The Prezzies- Movie Reviews & Awards

Featured Review: DECEMBER

2008-12-20T08:36:00.000-08:00

Holidays and finals and work and church and friends have me overloaded, so I have not seen very many films lately, but more of the award movies are coming out and if I don't write legitimate reviews they'll be updated here.

BOLT - Starring John Travolta, Miley Cyrus, Sussie Essman
Grade: B

BOY IN THE STRIPED PAJAMAS - Starring Vera Farmiga
Grade: C+

THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON - Starring Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton
Grade: B

DOUBT - Starring Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams
Grade: A

FROST/NIXON - Starring Frank Langella, Michael Sheen, Sam Rockwell
Grade: A-

IGOR - Starring John Cusack,
Grade: F

MADAGASCAR 2 - Starring Ben Stiller, David Schwimmer, Jada Pinkett
Grade: C

MILK - Starring Sean Penn, Emile Hirsch, Josh Brolin
Grade: B-

NOBEL SON - Starring Alan Rickman, Bryan Greenberg, Mary Steenburgen
Grade: D+

RACHEL GETTING MARRIED - Starring Anne Hathaway, Rosemarie Dewitt, Debra Winger
Grade: A-

REVOLUTIONARY ROAD - Starring Leo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Michael Shannon
Grade: TBA

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE - Starring Dev Patel
Grade: A+

VALKYRIE - Starring Tom Cruise, Tom Wilkinson, Bill Nighy
Grade: B+

YES MAN - Starring Jim Carrey, Zooey Deschanel, Bradley Cooper
Grade: B

Featured Review: CHANGELING

2008-11-13T11:25:00.000-08:00

Changeling

Starring - Angelina Jolie, John Malkovich, Jeffrey Donovan, Amy Ryan, Colm Feore, Jason Butler Harner, Michael Kelly, Geoff Pierson

Directed by Clint Eastwood

Grade: B

"I want my son back! I want my son back!"

Watching the details so intricately placed in Changeling, I began to notice something. So we have standardized the telephones since the 1920s. We've standardized refrigerators, cars, public transportation, cereal boxes, arrest warrants, and mental institutions. So now, have we standardized award movies?

Changeling turned into what invariably happens to several films of its caliber every year; it went from a good film that otherwise would be an engrossing period biopic, into a forgettable "award" movie. The entire production is full of pedigree that screams from its every ounce of life that it wants to be a big contender come February's Oscars. However, it lacks the true gumption and risk some of the best movies ever made had to deservedly get there.

Angelina Jolie stars as Christine Collins, a single mother in the working world of 1920's Los Angeles. When her son Walter goes missing during an emergency shift at the Pacific Telephone Company, Christine is soon embroiled in hardships and controversy with the Los Angeles Police Department, a devious and corrupted lot led by Captain J.J. Jones (Burn Notice's Jeffrey Donovan). They give her a different boy, send her to a mental institution, subject her to a serial killer's dementia, and out and out lie and underhand her plight. The only humane person it seems is Reverend Gustav Briegleb, a radio pastor who uses her to highlight the treacherous police force.

Unlike the flappers we've seen in Chicago, Christine is an honest, hardworking woman active in the retro society dominated by men and corruption, just touching as a precursor to the equal rights and power women would fight for decades later. The title doesn't necessarily invoke the change in Christine's "son", but rather the strength she acquires through her ordeals. Jolie is very strong at purporting this, mixing a shy, trampled demeanor with a little bit of "We Can Do It" slogan spirit as her terrible circumstances go on through the years. Since the Best Actress category is always a little weak, Jolie seems to be a shoo-in to get a nomination.

Other performers vary, but all are adept. Jason Butler Harner is as outstanding as he is creepy playing Gordon Northcott, a demented, abusive, but almost child-like Canadian serial killer involved with Walter's disappearance. Amy Ryan is subtly good as a "woman of the night" Christine meets in the mental ward, as is Malkovich as the reverend out for justice, a rare restrained role for him. Only Jeffrey Donovan, struggling to rid himself of his New England accent, seemed a bit stiff.

The biggest problem I had with Changeling as a complete film was the same I had with David Fincher's Zodiac last year. Both biopics were definitely watchable with an invigorating cast and a sharp story, based on true-to-life serial killer cases and the people involved on the investigative side. But like Zodiac, Changeling drew back from any prestige with a procedural feel and too many subplot elements distracting away from the heart of the story, which Eastwood chose to make about the plight of Christine Collins.

Eastwood's direction is deceptively simple, which is both a positive and negative. His style invokes an old school Chinatown feeling (both films are about power and corruption in Depression-era Los Angeles), with pinpoint accuracy of the styles, colors, models and fads of the time. However, it's done to such a fault that Changeling plays like a straightforward period movie, without much suspense. There's some ambiguity within the context of the story, but Eastwood piles everything together in such a simple manner that the film tends to drag on during the times when the acting isn't being put on showcase.

Changeling is by all accounts a good film; solid acting, swift direction, and the pace was steady enough to stay alert and comprehensive throughout. But for such a lofty pedestal it placed itself on, Eastwood and company failed to trigger a real emotional reaction. When a film wants to puff itself up as an award worthy film, it has to fire on all cylinders. Instead Changeling went through all the motions of a forgettable award movie.

Featured Reviews: NOVEMBER

2008-11-10T15:54:00.000-08:00

`
Yikes, I'm really behind! So many things going on right now, and it's a shame for my movie watching because I haven't had time to do any personal choices, only going with friends & family, thus I haven't even seen Changeling yet. As always though, check out the mini review database blog for every movie I've seen this year. So here's a roundup of films I've seen since the last front page update:

Body Of Lies - Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Russell Crowe, Mark Strong
Director Ridley Scott peppers some unorthodox moods and settings into an otherwise typical cat and mouse chess game of spy intrigue, thus making Body Of Lies interesting and watchable aside from its two main stars. DiCaprio and Crowe are certainly fine here, but the film just nearly misses going south on its own prestige, ala Scott's American Gangster a year ago. Mark Strong, as a Jordanian leader and possibly the British equivalent to Andy Garcia, is a quiet force that hits the right marks.
Grade: B (10/10/08)

City Of Ember - Starring Saoirse Ronan, Harry Treadway, Bill Murray
Usually obscurer, secondhand children fantasy novels such as City Of Ember fizzle out as movie adaptations. But unlike say, The Seeker or The Golden Compass (though Ember's box office numbers say otherwise), Ember has the feel of a cult classic kids adventure that hasn't been seen widespread since the 1980s. Though it treads into some mundane and quirky aspects, the film features some fun performances and Oscar/Prezzie deserving Set Design/Costumes.
Grade: A- (10/10/08)

The Express - Starring Dennis Quaid, Rob Brown, Omar Benson Miller
Saved by the surprisingly nuanced performance by Brown as the titularly nicknamed player, The Express is an otherwise stereotypical feel-good-to-feel-bad sports drama ala previous football films about race and death such as Remember The Titans and Brian's Song. Frankly it's amazing a story like Ernie Davis' has went this long without a film treatment. Solid film to watch, even if you've seen similar variations of every cliche in the football film playbook several times before.
Grade: B- (10/10/08)

Passengers- Starring Anne Hathaway, Patrick Wilson, Andre Braugher
It's not the out and out worst movie of the year, but Passengers is so boring and cluttered with curious mistakes that it fares worse than many pointless films that you know are going to be bad. Horrendous story with a nonsensical ending that flips between vague thriller and peppy romance, anchored by uninspired performances and the dreariest shot location in history. Has there EVER been a good film made in Vancouver?
Grade: F

RockNRolla - Starring Gerard Butler, Tom Wilkinson, Mark Strong
Entertaining if stereotypical Guy Ritchie British gangster noir, RockNRolla has a mix of great performances (Wilkinson, Strong, Toby Kebbell as the title nickname) and atrocious ones by Jeremy Piven (a surprise) and Thandie Newton (no surprise). Although quick-paced and fun, the quirkiness of Ritchie's characters and situations have never been this full tilt, and it starts to get annoying towards the end.
Grade: C+ (11/9/2008)

Role Models - Starring Paul Rudd, Seann William Scott, Elizabeth Banks
There's something about a little boy, not even yet a teenager, shouting extreme expletives that kind of bothers me. Curse words are a great tool for humor, but not when it's so out-and-out obvious. I can watch kids get blown up, shot, murdered all sorts of ways on screen, but Role Models' sort of lopsided raunch-to-heart ratio couldn't muster up the affection. File this under the underwhelming category with the similar but blander Drillbit Taylor.
Grade: D+ (11/9/2008)

Zack & Miri Make A Porno - Starring Seth Rogen, Elizabeth Banks, Craig Robinson
Though not as cohesively funny and warm as Judd Apatow's 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up, director/writer Kevin Smith fills in for Apatow's producer misfires this year with his own knock-off that follows the same raunchy-but-sweet formula. Crude, quite possibly deserves an NC-17 in its own right, but downright more touching and funny than 95% of PG-13 movies. Justin Long, Brandon Routh and surprisingly Jason Mewes are highlights along with usually durable Rogen & Banks.
Grade: B+

Featured Review: OCTOBER I

2008-10-07T11:41:00.000-07:00

Continuing the trend of short reviews, I had free time on Friday & Saturday to see 7 films (4 on Friday for a grand total of $5, 3 on Saturday for $5, equaling 7 films for $10). Also added Choke from a random Tuesday night screening after class.

Appaloosa - Starring Ed Harris, Viggo Mortensen, Renee Zellweger
Harris starred, directed, co-wrote and co-produced this lumbering western that re-teams him with his A History Of Violence co-star Mortensen. The performances are all solid and edgy, menacing in their surroundings (though Jeremy Irons' character voice is remarkably similar to that of Daniel Plainview), but Appaloosa slowly builds and builds to a climax that never really comes. Pretty to look at, not very interesting to watch.
Grade: C (10/4/08)

Beverly Hills Chihuahua - Starring Piper Perabo, Jamie Lee Curtis, Drew Barrymore
The premise and the marketing for this film is outlandishly and garishly stupid by all means, but Chihuahua IS a Disney movie. Given the chance, Chihuahua isn't half bad, and actually spreads a positive moral message to its key demographic of little kids. Director Raja Gosnell (Scooby Doo) refrains from taking the film's annoying qualities to an absolute hilt. Sort of like this generation's Homeward Bound, except for slightly less intelligent and focused kids. AKA, perfect for the YouTube generation.
Grade: C (10/3/08)

Blindness - Starring Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Gael Garcia Bernal
Blindness, Fernando Meirelles' much anticipated follow-up to Cidade de Deus and The Constant Gardner, is extremely ambitious visually, ironic for such a story about quarantined blind people. It has Children Of Men and I Am Legend vibes, inserting a we-take-our-lives-for-granted rhetoric in the midst of an almost apocalyptic disaster quality film. In the end Blindness fails to see a grander picture of allegorical democracy, but is interesting enough for an artsy two hour commentary on the beauty of vision.
Grade: B (10/4/08)

Choke - Starring Sam Rockwell, Anjelica Huston, Kelly Macdonald
Anjelica Huston gives a knockout performance, as does Rockwell as always, but it's hard to take their merits seriously in such a bizarre story of bizarre characters. Sort of true to Chuck Palahiuk's book, everything is disjointed until the very end, but it takes a lot of investment to understand any of the character's motives beyond the simple premises. Entertaining, but strange and hard to warm up to.
Grade: B- (9/30/08)

Fireproof - Starring Kirk Cameron, Erin Bethea, Ken Bevel
It's a simple matter of personal faith; if you're a die-hard Christian, you'll probably love Fireproof. If you're an atheist, agnostic or someone who couldn't give a crap about Kirk Cameron, Fireproof will make you burn with hate. Yes, the acting is kind of cheesy at points, and it is more or less shot like a Lifetime movie. But for a film that was made on half a million dollars and starring Cameron and a bunch of Georgia church volunteers, it's surprisingly durable.
Grade: B (10/3/08)

How To Lose Friends & Alienate People - Starring Simon Pegg, Kirsten Dunst, Megan Fox
Whereas Pegg's "Brit conquering the States" contemporary Ricky Gervais found himself working seamlessly in the mainstream Ghost Town, Pegg has yet to break out of the sheer brilliance of Shaun Of The Dead. How To Lose Friends is full of pompous revelation and cliche hyperbole. It gets tolerable in the second half, but save the pig and chihuahuas for a family comedy. Fox is spot-on as an airhead actress, but she's still only used for her body here.
Grade: C- (10/3/08)

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist - Starring Michael Cera, Kat Dennings, Alexis Dziena
With its cooler-than-thou New York suburbanites crawling the city spouting lyrics and gusto within every square inch of prime hipster real estate, Nick & Norah should be a casualty of the MTV generation lambasting the indie generation. But the film features a charming cast of up-and-comers who fit into their roles like beautiful stereotypes, and we're left with a pocketful of music rebellion nostalgia that hasn't really been seen since the 1980s.
Grade: B- (10/3/08)

Righteous Kill - Starring Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, John Leguizamo
On the bright side, director Jon Avnet improves on his technique over 88 Minutes. While De Niro and Pacino are nowhere near the brilliance their careers were 20-30 years ago, they don't embarrass themselves too badly here. The big hitch however is the fact that the "grand twist" is obvious to anyone who's ever seen a NYPD noir 20 minutes into the movie, and thus we're forced to watch this tepid cat and mouse game go on for another hour before anything gets resolved.
Grade: D+ (10/4/08)

Featured Review: SEPTEMBER

2008-10-01T08:50:00.000-07:00

So I've been incredibly busy lately with college, relationships and a new job, so for now I'm just going to post short reviews of the films I've seen this September, and at worst post every 2 weeks or so the new things that come up. Still planning to do a major awards ceremony this winter.

Bangkok Dangerous- Starring Nicolas Cage, Shahkrit, Yamnarm, Charlie Young
Laughably bad and exceedingly boring, Bangkok Dangerous plays like Nic Cage's steely Asian action version of An American In Paris. He fights some bad guys, trains his Thai courier boy the ways of the American dojo, and falls in love with a deaf mute pharmacy clerk. And the hair, oh Lord child, the hair. Cage's pantomime skills are classic.
Grade: D (9/5/08)

Burn After Reading - Starring George Clooney, Frances McDormand, Brad Pitt
Though not nearly as funny or heartwarming as some of the Coens' best parables, Burn After Reading doesn't necessarily let it's big name actors get in the way of an interesting and well-made, if ultimately pointless film. The main stars range from excellent (Pitt is a considerable Supporting Actor nomination) to weary (John Malkovich is a great actor, but kind of slows down the film here).
Grade: B+ (9/13/08)

College - Starring Drake Bell, Kevin Covais, Andrew Caldwell
It's pretty sad when a film titled College is still more infinitely forgettable than a simple T-shirt with the word on it. Though it has some genuinely funny laughs occasionally, the movie suffers from a slew of perplexing decisions going against it. Targeting high schoolers and Drake Bell fans with an R-rating? Making all your characters except Covais truly detestable? This ain't your older brother's Superbad.
Grade: D+ (9/5/08)

Eagle Eye - Starring Shia LeBeouf, Michelle Monaghan, Billy Bob Thornton
Eagle Eye is sort of a coming out party for director D.J. Caruso to be the next Michael Bay. Vastly entertaining yet insufferably over-the-top and cliche, Eagle Eye curbs itself from a host of movies, including Enemy Of The State, I Robot and without spoiling TOO much, 2001: A Space Odyssey. Sure, it has a cheeky sense of humor and never truly takes itself completely seriously, but even if it was thrilling enough to finish the popcorn bag, you find yourself asking WHY?
Grade: C+ (9/27/08)

Fool's Gold* - Starring Matthew McConaughey, Kate Hudson, Donald Sutherland
Despite the easy affability, chemistry and charm of the leading actors- a pair that should be together in real life- Fool's Gold sinks to the bottom of the filmmaking depths with shallow caricatures and some jarring violence for such a breezy and hollow effort. It's like an exotic vacation that you spent the entire time in the lavatory for.
Grade: D+

Ghost Town - Starring Ricky Gervais, Greg Kinnear, Tea Leoni
It takes a lot of gall to appreciate Gervais' awkward and dread based sitcom comedies (including the brilliant, original UK version of The Office), but surprisingly Gervais is easily accessible here. He alone turns what would normally be a middling romantic comedy of the updated Topper variety into a charming spectacle with a little bit of off-color bite. Ghost Town is the kind of film that one shouldn't necessarily be excited to see, but is proof that there is fresh life in the romantic comedy genre. Surprising little gem of a movie.
Grade: B+ (9/25/08)

Man On Wire - Starring Philippe Petit, Annie Allix, Jean-Louis Blondeau
Usually when one thinks of a documentary, they think of a subject that is either made to change a point of view, or to enlighten. Certainly Man On Wire enlightens, but for a subject so seemingly inconsequential in the grand scope of the world- a man tightrope walking across the World Trade Center almost 35 years ago- it is highly entertaining. Blending a unique spin of straight documentary and heist film, director James Marsh doesn't mince on 9/11 despite an easy target to do so, and thus the absence of the subject makes the legacy of the WTC that much more bittersweet.
Grade: A- (9/16/08)

Miracle At St. Anna - Starring Derek Luke, Michael Ealy, Laz Alonso
For every ingenious thing Spike Lee crafts within this quasi-true story of black soldiers holed up in Italy during WWII, Lee seems to make 1 1/2 times more mistakes with the storyline. While his "struggling race in the face of white supremacy" slant has been toned down over the years, Lee still manages to make a couple of toothless jabs at the subject. An interesting tale with a couple of stellar performances (Omar Benson Miller in particular is sweet natured), Miracle At St. Anna ends up disappointing in the long run.
Grade: B- (9/26/08)

Indie Review: BRIDESHEAD

2008-09-04T11:14:00.000-07:00

For the mini-review of the indie film of lesser importance, Bottle Shock, click here.

Brideshead Revisited

Starring- Matthew Goode, Ben Whislaw, Hayley Atwell, Emma Thompson, Michael Gambon, Patrick Malahide

Directed by Julian Jarrold

Grade: B-

"Sebastian and I are a couple of heathens."
"I am not a heathen. I'm a sinner."

To anyone who's seen Atonement and has fallen in love with it, Brideshead Revisited may seem like a blatant knockoff of Joe Wright's vision of Ian McEwan's novel. But very much like a teen slasher picture or a Matthew McConaughey film, the British Period Epic is just its own separate genre. Each one will feature sweeping choreography, immaculate theatre-trained class acting, and high society drama. From Howard's End to The English Patient to The Heart Of Me, British Period Epics are its own brand of demographics.

The true key of distancing Brideshead to the far superior Atonement is less subtle. The acting here is top notch, but just a shade underneath the performances of Keira Knightley, James McAvoy and Vanessa Redgrave. The direction by Julian Jarrold is classy, but doesn't quite have the same aesthic pleasure. The writing, based on the novel by Evelyn Waugh, Overall it does indeed share many similarities with Atonement done to a lesser quality, but Brideshead Revisited gets judged by its own highlights and demerits.

Charles Ryder (Match Point's Matthew Goode) is a middle-class young man off to Oxford in the years prior to World War II. While there, he begins a friendship with the flamboyantly gay Sebastian Flyte (Ben Whislaw), who invites Charles to his family's huge estate, aptly titled Brideshead. Therein lies a mess of conflict; Charles is a modern-day atheist, unsure of what he wants out of his life, but begins to fall for Sebastian's sister Julia (Hayley Atwell). Sebastian is part of a devoutly Catholic family, and being homosexual and confused about the contrasts of who he's supposed to be, turns to alcohol. Their mother, Lady Marchmain (Emma Thompson), is one of the last of dying breed of nobility and class from England's past, clinging onto to her religion in the face of the problems surrounding her.

Firstly, I've never personally read the book, but knowing what it entails, the film version of Brideshead Revisited seems to lose its deeper meaning. Waugh's novel was chiefly entrenched on the roles Catholicism and atheism played on the wealthy elite and middle class alike, and while Waugh himself was pro-Catholic, he gave principal allusions to both of its faults as well as its merits.

The film hints at it, but neither Jarrold or the screen adapters Andrew Davies or Jeremy Brock are fearless enough to tackle the subject straight on. Instead it just sort of resides off to the side while the temptations of love become the focus of the fim. Rather than looking at Lady Marchmain and Sebastian's religiousness in the face of each of their problems, Brideshead devolves into a mostly straightforward love triangle.

Secondly was the odd nature of the relationships. There were allusions to homosexual experimenting and love trysts in the novel, but the kiss between Charles and Sebastian in the film seemed almost done in exploitation than necessary to the story. Charles' pursuit of Julia rings somewhat hollow as well. It's not that these subjects are bad, but a bigger focus on the way the family crumbles yet finds its strength in its religious beliefs (the death bed scene of their spiritually wavering father is the acme of the film), more akin to the book, would have distanced Brideshead Revisited from its Atonement comparisons.

Wrapping up the film also proves fairly troublesome. It's pretty true to the book in story towards the end, but drags on for a good 20-30 minutes with several false endings that ultimately does not lead us to any particularly better conclusion. There was a proper climax, but it gets ruined with 20 minutes of almost needless extra explanation. We go from 100 minutes of blossoming drama, to 20 minutes of rapid-fire tying of loose ends.

Despite all of these faults, Brideshead Revisited is buoyant with some fine acting. Goode, known to many American audiences for films such as The Lookout and Chasing Liberty is dependable as the lead, performing like a standard Brit of class, never once breaking emotion unless its called for. Whislaw (I'm Not There) is as endearingly touching as Sebastian as he is revolting in his despair. Emma Thompson, matriarch of the Flyte clan, may follow Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett and her own footsteps (Sense & Sensibility) to another Oscar nomination with her domineering performance that voters eat up.

I'm almost tempted to check out the fabled 1981 BBC miniseries, because it is there that Waugh's book has supposedly been done justice. But I'm not a big enough fan of the British Period Epic to seek it out. If you're naturally a fan of the British Period Epic, you won't be too disappointed with Brideshead Revisited, other than maybe that BPE's poster girl Keira Knightley isn't in the film. But if you're new to exploring the genre, I'd advise you to check out Atonement first. Not because this is 'too British' as one may lead you to believe, but because it has

Featured Review: TRAITOR

2008-09-03T22:03:00.000-07:00

Traitor

Starring- Don Cheadle, Guy Pearce, Said Taghmaoui, Neal McDonough, Aly Khan, Jeff Daniels

Directed by Jeffrey Nachmanoff

Grade: A-

"You must be willing to sacrifice some of your pawns if you want to win the game."

There seems to be a misconception in Hollywood; that action films have to be dumb for the sake of the fight sequences, and that independent drama films with artistic ties cannot be violent, lest their fickle critics debase it as a said action film. Thankfully, Traitor blends both worlds together into a mostly captivating and engrossing spy thriller that offers the audience something different to think about. Something less patriotically jingoism in its actions, and more , even if that worldview isn't fully realized.

Surprisingly, Steve Martin, the guy still making Pink Panther and Cheaper By The Dozen sequels, is a co-conspirator behind Traitor's story. It's understandable to see him delve into a softer side with such Anglo-urban schmaltz as Shopgirl, but to come up with truly unique anti-American perspective (even if the film doesn't always stay anti-American) that isn't seen in too many mainstream films, Martin deserves a chance to branch out from the inane family comedies he's been stuck with as of late.

Don Cheadle stars as Samir Horn, a Sudanese native who had military ties to the United States. Currently he's in Yemen, selling explosives to American officials and Islamic terrorists alike; whoever is the highest bidder for his services. When Roy Clayton (Memento's Guy Pearce) and his partner Max Archer (Neal McDonough) step into the investigation, Samir finds himself in a worldwide cat and mouse game not only with them on his trail, but also navigating

Cheadle is certainly a treat to watch as he usually is, even if his character slowly becomes the "sensitive, slightly offended Black man out to do good", a Cheadle staple (see Hotel Rwanda, Boogie Nights, Reign Over Me). But it's still a great act. For at least the first half of the film his intentions are ambiguous and the audience is unsure how to like the character. It's no question that he'll end up being a good guy, but how good? He's no knight in shining armor, but can he redeem himself as a whole, or has his past rendered him to a life of guiltless solidarity? Cheadle leads us on a pretty decent journey of his emotions.

Also engaging is Said Taghmaoui, as Omar. He, more often that Cheadle's Samir, represents the conflicting views and sentimentality of what we consider terrorists. Omar is very much a part of the spree of violence, but has a pathos worked into the fabric of his character. Taghmaoui was one of the more interesting actors in Vantage Point, and has a real ability to be a principal star ala Omar Sharif if he's given his chance.

As a message film, Traitor doesn't pack much of a punch, but doesn't limp to its conclusion either. Obviously it strives to look deeper into the world and reasoning of people who commit such brutal acts of violence against Americans and their fellow countrymen. While its biggest points don't hit hard enough to truly get people debate the ramifications of America's status as First-World "peacemaker", it does offer more insight to its subject than most films claim to have.

The film can excuse itself from its intellectual faults by being a solid spy thriller. As far as action goes, it may even be considered a little slow paced for people expecting to see something as gung-ho as the Bourne trilogy. But there's twists and turns among the espionage, with plenty of violence, that give Traitor a few ounces of extra adrenaline over other dramas. It'll keep you guessing and interested throughout.

At times a bit cloying, but mostly enjoyable and thoughtful, Traitor is a rousing drama in the September midst of Hollywood dumping ground cinema. It's at times smarter than the Bourne series, but not as adventurous or . For a film conceived by a guy who's next film project is a comedic remake of Topper, and directed by the writer of The Day After Tomorrow, Traitor is however unusually engrossing thriller drama to watch. Unlike say, 88 Minutes, Traitor doesn't sabotage us on that.

Featured Review: DISASTER MOVIE

2008-08-30T13:05:00.000-07:00

To read last week's mini review on Star Wars: The Clone Wars, or any other of the 94 movies from 2008 I've seen, CLICK HERE.

Disaster Movie

Starring- Matt Lanter, Vanessa Minnillo, Nicole Parker, Crista Flanagan, Calvin 'G Thang' Johnson, Ike Barinholtz, Kim Kardashian

Directed by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer

Grade: F

"That sounds kind of gay, dude."

WRITER'S NOTE: I did not pay to see this film. I have a reputation to uphold.

I try to be a consummate professional when critiquing movies; I don't want to be like the filmmakers of Disaster Movie and delve into the lowest forms of trepidation by mocking something so mercilessly and pointlessly infantile like Disaster Movie, and make an entire article one long ode to terrible filmmaking. It may certainly seem futile on such a wispy and unnecessary movie, but I'll give this short review my best academic reasoning behind why I and many, many, many others will hate this film, many without even seeing it.

By calling their film Disaster Movie, directors Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer purposefully and openly set themselves up for a barrage of reviews that use a pun along the lines of "a complete disaster of a movie". They don't need the critics. Instead they have a built-in audience of ADHD-riddled pre-teens and their parents who read the glossy supermarket magazines about Brangelina's latest adoption news. Friedberg, Seltzer and Lionsgate can laugh all the way to the bank while their "fans" hopelessly sit through 90 minutes of laughless celluloid. But gaging the audience that showed up for the screening, perhaps once and for all the last laugh will be on them.

If you've actually sat through one of these films, you know the title is misleading. While each film has a threadbare plot throughout that coincide with the name, every film is just weak satire on the minute pop culture of our society. The most sensible way to describe the plot goes like this: Will (Matt Lanter) and Amy (MTV's Vanessa Minnillo) break up because of his commitment issues. Will's friend Calvin (Gary 'G Thang' Johnson) then throws him a birthday party. When the city is under attack by some hurricane or what have you and Amy is trapped in a museum where she works, Will, Calvin, and other characters face strange encounters, most not involving any sort of actual 'disaster'. It's best left not to describe it.

The plot, or whatever you make of it, is more or less a patchwork of Cloverfield and The Day After Tomorrow. But they won't reference the latter by name because the core audience of Disaster Movie were but mere babies when that film was released in 2004. A real satire on disaster movies (which in effect was already done by David Zucker's Airplane! spoof on the Airport series) would have highlighted the Irwin Allen years, the random star power of those films (no Carmen Electra is not a 'star') or at least thrown in some sly winks to the 1990's revival of the genre. No Charleston Heston tributes? No dice.

Instead it's the kind of film that references one of the most quotable lines in the Rocky franchise, forever over-saturated on t-shirts and pop culture shows, by saying "Like Dolph Lundgren in Rocky IV, 'I must break you'". You know, in case the kids younger than 11 don't get the reference in between the 'jokes' of a film of which the oldest parody reference is December 2006's Night At The Museum.

It's the kind of film that sings TWO musical numbers that are so annoyingly bad and random that it actually makes you think "Prom Tonight" from 2001's Not Another Teen Movie deserved a Grammy. Or at least a Juno award.

It's the kind of film that drags on for 5 minutes "making fun" of Hannah Montana's self-promotion. But really, it sounded like they were giving Miley Cyrus a pitch more than actually making fun of her. Maybe when Cyrus' show ends and she's about 2 months away from defying daddy in a Playboy or Maxim spread, she'll star in Oscar Movie or Animated Movie (or isn't she already doing that in Bolt?).

It's the kind of film that doesn't even bother hiring lookalike actors anymore. The guy who did Dr. Phil looked, talked and acted nothing like the real subject, and the way they wrote his character can't even be considered a 'parody' since it wasn't even making fun of things he's known for.

It's the kind of film that has a guy named 'G Thang' as one of its stars.

Sadly I have to admit that Disaster Movie edges out Friedberg/Seltzer's previous installment Meet The Spartans just an infinite fraction of an iota. While Spartans was devoid of a single laugh, Disaster did throw me for a couple of "I cannot believe they are doing this" chuckles. Perhaps the only genuinely funny moment, and an awkward one at that, was Nicole Parker's take of Amy Adams' Enchanted princess, describing her drug tolerance. But considering she did cheap impersonations of Jessica Simpson and Amy Winehouse as well, she deserves just as much ire as the rest of the prorated MadTV cast.

I refuse to end this article with a cheap titular pun. Friedberg and Seltzer know they want it, but they don't deserve it.

DVD Review: RAISING ARIZONA (1987)

2008-08-28T14:04:00.000-07:00

Raising Arizona

Released: March 13, 1987

Box Office: $22.8 million
(ranked approx 51st of 1987)

Starring- Nicolas Cage, Holly Hunter, John Goodman, William Forsythe, Trey Wilson, Sam McMurray, Frances McDormand, Randall 'Tex' Cobb

Directed by Joel Coen

DVD Issue: 1999

Grade: B+

Before he became the action guy of The Rock and Con-Air, and later the terrible star of vehicular catastrophes like The Wicker Man and Next, Nicolas Cage was a normal actor of varying star power. Once he had a footing in the Hollywood script machine, he struggled between serious projects like The Boy In Blue, Moonstruck, and Leaving Las Vegas and curious misfires like Vampire's Kiss, Amos & Andrew and Deadfall. Sometimes lost in the shuffle of his spotty early career before 1996 is the 1987 Coen Brothers gem, Raising Arizona.

Raising Arizona is only the 2nd feature the Coen Brothers- Ethan and Joel- ever wrote and directed, the first comedy, but viewing it more than 20 years and 11 films later reveals many similarities in context and style that they would revisit later. Despite a flair of 1980's family comedy absurdity that runs throughout, Raising Arizona is very much a smartly written comedy for the time, one that would set a template for such Coen classics as Fargo, The Big Lebowski, and the tentatively released Burn After Reading.

Cage stars as Herbert "H.I." McDunnough (a perfect Coen name), a petty convenience store robber in Tempe, Arizona who falls in love with Edwina, nicknamed "Ed" (Holly Hunter), a police station photographer, while going through the justice system time and again. They get married, and H.I. is determined to settle down and raise a family. However, Ed is discovered to be barren, and H.I. gets the itch to fall back into his criminal life. When the television news stations cover the birth of quintuplets to a wealthy local furniture magnate, the pair get the idea to steal one of the babies. Getting their hands on one proves to be easy. Keeping it is an entirely different matter.

As a native to the great state of Arizona, I could have taken offense to the hillbilly existence the state is portrayed as (as Cage's H.I. declares, maybe happiness is just Utah). Even 20 years ago the suburban city of Tempe was not made of poor white trash trailers in wide-open desert. Contrary to belief, not everybody wore printed leisure shirts, bola ties, and drove around in wood-paneled sedans.

But anyone familiar with the Coens' regular style of characters, especially in their comedies- primary examples being in Fargo, The Big Lebowski, O Brother Where Art Thou, and The Ladykillers- will know that at least one character in these films possess the Coen rhetoric. They may talk like country bumpkins, but also possess the verbal abilities of uniquely American folklore and speak. Some fans took the stereotypes of Minnesota and the north to heart in Fargo, but like Raising Arizona, it's not so much the product of the environment as it is the product of the Coens' world.

Also like many other Ethan and Joel films, the imagery in Raising Arizona stands out in particular. While some shots, such as Cage's legs swinging in the air while fighting with Goodman or Cobb's Leonard Smalls getting knocked off his motorcycle, scream of the slapstick antics that were popular in the decade of comedy, there are thought invoking scenery. The film is littered with allusions to hope and despair, partially influenced by the Cold War, including the burning car behind Edwina.

Because this is in essence a self-conscious comedy film of the 1980s, the acting will undoubtedly get a little tiresome. Sam McMurray and Frances McDormand (wife of Joel, hence why she stars in almost all Coen works and has been made a certifiably noted actress) screech their way through their big scene as suburban yuppies. There's a lot of hollering involved with Goodman and William Forsythe's characters, much crying from Hunter (who became a legitimate leading actress after this and Broadcast News later in the year), and many a stupid quip by Cage.

Granted, for this kind of slapstick humor mixed with folklore pathos, Raising Arizona is funny if not outright ribald, and actually quite sweet. Some of Cage's dumbfounded looks are genuinely hilarious, and the way almost each character speaks real dialogue in eloquent fashion compared with the poor diction that they have, is funny

Raising Arizona is one of just many, many cult classics from the decade that brought the art of a family comedy to the Hollywood conscience. But unlike quite a few that hinges on its stupid premise or all-star cast, Arizona is graced with a good script and direction by its up-and-coming sibling duo, which foretells of many of the Coens' projects to come.

Featured Review: HOUSE BUNNY

2008-08-25T13:44:00.000-07:00

The House Bunny

Starring- Anna Faris, Emma Stone, Kat Dennings, Katherine McPhee, Rumer Willis, Colin Hanks, Christopher McDonald, Beverly D'Angelo

Directed by Fred Wolf

Grade: D

"I gotta meet this frickin' bird!"

If while watching The House Bunny, you start to feel deja vu, you're not alone. Written by the co-writers of Legally Blonde, this film plays like a tired mixture of 50% Blonde, 30% Revenge Of The Nerds, and 20% Sydney White. Lots of ditsy blondes, lots of pink, lots of stereotypes about college make the film so vapid that it refuses to listen to the genial goodwill message it tacks on at the end.

While Anna Faris is no Reese Witherspoon in the acting pantheon, she deviates away from Witherspoon's Elle Woods enough to find a character on her own. Faris at times is really annoying, playing up the Marilyn Monroe-voiced, clueless but means well bimbo, but her comic timing and natural likability is one of the few saving graces for a pretty cliche and tumescent film.

The House Bunny has an undeniable mark left by Happy Madison, the Adam Sandler-owned production company in charge of it. It is at times just as raunchy as some of Sandler and his crew's dirtiest films, and if there is anything positive to say about the movie besides Faris' comic timing, it would be the equal way that the girls can perform gross-out gags alongside the boys. But then, is that really a good thing when it results in The House Bunny?

Shelley (Faris) is a former orphan, now a staple in Hugh Hefner's Playboy Mansion. But unbeknown to her, some of her fellow Playmates want her gone. Therefore, a day after turning 27, she is forced to move out. Where can an unschooled, unintelligent, poor, former Playboy bunny go to? Naturally, after a night in jail, she finds a sorority house further down the block. This leads Shelley to an unlikely facade as House Mother to the worst and most ragtag house on campus. These girls need pledges to keep their chapter, but who wants to pledge at a place that doesn't feature rockin' parties and kickass social events?. Shelley has ideas.

Pretty much every cliche about college and female outcasts are presented here. The girls range from being nerds to feminist rebels to pregnant hippies to exceedingly tomboyish. They are purposely and exagerratedly ugly, their house is ugly, and naturally, in the case of Emma Stone and Katherine McPhee, and mostly, in the case of Kat Dennings and Rumer Willis (eerily similar looking to father Bruce) become beautiful with a quick She's All That montage makeover that exceeds no cost.

The movie throws in a quick feel-good ending about the dangers of over-hyping the value of looks, but after spending the bulk center of the film glorifying the girls' new wealth in popularity and outer gravitas, the final moments feels as contrite and hollow as the jokes that reside in those moments.

The humor here is a bit overlapping at times. There's a dearth of dumb blonde jokes as expected, but once in awhile the screenwriters slip in a genuinely witty little tidbit that almost goes unnoticed. Instead the movie focuses on the dimwit musings that a 'typical blonde' from Playboy like Shelley might conceive in her head.

Anna Faris has come a long way from being the slightly-built, raven-haired Cindy Campbell of the Scary Movie franchise. One could say that when Reese Witherspoon left the vapid blonde role for bigger and artsier pictures like Walk The Line and, uh, Just Like Heaven, Faris ably filled in on her own terms. But how many films do we need, in which a ditsy woman learns how to deal with her life and the people that surround her in cutesy fashion and fabulous, FABULOUS clothes?

Overall, The House Bunny feels like just another comedy that curbs its ideas from the wacky hi-jinks movies from the 1980s, without as much family-friendly camp. Perhaps in 25 years our generation and the next will look at movies like The House Bunny with the same kind of cult reverence that we do for Revenge Of The Nerds; never as a particularly good film, but enjoying the somewhat dated 'product of the times' and humor with genial affection. Shelley may have hoped to be a Playboy Centerfold, but that's the best The House Bunny can hope for.

Featured Review: MIRRORS

2008-08-23T10:13:00.000-07:00

Mirrors

Starring- Kiefer Sutherland, Paula Patton, Amy Smart, Cameron Boyce, Erica Gluck, John Shrapnel

Directed by Alexandre Aja

Grade: F

"Don't make me threaten you!"

Remember that lost season of 24 when Jack Bauer, between thwarting Russian terrorists and a secret government conspiracy unit, saved the world from demonic spirits that use mirrors to kill innocents? The one where he runs around screaming at people to save his family, shooting at the mirrors, and then fights the secret bad guy that almost comes out of nowhere towards the end? And we thought the writer's strike would save us from such a wild scenario.

As ludicrious as the plot sounds, movies like Mirrors can at times be unabashedly good. Films like The Shining and Poltergeist knew how to effectively deal with troublesome and killer ghosts in a story that didn't hinder the excitement or terror. But while director Alexandre Aja (Haute Tension, The Hills Have Eyes) earns a few points for cinematic style, he couldn't maintain a cohesive script, a shred of plausible acting, or any proper special effects. The rest of Mirrors is a jagged mess of broken shrapnel painstakingly piercing our auditory and visual senses.

Kiefer Sutherland stars as Ben Carson, a disgraced ex-cop who is rebounding from a bout with the bottle. His relationships are tenuous; he's unresponsive to his sister Angela (Amy Smart), seperated from his wife Amy (Paula Patton), and rarely sees his kids. That all is put to the test when Ben gets a job as a security guard, patrolling a burnt out department store that is left standing due to legal tie-ups. See, the mirrors in the place, enough to basically cover the entire store, are haunted with demon spirits. They want something, someone, Kiefer's blood be damned.

Never mind that the department store Kiefer oversees is larger than most malls, and that despite being gutted by a fire five years before, still retains all the charred mannequins, counters, and racks of burnt clothes. Never mind that Kiefer's job is so fresh that he's able to find the wallet of the guy he replaced in a locker, or that he can waltz in and check the guy's body because his wife just HAPPENS to be a forensic analyst at the morgue where the body was taken. No, Mirrors is much worse than that.

The plot holes are mind-numbingly rampant for a plot that sounds so ridiculous to begin with. Most of the damage the demon spirits inflict on the cast happen outside of the department store, as a means of revenge or notice. How can these random mirrors be haunted if the story's big reveal is primarily focused on the history of the department store mirrors? If they can travel to other mirrors in people's houses that easily, why don't they do much more widespread damage?

It's just another in a long line of films that only uses enough logic to drive its story, especially coming from a director who made one of the ultimate cop-out endings in recent film history in Haute Tension. They paint over the mirrors in the family house (and there's dozens of them. What, the Carsons don't appreciate any art?), instead of throwing them away, and apparently if that doesn't work, the spirits can supposedly control the water faucets, so they can reflect themselves in the flood.

The ending is somewhat unique, but the stupidity and fallacies of the first 108 minutes that preceded it completely desensitizes the viewer past the point of caring. It was like Aja came up with this last idea first, and attempted to build a shoddy story that leads to it.

Sutherland's status as Jack Bauer is supposed to lend an air of credence to the film, but Kiefer is overtly terrible. He starts off somewhat of a pussycat in his faux cashmere sweater and collared shirt, but by the end becomes as pushy and loud as Bauer is during an interrogation. Except instead of questioning terrorists, he's threatening elderly nuns about ghosts inside mirrors. Sutherland gets one-liner gold such as "What do you want from me?!" and "The mirrors... they're so clean!", and has an asinine penchant for screaming a singular profanity after every conversation. It's really quite humorous.

The effects were mostly cut-rate as well. The computer animation is so cartoonish in its gore factor that it illicited more laughter from the audience than gasps. Simple prosthetics, like in the mirror scene from Poltergeist, might have been scarier. Natch, just about anything inserted into the film would have been scarier than Mirrors as it is, aside from say, Prom Night.

Maybe I'm just being overly critical about a film that is not supposed to be as smart and sensible as Hamlet or even Hamlet 2. But you'd like to think that Kiefer and Patton are brighter than this. Even Amy Smart, she of Road Trip and Crank, doesn't deserve the miserable fate of being in Mirrors. When a horror film can't sustain a scare or even a modicum of reason for us to believe and invest in the story, the empathy for its mistakes doesn't exist. If only the wretched memory of Mirrors that now haunt my head didn't exist...

DVD Review: THE WIZ (1978)

2008-08-21T18:37:00.000-07:00

The Wiz

Released: October 24, 1978

Box Office: $13.6 million
(ranked approx. 20th of 1978)

Starring- Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, Nipsey Russell, Ted Ross, Mabel King, Theresa Merritt, Lena Horne, Richard Pryor

Directed by Sidney Lumet

DVD Issue: 1999

Grade: D+

The Wiz is as fascinating to watch as it is terrible. With such a strong roster of pop and jazz singers such as Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, Lena Horne, Nipsey Russell, Thelma Carpenter, and Mabel King, along with one of the funniest comedians of his time, Richard Pryor, The Wiz should have succeeded on its acting and singing alone. Alas, because of some dreadful directing and writing, and let's face it, the entire project, The Wiz becomes a sour, almost blackface minstrel-like offshoot of L. Frank Baum's 'The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz'.

That being said, unlike modern African-American re-imaginings of seminal "white" classics, including recent bombs such as Cedric The Entertainer's The Honeymooners, The Wiz is done with all seriousness and a sense of pride in its production. Based on the popular titular Broadway play of the time, The Wiz therefore plays like a failed prototype of what Dreamgirls would realize 28 years later rather than something that truly offends. This was a film that was suppose to change the market for urban audiences. Instead The Wiz's box office failure singlehandedly set back the financing on black films for several years.

Diana Ross, somewhere in between her Janet Jackson-like diva makeover of the late seventies, plays Dorothy, remade as a shy, 24-year-old kindergarten teacher in Harlem. Like her original character's counterpart, Dorothy gets transported to the magical land of Oz, which is a sort of fantasy version of New York City. She must travel to Emerald City to see 'The Wiz', a metallic head with a metallic afro voiced by comedian Richard Pryor. Along the way she meets and befriends The Scarecrow (Jackson), Tinman (Russell) and the Cowardly Lion (Ted Ross), and faces all sorts of strange baroque versions of real-life city dangers such as homelessness, drugs, and shiny gold disco dancers.

I've never been a fan of Ross' musical career after she left the Supremes, and The Wiz doesn't really change my opinion of her here. She's fairly less of a megalomaniac diva as Dorothy, but also plays the character as a near infantile nitwit. She's 34, playing a 24-year-old with a 4-year-old's emotional capacity. Luckily, there are far more baffling things in the film to truly pinpoint her as the film's ultimate flaw.

Michael Jackson provides key selections to the soundtrack just fine, but with his youthful, pre-vitiligo/lupus looks hidden behind a Raggedy Andy style costume of The Scarecrow, Jackson looks and sounds more like Anna Faris in drag than he does a teen heartthrob. His and Ross' dough-soft acting, especially in comparison to the overly Shakespearean theatrical Ted Ross, recreating his Broadway role of the Cowardly Lion, and the weird vaudevillian antics of Russell as the Tinman, bring an odd combination to the bulk of the film.

Then there's the storyline. The Wiz starts off fairly innocuous, mostly with painted sets and jazz stylings. But about halfway through the film seems to only get stranger and stranger. The foursome run into a cavalcade of nightmares in a yellow brick train station led by a creepy character called the Subway Peddler. They finally reach the World Trade Center-inspired building of gold disco convention, led by the 'phony' silver head of Richard Pryor's Wiz, but not before Dorothy and the gang visit worlds involving opium dens, sweatshops, and flying monkey motorcycle gangs.

Even more troubling is the Caucasian hierarchy in control behind the scenes. Outside of the musical score and actors, almost everyone else involved is white, which might have led to some friction between what makes a truly successful film. Obviously people of all race and creed can make the best films ever made, but when an all-white production crew is trying to make an all-black musical, there are racial tolerances that are obviously going to be stepped on and mixed up. It's like The Wiz was made with the utmost stress on being hip and fresh to black audiences, an African-American Tommy if you will, and instead comes off like a big-budget blaxploitation film.

Sidney Lumet is a famous director, known mostly for classics such as 12 Angry Men, Dog Day Afternoon, Network, The Pawnbroker and Before The Devil Knows You're Dead. These type of films are gritty, and often are shot like photoplays; movies that don't require many external sets. Lumet's treatment of The Wiz at times seems both terribly expensive and cheaply bare. It is also remarkably poorly lit for a musical with so much color. Helmed by a legitimate musical director of the time like Bob Fosse or Alan Parker, The Wiz might have worked under camp brilliance like Grease did the same year.

Then you have a younger Joel Schumacher adapting the screenplay. Schumacher, known mostly for directing films such as The Lost Boys, Batman & Robin, Phone Booth and The Number 23, doesn't seem like the type of person that would service a black musical script, and his almost comically "darkie" dialogue is definitely a part of the film's failure. Rob Cohen, director of such modern action fare as The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor, The Fast & The Furious, xXx, Stealth, Dragonheart, and The Skulls, was a producer on the film as well, and was a crucial factor in getting Diana Ross the lead part.

The Wiz is almost surreal to see. With sets and songs planted firmly in the late seventies, it's almost as enjoyable in its dreadfulness as it would be watching a legitimately good version of the Broadway musical. It's easy to see why Ross and Jackson never really became actors, nor why Lumet ever helmed another musical or principally black cast again. Somewhere along the yellow brick production road, The Wiz succumbed to a terrible fate of being without much of a brain. At least the music was fly.

Featured Review: THE ROCKER

2008-08-20T21:51:00.000-07:00

This review was originally written from an advanced screening on July 25th.

The Rocker

Starring- Rainn Wilson, Christina Applegate, Teddy Geiger, Emma Stone, Josh Gad, Jason Sudeikis, Jane Lynch, Jeff Garlin, Will Arnett

Directed by Peter Cattaneo

Grade: C-

"A lot of elevators play Celine Dion... that doesn't make it right."

Actors who get defined to one television role often have a blessing and a curse. They experience popularity and job security for the duration of their career-making character, but then they also struggle to develop a successful transition away from it. Michael Richards often superseded his titular co-star as Kramer in Seinfeld, but couldn't etch out anything of substance on his own. Bob Denver was known as Gilligan for the rest of his life. Same goes more or less for people like George Wendt, Megan Mullally, James Van Der Beek, Neil Patrick Harris, etc. They just can't escape the shadow of what made them a household name in the first place.

So is the case of Rainn Wilson and his first fully-engaged star-making turn, The Rocker. Stuck somewhere between a vehicle for Wilson, a vehicle for stalwart teen rocker Teddy Geiger, and an earnest if lukewarm attempt to appease every demographic with a slightly risque but never truly offensive PG-13 family message film, The Rocker never reaches that pantheon of hard metal licks. Instead it plays like weak radio-friendly pop rock.

The Rainn man plays Robert 'Fish' Fishman, once the highly touted drummer of 1980's hair metal band Vesuvius (with cheeky cameos by Will Arnett, Fred Armisen and Bradley Cooper), now a loser living in his sister's attic over 20 years later. His nebbish nephew Matt (Josh Gad, of FOX's short-lived Back To You) is playing the prom with his band A.D.D, and when their drummer gets expelled from school, Matt is forced to call upon his uncle for help. Igniting new passion into his life, Fish wheels and deals the local garage band into scoring gigs and going on tour, often in ways he didn't plan for. Along the way, he and his younger bandmates finds lessons in life and begins to grow up.

Everybody who has seen at least 50 mainstream movies know how these kinds of films end up. Each of the band members have ups, they have downs, they face their biggest challenge, the big bad villain (in this case being Fish's old band Vesuvius) gets its long-awaited comeuppance, and Fish gets the girl. All of this at the mere price of logical fallacy and enough pratfalls to make Chevy Chase want to sue.

Whereas Wilson's supporting role in My Super Ex-Girlfriend basically placed him as a jerk with glasses much in the vein as his character Dwight in The Office, Wilson's The Rocker persona almost strives with the singular goal of making him the exact opposite. He wears longer hair (a relic of the 1980's glam he's refused to move on with), doesn't wear glasses, and has a 'wild' personality. The movie itself is centered around a dozen or so gags that cause Fish bodily harm, a broad tactic that is rarely used in The Office.

But the trouble with this of course is, without the Dwight persona, Wilson isn't really all that much interesting. He hasn't had much of a chance to shine elsewhere, but does anybody remember his bit roles in Almost Famous, Sahara or Steven Soderbergh's Full Frontal? For the few people that sat through House Of 1000 Corpses and watched him get killed and turned into some kind of mermaid creature, did they really look at his performance and say "Wow, he's going to be a star someday"?

Similarly unimpressive is Teddy Geiger, the 'real' brains behind the fictional band as the lead singer, songwriter and guitarist. He has genuine talent, but his character is so depressing and one-note for much of the movie it's hard to see him as a legitimate actor. I can imagine that after his short-lived success with his album Underage Thinking in 2006 went nowhere, he's looking jealously towards the increasingly manic fandom of The Jonas Brothers, wondering where it all went wrong.

The music in The Rocker is manufactured almost as much as a Disney multimedia franchise, only much less successful. Geiger and the modern A.D.D. band are obviously going for that 'tween rock sound somewhere between The All-American Rejects, Boys Like Girls and any number of the Fueled By Ramen label cohorts. They're all catchy enough, but nothing inspires. Worse that, not a single song is played in its entirety. Seems the writers concocted a verse and a chorus and settled at that. Had they made full-length songs and released them before the film comes out, income-flushed ten-year-olds might be almost as excited to see this as they were for Camp Rock and High School Musical 3.

If Rainn Wilson is ever going to come out of the shadow of Dwight Schrute, he needs a better outing than this. The Rocker seemed like a limp idea that Wilson was able to jump on in an effort to give himself some public face time. Unfortunately, plain and simple, this isn't the kind of movie that will take him to the top of the charts.

Indie Review: AMERICAN TEEN

2008-08-17T17:26:00.000-07:00

A mini-review for College Road Trip, 2008's shrillest and loudest film of the year, can be read HERE.

American Teen

Starring- Hannah Bailey, Colin Clemens, Jake Tusing, Megan Krizmanich, Mitch Reinholt, Geoff Haase

Directed by Nanette Burstein

Grade: D+

"You could've gotten an A."

Sometimes documentaries are used to convince viewers to think a certain way. Others merely offer a glimpse of its' subject, and leave the audience to interpret what actions should follow. Being the latter, American Teen has an intimate take on the lives of these high school students that many times parallel the lives that we've all had as students. But while that unity and common bond through moments of joy and suffrage may be the ultimate goal of the film, American Teen doesn't really offer anything new, nor at times does it particularly convincingly.

The film follows five teens during their senior year of high school in Warsaw, Indiana. On the outside looking in, you can stereotype each student; Megan is the affluent snob in the popular cliques. Jake is the acne-scarred nerd with no friends. Hannah is the independent free spirit that roams the social circles. Colin is the golden boy athlete. Mitch is Colin's teammate, but has a streak of independence as well.

But as the film unfolds, each student has deeper emotional scarring, some from the high school experience itself, some from their home life. Colin has pressure to get a basketball scholarship, and isn't as solid in popularity as one might think. Hannah continually breaks her strong will for boys and the pursuit of happiness. Jake breaks out of his anti-social , but burns his bridges really quickly. Megan deals with the death of a sister, and going to Notre Dame isn't just a priority for her, but almost an ultimatum from her family.

The common thread that gets noticed throughout is the parenting. All five kids have parents together except for maybe Jake's, who aren't even featured. Megan's father calls her an idiot when she helps toilet paper and spray-paint a rival's house. Hannah's parents try to bring sense to her, but their words are choosy. Colin's father (an Elvis impersonator) is backhandedly supportive, giving advice while telling his son he is never quite good enough. The questionable logic behind the parenting these adults do is often more interesting and telling than anything the teenagers do.

Unfortunately, while director Nanette Burstein (On The Ropes, The Kid Stays In The Picture) gives a simple, straightforward approach to the direction, it also feels pretty fake. There's an understanding that the editing process is heavily manipulated sometimes in the effort to make a conceivable and hard-hitting film, but as American Teen goes on, we notice parts of the same day, people wearing the same shirts and sitting in the same restaurants throughout the film. I'm sure they covered an entire year, but this realization took me personally, out of the honesty of the film.

I'm not saying anything in the film was scripted, but the way the film unfolds seems based more on an episode of The Hills than Hoop Dreams. The drama the subjects face isn't anything much more than stuff anyone of that age group would face, but American Teen revels in its potboiler drama. Like Burstein sat for eight hours filming one kid, and got excited when they slipped up and said something stupid. The poster above that parodies The Breakfast Club says it all; American Teen vies to create a seminal movement in film, than to create an actual merit.

Also distracting from the major element of the film are the animation vignettes. One of the teenagers could be telling a real, heartfelt story, and Burstein breaks the talking head interview up with animated representatives. These little scenes only further distances the entire project from reality, especially Jake's scenes involving a World Of Warcraft-like fantasy world.

American Teen offers a glimpse of the typical life of a teenager in America, if only a prorated portion aimed at sensationalizing the high drama that normal teenagers get themselves into. There are some genuine moments, but overall the film doesn't truly strike a nerve into the class system in high school, nor does it offer anything exciting or different from any other documentary or insightful biopic of the American way of life.

Featured Review: VICKY CRISTINA

2008-08-16T16:05:00.000-07:00

Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Starring- Scarlett Johansson, Javier Bardem, Rebecca Hall, Penelope Cruz, Chris Messina, Patrica Clarkson, Kevin Dunn

Directed by Woody Allen

Grade: C+

"Life is short, life is dull, life is full of pain."

Woody Allen's fanbase is desperate for a hit. His films have more or less faltered from the nearly universally acclaimed works he submitted decades ago, but when one decent piece of work such as Vicky Cristina Barcelona hits the pipeline after so many other flukes and failures, people are desperate to find much more substance and eloquence than Woody, I think, is capable of anymore. A time-filling, pleasing little film that rights the ship set by Scoop and Anything Else? Yes, but Vicky Cristina never truly shakes up the world in which its characters are so desperately trying to live in.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona is an interesting little piece of cinema. It obviously draws on European ideas and influences, particularly of the sexual revolution of the French New Wave. How do I know? Because the narrator explains it to us, in case we didn't get that was Allen's intentions here. There's many instances of bed-sharing, bed-hopping, three-ways, and other sexual and philosophical ideas, so it must be European. At least that's the freewheeling theme that speaks loudest.

We meet Vicky (Rebecca Hall) and Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) on their voyage to a summer trip in Barcelona, Spain. Vicky has studying to do, and Cristina goes along for the adventure. They both have different directions they are heading in their lives, with different ideals, but when a curiously handsome and winsome stranger, Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem) interjects some romance between them, both Vicky and Cristina begin to question themselves. They work it out, and all seems to be fine and good, until Juan Antonio's suicidal, moody, yet talented ex-wife Maria Elena (Penelope Cruz) forces herself back into the picture.

Like Wes Anderson, Allen as of late has been fascinated with the trials and tribulations of the wealthy. Without good money, neither of the women would be able to jet set for the summer to Spain, one being able to whisk off to France when she feels like it. The couple they stay with own a fabulous mansion, Juan Antonio lives in a sprawling estate despite a carefree artist's life, and even his father seems to have a great big place to stay without much effort to show. Obviously it's a fantasy tale, but it seems Allen forgets that not everybody can name drop and travel to New York, Paris, Barcelona and the rest of the world at the tip of a hat.

Almost all of his characters, narrator included, spout off pretentious, haughty, over-enunciated diction for simple conversation. While that can be refreshing in a world of mainstream film that relies on swear words and slang, Allen's conversation lacks the wit his best-loved films are known for, and thus ultimately rings hollow. When Vicky says something like, "Let's not get into one of those turgid, categorical, imperative arguments" when just conversing with her husband and Cristina down a charming boutique alleyway, it would stop the flow of the moment in any conversation in real life. But because this is classic Woody Allen, the line passes right through.

The narration is served to function as a storytelling device, to make the film unfold like a short story you'd read on a relaxing day in a southern Europe villa. But in the end it does nothing but distract the viewer away from what the picture can tell us. So we understand Vicky has repressed feelings. Cristina doesn't know what she wants in her life. But these ladies are both very capable actresses, I'd prefer to have their emotions tell me what they're feeling rather than some nameless narrator completely unconnected to the story.

What keeps the movie above the waters of tedious arrogance is the acting. Every member of the principle cast is engaging and spirited, if only forced to embody characters that speak words that sound better on paper. Hall is particularly intriguing, with a face and charm of a possible star. Johansson holds up well, as does Bardem, who does a great job masking his Anton Chigurh-ness. But the most widely noticed and accessible role is Penelope Cruz's.

Cruz is the firecracker that sets the table for the second half of the film. Her performance is quite impressive, with a mix of fierce intensity, wild-eyed curiosity, but yet with enough nuance to control her aspect of the story. She's been given much praise as a possible award candidate, but for now she's on the fringe. If Cruz was given more to do than just be the crazy tigress that drives the stake through Juan Antonio and Cristina's existence, maybe the performance would've stood out more.

While overall Vicky Cristina Barcelona can be kind of unsatisfying and not as stirring as Woody's only other "good" film of the decade, Match Point, it is a step up from his terribly uneven resume of late.

Still, it's quite amazing that a man who can write witty screenplays such as Love & Death, Sleeper, Bananas, Annie Hall, Manhattan and et cetera, can lose his touch for the joy he found in his own neurosis. It doesn't necessarily take an East Coast ivory tower intellectual to understand his humor, but Allen needs to embrace that as his niche like he used to, rather than pretend he's something he's not. Because without his classic, compulsive wit, you get a 'turgid, categorical, imperative' kind of film like Vicky Cristina Barcelona.

Indie Review: HENRY POOLE

2008-08-15T14:15:00.000-07:00

PLEASE NOTE: Writing this review got out of hand a little bit, so I'm pretty sure at least half of the review interjects my own opinions that had nothing to do with the film. So, be forewarned.

Henry Poole Is Here

Starring- Luke Wilson, Radha Mitchell, Adriana Barraza, Morgan Lily, Rachel Seiferth, Cheryl Hines, Richard Benjamin, George Lopez

Directed by Mark Pellington

Grade: A

"All I see is a water stain from a lousy stucco job."

Religion is probably the touchiest subject that two strangers can talk about. More than politics, than sports, than relationships, religious beliefs are something that everybody has a pretty strong opinion about, whether they are firm believers in God, or think its an age-old facade. Having been on both sides of the intermittent fence over the course of my life, I can say with an open heart that its hard to discuss religion with strangers. There's nothing satisfying about someone persecuting my beliefs, nor is there anything redeeming when someone attempts to goad me into believing something I'm not comfortable accepting.

These two divided factions can easily persuade someone to love or hate Henry Poole Is Here. At times it tips its hand into being pro-Faith, but it never lets go of the wider message it tries to convey; the worst thing in the world is to not have faith and hope in something. If you believe in the healing power of God and Jesus Christ, great, but if you don't, that's certainly your prerogative. But for those who don't have anything or anyone to believe in, it's a long road ahead of you until you're able to lift the burden off of yourself and place it on something stronger, whether its God, Buddha or a positive affirmation that nothing exists beyond our existential world. And that's where Henry Poole scores its knockout.

Henry Poole (Luke Wilson) moves into in a non-descript Los Angeles neighborhood, pretty much ready to die. He has received a quite literal death sentence, and therefore has abandoned everything else in his life, intent on being alone. Not for very long, as Henry's meddlesome next door neighbor Esperanza (Babel's Adriana Barraza) finds a water stain on the outer stucco wall of his house, her devout faith declaring it to be the face of Jesus Christ. Soon the stain starts 'crying' blood, and the entire neighborhood starts to flock to Henry's house, much to his chagrin. Even more bothersome for Henry is the fact that they are supposedly being healed by touching the stain, including the traumatized daughter of his other neighbor Dawn (Radha Mitchell).

The story at first kind of sounds like a satire of the ultra-religious, the ones who stare into grilled cheese sandwiches and lima beans hoping to find their affirmation of Christ. But soon it becomes apparent that the stain isn't the focus of the story, but of the people and how each of them deals with what they believe in and how they feel they can help each other and themselves.

While God and the Catholic church are major thematic elements here, director Mark Pellington (Arlington Road, The Mothman Prophecies) attempts to transcend just a black and white story about the healing powers of God and the faithful. One can easily interpret that the stain doesn't necessarily heal its touchers because its a second coming of Jesus, but because they wanted something to affirm that they can overcome their obstacles. Same goes for Henry. He spent the entire movie running away from things he couldn't change, and while the ending may seem happy and set and cliche, we simply do not know if its the truth or just hope. What we do know is that faith and hope and love gets us through the day.

It's the little details that score big. The stain in the beginning appears ambiguous. Shots are purposely panned away from the stain itself, until as the film goes on and more people start to take notice, the shape gets darker and clearer. It might be a ploy, but it also symbolizes Henry's urgency unto himself to pay attention to the wall and find the missing piece within himself that everyone else has. With character names like Patience, Dawn, and Esperanza (Hope in Spanish), it's a subtle and unobtrusive nod that maybe everything in Henry's little world will be okay, which is the feeling that religious beliefs are supposed to invoke in the first place.

Luke Wilson definitely gives his best performance since The Royal Tenanbaums. When doing comedy roles, Wilson tends to err on the side of blandness, but he can really nail down the scruffy, depressed, cynic role. Just looking at him tells you so much about how many years of pain is built up inside of him. George Lopez is also a standout in a small role as a local priest, without being funny at all.

It is kind of disappointing the way Henry Poole is being marketed for the type of film it is. Billed as a comedy in some sources, with a quirky poster of the film's characters with quirky smiles, people may be led in to Henry Poole to expect a cute comedy and come out not expecting its heavier messages. Cheryl Hines' small role in the first act as Henry's real estate agent, and Barraza's highly religious and 'wacky' neighbor, at least in the beginning, do not gel quite right with the rest of film, and yet Hines gets a big headshot on the poster. I didn't know Cheryl Hines' name and face attracted moviegoers.

Whether or not you believe in God, Henry Poole's best selling point is making a finely crafted parable about people in different stages of grief, belief, and sweet relief. It leaves enough things open to interpretation without being pretentiously ambiguous. It shouldn't force you to change your mind about what you believe in, or how you should go about expressing that belief, but rather understand that not everybody can be persuaded into believing or disbelieving what they in their hearts understand to be true. Henry Poole has some odd music choices and little montage clips, but the idea behind it is much more heartfelt that most things you'll find in a cineplex.

Featured Review: TROPIC THUNDER

2008-08-14T17:00:00.001-07:00

Tropic Thunder

Starring- Ben Stiller, Jack Black, Robert Downey Jr, Nick Nolte, Jay Baruchel, Brandon T. Jackson, Matthew McConaughey, Tom Cruise

Directed by Ben Stiller

Grade: A-

"I know who I am! I'm the dude playing the dude disguised as another dude!"

Everybody likes Hollywood, but films about Hollywood often do not fare well. Most viewers have never worked inside a studio, so the art of satirizing something everyone on the set can side with, but the audience can't, often results in a mixed, awkward film. At times, especially in the beginning, Tropic Thunder crosses that line, threatening never to come back. But with a little moxie by its stars and a pretty cohesive and well-rounded script, Thunder rolls back.

While his starring comedies have been lackluster of late, Jack Black scored a major hit with Kung Fu Panda. Robert Downey Jr. has Iron Man and a serious career. The real test for the film was for Ben Stiller, who not only stars, but co-wrote and directed Thunder. Outside of the holiday hits A Night At The Museum and Madagascar, his legitimate comedies haven't risen to the challenge of his peers the past few years. So it's fitting that while Stiller makes himself the de facto number one star, he also makes a winning film because of his reliance on sharing the wealth with his co-stars.

Tropic Thunder starts with a trailer for each of the main characters. We meet Tugg Speedman (Stiller), the faltering action star trying to branch out without much success, Jeff "Fats" Portnoy (Black), the drug-addicted, Eddie Murphy-esque comic, and Kirk Lazarus (Downey), the insecure 5-time Oscar winning Australian who gets a skin procedure to play a black soldier. Their egos and other mistakes by rookie director Damien Cockburn (Steve Coogan) and his crew throw the film production into a tailspin.

With patience and money running thin, Cockburn is goaded by Four Leaf Tayback (Nick Nolte), the deranged former soldier and writer of the book the film is based on, to drop the actors off in the real jungle and film guerrilla-style. So off go the three stars and two supporting actors, the energy drink spokesrapper Alpa Chino (Brandon T. Jackson), and the only character without an ego or exposition, Kevin Sandusky (Jay Baruchel) into the wilds of Vietnam without a clue what's happening.

After the initial trailers, Tropic Thunder starts off quite poorly. Coogan whines. Tom Cruise yells and curses. The likes of Bill Hader and Danny McBride run around spouting things, and the other stars get their introductions and story lines through television appearances. There's too much going on at one time to really focus on the humor at hand. The film doesn't really pick up until the five actors get booted off to the jungle, and get an unexpected and gross surprise almost immediately.

As the main cast get deeper and deeper into the jungle, the action picks up, but so does the laughter. The actors have discussions about their often shallow personal lives, about role techniques, about who they're supposed to be to other people. All five of them have a chance to really shine at some point without resorting to, at least in Stiller and Black's case, what type of humor they're familiar with.

If you can't tell from the trailer alone, Downey Jr's portrayal of Kirk Lazarus is downright amazing in itself. Humor wise, there have been better roles, and his is probably not even the funniest of the movie (Cruise and Matthew McConaughey are arguably the funniest when they share screen time). But the fact that the normally sarcastic-toned, dark-haired, beady eyed Downey can switch back and forth between a blond, blue eyed Australian and his stereotypically gruff black persona shows how much depth Downey can eke out of himself even in a summer comedy. He brings a touch of true class to his absurdness, whereas Stiller is forced to parody his own ridiculous Zoolander type goofiness.

Meanwhile, though his character is still close to being the straight man of the group, it's good to see Jay Baruchel in a bigger chunk of movie action. Since his lead role in the cult Judd Apatow series Undeclared, Baruchel has quietly popped up in bit parts over the years, including Almost Famous, The Rules Of Attraction, Million Dollar Baby (playing his own retarded character), and Knocked Up. If any of Apatow's proteges could use his own star-making vehicle, after Tropic Thunder Baruchel attests that he can do it, being both funny and often times the sensible leader of the egotistical group.

The cameos number in the dozens, perhaps the largest since Robert Altman's The Player. We see them in the fake trailers, television talk shows, and the award ceremonies (often out of irony), and yet unlike most films that shill for the acknowledgments, Thunder's star power feels legit. Strangest of all is the fact we expect Cruise and McConaughey to be cameos, but they are in the film just as much as any other actor. Cruise has great fun in his first comedy appearance since Austin Powers in Goldmember, and McConaughey, replacing Owen Wilson, works better in his role than Wilson would have because we don't expect it from a "romantic comedy" star like McConaughey.

Tropic Thunder loses itself in the middle of lampooning the Hollywood system at times, and the potential for an even better film was there. But while it was slightly disappointing to the funny bone, Thunder survived among its comedic peers by being comprehensible and enjoyable all the way through, which is a much better compliment than most of 2008's comedies have been given. Perhaps if it does well at the box office, we will see a Tugg Speedman reprise in Tropic Thunder VI: Arctic Lightning. I'm sure Stiller would light up with that thought.

DVD Review: LOGAN'S RUN (1976)

2008-08-13T10:01:00.000-07:00

Logan's Run

Released: June 23, 1976

Box Office: $25 million
(Ranked approx. 13th of 1976)

Starring- Michael York, Jenny Agutter, Richard Jordan, Peter Ustinov, Farrah Fawcett, Roscoe Lee Browne

Directed by Michael Anderson

DVD Issue: 2004

Grade: D

Logan's Run is the kind of film that is passed on from the past few generations more in memory than actual devotion. Almost all the television shows that parody pop culture have made at least one mention of the film, usually referencing the palm crystals or the Carrousel ritual. But released in the dawn of the sci-fi film that changed the genre forever, Star Wars, and in the time that many dystopian thrillers were being made, can Logan's Run stand above and beyond a cult film 32 years later and stand on it's own legs?

I've always been interested in the dystopian idea of the future, ever since I read Lois Lowry's The Giver in 5th grade. From 1984 to Blade Runner to Fahrenheit 451 to A Clockwork Orange, it gives writers and directors a chance to conceive an endless imagination of our world gone wrong, whether they believe it to be corporate and inventive madness, or because of our increasing lack of religious beliefs.

But while Logan's Run has some valid moments, offering glimpses of Adam & Eve-like elements and man's intended nature to live and conduct his own free will, it is ruined by some terrible subplots and a lack of chemistry (even if there's supposed to be a lack of chemistry). It can be considered somewhat tongue-in-cheek, that of a camp ideology, but Logan's Run at times takes itself too seriously to downplay its harsher criticisms.

In the Year Of The City 2274, a large self-sustaining dome city, people are hedonists. They play and whet their sexual appetites day and night, and rely on machines to feed and provide them with amenities. However, to control the population in the city, the people must die at age 30. Logan 5 (Michael York) is a Sandman- a government agent who must kill people who run from Carrousel, the ritual that offers 'renewal' from their death. Thanks to Jessica 6 (Jenny Agutter), he gets wind of 'Sanctuary', a place where people supposedly can live past 30, and the reason people run from Carrousel. Soon enough, Logan is forced to find 'Sanctuary', but will he go to destroy it or go to save his own life?

The acting was as stiff as the braless lead females in the film. York, known mostly in today's times as British spy controller Basil Exposition in the Austin Powers series, is pretty uncharismatic aside from his Charleston Heston rip-off scene screaming "NO! YOU DON'T HAVE TO GO IN THERE! YOU DON'T HAVE TO DIE!". Agutter is okay, but when director Michael Anderson uses a deliberate part inside an ice cave just to get her naked, you know she wasn't cast for her acting. Same can be said for Farrah Fawcett (Majors), playing a ditzy blonde nurse in a sequined silver dress. Perhaps worst of all was 2-time Oscar winner Peter Ustinov as a singular old man Logan and Jessica find outside; did he have Parkinson's disease? Was he supposed to sound like Jim Backus' Mr. Magoo?

The editing and explanation of Logan's Run is muddled at best. At times Logan will just finish talking and instantly we're taken to another scene. Once Logan says something serious and the camera pans about 2 inches to another take and Logan begins laughing at something. They disregard children, as at the end of the film when everybody escapes to the outside and we see the large crowd gather at the top, there are no children or babies despite the whole beginning of the film taking care to point out the 1:1 ratio of births to deaths. Perhaps the biggest plot confusion of all was the computer's reasoning for making Logan the sole Sandman to wipe out 'Sanctuary'.

What was the whole point of Carrousel? Couldn't they have picked a cooler or more explainable way for them to die? If it was meant to be a spectator sport, they couldn't devise something more akin to Rollerball or Death Race, both of which were made into terrible remakes because of the message of violence that quenches the thirst in our society today? If not, then why did they wear weird masks and float around? If it was a sacred ritual, why did everybody cheer and treat it like a game? Carrousel seemed like a grisly version of the bubble factory in Willy Wonka.

Many of the subplots only seem to get in the way of the central story, and play like poor mini skits thrown in to bolster the running time. They run through a 'Love Shop', mostly so director Anderson can insert T&A (into a PG film no less) and strange vibrato music. They travel to 'Cathedral' to fight a pack of young kids called 'Cubs', who for some inexplicable reason are feral and supposedly drugged up on something called 'Muscle', and worst of all run into Box on the way to 'Sanctuary'. Box, a giant shiny tinfoil robot played by Roscoe Lee Browne, has gone insane and must've seen Soylent Green one too many times on his Betamax.

The sets bother me as well. It comes with a certain understanding that 'futuristic' movies, especially ones made in the 1960's and 1970's, will have a now retro flair 30+ years later. Many films at the time designed modern amenities, but kept the brown, orange, beige or yellow wood paneling color scheme of the era. Logan's Run is no different. However, it is quite obvious that the entire city is made up of thinly-veiled malls and hotels of the time. The outside water turbine, used at the end of the film, is quite obviously the Forth Worth Water Gardens. Were they too busy to build real sets? Only the recreations of the National Mall in Washington D.C. was worth any redeeming value.

While the special effects did not sway me for voting either way, they are extremely outdated. The shots may have won an Oscar, but considering the magic George Lucas' crew came out with the next year, the effects pale in comparison. Here we see debris superimposed over the reels for an explosion, stop motion to show the effects of disintegration, sparklers going off when a person combusted during Carrousel, a giant scale city for overhead shots, the list goes on and on.

It's hard not to compare certain sci-fi efforts to other ones. Logan's Run has many thematic elements to other films that preceded it in the mid-70s, most notably Soylent Green, Rollerball, and Planet Of The Apes, and obviously played a factor in modern films such as The Island and Gattaca. But while many of the films from the same era endure based on some truly remarkable writing, acting or at least one memorable scene, Logan's Run fares pretty poorly as a run-of-the-mill exercise in the genre. Good idea, weak execution.

Featured Review: SWING VOTE

2008-08-12T08:33:00.000-07:00

For the mini-review of the long-forgotten Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day, and 81 others, click here.

Swing Vote

Starring- Kevin Costner, Paula Patton, Kelsey Grammer, Dennis Hopper, Madeline Carroll, Stanley Tucci, Nathan Lane, George Lopez

Directed by Joshua Michael Stern

Grade: B+

"What are we about?"
"Winning. Because if you don't win, you can't do what you set out to do."

In the wake of perhaps the most important Presidential election of our time, and surely the most engaging Democratic election ever, it's kind of amazing that Swing Vote fared so poorly at the box office. Surely it was the lack of marketing, mostly centering around the film being just another Kevin Costner vehicle, and bad timing, being released square in the middle of the summer movie bonanza and well before the fervor of a Presidential election reaches the public who are not political aficionados. Even so, one would get the sense there could be some kind of market for a film like Swing Vote.

Strange, because while Touchstone may not have had faith in the initially unrealistic plot and turn of events, Swing Vote comes away with much less cheese and sap than its trailer or synopsis would lead you to believe. Instead it's an inarguably easygoing story that doesn't stray from the center line of politics, and surprisingly for such a toothless jab at pundits and the media, it's somewhat effective. If a film like The Manchurian Candidate or Dr. Strangelove is an intellectual thinking man's political satire, Swing Vote is a poor man's Capra-esque tale. Heartwarming and earnest, if decidedly overreaching in its humble message.

Ernest "Bud" Johnson (Costner) is a newly unemployed everyman from Texico, New Mexico (real town!), who rather drink, sleep, and carouse around than to own up to any responsibilities in his life. His daughter Molly (Madeline Carroll) does most of the things around the house and keeps him out of trouble. When he fails to show up for the polls on Election Day, thereby disappointing his daughter, she attempts to cast a ballot for him, but the machine gets shut off. When they find out New Mexico is the state that decides the entire election, it ends up coming down to one county, and to one man, Bud.

Costner as Bud is quite frankly a real jerk. He seems to at times have no respect for anyone but himself, and even himself he thinks very lowly of. Bud constantly lets down his daughter, and seemingly has no real moral compass outside of the basic rules of abuse and murder. Costner is actually quite good in the role, making one almost believe he isn't the actor who's face and name is supposed to sell the film on the poster. The fact that his character never truly breaks away from his sardonic, redneck ways even after his realization of what kind of life he's led, goes a long way into selling the character and plot implications.

Same goes for his daughter Molly and his supposed "love interest" Kate Madison, played by Madeline Carroll and Paula Patton respectively. Molly has a terrible case of Lisa Simpson syndrome, being way too smart and insightful for her age, being able to point out the flaws of every character and America in general just when the scene needs it. Patton often has the same "too perfect to be real" persona, but the fact that neither she nor Molly end up being a deciding factor in Bud's decision (Kate and Bud, despite all roads leading towards it, never actually start a relationship), again thwarts the pigeon-holing Swing Vote was destined to follow.

Kelsey Grammer and Dennis Hopper, the incumbent Republican and the opposing Democrat, make believable politicians. Though both are Republicans in real life, both Grammer and Hopper carry an air about themselves that speak of the basic principles of the parties they represent. Though the fact that their waffling on tried and true conservative and liberal stances in the effort to obtain Bud's vote can be seen as more unrealistic than the one-vote-wins plot, it often finds its most satirical moments there. It's a shame that Hopper's role was supposedly cut dramatically, because he's pretty interesting, especially in the film's funniest scene about an anti-abortion commercial.

Also lending some credence is the clean direction by Joshua Michael Stern. The film is a finely paced parable that never seems to sag much, nor get too frantic in places. Many scenes are aesthetically aware, going for centering shots and crisp backgrounds. The fact that Swing Vote merely looks like it was taken under careful consideration by Stern, sells the film more than any of the performances.

Let's face it, the fact that America comes down to one singular vote is pretty preposterous. There have been elections that came down to one vote many times in the history of the world, but never on such a scale as Swing Vote fantasizes. Especially in this day and age, when the candidates have so many campaign workers and strategists (in this case, realistically seedy Nathan Lane and Stanley Tucci), a recount and further controversy would happen long before such a situation would arise.

But to Swing Vote's credit, it's quite self-aware in the fact that it's not supposed to be a hard-nosed satire that strives for absolute realism. At least it acknowledged that the popular vote wasn't tied, as Bud's tiny county was merely the deciding vote of a state that would tip a neck and neck election. While everyone is waiting for Bud's decision, Hopper's Greenleaf has a one electoral vote lead. Adding mixed opinions from real-life pundits such as Chris Mathews, Bill Maher, Larry King, Ariana Huffington, and James Carville further the fact that this is a fantasy movie that merely offers a few good-natured questions, not out to shake up the entire political world.

Swing Vote is a nifty little film if it isn't expected to completely deride the facade of American politics. It makes some earnest points about the sensationalism in the media, and the corporate underbelly behind the electoral process and government positioning, but it's for a more mainstream audience. Not to say it's dumbed down, but just with softer edges. If you're someone who is a staunch supporter of a particular affiliation, the viewpoints you carry will definitely cloud your mind of a movie that isn't trying to swing viewers into a set party. But if like Bud, you're not very political or have an open mind to everybody's ideas, Swing Vote may be for you.

Awards Talk: August Coverage

2008-08-11T13:32:00.000-07:00

The Prezzies covered 10 sure-to-be award contenders (scratch that, 9 plus the splendid camp of Oliver Stone's W.) and rattled off 10 more to watch two months ago, which can be read here. With the release dates drawing closer as we reach the end of the summer of blockbusters, here are two more films covered in-depth, and the prognosis of the summer fare on awards season. Obviously, the films from the previous installment will get more coverage as they are released, reviewed, and the countdown to the major award ceremonies draw near.

The Road
(tentative release date: November 11th limited; November 26 wide)

Based on Cormac McCarthy's (No Country For Old Men, All The Pretty Horses) 2006 book of the same name, The Road is a bleak, post-apocalyptic parable that consists of a science fiction background, with a very much human dramatic element. The story of a father and son (Viggo Mortensen and American newcomer from Australia, Kodi Smit-McPhee) who escape the violence of society for the coast, and the trouble and people they meet along the way. The film also co-stars Charlize Theron, Robert Duvall and Guy Pearce, and directed by John Hillcoat (The Proposition).

The Road is very similar in makeup to other recent and forthcoming doom and gloom fiction with real world sensibilities such as Children Of Men and Blindness. While Men had been received tremendously with critics and fans alike, it didn't win much but a few minor cinematography awards. Blindness, with prestigious director and heralded cast fared rather poorly at Cannes. So with Blindness still yet to be released, a second film in several months that deal with death and destruction on a wide environmental sci-fi scale (The Happening is another kind of fiction entirely) might not win over voters.

Also going against the film is the bland title, despite its faithfulness to the book. The Road can easily be confused with the major Leonardo DiCaprio-Kate Winslet award-seeking film Revolutionary Road later this year, not to mention other recent titles such as Reservation Road and Glory Road. There's even the famous Italian classic, La Strada, currently #233 on IMDB's Top 250 list, which in English context is also simply called The Road.

Seven Pounds
(tentative release: December 12, wide)

Not to be confused with 21 Grams, Seven Pounds is Will Smith's latest and greatest vehicle to snag the long coveted Oscar the former Fresh Prince has been seeking since Ali. Smith plays an IRS agent who kills seven people in an accident, and after facing suicidal tendencies begin to help out seven other people with their lives. From there he falls in love with a woman with a heart condition (Rosario Dawson) and begins to move on with his own life.

Many see Seven Pounds as a natural continuation for Will Smith's depth as an actor after his nominating role in the 2006 holiday movie The Pursuit Of Happyness. While Seven Pounds doesn't have the box office aspirations of the usual Smith fare of recent times like Hancock and I Am Legend, it shouldn't have a problem being one of the most widely seen award-contending movies thanks to Smith's built-in audience.

Despite it's subject matter, much like the Pursuit Of Happyness, Smith can't inexplicably star in something dangerously serious to ward off his fanbase. He's strong for an acting nomination, but it's hard to see much more of a well-rounded nomination count thanks to co-starring cast (Rosario Dawson, Woody Harrelson, Barry Pepper) not strong in voters' minds, and a story that seems destined to have an automatic happy ending, however small.

Current Prognosis:

As it stands now, the two most important films over the summer ended up being The Dark Knight and Wall-E. That's not to take away from the other films that succeed both at the box office or with the fans and critics, or the smaller independent films that might find a way to hang on to a piece of the awards. But these two films have come away with a lasting impression that will mostly likely hold on to a couple of nominations.

The Dark Knight is almost universally guaranteed to give Heath Ledger a posthumous Best Supporting Actor nomination in every ceremony that gives out the distinction. Depending on the strength of the category as the year ends, Aaron Eckhart may pick up a few nominations as well. The overall chances of a Best Picture or Best Director nomination looks slim because of Hollywood politics, but time will tell.

Wall-E also has a dark horse chance to steal a Best Picture nomination, although it's pretty much a shoo-in already to win Best Animated Feature. I'm not sure if an animated film can be eligible for Cinematography, but if it can, Wall-E should be included in that as well. Screenplay (despite the lack of actual dialogue) could be a real possibility as well.

Actor Spotlight: AARON ECKHART

2008-08-08T13:27:00.000-07:00

Aaron Eckart is the fourth actor covered in The Prezzies' Actor Spotlight series. Click the link to read about previous subjects Sam Rockwell, John C. Reilly, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

With the release of the summer's biggest box office hit, The Dark Knight, critics and fans alike have given infinite praise to Aaron Eckhart for his Harvey Dent/Two-Face portrayal. While his performance is somewhat overshadowed by the immediacy for Heath Ledger's posthumous career, both critics and fans have seem to open their eyes towards the blond, chisel-jawed Mormon actor. He's been around the scene for over 15 years, but outside of a few juicier roles, Eckhart had been the underrated actor of terrible films.

Before The Dark Knight, and even possibly after it, Eckhart has been a vaguely familiar face (occasionally he'll get confused with actor Thomas Jane) that hasn't been noted for any particular role. Critically praised in 2005's Thank You For Smoking and Julia Robert's award-winning vehicle Erin Brockovich, in mainstream film Eckhart's biggest performances were in box office duds such as The Core and The Black Dahlia. Nobody blames him for his performances, nor for the projects he chooses. At least The Black Dahlia was supposed to be good on paper.

Born Aaron Edward Eckhart on March 12, 1968 in Cupertino, California (in the area of San Jose), Eckhart and his two older brothers grew up in a devout Mormon household. The family traveled around, and during his high school years Eckhart at times lived in both England and Australia. He took several years off after graduating to chase waves in Hawaii and serve the LDS (Latter Day Saints) Church in a mission to France, though he still found time to go skiing there.

After coming back stateside, Eckhart enrolled at Brigham Young University, the most prestigious Mormon-affiliated college, as a film major. There he struck up a friendship with writer/director Neil LaBute, who several years later would go on to cast Eckhart in his first starring role. The two would form a nice pairing at BYU, earning several awards for their plays.

Like many actors looking for his big break, Eckhart began appearing in small-budget television movies and schlock films during his time at BYU. First was a bit role in 1992's Double Jeopardy, a Sela Ward/Bruce Boxleitner CBS movie. He followed that with the role of Samson in Ancient Secrets Of The Bible, Part II, and a tiny part in Scott Glenn's Slaughter Of The Innocents in 1994. Eckhart also participated as an extra in Beverly Hills 90210.

Eckhart's career stalled for several years in the mid-1990's, but was kick-started by fate. LaBute got his hands on $25,000 financing, and decided to cast Eckhart in the lead role of his debut film, In The Company Of Men, which was adapted from one of his BYU plays. Eckhart starred as Chad, a seedy junior executive who decides to exact revenge on the female race by corrupting a sweet, deaf secretary. Company Of Men, despite its budget, became an independent hit thanks to its controversial subject, and this performance got the attention of producers for both Eckhart and LaBute. Eckhart won the Satellite and Independent Spirit awards for Best Debut.

LaBute picked up a $5 million dollar budget, 400 times higher than his previous film, to make the ensemble drama Your Friends and Neighbors in 1998. Eckhart appeared with the likes of Ben Stiller, Amy Brenneman, Catherine Keener, Natassja Kinski and Jason Patric. Out of the six stars, Eckhart was the least well known at the time, but was lauded as an integral part of the group.

After a couple more good roles in 1998 indies Thursday and Molly, Oliver Stone noticed Eckhart's potential and cast him as offensive coordinator Nick Crozier in Stone's ill-fated film about the injustices of football, Any Given Sunday. Unfortunately, Oliver Stone is to football what a midget is to basketball, and the movie was a disaster. Despite the star-studded cast, many missteps were given flak, including Cameron Diaz's role as an owner. Like much of his future career, despite the bad reviews for the film, Eckhart, in a bland role, wasn't at fault.

But for what Any Given Sunday was worth, Eckhart got his biggest and most important role the next year. Co-starring with Julia Roberts in her Academy Award-making turn as the titular Erin Brockovich, Eckhart turned away from his clean-faced, smarmy stereotype and played the sensitive, ponytail wearing, white trash biker who helps take care of her kids. His role was pretty thankless, but it was Eckhart's first time in the exposure of an award-heavy film.

Also that year was Neil LaBute's sell-out third project, Nurse Betty. Again, because of the principal cast (Renee Zellweger, Chris Rock, Morgan Freeman, Greg Kinnear), Eckhart got deflected of the critics ire, but LaBute wasn't so lucky. While Eckhart has found salvation with a couple of stellar roles, LaBute has gone backwards.

After Director Sean Penn's The Pledge saw him paired up as Jack Nicholson's young detective partner trying to find a girl's killer, Eckhart saw a string of quasi-starring roles in underachieving films that tried to make him a bonafide household name. The fourth pairing with LaBute came Possession, an underwhelming British drama featuring Gwyneth Paltrow. The Core featured an Eckhart/Hilary Swank pairing to save the world in weak Armageddon fashion, while Paycheck returned him to sleazy corporate territory opposite Ben Affleck, Paul Giamatti and Uma Thurman.

Suspect Zero was a promising but ultimately flat serial killer thriller with Ben Kingsley, while a supporting role in Ron Howard's misguided The Missing, his attempt at a serious western, went nowhere. Eckhart's career as a leading man seemed in jeopardy. So back he went to starring in a trio of independent films, one of which became his third universally acclaimed part.

Conversations With Other Women and Neverwas were good little films in their own right, but it was the role of Nick Naylor in Jason Reitman's (Juno) directorial feature debut Thank You For Smoking that put Eckart back on the map all over again. This time, despite the cast of faces (Robert Duvall, Rob Lowe, Katie Holmes, William H. Macy, Sam Elliott, Adam Brody, Maria Bello) in the ensemble, it was all Eckhart's picture. His performance, combining the smug arrogance he was previously known for and the soft realization of a man in a crisis, Eckhart earned acting nominations from the Golden Globes, Independent Spirit, Prism, and Satellite Awards.

The Black Dahlia was originally intended to be the widely released crime noir drama that would earn Eckhart further kudos, ala L.A. Confidential did for Russell Crowe. But Brian De Palma's film fell hard thanks to some clunky storytelling and not-up-task acting by Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, and even Eckhart himself. Like fellow actors James Franco and Jason Ritter, popping up in a cameo for LaBute's widely despised The Wicker Man remake didn't exactly bolster his resume. Around this time he also began dating Kristyn Osborn from the country group SHeDAISY, and appeared in one of their music videos.

2007 gave Eckhart more genial everyman characters to play, with a DOA turn in the quickly forgotten romantic comedy No Reservations, co-starring Catherine Zeta-Jones. His role as a chef with romantic interests to a woman with a put-upon child situation recalls a sanitized comedy version of Erin Brockovich. Then, with the meekly accepted Bill, which finally got around to being dumped in theatres in early 2008, Eckhart was the titular character who finds himself stuck in unappreciated average guy role.

But these were just small potatoes for his masterpiece performance, the one that once and for all made him a household name after 16 years of ups and downs as featured star. For The Dark Knight, visionary director Christopher Nolan (Memento, The Prestige) cast Eckhart as Harvey Dent, the white knight district attorney of Gotham City. Yes, his character becomes an evil, disfigured bad guy, but it was Nolan and Eckhart's prerogative to focus on the character of Dent himself. Mixing what Eckhart has shown to be so good at- a self-effacing cockiness with deep emotional insecurities- The Dark Knight was commended for its performances from not just Ledger and Bale, but for Eckhart as well.

For newer fans and critics, this may have come as a surprise, but for people who have followed Eckhart's career, it was expected. Talk has Ledger receiving a posthumous Best Supporting Actor nomination from all the major award ceremonies, but truth is, Eckhart is just as much deserving. Ledger had the darker, flashier role, but Eckhart held up just as well.

Later this year he appears in the film festival raved but Fox News-hated Towelhead (formerly Nothing Is Private), a drama about the growing pains of an Arab-American teenager, featuring Toni Collette and his Thank You For Smoking co-star Maria Bello. Eckhart plays a bigoted Army reservist neighbor who gets into some deep trouble with the girl. Further in the pipeline is Traveling by first-time director Brandon Camp. The romantic drama co-stars Jennifer Aniston and Martin Sheen.

Aaron Eckhart will never be the unquestionable and only star of a major summer blockbuster or nearly-guaranteed Oscar contender, but his career has been more than satisfactory. He gets a steady stream of work in both mainstream and independent films, gets a chance to try new things, and has made fans in the process, without succumbing to the pressures of evangelical media. For a Mormon boy who has stayed out of the public spotlight, his career is very good indeed.

The Prezzies' Top 5 Aaron Eckhart Performances
1. The Dark Knight
2. Thank You For Smoking
3. In The Company Of Men
4. Erin Brockovich
5. Your Friends & Neighbors

Featured Review: PINEAPPLE EXPRESS

2008-08-07T11:09:00.000-07:00

This article was originally written on July 18th as part of the Advanced Reviews series.

Pineapple Express

Starring- Seth Rogen, James Franco, Gary Cole, Rosie Perez, Danny McBride, Amber Heard, Kevin Corrigan, Craig Robinson, Ed Begley Jr, Nora Dunn.

Directed by David Gordon Green

Grade: B-

"Thug life!"

Marijuana smokers rejoice. Pineapple Express becomes the first box office wide release since 1998's Half Baked to make no qualms about it's weed-y roots. Trying to create a new breed of film with over-the-top violence and action coupled with dirty, raunchy humor and gloriously unabashed love for the plant drug, Pineapple Express tries to do too much, and ends up doing way too little.

Opinion-takers at the advanced screening were asking patrons if it was the next Cheech & Chong. Not that Cheech & Chong is such a good movie to want to compare praise to, but Pineapple Express is not only inferior to the former film, but it's a black mark on Seth Rogen's otherwise sterling Apatow-linked career. Freaks & Geeks, Undeclared, The 40-Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, Superbad, all great shows and movies. Pineapple Express? Disappointing.

Rogen stars as Dale Denton, a subpoena server who is inexplicably dating a teenager in high school. And he really, really, loves pot. Off the bat he witnesses a drug kingpin (Office Space's Gary Cole) and a saucy little policewoman (Rosie Perez) murder one of the sons of his main rival. They connect Dale to the crime scene thanks to his rare 'Pineapple Express' joint, and thus sets off a chain of who's-working-for-who scenarios involving his pot dealer Saul (Spider-Man's James Franco), two hitmen (Kevin Corrigan, Craig Robinson) and Saul's own middleman Red (Danny McBride). Dale and Saul bond as their adventure reaches its climax.

The humor, both marijuana-related and otherwise, have some extremely funny moments. But for every joke that hits, there are just as many that are extremely awkward to sit through. The cast was obviously going for that semi-improvisational, stream-of-consciousness feel that Apatow ekes so well out of his directed cast, but for Rogen and director David Gordon Green, it just throws the film's pacing out the window. Granted that success rate is much better than most other comedians' films this year, but for Rogen, we the audience expected better. The funniest parts of the redband trailer, as well as the awesome song "Paper Planes" by M.I.A., are literally M.I.A. from the film.

James Franco steals the movie performance-wise, but maybe it's because the rest of the cast fails to inspire. Franco seems genuine as Saul, a stoned loser who just wants companionship. He often has the best lines in the film and we tend to care about him over Dale. Rogen on the other hand is actually sort of annoying and loud, and when the scenes get packed with quick reactionary moments, he exposes himself to still be a green actor.

The other players are one-note at best. Gary Cole has very little personality, playing his drug lord as almost a straight villain. Rosie Perez hasn't been in a film I've seen since God knows when, and I STILL can't understand her when she talks. Kevin Corrigan and Craig Robinson (of Grounded For Life and The Office respectively) are more awkward than funny, and Danny McBride's one good line in the movie-- "Thug life!"-- is in the trailers. The clumsy ending involving Rogen, Franco and McBride, was seriously anti-climatic.

Why is Dale dating a high school girl? Statutory Rape aside, they never explained it, nor does it make a lot of sense, even for a movie like this. If she was ugly, or if Rogen was particularly good-looking, then maybe I'd get it. Or if she was only using him for free drugs, I'd totally understand. But from all accounts none of that was the case, and we are forced to believe that model/actress Amber Heard (Hidden Hills, Never Back Down) genuinely wants to date a scuzzy 25-year-old subpoena server who looks like he's 35. How much of a boner/ego did Rogen get while writing this idea?

For the longest time I was a fan of Seth Rogen, years before he became the warty toad prince of raunchy but pathos-driven R-rated comedy. From Freaks and Geeks to Undeclared, popping up in minuscule roles in Donnie Darko and Anchorman, he was very much under appreciated. Judd Apatow gave him a chance at screen-time in The 40 Year Old Virgin, which led to bona fide stardom in Knocked Up. Now he is no longer the dirty Seth Rogen with a cult fan base but Seth Rogen, the dirty Hollywood multi-tasking entity.

Pineapple Express could have been a resplendent example, setting up a template for more films of the same cloth. But something here did not click at all, at least not from the Rogen Wing of the School of Apatow. Maybe it was the budget. Maybe it was the director (who previously helmed the extravagantly different drama Snow Angels). Maybe they all were affected too much by the stage weed on set. Whatever it was, Pineapple Express failed to rocket to the pinnacle of our funny bones.

DVD Review: SHORT CIRCUIT (1986)

2008-08-05T20:23:00.000-07:00

This is the second review I've done about an older film on DVD. It may become a weekly series if I have time.

Short Circuit

Released: May 9, 1986

Box Office: $40.6 million
(Ranked 21st of 1986)

Starring- Ally Sheedy, Steve Guttenberg, Fisher Stevens, Austin Pendleton, G.W. Bailey, Brian McNamara

Directed by John Badlam

DVD Issue: 2004

Grade: C+

As the Wall-E previews made the rounds late last year, many keen observers born in that span between Generation X and Generation Y, the ones who grew up on the highest content of Saturday morning sugar, television and movies, were quick to dismiss the compact little robot as a Johnny Five knockoff.

Nevertheless, while there's no doubt the two robots share quite a few striking similarities in both looks and actions, Short Circuit was made in an era that valued niceties and a breezy entertainment formula that hinders its potential. Even more so after the looming monolith of what Wall-E has become. In fact, Wall-E is everything Short Circuit aspired to be, 22 years too early.

Viewed in 2008, Short Circuit is seen as a good example of the lighthearted fare of the mid-1980's. It's extremely dated yet innocent enough to provoke a fun attitude, whether its a childhood classic or seeing it for the first time. It has a genial message of love and the appreciation of living life, and chugs along at a steady pace towards its climax, replete with kid-friendly humor and a predictable turn of events.

Newton Crosby (Steve Guttenberg) is a lead programmer of NOVA's newest military robots. Designed to blow up enemy warfare in the fight against the Soviet Union, a malfunction causes the last of these prototype robots, Number Five, to become 'alive' with feelings and thoughts. He escapes and finds himself bonding with Stephanie (Ally Sheedy), a quirky girl who takes care of a hoard of pets. Together, along with Newton, the trio must stop NOVA from destroying Number Five from being deprogrammed, which according to him is equal to death.

Number Five (commonly referred to Johnny Five, despite only calling himself that at the very end) not only shares common ground with Wall-E, but I believe his inspiration in 1986 was E.T. Both are non-human creatures that at first are ugly in appearance but become comfortable and even cute to look at. Both are curious, intelligent, and their mysterious properties forces them to run from the authorities. Most importantly, both aimed to cash in the family market with PG-rated antics. While Short Circuit was a modest success that spawned a sequel two years later, it was not anywhere in the monetary and thematic stratosphere as E.T. was.

Let's get this fact out right now: Guttenberg and Sheedy make one of the worst pairs in cinematic history. If there was a Prezzie Awards back in 1986, Sheedy would win Worst Actress hands down. I'm not sure if she was just playing a loud, crass, annoying, vapid, spaced out twit, or if Sheedy really is that bad of an actress. She was definitely tolerable in The Breakfast Club, but her overexaggerated mannerisms and complete lack of subtlety interacting with an inanimate character endangers the entire Short Circuit project.

Never one to set an example, Guttenberg, already a grizzly veteran of three Police Academy films and Cocoon, isn't much better. But at least he doesn't scream his lines with all the fervor of an actress looking for a coke fix. Also among the shockingly terrible is Fisher Stevens, playing perhaps the most stereotypical horny Indian-American computer scientist in the history of the world. Never mind that Kal Penn must have drawn inspiration from him for the Van Wilder films, but Stevens isn't even Indian. Kind of derogatory.

Another dated but fun reference to the time period Short Circuit offers (besides its terrible actors who mostly disappeared after December 31st, 1989) is the "advanced" technology used on the Soviet Union front. Like films such as Firefox, Red Dawn, WarGames, Russkies, Spies Like Us, Rocky IV and countless other 1980s seminal classics, Short Circuit features characters navigating fancy green and black computer screens, making not so subtle jabs at the Russians. You're not a scientist unless you have a robotic hand giving the middle finger.

Short Circuit is just one of the glut of movies from the 1980s that appeal to 20 and 30 somethings out of fond memories, not outright goodness. We are forced to deride films released today that might be on par with Short Circuit, but in reality the kids who see movies such as Journey To The Center Of The Earth will love them 20 years later like the parents of today loved The Goonies. Short Circuit may not even be fit to wash Wall-E's treads, but it's a cute diversion, exactly what nostalgia was made for.

Featured Review: THE MUMMY 3

2008-08-03T16:47:00.000-07:00

The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor

Starring- Brendan Fraser, Jet Li, Maria Bello, John Hannah, Luke Ford, Michelle Yeoh, Isabella Leong, Russell Wong

Directed by Rob Cohen

Grade: B

"You fought one mummy Dad..."
"Yeah one mummy... twice!"

Who knew Brendan Fraser still had this much clout in Hollywood? After striking out in scarcely seen serious fare like The Air I Breathe and The Last Time, Fraser goes back to his action comedy roots so seamlessly, that the seven year gap since 2001's The Mummy Returns almost seems non-existent. The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor is by no means an outstanding film, but a fast-paced, easy to swallow adventure that pulls enough punches to gloss over some of the goofy content.

The Mummy franchise has always felt like a light-hearted rip-off of Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones series. Less overall violence, less Harrison Ford quips and more Fraser mugging. Dragon Emperor falls into the same vein as the previous two; our heroic characters get into peril time and time again, a massive hoard of the undead stage unrelenting attacks on them, and in the end they manage to scrape out a victory. It's a tried and true plot fitting for the old cinematic heroes of Errol Flynn's era.

Dragon Emperor picks up about 13 or 14 years after the previous installment. Rick O'Connell (Fraser) and wife Evelyn (Maria Bello, pulling a Darrin Stevens on the audience after Rachel Weisz opted out) are rich and retired in the English countryside, while unbeknown to them, son Alex has dropped out of college to follow in his parents' footsteps as an archaeologist and explorer. He finds the temple to the Emperor Han (Jet Li), a ruthless dictator who was frozen in stone by a curse. Of course through a twist of allegiances, the diamond stone that alleviates the curse falls into the wrong hands, Emperor Han is freed, and all hell breaks loose for the O'Connells.

The plot is your standard fare for action adventures set in foreign countries with mysterious ruins. Lots of booby traps and needlessly difficult puzzles and wall openings litter the tombs and temples. Fraser spouts "I can't believe this is happening again" type quotes for humor, although the script keeps the real groaners to a minimum. I won't even go into length badmouthing the field-goal kicking Chinese Abominable Snowmen. At least the bland Alex O'Connell character, all grown up from being the stereotypical 'meddlesome child' of action movies in The Mummy Returns, unlike Shia LeBeouf in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, is played by too less of a name (Australian Luke Ford) to get spin-off aspirations.

Effects-wise, Dragon Emperor is pretty run-of-the-mill as well. Some good animation of the skeletons during the battle scenes, plus the snow-drenched Shangri-La temple, but a couple of bloody combustions involving Li's are much weaker. They devolve into almost cartoonish fashion. Director Rob Cohen (The Fast and the Furious, xXx) takes over for Stephen Sommers and works an almost exact rendering of what Sommers would have done with the project anyways. Tit for tat.

Maria Bello (A History Of Violence, Thank You For Smoking), pales in comparison to Rachel Weisz as the "second" Evelyn O'Connell. She's a good actress, attested by at least the films mentioned above, but working out of her element of moody dramas and feigning a British accent, she doesn't muster anything much more than a fond recollection of Weisz in the role.

Li, Michelle Yeoh, Isabella Leong, and Russell Wong however are spot on and interesting in their roles concerning the fate of China and the Emperor's rule. Yeoh, of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon fame, is no stranger to the physical side of her role, and Leong proves she can be capable of being a future serious actress. Li doesn't necessarily do much besides growl and kill minions, but he serves as a quiet force to a film that could otherwise lack some credibility.

The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor is nothing else but a summer blockbuster that needs a soda and popcorn to wash it down. By the time the soda gets thrown in the trash bin, the memory of such a film is thrown out of collective consciousness. It wouldn't be a terrible predicament to see a fourth installment in the Mummy franchise, but like this third film, it's not something to look forward to all summer. It's just... there.

Indie Review: MEAT TRAIN

2008-08-02T16:55:00.000-07:00

The Midnight Meat Train

Starring- Bradley Cooper, Leslie Bibb, Vinnie Jones, Brooke Shields, Roger Bart, Peter Jacobson, Tony Curran

Directed by Ryuhei Kitamura

Grade: D-

"Please step away from the meat."

The Midnight Meat Train is everything the title suggests. It may sound like a cheesy pornography or a football nickname gone wrong, but make no mistakes, Meat Train is a Clive Barker inspired horror film. Dumped into a little over one hundred critically forgotten second-run discount theatres mostly in the Western United States, despite being a new release, Meat Train's trailer, enigmatic title and release made it worth seeking out. But I soon realized, this Meat was rotten.

Because of Lionsgate's internal shuffle, new head honcho Joe Drake (a former exec at Focus Features, which produced the best horror film of 2008 to date, The Strangers), had a couple of projects from the old regime that he had no faith in releasing. Conspiracy theories abound, but these things are true; The studio's Saw V is expected to be the moneymaker, and because it was contractually obligated to appear in a couple of theatres, Midnight Meat Train was given an esoteric release. Buried not only behind popular new movies, but under the tracks of long-time second-run holdouts College Road Trip and Nim's Island.

I was genuinely shocked by that piece of information, considering how some horror movies can truly perform with a little marketing, including the original Saw. But after sitting through 90 minutes of Midnight Meat Train, I began to understand just how smart Lionsgate must be.

The film stars up-and-coming Bradley Cooper (Alias, Wedding Crashers) as Leon Kauffman, a professional photographer without much success. He takes pictures of the dark underbelly of New York City, but can never capture anything truly remarkable. When Susan Hoff (an ubiquitously perky Brooke Shields), the owner of an art gallery Leon tries to sell pictures to, point blankly tells him to get in the face of danger for those once-in-a-lifetime shots, Leon takes it seriously.

So seriously in fact, that he stumbles upon Mahogany (Vinnie Jones), a serial killer who butchers quiet passengers on the subway in the middle of the night and splays them on meat hooks (hence the title, The Midnight Meat Train). Leon starts to become obsessed with taking the right pictures of the murders, despite the element of danger in being exposed. But while his girlfriend Maya (Leslie Bibb) is worried, Leon finds by studying Mahogany, there's a whole other, deeper, darker facet to his character and reasoning than just mercilessly slaughtering random passengers.

Meat Train's plot is just as ridiculously executed as it is to read. Based off a short story by Barker in his 1984 novel collection, I honestly gave the movie every opportunity to be an enjoyable horror flick. The merits of plot and and sensibility don't always have to make perfect sense in these kinds of films. I'm one of the few positive critics for last year's The Hitcher re-make because of that reason. But Meat Train is just so over-the-top bad without much to praise in the acting, writing or filmmaking department (although for most of the beginning, director Ryuhei Kitamura's blurry camera work was effective), that the project just became one big non-entity.

The characters were just as bad. Each one of them were comically stupid. Cooper's Leon takes photographs of dangerous thugs, homeless people, and the villain with all the subtlety of a lead pipe to the face. He follows Mahogany around with a camera the size of a 1992 cell phone, creeping around 10 feet behind like he's a member of Mystery Inc. Halfway through, after getting too close to the villain (as in, taking pictures of Mahogany in the same subway train that he's literally butchering people in), Cooper does a complete 180 and becomes psycho and gruff, bent on revenge.

Leslie Bibb's Maya is mostly there for support and skin, and for awhile the only one in the movie with a voice of reason. Then just as you figure there's some validation in her, she and Leon's art friend Jurgis (Roger Bart, apparently not satisfied with Hostel II as the goriest pick on his resume) break into Mahogany's apartment to retrieve Leon's camera. Never mind how they even found the place without Leon's help, but Maya finds evidence Mahogany carries in his suitcase that you'd only find in a cliche movie. You can pretty much figure where its going to go from there.

Or not. If you haven't read Barker's story, the last five minutes veers past left field and into the bleachers of weirdness. We go from over-the-top serial killer film to excessively violent supernatural film. It answers those long-standing questions that arise during the movie, such as "Why is he doing this?" and "Why am I watching this?", which in the grand scheme of the film is kind of exalting, but after 95 minutes of a certain kind of terror, changing the course of Meat Train entirely with that ending just adds to the terrible aspects of it.

Maybe it was the stains in the horrendously patterned carpets or the smell of stale relish coating the walls, but seeing Midnight Meat Train at a barely-managed dollar theatre almost enhanced the experience. As dreadful as the film was at times, you almost felt like in the dank and dark confines of the auditorium, you had every much chance to die as the victims in the film. That at least kept the surprisingly low scare factor in Meat Train from totally ruining the experience.

If you have the chance to see The Midnight Meat Train, I suggest you go, if only for the novelty of seeing a unique and distasteful horror flick in the presence of the acidic popcorn and sticky linoleum floors of yesteryear. It may have been given an ultimate backstabbing job by its own hand, but had something as amusingly abnormal as Meat Train been released in major market theatres, I doubt it would've fared much better than last year's parking garage thriller P2. So almost by accident, the fans in the know get two interestingly horrific experiences for the price of less than one.

TOP TEN Anticipated Movies (8/08)

2008-08-01T09:04:00.000-07:00

This month I decided to pick closer releases, rather than many that are still 4+ months away, so that I don't have to write about most of them EVERY month until then. Most of my picks may seem juvenile, but trust me when I say I can't wait for the holidays when we can throw away most of the mainstream junk until January and start to break down and analyze the "serious" junk.

In order of tentative release:

Tropic Thunder (8/13)
Iron Man has come and gone, and almost seems diminutive compared to the juggernaut that is The Dark Knight, but Robert Downey Jr. gets another chance to reign supreme. I hope beyond all hope that despite the rocky presence of Ben Stiller and Jack Black that Tropic Thunder is a cohesively funny film, which can't be said for most of the comedies this year.

Mirrors (8/15)
I don't know about you, but there's something just magical about the way Kiefer Sutherland, Jack Bauer of all fictional people, stands next to a demon mirror and screams "What do you want!?". But who knows, maybe a horror film with Sutherland, Paula Patton, and the literally jaw-breaking Amy Smart will actually be kind of good? Too much to ask?

Hamlet 2 (8/22; limited)
Since we're still a few months away from getting into ultra-serious award fare, Hamlet 2 looks like the oddball little comedy that might score well at the indie theatres. After that box office debacle Around The World In 80 Days remake, can Steve Coogan really take America by storm with "Rock Me Sexy Jesus?"

Disaster Movie (8/29)
My friend Mikey @ The Movies sits through way too much cheap direct-to-DVD fare for me to handle, but sneaking into these bottom of the barrel "parody" films have become almost a rite of passage. We do not condone this kind of filmmaking with our hard-earned money, but damned if we don't peek our heads in and get tortured with 90 minutes of this.

Burn After Reading (9/12)
Clooney! Pitt! Malkovich! McDormand! Swinton! Coens! That's all I'm going to say, lest this gets overhyped.

Righteous Kill (9/12)
This is going to be either really good, or really, really, really, terrible. Consider; Robert De Niro and Al Pacino pair up for the first time on the same screen and only the 2nd time (after Heat) in a film, and written by Russell Gewirtz of the tantalizing Inside Man. But, Pacino hasn't made a decent film since 2002's Insomnia, and Righteous Kill is directed by none other than Pacino's 88 Minutes auteur Jon Avnet. And it co-stars 50 Cent as 'Spider'. Yeah.

Miracle At St. Anna/Blindness/Eagle Eye/Choke (9/26)
This is a cop-out I know, but September 26th looks to be an amazingly strong week in movies, especially in a September filled with uninspiring fare such as Bangkok Dangerous and Lakeview Terrace. We have a serious Spike Lee war movie, a new Fernando Meirelles film (Cidade de Deus, The Constant Gardener), a goofy new Shia LaBeouf flick, and independent theatres will run Sam Rockwell's sex-fest Choke.

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist (10/3)
All hail the return of Michael Cera, our hero of teenage neurosis. Youth In Revolt comes in December, but for October Cera teams with Charlie Bartlett and 40 Year Old Virgin girl Kat Dennings for a romance set in NYC's underground band scene. Expect plenty of Cera being a badass on the music stage, while stumbling with his words off-stage.

Beverly Hills Chihuahua (10/3)
In the season of the dog (future slated dog movies this winter include Bolt, Marley & Me, and Hotel For Dogs), Beverly Hills Chihuahua, directed by Scooby-Doo fanboy Raja Gosnell, is going to be outright horrible. But damn it if I haven't been caught mumbling "Chihuahua!" in group affairs. Whether it turns out to be pure infantile crap or an infectious holiday hit (I'm leaning towards the former), I know I'll end up seeing this. Natch, I'm actually looking forward to this... yikes.

Max Payne/Flash Of Genius/W. (10/17)
Another cop-out, but what an interesting weekend this presents. First and most popularly is Max Payne, Mark Wahlberg's gory thriller based on the iconic video game. But this same weekend also features a quaint tale about the corporate injustices of a car company over a patent, starring Greg Kinnear, and Oliver Stone's slick-looking, fascinating but questionably needed W.

Future Must-Sees: The Brothers Bloom (10/24), Changeling (10/24), Zack & Miri Make A Porno (10/31), Quantum Of Solace (11/7), Australia (11/14), Harry Potter (11/21), Defiance (12/12), The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button (12/19), Yes Man (12/19), Marley & Me (12/25), Revolutionary Road (12/25)

DVD Review: CREEPSHOW (1982)

2008-07-31T14:54:00.000-07:00

Because The Prezzies don't have ENOUGH topics to cover on this site (Reviews, Mini-Reviews, Actor Spotlights, Awards Speculation, Retro Awards, Anticipated Releases), there will now be the occasional DVD Review here. I have almost 250 DVD movies, and about 30 television seasons, and lately have been trolling Half Price Books for older clearance discs at $2-3 each. The reviews will mostly cover the film itself, since they are older, many younger people may have not seen them, but we'll discuss the Special Features if they apply or are noteworthy. Today, we will take a look at the 1982 camp horror classic, Creepshow.

Creepshow

Released: November 12, 1982

Box Office: $21 million
(Ranked 37th of 1982)

Starring: Hal Holbrook, Leslie Nielsen, Adrienne Barbeau, E.G. Marshall, Ted Danson, Fritz Weaver, Ed Harris, Stephen King

Director: George A. Romero

DVD Issue: 1999

Grade: B

Stephen King and George A. Romero's Creepshow is perhaps the most well-known portmanteau in horror cinema. Grossing a modest $21 million in a 1982 era dominated by E.T., it's success greenlighted the likes of future "tales of terror" popular in the 1980s, such as The Twilight Zone Movie, King's Cat Eye, and Tales From The Darkside. It, along with the cheap double features of the sixties and seventies, inspired Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez to make Grindhouse (Eli Roth's short segment 'Thanksgiving' in the film even uses part of the Creepshow score).

But while Creepshow may have helped revived the genre of anthology horror, movies that pieced together several unrelated tales of the macabre into one feature film, the United Kingdom had quite a run with these type of tales at least a full two decades before that.

One of the first was Dead of Night in 1948, which influenced many radio programs and future television adaptations at the time. The genre picked up in the late sixties and seventies with such fare as Dr. Terror's House Of Horrors and The Vault Of Horror. The most famous of these was 1972's Tales From The Crypt, which later lent its name to the HBO series and its run of knockoffs. The 1972 version starred Joan Collins and Peter Cushing, and featured a memorably stirring tale involving a tunnel of razors and a German Shepherd that can be seen as a precursor to today's Saw franchise.

Creepshow is all about tongue-in-cheek camp. Romero uses comic book fonts to segue from one tale to another, and often implements it into the stories themselves. This gives the film a playful vibe that many films in the 'grunge' era would use 10 years later. King adapts five stories, two from previously published short works, and three written exclusively for the screen. They range from zombies to aliens to (gulp) bugs.

The first two are obviously the weakest, but both have their guilty pleasures. In Father's Day, a demented older woman and her snobbish relatives (one played by a 31-year-old, pre-The Right Stuff Ed Harris) are murdered one-by-one by the abusive father she had killed seven years earlier, now a zombie out for his "Father's Day cake". In The Lonesome Death Of Jody Verrill, King himself plays the dim-witted titular character, who finds a meteorite that turns everything it touches into a grassy substance. King's performance is majorly ostentatious, but engrossingly fun to watch at the same time.

Something To Tide You Over starts off good, albeit without much 'horror' element, but then loses its steam at the end. Leslie Nielsen, fresh off Airplane! and the original Prom Night, devises a murder plot against his cheating wife and her lover Harry (Ted Danson, with Cheers in its first season). He forces them to be buried in sand up to their neck and eventually drown when the tide comes in. Nielsen's Richard takes glee in his set-up, but the segment soon spirals into a zombie revenge plot.

The best, longest and most realized segment is The Crate, based off of a King short story. Hal Holbrook (All The President's Men, Into The Wild) stars as Henry, a college professor who loathes his brash, foul-mouthed wife Billie (early 80s sexpot Adrienne Barbeau). When Dexter Stanley (longtime character actor Fritz Weaver), a colleague of his, finds a box under the laboratory stairs that contains a man-eating primate, Henry seizes this opportunity to put Billie away once and for all. The plot may sound stupid, but unlike the previous three stories, The Crate is actually quite suspenseful and holds a steady pace the entire segment.

Finally we have They're Creeping Up On You, which for me personally, was almost impossible to watch. E.G. Marshall goes to town as a rich millionaire germaphobe with a soulless attitude and a fear of cockroaches. I have my own major fear of certain insects, not so much the cockroaches themselves but seeing their bodies up close (which is why I don't own The Fly, Mimic, Joe's Apartment etc) . So suffice to say, the whole story revolving around his eventual demise by the deed of many, many cockroaches left me very, very uneasy.

The whole film has the fun and charisma of laughably dated makeup/effects by Tom Savini (Friday The 13th, Dawn Of The Dead) and over-the-top acting. But in a way, these kinds of films are long gone and sort of missed. While Creepshow may look garish compared to some of the best special effect efforts of our time, it was a labor of love. Many of the features we see today that look cheap are effectively because they were made strictly for money and a job. Creepshow may be frightening, but it has a lot of heart, something many horror films are missing in this generation.

Featured Review: X-FILES 2

2008-07-30T11:57:00.000-07:00

The X-Files: I Want To Believe

Starring David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, Billy Connolly, Amanda Peet, Alvin 'Xzibit' Joiner, Mitch Pileggi

Directed by Chris Carter

Grade: C-

"I don't believe this."
"You know, that's been your problem from the very beginning."

I certainly wanted to believe. I wanted to believe that this second film installment of The X-Files franchise would be an engaging sci-fi thriller, something that could possibly lend credence to future sequels. If anything, give David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson something to do with their careers and balance out the negativity surrounding most of the recently released tripe in the horror/sci-fi genre. Instead, like the religious beliefs of Anderson's Scully, all that was left for The X-Files: I Want To Believe, was ugly, open-ended doubt.

It's been so long since the television series and first film premiered, that I barely remember said film, 1998's Fight The Future. But there were some indelible images. A kid being consumed by black goo, our heroes being chased by bees, a giant alien spaceship. It was an entertaining movie that combined some of the best elements of the show; aliens and dramatic tension. But I Want To Believe refuses to mix in its' most unearthly lineage, rather opting to put away their metaphysical playthings for a more complex 'human' touch. And that extracts all the interest out of new and casual fans like myself in enjoying this movie.

Years after their last hurrah in the FBI, Dana Scully (Anderson) is a doctor in a Catholic hospital dealing with a crisis of faith, especially over a presumably terminally ill little boy. She gets called upon to dig up her old partner Fox Mulder, a not-so-sought-after fugitive, to help solve an unusual case involving another missing FBI agent. He eventually agrees, and begins to not only earn the trust of Dakota Whitney (Amanda Peet) the agent in charge of the investigation, but gets Scully involved in the process as well. The main chip the FBI have is Father Joe (Billy Connolly) a former Catholic priest and pedophile who has psychic visions that relate to the missing agent.

In essence the plot is less an exertion of the paranormal and supernatural, but that of a straight crime thriller with mythological subtext. However, therein lies its biggest problem: there seems to be more elements of films such as Zodiac or Stigmata than anything uniquely exciting or worthy of being a nearly two hour stand-alone television franchise vehicle. It drags on very, very slowly from one scene to the next without much of an element of surprise. When something climatic DOES happen, it pops out at you with all the excitement of a broken jack-in-the-box.

As fellow critic Michael Brieaddy points out, the film has very much the same feel that die hard fans of the television show know of. Like Buffy The Vampire Slayer, The X-Files focused just as much on serious issues of people's lives and relationships as they did on the creatures. Not every episode is filled with alien and ghost arcs.

I'm all for serious drama fare. But ten years between films and a six year layoff on the franchise in general does not give them the excuse to build a template for a whole movie series with this much conversation building. Franchises like Batman and Spider-Man has earned the right to space out their action sequences with exposition and tension building and introducing future characters, but for The X-Files, with all subtle references to characters' past lives aside, we need a little refresher course. Had this been a direct sequel to Fight The Future, released in 1999 or 2000 while the show still was on the air, I Want To Believe might succeed without much mythological ado. But it's 2008, and nobody but the resolute fanboys care anymore.

None of the original supporting characters from the series' run appeared in the film (although many actors who served in bit episodic roles are littered throughout), save one. Mitch Pileggi, Assistant Director Walter Skinner, shows up for a brief scene towards the end. His appearance, no matter how canonical within the series of events, seems like an underwhelming attempt at getting longtime fans to clap or holler for another familiar face. But this is The X-Files, not The Brady Bunch Movie.

I may be nitpicking, because the performances were adequate enough. Xzibit never shouted 'Pimp My Ride!', and Connolly stood out as the formerly immoral priest, but really, if you're only making the movie to please a fan base that can't even beat Mamma Mia! in its second week at the box office, why not just resurrect it for cable television (The Sci-Fi Channel would kill for this license), or make a direct-to-DVD film series? Or are Duchovny and Anderson too busy to resort to such low wages? Looking at their resumes, I certainly find THAT hard to believe.

Featured Review: SPACE CHIMPS

2008-07-29T18:46:00.000-07:00

Space Chimps

Starring Andy Samberg, Cheryl Hines, Jeff Daniels, Patrick Warburton, Kristin Chenoweth, Stanley Tucci, Jane Lynch, Carlos Alazraqui

Directed by Kirk De Micco

Grade: D

"Let's chimp this ride!"

Space Chimps, the second of three computer-animated tales about non-humans going into space this summer, is by far much less quality than its' predecessor, the stunning and exquisite Pixar offering Wall-E. Sadly, with Fly Me To The Moon yet to be released, this laughable and insulting excuse of a film to 'entertain' children, may not even be the worse of the lot. But it certainly fails to muster any sympathy with a no-budget animation crew and the lamest excuse of a script this side of the nebula, even by kiddie film standards.

Produced by Vanguard and Starz Animation (raise your hand if you knew the premium cable movie channel had its own animation division), Space Chimps looks like a product of a burgeoning technical college animator circa 1994. One can use the excuse of the simple and bare graphics as eye-pleasing to the youngest children who might be scared of some imagery in Wall-E. But let's face it, Toy Story had more depth and complexity in its computer generated scenery than Space Chimps, and the former film was released THIRTEEN years ago. This is just a cheap attempt to cash in on the cartoon market.

We meet Ham III (voice of Andy Samberg), a circus performer and grandson of the famous Ham, revered as the first hominid to successful fly in outer space (possibly because in real life at least half the monkeys launched during the era died). Ham III however, doesn't have the same ambition. But when the space program comes under flak for losing an expensive probe in a wormhole, letting a meglomaniac alien (voice of Jeff Daniels) bent on ruling his home planet with a giant casino inherit it, they use Ham III and fellow more serious chimps Luna (Cheryl Hines) and Titan (Patrick Warburton) as a last-ditch public relations stunt to retrieve the probe.

If there's one minor kudos to be given to the animators, it would be the texture of the monkeys. At least the detail of their fur seem to been given a little time to materialize. But the set pieces and other beings that populate the film are so terrible-looking, it sucks whatever tiny bit of clean and composite animation right out of your brain. The NASA space center and the humans therein are chunky and lifeless looking, while the alien planet the chimps descend upon is again, cheap enough to be made on a Macintosh in 1994.

But if that isn't sad enough, the characters and the script are completely asinine as well. There is a mentor simian named Houston (who looks eerily like a chimp version of actor Gary Cole. Was that intentional?), named specifically for a "Houston, we have a problem" joke. Every other line spoken by Titan is a pun involving 'chimp'. "We'll have to chimprovise!" and "Let's chimp this ride!" are not exactly what constitutes a good movie. Then we're littered with random references to Beverly Hills Cop and David Bowie, just to see if parents are paying attention. Worse yet is a couple of off-color remarks that to adults can insinuate sexual references, but still should have no place in a G-rated film whether the kids get it or not.

Jeff Daniels at least does some liberations with his voice, because his villainous alien character Zartog sounds nothing like him. But that's also to say his new voice is awful, loud and screeching. The same could be said for Kristin Chenoweth's character, nicknamed Kilowatt (again, so named as an eye-rolling pun). Every moment she's on screen, there's a shrillness in her voice that can only be heard by dogs. The fact that Kilowatt claims she's the last of her race on the planet, then towards the end of the movie we see several more just like her in the crowd just proves how poorly conceived this whole project was.

Maybe it's futile to debunk a film that's squarely aimed at the crowd young enough to believe anybody and their grandmothers can go into outer space. But when there's magnificent entertainment for children out there, including Wall-E and Kit Kittredge, there's no reason for Space Chimps to have to pander to the lowest recesses of our toddler's minds. We need to engage them in thoughtful, well-written entertainment. But for Space Chimps, that's 'chimply' not the case.

Featured Review: MAMMA MIA!

2008-07-28T12:02:00.000-07:00

Read up on the quickly forgotten dark political satire War Inc. movie review HERE.

Mamma Mia!

Starring Meryl Streep, Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth, Amanda Seyfried, Stellan Skarsgard, Christine Baranski, Julie Walters, Dominic Cooper

Directed by Phyllida Lloyd

Grade: C+

"I don't care if you've slept with hundreds of men!"
"I haven't slept with hundreds of men..."

If last year's Sweeney Todd was an exercise in bringing the ultra-dark, consummately Gothic stylings of Broadway to the multiplex near you, Mamma Mia! could be considered the polar opposite. With its flamboyant costumes, beautiful and entirely dreamt up exteriors of Greek isles, and gads of pretty people of European ancestry singing along to the collective works of ABBA, Mamma Mia! is less a movie experience but a theatre revue filmed for a community playhouse.

I'm not here to judge the merits of the actual musical, for I'm sure the stage-to-screen transition lost many elements that made the Broadway/West End/Las Vegas show such a smash hit. But one certainly has to wonder why there's such a fervor for a franchise revolving around cheeky disco-flavored Swedish pop music that is 30 years old. Across The Universe worked because there was a multitude of great Beatles songs to play around with. How can they possibly fit such ABBA gold as "Dancing Queen" and "S.O.S." into a workable storyline?

Sophie (Mean Girls' Amanda Seyfried) is a beautiful young lady living in a resort town in Greece. She's about to be married, but there's still one major aspect of her life she hasn't wrapped up. The identity of her father. After reading through her mother Donna's (Meryl Streep) diary, Sophie finds out it can be one of three men from different parts of the world. Sam (Pierce Brosnan), Harry (Colin Firth) and Bill (Stellan Skarsgard) are all invited, all show up, and all must play a game of cat and mouse with Sophie's, and especially Donna's, feelings.

It's the kind of movie that you absolutely cannot take seriously. Nearly everyone on the island aside from say, Julie Walters and Christine Baranski (channeling her best Samantha Jones and Nina Van Horn) are young, fabulously gorgeous and have no duties but to group together and dance the day, afternoon, and night away. And if they aren't immaculately good-looking, the older ones like Baranski have the promiscuous spirit and spunk to make up for it.

It's the kind of movie where Streep's Donna can pity herself for living in one of Earth's paradises. Where there's only one black person and he's instantly attracted to the older ladies. Where one of the fathers can be swarmed by a sea of young, attractive ladies, then instantly realize he's gay. Where Pierce Brosnan, a famous Irishman, is tabbed to play an American, and yet cannot hold a tune in any dialect.

Thankfully both productions stay away from such kitsch hits as "Waterloo" and "Fernando" (although Streep hums the latter tune while walking about the village, and the cast sings the former in credit-rolling, non-canonical camp fashion). While it doesn't fit the context of the film's spectrum, "Dancing Queen" is the most joyous and infectious number, giving the village cast a few minutes to drop what they're doing and go on a town excursion with Donna.

The performances and tonal voices range from very good to "if he can't sing, why the heck did they cast him then?". Meryl Streep at some points of Mamma Mia! carries the movie on her back, giving a surprisingly well-rounded singing and acting accomplishment. 'Surprising' shouldn't be a word used for a 14-time Academy Award nominated actress, but Streep at 59, is quite spry and jubilant throughout. Her swan song, "The Winner Takes It All", isn't the most realized piece of pop music, but Streep commands a good acting presentation while pulling off the singing. It's guaranteed she'll add a record-tying 22nd Golden Globe nomination for this film, and it's possible she'll pick up Prezzie and Oscar bids.

Seyfried, Baranski, Walters, Cooper and even Skarsgard hold their own in various degrees, and Colin Firth does okay. His one solo, an acoustic folk version of "Our Last Summer" is suspect, but he gets through it. But the real travesty is Brosnan. His character is the lead of the three possible fathers, and his two big numbers are almost a pain to sit through. The Streep/Brosnan duet "S.O.S." is supposed to be a climax leading into the final act of the film, but his jarring lack of vocal range, best described as not having any whatsoever, pretty much ruins whatever emotion is coming out of Streep. His "When All Is Said And Done" is stranger yet.

It's good to see the movie musical trickling back into contemporary cinema after many years of exile. But whereas some recent musicals, Chicago, Dreamgirls, Across The Universe, Moulin Rouge! and et cetera have attempted to put a modern day film technique on the tried and true classic genre, Mamma Mia! plays like a forgettable MGM picture during the height of the movie musical generation of the 1940s and early 50s. The only changes made is the progressive sexuality and the retro-hip soundtrack. Like the band that provides said soundtrack, Mamma Mia! is just an aberration in the pop culture lexicon.

Featured Review: STEP BROTHERS

2008-07-27T21:41:00.000-07:00

STEP BROTHERS

Starring Will Ferrell, John C. Reilly, Mary Steenburgen, Richard Jenkins, Adam Scott, Kathryn Hahn, Rob Riggle, Seth Rogen

Directed by Adam McKay

Grade: D+

"Your voice is amazing. It was a like a combination of Fergie and Jesus!"

Step Brothers has officially broken my tolerance and taste for the vulgar. Long after many people turned away from this brand of comedy, I've been there to defend the art of humor in any shape or form. It was my belief that if your film cannot be witty or smartly comedic on its own merits, there's nothing a couple of tasteless, out-of-left field vulgarities and expletives can't usually fix.

Though while Step Brothers derives much of its best and funniest moments from these lewd scenarios, it ends up coming off so vicious, you really have to have no morals at all to laugh without feeling a little shame. For the writers and stars of this movie, it's obvious they were too busy laughing at themselves to realize how threatening and egregious their lines escalate into when seen as a whole 95 minute film. Like Anchorman, Step Brothers is very much a quotable movie, but unlike Anchorman, this picture doesn't have the same good will.

Ferrell and Reilly team up again, akin to their last effort, Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby, they have plenty of chemistry together. But also similar to the previous film, it veers off course and quickly becomes graceless to laugh at, and worse to appreciate as an actual piece of cinema. By the time Step Brothers attempts to steer the characters into a happy ending, it takes away the awkward laughter and replaces it with ugly transitory scenes that don't even make sense.

Brennan (Ferrell) and Dale (Reilly) are two 40 year olds who have been coddled by their parents Nancy and Robert (Mary Steenburgen and Richard Jenkins respectively) for so long, they strut around their houses in their underwear with a sense of entitlement. But when Nancy and Robert get married, Dale and Brennan are forced to co-exist. At first each are threatened by the change in their comfortable lifestyle, but soon enough they become fast friends over a mutual hate for Brennan's younger brother. This ends up being a bigger problem for their exasperated parents. The bad influence Dale and Brennan bring to each other gives Robert incentive to give the men an ultimatum: get jobs or move out.

It's a good subject to mine humor from. There is a whole society of people in this country who refuse to grow up and take responsibility for themselves (at 23, I try my hardest not to end up like that). Such films as Failure To Launch and You, Me & Dupree touched upon the slacker, overgrown teenager infesting their responsible antagonists angle, but Step Brothers put a crude, adulterated take on it.

However, it's one thing to hear the brothers argue and shout obscenities at each other (often with body parts being involved), but how many times do you need to hear them cuss out their parents? Jenkins is played off almost as a bad guy for drawing a hard line on the two, but after 40 years of laziness as a father and the recent trouble the duo had gotten into, he was entirely justifiable. What's so funny about disrespecting EVERYBODY around you, at least after the 14th time?

Besides the viciousness and outrageousness of the characters' feelings towards one another, the supporting characters vary from bad to outright horrible. Adam Scott (Monster-In-Law) plays Brennan's much more successful younger brother, who is made to be a complete jerk. But his character is seen as an annoying jackass, and his scenes usually bring the movie to a complete halt. Even worse is Kathryn Hahn (Crossing Jordan) as his repressed wife, who after witnessing Dale punch her husband, goes off the deep end with a major crush on him. Every scene that involves her, in conjunction with Scott as her husband, totally ruin the chemistry, however vile, between Ferrell and Reilly.

Don't get me wrong, I laughed, and I laughed hard. But for every one-liner that was brilliantly observed or random, there was plenty of them to make you cringe. It ends up becoming like a series of skits, trying to find out what the step brothers can possibly do to be funny. For such a solid premise for a straight comedy, the whole effort was terribly disappointing, which has become an increasing reality for projects with Judd Apatow's name on it. I think he and the other guys involved in his circle need to just sit the rest of this year out and recoup before they even attempt an Anchorman 2.

Advanced Review: THE ROCKER

2008-07-25T11:41:00.000-07:00

This is an advanced review for The Rocker, originally to be released July 30th, but now currently pushed back until August 20th. Whenever it does get released, we'll revisit this post.

The Rocker

Starring- Rainn Wilson, Christina Applegate, Teddy Geiger, Emma Stone, Josh Gad, Jason Sudeikis, Jane Lynch, Jeff Garlin, Will Arnett

Directed by Peter Cattaneo

Grade: C-

"A lot of elevators play Celine Dion... that doesn't make it right."

Actors who get defined to one television role often have a blessing and a curse. They experience popularity and job security for the duration of their career-making character, but then they also struggle to develop a successful transition away from it. Michael Richards often superseded his titular co-star as Kramer in Seinfeld, but couldn't etch out anything of substance on his own. Bob Denver was known as Gilligan for the rest of his life. Same goes more or less for people like George Wendt, Megan Mullally, James Van Der Beek, Neil Patrick Harris, etc. They just can't escape the shadow of what made them a household name in the first place.

So is the case of Rainn Wilson and his first fully-engaged star-making turn, The Rocker. Stuck somewhere between a vehicle for Wilson, a vehicle for stalwart teen rocker Teddy Geiger, and an earnest if lukewarm attempt to appease every demographic with a slightly risque but never truly offensive PG-13 family message film, The Rocker never reaches that pantheon of hard metal licks. Instead it plays like weak radio-friendly pop rock.

The Rainn man plays Robert 'Fish' Fishman, once the highly touted drummer of 1980's hair metal band Vesuvius (with cheeky cameos by Will Arnett, Fred Armisen and Bradley Cooper), now a loser living in his sister's attic over 20 years later. His nebbish nephew Matt (Josh Gad, of FOX's short-lived Back To You) is playing the prom with his band A.D.D, and when their drummer gets expelled from school, Matt is forced to call upon his uncle for help. Igniting new passion into his life, Fish wheels and deals the local garage band into scoring gigs and going on tour, often in ways he didn't plan for. Along the way, he and his younger bandmates finds lessons in life and begins to grow up.

Everybody who has seen at least 50 mainstream movies know how these kinds of films end up. Each of the band members have ups, they have downs, they face their biggest challenge, the big bad villain (in this case being Fish's old band Vesuvius) gets its long-awaited comeuppance, and Fish gets the girl. All of this at the mere price of logical fallacy and enough pratfalls to make Chevy Chase want to sue.

Whereas Wilson's supporting role in My Super Ex-Girlfriend basically placed him as a jerk with glasses much in the vein as his character Dwight in The Office, Wilson's The Rocker persona almost strives with the singular goal of making him the exact opposite. He wears longer hair (a relic of the 1980's glam he's refused to move on with), doesn't wear glasses, and has a 'wild' personality. The movie itself is centered around a dozen or so gags that cause Fish bodily harm, a broad tactic that is rarely used in The Office.

But the trouble with this of course is, without the Dwight persona, Wilson isn't really all that much interesting. He hasn't had much of a chance to shine elsewhere, but does anybody remember his bit roles in Almost Famous, Sahara or Steven Soderbergh's Full Frontal? For the few people that sat through House Of 1000 Corpses and watched him get killed and turned into some kind of mermaid creature, did they really look at his performance and say "Wow, he's going to be a star someday"?

Similarly unimpressive is Teddy Geiger, the 'real' brains behind the fictional band as the lead singer, songwriter and guitarist. He has genuine talent, but his character is so depressing and one-note for much of the movie it's hard to see him as a legitimate actor. I can imagine that after his short-lived success with his album Underage Thinking in 2006 went nowhere, he's looking jealously towards the increasingly manic fandom of The Jonas Brothers, wondering where it all went wrong.

The music in The Rocker is manufactured almost as much as a Disney multimedia franchise, only much less successful. Geiger and the modern A.D.D. band are obviously going for that 'tween rock sound somewhere between The All-American Rejects, Boys Like Girls and any number of the Fueled By Ramen label cohorts. They're all catchy enough, but nothing inspires. Worse that, not a single song is played in its entirety. Seems the writers concocted a verse and a chorus and settled at that. Had they made full-length songs and released them before the film comes out, income-flushed ten-year-olds might be almost as excited to see this as they were for Camp Rock and High School Musical 3.

If Rainn Wilson is ever going to come out of the shadow of Dwight Schrute, he needs a better outing than this. The Rocker seemed like a limp idea that Wilson was able to jump on in an effort to give himself some public face time. Unfortunately, plain and simple, this isn't the kind of movie that will take him to the top of the charts.

TOP 10 NEW DIRECTORS

2008-07-23T14:12:00.000-07:00

_
This is a list of the 10 best directors who made their first full-length, at least somewhat widely released film, within the past 15 years. So with apologies to Quentin Tarantino, Peter Jackson, David Fincher, Cameron Crowe, Alfonso Cuaron, and Ang Lee lovers (I <3 them too and they would be high on the list), they and other directors missed the cutoff with films that preceded 1993.

I was amazed after I compiled the list just how international the directors are. While not all of them were raised in the respective countries they were born in, we have two Americans, two Brits, two from France, one Australian, one Brazilian, one from Mexico and one from India.

That said, I tried to pick directors over their body of work, not just who is hot at the moment. Many of the honorable mentions in the next paragraph have at least one excellent film, but probably didn't crack the list because of a smaller sampling size to judge or erratic projects that I haven't seen or wasn't widely seen.

The Honorable Mentions:

Marc Forster, Guy Ritchie, George Clooney, Paul Greengrass, Spike Jonze, Darren Aronofsky, Alexander Payne, Kevin Smith, Richard Linklater, Sofia Coppola, Judd Apatow, Danny Boyle

The TOP 10

10. M. NIGHT SHYAMALAN

Shyamalan has a bad rap these days. It almost seems like ancient times that he was the golden boy of Hollywood after The Sixth Sense and the criminally underseen Unbreakable. Even with his worst films, they are derided because of Shyamalan's promise as a director, not because they are outright terrible. There are still some definite pieces of his newer films that he can bring himself back together to make another cohesively commerical and critical hit, but time will tell.

Selected Works:
Wide Awake (1998)
The Sixth Sense (1999)
Unbreakable (2000)
Signs (2002)
The Village (2004)
Lady In The Water (2006)
The Happening (2008)

9. GUILLERMO DEL TORO

Like many on this list, del Toro gives us an uncompromised vision of what he enjoys in filmmaking, and yet at the same time usually rewards his audience with a good story. Anyone that can make a sequel to Blade better than it should be deserves some props. It will be interesting to see if del Toro can contend with The Hobbit, following the sterling work of Peter Jackson, but at the same time knowing his unusual penchant for the macabre creatures he dreams up, it should be a treat in its own way.

Selected Works:
Mimic (1997)
El Espinazo del Diablo (The Devil's Backbone) (2001)
Blade II (2002)
Hellboy (2004)
El Laberinto del Fauno (Pan's Labyrinth) (2006)
Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008)
The Hobbit (2011)

8. FERNANDO MEIRELLES

Finding his way through the movie system of Brazil, Meirelles worked on experimental films and children's television before he and his friends' production company made Domesticas (Maids) in 2001. This afforded him to film Cidade de Deus (City Of God) in 2002, which with it's gritty but almost authentic storytelling became an international hit and earned him a rare Best Director nomination for a foreign film from the Academy Awards. Meirelles got more acclaim on his first English language feature The Constant Gardener, and from there he is all but destined to become a top-line Hollywood director.

Selected Works:
Domesticas (Maids) (2001)
Cidade de Deus (2002)
The Constant Gardener (2005)
Blindness (2008)

7. FRANK DARABONT

This French-born director can be considered Stephen King's personal book-to-screen adaptater, but assuming he's made all of King's most critical films, there's nothing wrong with it. King's books have usually been hit or miss, with many of them ranging from ultra campy to middling, so with Darabont's take on The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile, it's easy to see the disparity. As a screenwriter Darabont wrote horror films in the 1980s, including A Nightmare On Elm Street 3, The Blob, and The Fly II.

Selected Works:
The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
The Green Mile (1999)
The Majestic (2001)
The Mist (2007)

6. MICHEL GONDRY

The former music video autuer turned movie director, Gondry's films can be said to veer largely off the mainstream path. The Frenchman has also taken flak for being lost in a world of quirky and surreal imagery, but no heart without a script by Oscar winner Charlie Kaufman. But it's undoubtedly true that he has an unique vision and feel for the camera that many directors would give their entire lives for.

Selected Works:
Human Nature (2001)
Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind (2004)
Block Party (2005)
La Science Des Reves (The Science Of Sleep) (2006)
Be Kind Rewind (2008)

5. MEL GIBSON

All jokes aside, let's face it; the man knows how to make a movie. He commandeered himself to great heights in Braveheart, and then crafted the most widely scrutinized religious movie ever released. Some may claim his filmmaking is sensationalism and bombastic, but even so Gibson has a flair for the powerful and dramatic. His acting and his off-screen troubles have hindered his chance to be a steady director, which may have increased his respectability as a director.

Selected Works:
The Man Without A Face (1993)
Braveheart (1995)
The Passion Of The Christ (2004)
Apocalypto (2006)

4. SAM MENDES

Mendes came out of pretty much nowhere (London stage, but Variety doesn't really report that) to blow critics away with American Beauty in 1999, his directorial debut in film. His films tend to paint a stirring portrait of the behind-the-scenes of everyday life, whether it's in suburban homes or on a foreign battlefield. He has since popped up every three years with films that have gone on to be at least above average in reviews, and looks poised to make a big run at the awards in 2008 with the Leonardo DiCaprio film Revolutionary Road. Mendes also is done filming his first true comedy, Farlanders, set for 2009.

Selected Works:
American Beauty (1999)
Road To Perdition (2002)
Jarhead (2005)
Revolutionary Road (2008)
Farlanders (2009)

3. WES ANDERSON

Some critics of Wes Anderson's works will point out the striking similarities in themes and texture in almost all of his films. Paternal abandonment, greedy children, damaged and forbidden love. Some claim that, like the works of Michel Gondry, Anderson's movies are never as fully realized without the script help of his favorite star, Owen Wilson. But for every critic who has tired of Anderson's so-real-it's-fake French-inspired retro vintage chic world of snappy, obscure pop songs, there are plenty more like myself who enjoy them.

Selected Works:
Bottle Rocket (1996)
Rushmore (1998)
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (2004)
The Darjeeling Limited (2007)
The Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)

2. CHRISTOPHER NOLAN

This lifelong filmmaking Londoner got a running start in 1998 with the short, gritty British neo-noir crime drama Following, and from there patchworked a resume that escalated from small, critically acclaimed thrillers to ones that changed the whole way of how superhero movies should be looked at. His other films are also considered mini masterpieces by most people as well. When Insomnia is the weakest link of your mainstream career, you know you're a good director indeed.

Selected Works:
Following (1998)
Memento (2000)
Insomnia (2002)
Batman Begins (2005)
The Prestige (2006)
The Dark Knight (2008)

1. PAUL THOMAS ANDERSON

If there's been any director that resembles Stanley Kubrick in the department of haphazard scheduling of work but garnering instantly classic praise, Anderson would win hands down. PTA has only crafted 5 full length films in the past 12 years, 2 in this decade. But with each release his films have tended to be more focused, ekeing out some of the best performances of his stars' lives. With it, more kudos and scrutiny. He is also one of the few directors working that gets to write and produce every script he directs, a rarity in films that get a chance to ascend the independent realm.

Selected Works:
Hard Eight (1996)
Boogie Nights (1997)
Magnolia (1999)
Punch-Drunk Love (2002)
There Will Be Blood (2007)

Featured Review: DARK KNIGHT

2008-07-20T10:02:00.000-07:00

The Dark Knight

Starring- Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Gary Oldman, Eric Roberts, Anthony Michael Hall, William Fichtner, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman

Directed by Christopher Nolan

Grade: A

"Some men just want to watch the world burn."

The Dark Knight, after months and months of hype, anticipation, reflection on the death of Heath Ledger and so forth, is still nothing short of amazing. It is an exhilarating, exhausting thrill ride that is also as darkly Gothic and rich in storyline as almost any cinematic drama comes. Director Christopher Nolan takes visual cues from all the best heist films and elevates Knight into a class of superhero movies unto itself. His actors take it into something beyond superhero.

It is certainly not the greatest film of all-time, or for me, even a perfect five star/A+ movie. Indeed it is one of the greatest action movies of all-time, if not the best. The acting, the story, just about everything is an achievement in a film that revolves around pyrotechnic sequences. But while the spectacle and effects are downright breathtaking, it doesn't completely excuse The Dark Knight from its minor flaws. Rather, it just pushes them aside and let us enjoy an incredible experience.

We welcome billionaire Bruce Wayne and his crime fighting alter ego Batman (Christian Bale) back after a short ebb in crime. Having put away the most dastardly of villains behind the mask, Wayne finds that the real hero now is Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), a very public District Attorney. Dent is the man that can do no wrong, and his judicial powers of locking up large quantities of the Mob gives the public reason to believe they don't need Batman anymore. That is of course, until The Joker (Heath Ledger), a nefarious madman without a soul, begins to ramp up his murderous mayhem sprees. But neither Batman nor Dent have the right tools to battle with a man who has no motive or conscious, blurring the line between what's right and what's wrong. For that, both will pay some major sacrifices.

The performances of course, is the centerpiece of the film, and they are all stunning. In fact, as good of an actor as Bale is, both in this film and his career resume (The Prestige, 3:10 To Yuma, American Psycho), he is perhaps the WORST one in this movie. His caped crusader voice, gruff and raspy, is one of the few very minor things that kept me from giving The Dark Knight a perfect score. It's rare to see the leading actor, especially one that revolves around a big budgeted costumed protagonist, be so outshone by some of his supporting cast. Bale was solid, and again shows he's much better suited for the part than George Clooney or Val Kilmer was, but the other actors were just that much superior.

The first and most obviously is Heath Ledger in his final major role. The buildup that has surrounded his death and performance nearly choked me to death, but it is easy to see why. As the Joker, he completely immerses himself with the character and becomes one of the darkest, creepiest, and most well-written villains in cinematic history. Nobody in Gotham knows his story, yet the entire world seems to understand that he is the deeply disturbed type that just can't be reasoned with. Ledger gives one of his finest performances here, making the Joker a real, if absolutely wacko, villain, something that Jack Nicholson and Cesar Romero failed to do.

But for all the scrutiny surrounded on Ledger's role, somewhat lost in the shuffle is Aaron Eckhart. As Harvey Dent he is magnificent as the everyday hero, mixing in a bit of cockiness with an increasing weariness of the battle against crime that he's losing. All he wants is for his city to be a safe place, to be able to take his girlfriend, Bruce Wayne flame Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal, replacing Queen of Scientology Katie Holmes) out and not be harassed by crime. He is, as the city officials call him a "white knight". After the Joker initiates a terrible disaster that destroys him both physically and mentally (some awesomely sick effects, like a human exoskeleton from the Terminator movies), he himself goes on a spree of terror, infinitely beating the trash out of Billy Dee Williams' Dent in Tim Burton's Batman, and Tommy Lee Jones' Two-Face performance in Batman Forever. Both Eckhart and Ledger deserve Supporting Actor nominations.

Let's not forget Gary Oldman as James Gordon, Michael Caine as Alfred Pennyworth, and Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox. All are consummate actors who could have phoned in their roles because in the beginning The Dark Knight doesn't seem like the award potential type. But they, and Oldman especially, are just as solid to watch here as in many of their movies. Gyllenhaal herself improves the Rachel Dawes character more than Holmes ever could.

The only plot thread that bothered me was the fate of The Joker. (This paragraph has spoilers, so don't read it if you haven't seen the film). In the original cut of the film, The Joker supposedly kills himself. But out of sensitivity to Ledger's death, the last we see of him is being caught on a high wire and swarmed by SWAT members. But after it was shown how he could so easily escape from jail, wouldn't it be easy to assume he could break out any time he wanted to? It would've helped to have some finality, especially considering the fate of Ledger proving nearly impossible to resurrect the character in this Nolan canon of the Batman series.

But those gripes are just tiny insignificant specks in an otherwise large, masterful film. Christopher Nolan, with Memento under his belt has taken that rich history of dark dramas that get award voters in a tizzy and made it mainstream for the factions of the movie going public that only see box office actioners. He and his actors prove that, like graphic novels are to comic books, action movies can have a brilliant and deep storyline.

All praise aside to the first two Spider-Man films, but The Dark Knight is possibly the richest superhero movie of them all. And that's no joke.

Advanced Review: PINEAPPLE EXPRESS

2008-07-18T12:40:00.000-07:00

This is an advanced review for the August 8th release Pineapple Express. We will revisit the review when the film is released to the general public. To see the DVD mini-review of Martin Lawrence's Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins, Click Here

Pineapple Express

Starring- Seth Rogen, James Franco, Gary Cole, Rosie Perez, Danny McBride, Amber Heard, Kevin Corrigan, Craig Robinson, Ed Begley Jr, Nora Dunn.

Directed by David Gordon Green

Grade: B-

"Thug life!"

Marijuana smokers rejoice. Pineapple Express becomes the first box office wide release since 1998's Half Baked to make no qualms about it's weed-y roots. Trying to create a new breed of film with over-the-top violence and action coupled with dirty, raunchy humor and gloriously unabashed love for the plant drug, Pineapple Express tries to do too much, and ends up doing way too little.

Opinion-takers at the advanced screening were asking patrons if it was the next Cheech & Chong. Not that Cheech & Chong is such a good movie to want to compare praise to, but Pineapple Express is not only inferior to the former film, but it's a black mark on Seth Rogen's otherwise sterling Apatow-linked career. Freaks & Geeks, Undeclared, The 40-Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, Superbad, all great shows and movies. Pineapple Express? Disappointing.

Rogen stars as Dale Denton, a subpoena server who is inexplicably dating a teenager in high school. And he really, really, loves pot. Off the bat he witnesses a drug kingpin (Office Space's Gary Cole) and a saucy little policewoman (Rosie Perez) murder one of the sons of his main rival. They connect Dale to the crime scene thanks to his rare 'Pineapple Express' joint, and thus sets off a chain of who's-working-for-who scenarios involving his pot dealer Saul (Spider-Man's James Franco), two hitmen (Kevin Corrigan, Craig Robinson) and Saul's own middleman Red (Danny McBride). Dale and Saul bond as their adventure reaches its climax.

The humor, both marijuana-related and otherwise, have some extremely funny moments. But for every joke that hits, there are just as many that are extremely awkward to sit through. The cast was obviously going for that semi-improvisational, stream-of-consciousness feel that Apatow ekes so well out of his directed cast, but for Rogen and director David Gordon Green, it just throws the film's pacing out the window. Granted that success rate is much better than most other comedians' films this year, but for Rogen, we the audience expected better. The funniest parts of the redband trailer, as well as the awesome song "Paper Planes" by M.I.A., are literally M.I.A. from the film.

James Franco steals the movie performance-wise, but maybe it's because the rest of the cast fails to inspire. Franco seems genuine as Saul, a stoned loser who just wants companionship. He often has the best lines in the film and we tend to care about him over Dale. Rogen on the other hand is actually sort of annoying and loud, and when the scenes get packed with quick reactionary moments, he exposes himself to still be a green actor.

The other players are one-note at best. Gary Cole has very little personality, playing his drug lord as almost a straight villain. Rosie Perez hasn't been in a film I've seen since God knows when, and I STILL can't understand her when she talks. Kevin Corrigan and Craig Robinson (of Grounded For Life and The Office respectively) are more awkward than funny, and Danny McBride's one good line in the movie-- "Thug life!"-- is in the trailers. The clumsy ending involving Rogen, Franco and McBride, was seriously anti-climatic.

Why is Dale dating a high school girl? Statutory Rape aside, they never explained it, nor does it make a lot of sense, even for a movie like this. If she was ugly, or if Rogen was particularly good-looking, then maybe I'd get it. Or if she was only using him for free drugs, I'd totally understand. But from all accounts none of that was the case, and we are forced to believe that model/actress Amber Heard (Hidden Hills, Never Back Down) genuinely wants to date a scuzzy 25-year-old subpoena server who looks like he's 35. How much of a boner/ego did Rogen get while writing this idea?

For the longest time I was a fan of Seth Rogen, years before he became the warty toad prince of raunchy but pathos-driven R-rated comedy. From Freaks and Geeks to Undeclared, popping up in minuscule roles in Donnie Darko and Anchorman, he was very much under appreciated. Judd Apatow gave him a chance at screen-time in The 40 Year Old Virgin, which led to bona fide stardom in Knocked Up. Now he is no longer the dirty Seth Rogen with a cult fan base but Seth Rogen, the dirty Hollywood multi-tasking entity.

Pineapple Express could have been a resplendent example, setting up a template for more films of the same cloth. But something here did not click at all, at least not from the Rogen Wing of the School of Apatow. Maybe it was the budget. Maybe it was the director (who previously helmed the extravagantly different drama Snow Angels). Maybe they all were affected too much by the stage weed on set. Whatever it was, Pineapple Express failed to rocket to the pinnacle of our funny bones.

Actor Spotlight: JOSEPH GORDON-LEVITT

2008-07-16T17:00:00.000-07:00

This is the 3rd in a series of Actor Spotlights. To read about the aptly titled The Life Before Her Eyes, starring Uma Thurman and Evan Rachel Wood, or to check out the decidedly Joseph Gordon-Levitt less clunker Never Back Down, click here.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is only 27, but he has transformed himself through a lifetime's worth of roles. As a child he flapped his arms for a last place baseball team. As a teenager he was an elderly information officer for a group of clueless aliens. As a formidable adult, he had become the prince of mentally damaged and deficient independent film characters. In 2009, he rises to the top of the box office in the unusual role of 'Cobra Commander' for the G.I. Joe screen treatment. Yes, at 27, Levitt has come full circle, if in the form of a jagged oval.

But don't let his double surname and road through art houses across America fool you, Levitt is up for anything that gives him a challenge. He's remarked several times about the integrity and longevity of his career in the face of some of his less-successful childhood peers.

"Success is not important to me, nor are power or money. If the script feels good, then I'm in. It's that simple."

Born Joseph Leonard Gordon-Levitt on February 17, 1981 in Los Angeles, California, Levitt started in local stage productions at age four. From there talent agents booked him in commercials, including Saturday morning staples as Cocoa Puffs and Pop-Tarts. Progressing as a normal late 1980's child actor should, he picked up a dearth of roles in made for television movies, including a Dark Shadows remake in 1990, which was picked up for a 12 episode series.

After popping up in guest appearances on Family Ties and Murder, She Wrote, Levitt debuted in theatres in 1992 with a background role in Beethoven and a minor role in A River Runs Through It. Also in that year he was a regular on his second short-lived television series, the NBC situation comedy The Powers That Be, the creators of which would go on to develop Friends, and co-starring future Fraiser star David Hyde Pierce. Levitt himself would return to NBC in 4 years.

As the typical child actor of his generation went, while recurring on Roseanne, Gordon-Levitt snagged two lead roles in 1994. In Holy Matrimony, a one-joke plot about a reckless Patricia Arquette marrying a young Canadian Hutterite, Levitt plays Ezekiel, the young man who must step in and marry Arquette's character when his older brother dies. Hilarity ensues.

The more widely seen role that year however came in the form of the summer remake of Angels In The Outfield. Replacing the Pittsburgh Pirates of the original with the titular team from Los Angeles (nee California), and packing it with family friendly special effects, Outfield was a hit. Packed with stars and future stars of the time including Danny Glover, Christopher Lloyd, Tony Danza, Matthew McConaughey, and Adrian Brody, Outfield pushed Levitt into the A-list of adolescent actors.

Gordon-Levitt appeared as Demi Moore's son in The Juror, a big budget crime thriller co-starring Alec Baldwin, Anne Heche, and pre-Sopranos James Gandolfini. But it was his third television pilot, third with NBC, that gave him stability.

For six seasons Gordon-Levitt co-starred as 'Tommy Solomon' in 3rd Rock From The Sun, an absurdist situation comedy about a group of aliens who descend to Earth to learn about the culture, only to be stuck there. The show was very much a vehicle for John Lithgow, with a breakout role of sorts for French Stewart, but along with Kristen Johnston, Levitt rounded out the foursome of characters in a way that made a far-fetched plot marginally work for an amazing 6 years.

While in the employ of NBC, Levitt appeared in a couple of hit films during the late 1990s. Halloween H2O saw the return of series original Jamie Lee Curtis, while 10 Things I Hate About You was a teen cult favorite starring heartthrobs Heath Ledger and Julia Stiles, meant to be a companion piece to Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet. This would be the last mainstream role Levitt would appear in for quite some time.

After leaving 3rd Rock as a regular in it's last season in 2000, Levitt attended Columbia University and took an interest in French studies and the arts. It wasn't until late 2001 that he decided to get back into acting. But if he was to do it, he wanted roles that were interesting to play, not ones that would make him a star.

"The whole concept of celebrity pisses me off. While I'm not a celebrity, it's such a weird concept that society has cooked up for us. Astronauts and teachers are much more amazing than actors."

Aside from voicing the main role of Jim Hawkins in one of Disney's last hand-drawn efforts Treasure Island in 2002, what came forth has been a string of gritty independent film that for the most part has been critically lauded.

Starting in 2001, Levitt got his 'disturbed man' chops in Manic, co-starring Don Cheadle and Zooey Deschanel. His portrayal of an unbalanced teen in a juvenile psychiatric ward earned rave reviews from the festival circuit. By the time it was released in 2003, Levitt was already appearing in the gay Mormon film Latter Days and filming the Anne Hathaway drama Havoc, about hip-hop influenced suburbanites who get caught up with real inner-city gangsters.

2004 saw perhaps his most controversial role, that of child abuse victim and gay prostitute Neil McCormick in Mysterious Skin. It was here that Levitt began to get noticed as an all-out independent film risk-taker.

With Brick in 2006, Levitt earned his most critical reviews to date as Brendan Frye, a teenage detective of sorts who must weave through the corruption that has embodied the cliques at his high school. With old school dialogue, a winning script and all the style of a classic film noir, Brick showed Levitt to be capable of taking a dramatic lead and nailing it on its head wonderfully.

2007 saw more of the same with a similar smaller budget crime thriller The Lookout. Going back to the mentally polluted origins of Manic, Levitt quietly helmed the story of a young man with brain damage and short-term memory loss who gets taken in by criminals who use him to rob the bank he works at.

After his Elmore Leonard adaptation Killshot, co-starring Diane Lane, Thomas Jane and Rosario Dawson, got shelved after two years of release date limbo, Levitt appeared in the MTV film Stop-Loss. Again playing a man with mental problems, this time because of his service in the Iraq War, Stop-Loss received mixed reviews and an even worse fate at the box office.

But for Joseph Gordon-Levitt, it's far from a downslope in his career. Ascending into a more sizable spotlight, he has 6 projects awaiting release or is in production. The first of these is the highly anticipated and possibly award-aspiring Spike Lee directed The Miracle Of St. Anna. As a modern day news reporter interested in the story of four African American soldiers in Italy during World War II, his role isn't large, but it's certainly an integral part of the film.

Later in the year should come two independent romances. The comedy 500 Days of Summer, reuniting Levitt's Manic co-star Zooey Deschanel. In it, Levitt plays a hopeless romantic who falls in love with Deschanel, a scorned woman after years of broken hearts. The drama Uncertainty pits him with Olivia Thirlby (Juno, Snow Angels).

2009 may be the year he breaks out, at least as a mainstream actor. Despite an aversion for celebrity, he will be the titular villain boss and commander of the Cobras in the August 9th, 2009 release of G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra, co-starring friend and frequent collaborator Channing Tatum among many others. While most of the stars have had pictures of their characters released, Levitt's is kept under wraps. It's a highly visible role, but Levitt is playing it for other reasons.

"What attracted me to being in G.I. Joe was when they showed me the drawings of the character that I was going to get to play. I love the idea of just getting to play something way, way larger and huger than life. G.I. Joe is not layered or profound at all; it's just a big thrill ride."

Also a cause for excitement is Akira, a live action imagining of the influential 1988 Japanese manga, rumored to be co-starring Leonardo DiCaprio. The scripting was derailed at first because of the writer's strike and the possible actor's strike may delay it further, but it could have a late 2009/2010 release. Gordon-Levitt also was in talks to star in a romantic comedy titled The Frog King, but as of this writing the project is not in production.

From a kid shilling toaster pastries to wearing a hooded mask in next summer's largest spectacle, with all of his gritty, spirited roles in between, Gordon Levitt has continually been acclaimed one of America's best young actors. At 27, and with an unconventional head on his shoulders, it's only expected of him to produce more films of the ilk for many years to come.

The Prezzies' Top 5 Joseph Gordon-Levitt Performances
1. Brick
2. The Lookout
3. Manic
4. Stop-Loss
5. Angels In The Outfield

Indie Review: KIT KITTREDGE

2008-07-14T13:36:00.000-07:00

To see mini-reviews of chick flicks Mad Money and 27 Dresses, click here.

Kit Kittredge: An American Girl

Starring- Abagail Breslin, Julia Ormand, Chris O'Donnell, Zach Mills, Max Thieriot, Willow Smith, Jane Krakowski, Wallace Shawn, Colin Mochrie, Glenne Headley, Joan Cusack, Stanley Tucci.

Directed by Patricia Rozema

Grade: A

"I will decline... and laugh."

Kit Kittredge: An American Girl is the type of film that is immediately pigeon-holed into the kind of territory lost on major critic review, and more importantly, the demographics that define what's popular in the United States. And that's a real shame, for Kit Kittredge is a surprisingly engaging and charming movie that harks back to an old-fashioned kind of story-telling and direction that gives kids a chance to take a breather from the glut of "family friendly" action comedies.

Most G-rated films are vapid, and do nothing to further teach their audience anything new. Producers and filmmakers mistake a G-rating for 'clean' and 'safe', forgetting that just because there isn't any dirty language or violent thematic elements, doesn't mean they can't touch on serious subjects and craft a fine film that while being defined a 'family film', can be seen by anyone. Writer Ann Peacock and director Patricia Rozema do just that.

Based on one of the once popular line of American Girl dolls (in days before Bratz, and mostly for upper-middle class little girls), Kit Kittredge stars Abigail Breslin as the titular character, an intelligent and guile ten year old who dreams of being a reporter. Her family is well-off in Depression era Cincinnati, Ohio, but soon the increasing financial troubles that are spreading around her neighborhood hit home. Kit's father (Chris O'Donnell) loses his job and goes in search of a new one in Chicago, and her mother (Julia Ormand) is forced to bring in boarders and sell eggs to make ends meet.

Here is where Kit gets the bulk of its story. Kit gets involved with a host of quirky but friendly roommates staying at the house, including Miss Dooley (Jane Krakowski), a flirty single dancer, Mrs. Howard and her son Stirling (Glenne Headley and Zach Mills), a stern mother who's husband also leaves the city to find work, Miss Bond (Joan Cusack), a wacky bookmobile driver, and Jefferson Berk (Stanley Tucci), a down-on-his-luck magician. She also befriends two child hobos (Max Thieriot and Willow Smith, daughter of Will), who get discriminated against. When a couple robberies take place and the hobo community is placed at blame, Kit goes on the case.

What makes Kit Kittredge so unique, whether it was rated G or PG or NC-17, is that it's a rare and well done look at a serious issue through a child's eye. It doesn't trivialize the ugly truth of the Great Depression, rather just offers bits and pieces of it through the embodiment of a ten year old child who never had to deal with poverty, let alone understand it at first.

The performances are first-rate for a children's film. Breslin commands her screen-time as Kit, and it's hard to decide if she's acting beyond her years or is just in fact so perfectly in tune with playing a little girl. O'Donnell does a great job as well, playing the downtrodden father who just wants what's best for his family, even in the face of his mistakes. While Cusack and Tucci bring the last act of the film into a bit of a tailspin with some goofy antics, their performances are fun and light. Even Who's Line Is It Anyways?'s Colin Mochrie gets some heartfelt screen time.

For a small, independently financed family movie, Kit Kittredge is a pretty amazing achievement. I noticed a distinct difference in the attitudes and parenting of people who brought children in to see this film and the ones that took them to see Meet Dave. They are the ones that can appreciate an old-fashioned quality film that doesn't give our youth reason to develop ADHD, but rather to be sensitive, thoughtful little people like Kit. In a generation of girls growing up on Bratz and Hannah Montana, she is a proper role model.

Featured Review: HELLBOY 2

2008-07-13T13:01:00.000-07:00

For the mini-review of the sequel to 'Step Up', discreetly titled Step Up 2 The Streets, click here.

Hellboy II: The Golden Army

Starring- Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Doug Jones, Jeffrey Tambor, Seth MacFarlane, Luke Goss, Anna Walton, John Hurt.

Directed by Guillermo del Toro

Grade: C

"Now you've pissed me off!"

Guillermo del Toro is a visionary genius of the fantastical and imaginary. Anyone who has seen Pan's Labyrinth, whether they appreciate fantasy or war epics or not, can attest to the wonderful ideas and creatures del Toro comes up with in that brain of his. But with Hellboy II: The Golden Army, those mythical beings, while at times still resonate some amazing imagery, also begin to wear on your senses. At what point do the monsters and beings go from visionary delight, to being strange, random costumes for weirdness' sake?

I admit I have not seen the original Hellboy as of this writing. But I can surmise that at the time, before Pan, before many of the glut of fantasy novels turned big screen film treatments came out, Hellboy was fresh and unique. Iron Man, Hancock and Hulk claim to have the summer's darkest superhero, but that distinction clearly belongs to Hellboy and his close friends. But while the humanity of the movie is not to be ignored, the bizarre aspects are hard to look over either, and for me, not in a good way.

After a short opening with a young Hellboy being read to about the titular Golden Army by his caretaker (John Hurt), we meet him again in the present day during a crisis with his girlfriend, fellow U.S. government operative and superhuman outcast Liz (Selma Blair). She doesn't feel appreciated by him, et cetera, and Abe Sapien, a cetacean being with psychometry powers, discovers a personal secret of hers.

All of this must be worked out during an investigation concerning an auction house melee, to which the three find is part of a larger, ages old mystery concerning said Golden Army. It seems the elf son of the King who disposed of the army wants his revenge, and is out to seek the necessary parts to reignite it. Naturally if he succeeds, mankind is doomed.

Granted del Toro did not create the main characters, who are based from the Dark Horse comics in the 1990s. For better or worse, they are a good group; interesting, complex, and often mimic that of real people with feelings both sensible and irrational. Ron Perlman is enjoyable as the misunderstood and sometimes misguided, fun-loving Hellboy. He has a large personality, and Perlman portrays Hellboy nicely without letting the red makeup sell the character for him. Abe Sapien is a great realization as well. His loneliness yet impeccable pluckiness makes for a solid sidekick.

However, it's the secondary and background characters that get heady. For every eclectic but cool being such as the headless ectoplasmic Johann Krauss (voiced by Family Guy's Seth MacFarlane), there's mutants like The Angel Of Death and The Chamberlain (both played by Doug Jones, who wears the Abe Sapien suit), and the plant creature Hellboy fights with. These kinds of characters scream the work of del Toro; gangly, skinny, grotesque.

As good as it is to see the filmmaker hark back to older days of makeup rather than CGI, at what point do scenes seem wholly original, and not inspired by a glut of other fantasy films? When Hellboy and Abe scour the underground paranormal market, del Toro cuts to many vendors and patrons with capricious looks, showing off his makeup team's effort in bringing unearthly mutants to life. But doesn't the whole sequence feel as familiar as the cantina scene in the original Star Wars?

Hellboy II: The Golden Army is an ambitious undertaking, something viewers don't always see when it comes to sequels, especially ones released smack dab in the middle of the summer season. But for all that's worth, it just doesn't succeed cohesively enough to garner major kudos. Perhaps after feeling lukewarm to the other weekend fantasy films Journey to the Center of the Earth and Meet Dave, del Toro himself can give me an exercise into appreciating the works of the imaginary. I just pray if Hellboy 3 is made, there are no Shrek-like hellbabies running loose.

Featured Review: MEET DAVE

2008-07-12T12:40:00.000-07:00

Meet Dave

Starring Eddie Murphy (x2), Elizabeth Banks, Gabrielle Union, Ed Helms, Scott Caan, Mike O'Malley, Pat Kilbane, Kevin Hart, Judah Friedlander.

Directed by Brian Robbins

Grade: D

"I am Dave... Dave... Ming... Chang."

Perhaps the only thing more disturbing than Eddie Murphy's character of the alien spaceship vessel Dave, is Eddie Murphy's career. This is a man who captured a generation of post-Richard Pryor fans with his vulgar and obscenely hilarious stand-up comedy. This is a man who has been in respectable comedies such as the Beverly Hills Cop and 48 Hrs franchises, Coming To America, and dare I say The Nutty Professor and Bowfinger. This is a man who has plied his trade in family films (Shrek, Mulan, Dr. Dolittle, The Haunted Mansion, Daddy Day Care), and just TWO YEARS AGO almost won an Oscar for Dreamgirls.

This is a man who causes himself self-harm, and wants to destroy his career.

What in the name of Hollywood's holiest possesses Murphy to be involved in these kinds of films? Is it the money? The star power? The complete lack of a smart agent to dissuade him from making a complete joke out of himself? Let's get this out right now; Meet Dave is legitimately funny. Funnier than perhaps Adam Sandler's Zohan and Mike Myers' Love Guru combined. But the movie itself is so terrible, from the plot to the acting to the ridiculousness of the whole asinine thing, you have to wonder if Meet Dave is less a comedy but an actual autobiography of the inner workings of Murphy's own brain.

Murphy stars as Dave, the fictional name of the human-like spaceship that crash lands near the Statue of Liberty. He is made in the likeness of the ship's captain, also played by Murphy. The crew of several hundred all work throughout the ship's body to control Dave's functions, which doesn't work as smoothly as planned. He is flanked by his number two man Number Two (The Office's Ed Helms) and pretty soldier Number Three (Gabrielle Union). They are on Earth to deplete its' water source for their own dying planet, but are side-tracked after being hit by Gina Morrison (Elizabeth Banks) and bonding with her son Josh. The encounters the ship faces with Earth people begin to have a major effect on all the alien inhabitants in vastly different ways.

The plot is point blank, terrible. It plays out way less confusing than it sounds, and then has a sub plot involving two cops (Scott Caan and Mike O'Malley) who investigate the crash. I'm fortunate never to have seen The Adventures of Pluto Nash, but I can't imagine it being much more ridiculous than Dave.

Things play out as they lie, mining humor from sources with little effort. The nerdy-looking alien in charge of the ship's engineering (30 Rock's Judah Friedlander) becomes a Myspace addict, the security officer (Pat Kilbane, original MADtv member) sees 12 seconds of Broadway's A Chorus Line and becomes flamboyantly gay, the repairman (Kevin Hart) gets drunk and listens to hip-hop and becomes a loud-mouthed stereotype. And so on and so on.

Murphy himself, while awful, is at least kind of humorous. His attacks on the audiences' funny bone comprises mostly of goofy faces, odd voices, literal interpretations, sight gags, and random dialogue. It can tend to be kind of self-centered in the vein of "let's see how much screen time I can fit my face onto", but he fares better than Myers this summer, and is slightly more restraint than his other multi-character movies such as the recent Norbit. Still doesn't excuse the fact that as Dave he is really, really-- and I mean really-- disturbing. I don't think I've seen an actor blankly smile so much since at least Murphy's Holy Man.

The addition of Helms could be considered a minor bright spot. As the second in command who eventually becomes overstimulated with power, he brings some of his humorous persona from The Office with him. A couple of his quips are some of the funniest in the movie.

The romantic interest between Dave and Banks' character Gina is extremely awkward. She tries earnestly to forge some kind of intimate connection with him, despite the fact he's quite obviously not right in the head, let alone actually a complex alien spaceship. How desperate is she if she's still hanging out with him after witnessing his obvious lack of emotional connection and strange demeanor? This character/plot advancement is the perfect reason why you can't expect anything good out of a movie like Meet Dave.

I couldn't quite tell if I was laughing out loud because it was genuinely funny or if it was so ridiculous that it's a gut reaction. But in a year of mostly joyless star vehicles so far, at least Murphy found a way to eke a little entertainment out of his expectations. But if he is to ever regain any amount of respect he had from the 1980s, Murphy needs to go back to his roots and ditch the Eddie Murphy brand name.

After this newest box office disaster (estimates from Friday placed the film in 7th with a paltry $1.7 million take), Murphy needs to put away Meet Dave and take out an old photograph to meet Eddie Murphy circa 1982. Where has he gone?

Featured Review: JOURNEY

2008-07-12T11:37:00.000-07:00

For the mini-review of the similarly apathetically received CGI family film The Spiderwick Chronicles, click HERE

Journey To The Center Of The Earth

Starring- Brendan Fraser, Josh Hutcherson, Anita Briem, Seth Meyers, Jean Michel Pare.

Directed by Eric Brevig

Grade: C+

"So, do you come here often?"

Journey to the Center of the Earth is proof that a full-blown CGI film can be made on the cheap. Granted $45 million isn't exactly cheap in a recession crisis when many Americans are struggling to pay $4 a gallon for gasoline, but compared to the astronomical budgets of other recent summer movies, Wall-E ($180 million), Hancock ($150), Iron Man ($140), and Kung Fu Panda ($130), Journey is small potatoes. But that's not to say the film's effects doesn't have its drawbacks.

Since the main gimmick for the movie is to watch it in 3-D, it may depend on how the viewer experiences the film in order to get full enjoyment out of it. We screened it without the 3-D projection, and at times it did feel like we were missing out on a key element. Several of the sight gags that the movie nearly went into a complete halt in the story for were quite obviously made specifically to give the 3-D audience a scare. Without the 3-D aspect, Journey just came off cheesy at those points.

The scenery for the center of the world is pretty enough, but also because of the extensive use of green-screen imaging going on, seems completely out of touch. Part of the wonder and amazement other worlds had on the effect of kids in the past was the hard work the crew put into making these set pieces. CGI can render some amazing things beyond people's wildest dreams, but Journey was second-rate at best. Nice to look at, but kind of a yawn to appreciate.

Rather than opting for a straight re-telling of the Jules Verne book, Journey attempts a quasi-parallel story involving the real book as a guide for the characters. Trevor Anderson (Fraser), a down-on-his-luck, largely ignored volcanic science professor, is in charge of his nephew Sean (Josh Hutcherson), the son of his deceased brother for the week. The two don't get along very well, but soon Trevor discovers an anomaly in one of his field research stations in Iceland, and is forced to bring his nephew along. After connecting with pretty mountain guide Hannah (Anita Briem), daughter of a prominent scientist who had connections with Trevor's brother, the three set off to check on his geological marker. What they end up with is a whole new adventure.

After apparently burrowing underneath the surface for a couple years, Brendan Fraser has re-emerged in 2008 with two family friendly big-budget action flicks over the summer, the first of which is Journey. He is largely in the mode of his piqued Fraser-ness, playing up the sappy good guy with corny one-liners and an exasperated mug. After hit or miss performances the past several years in less widely exposed films such as Crash and the neanderthal Crash wannabe The Air I Breathe, Fraser is found right where his true niche is; the American father figure with the heart of gold in family-oriented action comedies.

One plus going for the film is the fact it is central on the three characters, and not solely on random supporting cast or the CGI creatures that prey on them. In the beginning we see a cameo by Saturday Night Live chum Seth Meyers, but for the vast bulk of the film there are only the three of them, which gives the viewer a chance to spend more time developing a bond with each one. Granted, they are all more or less stereotypes of their respective age/gender/nationality, but for a family film it could've been much worse.

Journey to the Center of the Earth is one of the those mid-sized, middle-rate, mildly enjoyable films that are entertaining to watch, but will never be remembered for any one thing in particular. They go down, fight dinosaurs and venus fly traps, they come up, they want to explore the Lost City of Atlantis in a hopeful sequel. Pretty much standard fare for a hot summer day in July.

Since it topped out at 115 degrees deep in the mantle of the earth, perhaps next time they should consider having a journey to the center of Phoenix, Arizona. Play some golf, go hiking, get chased by snowbirds in dinosaur Buicks. It might make for just as an interesting adventure.

Prezzie Awards: 1998

2008-07-08T10:13:00.000-07:00

The year 1998: John Glenn became the oldest man in space around the same time Viagra started offering happy pills to old men. Brolin married Streisand, Uma married Ethan, Exxon married Mobil, El Nino came and went, and J.K. Rowling quietly released her first book. Jesse Ventura wrestled with the Minnesota government while the President of our United States claimed he "did not have sexual relations with that woman".

American grandmothers got "Jiggy Wit It", while the teenagers thought they were unique listening to Marilyn Manson. Hipsters in Los Angeles brought back Swing music during which Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa enchanted the public with their own swings. Children trained their Furby dolls while watching Teletubbies, while their siblings found their sensitive side on Dawson's Creek and their parents said goodbye to Seinfeld. Backstreet's back, alright.

At the box office, Titanic, despite being released the year before, still cruised at the top of charts for months to come. America found out there WAS something about a girl named Mary. The public couldn't get enough of seeing their towns and cities destroyed, with Deep Impact and Godzilla, and of course they didn't want to miss a thing in Armageddon.

Bugs invaded the big screen as Pixar released its long awaited follow-up to Toy Story with A Bug's Life, preceded by DreamWorks' Antz. We fought the future with The X-Files, got spun right round like a record with The Wedding Singer, and talked with the animals in Doctor Dolittle.

Saving Private Ryan was the year's most critical and commercial hit, gathering up $226 million, 11 Oscar Nominations and 5 wins. But the Academy in 1998 went crazy for Roberto Benigni, and fell into a passionate but short romance with Shakespeare In Love.

Here are the retrospective awards for 1998:

Top Ten List
1. American History X
2. The Truman Show
3. Pleasantville
4. Rushmore
5. Saving Private Ryan
6. There's Something About Mary
7. The Wedding Singer
8. A Simple Plan
9. The Big Lebowski
10. Shakespeare In Love

The Academy Award voters had a sweeping approval of Shakespeare In Love, and within a few short years most would rethink it. It's a good film, rated #10 here, but originality strikes true in films such as The Truman Show, Pleasantville, Rushmore, and The Big Lebowski. Comedies were well-served with two classics in There's Something About Mary and The Wedding Singer, while A Simple Plan was very much a Coen Brothers inspired drama. Saving Private Ryan should have been the big winner in the political sense.

Controversy aside, American History X is my top film of 1998. Whether or not director Tony Kaye's claims of editing by Edward Norton is true, whoever had the final cut made a masterful film. It is hard-hitting without being preachy, and we come to develop a complex hate yet affection for the mixed up characters who occupy the story. American History X derides the subject of white supremacy more than it condones it, but it also gives good reason to why some lost soul might believe in it, giving the film a powerful argument that something like Shakespeare In Love just doesn't quite have.

Bottom Five List
1. The Avengers
2. Godzilla
3. Psycho
4. Lost In Space
5. Ringmaster

All of these films are terrible, make no mistake. Ringmaster was Jerry Springer's vanity project right in the middle of America's fascination with cheating transvestite midget whores. Godzilla was a lame attempt at disaster franchising by master of terrible disaster movies Roland Emmerich. Psycho featured a shot-by-shot color remake of an original classic, starring Vince Vaughn as a serial killer and Anne Heche as a sexy vixen. Lost In Space was only 1998's SECOND worst film based on a sixties television classic.

The Avengers win the crown. First they take respectable actors such as Ralph Fiennes, Uma Thurman and Sean Connery, and change a quintessential British show into an American blockbuster. Then they attempt to make Thurman, never a prototypical "sexy" actress, into one of the UK's long favored characters, Emma Peel. Add Sean Connery in a terrible villain role (leading up to more suckitude in 2003's worst nominee The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen) and a pathetic excuse for a plot, and The Avengers is the worst film of 1998.

Best Actor:
Carrey, Jim (The Truman Show)
Norton, Edward (American History X)
Hanks, Tom (Saving Private Ryan)
Depp, Johnny (Fear & Loathing)
Benigni, Roberto (Life Is Beautiful)

With respect to the chair-hopping Benigni, this category is neck and neck between Carrey and Norton, for two wildly different roles. Carrey ekes out the win with his touching performance as the titular Truman, coming at a time when Ace Ventura 2 and The Cable Guy was still fresh on his resume. Norton, meanwhile, gives an amazing performance as a reformed white supremacist skinhead, but ends up losing the nod because in essence his character post-reform is still very much Norton.

Best Actress:
Allen, Joan (Pleasantville)
Blanchett, Cate (Elizabeth)
Paltrow, Gwyneth (Shakespeare In Love)
Linney, Laura (The Truman Show)
Diaz, Cameron (There's Something About Mary)

Blanchett and Paltrow would continue to catapult themselves into the strata of go-to dramatic actresses after their performances of mid-2nd millennium English women, but I've always had a low tolerance for Victorian era royal dramas. Instead, Allen, who has 3 Oscar nominations but was overlooked here, wins with a superb performance as the stereotypical 1950s American housewife who begins to develop her independence, courage, and inquisition.

Best Supporting Actor:
Daniels, Jeff (Pleasantville)
Harris, Ed (The Truman Show)
Thornton, Billy Bob (A Simple Plan)
Duvall, Robert (A Civil Action)
Del Toro, Benicio (Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas)

This is probably the toughest category to choose of the year. All five nominees were very good in their roles, but none of them truly stood out above any other. I've always been a fan of Jeff Daniels, so with his sweet and caring persona as sensitive soda shop jerk, he gets the nod over equally adept performances by Harris and Thornton.

Best Supporting Actress:
Williams, Olivia (Rushmore)
Dench, Judi (Shakespeare In Love)
Fonda, Bridget (A Simple Plan)
Berry, Halle (Bulworth)
Bates, Kathy (Primary Colors)

If Supporting Actor was the toughest to choose, Supporting Actress was the weakest crop to pick from. The Academy was criticized for giving Dench the win despite the minuscule role, but really there is not much to branch out on. I thought long and hard and went with Williams, as Rushmore was pretty much shafted by the end of the year. Williams gave a fine performance as the teacher who must contend with a precocious student, his wealthy mentor, and her recently deceased husband.

Best Director:
Spielberg, Steven (Saving Private Ryan)
Weir, Peter (The Truman Show)
Malick, Terence (The Thin Red Line)
Beatty, Warren (Bulworth)
Gallo, Vincent (Buffalo '66)

Saving Private Ryan was absolutely brutal to watch the first time around. The violence is more jarring than any slasher horror film, and for that I suppose it paints an accurate portrait of war. Weir crafted a film basically about the nature of the human race, but the overall direction wasn't as stunning as Spielberg's vision. Beatty and Gallo made good films about gritty times and characters, and Malick made almost as good a war picture as Spielberg but was lost behind in the accolades.

Best Screenplay:
McKenna, David (American History X)
Ross, Gary (Pleasantville)
Niccol, Andrew (The Truman Show)
Frank, Scott (Out Of Sight)
Rodat, Robert (Saving Private Ryan)

All of these films are tightly packed with juicy lines both comedic and dramatic. But for his script that digs its nails into the potboiler of racial hate not just as a one-sided argument, David McKenna's American History X wins. Ross and Niccol both highlight the frailness and aptitude of the beauty of everyday life, which make for outstanding films. Frank probably best adapts an Elmore Leonard novel (Jackie Brown, Get Shorty, Be Cool, The Big Bounce), and Rodat puts a powerful story in place for Spielberg to envision on screen.

Best Foreign Film:
Life Is Beautiful (Italy)

_

Featured Review: HANCOCK

2008-07-05T11:59:00.000-07:00

Hancock

Starring Will Smith, Charlize Theron, Jason Bateman, Jae Head, Eddie Marsan, Thomas Lennon, Johnny Galecki.

Directed by Peter Berg

Grade: C-

"You got a problem, Thickness?"

Never doubt the power of Will Smith. Once the goofy star of The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air and parent-friendly rap about homework and summer time, Smith is now Hollywood's most durable and bankable leading man. Hancock is sort of a theory on that idea. Market the film simply as a giant poster with Smith's giant head, leak out a general plot synopsis about a drunk superhero, release it on the 4th of July weekend, and watch the money roll in. It doesn't even have to be a good film, if Smith is the star, people will take their chances because he's that likable. And he is.

Smith plays John Hancock (or so we're told) the only man in the world with superhuman powers (or so we're told). But Hancock has become dismayed with the unforgiving public. Yes, he helps stops the bad guys, but because he's spent years feeling sorry for himself and getting drunk, his assistance is nearly as unwanted as it is helpful. After one particularly disastrous outing, he by chance saves the life of Ray (Jason Bateman), a bleeding-heart public relations man who in turn wants to change Hancock's image back to favorable. It begins to work in various degrees, until Hancock discovers friction coming from Ray's wife Mary (Charlize Theron). Then Hancock derails.

The first half or so of the film is surprisingly taut. Director Peter Berg establishes Hancock as a lazy drunk who just happens to be able to do anything he wants or needs to stop bad guys if he puts some effort into it. But he doesn't, so this anti-hero hero angle gets a decent amount of sight gags and chuckles out of it. More come when he deals with Ray and his family, as Ray attempts to straighten Hancock out by showing him ill-fated YouTube clips and sends him to prison to repent his crimes against the city while saving it.

The jail scenes are when Hancock begin to lag, but it doesn't completely falter until Theron gets more screen time. As an actress here, she is not terrible, but rather her character ruins the movie. Up to this point, she served as Ray's cynical but loving wife, not much of an entity at all. But when Hancock discovers she's harboring a secret, the film goes off the deep end into a muddled mess of half-baked ideas. No longer does it become funny and light-hearted, but gets heavy-handed and confusing. They do little to explain the reasoning behind the twist the film takes, and for that, we never really understand the point of the climax.

As Hancock, Smith is as entertaining and great to watch as he usually is. He starts off as just about an unlikable guy as you can get (and for that you like to watch him), and by the end of the movie has transformed into a good person who understands his civic responsibilities. It's not Smith's fault when his character gets painted into a corner with his own absurdist qualities. Bateman is also fun to see unfold, playing the everyman character he has down so pat. It's amazing that his sometimes anti-social sarcasm in real life gets him some flak, because on film Bateman is selfless in almost all of his roles post Arrested Development.

Perhaps the biggest problem besides the terrible fate of developing Theron's character is the direction. I'm all for Peter Berg going for a more gritty feel to distinguish Hancock as an anti-hero, but there are times in the film that the shaky camera work during scenes that are just expositional conversations that it's just not needed. It worked for him in the trenches of the Saudi Arabian territory of The Kingdom, but for Hancock it just distracted from the humor and/or emotional complexity (what they tried of it, anyway) the film offered.

The plot also suffers from some distracting inconsistencies. Hancock is seemingly able to do anything, but at other times you question that if he can do all of this, why does he still lack the gumption to use common sense, even after he's been remade as a citizen savior? And the validity of some convicts who escape prison to terrorize the later 'mortal' Hancock seem to lack logic as well. The same can be said of Theron's character in its entirety. She makes the movie play out like an expensive rip-off of Uma Thurman's My Super Ex-Girlfriend.

In one scene she visits Hancock with excessive eye-liner and a halter top underneath her jacket, when in the rest of the film she had been conservative and au naturale. So what, did she take the time to put it all on when she went to see him, or does her character just highlight her attributes naturally when her 'secret' is out? Little things like this can be overlooked in a better film, but Hancock is full of stuff like that. For example, Johnny Galecki (of Roseanne and The Big Bang Theory) and Thomas Lennon (Reno 911!) have co-star credits, and literally have 12 seconds of screen-time, combined.

Hancock is not the worst summer blockbuster out this year, nor is it the worst superhero movie. It's just one that suffers a fatal flaw, sprinkled with a few minor ones that serve as a couple of kicks to dead celluloid. If the crew could have found a way to keep the tone of the first half of the film, Hancock could have been an enjoyable 'B' graded movie. Instead, it just serves as a shining example to the ferocity and longevity of Will Smith's career. Put his face on a 20-foot, silk-screened poster, people will come.

TOP 10 Anticipated Movies (July 08)

2008-07-01T10:01:00.000-07:00

For the mini-review of The Air I Breathe, starring Forest Whitaker, Sarah Michelle Gellar and Brendan Fraser, Click Here.

10 Anticipated Movies, in order of tentative release:

The Dark Knight (7/18)
Thankfully the hype died down just enough to keep TDK from over-saturation. Yes, Heath Ledger keeps getting sick posthumous praise for his work as the Joker despite most people and critics having yet to see his performance, but it builds suspense. We almost got a look at Aaron Eckhart's Two-Face face in an online teaser.

Mamma Mia! (7/18)
Just kidding. Even as a chronic sneaker into other movies (to curb the high price of film-going, heh), it will be a sad day if I am forced to sneak into this film after TDK. This movie makes Hairspray (which I actually enjoyed) look like a Steven Seagal actioner. I'd sadly be more interested in sneaking into Andy Samberg's Space Chimps instead.

Step Brothers (7/25)
The red band trailer did much to improve on the lackluster showing of its theatre presentation. Bad language, while a film it doesn't make, can help improve one, which it did for the Step Brothers. The full scene with Ferrell and the employment interviewer is genuinely funny, so let's hope the entire film can sustain that ingenuity.

Pineapple Express (8/8)
Word has sort of died in the mainstream as of late, but will surely pick up once the release draws near. In the marijuana aficionado circles, it's the greatest thing since the sliced bong. It's exciting because everyday, after a particularly long smoking session, they discover a movie called Pineapple Express is coming out! Woah!

Tropic Thunder (8/15)
It's still hard to muster up genuine excitement for this project. As much as Downey Jr has my heart and Black has rejuvenated his career tolerance with Be Kind Rewind and Kung Fu Panda, I can't see this being more than a one-joke kind of film. Stiller, for example, hasn't had a genuine across-the-board comedy hit since Dodgeball and Meet The Fockers in 2004. So can all these egos and range of talents come together cohesively?

Disaster Movie (8/29)
I am a sick, twisted soul. In order to appreciate the fine, immaculate texture of the great films, I have to know just how bad a film can go in the opposite direction. Meet The Spartans was sheer torture, and Disaster Movie will probably be akin to scheduling a root canal with no Novocaine. Call me Arthur Denton, but as long as I can see it for free, I like knowing just how bad films can get. I'm waiting for someone to release Ass: The Movie.

Burn After Reading (9/12)
Something about this project gets stuck in my head. Possibly it's just the brilliant use of forgotten sixties psychedelic pop in the trailer (Spirit's "I've Got A Line On You"), or possibly because it's the Coen Brothers going back to comedic roots with an all-star cast (Pitt! Clooney! Swinton! Malkovich! McDormand!) that actually looks funnier than any of Pitt/Clooney's Ocean series.

Choke (9/26)
The trailer feels very disjointed, but still adequately shows the heart of the film while adding a touch of absurd humor, which I'm sure will foretell the real film considering the plot. Rockwell looks very Rockwell-esque, that is, offbeat, dirty, and yet somehow good. Kelly McDonald of Trainspotting and more recently No Country For Old Men could come off annoying.

Zack & Miri Make A Porno (10/31)
A teaser trailer pretty much shows us all we really need to know. Kevin Smith, he of Jersey Girl fame (what, wrong film of his to promote?), is going for Knocked Up territory with two hours of semi-improvisational sex jokes courtesy of Seth Rogen and a hotter woman (in this case, Elizabeth Banks) wrapped around an earnest love story. I've heard this thing might have to get cut a little to stay away from an NC-17 rating.

The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button (12/25)
I just cannot get enough of the full-length trailer, which has now fully debuted online. It's magnificently done, and shows just enough of the plot to get the general idea of what's in store, while giving away absolutely nothing about the intricate details of its contents. A sure Oscar contender if it doesn't flame out.

Featured Review: WANTED

2008-06-29T11:23:00.000-07:00

Wanted

Starring- James McAvoy, Morgan Freeman, Angelina Jolie, Thomas Kretschmann, Common, Terence Stamp

Directed by Timur Bekmambetov

Grade: B

"What the [expletive deleted] have you done lately?"

Usually films that have no regards for the laws of physics are generally bad. Then, there are movies like Wanted that take no prisoners in its attempt to go balls-out ballistic on your common sense and defy even the most stuck-up film scholars to admit that real life movies don't always have to be true-to-life. Wanted literally rewrites the mindless action film into an enjoyable, guilty pleasure.

We meet Wesley Gibson (Atonement's James McAvoy, decidedly less sexy and brooding here) in the middle of a mental breakdown. His office job sucks, his girlfriend and best friend are having not-so-secret sex behind his back, and he takes medication to control his panic attacks. Overall, he feels his life is meaningless. That is, until the day Fox (Angelina Jolie, decidedly less pregnant here), an ultra-attractive super assassin comes and saves him from another killer. Gibson gets recruited into Fox's group, The Fraternity, led by Sloan (Morgan Freeman, decidedly less God-like here), based entirely on the fact that he must have his father's genes of a killer.

What ensues is two hours of violence and chase scenes. Some of the action is so over the top that it begins to get tiresome. We've broken down the thought process of making sense of the outlandish stuff going down on screen, so it ends up becoming acceptable. They could pack sixteen elephants into a gun chamber and use them to kill the Pope from the planet Mars at that point and it'd somehow make perfect sense in Wanted.

Whereas the Clive Owen/Paul Giamatti vehicle Shoot 'Em Up, last year's attempt at tongue-in-cheek action/dark comedy bonanza, largely failed because it worked to provide realism as much as its asinine plot and violence sequencing, Wanted makes no such mistakes. Its plot is genially stupid, but there are enough twists and turns, some predictable, some should have been predictable, to keep the action scenes chugging along.

Director Bekmambetov knows a story about curving bullets, a prophetic loom weaver, and a sinister Morgan Freeman isn't supposed to be real. He instead provides gunplay, and lots of it. I'm not a fan of directors who use quick cuts and warbling camera angles (example being Tony Scott) but to highlight Wesley's inner turmoil, Bekmambetov does a fine job using it, but to a minimum. His black comedy vision of Wesley's stark contrast between sterile office life and excessive violence recalls Mary Harron's American Psycho.

McAvoy is the standout actor here. After getting his chops in prestigious award-seeking films such as The Last King Of Scotland and Atonement, and being best known to wider audiences in the first The Chronicles Of Narnia, McAvoy does a seamless transition from meek, panic-ridden everyman to world-weary badass. With his crooked smile and sweaty, pasty face, he is unafraid to look foolish and ugly.

Jolie, meanwhile, is more engaging than she has been in the recent past, but is strictly there for sex appeal. In the end the two stars never engage in any sexual activity, which I suppose is a refreshing rarity in a film like this, but her character is pretty well undeveloped, aside from a small flashback to her childhood. She could also stand to gain a few pounds. I don't know any sexy assassins, but I would assume they don't look so gaunt, with such bony arms. Her muscle mass doesn't even look like she could carry one of those guns, let alone fly in all directions and murder somebody with it.

As a critic, its easy to take Wanted down a few pegs. It was not made for us to cherish as a smart piece of cinematic history. Instead it is an action film that surprisingly exceeds the expectations many fans and non-fans assume of it, and for that Wanted gets praise. It's different in minor aspects, gloriously undaunted by its limitations, and in all, a fun ride.

Featured Review: WALL-E

2008-06-28T01:44:00.000-07:00

For the mini review of In Bruges starring Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson and Ralph Fiennes, CLICK HERE

WALL-E

Starring- Ben Burtt, Elissa Knight, Jeff Garlin, John Ratzenberger, Kathy Najimy, Sigourney Weaver, Fred Willard

Directed by Andrew Stanton

Grade: A+

"I don't want to survive, I want to live!"

A poor, lonely, hard working boy with undistinguished looks meets an eye-pleasing girl with a cold attitude. He has something she wants without even knowing it, but in the end she finds he's more than just a casual acquaintance but a true friend. He goes to save her when she's in peril, and she eventually finds herself caring about him enough to do the same. Sound like your typical romantic movie? Because it's actually the love story of two robots.

The men at Pixar are geniuses. Only they can turn a hunk of rusty scrap metal with binoculars for eyes into one of the most endearing and captivating characters in animated cinematic history. WALL-E doesn't so much as speak as form sound from a mechanical voicebox, and yet he expresses more emotion than just about any actor in any movie I've ever seen. The relationship between WALL-E and EVE is often more realistic than most love stories told on screen in live action.

With the abundance of remakes and re-imaginings of past franchises, watching such an original creation like WALL-E, I couldn't help but feel like I was watching movie history in the making, akin to past generations the first they saw Star Wars or E.T. on the big screen. This was beyond the typical Pixar film- a beautiful and well-crafted animated movie that's still just an animated movie- rather, WALL-E explored thoughts in environmentalism, consumerism, love, acceptance in society, philosophy, and what it means to be human. Pretty heady stuff for a movie typically aimed at kids. It was made almost with the adult fan in mind over the little ones.

But make no mistake, WALL-E is to be loved by everyone.

We meet the little robot 700 years after man has left Earth, destroying His planet with rampant eco-destruction. WALL-E (Waste Allocation Lift Loader Earth-Class) is purposed to help pack the waste into nifty little cubes and stack them into skyscrapers. However, long after his brothers have broke down, WALL-E develops a personality. He collects odd assortments he's never seen before, and befriends a tiny cockroach, possibly the only other "living" thing on the planet. But when a sleek robot named EVE sets down into the world, looking for something, WALL-E is instantly smitten.

This first hour of the film is both visually and thematically amazing. The animators did a great job constructing a futuristic world of giant superstores and buildings gone idle, WALL-E shuttling around the city landscape as if being the only moving thing on the planet was normal to him. But it becomes obvious he wants more when EVE arrives. With his hang-dog eyes and stoic demeanor, watching Hello Dolly! for companionship just isn't enough anymore. His natural curiosity makes for wonderful and touching humor, and the fact that he grew from an emotionless robot into one that understands feelings over the course of 700 years while his human brethren grow distant is very thought provoking.

The second half of the film isn't quite as impressive, but still a knockout by any means for other reasons. Once WALL-E arrives on the spaceship of the last race of humans in pursuit of EVE, we are introduced to a world of generic, super-obese and mindless humans (all white or black, still speaking remedial English, so it looks like Americans were the only survivors) who can't even muster the will to walk or eat anything on a plate. They're served by more advanced and intelligent robots than WALL-E, often with meaner streaks or malfunctioning units.

While not as beautifully poetic as the first half, this part still holds value in its entertainment and message. Man was made to enjoy his Earth and his fellow passengers on it. When a robot ends up learning the meaning of life and love before the humans, you know you've gone too soft as a society. Some parents may be turned off by a movie that intends to spread a message, maybe almost insulted, but WALL-E never panders. Besides, the film's target audience: children, won't understand the significance of these adult themes. They'll be too busy laughing along to WALL-E's exploration antics, which in itself was funnier than most comedies released this year.

Pixar never fails to amaze. Sometimes they hit minor snags with Cars or A Bug's Life, but even those films are triumphs compared to some of the best of competing studios. But with WALL-E, Pixar has once again raised the bar. In fact, they might have raised it too high, for when the next films come out, they'll all be compared in standards to this film. Toy Story, its sequel, even Finding Nemo, Ratatouille and The Incredibles were amazing, but were finally usurped by WALL-E. So what can possibly come along to top that? Toy Story 3?

Whatever. With Pixar, there are no guarantees, only that their imaginations are limitless, to infinity and beyond.

Actor Spotlight: JOHN C. REILLY

2008-06-22T11:42:00.000-07:00

This is the 2nd in a series of Actor Spotlights. The first piece, chronicling Sam Rockwell, can be found here.

Perhaps one of the oddest and most unconventional leading men in Hollywood history, John C. Reilly rose up from charismatic supporting actor to genuine ensemble star, and now even gets to helm his own movie occasionally. The lumpy-faced Chicago, Illinois native, with his pock-marked skin and curly hair, has kept himself down-to-earth despite 20 years in the movie industry. Since the beginning he has appeared in films that have starred some of Hollywood's biggest stars. Often zig-zagging between starring and supporting roles in mainstream and independent film, all the while showing up in the most random cameos. Reilly is truly an everyman actor.

Born John Christopher Reilly to a Catholic household of six children on the south side of Chicago on May 24, 1965, Reilly stayed out of trouble by immersing himself in acting in local theatre productions. He trained at the Goodman School of Drama out of DePaul University, and appeared as a member of the prestigious Steppenwolf Theatre troupe founded by actor Gary Sinise, which has featured renowned actors such as John Malkovich, Joan Allen, and Laurie Metcalf.

Reilly's big break came suddenly, and by chance in 1988. Hired by Brian De Palma to appear in his Vietnam film Casualties Of War as a nameless soldier with one line who gets his arm blown off, Reilly flew on an airplane for the first time for filming. Released in August of 1989, Casualties Of War, piggy-backing off popular Vietnam films of the era such as Platoon, Full Metal Jacket, and Good Morning, Vietnam, starred Michael J. Fox and Sean Penn and featured John Leguizamo in his own debut role.

Stephen Baldwin, in an early acting role, was hired to play one of the soldiers who rapes a young Vietnamese girl, Pfc. Herbert Hatcher, in the film. However, as soon as Reilly flew back home, De Palma realized Baldwin was not working out. De Palma fired Baldwin and brought back Reilly for the Hatcher role, expanding it into a full supporting role. If that wasn't enough of a coup for the 24-year-old DePaul graduate, he also met his future wife, Alison Dickey, on the set. Since John Reilly was already registered in the SAG databases, the young actor added a C. to his name

"The C stands for Christopher. You can blame the union for that. The Screen Actors Guild make you do it if there's another member with the same name. I wasn't going to change my name, so I just included the middle one. It was a decision I had to make on Casualties Of War, my first film in 1989. I got a phone call and had to fly out to Thailand where Brian De Palma was shooting and it was a sudden decision, and I'm stuck with it. So I'm glad I didn't go for a stupid and exotic-sounding name just to grab attention, or you could be talking to a man named Tallulah or something."

After showing up later in the year as a 'young monk' in another Sean Penn vehicle, We're No Angels (co-starring Robert De Niro), Reilly got another supporting part in an established star's big film. 1990 saw the release of Tom Cruise's Days Of Thunder, a bombastic summer movie dedicated to stock car racing. Reilly appeared as Buck Bretherton, an aw-shucks member of Cole Trickle's car maintenance crew. Later in the year he appeared as the ill-fated homely crony Stevie McGuire in State Of Grace, his third pairing with Penn.

Reilly popped up again in 1992 with a trio of diverse roles. In Out On A Limb he plays one of two drunk brothers who run afoul of Matthew Broderick in this absurd farce. For Hoffa, Danny DeVito tapped Reilly for a supporting role in the Teamster Union opposite Jack Nicholson. Reilly even showed up as 'Cop at Police Station' in Woody Allen's Shadows & Fog.

The next few years saw continuous work as faceless supporting roles. 1993's What's Eating Gilbert Grape, a critical independent and cult favorite starring then rising stars Johnny Depp and Leonardo DiCaprio, saw Reilly play Depp's friend Tucker Van Dyke. In 1994 Reilly got perhaps his most sinister and widely noticeable role at the time as Terry, who along with Kevin Bacon, terrorized Meryl Streep's family in The River Wild. The next year he reunites with Wild co-star David Strathairn, playing Constable Frank Stamshaw in Stephen King's Dolores Claiborne.

Towards the mid-1990s, Reilly turned to smaller films, among them Boys, Georgia, and Hell Cab. The one that had the most implication though was Hard Eight. Originally titled Sydney, first time feautre director Paul Thomas Anderson gave Reilly his first starring role as a hapless loser who gets help from an older mentor played by Philip Baker Hall. The two of them, along with other Anderson regulars Philip Seymour Hoffman, Melora Waters and Robert Ridgely, would help shape Anderson's breakthrough film the next year, Boogie Nights.

In the grand scheme of the film, Reilly's character Reed Rothchild represents Reilly's persona in movies up to that point. The likeable, goofy supporting character that appears in a large bulk of the film but never plays any specific importance. While most of Boogie Nights is pretty tongue-in-cheek, Reilly's Rothchild is served as Dirk Diggler's (Mark Wahlberg) best friend and comic foil. While this performance didn't garner him any specific award recognition, it did give way to more supporting film work.

Pairing with Sean Penn for a fourth time, Reilly joined another ensemble cast for Terence Malick's The Thin Red Line. Despite seven Academy Award nominations and a cast that included major names such as Penn, George Clooney, John Travolta, John Cusack, Adrian Brody, Nick Nolte, Woody Harrelson, and James Caviezel, The Thin Red Line was cancelled out and overshadowed that year by Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan.

Between 1999 and 2002 was arguably the best and hardest working stretch of Reilly's career, and for many supporting actors in general. After The Thin Red Line ended run in theatres in early 1999, audiences saw him in supporting roles in two lightweight romantic dramedies. Ironically in both, he was named 'Gus'. In Never Been Kissed, Reilly is Drew Barrymore's hard-working newspaper co-worker. For Kevin Costner's For Love Of The Game, he appears as the star's wisecracking catcher. Finally to round out the year Reilly re-teamed with P.T. Anderson for Anderson's anticipated follow-up film, Magnolia.

In Magnolia, Reilly gets a role that he hadn't experienced before in a large-scale film; his character, police officer Jim Kurring, falls in love. Unlike his previous roles of unremarkable nobodies that fill screen time, Reilly's performance in Magnolia proves he had an emotional range that went mostly untapped in past films.

Reilly continued his stereotyping as a supporting lout in big-budget films with Wolfgang Petersen's $140 million dollar epic The Perfect Storm in 2000, re-team with past co-stars Clooney and Wahlberg.

After being nominated for a Tony Award for True West, and appearing in friend Jennifer Jason Leigh's indie ensemble The Anniversary Party, Reilly had a record-breaking year in 2002, even by Hollywood standards. Having four major supporting roles in the one year alone, three of the films were nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards. This was the first time an actor had appeared in that many Best Picture nominees since Thomas Mitchell in 1939.

Three of the films has Reilly playing the well-meaning but often hapless and dumb husband of stronger women. In The Good Girl Reilly is a pot-smoking house painter married to Jennifer Aniston. The Hours travels him back in time to the 1950s as Julianne Moore's clueless but hard-working mate. His best role goes further back to the 1920s in Chicago, playing the dim-witted spouse of Renee Zellweger, Amos Hart. His heartbreaking rendition of "Mr. Cellophane" during a critcal moment of the film earned Reilly his first Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor, although he lost to Chris Cooper in Adaptation. His other role was Daniel Day-Lewis' right-hand man Happy Jack in Gangs Of New York.

Since 2002, Reilly's resume has been eclectic, often veering towards more comedy and starring roles. In 2004 he teamed with Leo DiCaprio for a third name in his last Best Picture nominated film The Aviator, playing Howard Hughes' CEO Noah Dietrich. Also over the next couple years Reilly could be seen in Criminal, Dark Water, and A Prairie Home Companion.

Despite playing numerous comedic characters on both film and stage, for many, Will Ferrell's 2006 NASCAR satire Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby was their first exposure of Reilly as a humorist. Ferrell wanted him to play 'Champ Kind' in his previous Anchorman: The Legend Of Ron Burgundy, but due to the filming of The Aviator, Reilly was replaced with David Koechner.

"I love that people can't place me. They don't know my name. That's 'mission accomplished' in my world."

Talladega Nights was a modest hit, and led Reilly to his first true, big-budget, widely released film. In December of 2007, Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story was released. While the film itself was hit or miss, many critics praised Reilly's performance for his earnest comic timing and singing voice. Walk Hard was followed by a toned-down comedy role in the independent The Promotion in early 2008.

The immediate future shows Reilly enjoying his stretch of comedy roles, and sees him expanding on some out-of-the-box projects. Later this summer he re-teams with Will Ferrell for Step Brothers, which already looks better than Talladega Nights and some of Ferrell's recent flops including Semi-Pro and Bewitched.

Also in the works is a CGI sci-fi/fantasy project simply called 9, concerning the lives of rag dolls who must fight for their future. It co-stars Jennifer Connelly, Elijah Wood, and Martin Landau. In 2009, expect to see Reilly as head vampire 'Larten Crepsley' in Paul Weitz's (American Pie, About A Boy, American Dreamz) fantasy epic Cirque du Freak. If it performs well at the box office, there could be up to three more sequels in store.

John C. Reilly may never become Hollywood's most bankable stars, but there's no mistaking his affable charms whenever he appears on camera. With a huge and diverse range of roles, spanning from the lowest of the lowbrow comedies, nearly depressing serious dramatic biographies, and invigorating musicals on stage and screen, Reilly can pretty much choose where he wants to go from here.

The Prezzies' Top 5 John C. Reilly Performances
Chicago
Boogie Nights
Magnolia
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
Gangs Of New York

Featured Review: GET SMART

2008-06-21T11:30:00.000-07:00

Get Smart

Starring- Steve Carell, Anne Hathaway, Dwayne Johnson, Alan Arkin, Terence Stamp, Masi Oka, Terry Crews, David Koechner, James Caan.

Directed by Peter Segal

Grade: C+

"Missed it by that much."

Would you believe Get Smart is a witty, life-changing comedy in three acts? No? Would you believe then that it's full of James Bond like action scenes that just blow you away? No? Then would you believe it's a sometimes funny and middling cookie-cutter action comedy that fails to inspire any original thoughts? Okay good. Getting that out of the way, if you're too young to remember this paragraph's running joke in the original television series, the producers of the Get Smart movie would like you to see their film.

I can see how the boardroom meeting played out. Steve Carell is a hot property who can still be had on the cheap. He's really adept at playing clueless but well-meaning characters. He needs an established franchise. Afraid to concoct a new brand, someone suggests re-imaging the 1960s Get Smart television show. Don Adams' character has Carell written all over it. Demographics show younger fans will come for the action comedy, but hope that like all big-budget 'retro' television show movies, older fans will come for the nostalgia. Everyone is pleased with the idea, send a temp worker to flesh a couple of things out, and order Thai and martinis for lunch.

As it is, Get Smart is a quick paced, solid film. It just doesn't do anything very exceptional. The comedy has its moments, but most of it is given away in the trailers, and still doesn't have the slapstick absurdity that Adams' old show had. The action sequences are kind of cool, but again none of it is breathtaking. One scene even seems to lift a key fight from The Matrix Reloaded. There's just so much beige geniality to the film that there's just not a whole lot to lambaste or praise about it.

The film version re-imagines Maxwell Smart (Carell) as a formerly obese top researcher for the agents of CONTROL, which to the public eye was decommissioned after the Cold War. When it is found out that main enemy Russia's KAOS has compromised CONTROL's intelligence, the Chief (Alan Arkin) finally decides Max, for better or worse, will have to help in the field. He assigns Max, code name Agent 86, with Agent 99, an older woman and top spy who had a face change, played by Anne Hathaway. From there, 86 and 99 must crack the case and stop the film's biggest baddie, Siegfried (Terence Stamp).

Get Smart the television show, created by future movie comedian Mel Brooks, was goofy camp, made strictly to showcase quick one-liners and a breezy 30-minute plot. Because most moviegoers under the age of 45 probably are not familiar with the original show, the film manages to shed away most of what made the television version run for so long, instead focusing on a action-comedy hybrid. It's not a bad thing, but with Carell's penchant for the same kind of comedy Adams used to do, he could have been given more slapstick things to do without resorting to childish humor. That's what made the original television series, and most Mel Brooks comedies in general, so appealing.

Carell as per usual is a compassionate player. Eventually like every comedian his routine will grow old (in 2008, re: Adam Sandler, Will Ferrell, Mike Myers), but as the 'befuddled but earnest' guy, it's much more toned down that of a lot of his contemporaries. We understand that Max in the film has a few insecurities left to work out, but being in the employ of CONTROL for so long has given him enough tools to succeed even when the Chief and his fellow agents don't think it. Carell is perfectly fine with that emotional range.

While they keep true to the original with character names (The Chief and the other agents names are never revealed, CONTROL and KAOS are intact, and we get a glimpse of the android Hymie), and the occasional catch phrase, the biggest creative license and perhaps most ill-advised character change is Agent 99. Hathaway's version starts off as a cold, strong, 21st Century woman, almost a feminist. Then she makes a complete 360 two-thirds of the way into the film into a romantic vagabond who has various indiscretions. It took four seasons of flirtatious zingers before Max and 99 fell in love. It took Hathaway's character about 30 minutes. Even Mary Jane from Spider-Man would tell her to slow down.

All in all, Get Smart is like trying to flesh out a comic strip into a feature film. You get the names and the general idea down pat, but after everything is bulked up into two hours, it is modernized and generalized into your average but unsatisfying popcorn movie. In that case, Get Smart could have used some help in their research to "get funnier".

Sorry about that, readers.

Featured Review: THE LOVE GURU

2008-06-20T13:22:00.001-07:00

As if seeing The Love Guru this weekend wasn't a bad enough assault on my cognitive thoughts, a mini-review of February's hapless Witless Protection can now be found in the review database here.

The Love Guru

Starring- Mike Myers, Jessica Alba, Justin Timberlake, Romany Malco, Verne Troyer, Meagan Good, Stephen Colbert, Ben Kingsley.

Directed by Marco Schnabel

Grade: D-

"You've got a firm grasp on the obvious."

The Love Guru is Mike Myers' ultimate 'eff you' film. A big middle finger to the critics, fans, and studio executives who long pestered him about a new movie. 'When is the next Wayne's World coming out?', 'Are we going to see Dr. Evil in a spin-off sequel?'. People were bothered that he hadn't starred in a live-action film since Austin Powers in Goldmember in 2002 (I refuse to acknowledge The Cat In The Hat). Adam Sandler churns out a new film yearly. Judd Apatow has his name on a great deal of projects the last few years. Where's Mike Myers been?

And then The Love Guru hits. Guess that solved that question.

To say the film is monstrously bad on all accounts is a lie. It's monstrously bad on all but a few minor things that are absolute moot. Guru's supporting characters look like they are trying really, really, really hard to make things work and not laugh ridiculously between takes about how asinine the whole project is. Despite the stellar background of stand-up comedians in the film, I doubt any of them got to improvise much. This is Mike Myers' The Adventures Of Pluto Nash. This is his vehicle, and his alone, and it sank like the Titanic.

The film centers around a boy named Maurice (Myers, computer altered to look like a child, purposely bad) who along with Deepak Chopra grows up to learn the wisdom of Guru Tugginmypudha (Ben Kingsley, obviously high from the on-set pot he smokes in The Wackness). As an adult, going by the name Pitka, he has become a rival to Chopra, now a famous celebrity guru. He gets an offer from Jane Bullard (Jessica Alba, only there for eye candy), the bequeathed owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs, who for the sole reason of having an absurd crush on him, puts her faith in Pitka solving the relationship woes of star player Darren Roanoke. Roanoke's girlfriend is shacking up with Jacques Grande (Justin Timberlake), who just happens to be the star goalie of the Los Angeles Kings, the team the Maple Leafs are playing in the Stanley Cup.

Never mind the fact that these were two of worst teams in the National Hockey League last season (the sad thing is, the NHL gave full logo rights for the film, a desperate play to attract more fans), or that despite being an avid hockey fan, Myers couldn't have wrote a worse or less cliche hockey game scenario. No, if Myers stopped mugging for the camera for just one moment and gave a little screen-time to his co-stars, this ridiculous carnival of catastrophe could have been salvaged.

Timberlake seems to be the only one that at least makes an effort, not knowing the terrible fate of what he signed up for. As a French-Canadian goalie with a huge penis, he at least has fun with the role. Unfortunately we don't. Stephen Colbert, as one of the announcers of Hockey Night In Canada (though without Don Cherry, what's the point of calling it HNIC?), has an ounce of what he used to do on Strangers With Candy before he hit it big in Jon Stewart's entourage, but it's not nearly enough. Everyone else is criminally wasted.

Romany Malco had great moments in The 40-Year-Old Virgin, and at least tried to be funny in Baby Mama. Here he gets a bigger role, but as a straight man in an unfunny comedy, he's nothing. Jim Gaffigan is a hilarious stand-up comedian, but gets relegated to five lines as the announcing partner to Colbert. John Oliver is a popular correspondent on The Daily Show, but here instead is just Pitka's annoying manager. Sharp-eyed Comedy Central viewers will even notice Daniel Tosh being given two lines and a cowboy hat. What a waste.

Overall, for what? So Myers can giggle his way through 90 minutes of obvious double entendres, and then point out the joke in case the idiots who wandered in from the latest Friedberg/Seltzer crapfest didn't get it? We get it, the CHARACTER has that personality flaw where he points out the obvious and makes jokes that are only funny to him and people on the screen being paid to read a cue card and laugh. But as a writer and performer, Myers has the power to not abuse that kind of control. Instead though, he took everything that was kind of annoying about his previous characters from Saturday Night Live and Austin Powers and exaggerated it tenfold. Some studio executive really needed to step in here and hit Myers' ego with a rolled up newspaper and say "No!"

The Love Guru would've made for a really easy 'F' grade, but since I'm stingy and have forever been numbed by comedy in general after Meet The Spartans, I give it a D- solely on the effort of Timberlake. Sure he's terrible, but I'm pretty sure he was the only one unaware about the conspiracy Myers had to screw with the public. Lou Reed had his Metal Machine Music, Mike Myers will forever have this branded on his resume.

No party time, no excellence here. If this is what we are to expect from Myers here on out, "Wayne's World 3" if ever made, will be a travesty to our nostalgic senses.

Indie Review: THE PROMOTION

2008-06-18T15:06:00.000-07:00

THE PROMOTION

Starring- Seann William Scott, John C. Reilly, Jenna Fischer, Gil Bellows, Lili Taylor, Fred Armisen, Rick Gonzalez

Directed by Steve Conrad

Grade: C+

"Black apples?"
"I said... bad ones? Blapples?"

Workplace comedies have been inconsistent. The rise of such have been attributed to the great, cult classic Office Space, and NBC's The Office, both shining examples of the mind-numbing tediousness of which we call middle-class life. But other times comes trash such as Employee Of The Month or Fred Savage's Working. The Promotion is a small budget, little slice of film that neither caters to the PG-13 crowd that flocked to see Employee, nor the infinitely quotable "So true!" films and television shows such as The Office. Instead, it jockeys for a middle management position in independent film purgatory.

Seann William Scott stars as Doug Stauber, an assistant manager of a Chicago area supermarket. He's of that nebbish quality, a 31 year old who's realizing he's never going to change the world, so a promotion as full manager to a nicer store opening up a few blocks away would really do wonders on his psyche. He has a loving wife (The Office's Jenna Fischer, perfect for that non-Hollywood pretty look), but they deal with the daily hassles surrounding them, everything from her self-effacing boss to homosexual banjo players in the apartment next door. And that doesn't even begin to detail his problems at the particular store he works at.

His clueless but well-meaning manager Scott (SNL's Fred Armisen) considers him a "shoo-in" for the new job. That is until a new assistant manager from a Canadian subsidiary grocer comes in. Richard Wehlner (John C. Reilly), with his easygoing personality and previous experience becomes the new favorite almost immediately. It's easy for Doug to hate Richard, but soon he realizes Richard is more or less in the same position he's in, and like Doug, has a few shortcomings that will be exposed over the course of the film.

The Promotion is strikingly similar to Chaos Theory, another quirky indie comedy that made rounds in film festivals before being unceremoniously dumped into select theatres this year. Both films pass themselves off as a straight comedy, but as the trailers for both just begin to indicate, there's a serious dramatic tone that dares to overshadow the comedic element. Indeed The Promotion has some humorous moments, and the pathos director Steve Conrad mixes in could have been done worse by a commercial director. But the final product is wildly uneven, which could be the reason it got short-changed in its release schedule.

One moment there's a scene of deep thought about the prevalence of middle class life. Next there's a joke about masturbation. For every seemingly sharp acerbic wit joke, there's an uncomfortable shift in either gross-out humor or dramatic contemplation. The Promotion in general as a film isn't comprised of toilet humor, so when it comes up, it feels largely out of place. The humor isn't laugh out loud funny either, just a dozen moments of smiling chuckles, and that's if you can tolerate the almost borderline racist moments. Black, Hispanic, the mentally handicap, all represented in questionable formats (though the 'Black Apple' moment is probably the funniest part of the film).

No, the best parts of the film are actually the dramatic scenes of the characters' moral compass. It's nothing new at all, but when the comedy is lacking, at least the simple story of identity, family, and the American Dream is there. Conrad rarely sticks to the Hollywood convention of a "Scott vs. Reilly" scenario, instead playing them off as two separate, real characters who must fight for the same job for personal gain. It's admittedly a rare film where the protagonist (Scott) as a character is less likable as the supposed antagonist (Reilly). It's not that Scott's Doug Stauber isn't likable, but Reilly's Wehlner is such a harmless goof that you feel kind of sorry for him. At least Stauber you can envision landing back on his feet at some point. If the ending of the film wasn't so abrupt and unsatisfying, you'd imagine Wehlner being in a tougher spot if he doesn't get the job.

Most of the performances are above average, or at least adequate. Reilly is his usual movie persona, the lovable, sometimes dimwitted oaf. Fischer and Taylor, while pleasant, are pretty much non-entities as the men's wives. Armisen is quietly entertaining, as is Jason Bateman in an uncredited cameo. Scott actually gives his best dramatic performance to date (his FIRST dramatic role to date?). He's still got awhile to go before he goes Jim Carrey on the world, but like Ryan Reynolds in Chaos Theory, he proves that the potential could be there (looking at his upcoming resume, I'm guessing that won't be happening...). The only bad performance I'd rate is Gil Bellows as the head of the board of the directors choosing the new manager. He's too oily and over-the-top for such a low-key film that unassumingly throws out risque jokes.

The cinematography and the feel of the movie is really its strongest suit. Donaldson's, the grocery store, is crisp and clean in design, recalling one of those smaller grocers that cater to inner-ring suburbanites with a retro-modern 'friendly neighborhood' design. The film's contrasts between the vivid and the muted colors of suburban life give The Promotion a positive aesthetic look that sometimes distracts away from the disjointed mistakes crumbling around it.

The Promotion is typical independent comedy. Some good ideas, some bad ones, interesting casting, and a shoestring budget that proves that non-action films can be made to look nice without a budget the size of Myanmar's economy (I'm looking at you, Zohan). Sometimes it works brilliantly, sometimes it fails miserably, but usually, as this movie upholds, it's somewhere in the middle. And that adequacy isn't enough to make The Promotion stand out and warrant a raise to the mainstream cinemas.

Featured Review: INCREDIBLE HULK

2008-06-14T08:37:00.000-07:00

The Incredible Hulk

Starring- Edward Norton, Liv Tyler, Tim Roth, William Hurt, Tim Blake Nelson, Ty Burrell, Lou Ferrigno

Directed by Louis Leterrier

Grade: B

"As far as I'm concerned that man's whole body is property of the US Army."

Edward Norton's Hulk gets angry when you compare him to Eric Bana's Hulk. You wouldn't like him when he's angry. Indeed, much of The Incredible Hulk's credo is trying to stay as far away from the first film as possible, despite the mere five years it took to reboot the franchise. For all that it gets ridiculed, Ang Lee's Hulk wasn't THAT bad. But with new people in charge and Marvel Studios primed to handle their property better, The Incredible Hulk is made bigger, better, stronger, and less touchy-feely. Was it worth it?

With an ample amount of projects in the pipeline for Marvel Studios, one has to ask if making another Hulk film was relevant. After all, with Thor and The Avengers and Ant-Man (yes, Ant-Man) needing summer real estate property, why remake a superhero that's been tainted in the public opinion not so long ago?

These auspicious beginnings start the film off cloudy. Unlike Hulk's summer brother Iron Man, this film doesn't have an extensive origin story. In fact, it has none at all. We see the basic idea of Norton's Bruce Banner undergoing his gamma radiation accident, and small clips of the ensuing rampage during the opening credits. General Ross (William Hurt) fills Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth) and the audience in with vague details of why Banner was working in the lab, but it never evolves. If the viewer wanted to know why Banner became the Hulk, they'd have to recall the 2003 film, which is the entire antithesis to the reason this one was made.

The second scene salvages the non-existent backstory. We see Banner years after his exile from America, living in the slums of Brazil, trying to find a cure for his 'disease'. The foreign set and action pieces, combined with the choppy history of the character's past actually conjures up vibes of the Bourne trilogy. Immediately we realize they're going for a grittier movie than Lee's version.

Hulk's CGI is grittier as well. Gone is the smooth, bright green, almost cartoonish texture that the campy television show and the last film featured. Leterrier's version is ripped and bumpy, dark green and almost gray like his original comic counterpart was. He eschews the bright purple gym pants for normal ones (even making an inside joke about them. Take THAT Ang Lee!).

There's just one noticeable problem about the casting. While Marvel did a little too good of a job replacing Jennifer Connelly with Liv Tyler and Sam Elliott with William Hurt (did anybody notice the difference between any of them?), they didn't re-tool the CGI character for Norton. Both the 2003 and 2008 Hulks, while different in many aspects, still feature the same kind of brute-faced, black-haired look. While Norton is always a refreshing actor in films, his superhero identity still looked like Eric Bana. The whole reason Bana was cast in the first place was because he looked like a human version of what his character became. If they truly wanted to separate themselves from the previous installment, they could've took some liberty with molding the Hulk a little closer to Norton's image.

Tim Roth also seems like an odd choice as the super-soldier Emil Blonsky turned mutant villain Abomination. His acting was spot on, but Roth is a mere 5'7, playing a world-class military expert who eventually gets drugged up enough before transforming that he has human superpowers. This slight can be worked around, but Leterrier shows a critical moment in the plot where Roth has to stand side by side with William Hurt, who's 6'2. The difference is staggering, and distracts from remembering Roth is supposed to be nearly invincible at times.

Otherwise, the film is an entertaining two hours. Most of the action scenes are thrilling without being overlong or tedious. The CGI is more polished than its predecessor, as is the acting. It's not as good as Iron Man, but we can basically see where Marvel Studios is going with its projects. Packaged with Robert Downey Jr's Tony Stark cameo and Tim Blake Nelson's quirky supporting character tie-in as Samuel Sterns, The Avengers better be a masterpiece, since in effect Hulk and Iron Man boils down to being two hours teases for the future films.

If they decide in 2013 that this Hulk is unsatisfactory, and another reboot is made, that'll make me angry. You'd like it when I'm angry, makes for a better blog.

Featured Review: THE HAPPENING

2008-06-13T17:18:00.000-07:00

The Happening

Starring- Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel, John Leguizamo, Ashlyn Sanchez, Betty Buckley, Spencer Breslin

Directed by M. Night Shyamalan

Grade: C

"We've lost contact."
"With whom?"
"With everyone."

M. Night Shyamalan broke out in Hollywood with a provocative, spellbinding piece of horror history with 1999's The Sixth Sense. In the nine years since, critics, fans and Shyamalan himself have placed tough scrutiny on him recapturing that glory. The Happening finally stopped his descent in subsequently worse filmmaking, but because his last movie, Lady In The Water, was so flawed, he had hardly anywhere else to go but up. Small victory, but still plenty of problems.

The largest malfunction with The Happening is that it fails in what Shyamalan does best; creating engaging characters the audience can at least respect, and throwing them off with shock twists. However now, as his shock endings have become passe in the pop culture lexicon, Shyamalan is so terrified to make a bold move that The Happening just ends up being a somewhat pointless movie. It is a film that simply doesn't have much happen.

Mark Wahlberg plays Philadelphia high school science teacher Elliot Moore, who's having marital problems with Alma (Zooey Deschanel) when he and his fellow teachers, including math nerd and best friend Julian (John Leguizamo), find out New York City is under attack. More specifically, people are attacking themselves. When the confrontations spread locally, the three of them and Julian's daughter set off on a train to escape the cities. Soon, they eventually are forced to run on foot to get away.

Get away from what exactly? The marketing for the film did a good job to keep the evil forces of nature (no pun intended) wrapped up in secrecy. But the movie doesn't give us much to work with. Natural disaster? Terrorist attack? Government experiment gone wrong? There's no clear indication, only theories. That may work for certain movies that are engaging otherwise, but for a film that's mostly 90 minutes of people running around trying not to commit suicide, without a shock ending or any answers makes The Happening a cheated movie.

Almost all the characters are unlikeable. Wahlberg's Elliot tries to have a personality in the beginning of the movie, interacting with his students, but by the end he's as bland as the Pennsylvanian countryside. Deschanel's character is supposed to be emotionally unavailable, but she acts like she's mentally handicapped for 3/4 of the film. Leguizamo was the most interesting and believable of the main leads, but he's not in the movie enough to save it.

If anything in the film is considered a shock, it probably has to do with Spencer Breslin's (once an annoying child actor, now annoying teenager) character. Shyamalan tries to give a punch to the gut there like in The Mist. But by the time that "shock" happens, the whole thing feels kind of ridiculous. Sadly though, the end is as straightforward as can be, something that made the audience kind of confused. As in "Really? That's it?"

The Happening's whole premise is a good idea, give Shyamalan credit there. The entire discussion about evolution and natural selection and the effects we have on plants and the environment is an engaging one. It was trying to be a smart version of The Ruins, except the latter at least was effectively scary and entertaining.

But after the first few scenes, Shyamalan couldn't keep it effective. When the scariest thing about the film is wondering if the characters are going to be able to outrun wind, it's obvious the script looked better on paper. Actually, scratch that. The scariest thing was Betty Buckley as the old shut-in Mrs. Jones. What the hell was that all about?

Overall, The Happening wasn't a terrible movie; it didn't feel overly long and enough stuff took place that it wasn't completely boring either. But everything was adequate at best, and this film became probably one of the biggest non-entities in movie theatres I've ever seen. In the end we realized the only thing that truly 'happened' was that we didn't learn anything about anything, except that Shymalan could develop a sequel if he wanted to.

Let's pray "The Happening 2: It Happened Again" doesn't happen.

Actor Spotlight: SAM ROCKWELL

2008-06-11T08:34:00.000-07:00

This is the first in a series that will be updated erratically (whenever boredom strikes and I feel inspired). This article is in lieu of a full review of What Happens In Vegas... the mini-review for that film can be found here.

Sam Rockwell is a major enigma. He's still a person that many casual movie-goers can point out as a 'that guy' character actor, and not remember the name. He's been through a long list of film the past 20 years, from the most independent of indie films, to critical art house films, to disastrous box office flops, often interchangeably. He's been dubbed on more than one occasion the "male Parker Posey." Across the vast expanse of his career, Rockwell has displayed a certain seedy charm to such an effect, it's sometimes hard to determine if his affable and sly demeanor is pure acting or a fabric of Rockwell himself.

Born, well, Sam Rockwell (none of his bios list a middle name) in Daly City, California on November 5, 1968, Rockwell grew up in a divorced family of artists that allowed him to experience a true bohemian upbringing. Shuttled between New York City and San Francisco, Rockwell became an admitted drug user in the excess of 1980s youth, and a natural ascension to acting from his parents followed. ~~In 1984 he released his only hit single in the music industry, the pop classic "Somebody's Watching Me."~~

Rockwell's debut in film came when he snagged the role of the oldest brother in the low budget horror schlock Clownhouse. Trying to capitalize on the string of major horror hits of the era, Clownhouse went nowhere. But this started Sam on the way back to become an actor in New York full-time.

The next couple years at the turn of the 1990s, Rockwell was able to hold down a few minor roles in semi-noticeable films such as Last Exit To Brooklyn and In Living Color's Tommy Davidson's vehicle, Strictly Business. But arguably his biggest legacy from the era is the thankless role of 'Head Thug' in 1990's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

From here, Rockwell disappeared into the fray of the independent fare of New York city. In 1992 alone he had supporting parts in Light Sleeper, In The Soup, Jack & His Friends, and Happy Hell Night. He also appeared in two episodes of Law & Order in this time.

But success and starring roles still eluded him. Working typical actor jobs as a busboy and deliveryman, and not so typical ones such as a private detective's assistant, Rockwell eventually hit the big time doing, of all things, a commercial for Miller beer in 1994. This allowed him to focus on acting.

The mid-1990s and his heretofore indie pedigree found Rockwell with a stable of odd supporting characters, foreshadowing much of his box office career. The Search For One-Eyed Jimmy, Box Of Moonlight and Ben Affleck's Glory Daze featured notable names that were upstaged by Rockwell's eccentric characters, often the true focus of the films. His role in Moonlight got the attention of the producers of Lawn Dogs, and this began the critical ascent Rockwell's career had been waiting the past 8 years for.

After Sam Rockwell's nuanced performance in the lauded and 'featured' indie Lawn Dogs won several awards, his career started taking off. In 1998 Rockwell got his second starring role in Safe Men with fellow indie supporting character actor Steve Zahn. Also that year he got a tiny blip of screen time in Woody Allen's Celebrity, as part of Leonardo DiCaprio's posse (with future Entourage star Adrian Grenier).

1998, however, was just a filler year for Rockwell compared to his true breakout year of 1999. After Lawn Dogs, he got the attention of several influential players in Hollywood. A Midsummer's Night Dream, made to capitalize on the success of Shakespeare In Love the year before, saw Rockwell play Francis Flute. Another hallmark was as Guy Fleegman in Galaxy Quest. Quest not only showed the public that Rockwell possessed comedic chops, but also pigeon-holed him as a 'that guy'.

If the previous two films had made Rockwell at least a name in Hollywood studio productions, Steven Spielberg got people actually talking about him. Spielberg saw Lawn Dogs, and gave Rockwell the role of the disturbing antagonizer Wild Bill Wharton in the major release The Green Mile. Rockwell got acclaim for his role as the deranged inmate from much more widely read sources than the ones who watched Lawn Dogs. But the stardom was swift, and it nearly derailed his niche as an actor.

Charlie's Angels, released in 2000, was one of the most highly anticipated franchises that year, and amongst the star power of Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, and Bill Murray, Rockwell found himself playing the villain. But unlike his other villainous roles, this was his first summer blockbuster, and he got to play a suave playboy. Unfortunately the film was terrible in execution, and Rockwell struggled to look 'cool' on screen.

Although he had his highest profile role to date, his performance provoked apathy. Rockwell laid low and went back to his independent roots, often appearing in friends' short films. It was in 2002 that Rockwell got the nod to star in George Clooney's directorial debut, Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind. The producers wanted a bigger name to play Confessions' Chuck Barris, full-time television show producer, part-time CIA assassin, but Clooney insisted on Rockwell. He didn't let him down. He conveyed the essence of Barris' affable desperation, both in seriousness and to comedic effect. Critics at the time were enamored with the performance, and Rockwell won several local Best Actor awards.

Sam got another high-profile gig in the favorably reviewed Matchstick Men, playing, what else, but a comically flawed sidekick to star Nicolas Cage. As Entertainment Weekly noted at the time, "Sam Rockwell, who seems destined by a kind of excessive interestingness to forever be a colorful sidekick."

For better or worse, Rockwell then appeared in the highly anticipated but ultimately disappointing The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy in 2005, as the strange cult leader Zaphod Beeblebrox. But perhaps like Charlie's Angels, Rockwell in Hitchhiker didn't show off his best talents on the big box office scale. In essence, Beeblebrox was a signature Rockwell role; goofy charms met with an an unorthodox parlance. But again, it did not curry any favors for Rockwell's stock.

That brings us to Sam's recent credits. He filled a true Rockwell-esque supporting role as Casey Affleck's brother Charley Ford in the critical but little seen The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford. Even better was his star turn in another little seen but somewhat prestigious indie film, Snow Angels. Playing a depressed, emotionally and mentally damaged father was pretty typical of Rockwell, but it's what he does best, and he completely nailed the role. If it was released at a better time or got more attention, Rockwell's name would be right up in the awards conversations.

This fall we look forward to Choke, based off a Chuck Palahniuk (Fight Club) novel, which should continue to make new fans out of Rockwell's work. At the end of the year he plays author James Reston Jr. in Ron Howard's awards-seeking Frost/Nixon, most likely another thankless supporting role. Other movies in post-production include Moon, Everybody's Fine, and Gentlemen Broncos.

Sam Rockwell may never become a consistent star in Hollywood, and may be lucky to continue popping up in major budget films. But with a penchant for dark, odd characters, Rockwell is suited just fine for interesting independent films. Whatever happens with his career, an appearance by Rockwell in a film is a welcome addition.

The Prezzies' Top Five Sam Rockwell Performances
1. Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind
2. Snow Angels
3. The Green Mile
4. Matchstick Men
5. Lawn Dogs

Featured Review: KUNG FU PANDA

2008-06-10T20:58:00.000-07:00

Kung Fu Panda

Starring- Jack Black, Dustin Hoffman, Angelina Jolie, Ian McShane, Seth Rogen, Lucy Liu, David Cross, Jackie Chan

Directed by Mark Osborne and John Stevenson

Grade: B

"I'm not a big fat panda. I'm the big fat panda!"

Right out of the gate, Kung Fu Panda's marketing in movie theatres ("Hey you with the cell phone...") months beforehand made the film somewhat undesirable. We get it; Jack Black, a jovial, rotund, energetic sort of actor, voices a jovial, rotund, energetic panda. No stretch there. With the dearth of CGI-animated films being shoved out, titles such as Valiant, Flushed Away, The Wild, Over The Hedge etc, long forgotten about, can Panda compete?

Surprising to say, but while Kung Fu Panda is far from a perfect family film, it does succeed in entertaining the same way as the lesser of Pixar's films do. A cliche story, mixed with some genuine affection and humor, and some murky, mixed feel-good messages to kids, and Dreamworks' has its first true hit outside of the Shrek franchise.

Kung Fu Panda actually starts off very strong. We learn, much like in a traditional Chinese folklore, of the predetermined fate of Po (Black), a clumsy but good-natured giant panda who's not expected of anything but to make noodles for his father. It's when he attempts to join his neighbors in celebrating the revealing of the chosen 'Dragon Warrior' that things kick off.

Many of the early moments of the film is quick-paced and humorous, appealing especially to kids. Po gets into comedic violence often, but it's usually pretty tame. Getting into the walled off temple that the christening takes place is an especially realized piece of the film.

Panda does, however, lose steam into the second half. After a brilliantly drawn scene showing the evil Tai Lung (McShane) escaping from his prison, the film gets pretty heavily caught up in its own message, one that when lighthearted works best, but gets poured on as the film progresses.

The basic theme is that no matter who you are or what you are, if you believe in yourself, you have the power to do anything, and that each and every thing can be special. Whether that be fighting a warrior that's much stronger and faster than you, or climbing a bunch of cabinets to eat almond cookies. This gets mixed up a little. At times it seems like the message is trying to deconstruct body image issues, saying to kids "it's okay if you're fat, you can still achieve great things, like being a master at kung fu!". But remember, pandas have fat deposits, it's part of their body makeup. Childhood obesity isn't.

Another mixed reaction to the film is the voice cast. Black brings his personality perfectly to Po, using his enthusiasm to sell the panda as a lovable, lazy goof. Dustin Hoffman is fun as well as Shifu, Po's rat-like kung fu master. At times Hoffman sounds more Jewish than Chinese, but his grandfatherly voice casts a warm tone over his sometimes demeaning character. But while they, and McShane's dastardly villain voice are the highlights, everyone else gets lost in the shuffle.

Angelina Jolie's Tigress is mostly forgettable, at least for as much star power as her name commands. Seth Rogen, Lucy Liu, and David Cross, while being recognized, are under utilized. Worst of all is Jackie Chan, voicing the Monkey. He had maybe two or three lines and I can't remember what any of them were, let alone figure out it was Chan until the credits rolled.

Otherwise, Kung Fu Panda was a pleasant animated film, maybe one of the best not put out by Pixar. Unlike Shrek and it's counterparts, Panda doesn't pander to parents with quick pop culture references that go stale in three years. It relies on its story, for better or worse. Panda doesn't quite endear like Horton Hears A Who!, and will probably fall to third when Wall-E is released, but still a minor feat unto itself considering how much we all dreaded the cell phone commercial.