Silverman

2023 Oscars Best Picture Review: Maestro

Jon The Blogcentric1 Comment
Maestro is a dead-on portrayal of Leonard Bernstein (played by Bradley Cooper) and his wife Felicia (played by Carey Mulligan)

Would a film about Leonard Bernstein be worth seeing? The film Maestro succeeds in making anyone who likes music worth seeing.

There are a lot of musical geniuses we know of for their music, but few we know of for themselves and the lives they led. Leonard Bernstein is one. Many of us are familiar with the conducting he performed or the music he’s written. What most of us are unaware of is his eccentricities as someone in the arts, his past of marrying a woman despite being gay, and his extramarital affairs. Despite it all, despite Bernstein’s failings as a person outside of his music, he still found Felicia to be his soul mate. That one person in the world who knew him inside out and understood him. There’s no doubt if Bernstein was out now, he’d have no problem pursuing a man openly. It was the times where loving his own was a criminal offense that could lead to his downfall. His liaisons with men had to be as secretive to the world as they had to be secretive to Felicia. The thing is had he lived in a time when it was okay to love your own, he wouldn’t have love Felicia: the one person meant for him. It does leave you thinking what would have happened if Leonard was free?

Even though it does a lot of focus on his marriage to Felicia and his infidelity during the time, it doesn’t forget it’s a musicography. It shows Leonard’s career from its start coming from a lucky break of the guest conductor falling ill to opening doors for him and his music to be heard in symphony halls and on the stages of Broadway musicals and on the silver screen, and even intricate choral pieces. It’s known that geniuses are known for their eccentricities. Leonard’s eccentricity was music singing inside of him and his need to create. If there’s one scene that stands out how much music was a part of Bernstein, it was him conducting his musical Mass. His body movements as he conducts sends that message of how into the music he was. Even as he was no longer the grand composer, he still spent the last years of his life teaching music students. He gave back as much as he created.

Though this is without a doubt a musicography of Leonard Bernstein, this is also about Felicia Montealegre. An actress herself, she was a free spirit of the arts like Leonard. She was understanding of his homosexuality, but was willing to take the risk of loving him and even marrying him. She herself was an actress and she also embraced the free-spirited feelings of the artist. Her love for him as well of her support for his work is as undying as his support for her and her work. She fends of rumors of his liaisons with men by reminding people and insists she holds reign over him as his wife. Even though she does, it’s obvious there will come a testing point in this. Especially as rumors are heard by his daughter Jamie and alcoholism controls his life. Even though the marriage does break down in the late-60’s she still remains with him and it’s as she’s dying of breast cancer that brings them back together. It seems as though despite the hurt, Felicia still believed Leonard was the one for him just like she appeared to be the only one for Leonard. The scenes of her death and as Leonard tries to live his last years without her sends that message.

Excellent work from Bradley Cooper. This is not the first time he acts, co-writes and directs in a film. A Star Is Born was the first. In this, his second effort, he does a great three-dimensional job in recreating Leonard Bernstein with the character he creates and the story he co-wrote with Josh Singer. He takes Bernstein inside out and showcases aspects we hardly knew of a person we’re familiar with. The film is also a great showcase of Cooper over the years. How many of you remember 2009’s The Hangover, Cooper’s breakthrough film, and still carry that image around of him over the years? This film is quite possibly the best film to rid one of that image of Bradley Cooper that’s lived rent free in your head for years and showcase his maturity of an actor over the years. Even seeing how you hardly sense a drop of Cooper in the role and see Bernstein will give you some new-found respect for him.

Also worthy of admiration is Carey Mulligan. Just like you see Leonard instead of Bradley in this film, you will also see Felicia instead of Carey in the film. Her performance of Felicia is something completely different from what you’ve seen Carey perform before. It will even get you thinking at times the film may be more about Felicia than Leonard. She does a great job who loves Leonard and embraces the freeness of the artist, but will have it tested throughout her marriage. Also great is Sarah Silverman as the sister Shirley. Those who only know Silverman through her comedy will be surprised to see she can pull drama off well too. She’s great as the one who knows Leonard inside out and serves one to warn Felicia of him. Also great is the performance of Matt Bomer as David Oppenheim: the man caught in the middle of this love triangle. For technical efforts, Matthew Libatique does a great job in doing the cinematic images and angles. The makeup team does a standout job in creating Cooper’s face to look like Bernstein from the age spots to the nose. The sound department is also great. They know that this film is about Bernstein’s music and they do an excellent job in working the sound right for the film.

Maestro is a three-dimensional biographical film that succeeds in getting one to get even closer and more personal with Leonard Bernstein. It’s also about the love of his life that would never die.

Movie Review: Wreck-It Ralph

Jon The Blogcentric1 Comment

Wreck-It-Ralph

I am bad

And that’s good.

I will never be good

And that’s not bad.

There is no one

I’d rather be

Than me.

I saw Wreck-It Ralph many weeks after its original release. I know it’s late but I finally had the chance to see it. I’ve always wanted to but I waiting too long. Now that I’ve finally seen it, here’s what I think of it.

Wreck-It Ralph is a video game villain in the early 80’s game Fix It Felix Jr. He wrecks the apartment that Felix fixes. Every time Felix completes the fixing, the tenants celebrate by throwing Ralph off the top of the building. It’s been like that for the thirty years Fix It Felix Jr.has been in Litwak’s Family Fun Centre and Arcade. When the arcade closes, all the arcade characters stop what they’re doing and lead normal lives even to travel between game to game. In Fix It Felix Jr., the tenants go to sleep and Ralph sleeps in a pile of bricks. Thirty years of this is very overbearing for Ralph as he tells his story at a ‘Bad-Anon’ meeting for video game bad guys like House Of The Dead’s Cyril, Street Fighter’s Zangief and the ghost of Pac-Man. The Bad Anon group try to reassure Ralph that his villain status is good like theirs but it doesn’t help much especially since Felix and the tenants are celebrating their 30th Anniversary at Litwak’s and leave Ralph completely out of the picture.

So what does Ralph do? He tries to find a video game to make himself a hero. He pursues it in Hero’s Duty, an army game where soldiers shoot cyber bugs in pursuit of a medal of honor. Ralph does a clumsy job but receives the medal. Finally a hero. Only problem is Ralph accidentally hatched a Cybug during that time. This also leaves Fix It Felix’s game malfunctioning and in the danger of being taken out for good. This would leave Felix and the apartment tenants homeless. Any video game taken out of Litwak’s leaves the characters homeless. Just ask Q-Bert.

Ralph continues on amongst video games where he finds himself in a candy-themed kart-racing game called Sugar Rush. Here he meets a bratty girl named Vannelope who likes teasing Ralph and dreams of racing. She even steals his medal in order to race in the game. Problem is she’s not allowed to race according to King Candy, the King of the game. Ralph wants her to race in order to win his medal back. In the meantime, one of the Cybugs is in danger of multiplying inside Sugar Rush and both Fix It Felix and Sargent Calhoun, the female sergeant in Hero’s Duty, are searching for Ralph: Felix to get him back to the game for it to function and Calhoun to stop the Cybug from multiplying and destroying the Sugar Rush game.

Ralph soon learns Vannelope lives in Diet Cola mountain shunned away by the racers. He helps build a car for Vannelope and teaches her how to race for the win. In the meantime troubles mount. Sargent notices the Cybugs have multiplied and could wreck the Sugar Rush scenery. Felix searches for Ralph and falls in love with Calhoun only to remind her of a previous relationship. King Candy offers to give Ralph back his medal to prevent Vannelope from racing as she is a ‘glitch’. He smashes it up right in front of Vannelope. And the tenants of Fix It Felix’s apartment pack their bags anticipating the worst. Looks like Ralph wrecked more than what he bargained for.

Things change when Ralph notices on the Sugar Rush game unit’s side–noticeable because Fix-It Felix’s screen faces Sugar Rush– that Vannelope was intended to be in the game in the first place. Ralph then proceeds to do the right things. He breaks Felix out of the prison King Candy put him in and gets him to fix Vannelope’s car. He then gets Vannelope out of the dungeon and gets her racing. Soon Ralph, Felix and Calhoun have to fight the Cybugs while Vannelope attempts to chase down King Candy while he leads the race. Soon it’s revealed that King Candy is the incarnation of Turbo: a racing character from an early 80’s racing game that went on to sabotage other video games upon his declining popularity. The race and the battle with the bugs lead to a somewhat predictable ending that does manage to both thrill, entertain and will leave the audience happy with the ending.

This is one example of how a fun movie like this can have excellent and creative writing. It was great to see how it was able to create ‘lives’ for these video game characters and even help given them focuses from their point of view. Mind you it had to do such in order to make such a storyline like this work. It also had to take in consideration of the cyber world of not only living in a video game but going from game to game to even being one of the games unplugged for good. The sign on a ‘homeless’ Q-Bert was also a good example of creating ‘lives’ for characters of video games past. Interesting universe of Litwak’s arcade. Makes it fun and entertaining to watch. What’s also great about this is that the story is like a maze of stories and plots coming together and making for a story that’s not too confusing and fun to watch. It all comes together in the end.

This is one of three animated features released by Disney this year. The first was Brave which was done by the Pixar studios. The second was Frankenweenie done by Tim Burton Productions and this was done by Walt Disney Studios. No doubt this has been Disney’s year in this genre. The film is co-written by Pixar writer Jim Reardon and directed by Rich Moore: writer for episodes of Futurama and The Critic. The film features vocal talents of John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman and Ed O’Neil. The film features a music score by Henry Jackman and songs from Skrillex, Owl City and AKB48. Ironically the film’s theme song Wreck-It Wreck-It Ralph! is performed by Buckner & Garcia, the duo responsible for the 1982 novelty hit PacMan Fever.

For me I consider this movie a salute to video games from its early heydays of the 1980s to the present. I’ve often said the 80’s is to video games what the 50’s is to rock and roll. It was a fun romp into the world of video games while having an excellent story to go with it. Another thing too. As you may have noticed, video game movies have had a history of being lousy. Super Mario Brothers, Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat and its sequel: all lousy and forgettable even if a hit. Now we finally have a video game movie that’s as well-written and well-acted as it is entertaining. And to think it’s mostly featuring characters of fictional video games. It took a while but glad one finally came along.

Wreck-It Ralph is one of the best animated movies of the year. A creative take on video games past and present, real and fictional. It gives audiences young and old entertainment enjoyment. Also it’s a reminder that video game villains have feelings too. Never forget that.