'Life Itself' (2018) Review

As a young New York couple goes from college romance to marriage and the birth of their first child, the unexpected twists of their journey create reverberations that echo over continents and through lifetimes. 

Written and directed by This Is Us series creator Dan Fogelman, Life Itself is a film told in five distinct chapters from the perspective of five different protagonists. Before I continue any further, I'd like to preface my thoughts by informing you that I began watching This Is Us this past summer and instantly adored the acclaimed series. Believe it or not, but I had some reservations about This Is Us. I was reluctant to begin watching the series because I thought it looked like an emotionally-manipulative melodramatic soap opera and didn't feel that it would be up my alley. Nevertheless, I binged the first two seasons in a matter of days and am eagerly awaiting the season three premiere next Tuesday. I say this because I want to communicate that I'm now a fan of Fogelman's work and was rooting for Life Itself to be a smashing success. I sought out the film in spite of its scathing reviews and held out hope I might at least be able to enjoy the motion-picture. However, my faith was tragically misplaced as Life Itself is one of the year's biggest disappointments.

Marketed as a feature-length version of This Is Us, Life Itself proves to be the crude, condensed and confused version. Imagine if you took the thematic material, non-chronological storytelling, and sentimentality of the series, dialed it up to an eleven, shoved it in a blender, and then forcibly pieced everything back together afterward. That concoction is the best possible description of Life Itself. It strangely tries to be Tarantino-esque with tons of vulgarity and hyper-violence while striving to emulate This Is Us' emotional sincerity as well. The amalgamation doesn't work whatsoever because there are jarring tonal inconsistencies between the presentation and the subject matter. Fogelman oddly seeks to portray toxic behavior like unhealthy obsession and abandonment as though they're endearing when they're not. He plays some of this darker material for laughs, and it just leaves you feeling extremely uncomfortable. 

Spread throughout the film are several abrupt tonal shifts which act as shock value for the sake of shock value. I do not particularly appreciate using the term "emotionally manipulative" in my criticism because I think it's well within reason for a filmmaker to try and draw an emotional response from their audience, provided the narrative earn its emotional beats. Ultimately, the filmmaker's goal is to connect with the audience and convince them that they should care or feel something when all is said-and-done. Life Itself fails spectacularly in that regard because it never earns its emotional beats. The situations the characters find themselves in feel needlessly contrived for the sake of cheap sentimentality. Their lives are riddled with tragedy to such an exaggerated extent that it's honestly unbelievable and unrealistic. 

Not to mention the characters are woefully underdeveloped. Where This Is Us is a prime example of a series that earns emotion by fleshing out its characters and crafting genuine drama, Life Itself hardly devotes enough time for the viewer to form a meaningful attachment with any characters. Each chapter lasts anywhere from 15-to-30 minutes, mostly composed of ineffective voiceover narration spoken over romantic montages. Of course, This Is Us has the benefit of being told as a long-form episodic series, but Life Itself backed itself into a corner from the start thanks to its structural approach. Many of these characters lack personality beyond being one-note human sketches. The five chapters follow a depressed man, an angsty young woman, a careful Spanish olive plantation worker, a traumatized college student, and the narrator herself who possesses no worthwhile character traits. A narrative thread connects this multi-generational, cross-continental web of stories, but the chapters are at odds with one another as initially presented. 

Built around the profound thesis that "life is the ultimate unreliable narrator," Life Itself never dives any deeper into its superficial message. I heard those words at least twenty times, but have yet to understand the grand significance of them. Like what the heck does that REALLY mean? I don't know, and I'm sure Fogelman doesn't either. 

If Life Itself has any saving grace, it would undoubtedly be the performances. If it's any consolation, Oscar Isaac, Olivia Wilde, Mandy Patnkin, Olivia Cooke, Sergio Peris-Mancheta, Laia Costa, Àlex Monner, Annette Bening, and Antonio Banderas are all excellent and remain committed to the material in spite of its messiness. Sparks were flying between Isaac and Wilde and Peris-Mancheta and Costa in particular. The tonal disconnect is what tanks this film.

I'm sure fellow viewers of This Is Us are surprised by my incessant rambling (I'd like to think of it as a therapeutic writing exercise), but Life Itself fails in every regard which This Is Us succeeds. Life Itself is so unfathomably absurd that it genuinely needs to be seen to be believed. Amazon Studios is distributing so you can probably expect to see it on Prime Video in a matter of months. If you REALLY want to see it, I'd wait till then. At least it's covered by your Prime membership at that point. Otherwise, Life Itself is indicative of life itself- it's messy, confusing, and very bizarre.

Film Assessment: D

'Operation Finale' Review

Fifteen years after the end of World War II, a team of top-secret Israeli agents travels to Argentina to track down Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi officer who orchestrated the transportation logistics that brought millions of innocent Jews to their deaths in concentration camps. Hoping to sneak him out of the country to stand trial, agent Peter Malkin soon finds himself playing a deadly game of cat and mouse with the notorious war criminal.

Based on a true story, Operation Finale is a historical drama directed by Chris Weitz which features a script penned by first-time feature screenwriter Matthew Orton. As a history buff and fan of both Oscar Isaac and Sir Ben Kingsley's work, I was surprised that Operation Finale flew under my radar until a few weeks before its release. While that could spell trouble for some, I chose to see the film nonetheless. Anyways, while Operation Finale is well-crafted in regards to its cinematography and production design, the film was ultimately too dull and drawn-out for its own good.

However, on account of the story's fascinating central conflict, that shouldn't be the case. Due to personal woes, Malkin's torn between letting Eichmann live to stand trial or killing him as penance for his crimes. It's an understandable dilemma considering Eichmann was the architect of the Final Solution, but I wish Orton had expanded on this. Though, Isaac and Kingsley compensate for the writer's shortcomings thanks to an electric interplay. After all, the film's at its best when these two actors are alone in a room together. Unfortunately, Operation Finale's saving grace is also its undoing. Whenever the focus is shifted away from Eichmann, the film falls into the trappings of a conventional biopic.

Oftentimes, the characters' circumstances feel overdramatized for the sake of intensifying the situation and making it more cinematic. This technique effectively bloats the runtime and tests the viewer's patience in the meantime. I understand that the mission carried an element of danger, but the emphasis on tension only served to undercut the filmmakers' intentions. It's not too bad at first but it grew repetitive and wearisome as it went on. Clocking in at two hours and two minutes, Operation Finale seemed to drag on with plenty of superfluous material. You could probably shave off twenty-thirty minutes and wind up with something special. Alas, the end result's overstuffed. 

Before I conclude this review, I'd like to briefly touch on Alexandre Desplat's score though. Desplat's a two-time Academy Award-winning composer, so it would be foolish to expect anything short of greatness from him. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that Desplat's themes would be so lively and energetic. The percussive nature of the score really worked in the film's favor and the frequent use of xylophone was interesting, to say the least. It's an instrument that 's not utilized very often in film scores so it was refreshing to hear in a weird way. One other interesting tidbit I found while perusing IMDB was learning that he had a daughter named Antonia Desplat who was cast in the film.

While you could just as easily scroll through a wiki-page and get the gist of the entire affair, history buffs will consider Operation Finale well worth the watch for its depiction of these harrowing events. A leaner version of this film which focused on the team's dilemma to protect Eichmann probably would have been more interesting though. 

Film Assessment: C+

'Annihilation' Review

Annihilation charts a course alongside a biologist as she joins a dangerous, classified expedition to "The Shimmer," a place where the laws of nature no longer apply. Only inside can she and her team unravel the mystery of it all.

Annihilation is the second film to be written and directed by Alex Garland following Ex Machina, and it's yet another stunning work of cerebral science fiction from the director. Garland has adapted Jeff VanderMeer's novel into a high concept sci-fi story about self-destruction, and although I've heard it's not a faithful adaptation, it's certainly both interesting and thought-provoking. While the marketing may suggest it's a sci-fi horror like Alien, I'd actually liken it to more philosophical work such as Denis Villenueve's Arrival. There's elements of horror incorporated into the film for sure, but Annihilation's much more involved in exploring metaphysical mysteries than trying to excite audiences. 

If there's one thing I'm sure of, it's that Annihilation will not be a film for everyone. The third act will almost certainly be divisive among audiences due to its ambiguity, and I imagine many won't be onboard with the story's direction whatsoever. Even though I quite enjoyed it, I can totally understand why someone would carry the opposite point-of-view, and Paramount seems to be aware that this film isn't intended to be consumed by the masses considering the film will be released straight to Netflix internationally. With that in mind, I hope the studio doesn't take away the wrong lessons from this weekend's lackluster box office performance and continues to release daring, innovative films. 

I, myself, found this film fascinating from start-to-finish as I was fully invested in exploring the estranged interior of "The Shimmer" and incessantly awestruck by the resplendent psychedelic sensibilities of the film's visuals. Annihilation is extraordinarily impressive from both a visual and audible standpoint thanks to phenomenal production design from Mark Digby, splendid otherworldly imagery captured by cinematographer Rob Hardy, vibrant visual effects work, and sensational sound design. Everything inside "The Shimmer" carried an element of intrigue with it while resembling something that was simultaneously beautiful and dreamlike, yet horrifying and nightmarish, and the swelling score composed by Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury reflected the ethereal environment perfectly! 

In regards to acting, the entire ensemble provides a substantive performance. As you may be able to tell from the photos I've included in the review, the cast is primarily female and sometimes that can work to a film's detriment if the focus is placed on empowerment over simply telling a good representative story, but Annihilation thankfully doesn't fall into that trap. Natalie Portman leads as Lena and puts forth yet another powerhouse performance, as is to be expected. Portman imbues her character with a lot of subtlety and nuance that really pays off once her self-destructive tendencies are revealed to the audience, though witnessing her change and growth as a character was perhaps the most rewarding. Rounding out the team are strong turns from Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tessa Thompson, Gina Rodriguez, and Tuva Novotny as pessimistic psychologist and leader Dr. Ventress, vulnerable physicist Josie Radek, outgoing and outspoken paramedic Anya Thorensen, and the weary, understated anthropologist Cass Sheppard. Oscar Isaac and Benedict Wong each have minimal screen time, but carry crucial presences in the film respectively. 

Annihilation isn't merely something that can only be appreciated through its staggering technical achievements though. In fact, I was hooked by my interest in the characters as well as a genuine desire to discover the inner workings of this uncanny atmosphere. That last bit will probably be a commonality for viewers as they struggle to figure out what the heck is going on within the confines of this unnatural area, and I'm sure a good portion of those curious will leave immensely frustrated when Garland doesn't offer them all the answers on a silver platter. This is a film you'll need to digest and think about for awhile afterwards before settling on a verdict, hence why it took a little longer than usual for me to share this review. If you judge the film purely based on your knee-jerk reaction to the insane ending, then everything will be lost on you. This film requires in-depth thought and analysis in order to piece together your own interpretation of it all, and if that doesn't sound like something you're interested in, then this is definitely not for you. 

However, I implore those prepared to contemplate weighty philosophies to go out and support this film to demonstrate to the studio that there is actually an audience for this type of ambitious storytelling. If that sounds like you or you were interested in seeing Annihilation, I say give it a shot because opinions are quite scattered all over the place on this film. 

Whatever the case may be, Annihilation is a big, bold, and breathtaking work of science fiction that should be experienced on the largest screen possible. Prepare all you'd like, but your mind will be annihilated nonetheless.

Film Assessment: A-

'Ex Machina' Review

Nominated For: Best Original Screenplay and Best Visual Effects.

Won: Best Visual Effects.

Ex Machina managed to slip under my radar as I didn't begin to hear about it till around December despite it's April release, and I can say that Ex Machina certainly lived up to the buzz. Alex Garland, writer and director, makes his directorial debut and certainly made a huge splash. The film follows a futuristic society in which a young computer coder is invited to a research facility owned by his company's CEO to test an Artificial Intelligence. 

The film centers on a very central core cast of only three characters and all three actors where phenominal. Domhnall Gleeson is essentially the audience's voice throughout the film as he expresses his amazement regarding this technical feat and attempts to rationalize the logistics of artificial intelligence making his character the everyman who is instantly relatable and somewhat likable. Oscar Isaac provides a terrific performance as a very conflicted, foreboding eccentric billionaire that maintains this foreboding mysterious presence throughout. 

Alicia Vikander was so convincing as Ava, the artificial intelligence, providing this neutral realm between human and robot as she must portray an artificial intelligence that is so lifelike yet doesn't quite understand humanity. The visual effects on display in this film were mind boggling. The effects used to create Ava looked really realistic and it was believable that Alicia Vikander was actually this AI inside a humanoid robotic body. One interesting aspect is that the film walks the fine line between science fiction and science exploring something that could certainly happen in real life. 

The moment the credits started rolling I began to consider one of the central themes present regarding the difference between humans and artificial intelligence. The best description I can provide for Ex Machina is that it was a very thought provoking film with incredible visual effects, terrific performances, and a very intriguing premise.

Film Assessment: A