Posts tagged Ben Foster
Kill Your Darlings – Movie Trailer
Dec 8th
Daniel Radcliffe stars as Beat Generation icon Allen Ginsberg in this biopic set during the famed poet’s early years at Columbia University, and centering on a murder investigation involving Ginsberg, his handsome classmate Lucien Carr, and fellow Beat author William Burroughs. The year is 1944. Ginsberg (Radcliffe) is a young student at Columbia University when he falls hopelessly under the spell of charismatic classmate Carr (Dane DeHaan). Alongside Carr, Ginsberg manages to strike up friendships with aspiring writers William Burroughs (Ben Foster) and Jack Kerouac (Jack Huston) that would cast conformity to the wind, and serve as the foundation of the Beat movement. Meanwhile, an older outsider named David Krammerer falls deeply and madly in love with the impossibly cool Carr. Later, when Krammerer dies under mysterious circumstances, police arrest Kerouac, Burroughs, and Carr as potential suspects, paving the way for an investigation that would have a major impact on the lives of the three emerging artists.
Chronicle – Movie Trailer
Feb 26th
Three high school students make an incredible discovery, leading to their developing uncanny powers beyond their understanding. As they learn to control their abilities and use them to their advantage, their lives start to spin out of control, and their darker sides begin to take over.
“The Messenger” Sober Notification of War
Mar 4th
Sober Notification of War
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
THE MESSENGER is about one aspect of the modern-day Army that you don’t see much these days: the notification of next of kin that someone in their family has been killed in war.
However, the focus isn’t on the families who are notified. The focus is on two of the soldiers whose job is to do the notifications.
Ben Foster plays Staff Sgt. Will Montgomery. He was severely injured in combat, he has three months left to serve on his enlistment, and he is assigned to be one-half of the casualty notification team on an Army base.
The other half is Capt. Tony Stone, played by Woody Harrelson. Capt. Stone is a veteran at this unpleasant duty, and he tells Sgt. Montgomery, “We’re just here for notification, not God, not heaven.”
As further instruction, Capt. Stone says, “You do not speak with anyone other than next of kin. Avoid physical contact. In case you feel like offering a hug, don’t.”
And as one final word of advice, Capt. Stone says, “I should warn you, some of them do have guns.”
Their first notification together doesn’t go well at all, not that you could imagine that any of them would be easy.
Capt. Stone reveals to Sgt. Montgomery that he has been sober for three years and doesn’t drink anything stronger than soda pop. Although now single, he has been married three times, twice to the same woman.
Sgt. Montgomery, on the other hand, has just been informed by his girlfriend that she is getting married soon and to someone he knows.
Sgt. Montgomery tells Capt. Stone that he is ready to handle the second notification, and he informs a man that his son has been killed in combat, but that one doesn’t go well, either.
Finally, their third notification together goes better, this one to a woman about her husband, but Sgt. Montgomery gets affected enough to return to the widow’s house to see how she is holding up.
There are other encounters, as well, in public, and eventually the two of them become friends, which is strictly against Capt. Stone’s directions.
Unfortunately, Harrelson is all quirky mannerisms, and he acts as if he is always trying to upstage the other person, even when he is the only one onscreen.
THE MESSENGER is a sober notification of war.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”