Spectacle and Silliness
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)
Elvis (Baz Luhrmann) rated PG-13 159 min.
Opening Chatter (no spoilers): While you can find an enormous amount written about both pop-superstar Elvis Presley and his long-time-manager Colonel Tom Parker, as well as many other movies/documentaries about them, I’ll stay true to my standard policy of warning you about upcoming Spoilers in this specific offering as they work their way into my review. Further, as you can see from a couple of links in the next section of this posting this biopic uses the standard mode of artistic license in presenting what’s largely-historically-based, so by my announcements of things you might not want to know until you choose to see this movie for yourself I can spare you the cognitive dissonance that might come from the occasional-mismatchs between Luhrmann’s Elvis and the historical record. Further, as has been my tactic for the last month or so, I waited until Elvis had been out for a week before venturing into a theater to see it (the only option at this time) to allow for more space between me and my fellow patrons, given how furious the COVID surge is in my vicinity and how popular Elvis proved to be upon its debut (at least I don’t have to deal with that regarding last weekend’s big hit, Minions: The Rise of Gru [Kyle Badla {truly a hit, most-lucrative-July 4th-opening-weekend of all-time, taking in $123 million domestically—U.S.-Canada—$217 million worldwide} as I, one of the very few apparently, have no interest in the exploits of these little yellow creatures or their aspiring-villain-leader]). Assuming you have your own COVID strategy in mind and are interested in seeing Elvis I will highly recommend it, even though the CCAL’s not quite as enthusiastic as I am. Admittedly, this isn’t a definitive biography of the so-called King of Rock and Roll (more on that later), but it consistently plays to the heart of the best aspects of a very-talented-but-ultimately-tragic-man, even if we don’t get into his dietary quirks (fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches) or his skewed-interest in clandestine-law-enforcement (Elvis & Nixon [Liza Johnson, 2016; review in our April 21, 2016 posting]) just as we don’t see any decent side of Col. Parker here, probably an exaggeration as well (but not too much it would seem, from what I’ve read).
Given all that focus on Elvis, though, I was also looking for something less-intense, settled on a Kevin Hart-Woody Harrelson comedy-drama about mistaken-identity in the deadly world of hitmen, a decent-enough-diversion for me but a real clunker for the OCCU; nevertheless, you’re welcome to see it on Netflix steaming if you like. Also, as in every Two Guys posting, here are links for the schedule of the cable network, Turner Classic Movies, giving you a wide selection of older films with no commercial interruptions and the JustWatch site with their extensive options for streaming rental or purchase. For curiosity in what reigned at our domestic box-office last weekend, go here.
July 7, 2022: Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark will be taking a short break but watch for a return soon with our exploration of Thor: Love and Thunder, along with other cinematic delights.
Here’s the trailer for Elvis:
(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: This film begins with on-screen narration by Colonel Tom Parker (Tom Hanks [under layers of prosthetics, making him look to me like actor Sidney Greenstreet playing "Fat Man" Kasper Gutman in The Maltese Falcon {John Huston, 1941}]) in 1997 as he’s near death, giving us his version of how he made Elvis Presley (Austin Butler) the international-superstar that he became, even though it becomes clear as this story progresses Parker was interested only in the financial windfall Elvis’ career offered to Parker’s gambling-addiction rather than caring to truly nurture the talent the singer/actor possessed. Much of this story as it unfolds comes to us directly from Parker’s retelling although there are several scenes of Elvis’ private life Parker didn’t participate in directly so it’s not fully clear if these aspects of the presentation are from Elvis’ POV or are based on hearsay Parker became aware of. However the events rapidly shown to us across the decades of Presley’s life may be shaped by Parker’s interpretation of them (just as we really know little about the title character in Citizen Kane [Orson Welles, 1941] because everything we see of him [except his death in the opening minutes] is told to us by others, never clarifying if their recitations are accurate or colored by their own agendas), we do learn a lot about Elvis (played as a boy by Chaydon Jay), born in 1935 in Tupelo, MS (his identical twin brother, Jesse, died stillborn), lived in poverty especially when he and Mom Gladys (Helen Thomson) had to move into a shack in the Black part of town due to their poverty-stricken-situation while Dad Vernon (Richard Roxburgh [also resembles someone else to me, Jerry Stiller as George Costanza’s father in NBC TV’s Seinfeld {1989-‘98}]) is in jail for altering a check. This exposure to Black music (he secretly watches Arthur ”Big Boy” Crudup [Gary Clark Jr.] play the blues in a local bar) and religious tent revivals (he slips into one, seemingly has a visitation from the Holy Spirit, implying his later gospel interests) is intensified when the family moves to Memphis in 1948 where he goes over to Beale Street to hear Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton (Shonka Dukureh) singing “Hound Dog,” becomes friends with future-guitarist-legend B.B. King (Kelvin Harrison Jr.), is clearly stunned by the energetic performance of Little Richard (Alton Mason).
1954 became a seminal year for Elvis as he recorded some songs at Sam Phillips’ (Josh McConville) Sun Records, got some airplay, performed on TV’s Louisiana Hayride (a competitor of Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry) where his pink suit, pile of dark, greasy hair, sideburns, sensuous shaking (especially his pelvic region) led to screaming embrace by girls in the audience, quick attention of Parker who signs him for tours led by country-music-star Hank Snow (David Wenham), who has no interest in this wild music. Parker then talks Elvis into singular management (dropping Snow in the process), pulls him away from Phillips to a bigger contract at RCA promising the money Elvis dreamed off to buy Gladys a huge home in Memphis (Graceland), plus her own pink Cadillac.
Hit records and mindless-but-successful-movies follow, although Elvis’s gyrations on stage fire up local parents and police about “vulgarity,” so he promises the Colonel he’ll tame himself (as he had to do in a 1956 farcical presence on TV’s The Steve Allen Show) but goes wild on stage as usual resulting in cops breaking up the concert. Parker then seemingly convinces the U.S. government to draft Elvis into the Army to cut his hair, clean up his image, as an all-American-youth dutifully serving in Germany 1958-’60 where he meets, falls in love with Priscilla Wagner/Beaulieu (Olivia DeJonge)—surname changed after her father died, mother remarried—whom he will later wed, with her have their daughter Lisa Marie, but also in this time he suffers Gladys’ death from alcoholism. As music tastes and social mores evolve in the early/mid-1960s, though, Parker’s insistence on Elvis pumping out mediocre hits and formulaic movies lead his meal-ticket into frustration/eclipse, so Parker arranges for him to record a 1-hour-TV ’68 Comeback Special to air in December 1968 which he promises NBC will be a holiday-themed-show like you’d expect from Perry Como or Andy Williams. Instead, Elvis, dressed in black leather, comes onto a small stage surrounded by an audience, plays a lot of his old hits, seems to ignore any Christmas theme entirely, but the taping’s interrupted by the assassination of Robert Kennedy which hits Elvis as hard as the recent murder of Martin Luther King Jr. did, so he finishes the TV special with a powerful delivery of a socially-aware-song, "If I Can Dream", infuriating the network and Parker but going over fabulously with the public. Soon after, Parker brings him to Las Vegas to perform at the new International Hotel, then thwarts Elvis’ desire to do a European tour by arranging a deal with the hotel owners for Elvis to perform there in stints over the next 5 years for $1 million annually, along with (crucially) erasing Parker’s gambling debts.
⇒Frustrated by Parker’s machinations and forced to keep touring even when facing exhaustion, Elvis becomes a living-pharmaceutical-intake-device (plus affairs on the road) leading to Priscilla divorcing him in 1973, drugs increasing, shows getting sloppier, until he finds out some sordid truths about Parker (more on that in the 2nd review section below), fires him from on stage one night but has to relent because Elvis and (nominal business manager) Vernon owe Parker millions (even though he’d already taken about 50% of what Elvis earned), had no resources to pay it. As Parker wraps up his account of Elvis’ life, he notes one final, impressive song (Rapid City, SD on June 21, 1977) where Elvis forced his bloated body through a great rendition of the 1965 Righteous Brothers’ hit, “Unchained Melody” (shown here, the real thing; modified here in the film). Elvis dies in August 1977, Parker lives another 20 years but finishes broke and alone, not mourned like Elvis.⇐
So What? I passed up my only chance to see Elvis perform live as I was in Austin, TX in spring 1977 when he performed at the Austin Municipal Auditorium, but by that time I was aware of his stage shows constantly compromised by his lack of energy, considerable weight, forgetting of lyrics, so not wanting to bother with a broken-down-version of a musical legend whom I considered old (due to all those problems) even though he was only 42 while I was just several months away from 30 (anyway, for me the true King of Rock and Roll is Chuck Berry; I did enjoy various Elvis 1950s radio hits but was much more interested in Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison [maybe because we were all from Texas?]). Then that summer I moved to Dallas to begin my teaching career at Southern Methodist U. only to leave campus on August 16, turned on the radio to hear Elvis died that day. In a way, I was sorry I didn’t make use of that opportunity a few months earlier to at least say I saw him, no matter what condition he was in, but if it had turned out to be one of those final lackluster performances (likely for an audience of women who’d resemble my mother, remembering how they got “all shook up” back in the ‘50s) I probably still wouldn’t have cared for being there, except if he’d been able to deliver something of the caliber of that Rapid City “Unchained Melody” (which seemed to have been the vibe as reported just above by Paul Beutel) so it’s hard to know if anything he did with that March 28, 1977 setlist would have moved me much, except in retrospect about his legacy.
Maybe as payback for my skip-the-concert-decision and my lingering qualms about what it might have been like, I was “treated” to 2 hours of “The King” played by my sister-in-law on a Sirius Radio Elvis channel when she drove me and my wife, Nina, from New London, NH to Boston once, so I can tell you that, when you’re not just getting a collection of old hits but also a pile of other people’s songs from his numerous albums, for me Elvis gets old mighty quick, although he’d have been fine with some intertwining of Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison, Little Richard, Fats Domino, and Ricky Nelson, but it was not to be that day. So, while I appreciate how Elvis, through Parker’s manipulations, was constructed as The King through his avalanche of hit records, movies, TV appearances (on Allen’s show he had to dress in a tux, do “Hound Dog” to a dog, but he left that behind with his October 28, 1956 visit to the Ed Sullivan Show singing the same song, although with minimal shakes, only a few shots from the waist up), and concerts (including 1973's Aloha from Hawaii sent by satellite live to Australia, many countries in Asia, then shown again to Europe and the U.S.), I can’t say he was among my top favorites from the early days of rock and roll, although this new movie makes me easily appreciate him as someone with much to give in terms of entertaining an audience, aspirations to be more than just a forgettable pop-phenomenon, ultimately became a tragic figure pushed by a ruthless manager (and seemingly-useless-father in terms of pushing back at Parker) into a deadly lifestyle, as multiple physical problems finally resulted in his heart giving out.
As to how accurate what we’re seeing might be, you can consult this short video (14:28) on the film’s Top 10 items right and wrong (Spoilers, though, along with an ad interrupting at about 10:05) along with this article by Parker biographer Alanna Nash, who disagrees with a good bit of what’s on screen (although it’s been praised by members of the Presley family, so you have to take invested-perspectives into account in many directions here, although another article about Mike Stoller [with Jerry Leiber, wrote 2 dozen songs for Elvis, even wrote “Hound Dog” for Big Mama Thornton in 1953] notes how petty and confining Parker could be about “his” star, cutting them off form him in 1963, a sense captured well in this Anatomy of a Scene [2:43] by the director where Parker first latches onto Elvis at the Louisiana Hayride broadcast [even though that's not how they connected]). Maybe one way to sift through this is to watch this mini-documentary about Elvis (15:04 [ads interrupt at about 4:30, 11:20]), then go watch Luhrmann’s take on these men for yourself, decide how it settles in for you. For me, even if it’s not completely-historically-correct (what biopic has been?) I think there’s a solid, truthful essence, the filmmaking style is rapidly/engagingly-interactive (often intercutting shots of young Elvis with his life later on), the music’s what you pay to see a story about Elvis for (Butler effectively singing the early material, then blended with Elvis later on), and the acting’s superb—I’ll be shocked if Butler doesn’t get a Best Actor Oscar nomination and to me Hanks is just as effective as Parker (despite others disagreeing with that) but would likely be considered for Supporting Actor because while Parker’s narration frames the story Butler’s the one on-screen the most, in a film that's named after his character after all. All in all, my advice: Go see it!
Bottom Line Final Comments: The CCAL generally agrees with me in support of Elvis with Rotten Tomatoes reviews at 78% positive, although the usually-more-restrained-Metacritic-voices provide only a 64% average score (yet for them that means “Generally favorable reviews”; more details on both critics’-accumulation-sites in the Related Links section of this posting far below, as I cite with anything I review). Yet, in trying to understand why some of the critical establishment isn’t too supportive I looked over various options, chose the Observer’s Rex Reed as a naysayer-spokesperson: “The swiveling hips, the lubricated lips and the voice that sounded like it was coming from a mouth full of grits are back again, in an erratic, interminable, over-produced biopic […] Under the self-indulgent, disorganized leadership of Baz Luhrmann, I’m afraid it’s pretty much a mess.” Well, no ambiguity there, still I’m more in league with ABC’s Peter Travers: “[… Luhrmann] never misses a chance to wow us with sights and sounds that would have appealed to Elvis' own flamboyant sense of showmanship. […] Butler does Elvis proud with the grit and grace of his performance. A star is born in Butler. Like Elvis, you can't take your eyes off him.” Audiences would seem to agree as Elvis opened in 3,906 theaters yielding a domestic gross so far of $71.8 million, $118.3 million globally, which, of course, doesn’t compare to Minions … domestic debut of $123 million ($216.9 globally) or the continued box-office-assault of Top Gun: Maverick ($570.7 million domestically, $1.115 billion worldwide after 6 weeks [Joseph Kosinski; review in our June 9, 2022 posting]), but it does show a strong interest in this audiovisually-extravagant-exploration of Presley, which may not make as much total cash as some other summer-high-budget-extravaganzas but is more likely to be remembered (I hope) come awards season late in autumn 2022 and beyond.
One more thing I’d like to note before signing off on this film is some criticism of Tom Hanks’ portrayal of Col. Parker—whose name was actually Andreas Cornelis van Juijk, a Dutchman who became an undocumented immigrant into the U.S., joined the Army but never was an officer (in fact, went AWOL), never had a passport which is the main reason he didn’t want Elvis performing overseas as he’d not be able to join him, an unthinkable situation for such a control-freak. Some have rejected the actor’s performance—Reed says: "Balding and bloated, Hanks is a grotesque lampoon of everything from Tennessee Williams’ Big Daddy to Colonel Sanders of fried chicken fame, padded beyond recognition and disfigured by a mass of prosthetics. He comes out of the chute hateful, so there’s nowhere to go with the role."—while others have scoffed at what they hear as an inconsistent accent, but in material I’ve read about “Parker” I find he did have an obvious foreign accent which he tried to morph into a Southern one with a claim of being born in Huntington, WV, so as the years go on in this film it’s not a problem for me that how we hear his odd-enunciation.
Now, as to whether Parker deserves a better interpretation than Luhrmann’s given him here may be up for debate, but with the confused-but-sincere-semi-saintly-manner in which Elvis is depicted (no wonder the Presley family likes it so much) we need an unrepentant-villain for contrast, which this money-grubbing-rendition of the Colonel successfully fits the bill. OK, I’ve rambled on almost as long as the film does so I’ll bring it to a close with my usual tactic of a Musical Metaphor to provide one last bit of commentary. Given Elvis Presley as the subject of this film (despite how Parker wants to put himself in the forefront here) there’s lots of music to choose from, with “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” as a logical-contender given how often the lives of these principal players are so empty (You can hear it here, from the ’68 Comeback Special with a couple of takes cut together, Elvis oddly reading the middle lyrics as if he’s either forgotten them or wants to give the impression of poetry?), but I’m going with “Suspicious Minds” from Aloha from Hawaii at https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=MT3P7p-WNSY (yet, if you’d like to hear the recorded version with the odd early-fade-out, fade-back-in-structure which always intrigued me, here it is [on the 2002 album Elvis: 30 #1 Hits; “… Lonesome Tonight” is there too, with many well-known-others]) because, though this song’s about 2 lovers not able to resolve their tensions, the film shows Elvis as constantly “caught in a trap” when those who he’d want to be close to him—Gladys, Col. Parker, Priscilla especially—all had their own needs to be met by him yet they weren’t comfortable, at various times, with the directions he chose/tried to choose for himself butting up against the directions they’d prefer, even as he knows “we can’t build our dreams / On suspicious minds” that often undermine his greater goals.
However, rather than stopping there I can’t help but add another Metaphor, which speaks to the mystical status Elvis continues to have in our culture long after his death as so much associated with him seems to have a sort of spiritual dimension for those who are enthralled by it; therefore, I turn to Paul Simon’s “Graceland” (from the 1986 album of that name) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VTcBO4q5kY, a 2012 concert at London’s Hyde Park where he reunited with South African musicians from the album as we all explore the allure of Graceland, along with the memory of Elvis (buried there in his former home, with his parents), “For reasons I cannot explain / There’s some part of me wants to see / Graceland / And I may be obliged to defend / Every love, every ending / Or maybe there’s no obligations now / Maybe I’ve a reason to believe / We all will be received / in Graceland.” But while this rendition of the song draws upon the talents of contemporary Africans who represent the ancestors of the Black musicians Elvis was so drawn to he also had success with country music fans (taking us back ironically to Hank Snow), so I’ll actually close with another version of “Graceland,” a duet with Simon and Willie Nelson from Farm Aid in 1993, as in our post-Elvis-ways we may all be “Poor boys and pilgrims with families / And we are going to Graceland”; Elvis may even be waiting for us, but I suggest we think twice if he offers to cook dinner.
SHORT TAKES (spoilers also appear here)
An amiable guy who messes up a lot tries to make amends with a spa trip mainly for the pleasure of his wife, but he accidently gets mistaken by some goons as being the feared Man from Toronto, then he’s recruited by FBI agents for maintaining this identity mix-up to help them prevent an international incident so he reluctantly goes along, ultimately helped by the true, vicious Toronto Man in his quest.
Here’s the trailer:
Before reading further, please refer to the plot spoilers warning detailed far above.
Teddy (Kevin Hart) is an ongoing screw-up in NYC whose latest scheme of establishing an Internet regime of non-contact-boxing* is quickly rejected by Marty (Martin Roach) because Teddy printed up fliers advertising Marty’s gym but forgot to include an address or phone number. So, in an attempt to do something great for wife Lori’s (Jasmine Matthews) birthday, Teddy books a day spa in the woods a few states away, lets her off for a 2-hour-session while he checks in; however, he forgot to update his printer toner so it’s hard to read his cabin number on the receipt. Of course, he goes to the wrong one where he’s greeted by tough guys who have a handcuffed-man hanging from the ceiling with Teddy mistaken for the horrid torturer known as The Man from Toronto (Woody Harrelson) who hasn’t quite arrived yet. In a frantic attempt to scare answers from the hostage Teddy puts on a spontaneous show effective in getting the needed info, yet chaos ensues when the FBI raids the place, followed by Agents Lawrence (Kate Drummond) and Davis (Ronnie Rowe) demanding Teddy immediately come with them to continue his ruse because they need for him (as the assassin) to meet in D.C. with Venezuelan Colonel Marin (Alejandro De Hoyos), to stop him from killing the Venezuelan President; to keep Lori occupied they send beefy-Agent Santoro (Jencarlos Canela) to act as a guide for her on a shopping trip (Teddy’s not amused by this hunky-choice of companions).
But then Teddy’s sent by the Col.’s wife, Daniela (Lela Loren), to Puerto Rico; however, by this time the real Toronto Man (actually named Randy) sneaks onto the plane, kills everyone but Teddy, then works with his Handler (Ellen Barkin) by phone (he's never met her) to keep up Teddy’s role where he has to figure out which of 4 captive men is Green, which he does but only after vomiting on another one; Randy comes in, kills all but Teddy and Green who tells them the Col. wants a weapon needing Green’s thumbprint to activate, so Randy cuts off his thumb. Before they can escape, though, they’re confronted by The Man from Miami (Pierson Fodé), so we get another shootout yet with no one dead this time. Back in the U.S. that night Teddy and Randy join Lori and her friend Anne (Kaley Cuoco) for dinner; Randy's nervous around women until Anne easily warms up to him.
*Played for absurd laughs but it’s a real thing, a legitimate form of exercise and stress reduction.
⇒The Miami Man arrives at the restaurant too, though, so we get another fight scene with him (seemingly sent by Randy’s Handler) stealing the thumb. Ultimately, Teddy and Randy prevent the Venezuelan assassination but have to fight off more killers in the process, including the Handler, who tried to terminate our heroes, and The Man from Tokyo (Tomohisa Yamashita). Ultimately, Randy ends up running a restaurant, Teddy’s exercise-boxing-idea bears fruit, but the 2 men are still in dispute over how Teddy allowed Randy’s prized-auto to be destroyed by a train.*⇐ The mistaken-identity-premise is cute enough here, as are the comic chops from Hart and Harrelson, but once the situation’s been established we mainly go through scene-after-repetitious-scene of battles where numerous bad guys eventually bite the dust so unless you’re already a Netflix streaming subscriber I wouldn’t pay for even a month just to see this, a long-delayed-release (intended for 2020 until COVID came along) totally dismissed by the OCCU (RT: 23% positive reviews, MC: 34% average score), although it’s a decent-enough diversion if you have nothing else to do for a couple of hours.
As this movie’s a bit of a farce, so’s my chosen Musical Metaphor, Johnny River’s “Secret Agent Man” (originally used with the opening titles of CBS TV’s Secret Agent, 1964-’66, expanded to a hit single on Rivers’ 1966 album … And I Know You Wanna Dance) at https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=6iaR3WO71j4 because Teddy was never an FBI agent nor were there any “persuasive lips” for him to make a mistake with even though with all these hitmen running around “The odds are he won’t live to see tomorrow,” until he finds himself under the marginally-agreeing-guardian angel from Toronto. This week I was more concerned with the baseball men from Toronto, the Blue Jays, who could have contributed to the 2022 misery of my Oakland Athletics as the American League beatdown on the A’s continues (worst record in the sport as we’re barely over halfway through the season!); however, better fortune prevailed as A’s took 2 of 3, only lost the last one by a 2-1 score.
*There’s more plot than what I’ve summarized, so if you want to read about added details I’ll provide
a source for such, although I’m surprised Wikipedia didn’t ask for further compression of this prose.
Other Cinema-Related Stuff: Here are extra items that you might like: (1) What's new on Netflix in July 2022; (2) What's new on Amazon Prime Video in July 2022; (3) What's new on Hulu in July 2022; (4) What's new on Disney+ in July 2022; (5) What's new on HBO/HBO Max in July 2022; and (6) Why Minions: The Rise of Gru made more money than Lightyear.
Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:
We encourage you to visit the Summary of Two Guys Reviews for our past posts.* 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 please visit our Facebook page. We appreciate your support whenever and however you can offer it!
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Here’s more information about Elvis:
https://elvis.warnerbros.com/?home
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNOTE35VJ2k (9:09 actors Austin Butler and Tom Hanks discuss their roles in this movie)
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/elvis
https://www.metacritic.com/movie/elvis
Here’s more information about The Man from Toronto:
https://www.netflix.com/title/81251628
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVItbEOjpHk (4:52 interview with actors Kevin Hart and Woody Harrelson)
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_man_from_toronto_2022
https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-man-from-toronto
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If you’d rather contact Ken directly rather than leaving a comment here please use my email address of kenburke409@gmail.com—type it directly if the link doesn’t work. (But if you truly have too much time on your hands you might want to explore some even-longer-and-more-obtuse-than-my-film-reviews-academic-articles about various cinematic topics at my website, https://kenburke.academia.edu, which could really give you something to talk to me about.)
If we did talk, though, you’d easily see how my early-70s-age informs my references, Musical Metaphors, etc. in these reviews because I’m clearly a guy of the later 20th century, not so much the contemporary world. I’ve come to accept my ongoing situation, though, realizing we all (if fate allows) keep getting older, we just have to embrace it, as Joni Mitchell did so well in "The Circle Game," offering sage advice even when she was quite young herself.
By the way, if you’re ever at The Hotel California knock on my door—but you know what the check-out policy is so be prepared to stay for awhile (quite an eternal while, in fact, but maybe while there you’ll get a chance to meet Eagles co-founder Glenn Frey, RIP). Ken
P.S. Just to show that I haven’t fully flushed Texas out of my system here’s an alternative destination for you, Home in a Texas Bar, with Gary P. Nunn and Jerry Jeff Walker (although, as you know, with bar songs there are plenty about people broken down by various tragic circumstances, with maybe the best of the bunch—calls itself “perfect”—being "You Never Even Called Me By My Name" written by Steve Goodman, sung by David Allen Coe). But wherever the rest of my body may be my heart’s always with my longtime-companion/lover/
wife, Nina Kindblad, so here’s our favorite shared song—Neil Young’s "Harvest Moon"—from the performance we saw at the Desert Trip concerts in Indio, CA on October 15, 2016 (as a full moon was rising over the stadium) because “I’m still in love with you,” my dearest, a never-changing-reality even as the moon waxes/wanes over the months/years to come. But, just as we can be raunchy at times (in private of course) Neil and his backing band, Promise of the Real, on that same night also did a lengthy, fantastic version of "Cowgirl in the Sand" (19:06) which I’d also like to commit to this blog’s always-ending-tunes; I never get tired of listening to it, then and now (one of my idle dreams is to play guitar even half this well). But, while I’m at it, I’ll also include another of my top favorites, from the night before at Desert Trip, the Rolling Stones’ "Gimme Shelter" (Wow!), a song “just a shot away” in my memory (along with my memory of their great drummer, Charlie Watts, RIP). To finish this cluster of all-time-great-songs I’d like to have played at my wake (as far away from now as possible) here’s one Dylan didn’t play at Desert Trip but it’s great, much beloved by me and Nina: "Visions of Johanna." However, if the day does come when Nina has to present these above thoughts (beginning with “If we did talk”) and this music after my demise I might as well make this into a somewhat-Top 10 of songs that mattered to me by adding The Beatles’ "A Day in the Life,"
because that chaotic-orchestral-finale sounds like what the death experience may be like, and the Beach Boys’ "Fun Fun Fun" because this gathering may have gotten morbid so I’d like to sign off with something much more upbeat to remember me (the Galveston non-surfer) by.
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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 17,908 (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):
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