Film

“Whoa ... these new edibles are hella potey. ...”

Night moves

A jilted husband uses the power of the pen to mess with his ex-wife’s mind in Nocturnal Animals, the engaging and dark-hearted latest from director Tom Ford.

Amy Adams, on fire in 2016 even after you factor in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, plays Susan Morrow, a bizarre art gallery owner stuck in a rut. Her bland but gorgeous husband (Armie Hammer—also having a good year) is ambivalent toward her, and she’s borderline broke and generally unhappy.

She gets a manuscript in the mail from ex-husband Edward Sheffield (Jake Gyllenhaal). He was a struggling writer when the two were together, but now he just might have the novel that could get his career going. Susan agrees to read the advance copy, and the story within freaks her out, to say the least.

The film’s screenplay, written by Ford and based on the novel by Austin Wright, then goes on an ultra-clever route. We see the story play out as Susan reads it and, as many of us often do, Susan casts the main character in the novel, Tony Hastings, as somebody she knows—her ex-husband. So Gyllenhaal plays two roles in the film: Edward in flashbacks and Tony, husband of Laura (Isla Fisher) and father to India (Ellie Bamber), in her visualization of the novel.

One of the great tricks of the movie is that it remains a mystery whether or not the events in the novel are based on events in the larger narrative, or just act as a symbolic representation of the cruelties Susan inflicted upon Edward when she left him. Also, we never really know if Edward is somebody who simply wrote a chilling thriller and wants his ex-wife’s honest opinion, or if he’s sending her a “message.”

Edward’s novel is a searing thriller involving a family, led by Tony, on a road trip in Texas. They get harassed on the highway by a group of thugs, but most notably by Ray (a completely terrifying Aaron

Taylor-Johnson). Things go really bad, which allows for the entrance of a lawman character, Bobby Andes. That lawman just happens to be played by Michael Shannon, so now you know why this movie is so damned fun to watch. Well, fun in that it’s always a pleasure to see performers setting the screen ablaze with their work. Not so fun in that there are a lot of exposed nerves and brutal moments in this movie, and it isn’t for the fainthearted. Ford and friends traffic in the dark side with this baby. All of the worst fears of husbands and wives are in play for this one, and happy endings aren’t on its mind. Gyllenhaal, who did a great job with dual roles in Enemy, excels again as the jilted husband/helpless father. His characters are made to go through every kind of torture a man can go through, and then some. You get the sense he worked himself up to a lot of stomachaches while making this film. Adams portrays a once virtuous woman made slightly vapid Nocturnal Animals due to some, perhaps, arguably bad life choices. She still manages 12345 to create a character that ultimately breaks your heart. While Edward’s Director: Tom Ford possibly vengeful actions might Starring: Amy Adams, Jake be fighting to paint Susan in a bad Gyllenhaal, Michael Shannon light, Susan still winds up a sensitive, sympathetic character. That’s Amy Adams for you. She can pretty much pull off anything in front of a camera. Shannon, having a banner year even after you factor in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, plays a lawman with a death sentence just about the way you would expect Shannon to play a character with such a dilemma. (Read: He kills it.) TaylorJohnson goes against type as a redneck monster who’s unpredictable until he becomes horrifyingly predictable. This is Tom Ford’s second film as a director after A Single Man, so he’s a solid two-for-two. Nocturnal Animals certainly goes down as one of the year’s more unusual mainstream films. It’s also a movie that might inspire you to take a more populated road on that journey through Texas you’ve been planning. Ω

4Arrival Director Denis Villeneuve has made one of the year’s best science fiction films. Amy Adams stars as Dr. Louise Banks, a linguistics teacher crippled by visions of a daughter who died of a rare illness. She lives a life of seclusion, where the only thing she really does is teach her class and mope around her lakefront home. (Man, that must be one abnormally high paying teacher’s gig.) During class, a bunch of phones go off. A student instructs her to turn on the TV, and, bam, that’s how she discovers the planet seems to be getting a visit from an alien force. Strange giant pods have parked themselves all over the planet, and nobody knows their intent. A solemn military man (Forest Whitaker) shows up in Louise’s office and informs her the world needs her. She has a sense of purpose again. It isn’t long before she’s inside an alien ship trying to talk to the “Heptapods,” large, elephant-looking aliens with seven legs. She’s joined by a science officer played by a surprisingly low-key Jeremy Renner. This is a sci-fi movie that gives itself time to breathe.

3The Eagle Huntress Director Otto Bell’s documentary plays out like a cool, dramatic adventure film as a young girl aims to be the first eagle hunter in her family. Aisholpan, a 13 year-old Mongolian girl living with her tribe, has always been fascinated with eagles and wants to become a champion eagle hunter like her father and grandfather (They hunt using eagles to catch game, rather than actually hunting eagles.) The film follows her through initial training, including the capturing of her own baby eagle on a treacherous cliff. This kid isn’t messing around; she really wants this. It’s fascinating watching the eagle acclimate to its new home; you feel a little sorry for it, but its captors feed it well, and it certainly bonds with Aisholpan. It’s an amazing animal, and there’s a lot of joy in simply seeing food going into its mouth. It’s also amazing to see its particular brand of voracious eating going on just inches from the young girl’s face. This kid has a lot of faith in the goodwill of her big bird. Yes, that’s Rey herself, Daisy Ridley, chiming in with the occasional narration. (Her voice was made for this sort of thing.) Parts of the doc feel a little staged, but its overwhelming charm cancels out the phony moments. Aisholpan and her big bird do eventually make it to the eagle festival, with her being the only female participant. It ends with the girl and her eagle going on a winter hunt, and some pretty amazing battles with foxes. I didn’t even know eagle hunting was a thing until I saw this.

4The Edge of Seventeen Writer-director Kelly Fremon Craig makes an impressive debut with this darkly funny take on the life of a modern day high school outcast. Hailee Steinfeld gives her best performance since TrueGritas Nadine, a highly intelligent teen going through an awkward stage when her best friend (Haley Lu Richardson) starts dating her brother (Blake Jenner). Nadine is a practitioner of brutal honesty, which basically gets her ostracized at school and in trouble with her family. The only one who really stops to listen is her teacher (a hilarious Woody Harrelson) who actually has no choice given his profession. Craig’s screenplay is first rate, and her directing results in some great performances. Steinfeld is good enough here to be considered for her second Oscar nomination, while Jenner (who starred in this year’s EverybodyWantsSome!!) is equally good. Kyra Sedgwick is also very good in a supporting role as Nadine’s mother, while Hayden Szeto does excellent work as a high school boy who hasn’t mastered the art of properly asking somebody out. (His performance is all the more impressive because he’s over 30 playing 18.)

4The Eyes of My Mother Ever wondered what would happen to your kid if you raised her in the middle of nowhere with no friends and showed her how to perform surgery on decapitated cow heads? Writer-director Nicolas Pesce has and, heck, he’s made a whole damned movie about it. After a really strange guy (Will Brill) visits her farm home and a series of really bad things happen, Francisca (Kika Magalhaes) is left alone with nobody to talk to. Well, actually, she does have a pet, but we won’t go into that right now. Francisca has had very little social interaction over the years, other than with that pet, and she ventures out to see what the outside world is like. As it turns out, it would’ve been much better for a few people if she had chosen to just stay home and watch TV. Shot in black and white and coupled with an effectively eerie score, this is old school horror. Like, early Wes Craven/Tobe Hooper kind of horror. Francisca turns out to be a memorable movie monster in this gothic fairytale, one that will leave you extra cautious about picking up those hitchhikers. Pesce knows what scary is, and he certainly knows how to direct a scary picture. If you don’t like horror films already, I can pretty much guarantee you are going to violently hate this one. It’s nightmare fuel, for sure. (Available for rent on iTunes, Amazon.com and OnDemand during a limited theatrical release.)

2Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them Peter Yates returns to helm the next chapter in the HarryPotteruniverse, a prequel called FantasticBeastsandWhere toFindThem, the title of a textbook Harry studied at Hogwarts. The film takes place well before Harry’s time, as the world of wizardry comes to New York City in the 1920s. Unfortunately, Beastsstruggles with some of the same problems as the first, lackluster HarryPotter. It’s a sometimes good-looking movie with a screenplay that never takes hold. It’s all over the place, with no real sense of purpose other than setting up future movies. It’s nothing but an overblown place-setter. In place of Daniel Radcliffe’s Harry, we get Eddie Redmayne’s Newt, author and caretaker for a variety of “fantastic beasts.” The film opens with him coming to New York toting a suitcase with a variety of beasts bursting to get out. Some of them do, indeed, escape and wreak havoc. Most notably a little platypus-looking thing called Niffler. There’s a fun moment when Newt opens his case, and drops into it like it contains a staircase. It reveals a vast home for the creatures inside, where he feeds them and plays. And that’s it, really. The movie is a big setup for the occasional sequences involving Redmayne interacting with special effects. The creatures might look relatively cool, but none of them register as great characters that move the plot along. Dan Fogler is pretty good in a supporting role as somebody who befriends Newt.

4Hacksaw Ridge Mel Gibson directs his first movie in a decade and—surprise—the sucker bleeds. As a director, Gibson stands alongside the likes of Sam Raimi, David Cronenberg and Peter Jackson as a master of body horror. Yes, I will go so far as to say his latest, Hacksaw Ridge, is an all out horror film in parts. His depiction of a World War II battle makes George Romero’s DawnoftheDeadlook like Zootopia. The movie tells the true story of Desmond Doss (Andrew Garfield), a battlefield medic and the first of three conscientious objectors in U.S. warfare history to receive the Medal of Honor. The dude refused to pick up a gun, or any weapon for that matter, during his time served in Okinawa. That didn’t stop him from braving the battlefields with comrades, eventually saving the lives of 75 men. Much of the film’s first half is devoted to Doss’ backstory, a troubled childhood with his alcoholic World War I veteran father (Hugo Weaving) and an eventual romance with future wife Dorothy Schutte (Teresa Palmer). The early goings in the film are handled well, although schmaltzy at times. When Doss goes to boot camp and faces off against commanding officers like Captain Glover (Sam Worthington) and Sgt. Howell (Vince Vaughn), the film starts to get very interesting. When the action switches to the scaling of the Maeda Escarpment, a.k.a. HacksawRidge, the movie becomes perhaps the most grueling war movie experience ever made. 12.08.16 | RN&R | 23