"Klara and the Sun" - Pleasantville.

Klara and the Sun is the latest movie from filmmaker Taika Waititi. Chances are good you've seen at least one of his movies because he directed the last two Thor movies. You may also know him from his role as the villain Antwan in Free Guy or as the Oscar winning writer (and non-Oscar winning director) of Jojo Rabbit. No matter how you know of him, you probably liked at least one his movies. But you also are aware of how not-good was Thor: Love and Thunder. Like, really not good. Thankfully, Klara and the Sun hews much more toward Jojo Rabbit than Love and Thunder.

That's not to say Klara and the Sun isn't without problems. The film is adapted from a book of the same name by Kazuo Ishiguro and a couple of people noted that it strays a bit from the book. They didn't elaborate on specifics, but did say that the book is much better than the film. That's not surprising in the least because 99.9 percent of all books are considered better than the movies (that remaining 0.1 percent are all of the Harry Potter movies).

Because I was curious, I read through the plot summary of the book on the related Wikipedia page, which describes the same major plot points that appear in the film. Klara (Jenna Ortega) is a robot known as an Artificial Friend (AF). She and other AFs pose in a store, hoping to be purchased so they can fulfill their role as someone's lifelong friend. One day, teenager Josie (Mia Tharia) spots Klara in the store's window and takes a liking to her. Josie convinces her mother Chrissie (Amy Adams) to buy Klara - despite Chrissie wanting to purchase a newer model robot from across the street - and Klara couldn't be happier.

Klara may be a robot, but her level of programming makes her the equivalent of a four-year-old. Since she had never left the store prior to meeting Josie and her entire knowledge-base is a combination of observing people through the store's window and what little the store manager (Natasha Lyonne) tells the AFs. Klara doesn't know how to navigate stairs, is terrified of walking through a wheat field, thinks the sun is a god who lives in a barn on top of a hill that she can see from Josie's house, and that automated street cleaners are monsters. It's adorable and you want Josie to ruffle Klara's hair on multiple occasions. Unfortunately, Chrissie is not amused with Klara. Chrissie is a no-nonsense mother who thinks Klara is an idiot, fully expecting to return Klara to the AF store within a week.

After Klara is taken to live with Josie and Chrissie, we learn that Josie had a past surgery known as lifting, a procedure that altered her DNA to make her super smart. The procedure also comes with the risk that the recipient can become fatally ill and, yes, turns out Josie is fatally ill. Upon learning this, Klara prays to the sun to heal Josie with its life-giving sunlight. Is that hair-rufflingly adorable or what?

Despite the movie's title and Josie's prognosis, this movie isn't really about Klara or Josie. It's about Chrissie. More specifically, it's about dealing with grief and loss. It turns out that Josie had a sister who died some time ago and Chrissie has not coped well with the loss. She drinks, she inhales some sort of drug, and she greenlit the lifting procedure on Josie to, in Chrissie's words, "give Josie every advantage possible." It's pretty obvious that the procedure was also intended to substitute for parenting. Ditto for bringing in Klara. Though, Chrissie has an ulterior motive for Klara that the film reveals later. Don't worry, it's nothing sinister. But it is the kind of thing that would piss off every teenager who ever lived.

All of that sounds pretty straight forward, but as I said, this film is not without problems. So much of the focus is on Klara and a plethora of other themes that the film's real plot often gets lost in so much noise. Besides family strife, the film touches on ideas like social classes, religious delusion, faith, individualism, self-image, slavery, discrimination, the Internet, World War III, jealousy, artificial intelligence, devices substituting for human contact, and pollution. Yeah...there's a lot of noise.

A lot of that noise is just that - noise. Take, for example, the social classes. Klara has a party and a bunch of other lifted kids are there. An entire scene plays out where the kids insult Klara, Josie, and Josie's un-lifted friend Rick (Aran Murphy). It's the only time in the film these kids are seen and does nothing to further the plot or speak to the relationship between Josie and Chrissie. Or another scene where Josie spots Rick giving Klara a piggy-back ride and becomes immediately jealous and suspicious that Klara is trying to steal Rick. Josie is super smart, but immediately forgets that Klara is a robot and an exceptionally naive one at that? Just, no. Klara may be an idiot, but Josie has been genetically modified to not be an idiot.

Luckily, the film has some good elements to balance out those problems. The most obvious one is Ortega's performance. She is absolutely believable as a naive robot, delivering every line and emotion with pure earnestness. I don't doubt for a moment that Klara truly believes the sun is a god, street cleaning machines are monsters, and wheat is scary. It's in every line of dialogue, every expression on her face, and every awkward step she takes in the fields or down the staircase. I also quite enjoyed a minor character simply called Scarecrow (Jesse Griffin), another robot whose entire job is exactly what his name says, but who also exhibits much of the same naivete as Klara. Then there's Adams, who is just killer as Chrissie. If you've ever wondered what "stares daggers with her eyes" really looks like, Adams demonstrates that expression multiple times. And that's when she's not showing Chrissie's vulnerability as a grieving mother trying to come to terms with losing another daughter.

While the movie could have been much better and more focused, I found myself mostly content with the film. The best way I can describe it is that it's is a pleasant movie. If nothing else, it's not Love and Thunder.

Rating: Ask for eight dollars back for all the noise.

"Whalefall" - Inner space.

Whalefall is probably the best movie one can make about a human being trying to survive being swallowed by a whale. That's not a compliment. Whalefall is not a very good movie. During the first half, I had a very strong urge to walk out of the theater, which is extremely rare for me. And I say that as someone who has sat through multiple entire Colleen Hoover movies. During the second half of Whalefall, I was laughing at how silly the movie became. But this movie isn't really about surviving a whale's digestive tract. It's about father and son relationships. Because nothing's as good a metaphor for father-son relationships as stomach acid and bile.

Let's get the big issue out of the way first - suspension of disbelief. Can a human survive being fully swallowed by a whale? No. Did I look into this at all? Of course I did. You think the guy whose top five movie concerns are plot, plot, character development, plot, and absolutely-no-Dakota-Johnson-ever-again wouldn't look up what's in whale innards?

But I didn't look it up so I could take the movie to task over it. It's the premise of the movie and I'm perfectly willing to accept the premise. Just like I'm willing to accept the premise of transforming alien robots or haunted dolls or Dwayne Johnson. I looked it up out of curiosity and discovered that (a) no and (b) the filmmakers added as much realism as they could, but they also took a lot of liberties because, again, no.

So how does this human end up in a whale's gullet? Jay (Austin Abrams) returns home for his father Mitt's (Josh Brolin) funeral. Mitt committed suicide by drowning himself off the coast and Jay decides to search for Mitt's body because "it's something I feel like I have to do." While Jay is searching the ocean floor, a sperm whale is trying to catch and eat a giant squid. As the whale is attempting to swallow the squid, the whale swims past Jay and the squid snatches Jay with one of its tentacles. I saw this entire chase sequence in a preview a couple of months ago and it is easily the highlight of the film. It's dramatic, it's intense, it's visually and auditorily fantastic. It's the kind of scene that's so well done you feel like you are experiencing every sensation that Jay feels and you find yourself peeling your fingernail out of the armrest of your seat after the screen cuts to black.

Before Jay wakes up, we're treated to the first of many flashbacks where a younger Jay is being berated by Mitt. Usually, he's being berated over scuba diving lessons or how the ocean is being destroyed by people or even just because Mitt condescends that aquariums are "fake ocean." These scenes aren't quite as uncomfortable as the scenes inside the whale, but they're in the same ballpark. If you had an overbearing father who was a mean drunk and verbally (if not physically) abusive, you might prefer the whale stomach scenes. On a related note, wow is Josh Brolin a good actor.

These flashback scenes aren't the reason I debated leaving the theater. About ten minutes into the scenes inside the whale, after Jay wakes up, my ick factor was through the roof. It's not that I can't handle body parts or gore or gross scenes in general. It's just that these scenes in particular repulsed everything in me and my brain went "Do you really want to sit through ninety more minutes of this?" I think it was the combination of the Dolby theater pumping the bodily sounds (muscular contractions, dripping, squishing) at a million decibels, Jay's panic-filled actions, the claustrophobic setting (Jay doesn't have much room to move around), and the visuals all working in the exact right way to trigger my flight response. Nothing about it was enjoyable and brain made sure I knew it.

I think that was the real reason for the flashbacks. From a narrative perspective, I know those flashbacks were for character development and metaphorically linking past events to each scene inside the whale. But really, it was to give our brains a break from the ick every few minutes. At least, it was until the movie decided to get an unintentional sense of humor.

Two scenes had me laughing out loud at their absurdity. The first was when the whale has half of its body sticking vertically out of the ocean and Jay is clinging to the whale's voice box, screaming for help at the top of his lungs at a distant boat filled with whale watchers (he can hear the boat and occasionally see it when the whale lowers its constantly-open-for-some-reason mouth). Hilariously, this scene is less silly than when Jay starts conversing with the whale and the whale is talking back in Mitt's voice. Obviously, this is meant to show Jay's reconciliation with his feelings about his dad. But it comes off like a pie to the face. Especially when it becomes a series of deus ex machinas. I think movies are allowed to have one deus ex machina, not six.

Ultimately, I made it through to the end of the film. I was glad it was over for multiple reasons and the ickiness ended up being the least of those reasons. A small reason was I annoyed at Jay for much of the movie for two things. (1) He decided to go searching for his father underwater, in a kelp field, on a cloudy, stormy day...without a flashlight. (2) He kept taking his goggles off inside the whale. Yeah, maybe his dad was onto something with all his berating. Mostly I was glad it was over because, throughout my viewing, I kept thinking of two other better movies that shared similarities with Whalefall. The first was Buried because it also featured a guy trapped in a tiny space trying to get out. The second was Innerspace, featuring Dennis Quaid zipping around inside Martin Short's body in a tiny little ship. Whalefall is the exact wrong ratio of Buried to Innerspace. For most of us, at least. Depends on how you feel about your father and/or whale guts.

Rating: Ask for twelve dollars back and don't say I didn't warn you.

"The Social Reckoning" - Like and share.

My favorite thing about writer/director Aaron Sorkin is his ability to frame complicated topics in ways that are easily understood. Whether it's A Few Good Men, Charlie Wilson's War, The Social Network, The Trial of the Chicago 7, or any episode of The West Wing, you will understand whatever you just watched when the credits roll. As an added bonus, Sorkin's writing makes for very engrossing viewing, no matter the topic. He made Moneyball a riveting watch about baseball statistics. Think about that act of wizardry for a moment (and I say this as a pathological baseball fan). His latest film, The Social Reckoning is no different.

Since I know you're wondering, The Social Reckoning is not a sequel to the The Social Network. Yes, Sorkin wrote both films. Yes, they are both about Facebook. Yes, both feature a portrayal of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg as a loathsome sack of shit. But that's the end of the connection. Reckoning doesn't pick up where Network left off. Reckoning doesn't try to tell us what's happened in the sixteen years between films. Reckoning doesn't even keep Zuckerberg as its main character. Reckoning is about an algorithm. And you thought baseball statistics were mundane.

More specifically, The Social Reckoning is about the impact of Facebook's algorithm on Facebook's users. To frame this topic, Sorkin focuses on two things. One is the investigation by a journalist and whistleblower that led to the Wall Street Journal's appropriately titled series published in 2021 - The Facebook Files: A Wall Street Journal Investigation. The other is Zuckerberg being prepped by his assistants for an upcoming congressional testimony. The investigation took place from 2019 to 2021 and Zuckerberg's prep occurs on January 6, 2021. So, the film jumps back and forth between the two as they progress to their respective climaxes. To avoid any confusion, the film shows a timeline on the screen every time one of these transitions occurs. I told you - easy to understand.

Before you start watching this movie, you should know that it will make you mad at several points. Well, probably make you mad. Depends on how you feel about a drunk asshole verbally accosting two cops for the sin of stopping to check on the asshole because the asshole's car was belching a ton of smoke from its engine. Especially when that drunk asshole veers her assault into some wildly virulent racism. And if my repeated use of the word asshole upsets you, you really, really shouldn't see this movie. Because asshole is the nicest word I can think of to describe her and it's not the toughest scene in the movie to watch. Also, this scene is how the movie opens.

It's an important scene for so many reasons, but its primary purpose is to establish a motivation for the whistleblower, Facebook employee Frances Haugen (Mikey Madison). Frances is a real person who worked in Facebook's civic integrity team to combat misinformation spread by Facebook posts. The opening scene includes the asshole recording her encounter and posting the video online. Frances recognizes the asshole as a past friend and is alarmed at how radicalized that friend had become, knowing that much of it had to do with her former friend's online presence. Being a data scientist, Frances does some digging through internal Facebook files and comes up with some very alarming statistics.

Around the same time, investigative journalist Jeff Horwitz (Jeremy Allen White) takes an assignment to cover Facebook. His intuition tells him something is terribly wrong with Facebook (and social media in general), so he starts digging. Eventually, Frances contacts him and the two develop a working relationship over several months. And by working relationship, I mean she drips information to him in very small parts because she really believes in Facebook's mission (connecting people) and doesn't want to get fired (or worse). As the investigation develops, we can see how Sorkin uses it to explain the issue in simple terms. Horwitz has the technical acumen of a marble and Frances continually reminds him (and us) about it. This allows the movie to explain things like algorithms and MSI (meaningful social interactions) in very simple terms and in an organic manner while not interrupting the flow of the film. And it does the same thing in the opposite direction, with Horwitz constantly trying to explain how journalism and reporting really works.

The same thing goes for the Zuckerberg scenes. In those scenes, he (Jeremy Strong) is constantly displaying an aura of "I'm smarter than everyone" vibe, if not outright saying it. Conversely, an old friend-turned-critic, Charlie Garrigan (Bill Burr), spars with Zuckerberg while Zuckerberg is trying to answer questions they expect Congress to ask. Garrigan keeps explaining to Zuckerberg what he is missing or ignoring by, among other things, refusing to stop platforming political ads containing misinformation and lies. Like with Horwitz and Haugen, we have two people with very different knowledge backgrounds, but this time it's both a political discussion (Garrigan explaining to Zuckerberg) and business discussion (Zuckerberg explaining to Garrigan). And again, everything is spoken in very clear terms so that the audience doesn't get lost in all of the dialogue.

Of course there is a lot of dialogue - this is a Sorkin piece. He's the exact opposite of the man of few words. But it's always a good thing, especially because Sorkin (and his associates) always seems to find the perfect actors for his screenplays. No matter how good his writing is, it only works with good performances. And this film is packed with great performances. Madison turns in a layered performance that makes her Haugen sympathetic, frustrating, strong, and meek all at the same time. In other words, a very, very human performance. White gives us a reporter who we definitely want to see succeed. He's kind, understanding, very direct with his intentions, and never makes you think he has motives other than to help people through his journalism. Strong is excellent as well; all the proof you need being that you want to punch his Zuckerberg's stupid, condescending, greedy face. Just like the actual Zuckerberg. And then there's Burr, who is so good that you'll forget he made his name as a stand-up comedian. Like John Leguizamo in The Odyssey, Burr deserves a lot of consideration for a best-supporting actor Oscar.

At this point, you probably want to know is if Reckoning is better, as good as, or worse than The Social Network. Honestly, I don’t know. It’s been sixteen years since I saw that movie and I don’t remember much about any more. Just that by the time it was over, I wanted someone to punch Zuckerberg’s (Jesse Eisenberg) stupid face. Still do.

Rating: Don’t ask for any money back, no matter what the algorithm says.