Wednesday, December 31, 2014

Unbroken—Movie Review

by Peter J. O'Connell                      

Unbroken. Released: Dec. 25, 2014. Running time: 137 mins. Rated: PG-13 for war violence, including intense sequences of brutality, and for brief language.

The heroic epics of ancient times usually began “in medias res.” This Latin phrase means “in the middle of the action.” Flashbacks creating the back story followed. This is also the approach that director Angelina Jolie takes in Unbroken, the story of an American Olympian and World War II hero, Louie Zamperini.

The action into which we are plunged at the beginning of the film is a truly stunning sequence depicting the bombing run of a B-24 on a Japanese position in the Pacific in 1943. We see that such planes were essentially simply steel shells, with open sections, and we feel the intense reactions of Louie and the rest of the crew as the B-24 flies and fights its way through flak-filled skies swarming with enemy fighter planes.

Flashbacks show us Louie, played by Jack O'Connell, growing up in an immigrant Italian Catholic family in California. Young Louie starts getting into trouble but is fleet of foot and develops discipline and determination by becoming a local track-and-field star rather than a juvenile delinquent. He even becomes one of America's standout athletes at the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

Louie's discipline and determination, as well as religious faith and the knowledge that he is loved by his family, sustain him in the ordeals that afflict him during the war. On a rescue mission, his plane crashes into the Pacific. He is one of only three survivors, who spend an astonishing 47 days in rubber life rafts in the shark-filled ocean waters. We see the desperate measures that the three take to stay alive. Finally, they are simultaneously rescued and captured when a Japanese naval vessel comes upon them.

Brutal treatment in two prison camps follows. Louie is singled out for especially harsh measures by Watanabe, a sadistic Japanese officer played by Takamasa Ishihara. (Ishihara's sleek, smooth features and silken manner remind one of an Asian version of early James Spader.) Louie draws this attention because of being an Olympian, and also, the film hints, because Watanabe may feel a homoerotic attraction to him that results in a kind of love/hate syndrome.

Louie's finest moment comes when the Japanese offer him a comfortable lifestyle if he will make broadcasts against the United States—and he refuses. On-screen information tells us that Louie underwent some emotional and psychological difficulties after the war but overcame them through religious faith and the love of his wife and family. Actual news footage shows him running with the Olympic torch in Japan in 1988—running past one of the prison camps where he was held. He died at age 97 in July 2014.


Jolie's film, which is based on Laura Hillenbrand's best-selling book and includes the noted Coen brothers among its screenwriters, is a very worthy endeavor, well served by O'Connell, Ishihara and the rest of its relatively little-known cast, but it tends to evoke admiration for Louie Zamperini without forging an emotional bond with him for audiences. However, as we note the men who flew with Zamperini and the hundreds imprisoned with him, the film does remind us that his struggle and eventual triumph differed only in degree from that of so many others of what has been rightly called “the greatest generation.” See the film for its own merits and as a salute to them.  

Monday, December 29, 2014

Happy Holidays!

"We should live every day like it is a holiday, being thankful and spending time with family, and looking hopefully to the future." 

The Homesman—Movie Review

by Peter J. O'Connell                

The Homesman. Released in U.S.: Nov. 21, 2014. Running time: 122 mins. Rated: R for violence, sexual content, some disturbing behavior and nudity.

Life was rough on the Nebraska frontier in pioneer times. It may have been especially rough on the pioneer women. After all, they had to deal not only with isolation, hard work, wild weather and other difficulties and dangers out there on the prairie, but also with the difficult and dangerous pioneer men. Some went crazy as a result. It is the situation of these women—and one who sought to save them—that is the subject of The Homesman, directed by, co-written by and co-starring Tommy Lee Jones.

The three women in the film who break under the pressures of frontier life include: one who is repeatedly raped by her husband in his attempt to have children—she becomes extremely violent; one who loses all her children to illness and becomes extremely melancholic; and one who throws her own child down the “hole” of a privy and becomes virtually catatonic.

The woman who decides to rescue these three and take them on a long journey in a mule-drawn kind of paddy wagon to a church in Iowa that will care for them is Mary Bell Cuddy, a spinster and former teacher described by one man as “too bossy and too damn plain.” Cuddy is played by Hilary Swank, whose career in film has often featured strong women characters. Swank also, although far from being a plain woman, has the ability, to paraphrase the old TV ad, to “play one” in the movies. To assist her, Cuddy hires George Briggs, a grizzled ne'er-do-well, who does, however, have considerable practical abilities. Briggs is the character played by Tommy Lee Jones, with his typical gruff skill.

Adventures and vicissitudes ensue as the wagon makes its way eastward across the trackless wastes of the Wild West. The hardships involved eventually start to make both Cuddy and Briggs, as it were, crazy like the three women. In shocking scenes, Cuddy does harm to herself, and Briggs does harm, putting it mildly, to others. At the end of the movie, Briggs has some brief but interesting encounters with characters played by Meryl Streep and Hailee Steinfield.

Some “footnotes” for the film: Tommy Lee Jones has appeared in both classic Westerns (such as the TV miniseries Lonesome Dove) and contemporary ones (such as No Country for Old Men and The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, which he also directed). The Homesman, with its classic “dangerous journey of diverse characters with a 'civilizing' mission” and its contemporary feminist themes, is a kind of combination of these two kinds of Westerns. The considerable number of stars (Streep, Steinfield, John Lithgow, James Spader) and noted character actors (such as Barry Corbin, William Fichtner, Tim Blake Nelson) in brief roles in the film suggests that Tommy Lee Jones may have called on his many friends in the Hollywood community to help with his project. And Jones also boosts his own family's careers by casting his son and daughter in the picture. (Streep's daughter is also in the film.) Those familiar with the roles played by Jones and Streep as a married couple in 2012's Hope Springs may be amused by the tone of the scenes between the two in The Homesman. Also, those who recall Hailee Steinfield's role in the recent remake of True Grit will appreciate her interaction here with a character as grizzled as Rooster Cogburn in that film. And, finally, it's interesting to note that a journey across Nebraska by a grizzled character formed the plot of the acclaimed 2013 film Nebraska.   




Top Names Over the Last 100 Years

The following table shows the 100 most popular given names for male and female babies born during the last 100 years, 1914-2013. For each rank and sex, the table shows the name and the number of occurrences of that name. These time-tested popular names were taken from a universe that includes 169,233,019 male births and 165,941,917 female births.

Popular names for births in 1914-2013
MalesFemales
RankNameNumberNameNumber
1James4,866,619Mary3,611,970
2John4,739,937Patricia1,566,673
3Robert4,663,044Jennifer1,461,186
4Michael4,274,035Elizabeth1,460,714
5William3,749,398Linda1,447,270
6David3,532,745Barbara1,419,954
7Richard2,514,061Susan1,107,871
8Joseph2,429,076Margaret1,075,828
9Charles2,202,425Jessica1,038,248
10Thomas2,189,914Dorothy1,009,728
11Christopher1,981,942Sarah996,176
12Daniel1,833,861Karen982,864
13Matthew1,535,504Nancy980,659
14Donald1,392,452Betty978,903
15Anthony1,374,826Lisa963,461
16Paul1,338,796Sandra871,935
17Mark1,337,781Helen839,049
18George1,279,176Ashley831,126
19Steven1,269,104Donna827,839
20Kenneth1,250,728Kimberly825,188
21Andrew1,220,464Carol813,104
22Edward1,183,885Michelle802,726
23Joshua1,162,595Emily776,588
24Brian1,155,378Amanda769,412
25Kevin1,147,194Melissa746,598
26Ronald1,073,055Deborah738,182
27Timothy1,055,093Laura737,287
28Jason1,008,367Stephanie732,475
29Jeffrey968,779Rebecca727,122
30Gary897,536Sharon720,198
31Ryan891,166Cynthia703,977
32Nicholas866,148Kathleen700,446
33Eric861,720Ruth690,702
34Jacob848,038Anna688,230
35Stephen842,384Shirley680,162
36Jonathan803,785Amy673,299
37Larry801,570Angela653,815
38Frank792,425Virginia605,681
39Scott766,917Brenda605,336
40Justin758,002Pamela593,379
41Brandon734,956Catherine589,636
42Raymond730,505Katherine584,301
43Gregory702,296Nicole577,390
44Samuel673,653Christine571,921
45Benjamin660,859Janet550,377
46Patrick654,333Debra550,114
47Jack624,651Samantha549,656
48Dennis611,088Carolyn547,182
49Jerry604,399Rachel543,294
50Alexander596,167Heather523,369
51Tyler564,635Maria520,013
52Henry552,764Diane517,239
53Douglas552,541Frances507,194
54Peter549,126Joyce503,943
55Aaron542,328Julie503,658
56Walter539,969Emma482,694
57Jose535,132Evelyn477,717
58Adam524,872Martha477,345
59Zachary513,121Joan477,063
60Harold510,935Kelly468,441
61Nathan503,723Christina468,006
62Kyle468,806Lauren456,337
63Carl467,691Judith449,584
64Arthur459,623Alice446,529
65Gerald440,160Victoria446,019
66Roger434,033Doris441,420
67Lawrence432,407Ann441,101
68Keith430,907Jean440,900
69Albert426,595Cheryl438,916
70Jeremy425,094Marie438,758
71Terry420,348Megan433,186
72Joe415,584Kathryn423,415
73Sean409,292Andrea420,518
74Willie401,244Jacqueline415,334
75Jesse387,718Gloria407,880
76Austin382,419Teresa406,116
77Christian381,911Janice403,901
78Ralph380,721Sara402,166
79Billy380,571Rose393,573
80Bruce376,305Hannah393,208
81Bryan369,632Julia392,864
82Roy366,779Theresa384,281
83Eugene357,110Judy380,857
84Ethan355,803Grace378,602
85Louis351,563Beverly375,754
86Wayne346,862Denise370,776
87Jordan345,140Marilyn367,206
88Harry342,952Mildred366,723
89Russell336,600Amber365,710
90Alan335,720Danielle362,010
91Juan328,239Brittany355,762
92Philip325,446Olivia352,263
93Randy325,386Diana351,810
94Dylan321,319Jane349,812
95Howard316,046Lori340,265
96Vincent315,590Madison336,143
97Bobby311,783Tiffany333,625
98Johnny305,004Kathy332,976
99Phillip300,279Tammy331,500
100Shawn298,043Crystal326,726
Source: 100% sample based on Social Security card application data as of the end of February 2014. See the limitations of this data source.