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Jennifer Lawrence

mother!

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mother!

If you want to find the most polarizing film of 2017, look no further than Darren Aronofsky’s baroque experiment in psychological horror, mother! (which after this point, I’ll refer to simply as Mother). This is a movie that’s impact I suspect will diminish on a second viewing. Unlocking the secret at Mother’s core, which will probably come at a slightly different point for just about everyone seeing it, robs it of some of its power. Aronofsky has made pure allegory here, using an extreme dream-logic aesthetic that is nothing if not simultaneously hypnotic and terrifying.

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Passengers

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Passengers

Passengers is a great movie. At least, it’s a great movie if you hate thinking. The makers and marketers were clearly aware of this. Razzle and dazzle ‘em enough, they must have thought, and they’ll look past the fact that it's deeply flawed on a basic, storytelling level. It’s true enough. If you mentally check out, Passengers is a pretty enjoyable experience.

The tale of two interstellar space travelers, who wake up from hibernation 90 years too soon, is packed with gorgeous special effects and tense action sequences. The two leads have a heavy burden, and they pull it off in grand style. Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence, semi-stranded like Robinson Crusoe, are on a lonely craft adrift in the vast ocean of space instead of on a deserted island. Almost the entire movie rests on their shoulders, and they prove themselves capable of the task. But they do all that in a movie so clunky and half-baked that it’s easy to forget; the film’s rightful destiny.

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Joy

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Joy

It’s a real surprise that one of the most engaging and uplifting movies to come out of 2015 is centered around the creation of a mop. Joy is a film by writer/director David O. Russell, though, so there is much more swirling around that main plot point. Within the semi-autobiographical story of Joy Mangano – the entrepreneur responsible for the Miracle Mop – are the ups-and-downs of a real life Horatio Alger story, a nostalgic look back at the novelty of the QVC shopping channel, and a family drama reminiscent of a John Cassavetes film like A Woman Under the Influence.

Russell has had two major preoccupations in his filmmaking career. One is historical period pieces focusing on fictionalized events of true stories in the very near past, reflected by his films Three Kings and American Hustle. The director’s other mode is his intense examination of family dynamics, and the more dysfunctional, the better. That subject is represented by films like Spanking the Monkey, Flirting with Disaster and Silver Linings Playbook. Joy, like his 2010 film The Fighter, is a melding of the two.

Set in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Russell frames his story of a woman struggling with the idea that she’s meant for greater things through the lens of a soap opera, an obsession of the main character’s mother. We’re clued into this with the movie’s introduction, an overwrought scene from the mother’s favorite soap that Russell stages with cheesy, histrionic glee. It serves as a key to the rest of the movie. Joy Mangano may be a real person, but just like soap operas are a melodramatic version of reality, the movie Joy is a fusion of real life and amplified drama.

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The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2

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The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2 can at times be as tedious as its title. The movie suffers from what can be described as Lord of the Rings Trilogy Ending Syndrome. After the dramatic climax is over, there are at least three separate dénouements, any of which could have served as a single ending on its own. Because the final book in the trilogy that this film franchise is based on was already split into two movies, the endless concluding is even more taxing than it might have been. It’s obvious money was the primary motivating factor. That’s a shocking revelation about Hollywood, I know. At the same time, Mockingjay, Part 2 is an effective action thriller that keeps things moving for most of its two hours and seventeen minutes.

The film picks up just moments after the events of Part 1, when Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) is attacked by fellow Hunger Games survivor Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson), who was just rescued from the clutches of the nefarious President Snow. The rebels discover that Snow (Donald Sutherland) used a combination of torture and brainwashing to program Peeta, making him believe that Katniss is evil and must be destroyed. While being held in the capital, Peeta was used as a weapon against the burgeoning rebellion by appearing in propaganda meant to convince the citizens of Panem that their totalitarian society must be upheld. Now Peeta is literally a weapon, sent to kill Katniss.

Just like Part 1, this movie deals with a couple important themes in interesting and thought-provoking ways. The use and purpose of propaganda, on both sides of a conflict, and the devastating effect of a constant state of war on those who have to live with it continue to be explored. The rebels, headed by President Alma Coin (Julianne Moore), think they can deprogram Peeta. Naturally, Coin wants to use Peeta for her own propaganda purposes. When Katniss decides to head to the capital against orders, Coin sends Peeta to join her so video footage can show he has switched sides, giving a morale boost to her soldiers.

But can Peeta be trusted not to hurt Katniss? Ultimately a politician, Coin’s motives are questioned by those close to Katniss, since the Mockingjay could be seen as a threat to Coin’s power in the event of the rebels’ victory. It’s this kind of Machiavellian intrigue that makes Mockingjay, Part 2 thematically rich. Instead of an unquestionably virtuous leader, President Coin is a figure who might or might not be as duplicitous as the despot President Snow. This dynamic kept me guessing right up until the tense climax, when Katniss herself is forced to decide what’s best for the people of Panem.

Katniss is our true hero, so it’s her decision to make.

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