OCEANS

Written and Directed by Jacques Perrin and Jacques Cluzaud
Narrated by Pierce Brosnan

Narrator: Down here, it’s like nature has given everything a try.

I’ve never been particularly fascinated with the vast bodies of water known as the planet’s oceans. Sit me in a movie theatre though and immerse me in one of those bodies on the big screen and I may as well be a fish, because I won’t want to get out of the water. Disney Nature’s second environmentally friendly documentary in their Earth Day series, entitled OCEANS, sets out to do just that – to take the viewer by the hand and guide them through these foreign, fantastical waters so that all who take the plunge, emerge knowing that much more about how it feels to be a fish these days.

OCEANS, like any Disney film, is interested in making sure that everyone who sees it is enjoying themselves. When that approach applies to a documentary, it means ensuring that every child that sits in those theatre seats is taken in enough by what they see, so that they sit still in those seats until the credits roll. To do this, directors, Jacques Perrin and Jacques Cluzaud – no strangers to nature films themselves, after collaborating on 2001’s WINGED MIGRATION, a documentary about migratory patterns – place the viewer in the mind of a child, focusing more on who lives in the ocean instead of the ocean itself. Why go on incessantly about oceanic statistics when you can simply just sit in wonder and awe of every unbelievable image you see unfold? Even narrator, Pierce Brosnan, speaks in a slow, soothing tone throughout, careful to balance the drifting attention of a child without insulting the intelligence of the adults who brought them.

Striking that balance can be tricky but Perrin and Cluzaud accomplish their goal nicely for most of the underwater journey. Disney broke away from the structure that worked for them in their first nature release, EARTH, where they repurposed footage from the BBC series, “Planet Earth”. With OCEANS though, they captured some of the same situations that “Planet Earth” did for their segment on oceans, but it is an all-new film this time out, allowing OCEANS to feel much fresher than EARTH ever did. It is also a great second topic to explore as the oceans themselves, especially the depths, provide so many fascinating creatures that most people have never seen and some people won’t even believe are real. Some of the focus is lost when the green agenda is raised about an hour into the film but fortunately more time is spent admiring overall instead of preaching.

These two kids behind me did not stop asking their very patient mother questions throughout the film. If my mom had been there, I too would have been tugging at her blouse, asking, “What’s that, Mommy? What’s that!?” Well, I would have if I were still 10. Anyway, at first I wondered if maybe all of this was lost on them, but then I realized that questions mean interest and these two definitely had questions. More importantly though, they also had some very good laughs at just how crazy nature really can be. And while they may be laughing now, they will likely one day be tugging at their mother once again as they inevitably find themselves staring out into an ocean.

MAMMA MIA!

Written by Catherine Johnson
Music by Stig Anderson, Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus
Directed by Phyllida Lloyd
Starring Meryl Streep, Amanda Seyfried, Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth, Christine Baranski, Julie Walters and Stellan Skarsgard


Donna: Mamma Mia, here I go again. My, my, how can I resist you?

Let me tell you. Just because I’ve been listening to ABBA almost non-stop since I saw MAMMA MIA! two days ago does not mean I enjoyed the film all that much. It’s just the Swedish pop super group’s music is so darn infectious. You would think that energy would translate to a feel-great good time at the movies but sadly this is not the case. First time feature filmmaker, Phyllida Lloyd, spends far too much time dragging her feet when they should be dancing up and down the beach and no matter how many shots of the moonlight shimmering against the waves there are, the film is still a clunker instead of a stunner.


When a musical is paper thin on the stage, it runs the risk of being just plain silly on the screen. On the stage, MAMMA MIA! is a somewhat justified excuse to revive a bunch of ABBA tracks wrapped into a completely implausible, overly romantic farce. Young Sophie (played on screen by Amanda Seyfried) is but 20 and about to marry the very supportive and very handsome, Sky (Dominic Cooper). Something is missing though. Sophie has lived on this tiny Greek island her entire life and helped run a crumbling hotel with her mother, Donna (Meryl Streep) but she has never met her father. As far as she knows, he left before her mother could say anything to him but a chance encounter with her mother’s diary from the summer of her conception narrows the possible men to three. So rather than talk to her mother about her desire to know where she came from, she invites all three men (Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth and Stellan Skarsgard) to her wedding, pretending to be her mother looking for a reunion. Naturally all three men accept the invite and hijinks ensue. While the campiness of the whole affair is forgiven on stage because the suspension of disbelief doesn’t apply, this screen version is too far removed from the stage to feel the least bit plausible.


I believe in angels, something good in everything I see. And while there is very little good to focus on in MAMMA MIA!, at least there is always the surprising Streep. She jumps up and down on beds, slides down banisters without the least bit of concern for breaking her hip and she can sing too. Much like her turn in THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA, Streep’s performance as the lonely mother of the bride carries the film forward and, in the show stopping “The Winner Takes It All”, elevates the film to heights it could never have achieved without her participation. Though the two don’t get nearly enough screen time together, Streep and Seyfriend make a great mother/daughter combo. Seyfried’s fresh exuberance seems like it might actually be inherited from her movie mom. The rest of the cast delivers varying results – Julie Walters clearly thinks she is a comic genius but she comes off too brash; Christine Baranski is miscast as an older bombshell making for some particularly awkward moments with younger men; and someone should ensure that Pierce Brosnan never sings on screen again.


Ultimately, MAMMA MIA! never connects all of its components. A melodramatic moment is followed by a peppy ABBA song, which somehow erases everyone’s pain. In that sense, ABBA’s music is the perfect choice to set the tone as it is some of the most depressing pop lyricism set to upbeat melodies in pop history. While the contrast adds weight to the songs themselves, the musical masking casts an air of falseness that never lifts on the film. What your left with is a compilation of poorly choreographed, plainly sung music videos. No offence, Meryl, but you are long past your MTV days.

MARRIED LIFE

Written by Ira Sachs and Oren Moverman
Directed by Ira Sachs
Starring: Chris Cooper, Patricia Clarkson, Pierce Brosnan and Rachel McAdams


Richard Langley: I always felt marriage was like a mild illness, like the flu or chicken pox.

The biggest problem with MARRIED LIFE, the movie not the state of existence, is the tone set by its title. Before even setting foot in the theatre, your mind is filled with preconceived notions about the likelihoods the film will deliver. You cannot expect a film called MARRIED LIFE to show long term couples just as happy now as they were when they first met. In fact, in these cynical times, you might likely be disappointed if you didn’t see spouses abusing each other, scheming and plotting against the other or, if you want to be old fashioned, just plain cheating on each other. Perhaps to offset these expectations, writer/director, Ira Sachs, sets his story in the 1940’s, a supposedly simpler time when people were married and stayed that way despite their personal unhappiness. Even a setting as delicately composed as this one is not a good enough disguise for its contemporary sensibility. The film’s fate seems sealed as soon as the opening credits begin to roll. Similar in design and manner to television’s “Desperate Housewives”, a show that has built its reputation on couples scheming, they seem to announce Sach’s intention to give us exactly what we expect. Only when the final animated frame settles on a city skyline and you expect the real thing to take its place, Sachs reveals that it is in fact a reflection. With the lens pointing inward now, I wonder if I’ve spoken too soon.


Like the beginning of a marriage, for a while, it is good. The strings of the score swell and sweep you up into the sentiment like a warm wind taking you for a dance in the sky overlooking a quiet family-friendly suburban street. This particular street is home to Harry and Pat Allen (Chris Cooper and Patricia Clarkson). The two have been married for what might as well be forever and they still cherish and respect each other but whether they still love each other is a question that looms over their lives like a heavy cloud. Harry believes that love is defined by the desire to give constantly to the other person. Pat believes that love is sex. Despite their definitions being categorically on different pages, they are a solid, functional couple. However, Harry has found another woman, Kay (Rachel McAdams in a refreshing return that is more tender and vulnerable than past performances) for whom continuously being doted on is the perfect compliment to her lonely life. I suppose it doesn’t hurt that she is younger and beautiful but Harry conveniently avoids seeing this as the motivating factor for his affection.


And so Harry finds himself in quite the pickle. He doesn’t want to burden his wife with the embarrassment of a divorce but yet he cannot deny that he is no longer in love with her. Harry is a sensible businessman who lives his life with order and reason and is still able to embrace his more romantic sensibility, wanting his life to embody the love he feels. He racks his brain to come up with the tidiest, most logical solution to his dilemma and somehow, the best plan he can come up with is to kill his wife. He rationalizes that this will cause the least amount of pain to all involved, including his children. Is it me or is this the least rational course of action? Essentially, this becomes MARRIED LIFE’s main storyline and as it is ridiculous in concept, it also serves to undermine the intelligence of what was otherwise a fairly engaging film. Even Sachs seems unsure of this whole direction as he throws in a couple of painfully obvious scenes about how death can take away misery rather than add to it. If Sachs isn’t buying it, I’m not sure how he thought anyone else would.


Despite its shortcomings, MARRIED LIFE does plant a few seeds of wisdom in its perfectly tended garden. The banalities of spending every day of your life with the same person are accepted by most of the characters as a perfectly normal piece of the pie. With decades past between their time and ours, have we really changed all that much? There are so many things happening and left unsaid in any marriage with both partners none the wiser. Subsequently, we have fine-tuned an uncanny ability to exist in a state of comfortable misery. We may look elsewhere for distraction but so many never walk away from what they know isn’t working. Applying that same logic makes sitting through MARRIED LIFE entirely acceptable while you wonder what’s playing next door.