Can A Child Survive A Mother’s Hate?

AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY — A mother’s hate inflicts the worst kind of suffering. There’s not one child among the main characters in August: Osage County who escapes. Not Violet, not Mattie Faye, not Barbara, Karen, Ivey, or even little Charles. Most of the film’s immediate suffering is at the hands of Violet Westin, the cruel matriarch of the Westin family. There’s certainly no excuse for a mother’s cruelty. Yet, can it be understood?  Even more importantly, how does a daughter save herself? Can a relationship with a mother like Violet ever change?

DO YOU HAVE TO MAKE A POISONOUS CHOICE TO SURVIVE?

AMERICAN HUSTLE — David O. Russell’s American Hustle is a cinematic treatise on the complexities of survival. Irving Rosenfeld, Sydney Prosser (AKA Lady Edith Greensley), Richie DiMaso, and Rosalyn Rosenfeld are each, in their own uniquely perverse and destructive ways, just trying to survive. But, are they? If we remove ourselves from the intrigue of the hustle itself (based upon the FBI Abscam operation of 1980), what exactly can we learn about this particular brand of self-serving (or should I say, rather desperate) psychological survival?

HOW TO BUY A WILL TO LIVE

DALLAS BUYER’S CLUB — There are two radical choices when faced with a death sentence: jolt into a potent sobriety and fight to live. Or, sink into despair so deep that drugs are a greater solace than fighting the monster killing you. Ron Woodroof, played brilliantly by Matthew McConaughey (Golden Globe Best Actor), chooses the former. But Rayon, a transgender woman, played with magnificent pathos by Jared Leto (Golden Globe Best Supporting Actor) can’t stop her harmful behaviors. What are the driving forces (emotional ones, that is) behind an out of character transformation versus self-destruction?

THERE ARE NO FRIENDS IN THE WORLD OF GREED

THE WOLF OF WALL STREET — Martin Scorsese’s The Wolf Of Wall Street is an indulgently voyeuristic picture of MORE, MORE, MORE, at every level. Money, sex, drugs – there’s no stopping the film’s main characters, Jordan Belfort and his cohorts, from their purely hedonistic pursuits. And, yet, that’s still not enough. Is Martin Scorsese secretly enthralled and glorifying debauchery, as some critics and viewers suggest? Or, is his three-hour film really meant to take us inside the depraved minds of men who are completely out for themselves and have absolutely no capacity for human concern?

You Think This Movie Is About Saving Mr. Banks? Oh Dear…

SAVING MR. BANKS — Saving Mr. Banks takes many of us back to delicious childhood memories of Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke singing “Jolly Holiday”, “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”, “Let’s Go Fly a Kite”, and “A Spoonful of Sugar Makes The Medicine Go Down”. What we couldn’t know as children is the heartbreaking story behind PL Travers’ Mary Poppins; a trauma so deep a spoonful of kindness would never be enough to turn it around.

HEARTBURN - A Novel by Nora Ephron

HEARTBURN — “’Tis the season to be jolly.” It’s also the season to miss people. Nora Ephron is someone to be missed. She could make us laugh at our necks, and at almost anything. Her novel, Heartburn (a barely fictionalized account of the end of her own marriage), even manages to make us laugh at divorce. Why she turns a sad, disturbing, and even enraging reality funny is an interesting question.

Divorce isn’t a laughing matter. For Rachel Samstat, Heartburn’s betrayed wife, it’s certainly not funny that her husband’s having an affair with a woman who just came to dinner and asked for her carrot cake recipe. Especially when, not suspecting anything remotely of the kind, she willingly gives it to her. A laugh can be a good thing. Laughter is also a way of avoiding tears. Rachel cries, but fights it. As her therapist says: “She makes jokes even when she feels terrible.”

How Unreal Can A Character Get?

BLUE JASMINE — What happened to Woody Allen? This prolific filmmaker is well known for creating quirkily neurotic yet lovable characters—even characters with depth.  However Jasmine French, the lead character in Allen’s latest film Blue Jasmine, unfortunately, isn’t one of them.