6A — Monday, March 5, 2018
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Live action Oscar shorts 
continue to pack a punch

The 
Oscar 
nominees 
for 

Live Action Short this year 
are a mixed bag in topic, 
tone and execution. The five 
nominees touch on everything 
from the mistreatment of deaf 
British school children to the 
systematic racism that existed 
a century after abolition in the 
South — sometimes testing the 
integrity of the edges of dusty 
theater seats, and at times 
accomplishing no more than 
a chorus of groans from the 
audience to skip on to the next 
one. 

“DeKalb 
Elementary” 

depicts 
in 
real 
time 
the 

harrowing 
half-hour 
that 

follows 
an 
armed 
intruder 

entering a school. All one scene, 
shot entirely in the school’s 
front office, featuring only two 
main characters throughout, 
“DeKalb” finds success in its 
simplicity. 
It 
doesn’t 
dress 

up the conflict to heighten 
the stakes because it doesn’t 
need to — more than enough 
tension is created by virtue 
of 
the 
situation. 
“DeKalb” 

is an ode to human empathy 
and 
understanding 
in 
the 

tight spaces where it ought 
to exist the least, and strong 
performances from everyone 
involved make it a front runner 
for this award.

“The Silent Child” has a plot 

too convoluted for a short. It 

pits a social worker against her 
patient Libby’s mother when 
the mother makes Libby forgo 
learning sign language to learn 
lip reading and speech therapy 
in its place. Difficulty explaining 
the plot in a sentence does not 
bode well for a 20 minute run 
time. The short could have 
been saved had it not lay such 
focus on the mother. It tries too 
hard to build her up as some 
misguided villain while losing 
sight of the far more interesting 
relationship between Libby and 
her caretaker. The filmmakers 
throw up statistics about deaf 
children suffering in the British 
public school system before 
the credits roll, making the 
whole thing feel more like a 
manipulative humane society 
ad than an Oscar nominated 
short film.

“My 
Nephew 
Emmitt” 

tells an unfortunate tale of 
Black subjugation in postwar 
America. 
Slavery 
had 
been 

outlawed 
almost 
a 
century 

before, yet Moses Wright and 
his family are powerless to 
stop a group of white men who 
come to take away their visiting 
relative for flirting with a white 
woman 
in 
town. 
“Emmitt” 

is reminiscent of this year’s 
“Mudbound” in both setting 
and sentiment. It’s certainly 
not as fleshed out as the feature 
film (not that it realistically 
could be), but manages to carry 
a similar weight. 

“The Eleven O’Clock” is 

the only comedic nominee of 

the five. The short plays off 
the gag of a psychiatrist whose 
patient is living the delusion 
that he is a psychiatrist, too, 
leading to some funny moments 
within the confusion. But the 
strong concept leaves itself a 
little long, and almost outstays 
its welcome. In a way, the 
interaction between the two 
men 
devolves 
too 
quickly, 

becoming loud and absurd too 
fast, breaking the suspension 
of disbelief that either one of 
the characters shown could 
be an actual trained medical 
professional. 
It’s 
difficult. 

“Eleven” is unique in this field 
of five for its playful approach, 
but falls short for that same 
reason. There isn’t enough meat 
behind it, yet it is a refreshing 
change of pace from the darker 
tone that pervades the rest of 
the category. 

“Watu Wote” mirrors the 

real-life 2015 story of a group 
of Muslims who protect their 
fellow Christian bus passengers 
from a group of Al-Shabaab 
terrorists. 
The 
Muslims 

conceal the Christians within 
their ranks, staring down rifle 
barrels without giving them 
up. “Wote” starts off slow, 
taking its time establishing the 
main character with Muslim 
prejudices so that they can be 
squashed later on. The actual 
event of the bus being held 
up doesn’t occur until about 
halfway through the short, but 
the execution of the sequence 
doesn’t disappoint. 

STEPHEN SATARINO

For the Daily

FILM REVIEW

SLICK FILMS

HAMBURG MEDIA SCHOOL

‘Film Stars Don’t Die In 
Liverpool’ lacks relevance

The age-gap romance has 

been 
repeatedly 
explored 

in sitcoms and soap operas, 
movies and literature, so the 
setup for “Film Stars Don’t 
Die in Liverpool” sounds like 
a tired subject matter. We’ve 
all seen the Gloria and Jay 
Pritchetts of the world. We’re 
used to the alarming difference 
in age between actors and 
actresses (as in a 61-year-old 
Liam Neeson starring opposite 
a 29-year-old Olivia Wilde in 
“Third Person”). However, the 

typical gender roles are flipped 
in director Paul McGuigan’s 
latest 
film. 
Instead 
of 
a 

bland, rich man with a young, 
attractive 
girlfriend, 
this 

film, based on a memoir of the 
same title, pairs a renowned 
former movie actress with a 
younger lover. For McGuigan, 
whose filmography consists 
largely of action movies like 
“Gangster No. 1,” this romantic 
adaptation is a surprise.

“Film Stars Don’t Die in 

Liverpool” 
examines 
the 

relationship between Gloria 
Grahame 
(Annette 
Bening, 

“20th Century Women”) and 
Peter 
Turner 
(Jamie 
Bell, 

“Man On A Ledge”) in the late 
’70s and early ’80s. Grahame, 
notorious for her vanity and 
brief 
success 
in 
the 
’50s, 

realizes her death is imminent 
after a long struggle with 
breast cancer. She reconnects 
with her old flame, Turner, 
a stage actor, and joins his 
family in Liverpool. A series of 
flashbacks reveal their history, 
but unfortunately the script 
does not stretch adequately 
into Grahame’s acting heyday. 
As a result, screenwriter Matt 
Greenhalgh avoids making a 
significant, relevant political 
statement about the treatment 
of older actresses and what 

MEGHAN CHOU

Daily Arts Writer

FILM REVIEW

happens 
after 
fame. 
The 

concentration 
remains 
on 

her final years in obscurity 
without a comparison to her 
life in the spotlight.

Bell 
and 
Bening 
deliver 

strong performances, milking 
depth out of the thin writing. 
Bening mixes regalness with 
spunky wit and tries to elevate 
the portrayal of Grahame. Bell 
also does a good job, playing 
off of Bening with believable 
chemistry. 
However, 
the 

lackluster script holds back 
both actors and does not do 
the memoir justice. Despite 
the 
winning 
acting, 
the 

casting of Bell and Bening 

does not make sense with the 
real life people involved in 
the story. The down-to-earth 
Bening does not match the 
divaness of Grahame, nor does 
the introspective Bell align 
with the easygoing Turner. 
In the end, this story with so 
much potential falls short of 
expectations.

“Film Stars Don’t Die in 

Liverpool” had early Oscar 
buzz 
that 
quickly 
faded 

following its initial release 
in the United Kingdom. With 
such a rich background to pull 
from given Gloria Grahame’s 
messy, 
often 
scandalous 

career, the script really does a 

disservice to her colorful life. 
Grahame won an Oscar in 1952 
for her work in “The Bad and 
the Beautiful” and appeared 
in blockbuster hits like “It’s 
a Wonderful Life” and “In a 
Lonely Place.” Although the 
film touches on some of her 
most well-known works, it 
skates over her intoxicatingly 
complicated 
marriages 

and 
professional 
exploits. 

Bening prevents the hectic 
writing from swallowing this 
fascinating woman completely, 
but overall “Film Stars Don’t 
Die in Liverpool” kills off its 
best material before it has the 
chance to grow.

SONY PICTURES CLASSICS

‘An American Marriage’ 
is an instantaneous classic

The title of “An American 

Marriage” might conjure up a 
stilted vision of the American 
dream 
inflected 
by 
1950s 

nostalgia: 
gingham-print 

aprons, towheaded children, 
suburban purgatory. It’s a 
white-washed understanding 
of Americana, and I’m not just 
talking about the picket fences. 
But this is exactly the notion 
of what makes a marriage 
“American” that Tayari Jones’s 
accomplished 
new 
novel 

interrogates, complicates and 
ultimately dismisses. In its 
place, Jones offers a vision of 
marriage in modern America 
that is raw and complex, and 
asks us to consider how the 
most intimate parts of our 
lives can be shaped by national 
narratives beyond our control.

Celestial 
Davenport 
is 

strong-willed and formidable, 
a 
folk-artist 
from 
Atlanta 

who makes custom dolls. Roy 
Hamilton is ambitious and 
entrepreneurial, 
determined 

to rise above his small-town 
Louisiana roots and make 
a name for himself. Both 
are 
graduates 
of 
southern 

historically-Black colleges and 
universities, navigating what 
it means to be a part of “What 
the rest of America thinks of as 
middle-middle-class and what 
Black America calls upper-
middle-class” in a country 
still haunted by the pre-
Civil Rights traumas of their 
parents and grandparents.

From the beginning, Jones 

insists on the intersection of 
the personal and political. 
Celestial and Roy’s tumble 

into a passionate and often 
volatile marriage blends easily 
into the canon of “universal” 
narratives, speaking to the 
optimistic ease with which 
young people commit to a 
lifetime together before they 
can possibly understand how 

long a lifetime really is. But 
their marriage is also hemmed 
tightly 
to 
the 
particular 

circumstances 
of 
race, 

history 
and 
socioeconomic 

status. Celestial, who comes 
from 
greater 
economic 

privilege, 
is 
constantly 

aware of this imbalance in 
their relationship, and Roy’s 
mother criticizes him for not 
marrying a woman of his own 
social class so he can “Lift 
somebody up with him.” They 
both want their children to be 
raised in a world where they 
aren’t constantly reminded of 
their race. As Roy says, “I’m 
not going to remind my kids 
that somebody died in order 
for me to do everyday things.”

Their expectations of one 

another’s gender roles adds 
another layer of complication 
to their marriage. Roy is 
conservative, constantly needs 
affirmation of his masculinity 
and expects his wife to be 
subordinate. 
Celestial 
is 

stridently 
feminist, 
insists 

that they remove “to obey” 
from 
their 
wedding 
vows 

and 
feels 
pressured 
into 

motherhood regardless of her 
own doubts: “Is motherhood 
really optional when you’re 
a perfectly normal woman 
married to a perfectly normal 
man?” Jones’s gift for nuance 
makes it possible for readers to 
root for this couple and, in the 
same breath, question whether 
their relationship is entirely 
healthy.

Then tragedy strikes: Roy is 

falsely accused and convicted 
of rape, and sentenced to 12 
years in a Louisiana prison 
— known to be one of the 
worst states for Black men in 
the justice system. When his 
conviction is overturned five 
years later and he is released 
into the world, he and Celestial 
must 
contend 
with 
the 

destruction of their American 
dream by a systematically 
unjust 
justice 
system 
and 

with the new people they’ve 
become.

The narrative is instantly 

classic: one part “To Kill a 
Mockingbird,” one part “The 
Count 
of 
Monte 
Cristo.” 

But it is also contemporary, 
immediate and keenly critical. 
Jones’s greatest gift as a writer, 
besides 
the 
lyrical 
beauty 

of her prose and compelling 
complexity of her characters, 
is her ability to see the forest 
for the trees, to understand 
the silent forces that guide our 
lives and to fight for the right 
to choose a different direction. 
With “An American Marriage,” 
Jones testifies to an expanded 
understanding 
of 
whose 

stories need to be included 
in the canon of “universal” 
American 
narratives, 
and 

carves a place for herself as 
one of the great chroniclers of 
American life.

JULIA MOSS
Daily Arts Writer

BOOK REVIEW

“An American 

Marriage”

Tayari Jones

Algonquin Books

February 6

Courtesy of Tayari Jones