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It may look like just an arcane insider story that happened in the movie industry this week but it's probably more than that. Paramount Pictures has a new owner and theater owners are watching with concern because the group that bought the studio is headed by David Ellison. He'll be the new CEO and as the son of Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle, the third largest software company in the world, is expected to push Paramount into more of a technology company. He's said as much to investors this week. To theater owners that may mean more movies streaming and fewer for them to show. And maybe, a shorter time to show them. Change creeps on bit by bit.
Meanwhile, two of these three new films this week are in theaters only:
Fly Me To The Moon: 3 stars
Mother of All Shows: 3 ½
Longlegs: 3
FLY ME TO THE MOON: There were people who believed the moon landing we saw on TV back in 1969 was faked; filmed in a movie studio. The Russians alleged that too and at least two movies (a James Bond and one starring O.J. Simpson) dealt with it. And here we have another riff on the story but that's all it is, a riff. It feels trivial. It's now centered on a love story and heavily promoted for the star power of Scarlett Johansson and Channing Tatum although they don't generate a lot of chemistry. Just flirting and a couple of kisses, for which, ironically, the film has an intimacy co-ordinator.
What it also has though, and what makes the film quite enjoyable to watch is an extremely good re-creation of the era.
We get the NASA facilities, TV news with Walter Cronkite and fine soul and R&B songs on the soundtrack. And the Viet Nam war going on at the same time. The US was set on beating the Russians to the moon but the American public had cooled on the Apollo program. The answer? Promotion. In this scenario, a publicist (Johansson) is brought in to revive interest and thereby keep key politicians onside with their say over the public purse. Her wily spiels are the best parts of this film.
She also re-meets the mission director (Tatum). They had met in a bar earlier and now share their back stories, his including regret; hers a dodgy background, both sidebars to the main story.
They're ordered to film a moonlanding on a soundstage in case it's needed for the TV coverage. Woody Harrelson is the sly government official who brings the order (from Richard Nixon, it is presumed) and Jim Rash is the fluttery artiste brought in to direct the production. He's very funny, much more than the movie is. There are other good performances, Ray Romano, for instance as a NASA official, and some tension later on, but overall it's only light entertainment. (In theaters) 3 out of 5
MOTHER OF ALL SHOWS: This is the most imaginative version I've ever seen of that movie-theme staple: the friction between mothers and daughters. It's bristling with flash, lively sequences based on many TV formats and a very strong performance by Wendie Malick as the mother. Her name is Rosa and she appears “only inside the mind” of her daughter Liza (Melissa D'Agostino, who also wrote, directed and co-wrote songs). The film, made in Ontario, is one of the better Canadian productions I've seen in some time precisely because it is so inventive.
Liza is working through her feelings about mom who is now in a care home, dying of cancer. Why mourn when she's been described as “relentless and mean, intent on making you miserable?” There are too many memories and too much history to just let them all go.
They reappear in visions of mom doing a comic monologue (“This is my world”), hosting a game show (The Mating Show, where she disses Liza for showing “no discernable life direction”) and a song-and-dance production number which she performs with back-up dancers. She finds occasion to humiliate her daughter who she admits is better than she is but laments that she doesn't get any credit for that. She likes children, until “they develop personalities.” Dinner scenes, confessions before a priest and mock TV commercials express more of this whole range of conflicted emotions. An argument with her cousin Lisa turns into knights jousting, wrestlers grappling, airplanes in a dogfight, even a jungle scene because she's “considered a hostile agent.” This film is fun and for many women sure to be evocative. (VOD and digital, starting next Tuesday). 3 ½ out of 5
LONGLEGS: Here's a nifty horror film that won't gross you out as so many do these days but will chill you with a growing feeling of dread. And offer a few scares in dark places or seen out a window on a gloomy night. The horrors are atmosphere- and plot-driven, like in Silence of the Lambs which is something of an inspiration. A female FBI agent (Maika Monroe) is asked to investigate a serial killer case that has confounded others for years. She has ace intuitive powers and suspects a cackling weirdo loner, played with brio by a hard-to-recognize Nicolas Cage. But how could he have done it? Ten families were killed. There was never a sign of forced entry; possibly someone was welcomed into the house and there were cryptic notes signed “Longlegs” left behind.
The agent finds a pattern in the killings; they were always just before or after the birthday of a young girl in the family. The killer made dolls that he sent as presents. He dabbled in Satanism. The agent's mother reminds her constantly to say her prayers. They'll protect her from the devil, she says. But it's not that easy. As a prologue filmed like an old home movie suggests there are connections here that go far back and will take some time to reveal. The trail is engrossing for us to follow even if the final explanation is not totally clear or even nonsensical. The film is tightly written and smoothly directed though by Osgood (Oz) Perkins. He's the son of Anthony Perkins, yes the Psycho actor, and he made it in Vancouver, where he now lives, and in nearby towns Maple Ridge and Langley. Good creepy scares for the summer. (In theaters) 3 out of 5
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