Posts Tagged ‘Michael Cera’

Barbie

Director: Greta Gerwig

Cast: Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, America Ferrera, Emma Mackey, Issa Rae, Kate McKinnon, Michael Cera, Will Ferrell, Helen Mirren, Rhea Pearlman, Simu Liu, Kingsley Ben-Adir

Running Time: 1 hour 54 minutes

Film Rating: 7.5 out of 10

Toys as a consumer product are self reflexively explored with wit and sarcasm by Ladybird and Little Women director Greta Gerwig in the highly anticipated fantasy film Barbie starring Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling as the dolls Barbie and Ken, who combined have multiple blonde moments.

It all starts off beautifully in the valley of the dolls aka Barbieland where like Pleasantville everything is perfect until Ken tries to reach the end of the wave and hits a dead-end and when Barbie’s doll like features start diminishing quickly including her high heel step and thoughts of death start seeping into her consciousness.

On consultation with weird Barbie wonderfully portrayed by Kate McKinnon, Barbie ventures off Barbieland through a portal which connects her to Los Angeles specifically the headquarters of Mattel, the manufacturers of Barbie where she confronts corporate doublespeak and patriarchy masquerading as profit.

Once in Los Angeles, Barbie is lost and confused whereas Ken, on the other hand revels in the patriarchy and rushes back to Barbieland to plot a revolution with the other Ken dolls, notably starring a range of male actors from Kingsley Ben-Adir to Simu Liu. Ken even discovers a liking for trucks and horses while Barbie discovers a fearless corporate secretary Gloria superbly played by Ugly Betty star America Ferrara, who unlocks the secret of Barbie’s beautiful transformation.

Ryan Gosling is superb as Ken, carefully crafting a narrative arc for his character from naivety to tyranny and then back to nostalgia. Gosling deserves an Oscar nomination for his role as Ken, from the jiving dance numbers to the villainous revenge he plots against the Barbies played by numerous actresses including Emma Mackey (Eiffel, Emily, Death on the Nile) and Issa Rae.

Despite all the hype and publicity, Barbie is not a sweet children’s film for small little girls, but a scathing allegorical tale on the nature of capitalism and how the gender roles have been structured to suit profit over flexibility, often pushing women out of the workplace in favour of men. Writer and director Greta Gerwig does the full range of jibes against her male counterparts from toxic masculinity to man explaining and from suffrage to male preening, questioning specifically assigned gender roles. In this respect her casting of the hottest star in the world Ryan Gosling is spot on as Ken and his performance elevates Barbie from a vivacious almost perfect land to a treacherous battle of the sexes whereby both Barbie and Ken have to discover their own identities.

Barbie is a candy coloured condemnation of the social roles assigned to men and women and how little children are socialized into specific gender roles through toys manufactured by shady multi-million dollar corporations. While Margot Robbie looks like Barbie, it is really her supporting cast that does the heavy lifting particularly America Ferrera as a contemporary woman juggling a career and raising a difficult daughter.

Where Gerwig falters in Barbie is that a toy is a difficult subject matter to adapt into a big screen unlike a novel such as Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women. Her directorial faults include crass excess and some really silly scenes especially those with Will Ferrell.

Barbie is a fun enjoyable fantasy but it is a film that takes itself too seriously in parts and not seriously enough as a sustainable narrative. Fortunately Ryan Gosling is talented enough to make Barbie’s counterpart, vain and idiotic. However, Kenough is not sufficient to stop the Barbie force.

Barbie gets a film rating of 7.5 out of 10 and is elevated by excellent supporting performances and fabulous kaleidoscopic costumes by double Oscar winning costume designer Jacqueline Durran (Little Women, Anna Karenina).

See it for the costumes, the dance moves and the music particularly the retro disco scene at the Barbie house party.

Gloria Bell

Director: Sebastian Lelio

Cast: Julianne Moore, John Turturro, Brad Garrett, Michael Cera, Rita Wilson, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Caren Pistorius, Barbara Sukowa, Sean Astin, Holland Taylor

Foreign Language film Oscar winner for A Fantastic Woman, Chilean director Sebastian Lelio recreates an English language version of his Chilean film Gloria called Gloria Bell set in contemporary Los Angeles and starring Oscar winner Julianne Moore (Still Alice).

Moore plays a fifty something divorced woman Gloria Bell who has a mundane insurance job during the day in a downtown L. A. company but who trawls the disco nightclubs in the evening sipping martini’s and dancing with strange men.

Whilst Julianne Moore is brilliant as Gloria Bell a woman who is prone to people pleasing which includes her rather awkward interactions with her grown up children Peter played by Juno star Michael Cera and Anne played by South African born immigrant Caren Pistorius (The Light Between Oceans, Mortal Engines).

Gloria even tries to placate her anxious co-worker Melinda who is on verge of losing her job in a particularly noteworthy scene on an office balcony overlooking downtown L. A. Melinda is played by famed German actress Barbara Sukowa (Atomic Blonde, Hannah Arendt, Lola).

When it comes to men, Gloria despite her disco dancing antics does not have as much luck as she meets the divorcee with serious baggage issues Arnold wonderfully played against type by John Turturro (Fading Gigolo, Barton Fink, Jungle Fever).

Gloria desperately tries to navigate this new relationship with the weird Arnold as he battles to cut ties with his ex-wife and children and is desperately jealous when Gloria introduces him to her ex-husband Dustin played by Brad Garrett and his new wife Fiona played by Jeanne Tripplehorn (Basic Instinct, The Firm, Mickey Blue Eyes). The only two women Gloria can rely on in times of crisis are her best friend Vicky played by Rita Wilson and her wealthy mother Hillary, a superb cameo by comedic star Holland Taylor.

Director Lelio lets many scenes linger too long for a film which lacks a fast moving storyline yet Gloria Bell is held together by a fabulous performance by Julianne Moore as she inhabits all the garish interior scenes of L. A. nightclubs and Vegas casinos.

Gloria Bell is an interesting portrait of a woman’s journey of self-discovery as she truly becomes an independent woman after she realizes that she cannot rely on her children or the men in her life.

Whilst I have not seen the original 2013 Chilean film Gloria which Sebastian Lelio also directed, audiences might find this Americanized version Gloria Bell slightly bland and very slow moving despite the superb performances and catchy musical score.

Gloria Bell gets a film rating of 6.5 out of 10 and is saved by Julianne Moore’s terrific performance but unfortunately becomes a slow moving story of a woman finding her own independence.

My impression was that Gloria Bell simply did not translate well into a contemporary American version despite the auteur efforts of director Sebastian Lelio.

Molly’s Game

Director: Aaron Sorkin

Cast: Jessica Chastain, Idris Elba, Kevin Costner, Michael Cera, Jeremy Strong, Graham Greene, Chris O’Dowd, Justin Kirk, J. C. MacKenzie

The Social Network, Moneyball and Steve Jobs screenwriter Aaron Sorkin makes his directorial debut in Molly’s Game featuring a powerfully hard core performance by Oscar nominee Jessica Chastain (The Help, Zero Dark Thirty) who is basically in every frame of the 2 hour and 20 minute expose of the decadent world of illicit high stakes poker.

Chastain plays Molly Bloom a savvy and smart young woman who in a bid to escape the clutches of her persuasive and pushy father Larry Bloom, a stand out performance by Oscar winner Kevin Costner (Dances with Wolves), leaves Colorado and heads to Los Angeles where she starts working for a slimeball misogynist Dean Keith played by Jeremy Strong who asks her to set up and run a regular Tuesday night poker game with a $10 000 buy in.

Soon the shrewd and street smart Bloom takes the poker game away from Keith and sets up her own High Class games at a luxurious suite at a Beverley Hills hotel aided by the dubious Player X played by Canadian actor Michael Cera (Superbad, Juno).

Sorkin tells and retells Molly’s rise and fall from power through a series of carefully crafted narrative flashbacks in between scenes with Molly Bloom and her New York defense attorney wonderfully played by Idris Elba (The Mountain Between Us, Star Trek Beyond).

With Sorkin’s trademark flair for snappy dialogue and producing a distinct visual style of his own, Molly’s Game is a fascinating portrait of a young woman who gets dangerously and illegally caught up in the world of high stakes poker where she eventually becomes subjected to the whims of vain and powerful men, most of whom are gambling addicts and would think nothing of sitting at a poker table until dawn betting their fortunes away just to prove who is a winning player.

Within this highly competitive masculine world, Molly Bloom gets indicted for organizing poker games with among others the Russian mafia in New York as well as Hollywood film stars, producers, rock stars and East Coast Trust fund babies.

Jessica Chastain is stunning in Molly’s Game and keeps the pace of this lengthy film, portraying a decadent Madame who presides over a glamorous boudoir for men to gamble, drink and flirt with gorgeous supermodels or as her book publisher says, she was the keeper of a very expensive and indulgent man cave.

At the heart of the story, which could have been edited in sections, is Molly’s complex relationship with her father who she was always goading from her rebellious teenage years to her earlier childhood attempts at becoming an Olympic ski jumper in Salt Lake City.

If audiences enjoyed The Social Network and Steve Jobs, then they will love Molly’s Game, a decadent tale of one woman who bet her good name and reputation on the house.

Molly’s Game gets a film rating of 7.5 out of 10 and is worth seeing for a remarkable performance by Jessica Chastain who really proves her talent as the heroine in this gritty, seductive tale about greed and power.