Leonardo DiCaprio has been Martin Scorcese’s favorite leading man in recent years, starring in Gangs of New York (2002), The Aviator (2004) and The Departed (2006), which won the Academy Award for Best Picture while simultaneously finally landing the legendary director an elusive Oscar. Unfortunately, the pair’s latest collaboration, Shutter Island, fails to measure up to their last, for it simply peters out after establishing a very promising premise.
The movie was adapted from the best seller of the same name by Dennis Lehane, the New England novelist known for his Boston-based murder mysteries like Mystic River and Gone Baby Gone. Shutter Island, by contrast, is a psychological thriller set in 1954 off the coast of Massachusetts at Ashecliffe Mental Hospital for the Criminally-Insane.
As the film unfolds, we’re introduced to Federal Marshals Teddy Daniels (DiCaprio) and Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo) as they head by ferry to the high-security facility to help handle a crisis situation. This deliberately-paced opening tableau is rather evocative of the Gothic horror genre, atmospherically, as the boat slowly breaks through a thick mist to reveal the eerie specter of an imposing edifice sitting high atop the tiny isle, ala the fog-shrouded mansion or castle of so many classic haunted house flicks.
Headline: Oscar-Nominated Iraq Fallout Flick Re-Released in Theaters
While The Hurt-Locker, the Iraq War’s answer to Saving Private Ryan, has been getting a lot of attention during awards season, for my money, the period piece which will be better remembered a generation from now is The Messenger. I mean really, how much creativity does it take to blow a bunch of battle-fatigued Marines to smithereens as they scour the streets of Baghdad in what looks like heat-seeking, scuba diving equipment? Sure, the graphic splatter flick certainly generates a lot of tension along the way, but who goes to the movies to sit there bracing yourself for the sight of young soldiers on IED detection duty being scrambled in an instant into unrecognizable body parts.
The Messenger, which written and directed by Oren Moverman, is sort of a sequel to The Hurt Locker, since it focuses on death and grieving, the unfortunate fallout of the ugly business that is war. For this reason, the film might have been more appropriately titled “The Hurt Locker 2,” since the term is defined as a period of inescapable, immense emotional pain.
The peripatetic buddy adventure revolves around Army Captain Tony Stone (Woody Harrelson) and Staff Sergeant Will Montgomery (Ben Foster), partners stationed stateside assigned the thankless task job of informing next of kin that a loved one has perished overseas on the field of battle. Steely Stone understands the rules of engagement, especially the one about no fraternizing with or even hugging attractive, vulnerable widows. But sensitive-type Will must have kept his fingers crossed when he made that pledge, because he has a hard time following protocol after delivering the grim news to Olivia Pitterson (Samantha Morton) that her husband has perished.
Reuniting the same charismatic cast and characters from his hit comedy/drama WHY DID I GET MARRIED, Tyler Perry brings us the next chapter in the lives of eight college friends struggling with the challenges of marital life in WHY DID I GET MARRIED TOO.
In theaters April 2, 2010
Check out the whole cast on this brand-new poster:
Nate Parker was born in Norfolk, Virginia on November 18, 1979 to a 17 year-old single-mom who never married his biological father. He and his younger sisters were raised mostly in Bath, Maine which is where his stepfather was stationed by the U.S. Air Force.
Nate only started acting after graduating from the University of Oklahoma, when he was spotted by a talent scout while waiting for a friend at an audition. Signed by an agent, Parker immediately moved to Los Angeles where he soon landed work in commercials and bit parts on several TV shows before he found his breakout role as Hakim in the desegregation drama Pride.
He has since starred in other sagas with civil rights themes such as The Great Debaters and The Secret Life of Bees, and later this year he’ll be playing a Tuskegee Airman in the WWII epic Red Tails. Here, Nate talks about his current release, Blood Done Sign My Name, a bio-pic about the rise to prominence of a young Ben Chavis, who went on to become Chairman of the NAACP, in the wake of a lynching in North Carolina. He also discusses his preference to make socially-significant projects.
Kam Williams: Nate, thanks so much for the time.
Nate Parker: Of course, any time, brother.
KW: What interested you in doing Blood Done Sign My Name to play an important civil rights figure like Ben Chavis?
NP: To put it plainly, it was the fact that it fit my model. I prefer to make movies which not only have a message for “then” but a message for “now.” Here was this 22 year-old brother who had no idea what was about to happen, and yet, when it did, he stepped into it in a way which changed an entire community. There was leadership and a sense of accountability in this young man, and those are qualities I can talk about in 2010. So, when I read the script, I knew that it could serve as a tool in the present for some of what ails our community.
KW: How did you prepare for the role?
NP: I read everything I could about the period, including the book the film is based on.
The book was incredible because it deals with racism, white supremacy and the black inferiority complex in a real way, and it illustrates how they can be a cancer on a community.
KW: And how does that relate to today?
NP: I look around today, and I see the Prison-Industrial Complex, and how 50% of our brothers and sisters are behind bars, and how half of us are dropping out of school. And I look at the escalating HIV rate in the black community. These are issues now, and we need leaders to address those crises in the way that Ben Chavis was effective at inspiring a whole generation of kids.
KW: Is it true that your showbiz career got started when you were spotted by a talent scout?
NP: Yeah, I was working in computers when this stranger approached me out of the blue, saying I should become an actor. I took it as a gift from God, because I had been praying for clarity about what He wanted me to do, since I wasn’t happy in computers. So, I gave my employer notice, and moved to L.A. in two weeks. It was definitely Divine intervention. And six year’s later, here I am, and Jon Simmons, the guy who signed me up, is still my manager.
KW: Praise the Lord! I guess you were surprised by your meteoric rise, huh?
NP: It’s been surprising in the sense that it happened so quickly. But I’d say it’s been more of a blessing than a surprise because I believe it was God’s plan to give me this platform. That’s where my passion comes from, to use it to benefit people, especially people from my community.
KW: Why are these message movies you make so important?
Available online and in stores TODAY is the New York City based crime thriller, The Stick Up Kids (DVD), featuring Bryce Wilson (Beauty Shop, Hair Show), Mel Jackson (Deliver Us From Eva, Soul Food), Hawthorne James (The Five Heartbeats, Speed), and Tariq Alexander (The System Within, Kings of the Evening).
February 21st, 2010 
ibhmagazine 
Leonardo DiCaprio has been Martin Scorcese’s favorite leading man in recent years, starring in Gangs of New York (2002), The Aviator (2004) and The Departed (2006), which won the Academy Award for Best Picture while simultaneously finally landing the legendary director an elusive Oscar. Unfortunately, the pair’s latest collaboration, Shutter Island, fails to measure up to their last, for it simply peters out after establishing a very promising premise.
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