Prisoners
Film Review by Kam Williams
Parents and Police Search for Kidnapped Kids in Mesmerizing, Multi-Layered Mystery
Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) is a rugged outdoorsman and family man with deep roots in rural Pennsylvania. He and his wife, Grace (Maria Bello), are raising their kids, 6 year-old Anna (Erin Gerasimovich) and teenage Ralph (Dylan Minnette) in the tiny town of Dover, an idyllic oasis seemingly far removed from big city afflictions.
It is Thanksgiving morning, and the doting dad has decided his son is ready to shoot his first deer, a rite-of-passage he’d shared with his own father upon coming-of-age a generation earlier. And after a telling tableau dripping with Christian symbolism reflected in a recitation of the Lord’s Prayer and a cross dangling from their pickup truck’s rearview mirror, we find the two deep in the woods where the boy does, indeed, bag his first buck.
“Be ready,” Keller ominously advises Ralph on the return trip, not because he has a premonition about any impending disaster, but due to the vague sense of paranoia he has cultivated over the years as an amateur survivalist. Still, a basement stocked with years’ worth of provisions would prove to be of no use in the calamity about to unfold later that day.
First, the Dovers travel to the home of Nancy (Viola Davis) and Franklin Birch (Terrence Howard), neighbors with a couple of kids around the same age as theirs. However, after sharing a satisfying Thanksgiving dinner, youngsters Anna and Joy (Kyla Drew Simmons) vanish without a trace while playing outside unsupervised.
The only lead is a suspicious RV parked down the street which the police trace to Alex Jones (Paul Dano), the mentally-challenged village idiot (Paul Dano) ostensibly incapable of pulling off such an abduction. With no other clues to follow, the investigating officer (Jake Gyllenhaal) puts the case on a back burner, much to the chagrin of the missing girls’ anguished parents.
Given that time is of the essence, it is no surprise when a very desperate Keller takes the law into his own hands, with his manic behavior cutting a sharp contrast to the relatively-measured approach of deliberately-paced Detective Loki. Will the frustrated father or the laid-back cop crack the case first? Or will they join forces and pool their resources? Will Anna and Joy be rescued alive, or found too late to save them? Or will the whodunit simply go unsolved.
That is the mystery at the heart of Prisoners, a mesmerizing, multi-layered masterpiece brilliantly directed by Dennis Villeneuve. Screenwriter Aaron Guzikowski deserves equal credit for the film’s intricately-plotted script which oh so slowly ratchets-up the tension in a compelling fashion guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat every step of the way.
A compelling character study of the emotional toll exacted by a kidnapping on the psyche of the victims’ loved ones.
Excellent (4 stars)
Rated R for pervasive profanity and disturbing violence
Running time: 153 minutes
Distributor: Warner Brothers
To see a trailer for Prisoners, visit:
Crazy Rich:
Power, Scandal, and Tragedy inside the Johnson & Johnson Dynasty
by Jerry Oppenheimer
Book Review by Kam Williams
St. Martin’s Press
Hardcover, $27.99
504 pages, Illustrated
ISBN: 978-0-312-66211-0
“Heirs to a Band-Aid and Baby Powder fortune, the Johnsons have enjoyed unimaginable wealth since Johnson & Johnson was founded in 1886—but their personal lives have been marred by bitter feuds, violent and costly divorces, sexual aberration, and myriad tragedies…
Their entrepreneurial prowess has brought them enormous power and success in business, but their private lives have been haunted by misfortunes through the generations… This scrupulously researched biography… places the Johnson & Johnson family under a journalistic microscope… [and] reveals the secrets behind their immense power, their extraordinary wealth, and their provocative dramas…
Based on exclusive on-the-record interviews with family, friends, business associates, lovers, and detractors, Crazy Rich serves up the first definitive and objective look at a platinum dynasty that was once termed ‘perhaps the most dysfunctional family in the Fortune 500.’”
-- Excerpted from the book jacket
If you’re curious about how the other half lives, have I got a book for you! While Robin Leach would have us believe that it’s all “champagne wishes and caviar dreams” for the well-to-do, the truth might be far afield from the fluff pieces the terminally-exuberant host of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous routinely served up on his syndicated TV show.
By contrast, Jerry Oppenheimer is a journalist just as obsessed with celebrity, but he’s staked his career on exposing the ugly underbelly of fame and fortune. He’s written unauthorized biographies of such public figures as the Clintons, Martha Stewart, the Hiltons, Barbara Walters, Jerry Seinfeld and Ethel Kennedy, to name a few.
The super sleuth’s latest expose’ is a warts-and-all biography of the Johnsons, heirs to the mammoth Johnson & Johnson Band-Aid fortune. While the multigenerational opus opens with a chapter on the heir who is currently most-visible, New York Jets owner Woody Johnson, the 500-page tome is fairly encyclopedic in nature, as it covers the history of the enduring dynasty from its inception right up to the present.
Listen, any family tree that stretches back to the mid-19th Century is bound to have its share of tragedy. After all, if immortality were something that money could buy, the rich would live, and only the poor would die.
Nevertheless, the Johnsons do seem to have been burdened with a Job’s worth of adversity, to make a Biblical allusion. For instance, you may remember the drug-related death of Woody’s 30 year-old daughter Casey, which was widely-reported in the tabloids in January of 2010. At the time, the openly-bisexual celebutante was engaged to Tia Tequila, the flamboyant star of her own reality television series.
You might find it interesting to learn that Casey’s parents divorced, and that while Woody acquired a pro football team, his ex, Sale, married a former football star, Ahmad Rashad. And Ahmad isn’t the only African-American mentioned in the book, somehow this critic ended up featured on a few pages. But you’ll have to shell out the bucks to buy it to find out exactly why.
Overall, Crazy Rich is a riveting page-turner you won’t want to put down, provided salacious stories about the bizarre behavior of the Jet Set are your cup of tea.
To order a copy of Crazy Rich, visit:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0312662114/ref%3dnosim/thslfofire-20 Johnson
Watch film clip ( Spanish language subtitled version)
"When The Iron Bird Flies" Spanish language subtitled version is now available for digital download in High Definition 1080p.
“Ver este documental es una tremenda oportunidad para conocer la profunda compasión y valentía de los budistas tibetanos al enfrentar la realidad de la invasión de su país, y darnos cuenta de como han transformado ese dolor en beneficio para toda la humanidad… De un modo intimo, comprensible y emocionante la documentalista profundiza en ejemplos biográficos de lo que ha provocado el encuentro con el Budismo Tibetano.”
– Francesca Nilo Gatica, Directora del diplomado Mindfulness, Universidad Del Desarrollo, Santiago de Chile
Winnie Mandela
Film Review by Kam Williams
Winnie Mandela (Jennifer Hudson) is a controversial figure in the annals of South Africa history. For not only was she the first wife of freedom fighter-turned-President Nelson Mandela (Terrence Howard), but she was also convicted of ordering numerous human rights violations.
At the height of the anti-apartheid movement, she headed a goon squad which doled out street justice to blacks suspected of collaborating with the white establishment. With Winnie’s blessing, snitches would be sentenced to death by necklace, meaning by having a gasoline-soaked tire placed on their shoulders and set on fire.
And after the fall of Apartheid, she confessed before the country Truth and Reconciliation commission to “the murder, torture, abduction and assault of numerous men, women and children.” So, it’s understandably hard to put a sympathetic spin on such an infamous political figure.
That is the challenge tackled by director Darrell Roodt in Winnie Mandela, a warts-and-all biopic which focuses on its subject’s childhood, college days and marriage while making short shrift of her transition into a war criminal. Along the way, we learn that she was a headstrong tomboy who blossomed into the irresistible beauty that Nelson fell in love with at first sight.
Sadly, the two were separated for 27 years while he was imprisoned on Robben Island for treason because of his call for an end of Apartheid. And perhaps that was what led Winnie to rationalize resorting to fighting the government and stool pigeons by any means necessary.
As for the acting, Jennifer Hudson and Terrence Howard do their best to adopt appropriate accents, but they both sound fake since they’re surrounded by a cast comprised of actual South Africans. The production’s most glaring flaw, nevertheless, is that the poorly-scripted screenplay simply fails to give the audience much of a reason to invest in unlikable Winnie’s life story.
Winnie Mandela, less an honorable “Mother of the Nation,” than a disgraceful, “bad mother-[shut your mouth]!”
Fair (1 star)
R for violence and profanity
Running time: 107 minutes
Studio: RLJ Entertainment
Distributor: Image Entertainment
To see a trailer for Winnie Mandela, visit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGnc4FP6eII
Cuba Gooding, Jr
The “Lee Daniels’ The Butler” Interview
with Kam Williams
Show Me The Butler!
Cuba Gooding, Jr. was born in the Bronx on January 2, 1968, but raised in Los Angeles from the age of 4 on. Best known for his Oscar-winning portrayal of the charmingly-arrogant Rod “Show Me the Money!” Tidwell in Cameron Crowe’s Jerry Maguire, he first found fame in 1991 when he received critical acclaim for his performance in John Singleton’s coming-of-age classic Boyz n the Hood.
Cuba followed-up that success with roles in As Good as It Gets, What Dreams May Come, and the Oscar-nominated A Few Good Men. The versatile thespian’s repertoire also includes roles in pictures ranging from Red Tails to Radio to Men of Honor to Pearl Harbor to American Gangster to Shadowboxer to Boat Trip to Snow Dogs to Norbit.
Among his upcoming big screen projects are Don Jon and the sequel Machete Kills. On television, he played the title character in the award-winning Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story, as well as in Firelight, the highest rated Hallmark Hall of Fame movie ever.
A decade ago, Cuba’s extraordinary achievements were recognized when he was awarded with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Here, he talks about his work opposite Forest Whitaker and Oprah Winfrey in Lee Daniels’ The Butler.
Kam Williams: Hi Cuba, appreciate the time.
Cuba Gooding, Jr: Anytime, Kam. How are ya, buddy?
KW: Great, and you?
CG: Very well, thank you.
KW: What interested you in The Butler?
CG: Well, to give you a little history, Lee Daniels and I had been friends even before he was a producer, manager or casting director. When he offered me the role of the shadowboxer in Shadowboxer, I was invited into the editing room. We’ve done this thing throughout his career from Precious on, where he sends me screenplays that he’s considering. So, I feel like this is an invested relationship I have with him. He sent me this screenplay about five years ago, suggesting that I might be the butler.
KW: Were you upset when you didn’t land the title role?
CG: No, one thing led to another in casting choices, and now I couldn’t imagine this movie without Forest Whitaker playing the lead and Oprah playing his wife. I think they’re both deserving of Oscar nominations. Their relationship in the movie’s so powerful, and so is Forest’s with David Oyelowo’s character.
KW: You did a great job, too.
CG: Thanks. It just feels so good to be involved again with a movie that’s socially relevant. I recently met a 27 year-old white male who admitted that he didn’t know about the sit-ins until seeing this movie’s scene with the kids being refused service in a segregated diner. And it hit me how we can so easily forget, because I’m in my forties. There’s such a disconnect from the next generation in terms of all the brutality. That’s why it feels good to be a part of this film which revisits that time period and talks about what transpired.
KW: Especially because it tackles the material from a fresh perspective.
CG: It’s interesting, too, because when Django Unchained came out, so many people were alienated by it, while others who thought it was just a really cool ride from Quentin Tarantino said, “Get over it!” If you look at the latter group, a lot of them were really young kids who had a disconnect from slavery. To them, all they saw was their hero being freed, shooting back, saving the day and getting his girl. It’s funny, I started dating my wife, who’s Caucasian with blonde hair and blue eyes, in 1987. I got hate mail when I did Boyz n the Hood saying stuff like, “I can’t believe your girlfriend is white.” But I hadn’t grown up in the South back in the days when blacks were lynched for even looking at a white woman. And when you look at what I did today, it’s elementary compared to the attention being paid to the issue of same-sex marriage. So, we’ve moved away for the better, but we just can’t afford to forget all the sacrifices and trials and tribulations.
KW: How much research did you have to do to prepare for the role?
CG: Well, I’d been researching and gathering information on the subject for several years for both this script and for a Martin Luther King story about Selma. So, it’s a time period I’d already become pretty well-versed in.
KW: Editor/Legist Patricia Turnier asks: How similar are you to your character in The Butler, Carter Wilson?
CG: I AM that guy! [LOL] Sometimes, I can be pretty goofy, and a bit of an exhibitionist. I don’t think I’m quite as free with the lips as he is, but I can tell a joke or two. Some of those lines I ad-libbed.
KW: How emotionally affected were you seeing the film for the first time?
CG: I was a wreck. I sat and hugged Pam [producer Pam Williams] like someone had died in the family. And, to be honest with you, Kam, it wasn’t so much the history lesson, but simply that my eldest son who’s 18 was going off to college, and I couldn’t get back to L.A. to see him off when he left because I was stuck in New York. The father-son relationship just hit me, man, especially the scene where Cecil Gaines says goodbye to his son departing for college. What I experienced wasn’t a feeling of sadness, but rather a realization of this higher calling in life, and how we’re all a part of this chain.
KW: Speaking of your being in New York, Harriet Pakula-Teweles asks: How did you enjoy being on Broadway? What play were you doing, A Trip to Bountiful?
CG: Yes, sir, since February. I loved it. I actually started in theater, that’s where an agent found me in ’86, I was doing a Shakespeare festival. On the stage, if you don’t understand every word of what you’re saying, it is apparent in your countenance. So, I was always about living the character. Then I got stolen away by TV where I got my start as MacGyver’s sidekick for awhile which was easy to phone in. You know the guy, you know the peril, and you know how to save the day. So, I leapt at this opportunity to go back, and it reignited my creativity. Just to be across from Cicely Tyson on that stage every day, was great. My creative passion is back!
KW: Harriet also asks: With so many classic films being redone, is there a remake you'd like to star in?
CG: That’s an interesting question I’ve never been asked. Just last night, literary, I was sitting around talking with some friends about those old movies with a Broadway theme. Maybe one of those.
KW: The Viola Davis question: What’s the difference between who you are at home as opposed to the person we see on the red carpet?
CG: Well, I smile a lot more on the red carpet.
KW: The Anthony Anderson question: If you could have a superpower, which one would you choose?
CG: I would fly. I’ve been dreaming about flying since I was 5 years-old.
KW: The Gabby Douglas question: If you had to choose another profession, what would that be?
CG: Social work. Or maybe coaching kids sports. I’ve always been a people person. It would have to be something where I could help people.
KW: Attorney Bernadette Beekman asks: What is your favorite charity?
CG: The Boys and Girls Clubs of America is one of them. I have a few.
KW: Can you give me a Cuba Gooding, Jr. question to ask other celebrities?
CG: Yeah, what still scares you?
KW: Thanks, and thanks again for the time, Cuba.
CG: My pleasure, Kam.
To see a trailer for Lee Daniels’ The Butler, visit: