Month: April 2016

HOLOGRAM FOR THE KING

Hologram for the King, receptionist

Tom Hanks gets the run-around by Saudi receptionist.

Hologram for the King, dinner

Culture shock begins with dinner.

HOLOGRAM FOR THE KING

By Marlene Ardoin

Tom Hanks, as Alan Clay, communicates the feeling of overwhelm as an American executive during the recent financial meltdown in the global market. In fact, he even has a panic attack. His personal fallout includes a disintegrating marriage and the loss of his home. He feels unable to control his circumstances.

He was formerly a Schwinn bike executive, until that business fell to the global competition. His company thought that outsourcing the manufacturing of Schwinn in China was a good idea. He explains that China learned how to make a good bike in the process, and developed their own brands to compete at a much lower price.

So, we arrive in Saudi Arabia with our executive, who is now representing a hologram company. He must deal with jet lag, culture shock, and a nasty cist in the middle of his back. This is all building the stage for his stage-four panic attack. The cist could represent what has been festering inside him that has now positioned itself in the unreachable part of his back. It is like the piece of straw that broke the camel’s back.

His pain causes him to reach out to two Saudi individuals, the broad-minded taxi driver (Alexander Black) and the out of place, female Saudi doctor (Sarita Choudhury). They both rush to his side in the midst of his panic attack.

The film does a good job of hitting all the points in culture shock of an American in Saudi Arabia. 1) They are given a tent to set up their hologram demonstration that has no Wi-Fi signal, no food and no air-conditioning. 2) He gets the run-around from the receptionist. 3) He discovers that they are not the only culture there to meet the king. A Scandinavian contingent has been waiting for about 18 months. 4) Drinking is not allowed in Saudi Arabia, but somehow, everyone is finding alcohol. 5) Women need to hide their hair and their bodies. 6) Men can have several wives. 7) Anyone who is non-Muslim is not allowed within miles of Mecca. 8) Single women are not allowed to be alone with single men. 9) Only the husband can make a decision to divorce. And, 10) women are not supposed to have an education or a career.

Our beautiful female doctor has two children and is trying to get out of her marriage. It seems that her husband has not paid attention to her for some time. Enter a very stressed-out American, who could really use a little tender attention and love.

The buildings in this film about Saudi Arabia are palatial. Our doctor takes our American to her home by the sea. Because of customs, she has to impersonate a man in order to go swimming with him. This turns out to be an erotic surprise, totally unexpected.

Our American is very social, and his attempts at being friendly eventually are reciprocated. He finds that he can start a new life in Saudi Arabia, and his daughter, who is ever faithful to him, may just get that college education after all.

The king does show up, but only after our American develops the nerve to ask for air-conditioning, food and Wi-Fi connection to his tent.

4/29/2016 # Hologram for the King

DEMOLITION

Demolition, with father-in-law

Father-in-law (Chris Cooper), Phil, pressures Davis (Jake Gyllenhaal) to pull it together

Demolition, with teen

Jake Gyllenhaal, Davis, and Judah Lewis, Chris, learn how to use tools together.

DEMOLITION

By Marlene Ardoin

Jake Gyllenhaal plays Davis, a man dealing with his wife’s sudden death. He can’t quite put his finger on it, but something is off about the event.

He feels that he was married to a stranger. Her last words to him were about using his tools. This triggers a psychosis in him to take everything apart with his tools. He didn’t even know he had tools. His main way of making a living is in big finance, not using tools.

Both physically and psychologically, he begins to examine his life and his marriage relationship.

He communicates his discoveries and frustrations in a series of complaint letters to a vending machine company. While he was waiting in the trauma floor of the hospital, he tries to purchase some peanut M & M’s, but they get stuck in the vending machine.

His series of letters reveal a surprising effort on his part. He is frustrated that he was not able to get his M & M’s, because, we discover that almost everything else in his life was obtained easily and effortlessly.

He discovers in his process, that not only did he not know who his wife was, but her well-to-do parents had even less of a clue than he did.

His wife was their only child, so they wanted to create some kind of a legacy to keep her memory alive. What they come up with as a legacy had no relationship to what their daughter really cared about.

Meanwhile, a female customer service rep, Karen (Naomi Watts), at the vending machine company responds to his letters. She is pulled into his struggle and web of exploration out of curiosity and concern.

She is a single mom with a rebellious teen son (Judah Lewis), who has some questions about his sexual orientation. Clearly, she has a lot on her plate, but her heart goes out to Davis. She is on a different social status, and her life is even more desperate and unexamined than his. He has a lot more money than she, and she does not have any money to waste.

What this film triggers in me is the old adage that an unexamined life is not worth living.

How can one raise a child without having some kind of understanding of who they are? And, the same goes for a marital partner. How can you be married to someone without learning anything about them?

Like, what do they really care about? What makes them come alive? And, what can you do to nurture the best in them?

Davis is open to these questions in himself and proves to be very non-judgmental in his discovery of others.

I have the sense that this is just the beginning of his self-discovery. So far, he has just done what was easy, without much effort on his part. Like Karen’s teen, he is full of self-loathing. He feels dead, without goals, excitement, striving or challenge. He is in the process of rejecting the easy way, which did not serve him, or do him any real favors.

This film concerns itself with truth and love, as each character serves to reveal and nurture one another in surprising ways.

Why just include ones children or ones marital partner, why not extend it to teachers, neighbors, employers, spiritual leaders and political leaders, to name a few possibilities?

4/21/2016 # Demolition

HELLO, MY NAME IS DORIS

Sally Field, accountant, with Max Greenfield, the company’s new art director

13 year old shows Doris (Sally Field) how to use Facebook

HELLO, MY NAME IS DORIS

By Marlene Ardoin

Sally Field portrays what it is like for every woman who is over 40 years old, in “Hello, My Name is Doris.” Usually, after 40 years old, women become invisible. However, that is not the case for Doris. She is very mindful of her personal appearance and personal space. It is not her fault that she is disrespected, not only by her family, but also by her co-workers.

As the film opens, we discover that Doris has sacrificed her life to taking care of her aging mother, who has just passed away. She is in a state of grief and bewilderment of her new found freedom.

In addition, no sooner has her mother been laid to rest, than her long, lost brother shows up with his wife, to proceed to pressure Doris into selling her childhood home and everything in it. The sentiment is to get in on the financial action. This is all Doris has for security, so they also provide her with a counselor, who can aid Doris in the letting go part.

Even in her grief, Doris proves not to be such an easy doormat. She works as an accountant at work, and has been an accountant for many years. She may have a big heart, but she is not a dummy.

Luckily, Doris has great friends, who give her real, emotional support. At this point in her life, her friend’s thirteen year old grand-daughter, really helps to cheer her up, because Doris is attracted to a new employee at the office, the new art director, played by Max Greenfield. It is suggested that Doris is emotionally a thirteen year old, but rather the intrigue, aggressiveness and angst of a teen, than a mature, self-centered narcissist.

Doris is worthy of friendship, because she is a giver by nature. Just as Doris rocks her colorful outfits, she fights hard for her new life.

She is great company at a concert and even opens a Facebook account. To Doris’s dismay, the young art director has a beautiful, young girlfriend, who sings, but somehow, was not present at the electro-pop band concert that her boyfriend attends.

Doris has a lot to offer in a relationship. Doris offers interest, enthusiasm, empathy, fun and passion. Not only that, but she has a home on Staten Island, she cooks, she is open to new experiences, and Doris is open to a great, big change in her life.

If you are a woman, and over 40 years old, I think you might enjoy this one.

4/14/16 # Hello, My Name Is Doris

MIRACLES FROM HEAVEN

Miracles from Heaven - Garner & Latifa

Angela (Queen Latifah) cheers up Christy Beam (Jennifer Garner) and daughter Anna (Kylie Rogers)

Miracles from Heaven - Real family

Real family, Kevin & Christy Beam, with children (youngest to eldest) Adelynn, Anna, and Abbie.

MIRACLES FROM HEAVEN

By Marlene Ardoin

I came away from “Miracles From Heaven” feeling nourished and stimulated at the same time. This film seeks to ask questions as it relates a true story about a 10 year old girl, who is spontaneously healed from an incurable disease. She says that God spoke to her.

The girl is Anna (Kylie Rogers). She is one of three daughters, of a veterinarian and his wife (Jennifer Garner), who operate their new business out of their farm in Burleson, Texas in 2011. Financially, things are tight.

Being one of three daughters probably meant that sibling rivalry was intense, especially being the middle daughter. The question that occurred to me was why did Anna suddenly become ill in the first place? She is completely normal, then suddenly, her internal intestinal system stops communicating with her digestive system. I’m just wondering.

There is no question that she is in serious medical trouble. And, her parents have to decide what they are going to do about it. Anna has wonderful parents. Ironically, the competition is over the mother/father love, which is in short supply for all three children, especially with the new business at their home.

Anna’s father, Kevin Beam (Martin Henderson) seems firm in his resolve to do whatever it takes to manage the financial part. But, financially, things are spiraling out of control. Miracles do start happening. People and events start allowing him to do what is needed. Like the computers going down at the airport, when he is trying to take his two other daughters on a flight to Boston to visit his deathly ill daughter Anna and his wife, Christy Beam.

Christy Beam, played convincingly by Garner, abandons faith in God, in favor of personal will to help her ill daughter. She tries waiting for that specialist to call her, but cannot take the pressure to seeing her daughter in severe pain and in steady medical decline. What she realizes in hindsight, is that she is being tested. Miracles are happening for her as well, but she does not recognize them, while they are happening.

Queen Latifah plays a big-hearted Boston waitress, Angela, who really is an angel in disguise. You never know who is going to be the gate-keeper to your sanity and your well-being. Angela is an angel, the new hospital receptionist is an angel and so is the light-hearted specialist, Dr. Nurko (Eugenio Derbez). They are all Christy’s miracles.

Anna is also being tested. Her roommate at the hospital has cancer. Spoiler alert, Anna passes her test with flying colors.

Speaking of miracles, we haven’t even gotten to the main miracle, Anna’s accident, the hollow tree, the butterfly and God.

Whether you are a believer or not, “Miracles from Heaven” will leave you inspired and at peace.

4/3/2016 #Miracles From Heaven