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road movie

The Last Right – Acts of Grace

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“It’s the first right thing I do for him, and it’s the last.”

Doing the right thing is central to Aoife Crehan’s premier feature film The Last Right. But right for whom? And how do we judge the right among multiple values that all have a claim as right?

Daniel Murphy (Michael Huisman) is a New York tax attorney heading back to Ireland for his mother’s funeral. Next to him on the plane is Padraig Murphy (no relation), who is taking his estranged brother’s body back to Ireland after 30 years with no contact. He says that at least they can be together in death even if not in life. When just before landing Padraig is found to have died, it’s discovered that he has listed Daniel as his next of kin.

When Daniel gets home for the funeral, we discover he has a brother, Louis (Samuel Bottonley), with autism. Daniel’s plan is to take Louis back to the US and place him in a special school. But when the authorities seek Daniel’s help dealing with Padraig’s body, a series of unlikely occurrences leads to Daniel and Louis driving the family Volvo the length of Ireland with the coffin strapped to the top of the car so that he can be buried along with his brother. Also along for the ride is a women they have just met, Mary (Niamh Algar).

At the same time, the authorities have decided to hold on to Padraig’s body. The Garda is after them for bodysnatching. When the story becomes national news, many people see what Daniel is doing as a kind sacrifice. By the time he gets to the church, just ahead of the Garda, many have turned out for the funeral of these two lonely brothers.

Along the way there are revelations (including a major one about the relationship between Louis and Daniel) and a budding romance with Daniel and Mary. All of which must turn into conflicts before the right thing to do is finally achieved.

The film is about 50% road movie, 40% romantic comedy, and 10% Rainman. The romcom aspects are the least compelling part of the film, especially when you consider that this trip and the resulting relationship happens in two days.

This is a film that shows how grace can come from unexpected sources. Daniel, although under duress, acts as a grace giver in hauling Padraig’s coffin to be joined with his brother, just as Padraig acted with grace to bring his brother’s remains home. But Daniel also is the recipient of grace in many ways along the way. And it is important to remember that grace is by definition unmerited. Daniel, who essentially operates from selfish motives, finds his life open up in new ways as he comes to know and appreciate Louis. It allows Daniel, who finds grace so frequently in the film to become a gracious person who can set aside his own selfish ways to welcome others into his life.

The Last Right is available in theaters and on demand.

News of the World – No Home to Go To

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“To move forward, you must first remember.”

 What does it mean to journey home when you have no home? What would The Odyssey have been about if Odysseus had no Penelope waiting for him in Ithaca? Paul Greengrass’s News of the World, based on the best selling novel by Paulette Jiles, is just that kind of story.

Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd (Tom Hanks), a former Confederate soldier, travels from town to town in Texas as a news reader. Most people are too busy to bother reading newspapers (if they can read). Kidd comes to town with a collection of newspapers from around the world and serves as a non-fiction storyteller. He tells of things in Asia and Africa. He may relate sad news of a meningitis outbreak in a nearby town. He brings news of other Texas towns, or of survivors of a mine disaster in Pennsylvania. He is entertaining, but can also be serious, addressing life under the Reconstruction military occupation.

On the road one day, he comes across a wrecked wagon and finds a lynched black man hanging nearby. He also finds a young, blond, blue-eyed girl dressed in buckskins like a Native American. He finds papers that says she is Johanna Leonberger (Helena Zengel). Her parents had been killed by Kiowas. She was taken in and raised by them. She knows no English (although she may remember a little German). Johanna (who doesn’t know that name—her name is Cicada) is wary of Kidd, but more in fear of the soldiers who come along. She reluctantly goes with Kidd. The first thing she says to him (which he cannot understand) is “Home. I just want to go home.” But she has no home. Her Kiowa parents are dead. She is being sent back by the government to live with an aunt and uncle.

Kidd takes her to the next town, where he learns that the Indian agent will be back in three months. He can wait or take her to her aunt and uncle hundreds of miles away.  So these two reluctant travelers set off on a journey in which, like Odysseus, they will find those who befriend them, but many who would do them harm. But even if they overcome the obstacles of the journey, what will await them at the end of their journey?

Although the story is set in 1870, it reflects many themes that are all too familiar to today’s world. There is great bitterness among many over the loss of the Civil War and the Union occupation. At one reading, there is great anger as Kidd reads about President Grant requiring Texas to accept the new amendments to the Constitution (13, 14, and 15) before it can be readmitted. This is a world of polarization, racism (towards Native Americans and blacks), and lawlessness.

In one town they travel through, the town boss is interested in Kidd’s news reading, but only wants things from his paper read. (Hello, Fox News) That is the extreme of the sense of isolation and insularity that all the towns reflect. As a news reader, Kidd is bringing the outside world to these communities, and with it a different way of looking at things.

That different way of understanding the world plays out in the relationship between Kidd and Johanna. Raised in the Kiowa traditions, Johanna sees the world as a whole—the circle of earth and sky. Kidd explains to her that for white people, it is always a line, heading forward. But for Kidd, that line really isn’t moving forward. His itinerant life is really a way of avoiding a loss he cannot bear to confront.

The idea of home comes up frequently throughout the film, beginning with Johanna’s first words. We wonder what home she wants to go to. She has been orphaned twice. She barely remembers her birth parents (but she does find her way to the cabin they lived in). She does not know the aunt and uncle she is being sent to. When she sees a band of Kiowa across the river she calls out for them to wait for her, but they are too far away to hear her cry. So there are three homes that have or might make up her life.

Kidd on the other hand is homeless. He travels from town to town, but never back to San Antonio where his life was before the war. While Odysseus wished he could make a straight line home to Ithaca, Kidd seems to be doing all he can to avoid returning home. When he does it is filled with sorrow. But it also frees him to find a new life, a new reality.

This film asks us to see the brokenness that is so prevalent in the world around us. How will we respond to such a world? Will we focus only on ourselves and our immediate surroundings? Do we only care about what is happening to us, to our neighbors, our community? Will we hear the stories of different people near and far? Will we find our freedom in being open to those we do not know, but who will bring their world to ours?

News of the World is available digitally and on Blu-ray and DVD.

Photos courtesy of Universal Pictures.

Queen & Slim: Running into Love

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I have heard Queen & Slim called a black Bonnie and Clyde (which references a line in the film) and a heterosexual Thelma & Louise. The latter is more apt, but neither really quite captures the way this film fuses the on-the-run trope with today’s cultural affairs.

Daniel Kaluuya as Slim in Queen & Slim, directed by Melina Matsoukas.

This is the story of a black man (Daniel Kaluuya) and woman (Jodie Turner-Smith) on their first date. It is a nightmare. These two have nothing in common. He is a working man; she is a criminal defense attorney. He is religious—praying before meals, vanity license plate: TRUSTGOD; she doesn’t believe in God. He is looking to create a relationship; she accepted the date because it was a bad day and she didn’t want to be by herself. While driving home after the disastrous date, they are pulled over by a police officer for a minor traffic infraction. The cop is abusive and the situation escalates until the black man ends up shooting and killing the officer in self-defense.

Jodie Turner-Smith as Queen in Queen & Slim, directed by Melina Matsoukas.

The man wants to confess what he’s done, knowing it was unavoidable, but the woman knows how the justice system treats black people and convinces him that they must go on the run. Before long the dashcam video goes viral and there is a nationwide manhunt. As the days pass, this odd couple is together in a car looking for a plan. They slowly learn more about each other and themselves. The relationship, that seemed so impossible on that date, warms and develops into something precious to them both.

You may have noted that I’ve not used names for these two characters. We don’t know their names until the last few minutes of the film. They are essentially anonymous. Even the names in the title are not used in the film. Those names are also designed to make these two into an every man and woman. Screenwriter Lena Waithe says she used Queen “because I think all Black women are Queens”. Slim, she says, is an affectionate name black men use among themselves.

Along the way, the two encounter other people. Many, but not all, of the black people they meet are supportive. Many even see them as folk heroes or revolutionaries. Slim and Queen seem taken aback by these perceptions. That is a key difference between this film and Bonnie and Clyde and Thelma & Louise. Queen and Slim have no self-understanding that they are anything more than people in trouble. There is a nice coda in the film (in which we learn their real names) that revisits some of those people they met along the way in the aftermath of their journey.

(from left, centered) Slim (Daniel Kaluuya) and Queen (Jodie Turner-Smith) in Queen & Slim, directed by Melina Matsoukas.

Both natures of the film—criminals on the run and growing relationship—are present throughout, but the first half of the film is more heavily focused on the on-the-run theme. At just about the halfway mark, the film shifts the weight of the story to the relationship. It is in this half that we begin to learn more about the characters. Queen has seemed to be cold and detached. She seems strong and capable. But she has a past that has made her hide her vulnerabilities. Slim is trusting, compliant, and fearful. He is filled with guilt over killing a man. As they travel together, he must overcome his fear as he strives to survive.

(from left) Slim (Daniel Kaluuya) and Queen (Jodie Turner-Smith) in Queen & Slim, directed by Melina Matsoukas.

This film cannot be understood without an appreciation of the ways racism forms people’s lives. As we watch that traffic stop unfold and escalate into a lethal encounter, we know that Slim was justified in his action. But should he trust the legal system to treat him fairly? Is Queen right that as soon as he gave himself up he would “become the property of the state”? How a person of color answers those questions will likely differ from how persons of privilege react to them.

Special features include commentary from the writer and director, “A Deeper Meaning” with Kaluuya, Turner-Smith, and the filmmakers; “Melina & Lena” with the writer and director; the “Off the Script” screenplay reading; and “On the Run with Queen & Slim” behind-the-scenes.

Photos courtesy of Universal Pictures

The Peanut Butter Falcon – Heart of a Hero

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One of the basic frameworks for a plot is The Hero Takes a Journey. It is seen in The Odyssey, any number of road movies, as well as the Gospel According to Luke. The Peanut Butter Falcon (winner of an audience award at SXSW) is the latest iteration of that plotline. The heroes may seem a bit unlikely, but it is the trip itself which reveals heroism.

The Peanut Butter Falcon

Zak (Zack Gottsagen) is a young man with Down syndrome who has escaped a nursing home wearing only his briefs. His dream is to go to a pro wrestling school run by the Salt Water Redneck (Thomas Haden Church). While hiding out in a boat, Zak becomes connected with Tyler (Shia LaBeouf) a small time criminal on the run from some angry fisherman he has crossed. As Tyler makes his way through the Outer Banks towards Florida, Zak follows along, a bit to Tyler’s chagrin. Meanwhile the fishermen are trying to track down Tyler, and Eleanor (Dakota Johnson), a young kind-hearted caregiver from the rest home, is trying to find Zak and return him. And so, the adventures begin.

At the screening I attended, the co-writers/directors (Tyler Nilson and Mike Schwartz) told the crowd that they made this film because Zack Gottsagen wanted to be a movie star. They had volunteered at Zeno Mountain Farm, an organization that works with people of many handicaps. Sometimes their task is to make a film. (Cf. the documentary Becoming Bulletproof.) They met Zack there and became friends. They decided to create an opportunity for Zack to fulfill his dream.

The Peanut Butter Falcon

Because Down syndrome is a part of Zak’s character, the story inevitably has an aspect about overcoming obstacles to fulfill dreams. And the film has a bit of inspirational quality because of that. But that is not the main focus of the story. More important are questions of belonging, and knowing who you are. Zak’s struggles provide the catalyst for these other, more universal themes to be examined.

Early in the film we get the line, “Friends are the family you choose.” As Zak and Tyler travel together, a bond is formed that is strengthened as they meet each problem on the way. When Eleanor reluctantly joins them, a more complex relationship begins to grow. Each of these three has no one else in their lives. Zak has become a ward of the state because his family can’t provide for his special needs, Tyler is suffering grief and guilt over his brother’s death. Eleanor has been widowed (although her grief isn’t really explored). As different as they all are, they begin to find fulfillment in the “family” they are becoming.

The Peanut Butter Falcon

But on the individual level, the story focuses on who we are by nature. It first comes up one night as Tyler and Zak are under the stars. Zak dreams of being a wrestler and wants to be a bad guy. But Tyler tells him that he has the heart of the hero, so he’ll never be able to be a villain. Tyler is uncertain how to answer if he himself is a good guy or bad buy, but Zak knows.

That theme is approached in a slightly different perspective in a scene involving a blind preacher. As he prepares to baptize Zak, he notes that there are wolves and sheep in this world. He can tell that the two of them are sheep, but that the wolves are after them. He offers baptism as a kind of protection from the wolves of the world. (Which is an interesting—and not unsound—understanding of baptism.)

As this theme of good guy/bad guy plays out, we see that not only is Tyler right about Zak having the heart of a hero, but that through his time with Zak, we see that Tyler has a hero’s heart as well.

The Peanut Butter Falcon

Road movies such as this are usually about the change the journey brings to the characters. The Peanut Butter Falcon is not so much about transformation as it is about revealing what might be hidden in rough or seemingly broken exteriors.

Special features include a photo gallery, a theatrical trailer, and “Zack’s Story: The Making of the Peanut Butter Falcon.”

Photos courtesy of Roadside Attractions and Armory Films

The Last Suit – Road Trip to Grace

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We often try to bury the past—to forget the pain and suffering. That can be a good thing if we move on with life and find fulfillment. But often that buried past comes to haunt us. It may actually prevent the good life we hope for in the future until it is recognized and addressed.

Abraham Bursztein (Miguel Ángel Solá) is an 88 year old Holocaust survivor who has made a life for himself in Buenos Aires. But his health is failing. His children have sold his home and he is scheduled to move into a retirement home. But he has a secret plan to make one last trip—to return to Poland to take a suit to the Christian friend who saved his life after the War. But this is a trip that is not just about the gratitude he owes that friend; it is also about the resentments he has carried all these years.

The film is a road movie of his trip to find what has been missing from his life. In part the trip is an attempt to be in control of his life. His children have made all the decisions for him. But the trip is also driven by a long-forgotten promise. His life cannot be complete while that promise has not been fulfilled. He sees this as a one-way trip, as though he is doing this as one final task before he is ready for the end.

Abraham is a severe, judgmental, and bitter man who holds grudges forever. His family knows that he considers “Poland” a dirty word. As he makes this trip he refuses to say the word himself. He’ll only show a piece of paper with the word on it. We know that Poland is where terrible things happened to him. He continues to hold on to the anger against Poland, and even more Germany.

This road trip turns into a series of encounters that put his anger in perspective. He keeps meeting people who, in spite of his cheerlessness and even rudeness, seek to help him. Each of these people bring a touch of grace into his life. He begins to connect with them in ways that start to knock down the walls of his anger. When he comes to his final destination, we learn that what he is really trying to return to is the place where he first met grace in the actions of another. This time grace was a chance to return to life after being in the realm of death that was the Holocaust. When those walls are finally destroyed, Abraham is then free to love as he has not done for many years.

Watching the film, I constantly wondered why these people would respond to Abraham with kindness when he was always so mean-spirited. But then that is what makes it grace. Grace reaches out to those who do not deserve it. It is freely offered just because it is needed. The film does not talk about God, but it does show the way God—and God’s people—touch lives and bring new life.

Photos courtesy of Outsider Pictures

 

Boundaries – Dysfunctional Family Takes to the Road

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Road trips movies are inevitably about the forces that pull us apart and/or draw us together. Boundaries, from writer-director Shana Feste, uses this vehicle to look at three generations of a family in need of both distance and reunion.

Laura (Vera Farminga) has a problem setting limits, as is seen in the fact that she brings home every stray or injured dog or cat she finds. The one boundary she does keep is to never answer her father Jack’s (Christopher Plummer) many phone calls. But when her son Henry (Lewis MacDougall) is expelled from school for a nude caricature of the principal, she needs Jack’s help to pay for a special private school. Jack needs Laura’s help as well because he’s being kicked out of his retirement community for growing and selling marijuana. So a deal is struck and soon Laura is driving Jack’s ancient Rolls Royce down the Pacific Coast to deliver him to her sister Jojo (Kristen Schaal). What Laura doesn’t know is that the trunk is full of weed that Jack (with Henry’s help) is selling along the way.

Laura and Jack’s relationship is the key one in the film. The estrangement is based on Jack’s history of being a con man and years of broken promises. She is skeptical about letting him into Henry’s life (even before she eventually discovers Jack is using his grandson in the pot business). It is obvious that many of the woes in Laura’s life are rooted in her relationship with her father. She is the epitome of a people-pleaser and is often taken advantage of. Henry is obviously in need of more than she can provide, but Jack is hardly the influence she wants. Even her openness to strays is a search for those who can be relied on to return affection.

Although most of her life is devoid of boundaries, the discovery on the road trip is that the one fence she maintains is the one she has built around her heart concerning her father. As we should expect from a road movie, there will be times when the relationship is ready to crash, but in time, Jack and Laura may find the route that will take them to a new place—a place where they can find more in each other than they have known.

Photos courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics

The Saint of Killers Speaks: 1on1 with Graham McTavish (PREACHER)

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Photo Credit: Pari Dukovic/AMC

AMC’s Preacher has returned… but the Saint of Killers is right behind him.

As the second season of the supernatural dramedy is unleashed, actor Graham McTavish is excited about the opportunity to for the audience to reconnect with some of the the most unique characters on television.

“[Preacher] is based on a series of comic books that were written in the late 90s into the early 2000s,” he begins.  “It concerns a Texas preacher named Jesse Custer (played by Dominic Cooper), who becomes host to an entity called Genesis, which is a product of a union between an angel and a demon.  His girlfriend is a female assassin, his best friend is an Irish vampire and he’s pursued across America by a sort of beast from Hell, a relentless killing machine, [named] the Saint of Killers (who I play).  It’s quite the ride… There’s no other show quite like it.”

Photo Credit: Skip Bolen/AMC/Sony Pictures Television

Though Preacher has become known for its dark, brooding tone and graphic violence, McTavish also insists that the show also carries a dark sense of humour and energy to it as well.

“It’s also really funny.  There are things we can do on Preacher that you can’t seem to do anywhere else.  There’s a sort of style and flare and it’s very true to the comics both in its content and in the way [that] it’s shot.  As a fan of the books, it’s been a fantastic privilege to be working on it.”

Interestingly enough, one of the key participants responsible for bringing Preacher to the screen is executive producer, Seth Rogan.  Known primarily for his comedic roles in films like The Pineapple Express and Neighbors, Rogan’s involvement might be considered somewhat of a surprise.  However, McTavish assures the fans that Rogan’s vision for Preacher comes out his deep love of the source material.

“[Seth] is a huge fan of the books, like me.  This is a passion project for [him and co-producers Sam Catlin and Evan Goldberg],” he explains.  “They’ve been wanting to make this for years and years and years.  When you bring that kind of fanboy passion to a show like this, it’s actually important that it’s in the hands of people like that.  They guard the integrity of [comic creators] Garth [Ennis] and Steve [Dillon’s] work while bringing their own special style.  It is a different medium so it has to be told a different way but they’re very, very faithful to the content and the spirit of the books.  Like the comics, you never quite know what’s coming next with those two… It’s great!”

BTS, Executive Producer Seth Rogen, Graham McTavish as The Saint of Killers, Executive Producer Evan Goldberg – Preacher _ Season 2, Episode 1 – Photo Credit: Skip Bolen/AMC/Sony Pictures Television

In Preacher, McTavish plays the vicious Saint of Killers, a cowboy assassin unleashed upon Jesse (literally) from the pits of Hell.  Though one might assume that a character like this is consumed by a deeply rooted sense of vengeance, McTavish argues that the character is far more complex, motivated by his own sense of justice and even love.

According to McTavish, “He was a cowboy who, like all the main characters, who is struggling with that inner conflict between good and evil.  He’s trying to be a good man.  That is taken away from him and he almost becomes an Old Testament, Biblical vengeful character and he’s recruited by Heaven and Hell to get Genesis and Jesse happens to be the host of that entity.  So, he doesn’t have anything personal against him at this time.  He’s a means to an end.  He’s in the way.  Just like anyone that strays into the Saints path…  If the Saint gets Genesis back from Jesse, the deal is that he gets to rejoin his family in Heaven.  So, in that sense, his journey is, in a very tortured and violent way, motivated by love.  I think anyone with a family can imagine themselves going through any kind of hell to protect them.  That’s how I see him.”

“I think certainly in Season One, he is inspired with justice.  I mean, it’s very extreme.  It’s got that sort of Old Testament feel to it: ‘You do this to my family.  I’ll do this to the whole town.’ I mean, that’s pretty dark stuff.  There’s no half measures in that sense.  He has a sense of justice.  He does.  And, when he goes back to the town, he does so with the best of intentions… I guess there’s a mixture of both [justice and vengeance].”

Graham McTavish as The Saint of Killers – Preacher _ Season 2, Episode 2 – Photo Credit: Skip Bolen/AMC/Sony Pictures Television

A long-time fan of the Saint himself, McTavish says that the opportunity to play him was simply too exciting to pass up.  As a result, he has little trouble getting into character, despite the Saint’s vicious demeanour.

“It’s enormous fun to do it.  There are different ways to get into a character like this.  In this case, when I put on the dusty coat, the hat, strap 10 lbs of iron to my waist and ride a horse into a western town, that does a lot of the work for you, believe me… There’s this anger, this rage.  We all have different approaches.  When I have to turn on that feeling, I think of my family and my young children.  If anything even remotely happened to them like what happened to the Saint’s family, I mean that would be a motivation for some pretty extreme behaviour.  I think that’s how I relate to him.  He appeals to a lot of fans to the book.  I think he kind of represents the purity of that justice.  We’re not going to hear that point of view. You’re simply going to be punished.”

Deeply rooted within Christian mythology, the show’s tone is unlike anything we’ve seen before on television.  Both reverent and irreverent at times, Preacher seems bent on exploring the concept of religion in unconventional ways.  Although it’s set against a spiritual background, McTavish believes that, ultimately, the show is focused on exploring the nature of humanity and our battle between good and evil.

Photo Credit: Skip Bolen/AMC/Sony Pictures Television

“For me, what is really being explored in the story… is those characters who are struggling with this eternal conflict between good and bad, or good and evil if you want to call it that,” he states.  “People try and do good things, and they screw it up.  Now, in some examples with these characters, they do that in the most extreme ways but, essentially, it tells a human story set against a supernatural–maybe spiritual–background.  But the story is universal and that’s what I think appeals to me about it is that there are no neat answers in Preacher.  It’s not something you read for comfort.  It’s not like the typical procedural dramas… it’s much murkier.”

Interestingly, Preacher is merely one of many shows on television right now that seek to explore man’s relationship with the spiritual.  With titles like Supernatural, and American Gods ranging in style and tone, the common thread between them seems to be their interest in spiritual conflict.  In light of this, McTavish agrees that these shows tend to reveal a deeper longing for answers that lies rooted in the heart of our culture.

“I think particularly post second World War, maybe a little more recent than that, there’s something in the collective identity among people, not just in America,” he reflects.  “The rise of individualism against community.  All of those things.  I think they all play towards giving an appeal to shows that explore an alternative to that solution that try to resolve that in kind of a communal way, some in a more spiritual way, of finding answers. But, at the same time, not delivering those answers in kind of a sort-of easily spoon-fed way. It reflects the complexity of our time post-war.  I think, to some degree, thinking of my own parents, life was a lot simpler… In the case of the Second World War, you were faced with a very obvious enemy.  ‘This is fascism.  It needs to be defeated.’  Nowadays, conflicts are never-ending and it all seems very murky.  I think it’s very difficult for people to understand what’s going on with politics and different cultures.  In some ways, we know more about the world than ever before but I think that frightens us. Television at least partly reflects that.”

Photo Credit: Marco Grob/AMC

As Season Two unfurls, McTavish insists that the show will feel a lot more like the original source material than the previous season.  With last year serving as almost a prequel to the comics, Season Two sets out with Jesse and Co. on the open road, searching for God.

“It’s very much more the road trip and really where the comics begin,” McTavish explains.  “Anyone who’s read the comic will recognize the world that they all live in now in Season Two.  We’re introducing the audience to all sorts of unusual situations [and characters].  I won’t spoil it but they are great.   In true Preacher form, I would read every script.. and there would be moments where you say I cannot believe they’re going to do that.  And yeah, they do!  It’s totally unpredictable… I think that’s one of the huge strengths of the show where there’s a moment in every show where the audience says ‘I did not see that coming!’  And that’s rare.  We’re so familiar with the conventions and the language of television that surprising the audience is hard and I think we did that very well.”
Preacher: Season Two premiered on AMC on Sunday, June 25th and resumes in its regular timeslot on Monday, June 26, 2017.

Graham McTavish as The Saint of Killers – Preacher _ Season 2, Episode 2 – Photo Credit: Skip Bolen/AMC/Sony Pictures Television