Why every guy should see Bridesmaids

Because you can observe a lot by just watching as Yogi says. Because you might just fall in love (with Kristin Wiig) for two hours and five minutes. And because it’s just really a good movie.

How many times have you heard women talk or seen them interact with no man in sight? Ne-ver! Well, here’s your chance.

Even though the conversations and the actions in movies and plays are highly scripted – there’s always something true about them, and there seems to be a lot of truth here.

Men and women are raised in different camps even when they grow up in the same house. Women are so much better at keeping themselves mysterious, except in the company of other women. So, if you want to find out a little more about how much you don’t know, see this movie.

After Anne Frank

Can something be about everything? Imagine the lens of a camera through which you see everything, including a lens and a camera. Now you’re ready for Carol Lempert’s latest one-woman show, “After Anne Frank.”

On the surface, this is a performance about an actress who, through serendipity, has played every female part in the theatrical staging of the Diary of Anne Frank, and this actress happens to be the one telling you the story.

But it is also about the uneasy interdependence of history and drama. Are there some realities so profound that mere words can never do them justice? Does telling the story exploit its source? But if we don’t tell the story out of some deep reverence for the unthinkable will it whither in silence, and be forgotten?

These philosophical and moral questions spring out of this virtuoso performance interlaced with humor, yes laugh-out-loud humor, and journalistic, political, and legal lessons about how many different lives a single story can take.

It’s a play about a play that asks you how much playing is too much. Does this sound clever? It’s certainly that, but it’s much more; the talent of the actress turns the “ideas” with which it plays into a palpable experience for the audience.

The playwright/actress puts a piece of crystal in your hands, then turns it over, and with each new turn, something else gets revealed. And then, with genuine concern, she reaches across vales of karma to the original protagonist holding pen and notebook.

The Fringe has elected to include “After Anne Frank” in its upcoming season. Be sure to check local listings.

Tree of Life

There can be no broader canvas than the one on which this film is painted. It reaches back to the beginning of life and seemingly goes beyond the end of time. Throughout is the intensely personal story of a 1950’s Texas family living with more than the usual problems, but not so unusual that we cannot relate. All of the action is seen through the eyes of a sensitive boy.

This is not a film for the casual movie-goer. There isn’t a single laugh, not even a smile. And while the beauty of the visuals is arresting, for viewers whose expectations have not been set, all of this beauty will only produce impatience and bewilderment.

The narrative voice at the beginning sets the underpinning which is a debate between “nature” and “grace.” Nature gives us beauty, sustenance, and life itself, but it cares nothing for us as individuals; it takes grace for that, embodied in this film by the actress Jessica Chastain, mother to three young boys.

To show how sweeping the time shifts are, consider this: Brad Pitt plays Sean Penn’s father. The story is told through visual echoes, sometimes very subtle. In nature, there is conflict; beauty is a by-product; just as real is the conflict between human beings. Dissatisfaction is a potent force. Creating beauty is an act of courage. I believe this is the director’s vision, but it may be too much to expect one-time viewers to share it.