50/50 (USA) Directed by Jonathan Levine  Written by Will Reiser  Starring Joseph Gordon Leavitt; Seth Rogan; Angelica Huston; Bryce Dallas Howard; Phillip Baker Hall; Matt Frewer; Andrew Airlie

A strange blend of movie-of-the week subject matter and stoner comedy somehow works in spite of itself, due in no small part to a relatively light touch by director Jonathan Levine (The Wackness). The film is based on Will Reiser’s semi-auto-biographical/fictionalized script focusing on his personal battle with cancer. Reiser and actor/producer Seth Rogan were friends in real life, working together on Da Ali G Show in 2003 when he was diagnosed with the disease. Here, Joseph Gordon Leavitt plays Reiser stand-in Adam Lerner, a Public Radio employee in a bad committed relationship with girlfriend Katherine (Bryce Dallas Howard). Adam is a bit of a neurotic, a non-smoker/drinker, who worries about everything, a trait clearly handed down from his smothering Mom Diane (Angelica Huston). Rogan is Adam’s (surprise) stoner best friend/co-worker Kyle, who exploits the news of his buddy’s affliction as a tool to pick up girls and help him smoke more weed. While there is an unfortunate misogynistic viewpoint at work here that helps sour some of the more effective elements of the film, Rogan’s jerk-off character is funny, and the actor is always better when not having to carry the full weight of a film’s emotional center. Although Anna Kendrick’s young therapist Katherine feels like exactly what she is - a contrived screenwriting invention to give Adam a love interest and elicit expository dialogue in a more natural way, their relationship is sweet, despite the overdose of self-aware awkwardness. Saddled with a one-note character, Bryce Dallas Howard somehow manages to squeeze something interesting out of the girlfriend from hell, and Huston does well as the overly protective, burdened Mom, ultimately serving as the impetus for one of the main lessons learned. While the film heavily leans toward the relationship between Adam and Kyle, we do get several effective scenes with cancer patients Alan (Phillip Baker Hall) and Mitch (Matt Frewer) as Adam is undergoes chemo, though opportunies for more trenchant inspection of the medical profession with the chilly, distant Dr. Ross (Andrew Airlie) go largely unexplored. While 50/50 might have been more effective as a film about a guy who gets Cancer and how the people around him react, as opposed to being melded into a comedic sensibility that feels more like Seth Rogan’s well established one, it is nevertheless an interesting handling of a difficult subject matter.

The Ides of March (USA) Directed by George Clooney Written by George Clooney; Grant Heslov; Beau Willmon Starring George Clooney; Ryan Gosling; Evan Rachel Wood; Phillip Seymour Hoffman; Paul Giamatti; Marisa Tomei; Jeffrey Wright; Max Minghella; Jennifer Ehle

Directed by George Clooney, the script is based on the play Farragut North by Beau Willmon (who shares screenwriting credit with Clooney and his partner Grant Heslov). Focusing on presidential candidate/ Pennsylvania Governor Mike Morris (Clooney), Ides is reminiscent of similarly solid political dramas like Primary Colors (1998); The Candidate (1972); The Contender (2000); Manchurian Candidate (1962); The Best Man (1964); and State of Play (2003/2009).

Clooney is clearly at home with the material, and the story naturally reminds us of the many real life presidential candidates who have dealt with public scrutiny under the intense national media spotlight. Ideas about special interest groups/PACs and the accepted quid pro quo nature of the beast are woven in nicely to a fairly standard morality play. With visuals from Alexander Payne regular Phedon Papamichael, the mis-en-scene is nothing less than rock solid - the look just right, the dialogue crackling with insider talk and topical references.

Clooney’s Hollywood cache can be felt in the knock-out cast he manages to assemble, one that includes Ryan Gosling as media expert/2nd in command, Stephen Meyers; Evan Rachel Wood as intern Molly Stearns; Marisa Tomei as reporter Ida Horowicz; Paul Giamatti as opposition campaigner Tom Duffy; Jeffrey Wright as Senator Thompson; and Phillip Seymour Hoffman as campaign manger Paul Zara, and as one might expect given the pedigree of the cast and the director’s background as an actor, the performances are all top-notch.

While it’s easy to enjoy the snappy dialogue and the swift pace of the plot; and, while the talents of the cast create an anticipation regarding the promise of potential greatness in each individual scene; Ides is a rare example of a film that might have benefited from more run time. Its through-line is so strong that’s it’s as if we miss out on some prime opportunities to savor the actors and the spot-on world being portrayed, and one can’t help but wish there was a bit more digressive meandering, and perhaps less reliance on the rigid structure of conventional genre.

The end result of the admittedly slick end product is that there is a feeling of never having gotten to the heart of characters played by Jeffrey Wright, Marisa Tomei, and Phillip Seymour Hoffman, for instance - who all seem equally as potentially interesting as our leads. This is not to say that Clooney and Gosling are not well suited for, or compelling in, their archetypal roles. Clooney, again, looks right at home as Morris - a well-spoken politician with a quick mind and easy smile, a man accustomed to working people and cultivating his image at all costs. Gosling’s Steven, despite his relative experience, is still an innocent, maintaining the belief one can mix idealism with the very cynical, dirty game of campaign strategy, still under the impression that he can carefully manipulate the degrees to which he compromises his personal integrity.

Restraint and minimalism are not often qualities associated with the Hollywood product, and so both should probably always be applauded when employed. Clooney the man has a number of strengths that help make him the effective mini-mogul he is, not the least of which being good taste. The films he has thus far elected to direct are reflective of this quality, each a thoughtful handling of subject matter with some meat on the bones.

Perhaps it is unfair to criticize or penalize a film for not showing off all the members of its phenomenal cast to the fullest, or for having strong, lead actors in minor roles in the first place, and perhaps asking a film that is financed by Hollywood, and essentially affixed to genre, to become something more is also unfair. There is, after all, the old axiom about leaving them wanting more. Still, it might be the very quality of the elements contained in this cinematic stew that raise the stakes and automatically promise something more, and in the end this very good film leaves one feeling feeling somewhat unsatisfied, as if this were part one of a two part mini-series that leaves one anticipating a next installment that will never come.

Directed by Jean Luc Godard  Written by Jean Luc Godard

Eighty one year old Jean Luc Godard continues his ongoing dialectic about the collapse of traditional cinema (and, for that matter, Western civilization) in his latest video essay - the form which has dominated his career for some twenty five years.

It is difficult to pinpoint the parameters of documentary or narrative film, or define what specific forms are better suited for museum installation or film festival circuits as opposed to delivery in mainstream theaters/ V.O.D and the like. Is it the structure of a piece (or lack thereof) that should determine the method of delivery, or is the very narrowness of our expectations responsible for marginalizing avant-garde/non-traditional cinema in all its auspices in the first place?

One thing is for sure - it is only Godard’s reputation (related to the marketplace he despises) that allows a film like this a wider (though, obviously, still limited) audience, but at this point it is not as if the master has suckered anyone in. Complaining about the obtuse particulars when it comes to Godard is akin to bemoaning the methodology in the latest from Lars Von Trier or David Lynch. One can debate the merits of the individual pieces, but the embrace of surrealism and disavowal of some of the accoutrements of traditional cinema have been clearly established.

Regardless of the exact definition of what makes a film a film (and whether or not this question is at all relevant), Godard long since took to blasting cinema for its failures. Well over half of his career has now been dedicated to attempting to de/re-construct the form. His varied subject matter over the course of this pursuit has included repeated attacks on capitalism/consumerism and intellectual explorations of art in its many forms - music, painting, literature. Underlying all of the highly politicized work is, or course, a search for illusive truth, although inaccessibility (at least to many) is often a result of the deliberate opaque quality of the finished products arising from this path.

Broken into three distinct sections, Film Socialisme begins with a cruise ship floating on Mediterranean seas. Immediately, we are hit with Godard’s first use of HD, the footage resembling his vibrant, saturated color in something like Made in The USA. As if to provide a direct contrast to some of this stunning photography, however, the director also employs visuals that seem shot with a cell phone camera. Godard further infuses the section with a host of noise, distortions, and unconventional cuts, and throughout the film he also gives us oddly incomplete English sub-titles (for the French, Arabic, German, and Russian) he has termed Navajo English, consisting of a series of nearly incomprehensible phrases/key words that keep an audience guessing as to what is being said.

In Part One we float around the ship in a kind of dream state, listening to snatches of indecipherable philosophizing from some of the white passengers, the the dark skin workers, and a narrator (with several strange asides about Jews; a references to YouTube; and a bizarre appearance by Patti Smith thrown in for good measure). The feeling evoked is that of randomness, and the flatness of the grotesques populating the boat call to mind the Rive Gauche death walkers of Last Year in Marienbad and the like.

Part Two more rootedly focuses on a family of radicals consisting of two children and their parents based in a gas station in rural Southern France. The disaffected elder daughter and her more animated younger brother put their parents through a kind of test, asking them a series of serious questions about life and the world. As we see various shots of a llama and a donkey, seemingly family pets, two women arrive at the station and proceed to film and record sound. The overall effect is reminiscent of Godard circa the late 60s with characters (again emotionally flattened) speaking in political tract with odd surrealistic flourishes added to the mix. Part Three diverges from any attempt at narrative, and instead employs free flowing montage to show us a history of various political events across a handful of European countries in conflict. This format is recognizable in Godard’s better known essays of the recent past, most notably his series: Histoire du Cinema.

If one doesn’t speak French you must be satisfied with the dribbled bits of information being conveyed by the silly “Navajo English” (basically a series of words). While clearly intentionally alienating, it seems an angry, provincial, and arrogant tactic on the part of the artist. Otherwise, why have the subjects/actors speaking in a recognizable language at all, or why not manipulate the actual sound dialogue as opposed to merely the subtitles? In his defense, Godard the socialist does not preach inclusiveness when it comes to film. As always, his intended audience is exclusively the intellectual elite. It is worth noting, however, that in this case Godard is intent on excluding only those who do not speak his native language.

The work is at times visually beautiful, dreamy, and even vaguely intriguing in its challenging way, while simultaneously being overly precious, unnecessarily shrouded by device, and ultimately, barely cohesive. Of course, Godard could care less what anyone thinks, which is perhaps partly the point, though to what ends?

Tuesday After Christmas (ROM) Directed by Radu Muntean Written by Radu Muntean; Razvan Radulescu; Alexandra Baciu  Starring Mimi Branescu; Maria Popistau; Mirella Oprisor; Dragos Bucur; Sasa Paul-Szel

Arising out of a country that has given us 2005s The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (Cristi Puiu) and 2007s 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Christian Mungiu) comes Tuesday After Christmas, director/co-writer Radu Muntean’s simple, self contained story about Paul (Mimi Branescu), a married banker having an affair with his daughter Mara’s (Sasa Paul-Szel) dentist Raluca (Maria Popistau). Muntean uses long, extended takes and - with the exception of slight tilts and pans - very little camera movement (and, for that matter, editing) to allow the film to unfold as if we are simply observing life unfold before us. In fact, the scenes usually play out in a single medium or wide shot. Paul kids with his girlfriend in bed, talks on his cell phone, shops with his wife, disciplines his young daughter, but through the mundane depiction of events a conclusion is building as Paul’s convenient little set up seems destined to end. The wonderful thing about the film is that none of the characters are at all polarized. Paul seems to be a rather ordinary guy with a decent sense of humor, graying, forty-ish, a little overweight. His average if pleasant looking wife Adriana is of the same general age. A working mother, she is busy, concerned about their daughter, immersed in their life together. The object of Paul’s affection, Raluca, is also seemingly a nice enough person, much younger, though no great beauty; not overly demanding of Paul, but clearly tired of their arrangement and wanting more. On the whole, Paul’s marriage seems ordinary, but (with the exception of his infidelity, of course) his relationship doesn’t overtly appear to be in major trouble. The set up is one we all know to be true to life - the older married man leaving his age appropriate wife for a younger woman, but here the story is told with such raw honestly that if feels as if we are watching real time emotion on display. What’s interesting about Muntean’s style though is that his search for documentary-like realism does not include an attempt to mirror the form of documentary through verite methods, but rather involves simply allowing actors to behave truthfully in front of a static, unobtrusive camera. Particularly notable is Mirella Oprisor, who brings a heartbreaking vulnerability and humaness to a woman realizing the life she has constructed is crumbling.

Senna (BRIT) Directed by Asif Kapadia; Written by Mandish Pandey

Senna is a gripping documentary about the life of Brazilian Formula One race car driver Ayrton Senna. What sounds like a very average set up for a sports bio is transformed into high drama of the first order as director Asif Kapadia manages to transcend the genre with a piece that compels from starting gate to finish line. The film uses archival footage extensively, drawing from a staggering 4-5 thousand hours of available material. Kapadia details Senna’s rise from child go-kart racer supported by his doting parents to Formula One prominence in the mid-eighties. Emerging onto center stage is his larger-than-life ongoing battle with Frenchman Alain Prost, a fierce rivalry that involved complicated racing politics and divergent individual approaches to the sport. Coming from a privileged background, the handsome, intense, and enigmatic Senna became a national hero in poverty stricken Brazil, racing with fearlessness that would match any driver in the history of the sport. Unabashedly patriotic, and emboldened by his strong faith in God, Senna felt strongly compelled to represent his country and give them something to be proud of. His mission brought him world wide fame and great fortune, but also burdened him with a heavy, self-imposed mandate to perform at the highest level each time out of the box. To go along with the wealth of behind-the-scenes footage of the driver at work, and home movies showing him during down time with his family, we also experience Senna’s perspective behind the wheel via a camera placed in the car. This footage adds to the suspense as the audience gets a taste of the extreme speed and dangerous turns involved. During his decade long career, Senna battled the powers to be for better safety regulations - efforts that are juxtaposed with his reputation as an extreme risk taker who got better in the rain when danger increased, and, of course, the ultimate irony of his fate.

The Guard (IRE) Directed by John Michael McDonagh  Written by John Michael McDonagh  Starring Brendan Gleason; Don Cheadle; Liam Cunningham; Mark Strong; David Wilmot; Fionnula Flanagan; Rory Keenan; Dominique McElliott; Katarina Cas;

Brother of award winning playwright and In Bruges (2008) writer and director, Martin, John Michael McDonagh directs from his own script, a dry comedy mirroring his brother’s first feature that also stars Brendan Gleason. Here, the actor plays a local police officer (”Guard” or “Garda”) from Connemara with a shaky moral compass and a joke for all occasions. Gleason has made a career playing a variety of cheeky bastards, and he is solid as Sergeant Gerry Boyle, who comes across a murder that turns out to be connected to a group of nefarious international drug smugglers (ably played by Liam Cunningham; Mark Strong; and David Wilmot). The script is filled with a bevy of funny one liners, many of them having to do with either local, Irish Catholic culture, or their parochial, tongue-in-cheek view of all things American. Don Cheadle plays FBI agent Wendell Everett, who shows up in Ireland intent on stopping the gang (though mostly to act as straight man and ensure some American box office), but predictably finds himself a stranger in a strange land. Cheadle’s character is the weakest element of the film, which does best when immersed with Gleason as he interacts with the colorful locals. While veterans Cunningham; Strong; and Wilmot are funny as the philosophizing gangster trio, the dialogue does smack of overwritten early Tarantino. Though she only appears in a few scenes, Fionnula Flanagan is fantastic as Boyle’s dying mother Eileen, and the rest of the supporting players are also very good. Shot with crisp, vibrant colors, the interiors are designed in solid primary colors, mirroring the richly drawn pallet of Ireland’s land and water. While the formulaic plot is strictly by the book, a deep cast that includes a terrific lead; a smart, amusing script; and the color splashed visuals are enough to make The Guard an entertaining, if not altogether original, watch.

Certfied Copy (FR) Directed by Abbas Kiarostami Written by Abbas Kiarostami Starring Juliette Binoche; William Shimmel; Adrian Moore; Gianna Giachetti; Angelo Barbagallo

The marvelous Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami, who has a history of employing non-actors, steps a bit out of his box to create a vehicle for previous collaborator (Shirin) and internationally known actress Juliette Binoche. It is interesting to see Kiarostami working outside his native language (the film easily transitions between French, English, and Italian), and his style is clearly evident in some of the longer takes and shots of characters in cars while driving, but this film is all about the luminous Binoche. It has been some time since Kiarostami made a narrative film, but for him and other Iranian filmmakers the difference between narrative and documentary is often elusive. Iranian cinema is full of conscious, meta nods to the form itself, as well as sleight of hand involving very the nature of fact and fiction. The title of the film points toward the idea of replication in its many forms, and throughout we are never entirely sure of the films’ reality. Kiarostami eschews his standard long sweeping panned shots, but we still gaze upon vistas of a remote, rural area, and the director also employs a series of close-ups featuring the actors (especially Binoche) speaking directly into camera when talking to their scene partner. Binoche plays a woman, Elle, who has a young son and may or may not be a journalist. In the beginning of the film she attends a lecture from British author, James Miller (William Shimmel). The two later meet for what is presumably an interview, but the nature of their relationship begins to come into question. Though there are some scenes featuring supporting actors (Kiarostami mixes experienced and non-experienced actors) it is essentially a two-hander, and there is significant philosophizing about art (the subject of Miller’s book Carbon Copy), a subject that is related to personal relationships. Shimmel is an opera singer by profession, and in his best moments his stoic, inexpressive manner and upright countenance might be comparable to Ciaran Hinds or David Straithan. In direct contrast, Binoche is, per usual, a delight, full of small gestures and looks that breathe life into the somewhat dry proceedings. If one can get beyond the abstract nature of the relationship between the leads (a commentary in and of itself), there is much here between the lines about the nature of men and women and long term romantic relationships.

Mildred Pierce (HBO) Difrected by Todd Haynes  Written by Tod Haynes; Jonathan Raymond  Starring Kate Winslet; Guy Pearce; Evan Rachel Wood; Brian O’Byrne; Mare Winningham; James Legros; Melissa Leo; Morgan Turner; Hope Davis; Marin Ireland; Ronald Guttman; Miriam Shor

Melodrama is most often synonymous with soapy, overdone weepies filled with big acting and plot overstuffed with tragedy. With Todd Haynes it becomes something very different - period piece, riff on earlier masters like Douglas Sirk, and simply put - emotion infused drama of the highest order. This five part, 336 minute HBO mini-series has already deservedly received a heap of awards, including an Emmy for Kate Winslet, Guy Pearce, and ones for music (the great Carter Burwell), casting, and art direction, and is nominated for many others. Based on the 1941 novel by James M. Cain, this adaptation follows the well-known 1945 film of the same name, which famously starred Joan Crawford. This version (perhaps owed in large part to the run time) remains truer to the book, telling the story entirely from Mildred’s perspective. Kate Winslet is nothing less than outstanding in a demanding role in which she is on screen throughout, dominating with a subtle, nuanced performance from start to finish. Guy Pearce as lover and later, husband, Monty; Melissa Leo as pal Lucy; and Evan Rachel Wood as grown up daughter Veda are also superb (young Morgan Turner is less successful as child Veda). Cinematographer Edward Lachman, who also teamed up with Haynes in Far From Heaven, gives the series a warm, cinematic look, and the period is lovingly evoked from an obviously talented design team and a director with a top-notch feel for period. The story revolves around the newly divorced Mildred’s search for identity and financial independence in pre-WWII America, but its narrow focus on one woman’s life does not belie the relevance to greater issues having to do with women, class, and the concept of the American dream. Though Mildred’s daughter Veda is a bit of a one dimensional character, blindly ambitious and pretentious from a young age, she is, of course, an outgrowth of something deep inside Mildred, a manifestation of her own desire to be better in the eyes of the community, and to live up to what she believes herself to be. Adapted by Haynes and director Kelly Reichart’s frequent collaborator Jonathan Raymond, the script is tightly wound and extremely well modulated. An exceptional piece of filmmaking for a cable television station that continues to provide a home for important work in several formats.

Unguarded (DOC) (USA) Directed by Jonathan Hock

Currently being shown on ESPN.

Chris Herren is a former NBA basketball player whose struggle with drugs and alcohol is documented in this look at one man’s battle to overcome his own personal demons.

Herren grew up in basketball crazy Fall River, Massachusetts, a working class community some 45 miles southeast of Boston.  A shorter distance to Providence RI, Fall River has a reputation a depressed ex mill town a long way removed from ‘better days’, a place where most are born, grow up, and die without leaving.

Raised in a basketball family, Herren, now 36, is one of the greatest high school players to come out of the state. He was an All American and the Gatorade Player of the Year during his senior season, and during his junior year he and his team’s state championship drive was chronicled in Providence Journal writer Bill Reynold’s 1994 book Fall River Dreams. Reynolds has co-written a new book with Herren, entitled Basketball Junkie (2011), and the writer appears briefly in the film.

Following high school, Herren accepted a scholarship to Boston College, transferred to Fresno State, played in the NBA for the Denver Nuggets and Boston Celtics, and then overseas in five different countries, but throughout his journey drugs and alcohol ruled his life, and among other revelations is the fact that Herren admits to playing in college while under the influence of cocaine, and playing professional basketball while being a full-blown heroin user.

Longtime documentary director Jonathan Hock slickly frames the story by showing Herren in his current role as motivational speaker as he tells his story to different groups, interspersing interviews with relatives (the ones with brother Mike are particularly poignant), friends, and basketball insiders (coaches Jerry Tarkanian and Rick Pitino); old photos and footage; and journeying to some key spots in Herren’s past as he relates anecdotes about his playing career and substance abuse.

According to Herren he is now (at the time of the filming) three years sober, and spends his time working with recovering addicts, public speaking, and coaching kids. Married, with three children, and clearly contrite about his problematic history, Herren admits to neglecting his family and wasting lots of money on drugs, though with the exception of a few stories, and some detailing of several  arrests, very few specifics emerge about his behavior. Thus, though wife Heather emerges as a kind of stalwart hero, one is left to guess about the merely alluded to extent of what she endured, and immediate questions about her husband’s fidelity, how she has survived as he admittedly sold off their possessions, etc. abound.

As is the film is still a worthwhile cautionary tale, and one must credit the appealing Herren with being willing to expose himself in this way, but this is still a manicured profile as opposed to a serious investigative documentary, and whether the supposition is true or not it feels very much as if Herren is dictating the terms here. While it would be silly not to recognize the courage it takes to admit to nearly ruining ones life in this manner, and to applaud him for turning things around, it seems as if concerns for the people closest to him may have led Herren to be less than forthcoming regarding the lives of his family. Admirable perhaps, but not necessarily conducive to telling the whole story.

One only has to look at some of the missing information to see that this is a less than fully rounded piece. In addition to the previous questions posed, there is little to no mention of brother Mike’s own, publicized trouble with the law, including a 2010 arrest and incarceration for beating his twenty five year old girlfriend; the nature of the brothers (very primary) past and/or present relationship with father Al, or the senior Herren’s well-known career in Massachusetts politics; the impact of the two books involving Herren’s life; his parent’s divorce; the effect of his mother’s death; or writer Reynolds marrying his mother. One is therefore left with a host of serious lingering questions about his ongoing mental health and treatment (scant information is given); his family background and possible problems in his childhood home; his wife and children’s road to healing (have they gotten obviously needed professional help themselves?); he and his family’s current financial situation; and the reasons why a handsome, superstar athlete with all the gifts in the world becomes a serious heroin addict.

Simply stating he grew up in Fall River and that there was a lot of pressure to live up to community/family expectations is frankly not nearly enough to begin to answer those questions, and unfortunately the film doesn’t even try. An interesting story, but given its handling perhaps better suited for a segment on HBO’s Real Sports.

Hugo (USA) Directed by Martin Scorcese Written by John Logan Starring Asa Butterfield; Ben Kingsley; Chloe Moretz; Sasha Baron Cohen; Emily Mortimer; Ray Winstone; Christopher Lee; Michael Stuhlbarg; Richard Griffiths

For the past twenty-plus years, Director Martin Scorcese’s career could be described as an unending search to make big, Hollywood films of any and all sorts. With Hugo he manages to touch yet another base, rendering a 3D kids offering that seems to borrow liberally from the spirit of Spielberg and the literal past work of Jean Pierre Jeunet, a director who might have actually made the film this one aspires to be.

Screenwriter John Logan (The Aviator; Gladiator; Coriolanus) adapted Brian Selznick’s popular 2007 children’s novel The Invention of Hugo Cabaret, but the end result is neither as whimsical, quirky, nor funny as it endeavors to be. Starring Asa Butterfield as the Dickens-like Hugo Cabret, an orphan living in a Paris train station clock-tower in the 1930s, the story involves the boy’s connection with a retired film director/toy store owner Georges Melies (Ben Kingsley), and his bookish charge Isabelle (Chloe Moretz), who is also an orphan.

While we know why the film is set is France and yet has characters speaking English, big budget/American box office considerations get no quarter here, and do not mitigate discussion involving the films’ overall merit. The fact is films of this kind, set in a non-English speaking country, but having characters inexplicably speaking the language (often, as here, with a British accent) always have issues with a lack of authenticity.

At 128 minutes, Hugo also has pacing issues aplenty, and is probably twenty minutes too long. Stretching to create mystery where there is little, extended run time is devoted to multiple long scenes where young Hugo mourns his dead father (Jude Law) with passages of expository dialogue. Though Scorcese effectively opens with one of his classic tracking shots, the majority of the many chase scenes seem overextended. There are even issues with some of the 3D effects - i.e. a train wreck where we never see the train jump the tracks; shots going from extreme 3D close-ups to wide shots that seem off kilter.

While the supporting cast is made of up wonderful actors, they are, by and large, underused, particularly in the case of Emily Mortimer, who is barely allowed to speak. While long interludes are devoted to Sasha Baron Cohen’s mugging, other potential story-lines (unlike, for instance, Jeunet’s Amelie) are left entirely unmined, missing out on multiple chances for genuine whimsy and romance. Where shorter, concise passages of the world within the train station might have created a richer, more verdant playing field, Scorcese seems intent on finding ways to use the 3D at his disposal, and unfortunately his employment of such often seems stretched, and winds up coming at the expense of story and further character development.

There is no doubt that there is an essence of classic children’s films being referenced (and only referenced) here, and Scorcese’s vast film knowledge (as well as long time collaborator Dante Ferretti’s skill) contributes to a well designed physical setting, and there is pleasure to be had in journeying around the station and onto the Paris streets. Skilled cinematographer, Robert Richardson, moves the camera with expected ease, and while the technology gives the viewer a fuller, more detailed look at the nooks and crannies of Hugo’s odd world, in only a few places (some interesting close-ups; the cinematic world of Melies) does it pay significant dividends.

Clearly there is a personal statement being made with Scorcese as real life classic film champion and preservationist, and this element of the story seems particularly overwrought, self-serious, and on the nose, with the message pounded home in a misguided, logy third act. Though the fantasy sequences with Melies and his glass studio are exceptionally evoked, this preachy theme eventually takes over the film, further distancing the supporting characters (until a final cribbed from Wes Anderson), and most tragically, minimizing Hugo (the one person we truly care about), his budding relationship with Isabelle, and his search for connection with his father. While in theory the automaton is a nice device linking the old director with Hugo and his Dad it too reads as something flown in from A.I., and never lives up to its magical promise.

While Moretz at times seems vaguely uncomfortable in her role, Asa Butterfield is excellent as the titular Hugo, and his presence helps makes Hugo more watch-able than it might otherwise have been. Ultimately, while the film has its charms, some elusive key ingredient seems buried in a relative morass of form; strain to employ this hot, new technology; and didactic personal statement from the professorial director. While the film contains all the prerequisite trappings and clearly wants us to be moved, wowed, and enchanted, it somehow fails to actually elicit those reactions.