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Under discussion:

President Barack Obama: The Man and His Journey  (2009)

President Barack Obama: The Man and His Journey

CodeBlack Entertainment and Vivendient Films

I am always skeptical of what seem to be cash-grabs. You know, those books you see in the supermarket, promising to be a titillating expose on the flavor of the month, only to be duped by works that are at best cobbled together by random facts and stats easily revealed by a quick Google search?

When it comes to our latest historic presidential inauguration, I have my fair share of memorabilia (pins, posters, etc). But I am wary of documentaries that seem pre-packaged and ready to ride the coattails of the success for monetary gain, which is why when I sat down to review “President Barack Obama: The Man and His Journey,” I was, at the very least, dubious.

It is far from the overnight, stitched-together compilation that it could have been – with interview footage handsomely shot, subtly lit ,and including a wide-range of interviewees. But the film will perhaps serve better for classrooms of future generations as a cursory primer of Barack’s political life; for it is not really the “intimate portrait” we are promised on the back cover of the DVD box.

Director Maria Arita Howard keeps matters moving briskly for its 90-minute run time, but sometimes falls back on one too many shots of smiling children, flapping flags and amber waves of grain that were too much even for an Obama supporter.

She does populate it with a nice mix of supporters -- everyone from radio personality Tom Joyner, actor Blair Underwood (who also serves as narrator and who has not seemed to age at all since his “L.A. Law” days), Martin Luther King, III, journalist Roland Martin and actor Hill Harper, a Harvard classmate of Obama.  The film rapidly covers his life’s journey, yet barely stays too long in any particular area for us to get a sense of its influence on Obama, or his on it.

Each fawns over the politician, from the grassroots campaign volunteer to his fellow senators. And while Obama’s story is quintessentially American, the viewer is never stirred to the goosebumps one can encounter by watching a speech given by the man himself.

Now, being a political beast myself, there was little included that I did not already know about our President’s political past, so for those who have only gleaned their Obama knowledge throughout the latest campaign, there may be many an interesting kernel of information of his personal and political past.

But there are also segments that seem rather superfluous to the man’s impact (do we really need to hear the entire song of “Fired Up”?).  For someone with such a meteoric rise to power, some insight along the way would have certainly been advantageous. I would much rather have spent time learning about his childhood struggles as a bi-racial child and how they have strengthened his reserve and convictions than to see grainy footage of him waving to crowds that were played on endless loops during this past election season.

Of course, the biography of the man is still being written and will undoubtedly serve to inspire song, film and documentaries for years to come. As it stands, “President Barack Obama: The Man and His Journey” is a serviceable primer, filled with a nice range of articulate, interesting supporters from throughout his life.  But as a probing, in-depth portrait of this inspirational figure and the motivating factors that led him to become the most powerful man on the planet, “President Barack Obama” only skims the surface.

The disc also includes seven motivational “Yes We Can” shorts, which depict several strife-ridden situations, all inspired by the words of our president, and each closing with the seminal  will.i.am number, but sadly, no video of the song itself. Instead you can watch “Fired Up” again from the Bergevin Brothers, which is already played at length during the documentary, and a music video for Brian McKnight’s “Yes We Can!” There are also extended interviews from many of the interviewees that prove more entertaining than insightful.

Under discussion:

Imitation of Life  (1959)

All That Heaven Allows  (1955)

Bigger Than Life  (1956)

The Brady Bunch Movie  (1995)

Titanic  (1997)

America's Civil War: 1862 - Chancellorsville Rebel Victory, Rebel Loss  Production Year

Revolutionary Road  (2008)

Mad Men: Season 01  (2007)

Director Sam Mendes does not seem to be a big fan of the suburbs. Between his latest film Revolutionary Road and 1999’s American Beauty, Mendes picks at the scabs of suburbia, allowing viewers to gaze at all that oozes from it.

Like Beauty, Road focuses on a couple whose relationship luster is fading fast, as youthful aspirations fall wayside to the compromises of adulthood. But where the former film dealt with the struggles of a modern day, middle-aged couple, Road focuses on a '50s-era husband and wife (played by Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet) at the earlier stages of their domesticity. And for those fans looking forward to the romantic pairing of the leads from a certain movie about a big boat, let's just say they had it easy with the iceberg compared to what they put themselves through here.

Frank (DiCaprio) and April's (Winslet) life certainly begins storybook enough – meeting at a social event, eyes locking across a crowded, smoky room and soon settling into cookie-cutter suburbia to raise a couple of rugrats. Frank, the breadwinner, dutifully goes to a job in which the only perk for him is that it allows him to “swim” in the secretarial pool from time to time. April, meanwhile, struggles with the fact that her acting dreams have been dashed and puts on a Douglas Sirk-sized smile as she attempts to conform to her role as Happy Housewife.

As April grabs at some sort of identity outside the home, Frank half-heartedly goes along for the ride, agreeing to flee to Paris, where she thinks they can start anew and she can be their sole support system. The vision is as childishly executed as it sounds, with no real plan or vision as to what will happen once they arrive (we never see the couple attempt to even learn the language). We spend more time with them telling everyone they're giving their American Dream lifestyle the big kiss-off, rather than actually preparing for their future life. When that dream dies on the vine, their world begins to implode.

Revolutionary Road is based on an acclaimed 1961 novel by Richard Yates, which, at the time, might have been seen as groundbreaking, as most domestic images of the time were that of the Cleaver clan. But today, the film seems already dated. Gone is the slightest trace of wit (albeit for one supporting character) that Yates infused in his novel, and it's pretty much a given now that the media-fueled visions of the perfect family were usually anything but. Viewers are thrust into their relationship mid-tempest, and there is hardly any trace of love that was ever shared between the two. Even their children are used as props, both figuratively and literally, as they vanish from the picture for conveniently long stretches.

The result is like being invited over to the neighborhood home of a querulous couple, as you sit awkwardly counting the minutes until you can excuse yourself to relieve the babysitter. Under Mendes' direction, the couple never becomes an actual “couple,” just sounding boards for each other's frustrations.

The only character who is halfway interesting is John (played by the excellent Michael Shannon), a neighbor's son, fresh from a mental institution, who delights in exposing the couple's flaws and hidden truths to their life together. Also to the film's credit is production designer Kristi Zea who captures the suburban sterility in almost every scene within the home.

But despite the effective histrionics of Leo and Kate – which feel more like Oscar-clip reels than part of a cohesive narrative – the film is never the deeply moving, personal character study it wants to by. Directors Douglas Sirk (Imitation of Life, All That Heaven Allows) and  Nicholas Ray (Bigger Than Life, Rebel Without a Cause) covered the same dirt-under-the-astroturf territory decades ago, when it felt more dangerous to do so. Hell, even the Brady Bunch got in on it in their 1995 film. 

Exposing the lack of conformity of '50s wedded bliss today carries none of the same impact. We are closing in on the second decade of the new millennium, and I think it's pretty well established that the image of the “perfect family” was a myth. Viewers can simply tune into AMC's expertly crafted Mad Men each week to witness a much more colorful, developed expose of the era's seamier side instead a dead-end drive down this Road.

Under discussion:

Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man  (1991)

Homeboy  (1988)

The Wrestler  (2008)

JCVD  (2008)

Full disclosure: My love for Mickey Rourke is pretty boundless. In college, I devoted an entire expose that even lavished praise on such works as the little-seen underrated gem Homeboy (which Rourke wrote) and the misunderstood Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man. It is almost as though he has tried throughout the years to pummel away at his good looks, and prove to someone (himself?) that there was much more to the man than his Brando-esque visage suggested.

At a time in his career which many of his peers were bruising their bodies in an attempt to reverse time, he decided to step into the ring as a semi-pro boxer, subjecting himself to beatings no film critic could ever bestow upon him.

That personal history is quite possibly the reason why The Wrestler resonates with such humanity and humility, as Rourke does not portray so much as inhabits the character of Randy "The Ram" Robinson, a man hopelessly devoted to the '80s-era heights of his fame that have long passed him by. And yet he is still entering the ring in front of devoted, albeit fewer, fans. His entrance is still set to the solidly '80s metal of Quiet Riot's "Bang Your Head," and his van's stereo is often blasting tunes from other bygone acts such as The Scorpions and Cinderella.

You can almost hear his tendons stretching and snapping after each performance now. And still, he subjects himself to low-rent gigs, hitched onto memories of former glories and the nostalgia of what once was. Scene after scene aches with honesty, from the makeshift matches in which wrestling's washed up and wannabes mingle in high school cafeterias that double as changing rooms, to the quiet moments of Randy desperately extending a crippled hand to his estranged adult daughter.

The one ember of hope in Randy's life comes from Cassidy (played by Marisa Tomei), a stripper whose sympathy for the tough-but-tender wrassler blossoms into friendship. Her predicament is quite similar, in that her career is one defined by her body, and as time begins to erode its youthful elasticity, she can see her shelf-life is nearing its expiration date. As Cassidy, Tomei continues to set the screen ablaze as she did in last year's Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. The only criticism is that her role requires her to be rejected by some patrons who mock her age and request another stripper, and I cannot envision a rational person who would ever scoff at the chance for even one minute in the Champagne Room with her.

It's fitting that Bruce Springsteen closes the film, as the entire film unfolds like a dramatization of a character from the musician's catalogue. And the film is director Darren Aronofsky's Nebraska: honest, raw, stark and nakedly personal. The director, who is more known for his flashy, dramatically braided dramas (Pi, Requiem for a Dream, The Fountain), applied no technical wizardry here, even allowing passing migrating geese to populate the background sound (which, in itself takes on meaning of moving on, something the main character just can't do).

This is not to say that The Wrestler is without its moments of levity. During a shopping trip for Randy's daughter, Cassidy asks him what type of style the girl prefers in clothing: Goth, hippie, preppy? “I think she's a lesbian, does that make a difference?” he cluelessly responds.

Anchoring it all is Rourke, whose performance feels like his entire career has been working toward this role. Battered, bruised, but doggedly determined to stay relevant, Rourke's impassioned pleas for acceptance are heartbreaking and captivatingly honest. In one brief bit between Randy and his daughter (played by Evan Rachel Wood, whose career is littered with parts like this), it plays almost like an off-camera confessional from Rourke himself. The scene is vaguely similar to one in this year's JCVD, in which Jean Claude Van Damme places his muscular heart squarely on his sleeve.

The Wrestler explores no new ground thematically, but demonstrates that, in the right hands with the right actors, even time-tested tales can be polished off and presented anew with astounding results.