Only the Brave

ONLY THE BRAVE (Joseph Kosinski, 2017)

In ONLY THE BRAVE Eric Marsh (Josh Brolin) oversees a unit within the Prescott, Arizona Fire Department that fights wildfires, but because they are not certified at the highest level, they are relegated to tasks he feels the team is overqualified for. With the help of the department’s Duane Stinebrink (Jeff Bridges), Eric gets his chance to get the team to the level of hotshots. He also convinces the mayor that as hotshots they'll earn more for hire to other communities than it costs to maintain the team. Among the firefighters is Brendan McDonough (Miles Teller), a burnout who says he’s determined to turn around his life after fathering a daughter.

ONLY THE BRAVE holds up the honor and dignity of a group working tirelessly and selflessly toward a common cause. Although the men may carry themselves with a certain swagger, the danger in what they do is always apparent to them and the loved ones worrying as they rush off to stop a big conflagration. While Ken Nolan and Eric Warren Springer’s screenplay holds these men up as heroes, it doesn’t do so at the expense of portraying their flaws and the tensions among them. These guys must rely on each other, but the personality clashes and self-destructive behaviors that exist in every team are just as visible here. Such a large crew can make it difficult to get to know all of them beyond a defining trait or two, which is why Marsh, McDonough, and Taylor Kitsch’s Chris MacKenzie, the wilder spirit in this bunch, receive the majority of the focus. Still, ONLY THE BRAVE does well at providing glimpses of those who are no less important than the ones who dominate the story.

Director Joseph Kosinski shoots the firefighting scene with attention to the technical requirements and strategy involved in taming the flames gobbling up the land before they reach homes. The hotshots literally fight fire with fire, which sounds counterintuitive but proves to be a remarkably effective approach as long as the situation has been properly assessed. ONLY THE BRAVE houses deep respect for the people who do this work, and in explaining how they achieve positive results, it honors all those whose accumulated knowledge and losses allow for such remarkable achievements now.

It’s fair to assume that a film about civic protectors probably contains its share of tragedy. ONLY THE BRAVE fits into the tradition of memorialization for such people. Rather than doing so with a plaque, the moving images, in the literal and metaphorical senses, depict what some are willing to risk for the safety of all. Kosinski handles the inevitable scene of informing loved ones about deaths on the job with delicacy and power combining the joy and jealousy for those who survived and anger and sorrow on the part of those who don’t come home. There can be a tendency for empty valorization of sacrifice, as though death in service makes it more acceptable while denying the impact that resonates through those left behind. ONLY THE BRAVE acknowledges the heroism but respects that all of the ringing words of praise can never make up for what is given.

Grade: B

The Little Prince

THE LITTLE PRINCE (Mark Osborne, 2015)

The Little Girl (Mackenzie Foy) in THE LITTLE PRINCE is being groomed by her Mother (Rachel McAdams) to be a striver in a dog-eat-dog world. She bombs the entrance interview to get into the prestigious Werth Academie, but a move into the right house within its district and a meticulous and demanding summer schedule of preparatory work are anticipated to launch her on the path to success. While other kids might balk at a summer of intense studying while a parent is away at work, the Little Girl naturally takes to it.

Her focus is tested when she meets the old man who lives next door. The Aviator (Jeff Bridges) gets her attention to wander with the creaky, old plane he’s trying to repair and stories of his desert encounter years ago with the Little Prince (Riley Osborne), a boy who lives on an asteroid. The Little Girl and the Aviator’s friendship lead her to searching for the Little Prince when the old man grows ill and becomes unable to look for him.

THE LITTLE PRINCE adapts Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s classic novella of the same name and puts the book within a contemporary story, thus using it as a leaping off point for expansion. The framing device has practical reasons because without it there likely isn’t enough source material to mold into a feature film. There’s creative justification too, as the things de Saint-Exupéry bemoaned in 1943 have surely increased in today’s world. If he was worried about child-like wonder being stamped out on the path to adulthood, he probably would not be heartened by the emphasis on practicality in education and the culture today.

This reworking of THE LITTLE PRINCE complements the original’s concerns about how the process of growing up can result in the loss of curiosity and lack of appreciation for intangible pleasures with values hard to quantify in a market-driven society. Parental insecurities about their child’s future and the desire to optimize time to increase marketability and competitiveness are rightfully significant. Still, maligning play and contemplation, or treating them as goods only if they have discretely applicable ends, undermines development of the whole child.

THE LITTLE PRINCE employs two styles: three-dimensional computer animation for the contemporary portions and stop-motion watercolors for memories of the Little Prince. Scenes rendered in the newer method impress with their sleekness while the older style contains warmth and personality, qualities that often leak out when seeking to conform to look like every other CGI-animated film now. The standardized perfection of the contemporary scenes are not artless, but to a degree they represent what the film wishes to resist, namely efficiency prized over wonder. There can be beauty in both. In using different styles, THE LITTLE PRINCE integrate the practical and the dreamy as a guide to remembering how they feed one another.

Grade: B

Hell or High Water

HELL OR HIGH WATER (David Mackenzie, 2016)

The Howard brothers turn to a life of crime to save their deceased mother’s West Texas ranch in HELL OR HIGH WATER. Older brother Tanner (Ben Foster) has already done hard time for stealing, so he has no compunction about holding up branches of the bank they owe in order to raise the capital to retain ownership of family property. Toby (Chris Pine) is less enamored of the idea of using illegal means to provide for the well-being of his two sons living with his ex-wife, but if this is the only option available to him, then at least he can concoct a plan that will hopefully keep them or anyone else from getting hurt.

Tanner and Toby try to strike early when fewer people are around and stick to stealing loose, low denomination bills in the cashiers’ drawers so that the money is untraceable. Their thefts aren’t big enough to attract the attention of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, leaving the pursuit of these bank robbers to Texas Rangers Marcus Hamilton (Jeff Bridges) and Alberto Parker (Gil Birmingham). Marcus is close to a retirement he’s less than eager to settle into, so he welcomes the opportunity to mix it up in the field perhaps one last time.

HELL OR HIGH WATER alternates scenes between duos on opposite sides of law with the expectation that at some point their paths will cross. Dividing the time about evenly gives space for empathizing with the circumstances that have brought Tanner and Toby to this point and to admire the ingenuity of and poetic revenge in the thieves’ methods. What they’re doing is wrong, yet it doesn’t seem entirely unwarranted either. The split focus also permits the lawmen to take on some added gravity. Rooting interests may favor the righteous brothers, but Marcus and Alberto come across as principled upkeepers of the code.

While the recession and its aftermath weigh on characters grieving for what has been or will be lost, screenwriter Taylor Sheridan, who also wrote SICARIO, manages to carve out ample room for humor. Foster has a grand time savoring the bond Tanner forms through crime with his less enthusiastic sibling. HIs character would probably commit these acts for kicks, so being able to carry them out in the name of self-justified justice and familial preservation is the icing on the cake. Bridges’ gruffness is never not a source of amusement. He busts the chops of his partner in a way that is easier for men in a tough job to express affection. Marcus baits Alberto with cracks on his heritage and may get under his partner’s skin on occasion, but mostly they give the sense of mutually respecting co-workers who have to tease one another to share the closeness they feel.

HELL OR HIGH WATER takes delight in the color found in declining small towns dotting the landscape. Nowhere is that more apparent than in the scene in which an elderly, no guff-taking waitress asks for the Rangers’ diner orders by barking “What don’t you want?” at them. Coming from her it’s an accusation more than a question. 88-year-old actress Margaret Bowman makes a meal of her handful of lines by pinning them to their seats with enough sharp attitude to castrate a bull in a single flick. In a film that examines the motivating force of taking what one feels is deserved, such behavior could not be encapsulated more effectively.

Grade: A-