Stream Clio Barnard's THE SELFISH GIANT -- which is even better than you've heard

A movie, the power of which acumulates into something approaching tragedy -- not in the classic rendition of hubris and great men brought low, but in the even deeper experience of characters like us, who possess possibilities, being robbed of them and finally of an entire society sinking unnecessarily into the chasm -- THE SELFISH GIANT is British filmmaker Clio Barnard's follow-up to her unusual The Arbor. It is, first to last, a marvelous, engrossing, enlightening piece of work. Said to be inspired by Oscar Wilde's children's tale of the same name, though I defy you to connect all the dots that led from the story to the movie (doesn't matter, for I believe the spirit of the story is captured by the film), Barnard tells the tale of two young chums, both with problems, physical and/or behavioral, trying to make a go of it in a highly depressed area of Britain.

The writer/director's work here (Ms Barnard is shown at left) is quite unlike that of  The Arbor,  with its layers of irony and distancing. Instead, she has chosen to tell the tale from the viewpoint of the two boys, and from her screen newcomers, she has drawn the kind of near-perfect performances you don't often see, even from adult Oscar winners, let alone kids like these. There is not a false moment in either of their work, and if you might have a question about a bit else that goes on here (the confession/ apology from the film's "giant," a scrap metal dealer played very well by Sean Gilder, you won't be able to find fault with the two boys, played magnificently by Connor Chapman (below, left) and Shaun Thomas (below, right).

Mr. Chapman, in particular, is amazing as Arbor (odd name for a boy, but it does call to mind Ms Barnard's last film): tow-headed, small, scrappy, smart and asthmatic, his energy level is as enormous as it is put generally to ill use. He's always finding ways to scam. But, then, what else is available to poor kids in this depressed economic environment?

As his pal Swifty, young Mr. Thomas is equally fine. Slower than Arbor in nearly all ways, his innate kindness always shines forth. His love for and understanding of horses proves a saving grace, as that scrap metal dealer also deals in trotting races and ends up using Swifty as his jockey.

The Gilder character's preference for Swifty over Arbor also leads to understandable jealousy which finally takes form in action, leading to a truly awful consequence. The compact film, just 90 minutes in length, is psychologically, sociologically and economically sound, and it is formed so cunningly that we follow it as we would a suspense drama.

The Selfish Giant is also a beautiful film in its way. The countryside is hardly lush, yet we experience, as do the boys, the joy of being outside in it and away from the family problems -- drugs, alcohol, abuse -- that both kids endure.

Normally I worry about over-praising certain films, but I don't think this could even be a problem here -- so right in all regards is Ms Barnard's approach and execution. This is a small film that never tries to be any more than it is. But what it is turns out to be extraordinary.

At the end we're left with the question: How do we make this sort of thing not happen? There are ways. Time to get started. (If only the world had much time left before climate change begins eradicating us all.)

The Selfish Giant -- from Sundance Selects and Protagonist Pictures -- out now on DVD, is also streamable via Netflix streaming.  (If you get the DVD, as I did -- before I knew the film was streamable -- watch the Bonus features. These will add even more to your understanding and enjoyment.)

In DISCONNECT Andrew Stern/Henry Alex Rubin connect with the way we live now

The kind of movie that the Oscar-winning Crash might have been (had it been a good film and not so bang-your-head obvious), DISCONNECT is one of those people-are-connected movies in which the connections are made relatively intelligently and believably, while the behavior of the people involved stays centered and on-course, even as events escalate enormously and precipitously. Writer Andrew Stern and director Henry Alex Rubin get a lot of things right in their telling of these interconnected tales -- both the little details (mistakes in typing while texting) and the larger picture (how a TV news story blossoms into a career-changing thing for the reporter/newscaster, even as it threatens the life of its subject).

The filmmakers (that's director Rubin, shown at right) also manage to hit dead center three major problems society is having to deal with currently, due to the rise in the use and importance of the internet -- online porn and sex for sale, bullying in school via photos and information that can reach a huge audience almost instantly, and identity theft and credit-card/bank-account heists via emails and surreptitiously embedded malware -- together with other problems that have been around for a good long time: parent-child lack of communication and how ambition can color and upend our sense of right and wrong.

The four stories that intertwine barely or forcefully include those of a family of four played by Jason Bateman (above, center) and Hope Davis (above, left--who's a brunette!) as the parents and Jonah Bobo and Haley Ramm (above, right) as their kids; ex-Marine (Alexander Skarsgård, below, left), his wife (Paula Patton, below, right) and her internet pal (Michael Nyqvist);

and ex-policeman dad (a particularly good performance from Frank Grillo) and his technically-savvy but initially empathy-challenged son (Colin Ford); and that TV reporter and the very young man she connects with online who is selling sex. In the role of the newscas-ter/journalist, British actress Andrea Riseborough (below, left, and just seen a week or so back in Welcome to the Punch) does a terrific job, not just of convincing us that she works on American TV but also that she would cut corners morally and journalistically to get this particular story that involves the gorgeous and hunky young man played by Max Thieriot (below, right).

Make no mistake, Disconnnect is a melodrama. But melodrama done well is no mean feat, and Stern and Rubin manage to avoid excess, even though they do go right up to that point but always stop short of toppling into the abyss. Their fine ensemble cast is a big help here. These actors make you feel their pain (and there'a a lot of that -- psychically, emotionally and finally physically) but they're also smart enough to let you feel their humor and enjoyment of the moment, as well. (Intuitive actors always know it can't always be sturm und drang.)

In a sweet touch during the end credits, we see that the film has a dedication to the late Andrew Sarris, a fine and sorely missed film lover and critic, who I would like to think would have appreciated the very good things about this new film. Disconnect -- from LD Entertainment and running 115 minutes -- opens Friday, April 12, in New York City at the AMC Loews Lincoln Square and the Regal Union Square Stadium 14, and in the L.A. area at the AMC Century City 15. And maybe elsewhere, too -- now or eventually -- thought I cannot find any listing of nationwide playdates on any web site....

Rodrigo Garcia's MOTHER AND CHILD is the American film of the year so far

Is there a more humane and attentive (particularly to women) filmmaker than Rodrigo Garcia? On the basis of the three full-length films he has written and directed: the new MOTHER AND CHILD, Nine Lives and Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her, I would doubt this.  When I first saw "Things You Can Tell" (back in 2000 -- Señor Garcia, in addition to doing a lot of work for cable television, seems to gift us with one full-length film every five years), I swore that it had to have been made by a woman.  I did not believe a man was capable of understanding, not to mention communicating at such a personal level, so much about women's lives.  Wrong.  That was my first experience -- a memorable one -- with a Garcia film.

Then came Nine Lives in 2005, another winner, and now Mother and Child, in which the filmmaker (shown at right) surpasses himself.  Which is saying something.  From the first image on the screen -- no dialog here -- we are pulled in to one of the oldest stories on earth but in a way that seems fresh and specific.  When the dialog starts, it is every bit as fine as those images: direct, real, neither spare nor profuse but exactly what is needed.  His theme here is what you would expect from the title, yet, although the routes Rodrigo takes to bring that theme to life are twisty and interconnected, his film-making style is simple and quiet.  He never shouts, though his characters sometimes do.

Several sets of characters overlap here: A physical therapist (Annette Bening, at left) who lives with her aged, sick mother (Eileen Ryan); a relatively young, hotshot lawyer (Naomi Watts, below, right) taking a job in a prestigious law firm owned by Samuel L. Jackson (below, left); a young couple (Kerry Washington and David Ramsey (shown two photos below and at bottom) who hope to adopt an about-to-be born baby from a young unwed mother (Shareeka Epps).  Of course, these people connect eventually (some are con-
nected already), yet plot is the last thing you will be worrying about because each incident is so well-
written & performed that the movie quickly takes on its own sense of wonder, as one splendid scene follows another, and another.

Yes, we have seen all this before, and yet Garcia makes it new.  Death that comes suddenly and quietly.  A sex scene as hot as any you'll have viewed of late (except perhaps Eyes Wide Open), in which the couple stays fully clothed. (More important here is how the female's need for control is played out in her sexual behavior.)   When a new character (essayed by the always fine David Morse) is introduced, we know immediately who he is without any explanation except the brilliant moment-by-moment acting by Ms Bening, who nails her abrasive, sad, needy character and then ever-so-slowly begins to let her breathe.

Ms Watts, too, is exceptional.  She at last makes good on the pro-
mise she showed us in Mulholland Dr.  She's always been believ-
able, but her subsequent career has so far had to do with mostly mediocre roles she's been asked to play (Le Divorce is an excep-
tion -- and an exceptionally misunderstood movie).  It was clear she had it in her, and here she lets it out -- in a role to die for.  Jimmy Smits is wonderful, too.  He's aging well, putting on a bit of weight, and growing into a stalwart older man. When Bening asks him, "Where did you come from?" you'll know exactly what she means.

Elpidia Carillo (above, in the center of the threesome), Elizabeth Pena, Amy Brenneman -- all alumni of the Garcia oeuvre -- do fine work for him again, along with Marc Blucas, S. Epatha Merkerson and Cherry Jones, to name but a few in the large, first-rate cast.  I should think there are very few really good actors who would not jump at the chance to work under this exceptional filmmaker, whose special ability is to bring out the best in everything to
which he connects. 

The subject of adoption and the need for the birth mother/child reunion has been done to death, so it is even more surprising how moving and important Garcia makes it.  (The film this most reminded me of is the under-seen but very sad and dear Loggerheads.)  How nice that the deep feelings that keep welling up in you come from the characters on view rather than from any melodrama. Given the situations here, melodrama would be easy, but the filmmaker manages to avoid it. This is the secret of Garcia's success. He hardly needs a "plot."  Instead, his full, rich characters -- fired by specific, meaningful dialog -- simply take over the film and run with it.  (The writer/director also handily incorporates the way we live now -- class, immigration and so forth -- into his scenario.)

Mother and Child, from Sony Pictures Classics, opens this Friday, May 7 in New York and Los Angeles. A nationwide limited rollout will follow. To call this the perfect Mother's Day movie (which it is) still sells it short.  It's the perfect Father's Day film, too.  If dad could
but rise to the occasion that Garcia presents, he'd learn a whole
lot more about mom.

Scott Caan/Patrick Hoelck's MERCY brings fine ensemble acting and a lesson on love

What a pleasure it is to watch scene after scene of an acting ensemble that nails moment after moment -- with smart, au courant dialog to match. This is what writer/producer Scott Caan gives us in MERCY, directed by Patrick Hoelck with an eye for the way so many of life's important things happen on the sidelines rather than coming straight at you. This is true even when one's main character is a full-of-himself, successful writer who appears to barrel through life getting everything he wants. Ah, but is he happy?

Happiness, and its handmaiden love, are what Caan (shown below) and Hoelck (shown at right) are out to explore in their film, and to a fair degree they manage it. Early on, Caan's writer character (Johnny) makes a play for a waitress (very nice work from Whitney Able) on the catering staff of a party thrown for him.  We see this "play" from many angles: his, hers, that of his friends, and then much later, when the pair meets again. Meanwhile, Johnny has fallen for the gorgeous title character (as in "angel of") and much of the story -- told in an odd kind of flashback/flashforward style that circles toward completion --
tells of this relationship.

Because the moment-to-moment acting on the part of every cast member, from the leads to the barley-there, is so good, it is easy for us viewers to plow ahead. That cast includes Wendy Glenn (below) in the title role (who appears to be every bit as intelligent as she is gorgeous), Troy Garity as Johnny's best friend (underused, perhaps, but as usual, spot-on), Erika Christensen as a young woman who comes into Johnny's life later on, Dylan McDermott as Johnny's agent and even James Caan, (shown, bottom, left, who gives us, along with Scott, a nice père et fils scene, which can't help but have you wondering how close to real life this might be). Further, the film has a European sensibility to it, from its fine cinematography to the utterly natural behavior on view to its literate script with such a smart sense of indirection that it takes awhile to even know what the movie is actually about.  It's here, however, once we've realized the point of Mr Caan's screenplay, that some of us may want something more.

Chekhov has long been quoted to the effect that if you show a gun in act one, you'd better use it in act two.  The same might be said for the ubiquitous piece of self-help medical equipment on view here.  While the set-up is displayed noticeably, it is at least not rammed down our throats; then Caan and Hoelck, as expected, make further use of it.  What happens in Mercy may set younger hearts aflutter with surprise, tears and the sadness of "if only!"  Older viewers who've been around that block a few times may nod in recognition, while thinking, "Hmmph!  This pair sure got off easily: Their perfect-if-short-lived relationship took nearly no work at all."

Mercy, another smart pick-up from IFC Films, the company that is making sure we see so many movies from around the world that we otherwise might not, opens Friday, April 30 in theatrical release in New York City at the IFC Center, in Los Angeles at the Laemmle Sunset 5 on May 7, and On-Demand tomorrow, April 28.  Click on the link ahead to determine if and how you can see it via IFC On-Demand.