ScreenFish

where faith and film are intertwined

Ellen Barkin

Breaking News in Yuba County: The Affirmations Run Out

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He’s missing! Then again, so is a slice of my birthday cake…

I think it’s safe to say that most of us have had days where it seemed like nothing seemed to go right. The car ran out of gas; a coworker received a promotion instead of you; a stain appeared on your outfit that couldn’t be easily disguised; and many more situations that have already come to your mind. 

In the case of Sue Buttons (Allison Janney), her life seems to consist of nothing good. At the beginning of Tate Taylor’s Breaking News in Yuba County, she picks up a birthday cake for herself while muttering affirmations to herself (“I am good”; “I am special”). The cake is misspelled and she is unable to do anything about it. She drives to her job at a call center and her first call is demeaning. She thinks her workplace remembered her birthday, but their celebration was for another person.  These are only the beginning of her issues thanks to a completely dysfunctional family and a latent desire to be known and respected.

In theory, this sounds like a fantastic premise for a film. Add in an extremely talented group of Hollywood actors (Wanda Sykes; Juliette Lewis; Ellen Barkin; and Dominic Burgess among others) and actresses and you’ve got a verifiable winner.  The problem is that Breaking News in Yuba County starts off wonderfully before devolving into a muddled mess that leaves more questions than answers. How did it go so wrong?

The problems begin as soon as Sue gets home. Her husband Carl (Matthew Modine, who gets woefully little screen time) is caught up in a bad situation involving millions of dollars and a tryst in a seedy hotel. Thinking the flowers he purchased were for her, Sue follows him and discovers more than she bargained for. Catching him in the middle of an affair was bad enough, but watching him fall over dead was worse. Suddenly, the film takes on a dark Weekend at Bernie’s feel except she buries Carl and the money in the hotel playground.

This triggers a flood of cops, confusion, and a trio of Mafia-ish characters (including Awkwafina) that are geared up to inflict damage in cruel ways. There’s more, but I’ll focus on Sue’s attempt to increase her popularity as a result of a missing person case not unlike those Nancy Grace episodes on CNN. Her sister Nancy (Mila Kunis) is a local reporter and gets the word out that Sue’s husband is “missing,” but Sue wants to go higher and piggybacks on a national missing person case. At this point, the plot completely unravels and becomes a gore-fest – both in its ending and in a number of grisly deaths that would’ve made the director of Saw proud.  Will Sue be able to finally affirm herself?  You’ll find out if you can make it to the Crash-like ending.

It is important to recognize that a common thread throughout Breaking News in Yuba County involves Sue’s constant attempts to affirm herself.  She starts off talking to herself in the grocery store and is heard recounting the same phrases as she goes from nobody to pseudo-star.  It becomes a catalyst that transforms her into someone who is desperate to do anything to get seen in a popular light (at least in her eyes) by the public. The issue here is not the affirmations themselves, but where the words point her to. They give her ego a massive boost that, once triggered, is near impossible to get rid of.  Conversely, as a Christian, I believe that our affirmations should come from the Bible and the words God tells us. He loves each of us with an everlasting love and has drawn us with lovingkindness (see Jeremiah 31:3).  If that’s good, there’s a whole lot more of these God has to share.  By finding our value and worth in Him, we won’t have to resort to being a part of a racket (knowingly or unknowingly) as Sue horrifyingly discovered. Instead, we can relate to One who sings songs over us (see Zephaniah 3:17)

Breaking News in Yuba County is available on VOD.

Ocean’s Thirteen: Shaking Sinatra’s Hand

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Near the beginning of Ocean’s Thirteen, Willie Banks (Al Pacino) muscles Reuben Tishkoff out of his share of a casino, offering Reuben a pittance for his half. Reuben responds:

Everybody said that you would try to screw me. That you done it to every one of your partners. But I defended you. I said, “No! Me and Willy Bank been around long enough… that we both shook Sinatra’s hand. And there’s a code among guys that shook Sinatra’s hand.”

Thirteen is about loyalty. It is about the rest of the “eleven” being loyal to Reuben, and a general “honor among thieves.” Sinatra was known as a celebrity who did not look down on people and genuinely cared about them. He wasn’t like Terry Benedict or Willie Bank, merely using people to get ahead. A couple of quotes on Wikipedia, from an interview in 1963 he did with Playboy, stand out:

I’m for decency — period. I’m for anything and everything that bodes love and consideration for my fellow man.

If you don’t know the guy on the other side of the world, love him anyway because he’s just like you. He has the same dreams, the same hopes and fears. It’s one world, pal. We’re all neighbors.

Sinatra was jaded toward organized religion, but he seems to have a good grasp on how Jesus taught us to treat our fellow human beings. The rumors about his relationship with organized crime persist, by I have the impression if he was your friend, he would be the most loyal friend you could have. People like Bank and Benedict never understand that type of loyalty; they’re, well… Benedict Arnolds.

The phrase “shaking Sinatra’s hand” could also be applied to the movie as a whole. It is the only one of the trilogy which even mentions Frank Sinatra, even though he was the preeminent star of the movie which inspired it. And it is the only movie of the three which includes one of his songs.

Most of the songs Sinatra is famous for are fluff. “This Town” is no exception. As I researched it for this review, I came across the lyrics for a song, also titled “This Town,” by Niall Horan, from the band One Direction. I was amazed how the first verse fit in with the movie.

Waking up to kiss you and nobody’s there
The smell of your perfume still stuck in the air
It’s hard
Yesterday I thought I saw your shadow running round
It’s funny how things never change in this old town
So far from the stars

The first two lines of the song remind us the leading ladies from the last two films are not around. We are told, “It’s not their fight.” Tess and Isabel aren’t really part of the eleven, and are not close enough to Reuben that loyalty would demand they take part. They understand, but neither have liked their partners being involved in criminal activity.

The end of the first verse, however, is just the opposite of the movie. The movie is filled with stars, and a recurring theme is how Vegas has changed—since Sinatra passed on, anyway. Change can either be good or bad.

The first time we run into the word “change” in the movie is when Rusty and Danny get off a private plane. Linus, who is picking them up, asks, “Any change?” He is asking about Rueben’s condition. Reuben has had a heart attack after being cheated by Bank. He has given up hope.

In a flashback, Bank tells Reuben, “The arrangement is changing. Was changed. As a matter of fact, there is no arrangement.” When he is given a casino chip with the words “The Bank Casino” on it, Reuben laments, “You changed the name.”

Bank wanted to effect a change that would devastate Reuben. His friends wanted to affect him in a way that would bring a positive change. Their constant encouragement—especially from their letters—brings him back. Reuben’s health and attitude following adversity changes for the better. His financial situation will also change for the better at the end of the movie.

In a sequence with reminiscences about how kind Reuben was to them, Rusty and Danny remember what Vegas used to be like. Not all change is good. Bigger is not always better.

Rusty: The Sands was there, Desert Inn.
Danny: They built them a lot smaller back then.
Rusty: They seemed pretty big.
Danny: Town’s changed.

At the end of the movie, as Danny talks to Bank about what a rough night the casino owner had (“half a billion running out the door”), Bank retorts that he will quickly bounce back; Danny hasn’t really hurt him. “This town might’ve changed, but not me.”

Bank thinks his unchanging ruthlessness will save him. What he doesn’t realize is the way he treats people has earned him enemies, and Danny’s loyalty has earned him friends. As Danny tells him, “…you shook Sinatra’s hand. You should know better, Willie.”

In the other two movies, after the “bad guy” is taken down, the guy gets the girl. In this movie, the bad guy is left with the girl, and her fate is probably not good. The role of women in the Ocean’s movies is, at best, problematic. Tess and Isabel end up partners with criminals, although Danny and Rusty are at least loyal criminals. Not the worst choice the ladies could have made, but not exactly a wise choice, either.

Abigail Sponder (Ellen Barkin) not only works for the worst of the bad, but she allows herself to be manipulated into unknowingly betraying him. She is a specimen of two of the worst stenotypes of women: both the heartless bitch and the oversexed slut. As the only major female character in the film, this is a travesty.

This weekend, Ocean’s 8 opens with the title roles all being portrayed by women. Will this movie redeem the legacy from its sexist past? We shall see.