Peneflix

“Success is getting what you want, happiness is wanting what you get.” Dale Carnegie

Recently, I met and surpassed my “Subscribership” goal; I am in debt to the known and unknown readers who have buoyed my spirits, corrected my errors, lauded and clinically critiqued my opinions; you have contributed to the continued elasticity of my intellect, the firm conviction that the web I thrive in, at times isolated, but never lonely, produces the desired effect. I can state unequivocally, because of you, a myriad of diverse souls, scattered throughout the globe, that I am happy with the gifts I’ve received.

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts.” Sage, Winston Churchill recognized that success is not an end in itself, and never does appear without bruising disappointments, scars reminiscent of the journey leading to the taste and “sweet smell of success.”   Computer glitches, self-reflection, dark moments of questioning my goals, miraculously evaporate when concentrating on a review.  Unlike Sisyphus, having the same monotonous boulder to manipulate, my varied blunders will ceaselessly occur, but perpetually educate; whether insanity or tenacity, I will continue to, maybe not fearlessly, struggle for my minor sphere, in the vast, intrepid galaxy of internet explorers.

Gratitude Always.

For Now……………Peneflix

Are there any clean ones?

All documentaries are imbued with a certain dose of subjectivity and “Dirty Wars” (based on the book of same title by Jeremy Scahill) is no exception; the difference lies in the conscience of reporter Jeremy Scahill and brilliant direction by Richard Rowley. They tackle the tactics of counterterrorism since 9/11: erasing boundaries, acceptance of collateral damage, absence of accountability on the part of the U.S. Government (especially acts perpetrated by the Joint Special Operations Command or JSOC); the film carries the viewer through the carnage of war -ravaged  Afghanistan, Yemen and Somalia. 

Scahill and Rowley tenaciously travel where others fear to tread; as an investigative reporter Scahill interviews the family of a slaughtered police chief (and two pregnant women) in the village of Gardez, Afghanistan. Cell phone technology adds to the gory validity of the erroneous, lethal raid; subterfuge lies at the core of government sanctioned strikes.

“Dirty Wars” beautifully filmed, fearlessly criticizes the Bush and Obama administrations,  their covert and clandestine use of drone warfare as a legitimate means to an end. Scahill, with incredible temerity, garnishes interviews with massively-armed Yemen soldiers; the father of Anwar al-Awlaki (assassinated radical Imam) and mistakenly, his sixteen-year-old  grandson; Somali warlords, supported by Washington, in the elimination quest of al-Qaida. Scahill’s empathy elicits formidable, horrifying outbursts, wreaking with animosity from the interviewees.

“Dirty Wars” sadly poses questions that may never be answered;  unsolvable, problematic conundrums; gray areas never to be defined, clarified; unrelenting, exponentially increasing war on terror; a pyrrhic war that gleans teeming hatred for America, and all its citizens. Depressing, frightening and bereft of hope, Scahill/Rowley’s portrait of counter-terrorism is uncensored;  a tribute to the First Amendment; no greater document has ever been conceived; America is flawed, but will always breathe free.

THREE STARS!!!

For Now………….Peneflix

It took nerves of steel to sit through this torturous tribute, homage to pyrotechnics and digitalization; actors were crucified on an altar of inane, embarrassing mediocrity; obscene, flagrant waste of 250 million dollars,  but admittedly some audiences will relish it. Being a lifelong fan of Clark Kent (“Superman”) this glossy, plastic composite was monumentally detrimental to his iconic, mild –mannered, super-endowed image. Henry Cavill (“The Immortals”) is a  perfectly-proportioned beauty and if this is a sample of the male population on the planet Kryptonite, it might be worth recreating.

The movie is insufferably slow in the “messianic” birth of the mighty “S” (“Kal-El”) and the destruction of Kryptonite; the battle between Jor-El (Superman’s father; a robotic Russell Crowe) and demonic General Zod (laughably dead-pan performance by Michael Shannon) was the commencement of one implosion, explosion, cataclysmic event, followed by ubiquitous, ceaseless climaxes.

Overbearing biblical comparisons, “Clark” is a dash of Moses and Christ; his manger stored in his surrogate parents barn in “Kansas” (enough citations to make one yearn for “Dorothy”); a shallow script leaves little for “Martha and Jonathan Kent” (once glorious Diane Lane and Kevin Costner) to imbue or incite interest in their folksy awe of their uninvited, stratospheric progeny. Enter “Lois Lane”, Amy Adams epitomizes the “cute” in “cute”; but is unconvincing as the bright reporter, protecting the anonymity of the world’s most sought after,  maligned hero; also, barely a dollop of chemistry between she and Superman; takes a leap of faith to envision a man beneath the supersonic suit.

Tiring, tedious, enervating , recalling “faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Is it a bird? Is it a plane?”  NO,  it’s peneflix poll -vaulting to the nearest exit!

ONE STAR!

For Now………Peneflix

It took nerves of steel to sit through this torturous tribute, homage to pyrotechnics and digitalization; actors were crucified on an altar of inane, embarrassing mediocrity; obscene, flagrant waste of 250 million dollars,  but admittedly some audiences will relish it. Being a lifelong fan of Clark Kent (“Superman”) this glossy, plastic composite was monumentally detrimental to his iconic, mild –mannered, super-endowed image. Henry Cavill (“The Immortals”) is a  perfectly-proportioned beauty and if this is a sample of the male population on the planet Kryptonite, it might be worth recreating.

The movie is insufferably slow in the “messianic” birth of the mighty “S” (“Kal-El”) and the destruction of Kryptonite; the battle between Jor-El (Superman’s father; a robotic Russell Crowe) and demonic General Zod (laughably dead-pan performance by Michael Shannon) was the commencement of one implosion, explosion, cataclysmic event, followed by ubiquitous, ceaseless climaxes.

Overbearing biblical comparisons, “Clark” is a dash of Moses and Christ; his manger stored in his surrogate parents barn in “Kansas” (enough citations to make one yearn for “Dorothy”); a shallow script leaves little for “Martha and Jonathan Kent” (once glorious Diane Lane and Kevin Costner) to imbue or incite interest in their folksy awe of their uninvited, stratospheric progeny. Enter “Lois Lane”, Amy Adams epitomizes the “cute” in “cute”; but is unconvincing as the bright reporter, protecting the anonymity of the world’s most sought after,  maligned hero; also, barely a dollop of chemistry between she and Superman; takes a leap of faith to envision a man beneath the supersonic suit.

Tiring, tedious, enervating , recalling “faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Is it a bird? Is it a plane?”  NO,  it’s peneflix poll -vaulting to the nearest exit!

ONE STAR!

For Now………Peneflix

In the running for one of the most preposterous films of the year; no star- power could save this ridiculous scenario, featuring anarchists (“The East”) Juno Page, Alexander Skarsgard, Toby Kebbell, dedicated vigilantes, using poisonous tactics to rid the country of corporate malfeasance; young idealists, intransigent, misguided; supposedly correcting environmental injustices; Machiavellian measures do not compensate for the wrongs perpetrated by monolithic, blindly capitalistic businesses.

Written and directed by the dynamic duo: Zal Batmanglij and Britt Marling; Ms. Marling stars as “Sarah” an ex FBI agent working for a private D.C. Intelligence agency (run by “Sharon”, Patricia Clarkson); infiltrates the “den” of  anarchists; survives on Dumpster-Diving, cuisine that has yet to perish, but discarded by irresponsible consumers; partakes in a jejune game of “spin the bottle”; catches a mild case of Stockholm Syndrome;  goes on a “jam”, euphuism for wrecking havoc, justified revenge on a reprehensible pharmaceutical company; innocents are pointlessly sacrificed, collateral damage expected in their well-intentioned, imprudent quest. Reminiscent of “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” (erroneously attributed to Samuel Johnson). Their intentions were prophetic and flawed.

In today’s environment we have seen major companies be held accountable for massive disregard for humanity: Shell Oil, Chevron, Texaco, British Petroleum; the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 has struggled to curtail flagrant abuses by the giants who control this vital resource necessary for survival in the twenty-first century; pharmaceutical companies are incessantly  bombarded with class action suits. We have “miles to go”;  “The East” proselytizes, yet fails to inspire; it triumphs in vapid, predictable exhortations; an unexciting, boring tale that never titillates or trespasses upon one’s imagination.

Left, longing for “Erin Brockovich” and “Silkwood”.

0NE & 1/2 STARS!!

For Now…………Peneflix

In the running for one of the most preposterous films of the year; no star- power could save this ridiculous scenario, featuring anarchists (“The East”) Juno Page, Alexander Skarsgard, Toby Kebbell, dedicated vigilantes, using poisonous tactics to rid the country of corporate malfeasance; young idealists, intransigent, misguided; supposedly correcting environmental injustices; Machiavellian measures do not compensate for the wrongs perpetrated by monolithic, blindly capitalistic businesses.

Written and directed by the dynamic duo: Zal Batmanglij and Britt Marling; Ms. Marling stars as “Sarah” an ex FBI agent working for a private D.C. Intelligence agency (run by “Sharon”, Patricia Clarkson); infiltrates the “den” of  anarchists; survives on Dumpster-Diving, cuisine that has yet to perish, but discarded by irresponsible consumers; partakes in a jejune game of “spin the bottle”; catches a mild case of Stockholm Syndrome;  goes on a “jam”, euphuism for wrecking havoc, justified revenge on a reprehensible pharmaceutical company; innocents are pointlessly sacrificed, collateral damage expected in their well-intentioned, imprudent quest. Reminiscent of “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” (erroneously attributed to Samuel Johnson). Their intentions were prophetic and flawed.

In today’s environment we have seen major companies be held accountable for massive disregard for humanity: Shell Oil, Chevron, Texaco, British Petroleum; the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 has struggled to curtail flagrant abuses by the giants who control this vital resource necessary for survival in the twenty-first century; pharmaceutical companies are incessantly  bombarded with class action suits. We have “miles to go”;  “The East” proselytizes, yet fails to inspire; it triumphs in vapid, predictable exhortations; an unexciting, boring tale that never titillates or trespasses upon one’s imagination.

Left, longing for “Erin Brockovich” and “Silkwood”.

0NE & 1/2 STARS!!

For Now…………Peneflix  

Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson are extremely likeable actors; their on -screen chemistry reverberates, echoes a  camaraderie that must bleed into their off- screen relationship; they verbalize and finish each others thoughts, their auras blend into a solid, granite friendship. Unfortunately, their likeability cannot salvage what could have been a fascinating scenario, which should have taken flight, but sadly whimpers, struggles and never gets off the ground.

“Google” founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin (while they were working on their PHD’s at Stanford) is a behemoth that  along with “Apple”, changed the world;  allowed director Shawn Levy tremendous latitude in using Google’s Menlo Park campus and lending computer scientists to translate correctly “Googlese” to the novices, “Nooglers”.

Obsolete,  forty-something’s, sophisticated salesmen, vacantly devoid of computer skills, miraculously get a shot as interns in Google’s summer program; implausible, since approximately forty thousand brainiacs apply for space limited to fifteen hundred; a glimmer of hope, instantly dashed by celestial stereotyping; it is 2013,  everyone knows “nerds” can be beautiful, sociable, athletic ( Winkelvoss twins, Brit Marling, Ryan Fitzpatrick, Steve Nash); the interns are sophomoric, pasty, pod-like individuals, the world and  its fruits, at the their fingertips, yet they choose to hibernate in an airless,  charmless crypt, filled with androids, biometrics, gigabytes, algorithms.

“Billy” (Vaughn) and “Nick” (Wilson), benign misfits, “talk the talk” bring their paltry team and each other together with a barrage of platitudinous, pontificating sermons and an evening imbibing, lusting in a strip club; misty-eyed converts rally around the saccharine, worldly neophytes; “The Internship” sinks into maudlin, melodramatic predictability.

I like Wilson and Vaughn but not their “internship”.

TWO STARS!!

For Now…….Penelope

Recently, I was asked when was the last time I laughed, uncontrollably, with pure abandonment, total disregard for  propriety; with alacrity I yelped, watching “The Kings of Summer”. A joyous “coming of age” film reminiscent of Mark Twain’s “Tom Sawyer”, “Huckleberry Finn” adventures, minus the dark side. Director Jordan Vogt-Roberts’s “The Kings of Summer” encapsulates the validity of why people flock to darkened venues to wallow in the luxurious, at times injurious, plights of strangers; strangers that in less than two hours are unmasked, become friends or catapulted into anonymity; legitimate, sensational voyeurism; in this scenario, unmitigated fun.

“Joe” (Nick Robinson) a fifteen-year-old frustrated, bright boy, living with his bitter, single father “Frank” (caustically galvanizing, dead-pan performance by Nick Offerman); his mother is deceased; flees the confines of his middle class neighborhood and the unceasing harangues of his dad; convinces his closest friend, “Patrick” (Gabriel Basso) to accompany him into Thoreau-like terrain, build a house and “suck the marrow out of life”. They are joined by “Biaggio” (Moises Arias) one of the most enchanting, compelling creatures to grace the contemporary screen; combination golem/troll he kidnaps every scene, and like “E.T” charms and seduces the most intransigent hearts.

“The Kings of Summer” is positively refreshing, unscarred by bullying, cruelty (“Lord of the Flies”), menacing mayhem. It addresses issues of adolescence, struggling to emerge from the chrysalis into adulthood; ache of first love’s tragic carnage; finding a neutral ground within parental parameters.  Incredibly, all the characters are intrinsically kind, genuinely decent people; we recognize these people, they are our neighbors, friends, families; they are us.

Loving the medicinal rewards of laughter, “The Kings of Summer” delivers the “full monty”!

FOUR STARS!!!!

For Now………Peneflix

The third, and possibly best, of the “Before” films; “Jesse” and “Celine” (Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy) no longer in the throes of love’s commencing powers, passions ignited by a glance; seasoned, in their early 40’s, with twin daughters, vacationing in Greece. Jesse’s son by his first marriage has left for Chicago; leaving an anguished, guilt-ridden, perplexed Jesse, venting to Celine, who is wresting with her own professional issues.

Jesse still sports the homeless, unshaven, unwashed look but redeems his personal scruff with his razor-sharp intellect. Self- deprecating Celine, a little thicker, but still in possession of magnificent tresses, an acerbic sense of humor, and a wit to match her partner; in essence, their stars were meant to cross and remain cemented in perpetuity.

With trepidation, fearing an onslaught of the “like” affliction, I reluctantly ventured into the third, and surprisingly wonderful, collaboration between Richard Linklater, Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy. Reminiscent of Kathryn Hepburn/Spencer Tracy films of yesteryear it is a homage to “conversation”; the characters talk to each other: intensely, lovingly, bitterly, bitingly and in the process reveal their innermost foibles, regrets, pains, insecurities. Anyone who has had a long term relationship will recognize the peaks and valleys this couple describe so ardently; words that wound, soothe, heal and gift inimitable encouragement, joy, love.

A poignantly memorable moment occurs, at a sumptuous lunch, served al fresco, surrounded by the shimmering, vibrantly heated Greek landscape;  four couples, multi-generational (millennials, mid-life, octogenarians) expound on relationships: why some wither, others flourish; no definitive answers, just voluminous wisdom in the simplest spoken reflection.

The tangible, palatable chemistry between Delpy and Hawke is the force behind the realistic richness of the film; passion is tempered, but their friendship has been nurtured by life’s fires and like the strongest steel, tested, unbreakable; inevitably, after midnight, “friendship” is the tie that binds.

FOUR STARS!!!!

For Now………….Peneflix

Who doesn’t like magic?  Magic is transformative, the unimaginable becomes a reality; it is awe -inspiring, defies logic and has been around since Jesus Christ did the “loaves and fishes” number a couple of thousand years ago; yes, magic can sway, even convert the most ardent disbeliever. Its fascination is proven ubiquitously by David Copperfield, Doug Henning, Siegfried & Roy, all descendants of the emperor of wizardry, Harry Houdini (Ehrich Weisz 1875-1926).

“Now You See Me”  is a fantastical romp in a surreal, illusionary  galaxy; magicians, masters of “slight of hand”, escape, mental clairvoyance, brought together by an unknown, all-powerful “Oz” of alchemy, dazzling the world with imposing, seemingly impossible, punitive feats; it is flawed, implausible, farcical; simultaneously captivating, enervating entertainment.

Stunning actors keep the film from sliding precipitously into the melodramatic; magicians ( “Four Horsemen”, biblical reference to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse; Revelations, Chapter 6 ): Jesse Eisenberg ( since “The Social Network”  all his performances seethe with intelligence), Woody Harrrelson (forever cunning and funny), Isla Fisher (female filly), Dave Franco (lookalike for his brother, James); law enforcement: Mark Ruffalo (adds depth to the most simplistic roles), Melanie Laurent (luminously lovely, as always); Morgan Freeman (forever fine), trying to regain his reputation as myth-demoralizer.

Enough secrets of the trade are unveiled but never robbing the viewer of tingling, titillating suspense.  “Now You See Me” is a magical “escape” into the realm of wonder; possibly, crouching beneath the inevitabilities of our daily lives are the seeds of magical might, hibernating, longing to be awakened.

THREE STARS!!!

For Now………..Peneflix