“Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore” - How to make magic boring.

We are often faced with choices in life that we wish we could go back and choose again. While walking into the screening of Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, I was presented with a choice of schwag for the film - would I like a movie poster or a reusable, cloth grocery bag? As a fan of movie posters, I took the poster offered to me. After watching the film, I realize I made a terrible error. As much fun as it would be to poke a thousand thumbtacks through the poster to express my opinion of this movie, I could at least have made use of the grocery bag. I would have turned it inside out to avoid the shame of carrying around an advertisement for the film, but at least its sole purpose wouldn’t have been to rot in a landfill for its entire existence.

(SPOILER ALERT - Despite there being very little plot to speak of, I’m going to speak of it anyway.)

It’s been three and a half years since the last Fantastic Beasts film - The Crimes of Grindelwald - and it’s safe to say quite a bit has happened in real life since then, and is still happening. Suffice it to say, trying to remember anything that happened in Crimes after absorbing recent IRL events is a monumental task. It also doesn’t help that Crimes was so forgettable. In fact, it was so unmemorable that it didn’t even phase me when Mads Mikkelsen appeared in the new film as Gellert Grindelwald, in place of Grindelwald’s former portrayer, Johnny Depp. To be specific, my response was “well, I guess Depp is out.”

The film opens with Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) tending to a magical beast called a qilin, underneath a rock arch on top of a mountain. That word is pronounced: chill-in, and, yes, it’s as dumb as it sounds. I chuckled every time it was uttered on screen. That aside, it was nice to see a new creature introduced, since the last film decided to all but abandon the concept of showing us fantastic beasts. This time, the film embraced this new beast by making the qilin the film’s MacGuffin. Newt is there to assist with the birth of a baby (maybe called a chill-y? eh?) but is attacked by a couple of Grindelwald’s hench-wizards, including Credence (Ezra Miller). They kill the mother and steal the baby, leaving Newt unconscious in a river. Newt wakes, returns to the dead mother, and is greeted by a second baby qilin.

Meanwhile, Albus Dumbledore (Jude Law) meets with Grindelwald at a cafe. They discuss the anti-muggle pact they made when they were young, which Albus chalks up as a mistake he made because he was blinded by his love for Grindelwald. If there is one through-line in all of the Potter-verse, ahem, Wizarding World (try as hard as you want WB, it’ll always be the Potter-verse), it’s that dark wizards are driven by racism as their sole motivation for everything they do. Grindelwald is no exception, as his plan continues to be the subjugation or extermination of muggles. One small problem - Grindelwald is an escaped fugitive and accused murderer being hunted by the wizard cops.

Those two paragraphs intersect to form the mess posing as a plot. As we learned in the previous film, Grindelwald can see bits of the future. This is how he was able to send people to capture the baby qilin. We eventually learn that qilins are used to select the leader of the entire wizarding world. Apparently, qilins can see into the hearts of all people and know who is pure and who is not. To those who are pure, they will bow in respect. In that case, why the hell is anyone campaigning and why are there people advocating for one wizard or another? On top of that, do wizard leaders not keep a qilin in some sort of protected sanctuary that is kept in the public eye, in order to prevent any shenanigans? Nobody is going to question the fact that the qilin being used in the selection isn’t glowing, despite that being a qilin’s defining physical feature? And what happens if the qilin doesn’t bow to anyone? And they say muggles are the inferior ones.

My friend summed up the movie quite nicely, saying “I didn’t care about anything or anyone at any time during this movie.” If any one scene is the epitome of that statement, it’s when we meet the group of people Albus has assembled who are going to try to stop Grindelwald. Returning is Newt’s muggle friend Jacob (Dan Fogler), Newt’s brother Theseus (Callum Turner), Lally (Jessica Williams), Yusuf (William Nadylam), and Newt’s assistant Bunty (Victoria Yates). Apparently, all of these characters appeared in the previous film, yet Jacob is the only one that I could remember. It didn’t help that they were all introduced to each other by name in the scene, as if the film is as unfamiliar with them as the audience. But, to my point, I didn’t care that any of them were there either.

Jacob’s charm was stomped on in the last film and is essentially there as trolling of Grindelwald by Dumbledore, if not trolling of the audience by J.K. Rowling. Yusuf is supposed to be a spy, but Grindelwald can see the future, plus Grindelwald has Queenie (Alison Sudol) reading the minds of anyone who comes near. The fact that Yusuf is a spy is literally the first conversation topic between Yusuf and Grindelwald, so what’s his job again? Theseus and Lally are the muscle known as aurors, though Lally should have been pushed from their train for whatever the fuck was the affectation she was going for with her dialogue delivery. Conspicuously missing are Tina (Katherine Waterston) and Albus, though Albus at least has an excuse - he can’t even think about fighting Grindelwald due to their blood pact. All in all, it’s a group that exudes nothing but shrugs throughout the film, mostly due to them barely mattering to the plot.

Speaking of not mattering to the plot, this won’t be the last time we see Grindelwald. Like every film in the Potter-verse, save The Deathly Hallows Part 2, the film ends without concluding anything important. We haven’t met any new, interesting characters and the ones we have met inspire little more than yawns. We haven’t gotten any new story arcs to follow and the main story - dark wizards hate muggles - is as uninteresting as ever. All we’ve seen is a couple of minor subplots conclude and an implicit To Be Continued...

In addition to the film not making us care about anything, it was straight boring. How the fuck do you make a movie about wizards and magical animals boring, J.K.?! All I wanted from this movie was to be entertained for a couple of hours and see a bunch of magic. What I got was a wand fight that might as well have been a laser gun fight (just different colored balls of light flying at each other), a few floating teacups (which we already saw in Beauty and the Beast, so not impressed), and Newt and his brother doing a goofy walk to avoid being attacked by some scorpion-crab things in a dungeon. The most boring movie I’ve ever seen used to have an easy answer. Now, I have to pause before I answer The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

Rating: Ask for all of your money back for two movies worth of Potter-verse.

“The Trial of the Chicago 7” - A Few Good Men

As I write this, it is January 2021. A few days ago, rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol, attempting a violent insurrection of the U.S government, fueled at its core by anger, hatred, and lies. That event is still very raw for us, and in some ways, it made watching this movie very uncomfortable. It sparked a discussion between my wife and me about sympathy, and whether it is possible to feel compassion for people, no matter their methods or beliefs, who think they are doing the right thing by standing up to the establishment. I think it is possible…but there is a limit to that compassion.

The recent actions at the Capitol have been called a protest by some, but after watching The Trial of the Chicago 7, I know the Capitol rioters were not protestors. If a protestor brings firearms to a protest, they cease being protestors and, by definition, become terrorists. If a citizen attacks the government of his or her own country, they became traitors. I understand why they are upset, but I have no sympathy. There is definitely a right and wrong, and starting a violent insurrection of our government because your guy didn’t win is wrong.

The 1968 protestors, on the other hand, were at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago to protest the Vietnam War. Specifically, they wanted an end to the war in order to prevent more American soldiers from dying. From the evidence available, it seems that they were not armed and certainly did not show up wearing tactical combat gear. They were not there because they believed a mountain of lies, and evidence also suggests that they did not incite violence; the police did. So, yes, I have sympathy for them because they were peacefully protesting based on verifiable facts and common decency. That is why we view the main characters in the film as the protagonists rather than view them as the dirty hippies that they were accused of being at the time.

(SPOILER ALERT - It’s been fifty-two years and the fact that many of us, myself included, do not know this history is sad.)

Knowing nothing about the protests in the film, my main reason for wanting to watch it was Aaron Sorkin. The West Wing remains one of the best written television shows of all time and I will always watch a Sorkin film because of it. Even if you did not know The Trial of the Chicago 7 was written by Sorkin, you will know very quickly. It features Sorkin’s signature long takes and witty dialogue, hooking you instantly. It also won’t take you very long to notice the similarities to A Few Good Men, another Sorkin classic. And who doesn’t love a very well written courtroom drama?

Much of the film takes place in a courtroom, showing us the trial of eight men - Abbie Hoffman (Sacha Baron Cohen), Tom Hayden (Eddie Redmayne), Rennie Davis (Alex Sharp), Jerry Rubin (Jeremy Strong), David Dellinger (John Carroll Lynch), Lee Weiner (Noah Robbins), John Froines (Daniel Flaherty), and Bobby Seale (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) - interlaced with flashbacks that piece together the events leading up to the riot and the riot itself. Yes, that is eight men, not seven. I know - I was confused too. A major part of the story is how Bobby Seale was arrested as part of the effort by authorities to stamp out the protests, even though he wasn’t part of the group that planned the protest, as well as an attempt to take down the Black Panthers (which Seale cofounded). Eventually, Seale was removed from the case and the charges were dropped, though that was by no means the end of his legal travails. He was also arguably the most memorable part of the trial, if not the film.

Seale is the first reason to feel sympathy for the group as a whole. His lawyer was in the hospital when the trial started and the judge refused to delay the trial to wait for his lawyer to recover. Even though neither you nor I are lawyers, we both know that forcing a person to stand trial without a lawyer is illegal, a violation of the constitution, and, to put it in Latin terms, horseshit. When this fact is pointed out several times by Bobby, as well as by the lead council for the other seven, William Kunstler (Mark Rylance), Judge Julius Hoffman (Frank Langella) shrugs it off without a care for the law or justice. Immediately you side with the defendants, especially Bobby, and hate Judge Hoffman with a passion.

As the trial moves along, the blatant injustice perpetrated by Judge Hoffman becomes infuriating. He constantly dismisses objections, evidence, testimony, and the law, always to the detriment of the defendants while demeaning them in the process. In addition, he doles out arbitrary and capricious admonitions, as well as contempt charges, as if he has a side bet with the prosecution’s boss. And during this whole facade, you will wonder if there is a line Judge Hoffman can cross that will cause federal prosecutor Richard Schultz (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) to finally speak up. As it turns out, the answer is yes, but it is the bare minimum and far overdue in the course of the trial.

This being a Sorkin vehicle, the defendants are ready with quick witticisms and smart retorts. Abbie and Jerry provide plenty of levity to keep the trial from becoming a medieval inquisition, though rack up the contempt charges at a brisk pace. Throughout the length of the trial, we get to know the men through the flashbacks and conversations outside the courtroom. The back and forth between the timelines works great for character building and slowly ratchets up the drama as both the trial and pre-riot events come to a climax. It’s like watching the best pieces of The West Wing hook up with the best pieces of A Few Good Men and you almost cry it’s so good.

Besides the writing, the reason why the whole movie works so well is the acting. Every line in the film is delivered with a passion that would make the actual historical figures proud. Well, maybe not Judge Hoffman. The whole point of acting is to make the audience believe the actor is the character. Langella puts forth a performance that makes Hoffman the odious and hateful person he is described as being (yes, I did some reading after watching the film). It’s the kind of performance that would make Hoffman’s mother roll over in her grave and it was awesome to behold. And that was just the tip of the iceberg. Cohen shines as Abbie Hoffman, as does Redmayne as Hayden. The two of them are at odds with each other while sharing ideals, and the exchanges are everything we love from Sorkin. As an added bonus, we even get treated to five-ish minutes of A-plus Michael Keaton near the end of the second act.

As well as being a fantastic movie, it is also an extremely relevant movie. Being released in summer of 2020, during the heights of the Black Lives Matter and George Floyd protests, is apropos due to both the film and current events putting a spotlight on police brutality, institutional racism, and people protesting to make the message heard. It will absolutely invoke sympathy in any viewer with an ounce of decency and caring for his fellow Americans. It is exactly the movie we need right now to make us see things for what they are and to remember that protesting requires truth and non-violence. It is the kind of movie that shows us we only need a few good people to make a difference.

Rating: Don’t ask for any money back, but do ask for a history book. You can handle the truth.