I said if somebody asked me to name my five favorite Beatles songs, it would take me a while to sift through them because I could probably come up with 50 off the top of my head. If they asked me to hum some melodies, I’d have to decide among all their melodies that waft through my head, like “Yesterday,” “Let It Be,” “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” “Ticket to Ride”; the list would go on and on.

There is no comparison between the quality of the music written by The Beatles and the quality of the music written by Bruce Springsteen. That’s proven by the band Rain, which tours the world performing a Beatles concert, with Beatles look- and sound-alikes. Thirty-five years from now does anybody think that there will be look- and sound-alikes of the E Street Band touring the world to sold-out audiences?

The concert starts with videos of the current events from the ‘60s, like the hula hoop, Chubby Checker’s twist, and the Kennedys in the White House. It segues into the concert with Ed Sullivan introducing The Beatles on his television show in 1964, at which point the curtain rises and there are the mop top Beatles singing, “I Want to Hold Your Hand.”

Performing before a packed house at the Pantages, Steve Landes, Joey Curatolo, Job Bithorn, and Ralph Castelli, play the roles of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, respectively. Landes has Lennon down cold. His stance at the microphone playing the guitar is exactly as Lennon did, and his voice is an amazing replica. The others are high quality musicians. The arrangements are identical to the Beatles’ recorded performances of the songs, and the music rocks. The audience was up and down throughout the evening, clapping and singing along to the familiar songs, encouraged on by the performers, closing, naturally, with a rousing rendition of “Hey, Jude.”

The concert proceeds through the several stages of The Beatles’ short, seven-year life in the limelight, from mop tops to Sgt. Pepper to Abbey Road, with costumes to boot.

There is a camaraderie at these concerts. We all have something in common; we are all Beatlemaniacs. We got there early and sat in the Bar and talked with strangers about The Beatles. It was a wonderful feeling.

Last year I had press passes and sat up front. This year I wanted to experience the show as just a normal person in the audience and sat in row QQ, in the Orchestra but near the rear of the theater, under the balcony. I thought the sound was too loud, but it might have been due to the balcony over our heads because last year I don’t remember it being that loud and I was much closer.

There’s no way they can play the entire repertoire of Beatles music, but I was disappointed that my favorite Beatles song, “Here, There, and Everywhere” was not on the list.

I can’t understand why everyone wouldn’t love The Beatles’ music. However, even though my friend who accompanied me is not a Beatles fan, she loved the show.

At Any Price

Run time 105 minutes.
OK for children.

Dennis Quaid in “At Any Price.”

Although I had been vaguely aware of genetically modified food products, I learned about it in a lot of detail when I recently read the book Wheat Belly. I took that advice to heart and gave up eating wheat, which I learned is a far cry from the natural wheat our parents and grandparents ate, and that what we eat now has unexpected side effects.

Ramin Bahrani, who directed and wrote a terrific script (with Hallie Elizabeth Newton), has created a devastating indictment of modern agriculture and genetically modified seeds (GMO), based on an actual incident that he discovered while doing his research. He stayed with a farmer he had met earlier, Troy Roush, who explained to him how he had been investigated by Monsanto for patent infringement in the use of Monsanto’s GMOs and how two agents followed him around. Facsimiles of those agents appear in this picture.

Dennis Quaid gives an Oscar®-quality performance playing Henry Whipple, a third-generation farmer growing corn and selling GMO seeds. Although Henry is devoted to his family, he seems to spend much of his time as a salesman, and a self-centered one at that. He’s got a devoted wife, Irene (Kim Dickens, in a fine performance), and two sons. One of the sons, Dean (Zac Efron) is more interested in becoming a NASCAR race driver than taking over the family farm. Dean has a cute girlfriend, Cadence (played in her film debut by Maika Monroe, in a performance that marks her as a real comer). Henry is cheating on Irene with Meredith (Heather Graham). There are other relationships with other farmers and their families that come to have ravaging effects on the Whipple family.

Quaid is brilliantly cast in this role. He can flash his fantastic smile at a moment’s notice, regardless of what’s going on inside. He is required to express a wide range of emotions in this film and he never fails.

Efron also gives an exceptional performance as the dissatisfied son. Things progress as they do in real life, as the problems of the Whipple family keep piling up. While this is dramatic, it is so well presented that it looks like we are viewing real lives as they unfold as lives do.

Bahrani has directed a socially valuable and entertaining film. This is a view of farm life that shows it to be far from what most people in the city imagine it to be, abetted by the outstanding performances of the entire cast.

The Iceman

Runtime 105 minutes.
Not for children.

Michael Shannon is “The Iceman.”

This is the mostly true story of a serial killer named Richard Kuklinski (a.k.a. The Iceman) who eventually became a contract killer for the mob. Extremely well directed by Ariel Vroman, who also cowrote the script with Morgan Land, the story and chronology have been changed, probably for the purposes of making it into a movie.

Vroman gets exceptional performances out of Michael Shannon as Kuklinski, Winona Ryder as his wife, Deborah, Chris Evans as fellow hitman Robert “Mr. Softee” Pronge, Stephen Dorff as Kuklinski’s younger brother Joey, Ray Liotta as The Gambino Crime Family soldato, Roy Demeo, and David Schwimmer as Demeo’s goombah Josh Rosenthal. In fact, this is the best performance I’ve ever seen Liotta give. He proves he can act without using an F-bomb every other word.

The only thing off-putting about this film is the graphic violence. Many of Kuklinski’s murders are shown in relatively graphic detail. But the story is so well told that even if you have to avert your eyes a couple of times, it’s an entertaining film.

The film was shot almost entirely in Shreveport, Louisiana (because that’s where producer Millennium Films is located), although the settings are New Jersey and New York. While the film shows that Kuklinski was working in a porn film lab when he met Demeo and became a contract killer, in fact his killing spree started in the early to mid-50s when he started killing for the sport of it, and he probably didn’t meet Demeo until the early ‘70s, after he had been a contract killer for Newark’s DeCavalcante crime family for an extended period of time. This only shows a small portion of his murders and completely omits the fact that he killed for the fun of it and was doing so before he hooked up with the mob.

One aspect of the film shows that Kuklinski was extremely protective of his wife and daughters, and that they knew absolutely nothing about his murderous activities. However, this diverges somewhat from the facts and is an oddly sensitive portrayal of a cold-blooded monster. It downplays the fact that while he never mistreated his daughters, he often beat his wife.

The film is well made and holds interest, but I deplore the delicate treatment of this despicable beast. Watching Vroman’s take, one almost feels sympathy for him.

Aroused

Runtime 73 minutes.
Not for children.

This documentary about women who have sex on camera in the porn industry is not as titillating as one would suspect, nor is it as revealing. Director Deborah Anderson interviews 16 of the most successful female porn stars as they are posing for a fine art photographic book. Although they all justify what they do, their justifications for the morality of what they do are mostly puerile rationalizations. I was disappointed that they didn’t go into more detail about how they view the morality of what they do and how their profession of having sex on a daily basis with other actors affects their personal love relationships. Even more disappointing, the film doesn’t show any of the behavior they engage in on camera. That would contrast their actions with their rationalizations. Since there are no sexual acts actually shown (although there is some nudity), the stark contrast between what they say and what they do is missing. To just say that they engage in sex, and then showing them talking about the morality of it isn’t the same as watching the actual acts in which they engage before listening to their justifications. Since it doesn’t do this, it lacks the impact it could have had.

District Attorney Jackie Lacey.

Jackie Lacey graduated from Dorsey High School in Los Angeles and received her bachelor’s degree in Psychology at UC Irvine. She received her J.D. from USC in 1982. She joined the District Attorney’s office in 1986. After working as a prosecutor for more than ten years, and working in administration for more than ten years, on March 12, 2011 she was appointed to chief deputy, the number two person in the DA’s office and was elected District Attorney in December, 2012. She is a member of LA 5 Rotary Club.

I met her in her office on the 18th floor of the District Attorney’s office in the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center on Temple Street in Los Angeles. She had just returned from a major drug bust that was initiated by her office and I asked her about it.

Jackie: Our office got involved with a major narcotics investigation that captured 24 kilos of cocaine along with a bunch of cash and shut down a major drug dealer.

Tony: How does that work procedurally? How does the DAs office get involved in that? Is this normally a police matter?

Jackie: Right. We get tips. The state Bureau of Narcotics has been shut down due to budget cuts. There are a lot of informants out there who have information but who no longer have a Bureau of Narcotics enforcement to turn to. So our folks are trained and they got a tip. We got the information and acted upon it and seized an incredible amount of cocaine and are very excited about it.

Tony: Is there anything in the office of being the District Attorney that has surprised you even though you’ve been in administration for many years?

Jackie: What surprises me about the job the most is the demand. This is a 24-hour-a-day, seven-days-a-week job. You’re constantly reading the papers and getting information, making decisions, evaluating and reevaluating, having conversations about this office or how to run an office this size literarily maybe 90% of the time, if not doing something about it then thinking about it.

Tony: What kind of decisions do you have to make as District Attorney?

Jackie: I make decisions about our responses to correspondence. Let me give you an example. Right now I’m dealing with realignment (a law that shifted the responsibility for some categories of state prisoners from the state to the counties). We need a definition of recidivism. We have to figure out whether a shift of prisoners to the County level is working, whether the crime rates are going up or down, whatever. I spend a lot of time thinking and meeting with people talking about how can we capture the data and how will we define recidivism. Before realignment, Tony, CDCR (California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation) always put out these recidivism reports and they defined California’s recidivism rate at 60%, which was really high compared nationally. They defined it as you recidivate when you return to state custody for any reason, for parole violation or a new case. Now that there is a certain category of crime, criminals that can’t return to state prison, can only return to county jail, how do you define it? We have to come up with a definition as close to what we had before in order to determine whether crime is going up.

I’m advocating that we include what is called “flash incarceration,” which occurs when you are being monitored by a probation officer and your probation officer says, “You tested dirty; you didn’t show up for this so I’m going to put you in custody for 1 to 10 days, depending on what your violation is.” I believe that ought to be counted towards the recidivism rate. Probation disagrees.

Tony: Who makes the final decision?

Jackie: I think what you’re going to see is more than one report on recidivism.

Tony: Let’s move on to something else. Now I’m going to ask you a question I’m sure nobody has ever asked you. Civil litigation is really awful. People file verified complaints, where they swear to the allegations set forth in their complaints under penalty of perjury. They lie all the time. Does your office ever prosecute that?

Jackie: It depends. We have a standard of proof with regard to perjury. You have to be able to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. Under the cloak of civil litigation all kinds of things can be said. There are all kinds of privileges. So, in general, we don’t use our resources to prosecute people who file civil cases just because the opposing party says they are lying. That’s always going to be the answer, right? That’s why you are in civil litigation.

Tony: What if it is black and white? What if it is clear that somebody lied?

Jackie: If the proper case were brought to our office; if witnesses were there, we would, and we have prosecuted perjury in the past.

Tony: What do you mean by a proper case?

Jackie: There’s got to be witnesses. It’s got to be a dead-bang provable lie. We’ve got limited resources so we have to prioritize when we decide to prosecute.

Tony: What do you like better, litigating or administrating?

Jackie: I love administrating, I really do. The opportunity to set policy, to motivate, to inspire, to leave a legacy here is wonderful. I loved litigating. The last case I litigated was a hate crime murder case. I loved the fact that I was representing the people of the State of California and really had hit my stride. I feel that that same sort of opportunity is presenting itself right now but on a much grander scale.

Tony: I’m not asking you to criticize Steve Cooley, whom we both greatly admire, but what do you feel needs to be done that hasn’t been done?

Jackie: People probably get tired of hearing me say this, but I never get tired of saying it. Steve Cooley left this office in great shape. He personally mentored me for 12 years. The way I have always seen my role is to want to protect his legacy and to protect this office and to build upon what he has already done. The challenges for Steve were different than what they are for me. Steve did not really have the challenge of figuring out, now that realignment is here, how to make it work. He did not have court closures and I do. He started with high-tech crime and cybercrime. Cybercrime is getting worse nationally so I think I have to be much more aggressive. So I have steadfastly maintained that the office is in incredibly good shape so there’s nowhere to go right now but up.

Tony: Do you read much? If so, what?

Jackie: Right now I’m reading a book, A Bright and Guilty Place: Murder, Corruption, and L.A.’s Scandalous Coming of Age by Richard Traynor, and I only get 10 pages a month. It’s about the history of the justice system here in the DAs office. If I have time to read, Tony. I’m reading recidivism reports, probation reports, how they’re doing with realignment. I love to read, but I feel guilty if I have the time to read if I’m not reading work related stuff.

Tony: Isn’t there a danger of burnout?

Jackie: Sure. Absolutely. I’m working on that. (laughs)

Tony: What authors did you like when you did read?

Jackie: I love Dean Koontz. I love reading Nora Roberts romance novels because they are such escapism. I’m reading a book now on my iPad called Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg about how women advance through corporate structure.

Tony: What movies do you like?

Jackie: I just saw a movie that I really liked called Silver Linings Playbook. I love that movie. It was my kind of movie, a love story plus a socially conscious movie about mental illness and the family structure. I’m probably about four or five years behind in terms of modern culture on television, but I just discovered Mad Men. I just finished season one. They’re probably at season five, I think, now. I love that show. It’s an interesting study in human nature and what we were really like as a country back in the ‘50s.

Tony: Has anything happened here in this job that you had not anticipated?

Jackie: No. Not really. I put together my leadership team, which I think is crucial. You have to have people whom you trust, whom you believe in, who are competent to do the job. We have some people who worked for Steve Cooley in his administration, but there are also a lot of fresh ideas here and new people in leadership. I think that at least 50% of accomplishing goals is putting the right people in jobs.

Tony: What are your goals?

Jackie: I have five basic goals:

1. Get accurate information on realignment;
2. Expanded use of alternate sentencing courts because they save bed space and money and they are better places to put these people;
3. Expanded environmental crimes;
4. Warn my seniors about financial scams;
5. Do something about the cyber criminals.

Tony: You’re a double pioneer. Jackie Robinson just broke the color line in baseball but you are both the first woman and the first African-American District Attorney.

Jackie: I’m aware of the fact that I’m the 42nd District Attorney and Jackie Robinson’s number was 42. I need a jersey. Where can I get a jersey? (laughs)

Tony: Do you feel any pressure being the first woman and the first African-American to hold the office of Los Angeles County District Attorney?

Jackie: Absolutely. I want to do well. I don’t want people to say, “She was the first woman but was she a good District Attorney?” It’s much more important to me to be remembered as leaving this office in a much better shape and accomplishing things. Yes, there is a lot of pressure. If I do a good job people won’t hesitate about electing another African-American or another qualified woman.

Tony: Have you felt any resentment against you?

Jackie: I don’t. Our office is more than 50% women. It’s very diverse. It’s almost been six months and I’ve really been made to feel very welcome here. There isn’t a week that goes by without someone saying, “I’m really so happy to have you as the District Attorney.”

Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf’s

Run time 93 minutes.
OK for children.

People who take fashion seriously are idiots.

— Joan Rivers

“Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf’s.”

Rivers says this at the beginning of the film. Brilliantly directed by Matthew Miele, however, what follows is a parade of people who take fashion very seriously. This is a delightful, informative, educational, and highly entertaining documentary about the 111-year history of the iconic New York department store Bergdorf Goodman. The title is from one of The New Yorker’s classic cartoons by Victoria Roberts.

Fashion maven after fashion maven appears before the cameras to tell the importance of Bergdorf to fashion and their careers. However, even though the production values of this film are extraordinarily high, the filmmakers make the same mistake made by most documentary makers in that they identify the talking heads by an identifying graphic the first couple of times they appear on the screen, then no more. This is a problem because there are so many people whose faces are unfamiliar to ordinary viewers that it is not possible to remember who is who. Whenever somebody appears on the screen, that person should be identified by a graphic throughout the entire film to refresh the viewer’s memory.

Appearing throughout the film are Giorgio Armani, Candice Bergen, Manolo Blahnik, Dolce & Gabbana, Marc Jacobs, Naeem Khan, Michael Kors, Karl Lagerfeld, Lauren Bush, Susan Lucci, Christian Louboutin, Catherine Malandrino, Gilles Mendel, Isaac Mizrahi, Ashley Olsen and Mary-Kate Olsen, Thakoon Panichgul, Rivers and Jason Wu, and this is just the short list.

But better than all these designers and stars are the detailed stories of the employees who make the store such a special place, including fashion director Linda Fargo, the powerful woman who makes the career-making (or breaking) decision of which new designer gets in and which doesn’t; window decorator David Hoey who makes the Bergdorf Christmas windows look like they should be displayed in an art gallery; and personal shopper Betty Halbreich, who helps A-list movie stars, politicians, and fashionistas make their choices. Her caustic wit is responsible for some of the biggest laughs provided by the film.

There are so many wonderful anecdotes that I don’t want to spoil the film by repeating them. However just as an example, the story is told that one Christmas Eve, Yoko Ono called at closing time and said that she and John Lennon wanted to come down and look at some fur coats. Naturally, because of who they were, the store remained open for them. Yoko arrived, but they had to wait two hours for John to come. When he finally arrived they ended up buying 80 fur coats, one each for their entire staff, at a cost of over $2 million.

While I was looking forward to this, because I do like documentaries, even in my anticipation I could not have realized how entertaining this is, clearly one of the most entertaining films of the year. The photography is beautiful, and the graphics are large, shadowed, and easy to read.

There are also some fantastic pictures of New York from the beginning of the 20th century. Bergdorf’s is on Fifth Avenue at 57th Street, right across the street from the Plaza Hotel, so the photographs are of a location that should be familiar to the vast majority of people.

I’m not going to give away any spoilers, but when you learn what the Bergdorf salespeople make, your jaw will drop.

Love Is All You Need

Runtime 110 minutes.
OK for children.

Pierce Brosnan and Trine Dyrholm in “Love Is All You Need.”

This is a terrific film about two lonely, vulnerable, middle-aged people and the emotions they go through when they both travel, separately, to Italy for the marriage of their children to one another. The acting by Pierce Brosnan and Trine Dyrholm is nothing short of spectacular. However, despite the title, this has nothing to do with The Beatles (whose song was entitled, “All You Need Is Love”).

Directed by Susanne Bier from a story by Bier and Anders Thomas Jensen, who wrote the screenplay, this is a tender, sensitive, romantic film that also presents terrific shots of Sorrento by director of photography Morten Søborg and music by composer Johan Söderqvist that is at once lighthearted and magical, and also touching and affective. Dean Martin’s 1953 megahit “That’s Amore” is played throughout, enhancing the romance. It’s the rare film that gets me to laugh and cry within the space of 110 minutes.

40 year-old Dyrholm gives an award–quality performance as a woman battling cancer, dealing with a cheating husband, all the while being a good, understanding mother to her two children and flashing one of the best smiles on film. I have rarely seen a performance as good as the one she gives here. But that should not be too surprising, as she appeared in the best movie I saw last year, A Royal Affair. After Alec Baldwin saw her in Troubled Water (2008), he called her the best actress ever. After seeing her performance here, I cannot disagree with him.

After decades as an actor, Brosnan reaches his peak with this role. He’s wasted his time with a lot of junk, like being a not very convincing James Bond, participating in a horrible cast in Mamma Mia, and he was as horrible in that as everybody else. But occasionally, I should say rarely, he has branched out and taken roles that require talent and range. He was good in The Ghost Writer (2010) and much better in The Matador (also 2010). But here he reaches his zenith.

The supporting cast is equally good. Paprika Steen is convincing as Brosnan’s hateful sister-in-law. Kim Bodnia is Dyrholm’s equally unappealing husband. Sebastian Jessen is a Hugh Grant look-alike as Brosnan’s son. Molly Blixt Egelind and Christiane Schaumburg-Müller round out the cast giving good performances as Dyrholm’s daughter and Bodia’s mistress, respectively.

This movie has several twists and turns, but it proceeds apace and, like most good films, it’s best seen not knowing much about what’s going to happen. 110 minutes might sound like a long time for a film like this, but the time never dragged for me. In English, Danish, and Italian.

Oblivion

Runtime 125 minutes.
OK for children.

Tom Cruise in “Oblivion.”

This is the type of 21st century major studio film I have come to loathe. It’s set in 2077 after Earth has been devastated by a cataclysmic war. Tom Cruise and Andrea Riseborough are apparently the only human beings monitoring Earth as water is being sucked from the surface for a migration to one of the moons of Saturn for the survivors of the war. Tom and Andrea report to a computerized person orbiting the dead and dying earth, played by Melissa Leo. There are some bad creatures still on the planet who occasionally attack Tom, and Tom and Andrea are ordered to keep away from them, as well as to stay out of a zone labeled prohibited because it is highly radioactive.

Although the production notes claim this to be “an original and groundbreaking cinematic event,” they also state that it is based on the “graphic novel created by Joseph Kosinski” (who is the director of the film). However, it seems to me to be clearly based on a radio show that was originally broadcast on November 26, 1950 entitled “Universe,” written by Robert Henlein that told almost the same story. I heard Greg Bell’s 1951 rebroadcast of the show on XM Radio’s Classic Radio channel approximately a month ago. I haven’t seen Kosinski’s graphic novel (a supercilious term for a long comic book), but this story is so shockingly similar to Henlein’s story that it strains credulity to believe that the creators of this film were not greatly influenced or inspired by Henlein’s story.

There are five writing credits, so I won’t bother to mention them here, especially since I suspect that the story was purloined from the aforementioned radio show. Even so, the script is well-written and the story captivating. Although it runs for over two hours, Kosinski keeps the pace moving. The story is told well as at the beginning the tension starts and doesn’t let up until the final scenes.

Surprising for special effects– driven movies like this, the cast is top-flight, including Morgan Freeman, Leo, and Olga Kurylenko, who seems to be making an appearance in almost every movie I see recently.

Like many modern movies, this is clearly aimed at the videogame crowd, because the special effects are straight out of that genre. Normally these kinds of things are a big bore. But here they are essential to the plot and are of high quality so to not overwhelm the movie.

The film is visually stunning; shot with a new Sony F65 digital camera, it has clarity four times a High Def image. There are a lot of stunts in the film and it is claimed that Cruise does them all himself. I’m generally dubious of claims (and it’s almost always that stars claim to perform their own stunts) that a huge star would risk himself on dangerous stunts and that production companies and insurance companies would allow a star upon which the success of the film depends to take such risks, but that’s what they claim. If he did do them, they are impressive.

I came out of this film pleasantly surprised. The less you know about the plot, the more you will enjoy the film. But shame on them for not giving Henlein any credit.

Disconnect

Runtime 115 minutes.
Not for children.

From l, Colin Ford and Jason Bateman in “Disconnect.”

Crash (2004) started it all and won an Academy Award for Best Picture with four separate vignettes, all of which came together at the end. This is the same style, telling about an ambitious attorney who spends more time on his cell phone than with his family, a married couple who is the victim of identity theft, a widowed former policeman with an adventurous son who cyber bullies a classmate, and a journalist consumed by ambition who wants to establish a reputation by reporting about a teenager who performs on an adult-only website.

Well directed by Henry-Alex Rubin from a script by Andrew Stern, the ensemble cast is led by Jason Bateman, who forsakes his heretofore comedic reputation to act in a straight drama. He is joined by a good cast of supporting players, like Michael Nyqvist, who played the lead in the Swedish (and better) version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009), Hope Davis, Frank Grillo, Alexander Skarsgård, and others, all of whom perform at a high standard. Special mention must go to 16-year-old Colin Ford, who plays Grillo’s mischievous son who causes huge problems. He displays admirable range in a difficult role.

This is a movie with mounting tension, not an easy one to watch. Especially difficult is the cyber bullying segment; difficult and very well done. It shows the thoughtlessness of teenagers, how they pick on people who are different with no thought to the consequences, and it shows the consequences. This is the kind of movie that can have a beneficial effect if enough teenagers watch it.

I have to admit, however, that I thought it ended with a thud. Maybe that’s the way life is. Even so, this isn’t life, it’s a movie! Rubin should have worked to get a better ending. Up until the last five minutes, though, this is thoroughly engrossing.

42

Runtime 128 minutes.
OK for children.

Chadwick Boseman as Jackie Robinson in “42.”

When I was growing up, Jackie Robinson was the Dodger I disliked the most. It had nothing to do with his race. I was a Yankee fan and Jackie was a hated Brooklyn Dodger. Actually, it was a compliment to him that I didn’t like him because he epitomized his competitiveness with the Dodgers and I did not want them to beat the Yankees.

During Robinson’s ten-year tenure with the Dodgers, they faced the Yankees in the World Series six times, 1947, 49, 52, 53, 55, and 56 (the Bums lost the 1950 pennant to the Philadelphia Phillies in the 10th inning of the last game of the season and lost the 1951 pennant to the New York Giants in the last inning of the third playoff game on Bobby Thomson’s historic homerun; with a little luck they would have faced the Yankees in five consecutive World Series). This was baseball’s golden era and Robinson was the best player on the Dodgers, so he was the one Yankee fans hated the most.

Later, when I grew up, I came to not only admire Jackie, but to revere him. I think he was the greatest American of the 20th century, and not just because he was a great baseball player. What he went through in breaking the color line in baseball was heroic, even saintly and had ramifications far beyond the baseball world and the world of sport.

This film brilliantly captures what Robinson faced in 1946 and 1947. It shows the blatant racism of the players and the Establishment, the horrible slurs that were thrown at him, how alone he was, the only black baseball player in all of professional baseball. It shows how many of his Dodger teammates were against him, and those that were for him like Ralph Branca (Hamish Linklater) and PeeWee Reese (Lucas Black), and his courage in refusing to fight back when attacked, and attacked viciously. The attacks are epitomized by the epithets thrown at him by Philadelphia Phillies’ manager, Ben Chapman (Alan Tudyk, in a good performance). What goes on in this movie isn’t something out of a writer’s imagination. These things actually happened and what Chapman yelled at him was probably a lot worse than what’s shown on the screen.

I’m probably one of the few film critics who actually saw Jackie Robinson play baseball. I’m sure I’m the only film critic who knows as much about Jackie Robinson as I do. In fact, I used the interview shown in the film between Jackie and Branch Rickey as a classic example of how to use silence in an interview in my award-winning groundbreaking 1978 book Sweaty Palms: the Neglected Art of Being Interviewed.

I can’t say enough good things about this moving film. Baseball has not been well treated by Hollywood, but Hollywood gets it right here. Brilliantly written and directed by Brian Helgeland, who received the approval of Rachel Robinson (exceptionally well played by Nicole Beharie), Jackie’s widow, the baseball scenes are right on. The CGI re-creations of the classic baseball fields, Ebbets Field, The Polo Grounds, and Forbes Field in Pittsburgh, are exceptionally accurate.

But better than that is the acting. Chadwick Boseman looks like Jackie, and, while not as bulky as Jackie (who starred in football, basketball, and track in addition to baseball at UCLA), permeates athleticism. Harrison Ford gives an award quality performance as Branch Rickey, the crusty general manager who made the earthshaking decision to break the color line and picked the right man to do it. Helgeland’s script strikes the right chords in showing Robinson’s heroism but doing it by showing that he was at heart just a man who was trying to earn a living who was put in a historical situation and rose to the occasion better than anyone could have hoped.

What makes what Robinson did even more remarkable is that despite all the pressure he was under unrelated to baseball, he still performed well enough on the field to be named Rookie of the Year in 1947 and the National League’s Most Valuable Player in 1949!

There are a few factual problems, but nothing earthshaking. One thing that bothered me was that when sportscaster Red Barber (John C. McGinley in the poorest performance in the movie) is discussing the Dodgers’ prospects for 1947, he states that the Dodgers “finished two games behind in 1946 and hope to do better.” This is highly misleading. In fact, the Dodgers and Cardinals tied for the pennant in 1946 and played a best two out of three game playoff. The Cardinals won the first two games so, technically, Barber was right, but the implication was that the Dodgers barely missed winning the pennant by two games when in fact they actually tied for the pennant. Maybe this was a little too complicated for Helgeland to get in the movie, but he didn’t have to have Red Barber make a statement that he clearly never made. If Barber ever referred to 1946 at the beginning of 1947 he would undoubtedly have said that the Dodgers tied for the pennant and lost in a playoff.

As a last tag and nothing to do with the movie, however, I do want to comment on the Dodgers. While the team basks in the glory of how it gave Robinson the chance to break the color line, in 1950 Branch Rickey was forced out of management by a shrewd lawyer, Walter O’Malley (although Rickey did manage to get over a million dollars for his interest). Six years later the Dodgers ignored the contributions Jackie made not only to baseball but to American society as a whole by trading Jackie to the Dodgers’ hated crosstown rivals, the New York Giants for a journeyman pitcher, Dick Littlefield. The trade was engineered by O’Malley over the objections of his General Manager, Buzzie Bavasi. Robinson retired a month later and the trade was voided. Jackie later described O’Malley as “viciously antagonistic.”

Jackie Robinson was a gentleman. In 1950 UCLA’s basketball team played in Madison Square Garden against CCNY, who became the only team to win both the NCAA and the NIT tournaments in the same year. Even so, UCLA won. As they were walking off the court, Jerry Norman, who was the starting guard for UCLA, told me that a New York Times photographer asked Jerry and three other players to pose for a picture with a black man who was dressed in a suit and tie. It was Jackie Robinson. Jackie had traveled all the way from Brooklyn to see his old team play and he dressed up for it and did it without contacting anyone at UCLA to tell them he would be there. For me, that speaks volumes about his character and the high quality person he was.

I could go on and on about this movie and about Jackie Robinson, but that’s for another day. Suffice it to say that this movie should get an Oscar nomination and so should Boseman, Ford, and Helgeland, at least. Bravo to Warner Bros. for making such a fine movie, one that will interest fans and non-fans alike, about an American hero.

Admission

Runtime 107 minutes.
OK for children.

Tina Fey and Paul Rudd in “Admission.”

I used to think that Mark Waters was a genius. He had back-to-back comedic hits with Freaky Friday (2003) and Mean Girls (2004). But excellence has disappeared from his work and now he’s working on a TV series called Witches of East End. I gave him genius category because comedy is, frankly, difficult. In fact, I think that comedy is the most difficult of all the performing arts.

Enter Paul Weitz, who is responsible for the brilliant About a Boy in 2002. Like Waters, he has not exactly burned as a bright star since. But now, a decade later, he directs this poignant comedy about an admissions director, Portia Nathan (Tina Fey) at Princeton. He has taken a terrific script by Karen Croner, assembled an equally terrific cast that includes Paul Rudd, Michael Sheen, and the always enjoyable Wallace Shawn, resulting in a first rate comedy that comes close to equaling the quality of About a Boy.

Fey has been an exceptionally good writer. But when I’ve seen her in movies she has appeared more like a writer who has the capability of acting what she writes without shining. Here she shines, giving an Oscar®-quality performance. She is joined in this regard by Rudd as a teacher who is encouraging her to admit Jeremiah (Nat Wolff), a high school senior without any apparent accomplishments, to Princeton.

There is a lot more to the film than that and it includes a scintillating performance by a hard-to-recognize Lily Tomlin, as Susannah, Portia’s bizarre mother.

This is an entertaining film with good pace and sparkling performances.

To the Wonder

Runtime 113 minutes.
Not for children.

It is a tale told by an idiot Full of sound and fury Signifying nothing.

— William Shakespeare

While this is a line from Macbeth, written in the 16th century, Shakespeare’s words constitute a concise critique of this film.

Ben Affleck in “To the Wonder.”

Writer-director Terrence Malick is the master of bore, and this is his bête noire. The man who made a bloodthirsty war movie, The Thin Red Line (1998) into a sleepfest has outdone himself here. Starring Ben Affleck, Olga Kurylenko, Rachel McAdams, and Javier Bardem, this is a nonsensical exercise in directorial egotism. While production notes try to explain what it’s about, no story unfolds onscreen for the uninitiated.

This is an incoherent jumble of scenes, each of which is totally unrelated to what precedes and what follows. At times it seems like a cinematographer gone mad as each shot seems to be inserted in the movie just because it is a good shot of scenery, or of a star walking along with his or her reflection in a window, or rushing water, or interesting angles. But the scenes mean nothing and have little or no connection with the story, you should pardon the expression, or the characters. And, of course, since this is Terrence Malick, there are innumerable shots of people thinking… and thinking… and thinking….

Rachel McAdams is listed as a costar, but it’s unlikely that she appears on the screen for more than five minutes. It’s mostly a silent film because nobody says much of anything. In fact, I would bet that there are more words in this review than are spoken in the entire two hour film. Characters suddenly appear that you’ve never seen before and don’t see again. Nothing makes any sense.

I’ve seen a lot of awful movies, mostly in a room full of critics. But this is the first movie I’ve ever seen where the critics were rushing for the doors as soon as the film ended volunteering comments ranging from bad to awful, laughing at the absurdity of it all.

If this is not the worst film ever made, it’s certainly one of the most boring.

The Company You Keep

Runtime 125 minutes.
OK for children.

Robert Redford in “The Company You Keep.”

What’s with Robert Redford, anyway? The last movie he directed, The Conspirator (2010) tried to make Mary Surratt, a woman who could stand as the most notorious villain in American history, into a misunderstood hero. Surratt was the mother of one of the conspirators who were involved in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. She could have stopped it. Instead, she helped the conspirators, was caught, tried, and hung, and properly so because the evidence against her was overwhelming. Redford’s movie cooked the books by ignoring the evidence against her and presented her as a sympathetic figure.

Now he bases this film on the case of Kathleen Ann Soliah, who was a member of the notorious Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) and participated in a bank robbery that resulted in the death of 42-year-old Myrna Opsahl, a mother of four who was in the bank depositing money for her church. Soliah immediately went underground, marrying, having children and living a quiet life in Minnesota before she was caught decades after the robbery and rightfully sentenced to prison.

Redford changes her name to Sharon Solarz (leftwing icon Susan Sarandon), makes her a member of the Weather Underground (of which the equally notorious Bill Ayers was a leader) and the result is this sympathetic movie about people who bombed the Pentagon and other government offices decades ago.

Redford’s idea here is to put a human face on these violent ideologues. His theme seems to be that if something happened a long time ago and people have been in hiding and leading exemplary lives, let’s just forget the bombings and violent deeds for which they were responsible. Naturally, the nature of the crimes they committed is minimized so that their crimes seem not to be anything other than memories. Redford apparently feels there should be no responsibility or punishment for what they did. (In fact, very few Weather Underground people were prosecuted for two reasons: illegal government wiretaps and amnesty granted by President Carter.)

Redford plays one of the members of the group who has also been living underground. Journalist Shia LaBeouf becomes suspicious and when Redford goes on the run, LaBeouf tracks him. Even though the basis of the film is offensive to lots of people who aren’t sympathetic to people who bomb government buildings, it is still a very entertaining film if you can suppress your opinion of the people who are pictured with such empathy by fellow-traveler Redford.

The cast is A-list, Chris Cooper, Nick Nolte, Richard Jenkins, Terrence Howard, Julie Christie, Stanley Tucci, and Anna Kendrick, all of whom are a pleasure to watch. But better than that is the presence of Sam Elliott, who has spent much of the past 30 years as a voice for commercials and animated films. Elliott has been a favorite of mine for a long time. His Lifeguard (1976) is one of history’s most underrated and underappreciated films.

There are dialogues that seem intended to picture these people as repentive, and originally misguided in their methods but are now basically harmless if not irrelevant. These scenes reminded me of the line from West Side Story when the Jets are justifying their violent behavior by telling Officer Krupke, “We’re depraved because we’re deprived.” I kept thinking of Myrna Opshahl and her children and couldn’t muster much sympathy for Redford and Christie and the rest of their compatriots.

Redford is a talented director and this movie epitomizes that talent. The point of the film irritated me, but I also enjoyed it, unlike Redford’s The Conspirator.

G.I. Joe: Retaliation

Runtime 110 minutes.
Not for children.

From l, Channing Tatum and Dwayne Johnson in “G.I. Joe: Retaliation.”

This is another of those action movies that seem to be aimed solely at people who like to sit around and waste their time playing video games hour after hour. In fact, G.I. Joe was created by the toy company Hasbro as a line of action figures. The figures were adapted to video games beginning in 1983. A new game was created to coincide with the release of the first movie, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra in 2009. As might be expected, this sequel is full of totally mindless, idiotic, incredible scenes where bullets are sprayed like water, yet rarely does a hero get scratched. The two big-name stars are Dwayne Johnson and Bruce Willis. Johnson is back to his “The Rock” persona, and more’s the pity. Because the film was on the shelf for an extended period (see below), Johnson looks a lot buffer than he does today.

As to Bruce, he has been done in by the success of the Die Hard series where one man takes on impossible odds and prevails. I know that there is a lot of money in junk like this, but it should be limited to people who can’t act. Both Willis and Johnson are good performers with range beyond that required of action heroes. They put in their time with this stuff, now it’s time to move on, although Willis is getting a little long in the tooth. Johnson, however, could have a rewarding career in front of him, and by rewarding I don’t mean just financially but professionally. He has to decide whether he would rather be Paul Newman or Arnold.

If you’re not into cartoon figures and video games (I’m not) it’s a little difficult to determine the good guys from the bad guys at the outset, although I suspected that one guy who looked like he might be a good guy was, in reality, a well-established bad guy.

The scenes are nothing if not ludicrous. The fights are ridiculous. The story is something about a bad guy who takes over the U.S. government and has a fiendish plan for the rest of the world. It’s up to the three G.I. Joes left in the world to save the world. The way they do it is incomprehensible and absurd, but that’s what you get when you pay your money for a movie like this.

What’s really awful about this and others of its ilk is that the solutions, scenes, and resolutions defy any explanation. The filmmakers just make something happen that couldn’t possibly happen. Just as a for instance, in this thing, three men are imprisoned in a capsule containing a liquid solution that puts them, paralyzed, in suspended animation. Suddenly one of them breaks out and frees the other two. It is absolutely impossible for this to happen and it is not explained how he does it. But he had to get out of the capsule or the movie wouldn’t move forward, so, viola! out he comes! This type of thing happens time and again in this movie.

This film was scheduled to be released in June, 2012, but when Paramount received dismal feedback from screenings it was yanked for some reshoots, apparently to build up the role of Channing Tatum who dies at the outset. But he still dies at the outset and it’s still mind-numbingly moronic.

All of that said, the 3-D (which was added after the release was delayed) is spectacular. The film might be worth seeing for the CGI-created stunts and the 3-D. But I wish they’d stop making frivolous nonsense like this.

Olympus Has Fallen

Runtime 119 minutes.
Not for children.

From l, Gerard Butler and Aaron Eckhart in “Olympus Has Fallen.”

This film is a blatant ripoff of the Bruce Willis Die Hard movies that pit one-man against enormous numbers of people to save the world as we know it. Even if it is hopelessly duplicative and basically unbelievable, and even though Gerard Butler is no Bruce Willis, director Antoine Fuqua takes the original story by first timers Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt and creates an action film that is, well, full of action.

This is another film where millions of bullets are shot, sprayed all over the place, killing everyone inside but our hero Gerard. Despite the low odds against anyone surviving all the bullets shot at him, Gerard is the star and he perseveres.

The cast is replete with big names, Aaron Eckhart, Oscar® winner Morgan Freeman, Angela Bassett, Robert Forster, Ashley Judd, Melissa Leo, and Dylan McDermott. But this film is not about acting. It’s about blowing up the White House, killing everyone in sight, and generally causing as much mayhem as possible.

The one performance that stood out was that by Radha Mitchell, who is so little prized by the producers that she isn’t even listed in the cast published on IMDB. But she gives a terrific performance as Butler’s wife. Mitchell is as beautiful as anyone in Hollywood and it’s always amazed me that she hasn’t been able to get more roles. Maybe this will help her because her performance certainly stands out above the others, most of which are little more than cameos since all the screen time belongs to Butler.

If this movie stands for anything, though, it’s that music can make a mediocre movie entertaining. The score by Trevor Morris is award-quality. But the director and producers are so tone deaf about what makes a movie work that they don’t single Morris out for credit in the production notes that are handed out to critics. His name was buried in the credits that you see rolling at the end of the film. Morris has worked mostly in TV, producing scores for TV shows like The Firm, an underappreciated thriller that depended quite a bit on the music to enhance the tension. Unfortunately, it was not renewed after one season. The score Morris wrote for this film allows it to rise above the mundane.

Adding to the score are the sound effects (Mandell Winter & David Esparza). I saw this in a small screening room and the room shook at times with the explosions, and even when a jet flew over. Whether that was because of the small room and it wouldn’t be reflected in a theater, I don’t know.

This isn’t a movie that’s going to live in anyone’s memory, but it’s still an entertaining trip.

Renoir

Runtime 111 minutes.
Not for children.

Christa Theret and Michel Bouquet in “Renoir.”

This is the story of the last days of the life of the great Impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir (Michel Bouquet) at his home in Cagnes-sur-Mer on the French Riviera in 1915. While the film is inordinately slow, it is a richly photographed, lovingly told capturing of an era strangely untouched by the massacres of World War I.

The story revolves around Andrée Heuschling (Christa Théret) who later was known as Catherine Hessling, Renoir’s last model who becomes romantically involved with Renoir’s middle son, Jean (Vincent Rottiers), and was the inspiration for this unmotivated son to become a renowned filmmaker.

Although Renoir was known for his Impressionist landscapes, he spent the last years of his life drawings nude feminine bodies floating in nature. Director Gilles Bourdos tried to make the fictional story as close to real life as possible. The actual painting on screen was done by Guy Ribes, a forger, who had just been released from prison when he took the job. Ribes doesn’t copy originals. Rather, he paints new, nonexisting works, by great painters. So all the painting scenes were done on the set in real time with the hand of Ribes.

I’ve seen the documentary Ceux de Chez Nous by Sacha Guitry that filmed Renoir during this period of his life which shows him painting with the paintbrush taped to his hand. Watching Bouquet and Ribes re-create the real Renoir was so realistic Renoir would have approved.

All the characters in the film were real people as graphics at the end of the film inform. While Buordos brings them to life, the film is so slow and action–free that it is sometimes difficult to maintain concentration. On the positive side, the cinematography by Mark Ping Bing Lee is an artistic achievement in itself, and worth the price of admission. The nudity is also enticing. Heuschling’s body looks a work of art, as does the body of the other model who appears late in the film and whose name I don’t know.

It comes close to breaking my heart to give this well-made, beautifully photographed movie such a low rating, especially when the acting by the three main characters is so good. But it is so slow and so long, one must be extremely patient and understanding.

So UCLA hired a guy who went from the Big Ten to New Mexico, hardly an advancement, got knocked off by Harvard, of all people, in this year’s NCAAs, and who apparently plays Bobby Knight’s “motion offense,” which is the same boring offense that Ben Howland ran with such lack of distinction at UCLA. Howland’s motion offense ruined one of the most talented teams ever to play college basketball, Howland’s 2007-8 squad with Kevin Love, Russell Westbrook, and Darren Collison, a team that under John Wooden would have been undefeated national champions, but never once ran a fast break. Love was the best rebounder and outlet passer since Bill Walton, had two guards who could run like the wind in Westbrook and Collison, but never got a chance to show it at Pauley Pavilion thanks to Howland. Worse, his motion offense had Love as the fourth option on offense. So UCLA gets rid of Howland, but hires another coach who runs the same offense that drove hordes of fans out of Pauley Pavilion. This makes sense?

Exacerbating this choice, UCLA apparently induced Alford to breach his contract at New Mexico, a contract he had just signed 10 days before. How does this fit in with the high moral standards set by John Wooden at UCLA?

So what happens this morning? I learned that USC hired Enfield, the guy from Florida Gold Coast!!! USC! A football school! Hires the most exciting young basketball coach in the country, right under the noses of what is the most hallowed basketball program in American basketball! I’ll bet you a dollar to a doughnut that UCLA didn’t even interview the guy.

As a UCLA basketball fan, I hope that Alford is more than he appears. I hope he knows how to run a fast break and that he can be more successful than he has to date. But, even so, Enfield was the obvious choice, a no-brainer. This is a dark day in UCLA basketball history.

Tony Medley is the author of UCLA Basketball: The Real Story, available on Kindle or at tonymedley.com/UCLA_%20Basketball.htm.