The Bandit

Movies to See Right Now (at home)

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THE LOVEBIRDS

This week: a Hollywood buddy documentary, an all-on-screens horror film, a current Netflix rom com and a sweet, heartfelt indie. Plus the most eclectic watch-at-home recommendations you’ll find anywhere.

ON VIDEO

Burt Reynolds and Hal Needham in THE BANDIT. Photo courtesy of the San Francisco Film Society.

The Bandit: The buddies in this buddy documentary are mega-star Burt Reynolds and his stuntman/friend/roommate Hal Needham, who directed the enormously successful Smokey and the Bandit franchise. The Bandit is a hoot, and features some amazing movie stunts., Stream it from Amazon, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

Unfriended: Teenagers convene via webcams on social media. But their computers are hijacked by an Unknown Force who starts wreaking revenge. It’s a perfect little horror film for a time when we are living our lives on Zoom. Unfriended is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and to stream from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and Flixster.

The Lovebirds: Issa Rae (Insecure) and Kumail Nanjiani (Silicon Valley, The Big Sick) star in this rom com. The plot is playful, but the relationship is truthful. It’s streaming on Netflix.

Driveways: I can’t think of a more authentic movie about intergenerational relationships than this charming, character-driven indie. The more I think about Driveways, the more I admire it. It also features the final performance – so genuine and subtle – by Brian Dennehy. Driveways is available to stream on all the major platforms.

The most eclectic watch-at-home recommendations you’ll find ANYWHERE:

ON TV

On June 18, Turner Classic Movies will air the hard-to-find Pale Flower, one of my Overlooked Noir This Japanese neo-noir is a slow burn that erupts into thrilling set pieces. Writer-director Masahiro Shinoda’s masterpiece is pioneering neo-noir. Don’t miss it.

PALE FLOWER

Movies to See Right Now

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Ben Foster and Chris Pine in HELL OR HIGH WATER
Ben Foster and Chris Pine in HELL OR HIGH WATER

Topping my recommendations is the best movie of the year so far – the character-driven crime drama Hell or High Water. It’s atmospheric, gripping, and packed with superb performances. Hell or High Water is a screenwriting masterpiece by Taylor Sheridan. Must See.

Here are other attractive movie choices:

  • Really liked the New Zealand teen-geezer adventure dramedy Hunt for the Wilderpeople.
  • Florence Foster Jenkins is not just a one-joke movie about a bad singer – it’s a love story about trying to protect the one that you love.
  • I found the documentary about Burt Reynolds and his stuntman/director Hal Needham, The Bandit, very enjoyable; it’s playing on CMT.
  • Don’t Think Twice is a dramedy set in the world of comedy, another smart, insightful little film by Mike Birbiglia.
  • Woody Allen’s love triangle comedy Cafe Society is a well-made and entertaining diversion, but hardly a Must See.

Don’t have an unbridled recommendation for Mia Madre.

My DVD/Stream of the Week is the painfully timely Weiner, one of my Best Movies of 2016 – So Far. Weiner is available on DVD from Netflix and to stream from Amazon Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and DirecTV.

Today, Turner Classic Movies airs The Conversation.  And coming up on September 12, TCM delivers early Spielberg: The Sugarland Express (1974).  White trash anti-heroes (Goldie Hahn and William Atherton) pull off a jail break, but their harebrained scheme evolves into a man-hunt and then a hostage standoff.   The wonderfully underused Ben Johnson plays the lawman.

The young Steven Spielberg’s career trajectory as a director began with Duel and a couple of other TV movies, and then The Sugarland Express was his first feature.   Right after Sugarland came Jaws and Close Encounters and Raiders and ET and etc.   The Sugarland Express was made in that very brief period when big movie studios let auteur directors tell stories that today could only be made as “indies” (like The Conversation, Five Easy Pieces, The Last Picture Show, Taxi Driver, All That Jazz).

Movies to See Right Now

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Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant in FLORENCE FOSTER JENKINS
Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant in FLORENCE FOSTER JENKINS

Traditionally movie-poor August is past, but these are good choices:

  • Really liked the New Zealand teen-geezer adventure dramedy Hunt for the Wilderpeople.
  • Florence Foster Jenkins is not just a one-joke movie about a bad singer – it’s a love story about trying to protect the one that you love.
  • I found the documentary about Burt Reynolds and his stuntman/director Hal Needham, The Bandit, very enjoyable; it’s playing on CMT.
  • Woody Allen’s love triangle comedy Cafe Society is a well-made and entertaining diversion, but hardly a Must See.
  • I haven’t seen them yet, but readers with really good taste have recommended Captain Fantastic and Hell or High Water.

Not an unbridled recommendation for Mia Madre, opening today.

Tonight, Turner Classic Movies airs Robert Redford and Gene Hackman in Director Michael Ritchie’s Downhill Racer. It’s one of the best sports movies ever (Olympic skiing), and it came as all three filmmakers were poised to do some of their greatest work (The Candidate, The Sting, The French Connection).

On September 5,  Turner Classic Movies brings us a fantastic comedy,  My Man Godfrey (1936).  An assembly of eccentric, oblivious, venal and utterly spoiled characters make up a rich Park Avenue family and their hangers-on during the Depression. The kooky daughter (Carole Lombard) brings home a homeless guy (William Powell) to serve as their butler. The contrast between the dignified butler and his wacky employers results in a brilliant screwball comedy that masks searing social criticism that is sharply relevant today. The wonderful character actor Eugene Pallette (who looked and sounded like a bullfrog in a tuxedo) plays the family’s patriarch, who is keenly aware that his wife and kids are completely nuts.

William Powell and Carole Lombard in MY MAN GODFREY
William Powell and Carole Lombard in MY MAN GODFREY

Movies to See Right Now

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Julian Dennison and Sam Neill in HUNT FOR THE WILDERPEOPLE
Julian Dennison and Sam Neill in HUNT FOR THE WILDERPEOPLE

The Movie Gourmet has been very quiet of late because I’m dealing with a major home remodel and a temporary move, as well as the demands of my day job, which seem to increase during even-numbered years. But I’ll be back in full force by mid-September, just in time for the big prestige movies of 2016. In the meantime:

  • Really liked the New Zealand teen-geezer adventure dramedy Hunt for the Wilderpeople.
  • Florence Foster Jenkins is not just a one-joke movie about a bad singer – it’s a love story about trying to protect the one that you love.
  • I found the documentary about Burt Reynolds and his stuntman/director Hal Needham, The Bandit, very enjoyable; it’s playing on CMT.
  • Woody Allen’s love triangle comedy Cafe Society is a well-made and entertaining diversion, but hardly a Must See.
  • I haven’t seen them yet, but readers with really good taste have recommended Captain Fantastic and Hell or High Water.

On September 1, Turner Classic Movies will be presenting the best work of Preston Sturges, the first workaday Hollywood screenwriter to transition into a major writer-director. TCM will be screening The Lady Eve, Sullivan’s Travels, Hail the Conquering Hero! and The Great McGinty, an impressive body of work that Sturges churned out between the ages of 42 and 46. Unfortunately, his turbulent personality led to conflict in his business affairs, which exacerbated his drinking. He burned out and was dead at age 60, but he left behind some of the very, very smartest and funniest movie comedies.

Veronica Lake and Joel McCrea in SULLIVAN'S TRAVELS
Veronica Lake and Joel McCrea in SULLIVAN’S TRAVELS

Movies to See Right Now

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OUR LITTLE SISTER
OUR LITTLE SISTER

In theaters right now:

  • The Japanese domestic drama Our Little Sister is remarkably uplifting. I would seek it out because it’s unlikely to remain in theaters for more than two or three weeks.
  • Zero Days is a documentary on a jaw-dropping hacker mystery – who and how was able to get Iranian military computers to destroy the hardware for their own nuclear weapons program.
  • Really liked the New Zealand teen-geezer adventure dramedy Hunt for the Wilderpeople.
  • The subversive documentary Under the Sun is a searing insight into totalitarian North Korean society, all from government-approved filming that tells a different story than the wackadoodle dictatorship intended.
  • Woody Allen’s love triangle comedy Cafe Society is a well-made and entertaining diversion, but hardly a Must See.
  • Finding Dory doesn’t have the breakthrough animation or the depth of story that we expect from Pixar, but it won’t be painful to watch a zillion times with your kids.
  • I’m not writing about Ghostbusters, but I’ve seen it, and it’s not terrible. Kristen Wiig and Melissa McCarthy are brilliant talents, and they produce some laughs in Ghostbusters.

Tomorrow, I’ll be writing about The Bandit, coming up on on CMT tomorrow night.

There’s still time to catch two of my top picks at the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival (SFJFF36), which is wrapping up this weekend. False Flag and Wrestling Jerusalem will be screening at the Rafael in San Rafael.

My DVD/Stream of the week is the hilariously dark Argentine comedy Wild Tales. Writer-director Damián Szifron presents a series of individual stories about revenge. It’s still high my list of Best Movies of 2015 – So Far. It’s now available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon Instant Video, iTunes, Vudu and Xbox Video.

THE BANDIT: a buddy movie about a buddy movie

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Burt Reynolds and Hal Needham in THE BANDIT. Photo courtesy of the San Francisco Film Society.

Writer-director Jesse Moss describes The Bandit as “a buddy movie about a buddy movie”, and he’s right. The buddies are mega-star Burt Reynolds and his stuntman/friend/roommate Hal Needham, who directed the enormously successful Smokey and the Bandit franchise.

Needham, one of only two stuntmen with an Oscar, is arguably cinema’s greatest stunt performer and stunt coordinator. Reynolds did many of his own stunts, and we we see some hard, hard falls in The Bandit. But Burt did nothing to nothing to match Needham, whose FIRST career stunt was jumping off an airplane wing to tackle a rider off his horse. We see many instances where Needham became a LITERAL car crash test dummy.

One of The Bandit’s highlights is the Needham stunt that broke his back – jumping a car off a dock and onto a barge – and slamming into the barge a little short.

There’s rich source material here from Burt’s garage (Reynolds calls it “King Tut’s Tomb for documentarinans”), which stored tapes back to 1956.

For added color, Needham and Reynolds were epic partiers, who embraced and exemplified the Mad Men era. Needham was a vivid character and lived a helluva life. I strongly recommend Terry Gross’ Fresh Air interview with Needham.

Hal’s widow told Bay Area filmmaker Jesse Moss that Needham hated documentaries because they were boring, so Moss aimed to make a documentary that Hal would enjoy. Indeed, The Bandit opens with the sly Reynolds, in maroon leisure suit with flared pant legs, mocking his own image outrageously. And, it’s a hoot throughout.

(Moss’ first movie was at San Francisco’s Castro Theater in 1979, when his dad took him a double feature of Erroll Morris’ Gates of Heaven and Hardware Wars, a documentarian born!)

I saw The Bandit at its premiere at the San Francisco International Film Festival (SFFILM). It played on TV channel CMT, and now can be streamed on Amazon, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

SFIFF: previewing the documentaries

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A scene from Josh Kriegman and Elyse Steinberg's WEINER will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 - May 5,2016.
WEINER. Photo courtesy  San Francisco Film Society.

There’s a characteristically strong slate of documentaries at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival (SFIFF).  The  docs with the highest profiles are

  • Weiner  – This hit from the Sundance and New Directors film festivals is an inside look at Anthony Weiner’s cringeworthy, self-immolating campaign for New York City Mayor;
  • Miss Sharon Jones! – Sure to be a festival crowd-pleaser, this doc chronicles the salty Dap Kings frontwoman and her fight against cancer.  From Academy Award-winning documentarian Barbara Kopple (Harlan County U.S.A.);
  • Unlocking the Cage – an animal welfare doc from storied filmmakers Chris Hegedus (The War Room) and D.A. Pennebaker (Monterey Pop and The War Room); and
  • The Bandit, in the coveted slot as the festivals’ Closing Night film, documents the real life bromance between Burt Reynolds and iconic stuntman Hal Needham that led to Needham’s Smokey and the Bandit movies.

But some of the best docs in the fest are less well-known nuggets:

  • NUTS! – a persistently hilarious (and finally poignant) documentary about the rise and fall of a medical and radio empire – all built on goat testicle “implantation” surgery in gullible humans.
  • Dead Slow Ahead – a visually stunning and an often hypnotic film, shot on a massive freighter on its voyage across vast ocean expanses with its all-Filipino crew.
  • Under the Sun – a searing insight into totalitarian North Korean society, all from government-approved footage that tells a different story than the wackadoodle dictatorship intended.

Last year’s SFIFF brought us The Look of Silence, Listen to Me Marlon, Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead and Very Semi-Serious.  The festival’s 2016 docs may be even more impressive.

The 59th San Francisco International Film Festival (SFIFF) runs through May 5. Throughout the fest, I’ll be linking more festival coverage to my SFFIF 2016 page, including both features and movie recommendations. Follow me on Twitter for the very latest coverage.

Sharon Jones performs at the Beacon Theater in Barbara Kopple's MISS SHARON JONES!, playing at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, April 21st - May 5th, 2016.Jacob Blickenstaff, 2014, courtesy of San Francisco Film Society
MISS SHARON JONES! Photo: Jacob Blickenstaff, 2014, courtesy of San Francisco Film Society.