Rapid Response: Ali

Ali_movie_posterI learned a lot about Muhammad Ali in the wake of his death a few weeks back. His fighting record was stellar, and there are so many wonderful photos of Ali with other geniuses who all saw him as The Greatest, but he’s the most important sportsman of all time because he changed the game and changed the world.

I perhaps learned less so watching Michael Mann’s “Ali,” a frustratingly long and meandering biopic with only some strong performances and fight cinematography to back it up.

Most biopics of this pedigree would feel the need to start in Ali’s childhood and work its way up through his late in life Parkinson’s. Mann resists that urge and focuses strictly on his time as a fighter, both in the ring and as a warrior for civil rights, his religion and the war. And yet you could make a movie that dialed closely on any one of these moments. If Malcolm X can get his own film then so can his relationship with Ali. You could make an entire Frost v. Nixon style movie based solely around Ali’s interviews with Howard Cosell. The discrepancy between their on-camera squabbles and off-camera chemistry could make a great comedy.

But by the time “Ali” arrives in Africa for the fight with George Foreman, not to mention the late-to-the-party introduction of yet another one of his wives, the compelling conflict and intricate drama of Vietnam and the Civil Rights movement feels so far in the rearview mirror. We know the outcome of the fight, and the original tension the movie spent the first hour plus establishing has vanished.

So much of “Ali” hangs on Will Smith’s charisma in the role. It’s all in the mannerisms, the footwork, the bobbing and weaving, the physicality of his performance. When he’s being interviewed you can see his dramatic shift in posture, with his legs spread wide and a new cadence and rhythm to his voice. In the more dramatic scenes its his ability to get lost in a deep stare under heavy eyebrows and a gigantic forehead. Smith just fits the part better than anyone else could, and it’s arguably his best performance.

“Ali” wouldn’t be the first biopic to have a stellar lead performance and little else going for it. I said as much about “Chaplin” just this past week. But it’s amazing how in the film’s first hour, it genuinely floats like a butterfly and stings like a bee, streamlining Ali’s life moments, his energy and his legacy all around those pivotal fights. It’s just by the end it’s moving so slowly it hardly resembles a champion.

Rapid Response: Chaplin

Robert Downey Jr. shines in the biopic on the life of Charlie Chaplin and his Tramp.

chaplin-coverA lot of generic biopics about geniuses get a pass because they show an endearing side to a beloved figure. I can swallow a mediocre movie about “The Doors” because Val Kilmer is so electric as Jim Morrison on stage and I love the music.

In the case of “Chaplin,” I’m at a crossroads. I adore Charlie Chaplin and The Tramp, and Robert Downey Jr. has his mannerisms and his likeness down pat. It’s a wonderful performance, and the same goes for Kevin Kline as Douglas Fairbanks, a natural fit. But Richard Attenborough’s film has the markings of a prestige picture, a stuffy melodrama made to win Oscars and exactly the opposite of what The Tramp stood for. It doesn’t understand what made Chaplin such a gifted physical comedian or have the visual style to capture how his knack behind the camera gave each visual gag the necessary grace and style to make it funny, and it doesn’t show how he came to be truly great but rather assumes he always was.

I refer back to the most basic rules of movie biopics about geniuses: focus on an individual moment of the figure’s story, not their entire life. Drawn from Chaplin’s real-life autobiography and yet reimagined as Chaplin filling in important blanks of his life story with a fictional publisher (Anthony Hopkins), Attenborough’s film starts in Chaplin’s childhood and his complications with a mentally ill mother, then moves through his early vaudeville days before he’s swept off to America and early Hollywood. During the title cards, the black and white image of a sad, lonely Tramp removing his makeup has an unexpected poignancy, a quick glimpse of an icon as we’ve never seen him before, but Attenborough immediately signals what kind of melodramatic slog this will be. Why do we have to endure such bland, downtrodden moments of grief when we’re telling a story of one of the silver screen’s most beloved clowns?

“Chaplin” gets caught in an unfortunate middle ground, with film buffs who already know the full story disappointed at how the film chooses to treat their icon, and with newbies to Chaplin getting the wrong idea about his legacy. And while it might’ve been a wise idea to update the Tramp persona to exist in the late 20th Century, the movie forgoes a sense of classicism and feels dated as a result.

Occasionally the film shows twinkles of magic. Chaplin gets giddy and awestruck at the early magic of cinema and in how pioneer director Mack Sennett (Dan Aykroyd) walks him through the elementary simple process of movie editing in order to create something incredible. It feels quaint today, but then this was once considered a gimmick and a novelty. Another sequence with Chaplin dodging some real life cops toys with some original slapstick and zaniness, although without a classical bent, several of these Downey showcases are undercut by editing that, in Chaplin’s case, would’ve been far more economical.

Working from “The Immigrant” up through “Limelight” and through all of his tumultuous marriages and tabloid worthy affairs, everything here has moments of promise before becoming yet another footnote in his autobiography. When your only goal is to do lip service to everything and say that even the genius can feel humble and inadequate, it begs the question again, who is this movie for? What is it trying to say? The Tramp never spoke a word, and yet he spoke more volumes than the biopic bearing his name.

The Nice Guys

Shane Black directs Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe in a noir comedy set in ’70s Los Angeles.

TheNiceGuysPoster2Across the “Lethal Weapon” movies and “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang,” few directors have been as consistently successful with action comedies as Shane Black. In his latest film “The Nice Guys,” he’s combined that penchant for irreverence and slick action into a hilarious, scandalous, seedy noir in the vein of “L.A. Confidential” and a Judd Apatow bromance.

Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling play private detectives trying to track down a missing teenage girl named Amelia (Margaret Qualley) in ‘70s Los Angeles, believing that her disappearance may be tied to the recent suicide of a notable porn star. Jackson Healy (Crowe) is an unlicensed tough specializing in roughing up perverts and collecting payments. Amelia is one of his clients, and he crosses paths with Holland March (Gosling) as March tries to locate her for a separate client. When Healy loses track of Amelia and gangsters come looking to kill her, Healy and March team up to protect her and uncover the scam brewing under the surface.

“You made a porno film where the point is the story?” March poses this question to Amelia as the complexities of their case get revealed. And in the same way, Black makes a commitment to story first above action or even comedy. Layered with intricate detail and mystery and littered with nostalgic, local color, “The Nice Guys” proves to be a great vehicle for Crowe and Gosling because it sets up stakes first.

It’s a buddy movie, yes, but the two of them together feed off their bad behavior and annoyance with the other. Crowe’s slack poise contrasts wonderfully with Gosling’s bouncy and twitchy façade. Crowe can be perfectly stoic and look as though he’s phoning it in, and then manage a perfectly timed sucker punch or even a spit take. Gosling on the other hand can barely keep himself composed, fighting with a bathroom stall door or fidgeting in a quiet panic as he bleeds profusely after trying to punch through a window. It looks so easy when other PIs do it!

But equally as engaging as “The Nice Guys’s” screwball mystery involves how Healy and March manage to redeem themselves amid their corrupt, wild, sleazy or idiotic behavior. The two each have their vices, with Healy being quick to anger and violence and March taking advantage of senile old folks or neglecting his tween daughter Holly (Angourie Rice).

Holly in particular brings the film together in surprising ways, with Healy forming a natural, yet unexpected bond with her as she looks to him to become a better person. Crowe of course has the dramatic depth to make such a character development convincing. But Gosling still manages the best chemistry. Holly sneaks along with Healy and March to a party at a porn star’s house and exclaims, “There are whores here and stuff!” Ever the perfect father, March says, “I told you not to say that word. Just say, ‘there are whores here.”

“The Nice Guys” doesn’t have too much to say about 2016, but this screwball trip back to the ‘70s is packed with nostalgia, sex, goofy fun…and stuff.

3 ½ stars

 

The Fits

First time director Anna Rose Holmer’s indie film is a stylized coming of age story for a young tomboy.

fits_onesheet_final2.inddWorking out is overrated, and so is “The Fits,” a new indie film by first time director Anna Rose Holmer. The adrenaline and endorphin rush you get from exercise and activity has been visualized in punishing, stimulating style in war films, boxing films, you name it. But these films channel the sensation of putting yourself through that pain alongside other emotional conflict.

Holmer communicates mood and drama entirely through body language and cinematic techniques, but it’s so devoid of a story or substance (it’s only 72 minutes long) that it feels more like a formless, visual tone poem. Critics have championed the film’s look and feel since its premiere at the Venice Film Festival and later as part of Sundance’s New Directors branch, but it’s hardly much more than a slick student film.

When we meet Toni (Royalty Hightower), a skinny, black 11-year-old tomboy, she’s displaying quiet intensity as she does sit-ups while her reflection stares back at her. Holmer films this workout scene and others of her jump roping or dancing head-on, like an obsessed Errol Morris, as a way of looking in the mirror and confronting what you’re made of. “The Fits” is transfixed on the body’s dexterity, how it moves and how it feels in the moment. And it would be plenty effective and visceral even without a disturbing, dissonant woodwind on the score that seems to place Toni in a horror film.

Toni trains as a boxer with her older brother, but she really wants to be a dancer, watching the older girls of the Lionesses and their champion dance squad. In one scene Toni drags a workout bag through the halls of her Cincinnati rec-center as a stream of the dancers rush past her in celebration at their victory. Toni’s so focused and intense, but the others hardly notice her.

As she goes through tryouts and works at being a better dancer, several of the older girls on her team experience a mysterious and unexplained bout of seizures and shortness of breath, which the news media dubs “The Fits.” The tween girls all Snapchat their friend writhing and choking on the floor, and as more go through it, the girls begin to treat it as something of a rite-of-passage, with Toni left wondering why she hasn’t gotten The Fits yet.

Even at barely over an hour, “The Fits’s” persistently on-edge style grows tiresome as it tries to amplify the intensity through little else than its in your face framing and score. What is “The Fits” about other than being a coming-of-age story? We hear Toni say, “I just want to compete,” and she absorbs abuse by peeling tattoos and nail polish off her skin or not screaming when she pierces her own ears, but the specifics of her pain or her ambitions are frustratingly vague.

“The Fits” even has a stylish music video montage that suddenly breaks with the film’s style and matches the fantasy and color in the Rihanna dance sequence in “Girlhood,” another indie film about a black girl coming of age. But it’s at that moment “The Fits” ends, a stylistic high note but a strange story beat that resolves little.

“The Fits” isn’t moving and powerful so much as its style makes it weirdly unsettling. It’s like working out: there’s a big difference between just feeling good and actually seeing results.

2 stars

The Lobster

Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos envisions a dystopian future in a satire about modern romance.

TheLobsterPosterIf you could be transformed into any animal, which would it be? It sounds like a bad question on a dating website, and yet we’ve become more reliant on such quirks in defining relationships and romance. Colin Farrell chooses to be the title animal in “The Lobster,” an absurdist satire that uses a hilariously bizarre, futuristic premise to lampoon the idea of modern love.

Director Yorgos Lanthimos, the Greek director behind “Dogtooth” now working in the English language, imagines a future in which it’s a law to have a romantic partner. Those without one, like David (Farrell) after recently becoming a widower, are sent to an upscale resort hotel and given 45 days to find a match or be transformed into an animal of their choice.

Lanthimos has some fun in subtly revealing the details of this premise, and the film’s deadpan style slowly works its way from raised-eyebrow peculiarities to laugh-out-loud moments of uneasy humor. For instance, David casually drops the detail that his dog is actually his brother who didn’t “make it.” When he arrives at the hotel, his choice to become a lobster has more to do with survival than preference. He envisions a long life span, an ability to swim and an easier chance at mating, and we wonder if David’s not actually trying to make it as a human any longer but simply waiting out the clock.

The details get stranger. Periodically the hotel guests are required to participate in a hunt for “loners,” single people who have rejected the rules of society and now live in the forest. Bagging one nabs you an extra day, and some hotel guests have spent years here as a result. Lanthimos stages these hunts like graceful slow-motion sequences in a Michael Mann film, stylized, operatic and wholly absurd. Guests are also tethered through their belt loops and restricted from masturbating; one who breaks the rule (John C. Reilly) gets his hand shoved in a toaster during breakfast. And only those who share similar characteristics to each other can become couples. One young girl (Jessica Barden) touts that she gets sporadic nosebleeds. David might be interested, but his trait is that he’s shortsighted, so no match.

“The Lobster” works great as a dystopian comedy (without explanation, random elephants or flamingos can be spotted in the background), but it helps that these oddities have parallels to dating in 2016. We give too much weight to superficial character traits, we go to great lengths to remain in love, we assign unnecessary rules and norms on society, and we shun those who can’t find a significant other. Lanthimos approaches these themes with ironic levity, like when the hotel’s manager informs an aspiring couple, “If you cannot solve any problems yourselves, you will be assigned children,” or with shocking poignancy, like the line, “A relationship can’t be built on a lie,” after it’s revealed one member of a couple faked a similar character trait.

Of course we know love is never defined by strict rules. Lanthimos’s deadpan tone, with every character delivering their lines in matter-of-fact, staccato notes (not to mention a score that’s equally terse and arresting), underscores the need to dismantle what he sees as ludicrous institutions.

Love however is something of an act of survival. For as comically bleak as “The Lobster” can be, the romance formed between Farrell and another loner played by Rachel Weisz reaches touching heights. Lanthimos asks if it’s harder to pretend you have feelings or that you don’t, and there’s a push-and-pull between this film’s harder exterior and softer inside. It’s a perfect match.

4 stars

Rapid Response: Young Mr. Lincoln

Henry Fonda plays Abraham Lincoln as a young lawyer in Springfield in John Ford’s 1939 classic.

220px-Youngmrlincoln“You’re crazy! I can’t play Lincoln. That’s like playing God, to me.” Henry Fonda said in a 1975 interview that he only played Abraham Lincoln because John Ford (who else) “shamed” him into doing it. “You think it’s The Great Emancipator huh? He’s a young, jack-legged lawyer from Springfield for Christ sake!”

We certainly do have this revered image of our 16th President, and yet the two biggest actors who have played him, Fonda and more recently Daniel Day Lewis, both played Lincoln with a sort of laid back aplomb. In their performances they made Lincoln into a great man by separating him from the esteem and the myth.

In “Young Mr. Lincoln,” which Ford cranked out in his seminal year of 1939 alongside “Stagecoach” and “Drums Along the Mohawk,” it’s immediately apparent that the image of Lincoln that Ford is going for differs from that of the stuffy politicians and bourgeois speaking in grand statements. He’s a proletariat homeboy who spoke calmly and plainly and won over the nation through his clear, honest demeanor and homespun wisdom.

Much of that credit certainly belongs to Fonda. Instantly he gives Lincoln a humble, trustworthy presence. It’s all in his tall and lanky body language. He leans on doorways and railings not unlike the iconic stooped perch he musters in Ford’s “My Darling Clementine, his poise and shoulders are lax, casual and he never has the need to truly boast or raise his voice. Look at one scene in which Lincoln, practicing as a young lawyer in Springfield, convinces two men who both want damages from the other to settle their case. He acts as though he’s telling them a story and lesson before revealing that he’s good at cracking heads, his eyes turning into icy spears as he does.

All the while Ford shoots Fonda at congenial, reassuring angles. Our first great look at Lincoln is a centered shot from chest height, just slightly glancing up at his sheepish face. Unlike the politician who spoke before him, Ford doesn’t frame Lincoln as some towering figure, but a relatable one. Lincoln’s words reached people on their level, and so does Ford’s film.

The story itself is a fictionalized version of one of Lincoln’s first court cases when he was a young man, not a president. Some out-of-towners get into a fight with a local brute, and when the man ends up dead, the town wants to lynch the two outsiders. Lincoln single-handedly stops the mob and agrees to defend the boys in a rousing and amusing courtroom drama. It’s complete with a few teases to his eventual wife Mary Todd and to his rival Stephen Douglas (a scene with John Wilkes Booth was cut from the film), but the film’s real charms lie in how Ford can capture the pulse of a community from this period.

“Young Mr. Lincoln” acts as a call for a more relatable leader, one who can subdue the fire of an angry crowd just through his words, but also one who will eat pies, split rails and cheat at tug of war, an average person who is in actuality extraordinary.

Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping

popstar-never-stop-never-stopping-posterIf you’re going to make a joke song, at least make it a good song. That was the sentiment the Coen Brothers had when writing “Please Mr. Kennedy,” and if The Lonely Island were around in 1960s Greenwich Village, they might’ve recorded just that. As far as fake joke bands go, no one gets more studio star power and indelible hooks to go along with their ridiculous lyrics about jizzing in pants or dicks in boxes. They do hilarious comedy but also make great music.

And in “Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping,” they’re singing about fucking Osama bin Laden and why the Mona Lisa is “an overrated piece of shit” without forgetting that they still need to make hits.

“Popstar” is the first official movie of the satirical rap trio made up of “SNL’s” Andy Samberg, Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer (the three star and co-wrote the film, with Taccone and Schaffer directing), and while it could just be their fourth album, it often plays as a Millennial version of “This is Spinal Tap.” The film’s documentary realistic style functions as a media critique as much as it does a genre parody, and it’s often so absurd it’s genius.

Samberg plays Conner4Real, one of the biggest and most influential hip hop artists in the world. Questlove, 50 Cent and Ringo Starr all sincerely confess in testimonials how his music changed their lives. The film has an autobiographical bent in that Conner got his start as part of a hip hop trio called the Style Boyz, three nerdy kids who just wanted to make music and became superstars. Conner goes solo and has a mega hit, but for his second album “Connquest,” he rejects the help of his fellow Style Boyz Owen (Taccone), now Conner’s DJ via an iPod, and Lawrence (Schaffer), who has now become a farmer and whittler in Wyoming. The documentary crew following Conner observes how both his album and tour flop as a result.

It’s not lost on the film that Samberg is 37 but plays a heartthrob who could be Justin Bieber’s age. But Samberg has an endearing, boyish charisma that he milks at every beat. He’s so confidently cool in all his mannerisms, but he’ll throw his arms out or toss his hair back in such a way that we both know he’s awesome and pretending to be a guy trying to look awesome. One song with (hologram) Adam Levine on guest vocals, “I’m So Humble,” seems to comment on how effortlessly cool he’s acting while clearly trying too hard.

Conner lives in a bubble of a Yes Men entourage, and his songs only call attention to his ignorance. One song claims to be about tolerance for same sex marriage, but in between Pink riding and singing on top of a unicorn, he interjects that he’s “Not Gay” along with quick, manly nouns like “pick up trucks” and “hot wings” to prove it.

All these songs have the outlandish production values of any one of The Lonely Island’s iconic SNL Digital Shorts, and you can imagine that perhaps multiple albums worth of material got poured into this one 86 minute movie. But what makes “Popstar” stand out as a film beyond just being a visual album (hey, if Beyonce can do it with “Lemonade”) are its merits as a commentary on pop, celebrity culture in the 21st Century.

Conner’s benchmark for success is that his album will go Gold, a never-mentioned reminder that no one buys albums anymore. He’s a compulsive oversharer on social media and believes that makes him genuine. His manager’s (Tim Meadows) bright idea is to have Conner roll out his album to play when you open the door of your refrigerator (“Nowadays if you don’t sell out, people will wonder if anyone even asked you”). And Will Arnett has a few show stealing moments riffing on TMZ’s Harvey Levin, cackling at nothing in particular and drinking constantly from obscenely sized coffee jugs.

Of course “Popstar” has perfectly bizarre, random and vulgar humor too. Conner proposes to his actress girlfriend Ashley September (Imogen Poots, hilariously ditzy) in a stunt that ends up with soul singer Seal attacked by wolves. One ingenious scene could be staged exactly the same on the radio. And what would a Lonely Island movie be without an unexpected Justin Timberlake cameo?

One of Conner’s signature career moments was a guest track he laid down called “The Catchphrase Verse.” “He was just using so many words I never heard,” says an astonished 50 Cent, including the winner “Patrick Stewart Money.” Of course, we’ve heard all these words before, and The Lonely Island have been using a variation of “The Catchphrase Verse” for years, staging absurd mashups of nouns and adjectives in order to make something dope.

For how many goofy, half-baked, sketch-sized ideas The Lonely Island pack into “Popstar,” this might just be their masterpiece.

3 ½ stars

Side by Side: Kingsman and Jupiter Ascending

The spy movie “Kingsman” and the sci-fi “Jupiter Ascending” share more in common than being B-movies.

Sometimes the hate or love for a film just doesn’t make sense. In “Kingsman: The Secret Service” and “Jupiter Ascending,” you have two wildly creative films that both look like video games, are trashy fun, feature outlandish performances and stunning special effects, and yet one is considered genuinely good and the other is a cult film, but only because it’s so terrible.

I’ll flip that script and say I believe “Jupiter Ascending” to be a genuinely good movie. Everything about “Jupiter Ascending” is bananas, but the Wachowskis have made an endlessly inventive film that begs pouring over their imagination. Channing Tatum plays a hunter spliced with the DNA of a wolf, and he sports pointed ears, a scruffy blonde goatee and gliding rocket boots, but he fights and acts with the acrobatics of Magic Mike, employing his senses and a holo shield to evaporate pale nymph monsters. Eddie Redmayne gives the definition of a scene-chewing performance, but he seems to know what movie he’s in, curling his fingers in a lilting, vampiric performance. His voice raises octaves as he strives for range, and it never grows tiresome despite how it grows out of proportion. Even the human characters on Earth are colorful, cartoonish Russian greaseballs that make the film ever livelier. And they’re matched by the CGI spectacle of lush palaces and exotic gowns that put “The Hunger Games” to shame. At the same time, we’ll see Tatum flying in front of tacky green screen backdrops made to represent the Chicago skyline, and the film’s artificiality and B-movie charm shine through.

“Kingsman” has just as many quirks and goofy scenarios that extend far beyond the realm of believability, but Matthew Vaughn, as in “Kick-Ass,” has a tendency to confuse pure lunacy and anarchy for style, and gratuitous cartoon violence for humor. “Kingsman” doesn’t actually have sensational stunts. Rather, we see a delirious whooshing of the camera (accomplished digitally) rather than traditional action editing. It allows Vaughn to whip projectiles across the room or zoom in ultra close on various gadgets. One scene has Colin Firth knocking a tooth out of a thug’s mouth, and the tooth hangs in the air in slow motion before flying past another thug’s dumbstruck face. Another is the hyper-violent bloodbath that takes place as a result of Valentine’s mind control. Is there anything about this scene that’s funny other than it’s set to the tune of the “Freebird” guitar solo? And why exactly does Samuel L. Jackson talk with a lisp in this movie?

I still had fun with both of these films, but what’s interesting is how each film approaches class dynamics. It’s rare for movies this trashy to actually have credible substance about society, and yet the fact that they do goes a long way to elevating them beyond their frivolous fun.

KSS_JB_D27_02661.CR2

Britain of course concerns itself far more with class and upbringing than Americans do generally, so perhaps in Britain this isn’t so revolutionary. But across the pond, “Kingsman” raises some interesting questions. In the film, Eggsy (Taron Egerton) comes from a working class background. When he arrives at the Kingsman training facility, all the other selected candidates are pompous, posh and preppy. They ask whether he’s an Oxford or Cambridge boy, which to anyone in England, coming from “Oxbridge” is an obvious sign of class and snobbery. The film shows that becoming a “gentleman” has little to do with your roots and everything to do with your actions. The film’s set pieces have stakes because they’re as much tests of character as they are feats of strength.

As for Jupiter (Mila Kunis) in “Jupiter Ascending,” the Wachowskis make a point to say that Jupiter was born over the Atlantic, literally without a country and that she’s “technically,” an alien. She explains how astrology has been a guiding factor in her upbringing, and each morning she complains saying, “I hate my life,” as though had she been born under different circumstances, things wouldn’t be so bad. Of course, Jupiter will find that all the wealth and royalty in the world will not make her want to change her heritage and her life.

Both evil plots are also governed by class dynamics. Valentine’s plan is to create a “culling” on Earth, in which the population whittles itself down through mass murder, leaving only the wealthy elite (like Eggsy’s privileged classmate) to survive. The culling process in “Jupiter Ascending” is a bit more sci-fi. The royal families have claims to individual planets, owning them and harvesting their resources like farms in order to extend their lives, but it’s still a process that favors the rich and treats other human beings as second class citizens made to serve.

People have been pointing to the libertarian politics in something like “Captain America: Civil War,” and yet Marvel deliberately makes their films wishy-washy and bland, scrubbed of an explicit position. The Wachowskis and Vaughn may have appeared to make innocent, meat and potatoes action films, but they’re far more sophisticated. Rather, because these are films “of the people” that reject sophistication, let’s just say they have a lot more character.

What’s my thing?

I loved Harry Potter. I read all the books as a kid multiple times through, although what kid in the early 2000s didn’t? I remember waiting in line at Target late at night to get my copy as soon as the new book became available. On long vacations, my sister and I would take turns reading a chapter at a time. For Halloween, I dressed as Harry in a custom cloak sewed by my grandmother. My friend went trick or treating with me as Ron Weasley. Sitting in the multiplex seats on opening night before one of the films, I named the four creators of the Marauder’s Map (Moody, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs) and won myself a movie poster. And when “The Prisoner of Azkaban” came out, I got a gigantic crush on Emma Watson (it hasn’t gone away).

But when I got to college, things changed. I did a story for the student newspaper about people who played in Quidditch clubs and made their own wands. Of all the sights to see in London, friends of mine went out of their way to take photos at Platform 9 & ¾. I started blocking and ignoring friends on Facebook because they constantly shared Buzzfeed articles and quizzes about what houses they belonged to, how hot Neville Longbottom has gotten, and what the entire friggin’ movie series would look like from Hermione’s point of view.

What happened? My love didn’t lessen over the years. But I clearly didn’t have this same obsession that so many others did. I was not like these people. I was not a Potterhead.

Here’s another one. I had shelves full of Legos as a kid, massive displays that I spent hours slaving over, playing with and imagining stories. But then there were the kids who created fantastic works of art with Legos that never matched the box. They attended conventions where they could practice and experiment with Lego’s robotics, spawning innovation for years to come. This wasn’t me either.

My obsession with Pokémon probably surpassed them all. I had two giant binders filled with Pokémon cards that dwarfed any collections of my friends. I’d be terrified to count just how much money my family spent on cards over the years. I loved playing the trading card game, even if my friends found it tedious. I watched the TV show religiously and poured hours into all the GameBoy games. Ash Ketchum was yet another Halloween costume of mine.

But what about the kids who competed in massive tournaments and conventions exclusively for real Pokémon masters? I never took my fandom with Pokémon beyond the backyard, but I could’ve been online at a young age, finding people all over the world who loved the game as much as I did. That didn’t happen.

The easy observation is that there will almost always be people more passionate than you about something, someone who is crazier, has gone to longer lengths, spent more money, time and effort. It’s very hard to be the absolute best at anything, be it sports, music or total fandom.

But in the 21st Century, we define ourselves not by how we dress or the games we play, but the things we share online, the arbitrary status symbols and activities that show we stand apart. If you didn’t tweet it, tag it, snap it or Instagram it, it may as well not have happened. And you must not really be a fan unless you’re on the right message boards, have the right followers on Twitter and have crafted an online presence to show how much you care.

All my life I’ve loved many things and devoted myself passionately to many hobbies, but only recently have I come to realize that I never directly aligned myself with any of these groups, subcultures, or whatever you wish to call them in 2016. I’m a film critic. That’s what I “do” but is it “my thing?”

It gets more difficult as I apply to jobs and have to work on defining my “brand” to prospective employers. Someone asked me during a job interview if I was into “nerd culture,” and I had to stumble for an answer. Sure, I know a lot about the Marvel movies, have seen most of them, am aware of some of the Easter eggs and nuances because I need to be in order to do my job. In the case of “Star Wars,” I even love it, but I’d be lying if I said I was the person most capable and interested in writing about it. That’s not my “thing.” I had to say I was a nerd for other things, like Wes Anderson and Tilda Swinton. If only fandom for those things paid the bills.

But even within film criticism, I’d be hard pressed to say I’ve carved out a niche. When people ask me what kind of movies I like, I tend to give a snarky answer and say, “I like movies that are good.” When I say that, it means I don’t have a preference for a genre, an era or a style. If a movie is well made and is interesting, I’m interested. It doesn’t even have to be “good.”

But at the same time, there are some people know the horror genre up and down, having gobbled up every junky, schlocky B-movie to come out of Fantastic Fest. Some people have watched every Bette Davis movie and have a poster of Robert Osborne up in their bedrooms (maybe).

Should I go to the trouble of sitting through every silent film I can get my hands on so that I can call myself an expert in a specific genre or medium? There’s animation, foreign films, documentaries, musicals, digital web based films, art installations, you name it. Will mastering any one of these things make me a better critic? Or more likely to get a job? Or happier? Or will I still fall into the trap of being second best?

And honestly, who has the time? I write about most movies I see, but I watch them because I want to. If I go on a Jim Jarmusch binge it’s because I’m in the mood, not because I consciously assigned myself that work. Maybe that should change.

I’ve also always learned throughout journalism school that the way to get a job is to be versatile. That means being able to write as well as do video, photos, radio, social media, etc. But it’s also meant to me that I should absorb the world broadly. I watch films of all stripes, I watch TV and listen to a ton of music. I read about politics, sports, science and even sometimes am curious about things like cooking or fashion. I tend to feel that if a movie is good enough, if an article is well written, I can get interested in anything.

I’ve been asking a lot of questions here, and I don’t necessarily mean them rhetorically. What can I do to be a better critic, scholar, fan, and even a friend?

Money Monster

Director Jodie Foster’s film challenges a sensational media and corrupt corporate culture.

moneymonstersmallShe’s as mad as hell and she isn’t going to take it anymore. Jodie Foster’s “Money Monster” (her follow-up to “The Beaver“) doubles as a media critique and a corporate screed folded into a small-scale thriller, and frankly it has just a few too many targets; “Network” meets “The Big Short” it’s not.

George Clooney plays his typical charming asshole, but this time channeling a Jim Cramer-type TV personality named Lee Gates. On his show, he makes stock tips with bells and whistles so ludicrous that his producer Patty (Julia Roberts) has accepted a job at another network and neglected to inform him. Because of the nature of the show’s stunts, a disgruntled New Yorker named Kyle (Jack O’Connell) manages to sneak onto set and hold Gates hostage with a homemade suicide vest, all while still broadcasting live. Kyle holds Gates responsible for telling his audience to invest in a company that just lost $80 million overnight due to a “computer glitch” and won’t stop until the company’s CEO (Dominic West) explains himself.

As Gates showboats with boxing gloves on the set of his show or draws voluptuous curves on an earnings graph, the movie starts to roll its eyes at itself and tacitly suggest that the sensationalism in today’s media could realistically result in such a hostage situation. But while Gates’s show resembles “Mad Money,” neither the terrorist scenario nor the Wall Street debacle necessarily feel ripped from the headlines.

Rather, “Money Monster” imagines how the world would react if such a circus took place on live TV. In between the cops plotting their rescue attempt and the corporate Communications Officer attempting to unravel the mystery of what happened to $80 million, Foster cuts away to random people watching TV in bars and coffee shops. Those in suits on Wall Street smirk and laugh, while others keep ordering drinks and playing foosball. To them it’s just another reality show.

The screenplay’s commentary (co-written by Jamie Linden, Alan DiFiore and Jim Kouf) has some interesting ideas, but flounders compared to the humanity Foster is able to wring from these characters. O’Connell’s character especially displays a lot of range, quickly moving from a deranged maniac with a manifesto to someone relatable and pitiable. And Clooney has to face the realization on live TV that his flashy personality and surface level charm may not be worth a thing.

If “Network” has become a classic, it’s because its sensationalized version of the media all came true. It has aged with shocking poignancy and clairvoyance. “Money Monster” may even be an entertaining drama, but when it hops on the soapbox and condemns a fishy stock market and fixed legal system, it already feels outdated.

2 ½ stars