Reeling Backward: "Wings" (1927)

Watching "Wings," the very first winner of the Oscar for Best Picture, and both the strengths and the limitations of its era are obvious.

The downsides are familiar from silent film acting, and early Hollywood in general: a stilted, theatrical acting style; maudlin portrayals of romantic and familial relationships; plots that often turn on happenstance and (mis)overheard conversations; action scenes constrained by the primitive special effects of the time.

But it's still a terrific picture, with some stuff I didn't expect. The gritty, uncompromising portrayal of World War I is shocking for its bloody mayhem and overt depiction of suffering and death. One of the main characters gets shot out of the sky, blood bursting from his mouth like a fountain. There's some daring sexual depictions, including a pair of lesbians, some naked male behinds at the military recruiting office and a brief topless shot of  Clara Bow.

And the aerial dogfighting scenes, though they contain a number of fake-looking collisions and other weaknesses, are still pretty cutting-edge for their time. Most notable was director William A. Wellman's use of rear-facing cameras mounted on actual airplanes, so he could film his stars as they experienced the real gyrations and wind-swept thrills of open-cockpit aviation.

Bow received top billing in the film, even though her part is a supporting one and she disappears for long stretches of the movie. The "It Girl" had a distinctive look that seems almost quaint nowadays -- kewpie-doll face, boyishly short haircut, huge expressive eyes and petite figure. She plays the (literal) girl next door, Mary Preston, who's been in love with Jack Powell (Charles "Buddy" Rogers) since they were kids.

Alas, Jack only seems to have motors on his brain, tinkering around with his hotrod, the Shooting Star. Soon war arrives and he signs up to be a pilot. After a misunderstanding, he goes to Europe mistakenly thinking that Sylvia (Jobyna Ralston), the sophisticated city girl, has given her heart to him.

In reality, she adores David Armstrong (Richard Arlen), the upstanding scion of the town's wealthiest family. Jack goes to war bearing Sylvia's locket with her picture inside, unaware the inscription on the back is made out to David. Meanwhile, Mary signs up as a volunteer to drive trucks for the Allies, hoping to be near Jack.

After an initial period of hostility, Jack and David become fast friends -- and ace pilots. I found it curious that there's very little footage of planes in the air during the film's first half, and then all of a sudden the aerial combat scenes wash over you like a tidal wave.

I've long been a fan of World War I aviation, a period in which new technological breakthroughs seemed to change the tide of the war in the air every couple of months. The film shows real hazards of those claptrap machines, like the machine gun jamming (a frequent occurrence). Though no one ever seems to run out of bullets.

"Wings" also depicts how dogfighting was hardly the epicenter of aerial combat. Attacks on ground targets are frequent, plus one thrilling sequence where Jack and David raid some zeppelins that were used effectively to spot out enemy troop moments.

The love story is less thrilling. Mary does indeed unite with Jack, but he's so plastered while on leave that he fails to recognize her. (Instead, implausibly, becoming obsessed with "lil' bubbles" that he imagines jumping from his champagne glass into virtually every object he sees.) Mary is sent packing back to the States when MPs discover her changing clothes in Jack's room with him passed out on the bed, thinking they've witnessed an unsavory dalliance.

The last extended sequence is emotionally gripping, though doesn't make a whole lot of logical sense. David is shot down during a mission, crashing in German territory. Gravely wounded, he makes his way to a German airfield and steals a plane. Meanwhile Jack, believing his friend dead, goes on a mad killing spree. Seeing David's plane approaching, he peppers it with fire -- somehow missing David's frantic signals. After David crashes into a house, Jack lands nearby to collect a trophy and discovers he's killed his best friend.

The moment is genuinely touching ... though the final sequence after Jack returns home is somewhat maudlin and unlikely. Jack -- having managed to obtain gray hair in between his mustering out and traveling to his hometown -- begs forgiveness from David's parents, giving the mother the tiny stuffed bear David carried with him as a good luck charm. (Of course, he left it behind during his ill-fated final mission.) Having received absolution, Jack meets up with Mary and realizes he's loved her all along.

Gary Cooper shows up for about two minutes as Cadet White, in one of his first major screen roles. It's an electric moment, and I found his more naturalistic acting style in sharp contrast to the stiff antics of Rogers and Arlen.

I very much enjoyed "Wings," even as I realized it was a product of its time. Perhaps the time is now right for a remake?

It was thought for many years that "Wings" had been lost to the ages, but a negative was found and restored. The film is being released on DVD and Blu-ray for the first time tomorrow, Jan. 24. It's a first-class restoration -- they even used different film stocks for the day and night scenes, with sepia for the former and a bluish tint for nighttime.

In addition to the musical score, the soundtrack also includes a number of sound effects -- plane engines, machine guns firing, cannon explosions and so forth. These were actually played during the film's initial release using then-new technology.

The filmmakers also hand-tinted frames to show planes plummeting to earth in flames. The effect is rather primitive, but lends a great deal of authenticity to the air combat.

3 stars out of four

Review: "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close"

"Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" is not the story of a conventional Everyman as a child -- Oskar Schell is no Everyboy.

No, Oskar is an extraordinary lad -- a smart, painfully shy boy. His only really deep human connection is with his father (Tom Hanks), who recognizes the specialness of his child not as a disadvantage to be regretted but an opportunity to draw him closer and nudge Oskar toward a rich life shared with others. Thomas Schell was a failed biochemist who became a jeweler, but whose real occupation was a Biblical sort of shepherd, tending to a flock of one.

But the elder Schell dies in the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center, and Oskar is left utterly alone. True, his mother (Sandra Bullock) is technically present, but Oskar correctly labels her an absentee parent. That's the sort of kid Oskar is: he knows what an absentee parent is, and he's hurting so badly inside he lashes out at his mother by telling her to her face that she's a failed mom.

"Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" is based on the novel by Jonathan Safran Foer, adapted for the screen by Eric Roth ("Forrest Gump") and directed by Stephen Daldry, who has made four feature films, all of which I've loved ("The Hours," "The Reader" and "Billy Elliot" are the previous three.)

It is not a movie that consciously tries to be "the" film about 9/11 -- what Oskar refers to simply as "The Worst Day." But in its stark exploration of wrenching loss and the capricious way human lives collide with each other, it best captures the emotional vacuum felt by an entire nation more than 11 years ago, and to a lessening degree since.

Oskar's father often assigned adventurous tasks, or "expeditions" to him. Ostensibly scientific undertakings, they were really exercises designed to force Oskar to interact with new people and explore the real world around him. Precocious and earnest, Oskar recognizes the true meaning of these assignments, but still tackles them with enthusiasm because he so adores his father.

Shortly before his death, Oskar's dad set before him the grandest expedition of all: discovering the mythical 6th borough of Manhattan. This mission takes on new meaning when the boy discovers a key hidden inside a vase in his father's untouched closet. Unmarked, with only the cryptic word "Black" printed on a piece of paper, Oskar concludes this clue must unlock the puzzle of Thomas Schell's death.

With great deliberateness, Oskar sets out to the far reaches of New York City, attempting to interview every person named Black to see if they know about the mystery of the key. Since Oskar suffers panic attacks at the mere prospect of mass transit, he will walk everywhere he needs to go on his free Saturdays. He calculates it will take him three years, which in his unadorned narration Oskar recognizes is his way of extending the time he gets to spend with his father, or at least his fading memory.

With such a non-traditional protagonist, I was not surprised to learn that Thomas Horn, the amazing young actor who portrays him, came to this film project in an atypical way. This is his first acting credit of any sort; he was discovered after winning a tournament of "Teen Jeopardy" at the age of 12. Like Hailee Steinfeld in "True Grit" or Haley Joel Osment in "The Sixth Sense," this is the sort of performance that feels almost ethereal is its ability to tap such emotional depths and complex inner thoughts in one so young.

Other able performers turn up in supporting roles. Viola Davis plays the first woman Oskar encounters in his travels, one who has suffered her own recent loss. Jeffrey Wright plays a businessman mourning the death of his own father. John Goodman is the security guard at Oskar's building who trades good-natured insults with him. Max von Sydow turns up as the mysterious, silent man living as a renter in his grandmother's apartment right across the way, who takes an unexpected role in the boy's quest.

Bullock's role as the distraught mother struggling to come to grips with her son's odd acting out would seem to be a thankless one, but later on she shines a new light on their relationship that shocks even  young Oskar.

"Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" hasn't been in the conversation of the best films of the year, but it deserves to be. It's a viscerally enthralling story about a singular boy trying to find his place in the world when his only anchor is ripped away. What a journey -- Oskar's, and ours.

3.5 stars out of four

The proper proportions of optimism, realism, cynicism and negativism

The Recipe for Success must include the proper proportions of optimism, realism, cynicism and negativism.

You need lots of optimism to dream up all the possibilities of things you can accomplish.

A goodly amount of realism is necessary to help you figure out which of those are the best ones to pursue.

Even a dollop of cynicism is a good thing, because it helps you learn from your mistakes and make better choices.

But even a pinch of negativism puts everything at risk, threatening to instill a bitter taste in all your endeavors. Best to leave it in the cupboard.

Video Review: "The Ides of March"

"The Ides of March" is an ambitious, well-executed political drama that loses points because if its utter lack of freshness. From the inspiring presidential candidate with secret dark spots, to the ambitious campaign insiders and journalists ready to cut throats to get ahead, to the naive young thing who gets caught up in the crossfire, there's virtually nothing in this movie that we haven't seen before.

George Clooney directed, co-wrote and has a supporting role in "Ides" as Mike Morris, a liberal governor who's the frontrunner for the race to the White House. Ryan Gosling stars as Stephen Myers, Morris' number-two man behind grizzled political veteran Paul Zara (Philip Seymour Hoffman).

Paul Giamatti plays the campaign manager for Morris' main opponent, who's got an ace up his sleeve as they head into the Ohio primary. Rounding out the cast are Marisa Tomei as a sly New York Times reporter and Evan Rachel Wood as a 20-year-old campaign volunteer who catches Stephen's eye.

That's a killer cast, and Clooney knows exactly how to exploit it, resulting in many winning scenes of dueling repartee and clashing egos. It's during these times that the movie reminds one of other, better political flicks like "The Candidate" or "Primary Colors."

But the screenplay by Clooney, his longtime collaborator Grant Heslov and Beau Willimon, based on a play by Willimon, continually goes down paths far too well-traveled. The audience knows almost everything that's going to happen long before it transpires.

Inevitability is a quality that may work when it comes to winning elections, but it turns otherwise promising films into cinematic also-rans.

Extra features aren't a landslide, but certainly make a solid showing that should please the electorate of video lovers.

The DVD version comes with a commentary track by Clooney and Heslov, plus two featurettes: "Believe: George Clooney" and "On the Campaign: The Cast of Ides of March."

Upgrade to Blu-ray, and you get two more featurettes: "Developing the Campaign: The Origin of Ides of March" and "What Does a Political Consultant Do?".

Movie: 2.5 stars out of four
Extras: 3 stars

Reeling Backward: "Air Force" (1943)

Written and shot in the heady days after Pearl Harbor, "Air Force" is a cheery bit of war propaganda that struck a chord with audiences when it was released in early 1943, less than 14 months after the surprise Japanese attack. The fictional tale of the intrepid crew of the B-17 "Mary-Ann" in the days before and after Dec. 7, 1941, it was a box office hit, earned a slew of Oscar nominations (including Best Screenplay) and became a rallying call for the war effort.

Seen today, though, it's a borderline cringe-worthy drama in which American soldiers seem extraordinarily giddy about the prospect of near-certain death, coupled with some terrible special effects miniatures that scarcely look better than cousin Johnny's toy planes and ships blown up with firecrackers.

Throw in some nasty anti-Japanese sentiment, virulent even by the standards of the time, and you've got a war film that has aged exceedingly poorly.

Perhaps most disturbing are several references put in during the Pearl Harbor attack scenes of "local Japanese" or "native Japanese" -- aka Japanese-Americans -- engaging in preplanned sabotage or attacks coordinated with the surprise air strike. Subsequent investigations proved that such claims were completely unfounded.

Though screenwriter Dudley Nichols, who received uncredited assists from Leah Baird, William Faulkner and Arthur T. Horman, cannot be entirely faulted for these harmful scenes -- which doubtless contributed to the xenophobic paranoia that helped justify the mass internment of Japanese-Americans. They were working on the movie in the weeks and months after Pearl Harbor, with the script being altered on the fly to reflect the shifting realities of war.

As a result, a number of historical inaccuracies crept into the story -- such as the B-17 crew flying to Manila, when in fact U.S. troops in the Philippines retreated to Australia shortly after the outbreak of hostilities.

"Air Force" is named after the flying division of the U.S. Army, which didn't get split off into a separate military branch until after the war. Curiously, the studio chose to showcase the Mary-Ann as the real star of the picture, despite a large and able cast of B-list stars and character actors.

John Ridgely plays the skipper, Capt. Michael "Irish" Quincannon, who's the perfect mix of inspiration command. Gig Young (an Oscar winner for "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?") is the trusty co-pilot. Arthur Kennedy, who I'll always remember as the crusty journalist from "Lawrence of Arabia," is the bombadier. Charles Drake turns up as the navigator with daddy issues, George Tobias is the obligatory New Yawkah crewman, and Harry Carey has a nice turn as the elder crew chief.

Rounding things out are James Brown as "Tex" Rader, a fighter pilot who enjoys a good-natured rivalry with the B-17 crew, and John Garfield as Winocki, the cynical gunner.

It's the familiar mix of characters you see in wartime movies, complete with the green young kid, etc. Winocki is the most interesting, since he was a pilot trainee who got washed out of flight school by Quincannon a couple of years earlier, and has a huge chip on his shoulder. His stint in the Army is set to expire three weeks after Pearl Harbor, but it doesn't take too many guesses to know he undergoes a change.

It's that insipid, familiar everybody's-a-swell-guy syndrome, except for the one not-so-swell guy, who later migrates in a swelltherly direction.

My biggest problem with the depiction of the Americans forces is that everyone's just so damn happy all the time! I quickly grew tired of all the aw-shucks smiles and playful bantering, and men cracking jokes even as they know they're about to be overrun by the Japanese. One commanding officer of a tiny island, already grievously wounded, is offered a flight out on the Mary-Ann and refuses with, of course, a joke and a smile.

The combat scenes range from a few decent aerial sections to absolutely horrible. The miniatures of battleships and carriers at sea are entirely unconvincing, as are the numerous shots of planes taking off and landing. There's just no weight to the images -- we can sense the lack of immense inertia from these great steel beasts.

The stuff up in the air is better, with some actual dogfight footage spliced in with decent special-effects shots of enemy planes seen through the gunners' doors. We get a real sense of how a B-17 crew works together -- the gunner on one side shouting out when a target is about to pass over to the other -- and I can't help but think this movie influenced George Lucas when he was shooting the first "Star Wars" film.

War is terrible, but as seen in "Air Force" it's one great big smarmy smilefest, with toy airplanes.

2 stars out of four

Review: "Contraband"

Here's a tidy little heist/thriller starring Mark Wahlberg doing what he does best: Playing the lone wolf vying against the various forces arrayed against him. Lately Wahlberg's roles have gravitated more toward characters motivated to protect his family, rather than just watching his own back.

But once things get going, it's all about Wahlberg out-muscling and out-thinking his enemies. He specializes in playing the underdog who always seems to gain the upper hand.

"Contraband" is based, very loosely, on an Icelandic film about a smuggler, and is directed by Baltasar Kormákur, who was the star and one of the producers of the earlier movie. I admit I've never heard of the star of a foreign movie directing an American actor in the Hollywood remake. (Imagine Noomi Rapace tapped to helm the American version of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.")

"Contraband" has misplaced aspirations toward something a little deeper, with a fine cast that includes Ben Foster, Giovanni Ribisi, Diego Luna and J.K. Simmons.

It's a rather large and motley crew of characters, good guys and bad guys and bad guys pretending to be good guys. Walberg is Chris Faraday, the lone good guy who plays at being a bad guy.

The former king of smugglers who went straight, Chris is lured/forced into the quintessential One Last Job when his young brother-in-law (Caleb Landry Jones) screws up a shipment, tossing a batch of drugs overboard when his ship is interdicted. The local drug kingpin, Tim Briggs, is played by Ribisi, who has a flair for skeevy malevolence. Briggs makes it clear that unless Chris covers the loss, Faraday's family will be targeted.

Kate Beckinsale has the thankless role as the wife, Kate, whose job is to look pretty and vulnerable, try to talk Chris out of going back to crime, and never do anything logical. After Briggs invades her home, threatens her sons with a gun and drives a truck through her hair salon, you'd think Kate would've learned 9-1-1 on her keypad.

Instead, she turns to Chris' best friend Sebastian for help. A former partner in crime, Sebastian sets up Chris' job but doesn't accompany him on the trip to Panama. He's played by Ben Foster, who also does skeevy pretty well.

Just to show what a good bad guy Chris is, he refuses to smuggle drugs in order to pay back Briggs, opting instead to bring in counterfeit dollar bills. This presents a logistical nightmare, since the amount of funny money needed will practically fill its own storage container. But Chris is the master of subterfuge, nicknamed Houdini for his ability to slip past other criminals and the law.

On most any level of serious consideration, "Contraband" isn't a particularly good movie. Its plot twists telegraph themselves pretty clearly, and every performer other than Wahlberg is only afforded a few scenes to piece together any depth to their characters.

But darn it, I just couldn't help having fun. The action goes all over the place, so that at one point Chris gets recruited into a Panamanian armored car robbery -- the heist within the heist. (Actually, there's yet another layer of theft, which I'll leave the audience to discover.)

J.K. Simmons is a hoot as the truculent ship's captain, who's not so much offended that a known smuggler like Chris is running an operation on his boat as the fact that he wasn't cut in on the scam.

"Contraband" may not be anybody's idea of great filmmaking, but with its scene-stealing cast, a few clever potboiler scenes and another sturdy performance from Wahlberg, it left me pleasantly snookered.

3 stars out off our

Review: "The Iron Lady"

"The Iron Lady" is a fairly standard biopic containing an extraordinary performance. That it is by Meryl Streep is not surprising; I'd say she has made a career resurgence in her 50s and early 60s, except she never really experienced a lull. Streep arguably occupies the place where Morgan Freeman sat 15 years ago: America's greatest living film actor.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science might as well give her a nomination now. This would be her 17th Oscar nod, a number so astounding its impact is dwarfed only by the fact that her last win was in 1983, for "Sophie's Choice."

Based on her riveting, spot-on turn as British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, I'd say her dry spell for taking home golden statues may well come to an end.

I often feel that with movies of this sort, containing a performance that is so dominating and full-bodied, the film around it tends to suffer. Like Jamie Foxx in "Ray" or Philip Seymour Hoffman in "Capote," Streep's gravitational pull is so powerful, story arcs and secondary characters tend to get sucked into the vortex.

Only Jim Broadbent, giving his own golden-caliber turn as Thatcher's long-suffering husband Denis, is given time to add more than perfunctory notes.

Most films about politicians tend to shy away from the politics -- especially when they don't sync up with Hollywood's leftist tilt. Director Phyllida Lloyd and screenwriter Abi Morgan make the bold and I think proper choice to put Thatcher's Conservative party ideals front and center to the story.

The movie isn't a diatribe for right-wing political conclusions, but shows how Thatcher's self-reliant upbringing and tendency to demand the best of those around her colored her way of thinking. In an age awash in self-reflection and where the slacker mentality is idolized, this portrait of the vinegary Thatcher and her stern exhortations has a sort of bracing throw-back freshness.

"It used to be about trying to do something," an elderly Thatcher complains to an admirer. "Now it's about trying to be someone."

The story unspools with old, doddering Thatcher reflecting on her life in flashback. Alexandra Roach plays young Thatcher, a grocer's daughter who ran for Parliament at age 24 (and lost). Over time, though, she gains standing until she believes it's time to run for leader of her party -- not because she thinks she can win, but because she wants to bolster ideals she believes have grown flabby.

In the modern sections, Denis Thatcher has long been dead, but Margaret still talks to him (raising great concern on the part of her handlers). On a conscious level, she knows he's not there, but her soul so aches for his companionship that she refuses to dismiss his apparition.

Ever the chameleon, Streep is made up to resemble Thatcher rather closely, including that famous swoop of helmet hair. She gets the iconic voice just right, a squeaky goose's honk that she employed to scold and argue her point. Once scene, showing her receiving vocal training in preparation for her national campaign, has (deliberate?) similarities to last year's "The King's Speech."

I thoroughly enjoyed "The Iron Lady," or more rather I enjoyed watching Streep embody Margaret Thatcher with a convincing mix of steel and velvet. This is a movie that contains greatness, though it never quite reaches it.

3 stars out of four