MY MOVIE SHELF: The Time Traveler’s Wife

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 16 Days to go: 13

Movie #424:  The Time Traveler’s Wife

I don’t remember when the novel The Time Traveler’s Wife came out, but I remember going to a movie with my friend and her having it in her bag (she always had four million things in her bag) to read here and there whenever she was stuck waiting for something. She raved about it, said she couldn’t put it down, and said it was practically begging to be a movie. That always stood out to me, in part because I’m always much more entranced by the movie in my head than by imagining an actual movie on a screen, but she was convinced of her opinion, so I felt I had to read the book.

I’m not sure I ever thought The Time Traveler’s Wife would make a good movie — in fact, I thought it might be a really difficult one — but I absolutely loved the book. It was sad and beautiful and loving, and I couldn’t get enough of it. I can no longer recall how many times I’ve read it. I do know, however, that I’ve recommended it to lots of people. In fact, I’m pretty sure it was the first book I recommended to my husband when we started seeing each other. Good books are such an enriching part of life, I always want to let them enrich others the same way they’ve enriched mine.

In the many years since I first learned of the book, I remember that same friend griping when Plan B picked up the rights, since that was Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston’s production company back when they were still married and the assumption was that they would play the parts. I think she thought they wouldn’t elevate the story to where it needed to be, but I think they would’ve been good. No one really knew how great they both could be back then. But, of course, they split up and the movie kind of sat in limbo for what seemed like a really long time to me, which means it might as well have been a lifetime in the movie industry, but then out of the blue, there it was. The Time Traveler’s Wife, starring Eric Bana as Henry and Rachel McAdams as Clare. (To be honest, I wasn’t sure they would be right for the roles either, but I think they did really well.)

The story is definitely difficult, but despite a rather tepid reception I think it did an extraordinary job crystallizing the winding and tightly woven plot down to its most essential and linear pieces. There is time-hopping, as any story featuring a time traveler would necessitate, but it’s always very clear where Henry is in his life and when it is he’s traveled to. The movie is lightened considerably, too. There is the necessary sadness connected to Henry’s condition, his fate, and the endless task of waiting for him, but the book goes into some deep areas of depression and release that it makes sense to cut for the film.

One way I wish the film had stayed more faithful to the book, though, is in its focus. The story, after all, is Clare’s not Henry’s. It’s called The Time Traveler’s Wife for a reason. The main character is and should always be Clare, not Henry, because the book — the story — is about the patience and faithfulness of a woman who loves a man that will always be leaving. The movie makes itself more about Henry’s travels and struggles. It makes sense because those are inherently more cinematic, and the effect of his disappearances is rendered as a lovely, almost mystical visual, but Clare’s arc has a lot more gravitas and sorrow than the film allows, which is unfortunate.

Having a husband who is away a lot of the time, I often feel like Clare — living life, taking care of the kids and the house and the bills and whatever other mundane tasks crop up over the course of our ordinary existence, but always with a piece of me in limbo, anticipating the moment he’ll return. There are lots of us out there in the world, with spouses who are gone for days or weeks or months at a time on a mission or a voyage or a hitch, outwardly making do. But always, always waiting.

MY MOVIE SHELF: Star Trek

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 18 Days to go: 14

Movie #422:  Star Trek

This was the very first blu-ray I bought, for our very first blu-ray player back in Christmas 2009, a gift for my husband (when he was still just my live-in boyfriend). It was billed (the format, not the film) as the best way to watch movies at home ever, and boy, was it. The fact that this J.J. Abrams reboot of the classic series/films is utterly fantastic certainly doesn’t hurt.

I never really liked watching Star Trek on TV as a kid. My mom was a big fan, so it found its way on pretty often, but I just couldn’t tune it out fast enough. Even the siren song of Wil Wheaton (who makes a voice cameo in this film as a Romulan) in Next Generation couldn’t hold my attention for long. I did get dragged to several of the films over the course of my childhood and adolescence (my favorite was The Voyage Home), but an affinity for it never really took. However, I absorbed enough of it to understand, to appreciate, and to be completely blown away by this version.

The challenge of any reboot is how to make the material new and fresh while maintaining the spirit of the original. Often there’s the risk / worry of rehashing old stories over and over (as in the case with Spider-Man’s origin story), or deviating so far from beloved canon (or that are just bad films) that the fan base decries and abandons the new work (as is the case with countless reboot attempts). Abrams avoided all of these pitfalls in his Star Trek reboot by employing a simple yet brilliant structural tactic: an alternate reality.

We open on the USS Kelvin, a Star Fleet ship about to be destroyed by time-displaced Romulans led by Nero (Eric Bana, bald and badass) looking to exact revenge on Spock from the future (Leonard Nimoy) and settling for any member of the Federation. Aboard this ship is one George Kirk (Chris Hemsworth), a first officer who gets made captain when his captain is killed and who evacuates the ship before it falls to the Romulans. Among the evacuees are his wife and newborn son, one James Tiberius Kirk. This one inciting event erases everything that came before — every episode, every film, every relationship, every everything — and starts the world anew.

In this world, Kirk (Chris Pine) has never known his father, who died on the Kelvin. He’s grown up willful and rebellious. He has no direction. He comes to Star Fleet as a recruit on a dare from Captain Pike (Bruce Greenwood), but he’s far too cocky and disobedient to be considered admirable or a leader. He’s not given command of the Enterprise. Instead, he’s grounded pending academic suspension. It’s grizzled friend Bones (Karl Urban) who gets him on the ship, where he’s rivals with the Spock of this reality (Zachary Quinto) — and in which Uhura (Zoe Saldana) and Spock are romantically involved. Suddenly, everything is possible all over again, and all new stories are set to be told. What’s past is still past (as Spock Prime can attest), but what’s ahead can be anything. It’s so obvious, and so clever, and so great as a structural, foundational move that it’s even given me hope for the upcoming Star Wars sequels.

The casting in this film is essential, naturally, because that’s the one aspect that really does need to emulate the earlier version, and it’s superb. In addition to the main cast, there is the adorable Anton Yelchin as Chekov, the fantastic Simon Pegg as Scotty, and the beautiful, perfect John Cho as Sulu. There are even crazy weird cameos, like Tyler Perry hanging out as some Federation big wig and Winona Ryder, six years Quinto’s senior, noticeably aged to be Spock’s mom.

Of course, the film itself — its story — also has to hold up to scrutiny, and it does. It clocks in just over two hours long, and yet the narrative is rich, layered and detailed, with lots of different locations, conflicts, and obstacles to tackle. It’s tightly plotted and well-paced, and it’s undeniably my favorite foray into the Star Trek universe. May it live long and prosper.

MY MOVIE SHELF: Munich

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 190  Days to go: 191

Movie #187:  Munich

Brokeback Mountain has grown more esteemed in my mind over the years, but at the time of the 2005 Academy Awards (held in 2006, because that’s how it works), Munich was my favorite of the Best Picture nominees. Profound, powerfully emotional and compelling, Munich is a retelling of the very real events following the 1972 hostage crises at the Munich Olympics. Rather than being what could be nothing more than a typical spy thriller, the film deals with the cost of being a political operative — the mental, emotional and spiritual toll it takes on these men — bringing additional depth and significance to their tale.

Once again, the movie is not a factual account of the events, but it is inspired by them and attempts to portray them honestly within the confines of this particular story about the insanity and the ultimate pointlessness of revenge. In the film, Avner (Eric Bana) is an Israeli intelligence officer who is selected by the government to head up a covert team of operatives to assassinate all the Palestinian terrorists involved in the Munich attack. He resigns from the Israeli government (at the urging of his handler Ephraim, played by Geoffrey Rush) so his actions can not be tied officially to Israel, and is joined by other Jewish specialists from around the world: Steve (Daniel Craig), Carl (Ciaran Hinds), Robert (Mathieu Kassovitz) and Hans (Hanns Zischler).

The group spend lots of time together, tracking down their targets and devising plans to assassinate them, kind of stumbling through the process — clearly unfamiliar and uncomfortable with the particulars of hired hits. In between, they struggle with the moral implications of their acts, how they are both seemingly justified and undermining the tenets of their religion. These struggles manifest themselves in the arguments they have among themselves and the frantic attempts to keep from harming any innocent victims.

The moral ground — and the group’s collective and individual sanity — gets muddled further as the group themselves find they are being targeted as well. In their attempts to defend and avenge their fallen, the group — and particularly Avner, being the focus of the film — delve deeper into paranoia and madness. As he finally flees his service and this mission — having moved his family to Brooklyn since he no longer feels they are safe in Israel — it’s clear he won’t ever fully regain his former contentment.

Munich explores the ambiguity of covert operations — sort of secret wars, in their way — and of the axiom of taking a life for a life. In many ways, the revenge operatives feel impassioned about their mission, driven to fulfill their obligations and avenge the fallen athletes, but in other ways it is clear the mission is wearing on the men. They seek solace and peace, even as they feel the pain of the loss of these Jewish lives. At the same time, however, Avner encounters a Palestinian operative who, like him, is just a man trying to do right by his people. In many ways, this is not meant to justify their actions but to decry them as counterproductive and just as harmful to the soul of the assassin as to the targeted victim.

I find gray areas compelling, as I often can see the pros and cons, the ups and downs of many situations, and I find that many movies don’t adequately explore those unanswerable questions. Munich sells itself short a bit at the end, admitting that none of the seven people Avner’s group murdered were necessarily tied to the Munich attack, thereby making the film’s morality much more clearly delineated, but up until that point it exists quite firmly in the middle, not able to either fully support or fully denounce these acts of revenge. In many ways, they are portrayed as necessary, but there is also a solid feel of underhandedness, which seems less of an endorsement and more of an indictment. That ambiguity makes Munich a stellar and fascinating film that, even if it’s no longer my favorite film of its year, still ranks among the best.