The good part of the new Netflix movie “Purple Hearts” is that it puts an important spotlight on the huge problem in this country for people who need medicine to survive but cannot afford it because their insurance companies will not pay for what they need and the fact that pharmaceutical companies charge exorbitant amounts for essential medicine.
Cassie, played by Sophia Carson is a 20 something bartender and singer who works at a bar that is near a military base. She finds out that she has type 1 Diabetes but like so many others, cannot afford to buy the insulin. From a chance meeting at a bar, Cassie meets Luke, played by Nicholas Galitzine who is a soldier about to return to Iraq. At first they dislike each other, but soon they both realize that if they got married, due to Army benefits, both of their financial problems might be correctable. Their relationship predictably does grow over time, leading to a love story and to some other complications.
Unfortunately for the rest of this movie, there are too TV-movie-soap-opera-subplots that make this entire production look like it should have been a Lifetime TV movie and not a film in theaters or even on Netflix. For this main reason the very low 35% Rotten Tomatoes are understandable, with my rating around 50% mainly for the message of addressing the outrageous cost of buying medicine in this country. Due to the TV-movie aspects, I cannot recommend this film.
The last time I saw any movie that started like the new movie “Fall”, was 22 years ago with the movie “Verticle Limit”, starring Chris O’Donnell. For those millions of us who do not have the brain abnormality and will never understand those who climb up mountains with what seems no fear of heights, or falling to their deaths or even becomming Paraplegic from the neck down – watching people risk their lives for a temporary thrill makes absolutely no sense. It is the simple science of weighing a short term thrill against a very long term disaster of being crippled for life or dead for eternity. Just what are these people thinking?
From the movie “Free Solo”, released in 2018 we all learned that the real life climber Alex Honnold has an abnormal brain that prevents him from recognizing fear. This total lack of fear was discovered during a brain MRI and it was this abnormality that enabled Honnold to be the first free climber (without ropes) of the mountain El Capitan. Somewhere along the line you would think there would be laws to prevent people like this, who have brain abnormalities from risking their lives so blatantly. Without a doubt, risking your life in this way has a temporary shelf life and one day, the horrible end will come.
From what we have all seen in recent Mission Impossible action movies, Tom Cruise also has this brain affliction that has allowed him to be the greatest stuntman of all time. All this is well and good and can be extremely impressive, but only if nothing goes wrong. When things do go wrong you are going to die, by falling to your death.
With the movie Fall, after a recent tragedy two women in their 20’s decide to scale a 2000 foot, abandoned, rusted and very dangerous radio tower. In real life, given the look of this old tower, I dont think even the most insane or stupid climber would dare to try to climb up it. The photography of these dizzying and dangerous heights is very well done, so well done that anyone with any level of severe fear of heights or vertigo might just walk out of the theater. I did not like some of the fakery with what was really going on during this story, trying to trick the audience or make us believe things were happening that did not happen, but overall the use of movie reflection (showing the use of a previous action later in the film) was very well done.
This tower according to the movie is the 4th highest structure in the United States that unfortunately is also located in the desert – that included some jackals that provide some additional danger to the two women stranded at the top. I did admire the courage of what the women tried to do to save their lives all the while trying to understand anyone stupid enough to risk their lives like this.
The actors in this movie are mostly unknowns, Grace Caroline Currey and Ginny Gardner with Jeffrey Dean Morgan who is known for the Walking Dead TV series.
The Rotten Tomatoes ratings for Fall is a too low 71%, with my rating a solid 80% and a recommendation for this film mainly for the well done special effects.
Student Loan debt, getting ripped off living in a bad apartment, having to take a bad job due to circumstances and mistakes you have made in the past. Your job is delivering food and is depressing with a boss who treats you badly. This is the real life story of millions of people in their 20’s, who through no fault of their own, were born at the wrong time and now realize that apartment living, with constantly rising rents, student loan debt that include outrageous interest payments, all add up to probably never being able to realize the American dream and owning their own home. In Emily’s unfortunate case, her luck has been mostly all bad, including a criminal record, with a good part of this not her fault.
The new movie “Emily The Criminal” is about a very challenged young women named Emily, played extremely well by Aubrey Plaza – who just might get an Academy Award nomination for this role. For many years Aubrey Plaza has been one of the best natural comedians. Her appearances on Talk Shows have demonstrated that with a subtle look with her eyes and a small comment she can make people laugh with what seems like no effort. This is an extremely rare talent that I have only seen with Johnny Carson, John Candy, Will Ferrell and Chelsea Handler.
With this well made film, Plaza is 100% dead serious, playing a desperate and very depressed young woman trying to find herself out of debt and a very bad job. This film is very effective at showing Emily’s bleak existence and her desperation to no matter what, save her own life. The following downward spiral is not only extremely well told and well acted, but most importantly believable – with the possible exception of the ending, that I thought had some glaring holes.
As this story, unfolds, Emily falls into working for a credit card fraud gang, where a group of criminals are able to create fake credit cards and buy merchandise (mainly flat screen TV’s) from stores. As the merchandise is taken from the store, it is immediately taken away in a van and then sold as stolen merchandise. This is a very dangerous racket that if caught, would result in many years in prison. This is the fundamental conflict within this story as Emily’s anger over a horrible existence becomes greater than the fear of spending many years in prison. This is the main idea behind the great TV series “Breaking Bad”.
It turns out that Emily, mainly due to her bad life, is very angry and is able to leverage her anger to be a brave fighter against some very dangerous people throughout this story. There is a relationship between Emily and Youcef played by Theo Rossi, who is one of the leaders of this credit card fraud gang. This relationship is also very well portrayed within this solid screenplay.
I mostly agreed with the final end to this story, that I thought was also believable based on Emily’s extreme circumstances that was leading her into an extremely difficult life of desperation and poverty that she would do almost anything to escape.
The Rotten Tomatoes ratings for Emily The Criminal is a very high 93%, with my rating in the 88% range and a strong recommendation.
A Screenwriters Perspective: Current and Past Movies. 