Kritical Kommentary - One Movie, Two Books

First, the movie....

This movie is yet another look at 1960's culture and history, a la "Trial of the Chicago 7" and "One Night in Miami."  This is the story of Fred Hampton, Vice Chairman of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party in 1969, and it is surprisingly relevant today in 2021 when police overreach and #BlackLiveMatter are very much a part of our culture.  It is also the story of Bill O'Neal, a small time car thief in Chicago who gets busted and is given a way out: infiltrate the Black Panthers and serve as an informant for the FBI in order to get the goods on the Panthers in general, Hampton in particular, whom Director J. Edgar Hoover deems to be a "Black Messiah" who must be stopped at all costs, even if it means doing away with such pesky little details as civil liberties, due process, and equal justice for all.   O'Neal becomes the "Judas" of the title in this excellent film.

The cast is terrific with "Get Out" co-stars Daniel Kaluuya as Hampton and LaKeith Stanfield as O'Neal, Jesse Plemons as the straight arrow white bread Hoover-era FBI Agent, and Martin Sheen as old J. Edgar himself.  Great performances all around. 

The "what happened to" titles at the end of the movie are especially jarring, particularly as they concern Bill O'Neal.  Pay attention to those.

Oh, and to settle something that has niggled at me since I saw "Get Out" two years ago, I Googled for the proper pronunciation of Daniel Kaluuya's name.  It's Kuh-Loo-Ya.  So there.

Three Stars from The Grandstander.

Now for the books, both of which have movie and show biz tie-ins.

I have long considered Carl Reiner, who died last year at the age of 98, to be one of the true authentic comic geniuses of our times.  Back in 2003, when Reiner was a young pup at age 81, he penned this memoir.  It is an easy read, but it is everything that you would expect from Carl Reiner: Funny, insightful, funny, poignant, and did I mention funny?

Great stories about Mel Brooks, Sid Caesar, Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore (his story about a distraught Moore coming to him to tell him that she and her then husband were going to divorce is a classic!), terrific stories about his father and his brother, and even some tales about his first born son, Robbie, who would go on to a very successful show biz career of his own fill this book.

Four Stars from The Grandstander.

Writer, humorist, novelist, screenwriter, and director Nora Ephron died in 2012 at the age of 71, a cancer victim. This slim book is a collection of essays of hers that was published in 2010.  I get the feeling that Ephron knew that she was dying when these essays were written because many of them deal with aging and getting old.  The final two essays in the book are especially moving.  One is titled "What I Won't Miss" (E-mail, My closet, Bras, Clarence Thomas, The sound of the vacuum cleaner) and the other "What I Will Miss" (My kids, Waffles, Bacon, Reading in bed, Coming over the bridge into Manhattan).  She also includes a very frank story of her divorce from her second husband whom she doesn't name, but whom we all know is Carl Bernstein.  Not sure how she had the guts to go into such detail.  It's not all bad stories and melancholia, her trademark wit is included in just about every essay in this very brief book.

Reading these essays prompted me to seek out and find her 1983 novel, "Heartburn", which tells the story of a successful writer who discovers that her husband is cheating on her while she is pregnant and leads to a divorce.  Yes, it is based on her experiences with Bernstein.  It was made into a successful 1986 movie - Ephron wrote the screenplay; Mike Nichols directed -  starring Meryl Streep and Jack Nicholson, and I will probably seek that movie out once I finish the book.

Three Stars from The Grandstander for this one.

"Get Out"

In an attempt to see as many of the Oscar nominated Best Picture movies as possible, we took ourselves out to the Cinemark last night - for a 10:00 PM showing, no less! - to see Jordan Peele's "Get Out".  This film was released in February of last year and was billed as a horror movie with a bit more heft than the usual slasher/Halloween/Friday the 13th blood-and-gore type of flick.  The movie drew critical acclaim and when the Oscar nominations were announced,  it pulled down four biggies: Picture, Actor (Daniel Kaluuya), Director (Jordan Peele) and Screenplay (Peele).

The premise:  African-American Chris Washington (Kaluuya) and his white girlfriend, Rose Armitage (Allison Williams), are going to spend the weekend at Rose's parents' (Bradley Whitford and Catherine Keener) country home.  Chris is apprehensive because (a) he will meeting them for the first time, and (b) Rose hasn't told her family that he, Chris, is black.  Also, a weekend party has been planned with guests who all seem to have a Stepford Wives quality to them and who take a decidedly odd interest in Chris.  There are only three other black people in site, the Armitages' maid and groundskeeper, and one guest at the party, a young man with a white wife who is at east thirty years older than he, and all three of them have a certain off kilter demeanor about them.

After an odd incident involving a camera flash, and a phone call to his friend, TSA agent Rod (Lil Rel Howery, who plays a critical role and also provides some comic relief), Chris begins to suspect that something really, really bad is taking place among the Armitages and their circle of friends.

I will say no more, plot-wise.

Directer/Writer Jordan Peele is getting lots of raves for this movie, and deservedly so.  The mood is set almost immediately with the very first scene in the movie, and other techniques used throughout makes this a great movie, visually speaking.  It is also a very well written and many terrific pieces make some biting commentary on racial relations and perceptions. There are several examples of see-how-cool-I-am pieces of dialog among the Armitages and their party guests concerning Barack Obama, Jesse Owens, and Tiger Woods that make you cringe in embarrassment, but those comments take on a completely different tone as the film unwinds.  There is also a scene where Rod goes to the police to report his concerns about Chris that is funny at first blush, but that also has different layers beneath the surface.

Kaluuya was great as the initially shy, then apprehensive, then befuddled, then terrified, then forceful Chris.  There are other very good performances by Williams as Rose, and Whitford and Keener as the creepy parents. As for Jordan Peele, well, I can't wait to see what he does next as a filmmaker.

We skipped this movie when it first came out because, hey, we don't like horror movies, but the critical acclaim, awards and nominations, and the recommendations of friends whose opinions I value (that means you, Tim Baker and Billy Hepfinger!), made us want to see this, and see it in an honest to God movie theater, before Oscar night.  We are really glad that we did, and Marilyn and I haven't really stopped talking about it since we left the theater.

I don't think that "Get Out" was the best movie of 2017, but it certainly deserves its nomination, and I am glad that we saw it.

It gets Three Stars from The Grandstander.