Review: "Greed"

Tonally “Greed” is a sticky wicket. It seems very much to be a satirical send-up of the billionaire class from writer/director Michael Winterbottom starring his frequent muse, Steve Coogan, who have made the “Trip” series of movies and TV show together.

Wearing a gloriously saturated spray tan and glaringly white fake teeth, Coogan’s Sir Richard “Greedy” McCreadie is a buffoonish figure with a hint of steel underneath. A wheeler-dealer extraordinaire, McCreadie is the self-proclaimed master of High Street, the center of the British fashion world.

His MO is famous: he swoops in and buys up a clothing brand, strips it of all its key assets to line his own pockets, then washes his hands when the enterprise topples. He uses the nefarious but perfectly legal levers of finance to essentially use a company’s own value to buy itself, passing off one debt to cover another.

The story centers on preparations for McCreadie’s massive 60th birthday party in Monaco. It’s a Mediterranean mecca of wealth where the rich and famous park their yachts and their assets in its tax-free haven.

The shindig promises to be a bacchanalian feast of delights and pomposity. Everyone is to dress in ancient Greek clothing – Sir Richard is a big fan of the film “Gladiator” -- and they’re even building a Parthenon to witness staged fights with a real lion. Alas, the lion seems old and meek and the cut-rate Bulgarians brought in to do the job are mucking it up.

Isla Fisher plays Samantha, McCreadie’s ex-wife. She’s the very picture of unearned privilege. Despite their divorce they remain quite close, in no small part because his business enterprise uses her as the primary stakeholder for those aforementioned tax cheats.

And it’s clear the old fires still burn, despite the fact each has hooked up with a younger, hot companion.
A couple of other framing stores mix in: flashbacks to an interrogation before a British Parliament committee, during which McCreadie flashes his famous contempt for his perceived lessers (which is everybody). And a mild-mannered writer, Nick (David Mitchell), has been hired to write McCreadie’s “official biography, so he hangs around in the background acting as the audience’s eyes and ears.

Dinita Gohil plays Amanda, an Indian-Brit who acts as the tycoon’s majordomo, trying to handle a thousand details for the impending party. Shirley Henderson is McCreadie’s mother, who carefully isntalled the chip on his shoulder long ago. Asa Butterfield plays Finn, the son who openly despises his dad, musing about his affinity for Oedipus.

In one of the more amusing side bits, Sophie Cookson plays the pampered daughter, Lily, who is trying desperately to launch her own “famous for being famous” brand a la the Kardashians. (McCreadie is vexed to learn Kim is richer than he is.) She has a reality TV crew following her around to film staged turmoil with her boyfriend.

That’s the world of the McCreadies: faked and overpriced.

It’s a typically on-point performance for Coogan, but the story tends to go into respective cycles where he’s constantly raining verbal abuse upon his staff (without ever actually firing anyone, strangely) or twisting elbows making deals.

“Say four and shake my hand,” is his go-to move for lowball offers.

Toward the last third “Greed” grows much angrier and sadder, as we’re asked not just to resent McCreadie and giggle at his excesses but condemn him for the way he leaves a wake of ruined prospects behind him. Problem is, we’ve spent 70 minutes or so laughing at him so it’s hard to suddenly take him seriously as a villain.

The movie ends with what must be the longest string of title cards I’ve ever seen, with all sorts of facts and figures about how big-name fashion brands exploit workers in developing countries, paying them a few quid a day to make clothes that sell for a hundred times that.

Mixing rage and laughter is a very tough amalgamation, and not one “Greed” pulls off very well. Despite plenty of nice pieces, this movie is less than the sum of its parts.

Review: "Stan & Ollie"

“Stan & Ollie” is a melancholy look at the relationship between one of film’s great comedic duos: Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. Though their place in the pop culture consciousness is closer to distant reverence than relevance these days, they were as big in Hollywood as you could get in the 1930s and ‘40s.

In their onscreen act, Oliver Hardy was the portly, overbearing one while Stan Laurel was the skinny numbskull. But as the film makes clear, in real life Stan was the stodgy brains of the outfit who wrote all their material, while Oliver was the joyful retiring sort who was happy to let his partner handle the business side of things.

They are played by Steve Coogan as Stan and John C. Reilly as Oliver. Both are completely believable, physically and otherwise, in their parts. Coogan gets by with just a little Brylcreem and altering his voice; Reilly uses a fat suit and impressive facial prosthetics. We quickly look past the exterior finishing and concentrate on the souls behind the legend.

The film, written by Jeff Pope and directed by Jon S. Baird, is set in 1953 after their fame has mostly faded. Oliver is now in his early 60s and in poor health, while Stan has been cut down by his attempts to buck the Hollywood system. An opening scene from 1937 shows them butting heads with studio chief Hal Roach (Danny Huston), demanding more money, which briefly led to them splitting up the act for a time.

It’s all water under the bridge for Ollie, but Stan still has a chip on his shoulder. He’s organized a stage tour of the United Kingdom, which is to build hype for a film they’re planning to shoot playing off the Robin Hood legend. They keep working on different bits for the movie, even though the man in charge of putting the financing together isn’t returning Stan’s calls.

What this lovely film shows is how people can be a perfect fit onstage but not really get along off it. They don’t detest each other or anything like that. They’ve played golf and double-dated with their wives -- whichever ones they had at the moment; both men have married and divorced repeatedly, which has cut into their finances -- without ever really becoming true friends.

Comedy is their shared language and point of reference for, well, everything. Playing seedy theaters before small audiences and staying in third-rate hotels, they make a joke of their circumstances while seething about it. But at the urging of the vaguely slimy producer handling the tour, Bernard Delfont (Rufus Jones), they do some publicity stunts in the different locales.

The crowds start to get bigger, and the boys find themselves actually enjoying working together again. What's more, they find themselves bonding in a way they hadn't before.

Around the midway point “the girls” arrive: Stan’s wife, Ida (Nina Arianda) and Ollie’s wife, Lucille (Shirley Henderson). Both men finally got it right after several tries, and found women they remained married to until they died. Ida is surly and Russian, and keeps prattling about her own dubious showbiz career. Lucille is a little shy and snarky, and worries that Ollie is endangering his health with the tour.

The women soon set to bickering, but the boys are still overjoyed to have them around.

There isn’t a whole lot of story to “Stan & Ollie.” It’s the story of two guys whose stars were inseparable, but whose personalities didn’t quite mesh. And yet, they managed to create something that endures. Sometimes just doing good work is enough.

Video review: "Trainspotting 2"

It’s funny how the long-term cultural relevance of a film has such low correlation with its box office tally. “Trainspotting” earned only $16 million in 1996, but is arguably one of the most influential movies of the past quarter-century. Certainly, director Danny Boyle and star Ewan McGregor have become important figures.

Its sequel, “Trainspotting 2,” made more than double that -- but, I think, is destined to be largely forgotten in popular culture, in much the same way the “Wizard of Oz” sequel was.

(See? Bet you didn’t even know there was one.)

It’s a well-made film: entertaining, smart, sharp performances and plenty of nifty items out of Boyle’s bag of filmmaking tricks. In the end, though, we’re left wondering why this endeavor needed to happen.

We revisit the old gang of addict/criminals 20 years later, now middle-aged guys in various states of evolution, or not. Renton (McGregor), who ripped off his pals after a big drug score, turned to straight work in Amsterdam. Begbie (Robert Carlyle) has been serving hard time in prison ever since, dreaming of getting his hands around Renton’s throat.

Simon “Sick Boy” (Jonny Lee Miller) has taken over his family’s crumbling bar, and runs a little extortion racket on the side. Spud (Ewen Bremner), the gentle, somewhat dimwitted soul of the bunch, is very much the same -- working itinerantly in between getting high and visiting his wife and son.

After a health scare, Renton returns to look up his old friends -- well, not Begbie -- to see if there’s any way he can make amends. Spud is receptive, Sick boy less so. But they’re eventually back to their old ways, doing drugs and dreaming up cons to run. Begbie soon escapes from prison and comes seeking his own sort of reconciliation.

Renton’s old screeds about commercialism overtaking middle-class values are nicely updated for these streaming-and-Tweeting times. Maybe the real lesson of “T2” is the old saw about things staying the same the more they change.

Bonus features form a short list, but it’s pretty meaty stuff. Boyle and screenwriter John Hodge team up for a feature-length commentary track, there’s a making-of featurette with Boyle and his cast, plus deleted scenes.

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Extras:

Review: "Trainspotting 2"

“So we all get old and then we can’t hack it anymore? Is that it?”
                --Mark Renton, “Trainspotting”

“You’re a tourist in your own youth.”
                --Simon aka “Sick Boy,” “Trainspotting 2”

File “Trainspotting 2” under Sequels We Never Thought We’d See. (Not to be confused with Sequels Nobody Wanted; e.g., “xXx: Return of Xander Cage.”)

“Trainspotting” from 1996, which followed a rough group of Scottish heroin addicts/thieves, launched star Ewan McGregor and director Danny Boyle, who have both gone on to major movie careers. Serious, Oscar-winning filmmakers tend to shy away from sequels because they’re seen as a generally unworthy endeavor.

But Boyle has long expressed interest in a sequel, though it took a while to round up the old gang. And it turns out that Irvine Welsh, the author of the book upon which the first movie was based, penned a follow-up novel that revisited the characters about 10 years later.

“Trainspotting 2” takes us even further out to 20 years. Our young anti-heroes -- Mark Renton (McGregor), Simon “Sick Boy” Williamson (Jonny Lee Miller), Danny “Spud” Murphy (Ewen Bremner) and Francis Begbie (Robert Caryle) -- are now middle-aged schlumps struggling to get on with meaningful lives.

The story (screenplay by John Hodge) brings the quartet back together to address old grudges, work out their individual disappointments and dream up some new schemes. It borrows heavily from the first movie, from particular shots to musical cues, including a reversal of the famous ending scene where Renton walks toward the camera with a cynical admonishment to “Choose life,” having just ripped off his mates following a big drug score.

I’ve seen the movie and I’m still not sure how I feel about it. Certainly, I liked it. Almost equally as certain, I don’t think it needed to be made.

Watching it is not unlike the experience of an estranged friend showing up on your doorstep after a long absence, a meeting filled with awkward pauses and mumbled apologies. When they leave a part of you is glad to have seen them again, while the other part wonders if some things are better left unsaid, some mysteries savored for remaining just so.

Renton has been living in Amsterdam working a straight job in accounting. He returns to Edinburgh after a couple of life-changing experiences, and to look up his old chums and see if forgiveness is a possibility. He finds Spud clean (albeit temporarily) but out of work, estranged from his wife and son.

A truly gentle soul, who seems to have gotten even more bird-like with the passing of years and the thinning of his plume-like shock of hair, Spud stands a bit apart from the story and acts as our eyes and ears.

Sick Boy is still addicted, though shifted to a more upscale cocaine habit. He runs his family’s run-down old pub, and has a side business setting up his prostitute girlfriend, Veronica (Anjela Nedyalkova), with well-to-do customers so he can film the antics and then blackmail them.

His reunion with Renton is less amicable than Spud’s, at least initially. Soon they’re back in cahoots, reminiscing about old times, running new scams and seeing who can be the first to betray the other.

Even less amenable is Begbie, the truly terrifying psychopath who seems to enjoy hurting others for its own sake. He’s been languishing in prison this whole time, and has Renton’s name on his lips in an unceasing litany for revenge. We know things are going to end grimy and bloody.

“Trainspotting” was an edgy, groundbreaking film because it provided us a funny, caustic window into the lowest dregs of society, then turned that glass around into a mirror that asked if everyday lives were really that much better. “Trainspotting 2” underlines many of the same themes without adding any meaningful postscript.