Biographical films are pulling in the viewers
Movie audiences are on the decline and have been for the past three years. And when studio executives begin to worry about narrowing profit margins—they made a loss of $400 million last year—they have a tendency to play it safe. If there’s one thing that Hollywood knows how to do, it’s to take something that appears to have a formula for success and attempt to repeat it. Which could be why we seem to have had a glut of hit films about real people—most notably with the success of Ray in 2004. This year starts off with two bio pics that will surely have some Oscar buzz to help them along.
WALK THE LINE ***1/2
Opening in the US with a respectable $22.4 million behind it, Walk the Line presents the story of the Man in Black: the late, great Johnny Cash. Based on two biographies of the famous country singer, the film was seven years in the making and had much input from both Cash and his wife right up until the singer’s death in 2003. The story is told in flashbacks as Cash reflects on his tragic and beautiful life just before stepping on stage for a concert at Folsom Prison. It’s a rather typical rags-to-riches story infused with a man’s self-destructive tendencies with sex, drugs and country music and his search for acceptance from his father. The great child acting of Johnny as a small boy at the beginning of the film is only a foreshadowing of things to come. Three-time Oscar-nominee Joaquin Phoenix (The Village) completely immerses himself in the role of Johnny Cash, and Reese Witherspoon (Just Like Heaven) beautifully plays Cash’s muse and savior, June Carter. Convincingly singing all the songs themselves, they offer powerful performances together, on stage and off. The film can best be described as Cash’s music is referred to in the film: “Steady as a train, sharp as a razor.”
German Release Date (subject to change) February 2,
US rated PG-13
www.walkthelinethemovie.com
CAPOTE ***
Another famous American figure rising to stardom in the late 1950s was the celebrated author Truman Capote. After reading an article in The New York Times about a Kansas family murdered in cold blood, Capote decided to investigate the crime and write an article for The New Yorker. But he became so involved in the story that he chose instead to write the novel In Cold Blood about the murder and his increasingly deepening relationship with the murderers. The film, which is based on this book, follows Capote (brilliantly portrayed by Philip Seymour Hoffman [Magnolia]) and his friend and muse, the writer of To Kill a Mockingbird, Nelle Harper Lee (Catherine Keener), as they travel between society parties in New York. Hoffman plays the flamboyantly gay writer a few octaves higher than is possible to understand at times, but his commitment to the role is worthy of an Oscar. It is in the actor’s quieter, more subtle moments that we see the author searching intensely for meaning in the world and his place in it. Keener (40 Year Old Virgin) stands by her friend both as a character and a performer. Supporting roles are filled with convincing performances by the ever-brilliant Oscar-winner Chris Cooper (Adaptation) and Clifton Collins, Jr. (Traffic), who plays the murderer of Capote’s affections, Perry Smith. It’s a slow, intelligent film offering a deep understanding of humanity and art.
German Release Date (subject to change) February 16,
US rated R
www.sonyclassics.com/capote
New release on DVD
MR. & MRS. SMITH **
Ranking as one of the top ten moneymakers of 2005, this film is a marketing executive’s dream, not least because most of the marketing was done as a result of the private lives of its two stars. Brad Pitt (Ocean’s Twelve) and Angelina Jolie (Tomb Raider) are an unbearably attractive married couple living a life of monotony in the suburbs. Secretly, however, they are assassins, whose targets become each other. Though a real-life relationship between the stars was rumored to have caused the break-up of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston’s marriage, director Doug Liman (The Bourne Identity) is quoted as saying “This is a movie that’s celebrating marriage.” The film starts slowly, trying to relate the boredom of marriage after five or six years, and then tailspins into ridiculousness as the action escalates. Supporting characters are a sorry attempt at comic relief. But if you’re not looking for anything deeper than the shell of a shotgun casing, this might be some fun.
German Release Date (subject to change) February 7,
US rated PG-13
www.mrandmrssmithmovie.com
