***1/2 out *****
The second Mesrine film is a step down from the original. The first one crammed about 10-12 years into two hours, this once only has to cram about 6 or 7, but still manages to feel slow and chuggy.
Mesrine, fresh from his criminal adventures in Canada, has returned to France and begun robbing banks with gusto. Although, if you're looking for action, you're in the wrong place. We see maybe one bank robbery in this one. Mesrine's ego has grown with his legend, and he now thinks of himself as someone who robs from the rich and gives to himself. It's like crossing Gordon Gekko with Robin Hood. He sees himself as a revolutionary, bringing down the French establishment.
But the French establishment has something for him…bullets! Hey, it worked for Bonnie and Clyde… This film is filled with more French character actors (well, that I recognized anyway). Samuel LiBehan (Brotherhood of the Wolf, He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not), Mathieu Almaric (Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Quantum of Solace) and Ludivine Sagnier (Swimming Pool, Paris, je t'aime) all show up at varying times as partners of Mesrine. There's also a cameo by Georges Wilson, who I don't particularly know, but is a big deal in France I'm told. They're not given a whole lot to do, though, and tend to disappear unceremoniously when the movie is through with them.
We never really delve into Mesrine's ego, just see him flaunt it (although there is an interesting scene where a real revolutionary shoots down his fight-the-power dreams). There's also a fun scene where Wilson manages to beat Mesrine at his own game. Cassell is still great, and carries the movie almost single-handedly, but here Mesrine is static. He's still charming and psychotic, but he's not as interesting.
The protracted climax basically replays the entire opening credits of the first film. It's a bad choice…they could've built some real suspense here, but it's deadened by us already knowing what the end result is. We also don't get much in the way of the controversy surrounding the French police ruthlessly gunning Mesrine down in broad daylight (no, I'm not giving away the end…we know this happens from the credits of the first film). It also more unfocused, sometimes making Mesrine the focal point, sometimes focusing on the cops hunting him. But there's never a sense of the cat-and-mouse game between the two.
It doesn't ruin the first one, and it's not a bad movie, but like Soderbergh's Che, the second half doesn't quite equal up to the first. Still, I'd recommend seeing Mesrine's saga.
Showing posts with label movie reviews. Show all posts
Showing posts with label movie reviews. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
movie review by brandon, the movie nerd! mesrine: killer instinct
**** out of *****
Jacques Mesrine (pronounced May-reen, or May-reign, or even sometimes, May-reign-uh) was a real-life French criminal who was sort of a cross between John Dillinger and Goodfellas. His sordid life was made into two movies in 2008 (or 07 and 08, depending on your online sources). The first film details his rise to becoming France's public enemy number one.
It starts with his release from the army, where he discovered a taste for brutality while torturing the rebellious Algerians (pretty ironic/hypocritical, considering how he fancied himself a rebel later on). He returns to France, and quickly hooks up with gangster Gerard Depardieu, rising through the ranks of Depardieu's small mob and eventually striking out on his own as a kidnapper and bank robber in both France, Canada, and even escaping to the U.S. once (although he was apparently apprehended in Arkansas, not Arizona as the movie depicts).
As Mesrine, Vincent Cassell is simply brilliant. He's got the perfect amount of charm and violence needed to show why this character is both magnetic and horrifying. The film remains neutral on Mesrine, showing us his life instead of making a judgment. We see the fun, party aspect of his life with girls and money, and we also see his sense of honor and loyalty (like when he tries to go straight...he accepts being laid off, and doesn't blame his boss).
But we also see the horrific violence he inflicts, and the crazy anger hiding just beneath his eyes. This is a guy who one minutes loves his wife and the next minute shoves a gun in her mouth. But we also can see why…the boss was not disrespecting him, just doing what needed to be done. A wife trying to hold him back from his own desires…to him, that's disrespect.
Director Jean-Francois Richet has a good grasp of American crime sagas, and does this in the grand seventies tradition of something like The Godfather, Serpico, or GoodFellas (yes, I know GoodFellas isn't from the seventies, but it's also in that same style). It bounces along, giving us glimpses into his life at different times. This can sometimes work against the film, as we sometimes don't really get to know the people orbiting him. But Richet does a good job with the passing of time. He shows us things that we know take a certain amount of time: babies being born, jail sentences, etc. And even though he sometimes skips action we think we'd like to see, he spares us one more bank robbery in order to prime us for the stunning (and amazingly off-the-cuff) jailbreak scene toward the end.
It can be choppy sometimes, but it works in that 70s way, and gives us a full portrait of one man's slow descent into crime. Definitely worth seeing, especially for fans of crime movies.
Monday, September 13, 2010
movie review by brandon, the movie nerd: the losers
*** out of *****
I've never read the comic book this is based on, but it's apparently got its fans, so I assume it's gotta be better than this thing. It opens they way all action-comedies should open…with the murder of 25 innocent children. At this rate, we'll be seeing 9/11 movies starring The Rock and some cutsy kid.
Jeffrey Dean Morgan (the Robert Downey, Jr.-looking guy from Watchmen) is the leader of an A-Team-like band of military specialists. They, much like the A-Team, are great soldiers with all sorts of wisecracks, and run afoul of a bad guy G-Man (Jason Patric) who attempts to kill them and kills the aforementioned 25 children instead. Our team of lovable losers must nut up and get back to America with the help of a truly awful Zoe Saldana and even the score with Patric. Too bad we've seen it all before, and much better.
It really does feel like a long episode of The A-Team, where everything goes 1) plot point 2) one-liners 3) action 4) one-liners 5) repeat. But the action is fairly typical and the plot is so unmemorable that it's hard to remember why anyone is actually doing any of these things. Most of the "clever one-liners" aren't near as clever as the screenwriters think they are, although a few work here and there. The best one is probably "I'm the black MacGuyver! Blaguyver!" But I only say that because it's the only one I bothered to remember, and that might be more because it was in all the previews.
To their credit, Morgan and the underrated Chris Evans do the best they can with the weak material, and even manage to make it work here and there. Idris Elba is utterly wasted in his role. I barely remember the other guys on the team. The best performance though belongs to Patric, who seems to be channeling Nicolas Cage at his Bad Lieutenanty best. He twitches and preens and generally looks like he knows it's a shitty movie so he's going to be as ridiculous as possible to teach someone a lesson. I'm not sure who learned anything, but I had a blast watching him.
I want to make a special point to discuss Zoe Saldana, who's the latest "it girl." She sucks pretty fucking hard. Watching her in this movie was like being the guy at the end of Audition getting needles shoved into your eyelids. She's got that Angelina Jolie problem of being way too damn skinny to be tough or fearsome in any way, and her attempts at being a badass chick just made me wonder how any of her costars could take her seriously.
I suppose the good and bad kinda cancel each other out, and just make the movie sort of forgettable instead of painful. Maybe something for nondiscriminating action fans. Everyone else can just watch some old A-Team episodes.
Monday, May 10, 2010
movie review by brandon, the movie nerd: fando y lis
**1/2 out of *****
Alejandro Jodorowsky's first film nearly got him killed…literally.
When it premiered at the Alcupulco Film Festival, it's grotesque sexual/religious imagery caused a full-scale riot. As the crowd went after him, Jodorowsky had to sneak out to a waiting limo. The crowd discovered it as it was driving him away and pelted it with rocks. A week later it opened in Mexico City to sold-out crowds…but again, riots ensued. Mexico banned the film and very nearly deported Jodorowsky back to his native Chile.
Amidst all of this nonsense, people also began thinking Jodorowsky was a vampire. Filmmaker Sergio Klainer began spreading the rumor, and it didn't help that the movie has a blood-drinking scene, or that actress Diana Mariscal (Lis) was anorexic, so she was abnormally thin in public appearances. The American release didn't do much better…15 minutes were cut from the film, and it was derided as a rip-off of Fellini or Bunuel. How Jodorowsky went from this to celebrated director of El Topo and The Holy Mountain is almost as amazing as how fast he fell in the mid 70s.
But enough history, how is the actual movie? Unfortunately, not great. Jodorowsky based it on memories of a play he once saw, and the entire script was apparently one page long. Like his later films, it tells the story of a surreal journey…this time Fando and Lis. Fando is an immature, selfish prick with a drum made of his dad's skin (!) and Lis is a paraplegic doormat with a phonograph player. They travel through a desolate, mountainous landscape looking for the lost city of Tar, where apparently all dreams can come true. They come across a motley of surreal, grotesque characters who seem more interested in debauchery than anything.
Then, every twenty minutes or so, Fando decides to mentally and physically abuse Lis, before ditching her to go off on his own (he usually comes crawling back). While it does have the weird, sometimes beautiful, imagery that Jodorowsky would become known for, it seems to be missing the depth of his later work. I liked a few scenes, like when Fando and Lis stumble upon a bunch of people waking up and floundering around in a mud pit. But none of the scenes added up to much of anything. I never got any sort of impression or introspection from what was onscreen.
And it's really hard to spend any time with the annoying main characters. Lis is at least an attractive lady, and loses her top here and there, but Fando is just a complete prick. There are several scenes of Fando doing things like dragging Lis across the stony ground by her dead legs while she screams in pain. It's unpleasant to watch, and the longer it goes, the more it focuses on the cruelty. I guess maybe that's the point, and maybe it's my own fault for not knowing what it's supposed to mean. But it's hard to watch something that seems to be cruel for cruelty's sake.
In the end, it's just a pretentious mess. Stick with his later work.
Alejandro Jodorowsky's first film nearly got him killed…literally.
When it premiered at the Alcupulco Film Festival, it's grotesque sexual/religious imagery caused a full-scale riot. As the crowd went after him, Jodorowsky had to sneak out to a waiting limo. The crowd discovered it as it was driving him away and pelted it with rocks. A week later it opened in Mexico City to sold-out crowds…but again, riots ensued. Mexico banned the film and very nearly deported Jodorowsky back to his native Chile.
Amidst all of this nonsense, people also began thinking Jodorowsky was a vampire. Filmmaker Sergio Klainer began spreading the rumor, and it didn't help that the movie has a blood-drinking scene, or that actress Diana Mariscal (Lis) was anorexic, so she was abnormally thin in public appearances. The American release didn't do much better…15 minutes were cut from the film, and it was derided as a rip-off of Fellini or Bunuel. How Jodorowsky went from this to celebrated director of El Topo and The Holy Mountain is almost as amazing as how fast he fell in the mid 70s.
But enough history, how is the actual movie? Unfortunately, not great. Jodorowsky based it on memories of a play he once saw, and the entire script was apparently one page long. Like his later films, it tells the story of a surreal journey…this time Fando and Lis. Fando is an immature, selfish prick with a drum made of his dad's skin (!) and Lis is a paraplegic doormat with a phonograph player. They travel through a desolate, mountainous landscape looking for the lost city of Tar, where apparently all dreams can come true. They come across a motley of surreal, grotesque characters who seem more interested in debauchery than anything.
Then, every twenty minutes or so, Fando decides to mentally and physically abuse Lis, before ditching her to go off on his own (he usually comes crawling back). While it does have the weird, sometimes beautiful, imagery that Jodorowsky would become known for, it seems to be missing the depth of his later work. I liked a few scenes, like when Fando and Lis stumble upon a bunch of people waking up and floundering around in a mud pit. But none of the scenes added up to much of anything. I never got any sort of impression or introspection from what was onscreen.
And it's really hard to spend any time with the annoying main characters. Lis is at least an attractive lady, and loses her top here and there, but Fando is just a complete prick. There are several scenes of Fando doing things like dragging Lis across the stony ground by her dead legs while she screams in pain. It's unpleasant to watch, and the longer it goes, the more it focuses on the cruelty. I guess maybe that's the point, and maybe it's my own fault for not knowing what it's supposed to mean. But it's hard to watch something that seems to be cruel for cruelty's sake.
In the end, it's just a pretentious mess. Stick with his later work.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
movie review by brandon, the movie nerd: cloudy with a chance of meatballs
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs- **** out of *****
3-D CGI cartoons are pretty much a dime a dozen, and most blow. Studios are busy cranking out the kind of cheap, lackluster children's fare that brought Disney to its knees in the early 2000s. But no one is really learning the lessons of Disney's blah animation section. Rather than focus on original, envelope-pushing entertainment a la Pixar, most studios are perfectly happy cranking out cruddy sequels to mediocre originals. Ooo, more Shrek! Another Ice Age! Hood winked 2? For real? Did anyone actually see Hoodwinked 1? Are we destined for another goddamned Shark Tale now?!
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs has a slightly different pedigree. It's based on the bestselling children's book and already has a legion of fans…luckily, Hollywood doesn’t mess it up too bad. Flint Lockwood is an inventor whose inventions cause more harm than good. He's trying to perfect a machine that turns water into food to help his struggling community. But it backfires, destroying the town's new sardine-themed amusement park and causing trouble for low-rent news lady Sam Sparks. But then the machine starts working, pulling moisture from the air and blanketing the town with storms of food. Flint finally receives the recognition he deserves, but as the machine begins to get a mind of its own, he realizes that the respect of his father and Sam means way more than the blind adoration of an entire town.
Well, it's a kid's movie, did you think there wouldn't be a lesson?
In terms of animation, it's near perfect. Sony seems to have figured out what Dreamworks learned with Kung Fu Panda…be as good as Pixar. They also make great use of the 3-D. Now, I didn't actually see this in 3-D, but even in 2-D I could see how much fun it would've been. Especially in the end, where food is flying around willy-nilly.
The story is highly imaginative, making the best out of the plot and even answering some of the questions rattling in my head (like how do they clean up after a hamburger storm?). The voice actors aren't the usual big name stars...there's nothing that pulls you out of an animated movie faster than a lion talking like Jack Bauer. "Mr. President, if we don't escape the zoo NOW, the terrorists will set off the nuclear bomb and unleash the deadly gas! DAMMIT!!" By casting people like Bill Hader and Anna Faris, we get solid voice actors without spending half the movie trying to figure out who they are. I didn't even recognize James Caan as the hilariously-animated father to Flint (I thought it was Ray Winstone). I also didn't recognize Andy Samberg or Bruce Campbell. The one everyone will know is Mr. T as the local tough-guy cop, but it's hard to disagree any time someone casts Mr. T.
But there is one problem with the movie…it tends to go over the top on emotional and action scenes. By the time we get to the end of the movie, we've seen Flint take so much crap from everyone that you wind up thinking, "Christ, does the movie want me to cry AGAIN?" The action scenes, especially the end, suffer from too many complications, and winds up just dragging on forever. I'm sure this is more to show off the 3-D technology, since the end all takes place in a gigantic floating food ball, but it starts to weigh the 2-D version down.
Still, it's not enough to sink the movie…there's enough charm and imagination to get you through the hiccups. The other studios haven't quite figured out how to make animated films like Pixar, but this shows they are trying. For a place as conventional as Hollywood, it gives me hope.
3-D CGI cartoons are pretty much a dime a dozen, and most blow. Studios are busy cranking out the kind of cheap, lackluster children's fare that brought Disney to its knees in the early 2000s. But no one is really learning the lessons of Disney's blah animation section. Rather than focus on original, envelope-pushing entertainment a la Pixar, most studios are perfectly happy cranking out cruddy sequels to mediocre originals. Ooo, more Shrek! Another Ice Age! Hood winked 2? For real? Did anyone actually see Hoodwinked 1? Are we destined for another goddamned Shark Tale now?!
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs has a slightly different pedigree. It's based on the bestselling children's book and already has a legion of fans…luckily, Hollywood doesn’t mess it up too bad. Flint Lockwood is an inventor whose inventions cause more harm than good. He's trying to perfect a machine that turns water into food to help his struggling community. But it backfires, destroying the town's new sardine-themed amusement park and causing trouble for low-rent news lady Sam Sparks. But then the machine starts working, pulling moisture from the air and blanketing the town with storms of food. Flint finally receives the recognition he deserves, but as the machine begins to get a mind of its own, he realizes that the respect of his father and Sam means way more than the blind adoration of an entire town.
Well, it's a kid's movie, did you think there wouldn't be a lesson?
In terms of animation, it's near perfect. Sony seems to have figured out what Dreamworks learned with Kung Fu Panda…be as good as Pixar. They also make great use of the 3-D. Now, I didn't actually see this in 3-D, but even in 2-D I could see how much fun it would've been. Especially in the end, where food is flying around willy-nilly.
The story is highly imaginative, making the best out of the plot and even answering some of the questions rattling in my head (like how do they clean up after a hamburger storm?). The voice actors aren't the usual big name stars...there's nothing that pulls you out of an animated movie faster than a lion talking like Jack Bauer. "Mr. President, if we don't escape the zoo NOW, the terrorists will set off the nuclear bomb and unleash the deadly gas! DAMMIT!!" By casting people like Bill Hader and Anna Faris, we get solid voice actors without spending half the movie trying to figure out who they are. I didn't even recognize James Caan as the hilariously-animated father to Flint (I thought it was Ray Winstone). I also didn't recognize Andy Samberg or Bruce Campbell. The one everyone will know is Mr. T as the local tough-guy cop, but it's hard to disagree any time someone casts Mr. T.
But there is one problem with the movie…it tends to go over the top on emotional and action scenes. By the time we get to the end of the movie, we've seen Flint take so much crap from everyone that you wind up thinking, "Christ, does the movie want me to cry AGAIN?" The action scenes, especially the end, suffer from too many complications, and winds up just dragging on forever. I'm sure this is more to show off the 3-D technology, since the end all takes place in a gigantic floating food ball, but it starts to weigh the 2-D version down.
Still, it's not enough to sink the movie…there's enough charm and imagination to get you through the hiccups. The other studios haven't quite figured out how to make animated films like Pixar, but this shows they are trying. For a place as conventional as Hollywood, it gives me hope.
Friday, February 12, 2010
movie review by brandon, the movie nerd: a single man
A Single Man- *** out of *****
It's very obvious Tom Ford's day job is as a clothing designer. Halfway through A Single Man, his directing debut, my friend whispered to me, "I feel like this is a long ad for Tom Ford's fashions." In a way yes…but at least everyone looks damn good.
Colin Firth plays George, a dapper, middle-aged gay man who is mourning the loss of his younger lover. Unable to deal with his pain, he decides to kill himself. He makes plans for his eventual demise, and spends what might be his final day preparing for death…but also looking for reasons to stay alive. As the main character, Colin Firth gives what's probably the best performance of his career. Famous for playing stiff Brits, this film allows him to expand more and really dig into his performance.
While George is also a stiff, secretive man (he has to be, as the movie takes place in the 60s), Firth does a brilliant job conveying the emotion roiling behind the mask he has to wear. The movie is also brilliant at detailing the gay culture of the 60s, where all speech is done in code and the protocols are murky at best. There's also a great supporting turn by Julianne Moore, a friend in love with Firth who can't grasp that his homosexuality isn't just a lark.
I wasn't as impressed with Firth's young student, but his role is also pretty thin. There's also beautiful cinematography, although any one who's seen Mad Men might get a case of déjà vu. And I think it goes without saying that the costumes are fantastic.
Unfortunately, Ford's inexperience at filmmaking is all too obvious. The close attention to detail in the technical aspects of the film seem out of balance with the direction and pacing. The film moves in fits and starts, moving from ambiguous scenes (like Firth's encounter with a Spanish hustler), to weird montages of the male physique, to brilliantly handled scenes (Firth and Moore's scene together, or the flashbacks to Firth and Matthew Goode), to scenes that drag on long after they've made their point (most of the conversations with a young, gay student). Ford relies too much on tricks that feel a little too film school. Such as the drab color scheme suddenly growing bright and colorful when Firth sees a sexy man or a dog. Yes, I know, these things brighten his world, but did it have to be SO obvious? And how exactly do children affect him? Because he is trapped in a lifestyle that makes children impossible? That would've been an interesting idea to explore, but we only really see the "downsides" of homosexuality in the sense of the world not accepting him.
We also get themes that are brought up and dropped, like Lee Pace as a paranoid professor or radio shows about the Cuban Missile Crisis. I can see how 50's paranoia could relate to homophobia, but why bring it up if you're not going to deal with it? The camera tends to dwell on clothes, which I suppose isn't surprising, but it does slow the movie down (I will say the slow pans of the suit he wanted to be buried in worked). The long, slow shots of male faces and bodies did start to grate on me though. I'm sure being straight plays a part, but at times it felt like Ford was more interested in lovingly caressing Firth's face or ass than telling a story. The final scenes with a young student come off as just very typical. I see what they're going for, but we've seen it before, and it takes too long to get where we know it's going.
But even that's not quite as annoying as the forced existentialism of the final minutes. It winds up feeling more like a cheat than a natural path. If Ford can tone down his indulgences, I think he can be a great filmmaker. He's got a lot of style, and he draws great performances from his cast. His debut reminds me of another flawed but very well done film from this year…Duncan Jones' Moon. Both are talented people just finding their legs, and I'm excited to see what they do next.
It's very obvious Tom Ford's day job is as a clothing designer. Halfway through A Single Man, his directing debut, my friend whispered to me, "I feel like this is a long ad for Tom Ford's fashions." In a way yes…but at least everyone looks damn good.
Colin Firth plays George, a dapper, middle-aged gay man who is mourning the loss of his younger lover. Unable to deal with his pain, he decides to kill himself. He makes plans for his eventual demise, and spends what might be his final day preparing for death…but also looking for reasons to stay alive. As the main character, Colin Firth gives what's probably the best performance of his career. Famous for playing stiff Brits, this film allows him to expand more and really dig into his performance.
While George is also a stiff, secretive man (he has to be, as the movie takes place in the 60s), Firth does a brilliant job conveying the emotion roiling behind the mask he has to wear. The movie is also brilliant at detailing the gay culture of the 60s, where all speech is done in code and the protocols are murky at best. There's also a great supporting turn by Julianne Moore, a friend in love with Firth who can't grasp that his homosexuality isn't just a lark.
I wasn't as impressed with Firth's young student, but his role is also pretty thin. There's also beautiful cinematography, although any one who's seen Mad Men might get a case of déjà vu. And I think it goes without saying that the costumes are fantastic.
Unfortunately, Ford's inexperience at filmmaking is all too obvious. The close attention to detail in the technical aspects of the film seem out of balance with the direction and pacing. The film moves in fits and starts, moving from ambiguous scenes (like Firth's encounter with a Spanish hustler), to weird montages of the male physique, to brilliantly handled scenes (Firth and Moore's scene together, or the flashbacks to Firth and Matthew Goode), to scenes that drag on long after they've made their point (most of the conversations with a young, gay student). Ford relies too much on tricks that feel a little too film school. Such as the drab color scheme suddenly growing bright and colorful when Firth sees a sexy man or a dog. Yes, I know, these things brighten his world, but did it have to be SO obvious? And how exactly do children affect him? Because he is trapped in a lifestyle that makes children impossible? That would've been an interesting idea to explore, but we only really see the "downsides" of homosexuality in the sense of the world not accepting him.
We also get themes that are brought up and dropped, like Lee Pace as a paranoid professor or radio shows about the Cuban Missile Crisis. I can see how 50's paranoia could relate to homophobia, but why bring it up if you're not going to deal with it? The camera tends to dwell on clothes, which I suppose isn't surprising, but it does slow the movie down (I will say the slow pans of the suit he wanted to be buried in worked). The long, slow shots of male faces and bodies did start to grate on me though. I'm sure being straight plays a part, but at times it felt like Ford was more interested in lovingly caressing Firth's face or ass than telling a story. The final scenes with a young student come off as just very typical. I see what they're going for, but we've seen it before, and it takes too long to get where we know it's going.
But even that's not quite as annoying as the forced existentialism of the final minutes. It winds up feeling more like a cheat than a natural path. If Ford can tone down his indulgences, I think he can be a great filmmaker. He's got a lot of style, and he draws great performances from his cast. His debut reminds me of another flawed but very well done film from this year…Duncan Jones' Moon. Both are talented people just finding their legs, and I'm excited to see what they do next.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
movie review by brandon, the movie nerd: turkish death wish
The Executioner/Cellât (Turkish Death Wish)- *** out of *****
Turkey ain't gonna let a good thing go by, so when Death Wish found a big American audience, Turkey replied with their own version. And like all Turkish remakes, it's about four bucks worth of shit slathered onto a piece of limp toast, and then delivered to you like it's filet mignon.
It's pretty faithful to the original movie, only instead of Kersey and his wife vacationing in Hawaii, here they go camping in the winter. Happy anniversary honey, let's go to the tundra! We're also treated to a "chewing" montage, which is fairly befuddling. Since it's Turkey, the murder/rape scene is even more violent and rapey, this time caused by punks (including the Turkish David Crosby and Turkish Yul Brenner) who are so evil that they steal an old lady's cabbage and wear cool vests. It's basically a re-enactment of the key scenes of the original, only the Reader's Digest Condensed Version.
Each scene has actors just spitting enough exposition to get us to the killings. Turkish Kersey (who looks like a Turkish Burt Reynolds…with a mullet) is much more blood thristy, getting his murder on and suffering none of the psychological effects that Bronson had. Well…kinda had, anyway. He still throws up in the sink after the first murder, but then inexplicably rubs the vomit on his face. I assume he's supposed to be splashing water on it, but that's not what it looks like...
It's also more sexist and racist than the original. Besides the amped up rape, the Turkish Burt Reynolds just ignores his secretary, even when she's talking directly to him. But at least she doesn't get her face bashed into the floor like a girl later in the movie. One scene has a girl walking up to a black bartender and saying, "Give me a vodka, blackie." Since this is the only African-American I've ever seen in a Turkish movie, I have to wonder if he was put there simply to be called racial slurs.
They do switch the rape victim from a daughter to a sister, which is either better or worse depending on your individual perversions. It's not quite as ludicrous as the Turkish superhero extravaganzas, but it has its fair share of nuttiness and misspelled subtitles (like "kitschen" or "roberries" instead of robberies). Lines like "Give me back my cabbage!" or "Let's shoot some bullets…it will relax you!" or "This is not a gun…but a poem" might be the result of crummy translations, but it's all part of the charm. Although, I'm not sure how an exchange like this could ever make any sense:
Racist Girl: Get me a vodka, blackie.
Thug #1: Hi…on the rejected one?
Racist Girl: No, on Pasabahce*
Thug #1: I see you don't greet your hunky bro no more
Racist Girl: Your ticket is not valid on our bus!
Thug #1: And we don't give money to ladies!
Racist Girl: Take your paw off me! I'm not on an amateur's team!
*Pasabahce is apparently a Turkish company that makes glassware. I thought figuring that out would somehow make the conversation coherent…but there you go.
Kinda feels like someone just cut phrases out and pasted them randomly into a screenplay, huh?
The last 15 minutes are the truly Turkish portions…when Turkish Burt Reynolds tracks down Crosby, Brenner, and Thug #1, dispatching them in truly hilarious ways (a catharsis Bronson was denied). Crosby gets electrocuted, a trick they pulled off by apparently taping a bunch of sparklers to his chest. Brenner gets shot in the knees and thrown out a window. Thug #1 gets beaten up, his hands smashed by a brick, and then thrown into a furnace. After witnessing this last murder, the cops just let Turkish Burt Reynolds go.
Okay! Thank you, Turkey, for your wonderful cinema!
Turkey ain't gonna let a good thing go by, so when Death Wish found a big American audience, Turkey replied with their own version. And like all Turkish remakes, it's about four bucks worth of shit slathered onto a piece of limp toast, and then delivered to you like it's filet mignon.
It's pretty faithful to the original movie, only instead of Kersey and his wife vacationing in Hawaii, here they go camping in the winter. Happy anniversary honey, let's go to the tundra! We're also treated to a "chewing" montage, which is fairly befuddling. Since it's Turkey, the murder/rape scene is even more violent and rapey, this time caused by punks (including the Turkish David Crosby and Turkish Yul Brenner) who are so evil that they steal an old lady's cabbage and wear cool vests. It's basically a re-enactment of the key scenes of the original, only the Reader's Digest Condensed Version.
Each scene has actors just spitting enough exposition to get us to the killings. Turkish Kersey (who looks like a Turkish Burt Reynolds…with a mullet) is much more blood thristy, getting his murder on and suffering none of the psychological effects that Bronson had. Well…kinda had, anyway. He still throws up in the sink after the first murder, but then inexplicably rubs the vomit on his face. I assume he's supposed to be splashing water on it, but that's not what it looks like...
It's also more sexist and racist than the original. Besides the amped up rape, the Turkish Burt Reynolds just ignores his secretary, even when she's talking directly to him. But at least she doesn't get her face bashed into the floor like a girl later in the movie. One scene has a girl walking up to a black bartender and saying, "Give me a vodka, blackie." Since this is the only African-American I've ever seen in a Turkish movie, I have to wonder if he was put there simply to be called racial slurs.
They do switch the rape victim from a daughter to a sister, which is either better or worse depending on your individual perversions. It's not quite as ludicrous as the Turkish superhero extravaganzas, but it has its fair share of nuttiness and misspelled subtitles (like "kitschen" or "roberries" instead of robberies). Lines like "Give me back my cabbage!" or "Let's shoot some bullets…it will relax you!" or "This is not a gun…but a poem" might be the result of crummy translations, but it's all part of the charm. Although, I'm not sure how an exchange like this could ever make any sense:
Racist Girl: Get me a vodka, blackie.
Thug #1: Hi…on the rejected one?
Racist Girl: No, on Pasabahce*
Thug #1: I see you don't greet your hunky bro no more
Racist Girl: Your ticket is not valid on our bus!
Thug #1: And we don't give money to ladies!
Racist Girl: Take your paw off me! I'm not on an amateur's team!
*Pasabahce is apparently a Turkish company that makes glassware. I thought figuring that out would somehow make the conversation coherent…but there you go.
Kinda feels like someone just cut phrases out and pasted them randomly into a screenplay, huh?
The last 15 minutes are the truly Turkish portions…when Turkish Burt Reynolds tracks down Crosby, Brenner, and Thug #1, dispatching them in truly hilarious ways (a catharsis Bronson was denied). Crosby gets electrocuted, a trick they pulled off by apparently taping a bunch of sparklers to his chest. Brenner gets shot in the knees and thrown out a window. Thug #1 gets beaten up, his hands smashed by a brick, and then thrown into a furnace. After witnessing this last murder, the cops just let Turkish Burt Reynolds go.
Okay! Thank you, Turkey, for your wonderful cinema!
Thursday, May 21, 2009
movie review by brandon: star trek
**** out of *****
As a kid, I was always a Star Wars guy.
I much preferred big, explosive space opera to Star Trek's quieter sci-fi drama. I have seen episodes of the show, and remember my mom calling me in from playing whenever the Khan and Tribble episodes were on. I also saw a lot of the 1970's animated version, as well as the first four movies in the series (and Turkish Star Trek! Where space is orange!). But it was more something that my dad watched.
Well, JJ Abrams is here to modern this bitch up a bit! We open with a really effective prologue, pitting the USS Kelvin (for all you Lost fans out there) against a mysterious Romulan ship with unstoppable weapons and the evil Captain Nero (Eric Bana). As acting captain, George Kirk manages to save his crew (including his wife and unborn son) before perishing with his ship. And I have to say, it's a pretty emotional scene for a summer blockbuster.
We then follow a few of Kirk and Spock's unnecessary childhood adventures before they both join Starfleet, and then skip ahead to Kirk beating the Kobayashi Maru test (apparently this means something to Star Trek people). THEN we get back to the plot, as an attack on Vulcan collects all our favorite Trekkers onto the Enterprise under the command of Christopher Pike (Bruce Greenwood). It seems Nero has found a way to turn planets into black holes (due to a red circle of goo, for all you Alias fans out there), and he's got both Vulcan and Earth in his sights.
Now, I'm torn on my rating. On one hand, there's really nothing I disliked about the movie. Oh sure, there's a lot of cheese...can't Kirk just walk into a cave instead of being chased by a big, pointless CGI monster? Isn't there any other way to explain the plot than to have a character show up at the mid-point and just explain it to the everyone? But it's all in good fun. I just didn't walk out wanting to boldly go where no man has gone before. This seems odd, as everyone else seems to be filling their pants about this movie. But to me it felt like a prologue…or perhaps my expectations were just too high.
Besides the JJ Abrams references to his most famous TV shows (the time travel/destiny plotline also owes a good deal to Lost), there are some good references to the original Star Trek (and probably lots more I missed). And he sets up a clever, although mildly infuriating, way to subvert all that dense Trek canon and start out anew. I particularly liked that even Abrams' Enterprise has one area full of pointlessly spinning blades.
And I suppose I got pretty wrapped up since I didn't even notice the just over two-hour running time, and actually felt like it could've gone longer (maybe I'm just used to the interminable Star Trek: The Motion Picture). So I've decided to err on the side of positivity. This is a fun movie, and probably the best way to spend your hard-earned cash in the multiplex..at least until Transformers: Revenge of the Incoherent Action Scene hits theaters.
click here to view trailers with HD options!
As a kid, I was always a Star Wars guy.
I much preferred big, explosive space opera to Star Trek's quieter sci-fi drama. I have seen episodes of the show, and remember my mom calling me in from playing whenever the Khan and Tribble episodes were on. I also saw a lot of the 1970's animated version, as well as the first four movies in the series (and Turkish Star Trek! Where space is orange!). But it was more something that my dad watched.
Well, JJ Abrams is here to modern this bitch up a bit! We open with a really effective prologue, pitting the USS Kelvin (for all you Lost fans out there) against a mysterious Romulan ship with unstoppable weapons and the evil Captain Nero (Eric Bana). As acting captain, George Kirk manages to save his crew (including his wife and unborn son) before perishing with his ship. And I have to say, it's a pretty emotional scene for a summer blockbuster.
We then follow a few of Kirk and Spock's unnecessary childhood adventures before they both join Starfleet, and then skip ahead to Kirk beating the Kobayashi Maru test (apparently this means something to Star Trek people). THEN we get back to the plot, as an attack on Vulcan collects all our favorite Trekkers onto the Enterprise under the command of Christopher Pike (Bruce Greenwood). It seems Nero has found a way to turn planets into black holes (due to a red circle of goo, for all you Alias fans out there), and he's got both Vulcan and Earth in his sights.
Now, I'm torn on my rating. On one hand, there's really nothing I disliked about the movie. Oh sure, there's a lot of cheese...can't Kirk just walk into a cave instead of being chased by a big, pointless CGI monster? Isn't there any other way to explain the plot than to have a character show up at the mid-point and just explain it to the everyone? But it's all in good fun. I just didn't walk out wanting to boldly go where no man has gone before. This seems odd, as everyone else seems to be filling their pants about this movie. But to me it felt like a prologue…or perhaps my expectations were just too high.
Besides the JJ Abrams references to his most famous TV shows (the time travel/destiny plotline also owes a good deal to Lost), there are some good references to the original Star Trek (and probably lots more I missed). And he sets up a clever, although mildly infuriating, way to subvert all that dense Trek canon and start out anew. I particularly liked that even Abrams' Enterprise has one area full of pointlessly spinning blades.
And I suppose I got pretty wrapped up since I didn't even notice the just over two-hour running time, and actually felt like it could've gone longer (maybe I'm just used to the interminable Star Trek: The Motion Picture). So I've decided to err on the side of positivity. This is a fun movie, and probably the best way to spend your hard-earned cash in the multiplex..at least until Transformers: Revenge of the Incoherent Action Scene hits theaters.
click here to view trailers with HD options!
Thursday, April 30, 2009
movie review by brandon: crank: high voltage
** out of *****
In the first Crank, Chev Chelios (Jason Statham) was given a poison that would kill him if he didn't keep his adrenaline up. Then he fell out of a helicopter.
The sequel picks up right where the first one left off, as a gang of foreign thugs grab his seemingly lifeless body to harvest the organs. Not on Statham's watch! After escaping, Chelios realizes that his heart has been taken out and given to a hundred year old Chinese man named Poon Dong (David Carradine…no, really), so he must track down various gangsters and guest stars in order to get his heart back for Doc Miles (Dwight Yoakam), who's reasonably sure he can put it back in.
In the meantime, Chelios has to keep electrocuting himself in order to keep his fake heart juiced with enough power. And that's the framework on which this all-out assault on everything that's good and holy hangs. But I'm not sure I can describe this gigantic mess in sane words.
Let me quote a bit from costar Bai Ling:
"Crank 2 is not a dream but a crazy ride as if you are hooked on drugs, you just can't stop but laughing and laughing and laughing in a speeding car, but don't worry, tell your grandmommy and your grand grand father, for them if will feel like they are in this fancy old Hollywood Gone with the wind car, have their lunch box in their lap and have Charley Chaplain sing : " A kiss is just a kiss, a lunch box is just a lunch box, box box box, hip hop hip hop hip hurt, there will be a chinese chicken soup in the hip box with a nice swimming fish from the blue sea in the sun singing: " Summer time, the fish will not jumping I am on striking ........and fish will listen to grandmommy's old story about how she can not find grandfather's old sun glass, but its a perfect Sunday pic nic soup, and you don't have to see it with glass, all you have to do is just in fact close your sleepy lovely red eyes and drink eat man and women, is it a film's name?"
Yep, that about covers it.
Anyone who saw the first Crank should expect more of the same, only crazier. It's the sort of movie where the main character can and WILL shove a shotgun up a guy's ass.
Where strippers get shot in their fake chests and silicon dribbles out. Where one fight scene suddenly turns into a parody of Godzilla vs. King Kong. Where Bai Ling runs around screaming like the psycho bitch she is, and her unintelligible sounds are subtitled in broken English.
Where Statham dry-humps an old lady. Where the movie stops for a second so you can see a ferret lick its own balls. Where a transition title card pops up in a chase scene that says "9 Seconds Later" and cuts right back to the chase scene.
Where Corey Haim wears a blond mullet wig and gets beat up by a lady. Where a man cuts off his own nipples while another guy dances. Where Dwight Yoakam threatens to "choke a bitch."
Where the filmmakers throw in tits every couple minutes for no other reason than there hadn't been tits for a couple minutes. Where Chelios can shoot the F out of a bunch of Asian people and then snarl "CHICKEN AND BROCCOLI!!" (I dare you to explain that one).
And we haven't even discussed the severed head in the fish tank that is STILL ALIVE.
As much as the above sounds so-bad-it's-good, a movie this brain-smashing eventually just gets boring. The loud noises, choppy edits, and face-rending audaciousness eventually beat you senseless. It's like driving at top speed into oncoming traffic with the radio turned as loud as possible and Bai Ling trying to blow the gearshift.
Sure, there is some fun to be had, and I had to give this a higher rating than it deserves simply because it dared to go where movies don't go (for good reason). But when it's on purpose it loses that cheesy goodness. There's a lot of insanity here, and it probably should be seen just so you know (or at least just to see Bai Ling get flattened by a speeding car). But as it stands, I'm not going to recommend it.
In the first Crank, Chev Chelios (Jason Statham) was given a poison that would kill him if he didn't keep his adrenaline up. Then he fell out of a helicopter.
The sequel picks up right where the first one left off, as a gang of foreign thugs grab his seemingly lifeless body to harvest the organs. Not on Statham's watch! After escaping, Chelios realizes that his heart has been taken out and given to a hundred year old Chinese man named Poon Dong (David Carradine…no, really), so he must track down various gangsters and guest stars in order to get his heart back for Doc Miles (Dwight Yoakam), who's reasonably sure he can put it back in.
In the meantime, Chelios has to keep electrocuting himself in order to keep his fake heart juiced with enough power. And that's the framework on which this all-out assault on everything that's good and holy hangs. But I'm not sure I can describe this gigantic mess in sane words.
Let me quote a bit from costar Bai Ling:
"Crank 2 is not a dream but a crazy ride as if you are hooked on drugs, you just can't stop but laughing and laughing and laughing in a speeding car, but don't worry, tell your grandmommy and your grand grand father, for them if will feel like they are in this fancy old Hollywood Gone with the wind car, have their lunch box in their lap and have Charley Chaplain sing : " A kiss is just a kiss, a lunch box is just a lunch box, box box box, hip hop hip hop hip hurt, there will be a chinese chicken soup in the hip box with a nice swimming fish from the blue sea in the sun singing: " Summer time, the fish will not jumping I am on striking ........and fish will listen to grandmommy's old story about how she can not find grandfather's old sun glass, but its a perfect Sunday pic nic soup, and you don't have to see it with glass, all you have to do is just in fact close your sleepy lovely red eyes and drink eat man and women, is it a film's name?"
Yep, that about covers it.
Anyone who saw the first Crank should expect more of the same, only crazier. It's the sort of movie where the main character can and WILL shove a shotgun up a guy's ass.
Where strippers get shot in their fake chests and silicon dribbles out. Where one fight scene suddenly turns into a parody of Godzilla vs. King Kong. Where Bai Ling runs around screaming like the psycho bitch she is, and her unintelligible sounds are subtitled in broken English.
Where Statham dry-humps an old lady. Where the movie stops for a second so you can see a ferret lick its own balls. Where a transition title card pops up in a chase scene that says "9 Seconds Later" and cuts right back to the chase scene.
Where Corey Haim wears a blond mullet wig and gets beat up by a lady. Where a man cuts off his own nipples while another guy dances. Where Dwight Yoakam threatens to "choke a bitch."
Where the filmmakers throw in tits every couple minutes for no other reason than there hadn't been tits for a couple minutes. Where Chelios can shoot the F out of a bunch of Asian people and then snarl "CHICKEN AND BROCCOLI!!" (I dare you to explain that one).
And we haven't even discussed the severed head in the fish tank that is STILL ALIVE.
As much as the above sounds so-bad-it's-good, a movie this brain-smashing eventually just gets boring. The loud noises, choppy edits, and face-rending audaciousness eventually beat you senseless. It's like driving at top speed into oncoming traffic with the radio turned as loud as possible and Bai Ling trying to blow the gearshift.
Sure, there is some fun to be had, and I had to give this a higher rating than it deserves simply because it dared to go where movies don't go (for good reason). But when it's on purpose it loses that cheesy goodness. There's a lot of insanity here, and it probably should be seen just so you know (or at least just to see Bai Ling get flattened by a speeding car). But as it stands, I'm not going to recommend it.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
movie review by brandon: the haunting in connecticut
*1/2 out of *****
About 70 bazillion horror movies come out each year, and maybe 1 or 2 are any good. And by "any good" I mean usually mediocre, but at least you don't want to pull your guts out with your bare hands to stop the pain. Once in a great while you get something like The Orphanage. Predictably, The Haunting in Connecticut isn't The Orphanage. It's not even A Nightmare on Elm Street Part V.
Virginia Madsen, who apparently turned her Sideways comeback into a career of moms and wives in bad genre movies, plays a mom and wife who moves her family to a creepy house in order to be closer to her son's cancer treatment center. But it used to be a mortuary, where an evil undertaker held séances, carved runes into dead bodies, and cut off eyelids for apparently no reason (the movie can't even be bothered to give us one).
Soon, the hauntings start. And by hauntings, I mean indistinct black figures in mirrors while loud strings and trumpets go "DEH!" The cancer kid starts hallucinating fuzzy and heavily edited hallucinations about séances. At one point ectoplasm is brought up, but I think only so there could be a movie poster where brown stuff comes out of a kid's mouth because the ectoplasm (a genuinely creepy idea) is dropped as soon as it comes out of the kid's mouth and explodes.
That's right, this is the kind of movie where a brown, poopy substance coming from a child's mouth isn't creepy enough. It has to EXPLODE. Did Michael Bay direct that scene?
Needless to say, there are no scares in this movie. Rather than try and write any, they fall back on every single cliché that every single horror movie has been using for the last 5 years. I didn't count, but in the first half-hour it seemed there were at least 30 times a loud sting of music accompanied a figure in a mirror.
So basically the audience is cheated. Why introduce a box of human eyelids and NEVER use it for anything other than a quick "ew"?. Or the "based on true events" tag line that horror films love to tack onto their promotional materials, even though the movie in now way resembles any of the supposedly true events. The guy who wrote the book, upon discovering that the family's stories all contradicted each other, was told by the "paranormal investigators" Ed and Lorraine Warren to make the entire story up.
Not that the movie in any way resembles the fictional book. That would involve actually doing something that hasn't been done in a shit horror movie before. So the hauntings aren't scary, the mystery never involving, the writing and direction just puked upon the screen. Every horror scene is so choppy and edit-heavy that I thought Jason Bourne was going to jump on screen and karate fight the ghosts.
It's the kind of movie that really infuriates me, where the filmmakers can barely disguise their contempt for the audience. Seriously, people, can we stop giving these pricks our money and demand something worth a damn?
About 70 bazillion horror movies come out each year, and maybe 1 or 2 are any good. And by "any good" I mean usually mediocre, but at least you don't want to pull your guts out with your bare hands to stop the pain. Once in a great while you get something like The Orphanage. Predictably, The Haunting in Connecticut isn't The Orphanage. It's not even A Nightmare on Elm Street Part V.
Virginia Madsen, who apparently turned her Sideways comeback into a career of moms and wives in bad genre movies, plays a mom and wife who moves her family to a creepy house in order to be closer to her son's cancer treatment center. But it used to be a mortuary, where an evil undertaker held séances, carved runes into dead bodies, and cut off eyelids for apparently no reason (the movie can't even be bothered to give us one).
Soon, the hauntings start. And by hauntings, I mean indistinct black figures in mirrors while loud strings and trumpets go "DEH!" The cancer kid starts hallucinating fuzzy and heavily edited hallucinations about séances. At one point ectoplasm is brought up, but I think only so there could be a movie poster where brown stuff comes out of a kid's mouth because the ectoplasm (a genuinely creepy idea) is dropped as soon as it comes out of the kid's mouth and explodes.
That's right, this is the kind of movie where a brown, poopy substance coming from a child's mouth isn't creepy enough. It has to EXPLODE. Did Michael Bay direct that scene?
Needless to say, there are no scares in this movie. Rather than try and write any, they fall back on every single cliché that every single horror movie has been using for the last 5 years. I didn't count, but in the first half-hour it seemed there were at least 30 times a loud sting of music accompanied a figure in a mirror.
So basically the audience is cheated. Why introduce a box of human eyelids and NEVER use it for anything other than a quick "ew"?. Or the "based on true events" tag line that horror films love to tack onto their promotional materials, even though the movie in now way resembles any of the supposedly true events. The guy who wrote the book, upon discovering that the family's stories all contradicted each other, was told by the "paranormal investigators" Ed and Lorraine Warren to make the entire story up.
Not that the movie in any way resembles the fictional book. That would involve actually doing something that hasn't been done in a shit horror movie before. So the hauntings aren't scary, the mystery never involving, the writing and direction just puked upon the screen. Every horror scene is so choppy and edit-heavy that I thought Jason Bourne was going to jump on screen and karate fight the ghosts.
It's the kind of movie that really infuriates me, where the filmmakers can barely disguise their contempt for the audience. Seriously, people, can we stop giving these pricks our money and demand something worth a damn?
Friday, April 24, 2009
movie review by brandon: i love you, man
brandon's rating **** out of *****
In the three or four years since The 40 Year-Old Virgin flung Judd Apatow from cult hero to comedy icon, his particular brand of comedy has come to reign supreme. Unfortunately, I also feel that since 40 Year-Old Virgin, the comedies have become more watered down and fallen into typical romantic comedy terrain. So I found myself really underwhelmed by the release of I Love You, Man…even though Apatow had nothing to do with it.
It just seemed like it would be along the same lines as last year's Forgetting Sarah Marshall. It would have its moments, and be overall enjoyable, but nothing exceptional. The mixed critical reviews only seemed to prove my beliefs. So I was as surprised as anyone when they turned out to be wrong. Stupid beliefs.
Paul Rudd plays Peter, a nice guy who has always connected better with chicks than with dudes. He proposes to his special lady (Rashida Jones), and faced with trying to put together a wedding party, decides he needs more guy friends. After several failed man-dates, he stumbles upon Sydney (Jason Siegal), a scrubby guy who embodies all the man traits Peter does not.
Peter soon falls in man love and finds his inner dude. But this starts to put a strain on his relationship, which was based on Peter's ability to connect with ladies. And sadly, the movie misses a golden opportunity to examine that dichotomy. Instead it's focused more on the men-need-to-grow-up thing that seems to reside inside every comedy these days. But hey, it's still a damn funny movie.
Rudd and Siegel make a great team, and Rudd shows that he can play the wide-eyed innocent as well as he can play the snarky guy. A few fun cameos (and a lot of Rush references) help round out the comedy. There's nothing overall fresh about the plot, but it takes the typical rom-com clichés and twists them slightly to be about platonic men. Like Rudd's line of bad man-dates, or his inability to call Siegel out of nervousness. I rolled my eyes when the usual borrowing-money plot reared its ugly head, but was surprised to see that it was handled in a new, inventive way.
After drivel like Haunting in Connecticut and Paul Blart, it's nice to know there are screenwriters who actually put some effort into their work. A lot of this may have more to do with my initial reluctance to see the movie, but I found myself pleasantly surprised. It probably won’t wind up in the comedy hall of fame or anything, but it's as good, fun time.
check out the trailer, if you live under a rock, by clicking here.
In the three or four years since The 40 Year-Old Virgin flung Judd Apatow from cult hero to comedy icon, his particular brand of comedy has come to reign supreme. Unfortunately, I also feel that since 40 Year-Old Virgin, the comedies have become more watered down and fallen into typical romantic comedy terrain. So I found myself really underwhelmed by the release of I Love You, Man…even though Apatow had nothing to do with it.
It just seemed like it would be along the same lines as last year's Forgetting Sarah Marshall. It would have its moments, and be overall enjoyable, but nothing exceptional. The mixed critical reviews only seemed to prove my beliefs. So I was as surprised as anyone when they turned out to be wrong. Stupid beliefs.
Paul Rudd plays Peter, a nice guy who has always connected better with chicks than with dudes. He proposes to his special lady (Rashida Jones), and faced with trying to put together a wedding party, decides he needs more guy friends. After several failed man-dates, he stumbles upon Sydney (Jason Siegal), a scrubby guy who embodies all the man traits Peter does not.
Peter soon falls in man love and finds his inner dude. But this starts to put a strain on his relationship, which was based on Peter's ability to connect with ladies. And sadly, the movie misses a golden opportunity to examine that dichotomy. Instead it's focused more on the men-need-to-grow-up thing that seems to reside inside every comedy these days. But hey, it's still a damn funny movie.
Rudd and Siegel make a great team, and Rudd shows that he can play the wide-eyed innocent as well as he can play the snarky guy. A few fun cameos (and a lot of Rush references) help round out the comedy. There's nothing overall fresh about the plot, but it takes the typical rom-com clichés and twists them slightly to be about platonic men. Like Rudd's line of bad man-dates, or his inability to call Siegel out of nervousness. I rolled my eyes when the usual borrowing-money plot reared its ugly head, but was surprised to see that it was handled in a new, inventive way.
After drivel like Haunting in Connecticut and Paul Blart, it's nice to know there are screenwriters who actually put some effort into their work. A lot of this may have more to do with my initial reluctance to see the movie, but I found myself pleasantly surprised. It probably won’t wind up in the comedy hall of fame or anything, but it's as good, fun time.
check out the trailer, if you live under a rock, by clicking here.
Saturday, April 4, 2009
movie review by brandon: knowing
Knowing- ***
Nicolas Cage has recently become that go-to guy when you need a famous name for your crappy movie. And I fall for it every time, thinking THIS is going to be the one where Cage delivers one of his patented nutjob performances and I laugh and laugh at all the silliness onscreen.
So I've sat through garbage like The Wicker Man, Ghost Rider, Next, and Bangkok Dangerous just waiting for Cage to raise all holy hell. I've always been disappointed since Cage seems to be sleepwalking through all his recent films (although The Wicker Man came closest).
Now comes Knowing, which seems to promise more of the same. And it does…but at the same time, it doesn't. Like all movies nowadays, the preview gives away most of the special effects scenes, including the climax. Thanks guys!
So you know the story…a fifty year old time capsule is opened and Cage's son gets a sheet of numbers. Cage winds up, in record time, deciphering that the sequence gives the date, number of dead, and location of every major disaster. There are three left (all within convenient driving distance for Cage), and it appears time is running out.
Again, I don't get my Cage freak-out, but I have to say it's the closest he's come to acting in a while. He's still pretty sputtery and vacant, but not as bad as usual. The rest of the cast falls right in line, including Rose Byrne as the never-consummated love interest, and their kids. They say their lines okay enough, but you never get the impression they really care.
And oh man, those lines. There are some real clunkers here. Especially when it tries build on the strained relationship between Cage and his son. And the plot progression is awkward at best. Cage will struggle over some minor mystery, only to have it solved the next scene so we can have some cool CGI. And that end…Jesus, it's like someone pushed you off your life raft into a sea of cheese.
But what's surprising is the amount of good here. Director Alex Proyas, who seems to be relegated to doing crap like I, Robot now, isn't quite ready to churn out studio crud yet. He stages some scenes that are WAY better than they have any right to be. The big CGI plane crash from the preview? The scene in the film is stunning...my mouth literally fell open and I immediately rewound it to watch again.
In fact, all of the effects scenes are well done (well, maybe not the Michael Bayish climax), and even some of the quieter ones fare better than they should. A few more passes at the screenplay may have developed this into a lean, intelligent thriller. Instead we've got a fast food movie that surprises…like you head to Wendy's instead of McDonalds for dinner.
And who knows, maybe I was only surprised because I expected a giant armload of greasy shit movie. But a little good is better than none at all...
click here to view the trailer:
Nicolas Cage has recently become that go-to guy when you need a famous name for your crappy movie. And I fall for it every time, thinking THIS is going to be the one where Cage delivers one of his patented nutjob performances and I laugh and laugh at all the silliness onscreen.
So I've sat through garbage like The Wicker Man, Ghost Rider, Next, and Bangkok Dangerous just waiting for Cage to raise all holy hell. I've always been disappointed since Cage seems to be sleepwalking through all his recent films (although The Wicker Man came closest).
Now comes Knowing, which seems to promise more of the same. And it does…but at the same time, it doesn't. Like all movies nowadays, the preview gives away most of the special effects scenes, including the climax. Thanks guys!
So you know the story…a fifty year old time capsule is opened and Cage's son gets a sheet of numbers. Cage winds up, in record time, deciphering that the sequence gives the date, number of dead, and location of every major disaster. There are three left (all within convenient driving distance for Cage), and it appears time is running out.
Again, I don't get my Cage freak-out, but I have to say it's the closest he's come to acting in a while. He's still pretty sputtery and vacant, but not as bad as usual. The rest of the cast falls right in line, including Rose Byrne as the never-consummated love interest, and their kids. They say their lines okay enough, but you never get the impression they really care.
And oh man, those lines. There are some real clunkers here. Especially when it tries build on the strained relationship between Cage and his son. And the plot progression is awkward at best. Cage will struggle over some minor mystery, only to have it solved the next scene so we can have some cool CGI. And that end…Jesus, it's like someone pushed you off your life raft into a sea of cheese.
But what's surprising is the amount of good here. Director Alex Proyas, who seems to be relegated to doing crap like I, Robot now, isn't quite ready to churn out studio crud yet. He stages some scenes that are WAY better than they have any right to be. The big CGI plane crash from the preview? The scene in the film is stunning...my mouth literally fell open and I immediately rewound it to watch again.
In fact, all of the effects scenes are well done (well, maybe not the Michael Bayish climax), and even some of the quieter ones fare better than they should. A few more passes at the screenplay may have developed this into a lean, intelligent thriller. Instead we've got a fast food movie that surprises…like you head to Wendy's instead of McDonalds for dinner.
And who knows, maybe I was only surprised because I expected a giant armload of greasy shit movie. But a little good is better than none at all...
click here to view the trailer:
Thursday, April 2, 2009
a movie review by brandon: blindness
Blindness- **
I read about half of this book just outside of college and, well, I was about done with books. It was good, but it was too dark, heady, and allegorical for me at the time. I put it down, promising to pick it back up later, and so time passed to 2008, when I first heard about the film.
Blindness is about what happens when civilization breaks down and people start following their baser instincts (the actual blindness is really just a MacGuffin). His prose is light and quick, bringing the horror of the situation home without immersing you in squalor (he's one of those authors who writes for the joy of prose itself, as opposed to plot or character).
Unfortunately, the movie doesn’t believe in the same things the author does.
An epidemic of blindness begins to attack the population, including a doctor (Mark Ruffalo) and his wife (Julianne Moore). Moore pretends blindness in order to be quarantined with her husband in an abandoned mental hospital. Things are fine at first, but as the epidemic grows, the hospital becomes less and less civilized, with people wandering naked, crapping in the halls, and gnashing their teeth. Enter The King of Ward 3 (Gael Garcia Bernal), a sadistic man who ruthlessly takes control of the hospital, and then enters into all kinds of rape and murder. Yay!
The problem with adapting a book like this is that you can't just film the plot. The book is about prose and allegory, so you need to tweak the film in order to get it to convey meaning through style, the way the novel did. But the screenwriter just writes the plot, and director Fernando Mierelles just immerses you into squalor. This worked in his brilliant City of God, but less so in the way overrated Constant Gardener, and even less here.
Maybe the rumors that he wasn't fully behind City of God are true, since he's been lacking ever since. There are ways to convey horror other than people squishing liquid shit between their toes, or being beaten to death during a rape. But Mierelles doesn't seem to know them.
The movie also doesn't seem to know what it is. It's an extremely unpleasant story, and just being as unpleasant as possible doesn’t engage an audience. And since there's no character development, there's no one to care about. The actors do their best, but it ain't much. By the underwhelming ending, you just feel dirty and abused, and you don't know what the point was.
Yeah. People are assholes, we all know that. I don't need two hours of awful to slam it home.
click to view the trailer:
I read about half of this book just outside of college and, well, I was about done with books. It was good, but it was too dark, heady, and allegorical for me at the time. I put it down, promising to pick it back up later, and so time passed to 2008, when I first heard about the film.
Blindness is about what happens when civilization breaks down and people start following their baser instincts (the actual blindness is really just a MacGuffin). His prose is light and quick, bringing the horror of the situation home without immersing you in squalor (he's one of those authors who writes for the joy of prose itself, as opposed to plot or character).
Unfortunately, the movie doesn’t believe in the same things the author does.
An epidemic of blindness begins to attack the population, including a doctor (Mark Ruffalo) and his wife (Julianne Moore). Moore pretends blindness in order to be quarantined with her husband in an abandoned mental hospital. Things are fine at first, but as the epidemic grows, the hospital becomes less and less civilized, with people wandering naked, crapping in the halls, and gnashing their teeth. Enter The King of Ward 3 (Gael Garcia Bernal), a sadistic man who ruthlessly takes control of the hospital, and then enters into all kinds of rape and murder. Yay!
The problem with adapting a book like this is that you can't just film the plot. The book is about prose and allegory, so you need to tweak the film in order to get it to convey meaning through style, the way the novel did. But the screenwriter just writes the plot, and director Fernando Mierelles just immerses you into squalor. This worked in his brilliant City of God, but less so in the way overrated Constant Gardener, and even less here.
Maybe the rumors that he wasn't fully behind City of God are true, since he's been lacking ever since. There are ways to convey horror other than people squishing liquid shit between their toes, or being beaten to death during a rape. But Mierelles doesn't seem to know them.
The movie also doesn't seem to know what it is. It's an extremely unpleasant story, and just being as unpleasant as possible doesn’t engage an audience. And since there's no character development, there's no one to care about. The actors do their best, but it ain't much. By the underwhelming ending, you just feel dirty and abused, and you don't know what the point was.
Yeah. People are assholes, we all know that. I don't need two hours of awful to slam it home.
click to view the trailer:
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
a movie review by brandon: dear zachary
my blog partner, brandon, really, really, REALLY likes movies. (that's him at karoake acting like a fool through the window while we partook in cancer sticks.)
his movie collection is enormous and includes classics, contemporary and cult films like the seventh seal, rififi, run ronnie run, buttcrack and turkish star wars, to name just a few out of the thousands of titles he's accumulated at this point.
brandon has a well cultivated film palette and understands more about film than most people i know. when brandon tells me he saw a film and what what his opinion was, i pay attention and rarely do i disagree. there aren't many people whose opinions on film i value but he has the dubious honour of being one of those very few people.
which is why he will be our resident movie reviewer. here is his first review:
Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father- *****
Dear Zachary was a movie that came out independently and disappeared faster than I could blink. But the reviews were nothing but heady, full-bodied praise, so I tucked the title back in my mind and went on with my life. LITTLE DID I KNOW.
The movie begins as an homage to director Kurt Kuenne's best friend, Andrew Bagby. Bagby was well-liked by everyone (as we see in interview after interview), and was living a great life until his fiancé dumped him. He fell into depression, and soon into the arms of Shirley, an unpleasant woman half his age. When he moved to Latrobe, PA (beer!), he dumped Shirley and started a new life as a doctor. Until he was discovered murdered in a parking lot.
All evidence pointed to Shirley, who fled back to her native Canada, announcing that she was pregnant with Andrew's son. Andrew's parents followed, quitting their jobs and pooling their savings in an attempt to bring Shirley to justice and raise their grandson.
The saga that follows is perhaps the most heartbreaking movie I have ever seen in my life. It's even more resonant because it's all true. Kuenne knows enough about film to let his footage of Andrew, and his interviews, speak for themselves. These are regular people who had a chance to meet someone special, and the range of emotions you see is all too real. So much so that it took me four days to get through a 90 minute movie.
The most heartbreaking are Andrew's parents, truly good people forced into a completely alien situation. There were times I wanted to beg Kuenne to cut away from them. You see EXACTLY what a child's death can do to their parents, and it's heartbreaking.
But Kuenne is also smart enough not to linger on the saddest aspects of the story. The majority of the film is devoted to how Andrew touched the lives of those he knew, and watching these people reminisce about their friend carries more weight and emotion than the more tragic aspects of the story.
I know that watching something so emotionally wrenching probably doesn’t seem like the best way to spend your precious free time, but it manages to speak volumes about life and why it's worth living, even at the worst of times. And sometimes we need reminding.
Click to view the trailer:
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