Movie Nation

There’s evidence of ambition in “The Yellow Birds,” a sober-minded Iraq War drama based on combat vet-author Kevin Powers’ novel.

It has a hint of “In the Valley of Elah” in its mysterious death of a soldier and Biblical undertones, of “Only the Brave” and “Stop-Loss” in its depiction of the scars veterans bring back from war.

The film attracted top-flight talent like Toni Collette and the under-employed Jennifer Aniston to play the mothers of the soldiers involved, and the New Han Solo, Alden Ehrenreich, and Tye Sheridan and Jack Huston play boots-on-the-ground, with Jason Patric signed on as a stateside military investigator looking into what went down over there.

And there’s it’s film-festival established running time, close to two hours, the length of serious drama, and bloated Judd Apatow comedies and Marvel movies.

But for all the vivid combat sequences, the gritty adjustment-back-home touches and a couple of genuinely emotional scenes, it feels incomplete, choppy and something of a cheat. Blame the screenplay, which shortchanges and over-sells its mystery, and the attempts at whacking the thing into releasable shape. Few pictures can cling to coherence after losing more than twenty minutes of run time, especially films which were cut for cause.

Ehrenreich and Sheridan (“Ready Player One”) are green Virginia boys who meet at boot camp. One may have enlisted because he’s adrift and the other as a life-experience craving artist planning on attending the University of Virginia afterwards. But their connection is a necessity.

Sergeant Sterling (Huston, of “Boardwalk Empire” and the recent “Ben-Hur”) ordains it. They’re to keep an eye on each other and “promise you’ll do what I say every f—–g time,” and they’ll be fine.

Private Bartle (Ehrenreich) is given further orders by Private Murphy’s mom (Aniston).

“Promise me you’ll take care of him over there.”

We don’t need to hear the film’s opening narration, that “The war tried to kill us in the spring, and the summer…It tried to kill us every day” to know that dramatic “take care of him” cliche will have its consequences.

Through the ambushes, the IEDs and the firefights, French director Alexandre Moors (the extraordinary “Blue Caprice” is his biggest non-music video credit) fails to get across the promises made and the sense that these guys are bonded and truly looking out for each other.

Except in the unit dance party, where Bartle urges Murphy to dance with a medic he’s got a crush on.

The combat sequences have the requisite fire and fury and gulping, weeping fear. They feature the usual incidents such movies inevitably include — a Humvee blown up by an improvised explosive device, a party interrupted by a mortar barrage, snipers who kill comrades and are then hunted down and killed, accidents in the heat of a firefight.

Something happened that shouldn’t have. That much is obvious when they get back home. One man is missing, others are cracking up and the Army’s sent an investigator (Patric), not a shrink, to help them cope.

Collette anchors this home front section of the film, an angry single mom who wants the Army investigator to answer her question first.

“What’d you people DO to him?”

Aniston manages a sympathetic portrait of a parent looking for answers to her questions, as well.

And Huston stands-out among the foot soldiers, bellowing orders in a nearly indecipherable drawl, blowing off the investigator with a beautifully bitter “I ain’t nobody’s sergeant no more.”

Ehrenreich is sympathetic and more suited to this role than the future-swaggerer Han Solo, but he’s still not a charismatic screen presence to hang your picture on.

It’s the film in toto that stumbles, a bungled march of fits and starts, scenes that  work as stand-alone moments, but connect more in our memories of the tropes of combat films than in anything the director and screenwriters manage.

The drastic editing can’t have helped in terms of coherence. Any explanation of “The Yellow Birds” is lost as the titular metaphor (and military marching cadence) that inspired it is the 20 minutes or more they whacked from this.

There have been too many good, bad and indifferent movies about the Iraq War to waste your time on a mediocre one, especially if there was probably a good movie in the book this one is based on.

MPAA Rating:R for war violence, some grisly images, sexual material, and language throughout

Cast: Alden Ehrenreich, Jack Huston, Jennifer Aniston, Tye Sheridan, Toni Collette, Jason Patric

Credits: Directed by Alexandre Moors, script by David Lowery, R.F.I. Porto, based on the Kevin Powers novel. A Saban Films release.

Running time: 1:35

“Maineland” is an underachieving documentary about over-achieving Chinese exchange students at a remote prep school in Maine.

It’s a culture-clash story where cultures don’t truly clash, where “America” doesn’t so much rub off on kids from Chinese megacities relocated to the boondocks, as intrigue them — the way science students peer at a petri dish under a microscope.

The two children of Chinese affluence followed here — Stella and Harry — may get a taste of prom, join the cheer squad and “boldly” take on the story and symbolism of “the man and the tank,” the lone protester who stood in front of a Chinese tank at Tienanmen Square for a student project.  But “America” doesn’t make much more than a superficial impact on them or their fellow exchange student classmates, director Miao Wang suggests.

And they make no impact at all, in the film’s eyes, on the locals and other U.S. nationals who are their classmates at venerable Fryeburg Academy.

Wang makes what plays like an official Chinese government sanctioned portrait of this diaspora of affluence — upwardly mobile families, stressed by their place in capitalism (marriages are strained or broken), sending their kids abroad to American prep schools for a leg up in the coming workforce.

The schools? They desperately need that overseas tuition money.

The families of these kids want them well-rounded, in the top tier of their generation, kids who might give them an insider’s edge in the American marketplace should they be able to stay on after prep school and college.

“When China is stronger, they’ll be back,” one father suggests. Meanwhile, their kids can indulge in the preoccupations of the children of families who have “made it.”

In the case of Harry, that means he can dream of working in music, composing, and not have to fret about pointing at a career guaranteed to give him a job. He’s fascinated by “capitalism” and its differences with Chinese “collectivism.”

Harry’s the introvert here, classmate Stella is the extrovert — bubbly, discovering boys, popular and cute. Her experience is a little broader than his, her hope is to continue to a U.S. college and maybe take a role in the family business in the U.S. market.

But the Chinese students are a clannish bunch, all the way through school, Wang’s film suggests. She confines her movie to the lives the kids leave behind, their families back home, and to the school grounds itself. Establishing shots of how tiny Fryeburg is, backwoods almost, lead to only one scene of the kids doing anything to interact with the community.

That scene? The Chinese kids all gather for meal at a Chinese restaurant where they, as they do when they’re not in class, speak Chinese to each other.

The most revealing scenes to an American viewer might be the gathered recruitment team from Fryeburg, sizing up the often gauche nouveau riche applicants with barely-hidden eye-rolls of how this kid or that one used his or her interview to talk about how he or she wants to make a “bucket of gold.”

The teachers don’t come off as elite so much as jaded, noting how the influx of Chinese is no different from the flood of Japanese kids when Japan was briefly ascendant, and Korean kids who still show up in numbers large enough to keep Fryeburg in the black.

A few classroom scenes capture a hint of teacher-xenophobia, but decades into this “import much of our student body” strategy keep the tactless cultural stereotyping to a minimum.

“Maineland” is informative in the most basic ways. But the big hole in Wang’s film is in failing to capture the disconnect, the true culture shock of children of neon bedecked skyscrapers, mansions and coddling parents packed off to the backwoods of Maine.

And the second biggest hole is missing the frison that must have been experienced by both sides in this exchange.

MPAA Rating: unrated, smoking

Cast: Stella, Harry

Credits:Directed by Miao Wang. An Abramorama release.

Running time: 1:30

The pre-weekend box office projections were based on studio estimates, market research based on franchise awareness, audience eagerness, yadda yadda.

And they ranged from $115 million to as high as $142. It wasn’t just Box Office Guru and Deadline.com, always iffy, that were off. Everybody was figuring “Solo” would do just fine.

I mean, “A Star Wars Story,” right? Another weekend of Disney making a mint.

Nope. Didn’t happen. By Saturday, estimates were spiraling down into the low of end the predicted range, by Sunday they’d bottomed out. No $95-105 for three days (plus Thursday night). No $125 for the whole weekend, more like $114.

And then Sunday deepened the dive. “Solo” finished three days with $83 million, and a healthy Monday (Why are they still expecting that?) could lift it to $101 million?

Let the wringing of hands begin. Did Disney kill the golden goose by overloading on “Star Wars” movies? Did the fact that this one plainly just isn’t very good, miscast, etc., hurt? Did viewers hear about the “troubled production” Ron Howard was brought in to fix?

Are audiences getting fatigued at more of the same-old/same-old from the Mouse and its Marvel  and LucasFilm Ltd. productions?

Yes, yes, yes and emphatically YES would be my guess. The “Deadpool 2” second weekend plunge suggests that all comic books and galaxies “far far away” are wearing out even the fanatics, and that the audience is outgrowing the repetitive piffle these movies have become. None of them have bombed, but over-familiarity is killing the sausage factory.

“Avengers” is still making money, but will it hold screens as long as “Black Panther?” “Deadpool” isn’t creating a vast expectation that “Yeah, we’re ready for the NEXT one,” even if it’s an “X-Force” R-rated action farce.

And “Star Wars” is way over-exposed, wrestled into new directions by J.J. Abrams and his acolytes, trying too hard to be younger and more diverse, when the stories and actors cast in them are lightweight and colorless, as in “bland.”

John Boyega? Daisy Ridley? Oscar Isaac? Alden Ehrenreich? Emilia Clarke? Donald Glover?

I am guessing they won’t learn from “Rogue One,” and fill the screen with experienced, Oscar nominated and experienced leads (Felicity Jones, Diego Luna) and surround them with Oscar winners and colorful genre veterans (Forest Whitaker, Ben Mendelsohn, Donnie Yen). “Rogue” wasn’t the big hit of this parade, it was just the best of the movies and the one that “holds up” as we say.

Even a better-cast “Solo” would have underwhelmed, but Disney has saddled us with a bit player from the Coen Brothers Universe, and he’s not got it. Why even consider making another with Alden?

Meanwhile, “A Quiet Place,” far more original, with great actors and genuine suspense and pathos, rolls on. “Black Panther,” a big cultural twist on the Marvel formula, endures.

“Breaking In,” “Life of the Party,” “I Feel Pretty,” and “Book Club,” all show up with less risk, an under-served audience and low budgets, and make bank (none of them were great, but hey, they were generally surprising and different)

Torture porn? Not really my genre. Kind of out-of-step with the “#MetToo” zeitgeist, with the perpetrators too-often having that “InCel” vibe about their attitudes towards women.

“Who’s Watching Oliver” is a twisted, darkly comical serial killer/torture porn tale set in Thailand about a nerdy creep who lures, drugs and rapes women — tourists like himself, or hookers — in the land where anything goes, sexually, save for the whole murder and dismemberment thing.

OK, probably not your genre either. “Hostel” was a long time ago. But just in case it is…

Oliver (Russell Geoffrey Banks) is a proper English lad who likes old things. He has old clocks, old luggage, out of fashion clothes. He uses greasy old-fashioned pomade in his hair.

He listens to Big Band jazz. He wears Buddy Holly glasses, even in the shower.

And of all his old things, he’s fondest of his mum, the oldest of the old things in his life. Mum (Margaret Roche) is a real piece of work.

He stammers, talks to himself, talks himself into approaching each victim.

“Just get up, go over there. Tell her she’s pretty. Girls like that.”

And Mum? She’s on his case, knocking back whisky and wine and barking orders via Skype.

“Give Mommy some SUGAR!”

She’s quick to drop “weirdo” on him, from the safety of her British home. But she’s the one who demands on-camera masturbation, sends him into the night to pick up a woman, promise her drugs and bring her home for a little bondage, rape and throat slitting.

“Momma wants some ACTION tonight!”

But as he’s trolling the amusement park, the stunning Sofia (Sara Malakul Lane) approaches him. She starts telling him her dreams. Maybe if you look like a Domhnall Gleeson who never came out of his nerd-shell, this could happen.

Sofia’s got a vulnerable streak, a trusting side and a past. So Oliver doesn’t want her to suffer the same fate as every other woman he talks up.

Director Richie Moore serves up a colorful fever dream of manipulation, hallucinations and violence, a little of it — too much of it — played for horrific laughs. It’s slick and repellent at the same time.

The locations have a certain novelty, not your generic “Bangkok binge” look.

Roche works herself into a delirious, foul-mouthed lather as a “Psycho” mom, and Banks gives himself to over-the-top with a certain glee. That Tony Perkins/”Psycho” dichotomy and subtlety isn’t what they were going for here.

But the monstrous twists aren’t all that. And the pacing is awfully slack for an 86 minute movie, lovely scenic bits of filler meant to capture the struggle for Oliver’s soul. Maybe it’s just the gruesome, excruciating detail of the dismemberments, with an illogically sick “love story” glibly grafted on it, but this thing seems to go on forever.

Again, not my genre. I thought it was dead, and in the #MeToo era, it ought to be.

But as for the nude, debased and abused “victims” here, I’ll leave the “We sent you to acting school for THIS?” chastisement for their mommas.

MPAA Rating: unrated, gory graphic violence directed at women, explicit sexual content, profanity

Cast: Russell Geoffrey Banks, Margaret Roche. Sara Malakul Lane

Credits:Directed by Richie Moore, script by Raimund Huber, Richie Moore and Russell Geoffrey Banks. A Gravitas Ventures release.

Running time: 1:26

I recognized a Hemingway and Harris Yulin, but the stars? Tate Ellington, Tara Summers, Victoria Clark. Another Long Island weekend getaway comedy. You know the tropes.

Oddly, “Wanderland” did not hit its April 20 release date, according to Box Office Mojo.

How much longer is that nasal, New York princess drawled “Yaaaaaaas” going to be funny? Just in terms of cultural currency?

It’s an essential comic component of the latest “Bridesmaids/Girl’s Trip” variation, “Ibiza,” now on Netflix. As in, the screenwriter got a credit, but the way Gillian Jacobs, SNL’s Vanessa Bayer and Phoebe Robinson toss it around, it’s not likely a deserved credit.

Any impending dead spot gets a “Yaaaaaaas,” often delivered by Bayer, and generally delivered through her nose. She is the mistress of this catch-phrase du jour. It’s almost funny the first five or so times you hear it.

“Ibiza” is about a marketing/PR striver named Harper (Jacobs) who endures Manhattan at its grinding worst, just for the job, just to be insulted by her narcissistic shrew of a boss (Michaela Watkins, starring in a FAR meaner/funnier movie) on her four year anniversary, or close to it.

“I’ve decided it’s time to send you on a little business trip.”

“Well, you did send me to Roanoke, Va.”

“I apologize. We paid for your hospital bill. Let’s move on.”

A Spanish sangria bottler wants to crack the U.S. market. Barcelona it is. Harper is off to close the deal with “a bunch of horny Spaniards.” That’s the queue for whiny princess dentists Nikki (Bayer) and bold woman of action Leah (Robinson) to tag along.

Work? Sure. After we’ve riffed about the disgusting stuff you see when you turn on a black light in a hotel room, bad a tanning accident accident and been exposed to a penis-painted-on-the-face prank that’s only visible under black light.

Clubs, after hours parties, hookah hits and booze boss Hernando’s invitation to enjoy “food, drink smiles and eye-opening sexual experiences” are the one thing that leads to another. The drunken pursuit of the sexy DJ Leo (Richard Madden) is actually what sends them offshore.

Frank banter about sex, the lack of it and “oversharing, OVERsharing!,” open-topped taxi rides and a “Sure Thing” pursuit among a sea of drunken driving “horny Spaniards” ensues.

“He’s not TECHNICALLY my boyfriend, but his name’s Diego and I’m PRETTY SURE I’m going to be having sex with him soon!”

Club scenes that go on forever, hot tub moments that go…well you know.

“This is just a moment. I’m having a moment. It’s more about the drugs and…Spain…”

The objective is to get uptight, downtrodden Harper to live a little, cut loose. If we bought Gillian Jacobs as that, well, it would help.

There are plenty of actors who admit they take roles just for the travel. Honest ones in the Michael Caine tradition. So ladies, fess up. Because this script doesn’t explain it, these trite roles don’t do it. It’s a “Girl’s Trip” that never leaves the tarmac.

Ibiza looks lovely, though if you’ve seen one thumping movie neon-and-strobe-filled nightclub, you’ve seen them all.

“Ibiza” is just…boring.

MPAA Rating: TV-MA, substance abuse, profanity, sexual content

Cast: Gillian Jacobs,  Vanessa Bayer, Phoebe Robinson, Felix Gomez, Richard Madden, Michaela Watkins

Credits:Directed by Alex Richanbach, script by  Lauryn Kahn. A Gary Sanchez/Netflix release.

Running time: 1:34

Here’s a documentary/personal essay of the “Roger & Me” variety, a cross-country trip collecting interviews about Elvis, his place in the culture, and the America his rise and fall foresaw.

Eugene Jarecki directed it, Alec Baldwin and Chuck D are in it.

And Emmy Lou Harris, and an Elvismobile — not one of his many Cadillacs, but his Rolls Royce.

Oscilloscope Labs is the releasing studio, and look for it in limited release June 22.

It’s a period piece based on a Henry James story, so it’s about an American among the ancient money/nobility of Europe.

Pairing Joely Richardson and Vanessa Redgrave usually pays off. The ingenues here include Poppy Delevinge and a Polanski daughter.

But what of our protagonist, the fellow in pursuit of lost “papers” of a died-too-young poet? He doesn’t sound like Jonathan Rhys Meyers, not as we’ve ever heard of him. A hint of Joseph Cotten in that accent. Surely he’s not been dubbed.

Nice to see him bounce back, with this and “The 12th Man.”

“The Aspern Papers” open in the U.S. late in the summer, limited release.

Ewan McGregor seems an odd choice to be the adult overworked and losing the thread of life Christopher Robin, the son of A.A. Milne who needs to get back to Pooh, Piglet, Tigger and Eeyore when grownup life becomes too much.

But here he is, in an Aug. 3 movie that seems somehow redundant in light of “Goodbye, Christopher Robin” a couple of years ago. But Marc Forster directed, Hayley Atwell co-stars. Could be good, even if this trailer lacks a certain magic.

Disney’s “Solo: A Star Wars Story,” jump started its “weekend” box office count with Thursday night showings, as is now custom.

It has a holiday weekend all to itself as a new release, meaning Monday/Memorial Day, will be huge as well.

But it’s not setting any records, and that in itself is news. Reviews are middling. The “Star Wars” saturation point appears to have been reached, as the troubled production, following the Christmas “Star Wars” movie, is managing about 92 million over 3.5 days, $114 over 4.5.

Disney and Fox, about to merge, would own 83% of the holiday box office had the merger already taken place, notes Deadline.com. Because “Deadpool 2,” despite a STEEP 67% plunge on its second weekend, will clear $50 over four days.

What do we call a movie that loses over 65% of its opening weekend audience the second weekend? You remember. A TPPP — “A Tyler Perry Picture Plummet.”

Disney’s  “Avengers” is still making “Infinity” bucks, another $19-20 million this weekend. 

“RBG,” the Ruth Bader Ginsburg documentary, is hanging in the top ten. It and “A Quiet Place” have one last weekend in the top ten before June films start muscling them aside.

“Quiet Place” is over $180 million, which suggests the Blunt/Krasinski brood don’t ave to worry about Ivy League college cash. Ever.