Blue Moon (2025)

 

Blue Moon (2025) – Ethan Hawke portrays Lorenz Hart, the lyricist that partnered with Richard Rodgers before he found Hammerstein. The movie takes place in a single night at the Broadway restaurant, Sardis, on the night Oklahoma opens and everything changes. It reads like a filmed stage play. The action never leaves the restaurant and although there would be ample opportunity for flashbacks, the movie handles everything with dialogue. I was surprised to learn that it was written directly for the screen. Blue Moon refers to the Rodgers and Hart tune you have heard your whole life. Elvis even did a cover of it at Sun Records. Hart was a cliché of a theater guy, short, gay, and an alcoholic. Ethan Hawke portrays all of this quite impressively even shrinking in size when necessary. Adam Scott gives a pleasantly subdued performance as Richard Rodgers. Simon Delaney plays the coruplent Oscar Hammerstein. Other famous people making appearance include E.B. White (Charlotte's Web), Hammerstein's protege Stephen Sondheim is somehow dragged to the restaurant looking 10 years old. Future Film director, George Roy Hill is squeezed in. Now although Hart plays for the other team so much of the drama is around Hart's infatuation with the Elizabeth Weiland character played by Margaret Qualley. She gives him a hope and rejection arc. How did Andie McDowell who couldn't act worth a lick wind up with two daughters than can? Richard Linklater is the underrated Gen X director, although it's hard to understand what he was thinking with his Bad News Bears remake. I bet you this is one day made into a Broadway show. If I were an Academy member I'd vote for Hawke. He's good here and too talented to have never won.

Worst Person in the World (2021)

 

Worst Person in the World (2021) – Joachim Trier's previous effort. Same lead actress, Renate Reinsve. Renate smiles occasionally in this one making her 2x more attractive. The downside is she is flighty like a lot of manic pixie dream girls, even if the Scandinavian version of that trope is otherwise more outwardly reserved than the crazy American version, but every bit as loopy on the inside. I have not read any reviews on it but my guess is that American critics will like her feminist free spirit although the observant viewer will understand how such a thing overlaps into self-destruction. The title is ironic. She's not the worst person. She's capricious. I've dated women like her. Nearly every attractive theater chick has these qualities. They are fun to date until they blow up. Trier captures the qualities of such a dame and demonstrates the vivaciousness that keeps me on the train longer than their wisdom would otherwise allow. There are obligatory topless shots, but she shows us a ding dong too. Equity, I guess. The ending is presented as upbeat on the surface, but it leaves open the question of whether she is happy or just not yet bored yet with her newest reality. If a person can't settle for happiness they will no doubt earn unhappiness in the long run.

Sentimental Value (2025)

 

Sentimental Value (2025) - Stellan Skarsgard (Good Will Hunting Math Professor) returns to his Swedish ancestral home for the funeral of his ex-wife reuniting, himself with his estranged adult daughters played by actresses I have not previously seen. Skarsgard we learn is a film director of some note, but hasn't made a movie in like 15 years. One of his daughters is a rising stage and television actress who holds a grudge against him for abandoning the family. Skarsgard has written a script for a comeback film and asks the daughter to star in the film. She rejects the offer accusing him of using her new ascending notoriety to get financing, Skarsgard retreats and is next seen in a theater celebrating the retrospection of his film career. He is forlorn by the ending of his active career but still touched by a scene he shot two decades prior that stars his other daughter as a ten year old. When the lights come up we see a teary Elle Fanning, who the audience learns is a big Hollywood movie star. Fanning invites him to join her group for dinner and they click. One thing leads to another and Fanning is going to star in his dormant project. That's the plot point that ends Act 1 and I found the entire film brilliant, maybe for personal reasons as I have two daughters. Skarsgard is an artist and his artistry is central to who he is and therefore central to the conflicts with his ex-wife and why he became estranged to the family. Late in the film the more accepting daughter is upset that he pitched a role in the film to her ten year old son. She doesn't want her son invested in that world. She says making the film with him was the best moment of her life and then he disappeared. She cannot have him do that to her son. Meanwhile, Elle Fanning realizes that she is wrong for the part, and seeks out the stage actress daughter to understand why she turned it down. Taken together the audience starts to see that art is how he shows his love to his family. He wrote the script not as a comeback, but as a way to connect with the estranged daughter. I think I'm most impressed with the effort because I don't think that an artist's personal flaws have ever been explained in such personal and familial context as related to the art. Thankfully it was nominated for Best Picture or I doubt I ever would have bothered with it.