Stephen Schaefer’s Hollywood & Mine – Boston Herald
‘The Tomorrow War’ stars Chris Pratt as a heroic father figure who has issues with his own father (J.K. Simmons). As a $200 million sci-fi fantasy, ‘War’ begins as time-traveling Earthlings come from 30 years in the future, yes 2051, to warn everyone that monstrous aliens, notable for their beast-like demeanor and notably ferocious with several sets of chompers are waging a war of extinction – and winning. So people today – all sorts of people – are recruited and sent via a teleporter to 2051 where most quickly die as they are eaten and eradicated by those huge horrors from Outer Space. Yes, there are many surprises along the way, including who Pratt meets in 2051. Director Adam McKay, Pratt and several in the cast did a virtual press conference. Here are excerpts from that:
Q: Many wars have been fought by the youngest people. We pull them out and throw them into battle. In this case, it is not kids but older people, people in their 30s or 40s who are drawn to fight. That’s an interesting twist. Chris, do you have any thoughts on that?
Chris Pratt: Yes, I do. It’s interesting. In terms of our history of conscription, if it’s World War II or Vietnam, we’ve seen these movies where it is 18- or 19-year-old kids getting thrown into the throes. They’re just kids forced to become men. It is a different relationship when it is an adult. I don’t think this is a spoiler: Everyone who goes forward into the future is over the age of 30 and everyone who’s come back to train us is under the age of 30. Because you realize that you can’t live in both timelines at the same time. They’re really just drafting a crop of people who are going to be dead in 2051. I hope that’s not a spoiler, but if it is, well, it’s not that big a spoiler.
You are dealing with people who are making life decisions based not on the life that they could lead but rather the world that they’re leaving for their children. My character Dan is doing this because if he doesn’t go, they’re going to take his wife in his place. This is something he has to do to protect his family, protect his daughter and leave her with a home life of having her mother there. It’s a different theme to think about someone being drafted away from their children. Rather than children being drafted away from their parents.
Q: Chris, what did Chris McKay bring to the project after working on ‘LEGO Batman’ and animation for so many years?
CP: Well, we talked about it earlier. I’ve heard this rule and I like it that when you give a dog medicine, you wrap it up in some hamburger. So that they eat the hamburger and don’t know they’re eating the medicine. I think it’s important to do that. Just when you’re talking to the dog, you don’t say, ‘Hey, it’s time for your medicine.’ You say, ‘Hey, it’s time for your hamburger.’ Any medicine that’s in this movie, it’s going to taste like a hamburger, you know what I mean? Don’t worry about it. It’s like a great entertaining, vibrant, exciting blockbuster movie. There might be a little takeaway of it, but mostly it’s fun and exciting. And make sure you turn off your phone when you watch it. [It’s on Amazon but] it’ll be just like being in a movie theater.
To the point of working with McKay, I’ve been able to work with him before. It’s so awesome to see this — he’s been making films for years and this is a big live-action movie. It was a massive step for him and for me coming on as a producer. I had so much to learn. I was grateful to be surrounded by really smart people. I was grateful to be working with Chris. He’s the kind of guy that is open to collaboration but also has a very clear vision. This is 100% his baby. I’ve worked with people who have transitioned from a writer into a director. Chris had cut his teeth mostly in the post-production process if I’m correct, and then is working as a director of animation and then a director of live-action. I think the best directors come from that side because you know what you need to give yourself in the [editing] room. He gave himself a lot of amazing options for the edit. He’s got this thing, this personality, a great knowledge of film, but also just a really vibrant personality. An exciting aura about him when he’s on set. It’s really contagious. I remember being up on top of a glacier in Iceland. He’s walking with sticks and a camera on his shoulder, trudging through the snow and looks at me. He’s like, ‘This is what I (expletive) got into this for, man. This is what I (expletive) got into this for.’ He does say the F-word a lot. I’m quoting him. He says, ‘We’re up on a (expletive) glacier making a (expletive)
movie right now.’ [laughs] It was like, ‘Yes, that’s right!’ There’s an excitement and an enthusiasm for the craft that he has. It’s his life, man. You could see it.
I’m just excited to see what he does next. I hope I’m a part of it. After this movie, I really think the world is completely his oyster. He can do whatever he wants. He shows that he can handle a massive budget, get it done on time, under budget, and deliver a great movie. He’s going to have his pick of jobs that he’s going to want to do. That’s really cool.
NEW DVDs:
ROALD DAHL’S CLASSIC While Johnny Depp and Tim Burton had a triumph with their 2005 update on ‘Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory’ (4K ultra HD + Blu-ray + Digital Code, WB, G), it is the Gene Wilder version, now celebrating its 50th anniversary, that remains the standard bearer. Both films originated from Roald Dahl’s 1964 ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.’ Dahl is credited with the screenplay but, in fact, he disowned the film (he was quite cranky) when another writer came onboard, revised the ending and added songs. Those tunes by Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley (his hit songs include ‘What Kind of Fool Am I,’ ‘Goldfinger’ and ‘Feeling Good’) included a hit single ‘The Candy Man’ and were Oscar nominated. Casting Wilder came only after much discussion. All of the Monty Python crew were interested but not considered big enough names. Peter Sellers begged Dahl to play Wonka, while Fred Astaire and Joel Grey were among the names mentioned. Dahl’s choice was Spike Milligan. Bill, the candy store owner, was a role sought by Sammy Davis, Jr. and Newley but both were considered too well known for the minor role. Ironically, Davis had his only Number One hit with ‘Candy Man.’ Special Features: Audio commentary with ‘Wonka’ kids, ‘Pure Imagination: The Story of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory’ documentary, 4 – not 3, not 2, but – 4 Sing-Along songs. Plus a vintage featurette.
A CRITERION FIRST With ‘Pariah’ (Blu-ray, Criterion Collection, R), writer-director Dee Rees becomes the first Black woman and the first Queer woman of color to be included in the prestigious Criterion Collection. Criterion, which boasts over 1,000 state of the art titles, was taken to task for its lack of diversity in the many filmmakers it’s chosen. ‘Pariah,’ a semi-autobiographical 2011 story about a teenaged Brooklyn lesbian (Adepero Oduye) coming to terms with her sexuality amid her parents’ disapproval, is notable for its incisive details. Special Edition Features: A new conversation between Rees and filmmaker Michelle Parkerson. Also new: A cast reunion with Rees, a program on making ‘Pariah’ with Rees, the production designer, editor, producer and cinematographer. Interview with ‘Queer Times, Black Futures’ author Kara Keeling. Plus printed essay by critic Cassie da Costa.
CELEBRATE ‘PINK’ AT 35 An essential Brat Pack ‘80s artifact, John Hughes’ ‘Pretty in Pink’ (Steelbook Blu-ray + Digital, Paramount, PG-13) in 1986 followed his first two Molly Ringwald hits, ‘Sixteen Candles’ (’84) and ‘The Breakfast Club’ (’85). A romantic triangle with a critically praised, popular soundtrack, test audiences nevertheless hated the original ending and demanded that Ringwald’s Andie end up with her ‘prince,’ the handsome Blane (Andrew McCarthy). And definitely not end up with her best but weird friend Duckie (Jon Cryer, soon to be immortal as one of the ’Two and a Half Men’ for 12 seasons). The reality, Ringwald has said, was that Duckie was based on her best friend, who was gay. Ringwald also voted to cast McCarthy, not the first-choice Charlie Sheen. Hughes, unhappy having his ending altered, took 5 days to script the revised final scene. The missing original footage? It’s discussed in the Special Features where there is also the isolated score and a Filmmaker Focus with director Howard Deutch.
EXPANDING ROM COM BORDERS Out and proud gay Israeli filmmaker Eytan Fox has earned a global gay following with hits like ‘Yossi & Jagger’ and ‘Walk on Water.’ His ‘Sublet’ (DVD, Greenwich, Not Rated) follows a depressed NY Times travel columnist in Tel Aviv to write an article. Stage veteran John Benjamin Hickey (a Tony winner for ‘The Normal Heart’ revival, the star of the recent gay epic, ‘The Inheritance’) is the journalist who rents a sublet from a gay film student (Niv Nissim) and discovers life can change and actually get better. A cross generational romance that hits all the right buttons.
CLAUDETTE IN CONTROL In Hollywood, being a star means you usually get your way when making a movie. Claudette Colbert, a French-American stage actress who transitioned to hit films in the late 1920s, became famous in Cecil B. DeMille’s historical 1933 religious epic ‘The Sign of the Cross’ (’32) where she took a bath in asses’ milk and in the title role of DeMille’s 1934 ‘Cleopatra.’ She won her Best Actress Oscar for the now-classic romantic comedy ‘It Happened One Night’ opposite Clark Gable. By the time she made the 1935 ‘The Gilded Lily’ (Blu-ray, KL Studio Classics, Not Rated), Colbert was able to demand that only the left side of her face be photographed. She felt it was preferential to her right side – and that was, strangely enough, true. But knowing this means watching any Colbert movie with the awareness of how much trouble they had to go through to always get that left side! ‘Gilded,’ directed by the comedian-turned-director Wesley Ruggles, is a Depression-era fantasy about a woman who dreams of marrying a millionaire. Only when a real millionaire (Ray Milland) appears and a wedding is imminent, it means leaving her newspaper reporter (Fred MacMurray) in the proverbial dust. This was the 1st of 7 teamings Colbert would have with MacMurray (‘Double Indemnity,’ ‘The Apartment,’ ‘My Three Sons’). Bonus: film historian Kat Ellinger’s audio commentary.
ANYONE? ANYONE? Some movies really are magical and John Hughes’ ‘Ferris Bueller’s Day Off’ (Steelbook Blu-ray + Digital, Paramount, PG-13), 35 years later but who’s counting, retains that magic. The screenplay suggests what kind of an adventure Mark Twain might have written if he were around in 1986 and didn’t have Huck or Jim. Ferris, as played by Matthew Broderick, 23 at the time, with just the right tone as super confident and super cool, takes his day off for a Chicago adventure with his best bud and girlfriend. Hughes rarely directed his screenplays but he did so here. Special Features: Featurettes on casting, making of, ‘Who is Ferris Bueller? and ‘Vintage Ferris Bueller: The Lost Tapes.’
3 DIVAS ON THE ROAD The casting of the 2006 women’s road movie ‘Bonneville’ (Blu-ray, Kino Lorber, PG) is ideal. Jessica Lange is the widow driving 5 days cross country to Santa Barbara where she can will disperse her husband’s ashes. Her best friends along for the ride: Kathy Bates (‘Misery,’ ‘Dolores Claiborne,’ ‘About Schmidt’) and Joan Allen (‘The Bourne Supremacy,’ ‘The Bourne Ultimatum’). The title refers to their comfy carriage, a 1966 Pontiac Bonneville convertible. Not forgotten is her hubby’s horrible adult child, a missing will that unless found means real misery for Lange. Bonus: Behind the scenes.
OBSCURE BOGIE When they program Humphrey Bogart film festivals, ‘Chain Lightning’ (Blu-ray, Warner Archive, Not Rated) is not among the dozen-plus entries which will always be included, like ‘The Maltese Falcon,’ ‘Casablanca’ and ‘The African Queen.’ Partly that’s because of a now dated topic: ‘Lightning’ is focused on the media explosion of interest in jet-propelled aviation. Breaking the sound barrier! Movies like ‘The McConnell Story.’ Once passenger planes lost their propellers and the Jet Age began in the Sixties, interest in the technical thrills and danger were consigned alongside tales of the Model T and horse and buggy rides. The ‘Chain’ drama involves Bogart’s jet test pilot Matt Brennan flying over the North Pole to the Pentagon in DC. Can he do it!? Love interest is lovely, husky voiced Eleanor Parker (‘Interrupted Melody,’ ‘Caged,’ ‘The Naked Jungle’ and ‘Scaramouche’). Special Features: ‘Bear Feat’ cartoon, short ‘So You Want to Be an Actor.’
A SWISS GEM Delightful! A truly disarming surprise, the Swiss ‘My Wonderful Wanda’ (DVD, Kino Lorber, Not Rated) could be viewed as a family film that gleefully takes a satiric dive into selfish, controlling Haves and the revenge of the Have Nots. This isn’t ‘Parasite’ however. Here there are no homicides, just threatened reputations. Wanda has left her children with her parents in Poland to work in the lakeside villa of the stroke-ridden Wegmeister-Gloor patriarch. His elegant, matter of fact wife Elsa (Marthe Keller whose ‘70s Hollywood career meant starring in Billy Wilder’s ‘Fedora’ and opposite Al Pacino in ‘Bobby Deerfield’) is cool but never cruel or condescending to Wanda. That would be the attitude of Elsa’s daughter, a spectacularly unhappy, you might say miserable and you would be right, married woman without children. Her brother, heir to the family fortune, is a space cadet. The mix of family and immigrant worker includes sex, screaming and, for us, hilarity. Co-written and directed by Bettina Oberli. Remember her name. In German with optional English subtitles.
SAM RAIMI’S HORROR There’s a new movie ‘Lourdes’ about the world-famous Marian shrine in France where the sick and disabled come for its blessed waters, hoping to be cured. That would be an uneasy companion with the horrific ‘The Unholy’ (Blu-ray + Digital, Screen Gems, PG-13). This is an adaptation of the late English writer James Herbert’s ‘Shrine’ – he also wrote ‘The Rats’ about rodents the size of small dogs who feast on Toronto’s human population. In ‘Unholy’ a young hearing-impaired girl prays to the Virgin Mary and has her hearing restored. She can now speak and heal the sick which attracts crowds. Enter Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s disgraced journalist who has come to investigate the small New England town. As the title suggests, Morgan wonders if it’s not Mary, Mother of God, who is making this happen but…. ‘The Unholy.’ Raimi’s landmark horrors go back to ‘The Evil Dead’ ‘80s franchise.
THE START FOR 2 LEGENDS How do legendary filmmakers get started? That question is answered with new Blu-rays for 2 titans of world cinema. Jean Renoir was the son of the celebrated Impressionist painter Auguste Renoir. Jean stands tall for 2 masterworks, the 1937 anti-war ‘The Grand Illusion’ with Erich Von Stroheim and the 1939 ‘The Rules of the Game,’ both considered among the greatest films ever made with ‘Rules’ seen as disturbingly prophetic about the bloodbath that would soon follow with another world war. Renoir made films in Hollywood during his exile from Nazi-occupied France and died at 84 in Beverly Hills. His first film ‘Whirlpool of Fate’ (Blu-ray, Kino Classics, Not Rated) in 1925 has just been given a new 4K restoration. It stars his then-wife Catherine Hessling who would be his frequent star and tells the tragedy of a young orphan girl. Renoir filmed ‘Whirlpool’ on Impressionist painter Paul Cezanne’s property. The Blu-ray has a score by Antonio Coppola and a commentary by film critic Nick Pinkerton.
Josef von Sternberg was enormously influential as a Hollywood director, revered for his ability to create faraway worlds onscreen, whether it be war-torn China (‘Shanghai Express’) or the vast Sahara desert (‘Morocco’), while never leaving the Paramount backlot. The director’s career had begun in the early 1920s with silents. His 1927 crime drama ‘Underworld’ won him a contract at Paramount where his greatest films would be made in the following decade. His next picture, a 1928 drama ‘The Last Command’ won his star Emil Jannings the very first Best Actor Oscar (Jannings would next star in von Sternberg’s greatest film ‘The Blue Angel’ opposite the director’s great discovery and, some say, great love). The director’s first sound film, the 1929 ‘Thunderbolt’ (Blu-ray, KL Studio Classics, Not Rated), earned its star George Bancroft a Best Actor Oscar nomination and won praise for its innovative sound work. Bancroft as Thunderbolt Jim Lang is incarcerated on Death Row, awaiting execution, when the young punk who stole his girlfriend Ritzy (Fay Wray, a few years before ‘King Kong’) lands in the cell next to his. Thunderbolt vows to murder him before he dies. This is categorized as pre-Code proto-noir; there is a commentary by Nick Pinkerton.
MIGHTY FINE HUGHES What makes John Hughes’ 1987 ‘Some Kind of Wonderful’ (Steelbook Blu-ray + Digital, Paramount, PG-13) so really wonderful is its terrific cast, an ensemble that still shimmers after so many decades. There was much sturm und drang behind the scenes. Hughes fired his original director Martha Coolidge to rehire Howard Deutch whom he had feuded with because on their earlier film ‘Pretty in Pink’ test audiences hated his ending and a new one was shot. But when ‘Pink’ was big hit, Hughes changed his mind and asked Deutch back. ‘Wonderful’ is actually the same story as ‘Pink’ only Hughes changed the characters’ genders. Eric Stoltz, Mary Stuart Masterson and Lea Thompson are LA high schoolers. Stoltz is Keith, a blue-collar mechanic, and Masterson’s Watts is his tomboyish friend who’s rumored to be a lesbian (later Masterson would play a lesbian in her biggest hit ‘Fried Green Tomatoes’). In classic rom-com conflicts, Keith’s hot for the hottest girl in school Amanda (Thompson who married and is still married to Deutch) and Watts, seeing that, realizes she has more than best buds feeling for him. Trivia note: Hughes’ inside joke is naming his trio after Rolling Stones Keith Richards, Charlie Watts and their song ‘Miss Amanda Jones.’ Special Features: Commentary by director Howard Deutch and his leading lady/wife Lea Thompson, a ‘conversation’ with Deutch, featurettes on behind the scenes, the cast and a Hughes time capsule.