Butler's Cinema Scene

Sam Elliott

“THE MAN WHO KILLED HITLER AND THEN THE BIGFOOT” My rating: B

98 minutes | No MPAA rating

When it comes to pulpy promise, it’s hard to beat a title like “The Man Who Killed Hitler and Then the Bigfoot.”

But what’s unsettling about this debut feature from writer/director Robert D. Krzykowski is the way it defies almost all audience expectations while giving us Sam Elliott in one of his greatest performances.

In fact, one cannot imagine “The Man Who Killed Hitler…” working without the presence of the 75-year-old Elliott, a white-haired warrior of such potent screen charisma that I would gladly watch him absentmindedly scratch his ass for 90 minutes.

We meet Calvin Barr in the late ’80s or early ’90s, occupying a bar stool in a tavern in the quaint Norman Rockwell-esque town he’s called his home for more than seven decades. Calvin is quiet and cryptic, a man who exudes a certain angst but would never talk about it.

Still, he’s obviously not your typical senior citizen.  He makes mincemeat of a trio of punks who try to hijack his car late one night.

The first 45 minutes of Krzykowski’s screenplay follow Calvin in both the present and the past, interspersing his unremarkable daily routine with flashbacks to his service in World War II. We see glimpses of young Calvin (Aiden Turner) being sent behind enemy lines disguised as a Nazi officer. His assignment is to put a bullet in Der Fuerher.

Other flashbacks take him to the pre-war years when he worked in a shop on Main Street and wooed a pretty school teacher (Caitlin FitzGerald); he was sent to war before they could wed or even consummate their affair. That loss will haunt him to his dying day.

Which could be soon. Forty-five minutes into the film our hero is paid a visit by a federal agent (Ron Livingston) who announces that Calvin’s country once again desperately needs his help.  It seems that an ever-widening area of  Canadian forest is being ravaged by a mysterious influenza that is being spread by none other than Bigfoot.

Blood tests have shown that Calvin is one of the few humans immune to the virus; now he’s being sent up North to stalk  the hairy creature: “If we cannot contain the beast, if we cannot destroy it and it escapes, this could be the end.”

I’ll say this about Krzykowski…whatever his talents as a filmmaker they are vastly surpassed by his abilities as a prognosticator.  Basically this film predicts the pandemic we’re now experiencing. (more…)

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Kelsea Bauman, Will Dennis

“VANILLA”  My rating: B

87 minutes | No MPAA rating

If Elliott (Will Dennis) was ice cream he’d be vanilla.

His shirts are always buttoned tightly around his neck. He carefully charts out each day’s schedule (most days the big entry is “Lunch”).

Elliott spends many hours mooning about the girlfriend who got away. In his remaining time he is developing an app that will allows hungry users to literally scream for ice cream into their cell phones; a delivery man will be dispatched with the desired cones, scoops, toppings and other accoutrements.

Elliott is such a boring, lame-o character that one cannot imagine him holding down a feature film all by his lonesome. Happily he shares the screen with Kimmie (Kelsea Bauman), a sort of sarcasm-steeped gamine who hopes to become a standup comic. Between the two of them they make “Vanilla” a low-keyed, off-beat pleasure.

Making this all the more remarkable is that Dennis, who also wrote and directed the film, and Bauman have no feature film experience.  Until recently he was a product design consultant; “Vanilla” is his feature debut and while it isn’t earth-shaking, it’s kinda huggable.

The central premise has Will and Kimmie joining forces to drive his old van (it’s white, naturally) from NYC to New Orleans, where his ex, Trisha (Taylor Hess) is a P.A. on a film shoot and desperately needs an old beat-up white van for a stunt.

(more…)

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Sidney Flanigan, Talia Ryder

“NEVER RARELY SOMETIMES ALWAYS”  My rating: B 

101 minutes | MPAA rating: PG-13

A hot-button issue gets minimalist treatment in Eliza Hittman’s “Never Rarely Sometimes Always.”

Yet despite the austerity of Hittman’s effort, this is a film that hooks us emotionally and intellectually.

Autumn (Sidney Flanigan) is a high schooler in small-town Pennsylvania. When we first meet her she’s singing at a local open-mic showcase.

After the performance she and her family (her mom is played by Sharon Van Etten, the singer; her vaguely indifferent stepdad by Ryan Eggold) decamp to a local restaurant. At an adjacent table a group of teenage boys are hanging out.   Autumn takes offense at something they’re doing and tosses her drink on one of them.

What’s that all about?   We follow Autumn to a clinic where she’s told she’s 10 weeks pregnant and treated to an anti abortion video.  She learns that as a minor in Pennsylvania she must get a parent’s permission before having an abortion.

And so in the dead of night Autumn and her supportive cousin Skylar (Talia Ryder) grab a bus to the Big Apple where there are fewer restrictions.

What is supposed to be a one-day trip turns into something rather more complicated.  The Planned Parenthood doctor tells Autumn she’s more like 20 weeks gone; that’ll mean a two-day procedure and a longer stay in NYC.  Strapped for money the girls will basically have to spend a night bumming around the city. (more…)

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