MHeying777-1 Reviews

12 Mighty Orphans (2021)

A New Film Genre--The True American Orphan

[9/10 · 21 June 2021]

My orphan wife and I found "12" very satisfying and highly emotional, given we are both orphans. (I spent 9 years at the Tarrant County Children's Home, cross town rivals of the Masonics in '58 when we beat them for the industrial league state basketball championship. Two of the "12 Mighty Mites", Charles Sealey and Jack Whitley, became my football coaches at Poly High in '61. Whitley flew a B-25 in WWII and Sealey was a paratrooper. Whitley also became superintendent of the Tarrant County Children's Home prior to my time there. My mother--Poly class of '38--likely attended the games with Poly depicted in the film.) This film has some great acting and a good script, although it seems a bit fast paced. I didn't want it to end.

Friday Night Lights was the ultimate in the Texas high school football drama genre, so author Jim Dent and the film team had a high bar to jump over. The Fort Worth Masonic Home teams of the Depression years provided just the right material. All Dent had to do was get it down on paper. Hollywood did the rest.

"12" is about a team overcoming amazing obstacles in the quest for the championship, a story we've heard a thousand times. But not about a team of orphans. It's characters that make a story interesting, and the film (and the book) excel when the focus is on these downtrodden cast-offs. But bits and pieces were left out that would have made them more real and compelling.

You can learn a lot about people sitting across from them over a meal. Someone cooked 3 meals a day,7 days a week, for the 150 orphans and staff at the Masonic Home, yet we never see them even in the dining room. Teenage boys talk a lot about girls, yet the subject rarely came up. In an orphanage everyone has daily and weekly chores, but the subject of chores goes unaddressed. Is this an orphanage or a boarding school?

What about families? Orphanages have visitation, yet the subject of family visitation was AWOL except in one powerful scene when a mean mother shows up unannounced to claim her now popular son 10 years after dumping him. It would have been more realistic to show the mother struggling to recognize her son, whose appearance would have changed dramatically during those 10 years.

The film's two 2 dimensional villains were caricatures--the larcenous, paddle-happy administrator and the cruel Poly High football coach. This storytelling faux pas nearly destroyed the film's credibility.

The film will be a major success for two reasons: a) it's a great Depression-era story of hope and triumph over adversity and b) it cracks open a new storytelling franchise--orphan life in America. If the film makes a lot of money it will pave the way for more realistic stories about the American orphan. For this reason alone, I take off my hat to Jim Dent, who had the courage to take on the challenge and then convince Hollywood to make it into a film far better than his thoroughly entertaining book. Dent has inspired me to finish my memoirs about living in the children's home, COUNTY KID and THE ADOPTIMIST.

Jim Dent, for profit or whatever reason, has single-handedly made America finally face the fact that this country has orphanages.

The Glass Castle (2017)

Made Especially for the Wounded Warrior.

[8/10 · 14 August 2017]

This is the film of the century for wounded warriors like myself who survived severe childhood trauma and chaos. I sat down in the theater and it was over in a blink.

I sobbed in more than a couple of places and left in a state of shock that lasted for hours. For "civilians," this masterful bio- flick will not be such a monumental achievement, for they lack a frame of reference. The sting of a hornet is an abstract notion for those who've never been stung. But for the rest of us..., wham!

Casting: Excellent, especially the roles of Jeannette and her father, Rex. The child roles were very effective, especially those of Jeannette.

Acting: Brilliant by Brie and Woody, who channeled Jeannette and Rex The Rosemary (mother of Jeannette) role was believable but didn't convey the degree of maternal indifference in the book. Woody seemed overweight for the role, but his mannerisms and speech delivery made up for it. He had several strong moments, but I expect his rendition of Rex's delirium in his Herculean struggle to quit drinking will be shown on Oscar night.

Script: Well done. Jeannette's story unfolds in overlapping flashbacks, starting when Jeannette as an accomplished adult writer in New York. Very effective for the way it emulates the consciousness of someone wrestling with their traumatic history but challenging for those who crave a simplistic plot line.

Setting: There are three main settings--New York City, Arizona and Virginia mountains (or similar "hillbilly" country). The Arizona desert scenes lacked the full brilliance of the sweeping sunsets and nighttime Milky Way galaxy that I recall. The scenes in New York and Virginia were confined as well, but effective.

Themes: Triumph over the effects of alcoholism, parental neglect, pedophilia and the resiliency of children in the face of parental dysfunction.

Key Dialog: "We have to stick together," teenage Jeannette to her siblings.

Suggestion: Read the book first. Jeannette's an excellent writer.

This complicated, emotionally draining film owes much of its high effectiveness to the fact that it is a true story, proving that fiction cannot compete with the harrowing reality of well rendered truth.

Unmistaken Child (2008)

A Crime Against Humanity

[8/10 · 8 June 2011]

Before watching this this well-made documentary I had been interested in Buddhism, but now have lost all respect for the Tibetan form.

The film follows a Buddhist priest from village to village and he inquires about likely candidates, examines and tests, looking for "special" traits, until finally he selects one who is clearly advanced in comparison with the others, bright-eyed and intelligent--a precocious toddler whose parents are clearly distressed, as is the child, when he is finally removed from his loving parents to be raised by monks.

Any belief system that promotes the taking of children from perfectly good families is utter barbarism. Such cruelty cannot be defended nor condoned on any level except domination and mind control. How better to subjugate a people than to take the best and brightest of their children and brainwash the public into believing this is for some divine purpose. Such a practice is repugnant to the extreme.

The child's selections of beads and trinkets is proof of nothing but a precocious ability to read queues from the facial expressions and body language of those surrounding him. It was theater staged to subjugate the gullible.

Avatar (2009)

A Star Wars Retread With Glitzy Effects

[7/10 · 18 January 2010]

The same old worn-out plot, good guys shooting bad guys. When will people get tired of this?! It was like watching a shoot-em-up video game. Boring as hell. Can't believe I spent 3 hours and six bucks (the early bird rate) watching this. But I had to see what everyone was (cough, choke)raving about.

Sorry, folks, I'm not impressed with pseudo-humanoid images created by eggheads behind computer screens. Yes, they're life-like, but that's the point, they aren't life. I want real human actors, and no computer's ever going to duplicate that.

Yes, there was a lot of beautiful imagery. Yes there was artful rendition of battle scenes, strange creatures and forestry. All good and wonderful. The themes were admirable, such as how all of life is interconnected and how our planet is in ecological decline because of irresponsible economic economic exploitation. Major points for driving those issues home.

But the film glorifies death, violence and destruction, as do so many of Hollywood's offerings. Why must the solution to conflict always be presented as war. Haven't we had enough war? I guess it's too easy to create video games. People keep buying them.

Up in the Air (I) (2009)

Choose Your Attachments Wisely

[9/10 · 17 January 2010]

A deeply philosophical film. Everything worked, but I didn't like the stark message that love and attachments are empty promises--that ultimately we die alone. There was a coldness and cynicism and to the entire film, but we are left with the idea that the main character, played effectively by George Clooney, may be ready for a change. This is not a feel-good film, but it will make you think.

The casting was superb, particularly the character Natalie, a know-it-all-but-clueless Cornell MBA, who goes on the road with Clooney's character and gets an education about the real world.

This film is highly relevant in these times of traumatic corporate downsizing and economic stress--people losing not just their livelihoods, but their homes and even their their lives.

The film is a study in the Buddhist principle that suffering arisings from desire and attachment. This is driven home, without ever mentioning religion. The more attached you become to someone or to an object, the greater you suffer when it is taken away. That's intuitive, but the film questions these attachments and desires and shows how empty life can be lived without them. Choose your attachments carefully, the film infers, and a goal of airline mileage credits seems to be the one attachment Clooney's character allows himself--something attainable, that he has complete control over.

But the film isn't entirely cynical about losing your job. The point is made in several places that it can be the opportunity to change your life to something better.

The sets were perfectly rendered--airport lobbies, check-in gates, hotels, airliners... .

In so many great films, the music feels intrusive. When I notice the sound track, it pulls me out of the story. The music here was just right.

The cinematography was great, magical. I was captivated from beginning to end, made to forget that I was in a theater.

Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944)

A Message to Young Women

[6/10 · 15 November 2009]

I was born in July, 1945, and viewed the film in 2009 as research for my memoir about growing up in a Texas orphanage. I was searching for clues about my mother's life, the era into which I was born. She would likely have viewed the film. I was struck by a line spoken by Ted's young wife Ellen and repeated in his mind at key emotional moments of the film.

Ellen says (in effect), "This baby is what tells me you will come back to me." In the mind of an insecure young woman in a rocky marriage (as my mother was), the powerfully delivered message seemed to say: get pregnant to keep your man. It didn't work out that way. Right after my father left for duty in Germany, she divorced him. I was eight months old.

I read the book when I was ten and enjoyed it immensely. I liked how the film portrayed wartime American culture, though I'm sure it was idealized for the propaganda effect.

The buffoonery about singing "The Eyes of Texas" was painful because the abuse at the Texas orphanage was horrific.

It's ironic that I live in Alameda, where the Hornet is a tourist attraction as a museum.

Nobody's Fool (1994)

Love and Redemption, With a Little Contempt for Flawed Authority

[9/10 · 24 October 2009]

My sentimental favorite Newman film exemplifying some of my deepest values. Sully lives his love for the common folk of his town and his contempt for arrogance and greedy authority figures. Favorite line, spoken to "Rub," his mentally-retarded coworker: "Peter's my son; you're my best friend."

The setting is superb, a small town in New York in the winter -- a metaphor for society at large. Newman's character, Sully, looks after the poor and meek while awakening to the importance of his role as a father and a grandfather.

The cinematography is excellent; rarely can you tell when the natural lighting is enhanced. The script is clean and crisp. Doesn't drag anywhere and keeps me guessing. Newman's his usual great self, and the supporting cast is superb, making this film flow like silk. Philip Seymour Hoffman nails his role as an overzealous cop. Melanie Griffith is brilliant and beautiful. Jessica Tandy plays her (final?) role with perfection. Bruce Willis plays his wise-cracking typecast role to perfection as well.

The Chase (1966)

Barely Believable - Weak at Every Turn

[5/10 · 24 February 2009]

I bought the DVD because of the incredible cast, Brando in particular, but could barely force myself to stay with the film to the end. There are so many weaknesses. Only have space for a few.

CINEMATOGRAPHY - Too few close-ups! Good grief, key characters need at least one close-up to anchor them in our minds, and key moments need dramatizing! There was not even a close-up of the (oil) drilling rig. For oil to be important, you need at least one shot of an entire oil field, showing pumps and drilling rigs. Too much of the film is shot at night, when lighting is so difficult. DIRECTING - The fight scenes didn't even pretend to look real, and that awful whistling in the wrecking yard between Fonda and Redford, even Fonda and Fox (her beau) was totally unbelievable. There was so much physical jostling between characters at the party that it made it boring. SCRIPT - (The weakest link.) We needed more back story to feel the tension between Sheriff Brando and the E.G. Marshall character. Oil, the source of the wealth, was barely mentioned, and we saw one drilling rig, a wimpy thing that would be used to drill for water. (Again, no close-up.)Fonda and her boyfriend didn't really seem connected (not one really intimate scene between them). Too much time was wasted on parties with little contribution to the plot. Too much of the plot was carried by dialog instead of action or setting. (Film is, first and foremost, a VISUAL medium!!) How many flaming tires rolled down an embankment does it take to make a point? How many flares tossed into the air from the same angle? Conflicts aren't dramatized. Except for the fight scene in the Sheriff's office, each time someone takes a stand, the other side backs down too readily. There were many elements of a good script here, but they weren't sufficiently rendered to invest me emotionally.