The Words On Flicks Show's Top Ten Flicks of 2022

WOF: Top Ten Movies of 2022

Gotta be honest, I wasn't that excited about the films that came out this year. My favorite is at the Number One position -- crazy about it -- but everything else was just sort of ... OK. I got overwhelmed trying to catch up with things this last month (Glass Onion, Babylon, EO, etc.) so I may write about them as we move into 2023. I was more impressed by the work of actresses in this year's crop as well. What's on your list of favorites from this year? 

1. The Woman King - I can't say enough about this film -- the unique storyline based on a part of African history that we knew little about until now. The towering performance by Viola Davis as a brilliant,battle-worn general of the Kingdom of Dahomey's fierce legion of female warriors, the Agojie, which is nothing short of perfection. Gina Prince Bythewood's surehanded direction, keeping the plot moving at an incredible clip so there are thrilling action scenes, touching and revealing moments between characters, wonderful performances by a slew of actors from Thuso Mbede, Sheila Atim, Lashana Lynch, and John Boyega. Very few dull moments. Despite the knee-jerk griping about who wrote the film (one of them the white actress and producer Maria Bello), that it celebrates slavery (it depicts the historical facts of slavery during the time period but is not exploitative or congratulatory about it), and whether or not every detail is historically accurate (it's a movie, people!), The Woman King delivers on every level: Drama, history, beautiful visuals, a timeless story, and a celebration of the power of Black women that does not exclude or villainize all Black men. [Check out my podcast discussion with journalist Tonya Pendleton about The Woman King HERE.] 

2. Inspection - Heart rending true-life tale written and directed by Elegance Bratton of a gay man trying to make something of his life by becoming a Marine. Kudos to actor Jeremy Pope, with support from Gabrielle Union and Bokeem Woodbine.

3. Everything Everywhere All At Once - Enjoyed this fantastically mind-bending film that manages to be about the immigration experience, love, family, multiple universes, action, and the meaning of life. Great job by Michelle Yeoh and support from Ke Huy Quan (Data from The Goonies!) and Stephanie Hsu. 

4. Nope - Writer/director Jordan Peele packed a lot of layers into this alien thriller that is more thought provoking than scary. Daniel Kaluuya is low key thoughtful throughout, but playing his sister, Keke Palmer gives an Incredible performance. 

5.  Wakanda Forever - Just because. I appreciated director Ryan Coogler's work and the cast in the continuation of the story in the absence of T'Challa actor Chadwick Boseman and the appearance of another secret society of underwater beings based on indigenous South American lore.  STandouts here are Angela Bassett as Queen Ramonda and Tenoch Huerta as the Talokan leader Namor.

6. The Fabelmans - A Spielberg film is always an event. The story of how the young main character's family fell apart, and the performance by Michele Williams as his mom, is what made it memorable for me. [My attitude toward it has softened since first viewing, but here's my first-reaction review HERE.]

7. The Banshees of Inisherin - Colin Ferrell and Brendan Gleeson do some of their best acting work in this dark comedy (some would call it a tragedy), where the sudden breakdown of a longtime friendship between residents of an Irish island turns into an absurdly bitter and bloody feud. 

8. Till - in a full-length film that follows last spring's TV series and documentary, Till recounts the aftermath of the horrific racially motivated 1955 killing of young Emmett Till, focusing on his mother's journey to activism through her determination to get justice for her son. Danielle Deadwyler brings both gravitas and fragility to the role of a woman who ignited the Civil Rights Movement. 

9. Honk for Jesus, Save Your Soul - Actress Regina Hall in particular makes this mockumentary about a disgraced pastor and his wife worth watching. This is also the first full-length feature by writer/director Adamma Ebo. With Sterling K. Brown, who gets to stretch his tragicomic acting muscles as well. A painfully funny viewing experience. [For my review, click HERE.]  

10. Good Luck to You, Leo Grande - In this mostly two-character dramedy, Emma Thompson plays a middle-aged widow who meets in a hotel room with a sex worker played by Daryl McCormack, so that she can experience sexual satisfaction. Her acting here is a revelation, as her retired schoolteacher character and the young, handsome, accommodating "Leo Grande" work through a Pandora's box of nerves, expectations, stereotypes, sexual hang-ups, misunderstandings, and how to separate the personal from the professional. [Check out my video podcast with WOCA (Women Of a Certain Age) right HERE.]

Wishing you a joyful, prosperous and healthy 2023.

Happy New Year!!

Portrait of the Director as a Young Man: Spielberg's "The Fabelmans"

 The Fabelmans
directed by Steven Spielberg

starring Michelle Williams, Gabriel LaBelle, Paul Dano, Judd Hirsch, Seth Rogen

It seems that every artist has some family trauma in their origin story, and in The Fabelmans, director Steven Spielberg has shared some of the forces that shaped him into one of the most successful and admired filmmakers of our time. At this point in his career, Spielberg is a titan of Hollywood moviemaking, who created the concept of a blockbuster and whose many films are considered classics of American cinema: Jaws, E.T. The Extraterrestrial, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Color Purple, Schindler's List, Saving Private Ryan and many more. 

At this point, a new Steven Spielberg movie is not just a movie, but an event. And so it is with his new semi-autobiographical film The Fabelmans,  a coming-of-age family drama co-written with the phenomenal Tony Kushner, the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and screenwriter. But I wish I hadn't known it was about Spielberg, by Spielberg. The setup somehow created high expectations and I was disappointed. I kept waiting for something to happen.  In this portrait of the artist as a young man, I would like to have seen even more of his art. 

It's not as if nothing happens. The Fabelmans starts at the movies, which is where it should. Young Sammy's inciting incident is set in the 1950s at a local cinema in New Jersey, where Sammy's parents take turns explaining the concept of the moviegoing experience to the boy in diametrically different ways. Here we see instantly that he's got an artistic mother and a scientific father. I couldn't help thinking how lucky this kid was to have smart, articulate parents who could explain both the mechanics and the magic of film in such detail and were patient enough to do so. (Some of us were raised by you'll-like-it-or-else / we-can-go-home-right-now/ I-don't-have-time-to-explain-it-to-you / how-the-hell-should-I-know-how-movies-work parents). 

While watching, Sammy becomes fascinated by a train wreck scene in big top drama The Greatest Show On Earth. When Sammy asks for and receives a Lionel train set for Hanukkah, he is helped by his mother Mitzi to film the life-like train crashing into a toy car and a toy house with his father's camera so he can watch it over and over. It's explained by Mitzi as the boy's attempt to control his fear by restaging this horrific accident. 

As Sammy grows up and his passion for filmmaking increases, we begin to notice the tiny cracks beginning to fracture his parents' seemingly perfect marriage. His father Burt, played by Paul Dano in his usual inscrutable manner, is a well-meaning but serious man, a brilliant pioneer of 1960s computer technology. His jokester co-worker and best friend Bennie (Seth Rogen) is constantly at the house, talking science with Burt but also lightening the mood for the rest of the Fabelmans and becoming a surrogate uncle to the kids. Sammy's mother Mitzi (Michelle Williams) is a frustrated concert pianist with a mercurial and fun-loving nature who adores Sammy and his three younger sisters, though their existence derailed her once-promising music career. It's clear that while she admires and respects Burt, she feels increasingly perplexed by his genius and isolated from him as he pursues his highly technical career. 

"In this family, it's always the artists versus the scientists," she tells Sammy.

It's now the 1960s, and teenaged Sammy has started making his own movies with his sisters and friends, and is getting quite good at it. Meanwhile, he's frustrated by his father's view of his increasingly sophisticated Super 8 moviemaking as a frivolous and expensive hobby. But when Burt senses Mitzi's fragile mental state after her mother dies, Burt asks his son to put aside plans to shoot another WWII-themed film with his boy scout troop and instead cheer up his mother with an edited film of their recent family camping trip. It's a case of a picture speaking a thousand words when Sammy views the footage and discovers evidence that his mother's friendship with "Uncle" Bennie is more intimate than it should be. Disillusioned, Sammy has to cope with the fact that the adults in his life all have moral failings. 

Burt moves the family to Northern California, leaving Bennie behind, and things unravel quickly. Sammy struggles as his mother begins to crumble emotionally; the house they are renting is a horror; he's bullied as one of the only Jewish kids in the school; and he remains at odds with his father over his career path. One bright spot is when he makes a film of his high school's annual "Ditch Day," which is ultimately a triumph when shown at the prom. But Sammy also uses the framing and imagery in the film to exalt some of the classmates who have tormented him the most, to their shame. 

The best part of the entire film, as far as I'm concerned, is a scene performed in his underwear by the incomparable 86-year-old Judd Hirsch. Portraying Boris, Mitzi's long-missing uncle who worked in 

silent films and the circus and shows up unexpectedly right after his sister has died, Hirsch is a revelation. After dinner, preparing for bed in Sammy's room, Boris lectures his great nephew as only an eccentric elder with nothing to lose can. Recognizing Sammy's talent and his drive to make movies as the same obsession with art that he himself and the piano-paying Mitzi possess, Uncle Boris tells Sammy that art and relationships will always be at odds throughout his life. When he grabs Sammy by the cheeks during the lecture, the baffled teen pulls away and complains that the old man almost pulled his face off. "That's to remind you how much it hurts," is his response. In his five minutes on screen, Uncle Boris delivers the essential dilemma of every filmmaker, writer, musician, painter, and craftsperson alive.  

The Fabelmans is a slow and subtle examination of family dynamics, of the growing pains of one specific artist from a middle-class Jewish family where the loving parents eventually divorce. It's not a particularly unique, remarkable, or amazing story. But as a Spielberg film The Fabelmans does have some remarkably recognizable Spielbergian elements, such as the suburban sprawl we've seen in E.T. and Close Encounters, the ability to draw natural performances out of kids, the golden haze of his cinematography (by the brilliant Janusz Kamiński, a frequent Spielberg collaborator and Oscar winner for Saving Private Ryan and Schindler's List) and some outstanding performances, particularly by the incandescent Michelle Williams as Mitzi and relative newcomer Gabrielle LaBelle as Sammy. 

What we have just seen is how a young man's feet have been set on a career path that we will all become very familiar with later. It's a movie about how one young filmmaker first became fascinated by the movies, began to notice the fine details of life through a camera lens, and ultimately learned the power of film to alter perceptions. The movie shows us what happens as Sammy gets better equipment and goes on to create stronger and more elaborate movies, but it's not as good at showing the why or the how of his filmmaking. I guess if it did, we'd all know how to be Spielbergs.

The Existential Crisis of A Cartoon Cat (And How Puss in Boots Makes Us Care)

 Puss in Boots 2: The Last Wish
directed by Joel Crawford

with the voices of Antonio Banderas, Salma Hayek Pinault, Harvey Guillén, Florence Pugh (Goldilocks), Olivia Colman (Mama Bear), Ray Winstone (Papa Bear), Samson Kayo (Baby Bear), John Mulaney (Jack Horner), Wagner Moura (Big Bad Wolf), Da'Vine Joy Randolph (Mama Luna), and Anthony Mendez (doctor)

With only one life to live, how should we choose to live it? What should our legacy be? As we get older, how do we face down the fact that we can no longer do the things we used to, not only physically but emotionally? What -- and who -- makes life truly worth living? Is fame and the adulation of the many worth more than the love of a few in anonymity? Do we run from death, or face it head on? And even as we know that death is a certainty, can we still find joy in the time we have left? 

That sounds like a lot, and it is for an animated movie (I love animated movies, btw). But somehow the DreamWorks romp sequel Puss in Boots 2: The Last Wish is both thought-provoking and rib-tickling. 

Animated movies have become so sophisticated over the last two decades that they seem better suited to adults than to children. That has certainly been true of the Shrek film series, which took sacred fairy tale characters and reimagined them as hilariously twisted adults with modern-day lifestyles and neuroses in a storybook setting that anybody who has cracked open a once-upon-a-time tale as a kid can easily recognize. In the brand-new animated feature Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, the very adult issues of aging and mortality take center stage, and while this seems like a dark way to go, the writers still manage to create a delightful film with uplifting messages for kids and adults alike. 

One of the most engaging characters spun off from the Shrek franchise, Puss in Boots is the charmingly arrogant, devil-may-care, sword-wielding Spanish adventurer and bandit in feline form who starred in his own successful animated spinoff, 2011's Puss in Boots. That film introduced his origin story as a former orphan who got pulled into a complicated magic beans heist by his stepbrother Humpty Dumpty, an adventure with ever-increasing risks, a cast of twisted nursery rhyme characters, several double-crosses, and a few surprises, including flirtation with slinky cat burglar and nemesis Kitty Softpaws. 

After eleven years, Puss is back. As the film begins, he's older, but not necessarily wiser. Self-satisfied as a swashbuckling, guitar-strumming, milk-guzzling celebrity, Puss likes to party hard, boasting that he laughs in the face of death and has never been cut by a blade. When his revels awaken a township's sleeping giant, he defeats it with panache, only to be fatally flattened himself. Revived by the village vet-doctor-dentist-barber, Puss is informed that he, in fact, died. Puss laughs it off until the doc gives him and the audience a quick run-through of the many previous ways he's kicked the bucket -- some nobly, some carelessly, all hilarious -- and delivers the shocking news that he's down to the last of his nine lives and should probably retire. 

This is a rude awakening for the formerly fearless feline, who skulks off to a watering hole to drink away his problems only to have a spaghetti western-style run-in with his own personal Grim Reaper, the Big Bad Wolf (Wagner Maura). When he ends up uncharacteristically losing the fight, he scampers away with his life flashing before his eyes. Kids will instantly recognize the threat of a red-eyed, fang-toothed wolfen villain out to flatten the hero; they will no doubt experience the very real fear that a life-or-death situation invokes -- even for as dauntless as hero as Puss In Boots. 

But for adults, Puss's dilemma is much more existential. With his hooded cloak and twin scythes, the Big Bad Wolf is Death himself. Regardless of the vivid animation and fast flying jokes, the film finds Puss considering all of the questions about the meaning of life that every one of us eventually considers sooner or later: What should a life consist of?  And what happens when it starts drawing to a close? 

We watch in dismay as Puss's fear of the Big Bad Wolf causes him to literally bury his famous persona and hide out with crazy cat lady Mama Luna (Da'Vine Joy Randolph), eventually growing fat, grizzled, and depressed, while bedeviled by an endlessly cheerful chihuahua (Harvey Guillén). Only when he discovers that there is a magic fallen star that can restore his eight previous lives -- and that he must get to it before the merciless kingpin Jack Horner, greedy hoodlums-for-hire Goldilocks and the Three Bears, and even sexy rival Kitty Softpaws -- is Puss goaded back into action. And so his fantastical quest for the star -- and past glory -- begins. 

In storybook land, as in life, there are no quick fixes and the path to the fallen star is littered with stumbling blocks. The film gets more frenetic in its second half as all the characters vie for the magical map to the star for their own wishes and plunge into the Dark Forest, a fantastical land that is equally beautiful, nightmarish, and confusing to the viewer. Along the way, Puss must confront his ego, his past, his allegiances, and ultimately Death itself to regain his humanity (felinity?). 

Puss is voiced once more by the amazing Antonio Banderas, who in his zesty baritone Zorro accent balances Puss's arrogance and humor with a real sense of thoughtfulness and sensitivity. He is contrite as he confesses his failings to Kitty Softpaws, voiced once more by Salma Hayek Pinault (his co-star in 1995's Desperado and in 2002's Frida), humble as he learns to care for the blithe therapy dog wannabe he's named Perrito, and defiant as he faces down the Big Bad Wolf with a renewed measure of courage.

The relentlessly upbeat character of Perrito touched me. A tiny dog with a big heart, Perrito is the just-keep-swimming Dora of the story, the seemingly dizzy character who spouts the most wisdom. Perrito turns his experience as a nameless unloved pup who's been continuously abandoned, abused, and even thrown into a river to drown into a tale of not merely survival but celebration. Somehow I couldn't help thinking of all the children who are abused or thrown away by careless parents or guardians, children lost in the foster care system or living on the streets, teens abandoned by their families because of their sexuality. Only some of these children reach adulthood with their sense of humor and joie de vivre intact, who make their families where they find them, and take pleasure in the simple things. This is Perrito, who is determined to make friends of these cats and keep them, no matter how they malign him, and to help them find the Fallen Star with no designs on it himself. As such, Perrito is good for goodness' sake. And as we sail into the holiday season, we need a reminder of the merits of cheerfulness, generosity, and kindness. 

I find much of the humor around Puss in his display of distinctly cat-like behaviors, even as he is portrayed as this larger-than-life figure. In The Last Wish we get a heaping helping: Puss heartily ordering a drink at a saloon, only to take tiny laps at it with his kitty tongue; his animated ginger fur slowly standing on end in fright; burying his boots and hat with backwards motions recognizable from any litter box session; and he and Kitty's stiffening tails, humped backs and snarling fangs as they face off for a catfight. And of course, his ability to turn his green cat eyes into giant limpid pools of unbearable cuteness is a trick that never gets old.

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish is a solid entry in DreamWorks animated collection and likely to be a hit with both kids and adults with its vivid characterizations, intense action sequences, crack voice work, and many lessons about life, death, family and friendship. And with Puss and friends wrapping up the flick with a voyage to the land of Far Far Away, where Shrek and Fiona dwell, we may be hearing more about Puss's final life adventures very soon. 

Meanwhile, I'll be watching this movie again. 

The Words On Flicks Show: The Woman King In All Her Glory, with Tonya Pendleton

The Woman King
Directed by Gina Prince Bythewood
Starring Viola Davis, Thuso Mbedu, Lashana Lynch, John Boyega, Sheila Atim, and Jordan Bolger

Viola Davis as The Woman King

For this episode of The Words on Flicks Show, I was joined by Philadelphia-based journalist and broadcaster Tonya Pendleton, who had many thoughts and observations to share about why The Woman King is so significant, how the lens of history can be distorted even by those that are purportedly recording it for posterity, the power of imagery and iconography, and the enduring beauty of Black Girl Magic. 

Listen to the podcast on SoundCloud here. 

The podcast is set to return on the EWaterRadio Network on BlogTalkRadio in October 2022. 
To listen to previous episodes of The Words On Flicks Show podcast, please click HERE
and scroll through. 

 

The Words On Flicks Show July 2022: Chi-Town On Film

Sweet Home Chicago! 

Returning to a celebration of U.S. cities in the movies, the Words On Flicks Show is saluting Chicago and its environs this month with special guest (and Chicago native), veteran journalist Demetrius Patterson.  We have a special place in our hearts for the Second City, especially in the wake of the Highland Park shooting on July 4.

Demetrius Patterson (aka D.E. Malik Patterson), is a native Chicagoan (evidenced by the fedora and Kangol hats he wears for just about every occasion), is an award-winning investigative/business journalist for various daily newspapers throughout the country, senior staff writer for the Chicago Defender, jazz music columnist, reviewer of high-end audiophile equipment, and entertainment media consultant (among other titles within the profession).

D.E. has over 25 years of journalism and media consulting experience. Writing about music for various publications, Patterson’s area of expertise focused mainly on jazz. In the ‘90s and early ‘00s, his syndicated jazz column on the Gannett News Service wire was highly received by professional musicians and connoisseurs alike within the genre. He also served as senior staff writer for iRock Jazz magazine; contributing writer for Black Radio Exclusive magazine (BRE); senior staff writer and music columnist for N’Digo magazine; and contributer for Jazziz, among other publications.

In addition, Patterson became an invited contributor to Harvard University/Oxford University Press’ African American National Biography (AANB) series of reference books on the who’s who of Black American culture.

As a senior staff writer for the Chicago Defender (and the Black Press of America news wire service), one of Patterson’s main beats was covering then Illinois U.S. Senator Barack Obama. Patterson had the inside coverage on Mr. Obama during beginning speculation that the senator might run for president of the United States. Nationally, however, few people throughout the nation knew much about the senator. Patterson’s stories gave insights into who the young Black presidential hopeful was and what his agenda might be. Patterson’s coverage on soon-to-be President Barack Obama were quoted in some of the largest newspapers in the country (including the L.A. Times and Washington Post).

Back in the music world, Patterson seemingly has been at the right place most of the time to have chance meetings in scoring some interviews with some of the greatest musicians of our time. Notable interviews include Luther Vandross, Ernie Isley, Nancy Wilson, Max Roach, Abbey Lincoln, Joe Henderson, Randy Weston, Horace Silver, Von Freeman, Chico Freeman, George Benson, Kyle Eastwood, George Duke, Brian Blade, Regina Carter, Michael Franks, Phyllis Hyman, Larry Willis, Wynton Marsalis, Stanley Clarke, Lester Bowie, Michael Franks and Pat Metheny among others.

Today, Patterson writes about and engages in enriching conversations regarding all aspects of Black American cultural influences (including exploring all contributions from the African Diaspora).

Listen to the show here: The Words On Flicks Show: Chi-Town On Film 07/17 by E Water Radio | Entertainment (blogtalkradio.com)

 

The Words On Flicks Show June 2022: Father's Day Special Guests

Celebrating fathers at the movies, in the movies, and for the movies this month on 

The Words On Flicks Show podcast!

Listen starting Sunday, June 12, 2022 at 3pm ET/12 noon PT here.

Here's the lowdown on our very special guests: 

Digital media and entertainment executive Juliana J. Bolden leads the creation of digital products, social media strategy, and the production of TV/film/digital content for brands like Wells Fargo, the Emmys, AT&T, the NAACP and NAACP Image Awards, Grey Goose, BlackTree TV, and served on the 2016 Democratic National Convention Committee Specialty Media team. In 2009, the San Francisco Bay Area native played a key role in building Emmys.com (the Television Academy’s very first consumer-facing website). Later that year, Bolden launched the Emmy Publications video/film production division. She began her television/digital career at ABC Family Channel/Disney, working on such long- and short-form programming as the ubiquitous Power Rangers series, and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications from San Diego State University. She is also currently the Exec Producer & Sr. Entertainment Correspondent for Hollywood Post Network/BlackTree TV Group.

A. Scott Galloway is a prolific Los Angeles-based Music Journalist who has been writing about music since 1988 for magazines that include Urban Network, Wax Poetics and the U.K.’s Blues & Soul – interviewing artists from Max Roach to Maxwell. His specialty niche is composing liner note essays for reissues and compilations of classic recordings for which he has written over 300. As it relates to history in Black Film, those credits include the 25th anniversary Deluxe 2-CD reissue of Curtis Mayfield’s “Superfly,” “The Reel Quincy Jones” compilation of the composer/conductor’s film music, “The Best of Shaft” compilation of songs and cues from the “Shaft” film trilogy, the golden era Motown time capsule “Cooley High,” a pairing of Gladys Knight & The Pips’ “Claudine” w/ “Pipe Dreams,” and the various artists compilation “Super Bad On Celluloid.” Mr. Galloway is also the Editor of the 2013 Hal Leonard deluxe coffee table book “Down The Rhodes: The Fender Rhodes Story.” And he wrote the foreword for Les McCann’s book of photography “Invitation to Openness.”

Harlem native Michael A. Gonzales is a cultural critic, short story scribe and essayist who has written for The Paris Review, The Village Voice, Wax Poetics, The Wire UK, Maggot Brain and Pitchfork. His fiction has appeared in Under the Thumb: Stories of Police Oppression edited by S.A. Cosby, Taint Taint Taint, Dead-End Jobs: A Hit Man Anthology edited by Andrew J. Rausch, Black Pulp edited by Gary Phillips and The Root. Upcoming stories will appear in The Book of Extraordinary Femme Fatale Stories edited by Maxim Jakubowski, Get Up Offa That Thing: Crime Fiction Inspired by James Brown edited by Gary Phillips, Killens Review of Arts & Letters and Obsidian Literature & Arts in the African Diaspora.

Leslie Hunter-Gadsden is a journalist and educator with more than 30 years of experience writing for print and online publications, including Next Avenue, Purple Clover, Black Enterprise and Forbes.com.  A graduate of Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism, she has written on a variety of topics including business, women in the workplace, motherhood, education, dance, theater, science, race relations and family ancestry.  The mother of two grown children, storytelling has always been her passion, whether through spoken word, written word, or dance.

Tonya Pendleton is a veteran multimedia journalist in news, sports, lifestyle and entertainment reporting. She’s written for Essence, Ebony, BET.com, The Source, XXL, Jordan Magazine, the Philadelphia Daily News, The Washington Post and more. In her current incarnation as a writer/editor with TheGrio.com and as “Things To Do” curator for NPR affiliate WHYY, she crafts content for a local and global audience. The Philadelphia resident was born and raised in New York City and is a graduate of The New School. 

Karen Thomas has never worked a day in her life. She pursued her passion for 20 years as ESSENCE marketing and special events director, retired, then spent the next 20 years developing a $200 million not-for-profit charter school network that grew from a $1 million investment.  Her idea of retirement is doing whatever the hell she pleases including living in Paris to study art history. Her greatest accomplishments are her children and grandchildren, with whom she hopes never to live.” 

As a native son of Texas, Derrick Thompson spent many of his formative years dreaming of the bright lights of New York City.  An acceptance letter from Columbia University would turn that dream into a reality. Although he earned his Ivy League degree in Urban Studies, it was the music business that brought his professional career to life.  Derrick landed his first music gig as a sales assistant at the now legendary Sleeping Bag Records. There he would cut his teeth in a number of positions including dance music promotion, product management and talent acquisition. Helping the tiny label land its first #1 Billboard album would be his first crowning achievement. Derrick moved on to stints at both Def Jam and EMI working with the likes of LL Cool J and Arrested Development. Eventually Derrick found his way to the newly formed BMG Music Publishing. Starting as a music library coordinator, he would eventually rise to become Senior Vice President of Talent and oversaw the company’s expanding R&B/Hiphop roster. During his successful tenure at BMG , he brought the likes of Mobb Deep , Nelly , Erykah Badu and Lupe Fiasco into the BMG music publishing family.  Derrick serves on the advisory board of the New York based ad agency Sparks & Honey. A past recipient of both the Heroes And Legend Award and the Award of Excellence from Urban Network, Derrick  has embarked on a brand new professional chapter as a content creator.  

Song Snippets*:

"Daddy Could Swear, I Declare," Gladys Knight & the Pips

"Song For My Father," Horace Silver

 "Color Him Father," The Winstons

 "Son of Shaft," The Bar-Kays

 "Papa Don't Take No Mess," by James Brown

 "Your Daddy Loves You," Gil-Scott Heron

 "Dance With My Father," Luther Vandross

 "Dat Dere," Oscar Brown Jr.

 "Papa," Paul Anka Live

*I was determined not to use The Temptations’ “Papa Was  A Rolling Stone”

All Buckle, No Swash: This "Cyrano" Disappoints

 Cyrano
directed by Joe Wright
starring Peter Dinklage, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Haley Bennett, Ben Mendelsohn 

I have said it before and I will say it again: I love musicals. I grew up on a steady diet of Lerner & Lowe, Rodgers & Hammerstein, Cole Porter and Frank Loesser. These were the standards set for the American style musical from the 1920s through the mid 1960s, and I am a product of my Baby Boom generation, and I swallowed them, hook, line and sinker. The next generation of musicals -- particularly the jukebox style and the rock opera -- have also gained my affection. The combination of storytelling with the emotion of clever lyrics wedded to powerful melodies, performed by incredible talents, has always been appealing to me.

Musicals have changed a lot over the last two decades -- they have grown into presentations with songs that incorporate rock, soul, blues, opera, hip-hop and today's pop music. Characters have more stream-of-consciousness thoughts set to music and songs don't always have memorable choruses. Today's musicals -- particularly in film -- don't always seem to require fabulous singing voices. Often to their detriment.

The story of Cyrano de Bergerac is a tale of unrequited love a nobleman with a physical deformity has for a young eligible woman, Roxane, who has fallen in love at first sight with Christian de Neuvillette, another soldier. Most of us know this story, or some form of it. First introduced via the 1897 play written by Frenchman Edmond Rostand, the original drama was inspired by a very real author, poet and duelist and written in rhyming couplets. According to this beloved tale, Cyrano believed that no woman could truly love him because of his deformity, his extra-large nose, so he agreed to ghost-write letters for his love-stricken but inarticulate fellow cadet, Christian, to make Roxane fall in love with him. This allows Cyrano to pour out his own feelings for her under the guise of being Christian. 

Cyrano The Musical

Jose Ferrer chews the scenery with gusto in his most famous stage role and on the screen in 1950's first English language version that earned him an Academy Award. A previous musical version, Cyrano, starring Christopher Plummer and directed by Michael Kidd, played just 94 performances on Broadway starting in 1973. Steve Martin translated the idea to a comedy set in Canada with a happy ending in 1987's Roxanne (a very cute and laugh-filled film for the rom-com crowd). A French-language screen version starring Gerard Depardieu did well in 1990. The original play has been restaged dozens of times, and the main themes have been adapted or satirized on the big screen, on stage, and on television. 

Jose Ferrer in the 1950 film

All this brings me to Cyrano, the musical film released by Disney and starring award-winning actor Peter Dinklage in the title role. I am a big fan of Peter Dinklage -- he is an amazing and handsome actor who just happens to have dwarfism. Throughout his career he has been successful at avoiding roles usually reserved for actors of his stature, like fantasy elves, leprechauns, trolls or freaks, and been able to showcase his humanity and range. This Cyrano was crafted especially for him by his wife, Erica Schmidt, who adapted the original material, adding music by the Grammy-winning rock group The National. It's a clever idea -- transferring Cyrano's stumbling block from a facial feature to his stature -- that at first glance works well. It's also nice that the film engages in diverse casting choices, making its young Christian a man of color, played by newcomer Kelvin Harrison Jr.  

Still -- This Cyrano is mopey and dopey. A lot of this Cyrano takes the audience for granted -- we have to take a lot of facts as a matter of course, just because the movie says they are so. I guess Roxanne is beautiful enough to fall in love with at first sight -- she needs a weekend in the sun and a sandwich. And I guess she's clever and intellectual -- her bucking her intended husband, the villainous Duke De Guiche, is evidence. The Cyrano character is supposed to inspire admiration: for his boldness, his brashness, his derring-do, his swordplay both with a sharpened bit of steel and with his tongue. He's supposed to be clever and funny and smart in addition to being secretly lovelorn. But Dinklage doesn't quite carry that off -- he's less swagger and more haggard. He seems bitter and mean instead of clever, hangdog instead of noble, his swordplay is questionable, he's shaggy in a world of foppery (powdered wigs, powdered faces, beauty marks, and high heels are worn by both sexes) and what's worse, his singing voice is ... less than compelling. It doesn't help that many of the songs in this musical are slow, sad, navel-gazing yearnings about love: wanting love, losing love, not being able to declare love, being in love. There's not enough upbeat, celebratory tunes here that make you leave the theater singing. 

Can this love be revealed? Bennett & Dinklage

There are some interesting dance numbers, such as when Christian reprises the song originally crooned by Roxanne (in a lyrical soprano by Haley Bennett) in an earlier scene, when his fellow French army cadets suddenly begin to gyrate, quadrille, and lift each other with deadpan earnestness behind him. Harrison's voice is also less than what a stage actor would muster, and the distracting swooshing of the costumes as the men dance behind him is so disconnected that I was laughing out loud. Again, no joy. Just ludicrousness.

Granted, Cyrano sticks fairly close to the original material. Therefore -- Spoiler -- the ending isn't exactly happy. In the original story, Roxanne and Christian wed but barely have a chance to consummate before Christian is killed in battle, and Cyrano keeps his love for Roxanne a secret until his last dying breath a few years later. So no, he doesn't really get the girl. 

Bennett & Harrison in Cyrano

I wanted to like this Cyrano. It's beautifully shot. The costuming and set design are impeccable. Peter Dinklage is acting and singing his heart out. But so much of this film is off-putting, weird, sad, and disjointed. I literally wanted to stand up in the middle of the movie theater and yell, Wake Up -- This Is A BAD Movie, people!!! But that's just snobbery on my part. Many people seem to love this film and have heaped it with accolades. 

But I have to put a red light on for this Roxanne. 

We Fall Down: Regina Hall Shines In "Honk For Jesus, Save Your Soul"

Honk For Jesus, Save Your Soul

directed by Adamma Ebo
starring Regina Hall, Sterling K. Brown

Thanks to the auspices of the African American Film Critics Association, which I rejoined recently, I was able to view the Syndance Festival hit Honk For Jesus, Save Your Soul. Alternately a side-splitting mockumentary, a workplace comedy, an unsparing relationship drama, a scathing critique of organized religion, and a probing examination of our current culture, Honk For Jesus -- which premiered January 23 at the Sundance Film Festival --is a rollercoaster ride that starts with laughter and ends in tears. 

Written and directed by Atlanta newcomer Adamma Ebo and produced by her twin sister Adanne Ebo, Honk For Jesus stars the incredibly committed Sterling K. Brown (This Is Us) and the incomparably talented Regina Hall, who both also support the film as producers. Their performances hold the film together so tightly that you get swept up into the story. 

And the story is not unfamiliar, thanks to headlines of fallen or compromised church leaders over the last decade. Whether Honk For Jesus evokes laughter, ridicule, compassion, or ire is an open question as the film winds to its conclusion. 

Charismatic pastor Lee-Curtis Childs (Brown) and his devoted wife, First Lady Trinitie Childs (Hall) are attempting to rebound from an unnamed scandal that has left their Georgia Southern Baptist megachurch mostly empty of congregants. Desperate but determined to reclaim their pre-scandal glory, the couple engages a mostly unseen documentary film crew to follow them as they attempt to regain their standing in the church community, restore their reputations, and fill their pews once more. Of course, the cameras capture more than the Childs bargained for, not only recording their fake-pious assurances that God will see them through their current woes, but their unbridled materialism, their intense competition with a local couple who pastor a rival church, their marital squabbles, their hypocrisy, and their delusional belief that the scandal will melt away once they throw enough money at the problem and put on a happy face. Some of the moments with the Childs are not seen through the documentarists' lens, as in an intimate scene when the couple has sex and it is obvious that Pastor Childs has certain ... preferences. 

There are some laughs, as when the couple cluelessly gives a tour of the church's expansive wardrobe area, where Lee-Curtis and Trinitie revel in the sheer number of pricey designer outfits available for Sunday wear; an erstwhile service where Pastor Lee-Curtis decides to strip down in front of a handful of remaining parishioners to plunge into the baptism pool in a misguided attempt to cleanse himself of his transgressions, only to have a tiff with Trinitie over the proper way to say "Amen"; and when Trinitie goes to the mall to shop for an expensive Church Lady Hat only to be confronted by a former parishioner in a fraught and fake exchange about the rival church's plans. 

Though the nature of the scandal the couple faces is never spelled out in so many words, we get numerous clues about sexual misconduct with male minors from Pastor Lee-Curtis's encounters: on the phone with his lawyer, with a young cameraman from the documentary crew, and in an ugly exchange with a young man who was a former parishioner. For his part, a narcissistic Lee-Curtis is mostly unwilling to acknowledge his particular demons, or to truly apologize to his parishioners or indeed his wife for his behavior. As the film continues, we see that Trinitie's determined smiles, spousal pep talks, assurances to the camera that their devoted ministry will go on, and willingness to publicly humiliate herself to regain their status are literally a (praise mime dancing) mask for all the humiliations she faces as the wife of a compromised man of God. Ultimately, the mask slips as the couple's plans for a grand reopening of their church on Easter Sunday seem more and more compromised,

In the end, after consulting her faithful mother, Trinitie is resolute in her commitment to the man she married and to his vision of the Wander to Greater Paths Church (a name that itself begs for a stream of jokes). As the film draws to a close, we are left to wonder about just how much Trinitie's faith in both her God and her husband can endure.

While there have been numerous television shows and series that address the business of religion and the hypocrisy of church leaders, I expect Honk For Jesus to strike a nerve in the community. I was impressed by the performances of these two actors, but most especially by Hall, who elicits sympathy as a woman who sees through the B.S. but remains committed. 

You can watch my interaction with Regina Hall and Sterling K. Brown at the AAFCA Roundtable about this film here: