Bon voyage! Robert Redford captains J.C. Chandor's fine sailing saga -- ALL IS LOST

Get ready. But for what? Is this, as it appears, a kind of classy, arthouse version of the oh, no, no, no! mini-budget-but-grueling experience of Open Water? Best not to know any more going into ALL IS LOST, the new film from J.C. Chandor, that very talented writer/director of Margin Call, who is here dealing with a primal, man-against-the-elements theme, instead of the perhaps slightly-less-primal struggle of man-against-fellow-man (or woman) of the earlier film. But is today's audience ready for a movie about an aging sailor for whom, as the title proclaims, all is lost? Or is it prepared, rather, for a "movie," in which we know from vast experience, that hope springs eternal? We shall see.

In any case, the filmmaker, shown at left, has given us for the most part something we seldom see at the movies: A kind of you-are-there, moment-to-moment, often suspenseful, sometimes scare-the-wits-out-of-you experience in which we give up much of what we expect and demand from motion pictures -- dialog, back-story and characterization for starters -- and instead plunge into things head-first. I suspect most intelligent audiences won't mind the trade-off one little bit. So very well has Mr. Chandor filled his screenplay with incident, small and large, then paced his 107-minute movie like a continually cresting and waning wave, and so hugely effective is his star, the 77-year-old Robert Redford, who though showing every one of those years in his face, still commands a remarkably strong-looking and agile body, this one-of-a-kind film appears to be an instant classic.

Come on: Am I telling you that a movie featuring but one character, has almost zero dialog, and promises a set that is either inside the yacht or out on the ocean will rivet you for the total of its running time? I am. That Mr. Chandor has not even given Redford a cat to accompany him on the voyage and to whom he could chat now and then (and get us all sentimental in the process) speaks volumes about the kind of movie he wanted to make.

If only he had completely achieved this, All Is Lost might have been among the greatest films ever made. But there's that pesky thing about, well, the movie's music (credited to Alex Ebert), for one thing. If ever an endeavor could have managed nicely without any music, it's this one. Just the sound of the sea and wind and storm and occasional silence would have been fine -- and sometime Chandor gives us this. But then, in all those key dramatic moments, we get the musical "hype," which just adds to the "movie-ness" of it all. To be fair, I must say that the friend who attended the screening with me never even noticed the music. He did, however, thoroughly object to the barely-there shot of an appendage at the conclusion, which I found wonderfully swift and smart. To each his own, I suppose.

Story-wise, there is also the problem of something that occurs more often than it might. The first time, we're pinned to our seats with hope and despair, the second seems a bit like rubbing it in, and then.... On the plus side is the object that starts the whole story moving, simultaneously putting us in touch with globalization and the world in which we live.

Then there's the terrific character played by Redford. We know nothing about the man -- except, through his "goodbye" note, the words of which we hear read at film's beginning, in which he tells whomever that he is sorry. Yet in his moment-to-moment intelligence, actions and thought this guy becomes indelible. We are he and he us. And we don't need to know a lick about sailing per se to stay with the movie. This speaks volumes about Chandor's (and his editor Pete Beaudreau's) ability to get us to follow so easily what is happening and why, and further, to connect so strongly with our sailor's character and humanity.

While the photography is everything it ought to be (up top by Frank G. DeMarco, underwater by Peter Zuccarini), I do question the need for the underwater stuff, gorgeous as it is (that school of fish is memorable indeed), because it takes us away from our guy and further, it's something that our hero himself can't see, so why are we seeing it? I guess, simply to give us a little relief from the expected impending doom.

While these are not necessarily niggling problems, they still do not detract in any major way from the film's overall worth. Despite its faults, All Is Lost remains the kind of movie you rarely encounter. It's an achievement and -- more so, I think, than the also-at-sea Captain Phillips -- an absolute must-see for film buffs and maybe even for that quirky and fickle populace known as the "mainstream."

The movie -- from Lionsgate and Roadside Attractions -- opens today in Los Angeles at the AMC Century 15, Arclight Hollywood and The Landmark in West L.A.; in New York catch it at the Angelika Film Center, City Cinema 123 and AMC Lincoln Square. Next Friday, October 25, it breaks out nationwide.

Amazing fun (along with some gross scares) and just about a perfect blend of horror and comedy: the Cairnes bros' buoyant 100 BLOODY ACRES

Do not, under any circumstance, miss this delightfully deranged horror comedy in which a pair of brothers named Cameron and Colin Cairnes create a movie that tiptoes through a minefield of possible misfires and comes out the other side just radiant with laughter, shock and as much blood n' gore as you want, while remaining, well, an absolute charmer. How these two first-time full-length filmmakers (shown below, but don't ask me which is which) manage this looks easy as pie but in reality is nothing so simple. No, this kind of concoction is much-longed-for but rarely achieved: a movie that never missteps as it travels from a kids-on-the-road film to backwoods horror to chock-full of fun, thrills and chills to sexual eye- (and mouth-) opening surprise to imminently satisfying love story/comedy/morality play. Who'd have thought it possible?

100 BLOODY ACRES is as good an example of the amusing horror/slasher movie as I have perhaps ever come across, and I think the reason is that the filmmakers (above) do not push anything in untoward fashion. From the first, as we are introduced to the two sets of characters who will soon interact -- the three "kids" (two of whom are shown below) off to see a Woodstock-like rock concert and the two brothers (shown further below) who own a local fertilizer company and have discovered how much better the use of roadkill makes their product -- each moment seems fresh and often off-the-cuff funny. Or grizzly.

As the plot (along with the fertilizer and blood) thickens, this sense of a kind of jaunty reality continues, pulling us easily along. The Cairnses man-age to keep the fun, thrills, suspense, gore and adventure rolling at a near breakneck pace, with events tumbling over each other and -- best of all -- characters growing richer and more surprising as the movie chugs along.

The cast could hardly be better chosen, with each member delivering the goods. Perhaps a special nod must be made to Chrissie Page, who plays Aunt Nancy and offers up the biggest surprise of all. For its immortal line alone -- "When's the sound check?" -- which gave me my biggest laugh of the year so far, I'd have to recommend this movie. OK: I'm not saying another word. It's up to you. Seek this one out or miss a top-of-the-line treasure and a genre-mash-up for the ages.

100 Bloody Acres -- from Doppelganger Releasing, the off-kilter/off-color/on-target arm of the more art/mainstream distributor, Music Box Films -- has just come available on DVD. Let's hope, like other Music Box movies, it finds its way quickly onto Netflix streaming.

EL INFIERNO: Luis Estrada & Jaime Sampietro's black, comedic portrait of the state of Mexico

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EL INFIERNO (the title literally means hell, and the movie metaphorically takes us there) is a very long, straight-ahead tale of a middle-aged man named Benny (played by the well-known Mexican actor Damián Alcázar) who returns from the U.S. (he's been deported) to his little home-town in Mexico and begins to fit right into the completely sleazy, horrific, drug addled, greedy, murderous, lascivious life-style of the place. Even his old mom, who initially berates her son for never having written to her over the 20 years he was gone -- "We thought you were dead!" -- soon enough capitulates to the pricey gifts he offers her. In fact, she asks for more.

To anyone who remotely follows current and past Mexican history, none of this will come as a shock. The real surprise of the movie is how thuddingly obvious it is from first to last in presenting us this tale of an already venal and uncaring guy who becomes even more so when offered the least opportunity. The tone taken by Luis Estrada,(shown at right) the director /co-writer (with Jaime Sampietro), is one of only slight exaggeration, which produces the comedic sense, while the events parading in front of us quickly turn that comedy pitch black.

Alcázar (above and on poster top) is a very talented actor, here given little chance to shown his range or abilities. He's perfectly OK so far as he is allowed to go. But this is no great distance, and it's traversed in mostly baby steps. For a much better example of Mexican black comedy, see the terrific film Herod's Law (from 1999) to discover what Alcázar -- along with Estrada and Sampietro, who, with a couple of other writers, also made this movie -- can accomplish.

In that earlier film, they gave us something at once rich and strange, while also shocking and surprising. Here, perhaps in order to reach the lowest common denominator, they cross every "t" and dot each "i" -- resulting in a screenplay and finished movie that you can pretty much write-as-you-go. At one point, our "hero" asks his friend Cochiloco (Joaquín Cosio, above, right) "Aren't you afraid of going to hell?" Comes the reply: "Hell is right here." Ay -- profound!)

What Benny finds in his home-town is a dead brother, along with the brother's widow and son; his best friends now all working for the local drug lord; and only one person (his kindly godfather) remains free from the taint of Mexico's manure. (As to how this nice guy managed to avoid the smell, we're not made privy.)

As Benny negotiates his new role as "enforcer" for the drug cartel's main man (and his dysfunctional family), he thrives on its perks, while trying to retain his "humanity." Sure. Along the way we note the collaboration of the local police, the Church, politicians, and all else -- with betrayal, somewhere along the line, forever the name of the game.

There's a lot of violence here, though it barely begins to compare with Oliver Stone's Savages, to cite but one of our recent super-violent films. And because the tone is somewhat comic, that violence is somehow made easier to take, which is exactly the effect that it should not have. The darkly funny conclusion promises, undoubtedly correctly, that poor Mexico will continue to experience, down the generations, more (and more and more) of the same.

You can view El Infierno (known in some quarters as El Narco), running two hours and 29 minutes, on Netflix streaming, and you can also view Herod's Law (under its Spanish title, La ley de Herodes, on DVD, also from Netflix and/or other sources.

Marcus Warren's British-based gangster thriller, THE HEAVY, hits the Netflix streaming source

Gary Stretch -- a Lancashire lad who went on to become a well-known (in Britain) boxer, then a model and now an actor -- is a guy it turns out we've seen a few times already (Savages, Alexander) but had not noticed. There's no way you can't notice Stretch in THE HEAVY -- a crime thriller set alternately and interestingly in the world of expensive art and a rather scuzzy gangland element (they turn out to have much in common) -- because he's the star. Just who is the titular "heavy"? That's up for grabs, but it could be anyone from the rogue cop (played nastily by Vinnie Jones) to the art/crime boss (essayed smoothly by Stephen Rea) to the fellow who's about to run for British Prime Minister (played close-to-the-vest by Adrian Paul), as the estranged brother of our Mr. Stretch.

If we're speaking solely in moral terms, the heaviest fellow in the bunch is clearly our "anti-hero," Boots (Mr. Stretch's role) above, recently out of prison and now working the that naughty art-and-crime kingpin, who appears to have given his "enforcer" one lulu of a job. What it is we don't know, but it's important and it concerns an apartment occupied by the lovely Shannyn Sossamon (below).

The movie moves back and forth in time and location, introducing us along the way to the brother's parents (Jean Marsh and Christopher Lee, the latter pictured below with his "son"), involving us some sleazy drug dealings, and letting us watch that nasty cop take out his sadistic whims on various characters he meets along the way.

One of those characters is the kingpin's very cute right-hand-man, below, played by the smooth and sexy (but evidently rather unpleasant) singer/actor Lee Ryan. The plot here is pleasantly convoluted -- you'll have some fun following it -- even if it sometimes gives off an air of being hastily cobbled together. The dialog is generally serviceable, though in one scene between Jones and Rea, it does get a bit much: You'll want to ask the writer/director Marcus Warren what the hell he was going for here. Warren's direction is relatively fast-paced and sleek, and he gets good performances from his whole cast. (Why not? Most of them are uber-professionals.)

There is a rather limited budget on view, so what ought to be a large crowd scene is shot with a handful of extras. Still, there is enough suspense, surprise and thrills to carry most intelligent audiences along, and the ending, together with the reason for it, is quite something. Villain-wise, it unmasks the heavy, gives added moral weight to the decision of the hero, while simultaneously making us understand why we hate so many politicians.

The Heavy, a better-than-average time-waster, is available now via Netflix streaming, but can also be found on DVD via Amazon and perhaps other sources, too.

KILL YOUR DARLINGS: It's Ginsberg time again in John Krokidas' dark, sad, funny "other" fest

What an unusual and surprisingly successful piece of work is KILL YOUR DARLINGS (not to be mistaken for that very interesting but not finally very successful film from 2006 starring Lolita Davidovich and Andreas Wilson). This is at least the fourth movie in as many years to tackle the subject of Allen Ginsberg and his poet pals of the "beat generation," as it was so-called. Oddly enough, all four films are quite good, whether Ginsberg is front and center (as here and in Howl) or simply part of the ensemble (as in On the Road or the fine documentary The Beat Hotel).

As directed by a young  fellow who seems to have come directly from out-of-the-blue, John Krokidas (this is his first full-lengther, after making a couple of shorts), the movie is quite stunning -- fortunately less for any of its individual "effects" that for how very well the filmmaker has woven them all into his dark tale of life at Columbia University circa 1944 among a group of people who can most effectively be described as "the other." Not only were several of them homosexual (at at time in our history when this really was the love that dare not speak its name), these outsiders were champing at the bit of every-thing remotely traditional -- from sex to poetry to the classroom canon. Struggling to create new art forms and life/love relationships, they were, to be sure, poseurs of a sort (weren't we all--isn't that part of growing up?), yet a number of them also possessed a good deal of talent.

Of the group we see here, Ginsberg (Daniel Radcliffe, at left), Jack Kerouac (Jack Huston) and William Burroughs (Ben Foster) have the real thing, while two others -- a young man named Lucien Carr (Dane DeHaan) and his older "pal" David Kammerer (Michael C. Hall) -- are more provocateurs/
hangers-on.

Because Carr is so immediately alluring, full of himself and hugely attractive to Ginsberg, it takes awhile for the budding poet (and us) to begin to notice the flush behind the flash.

It helps, too, that Mr. DeHaan (above) gives such a wired, full-out performance. Despite Mr. Radcliffe's star-power and popularity, DeHaan's is the pivotal role in the film, and the actor makes it work by initially seducing us with his gorgeous, energetic facade, and then slowly letting the cracks appear.

Not that Radcliffe himself isn't just fine as the young Ginsberg. The actor seems here bent on dislodging a certain Mister Potter as far out of our memory as possible, and he does just that. As a young man just beginning to discover his talent and sexual proclivities, he's moment-to-moment as truthful as you could want -- whether in his interaction with his peers or his parents (that's the ever-remarkable Jennifer Jason Leigh (above, as mom) and a very surprising David Cross (reminding us of a young Lee Wilkoff), shown below, with Radcliffe, as dad.

Mr. Foster, below, always good, gets the look and just-slightly-off-beat/off-key behavior of Burroughs so right that it took me awhile to realize who it was playing this particular role.

Returning perhaps to his Six Feet Under roots, Mr. Hall (below), who is most likely at this point too be remembered for his performances there and in Dexter, makes his needy, angry Kammerer character a very sad and memorable one.

If Mr. Huston's Kerouac (shown below, left, with Elizabeth Olsen as his girlfriend) pales a bit beside that of Sam Riley's in On the Road, it's only because Riley received much more screen time.  Here, Kerouac seems (probably correctly, too) more acted-upon than a self-starter.

Krokidas and his ace crew have brought back the 1940s in beautiful, if dark, fashion. The sets, costumes, cars, and pursuits of the characters -- mostly drugs, booze, sex and writing -- are all on the mark, genuinely interesting and believable, too. The screenplay by Krokidas and Austin Bunn is also first-rate in its ability to glance off things quickly and efficiently while leading us exactly where we need to go.

How the filmmaker delivers certain hallucinatory scenes of drug/booze-fueled highs are quite affecting and unusual. In fact, the entire movie could be called affecting and unusual, especially in the manner in which it tackles the subject of being an "other" when that meant living such a highly proscribed life that it was no wonder that Ginsberg -- in his poetry as in all else -- simply had to break free.

How and why he does this, Krokidas and his crack cast help show us so very well that Kill Your Darlings becomes one of this year's best films.

From Sony Pictures Classics and running a surprisingly swift 104 minutes, the movie opens this Wednesday, October 16, in New York City (the Walter Reade Theater and the Sunshine Cinema) and in Los Angeles (at The Landmark).

TERROR TRACT, a 13-year-old, TV scare-movie-cum-time-capsule appears on Netflix streaming...

Never heard of this one, TrustMovies mused, as he came across TERROR TRACT, a new addition to what's available to stream on Netflix. He knew the film could not be that new, as it starred the late John Ritter (below), and a much younger-looking David DeLuise, son of the late Dom. As he watched even the first few minutes of the movie, it became clear why he had no memory of it: It was made for, and had its debut, on television. Indeed, it looks, acts and sounds like TV -- in everything from the plotting to dialog to the flat lighting and-pretty-if-generic sets. In fact, it seems to want to recreate something like that very popular TV scare movie from the 1970s, Trilogy of Terror. T of T doesn't hold up all that well, either, though the Karen-Black-meets-devil-doll episode can still startle, thrill and charm you. T of T was also, as I recall, made up of three completely diverse stories pushed together to create a full-length TV movie. Terror Tract has three stories, too, but it also features a wrap-around tale that opens, closes and becomes a kind of entr'acte to its three tales.

The initial tale is pretty standard stuff: the cuckoldry and revenge of a husband (Fredric Lehne) against his wife (Rachel York) and her lover (the very hard-bodied Carmine Giovinazzo) with a large splash of the supernatural tossed in. Around the time of the third "nightmare," you'll want to press fast-forward."

Tale two is the movie's bid for Devil Doll status, with a very naughty little monkey (above) doing the honors here, as a "lost" animal who charms/worms his way into a sweet little nuclear family. But the real enticement will probably be the star of this one: Bryan Cranston strutting his stuff nearly a decade prior to Breaking Bad. He's good, as usual, and the story builds nicely into something pretty horrific.

The final story involves a serial killer of women known as "the Granny Killer, due to the granny mask (below) that he/she always wears. This one is the shortest, chock-a-block with murder, ESP, and surprises that you can usually figure out prior to their arrival. But the performances of Will Estes as the boy who envisions the awful events, and Brenda Strong as the shrink in whose office he ends up, help move things along.

The wraparound section -- featuring DeLuise and Allison Smith (both shown below) as a young couple looking to buy a house, and Ritter as the schlubby-but-honest realtor helping them -- also builds to an ending that, back in 2000 when this TV movie was made, probably caught the zeitgeist nicely as it gives us a vision of real estate hell -- not just via the individual houses and their stories but finally throughout an entire neighborhood in which the movie takes place.

This is funny and nasty, though it -- like almost everything else in the film -- could have been funnier, nastier and better observed. Terror Tract, co-directed by  Lance W. Dreesen and Clint Hutchison (two episodes each) and written by Mr. Hutchison, is really just a semi-glossy time-waster, but if you're a fan of any of the actors mentioned, you might just find it a worthwhile "waste."  You can catch it now via Netflix streaming -- and maybe elsewhere, too.