500 Days of Summer

Narrator: There are two types of people: a woman and a man.

Absolutely the best film that I’ve seen all year. This is the most clever, un-romantic/yet romantic comedy. Tom [Joseph Gordon-Levitt] immediately becomes smitten with Summer [Zooey Deschanel]. He’s a super sensitive guy who has always felt that without love, without a girlfriend his life is incomplete. Summer is the bubbly, free-spirit who makes no plans and takes a day at a time. Tom picks apart every encounter with Summer and overanalyzes everything 500 Days of Summer flips your expectations upside down. It mixes things up. Tom wants Summer to commit. He wants her to be his girlfriend. From the beginning, she tells him, in guy-style, that she is not looking for a relationship and that: “There’s no such thing as love. It’s fantasy.” 500 Days of Summer will make you laugh and marvel at the sparkling Deschanel and a brooding, introspective Gordon-Levitt. Quality acting by two of the most talented younger actors, a creative script, and sweet, real, laugh-out-loud and cringe-worthy moments make 500 Days of Summer is a must-see and a near perfect film.

Grade: A

In the Loop

Hysterical, witty, brash British comedy the imagines the days behind closed doors at Downing Street and in other offices of the British and U.S. government leading up to the Iraq War. Basically the U.S. President and the British Prime Minister are gung ho [as history shows] to go to war but not everyone working for them is in agreement or in such a hurry to send the troops into harm’s way. In the Loop is about politicians who appear to be self-composed and put together and full of the perfect sound bites and then they collapse under pressure or are completely different away from the public and media. In the Loop is fast-paced and provides an insight into British politics as well as a bit of a viewpoint into what the Brits think of Americans [we are Rock Stars! in their eyes apparently]. Directed by Armando Iannucci and written by Jesse Armstrong and Simon Blackwell. An impressive cast includes: Peter Capaldi [Skins, Torchwood], Tom Hollander [The Soloist, Valkyrie], James Gandolfini [The Sopranos, The Mexican], Gina McKee [Atonement], Steve Coogan [Hamlet 2, Tropic Thunder], Anna Chulmsky [all grown up star of My Girl, Blood Car]. You will laugh so much that you might miss some of the lines and will have to put it in your netflix queue!

Grade: A-

After the screening, Director Armando Iannucci said that leading up to Iraq, there were intelligent people having no idea what to do and then “British going to America and getting starstruck with press and glitter of Washington”

He added: “few people in Washington against the war resigned. they just moved laterallly.”

About In the Loop: He wanted the film to be “funny but not belittling the subject, just come at it from every angle. Fundamentally it’s about the war.”

Children of Invention

Children of Invention is a surprising film about a hard-working, impassioned mother. At the beginning of the film, we watch as Elaine, a divorced mother from Hong Kong, who no longer can afford the mortgage on her house moves out while the police watch. There’s that tense edge as when someone gets laid off from work and must be escorted off the premises by security. Since she and her two children are moving to a small apartment, they cannot take their couch with them. As they drive off, one of the lasting powerful images of the film is the couch and tons of bottles of discarded vitamins (Elaine had tried her hand at selling blue algae).

Though we see Elaine studying through a Real Estate broker’s exam book, she wants a quick money fix and keeps calling advertisements for marketing and sales that do not seem all that solid. Out of desperation for quick money to jump start her life, Elaine becomes involved in a pyramid scheme. Natively she works 16-hour days, paying little attention to the needs of her two children. Though she makes questionable decisions, Elaine remains strong and determined to belong, succeed and make life for her two children easier than it is for her. Elaine worked while her ex-husband earned his engineering degree and then after the divorce he returned to Hong Kong.

One night when Elaine fails to return home from her job, Elaine’s two children, Raymond and Tina, must fend for themselves. This takes them out to Boston with a plan based on Raymond’s quirky inventions. The result is sweet, moving and a slice of familial bonding. Written and directed by Boston native Tze Chun and loosely based on aspects of his own childhood, Children of Invention poignantly and creatively bridges traditional Asian culture with United States desires and prosperity.

Grade: A-

The Missing Person

I’m in the hide and seek business.
That’s for kids.
If you add some money to it, it’s for adults.

Quirky noir starring Michael Shannon [Revolutionary Road] as alcoholic private investigator John Roscow gets a case to follow a guy with few other instructions. He almost too low key and too mellow but sometimes it works to his benefit under the circumstances. Amy Ryan [Gone Baby Gone] plays the assistant to the man who has hired the PI. Ryan and Shannon have a sardonic relationship that fits the film and its ending.So we ask, as he does, who is this guy? What is important? What is he doing? He seems suspicious because he’s traveling with a young Mexican boy. Roscow sets out after him and doesn’t find out very much about the guy. So then what is the deal? Roscow is an odd one and you just know more layers will be revealed. The entire film I wondered why the title was The Missing Person until both men are connected in some way to 9/11. The Missing Person is an amusing old-fashioned style gumshoe film with an intriguing secret that reveals itself toward the end.

Grade: B-

I’m 35. I’ve only lived life through roles written for me by you. I want an unwritten life. No more stories.
–Bloom

Mexico is—and I don’t like to vilify an entire country—but Mexico’s a horrible place.
–Stephen

The Brothers Bloom, written and directed by Rian Johnson [Brick], is a refreshing, surprising and unique comedy. The Brothers Bloom is quirky and clever, with many hysterical moments. The film centers around two brothers who spent their youth in and out of foster homes. Stephen [Mark Ruffalo] and Bloom [Adrien Brody] adapted to new situations by becoming quick on their feet and creating various characters in order to blend in and to get what they wanted or needed at the time. As adults, the two brothers now jet set around the world as notorious con artists. Stephen devises the master plan, weaves the stories and creates the characters to dupe millionaires out of their money. [It is hysterical to see his blueprints of the plans. The style has not changed from his childhood to present day.] Bloom has the task to befriend the mark. He’s quiet and disarming. Genuine and charming.

The brothers decide to embark on one last job. The target: an eccentric heiress in New Jersey, Penelope (Rachel Weisz), and Stephen knows that she will be an easy target.

Stephen remains the mastermind. He acts and controls. He and Bloom have a complex relationship as Stephen is the older brother and the stronger-willed one. Bloom is overly sensitive and caring. Sometimes too much so in their chosen field of work.

Introverted Bloom worries and analyzes everything while Penelope, suddenly free to explore the world, is a ray of sunshine, smiling her way through any situation. She turns out to be an asset instead of a mark. Bloom falls in love with her, definitely not part of Stephen’s plans. But how could he not? She’s beautiful, smart, charming and delightful. They perfectly balance each other’s personalities.

Each character seems stuck. Stephen does not want to give up the game, the planning, and the con. Bloom cannot tear himself away from Stephen and what Stephen wants him to do. He cannot make his own decisions that will make him truly happy. Penelope’s privileged background keeps her from living a full life and her own life.

A snappy script with twisty moments and action-packed scenes makes The Brothers Bloom an outstanding film.

Grade: A-

First, I’m an artist.
Second, I’m a surgeon.
–Dr. Marcie

In 2003, Dr. Marci Bowers left her family and thriving OB/GYN practice in Seattle to take over Dr. Stanley Biber’s genital reassignment surgery (GRS) practice in Trinidad, Colorodo, and a former coal mining town of 9,000. “Trinidad . . . for the transgender community became kind of a spiritual place and of course the sex change capital of the world,” said Dr. Marci Bowers. Marci is the first transgender woman to perform GRS.

“It’s not gender reassignment surgery but genital reassignment. It’s aligning the genitals with the gender that’s always been in place,” explained Marci.

The medical aspect is unnecessary. Dr. Marci shows close-ups of hairy post-op reconstructed vaginas with clitoris, vulva and proper symmetry. It steers away from the true point of the film: understanding the people behind the surgical procedures. This isn’t a surgical show. All of a sudden I felt we were delving into the blood and gore of surgery. Bloody skin being stretched and stitched.

Trinidad would have maintained greater understanding for transgendered if the filmmakers, PJ Raval and Jay Hodges, keep their cameras on the characters instead of delving into the surgical suite.

The true beautiful aspects of the film are the moments it focuses on three different transgender women. There is Marci’s story, as well as that of Sabrina Marcus, an engineer and founder of the Southern Comfort Transgender Conference, and Dr. Laura Ellis, a family practitioner. Both women are working to establish a recovery bed-and-breakfast for post-operative transgender patients.

Sabrina is the most interesting woman of the three as she is honest and sincere about her decision. She came out as transsexual in her late teens to early 20s and started dressing as a woman but then met and married a woman, and had children. I adore her refreshing candor. She and her wife divorced though she still has parental and visitation rights of her teenage children who are very easy going and supportive.

Due to the fact that she was transitioning from a man to a woman, Sabrina lost her job as a shuttle engineer. She admits to her life’s dichotomy and complexity as she was living as “½ man, ½ woman.”

Sabrina adds: “You’re almost pushed into this environment where you’re either a boy or a girl. There really needs to be an allowance for someone who needs to be in the middle. I consider myself a transsexual woman.”

At one point she admits that she misses aspects of being a man and that few transgendered people would ever share that thought. That comment was really eye-opening to me. I would never think that after so many years of being trapped in the wrong body that someone would miss the old body.

Trinidad tries to be a film that opens up the audience’s eyes to the little know transgender community. The filmmakers have interviews with townspeople: some who do not understand the transgender community at all and a few more open minded people who say that whatever makes someone feel comfortable should be accepted. But it does seem that a line is drawn in the sand between the transgendered and many in the community. Trinidad is a film about tolerance, individuality and being oneself in one’s body and one’s own skin.

Sunday, April 26, 5:45, Somerville Theatre.

GRADE: C+