A House of Dynamite

 

Director: Kathryn Bigelow
Starring: Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Anthony Ramos, Moses Ingram, Jonah Hauer-King, Greta Lee, Jason Clarke, Willa Fitzgerald, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Kaitlyn Dever
Running Time: 112 min.
Rating: R

★★★ (out of ★★★★) 

What's so startling about Kathryn Bigelow's A House of Dynamite is how it maintains the momentum of remaining just twenty minutes away from imminent doom for the picture's entire running length. By shifting perspectives between multiple characters and doubling back to reveal crucial information, Bigelow presents a horrifying scenario that doesn't seem so far removed from current reality. And while experts will probably pick apart certain details in screenwriter and former NBC News President Noah Oppenheim's script, the chilling conceit behind his apocalyptic premise undeniably resonates.

No longer a false alarm or hypothetical, these officials try to navigate a nuclear pressure cooker where experience helps, but isn't enough, especially when a half-broken system and lack of information leaves the fate of the United States up to a coin toss. Buoyed by an all-star cast, their characters know something the world doesn't as seconds tick away, each forced to endure the quiet torture of telling their families without really "telling" them. But beyond that, it's compelling to watch how they function as cogs in a giant machine that just isn't built for something like this. 

Showing the same sequence of events from three points of view, the action opens early morning in Washington D.C., when White House Situation Room manager Olivia Walker (Rebecca Ferguson, Deputy National Security Advisor Jake Baerington (Gabriel Basso) and the President of the United States (Idris Elba) are informed that radar detected an unidentified ICBM launched over the Pacific on a trajectory to strike Chicago within twenty minutes. After being initially dismissed as a routine missile test, events take a horrifying turn,with all hands on deck to determine the next steps. 

The President joins a video call with Secretary of Defense Reid Baker (Jared Harris) and U.S. Strategic Command's General Anthony Brady (Tracy Letts) as Fort Greely commander Major Daniel Gonzalez (Anthony Ramos) is ordered to launch ground based interceptors to take out the missile. But when further complications arise and FEMA activates an emergency response, the President must make an unimaginable choice. With Chicago minutes away from being leveled, the realization sets in that the worst may still be ahead.

There's no reason for those involved to believe it'll be anything other than a normal day, or as normal as it gets in jobs this crucial to national security. For a short while, a small sense of predictability and routine follows Olivia to work that morning as she says goodbye to her husband and sick young son, unaware of what awaits. Ferguson's performance in these early scenes convey the mannerisms and demeanor of a deliberate, dedicated woman well equipped to handle crisis. But even she'll reach her breaking point while wrangling all the players necessary to stop the unthinkable. 

Despite opening those lines of communication, chaos reigns when the story shifts to Basso's flustered Baerington, who juggles the responsibility of impending fatherhood with a rapidly approaching disaster. He's nervous but exceptionally qualified in his attempts to advise the President, butting heads with Letts' General Brady, a Cheney-like war hawk hellbent on retaliation, with or without the necessary intel. The question is whether that's worth the risk when they're still unsure who's responsible or why. When technology fails, plans evolve, tragically resigning them to focus on what's still within their control.  

That's especially true for Harris's Secretary of Defense Baker, a recent widower whose estranged daughter Caroline (Kaitlyn Dever) lives directly in the path of destruction. Their brief conversation and Baker's actions after it are by far the the film's most emotionally jarring moments. There's also some smaller, but memorable turns from Moses Ingram as a FEMA official, Jason Clarke as the White House Situation Room Director, Willa Fitzgerald as a CNN reporter and Greta Lee as a National Intelligence Officer who takes the most important phone call of her life in a cruelly ironic location.   

Elba's believable portrayal as Commander-in-Chief is bolstered by subtler scenes leading into the catastrophe that puts his character's personality and leadership style into context. Already exhausted, this drains what little energy he has left as the various scenarios are laid out for someone who was making a charity appearance only minutes earlier. 

Leaning on his wife and First Lady (Renée Elise Goldsberry) for support, it's ultimately military aide Reeves (Jonah Hauer-King) who guides the POTUS in choosing between Bareington and Brady's opposing options. While the film leaves a little too much hanging in the air, it's  fairly obvious what occurs, even if it isn't shown. Still, you can't help but wonder if a more conclusive, powerful payoff could have better driven this nightmare scenario home. 

Taking inspiration from similarly themes genre classics like Fail Safe and The Day After, it's a safe bet the eerily prescient script was written years prior, serving as a stark warning for any administration, but most especially unprepared, lesser qualified ones. And while the film's title is lifted from a key line of dialogue, it also works as a choice metaphor for describing this problem we're still no closer to solving. Despite an ending that stops short of delivering an unforgettable final blow, Bigelow steps back enough to let viewers debate and dissect what they think they've just seen.                                                         

Men, Women and Children

Director: Jason Reitman
Starring: Rosemarie DeWitt, Jennifer Garner, Judy Greer, Dean Norris, Adam Sandler, Ansel Elgort,
Kaitlyn Dever, J.K. Simmons, Dennis Haysbert, Olivia Crocicchia, Elena Kampouris, Travis Tope, Emma Thompson (voice)
Running Time: 119 min.
Rating:  R

★★★ (out of ★★★★)

Throughout the 1970's, the ABC network aired The After School Special, a series of made-for-TV movies aimed at teens that tackled controversial social issues of the time. If such a special came out today, exploring the dangers of social media and technology, and you mixed it in a blender with American Beauty, the result would sort of strangely resemble Jason Reitman's Men, Women and Children. But while those comparisons seem to set the stage for the latest in a long list of pans for one of the worst received movies of last year, it's actually kind of a compliment. After all, both won awards and critical acclaim for good reason. This sure didn't, but it's certainly more intriguing than expected, and hardly the huge abomination the media trumpeted it as.

Reitman may not achieve everything he sets out to, inevitably falling short of its brilliant teaser poster's promise, but it mostly works. For better or worse, I was gripped by each of the stories that comprise the narrative and impressed by a handful of actors playing against type. The big surprise was that it was a bit more restrained than expected given a subject matter that deals less with the dangers of the digital age, but how people are really the problem.

After a cosmic framing device speculating on humans' place in the universe (sardonically narrated by Emma Thompson), we crash down to Earth where Don (Adam Sandler) is a depressed, sexually frustrated husband stuck in a passionless marriage to an equally bored Helen (Rosemarie DeWitt). She spends her free time at work creating an Ashley Madison profile while he's building up the courage to seek out an escort service and sneaking into his teen son Chris' (Travis Tope) room to view online pornography.

So extreme is Chris' taste in porn that it's actually preventing him from being aroused by anything or anyone else, including would-be girlfriend and aspiring celebrity, Hannah (Olivia Crocicchia). Her vanity proves to be a contagiously destructive influence on younger classmate, Allison (a shockingly good Elena Kampouris), a formerly overweight girl starving herself to gain the attention of an older "bad boy" who wouldn't give her the time of day.

Meanwhile, Hannah's mom Joan (Judy Greer), a former actress, is maintaining her daughter's website, taking and posting inappropriate photos of her for paying subscribers in a desperate attempt to boost her profile. Joan forms a bond with single dad, Kent (Dean Norris) over their mutual dislike of the neighborhood's cyber-watchdog mom, Patricia (Jennifer Garner), whose constant monitoring of daughter Brandy's (Kaitlyn Dever) online and cell phone activity is preventing the teen from having anything resembling a social life.

At school, Brandy finds a kindred spirit in Kent's son, the similarly depressed and introspective Tim (Ansel Elgort), who suddenly quit the football team and is addicted to an online role-playing video game. They start secretly seeing each other in what ends up being the golden ticket storyline, easily doing the best job at conveying the film's themes of loneliness and isolation amidst a world that's more technologically connected than ever. 

Okay, so when described like this, the whole thing does seem a little ridiculous. But it isn't strung together by contrivances or coincidences, as is often the case when dealing with intersecting storylines within a single film. Nothing happens here that's crazy to accept and it plays more like a collection of character sketches. Of course, some are better than others. And as uninteresting as it would seem spending two hours watching strangers text and stare at their screens, this presents that idea more tolerably than similar films exploring the subject, or even movies of other genres with characters electronically plugged in. At least Reitman can provide the reasoning that he's showing exactly what his film is about through their actions.

It's almost painful to reveal that the weakest thread is Sandler's and DeWitt's, if only because the last thing Sandler needs is anyone discouraging him for stepping out of his comfort zone and exploring his dramatic side. Here he proves again just how subtle and effective a performer he is when out of goofball mode. Unfortunately, it's in a typical unsatisfied spouses storyline, as these two downers sulk through their extra-marital affairs. This, along with their son's impotence issues (which isn't given as much time), is the weakest segment, culminating in a resolution that's very matter of fact. Those complaining this film hits audiences over the head with its themes should re-watch this story arc as its restraint is more likely to induce a nap.

The pairing of Dean Norris and Judy Greer is a highlight, with both are cast wildly against type. Norris' Kent is nervous and underconfident in the wake of his wife leaving their family while Greer plays the stage mom from hell, living vicariously through her daughter until a harsh dose of reality knocks her cold. It's an especially big jump for Norris, who's very far removed from Breaking Bad's macho, authoritative Hank Schrader as fans should be surprised just how large his supporting role is and what he does with it.

Tim having this sudden epiphany and quitting the football team because he's miserable for reasons having nothing to do with football just might be the most realistic event in the film. That's just exactly the kind of thing an angry, depressed teen would do and it feels completely earned, as does most of the storyline involving him and Brandy's secret, forbidden relationship. Touching and truthful to a fault, you have to wonder how good a film this could have been on its own, with Elgort and Dever proving why they're on the top of everyone's list of young actors to watch.

Elgort continues his streak of straddling the line between likable jock and sensitive introvert, adding depth to what could have been a superficially drawn teen caricature, while Dever conveys this world of hurt and shame on her face without muttering a word. And with Jennifer Garner's psychotically overprotective parent watching her every move, that's understandable. Would anyone go to the extreme lengths she does to shield her daughter from social media? You wonder why she even lets her daughter have a phone or computer considering all the work she must put in monitoring it.

The most interesting takeaway is that if this took place during another era, we'd still have this issue. It's the technology that's allowing us to hurt each other faster and more impersonally, as a phone or mobile device in the hands of these characters may as well be a pipe bomb. Reitman's multi-narrative approach toward presenting modern technology as gasoline on a fire is a good one, even as many didn't care for how he went about making that point or thought maybe he just shouldn't have said anything at all. As someone who's no fan of his pitiful previous effort, the belabored Labor Day, and agrees he's slipped recently, there's still no denying pitchforks were undeservedly out for this one before it was even released.

Chalk it up to low expectations or this falling firmly within the suburban drama genre I tend to heavily favor, but Reitman deserves credit for at least trying something different and achieving passable results, thanks mostly to the performances. Years down the line, when the technology becomes dated and the film's an artifact, it remains to be seen whether this effort provides any insight on human behavior. It's a movie very much of its time. Of course, that time happens to be now and the characters inhabiting it are irritatingly and uncomfortably recognizable.
        

Short Term 12

Director: Destin Daniel Cretton
Starring: Brie Larson, John Gallagher Jr, Kaitlyn Dever, Rami Malek, Keith Stanfield, Kevin Hernandez, Melora Walters, Frantz Turner, Alex Calloway
Running Time: 97 min.
Rating: R

★★★★ (out of ★★★★)

You can just tell when a movie's telling the truth. When a movie's being completely honest, no strings are being pulled and no games being played. It's like you're disappearing into the lives of the characters, and only when the final credits roll is it possible to entertain the fact they're not real people. Going on description alone, Short Term 12 almost has no business being as great as it is. On paper, there's nothing particularly remarkable about the story. The cast is comprised mostly of unknowns, while writer/director Destin Cretton is similarly untested. And yet, despite a tiny budget and very little promotion, the small indie feels bigger than any blockbuster because all the cogs in the machine are working in perfect harmony. Despite being one of the best reviewed films of the year, it still somehow manages to overperform, exceeding those expectations by simply keeping it raw and real.

The theatrical poster captures a scene I was curious to see play out in the actual film to discover its context. It turns out to be its final one, but revealing that spoils nothing since all of the film's power is contained in each minute leading up to it. It's ultimately a story about stories. Stories people tell themselves and others to get through the pain and those they tell to conceal the truth of what they're actually going through. It's also a reminder how many trudge through life with all kinds of buried problems no one even knows about, somehow able to normally function. Until finally they can't. And at its core is the best performance given by any actor, male or female, in the past year. 

Grace (Brie Larson) is a twenty-something supervisor at Short Term 12, a group home facility for troubled teens. In most cases, it's just a short stop before they get where they're going. Hopefully it's home, even if for some that may not be such a hopeful scenario. Her co-worker and live-in boyfriend is Mason (John Gallagher Jr.) and the film opens with both of them showing quiet new employee Nate (Rami Malek) the ropes and explaining rules and procedures. Their job isn't to be these kids' friends or therapists, but make sure they stay out of trouble and keep occupied with various activities. It's more exhausting than it seems, as most are still wrestling with the emotional issues that landed them there, causing the job to sometimes more closely resemble that of a parole or corrections officer than a social worker.

If a kid escapes and leaves the grounds, they can be followed, but that's it. They're basically gone. The arrival of Jayden (Kaitlyn Dever), a morose teen with a history of self-harm brings a painful personal event to the surface for Grace that she's long buried. Something not even Mason knows and she's willing to destroy their relationship to avoid talking about. Sensing a girl silently crying out for help in a way only she seems to recognize, Grace breaks the rules, reaching out to Kaitlyn, putting both her job and relationship in jeopardy, while painfully confronting her own emotional demons.

From the minute this starts, it feels as if we've been dropped in a documentary about troubled teens and the counselors who work with them. It looks and sounds that authentic, as if we're seeing non-rehearsed moments we shouldn't even be allowed to witness. Those who have worked in a facility like this would obviously have a better idea of how close to reality this veers, but considering Cretton spent time at such a facility for a few months (before turning his real-life experience into the short student film this is expanded from) it's safe to say it's probably pretty accurate. That Grace is the picture of competence and composure at her job makes all that comes later that much more powerful when she's unable to take her own advice. It's different when it's you. Her and Mason at work is a case study in itself since they use all these little tricks to control the kids and earn their respect, if even just temporarily. There are little nuggets of this in every scene, especially evident when they're training the newbie and we see all the things he does wrong, yet also some of the potential buried within those rookie mistakes. There seems to be a constant battle between following protocol and being there for the kids, but not too much.

When the bomb drops about Grace's past, the film doesn't treat it as a shock or surprise because it isn't. It was all there the whole time in Brie Larson's performance, which is what makes it such a tightrope walk. We know Grace because we know people just like her. One of the toughest things to convey as actor are hidden reserves of surprising strength or deep pain. In this role Larson is able to do both, sometimes at once, and because we start with so much respect for the character and her relationship with her boyfriend and to these teens, when she's forced to pull back the curtain on her life, the reveal is almost unbearable to take. Brought to her knees emotionally by her own past, we see her go from a pillar of strength to someone who barely has enough confidence to function.  After being the best thing in an already very good 21 Jump Street and bringing a little more to ex-girlfriend parts in Scott Pilgrim and The Spectacular Now, it seemed Larson was following a trajectory similar to that of Emma Stone, which wouldn't have been bad at all. But this changes things. It was hard to predict her capable of digging so deep this soon.

The film's centerpiece scene is the telling of a children's story, carried by the performances of Larson and a revelatory Kaitlyn Dever, along with some really great writing. There's something pure and innocent about the simplicity of a brilliantly conceived children's story, so hearing one delivered in the context it is here makes the revelation coming from it more heartbreaking than if it were presented any other way. Despite coming from the mind of a screenwriter, there's never any doubt hearing it unfold that it's from from the pen of a teenager reaching out for help the only way she knows how. More signs the script is firing on all cylinders comes in the depiction of Grace's boss, Jack (Frantz Turner), who can't act on her pleas that a girl's in serious trouble. It's not that he's an idiot who doesn't listen or an incompetent supervisor as would be the case in a lesser film, but rather because his hands are tied legally. He's a rational guy who cares about the kids and understands Grace's frustration, while also realizing he has to let a valuable employee vent a little and take it out on him. He's also trying to do the best he can, which is a surprisingly nuanced touch for a character that could so easily be a movie stereotype.

This isn't to say the entire film revolves around Jayden and her problems, or even Grace being forced to confront hers. 18-year-old resident Marcus (Keith Stanfield), is struggling with the fact he'll be leaving the facility and worried what awaits him on the other side. His situation is just as compelling as Jayden's, even if we know far less about it. Stanfield's the only actor from Cretton's original short to return for the feature and his frequently wordless performance carries enough quite intensity and vulnerability to tell us all we need about his past, as does the actor/rapper's unforgettable, self-penned song, "So You Know What It's Like."

There are are so many ways this project could have gone wrong. We've seen it before. Tackling this subject matter almost always leads to eye rolls when filmmakers completely bypass the cold, hard truth in favor of taking a sappy, falsely inspirational route. You can argue all day what exactly makes a "perfect" movie, analyzing the acting, writing, directing and cinematography until you're blue in the face, and while this surely comes up aces in those categories, it's always those unpredictable intangible factors that come together to create the total package. Most are invisible. Short Term 12 is listed as running 97 minutes but it could have been 80 minutes or three hours and I wouldn't have noticed the difference. When you're this absorbed, time disappears and the movie's over in the blink of an eye. You can almost hear the slam of a book closing, as the story reaches its logical conclusion, not because someone chose to end it, but because it's over. Cretton and his actors make magic and everyone should see it.