Each week in\u00a0The Moviegoer<\/a>, Nick Olson examines new and upcoming films.<\/em><\/p>\n Killing Them Softly<\/em> (Andrew Dominik, 2012)<\/p>\n My anticipation for\u00a0Killing Them Softly<\/em>\u2013Dominik\u2019s long-awaited followup to his excellent 2007 feature, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford<\/em>\u2013was admittedly high. I thought the latter a masterfully crafted, slow-burn thriller of a western. Reunited with Brad Pitt, Dominik returns with a modern day gangster flick that is an allegory about America\u2019s 2008 recession. Pitt plays a hitman named Jackie Cogan who is hired to restore some order to a criminal poker ring after it\u2019s been robbed for a second time. In hard economic times, a message needs to be sent to keep the underworld relatively cool.<\/p>\n Pitt puts in another star turn here, and Dominik is just as effective in his visual work as he was with Jesse James<\/em>\u2013and the dialogue is sharp, too. The film\u2019s central robbery scene features some of the best camera maneuvering I\u2019ve seen all year. I think what most pleasantly surprised me was that the film functioned rather well as a dark comedy. This comic tone gives the film\u2019s assassination-style themes a subdued force. Upon the film\u2019s conclusion, I felt a bit disappointed because the economic crisis themes seemed, as many critics have noted, \u201con the nose.\u201d Yet, with some distance from the film, I\u2019m beginning to wonder if Dominik packed more of a difficult punch than he\u2019s being given credit for. That is, I think he intended for the surface-level allegory to be \u201con the nose\u201d\u2013with brass knuckles, you might say. It\u2019s getting at the little bits of subtle commentary at every turn that may prove worthwhile on a second viewing. It\u2019s no question what<\/em> Dominik\u2019s killing here, but the\u00a0how<\/em> of this killing may be more subtle\u2013soft\u2013than you\u2019d first guess. I wouldn\u2019t be surprised if time treats this film well.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Jiro Dreams of Sushi <\/em>(David Gelb, 2012)<\/p>\n If you haven\u2019t yet, go read Jason Morehead\u2019s excellent piece<\/a> on Jiro Dreams of Sushi<\/em>. Better yet, watch this documentary on Netflix Instant<\/a>, and then read his take. Along with The Imposter<\/em> (see below) and The Queen of Versaille<\/a><\/em>s<\/a>, <\/em>this is one of my favorite documentaries of the year. Jiro is an 86 year old owner of a famed sushi restaurant in Japan. His sushi joint seats ten and runs at least $300 a person. Jason has already covered much of what I loved about Gelb\u2019s fascinating film. I\u2019ll simply add that it most struck me as a multifaceted look at the art of preparation. It\u2019s about the preparation that goes into cultivating one of the world\u2019s finest sushi restaurants; it\u2019s about the preparation that Jiro didn\u2019t receive from his father; it\u2019s about the ways Jiro did and didn\u2019t follow his father in preparing his sons. At its heart, the documentary suggests that dreams are best achieved when couched within repetition, discipline, and tradition; but there\u2019s also quite an underlying suggestion that priorities must factor into that equation.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The Deep Blue Sea <\/em>(Terrence Davies, 2012)<\/p>\n Terrence Davies\u2019s adaptation of the 1952 Terrence Rattigan play features a fairly conventional story. Woman is married to successful older man who leaves her feeling emotionally and physically unsatisfied; woman begins emotionally and physically charged affair with charming younger man who leaves her stranded in ways that older man didn\u2019t; this conflict is presented as a depressing either\/or. Yet, Davies\u2013supported by all-around excellent performances\u2013manages to craft a totally engrossing drama. If the dramatic situation seems contrived, none of its proceedings in this film feel the least bit artificial. The post-war setting lends the film an overriding anxiety; tension-filled pauses emphasize social-psychological burden; fluttering cigarette smoke adds stress to dark, muted rooms; that old strain between passion and reason is displayed on faces equally bewildered and irritated. The three main leads all manage to transcend their stereotypical roles, giving each character a soulful depth that makes the conflict believable.<\/p>\n Davies\u2019s film stakes its claim to refined style in the opening credit sequence: in a shaky, foreboding voice, Weisz reads a suicide note she\u2019s written to the man she\u2019s having an affair with. In the background, we can hear rain falling and an incessant, ticking clock. Are they the final ticks? The unquestionable star here is Rachel Weisz as the anxious lead, Hester. In a film that begins with a suicide attempt and works backwards in flashbacks to depict the intimate, daily circumstances that help facilitate it, Weisz wears despair heartrendingly well.\u00a0 The Deep Blue Sea<\/em> is a deft portrait of a suicidal woman who becomes isolated in a cold marital relationship and then becomes increasingly unstable in an adulterous one. Even if the narrative options out of her plight seem unrealistically reduced, so it often is with the troubled, shriveling soul.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The Imposter <\/em>(Bart Layton, 2012)<\/p>\n True story: I presently have three films on my year-end 2012 favorites list all bunched together back-to-back-to-back, and they\u2019re all about imposters. One film<\/a> is a fictional story that involves a cult leader who gains satisfaction from having manipulative control over his followers. You can tell he\u2019s playing a sham game by the way that he desires to keep his followers out at sea and away from challenges to his authority\u2013or in how defensiveness shapes his response to those few challenges that come his way. The second film<\/a> is a potent mix between documentary and fiction about a man who murders an elderly woman, admits to it, and still has a kind of unthinking support from his small-town community. He\u2019s a churchgoer who performs many great kindnesses. But you can tell he\u2019s a sham given that those gifts to others have a remote quality about them such that the people seem more familiar with the gifts than the giver.<\/p>\n The third film is a documentary styled as a sometimes-humorous con-man thriller, and it\u2019s called The Imposter<\/em>. A Texas family\u2019s 13 year old son, Nicholas Barclay, goes missing; there\u2019s no sign of foul play and no trace of him. Three years later, the family receives word that Nicholas has been found in Spain, and that he claims to have experienced various forms of physical abuse. Bart Layton\u2019s documentary doesn\u2019t revolve around the mystery of whether or not it\u2019s actually Barclay; from the beginning of the film we\u2019re privy to this being the work of a French imposter. Instead, this thriller works as one which methodically unfolds the story via the calculated tactics of a grand impersonator. And this thriller has heart, too, because throughout we\u2019re led to wonder at what kind of scarring causes a 23 year old man to impersonate missing or orphaned adolescents. And there\u2019s still a mystery at work here revolving around the family who receives the imposter, but to say more about that would be to say too much. With Jiro <\/em>and The Queen of Versailles<\/em>, The Imposter <\/em>is part of a three-horse race for my favorite 2012 documentary. And it just might be my favorite of this year\u2019s three imposters.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Holy Motors <\/em>(Leos Carax, 2012)<\/p>\n Holy Motors <\/em>is the kind of film that you\u2019re afraid to say something about too soon after viewing it (or maybe that\u2019s just me?). At first glance, it might seem to qualify as non-sense without a trace of sanity. Or, if you\u2019re like me and lack a finer historical sense of cinema, you may feel like many allusions go over your head. The latter you can get by without alright enough, though it probably takes away some of the film\u2019s pleasures. The former is, for the most part, a too-convenient label for a film that simply resists conventional narrative sense. But after two viewings, I\u2019ll give a brief comment a whirl. <\/em><\/p>\n Holy Motors <\/em>eludes neat summation, but one way of phrasing it may give you a sense of entry into its outrageous world. The director, Leos Carax, plays himself in the very beginning of the film. He wakes up and is himself the key to unlocking a world that begins in a movie theater. We hear the sounds of seagulls and ships. Shortly thereafter, lead actor Denis Levant emerges from a house which seems shaped like a ship. Dressed in a suit and middle-aged, he waves goodbye to his conventional family and enters a stretch limo. What happens over the course of the coming day\u2013which plays like an entire life\u2013is anything but conventional. The man\u2019s name is \u201cOscar,\u201d the back of his limo functions as a dress and makeup room, and he has several \u201cappointments\u201d throughout the day in which he plays a role in a particular scenario. \u201cOscar\u201d becomes old beggar woman, motion-captured beast, and tragically grumpy father\u2013among other roles.Oh, and if that doesn\u2019t sound interesting enough, not all of the references are relatively obscure\u2013Kylie Minogue and Eva Mendes are involved.<\/p>\n