Saturday, July 4, 2015

Chloe And Theo: Dakota Johnson's Fifty Shades of Green?


A kind of big screen flaky fairy tale about environmental activism and global warming, Chloe And Theo is an unfortunate example of how good intentions can end up formulated in the worst ways. Not to mention underestimating the intelligence of the assumed idiotized movie audience to such a degree, that this film on sugar coating overload can be viewed as more about polluting minds than mother earth.

Presumably based on a true story about Theo Ikummaq, an Indigenous Canadian Arctic Inuit who sought the help of world leaders as his people have been observing with alarm the melting away of their frozen, once eternal 'cathedrals of ice' all around them, Theo apparently ended up in this Hollywood style yarn instead. And a narrative which never more than vaguely addresses the ecological issues presenting themselves, but veers into an offensive crime caper parody connected to poverty and racism. Black Lives Hardly Matter Alert.

Dakota Johnson, fresh from her critically denounced stint as the love interest of demented Wall Street honcho Christian Grey in Fifty Shades Of Grey, has moved on to masquerading here as scowling, duplicitous homeless hustler Chloe on the streets of Manhattan. How she ended up there and whether it may have anything to do with Grey dumping her for good in the perpetual Shades sequels to come, is anyone's guess in the absence of a credible back story.

In any case, Chloe soon crosses paths with Theo, who has journeyed to 'the people of the South' in order to hopefully seek help from their elders on behalf of his people concerning an 'angry sun' as 'my world is melting, please save our world from the sun.' But what eventually ensues is no less than two acts of threatened violence involving African American males confronting him, and all sorts of potential fraud at the hands of poor people, that indeed appears to upstage as a more often than not silly distraction, any environmental concern as the most imminent danger.

Which is not to say that the film is without its scattered moments of wit and solemn reflection. For instance elders in the 'South' unlike the wise and revered ones of his own culture, are discovered by Theo to his dismay as discarded and seemingly imprisoned inhabitants of bleak nursing homes. Or, the subtle but meaningful interludes of reflection, when Theo's quest is defined as 'purpose' in contrast to US society's emphasis on 'fun' as the ultimate human fulfillment.

Though an unfortunately telling episode, is when Chloe berates an upper class human rights lawyer, played by Mira Sorvino, who offers to help Theo have his message heard. As Chloe scolds her for being too rich to understand or relate to poverty and street people like her. An irony presenting itself which is so blatant and unreal, as these wealthy actors themselves impersonate the poor with such artificial posturing primarily telegraphing utter mockery.

So will we ever see the day when the actual workingclass is hired in movies to authentically play themselves? Just as whites historically mimicking people of color on screen was shunned long ago.

So the question remains, what does it actually mean to say a movie is going green, or is it just more of fifty shades of green gone Hollywood. Which in that case, is likely to refer more to the motivation of green growing in box offices, than in nature.

Prairie Miller

10 comments:

  1. This is the most unfair, unbalanced and inaccurate review I have ever read. What a garbage! Please find another job.

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  2. This critic stinks of envy and lack of understanding. Unfounded and plain anger piece, as we can state for the "racist" point the author writes - but actually, there is nothing in the movie that leads someone to think about the 'black or white' issue, as even the main character was killed by a white guy. Anyway, this just makes me realize even harder that most people today are incapable of impartial and critical thinking. It is a good movie. It is a bad critic piece written by a terrible writer.

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  3. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  4. This review is so absurd! Chloe and Theo was such a beautiful movie and I agree with the commenter...you should find another job.

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  5. Watch the movie and judge for yourself. This review has an agenda. I don't know what it is but the writer is more interested in the actors... Wait I'm thinking you didn't get the part so many times that you thought better to be a critic of others success. THE MOVIE FOR ME WAS EXCELLENT. THANKS.

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  6. Totally agree. You need to find another job!

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  7. I thought this movie was well done and, I feel it had nothing to do with race at all. This movie was heartfelt and, BEAUTIFUL. Every part of this movie to me felt real.

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  8. I thought this movie was well done and, I feel it had nothing to do with race at all. This movie was heartfelt and, BEAUTIFUL. Every part of this movie to me felt real.

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  9. This movie had very solid intentions. I do believe that it was worth the time to watch. There were some forced moments and jarring transitions, but all in all it was a very sweet film and had a message that absolutely needs to be heard and told on a massive scale. The writing for Theo was very touching at times and had the power to transport one's mind to the hopeful ideology that we might be able to turn the destruction of our home and planet around before it is too late.

    HOWEVER - This critic "Prairie" is awfully hard on a movie that was created for the purpose of saving things like what she was apparently named after. What's more, if you're going to put up a blog site for critiquing films, you should really learn how to write a sentence to begin with. This review we have here from Miss Miller is chalked full of ridiculously erroneous run-on sentences, sentence fragments, and flat our incomplete thoughts. Thus is literally embarrassing to read, lol!

    Example 1:
    "So the question remains, what does it actually mean to say a movie is going green, or is it just more of fifty shades of green gone Hollywood." ---you start the sentence by citing that it poses a question but have no question mark...and this is probably the most minute of errors.

    Example 2:
    "Presumably based on a true story about Theo Ikummaq, an Indigenous Canadian Arctic Inuit who sought the help of world leaders as his people have been observing with alarm the melting away of their frozen, once eternal 'cathedrals of ice' all around them, Theo apparently ended up in this Hollywood style yarn instead. And a narrative which never more than vaguely addresses the ecological issues presenting themselves, but veers into an offensive crime caper parody connected to poverty and racism."
    ---WOW!! So for one, there isn't a single actual sentence in this whole paragraph. For two, you just sound like an ignorant person who wants to blame their own lack of success or recognition on empty claims of bigotry.

    ADVICE SUMMATION:
    1) Watch the movie if you've got 75 minutes to kill and want a feel good movie but don't care if it leaves you tingling from the caliber of acting or polished quality.
    2) Never read anything again from this critique unless you want to feel better about your own intelligence and don't mind clicking on a link that misspelled "Critical Woman" as "Critial" on her imdb listing.....idiot

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