The Film Elitist

The Princess and the Frog

2009-12-17T19:42:00.005-05:00

With The Princess and the Frog Disney has returned to traditional 2D animation for the first time in half a decade- and it couldn't have come at a better time. During a market filled with a plethora of similarly styled 3D animated films, The Princess and the Frog is like a breath of fresh air. It's on par with the best of Disney's animated films in the 90's, and easily the best in the past decade. The animation race for the Oscars is going to be interesting this year, with this movie, Miyazaki's Ponyo, Coraline, and The Fantastic Mr. Fox (even though I haven't seen it yet) all contenders. I would not be surprised to see The Princess and the Frog as a front runner.

The movie re imagines the classic fairy tale, setting it in 1920's era New Orleans. We find Tiana (Anika Noni Rose), a waitress who dreams of opening her own restaurant. Simultaneously Prince Naveen (Bruno Campos) from the fictitious country of Maldona is visiting the city in hopes of finding a rich woman to marry. Both of their plans are waylaid, however, when Naveen is turned into a frog by a voodoo witchdoctor (Keith David). Per the fairy tale, Tiana kisses the frog in hopes of turning him into a prince, but instead she turns into a frog. The rest of the movie is spent with them trying to return to their human form, and of course finding love along the way.

The music is stellar. It's not quite on par with earlier Disney canon, but Randy Newman's songs certainly stand on their own. The gospel and blues based musical numbers seem a little tacked on in places, like they included out of obligation instead of furthering the plot. This is forgivable, however, as the zydeco infused music is so darn fun. Complementing the music is a top notch voice cast. Anika Noni Rose gained notoriety with Dream Girls, and proved herself once again here. And Jim Cummings lends his versatile voice as a Cajun firefly, Ray.

On a whole, The Princess and the Frog is lighter than many of its predecessors. The heavy themes patricide as found in the Lion King, abuse in Beauty and the Beast, and a plethora of cultural conflict found in many movies are abandoned for simpler ideas. One of the fundamental themes of being true to yourself is summed up in one of the best songs- "Dig a Little Deeper". Even the villain of Dr. Facilliar is more goofy than threatening.

With the first black princess, and set in the early 20th century, racial and class differences are touched on briefly, but glossed over. As with most Disney movies, they play up accents and stereotypes, which still leaves a slightly bad taste in my mouth. Likewise, the idea that all you need is a man is tossed around, and never really refuted. Even though it's almost 2010, some of these archaic themes still hold a major role in these movies. Given the light hearted feel of the movie as a whole, these didn't weigh too heavily.

This was one of the movies I was most looking forward to, and it didn't disappoint. Having Ron Clemments and John Musker reboot Disney's 2D department was a wise decision, considering the pair brought us both The Little Mermaid and Aladdin. The Princess and the Frog is not only possibly the best animated movie of the year- it's one of the best movies period.

4.5/5

Roy Disney

2009-12-16T22:59:00.002-05:00

1930-2009

Son of Disney co-founder Roy O. Disney died today at 79. He headed up Disney's animation division during its rebirth in the late 80's and 90's.

Here is an article about him.

Paranormal Activity

2009-12-09T18:05:00.005-05:00

Paranormal Activity is just another example in a long (and sure to continue) string of documentary styled horror movies. This movie came almost exactly a decade after The Blair Witch Project kicked off the whole idea. Yes, I know movies like Cannibal Holocaust were made long before that, but really Blair Witch was the first enormous one. Blair Witch begat movies like Rec and its remake Quarantine, as well as big budget derivations such as Cloverfield. None of this genre's offspring, including Paranormal Activity, have even come close to impact of 1999's original.

Paranormal Activity tells the simple story of Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat, a couple settling into a new house. It's been revealed that Katie has been haunted by a demonic force her entire life. This prompts Micah to buy several video cameras, and thus the movie is born. Like its predecessors, this movie is billed as "found footage." This footage (depending on in what country you see the movie) offers little more than things moving in the night, and a couple's relationship crumbling on camera.

This certainly had potential. Forgoing big scares in favor of a creepy realistic atmosphere, and genuine emotional tension could be a recipe for huge success. Unfortunately that emotional tension was not very genuine. A movie like this depends wholly on whether it can sell that this is actually happening to these people. If that doesn't work, the movie doesn't work. And unfortunately, it didn't work. At no point did I stop being aware that this is nothing but a movie.

This problem may be that this idea can no longer support an entire movie. Paranormal Activity had a slew of genuinely heart pounding moments. Drawn out shots of the couple sleeping, that culminate with nothing more that the movement in their bedroom door will leave you drenched with sweat. These shining moments are countered, however, with absurd shots like a Ouija board catching on fire.

Some of the more promising moments made for a great viral marketing campaign. This raises the question about why some of these movies have more compelling advertising than the movies themselves. The marketing for Quarantine was far better than the movie it was promoting. These film makers can take note of phenomena like this year's genuinely frightening "Slender Man" videos on youtube (search "MarbleHornets"). Short ambiguous clips can prove to be far scarier than an entire movie. Paranormal Activity was extremely close to being a good scary movie. It had tremendous potential, but ultimately tried to stretch its concept too far, which undermined what could have been a terrifying premise.

3/5

The Twilght Saga: New Moon

2009-12-09T12:05:00.004-05:00

Now I'm aware that I'm not the target audience of a romantic vampire themed movie. However, I am a fan of Ann Rice based movies, and the show True Blood, so I do know that good work in this genre is possible. The second installment of the Twilight Saga is certainly not an example of one. I did not care for the first one. The acting was some of the most wooden I'd ever seen, and the characters all struck me as overly dramatic. Painfully so.

This movie starts where the first one left off, with Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) and her vampiric beau Edward Cullen (Edward Cullen). Him an his family leave town, and leave Bella heartbroken. She falls into a depression, and grows close to an old friend, Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner), who happens to be a werewolf. A love triangle ensues, some war between vampires and werewolves is revealed, and whole slew of melodrama and mediocre visual effects engulfs the rest of the movie.

The weaknesses of the first movie are amplified here. Apparently Stewart views acting as a simple combination of biting her lip, dead-eyed looks to the left of the camera, and the occasional furrowed brow. The others don't treat the craft much better. The absurdity of the first one is also exaggerated here. I just wanted to grab them by the shoulders and shake vigorously, screaming that highschool is not the end of their lives. At least the vampires were several hundred years old, or something like that. but Bella, c'mon, is your highschool crush really worth turning into a vampire? It's overly dramatic concepts like this that make it impossible to take these movies seriously.

I don't think I can blame the actors completely for their lack of performance. Taylor Lautner was among the worst offenders in this movie. Half the movie was spent sans-shirt, a quarter was spent as a poor CG wolf, and the final quarter was spent looking confused. Yet when he hosted Saturday Night Live this past week, he was absolutely hilarious. There can only one explanation for this disconnect- a terrible script, or a terrible director (considering Chris Weitz's previous movie, Golden Compass, essentially killed a franchise before it got off the ground- even though I liked it). Both of which would account for a majority of this movie's problems.

Box offices don't lie, however. A $200 million opening weekend means they're doing something right, and pretty much have a mandate to finish up the series. This is certainly not my cup of tea, but apparently it appeals to some (which we can only partially attribute to a shirtless Taylor Lautner). The audience for this movie already knows they're the audience. If you had to read this to decide whether you want to see it, I guarantee you don't.

0.5/5

The Secret of Kells

2009-12-09T11:56:00.004-05:00

The Secret of Kells was perhaps the single movie I was most looking forward to this year. And it did not disappoint. In a world dominated by painfully similar animated features, this movie out of Ireland brought a truly unique aesthetic, that excited me more than a half dozen Pixar films.

The Secret of Kells tells the mythical creation story of the Book of Kells. It follows Brendan (Evan McGuire), the young and mischievous nephew of Abbot Cellach (Brendan Gleeson) from the city of Kells. With an invasion of murderous vikings on the horizon, the town is visited by Brother Aiden (Mick Lally), an artist working on what would become the Book of Kells. Conflict ensues between Aiden and Cellach, with the Abbot wanting to focus on the wall he's building around the city, and the Brother wanting to work towards conserving knowledge in his books. Brendan is caught in the middle.

The story is rather thin. It's entertaining, but it's a little sporatic. Certain characters like Aisling (Christen Mooney), the faerie who lives in the forest outside of Kells, are not effectively used. The movie set her up very well, but she essentially disappeared about 3 quarters of the way through the movie. A few places where the pacing seemed to hit a standstill, like when Aisling is endowed with certain musical powers strictly to write them out of a corner, were the only minor issues I had with the movie.

Aesthetically, Secret of Kells is brilliant. The style reflects the illuminated manuscripts that are the focus of the films. The characters are designed beautifully, and the animation complements the style. Each frame of this film qualifies as a piece of art. The animation breathes a certain brilliance into the characters. Brother Aiden's cat for example, and the denizens of the abbey were wonderfully aniamted. And scenes with Aisling darting through the forest were inspired.

Movies like The Secret of Kells seem so new and refreshing in a world filled a barrage of formulaic animated movies. I hope this movie finds a wide audience, because it's easily one of the best animated movies in years.

4.5/5

2012

2009-11-28T09:44:00.004-05:00

Roland Emmerich said he wanted to create the disaster movie to end all disaster movies. Here's hoping he's right. He may not make the best disaster movies, but the director who brought us Independence Day (which I actually loved), Godzilla, and The Day After Tomorrow, certainly makes the biggest ones. Given the genre you can't expect a brilliant movie, but you can experience a feast for the eyes. In this regard, and only this regard, 2012 delivers.

2012 exploits the theory that the world is going to end on December 21st 2012, coinciding with the end of a cycle in the Mayan long count calender. The movie actually makes a solid, albeit, absurd attempt at a scientific explanation for the end of the world. Increased solar activity is causing the core of the Earth to heat up, and essentially destroy everything. I guess this was the only idea they could think of that would result in Earthquakes, volcanoes, and tsunamis. When the movie opened in an underground neutrino detection lab, I got extremely excited. This ended up being the highlight of the movie for me.

The movie is long, nearly 3 hours, which enables story to follow essentially 2 plot lines. The primary one involves the Curtis family (led by John Cusack and Amanda Peet) as they trek their way across the globe, escaping Los Angeles as it falls into the sea, and Yellowstone, as a volcano destroys a majority of the country. The second story follows the politicians (including Danny Glover as president, and Oliver Platt and Chiwetel Ejiofor as science advisers) as they attempt to continue the human race. I don't want to give away the few plot developments in the movie, suffice it to say that these two stories obligingly come together in the unnecessarily drawn out climax.

The true star of the movie was the visual effects (certainly wasn't any of the characters). They looked spectacular, if a bit goofy at times. I didn't think Emmerich could top the snap freeze of New York in The Day After Tomorrow, but he managed to do it- many times over. The shots of a plane flying through toppling buildings as LA falls into the ocean, or of an RV outrunning a pyroclastic flow in Yellowstone, or of a global flood wiping out the Asian subcontinent are over the top.

There was no shortage if cringe worthy moments. The president staying behind as Washington is destroyed- seriously? Our intrepid band of heroes sneaking onto an ark that's supposed to save humanity? You've got to be kidding me. On the other hand, the goofy conspiracy theorist played by Woody Harrelson almost made going to the movie worth while.

In the end, this is really nothing more than a spectacle of visual effects. If you go into it expecting as much, you'll probably come away happy. If you expect anything more than that you'll be sorely disappointed (and after 3 hours sitting in a movie theater seat, just plain sore). If anything good comes out of this movie, it will be to make film makers think twice before making another disaster movie.

1.5/5

Where The Wild Things Are

2009-11-25T16:29:00.005-05:00

Where The Wild Things Are is one of my favorite movies of the year thus far. It's an adaptation of Maurice Sendak's story of a misbehaving, over imaginative youth named Max. I had trouble picturing a book with only a hand full of sentences transferring well into a movie, but director Spike Jonze and writer Dave Eggers pull it off. It probably didn't hurt that they were in constant contact with Sendak himself, who ultimately gave the final product his blessing.

The movie follows Max (Max Records) an over active kid driving his single mother crazy. After a brief introduction of the characters, including his love-hate relationship with his older sister and his mother, he runs away to an imaginary island where he comes across the titular Wild Things. After a fairly tense initial confrontation, he becomes their leader. His relationship with the Wild Things, in turn, closely resembles his relationship with his own family, in a well deserved role reversal.

Perhaps the most touching, and certainly the most important, relationship is between Max and Carol (voiced by James Gandolfini) the biggest and most volatile of the Wild Things. Carol gives Max the ability to see himself from the outside, as well as a look into how his behavior affects those around him. For the first time, he is able to see things from his mother's point of view.

There's been some complaints bandied around about how this movie may be too scary for children. There may indeed be some validity to that. The relationship between Max and the various Wild Things hovers between touching and dramatically intense. Each one of the creatures embodies certain flaws and emotional dysfunction. Everybody feels these things, but it may be difficult for a children to wrap their heads around them- hence these traits personify themselves in each of Max's new found friends. I expect that the ability for children to relate to Max far outweighs any scary moments. In fact, while watching this movie I thought I was looking at myself at a younger age.

Aside from being an extremely touching story, Where The Wild Things Are is beautiful to look at. The island Max travels embodies the grand scope, that could only come from a vivid imagination. Yet somehow, he makes the seemingly boundless island feel intimate. This is also a prime example of how to effectively use computer visual effects. The Wild Things themselves were all done with actors in suits. Their faces, however, were CG. Honestly, I didn't know that before going into it, and would have never suspected a thing. The raw emotion conveyed by these creatures makes it feel like no effects were created at all.

My one quibble with this movie is in one minor departure from the book. In Sendak's original, Max is sent to his room, and creates the entire Wild Things universe in his room. In the movie he runs away from home, and despite still being clearly within his imagination, "travels" to the island. By forcing Max to leave his house, the movie blurs this line and diminishes the power of his imagination. This missed opportunity is the only thing that prevented Where The Wild Things Are from being a home-run.

4.5/5

Astro Boy

2009-11-23T10:36:00.004-05:00

We go from one mediocre animated movie to one that borders on abysmal. I have a number of issues with this movie. I'm disappointed with both how it was done and what they turned the classic character into. Most important, however, the movie itself was simply poorly done. It was poorly written, poorly acted, and poorly directed.

A little history is in order at this point. Astro Boy began its life as a Japanese manga in the 50's, then quickly expanded into a television show in the 60's, possibly the first anime. It also went through several more iterations over the following decades. I hate to be one of those fanboys complaining about how something is updated and doesn't follow the old way (especially because I'm not an Astro Boy fan), but my first issue is that they did the movie with 3D aimation. I understand that things need to be updated, but that simply removes it too far from its roots. Astro Boy had potential to bring the manga aesthetic to the screen, but instead ended up looking like just another generic 3D movie. In addition to the watering down of the aesthetic, they watered it down thematically. Traditionally, Astro Boy is pretty dark. I mean for crying out loud, the title character is a robot made by a grieving scientist after his son died. Though this remains the same for the movie, it's somehow lost all of its edge. The dark themes are watered down by a very happy-go-lucky aesthetic.

Astro Boy doesn't stop at butchering a classic character. The acting is awful. I never thought there could be anything more rigid than Nicholas Cage as an actor, but I was wrong. Nicholas Cage as a voice actor is even worse. Nathan Lane as Ham Egg, the impoverished robot tinkerer that takes Astro in as part of his family, is one of the few shining spots in acting. But still, he was never anything but Nathan Lane just playing Ham Egg. I never got lost in any of the characters. Perhaps the truely funny moments came with the Robot Liberation Front, a band of 3 inept robots trying to start a revolution. During these scenes the comedic timing was spot on, and I would have sworn these actors were channeling the likes of John Cleese or Michael Palin. Sadly, these moments were rarities.

This may be a little more harsh than this movie deserves. It wasn't necessarily bad. I can see it appealing to kids who may identify with Astro Boy. Themes of fitting in are prevalent, and may ring true with certain age groups. The movie touches on everything from class and generational differences, to whether robots can feel like humans (clearly embodying that idea of fitting in). Perhaps the reason I found this movie so poor is that it was a missed opportunity. It could have been something special, but instead is just another generic, sterile, 3D movie. A re imaging of a classic manga character should not have been reduced to this.

1.5/5

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

2009-10-30T00:29:00.006-05:00

If I ever read the book that Sony's new animated movie was based on, I don't remember it. Essentially, it tells the story of Chewandswallow, a delightful little town in which the clouds rain food. The movie delves into the origin story of this community, and how its peculiar weather patterns came to be. It's a cute story, and has some potential for fun visuals (seriously. Raining food? That could be deliciously wacky). Unfortunately, though, this movie is indicative of what I see as a problem in the animation industry. Any charm or uniqueness is sacrificed for a safe bet, and 3D.

Naturally, this movie was indeed in 3D, though I did not see it as such. As usual, this proves to be a good litmus test on the directing of a movie. If it holds up without having to rely on cheap 3D tricks, they've done a good job. Unfortunately, Phil Lord and Chris Miller seemed to use the technology as a bit of a crutch. I appreciated the apocalyptic imagery of food raining from the sky, but there's only so many times you can see burgers falling past the camera before it gets old. There's very little in the movie besides what was presented in the trailers.

The story centers on Flint Lockwood (Bill Hader), a dud of an inventor who wants nothing more than to make his father (James Caan) proud of him. Despite his machine to (unwittingly) make it rain food, their relationship remains strained. Naturally things have to go awry when the mayor (Bruce Campbell) of the economically depressed town takes over control of the machine. Throw in a struggling reporter/love interest (Anna Faris) and you have a recipe for an extremely generic movie.

One of the movie's biggest flaws (at least from the perspective of an animation student) is the inconsistency in style. Some of the characters, especially the police officer voiced by Mr. T, feature incredible quick and snappy animation. Whereas other characters are much more subtle and realistic. Both are completely valid, but they don't belong together.

In addition to the animation issues, the story had some pretty severe pacing problems. It started out quite funny and moved along pleasantly. However, the middle dragged terribly, and by the time the speedy third act came together, it was just too late. In fact, when they confront the machine head on, the movie becomes so rapid fire and absurd that it feels almost like a completely different movie.

There were some funny moments in the movie. Andy Samberg's role as Baby Brent, a former child star and spokesperson for the town made me laugh, and the relationship between Flint and Sam Sparks (the reporter) was endearing and even a little identifiable. The main problems with the movie were just consistency, both in style and in the story itself.

2/5

Surrogates

2009-10-03T08:58:00.006-05:00

This was one of the 20 movies I was most looking forward to the rest of the year- and I was a little disappointed. Actually, make that considerably disappointed. I think Surrogates has a very compelling idea that would make a great science fiction story. Unfortunately the movie itself just does not live up to the potential of the idea.

Surrogates takes place in the near future, and most people are living their lives through robotic proxies. This eliminates any sort of risk involved in your daily life. Of course, by extension, it also eliminates your ability to truly experience life. As the movie opens we're introduced to a murder. For the first time, a person is killed while operating their surrogate. This means that using surrogates is no longer a sure fire safe way to experience life. Bruce Willis stars as Tom Greer, a detective investigating this first homicide in a decade.

I think this is a great concept. It explores themes of what happens to people when they're physically cut off from the world. This naturally leads to an emotional distance. The movie touches on these themes- but just barely. Instead it focuses on Bruce Willis doing what Bruce Willis does best- kick some ass. Now normally I'd be okay with a movie centering on him trying to infiltrate an anti-surrogate sect living on a reservation in the heart of New York City. In fact, I'd probably downright enjoy it. But not when an idea has as much potential as Surrogates.

The anti-aging effects in this movie creating a younger Bruce Willis surrogate are awful. They make the young Patrick Stewart in Wolverine look amazing. But I was drawn in this time. The surrogates are supposed to be stiff and unnatural. I would almost swear they did it intentionally, and it added to the unsettling nature of a robot doppelganger. The stiff appearance, that's okay, but there's no excuse for equally stiff dialog.

Surrogates wasn't necessarily a bad movie. It had some interesting parts, before devolving into superhuman chase scenes. And the cast wasn't bad. I always enjoy Bruce Willis, and Rosamund Pike (his foil and wife). And I always enjoy James Cromwell, even if the motivation for his character as the creator of surrogate technology was severely stretched. The problem with this movie is simply that it fell far short of what it could have been. In a way, that's more disappointing than if it had just been bad.

2.5/5

Jennifer's Body

2009-09-25T09:18:00.002-05:00

Oh my. This movie is just bad. Jennifer's Body is Diablo Cody's follow-up script to her Oscar winning Juno (which despite which I assume I gave a glowing review to, was highly overrated). This time she ventures into the teen-horror-comedy genre. Megan Fox stars as Jennifer a possessed cheerleader who starts killing her male classmates. Starring along side her is Amanda Seyfried as Needy, her slightly dorky "all she needs to do to be hot is take off her glasses" stereotype.

Just looking at the trailers you can tell the target audience. Seriously, Megan Fox in a horror movie with lesbian undertones. Who do you think wants to see this movie? On the subject of Megan Fox- she's simply terrible. At least Seyfried can act. It's a terrible role, but she's able to make it work. Fox on the other hand, is downright awful. It worked fine in Transformers because the real stars were the robots. And it could work here, because she's supposed to be a sexy husk of a person. But instead of looking alluring, she just looks confused.

The script certainly has Diablo Cody all over it. From gems like "it has to be true, it's on the Wikipedia," to "Move on dot org" (in which Jennifer is telling Needy to get past the fact they were almost killed in a fire). If you want to bring trendy catch phrases into your script to show off the hipness of your characters, fine, it worked or Juno. But don't call it "The Wikipedia." It just makes high schoolers look even more vapid than intended. I know these are little quibbles, but if you're going to build your whole trademark around quick witty dialog, you better make it a lot tighter than that.

It had a relatively small budget (most of which probably went to their troublesome star) so I have little doubt it'll turn a pretty profit. Though it did have a mediocre opening weekend- so here's hoping movie going audiences aren't being drawn in by this movie's one trick.

0.5/5

Patrick Swayze

2009-09-14T21:19:00.000-05:00

1952-2009

Here's a pretty decent obituary about him.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7300449.stm

9

2009-09-13T08:58:00.004-05:00

You generally don't associate post apocalyptic wasteland with animation (yes, Wall-e did it) but 9 takes that idea to a new extreme. The human race has been wiped out and all that remains is a small band of rag doll-esque heroes and the robot responsible for destroying humanity. This is certainly not a children's movie (that should be evident from the presence of Timur Bekmambetov as producer), but it doesn't feature anything that would inappropriate for children- just some intense action.

The movie opens with the title character "9" awakening for the first time. He quickly comes across and is befriended by "2" (all the characters are just numbers), and is almost immediately thrust into the conflict between the survivors and the machines. The film moves at a rapid clip, and in no time the action is in full swing. This results in little character development up front. Fortunately this comes throughout the movie in the short bits between action sequences.

Clearly the best aspect of the movie is the animation, and the all around visual aesthetic. Shane Acker captured the wasteland of the crumbling ruins of society perfectly. There was not a shot lacking the requisite filth and dust. Every detail seemed painstakingly created. You could see Tim Burton's hand at work in some of the robotic villains, including one disturbing doll faced snake creature. These particular moments seem to be the ones making this not a kid friendly movie.

The film could be taken as cautionary tale about our dependence on technology; or on the importance of the human soul; or even a simple tale of redemption both for "9" and the cantankerous de-facto leader "1". Honestly, I don't think any of these themes are all that strong, and it seems they're simply a way to stitch together well directed action sequences. In the end, 9 simply boils down to a feature length video game cinematic.

3/5

Also, here's shane Acker's original short. Almost every part of this showed up again in some way in the movie- and the style remained almost exact. The short gives you a really good idea of the movie.

The Final Destination

2009-09-12T00:01:00.004-05:00

Well they've certainly got their formula down. One teen has a premonition about an overly elaborate and drawn disaster, saves his or her friends, and subsequently spends the rest of the movie trying avoid death. The first movie actually introduced this as an interesting a novel concept (though it was poorly executed). The second one, though bad, featured a spectacular car accident scene that still looks great. The third brought a sense of humor and lightened the series a bit. Now the fourth installment just went through the paces. Though none of the movies were good (or even mediocre), it should come as little surprise that this was the worst.

This time Nick O'Bannon (Bobby Campo) and a few of his friends are at a NASCAR race. He witnesses a horrific crash that kills everyone in his section- in his mind. After making a scene he convinces his friends to leave, and by extension a few others follow. Of course, the accident occurs, and now they have to avoid increasingly complex traps set by death.

I'm not outright dismissing this movie. Naturally it's not supposed to be an Oscar contender. The few things that made its predecessors palletable are all but absent here. In the previous movies, the accident caused the survivors to band together and try to protect each other. This time except for the four main characters, there's almost no interaction between the survivors. This means there's absolutely no development of these characters. In the first movies as well, the death scenes were indeed elaborate, but at least they led somewhere. In this movie, however, these buildups lead nowhere. Drawn out and complex traps end up being for naught. Granted, this ends up blindsiding you, but more importantly it leaves you asking "what was the point of that?" And the few times the payoff is as intended, it is so absurd as to put even the most outlandish deaths in the earlier movies to shame.

This is the shortest movie of the franchise, clocking in at under an hour and a half. Clearly they sacrificed even the most remote character development to keep this trim running length. I did not have the privilege of seeing this in 3D, but I bet I picked out most if not all of the instances this effect was used. I'm not sure if I've ever seen a movie that relied so heavily on objects flying at the screen.

0.5/5

Julie and Julia

2009-09-09T09:26:00.005-05:00

Julie and Julia is an absolutely delightful close to the Summer. Amy Adams stars as Julie Powel, a skilled amateur cook lacking something that can't be fulfilled through her cubicle job. She finds an outlet through Julia Child. Julie gives herself one year to cook every recipe in Julia's "Mastering the art of French Cooking" and blog about it. 500 and some recipes in one year. Meanwhile, the movie features the parallel, and more compelling, story of Julia Child as she's writing the book.

Despite some certainly dramatic moments, the movie maintains a decidedly lighthearted tone through most of it. I don't think there was a single scene with Julia Child (played brilliantly by Meryl Streep) that didn't elicit a smile on my face. Her infectious positive, even when things didn't go her way (and this was a lot) was astounding. I'm hoping for an Oscar nomination for her role. Amy Adams seemed to hold her own pretty well as Julia Child's modern counterpart. She wasn't as effective as Meryl Streep, but then again, who is?

The movie switches between Child trying to get her book made, and Powel trying to get her blog made. They both faced completely different, yet somehow linked trials. Both were lost in a way, not sure what they wanted, and both found salvation through cooking (Julia as a profession, Julie as a hobby). The similarities also carried into their tasks. Julie finds herself overwhelmed by the momentous task, whereas Julia had trouble keeping it as small as it was. The major difference between the two was that Julie's endeavor started to drive a wedge between her and her husband (Chris Messina) whereas Julia and her husband Paul (Stanley Tucci with yet another amazing performance) never let anything get between them. It's almost certain that his presence played a major role in her never gloomy attitude.

They both found themselves in a situation many can relate to. Though Julie had her identity crisis about 20 years younger than Julia's, and dealt with it in a very public forum. Of course the food was center stage for both of them. Though Julie often found it more obligation and bane than salvation (the scene when she tries to make an aspic for example). But what was possibly even more important than just the food, was the process- the exploration.

The part with Julie got off to a but of a slow start. Whereas Julia seemed to fall naturally into her quest for french cuisine, Julie's motives seemed a little forced. The first twenty minutes or so are filled with very expository conversations. The inciting argument that drove her into the block was painfully obvious. It stopped just short of her husband saying "I dare you." Julie took this off the cuff remark seriously and the seeds that would eventually grow into her book were sown. This is a very minor, quibble, however, and the rest of the movie makes up for it. Besides these few forced moments, this is one of the most charming films I've seen in some time.

4.5/5

Top 20 movies for the rest of the year

2009-08-28T08:50:00.006-05:00

I figured it's time to post the top movies I'm looking forward to for the rest of the year. These are in no particular order (mostly in order that they're coming out)

Taking Woodstock
I know this one is already out, but I haven't seen it yet, so it's leading off my list.

Extract
This looks like a fairly standard romantic comedy (except that it actually looks funny). I'm a big fan of Jason Bateman, and think that he makes a really good underdog romantic lead. Add to that a supporting cast of Mila Kunis, Kristin Wiig, and Ben Affleck, who is always so much better as a supporting actor, and I think we'll have a winner.

Carriers
There's never a shortage of zombie-esque movies. Carriers looks much better than the overly, albeit intentional, cheesy Zombieland which comes out around the same time. Carriers plays up the isolation and the forced mobility that made movies like 28 Days later so good. Carriers may end up being terrible, but I hope it'll at least be scary.

9
This is Shane Acker's feature length debut. After directing a short of the same name, Timur Bekmambetov and Tim Burton gave him the opportunity to turn it into a feature. There's no shortage of animated movies rounding out the year (Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, Planet 51, Princess and the Frog) but this seems to be the only serious one, and the only post-apocolyptic animation I can recall since Heavy Metal.

No Impact Man
This seems to be a fairly interesting documentary on a family's attempts to minimize their carbon footprint, and the struggles that follow. If anything, it may just show how futile this attempt really is.

The Informant
This seems like a very funny case of the wrong man for the wrong job. The Informant is a corporate dark comedy that seems to be in the same vein as last year's Burn After Reading. And Matt Damon as a lovable goof? Sound good to me.

Surrogats
In a very plausible future, people are able to live their lives through a robotic proxy, while staying in the comfort of their own home. But then people start dieing while hooked up to their surrogates, and Bruce Willis must actually go out in the world to figure out what's going on.

A Serious Man
I don't know what this movie is about, other than a perennial loser's life spiraling out of control. But the fact that it's from the Cohen Brothers nearly guarantees a winner.

Whip It
In general I've become sick of the quirky indie film. I had no interest in 500 Days of Summer or Paper Hearts. Whip It, however, looks like it transcends the quirky quicksand (despite staring Ellen Page) and looks like it will be genuinely entertaining.

The Invention of Lying
This one may be entertaining or awful. Ricky Gervais is one funny guy, but doesn't have a very good record in film. Hopefully this will be better than Ghost Town.

Good Hair
This is one of two documentaries on my list. Hosted by Chris Rock, this study in the history and stigma of African American hair seems genuinely compelling. And judging from the trailer, despite some serious undertones, it does not take itself too seriously. With Chris Rock leading it, it promises to be very funny.

The Road
I did not particularly like Cormack McCarthy's book, but i think the bleak post-apocalyptic future will lend itself to a beautiful movie. My concern is that the movie appears to reveal more about what happened before the story begins than the book. It always worried me when a movie takes liberties like this.

Where the Wild Things Are
I have no idea how they can turn a children's book with more than 10 sentences into a feature length movie. If anyone can, Spike Jonze can. What I've seen of it looks absolutely wonderful.

New York, I love You
This is the sequel (sort of) to Paris, je t'aime, which I believe I gave a 5 to. This time the movie is series of short films about New York. The movie doesn't have the same caliber of directors found in the original one, and it lacks the presence of any director who is associated with New York. No Scorsese, no Woody Allen, no Spike Lee. The only person really holding that tradition is Allen Hughs. I hope this will lead to a New generation of New York directors (despite the inclusion of Brett Ratner).

Lovely Bones
Peter Jackson's new story of what happens after a girl is murdered looks exquisit, and thrilling at parts. I never read the book, but this is near the top of the list for movies I'm looking forward to.

Amelia
Directed by Mira Nair (who also contributes a segment to New York, I Love You), this Amerlia Earhart biopic features Hilary Swank in the starring role.

The Fourth Kind
"based on true events" is always both a draw and a caution. Like many of the movies on this list, this one is a wildcard. It could either be fantastically scary (which the trailer makes it look) or a complete dud. Here's hoping for fantastically scary.

The Boat that Rocked
This looks like one of the funniest movies on the list. It follows the story of a pirate radio station transmitting of a boat in 1960's. With a cast led by Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Bill Nighy, Nick Frost, and Kenneth Branagh, this one can't lose.

The Princess and the Frog
Finally Disney is returning to 2D. This movie adds a cajun feel and decidedly original twist on this classic fairy tale. I'm hoping that this movie does well, because we are in desperate need of a return to classic animation.

Sherlock Holmes
This isn't quite the dignified Hound of Baskervilles Sherlock Holmes, but I think Robert Downy Jr. can bring the famous detective in the new century.

The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard

2009-08-26T18:26:00.004-05:00

This movie is atrocious. But honestly, that doesn't come as any surprise. It had some potential- a great cast (and I mean really great) and a concept that could lend itself to some very funny situations. Unfortunately the film makers doesn't utilize any of these assets, and instead they churn out a criminally unfunny movie.

The Goods is about a band of mercenary car salesmen who travel around the country trying to save struggling dealers. The movie opens on failing Selleck Motors as Don Ready (Jeremy Piven) and his crew come in revitalize the company before it's foreclosed on. Car lots can involve very funny situations- one of my favorite Seinfeld episodes took place at a car dealership. The Goods, instead of including well timed observational humor, focuses on profanity, sexual innuendo, and situations that rival our least favorite parody movies (Including comparing the auto lot to a riot and a battlefield).

Piven tried to capture that sleazy, yet somehow charming jerk. This applies both to moving cars, and his infatuation with the dealer owner's daughter (Jordana Spiro). Aaron Eckhart mastered this role in Thank You For Smoking, whereas Piven just you with a bad taste. This applies to most of the other characters, too, from Ving Rhames' stiff dialog, to Rob Riggle's man-child. The only person immune to this is Ed Helms, who I think is one of the funniest people working today.

Of course the best selling point is the cast. That's what sold me. Ving Rhames, Ed Helms, Tony Hale, Rob Riggle, David Koechner, and even a small but great cameo by Kristen Schaal. And this is just a small sampling of a wonderful ensemble cast. The movie falls well short of the sum of its parts (it's more like the difference of its parts). It suffers the same fate as last year's Step Brothers. Great comedic leads given a terrible script. The dialog is stilted, and as I previously mentioned, it focuses way too much on profanity. This really isn't much of surprise with a fairly green director (Neal Brennan) and writers. Brennan, the most experienced of the team made his break directing Chapelle's Show. When charged with a feature, however, he just can't keep it going. Even though it's produced by funnyman Will Ferrel, the best that comes out is his small cameo in one scene.

The Goods is one of the least funny movies of the year. A great cast is reduced to walking through stilted dialog like their reading it for the first time. Don't waste your time on The Goods.

1/5

Inglourious Basterds

2009-08-23T21:53:00.004-05:00

Inglourious Basterds is pure Quentin Tarantino. This movie is exactly what you probably expect. Despite taking its name from a 1978 WWII movie, it bares a much closer resemblance to The Dirty Dozen. Boiling this movie down to one central idea is not difficult. Brad Pitt plays Lt. Aldo Raine, who leads a small band on a covert mission to kill as many nazis as possible. And in true Tarantino fashion, they do so as brutally as possible. Everything culminates in two separate assassination plots.

The movie certainly pays homage to the old Westerns, with a group of rough and tumble vigilantes taking matters into their own hands- a la The Wild Bunch. Though Inglourious Basterds forewent the initial character development found in The Dirty Dozen, and jumped straight into the action. In reality, we never do find anything out about most of the characters, keeping us fairly detached from the "Basterds" themselves. This seems to be a Tarantino trademark (I don't think I've ever really cared about any of his characters). This lack of development doesn't really bother me, as the characters are so outlandish, they're essentially caricatures.

This caricature is embodied most straightforwardly in Brad Pitt's character. The leader of the bastards brings his thick Tennessee drawl to everything (especially when he tries to pass himself off as Italian). The rest of his band (including Eli Roth, BJ Novak, and Omar Doom) offer up similar if more subtle (except Roth's foul mouthed, baseball bat wielding behemoth) performances. In reality, the only real nuanced role was that of Shosanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent), a Jewish woman in France who witnessed the deaths of her entire family. It just so happens that she has a completely unrelated assassination plot, at the same exact time and place as the bastards'.

Tarantino makes his love of film known. He bends genres almost beyond the breaking point. Despite being rooted in the spaghetti westerns (with the obligatory "Once Upon a Time..." moniker) a scene dealing with a British operative and his commanding officer discussing the nuances of German cinema (yes, that is actually relevant to the story) would make Peter Sellers and George C. Scott proud. And during the effeminate interactions between Hitler, and his propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels I could almost see Mel Brooks' hand at work. Not to mention the over-the-top German Corporal Lada, serving as an equally absurd counterpoint to Pitt's character. Tarantino's love of film embodies itself in all aspects of this movie. Many of the characters derive their names from directors, and assassination plots are intricately tied to- what else- the cinema. I must say, though, at some points it was a little unsettling sitting in a movie theater while watching the movie theater scenes.

Tarantino brings his trademark conversational wit full force here. The best scenes involve nothing more than people sitting around a table. The tension is palpable even though most of the dialog was in German or French. He manages to ratchet up the suspense of one party hiding something, and the other party closing in that secret. The shame is that all of these wonderful aspects of the movie don't mesh very well. This makes the film lack the cohesion that made some of his other movies so good. Inglourious Basterds isn't a bad movie by any means, it just doesn't rise any higher than an ample director's love letter to his favorite genres.

3.5/5

Alive in Joburg

2009-08-21T22:56:00.002-05:00

Here's the short that District 9 was based on. It was directed by Neill Blomkamp, and after Peter Jackson saw it, he recruited Blomkamp to direct the ill fated Halo movie. When that fell through, District 9 grew out of its ashes. If you haven't seen the actual movie yet, don't worry, this doesn't give anything away. Totally different plot, just the same overall situation.

District 9

2009-08-20T08:51:00.003-05:00

District 9 will doubtlessly be one of the big movies of the summer. The movie tries to shoot for the stars, to create an effects heavy sci-fi classic with something important to say. And it comes pretty close. Unfortunately this incredibly promising movie does disappoint a little, and doesn't quite live up to its potential.

In case you haven't been inundated with the trailers for District 9, the basic premise is that a giant alien craft had come to rest of Johannesburg 20 years ago. The aliens inside were brought down to Earth, and after attempts to integrate, were sealed off in a slum. There are essentially two different movies here. The first is a wonderful documentary style history of the topic, and an incredibly tense visit into the slum. The cameras follow Wikus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley), as he serves eviction notices to the alien residents, starting a relocation effort. Director Neill Blomkamp helms this portion of the movie perfectly. The rest of District 9, however, is nothing more than a fugitive movie, which devolves even further in the third act to an ultra violent shootout.

There's no shortage of political commentary here. Science Fiction lends itself so well in this area. It lets the creators postulate on "what if" scenarios, and more often than not- go the dark route. District 9 is no exception. There is the obvious apartheid symbolism (Blomkamp grew up in South Africa). But even further than that, it focuses on refugee treatment, and even touches on the military industrial complex. The movie goes places I wouldn't have thought to, but after seeing it, I can only think "of course." I imagine District 9 hit the reactions the government would have to these aliens right on the head.

Perhaps even more fundamental than the political commentary is the commentary on human (and I guess non-human) nature. Without getting into the specifics because I don't want to reveal much of the movie- themes of trust and self-preservation are at the forefront of District 9.

The movie looks great. With a budget of $30 million it looks better than movies with a budget $130 million. Each alien is unique, with its individual visual personality. And the images of this giant ship hovering over the slums of Johannesburg are haunting. The ending act, however, takes things a little too far. I felt parts were graphic, just for the sake of being graphic. How many times can blood splatter on the camera?

Despite the movie weakening towards the end, District 9 is still an overall strong movie. It's thrilling, actually has a message, and really will keep you on the edge of your seat.

4/5

Gake no ue no Ponyo

2009-08-19T13:36:00.005-05:00

So the independent summer train keeps rolling on. First it was Hurt Locker, then Moon, and now Ponyo (even though it's been out in Japan for a year). Ponyo demonstrates one of Miyazaki's skills, creating children. Ponyo is easily the cutest thing he's put on screen since 1989's My Neighbor Totoro. The visual aesthetic is, of course, beautiful, and the animation is great. Unfortunately the narrative suffers a bit, which prevents his movie from being among his best.

Ponyo is in the same vein as The Little Mermaid, about a fish (Ponyo) wanting to become a human. Along with this simple and human tale, Miyazaki throws in some epic repercussions. In essence the entire world hangs in a balance because of the decisions of one fish. This lead to some absolutely breathtaking scenes, but the scope of this otherwise intimate story was a tad too much.

On the other end is Sosuke, the little boy who is the adoration of Ponyo. Some of the best scenes are between him, Ponyo, and Sosuke's mother- who is just trying to cope with the concept of this fish who's magically turned into a girl (I must say she takes it very well). There were a number of scenes reminiscent of the Little Mermaid, with learning how to eat with utensils.

An interesting trait that is found in similar Miyazaki films (Totoro, Kiki's Delivery Service) is the absence of a true antagonistic force. In Ponyo there is really no villain- even characters that seem a little bad really aren't. In cases like these, circumstance or nature are really the opposing forces. I have no problem with these, he used that force very effectively in other movies. But with the scope of the destruction of the planet in balance here, it seems there should a more conscious force behind the conflict.

Narrative problems aside, the movie was beautiful. Miyazaki's movies always seem like they're paintings in motion, and Ponyo takes this even a step further. In a genuinely exciting scene, Sosuke and his mother are trying to outrun a raging sea, with giant waves that resemble actual fish as they crash over the winding road leading to their house. All the while Ponyo running along along the surface of the water.

Though this isn't in the upper echelon of Miyazaki's cannon, that doesn't say much. Ponyo is certainly weak when it comes to the narrative (it has its fair share of holes that are solved by simply ignoring them). Despite its problems, Ponyo is still a beautiful and thoroughly enjoyable animation. Finally, even though this doesn't have anything to do with the movie itself- I really wish these movies would shown in Japanese with subtitles. I am absolutely tired of dubbed over films.

4/5

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

2009-08-14T20:42:00.002-05:00

If you're fan a fan of G.I. Joe- either the series or the comics, you'll hate this movie. Neither characters nor plot stay true to the original universe. If you're not a fan of G.I. Joe- there's really no reason for you to see this movie. It's a sorry excuse for a Summer blockbuster (though blockbuster it is indeed). After rising to action prominence with The Mummy and its sequel, Stephen Sommers piloted this movie- his first one after the abysmal Van Helsing. Clearly G.I. Joe will not help that reputation.

The movie is sort of an origin story both for the Cobra (essentially G.I. Joe's legion of Doom) and Duke (Channing Tatum) perhaps the most well known G.I. Joe. The M.A.R.S corporation has created a nanotech weapon, capable of propagating itself and eating through all metal on an unstoppable rampage. Clearly not a good idea. But he manages to sell some of the weapons to NATO, so Duke and his intrepid partner, Ripcord (Marlon Wayans) are charged with transporting them. Of course, they're intercepted by the Cobra, led by The Baroness (Sienna Miller)- Duke's old fiancee. Ripcord, Duke, and the weapons are rescued by the Joes, and after an obligatory montage, the duo join the elite force- none too soon. Because, of course, the Cobra are back.

Now this movie is naturally nothing more than a barrage of visual effects, with a loosely constructed plot to showcase them in the best possible way. The problem with this is that the movie doesn't do a very good job of setting up this effects heavy universe- so when the phenomenal action sequences do appear, they seem out of place. I mean seriously, accelerator suits? I imagine th story session that came up with this idea went something like "hey, let's do a car chase, except on foot!" Don't get me wrong, it looks cool, but they used it so sparingly that it doesn't make much sense. Really this movie is no more absurd than Transformers. But the reason Transformers worked is that they set up the world to be like this- whereas G.I. Joe just through these elements into a world that's pretty much supposed to be ours.

There are a lot of characters in this movie, both good guys and bad guys. And it seems they wanted to explore the back stories to all of them (of course none of them meshing with the comic or cartoon). The result is a cursory introduction, including poorly constructed relationships, mind control devices, and end of movie twists in place for the sole purpose of allowing for a sequel.

G.I. Joe does deliver on the effects, and for $170 million it certainly should. Unfortunately there's really no point to them. This poorly constructed movie I'm sure has left many disappointed.

1/5

Moon

2009-08-10T14:02:00.004-05:00

Moon is the best sci-fi thriller of the past several years. In fact, you might have to go much further back to find a comparable film. This is a difficult one to review without giving too much away. So forgive me for being vague, but I don't want to tell anything that's not given away in the trailer. Suffice it to say that Duncan Jones in his feature length debut throws a fair share of curve balls at you.

In the future we are harvesting clean burning H3 from the surface of the Moon. This mostly automated operation still requires a crew of one. We find Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) a few weeks from the end of his three year contract. As can be expected from anyone spending 3 years alone on the Moon with your only companion being a computer (even though it's voiced by Kevin Spacey), Bell is losing his marbles. He's been talking to himself for years, and is starting to see things. A wrench is really thrown into the works when he goes out and finds a wreck. Inside the vehicle is...well...himself. This is as far as I can go without giving too much away. But I guarantee that whatever you're thinking right now, is wrong.

It would be a disservice to say that this movie has a twist ending. It has a twist, but it happens halfway through. Moon then proceeds to do what almost no movie like it does- takes that twist and actually develops it. It quickly wears off as being twist, and proceeds to be simply an intriguing plot. There are far too few movies that turn your expectations on their head like this.

There are essentially two character- Sam Bell, and GERTY (the computer). It takes a true acting powerhouse to carry a movie solo. John Cusack managed to do it a few years ago in 1408, and though I haven't seen it (I know, I'm ashamed) Tom Hanks allegedly did the same in Castaway. I'm putting Rockwell among those ranks. He's been around for quite a while, and despite some amazing roles (Frost/Nixon, Choke) he doesn't seem to resonate as a true leading man. I seriously hope he gets more notoriety than he has from his already deserving career, because he turns out a brilliant performance in Moon. This is, of course, matched by Spacey's GERTY who seems to be channeling Hal 9000. GERTY made me realize for the first time, how emotive a simple smiley or frownie face can actually be.

Moon is simply a wonderful piece of work. For (what I'm assuming) was a fairly low budget, it looks pretty good. Jones returned to sci-fi roots by using mostly practical models for set pieces and Moonscapes. I'm glad, because the few CG elements really did not look very good. In a movie with so much claustrophobia, despite being sci-fi, does not require visual extravagance. Jones balances this perfectly, not attempting more than he could, and executing what he did perfectly. Moon is a fascinating, and at parts, a heartbreaking, sci-fi thriller. Don't be fooled by the trailer. It makes it seem like an action movie. In reality it's purely about the character development- exactly as it should be.

5/5

The Hurt Locker

2009-08-08T18:56:00.006-05:00

The Hurt Locker is one of the best films of the year, and quite possibly the best narratives dealing with the Iraq war thus far. It follows a division of bomb defusing technicians in Baghdad- quite possibly the most dangerous job in the war. Paraphrasing one of the main characters- if you see them coming, run the other way. The movie delves deeply into psyche of these soldiers, what it takes for them to do what they have to do.

The movie essentially opens with Sergent William James (Jeremy Renner) joining Bravo Company. To put things diplomatically, he is slightly unstable. Whether this is a result or a cause of repeated tours in Afghanistan and Iraq is up for debate. The ending sheds some light on this, but still raises more questions. Regardless, his disregard for protocol puts him at odds with one of his partners- Sergent JT Sanborn (Anthony Mackie). Rounding out the team is Specialist Owen Eldridge (Brian Geraghty), the least seasoned of the group, having difficulty cutting his teeth in actual combat. The movie follows the day to day challenges the soldiers face, and what they do to cope.

The dynamic between the three of these actors is what really brings Hurt Locker to life. They're all relative unknowns, and when you throw them in this environment, they really don't seem like actors. Even the few big stars in the film- Guy Pearce, Ralph Fiennes, and David Morse- I didn't recognize. Granted they had small roles. The upshot, though, is that they all just seemed like soldiers.

Kathryn Bigelow shot this movie to look almost like a documentary. The cameras are among the action- shaky, but not too shaky. Instead of the intentionally disorienting direction of movies like the Bourne series, Hurt Locker gives the impression of someone actually trying to keep the camera stable amidst the action. This adds a tremendous amount of realism to the movie.

The Hurt Locker balances extremely tense moments- whether they're disarming loads of explosives or pinned down by a sniper in the open desert- with scenes of the soldiers in their spare time- playing soccer, and just getting drunk. Despite this contrast, you never forget that they're still in a war torn country. Scenes late in the movie bring these two worlds crashing together, and even when they're away from the battlefield, these soldiers are still affected by it.

The closing of the movie left a little to be desired. The style changed drastically, and it left the timeline a little ambiguous (though I'm a part of the campy that thinks everything is actually linear). It leaves you unsure about some important events. But this was a very small part of the movie. For the record, I don't know what Hurt Locker means. I've heard several different ideas, all seeming equally probable. If anyone knows definitively, let me know.

4.5/5

John Hughes

2009-08-06T20:22:00.002-05:00

John Hughes 1950-2009

The legendary comedic director died today at 59. He helmed some of my favorites including Uncle Buck, Ferris Bueller, Sixteen Candles, Breakfast Club, and my very first R rated movie- Planes, Trains, and Automobiles.

Add to these his writing credits on the Vacation series, Home Alone movies, and The Great Outdoors, and you'd be hard pressed to find someone ranked higher on any comedy list.

Orphan

2009-08-04T08:25:00.004-05:00

Orphan is a pretty successful scary movie. There are some genuinely suspenseful moments, a genuinely unsettling story, and something completely missing from most modern horror movies- a twist ending that's neither contrived or obvious. Now this isn't an entirely original movie. It bares a striking resemblance to The Good Son, which in turn bares a striking resemblance to The Bad Seed, and about a dozen other movies. This just shows that there are no new stories. Instead what's important is what new ideas are brought to these stories. In this regard, Orphan handles itself well.

The story follows a married couple, Kate and John Coleman (Vera Fermiga and Peter Sarsgaard), just after the stillbirth of what would have been their third child. After this tragedy, they decide to adopt. Probably a poor decision considering Kate wrestling with this recent trauma and dealing with her demons of prior alcoholism (which nearly resulted in the death of their second child- daughter, Max). These problems are exacerbated when they adopt Esther (Isabelle Fuhrman), who can nicely be described as odd.

It quickly becomes apparent that Esther is more than odd, when accidents begin to follow her around. This drives a wedge between John (who only sees the disingenuous overly enthusiastic Esther) and Kate (who sees the real Esther). And caught in the middle are Max and their oldest child, Daniel. They are intimidated, and even threatened by Esther, but are powerless to do anything as Esther gets more and more audacious while keeping John eating out of her hand.

What makes this movie good is besides depending on shocking scares (though it has its fair share of those, too), it relies heavily on Kate dealing with her own demons, blaming herself both for the stillbirth and Max's near death. The acting captures these emotions for the most part. Fermiga is powerful, Fuhrman is disturbing (I'm hoping this doesn't get her typecast), and Aryana Engineer who plays the hearing impaired Max is absolutely adorable. Really the weak parts were Sarsgaard, who I generally love, and Jimmy Bennett who plays Daniel. They both seemed to just go through the motions, and Sarsgaard especially came across as simply not being there. I don't blame them, though. The parts themselves were simply poor.

I frequently find myself disappointed by horror movies. Maybe one out of ten ends up being worth my time (and that is a very generous ratio). Orphan is that one. It's not stellar but it's a decent thriller.

3/5

Tron Legacy

2009-08-01T23:25:00.002-05:00

I know I'm a little late posting this. But this is the most exciting thing for me to come out of ComicCon.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

2009-07-18T14:17:00.003-05:00

Hormones are on the loose at Hogwarts. Oh, and so is the Dark Lord. Those two concepts pretty well summarize the latest Harry Potter endeavor. Now as with the others, I haven't read the book, so can't compare the movie to the text, but given its two and a half hour run time, I'm sure they kept as much in the movie as they could. David Yates returns to helm his second movie in the franchise, and The Half Blood Prince continues the dark path set out in the previous installment.

Voldemort is back (even though he's actually been back for two movies now) and everything effectively has hit the fan. His army, known as Death Eaters has been striking those that would oppose them in what I suppose could be described as guerrilla warfare. With each attempt they are getting closer and closer to Hogwarts. And of course, once again, it's up to Harry Potter to step up. Professor Dumbledore continues to predict an ever more dire situation, and gets Harry ever more in over his head. Even more than in the past, it's become imperative to question who they can trust, and that number is dwindling.

But there's a major distraction getting in the way of him from saving the world- girls. Love triangles abound as our student wizards are blossoming into adults (or something like that). I understand this is an important part of character development, but it brought this fantasy romp dangerously close to teenage drama. The New Moon trailer that preceded the movie gave me enough of that. This resulted in no few awkward scenes of students quarreling with uncomfortable professors looking on. I'm sure they were thinking the same thing I was.

The Half Blood Prince did deliver what I expect from a Harry Potter movie. The visuals not only looked gorgeous, but were very unique. This franchise has adopted abstract literacy in the form of beautiful transitions creating a look of the uncanny. Actual liquid extract of memory, mixing like ink water to reveal those flashbacks was a creative and stunning approach to a simple scene transition. But in an even more conventional sense, everything about this movie looks great.

Like I said before, this installment has continued the series down a dark direction. You can tell just from the trailers featuring the horror movie-esque creatures swarming out an underground lake. I've had this rant before (probably with the previous Harry Potter movie even) that movies seeming to have a very young target audience are getting more and more intense. These movies suffer from this, Transformers suffered from it, and others do as well. The Half Blood Prince is the first movie since the 3rd one to get a PG rating, which I think was given out a little easily. There are some genuinely unsettling moments in this movie. And there are multiple scenes when the characters act drunk or even stoned (seriously).

Half Blood Prince was fun. It was a visual feast, and despite being dark in nature, had probably more funny moments than any of the other ones. There were multiple times when the audience laughed uproariously (including myself). It just suffers a little from bringing too much of that teenage drama to play. A little bit is fine and even necessary, but c'mon, the world is at stake, who cares who Ron is going out with.

3.5/5

Brüno

2009-07-15T19:22:00.003-05:00

I was not a big fan of Borat, but I was able to at least see the comedic mastery at work. Sacha Baron Cohen pulled off such a pervasive blurring the line between reality and illusion that he seemed to be channeling Andy Kauffman. Borat was a little outrageous for me at parts, but I was able to understand how funny the uncomfortable moments could be. This time out, Cohen continues his quest of bringing out the worst in everyone he sees be embodying his third major alternate ego- Bruno- a flamboyantly homosexual Austrian.

Essentially the movie loosely follows Bruno's attempts to become a star after being disgraced as a fashion reporter at Milan. He travels to Hollywood to try acting (including one very funny scene featuring him as an extra), to try pushing his own pilot, to try charity, and just about any celebrity stunt he can come up with.

There are some moments in the movie (a few) that are uproariously funny. The funniest moments, however, are not because of his persona, but the parts when he has to do as little as possible to drag responses from his interviewees. The highlight was a slightly disturbing casting call for babies, in which the stage parents said they would agree to put their babies through virtually anything. This had nothing to do with the Bruno character, but instead was strictly about the audacity these people had. That's where the movie shone.

Unfortunately, most of the movie consisted of Cohen acting ever more outrageous to elicit reactions from people. Unlike Borat, which is comparably tame, Bruno had to go far and beyond what almost any individual could put up with- then paint the naïfs he interviews as homophobes. I'd venture to say they're more phobic of his annoying antics.

He continues to blur the lines between genuine reactions and stage. There was one hilarious scene in which he brings his adopted African baby featured prominently in the trailers on to a talk show. I appreciated this as it lampooned the talk show culture and used the absurdities normally found on these shows against it. Unfortunately the credibility begins to unravel as the particular show he was on was canceled 13 years ago. Whether it was wholly staged with the audience being in on it or not, i don't know. But the simple fact that two different actors played his adopted baby, makes this movie feel like it's trying a whole lot harder than Borat.

I'm not sure what Cohen is trying to say with this movie. The antisemitism that defined Borat had a comedic irony considering Cohen's orthodox Jewish upbringing. Bruno's character, is a further departure from Cohen himself. His flamboyant actions almost pale in comparison to the obnoxiously phony Austrian accent. If he's trying to point out the rottenness in all of us, I found myself feeling for those he came into contact with- including a pitiable Ron Paul who was suckered into an interview that would have made anyone walk out.

Borat had that sort of effortless comedic timing. He was awfully offensive, but you were able to (sort of) dismiss it as ignorant innocence. The "He's not from around here- their customs are different" mentality really went a long way in that movie. And despite his detestable behavior, he was endearing in a way. Bruno, on the other hand, is simply annoying. I feel that it's not his flamboyant persona that actually gets to people, but it's his abrasive aggressiveness. This visible effort to get a reaction turned off not only his interviewees, but it turned me off as well.

2.5/5

Year One

2009-07-12T18:36:00.004-05:00

So I go from one of the funniest movies of the year to one of the worst. Unlike The Hangover which looked awful from the trailers and turned out to be hilarious, Year One looked awful from the trailers and turned out to be awful. The ingredients sound like they would make a great movie. A Harold Ramis parody starring Jack Black and Michael Cera, with Hank Azaria, Oliver Platt, and David Cross in smaller roles. A comedic mastermind leading a cast of fantastic stars. Somehow, it just never added up.

The movie essentially follows Zed (Black) and Oh (Cera) after Zed is banished from their tribe. They go off on their own and come across a slew of biblical characters. David Cross plays an underwhelming annoying Cain, and Hank Azaria lends his normally talented performance to Abraham. They also find two women from their tribe- conveniently the same two that had been the objects of Zed and Oh's affections (June Diane Raphael, and Juno Temple). The problem is that they are slaves. The rest of the movie revolves around Zed and Oh trying to free them.

There's nearly nothing redeeming about this movie. A movie must contain at least one compelling feature- good plot, good characters, be funny, or like Transformers just look really good. Unfortunately Year One has none of these. It's filled with warmed over references to circumcision, and sodomy. The one funny part was Eema (Temple) talking to Oh about being a slave. No coincidence that this scene was featured in every trailer.

I think the disappointment falls squarely on Ramis' shoulders. These are all very capable actors. Cera is one of my favorite rising stars, and honestly, he brought his awkward teenage years into the prehistoric setting with moderate comedic success. That alone, however, cannot carry a movie. No matter how good an actor is, he's can only do much with an awful script. In this case, however, it's not just the script that's bad. Scenes cut awkwardly from one to the next with little or no resolution. In a well constructed story, each scene should essentially contain a condensed version of the three act structure. In Year One, it's as if half the scenes are missing that third act.

Year One was awful, but I won't hold this against any of them- too much. Everyone is entitled to a bomb occasionally. There's no way this will affect the actors, and as for Ramis, I still have high hopes about the upcoming Ghostbusters movie. Maybe he'll redeem himself in that.

1/5

The Hangover

2009-07-05T10:18:00.003-05:00

This is quite possibly the funniest movie of the year. It features a rather mundane premise, 4 friends go to Vegas for a bachelor party. I know, I've never heard of anything like it either. What sets The Hangover apart, though, is that it is excruciatingly funny, and our four main characters work incredibly well together.

There really was no star of this movie, though Zach Galifianakis and Ed Helms elicited the most laughs. That wouldn't have worked, however, without Bradley Cooper and Justin Bartha playing the straight men (kind of). The movie begins straight away around the climax- with Phil (Cooper) on the phone telling Doug's (Bartha) soon to be wife that Doug is missing. Like the characters themselves, we have to spend the entire movie learning what led up to this point. This is an interesting narrative idea to put us in the same shoes as the characters. It's certainly not original, but it does succeed in making ordinary events funny.

The movie follows Phil, Alan (Galifianakis)- Doug's soon-to-be brother-in-law, and Stu (Helms) as they travel around Vegas trying following clues to recount the night before. Each turn leads to a more outrageous escapade, of which they remember nothing. Mike Tyson, a tiger, a marriage, a baby, and the Asian mafia all somehow played a role in their night out. These run-ins range from being uproariously funny, to kind of flat. Without exception, however, the funniest moments where when it was just the three of them arguing.

Galifianakis essentially played himself- bringing his self-deprecating outsider humor to a role that is equal parts puppy-dog endearing and "what the hell?" randomness. Imagine a more soft-spoken Jack Black, with an actual dynamic range. Ed Helms, the other highlight, is a completely housebroken boyfriend, who more than any other makes a series of very unfortunate decisions over the course of their night of debauchery. During all of this he just means well.

The movie hearkens back to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, in that we are put in the same exact position of blind hindsight as the characters. Instead of being a drug induced pursuit enlightenment, The Hangover is simply a drug induced pursuit of a good time. The Hangover promises to be one of the funniest movies of 2009.

4/5

Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen

2009-06-30T18:38:00.005-05:00

Three things I learned from this movie. Transformers are evidently warm blooded- and for that matter, they actually breath. There's no need for consistency in things like size, or bad-assery, and clearly Megan Fox doesn't need to actually act. Clearly this movie delivers exactly what the trailers offer- a rehashing of the previous movie's plot, with a ton of transformer visual effects, and a slight bit of acting thrown into the mix.

Most convenient double entendre ever. The title both means the revenge of those lost in the first movie, and one of the most hackneyed names for a villain ever. You guessed it, the bad guy's name is actually "The Fallen." This movie begins essentially where the last one left off. Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) is heading off to college, and is trying to regain a bit of normalcy in his life (despite having a transformer for a car). Along the way he's trying to maintain a long distance relationship with his girlfriend, Mikaela (Megan Fox). And that's where the human interaction essentially ends. On the flip side, the autobots (good transformers) have teamed up with the military to rid the world of the last of the decepticons (bad transformers) that are in hiding. This setup results in the best scene of the movie- which is unfortunately the first one. For the two and half hours that follow it, the movie just goes down hill.

Through an awkward narration delivered by none other than Optimus Prime himself, we learn that the relationship between transformers and humans goes back thousands of years, and through a clumsily developed plot line, made overly complicated with obnoxious sounding names that sound like they were thought up by a tech savvy third grader, we learn that the decepticons, led by "The Fallen" want to destroy the Sun. This leads to a movie filled with robotic hand to hand combat, and more cameras rotating around a transforming robot than I could count.

Obviously the movie is stupid, with a few exceptions, the acting is awful (both human and robot). Shia LaBeouf in a few wonderful scenes seemed to be channeling his Even Stevens days and reprised some of his goofy physical humor that has been missing from any of his roles in years. John Turturro also returned in his role from the first movie, and somehow managed to make the dialog he was given much better than it actually was. Unfortunately he could only do so much, and it was still very flat.

But the point of the movie is, of course, the Transformers themselves. And I must say, they were beautiful. Unfortunately they didn't pack the same visual wallop as the first one. It suffered from the same thing the Jurassic Park sequels did. We've seen these before, so we're not blown away simply by how they look. We need more. Michael Bay answered this by ramping up the action, and giving more character to the robots. In the first part he kind of succeeded (which I'll get to in a moment) but on the second aspect, he failed miserably.

There has been a lot of criticism about the movie having racist undertones. This is due largely because of two Transformers called the Twins- they talk in ebonics, sport golden teeth, and pretty much get in the way. I can completely understand why people would be offended- however, the true offense here is that they're just awful characters. They're not necessary to the movie, and if they were indeed included for comic relief, it fell flat. Sure they're stereotypes, but no more so than the Hyenas in The Lion King. The difference is that those were important, and great characters.

As far as ramping up the action, he certainly did that- but at a cost. The movie features a lot of lingering shots on Transformer's fighting, which I appreciated. Nothing bothers me more than rapid fire cutting to disorient you (and essentially make it easier on the director). Unfortunately this also resulted in some pretty horrifically violent scenes. I guess the idea is that if it's robots getting their heads ripped off and disemboweled, it's okay. But still, I found a few parts almost difficult to watch. The violence and the profanity I think could very possibly alienate a younger crowd- a very important demographic for these movies. However, there were a lot of little kids at the showing I saw, and they seemed to get a kick out of it, so maybe I'm just behind the times.

In all, it was a pretty terrible movie. An hour too long, too violent, bad acting, bad dialog, bad plot. But, and this is a very important but, it looked absolutely gorgeous. Very rarely do I enjoy a movie based simply on it being pretty. This movie, though it fell short of getting real positive feedback from me, was very close to being worth it just for the effects.

2/5

Vals Im Bashir

2009-06-25T09:03:00.005-05:00

I've been waiting almost a year to Waltz With Bashir, and it finally came out on video. I'm thrilled to report that it did not disappoint. It has elicited many comparisons to Persepolis from a few years ago. Both brought unique animation styles, both were documentary-esque, but most importantly- both were stellar films.

Bashir is about director Ari Folman trying to unearth repressed memories about his time in the Israeli army when they invaded Lebanon in 1982. He accomplishes this through a series of interviews with other soldiers that served with him. Of specific concern to him, and the true fuel for his quest was the desire to remember his role in the taking of Beirut and the massacres at Sabra and Shatilia, supposedly sparked by the assassination of Lebanese president Bashir Gemayel (hence the title of the film). As Folman talks with more people, his memories slowly start to come back, until he can finally see those fateful days in Beirut.

This is a powerful movie about what otherwise good people do in war. It's interesting seeing a conflicted Folman want to find out what happened, but scared to find out what he did. All of this was sparked by one of his friends who was being haunted by dreams of dogs he killed during the war. Folman then started likewise being haunted by his own dreams (or lack thereof).

The animation is the most unique feature of the movie- of course. It was primarily done with cutout animation in Flash (with no rotoscoping- they made that very clear on the bonus features). The rendering style, and the cutout animation give the impression of a comic book in motion. I'm confident that this movie would work just as well if it were a graphic novel instead. At first the animation bothered me a little, because it's all very slow and kind of robotic. It's as if the characters are floating through some kind of liquid. Eventually I grew used to this because it seemed to fit with the dream like nature of the film.

The music played an incredibly important role in this film. Each scene it seemed was paired perfectly which a wide range of music- from gritty rock to classical. The musical choices greatly influenced the feel of the scenes. The titular Waltz came from a dreamlike scene of a soldier dodging bullets in a ballet under the watchful eye of building sized banners of Bashir- all set to a Chopin waltz. Other scenes of soldiers goofing off amid gunfire, or time lapsed warfare going on in the distance to original rock songs about bombing Lebanon were reminiscent of scenes like surfing in Apocalypse Now, or the latter half of Full Metal Jacket. The juxtaposition of the music and the atrocities being met with nonchalance typify the stoic acceptance that these are just the realities of war.

This is a wonderful movie in all aspects. The illustrations are far better than the actual animation, but the animation itself is acceptable given the context. The story itself is power, as Forman tries to find the answers that he may not actually want to know.

5/5

Drag Me To Hell

2009-06-23T18:15:00.006-05:00

Sam Raimi returns to his roots of horror with Drag Me To Hell. It's been 17 years since he did Army of Darkness, and to all those fanboys out there- he's still got it. I was dubious that he could retain his horror chops after almost a decade with the over produced Spider Man trilogy. Though Drag Me To Hell doesn't embody quite the campy deliciousness of the Evil Dead Trilogy- it seems to come as close as anything can in today's profit driven industry.

Alison Lohman stars as Christine Brown, a bank loan officer who in a bid for a promotion foreclosed on the worst imaginable person- an old gypsy woman who in retaliation lets loose a curse on Christine to- per the title- drag her to hell. I never understood why curses take so long to accomplish their goal. I guess there wouldn't be much a movie if there were immediate results. Starring alongside her is Justin Long as her fairly pointless arm candy boyfriend, Clay. He really serves no purpose besides providing a necessary love interest.

Where the movie really comes to life are in the scenes where gross-out practical effects take the center stage (and there's plenty of those). I was hooked from a scene early on when the old woman assaults Christine in a parking garage. For a split second I was worried this was going to be lame and goofy. I quickly realized goofy was an appropriate term, but I had to replace lame with wonderful. Goof and camp are what Sam Raimi does amazingly well, and it's what keeps his fans coming back.

Though Raimi doesn't reach quite the same echelon as the stop motion skeletons of Army of Darkness, those days are long gone. But he does manage to capture some scene reminiscent of the early 90's from movies like It (which despite what anyone says- I still think is one of the scariest movies of all time).

Drag Me To Hell is definitely a niche film, and you should pretty much know what you're getting when you go into it. You'll notice this review didn't mention anything about the acting, or the brilliant plot development. You may be surprised to hear this, but those were pretty much not there- unless you consider Christine going to a fortune teller to try to exorcise the demons an original plot point. Perhaps the best test you can conduct about whether you will like this movie is look at the title. If it sounds stupid and unpleasant to you, guess what- you won't like the movie. If the title sounds downright awesome- you'll have a blast.

3.5/5

The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3

2009-06-23T09:08:00.004-05:00

I have never seen the original, so I can't attest to any comparisons between that and this remake, though I've heard the original sets the bar pretty high. This one, helmed by the always too slick for his own good, Tony Scott, is high on style but as usual, low on plot. He tries to throw a lot of unnecessary action into the movie, pushing it to around two hours- when it doesn't need to be a minute over an hour and a half.

John Travolta stars as Ryder, a gunman who hijacks a subway train and holds it ransom. Denzel Washington plays the Walter Garber, the train dispatcher on the other end of the radio- the only one whom Ryder will negotiate with- perhaps because of his own shady past. The two of them have great chemistry, as great acting pairs always do. Even though they're almost never on screen together, they really feed off of each other. Travolta does what he does best- act as a crazy but charming villain, and Washington does what he does best- act as an imperfect and conflicted hero.

The problem arises when Scott tries to artificially action and suspense where it's not needed. This is exemplified by the "car chase" featured prominently in the trailer. These bloated scenes just take away from the the best thing the movie has to offer- two stellar actors let loose to do what they do best.

The movie doesn't have anything new to offer. At its best, Pelham features some sparkling moments between Washington and Travolta. Through most of it, however, it's just another formulaic heist movie. From the time warping opening credits to the action packed final showdown, this movie is pure Tony Scott. Unfortunately he doesn't push the style as far as movies like Domino, or go as unique as Enemy of the State. It's not his best, but it's also not his worst.

2.5/5

How have these not been made into movies?

2009-06-16T09:07:00.002-05:00

Do you ever read a book and think that it would make a perfect movie? Well usually it's already been made- possibly more than once. Every so often, though, I think there is potential for a fantastic adaptation and none can be found. This leads to the obvious question- How have these not been made into movies? Today I've got two.

The first is John Steinbeck's "In Dubious Battle". Steinbeck is obviously no stranger to the screen. There have been movies made of Canary Row and Sweet Thursday, and numerous versions of East of Eden, Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, and others. But I have never seen an adaptation of In Dubious Battle- what I feel is one of his strongest works.

It tells the story of two members of the communist party trying to introduce unionization to field workers in California. During this course they deal with strikes, intimidation, and harsh conditions. It covers important issues, is filled with deep conflicted characters, and could feature some brilliant cinematography of vast Western fruit farms. Seriously, how has this not been made.

My second choice is "I, Houdini", a children's book by Lynn Reid Banks (whom is more well known perhaps as the writer of the Indian in the Cupboard series). I, Houdini is told from the perspective of a family's hamster, who wants nothing less than to be caged up. He manages to escape from every cage the family uses, and wreaks havoc when he's loose. Eventually he escapes the house and is introduced to the world outside- both its majesty and its horror.

I may be swayed on this one because I read it many times when I was younger and always loved it. But I genuinely feel it could make a wonderful movie if done correctly. It would have to be animated, and would either have to be done by Martin Rosen (Watership Down, Plague Dogs), or in a Don Bluth fashion (Secret of NIMH). But it's a wonderful story with undertones about balancing adventure and danger, freedom and risk. Again, how has this not been made into a movie?

Leave a message with if you've got any movies that are just dying to be made. And more importantly, leave a message if either of these have indeed been made, because I would be dying to see them.

Up (among other things)

2009-06-12T08:52:00.003-05:00

Okay, so yes, it's been months since I last posted a review. My apologies. But I couldn't let The Film Elitist go down without a fight, so here we go again. Hopefully there's still some people out there who will read this.

The last six months have been filled with a wide range of movies, from the sublime (Coraline, Star Trek) to the mediocre (Wolverine Origins, Knowing) to the absolutely abysmal (Terminator Salvation, Monsters V. Aliens). I Debated about trying to catch up on some of these movies, but decided instead to just charge ahead with what's knew. Suffice it to say, you should see the first two I mentioned, and disregard all the others.

So for my first movie back I'll be reviewing Up, the latest Pixar feature. For better or worse, I've come to expect a certain (almost unobtainable) level of quality from Pixar. Up, it turned out, fell short of that mark (albeit only slightly). Peter Doctor, one of Pixar's core creative team, took the reins in this unique tale- the first one he's helmed since Monster's Inc in 2001. It's certainly an original story, but also certainly not without his flaws.
Up follows Carl Fredrickson (Ed Asner) in his golden years. On the eve of his commitment to a retirement home, he decides he must fulfill a long held promise of adventure. He fills thousands of balloons with helium (20,622 to be exact) and takes off with his house on his final big adventure. Unbeknownst to him, Russell (Jordan Nagai) an enthusiastic boyscout-esque Wilderness Explorer is off to share the adventure after being stuck on the porch of the house as it floated away. Fairly quickly they reach their goal (approximately) and it's a race for Carl to get the house to its final resting place before the helium runs out. Things are complicated however, with the appearance of an exotic bird, her hunter, and a lovable dog named Doug.

First of, it's Pixar, so naturally it looked gorgeous, and the animation was stellar. It continued Pixar's tradition of very realistically subtle animation, but included some wacky parts with the bird that were reminiscent of the Dodo from Loony Tunes.

My issues come from the story (and mostly not the story itself, but how it's executed). At the beginning of the movie we're met with a lengthy sequence outlining Carl's entire history. It's a beautiful montage, and I've heard of many from whom it extracted tears. However, it's a little overt. Within the first ten minutes we really know everything there is to know about this character. I don't like being told how to feel about a character. That is something that should be revealed over time, and it should be up to the audience to figure out throughout the course of the movie. I wouldn't lose those early scenes, I would just spread them out to break up some of the movie later on, and use them to explain events after they've happened, as a way to create dramatic tension, then release it.

The other part that I took issue with were some of the gags (notably vicious dogs with high voices). These were used over and over. I understand that things like gag recognition will hold the attention spans of young children, but these really don't help the movie. And things get really wild with dogs flying airplanes, and a pretty amazing aerial battle. Some of this could have been done without.

It seems this movie suffers from what all Pixar movies suffer from a little. It deals with some heavy subject matter, but also has to draw in the young-uns. It leads to a slightly schizophrenic feel, trying to balance these two ideas. It mostly does a good job, but occasionally leans too far in one direction or the other.

4/5

Milk

2009-01-25T19:43:00.002-05:00

Milk is Gus Van Sant's more straight forward narrative since Good Will Hunting. After engaging in art house flick after art house flick, he returns to the mainstream and gives us a wonderfully crafted and powerful biography.

Milk tells the true story of Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official in California. It follows his introduction into politics all the way to his assassination. The story is so fascinating and powerful, that very little needed to be done to make this a great movie. That apparently wasn't enough, though. Because Sean Penn, Emile Hirsch, Josh Brolin, and James Franco give stellar performances. I would have hands down given Penn the best actor award (though I haven't seen the Wrestler). But not just him, the rest of the cast fills out every corner of the ensemble, making every character fascinating for their time on screen (even if only for a shot or two).

Van Sant blended archival footage with the movie production. This could potentially be distracting (I mean why not just make a documentary- it would be just as interesting). But it didn't bother me at all. Van Sant really brought the era (which happened before I was born) and actually painted an image that made me feel like I could have lived through it.

The movie splits time between Milk's struggles as a politician, his dysfunctional relationships, and the general culture of Castro Street. The movie meanders through both tragic and triumphant points- ranging from his election as city supervisor, to the fight against anti-gay activist Mary Anne White.

Milk is a powerful movie that makes you want to be a part of something larger. It truly demonstrates the power of activism, but also the sacrifices that must be made. Milk had to give up his most cherished relationships (James Franco) and finally even his life. This is one of my top movies of 2008.

5/5

Belated Happy Birthday

2009-01-25T19:40:00.001-05:00

Well, I missed my third anniversary on this blog. And well, I've not been doing my best keeping up with it. Especially during awards season of all times.

Oh well, I'm gonna keep rocking along. Let's hope I get more up this year.

Golden Globes

2009-01-11T23:06:00.001-05:00

On a whole, not too many surprises. I was surprised and pretty happy to see Slumdog Millionare get both best director and best picture. Waltz With Bashir as best foreign language film has me even more excited and can't wait to see it. Heath Ledger as best supporting actor was no surprise, but I was a little surprised about Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler (though I haven't seen it yet, so I can't really judge).

Anyway, here's the full list.

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Golden Globes, USA: 2009

Just Announced...

Best Motion Picture - Drama

Winner: Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama

Winner: Mickey Rourke for The Wrestler (2008)

Best Television Series - Drama

Winner: "Mad Men" (2007)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama

Winner: Kate Winslet for Revolutionary Road (2008)

Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy

Winner: Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy

Winner: Colin Farrell for In Bruges (2008)

Best Director - Motion Picture

Winner: Danny Boyle for Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy

Winner: Tina Fey for "30 Rock" (2006)

Best Original Score - Motion Picture

Winner: Slumdog Millionaire (2008) - A.R. Rahman

Best Television Series - Musical or Comedy

Winner: "30 Rock" (2006)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or a Motion Picture Made for Television

Winner: Paul Giamatti for "John Adams" (2008)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy

Winner: Alec Baldwin for "30 Rock" (2006)

Best Screenplay - Motion Picture

Winner: Slumdog Millionaire (2008) - Simon Beaufoy

Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or a Motion Picture Made for Television

Winner: Laura Linney for "John Adams" (2008)

Best Foreign Language Film

Winner: Vals Im Bashir (2008)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture

Winner: Heath Ledger for The Dark Knight (2008)

Best Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television

Winner: "John Adams" (2008)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy

Winner: Sally Hawkins for Happy-Go-Lucky (2008)

Best Animated Film

Winner: WALL·E (2008)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series - Drama

Winner: Anna Paquin for "True Blood" (2007)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series - Drama

Winner: Gabriel Byrne for "In Treatment" (2008)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television

Winner: Laura Dern for Recount (2008) (TV)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television

Winner: Tom Wilkinson for "John Adams" (2008)

Best Original Song - Motion Picture

Winner: The Wrestler (2008)("The Wrestler")

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture

Winner: Kate Winslet for The Reader (2008)

Seven Pounds

2009-01-11T21:12:00.002-05:00

This is a difficult one to review. The movie is billed as a big super secret ending. Unfortunately, said ending is obvious from the first scene. This doesn't really detracted from the power content of the movie, it just makes the advertising a little misleading.

I don't want to give too much away, so I'll just say that Will Smith stars as Ben Thomas, a man on a mission to atone for his sins. He tries to dedicate his life to being the ultimate good Samaritan, sacrificing whatever he can. Rosario Dawson stars along side him as the new found love of his life, Emily Posa, and one of his targets for good deeds.

The chemistry between the two leads is wonderful- probably the best part of the movie. Will Smith is definitely one of the best actors of his generation, and Rosario Dawson manages to pull out emotional performances in a wide variety of roles. The relationship is even more powerful with the knowledge of what is to come later in the movie.

I harp on the lack of surprise, but after thinking about long after the movie was over, it almost enhances the theme. We know what Thomas has to do, and it's heartbreaking seeing him continue to go through with it.

Woody Harrelson continues what could be thought of as a career revitalization. It took nearly a decade for him to recapture the brilliance he portrayed in Natural Born Killers. In the last several years he's run the gambit from equally violent movies like No Country For Old Men, to brilliant sci-fi flicks (Scanner Darkly). Seven Pounds took him in an even different direction, portraying one of the kindest people I have seen captured on screen in some time.

Seven Pounds was okay. It wasn't terribly memorable, and clearly mis advertised. I enjoyed watching it, but it just couldn't meet my expectations.

2.5/5

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

2009-01-11T20:28:00.002-05:00

There are certain films that seem to be made for the sole purpose of being Oscar fodder. Few movies typify this idea more than The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. David Fincher completely lept out of his element of directing thrillers and psychological movies like Seven and Fight Club, to helm the touching life story of a man with a most curious disease.

Brad Pitt stars as the titular character, a man who mysteriously ages backwards. He was born as a crippled old man, and died an infant. This bizarre story is an adaptation of the short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald. At first I wondered how they could turn a 20 page story into a nearly 3 hour movie, but after seeing it, I wonder how he was able to fit this story in so few pages.

Honestly, the movie is nearly a carbon copy of Forest Gump, with of course the very obvious twist. But it follows Benjamin as he experiences the world for the first time, experiencing everything in the reverse order that you would expect. The parallels between this and Forest Gump are unmistakable. Growing up in a boarding house, spending your whole life coming back to your one true love (Daisy, in this case played by Cate Blanchett), war, boating, and of course overcoming a rather severe handicap. I have not read the story, but I wonder how much of the movie was padded by material inspired from Forest Gump.

The story is revealed to us through Benjamin's journal as Daisy lies on her deathbed. They set this during Hurricane Katrina. I didn't care for this, because it didn't play a real role in the story (the novella took place in Philadelphia), and it seems to unnecessarily date a timeless story.

On a whole, the movie was fantastic. It was a joy seeing the world through Benjamin's inquisitive and eager eyes. But when your love is aging opposite you, it's heartbreakingly clear that aside for a short while, things just will not work out. These were issues Daisy and Benjamin had to face as their paths crossed and recrossed throughout their lives.

The cast of characters he meets along the way is what really brings sparkle to this movie.
The folks at the retirement home he grew up in each had their own unique and fascinating stories. And it only got more wonderous on his travels. Many things can be taken away from this movie. The idea of one true love. and overcoming trials to find this person, for however brief a time, are entirely valid interpretations. But I think the movie was actually saying that every single person is fascinating, and every single person has a story to tell.

4.5/5

The Day the Earth Stood Still

2008-12-24T09:38:00.002-05:00

This is of course the highly hyped, highly grossing end of the year blockbuster remake of the 1951 sci-fi classic. To the benefit of the filmmakers it's more of a re-imagining of the story than a simple remake with better visual effects. In fact, the first half hour or so actually showed promise. But then Keanu Reeves started acting, and the whole thing just fell apart.

The primary story is essentially the same. In the original, an alien and an indestructible robot come to Earth to try to broker peace in a way. In a slightly hypocritical fashion the message is "make peace or we will destroy you all." This clear Cold War allegory has been updated to the current crisis facing the planet- the environment. This time, Klaatu (Reeves) has come not too warn the Earth about our polluting ways, but to tell us that it's already too late.

There were some exciting scenes. When Klaatu's ship first arrives, it brought back memories of the breathtaking entrance of the aliens. And to their credit, they did a fairly nice job of updating Gort, the giant robot, while staying true to its original styling. I even kind of dug the concept of it releasing a swarm of nano-robots, or small creatures, or whatever they were. I mean if you were going to destroy all life on a planet, would you do it just by shooting a laser?

Jennifer Connelly plays Helen Benson, a doctor who helps Klaatu, and tries to convince him to not wipe out our species. She is accompanied on this quest by her adopted son (Jaden Smith). The two of them looked positively animated next to Reeves. I understand that the point was to portray him as cold and emotionless, but how could they replace the inquisitive and almost fatherly Klaatu of Michael Rennie with this?

Aside from updating to 21st century visuals, there was no reason for this movie to be made. The Day the Earth Stood Still took one of the classic sci-fi movies of all time, and turned into forgettable drivel. If you haven't seen the original, please, see that instead.

Synecdoche, New York

2008-12-23T09:35:00.006-05:00

This is Charlie Kauffman at his most bizarre. This is saying something considering he is the man that penned Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and Adaptation. But this is also his most serious, and one of the most touching. In fact, it's my favorite behind Eternal Sunshine. This is also his directorial debut, and it seems he struggles some times under the weight of the script. Despite some flaws, Synecdoche is a pretty remarkable film.

First, we need to clear the air about the name. It's a play on words. The movie takes place in Schenectady, New York, but the term Synecdoche means to use a part of something as a representation as the whole (like saying 'sail' to represent a ship). This makes sense later on in the movie.

Synecdoche is a movie of essentially two parts. It stars Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Caden Cotard, a theater director struggling (not very hard, though) to keep his family together. This includes his feelings of inferiority in the face of his artistic wife (Catherine Keener). The movie really gets going, however, after his entire life crumbles, and he receives a MacArthur grant. Armed with his new found money he starts production on the largest play ever conceived- recreating New York in a warehouse (hence the name). This takes a turn for the bizarre when he hires what balloons to thousands of actors to live out their daily (yet scripted) lives in this microcosm. And he does this for decades, with it growing bigger and bigger all the time.

Besides the play the movie deals with the women in his life. Clearly Caden is too narcissistic to truly connect with anyone, whether it's his first wife or daughter, his second marriage to one of his actresses (Michelle Williams), or his true love and long time assistant, Hazel (Samantha Morton). These relationships are all played out in his real life, and by the actors that portray each of them in his play. In true Kaufman fashion, he has the real people and the their actors sharing many of the scenes in the second half.

The movie, though completely open to limitless interpretations, seemed to be about Caden's descent in full blown self-indulgence. He was struck by an illness that slowly rendered his motor skills inactive (whether this actually was happening or was just in his head, who knows). Every romantic encounter foundered, and his grand work (again, who knows if any of it actually happened) crushed him. Despite its grandiose nature and ideas, the movie really just seemed to be about an extremely lonely and socially inept man, hiding behind the director's chair of real life.

This movie just continues to enhance my adoration of Hoffman. He can play everything, from the flamboyant arrogance of Capote, to the genuine self-loathing of Synecdoche. The rest of the cast was wonderfully bizarre, each portraying their own unique oddities. The problem with this movie is that it dragged a little bit. I can see why Kaufman would want to direct it himself, probably only the writer of this script could visualize it. Unfortunately it drags in several spots, and over two hours is a long time to barely hang on to what's happening. I think the entire ending could have been left off.

This can be a difficult movie to watch, but there are parts that make it absolutely magical. The characters are fantastic, and there are some hilarious scenes balance with utterly depressing ones. It's filled with the a self-deprecating sort of humor, exemplified with Hazel buying a house while it's on fire, and living in it for another few decades. If you liked his previous movies I strongly recommend checking this one out. Besides, in an interview with Kaufman, he said that there is no wrong way to interpret this movie. See? No pressure.

4/5

Frost/Nixon

2008-12-17T11:29:00.002-05:00

2008 looks like it will be ending quite strongly, with Frost/Nixon being among one of the award contenders. It tells the story behind the legendary 1977 interviews of Richard Nixon (Frank Langella) by David Frost (Michael Sheen). I've never seen a movie consisting almost entirely of interviews be so intense. This is Ron Howard's best movie in quite some time, possibly going all the way back Apollo 13 in 1995.

One interesting thing about this movie is that it was based on a play also written by Peter Morgan (who was nominated a few years ago for The Queen). Langella and Sheen both also starred in the stage production. It's fitting that a movie that is so dialog driven and so focused on one location would have been born on stage. Movies like this always seem to be better because of this, as opposed to being written originally for screen. Having the feel of the theater trims away all the fat, and just leaves the most important aspects.

The interviews could have gone one of two ways. Nixon was looking at them to clear himself and look presidential. Frost's team was hoping to "Give him the trial he never had," according to one of Frost's researchers- James Reston Jr. (Sam Rockwell). Reston, along with with John Birt (Matthew MacFayden) and Bob Zelnick (Oliver Platt) scour every piece of evidence in hope of backing Nixon into a corner. Frost, on the other hand, is more concerned about ratings and money.

Frost's lack of preparation is evident when Nixon walks all over him during the first few interviews. Sheen captures this show-business freewheeling attitude wonderfully. It takes one of the most intense phone calls I've ever heard to whip Frost into shape. And from that point on, the interviews become a no holds barred battle.

Frank Langella deserves his recent Golden Globe nomination, and so far of the movies I've seen this year, he should win. He portrayed Nixon as simultaneously arrogant and fragile. Despite the failure of most of the interviews, they managed to capture Nixon in a vulnerable light that had never been seen before. Even without the climactic outburst featured so prominently in the trailers, it would have still been a breathtaking moment.

And the cast just goes on. Kevin Bacon, in what may be his first great dramatic role since Mystic River, plays Jack Brennan, military aid to the former president who will do anything to protect Nixon. And the criminally underrated Toby Jones (his Capote was equal or better than Phillip Seymour Hoffman's) plays legendary talent agent Swifty Lazar, representing Nixon to get the most out of the interviews.

It's not easy of make a movie about an interview and research exciting, but Ron Howard and the fantastic cast pulled it off. Everything from the tense scenes between Frost and Nixon to the sleepless nights with the researchers lend brevity to the importance of this event. Probably the highest praise I could bestow on this movie is that it makes me want to watch the actual interviews.

5/5

Bottle Shock

2008-12-16T11:03:00.004-05:00

Imagine Sideways if it were actually about wine instead of self-loathing. This movie is nothing but good fun and wine. The closing film at the Savannah Film fest stood out among a year dominated by rather serious movies. Bottle Shock is based on the true story of a 1976 wine tasting in Paris, the first of which including California wines. It was what could only be described as America's wine coming out party.

In the movie, Steven Spurrior (Alan Rickman)- the owner of a Parisian win store- in an attempt to cement France as the wine center of the world, relents to his fiend's challenge and sets up a blind tasting to include American wines. He sets off to California to track down the best of what Napa Valley has to offer. Here Spurrior comes across a vineyard run by father and son team Jim and Bo Barret (Bill Pullman and Chris Pine). It's a story as old as time. The stubborn strong headed father butting heads with his slacker son. As the movie progresses, the roles change in a way, as Bo wants to participate in the tasting, while Jim wants nothing to do with it, or the stuck up Spurrior.

Bo, with his youthful ambition and openness, sees the competition as a way to finally give California wines credibility. He finally looks to something beyond hustling people tasting wine in the local bars with his best friend and wine connoisseur, Gustavo Brambila (Freddy Rodriguez) and the vineyard's new intern, Sam (Rachael Taylor). Jim, on the other hand, sees the competition as nothing more than an attempt to mock America.

The movie does, of course, include other plot lines, like a love triangle between Bo, Gustavo, and Sam, and conflict between Gustavo and Jim when Gustavo wants to start his own vineyard. None of these, however, overshadow the wine. Without a doubt the best moments are when the characters are either talking about, or drinking wine. It forms not only the backbone of the movie, but also the cornerstone of their lives. It seems the only time they're truly in their element is when wine is around.

Bottle Shock was a delightfully fun movie. There's not a whole lot of substance to it, but it doesn't pretend to have what it doesn't. It naturally has the intergenerational and international conflict that drives the movie, but it's not bogged down by trying to say too much by these themes. It presents them as is, and lets them just float in the background. The movie is fun from the start all the way to its light finish.

4.5/5

Cadillac Records

2008-12-10T15:02:00.002-05:00

Cadillac records chronicles the story of Leonard Chess (Adrien Brody)- founder of Chess Records- and the artists who recorded there. This is a tremendous cast of larger than life characters, including Muddy Waters (Jeffrey Wright), Chuck Berry (Mos Def), Little Walter (Columbus Short), Etta James (Beyonce Knowles) , Howlin' Wolf (Eammon Walker), and Willie Dixon (Cedric the Entertainer), all of whom are in the rock and roll hall of fame. Cadillac records is more of a story about the music and the time, than about the people.

Since there were so many powerful characters it was impossible to delve into much depth on any of them. The exception to this was Waters and Walter, the two original artists at the label. They represented the relationship between the artists and Chess, and personified the conflict between the races at the time. The movie dealt with their struggles to keep the blues relevant through rock and roll, and how the dealt with fame and money. None of the characters were painted as wonderful people, but they were painted as flawed heroes.

None of this is more evident than with Chess himself. Considering this was the man who probably did more than any other to integrate the air-waves, and erase the prefix "race" from music, we don't get a whole lot about him. We know he was a savvy business man, morally ambiguous at times, and apparently traded Cadillacs as currency (hence the title). Other than general themes, and the fact that he threw out the rules with every recording, the movie doesn't tell us much about why he did what he did. Was his intention to further music? Or was it just to make money? In this film, the answer is really not that important.

Even Etta James, brilliantly portrayed by Beyonce was a small player in the story. She didn't appear to more than half way through, and her story was barely touched. Even though her music was the highlight of the movie, and she had a greater personal impact on Chess than any other character, we didn't get much about her psyche besides the surface race issues. This was my one major complaint about the movie. Rarely will I say this, but I think it could have stood to be longer- if only to better accommodate the depth of these characters.

In the end, the music really was the star. Every member of the cast amply captured their characters (and from what I've read, accurately captured their true personalities). But the story whipped by too fast to get more than just a feel for the characters. If you enjoy 50's and 60's rhythm and blues, you'll love this movie. And if you lived through it, you'll love it even more. As opposed to being a straight forward biopic, Cadillac Records is more of a look at what happened behind the scenes on these legendary recordings.

4/5

Australia

2008-12-09T14:14:00.003-05:00

Australia is at the center of a very divided public. There have been some wonderful things said about the movie, and some terrible things. In fact, even the group that I went with was divided- though not as polarized. Our impressions ran the gamut from terrible to mediocre. I think I had the best impression of it, though I would still rate it as "just okay." Australia is long- very long. But there's a lot there. Perhaps too much for its own good. The movie struggles to find what it really wants to be. Is it love story set in the wilds of Australia? Well, yeah, except for the war tacked on to the last hour, and the ever present oppression of the aborigines. Australia tries to say a lot, but just seems to get bogged down in its own self importance.

The movies follows the wandering story of Lady Sarah Ashley (Nicole Kidman) as she takes over the management of an Australian cattle ranch following the death of her husband. She grows as she takes on her competitor, King Carney (Bryan Brown) who owns half of northern Australia, as they vie to provide beef to the Australian army. At her side is Drover (Hugh Jackman) the man responsible for driving the cattle, and Nullah (Brandon Walters) a half aborigines boy, whom Lady Ashley sort of adopts. The movie explores the struggle to save the ranch, the struggle to keep Nullah out of the hands of the missionaries, and the struggle within Drover between following his untamed lifestyle, and his romantic relations with Lady Ashley. And these are just desperately over simplified explanations of the plots. Australia truly has an epic web of story lines.

The movie was indeed beautiful to look at. The Australian outback was incredible in its scope, and the scenes where Drover, Lady Ashley, and their workers are driving the cattle into Darwin are breathtaking. Unfortunately, pretty pictures can only hold for so long- not almost 3 hours. In fact, it takes a lot to hold an audience's attention for that long. Very few movies can.

The movie was not bad for about the first half. The conflict between the Ashley camp and the Carney camp, and the moderately exciting cattle drive were enjoyable. Even the development of the relationship between Drover and Lady Ashley fell in step with traditional Baz Luhrmann romance stories. But after three or four times of me thinking, "this would be a good place to end it," the movie kept going.

One thing about Luhrmann is that is excellent with revolutionary concepts and styles. Romeo and Juliet was a fantastic update of one of the most fundamental stories of all time. And the style of Moulin Rouge! still blows me away. The point is that neither of these movies required the greatest acting. The concept and in Moulin Rouge's case- the music- carried the movies. No such luck in Australia. Now I'm not saying Hugh Jackman wasn't good. He was the best in the cast. Nicole Kidman I never think is all that strong. And Nullah, the aboriginal boy, sometimes bordered on being as irritating as Short Round in Temple of Doom.

On top of everything, even on top of the war, there was the themes of the missing generations- in which the government took aboriginal children from their families. These seems to have been an important theme to Luhrmann, but it was almost lost in the shuffle of everything else. The scenes with Nullah's mystic grandfather therefor just seemed out of place.

Australia wasn't terrible. But I must warn you, it's not a movie to go see unless you're in the mood to see that movie specifically. Despite being too large and too ambitious for its own good, there were still some moments that were gems. Australia certainly isn't a bomb, and it hasn't brought down my esteem for Luhrmann. It's simply that he tried to cover just too much and as a result, everything suffered.

2.5/5

Bolt

2008-12-02T15:44:00.006-05:00

Bolt is the newest animation from Disney, and by far their best venture into 3D. It's the first movie that they've made entirely since their acquisition of Pixar, and it shows. The animation is wonderful, the aesthetic is fantastic, and the story is god forbid- original. While many movies go for throwaway gags every minute, Bolt focuses more on a genuinely crafted plot.

Bolt (John Travolta) is the biggest canine star on TV. The only catch is that he doesn't know it's not real. There are some very clever scenes faking special effects on stage to maintain the illusion of reality to Bolt while they're filming. Unfortunately it also prevents Penny (Miley Cyrus), Bolt's owner and co-star from actually having him as a pet. To boost the show's ratings, they decide to have Penny kidnapped in a cliffhanger ending. Not knowing that this is fake, Bolt manages to escape from his trailer and sets off on a cross country journey to rescue her.

Along the way Bolt assembles a little posse. Mittens the cat (Susie Essman) provides a sarcastic dose of realism to counter Bolt's delusions. Unfortunately her protests fall on deaf ears as Bolt thinks that she is in on the conspiracy that captured Penny (in the show, the bad guys are cats). Along the way they pick up Rhino (Mark Walton) a hamster in a ball who reveals himself to be Bolt's biggest fan. He buys right into the reality of the show and feeds Bolt's mission with unparalleled enthusiasm.

This is, of course, a family movie, so it lays on its themes pretty thickly. Perhaps a little more overt than I would care, but that's forgivable considering the primary audience. The idea of family and belonging are expressed through Mittens' distrust of the humans that abandoned her, and Bolt fearing that Penny has replaced him with a new dog. These are touching, if sappy, moments.

Bolt is being shown in both regular ad 3D. I saw it in 3D and though it does add something to the experience, I always have trouble balancing the 3D glasses with my actual glasses. And for some reason stereoscopic movies seem to strain my eyes more. That, plus the several dollars added to the ticket price may make it not worth while (though seeing trailers to Up, Monsters Vs. Aliens, and Coraline in 3D were pretty cool). The good thing about Bolt is that Brian Howard and Chris Williams did not direct it for stereoscopic viewing. This means there are not a lot of things illogically flying at the camera (though there are a few). The 3D is done much subtler, adding depth to the rich environments.

These environments truly stood out in this movie. Detailed streets from cities around the country, elaborate film sets, and lush wilderness environments make each scene unique. There is never a shortage of eye candy. These sets are only matched by the delightful animation. The movie really did feel fresh, among animations that generally seem more occupied parodying pop culture than creating something original. Also, Bolt opens with possibly the cutest scene ever put on film. If this movie doesn't make you want to get a puppy, there is something seriously wrong.

4.5/5

Twilight

2008-12-02T14:58:00.005-05:00

Never before have I been to a movie that elicits not one, but two squeals from the audience- both for vampire hottie Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), and his "father" (Peter Facinelli). This experience aptly explains how this movie topped the box office and had the second best opening of the year (behind The Dark Knight, of course). The first installment of Stephanie Meyer's wildly popular book series may have been a smash, but it was anything but a good movie.

Kristen Stewart stars as Bella Swan. If there's a more obvious allusion to the ugly duckling, or the belle of the ball or whatever combination they're trying to convey, I haven't seen it. Bella is supposed to be that "every girl," cute, but plain by movie standards, who becomes the object of the vampiric heartthrob's affection. In this regard I can understand the troves of high-school girls lined up outside the theater on opening night. It's a shame that they weren't met with a quality film to backup their crush.

The vampires in this movie are not your traditional sort. They've given up feeding on people- a sort of tofu variety of vampire. They're still super fast, super strong, and can fly-ish. But instead of burning up during the day (they have to go to school after all), they sort of sparkle in direct sunlight. Yeah, they sparkle, like they were attacked by face glitter wielding PETA members. That actually got incredulous laughs from the audience they had won over weeks before the movie even came out.

The film opens with Bella moving in with her father in a cold rainy Oregon town, a far cry from her mother in Pheonix. Bella immediately proves to be popular, attractive to nearly every group in school, including catching the eye of Cullen. It's not long before the two of them start an awkward relationship, made difficult by the fact that he wants nothing more than to drain the life out of her. As he put it, she's his "own personal kind of heroin." I'm not sure whether that was meant to be flattering or just plain creepy. Either way, it's a prime example of the poor dialog that riddled this movie.

I take beef with the message in this movie. In an interview, Kirsten Stewart said something along the lines of Bella not being your standard damsel in distress. "She's a real woman." I got the complete opposite impression. This role is why people may look at high-school girls as, well, stupid. Edward is Bella's first crush, and yeah, that's a big deal. But risking her own life and essentially the lives of her parents? Even going so far as to wanting to be turned into a vampire so she could be with him forever. Call me crazy but that relationship seems a little too serious.

The visual effects were pretty bland, except for one really interesting scene. The Cullen family brings Bella to play baseball with them in the middle of a thunderstorm. It's one of the most exciting baseball games I've seen in a long time. And it culminates in a confrontation between the Cullens and a roving group of vampires who have not adopted their tofu lifestyle.

Twilight doesn't provide much on the action front until towards the end. And it doesn't offer much in the way of a legitimate love story, or teen drama. It just cobbles together all of those into a mediocre film with little more than attractive leading actors.

1.5/5

Long time

2008-12-02T14:50:00.003-05:00

My god it's been a long time. I apologize for that. It was the end of the quarter in school, and I was utterly swamped. But I've got a whole slew of reviews that I'm going to get out. And besides, it's getting close to the end of the year, with some pretty big movies coming out (Frost/Nixon, and Milk- I'm looking at you guys). So keep checking back, and I swear I've got movies for ya'll.

Comment

2008-11-10T20:49:00.002-05:00

A while back I posted an essay I wrote several years ago about portrayals of various groups in Disney animation (in hindsight probably a bad idea as I am an animation student who would like to work at some point). But earlier today there was a comment left on that posting with some wonderful analysis, giving a different perspective, and pointing out a number of things I hadn't taken into account.

Here is the original essay and the comment. Thanks for taking the time to comment, Bre'Ana. It certainly got me thinking.

Your Name Here

2008-11-06T16:17:00.004-05:00

Sorry it's been so long since I've put up a real review, I've been extremely busy. I've got about a dozen movies I've seen and still need to write about. So stay tuned.

Your Name Here was the first movie I saw at the Savannah Film Fest this year. It can probably be best described as a slightly more accessible version of David Lynch-esque warping of realities. It stars Bill Pullman as William J. Frick, a character based on Phillip K. Dick- famed science fiction author. It was so much a deep exploration of philosophical ideas, as an adventure into a truly troubled mind.

Pullman is fantastic in this role. He flips around between worlds he's created, not knowing what's real and what's not. As an audience we are kept in the dark through most of it. But we are consistently drawn into his mind, as he alternates between apathy and hypersensitivity. Pullman is convincing in all of these.

Your Name Here focuses primarily on a cult that Frick is allegedly creating with the publication of his newest book. Everybody wants to know what he's going to say, and use it for their own means. The only problem is that he has no idea what any of them are talking about. Living in one of his stories there's even a government conspiracy about a new drug that will maintain a grasp over the populace (this could very easily be referencing Dick's A Scanner Darkly).

The problem this this movie is that it never really convinces us of these realities. We never believe this is anything but inside his head, and that makes the events a little less interesting. Even if we knew these scenes weren't real, we never believe Frick sees them as real either. It's like he knows it's all in his mind.

This movie may not appeal to everyone. If you like bizarre sci-movies, then see it. But pay attention, because you may not understand it otherwise. Actually, even if you pay attention you may not understand it. I don't think we're meant to.

3/5

Your Name Here
by moviestrailer

Michael Chricton

2008-11-06T16:02:00.002-05:00

1942-2008

This was especially tragic to me, as his books and movies have had a considerable personal influence on me.

Happy Birthday IMDB

2008-10-17T08:51:00.003-05:00

Yup, IMDB is legal. It was founded 18 years ago today. I've linked to a message from the founder.

http://www.imdb.com/18thbirthday

Quarantine

2008-10-16T10:37:00.003-05:00

This is the newest movie employing the film-making style pioneered by the Blair Witch Project. Quarantine is a remake of the Spanish horror movie, [Rec], coming no more than a year after the original. The movie is a rather straight forward thriller. A camera crew is following a fire brigade for a night when they are called to a disturbance at an old apartment building. After an old woman attacks one of them, they discover that the Center for Disease Control has quarantined the building. The rest of the movie is spent following the residents trying figure out what's going on, and just trying to survive- with the news crew filming the entire thing.

Quarantine had an interesting advertising campaign- similar to that of Cloverfield. Leaked video about this "Actual event" that the government was trying to cover up. What? You mean you didn't actually see any of these videos they put out last year? Guess the promoters were a little too secretive for it to do any good. Hence the more recent barrage of traditional trailers hyping the movie.

The movie started out mediocre. It opens with Angela Vidal (Jennifer Carpenter) and her cameraman Scott (Steve Harris) touring the fire-station with a group of uncouth firemen. This is cut short when they get a call. Upon arriving at an apartment building they find a diseased lady who attacks them. Before they are able to get her out, the building is locked up, and they're trapped inside- to try to survive. Neither them nor the residents have any idea what is going on, just that nobody is going to be allowed out. Fortunately Angela and Scott are there to record the entire thing.

What really set Cloverfield apart was the spectacular production value (the monster aside) integrated into a low budget hand-held look. This was done very well. Quarantine on the other hand, just looks shaky. Sure it's supposed to have that style, and you can't expect someone fighting diseased zombie-esque people to record, let alone hold a camera steady, but there's a fine line between conveying that style, and just being confusing. There were far too many parts of the movie where I had no idea what was happening.

The acting was pretty bad, but it usually is in movies like this. It was certainly better than the performances in the similarly styled Diary of the Dead. The opening scenes in the firehouse were nothing short of awkward, but it got a little better as it progressed. Unfortunately as the acting got better, everything else got worse. I think the lowest point was when they smashed in the head of one of the infected with the camera itself. Magically the blood smeared lens didn't break, and was cleaned in the next shot.

The movie had potential, but unfortunately didn't live up to what I was hoping. It is very similar to [REC] (which I may throw up a review of as well), but every aspect was one step lower than the original. If you're going to make a remake so soon after the original, you better make better, or at least different. This was more of a generic brand knock-off.

2/5

Film Fest

2008-10-11T14:35:00.002-05:00

So I got my tickets to this year's Savannah Film Fest, and I am excited. The lineup I've got:

Synecdoche, New York- Charlie Kaufman's new movie, starring Phillip Seymore Hoffman
O'Horten- a story about a retired subway train operator
The Wrecking Crew- a documentary about the legendary studio band
Elite Squad- a movie about Brazilian drug wars
Your Name Here- a biography of Phillip K. Dick
A Clockwork Orange- Yup, and Malcom McDowell is going to be here
Crazy- a movie based on Hank Garland
The Brothers Warner- A doc about the movie studio
The 27 Club- about a lead singer following in the footsteps of Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, and Kurt Cobain

I really wanted to see The Wrestler- the newest movie from Darren Aronofsky, but it was sold out.

Anyway, I'll have plenty of reviews coming up at the end of the month.

Beverly Hills Chihuahua

2008-10-11T14:17:00.002-05:00

Yeah, I know. Don't worry, I'll keep this one short. I still feel I should review it, as it was #1 at the box office last week. Beverly Hills Chihuahua is the latest outing from director, Raja Gosnell- the genius behind both Scooby Doo movies, and Big Mama's House. This movie is like a bad version of Homeward Bound- possibly my favorite talking animal movie. It even has a similar premise with a dog being lost and trying to find her way home.

That dog is Chloe (Drew Barrymore) a spoiled chihuahua lost in Mexico. She finds help in unlikely sources, like a former police dog, turned dog fighter- Delgado (Andy Garcia). Or another annoying chihuahua (George Lopez). This movie is nothing but unfunny Mexican stereotypes and drawn out accents. I felt like every character was emulating Slowpoke Rodriguez (Speedy Gonzales's cousin).

The human cast, consisting primarily of Piper Perabo (entrusted with taking care of Chloe), and Jamie Lee Curtis (her aunt, whom Chloe actually belongs to) were just dull. I didn't care at all what they did. I mean c'mon, if you're entrusted with taking care of your rich aunt's dog, why take it to Mexico with you? And her completely inane friends, "c'mon, there's no way you'll find her, come to the beach with us." Some parts of the film offended me as a movie-goer. Did they really think we would swallow such crap? I realize that it's a children's movie, but there was nothing endearing about any of these characters- human or animal.

If you're going to take your kids to a movie about talking animals, don't. Instead rent Homeward Bound, or Milo and Otis (they don't talk, but it's just a fantastic movie). Even look Who's Talking Now was a far superior movie to this trite.

0/5

Crawford

2008-10-11T13:47:00.002-05:00

This was a fascinating documentary about Crawford Texas. Of course none of us would have ever heard of it had President Bush not moved there at the start of his 2000 campaign. Contrary to what you may think, the movie is not about him or his politics, but about his impact on the town. It covers both the good, and bad, the short term, and the long term.

First time director, David Modigliani, does an admirable job of being bias out of the movie. I suspect he leaned somewhat liberal, but the movie stayed almost completely neutral. It featured interviews with people from all political affiliations, and age groups. Some loved the presence of Bush, and some hated it. Some loved his policies, and some hated them. The one thing that bonded all of the interviewees together, however, was the profound impact their new neighbor had on them.

The movie primarily dealt with how the town coped with being in the political center ring. Crawford had to manage an invasion from tens of thousands of demonstrators and members of the media. This led to an economic boom, but also led to conflict. The business that managed to spring up on account of the tourism, eventually sank, in no small part to the press painting the town as one-horse, Podunk, illiterate, gun-toting, backwater. Little was known about the liberal newspaper headquartered there, or even the neo-anarchist peace-house. Crawford is indeed as diverse as the rest of the country. But all we ever saw was the same shot on all the television channels of a rundown shack and a bale of straw claiming to be on the outskirts of Bush's ranch. In one humerus interview, one of the residents realizes that this common shot was not on Bush's ranch, but of a tool shed behind Crawford high-school.

Some of the more interesting interviews dealt with salt of the earth funny anecdotes, including one elderly man who slipped in behind Bush's motorcade in his pickup truck and enjoyed the benefits of having the road cleared for him. Whether it's true or not, he had a grand time telling it, and I had a grand time listening to it. Another interview dealt with people contemplating why Bush decided to move to the 700 population town of Crawford in the first place. The common conclusion was that it was not his doing, but his campaign's, in an effort to paint a true small town, working man image of the president.

The movie does delve into politics a bit. There's quite a bit of coverage of the protesters on both sides of the war, but it never takes sides. In fact, the townspeople basically said "we don't care what you believe, we just want you out of here." Once the movie strayed from the people of the town, and ventured into more politically driven content, I started to fade a little. Fortunately, there was not much of that. The movie primarily stayed focused on the people, from the young students who were learning to be politically active, to the preacher who wanted nothing more than for Bush to attend his church (and spout some crazy talk about the end of days).

I suppose the purpose of this was just to explore the idea that there is much more than what we see. Crawford is more diverse and complex than we would ever be allowed to realize. to paraphrase what one interviewer said "a couple years ago, if you asked where Crawford was, we'd say it's 50 miles outside of Waco. Now when you ask where Waco is, we say it's 50 miles from Crawford."

4/5

Eagle Eye

2008-09-30T20:20:00.001-05:00

Eagle Eye was actually kinda cool at times. It started out as a techno thriller story of mistaken identity- sort of like a Hitchcock for the twenty-first century. Don't get me wrong, I am in no way comparing D.J. Caruso's moderate directing chops to Hitchcock- just the themes of the movie. Eagle Eye takes things a bit too far, however, and the conspiracy laden movie begins to tread the line between parable and parody.

The movie opens in sort of military control room with the citing of a suspected terrorist. Despite a low confidence level that it is him, and potential for civilian casualties, the president gives the go ahead to take him out. We are then immediately introduced to Jerry Shaw (Shia LaBeouf), a seemingly unrelated copy shop employee. Soon after we meet Rachel Holloman (Michelle Monaghan), also seemingly unrelated. What brings these characters and situations together? A voice on a telephone. This mysterious woman somehow has the ability to not only see them at every turn, but also controls everything from traffic lights and TVs, to construction cranes and trains.

It's around this point that the movie jumps over the edge into absurdity. It actually hooked me from the trailers- the idea of some gigantic upper level conspiracy. The difference between the trailer and movie, however, is that a trailer leaves you with a punch, but the movie has to sustain it for 2 hours. This sort of awe inducing control doesn't hold up as well over that time- especially since you're required to provide an explanation of who is behind everything. And this explanation was unsatisfying at best.

There are some exciting scenes, like when Jerry is first arrested as being a suspected terrorist and the escape scene that follows. There's something that is simply inherently thrilling about being completely out of control, and being forced to obey a disembodied voice. Billy Bob Thorton and Rosario Dawson both lend themselves to the roles of FBI agents. They're talented performers, but don't really shine in this movie. That's not terribly necessary, though, since the real star is without a doubt that voice (and I have no idea who actually contributed their voice).

Eagle Eye has the distinction of being one of the most scripted and preachy endings I've ever seen in my life. The point of the movie was completely obvious, we did not need a stiff musing from a cabinet member revealing the wisdom and social commentary of the movie to us. but like I said before, the movie was mostly exciting, as long as you can accept some pretty hard to swallow premises.

2.5/5

Paul Newman

2008-09-27T10:25:00.000-05:00

Paul Newman

1925-2008

Here's a nice article about him

Lakeview Terrace

2008-09-26T19:54:00.003-05:00

I can't decide whether this movie was preachy, or just bad. I will admit that it had some thrilling moments, and may have had potential (the jury inside my head is still out on whether the potential was ever there), but it just did not work.

I like director Neil LaBute. I think Nurse Betty is one of the most underrated movies of the past decade, and I think I was the only person in America who kind of enjoyed the Wicker Man remake. Lakeview Terrace, however, was mediocre in its best moments, and just laughable at its worst.

A recently married couple, Chris and Lisa Mattson (Patrick Wilson, Kerry Washington), move into a luxurious new home in Southern California. And their neighbor, Abel Turner (Samuel L. Jackson), is not making their new life easy for them. The Mattson's may stir up some controversy being an interracial couple, but Turner seems to be taking this personally. From the beginning he starts terrorizing the couple, trying to get them to move. His tactics start out harmlessly annoying, but as his hatred grows, so do his acts. The problem that sets this apart from simply another feuding neighbor movie, is that Turner also happens to be a police officer. To cite cliche police drama terminology, he's a loose cannon. Not only are his personal feelings getting in the way, he's under investigation for improper conduct. Despite these issues, the force is filled with his friends, and there's nothing the Mattson's can do unless they take matters into their own hands.

Okay, so let's just get this out of the way. The movie is obviously about race relations. Everything from the very name of the movie (Lakeview Terrace was the name of the area where the infamous Rodney King beating took place), to the use of wild fire as a metaphor for this strained relationship. This is a good issue to raise, but it's tackled so obviously, and so superficially in this movie that it's almost a joke. There is personal motivation behind Turner's actions. I won't tell what they are so as to not spoil anything, but let me say that his motivation is among the most mono dimensional and blatantly state developments I've ever seen.

The acting was pretty dull in this movie, but it's not their fault. The script didn't lend itself to "acting." Lisa's father (who also disapproves of the marriage) even goes so far as to say "he's got the color factor...and that color is blue." I remember hearing this in a trailer as clever way of revealing that Turner is a cop. But by this point in the movie we were already well aware of this fact. Clearly, parts of the script were written for use in the trailer. This indicates the caliber of writing i this film.

I will say that the movie looked nice. The neighborhood was beautiful, and LaBute crafted a ideal looking environment to front these dark and sinister undertones. There was a wonderful contrast between the real estate, and the actions. Unfortunately that's one of the less important factors. The film is preachy at its best moments; and at its worst, it's just Lakeview Terrible.

1.5/5

Igor

2008-09-20T09:36:00.002-05:00

This year has given us several diverse animated movies. Some were wonderful (Kung Fu Panda, WALL-E), and some not so good ones (Space Chimps, Fly Me to the Moon). Igor falls mostly in the latter category. I actually started out liking it for the first 15 minutes or so, but it just went downhill from there.

Basically, Igor creates a Tim Burton-esque wold where mad scientists are the primary economic powerhouses in the impoverished kingdom of Malaria. They create doomsday weapons and the world pays them to not unleash them. In the kingdom there is a rigid caste system. If you are born with a hunched back, good luck, because you are an Igor. The only job you can have is a mad scientist assistant. The Igor who is the title's namesake is played by John Cusack. Despite his place in society, he wants to be an inventor. After his mad scientist (voiced by John Cleese) meets an untimely end, Igor secretly takes over inventing. The problem, however, is that his new weapon (played by Molly Shannon) is anything but evil.

Most of the cast seems to sleep through the movie. Jay Leno is dull as the king, and Eddie Izzard is only a little bit better as scientific rival, and fraud, Dr. Schadenfreude. The two exceptions to this lack of excitement are Steve Buschemi, who plays Scamper, an immortal and suicidal lab rat, and Sean Hayes, who plays Brain, um... a brain in a jar. The first few scenes of the movie feature the two of these in a series of rapid fire gags. I thought this was going to be the track Igor was going to take, but the movie soon slowed to a crawl.

The movie tries to tread a thin line between children's movie storytelling, and a more adult aesthetic. The script is hollow and poorly written at best. I don't think I've ever seen more expositional dialogs in my life. I'm paraphrasing and exaggerating here, but only slightly. This is from a conversation between Schadenfreude and his girlfriend, Jaclyn. "You're a fraud. As your girlfriend I'm going to continue posing as other people's girlfriends to steal their inventions for you." Seriously? There was no way to show this short of her saying it? No wonder the cast had so much trouble making this interesting.

This would have been forgivable if the target audience wasn't concerned with such matters. But the movie has some aspects that may not be appropriate for a young audience. First of all, Scampers tries to kill himself in a number of fairly horrific ways, and in graphic case we even see him blow a hole in his head. Let's not forget about the genera malicious themes embodied by even the lovable main character. At least he overcomes these evil ambitions my the end.

There were some funny moments, especially with Scamper and Brain. And there were some self-aware aspects that made me chuckle, like Molly Shannon's character being named Eva- presented in a way the mimicked WALL-E. Also, it the movie looked rather nice. The animation wasn't the best I've seen, but it was competent, and the design of the environments and characters embodied a certain twisted charm. These factors, however, a rendered moot when a script is this bad.

1.5/5

Burn After Reading

2008-09-12T18:07:00.002-05:00

"Report back to me when it makes sense." This line, spoken by a senior CIA officer (played by J.K. Simmons) fairly accurately sums up the premise of Burn After Reading. I am pleased to see the Cohen brothers make a return to comedy- especially after last year's No Country for Old Men. It's been 8 years since their last decent comedy (O, Brother Where Art Thou). Burn After Reading, however, follows much more in the vein of Fargo.

This is yet another convoluted story of mix-ups, and normal people getting in way over their heads. This fun little farce is about a former CIA agent, Osborne Cox (John Malkovich) and a CD that falls into the wrong hands. These hands happen to belong to the two true shining stars in the movie. The sweet and surprisingly sinister Linda Litske (Frances McDormand) and the critically incompetent meat-head, Chad Feldheimer (Brad Pitt). They both lit up every scene they were in. But of course, there's much more then just this simple story of blackmail. Infidelity abounds in this movie, involving Katie Cox, (Tilda Swinton), Harry Prafer (George Clooney proving once again he's a born fit with the Cohens), and back around to Litske. Throw into the mix private detectives, divorce lawyers, and even the Russians, and you get an idea of this wacky comedy.

The cast really made this movie. The story as fun as it was, was really nothing new. It was just a reinvention of story devices the Cohen's have done over and over again. Every member of this large ensemble, however, was fantastic. Malkovich was likely the saddest character, caught in the middle of all of this- and he just wanted to write his memoirs. Swinton was as cold and uncaring as she's ever been. Clooney provides an interesting blend of sexual deviance (what until you see the machine he built in his spare time) and paranoia. I looked at McDormand as a shallow version of her amazing Fargo role, and Pitt was just a big adorable dummy. There wasn't a scene he was in that I didn't laugh.

Now of course, this is a Cohen Brothers movie after all. So that means some rather violent scenes. But it is still nothing compared to No Country, or even the Woodchipper scene from Fargo. These are more quick and surprising.

This isn't the most original movie ever, and it's not one of the Cohens' best (though with their amazing catalog that's a pretty tall order). But it was downright funny. It's been a while since I actually laughed out loud at a movie (and even heard scattered "this is funny" comments). In a rare case the trailers for this movie actually accurately represented the movie. If the trailers excite you, then see this movie. It delivers on everything that is promises.

4/5

Pineapple Express

2008-08-19T19:40:00.002-05:00

Sorry it's been a while since a real review. Hopefully I'll have Tropic Thunder, Mirrors, and Clone Wars on the way, so stay tuned. First, though, is one of the few beacons of comedy in the midst of a rather unfunny summer. Pineapple Express is, of course, the newest comedy from the Apatow gang. This time relative newcomer David Gordon Green helms a Seth Rogan script to a mostly positive product.

This is, what else, a stoner movie. Rogan plays Dale Denton a professional loser who witnesses a murder committed by drug lord Ted Jones (Gary Cole). Dale goes running to his only friend, who also happens to be his dealer- Saul Silver (James Franco). The problem is that he gets his supply from Jones. The result is a tale of mistaken identity worthy of Hitchcock that wraps Saul and Dale up in the middle of a drug war.

The movie was decent on a whole- but not on par with some of their other movies. And it certainly will not go down as a stoner classic. It was a funny distraction, though. Each character was an overblown caricature- from Dale and Saul's perpetual high, to Jones' Pulp Fiction worthy thugs. The relationship between Dale and Saul was delightful. The two of them in their intoxicated state try to reason through simple problems and manage to come up with absurdly elaborate solutions. The best part of this is that they're completely aware of this. They try to destroy their phones so they can't be traced, yet leave the car on all night so it drains the batteries. It's amusing watching two men who can barely function try to escape from a crime boss.

There were some parts of the movie that really left me a little dumbfounded, however. Apparently Seth Rogan had written this quite a while ago, before he was a big name, and it kind of shows. His character, who delivers summons to criminals is dating a girl who is still in highschool. And he meets her there, and everybody just seems to be hunky dory with that. In fact, he's even invited to have dinner with her parents. Even in a near slapstick comedy like this, that's a bit too weird.

The highlight of the movie is the car chase that is featured so predominantly in the trailers. This scene really embodies the spirit of the movie. Saul "rescues" Dale from someone who was trying to help them, and they end up being chased with Saul's foot caught in the windshield where he tried to kick it out. This is the perfect example of the two of them completely ruining what should be a simple situation.

The final act in the movie really falls short in comparison. It turns into a rather straight forward action movie. The mentality of lighthearted (if inappropriate) fun is replaced by boring shootouts and fight scenes. This is absurd, but not in a good way. It seems like the main thing that made the movie good, a script by an author not held down by conventions, and obviously under a number of influences, is also what made it end so poorly. It's clear they didn't know a good way out of the story.

So the ending was lacking pretty severely, it's still better than that abysmal Step Brothers in every regard. I was a little disappointed by Pineapple Express because I've been excited about it for sixth months or so. But I'm not going to hold it against them. I suppose the movie did deliver on what it offered, a funny distraction. I just wish it didn't leave me with a bad taste.

3.5/5

Isaac Hayes

2008-08-15T09:43:00.000-05:00

1942-2008

Bernie Mac

2008-08-10T09:17:00.000-05:00

1957-2008

Step Brothers

2008-08-05T16:32:00.002-05:00

This movie was atrocious. It actually had the makings of a pretty good movie. Will Ferrell is of course one of the best current funnymen, and John C. Reily is a very good actor (though I prefer him in dramatic roles. Adam Mckay is certainly no newcomer to comedy. He's been writing and directing on Saturday Night Live for the past 10 years, and was behind some of Ferrell's best movies. Unfortunately, the movie falls flat.

Brennan Huff (Ferrell) and Dale Doback (Reilly) are two emotionally stunted men in their late thirties still living at home with their respective single parents. Conflict arises when their parents get together and Brennan and Dale now have to live under one roof. They spend two hours acting like 10 year olds. All the expected conflicts are there, from not touching each others things, to having to share a bedroom.

The core story here is the struggle for these two man-children to leave the nest and finally start their adult lives. This could be really funny as a short, or it could be endearing as a feature, but their attempt to stretch this joke for an entire movie simply does not work. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly a few funny scenes. Brennan and Dale spend a very funny montage interviewing for jobs- going into the interviews together. It's too bad that these funny scenes were short, and there just weren't many of them.

In an odd, and I think misguided choice, the movie was rated R. This is clearly because of the excessive language peppered throughout. Aside from this, there was nothing at all offensive. So by including completely unnecessary and often times out of place language, they cut off much of the potential demographic.

I think Ferrell should try revisiting his touching abilities that he demonstrated in Stranger Than Fiction. And I really miss the John C. Reilly of Gangs of New York. Any way you look at it, Step Brothers was just a miss.

1/5

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

2008-08-03T12:57:00.002-05:00

What would be great would be if this were an actual job, so then I wouldn't have to pay ten dollars to go see movies like this. The third Mummy installment was just awful. It was a close race, but it still failed to unseat Dark Knight from the #1 spot where it has sat for the third week. I guess we'll have to wait and see if Pineapple Express manages to accomplish that next week.

This movie employs essentially the same formula the other's in the franchise have. This time, however, Rick O'Connell (Brendan Fraser) is fighting a mummy in China. The movie opens with a fairly long winded history of the Dragon Emperor, his rise to power, and his downfall. 2000 years later, his tomb is discovered by Rick's son, Alex (Luke Ford), and a militant faction is trying to raise the emperor and his ancient army. In true Mummy fashion, the fate of the world rests on a rather small band including Rick, Alex, Rick's Wife, Evelyn (Maria Bello), her brother, Jonathan (John Hannah), and the mother daughter team of Zi Juan (Michelle Yeoh) and Lin (Isabelle Leong) that has been trying to keep the emperor down for the past two millenia. Aside from the different setting, there is virtually nothing new about this movie.

This movie takes some of the funny absurdities of the previous installments to a new level. The horribly integrated Yetis and a rather cartoonish dragon divorce this movie from any sort of reality. Of course there was the obligatory clash between the armies of the undead. And actually, these looked pretty good. In fact, I'll even through the "car" chase scene between a chariot and a truck loaded with fireworks into the good pile. But it takes more than an impressive battle to make a movie.

The movie was obnoxiously self aware. Early on in her first appearance, Evelyn says "I'm a whole new woman." This is clearly nod to the fact that Bello replaced Rachel Weisz who had played the role in the first two movies. Not long after that in a scene about their marital relations, the music plays up anticipation than letdown as the orchestra comes to a grinding halt. I understand that this is an adventure comedy, but parts like those were just annoying.

I've made it no secret that I am no fan of Brenden Fraser. It seems like he can only play himself. His lines in this movie seemed almost interchangeable with those in Journey to the Center of the Earth. And Bello plays a rather odd character (much different than I remember from the earlier movies) who seems to have some sort of sexual fetish about mummies and being in danger. That's gotta be a difficult turn on to deal with. And Luke Ford was just about on par with Fraser, but I think it was just his character. In the middle of tracking the emperor, he's talking to his mother about relationship advice because he has a thing for Lin, whom he just met earlier that day. I think he may have more pressing matters. And that's not even mentioning the fact that Ford is only 13 years younger than the actors portraying his parents- and it looks like the gap is even smaller.

This really shouldn't come as a surprise. Even the best series start to have problems by the third installment. And the Mummy was never a very good franchise to begin with. Judging by how this movie will probably be received, and the fairly lackluster opening weekend, I can imagine this may be the last we hear from The Mummy.

1.5/5

The X-Files: I Want To Believe

2008-08-01T22:42:00.002-05:00

This movie had a lot going against it. And I mean a lot. It opened the week after The Dark Knight, which had the biggest opening weekend of all time, marketing was virtually non-existent, and the TV show ended 6 years ago, barely limping to the finish the line. The movie was really made as a sort of closure for X-Files fans. The big question, however, was are there any X-Files fans still out there. The answer is a somewhat muffled yes.

The movie plays out as a somewhat mediocre self-contained episode. All the deep seeded governmental conspiracies, alien invasions, and secret organizations that were so embedded in most of the series, and was full integrated into the first movie have long dissipated. This movie focuses more on the human side and the relationship of (former) FBI agents Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson).

The movie opens in classic X-Files fashion. A team of FBI agents are being led through a snow covered field by what appears to be a psychic. Our questions are answered, and more are posed with the discovery of a severed arm in the snow. This leads to an investigation regarding a missing agent and a rather grisly underground operation. The bizarre nature of the case forces the FBI to enlist help from our favorite former agents. The contrast between the two immediately comes back into play with Scully relying strictly on science, and Mulder putting all of his faith in the psychic from the beginning, Father Joseph Crissman (Billy Connolly) who happened to have been convicted pedophilia, ending his former career. This results in conflict between Mulder and just about everyone else.

Mulder and Scully's counterparts who are currently at the FBI are played by Amanda Peet and Xzibit. They have some pretty big shoes to fill. Peet does an ample job of actually creating another Scully- skeptical yet oddly attracted to Mulder's ideas. Xzibit on the other hand looks really out of place here. It's tough to come from hosting Pimp My Ride to being an FBI agent. He was all force without the finesse of the other characters. Anderson and Duchovny, despite what they claimed in interviews, seemed like they slipped right back into the roles as if no time had passed.

One of the major revelations in the movie is that we finally get closure regarding Mulder and Scully's relationship. We see early on that, yes, they are indeed together. Anyone who watched the show knows that the series was filled with sexual tension between the two from day one. This causes conflict between them when Scully wants to stay out of the FBI's matters, and Mulder wants to jump right back into it. Mulder's infatuation with Father Joseph also puts him at odds with Scully's righteous religious beliefs, and her hatred for what the man did. Clearly, this movie focused much more on their human side than on their detecting side. Don't get me wrong, there was no shortage of creepy moments, it was just much more subdued than the visual effects show than many may have expected.

Director and show creator Chris Carter threw little tidbits to fans. Most of these were unnecessary, but were still appreciated. There's a scene with Mulder talking about his sister who had been abducted by aliens when he was young, Scully wrestling with memories of having to give up her son, and even an appearance by their old boss, Walter Skinner (Mitch Pileggi) one of the favorite characters from the show. None of these really had any baring on the plot of the movie, which was fairly thin. They simply said to the fans "we're thinking of you."

As I've made pretty obvious, I loved the show- even the last few seasons after Duchovny left. So of course I liked the movie. They could have played nothing but the theme song for two hours and I would have gone. If you weren't a fan of the show, you may not be drawn in. But chances are, it you weren't a fan of the show, this probably wasn't high on your summer movie list anyway. The filmmakers knew this, so they decided to go with a relatively low budget and make it for those who were interested. I enjoyed the movie to no end, but in the interest of being unbiased, I'll have to say that some parts were a bit thin. If you did like the show, however, go see it, they need the support.

3/5

Smart People

2008-07-23T11:36:00.002-05:00

This was a little movie that slipped in and out of theaters back in April. I saw a couple of trailers for it, but never heard from it again. A few days I was finally able to catch it. I was excited because of the great cast involved, but it turned out to be a moderate dud.

The movie is about widowed English professor Lawrence Wetherhold (Dennis Quaid) and his family. He has a strained relationship with his conservative daughter, Vanessa (Ellen Page), rebellious son, James (Ashton Holmes) and deadbeat brother, Chuck (Thomas Haden Church). A combination of impatience and arrogance results in Lawrence injuring his head. This acts as a catalyst to bring him closer to his brother, whom he hires as a driver, and introduces Lawrence to his love interest/doctor Janet Hartigan (Sarah Jessica Parker).

The movie primarily deals with egotism and a holier than thou mentality. This prevented me from enjoying much of the movie. Even when the characters try to redeem themselves, it's done very superficially. Just as he's starting to connect with his daughter, Lawrence starts spending all of his time with Janet. This drives Vanessa and Chuck awkwardly close together. Neither of these two grow much from this new situation either. As the characters realize their faults, they simply become more and more stubborn. The movie is about imperfections, but instead of improving them, it seems they simply don't care. The only characters I could understand was James, in his attempts to distance himself and move on with a new life in college.

The acting is all well and good. This was certainly an A level cast, but they weren't really stretching themselves here. The actors could only do so much with such single dimensional characters. That's one way to judge an actor against a director or the movie as a whole. If the whole cast is uniformly stiff, it's probably not just their fault.

The movie had potential to be one of those great dysfunctional family movies like The Squid and the Whale or Imaginary Heroes. Somehow those movies managed to rise above the unlikeable characters, whereas Smart People just kind of wallows in them. The movie wasn't bad, but it didn't have the sparkle I would expect from such a powerhouse cast.

2.5/5

Estelle Getty

2008-07-22T16:01:00.001-05:00

Estelle Getty
1923-2008

Best known for her role as Sophia Petrillo on The Golden Girls, Estelle had an impressive career- made even more impressive that her first acting role was at the age of 55.

The Dark Knight

2008-07-19T03:59:00.002-05:00

This is likely the best comic book adaptation ever. I was of two minds about Batman Begins. The first half with Bruce Wayne's (Christian Bale) transformation into Batman was wonderful, but it kind of fell apart once he got back to Gotham. The Dark Knight, however, is fantastic from beginning to end. This is with little doubt the most anticipated movie of the year, and it did not disappoint.

The Dark Knight starts immediately after the previous movie. Batman is cleaning up Gotham City, and organized crime is on the run. We are introduced in the first scene to the city's newest scourge, The Joker (Heath Ledger). He teams up with the mob to hunt down and kill Batman, but has deeper rooted plans to simply bring Gotham City to its knees. He wants nothing short of anarchy. The only thing standing in his way is the Triumvirate of Batman, Lt. James Gordon (Gary Oldman), and the newly elected DA, Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart). As The Joker's terrorist attacks get more more severe, he seems to always be one step ahead of the law. The heroes must then compromise their own morals to do what's best for the city.

I don't want to sound like I'm just being influenced by Heath Ledger's recent death, but he managed to dethrone Jack Nicholson's Joker from the 1989 Tim Burton Batman. It wasn't just that he brought a more intense and unstable performance to the character, it was the entire package. Nicholson's Batman, despite being uncomfortable crazy was still more mischievous than terrifying. His plan of using makeup to poison the city, and clean looking clown makeup were both outlandish and kind of goofy. Ledger's Joker makeup is grimy and frightening, and he engages in much more direct acts of terrorism. This marks the full transformation of the character from cartoony to truly frightening. Just as an example, my favorite Joker moment (I can't say what without giving stuff away) was completely improvised by Ledger.

I felt the most important relationship was between Batman and Dent. The new DA is willing to whatever it takes to clean up the city. He teams up with Batman to do the dirty work, while Dent makes sure they're prosecuted legally. He is even referred to many times as a white knight, in contrast to Batman's Dark Knight. Tension arises between them, however, because Dent is in a relationship with Bruce Wayne's former love, Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal).

The Joker makes it his goal to bring Dent down from his pedestal, and undo all the good he's done. In fact, this is one of the most prevalent themes with the Joker. He's a master at bringing out the ugliness in people. The battle becomes a fight for Dent's image, with Batman shouldering the weight of all the dark deeds. This truly paints him as a tragic hero more than any other movie. He does everything for Gotham, and bares the brunt of their hatred.

There are some fantastic action sequences. Somehow director, Christopher Nolan, manages to hold your attention and not overwhelm with the almost three hour running time. A few if the more action filled scenes got a little confusing and disorienting, but these were made up for by some other fantastic ones. A car chase between a semi, a SWAT truck, and the Tumbler (the new Batmobile) was wonderful. And a sequence a little later with The Joker in jail was just as good.

The Dark Knight seems to capture perfectly the revitalized franchise. Gotham is as dark as it's ever been, and Batman has to act accordingly. The movie explores the complex morality of sinking to the level of those you're trying to capture. There's even a fairly direct commentary on government surveillance and what happens when one person gets too much power. The action, the character, and these themes of relative morality tie in perfectly together. I have little doubt that this will be the biggest film of the year.

5/5

Hellboy 2: The Golden Army

2008-07-18T11:44:00.003-05:00

I'm not terribly familiar with the Hellboy mythology, but that doesn't seem to pose much of a barrier to the accessibility of this movie. Guillermo del Toro certainly has proven himself as a master of the fanciful. He showed this sense of dark whimsy in Pan's Labyrinth, and again in Hellboy II.

The movie is centered on an ancient war between humans and elves. Centuries ago a peace had been reached, and this truce hung in a delicate balance for all that time. Jump forward to present day, where Elf Prince Nuada (Luke Goss) has grown tired of being relegated to the shadows of the world. He wants to gain access to a mythical and indestructible Golden Army. The only thing standing between him and control is his twin sister Nuala (Anna Walton) and the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense. For those that didn't see the first one (which is not required to understand this movie) the Bureau consists of our hero, Hellboy (Rom Perlman), Liz Sherman (Selma Blair), Abe Sapien (Doug Jones, and voiced by David Hyde Pierce), and is led by the bureaucratic and perpetually unhappy Tom Manning (Jeffery Tambor). As well as a slew of unimportant Men in Black. These forces now must face off, as usual, to save humanity.

The strongest part of this movie is the art direction. The creature design is nothing short of spectacular. This is demonstrated perfectly in the design of Wink, a monstrous troll, and the ravenous "tooth fairies" towards the beginning. Even the most annoying character, Johann Krauss (voiced by Seth McFarlane), the ethereal gas housed in a fish bowl domed body was interestingly designed. The character, a proponent of protocol, was brought in to reign in Hellboy's renegade nature. The Krauss character in general was simply cringe worthy. Hellboy and Abe Sapien, naturally, were very well designed. The hours they must have spent in makeup each day were well worth it.

Hellboy takes a more sarcastic approach to superheros. This smartass attitude was touched on in Iron Man, but is perfectly embodied in this franchise. Hellboy is the hero with an "I don't care what happens" outlook. He'll do what he wants, let his anger get the better of him, and let his love for Liz cloud his judgement. The movie touches on the themes of the public turning on the hero. Because of his disregard for property, he's not the most popular. This is important, because it adds depth to an otherwise mono-dimensional character.

The best scenes in the movie were actually towards the beginning. We get a telling of the history of the war between Elves and humans. This sequence is completely animated, and the characters are represented by what appear to be wooden puppets. This part, along with most of the movie, is just visually stunning. The plot is fairly paint by numbers, but it really is a visual work of art.

3/5

Journey To The Center Of The Earth

2008-07-14T02:24:00.002-05:00

This movie is pretty much exactly what I expected it to be. It's an action filled, special effects extravaganza that's short on everything else. Unfortunately, it wasn't playing in 3D at my theater, so I didn't have the opportunity of spending an extra five dollars for that experience. So maybe I didn't get the whole brevity of the movie, but I find this unlikely.

It's difficult to really attack the story. Obviously it's based on Jules Verne's classic novel of the same name- perhaps one of the greatest adventure stories of all time. The problem with this one is the drastic character change. In the book, the professor is an intelligent academic. In the movie, he's Brendan Fraser. In the book, his nephew is in his 20's, and able to hold his own, not very fitting for the 15 year old Josh Hutcherson. And finally, the book employs a rugged Icelandic sherpa, instead of the young Anita Briem. I guess that was an attempt to bring the story to a younger audience. But instead I feel that none of these characters could really handle themselves in this situation.

I'm always dubious about when a movie is directed for 3D stereoscopic projection. It tends to influence illogical shot construction, and an excessive amount of things coming straight at the camera. Flashlights, dinosaurs, and slime are all a part of this. So when you watch it not in a 3D theater, it just looks kind of dumb. As far as the effects themselves go, they're fine. The story is inherently whimsical, so glowing birds, giant dinosaurs, and rather stylish magma despite being over the top, doesn't seem all that out of place.

Some of my favorite moments are still there, even if they don't follow the book very closely. The vast underground ocean fulfilled its thrillingly obligatory scenes, and there was an interesting sequence with Hutcherson leaping across floating rocks, baring a strange resemblance to video game jumping puzzles. I imagine that will play prominently in whatever video game tie in they come out with.

There were a few fun moments, but on a whole, they movie was just dull. When something is made for 3D, that influences the directing choices a bit too much. I really hope this isn't going to be a trend, because it makes for a weaker movie. I'm sure audiences won't be drawn in by these gimmicks. Unfortunately, however, I think people will continue to be drawn in by Brendan Fraser.

1.5/5

Seriously

2008-07-06T13:42:00.000-05:00

These are genuine animated movies done by a Brazilian production company. If you ever wondered what Pixar and Dreamworks movies would look like if they were really really bad, here you go.

Sorry about the Spanish on this one. I couldn't find an English version that would let me embed it. It's called Little Panda Fighter and is about a Panda that fights, but really wants to dance ballet.

And unfortunately I could not embed these, but here are the links to a few more.

Tiny Robots
Little Cars

Hancock

2008-07-05T20:44:00.002-05:00

This movie is just a mess. There's no doubt about its success, however. It knocked WALL*E out of the #1 spot, but we'll just have to wait and see if it has any longevity- I have my doubts. The movie starts out strong enough, with typical Will Smith attitude, and Jason Bateman awkwardness. But the last act completely throws everything before it out, and completely ruins the movie.

As the very well constructed trailers show, Will Smith plays Hancock, a superhero hero without much hero. He's a drunken hobo who inflicts his own brand of vigilant justice. It's essentially his Bad Boys (the loose cannon Mike Lowry) character with super powers. He usually does more damage than he prevents. As a result, public opinion of him is not the most favorable. He ends up saving Ray Embrey's (Jason Bateman) life. Embrey, a PR consultant decides to help Hancock turn his image around. This involves repaying his debt to society (at least until the police realize they need him) and sporting some superhero digs.

The first half is actually fairly entertaining. Smith oozes the attitude that's become synonymous with his roles. And Bateman exudes his charming good guy awkwardness. The two of them form a great chemistry, resulting in some very entertaining scenes. Unfortunately, the movie takes a darker and more serious tone. Without giving away too much, this involves Ray's wife, Mary (Charlize Theron), and the random arrival of a super villain. Some of this was included to show Hancock's detailed history. But really all this accomplished was ruining what could have been a simply a fun, exciting movie.

Director Peter Berg has developed a distinctive hand-held look. This worked well in the war movie The Kingdom, but here it just got rather annoying. In the more action packed scenes, (especially towards the end) I think every shot included either a whip pan or a drastic zoom. Half of the time during the climax, I had no idea what was even happening. As the movie became more serious, the camera work seemed to get more erratic.

I was skeptical of this movie going into it. The first half of the movie managed to win me over to its side, and I was enjoying myself. This new found trust was betrayed by the time the final act rolled around. It tried to take itself too seriously and explain too much. The movie would have been good if not for this fact. In the end this ruined everything the movie had going for it.

1.5/5

Just to give an idea of what I'm saying: After re-watching the trailer, I could only pick out one split-second clip that was not in the first hour or so of the movie. This should give a clear indication of the problems the plague the second half.

Wanted

2008-07-01T22:44:00.003-05:00

If you've read my previous reviews, you'll know that I really like both Night Watch and Day Watch by Russian director Timur Bekmambetov. Wanted is his debut American movie. He tries to maintain his unique style with this movie, but it doesn't quite work as well with the slightly more realistic plot.

Wanted essentially follows Wesley Gibson (James McAvoy) as he is recruited by an organization of assassins known as "The Fraternity." The group is led by Sloan (Morgan Freeman) and Gibson's mentor is Fox (Angelina Jolie). The clan take on missions of assassination assigned to them by a loom. Yes, a loom. What's more- a loom of fate. This really is as dumb as it sounds. Bekmambetov is no stranger to this brand of idea, however. In Day Watch the coveted artifact was The Chalk of Destiny. The difference between those movies and Wanted is that those were based in a sort of underground mythology. This movie is supposed to be based in reality, but these pivotal absurdities make it rather unbelievable.

His directing is slick as always. Tracking bullets from across a city, spectacular car chases, and an obnoxiously overdone train crash. These types of epic scenes worked perfectly in harmony with his Russian movies, and here they looked great- but unfortunately they didn't save this movie. It's difficult to put my finger on why this movie didn't work as well. I think it's trying to transplant the very uniquely Russian feel to a very American movie. This was not a necessary cast at all. The acting took a back seat to the camera work and action. Having big names in the leads only functioned to be a distraction. It's more difficult to see Angelina Jolie in this gritty yet hip underworld than an unknown actress.

Thematically the movie was decent. Gibson is pulled from his depressing humdrum life into this world of violence and intrigue. It was amusing that his assassin skills had been been diagnosed as panic attacks in his normal life. He had to break out of his cubicle job to accomplish what he was really meant for (kind of like a lesser Neo from The Matrix). And there are a fair amount a twists towards the end. Unfortunately these all turned out to be pretty underwhelming. It's not a terrible, and looked pretty good. It's a shame this great director had to resort to pandering to a Hollywood movie. Hopefully the sequel to Day Watch will be coming soon, and hopefully it will recapture that Russian spirit that made the first two so good.

3/5

WALL*E

2008-06-29T16:25:00.002-05:00

I go from one wonderful animated movie to another equally wonderful one. WALL*E is hands down the best movie of the year so far. I don't know if this is Pixar's best movie to date, but it is certainly in the running. This is saying a lot when talking about a company with as high caliber films as they create.

I figure first I'll talk about the short that preceded the film. Pixar packages each of their films with a short- often used to try out a new technique, or give up and comers a chance to take the reins. This short, Presto, is a pretty clear throwback to classic Warner Brothers animations. It was by far Pixar's most cartoony film to date. It's interesting that they coupled it with quite possibly their most subtle feature. Presto tells a simple story of a magician, his hungry rabbit, and a teleporting hat. This sets up a genuinely hilarious set of visual gags with various objects going in and out of the hat at (much the consternation of the magician) the most inopportune times. Despite nothing going right, these pratfalls lead to one wonderfully choreographed and downright impressive magic show.

As for WALL*E itself, it's a lovely, poignant love story. An animated movie with very little dialog about a love between two robots (who have only the bare minimum of facial expressions) seemed to be a fairly progressive gamble. By director Andrew Stanton's own testimony, however, the idea of subtly was the driving force from when the idea was first kicked around during Pixar's legendary brain storming session a decade ago. This is the last movie to come out of that session, and I'm kind of glad they waited on it. I think a movie like this wouldn't have done as well without the power and reputation of a company like Pixar behind it.

The main character, WALL*E (Waste Allocation Load Lifter- Earth-Class) is essentially a trash compactor with tank treads. Him and his brethren were left on Earth to clean up after the human race trashed the planet and escaped into space. 700 years later he is (presumably) the last robot on Earth, and continues to go about his duties day in and day out. Over the millennia, however, he developed a very un-robotic characteristic: a personality. A very endearing personality at that. Life goes on as normal until one day a space ship lands, depositing another robot. EVE, a robot sent to investigate if there is any life left on Earth, becomes the immediate object of WALL*E's affection. The two form the most unlikely love, and WALL*E follows her back into space after she is picked up. The two of them become the key to humans re-inhabiting the planet.

Okay, the story isn't terribly new. Lovers from essentially different classes having to overcome obstacles to be together. The originality comes in the robots. These two (WALL*E especially) are among the most emotive characters I've ever seen. It was troubling to see a robot with more heart than I have. It's not often that you see a robot and genuinely feel for the characters. I've never been to an animated movie where the audience was literally silent in emotional expectation. That is a true testament to the animators at Pixar.

The only issues came in with some of the human characters. When humans come into play in the second act, they were fairly stylized- in the same vein as The Incredibles. This was in kind of jarring contrast to the realism of the scenes on Earth. I can see where this would be intentional in comparing the grittiness of the world they left behind to the sterility of the space station. It's just that the characters themselves didn't seem to fit in the same world as WALL*E. This wouldn't have been so bad, except for the few live action shots included. WALL*E passes the time on Earth by watching a VHS of Hello Dolly. That live action is fine, but they also include footage of Earth's president, played by Fred Willard. There's something a little unsettling when the human animated characters are watching this live action footage. Something just doesn't jive between the two.

This is only a very minor complaint. All of this takes a back seat to the characters anyway. I was a little concerned that dialog consisting primarily of robot deeps and whistles would get annoying. Somehow this really managed to work. It seems that their gamble really payed off. This week it was deservedly at #1, and I expect it to stick around for quite a while.

5/5

Persepolis

2008-06-26T20:23:00.001-05:00

I have been waiting to see this movie since I missed it at the Savannah Film Fest last October. Fortunately, this Oscar nominated animated film came out on DVD yesterday. Persepolis is based on the graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi, who also co-wrote and directed the movie. I strongly recommend reading the book as well, but consider seeing the movie first. I loved the book so much that the movie could not possibly have met my expectations. Despite this, it was still a triumph in all aspects.

The story is Satrapi's autobiography of growing up in Iran during the Islamic revolution of the late seventies and the subsequent war with Iraq. There is a little bit of history, but nothing substantial. The main focus is looking at these major events through the eyes and memories of a little girl. A little who is enamored with Western culture and inspired by the rebellious history of her family (her uncle and grandfather had both been political prisoners at various times). The story also follows her as she travels to Europe to escape the oppression.

Despite all the serious political conflict, the main drive behind the movie is Marjane's struggle to find herself, and not forget where she came from. She is constantly at odds with those in power, whether in Iran or Europe, yet frequently finds herself denying her heritage. Neither Education, travel, or even relationships seem to bring her peace. It's a very interesting story of one woman's struggle to deal with her roots.

This is a unique movie in that it is almost entirely 2D. There are some 3D parts, but they are masked very well and are not even noticeable. In fact, some of the more abstract dream sequences go so far as to resemble cutouts. This sort of style would not be found in any American Hollywood production these days. There very idea that the movie returns to more traditional techniques in hopes of emulating the graphic novel feel makes it seem new and refreshing.

Mixed with the serious nature of the movie there are some genuinely funny and charming moments. And many of the characters (especially those in Europe) provide an interesting contrast to the seriousness of the revolution. While in Marjane's homeland people are fighting a war, these European students are trying to pose as nihilistic anarchists (but really only succeed in following fashion trends). At other times, the exaggerated animation keeps this firmly rooted as being a cartoon.

The movie is absolutely wonderful. The only thing that disappointed me was that some things from the book were glossed over. In the process, they kept it at a very palatable hour and a half. So none of this would have bothered me had I not read the book first. This is easily one of the best movies I've seen in a long time.

5/5

Grace is Gone

2008-06-24T22:42:00.001-05:00

This is one of the saddest movies I've seen in a long time. I'll be the first to admit that it's also one of the sappiest and cheesiest. It came and went under the radar in late 2007. I had been excited about it (as it was on my top 20 for the rest of the year entry last September). I forgot about it, however, due to poor marketing, and its extremely limited release of 7 theaters. The movie deals with the difficult situation military families are put in. As opposed to the other recent Iraqi War movie, Stop Loss, which presented a gritty soldier's point of view, Grace is Gone focused entirely on those left behind.

The movie revolves around Stanley Phillips (John Cusack), who's wife, Grace is fighting in Iraq. Near the beginning of the movie, the inevitable knock on his front door comes, notifying him that Grace has been killed. He not only has to cope with this news, he also has to break it to his two young daughters Heidi (Shélan O'Keefe) and Dawn (Gracie Bednarczyk), who appeared to be 13 and 8 respectively. The problem is only compounded by his inability to communicate with them (seriously, what father knows what to say to a pre-teen girl?) Stanley handles this issue the only way he knows, by not telling them. Instead, he takes them on a road-trip to an amusement park, while he tries to sot through his own emotions before telling the girls.

John Cusack is one of my favorites. Last year alone he wowed in the one-man thriller 1408, and was one the only saving graces in Martian Child. This time, however, he wasn't dragged down by his child co-stars. Both O'Keefe and Bednarczyk were wonderful. Heidi's muted enthusiasm, and guarded emotions reflect a young teenager going through those changes. Her character is every bit as complex as Stanley. She struggles with trusting her emotionally distant father, while knowing that something is wrong. Dawn, on the other hand, displays the unrestrained emotions common with a young girl.

There's nothing surprising about this movie. It turns up the emotion from the support group opening all the way to the silent musical ending. Stanley is a character that you will most certainly not agree with. His brother (Alessandro Nivola) sums it up concisely in one scene when he says "You're going to screw up those girls," when he hears about Stanley's amusement park plan. As much as we may not like him for keeping this from his daughters throughout the movie, we can at least appreciate the difficulty he's going through.

Some of the best scenes are Stanley alone, talking to his answering machine just to hear Grace's voice. These are when he finally lets his guard down and is at his most vulnerable. What is nice about this movie is that it doesn't have the obvious anti-war undertones that could so easily pushed. Stanley is never angry about what happened, possibly because of the almost too convenient fact that he was a former soldier himself.

As I've tried to make clear, the movie was rather cheesy, and fairly obvious- but somehow that really worked. They didn't try to be anything deeper than a simple emotional journey of a grieving husband. I would compare it to Love Story. It's a movie that oozes sap, but I challenge you to watch it without getting teared up.

4/5

George Carlin

2008-06-23T13:25:00.001-05:00

George Carlin
1937-2008

One of the most influential and offensive comedians of all time.

article

The Incredible Hulk

2008-06-22T21:53:00.002-05:00

Let me preface this by saying that I'm not a huge fan of The Hulk. Never read the comics, never liked the show aside from the campy value, and absolutely hated Ang Lee's version. With all that in mind, this movie wasn't as bad as it could have been. Unlike the home-runs of Iron Man and what Dark Knight promises to deliver, The Incredible Hulk can be looked at as anything more than a simple action movie.

The movie starts out with a little background on how Bruce Banner (Ed Norton) became the Hulk: a gamma ray explosion caused by a self-induced experiment gone awry. We find Banner six months later hiding from the government in South America. In my favorite scene he's working in a bottling factory. They poke fun at the Hulk tradition as his infamous "Don't make me angry, you wouldn't like me when I'm angry." Unfortunately, he's speaking Spanish and replaces "angry" with "hungry"- much to the confusion of the person he's sparring with.

The government manages to track him down, and General Ross (William Hurt) and Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth) are on his trail. Banner begins corresponding with a scientist, Samuel Sterns (Tim Blake Nelson), in hopes of finding a cure. This results in the army tracking him down, coming to a head in a series of showdowns. Culminating when Blonsky himself takes a serum to become a sort of Hulk- an Abomination. This leads to the epic battle so prevalently featured in the trailers.

The action scenes were orchestrated great, but they were so overdone- especially the last one. I understand that this is part of the point, but it reminds me of one of those cheesy Power Rangers battles. The Hulk in this movie looked much grittier and more menacing than in the previous one, and he didn't suffer from extreme variations in size the plagued Lee's version.
Even so, it still felt a bit cartoony.

The acting wasn't great. Ed Norton, as always delivers, but Roth, Hurt, and Liv Tyler (playing Betty Ross- Banner's love interest and General Ross' daughter) seemed bored through the whole thing. There was virtually no chemistry between Norton and Tyler. The only character that has any sort of depth anyway is Banner. He has to wrestle to keep his anger under control, yet utilize the Hulk's power. In this version it's simply having his heart rate jump above a certain speed that will result in a transformation. This includes a humorous sex(ish) scene.

The saving grace to this movie is the light-hearted approach it takes to the franchise- including characteristics from its history, and current. I have a feeling Marvel is massing something huge. With Samuel L Jackson appearing as Nick Fury at the end of Iron Man, and now Robert Downy Jr. making an appearance as Tony Stark, and S.H.E.I.L.D playing a major role in the tracking of the Hulk. This movie wasn't great unto itself, but I hope it's a precursor of major things to come.

2/5

Futurama: The Beast with a Billion Backs

2008-06-21T19:24:00.002-05:00

This is the second feature length Futurama movie. The follow-up to Bender's Big Score had its moments, but it wasn't nearly as funny as the first one, and far inferior to the show. The biggest problem seems to be that the plot of this one just didn't warrant a full length movie. To make this easier, I'm reviewing the movie on the assumption that you're familiar with the TV show. Though that's not necessary for the movie, it certainly makes it easier since there's very little character exposition.

This time a mysterious rip in time and space has appeared (supposedly a result of Bender's time traveling in the first movie). This opens a porthole into an alternate universe. In a quest to mind a meaningful relationship, the creature of this universe, Yivo (voiced by David Cross), tries to marry himself with each and every member of our universe. Contrary to any sort of conventional wisdom, Fry (voiced by Billy West) becomes the vessel for Yivo. This comes after a rejection from his polygamous girlfriend, Colleen (Brittany Murphy). Meanwhile, Bender (John Di Maggio) continues his long time disillusionment with the second class treatment of robots. In a fairly tacked on side plot he gets initiated into the "League of Robots," who contribute only the bare minimum to the progress of the movie.

The movie wasn't great, but like any television series, not all episodes are the best. This has a more clean division of acts making it easier to split up into episodes than Bender's Big Score, but when put together at once, it comes across as a little choppy. The final act as a whole just wasn't needed. There were some funny moments with perennial favorites like Dr. Zoidberg, and a well planned out continuing conflict between Dr. Farnsworth and his rival Wernstrom. Unfortunately it also featured a lengthy story involving Kiff (Maruice La Marche), an annoying, green alien.

This movie seems like it would be better suited for a TV episode or two- not a full length movie. The limited plot was stretched beyond its breaking point, and lost its entertainment value about half way through. To compensate it included side plots that just didn't mesh with the primary one. Many of the jokes were random and kind of gross- more so than the show. Some of these seemed weird just for the sake of being weird, and were carried on a bit too far. It did feature some rather funny jokes, but it wasn't enough.

2/5

Kung Fu Panda

2008-06-21T16:42:00.002-05:00

I definitely think DreamWorks animation is getting better with each successive movie. The Shrek franchise seemed to fizzle after the first one, but now that those movies are behind us (except for 2010's Shrek Goes Fourth) the company can focus on more original movies. Over The Hedge, Bee Movie, and now Kung Fu Panda are hopefully the direction DreamWorks is heading. Though Kung Fu Panda isn't as good as the other two, it still had its unique charm.

Jack Black stars as the portly hero named Po. He's stuck in a job working for his father a noodle stand, but wants nothing more than to learn Kung Fu. High above the valley in which he lives resides the Kung Fu masters Tigress (Angelina Jolie), Monkey (Jackie Chan), Crane (David Cross), Mantis (Seth Rogen), and Snake (Lucy Liu). They are led by Shifu (Dustin Hoffman) and Oogway (Randall Duk Kim). This group is in place to protect the valley, and receive the complete adoration of Po. One fateful day, Oogway decides it is time to name the "Dragon Warrior" (a ultimate warrior of sorts). After an amusing series of mishaps, and to the other Kung Fu masters' chagrin, he bestows this honor on Po. The others try to break him, but of course, Po ends up having to be the savior of the entire valley. He is the only one who is able to fight Tai Lung (Ian McShane) one of Sifu's former students turned evil.

Most importantly, the movie was entertaining. Jack Black is funny in almost everything that he does. And I've heard the term "skadoosh" many places since the movie. His best moments I felt came at the beginning of the movie- where he's at his most dreamy, and most inept. The movie is more violent than I would have expected for a children's movie- but I guess these are different times. The action and fight sequences are pretty stunning, though. There are a lot of them, yet each one is unique, exciting, and downright creative. It's clear they had an actual martial artist choreograph these scenes.

It was an all-star, but confusing cast. The movie so well captured the look of Asian cinema. The lush backgrounds looked like Kabuki paintings, but the cast didn't match it at all. I'm not sure what the reasoning was for including a distinctly American cast (except for Lucy Liu and Jackie Chan). Now Jack Black was forgivable, because his style of clowning was the cornerstone of the whole movie, but Dustin Hoffman, Seth Rogan, and David Cross? I couldn't get past the fact that it was those actors.

The other aspect that bothered me was the inconsistent character development. Over the course of a day Po manges to transform himself from an obese, bumbling, dummy into an obese, bumbling, dummy that is a master at Kung Fu. I realize this was intentional, but I still think it should have been more of an actual transformation instead of a spontaneous change as it was. Likewise, Tai Lung starts out as the ultimate Kung Fu master, yet when he faces Po, he makes what appears to be a continuous series of mistakes. And he seems to be, well, not so tough.

The deep Kung Fu philosophical moments left me scratching my head. "Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called the present," as spoken by Oogway seemed contrived even more a movie like this. Clearly they still don't have the more mature market cornered yet, but they're getting closer.

These inconsistencies don't pose much of a problem though. The dialog is mostly funny, and the animation is on par with the likes of Pixar. They still don't quite have the same level of story telling, or as wide an audience appeal. DreamWorks seems stuck in the straight forward comedic childlike appeal, with fairly obvious and cheesy messages. Despite all this, the movie looked really good, and was a lot of fun.

3/5

Stan Winston Article

2008-06-20T09:17:00.002-05:00

Here's a really neat article about him that found with memories from a whole slew of directors that worked with him.

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/37109

Stan Winston

2008-06-16T17:04:00.000-05:00

1946-2008

One of the greatest VFX artists of all time

The Happening

2008-06-16T12:41:00.002-05:00

I like M. Night Shyamalan. He may not be the next Hitchcock or Spielberg people were claiming after the sixth sense, but he does craft some interesting stories. I'd put him on par with the likes of John Carpenter (which I intend as a compliment). They both have created some poor movies, but also some very thrilling ones. Shyamalan seems to bounce back, humbled by the failure of the abysmal Lady in the Water. The Happening is a much more subdued thriller, and he's finally avoided twists for the sake of having a twist.

The best scenes, unfortunately, are in the trailer and right at the beginning of the movie. They set up a confused human race facing a force that we cannot begin to understand. People being killing themselves en mass for no apparent reason. People suspect terrorism, then nuclear leaks, then toxins sent off by defense mechanisms in plants. People begin to flee cities in the North East and become isolated as smaller and smaller bands of people begin to be affected.

Mark Wahlberg stars as a science teacher trying to figure out what's happening. He travels with his wife Alma (Zooey Deschanel), brother Julian (John Leguizamo) and his daughter Jess (Ashlyn Sanchez). Wahlberg was the weakest link here. A combination of wooden acting, and poor dialog made me feel bad not for the character, but for the actor. Leguizamo was fine, though he had a fairly small role. Same with Sanchez. Deschanel I thought was actually very good. All of this tragedy made her question everything in her life. While Elliot (Wahlberg) simply went into survival mode, she wrestled with much deeper emotions.

This could really almost be a follow-up to Signs, in that it explores the same themes of isolation and claustrophobia. It also hammers it's theme of environmentalism the same way Signs drove in its themes of faith. Both were completely overt and even a little preachy in these ideas. When it comes to underlying text, Shyamalan throws subtlety to the side. I'd prefer it is the environmentalist message was left for us to figure out, not told to us by a news anchor that bares a striking resemblance to Creed Bratton.

These was actually considerable depth to this movie. Aside from the obvious environmental themes, the concept of needing isolation to survive is an interesting idea. In a time when all you want is companionship- that's the very thing that could kill you. Leguizamo also posed some hidden questions of the exponential impact we have on the environment under the guise of his status as a math teacher.

The movie isn't a jump out of your seat thriller, and in only a couple of (possibly unnecessary) scenes is it cringe worthy. It's the type of thriller that leaves a rock in your stomach, and you're not even exactly sure why. There have been many complaints that the movie is just boring, but the slow pace of it allows you to fully contemplate the subtext. It's a great idea, but unfortunately the actual script itself just isn't up to par.

3.5/5

Son of Rambow

2008-06-15T23:59:00.003-05:00

This is director Garth Jennings' follow-up to the gluttonous and charmless Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. This time he wisely chose a nuanced, British, coming of age story. The movie is charming and a rare glimpse of what it really feels like being a child.

At its core, the movie is about a forbidden friendship. Will Proudfoot (Bill Milner) is the eldest son in a fatherless, yet very religious family. He has lived a sheltered childhood devoid of television, movies, and just about anything secular. The extent of this is demonstrated in a early scene where he has to excuse himself from the showing of a documentary in class. He strikes up an unlikely friendship with Lee Carter (Will Poulter), who can only be described as the bad boy of the school. Lee opens Will's eyes by showing him a bootlegged copy of First Blood- the first Rambo movie. What started as a tentative friendship based on intimidation blossoms into genuine comradery. Unfortunately they are forced to keep their friendship a secret, which strains both of their relationship.

The common ground that two of them initially find is their love of the movie. Initially Will agrees to be Lee's stunt-man in his own version of Rambo. There is nothing more fun than kids with a video camera. It's like Be Kind Rewind- except with actual kids, instead of Jack Black just acting like one. My friends and I used to do this thing, and I can relate to just how much fun it really is. As the movie progresses the stunts get more and more elaborate and dangerous. They're fun because you know nothing is really going to happen, even when Will is nose diving out of trees.

Despite all the fun dare devil scenes, it manages to delve into the importance of childhood friendships and growing up. Even though this time is nothing more than a footnote in your life, at the time, you can't imagine anything more important or serious. Son of Rambow really captures his mentality while still remaining utterly charming. Both Milner and Poulter are wonderful. Granted, it's probably not much of stretch for them as these weren't the most intense childrens' roles I've seen recently.

The movie may be a little slow for some. Not a whole lot happens aside from the trials associated with their friendship. It's billed as a comedy, but there's not much in the way of actual laughs. It's just a touching little story about two boys just trying to survive childhood as best they can.

4/5

You Don't Mess With the Zohan

2008-06-12T15:12:00.003-05:00

I really want Adam Sandler to do another Punch Drunk Love. He was just so good in that. In the mean time I guess we'll just have to settle for The Zohan. The movie, surprisingly, was not terrible. It was funnier than I was anticipating. I'm not talking about just a chuckle- I actually laughed out loud a few times. The Zohan also has the distinction of possibly being the best movie Rob Schneider has had a major role in (though I realize this isn't saying much).

As is apparent from the trailers, Sandler plays Zohan, an Israeli counter-terrorist. He grows tired of this life and moves to New York to become a hair-stylist. His smooth talking sexy charm brings in hoards of women to the establishment and help spark a romantic relationship with the salon's Palestinian proprietor, Dalia (Emmanuelle Chriqui). Sadly, the romantic story line lacks any sort of sparkle, and Dalia never seems more than bored with Zohan's antics. Several other conflicts are included. Zohan is recognized for who he really is, and runs into issues with is enemy- Phantom (John Turturro) who is aided by cab driving Salim (Schneider). Half way through another conflict is introduced. Real Estate mogul Walbridge (Michael Buffer) wants to force out Dalia's salon, and will use any means to accomplish this- including, ironically, terrorism.

This is an interesting movie because it features intentionally overt racism. Nearly every character embodies some sort of Middle Eastern stereotype. From the cab drivers and electronic store owners, to sexual deviants (which I didn't even know was a stereotype). This didn't work as well as is something like Harold and Kumar because the intent here was to laugh at the characters instead of raising questions about the stereotypes. Zohan doesn't raise the social commentary that it could have.

But there are indeed some funny moments, at least to me. And these were the most intentionally racist parts. The Israelis and Palestinians discussing "politics" and Hezbollah help line which states "We will be back operating as soon as the current peace talks break down," were funny and did explore genuine commentary. Other parts such as the ultra flexible feet featured in the trailers and a Rocky styled workout montage belonged more in the parody movie franchises than in a story like this.

I really am of two minds on this movie. As a story, it was sloppy and pretty worthless. But, it did have some pretty funny moments. If you don't like even some of Sandler's better movies (Happy Gilmore, Billy Madison) then you'll probably hate this. If you don't care how poor the story is, and just want to watch him do what he does best- talk in funny accents- then give it a shot.

2/5

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian

2008-06-12T10:17:00.002-05:00

This review will actually be a composite of my own opinions and those of the people I saw it with. After we watched it, we engaged in a fairly lengthy critique- so you're getting the best of both worlds here. After deliberation we were in agreement about the movie's mediocrity. It had some good moments, but on a whole much left to be desired character and plot wise.

This time out we find Narnia hundreds of years older than we left it, while only a year has passed in our world. Humans have driven the native Narnians deep into the woods and on the brink of extinction. The titular Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes) the heir to the human throne is being threatened by his ambitious uncle, Miraz (Sergio Castellitto). Caspian flees into the woods only to be captured and taken in by the few remaining Narnians. Upon blowing a horn, our heroes from the first installment return. Peter (William Moseley), Susan (Anna Popplewell), Edmund (Skander Keynes), and Lucy (Georgie Henley) are once again needed to reunite Narnia, and defeat the forces of evil by returning Prince Caspian to the throne.

The plot seemed to work okay. There was nothing really inspired about it, but for a typical epic mythical movie, it fit the mold. The biggest problem came with the characters- specifically that of Prince Caspian. I'm going to try to not give anything away, suffice it to say that he did not earn his return to power. He is supposed to go through some profound change and rise to be a hero. Unfortunately, this never really happened. This left the character tasting very bad to me, and I never actually wanted him to be returned the throne.

The four Pevensies, on the other hand, were as good as I remember from the first one. They each embodied their unique character traits that made them truly individuals. Peter was the natural leader, but still had to struggle with the corrupting temptations of power. Susan- perhaps the most straight laced honorable of the batch dealt with her obvious yet unexplained romantic interest with Caspian. Edmund spent the movie trying to live up to his brother's shadow. And Lucy has the innocent and unyielding faith in Aslan the lion. These four characters are great, and unlike Caspian, their actions make sense and seem motivated.

The other aspect of the movie that bothered us was the lack of exposition. The Narnians go from wanting to kill Caspian to pledging their lives to him all within a minute of screen time. Or where and what Aslan has been doing for the past several hundred years, and why he insisted on returning the way her did (I won't give away anything). Honestly, that part made me angry at him. Finally, as minor as this sounds, the song they put at the end almost ruined the conclusion of the movie for me. The Golden Compass did this as well. I abhor it when movies have pop songs at the end of a wonderful score- especially in movies like this. When will they learn that it just doesn't work?

I was a fan of the first movie, and this was just a letdown. Something I didn't talk about before was how it looked. The animal animation and the visual effects were done very well. The battle sequences were exciting and entertaining. None of this really matters, though, if the story and character development just isn't there.

2/5

Teeth

2008-06-06T15:38:00.002-05:00

I was actually going to let this one go without a review, because I figured it didn't have much mass appeal associated with it. But then Empire Online listed it as one of the must see movies of the summer. Given this glowing recommendation, I felt I had to weigh in. I like the dark, weird, twisted movies, and this one had some promise. Unfortunately, it just ended up being weird without the interesting narrative to back it up.

Jess Weixler stars as Dawn, a woman coming of age with a unique trait. To put it bluntly, her vagina is lined with teeth. And from judging what she does with these, very sharp teeth. It does have an interesting theme of female sexual empowerment, but this is simultaneously overbearing and lost. As blatant as it is represented by her "biting" off male aggressors' privates, the sheer dumb horror of the movie dulls the message. It's empowerment, but not to be taken seriously. In short, the horror aspect subverts the message.

It's billed as a horror comedy, so I may be looking at it a little too seriously. The sound effects and some rather graphic scenes will make you both cringe and giggle (but mostly cringe). The part of the movie I did appreciate was that Dawn is an advocate of abstinence. This is clearly in place to explain why she's never been told that you're not supposed to have teeth down there, but it also takes a comical shot at all those chastity rallies that are so popular in schools. These were my favorite scenes.

Another (maybe unintentionally funny) scene features her first trip to a gynecologist. Believing him to be overly aggressive, he feels the wrath of her special endowment. This sends him out of the room screaming "Vagina Dentata!"- evidently the name of said affliction. I hope this was supposed to be absurd and funny.

This was actually a movie I watched, and then just forgot about. Didn't really think it was worth a mention until I caught that list. It's not like the movie was terrible- I mean it wasn't supposed to be great in the first place. If you do see it, don't take it too seriously, that was my mistake. Just laugh it off, and be prepared to cover your eyes at a few uncomfortable scenes.

2/5

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

2008-06-04T15:15:00.003-05:00

I may get some flack for this review, but I'm prepared to back up everything I say. First, I must make a few things clear. I am a tremendous Indiana Jones fan. Raiders of the Lost Ark and Last Crusade are two of my favorite movies. I'll even watch Temple of Doom from time to time- and enjoy it. Crystal Skull was better then Temple. but it was still a pretty severe disappointment. Now you will find people both loving this movie, and hating it. I didn't quite hate it, but it was indeed a major let-down.

This time out, an aged Indiana Jones faces a Soviet plot to obtain a new mysterious artifact- South American crystal skulls. Joining him is a greaser with ties to one of Indy's colleagues. The aptly named Mutt Williams is played by rising leading man Shia LaBeouf. I don't want to reveal any more of the plot than this, because it is filled with a series of twists that do indeed keep you entertained.

I'm going to start with what I liked about the movie- because there were things I did like. It was fun. The scene featured prominently in the trailers with Indy fighting off the Communists in a warehouse was enjoyable. Even the absurd jungle surfing on duck boats was fun (for a while at least). Also, Harrison Ford is good as ever. Clearly he wasn't able to do the stunts so much anymore, but he still has the attitude. And I appreciated that they didn't try to conceal his aging. They showed him old, but that he could still kick ass. I'm a big fan of Shia LaBeouf, and even though his character does fall into the annoying side-kick at times, it's not nearly as bad as Shorty in Temple of Doom.

It's clear that I did not hate the movie, but there were several things that prevented me from really liking it. Perhaps the most troubling was the use of CG. In an interview Spielberg said that he was trying to capture the spirit of a less mature director- himself in the 80's when he directed the original films. I think he accomplishes this very well in the look of the movie- except for the heavy use of CG. The gophers were awful and unnecessary (if you see it, you'll know exactly what I mean). As were the atomic blast and the swinging through the jungle. Even the waterfalls were a little much (but forgivable). It's as if he tried to re-invigorate a more raw filming style, but overloaded it with computer graphics. The climax of the movie is the perfect example of this.

The movie had another negative side effect for me. When I was analyzing Crystal Skull I was saying to myself that the movie was just absurd. But then when I thought back objectively on the original trilogy, I realized that those were every bit as absurd. I'd always just loved them without really questioning them. Crystal Skull had the negative influence of causing me to look back at the originals with a more critical eye. T

he thing that keeps my faith in at least two of the originals, is that the artifacts being hunted were legitimately of profound interest. The Ark of the Covenant and the Holy Grail are fascinating archaeological artifacts of Religious orientation. The Crystal Skulls, on the other hand, though real, are fairly obscure artifacts that have been widely dismissed as having a modern origin. This may seem like a small difference, but I think the historical interest of the actual artifacts plays a tremendous role in the interest of the movie.

The movie wasn't terribly, and most people will probably enjoy it to at least some degree. I did. It's just that I've been watching Indiana Jones my whole life and was expecting something powerful here. Instead, I was met with a fairly disengaging story riddled with too much CG. It's fun, but it was also a let-down.

2.5/5

What Happens In Vegas

2008-06-02T13:35:00.003-05:00

What happens when you take a commercial tag-line and make a movie out of it? You get What Happens in Vegas. I really wish what happened at the brainstorming sessions for this movie had stayed in those brainstorming sessions. Instead, they unleashed this newest Ashton Kutcher abomination on the world.

Okay, maybe that introduction was a bit harsh. I'll let you judge for yourself. Kutcher plays Jack Fuller, a loser who after being fired by his dad, takes a trip to Vegas. He stars opposite Cameron Diaz who plays Joy McNally, the victim of a recent breakup who also goes to Vegas to drown her sorrows. In a night of drunken passion, the two get married. Okay, no problem, they'll get it annulled. A wrench is thrown into that machinery, however, in the form of a winning slot machine pull, and 3 million dollars. The two go to court to get this worked out. I'm not sure which was more unrealistic- the fact that Dennis Miller played the judge, or that he sentenced them to six months of marriage, during which the 3 million would be frozen. Is this really how our judicial system works?

The two move in together, and begin the war to drive the other one out. This had some amusing moments: Jack urinating in the sink when Joy hogged the bathroom, or a party thrown by Joy to tempt Jack into infidelity, but there were only a few of these. Of course, as the movie progresses, the two begin to fall for each other, and (I'm sorry for giving anything away) they work it out. Big surprise there.

Looking back on the career of Ashton Kutcher to this point, over half of his roles are in movies like this. In fact, the only real risky part he's taken was in Butterfly Effect. And despite that movie being a spectacular flop, I appreciated it. I guess we was just made for these non-comedic and non-romantic, romantic comedies.

Often in a movie like this the supporting cast can bring a bit of redemption. Not so much in this case. Dennis Miller was just absurd in his small role. Jack's friend, played by Rob Corddry was simply annoying. Queen Latifah played her role as a marriage councilor rather straight, seeming more as a prop than a character. Even the zany Zach Galifianakis played a fairly boring character.

What Happens in Vegas was very underwhelming. Despite a few funny scenes, there was nothing original about this movie. I'm trying to come up with something to redeem it, but there is not much.

1.5/5

Sydney Pollack

2008-05-27T03:41:00.004-05:00

Sorry, it's been a while since I've reviewed anything. I actually have three or four movies that I'm currently writing up, I just haven't had much time. I absolutely had to post about this loss, however.

Sydney Pollack
1934-2008

New York Times Article

Baby Mama

2008-05-16T19:10:00.002-05:00

This movie has some funny moments, but in general, it's a miss. The script is uninspired, and the cast seems like they're just walking through the roles. But of course, you don't expect brilliance out of a movie called Baby Mama. Even so, with a rather credible cast, I was hoping for a movie with a little more substance.

Tina Fey stars as Kate Holbrook, a career driven real-estate entrepreneur wants a baby. One problem is she has no mate. Another, and more serious problem is that she's unable to conceive. Enter Angie Ostrowiski (Amy Poehler) a white trash woman looking to make a quick buck. She agrees to be a surrogate mother to carry Kate's baby. After a series of events, they start living together.

Pretty much the ongoing joke is a version of the odd couple. Kate is the mature, uptight business woman, and Angie is the childish, slow-witted, slob. This relationship provides more than just comedy. Clearly Angie is functioning in a role preparing Kate for motherhood. One of the characters (Kate's sister I believe) directly alludes to this fact.

There were several very amusing characters in the movie. Unfortunately, these were mostly very minor roles. Daily Show correspondent, and "PC Guy" John Hodgeman plays a hilariously awkward fertility specialist. Steve Martin is Kate's boss, and plays a cross between himself and Mr. Peterman from Seinfeld. Sigourney Weaver has my favorite role of the movie, portraying the surrogate coordinator who is also going through her own pregnancy- at 60.

The movie isn't great, but it has fun moments. Some of the more outrageous characters are amusing, but the two leads get a little irritating. Also, a sort of twist towards the end fizzles out before it even gets started, and the potential conflict that could result is barely tapped. If you want to see this, you may enjoy it, but if you're doubtful, it's best to stay away.

2/5

Speed Racer

2008-05-10T00:25:00.002-05:00

This is of course the much anticipated live action adaptation of the classic Japanese cartoon. I hesitate to say live action, because much more of it was animated. I really loved the old cartoon, and I think this managed to beautifully capture the style and mood of the original. Unfortunately, rhythm wise, and a plot wise, the execution left a bit to be desired.

The original cartoon is one of the most popular Japanese anime series. It ran in the late 60's, and though I wasn't around to see it, I enjoyed watching reruns decades later. When I found out about the Wachowski making a movie out of the series, I was both excited and skeptical. The first Matrix movie was one of my favorites of all time. The second two, on the other hand, were two of my least favorites. I went into this with more curiosity than any real expectations. Still, I thought if anyone could pull it off, it would be the Wachowskis.

Emile Hirsch plays Speed, the racing wunderkind of the Racer family. This talent did not come out of the blue, however. His father, Pops (John Goodman) is a race car designer, and his older brother, Rex (Scott Porter) was a champion driver until a series of scandals and tragedies. The movie opens already showing Speed wrestling with demons. As he hones his driving skills he gets an offer drive for one of the major auto manufacturers, Royalton motors. Speed must face the choice of leaving his family, or staying with them while Royalton systematically ruins their lives.

There is much much more in this movie than just that familial plot. The movie includes conspiracies fixing the outcomes of races to boost company profits, double crossing deals, and industrial take-overs. Some of this is pretty heavy for a fun and pretty movie about racing. The plot wasn't necessary difficult unto itself. The problem occurred in the execution of it. Between (and some times during) lengthy race scenes, the story was delivered like a machine gun. Plot points were not slowly revealed, but shot at us all at once. With great potential for development, this method kind of annoyed me.

Visually, however, the movie was stunning. I am still reeling at how accurately they were able to capture the spirit of the show. The almost absence of cuts from one scene to another, the fluorescent colors everywhere, and the extremely stylized, painted backgrounds are all reminiscent of the show. Even the cartoony acting including the understanding mother (Susan Sarandon), the mysterious loner (Matthew Fox), the seductive yet playful girlfriend (Christina Ricci), and the goofy inept sidekick (Kick Gurry). Of course the most extreme of all is Speed's younger brother (Paulie Litt) and his monkey. The two of them, and Sparky (Gurry) were probably the characters that most resembled the cartoon origins.

The movie was filled with eye-candy that might be easy to miss. For example, in one scene, Speed's car comes to a screeching halt, and he leaps out, landing on his feet in an homage to the opening credits of the cartoon. One of tracks is even a giant praxinoscope. Some of the scenes with the racers aggressively jockying for position will make you laugh in their absurdity, but they still work okay in the context of the world created in this movie. Everything on screen is there to reflect back to the series.

You should see this just for the visual splendor. The final race has a trippy resemblance to 2001, and the whole movie has this Japanese animated Wizard of Oz quality to it. The world is made even more unsettling when it whips by through the windshield of a race car. The dirty underworld hidden beneath the giant companies provides a darker contrast to the vibrant world. I can't think of enough to say about how the movie looked. I wish, though, that more time had been taken to develop this potentially complex plot, and actually have it progress naturally, instead of having the plot points shoved through a collator.

3/5

Iron Man

2008-05-05T19:10:00.002-05:00

Summer blockbuster season is upon us. Leading off the year is the latest superhero comic book adventure- Iron Man. I'm not terribly familiar with the comics (at all), so I can only review from that perspective. A number of colleagues who are authorities on the subject, however, have enthusiastically signed off on it. In my uneducated opinion, it is one of the best comic adaptations to date. It's fun, it's action filled, and it doesn't take itself too seriously.

The cast is what made the movie for me. I love Robert Downy Jr, and am a fan of almost everything that he does. He fully captured the suave egomania that embodies Tony Stark. I was bothered by Jeff Bridges only because I could not pick out that it was him. I knew the voice immediately, but could not place it with his face- it really doesn't look anything like him. Gwyneth Paltrow is finally back in major picture after a few years of some very good, but under publicized roles (Proof, The Good Nights) and some minor misses (Infamous, Runing With Scissors). It's nice to see her back in a fun and rather sultry role.

Tony Stark (Downy Jr.) is the mechanical genius/CEO of Stark Enterprises- who among other things, manufactures weapons for the military. During a publicity demonstration in Afghanistan he is taken hostage and instructed to assemble a missile. During his imprisonment he sees the damage his weapons are causing, and vows to turn the company around on the side of good. When bureaucracy proves too much for the industrialist, he takes matters into his own hands, and becomes Iron Man- a global vigilante.

One of the appeals of Iron Man to me, is the fact that he doesn't have superpowers. He simple takes his resources and uses them for good. This adds a bit of humanity and vulnerability to the character for me. This was shown in the movie through the long process of him developing his suit, and his dependence on this technology to live. This was ruined a little for me by some of the flashier, more outrageous scenes (him out maneuvering a pair of F-22s as seen in the trailer).

Iron Man proves that comic book movies can be light hearted and still good. I'm hoping the new Hulk movie will follow suit. Pretty much from here until the end of summer is non-stop blockbusters on the horizon. This week is Speedracer, Then Prince Caspian, Indiana Jones, The Incredible Hulk, The Happening, Wall-E, Hancock, The Dark Knight, and many more. Some of those will be better than Iron Man, and others will probably fall short. This wasn't a bad way to start off the season.

3.5/5

Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay

2008-05-04T23:14:00.003-05:00

The original movie, with this heroic duo trying to make their way to White Castle has become a stoner cult- dare I say classic? Not generation defining like Dazed and Confused, Fast Times at Ridgemont High (or in my opinion, Superbad), but it will go down as a B level classic anyway. The sequel takes the concept and pummels it with social commentary. In a strange way, it actually works.

John Cho and Kal Penn reprise their roles as the titular characters. This time instead of trying to curb their munchies, they've been mistaken as terrorists, and are fleeing for their lives. They're on their way to Texas to get help from a connection in high places (who also happens to be marrying Kumar's lover interest).

On the surface, and after my first initial viewing, the movie was not very good. It was full of nudity jokes, flatulence humor, and of course drugs. The movie included a bottomless party (as opposed to topless) fellatio as a means of torture, a backwoods incestuous marriage, and a pot smoking President Bush (a really bad impression at that).

After that description you may be surprised to hear me recommend it. Despite all the crude humor, there is an important social undertone. Unlike the first movie which glossed over the main characters being Asians (except for one scene), that trait defines the course of this movie. A jumpy and paranoid old woman is the one who thought they were terrorists, and everyone else just followed suit. Racial bigotry is rampant in this movie- on all fronts. Every person is stereotyped, and this is done with the complete intention to not offend, but to provoke thought. You're not prodded to laugh at the stereotypes, but laugh at the people who actually feel this way.

This is a tough movie to sell. The people who will be laughing at it, are not those who will be seeing the undertones. And this may be the point. It takes a serious message and coats it in stoner humor. Best of all is that Neil Patrick Harris also returns, playing himself more wild than ever before. During his scenes I could not stop laughing.

This is a very curious movie. It's clearly low-brow humor, but with a deep intellectual message. Harold and Kumar are shaping up to be a subversive force to make even Noam Chomsky proud. I genuinely feel that it's people who watch movies like this and take these counter-stereotypes to heart (whether consciously or not), who are going to be changing the world.

3/5

Forgetting Sarah Marshall

2008-05-01T16:50:00.003-05:00

Sorry it's been a while since my last review. I decided to watch a very light, and very funny movie this time out. Sarah Marshall fit that bill. I'll be honest, I wasn't expecting very much out of it. I was disappointed by one of Judd Apatow's last productions (Walk Hard) and didn't think this one would offer much more. Instead, I was met with a very funny story that just about any loser who's ever been dumped can relate to.

Apatow has a great production model. Find a second tier actor (possibly from a supporting role in one of your previous movies, or even from one of your failed TV shows) use their script (after all, who in Hollywood isn't writing a script?) and let him star. Then bring on board a rookie director, and just let them have fun. More often than not, you'll come out with a hilarious product. For Sarah Marshall, that star/writer is Jason Segel, and that director is Nicholas Stoller.

Segel stars as Peter Bretter, a musician who gets dumped by his Television star girlfriend, Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell). In a vain attempt to move on, he goes on a vacation to Hawaii, where he coincidentally runs into Sarah with her new flame, Aldous Snow (Russell Brand). He is also a musician- a Gothic sex symbol, a perfect contrast to Bretter's television scores. This chance run-in sends Peter into complete despair, but due to a new romantic interest, Rachel Jansen (Mila Kunis) an employee at the resort, he stays.

This doesn't sound like a terribly funny movie, and some parts of it were fairly serious, but on a whole, it was hilarious. My favorite moments were scenes from Marshall's CSI inspired procedural show- costarring William Baldwin. I hate those shows, and seeing them so deliciously lampooned (Jason Bateman appears as an animal psychic detective), made the entire movie worth it.

Some of the more absurd parts (the nude breakup featured prominently in the trailers, and Bretter's puppet-Dracula rock opera) were actually true stories. And other moments such as an uncomfortable dinner the four main characters have together are so awkward, but painfully funny. The inclusion of Paul Rudd, Jonah, Hill, and Bill Hader as supporting characters seems to support this idea of a sort of Apatow fraternity. It's a tight knit group of very talented comedic actors and writers, just appearing to have fun.

Though Forgetting Sarah Marshall is funny, it won't go down as one of Apatow's most memorable ones. 40 Year Virgin, Knocked Up, and despite many who would agree with me, my favorite- Superbad, will all outlive Sarah Marshall. That doesn't really, matter, though. The Apatow crew has been creating long strings of funny movies for a few years now, and they've hit the ground running in 2008 after a slow end to 2007. Drillbit Taylor, the upcoming Pineapple Express, and Forgetting Sarah Marshall provide cheap, but fun comedy.

3.5/5