Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (1983)

I knew going in that this would not be a jolly holiday flick. It's about prisoners of war, after all. Still, I could think of no more appropriate season to watch it.

In 1942, British Lieutenant Colonel Lawrence (Tom Conti) remains a leader among the POWs at a camp in Indonesia, serving as a bilingual liaison relatively amiable to the Japanese officers, especially the otherwise harsh Sergeant Hara (Takeshi Kitano), who says the title. But neither Lawrence nor Hara is as focal as rebellious new POW Major Celliers (David Bowie) or even Captain Yonoi (Ryuchi Sakamoto, doubling as the composer), who, for all his strictness, tends to show Celliers favor, apparently for a reason he'd rather not admit to himself....

Klaus (2019)

Wow, a brand new Christmas movie in the IMDb top 250. Has that ever happened before? And how long can we expect it to stay up there? There seemed no better choice for me to watch on Christmas itself.

The setting appears to be 19th-century Scandinavia, in an alternate timeline where the Santa Claus legend hasn't started yet. Jesper (Jason Schwartzman) is in a postal academy out of sheer nepotism and wants to flunk out and return to a spoiled life without obligation, but his father will not oblige him so easily. Instead, he is assigned to the far-northern, remote island town of Smeerensburg, where he must deliver 6,000 letters in one year or be disowned. The unfriendly citizens are caught up in a clan feud and have no desire to write to anyone. Jesper is about to give up when he accidentally delivers a kiddie drawing to hermit Klaus (J.K. Simmons), who has made many unused toys and decides to press Jesper into delivering one to that kid. Jesper spreads word among the children that letters to Klaus result in nighttime toy deliveries, and the legend begins to take shape.

Sully (2016)

I haven't seen many pieces of entertainment, in any medium, based directly on events that I heard about when they were news. In this case, it's hard for me to believe that the event happened nearly 11 years ago.

I speak of the "Miracle on the Hudson," in which long-time pilot Chesley Sullenberger (Tom Hanks) lands a damaged commercial plane on a river instead of heading for either of two nearby airports. Everyone survives, but that's not the end of Sully's troubles. He develops PTSD symptoms, he and wife Lorraine (Laura Linney) are not crazy about all the public attention, and the National Transportation Safety Board, while impressed at his landing skill, thinks he made a dangerously wrong decision and should not be allowed to fly again. Can he convince the Board that its analyses are incorrect?

The Traitor (2019)

Thanks partly to a late start on my part, I didn't connect with the Meetup group that invited me to this showing, even afterward. Still, I overheard many people discussing it as they left, so I got a good sense of prevailing emotions. It's not the kind of movie you can be quiet about once you've seen it.

Based on a true story and spanning decades, it begins when Tommaso Buscetta is already established as Don Masino, "the Boss of Two Worlds." When he's served a fair amount of time for drug trafficking in Brazil and lost far too many relatives to infighting in the Sicilian Mafia (or Cosa Nostra, as they prefer to call it), he decides to spill all kinds of secrets to the legal authorities. This is almost unprecedented at the time, and you can guess how dangerous it is, especially in areas where Cosa Nostra is actually popular.

A Soldier's Story (1984)

Uh-oh, another little-mentioned '80s drama. Fortunately in my eyes, this one came out the same year as Amadeus, which could easily overshadow something good. And most of the on-screen soldier stories I can think of aren't bad.

In World War II, CPT Richard Davenport (Howard E. Rollins, Jr.) is sent from Washington, DC, to a Louisiana army base to investigate the anonymous fatal shooting of SGT Vernon Waters (Adolph Caesar) a short way from base. Given Waters' race and the setting, the KKK is the first suspect to jump to most minds, but of course, to have the first suspicion be correct would render the movie pretty lame. The local colonel allows only three days to solve the case, and that's not the last obstacle set in Davenport's path by officers who would prefer that he not be there. Those who appear to have nothing against Black people still fear likely reactions to a Black officer investigating and possibly arresting White soldiers....

Autumn Sonata (1978)

This is only the second Ingmar Bergman film I've seen in color, as well as the first with dubbing rather than subtitles, because that's what the DVD offered. The dub dialog is finely chosen, but the accents are so heavy that I didn't immediately realize it was English. Regardless, I could appreciate the advantage of not having to read the whole time, even if I had to remind myself not to get distracted by the slight disconnect between the words and the lip movements.

Famed pianist Charlotte (Ingrid Bergman, with the similarly named but unrelated director for once) visits her eldest daughter, Eva (Liv Ullmann), for the first time in ages. She is unpleasantly surprised to find her other daughter, Helena (Lena Nyman), living there too. Helena has limited mobility and apparently some sort of brain damage, her speech rarely intelligible to anyone but Eva. Eva's husband, Viktor (Halvar Björk), is also present but mostly keeps to himself, especially when Charlotte and Eva are conversing, since these two have considerable issues with each other.

They Call Me Trinity (1970)

I mentioned in my last review of a spaghetti western that it came close to comedy. Now I've seen one that actually has comedy among its genres listed on IMDb and Wikipedia.

The title character (Terence Hill), who's never called by any name except in the first scene, wanders into a town where his brother, Bambino (Bud Spencer), happens to be impersonating a sheriff while waiting to reunite with a fugitive gang. Bambino resents Trinity's laziness and proclivity to fights, but he'll take what help he can get to settle a conflict involving pacifistic Mormon settlers (who seem more like Amish to me), a land-grabbing major (Farley Granger), and some Mexican bandits out to take undue advantage of hospitality.

The Greatest Showman (2017)

For my other full viewing on a plane lately, I selected another spectacle, this one depending much more on audio, which thankfully was not defective this time. I had heard mixed reviews, but the high praise from some individuals who dis a lot of today's blockbusters got me curious.

The story follows P.T. Barnum, starting in childhood but quickly moving to young adulthood (when he's played by Hugh Jackman). Unsatisfied with a lower-class life, perhaps especially after marrying former rich girl Charity (Michelle Williams) and having two daughters with her, he takes great risks to seek success in the entertainment field. When his wax museum flops, he launches a freak show that becomes apparently the first example of what leaps to mind when we hear "circus" outside depictions of ancient Rome. Its tawdry nature makes it controversial even at the time, so he has to try harder to gain the respect afforded aristocrats.

Alita: Battle Angel (2019)

My plane headset had a bad case of feedback, so I missed at least a third of the dialog herein. I almost opted on that basis not to review the movie. But I had chosen it partly because I suspected that it was the kind of spectacle that didn't count on viewers paying close attention to dialog. Besides, for anything important I missed, I could (and did) check a synopsis later. Which confirmed my suspicions.

By the mid-26th century, technology has greatly advanced, not least for cyborgs, but if you're living in Iron City rather than the floating metropolis of Zalem, things look rather gritty. It is in the former location that a nearly dead cyborg who doesn't remember her name (Rosa Salazar) finds her human brain in a mostly new body thanks to scrap-hunting engineer Dr. Ido (Christoph Waltz), who calls her Alita in honor of his departed daughter. As Alita seeks an identity—not necessarily her old one—she discovers her knack for fighting as well as a few good contexts for her to do so, from joining the aggressive motorball races to hunting criminal cyborgs. But she still has some key things to learn, including what her incipient boyfriend, Hugo (Keean Johnson), has gotten himself mixed up in....

Take Shelter (2011)

Although IMDb lists horror among the genres of this picture, it's more of a psychological thriller. There is little violence, and nobody dies, tho that doesn't prevent a horror classification. The R rating appears to be entirely for swearing. Still, it at least hints at horrific premises. An immediate sequel, if there were one, might just delve into them.

Ohio construction worker Curtis (Michael Shannon) is under a lot of stress lately. He keeps getting nightmares that produce rare physical symptoms, perhaps as a result of inordinate fear. These dreams are consistent enough in theme -- a storm provoking maniacally hostile behavior in people and animals -- that he starts to take them as prophecy. Moreover, when awake, he keeps sensing signs of an intense if not bizarre imminent storm that nobody else senses. Not daring to ignore these, he seeks to expand an old storm shelter. In doing so, he defies employer rules, financial wisdom, and the convention of being honest and candid with one's wife, in this case Samantha (Jessica Chastain).