Bob's Cinema Diary: April 7, 2023: 'Paint' and 'One True Loves'

 

Paint

   Carl Nargle is a star at a small Vermont PBS station. His Afro-style doo, trademark pipe, and hushed delivery have turned his show, Paint, into a narcotic for those who want to be reassured that the world is OK. If you think this sounds a bit like PBS's Bob Ross, you'd be right -- sort of

  But Paint, the movie in which Owen Wilson plays a small-town celebrity who's losing his mojo, is less a fictionalized portrait of Ross than an ineffectual comedy about a deluded man who's losing his meager helping of fame. 

  The station where Carl works hires another painter (Ciara Renee) to bring new life to its lineup. Renee's Ambrosia proves popular with younger viewers; her painting is riskier than Carl's, although she doesn't seem to be particularly gifted, either.

   In sone ways Paint is a comedy of incompetence, bolstered by a  station manager (Steven Root) who appears not to know what he's doing. 

   In addition, Carl has relationship problems. A womanizer who works out of the back of his van, Carl can't be relied on for fidelity. 

   Michaela Watkins plays an assistant manager who once was Carl's great love. Lucy Freyer portrays a young station hand who falls for Carl but eventually realizes that his soft-spoken voice -- applied like a delicate brush stroke -- masks his narcissism and laziness. Carl repeatedly paints one scene, a Vermont mountain.

   Wilson inhabits the character with apparent ease, but the satire isn't sharp enough and writer/director Brit McAdams doesn't comment on the way that Nargle might be contributing to a warped understanding of artistic endeavor. 

    In all, the movie has much the same effect as one of Nargle's shows. It calms without ever finding anything much to say.

One True Loves

One True Loves adapts a novel by Taylor Jenkins Reid for the screen. Director Andy Fickman centers the story on Emma (Phillipa Soo), a happily married travel writer. Emma hopscotches the world with her husband (Luke Bracey). The screenplay’s major twist occurs when Bracey's Jesse, a photographer by trade, accepts an assignment at a remote location. He doesn't return and is assumed to have died in a helicopter crash. Emma grieves but eventually moves on with her life. She becomes engaged to steady Sam (Simu Liu), a music teacher who has zero wanderlust. By this time, Emma has taken over her parents' bookstore and has discovered the joys of sedentary living in small-town Massachusetts. But a major snag arises. Jesse somehow survived the crash, spent the last four years on a desert island, and now has returned. What's Emma to do? Marry Sam? Resume her relationship with Jesse? The screenplay eventually eases the way for Emma's decision, but en route, it includes sappy scenes, a few lame attempts at drama, and at least one scene in which Sam inappropriately shares his problems with his students. It's meant to be funny, but like many of the movie's other attempts at humor, it misses. OK, many movies rely on some level of contrivance, but in this case, contrivance crushes credibility.

Strong kickoff for another Marvel character

 

    Marvel's Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings leaps into Asian-American mythos in much in the way that Black Panther brought Afrocentric freshness to the indestructible Marvel universe.

    I don’t know if Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings will have the same impact as Black Panther — either commercially or culturally. But this latest Marvel movie has enough positive elements (action, humor and a story with deep family roots) to constitute an entertaining addition to Marvel’s apparently endless stream of movies.

     Shang-Chi gets off to a lively start. Sean (Simu Liu) -- later to become Shang-Chi -- works as a valet in San Francisco along with pal Katy (Awkwafina). It doesn't take long for the two to take a dizzying ride in a borrowed car.

     Sean and Katy also encounter a group of thugs on a bus, a sequence in which clever martial-arts maneuvers are augmented by the excitement of watching a large vehicle careen through the streets of San Francisco.

    Sean, we learn, has a secret. He was raised in China by a father (Tony Leung) who schooled him in martial arts. Leung's Wenwu was no pipe-and-slippers dad. Centuries ago, he acquired the fabled 10 rings which gave him superhero powers and eternal life. He expected his son to take his place as head of a powerful secret force of warriors.

    Shang-Chi had other ideas. He fled China when he was 14. 

    Upon his return to Macau 10 years later, Shang reunites with his younger sister Xialing (Meng'er Zhang). She's still upset that Shang left her with a father who didn't treat his daughter the way he treated his son.

   The plot eventually takes Shang and Katy to the mythic land of Ta-Lo where they meet Shang's aunt Ying Nan (Michelle Yeoh), a wise woman who makes positive use of her martial arts-skills.

    Like most Marvel movies, Shang-Chi gobbles up comic-book mythology as if were popcorn. Wuwen, who gave up his powers when he married Shang's mother (Fala Chen), believes that he can reunite with his late wife if he penetrates a seal that separates an evil soul-sucking dragon from humanity. 

    The meeting of Wuwen and Chen's Jiang Li produces some of the movie's more intriguing and well-choreographed action. Li's the only person who's able to subdue Wuwen's fighting spirit. 

     It makes more sense to see all this in a theater than to write about it in a review. Besides, the mythic elements of the story are supported by recognizable emotions: a husband's inability to accept his wife's death, a son's struggle to accept his true identity, and a sister who can't totally abandon her sibling resentments.

    The Ta-Lo sequences include an element of cuteness in the form of a furry faceless, winged creature that struck me as more Disney than Marvel, a little too precious perhaps. 

    But Shang-Chi never skimps on action. A fight that takes place on scaffolding attached to a high rise offers vertiginous fun.

    I've read that Liu wanted to model his fighting style on Jackie Chan. The fight sequences contain elements of Chan-like humor but, in my view, don’t rise to the level of Chan’s best work, which admittedly makes for a high bar.

   Director Destin Daniel Cretton and his team were smart to give Shang-Chi a sidekick and the movie suffers a bit when Awkwafina is off-screen. Liu masters the physical aspects of the role but sometimes  comes up short on personality. Oh well, that's probably a marginal criticism considering that Shang-Chi is an emerging character.

   The supporting cast -- particularly Yeoh, Leung, and Zhang -- offer more than window dressing. They really supports the movie, as does Benedict Wong, whose role is smaller but still strong. Ben Kingsley adds humor as Trevor Slattery, a fading TV actor whose presence is played for laughs. 

   The movie's ending -- involving dragons (good and evil), a father/son battle, and lots of fiery combat -- can't entirely avoid the bloat that seems obligatory in these efforts.

    Overall, though, Shang-Chi succeeds in introducing a new Marvel character to the screen and proves an invigorating addition to the Marvel universe. 

    Equally important in a world in which sequels seem mandatory, the movie leaves you wanting to see more of Shang-Chi and Katy, a comic-book duo with promising  potential.