The Hunger Games ***½

Director: Gary Ross
Cast: Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth
Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Willow Shields, Wes Bentley
Paula Malcomson, Toby Jones, Lenny Kravitz, Donald Sutherland
Stanley Tucci, Amandla Stenberg, Alexander Ludwig, Jack Quaid

One of the most disturbing realizations upon watching The Hunger Games is that the post-apocalyptic story revolves around a reality television show; meaning that yes, reality television programs are the entertainment equivalent of cockroaches and might survive much nobler art forms after the end of times. The show in this case is a twisted version of the Olympics titled "The Hunger Games", held every year by members of the Capitol to remember their violent history. During the games, twenty four men and women - between the ages of 12 to 18 - represent their districts and battle each other to death, until only one victor remains.
The movie concentrates on the 74th edition of the games and mainly follows Katniss Everdeen (Lawrence) the female tribute from the impoverished District 12. Katniss is an expert hunter who has been providing for her family since the death of her father in a mining accident (event which we see exclusively through dialogue-free flashbacks), it's her deep love for her little sister Prim (Shields) that drives her to offer herself as volunteer after Prim is chosen.
Katniss, along with male tribute Peeta (Hutcherson) and their mentor Haymitch (Harrelson), travel to the Capitol guided by the extravagant Effie Trinket (Banks), where they experience for the first time the riches and luxuries they would've never dreamt of having in their districts. But this land is no Oz and serves them merely as the lavish waiting room where they await their eventual participation in the games.
Eventually they are thrown onto a field populated with deathly traps, genetically engineered critters and more terrifying: other human beings whose only purpose is to survive.
Whatever the movie needs to say about the sad reality of entertainment in our times, in which suffering and schadenfreude seem to be the one thing audiences need to be happy, isn't as disturbing as the way in which it's told.
The Hunger Games, based on the popular book by Suzanne Collins, seems to be a critique of dumbed down entertainment but going beyond the genre limitations, it actually forces us to look beyond what we think of as "entertainment".
More than addressing the ridiculousness of reality television, which if nothing else is a disturbingly precise metaphor for "efficient capitalism" (minimum effort maximizing profit), we also come to terms with how journalism has become a sort of Roman sport in its own way.
Watching the film you are more reminded of CNN than you are of Survivor, especially when it's suggested that the games are broadcast twenty four hours a day. The film doesn't try to get to the source of this blood thirst, instead it focuses on one of the stars.
As played by Lawrence, Katniss is a young woman who knows what she wants and how to get it. The hunger in her eyes goes beyond putting a piece of bread in her mouth, it speaks of revenge, hatred and manipulation. Katniss isn't completely likable and that's what makes her so fascinating to watch.
Few actresses are able to empty themselves completely in the effortless way Lawrence does. It seems to take her absolutely nothing to "play" someone. In the movie, Katniss is forced to pretend she has a crush on Peeta, if only to get sponsors who might help her win.
Watching the way in which the lovestruck young man looks at Katniss, we aren't only convinced that she is playing the part to perfection, we also begin to question the nature of emotions. Several movies fail because they think of love as something pure and divine, The Hunger Games succeeds because it understands that love after all might be nothing more than a human creation.
Directed with utmost precision by Gary Ross, the film takes on the harsh task of transforming a novel told in the first person, into a movie that deals with the machinations of a larger social scheme. Ross understands that even this kind of brutality must be entertaining and crafts a movie that feels profound without dangling on extreme snobbery. The film becomes especially effective when we realize it's a direct representation of the story being told.
Novels tell us, movies show us and The Hunger Games then quite literally becomes "The Hunger Games", as we watch actors pretend to be young people who kill each other. Unlike the gamemakers in his movie, Ross is a merciful director and he spares us the need to watch extreme violence. He also denies us the pleasure of getting to know the characters better, which could come off as cold hearted but in all honesty, when's the last time you "knew" the Olympic games competitors? This lack of intimacy makes the film feel even more realistic, its points the more prescient and appropriate. It doesn't avoid the moral dilemmas, it simply establishes that it would never be able to solve them. Does your favorite Olympic sporting event change when one of the teams or competitors comes from a poor country? Perhaps in the future our desire to entertain ourselves will be directly connected to our selfish sense of survival. The movie reminds us that even then, once it's over, we can simply look away from the screen and move on with our lives.

Short Take: "Take Shelter", "Margin Call" and "Texas Killing Fields"

In Take Shelter, Michael Shannon plays Curtis, a man who is having constant apocalyptic visions, and can you blame him? With the world going through one of its most severe cases of economic, cultural and sociological

crises, he would need to be heavily sedated to be optimistic. This is the film's magic, how writer/director Jeff Nichols transports all these feelings of impending doom and crafts with them, not a preposterous ode to negativity but an intelligent psychological portrait about the way in which our subconscious manifests its fears.

The film isn't clever because we wonder whether Curtis' visions are signs of insanity or actual premonitions, but because of the way in which Shannon taps onto the fear of losing one's mind when trying to remain a responsible member of society. The film is almost socialist in the way it so fixates itself on work, as Curtis builds a shelter to protect his family (the ubiquitous Jessica Chastain plays his wife and is nothing short of perfect). Nichols crafts a workman symbolism as we see, construction worker, Curtis dig deep down into the ground to escape from a sky that for the first time seems to be noticing him. He's trying to escape doom by working harder. Now how's that for a pitch perfect snapshot of our times?  

Margin Call deals with the corruption that goes behind the stock market and emphasizes on the "thrills" that make Wall Street such an adored object of Hollywood's attention. Why not make a comedy about  this for once? The film doesn't really contribute anything new to the genre with Penn Badgley and Zachary Quinto playing the wide eyed virgins willing to sell their soul to get a piece of the pie and Kevin Spacey and Jeremy Irons playing larger-than-life monsters who control everything with their ruthlessness and suspenders. The ensemble is quite effective (despite having the likes of Simon Baker and Demi Moore in its ranks) but the film's lack of actual excitement makes it endlessly dull.

Oy, Sam Worthington really needs blue aliens or Keira Knightley to turn in semi-decent performances, playing a violent detective in Texas Killing Fields does him no favors, but then again the material does none of the actors any favor (although Jessica Chastain somehow manages to deliver the goods). This serial killer flick had all the makings of a B-gore fest, but everything is so overdone that its intention to be some sort of feminist essay bites in the back by becoming endlessly stereotypical and cliché. The film was directed by Michael Mann's daughter and one would wish she had inherited some of her dad's stylish eye for crime movies.

Grades
Take Shelter ***
Margin Call **
Texas Killing Fields *

Captain America: The First Avenger ***

Director: Joe Johnston

Cast: Chris Evans, Sebastian Stan, Tommy Lee Jones

Hayley Atwell, Neal McDonough, Dominic Cooper

Hugo Weaving, Derek Luke, Stanley Tucci

Out of the large universe of Marvel superheroes, Captain America has always been one of the strangest because unlike say, Spider-Man or Hulk, despite their US headquarters, he doesn't really represent a global cause. The stars and spangles on his uniform appeal specifically to Americans and no, the rest of the world does not consider the US of A to be its savior. In fact it's essentially intriguing to ask oneself why would a studio bother in making and distributing a film about such a specifically American icon when the country has unarguably been losing more and more prestige as a mediator of nations. Oh wait, there we have the answer...

In reality this film isn't so much a prequel to The Avengers or yet another money making blockbuster, it's basically a propagandistic piece that tries to recover the very American idea which says that the prouder you are of the USA, the more you will make foreigners admire you.

This sounds like a tough sell after the disastrous international consequences brought about by the Bush administration and the mixture of antipathy and pity brought on by the inefficient Obama government.

Each of these factors make Captain America: The First Avenger a complex beast because it's meant precisely to work as the sort of nationalistic fluff made during the war, designed to attract young men to enlist and young women to drool over their efforts. So, what's the best way to convey this without getting flack from liberals and extremist praise from conservatives? You make the movie an homage to the lost art of propaganda, you set it during the era when it thrived, you bash in the method's techniques and surreal patriotism and you get to have your cake and eat it too.

This is precisely what director Johnston does for this film, he borrows the retro aesthetics of his superb The Rocketeer, throws in some modern quips to satisfy comic book fans and even casts non-distinctive actors (can anyone tell the difference between Atwell, Sienna Miller and Claire Danes?) to fulfill the promise that anyone can become Captain America.

Chris Evans pulls off the all-American handsome blue eyed, blonde hair look as super soldier Steve Rogers, who starts out as a Benjamin Button-ized skinny young man with good intentions who catches the eye of a Nazi-escapee scientist (the always wonderful Tucci) who realizes he's the best subject for his new program. Rogers then is injected with a serum that - in the best fairy tale way - creates a physical manifestation of his inner values. Therefore the meek Rogers who hates bullies and never says no to a good cause turns into the obscenely muscular version of Evans we already know. Problem is that before he escaped Germany, the good scientist also conducted the experiment on the insane Dr. Schmidt (Weaving) who turned into a supervillain trying to destroy the world by means of Nordic god weaponry.

The film then becomes a brisk adventure that recalls 30s and 40s serials, the film exudes a lovely Indiana Jones spirit and the art design and costumes are spot on. The film is often at its best when it inadvertently gives us glimpses of the futuristic views of the past. Cooper is a scene-stealer as crazily seductive engineer Howard Stark (Iron Man's dad) and he shows absolute joy in a manic Howard Hughes inspired way. Gotta love that he gets to pull off the mustache now favored by hipsters the world over, while staying true to the aesthetics and customs of the era he's in.

For all its talk of American pride and honor, the film can get quite sneaky at times and you might find yourself rooting for the Captain's illegal operations. Perhaps all changes in times of war but to justify invasion in this day and era feels like an ethical conundrum, even in the name of blockbuster joys. Best of all is that Johnston never denies his intentions, at one point Dr. Schmidt reminds the Cap that he's not an emblem of nations, that his cause is in the name of one particular country. Of course he ignores him and despite our best efforts to keep neautral, we keep on cheering for him until the very end.

Burlesque **

Director: Steven Antin

Cast: Cher, Christina Aguilera

Eric Dane, Cam Gigandet, Kristen Bell, Dianna Agron

Alan Cumming, Peter Gallagher, Stanley Tucci

If The Pussycat Dolls could sing and had been discovered by Cher, their story would look something like Burlesque.

The story in the film has been told a million times (and in much better ways) but here's the deal:

Ali (Aguilera) is a small town girl trying to make it in Los Angeles, who just happens to sing like Christina Aguilera.

Tess (Cher) is a club owner trying her best to save her club from a real estate mogul (Dane) who wants to buy it from her, of course the club's not doing well and the only thing that could save them would be a new star...

Things do go as you expect them to and the movie pretends it's not about how well they tell the story but about how it looks.

The musical numbers are done in a Bob Fosse-meets a Kylie Minogue concert way and as such are quite effective. There's lots of lights, lots of feathers, more hot girls than Tess could ever afford to keep on payroll and of course Aguilera squeezes those pipes like there's no tomorrow.

Yet the thing is that for all of its flash and glitter, the movie can't help but feel absolutely lacking. For instance the second Aguilera comes onscreen (which is immediately after the studio logos appear) we know the gal can sing (in fact she does a number by herself as soon as the opening credits appear).

So when the moment comes for Tess and the club people to realize she has a talent, the audience is way knowledgeable of this fact (not to mention that Aguilera isn't much of an actress and Ali really comes often looking as a poorly dressed version of the singer).

In between numbers we get glimpses of the characters' lives and Aguilera gets a love triangle (with the efficiently cute Gigandet and Dane), Tess gets rejected by banks and other characters fill stock roles with grace (would've been fantastic to see more of Kristen Bell's bitchy Nikki).

The movie is instantly forgettable but boy do we come out craving more Cher. Her appearances are quite limited and she does the best numbers in the movie but we just can't get enough of her attitude, her flawless skin and her stingy one-liners (her chemistry with Tucci who technically reprises his character from The Devil Wears Prada) is just fantastic.

But Burlesque will not please those who expect their films to make any sense and demand more than lights and heavy makeup to have a good time at the movies.

For those, a complimentary cocktail or two are a must before entering this club.

Easy A ***

Director: Will Gluck
Cast: Emma Stone, Alyson Michalka, Penn Badgley
Amanda Bynes, Thomas Haden Church, Patricia Clarkson
Stanley Tucci, Lisa Kudrow, Cam Gigandet, Malcolm McDowell
Dan Byrd, Jake Sandvig

You know how they usually say "save the best for last", right? Have you noticed then, how movie credits usually do that when they know they have something special on their hands? They refer to a special someone by "introducing" or "presenting" and in some cases they go by the very humble "and". Such is the case of Easy A, watching its inventive credits we take in a quite remarkable cast (Kudrow! Church! Tucci and Clarkson! McDowell! all of whom are amazing by the way) before we are told that there's also someone named Emma Stone starring in the film.
What nobody tells us is how much of Ms. Stone we'll be seeing and how extraordinary she is. She plays Olive Penderghast, a high school student who unintentionally sets her reputation on fire.
Trying to look for an excuse to indulge in some secret single behavior and not hang out with her constricting best friend Rhiannon (Michalka) during the weekend she tells her that she has a date.
Come Monday morning, Rhi interrogates Olive so much that just to shut her up she ends up confessing she lost her virginity to a college guy during the weekend.
This confession happens to be heard by school prude Maryanne (Bynes) who then proceeds to spread the story faster than an STD. Olive soon becomes notorious for putting out and she begins getting the strangest requests from people who ask her to say she had sex with them to lubricate their high school social status.
In this way she "beds" a closeted gay guy, an underachieving geek and just about anyone else willing to give her a gift certificate for some nice restaurant.
Unlike teen flicks where the idea of sex is shrouded by mystery, prudishness or just plain horniness, Easy A approaches it from a completely mature place and makes us wonder exactly what is so special about sex in a day and age when it could either mean uber coolness or complete degradation.
The screenwriters aptly compare Olive's conundrum to that of Hester Prynne from The Scarlet Letter who had to carry a red letter on her dress to condemn her adultery and the director asks us for example what are social networks if not scarlet letters of our own making?
Therefore when Olive realizes the mess she's in, instead of trying to dispel the rumors she becomes empowered by them. She creates a strong sexual persona for herself in which she can feel comfortable and powerful.
Of course, the movie never implies that people should go around faking sexual histories and we see how the situation gets out of hand for the heroine but we leave the movie wondering why we act towards sex like we do.
How many people you know for example, have faked entire stories about their conquests or inversely lied about their promiscuity? For what purpose?
This movie makes us question the idea of sex in a world where it can become a pro or a con. For everyone who thinks it's awesome we slept with three strangers during a weekend, others are ready to take us to hell and make us pay for these sins.
The best thing about Easy A is that it doesn't pretend to know the answers to these questions, like a living thing it makes discoveries along with its protagonist. And what a star they got!
Stone is pure comedic perfection. Watch how she delivers her complicated lines without the awkward selfconsciousness of Ellen Page or how she embraces her provocative beauty without the lack of restraint Lindsay Lohan came to show at some point.
Her performance is amazing because of the way in which Stone becomes Olive, there's no tick-tock examination of the character as she acts, none of the selfrighteous "I'm a teen" mode actors in similar movies have.
It's funny that Olive is such a fan of 80's teen comedies because in a way she embodies the evolution John Hughes' work should have commended to the genre. Instead the genre got stuck in trying to recreate his films without taking into consideration that things would change.
Interestingly enough the film makes fun of itself all the time, especially when it defies viewers to contradict its ridiculous, but true, points.
Therefore at times Easy A plays like a compilation tape that chides this generation for its need to be famous by way of infamy while bashing in the privileges that come from sexual liberation.
Emma Stone may be no Dr. Ruth but she sure knows how to guide us through the joys and calamities of sex.

The Lovely Bones ***

Director: Peter Jackson
Cast: Saoirse Ronan, Rachel Weisz, Mark Wahlberg, Susan Sarandon
Stanley Tucci, Rose McIver, Nikki SooHoo, Carolyn Dando
Michael Imperioli, Thomas McCarthy, Reece Ritchie

Based on Alice Sebold's bestseller "The Lovely Bones" tells the story of Susie Salmon (Ronan) a fourteen year old girl who is raped and murdered by her neighbor George Harvey (Tucci) on December, 6, 1973.
"Back when people believed things like that didn't happen" narrates Susie from beyond the grave as the film follows the aftermath her murder has in the lives of her family and friends.
Stuck in a sort of limbo ("the blue horizon between heaven and earth" she calls it) she seeks redemption for her crime and tries to comfort her family by communicating with them.
In that way we meet her mother Abigail (a terrific, understated Weisz) who has denial issues, her father Jack (Wahlberg who had rarely been so moving),who becomes obsessed with solving the murder, sister Lindsey (McIver), little brother Buckley (Christian Thomas Ashdale) and crazy grandma Lynn (Sarandon who despite being the kind of character who always has a lit cigarette and a drink, remains compellingly watchable in the actress' hands).
Coming from an extensive special effects background Jackson once again tries to push boundaries creating Susie's personal heaven.
The results consist of majestic New Zealand vistas enhanced with computer effects which represent Susie's mood.
Jackson comes up with some clever setpieces, but there's nothing we hadn't seen before.
The most spectacular "effect" in this in-between is Ronan herself. Giving yet another breathtaking performance, the actress turns Susie into a girl next door. The kind of which you would've noticed if she went missing. She's sweet in scenes where she tries to reach out to her father (she's spectacular with Wahlberg) and punches your gut in her scenes with Tucci.
Ronan's ability to act like someone her own age seems easy to achieve, but definitely requires a special effort because child actors are always thought to be playing themselves.
Most special of all are her reactions with Reece Ritchie, who plays the guy Susie has a crush on. Her blushes are honest and real and when she escapes his kiss, but then accepts an invitation from Harvey, she doesn't become an accomplice in her own death, but acts like a girl that age would. When faced with the prospects of love she doubts herself and naturally trusts an adult more.
Whoever ended up adapting Sebold's book would've had trouble encompassing the author's rejection of the howcatchem and her delicate portrayal of grief. Jackson is no exception and sometimes he dedicates all his resources towards creating unjustified tension and police drama (Imperioli plays the detective in charge).
Scenes involving Harvey are all overwrought and storybook creepy, Tucci overdoes it by using every creepy trick in the notebook. Suspicious hairstyle, conniving mustache, weird accent, weirder walk. It's a surprise that it takes them so long to even think of him as a suspect.
But this makes sense when you think that the whole film is seen through Susie's perspective. When someone else becomes suspicious of the quiet Mr. Harvey, it's not an adult, or even a human being, but the Salmon family dog; who probably cared for Susie.
Maybe the Mr. Harvey we're seeing has nothing to do with how adults see him and Susie-being a child and all-overdoes the creep factor so that we too get to hate this man.
If this was Jackson's intention it gets lost from time to time in the war between style and substance he holds throughout the movie. "The Lovely Bones" has some serious elliptical problems and some characters act out of seeming deus ex machina.
But most of this can be forgiven for Ronan, who makes this almost heavenly.

Julie and Julia ***

Director: Nora Ephron
Cast: Meryl Streep, Amy Adams
Stanley Tucci, Chris Messina, Jane Lynch, Erin Dilly
Mary Kay Place, Linda Emond

Meryl Streep is to acting, what Julia Child was to cooking: a master of the craft, who never forgets to enjoy her work.
This is why it's no coincidence that Streep was chosen to play Child (this and than the fact that she's the greatest imitator ever and even seems to grow a few inches to play this part) but because watching Streep act, like watching Child cook, is a delight.
You might not learn how to cook and you might not learn how to act, but your day sure will seem richer after being with them.
Streep plays Child during her stay in Paris after WWII, where she moved with her diplomat husband Paul (Tucci), enrolled in Le Cordon Bleu and began writing what would become her masterpiece "Mastering the Art of French Cooking".
Fast forward fifty something years to New York City where aspiring novelist Julie Powell (Adams) comes up with the idea to write a blog detailing how she masters Julia Child's book in one year.
From this basis, Ephron shapes a charming story that often draws parallels between the women (think "The Hours" light, very light) to show us how inspiration can come from the unlikeliest of sources.
Graciously paced and crafted, the film evokes the charming, harmless spectacles of classic Hollywood that intended only to give pleasure to its audience.
In this film the pleasure is mostly owed to the performers. Adams, who's impossible to hate, even when playing a self pronounced "bitch", brings her kind of innocence to a part that would've been damaged from being played like the cynical idea we have of NY writers.
Her part of the story might be the least appealing, but with Chris Messina who plays her husband, they do enough justice to portraying our generation's need of fulfillment.
With Tucci and Streep however; you never can get just enough. Their chemistry is magnificent-rarely do movie marriages seem so convincing, loving and natural-and Tucci is a natural scene stealer, even if he's forced by the screenplay to subject to his wife's desires.
And how could he not? Streep is literally larger than life as Child. She nails the elongated vowels, the accent and most amazingly the spirit of the cooking icon.
Even when Ephron tries to give her as little dramatic conflict as possible (her biggest problems include learning to chop onions) Streep is always ahead of the game and gives Julia little things that transform her into an actual human being.
She might've constructed the performance from videos and recordings, but Streep gives her a something extra.
Remarkably though, she also is able to deliver a meta performance of sorts. By now, she knows people will have a hard time getting over the fact that it's another Meryl Streep performance and the genius actress draws on the primordial concept behind this to turn out the sort of performance that sums up the entire movie's spirit.
"There's nothing wrong with her, she's perfect" says Powell of Child, to which her husband replies "the Julia Child in your head".
And this is exactly what Streep is playing, watch how she gives us enough internal conflict with her eyes, but stops just in time to take us back to Powell.
Someone refers to her as Julie's imaginary friend and this might be all she's actually playing, like a Harvey we can see perhaps...
Streep isn't only playing someone who lived, she's playing her version of what she thinks Amy Adams' version of Julie Powell thinks she is.
In the very same way both women are figured out by the written word. For Powell (and Adams playing Powell) people judge her based on her blog (which is based on a book...and you get the idea).
With this Ephron has something very interesting to say about how our society decodes celebrity and the places they can take in our lives.
But other than this semi-existential conundrum, nothing ever goes seriously wrong in "Julie and Julia". Sure stews get burnt and McCarthyism threatens to spoil the fun at Julia's sister wedding, but other than that there is zero conflict, therefore the movie feels like enjoying a soufflé; where we seldom have the time or desire to learn how the hell the chef avoided deflation. We just savor it and for a second or two have no cares in the world.