"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.

“Armageddon Time” - What was I saying?

The IMDb synopsis of Armageddon Time is “A deeply personal coming-of-age story about the strength of family and the generational pursuit of the American Dream.” The movie poster for Armageddon Time features the tagline “The end of an era. The beginning of everything.” Such grandiose statements sound like the film is going to show us the childhood of someone like John Lewis, culminating with the march in Selma in 1965 and the signing of the Voting Rights Act. Think smaller. No, smaller. Like, microscopic. There you go.

Written and directed by James Gray, Armageddon Time is a kinda-maybe-sorta fictionalized look at a small portion of Gray’s own childhood growing up in Queens, New York. Depending on the source, it’s deeply personal or it’s loosely based on memories. I have no doubt that they are deeply personal memories for Gray, but the film’s presentation of them plays out like a story you tell where, halfway through, you realize you don’t have a point, but keep talking because everyone is too polite to point out they realized it before you did. Loosely it is.

(SPOILERS - Is it possible to spoil a movie with no plot? Guess, we’ll find out.)

Considering the film barely has a premise, let alone a plot, the only way forward here is to focus on the characters. Gray’s surrogate in the film is Paul Graff (Banks Repeta). Paul is a sixth grader living in Queens in 1980. Paul is kind of a jerk, which isn’t particularly surprising given the end of the last sentence. He constantly gets in trouble in school for disrupting class, he’s rude, dismissive, and openly defiant to his parents, and steals money from his parents. Eventually, he will attempt to run away with his friend Johnny (Jaylin Webb), which involves committing multiple crimes. And we’re supposed to sympathize with this kid?

Not that we can sympathize much with Paul’s parents, Irving (Jeremy Strong) and Esther (Anne Hathaway). Irving is an appliance repairman and Esther is a housewife. Irving has a temper and Esther is president of the PTA. Irving barks orders at his two sons without bothering to get out of his chair and Esther scolds the boys when they ignore Irving. Hathaway and Strong are very good actors and neither of them are given much to do in this film, with the exception of Irving beating Paul with a belt after a particularly egregious transgression. If you had to describe the most obvious and cliched parents of 1980, that’s how you would do it because they were probably your parents too.

Next, we have Grandpa Aaron (Anthony Hopkins). Aaron is the only family member who Paul responds positively to, but that’s probably due to Aaron giving Paul candy and presents. Like Hathaway and Strong, Hopkins is given little to do in this film, resulting in the closest you will ever get to seeing Hopkins phone in a performance. There’s one scene late in the film where Hopkins comes to life - Aaron channeling years of being discriminated against by anti-Semites, angrily imploring Paul not to let racist slurs toward Johnny (who is African American) go unanswered. What makes the scene stand out isn’t that it’s particularly powerful, but that nearly every other scene is so lifeless.

Finally, we have Johnny, a classmate and friend of Paul’s. If there’s anyone to sympathize with in this film, it’s Johnny. He lives alone with his bedridden grandmother, so is essentially taking care of himself. He puts up with racism on a daily basis, be it from his teacher, other kids, cops, Paul’s parents, or from 1980 Queens in general. The saddest part is that, even at just twelve years old, he’s already well aware of how the deck is stacked against him, yet still harbors a shred of hope of one day becoming an astronaut. If that doesn’t make you root for Johnny, maybe this will...

In the first classroom scene (and opening scene of the film), Johnny laughs at a drawing Paul made and their teacher (Mr. Turkeltaub) goes full racist by ridiculing Johnny for being stupid and having to repeat the sixth grade. In perhaps the most intriguing moment of the film, Johnny responds with “yeah, well you’re the one that taught me.” Whoa...is this movie going to be about the frequent and escalating clashes between Johnny and Turkeltaub, ending with one of them murdering the other? Not only was that many a student’s American dream, but that would assuredly be the end of an era and the beginning of everything.

Unfortunately, nothing remotely that interesting appears to have happened in Gray’s childhood. In fact, this film is confirmation that Gray lived arguably the most common life imaginable. So what’s with the synopsis? The only strength this family exhibits is the ability to begrudgingly tolerate each other while simultaneously bickering with each other. The family’s so-called American Dream is paying gobs of money to send Paul and his brother to an expensive, all-white private school for a chance at a “seat at the table,” except Paul’s dream is to be an artist and Paul doesn’t want leave his current school. And don’t even bother trying to decipher that nonsensical tagline unless you enjoy brain bleeds.

The frustrating thing about the movie is that its every attempt at making a point falls flat. We see the racism Johnny has to deal with, but the film just shrugs its shoulders with Johnny at the inevitability and inertia of it. There is an allusion to anti-Sematism, but the fact that the family is Jewish only seems to be noticed by the family itself. Gray tries to shine a spotlight on white privilege, but the film almost seems apologetic about the spotlight. There’s even an indictment of Reaganism, conservatism, and Trumpism (including a head-scratching cameo by Jessica Chastain as Maryanne Trump) that lands with the same impact as a fart in the wind, primarily because it’s almost all literal background noise.

If there’s anything to learn from Armageddon Time it’s that Gray is convinced his childhood has something insightful to say, but forgot what it was. This kind of seems like a theme with Gray, considering his last two films - The Lost City of Z and Ad Astra - were similarly flat and aimless. It kind of reminds me of a college roommate I had who insisted on listening to the same music over and over and eventually I had to tell him stop. See what I mean?

Rating: Ask for all of your money back and the beginning of everything.

 

“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.

“The Gentlemen” - Travel well indeed.

Guy Ritchie needed a win. After the success of his two Sherlock Holmes films in 2009 and 2011, people largely ignored the very good The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015), King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (2017) was an unmitigated disaster, and the Aladdin remake (2019) was a pile of shit that was only successful because certain nostalgia is as potent as heroin. Taking that nostalgia as a hint, Ritchie decided to go back to his roots by making another film in the same vein as the two that put him on the map (Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch). Full disclosure: I have never actually seen Snatch or Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. I probably should. Now that I have seen The Gentlemen, I have an idea what those other two are like.

One filmmaking technique I go back forth between hating and liking is starting a movie by showing us something from the middle or end of the story. The Usual Suspects employs one of the best uses of it and John Wick easily has one of the worst. Context is key. It works in The Usual Suspects because we want to find out the identity of Keyser Soze. It utterly fails in John Wick because we know John is not going to die. The Gentlemen starts with drug lord Mickey Pearson (Matthew McConaughey) sitting in a pub, talking to his wife, Rosalind (Michelle Dockery) over the phone. Behind him, a man with a gun walks up, the camera cuts to the table in front of him, then we hear a muffled gunshot and see blood spray across the table. Immediately, two thoughts race through your brain. One - did they just kill Matthew McConaughey? Two - there is no way they just killed Matthew McConaughey. Right?

You think he'll mind that we used his Lincoln for this?

Long ago, my wife taught me one of the cardinal rules of filmmaking - if you didn’t actually see the death, it didn’t actually happen. That is not to say characters are not killed off-screen sometimes. It is to say that an off-screen death can always and easily be undone. The Gentlemen puts this idea front and center. On one hand, McConaughey is the lead in the film, and he is Matthew McConaughey, so we immediately doubt that he is dead. On the other hand, he is playing a drug lord, so it is very conceivable that the story ends with his death. At this point, we don’t know if Pearson is good or bad or even know the fact that he is a drug lord (unless you had that spoiled for you by trailers or IMDb). All we know is the guy from the Lincoln ads appears to have taken a bullet to the brain.

In order to sell the mystery of the opening scene, the story is presented to us in the form of paparazzo Fletcher (Hugh Grant) and Pearson’s right-hand man, Raymond (Charlie Hunnam), walking us through the events leading up Pearson’s shooting. All of the events are the result of Pearson deciding to sell his marijuana business to American drug lord Matthew Berger (Jeremy Strong) and another aspiring drug lord, Dry Eye (Henry Golding), wanting to get in on the action. Fletcher has a bunch of incriminating evidence of Pearson and Raymond’s operations, including plenty of associated crimes, and decides to blackmail Raymond for £20 million. Raymond patiently listens as Fletcher recounts events and we, the audience, are treated to a very entertaining film.

He is definitely dead. Unless he isn't.

Plenty of credit goes to Ritchie, as this genre is his wheelhouse, but the film really works because of the performances. Hunnam and Grant are wonderful together, bantering and toying with each other throughout the film. Golding and Strong provide great contrasts in character to each other and Pearson, all three of them giving us a different type of character. Colin Farrell, playing a boxing coach whose students accidentally get them all caught up in the mix, steals every scene he is in. Dockery makes a case that she is the real power behind Mickey’s throne, standing out as the alpha in her every scene. And then of course, McConaughey. Pearson is an Oxford-educated, well-spoken kingpin, who is every bit as intimidating when calm as he is when his emotions break free. He is every bit the guy driving the Lincoln, as well as that same guy in the unaired commercials that murders passing-lane cruisers that cut him off while texting.

More often than not, I am not a fan of gangster flicks. Usually, it is films like The Irishman or The Departed or American Gangster that turn me off to the genre. Films that take themselves way too seriously; where violence seems to be the key focus of the film. Basically, movies that are no fun whatsoever. I gravitate towards the ones that are either very clever or have a sense of humor or, best of all, both. The Usual Suspects is the epitome of clever. Pulp Fiction has a sense of humor and is clever sometimes, though really tests the audience with the rape dungeon (and let’s be honest - the primary appeal of Pulp Fiction is much more the format of the movie than the story it tells). Over the years, I have found that British gangster films are my favorite because they are almost always clever and funny and The Gentlemen is definitely both. I am still patiently waiting for Sherlock Holmes 3, but The Gentlemen is worth the delay.

Rating: Do not ask for any money back unless you are still annoyed that Ritchie wasted our time with Aladdin.