Zero Dark Thirty

By John Mulderig, Catholic News Service

NEW YORK (CNS) – “Zero Dark Thirty” (Columbia) offers movie-goers a challenging account, based on real events, of the decade-long hunt for terrorist leader Osama bin Laden.

This gritty glimpse into the underworld of acknowledged detention centres and concealed prisons, known as “black sites,” raises ethical quandaries and presents content that will prove unsettling even for many adults.

The action centres on a relentlessly determined CIA officer named Maya (Jessica Chastain). Urged on by her superiors, one of whom demands that she “bring me people to kill,” Maya painstakingly gathers intelligence hints concerning bin Laden’s whereabouts and those of his confederates.

Eventually she weaves these slender strands of evidence together sufficiently to track America’s public enemy number one to his fortified compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. There, as enacted in the film’s climax, Navy SEALs killed him in May 2011.

Some of Maya’s leads are obtained by her colleague Dan (Jason Clarke), who employs both physical and psychological torture to break down the prisoners he interrogates. His techniques include water-boarding, a process that simulates the effects of drowning, close confinement and various forms of humiliation.

While director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal have crafted a compelling drama, their movie’s moral stance is ambiguous. The harsh reality of so-called “enhanced interrogation,” as practised by Dan, is graphically portrayed. Yet the results of subjecting prisoners to it are shown to be effective.

Viewers will need a strong grounding in their faith to discern the proper balance between the imperative of upholding human dignity and the equally grave obligation to save innocent human lives. They will also need to guard against the temptation to revel in the death of an evildoer.

As God asks the prophet Ezekiel, “Do I find pleasure in the death of the wicked – oracle of the Lord God? Do I not rejoice when they turn from their evil way and live?” (Ez. 18:23)

In keeping with the tough-guy tone of the spying and soldiering worlds in which “Zero Dark Thirty” is set, moreover, the dialogue involves a steady assault with F-bombs and other vulgarities.

The film contains considerable violence, including scenes of torture and degradation, brief rear nudity, at least one use of profanity as well as frequent rough and crude language.

 

A Good Day to Die Hard

By Adam Shaw, Catholic News Service

NEW YORK (CNS) – The quarter-century-old action franchise that started with 1988’s “Die Hard” seems to have reached its own death throes with “A Good Day to Die Hard” (Fox). This fifth instalment rests on the premise that killing can be an awful lot of fun.
New York detective and series protagonist John McClane (Bruce Willis) is on the trail of his son Jack (Jai Courtney) who appears to have gotten in with the wrong crowd in Moscow.

Things in Mother Russia are not what they seem, however, and an explosives-ridden car chase reveals that the elder McClane has underestimated his offspring.

Mostly reconciled, despite some lingering resentment, Dad and Junior team up to protect a government whistle-blower named Komarov (Sebastian Koch) from a variety of villains.In the process, of course, they kick up just the kind of carnage that made the quartet of earlier flicks box-office gold.

In a misguided attempt to keep the proceedings light-hearted, director John Moore presents a jaunty view of blood-letting  And, on occasion, he invites the audience to revel in the mayhem; slow-motion death scenes make an obvious appeal to movie-goers  basest, most visceral instincts.

The rudimentary efforts at character development in Skip Woods’ screenplay, meanwhile, are drowned amidst a murky tide of run-and-gun action.

The film contains constant violence, some of it gory, occasional profanity, frequent rough and crude language and two obscene gestures.

 

Quartet

By Joseph McAleer, Catholic News Service

NEW YORK (CNS) – Dustin Hoffman steps behind the camera for his directorial début with “Quartet” (Weinstein), a comedy-drama about musical artists who face the ultimate curtain call: a date with the Grim Reaper.

Based on the play by Ronald Harwood (who also wrote the screenplay), “Quartet” casts senior citizens in the same warm and fuzzy glow as last year’s “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.” Amid the gags and cat-fights  however, lie serious reflections on the challenges of ageing and a reminder to embrace the talents of our still-vital elderly.

Beecham House in the picturesque English countryside is a home for retired singers and musicians. As such, it’s a haven for eccentrics and outsize egos, ringing true Bette Davis’ famous observation, “Old age is not for sissies.”

Impresario Cedric Livingston (Michael Gambon) corrals the residents to put on a fundraiser every year on composer Giuseppe Verdi’s birthday. His dream is to reunite four legendary opera singers who once performed the “Quartet” from Verdi’s “Rigoletto.”

“It would be as if Maria Callas made her comeback,” he predicts.

The ensemble is made up of newly arrived, acid-tongued diva Jean Horton (Maggie Smith), her gentle ex-husband Reginald Paget (Tom Courtenay), dotty Cecily Robson (Pauline Collins), who’s in the early stages of dementia, and randy rogue Wilfred Bond (Billy Connolly). Wilf, as he’s known, is forever flirting with the young staff.

All of the singers are keen for the reunion, except Jean, who fears stepping into the spotlight again. “My gift deserted me,” she tells Reginald.

“It deserted us all,” he says. “It’s called life.”

Jean has an ulterior motive: to reconcile with Reginald, whom she abandoned for an affair with a rival tenor. She regrets the indiscretion, but Reginald is still bitter.

“I wanted a dignified senility,” he muses. “Fat chance now that she’s here.”

Still, the show must go on, and nothing tempts an ageing performer more than the smell of greasepaint and the glare of the footlights.

The salty language in “Quartet” and the script’s rather juvenile obsession with sex (it’s ripe with British euphemisms like “rumpy-pumpy”) distract somewhat from the fun of watching the veteran actors perform as well as from the pleasures afforded by the glorious soundtrack.

The film contains sexual innuendo and some profane and rough language.