our 9/14/23 posting),The Little Mermaid (Rob Marshall, 2023) and The Blackening (Tim Story, 2023; reviews in our 9/21/2023 posting), Inside (Vasilis Katsoupis, 2023; review in our 9/27/2023 posting).  Lately (due to ongoing COVID concerns about sharing a theater with a large audience) I’m still focused on whatever I can get on streaming, which drew 5,692 unique hits in June 2024, based on these offerings: The Beach Boys (Thom Zimmy, Frank Marshall) and Challengers (Luca Guadagnino; review in our 6/5/2024 posting), The Fall Guy (David Leitch; review in our 6/12/2024 posting), Hit Man (Richard Linklater; review in our 6/19/2024 posting), The Great Jillian Hall (Michael Cristofer; review in our 6/26/2024 posting).  Possibly, what I’ve been reviewing lately is too obscure for Internet surfers looking for commentary on current movies (although you’d think Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F [Frank Molloy; review in our July 10, 2024 posting] would have sparked some interest), but unknown (to me) factors seem crucial in what draws anyone to this blog in that for those Sept. 2023 reviews the hits to the actual postings ranged from 60 to 116, so it’s clear that an enormous number of Two Guys visitors were looking into older postings (a reality I see every week when I check my statistics), just as they continue to do recently, given that my June 2024 postings drew a range of only 34-57 unique hits, while this July’s review hits (not counting this one yet) range from a mere 24 to 46, so whatever in the recent past was drawing a hell of a lot more readers to this blog has, for now at least, faded away, although I still deeply appreciate those who’ve continued to find this seemingly-forlorn site, scattered around the world as you can explore with the last image at this posting's finish.

 So, oh my, what to do to potentially increase readership?  Well, how could I go wrong with a movie (streamed, of course) that features lesbian sex, illegal steroid use for a bulging-muscle contest, several deaths, and a seriously dysfunctional family which leads to even more dysfunctional relationships with previous/present partners?  If that lineup of content doesn’t draw in the masses to pump up my readership, well I don’t know what else could. (Although when It was in domestic [U.S.-Canada] release, starting on March 8, 2024 [then a lot of other countries from April 11-July 16, 2024], it didn’t generate too much income [a bit more on that in this review’s next section].)  Oh, sure, I could put on a mask for 2 hours, sit in the front row of a theater where no one else would go, watch and review Deadpool & Wolverine (Shawn Levy), but given that there are already 210 reviews of it on IMDb (as of tonight) I doubt seriously me tagging on to that box-office juggernaut (see  far below) would truly enhance my readership, so for now let’s just celebrate the blood-thirsty lesbians of Love Lies Bleeding.  Lou is certainly an interesting character (not that the others are anywhere near normal—whatever that is—but she’s quite complex), with one of her traits being a constant smoker while frequently listening to an audio cassette of a guy explaining how unhealthy this habit is which doesn’t appear to change her reliance on the smokes (she does finally quit, later in the story).

 If what you want in a movie is just hot sex (mostly female on female here, except for that brief Jackie-JJ encounter early on), a sweaty woman pumping iron, horrid family relationships that could have been celebrated on TV’s syndicated The Jerry Springer Show (ran from 1991 to 2018 [if you really want to wallow in that sort of grunge see if you can ever find a theatre performance of Jerry Springer: The Opera {Richard Thomas, Stewart Lee; 2001} which I saw on stage in London but apparently was too raunchy to come to San Francisco {?} as once intended]), and cold-blooded killings, then this one’s for you.  If not, don’t bother because you won’t find much else happening here.  One last comment on its presentation: When I saw it on HBO cable (random scheduling one night, which I saw in the newspaper)—rather than on Max (where it always resides, but I have to punch in the title one letter at a time in Search)—the image looked a bit strangely stretched, so afterward I did check it on Max (via Search, although it popped up after just “L” so it wasn’t hard to find after all) to see that it’s widescreen (more so than the current 9x6 standard), yet not as stretched as the HBO version so if you happen to see it on that cable channel don’t be surprised that it looks a little weird there (which actually harmonizes with weirdness of the plot so it’s still all good ... maybe).

Bottom Line Final Comments: Love Lies Bleeding began its theatrical run last March, was gone by the end of April domestically, made only $8.3 million ($12.5 million worldwide), so if you’re interested now you’ll need to turn to streaming (unless, like me, you happen upon it on HBO) where you’ll find it for free on Max (if you have a subscription to that platform which I get along with my monthly $10 to Comcast for HBO, or Max is available on its own for $9.99 a month if you’re fabulously-frugal) or pay $5.99 to Apple TV+ for a rental.  The CCAL encourages such interest with the Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews at 94%, the Metacritic average score at 77% (it takes a lot to get them to 80% or above; only happened 9 times so far this year for 35 options both I and they reviewed [not counting 3 other very independent releases I reviewed that they didn’t address at all]).  Certainly this is not a movie that appeals to all tastes—looks like the RT reviewers are considerably more impressed with the consistently-woven film noir attitude you’ll encounter in … Bleeding than the MC folks, so maybe you should skim over some of their positive and negative responses to get a better context of whether you’d be eager to see it or not.  While you’re mulling it over, though, you can listen to my usual end-of-review Musical Metaphor which this time is Elton John’s “Love Lies Bleeding” (paired as it often is in concert with his “Funeral for a Friend,” the first 2 cuts on the 1973 Goodbye Yellow Brick Road album) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvcIborfG0Y (from a show at NYC’s Madison Square Garden), which, curiously enough, isn’t used in this movie’s soundtrack.* (Come on, production team, do I have to do everything for you?)  Admittedly, the song’s about a romantic breakup which isn’t the main thrust of this cinematic story, but lyrics like “I wonder if those changes have left a scar on you / Like all the burnin’ hoops of fire that you and I passed through” seem to me to be quite relevant to the saga of Lou and Jackie (and there are more than enough funerals implied in Love Lies Bleeding to connect up with John’s instrumental piece as well).

*This odd omission reminds me of another mismatch of song and film concerning Gene Pitney’s 1962 hit (written by Burt Bacharach, Hal David; on Pitney’s 1962 Only Love Can Break a Heart album) "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence" referring to a fabulous film of that year (same title; directed by John Ford; starring James Stewart, John Wayne, Lee Marvin, Vera Miles, Andy Devine, Woody Strode, and John Carradine, among others) where the song’s lyrics refer to the film’s content, yet it’s not part of the soundtrack.  I can’t encourage you enough to see this film’s exploration of the foundational American myth of wilderness vs. garden, contrasting individuality with community (shots from the film accompany Pitney’s song here).  You can check out JustWatch for streaming options.

          

SHORT TAKES

           

 First in this final segment, here's a quick follow-up to a comment I made last week in the process of meandering through my review of Memory (Michel Franco), noting Peter Sarsgaard (great in Memory) in the Apple TV+ streaming series Presumed Innocent where I said I’d be watching for comparison to the movie version of Scott Turow‘s novel (1987), based like the TV series, with the same title (Alan J. Pakula, 1990), as the older one focused on Harrison Ford’s character (played by Jake Gyllenhaal for Apple).  While I’m not reviewing the older movie here, I’ll note it’s much truer to the book so current screenwriter  (of most episodes, sometimes with a co-writer) David E. Kelly took the story in some different directions, with Sarsgaard’s prominent TV character barely a presence in the movie.  I still lean a bit toward the Apple version, but you’d likely find the movie enjoyable also.

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:   

(1) Deadpool & Wolverine pushes Marvel Cinematic Universe past $30 billion globally (for an historic first); (2) Deadpool & Wolverine contains a eulogy for 20th Century Fox, the former home of the X-Men franchise; (3)  The latest Superman finishes filming; (4) Bob Dylan experts largely praise Timothée Chalamet's take on Dylan in the upcoming A Complete Unknown.

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Finally, for the data-oriented among you, Google stats say over the past month the total unique hits at this site were 5,692—a huge drop-off from the marvelous 40-50K of some recent months; never overestimate yourself! (As always, we thank all of you for your ongoing support with our hopes you’ll continue to be regular readers.)  Below is a snapshot of where those responses have come from within the previous week (with appreciation for the unspecified “Others” also visiting Two Guys’ site):

Memory plus Short Takes on some other cinematic topics

Which Is Worse, Forgetting or Remembering?

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) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative.  However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, though better options may be on the horizon.  (Note: Anything in bold blue [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)

My reviews’ premise: “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 song’s name)

                Memory (Michel Franco)   rated R   90 min.

Here’s the trailer:

       (Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size; 

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

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: Sylvia (Jessica Chastain): a single mother of teenage daughter Anna (Brooke Timber)—tensions between them as Mom refuses to let daughter date; a social worker at a home for mentally-challenged adults; an appreciated member of her local (in NYC) AA group; mostly keeps to herself due to horrid memories of being raped when she was 12.  Younger sister Olivia (Merritt Wever) talks her into going to a high-school reunion where she mostly sits alone, doesn’t do much, but is troubled by a man (we later find out is Saul [Peter Sarsgaard]) who sits close to her, smiles at her, but then follows her as she’s headed home by herself on a dark night in the big city.  When she gets inside and locks up she can see he’s out there, doesn’t leave even when the rain comes.  Next morning Sylvia finds him still outside, drenched, not too responsive even just to her basic questions.

 However, she does learn some info about his identity, so she calls his brother, Isaac (Josh Charles), to come retrieve him.  She goes along with them to Isaac’s home (Saul lives there too) where she gets an apology from Isaac about the situation, learns Saul has early onset dementia that easily gets him confused, unable to make many new memories or recall older ones.  Sylvia then takes Saul to a park, wants to know why he followed her home, but he says he has no idea, doesn’t even know who she is; this angers her because she says he was with a group of older boys, led by 18-year-old Ben Goldberg, who raped her, with Saul forcing fellatio on her.  He says he remembers none of it which at first angers her as she storms off, but then she reconsiders, comes back, helps him get home.  Sara (Elsie Fisher), Isaac’s daughter, offers Sylvia an additional job of caring for Saul during the day when Isaac can’t be there; she accepts after Olivia convinces her that Saul didn’t come to their school until after she’d transferred elsewhere, so her long-ago-memory of him must be mistaken, she apologizes.  As the days go on, Sylvia becomes close with Saul even as he also befriends Anna.

 One day, Sylvia and Saul fall asleep on the couch holding each other more in friendship than love, discovered by Sara; this situation disturbs Sylvia anyway, so she terminates the job with Saul, only for him to come to her place where they begin a romance, much to Isaac’s dismay.  Anna then seeks out her grandmother, Samantha (Jessica Harper), against Sylvia’s edict that there be no such contact; Grandma tells the kid Sylvia was a wild child when she was a teenager.  All of this comes to a head one day at Olivia’s home where Sylvia is confronted by Samantha, upset both that her daughter’s now involved with a man with mental issues and that she’s been kept away from her granddaughter.  Samantha accuses Sylvia of lying about her sexual assault in school, Sylvia countering that her late father (Samantha’s now married to Robert [Tom Hammond]) used to rape her as well, with Olivia verifying how the man used to take her sister into his closed room.  Sylvia tells Samantha the lack of her mother believing her about Dad is what later drove her away, just like when back then Olivia asked Samantha about Dad’s actions she was also called a liar and slapped.  

 A distraught Sylvia isolates herself at home, comforted by Saul; Olivia tries to see her but is turned away by Anna who wants to know why her aunt never confirmed Mom’s traumas, to which Olivia says she was just a child, didn’t really know for sure what was going on, didn't know what to do.  Eventually, with Saul’s help Sylvia goes back to work, but one night after Saul gets up to use the bathroom he can’t remember which bedroom is Sylvia’s, which is Anna’s, so he sits in the hall for the rest of the night to avoid any misunderstandings.  ⇒Next day when he’s by himself he falls from Sylvia’s balcony, is taken to the hospital where Sylvia’s prevented by Isaac from seeing him.  When Saul’s back at Isaac’s home Sylvia tries to contact him, but he doesn’t reply to her phone messages.  Anna goes to visit, finds he has a full-time nurse, Isaac took away his phone so Saul knew nothing of Sylvia’s attempts.  Anna convinces Saul to sneak out with her so she can take him back to Sylvia.⇐

So What? In early 2024 I devoted most of this blog to 2023 releases just coming to streaming; after the Oscar awards, though, I wanted to focus only on 2024 releases (except for re-watching Funny Girl [William Wyler, 1968] so I could officially give it 5 stars), but in a couple of cases staying true to my self-imposed limitation called for a useful rationalization.  While Memory had played at the September 8, 2023 Venice Film Festival that was no problem as I never muddy up my release-considerations because something has screened at any domestic (U.S.-Canada) or overseas festivals because all I care about is whatever I’m exploring is currently available to a potentially-large audience either in theaters or on streaming platforms, but the wrinkle with Memory is it opened in LA and NYC on December 22, 2023, didn’t go wider than that until January 2024 so that’s when the rationalization comes in as I'd now consider this as a 2024 film, easily ready for the blog's reviewing. 

  Rationalization or not, I was interested in this story because of Sarsgaard, who plays smarmy attorney Tommy Motto in the Apple TV+ streaming series, Presumed Innocent, trying to prove his former colleague, Rusty Sabich (Jake Gyllenhaal) killed another colleague, Carolyn Polhemus (Renate Reinsva), with whom Rusty was having an affair.  (The final episode aired tonight—I won’t give anything away*—so my next [non-blog] task is to watch the 1990 movie [Alan J. Pakula], like the TV series based on a 1987 novel by Scott Turow, where Harrison Ford is Sabich, Joe Grifasi is Motto, Greta Scacchi is Polhemus, and Sabich’s wife, Barbara [played marvelously in the TV series by Ruth Negga], is Bonnie Bedelia).  While I can’t say anything yet about this movie (Rotten Tomatoes gave it 86% positive reviews, Metacritic’s average score was 72%; highly successful at the box-office as well, $221.3 million worldwide [lots back then])—although I likely saw it but at present no memory comes back to me—but I do highly recommend the current Apple TV+ series, as the plot takes unanticipated turns, tension stays consistently high, acting is marvelous throughout, including by Sarsgaard, as he is too in Memory, to now take us back to what I’m supposed to be writing about.

*But, if you’re like one of my cats (curiosity = trouble), go here (Spoilers!) to learn what's happened.

 In fact, when this film was shown last fall in Venice he won their Volpi Cut for Best Actor, hence the photo of him above the previous paragraph (I can’t find any info on who the other nominees were) and I hope some likewise consideration was given to Chastain (but even if it was, the Volpi Cup for Best Actress went to Cailee Spaeny for Priscilla [Sofia Coppola, 2023; review in our January 4, 2024 posting]), a Best Actress Oscar winner for The Eyes of Tammy Faye (Michael Showalter, 2021; review in our January 13, 2022 posting) who provided the other reason—along with Sarsgaard—why I was interested in seeing Memory, because she’s so powerful in every role she’s taken on, a streak that continues with her performance here.  These two main characters are fascinatingly-fractured as well in that Sylvia’s been so damaged by her past assaults she’s too eager to assume Saul was one of her rapists when that was never the case just as he’s so lost in his mental fog that when they go to a diner he apparently regularly frequents he has no idea what the “special” he always orders is nor does he recall the waitress who regularly brings it to him, yet he knows what he feels for Sylvia even though I’m sure he’d have a hard time describing it to anyone.  However, like with Fancy Dance (Erica Trembay) which I reviewed last week, the hopeful feelings at the end of what’s on screen in this film are just a pause in an ongoing flow of events which haven’t found true resolution yet, as much more is likely to come in the form of complications especially from Isaac or Samantha, maybe even Robert or Sara, but that’s for us to speculate, without any solid direction from the presented events to guide our assumptions into an unknown future for these folks.  Sometimes that’s what makes a film so effective: we’ve given a lot, even as more (ambiguous in details) is vaguely implied.

Bottom Line Final Comments: As noted above, Memory did have a theatrical run, although it hardly made a dent at the box-office, taking in only about $381 thousand domestically, $1.7 million worldwide, so now your opportunity to see this fine drama rests with cable TV and streaming, where you might luck onto a screening on Showtime (as I did) with that option also apparently in some form by itself or in conjunction with Paramount+ where you can find it free for 7 days, same with fubo, or you can rent it for $5.99 from Amazon Prime Video or Apple TV+ (the JustWatch site is now more detailed than it used to be, but, at least for me, a bit confusing in what it cites for watching availability).  The CCAL is supportive of you doing some exploration to find this film, though, with RT positive reviews at 86%, MC average score at 71%. I think overall you’d be satisfied if you seek it out, although there is a troubling aspect to Sylvia’s mistaken memory of Saul raping her, which may inadvertently (certainly she was traumatized by whomever assaulted her then) feed into the stance of those—like Samantha—who deny the validity of people, mostly women, who have memories of sexual attacks even though the accused-perpetrators and their supporters claim nothing ever happened.  I don’t think such questioning of victims’ accounts are an intended aspect of this narrative, although if Olivia’s memory is correct then Sylvia was initially wrong about Saul despite her self-conviction that she was right.  We might also wonder just how effective a lover Saul will be for Sylvia given his almost-closed memory of past events, his unclear ability to fully understand what’s going on in his current life, so we have flawed but sincere characters here who may be a positive infusion for each other or may just be a passing respite in ongoing seas of turmoil.

 I’ll leave any further interpretations of this film to you as I move on to closure with my standard device of a Musical Metaphor, which I suppose could be Procol Harum’s "A Whiter Shade of Pale" (a 1967 hit, found on the U.S. album of the band’s name [but not on the U.K. version of the same album]), which is used frequently in the film, although I can’t say exactly how it relates to Memory’s story (nor can anyone seem to definitively explain what the song is about), so I’ll go another direction with “The Way We Were” (written by Alan Bergman, Marilyn Bergman, Marvin Hamlisch, on the soundtrack album of The Way We Were movie [Sydney Pollack, 1973]) at https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K2_Kl36IEA, with Barbra Streisand singing, accompanied by clips of her and Robert Redford from the movie, or if you’d just prefer Barbra here she is at the 2013 Oscar ceremony in tribute to the late Hamlisch (died 2012), with the tune winning the 1974 Oscar for Best Original Song.  Yes, this Metaphor choice is about a romance that couldn’t endure the sociopolitical differences of the lovers, but for me it can also be about Saul’s lost memories of the way he was (and mostly is) while I project it referring as well to a future time for Sylvia when Saul will likely forget who she is as well.  An ultimately sad song tacked on by me to a film that looks for hope wherever it can be found, yet still appropriate to the unsettled lives of these 2 damaged protagonists.

          

SHORT TAKES

               

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:   

Here are 4 options for your thoughtful consideration: (1) IMDb's 5 Things to Watch this week; (2) Netflix tops 277 million subscribers: (3) IMDb's most anticipated sequels, prequels, spin-offs; (4) Inside Out 2 now highest-grossing movie in history, $1.46 billion worldwide, still growing.

 

We encourage you to visit the Summary of Two Guys Reviews for our past posts* (scroll to the bottom of this Summary page to see additional info about your 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 also note that to Post a Comment below about our reviews you need to have either a Google account (which you can easily get at https://accounts.google.com/NewAccount if you need to sign up) or other sign-in identification from the pull-down menu below before you preview or post.  You can also leave comments at our Facebook page, although you may have to somehow register with us there in order to comment (FB procedures: frequently perplexing mysteries for us aged farts).

*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.

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

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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 the total unique hits at this site were 5,692—a huge drop-off from the marvelous 40-50K of some recent months; never overestimate yourself! (As always, we thank all of you for your ongoing support with our hopes you’ll continue to be regular readers.)  Below is a snapshot of where those responses have come from within the previous week (with appreciation for the unspecified “Others” also visiting Two Guys’ site):

Fancy Dance plus Short Takes on other cinematic topics

“Some dance to remember, some dance to forget”

(lyric from The Eagles’ ”Hotel California,” on their 1976 album of the same name)

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) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative.  However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, though better options may be on the horizon.  (Note: Anything in bold blue [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)

My reviews’ premise: “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 song’s name)

      Fancy Dance (Erica Tremblay)   rated R   90 min.

Here’s the trailer:

       (Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size; 

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

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: Jax (Lily Gladstone) and Tawi (Hauli Gray [but we don’t see much of her]) are sisters, members of Oklahoma’s Seneca-Cayuga Nation.  Their Native mother died sometime before this story begins, with their White father, Frank (Shea Whigham), then marrying a White woman, Nancy (Audrey Wasilewski), with little support from his daughters.  Speaking of daughters, Tawi’s 13-year-old Roki (Isabel DeRoy-Olson) spends a lot of time with Aunt Jax—our story opens with them catching crayfish in a river to sell to a local guy for bait—especially because Mom’s gone missing for some days now, worrying Roki because she hopes to participate in the mother-daughter dance at an important upcoming powwow.  Jax tries to be upbeat about it, insisting Tawi will surely be at the event, but privately she’s concerned, especially because there are now “Missing” posters of her sister tacked up everywhere along with the ones she carries around to show to anyone she meets, but with no reports of Tawi, so she tries to channel some hope into helping Roki prepare for the dances.  (Jax used to participate in such mother-daughter dances too, but since the death of her matriarchal-partner she’s generally pulled away from the powwows.)  Roki reminisces about her Mom, looks at old photos of her and dance footage from previous events, tries on some of her clothes, especially a fringed jacket to wear at the dances.  Jax’s concern is growing so she gets drunk one night, has to be helped home by her uncle, JJ (Ryan Begay), I assume a brother of her lone-gone mother.  Then, Frank and Nancy come to visit with clear tension between father and daughter; he reminds her that years ago he tried to get his children to leave the reservation but they refused, wanting to remain close to their heritage.  Things get worse when Jax tries to apply to foster Roki, but she’s denied because of her past criminal record (possibly theft, based on what we’ll see a bit later), so Roki’s taken by the authorities to live with Frank and Nancy, which the girl has to accept.

 Frustrated by this, Jax quietly calls into Roki’s room one night, tells her niece to get Frank’s truck keys so they can slip away, ultimately bound for the powwow in Tulsa; Frank calls the police so an Amber Alert is issued with photos of Jax and Roki in local newspapers and TV coverage, even as they manage to elude detection, sometimes helping themselves to stolen goods at various stores along the way, although when Roki tries to take something at one location Jax makes her put it back even as the security guard’s suspicious so outside they end up being questioned by an ICE agent as if they're undocumented immigrants but manage to talk their way out of trouble, although Roki has to wait in the “cop car” while Jax converses with the agent.  (Roki’s just begun to have her period, so she leaves a bloody “present” in the guy's backseat.)  ⇒Trouble then grows between Jax and Roki because as the older one calls JJ, tells him she doesn’t really expect to find Tawi, the girl overhears this, is devastated, then it gets worse when a guy recognizes them, calls the cops, but he’s wounded by Roki who (unknown to Jax) has taken Jax’s pistol from her bag.  Cops arrive, seemed to me they catch Roki but Jax gets away, yet when Jax calls Frank he has no knowledge of where Roki is, but—based on a tip JJ got—Tawi’s body's been found in a nearby lake.  Jax continues on to the powwow, briefly joins the mother-daughter dance, then withdraws; however, during the dance to honor Missing and Murdered Women, Jax sees Roki dancing, decides to join her as they seem to be reconciled.⇐

So What? While some might complain (as some always will) about none of the principal actors in this drama are from the Seneca-Cayuga Nation—Gladstone’s of Piegan Blackfeet, Nez Perce, and European heritage; DeRoy-Olson’s from the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in First Nation, Yukon and Ebb and Flow First Nation in Manitoba, Canada; Begay’s Navajo—at least these are Indigenous people playing Native Americans (so much better than much of Hollywood’s history where notable Indian parts in Westerns were usually played by White actors [such as German-heritage Henry Brandon as Indian Chief Scar in John Ford’s famous 1956 The Searchers], although things did get somewhat better with Native actors in significant Native roles in such celebrated mainstream fare as Little Big Man [Arthur Penn, 1970] and Best Picture Oscar-winner Dances with Wolves [Kevin Costner, 1990], with a major addition in Smoke Signals [Chris Eyre, 1998] which featured Indigenous people in all the primary roles), plus Fancy Dance director (feature debut after several short documentaries)/co-screenwriter (with Miciana Alise) Tremblay is Seneca-Cayuga, so she knows of what she presents in this film.  If you’d like to know more about this Native Nation, just go here.  Once you’ve satisfied your interests in that direction, you might also want to know more about Fancy Dances, so here's an extensive source which chronicles how this ritual may have originated with the Ponca tribe, with war dance implications, in the 1920s-‘30s before evolving into something now frequently found in the powwows of many Native Nations.  While it was first done only by men, over time women’s Fancy Dance also came about with the fringed shawl the dancers wear implying a butterfly emerging from a cocoon.  Given that I didn’t do any research into what the title of this film refers to before I watched it (should have; oh, well), I wasn’t all that aware an actual Fancy Dance occurs within this narrative, yet there’s a photo of it just above so I’m a little at a loss to know exactly how this title conveys connection to the troubled relationship of Jax and Roki, but any explorations/explanations anyone would like to offer me are certainly welcome in the Comments option at the very end of this posting.

 What I can say clearly is that both Gladstone and DeRoy-Olson are excellent in their roles (which I’d expect from Gladstone after her Best Actress Oscar nomination for her impact in Killers of the Flower Moon [Martin Scorsese, 2023; review in our November 9, 2023 posting] where she seemed to have a solid shot at winning until the prize ultimately went to Emma Stone for Poor Things [Yorgos Lanthimos, 2023; review in our March 13, 2024 posting]), with Gladstone given the situation of completely commanding this story, more so than in her somewhat-limited screen time in … Flower Moon, while DeRoy-Olson’s screen-debut proved to be a marvelous counter-presence in this subtly-intense family drama.  I also appreciated how so much backstory (and forward-story, for that matter) is only implied, not explored in what could become pedantic-detail.  We really know nothing about Jax’s mother nor her marriage to Frank, we don’t know what happened with Tawi, we don’t know what will become of Jax and Roki’s lives after the Tulsa powwow because Jax already has past convictions that prevent her from becoming a second-mother to her niece, plus she probably also faces new kidnapping charges (unless Frank can somehow intervene for her), but that’s all left to our speculations without stretching out what already exists as a rightly-timed story that spins us into a flow of connected events, then gracefully leaves without any need to explain all that wasn’t specified.

Bottom Line Final Comments: Fancy Dance came to “select theaters” (basically means: “probably nowhere near you”) on June 21, 2024; however, I have no box-office info for its presence in domestic (U.S.-Canada) venues, although there’s a report of a $16,683 opening in the U.K.  What matters for those who might care to watch it is its availability on streaming where it’s free for Apple TV+ subscribers (or you can get in for 7 days free, then $9.99 monthly if you want to stay).  The CCAL’s generally highly-supportive of this film with the Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews at a commanding 96% (I’ve been on a hot-roll with them lately as I’ve given 4 stars-reviews to Hit Man [Richard Linklater; review in our June 19, 2024 posting], The Great Lillian Hall [Michael Cristofer; review in our June 26, 2024 posting], and The Last Stop in Yuma County [Francis Galluppi; review in our July 3, 2024 posting], along with my top 5 stars for revisiting Funny Girl [William Wyler, 1968; review in our June 26, 2024 posting], which they’ve respectively [and respectfully] reviewed positively at 96%, 94%, 96%, and 94%), with the frequently more-restrained Metacritic average score at 77%.  (The Metacritic scores for these films are, respectively, 82%, 78%, 72%, and 88%.)  However, this impressive streak was broken up last week by Beverly Hills Cop: Alex F (Mark Malloy; review in our July 10, 2024 posting) with me at 3 stars, RT at 66%, MC at 55% (the heat is now off.)

 I find Fancy Dance to be beautiful in its heartfelt-directness and explorations of interpersonal traumas, highly recommend it to you, as does The Hollywood Reporter’s Justin Lowe (a review from last year’s Sundance Film Festival): “Fancy Dance presents a broader narrative that emphasizes the connections that sustain families, communities and tribal nations, even when confronted with a legacy of disenfranchisement. Tremblay’s film validates the varied expressions of that experience with an affirming account of resilience and hope that sparkles with authentic performances, sensitive scripting and a genuine sense of place that resonate well after the final credits roll.”  I think those of us who support this film have made our points well enough for encouraging you to join us which I hope you'll do regarding this obscure gem, so I’ll just move on with my usual device of a review-ending Musical Metaphor, but this time I’ll do something different by sending you to this informative site which presents the 5 finalists for the Spotlight Dance Special for the Women’s Fancy Dance at Apache Gold Casino & Resort Powwow, March 4, 2024, so you may see for yourself what Fancy Dance is all about.

                  

SHORT TAKES

                  

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:   

(1) Remembering Shelly Duvall; (2) Nielsen streaming champs for week of June 10-16, 2024.

We encourage you to visit the Summary of Two Guys Reviews for our past posts* (scroll to the bottom of this Summary page to see additional info about your 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 also note that to Post a Comment below about our reviews you need to have either a Google account (which you can easily get at https://accounts.google.com/NewAccount if you need to sign up) or other sign-in identification from the pull-down menu below before you preview or post.  You can also leave comments at our Facebook page, although you may have to somehow register with us there in order to comment (FB procedures: frequently perplexing mysteries for us aged farts).

*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.

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.

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 the total unique hits at this site were 5,692—a huge drop-off from the marvelous 40-50K of some recent months; never overestimate yourself! (As always, we thank all of you for your ongoing support with our hopes you’ll continue to be regular readers.)  Below is a snapshot of where those responses have come from within the previous week (with appreciation for the unspecified “Others” also visiting Two Guys’ site):