(Spoiler alert: spoilers ahead)
Hail, Caesar!
In an act of not so subtle foreshadowing, Hail, Caesar! opens with crisis-management "fixer" Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin) giving confession, followed by driving through heavy rain to put out a fire involving one of the actresses at the studio for which he works. The rest of the movie bathes in the resplendent Southern California sun, but raindrops keep falling on Eddie's head.
Naturally, the titular movie-within-a-movie Hail, Caesar! is the biggest item on Eddie's plate. When we see the trailer for the film, the sheer scope and camp reveal just how much Eddie has to deal with - and also how the film views Eddie. As the trailer introduces the story of Jesus of Nazareth, it's also introducing Eddie as one who eats others sins at the price of dying a little inside. Today that involves, among other things, movie star Baird Whitlock (George Clooney) getting kidnapped, starlet DeeAnna Moran (Scarlett Johansson) becoming pregnant out of wedlock, studio execs re-casting spaghetti western vet Hobie Doyle (Alden Ehrenreich) against director Laurence Laurentz's (Ralph Fiennes) best wishes, and twin/rival gossip columnists Thora and Thessaly Thacker (Tilda Swinton) digging for scoops. The nature of the grind may change from day to day, but confession is Eddie's one constant that lets him bear the studio's burdens.
Hail, Caesar! takes pride in paying tribute to films on which Classical Hollywood buttered its bread; some of the movie-within-movie scenes evoke memories of Ben Hur, John Wayne, Oklahoma!, Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, and 42nd Street. I especially loved Johansson's aquatic musical number, with its birds-eye view and precise, machine-like choreography; Julian Marsh and Peggy Sawyer would be proud how how the camera emphasizes function over form, and emergent properties of the collective. But Hail, Caesar isn't just interested in what films used to be made - it's also interested in how they were made, particularly the implications of the old studio system. When communist screenwriters kidnap Whitlock, they explain it as an act of proletariat defiance against the corporate machine. Whitlock protests that "they take care of us" - and that's certainly true, but at what cost? The studio keeps the actors comfortable, but on the studio's terms - they talk, act, date, marry, and get paid as the studio dictates. Hobie Doyle may be a pasta/lasso-twirling cowboy, both on screen and at heart, but only as long as the studio lets it be. Hollywood may be glamorous, but it's not as free as the Western frontier. By the time Baird Whitlock returns to Capitol Picture, he knows that being reduced to capital is the price of stardom.
At times, Hail, Caesar! feels a bit heavy-handed, and its myriad of subplots don't cohere as smoothly as I had hoped. Some of the cameos (Frances McDormand, Wayne Knight, Jonah Hill, Alison Pill) are delightful, but tantalizingly short. This might not be the Coen Brothers' best work, but it works as a fun, lighthearted romp, and a bittersweet tribute to the Hollywood of yesteryear.
Grade: 7/10
Deadpool
From the moment Deadpool opens, it knows exactly how it wants to tell us its story. The camera at first appears to be rotating, but actually it ends up spiraling outwards to reveal more about the scene. Better yet, the opening credits are delightfully meta - Deadpool stars a "perfect man", "hot chick", "sidekick", and "british villain", etc. Director Tim Miller quickly demonstrates an eye for geometry, both physically and metaphorically; Deadpool intends and knows how to take advantage of all available dimensions.
Deadpool's plot is pretty standard origin story fare. Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) is a bounty hunter, and a regular at a bar frequented by bounty hunters and run by his best friend Weasel (T.J. Miller). Wade eventually becomes romantically involved with Vanessa Carlysle (Morena Baccarin), until gaining superpowers that force him to (temporarily) sever ties to her, setting up the central conflict of defeating the villain (Ed Skrein) and getting (back) the girl. What sets Deadpool apart is its irreverent tone and refusal to take itself any more seriously than necessary. Deadpool's hyperawareness of the tropes of the genre and Reynolds's insouciant fourth wall breaks allow the film to seamlessly poke fun at all the expected hackneyed character beats and reactions. Even if the macro narrative arc checks off familiar boxes, it does so in a way that develops the characters in a more organic and interesting manner.
At their best, fourth wall breaks make exposition go more smoothly, keep up a snappy pace, provide unique insight into a character's psyche, give an added feeling of inclusion to the audience, and help set up expectations that are later subverted. Deadpool may not be quite up to the gold standard of, say, Better off Ted, but it definitely uses the fourth wall breaks for great effect. Ryan Reynolds's asides give us valuable insight into how he uses dry humor as a defense mechanism for masking his pain and insecurity. But there's a more subtle benefit to including the audience in the story - it establishes that all three spatial dimensions are available to the camera, most notably the z-axis. During all the fight scenes Deadpool quite often sends characters and objects hurtling towards the screen; fighters don't just move laterally, but rotate, twist, and twirl into and out of focus. Deadpool quite often had the look and feel of a 3D movie, without the need for fancy glasses or inflated ticket prices. This seems like a trivial thing, but I can't remember the last superhero movie in which the fight scenes felt this lifelike and in-your-face - in retrospect its jarring just how...flat other superhero movies constrained to the two dimensions of the screen feel. Then again, other superhero movies don't put in the same work to (directly and indirectly) connect with the audience, and thus don't reap the same rewards.
Deadpool isn't as deep and introspective as Spiderman 2, and it's not quite as witty as Guardians of the Galaxy; but even if it falls short of those two masterpieces, it's exceptionally well-directed, refreshing, and eminently re-watchable.
Grade: 8/10
