Movie Review ~ The Gray Man (2022)

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The Facts:

Synopsis: When the CIA’s most skilled operative—whose true identity is known to none—accidentally uncovers dark agency secrets, a psychopathic former colleague puts a bounty on his head, setting off a global manhunt by international assassins.
Stars: Ryan Gosling, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Regé-Jean Page, Billy Bob Thornton, Jessica Henwick, Dhanush, Wagner Moura, Alfre Woodard
Director: Anthony and Joe Russo
Rated: PG-13
Running Length: 122 minutes
TMMM Score: (3/10)
Review:  When directors Anthony and Joe Russo wrapped up their boundary-busting run in the Marvel Cinematic Universe with the epic final two films in The Infinity Saga (2018’s Avengers: Infinity War and 2019’s Avengers: Endgame), no one could blame them for wanting to shift gears. Not only did they pump the brakes on their action-heavy output, but they also changed direction altogether, delivering 2021’s sour Cherry on Apple TV+ to viewers and critics who thought it was the pits. Though the public could wholly attribute the blame for the failure to their lack of conscious oversight, that misguided biopic did precious little to help out star Tom Holland’s career post-Spider-Man. Still, it seemed to be a minor bump in the Brothers Russo Road of directing.

On paper, The Gray Man reads like it should be an enterprise worth undertaking for the directors known for their large-scale action sequences and creative camerawork, and it doesn’t hurt they’ve roped in three appealing stars as headliners. Like last November’s Red Notice, the trio and the material rarely mesh, resulting in a directionless film that is often voraciously senseless, frequently misogynistic, and unusually dull. That it took two directors to make a film so mediocre is almost incredibly commendable in a way, but that is little consolation when you’re an hour into the endless movie, and barely anything has happened.

Commuting the sentence of a young man convicted of murder and recruiting him to a fledgling covert ops agency of skilled killers, Fitzroy (Billy Bob Thornton, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot) knows there is potential in the man that can be developed over time. Flash forward eighteen years, and Six (Ryan Gosling, Blade Runner 2049) is indeed the cool as a cucumber assassin his mentor knew he’d be. We know this because he’s wearing a slick suit, barely talks above a whisper, and looks up at his contact, Agent Dani Miranda (Ana de Armas, Deep Water), from under heavy-lidded eyes. Six is on a mission ordered by agency head Carmichael (Regé-Jean Page, Sylvie’s Love) to take out a target when the plan goes awry, and he’s left with a piece of information that holds the answers to corruption from inside the organization. Of course, this puts a target on his back, and he’s soon on a globe-trotting run for his life while trying to expose the cover-up.

Unwilling to let this data leak, Carmichael calls in an outside clean-up crew led by Lloyd Hansen (Chris Evans, Lightyear), a former recruit alongside Six that was kicked out for his unscrupulous methods. We get a good idea of those methods early on (it involves a car battery) and later when a set of fingernails gets threatened by a pair of pliers wielded by Lloyd. Lloyd is determined to take Six out, partly because he wants the bragging rights, which is why he’s willing to play dirty. Pulling all the stops out and ready to incite a worldwide news event to take out one man, Lloyd makes a final play for engaging Six…, and that’s when he goes too far.

If you haven’t gleaned it yet, The Gray Man comes down to Six and Lloyd proving who is the best bad guy, and it doesn’t matter how much collateral damage there is. Seeming to forget that both men are supposed to be experts in espionage and stealth, the Russo’s never provide an opportunity for them (or anyone) to be sneaky about anything. I don’t think they’d be able to film Evans creeping up behind Gosling competently; there must be some grand gesture to accompany it. It’s an example of brutish toxicity that feels disingenuous to both characters. Neither had to take on these tired tropes to be exciting, and the fact that they’re reduced to men that have to prove their might rather than finish the job and go home is more for the movies than anything honest and character related. 

Gosling is far dourer in his role than Evans, who seems to be having a lot of fun in his ultra-tight retro-designer polo shirts and, according to Six, “trash stash.” As much as Gosling is having fun with the action sequences, he seems to get the dramatic scenes to be hokey pokey. A side plot involving Julia Butters (Once Upon a Time in Hollywood) as Fitzroy’s kidnapped niece is so shoehorned to achieve one story contrivance it’s almost laughable. I almost wish we discovered de Armas played the same role from No Time to Die…or even Knives Out. At least we’d understand why she’s putting forth so little effort to set herself apart from the background extras. 

The Russo’s make a critical error in casting Page and Jessica Henwick (On the Rocks) as two of Langley’s agents with dirty hands, but how bad either of them is remains to be seen. The undisputed star story out of Bridgerton, I think Page played his cards too early and jumped from that Netflix show to the next level before he was ready. There’s not much going on with him, both in personality or performance. While I appreciated another female character, Henwick spends most of the movie watching a monitor and giving an out loud recap of what we saw, lamenting how “bad this looks” for her. If only we cared enough to feel for any of these people. Don’t even get me started with the raw deal dealt to the esteemed Alfre Woodard (Clemency) or the utter ridiculousness of the performance of Wagner Moura (Elysium) playing a contact Gosling reaches out to.

If you watch for someone, you’ll be rewarded briefly when the mononymous Dhanush appears as a Tamil killer who gives Gosling and de Armas a good stomping. These action sequences land with a swift punch and makes you wish Dhanush had a more significant part to sustain the movie’s back end when there are no twists to divert The Gray Man off its standard path. Whenever I thought the filmmakers would introduce an unexpected wrinkle, the Russo’s opted for the easiest out and never looked back. Yes, they try to whip out their bag of camera tricks, but it looks like the fast-roaming lens-work Sam Raimi used decades ago in his Evil Dead films and even recently in Michael Bay’s Ambulance.

While the action sequences are big and loud, they mostly come off incredibly phony due to an overabundance of CGI, green screen, and composite filmmaking. Again, as I mentioned in my review of Thor: Love and Thunder, I’m shocked that in 2022 we’re still willing to accept effects that look so terrible or large-scale blistering shootouts that are impossible to follow. In the centerpiece scene of The Gray Man, Gosling is in the middle of a park chained to a bench and is descended upon by 15 men with gigantic guns trying to take him out. They wind up shooting at everyone BUT Gosling. Where’s the logic (or fun) in that? You stew on that because I’ve already thought about The Gray Man more than anyone involved has.

Movie Review ~ Anything’s Possible

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The Facts:

Synopsis: Kelsa is a confident trans girl trying to get through senior year. When her classmate Khal gets a crush on her, he musters up the courage to ask her out, despite the drama he knows it could cause.
Stars: Eva Reign, Abubakr Ali, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Courtnee Carter, Kelly Lamor Wilson, Grant Reynolds
Director: Billy Porter
Rated: PG-13
Running Length: 96 minutes
TMMM Score: (7/10)
Review:  Rolling things back to the old school days of riding your bike or driving your car to the video store and renting a movie, I remember when I started noticing a niche market of films marketed to the LGBTQ+ community. While most releases had several (or, if you were Blockbuster, dozens) of copies available, these would only have one lone copy, and good luck finding it in. You had to almost stalk the shelves until the title you were eyeing got re-shelved, and even then, you could be stuck with a stinker. Like many a curious youth, one of the first I remember getting was 1999’s now cult favorite Trick starring master thespian Tori Spelling.   While the production values were iffy and the romantic entanglements of the leading males terminally arch, it showed me that there was space being made for these stories to be told.

I wish we’d come a bit further in the years since, but significant progress has still been made. 2018’s Love, Simon moved the dial, and I think Anything’s Possible will continue turning up the volume. Directed by Tony-winning Broadway legend Billy Porter and set in his hometown of Pittsburgh, what we have here feels like a first, at least in my book. A high school romantic comedy between a trans girl and a male-identifying classmate might not seem quite the revolutionary breakthrough, but the shots at normalizing it are. Not attempting to alter the viewers’ perceptions at the outset, Porter’s film focuses on letting love bloom, only allowing that outside world in when necessary.

As she begins her senior year, Kelsa (Eva Reign) appears ready to face the world outside the high school bubble. With friends by her side and a protective, slightly overinvolved single mother (Renée Elise Goldsberry, Waves), always her biggest cheerleader, Kelsa has the kind of confidence many of her peers envy. Deep down, though, she has the same insecurities she keeps hidden because there’s already enough that’s out there for the world to dissect. Growing up as trans, her classmates have largely accepted her, but there’s still the fear of rejection, a feeling that has persisted since her father left the family.

This year will be different, though; it starts on day one with an art class that pairs her with Khal (Abubakr Ali), a boy from her class with his own set of hang-ups and societal norms with which to contend. The spark is there from the start between the two, and a flirtation develops, but the problem is that Kelsa’s best friend (Courtnee Carter) had eyes for Khal first and doesn’t take being passed over for Kelsa as a true friend would. As a cautious relationship between the new couple emerges, Kelsa sees her friendship replaced with being ostracized from her former friend group. The more she puts herself out there for the world to see, the greater her chance of getting hurt worse. Dreaming of a life far away from high school and recognizing Khal doesn’t share that same path is another roadblock on their journey to romance, but on this trip, as with any love worth pursuing, anything’s possible.

For Porter’s first directing gig, Anything’s Possible is as fresh as a daisy with an eclectic array of new faces assembled for the high schoolers. I wasn’t familiar with much of this cast, but for the first time in a long while, you feel like you’re seeing several future stars at the genesis of their long careers. There’s something to Porter’s magic touch that gives the film its emotional center without having to delve deep into overindulgent displays on the part of the actors. The only major moment of high drama acting comes between Goldsberry and Reign. It’s the kind of mother-daughter argument that works well because of the writing (though Ximena García Lecuona’s script is often quite clever) and because both actresses have lived their characters so thoroughly that it comes across as an uncomfortably honest moment of truth.

The chemistry between Reign and Ali is lovely, and while I have to wonder just how realistic it was to give Khal quite so many open-book/open-mind traits (his one flaw can’t be that he can’t NOT be a good person) when the two of them are together the movie clicks. Porter has a real find in Reign. There are times when you can see the shaky acting of a newcomer, but either those scenes were shot early on, or there was another reason we aren’t aware. Eventually, Reign warms up as the film goes along. You might think Tony Award winner Goldsberry has a little yawn-er of a role, but wait and see what a mother’s frustration can unleash in the wrong circumstances. It won’t be for this movie, but trust that Goldsberry is getting more major award recognition within the next five years.

I liked that Porter didn’t bite off more than he could chew with his freshman attempt at filmmaking in a studio setting. Despite a closing credit dance song that comes across as pretty silly (and, I think, under-rehearsed?), mainly because the actors appear to be a little embarrassed to be doing it, Anything’s Possible is more than a passable romantic teen comedy. There are admirable messages to be delivered and the kind of third act when everything gets twisted up and resolved…but don’t think you’ve figured out how it will end. These are times of change, impermanence, and maybe ‘happily ever after’ doesn’t equate to what it did all those years back. And that’s OK. Or perhaps it ends like every other rom-com we’ve seen before in the most expected way imaginable. It’s possible. 

Movie Review ~ My Old School

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The Facts:

Synopsis: In 1993, 16-year-old Brandon Lee enrolled at Bearsden Academy, a preparatory school in an upper-middle-class suburb of Glasgow. After an initially awkward start, Lee — who had, until then, been privately tutored in Canada while on tour with his opera singer mom — would quickly become the school’s brightest and most popular pupil.
Stars: Alan Cumming
Director: Jono McLeod
Rated: NR
Running Length: 104 minutes
TMMM Score: (7/10)
Review: As a spoiler-free movie review site, I like to keep as much of the plot developments under wraps and leave it to the viewer to experience the film as fresh as possible. Sometimes, the basic outline of a movie can make that difficult, and the documentary is frequently one of the trickier genres where I need to be extra on my game. I had a devil of a time thinking about that approaching the review of My Old School, director Jono McLeod’s look back at one strange year during secondary school and the classmate who left a lasting impression on him and his classmates. To say too much would be to rob McLeod’s carefully constructed narrative, but withholding information wouldn’t leave much to say. 

McLeod makes great pains to conceal the twist, and I also feel like I should. So, if this review feels more like a vague dance-around plot than usual, it’s in service to your overall entertainment if you see this enjoyable docu-mystery. I had it spoiled for me, and I will admit that knowing the secret already, it managed to color the first half of the movie when I was supposed to be in the dark. Try if you can avoid finding out any more information than you need because My Old School has several head-turning curveballs to throw.

Interviewing an array of his former classmates, McLeod takes us back to 1995 when their school in Bearsden, Scotland, received a new student, Brandon Lee. Brandon couldn’t help but stand out from the other students with his tightly curled hair and odd facial features. Still, he made a good impression on the teachers and fell into a group of friends and school activities that fit the definition of an active participant in the high school experience. His professional maturity on stage acting in South Pacific was even called out by the stern headmaster, who didn’t dole out compliments easily. When he graduated, Brandon set his plans to attend medical school, and off he went to a nearby college to become a doctor.

Typically, this is where the tale would end for a preparatory school success story. Yet the tale of Brandon Lee was just beginning. McLeod and his classmates walk us through the experience of being in school with him and several odd events that occurred. Living with his grandmother after his opera-singer mother was killed in a car wreck and his father passed away, Lee would have friends over and treated people well…but it always appeared as if he were holding something back. Driving in a car with friends late one night, they noticed a police car appearing out of the murky darkness, and Brandon, thinking the siren in the distance was going to pull them over, turned to his friends and admitted that if he was pulled over and questioned, the name on his license might not match the one they knew…

Candid interviews with the former students reveal a close-knit class that bonded over the daunting school, its somewhat overbearing faculty, and the saga of Brandon Lee that touched them all in one way or another. While many know the whole story, some only know bits and pieces revealed during McLeod’s interviews. They learn the truth(s) as we do, and it’s fascinating to see decades of lies cleared up in a matter of seconds and the wave of disbelief that follows. Interspersed with photos and video footage from back then, McLeod tells much of that past time through animated segments that aren’t Pixar/Illumination quality but have that art class vibe, further establishing this as a home-spun project with heart.

The most impressive interview of all is with Brandon Lee himself. Not wanting to be interviewed on camera, Lee agreed to an audio interview, and McLeod enlisted actor Alan Cumming to lip-synch it on camera. At one time, Cumming (GoldenEye) was set to star in a film version of this wild story, but the project never got off the ground. In a way, My Old School is a full circle moment for the actor, who completely nails mouthing the words along with the audio so well that by the end, you forget he isn’t the one speaking the lines. 

I think the film runs a little longer than needed, with some story padding that could be shored up with editing. Yet it’s not a boring tale to follow. I also get why McLeod would want to tell the story and rope his classmates into recounting their impressions. Still, My Old School doesn’t contain the kind of cathartic resolution or reflection by the filmmaker (who often appears on camera) to drive home why McLeod ultimately made it. Is it to close a chapter for the class who never really got the chance to end things on their terms? Or is it meant to start a new paragraph for a story that continues today?