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Man on a Ledge Movie Review
By Rick Grant B + Rated PG-13
A righteous NYPD detective, Nick Cassidy (Sam Worthington) is framed by a group of bad cops for stealing a large rare diamond from a real estate tycoon, David Englander (Ed Harris). Nick is convicted and ends up in the worst prison in America, Sing-Sing. In this overcrowded concrete jungle of lifers, ex-cops get beaten senseless daily. His future is grim. What can he do? First, he has to break out of jail. Then, he has to prove his innocence while on the run as an escaped fugitive. Yes, it’s a mission impossible.
But Nick has an intricate plan which includes his brother, Joey and his girlfriend, who helped him break out of jail. He hatches his plan by climbing from the window of a hotel room, on a ledge, high above the street below. He leaves no fingerprints in the room to delay his identification.
Then with much determination, he stays on ledge and waits for the crowd to gather and the cops to come. Soon chaos ensues on the street, with people yelling "jump." The cops send in their Hostage Negotiator Lydia Mercer (Elizabeth Banks) to talk him down. Recently, she failed to talk down a jumper off the Brooklyn bridge and is catching flack from the brass.
Nick is wearing an "earwig"-- a tiny two way communication device deep in his ear to talk with his brother and his girlfriend who are on the roof of a building across the street. Of course, his ledge act is a diversion to what Joey and is partner are doing. He has to stay on the ledge until they accomplish their mission.
This thriller has many different parts to keep viewers on the edge of their seats. The audience will wonder which of the cops on the scene framed Nick. This cadre of paid-off thugs with badges are getting nervous and want to call in SWAT to take Nick out. As the plot unfolds, the guilty bad cops are getting desperate to silence Nick. After all, the law is on their side. Nick is an escaped fugitive who is considered armed and dangerous.
However, Lydia senses something is not right with this scenario, and to keep SWAT from killing Nick, she climbs out on the ledge with him. He gives her some information about his case and she believes him. Lydia has to keep control of the situation to find out who the dirty cops are, and allow Nick to finish what he started.
With many facets to the scenario, the various elements slowly intersect. It’s got everything to keep restless viewers captivated for the entire running time.
Directed by Asger Leth from a well written screenplay, Leth keeps all the balls in the air at once as Nick runs out of time. Nick’s plan is skewed by Joey and his girlfriend’s inexperience, but they manage to go undiscovered. This plan is make or break for Nick, who will either be killed or succeed in proving his innocence. It’s a long shot at best!
Girl With The Dragon Tattoo Movie Review
By Rick Grant A Rated R
This mystery-intrigue story adapted to film from the late Stieg Larsson’s novel, is one of the most celebrated mystery-adventure tales ever written. His work sold 50 million copies worldwide. Tragically, Larsson never got a chance to enjoy his wealth. One day, he rushed up seven flights of stairs and dropped dead at 43 years old.
However, Larsson left us this complex story of a journalist, Mikael Bloomkvist, (Daniel Craig) who is part owner of a left leaning newspaper, "Millennium." The paper slandered a crooked businessman, Wennersstrom. Bloomkvist wrote the story and was charged with defamation of character. Since he couldn’t back up his material with sources providing facts, he was convicted and sentenced to 2 months in jail.
In Sweden, he could choose the date he would report to jail. Meanwhile, Bloomkvist is contacted by a man named Henrick Vanger (Christopher Plummer) –a well known wealthy industrialist, to come to his town and visit him. He has something important to discuss with Bloomkvist and he refuses to talk about it over the phone. Reluctantly, Bloomkvist travels to Vanger’s mansion in a small Swedish town up north in the middle of winter. Bloomkvist rationalizes that no matter what happens with Vanger, he needs a getaway from his legal troubles.
Vanger is an old man who is a member of a highly dysfunctional family of misfits and greed mongers. Initially, he wants Bloomkvist to write his biography. He will pay Bloomkvist an obscene amount of money. However, the real reason he wants to hire Bloomkvist is to find out who murdered his daughter, Harriet, eighteen years ago. There is no body, but she is presumed dead. Vanger is impressed by Bloomkvist’s investigative skills, and he wants to him to find out who killed her. As a bonus, Vanger will help Bloomkvist bring down his nemesis, Wennerstrom. Vanger has indisputable evidence of Wennerstrom’s illegal activities.
The key character in this story is a free spirit–a highly skilled investigator, hacker, and bisexual provocateur, Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara). She rides a Triumph motorcycle, has tattoos, and dresses in various outrageous costumes. Much to her chagrin, her life is held hostage by the state dating back to her rebellious youth. It’s a terrible humiliation that suddenly Lisbeth has to report to a sadistic legal advocate, Yorick van Wageringen, who tortures and rapes her in return for access to her money and a certain amount of freedom. Of course, Lisbeth gets her revenge.
Lisbeth’s brilliant investigative skills are eventually revealed to Bloomkvist who needs a first class research assistant. Rooney Mara lights up her scenes with her explosive chemistry. Sexual sparks fly with Daniel Craig’s Bloomkvist. Ah yes, it was Lisbeth who initiated the tryst. Well, hell it’s Daniel Craig!As the odd-couple sleuths investigate the case, they stumble onto a series of murders that could be related to Harriet’s demise. Their intense investigation leads to many twists and turns.
Director David Fincher was faithful to the book, in that, he created the scenes exactly as Larsson had described them. Fincher skillfully stuck to the highly charged adventure story of Salander and Bloomkvist’s investigation. Rooney Mara is mesmerizing as Lisbeth and Daniel Craig plays down his physicality in favor of clever acting. This is the quintessential must see film of this year.
War Horse Movie Review
By Rick Grant B+ Rated PG
Spoiler alert: It’s tragically sad: The starving British Army during WWI ate the poor horse named Joey but gave Albert a rabbit to placate his grief.
Oh, only kidding.
This is a Christmas day horse film reminiscent of "The Black Stallion." It boldly chronicles the journey of the thoroughbred, Joey as he suffers and fights to survive the horrors of The Great War.
Spielberg’s epic horse film is noteworthy for its realistic battle scenes during the trench war stalemate of WWI. The bloody war sent men on horses with swords galloping to sudden death against modern artillery and high-rate-of-fire machine guns for the glory of the British empire–or some nonsense like that.
The stupid British military never adjusted to the new type of warfare, sending wave after wave of British soldiers to their deaths crossing no-man’s-land. Most all of them were mowed down by German machine guns or blown to bits by German heavy artillery. It was the invention of the battle tank that finally broke the stalemate and ushered in the era of mechanized warfare.
To hook the audience to love of the horse, an alcoholic British farmer mistakenly buys a pregnant thoroughbred mare at auction as a plow horse. The farmer’s son, Albert (Jeremy Irvine) bonds with the newborn colt and names him Joey.
There are overly contrived scenes of the boy raising his best friend Joey. But this obvious effort to manipulate the viewers’ emotions is worth eating the pablum to get to the real story–putting Joey in jeopardy dodging bullets and shrapnel.
After Joey grows to maturity, it’s unlikely he could adjust to plowing fields. Consequently, if the farmer can’t plow his fields his landlord will evict him for non payment of his lease.
So, Albert must teach the horse to plow the land. In a funny shot, the horse looks back at Albert and probably thinks "Do I look like a plow horse." He then bolts with the plow in tow. But, Albert persists and eventually the horse gets the hang of pulling the plow. Yes, the farmer grows a healthy crop. Alas, torrential rains flood the crop and leave the family destitute. The farmer now has to sell the horse to the Army. Albert finds out and runs to Joey’s rescue in the town. But it’s too late, Joey is drafted into the Army.
Like in "Saving Private Ryan," Spielberg shot amazingly realistic battle scenes of the WWI’s carnage. After a Calvary charge into machine gun fire, Spielberg pulls back the camera on a crane to view the shocking scene of the entire regiment, including their horses, laying dead. Miraculously, Joey makes it through and is captured by the Germans.
Joey’s life with The Hun was no better than with the British suicide missions. Horses were made to pull tons of artillery pieces up hills into position. Some of them just died of the physical stress of the load burden.
Although the story is gushingly sentimental aimed at the Christmas day audience to get away from their creepy relatives, it’s a beautifully shot with brutal realism of the tragic waste of lives lost by stubborn generals. These egomaniacal fools refused to face the fact that warfare had changed, and armored vehicles were much safer than horses. Enter the tanks!
