'House of Sand and Fog' is a kind of horror film, ahead of its time

House of Sand and Fog is many things -- one of the saddest movies ever made, perhaps one of the more nuanced portraits of Middle Eastern characters that's ever come out of Hollywood, but it also plays as a horror film, one where the consequences and calamity have more to do with race than supernatural menace.

It came out in 2003, during the height of Iraq War fervor, and its easy to see how the film could have been viewed then as antidote to mindless Islamaphobia and stereotyping.

Ben Kingsley, in a towering performance, plays the stern and stubborn head of a household of Iranian exiles. They are not cowering, victimized refugees, but instead proud and spiteful towards the radicalized Ayotollahs who pushed them out of their native country.

They pointedly do not view themselves as Arabs -- although their adopted country almost certainly does -- and Kingsley's character is so attached to his former wealth and status, he meticulously works several menial jobs so his family can live in relative luxury and put on heirs.

He hatches a plan (or scheme, depending on your point of view) to save up his meager wealth to invest in a property that he will then flip for a profit so he can secure a sustained economic future for his wife and young son. It's a most American and capitalist idea that runs into an unintended roadblock in the personage of Jennifer Connelly's character, who is almost the walking/talking personification of white privilege.

A number of twists and turns ensue, where the ignorance and self-centeredness of Connelly's character (and by extension her half-wit new lover, played by Ron Eldard) plunges all of these characters into an abyss of bad decisions and eventually, death.

It's all a bit heavy, perhaps too on the nose, yet incredibly affecting because it is that rare film where we actually are forced to see the collateral damage that a lack of empathy for what is commonly referred to as "the other" can wrought.

Now, I must confess that I have never read the source material, so I'm not sure how this movie compares. It almost certainly collapses the time in which the events of the plot unfold, which is why it could be condemned as overheated melodrama by some critics.

But I think its detractors are missing some of its innate power -- besides Kingsley's Oscar-nominated lead performance and Shohreh Aghdashloo's heartbreaking supporting one -- the film makes a genuine effort to humanize everyone in it.

Normally, narratives of this kind would almost solely focus on the Connelly character, and go out of its way to stack the deck in her favor. This film does not give her the benefit of the doubt. It also doesn't shy away for conveying the fact that Kingsley's character is a misogynist at best and an occasionally abusive husband at worst.

Films like this, which are few and far between outside of awards season, are incredibly vital now in the political climate we're currently living in -- where whole religions and ethnic populations are getting painted with a broader brush than they have been in decades -- nuance and complexity is desperately needed and edifying for audiences who may have been exposed to just one, flawed and simplistic point of view.

'How Did This Get Made?' has kept me sane this past year

I have been late to the podcast game, and even now I wouldn't call myself an aficionado of the genre. That being said, my favorite podcast -- and the one I've been obsessively listening to for the better part of the past year, has been "How Did This Get Made?" a masterful takedown of the worst movies of all time, hosted by three comedic geniuses -- Paul Scheer, June Diane Raphael (who also happens to be Paul's wife) and my personal favorite -- Jason Mantzoukas, whose blunt honesty really reminds me of myself.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, and taking stock of things we are thankful for, I wanted to pay tribute to this podcast, which has lifted my spirits during many bad days at work and helped me get some more perspective on my favorite art form -- the movies.

It has become abundantly clear since the election of Donald Trump as president, that we are now entering a scary new area where facts are treated no differently than opinions, and people are creating their own alternative realities that essentially confirm their pre-existing worldviews.

The Lawnmower Man

In a climate like this -- there are few things you can be certain of anymore. So it's comforting, in a way, to hang on to the simple pleasures of life. And for me, that includes horrifically bad movies.

What "Zouk," Paul and June Diane do (as well as their excellent array of mostly comedian guests) is not simply take cheap shots and films that failed miserably.

They really deconstruct these movies and in some cases -- like with the exploration of then-Bruce Jenner's nascent sexual curiosity in the abominable Can't Stop the Music -- they see what is worthwhile or even compelling about some of these catastrophes.

In other words, they give credit where credit is due (Gene Kelly's performance in Xanadu) and eviscerate the rest. They are smart, funny and hyper woke to issues of race, gender and intersectionality that the filmmakers often couldn't have conceived of at the time of their films' release.

They select some obvious targets -- The Room, I Know Who Killed Me, much of Nicolas Cage's oeuvre, but they also do some deeper cut flops too, some of which I'd never heard of and have felt compelled to check out after listening to the show.

Would I have sought out Cindy Crawford's Fair Game on my own? Probably never. But it was so good-bad, that I am glad that I did.

Most recently, the gang at HDTGM took on another movie I've never seen and hadn't ever given much thought to -- 1992's hopelessly dated and politically incorrect sci-fi thriller The Lawnmower Man. This time capsule of a movie boasts a pre-James Bond fame Pierce Brosnan, some horrendous looking special effects, and some of the most problematic sexual politics I've seen in quite some time.

Watching this movie, and then reveling in the HDTGM podcast's excellent dissection of it, was a real delight amid a frustrating Thanksgiving holiday and an even darker period in our nation's history. At the end of the day, it's just a podcast but it's one of the few things that makes me smile right now.

Besides, of course, my wife, who introduced me to it.

'Never Seen It' - Episode 11 - We ferociously consume 'Zootopia'

Zootopia

After a long, self-imposed hiatus, we're back! My wife Elizabeth Rosado and I both watched the blockbuster animated Zootopia separately for the first time on Friday (it's currently streaming on Netflix). And we got together to discuss it and discover layers upon layers of sophistication and depth under the surface of this charming little fable.

This is our first post-election episode, which means we couldn't help but bring politics into the mix. And somehow we would up talking a lot about Captain American: Civil War, another massive hit from this year that had something significant to say about our culture and how we respond to crises.

Check out our deep thoughts by clicking on the YouTube link below. And stay tuned for more installments of our podcast on this blog:

'Machete' makes a lot more sense in a post-Trump election era

I liked Machete fine when I first saw it back in 2010, during its initial run in theaters.

I had been a big fan of its trailer, featured in the underrated Quentin Tarantino-Robert Rodriguez collaboration Grindhouse, and I got a kick out of its silliness and sensationalism.

Ironically, I did roll my eyes a bit at the film's overt political messaging on the topic of immigration-- not because I didn't agree with its viewpoint, I did -- but it felt like the wrong vehicle to tackle the topic. Now, in a post-Trump election period, I stand corrected. This movie, as absurd as it is, was really ahead of its time, and from a political satire perspective, quite brilliant.

It was released during the contentious fight over a particularly racially biased immigration bill that was going into effect in Arizona at the time, one that essentially empowered white citizens of that state to view their brown neighbors with suspicion and to intimidate the undocumented on a massive scale.

The law  now seems quaint by comparison to the modern-day "Trail of Tears" that the Trump administration appears to have in store for this country, but of course, this film pre-dated the real estate mogul's emergence as a real political force by at least a year (Trump's oft-forgotten 'birther' crusade would begin the following year, and his preoccupation with nativism and immigration wouldn't surface for another four).

Robert De Niro in Machete

And yet, the film features a Trump-like figure, ironically played by one of the most vocal anti-Trump celebrities out there -- Oscar-winning legend Robert De Niro. In what may go down as one of the loosest, goofiest performances of his career, De Niro plays an evil, immigrant-hating Texas senator, who literally shoots people at the border himself and stokes voters' fears about "hordes" entering the U.S. illegally to win re-election.

Upon first viewing, the De Niro's character's over the top ads featuring nefarious looking "illegals" plays as overstated parody, but during the 2016 election, Trump ran an ad that was eerily similar, although it was later revealed that the footage he used was not actually the U.S. border at all (it was Morocco).

The De Niro character is complimented by a sadistic local sheriff, almost certainly inspired by the recently defeated anti-immigrant crusader Joe Arpaio, played with the appropriate amount of malice by Don Johnson. In the film, director Robert Rodriguez makes no bones about the fact that his sympathies lie with the undocumented population, and both arch-villains get their comeuppance and then some.

Now nearly seven years later, his vision of a populace being pulled apart by racial animosity doesn't play as too hyperbolic anymore. If anything it seems naive, in the sense that good triumphs over evil in this movie with relative ease.

In the real world, concepts that just a few years ago would never have enjoyed a mainstream audience -- like Muslim registries or the re-institution of torture -- are now being bandied about as plausible policy proposals that enjoy broad support, at least in conservative circles.

And the tragedy is that there are no real-life Machetes -- outlaw former federales who inflict street justice and expose the hypocrisy of reactionary politicians. Machete, a film that is still purely fun on a pulpy level, also winds up being a prescient portrait of an America brought down by its demonization of the "other."

Is 'Batman vs. Superman' really as bad as everyone said it was?

When Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice came out earlier this year, I was cautiously optimistic. Despite some reservations about the casting of Ben Affleck as Batman, and concerns that Man of Steel didn't exactly return the Superman character to its former glory, the trailer did look exciting.

But then, despite massive box office, the film was almost universally trashed -- not just by critics, but fanboys, too. And that's saying something.

Although, admittedly, Marvel has a much better track record -- especially recently -- at the movies, I grew up loving DC Comics characters more, with Superman and Batman being my two favorites. I had wanted to like this film, but the buzz was so deafeningly negative that I decided to wait for its DVD release.

I finally got to see it last night -- all 2 and 1/2 hours of it. And I can confirm that yes, it really is that terrible ... and yet it didn't need to be.

I am probably not the first person to point this out, but the whole movie essentially felt like one long trailer. There was virtually no narrative coherence. Ideas would be introduced and then abandoned with no explanation. There are dream sequences sandwiched into the action without much to differentiate them. I simply have no idea what the villain's motivation was or what he was trying to achieve.

And let's talk about that villain for a second. The casting of Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor had me intrigued at first. In his best performance to date -- in The Social Network -- he hinted at a kind of ruthlessness underneath his twitchy nerd facade. And it would have been interesting had he chosen to play Luthor fairly realistically. But instead he gives one of the worst performances I've seen this year -- a Razzie-worthy potpourri of irritating vocal tics and over the top flailing.

My thoughts exactly

In the film's finale they appear to be setting up his return for future installments, but I simply don't know how they can justify that, unless the thinking is that his take on Luthor has nowhere to go but up.

Ironically, Affleck -- who like a lot fans, I thought was all wrong for the Dark Knight -- is the best thing about this movie. He really bulked up and looks great in the batsuit. He brings a little bit more nastiness to the character than I've seen previously and he is at the center of the film's best action sequence (one that should have opened the film), a bravura fight in the desert, where clad in a badass trenchcoat, Batman dispatches an army of bad guys in what appears to be one shot.

But even that dynamite sequence is undermined by the fact that it is apparently all just a dream -- and I am still scratching my head about why that choice and so many other decisions in this film were made, other than to set up future films, which is at best shortsighted and at worst, deeply cynical.

Here are a few other things that got under my skin:

The color palette - Besides the narrative incoherence, one of the most glaring flaws of this film is its muddy and unattractive look -- which has become some of a trademark for the movie's director, Zack Snyder. Some filmmakers have decided that the literal darkness of a movie will connote the brooding nature of its screenplay, but they forget that Christopher Nolan's Batman films often took place in pristine daylight (think the Joker's bank heist in The Dark Knight) and for the most part, the action in those films was coherent and semi-plausible. In this film there was so much CGI, I often simply had no idea of who or what I was looking at.

The use of Wonder Woman - I rolled my eyes when I learned Wonder Woman was being shoehorned into this film, not because I have anything against the character -- I love her -- but because I anticipated that it would lead to a bloated screenplay where either she or other characters would not have enough time to really be a fully developed and realized person. Gal Gadot looks great, but doesn't get to imbue Wonder Woman with any personality whatsoever. Instead she serves to tee up future Justice League movies with the likes of Aquaman, which I will have no interest in seeing.

Henry Cavill - Here's another actor who looks the part (certainly more than Brandon Routh did) but who has no discernible appeal. I don't remember hating Man of Steel as much as many other people did, but I remember very little about it, which I think speaks volumes. Cavill is even less charismatic here, largely warbling his lines with no emotion or just grimacing a lot. At the very least, Affleck tries to sell his performance as Bruce Wayne, Cavill seems to be leaning entirely on his looks, and he winds up being forgettable in a film he's supposed to be a main attraction in.

The lack of humor - I don't need my superhero movies to be a laugh riot, but a little levity isn't necessarily a bad thing. The Marvel movies have mastered the art of being funny without being totally frivolous. Watching this bleak, overlong slog of a movie, I kept thinking about how unamusing it must have been for the kids who went to see it. Superman in particular requires a light touch, as Christopher Reeve proved, otherwise he collapses under the weight of his Christ-like characteristics.

The finale - In what has becoming an increasingly tiresome trope, the film ends with a giant CGI creature fighting our three heroes and destroying a city in the process. What is especially appalling about this ending is that is completely undercuts what is somewhat clever about the opening -- which takes place during (and appears to condemn) the damage caused by the extended fight scenes which ended Man of Steel. Clearly, I was not a fan of this movie, and therefore I am not sure what ending could have salvaged it. But this mess of explosions and smoke clouds didn't leave me wanting more.

'Arrival' is movie that forces you to think, which is a good thing

The new film Arrival is the kind of movie I like to say I admired more than I enjoyed. I am thrilled it's finding an audience (it opened with over $20 million last weekend) because it is both very original, thoughtful and intended for grown-ups, which as I am constantly griping, is increasingly rare these days.

It's not exactly a fun movie -- I found it to be plodding at times and its complex plot needed some untangling for me afterwards, but it's admirable movie. Although, I would personally put it a notch below director Denis Villeneuve's other films I've seen: Prisoners and Sicario.

This is not the film it's being marketed to be, which will either pleasantly surprise some viewers or infuriate them. Essentially a character study buried within a sci-fi mind-bender, what it can be accurately described as is a wonderful showcase for Amy Adams, who has emerged as one of my favorite actresses working today.

In some ways she reminds me of an old fashioned movie star in that she projects a sort of inherent goodness that is never boring. It would be interesting to see her play an outright villain and my favorite performance of hers to date (in American Hustle) did show quite a bit more edge, but in Arrival she is terrific as a woman haunted by death but innately curious about life.

Her world is one where communication is key -- she translates languages -- and she is thrust into an improbable crisis when unidentified flying objects pop up in a dozen places around the globe.

Not unlike Steven Soderbergh's underrated infectious disease thriller Contagion, Arrival treats the presence of extra-terrestrials in a wholly realistic and sober way.

This is not some CGI extravaganza, there are moments of palpable tension, but it's not really a thriller. The film makes you work a little bit to comprehend it which is something I can appreciate, although I wish it has been a little less languid and a lot more direct about what it was trying accomplish.

That said, Arrival is an ambitious movie -- which makes salient points about how we  as a society and individuals handle a crisis and how we interpret time, heady ideas for any film to take on.

I kept think this material would make for a very good book and for the most part if makes for a solid, engaging film. Its a lot more sentimental that Villeneuve's prior work and its elliptical nature -- that reminded me a bit of Interstellar, another film I found preoccupied with its own profundity -- can be a little indulgent at times.

Still, I am more than willing to say that this is a film I would revisit and re-evaluate, and it should be seen, if not other reason than Adams' lead performance, and the fact that it has the audacity to make an alien visitation movie where the aliens are pretty unimportant to the grander story.

'Big Trouble in Little China' and post-election recovery mode

There are people who think we're overreacting. That we need to simply accepted what happened in the presidential election last week and move on. I am not one of those people.

As a person of color, and simply as an American, I am not feeling safe or comfortable about what's going on in my country's name. And while there are those urging unity with people who voted for someone who has denigrated and demeaned my culture and many others, my heart is with the millions of people who feel like they have been thrown under the bus based on the election results.

It's been hard to cope these last few days, to act like things are normal -- they're not.

I have questioned a lot of my preconceived notions, about my career, how I spend my free time, hell, just people in general.

Virtually nothing can stop me from enjoying the escapism that movies provide though. And on a whim last night I decided to watch a particularly diverting movie -- John Carpenter's 1986 fantasy Big Trouble In Little China -- and despite the movie's considerable flaws, it did provide a wonderful reprieve from all the agony I've been feeling as of late.

It's far from my favorite John Carpenter film -- it's so nutty that I have never fully comprehended its plot and it's hard to make the case that it's not woefully culturally insensitive -- but it is very funny, especially Kurt Russell's John Wayne-esque lead performance, and it's got a visual panache that I greatly appreciate.

The movie tanked when it was first released but has since, like many Carpenter films, earned a devoted cult following. And although it's taken me longer to warm up to it, this trippy trifle is just purely fun and it has a dated charm (it came out 30 years ago) that I found comforting.

I believe in the next four years that pop culture will play a very important role. There will be incisive and incendiary works of art like Rass Kass's Trump takedown "Amerikkan Horror Story," but there will also be colorful confections that will provide us with enough joy and enthusiasm to remind us that we can still laugh, that was can still enjoy ourselves, in spite of the darkness.

Doctor Strange is one of those movies. I am expecting that the upcoming Rogue One: A Star Wars Story will also be. As our president-elect chooses to spend his time lashing out at every perceived slight on Twitter and appoints people with white supremacist ties to crucial policy-making positions, I do see some glimmer of hope in the fact that we still have the movies to go to.

Here's hoping that Hollywood also has a strong rebuke in store for the bigotry, ignorance and fear that appears to have infected a significant portion of the American populace. We can't turn back the clock and we can't undo our sins, but we can at least move forward and make sense of what we've done.

Election night edition: The Donald Trump-'Dead Zone' connection

Martin Sheen in The Dead Zone

I am far from the first person to point this out, but there is an infamous fictional politician -- albeit, an exaggerated one, who bears a startling similarity to one Donald J. Trump, The character is the seemingly bloodthirsty and populist Greg Stillson in the David Cronenberg film (based on the Stephen King novel) The Dead Zone.

In the film (I've never read the book so I can't compare the characterization), Stillson is a Machiavellian simpleton: corrupt, vain and vengeful.

Ironically, the character is played by Martin Sheen, a real life liberal who has endeared himself to a generation by playing an idealized version of a president on TV's The West Wing. In this 1983 film however, he is gleefully manic, practically frothing at the mouth with dreams of being a demagogue.

The film's main conceit, that Christopher Walken can envision the bleak future (and sometimes past), is exploited to reveal that Stillson will eventually launch a thermonuclear war almost entirely to get his rocks off, a premise that Trump opponents fear is far too plausible,

Cursed or blessed with this information the Walken character takes it upon himself to assassinate Stillson to spare humanity his wrath. But -- SPOILER ALERT -- he is unsuccessful. And yet, in the process, he unintentionally exposes Stillson's cruelty and cowardice. The would-be president literally uses a baby to act as a human shield in one of the funniest and most disturbing twists I can imagine.

We get to see an alternative future where Stillson is an outcast from public life and a suicide case.

#DonaldTrump reminding me more every day of
Greg Stillson from @StephenKing's movie The Dead Zone#FeelTheBern pic.twitter.com/uZuMq0ePbc

— Phil (@PhiIIip_Thomas) March 13, 2016

Of course, on Election Day, none of these extreme scenarios needs to take place. The voters can simply turn out in numbers commensurate with polling and the shifting demographics of this nation, which all seem to spell doom for Trump's shockingly reactionary campaign.

But as a student of politics and an obsessive fan of pop culture, regardless of what happens tonight I can't shake loose the absurdity of the situation we find ourselves in. And I suppose comparisons to The Dead Zone and other works of fiction are apt, because at times it feels like we are watching a film play out in real life, except the stakes are very real and the repercussions enormous.

My introduction to Donald Trump as a child was as a tabloid fixture and he wasn't someone I paid much attention to until he decided to troll the first black president for the better part of a year in 2011, questioning his academic record and his citizenship in a self serving effort to de-legitimize him,

When powerful people in this country (here's looking at you Mitt Romney) chose to embrace Trump -- even after the president humiliated him and exposed his so-called 'efforts' to force him to release his birth certificate as all for naught -- it normalized him, even elevated him.

We watched as he became a king maker, then a backseat driver and then the standard bearer of one of this nation's two major political parties. Now, several million people are flocking to vote for him, even though a majority believe he committed sexual assault at some point in his life.

I want to repeat that -- millions of people are planning to and have already voted for someone they believe committed sexual assault.

The Stillson character was almost certainly meant to be an over-the-top, horror movie concoction -- especially since being flippant about nuclear weapons has been beyond the pale since their introduction onto the world stage. But time and Trump have changed everything, making a scene like this seem like a real possibility instead of a surreal, fictional, alternative reality:

'Doctor Strange' continues Marvel's unprecedented winning streak

I had no real knowledge of the Doctor Strange character prior to today, when I saw the new Marvel film based on the comic book. And I think that actually helped me because it was one of the few of the assembly line's films which I entered totally blind.

I knew the reviews were good and that there was some (warranted) grumbling about the fact that Tilda Swinton was cast in a role that was originally conceived for a character of Asian descent.

For the record, Swinton is sensational in the film, but there was no need to whitewash the role.

Doctor Strange is easily one of the most visually audacious Marvel films to date. It takes those mind-bending, time-folding images from Inception to even new heights. Although his American accent is somewhat distracting at first, Cumberbatch makes a likable, funny and engaging hero. And the film's origin story is far more engrossing than many of the other recent superhero offerings I've seen.

I'm not quite sure how this character will fit into the larger Marvel universe -- and after Civil War, I wonder if there is a danger of there being too many characters to sustain a cohesive story. That said, these films are starting to feel less formulaic and that's a great thing.

Benedict Cumberbatch in Doctor Strange

This one is definitely a trippy addition to the filmography, and there were times where, I must admit, I lost the thread of the plot a bit. If you're a fantasy lover, which I genuinely am not, this will be an entry that will be of interest to you.

For me I was buoyed by the performances and the possibilities the premise presented. This is the only superhero film where spirituality comes into play, as well as time travel and metaphysical realms.

As with every Marvel creation, Strange will now show up in other character's films and maybe even an Avengers behemoth, but he also has a lot of potential for more stories of his own -- as the end credits sequence strongly suggests.

The thing that honestly impresses me about this movie is simply how impressive it is -- it takes an incredibly bizarre idea -- a man who learns how to create weapons and traverse time through the power of his mind's eye -- and makes it not only seem somewhat plausible but wildly entertaining.

Now if only DC Comics could get their act together so we can have a real cinematic rivalry on our hands.

'Loving' is the least 'Oscar-y' Academy Award contender this year

This week I got the opportunity to get an early look at one of the movies in this year's Oscar discussion -- the drama Loving, which dramatizes the iconic 1967 Loving v. Virginia Supreme Court decision that put a stop the remaining anti-miscegenation laws in this country, of which there were actually quite a few, believe it or not.

Audiences expecting a rousing polemic may be surprised by this movie. It is decidedly low key and quiet, much like the real life couple that inspired it -- Mildred and Richard Loving. And this may confound some viewers (it already has turned off some critics) who are looking for more passion and intensity from this story.

If you've seen the terrific HBO documentary on the Lovings however, you might walk away understanding why director Jeff Nichol's decision to make a more soft-spoken movie is not only accurate but inspired.

There is no question that its stars -- Joel Edgerton and Ruth Negga -- should and will warrant serious awards consideration. It'll be interesting to see if one or both performances squeak into what are almost always very competitive lead acting races, because they aren't "big" -- but they feel honest and true.

Edgerton, who continues to grow on me and surprise me as an actor, is incredibly moving as Richard Loving, a prideful man who is also painfully shy when it comes to the media attention his coupling engenders. He appears to bear the agony of their situation the hardest and he creates a great deal of empathy for his character.

Negga, who I must confess I've never seen in a film before, is also a bit of a revelation. She has arguably the less showy role, in a way. Her Mildred is more outspoken and self assured, and Negga projects so much warmth and decency, it's easy to feel a sense of outrage about what happened to this couple.

And what happened is edifying. The two were married in Washington, D.C. in 1958, when they returned to their Virginia home, they were ripped out of the beds in the middle of night and jailed separately, simply for being an interracial couple. To think that something like that took place less than 60 years ago would be unfathomable to a lot of people today, which is precisely why this film should exist and be seen.

The tone definitely does take some getting adjusted to. Like some of his other films, Nichols is not interested in propulsive scores or snappy dialogue. Still, it's obvious that he cared deeply about his characters and this story, which obviously has parallels to the modern marriage equality fight.

It'd be interesting to see how this story would have been told in another director's hands -- perhaps a filmmaker of color -- but I think this project does honor the Lovings' legacy and rightfully elevates their courage and decency.

It's not going to make much of a splash in theaters right now, it's creeping in opposite the latest Marvel behemoth Dr. Strange, but it's definitely worth getting around to as the season unfolds.