Selma

Review by Pamela Zoslov

Debate rages on over SELMA, Anna DuVernay's thoughtful and rather beautiful account of the 1965 Freedom March from Selma to Montgomery. Those defending the legacy of Lyndon Baines Johnson have decried the film's portrayal of LBJ as a nemesis of Martin Luther King and an obstacle to the Civil Rights movement, in their eyes a significant distortion of history.


There is a certain villainy about DuVernay's LBJ, as portrayed by Tom Wilkinson. With an unwieldy Texas accent, Wilkinson's LBJ berates King for insisting he press for a voting rights bill now, rather than defer it in favor of his top legislative priority, the War on Poverty. The angry, adversarial tone of their Oval Office meetings seems a bit implausible, and the film's implication that Johnson was complicit in J. Edgar Hoover's contemptible surveillance and vindictive smear campaign against King seems a bridge too far – even though LBJ was a notoriously crude man and is suspected of having done things far worse than opposing King. Hoover (played in the film by Dylan Baker) was a dangerous and powerful psychopath, and the film uses as a narrative device data from FBI surveillance of King's movements. Johnson and King did clash, but it was over the Vietnam War, after the events depicted in the film.

The film may be a bit unfair to Johnson, but DuVernay says that was not her intention. “I think this has all been a bit overblown, especially because this film is not about LBJ,” she told Terry Gross on NPR's "Fresh Air." “This is a film that's about the people of Selma and the black leadership of Selma and the allies who came to the aid of black people who were being terrorized in Selma. And one of those allies turned out to be, eventually, LBJ," whose speech announcing the Voting Rights Act, in which he quotes "We Shall Overcome," crowns the film triumphantly.

Felony (opens today in Cleveland at the Capitol Theatre)

[FELONY opens in Cleveland on Friday October 17th exclusively at the Capitol Theatre.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

Our sympathies are with Detective Mal Toohey (Joel Edgerton) right off the bat in FELONY, an Australian drama Edgerton also wrote the screenplay for. While chasing a suspect in the film's opening scene, Toohey takes a shot in the stomach. Fortunately he's wearing his bullet proof vest, but he was putting his life on the line for his job nonetheless. While celebrating his survival and a successful bust, Mal has a bit too much to drink. He's a cop, so he gets a pass at a sobriety checkpoint, and besides, he's not really that drunk, right? Drunk enough to sideswipe a 9 year old boy out riding his bike, it turns out.

Burke and Hare (November 27th and 28th at the Cleveland Cinematheque)

[BURKE AND HARE screens Sunday November 27th at 6:30 pm and Monday November 28th at 8:45 pm at the Cleveland Cinematheque.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

The place is Scotland, the year is 1828. As our narrator, an affable executioner (Bill Bailey), informs us, the locale is in the midst of something of a medical renaissance. Even faster progress might be made in the pursuit of medical knowledge if only there were more cadavers to dissect, but alas only the bodies of executed criminals may be used for medical study, and there just aren't enough people being executed of late. That trickle all but dries up for Dr. Knox (Tom Wilkinson) after his rival Dr. Monro (Tim Curry) finds a way to get all the corpses for himself. Stepping in to meet the demand are a couple of Irish scam artists by the name of William Burke (Simon Pegg) and Willaim Hare (Andy Serkis). The first corpse the pair sells died of natural causes, but when finding another fresh subject proves difficult, the pair resorts to murder with little hesitation.

BURKE AND HARE begins with the statement that, “This is a true story. Except for the parts that are not.” That's usually the case with any film that purports to be “based on a true story”, but I do admire the filmmakers' forthrightness in this case. And indeed, a great many of the factual details have been changed. I just don't quite understand why. Normally if you're going to tinker with a true story, it's to juice up the action, make the story flow better, and/or emphasize particular themes and ideas the director wants to focus on. The changes co-writers Piers Ashworth and Nick Moorcroft have made, however, feel arbitrary.

The Debt

Review by Bob Ignizio

It's a good thing other countries still make original movies, or else Hollywood might run out of stuff to remake. THE DEBT is a redo of the award-winning 2007 Israeli film Ha-Hov, at present unreleased in America. With SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE director John Madden at the helm and a prestigious cast that includes past Oscar winner Helen Mirren and Oscar nominee Tom Wilkinson, it's obvious that the producers of this American version are hoping to replicate that success.

The plot concerns 3 Mossad agents – Rachael (Jessica Chastain/Mirren), David (Sam Worthington/Ciarán Hinds) and Stephan (Martin Csokas/Wilkinson) who in 1966 are given the mission of bringing Nazi war criminal Dieter Vogel (Jesper Christensen) back to Israel for trial. They capture the man in East Germany, but before they can smuggle him to the west, he escapes from his bonds and attacks Rachael. She recovers from the attack and shoots Vogel dead before he can escape, winding up with a scar on her face as a souvenir in the process.

Jackboots on Whitehall (now available on home video)

[JACKBOOTS ON WHITEHALL is now available on home video.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

In the recent documentary MARWENCOL we meet Mark Hogancamp, a man trying to cope with the mental and emotional problems (including amnesia) brought on by a severe beating. He does so by creating a village out of dolls and carefully detailed models that he places in a World War II setting.

JACKBOOTS ON WHITEHALL looks a lot like Hogancamp's imaginary town come to life. The film is set in an alternate version of World War II where the Nazis take over London. The flesh and blood cast, which is a veritable who's who of British actors, lend their voices only; the on-screen action is brought to life using animated action figures. I doubt there was any direct influence, but the visual similarities are strong enough that you can't help but compare if you're familiar with Hogancamp's unusual vision.