unsane

Steven Soderbergh's iPhone 7-shot mini opus mental ward-set thriller persistently toys with audience's perceptions of what is real and what is imagined in an era where much of our visual lives are now drawn to the screen of a phone. Sawyer Valentini (played by The Crown's Claire Foy, who shows a shade of fiery intensity many of us haven't seen yet) has a bland office job and has seemingly unwillingly committed herself to the unsettling Pennsylvania hospital. She desperately wants out and is thwarted by bureaucracy and unconcerned employees and by the taunting of some of her fellow patients. Furthermore a mystery emerges whether or not one of the workers there is a man who previously stalked her.

A filmmaker who has oscillated between sublime pieces and clunkers, Soderbergh remains one of my favorite directors. Even his less successful works have an inner charm and a textured feel. Last year's underrated shaggy summer heist Logan Lucky boasted excellent technicals, jokey characters and situations bolstered by an emotionally sincere backbone. Unsane is less satisfactory but still intriguing and enjoyable cinema. Although the grimy iPhone photography lends itself to a simultaneous feel of gimmickry and impressiveness, it's not the only stunt here.  The movie plays deadly serious but is also imbued with tongue-in-cheek humor and references galore (from 70s grit like Cuckoo's Nest to moody slasher pics like Halloween II to schlock adult thrillers of the early 90s). Matt Damon explaining a litany of how-to's of dealing with a stalker is unabashed Soderbergh-corn. Amy Irving, who delivered a memorable turn as Sue Snell in Brian DePalma's Carrie, serves up a WASP-y presence here with acting tics that feel of another time. Juno Temple, who shined in Woody Allen's Wonder Wheel, does her best with an over-the-top cardboard role (something we see a lot in the cackling, twitchy patients of prison and Snake Pit flicks and TV shows). The cell phone also becomes a literal lifeline as one of the patients (played with low-key ease by Jay Pharoah) sneaks his to Sawyer to use. Thomas Newman's score of click-clacks, buzzing distortion, and a descending piano drone theme, adds to the Sawyer's desperation and is some of his most interesting work I've heard in a while. For those--like some of my groaning audience companions--who may not be thinking of the film in context of Soderbergh's filmography, may find Unsane understandably unappealing but it's rich for those like me who enjoys adult thrillers and Soderbergh's offbeat eye. ***

-Jeffery Berg

film score tu(n)esday!

Here are some of my favorite film scores so far from this year!

Shane Carruth - Upstream Color

The score by the film's director / actor / writer (impressive) was really alluring, inventive and was my key into a movie which, at times, was a bit murky.

Alexander Ebert - All is Lost

Ebert's (of Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros) melodic score made Robert Redford's trials and tribulations at sea a little more interesting to watch.

"Popular music usually has a chorus that needs to repeat, and people need to remember the song. That's sort of the major guideline when you're writing a song. And to be able to write something that did not have a chorus — and that would play for as long as it needed to and naturally disappear and come back whenever it needed to ... for me, that was very natural, actually. It was super liberating." -Alexander Ebert

Explosions in the Sky & David Wingo - Prince Avalanche

"Alone Time" is my favorite cue and its placement in the film is quite lovely.

Jóhann Jóhannsson - Prisoners

So I fell for this wacky, overlong melodrama mystery set in a wintery suburb in Pennsylvania.  The laconic score by Icelandic composer Jóhannsson is a good match with Roger Deakins' beautiful, moody photography.

Cliff Martinez - Only God Forgives

After Drive, this movie and its use of music was a bit of a letdown but Martinez offers a memorable cut "Wanna Fight?" that's pretty much the film's only highlight.

Thomas Newman - Side Effects

Chilly and repetitive, but with a slight playful tone, Newman's score to Steven Soderbergh's is very fitting and guides the movie's eeriness and myriad of plot twists.

Steven Price - Gravity

Some have complained that Price's score is a bit overwrought but I thought it added nicely to the tension and the movie's thrill-ride mentality.  It makes sense that Price was previously a music editor, since this score plays a lot with bombast and silence.

"The visuals are incredibly beautiful, but equally, it's the most terrifying thing you've ever seen in lots of ways. So the music had to do both of those things and feel kind of very organic and very textural, but equally kind of help your stomach to drop when things were spinning around you." -Steven Price

Max Richter - Wadjda

Modern classical composer Richter provided some soulful music for this deceptively simple Saudi Arabian tale.

Rob - Maniac

Throbbing mosaic of music from the Phoenix bandmate with traces of Air and John Carpenter.

"I wanted to do something very melancholic and sentimental that's related to his childhood trauma—very naive melodies and a very soft and childish mood, so that it can contrast with the violence and the horror." 

-Rob

Skrillex & Cliff Martinez - Spring Breakers

The garishness of Skrillex and the moodiness of Martinez's usual music is well-matched to the vibe of this raw, neon-hearted farce.

Hans Zimmer - 12 Years a Slave

I guess the main complaint is that Zimmer's music sounds so similar to his work on Inception and The Thin Red Line. I definitely get it and Zimmer has never been one of my favorite composers, but I found the dreamy string motif "Solomon" was used so hauntingly and beautifully throughout--doggedly stuck in different scenes of different emotions.