Several people commented during our Avatar contest that they would like to see us  review The Mummy (1999). I happen to have a unique perspective on this movie, as it has somehow wormed its way into an odd place in my life. I first saw it in college, and while I didn’t hate it, I felt no interest in sitting through it ever again. Steven Sommers’ obsession with mindless spectacle and pointless deaths was enough to ruffle even my then-adolescent feathers.  I put The Mummy from my mind, and didn’t even bother to check out the over-hyped sequel in the summer of 2001.

Seven years later, I got married, and I learned that The Mummy was one of my wife’s all-time favorite movies. Since it had been so long, and out of affection for her, I gladly endured one more screening. The problem is, one was not enough for her. For the last two years of my life, every time there’s laundry to fold or iron, The Mummy goes in the VCR. I usually try to busy myself in some other room, balancing the checkbook or something, whenever she watches The Mummy. Despite this, I can still hear it, and have learned all the screams of the movie by heart.

So, what’s in The Mummy? We start around 1200 B.C. when Imhotep (Arnold Vosloo), high priest of Pharaoh Sethi I, and Ank Su Namun, the Paraoh’s concubine (Patricia Velasquez, above) conspire to murder Sethi. They take turns hacking him with swords, causing him to go “Aaaggh!” “Eeee!”  “Aaaaa!” Ank Su Namun then kills herself to avoid punishment for the murder. Imhotep later tries to resurrect her, but Sethi’s guards stop him. He is sentenced to be mummified alive for his crimes. (Just for the record, that’s not nearly as bad as it sounds. In real life, you’d be dead halfway through step one.) Some priests cut off his tongue, resulting in a scream that is really more of gasp. Imhotep is then buried alive, and placed under a curse that says, should he be resurrected, he would return as a pestilence to destroy the earth.

Before Scott Evil can jump up and say “Why don’t you just kill him and be done with it?” we are transported to the 1920s. We meet Evelyn Carnahan (Rachel Weisz), a British librarian and Egyptologist, who emits an “Eeeek!” when her brother, Jonathon (John Hannah), makes a mummy pop out of a sarcophagus, startling her. Jonathon has found an artifact that intrigues Evie, and she begins assembling a team to travel deep into Egypt to find the lost city of Hamunaptra. They are joined by Rick O’Connell (Brendan Fraser), an adventurer from the States, and four treasure hunters, along with many other nameless pieces of monster fodder, destined to emit screams.

On the journey, their ship is attacked by fighters who protect Imhotep’s tomb called the Medjai. O’Connell sets one on fire, who jumps off the boat, screaming “Hoo, hoo, hoo-aaaaah!” (splash) Once they arrive at Hamunaptra, three Arabic-speaking guides are melted by acid in a booby trap,

Aaagh!

Aaagh!

Owwie!

A warden has a golden beetle come to life, burrow into his foot, then up his body and into his brain, causing him to go mad and run screaming down a corridor into a wall

Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Smack

And finally, Evie reads from the Book of the Dead, bringing Imhotep back to life. “Noo! You must not read from the book!” As soon as she does, a storm of locust comes up, forcing the adventurers inside the ancient temple that is now stalked by Imhotep. One by one, all the extras are killed either by Imhotep, the beetles, or booby traps, resulting in screams to numerous to transcribe.

They return to Cairo but the Mummy follows them. Four treasure hunters are under a special curse for opening Imhotep’s organ chest, and he kills each of them before moving on to the rest of the world. While the first one dies screaming “No! Please, please, please …” the rest of them go out with more of an “Aaaeeeiiieck*” as Imhotep drains them of their life. Each time he does so, he partially regenerates, until he looks like a living man. Which raises some questions: what would he have done if fewer than four had opened the chest? If no one had opened the chest, but Evie had read from the book, would he have just destroyed the world as a walking corpse? For that matter, since he plans on destroying the world anyway, why bother with these guys?

The Mummy; half-way through his curse victims, so ... 50% regenerated?

The answer is, you have to think like Steven Sommers. For Sommers, making sense is nothing; spectacle is everything. Nothing goes into the “plot” of this movie unless it will lead to either a fight scene or a horrific, screaming death (although the deaths involve an implausible omission of red liquid to keep that all-important PG-13 rating). The curse on Imhotep’s organ chest is nothing more than an aside, crammed into the movie to give Sommers an excuse to kill four more guys.

Frankly, the rest of the movie is pretty much the same thing. More screams, people dying by the hundred, and inane scripture quotations with no meaning. Beth eventually showed me the sequel, and I actually liked it a little better, though I think it was mostly because I had lower expectations. If you’re interested in Sommer’s work, or in Universal Studios monsters, your time would be better spent checking out Van Helsing (2004). It has all the same stupidities as The Mummy, but at least has cooler characters, awesome action scenes, and some really wicked gadgets.

To summarize my impression of The Mummy:

Sitting through it once: “Eh.” (In other words, *½~~~ (1.5/5))

Being subjected to it over and over:

“Aaaggh!” “Eeee!”  “Aaaaa!”

“Hoo, hoo, hoo-aaaaah!” (splash)

Aaagh!

Aaagh!

Owwie!

Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Smack

“No! Please, please, please …”

“Aaaeeeiiieck*”

“She exerts enormous power, doesn’t she, Lawrence?” Sir John Talbot (Anthony Hopkins) gazes into a telescope at “That orb’d maiden with white fire laden, whom mortals call the moon.” At his side is his estranged son (Benicio del Toro). Lawrence, of course, has no idea just how strong a pull the moon will soon have over him.

The full moon still holds sway over the imaginations, and debatably, physiological responses, of mortals. Again and again, it draws us back to werewolf mythology. Then again, if you think werewolves are only mythology, you’re probably not one of the souls who has run into the Bray Road Beast, or one of the 102 French peasants who met their end in the jaws of the Beast of Gevaudan. The Wolfman is worth watching. I will say, it isn’t very scary. But then again, scary is hard to do.

While I wouldn’t want to tangle with a werewolf in real life, they are not among Hollywood’s scariest of monsters. Their existence is limited to two or three days a month. They have none of the intellect of Dracula, the omnipresence of Pazuzu, or the reproductive speed of Aliens. This, of course left the writers with the problem of how to build suspense and terror in between full moons and, of course, fill the movie up with enough jump-scares and bloodshed to keep a 21^st century audience interested. They actually did a pretty good job. While some werewolf movies act like they have the authority to summon a full moon at their whim, The Wolfman actually allows such phenomena to happen at their natural time, bothering to fill the weeks in between with plausible plot developments.

Full moon #1: Ben Talbot, walking through Stock Scary Scene #F785, strolls alone into the woods, shouting “I know you’re out there! Show yourself!” He is then fatally mauled by the Wolfman. Never walk alone into the dark shouting “show yourself,” kids, it won’t end well.

His brother, Lawrence is summoned from London for Ben’s funeral. He returns to Talbot Hall in Blackmoore, where we meet his father, Sir John, and Ben’s fiancé, Gwen Conliff (Emily Blunt). We then get a lot of back-story about their family history and hear the locals talk of two other gruesome deaths the night of Ben’s. “Whatever did it was big, had claws, and didn’t mind a load of buckshot.”

Full moon #2: Talbot goes to a nearby Gypsy camp to inquire about a medallion he found among Ben’s belongings. A group of villagers shows up armed, suspecting the Gypsies’ performing bear caused the deaths. However, during the ensuing confrontation, a strange creature, visible only as a blur and a shadow, attacks the camp, killing Brittons and Gypsyies alike. Talbot sees the creature chasing a panicked boy, intervenes, and is, you guessed it, bitten but not killed.

As Talbot lies in bed, recovering, we get more dialogue, flashbacks, a doctor who shakes his head when Talbot is up and walking around after a week, and a visit from a rational-minded inspector (Hugo Weaving), trying to get to the bottom of the murders. By now, of course, the villagers know what’s up, and everyone is making silver bullets, though we later find out that most of them can’t hit the broad side of a barn.

Make up has come a long way since 1941.

Full moon #3, of course, is Talbot’s first transformation, after which, he is arrested, believed to be a homicidal lunatic, and suffers four weeks of, well, somewhat realistic torment at the hands of a 19^th century asylum. And of course, there are more flashbacks, more hallucinations, and more back-story.

Full moon #4: We see Talbot running amok in Downtown London, which is pretty cool. Then Talbot returns to Blackmoore for Full moon #5.

The Bray Road Beast

The Wolfman is a fairly faithful adaptation of the 1941 film of the same name starring Lon Chaney, Jr. (If anybody cares.) It does, however, contain some plot enhancements worthy of modern special effects, including a great monster-vs.-monster sequence toward the end. There is also a climactic scene between Lawrence as the Wolfman and Gwen that plays out beautifully.

That said, there are also some eye-roll-worthy techniques that they use, such as cramming the movie full of dream sequences and hallucinations, mainly to give themselves enough  jump-scares and severed heads to fill up the trailer. Even without the hallucinations, this is one of the goriest movies I have ever seen. If the body count of The Wolfman doesn’t break 100, it’s got to be close, especially if you count each of the pieces most of the bodies wind up in. Think When Animals Attack on steroids. Then again, I doubt lupine predation was ever a tidy affair.

Overall, this is a highly engaging picture with an interesting story and some good action. If you’ve got a strong stomach, rent it, make some popcorn, and enjoy. Then go outside, and see if you can fight the urge to howl at the moon!

***½~ (3.5/5)

Well, what can be said about Legion? It’s a bit too nonsensical for me to call it good. On the other hand it isn’t really badenough for me to talk about that either. It’s not remotely accurate to its subject matter, but it’s not irreverent enough to be offensive. Ultimately, when the lights go on and you’re walking away from this one, scratching your head, what you’re most likely to remember about the movie is exactly what you saw on the poster: an Archangel with a machine gun. And if that by itself isn’t worth a “hell, yeah,” it’s got to be at least worth a “heck, yeah.”

The movie opens with the text of Psalm 34:11, and actually builds on that theme pretty well. For all its faults, Legiondoes make God seem pretty scary. Fed up with man’s wickedness, He dispatches His angelic legion to exterminate us. However, the Archangel Michael (Paul Bethany) refuses to give up on man, and possibly refuses to believe that God has really given up. He drops into Los Angeles on Dec. 23 and hacks off his wings with a combat knife. He then breaks into and loots a gun store, steals a police car, and drives to a trailer park in the middle of nowhere called Paradise Falls.

But wait. It gets better.

At the Paradise Falls diner, we meet a motley crew of characters from different walks of life who either work in the diner or have had the misfortune to get lost/break down there. Most notably, we meet Charlie (Adrianne Palicki), a seemingly insignificant, poor, unwed mother to be, and Jeep (Lucas Black), her live-in boyfriend. Not only is Jeep not the father of Charlie’s child, but she has slept with just about everyone in town except him. Nonetheless, he loves her and offers to help her raise the baby.

Why sneak out the door with the guns when you can blow something up?

There follows an unintentionally comical scene, in which a little old lady (Jeanette Miller) orders a rare steak, uses the c-word, bites a guy on the neck, and then climbs the wall ala The Exorcist, before being shot to death by Kyle (Tyrece Gibson), the token gangsta of the film. Then we see a swarm of bugs that has nothing to do with the rest of the movie. Then Michael shows up and shoves sub-machine guns into everyone’s hands, telling them more like the old lady are on their way.

Michael explains that the deformed maniacs now assembling around the diner are possessed — not by demons, but by angels! He has come to protect Charlie, because her child is humanity’s hope for survival.

Yep. The male child of an insignificant, young, single girl, born on Dec. 25 in the middle of nowhere is humanity’s hope. Ever hear a story like that before? Other than a vague reference to the child “leading mankind out of darkness,” no explanation for Michael’s assertion is ever given. From there, Legion shifts from The Exorcist to Night of the Living Dead, as the Possessed try to fight their way into the diner.

The whole ordeal raises a lot of questions. If God has truly despaired of humanity, why is He committing so many resources to killing this child? And if He hasn’t, why not let the child live? Why do the Possessed sometimes exhibit a survival instinct and other times not?

What are the rules on angels? Are they truly immortal, or just tougher than humans? Do they lose their powers if they cut their wings off? The movie never seems to make up its mind. If humans possessed by angels can’t come near the child, why can Gabriel (Kevin Durand) walk right in the door? And when we see that God has apparently resurrected Michael and given him a new set of wings, just in time to save the day, are we to assume that Michael somehow changed God’s mind, or that this was what God had in mind all along?

Such questions matter not to director Scott Stewart. I don’t believe there was ever a hope on his part to do anything more than make a cool, scary action movie.

And action there is. Bethany gets a few fight scenes that would make Chuck Norris jealous. Near the end, there is a scene where Michael and Gabriel go one-on-one in the diner and tear the place apart. This scene, if you will pardon my technical jargon, is probably the most freakin’ awesome action sequence I have seen since Spiderman 3. It’s worth sitting through the rest of the movie for.

I can’t say I recommend this movie, but I definitely recommend searching YouTube for the angel smack-down scene. Can I get heck-yeah?

**~~~ (2/5)

Imagine a world where vampires live in fear. And not of Dr. Van Helsing or Blade, but of poverty, crime and environmental destruction. Sound hard to believe? That’s the world of Daybreakers (2009), directed by the Spierig brothers.

In 2019, vampires outnumber humans more than ten to one. The vampires have become somewhat comfortable with their dominant status, and now drive expensive cars away from suburban homes to boring white collar jobs in the city. Certain noteworthy changes in culture have resulted from this. For instance, all buildings and vehicles are now equipped with lead sheets that cover the windows during daylight hours, and loudspeakers broadcast warnings when there is one hour until daybreak. Vampires in suits line up at coffee stands for coffee with a shot of blood in it.

Subway commuters. And you thought vampires were cool.

But of course, there’s a problem; one that you’ve probably already guessed. With so few humans left, vampires are in danger of starvation. Most of the humans still in existence are kept sedated, hooked up to giant machines ala The Matrix, being farmed for their blood. The government rations blood more and more strictly, with those in control keeping a little extra for themselves, naturally. An increasingly fearful – and hungry –middle class hurries past dark alleys and hides in their homes, and the lower classes, “subsiders,” deprived of blood, mutate into something out of … well, a vampire movie (below).

Amidst all this, we meet Edward Dalton (Ethan Hawke), chief hematologist for a corporation that controls most of America’s remaining blood supply. With riots breaking out over the blood shortage, the company is putting increasing pressure on Ed to create some kind of “blood-substitute.” Meanwhile, Ed wrestles with his conscience over being a vampire and refuses to touch human blood, to the detriment of his health. This creates a good deal of tension between Ed and his brother, Frankie (Michael Dorman), who hunts humans for the U.S. Army.

A small number of humans are still free, hiding in rural areas. After a chance meeting with some of them, Ed receives an invitation to the countryside to learn about a cure for vampirism that they have discovered, and a chance to restore balance to the food chain.

The cast drives this one home with a number of powerhouse actors. Sam Neil, whom we seem to see about as often as a real vampire, plays Charles Bromley, the CEO of Ed’s company. One of history’s most under-rated actors, Neil blends the smooth charm of a Manhattan sophisticate with the sinister nature of a bloodsucker in a fascinating way. The inimitable Willem Dafoe also appears as the grizzled former vampire who stumbled upon the miracle cure. A collection of Aussie stars (Daybreakers was filmed in Australia) rounds out the cast nicely.

Hawke and Dafoe do not suck in "Daybreakers."

Daybreakers could justifiably be called a horror movie, but not in the way one normally thinks of horror. It does get gory – even ridiculously so – at times, but it’s not about the gore. It’s about the horrors of a society that has gotten too comfortable, and is eating itself. As corrupt potentates drink blood wine and eat blood caviar, we wonder how much longer civilization can bear the strain. The pristine homes and manicured lawns of suburbia are nothing more than petty amusements the vampires use to distract themselves from their impending doom. Near the end, we bear witness to the kind of moral travesties that desperation is often used to justify. And it’s all horribly familiar; the story of our lives, retold through the bloodshot eyes of the undead.

I wouldn’t want to put anyone off this movie, because it is one of the best I have

Neil drinks blood, but still does not suck in "Daybreakers."

seen in a long time. For all of the negativity, it actually has a pretty uplifting ending (especially for a vampire movie), despite a few painfully sad moments along the way. There are also a number of genuinely fun scenes, including a hair-raising home invasion by a bat-like subsider. Even better, this scene is followed by an unintentionally hilarious crime-investigation scene, with every law enforcement cliché from the past 60 years standing around the decapitated body of this bizare creature from hell.

I figured I could get some work done during this movie, but my papers were left forgotten on the coffee table as I was glued to the screen. Daybreakers was only the second movie done by the Spierig brothers, but it’s as gripping and thought-provoking as anything out there. If you’ve got a strong stomach, it’s a must see.

****~ (4/5)

This is why great movies shouldn’t have sequels. Make no mistake, Iron Man was a great movie. It took a character from the depths of obscurity and made him a national symbol. Sure it was a comic book movie, but it had more heart and more flare than a lot of more serious films. The story of a man totally absorbed in himself and his own pleasure being changed and using his power to protect those who couldn’t protect themselves was truly inspiring, led by a truly gifted actor. The action, while limited in quantity, was excellent in quality.

How do you follow an act like that? Well, at the command of the almighty dollar, Marvel Studios had to try. To be fair, what they came up with is watchable, in fact clearly a better sequal than their colossal disappointments of Spiderman 2 and X2: X-Men United, but it has none of the power of Iron Man.

The scene in Iron Man where Stark rescues the villagers from the Ten Rings is a scene I’ll probably never forget. It took two thirds of the movie to get to Stark’s first heroics as Iron Man, but it was well worth it.

If you’re thinking that, now that we have the origin story out of the way, we’ll get some extra action and heroics, think again. Marvel has to cram in more subplots and implausible characters to eat up time. Well, that’s not so bad, you say, more plot development is good, right?

Not when the writers are used to writing for comic books. Comic books have room for stories that go in circles, whereas movies simply don’t. For example, in part 2, Stark finds out that he’s dying due to the effects of the reactor core he built in part 1. Precious time for action sequences disappears forever while he remodels his workshop to build a machine and creates some “new element” that was supposedly impossible to create through a process the movie never even tries to explain. This new element magically cures his ailment and everything goes back to normal, so it doesn’t even drive the story. If I were to read through a decade’s worth of monthly comic book issues, I would expect some filler crap like this, but for a movie, it’s just wrong.

Similarly, after Stark seemed to have gotten a new set of priorities in part 1, in part 2, we get more of him staggering drunkenly, driving sports cars, and trying to score. When someone turns over a new leaf, is it unreasonable to expect them to never relapse? Probably. But that’s not the point. Why are we paying to watch the same stuff over?

Unlike comic serials, which are expected to keep a story going perpetually, a movie can, and should, present a coherent story that stands on its own and doesn’t waste time with filler. Judging by the buzz among nerds over the past few years, and by the easter eggs in both Iron Man movies, Marvell plans on changing this. Iron Man 2 is actually set-up for movies about Thor and the Avengers (who include Iron Man). In other words, Marvell plans on making movies more like comic books, written not so much to entertain as to advertise the next movie and keep you coming back for more. This might score with the hardcore comic nerds, but I doubt the general public will tolerate it for long.

I should probably say that Iron Man 2 is not horrible, and is even kind of entertaining if you turn your brain off. I’m sure there will be a third one, and I’ll probably see it. After all, both Spiderman and X-Men made improvements with their third installments. Once Iron Man 2 is out on video, it won’t be a bad way for you to kill two hours.

**~~~ (2/5)

In the summer of 1975, people crowded into movie theatres to see the work of a young genius named Steven Spielberg. They watched as a young woman, drunkenly laughing, led her boyfriend to the water’s edge, then began swimming out to sea. She was having a great time – and then suddenly, she disappeared. A few seconds later she reappeared, screaming, gasping and trying to fight, and then she was gone again. The whole thing took maybe ten seconds.

Movie goers sat transfixed, still feeling the terror that woman felt in her final moments. For years afterwards, millions refused to go into the water. And they never saw a thing. Oh, sure, for the next two hours (and then for three inferior sequels) Jaws turned the sea white with thrashing and red with blood, but no one has forgotten that first scene to this day.

Naturally, a classic will have imitators, and shark films have abounded ever since, but none have ever figured out what it was that made Jaws great. Most have clung to the belief that “bigger is better.” This is probably why there is a whole subgenre of “Megalodon” films.

Carcharodon Megalodon is the designation given by many scientists to a number of poorly-preserved fossils. These fossils seem to be essentially identical to those of the Great White Shark – except much larger. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carcharodon_megalodon)

Megalodon, lovingly termed “Meg” by paleontolgists, is thought to have grown to 60 or 70 feet, and to have been extinct for 2.5 million years (Although a 60-foot Great White was reported around 500 years ago). So if a 25-foot Great White in Jaws was scary, a 70-foot Great White is even scarier, right? Sigh.

A meg mouth reconstructed in 1909.

I decided to get my feet wet in this world of the Hollywood Meg last night and came away with all my toes still attached. I first watched Megalodon, Dir. Pat Corbit, 2004 (hereafter Meg) and then Shark Attack 3: Megalodon, Dir. David Worth, 2002 (hereafter SA3).

Meg is actually not too bad. You kind of have to get past the fact that they used prehistoric CGI to go with their prehistoric monster, and the fact that the editing is never quite right for building suspense, but the plot is straightforward and not too implausible. Two journalists arrive at a new multi-billion dollar oil rig to cover its first bite into the floor of the north Atlantic. But of course (say it with me now) Something Goes Wrong and the drill sinks into a previously undiscovered subterranean ocean. A few hours later, the rig begins to shake as something big swims out of the hole. Several people go down to check it out and they don’t all make it back up.

Painting by Csotonyi of a meg attacking a mosasaur.

If Meg has a strength, it’s its simplicity. In a 90-minute film, no time is wasted on character development. They give us just enough scenes to understand the general situation and what equipment the characters have to work with before introducing the threat. We are then treated to shots of the shark swimming around, crashing into steel girders and ramming it’s head through ice caps, trying to get at the people on top. These scenes are kind of cool, and in an undersea story, it only makes sense that we see the shark. All this might sound like damning with faint praise, but Corbit does deserve a nod for not trying to do more than he could.

The biggest problem is that there doesn’t seem to be any miniature work in Meg. This can be a good thing only if the CGI is flawless, and this CGI is … not. Still, it’s fun watching a giant shark chase a submersible through a maze of I-beams.

If there is anything good about SA3, it’s that the overall plot is very well put together. The action centers around a seaside resort in Mexico. It’s not surprising that a millionaire communications CEO (George Stanchev) is staying at this resort. It’s also not surprising that the area happens to be the crossroads for his company’s trans-pacific cable. And it’s not too surprising that the cable’s electro-magnetic pulses have lured a prehistoric shark out of the Challenger Deep, which has followed the cable to this very spot. As parts of large marine animals, and then people, begin to wash ashore at the resort, Ben Carpenter (John Barrowman), a life guard, begins to worry about the safety of vacationers. When he finds a strange tooth in the cable, he sends the picture over the internet. A paleontologist in San Diego, Catlin Stone (Jenny McShane), recognizes the species and travels to the resort to study the meg. Thus it makes sense that all these characters are in the same place because they’ve all been drawn her by the effects of the cable. There’s plenty of conflict between them, too. Carpenter is intent on killing the shark, Stone wants to study it, and the rich guy just wants his system to get up and running.

Sadly, this movie has too many millstones around its neck to keep it’s head above water. It’s got the worst acting I’ve seen this side of grade school pageants. It’s downright painful to sit through scene after scene of cheesy dialogue, where you actually see actors turning their heads away from the camera right before they break out laughing (did they not have time for second takes, or what?). The low production values are also something to behold. If it hadn’t been for repeated references to the internet and cell phones, I would have sworn this was filmed in the ‘70s.

If you think this is real, you'll be terrified by "Shark Attack 3."

And of course, we have the token lack of subtly. Right in the first scene, we see a shot of the shark’s face rushing at the camera, and then chomping down on a welder. Later, a couple starts to make out on a water slide, which drops them into the ocean, and they are instantly attacked. No circling to be realistic or build suspense. We see the shark through the whole movie, and – get this – it actually growls! None of it is remotely plausible or scary, unless you’re the sort who has nightmares about being photographed and superimposed over a shark’s mouth.

The most pathetic thing about SA3 is that it tries so hard to be Jaws. The main characters go out on a boat and shoot guns and harpoons at the shark, the shark eventually sticks its head into the boat as in Jaws; the movie even copies Jaws 3, when the first meg is killed and then a bigger meg (possibly mom?) appears in the last 15 minutes to attack a cruise ship and swallow motorboats whole. It seems Worth was making it easy on himself with this one, counting on the principle that a movie doesn’t have to be good, as long as there are plenty of scenes of girls taking their bathing suits off.

Incidentally, don’t ask me what SA3 is a sequel to. A search of IMDB for “Shark Attack” turned up more movies than I could shake a stick at. Doubtless, the future will bring many more. Other marine monsters have made it to the movies from time to time (e.g. The Beast, Lake Placid), but none of them capture our imaginations the way sharks do. As the mayor explained in Jaws, “You yell ‘barracuda,’ everybody says ‘Huh? What?’ You yell ‘shark,’…”

Panic scene from "Jaws."

Megalodon

*½~~~ (1.5/5)

Shark Attack 3: Megalodon

½~~~~ (0.5/5)

You’ve probably seen The Dark Knight, so imagine what that movie would have been like if the Joker had been the hero. That’s the basic idea of Law Abiding Citizen. The Joker is Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler, looking much more vulnerable than he did in 300), who has an experience in the first scene that would probably drive most people to super-villainhood. Two men, Ames and Dalby, break into his home, stab him, and rape and murder his wife and daughter.

Playing opposite Butler is Jamie Fox as assistant Philadelphia D.A. Nick Rice, who prosecutes the two defendants. The case draws a bad judge, who suppresses DNA evidence, making Nick nervous as to whether he can win. Nick then has the unpleasant task of telling Clyde that he feels he has no choice but to offer Dalby a plea bargain to testify against Ames and put Ames on death row. Clyde, of course, begs him not to do it.

Butler lights up the screen as a man who's lost everything.

As a prosecutor, I identified with Nick’s struggle a great deal. Prosecutors have to work in a flawed system, concerned more with the rights of criminals than those of victims, and we have to make a lot of hard choices. Nick’s decision is based partly on a belief that he has no choice and that “some justice is better than no justice at all.” However, he is also motivated partly by the desire to preserve his 96% conviction rate, and his ambition to one day become D.A. He devastates Clyde when he makes the deal.

Nick Rice searches for clues

The scene switches  to ten years later. Nick witnesses Ames’ execution, when something goes horribly wrong (or maybe right). As the serum slips into Ames, he begins to writhe and scream. The serum is supposed to bring about death painlessly, but Ames dies in agony. It is later discovered that somebody switched the canister of serum for another chemical. Meanwhile, Dalby, a free man, finds himself drugged and kidnapped by Clyde, and strapped to a gurney, where Clyde explains everything  he’s going to do to him in painful detail, before slowly cutting Dalby’s body apart while Dalby screams (the explanation comes in handy because the audience is mercifully spared most of what happens).

Nick gives Clyde a bracelet made by his daughter.

Clyde is arrested and interrogated by – you guessed it – Nick. He offers confessions in exchange for being provided luxuries during his pre-trial custody. Ever-concerned about his conviction rate, Nick agrees to purchase the confessions. However, it soon becomes clear that Clyde was planning on being “caught” the whole time. From inside a jail cell, he begins to unfold his plan for retribution against the entire corrupt legal system, saving Nick for last.

It's not a movie until something blows up!

Law Abiding Citizen is one of few movies that I have seen that actually give an accurate portrayal of the legal world. I definitely identified with the struggles – both external and internal – that prosecutors must face. We live in a dark world, and I often wonder how civilization holds together at all. Much like The Dark Knight, however, the realism breaks down as Clyde’s homicidal antics go further and further. It’s impossible to believe one man could hold an entire city hostage from inside a jail cell, even with ten years to plan. Foxx and Butler both turn in tour-de-force acting jobs and involve the audience in their struggles. We tend to root for Nick, and yet we can’t help but feel angry with him for chickening out and playing politics. Meanwhile, it’s fun at first to watch Clyde get his vengeance, but he goes way too far. The supporting cast also does a great job. Some of the most memorable shots are of people’s faces when they realize they are about to die – not an easy thing to pull off. Colm Meany gets a rare heroic roll, and actually survives the whole movie.

This is one of those movies not everyone will enjoy, but everyone should see.

****½ (4.5/5)

The faithful reader might remember a piece I posted last fall on Glory Road. Thad H. posted a comment on that piece suggesting that I might enjoy Friday Night Lights, the story of the 1988 Permian “Mojo” Panthers, led by Coach Gary Gaines (Billy Bob Thornton) in their bid for their 6^th State Championship.

If you like high school football you’ll love this movie. It takes place in small-town Texas (Odessa, to be exact), where football is a religion and the high school players are hailed as much as NFL stars. Director Peter Berg serves up plenty of bone-bruising hits, body-bending catches, and tackles that have to involve a trampoline just off camera.

Odessa is a blue collar, nearly impoverished town, and there are two kinds of boys: those who might make it out of this town, and those who won’t. Those who might play their hearts out on the field in hopes of getting an NCAA scholarship. Those who won’t play their hearts out on the field because this is all they’ll ever have.

Beginning of the season.

All this creates an intense environment to grow up in. Gaines is threatened with termination if he doesn’t win State, and after one loss, comes home to find “for sale” signs all over his yard. One of his players, Don Billingsly (Gerrett Hedlund), is cursed to be the son of a local football legend, and not have his ability. For several painful scenes, Chuck Billingsly (Tim McGraw) verbally abuses Don and grinds him down for cut-ups on the field. The Panthers win most of their games, but people flagellate them for every mistake. All of this spills onto the field, of course, and Berg makes the action nasty enough that you wonder if this is a sports movie or the teen version of  Braveheart. If you enjoy watching young men get their noses smashed and fingers broken, this is the movie for you.

FNLdoes keep the audience involved. I kept backing it up to revisit what happened. The pacing is a little off, though. In a couple of close games, for example, Mojo is getting killed for awhile, Gaines yells a lot, and then suddenly they have some big plays, and end up winning or making it close. The film never builds your anticipation or shows what they changed on the field to get that result. A good sports movie would at least have some kind of inspirational speech that turns things around.

But why complain? This is a movie made for sports nuts, and it makes you feel like you’re watching a real game. There was only one thing about this film I really didn’t like. (Spoiler alert: you might want to skip the next paragraph.)

Target audience of "Friday Night Lights."

For the championship game, Mojo goes up against Dallas Carter, a team full of 300-pounders that hardly seem to belong in high school. As a matter of fact, in reality, D.C. was later stripped of its title for playing an ineligible player.

End of the season.

 No one expects Mojo to give D.C. any trouble. After being down as much as 21 points, Mojo comes back to close the gap to six, and then falls inches short of a TD at the last second. We then see a lot of slow motion walking across the field. One person walking is Don Billingsly. Chuck comes out of the stands and gives him a hug – which Don actually accepts! WTF?? Now that he’s fought overwhelming odds, covered himself in bruises and sprained every joint in his body, he’s good enough for acknowledgement from the man who’s treated him like dirt all his life, and he takes it?? I wanted him to push dad aside and congratulate his team, or kiss his girlfriend, or something.

A lot of guys love to talk about how football produces the best kind of men, and this movie was made for them. I tend to think the success of ex-players has less to do with qualities the game instills than the fact that having played for the local high school is a golden ticket into the local country club. It gets a little old having to be twice as good and work twice as hard as the guys that played football. That doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate and enjoy the drama that comes with sports, however. FNL succeeds at what it sets out to do, and for that I give it

***~~ (3/5)

So why do a review of a movie that turns 50 this year? Because every so often there is a movie so great that it transcends time; a classic. None the less, due to the shear volume of material put out by Hollywood, great films can be forgotten just because they didn’t come out in the last year or two, or because audiences get comfortable with different styles. To put it simply, greatness should not be allowed to die.

The Ten Commandments was directed by savy Hollywood operator and professing Christian Cecil B. Demille. The fact that some of Demille’s movies were based on parts of the Bible automatically drew some criticism. One contemporary accused Demille of making “small-minded movies on a huge scale.” The “huge scale” part definitely applies to The Ten Commandments. Demille had to employ a cast of thousands of extras to recreate Pharo’s army and the mass Exodus of Hebrew slaves. The story spans 85 years and takes 3:39 to unfold, and every scene – nay, every line of dialogue – drives the story. And of course, then-revolutionary techniques were used to make the Red Sea sit up and beg, making movie history.

One of the temptations that Moses brushes off like dandruf. Heston must have taken a lot of cold showers.

But small minded? No one can take an honest look at this film and seriously hold that belief. This is one of the most compelling and thoughtful pictures ever made. The early story happens during a politically volatile period in the (speculative) history of ancient Egypt. Pharo Sethi I is nearing the end of his life and his throne must naturally pass to his biological heir, the ambitious Rameses II. Yul Brynner is absolutely brilliant in this role. You don’t like him and yet you’re compelled to respect him. Driven by his desire for the crown and for the beautiful Nefretiri (Anne Baxter), he puts force that few actors can into every scene he appears in. Sethi has nearly equal force, however, and superior power. Like most old men who’ve spent their lives being waited on, he has begun to worry about his legacy. He prefers his sister’s adopted son, Moses, who never stops building tributes to him, as a successor. Rameses begins hatching plots to undo this adopted brother.

Nefretiri, a hormonal adolescent girl with the power of a princess, plays her own game. Madly in love with Moses, she can’t bear the thought of being wed to Rameses. She constantly praises Moses and sweet talks Sethi. One scene between her and Rameses is one of Hollywood’s more memorable scenes. It’s a reminder that movies were much more powerful when the sexual tension was kept below the surface. Nefretiri is not passive, however, her passion drives her to extreme lengths, including murder. There are an assortment of other wily characters with their own motivations to add interest.

All of this is superbly done, and plenty for four stars. But so far, all this political maneuvering and forbidden romance could be in The Godfather, The Good Shepherd, or any number of intrigue movies. What makes The Ten Commandments different? The protagonist. Moses never criticizes the other characters; he simply passes through the politics and back-stabbing as if he doesn’t notice it.

Prophet, priests, and king.

Differences between Moses and the others begin to show right after Nefretiri has killed her hand maiden. Moses is knocking at her door. After a minute of romance, Moses learns that she has killed Memnet. He insists on knowing why, and drags it out of her that Memnet told her about his Hebrew heritage (unknown to him). She spouts typical Hollywood rhetoric, e.g., “I love you, that’s the only truth I know.” His reply is “love cannot drown truth.” Moses is favored above everyone else in Egypt, and its throne has now been promised to him. He has every comfort he could want and a beautiful woman madly in love with him. However, the revelation drives him to uncover his past, and he actually leaves the palace to work in the brick pits. His mother and Nefretiri urge him to stay, telling him that justice and truth are better served from a throne. This is just one age-old struggle the movie addresses; shouldn’t righteous men seek out power for the benefit of all? – and yet power so often rules the one who has it and makes him more wicked than any tyrant he replaced.

After Moses is arrested, Sethi asks him “Why are you forcing me to destroy you?” Moses replies “The evil that men should turn their brothers into beasts of burden … if there is a god, he did not mean this to be so.” Moses bears the fall from next pharo to condemned prisoner with remarkable grace, out of nothing more than an un-named conviction of what is right. How many of us have that kind of strength?

We are, of course, eventually directed to the “Power that has shaped Moses’ way,” as he puts it. The Ten Commandments does a number of things that contemporary audiences will be uncomfortable with, including overt references to Yaweh, the God of Abraham, as opposed to vague references to “God.” It’s unlikely DeMille would have taken the same criticism if the film wasn’t such an uncompromising statement of Biblical truth.

Still looks real.

If you haven’t seen The Ten Commandments for a few years, you owe it to yourself to at least rent a copy. If you’ve only watched it on TV, there is a part that is usually cut. No matter how many times I watch The Ten Commandments (don’t worry, I try to stay busy while I watch it), I can never bring myself to skip past it. In an unusual (possibly unique) move, DeMille addresses the audience face to face before the film starts. DeMille’s passion is infectious, and he brings the whole purpose of the movie into focus. The theme of The Ten Commandments, DeMille emphatically states, is “whether men are to be ruled by God’s Law, or by the whim of a dictator like Rameses. Are men the property of the state, or are they free souls under God? This same battle continues throughout the world today.” How true. We need only look at the history of the United States to see that, as our government and culture have progressively rejected the Law of God, we have seen not freedom, but an explosion of government invasion of everyone’s lives.

Everyone remembers the Red Sea scene from this film, but few remember the true climax of the story, after Moses has received the Commandments from Yahweh. He goes back down the mountain to find the people worshiping the Calf and reveling in depravity. Dathan (Edward G. Robinson), a rabble-rouser, declares “We’re gathered against you Moses. We’re free!” Moses shouts “There is no freedom without the law!” What more is there to say? I guess there’s still the Gospel. But DeMille tried to force that into the 1920s version of The Ten Commandments, and it ruined it. One movie can only do so much. But this one does all that one can – and then some. The Book isn’t bad either.

***** (5/5)

You will not enjoy The Ugly Truth. At least, for your sake, I hope you don’t. When I saw it, I was repeatedly asking myself two questions: One: why am I watching this? And two: do members of our culture really have so little hope that they can’t aspire to anything more than this?

The Ugly Truth might be interpreted by some as a “chick flick,” however it attempts to bring the male perspective into the ugly picture it draws of relationships. I emphasize “attempts.”

At the beginning, we meet Abby Richter (Katherine Heigl) a high-power TV producer who is successful in all things except love. By far the most entertaining scene is one of the first, in which she goes to a restaurant and meets (for the first time) a bachelor that she has been paired with by a computer dating service. Their conversation goes something like this:

She (opening black leather folder): I was so excited to meet you, because your profile had nine out of the ten characteristics on my checklist.

He: You brought my profile to our date??

She (turning pages): Oh, my assistant put it in my bag. She doesn’t like me to be caught unprepared – not that I am ever not prepared. Kudos on your comprehensive car insurance plan, by the way.

He: That wasn’t in my profile.

She: No, but it was in your background check.

He: Uh …

She (after a pause): Oh, don’t worry, I brought a list of conversation topics in case this happened.

He (rubbing his face): So, I take it this has happened before…

Director Robert Luketic figures we can probably guess how the rest of the date goes, and cuts to a scene of Abby returning home, dejected. She starts channel surfing and comes across Mike Chadway (Gerard Butler), a brash, shallow, foul-mouthed guy in tight pants doing his call-in show called “The Ugly Truth.” Chadway is throwing relationship books into a barrel and setting them on fire like the refuse they are.

He declares “Men are simple! You want a relationship, ladies, here’s how. It’s called a Stairmaster …” Scrub out a lot of profanity and stomach-churning innuendo, and Mike is essentially saying women need to get an ideal body, put on a revealing outfit, and then men will want to have sex with them. Only then is a relationship (albeit a fairly one-sided one) possible. Incensed, Abby calls him and demands “Do you really expect us to believe men are incapable of feeling love, and are all as perverse as you?” He asks if she knows a man who is not. Abby takes a breath and begins describing the ideal man who lives in her mind. He replies:

“Oh, I get it, you’re a lesbian.”

“What??”

“You must be; you just described the perfect woman!”

The next day, Abby goes to work and finds out, to her horror, that her boss thinks their programming has gotten boring, and has hired Mike to spice it up. Mike’s first appearance on Abby’s station is to be with unhappily married anchors Georgia (Cheryl Hines) and Larry (John Michael Higgins), who are more-or-less Regis and Kathy Lee. Abby coaches the two of them before the show to humiliate him on the air.

Mike and Abby have a stare-down over makeup.

However, once on the air, Mike gets them to admit to all of their marital problems, finally getting Larry to acknowledge that he is so embarrassed by the fact that Georgia makes more money than he does, that he has been impotent for several months. After some coaching by Mike, Larry demands, “Georgia, let me be a man!” He suddenly attacks her with passionate kisses and then throws her over his shoulder and carries her off the set. Everyone in the control room is cheering, Mike’s popularity is now assured, and Abby is next seen curled up on the floor of the closet in her office.

In between all of this, Abby meets her neighbor, Collin (Eric Winter). Collin is an orthopedic surgeon who has somehow found time to maintain the body of a professional weight lifter. He loves poetry, cooking, and giving foot massages (when I saw this, I rolled my eyes hard enough to pull a muscle). Hoping to take Mike down a peg, Abby announces to him that she has actually met the perfect man she has been dreaming of. Mike asks “has he asked you out yet?” Abby immediately marches to her phone, and calls Collin to ask him out. When Collin hesitates, Mike hangs up Abby’s phone with the comment “He was blowing you off.” Abby is angry, but it gets her attention when Collin calls back, as Mike predicted. Mike instructs “Now make him suffer. Put him on hold.” Once again, Collin reacts as Mike predicts. Mike and Abby make a deal that if she does as Mike says and she lands Collin, she will cooperate with his efforts at the network. If not, he’ll quit.

The rest of the movie is scenes of Mike giving Abby tips on seductive dress, flirting and teasing. None of it is funny, however, and a lot of it is disgusting. Every exchange follows this pattern:

He: We need to change your hair/clothing/eye color/butt.

She (indignant): What is wrong with it?

He: It makes you look sensible/professional/mature.

She: What is wrong with sensible/professional/mature?

He: Nothing, except no-one-wants-to-f.ck-it.

Eventually, Abby does land Collin. But by this point – you guessed it – Mike has fallen for her. We also learn a little more about Mike’s background; how he has been burned by a lot of girls that didn’t really like him, and made him what he is today. He eventually goes on a rant about how women don’t care about you, they only care about their checklist. All of this could have been fairly interesting if Luketic had taken the time to really get us inside the characters heads, but he seems to prefer to spend the time on shock value. By the end of act one, I was looking at my watch.

Mike, after wrestling with twins in jello. Don't worry; he only slept with the one that could read.

The script for this film was written by three women, and Mike Chadway seems to be their attempt to incorporate the male perspective on relationships. Mike is a tad likable for a minute here and there just because he’s not ashamed of being a guy. But in the end, what his lines amount to is a restatement of the same things that bitter, sexually frustrated women say about men. In other words, Mike has only found a more phallocentric way of saying “men are pigs.”

For example, in one scene where he coaches Abby, he tells her “Never criticize. For men, self improvement ends with toilet training.” Doubtless a lot of women feel this way. It is nonsense, however. Men have plenty of interest in self improvement. The problem is women tend to think that they can mold a man into who they think he should be through nagging and criticizing. It doesn’t work on them, so I don’t know why they think it will work on us.

The worst thing about The Ugly Truth isn’t the gross dialogue or the choppy editing. It’s the utter sadness I felt for anyone who could actually connect with this movie. As I sat watching it with my beautiful wife curled up next to me, I wondered what it would be like to have to believe that there is no hope of anything better than the occasional cheap thrill in relationships.

Because that’s what the writers seem to believe. Neither Abby nor Mike ever really grow or learn anything; they just inexplicably fall in love with each other on a hot air balloon. Cut to the final scene of the two of them in bed. There was actually another ending filmed that involves the two of them getting married. Mike gives a speech in which he says “It’s true that every woman has a checklist, but occasionally a regular guy like me can sneak onto that checklist by using good old fashion true love.” They could have at least partially redeemed the movie if they had used this ending. Sure, the theatrical ending fits better with the spirit of the movie, but why would you want to do that?

So I hope you’re as repulsed by The Ugly Truth as I am. If nothing else, watching it made me appreciate my love-filled and passionate marriage. Which brings me back to the question: why was I even watching that tripe? The reason was, she asked me to watch it with her, and I knew it would make her happy if I did. Yeah. I’m a stud.

*~~~~ (1/5)