Dilettante's Diary

Dec 15/15

Home
Who Do I Think I Am?
Index: Movies
Index: Writing
Index: Theatre
Index: Music
Index: Exhibitions
Artists' Blogs
Index: TV, Radio and Misc
Restaurants
MAY 27, 2024
Nov 3, 2023
Aug 2, 2023
July 4, 2023
Apr 21, 2023
Feb 10, 2023
Jan 24, 2023
Jan 11, 2023
Dec 2, 2022
July 26, 2022
July 4, 2022
June 2, 2022
March 25, 2022
March 11, 2022
Feb 14, 2022
Nov 19, 2021
Oct 2021
Sept 16, 2021
July 21, 2021
July 15, 2021
June 11, 2021
Apr 23, 2021
March 12, 2021
Feb 13, 2021
Jan 5, 2021
December 2020
Autumn Mysteries 2020
Aug 12/20
May 25/20
Apr 30/20
March 12/20
Dec 6/19
Jan 29/20
Nov 10/19
Oct 24/19
Sept 30/19
Aug 2/19
June 22/19
May 26/19
Apr 22/19
Feb 23/19
Jan 15/19
Dec 20/18
Dec 3/18
Oct 3/18
Sept 9/18
Aug 9/18
July 19/18
June 2/18
May 14/18
Apr 23/18
Feb 22/18
Jan15/18
Dec 13/17
Nov 22/17
Nov 3/17
Oct 5/17
Sept 21/17
Aug 3/17
June 16/17
Mar 21/17
Feb 26/17
Feb 9/17
Jan 30/17
Dec 19/16
Dec 11/16
Nov 20/16
Sept 17/2016
Aug 21/16
July 17/16
June 29/16
June 2/16
Apr 23/16
Feb 28/16
Feb 1/16
Jan 27/16
Winter Reading 2016
Dec 15/15
Nov 19/15
Fall Reading 2015
Oct 29/15
Sept 16/15
Sept 4/15
July 29, 2015
July 1, 2015
June 7/15
Summer Reading 2015
May 19/15
Apr 30/15
Apr 19/15
Spring Reading 2015
March 23/15
March 11/15
Winter Reading 2015
Feb 20/15
Feb 8/15
Jan 29/15
Jan 20/15
Highs 'N Lows of 2014
Dec 19/14
Dec 2/14
Nov 10/14
Oct 29/14
Fall Reading 2014
Sept 17/14
Summer Reading 2014
Aug 22/14
Aug 8/14
July 11/14
June 16/14
May 28/14
Apr 30/14
Apr 16/14
Apr 2/14
March 21, 2014
March 13/14
Feb 11/14
Sept 23/13
Favourite Works: 2004-2013
Two Novels by BARBARA PYM
Sabbath's Theater by PHILIP ROTH
July 18/13
Summer Reading 2013
June 19/13
May 30/13
Spring Reading 2013
May 10/13
Apr 18/13
Mar 29/13
March 14, 2013
The Artist Project 2013
Feb 25/13
Winter Reading 2013
Feb 7/13
Jan 22/13
Jan 12/13
A Toast to 2012
Dec 19/12
Dec 16/12
Dec 4/12
Fall Reading 2012
Nov 17/12
Nov 6/12
Art Toronto 2012
Oct 23/12
Oct 4/12
Sept 28/12
Summer Reading 2012
Aug 26/12
Aug 8/12
Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition 2012
July 14/12
June 28/12
MIMC
May 27/12
May 20/12
May 4/12
La Traviata: Met's Live HD Version
Apr 21/12
Apr 6/12
Mar 22/12
Mar 9/12
The Artist Project 2012
Academy Awards Show 2012
Feb 26/12
Feb 11/12
Jan 23/12
Jan 15/12
Jan 7/12
Dec 20/11
Dec 12/11
Nov 27/11
Nov 18/11
Nov 7/11
Art Toronto 2011
Oct 22/11
Oct 17/11
Sept 30, 2011
Summer Reading 2011
Aug 11/11
July 28, 2011
July 19/11
TOAE 2011
June 25/11
June 20/11
June 2/11
May 14/11
Apr 29/11
Toronto Art Expo 2011
Apr 11/11
March 24/11
The Artist Project 2011
March 11/11
Feb 23/11
Feb 7/11
Jan 21/11
HIGHS 'N LOWS OF 2010
Jan 17/11
Dec 21/10
Dec 6/10
Nov 11/10
Fall Reading 2010
Oct 22/10
Summer Reading 2010
Aug 9/10
Aug 2/10
TOAE 2010
July 16/10
The Shack
June 27/10
June 3/10
May 5/10
April 17/10
Mar 28/10
Mar 17/10
The Artist Project 2010
Toronto Art Expo 2010
Feb 22/10
Feb 3/10
Notables of '09
Jan 11/10
Dec 31/09
Dec 17/09
How Fiction Works
Nov 24/09
Sex for Saints
Nov 11/09
Housekeeping
Oct 22/09
Oct 6/09
Sept 18/09
Aug 23/09
July 31/09
July 17/09
Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition 2009
Toronto Fringe 2009
Zen Wrapped In Karma Dipped In Chocolate
June 28/09
June 6/09
Myriad Mysteries 2009
May 10/09
CBC Radio -- "The New Two"
April 14/09
March 24/09
Toronto Art Expo '09
March 1/09
The Jesus Sayings
Feb 8/09
Jan 26/09
Jan 10/09
Stand-outs of 2008
Dec 24/08
Dec 4/08
Nov 16/08
Oct 27/08
Oct 16/08
Sept 26/08
Sept 5/08
July 21/08
Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition 08
July 5/08
June 23/08
June 4/08
May 18/08
May 4/08
April 16/08
March 26/08
Head to Head
Feb 26/08
Feb 13/08
Jan 30/08
Jan 17/08
Notables of 2007
Dec 30/07
Dec 8/07
Nov 22/07
Oct 25/07
Oct 4/07
Sept 18/07
Aug 29/07
Aug 8/07
Summer Mysteries '07
July 20/07
June 28/07
June 8/07
May 21/07
May 2/07
April 14/07
March 23/07
Toronto Art Expo 2007
March 8/07
Feb 16/07
Feb 2/07
Jan 24/07
Notables of 2006
Dec 27/06
December 11/06
November 28/06
Nov 8/06
October 14/06
Sept 22/06
Ring Psycho (Wagner on CBC Radio)
Sept 6/06
August 12/06
July 18/06
June 27/06
June 9/06
May 23/06
Me In Manhattan
May 2/06
April 12/06
March 17/06
March 9/06
Feb 16/06
Feb 1/06
Jan 11/06
Dec 31/05
Dec 12/05
Nov 25/05
Nov 4/05
Oct 24/05
Sept 7/05
Sept 16/05
Sept 1/05
Aug 10/05
July 21/05
Me and the Jays
July 10/05
June 15/05
May 18/05
April 27/05
April 18/05
April 8/05
March 21/05
Feb 28/05
Feb 21/05
Feb 4/05
Jan 28/05
Jan 19/05
Jan 5/05
About Me
Dec 20/04
Dec 5/04
MOVIES
BOOKS
RE-READINGS
MYSTERIES/CRIME books
VIDEOS and DVDs
PLAYS
OTHER STUFF: Art Exhibitions, Concerts, etc.

The date that appears above is the date of the most recent reviews. As new reviews are added, the date will change accordingly. The new reviews will appear towards the top of the page and the older ones will move further down. When the page is closed, the items will be archived according to the final date on the page.

Reviewed here: Spotlight (Movie); The Night Before (Movie); This Is That (Radio)

Spotlight (Movie) written by Tom McCarthy and Josh Singer; directed by Tom McCarthy; starring Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber, John Slattery, Brian d’Arcy James, Stanley Tucci, Elena Wohl, Gene Amoroso, Doug Murray, Jamey Sheridan, Neal Huff, Billy Crudup, Robert B. Kennedy, Len Cariou, Jimmy LeBlanc

Illicit sex, especially when it involves religious leaders, makes for great copy. But the point of this movie about the sex abuse perpetrated by the Catholic clergy in the Boston diocese isn’t to dwell on the salacious details. Rather, the movie’s focus is on the system that allowed the abuse to be covered up for so long. That’s the point made by publisher Marty Baron (played by Liev Schreiber) in his instructions to the Boston Globe reporters who published the results of their year-long investigation in 2002.

At first, it’s hard to get your bearings in a barrage of expository dialogue and a flurry of names and titles: lawyers, priests, reporters, editors, victims, publishers. Even by the end of the movie, it’s difficult to be sure who some of these people are. Along the way, though, it becomes clear that, while the movie doesn’t particularly concern itself with trying to present the hierarchy’s justification of the way it handled the scandals, it does give a fair, balanced view of how the issue looked to the rest of the world and, in particular, to the Globe’s staff. As to why so much abuse occurred, the movie wisely doesn’t delve into that minefield, other than a brief reference to some possible explanations, such as the church’s obsession with celibacy and the sexual immaturity of many clerics.

We’ve seen a lot of movies about how things work in newspapers, All the President’s Men being one of the most illustrious examples. Spotlight shows that there are still good reasons for looking into that fascinating milieu. We get to sit in on the tense discussions among the staff members about what they should or shouldn’t do, how they’re going to approach this or that potential witness, how to get this reluctant victim to talk. (In terms of this behind-the-scenes strategizing, it’s a lot like Page One, the documentary about the New York Times.)

The four reporters working on this story belong to the Globe’s special investigative section known as "Spotlight" and much of their success in this instance comes from the dogged and ballsy insistence of Mike Rezendes, as played here by Mark Ruffalo. He goes where no one but an intrepid, even a reckless, reporter would go. The Catholic culture of Boston went into defence mode, trying to block him at every move. If it wasn’t for his determination, the team would never have turned up the facts needed to publish the story. Another team member who is just as committed, but in a gentler way, is played by Rachel McAdams. When she’s sitting face-to-face with a sex abuse victim and she’s coaxing the necessary information out of him, there’s an honesty and simplicity about her that dissolves any hint of conflict between her identities as an investigative reporter and a genuinely sympathetic human being.

This being a movie about a big issue – i.e. getting the story – it doesn’t dish up the sort of interpersonal drama that you get in a character movie. Relationships don’t matter much here. No affairs or romances. A passing reference to the fact that Mike Rezendes and his wife are separated makes you notice that there are hardly any other domestic details about the characters. Apart from some dynamic tussles among the newspaper’s staff, we mostly get a lot of flinty-eyed men glaring at each other and refusing to answer questions. In that respect, this movie’s a panoply of male stonewalling. No doubt that’s why interviews with some of the abuse victims bring on tears. One victim, a tough-looking, hard-bitten young dad (Jimmy LeBlanc, I think) squirms and fidgets, barely able to spit out the story of what happened to him. The scene should earn him a special award for the most gripping appearance by an actor in a cameo role.

Although it’s not a character movie, there are significant developments in terms of some of the characters. An obnoxious lawyer, played by Stanley Tucci, turns out to be someone quite different from whom we took him to be. And there’s even an unexpected revelation when one of the reporters on the Spotlight team turns out, belatedly, to have a somewhat ambiguous role in the Globe’s reporting on the story. I did find it slightly melodramatic when one reporter, a father, took somewhat extreme measures on finding that some priests who had been sex abusers were living in his neighbourhood. A bit of hysteria or a reasonable parental response? Hard to say.

The only aspect of the movie that struck me as phony, without question, was Howard Shore’s music. It was constantly chugging along, trying to convince us that important doings were underway. Whether it was Mark Ruffalo dashing from taxi to courthouse, or reporters searching through clipping files, or printing presses disgorging newspapers, the score kept trying, unnecessarily, to ratchet up the tension. Is it taken for granted that viewers are conditioned to need this kind of emotional prompting? All that the music was doing for me was making me wonder if the filmmakers didn’t think the proceedings on screen were interesting enough to keep my attention. If the story-telling is good enough, why introduce these sound effects to suggest that maybe it isn’t?

 

The Night Before (Movie) written by Jonathan Levine, Kyle Hunter, Ariel Shaffir, Evan Goldberg; directed by Jonathan Levine; starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Seth Rogen, Anthony Mackie, Jillian Bell, Lizzy Caplan, Michael Shannon, Aaron Hill, Ilana Glazer, Heléne York, Darrie Lawrence.

When I walk into a matinee showing of a movie like this, I expect to find lots of teens who are skipping school. Could the fact that there weren’t any present this time suggest that there’s something wrong with the movie?

If there’s a genre for this kind of goofball comedy, it’s typified by the Hangover series: a group of buddies gets drunk and/or stoned and goes on a wild spree. Anything can happen, but mostly what you get is slapstick and gross-out humour.

Right off the top, this movie warns you that you’re not in for any high class entertainment. We’re shown a book that has the classic look of a beloved fairy tale and an off-screen announcer is intoning: "Twas the night before Christmas in two thousand and one/And this is when Ethan became an orphan." (pronounced "orphun") The message is clear: since we can’t even manage a good rhyme, don’t expect any high art from us.

The premise, as indicated in that opening doggerel, is that Ethan (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) lost his parents in a car crash at holiday time in 2001. His pals, Isaac (Seth Rogen) and Chris (Anthony Mackie), stepped in to cheer him up. That went so well that the three guys have gotten together on every Christmas Eve since. But Isaac is married now and his wife’s about to give birth to their first baby. Chris has become a famous football star with lots of demands on his time. This being their last Christmas Eve together, the guys are determined to make it memorable.

The prospect of that becomes all the more probable when Ethan manages to steal invitations to a legendary extravaganza: the Nutcracker Ball. It’s so special that you can’t know its location until you phone a secret number and then follow instructions as on a treasure hunt. When you get there, you’re gonna find that everybody who’s anybody is enjoying the mind-blowing party of all time.

Our guys, as you might expect, encounter more than a few roadblocks en route to the party. The result is that their chaotic night amounts to a movie that’s a potpourri of good and not-so-good bits.

Early on, there’s the scene where the dejected Ethan is working for a caterer at a posh party and his boss is complaining that Ethan’s not doing a good enough job of portraying a Christmas elf. So we get an amusing spot of face-acting from Mr. Gordon-Levitt as he tries various kooky expressions to catch the elf look. Thanks to a little box of recreational drugs that Isaac’s wife has provided for his night out, he finds himself having a soulful discussion with one of the three statues of the Magi in a life-sized nativity scene outside a Catholic church. And that, of course, leads to Isaac’s being dragged into midnight mass. Which leads to him, in his holiday sweater emblazoned with a huge Star of David, proclaiming to the congregation that the Jews didn’t kill Jesus. Which leads to Isaac riffling through the hymnal racks to try to find a barf bag.

Freaking out in a washroom, Isaac makes a video on his smart phone, expressing thoughts that no man would dare to express with a clear and sober mind: all about how this business of having a baby is a serious mistake, his child is going to turn out to be a monster that goes around killing people. It’s almost too much to sit through but it does have a good payoff later in the movie. When the guys finally arrive at the big party, they find celebs like Miley Cyrus and James Franco on hand, playing themselves. In the carry-on between Mr. Franco and Mr. Rogen, there’s the obligatory gay teasing, along with plenty of dick jokes, just so that the movie can show how hip it is.

The dialogue is sprinkled with some great lines:

  • A guy is fumblingly trying to propose to a woman: "Let’s pretend I’m saying it right."
  • When the three buddies are sneaking into the apartment of the football hero’s mother, they encounter a shrine crowded with his trophies. Isaac: "Did you die and not tell her?"
  • The football hero to a sexy fan who wonders why he wants to spend Christmas Eve with her rather than with family: "Oh, baby, family comes and goes but fans are forever!"
  • When Ethan gets into a knock-down-drag-out fight with two renegade Santa Clauses whom he accuses of disrespecting Christmas, one of the Santas gasps, in the midst of the fray: "I have a feeling this is about something else."

[None of these is an exact quote, as I didn’t have a recorder on hand.]

Another nice thing about the movie – although this may have become standard in these broad comedies – is that many of the "stock" characters turn out to be quite other than what you’re expecting. Isaac’s wife, Betsy (Jillian Bell), has a lot more smarts than her soft, pampered look would suggest. The footballer’s mom combines a sweet religiosity with foul-mouthed cunning. Diana (Lizzy Caplan), Ethan’s ex, comes across as intelligent and mature, instead of the typical bimbo who might have served the purpose.

The character with the most intriguing combination of conflicting traits is Mr. Green (Michael Shannon), the guys’ former English teacher. Looking like a seedy street person now, he sells the guys drugs while telling them how proud he is of them. Mr. Green, admitting that his "quiet intensity" tends to scare people, can, in a poetic vein, cite The Great Gatsby as one of his major influences. When the guys use the footballer’s nickname, "Messiah," Mr. Green protests: "For me, there’s only one Messiah, and that’s Our Lord Jesus Christ."

In spite of these and many other likeable aspects of the movie, it doesn’t, for me, work as a whole. Partly, that’s because the forward thrust of the plot – the push to the big party – doesn’t have the relentless momentum that a comedy like this needs. There are lulls, such as a dinner that the footballer’s mom lays on spontaneously. At another point, the guys are in a subway car arguing about what they’ve done with their lives in terms of things like responsibilities and values. It’s interesting material but it drags things down. (Could that explain the lack of teens in the audience?)

Maybe this movie shows what tends to happen when you have so many scriptwriters: plenty of ideas but some of them not fitting very well with others. There’s the question of the football hero. What’s with this guy? His attempt to come off like a celeb clashes with the believable, ordinary lives of the other two guys. That tends to throw the movie off-key. And there’s the point where he furiously refuses to wear his Christmas sweater. What’s that about? Another question concerns Ethan’s break-up with his ex. Supposedly it was because he refused to meet her parents. Huh? We know he has lost his own parents but that doesn’t explain his aversion to hers.

But the biggest problem with the movie – at least for me – is that, while it keeps taking deft jabs at the whole Christmas thing, it needs you to buy into the sentimentality after all. It’s as if you’re supposed to know that, in spite of the satire and the irreverence, the warm, fuzzy ending’s coming. How could a Hollywood movie hope to succeed if it trashed Christmas for real? At risk of coming off like just another grinch, I’d have to say that the movie’s buying into the cheesy aspects of the popular festival sent me away from the theatre feeling slightly used and abused.

 

This Is That (CBC Radio One) by Pat Kelly and Peter Oldring

Now that the new federal government is making noises about restoring the CBC’s funding, chances are that we lovers of CBC Radio are compiling our wish lists for what we’d like to see happen.

Some possibilities:

  • The elimination of those abominable ads on Radio Two?
  • The return of the third hour on Michael Enright’s "The Sunday Edition"?
  • Fewer repeat programs, more new ones?
  • More researchers, so that programs like "The Current" and "As It Happens" won’t be forced to fall back on fluffy fillers?

While visions of such sugar-plums are dancing in our heads, let’s not lose sight of some bonbons that are already being offered on CBC Radio One.

I don’t often get to hear This Is That, because it’s broadcast time (Thursday and Saturday at 11:30 a.m.) doesn’t fit well with my work schedule, but when I do catch the program, I’m invariably impressed by the ingenuity of the writing and the high calibre of the acting. Many other comedy shows on CBC Radio have tended to sound a bit sophomoric: you hand microphones to a bunch of crazy people and see what they can do. Sometimes the point of the so-called humour seems to be nothing more than to cause amazement at the way that people can clown around. But the material on This Is That has definite bite; it makes good points more often than not.

The best way to describe the tone of the show would be droll satire. Diverse aspects of our society are lampooned in a straight-faced way. But the underlying agenda – what makes the show especially worthwhile – is the implied critique of the way the media focuses on all these issues and, moreover, the way we’re all addicted to the media coverage of them.

In terms of performance, one of the key elements in the show’s success is that the people enacting the sketches – interviews, usually – sound so believable. I remember one item from some years ago, when a guy impersonating a representative the Canadian Security Intelligence Service was justifying the agency’s high budget. You had to have classy motorcycles and expensive leather jackets to be accepted by the criminal gangs you were trying to infiltrate, he said. That premise may not be amazingly funny, but what made the sketch so delicious was that the actor sounded like such a typical Canadian hunk: gung-ho, friendly and reasonable in spite of the nonsense he was spouting.

That authenticity of voice carries almost every item. I’m thinking of the recent one when a lady from Victoria was promoting a plan to banish nighttime fireworks, on the grounds that they cause too much disturbance. She sounded exactly like your neighbour airing her latest grievance, whether it be about dog droppings, or school buses, or pedestrian crossings. Same with the phone-in section, where "listeners" respond to previous show items. The feedback about the plan to introduce kissing lessons in Saskatchewan schools brought "calls" from a variety of very familiar Canadian cranks.

The show’s creators – Peter Oldring and Pat Kelly – handle all this material, whether as hosts or interviewers, in a restrained, courteous manner. Unlike a lot of would-be radio comedians, they don’t make the mistake of sounding like they’re trying to be funny. Instead, their measured tone suggests that they’re not quite sure whether they can believe what they’re hearing, but they’re too polite, i.e. too Canadian, to let their incredulity show.

If this is what constitutes the new wave of Canadian comedy and if restored funding for the CBC can give us more of it, bring it on!

You can respond to: patrick@dilettantesdiary.com