Movie Nation

“Umrika” is a dark commentary on the varied reasons for immigration and its human cost wrapped in a sunny, traditional “coming to America” package. This Sundance Audience award winner is a fascinating film to get around to in post-Trump America, a time when that warm, well-worn “Anything is possible if we can just get to America” movie narrative has been utterly shattered, from within and from without.

Prashant Nair set his “illusions of immigration” parable in a very different India — the pre-boom 1980s. That India is evaporating. And within a couple of years of this film’s release, the America of “I lift my lamp beside the golden door” was closed, unmasked and utterly disgraced in the eyes of the rest of the world.

Rajan (Prateik Babbar) is the son of a picture-postcard village in the north of India, where chickens roost on the thatched roofs and goats wander the fields. He will leave the genteel poverty of this world and go to “Umrika,” as they say there — “America.”

His mother (Smita Tambe) is almost inconsolable. But she, her husband (Pramod Pathak) and younger son, Ramakant (Shubham More) are consoled by the promise that he’ll send money home, and that he’ll write.

And so he does. Within months, the letters begin to arrive as our narrator, the adult Ramakant (Suraj Sharma) tells us. Rajan sends magazine photos of the sights, and regales them all with the wonders in the U.S.

“Over here, even the bathrooms are bigger than Lalu’s hut!”

The postman, played by Rajahs Tailang, reads the letters aloud to the entire, mostly-illiterate village. Presents — a “piggy bank” — arrive, as well. And this goes on for years. Ramakant is inspired to go to school with his pal Lalu, and learn to read.

Electricity comes to Jitvapur, a family member dies, and then the letters stop. Ramakant learns the truth behind the letters, but not the whole truth. He must go, first to Dehli, and then to Umrika, to figure out what has happened.

And in the teeming, corrupt city, the young man, accompanied by his childhood pal Lalu (Tony Revolori of “The Grand Budapest Hotel”), doggedly follows Rajan’s trail, which points to all sorts of unhappy or unsavory conclusions as to what happened to him.

“Umrika” is a dramedy of intrigues, moral compromises and suspense interrupted by lovely dashes of whimsy, the gossip, legends and delusions 1980s working class/working poor Indians harbored about the mythic land across the sea.

“I’ve heard in Umrika, there’s this thing called ‘calories,'” one wag declares (in Hindi with English subtitles). “Makes them all big as balloons.”

The family back home sees pictures of a cookout Rajan allegedly went to, and just KNOW those hot dogs everybody is eating could not mean he’s eating MEAT. They must be roasted “American carrots!”

And when the traveling tent cinema shows “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom,” notions of who the actual “hero” of the picture is are entirely different, as the audience shouting at the screen and pelting Harrison Ford’s image with food reveals.

But those lighter touches are but distractions from the larger drama of Rama’s scheming to get to the man who helped smuggle his brother abroad, to get information from another guy from their village who lives in the city and may know something, and of Rama’s disillusionment about his brother, their family, their village, their country and the one Rajan wanted to go to — Umrika.

It’s a film of genuine surprises and tiny delights, even though it bogs down and loses its urgency when the quest that drives it falls into the background. There are hints of “Il Postino” and “The Third Man” in its mashup of plots.

The performances are generally solid, if a little generic. Revolori stands out and makes the sharpest impression.

But Nair — he went on to make “Tryst with Destiny” after this — has conjured up a warm, yet illusory and brittle memory of a more naive time, when Indians and Americans could live perfectly happy, seeing only the innocent gloss of their current lives and the glorious, gilded world that awaited them, if only they could make it to Umrika.

MPAA Rating: unrated, violence, profanity

Cast: Suraj Sharma, Smita Tambe, Tony Revolori, Prateik Babbar and Rajesh Tailang

Credits: Written and directed by Prashant Nair. A Samosa Stories/Netflix release.

Running time: 1:38

My pal over at Exhibitor Relations Co. (@ERCboxoffice) just tweeted this post “Mulan” move and new “Bill & Ted” delay. The fall is shaking up as well as some movies are just pushing into early 2021. And damnitall, I have to fix one date that changed just now. “Unhinged” just gave up July 10.

“Just another film fallout Friday. Here’s the new summer line-up of cinematic sacrifices: 7/17 – BROKEN HEARTS GALLERY, SAINT MAUD 7/31 – INCEPTION: REFOLDED, UNHINGED, 8/7 – EMPTY MAN 8/12 – TENET 8/14 – GREENLAND 8/21 – ANTEBELLUM, MULAN 8/28 – BILL & TED 3, NEW MUTANTS” https://twitter.com/ERCboxoffice/status/1276672258992246785?s=20

Coming next month to Arrow Video streaming.

Don’t judge me.

“The Royal Hibiscus Hotel” is a shiny, foodie-friendly bauble of a rom-com, practically a brochure for Nollywood, the nickname the rest of the world has given Nigeria’s film industry.

The acting’s uneven, the story limp and generic. And like a brochure, it just lies there — static, a comedy lacking the animation, action and sense of life that would make it come alive.

It’s about an upper class Nigerian, Ope (Zainad Balogun), plugging away in the London food scene, mentored by a famous Frenchman (Elijah Braik) but fed up with the the bloke she works for, the latest London braying bully who thinks he’s Gordon Ramsey.

Maybe it’s time to take one of those calls from her always-dialing parents, a fractious couple (Jide Kosoko, Rachel Oniga) whose inability to get to the bloody point drive her (and us) to distraction. Maybe it’s time to go home to the family’s Lagos hotel, the Royal Hibiscus.

Quite the Plan B she has in mind. Must be nice. But it’s not like the place couldn’t use her help. The gum-snapping desk clerk (Kemi Lala Akindoju) would rather come on to the rich guests than answer the phone or check guests in. And the chef (Charles Inojie)? He’s fond of the bottle — any bottle.

It’s just that Dad hasn’t told her he’s selling the place. With her Mom nagging her father that “A lady her age should be married,” he’s just happy to have her back home. He lets her take over the kitchen and start making plans even as the two hunky investors (Kenneth Okolie, Deyemi Okanlawon) show up to close the deal, or badger him until he does.

But then Deji (Okolie) decides he likes what he sees — not just in the hotel, but in the kitchen. And things get…complicated.

Only they don’t. Not really. Absolutely nothing happens that we don’t see rolling gently down the hill an hour before it hits us.

The food makes for appetizing set dressing, but there’s too little preparation and explaining to make it a central feature of the film. The kitchen is as quiet as a morgue, and about as lively.

Scenes don’t move. Actors just take their position, stand there and prattle their not-that-funny lines (in English and Yoruba, with English subtitles).

The leads are lovely and charming and have chemistry. But they’re surrounded by mostly much broader players, bugging out their eyes, working their mouths as if they’ve just made the jump from silent film to sound.

Ms. Oniga may be a beloved figure in Nigerian cinema (I don’t know that.), but in this hemisphere, she should could give seminars in Central Park — the art of mugging for the camera.

This plays out as a film with a lovely sheen of sophistication, a Nigeria of affluence, culture-consciousness, with no crowds, traffic jams or poverty. But the kitchen, hotel and country we see here don’t feel cooked in, lived in or loved in.

MPAA Rating: TV-PG

Cast: Zainab Balogun, Kenneth Okolie, Jide Kosoko, Rachel Oniga, Deyemi Okanlawon,  Kemi Lala Akindoju, Charles Inojie

Credits: Directed by Ishaya Bako, script by Nicole Brown,Debo Oluwatuminu, Yinka Ogun. An Ebonylife release on Netflix

Running time: 1:31

This is a grimly prescient disaster pic from STX. Gerry Butler is an Orlando area husband and dad (I can totally see that.) who tries to get his family to safety.

When you name a comet “Clark,” who’s that going to scare?

Release dates are changing with the hour, so who knows when this one will hit…theaters.

My bucket list quest to see every road picture ever made brought me to this dry and dark comedy from 2008, a tale of a vintage car dealer and a junkie trekking across Belgium in a 1979 Caprice Classic station wagon.

No, the car’s not an “Eldorado.” That’s used in the ironic/metaphoric sense by writer-director-star Bouli Lanners. It’s the elusive “destination” his character, Yvan, thinks he’s driving the junkie (Fabrice Adde) to, AFTER he’s caught the guy breaking into the apartment he keeps over his garage and “dealership.”

Yvan is partial to “Yank Tanks,” oversized American gas guzzlers from the era motoring enthusiasts in the U.S. have labeled “Malaise Motors.” He’s just taken delivery of one. No, it’s not “competition ready,” or “prêt pour la compétition,” in his native French (with English subtitles). But he’s sure he can flip it.

Meanwhile, though, he’s got this nuisance junkie he rousted out of his apartment and left by the side of the road. The guy says his name is Elie. He bargained for the right to walk off with Yvan’s piggybank the night before. Denied that, he just wants to get “home,” to his parents’ place “near the French border.”

Along the way, they hit the Stations of the Road Trip Cross. There’s the weird fellow Chevy Caprice owner (Philippe Nahon) who offers, nay INSISTS on helping Yvan fix a busted radiator hose. In that guy’s garage is his “collection,” every car with a single dent. The cars hit and killed somebody.

“I have newspaper clippings, police reports,” he salivates, sensing a sale to a fellow “collector.” As if that’s not weird enough, he insists he can tell a person’s future by touching them. But where this encounter goes next is almost jaw-dropping.

Worried about falling asleep at the wheel? “Attach your hair to the roof (headliner in the car).

A drunk-driving near-accident (driving over an embankment) puts them in the company of nudists, led by an elderly fellow who goes by a fairly famous name. Every guy who deals with his has to look the other way.

It’s all rather daft and quite dark. Lanners, no one will be surprised to learn, has played other “Yvans” and directed other droll dramedies such as “The Giants” and “The First, The Last.”

Here, he’s a gruff and irritated presence, reluctant to trust this oddball he’s decided to take home to Momma. Yvan is stubborn, dogmatic, a bit put off by everything and everyone they run into, or runs into them. But his humanity shines through in little hints of generosity and compassion.

Adde’s Elie is every “user” you’ve ever been used by. But he’s clean enough to let some of his humanity through as well. Meeting his family provides some answers.

It’s not a great picture, and as road comedies go, it turns entirely too grim for most tastes. But “Eldorado” is an engrossing peek at a Belgium that lives, works and “collects” in ways that being a European punchline rarely let on.

MPAA Rating: TV-MA, violence, profanity, alcohol abuse

Cast: Bouli Lanners, Fabrice Adde, Philippe Nahon

Credits: Written and directed by Bouli Lanners.  A Film Movement Plus release.

Running time: 1:21

There are funny lines, hilarious scenes and the occasional blast of gleeful, Eurovision excess rolled into “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga.”

Sure, it’s an old school “high concept” star vehicle — a lot like many an earlier Will Ferrell comedy, “Semi-Pro” and “Blades of Glory,” for instance. Nobody does those better than Ferrell, so there’s that.

But Judas Apatow Priest, who EDITED this hulk? Anything cute, funny or charming gets lost in that Netflix-indulged Apatowantiasis, a glorious “SNL” sketch gag stretched to true “saga” length, a bloated, leaden two hours-plus.

The hip kids were never into the annual “Eurovision Song Contest,” a televised cheese plate serving up generic pop in grandiose stage presentations, one performer or band per country every year (save this one, COVID-canceled) for the past 60 years.

But in one fairydust-sprinkled moment, ABBA won and spun that win into global fame. It’s that moment that launches “The Story of Fire Saga,” because little Lars Erickssong forgot about his dead mother for a moment and danced wildly in front of the TV, embarrassing the hell out of his gruff, fisherman dad (Pierce Brosnan).

And little silent Sigrit Ericksdottir fell into the same “Waterloo” rapture with Lars that night in 1974. That became their shared goal and their shared lives.

Now, 46 years later, they’re still chasing that dream with their small Icelandic town’s cover band, Fire Saga, and its aged accordionist and tween drummer. Romance? No, they can’t have that, no matter now much Sigrit (Rachel McAdams) wants it.

Because “You are brother-sister?”

“No. Probably not.”

It’s because love “tears bands apart — Fleetwood Mac, ABBA, Post Malone, Semen & Garfunkel…”

“Right. I forgot about de Semen.”

They may cover Pharrell Williams’ hit “Happy,” and submit to endless drunken requests for “Ya Ya Ding Dong” from the barflies. But they dream of donning Viking gear and singing their “Double Trouble” love song for all the civilized world on TV at Eurovision.

Shockingly, events conspire to send them to Eurovision in Edinburgh. Their partnership is tested, their back-country eyes opened to a world of big talents with omnivorous sexual appetites.

Ferrell, who co-wrote the script, and director David Dobkin make the most of Netflix’s travel money, capturing the glories of Iceland and the wonders of parking a bewigged Will and whiter-than-white Rachel in it.

Edinburgh, the Scottish Sin City where the film’s version of Eurovision is staged, gets some lovely travelogue moments.

The songs are broadly funny and BIG, in keeping with the character of the contest. None quite cross over into hilarious, although many provide a chuckle.

Demi Lovato plays the Icelandic favorite who doesn’t get to compete, but who “haunts” Lars as he goes more and more outlandish with a stage production that easily overwhelms their sweet little ditty.

Dan Stevens is a hoot as a closeted Russian pop idol who makes music the homoerotic way.

The one giddy scene is a tracking shot through a “sing around,” competitors partying and vamping up a medley of Cher, ABBA, Madonna et al hits.

But the best line is landed back home in Husevik, in the bar where the locals gather to watch the competition and — knowing the ineptitude of the hometown band — “take our medicine.”

Eurovision veterans pepper the bit players cast, including the transgender Austrian Conchita Wurst, presented as just a smidgen more than sight gag.

Little here surprises, although the way the first act skips through the preliminaries you might puzzle over “How’re they going to get another 90 minutes out of this?”

By the usual ways — overextending scenes, making Graham Norton the anchor of BBC coverage of the contest, leaving in jokes that don’t land and staggering toward one of two possible finales.

Ferrell is better than this at this stage of his career, and yet he still gives it his all. It’s good to see McAdams back at work after having a baby, even if she doesn’t do her own singing.

But the quickest, silliest and sunniest way to get your fill of Eurovision is hunting up performances on Youtube, none more delightfully primitive than ABBA’s breakout moment in 1974.

“The Fire Saga Story” has barely enough sparks for a sketch, much less a “saga.”

MPAA Rating: PG-13 for crude sexual material including full nude sculptures, some comic violent images, and language

Cast: Will Ferrell, Rachel McAdams, Pierce Brosnan, Demi Lovato, Dan Stevens

Credits: Directed by David Dobkin, script by Will Ferrell, Andrew Steele. A Netflix release.

Running time: 2:03

The disastrously disorganized American response to the COVID19 pandemic has me wondering if July is another write off month for the movies, sports, the works. Case numbers are skyrocketing in Florida and other states, a first wave that morphed into a second. LeBron needs to call off this Florida NBA nonsense, college football needs to take another time out. And the release of Christopher Nolan’s #Tenet has been delayed again from July 31 to Aug. 12 because of a surge in COVID-19 cases. Disney? Are you paying attention?

https://t.co/iStZYAQ9n3 https://twitter.com/THR/status/1276336901595828225?s=20

The sweeping title “Shanghai Triad” always promised a more epic film than the great Zhang Yimou gave us. But this intimate, ornate and melodramatic gangland tale has glories all its own. And while Zhang was the master of scale in such epics as “House of Flying Daggers” and “Hero,” it’s the smaller scale and more romantic films which burn into the memory — “Ju Dou,” “Raise the Red Lantern,” “The Road Home” and “Coming Home” among them.

Based on a novel by Li Xiao, it is a lovely if somewhat airless melodrama of competing mobsters, mob wealth, Western decadence and betrayal in the Shanghai just before the Japanese invaded.

Young Shuisheng (Xiaoxiao Wang) looks to be about 13 as he arrives in the city, summoned by his Uncle Liu (Xuejian Li) to join the household staff of “The Boss” (Baotian Li) and leader of their Tang clan.

Shuisheng is “bumpkin” enough to not know what a telephone is, to have never seen a cigarette lighter. He is our eyes and ears as Uncle Liu and others explains this strange new life to him, and to the audience.

He’d better be a quick learner, because he’s to be the manservant to the boss’s mistress, the beguiling Bijou (Gong Li), chanteuse at the boss’s swank, Western style night nightclub. She’s a diva, an imperious bully and a manipulator.

“When she speaks to you,” he warns (in Chinese with English subtitles), “look at nothing but your shoes!”

She is jealous of “The Boss,” but stepping out on him with a much younger gangster from a rival mob (Chun Sun).

Over the course of an eventful week, the kid will catch her costumed, chorus-line-backed act in the club, endure her temper, get a glimpse of a mob execution and see the bloody aftermath of an attempted assassination.

He, like everybody else, deals with the caprices of “Miss,” and grows instantly devoted to her even as he suffers her wrath, and then is dragged to a hideaway island where she, The Boss and “The Boys” lay low waiting for the head man to recover from his dagger wounds and plot his revenge.

There’s a brittle quality to Gong’s performance here, perhaps reflecting the end of her seven-film-long romance with Zhang. They’d work together again, but even the scripted moments of warmth, Bijou softening as she sees the consequences of her callousness, come off chilly.

Zhang gives us lavish and dreamy night club scenes that rival the over-the-top decor and entertainment of big budget fantasies set in this era with similar scenes — “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” and “Victor/Victoria.” Watching the rich clientele, the size of the jazz orchestra and long, leggy line of costume-changing chorines accompanying Bijou in this glittery ballroom, one can’t help but wonder at the cover charge it would take to make money off this.

The intrigues are intriguing enough, but the film makes us wait for its final act on that tiny, primitive island to trot them out. And the finale leaves more to be desired than it should.

Still, this is Zhang at his peak — twenty years before the horrors of “The Great Wall,” working with his muse (Gong Li will be seen next in Disney’s “Mulan”) and showing off a China that the Communist oligarchs would eventually come to emulate — of Western style luxury and opulence, and the casual, business-as-usual corruption that helps one acquire it.

MPAA Rating: R for some language and images of violence

Cast: Gong Li, Baotian Li, Xiaoxiao Wang, Chun Sun and Xuejian Li

Credits: Directed by Zhang Yimou, screenplay by Feiyu Bi, based on a novel by Li Xiao. A Film Movement virtual re-release.

Running time: 1:48

August 7 this little stroll down music’s memory lane rolls out, a doc about the “alternative” to Rolling Stone, a rowdy little rag full of misfits, rudeness and cheerleading for many a band eschewed by Jann Wenner’s army of taste-setters.

Kind of a ’70s white boy/white girl thing, it was. But if you were “in on it…”