Salt and Fire (May 4th and 5th at the Cleveland Cinematheque)

[SALT AND FIRE screens Thursday May 4th at 6:45 pm and Friday May 5th at 9:35 pm at the Cleveland Cinematheque.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

After a few years spent making only documentaries, filmmaker Werner Herzog recently made a return to narrative film with two features. While technically 2016 releases, both films have had their Cleveland premieres this year. The first, the epic biopic QUEEN OF THE DESSERT, was a sumptuous yet inert period piece that dealt with some of Herzog's usual themes (a driven protagonist who follows their vision despite great resistance), but did so in a safe and, frankly, dull manner. While SALT AND FIRE has some issues of its own, being safe and dull is not among them.

The film begins with a UN delegation being sent to investigate an environmental disaster. The team, led by Dr. Laura Sommerfeld (Veronica Ferres), is kidnapped by what appears to be a terrorist group. As it turns out, though, the abductors are working for the CEO of the corporation responsible for the disaster, Matt Riley (Michael Shannon).

Nocturnal Animals

By George M. Thomas

Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Shannon in Nocturnal Animals.

NOCTURNAL ANIMALS is a deft, intelligent, and twisty rumination on relationships and the expectations that come with them.

Hitchcockian in design, director Tom Ford crafts a suspenseful tale blending several story elements, all of which grab the viewer in a way that makes them wonder from where, exactly, this story will arrive.

Through it all, everyone in the cast provides compelling performances as Ford takes the audience through several worlds; one cold, austere and filled with loneliness, another alive with hope and potential, and a third that’s scarier than hell.

Amy Adams, in her second award worthy performance of the fall, stars as Susan, an art gallery owner with a seemingly successful husband (Armie Hammer) who appears to have it all. The reality is something altogether different.

Complete Unknown (opens in Cleveland September 23rd at the Cedar Lee Theatre)

[COMPLETE UNKNOWN opens in Cleveland on Friday September 23rd exclusively at the Cedar Lee Theatre.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

*NOTE* - This review was previously published under the assumption that the film had opened on September 16th. The release date was pushed back. We at the Cleveland Movie Blog apologize for any confusion.

In COMPLETE UNKNOWN, Rachael Weisz plays Alice, a woman who changes identities and professions as easily as most of us change our socks. When we first meet her, she's working as assistant to a Chinese magician. Evidently tired of this particular life, she does a disappearing act of her own. When she turns up next, she's in America passing herself off as a scientist studying frogs. It is in this guise that she encounters Tom (Michael Shannon). Although Tom, for his part, is certain that the two have met before.

Director Joshua Marston, who co-wrote the film with Julian Sheppard, allows the story to unfold slowly, creating an atmosphere of uncanny mystery and romantic tension as he does so. The film also benefits from its two leads, both of whom deliver enthralling performances that compel the audience to stick with the film, certain there must be something of interest just around the bend, some twist of the plot or some deeper theme. Yeah, not really.

Elvis & Nixon

Review by Pamela Zoslov

The infamous presidency of Richard Nixon continues to reverberate in American culture. Recently a quote surfaced from now-dead Nixon henchman John Ehrlichman, who admitted to a journalist in 1994 that the “War on Drugs” was aimed at neutralizing black people and the antiwar left.

The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar Left, and black people....We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black. But by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”

Midnight Special

Review by Joseph Anthony

Recent press about MIDNIGHT SPECIAL has drawn comparisons to Steven Spielberg’s earlier sci-fi work. While those comparisons are valid, MIDNIGHT SPECIAL is unmistakably a Jeff Nichols’ film. SPECIAL has the grandeur and emotional tidings of a Spielberg flick, but like his three previous efforts (SHOTGUN STORIES, TAKE SHELTER, MUD), Nichols brings a southern charm that adds calm and charisma to his work.

2013’s MUD was one of my favorites of that year. In my review for that film, I described it as being “funny, tense, romantic, dramatic and even has some action. And while it’s packed with things we love in film, it still moves at a leisurely pace, telling us the story it wants to tell.” With the exception of romance, this description is just as appropriate for MIDNIGHT SPECIAL.

Man of Steel

Review by Pete Roche

Lots of teens and twenty-somethings quit the proverbial nest to attend college or travel a bit.  It’s a rite of passage in these parts. 

Earth, that is.  You see, leaving home to “find oneself” takes on entirely new meaning when you’re actually the sole survivor of a dead, distant world.

Such is the premise of MAN OF STEEL, the sixth major motion picture adaptation of DC Comic’s premiere protagonist—and the best Superman movie in thirty years.

Working from a story by David S. Goyer (with an assist from THE DARK KNIGHT's Christopher Nolan) director Zack Snyder (WATCHMEN, 300) re-imagines Superman for a new generation—a demographic reared on hyperkinetic action fare starring transforming robots, sugary CGI animals, and ironclad, web-headed crusaders from DC's rival publisher. 

Take Shelter (now available on home video)

[TAKE SHELTER is now available on home video.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

I first became aware of the excellent actor Michael Shannon in BUG, that was doomed by a misleading market campaign that made it appear to be a straight forward horror film instead of the psychological drama with horror elements that it was. TAKE SHELTER could almost be a companion piece to that film. It's quieter and more grounded in reality, but once again Shannon plays a man whose sanity is in question, and while by no means a horror film it does use some techniques of the genre.

Curtis (Shannon) is a hard-working regular guy who is either beginning to experience the onset of schizophrenia, an affliction that runs in his family, or having psychic flashes of a grim future where friends, neighbors and trusted pets attack like they're in a zombie movie and a storm rains brown water. Curtis recognizes that he may have an illness, but he has a hard time reaching out for help. Eventually he does see a psychiatrist, but to hedge his bets he begins taking precautions to protect his family – wife Samatha (Jessica Chastain) and hearing-impaired daughter Hannah (Tova Stewart). While caging up the lovable family dog and enlarging his backyard storm shelter seem reasonable actions to Curits, to everyone else he seems a little bit crazy. But what if he's right?