ica has ument. is still rn into its nueath of is only fellow
ted for, meeting atified. justice, eed to
y aligns protect. es, the eroes is s in the nything
’s insisd Roge intereen the n about finally s Stark er with is fully ying to
ecracky man wholly ntastic ressed, le with ve the convicestroyill love
raverse ivist.
The reel
Mon by meg weichman
DOWNTOWN
Ladies Night - $1 off drinks & $5 martinis
TRAVERSE CITY
closed at 9pm
Tues - $2 well drinks & shots OPEN MIC WITH HOST CHRIS STERR
Wed - Get it in the can for $1
with FUNKY PROFESSOR
keanu
Thurs - MI beer night $1 off all MI beer
w/ THE POCKET
K
eegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele are the best at what they do. No one offers better, more biting, and holy-cowhilarious social commentary than their now-defunct Comedy Central show Key and Peele. It’s a very fine line to walk and by combining their deft satire with approachable pop culture references they walk it very well. Their first foray into feature film (which they wrote, produced, and star in) has the footprints of their beloved TV work but, sadly, isn’t nearly as taut. Keanu values action over comedy, violence over satire, and takes a fairly brutal, and fairly bizarre, shift in tone midway through the movie. Maybe Key and Peele are just better at thinking and working in sketch format. Yet for as much as they get out of the film’s one-note concept – two nerdy middle class black men assume the identities of drug assassins in order to get their pet kitten, the titular Keanu, back – I don’t think that will always be the case. (See the transcendent giddy glee of their amazing exploration into the solo career of George Michael). One would think that with their adroit observations they could have delivered a film that entertains the masses and also matches their nimble brilliance. But hey, at least there’s a kitten.
SUNDAY 12:30 • 2:45 • 5 • 7 PM MON - THU 1:30 • 3:45 • 6 • 8:15 PM •••••••••••••••••••••••••• •••••••••••••
REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSENR WEDNESDAY 10:30 AM
The Complete James Dean month - 25¢ Classic Matinee
SENSORY FRIENDLY CLASSIC SURPRISE
Sat May 21: THE BARBAROSSA BROTHERS Sun May 22 KARAOKE (10PM-2AM)
941-1930 downtown TC check us out at unionstreetstationtc.net
FRIDAY 11 AM - 25¢ Classic Matinee
LEGENDPG
FRIDAY NIGHT FLICKS - $3 or 2 for $5 •••••••••••••••••••••••••• •••••••••••••
DOWNTOWN
jungle book
Happy Hour: JOE WILSON TRIO Then: THE BARBAROSSA BROTHERS Buckets of Beer starting at $7
Fri May 20:
IN CLINCH PARK
SUNDAY 1 • 4:15* • 7:30 PM MONDAY 1* • 4:15 • 7:30* PM TUE & THU 1 • 4:15* • 7:30 PM WEDNESDAY 1* • 4:15 • 7:30* PM
D
irector Jon Favreau’s take on Rudyard Kipling’s classic story The Jungle Book is a technical marvel. A visually audacious achievement and lush fantasy adventure, it seamlessly creates a world where rhinos, crocodiles, porcupines, wolves, monkeys — the whole dang menagerie — have never looked so startlingly real. And they talk! But to what end? The mindboggling special effects conflict with a story that doesn’t know what it wants to be. The story is ostensibly one you know; Man-cub Mowgli, raised in a wolf tribe by mother Raksha (Lupita Nyong’o), finds his life suddenly in danger when the villainous tiger Shere Khan (Idris Elba) basically puts a death sentence on his head. And so it then falls to the protective paternal figures, serious-minded panther Bagheera (Ben Kingsley) and fun-loving bear Baloo (Bill Murray), to safely shepherd him to the man village. So even though this version is basically a carbon copy of Disney’s 1967 take on the story, by retaining Disney’s original framework and adding extensive action set pieces that make it darker and scarier, it strips the story of its wonder. It lacks fun and warmth. Too scary for little kids, too straightforward and uninvolved for adults, it hits a sweet spot for kids of a certain age raised on bombastic CGI creations. So if you don’t see yourself fitting that criteria, consider it barely a necessity to see this one.
*Presented In Dolby Digital
(no 3D surcharge)
231-947-4800
midnight special
M
idnight Special, the latest film from director Jeff Nichols (Take Shelter, Mud), is the kind of film that doesn’t get made much anymore: a film so imbued with genuine mystery and intrigue, yet grounded in the mundane everyday connections we all experience, that you will be completely swept away. It’s the story of a father (Michael Shannon) on the run with his eight-year-old son Alton (St. Vincent’s Jaeden Lieberher) in order to protect him from those after Alton’s strange powers. To continue in any detail would rob you of one of the best pieces of cinematic storytelling I’ve seen, and easily the best movie of the year so far. It’s thrilling, eerie, and tender, and explores the lengths people will go to for what they believe in with uncanny emotional depth. Borrowing tone and trajectory from Steven Spielberg’s 1977 opus Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Midnight Special is less a science fiction tale than one of ordinary people struggling to understand the extraordinary things that are upending their world. This is a profound, introspective work of art masquerading as a genre film. So don’t let the sci-fi mantle scare you off; this magnificently compelling film is so much more than the sum of its parts.
Northern Express Weekly • may 16, 2016 • 35