2016 Sleepers
                                                              Part 2

Here is another group of little-known films from last year that I thought were pretty good. I hope you can find one or two you will like.
Florence Foster Jenkins starred the incomparable Meryl Streep as the world’s worst singer. She was nominated for yet another Oscar. This time she didn’t win. But I liked the earlier European version of the same story even better. Marguerite is one of those European collaboration deals- French, Belgian, Czech. But anyway it features a bunch of actors you never heard of in this charming, funny story. This poor lady couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket but nobody wants to tell her this. And she has plenty of money and contacts and so schedules a gala solo performance that is at once painful, touching and hilarious. 
Should we be a little concerned about the use of drones to blow people up? The question is graphically addressed in Eye In The Sky. With Alan Rickman as the good guy and the redoubtable Helen Mirren as the bad guy, the suspense builds about a missile strike in Kenya. Will there be “collateral damage” if it goes forward?
Joseph Gordon-Leavitt (a Tar Heel, by the way!) is the star of Oliver Stone’s Snowden. It is the maybe- true story of how a lower level CIA employee copied files that showed the US hacking into the accounts of nearly everyone, including the leaders of allied foreign countries like Germany. Since you never know how closely to the truth the good ship Oliver Stone sails, I’d say take this one with a grain of salt. But it is nonetheless fascinating. 
I admit to being a sucker for underdog movies like Rudy and Kangaroo Kid. Even better when the underdog is a child, like the little boy in Searching For Bobby Fischer. So I naturally really liked The Queen Of Katwe. It is based on the true story of a young Ungandan girl who somehow becomes a world class chess player. In the cast is David Oyelowo (Martin Luther King, Jr. in Selma) and a bunch of unknowns. He is the mentor for 10-year-old Phiona Mutesi who has a mind like a steel trap and quickly rises in international chess circles. 
Even if you don’t like baseball (shame on you!) I think you would enjoy Fastball, a very good documentary from last year. It explores the science and the myths about baseballs being thrown at incredible speeds. Nolan Ryan, Hank Aaron and other notable baseballers join narrator Kevin Costner in this fascinating doc. Many players insist that a fastball rises as it crosses the plate, while scientists say this isn’t possible. The debate rages on- and it is lots of fun to watch it! 
All of the movies in this article are available on DVD. Only Eye In The Sky is not suitable for all audiences. 

                                                         2016 Sleepers
                                                            Part One

Now that the Oscars are over, screw-ups and all, it’s time to trot out Mr. Movie’s sleepers from last year. Almost all of these eluded the Academy and most viewers. I have a bunch; all good. Strangely enough, the first five are all foreign- just happened that way.
Love And Friendship was actually my number 4 film. It is a delicious comedy about trying to move upward in British society by marrying well. It’s based on Jane Austen’s little-known epistolary novel, Lady Susan. Kate Beckinsale shines as the wily, calculating Susan. She is almost penniless but is determined to get for her daughter, and herself, a good match. I thought Ms. Beckinsale should have had an Oscar nomination. I think this movie just came out too early in the year to get much notice. It is a hoot!
Only Yesterday will be a tough sell to some of you, because (1) it’s Japanese, and (2) it’s animated. But it is a true delight, beautifully drawn with a touching story and a magnetic leading lady. Taeko has a job in Tokyo and decides to spend the summer at her brother’s farm, where she had many pleasant times as a child. Working along with her relatives and others, she develops a strong kinship with the land, a nice young man, and with herself. Give this a try. I believe you will thank me. 
Okay, I know some of you are thinking, “This guy seems hung up on Japanese movies,” and I guess that’s somewhat true. My next pick is another from the Land of the Rising Sun, Our Little Sister. The story is extremely simple. At the funeral of their father, three sisters discover a 14-year-old half-sister they didn’t know about. As there is no one to take care of her now, they invite her to live with them. I know that doesn’t sound like much- but it is.
Now back to England for the very fine and under appreciated Denial. American author Deborah Lipstadt (Rachel Weisz) has her lecture on the Holocaust loudly interrupted by a very combative David Irving (Timothy Spall). He then sues her in an English court for libel, as she has publicly called him a Holocaust denier. In England the burden of proof in a libel case is on the one who published the statement, not the other way around. Much of the film takes place in the courtroom, but there is plenty of outside footage, including a harrowing trip to Auschwitz. Tom Wilkinson has a fine role as Lipstadt’s British lawyer. Spall is hateful and splendid.
And finally a trip to Sweden for the altogether wonderful A Man Called Ove. Ove lives in a housing development and has made himself the arbiter of the local rules. He seems to hate just about everyone and everything and is completely unreasonable. An Iranian family moves in across the street and are clueless that he doesn’t like them. Their adorable children and pregnant mom just won’t give up. Ove lost his wife and in a very moving segment details her passing to his new neighbor. This lovely film is taken from a Swedish novel by Frederik Backman, which remains a best-seller in America. 
All of the movies in this article are available on DVD. Only Denial is too rough for littlies, though they might not care for most of the others.

                                                 AND THE WINNER ISN’T
On Academy Awards night there have been some real howlers, without a doubt. It’s going to be hard to top the 2017 gaffe when the wrong film was announced as Best Movie. To me, they got it right when they said La La Land won because I think it should have. I had Moonlight as my number 10. I also liked Manchester By The Sea and Hidden Figures more than Moonlight. But strangely enough in going through the Best Film awards, I think that most of the time the voters got it right- at least of those nominated. Deserving films that didn’t even make the list is the subject for another article. Herewith, in my opinion, the worst mistakes made by the Academy when picking the best film.
The greatest miscarriage of justice came in 1952 when the very mediocre and overlong Greatest Show on Earth was named instead of the classic High Noon. The former is largely forgotten now, while the Western icon is constantly viewed and is taught in film classes. It is Gary Cooper’s masterpiece and on everyone’s top 10 Westerns list. 
In 1967 Arthur Penn teamed Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway in Bonnie and Clyde, a film that literally changed the way movies are made. The Barrow gang are violent creeps and shown as such. There’s not a wet eye in the house when the curtain comes down. But this classic lost to In The Heat Of The Night, which isn’t bad, but I think won because the subject matter (black Northern cop solves redneck murder) was more appealing. 
A little of the same thing was going on in 1990 when the voters fell in love with Kevin Costner’s politically correct Indians and named Dances With Wolves over Martin Scorcese’s classic gangster flick, Goodfellas. Robert DeNiro, Joe Pesci and Ray Liotta make this Mafia story stand up. 
The Last Emperor (1987) is a good enough bioflick about China, but pales in comparison to the ground-breaking and altogether wonderful Broadcast News. It is doubtful a better movie about TV and its inner workings will ever be made.Goodnight and Good Luck comes pretty close. 
Some people really like Out Of Africa (1985). Not me. Instead, my vote would be for The Color Purple, with Stephen Spielberg wonderfully bringing to life the Alice Walker classic. Danny Glover, Oprah Winfrey, and Whoopi Goldberg lead a fine cast in one of the few films to show that black people are people.
Thirteen years ago the Academy picked Crash, which I really like. But to me it is a half-step or more behind Brokeback Mountain, a ground-breaker that will be around as long as people watch movies. The 2015 winner, Birdman, is pretty good. But as good as Richard Linklater’s monumental Boyhood? Not to me. 
All of the films in this article are available on DVD. All are for mature audiences. 

      BASEBALL HAS BEEN VERY, VERY GOOD TO MOVIES

Pitchers and catchers report! That clarion call every February means that baseball will soon be here once again. And we’re still relishing the Chicago Cubs’ wonderful victory last fall!
There never has been a movie that captures the speed and grace of baseball. Football, basketball and track all photograph better. But Hollywood (and I) love baseball and there are lots of films that have a good feel for baseball's spirit.
These are my favorite baseball movies:
1. Field of Dreams  (1989). I absolutely love this wonderful film. It's the best thing Kevin Costner has ever done. James Earl Jones is splendid as the kidnaped writer and Ray Liotta's debut as Shoeless Joe is top notch. The magic of baseball and something of what it has meant to Americans is here, as well as the ridicule true believers in any magic must endure. When the players materialize out of the cornfield I always get goose bumps.
2. The Natural (1984). Larger than life and meant to be, this is the fable of the Great American Hero. Robert Redford has it down pat. OK, guys, maybe he is a little too pretty, but live with it. Glenn Close is the hero's dream of The Lady. The argument that Roy Hobbs' home runs are impossible is completely beside the point. 
3. Bull Durham (1988). The movie that made Durham Bulls memorabilia famous. As good as it gets in portraying the gritty, quirky world of minor league baseball. Susan Sarandon is just right (isn't she always?) as the ultimate fan, Kevin Costner is fine as Crash Davis, and a pleasantly awkward Tim Robbins is good as The Kid. Funny, touching, and lots of fun.
4. Pride of the Yankees (1942). Gary Cooper is more like Lou Gehrig than Gehrig was. The complete team player with the terminal disease that was named for him won't leave a dry eye in the house when the credits roll.
5. Bang the Drum Slowly (1973). Another doomed player; here a none-too-bright but engaging Robert DeNiro. He gets the puzzlement of "why me?" across really well.  The camaraderie of the players, and even their occasional meanness, seem right on the money. 
Close runners-up: Major League (1989) [inept but hilarious Cleveland wins pennant], The Stratton Story (1949) [one-armed Major League pitcher], and A League of Their Own (1992 ) [girls playing professional baseball]. The last one gave us this memorable phrase from manager Tom Hanks: “There’s no crying in baseball”.
And a special Honorable Mention to Ken Burns' TV series Baseball, a nine-hour love story done as well as it could be.
All of the films in this column are available on DVD. Only Bull Durham is not suitable for all ages.

                                                             NEWSPAPERS
Newspapers have been a rich source of movie material. If Hollywood rarely catches the true flavor of putting out a newspaper, it isn’t from lack of trying. And newspapers fascinate us; they have been the heroes and villains of many stories since before the Republic was founded. Newspapers have had a hard time with the blossoming of the internet. But I happen to think that their death, like that of Mark Twain, is greatly exaggerated. 
There could hardly be a better example of the power of newspapers than All The President’s Men (1976) in which Bob Woodward (Robert Redford), Carl Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman) and the Washington Post merely topple a president of the United States (Nixon, of course). Forty-one years later this is still a terrific movie. Good story, good cast, and some real good inside newspaper stuff. One of the best opening sequences ever made. 
But a very close runner-up about the power of the press is 2015's Best Picture Oscar winner Spotlight. Mark Ruffalo and Rachel McAdams are intrepid reporters in a special Boston Globe unit. Their boss is played by Michael Keaton and his boss by Liev Schreiber. The Globe blows the top off a scandal about Catholic priests molesting children, and the cover-up of the situation by the hierarchy. 
His Girl Friday (1940) is that rarest of beasts- a remake of a good movie that is better than the original. The Front Page (1931) is the first take on the Hecht-MacArthur play, with Adolphe Menjou and Pat O’Brien, and it is very good. But Cary Grant as the crafty editor, Rosalind Russell as his star reporter and ex-wife, and Ralph Bellamy as Roz’s wimpy fiance, make His Girl Friday even better. Both are terrific newspaper movies with delicious machine-gun dialogue from smart-aleck reporters.
Spencer Tracy, Myrna Loy, William Powell and Jean Harlow are an unbeatable cast in Libeled Lady (1936). Tracy’s newspaper inadvertently prints a false story about Loy, then dispatches playboy Powell to seduce her. Harlow is Tracy’s fiancee, and is somehow persuaded to marry Powell so his affair with Loy will be scandalous. Well, 
the plot may be convoluted and not very true to the newspaper business, but it is so much fun that nobody cares.
Absence of Malice (1981) illustrates how newspapers can go wrong. Reporter Sally Field is conned into printing a fake story about innocent Paul Newman. He sues for libel.She cries freedom of the press. It’s an excellent story showing both sides of this equation. Both actors are so engaging you find yourself pulling both ways.
Perhaps the movie that best captures the newspaper business is The Paper (1994). Michael Keaton, Glenn Close, Robert Duvall and Randy Quaid lead a brilliant cast in this Ron Howard-directed vehicle about the problems on a big-city daily. About midway through the press run a terrible mistake is discovered. This film is way over the top, but somewhat accurate on the newspaper details and fun to watch if you don’t stop to think. 
All of the movies in this article are available on DVD. All except Spotlight are suitable for children 10 and up, subject only to the boredom quotient. 

                                                            JOHN HURT


John Hurt could play anything. The wily, wiry little Englishman could disappear into any role and become the character. His everyman persona made him a favorite of casting directors and in his 90-year lifetime he appeared in over 100 movies and TV shows. What WAS unique about him was his voice, and he did the narration or voice over for dozens of shows. 
Hurt’s first appearance of note was in the towering A Man For All Seasons (1966). He plays the villainous Richard Rich, a hateful toady who helps to bring down the noble Thomas Moore (Paul Scofield). 
Midnight Express (1978) is the harrowing, mostly true, story of American college student Billy Hayes. He is caught with hashish strapped to his legs and thrown into a Turkish prison. John Hurt plays fellow inmate Max, an English heroin addict who befriends the American. Hurt doesn’t seem to be an actor playing a drug addict, he seems to BE one. He was nominated for an Oscar but lost to Christopher Walken for The Deer Hunter. 
John Hurt’s optimum performance is as John Merrick, the unfortunate Elephant Man (1980). Poor Merrick was so deformed that he scared people and could only sleep by fits and starts because of his enormous head. Hurt endured 8 hours of makeup preparation for each day’s shooting! He is heartbreakingly good in this incredibly difficult part. He was nominated for Oscar but lost to Robert De Niro for Raging Bull. 
George Orwell’s 1984 has been scaring people for decades. It creates a dystopian world where Big Brother runs everything, words and phrases are adjusted to newspeak, and everyone is supposed to be just alike. John Hurt was a natural to play Winston Smith, the plainspoken hopeless hero of this terrifying film. The film came out in 1984, and it seems to resonate particularly in these troubled times. 
John Hurt appeared in several of the Harry Potter films as Olivander, a minor character perfectly portrayed.
Hurt’s last major part was as Control, the head of British Intelligence, in John Le Carre’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (2011). He comes to a bad end, not an unusual thing in a Le Carre story. In this top-flight adaptation, Hurt is joined by Tom Hardy, Benedict Cummberbatch, Colin Firth and Gary Oldman as George Smiley. 
But he has a fairly important role as the consoling priest to Natalie Portman’s Jackie (2016). It is in their scene that much of the truth of the Kennedys’ relationship is revealed.
John Hurt may also be observed and admired in Owning Mahoney (2003), The Commissioner (1998) and as Professor Oxley in the very entertaining Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008). 
At the time of his recent death, John Hurt also had appeared in four more films, which will be released shortly.
All of the films in this article are available on DVD. The Harry Potters are ok for most kids. The rest are for grown-ups.

                                                                    2016 FILMS

1-La La Land 10
2-Sully 9
3-Hidden Figures 9
4-Love And Friendship 9
5-Deepwater Horizon 9
6-Only Yesterday Jap 9
7-Our Little Sister Jap 9
8-Manchester By The Sea 9
9-Denial 9
10-Moonlight 8
11-Hell And High Water 8
12-A Man Called Ove Swed 8
13-Marguerite Fr 8
14-Loving 8
15-Lion 8
16-Jackie 8
17-Fences 8
18-Eye In The Sky 8
19-Patriots Day 8
20-Snowden 8
21-Queen Of Katwe 8
22-Fastball 8
23-The Witness 8
24-Weiner 8
25-Jason Bourne 8
26-Mia Madre Ital 8
27-The Meddler 8
28-Miss Sloane 8
29-Mustang 8
30-The Family Fang 8
31-Don’t Think Twice 8
32-City of Gold 8
33-Gleason 8
34Hunt For The Wilderpeople NZ 8
35-Moana 8
36-The Jungle Book 8
37-Zootopia 8