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Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time

October 18, 2010 by

I love a good time-travel story.  From the Terminator films, Back to the Future series, and ripping yarns like the 2000  film Frequency, there is something alluring and exciting about the past and future colliding.  Even the recent Star Trek reboot found a few wormholes.  Time travel will always come across in film as a tricky contradicting device full of paradoxes.  In Prince of Persia, the film bases its premise on the possibility that time travel and its power may fall into the wrong hands (as all films of this sort do), but it presents time travel in a limited arrangement.

The plot introduces the Persian empire at the height of its power.  Its king is paraded through the streets where he comes across a defiant young boy who seeks to protect another young man from punishment as a result of thievery.  In fact, it feels very similar to a live-action version of Disney’s Aladdin.  This protective boy, Dastan, stirs up the king’s heart, and the orphaned boy is taken into the royal family as a young prince.  Later on he grows up to become the adult Jake Gyllenhaal, bulked up with flowing dark hair and bronzed skin attributed to multiple trips to the tanning salon.  He is a trained warrior, and trusted commander in the nation’s army.  Dastan’s royal brothers are set to capture the peaceful city of  Almut.  Though Dastan’s skills as a fighter are commendable among his siblings, they feel he is not ready for such a massive attack.  To prove himself worthy, Dastan scaffolds the wall of Almut and lays siege to the city, leading a small band of soldiers to victory before the royal brothers arrive.  Dastan becomes a hero, and as such, takes a handsome dagger from Almut—one with mystical powers. 

During a celebration, the ceremony is interrupted when a prestigious cloak, laced with an acidic poison, is offered to the king and kills him very quickly.  Dastan, having been asked to offer the cloak before the ceremony, appears to be the traitor with the intent of taking the throne.  Quickly afoot from his own people, Dastan escapes with a princess of Almut, Tamina (Gemma Arterton) captured shortly following the attack.  Tamina’s sole interest is in protecting the dagger Dastan carries and returning it, as it has the power to rewind a minute (or roughly so) in time.  It soon becomes apparent to Dastan that someone, most likely his eldest brother, must have been after the dagger for its power.  The story eventually expands the power of the dagger in revealing an underground stone ruled by the gods that can ultimately lead to a total reversal of history and mankind’s complete destruction.  What else is new?

Caught in this storm of chaos, Dastan seeks out his uncle (Ben Kingsley), the only man he can trust to clear his name and restore order in the kingdom, as well as return the dagger to safety.

Regarding the dagger and its power, I love how the story has found a way to eliminate the paradox of time travel.  The dagger holds a button on it, that if pressed with the proper sand in it (dopey, I know), simply rewinds time back about a minute.  Only the holder of the dagger knows that any change has taken place.  So in essence, there really isn’t any traveling in time—time is simply rewinding itself, and this is the limit of the dagger.  I like the premise, and the limited power there.  But of course the premise takes things to a new level once man’s history is revealed.  The gods apparently had wiped out all of humanity but one young girl who pleaded to live and was granted her survival.  She was given this dagger of power and it has been kept in secret… blah, blah, blah.  The narrative makes a huge leap to potential world annihalation, and once this happens, the story gets incredibly sloppy and stitched together, when it could have stuck to this dagger’s original limit of power.  I’m sure that would have been more enjoyable.

Prince of Persia is based on a video game series I haven’t played, nor ever will I’m sure.  And of course, this coulda-shoulda-woulda blockbuster film from Producer Jerry Bruckheimer (hoping so desperately to turn this into a Pirates of the Caribbean franchise) delivers a very expensive product.  You can see it onscreen, even if a few of the digital shots look a little hammy.  With a lot opportunity here, the film turns to silliness to try and exact the charm of that Johnny Depp adventure.  The problem is that Gyllenhaal is no Depp.  And as much leaping and jumping around as Gyllenhaal’s stuntmen do, as muscle-bound as the actor has become, it doesn’t bring natural charisma or wit to his performance as a side effect. 

The story doesn’t help Gyllenhaal’s cause.  Pirates was silly, yes, but the characters carried the plot.  Once Prince of Persia evolves into a history lesson on the gods’ wiping out humanity, and their intent on doing so again if the dagger is misused, I felt the story crumbling in on itself, as if I could see the writers in the background trying to staple ideas together.  Ultimately, the film gets too big, too silly, and too careless for any of its original ambitions to prevail, and the filmmakers should have realized that a mammoth production wouldn’t sell itself.  Pirates of the Caribbean certainly didn’t.  Bruckheimer had his ace in the hole after all was said and done—Johnny Depp making an icon out of Jack Sparrow.  Unfortunately he failed to repeat that process.  While Persia still isn’t quite the mess that the third Pirates film became, it’s still about as silly and unpolished.  As a marginally enjoyable big-budget diversion, I found this film to be watchable, but I can’t heartily recommend it.

[Rating:2.5/5]

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Die Hard with a Vengeance

October 12, 2010 by

Die Hard with a Vengeance Having essentially re-invented the loose cannon archetype for a new generation with John McClane (the character Bruce Willis was born to play) in the original Die Hard, McTiernan returns to the franchise to direct its second sequel and in doing so injects a whole new meaning to the phrase “over the top”.  After a string of middling successes following his early breakout triumphs of Die Hard and Predator, McTiernan went back to basics with the cop-versus-terrorists approach that worked so well seven years earlier.  And what a trip is is.  Vengeance is the most outlandish film in the series, and an experience that continues to up the tension and excitement with each act right up to the climactic Canadian finish.  But the spectacle never gets ahead of itself, and McTiernan keeps things loose with a healthy dose of humor and genuine on-screen chemistry between Willis and his new sidekick Zeus Carver (a masterfully-cast Samuel L. Jackson, playing his character to the hilt).  But while sizable portions of New York City end up as smoldering ruins, the focus is on the characters, not the action and explosions.  A trick Michael Bay might want to try out sometime.

The movie starts with an explosion outside a department store, which sets in motion a series of events crafted by criminal mastermind Simon Gruber–brother of Hans Gruber, the financial would-be terrorist handily dispatched via defenestration at the hands of McClane in the original Die Hard.  Naturally our favorite khaki-clad cop is at the center of it all, and is forced to jump through a series of hoops lest Mr. Gruber blow up more locales around the city.  Rather than have him go it alone, though, he is joined by a perfectly mismatched foil in Zeus Carver, an angry electrician who has a bone to pick with nearly everyone in the city.  Well, everyone who isn’t like him anyway.  The pairing of Jackson and Willis is what lends Vengeance its true charm, as their constant bickering and insulting is as explosive as a pile of C4.  Both reluctant heroes end up tearing through New York while being guided by the sinister hand of Gruber, who may or may not be using the entire act as a distraction for a much larger plan.

Die Hard 3: McClane, Carver, Laptop

John McClane and his new BFF Zeus Carver take a break from busting heads to play some 7th Guest and Monkey Island.

While the scale of the action gets continually ramped up throughout the film, there are times when things get a little too outlandish for their own good.  I can handle subway explosions, high-speed car chases through crowded streets, and elevator shootouts just fine.  But when refrigerator-sized (and shaped) plot devices appear out of thin air, or McClane literally surfs on the hood of a dump truck, things start to get a little silly.  I think McTiernan was sort of going for broke, though, and as long as he was capping the Die Hard trilogy he was going to throw everything at the audience that was even remotely within the realm of metaphysical possibility.  There is not one iota of plausibility in the entire film, but that’s not really the point.  Vengeance is in many ways the culmination of 1980’s action movie excesses, and it knows it.

One other troubling aspect of the film is the fact that the first half kind of wastes one of the most hardened, do-or-die action heroes ever committed to celluloid.  McClane and Carver, as pawns in Gruber’s diabolical scheme (you can practically hear Jeremy Irons practicing his Evil Villain Laughterâ„¢ offscreen), spend the first hour demolishing the five boroughs while solving riddles and mind puzzles instead of actually fighting bad guys.  Screenwriter Jonathan Hensleigh has said that the entire first hour of the film was taken directly from his original project with character names changed to fit the Die Hard series, and while the action is still as explosive as ever, it does feel out of place for a Die Hard film.  Even so, action film junkies need to look no further for a liberal dose of adrenaline.

Rating:[Rating:4.5/5]

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The Town

September 26, 2010 by

Ben Affleck continues to reinvent himself quite successfully with the engaging action-thriller The Town, his second outing as director following his debut with Gone Baby Gone three years ago.  Sticking with what works for him, Affleck returns to Boston-set crime dramas, and his abilities behind the camera prove that within this particular sub-genre he can compete with the best in the biz, including Michael Mann and Martin Scorsese.  The mere fact that he bests Mann’s recent Public Enemies and Ridley Scott’s American Gangster by a wide margin tells us we’ve got a new player in town.  No pun intended.

The Town tells the story of a band of thieves led by Doug McCray (Affleck).  The film opens with McCray and his three cohorts entering a bank under the veil of ghoulish skeletal masks and dark cloaks and armed with automatic weapons, escaping with the bank’s entire loot in a matter of minutes.  Upon their exit, James (Jeremy Renner), the reckless one of the bunch, decides to grab a bank teller, Claire (Rebecca Hall), as a hostage.  Blindfolded throughout her capture, she is eventually released and left unharmed.  The guys become worried that she might leak incriminating information to the feds, so Doug takes it upon himself to follow her.  She approaches him in a laundromat where they strike up conversation, and Doug (having taken an interest in her) decides to cross a dangerous line in asking her out for a drink.  Eventually, their casual friendship turns into something serious, and Doug is forced to hide his criminal life from her as he continues to participate in further high-risk heists.

These heists are orchestrated by a dangerous Irishman, Fergus (Pete Postlethwaite), the same operator that resulted in Doug’s father’s incarceration.  In fact, Doug has essentially been enslaved into his line of work as a professional thief.  I was never exactly sympathetic for him in his position, because despite his protective feelings for Claire, his loyalty to his family, and his longing to know of his disappeared mother, Doug never frowns upon stealing.  He is leery of James and his violent tendencies, not because someone may end up getting hurt, but that he may end up paying for James’ mistakes.

If I have one complaint about The Town, it’s that I don’t know what Affleck wants to say here.  He walks a fine line of upholding Doug’s character as a career criminal because he may have a soft heart.  His position is definitely conflicted, but does he really deserve to be painted as a hero?  One who shoots at police officers and keeps stolen government money…

I can’t say this complaint in any way pulled me out of the tension of the film.  Throughout two gripping hours of excitement, Affleck had me on the edge of my seat.  In much the same way, Gone Baby Gone had me conflicted regarding its moral position, however, I still found it to be 2007’s best and most overlooked film.  The Town proves Affleck knows what he’s doing, and perhaps purposefully chooses to push audiences into debate.  If Christopher Nolan can cause us to debate about the nature of reality, why can’t Affleck cause debate over moral issues?

I feel like I’m leaping the track here, so as for how well put-together The Town is, let me just say an action-crime picture hasn’t been this well-done since Heat.  Sure, The Departed is a better film, but it didn’t have rousing shootouts like Affleck conjures up.  Not only are they well-done, but they also have purpose.  The film itself becomes so engrossing from the opening scene, that what follows only adds to the suspense.  I cared about Doug McCray, even if I realized I didn’t quite agree with his position.  I felt for Claire, the hostage who unknowingly enters into a relationship with a man who quietly understand her trauma (for obvious reasons).  Even the character of James, compelled to one-up any sort of  opposition resulting in a penchant for violence is desperate for Doug’s loyalty, and longs for a semblance of a family.  The actors are extraordinary here, playing versions of characters we’ve seen in many crime-thrillers, but they pull it off remarkably well, and add authentic touches in their performances—most notably Affleck, himself, and Jeremy Renner (fresh off his Oscar nomination for The Hurt Locker).  We are even presented with the determined FBI detective, Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) tracking McCray’s clan, desperate for useful evidence against a party he already knows to be guilty.  Every one of the performances feels spot-on, as does the authenticity of the film.

I was so impressed with how believable The Town is executed.  From the robberies, to the chases, throughout the FBI investigation, and Affleck’s presentation of his hometown, I never felt as though the film became overblown, even through certain contrivances of the story and the enormity of the action sequences.  Looking back on the film, I realize the entire romantic relationship between Claire and Doug only serves to construct a movie plot, but I still remain so impressed with Affleck’s film.  In many ways it is both wholly original, and yet completely unoriginal, with direct comparisons made available to the aforementioned Heat.  Affleck’s presentation of the material sidesteps all comparisons that could be made, as it truly feels fresh and exciting, and is the best action film in quite some time.  Look for The Town to be a front-runner for award attention this year, and certainly don’t miss it.

[Rating:4.5/5]

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The Other Guys

September 23, 2010 by

I can’t remember the last time I sat through a major comedy featuring prominent stars without at least a few good laughs finding their way out.  To my complete surprise, Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg have unsuccessfully lampooned the buddy-cop action flick with The Other Guys.  This latest Adam McKay–Will Ferrell collaboration hit with a thud, so much so I began questioning whether I even enjoy Ferrell as a comedian.

That simply can’t be the case.  He’s a gifted comic actor, and his performances in Elf, Anchorman, Zoolander, Wedding Crashers, Blades of Glory and other films have caused me side-splitting pains of laughter.  But lately with Semi-Pro, Step Brothers, Land of the Lost, and now The Other Guys (which is getting good reviews and making buckets of dough), I seem to be losing appreciation for the funnyman.  However, a likelier conclusion would be that he has simply been floundering in stink-pile projects.  Either way, The Other Guys happens to be an intriguing premise and allows Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg to trade zingers—an opportunity I was looking forward to immensely.  The script simply goes nowhere, and I didn’t care for any of the jokes.

Ferrell and Wahlberg play pencil-pushing cops Gamble and Hoitz, living in the shadows of destructive action-hero NYPD detectives (Samuel L. Jackson, Dwayne Johnson) living out Bad Boys-style stunts and rescues on a daily basis.  One such chase has them leap off a high-rise building in an effort to catch the bad guys, and their self-proclaimed indestructibility causes them to forget that gravity will pull them to their deaths. With these two larger-than-life boneheads out of the way, Hoitz wants in on the action and away from his desk, dragging the hesitant Gamble along with him.  Gamble wants to play it safe, while Hoitz is looking for a big case.  The two find one unexpectedly, and become knee-deep in some extortion plot resulting in their inevitable suspension, allowing action-movie cliches to ensue (although it’s intended for laughs).

Sadly, I found zero fun here.  I can appreciate what McKay and Ferrell were trying to do, and I can see this potentially being a great comedy, but the jokes continuously backfired and fell flat.  Even Wahlberg, usually the hard-nosed action-star, failed to do much more than shout obnoxiously throughout (hilarious Mark, I know).  The plot was simply lacking, the dialogue wasn’t funny, and the mash-up of Ferrell and Wahlberg was in fact inspired, but went nowhere with the material.  I am amazed that the critically-reviled Cop Out from Kevin Smith seemed more enjoyable.  If Other Guys has a redeeming quality, it is Michael Keaton throwing out lyrics from TLC hits and doubling as Police Captain and Manager of Bed Bath & Beyond.  Otherwise, Adam McKay and Will Ferrell continue down a slippery slope.  Step Brothers I hated, and Other Guys almost as much, just not in the same way.  Where Step Brothers was so idiotic and loud, Other Guys is simply tired and lazy.

[Rating:1.5/5]

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Machete

September 21, 2010 by

Mr. Robert Rodriguez dispenses his disposable grindhouse cinema upon us once again.  Don’t take that as a rip on the man.  As one of the few filmmakers allowed to take a film and design it from concept to execution, making it completely and utterly as he sees it, I commend him on all of his accomplishments.  He’s a fanboy movie-lover making fanboys all over the world jump for joy.  With Sin City and From Dusk Til Dawn, he’s proven himself a filmmaker in a distinct class of his own, even while turning his head to make Spy Kids movies for the youngsters.  Machete, the extended feature-length trailer to compliment his ‘fake trailer’ used in his and Tarantino’s Grindhouse experiment three years ago, turns out to be one of the goofiest action movies to approach self-parody without being a full-blown spoof on the genre.

Most comparable to the shoddy, bloody and dumb fun of Shoot Em Up, Rodriguez and his co-director Ethan Maniquis do not restrain from any of their most remote sensibilities in turning Machete into a cheese-fest, throwing everything that can spray blood and produce laughter at the screen.  It feels the only approach they saw to this Mexican revenge saga was to take it as a great big in-joke comedy.  For those expecting Death Wish or Man on Fire, look elsewhere.  Rodriguez and Maniquis bring Machete to the screen for actors like Robert DeNiro, Jeff Fahey, Lindsay Lohan and Jessica Alba—giving them ample opportunity to ham it up as much as they can.  They seem to be having fun, so I suppose we should too.

Machete, starring typical villain Danny Trejo at age 66 as the title character, is on a mission for revenge.  As a former federal agent working for the U.S., he opens the film betrayed and left for dead following a rescue operation that results in a crime boss (Steven Seagal) taking the lives of his wife and daughter.  Failing to learn from his mistakes, he hides out along the border of Mexico and takes a job of assassinating Senator McLaughlin (DeNiro) in an effort to prevent him from constructing a wall that will separate the U.S. and Mexico.  Could it be that the assassination is a major setup for Machete, and that his employers turn him into a target?  Now with every lawman looking for his head, Machete must dodge death continuously and succeeds in doing so (simply because he’s that guy that won’t die).  With the help of an underground immigrant smuggler (Michelle Rodriguez), another federal agent (Jessica Alba), and his own brother—a priest with an arsenal of weaponry (Cheech Marin), Machete brings the fight to Senator McLaughlin (DeNiro) and his adviser (Fahey) that hired him.  Oh, and everyone that has ever wronged him must pay too.

Nonsensical cutthroat violence culminates most of Rodriguez’s campy exploitation film, a prime B-movie belonging in a second Grindhouse feature.   The filmmaker even recycles clips from his original 2007 trailer and incorporates them into the movie—that was actually a nice touch.  The enjoyment of the film rests solely on what an audience is looking for.  I think it will work strictly for the Rodriguez fanbase, and all others need not apply.  I enjoyed it for what it was.  Rarely would an audience be treated to a film that throws Steven Seagal, Robert DeNiro, and Lindsay Lohan together.  That is all Machete is: a barrage of talent from all levels thrown into a campy thriller where an antihero with the face of Trejo can get the girls, kill the bad guys, and stick a thorn into illegal immigration.  Machete knows it is pure trash and flaunts it.    By the end, the movie sinks (or rises) to Monty Python-level hilarity in a scene pitting the aging Seagal against the aging Trejo.  Mr. Seagal, in all his years, has never seen better days on screen, giving us the film’s most bizarre moment.  However, we are meant to indulge in it and enjoy the stupidity, as with the entire movie.  Taking any single frame seriously would be a slap in the face to the filmmakers.

[Rating:3/5]

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The Expendables

September 3, 2010 by

Fans of 80’s classics Cobra, Commando, Rambo II, Above the Law, Bloodsport, and Missing in Action should be rejoicing over Sylvester Stallone’s pool of testosterone in The Expendables, his attempt at delivering the highest-caliber shoot-em-up/martial arts/men-on-a-mission thrill ride featuring a discounted menu of Senior action icons.  Why is it that perhaps the most promising film concept of the season turns out to be such a dud?

The answer: Sylvester Stallone, the writer/director.

I’ll give the man some credit as the lead star—at age 64, he’s bringing it, botox and all.  Ripped to shreds, and pumped up with steroids (there just can’t be any other way), Stallone returns to cinemas as Barney Ross, leader of a mercenary squad hired by Mr. Church (Bruce Willis) to take out a former CIA operative, Munroe (Eric Roberts) and his drug-trading South American general Garza (David Zayas).  Stallone wants a payment of $5 million for his team which includes a list of hand-me-down single-trait killers.

Among the line-up we have Jason Statham as Lee Christmas, a blade-wielding expert, believing wholeheartedly that knives travel faster than bullets.  Jet Li plays martial-artist Ying Yang, but his sole trait is that he’s made fun of for his height.  Why don’t they call him Short-Round?  UFC fighter Randy Couture really has no traits except for awkwardly explaining his cauliflower ear.  Terry Crews is only memorable for toting an AA-12 shotgun (much like Jesse Ventura being memorable for sporting a Gatling gun in Predator).  Finally, Dolph Lundgren plays Gunner, messed up on drugs and a thirst for blood, an uncontrollable rage that gets him tossed to the curb and wanting to exact revenge.

After Ross accepts the mission from Mr. Church, he and Christmas head out to their South American location to scope out their targets and who all is involved.  The two end up launching an attack on the entire base after nearly being captured along with their informant, Sandra (Giselle Itie), the daughter of Gen. Garza.  Upon the boys’ escape, Sandra refuses to leave and gets captured by her father’s army.  Ross returns to listen to the team’s mechanic, Tool (Mickey Rourke), tell a Vietnam story about a woman he failed to save that has haunted him ever since.  That story apparently shakes up Ross clogging his brain with guilt and remorse, and he decides to return to the island and rescue the woman, but his men refuse to let him go alone.  Meanwhile, former teammate Gunner has given up his old team to Munroe and has plans to stop the ‘expendables’ from succeeding.

The Expendables has only one good scene—where Rourke pours his heart out over his Vietnam regret.  As potentially forced as Stallone’s dramatic change of heart may be following Rourke’s speal, the scene still plays out very well, and it’s the only real ‘acting’ moment in the entire movie.  I know some will be questioning about the obligatory scene featuring Schwarzenegger and Willis hamming it up with Stallone.  Well, as much fun as the scene should be, it isn’t.  It’s forced.  It’s awkward.  It’s poorly written, if scripted at all—much like the rest of the film.  Schwarzenegger plays a competing mercenary leader that used to work with Stallone, but they went their separate ways.  He tells Willis, “Give this job to my friend, he loves playing in the jungle.”  Bruce says of Arnold, “What’s that guy’s problem?”  Stallone: “He wants to be president.”  So much for what could have been.  But that’s the problem with Stallone’s entire movie.

This had all the potential in the world, and the movie disappointingly feels like a cut-and-paste assignment thrown together so sloppily because of Stallone’s desire to cram a bunch of action stars together.  He delivers zero character development, the plot makes absolutely no sense, and I hardly believe Stallone’s sudden transition in wanting to rescue this younger woman (suggesting an awkward romance between her and the action star who is 30 years her senior).  Also be sure to watch out for any of the dialogue, as it hits you in the gut so hard with its stupidity that you’ll be puking within the first 20 minutes.  I’m not talking about funny camp-style 80s one-liners.  I’m talking about terribly-written dialogue meeting awful line readings, one after the other—particularly from Lundgren and Li.

Perhaps my biggest issue with the film isn’t the bad acting, or the horrible writing, or the lacking camradery among the Expendables, but it is Stallone’s way of filming most of the scenes.  Shot almost completely in close-up the entire time, Stallone zooms in on these stars’ individual faces, even in multi-character moments, and it is beyond awkward.  Trust me, he’s not doing these old-timers any favors.  Even in scenes showcasing the location of the island, the extras in the town are shot in close-up, and it becomes unbelievably distracting.

If that’s not enough, even the fight sequences have little creativity and energy.  Granted, the final action bout on the island featuring the entire mercenary squad against a hundred or so faceless enemy soldiers works about as best as it can, if you can tell what’s going on—which is a rare occasion.  The battles also feature hilariously cheesy CGI blood and sloppy special effects surrounding the mayhem as the film’s MPAA rating was never decided on until late in the game.  Since the movie could have ended up being PG-13, I guess no physical fake blood was used during filming, and it really shows.

In fact, all of the film’s flaws really show.  It seems to be an embarrassing exercise in rushed filmmaking with little substance to build on from the get-go.  I love the concept of The Expendables, and I really feel as though I wasn’t expecting top-notch quality here.  But Stallone, who actually put out a solid and gratuitous fourth Rambo installment just two years ago, ought to know how to write and direct at this point.  It feels as though he did neither here, having his film fare about the same as these Direct-to-DVD actioners we see Steven Seagal and Van Damme releasing five of a year.  For the inevitable sequel, I hope Sly stays in front of the camera and allows another filmmaker to take the reigns, perhaps Quentin Tarantino?  Hey, I can dream.

[Rating:1.5/5]

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Sorcerer’s Apprentice

August 18, 2010 by

Without Jay Baruchel’s incessant whining, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice would have been at least a mindlessly amusing thrill ride. Baruchel ripped the heart right out of this movie, and left pieces of it scattered all over the set. Baruchel plays Dave, this story’s Luke Skywalker; a young man, bored and discouraged with his average life, until centuries-old wizard Balthazar Blake (Nicolas Cage) bursts into his life, tells him he has special powers and he has to save the world, and starts training him. But he’s everything a Luke Skywalker character shouldn’t be. He’s whiney, he’s wishy-washy, he’s boring, he’s just plain annoying.

I was optimistic enough to hope that superstar Cage would prop up the movie where Baruchel let it drop, but I’m afraid Cage has passed his prime. What’s more, his costume seems a bit derivative. Take a look at him below,  next to a picture of Chicago wizard Harry Dresden and tell me you don’t see some resemblance.

The only cast member that carries his part particularly well is Alfred Molina as Maxim Horvath, the evil wizard bent on world domination. Horvath has adopted the modus operandi of a late 19th century British gentleman, complete with bowler hat and cane. Molina slips seamlessly into the role, infusing it with Horvath’s sinister nature.  He commands the respect that every great megalomaniac does. Toby Kebell rounds out the cast as his henchman, Drake Stone. Aside from Horvath, the only interesting character is a 17th century witch who gets a whopping ten seconds of screen time. Talk about disappointing.

Molina and Cage have some impressive fight sequences. Once again, Apprentice seems to be at its best, when it copies The Dresden Files. A good, visceral punch-out with a little magic thrown in is, in my opinion, the best thing a wizard story can have. Too much magic, and it starts to get ridiculous. This would have been a better movie with more of these and fewer over-the-top scenes.

Blake brings this statue to life and rides it early in the movie.

Apprentice is a bit too eager to show off its special effects budget. Right from the word go, we get an overbearing score crammed into our ears, in-your-face magic battles, and statuary turning into monsters that tear skyscrapers to pieces. The movie seldom pauses to build the plot or get to know the characters. It’s too bad, because the climactic battle is actually pretty intense, rather inventive, and very effective dramatically. It would have made the perfect bang to finish the movie with if it had been preceded by two hours of subtlety and development. Sadly, being preceded by a string of even bigger bangs, the relative pop at the end seems flat and empty.

Most of what happens is not only cliché, but painfully derivative, ripping off other movies and not adding anything original. When a clerk tells Horvath “I’m going to need to see your faculty identification,” Horvath waves his wand and says “You don’t need to see my faculty identification.” Drake then delivers the line “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for,” but it’s too late; half the audience has already said it. More annoying yet, when Dave is having a hard time cleaning up his lab space, he uses his new powers to make brooms and mops come alive. Guess what happens next. If you said “he can’t get them to stop and he nearly drowns, right before Balthazar saves the day,” you get a cookie. This scene copies the other Sorcerer’s Apprentice, to a tee, using the same music and even including a silhouette shot of Dave chopping up a broom with an ax. And it does nothing to advance the story. It’s just forced into the middle of the movie for its own sake – a classic big-lipped alligator moment.

Apprentice has a few things going for it. The special effects are cool, the action is cool, and the story, while bland, isn’t painful or preachy. It’s a pretty safe family film, and if you have kids, you could probably use Apprentice to shut them up for 90 minutes. You will be quite ready to leave before you see the credits, however. Ultimately, this is one more example of how the world’s biggest budget won’t guarantee a good movie. They couldn’t spend enough to hide the fact that Apprentice is simply one more re-hash of all the standard clichés clumsily thrown together, with none of them done well.

[Rating:2/5]

Filed Under: Action, Comedy, Drama Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Salt

August 1, 2010 by

Popcorn movies require a lot of hardware these days, but not a lot of firmware.  I can be very forgiving of cheeseball action movies that simply exist to be over-the-top trash (The A-Team, From Paris With Love).  These movies present a lot of impossible action sequences in the midst of generic plots.  When something like Salt comes along and throws a story at me that makes me scratch my head so hard it leaves a hole afterward, then my enjoyment-meter starts to fall no matter how many elaborate booms go off.

Angelina Jolie, the only A-list actress capable of carrying The Salt Identity, plays CIA agent Evelyn Salt.  Her character is introduced as a prisoner being held captive and tortured in North Korea where she is accused of being an American spy.  She continually denies the accusations until her team comes to negotiate her release.  Eventually she is restored to active duty and takes on an interrogation of a supposed Russian spy who elicits stories of a Russian camp under the former Soviet Union that trained young children to become American infiltrators that would learn U.S. culture and language and ultimately take positions in varying areas of the American government. According to him, the Russian president will be assassinated by one of these trained operatives, and soon the entire existence of the United States will be in jeopardy as this faction of assassins was designed specifically to eliminate the land of the free.  His detailed fairy tale comes to a halt when he accuses Evelyn Salt of being the infiltrator.  Immediately, Salt’s cohorts suspect her due to these allegations, and to protect her husband, she decides to run for her life and take on the CIA.

Further developments derail a lot of the initial setup here, but essentially the film tries to take a strong heroine and throw her into a Jason Bourne movie, and slowly turn her into an antihero.  And that’s all fine and good.  I can buy into it—in fact, the film works better as a female-led film, giving Tom Cruise a run for his money as he selected Knight and Day over Salt, and I think Jolie will only reap the benefits.

Salt does one thing particularly well: it moves… fast.  Once this baby sets up the premise for Jolie’s character to hit the skids, the movie essentially evolves into one lengthy action sequence that never slows down until the end credits.  The film only falls apart because of how absolutely preposterous the plot becomes.  The further I went with Salt, the more bologna it threw in my face.  Take note, the story isn’t exactly generic, it’s just too ludicrous for words.  Eventually I began to question the filmmakers’ intent with the storyline.  Does one take it seriously or disregard it altogether in favor of the action?  As gritty as the movie is, I can’t dismiss constant shifts in several characters and plot holes that parade through this thing like it’s Christmas Eve.  Once the mess gets ‘sorted out’ at the end, none of the movie makes much sense.  However, the stunts, pacing, and terrific editing were so impressive to me, and Jolie really keeps her head firmly above water in a man-movie genre, that I’m riding the fence on what I ultimately feel about the whole ordeal.  Can I deny that I was entertained throughout?  No.  Can I say I didn’t get increasingly frustrated with how dopey and slapped together the plot becomes? No.  Take it for what it’s worth.  If you want your brain to be engaged with your stunts, see Inception.  If you want a movie that doesn’t have a brain, but continually pushes you into overdrive as far as action goes, see Salt.  As for me, I’m stuck in neutral here.

[Rating:2.5/5]

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