The movie “Papillon” is a remake of the 1973 classic film that starred Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman. The most important thing to know about this story is that it is not only true but it also demonstrated the inhumane cruelty that existed in France in 1931. It is correct to understand that any one who commits murder or any kind of violent crime do not deserve a country club when they are sent away to prison, but the conditions and the administration of prisoners in French Guiana were so bad its a miracle anyone survived there. Most amazing is the main character in this movie, played very well by Charlie Hunnam, not only survived living with the fact that he was innocent and framed for murder, but also spent 7 years in solitary confinement for trying to escape twice. Very often this confinement consisted of total darkness. Unlike other bad recent remakes of classic films like Ben Hur, released in 2016, this movie stands on its own as different enough that its not just a scene by scene retread of the original film.

I was also impressed with the friendship that developed between Papillon and another man who committed a while collar crime and had no business being in a prison like this, played by Rami Malek. On several occassions Papillon risked both his life and freedom to save his friend.

As far as the story I was most impressed with the incredible resolve of Papillon who despite facing more years of solitary confinement, kept trying to escape his extreme injustice of being incarcerated for no reason because he was framed for murder. This story is first and foremost about “mans inhumanity to man” when it comes to running a prison. While prison reform has seen some improvements over many years, it is still a very long way to be what it should be.

The ending of Papillon for those who have not seen the original is so unlikely that many would not believe it unless it was a true story. At the end of the movie talks about the book Papillon that was a best seller when it was released in 1969 and sold over 13 million copies. I have included a link to this book on this web site.

Unlike so many other remakes, Papillon was well done and good enough to receive a strong recommendation.

The movie “Alpha” is very similar to the Disney movies in the past about our close relationship with dogs and in this case of this story a wolf. This story takes place 20,000 years ago and despite the prehistoric caveman times the human beings looked in far too good shape and wore clothing that looks like it was expertly made – almost like designer jackets, which of course makes no sense considering the time involved. Through a series amazing events that involve hunting buffalo a teenage boy is separated from his tribe and while trying to survive on his own, befriends a wolf who was also injured and separated from his pack. Some of the ideas here are far fetched and it seemed that some of the logistics did not make sense in some areas, but overall I thought this was a good example of a family movie, although some of the harrowing experiences are probably too intense for younger children.

Rotten Tomatoes gives this movie a rating of 86 and my rating is about a 75% – so I do recommend Alpha.

The new movie “Puzzle” is a low budget movie about the decisions we make in our 20’s that may cause us, because of money, obligations and family – to not realize our full potential or ever have the chance to figure out who we really are. For many of us, there is not enough money or time to find ourselves by going to a college that fewer can afford and some find themselves later in life unhappy about the choices they made in their youth. In the case of this story, Agnes is a wife in her early 40’s of a mechanic with 20 sons about to go to college, who finds herself trapped in a lonely boring life familiar to far too many married women. Through a random gift of a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle, Agnes finds that she is not only good at putting jigsaw puzzles together, but in is fact a rare genius at pattern recognition. As random as the shape of the puzzle pieces, Agnes buys another puzzle in New York City and through a flier at the store, becomes partners with another puzzle expert and their collaboration blooms into Jigsaw puzzle contests – who even knew there was such a thing?

Puzzle is a high quality low budget movie that has a great message and symbolism, and was engrossing throughout the entire 2 hours. One of the great speeches in the movie was by Agnes puzzle partner Robert, played very well by Irrfan Khan. He says, “Life is random and most of the time completely out of our control. With Puzzles, we are completely in control and when the puzzle is completed, we know we made all the right choices”. Anyone who sees this movie may have a strong desire to buy a 1000 piece puzzle and try to put it together, and this has always been a fun hobby for many people.

I strongly recommend Puzzle for its message, symbolism and quality of acting.