Video review: "Welcome to Marwen"

Every now and then, audiences and critics just plain get one wrong.

“Welcome to Marwen” was a complete box office bomb, grossing $10 million against a $39 budget. It currently has an abysmal 33 percent score on the Tomatometer -- about half that of the ludicrous Liam-Neeson-as-a-vengeful-snowplow-driver thriller, “Cold Pursuit.”

It came out for the Christmas rush and was promptly swallowed by “Aquaman,” “Mary Poppins Returns” and other blockbuster releases. Despite some big names being involved, including star Steve Carell and director/co-writer Robert Zemeckis, “Marwen” has essentially been memory-holed.

I urge you to go check it out on Blu-ray/DVD or streaming. It’s a wonderfully offbeat film -- funny and sad, grounded and giddy. It might be too weird for some people’s tastes, but for those who like unconventional storytelling it’s a true treat.

Carell plays Mark Hogancamp, an artist who was brutally beaten by a gang of men at bar because they thought he was gay. He isn’t, but Mark does like to wear ladies’ shoes, which apparently was enough reason. His injuries left him unable to draw, as well as wiping clean most of his memories prior to the attack.

His hobby-slash-obsession involves the creation of a model-scale fictional town in Belgium during the days of World War II. Mark populates the village with doll-side versions of himself and his female friends. Collectively they are freedom fighters taking on the evil Nazis.

These sequences are rendered in CGI with a cartoony, surreal quality that nonetheless packs a lot of emotional punch. Mark photographs the vignettes, which usually involve his character being tortured, as a sort of oddball personal therapy.

Now a major exhibition of Mark’s work is about to go on display, and he’s expected to testify in court for the sentencing of his attackers. He’s terribly anxious about both, as well as the arrival of an enticing new neighbor (Leslie Mann) across the street.

Yes, “Welcome to Marwen” may seem like a real head-scratcher at first. But it’s filled with so many wonderful things, especially Carell’s sensitive performance as a strange man with off-kilter impulses but a true heart.

Take a chance, and you might just find yourself bedazzled by this quirky jewel.

Bonus features are adqueate. They include deleted scenes and the following documentary shorts: “Marwen's Citizens,”  “A Visionary Director,” “Building Marwen” and  “Living Dolls.”

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Review: "Welcome to Marwen"

“Welcome to Marwen” is a strange and wonderful cinematic experience. It just may not be for you. Its combination of whimsy, tragedy and disturbing behavior isn’t going to be everyone’s bag.

I’m reminded of “Lars and the Real Girl,” which people seemed to take either as a quirky gem or utterly bewildering. If you’re in the former camp, my guess is you’ll take to “Marwen” as well.

Let’s just lay it out there: this is the tale of a damaged man who has built an elaborate replica of a fictional World War II Belgium village in his background, which he has populated with custom dolls that he arranges into various scenes and then photographs. Also, he likes wearing women’s stiletto heels.

If that description is off-putting to you, maybe toddle along your way now, without judgment. For the rest, we can get down to appreciating a film that’s decidedly off the beaten path.

It’s based on the true story of Mark Hogancamp (Steve Carell), an artist from upstate New York. He used to be an illustrator for comic books and stuff, but he was beaten to a pulp by five thugs after an encounter in a bar because they thought he was gay. Mark isn’t -- in fact he has a (possibly more than) healthy appreciation for the female form -- but he also has a thing for women’s high heels, and drunkenly let that slip.

As the story opens Mark is physically recovered from his injuries, but the mental and spiritual scars are still wide open. Nearly all of his memories prior to the attack have been wiped clean, and he can no longer draw or barely even write.

The dolls are clearly a cathartic exercise for him. Captain Hoagie, the heroic Army Air Service pilot who was shot down near Marwen, looks just like him. In his little vignettes, Hoagie is often captured and assaulted by Nazis, in a clear recreation of his own trauma. He even has a scar over one eye, as Mark does. But the Women of Marwen, an assortment of lovely resistance fighters, always arrive to save the day.

All of the Women are based on real people in his life. Caralala (Eiza Gonzalez) is a Latina based on a co-worker at the bar (which is also where he was assaulted). Anna (Gwendoline Christie) is the Russian caregiver who brings medicine and stern lectures. Roberta (Merritt Wever) runs the local hobby shop where he buys much of his materials. Suzette (Leslie Zemeckis) is an actress and showboat.

Oh, and there’s also an ancient resident witch named Deja Thoris (Diane Kruger) who flies and has magical powers. In Mark’s world, all the girls are attracted to Hoagie, but Deja has jealously laid claim to his affections, which he chastely refuses.

The doll sequences are marvelous, with Carell and company rendered into plastic-y shapes through CGI. We feel transported into another world, which has heft and authenticity despite the cartoonish quality.

A trio of events loom to turn Mark’s world upside down. A show of his artwork his about to open. The men who nearly killed him are due to be sentenced, and the lawyers want him there to confront them, which petrifies him. And a beautiful and kind woman, Nicol (Leslie Mann), moves in across the street and offers friendship. She is soon added to the Women.

This is perhaps Carell’s most sensitive performance to date. It’s odd to think that just a handful of years ago we regarded him as a goofy TV comedian. He plays Mark as a man who is wandering and lost, but knows he needs to keep moving forward. He will take many wrong turns, and we feel his pain as our own.

Director Robert Zemeckis, who co-wrote the script with Caroline Thompson, strikes a difficult balance in tone. We feel sympathy for Mark, but we’re sometimes a little scared by him, too. He’s childlike in his affections, and the women are careful to encourage his creativity without enforcing romantic feelings.

“Welcome to Marwen” is a story of trauma and redemption. We all find ways to cope with our pain. Some are healthy, some are not, some involve traditional therapy, and others take forms that we must invent for ourselves. Art, and movies, are a way.

Review: "Inglourious Basterds"

The idea of a kooky, hyper-violent World War II comedy with Quentin Tarantino doing his usual mishmash of eclectic music and circuitous dialogue sounds like a delightful romp -- especially when paired with Brad Pitt as the Appalachian-twanging bandit leader of a group of Jewish-American soldiers sent behind enemy lines to wreak terror on the Nazis.

Except for one problem: The "Inglourious Basterds" are bit players in their own flick.

If you've watched the trailer for the new film written/directed by Tarantino, then you've already seen a good chunk of the entire screen time of Pitt and his crew. There's essentially one scene of them bashing in Nazi skulls, and away they go. They reappear a couple more times, but only as supporting figures in another plot line.

The bulk of the sometimes-thrilling, oft-onerous 2½-hour running time is occupied with four other characters: Shoshanna (Mélanie Laurent), a Jewish girl hiding in the open as a Parisian cinema owner; Col. Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz), nicknamed the Jew Hunter, who kills her family in the film's opening sequence; Bridget von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger), a famous German film star secretly spying for the Brits; and Fredrick Zoller (Daniel Brühl), a German war hero and star of a Joseph Goebbels propaganda film based on his battle exploits.

Landa is by far the most compelling of the foursome. As played by Waltz, the colonel is a slithery and cunning adversary, whose modus operandi is to engage his victim in social banter until he finds a weakness, and then burrow into that crack in their facade like a boll weevil.

Kruger has a pivotal role in the film's best sequence, a meeting between Hammersmark, a British agent and two of the Basterds in a basement pub to set a plot to blow up Shoshanna's theater, where Zoller's film is set to premiere. The scene starts on a frivolous note with churlish parlor games, but suspicion and hostility are ever so patiently ratcheted up. We can practically smell the fuse burning.

This is Tarantino at his best, using his gift with dialogue and mood to stir the waters, subtly at first but with increasing turbulence.

Less engaging is the Shoshanna/Zoller storyline, in which the German soldier becomes smitten with the clearly unreceptive French (he thinks) woman. This culminates in an impromptu lunch date between them and Goebbels that just goes on and on.

Oh yes, the Basterds. Pitt plays Lt. Aldo Raine, his accent dripping with Tennessee molasses, who demands his eight Jewish recruits each gift him with 100 Nazi scalps -- and he's not talking figurative scalps, as Tarantino demonstrates in one unnecessary close-up after another.

Sudden, gruesome violence is a signature ingredient of the Tarantino gumbo, and others also crop up. There's a kinetic scene set to deliberately incongruous music (in this case, David Bowie's "Cat People (Putting Out Fire)"). A Mexican standoff takes place -- in fact, two characters have a debate about whether they are engaged in one. And Diane Kruger gets to be the latest actress to showcase her feet for extended close-ups to serve Tarantino's icky fetish for females' lowest appendages.

The name "Inglourious Basterds" comes from a cheapie 1978 Italian flick starring Fred Williamson and Bo Svenson that was basically a knockoff of "The Dirty Dozen," and bears no resemblance to this film other than the wartime setting.

Like "Death Proof" and the "Kill Bill" duology, Tarantino's newest work is that of a blazing cinematic talent who only seems to be interested in making movies that satisfy his own off-kilter, retrograde fantasies. Perhaps one day he'll invite us in.

2.5 stars