“Fruitvale Station”
Directed by Ryan Coogler
Starring Michael B. Jordan, Melonie Diaz, Octavia Spencer, Kevin Durand, Chad Michael Murray, Ariana Neal
Biography, Drama
90 Mins
R

*Warning: Spoilers follow. If you are unfamiliar with the true-life 2009 San Francisco Fruitvale Station event, don’t read on.*

As the lights pull up on Fruitvale Station, there wasn’t a dry eye in the theater. No one was hustling to get out first. Cell phones weren’t clicking on left and right. For once, everyone was somber, respectful and obviously moved by what they had just seen. In fact, in the midst of the moments where the film goes mute, lingering on lost moments, you could have heard a pin drop. That palpable, humbling silence is proof of the magnetizing power of Ryan Coogler‘s first feature film. Like Muhammad Ali, he floats like a butterfly, stings like a bee.

Opening with real cell phone footage of the 2009 San Francisco Fruitvale Station incident -in which a motionless, handcuffed 22-year old African American, named Oscar Grant, is shot in the back and killed by a police for no evident reason – we’re jolted into the tragedy to unfold. Rather than make us uncomfortable hostages to another “important story,” the hovering camerawork and winning, congenial tone invite us into the fold.  
Ex-jailbird, Oscar is a member of a loving, supportive family. He’s got the good fortune of a loving daughter and a forgiving baby-mama but he just can’t seem to get his act together. Trying to internalize Oprah’s mantra that “it takes 30 days to form a habit”, he’s seeking a new life that won’t result in a third prison sentence and further in more time spent away from his little girl.

Taking a real-world event and transforming it from just another tragedy to shake our heads at into a visceral theatrical experience, Coogler has done more than the average filmmaker. He has made a film with a razor sharp point that grabs us by the neck, pats us on the head, and then sits us down for a talk about why daddy is gone.

Speaking of his intentions behind the film, Coogler claims, “I wanted the audience to get to know this guy, to get attached, so that when the situation that happens to him happens, it’s not just like you read it in the paper, you know what I mean? When you know somebody as a human being, you know that life means something.” In this goal, Coogler has succeed tremendously.

The merciless gunning down of a two-time felon like Oscar Grant, played here with sterling commitment by Michael B. Jordan, is easily overlooked in the grand scheme of national calamities. We live in a world peppered with headlines of worldwide manhunts, massive bombings, increasing firearm massacres and counts upon counts of gang violence. In a way, we’ve become so accustomed to the shit that we don’t bother to notice another dump in an ocean stained brown. From the distant confines of our living rooms, it’s easy to shrug off these horror stories and go about our daily lives. It isn’t even entitlement, it’s Psycology 101. If we were to break down over every single case of injustice across the globe, mulling over each and every catastrophe, we wouldn’t make it to the supermarket without melting into a full-blown nervous wreck. We don’t get bogged down because we can’t. We blunt ourselves because the abominations of reality are too abundant to process.

But when it’s in our cities, in our towns, in our families, there is nothing more emotionally crippling than the loss of someone who’ve known and loved. This is Coogler’s aim; to introduce us to a man and see the resulting devastation when he is ripped away as hostilely and abruptly as a Brazilian wax. Like a top spinning and spinning and spinning and then woefully split onto its side, the true life affair is reeling with life and then suddenly, harrowingly still. We feel this resounding loss deep in our souls, shaken from our apathetic sidelines. But instead of trying to rub our noses in our indifference, Coogler has respectfully set out to present us with the full package that is Oscar Grant – the good with the bad.

Does Coogler reach too far trying to make Oscar a relatable character? Maybe, but, in all honesty, isn’t that the point? I never knew the man outside the context of the film but I feel like I got to know someone here. Whether he was an invention or not, I cared about him and it made it that much more devastating when he is gunned down like a dog in the street.

The point is, this could have happened to any of us. Coogler’s not trying to turn Oscar into a martyr or a saint, he’s just a normal guy in shitty circumstances. Do these so-called circumstances have to do with him being black? Most certainly. In this, Coogler cuts to the heart of an unsettling cultural epoch that accepts racial stereotyping as commonplace police methodology. Driving the film into something more than a mere biopic, Coogler’s is a stinging indictment holding the cruel reality of a modern police force where racism has come to fester and thrive up to the light.

Fleshing out what feels so much like a true recounting of events, Jordan is a sensation. He commits fully to his role, disappearing into it with warm familiarity. A prison-bound scene in which he demands a hug from his mother is especially affecting and could earn Jordan an Oscar nom on its own. As Oscar’s loving but stern mother, Octavia Spencer is a powerhouse – throttling between a strong matriarch and a grieving mother who’s life force is sapped by the loss of her baby child. As she weeps over him, it’s impossible to not feel a lump growing like a balloon in your throat.

But Fruitvale Station doesn’t bank on the brand of weepy, sentimental tearjerkers that leaves you with the bad taste of manipulation. It’s something entirely different and entirely beautiful – a genuinely power, superbly acted trainwreck spilling over with throbbing purpose. Even for those not absolutely spellbound, it would take an incredible degree of jaded indifference to shrug this powerful experience off.

A

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“The Wolverine”
Directed by James Mangold
Starring Hugh Jackman, Rila Fukushima, Hiroyuki Sanada, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Brian Tee, Hal Yamanouchi, Will Yun Lee, Ken Yamamura, Famke Janssen
Action, Adventure, Fantasy
126 Mins
PG-13

The Wolverine is as good a movie about Wolverine that audiences will probably ever get. While that sentiment comes saddled with a huge qualifier, I’d go so far as to claim that it’s a pretty good movie on its own terms. I dare say it might have been a great movie if directed by Darren Aronofsky.

As you may already know, Aronofsky was originally designed to direct this sixth Hugh Jackman-led X-Men film but when the devastating 2011 Tōhoku tsunami hit Japan, he backed out due to a projected major production delay (ironically enough moving onto a movie about impending giant waves: Noah). Even without his physical presence on set, the film carries on with his signature fingerprints. Displaying themes of isolation and madness amidst a particularly genre-defying and soul-rummaging performance from Hugh Jackman, this is (until late in the third act) the least cartoonish superhero movie to date.

We’ve been lead to believe that we know Wolverine before – having been presented his lackluster, but nonetheless enjoyable, origin story in X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Where that fell short, this bone-bleached view really digs into his character by stripping away the mutant world around him and plopping him in the midst of a modern samurai story. In prior installations, Wolverine has been a player in a massive web of mutant characters occupying the X-universe – though his importance is more similar to a queen than a pawn, or even a knight. But this is truly Logan’s story. It’s the story of a Ronin – a samurai without a master. In stark contrast to prior outings, he is the only “superhero” on display, even though that ubiquitous label may not suffice in this case study. We’re mixing more with Logan than Wolverine here – the daring, rogue outcast rather than the metal-clawed animal.

Unlike Wolverine’s introduction in Origins, this installment does better than frantic doggy paddling while fishing for Logan’s inner suffering. While his adamantium-laced body could have easily sunk, Logan manages to swim – in full, fluid strokes. It’s always a treat to see a project that intends to do more than barely keeping afloat. Six films later, Logan feels as fresh and timely as ever because this particular iteration more closely resembles a passion project than a cash-grab. Upon inspecting the pieces that went into this, it is clear why.

Based on Wolverine’s beloved Japanese story arc, Oscar-winner Christopher McQuarrie (The Usual Suspects) is behind the first draft, James Mangold, accolade-dressed director of Walk the Line and 3:10 to Yuma, sits in the captain’s chair, and Hugh Jackman as Logan is as committed to the role as ever. While a talent-mash doesn’t always result in success, this is more than just a sum of parts. Their acute commitment to novelty has inspired something largely unique that actually delivers on the promise to do something new. Though it does stray from the bold course coming into the home stretch, the willingness to ground this in a different culture, a different country and a different cage makes it an experimental success.

The film starts with a harrowing vignette in which Logan, a prisoner at a WWII Japanese war base, saves a young Japanese soldier, Yasida (Hal Yamanouchi), from incoming B52 bombers. With commanders performing traditional harakiri around them as a nuclear warhead detonates silently in the distance, the scene is measured in subtlety, foreshadowing motifs of the horror of war, the explosive shock of sudden desolation, and survivor’s guilt.

Waking from this flashback, Logan encounters the only thing really tethering this story to the previous X-Men entries: Jean Grey (Famke Janssen). Logan’s dreamy, introspective chats with Jean help flesh out the man he is and the internal battles he’s fighting. He’s a man who has sworn off violence, struggling with the animalistic urges that have driven him in the past. Considering that this story takes place after the events of X-Men: Last Stand, where Jean transforms into Phoenix, becomes a major mutant mind-terrorist and is killed by a remorseful Wolverine, we’re weary of her presence in the film, but soon learn that she is really just a mirror into Logan’s soul. As an ethereal guiding presence, Jean functions as a proxy to Logan’s conscious rather than a character with her own motive. In reality, Logan is truly alone.

Living amongst grizzly bears, blanketed in snow, and using evergreen trees as scratching posts, Logan is holed up in a graveyard of whiskey bottles, his unkempt beard and seedy appearance speaking volumes about his decaying fortitude. Shying away from the world at large, his attempts to go incognito run dry when his rage breaks lose in a bar fight and red-haired Japanese warrior, Yukio (Rila Fukushima), drags him out of his self-created hellhole to face fortune and glory all the way over in Japan.

Dumpster-rummaging, nightmare-driven exposition like this helps set the groundwork for Wolverine’s journey, which takes him from the backwoods of Canada to the towering megalopolis of Tokyo. At the behest of Yashida, the soldier he once saved turned tech-guru, now on his deathbed, Logan is wary to join but when he does, he’s a fish-out-of-water in Japan. With Japanese-based set design that calls attention to the ideas of old conflicting with new – tradition against innovation – Toyko is a living, breathing platform that serves to magnify Logan’s isolation.

Caught in a time warp where wounds heal and faces never age, Logan is haunted not by death but by life. Having lived hundreds of years already, Logan welcomes the idea of putting an end to his suffering but when Yashida unexpectedly offers to rid Logan of his eternal nature, Logan begins to realize that his gift might be worth keeping after all. Let’s just say that things don’t quite go that way and things aim towards the Spiderman 2 route where old Peter Parker stops being so adept at wall climbing.

Stripped of his powers and forced to experience life as an everyman, this is the story of the man behind the muttonchops, the bones beneath the metal-casings but that doesn’t mean there aren’t the requisite action sequences. Trust me, they’re there.

Instead of the building-smashing, chaotic entropy of recent superhero fare, the spectacles are honed in on traditional Japanese warfare – the art of the katana. Logan’s initial disregard for the time-honored Japanese sword later plays into the overarching themes of respect but, on a purely popcorn level, it makes for some great swordplay sequences. With a hierarchy that sets close quarters skills above gun blazing carnage, this is more of a samurai film than a superhero movie. Even the commercially succulent, bullet train-top sequence introduces the idea of stasis as victory – a riff on the old notion that the tortoise can beat the hare. In these regards, The Wolverine takes far more notes from The Last Samurai than The Dark Knight.

Even from a visual standpoint, The Wolverine doesn’t contain the bleak imagery of gritty affairs as Ross Emery frames everything in a splendor of picturesque Japanese vistas. In these choices, X-Men remains the boldest superhero franchise still breathing. Had Fox had the decency to stick by McQuarrie’s script – in which Wolverine was the only mutant, and axed Svetlana Khodchenkova‘s poison ivy-esque Viper, they would have really had something on their hands. But with blood on his claws, stumbling through a mob of broken English, Logan’s battle with the consequences of immortality is entirely watchable. Top that off with perhaps the best mid-credits scene in the history of credit scenes (one that actually is an important and meaningful scene, far superior to the weakening teasers from the Marvel camp) and you have a reason to go to the theaters this weekend.

B-

“The Conjuring”
Directed by James Wan
Starring Vera Farmiga, Patrick Wilson, Lili Taylor, Ron Livingstone, Shanley Caswell, Jayley McFarland, Joey King, Mackenzie Foy
Horror, Thriller
112 Mins
R

The Conjuring represents that rare breed of horror that’ll actually have you wary of bumps in the night for days to come. Rather than a repetitive one-and-done game of “where’s the [insert evil entity here] going to appear next?” James Wan has crafted something rich in atmosphere, thriving not on jump-scares but within the DNA of its underlying psychological horror. Like the great genre flicks of the past, The Conjuring is able to present a demonic presence as a likely possibility. In this case, possession and exorcism are presented as undeniable realities. The upper-tiered acting, eerie vibes, and genuine scares add up to a tenacious nail-biter more content to tingle your spine than work your funny bone.

The “based on a true story” gimmick has always inspired doubt, especially within the confines of the horror genre. Audiences are natural skeptics concerning the cold hard truth of the “true events” taking place and for good reason. In most scenarios, we expect the setup to be somewhat congruent with the facts but the stilted Hollywood payoffs in the third act often leave us with cocked eyebrows and scrunched faces of incredulity. While much of the same can be said of The Conjuring, there is a degree of credibility to its dubious framework in large part due to the blessing of the two true-life characters on which the experience is based.

Selling this as nonfiction, Wan succeeds more than most. Using pull quotes from the actual demonologists (literally experts on demons) on which the film is based, we’re left swallowing our dubiety even when outside the confines of the film. Taking the true-story stance, Wan forces us to take this hair-raising experience home to our bedrooms, our hallways, our homes, challenging us to doubt the veracity of this haunted yarn.

Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson play the Warrens, a pair of god-sent ghost hunters and self-proclaimed demonologists noted for their staunch belief in the beyond. Farmiga plays Lorraine, a saint-like partner and loving soul with a particularly disturbed clairvoyance. Her abilities allow her to tap into feelings buried in objects or places, lets her communicate with passed spirits, and sometimes, even allows her to see dead people a la The Sixth Sense. Wilson’s Ed isn’t quite the spiritual philanthropist that his wife is but his lordly talents gives him a penchant for amateur exorcisms. Their “gifts” give them a pious knack for helping others. Instead of camping it up, Wilson and Farmiga take their roles seriously and for good reason; the Warrens are real people.

Although the real-life Ed is now deceased, Lorraine was somewhat involved with the making of the film, working as a liaison on the production. Even though we can assume that she is ok with the truth being bent – or possibly broken – every once in a while, it’s troubling to hear her speak about these events with unwavering belief. Farmiga harnesses Lorraine’s devoted credo and exhumes legitimate fear from the onscreen haunting.

Outside of this film, the true-life Warrens are no strangers to Hollywood adaptations. Their life work – experiences with the paranormal – have also served as the basis for the Amityville Horror films. While those films resulted in controversy and lawsuits disputing their integrity, this one is similarly shifty in how much of it is truly based on real events. In the end though, the situations are terrifying and unearthly. The mere idea that people could believe to have experienced these events becomes unsettling in itself. 

While Wan’s film leans on familiar tropes of the horror genre – the dog that abruptly dies, threat-posing, self-animating objects, and whispers in the nighttime hallways – the real horror lies somewhere darker, deeper, and more secret. In this pursuit of scrappiness, Wan sweeps campiness under the rug and proffers a no-nonsense enterprise in its place. Here, the mandatory genre stereotypes come to die as Wan proves that they can be icing on the cake rather than the whole kit and caboodle.

While skirting around these more familiar elements of the genre, the area that Wan has proved to understand and excel at most is pacing. With Saw, he built the jig up piece-by-piece so that when he finally revealed his cards, the audience felt the payoff was earned. Here, Wan doesn’t thrust us right in the midst of the story. Instead, he begins humbly and uses the first two acts to build up a wobbling house of cards that he subsequently knocks down.

While it takes a good portion of the first act to really crank the brooding aura up to ten, the foggy tone is foreboding in the most palpable of ways. In these first thirty or forty minutes (when the nature of the film is revealing itself), the air is thick with bad omens but nothing stands out as forcefully ghastly. But everything changes pace in a bedroom scene involving a mere shadow behind the door.

In that scene, patient pacing and deep, humming bass turns flesh into a goosebump disco. And while many films undercut themselves by revealing their monsters-in-the-mist too soon, this is a problem that The Conjuring doesn’t face. Even after we see evil personified, we don’t retreat into a feeling that the buildup was greater than the payoff. Instead, it actually manages to result in something substantial. Replacing his original build-up scalpel with a third act sledgehammer, when Wan lets himself go, the surgical horror turns bonkers.

Much of this has to do with the fact that very little of Wan’s film uses CGI as a stand-in for villainy. As a more and more frequent substitute for practical effects, CGI continues to be a jolting experience that takes us out of the situation and plops us right back into the theaters seats. It’s like being at a play and someone’s beard falls off their face. You remember that this isn’t reality and forget the false-reality being built up around you. For detouring around CGI, and largely avoiding gore in general, Wan proves that moving forward in the genre most likely means looking to the past.

The ground upon this all stands is the unfortunate family in great need of a full-blown exorcism. As a world-building architect, Wan employs the emotional complexity of the family as paramount to the whole picture. Thankfully, it’s executed by seasoned performers with dedicated bravado. Lili Taylor and Ron Livingston color the backbone of their characters with a feverish anti-caricature bringing this poor family and their poor five daughters to life. We’re along for their ride and, fortunately, we feel for them.

Behind the curtains, the production design really gives all these characters a space to occupy that feels intimate yet chilling, homey but alien. The sound team, lead by Joseph Bishara‘s hairy score, gives the film a lingering sense of frightful wonder. Sonorous bass and crackling strings loom and cut, loom and cut, splicing the sonicscape while hyping our building sense of apprehension. With all these well-executed production elements in play, the crème of the crop comes from the script. The Conjuring breathes terror with screenwriting team Chad and Carey Hayesknowing exactly where to mine for scares. They do so often and are frighteningly effective at that task.

All in all, The Conjuring is just an incredibly effective creeper that is much more likely to linger with its patrons than much of the horror fare of the recent past. As such, it’s a flag-bearer of horror as homage and fear as a genuine experience. While the early claims of this being one of the scariest movies of all time may be a little forced, it does sit high up on the shelf. Following suit, horror movies following in The Conjuring‘s footsteps will have to withstand a new harsh standard that’ll demand them stand on its own two-feet without handicapping themselves with CGI or excessive gore. Going forth, prepare for a regular knocking when using simple jump-scare tactics as a solitary and weak-legged crutch.

B+