The Deliverance

My View:  The Deliverance  (2024) R  In The Deliverance, Ebony Jackson (Andra Day) is a single parent who moves her family into a new home, hoping for a fresh start. Ebony is determined to put her troubles behind her, but something in the house is causing trouble. With Child Protective Services threatening to tear her family apart, she must battle a demon in a battle for her life and the souls of her children. This is a mess of a film that doesn’t quite know what it aspires to be. The Deliverance is from Lee Daniels, who gave us Precious (2009) and The Butler (2013). The film starts as a drama about a family trying to survive. The family is in turmoil, as their father is away overseas in the military, and the mother, Ebony, played by the always interesting Andra Day, is a woman who handles the pressures of life by either lashing out at her children or drinking. Bill collectors are constantly hounding Ebony, making it difficult for her to keep a roof over her head. The situation is not helped by Ebony’s mother, played by Glen Close, who is full of opinions on how Ebony should raise her children while she is dealing with cancer. There is a brilliant scene that lets Close have fun with the role of her character. While hooked up to a machine for her treatment, she shows off her red bra and flirts with a medical technician (Omar Epps). And then there is the Department of Child Services woman, played by Mo’Nique, who shows up to check on the children without warning and with an attitude. If the film had continued along those lines, I think we would have a film that could have had an impact. Instead, we start having weird things happen. The basement becomes a breeding ground for flies, and Andre (Anthony B. Jenkins) begins to behave strangely. Andre begins talking to an imaginary friend, gets up in the middle of the night to drink a whole carton of milk and keeps going down to the basement. This is where the film goes off its rails, as the weirdness goes overboard. The scene where the film lost me was when Ebony hears a pounding on the basement door. She opens it up and Andre has been pounding his head against the door. Now, it’s a pounding that is cracking the outside of the door and the kid has a massive bump on his head. How does Ebony react? Asking what the heck was he doing down there. Not a worry about the huge bump on his head (one that stays there for a few days). The film goes into a bad ripoff of The Exorcist; this time, instead of a priest, we get a woman who calls herself an ‘Apostle’, who wants to do a ‘Deliverance’ in the house and get the Devil out of Andre. The last 30 minutes of the film is a mishmash of every possession movie you’ve seen (minus the projectile vomiting), with the usual devil high-jinks. Andra Day's outstanding performance is wasted in the film, which portrays a mother you won't like very much but still care for. The Deliverance is a drama that stops midway through and becomes a horror film with very little horror in it. To put it frankly, The Deliverance just doesn't deliver.  My Rating: Bargain Matinee  The Deliverance Website  Now playing on the Netflix platform.

Indiefest:  City of Dreams  (2024)  R  City of Dreams is about Jesús (Ari Lopez), who dreams of becoming a soccer star for his local team. His father surprisingly sends him to Los Angeles to train, but Jesús learns his destination isn’t a training camp but a sweatshop that his father has sold his son to. Jesús now dreams of escaping from his nightmare. This is another in a long line of films that have their heart and intent in the right place but don’t quite know how to get their idea across. We follow Jesús, who dreams (a lot) of becoming a soccer player for his favorite team, as he becomes part of a sweatshop that makes dresses in an old house run by a ruthless boss (Alfredo Castro) and his evil assistant (Andres Delgado). The film shows us the horrible conditions through the eyes of Jesús, a young man who doesn’t speak. With Jesús not being able to speak, it unfortunately gives us a lot of shots of Jesús, with his face always full of sweat and his mouth permanently open in horror. Anytime Jesús is in a situation that is too hard for him to handle, he imagines himself on a soccer field playing for his favorite professional team. Often those thoughts are interrupted by some sort of the Aztec warrior. I'm not entirely sure why. The film tries to do too much, as Jesús  realizes that not only is the place a sweat factory, but also involved in sex trafficking. And we have the treatment of Jesús when he attempts several escapes, which end with him being whipped while on what looks like a prayer bench. The film constantly uses religious symbolism to make Jesús a martyr and a possible savior. The ending of the film is strange and unsatisfying, with a scene that feels too staged to have any impact. City of Dreams, after the final scene, makes a plea from the filmmakers for people to become more involved with ending child slavery. As I said, the film’s heart is in the right place; it just delivers a film that never provides the impact it wants to.  My Rating: Cable  City of Dreams Website Now playing in theaters. 

My View:  You Gotta Believe  (2024)  PG  You Gotta Believe is about a Little League baseball team of misfits who dedicate their season to their best player’s dying father. Things begin to turn around and they achieve what they had previously believed was impossible: playing in the World Series. You Gotta Believe is a feel-good movie, which is strange because one of the main characters has terminal brain cancer. You Gotta Believe is helped by a solid cast, including Greg Kinnear, a too-busy father who takes over coaching the team when his best friend, played by Luke Wilson, is diagnosed with cancer and can’t continue coaching the team he loves. The film is also aided by Sarah Gadon and Molly Parker, who play the coach's wives with some humor and warmth. The cast makes this film watchable, and the chemistry between Kinnear and Wilson makes their characters’ relationship fun and believable. It’s an inspiring story of a coach who finds his talent in figuring out why particular players aren’t doing well and changing their positions or beliefs to where their strengths lay. I wish the director had opted for a more traditional storytelling approach. Instead, he tries too many cute camera shots, and there is a horrible sequence where we see the team on a winning streak as everyone from the coaches to the players and even the umpires sing the theme song to the old 60s Rawhide TV show. Those scenes take away from the film’s heart, which is about love and believing in yourself. That’s a shame, as You Gotta Believe is based on a true story about a team that went to the Little League World Series against all the odds.   My Rating: Bargain Matinee  You Gotta Believe Website  Now playing in theaters. 

Indiefest:  Tokyo Cowboy  (2023)  PG   Tokyo Cowboy is about Hideki (Arata Iura), a Japanese corporate executive known for turning failing companies around. When his company is about to liquidate a money-hemorrhaging cattle ranch in Montana, Hideki decides he can go to America and turn the ranch into a money-maker. Hideki is about to learn firsthand about life on a cattle ranch, and it’s going to be a bumpy ride. I loved this film and hope it will find the audience it deserves. The film reminds me of the wonderful 1983 film Local Hero, which starred Burt Lancaster and Peter Riegert, about an oil executive sent to buy out a small village in Scotland. Tokyo Cowboy is also a fish out of water story as Hideki is a brash corporate executive who has gotten his company’s attention by finding companies to buy and turning them into money-making machines. He is in a long-term relationship with Keiko (Ayako Fujitani), who happens to be his boss. Hideki is a headstrong guy, confident that he has the Midas touch, and at a big meeting, proposes that he can turn a failing Montana cattle ranch into a success by switching them to Japanese beef, the rare Wagyu cattle. He does this behind his boss/girlfriend’s back and is given the go-ahead to go to Montana. From the start, Hideki’s trip is a disaster. His luggage is lost, he insists on a small, cheaper car instead of a 4-wheel drive model, and his traveling companion, an expert in everything Wagyu, is more interested in having fun with the Montana ranch hands than listening to Hideki. Things go from bad to worse, and it’s very apparent that Hideki’s grandiose plans won’t work, but he keeps trying. Slowly, through the interaction of a ranch hand named Javier (Goya Robles) and the beauty of the Big Sky country, Hideki begins to realize that maybe he isn’t always right and, more importantly, isn’t happy with his life. There are some wonderful moments in this film, where characters feel real and are able to connect with each other. I loved a sequence where Javier takes Hideki to a Quinceanera, and Hideki not only has fun but suddenly realizes that he wants more from his relationship with Keiko. Tokyo Cowboy is filled with small moments that make the film feel warm, fun, and honest. I loved the performances of Goya Robles, a cowboy who wants to find a way to make money so that he can marry his girlfriend, and Robin Weigert as the Ranch manager whose family used to own the ranch she now manages and has seen company executives come into her home before. Arata Iura makes this film work as his character goes through a drastic change from a stuck-up corporate shill to a man who can find beauty and meaning in his life and his surroundings. It’s a fantastic multi-level performance that brings his character to life. So put on some boots, jump on a horse and take a ride with Hideki and maybe learn a few things about being a cowboy.   My Rating: Full Price  Tokyo Cowboy Website  Now playing in select theaters. 

Forgotten Film:  Telling Lies in America (1997) PG-13 Karchy (Brad Renfro) is the son of a Hungarian immigrant (Maximilian Schell) who works as a janitor. Karchy goes to a Catholic high school, where the rich kids mock him for being poor. Karchy, to pique the interest of a girl (Calista Flockhart), whom he has a crush on, goes to work for a local DJ (Kevin Bacon) who goes by the name of Billy Magic. The kid lies to get the job, and Billy sees that as a plus since he is going to use Karchy to receive the payola that Billy is getting to play certain records on the radio. This film is a blast to watch because of the cast. Bacon is perfect as the slick Billy Magic, who stays in a town only long enough to make some money, staying ahead of his child support payments. Brad Renfro is superbly portraying the boy who believes he has found the perfect role model in Billy, but eventually realizes that perhaps Billy's life isn't as great as it appears. A charming Calista Flockhart steals every scene she is in and is a delight as the girl who Karchy has fallen for. The film was written by Joe Eszterhas, who at one time was Hollywood’s highest-paid screenwriter with his mega-hit Basic Instinct (1993). Telling Lies in America was a passion project for Eszterhas, and it doesn’t have the crass and coarseness of his usual work, making the film feel more about its characters and how Karchy learns that appearances and brashness can cover up a lot of flaws.   My Rating: Full Price  Telling Lies in America Info  The film is available on most online screeners.

Weird Credits:  From the credits of Tokyo Cowboy:  Boss Wrangler

Coming Soon to a Screen Near You: The Substance (2024) R A celebrity (Demi Moore) believes that her days as a beauty have passed until she finds a black market drug. This cell-replicating formula temporarily creates a younger, better version of herself. The film received a huge standing ovation and won the Best Screenplay award at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. I have always been a fan of Demi Moore, and I hope the film will give her more lead roles in the future.  The Substance Info   The film is in theaters on Friday, September 20, 2024.

Until Next Time!