Investigating ambient sounds while creating some ravishing visuals: Michael Tyburski and Ben Nabors' THE SOUND OF SILENCE

I think a warning is in order here: If you insist on your movies being tidy and never open-ended, then perhaps move on to your next film of interest. THE SOUND OF SILENCE, a new American independent from co-writer (with Ben Nabors) and director Michael Tyburski is so small, quiet (even in its loud-sound moments) and unassuming that many folk will probably pass it right by. For those of us, however, who want something different that can engage our minds -- and even, dare I say it, our souls -- this oddball little movie is quite something else.

Misters Tyburski (shown at right) and Nabors have contrived a tale of a fellow named Peter (played by the inestimable Peter Sarsgaard, on poster above and in the final two photos, below) who is enamored of sounds -- together with the ways in which they form patterns that help contain and/or control our lives. He makes his living helping folk in need. In fact, he is, as his invoice puts it, a "house tuner" who discovers what, in various apartments and homes, is amiss and depriving his clients of sleep, energy, or general well-being.

Peter has been so successful, in fact, that no less than The New Yorker has profiled the guy. Yet regarding his latest client, Ellen Chasen (Rashida Jones, two photos down, giving another of her lovely, understated performances), something has gone amiss, and Peter seems unable to help her much.

Along with all this comes our protagonist's own need for some kind of acceptance from his peers and the scientific community; instead, it is only the marketing community that seems keen on using him and his work.

As Peter negotiates everything from a very personal kind of industrial espionage to his relationship with Ellen, the movie moves slowly yet entrancingly along, as viewers become immersed in this fellow's world of sound -- and the filmmaker's world of visuals which, it seems to TrustMovies, echoes in its own way that special sound experience.

Tyburski and his cinematographer (Eric Lin) show us a universe of patterns of every sort, in the design of both architecture and nature, and these take us with Peter on his journey, while consistently giving us something unusual, beautiful and a just a bit confounding to view as we listen.

Fuss has been made about the film's refusal to guide us definitely toward an understanding of things -- of whether Peter is brilliant or simply befuddled, whether his ideas are right or wrong, whether he and Ellen will get together, whether his scientific peers are on base or off, whether or not that marketing concern has ripped him off. So what?

If everything's up in the air, still, it surely does sound good -- and look even better. The fine supporting cast includes the likes of Austin Pendleton and Tony Revolori, both of whom add their own special, on-the-nose talents to this unusual mix.

From IFC Films and running just 87 minutes, the movie opened this past Friday, September 13, in New York City at the IFC Center and in Los Angeles at Laemmle's Royal. Simultaneously it will be available nationwide via VOD.

Solitude in company: Thomas Stuber's original, bittersweet and beautiful IN THE AISLES

It may not be the first film to adapt a Strauss waltz to an unusual visual, but for the most part IN THE AISLES, the new film from Thomas Stuber (he directed and co-wrote it with Clemens Meyer), is an original work of humanist art.

Beginning with its locale -- a kind of German version of Costco during, mostly, the graveyard shift -- the movie introduces a set of characters who slowly grow on you until you come to love them and want to care for them as though they were your very own.

Mr. Stuber, shown at right, takes his sweet time with all of this, so if you demand action and car chases, do please move along. Yet as quiet as all this is, it is also never for a moment boring.

This is due to a screenplay that doles out its information haltingly and pretty much in the manner that these characters themselves would offer it. They don't like to intrude -- on each other or even, it seems, on themselves.

The actors chosen for these roles are very good indeed, and even if you've seen them previously, the characters they play here will seem ideally matched with the performers.

The young man who acts as a kind of guide for us -- because, as the film begins, he is being trained for his first day on the job -- is Christian, played by Franz Rogowski (above, of Transit and Happy End). The object, soon, of Franz's affection is a pert and pretty co-worker named Marion (Sandra Hüller, below, of Toni Erdmann) .

Our "newbie" (Marion's pet name for Christian) is under the tutelage of long-time employee Bruno, whose initial gruff manner belies a sad heart of gold. As played by Peter Kurth, below, left -- the lead villain (one of them, anyway) from Babylon Berlin -- Bruno is a wonderful character, rich, deep and quiet, and one who grows and grows on us, until....

All of the night shift employees, no matter how small the role, are brought to fine and specific life here. Eventually this small group and its place of work becomes a world in itself, one that we are only too happy to abide in for the 125 minutes we're allowed to. In the Aisles proves a small, alternately bright and dark, wonder.

From Music Box Films, in German with English subtitles, the movie opens this Friday, June 14, in New York City at the Village East Cinema, and in Los Angeles on Friday, June 21, at Laemmle's Royal and on June 21 and over the weeks to come expanding to another 15 cities and theaters, including the Bill Cosford Cinema here in the Miami area on July 5. Click here, then scroll down to click on Theatrical Engagements to view all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters.

Want to learn about the life of J.R.R. Tolkien? Try Dome Karukoski's quietly compelling film

I think by now we know, when we watch a bio-pic (about almost anyone at all) that facts are going to be fudged and events and characters telescoped into whatever needs the filmmakers think they face. So it is with the new movie about the life of fabled author, South African-born J.R.R. Tolkien, who was educated in and lived most of his life on British soil.

Prior to the actual screening of the film, as the audience at a preview event sat waiting, on the screen flashed the history of this man in maybe a dozen or so individual written installments. But then, of course, the movie that followed this did not always adhere to the historical timeline we were given just moments before that movie began screening.

Still, TOLKIEN, written by David Gleeson and Stephen Beresford and directed by Dome Karukoski (shown at right, of Tom of Finland fame), proves consistently interesting and, as it slowly moves along, finally pretty compelling. Tolkien's real-life tale is mostly quiet and rather sad, with he and his younger brother orphaned at a relatively early age and placed in the care of a Catholic priest. And though the movie is being billed as rather a love story, it's the relationship between Tolkien and his three much-loved school chums (below) that finally raises the movie's temperature and major emotions.

Tolkien is played -- quite well, too -- by Nicholas Hoult (above, left, and below), while those chums are essayed by Anthony Boyle (center left), Patrick Gibson (center right) and Tom Glynn-Carney (right), each of whom makes his character specific and as memorable as possible, given their limited screen time.

The love interest is played (as an adult) by Lily Collins (below), who is pretty but a bit wan here (she registers much more strongly in Netflix's new Ted Bundy movie, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile). The romance is shown to be important in Tolkien's life, yet the movie comes to strongest life in the scenes between Tolkien and his mates,

and in the marvelous entry of Derek Jacobi, below, right, as the Oxford professor who mentors our hero (according to what we see here, the two men seems to have mentored each other). Jacobi's lengthy and delicious monolog about trees proves the movie's consummate treat -- as intelligent and witty as it is germane to Tolkien and his work.

The movie is at its weakest whenever the filmmakers decide they must show us the connections (as below) between the man and his writing, with really pretty silly images of dragons and monsters (which of course will bring to mind The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings). Yes, World War I was awful and, yes, the man was influenced by it, but what we get here is obvious, clunky and unnecessary.

Visually, the movie is often quite verdant and lovely (as below), and Karukoski and his cinematographer (Lasse Frank Johannessen) also capture some images of the war that are startling and darkly memorable.

Overall, the slow pace of the film probably means it will appeal mostly to folk who don't mind this lack of action and of course to those fans of Peter Jackson's hit films who might like to know more about the life of the interesting guy who created the initial work.

In any case, Tolkien, via Fox Searchlight and running 112 minutes, opens nationwide tomorrow, Friday, May 10. To find the theater(s) nearest you, simply click here.