Trees Lounge

Year of Release:  1996
Director:  Steve Buscemi
Screenplay:  Steve Buscemi
Starring:  Steve Buscemi, Chloe Sevigny, Mark Boone Junior, Anthony LaPaglia, Elizabeth Bracco, Seymour Cassel, Carol Kane, Samuel L. Jackson
Running Time:  95 minutes
Genre:  Drama, slice-of-life

In a tough, working-class neighbourhood of New York City, alcoholic Tommy Basilio (Buscemi) is a fixture at the local bar, Trees Lounge.  His girlfriend of eight years has left him for his boss and former best friend, Rob (LaPaglia).  Rob subsequently fired Tommy from his job as a mechanic for stealing money form the till.  In between drinking at the Trees Lounge, Tommy spends his time half-heartedly looking for work, eventually being given an ice-cream truck, following the death of the owner.  He also manages to form a connection with Debbie (Sevigny), the seventeen-year-old niece of a former girlfriend.

This is a downbeat, slice-of-life drama, very much in the John Cassavetes school of gritty realism, and features Cassavetes regular Seymour Cassel.  By and large the film sticks with Tommy, but it also deals with the lives of other Trees Lounge regulars, all of whom seem to lead pretty miserable lives.  Some crucial elements in the film are left ambiguous, not depicted on screen we are left to decide for ourselves what really happened from the often differing versions of events that the characters give us.  Not much happens in the film and, in keeping with the lives these characters lead, there are no real conclusions, despite glimmerings of hope it looks as if they will keep doing the same things over and over again.  This is a strong debut from Buscemi as a writer-director making largely unlikeable characters sympathetic and giving the film a strain of dark comedy.  The film has a strong cast full of recognisable faces from nineties independent movies.  The film's largely plotless nature and slow pace may put off some viewers but it is worth sticking with because it is a well-performed and well-written drama.  Buscemi scripted and directed one other film Animal Factory (2003) and has directed a number of TV episodes, but Trees Lounge really makes me which that he had done more as a writer/director because, on the evidence of this, he could have become a notable filmmaker as well as an actor.     

Steve Buscemi in Trees Lounge

Annabelle: Creation

Year of Release:  2017
Director:  David F. Sandberg
Screenplay:  Gary Dauberman
Starring:  Stephanie Sigman, Talitha Bateman, Lulu Wilson, Anthony LaPaglia, Miranda Otto
Running Time:  110 minutes
Genre:  Horror

In 1955, toymaker Samuel Mullins (LaPaglia) and his wife Esther (Otto), who never leaves her bedroom, grieve for their daughter Annabelle (Samara Lee) who died in an accident twelve years previously at the age of seven.  Despite their pain, they open their house to Sister Charlotte (Sigman) and six girls left homeless after the closure of their orphanage.  The first night, one of the girls Janice (Bateman), who suffers from polio, enters Annabelle's old bedroom and discovers a strange porcelain doll, which seems to be the focal point for powerful and deadly supernatural forces.

This details the story of the possessed doll, Annabelle, which was introduced in the movie The Conjuring (2013) and featured in it's own movie, Annabelle (2014).  Considering that this is a prequel to a spin-off, Annabelle: Creation is much better than might be expected.  It's very atmospheric with engaging characters and strong performances.  The scares are effective, sticking close to the old-school ghost train ride of the first The Conjuring film, and  the film allows itself time to build up before the horror elements kick in.  The films does suffer from the problem that a lot of prequels have with conclusions, in that it has to pave the way for other films instead of being it's own thing.  It's definitely worth checking out for anyone looking for a good creepy ghost story.

Linda (Lulu Wilson) and Annabelle in Annabelle: Creation