CAPITAL IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY: Justin Pemberton's necessary documentary of Thomas Piketty's even more necessary book

If ever a tome was needed to help correct the world's ever-growing inequality between the wealthy and the rest, it was Thomas Piketty's CAPITAL IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY, published in French in 2013 and the following year in an English-language translation.

Though an immediate best-seller internationally, TrustMovies suspects it was one of those books more talked about than actually read by the intelligent masses (yup, I didn't read it either). For those of us who didn't -- and even maybe for those who did -- here comes the movie version (a documentary, 'natch) directed by Justin Pemberton that, after a bit of a shaky start, goes on to become one of those must-see movies that may change the attitude of many lucky enough to view it.

Mr. Pemberton (shown at left), along with M. Piketty (shown below), make

their point via history, economics, statistics and even psychology. Regarding that last, the experiment shown here involving wealth, entitlement and the results of a Monopoly game played without anything resembling a level playing field should open your eyes and leave your mouth agape. That aforementioned point is how hugely the gap in western countries between the very wealthy and the remaining populace continues to widen -- along with how unhealthy this situation clearly is.

Piketty, who, along with Pemberton and Matthew Metcalfe, adapted his own book to the screen, has certainly managed to make his information come across as intelligent, important and more than a little timely.

It is Piketty himself who acts as initial narrator, speaking to us in French (with English subtitles) and popping up from time to time, along with a number of other smart, well-spoken talking heads (including economic analyst Rana Foroohar, above) who, together, make a very good case for why this enormous income disparity is so destructive for so many.

Initially, the documentary took some time to involve me and to lift off. I suspect this is because the film spends a good half hour offering a look at history and telling us things that, if we've also seen other fine docs such as Capitalism and No Gods, No Masters, we'll already know. Add to this, Mr. Pemberton's penchant for filling up the screen with so much of everything as to be distracting (see above and below).

Yet, as Capital in the Twenty-First Century moves along, it gathers such a head of steam that is soon becomes so vitally interesting and packed with more and more with succulent examples and pertinent information that, once finished, you may want to watch it all over again, just to make sure you got the whole thing.

By the time it gets to -- and sticks with -- this twenty-first century,  you'll be absolutely hooked, as Piketty and company explore everything from globalization and its discontents to the country of China (above) -- and why the Chinese (below) are faring better than are we in the west.

This is not simply a slap on the wrist or some dire warning without an accompanying solution. Piketty offers some good ones -- involving taxation and the monitoring of offshore tax havens, among others. Yes, this'll take work. But what that is worthwhile does not?

More to the point, this change demands both the will and the work. But with so many of our current politicians (just as those of the past, above) --- of either stripe -- in hock to the wealthy and the corporate, will and work are, as ever, in short supply. And now we have the current Corona virus to makes it all more difficult. Still, this is a documentary that demands to be seen, discussed and acted upon. We shall see.

From Kino Lorber and running 103 minutes, Capital in the Twenty-First Century was supposed to open theatrically this Friday, April 3 (click here, then click on PLAYDATES, to see the should-have-been theatrical venues). If not available theatrically, surely the film will soon be seen via digital streaming. I'll try to keep you posted with any updates here....

Hayek & Lithgow shine in Miguel Arteta & Mike White's timely triumph, BEATRIZ AT DINNER

Maybe it's simply a matter of these deadly and trying times, but so many movies suddenly seem to address this era of our would-be dictator Donald Trump and his slovenly, bought-out Congress -- either obliquely, in tales that deal with how the refusal to take responsibility for one's actions results in terrible pain and tragedy for others, as in the film I covered this past Saturday (Moka) and the one I will cover tomorrow (Harmonium), or directly, as with the documentary my colleague Lee Liberman posted on yesterday (Get Me Roger Stone) and today's dynamite offering, BEATRIZ AT DINNER, brought to us by a continually expansive and growing pair of filmmakers, director Miguel Arteta and writer Mike White (shown below, with White on the left, Arteta at center, and the star of their new film, Salma Hayek, on the right).

Mr. Arteta has given us so many good and interesting movies and television work -- from Chuck & Buck through The Good Girl and Getting On -- while White continues to amaze via his own deceptively deep and not-so-easy-to-pigeonhole humor, versatility and commitment (Chuck & Buck, The Good Girl, School of Rock, and especially that amazing HBO series, Enlightened). With Beatriz at Dinner, which has not a little in common with Enlightened, the two come together with one of their finest, most elegant and on-the-nose collaborations yet.

What White and Arteta have done is to set up a near-perfect situation involving -- if you chose to see it this way -- class, race, economics and politics, resulting in an, again, near-perfect showdown of, well, good versus evil. Good comes in the form of our heroine, Beatriz, played with such clear-hearted concern for humanity together with quiet fire and determination by Ms Hayek, that her character becomes instantly classic. When the name Beatriz is uttered henceforth, it'll be of this character that most moviegoers will immediately think. (For a quick but surprisingly full look at the versatility, not to mention beauty and talent, of Ms Hayek, I'd recommend a viewing of this film, together with Everly and As Luck Would Have It: two movies that show quite different sides of this actress.

Once the filmmakers set up their situation -- a dinner party whose wealthy, entitled guests include the kind of genuinely successful and powerful businessman that Donald Trump has long aspired (but failed utterly) to be. That's right: No bankruptcies and consistent loses for this guy. And yet, this powerhouse, quite properly named Doug Strutt, has also consistently despoiled the environment and caused various unwelcome diasporas around the globe. Strutt is played by John Lithgow (above), giving yet another of this actor's remarkable performances, and he is a fine and uber-nasty/intelligent example of major evil in today's world, as well as exactly the right foil for Hayek's Beatriz

How these two meet, match and go at it is set up so efficiently, cleverly and quickly that before we know it, we're neck-deep in the kind of situation and question that is on the mind of anyone who has considered the world at large, the haves and have-nots, climate change, and the continuing polarization of wealth and poverty in the western countries (it's always been there in those third-world spots).

The dinner party's host and hostess (David Warshofsky and Connie Britton, above, left and right, respectively) are initially welcoming (she much more than he) but as tempers rise and truth faces down power, they must honor their own needs above all else. Also present is the developer (Jay Duplass, below, center, right) who has put together an important project that Strutt is bankrolling, his date (a high-level PR person played by Chloë Sevigny), and Strutt's current significant other (Amy Landecker). Plus, of course, the hired help on the host/hostesses' staff.

Each actor has the chance to shine a bit, given White' cleverly unshowy but pungent dialog that never stoops to the kind of cheap and obvious laughs in which another recent popular and critically acclaimed rich-white-people-as-hosts movie, Get Out, indulges. And while the filmmakers hand us their situation all wrapped in a beautiful box with ribbon and bow, they choose not to solve this great world problem for us.

Oh, they certainly offer a couple of options, one of which you will not be able to nay-say too strongly, given how the movie develops. They make that particular option seems awfully inviting and, in fact, maybe the only legitimate way to proceed. Or not. One of the frustrating strengths of Beatriz at Dinner is that it forces us to consider all this in a manner that proves much more than mere "movie fodder." The film brings us face to face with a question most of us would prefer not to have to answer: What responsibility do we have as individuals for what is happening to our country and to our world?

Via the character of Beatriz, together with Ms Hayek's fine performance, we get a strong glimpse of believable and genuine spirituality of the sort seldom encountered on screen. (How White & Arteta set up Beatriz's character so eloquently and immediately in the movie's initial scene is exemplary.) Yet it this very spirituality that, in the end, probably prevents the kind of action necessary to counter the evil on display. As my friend and co-writer Lee Liberman asked at the end of yesterday's post:
Other suggestions? 

From Roadside Attractions and running a sleek and highly serviceable 83 minutes, the movie, after opening last weekend in our nation's cultural/entertainment centers, hits others cities in the days to come. Here in the South Florida area, it will open in the Miami areas at Regal's South Beach 18, the Landmark at Merrick Park 7, AMC's Aventura Mall 24 and Sunset Place 24; in  Ft. Lauderdale at The Classic Gateway; and in Boca Raton at the Cinemark Palace 20 and Regal Shadowood 16. On Friday, June 23, it will hit Miami's O Cinema. To see all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters, click here and then click on GET TICKETS.

Alex Gibney goes up against the 1 % -- in PARK AVENUE: Money, Power and the American Dream

Time tends to move very fast where political documen-taries are concerned. What only a year ago seemed super-hot and current, now can have us musing, "Well, we know all this already..." In the case of PARK AVENUE: Money, Power and the American Dream, the docu-mentary by the award-winning and hugely prolific Alex Gibney -- who in but the nine years since his breakout hit Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, has made some 21 further documentaries, including the much-heralded Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God and the Oscar-winning Taxi to the Dark Side -- we probably don't know all of this. Still, a good deal of it is indeed old news. However, in the case of how the income gap between the one percent and the rest of us continues to widen, this information cannot be stated -- or, hello, acted upon in some manner -- often enough.

So watching this film by Mr. Gibney, shown at left, is initially interesting in the way he contrasts New York's Park Avenue of Manhattan -- on which street live those who possess the most money of any citizens in the entire U.S.A. -- with the Park Avenue that continues up through Spanish Harlem (where TrustMovies lived for a time during the late 1980s) and across the bridge into the South Bronx, where the inhabitants are among the poorest in the nation. That there is something wrong here seems, well, under-stated in the extreme. Seeing the interiors of the Park Avenue apartments and what we used to refer to as "how the other half lives" (the other half? Things really have changed), is fun in a bizarre sort of way, as is the history of some of these buildings on the Avenue, such as 740 Park Avenue (aka 71 East 71st Street, shown below and further below) -- the edifice that, along with its super-wealthy occupants, receives the most attention here.

These "two" Park Avenues carry the theme of Gibney's doc, as the filmmaker asks if there's a snowball's chance in hell that folk from the upper end of that Avenue, under the system of government we now have, could ever hope to do more than work as doormen or cleaners for those on the Manhattan side. Doormen, in fact, figure prominently in the film. Gibney interviews one fellow who used to work at 740 Park Avenue (disguised in visage and voice, of course), and what we learn is unpleasant but rather expected, particularly in terms of what one of the uber-wealthy Koch brothers gives as a Christmas gratuity. Gee, it's the same as what my ex-wife and I (of the awfully middle-class) used to give, over 25 years ago, during the short time I lived in a doorman building.

The movie goes again into Ayn Rand and Paul Ryan (what a hot pair!) and some of the other subjects that came up prior to the last Presidential election, and we view charts and graphs (as below) about that ever widening income gap. Notes one talking head: "The poor are not very well represented in our system of government." Why? asks the filmmaker. "Because of the decline and destruction of unions," comes the reply. On that note we see what governor Scott Walker has been doing in and to Wisconsin, and hear from, among others, a husband and wife team of teachers in that state.

We also see how the wealthy like to take hold of middle-class resentment and point it downward toward the poor, rather than upward toward themselves, where it should be placed. Even if you will already know much of what Mr. Gibney has assembled here, it's salutary to be reminded of it all over again. As is pointed out along the way, when you hear folk like the Koch brothers, Stephen A. Schwarzman (whom we see a lot of here), politicians like Michele Bachmann and Eric Cantor, and yes, especially New York's own "Democratic" senator Chuck Schumer (who has kept the "carried interest" loophole safe for the wealthy) talk about "freedom," what they manage to leave out is that this freedom is available mostly for our billionaires. Simply hearing the disgraced ex-lobbyist Jack Abramoff (below) talk about how the collusion works between industry, the wealthy and our government is worth the price of admission.

You can view Park Avenue: Money, Power & the American Dream (which was shown on PBS' Independent Lens) via Netflix's streaming service. It's worth a watch and runs only a short 71 minutes.

Nicole Holofcener's PLEASE GIVE: yet another terrific ensemble movie -- this time with NYC at its center

Boobs galore -- and Rebecca Hall!

Both men and women moviegoers will have their own reasons for loving PLEASE GIVE. Mine begin with Ms Hall and the fact that writer/director Nicole Holofcener (shown just below) begins her swift, intelligent, funny and moving movie with the fe-
male breast, objec-
tified in a manner we have seldom seen. What fun -- and how bracing to be brought up so short!  But back to Ms Hall (shown at left, two photos down). This top-notch British actress, daughter of theater director Peter Hall, is simply so good: versatile and beautiful and able to transform herself visually from the inside, an ability I believe that few actors possess, or perhaps care to make use of.  (This gift/talent may not be the best means of becoming a "star," as audiences will not immediately recognize
you from role to role.)

Beginning with Starter for Ten (a lovely little movie you really should see, which also remains one of James McAvoy's best), this actress (shown below, at left) has kept impressing and growing, from The Prestige to Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Frost/Nixon to The Red Riding Trilogy and now this.  (Her perfect American accent's pretty amazing, too.)  Mousy, lonely and a little sad, her character, which in this film bears her own name, grounds the movie immediately; we feel for her, big-time. In fact, it is she, a radiology technician (that's how we see all those breasts) whom we first meet, and who, via her halting but insistent manner, connects us emotionally to the film and its many other characters.

These includes Rebecca's sister Mary (Amanda Peet, shown above, right), who gives facials for a living, and their angry and depressed grandmother Andra (Ann Guilbert); their next-door neighbors, a mom (Holofcener regular Catherine Keener, below left) and dad (Oliver Platt, below, right) who are estate sale mavens (they buy home furnishings to resell at a handy profit) and their chubby, pimply and still adorable teenage daughter Abby (Sarah Steele, two photos, below).  From this odd mix, the movie-maker creates jarring, humorous, sad but always recognizable New York City life.

Also on hand are Lois Smith, as the subject of one of Rebecca's breast x-rays, and her grandson, played by Thomas Ian Nicholas.  Every one, as you might expect in a cast this well-chosen, is first-rate. Each plays well within the ensemble but manages to stand out by creating a rich, full character.  As terrific as they are all, it is likely that Ms Guilbert, as Grandma (shown at bottom) will prove most memorable -- because she's so unusually dark and sad.

How wonderful to watch a writer/director continue to grow, as Ms Holofcener keeps doing.  Please Give is her best yet, as it tackles everything from an approaching death to the need (from guilt, of course, but also from a genuine, heartfelt place) to give to others less fortunate.  Still, there are all sorts of ways to give -- and to be "less fortunate," as daughter Abby is happy to point out.  Yes, there's a taste of Woody Allen here, but the tone is warmer and the one-liners, thankfully, much less frequent.

"Doing the right thing" often surfaces in the filmmaker's work, as I think it does in the mind of many of us, and Holofcener understands the complexity of this task, finding all the grit, pain and humor in trying to get it right.  Her dialog is great: specific, real and about so many different things.  And the little dance these characters do as they move around each other is quite sophisticated (not on their part but that of the filmmaker).  The view of life shown here is as wise in its way as, say, that of Max Ophuls -- but far more off-the-cuff and less stylish.

The movie will certainly do well, I should think, in urban locations (and L.A., of course), but I'd love it if it also drew some audiences in the hinterlands.  It would be nice for them to see us New Yorkers in our -- neurotic, yes, but also -- "everyday and accessible" mode.

Please Give, from Sony Pictures Classics, begins its nationwide limited-release rollout on Friday, April 30.