Drag Me to Hell

I didn't find Sam Raimi's "Drag Me to Hell" entertaining. It is an intelligently directed, edited and photographed horror flick with some canny moments, such as the weirdness at the dinner party. But those scary jolts can be clunky if not silly, and the writing is spotty, concerning as it does a young woman who is cursed by a Hungarian crone when the former declines to further extend the gypsy's bank credit. "Lamia" time. As a Christian I believe in damnation, but I don't believe in this film. It handles the subject of "eternal burning" too lightly, too frivolously--and, needless to say, with bad theology. Also, horror movies with abysmally dark endings stick in my craw. They're not fun. As if all this weren't enough, Alison Lohman, though lovely, gives a superficial performance as the cursed gal.

Observe and Report

The naive, brutish and bipolar security guard played by Seth Rogen is a very interesting figure, but the other characterizations are what sink this comic film. The guard's mother, the Ana Faris character--they're sketchy, underwritten, uninteresting. Worse, "Observe and Report" is very often unfunny.

A flop.

Shall We Kiss?

Emmanuel Mouret's film is a comedy wherein best friends inch their way into adulterous love and wherein Emilie, the female storyteller, confirms for us that some people never learn. Virginie Ledoyen is utterly watchable--restrained but not lazy or stolid--in one of the principal roles. A very Gallic work of art, this, and its change in tone (it doesn't stay a comedy) works, I think.

Star Trek

The original crew of the Starship Enterprise as young men and women is what we get from director J.J. Abrams and his writers in the '09 "Star Trek," a stirring adventure flick. Chris Pine (Jim Kirk) could use some charm and the plot could use a little less nonsense, but I thrilled at this-and-that--at some of Abrams's action footage and the clever interaction between the Enterprise's people.

The film is adeptly directed, edited, photographed and production-designed. It is a nice, fresh scene when Spock (Zachary Quinto) enters the ship elevator, then Uhura--Spock's girlfriend! (Zoe Saldana)--enters, after which the dark-skinned officer sweetly comforts the quiet Vulcan now that evil Romulans have murdered his mother. Cropping up, too, are a couple of interesting images of planets being destroyed through implosion. Although lacking in charm, Pine is hardly uncompelling, while Quinto is merely okay. I'm not very assiduous about looking for cinematic sexism but, as often happens in movies, a woman--Saldana--gets half-naked for a brief while, but no man ever does. Maybe next time. Be that as it may, "ST" is almost as much fun as Abrams's wacky TV series, "Lost." As dramatic entertainment it means business. Permission to come on board.

The Class

A novel, "Entre les Murs," by a French schoolteacher named Francois Begaudeau became a 2008 French film directed by Laurent Cantet. Called "The Class" in the U.S., it stars Begaudeau himself as Francois Marin, a thin, 30-something pedagogue in a multi-racial urban school, and if you think inner city schools aren't close to being a serious joke, this picture has news for you. The public institution here is a multicultural slagheap, wherein Marin, though dedicated, has no love and not much respect for his teenaged students. Understandably called "clowns" by another teacher more harried than Marin, the kids are mouthy, low-achieving whites, French Africans, Muslims, et al. Yes, some learning does take place in the school, but as well there is Marin advising a history teacher not to introduce to Marin's charges the subjects of Voltaire and the Enlightenment because they'll find them too tough. Thus low standards are insisted on.

Teachers in "The Class" are likable--they're played by actual teachers just as the students are played by actual students--but are forced to play the establishment's games regarding pupil discipline. It means nothing for Marin to have to take contemptuous Souleymane (Franck Keita) to the principal who will only question and admonish him. Nothing worse will happen--this time, at least. The school's absurdity apropos of meetings and student representatives paves the way for Marin's losing his temper and telling two girls, the student representatives, that they behave like "skanks." Interestingly, he never apologizes for this. In truth Marin is compelled to become a moral eunuch. He can make few moves, is virtually impotent.

The film invites us to wonder what kind of country present-day France is, really. What will it be tomorrow? Its liberalism seems unsustainable. Is it fast developing into a no-smoking, no school-discipline society (a woman enjoins Marin to put out his cigarette in an empty cafeteria)? The good news, to me, is that there is the threat of expulsion at the school. It hangs over the unruly Souleymane. Curious: a student tells Marin that if the boy is expelled he will not be able to stay in Paris, but rather his father will take him to live in Mali. Does this horrify a contemporary liberal? A (rebellious) Malian boy in France having to live in an African country? If so, why? Isn't Africa SUPERIOR to the West? Ah, yes: unsustainable liberalism. In 2003 Tony Blair declaimed, "As Britain knows, all predominant power seems for a time invincible but, in fact, it is transient. The question is: What do you leave behind?" What, pray tell, will the France of Cantet's film leave behind?

"The Class" was co-written by Cantet, a brilliant artist, with Robin Campillo and Begaudeau. Its informal, plotless nature somewhat mitigates the film's gravity and implications, but power is there even so. So is mild satire. Mainly, however, it's a very evenhanded work about a very disturbing school.

Revolutionary Road

Did you know American suburbanites of the 1950s were often desperately unhappy? It's true. Know what else? People today are often desperately unhappy as well, and many, many of them are secular liberals. What's to become of them?

The frustrating Sam Mendes directed this movie. It's even worse than his "American Beauty" and "Road to Perdition." Not only is it dated and banal and leaden, it is also written in such a way that it's impossible to care about the characters. Pity those poor American suburbanites.

A Doll's House (Theatre)

Ibsen's classic is still disturbing (and offensive?) In certain ways, it's also creaky now. The University of Tulsa recently staged it, and thank goodness it wasn't drenched in feminism: what Ibsen wrote is neither feminist nor anti-feminist. What we see is the playwright fighting not to reject the institution of marriage, and in fact winning the fight. Consider what goes on between Mrs. Linde and Krogstad.

David Cook's direction was mainly palatable. The part of Nora can be very unknowingly acted and that was not the case here (kudos to Jessica Elliott). I'm glad I attended.