Faster
Dwayne Johnson plays an impossibly self-sufficient ex-con who gets out of prison with only one thing in mind; to avenge the death of his brother who was killed in a double-cross after the two of them pulled a bank robbery.
It’s been many years. But the Rock has waited and planned and is going to kill everyone involved. In a matter of minutes apparently, because he is not being careful, is dropping clues like Jagger drops women, and is using a really noisy gun—he won’t last long. Oh, plus, when he gets out of stir, he runs all the way into town, into an auto junk yard, where he has a mint-condition Chevy muscle car stashed. With the afore-mentioned noisy gun in the glove-box.
The entire plot is Johnson going from thug to thug and killing them, after having a meaningful tête à tête about life, the universe, and everything. Except for the preacher. In the meantime, Billy Bob Thornton plays a strung-out detective ten days from retirement while he tries to manage a drug-habit, ruined reputation, an ex-wife and son, and catch the bad guy. His partner is Carla Gugino, a Rachel Weis look-alike, who isn’t happy about being stuck with the burn-out.
Oh, and to spice up the otherwise nonexistent plot, there is a hit man after Johnson. He is a super-rich Dotcom billionaire who is also an adrenalin junky-slash-perfectionist. As we watch, he beats Yoga. That’s right, like a video game, he goes through all the levels and has nothing else to master. The rich-boy with the violent hobby has some personal issues but is working them out. He’s deciding to propose to his über-hot girlfriend. Somehow, Johnson, a mouth-breathing ex-con bank robber, manages to elude, thwart, and defeat the hit man. Go figure. Not everyone who should, dies in this movie. They had to do it that way because everyone should have died but then they wouldn’t have been able to finish the film. This screenplay is the literary equivalent of Swiss cheese. It makes no sense, builds no interest, and makes us passionately indifferent to the characters. But it does have the Rock in it, so . . . . I went to see it.
It’s rated R for violence. I give it a three out of ten. The only people I can think of who might want to see it are Clark and James. Everyone else, steer clear.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Friday, November 12, 2010
Skyline
Skyline
This is a sci-fi, monster movie in the tradition of . . . all those other sci-fi monster movies. Like Godzilla. I really liked Godzilla.
In some ways it is fairly derivative. It has elements of Cloverfield in it (although the camera manages to stay still), as well as Independence Day, and even War of the Worlds. That is not necessarily an indictment, but it should be noted.
The only actor I recognized was Donald Faison, who played Dr. Turk in Scrubs.
It starts out in a predictable way; a couple is flying to LA to visit his recently rich and successful friend (Faison.) They party, crash, and wake up with a weird blue light shining into the luxury apartment. Like Cloverfield, they have no idea what’s going on, and neither do we. Some action occurs as they try to figure things out, but then huge construction things appear—pretty clearly alien technology but not really looking like starships other than they can float silently and apparently indefinitely. Huge monster thingies show up, stumping around the city, sucking up people—which the ship-machines are also doing—by the thousands. Then little runabouts exit the big ships a la Independence Day, except they might not be machines, and an air battle ensues.
But unlike Independence Day the story stays small, dealing with just a few people trying to survive, which was part of what made Cloverfield so effective. In fact, the protagonists (the few who live long enough to be in most of the film) never leave the luxury high-rise.
There must be an unwritten and highly hypocritical rule in Hollywood because the biggest star—the black guy—again gets killed before the halfway point. Go figure. I’m surprised he wasn’t wearing a red jersey.
I kind of liked how the people never find out anything about what’s going on. They are totally ignorant going in and coming out. The military arrives, and nukes one of the big ships, which crashes, but then it begins to reassemble itself which is creepy.
The pace is pretty good and the tension maintains a respectable level, just under spontaneous incontinence. Some of the scenes involving the aliens are grotesque, but not in a slasher kind of grotesque, more in an alien kind. I’m not sure why that matters, but it does.
The story tried to concentrate on the people and the interpersonal dynamics, but it is not entirely successful. Nothing happened onscreen to compel me to care about the protagonists, other than in the fairly abstract “fellow humans” kind of way. I think Cloverfield did a better job of that.
I got the impression that a bunch of gung-ho young Turks in the Effects industry got together and said “hey, let’s put together a project that will showcase what we can do.” For me, the special effects seemed to be the real star of the show. “We can do it in the barn!”
There was no skin and I don’t remember any cussing. Some gore, but to my jaded eye it was not extreme. Some of it could be pretty scary for some people.
It’s rated PG-13, which was about right.
I have to warn you though, if you’re planning to see it, that the ending is a little freakish. Highly unusual and very un-Hollywood. It will not be satisfying to the general movie-going audience. But I thought it was great and very compatible with the rest of the movie.
It was fun, but not a home run. I’m glad I saw it, and recommend it to Newell and James (who, like me, will go see anything) and Clark, to be specific. Let’s give it a 7.5 out of 10.
Now, for those of you who do not plan to see it, let me tell you a little more about the ending.
SPOILER ALERT
There is no ending. We never know what the aliens are doing or why they are there, but they are definitely winning. The two main characters do not escape. Both are sucked up into the big ship where some kind of biologic-machine-hybrid things are harvesting nervous systems—brains, spinal cord and main nerves, and giving them to the aliens who are ingesting them. The male lead gets his brain sucked out (the aliens detect a fetus in the female lead and do not de-brain her). But something goes wrong and the male lead somehow survives in some weird, para-normal sense, and takes over the body of the decidedly homely alien. He then begins to protect his “girl” from the other aliens, the screen goes dark and the credits begin to roll. I can’t even say it ended in a cliff-hanger—the aliens are clearly going to win. Like I said—there is no ending.
This is a sci-fi, monster movie in the tradition of . . . all those other sci-fi monster movies. Like Godzilla. I really liked Godzilla.
In some ways it is fairly derivative. It has elements of Cloverfield in it (although the camera manages to stay still), as well as Independence Day, and even War of the Worlds. That is not necessarily an indictment, but it should be noted.
The only actor I recognized was Donald Faison, who played Dr. Turk in Scrubs.
It starts out in a predictable way; a couple is flying to LA to visit his recently rich and successful friend (Faison.) They party, crash, and wake up with a weird blue light shining into the luxury apartment. Like Cloverfield, they have no idea what’s going on, and neither do we. Some action occurs as they try to figure things out, but then huge construction things appear—pretty clearly alien technology but not really looking like starships other than they can float silently and apparently indefinitely. Huge monster thingies show up, stumping around the city, sucking up people—which the ship-machines are also doing—by the thousands. Then little runabouts exit the big ships a la Independence Day, except they might not be machines, and an air battle ensues.
But unlike Independence Day the story stays small, dealing with just a few people trying to survive, which was part of what made Cloverfield so effective. In fact, the protagonists (the few who live long enough to be in most of the film) never leave the luxury high-rise.
There must be an unwritten and highly hypocritical rule in Hollywood because the biggest star—the black guy—again gets killed before the halfway point. Go figure. I’m surprised he wasn’t wearing a red jersey.
I kind of liked how the people never find out anything about what’s going on. They are totally ignorant going in and coming out. The military arrives, and nukes one of the big ships, which crashes, but then it begins to reassemble itself which is creepy.
The pace is pretty good and the tension maintains a respectable level, just under spontaneous incontinence. Some of the scenes involving the aliens are grotesque, but not in a slasher kind of grotesque, more in an alien kind. I’m not sure why that matters, but it does.
The story tried to concentrate on the people and the interpersonal dynamics, but it is not entirely successful. Nothing happened onscreen to compel me to care about the protagonists, other than in the fairly abstract “fellow humans” kind of way. I think Cloverfield did a better job of that.
I got the impression that a bunch of gung-ho young Turks in the Effects industry got together and said “hey, let’s put together a project that will showcase what we can do.” For me, the special effects seemed to be the real star of the show. “We can do it in the barn!”
There was no skin and I don’t remember any cussing. Some gore, but to my jaded eye it was not extreme. Some of it could be pretty scary for some people.
It’s rated PG-13, which was about right.
I have to warn you though, if you’re planning to see it, that the ending is a little freakish. Highly unusual and very un-Hollywood. It will not be satisfying to the general movie-going audience. But I thought it was great and very compatible with the rest of the movie.
It was fun, but not a home run. I’m glad I saw it, and recommend it to Newell and James (who, like me, will go see anything) and Clark, to be specific. Let’s give it a 7.5 out of 10.
Now, for those of you who do not plan to see it, let me tell you a little more about the ending.
SPOILER ALERT
There is no ending. We never know what the aliens are doing or why they are there, but they are definitely winning. The two main characters do not escape. Both are sucked up into the big ship where some kind of biologic-machine-hybrid things are harvesting nervous systems—brains, spinal cord and main nerves, and giving them to the aliens who are ingesting them. The male lead gets his brain sucked out (the aliens detect a fetus in the female lead and do not de-brain her). But something goes wrong and the male lead somehow survives in some weird, para-normal sense, and takes over the body of the decidedly homely alien. He then begins to protect his “girl” from the other aliens, the screen goes dark and the credits begin to roll. I can’t even say it ended in a cliff-hanger—the aliens are clearly going to win. Like I said—there is no ending.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Movie Review Let Me In
Let Me In
This is a vampire movie. At some point, we might think all the possible iterations of that genre would be discovered and done. For thirty years every time they announced a new mega-resort in Las Vegas, my dad would say “that’s it! This one is going to break the bank. Too many rooms! Too many casinos!” But it never happened. I guess there is no end to vampire movies either.
But this is not your typical vampire movie. Not by a long shot.
It begins in Los Alamos, NM, in the winter. IT is dark, night time. A winding road through juniper-heavy mesas of the high desert, snow on the ground, snow falling. Tiny blinking lights appear and slowly draw nearer until we can see three vehicles, each with flashing lights. An ambulance escorted by two police cars. A man has poured acid all over his head and torso.
It is a quiet movie. Almost solemn. The story focuses on a twelve-year old boy, living with his mom in an apartment complex while his parents are divorcing. He is quiet, a loner, no friends, tightly-wound. He is being bullied to a dangerous degree at school. No one has a clue. He keeps everything from his mother.
Someone moves in next door in the middle of the night, a middle-aged man who carries a large trunk up the stairs and into the empty apartment.
The next night, as the boy, Owen, sits in the snow and the dark on a play set in the courtyard, a bare-footed girl appears. She looks to be about his age. They look at each other.
“You don’t have any shoes,” he says to her.
“I don’t really get cold,” she explains.
Then, “I can’t be your friend,” she says. Nice. Very nice.
It is a dark movie, taking place mostly at night (how else would you show a vampire movie?) but spiritually dark as well, and morally ambiguous. Every scene reeks with loneliness and alienation.
It is so very subtle. We are lead slowly, carefully down a path of simmering intrigue and suspense, while the boy and the girl, Abby, form a strange, awkward bond.
Several stories are taking place at the same time. The boy’s, the girl’s, the girl’s “guardian” (we may as well call him Renfield) the police detective, the bully and his friends, mom and dad. They are all deftly crafted to make their ways unerringly together. ‘The mother is depressed and absorbed with her divorce, the fact that her life is falling apart. To emphasize this, we never see her face. She is always out of focus, partially hidden, her back to us, letting us know that her connection to her son is peripheral, at best. Still, he manages to find a friend. A strange one, but someone at least.
“Will you go steady with me?” He asks.
“Steady? What’s that?”
People begin dying, disappearing. The boy sees some things, hears things. Eventually, he realizes what Abby is. With twelve-year old innocence, he accepts the truth of it, and then accepts her. When he knows, he confronts her.
“How old are you really?” He asks. She looks sad, hesitant.
“I’m twelve,” she insists, “but I’ve been twelve for a really long time.” What a great line. The only other hint as to how long she’s been undead is the collection of antique puzzle-games on her dresser.
For a vampire movie, there is very little blood. Some of course, but nothing like you’re oh-so-boring, run-of-mill long-toothed slasher flicks. Most of the violence is out of the frame—hinted at. We hear it, but don’t really see it. This makes it much creepier.
The story builds carefully, slowly. It is well-crafted. Nothing flashy happens, there is no climax, only sadness, acceptance, and inevitability. We get a better look at the vulnerable side of the vampire, how dependant they are on their handler, their guardian, the necessity of a Renfield in their “lives.”
The two kids do great jobs. Owen is played by Kodi Smit-McPhee, and Abby by Chloe Moretz. She is haunting in her vulnerability, her uncertainty, and her loneliness. And devastating with her predation. When she is feeding, there is some herky-jerky CGI, which, despite its low-tech look, works quite well in this movie.
Abby’s guardian is played by Richard Jenkins who some of you will recognize as the Texan at the Ashram in Eat Love Pray. Or is that whom?
The movie is rated R, for violence and some gore. Remember, I said it wasn’t bloody by vampire standards—it’s still pretty gory. But it is a classic. Very creative, very inventive, with lots of subtle nods to the culture of vampiric aficionados. I especially liked the scene where Abby asks Owen to invite her in (vampires cannot enter a house or room without being invited) and he asks what will happen if he doesn’t invite her. She takes a deep breath, crosses the threshold, and stands in the middle of the room. In a moment she begins to bleed everywhere. She doesn’t know why—only that it always happens. (He quickly recants and invites her in.)
I really liked this movie. It was far better than the standard fare. I will give it a 10 for the genre rating, and an 8.5 for a standard rating. Except for a couple swear words, and one or two graphic scenes, I think Nita would have appreciated this one. She’s somewhere in Utah though, having left me for a newborn, so it’s a moot point.
This is a vampire movie. At some point, we might think all the possible iterations of that genre would be discovered and done. For thirty years every time they announced a new mega-resort in Las Vegas, my dad would say “that’s it! This one is going to break the bank. Too many rooms! Too many casinos!” But it never happened. I guess there is no end to vampire movies either.
But this is not your typical vampire movie. Not by a long shot.
It begins in Los Alamos, NM, in the winter. IT is dark, night time. A winding road through juniper-heavy mesas of the high desert, snow on the ground, snow falling. Tiny blinking lights appear and slowly draw nearer until we can see three vehicles, each with flashing lights. An ambulance escorted by two police cars. A man has poured acid all over his head and torso.
It is a quiet movie. Almost solemn. The story focuses on a twelve-year old boy, living with his mom in an apartment complex while his parents are divorcing. He is quiet, a loner, no friends, tightly-wound. He is being bullied to a dangerous degree at school. No one has a clue. He keeps everything from his mother.
Someone moves in next door in the middle of the night, a middle-aged man who carries a large trunk up the stairs and into the empty apartment.
The next night, as the boy, Owen, sits in the snow and the dark on a play set in the courtyard, a bare-footed girl appears. She looks to be about his age. They look at each other.
“You don’t have any shoes,” he says to her.
“I don’t really get cold,” she explains.
Then, “I can’t be your friend,” she says. Nice. Very nice.
It is a dark movie, taking place mostly at night (how else would you show a vampire movie?) but spiritually dark as well, and morally ambiguous. Every scene reeks with loneliness and alienation.
It is so very subtle. We are lead slowly, carefully down a path of simmering intrigue and suspense, while the boy and the girl, Abby, form a strange, awkward bond.
Several stories are taking place at the same time. The boy’s, the girl’s, the girl’s “guardian” (we may as well call him Renfield) the police detective, the bully and his friends, mom and dad. They are all deftly crafted to make their ways unerringly together. ‘The mother is depressed and absorbed with her divorce, the fact that her life is falling apart. To emphasize this, we never see her face. She is always out of focus, partially hidden, her back to us, letting us know that her connection to her son is peripheral, at best. Still, he manages to find a friend. A strange one, but someone at least.
“Will you go steady with me?” He asks.
“Steady? What’s that?”
People begin dying, disappearing. The boy sees some things, hears things. Eventually, he realizes what Abby is. With twelve-year old innocence, he accepts the truth of it, and then accepts her. When he knows, he confronts her.
“How old are you really?” He asks. She looks sad, hesitant.
“I’m twelve,” she insists, “but I’ve been twelve for a really long time.” What a great line. The only other hint as to how long she’s been undead is the collection of antique puzzle-games on her dresser.
For a vampire movie, there is very little blood. Some of course, but nothing like you’re oh-so-boring, run-of-mill long-toothed slasher flicks. Most of the violence is out of the frame—hinted at. We hear it, but don’t really see it. This makes it much creepier.
The story builds carefully, slowly. It is well-crafted. Nothing flashy happens, there is no climax, only sadness, acceptance, and inevitability. We get a better look at the vulnerable side of the vampire, how dependant they are on their handler, their guardian, the necessity of a Renfield in their “lives.”
The two kids do great jobs. Owen is played by Kodi Smit-McPhee, and Abby by Chloe Moretz. She is haunting in her vulnerability, her uncertainty, and her loneliness. And devastating with her predation. When she is feeding, there is some herky-jerky CGI, which, despite its low-tech look, works quite well in this movie.
Abby’s guardian is played by Richard Jenkins who some of you will recognize as the Texan at the Ashram in Eat Love Pray. Or is that whom?
The movie is rated R, for violence and some gore. Remember, I said it wasn’t bloody by vampire standards—it’s still pretty gory. But it is a classic. Very creative, very inventive, with lots of subtle nods to the culture of vampiric aficionados. I especially liked the scene where Abby asks Owen to invite her in (vampires cannot enter a house or room without being invited) and he asks what will happen if he doesn’t invite her. She takes a deep breath, crosses the threshold, and stands in the middle of the room. In a moment she begins to bleed everywhere. She doesn’t know why—only that it always happens. (He quickly recants and invites her in.)
I really liked this movie. It was far better than the standard fare. I will give it a 10 for the genre rating, and an 8.5 for a standard rating. Except for a couple swear words, and one or two graphic scenes, I think Nita would have appreciated this one. She’s somewhere in Utah though, having left me for a newborn, so it’s a moot point.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Resident Evil: Afterlife
Resident Evil: Afterlife
This is the fourth in the apparently endless franchise based on the game I’ve never played—never even seen. None of them are very good, but they star Zombies, so, you know . . . . . .
In this installment, the Umbrella Corporation’s synthetic virus has killed the entire planet and left millions of walking dead illegally loitering.
The film opens with super-powered-up Alice and her super-clones killing a thousand or so heavily armed private mercs, only to be injected with little beasties which render her—the real her—merely human again. But that doesn’t stop her.
Alice is still trying to find and save whatever remnant of humanity might be left, and is following a radio signal from someplace called Arcady, which appears to be in Alaska. She flies up there and finds no sign of anything—just a field of abandoned bush planes and no explanation as to why they are there or what happened to the pilots and passengers. I guess everybody was looking for Arcady, didn’t find it, and killed themselves from the disappointment. (There is a kind of explanation later on, but only obliquely.)
But she does find Claire, (Ali Larter) from movie number three, and they fly down the coast looking for survivors, finally finding some in LA. They have holed-up in a maximum security prison, which is pretty clever—the zombies surround it by the tens-of-thousands, but they can’t get in. Not until, that is, some giant in a rubber suit with a burlap bag over his head, and nails driven into his head and shoulders, comes along with a kind of battle axe, fifteen feet long and made from an engine block, and breaks the gates down. There is no explanation whatsoever about who this guy is, or why he is there. We don’t even know if he is a zombie or not. If not, why aren’t they eating him? If he is, how is he fashioning five-hundred pound weapons, and . . . you know, thinking?
Well . . . I don’t want to give too much away. The supporting cast is fine. The effects are as gruesome and fun as we’ve come to expect over the years. The stunts are totally unbelievable and still great.
The ultimate bad guy—an Umbrella über-president or something—played by Shawn Roberts, tries to do an impersonation of Hugo Weaving as Agent Smith, but it is pathetic. Plus he’s unkillable, and that’s no fun.
There is no rhyme or reason to this story. But that’s okay, because there is no rhyme or reason to Zombies in general—any zombie story is, by definition, illogical, irrational, and unreasonable. So they can pretty much do whatever they want with it, and those of us dumb enough to go watch them get what we deserve. (Raises hand with sheepish grin.)
I went in having already decided I’d like it, and I wasn’t disappointed. It was fun. Grotesque, yes. Deviant, yes. Mindless, yes. Perhaps even Evil (thus the title), but fun. I like the whole back-story of Umbrella Corporation, and the experimentations on Alice, and Raccoon City. I really like Milla Jovovich and Ali Larter—two hot-mamas—and the cool fight scenes. (I think there’s some guys in it too.)
It is in 3-D, which I didn’t know, or forgot. I don’t like 3-D. The effect fades on the periphery, and the special glasses are too dark. It’s like watching a movie with sunglasses on. But it was okay this time. I didn’t whine.
And of course, there is no ending. The way is open for number five. Milla is going to be playing Alice when she’d eighty. And if I’m still breathing, I’ll probably still be going to see her.
It is rated R, for all the Right Reasons. Nita didn’t go. In fact, she considers divorcing me every time I go to one of these, but I can’t stay away. It wasn’t that great, but I liked it anyway. I would recommend it to the South Park kids, but no one else.
This is the fourth in the apparently endless franchise based on the game I’ve never played—never even seen. None of them are very good, but they star Zombies, so, you know . . . . . .
In this installment, the Umbrella Corporation’s synthetic virus has killed the entire planet and left millions of walking dead illegally loitering.
The film opens with super-powered-up Alice and her super-clones killing a thousand or so heavily armed private mercs, only to be injected with little beasties which render her—the real her—merely human again. But that doesn’t stop her.
Alice is still trying to find and save whatever remnant of humanity might be left, and is following a radio signal from someplace called Arcady, which appears to be in Alaska. She flies up there and finds no sign of anything—just a field of abandoned bush planes and no explanation as to why they are there or what happened to the pilots and passengers. I guess everybody was looking for Arcady, didn’t find it, and killed themselves from the disappointment. (There is a kind of explanation later on, but only obliquely.)
But she does find Claire, (Ali Larter) from movie number three, and they fly down the coast looking for survivors, finally finding some in LA. They have holed-up in a maximum security prison, which is pretty clever—the zombies surround it by the tens-of-thousands, but they can’t get in. Not until, that is, some giant in a rubber suit with a burlap bag over his head, and nails driven into his head and shoulders, comes along with a kind of battle axe, fifteen feet long and made from an engine block, and breaks the gates down. There is no explanation whatsoever about who this guy is, or why he is there. We don’t even know if he is a zombie or not. If not, why aren’t they eating him? If he is, how is he fashioning five-hundred pound weapons, and . . . you know, thinking?
Well . . . I don’t want to give too much away. The supporting cast is fine. The effects are as gruesome and fun as we’ve come to expect over the years. The stunts are totally unbelievable and still great.
The ultimate bad guy—an Umbrella über-president or something—played by Shawn Roberts, tries to do an impersonation of Hugo Weaving as Agent Smith, but it is pathetic. Plus he’s unkillable, and that’s no fun.
There is no rhyme or reason to this story. But that’s okay, because there is no rhyme or reason to Zombies in general—any zombie story is, by definition, illogical, irrational, and unreasonable. So they can pretty much do whatever they want with it, and those of us dumb enough to go watch them get what we deserve. (Raises hand with sheepish grin.)
I went in having already decided I’d like it, and I wasn’t disappointed. It was fun. Grotesque, yes. Deviant, yes. Mindless, yes. Perhaps even Evil (thus the title), but fun. I like the whole back-story of Umbrella Corporation, and the experimentations on Alice, and Raccoon City. I really like Milla Jovovich and Ali Larter—two hot-mamas—and the cool fight scenes. (I think there’s some guys in it too.)
It is in 3-D, which I didn’t know, or forgot. I don’t like 3-D. The effect fades on the periphery, and the special glasses are too dark. It’s like watching a movie with sunglasses on. But it was okay this time. I didn’t whine.
And of course, there is no ending. The way is open for number five. Milla is going to be playing Alice when she’d eighty. And if I’m still breathing, I’ll probably still be going to see her.
It is rated R, for all the Right Reasons. Nita didn’t go. In fact, she considers divorcing me every time I go to one of these, but I can’t stay away. It wasn’t that great, but I liked it anyway. I would recommend it to the South Park kids, but no one else.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Scott Pilgrim vs the World
Maybe Nita is right. Maybe what she has been telling—warning—people about all these years is true. Maybe I am a completely deranged lunatic. (But it just might be a lunatic she’s looking for . . .) I say this because it is the only rational explanation for having gone to see this movie.
I am a 60-year old man, a child of another generation and culture. What would possibly posses me to think I would like anything about such a strange movie?
First of all, it is another flick based on a graphic novel. Once again, I had no idea. I never read them. Never have. But apparently, I am a crypto-collector, because I end up seeing them all. Ever since Cathy and I saw Tank Girl¬—and loved it, in fact. 15 or 20 years ago.
Second, the story is as emo, indie, and metrosexual as anything could be. Scott Pilgrim is played to a Tee by Michael Cera. (Bleeker in Juno.) If you know who he is, no explanation is necessary. Scott is 22 and dating a 17 year-old high-schooler. He is the wanna-be bass player in a wanna-be indie band. The drummer, Kim, is a cute-as-a-bug red-headed dwarf. And the world’s angriest female. The hanger-on, shy and lurking, the almost-in-the-band kid, is named Young Neil. Now, as if that isn’t a sufficiently low-brow play on words, the lead singer and guitar player, is named Stephen Stills. What chutzpah! I thought I was gonna die, first from choking, then from laughing. Stills plays an old, beat-up acoustic guitar that makes Willie Nelson’s look pristine, and the music is hard and electric at all times. It reminded me of Airplane, in which each shot of the jet on the screen is accompanied by the sound of a prop plane. Every time.
Scott’s roommate, played ably by Kieran Culkin, is openly gay. They share the only bed in their apartment, which is usually occupied by as many as four other people.
A new girl arrives, and Scot is smitten. He is the biggest dork in modern history, but wears her down, and they start hanging out. This is when he discovers that in order to date Ramona, he must defeat her Seven Evil ex’s in single combat . . . to the death.
This is where it starts to get weird.
Somehow, the director manages to make a live anime-graphic- novel-rendition, of a graphic novel about anime. I can’t explain it. Literally. The fight scenes are in the best tradition of the Saturday morning cartoons—except they’re live-action—where heroes can fly and call on mystic powers, and where music summons creatures from a crazed Japanese imagination to do battle a la Pikachu. Seriously, I have never seen anything remotely similar.
It is wildly inventive, creative, and fun. Just fun. It is funny, but so full of angst I was worried the projector might suddenly turn Goth and stop the film because it just couldn’t go on. It is stupid. And smart. And highly original. It was directed by someone named Edgar Wright, who should get a special Oscar for bravery. Either that, or the Ed Wood Lifetime Achievement Award.
Here comes the Wayne is deranged part: I loved it. I could not have gone to a movie with less in common to my life-experience, and it was refreshing, in a masochistic, pathos-ridden way.
I have no idea who to recommend it to. And if I did, I wouldn’t. The tagline for this movie is “An Epic of epic epicness.” And that is about right. It is rated PG-13. One or two instances of profanity. Although one girl cusses a lot, but bleeps herself out with a sound and little black bar over her mouth. Scott asks on several occasions how she is doing that.
With the possible exception of my youngest daughter and her boyfriend, and maybe Grah, and Dredla of course, I cannot think of anyone who would like this film. It may have been made by idiot savants for the severely autistic for all I know. (Hey, they deserve entertainment too.)
When I took Nita to see Napoleon Dynamite, it took two viewing for her to really get it and enjoy it. This one may take five.
But it is a masterpiece. I instantly placed it on my list of favorite movies of all time. Yes . . . with Tank Girl.
I am a 60-year old man, a child of another generation and culture. What would possibly posses me to think I would like anything about such a strange movie?
First of all, it is another flick based on a graphic novel. Once again, I had no idea. I never read them. Never have. But apparently, I am a crypto-collector, because I end up seeing them all. Ever since Cathy and I saw Tank Girl¬—and loved it, in fact. 15 or 20 years ago.
Second, the story is as emo, indie, and metrosexual as anything could be. Scott Pilgrim is played to a Tee by Michael Cera. (Bleeker in Juno.) If you know who he is, no explanation is necessary. Scott is 22 and dating a 17 year-old high-schooler. He is the wanna-be bass player in a wanna-be indie band. The drummer, Kim, is a cute-as-a-bug red-headed dwarf. And the world’s angriest female. The hanger-on, shy and lurking, the almost-in-the-band kid, is named Young Neil. Now, as if that isn’t a sufficiently low-brow play on words, the lead singer and guitar player, is named Stephen Stills. What chutzpah! I thought I was gonna die, first from choking, then from laughing. Stills plays an old, beat-up acoustic guitar that makes Willie Nelson’s look pristine, and the music is hard and electric at all times. It reminded me of Airplane, in which each shot of the jet on the screen is accompanied by the sound of a prop plane. Every time.
Scott’s roommate, played ably by Kieran Culkin, is openly gay. They share the only bed in their apartment, which is usually occupied by as many as four other people.
A new girl arrives, and Scot is smitten. He is the biggest dork in modern history, but wears her down, and they start hanging out. This is when he discovers that in order to date Ramona, he must defeat her Seven Evil ex’s in single combat . . . to the death.
This is where it starts to get weird.
Somehow, the director manages to make a live anime-graphic- novel-rendition, of a graphic novel about anime. I can’t explain it. Literally. The fight scenes are in the best tradition of the Saturday morning cartoons—except they’re live-action—where heroes can fly and call on mystic powers, and where music summons creatures from a crazed Japanese imagination to do battle a la Pikachu. Seriously, I have never seen anything remotely similar.
It is wildly inventive, creative, and fun. Just fun. It is funny, but so full of angst I was worried the projector might suddenly turn Goth and stop the film because it just couldn’t go on. It is stupid. And smart. And highly original. It was directed by someone named Edgar Wright, who should get a special Oscar for bravery. Either that, or the Ed Wood Lifetime Achievement Award.
Here comes the Wayne is deranged part: I loved it. I could not have gone to a movie with less in common to my life-experience, and it was refreshing, in a masochistic, pathos-ridden way.
I have no idea who to recommend it to. And if I did, I wouldn’t. The tagline for this movie is “An Epic of epic epicness.” And that is about right. It is rated PG-13. One or two instances of profanity. Although one girl cusses a lot, but bleeps herself out with a sound and little black bar over her mouth. Scott asks on several occasions how she is doing that.
With the possible exception of my youngest daughter and her boyfriend, and maybe Grah, and Dredla of course, I cannot think of anyone who would like this film. It may have been made by idiot savants for the severely autistic for all I know. (Hey, they deserve entertainment too.)
When I took Nita to see Napoleon Dynamite, it took two viewing for her to really get it and enjoy it. This one may take five.
But it is a masterpiece. I instantly placed it on my list of favorite movies of all time. Yes . . . with Tank Girl.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
The Expendables
Expendables
This is one we testosterone factories have been waiting for a for a while now. It is a who’s who of action heroes. It stars Sylvester Stallone, Jason (The Transporter) Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, Steve “Stone Cold” Austin, Terry Crews, and Mickey Rourke. Oh, and Eric Roberts, Julia’s less-gifted brother, plays the bad guy, as usual. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis make cameo’s as honorary members of the club. Plus of bunch of other people.
I wish they’d have been able to get a few other guys in it—like Claude Van Dam, and Steven Segal, and Mel Gibson, and Tony Jaa and Bruce Lee, and Steve McQueen and Gary Cooper, and Roy Rogers, but some of those guys don’t like each other very much, and a few of them are dead, so . . .
Besides, with that many, it would have been an army, not a team, and they would have out-numbered the bad guys. Where’s the fun in that?
Stallone shares the writing credit—we hate to admit it, but he’s a good writer—and he directed it. Bam! Home run!
Nothing about the plot is new. A crack mercenary team—rude, crude, and the best in the world, a suicide mission to rescue a girl and atone for past sins. An island kingdom being ruled by a thug with his own army, and an ex-CIA guy who is growing coca for a profit.
But then, when you least expect it . . . there’s a twist. It actually has a story. It has actual characters disguised as real people, with real problems. And the mercs are aging! They’re past their prime. (by a Nano-second.) That’s clever writing because Stallone is in his fifties, and I’d guess all the other guys are fast approaching.
Not only that, but as they age, these bulging brutes are learning to act. Who knew?
The writing is above average for the genre. Okay, anything more sophisticated than drawings with a crayon is above average for the genre, but the screenplay works pretty well. I laughed several times (as usual, I was alone in that endeavor) and really appreciated the very subtle nod to Kermit The Frog in a man’s man shoot-em-up.
And yes, there is a girl. Three actually. Jason Statham is in a rocky relationship—a pretty good side story. Mickey Rourke brings one home on his hog—for exactly one scene. And Stallone falls for an island girl (the General’s daughter. Pronounce that Hen-er-al, please.) But this girl is different. She is not twenty years old, and didn’t step off the bus from central casting under the “eye candy” sign. Oh, she’s attractive enough, but no beauty. And she can act. But Stallone writes in someone a little more age-appropriate for his character. Sure, she’s 35 and he’s like, 80, but it’s a start, right?
Forget about the story. If you are overly concerned with plot, this is not your kind of movie. Even though there is one. Sort of.
There is a lot of action, and it is sometimes brutal, if quick. It does not linger, as so many directors like to do ever since Sam Peckinpah hit the scene. If anything, Stallone gives the film a ragged edge, and increases the tension, by cutting the thing as close to the bone as possible when it comes to fights, explosions, knife-throws—lot’s of knife throws—and bloody casualties.
This is some of the best violent, military-action mayhem I have ever seen. The melee’s are awesome. The martial arts are awesome. The big-badda-boom parts are awesome. And they go on and on. Truly a minor masterpiece for the genre. In fact, I am giving it an A as a genre piece, and a B- as a general grade.
Now let’s be clear. It is not a great movie. But it’s probably as great as these guys are ever going to get, and it is way better than most of the fare we’ve seen over the years.
It is rated R, for violence, mayhem, and gore. Heads roll. Arms are severed. But each of those scenes is so brief, so . . . almost beside the point, that you wonder if you really even saw it. Great stuff. And Terry Crews makes the hat-box magazine, full-automatic shot gun my new favorite weapon. Boo-ya!
There’s some cussing in this one. There is no sex, and no skin, so the R comes from an over-abundance of violence. If I had drugged Nita unconscious and taken her in to see it on a gurney, she still would have walked out. Plus, I earned another small popcorn with my points card. How great is that?
This is one we testosterone factories have been waiting for a for a while now. It is a who’s who of action heroes. It stars Sylvester Stallone, Jason (The Transporter) Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, Steve “Stone Cold” Austin, Terry Crews, and Mickey Rourke. Oh, and Eric Roberts, Julia’s less-gifted brother, plays the bad guy, as usual. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis make cameo’s as honorary members of the club. Plus of bunch of other people.
I wish they’d have been able to get a few other guys in it—like Claude Van Dam, and Steven Segal, and Mel Gibson, and Tony Jaa and Bruce Lee, and Steve McQueen and Gary Cooper, and Roy Rogers, but some of those guys don’t like each other very much, and a few of them are dead, so . . .
Besides, with that many, it would have been an army, not a team, and they would have out-numbered the bad guys. Where’s the fun in that?
Stallone shares the writing credit—we hate to admit it, but he’s a good writer—and he directed it. Bam! Home run!
Nothing about the plot is new. A crack mercenary team—rude, crude, and the best in the world, a suicide mission to rescue a girl and atone for past sins. An island kingdom being ruled by a thug with his own army, and an ex-CIA guy who is growing coca for a profit.
But then, when you least expect it . . . there’s a twist. It actually has a story. It has actual characters disguised as real people, with real problems. And the mercs are aging! They’re past their prime. (by a Nano-second.) That’s clever writing because Stallone is in his fifties, and I’d guess all the other guys are fast approaching.
Not only that, but as they age, these bulging brutes are learning to act. Who knew?
The writing is above average for the genre. Okay, anything more sophisticated than drawings with a crayon is above average for the genre, but the screenplay works pretty well. I laughed several times (as usual, I was alone in that endeavor) and really appreciated the very subtle nod to Kermit The Frog in a man’s man shoot-em-up.
And yes, there is a girl. Three actually. Jason Statham is in a rocky relationship—a pretty good side story. Mickey Rourke brings one home on his hog—for exactly one scene. And Stallone falls for an island girl (the General’s daughter. Pronounce that Hen-er-al, please.) But this girl is different. She is not twenty years old, and didn’t step off the bus from central casting under the “eye candy” sign. Oh, she’s attractive enough, but no beauty. And she can act. But Stallone writes in someone a little more age-appropriate for his character. Sure, she’s 35 and he’s like, 80, but it’s a start, right?
Forget about the story. If you are overly concerned with plot, this is not your kind of movie. Even though there is one. Sort of.
There is a lot of action, and it is sometimes brutal, if quick. It does not linger, as so many directors like to do ever since Sam Peckinpah hit the scene. If anything, Stallone gives the film a ragged edge, and increases the tension, by cutting the thing as close to the bone as possible when it comes to fights, explosions, knife-throws—lot’s of knife throws—and bloody casualties.
This is some of the best violent, military-action mayhem I have ever seen. The melee’s are awesome. The martial arts are awesome. The big-badda-boom parts are awesome. And they go on and on. Truly a minor masterpiece for the genre. In fact, I am giving it an A as a genre piece, and a B- as a general grade.
Now let’s be clear. It is not a great movie. But it’s probably as great as these guys are ever going to get, and it is way better than most of the fare we’ve seen over the years.
It is rated R, for violence, mayhem, and gore. Heads roll. Arms are severed. But each of those scenes is so brief, so . . . almost beside the point, that you wonder if you really even saw it. Great stuff. And Terry Crews makes the hat-box magazine, full-automatic shot gun my new favorite weapon. Boo-ya!
There’s some cussing in this one. There is no sex, and no skin, so the R comes from an over-abundance of violence. If I had drugged Nita unconscious and taken her in to see it on a gurney, she still would have walked out. Plus, I earned another small popcorn with my points card. How great is that?
Eat Pray Love
Eat Pray Love
This is a contemplative story, a narration, a memoir, and a travel-as-discovery story.
I read the book a while ago, on my sister’s unerring recommendation. (Jan, you should start a blog and review/recommend books. You’re batting 1000 for me.)
A woman in her thirties discovers she is married for all the wrong reasons. Traditionally they are the right reasons, but not working for her. She decides to end the childless relationship, falls into the arms of an actor as she rebounds, becomes disillusioned, realizes she is at war with herself, and decides to take a break for a year. She will go to Rome, to learn the language, which she loves, and abuse the food, which she craves, then to India to study at the Ashram of her actor’s Guru, then to Bali, because a medicine man there told her she would return. That’s pretty much the plot.
The book is superlative. It works because Liz, the narrator, is a gifted and sensitive—and honest—writer. Translating such a thing onto film would be a challenge for anyone, and the director succeeds as well as anyone else might have.
Julia Roberts plays Liz. Everyone else in the movie is a supporting role—she is the only A-list name.
Liz’s dilemma, it seems to me, is universal—that is, we never know for sure if what we are thinking and feeling is real or counterfeit, and consequently, if the decisions we make regarding those thoughts and feelings, are the right ones. Or the best ones, or at least the most necessary ones.
She does seem to learn from the experiences her travels offer her, and discovers facets of life not previously examined, in the lives of the people she meets and befriends on the journey. In that sense, it is a positive story, but one which falls short of any objective conclusions, which is true for all of us.
Most of us have the sense that—and I have written about it often—books are superior to movies as vehicles for storytelling. (Unless the story is so simple, shallow and/or universal that a book is not really necessary. Think Star Wars.) Those of us who read a lot, and consequently are often seeing the movie after the fact, often bemoan the fact that too much was left out; what about this scene; you can’t really understand without the pages of narrative or thought going on in the protagonists head, etc. And this is usually true. But with this one, I found a rare instance where, for me, the opposite turned out to be true.
There is a scene, in India, where a fellow traveler, a man from Texas, reveals a painful, life-altering, gut-wrenching truth to Liz, because in order to grow, she needs to hear it. As the story unfolds they are sitting on a roof at the Ashram. It is emotionally very powerful. I remember the scene very well in the book, and found it to be both poignant, and profound. But in the movie, it becomes transcendent. It is the force, and talent, and overwhelming honesty of the two actors which renders it so potent. To see it being delivered, and accepted, in this case, was superior to reading it and imagining it. Richard Jenkins (you would recognize him) plays the Texan. It is one of the best jobs of acting I have ever seen.
And it made me realize something I had not really thought of before. When someone is the focus of a scene—delivering the soliloquy, telling the story, involved in the action, we tend to forget about the other people. But without saying a word, Julia Roberts not only holds her own in the scene, she makes it work. My little mini-epiphany is that the watcher, the listener, the responder, is just as important to a scene like this as the active one, on whom the scene focuses. If I were teaching film, this is the one I would use to illustrate that idea. Watch Casablanca again, the last scene, at the airport. Listen to Rick as he tells Ilsa why he can’t go with her, but watch Bergman as Bogart is speaking. That’s what I’m talking about.
With Eat Pray Love, Nita and I both bemoaned the fact that much had to be left out. A film like this could be nit-picked and second-guessed to death. Yes, it is sparse in some places. Yes, it is a little flat here and there, as if the director did not want to get too close, too intimate. It is a quiet, deliberately-paced film, without any big action. Not one explosion, if I remember correctly. But overall, it works very well, and we both recommend it.
It is rated PG-13. There is no sex, or skin in the movie (and there is in the book—handled well, I thought) and very few instances of profanity. Maybe 3. I’m not sure anyone will have any kind of eureka moment as a result of watching this one, but no one will leave having lost precious brain cells—which is not true of a lot of movies.
This is a contemplative story, a narration, a memoir, and a travel-as-discovery story.
I read the book a while ago, on my sister’s unerring recommendation. (Jan, you should start a blog and review/recommend books. You’re batting 1000 for me.)
A woman in her thirties discovers she is married for all the wrong reasons. Traditionally they are the right reasons, but not working for her. She decides to end the childless relationship, falls into the arms of an actor as she rebounds, becomes disillusioned, realizes she is at war with herself, and decides to take a break for a year. She will go to Rome, to learn the language, which she loves, and abuse the food, which she craves, then to India to study at the Ashram of her actor’s Guru, then to Bali, because a medicine man there told her she would return. That’s pretty much the plot.
The book is superlative. It works because Liz, the narrator, is a gifted and sensitive—and honest—writer. Translating such a thing onto film would be a challenge for anyone, and the director succeeds as well as anyone else might have.
Julia Roberts plays Liz. Everyone else in the movie is a supporting role—she is the only A-list name.
Liz’s dilemma, it seems to me, is universal—that is, we never know for sure if what we are thinking and feeling is real or counterfeit, and consequently, if the decisions we make regarding those thoughts and feelings, are the right ones. Or the best ones, or at least the most necessary ones.
She does seem to learn from the experiences her travels offer her, and discovers facets of life not previously examined, in the lives of the people she meets and befriends on the journey. In that sense, it is a positive story, but one which falls short of any objective conclusions, which is true for all of us.
Most of us have the sense that—and I have written about it often—books are superior to movies as vehicles for storytelling. (Unless the story is so simple, shallow and/or universal that a book is not really necessary. Think Star Wars.) Those of us who read a lot, and consequently are often seeing the movie after the fact, often bemoan the fact that too much was left out; what about this scene; you can’t really understand without the pages of narrative or thought going on in the protagonists head, etc. And this is usually true. But with this one, I found a rare instance where, for me, the opposite turned out to be true.
There is a scene, in India, where a fellow traveler, a man from Texas, reveals a painful, life-altering, gut-wrenching truth to Liz, because in order to grow, she needs to hear it. As the story unfolds they are sitting on a roof at the Ashram. It is emotionally very powerful. I remember the scene very well in the book, and found it to be both poignant, and profound. But in the movie, it becomes transcendent. It is the force, and talent, and overwhelming honesty of the two actors which renders it so potent. To see it being delivered, and accepted, in this case, was superior to reading it and imagining it. Richard Jenkins (you would recognize him) plays the Texan. It is one of the best jobs of acting I have ever seen.
And it made me realize something I had not really thought of before. When someone is the focus of a scene—delivering the soliloquy, telling the story, involved in the action, we tend to forget about the other people. But without saying a word, Julia Roberts not only holds her own in the scene, she makes it work. My little mini-epiphany is that the watcher, the listener, the responder, is just as important to a scene like this as the active one, on whom the scene focuses. If I were teaching film, this is the one I would use to illustrate that idea. Watch Casablanca again, the last scene, at the airport. Listen to Rick as he tells Ilsa why he can’t go with her, but watch Bergman as Bogart is speaking. That’s what I’m talking about.
With Eat Pray Love, Nita and I both bemoaned the fact that much had to be left out. A film like this could be nit-picked and second-guessed to death. Yes, it is sparse in some places. Yes, it is a little flat here and there, as if the director did not want to get too close, too intimate. It is a quiet, deliberately-paced film, without any big action. Not one explosion, if I remember correctly. But overall, it works very well, and we both recommend it.
It is rated PG-13. There is no sex, or skin in the movie (and there is in the book—handled well, I thought) and very few instances of profanity. Maybe 3. I’m not sure anyone will have any kind of eureka moment as a result of watching this one, but no one will leave having lost precious brain cells—which is not true of a lot of movies.
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