Springsteen in a dark time

 

  Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere has a message. I don't mean to suggest that the movie spends any time moralizing on the good life. Rather, the movie's message is embedded in every scene and in its main character. It goes something like this: Rising acclaim and recognition provide no immunity from depression, a dark occupying force that can take over a life.

  Set during the period after Springsteen's 1980 hit album The River and before the release of Born in the USA, the movie focuses on Springsteen's retreat into feelings and memories that consumed his creative life while also building toward an immobilizing breakdown.

   The result was the album Nebraska (1982), which became a commercial and critical success, but initially felt like a bad bet. Prior to the album's release, many of those around Springsteen viewed the work as a major mistake, a downbeat acoustic album that strayed from hard-driving rock. Nebraska, some feared, would push Springsteen into a career-shattering detour.

   As Springsteen, Jeremy Allen White (The Bear) had a difficult job. He doesn't look like Springsteen, and much of the movie shows Springsteen thinking or recollecting about his upbringing. His Springsteen is often seen responding to the world around him, digesting images that he may not fully understand.

   Black-and-white flashbacks focus on young Springsteen (Matthew Anthony Pellicano Jr.) and his relationship with his drunken, rage-prone father (Stephen Graham). Gaby Hoffman has a small turn as young Springsteen's mom, a softer counterpoint to her husband's fury.

   Jeremy Strong portrays Jon Landau, Springsteen's manager. Sympathetic to Springsteen's interior life,  Landau finds a secluded home in Colts Neck, NJ, where Springsteen is supposed to rest after a grueling tour.

    Instead, Springsteen does drop-in appearances at Asbury Park's fabled The Stone Pony. Eventually, he begins composing songs that reflect a dark, disoriented mood that resulted, at least in part, from worries that stardom would separate him from the Jersey roots that nourished his creativity. 

   During his semi-seclusion, Springsteen establishes a relationship with Faye (Odessa Young), a waitress and single mother. Too caught up in himself and too  isolated by depression, he's unable to commit to Faye. But his rejection of her doesn't seem cruel; it's more a reflection of what Springsteen has come to accept as limitations he might not overcome.

    Paul Walter Hauser portrays Mike Batlan, a Springsteen crew member, who helps The Boss record the songs that will become Nebraska on rudimentary equipment set up in the rented home.

   Springsteen resisted performing the songs he was writing with his band. He eschewed slick production values. He wanted to keep the music raw. The flaws of bargain-basement recording appealed to him; perhaps he wanted to present his pain without polish.

   Director Scott Cooper (Crazy Heart), who based the movie's screenplay on a book by Warren Zanes, overdoes the flashbacks, which function like the echoes Springsteen incorporated in the Nebraska tunes. Some of Springsteen's influences (a fascination with Terrence Malick's Badlands and a trip to the movies with his dad to see Robert Mitchum in Night of the Hunter) overemphasize the dreariness that purportedly infiltrated Springsteen's soul.

   At times, Deliver Me From Nowhere feels like an idea in search of a movie; it's possible that the making of a single album by someone suffering from severe depression isn't enough to keep a picture buzzing. Imagine a movie about Van Gogh that only dealt with his making of Starry Night.  On second thought, that might make for an intriguing movie; Van Gogh was living in the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum when Starry Night was painted.

    But you get my point: Deliver Me From Nowhere looks at Springsteen through a narrow lens.

   Still, Deliver Me From Nowhere strikes some resonant emotional chords. I'd put it this way: If Deliver Me From Nowhere were an album, you might say that not every song is a hit, but many are strong enough to carry the day in a story about a man teetering on the cusp of losing himself.

Tragedy stalks a wrestling family

 When I was a kid, I'd occasionally watch professional wrestling. But it never held my interest for long because it was a) grotesque b) staged and c) melodramatic. 

  Also, my mother would sometimes insist on a channel change. 

  "Why is that 'junk' blaring on the TV? Read a book.”

  The Iron Claw, a movie set in the world of professional wrestling, takes place in the 1970s and 1980s, long after I had even a minimal interest in pro wrestling. Thankfully director Sean Durkin (Marcy May Marlene) isn't only preaching to the pro-wrestling choir. 

  Durkins brings plenty of indie spirit to the story of the Von Erich family, a fabled bunch of professional wrestlers. He gives the movie focus by concentrating on the father/son relationship between Kevin Von Erich (an almost unrecognizable Zac Efron) and his tyrannical father (Holt McCallany).

    Kevin's three brothers (Harris Dickinson, Jeremy Allen White, and Stanley Simons) play important roles in creating the pressured environment in which these young men struggle toward maturity.

    All of the brothers wrestle. Even Simons's Mike, who prefers music and plays in a band, picks up the wrestling shield when others have fallen.

    Efron excels as Kevin, who for a time, is passed over in the family's quest to capture a championship belt. Nothing drives McCallany's Fritz, who wrestled during the 1960s, more than being top dog.  Fritz loves his kids but he has a touch of the Great Santini in him. He pushes, goads, and insists that the brothers meet his standards of toughness.

    The brothers mostly defer to Dad's judgments, and the relationships between the siblings are depicted as competitive yet caring.

    Kevin broods about being passed over in favor his brothers before getting his shot at the big time, but he doesn't undermine them. Although these young men have been taught to regard themselves as members of a family business, we get to know each of them as individuals.

   Dickinson's Davis seems like the only brother who's having fun in the ring. He’s the guy for whom things come easily. Kevin sweats; Davis glides.

  White's Kerry is infected by intensity, a counterpoint to Mike’s conflicted nature.

   As he tells the story of the Von Erich tribe, Durkin finds dark currents. The family believes it has been cursed. The oldest Von Erich brother died when he was a child. Since then, the brothers have been looking over their shoulders for the shadow of the reaper.

       Questions of danger loom because of injuries, accidents, and a father's unremitting mind-set, which he justifies as necessary if his sons are to achieve the goal he imposes on them. He even ranks his sons, although he acknowledges that the rankings can change according to performance.

   Softer moments occur when Kevin falls for the woman (Lily James) who will become his wife, the first glimmer that some of life's rewards might not require climbing into the ring or tossing someone out of it.

    If you're looking for a movie full of sports triumphs, The Iron Claw may disappoint. You'll more likely remember the movie as the tragic story of a family that found heartbreak in its single-minded pursuit of ring renown. 

   If you research the Von Erichs, you'll learn that Durkin omitted mention of Chris, a sixth son. Maybe purists will care. I wondered about it, but moved on.

   I don't want to oversell The Iron Claw, but there's good reason to acknowledge its strengths, including Efron's performance.  He gives the movie its wounded soul. 

   Kevin may not be the best of the Von Erich wrestlers, but he's sincere and eventually he learns that living under dictatorial rule isn't satisfying -- even if the dictator happens to be your father.

 

'Rental' can't quite subvert genre limits

   

      Two brothers and the women in their lives decide it would be great to spend a weekend in a beautiful home perched on the edge of an oceanside cliff in the Pacific Northwest.

     This foursome spends a delightful weekend escaping from daily worries, enjoying one another’s company, and having the kind of stimulating conversations that would turn anyone into an eager eavesdropper.

     By now, you probably know that I’m not talking about a movie because in movies when people head to an isolated coastal house — no matter how scenic the setting — trouble awaits. 

     So you won’t be surprised by The Rental when the couples under consideration encounter the home's weird, slightly hostile caretaker (Toby Huss). You’ll also be prepped for danger by the alternately creepy and ominous score.

     In his first directorial effort, Dave Franco tries to upset the genre apple cart but only partially succeeds. 
    Franco plays on friction between the brothers based on personal history, an ill-advised sexual encounter, and a hidden video camera that records it — although it’s not clear what purpose such video might serve. Blackmail? Turning these weekenders against one another? Providing kinky kicks for the person who put the camera there in the first place?

     Dan Stevens plays Charlie, a successful guy who’s married to Michelle (Alison Brie). Charlie’s brother Josh (Jeremy Allen White) expresses massive insecurity about his relationship with Charlie’s business partner (Shiela Vand). 

      Josh plays the group’s outlier, a college dropout who served time in jail for beating up a guy outside his frat house. Josh seems more addled than violent, but appearances can be deceiving. 
     Vand’s Mina, a woman of Middle Eastern descent, raises objections to the property manger’s apparent racism. The others seem to want to focus on fun, having planned to hike, down some Ecstasy and party. 
     As the story advances, secrets must be protected amid what we take to be a growing threat that eventually dips into mayhem at the hands of a figure who seems to have wandered into the proceedings from a Wes Craven movie.

     Your tolerance for The Rental depends a lot on how intriguing you find the movie’s four main characters, who might be refugees from any number of indie films. Mumblecore veteran Joe Swanberg (Drinking Buddies) co-scripted the movie with Franco.
      The screenplay flirts with issues about the tendency of the privileged to evade consequences, but these turn out be glancing blows.          
      Personally, I didn’t find this millennial foursome all that captivating and I certainly could have done without the movie’s horror elements, which arrive … well … because all that ominous music says they must.