Tag: gangster squad

La La Land Movie Review

Damien Chazelle has figured out innovative ways to marry music with film in a way that no other director has dared try in the 21st century and it permeates every frame of his sophomore feature La La Land. Let’s go back for a moment to the final scene of his masterful debut Whiplash. It culminated in a virtuoso drum performance from Miles Teller showing his skills from his dictatorial instructor J.K. Simmons that left a collective smile on the audience’s faces. That frown upside down feeling is immediately resurrected in the opening sequence here, as dozens of citizens stuck in L.A. traffic burst into a gleeful song and dance number. The message is loud and clear: writer/director Chazelle has been given the freedom to make a full-on old Hollywood style musical and he doesn’t shy away from the leeway.

Mia (Emma Stone) is an aspiring actress who works on the Warner Bros lot as a barista as she hustles from one despairing audition to the next. Sebastian (Ryan Gosling) is a jazz pianist who’s playing restaurants and pining to open his own club as he laments the  demise of the genre he adores. The two meet briefly and not romantically on that aforementioned Southern California freeway and keep bumping into each other. It takes them awhile to recognize that they adore one another. In Chazelle’s world, that elevation of their courtship involves some amazingly choreographed numbers. A particular highlight is one that occurs at the famed Griffith Observatory.

La La Land tracks the couple as their professional lives rise and fall. Mia is determined to get her one woman play off the ground. Sebastian joins a jazz fusion band led by John Legend and even though he’s not wild with their sound, it’s a steady paycheck. The picture coasts for a good portion of its running time on its harmonious relationship of the leads.

Yet real life eventually causes the needle to skip on their joyous record of happiness. It is then that those issues Mia and Sebastian experience allow the two actors playing them to stretch their dramatic chords. This is the third time Gosling and Stone have been together on screen (the others being Crazy, Stupid, Love and Gangster Squad) and their chemistry is already well established and rock solid. There’s a final audition scene involving Stone in which she left the crowd silent with her voice.

When we reach the third act, the decades old Hollywood rules in this genre of happily ever after don’t necessarily apply. Chazelle fashions a what if segment that is both inspiring and a bit heartbreaking, all while keeping us in tune with the boldness of taking something old and making it new. And you’ll be smiling again when the fade out occurs.

***1/2 (out of four)

Gangster Squad and Broken City Movie Reviews

January is typically seen as a dumping ground for films that studios have little confidence in. When a picture opens in the first month of the year with big stars, that can usually be seen as a red flag. And so it is with Gangster Squad and Broken City, which both opened in January to disappointing box office results. Audiences got it right here – they’re both forgettable titles that don’t deserve the considerable talent involved.

Gangster Squad is from Zombieland director Ruben Fleischer and takes place in Los Angeles circa 1949 when gangster Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn) has taken over the city with his particularly deadly Mob tactics. A straight-laced Sergeant (Josh Brolin) is enlisted by the police chief (Nick Nolte) to form a squad to take Mickey out and restore order at any cost. Brolin enlists lots of recognizable actors to help in the cause, from Ryan Gosling to Giovanni Ribisi to Michael Pena to Robert Patrick to Anthony Mackie.

The pic is a highly stylized exercise whose tone is closer to The Untouchables than other genre entries. The difference? The Untouchables was really good and effective. Squad feels unoriginal and derivative. Sure, it looks good, but you won’t remember much about it the morning. Most of the actors try their best, but they have skimpy material to work with.

Among the issues I had: we get a romance between Gosling’s character and Mickey’s girlfriend, played by Emma Stone. As you will recall, Gosling and Stone had major chemistry in 2011’s romantic comedy Crazy Stupid Love. Here, their relationship is underwritten and dull and it left me wishing I was watching their previous movie. Sean Penn, one of the finest actors of his generation, goes way over the top as Mickey. Also, his make-up job is pretty ridiculous. Brolin’s character is a bit of a bore and ultra cliched. He even comes with the pregnant wife whose character is straight outta Screenwriting 101.

Gangster Squad wants to bash us over the head with its excessive violence, but never bothers to give us interesting, well-written characters to get involved with. Director Fleischer showed tremendous promise with the original Zombieland. This movie doesn’t have an original idea or thought in its head.

Gangster Squad: ** (out of four)

Mark Wahlberg and Russell Crowe headline Broken City from director Allen Hughes (who co-directed Menace II Society and From Hell with his brother). The city is New York City, where Wahlberg is an ex-cop turned private eye who’s hired by the corrupt Mayor (Crowe) to find out who his wife is sleeping with days before the Mayoral election. This leads to your usual double crosses and instances where “not all is at it seems!”.

The first hour or so of City is decent if unremarkable. Eventually, the screenplay moves toward twists and turns that rely on BIG and unbelievable conveniences, like Wahlberg finding key pieces of evidence in a dumpster where the rest of the documents are being shredded. Thank goodness they forgot to shred the most important piece of evidence!

Like Squad, the characters are poorly developed. Wahlberg’s story arc is a familiar one – he’s a cop who may or may not have shot an unarmed suspect. He had a drinking problem… wanna take bets on if he relapses? He’s conflicted about doing the right thing, yada, yada, yada…

Crowe adds some decent acting to an otherwise unremarkable character. Catherine Zeta-Jones doesn’t have much to do as his neglected wife, who may or may not be having an affair.

Broken City fails mostly because of a lackluster screenplay. Wahlberg and Crowe deserve better and director Hughes has certainly shown an ability to do far better.

Broken City: ** (out of four)

So the January curse holds true for these pictures. Are they both watchable? Sure, but with lots of end of 2012 titles just reaching home release and the summer season beginning at the multiplex, why waste your time? I just did that for you!