Hit Man (2024)

Direction: Richard Linklater
Country: USA 

Flirting with film noir and sly romance, Hit Man is the latest film by Richard Linklater (Boyhood, Before trilogy), who directs it with down-to-earth awareness from an insightful script he co-wrote with the leading actor, Glen Powell. The story, based on the 2001 Texas Monthly magazine article of the same name by Skip Hollandsworth, gracefully balances tension and mordant wit. 

Powell portrays Gary Johnson, a philosophy professor and tech nerd who works undercover for the New Orleans police as a fake contract killer. His task, carried out thoroughly, consists in closing deals with the ones who try to hire him and then arrest them. Everything runs smoothly until one day he breaks the protocol to help Madison Figueroa (Adria Arjona), a desperate woman trying to escape an abusive husband. Their instant chemistry leads them into a dangerous game with unpredictable outcomes.

Flowing with a comfortable pace, the narrative reminds you how bonds between people may change you unexpectedly and drastically. Linklater, showcasing his versatility and effortless cinematic approach, has taken a familiar premise and imbued it with a unique identity, a notion explored here in a darkly comic way. Despite its unequivocally amoral nature, I found myself cheering on the protagonists’ lawlessness.

Hit Man is breezily acted, consistently funny, often charming, and noir enough to provide a great time in the theater.

Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood (2022)

Direction: Richard Linklater
Country: USA 

This gorgeous rotoscope animated statement about a self-proclaimed fabulist is nothing more than a loosely based representation of director Richard Linklater’s childhood in Houston,Texas, during the summer of 69. The director of Boyhood puts himself in the skin of Stanley (Milo Coy), who dreams about a top secret NASA mission created to get him to the moon faster than the Russians.

This lunar conquest - simultaneously personal and real - is likely to seduce young and old folks alike as it straddles between a dreamlike scripted fiction and a rigorous slice of history. It’s a gentle chronicle of a journey to adulthood underpinned by both an evocative setting and a love of science. As an autobiographical coming-of-age effort, it looks back on the director’s most fantastic fantasies, plunging the audience into a narrative thoughtfulness that is already a staple in Linklater’s works. 

This technically perfect, irresistibly nostalgic, and extremely informative cinematic experience offers us tremendously rich details about a specific time that are to be savored and absorbed without reservation. References to music and cinema, games and pranks, school activities and sports, as well as the family environment are pure enrapturement. 

The picture spreads an infectious good mood with a vast number of aspects I could easily relate to. I miss those times with no cell phones nor the internet undermining a way of living that seemed more candid. Combining a legitimate dramatic structure with enchanting visual results, Apollo 10 1/2 is an immersive fantasy stripped of stiffness, where one finds comfort, loveliness, and sweet moments of grace.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette (2019)

Direction: Richard Linklater
Country: USA

Comfortably enjoying his status of prodigious filmmaker and storyteller, Richard Linklater (Boyhood; Before Trilogy), stumbles terribly in Where’d You Go, Bernadette, a farcical comedy-drama that unlike its central character struggles to establish an immediate, strong connection with the viewer.

Adapted from the 2012 comedy novel of the same name, this flawed film never does justice to Maria Semple’s book, despite a few sympathetic moments that arise from the mighty presence of Cate Blanchett as the apparently dysfunctional, socially anxious Bernadette Fox.

Once a brilliant architect, this frequently impolite woman has exchanged L.A. for Seattle when she lost confidence in herself and stopped working for 20 years. She avoids people to the point of hiring a remote assistant in India for practically every basic need, but her brittle nerves start to attack hard again after she has promised to take her 15-year-old daughter, Bee (Emma Nelson), on a trip to Antarctica.

Besides all the thoughts of fear related to the trip, the relationship with her workaholic husband, Elgin (Billy Crudup), a Microsoft guru, gets more and more complicated in the sequence of an unjustified brawl with her neighbor Audrey (Kristen Wiig), an usurpation attempt from the Russian Mafia, and a problem with a prescription for seasickness medication. However, this tension between husband and wife never went beyond surface frictions, feeling more hypocrite than credible.

Despite the preliminary punchy spice, the film ended up almost flavorless due to a fabricated final section, or should I say confection, so idiotically portrayed that one may question if this is actually a Linklater film.

Toggling between self-commiseration and looking forward attitude, this dramedy turned nonsensical adventure fills each frame with an unconvincing euphoric reassurance. Its descendent trajectory in terms of engagement prevents it to succeed. One reason to see it? Blanchett!

Last Flag Flying (2017)

Directed By Richard Linklater
Country: USA

Throughout his outstanding career, reputed writer-director Richard Linklater proved to have a special gift, handling conversational romantic dramas (Before Trilogy), meticulous coming-of-age epics (“Boyhood”, “Dazed and Confused”), and entertaining period comedies (“Bernie”, “Everybody Wants Some”) with plenty of thoughtfulness, charm, and narrative charisma.

This time around, he joined forces with novelist Darryl Ponicsan to present a totally different story and style. Far more traditional, I would say.

“Last Flag Flying” takes a poignant look at war and at a father’s suffering. However, this woefully dramatic view intertwines with a comedic side that only works intermittently, without never providing that plain satisfaction one expects.

Not so cozy or smart in the dialogue, the film tells us about three old friends and Navy-vets, Larry "Doc" Shepherd (Steve Carell), Sal Nealon (Bryan Cranston), and Richard Mueller (Laurence Fishburne), who reunite in sad circumstances, decades after having returned from Vietnam.

Arrived from Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Doc, who finds everyone on the Internet and did time in a US Navy prison, was the one with the initiative of establishing contact with Sal, the reckless, permanently-hungover owner of a small bar, and Richard, a former alcoholic now turned into a married, respectful preacher at the Beacon Baptist Church. The reason for that is because Doc, now a widower, needs help to fetch and bury the dead body of his 21-year-old son, another national hero killed in Baghdad, days before Saddam Husain has been captured.

The friends drive to the Dover Air Force Base, just to learn that Doc’s son was no hero after all. He died when he left the base to get cokes for his buddies. Piqued by Sal, who approves of conflict and confrontation, Doc opts for taking his son to Portsmouth and bury him like a civilian in his graduation suit, provoking the exasperation of the authoritative Lt Col. Willits (Yul Vazquez).
 
The road trip back home becomes quite adventurous with some unexpected frictions, a couple of good laughs regarding the time in Vietnam, along with some regrets too, and the tightness of an almost forgotten friendship. Yet, the film keeps relying too much on the bigmouthed Sal and his agitated personality to impress, which, unfortunately, didn’t cause so much impact on me. 

Making a feel-good movie from a tragedy is no easy-to-do task, and Linklater only partially succeeds in that challenging endeavor. For most of its duration, “Last Flag Flying” felt more like a banal film rather than a Linklater’s film. Since the characters look and sound hypocritical on several occasions, authenticity was never set as a priority.