TRAIN DREAMS for the Senses

With an ethereal feel in its imagery and strong performances, Train Dreams is a memorable tale that engages through sight and sound as pure cinema.

At the start of the twentieth century, Robert Grainier is born and grows up in the Northwest observing the world around him.  As an adult (Joel Edgerton is superb), he finds seasonal, hard work in the burgeoning railroad and logging industries where death can happen by accident or from vendetta.  A decent, thoughtful man, he meets a woman named Gladys (Felicity Jones), and they become a couple who build a cabin and form a family together when they welcome their daughter Kate.  Frequently called away by transient work, Robert plans to build a saw mill so he can be closer to his family.  When disaster strikes, his world is altered forever.

The film’s structure follows a loose plotline as depicted in various events and reactions from Robert’s point-of-view. Through his travels he befriends and sometimes loses various people in his life including a logger (a stellar William H. Macy) and a forest ranger (Kerry Condon).  At times feeling guilt and regret, he witnesses incidents of racism and violence that expose the good and bad in others as he is haunted by visions and hallucinations from his past.    

Directed and co-written by Clint Bentley (Sing Sing), there is a strong comparison with director Terrence Malick (Days of Heaven) with the natural, visual splendor (beautifully filmed) in successive vignettes that not only give a sense of time and place, but of mood and feeling. It’s a collection of memories and relationships shot almost in documentary style and brought to life with talented actors. This memorable, sensory experience about one man’s simple, yet complicated life will linger long after the ending. 

****1/2 of ***** stars   Netflix

 

FRANKENSTEIN and the Power of Obsession

 Writer/director Guillermo del Toro (The Shape of Water) realizes his dream project of adapting Frankenstein, and the result is a masterful, atmospheric horror drama with a soul and featuring some stellar performances.

In the mid-19^th century near the Arctic north, a ship encounters Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac) on the ice being pursued by a mysterious, powerful figure.  The story behind this starts in Frankenstein’s traumatic youth with his strict surgeon father and fragile mother. As an adult, Victor is obsessed with life and death to the point he wants to create life from dead human remains. Branded a heretic, he finds an ally (Christoph Waltz) who finances his experiments which culminate in the creation of a living man/creature (Jacob Elordi), one who Victor attempts to communicate and study. When his brother William visits with his fiancée, Elizabeth (Mia Goth) it complicates matters.  Victor is torn for his feelings for Elizabeth and the disposition of his creature, who is virtually invulnerable. What follows is a harrowing odyssey of survival for the creature and Victor whose paths must cross.

It’s a fascinating take on the classic novel told in bold strokes as flashbacks and divided into chapters. The story unfolds in such a grand style that almost distracts from the narrative. The cast is led by Isaac and especially Elordi who must physically emote the tortured creature, pantomiming as wordless, childlike, then intelligent who slowly develops into a sympathetic character full of pathos.

Everything in this production exudes a gothic style superbly mounted in set design and costumes all gorgeously filmed as expected from the creator of Pan’s Labyrinth.  Comparing favorably with The Bride of Frankenstein and TV’s Frankenstein: The True Story, it’s one of del Toro’s best films and a triumph of cinematic vision.

****1/2 of ***** stars   Netflix