- 2012
- 28 Weeks Later
- 3rd Letter, The
- 50/50
- Adjustment Bureau, The
- Adventures in Babysitting
- Animal Farm
- Another Year
- Army of Darkness
- Arthur
- Arthur (original)
- Artist, The
- Bag of Bones
- Bang Bang Club
- Barney's Version
- Battle of Los Angeles
- Battle: Los Angeles
- Beastly
- Beaver, The
- Beginners
- Better Life, A
- Biutiful
- Black Button
- Black Death
- Black Swan
- Blair Witch Project, The
- Blind Date
- Bridesmaids
- Bronson
- Cabin Fever 2
- Camden 28, The
- Cannibal! The Musical
- Carnage
- Cars
- Cars 2
- Catfish
- Cave of Forgotten Dreams, The
- Cedar Rapids
- Christmas Story, A
- Citizen Ruth
- Closet Land
- Collapse
- Commerce
- Company Men, The
- Conan the Barbarian
- Confession, The
- Consent
- Conspirator, The
- Contagion
- Conviction
- Country Strong
- Crazies, The
- Crazies, The (original)
- Crazy, Stupid, Love.
- Creepshow
- Creepshow 2
- Crush, The
- Dark Days
- Day & Night
- Day of the Dead
- Day of the Dead 2: Contagium
- Days of Heaven
- Dead and Breakfast
- Debt, The
- Degenerate Art
- Descendants, The
- Dirty Filthy Love
- Dogtooth
- Dolphin Tale
- Downfall
- Drive
- Everything Is Illuminated
- Everything Must Go
- Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn
- External World, The
- Extract
- Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
- Film Unfinished, A
- Final Destination 5
- Final Destination, The
- Freakonomics
- Frozen
- Game, The
- Genesis
- Genius Within, A
- Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The
- Gnomeo & Juliet
- God of Love
- Good Morning, Mr. Hitler
- Greatest Movie Ever Sold, The
- Groundhog Day
- Grown Ups
- Gruffalo, The
- Hangover Part II, The
- Happythankyoumoreplease
- Hard Corps, The
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
- Heathers
- Hellraiser: Deader
- Hellraiser: Hellseeker
- Hellraiser: Hellworld
- Hellraiser: Inferno
- Help, The
- Higher Ground
- Hobo with a Shotgun
- Hold for Laughs
- Howard
- Hugo
- Hunger
- I Am Love
- I Love You Phillip Morris
- I Spit on Your Grave
- Ides of March, The
- Idiocracy
- Illusionist, The
- In Her Skin
- In the Light of Reverence
- In the Mouth of Madness
- In the Pit
- In Time
- Incident at Ogala
- Inside Job
- Insidious
- Jack Goes Boating
- Jane Eyre
- JCVD
- Killing in the Name
- King's Speech, The
- Knock Off
- Kung Fu Panda 2
- Kurt & Courtney
- Last Airbender, The
- Law Abiding Citizen
- Les Miserables
- Let's Pollute
- Like Crazy
- Limitless
- Lincoln Lawyer, The
- Lionheart
- Lo
- Lost Thing, The
- Lucky 13
- Madagascar, A Journey Diary
- Mao's Last Dancer
- Martha Marcy May Marlene
- Marwencol
- Maximum Risk
- Medicine for Melancholy
- Melancholia
- Midnight in Paris
- Mildred Pierce
- Misery
- Modify
- Moneyball
- Mozart & The Whale
- Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr.
- My Week with Marilyn
- Na Wewe
- Neighbors
- Neil Gaiman's Short Film about John Bolton
- Never Let Me Go
- Next Three Days, The
- Nice Guys Finish Last
- Night of the Comet
- Nowhere to Run
- One Day
- One Survivor Remembers
- One Week
- Order, The
- Our Idiot Brother
- Paranormal Activity
- Paranormal Activity 2
- Paranormal Activity 3
- Paul
- Philadelphia
- Pink Floyd: The Wall
- Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
- Planet of the Apes
- Planet Terror
- Poltergeist
- Poltergeist 2
- Poltergeist III
- Pontypool
- Poster Girl
- Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
- Puss in Boots
- Quarantine 2: Terminal
- Quest, The
- Rango
- Real Steel
- Red Dawn
- Red Riding: 1974
- Red Riding: 1980
- Red Riding: 1983
- Red State
- Replicant
- Requiem for a Dream
- Reservoir Dogs
- Restless
- Return to Horror High
- Ring, The
- Rio
- Ripple Effect
- Rise of the Planet of the Apes
- Robert Kennedy Remembered
- Rubber
- Salt
- Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
- Scrat's Continental Crack-Up
- Scrat's Continental Crack-Up Part 2
- SCRE4M
- Second in Command
- Sensology
- Sentiment of the Flesh, The
- Sex Drive
- Shame
- Sharpe's Eagle
- Sharpe's Rifles
- Shining, The
- Silence behind the Back, The
- Sling Blade
- Smash His Camera
- Smorgasbord
- Solitary Man, A
- Source Code
- Specials, The
- State of Play
- Steal this Movie!
- Strangers No More
- Sucker Punch
- Suicide Club
- Sun Come Up
- Sunnyview
- Sunset Limited, The
- Super
- Survival of the Dead
- Sweetgrass
- Taken
- Thing, The
- Thor
- Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
- Town, The
- Toy Story Toons: Hawaiian Vacation
- Tree of Life, The
- Trick R Treat
- Triplets of Belleville, The
- Trollhunter
- Truman Show, The
- Trust
- Tumbling
- Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
- Universal Soldier
- Universal Soldier: The Return
- Unknown
- Unloved, The
- Visitor Q
- Waking Sleeping Beauty
- Wall Street
- War Horse
- War Tapes, The
- Warriors of Qiugang, The
- Waste Land
- Way Back, The
- We Bought a Zoo
- We Need to Talk about Kevin
- Whisper
- William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe
- Win Win
- Wish 143
- Wolfman, The
- X-Men: First Class
- Yellow Handkerchief, The
- Yellowbrickroad
- Young Adult
Sunday, January 1, 2012
274 films in 2011 (six of them twice)
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
unfinished blog entry - Puss in Boots, In Time, Melancholia
Puss in Boots carries some of the humor of the Shrek films, for which it's a pseudo-prequel, but it has a bit more gravitas perhaps than... well the memory of those films if not the actual films--when I think about the first Shrek, there were a few sequences that tried to turn the drama up, put some real emotion into it, but it seems like the series depended more on amusing sight-gags and jokes more than, say, character growth. Puss in Boots is no less plot-driven, but the character of Humpty Dumpty, for example, has more depth than one might expect from these films. Still, he's available for simple jokes--his Golden Egg costume, for one obvious one (that probably should have been in the trailers... was Humpty Dumpty even in the trailers?)--as are Puss and Kitty Softpaws. There are some nice visuals here that would probably look good in 3D (though I didn't see it in 3D). The plot, while straightforward, isn't simplistic. All in all, a good family film, with a few good jokes for the adults.
In Time is a fairly straightforward critique of capitalism--one character even refers to the use of time as money as "Darwinian capitalism." The film has something serious to say, or a few somethings actually, but it's prettied up with a nice sci-fi veneer and the plot-necessary 25-years old cast. Still, I wonder if there isn't a big part of the potential audience that a) won't get it, or b) won't agree with it, so much so that the audience that might do both is limited... and, being science fiction, the film's audience is already limited. Many who saw The Truman Show might not have noticed commentary on our obsession with television, and many who see this won't get the capitalism thing... or will get hit over the head by it without quite recognizing it for what it is.
There are some good performances here, though some interactions between Timberlake and Seyfried draw attention to the triteness of some of the dialogue. There is some fault in the writing in taking a rather obvious metaphor and trying to work around it without outright commenting on it too often... that isn't to say they don't comment on it, but it's not like there are long monologues about the evils of capitalism... more like an assumption that capitalist greed=bad, rebellion against the system=good. I'm simplifying more than the film necessarily does, but the film also simplifies more than it necessarily has to. Still, this isn't a shallow action film but rather a thinkpiece pretending to be one.
Melancholia, on the other hand, does not pretend for even a moment that it's a shallow, audience-friendly film. It's first half, focused on Kirsten Dunst's Justine, is an extensive exploration of depression and the effect it can have on those around you, and it's about as bleak as one can get from a feature film. It is worth mentioning that this is not an American film, of course. Though filmed in English, this is a Lars Von trier film, a European film (for all that label usually means). The film takes its time (and, most people in the audience will think it's taking theirs as well) and at the point the subject turns to metaphor--a planet hurtling toward Earth effecting Justine and her sister, Charlotte Gainsbourg's Claire (the focus of the second half of the film)...
In Time is a fairly straightforward critique of capitalism--one character even refers to the use of time as money as "Darwinian capitalism." The film has something serious to say, or a few somethings actually, but it's prettied up with a nice sci-fi veneer and the plot-necessary 25-years old cast. Still, I wonder if there isn't a big part of the potential audience that a) won't get it, or b) won't agree with it, so much so that the audience that might do both is limited... and, being science fiction, the film's audience is already limited. Many who saw The Truman Show might not have noticed commentary on our obsession with television, and many who see this won't get the capitalism thing... or will get hit over the head by it without quite recognizing it for what it is.
There are some good performances here, though some interactions between Timberlake and Seyfried draw attention to the triteness of some of the dialogue. There is some fault in the writing in taking a rather obvious metaphor and trying to work around it without outright commenting on it too often... that isn't to say they don't comment on it, but it's not like there are long monologues about the evils of capitalism... more like an assumption that capitalist greed=bad, rebellion against the system=good. I'm simplifying more than the film necessarily does, but the film also simplifies more than it necessarily has to. Still, this isn't a shallow action film but rather a thinkpiece pretending to be one.
Melancholia, on the other hand, does not pretend for even a moment that it's a shallow, audience-friendly film. It's first half, focused on Kirsten Dunst's Justine, is an extensive exploration of depression and the effect it can have on those around you, and it's about as bleak as one can get from a feature film. It is worth mentioning that this is not an American film, of course. Though filmed in English, this is a Lars Von trier film, a European film (for all that label usually means). The film takes its time (and, most people in the audience will think it's taking theirs as well) and at the point the subject turns to metaphor--a planet hurtling toward Earth effecting Justine and her sister, Charlotte Gainsbourg's Claire (the focus of the second half of the film)...
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Reviews: The Ides of March and Real Steel
The problem with both The Ides of March and Real Steel is that neither one does anything particularly original or exciting. There are some great performances--the entire cast of The Ides of March is amazing--but the sums are less than their parts.
The Ides of March reminds me of Good Night and Good Luck, makes me wonder if George Clooney ought to stick to acting (and producing) over directing. His direction only rarely does anything notable... oddly enough, the most interesting moments, as far as direction, also include the most interesting use of music, while Desplat's score otherwise is quite mediocre and forgettable. Those moments involve a few scenes that begin a few beats behind where another film might get going... if you can understand what that means. Anyway, the acting is great, Clooney, Gosling, Giamatti, Hoffman, Evan Rachel Wood, even Marisa Tomei, Jeffrey Wright and Gregory Itzin in smaller roles. But, the storyline, which ultimately--SPOILERS AHEAD--involves the corruption of a guy who starts the film quite ideological and optimistic, should be darker, should be more powerful, shouldn't come across so rote.
Similarly, Real Steel, which crosses a boxing film with a father/son movie, reminiscent of Stallone's Over the Top--except far better--is certainly entertaining, and it hits all the expected notes, but it doesn't hit them in any way that's too unique. Again, some good performances, but overall, the film just comes across as something that's been seen time and time again. Now, that's not necessarily a bad thing. It's good to watch things over sometimes (plus, as I said, this film is reminiscent of Over the Top, except done quite a bit better... plus, well, fighting robots).
There's a weird sort of subplot in Real Steel that never quite gets anywhere, also. There are hints that Atom (the robot) is perhaps self-aware but ultimately, that doesn't matter much as--SPOILERS AHEAD--in the end, he doesn't have to fight without someone controlling him, which would have made more sense, that father and son had trained the robot to go beyond his programming and adapt on the fly... instead, Jackman's character effectively fights the big champion robot in the end, controlling Atom through his "shadow" function. This ending fits better with the father/son storyline, of course, but it detracts from any sense of character for the robot that may have come before.
Despite the lack of profundity in these two movies, it was a good morning at the theater. A bunch of good actors with good performances, a couple entertaining films, but nothing too... special.
The Ides of March reminds me of Good Night and Good Luck, makes me wonder if George Clooney ought to stick to acting (and producing) over directing. His direction only rarely does anything notable... oddly enough, the most interesting moments, as far as direction, also include the most interesting use of music, while Desplat's score otherwise is quite mediocre and forgettable. Those moments involve a few scenes that begin a few beats behind where another film might get going... if you can understand what that means. Anyway, the acting is great, Clooney, Gosling, Giamatti, Hoffman, Evan Rachel Wood, even Marisa Tomei, Jeffrey Wright and Gregory Itzin in smaller roles. But, the storyline, which ultimately--SPOILERS AHEAD--involves the corruption of a guy who starts the film quite ideological and optimistic, should be darker, should be more powerful, shouldn't come across so rote.
Similarly, Real Steel, which crosses a boxing film with a father/son movie, reminiscent of Stallone's Over the Top--except far better--is certainly entertaining, and it hits all the expected notes, but it doesn't hit them in any way that's too unique. Again, some good performances, but overall, the film just comes across as something that's been seen time and time again. Now, that's not necessarily a bad thing. It's good to watch things over sometimes (plus, as I said, this film is reminiscent of Over the Top, except done quite a bit better... plus, well, fighting robots).
There's a weird sort of subplot in Real Steel that never quite gets anywhere, also. There are hints that Atom (the robot) is perhaps self-aware but ultimately, that doesn't matter much as--SPOILERS AHEAD--in the end, he doesn't have to fight without someone controlling him, which would have made more sense, that father and son had trained the robot to go beyond his programming and adapt on the fly... instead, Jackman's character effectively fights the big champion robot in the end, controlling Atom through his "shadow" function. This ending fits better with the father/son storyline, of course, but it detracts from any sense of character for the robot that may have come before.
Despite the lack of profundity in these two movies, it was a good morning at the theater. A bunch of good actors with good performances, a couple entertaining films, but nothing too... special.
Thursday, September 22, 2011
movie review: DRIVE
(quick note: over the summer, i kept trying to get long comparative reviews written, and apparently that took too much time to get... what was it, one that i actually did? but now that school is in session and days are more methodical, i figured i'd start writing at least a short review for each movie i see... well, at least each movie i see in theaters.)
Drive, starring Ryan Gosling, is not necessarily a "great" film, but it is a very good movie. It gives off a vibe reminiscent of Heat or Collateral, a sorta '70s crime drama feel. This is a movie about a getaway driver by night, stunt driver by day, so in this day and age, it's actually quite remarkable that it isn't a fast-paced, action-packed thing but rather a relatively slow, deliberately-paced, almost meditative piece. Gosling's character barely speaks in many scenes, and he puts on a calm, patient demeanor, even when in the middle of a chase or a shooting scene.
The supporting cast is good, notably Bryan Cranston as Gosling's boss, Carey Mulligan as the SPOILER unrequited love interest, and Albert Brooks as the surprisingly menacing antagonist (of a sort). All of these actors do well with silence, sometimes better than with dialogue; Mulligan can get more across with a look and some deep breaths than many actresses can with whole soliloquies and Brooks' calm menace is possibly scarier than a real villain would be... SPOILER COMING... when he shakes hands and slits a guy's wrist at the same time, he's both scary and comforting at the same time, and maybe I haven't seen Brooks in enough films, but I didn't expect that from him. I expected good things from Gosling--I've liked every movie I've seen him in (and, though I haven't seen The Notebook, I'm sure that if I got in the mood to watch it, I'd probably also be in the mood to like it)--and from Mulligan--I recently saw an early screening of Restless, and I like Mia Wazikowska, but the more I see her, the less impressed I am by her; quite the opposite is true of Mulligan.
Drive isn't particularly complicated, but it also isn't necessarily predictable. All in all, a good time at the theater.
Drive, starring Ryan Gosling, is not necessarily a "great" film, but it is a very good movie. It gives off a vibe reminiscent of Heat or Collateral, a sorta '70s crime drama feel. This is a movie about a getaway driver by night, stunt driver by day, so in this day and age, it's actually quite remarkable that it isn't a fast-paced, action-packed thing but rather a relatively slow, deliberately-paced, almost meditative piece. Gosling's character barely speaks in many scenes, and he puts on a calm, patient demeanor, even when in the middle of a chase or a shooting scene.
The supporting cast is good, notably Bryan Cranston as Gosling's boss, Carey Mulligan as the SPOILER unrequited love interest, and Albert Brooks as the surprisingly menacing antagonist (of a sort). All of these actors do well with silence, sometimes better than with dialogue; Mulligan can get more across with a look and some deep breaths than many actresses can with whole soliloquies and Brooks' calm menace is possibly scarier than a real villain would be... SPOILER COMING... when he shakes hands and slits a guy's wrist at the same time, he's both scary and comforting at the same time, and maybe I haven't seen Brooks in enough films, but I didn't expect that from him. I expected good things from Gosling--I've liked every movie I've seen him in (and, though I haven't seen The Notebook, I'm sure that if I got in the mood to watch it, I'd probably also be in the mood to like it)--and from Mulligan--I recently saw an early screening of Restless, and I like Mia Wazikowska, but the more I see her, the less impressed I am by her; quite the opposite is true of Mulligan.
Drive isn't particularly complicated, but it also isn't necessarily predictable. All in all, a good time at the theater.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Cowboys & Aliens, Captain America, and a little bit of The Last Airbender
I had to look up the status of the Dark Tower film (based on Stephen King's series of books) after watching Cowboys & Aliens; Daniel Craig would make a great Roland Deschain. Turns out--and I think I knew this already, but forgot--Javier Bardem is playing him. Really, if we got a string of westerns coming up (though I don't think we do), they wouldn't do wrong to cast both Craig and Harrison Ford. They've both got good western faces, like Eastwood does (and did way back when). Anyway, both men not only look the part for a western but do great service to a film that despite its blatantly non-western premise plays out almost entirely like a western would. Favreau doesn't direct the film like a science fiction story but like a straight western in which the villains just happen to have flying ships, look like monsters, and are called "demons."
That is perhaps the best thing about Cowboys & Aliens, that it plays out as a Western, and doesn't play anything tongue-in-cheek, winking at the audience for knowing exactly what the cowboys are facing here... although, on that note, the film probably should have played up the fear levels a bit. Sure, the preacher calls them "demons" but no one really spends any time dealing realistically dealing with the notion of a) demons actually existing or b) flying things abducting townspeople. Then again, the tone fits with what would probably be in a classic western in which, instead of aliens, Indians are kidnapping people. Still, the film is far better than its graphic novel base deserves. I hated that book when I read it a few years back, not just because it stalled my own mini comic with the same title, but also because it was so poorly written, badly drawn. The film actually has some depth to it, taking its time to draw some 3-dimensional characters--side note, even Noah Ringer does pretty well as the sole child character... I only recently got around to seeing Shyamalan's The Last Airbender, which was a horrid, badly put together thing, and Ringer's Aang couldn't emote a bit. He wasn't an actor when he was cast for that film, but he's almost one now.
The rest of the cast is good, though Olivia Wilde's character, prior to--SPOILERS AHEAD--her burning, could have been played a little less overtly mysterious and peculiar. Another actress could've probably done the job better, but Wilde was serviceable. The various minor roles, Sam Rockwell, Adam Beach, Walton Goggins, Clancy Brown, Paul Dano, Keith Carradine (those last three in fairly small, but important roles), are all well done. All in all, the film works on more levels than one might expect given its appearance as a simplistic summer effects-heavy blockbuster. I think, for this year alone, we've already had a better western film in Rango, but Cowboys & Aliens works well as a western and works ok as a science fiction piece. Favreau knows what he's doing.
Backing up a bit, one of last summer's movies, The Last Airbender, continues the trend of Shyamalan's films getting increasingly bad as they go along. Important note, The Happening is still entertainingly bad, while Lady in the Water is offensively bad, so those two could be switched on the list rating how bad Shyamalan's films are. The Last Airbender is not entertaining, is not well acted, is poorly written, makes changes to its source that, minor (some pronunciation issues) and major (Aang never gets to full-on Avatar mode, destructive giant), serve no good purpose, and wastes some pretty good visual effects and guarantees there will be no good film adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender... unless someone pulls a Hulk and remakes this thing before anyone lets Shyamalan try a sequel. Meanwhile, the three seasons of the series are available on Netflix Instant and the new series, Legend of Korra, had a panel at Comic Con and looks to be airing sometime next year. Perhaps we can just put Shyamalan's version behind us and pretend it doesn't exist.
Visual Effects are getting cheap enough that bad movies like Shyamalan's The Last Airbender can have great ones and still be filmic shit. The Effects in Cowboys & Aliens are great in the darker scenes, a little lacking a few times in the daylight shots, but overall pretty good. Captain America also makes use of some great visual effects, including a rather unique effect, making Chris Evans look scrawny for his pre-Captain scenes. This effect has a few notable weak points, making his head and body look a little disconnected in certain shots and lighting. But, overall, the visual is a success. The color timing of the film, a little stylized for the World War II-era stuff, covers what probably wouldn't have worked as well in a realistically-colored sequence. Plenty of other stuff in this film has to be visual effects but doesn't come across as such--the Exposition, the various Hydra bases (though, obviously, parts of those were practical sets).
The acting in Captain America is good, and the film is a lot of fun (like the first Iron Man was and like Thor should have been more), getting plenty of humor in. I was never much of a reader of Captain America, and I'm not very familiar with Red Skull as a character or the various Howling Commandos (who were associated, apparently, with Nick Fury, not Steve Rogers, but the Marvel films can get away with Steve Rogers being frozen and coming back, as he's got the super soldier serum in his system, but Fury is a harder sell for being World War II-era, so the change is understandable). The various commandos, seem designed specifically for the comic nerds who will identify each of them individually, but the film really doesn't give any depth to them or spend much time with them, except as background to Captain America. The montage of the lot of them taking out various Hydra bases has little important content to it and almost comes across as a setup for a video game or a spinoff tv series or something more than an important part of this story.
Bucky gets a little more time than the Commandos, but I've already seen complaints--SPOILERS AHEAD--about his death not having the right tone for such a major character... Of course, when briefly I did follow Captain America, it was long after Bucky was a character, so again, I am not familiar with him. The film, I think, sets him up well enough before going to war, and brings him back fine enough. Inappropriately, as it turns out, when Rogers finds him in the Hydra base, and he's on what looks to be a lab table, I thought he was going to be turned bad as one of Red Skull's experimental soldiers or something (which would probably be a far cry from who Bucky was in Captain America history), but then that wasn't the case. He was not in the cells with the other soldiers because, well, he just wasn't. He does have a good moment just before his death, when he uses Captain America's shield.
Tommy Lee Jones and Stanley Tucci do well with their parts. Despite the importance of her role, Hayley Atwell's Agent Carter is such a one-note character that it's hard to judge how well she does with it. While Tucci's scientist role allows for a bit of depth, his counterpart Toby Jones is never given much to do but toady up to Red Skull. As for Red Skull, Hugo Weaving is wasted on a role that really doesn't even give him much to do, not even any good mustache-twirling (which would have been fitting the tone of the film, actually)... though, of course, Red Skull has no mustache. Dominic Cooper's Howard Stark does have a mustache, and he also has a meatier role (though not so important to the plot), and Cooper does a good job of creating a character related to Robert Downey Jr's Tony Stark, where one could understand the two being father and son even though they aren't in a film together.
The film sets up for The Avengers next year, though the framing sequence has little weight to the film as a whole. When--MINOR SPOILER--Rogers learns how much time has passed, and he simply laments that he had a date, I almost wished Agent Carter would be back as an old woman, they'd get to dance, and while cheesy, their relationship would have had a nice coda (which also would have put more weight on Atwell's role). At this point, the Marvel films are so deliberately tying together in the lead up to The Avengers that it wasn't even surprising that the after-the-credits bit was not a scene but a trailer. So, the framing sequence here is important (and it's important, of course, to know that Captain America isn't dead), but the cut to Rogers waking up in the fake 1940s room seems like a lazy transition for something that could have been far more dramatic, showing them actually get him out of the ice.
All in all, Cowboys & Aliens and Captain America were a good double feature. The former took itself serious enough to work, and the latter had fun enough with its setting to work. I'm not sure either one will be winning any awards, but they do what they need to do as big summer movies, and sometimes that is plenty.
That is perhaps the best thing about Cowboys & Aliens, that it plays out as a Western, and doesn't play anything tongue-in-cheek, winking at the audience for knowing exactly what the cowboys are facing here... although, on that note, the film probably should have played up the fear levels a bit. Sure, the preacher calls them "demons" but no one really spends any time dealing realistically dealing with the notion of a) demons actually existing or b) flying things abducting townspeople. Then again, the tone fits with what would probably be in a classic western in which, instead of aliens, Indians are kidnapping people. Still, the film is far better than its graphic novel base deserves. I hated that book when I read it a few years back, not just because it stalled my own mini comic with the same title, but also because it was so poorly written, badly drawn. The film actually has some depth to it, taking its time to draw some 3-dimensional characters--side note, even Noah Ringer does pretty well as the sole child character... I only recently got around to seeing Shyamalan's The Last Airbender, which was a horrid, badly put together thing, and Ringer's Aang couldn't emote a bit. He wasn't an actor when he was cast for that film, but he's almost one now.
The rest of the cast is good, though Olivia Wilde's character, prior to--SPOILERS AHEAD--her burning, could have been played a little less overtly mysterious and peculiar. Another actress could've probably done the job better, but Wilde was serviceable. The various minor roles, Sam Rockwell, Adam Beach, Walton Goggins, Clancy Brown, Paul Dano, Keith Carradine (those last three in fairly small, but important roles), are all well done. All in all, the film works on more levels than one might expect given its appearance as a simplistic summer effects-heavy blockbuster. I think, for this year alone, we've already had a better western film in Rango, but Cowboys & Aliens works well as a western and works ok as a science fiction piece. Favreau knows what he's doing.
Backing up a bit, one of last summer's movies, The Last Airbender, continues the trend of Shyamalan's films getting increasingly bad as they go along. Important note, The Happening is still entertainingly bad, while Lady in the Water is offensively bad, so those two could be switched on the list rating how bad Shyamalan's films are. The Last Airbender is not entertaining, is not well acted, is poorly written, makes changes to its source that, minor (some pronunciation issues) and major (Aang never gets to full-on Avatar mode, destructive giant), serve no good purpose, and wastes some pretty good visual effects and guarantees there will be no good film adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender... unless someone pulls a Hulk and remakes this thing before anyone lets Shyamalan try a sequel. Meanwhile, the three seasons of the series are available on Netflix Instant and the new series, Legend of Korra, had a panel at Comic Con and looks to be airing sometime next year. Perhaps we can just put Shyamalan's version behind us and pretend it doesn't exist.
Visual Effects are getting cheap enough that bad movies like Shyamalan's The Last Airbender can have great ones and still be filmic shit. The Effects in Cowboys & Aliens are great in the darker scenes, a little lacking a few times in the daylight shots, but overall pretty good. Captain America also makes use of some great visual effects, including a rather unique effect, making Chris Evans look scrawny for his pre-Captain scenes. This effect has a few notable weak points, making his head and body look a little disconnected in certain shots and lighting. But, overall, the visual is a success. The color timing of the film, a little stylized for the World War II-era stuff, covers what probably wouldn't have worked as well in a realistically-colored sequence. Plenty of other stuff in this film has to be visual effects but doesn't come across as such--the Exposition, the various Hydra bases (though, obviously, parts of those were practical sets).
The acting in Captain America is good, and the film is a lot of fun (like the first Iron Man was and like Thor should have been more), getting plenty of humor in. I was never much of a reader of Captain America, and I'm not very familiar with Red Skull as a character or the various Howling Commandos (who were associated, apparently, with Nick Fury, not Steve Rogers, but the Marvel films can get away with Steve Rogers being frozen and coming back, as he's got the super soldier serum in his system, but Fury is a harder sell for being World War II-era, so the change is understandable). The various commandos, seem designed specifically for the comic nerds who will identify each of them individually, but the film really doesn't give any depth to them or spend much time with them, except as background to Captain America. The montage of the lot of them taking out various Hydra bases has little important content to it and almost comes across as a setup for a video game or a spinoff tv series or something more than an important part of this story.
Bucky gets a little more time than the Commandos, but I've already seen complaints--SPOILERS AHEAD--about his death not having the right tone for such a major character... Of course, when briefly I did follow Captain America, it was long after Bucky was a character, so again, I am not familiar with him. The film, I think, sets him up well enough before going to war, and brings him back fine enough. Inappropriately, as it turns out, when Rogers finds him in the Hydra base, and he's on what looks to be a lab table, I thought he was going to be turned bad as one of Red Skull's experimental soldiers or something (which would probably be a far cry from who Bucky was in Captain America history), but then that wasn't the case. He was not in the cells with the other soldiers because, well, he just wasn't. He does have a good moment just before his death, when he uses Captain America's shield.
Tommy Lee Jones and Stanley Tucci do well with their parts. Despite the importance of her role, Hayley Atwell's Agent Carter is such a one-note character that it's hard to judge how well she does with it. While Tucci's scientist role allows for a bit of depth, his counterpart Toby Jones is never given much to do but toady up to Red Skull. As for Red Skull, Hugo Weaving is wasted on a role that really doesn't even give him much to do, not even any good mustache-twirling (which would have been fitting the tone of the film, actually)... though, of course, Red Skull has no mustache. Dominic Cooper's Howard Stark does have a mustache, and he also has a meatier role (though not so important to the plot), and Cooper does a good job of creating a character related to Robert Downey Jr's Tony Stark, where one could understand the two being father and son even though they aren't in a film together.
The film sets up for The Avengers next year, though the framing sequence has little weight to the film as a whole. When--MINOR SPOILER--Rogers learns how much time has passed, and he simply laments that he had a date, I almost wished Agent Carter would be back as an old woman, they'd get to dance, and while cheesy, their relationship would have had a nice coda (which also would have put more weight on Atwell's role). At this point, the Marvel films are so deliberately tying together in the lead up to The Avengers that it wasn't even surprising that the after-the-credits bit was not a scene but a trailer. So, the framing sequence here is important (and it's important, of course, to know that Captain America isn't dead), but the cut to Rogers waking up in the fake 1940s room seems like a lazy transition for something that could have been far more dramatic, showing them actually get him out of the ice.
All in all, Cowboys & Aliens and Captain America were a good double feature. The former took itself serious enough to work, and the latter had fun enough with its setting to work. I'm not sure either one will be winning any awards, but they do what they need to do as big summer movies, and sometimes that is plenty.
Sunday, June 26, 2011
a lot of movies in a very short time (or rather the last two months)
I haven't wanted to just post quick, brief reviews on this blog, but then, busy with school and life, i've not put up a longer post in two months. I really meant to write a long review of the documentary Marwencol (4/29), if for no other reason than to get a few more people to have even heard of it--it's about a guy who deals with mental disability by building and maintaining a Barbie-scale World War II-era village in his backyard and photographing it. Source Code (4/2) and The Beaver (5/5) each had me interested in writing a blog entry about opening titles--the former's titles reminded me of north by northwest, the latter's had an interesting take on one of its themes (everyone's lives being interconnected) in the opening titles. I could have written an entry about unnecessary 3D (using Pirates of the Caribbean On Stranger Tides (5/22) and Thor (5/7)) or good use of 3D (using Kung Fu Panda 2 (5/28) and Cars 2 (today)). I could have compared Bridesmaids (5/24) and The Hangover Part II (6/10), or explained how X-Men First Class (6/5) tried to be a few too many things at once but still was pretty entertaining (and Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy were great). I could have written about a couple small movies I rather enjoyed--Everything Must Go (5/13) and Beginners (6/5). I could have finally put together a review of the various Jean-Claude Van Damme films I've watched in the last few months--I believe I've mentioned watching these to possibly do an interpretation of a bit from JCVD next fall in a speech competition, and in the past two months (when I've gotten past a lot of his obvious ones already) I've watched The Hard Corps (4/26), Lionheart (5/10) Universal Soldier The Return (5/12) (since watching JCVD (1/2), I've already watched several other Van Damme movies: The Order (3/11), Maximum Risk (3/13), Universal Soldier (3/16), Second in Command (3/21), Replicant (3/24), Nowhere to Run (4/1), Knock Off (4/2), and The Quest (4/8)). I watched Downfall (5/21) again for History class, so I could have quite easily pasted that review here. I certainly could have written a review of The Tree of Life (5/29)...
Actually, I will comment a bit on The Tree of Life before I go today. Though some people were put off by the birth-of-the-universe sequence, I thought it was amazing and could have actually been longer (and maybe should have been, if only to get to primates before jumping back to the main storyline). The main storyline, the acting, and Malick's direction especially were all great. I did think the afterlife sequence was a bit lacking (and like the afterlife ending in Lost, a bit arbitrary in its representations of the characters and their interactions). But, like Malick's earlier films, this one is very watchable.
Also, the negative Cars 2 reviews are wrong. The film is a good spy movie, a good action piece, and a surprisingly fitting sequel to the original Cars... of course, many say that was the worst of Pixar's films. Then again, being the worst of a group of films as great as Pixar's have been--that's hardly an insult.
And, I will try to keep up this blog more over the summer, like I had it going as the Oscars approached.
Actually, I will comment a bit on The Tree of Life before I go today. Though some people were put off by the birth-of-the-universe sequence, I thought it was amazing and could have actually been longer (and maybe should have been, if only to get to primates before jumping back to the main storyline). The main storyline, the acting, and Malick's direction especially were all great. I did think the afterlife sequence was a bit lacking (and like the afterlife ending in Lost, a bit arbitrary in its representations of the characters and their interactions). But, like Malick's earlier films, this one is very watchable.
Also, the negative Cars 2 reviews are wrong. The film is a good spy movie, a good action piece, and a surprisingly fitting sequel to the original Cars... of course, many say that was the worst of Pixar's films. Then again, being the worst of a group of films as great as Pixar's have been--that's hardly an insult.
And, I will try to keep up this blog more over the summer, like I had it going as the Oscars approached.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Darth Maul’s retarded little brother… AKA Insidious
The opening shot of Insidious promises lame visuals the likes of numerous online websites purporting to have evidence of ghosts, you know blurry shapes in the background of photos, shadows in windows (except the opening shot of the film doesn’t bother to let us know that there’s no one there to cast this shadow, so this is in no way scary or even necessarily interesting), an old grandfather clock at the end of a hallway… because clocks are so scary (and, SPOILER alert: the clock is never relevant to the plot in any way).
The opening titles, and the music cues (with screeching violins that someone thought would be reminiscent of old gothic horror films but which in practice was taken too far) are lame. For no reason other than maybe the director thinks older horror films are cool, the shots during the title sequence are in black and white, with red smoky titles, you know the kinda stuff that would be cool to add to your homemade video maybe but that was silly anywhere else for at least a couple decades now… if not forever.
And then, the story begins. Mother and son have matching pajamas… no reason, and she never wears them again, it’s just something to make cute a scene that isn’t already, shouldn’t be, and really still isn’t even with the matching pajamas. Insert Chekhov’s photo album—for those who don’t get the reference, Chekhov’s gun, aka the gun on the mantle, is a fairly basic trick of drama. You introduce the gun in the first act, it goes off in the final act. Of course, the real trick is to not make the gun so obvious, but oh, no, there are no photos of your father as a child, at all, is such a silly detail that there’s absolutely no way that won’t come up later.
But, anyway, on with the story. Seems, a couple who seem to be barely middle class—he’s a high school teacher and she, well, briefly it seems like she’s a songwriter, but that is a useless detail inserted to add some depth or something (and to have one of their boxes go missing and have it matter to these characters… except she barely seems concerned, finds it like one scene after she’s noticed it’s missing and husband can’t be bothered to care it’s gone, so I guess he doesn’t care much for her songwriting… except there’s an attempt at a “cute” bedroom scene in which she asks which of her songs is his favorite, he suggest she write a song about him, laughter ensues and if there’d been a cinematically appropriate sex scene to follow, maybe there would have been something good in this film…
Anyway, backtracking, there are boxes (one of which went missing and shows up in the attic) because husband and wife and three kids, one named Dalton, and the other two named extraneous and superfluous, have just moved into a new house. And, despite random box from moving showing up in attic, the attic is in no way scary. Still, Dalton finds his way up there when the door opens itself, which really doesn’t jibe with the rest of the film, as the spirits don’t need him up there, and his going in the attic serves no actual plot purpose… seriously, though he falls off the broken ladder (another Chekhov’s gun set up maybe two scenes earlier when wife ventured into the attic and found her box of sheet music, even though she will only be seen near the piano once and that is probably just because the filmmaker thought it would be more interesting than her doing something housewife-ish) and hits his head—somehow hurting the front of his head even though he obviously hits the back of it, by the way—this ISN’T the cause of his coma… oh wait, “it’s not a coma, they don’t know what to call it,” as the line in the trailer goes, except yeah, it’s a coma, the doctor says it’s a coma, he just doesn’t know what’s caused Dalton to go all comatose. But, “not a coma” is so much more mysterious than “coma of unknown origin” I guess.
Anyway, Dalton into coma, jump ahead a few months, wife is all depressed—maybe that’s why she isn’t wearing her pajamas anymore, except such a detail of characterization seems far too complicated for this script; it’s more likely the costume department lost them. But, she’s sitting at the piano, writing a song and hears a voice over the baby monitor. So, she heads up to baby superfluous’ room and there’s no one there. And, the scares begin… (at this point, I wish that “not” line from Wayne’s World hadn’t gotten old, because that is exactly the lame joke I need)
Some other stuff happens, husband stays late at work (and there’s a drawing of the clown from Saw (a much better film that I now must assume was entirely because of the script, because James Wan is an awful director) just to make us hope Jigsaw will show up, or maybe this film is actually our Jigsaw trap, and we have to chew through our own eyes so we don’t have to see anymore of this) for no reason except wife is annoying, extraneous says he doesn’t like how Dalton walks around at night—oh, forgot to mention, Dalton is now at home, with medical stuff hooked up to him and everything; there’s even a brief scene in which the nurse shows wife how to insert a breathing tube in his nose, and there’s some cheesy line in there, the nurse telling the wife that the universe messed with the wrong woman, or something like that, even though we have no reason to a) think the nurse knows anything about wife, b) believe that wife is at all capable of caring for her comatose kid or c) care.
There are some ghosts, a kid who changes the song on the turntable—yes, wife has a turntable to go with the grandfather clock, because in this film there is nothing new, no new ideas and no new technology—and laughs and runs around, which doesn’t make him scary so much as a) potentially cute and b) mildly annoying. There’s also some large man in a trenchcoat who paces on the balcony then shows up in bedroom to lunge at wife and… well, not make contact because… well, I’m not sure why. Several times in the film, these spirits, be they ghosts or demons are simply scared away by the light being turned on—which really means there’s an easy way to protect Dalton, just turn on the lights in his room, but that’s too obvious—but in this instance, I think he just went away. And, eventually, there’s also the titular (well, Darth Maul’s Retarded Little Brother should’ve been the title at least) Junior Sith Lord, who’s a demon, who likes to paint half his face red, sharpen his fingers on an old grinding wheel and listen to “tiptoe through the tulips” mostly because, apparently, the filmmaker thinks that song is creepy. Except, combined with Junior Sith Lord, it’s just good for a laugh at how pathetic this film has gotten.
Enter husband’s mother, who tells us about a dream she had with Junior Sith Lord hanging out in Dalton’s room, and she tells us his voice is scary and unforgettable, but we don’t actually get to hear it. But, anyway, husband’s mother calls psychic lady, who is preceded by her comic sidekick investigators, who check out the house… oh, and this is another new house, because husband believed wife just enough to move out of the other house but not enough to trust psychic lady later—his scale of appropriate responses to wife hallucinating is a bit mixed up. There’s still a grandfather clock, which serves no purpose (well, possibly to tell the time, but that is hardly relevant to the plot), and there are still ghosts and demons and whatnot. Turns out—another classic line from the trailer—“it’s not the house that’s haunted, it’s your son” or rather it’s loser couple-that-are-trying-to-act-way-too-much-for-such-a-bad-film’s son. Enter psychic exposition lady to explain the plot. SPOILER ALERT, if anyone cares: Dalton can astral project when he sleeps, but he’s gone too far away this time into a place psychic lady calls “the further.” It’s this dark place where the souls of the dead are, all scary and tormented, but I guess “hell” was trademarked, so they couldn’t use that name. And, all these ghosts and Junior Sith Lord are hanging around to take Dalton’s soul’s place in his body. Now, this is a little weird in the case of Junior Sith Lord because, well, what good is it to be in some little kid’s body when you could instead be a demon? A demon can freak people out, maybe even whisper in their ears and get them to make really bad horror films to, you know, ruin the world. A little boy—he tries something and you just gotta smack him around a bit. But, apparently, Dalton’s body is a good place to be… but there’s more. Chekhov’s gun come home to roost, to mix metaphors—seems husband has no childhood photos because his mother stopped taking pictures of him and hid away the few photos she has because there’s some old woman that kept showing up in them; see he was just like Dalton, and this old woman ghost kept hanging out trying to get inside his body when he was young, and so psychic exposition lady made him forget he could astral project and apparently made him forget that normal kids sometimes get their pictures taken.
Husband rightly thinks psychic exposition lady is crazy and kicks her out of the house, but changes his mind like a scene later when he realizes that the same Junior Sith Lord psychic lady’s comic sidekick has scribbled is in Dalton’s drawings on the wall. So, then there’s a séance, with an inappropriately funny gasmask, and some lines about innards being torn out, and I’m wishing these people had their innards torn out, just to make things interesting, but no.
So… the climax: Husband has to astral project all over again, go to Hell, I mean, “The Further” to rescue Dalton. And, Hell is mostly dark and empty, except for a scene with some girl who apparently shot her family to death and they all have smiles on their faces—because smiles are scary—and there’s Darth Maul’s retarded little brother sharpening his fingers and listening to “tiptoe through the tulips” and I’m wishing he was listening to “jeepers creepers” because even in their worst scenes, those two films were far better than this one. So, husband grabs Dalton and runs, because anyone who’s seen any of the Hellraiser films knows that is how one gets away from demons… and how much better would this have been if Pinhead showed up? But I digress. Dalton wakes up, everything is fine…
SPOILER ALERT, but if you’ve read this far, what do you care? Husband seems all normal until psychic lady looks at him weird then takes his photo. He strangles her, but wife and husband’s mother and Dalton can’t hear from the next room because Dalton is gorging on spaghetti, because that is what one needs after a good coma, to fill one’s stomach as fast as possible. Anyway, wife finally hears… something, finds psychic lady dead—which means no more exposition, so wife has no idea what’s going on, until she picks up psychic lady’s camera, because, you know, getting that camera off the floor is more important than, say, calling the police. She sees photo of husband, rather, photo of old woman from his childhood photos, and husband comes up behind her as she’s looking at the camera, and cut to the INSIDIOUS title and screeching violins again and finally, we’re free.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)