Review: Lawless entertains with simplicity, charm, and blood

"Cars that transform into giant metal men, you say? I believe we can break them."

 Grade: A

"They don't make'em like they used to."

There's something to that simple statement that speaks as much to our yearning for the trappings of our youth as it does to our yearning the simplicity of those trappings.

Typically, when that saying is applied to movies, it's used an excuse to gripe that a new film is nowhere near as good as an older film remembered through rose-colored memories. Occasionally, it's used to point out an achievement in cinematic storytelling that harkens back to a "simpler", bygone era of filmmaking that put character and narrative above bombast and spectacle.

Director John Hillcoat and Screenwriter Nick Cave's Lawless, an adaptation of Northern Virginia-born writer Matt Bondurant's The Wettest County on Earth", is a superb example of the second circumstance.

Bringing together a cast that could rival a Nolan production, and borrowing a few of his repertory players to boot, Hillcoat and Cave,  craft an affecting, if simple narrative about the Bondurant brothers, three siblings who dominated the moonshine trade during the late 1920's in the isolated Appalachain-esque town of Franklin, Virginia. Tom Hardy, fresh off his lauded performance as the megaphone-voiced Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, plays the eldest Bondurant, Forrest, a reticent, broad shouldered bootlegger who evokes Karl Childers as much as he does Batman's latest heavy, whose is as devoted to the sale and procurement of white lightning as he is the cultivation of his family's legend of invincibility. Shia LaBeouf harness all that qualities that make him the prickly, smart ass you probably love to hate in a role as the youngest Bondurant, Jack, who has his sights set on being a big time gangster in the vein of Al Capone or Floyd Banner (Gotham's own Commissioner Gordon, Gary Oldman, appearing to have finally caught up with Bane). Jason Clarke rounds out the trio as middle brother Howard, a shell-shocked WWI vet who loves the consumption of the bush whiskey a bit more than the rest of his kin.

The Bondurants maintain an iron grip on the distribution in a town where everybody seems to have still, mostly through fear, intimidation, (sounds familiar, I just can't place it) and the propagation of their legend in and beyond Franklin. As the limp hand of Prohibition spreads to Franklin, the Bondurants find themselves forced to face giving up their enterprise to the likes of new Commonwealth attorney Mason Wardell and his foppish right hand Special Agent Charlie Rake (Guy Pearce, clearly reveling in Rake's snide villainy), a dapper hitman well versed in "The Chicago Way". Refusing to back down and undermine their legend and legacy, The Bondurants face enemies from within and beyond Franklin that threaten to change the peace of their kingdom by spilling as much, or more blood, than necessary. Suffice to say, shootings, beatings, and tar and featherings abound.

Lawless sounds terribly simple on paper, and in truth, it is, but the simplicity of narrative is what allowed Cave and Hillcoat to breathe such great life into Lawless' greatest achievements: its characters and the performances. Cave and Hillcoat, both responsible for 2005's phenomenal The Proposition (which also featured Pearce), have crafted some amazing and memorable characters in the Bondurant brothers and their opposition in the form of Charlie Rake. It is rare to come out of the theater today and hold on to the memory of the characters on screen over the spectacle of set pieces or left-field plot twists, but Cave, Hillcoat, and their cast have done an exceptional job in achieving that rarity. Tom Hardy, Shia Labeouf, and Guy Pearce especially excel at building great performances out of characters that were likely amazing on the page. Hardy harnesses his physicality to greater effect here than he did as Bane, making the audience believe his invincible with a few choice actions and even fewer words. In fact, if Lawless was screened right before Dark Knight Rises, I would be much more inclined to believe in the legend of Bane than I did after listening to Alfred Pennyworth's warning. Shia LaBeouf plays the role he has always played as that young punk whose appetite is bigger but not faster than his mouth. yet, in Lawless, his antics have greater context as he lives in the shadow of two brothers whose legend he knows he may never be able to live up to. And, Guy Pearce delivers one of the most memorable gangland villains to hit the screen in a while with his preening, snakish performance that makes the audience laugh at rakes as much as they cringe at his brutality. Even the extended cameos in lawless bear the fruit of great performances as Gary Oldman steps back on the rwrong side of the road with menace and wryness in his role as Banner.

Because Lawless is such a uncomplicated narrative, the performances shine especially bright, but Cave and Hillcoat still manage to integrate a few welcome surprises, all of which a character-based and surprisingly logical despite appearing mythic in nature. Nothing makes this more evident than the closing scenes that focus on Forrest, a man who is defined by an outsized legend. Yet, Cave and Hillcoat wrap things in such a way that will make it hard for many in the audience to restrain an awe-filled smile. In many ways, that is Lawless' most unique and endearing quality. It takes a story built on equal parts legend and fact and weaves them into a narrative that manages to make audiences believe that these characters could ably embody the proportions of the myths built around them. It is also a film that makes you like these characters more than they deserve to  be liked. In achieving both tasks, Lawless recalls Brian DePalma's The Untouchables, a movie from my youth that I remember fondly for its great characters and, hindsight being 20-20, simple but effective narrative. Which goes to show that, with the right amount of craft, care and attention to character and narrative, they can make'em just like the used to, if not better.

In-Between Observations:

• Dane Dehaan plays Shia LaBeouf's "sidekick" with as much nuance as he brought to his role as would be world destroyer in Chronicle. Definitely, one to watch.
• Jessica Chastain also does a great job as a Chicago girl looking for peace in the woods of Franklin and brings a quiet dignity to her role that few gangster dames can cop to.
• Lawless manages to wrap up a plot pint in less than ten minutes that FX's Sons Anarchy could not wrap up in almost ten episodes. Ten minutes of screen time vs. ten hours. One point for movies.
• Bane's deadliest weapon is not fear or a gas mask, it's a pair of brass knuckles. Trust me.

SPOILED ROTTEN - A Second Discussion on The Dark Knight Rises

SPOILERS AHEAD

Full disclosure: I hedged my bet on The Dark Knight Rises review. 

I gave it an A- based on my revised grading scale, which means it was worth going to see on opening weekend, and I stand by the grade. However, if you read the review, you'll find a far more tentative examination of Nolan's final Dark Knight Saga chapter, one which yearns for the unpredictable and far more entertaining ethos of The Dark Knight. 

Of course, in light of the shootings at the Friday night screening of DKR in Aurora, CO, there has been a necessary call for a bit of a moratorium on the DKR discussion, out of respect for the victims of that senseless tragedy. In fact, I'd like to applaud the studios for holding back on releasing box office numbers for DKR over the weekend. Unfortunately, the combination of the Colorado shooting and the increasingly sober reflections on the film itself, DKR is likely to go down in the annals of film history as a disappointment.

Throughout my review, I constantly referenced how DKR paled in comparison to The Dark Knight, and I firmly believe that, left to his own devices, Nolan would have abandoned the series with Batman riding the Batpod into the darkness as a hunted vigilante. In truth, maybe we all should have left the story there as well. Slowly but surely, articles about DKR's skewed, neoconservative politics, slapdash plotting, and tone deaf character work have a popped up online, with more surely coming down the pike. In a sad way, the shootings somewhat opened the door for the responses, as prior to the shooting, critics were receiving death threats for calling Nolan's film to the carpet on some glaring flaws that practically crippled a surefire hit. Suffice to say, fans have calmed down, if only because many don't want to be compared to the madman who robbed so many innocent people of the right to escape terror and hardship in the darkness of a movie theater. It's just such a shame that, in some cases, it took a loss of that magnitude, rather than time and sober reflection, to make the populace calm down a bit and think before responding with violent fervor rather than measured fanaticism.

I myself don't mean to take advantage of the situation to kick DKR when it's down, and I apologize if it seems that way--that is not my intention--but rather to reflect, after seeing the film twice in a weekend, on the fact that this film could not have succeeded the way many hoped it would because you do not trap lightning in a bottle, you can only marvel--no pun...never mind, pun fully intended--at the moment that fire from the sky cracks the ground and shows you just how amazing a moment of perfect creation can be.

The Dark Knight was lightning cracking the ground. It was an exceptional, if also a bit flawed, work that turned on an amazing, unmatched performance by Heath Ledger as the purest Clown Prince of Chaos to grace the silver screen...ever. Nolan could have toiled for years, waited decades, and still he may not have been able to capture a fraction of the magic he poured into the Dark Knight. His efforts on DKR prove that. 

Nolan is a director who truly, admirably aspires to give meaning to what many inaccurately classify as meaningless. Magic, superheroes, dreams. Nolan has worked with turned examinations of each of these subjects on their heads by revealing the not-so-hidden depth within these subjects. However, Nolan has always had an approach to his subjects that rarely treats characters as more than philosophies. Sure, sometimes he really delves into the humanity of his characters, as in his earlier works like Memento and The Prestige, but often, a few days distance from his work reveals that the characters in his more popular works barely exist as anything other than mouthpieces for esoteric philosophies and perceived dichotomies. Rarely do audiences remember his characters for who they are instead of what they represent. In something a movie like The Dark Knight, that approach is novel because the characters have philosophies that propel them into compelling action--also known as motivation--but in DKR, that approach is distracting because the philosophies led to action that is more head scratching than compelling.

In my initial review, I mentioned the disappointment of Bane, a character built up through every ounce of marketing to be the unstoppable force to Batman's immovable object. He's also framed as a revolutionary seeking to restore balance to economic inequality afflicting Gotham. By the end, he's nothing more than a lovesick henchman following orders and caring little for the plight of the average 99 percenter, finding them no different than Gotham's elite. This bait and switch is not surprising considering how Bane has been used as little more than a heavy in any media other than comics, an approach unaided by his goofy voice and weakly sardonic mannerisms. Even less surprising is the fact that the true mastermind behind Bane's plan is Bruce Wayne's new love interest Miranda Tate, who prefers her birth name, Talia Al Ghul.

Marion Cotillard plays Talia, a role telegraphed since the first photos of her on set surfaced. As soon as it is made clear that Ra's Al Ghul's League of Shadows is involved in the plot to destroy Gotham and the child of Ra's Al Ghul is mentioned, anybody who caught the Batman: The Animated Series episodes based around Ra's Al Ghul knew where DKR was headed, despite Nolan's predilection to change the names of characters in the films to protect their doppelgängers in the comics. This predilection extends to Nolan's favorite character in the film, Robin John Blake, a puzzling name change that is actually hokier than naming the character Dick Grayson or Jason Todd or Tim Drake. 

Now, I can't fault Nolan for his fairly dignified approach to including Robin in his ultra-serious Batman narrative, as it was one of the most consistent and well-conceived narrative threats within the film, albeit a bit contrived considering how quickly and effortlessly Blake ascends to a position in Batman's circle of trust. However, the same can be said for Selina "Don't Call Me Catwoman" Kyle, who also has a real character arc that leads her to a happily ever after with boyfriend/husband/traveling companion Bruce Wayne, after Batman "dies" in a nuclear explosion. Anne Hathaway does a good job with Ms. Kyle, especially in light of the fact that our last onscreen Catwoman was Halle Berry's Razzie winning performance as Patience Phillips. Sadly, as with Talia, Nolan cares more about the boys than the ladies, which means Selina gets an arc but not quite enough character development to make the audience believe that she and Bruce are destined to end up together. It's more of a case of populist appeasement: Fans like the Bat and Cat together so that's what they get for sitting through the 3-hour epic. Again, this can be traced to Nolan's favor of philosophy over character. Selina has a very character driven arc, one that is not bound to a significantly measurable or bombastic philosophy. As a result, her arc is truncated and she becomes more of a guest star than she should have been.

While the Catwoman and Robin development arcs are fairly solid, the failure of Bane overwhelms much of the proceedings, eclipsing the adequate work with Selina Kyle and John Blake. In particular, the Bane issue jabs at the audience's suspension of disbelief, especially our ability to believe that he wants to waste months dangling a nuclear device over Gotham simply to make Bruce Wayne feel like crap when blowing up the city immediately would have crushed Bruce Wayne far more effectively. Even more, Bane wants to show Bruce Wayne how his city is falling apart, but Nolan only shows a bunch of cops living underground with every other citizen locked inside their homes...not tearing the city apart. Based on what we are shown, Bane's plan failed before Batman even showed up. 

What Bane's plan does is allow for a second act that is equivalent to the unseen moments that preceded the very beginning of Batman Begins. Essentially, Bruce Wayne is locked in a prison and, through sheer force of will, must rise to become a hero, just like he did in Batman Begins. And that's exactly where Dark Knight Rises exists, in the space around and behind Batman Begins. The Dark Knight is an afterthought in DKR. With the exception of a mention about the Harvey Dent act and Commissioner Gordon's guilt over the lie he told about Batman killing Harvey Dent, the events of The Dark knight are vapors that ignore the elements of what is to date the most popular entry in the franchise. This is to say nothing of the marginalization of great characters like Alfred, who is excused for most of the film, and Lucius Fox. 

Despite the stack of flaws, DKR deserves to be seen in the theater if only to enjoy the spectacle, which it undoubtedly is, with an audience that will likely respond with shock and awe to the twists and the middling action--never Nolan's strong point. Just know that once you get some distance from this event of a movie and start pulling at the threads, this thing is gonna unravel faster than rayon. At that point, you'll probably end up right where I was after seeing DKR for the first time--wishing Heath Ledger was still with us so that we could watch the Joker challenge the Bat to dance with devil in the pale moonlight of Chicagotham.

SPOILER ALERT: Review - Dark Knight Rises Prologue

Tell someone they’re smart enough for long enough and sooner or later they start to believe it.

Contrary to popular, and surely his personal belief, Christopher Nolan isn’t as smart as everyone thinks he is, himself included.

This is not to say Nolan isn’t an intelligent auteur with the rare gift of vision in an era where mainstream cinema is bewilderingly bereft of directors with a unique voice. It does, however, mean that his approach to storytelling can be rather sterile—which isn’t news to the mildly observant—and less dynamic than the throngs of Nolanites might suggest.

SPOILER ALERT

Two nights ago, I had the fortune of catching the 6-minute prologue to next summer’s The Dark Knight Rises. The clip, and make no mistake that’s all it is, opens with Gary Oldman’s Commissioner Gordon delivering a eulogy at Harvey Dent’s funeral. It is a quick scene punctuated by Gordon’s dignified remark, “I remember Harvey Dent.” From there, the clip jumps to what appears to be South America (a subtitle might help, just for the sake of geography and those who don’t know that big bad Bane is from the Caribbean).

On a desolate airstrip, Mayor Carcetti (Aiden Gillen, genre film and TV’s fastest rising go-to slimeball) is double dipping as a smarmy—shocking—CIA agent who is awaiting the delivery of three poor unfortunate souls (read: hooded prisoners) who are clearly on their way to the Nolanverse version of Abu Grahib. The requisite heavily armed paramilitary pseudo-spies flank Carcetti and exchange tales of the man called "Bane". “Why does he wear the mask?” they ask. Isn’t it obvious or do that not realize that eight years prior some damaged rich boy in a Kevlar gimp outfit “escalated” the war on crime to a point where a jacked mercenary from the South American Alcatraz has decided the best way to intimidate innocents is to wear a third of Darth Vader’s mask and talk through a vocoder?

The three prisoners are soon delivered along with a Dr. Exotic Name (Pavel, actually, and thanks to IMDB for that info because the sound was for crap.). Apparently, Dr. Pavel has some kind of MacGuffin, but since cryptic is the order of the day, it is not really clear if it’s a formula like the well-known Venom that turned comic book Bane into a supersized luchador or something more sinister. Carcetti is surprised to see the three prisoners, having only expected two, and begrudgingly brings them on the plane in hopes of learning about "Bane".

Once on the plane, Carcetti tries to pull some of that bull-in-a-china-shop shit that never flew in Baltimore and threatens to shoot the prisoners or throw them off the plane. Of course, no one talks after the first two threats. After the third threat, one of the prisoners speaks. In a voice that is virtually indistinguishable from a cashier speaking through a drive-thru microphone, the hooded prisoner says something. Whatever he says forces Carcetti to rip off the hood and….dun dun dun…reveal Bane, complete with a Darth Vader muzzle that covers his mouth with what look like metal teeth. From here, Bane (Tom Hardy, still sporting the muscles he earned on the MMA Rocky movie, Warrior) rambles some completely incomprehensible rhetoric that is enough to rattle Carcetti and spur Carcetti’s bodyguards to train their guns on Bane’s head.

While Carcetti and his crew are distracted, another plane, a longer black plane, flies above Carcetti’s plane. A squad of paratroopers drops from the rear of the black plane and attaches to Carcetti’s plane with suction cups. Through a ridiculously complicated process, the squad strings up the wings and tail of Carcetti’s plane, attaching it to the black plane, then shoots out the windows of Carcetti’s plane. The black plane pulls up just enough to rip the wings and tail of the plane off, turn the plane vertical, and throw it into freefall. Bane, Carcetti, the bodyguards, Dr. Exotic Name and the other prisoners flop around the plane like Joseph Gordon Levitt and Dream Soldier #695 did in level 2 of Fischer’s dream in Inception. With the tail nothing more than a gaping hole, the paratroopers drop in and, through another complicated series of actions, place harnesses on the doctor and Bane, while lowering a fresh corpse into the cabin. Bane administer a funky blood transfusion between the doctor and the fresh corpse in what appears to be a poorly planned attempt to convince the world that the doctor will die in the impending crash. As Bane, the doctor and the paratroopers prepare to be ejected from the falling plane, in a manner much like Batman and his ‘skyhook’ escape from Hong Kong in Dark Knight, one of the formerly masked prisoners asks Bane for a harness. Bane grumbles indecipherably again and the prisoner nods and slides into the seat that will carry him to his grave. The black plane then releases Carcetti’s plane, which nosedives into oblivion and a disgusting wreckage that will likely kill at least five unsuspecting innocent people, all while Bane and doctor are safely lifted into the black plane.

The scene cuts and a far more fascinating sizzle reel plays, showing in quick succession: Bane arriving in Gotham with a boss chinchilla down coat, an collision between two tumblers, Batman arriving in Batman-style, a collision between the tumbler and a dump truck, Anne Hathaway dressed up as a cat and sneaking around, Bane punching Batman, Batman punching Bane, the 99% finally fighting the 1%, Anne Hathaway frowning (because that’s what Catwoman would do), Bane dropping Batman’s broken mask, and—the coup de grace—a Tumbler-fied Batwing flying over a camo tumbler!

Without question, the sizzle reel was far more engaging than the prologue. Finally, Nolan and crew are showing something more than stills and, so far, it seems as impressive and morose as expected.

There’s no sense of the overarching theme, but, knowing Nolan, it will be stated early and often. The prologue itself truly pales compared to the Joker prologue from a few years ago. It’s not news that the Joker is a hard act to follow, and this prologue proves it. Bane is an average villain at best, despite being nudged into two Bat-films, and this prologue didn’t go a long way to making him any more memorable than KGBeast. The heist itself is needlessly convoluted, as movie heists often are, and lacks the slight innovation and personality of Joker’s heist. Also, the widely reported problems with understanding Bane prevent the audience getting any sense of his personality or purpose beyond being a plane-jacker with a muzzle.

Bane can be an interesting villain—think reverse Captain America. He was born in a South American Prison that is compared to hell and subjected to a super steroid treatment. He demonstrates gray morality yet orchestrated a plan that lead to Batman taking a year off to recover. He could be something. The fact that he was born in a prison, alone, presents an opportunity for a great short origin. In fact, I’d like to offer this idea as a better prologue:

Bane, wearing a simple black balaclava and a prison jumper, is restrained and being prepared to receive his treatment. For months, he has heard his doctors discuss “The Batman” from Gotham city. For months, someone has been planning Bane’s escape. Before receiving his first shot, Bane finds his restraints are looser than normal. He gets his first shot. His muscles bulge. He breaks the restraint. The doctors notice much too late. He advances on them. They sound the alarm. Five guards rush in. Bane lays waste to them in a manner reminiscent of the beatdowns from the Arkham game series, complete with swift counters, reversals and punishing finishing blows. He escapes the treatment room and makes his way from the bottom of the jail to the top, using his memory to beat the locks and his physical prowess to punish wave after wave of guards. He reaches the outside. He breathes in the fresh air for a moment then looks to the sky. A black plane flies above. He ponders for a moment then runs about five yards from the prison gate and starts digging. He retrieves a harness, a grappling gun, and a newspaper clipping that reads “Batman: Scourge or Savior?” He pockets the clipping, steps into the harness, and points the grapple gun to the sky. The black plane circles while opening its hatch. It closes in on Bane. Bane fires the grapple, shooting off a skyhook like Batman’s, and is lifted by the plane. He is reeled into the hatch as the plane changes trajectory, flying north towards Gotham city.

That’s for free, Nolan.