Mountain Island - Carolina Weekly Newspapers

the reel deal
by Sean O’Connell
Beneath the feathered toupee, that disturbingly
fuzzy mustache, and 30 pounds of
listless, desk-job body fat lies Matt Damon,
giving an outstanding comedic performance
as the title character in Steven Soderbergh’s
“The Informant!”
Damon nails the part of Mark Whitacre, a
loyal and unassuming executive at food processor
Archer Daniels Midland who, in the
mid-1990s, reports his company’s suspicious
price-fixing tactics to ambitious FBI agents
(Joel McHale, Scott Bakula). But once
Whitacre tastes the power associated with
white-collar crime, tiny lies expand into webs
of corporate deceit that ensnare good guys,
bad guys and everyone in between.
Investigative reporter Kurt Eichenwald
wrote a best-selling book detailing Whitacre’s
factual case, which Soderbergh and screenwriter
Scott Burns have mined to create a
twisty – and twisted – dark comedy. If the
exclamation point added to the title doesn’t
tip off the rambunctious, carnival mood of
this intelligent and often uproarious cocktail,
then one listen of Marvin Hamlisch’s jazzy,
jokey, bubblegum-pop score absolutely sets
the record straight.
There’s a welcome symmetry – a cosmic balance,
if you will – to the fact that Jeffrey Levy-
Hinte’s “Soul Power” and Ang Lee’s “Taking
Woodstock” have reached Charlotte’s cinemas
at the same time. A double feature is recommended,
and since both are playing at the
Regal Park Terrace, it wouldn’t require any
driving between screenings.
Both films capture the painstaking details
that go into coordinating a large-scale, multiday
music festival. But where Lee’s fictional feature
found noteworthy stories along the fringes of
the Woodstock Music & Art Fair, Levy-Hinte’s
dynamic documentary celebrates the largerthan-life
artists who entertained from the stage
of Zaire ’74, the jazz and soul show planned in
conjunction with Muhammad Ali and George
Foreman’s legendary Rumble in the Jungle.
Access is the key to “Power.” As chief editor
of Leon Gast’s Oscar-winning boxing doc
“When We Were Kings,” Levy-Hinte watched
reels of valuable footage shot by cinematographers
Roderick Young, Kevin Keating and
Paul Goldsmith hit the cutting-room floor.
Recognizing a second story that needed telling,
Levy-Hinte salvaged these deleted “Kings”
scenes and spliced them together to create a
commemorative documentary that’s 35 years
in the making.
And access to previously unseen performances
is also what “Power” provides. Indeed,
the last 60 minutes of the 90-minute film mostly
consist of exclusive concert footage. Levy-
Hinte limits artists not named James Brown
to one song apiece, but his song selection is
‘The Informant!’
‘Soul Power’
But the laughter in “The Informant!” stems
from a disbelief that one attention-seeking
man could cause such disorder in corporate
and government environments. As Whitacre’s
mental turmoils surface through plot
revelations and a stream-of-consciousness
monologue, “The Informant!” protects an
undercurrent of sadness that drowns those
unlucky enough to be in the whistleblower’s
personal circle. It’s a deft piece of storytelling
by Soderbergh and Burns, because “The
Informant!” can shift gears on a whim, yet it
never jumps the rails or throws its audience
off track.
It’s also easy to forget how funny Damon
can be on screen. Because we seem to prefer
the A-list actor in “Bourne” thrillers
and intriguing political dramas, he’s forced
to pick and choose his comedic moments.
When they come, however, they are worth
savoring. Damon’s dry wit and precise timing
nearly were overshadowed by the star-power
glitz of Soderbergh’s “Ocean’s” ensembles.
(His tryst with Ellen Barkin saves “Ocean’s
Thirteen” from banality.) Years ago, Damon
willfully deflated his Hollywood hunk status
by playing a straight singer trying to
James Brown
commendable. Bill Withers croons his stirring
ballad, “Hope She’ll Be Happier,” with only an
acoustic guitar for accompaniment. B.B. King
blazes through “The Thrill Is Gone,” paving the
way for Soul Brother No. 1 to close the show in
grand fashion.
By all accounts, Zaire ’74 was a nonstop party,
an acknowledgment of the culture- bonding
power of music. Even the press conference
announcing the concert, held at the Waldorf
Astoria and presided over by Ali and smoothtalking
fight promoter Don King, was a festive
affair. Nowadays, an all-star event of this nature
would be broadcast on VH1, simulcast on satellite
radio, and available for download on iTunes
minutes after the final song. “Soul Power” does
its part to widen the historic concert’s potential
audience base. q
Grade: HHH out of 4
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for thematic elements
and brief strong language
Cast: Muhammad Ali, James Brown, B.B. King
Genre: Documentary
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
join a gay chorus on NBC’s “Will & Grace.”
Damon also enjoys distorting his good looks
to surprise us with broad physical comedy,
playing a conjoined twin (“Stuck On You”)
or a pierced and tattooed punk rock singer
(“Eurotrip”) if it helps the joke.
All of those choices – the physical alterations,
the pent-up humor and the untapped
reservoir of farcical showmanship – have led
to Damon’s unchecked and gleefully earnest
performance in “The Informant!” The actor’s
enthusiasm masks Whitacre’s true intentions,
so we’re never sure if he’s a wholesome
‘Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs’
Whether fair or
not, animated movies
released these days automatically
get compared
to the gold-standard pictures
produced by the
mighty Pixar Animated
Studios. And where
recent features like “Up”
and “WALL-E” brim
with creative energies,
Sony’s “Cloudy with a
Chance of Meatballs” is
just plain energetic, offering spirited entertainment
for children on a sugar high.
Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s “Meatballs”
attempts a prologue to Judi and Ron Barrett’s
much-loved book, explaining why weather patterns
in the fishing community of Chewandswallow
produce food products. It turns out
Flint Lockwood (Bill Hader), an amateur
inventor and professional disappointment to his
father (James Caan), is to blame. Flint builds a
machine that morphs water into food. When
an explosion rockets Flint’s invention into the
hemisphere, Chewandswallow welcomes a
buffet of delicious dishes from the sky, earning
Flint popularity, acceptance and the eye of
pretty, novice weathergirl Sam Sparks (Anna
Faris), assigned to cover the cloudy anomaly.
“Meatballs” actually has something to say.
It jabs at our gluttonous urges, the bigger-isbetter
cravings for super-sized culinary experiences,
and the fleeting power of overnight
celebrity as it cleverly spoofs Hollywood’s
Matt Damon
patriot standing up to corporate greed or a
snake oil salesman bored by his own existence
and looking for a quick escape to a better life.
Damon makes Whitacre a fabricator, a fullblown
storyteller. But he’s also, miraculously,
a champion for the common man. q
Grade: HHH out of 4
MPAA Rating: R for language
Cast: Matt Damon, Scott Bakula
Genre: Comedy/Crime/Drama
Studio: Warner Bros.
Flint (Bill Hader) and Sam (Anna Faris)
mockable disaster genre. Hader and Farris are
good choices for the lead voices, as are some of
the off-the-wall selections in supporting roles.
(Listen for Mr. T, Al Roker, Bruce Campbell
and Neil Patrick Harris, to name a few.)
But the strained father-son relationship and
worthy lessons about rising to individual challenges
take a backseat to ice cream snowball
fights, food puns (try to say “tomato tornado”
three times fast), bounces around a mansion
made of Jell-O, monkey poop jokes and enough
explosions to make Michael Bay envious.
Where Pixar would have made a nutritious
main course out of the character issues in Lord
and Miller’s script, “Meatballs” skips them in
favor of dessert. q
Grade: HH1/2 out of 4
MPAA Rating: PG for brief, mild language
Cast: Bill Hader, Anna Faris
Genre: Comedy/Animated
Studio: Sony/Columbia Pictures
Tune in to WBTV News 3 every Friday morning during the 5 o’clock hour for Sean’s weekly movie review segment and read his reviews at www.mountainislandweekly.com.
www.mountainislandweekly.com Mountain Island Weekly • Sept. 18-24, 2009 • Page 23