Film Review 2. The Border

This 1982 film by Tony Richardson fell through the cracks upon its initial release. Thirty years later The Border is an interesting curio with a relevant theme of corruption on the Texas-Mexico border that still remains topical. Richardson seems like an odd choice for this material. Part of the original British "New Wave" which consisted of guys like Lindsay Anderson and Reisz, Richardson had won the coveted Oscar for Best Director twenty years earlier for Tom Jones. Nicholson is really subdued in his performance as border patrol cop Charlie Smith .He doesn't display the usual Jack mannerisms. See Sean's Penn's The Pledge for another example. Uprooted from SoCal to Texas with his material obsessed wife Marcy (Valerie Perrine) he finds himself neck-deep in corruption. From his new partner Cat (Harvey Keitel) all the way up to his boss Red (Warren Oates, in one of his final performances). The movie's screenplay is penned by Walon Green, writer of Peckinpah's seminal The Wild Bunch. Nicholson's character eventual goes on the take, after initially resisting. He later sours when he sees the level of corruption from the black market circle on the border, even to the point of trying to cover up murders. Nicholson later develops a conscience when he helps a young Mexican woman find her missing infant that has been stolen and sold from Mexico into Texas.

The Border doesn't try to get too ambitious with its material; but remains watchable thanks to the cast of players involved. Nicholson's quiet and introspective Charlie is the polar opposite of Jack Torrence or Randal McMurphy. The denouement ends on a somewhat predictable note with Charlie rescuing the infant and having a stand-off with his corrupt partners in a junkyard.

Film Review 1. We Need to Talk About Kevin

Lynn Ramsey's film doesn't offer easy answers. It won't readily open up to the viewer all at once. What we are given is in piecemeal. Fragments of time stretched out over a span of sixteen years. The story takes place inside the deteriorating mind of Eva, (Tilda Swinton) her last refuge from the outside world and the actions perpetuated by her son Kevin, a demon seed that was always in the making.  Kevin is portrayed by three different actors representing each stage of his development. When Kevin is a toddler, he just irritates by shrieking constantly. Between the ages of 6 and 8 (Jasper Newell) he is a master manipulator in progress.  In one instance, Kevin destroys Eva's study room by using spray paint to color over the maps on her wall that represent places she wants to visit one day. He just smiles at her innocently, Kevin knows what buttons to push. In another episode he enrages Eva enough that she deliberately makes Kevin fall off a table and breaks his arm.

As a teenager (Ezra Miller) Kevin has blossomed into a younger version of Eva in appearance. The mirror image is closer than Eva would like to admit.  Kevin still finds outlets to torture his mother. He is always displays a sweet and affectionate facade around his father, Franklin (John C.  Reilly). Franklin is terminally upbeat. He always makes excuses for Kevin's behavior. He is polite and disconnected, which just reiterates his profound cluelessness that he thinks his family is living under any sense of normalcy. When Kevin is around his younger sister he projects a barely concealed contempt masked by annoyance.

An early dream sequence represents the maelstrom of Eva's delicate psyche. She is seen in a state of euphoria; dancing with hundreds of others in some kind of orgy of blood. Gallons of it. The camera zooms in further and what actually transpires is some kind of tomato festival in a locale that was probably featured on one of Eva's maps that Kevin desecrated. The image is disturbing, although it will portend what follows. Nobody talks about Kevin much. The film doesn't provide us with moments of  cross examinations from counselors. Classroom scenes that would illustrate Kevin's behavior among his peers. Every event that is witnessed, is from Eva's battered psyche after sixteen years of misery. Her life seems to have been a bunch disconnected episodes which she didn't willingly take part in. She has no compass, much like Kevin's own trajectory. They just happened.

We Need to Talk About Kevin is an unflinching character study, well acted and directed. It doesn't make any compromises.