The Curious Case of
BENJAMIN BUTTON
By
Sharlet Liebel ©2009

Fascinating is the premise that a father would run around the streets of old New Orleans with a newborn in his arms. Such is The Case of Benjamin Button. As he hesitates with the infant in his arms at the edge of the wharf on the Mississippi River,  a patrolman hollers out to him. He is chased several blocks and escapes. At least he didn’t commit murder. The man hides under the veil of darkness near a well-lit porch.  He looks around. Nobody is watching.  He reaches the decision to leave the lightly-blanketed child on the steps.

Earlier, we learn that this father is distraught over the death of his wife in child-birth. That their child is born old and wrinkled magnifies his dilemma.  Add to this drama an age when family doctors are discreet and unobtrusive into the personal lives of their patients and we are presented with the perfect setting for a child to disappear without question. 

Equally unquestioning is the appearance of a newborn to be raised by Queenie (Taraji P. Henson http://www.imdb.com/name/nm 0378245/bio ) a single, black, nurturing, young caregiver at an “old folks” home. This dear woman is heard only once to say she is curious. Her meaning is to describe her free spirit in trying to experience life rather than anyone’s appearance.  In the next scene, she beholds her child and sees his imperfection.  Her only thought is that God brought him into the world and everyone is entitled to his chance at life.  She names him Benjamin (Brad Pitt - http://www.imdb. com/name/nm0000093/ ). 

How fortunate for the child.  An unfortunate set of circumstances places Benjamin in an  unconventional setting among aging citizens who have traveled beyond the age of disbelief, conventions, expectations, and views of society. Here, relatives visit residents who live for a time, make friends, die, and are replaced by others.  It is the grandchild of one of the resident’s that plays with Benjamin and they become dear friends.  Her name is Daisy. (Cate Blanchett -http://www.imdb. com/ name/nm 0000949/ )

It is such a unique family into which F. Scott Fitzgerald introduces a person who arrives old and dies young.  In this household people live with dementia, repetitive phrases, physical and mental problems and no expectations of what should and should not be.  Living and dying is unchallenged. 

Somewhere in his imagination Fitzgerald must have considered that many people, even he, are saddened at the prospect of aging.  Daisy cries in one scene,  “I hate growing old.”  More than that, her dreams are shattered when she is struck  by a car and loses her career as a famous dancer .

Daisy is, at one time, performing in Paris and Benjamin is finally reunited with his father a manufacturer of buttons by the name of Button, just prior to his death.  He visits Daisy twice: once when he plans to propose marriage, and next when she’s in the hospital. On both occasions Daisy rejects him.  But upon recovering from her automobile accident she does return to find Benjamin.

Now, the two are in their 40s.  To their surprise, Daisy becomes pregnant. Their happiness together is short-lived because, as Benjamin reminds her, she cannot raise two children. He leaves to travel the world as he learned to do in his earlier years when he was a younger man in an old body . He returns years later when Daisy is married and his daughter is his present age.  He is now an older man in a young boy’s body. 

Three major events occur during this movie that are clearly defined and create an understandable storyline.  One is the gift presented to the community by the inventor of a clock that was mechanized to run in reverse.  Another is Daisy who is old and about to die, at any time.  She is telling her daughter the story of the only true love she ever had and never spoke about. The third is Benjamin Button who narrates his life from birth and throughout his relationships and adventures.

The viewer shares in Daisy’s tender care for her beloved Benjamin as his memory dims while he grows younger. It is a magnificent tale of living simply and loving as long as there is opportunity. Experience this movie with a friend or loved one. Nothing is ever sweeter.

The End.

Director  David Fincher

Eric Roth (screenplay)
Eric Roth (screen story) ...
 

CADILLAC RECORDS an Historical Drama

By

~Sharlet Liebel ©2008

You won’t believe the experience! Do you want action? You’ve got it. Booze and womanizing? Off the charts. Mood swings? Over the rainbow! Passion, history, reality, violence, bullets, death! It’s all there! The acting and direction are unflawed. Sound and acoustics are in surreal surround. Shockingly truthful and the story doesn’t spare the spectator.  It moves quickly. One thing, for sure, do not expect apologetics for the carnality of the supplemental facts as excitement mounts on wings of friends and foes. Look for an Academy Awards presentation to actors, directors, and the full gamut of contributors. At this writing, however, it looks like a sleeper but it’s about all the good new movies out for an explanation of this slow starter.

It’s Chicago in 1947 when bar owner Leonard Chess (Adrien Brody) scouts the streets for musicians. Muddy Waters (Jeffrey Wright) plays a mean guitar and Little Walter (Columbus Short) is incredible on the harmonica.  Little Walter becomes family to Muddy and his girlfriend Geneva (Gabrielle Union) who befriend him. Soon others are in competition to take center stage at the Chess Club. Big Willie Dixon (Cedric The Entertainer) is a gifted songwriter and talented bandleader. Howlin’ Wolf (Eamonn Walker) has a huge ego as a blues singer and appears explosively on the scene. He is in everybody’s face but takes a particularly crazy dislike toward Muddy Waters, which is terrifying considering everyone is packing a pistol.

Promoter Leonard Chess has bigger ideas.  He sets fire to his Club, collects the insurance and thus builds the best recording studio in the South Side of Chicago. He treats his talent well but owns their celebrity. They become icons driving new Cadillacs and owning houses that Chess gives them under contract. But Chess gets rich and they don’t touch the money.  Except that there is the one surprise incident that you’ll have to see the movie to appreciate.

This is the movie bibliography that can now be told with scenes upfront and personal. Prepare for this movie about historical overtures and consequences of a different space in time. It is not for the faint of heart. Experience the personalities and inner circles of intertwining artists of the era when difficult living is exemplified in songs and in the music. 

What draws the audience to the scene and actor? Is it not the passion of language, the swearing, and the confrontation! Don’t tease me about fear unless you want to see me sweat – they seem to say. Yes. It’s all there! Beauty, passion, terrible depravity, coarseness! But, believe me, it’s real. It’s believable.

You don’t want to miss it because this is the history of those times when blacks and whites don’t mix. These are the times when celebrated musicians carry guns for protection like they carry their guitars for strumming music from a gut feeling. The pistol is visible hardware leaving the house. Oh, Yeah. Lookout! Here comes trouble! But it’s a way of life and everybody carries protection.

And what we hear on the airwaves is called soul music.  It started out Rhythm and Blues. Or jazz.  Scenes are dark and dangerous in nightclubs and dismal personalities perpetuate the atmosphere of intrigue and danger.

It isn’t until 1955 that music starts changing the way people go to concerts and dance to the rhythms.  The cross-over into mainstream (white) America begins with the exuberant talents of skinny Chuck Berry who marks the start of Rock-and-Roll with a lot of Country in his tunes and his trade-mark “duck walk.” This magical music is what you hear turning a generation of people from segregation to integration.

It seems about mid-movie before our celebrated Etta James (Beyonce’ Knowles) appears for her brilliant introduction.  She saunters with an attitude that about decimates her audition. Not to be dissuaded by this prima donna, Chess challenges her persuasively with words that kill to really make her give a passionate audition of the magnitude he knows she is capable of. Wow!  From then on, it’s AT LAST and nobody belts those words out greater than our passionate darling of song. Etta sings many more great numbers that flood the audience with memories.

Beyonce’ re-creates Etta’s dramatic stage presence, voice power, and range with uncompromising brilliance. Additionally, she performs as a seasoned actor over challenging scenes of passion that deliver a believable message about the diva.

Etta James, now a celebrated female singer, has crossed-over. Her songs are so popular that her words are articulated among lovers uniting and parting. It’s a time where none of the politically correct establishment could change the population before and until this music began to hit the sound waves. Marriages lived and died just as were the lives of these poetic geniuses. Harmonica and guitar carried with it the total man and woman when, it is said, musicians could rise above the din of depressed circumstances and become famous.

Muddy Waters survived the slums and he was invited to London where he was lauded for his musical accomplishments.  In the end, some lives were lost and some were found.

Go alone if you plan to pick-up on history and nuances among and between the musicians because every scene is moving-right-along. The idea is to cram as much reality and as many connected musicians as possible into the hour and fifty minute long movie. Believe me, it explodes with powerful action and dialogue that one might think this movie is more than two hours long.

 
                                            CHANGELING
                                      Featuring Angelina Jolie
                                     Review by Sharlet Liebel ©2008

Award-winning is the acting performance and many-faceted believability of the character portrayed by Angelina Jolie , of a mother whose young boy disappears without a trace. Added to this is the  direction  and music of Clint Eastwood; definitely brilliance is his mainstay trademark.  

This featured presentation is daring and provocative. Apparently, the title is derived by the exchange of one young person for another. In addition, it is enhanced by magnificent scenes featuring authentic vehicles and streetcars driving through traffic, as well as period street clothes, home décor, and hairstyles that transport the viewer through a time-warp back to the years beginning in 1928. Many of the street scenes take place in Pasadena and Mira Loma, California. 

The dark true story takes place in Los Angeles, California, at a time when the Police Department was corruptible to the extent that innocent women were thrown into abusive situations. Their fate was disappearance at the Mental Institution for uncooperative behavior solely dependent upon the whims of the Police Chief. This incarceration was without benefit of a Court Order to show cause.  

Our protagonist is a young mother whose life is interrupted by an unknown intruder who disappears with her son.  She calls for help from the Police Department who put her off. She persists and soon the Police Department brings her a child to appease the citizens of the community and the newspapers carrying headline news about her quest.  This is a set-up and the deceit is forced upon this young woman who insists that the boy is not her son and that all the time wasted could be crucial to finding her son. Unfortunately, the young boy who has learned to lie about his true name and insists this is truly his mom works against her and he cannot be persuaded by this poor woman to fess-up due to his own desperate need to stay out of foster care. 

This desperate situation is championed by an Activist Preacher played by John Malkovich who has heard of the mother’s plight and has his church pray for her. Additionally, he is very public about his support for the young woman by openly antagonizing the corrupt Police Department through his church broadcasts. 

Except for the Pastor and a later coincidental investigation by an honest detective, the mystery of the child’s disappearance would never have been discovered.

This movie is intriguing with shockingly suspenseful moments as well as the discovery of a killer-at-large.  I would recommend this movie as a documentary and worthy of viewing.