Fast & Furious 6

May 22, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Well, it has been only a couple years since the last Fast & Furious installment, but Vin Diesel and company are back with a vengeance for the sixth (and not the last) time.  The only logical question for moviegoers is “has this Universal Pictures cash cow run its course?” After sitting through 130 minutes of pure unadulterated action, the only logical answer has to be, “not yet.”

fast and furiousJustin Lin is once again at the helm directing the massive amounts of fast cars and fantastical stunts the series has become known for. Both Vin Diesel and Paul Walker reprise their roles as the street-racing buddy duo of Dominic Torretto and Brian O’Connor. The Fast & Furious rat pack of Tyrese Gibson, former rapper Ludacris, Sung Kang, and Gal Gadot are also back to lend their expertise. And let us not forget the exploits of Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson, whose presence seemed to breathe some steroid-infused life back into series. This band of “heroes” is at it again attempting to stop the evil villain, Shaw (Luke Evans), whose evil plan is to steal the aptly named “components” to build something to sell to some bad guys for lots of money. Yeah, I don’t think the writers really cared about the whole plot thing either. The only thing you really need to know is that he has a master plan that will inevitably involve copious amounts of cars and carnage. Oh, and Letty Ortiz (Michelle Rodriguez) is somehow back from the dead despite assurances of her death and a funeral involving a body that was presumably identified by a licensed medical examiner.

I will quickly apologize if the brief synopsis implies a less than enjoyable movie, because the outcome is the pure opposite. There may not exist a more fun and action-packed movie this summer. No, this movie will never win any awards or be praised for its acting performances, but that isn’t and shouldn’t be the point. It seems that the script writers have fully embraced the sort of self-parody that is needed to make these films enjoyable. There are plenty of extremely humorous one-liners, many intended with a few not, and the action never stops. The pacing is very good and the action sequences are well done. Will there be times when you sit there and stare, mouth agape, at the completely unrealistic action sequence? Of course, but that only enhances the absurdity, and therefore, fun of this movie.

A movie like this is all about the specific expectations that one has going into it. This movie has a lot to offer both the cinephile and casual moviegoer if expectations of character and plot development are tempered while enjoying the exhilarating ride (pun intended). Fast & Furious 6 is a great way to spend some money if you enjoy popcorn-filled escapism amidst the increasing temperatures of the North American summer months. The best film in the hexology only fills me with hope that next movies will continue the trend.

 

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Star Trek Into Darkness

May 19, 2013 By 2 Comments

star-trekinto-darkness-posterSo much hoopla has been made over king-of-nerds J.J. Abrams directing the next chapter of the Star Wars saga that his latest sequel Star Trek Into Darkness has played second fiddle to the wave of news circling that other sci-fi universe.  For casual Trek fans, such as myself, Abrams will likely do for Star Wars what he has done for Captain Kirk and crew.

Abrams brought Trek out of the depths of cult obscurity and hammered down the door of nerdom to allow mainstream audiences access to an otherwise closed-off franchise.  With the use of punk wit, a young cast of immense talent, rousing action sequences, and the gravitational pull of dead-on comedy, the Star Trek reboot was one of very few films to not bring further slander to the term ‘reboot.’  The more times I’ve viewed the 2009 entry, the more I enjoy it as all-around grade-A entertainment.

Thus Mr. Abrams’ sequel Into Darkness gets a little more serious and has slightly less fun toying around with the strict mechanics of series expectations.  Slightly less.  The Abrams magic is still intact and he manages to deliver a satisfying action-sequel that simply hasn’t the fresh air of the previous film especially when the story relies on previously-mined material.

For round two Captain Kirk (Chris Pine), having just been suspended from active duty, is  driven to revenge after a terrorist named John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch) stages multiple attacks on the Federation that results in the untimely death of one of Kirk’s most endearing mentors.  The appointed captain reenlists Spock (Zachary Quinto) as his first officer and sets out with his crew aboard the Enterprise on a Starfleet mission to target the fugitive Harrison in hiding on a Klingon planet.  Relations are tense between the Federation and the Klingons, and Kirk has been ordered to target Harrison with highly powerful torpedoes whilst trying avoid the start of a planetary war.

star-trek-into-darkness-stillKirk must also grapple with his own thirst for blood and his rocky rapport with his crew members.  The story further digs into Trek lore, Spock’s and Uhura’s (Zoe Saldana) unlikely romantic relationship, and springs about as many laughs as the previous entry.  I honestly wasn’t quite as engulfed in this Trek, but only by a slim margin.  The film is still visually brilliant and action-packed, but the more sinister tones have set in as is to be expected for a second installment.

Most noteworthy in this chapter is the casting of Benedict Cumberbatch as the villain Harrison.  He’s a brilliant, deep-voiced menace full of mystery and intrigue.  The performance is the stuff of terrific acting and he’s certainly a much more memorable foe than Eric Bana as the bald Romulan from ’09 Trek.  The rest of the cast is exceptionally good just as they were last time, but Cumberbatch is a standout and helps elevate this sequel above its few shortcomings in originality and suspense.

The themes at play revolve around the true meaning of leadership, friendship and heroism.  It is here that the writers and Director Abrams pave the way for a strong emotional journey for the leading characters.  Set against the backdrop of grand set pieces—Spock caught on a small bed of rock in the middle of an erupting volcano; Kirk suited up and soaring through space between two Federation spaceships; Harrison’s attack on the Federation tower—the emotional undercurrent allows the action to actually have some stake.  But then occasionally, and all too abruptly, Abrams hooks back into familiar territory that the franchise has previously explored rather than leap over new hurdles.

As much as I think J.J. Abrams has delivered Star Trek out of darkness, I assume he will be moving on from the franchise to become engulfed in Star Wars.  Even though I would still welcome him back to Trek, perhaps that will be for the best?  Abrams has relied upon alternate takes of previous adventures for Trek thus far and I think it’s time for a new director to expropriate Abrams’ discovered fountain of youth for this franchise and hasten the current Enterprise crew to a new infinite frontier from a storytelling perspective.   Please don’t misunderstand, however.  Into Darkness is a rock-solid film and likely light years ahead of what’s to come this season.  But with such a previously accomplished entry, Abrams has not managed to top himself, and I can’t exactly fault him for that since he already brought Star Trek into greatness.

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Runaway Slave

May 12, 2013 By Leave a Comment

RS posterBy now, everybody and their dog is familiar with the series The Walking Dead on AMC, so you’ve probably seen the part where Rick Grimes rides into Atlanta, only to find it full of dilapidated corpses, shambling to and fro with a glassy-eyed stare, rotted flesh hanging from their faces, seeking only their next kicking, screaming meal. There’s a part of Runaway Slave eerily similar to that scene. Rev. C.L. Bryant, seeking answers to his questions, arrives in Atlanta, former commercial center of slavery and political center of the Confederacy, also the birthplace of MLK and, arguably, the Civil Rights movement. As he begins conducting interviews, he meets many people with the same glassy-eyed, hopeless stares, their bodies bearing tattoos and other scars of a pointless, nihilistic existence of government colonization. But of course, this isn’t some theoretical apocalyptic scenario. This is real life, and these are real Atlantans.

Runaway Slave is a documentary by Bryant, the great, great grandson of slaves in Louisiana who purchased 64 acres from their former masters upon emancipation. He lives on the same 64 acres today, when he’s not speaking at rallies around the country. Earlier in life, Bryant was a loyal member of the NAACP, and was climbing the hierarchy with some success, until he refused to speak at a pro-abortion rally. For his refusal, he was forced to resign from the organization. He was later fired from the church that he pastored for speaking out against big government. He made this film in 2010 and 2011, during the initial outrage that boiled up over Obamacare being rammed

Bryant interviews Alfonzo Rachel on the streets of L.A.

Bryant interviews Alfonzo Rachel on the streets of L.A.

through Congress. At that time he was speaking, among other places, at Tea Party rallies all over the country, and receiving hate mail calling him an Uncle Tom and a house n**ger.

The film opens with footage of the Restoring Honor rally on the Washington Mall the 47th anniversary of MLK’s famous march on Washington, featuring the likes of Glenn Beck and Dr. Alveda King (MLK’s niece). It zips back and forth between this event and Al Sharpton’s Reclaim the Dream rally at the White House, both happening at the same time. (Something that was odd, but cool, to note: At one point at the Beck/King rally, the camera zooms in on an American flag someone is carrying. Just below it on the same poll is a Nebraska Cornhuskers flag. Don’t know how it got there, but I paused the movie and it is definitely a Husker flag. Rex Burkhead would be proud.) Bryant is at the Sharpton rally, and interviews several people there, including Black Panthers. Afterward, he asks why, when the two groups profess to want most of the same things, Sharpton’s flock spews so much bile and seems to have so much hatred for those at the Honor rally.

As Bryant explains early on in the film, he is plagued with questions such as why, in an age when someone’s race doesn’t hold them back from walking into any business, voting, or holding any job, black Americans still believe they are not “free at last,” or why, after the Democrats fought to keep slavery legal, fought to keep schools segregated, sicked dogs on black protesters, and shot history’s greatest black leader, black Americans now vote 95% Democrat. He says “I have to find out if there are other people out there who think the way I do.” (If he’s been speaking at rallies for years, I think he probably knows, but every documentary needs a kickoff.) He then travels the country, interviewing people of different races and different political stripes. He interviews Jesse Jackson, and the aptly named Ben Jealous (he tries to interview Sharpton, who blows him off). However, the largest group that he talks to is black conservatives, such us Star Parker, Alfonzo Rachel and David Webb.

Sowell

Runaway Slave is not just an excuse to plug the books and web sites of people Bryant agrees with. It’s a well-made documentary that takes on some tough questions, generates some good discussion, and leaves room for the audience to draw its own thinking. The editing can be a little bit rough. Sometimes, Bryant will be talking to someone, and their lips won’t go with the words, as if we’re looking at an establishing shot, while we’re hearing dialogue from a more central shot. Bryant, can come off as just a tad narcissistic as well, as there are some shots were he appears to be interviewing himself. But in fairness, this is because he feels the need to explain why he is making this film. This is a documentary with a view point, but that doesn’t make it any less worth watching. I’d say the most interesting part is about 1 hour in, when Bryant covers the decision by a school board in North Carolina, under the strain of budget limitations, to stop cross-city busing. The reaction of certain people is quite telling. And disturbing.

Runaway Slave is a gusty and in-your-face move, but also carefully done and thoughtfully presented. It’s a movie that everyone should see.

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House of Cards

May 9, 2013 By 1 Comment

House of CaA few weeks ago one of my Twitter followers asked me if House of Cards was a good show.  I took a little while to figure out how to respond, because to answer that question requires a bit more than a simple “Yes” or “No.”  The brainchild of David Fincher, Kevin Spacey, and a heap of computer-powered data mining, Netflix’s reimagining of the classic British television drama is an interesting concoction.   It’s good in the sense that the production is slick, the acting is top-notch, and the plotlines are appropriately deep and intricate for this type of political thriller.  But House of Cards is much more than that, and even though I finished watching the series I’m still not sure exactly what to make of it.  It’s interesting, compelling, and often entertaining but unfortunately a host of other adjectives would be appropriate as well: creepy, sleazy, disgusting, and at times downright repugnant.

The show stars Kevin Spacey as a puppet master of sorts, the House Majority Whip pulling the strings of various beltway heavy-hitters while secretly pursuing an agenda of his own.  His Frank Underwood character, a Democrat from South Carolina’s 5th district, is as slimy and smarmy as they come: one episode delivering a moving eulogy for a young girl in front of a faithful congregation, using just the right mix of smiles and scriptures to work himself into the hearts and minds of the assembled masses, all the while becoming increasingly entangled in any number of conspiracies to ruin the lives and careers of anyone who stands in his way back in Washington.  Few things are beneath him, from drugs to extortion to murder, though he remains well-nigh untouchable as the wizard behind the political curtain while finding ways to manipulate his fellow Washington cockroaches into doing his bidding.  It’s an entirely cynical take on DC politics, gutting the optimistic heart The West Wing and replacing it with a dark mechanical lump of coal, and after every single episode my wife and I quickly fired up Parks and Recreation as a lighthearted palette-cleanser.

That’s not to say House of Cards is not a well-made show.  In many ways it genuinely is a good, if not great, made-for-internet-television production.  Easily holding its own against its weighty counterparts on networks like HBO and Showtime, House of Cards plumbs the sordid depths of Washington politics like few other productions (celluloid, digital, or otherwise) have done so.  At the start of the series, Underwood is at the apex of his political game, wielding his political power and acumen like a scalpel in the hands of a master surgeon.  He of course has his sights set much higher up the political ladder, but to reach them requires winning a dangerous game of chess that even he might not be ready for.  One of his key pawns in this high-stakes match is Zoe Barnes (Kate Mara), a hotshot reporter-turned-blogger whom Underwood uses to plant stories and sway public opinion through media manipulation.  But as one would expect in a show of this pedigree, Underwood and Barnes’ political relationship quickly becomes personal, though capriciously self-serving, and we quickly get the sense that Netflix is aiming to one-up HBO in their quest to shovel as much gratuitous sex as possible into the living rooms of their subscriber base.

House of CardsAlso at play in this grand political scheme is Underwood’s wife Clair (Robin Wright), with whom he shares an unsettlingly open relationship.  She runs the Clean Water Initiative, a nonprofit whose goals aren’t entirely in line with her husband’s, and serves as the closest thing House of Cards has to a moral center.  Poor Peter Russo (Corey Stoll) is the empty-headed fool who bandied about by Underwood like a nerf gun with the sole purpose of helping the Democrat from Dixie reach his lofty ambitions.  We get a front row seat to Russo’s doomed career both as a congressman and then gubernatorial candidate–a political self-immolation aided by Underwood who provides not only the match but the gasoline.  But alas, Russo’s political corpse is another rung to be stepped on if the ladder is to be climbed, and so up Underwood goes.  This is tragedy on a grand scale, and in that sense House of Cards succeeds admirably.  Of course there is a host of other players in Underwood’s clever game, from union bosses to vice presidents to the owner of a local barbecue joint, and it is often compelling to watch all the various threads come together–or unravel, as is often the case.

So why the bum rap?  Evaluating House of Cards is tricky because it’s hard for me to separate the content from the delivery. Despite the Oscar-worthy performances, intricate and well-developed plotlines, and compelling characters, I find it hard to recommend the show because it is so overpoweringly bleak.  It’s an interesting show, but not an enjoyable show.  Engaging but not satisfying.  Worth watching, though not what I would consider good.

Rating:

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Iron Man 3

May 1, 2013 By 1 Comment

IronMan3PosterIron Man 3 is the kind of crowd-pleasing adventure picture that has no business being so good.  After a sensational first installment from Director Jon Favreau that surprised audiences with its quick-wit and towering performance from leading actor Robert Downey Jr., the minor pitfall of Favreau’s uneventful Iron Man 2 was only salvaged by the contagious antics of Downey who embodies Tony Stark so well.  Then last summer’s The Avengers swept up audiences around the globe and expanded Stark’s world across an entire Marvel universe of other movies.  The result was an overpraised but undeniably fun success. Be sure to see/brush up on all three previous outings.

Iron Man 3 strikes only a year later with a new director and co-writer Shane Black whose previous writing credits include Lethal Weapon and Last Action Hero, and he commandeers a final product that rivals the sheer entertainment value of the first Iron Man film.  As long you don’t see it in its flat 3D format of course.

This is Tony Stark’s journey, not Iron Man’s.  Downey narrates the film’s opening moments and a few other segments of the picture.  His life has certainly changed since the world was exposed to Loki and his invading alien army—and the giant green guy—-and the flying hammer dude—and the other ‘human’ characters that can run around and shoot.  Not to mention wormholes and other dimensions.  Needless to say, Stark has a lot on his mind and he develops crippling anxiety episodes that prevent him from sleep and his ordinary business.  His relationship with Pepper (Gwyneth Paltrow) suffers and he spends his hours of insomnia devoted to developing advanced Iron Man suits.

A new villain enters the scene by the name of the Mandarin (Ben Kingsley), a middle-eastern terrorist threatening the American way of life.  He plants suicide bombers in various U.S. locations, but investigators quickly learn that his destructive pigeons have no formal explosive parts or materials.  Stark’s trusted bodyguard, Happy (Jon Favreau) follows one of the suspected threats only to be found victim to another terrorist attack.  In a rage, Stark invites the terrorist to his front door for a mano-a-mano confrontation.

kingsleyJust when our hero’s former botanist colleague, Maya Hansen (Rebecca Hall) arrives at the Malibu fortress to warn Tony of suspected terrorist involvement from the odd-duck geneticist, Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce), the Mandarin unleashes a massive attack to wipe out Iron Man for good.  The structure of Stark Industries falls to rubble.  Tony awakens abandoned, homeless, and all but defeated in a snowy Tennessee town.  His only armored suit has run out of juice, he’s been considered dead, and so he seeks refuge in a shed with the aid of starry-eyed boy, Harley (Ty Simpkins).

To stop the Mandarin from his further promised attacks (namely on the U.S. president), Stark investigates a trail of coverups involving an American soldier terrorist who may have been brainwashed by the Mandarin.  The truth about his death may procure the information Stark needs to defeat his most devastating human foe thus far.  Young Harley and Col. Rhodes (Don Cheadle) provide Stark the assistance he most certainly needs to stop the ultimate threat.

What to say about Iron Man 3?  How about: It’s awesome.  Flat-out awesome.  It’s witty.  It’s funny.  It’s action-packed.  It has more memorable moments than I can count.  I enjoyed it even more than The Avengers.  Some won’t.  And that’s fine.  But as a character-driven film with a concrete villain and driving plot, Iron Man 3 is a breath of fresh air.  I’d love to talk about some great sequences and some great moments of dialogue, but why spoil the fun?  Just know, this movie is funny, witty, quotable, and features breathtaking action sequences and the sharpest of digital effects.  It has to because the list of digital effect credits was seemingly endless.

But underneath all of its witty lines and gargantuan fireworks is a resonating story about a great protagonist up against a powerful villain.  Writer-director Shane Black (this guy from the 1987 masterpiece Predator) wisely pushes Stark to the brink and brings his story full-circle.  The film doesn’t have the gravity of a Christopher Nolan superhero picture, but Iron Man 3 is stupendous in its own regard, and a film I would return to much faster than any of those Batman films.  If the audience reaction from the crowd I saw it with was any indication, this trilogy-capper will be a massive hit and entirely well-received by viewers.  I can’t wait to take my wife and see it again.  As for a star rating?  Should I do it?  Should I really do it?  Ah, I’m all in (even if I regret it later).

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Pain and Gain

May 1, 2013 By 1 Comment

Pain and Gain Crime doesn’t pay.  Director Michael Bay goes the distance to remind audiences of that necessary lesson because it also gives him the opportunity to glorify and glamorize every ugly facet of it.  Sitting through Pain and Gain, an alleged black comedy that exposes the danger of American greed, I’m left to contend that the writers and actors sought to dig up a fascinatingly dark tale spun so unbelievably from the ground up that 15 percent of it must actually be true.  After all—this is a true story.  I could have used a newspaper clipping of said story or even a mere tweet.  Bay’s punishing drama lasts 130 gruesome minutes.

The story takes place in 1995 where a Miami fitness guru, Daniel Lugo (Mark Wahlberg), a smarmy snake with muscles, slithers his way into a senior position at a gym and manages to triple its membership within a short amount of time.  But the cash isn’t green enough, and after a few interactions with self-made titan sleaze Walter Kershaw (Tony Shalhoub), Daniel decides he can give the jerk what’s coming to him and steal all of his dough.

To do it, Daniel recruits the bronze mammoth and reformed ex-con Paul Doyle (Dwayne Johnson) and the steroid abuser Adrian Doorbal (Anthony Mackie).  Together the odd-trio team attempt a series of failed executions at nabbing Kershaw before finally kidnapping him and then torturing him for three weeks until he signs over all of his finances and possessions to the unorthodox bodybuilders.  The gang seals the deal by killing him, or so they think, and Kershaw escapes near death.  Held captive in a hospital bed, Kershaw’s repelling personality and lack of convincing evidence regarding his abduction cause the police to laugh off his account of events.

Left broke and broken, Kershaw hires a retired private investigator (Ed Harris) to find the three tank-sized clowns that stole everything from him.  It ends up only a matter of time that Daniel and his pals fall victim to the temptations of the wealthy lifestyle and they compromise their plans, setting off a series of idiotic judgments and actions that lead them to further murder and destruction.

pain and gain imagePain and Gain happens to illustrate everything about soulless filmmaking.  Despite decent performances from the cast, the script never allows us to care for anyone of these hulking doofuses because they’re all so vile and violent.  Wahlberg’s character should carry the story in a tragic fashion, but he’s so unlikable in every conceivable manner, as are the other characters who fall victim to his manipulations.  Johnson has the most well-rounded role as the beefy aggressor who has found Christ, only to immediately find the devil in Daniel.  Mackie plays the third hand with little of interest added to his character.

When the characters fail, Bay makes sure we feel the pain.  His music video-style only glamorizes the violence and depravity.  These three men become enforcers of brute punishment, and rather than explore any psychological dimensions of these characters, Bay plays the outrageous blackness of the film for laughs, only they don’t hit as hard as his three leading actors—if ever.  Instead the director lights up the screen with oil, sweat, and sunlight and plays his misogynistic melee tale for all its worth, consistently objectifying women and playing up the volatile chumps and their violent ways as something to be desired.  From the outset, we don’t understand these characters in any possible way, so why spend 130 slow minutes trying to laugh off their bloody antics?  Bay thinks he’s delivered a cautionary tale, but instead his penchant for cinematic destruction provides a herd of antagonist morons doing grotesque things that are meant to look ‘oh so cool’—which reminds me of another one of Bay’s ugly and overlong crap chutes from ten years ago.

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Oblivion

April 19, 2013 By Leave a Comment

OblivionMovie-Critics are calling Oblivion a mixed bag of sparse sci-fi plot threads strung together loosely and liberally.  They’re right.  I expected as much.  After all, what ground could the post-apocalyptic thriller have left to cover?  A future decades ahead.  Earth laid to waste.  Little to no survivors.  Futuristic machinery patrolling a ravaged globe.  Human technicians assigned to operate and repair the machines.

That’s the premise of Oblivion, which I suspect will mirror the upcoming thrillers After Earth and Elysium to some degree.  From The Matrix to 2001 to Moon to Wall-E to I, Robot and on and on, I could compare Director Joseph Kosinski’s film to many a science-fiction pictures of past.  That doesn’t hinder his film at all.  I anticipated I would spot similarities.  The film’s title even suggests where the story is headed.  Yet Kosinski’s canvas opens with mystery and intrigue that leads to grand places and ideas, even if they’ve all been mined before.

Tom Cruise plays Jack Reacher Harper, a pilot in the futuristic Earth, and one of the few survivors from an alien invasion led by Scavengers.  The Scavengers took out half of the moon causing vast planetary natural disasters, and humanity responded with nuclear warfare.  In the end, the aliens left, but Earth became a devastated habitat full of nuclear radiation.  Humans moved to a space station while Earth regenerates its ability to sustain life for a large population.

Huddled clans of Scavengers still roam the grounds.  Thus an army of government-produced drones monitor and control enemy activity.  But sometimes the drones are shot down or malfunction.  Harper, a drone repairman, keeps the drones up and running.  Outside of his job, he lives above the clouds in a technically advanced floating home base with his girlfriend and assistant, Victoria (Andrea Riseborough), who monitors his movement on the ground level.  She also communicates with the command base from which she receives orders including Harper’s daily itinerary.

During a routine maintenance scout, Harper finds a radio beacon activated by Scavengers.  Questions abound.  What or who are they calling?  When they attempt to capture the leery pilot, Harper must investigate what little he knows about the Scavengers, what they might be planning, and how they might be tied to his dreams about a mysterious woman (Olga Kurylenko) whom he does not know but seems to remember.

oblivion-searchFurther developments lead the narrative into even bigger territory, and most of what is offered has been recycled but not necessarily for the worse.  Kosinski’s film is set apart from its film-brethren by its visual landscape.  This is an amazing movie to look at.  I’m shocked this film wasn’t converted and released in 3D.  I admire a director and studio not following the herd for an extra buck.  Lush nature is contrasted with the decay of nuked civilization, and giant hydrocopter versus computerized war drone battles couldn’t be composed any better.

The story eventually introduces a colony of humans led by the great Morgan Freeman, but unfortunately, much of the supporting human characters are underused.  Cruise leads the show, and proves ever-capable, but if Oblivion falls under the weight of its grand ambition, it’s because the script misses the underlying human factor.  The film focuses less on humanity’s impact, and more on the impact to the Harper character who must come to terms with the painful reality of his place and identity in a devastated world.

The plot doesn’t exactly move at a fast clip either.  Oblvion, while featuring some stellar visuals and action, meanders more often than drives.  Harper investigates location after location.  He returns to home base and discusses his findings with Victoria again and again.  The movie reaches the halfway-marker before really diving into some meaty ‘events.’  There’s a lot of eye candy throughout the film’s entirety, but this movie needed to pick a destination and operate via a concrete route.  This is where the film borrows heavily from other films and that’s okay.  But choose some key check points in the story along the way.

Kosinski’s Oblivion is still a film to admire in many respects.  Despite insanely good visuals, I really felt like the film didn’t have the feel of a studio product.  It felt like the objective of a filmmaker brought up under some great sci-fi movies who set out to pave his own from used parts.  He doesn’t deliver slam-bang-pow-wow entertainment.  He gives us a thoughtful action film supported by a magnificent production design and visuals that will last long after the story fades from memory.

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Rise of the Guardians

April 9, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Rise G posterThe first thing you’ll notice about Rise of the Guardians is that it’s certainly, well, different. We start off with narration by the main character (Chris Pine). “Darkness … that’s the first thing I remember. It was dark and it was cold and I was scared.” Fair enough. But he continues. “Then I saw the Moon. It seemed to chase the dark away, and then I wasn’t scared anymore.” Ooookay. About this time, we see our narrator, his face young, but his hair white, apparently being pulled by an unseen force through the top of a frozen lake, to alight, barefoot, on the snow-covered branch of a tree, apparently unbothered by the cold. He soon wanders into a village, where he realizes no one can see or hear him. He continues: “My name is Jack Frost. How do I know that? The Moon told me so. That’s all he ever told me.”

Ooookay.

We then cut to 300 years later, at the North Pole. How do we know it’s the North Pole? The text on screen tells us so. We cut to the inside of a building, where a pair of booted feet make the ground shake with each step. We see a pair of strong arms, one tattooed “naughty,” the other tattooed “nice,” gripping a chainsaw, as it lays into a hapless block of ice. As a brilliant ice sculpture takes shape, we hear a booming voice: “Still waiting for cookies!”

Yes, it’s him. Chris Cringle, Pier Noel, bringer of joy and lover of children, but he’s nothing like you’ve seen in any other Santa movie. “North,” as he is nicknamed in Guardians (Alec Baldwin), is a regular badass, a mountain of a man that would make Jack Reacher submissive (yeah, I said it). He drives a tricked-out sleigh that would make Shaft jealous, pulled by reindeer that look like they should be ridden by the eight horsemen of the apocalypse. Or maybe Ghost Rider. Or the Headless Horseman. (They totally needed a scene where North pulls the sleigh up in front of the Fortress of Solitude and yells “Hey, Kent! You need to get yourself one of these babies!” And then races off, leaving a green-with-envy Superman in a cloud of dust. Alas, I wasn’t consulted.) Best of all, he carries these two huge scimitars, which he twirls with expertise, and with which he slices and dices the forces of evil!

Dude! Where was this Santa when I was kid??

North looks at his globe, a magical monitor from which he watches over all the children of the world and sees evil power creeping across it. He deduces that the lord of all evil himself, none other than the Boogeyman (Jude Law), is amassing power for an attack on the world’s kids. He calls an emergency meeting of the Guardians, supernatural beings who are given the power and responsibility to protect the wonder and innocence of children everywhere. The team consists of North, the Tooth Fairy (Isla Fisher), the Sandman (no voice) and, of course,

I'm not a kangaroo, mate. I'm a bunny. The EASTER Bunny.

I’m not a kangaroo, mate. I’m a bunny. The EASTER Bunny.

the Easter Bunny, who is also nothing like you’ve seen before. “Bunny” is voiced by Hugh Jackman, and Jackman must have enjoyed the heck out of this roll. He gives free reign to his Australian accent, and kicks his tough-guy persona into overdrive. Fittingly, his animated avatar is six feet tall, master of Thai-Chi and sports thorny tattoos across his keg-sized shoulders. He also wears a quiver across his back, carrying deadly boomerangs and egg bombs, which he’s not afraid to use.

Awesome. Though I have to say, all this makes watching him paint beautiful designs on eggs kind of awkward. Imagine if you caught Tito Ortiz doing needle point. Well, nothing’s perfect.

As you’ve probably figured out, this is a story not unlike The Avengers. The idea is to get a handful of superhumans together and have them fight against a huge army of nameless, faceless bad guys led by one villain who actually speaks. The Boogeyman (aka Pitch Black) even has a back story similar to that of Loki in Avengers (also rather similar to that of Satan in the Bible). He was once a Guardian, but when he demanded all the power and renown for himself, The Man in the Moon dismissed him from the company of the Guardians, and cast him down to the earth, to wander about scaring people. The Man in the Moon fills the roll of God in this story. We never see him directly, but he selects people to be Guardians and directs them in the fight against evil. He watches over the earth. And for a movie about Santa Clause and the Tooth Fairy … it works well enough. Once he knows Pitch is up to something, the Man in the Moon selects Jack Frost to join the ranks of the Guardians, and the battle begins.

If your dentist had Tooth's enthusiasm, you would run out the door in terror.

If your dentist had Tooth’s enthusiasm, you would run out the door in terror.

How does Rise of the Guardians stack up? It definitely takes some risks and I have to give it a nod for that. It’s not likely to become a classic, but it creates a world you can lose yourself in, and takes its characters to a place no one ever has before. It has a few gripping action sequences, and some funny lines. All in all, I liked it, and held on to the DVD to watch it a second time before returning it. Director Peter Ramsey helmed it well, considering that, with what they tried to do conceptually, it could have been an absolute train wreck of a movie, and it was actually pretty good. Plus, it’s safe for kids.

Maybe even a little too safe. There is one major flaw in Guardians, and that is that they do an absolutely abysmal job with the villain. Pitch is represented in every scene as this weird looking guy who mainly hangs out in the shadows and whines about how unfair his life is. They never make him scary. This is especially problematic considering who he is supposed to be. I mean, he’s the  Boogeyman, for Pete’s sake! He’s a Satan. A Dracula. The embodiment of all evil and terror from our basest instincts. The faceless horror that reaches out of every shadow to drag you to Hell. He’s the reason 4-year-olds wake up screaming at 2 a.m., the reason you suddenly start walking faster at night and you don’t know why, the reason grown men still make sure their closets are latched before bed. He needs to scare the audience, but Pitch never becomes the slightest bit threatening. We never see him do anything, except create this army of black horses (Night-mares. Get it?) that the Guardians fight. It’s implied that he’s giving kids nightmares around the world, but we never see any nightmares, or their effects.

Do something scary!

Do something scary!

I understand they were making a PG family film; I’m not asking to see blood and guts. They still could have made him scary. All Ramsey had to do was watch a few Disney movies and take notes. Disney has perfected the art of terrorizing kids and still getting a G rating. Throughout the whole movie, I thought it must be building to something. Pitch was going to change into something horrible and start attacking some kids … no? Well, I’m sure they’ll at least have some decent jump-scares where he pops out of something, maybe his eyes red, his teeth pointy … no? Well maybe he’ll transform for the final battle … nope. Pitch stays the same bland computer sprite for the entire movie and never makes himself a real threat. That, by itself, takes a star and a half off of this movie’s score.

Oh, well, like I said, nothing’s perfect. Guardians is still a wild ride, and well worth watching, if only for being original and good.

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