andPOP - Pop Culture With Substance

“Inside Hana’s Suitcase” will move anyone and everyone. The film mixes documentary with narrative techniques to tell the true-life story of Hana Brady, a girl who was killed during the Holocaust.

The film was inspired by the 2002 bestselling book Hana’s Suitcase. It retraces a series of coincidences that lead Tokyo school teacher Fumiko Ishioka, to the suitcase that belonged to a Czech Jewish girl, Hana Brady.

Ishioka, who also happens to be the director of the Tokyo Holocaust Education Centre, receives the suitcase with only two bits of information on Hana: her date of birth and the fact that she was an orphan by the time of her wartime capture. It doesn’t take long for the teacher to become emotionally invested in discovering Hana’s story, an investment she shares with her students. After intense research, she discovers that Hana’s brother George, a Holocaust survivor and thriving grandfather who lives in Toronto, is still alive.

Don’t let the documentary aspect turn you away from seeing this movie because it’s anything but dry. Director Larry Weinstein does a fantastic job of combining interviews with George and surviving friends and family with stunning re-enactment footage of Hana and George as kids. The two types of storytelling mesh together so well that sometimes they literally blend (a scene involving Ishioka and a drawing by Hana is simply amazing and unique).

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Dunno if you heard, but a concert documentary, starring a little-known performer who died recently, opened across the country at 12:01 this morning.

This performer, Michael Jackson, would likely have been plagued by scandal through much of his adult life had anyone actually heard of him, so perhaps it’s just as well.

To Sony’s credit, This Is It does not feel like a quickie cash-in on Jackson’s death. A bit over-adulatory perhaps, but that’s to be expected. It must be said, however, that Jackson’s death casts a pall over the movie’s early proceedings; to me, his fake cleft chin and overly manufactured nose make his face look like melted wax, his voice occasionally lilts – not in a good way – and some of his dance moves look robotic.

But as time passes, the rehearsals have an obvious effect on him; his dancing becomes smoother, his singing becomes stronger, and he appears to become younger. Performing came as naturally to Jackson as breathing, and while his voice occasionally disappears, he’s never off-key (and explains more than once that he’s trying to save his vocal cords), and every number yields enthusiastic applause from the gathered technicians and back-up dancers.

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If you can sit through corny lines such as “everyone has their destiny,” “Astro Boy” isn’t too shabby. While it doesn’t live up to Pixar standards, the movie is quite an engaging family-friendly action flick.

The animated film tells the story of a robotic boy who first emerged in the 1950’s as part of a Japanese manga series. Astro Boy then ventured into television in the ‘60s and today, he can be seen on the silver screen with upgraded CGI animation.

The film starts with Toby (voiced by Freddie Highmore), a brilliant, curious kid who’s the son of an even more brilliant scientist (Nicolas Cage). Unfortunately, he dies in a freak lab accident and his father, stricken with grief and guilt, creates a robot that looks exactly like Toby (memories included).

However, he realizes shortly after bringing the robot home that no one — or in this case nothing — can replace his son. He abandons the robot, who later takes on the name Astro and leaves the gleaming Metro City in order to find a place where he belongs (I apologize for the cheesiness, but that’s literally how he feels).

There’s one catch, Astro is powered by Blue Core energy, a crystalline nugget that’s extremely powerful and that the government, mainly the vicious president, wants to get its hands on.

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Only great movies require cheesy appraisals, so here it goes: “A Serious Man” is seriously good. Compared to other Coen brother films, it holds its own in a line of classics. And for those thinking you’re going in to see a comedy, note that it’s not just any comedy — it’s a horrific comedy (meant in the best of ways).

When you see the opening sequence featuring a Polish peasant and his wife speaking in Yiddish, just note that you’re not in the wrong theatre. The film kicks off with a short horror film, ending with spilled blood. It raises the question: “Has the almighty Hashem blessed them with a visitor? Or cursed them with a soul-stealing dybbuk?” You’ll understand once you see the film.

It then fast forwards to a 1967 Minneapolis Jewish community, of which Physics professor Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg) is a part of. And let’s just say his life isn’t one you would envy. Larry’s wife wants to leave him for their lovey-dovey friend Sy Ableman (Fred Melamed), his brother has taken over the family couch and his bathroom, and his kids are constantly bickering with each other.

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Here’s an old-fashioned crowd-pleaser; albeit, a crowd-pleaser with lots of blood spewing, limb-chewing, and bone breaking – but really, why would you see a movie called Zombieland if you didn’t want to see that?

Here’s a horror film that acknowledges how ridiculous it is by depicting a group of eight-year-old zombie girls before the opening credits; and a comedy that, by casting Jesse Eisenberg in the lead role, quickly establishes an enjoyably quirky tone, and maintains it by adding Abigail Breslin as a shotgun-toting 12-year-old and Woody Harrelson (in a terrific performance) as the movie’s resident badass.

Here’s a genre movie with a coherent plot – Breslin and Emma Stone, playing nervy sisters, push the thin but logical story along – and which pays attention to its characters, giving each of them solid backstories and respectable screentime. (My biggest complaint with Zombieland is that while the sisters are much stronger than typical damsels in distress, they nonetheless wind up being damsels in distress).

Here’s an action movie with an extended, glorious climax at an amusement park, with all the standbys (roller coaster, tilt-a-whirl, drop mechanism) used in exactly the way you’d expect; plus characters using really big guns, and firing them with a generous helping of one-liners.

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At the end of the day, “Coco Avant Chanel” doesn’t do justice to one of the world’s most iconic fashion figures. It leaves you wanting to see more of the avant (before) and the après (after) of Chanel’s rise to fame.

As suggested by the title, the film focuses on Coco’s early years, before she hit it big in the global fashion scene. We first meet her as an orphaned girl, with no sight of the glamour and celebrity endorsements that are associated with today’s Chanel brand. The movie then fast-forwards to a twenty-something Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel (played by “Amelie’s” Audrey Tautou) who’s involved in a French cabaret act with her sister (Marie Gillain). She dreams of becoming the next theatre starlet of Paris, but that dream slowly slips from her hands.

One older, wealthy man (Etienne Balsan played by Benoît Poelvoorde), promises to try and get her an audition and while she doesn’t make the cut, Gabrielle continues a brief fling with him. She comes off as opportunistic when she arrives at Etienne’s mansion unannounced and stays there as she decides what to do with her life.

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Ang Lee literally makes Woodstock the backdrop to his latest film. The famous music festival is both seen from a distance and heard from a distance. If you go into “Taking Woodstock” knowing that, you won’t be disappointed (ie. you won’t expect to hear crazy Jimi Hendrix drum solos or Janis Joplin’s electrifying voice).

It’s clear that Lee and his longtime collaborator, screenwriter James Schamus, were less interested in showcasing the ‘60s festival itself and more interested in exposing the impact that Woodstock had and the impression it left on the era. The main problem is “Taking Woodstock” uses stereotypical characters to explain the impact of a larger-than-life event.

Based on the memoirs of Elliot Tiber, this comedy (which has its fair doses of drama) tells the story of Elliot Teichberg (played by Demetri Martin) and his family of struggling Jewish immigrants living in White Lake, NY. In 1969, Elliot stumbled across Woodstock and found a home for the festival without a home.

Elliot, who felt empowered by the gay rights movement, was originally working as an interior designer in Greenwich Village. However, he also felt he needed to lend a helping hand to his overbearing parents and their rundown motel in White Lake called El Monaco. Conveniently enough, Elliot was also the head of the local chamber of commerce, which allowed him to approve a permit for the three day “peace & music” festival.

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Who knew Anglo-American relations could be so funny? Directed by Armando Lannucci, “In the Loop” shows just how loopy politicians can be. Be prepared for a nonstop ride of satirical humour made famous by the Brits.

After Simon Foster, a bumbling British minister for international development played by Tom Hollander, unknowingly backs a U.S. war in the Middle East (by suggesting war is “unforeseeable”) during an interview, the Prime Minister’s communications chief (Peter Capaldi) is left to clean up the mess as tension rises amongst both countries.

Soon enough, British government officials land in Washington, D.C., where a U.S. General (James Gandolfini) thinks war is just a crazy idea and the U.S. Assistant Secretary for Diplomacy (Mimi Kennedy) tries to infiltrate the War committee. Foster continues to make things worst by trying to gatecrash a slew of government meetings while his young assistant (Chris Addison) gets distracted by a sexy American intern (Anna Chlumsky), which leads to a United National Security Council vote that makes war seem “unforeseeable.”

See, I wasn’t joking about the roller coaster part, nor the comedy. “In the Loop” features nonstop dialogue back and forth, due in part to Capaldi’s character (said to be a satirized version of real-life British politician Alastair Campbell), Malcolm Tucker. For every adjective used by Malcolm, two or more profanities follow (his favourite is “horse cock”). Capaldi delivers by far the standoff performance in this film (a character he also plays in the British TV series “The Thick of It”). But after all, the script is simply hilarious. Judge for yourself. Here’s a sample of what to expect:

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It only seemed like a matter of time before World War Two was “Tarantino-ized.” After all, it’s the perfect setting for the “Pulp Fiction” director’s self-proclaimed poetry and mind-boggling gore.

Set in the first year of Germany’s occupation of France, “Inglourious Basterds” – a film that’s loosely based on the 1978 Italian war flick “The Inglorious Bastards” – kicks off with Nazi Colonel Hans Landa (played by German actor Christoph Waltz) who’s on the lookout for Jews (he’s literally referred to as the “Jew Hunter”). One of Landa’s searches in the outskirts of France leads him to a Jewish French girl, Shoshana Dreyfus (played by the beautiful Melanie Laurent) – whose family is killed by Landa and his crew.

Simultaneously (but in a different part of Europe) Lieutenant Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) organizes a group of Jewish American soldiers to perform swift acts of retribution. And by retribution, he means Tarantino-style revenge (which translates to gore X 150).

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At points, “The Time Traveler’s Wife” sheds new light into the romantic drama genre. But at others, it just gets old and fails the test of time.

The film – based on the hit novel by Audrey Niffenegger of the same title – revolves around Henry DeTamble (played by Eric Bana), a Chicago librarian with “Chrono Displacement” disorder, a condition which allows him to randomly disappear into both the past and the future without warning (otherwise known as time traveling).  He tries to build a life with the woman of his dreams, a young artist named Clare Abshire (Rachel McAdams), but their relationship is tested when the couple is forced to part ways for long periods of time due to his condition.

We first meet Henry as a little kid who’s assured by an older version of himself, after going through a car accident that everything is going to “be okay.” Fast forward a few decades later and a 30 something Henry is greeted by Clare whose known him since the age of six – the problem is, he doesn’t have a clue who she is.

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