Home-vid debut for old-fashioned, don't-miss, highly collaborative film, THE ETRUSCAN SMILE

One of those rare examples of a huge international collaboration -- an Israeli directing duo (Oded Binnun and Mihal Brezis, shown below, with Ms Brezis on the left), five screen-writers adapting a popular Spanish novel by José Luis Sampedro, filmed in Scotland and San Francisco and featuring actors from both sides of the Atlantic -- THE ETRUSCAN SMILE works better than you could possibly imagine, thanks to the skill, talent and sheer love gifted by everyone involved. Sure, the plot is probably as recycled as anything you've lately (or formerly) seen, yet every would-be cliche is either turned a tad askew or simply brought to such pulsating and believable life that you don't simply go along with it, you fucking embrace it.

Let's start with the movie's star, Brian Cox (at top and below): If this versatile and amazing actor is not considered one of England's "national treasures," along with the likes of Maggie Smith or Judi Dench, it must only be because he has fought so long and hard for Scottish independence from Britain. Here he plays an aging fellow named Rory, diagnosed with a disease for which he must travel from his home on the beautiful coast of Scotland to the USA for proper treatment, and to the San Francisco home of his estranged son, his daughter-in-law and his new grandson. Yes, you can easily predict the outcome, but getting there is so filled with beauty, fun, small surprises and spot-on performances that it's the journey, as they say, and not destination that proves most important.

Mr. Cox, utterly penetrating, specific and aglow -- whether he's the star bad guy, as in the current series Succession; a mere supporting player, as in the recent what's-going-on-here? thriller Last Moment of Clarity; or merely the best Winston Churchill I've yet seen -- adds luster to anything in which he appears. He's also a gracious, giving actor who never seems to "hog" the screen. Consequently, all the supporting performers shine, too, including the very fine JJ Feild (below, right, one of the great movie villains in the delightful and under-rated thriller, Not Safe for Work) and Thora Birch (below, left) as, respectively, the son and daughter-in-law.

Rosanna Arquette (below, left) is lovely, too, as a museum official and unexpected romantic interest, while actors like Peter Coyote (at center, two photos below) and Treat Williams (three photos below) bring the necessary professional-polish-plus to their roles.

Sub-plots such as the son's wanna-be chef career, the protection and survival of original Scots languages, and the too-helicopter parenting of that grandson are nicely woven into the whole, so the movie bounces along beautifully throughout.

Speaking of that grandson, TrustMovies does not usually have all that much to say about performances by very young children, but the little boy in The Etruscan Smile (shown at bottom and played by two youngsters, Oliver Epps and Elliot Epps) is as adorable as any kid this age I've seen on film.

My spouse noted that the filmmakers must have spent literally days and days getting all this amazing footage of the child. Either that, or those Epps toddlers are just naturally happy little scene stealers.

A word also must be said the for the sparkling and often gorgeous widescreen cinematography (by the great Javier Aguirresarobe) whose exteriors or Scotland (above) and interiors of lush apartments and/or museums (below) help make this a don't-want-to-take-your-eyes-off-it movie experience.

It is also a very moving one. We were not dried-eyed by the finale, nor do I suspect you will be. But all your attention here, as well as your smiles and tears, are well earned. This is old-fashioned, classy, story-well-told moviemaking at its finest.

From Lightyear Entertainment, running 107 minutes and distributed in the USA via MVD Entertainment Group, The Etruscan Smile, after a virtual theatrical release in April and May, is available now on home video via DVD, Blu-ray and digital streaming. 

DE PALMA lovers, rejoice! Get your fill of the guy in Baumbach and Paltrow's new doc

TrustMovies loves the work of Brian De Palma. And he's never found the man's films to be misogynist, either. They're too clever and artful for that. I have found Hitchcock to be misogynist, however, and De Palma thinks of himself as Hitch's true disciple. So go figure. Anyone who enjoys this particular movie-maker's oeuvre is a sitting duck for DE PALMA, the new documentary about the filmmaker (from Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow) that combines a kind of history of the man and his movies with enough footage from the various films to make you want (if you're a fan, of course) to go back and view them all over again. (If you're too young to know this director's work, the documentary ought to least whet your appetite for a further look.)

Baumbach (at right) and Paltrow (left) flank the famous filmmaker (shown above and on poster, top), and their movie evidently came out of one very long lunch (or maybe several), during which the director spills the beans about one after another of his films, starting from his very first short (a still from his early Greetings is shown below) and continuing right through his latest, visually stunning (but only middling otherwise) French movie remake, Passion. Along the way we get bits and pieces of De Palma's life, loves and desires -- which may not definitively explain the psychology behind his movies but which do provide some zesty food-for-thought -- and enough well-chosen moments from his many movies (40 of 'em, all told) to absolutely delight us fans.

There's plenty of gossip, too -- tales that can now, evidently, be told. Did you know, for instance, that actor Cliff Robertson was pretty much forced upon the director for his movie Obsession, and what De Palma tells about the work habits of Mister Cliff quite nicely explains the movie's half-assedness and why it so thoroughly belonged to its lovely newcomer co-star, Geneviève Bujold.

Scarface (above), though one of the filmmaker's more successful box-office draws, has never been among the movies I love. (It seem less like "a De Palma film" than do most of his others.) Hearing the director talk about the film makes me better understand why I feel this way. Ditto, his most successful box-office outing, the initial Mission Impossible movie, below.  (How he feels about movie "car chases" is one of the things you'll learn from the doc.)

De Palma, more than anyone, I think, was responsible for the resurgence of the career of movie composer Bernard Herrmann, and we learn some fascinating tidbits about this fellow, along with that of another composer used often by the master: Pino Donaggio.

Keepers like Dressed to Kill (above), Blow Out and Body Double (god, this guy loves watching!) are all on the agenda, too, as are some movies you may have forgotten. Was Snake Eyes the last good film that Nicolas Cage starred in?  And it is certainly time for a re-think of Femme Fatale. (below). What fun that one was, and its cunning use of the Cannes Film Fest was about as savvy as movies get.

How much better Fatal Attraction might have been had De Palma directed it, as was initially expected. But then we might not have gotten his best (along with Carlito'sWay) mainstream movie, The Untouchables (below). This doc will have you believing in karma, maybe.

The director has something vital and interesting to say about every last one of his films (his comments on Mission to Mars are smart and poignant). My biggest problem with De Palma -- the doc, not the director -- is that, even at almost two hours, it ought to have been a lot longer. Surely what we see here is but a fraction of the footage Jake and Noah shot. Maybe, even now, the film's distributor A24 (or some special movie "angel") is bankrolling the eight-hour version, which we will someday be able to view in segments on IFC or Turner Classic Movies. We live in hope.

Meanwhile, De Palma, after opening in New York and Los Angeles, hits cities around the country. Here in South Florida, you can see it at the Miami Beach Cinematheque. To view all currently scheduled playdates, cities and  theaters, click here.  (The still above is from Redacted, in which the director did for our Iraq War what his Casualties of War had done for Vietnam.)

Blunt's sharp as THE YOUNG VICTORIA in Jean-Marc Valée's intelligent film

How good are Emily Blunt in the title role and Rupert Friend as the German royal fellow who quietly becomes indispensable to her in THE YOUNG VICTORIA, the new history-over-lightly film by Jean-Marc Valée (shown below)? Very, very. These two actors -- one under-rated (Mr. Friend) and the other usually given her due -- are so fine, separately or together, that they offer the moment-to-moment specificity and strength needed to bring to life M. Valée's pretty much by-the-numbers rendition of the early days of England's most beloved Queen.

I don't mean to put down Valée's work-
manlike but effective job. He does what must be done in 100 minutes to make his movie mainstream, Masterpiece Theater-level entertainment (the equally efficient screenplay is from Julian Fellowes). It looks good, features a host of fine actors all doing a fine job, and tells an interesting story -- selecting its moments wisely to put together a picture of why and how a young and not-just-sheltered but deliberately-repressed girl found the strength and smarts to begin her rule.

Valée comes from a much-loved but little seen (in the U.S.) French-Canadian movie called C.R.A.Z.Y., which, in the subject, time and tone, would seem about as far from The Young Victoria as possible. Which makes this director a very interesting choice. How did the producers realize that he could handle all this: the sets and locations, the actors, the story, the time-frame, the works? He's done it, I think, by hitting all the notes that make up the standard-issue bio-pic, but just hitting them a little better, sometimes harder, than usual. He uses certain cliches -- soaring music, for instance -- in a damn-the-torpedo manner that works surprisingly well. It would take actors as strong as Ms Blunt (above, right) and Mr. Friend (above, left) to compete with this sort of thing, but by god they do -- and win.

He has drawn superb performances from his two leads. Blunt is always first-class, and here she captures both the character's vulnerability and her slowly growing strength. "I'm stronger than I look," she says at one point, and, boy, do we believe it. Friend is a more versatile actor than he is given credit for being: a sweetie pie in Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont, he switched to action hero for The Last Legion and a callow youth in Chéri. Here, as the smitten but uncertain suitor for Victoria's hand (and not the one favored by the powers-that-be) he's better than ever.

In the supporting cast, many shine: Paul Bettany, Miranda Rich-
ardson (center, in chartreuse), Jim Broadbent, Mark Strong (left), Harriet Walter and Thomas Kretschmann, to name a few. You'll pretty much know what you're in for when you sit down to watch The Young Victoria, but this does not mean that you won't be able to simply scrunch down in the chair, relax and enjoy every minute.

The new distribution firm Apparition (nice name!) is handling the movie. Over the past few months, it has given us Bright Star, Black Dynamite, the Boondock Saints sequel and now this one. Was ever a new distributor more diverse? We shall continue to watch this little company with much anticipation. Meanwhile, The Young Victoria opens in major cities across the U.S. on Friday, December 18. Click here and then insert your home zip code to learn if the film is playing near you.