20th Century Fox, 21st Century Masterpiece

Fantastic Mr. Fox

**** out of ****

Directed by: Wes Anderson

Featuring the voice talents of: George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Jason Schwartzman, Bill Murray, Willem Dafoe, Eric Anderson and Michael Gambon

Running time: 87 minutes

Wes Anderson has been making cartoons his entire career.

The loopy personalities featured in Rushmore and The Life Aquatic and the offbeat eccentricity of The Royal Tenenbaums are quite absurd in their live-action surroundings. It was only time before the auteur would make a smooth transition into the foray of animated cinema.

It was well worth the wait. Fantastic Mr. Fox, based on Roahl Dahl's children's book, is an animated adventure that ranks among the upper pantheon of Pixar’s modern classics.

The titular Mr. Fox (George Clooney) is a sly and charming, yet restless wild thing who raids farms and steals chickens. He yearns to be a king of the wild frontier – he even listens to “The Ballad of Davy Crockett” on his Walk Sonic (the Walkman of the forest).

But after his wife (Meryl Streep) announces she’s pregnant, the Foxes decide that he should take a less risky job.

12 fox-years later, the two live in a cozy hole with their stubborn son, Ash (Jason Schwartzman). Now a newspaper columnist, Mr. Fox eyes a fancier home, inside the base of a tree.

His lawyer, Badger (Bill Murray) warns that the enormous facilities nearby the house belong to three cutthroat farmers: the chubby Boggis, the petite Bunce, and the petrifying Bean (Michael Gambon).

Nevertheless, Mr. Fox purchases the tree, befriending the building superintendent, a warm if clueless opossum named Kylie (Wallace Wolodarsky).

The Foxes move in, alongside nephew Kristofferson (Eric Anderson, brother of Wes). The youngster has a golden touch at everything (from studies to athletics, including Whackbat, a sport that makes Quidditch look likes Rock, Paper, Scissors). This catches Mr. Fox’s eye, but makes Ash envious.

Living near the Boggis, Bunce and Bean estates, Mr. Fox and Kylie plan capers, sneak into the three farms and steal lots of produce. While the heists are initially successful, the farmers soon realize that something’s amiss.

Animation-wise, Fantastic Mr. Fox is unlike anything you’ve ever seen. Anderson and cinematographer Tristan Oliver (who photographed Chicken Run) decided to shoot the film at a rate of 12 frames per second (rather than the more fluid 24) so that viewers would notice the stop-motion medium. The result is simply groundbreaking.

It takes around a minute to get used to the frantic stop-and-start rhythms of the animation. Thankfully, there’s 86 more minutes to bask in it.

The design of the film is charming, full of scruffy textures and in-jokes that will fly by less observant viewers. As well, many of the specials effects are downright awe-inspiring. The film struts its stuff, but doesn’t wallow in it - the story never lags beneath the visual wizardry.

Despite the swift pacing and sublime dazzle, these foxes (and badgers, and rats, oh my) are quite relatable.

Mr. Fox, while the Danny Ocean of the forest, is a caring friend and loyal family man. He even takes a few quiet moments for his existential thoughts (Who am I? he ponders). Mrs. Fox is a sweet and perceptive wife, but she has a ferocious bite, as well. Even with the mayhem and relentless action, the animals have a tender humanity.

The script is also pitch-perfect, blending energetic situations, warm family-friendly morals, several touches of dry humour (vintage Anderson) and sharp one-liners.

One of the film’s most endearing quirks is the use of the word “cuss” as a substitute for harsh profanities. “If you're gonna cuss, you're not gonna cuss with me, you little cuss!” Badger roars at one point.

Not to worry parents, though: this is terrific entertainment for both adults and kids – although for entirely different reasons.

Kids will marvel at the wild story, colourful characters, and enchanting visuals. Adults will chuckle (rather heartily) at the sharp wit, and enjoy its deft intelligence and dynamic soundtrack (featuring vintage Beach Boys, rockin’ Rolling Stones and a whimsical Alexandre Desplat score).

In a just world, Mr. Fox would have stolen all the prints of New Moon and 2012, incinerated them, and replaced them with this sheer delight.

Fantastic Mr. Fox features more wit, more thrills and more laughs per minute than any release this year. It’s a mothercussin’ masterpiece!

Charlatan, Baby, Charlatan

Dear Friends, Family and Followers,

You may have noticed that I took a two-week absence from The Screening Room.

As a new arts reporter/critic for the Charlatan, Carleton's weekly newspaper, I have been receiving assignments from my editor, Larissa. This past week, she sent me out for my first assignment that was not a film review.

The article is regarding the release of a new documentary titled Good Hair that is premiering in Ottawa tomorrow. I saw an advance screening on Monday and contacted several of the participants on the interview panel (mentioned at the end of the article) as well.

My article was featured in this week's Charlatan, reaching news-stands across Carleton University this afternoon.

I have decided to post the article for your viewing pleasure. I hope you enjoy it!

By the way, I will be back with a review tomorrow for a film I saw this evening that was simply... "fantastic."

Weaving through the world of hair

By Jordan Adler

There's a hair-raising film coming to Ottawa this week.

It features an issue so widely discussed, so socially relevant and so fascinating, it won the Special Jury Prize at this year's Sundance Film Festival.

It is a documentary about hair.

Good Hair, opening Nov. 27, is a deeply funny and insightful documentary, which examines the love-hate relationship that African-Americans have with their hair.

Funny-man Chris Rock serves as the film's star and narrator.

When his little daughter asks him, "Daddy, why don't I have good hair?" the comedian sets out to bring common sense to a prevalent beauty issue.

In black communities, straight hair is considered to be "good," while natural (or "nappy") hair is frowned upon, as the film explains.

In Good Hair, Rock discovers that the chemical relaxers used to straighten black hair are made of sodium hydroxide.

This dangerous chemical could leave permanent bald spots once it seeps into the scalp.

Furthermore, he inquires into why many African-American women empty their wallets for a straight-hair weave, which can cost more than $1,000 for a full head.

Many of these weaves are cut off from Indian women in religious ceremonies. Rock discovers that removing one's hair in India is an act of self-sacrifice.

The film also explains that while African-Americans make up to 20% of the United States' population, they purchase 80% of all hair products.

To gain perspective on this "hairy" issue, Rock interviewed many African-American celebrities: from Disney star Raven-Symone Pearman to poet and author Maya Angelou, among others.

While the documentary primarily focuses on the relationship between African-Americans and their hair, dissatisfaction with appearance is a widespread issue that faces all societies.

For the film's premiere Nov. 27, five esteemed members of Ottawa's black community will participate in a panel discussion at the Bytowne Cinema.

The participants will use Good Hair as the root of their discussion on the social, political and aesthetic issues surrounding black hair. The panel will be hosted by CBC personality Adrian Harewood.

Among the panel participants is Dr. Amina Mire, a sociology professor at Carleton.

The discussion will take place immediately after the premiere screening that evening.

War on Drugs

The Men Who Stare at Goats

** out of ****

Directed by: Grant Heslov

Starring: George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, Jeff Bridges and Kevin Spacey

Running Time: 93 minutes

Jim Morrison’s hypnotic drawl – featured in the Doors’ tune “The End” – opens the 1979 war classic Apocalypse Now. If director Grant Heslov had decided to pay homage to the Vietnam epic in his latest film, the oddly titled The Men Who Stare at Goats, he could have played another Doors classic: “People Are Strange.”

Based on a book of the same title by Jon Ronson, Goats is a zany, bizarre and often hilarious glimpse of war, featuring an all-star cast. Unfortunately, it lacks wit, depth and – of all things – a point.

The film is like a goat itself: light on its toes but with a noticeable lack of meat on its bones.

Its narrator is Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor), a by-the-book reporter for the Ann Arbor Daily Telegram. After his marriage falls apart, Wilton flies overseas to cover the Iraq War.

There, he bumps into a Special Forces operator named Lyn Cassady (George Clooney, sporting the stiffest moustache featured on screen this year). Cassady reveals to our eager journalist that he, many years ago, partook in an experiment by the US military, in a New Age combat unit training “Jedi Warriors” (McGregor, who played Obi-Wan Kenobi in the recent Star Wars prequels, keeps a straight face).

Through a plethora of flashbacks, Cassady introduces the birth of the New Earth Army. Founded in the 1980s by the goofy Bill Django (Jeff Bridges), it was established to conduct military training using "spiritual" methods. Hence, the soldiers learned paranormal psychological skills. Cassady recounts that he excelled at these offbeat methods of battle, including invisibility, cloud bursting and intuition.

He was Django’s finest recruit, and was admired by his unit. But, it wouldn’t take special “Jedi” training to notice that the rude, shifty Larry Hooper (Kevin Spacey), another New Age “warrior,” was envious of Cassady’s swift progress.

Shifting back to the present day, Cassady leads the way into Iraq to finish a top-secret mission, with Bob at his side to capture the story. Along the way, they meet their fair share of kidnappings, firefights and IEDs, to name a few of the bumps on their collision course.

The flashback sequences, chronicling the rise and descent of the New Earth movement of psychic combat, are inspired, zanily funny, and as the onscreen text proclaims, more true “than you would believe.”

Unfortunately, the modern-day elements of the film, featuring Wilton and Cassady, have little drive or intrigue.

This is due to Ewan McGregor’s flat performance. The fine Scottish actor puts much effort into honing his American accent but fails to transmit any life into his character, who ultimately becomes a two-dimensional journalist archetype. We return to his present-day bits while yearning to remain in the loosy-goosey “Jedi warrior” training camp flashbacks.

McGregor is a dull patch of sand in an oasis of dynamic, yet deadpan comic performances. George Clooney skillfully merges a tough sense of shrewdness with a bowlful of craziness as the psychic expert. And Jeff Bridges channels his shaggy “dude” persona yet again – and that’s not a bad thing at all.

On the other hand, Kevin Spacey lives up to his surname in some instances, but his antagonistic rival, Hooper, has little material to work with.

Jon Ronson’s book was acclaimed for its swift blend of the bizarrely amusing with the incredibly disturbing. The film adaptation places firm (and unfortunate) emphasis on the former.

Heslov is keen on kooky slapstick bits, while ignoring the compelling wartime issues that could have made this feature gritty and relevant.

He turns Ronson’s investigative account into a farce, and the results go awry.

Some scenes depicting the carnage in Iraq are entirely bloodless. Moments of Bob and Lyn uncovering some horrific findings, especially toward the film’s end (that I will save spoiling), are skimmed over to pave the way for cheap sight gags.

The Men who Stares at Goats is inspired and quite hilarious at points, but by the mindlessly dumb finale – one that would have made Dr. Timothy Leary proud - it isn't a movie worth staring at for 93 minutes. The horror, the horror.

Performances at the Top of the Class

An Education

*** out of ****

Directed by: Lone Scherfig

Starring: Carey Mulligan, Peter Sarsgaard, Alfred Molina, Rosamund Pike, Cara Seymour and Emma Thompson

Running Time: 100 minutes

There’s one primary reason to see An Education, and her name is Carey Mulligan.

The young actress single-handedly carries the by-the-numbers film, adapted from Lynn Barber's memoir.

Mulligan sparkles with candor, wit and grace, with a sprinkling of vulnerability, as 16-year-old Jenny, a bright schoolgirl growing up in a middle-class London suburb in the early 1960s.

Her stern father (Alfred Molina) and compassionate mother (Cara Seymour) urge Jenny to keep her head in the books. They aren’t wealthy but have pride in their daughter, who’s been accepted into Oxford University.

That admiration subsides when Jenny meets a smooth, delightful Jewish fellow named David (Peter Sarsgaard). In their first encounter, he offers her a ride home in his beautiful roadster. During the ride, David discusses classical music, concert halls and Parisian hotspots with the innocent but wide-eyed teenager.

Just a harmless drive home turns into more when Jenny bumps into David again. He invites her to a concert with his friends (Rosamund Pike and Dominic Cooper). David and these acquaintances wear posh clothing, eat in fancy diners and converse about European cinema and art. Jenny is smitten with this lifestyle, even while being seduced by a man twice her age.

Her protective parents are speculative of the relationship, at first. But David, polite and sharply dressed, charms them into letting her go off with him on several excursions. He tells them these trips (including one to Paris) are just social ventures and ways for Jenny to acquaint herself with his well-educated friends and professors (including author C.S. Lewis, who he refers to as “Clive”).

Of course, these are deft deceptions. Of course, Jenny and David have other matters on their mind. And, of course, the grades start slipping and the acceptance into Oxford is up for question as well.

As Jenny, Carey Mulligan is simply enthralling. She has a tender maturity that works excellently in scenes with her naïve parents, but she can effortlessly remove these heavy clothes (in more than one way) during her adventures with David and company, radiantly exploring the lifestyles of the rich and careless.

A relative newcomer (her debut was in the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice as one of the Bennett sisters), Mulligan is dignified, luminous and vulnerable in all the right places. The only education she needs to be taking is how to channel the awards-season circuit, where she will undoubtedly be in the early months of 2010.

She is surrounded by an excellent ensemble. Alfred Molina (also Oscar-worthy) is a scene-stealer as the controlling, if easily manipulated father.

Emma Thompson, in an extended cameo as Jenny’s brash and anti-Semitic headmistress, and Olivia Williams as her belittled English professor, cautious of Jenny’s romantic perils (ironic, considering Williams is best known as a teacher who’s the object of a student’s affection in Wes Anderson’s Rushmore) are also superb.

My only reservation with the cast is American character actor Peter Sarsgaard. As David, he shares some nice chemistry with Mulligan, but he’s too old for the part; also, his British accent wavers at certain points.

An Education is briskly directed by Lone Scherfig. It is candescently photographed by John de Borman, and Paul Englishby provides the whimsical musical score.

The sets are authentic and exquisitely designed, reminiscent of those from the excellent television series Mad Men, which is also set in the early 1960s. But if Mad Men is a warm glass of red wine, An Education is sparkling champagne.

Nick Hornby’s script, meanwhile, has dialogue as crisp as anything I’ve heard all year. Jenny’s quip to David after her deflowering is an instant treasure.

Regardless, An Education is still a mundane romance with a conventional trajectory. It offers few surprises and wraps up the complications of Jenny’s schooling, not to mention her frisky relationship, far too easily.

While the cinematography is easy on the eyes, the dialogue is fantastic, and the performances, including a breakthrough from Mulligan, are mostly exceptional, An Education is quite predictable and avoids detouring into more challenging material when it has the chance.

The cast graduates with top honours, but maybe Hornby, already an accomplished novelist, needs to take some lessons on how to shake up the story structure.