I’ll be shelling out to see Michael Roskam‘s The Drop again this evening. I couldn’t understand roughly a third of the dialogue when I saw it at Toronto’s Princess of Wales theatre the weekend before last. And don’t tell me it’s my hearing — another Toronto-visiting critic agreed with my complaint about the POW’s murky tones on top of which The Theory of Everything composer Johann Johannsson told me he found the sound substandard. I’ll be seeing The Drop this evening at the Landmark, which I know has excellent sound. But it pisses me off regardless. The Drop is fine but without the sound issue I would have waited for a Vudu HDX availability. I called it “an earnestly above-average, Friends of Eddie Coyle-ish crime drama…well-acted, agreeably flavorfu…one of those low-key neighborhood personality soup bowls.” I was especially taken by the “always impressive Tom Hardy as an unassuming, seemingly-none-too-bright barkeep named Tom who surprises the audience but particularly Matthias Schoenaert‘s bullying bad-guy character in Act Three,” etc.

“A traffic accident involving a young boy spins a web of lies, suspicion and cover-ups around three policemen in Felony, a tension-packed drama from Aussie helmer Matthew Saville. The script, written by lead actor Joel Edgerton, teems with moral conundrums, as straight-arrow righteousness, self-serving pragmatism and plain, old-fashioned guilt duke it out amid drug busts and family disintegration. Thanks to Saville’s tightly controlled direction and a superlative cast, the mere exchange of glances builds as much suspense as the kinetic action sequence that opens the pic.” — from Ronnie Scheib‘s Variety review. Gravitas Ventures is releasing on 10.17.

I could live on a steady diet of Sidney Lumet movies for the rest of my life. Not just those made by the late director** but Lumet-style New York melodramas with his signature attitude and blunt, stabby brushstrokes. Urgent, propulsive tales of corruption. Tentacles of fate, forces closing in, shootings, beatings, etc. 33 Years Ago: “Hey, wanna go see that new movie? It’s with whatsisname…Treat Williams. I’ve heard it’s almost three hours of medium interiors of prosecutors and district attorneys debating whether or not to prosecute a corrupt cop who wanted to dishcarge the crap in his life but winds up ratting on his partners and his mafia cousins…whaddaya think?” A Most Violent Year will open on Wednesday, 12.31.14, which, by the way, is the same day that Leviathan opens.

** I don’t think I ever want to see Family Business again and I’m not so sure about Last of the Mobile Hot-Shots, but these aside…

Shawn Levy and Jonathan Tropper‘s This Is Where I Leave You (Warner Bros., 9.19) is one of those soothing suburban-middle-class family comedies in which the major characters (four 30something kids and their mom) fret about, examine and resolve their respective issues. I missed the opening 25 minutes in Toronto so I caught it again last night. It’s not bad — it just starts to feel like a sedative after the first hour. It occured to me that movies of this sort always take place in a really nice (usually pre-war) home with a nice big lawn shaded by big trees, plenty of bedrooms, loads of food on the dinner table, etc. And the photography is steady and unfussy and the lighting is just right with everyone looking well-dressed in a casual sort of way with perfect hair, etc. The idea is to make the audience feel as flush and comfortable as the characters. But I need to give Levy credit for handling the husband-discovers-wife-in-bed-with-his-boss scene (which is in the trailer) in an unexpected way. The husband (Jason Bateman) is holding a birthday cake when he walks in on the nasty-doers (Abigail Spencer, Dax Shepard), and right away you’re expecting Bateman to dump the cake on Spencer’s head. Or on Shepard’s. I’m not going to spoil but Bateman doesn’t do that. And what he does is just right. It might be the best scene in the film.

From my 1.17.14 review: “Damien Chazelle‘s Whiplash (Sony Pictures Classics, 10.14) is a raging two-hander about a gifted drummer named Andrew (Miles Teller). Enrolled at an elite Manhattan music school and determined to be not just proficient or admired but Buddy Rich-great, Andrew is a Bunsen burner. We can see from the get-go he’s going to be increasingly possessed and manic and single-minded about the skins. (All great musicians are like this to varying degrees.) On top of which he really doesn’t want to be like his kindly, failed-writer dad (Paul Reiser), and he can’t find peace with a pretty girl (Melissa Benoist) because she isn’t as consumed as he is — too uncertain and unexceptional.

“That’s combustible enough, but Chazelle turns it up with the villain/angel of the piece — a snarling, egg-bald, half-mad music instructor named Terence Fletcher (J.K. Simmons). This guy is definitely not sane and yet he knows what it takes to be great. Andrew recognizes this kindred (if dominating) spirit and wham…we’re off to the races. You know these guys are going to butt heads, and that a lot of emotional-psychological blood will be spilt (along with the actual stuff). This is the super-demanding realm of classic jazz. Everyone listening to Rich and Charlie Parker and other legends of that ilk. Playing the hell out of ‘Whiplash’ and ‘Cherokee’ and dreading Fletcher’s wrath. No pikers, whiners or jerkoffs.”

Fatih Akin‘s The Cut is “a big, ambitious, continent-spanning piece of work…but it’s a little simplistic emotionally, especially in its latter half as the film trudges across America with its hero. It doesn’t have the sophisticated nuance and wit of Akin’s contemporary German-language movies, like Head-On (’04) and The Edge of Heaven (’07). [The title] can mean the brutal act of murder itself; it can mean the division of husbands from wives, parents from children, and it can mean the present from the past, the insidious amputation of memory. Whether The Cut encompasses this last sense is up for debate, but it is a forceful, watchable, strongly presented picture and a courageous, honest gesture.” — from Peter Bradshaw‘s Guardian review, filed from Venice Film Festival on 8.31.14.

If you’re a cultured film cricket or impassioned film hound, there are two ways to go with Scott Frank‘s A Walk Among The Tombstones. You can praise it for being “an uncommonly well-made thriller,” as Village Voice critic Alan Scherstuhl did today, or you can say it’s too venal and misogynist (the bad guys are as animalistic and bloodthirsty as the Islamic State fighters) despite the gritty, well-honed, old-fashioned chops. But you can’t just wave it off. You can’t dismiss it for being retro (there’s nothing wrong with taking a basic ’70s-style approach) or for not being exceptionally well made (a ludicrous thing to say) or because it’s not cartoonishly violent in the rote style of the Taken films. Or because it invests in secondary characters. Or because it has a heart.

“The Taken films invite viewers to cheer violence,” Scherstuhl writes. “A Walk Among the Tombstones, with some moral force, insists that you want nothing to do with it.”

In short, you can say you don’t like Tombstones for whatever peculiar reason you may choose (as I often do), but you can’t fault the obviously high level of craft. You’ve got to at least show proper respect. Theatrical urban thrillers really need this kind of smart, low-key approach. Or…aahh, fuck it, maybe they don’t. Maybe it’s better to just let this level of writing and acting migrate to cable television where it belongs. But this is the kind of good-detective-vs.-maniacal-villain flick that nobody makes any more. It’s composed of well-ordered material and the right kind of instincts. It’s a bit like John Flynn‘s The Outfit, that 1973 Robert Duvall film that finally re-surfaced on DVD a few years ago. One of those tone-it-down, less-is-more exercises. And quite gripping in its own way. It just doesn’t pander to morons.

We know that Chris and Jonathan Nolan‘s Interstellar (Paramount, 11.5) involves an attempt to…you tell me. We know that the earth is dust-filled and polluted beyond hope and less and less capable of sustaining life, and that Matthew McConaughey is part of a team of space voyagers who want to somehow turn things around…but how? It’s a slim thread of a notion of a vague idea of something or other, and it’s been floating around for several months now. Does anyone know what Interstellar is actually about without the dandelion pollen? I’m not trying to be an asshole. I’m just feeling fed up with the vague-itude.

About ten days ago, or dead smack in the middle of the Toronto Film Festival, New Beverly Cinema owner Quentin Tarantino announced that he’s not only renovating the famously grimy, down-at-the-heels repertory theatre (it’s due to re-open sometime next month) but is totally committed to an all-35mm, all-the-time policy. The retro-minded director is not that worried about profitability. What matters to Tarantino (and I totally respect this) is standing by celluloid to the bitter end. “The big thing about what’s going to change now that I’m taking the theater over is, from here on in the New Beverly is only showing film,” Tarantino told Deadline‘s Jen Yamato. “That’s it. No digital. If something’s playing at the New Beverly, if we’re showing it, it’s on film.”

That means getting rid of the digital projector that theatre manager Michael Torgan (son of the late honcho/founder of the New Beverly) had installed. That also means Tarantino is taking over the New Beverly programming for the first three months of the new incarnation and showing many of his own 35mm prints, most of which are presumably in pretty good condition, along with pre-show shorts and cartoons and whatnot. (He basically wants the place to simulate a ’70s grindhouse vibe with a mixture of exploitation and art fare.) This also means that Torgan’s involvement in the new operation is…uhm, uncertain. Yamato wrote that while “terms of the takeover remain vague,” Torgan “might stay on as the New Beverly’s Julia Marchese and Brian Quinn step up as assistant managers.” Tarantino’s actual quote: “I want him to be involved”…hah!

The buzz for the last couple of months has been that David Fincher‘s Gone Girl is a movie that some couples might break up over. A chillingly entertaining, top-notch Fincher drill bit with a startling Rosamund Pike performance. A critic I know has just seen it and says the following: “The movie’s heart is curdled and cynical and black, and Fincher doesn’t pull any punches. I’m not sure it will catch on with mainstream audiences, but I’m really happy he made it. It’s so beautiful. Ben Affleck is aces, perhaps the best he’s ever been. It’s more of a provocative date movie than high art. I wouldn’t call it slamdunk Best Picture material, but watch out for a nomination for Rosamund Pike — she’s that good. Original author and screenwriter Gillian Flynn could get one too. I’m kinda surprised the book caught Fincher’s interest as it’s 95 percent dialogue in living rooms and 5 percent Fincher-style grotesquerie (including an insane bloody murder). Not showy or flashy in any way. I also really liked Patrick Fugit‘s near-silent performance. Fincher is so detailed oriented and specific he reminds me a little of Kubrick. It’s maybe 15 minutes too long, but Tyler Perry can act!”

Southern California Edison informed me today that equipment replacements will cause my particular area of West Hollywood to be without power for as long as 11 hours starting tomorrow around 7 pm. In a heat wave? Thanks, bozos! I’ve never heard of equipment replacements causing an outage lasting a full half-day. I’m presuming that the actual power-less period will be closer to an hour or two, but the SCE robots have been instructed to say it might last as long as 11 hours. So I booked a room for tomorrow night (check-in at 3 pm) at the Beverly Terrace hotel, which is just outside the grid area. It’ll cost over $200 bills but I don’t want to risk being without air conditioning or fans for that long a period. Am I acting like a spoiled nelly? Should I man up and cancel the reservation and just deal with it like the late Steve McQueen would have?

I know who Rob Marshall is. I know what he’s capable of, where his instincts lie, where he’s likely to go. I know what Chicago, Memoirs of a Geisha, Nine and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides were. He makes smooth, costly, handsomely designed films. You’re not going to get me to believe that his latest endeavor, a filmed adaptation of Stephen Sondheim‘s Into the Woods (Disney, 12.25), is going to be anything more or less than another Rob Marshall film. What that will finally amount to is, of course, anyone’s guess. But you know what I mean.