Ballast
Written and directed by Lance Hammer. With Micheal J. Smith, Sr., JimMyron Ross, Tarra Riggs, and Johnny McPhail. (NR)
Ballast is a wonderful little film by a director you've never heard of, with a cast of actors who weren't actors until they appeared here. Yet writer/director Lance Hammer and his cast of non-professional unknowns—all but one of them reside in the Mississippi Delta, where the film was shot with only natural, available light—have crafted a film that feels far more real (and far more truthful) than many other more "professional" works.
In the press notes for the film, Hammer makes note of "an energetic resonance in the Delta that moves me, especially in winter. It has to do with the dignity of endurance in the face of sorrow." That sums up the effect of Ballast, which has no dearth of either dignity or sorrow.
It all begins with a suicide. The death of Darius forces surviving brother Lawrence to reach out to his sister-in-law Marlee and her son James. Lawrence and Darius lived side by side in twin houses and owned a small convenience store and gas station together; Darius has left Marlee his home and his share of the business. Marlee, whom he abandoned, wants no part of either. Moreover, she wants no part of Lawrence in her son's life.
It's James, however, who forces the three together. Less troubled than simply lonely, he's drifting into a world of drugs and petty crime in an attempt to find a place he can belong. His missteps lead mother and son to take shelter in their new home, where Lawrence and Marlee, both weary and battle-scarred, are forced to find a way to negotiate a shared life.
Hammer and his actors spent months in rehearsal for this film, working together to develop a natural rhythm in their dialogue. It may sound counterintuitive—how could such a long process result in anything natural?—but in fact it's the very thing that makes the film so hypnotic. By incorporating many of the actors' natural expressions and improvisations, the final product feels less like a scripted performance than the organic growth of a relationship caught on film.
In the film's central struggle, Micheal J. Smith, Sr. and Tarra Riggs are perfect foils. Smith plays Lawrence as a stoic giant; his lumbering gait and short, mumbled responses speak to an impassivity in the face of Marlee's acid distaste. This is our life now, he seems to say, and whatever it is, we have to accept it.
The other surprise of Ballast is how effectively the film makes us feel the tonal changes of a changing life. Hammer makes good use of the often desolate terrain, with its flat and wide open spaces that show little on the horizon. James finds a temporary escape by watching trains disappear into an unknowable distance; the road to the convenience store narrows until its edges converge somewhere far off. There is no heart-tugging here, no glycerin tears, only lives unfolding in their own time, intersecting by necessity and riding the natural swells of hope and disappointment. Even in the saddest moments, one gets the sense that, for these people, setbacks aren't things that need to be overcome on the road to the mythical uplift of the Hollywood ending—they're simply a part of the life, sometimes hard, sometimes hopeful, that they are already living.
The Spirit
Directed by Frank Miller. Written by Frank Miller, based on the comic book series by Will Eisner. With Gabriel Macht, Eva Mendes, Samuel L. Jackson, Scarlett Johansson, Dan Gerrity, Jaime King, and Arthur the Cat. (PG-13)
Of all the recent superhero stories that have made the jump to film, The Spirit's leap to the big screen is perhaps the most surprising. Based on Will Eisner's groundbreaking 1940s-era series of comic books, it has none of the name recognition (at least among the demographic courted by the film world) of a Spider-Man or Batman. Presumably, it was only the success of writer/director Frank Miller, who penned the game-changing comic version of Batman: The Dark Knight as well as screen hits like Sin City, that enabled The Spirit to get greenlit.
The result is a mixed bag, the enjoyment of which will depend almost entirely on one's penchant for the arresting graphics of the comic form and an appreciation of its often overcooked style of writing. This is not an adaptation in the gritty Dark Knight vein, but one at once truer to its source material and more spectacularly over the top, where every "WHOOSH!!" "CLANG!!" and "POW!!" is lovingly recreated, even celebrated.
The Spirit (Gabriel Macht) is a one-man police squad, traipsing over the rooftops of Central City—a thinly veiled Manhattan, as it always is in the comics—in his trademark fedora and red tie, his black trench coat flapping in the breeze. When he was known as Denny Colt, he was an up-and-coming cop cut down in the line of duty. The Spirit is born when Colt comes to in his own coffin, apparently immortal. After a quick stop to pick up a mask, he's back to fighting crime.
His nemesis is The Octopus, played by Samuel L. Jackson with a maniacal glee. The pair find themselves duking it out every weekend to no great end (The Octopus is as immune to harm as The Spirit). But every hero needs a villain, and Jackson plays it to the hilt, even appearing in one scene wearing full Nazi regalia and that eyepiece of evil, the monocle. Does he really believe in the tenets of National Socialism? Probably not, but it gets the point across—he's a really bad guy.
Women were a big part of Eisner's comic too, and Miller stacks his film with a bevy of the genre's stereotypes. There are femme fatales with names like Sand Saref, Silken Floss and Plaster of Paris. Sand Saref (Eva Mendes) was Denny Colt's childhood girlfriend, but grew up into a diamond-loving killer on the hunt for the world's shiniest thing—the Golden Fleece of the Argo. While one could argue that the women hold most of the power in the film, the fact is they're treated mostly as eye candy, poured into low-cut dresses and purring through pouting lips.
That, perhaps, points to the film's fatal flaw—its fealty to the comic book world. The Spirit began as a seven-page insert in the Sunday papers; a feature film demands more substance, and Miller seems unwilling or unable to provide it. In its place is the striking visual style of the page—that, at least, provides some passing interest—and the hardboiled declarations of two-dimensional characters (while Jackson makes the most of it, Scarlett Johansson, as his sexpot underling Silken Floss, is so unbearably flat that she seems to be reading cue cards). It's ironic, really, that what The Spirit needs is a soul.
Marley & Me
Directed by David Frankel. Written by Scott Frank and Don Roos, based on the book by John Grogan. With Owen Wilson, Jennifer Aniston, Eric Dane, Kathleen Turner, Alan Arkin, and Clyde the Dog. (PG)
Ah, the dog movie. Marley & Me, the screen adaptation of John Grogan's best-selling book about his incorrigible Labrador, joins a long list of movies whose canine stars prove that the power of speech isn't a prerequisite for messing with human emotions. Give us a dog, a death, and a tilted head, and we will give you rivers of tears.
So it is here, with a few modern updates. For instance, Marley isn't picked out at the pet store by a doe-eyed moppet; here the puppy is the doe-eyed moppet, bought by a newly married Grogan as a means of keeping his new wife from thoughts of children. A small-time reporter for a South Florida newspaper, Grogan dreams of bigger things than reporting on the methane fire at the town dump. He'd rather be traveling to Colombia with college pal and fellow reporter Sebastian, whose drug cartel expos?s bring The New York Times sniffing.
Instead, Grogan (Owen Wilson) is stuck at home when he and his wife Jenny (Jennifer Aniston) find themselves unexpectedly pregnant. Looking to make more money to support a growing brood, he takes on writing a regular column for the paper, even though it means less of the hard reporting he longs to do. Wilson and Aniston are a good pair, neither too comic nor too maudlin—always a danger in movies like this—and strike the balance that marks a devoted couple. Their easy warmth is one of the film's unexpected bonuses.
Though he looks down at column writing, it turns out that Grogan is a natural, and his regular ramblings about life with Marley attract a following that turns him into a star in South Florida. (At least, the newspaper equivalent of a star.) Meanwhile, his family keeps growing—at times it seems that every time he walks in the door, Jenny is pregnant again. Eventually he packs up the family for a move to Philadelphia, where he'll have a chance to be a big-city reporter. Sadly, he leaves behind Alan Arkin, who has all the movie's best lines as Grogan's editor in Florida.
Through it all, Marley is there, usually with something in his mouth; for much of the movie, Marley is little more than a comic prop. Lessons are learned about accepting who you are, and accepting others—man and dog alike—as they come. As directed by David Frankel (The Devil Wears Prada) the film's first half is a bit scattershot, at one point skipping through years of Grogan's life with a rapid-fire voiceover at odds with the essentially gentle nature of the film. But eventually, it all settles down in pace with the aging Marley, until all that's left is that one final ride in the car. And a box of tissues.
Jack Brown can be reached at cinemadope@gmail.com.
