Movie Review: Here

This year marks the 30-year anniversary of one of the greatest movies ever made, "Forrest Gump," released in the summer of 1994 and directed by Robert Zemeckis. The powerful and emotional ending of Forrest Gump had an impact as strong as "Terms of Endearment," released in 1983, including audible sounds of sobbing within the audience I was in 30 years ago. Forrest Gump won Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay for Eric Roth, Best Director for Zemeckis, and won Tom Hanks his second best actor Oscar.

The main marketing for the new movie "Here" is the 30-year reunion of Forrest Gump with screenwriter, Eric Roth, who co-wrote "Here" with director Robert Zemeckis, Tom Hanks who plays the lead character Richard and Robin Wright who plays Margaret and who co-starred with Hanks in Forrest Gump.

Here is based on the book of the same name, written by Richard McGuire about a non-linear story told entirely within a single room over hundreds of thousands of years. There are random scenes about different lives and events, never told in any sequential order. There is no doubt that this might be a good idea for a book, but unfortunately trying to adapt this idea to a major movie was a bad idea. Possibly after purchasing the rights to the novel "Here", and later realizing that this unusual concept was not going to work as a highly regarded movie, the idea of bringing back the writer, director, and actors for Forrest Gump for the 30-year anniversary was an attempt to save the box office. With low ratings of 40% on Rotten Tomatoes for this film, a profitable box office is highly unlikely.

Attempting to review "Here" is very difficult because this is not really a movie. This film is more like a a deck of 52 cards representing different scenes and each card is just thrown at the audience at random. We are in the present day, then back to prehistoric times, then we are in the Revolutionary War period, then the Civil War, back to 50 years ago, then revisiting the 1920s, 1950s, present day, and then back to the time of the American Indian. All of this is shown in front of a bay window inside an old house or looking out into a forest during prehistoric times. Making a film like this has never been attempted, but is something like this watchable or even mildly entertaining? The consensus is clear that this film based on a famous book, just does not work as a movie. "Here" is the second film within the last month when a great director missed the mark. The last one "Megalopolis" directed by Francis Ford Coppola was a complete disaster, one of the worst movies I have ever seen.

The Rotten Tomatoes rating of 40% are accurate and only this high because of the acting of Tom Hanks and Robin Wright. This one is a surprisingly big miss.

Movie Review: Conclave

The new movie "Conclave" is about the aftermath of the Pope's death and what happens when the conclave at the Vatican goes through the extensive process of electing a new Pope. As a screenwriter, I have always known that for movies "show rather than tell", but with a film that is all dialogue, it still works as an impressive production because the acting is so well done.

Conclave stars Ralph Fiennes as the main character Lawrence who is in the middle of all the politics and backstabbing as 5 other Cardinals all maneuver to be the new Pope. Even though Lawrence does not want to be the new pope, he is still being voted for by the members of the conclave even while he tries to deflect their votes to another Cardinal, Bellini played by Stanley Tucci.

John Lithgow plays Cardinal Tremblay, who is the leading candidate for the new Pope, but Lawrence finds out that Tremblay would do anything to be the next pope including trying to ruin the reputation of his main contenders. Other candidates include Cardinal Adeyemi from Nigeria who wants to be elected the first black pope and finally Cardian Tedesco, a hardline conservative who wants to undo 50 years of progress the Catholic Church has made. Cardinal Bellini is the liberal in the group who wants to prevent Cardinal Tedesco from having a chance of being elected. This story creates scene after scene of intense dialogue as new information unfolds as the conclave votes several times to elect a new Pope.

This entire story is another example that blind ambition is greater than even the most devout believers of God and religion. Some people will do anything to get what they want, even at the expense of others, forgetting that what good is succeeding when you ruin the life and career of someone else?

The Rotten Tomatoes ratings for Conclave are a very high 92% with my rating at 85% for the excellent acting and a solid recommendation.

Movie Review: We Live in Time

The new movie "We Live in Time" can be seen as a tearjerker from a mile away. Like almost all movie tearjerkers, the story once again involves Cancer - in this case, stage 3 Ovarian Cancer. The difference with this film is how the story is told, through a series of "revolving flashbacks" in one of the most unusual ways I have ever seen a story unfold.

We Live in Time stars Andrew Garfield as Tobias and Florence Pugh as Almut, a married couple dealing with trying to have a child and Almut's diagnosis of Cancer. They meet after Almut accidentally hits Tobias with her car while he is retrieving a pen so he can sign his divorce papers, definitely a new idea where two people meet for the first time. This story also includes Almut and Tobias' attempts to conceive a child, which include trying IVF and their arguments that include Tobias wanting a child and Almut's doubts that she ever wants to be a parent. The decision about Almut's treatment is made by the couple early on to choose to live with quality rather than quantity to prolong Almut's life despite her terminal Cancer diagnosis and months of chemotherapy treatment.

The secondary story involves Almut, who is a professional Chef, entering a Chef competition with her work partner which seemed to have more to do with making this film lasting a full two hours than any other reason.

The world is sick of hearing about Cancer, the scourge of humanity for many decades, and the only solutions being chemo therapy and removing body parts. Considering the money generated from Cancer treatment in the world, the odds are high that the medical profession does not want to cure cancer, for fear of losing trillions of dollars of revenue. This movie is another tear-jerker, but it was produced well enough to recommend.

I mostly agree with the 79% ratings for this film on Rotten Tomatoes and do recommend this movie due to the well told story and solid acting performances from Garfield and Pugh.