The Measure of a Man

Films: Cyrano
Format: DVD from DeKalb Public Library on the kid’s television.

When I first saw that there would be a new version of the story of Cyrano de Bergerac, I was intrigued. It’s a hell of a good story, and I’m always a sucker for a sad romance. The story of Cyrano is one of the truly tragic romances. The basic story is that a truly great spirit, guardsman Cyrano de Bergerac, is a true Renaissance man, a warrior poet as gifted with the pen or wordplay as with the sword. But, the story goes, he is cursed with a giant nose, which prevents him from being loved, or so he believes. The twist in 2021’s Cyrano is not that the story has been turned into a musical but that the title character is played by Peter Dinklage.

And that really is the story. We open with one of the classic scenes of the Cyrano story. We are introduced to Roxanne (Haley Bennett), who is both poor and beautiful. She is being wooed—unsuccessfully—by Duke De Guiche (Ben Mendelsohn), who has a great deal of money to waste on her. He takes her to the theater to see Montfleury (Mark Benton), the most celebrated actor of his day, but the performance is interrupted by Cyrano (Dinklage), who dislikes him intently. While the actor runs off, Valvert (Joshua James) challenges Cyrano to a duel. Cyrano humiliates him, chants at him in rhyme, and eventually runs him through.

The Prime Minister's Speech

Films: Darkest Hour
Format: Blu-ray from DeKalb Public Library on rockin’ flatscreen.

For the next 800-1200 words I’m going to talk about Darkest Hour, but I’m also going to address what I see as a significant problem with the Oscars and the nominations. The reason for that is that Darkest Hour is one of those movies that serves as an excellent example for what I see as a continuing and continual problem. Oh, there are plenty of other potential examples. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is perhaps the best example I can think of in the last 10 years. Because it’s how my mind is currently working, I think I’m going to address that first.

The problem is that Oscar, or Oscar voters perhaps, don’t seem to know the difference between a movie being good and a movie being important, or at least about an important topic. I fully understand why many people in the film industry seemed to think that Darkest Hour was an important film. Depending on your political persuasion, this could well be seen as an inspiring story of someone standing up to face off against fascism when it appeared that fascism was taking over the world. I get that some will call it rousing. I understand this more or less memoir taken from Churchill’s life is something that people thing demands to be seen. But did it really need to be nominated for Best Picture?

Austen City Limits

Film: Pride & Prejudice
Format: DVD from NetFlix on laptop.

I genuinely like to give every movie I watch a chance. The best way to be surprised by something is not to go in with preconceived notions of the film in question even if that’s hard sometimes. In the case of Sense and Sensibility, I went in with suspicions and came out a believer. So when Pride & Prejudice, another Jane Austen romantic soap opera showed up in the mail, I was guardedly optimistic. It’s evident that I’m not the target demographic for a costume romance set in the decade or so before 1800, but I’ve been surprised plenty of times before. I had reservations, but I had hopes, too.

And you know what? The hopes paid off. Pride & Prejudice is a pretty good film. Oh, I didn’t rush out and find a copy of any of Jane Austen’s novels to start reading (although I did literally find a copy of the book in a restaurant a couple of hours after finishing the movie—true story), but I think I liked this as well as could be expected for someone who favors horror and science fiction over other genres. I still like Sense and Sensibility more. Part of that is the story itself and part of that is Ang Lee’s superior direction. But I was pleasantly surprised by this all the way through.

Secrets and Shame

Film: Atonement
Format: DVD from personal collection on kick-ass portable DVD player.


Atonement is a film of two halves. In the first half, we learn all that we need to learn about the principal characters with a couple of exceptions. In the second half, we get the payoff of everything in the first half, then get a fantasy ending and a real ending. It’s no coincidence that the first half of this film is excellent, dramatic, and great and that the second half has a tendency to drag.

As seems the case with many a film set in Britain, all of the early action takes place on one of those giant estates with five servants for every person living there. We are introduced to Briony Tallis (Saoirse Ronan), a precocious 13-year-old who spends a lot of her time writing. In this case, she has written a play to be performed at a party that evening. The parts of the play are to be performed by Lola Quincey (Juno Temple) and her two brothers, but the kids quickly lose interest.

Briony doesn’t push this because she’s too busy eavesdropping on her sister, Cecelia (Keira Knightley), who appears to be all but humping the son of the housekeeper, Robbie (James McAvoy). This is a problem for the precocious Briony, because she has one hell of a crush on the good looking lad, despite the fact that he undoubtedly looks upon her as a little girl. We also see the same scene Briony does from a different perspective, and while there’s some sexual tension between Cecelia and Robbie, they’re far from having a tender moment.

Also appearing is the brother of Cecelia and Briony, Leon (Patrick Kennedy) and Leon’s friend Paul Marshall (the awesomely named Benedict Cumberbatch), heir to a large candy fortune. It’s evident that Paul is something of a horndog and is mildly attracted to Cecelia, but is evidently saving the best of his loving for Lola.

Anyway, as it turns out, there is something between Cecelia and Robbie, and Briony walks in on them consummating their relationship, which convinces Briony that Robbie is a dangerous sex maniac. When Lola is ravaged that night, Briony tells everyone that it was Robbie. Since he is the son of one of the servants, the lie is believed, and Robbie shipped off to prison, which causes a rift in the family. Cecelia leaves. Robbie is let out of prison in exchange for his joining the Army at the start of World War II.

So the rest of the film is essentially what becomes of the lie and what happens with Briony, Cecelia, Robbie, Paul, and Lola in the ensuing half dozen years or so. Naturally, this is necessary for the telling of the story. The problem is that it simply isn’t as interesting as what comes before. Briony is a far more interesting character as a child than she is as a teen (played by Romola Garai) or as an older woman (played by Vanessa Redgrave).

This is not to say that there isn’t plenty of impressive work here. There is. The long take on the beach at Dunkirk, for instance, is a masterpiece of camera movement, timing, and coordination. This is a fantastic sequence because of its complexity and because it seems so completely natural. It’s difficult to make something that complicated and big look that seamless and easy, and this sequence can and will be studied for a long time.

And yet, all that really happens in the scenes in France are that Robbie and his compatriots wander around in retreat, reach Dunkirk, and wait. Robbie goes a bit mental for awhile and we deal with that. Interspersed are scenes of Briony working at a hospital and not doing it very well, almost as if she is trying to pay penance for what she did to Robbie several years before. In fact, it’s not “almost” as if she is doing that—it’s precisely what she is doing. But again, it’s simply not that interesting.

Sure, the conclusion is great. The last 10 minutes or so of the film are pitch perfect. The 50 minutes leading up to that ending, though, simply drag.

Atonement is nonetheless a seminal film for several reasons. It’s a great coming out party for Saoirse Ronan for one thing. It also marks a moment for Keira Knightley to grow up on film, and it’s one of the first films I’ve seen her in that I found appropriate for her. Okay, I liked the first Pirates film, too. But really, she’s a sort of non-entity in my book until this film, which proved that she could handle a role with real dramatic range. And James McAvoy is generally good in most things he touches, and he’s just as strong here.

If only it were more interesting!

Why to watch Atonement: The first half.
Why not to watch: The second half.