Tag: movies

Movie review: SINNERS

Michael B. Jordan and Michael B. Jordan

Admittedly, I was wary about seeing the movie SINNERS.  I can be a bit squeamish when it comes to a film described as vampire horror.  My friend Steve Bissette had recommended it when he saw it in April, but that type of film is more in his wheelhouse.

Then my daughter, likewise squeamish, viewed it in Cape Town, South Africa, in June, just before returning to the States. She said I had to see it because it was about the black experience in America, and it was about music.

So I went to the Madison Theatre near my home on the hottest day of the year, Primary Day – they have $5 films on Tuesdays! – while my wife, the most squeamish of the three of us, saw another flick at the same venue.

How do I describe this film? The IMDb notes: “Trying to leave their troubled lives behind [in Chicago], twin brothers (Michael B. Jordan) return to their hometown [in 1930s Mississippi] to start again, only to discover that an even greater evil is waiting to welcome them back.”

That doesn’t tell you much. Bissette wrote: “A rip-roaring fusion of masterful visual storytelling and toe-tapping music, writer-director Ryan Coogler’s first original blockbuster reveals the full scope of his singular imagination.

“Wildly primal, big and bold, fueled by pain and rage, by community and family, throbbing with love and sex and joy, infused with magic. A sumptuously textured, unmissable howl of a passion project.”
It’s about time
Someone named Corey Creekmur commented on Bissette’s Facebook page: “It’s such a rich sequence. It seems to be drawing upon African models of time, occult notions of time (such as the way vampires move outside of human time and share memories), and rich notions of musical and cultural continuity across eras. (It seems evocative of Sun Ra and George Clinton’s mystical, time and space traveling visions.) It’s dazzling in any case.”

Oh, it’s Afrofuturism, at least in part, which does not become clear to me until near the end.

It was well-acted by all involved. The scenes with the twins, Smoke and Stack, looked realistic. Special kudos to Miles Caton, who is all of 20, for playing the pivotal role of Sammie. And the music is excellent; I have, of all things, Rocky Road to Dublin, stuck in my head.

The Rotten Tomatoes reviews were 97% positive among critics and 96% positive among audiences. Some suggested that at 137 minutes, it was about 15 minutes too long. But I think the time built up the tension and better established the characters.

An audience reviewer on a site thought the vampires were silly, rather than scary-looking. I thought that was the point. The vampire’s life was alluring at some level.

Bissette is right about this: “if (and oh, you should) you catch SINNERS in the theater, be advised NOT to leave when the first of the final credits appears…

“The real ending to the film is mid-way through the final credits” (at least three of the dozen and a half folks in my theater left too early and missed Buddy Guy!), “and after the credits crawl conclude, a sublime post-credits sequence that sent me out of my seat positively elated follows” (I was in an otherwise empty theater.)

Hello! My Name Is Blotto: The Movie!

Bowtie, Broadway, Cheese, Sergeant, Lee Harvey, Blanche, Chevrolet, et al.

I had a deep-seated NEED to see the documentary Hello! My Name Is Blotto: The Movie! Here’s the trailer.

At this point, I need to explain what Blotto was. Initially, several of the members were part of the Star Spangled Washboard Band in the 1970s, starting off in Lake George, NY. They achieved a modicum of fame, even appearing on The Mike Douglas Show, which was a big deal. (John and Yoko co-hosted the show in 1972.)

Then, the SSWB disbanded and, through some alchemy, became Blotto, with the members all having the same last name, a la the Ramones. They created a song, “I Wanna Be a Lifeguard.” The Albany-based group received airplay from WNEW in NYC and other stations in the Northeast and beyond.  They had achieved a modicum of fame.

A new entity called Music Television was created in 1981. The folks at MTV wanted to know if Blotto had a video. A few months earlier, a couple of college kids working on their final project offered to make a short film of Lifeguard, which aired as the 36th video to play on MTV on August 1 of that year. And Lifeguard had a new life.

They toured incessantly, releasing some singles and the album Combo Akimbo, which had a great cover designed by the late, great John Caldwell. That album included I Quit.

FantaCo, the comic book store I worked at for much of the 1980s, carried their music partly because we were all part of the city’s arts scene. I got to know some of the guys. (We ended up at a restaurant in Troy after Raoul Vezina’s funeral in November 1983.)

But the music industry didn’t know how to categorize them. Blotto was not a comedy group, though there were comedic elements. Metal Head, for instance, annoyed some, er, metal heads, even though it featured Buck Dharma of Blue Öyster Cult.  Incidentally, there’s a funny story about a biker’s helmet.

Now what?

Eventually, they played less often and got “grown-up” jobs, such as Paul Rapp (drummer F. Lee Harvey) attending law school and becoming an intellectual property attorney.

Sarge (Greg Haymes) became a writer covering the music scene, primarily for the Albany Times Union and the Nippertown website. I would see him all over the area until his untimely death from cancer. I attended his funeral at the Egg, the first time I’d seen Broadway (Bill Polchinski, a social worker) in years.

Oh, the movie! I forgot. It was great! Lee Harvey, Broadway, and Bowtie (Paul Jossman, who got into computers) were the core conversants, along with Blanche (actor/director Helena Binder). There were old interviews with Sarge and Cheese (Keith Stephenson, who died in 1999).

The film featured familiar faces such as Jim Furlong (Last Vestige Records, and member of the music group the A.D.’s –Livin’ Downtown), Vinnie Birbiglia of the club J.B. Scott’s, and MTV VJ Martha Quinn.

I wish I could have gone to the world premiere at the Cohoes Music Hall, but I was out of town for a wedding. So when it was announced that it would be shown at the Spectrum Theatre in Albany, I was there for the Monday 3 p.m. show, the second of a two-week run. There will be others.

Blotto put Albany on the national music map and supported other local bands in the 1980s.

Movie review: 1946

What if the word “homosexual” was never meant to be in the Bible?

On Sunday night, May 4, I attended a showing of the 2022 film 1946: The Mistranslation That Shifted A Culture. It was shown at the nearby Madison Theatre, sponsored by the Spirit Committee of the Pride Center of the Capital Region. The movie “investigates how the word ‘homosexual’ was mistakenly added to the Bible in 1946 through expert interviews, archival research, and personal stories. This documentary challenges long-held assumptions and opens the door for honest healing dialogue about scripture, sexuality, and belonging.”

The movie is part biography/autobiography. Director Rocky Roggio is “an independent filmmaker and production designer.” Rocky is also a member of the LGBTQIA+ community and “moved out of her home after coming out to her conservative, religious parents. Rocky’s father, Sal Roggio, is a non-affirming pastor who preaches that the LGBTQIA+ lifestyle is sinful.” Rocky and Sal are in conversation throughout the film.

What a find!

The film is also part investigative journalism. Ed Oxford, a Graduate of Talbot Seminary, is a gay Christian and “a researcher in how the Bible has been weaponized against LGBTQ people.” He is greatly aided by his hero, Kathy Baldock, author, LGBTQ advocate, international speaker, and educator, and Executive Director of CanyonWalker Connections. She is “a leading expert on LGBTQ issues in the United States, especially dealing with historical and current discrimination faced from the socially conservative Christian church and political sector.” Ed and Kathy have fascinating story arcs before their big find in the archives of Yale University.

Their sleuthing led them to David S. “In 1959, a young, gay seminary student named David wrote a letter to the head of the Revised Standard Version biblical translation team challenging the RSV’s use of the word “homosexual” in 1 Corinthians 6:9. David wrote: ‘I write… because of my deep concern for those who are wronged and slandered by the incorrect usage of this word./” Here’s an interview between Kathy Baldock and David S., after an intro by Ed Oxford that explains the find; a bit of the footage is in the movie.

Reviews

The ten reviewers on Rotten Tomatoes were positive. Jennie Kermode wrote:  “This isn’t a film which sets itself up in opposition to Christianity – quite the opposite. Several of its participants speak of how amazed they were when they first came across the concept of gay Christians and realised that they didn’t have to choose, whether the concern was their own sexuality or their support for LGBTQ+ friends. One expresses horror at the way that a homophobic stance has driven good people away from the Church. There is a strong implication that another began questioning the Bible after finding it impossible to reconcile with the idea of a loving God.”

After the movie, there were brief discussions with people around us about how the film made us feel. At some level, it was positive. But as the film itself notes, something that was a mistranslation of the Greek a few decades ago has been baked into current conservative theology. Finding the corrections may not alter the demonization of queer people in some Christian churches, which makes it more important to stand for inclusiveness in “progressive” churches.    

I understand that there will be another showing in Albany in a few months. If you do such things, you may rent or buy the movie on Amazon.

Movie review: The Ballad of Wallis Island

get the group back together

I was intrigued enough by the trailer for the film The Ballad of Wallis Island that my wife and I saw at the Spectrum 8 in Albany on Income Tax Day; Tuesdays are cheaper. Charles (Tim Key) is a quirky guy who lives alone on a large property on a remote island.   He’s a massive fan of the folk duo McGwyer Mortimer (Tom Basden as Herb and Carey Mulligan as Nell).

So, he takes some of his lottery winnings and offers them the opportunity to play a private show at his home on Wallis Island. Do the bandmates and former lovers know that the other one is also coming? 

It’s a straightforward concept, but it’s a joy to see the three characters interact; they have great chemistry. Charles is trying to keep the other two happy enough to play together again. He has adapted to his vaguely solitary life, but needed much more.

Nice

It seems almost dismissive to label The Ballad of Wallis Island charming and relatable. One critic notes that “it touches on the passage of time and grief of lost relationships.” The nostalgia of getting together segues into old tensions resurfacing. Another critic: “It was a little bit funny, a little bit sad, and a little bit sweet, all at the same time.”

If you’re a music fan, and the music is nice, you may lean into this idea: wouldn’t you like to be able to have your favorite band get together one more time?

The movie was directed by James Griffiths and written by actors Basden and Key. It also stars Sian Clifford as the shopkeeper. Executive producers – eight are listed – include Griffiths, Basden, Key, and Mulligan, so this is a passion project., as you can tell from this gestation story.  

It’s only 100 minutes long, and it has a 97% positive rating with Rotten Tomatoes critics and 92% with moviegoers. 

Captain America: Brave New World

Sam Wilson

I was going to write a review of Captain America: Brave New World, but I need to talk about a previous storyline, even though I did not see it.  

Think Christian posted an article in 2021 titled Captain America and Christ’s Second Commandment. LeMarr Jackson suggests, “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier poses a provocative question: Is the world actually ready to accept and love a Black Captain America?…

“In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Captain America has stood for everything American: an indomitable will, a never-give-up attitude, a paragon of virtue, an extremely hard worker, and—above all else—an outstanding patriot. Not only has he represented these values, but he has also always looked a certain way, with “blond hair and blue eyes…”

“As he walks through a neighborhood with his partner Bucky (Sebastian Stan), a white man, two policemen stop them for having a spirited discussion. One of the cops insinuates that Sam is causing trouble by directly asking Bucky if Sam is “bothering” him. The cop also specifically asks Sam—but not Bucky—for identification, even telling Sam to ‘calm down.'”

Continuity

Having missed the six episodes of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier from 2021, Brave New World was a tad confusing. Part of the storyline of Winter Soldier is this: “Sam.. learns about the first Black super soldier, Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly). When Sam meets the now-older man, he is disillusioned over how his country has treated him. He was a good soldier, but he was hidden from the public and mistreated by his government—quite unlike Steve Rogers’s experience.” 

Ah, so that explains Bradley’s role in Brave New World. This reminded me of how comic books were an annoying medium. If you miss an issue, you sometimes feel totally out of the loop and confused.

Ultimately, an article in The Hollywood Reporter titled “Chris Evans’ Captain America Wasn’t Expected to Save Us.  So Why Is Anthony Mackie’s?” got me to see Brave New World, which I attended at the Spectrum Theatre. In contrast, my wife saw Conclave, which I had seen months earlier.

As a critic wrote, “Captain America feels like a supporting character in his own movie.” I thought it just me. For a two-hour film, it was busy. The only 49% positive critics’ rating/80% positive with fans seems right. I liked Anthony Mackie as the new Cap and Harrison Ford as President Thunderbolt Ross.

The character Ruth Bat-Seraph (Shira Haas), “an Israeli former Black Widow who is now a high-ranking government U.S. official, is also controversial” in some circles. Sigh. 

If you follow the MCU stuff, you might want to see it. Apparently, folks attending the Spectrum Theatre were not fans at 4 pm on the Tuesday after Presidents Day because I was the only one in a reasonably large theater.   

Ramblin' with Roger
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