In traipsing Old-Hollywood comedy Hail, Caesar!, sibling duo Joel and Ethan Coen reflect on the cyclonic nature of showbiz, much like its spiritual predecessor, Barton Fink. That movie (which, my god, is now 25 years old) is nastier and more idiosyncratic, skewering the film industry with voracious (and incredibly funny) disdain. The Coens’ 2016 offering is more relaxed and lighthearted, but what it lacks in crackling energy and forward momentum it makes up for with finely tuned, detail-oriented jokes and an overabundance of charm.

The charm factor is in effect no more than during one of the film’s several movie-within-the-movie, genre-parody scenes, in which Channing Tatum (playing Burt Gurney, a Gene Kelly-like hoofer) performs a jaunty tap number in a sailor suit. (Few current screen actors can move like this man, and the Coens don’t squander the chance to let him tear up a song-and-dance routine.) The movie’s set in 1951, predominantly unfolding on the grounds of Capitol studios (the same fictional studio from Barton Fink), and Gurney’s ditty is one of the many movies being filmed on the sunny studio grounds, including a glittery synchronized-swimming production (starring an Esther Williams-channeling Scarlett Johansson) and “Hail, Caesar!,” a Ben Hur-style epic starring self-involved, strong-chinned leading man named Baird Whitlock (played by George Clooney in the vein of Charlton Heston).

While most of the characters we see are cleverly-packaged homages to the stars of Dream Factory heyday, one is taken straight from the Hollywood history books. Capitol is absolutely bustling with chaotic activity on a daily basis, and one man is responsible for holding the whole operation together: Eddie Mannix, a real-life, legendary studio exec who put out fires at MGM for years. He’s embodied by Josh Brolin, who leads the charge as the main focus and anchor of the otherwise scattered story. Mannix is a bulldozing man on a mission, zooming around the lot and around town making unblinking threats and using cool-headed negotiation tactics to keep all of his pictures running on schedule and in harmony. There’s no one better, and a lucrative job offer from Lockheed has him considering leaving the loopy microcosm of Capitol to make a bigger buck, albeit for dirtier work.

Much is made of Mannix’s soul searching; the film opens with him repenting in a confessional, a place we see him return to twice more as he considers the Lockheed offer and reflects on the more questionable facets of his moral make-up and career choices. Brolin and the Coens have always had a fruitful partnership, and while Mannix isn’t as monumental a creation as Llewelyn Moss, for instance, he’s still interesting enough to stand out amid the crowd of larger-than-life personalities running around the rest of the film.

One such personality (my favorite, in fact) is Hobie Doyle (Alden Ehrenreich), a singing cowboy star who can perform eye-popping, impossible feats on horseback and has a gift for lasso acrobatics, but can’t read proper dialogue for squat. When he’s shoehorned into a production that calls for him to wear a tuxedo and walk into a room full of aristocrats speaking in Mid-Atlantic accents, it makes for one of the funniest scenes I’ve seen in recent memory (watching the baby-faced buckaroo do his involuntary cowboy strut in a tuxedo nearly killed me). The comedy’s all in the details, like how the stuffy production is under the hilariously named “Laurence Laurentz Presents” banner. Hobie isn’t a mere caricature, though; later on, he plays a key role in the film’s plot that shows us that he’s a true hero (which explains why he’s so awkward on a proper movie set; he’s too genuine to fake anything).

The dilemma at the center of the story that keeps the movie from being a randomly arranged series of unrelated scenes involves the kidnapping of Baird Whitlock by a stable of scorned communist screenwriters. As Mannix tries his best to handle the situation, he’s bombarded by a litany of on-set issues: Johansson’s starlet is looking to avoid a pregnancy scandal; the great Laurence Laurentz (Ralph Fiennes) refuses to tolerate Hobie’s atrocious line-reading skills. On top of that, he’s stalked by the film’s resident Hedda Hopper-esque columnists, persistent twin sisters played by a fantastic Tilda Swinton.

Mannix’s plate-spinning is involving enough, but I couldn’t help but yearn for more time with the rest of the cast. Johansson, Swinton and Tatum are super entertaining and part of me thinks it would have been nice to make Hail, Caesar a true ensemble piece, downsizing Mannix’s screen time a bit to give the others more room to do their thing. The Coens seem to be having a lot of fun stepping into the shoes of filmmakers from classical Hollywood and drinking in its grandiosity all while skewering the absurdity and silliness of its inherent artifice. They’ve become such assured storytellers and filmmakers that, even when they take it easy, we’re on the edge of our seats, grinning from ear to ear.

On Conan O’Brien‘s final appearance as the host of the Tonight Show (a dream gig he gave up to preserve his integrity), the emotional Late Night legend made one request of his young fans: “Please do not be cynical. I hate cynicism. For the record, it’s my least favorite quality. It doesn’t lead anywhere.” It was concise, it was poignant, and it was from the heart. Brad Bird‘s Tomorrowland has a message similarly meant to galvanize young people to be more optimistic, specifically about the future of our planet. But the road it takes to get there is so long and twisty and convoluted that the message is sapped of all its power. In 130 minutes, Tomorrowland fails to do what Conan did in seven seconds.

Bird’s second foray into the world of live-action filmmaking (after Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol) is a certifiable disappointment. It’s a preachy, low-stakes affair that only halfway delivers on its promise of shiny, futuristic spectacle; when the film’s dreary central mystery story becomes its prime focus, fun falls by the wayside in favor of thinly veiled patronization. Tomorrowland is a didactic indictment on the world’s pessimists, complainers and slouches who, according to Bird and co-writer Damon Lindelof, will be the planet’s death-bringers, ushering in the apocalypse. Yeesh.

The filmmakers’ intentions are good, but man is this movie overbearing. Bird and Lindelof seem to get caught up in the idea that Tomorrowland needs to be as culturally and socially relevant and as possible. “This movie needs to be important,” I can hear them saying. “It needs to change the world!” If they had spent more time making the movie more fun and entertaining rather than “important,” a better time would have been had by all and their big ideas would have shone through brighter. They try to dazzle and inspire by showing us a limitless future full of excitement and brave technology, but when their haughty finger-wagging takes over, it feels like we’re sitting in on a lecture at a chalkboard.

The film’s opener is a bumbling dud. George Clooney, playing a crotchety old scientist named Frank Walker, addresses the camera directly, recounting the extraordinary series of events from his boyhood that led him to Tomorrowland, a sort of dreamers’ utopia existing in a parallel universe, built by the brightest minds in history as a place for big thinkers to unleash their true potential. We flash back to the 1964 World’s Fair in Queens, New York (a stunning recreation), where a young Frank hopes to wow the crowds by entering into an inventors’ competition with his homemade jet-pack. He’s denied admittance, though, by a sniveling, arrogant judge (Hugh Laurie) who’s got “big bad” written on his forehead from the moment we see him. A young, freckle-faced girl named Athena (Raffey Cassidy) takes a liking to Frank (he’s gobsmacked, too) and sneaks him an extraordinary pin with a “T” on it that gains him entry to Tomorrowland.

The fleeting glimpses of Tomorrowland we get early in the movie are the best bits. The art direction is wonderful. We see miraculous things like petri dish-shaped swimming pools impossibly suspended in mid-air, with people diving into them and popping out of the bottom, only to land in another pool hovering several feet underneath. There’s a hulking, helpful robot that gives Frank a thumbs-up after fixing his broken jet-pack (a fun nod to Bird’s The Iron Giant), flying vehicles of all shapes and sizes, and sleek-looking towers reaching up to the stars.

Then, sadly, the cool stuff gets cut off as the story’s timeline fractures again, jumping to the present day where we follow a second protagonist, a teenage tech whiz with a rebel attitude named Casey (Britt Robertson). Through little acts of sabotage, she delays the dismantling of a NASA launch pad in her hometown of Cape Canaveral. Her focused devotion to such a futile endeavor makes her a perfect candidate for Plus Ultra, the group that populates Tomorrowland, and so one of the “T” pins mysteriously comes into her possession. We learn that it’s none other than Athena (who hasn’t aged a day, suspiciously) whose mission it is to recruit thinkers like Casey for Plus Ultra. After an explosive tussle with deadly robots disguised as geeky game store owners and a lot of driving, the two find Frank, now an old grouch exiled from Tomorrowland, living in a creaky old house decked out with futuristic gizmos. After another run-in with deadly robots, Casey and Athena convince Frank to take them back to the future. Er, I mean, Tomorrowland. Back to Tomorrowland.

While a lot of the visual tricks and set pieces are inventive and unconventional (a flashy-looking “time bomb” particularly tickled my fancy), the action overall feels kinda, well, weird. Everything moves a little too fast, and the camerawork and staging is so frenzied that we always feel one step behind. Things get disturbing, too, when the robots start shooting people with laser guns that dematerialize them, reducing them to thousands of bits of human remains. It’s off-putting to see these random acts of murder come and go so casually. Even the robots (who look like people) get literally torn to shreds by the booby traps in Frank’s house. One of them gets its face mangled by Casey when she bludgeons it over and over with a baseball bat. It’s like watching a blood-less version of Saw, and it gets really, really uncomfortable.

Frank’s arc plays out like you’d expect, with Casey and Athena re-igniting in the old grump the can-do spirit he lost as a boy. Clooney’s really good at his job (he constantly growls, “Ah, hell!” to sell us on his crankiness, and it works), but there’s nothing performance we can take home with us. Robertson sells the visual effects well with her open-jawed looks of astonishment (Jennifer Lawrence has become a grandmaster at this). But she, like Clooney, doesn’t go above and beyond her call of duty. Cassidy, the youngest cast member, is the only actor in the movie who excels, delivering her lines with as much maturity and poise as Clooney and Laurie. Sometimes you’ll see her standing in the background or on the side of the frame, reacting to Clooney and Robertson’s banter with looks of concern or amusement or sadness: In these small moments, she’s the best thing on the screen. That’s saying a lot.

Tomorrowland is all about bigness. It’s full of big ideas, big-budget visual effects, big-time action, and a great, big chin (his name is George). Why in the world, then, does it feel so goddamn small? It’s an issue of scale; while the movie starts off with sense of grandeur, reveling in the joy of imagination and ingenuity, the story’s scale progressively shrinks, to the point where, by the finale, the fate of two worlds is being fought over by four white people in a claustrophobic, computer generated room. I specify them as being white because I think it’s offensive that a film which claims to have a global message (at the end we see a montage of dreamers of all ethnicities looking to the sky with a glimmer in their eye; where were they in the rest of the film?!) suggests that the world can be a brighter place, but only once the human race’s potential is unlocked by caucasian geniuses.

The doomsday device that drives the film’s narrative is a machine on top of a tower that essentially spreads fear and cynicism across the world, poisoning our fragile minds. It’s a barely disguised skewering of modern media and news outlets, and ironically, it’s comes across like an off-base observation of the new generation’s collective intellect and temperament. Young people these days do have a troublingly romantic fascination with the idea of a dystopian future, but they’re not helplessly susceptible idiots. There’s a difference between cynicism and skepticism, and I don’t believe young people are little emo sacks of inaction Bird and Lindelof seem to suggest they are by making the movie’s messaging so blunt and condescending.

It hurts me that Bird, a storyteller near and dear to my heart, has produced such a clunker of a film. Tomorrowland fits into his filmography only to the extent that it’s about people striving to maximize their potential, a thread that runs throughout all his work. In almost every other respect, it’s uncharacteristically messy, contrived and ideologically confused. Optimism is key, though, and I sincerely hope Bird’s next offering will reflect the greatness he showed in The Incredibles, The Iron Giant and Ratatouille. Onwards and upwards, I suppose.

Let’s be honest for a minute. We all love George Clooney. He’s funny (Fantastic Mr. Fox), he’s sexy (The American), he’s smart (Michael Clayton), and he makes great movies (Ides of March). We also all love Brad Bird, whether we know it or not (The Incredibles, Mission: Impossible–Ghost Protocol). Which means we’re all pretty pumped for this summer’s Disney adventure Tomorrowland.

Tomorrowland sees disillusioned genius Frank (Clooney) and teenage scientist Casey (Britt Robertson) team up for a dangerous mission to uncover a secret place in time and space known only as Tomorrowland. For the most part the rest of the details have been kept tightly lidded, but since it’s a Disney movie we’re guessing that spectacle and hope will abound.

But even before we knew anything about this one, we were excited; Clooney is always solid, no matter the film, and Bird knows a thing or two about some good ol’ fashion light-hearted adventure that still leaves you hanging on the edge of your seat (not to mention his two Oscars). Pair that with a pretty wild supporting cast: Robertson, Hugh Laurie, Tim McGraw (?), Kathryn Hahn, and Judy Greer.  We had this one on our list of the 22 features we are most looking forward to in 2015, and it’s safe to say we are only getting more excited with each new trailer (the Eiffel Tower is a space ship!).

Check out the second trailer below:

So our first big awards ceremony of the season has now come and gone. In their third and final turn hosting, Tina Fey and Amy Poehler owned the opening monologue with some direct, honest, brave and spot-on hilarious jokes. Their were upsets (and quite a few instances where we didn’t predict the winners correctly) but here are our reactions to this year’s Golden Globe Awards.

Ananda Dillon

So there are plenty of things I didn’t call, let’s start there. The Grand Budapest Hotel taking home Comedy or Musical. I guess the only explanation I can think of there is that Birdman hardly fit the category anyway, though it was definitely the one we were expecting to hear called and that I was personally rooting for. There were the long shots I was hoping for, most specifically my call for Rosamund Pike for Actress in a Drama and Emma Stone for Supporting Actress. I knew they weren’t likely and am incredibly happy for Julianne Moore and Patricia Arquette so no hard feelings. All the other actor awards I called spot on. So I guess I can gloat about that. I had hoped the HFPA would get a little wacky with the women’s categories, but they went for the more obvious calls.

Obviously I wasn’t surprised by Richard Linklater‘s win for Best Director, nor Boyhood’s major take home as Best Drama, and while we were dead wrong about Best Screenplay it made me incredibly happy to see Alejandro G. Iñárritu up on stage accepting an award. We were also wrong when it came to the musical categories, but understand that the HFPA decided to be a bit more standard in those choices as well. We were also off with our choices for Foreign Language film and am a bit surprised they went with Leviathan over Ida, or even my backup vote of Force Majeure. Just makes it hard to predict where the Oscars might go. But the one category that I absolutely am flabbergasted by is the HFPA’s choice of How to Train Your Dragon 2 for Best Animated Film over the amazing and incomparable The Lego Movie. I’ve never had strong feelings about an animated film before and I’m truly despondent over their decision. Whatever, I expect the Academy to get it right.

I will say I thought Amy and Tina killed it, delivering jokes that were both daring and hilarious. Their jokes regarding Bill Cosby were of course the more triggering but they went next level delivering their best Cosby impressions, which before this whole scandal was everyone’s favorite way of poking fun at Cosby. It was absolutely meta and the best way to truly express the way humor allows us to showcase that no one deserves safety when using humor to cope with tragedy. Their jab at George Clooney and his more accomplished wife was pitch perfect in calling out Hollywood’s tendency to lose perspective, and the joke that Selma “totally worked and now everything is fine” was delivered perfectly by Tina Fey, casting a great light on unreasonable expectations for films of its ilk while also impressing that this isn’t the sort of conversation that should ever really end.

As for TV, once again the HFPA gets premature and gives too much love to first-season shows rather than reward the ones that have gotten stronger (a difficult feat these days) but if it gets more people to watch Transparent, fine by me. All in all, it was a fun evening, if a somewhat confusing one, and whether we can use much in the way of predictions for next Thursday’s Oscar nominations announcement seems unlikely.

C.J. Prince

Well, I guess I can’t say it was a particularly safe night, so that’s a positive. Tina and Amy were great, even though they were only on for a brief time after their monologue. But for the second year in the row they pull off a great George Clooney burn, and probably did the first funny Bill Cosby joke since that whole scandal broke out (there’s no point tiptoeing around it, so good for them for getting as tasteless as possible for network broadcast). But this is an awards show, so I guess I should talk about those…

I have to mention something about the TV awards first. In typical HFPA fashion, the awards went to freshmen shows instead of old favorites (remember Brooklyn Nine-Nine winning last year?). Sometimes that can lead to weird choices (how many people scratched their heads at Jane the Virgin winning Best Actress?), but other times an awesome show like Transparent ends up winning Best Comedy and Best Actor. So this is me saying that Transparent is an incredible show that deserves its awards, and if you haven’t seen it yet please do so immediately. So that’s that about TV.

Going back to the predictions Ananda and I made a few days ago, we wound up splitting on the acting awards. I was right about Julianne Moore, she was right about Eddie Redmayne. Apparently the HFPA love it when actors play people with horrible diseases. Don’t be surprised if Jennifer Aniston winds up playing a genius with ALS next year that discovers she has Alzheimers. We both wound up being right about Michael Keaton and Amy Adams in the comedy acting awards, but those seemed like obvious ones. What really took me by surprise (along with everyone else, I’m sure) is The Grand Budapest Hotel winning over Birdman. While I don’t love Wes Anderson’s latest film (I think it’s a pretty enjoyable trifle), I’m so happy it won over the annoying, unfunny Birdman. And hey, Wes Anderson just officially became a contender (I think?). HFPA also got the supporting actor/actress awards right, so good for them. Very happy Patricia Arquette won, and J.K. Simmons deserves every award under the sun for Whiplash. Some awards didn’t interest me in the slightest (I know my prediction was wrong about Best Score, but I don’t care about that category whatsoever), so I’ll just mention some notable wins and/or losses: Leviathan taking Best Foreign Film over Ida was great, and it gives me hope that Ida won’t get that Oscar so easily. I haven’t seen The Theory of Everything, but I’m bummed Oyelowo didn’t win for Selma. Ditto for Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcrawler. And The Lego Movie losing Best Animated might have been my biggest disappointment because it totally deserved it.

So all in all, a little more interesting than usual I guess. I’m sad to see Tina and Amy go as hosts, and I’m sure the HFPA will have a hard time picking a suitable replacement. And, oh yeah, Boyhood. Well I’m not surprised it won. You might have seen my thoughts on Boyhood already. I say good for Linklater, because he’s always been a great director. I just wish all of these trophies went to a different, better film by him, like Bernie or any of the Before films or hell, even School of Rock. After tonight, I think that the big Oscar for Best Picture is Boyhood‘s to lose at this point. What’ll be interesting is seeing what other films will end up getting nominated with it.

Universal Studios announced that the next Coen Brothers project, Hail, Caesar! has been slotted for February 5, 2016, according the EW.

The film looks to be a return to pure comedy for the Coens, their first since 2009’s A Serious Man, and stars George Clooney as a Hollywood fixer in the 1950s. The overall cast is very strong, including Scarlett Johansson, Ralph Fiennes, Tilda Swinton, Josh Brolin, Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill.

On first thought, the February date is a bit surprising and disappointing, considering the month is typically reserved for films that studios decide to dump while people are still focused on the upcoming Oscars. Also considering the film was initially thought to be released in 2015, this may be a bit of a bad sign. However, since the Coen Brothers are behind the project I wouldn’t be too concerned yet.

As the Coen Brothers continue to put together their follow-up to last year’s Inside Llewyn Davis, the enticing details about Hail, Caesar! have begun to stack up. Now set to join George Clooney in the film’s main cast is semi-frequent Coen collaborator Josh Brolin. Brolin, who last worked with the Coens on 2010’s True Grit also lead their last Oscar-winning effort No Country for Old Men.

Hail, Caesar! tells the story of Eddie Mannix, a “fixer” for the Hollywood studios in the 1950s, through the uniquely comedic perspective of Joel and Ethan Coen. During this era of Old Hollywood, it was common practice for studios to hire detectives and others to help maintain the squeaky clean image of its stars.

Universal Picture announced earlier this week that they had acquired worldwide distribution rights to Hail, Caesar! which is expected to be released in 2015.

Not only is Alfonso Cuaron’s Gravity one of the most visually immersive moviegoing experiences in memory, it’s also one of the handful of films that utilize 3-D technology to enhance the cinematic experience in a significant way. The “survival” element of Cuaron’s outer-space survival epic is unquestionably enhanced by the 3-D effect, which helps to convey the infinite vastness that constantly threatens to devour stars Sandra Bullock and George Clooney.

In this short vignette, which is essentially a showcase for View-D 3-D convergence technology, we’re shown an example of exactly what’s going on behind the curtain to make the 3-D in Gravity look so damn good. Here’s a description of the clip from the original post:

In this Artist Breakdown we analyse a scene from ‘Gravity’ starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney. Prime Focus World’s Richard Baker (Creative Director, View-D) and Matthew Bristowe (SVP, Production) take you on a step by step journey through the stereo conversion of the shot, describing how PFW’s View-D conversion process allows for the full integration of the VFX and conversion processes.

There will surely be more of these neat little breakdowns to come in the coming weeks, so keep an eye out for those!

Certainly no sci-fi film, and packed with more adrenaline than the average action film, it’s impossible not to have a physical reaction to the film Gravity. From the opening scene where astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney) and medical engineer Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) work high above the earth, the perspective is entirely disorienting. Voices from Houston check in on the astronauts, asking Dr. Stone if she’s feeling sick, and her queasy expression is easy to sympathize with. While the sensory impact of Gravity is what will make this film hard for any viewer to shake, it’s focus on every human’s instinct for survival and even human connectedness is what makes it a good film.

Gravity, while groundbreaking in its visuals, does rely upon them a bit heavily. The story is obvious by Hollywood conventions. Veteran astronaut Kowalski is finishing his final spacewalk, while Dr. Stone is on her first mission and not much of a space traveler. All seems to be going well in their mission to perform minor repairs on a space shuttle. A third astronaut, whose voice is all the character we’re really given of him, glides through space gleefully, as though to mock the tethers that keep him from spinning out into the cosmos. Then Houston gives them the command to abort. The Russians, (them again!), have destroyed one of their satellites and its remnants are hurtling in orbit directly toward them. A moment later they are bombarded with the high-speed pieces. Kowalski tries to hold on to Stone, but she is sent spiraling away from him. Thus begins her dizzying nightmare.

At times Alfonso Cuaron pulls the perspective into Stone’s helmet. Which, in that first harrowing moment, is the unending spinning of the universe as Dr. Stone demonstrates the laws of physics in sickening fashion. The universe has never seemed so big as in the drawn out minutes that Stone spends alone spinning into space unable to stop herself. Kowalski is able to reach her after a time, but their nerve-shattering journey to survive has only begun. With oxygen depleting, Kowalski’s jetpack running out of fuel, and the orbit of the earth set to bring the debris hurtling back at them in 90 minutes it’s a race against time and space, (sorry, I couldn’t resist), to survive.

Cuaron has been working on Gravity for almost four years, since the release of his last tale of human survival, Children of Men. Clearly drawn to stories of perseverance, Gravity isn’t as poignant as he is likely aiming for, but is most definitely a standout survival film. Cuaron’s decision to use Bullock in a space-based thriller may not seem the likely choice, but she was clearly a great decision. Her character is given the entirety of the sentimentality of the film to carry, including some hackneyed and hokey dialogue. But Sandy B. is America’s Sweetheart for good reason. She’s just so easy to root for. Each line delivered with just enough of an emotional waver in her soft voice to pull at the heart. Clooney is equally as typecast with his easy confidence and dulcet-tones that could talk anyone to safety. So while neither actor may be doing anything entirely new in their careers, they certainly do what they do best.

Choreographed and staged with intricate detail, the film’s visuals are like nothing ever experienced before in film. Forget ‘edge of your seat’, Gravity has its audience clinging to their seats and leaving with a newfound appreciation of terra firma. Never has 90 minutes felt so long. Alfonso Cuaron’s breathtaking film puts every viewer up into space in a way never before possible. Though admittedly in a way that may make any future space travelers think twice. Gravity is a healthy reminder of human smallness in a vast universe, but also successfully demonstrates the phenomenal strength of the human spirit.

Full disclosure: I personally do not like 3D movies, I feel that they are distracting to the true art of filmmaking. That being said, I saw the advanced screening of Gravity in 3D, however, my review would likely be no different for its 2D counterpart.

Gravity brings the long awaited return of Children of Men director Alfonso Cuarón. Set almost entirely in space, this sci-fi thriller with a dash of humor has stunning special effects and dedicated 3D scenes. Actors George Clooney and Sandra Bullock play characters Commander Matt Kowalsky and Mission Specialist Dr. Ryan Stone. Within the first 15 minutes viewers are taken from a light-hearted and even slightly humorous conversation between three astronauts outside a shuttle to an adrenaline packed thrill ride. The focus then turns to Bullock’s character who must now overcome the cornucopia of challenges that comes with trying to get back on Earth when you’ve just been flung into empty space by a large cloud of increasingly speeding satellite debris (all caused by the Russians of course).

I wish I could tell you the rest, but I’m guessing you would not like the spoilers. Besides, I forgot it all within 2 minutes of leaving my seat. It’s just not that memorable. What I can tell you is that it’s filled with dazzling special effects and “3d-ness” that is sure to wow and perhaps even shock some audiences. However, I thought it was overkill. With such a small amount of dialogue, you have more time to focus on the scenes that often were tilted or flipped, but I was severely disappointed by the lack story development through the somewhat meager pace of the movie. Bullock’s character has an emotional back story but that emotion remains untapped for the most part. The storyline itself is decent, though Gravity certainly left me begging for more development in both the story and the characters.

The two redeeming qualities in my opinion are the fact that it’s set in space and that the sound score was decent. Something that seems to have become more popular, but does not entirely distract from the poor storyline development and what to me are overly done special effects. It is sure to win something for it’s massive technical feats. Warning – if you just happen to be an astrophysicist or a nerdy space geek, you will shudder at the sight some of the scenes, just keep in mind it’s purely science fiction.

Gravity premieres October 4th for its wide release. Despite what I mentioned above, I suggest you go see it in theaters…perhaps with an astronaut’s helmet on if your local theater permits such awesomeness (and if it does not, you may want to find another theater). If you do decide to see it, keep a lookout for Marvin the Martian’s cameo appearance.

Gravity trailer:

My previous day at TIFF was originally going to comprise of four films as well, but unfortunately I had to bail out of one film due to pure tiredness (I’ll keep the film’s title unnamed here, but if it wasn’t for my physical limitations I would have stayed since it was good from what I saw). Luckily, I was able to chug through my second four-film day without a hitch, but I’ve learned now that it’s not something I should try more than once.

Night Moves

I decided to start my big day with Night Moves, which turned out to be the worst possible film to choose as a starting point. I’ve been a fan of Kelly Reichardt’s work from what I’ve seen, and was excited to see her approach being used on a genre film. Three activists from different walks of life get together to pull off a dangerous act of ‘eco-terror’: They buy a boat and rig it with explosives, hoping to blow up a dam. Theoretically what Reichardt is attempting here is interesting in its own right. Her stripped down style getting applied to a thriller makes for some neat moments, and the way things unravel so the three characters become corrupted by the same selfish behavior they abhor is a nice development.

The only problem is that Reichardt’s approach is bone dry, sucking out all of the tension and forward momentum. Paradoxically, while the main group (played by Jesse Eisenberg, Dakota Fanning and Peter Sarsgaard who all do their best at understating as much as possible) feel well-defined and realistic as characters, the tone of the film is so distant it’s impossible to feel anything about them. The last time Reichardt took a crack at a genre film it was the western with Meek’s Cutoff, which worked wonderfully. This time I think she simply picked the wrong area to work with. Hopefully next time she’ll be successful again with whatever she chooses.

RATING: 5.9

Gravity

Next up was the film that I had been waiting for since it was announced back in July: Gravity. Alfonso Cuaron spent seven years developing his follow-up to the brilliant Children of Men, and it’s apparent from the start just how much effort went into this film. The special effects are incredible, and it will be impossible to watch this without wondering exactly how they pulled off some moments. So Gravity does deliver in the spectacle department, but that’s mostly it. Granted it’s really good at it, and it’s an easy recommendation, but this is far from the new classic that people have been going on about.

Gravity is merely a well-done thriller that never lets up pacing-wise. Starting right in space with Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock), a new astronaut, and a veteran on his last mission (George Clooney), it takes all but 10 minutes before debris from a satellite crash has Bullock and Clooney flying in opposite directions with nothing to hold on to. That’s merely the start of the many, many problems Bullock encounters while she frantically tries to make it back to Earth alive, and by the end the amount of near-death experiences become absurd (and it drew some laughter from the audience as well).

There really won’t be anything better this year on a technical level, but Gravity is far too basic to enjoy beyond the surface. Bullock and Clooney are terrific in their roles, making the most of the little material they’re given. Bullock is given some backstory to work with, but the film’s suffocating and repetitive pace drown out any emotional impact. I know that what I’m saying sounds very negative about the film, but it’s mostly because I came away disappointed that Gravity did not live up to my high expectations. There are some truly incredible sequences in here, and for a studio tentpole it’s quite original, but don’t expect a masterpiece.

RATING: 7

October November

Continuing my strange tonal shifts in films throughout the day, I went to check out October November. Gotz Spielmann’s last film Revanche blew me away when I saw it years ago, and at the beginning I was expecting more of the same riveting drama when an actress (Nora von Waldstätten) is confronted by the wife of a man she’s having an affair with. That scene turns out to be the only moment where fireworks go off, as the focus shifts to the actress’ sister (Ursula Strauss) who runs a small hotel in the countryside owned by her father.

The two sisters reunite when their father takes a heart attack, and the tensions between them form the basis for October November. Strauss is jealous of her sister leaving to be successful while she was forced to stay at home, and Waldstätten feels like she has no idea who she really is. It’s another existential European drama, and Spielmann really doesn’t seem to know how to get these issues across. The majority of October November is a no-stakes drama until the final act sees the two daughters waiting for their father to finally pass away. Despite being superbly shot and acted, there really is very little to get interested in. There’s no doubt that Spielmann is still a mature and terrific writer/director, but he seems to have invested in subject matter that returns very little.

RATING: 6

Under the Skin

I ended my day with Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin, and what a way to close off my long weekend at TIFF. I’m not over the moon like some people who have seen this, but I can’t blame them for being so ecstatic. Glazer is a master of style, and his 9 year absence seems to have made his images even more striking. The film’s first half, which simply follows Scarlett Johansson’s alien character around as she seduces men to a horrific fate, works as an excellent mood piece. Glazer has created some shots that will probably stick with me more than any other film I’ve seen here, and Micah Levi’s score is one of the best of the year by leaps and bounds.

It pained me a lot when Under the Skin didn’t coalesce into something wholly terrific for me. The second half of the film, in which Johansson gains human qualities and gets hunted down by her alien superiors, is a step down from the beautifully expressive and original first half. Glazer seems to have a hard time getting across what he wants to say at some points (his goal, to show Earth through an outsider’s perspective, wasn’t exactly successful in my eyes), and while Johansson is great her role is too enigmatic to make any of the final acts resonate. At times horrifying, beautiful and strange, Under the Skin is a classic case of a film not adding up to the sum of its parts.

RATING: 6.9

Next up:

Ben Wheatley’s hallucinogenic trip through A Field in England, and the best film I’ve seen at TIFF.

Containing an all-star cast including, Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, Ewan McGregor and Juliette Lewis, comes a dramatic comedy based on the play by Tracy Letts. The film will be produced by George Clooney and Harvey Weinstein (amongst others) and distributed by The Weinstein Company. The trailer balances the contrasting seriousness and comedic values very well. What has me intrigued the most about John Wells’ August: Osage County is the assortment of characters and the actors that play them. The film seems like it will be very character driven, hopefully they will be developed enough for us to really invest in their emotional family drama.

Watch the official trailer for August: Osage County:

When you first watch this story of trickery and deceit, you may perceive it quite differently as you would following a second viewing. After seeing Burn After Reading for the first time in 2008, I was compelled to hate everything about it. I found it hard to enjoy the events that occurred, I was unhappy with the character arcs that Joel and Ethan chose and I was dissatisfied with the ending. Having recently watched it again, however, I was willing to retract my previous judgement and declare that I was quite taken with the quirky, deceitful scenarios that rolled out.

Burn After Reading is a story based upon the idea that when people want something badly enough, they can sometimes go to extreme measures in achieving it; and the Coen Brothers once again demonstrate different ridiculous outcomes to the everyday circumstances these characters endure.

Academy Award Winner, Frances McDormand (Fargo) – a Coen Brothers/Amy favourite, plays as Linda Litzke, a woman who is absolutely determined to undergo plastic surgery to reshape her body and uplift her life. The whole film is molded around Litzke’s unwavering focus on her desire to reinvent herself, and mishap after mishap ensues as her schemes become increasingly reckless (and as a result a lot more dangerous). Initially disheartened by her insurance company refusing to cover the surgery; Chad (Brad Pitt), discovers a disc containing what he believes to be “high quality information” that he presumes will help her money issues. What unfolds thereafter is a series of events that leads up to you finally thinking “so what did we just watch?” It is not a bad movie as a result of this, I enjoyed the fact it gave me time to reflect on what I had just sat through: a story full of real feelings, real emotions and a narrative that never leaves you wanting to drift off face first into your popcorn.

McDormand’s character portrayal is not the only one I wish to comment on, as Brad Pitt’s character Chad, was one of his most versatile performances to date. Playing an energetic yet comically naive personal trainer for a fitness centre, it gave Pitt a chance to step back from his alter ego Rusty Ryan/Tyler Durden persona. Chad’s simplicity gets him in a lot of trouble during the course of the film, but his optimism for life never falters.

Each scene leaves you thinking “what is actually happening” as the story continues to take us in many different directions. Subplots divide and multiply as the film unfolds, yet all are interwoven. You’re not necessarily confused with what the characters are up to, but more so why they’re perhaps building a reclining sex chair or chasing fitness instructors with an axe. There are characters that you’ll come to love or hate, but on some level you’ll secretly empathize with each and every one of them.

Joel and Ethan Coen have such a rich history in filming excellent and unforgettable movies, such as Raising Arizona (1987), Fargo (1996), The Big Lebowski (1998) and more recently No Country for Old Men (2007) and True Grit (2010), that anything they make is classed as unique and creative; and Burn After Reading ticks both those boxes. Because of how interesting the storylines for each character are and how entertainingly painful they are to watch, after every scene you’re constantly questioning yourself as to whether or not you love or hate the film.

The quote that the movie went for, “Intelligence is Relative”, fits perfectly to the references to the CIA, where “Intelligence” is paramount, every character, including those government officials, are clueless as to what is happening within their own lives let alone anyone else’s. It’s a great quote to summarize the plot and the characters alike – that there can be no stupid questions, only stupid answers; cue Burn after Reading.

The Descendants shares a lot in common with other films Alexander Payne has directed (About Schmidt, Sideways) in that it is about a middle-aged man on a journey of self-discovery. A man must learn how to raise his children while making some life changing decisions. The role for George Clooney is not very typical for him and does a good job with it. Even though the film felt contrived and underwhelming it is still watchable thanks to Clooney.

Matt King (George Clooney) must take charge of the household of two children when his wife ends up in coma after a bad boating accident. He is a lawyer who makes good money but he is a descendant of a Hawaiian princess who owned 25,000 acres of paradise. Matt does not believe in spoiling his children in his own words, “I want to leave them enough for them to do something but not too much that they do nothing.”

Going from the “backup parent” as he says to the primary parent is a difficult transition but he makes it look effortless. His youngest daughter, Scottie (Amara Miller) is ten years old and is having a hard time dealing with her mother being in the hospital. She is acting out in school and insulting girls out of frustration.

She gets her rebelliousness from her older sister Alexandra (Shailene Woodley). The seventeen year old spends most of her time hanging around boys and drugs which is why she is attending a boarding school. When Matt goes to pick her up from school so they can visit the hospital, she is found drinking after sneaking out.

As if Matt’s hands were not already full, two more events occur that complicate matters even more. The first is that the land he inherited he highly sought after for major commerce development. So he must decide to appease his family who want him to sell the land for the money or to keep the land to protect it.

The real blow comes when Alexandra shares what caused her and her mother to get into a major argument before the accident. She tells her father that her mother had been cheating on him and was considering asking for a divorce. The news hits him hard as you would expect and suddenly his focus is on something different.

He and Alexandra, now fueled by a bond, decide to investigate the man that their mother was having an affair with. They find his name and where he lives but are still not quite sure what the next step should be. When the doctors tell him that his wife will not wake up from coma, Matt just wants to find out as much as he can about this man and his side of the story.

George Clooney is definitely what made this film. Without his fine work I fear that the film would have been a disaster. He is featured in nearly every scene and makes the otherwise average film into something just a little bit more.

One of the problems I have with the film is that we are giving no background on his wife Elizabeth. We do not see any flashbacks or any insight as to who she was. This makes it hard to have any strong emotions about her or empathize with Matt for his loss.

Another issue I have with The Descendants is Sid’s character, it felt unneeded. Other than offering some comic relief, he was meaningless to the story. More times than not, I found myself asking why he is even in the scene at all.

Frankly, I do not see what all the Oscar buzz around The Descendants is all about. The film is certainly not a complete bust, but I am shocked that it is considered one of the front-runners for a Best Picture Oscar. The whole film is similar to the ending, it is tolerable but it could have been better.

Ricky Gervais returned as the host for the 69th Golden Globe Awards offending attendees with a beer just as he did last year. Although, this year he was a little more tame with his jokes, he proved he was worthy of being a repeating host.

As expected The Artist ended up with the most wins with three (including Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical and Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical). But The Descendants was a close second with two big wins (Best Motion Picture — Drama and Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama).

On the TV side of the awards no one show dominated and there were some surprises, namely Kelsey Grammer winning as Best Actor in a Drama and Matt LeBlanc getting a win for Best Actor in a Comedy. Game Of Thrones, Modern Family and American Horror Story each walked out with a win while Boardwalk Empire and Breaking Bad sadly going home empty handed.

The full list of Golden Globe film winners:
(The winners are highlighted in bold red font)

Best Motion Picture – Drama:
The Descendants
The Help
Hugo
The Ides of March
Moneyball
War Horse

Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical:
50/50
The Artist
Bridesmaids
Midnight in Paris
My Week With Marilyn

Best Director:
Woody Allen – Midnight in Paris
George Clooney – The Ides of March
Michel Hazanavicius – The Artist
Alexander Payne – The Descendants
Martin Scorsese – Hugo

Best Actress – Drama:
Glenn Close – Albert Nobbs
Viola Davis – The Help
Rooney Mara – The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Meryl Streep – The Iron Lady
Tilda Swinton – We Need to Talk About Kevin

Best Actor – Drama:
George Clooney – The Descendants
Leonardo DiCaprio – J. Edgar
Michael Fassbender – Shame
Ryan Gosling – The Ides of March
Brad Pitt – Moneyball

Best Actress – Comedy or Musical:
Jodie Foster – Carnage
Charlize Theron – Young Adult
Kristen Wiig – Bridesmaids
Michelle Williams – My Week With Marilyn
Kate Winslet – Carnage

Best Actor – Comedy or Musical:
Jean Dujardin – The Artist
Brendan Gleeson – The Guard
Joseph Gordon-Levitt – 50/50
Ryan Gosling – Crazy, Stupid, Love
Owen Wilson – Midnight In Paris

Best Supporting Actress:
Berenice Bejo – The Artist
Jessica Chastain – The Help
Janet McTeer – Albert Nobbs
Octavia Spencer – The Help
Shailene Woodley – The Descendants

Best Supporting Actor:
Kenneth Branagh – My Week with Marilyn
Albert Brooks – Drive
Jonah Hill – Moneyball
Viggo Mortensen – A Dangerous Method
Christopher Plummer, Beginners

Best Foreign Language Film:
The Flowers of War (China)
In the Land of Blood and Honey (USA)
The Kid With a Bike (Belgium)
A Separation (Iran)
The Skin I Live In (Spain)

Best Screenplay – Motion Picture:
Woody Allen – Midnight in Paris
George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Beau Willimon – The Ides of March
Michel Hazanavicius – The Artist
Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon, Jim Rash – The Descendants
Steven Zaillian, Aaron Sorkin – Moneyball

Best Original Score – Motion Picture:
Ludovic Bource – The Artist
Abel Korzeniowski – W.E.
Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross – The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Howard Shore – Hugo
John Williams – War Horse

Best Animated Feature Film:
The Adventures of Tintin
Arthur Christmas
Cars 2
Puss in Boots
Rango

Best Original Song – Motion Picture:
Hello Hello – Gnomeo & Juliet, music by Elton John, lyrics by Bernie Taupin
The Keeper – Machine Gun Preacher, music and lyrics by Chris Cornell
Lay Your Head Down – Albert Nobbs, music by Brian Byrne, lyrics by Glenn Close
The Living Proof – The Help, music by Mary J. Blige, Thomas Newman, Harvey Mason Jr.; lyrics by Mary J. Blige, Harvey Mason Jr., Damon Thomas
Masterpiece – W.E., music and lyrics by Madonna, Julie Frost, Jimmy Harry

Cecil B. DeMille Award:
Morgan Freeman

The full list of Golden Globe television winners:

Best Drama Series:
American Horror Story
Boardwalk Empire
Boss
Game of Thrones
Homeland

Best Comedy Or Musical:
Enlightened
Episodes
Glee
Modern Family
New Girl

Best TV Movie/Miniseries:
Cinema Verite
Downton Abbey
The Hour
Mildred Pierce
Too Big to Fail

Best Actress – Drama:
Claire Danes – Homeland
Mireille Enos – The Killing
Julianna Margulies – The Good Wife
Madeleine Stowe – Revenge
Callie Thorne – Necessary Roughness

Best Actor – Drama:
Steve Buscemi – Boardwalk Empire
Bryan Cranston – Breaking Bad
Kelsey Grammer – Boss
Jeremy Irons – The Borgias
Damian Lewis – Homeland

Best Actress – Comedy or Musical:
Laura Dern – Enlightened
Zooey Deschanel – New Girl
Tina Fey – 30 Rock
Laura Linney – The Big C
Amy Poehler – Parks and Recreation

Best Actor – Comedy or Musical:
Hugh Bonneville – Downtown Abbey
Idris Elba – Luther
William Hurt – Too Big to Fail
Bill Nighy – Page Eight
Dominic West – The Hour

Best Actress – TV Movie/Miniseries:
Romola Garai – The Hour
Diane Lane – Cinema Verite
Elizabeth McGovern – Downton Abbey
Emily Watson – Appropriate Adult
Kate Winslet – Mildred Pierce

Best Actor – TV Movie/Miniseries:
Alec Baldwin – 30 Rock
David Duchovny – Californication
Johnny Galecki – The Big Bang Theory
Thomas Jane – Hung
Matt LeBlanc – Episodes

Best Supporting Actress – TV Series:
Jessica Lange – American Horror Story
Kelly MacDonald – Boardwalk Empire
Maggie Smith – Downtown Abbey
Sofia Vergara – Modern Family
Evan Rachel Wood – Mildred Pierce

Best Supporting Actor – TV Series:
Peter Dinklage – Game of Thrones
Paul Giamatti – Too Big to Fail
Guy Pearce – Mildred Pierce
Tim Robbins – Cinema Verite
Eric Stonestreet – Modern Family

George Clooney directs and stars in his latest film, The Ides of March, which focuses on people involved in American politics and the scandals that often come with them. The film also shows how people evolve in politics from a passionate driven nobody who legitimately believes in what they are doing to a position climber who only cares about gaining power. These are all things most already know so you are not likely to walk away with anything new but thanks to the excellent cast giving strong performances it is not a deal breaker.

It is one week from the Ohio Democratic primary, which is one of the most important primaries because normally it puts the winner in a position to win the party and thus in the running for president in the general election. Mike Morris (George Clooney) is a Democrat governor who is looking to win this primary. Along his sides are his senior campaign manager Paul Zara (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and his press secretary Stephen Meyers (Ryan Gosling).

An example of how brilliant Stephen is, he comes up with a plan that would mandate 18 year olds to do 2 years of service of some kind whether that be in the army or the Peace Corps and in return their college will be paid for. They know that is a bold plan to announce but they also know the voting demographic will be for it since it does not affect them and the age group it does affect is too young to even vote.

Stephen makes the mistake of agreeing to meet with Tom Duffy (Paul Giamatti), who is the running mates campaign manager. Tom tries to lure Stephen into jump ship from his current position and work for his guy Senator Pullman. Stephen declines and that is when Tom lets him know that the race is much closer than he thinks. Tom informs him that they are in position to capture North Carolina’s delegates from a deal with the governor.

Stephen lets his team know of the situation and Paul comes up with a plan. Walk away from Ohio immediately and take a loss and head over to North Carolina to offer the governor a higher position if Morris is elected for his endorsement vote. Morris does not go for it and decides to stick it out in Ohio.

Meanwhile, a young intern named Molly Stearns (Evan Rachel Wood) takes interest in Stephen. They meet up outside of work where it is admitted that she has wanted him for some time now. He knows that they must keep this a secret but what he does not know is that he will soon discover a secret that could end the campaign in a heartbeat.

The ensemble cast is comprised of a collection of well-seasoned actors and actresses. A group that you would expect great performances from and they fulfill those expectations. With a cast of; George Clooney, Ryan Gosling, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Paul Giamatti, Evan Rachel Wood and Marisa Tomei, you just cannot go wrong in terms of performance.

Although the entire cast was great, the obvious stand out was Gosling. Watching his character development was my favorite quality of the film. You see Stephen changed from a guy who just wanted to win the polls to a guy that just wanted to get ahead in power.

If there is one thing you take away from The Ides of March it is that all politicians are dirty, even the ones you think are the good guys. Scandals are just the nature of being in politics, being under the microscope on everything you say and do does not help. It is nothing that most people did not already know which is why the storyline is fairly compelling but ultimately one that is not hard to predict how the scene would end once it had started.

Up In The Air has an all-star cast which received three Oscar nominations of the six total for the film, including Best Picture. Often times humorous and other times emotional, it features quick and witty dialogue with a unique storyline. That being said, it also does have its flaws.

Ryan Bingham’s (George Clooney) life is air travel and because of it, it is very orderly and systematic. Ryan’s job is to fly around the country to inform people that they are fired. He is very much alright with flying 270 days a year, in fact, he enjoys traveling in airports and different cities more than being at home.

Ryan meets Alex (Vera Farmiga) in an airport bar and the two first meet by quickly exchanging the differences between car rental companies as an attempt to impress one another. Then the two compare credit card reward cards before admitting they are two people that get turned on by elite status. They agree to meet each other in a couple weeks when they will be traveling closer to each other in another state.

Ryan returns home from his trip and does not forget to remind you that he does not particularly like being home. He is informed the next day at work that the company has decided to no longer fly workers around the country to fire people. Instead, he will be doing his job via video chat, thus grounding him at home and in his mind grounding his life. Not to mention shutting him down from the date he had just lined up.

So to no one’s surprise Ryan speaks out again this to his boss. It quickly involves the person who came up with the new plan, Natalie (Anna Kendrick). Natalie is a newly hired hard worker efficiency expert. She is very set on her way and lives life on deadlines both on and off work hours. She is a go getter and a planner and she blatantly says she does not mind being married to her career. She is not ashamed of it but does not want to settle in life.

Ryan convinces his boss into showing Natalie what he does on the road and tries to make his case that it cannot be done over the internet. She then travels with him to see what he does in person. He is trying to save what he believes his life is while at the same time she is trying to save the company’s efficiency.

Up In The Air finally reaches its most important part of the film when he is at his sister’s wedding. The groom gets cold feet and he is sent to deal with it. He talks people out of commitment and now has the task of talking the groom into commitment. Which is something he knows little about and you could say he is being a hypocrite because he has not subscribed to that way of thinking.

It was right about then he realizes that commitment is not as daunting and he thought. He has such a way with words; he more or less talks himself into it. Ryan realizes that perhaps he is ready to settle down with Alex after all. The only question left is has Alex turned over a new leaf as well?

Interestingly, the majority of the people we see getting fired at the beginning of Up In The Air are not actors (but obviously Zach Galifianakis is) but actual people who were recently laid off. The filmmakers put ads out and instructed people to treat the camera as if were like the person who fired them. I think that is a nice and creative touch to make it seem more believable.

After watching the film, I began to wonder if Natalie’s storyline even mattered. I believe they could have without her part. Although Anna Kendrick does a good job with this role, I don’t think it ultimately played any role of importance in the film.

The main idea behind the film is loyalty. The word was frequently in the background on airline advertisements. The airline, credit card and car rental places all have membership clubs that reward loyal customers. Both Ryan and Natalie are loyal to their jobs both have different views on what it means to be loyal in a relationship.

Up In The Air has an unique premise and good dialogue with acting that is beyond average but ultimately the storyline is a little bumpy. I am not sure if it is some ironic play on Ryan’s philosophy of empty backpacks and pointlessness but nearly every other character in the film besides himself is pointless. It was a well done film that should have been tied in together a little more.