By Susan Granger
Master filmmaker Steven Spielberg is fascinated with exploring history: “Schindler’s List,” “Saving Private Ryan,” “Munich,” “Amistad,” and “Lincoln.” Now, “Bridge of Spies.”
In New York City in the 1950s, at the height of the simmering Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, painter Rudolf Abel (Mark Rylance) is captured and accused of being a Russian spy.
Summoned by his boss (Alan Alda), insurance lawyer James B. Donovan (Tom Hanks) is told to represent Abel. A former prosecutor at the Nuremburg trials, Donovan’s known as a wily, pragmatic mediator.
Reluctant at first, Donovan is, nevertheless, determined to defend his client, insisting on “due process of law,” even when the presiding judge and the American public have deemed Abel guilty, and Donovan’s wife (Amy Ryan) and family are harassed in their Brooklyn home.
Sometime later, U.S. Air Force pilot Francis Gary Powers (Austin Stowell) is shot down over Soviet airspace. Both men possess sensitive information, becoming pawns, traded by their respective nations.
So CIA director Allen Dulles directs Donovan to fly to Berlin to broker the covert, danger-fraught deal, which is further complicated by the arrest of a young American student, Frederic Pryor (Will Rogers), detained in the Eastern sector behind the newly-erected Wall.
Co-scripted by Ethan and Joel Coen with Matt Charman, based on Donovan’s “Strangers on a Bridge: The Case of Colonel Abel and Francis Gary Powers” (1964), Spielberg creates an intensely suspenseful saga, culminating on the Glienicki Bridge over the Havel River.
As usual, Spielberg surrounds himself with the most talented actors and crew. Tom Hanks is flawless as a steadfast, idealistic, yet canny negotiator with a dry sense of humor, while Mark Rylance impresses with commanding finesse and ironic discretion.
Cinematographer Janusz Kaminski dazzles with a sequence of Powers ejecting from his U-2 surveillance plane, viewing its destruction through his parachute. Augmenting the dark subterfuge are Adam Stockhausen’s production design and Thomas Newman’s score.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Bridge of Spies” is an enthralling 10, an espionage thriller with contemporary relevance.
Set in Orlando, Florida, the taut, timely thriller “99 Homes” begins with a blood-splattered suicide as a suburban home-owner chooses death over eviction.
Disposing of the mess falls to callous real-estate broker Richard Carver (Michael Shannon) whose business is acquiring foreclosed-upon homes for re-sale – gaming the real-estate market and the government.
Next on Carver’s list is the family home of Dennis Nash (Andrew Garfield), an unemployed construction worker who is cruelly forced to move his widowed mother (Laura Dern) and young son (Noah Lomax) into a shabby motel.
Determined to earn enough to reclaim his home, Nash goes to work for Carver, despite Carver’s ominous warning: “When you work for me, you’re mine.”
First, Nash diligently handles clean-ups; then, he’s stealing air conditioners, appliances and water pumps from abandoned houses and posting ‘vacate’ notices when homeowners cannot keep up payments.
Soon, Nash becomes unscrupulous Carver’s protégé, evicting decent, working people and the elderly, giving them only two minutes to pack up their belongings which are dumped on the curb.
“First one’s a bitch, but you get numb to it,” Carver says, adding, “America doesn’t bail out losers.”
Although he’s earning a lot of money for the first time in his life, Nash is forced to repossess one home after another, each with its own humiliating tale.
Melodramatically scripted by director Ramin Bahrani and veteran Iranian filmmaker Amir Naderi from Bahareh Azimi’s story, it’s a simplistic but emotionally effective commentary on the American economy – with its legal and administrative loopholes.
Scruffy, bearded Andrew Garfield (“Spider-Man”) oozes vulnerability and anguish, while Michael Shannon’s (“The Iceman”) conniving cool is almost reptilian.
On the Granger Gauge, “99 Homes” is a socially-conscious, empathetic 8, effectively exposing real-estate corruption.
Conceived as an origin story/prequel to J.M. Barrie’s classic, “Pan” is maudlin mess.
It begins as a distraught young mother (Amanda Seyfried) leaves her infant son in a Dickensian-like London orphanage. His name is Peter and around his neck is a pendant, a tiny pan flute.
Bright-eyed Peter (Levi Miller) grows into a rambunctious lad who, during a World War II bombing raid, is loaded aboard a flying pirate ship, evading the German Luftwaffe and the Royal Air Force’s Spitfires.
Under the command of ferocious Captain Blackbeard (hideously costumed/made-up Hugh Jackman), they sail off into an alternate universe, known as Neverland, where Peter wants to find his mother.
Landing in huge, open mining pit, Peter’s forced to dig for Pixite – a.k.a. crystalized fairy dust, which Blackbeard uses to fight old age – while his slaves sing Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.”
Befriended by a grown-up miner, James Hook (Garrett Hedlund), wearing an Indiana Jones’ish fedora, Peter’s forced to walk the plank. Instead of falling – EGAD! – he flies! Peter and Hook are then captured by Tiger Lily (Rooney Mara) and her band of Indians.
Amid an armada of flying frigates and fairies, there’s also a huge crocodile and a mermaid trio. Hampered with a ludicrous script, director Joe Wright fills the screen with swashbuckling sound and campy, chaotic CGI fury – none of which makes much sense.
On the Granger Gauge, “Pan” is grotesque 2, a fantasy-adventure flop.
( Editor’s Note: Westport resident Susan Granger grew up in Hollywood, studied journalism with Pierre Salinger at Mills College, and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with highest honors in journalism. In addition to writing for newspapers and magazines, she has been on radio/television as an anchorwoman and movie/drama critic for many years. See her reviews at www.susangranger.com.)
