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Lethal Weapon 2

January 12, 2011 by

Lethal Weapon 2Once upon a time, action movies were gloriously overblown romps of bullet-ridden testosterone.  Action stars unapologetically careened around cities with the tiniest amount of legality to their actions–just barely enough to justify their immortal status as good guys.  They fought villains who were bad just for the sake of being bad, and needed no justification for their misdeeds and wrongdoings.  No moral grey areas existed in this golden age of action movies, which we will one day tell our kids about with the same glint in our eyes that my dad now possesses when he speaks of The Good Old Days.  Heroes were heroes, bad guys were bad guys, and you left the theater rooting for the chiseled machismo on display before your very eyes.  Sadly, this gilded age of dude-centric cinema faded out in the late 1980s and has yet to be brought back, despite attempts like Live Free or Die Hard and The Expendables.  Maybe it’s political correctness, maybe it’s technology (action stars just aren’t as cool when toting iPhones and netbooks), or maybe it’s just a cultural shift that no longer idolizes larger-than-life movie stars.  But watching movies like Lethal Weapon 2 sure makes me pine for those days.  The good old days.

There’s no subtlety in Richard Donner’s follow-up to his 1987 barn burner, the original Lethal Weapon.  And that’s a good thing.  For any kids who think Mel Gibson is off his rocker nowadays, here’s a news flash:  some of us have known for decades.  In Lethal Weapon 2 Mel Gibson plays Martin Riggs, an iconic coyboy cop: he’s crazy, unpredictable, off his rocker, and never follows the rules.  He gets chewed out by his police captain, but such conceps like regulations and procedures mean nothing to Riggs.  He does what he wants, chases (and gets) the girls, and shoots (many times) first and asks questions later.  Balancing him out is straight-laced cop Roger Murtaugh, played by Danny Glover at his bewildered best.

Lethal Weapon 2: Gibson Glover

Many people don't know it, but the real lethal weapon in the movie is Mel Gibson's mullet.

Together the two of them must solve an international caper that gets personal when the bad guys start taking out cops around the city.  The details aren’t really important–something about money laundering and South African smuggling–as the film is really just a means to showcase one of the best mismatched duos in movie history.  Martin and Riggs are the perfect pair of cops, and Gibson and Glover are the perfect actors to play them.  Joining the team for this second go-round is Joe Pesci at his greasy, fast-talking slimeball best, but his character is often just too annoying and distracting.  Still, his Leo Getz character does have a certain charm that kind of grown endearing by the end.

The movie starts with an entirely implausible car chase through the Los Angeles, and things only ramp up from there to the point of bordering on self-parody.  It’s the first of several increasingly ridiculous car chases sandwiched between exploding houses, exploding swimming pools (oh yes) and exploding toilets (you better believe it).  One-liners rack up like the body count, but this was 1989–a time when a hero could shoot a couple bad guys with a nail gun, followed by a quip like “Nailed ’em,” and get away with it.  Of course there’s a “romance” too, just to keep the ladies interested, but it’s not so much a romance as it is sheer conquest.  At times it’s almost comical to see Gibson careening down city streets clad in tight jeans and cowboy boots, or standing atop a bullet-riddled trailer home while spraying bullets from an M-16.  The whole spectacle just screams action movie but it does so with such unapologetic gusto that you can’t help but watch in awe.  Perhaps best of all, though, is the total lack of any CGI or digital trickery here.  When Dwayne Johnson takes out bad guys in movies like Faster you can practically smell the pixels.  But in Lethal Weapon 2, when cars crash and buildings explode there’s a palpable sense of reality knowing that something, even if it was just a model, really did meet a fiery end in order to get the shot filmed.

Maybe I’m waxing a bit nostalgic here, but watching Lethal Weapon is an astounding guilty pleasure.  And I could be a tad jaded in my old age, having turned the big three-oh last year, but when I watch action movies today I think about films of yesteryear like Lethal Weapon 2 and think how they just don’t make ’em like they used to.

Rating:[Rating:4/5]

Filed Under: Action Tagged With: , , ,

Black Swan

January 6, 2011 by

When I first heard about Darren Aronofsky’s new film, I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. Some sites were billing it as a Science Fiction film, which it really isn’t. I mean, if I were to say there’s a new Science Fiction film starring Natalie Portman where she plays a ballerina, you start thinking “Oh no, it’s 2001: A Space Odyssey all over again!” (Which was essentially a ballet in space.) In all actuality, Black Swan is a thriller, just so you are prepared.

To sum up the story, Natalie Portman plays a studying ballet dancer, Nina, who embodies the devoted artist – constantly in pursuit of perfection. The ballet company she performs with is slated to mount the classic show Swan Lake. It has always been her dream to play the Swan Queen, a role which requires the dancer to embody both the innocent, pure white swan and the evil, seductive black swan. Nina is a natural for the part of the white swan, but her innocence and drive for perfection undermine her ability to portray its free-spirited and manipulative alter ego.

"My dressing room on 'That 70s Show' was SO much bigger than this."

In attempting to tap into her darker side, with some “guidance” by the director, Nina becomes drawn to Lily, a new dancer in the company played by Mila Kunis. Lily represents everything Nina is not – she is imperfect, impulsive, and without inhibitions. Their interaction is the catalyst which starts Nina on a path of self discovery and evolution.

This film is difficult to review in the spirit of preserving its intentional uncertainty. The use of sound, camera shots and plot loops was very disorienting but lent to the storyline, leaving the audience just as confused by what was happening to Nina as she was herself. It isn’t really until the end of the movie that you have a fairly clear idea of what exactly was going on.

The story heavily mirrors (pun intended?) the story of Swan Lake as a metaphor for Nina’s life and transformation as a dancer. This imagery is practically beaten over the audience’s head with the use of color coordinated costuming, loads of reflective surfaces, mirrored action between characters, and Nina literally seeing other people turn into evil doppelgangers of herself.

This pretty much mirrors the look my friend Steve had on his face throughout the whole 2nd half of the movie.

Black Swan is most definitely rated R for disturbing imagery, language, and sexual content. This is a film that will be harder for less-mature audiences to handle, as they will easily be lost in giggling and grossing out over the previously mentioned content. (As was the high school-aged group in the theatre we were in.)

Thankfully, this content is not needlessly gratuitous. I must admit, I had my reservations when some of the loudest buzz over this movie centered around a love scene between Portman and Kunis, but it’s adequately woven into the overall plot flow, and still uses clever photography to avoid any full-on nudity. The disturbing imagery is a little more jarring, so be aware, there will be some moments you cringe, but they effectively lend themselves to the storytelling.

It's certainly easier on the eyes than that Keifer Sutherland movie.

I have to say, the film is artistically well done. I’m very interested to find out what technique(s) they used to create the independent mirror-image effects, as there are some fairly intricate moments where the camera would literally have to be looking at itself in the mirror, but it’s never seen. The storyline is solid, and the discomfort caused throughout the film is intentional and adds to the overall dark ambiance.

I’d recommend this to the over-17 film loving crowd, although I think you’d be fine to wait for it on DVD. The theatrical presentation doesn’t really add to the spectacle. Overall, it’s a solid film, with some excellent performances, specifically Portman’s, and a well-put-together cinematic vision on the part of the director. This will definitely be one to watch for in the upcoming awards season.

[Rating:4/5]

Filed Under: Drama Tagged With: , , , ,

G-Force

January 4, 2011 by

G-ForceIf Jerry Bruckheimer, producer of such bombastic cinema travesties like Bad Boys, Con Air, and Pearl Harbor, were to attach his name to a movie for kids about talking guinea pigs, what would it look like?  Would it still have all the familiar Bruckheimer tropes we know and love?  Would Michael Bay direct it?  These are trying questions for trying times indeed, and strangely, the answer to most of these would be a resounding “Yes.”  It has everything we might expect given the pedigree of the individuals involved:

Car chases…check.

Giant destructive robots…check.

A world in peril…check.

A clock counting down to doomsday…check.

Explosions, explosions, and more explosions…check.

But equally strange is the fact that G-Force somehow works, and works quite well.  The film opens in the middle of a top-secret operation a’la True Lies in which the band of super-rodents, codenamed G-Force, are infiltrating the residence of a technology billionaire Leonard Saber (Bill Nighy) in order to steal top-secret information from his computer.  Information which could determine…bum bum BUM… the fate of the free world.  The little animal wonders, equipped with the latest in miniature spy technology and Happy Meal-Ready names like Blaster (Tracy Jordan), Speckles (Nicolas Cage), and Hurley (Jon Favreau), are actually the product of a government experiment to study and harness the power of human-animal communication.  But when the mission goes awry, the government shuts down the operation and their leader Ben (Zach Galifianakis) is left empty-handed while the fate of the world (something about orbital space junk and the power of magnets…it really doesn’t matter) hangs in the balance.

G-Force Poster

It's clever...because it's a guinea pig. Get it?

Who will get to the bottom of things and stop the destruction of planet earth?  Why, none other than G-Force of course! The talking guinea pigs take it upon themselves to get to the bottom of the conspiracy with plenty of pint-sized gadgets and gizmos from their genius bearded buddy Ben.  Along the way they meet up with a several action-figure-ready talking animals who help them out and teach valuable lessons about teamwork, sacrifice, and the power of friendship.  There’s a car chase and some robot fights thrown in for good measure too, just to keep things interesting.  And for what it is, it works just fine.  I didn’t start watching a movie about talking superhero rodents expecting Citizen Kane or Shawshank Redemption.

Criticizing a movie like G-Force is somewhat moot, since the film is aimed squarely at a target audience who buys Zhu Zhu Pets.  But unlike some of its peers like Shrek, G-Force thankfully never plays to the lowest common denominator of toilet humor and cheap pop culture references.  Like the Disney adventure Bolt from a few years ago, it’s silly enough to be fun, but doesn’t play its audience for fools either.  And unlike other Bruckheimer explode-fests, Michael Bay actually didn’t direct this one.  And that is most certainly a good thing.

Rating:[Rating:3.5/5]

Filed Under: Family Tagged With: ,

True Grit (2010)

December 31, 2010 by

The Coen Brothers have been on a winning streak for quite some time.  Now the raves have been spooling over their remake of the John Wayne classic True Grit and I haven’t the faintest idea why—other than the fact that they are the Coen Brothers.  Not to say this is a particularly bad movie by any means, but it practically left my mind about as quickly as it entered it.

Set in the 1880s, willful 14-year-old girl Matty Ross (Hailee Steinfeld) hires the wild one-eyed sheriff Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to track down her father’s murderer, Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin) en route through Indian territory.  Texas Ranger LeBoeuf (Matt Damon) joins Matty and Rooster for the manhunt.  LeBoeuf wants Chaney to hang in Texas for crimes committed in the state.  Matty wants to see him at the end of the noose for her father’s murder.  Let the trademark Coen banter ensue, as True Grit quickly evolves from its revenge western saga shell into a full blown comedy.

Yes, that’s right.  True Grit is not the movie being advertised in TV spots.  What we really have here is a witty, dialogue-driven comedy with sprinkles of violence.  Very reminiscent of the Coen’s Fargo, I ate up the back-and-forth between Damon, Bridges, and Steinfeld.  Steinfeld especially carries her own here, and I see Oscar smiling down on her fondly in the future.  Much has been said about Bridges in the title role, and I have to say his interpretation of Cogburn is a puzzling one.  His drawl becomes so mumbled and distorting that I had trouble sorting through his words.  I think he finds the heart of the character, but I didn’t find his performance all that engaging.  For me, the movie was really the Steinfeld show.

All of this admiration for the writing and comedy leaves me wondering where the ‘grit’ went.  I enjoyed the Coen Brothers lighting a signature spark here, but I left True Grit craving for a little more drama—something eventful perhaps.  The Coens grace us with a parody of a Western, and while the comedy no doubt worked out well, I felt like the movie came to a close in a bit of an incomplete fashion.  Of course it ends in a shootout of good guys and bad guys, but there’s little intensity or excitement in the pursuit.  Even Josh Brolin’s mug doesn’t make an appearance until the final ten minutes or so.  True Grit is a well-made, well-written film that left a void unfulfilled.

[Rating:3/5]

Filed Under: Comedy, Western Tagged With: , , , , ,

Devil

December 29, 2010 by

Five people with curious backgrounds are trapped in a skyscraper elevator.  One of them may be the devil.  Can any of them get out alive?  Mourning Det. Bowden (Chris Messina) arrives on the scene to try and rescue the victims trapped in a predicament that quickly evolves into a homicide case as the supernatural enacts its vengeance on guilty souls.

Devil unfortunately was met with a dismal box-office reception in theaters.  Could this be attributed to the reputation of Producer M. Night Shyamalan (who also receives a story credit) whose career continues to dive?  Many were duped by the marketing into thinking the Shamster directed this, and that may have impacted the film’s potential and credibility.  The actual director, John Erick Dowdle (Quarantine) actually delivers a swift and engaging 80-minute horror film that consistently provides great character drama, classic whodunit mystery, all enveloped in a slick supernatural package.

I have minor criticisms involving how some of that supernatural ‘knowledge’ gets played out through a security guard character watching the murderous madness unfold.  It feels very Shyamalan-esque to have the devil’s playtime story spoon-fed to the audience through a character who knows everything about the situation, especially when it would be much wiser to simply leave that explanation out entirely.  The audience is smart enough to know the devil can be up to no good.

Luckily that complaint is small in comparison to what this overlooked and underrated horror gem has to offer.  Ignore what you think you might know about the film.  It’s a doozy of a little shocker and a very entertaining supernatural thriller from beginning to end—the best film Shyamalan never directed.

[Rating:4/5]

Filed Under: Horror, Mystery Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Wild Hogs

December 27, 2010 by

Wild HogsWild Hogs is based on a premise not unlike so many throwaway sitcoms: take a few ecclectic personalities, put them in a unique or singular situation, and watch the hilarity unfold. And like so many throwaway sitcoms, the concept actually has starts out well with some genuine sparks of creativity but quickly loses its way and gets mired in a hopeless rut of infantile scatalogical gags and cheap jokes for which someone clearly forgot to pen a punch line. The situation here is a road trip, and the characters are as generic as one could ask for: four middle-aged men longing to recapture their glory days after being faced with the clear revelation that their best years may have passed them by. This group of friends, who call themselves the Wild Hogs, used to be (or so we are told) something of a daring troupe of young firestarters. Having succumbed to the Hollywood faux-realities of suburban life, they decide one day to take a motorcycle trip to the coast with the wind at their backs and no rules or women to get in their way. (This being a Hollywood movie, the women in these men’s lives serve as little more than one-dimensional facades with bullet points of characterization: nag, berate, belittle your man.)

The meta-joke here is that the four guys are played by somewhat washed-up movie stars seeking, ostensibly, to recapture a bit of their former fame. John Travolta, Tim Allen, Martin Lawrence, and William H. Macy, who seem just as out of place and uncomfortable in leather jackets and do-rags as one could imagine, do their best to act like lifelong buddies when it’s pretty clear they all just showed up to flash a grin and collect a paycheck. Nevertheless, they do form an entertaining bunch of buds, and Allen and Lawrence riff on each other with at least a shadow of the biting wit and sarcasm on which they built their careers more than a decade ago. Travolta must have thought he was filming Face/Off Part 2, as he spends most of the movie acting like an over-the-top Nicolas Cage. And that’s saying something.  We are supposed to believe the Wild Hogs are a close-knit group of lifelong friends, but the chemistry just isn’t there.  Instead they seem like a group of four guys who are getting paid to act as if they are lifelong friends.  Oh, wait.

Wild Hogs: Tim Allen

"This one time on Home Improvement, Jill was mad at me so I got advice from Wilson. And then I made fun of Al's mom!"

Once they shrug off the chains of women, kids, jobs, and escape from the seventh level of hades known in Hollywood as “marriage,” they find themselves careening down the highway without any worries, cares, or cell phones in order to recapture a bit of the good ol’ days.  But sure enough, things get out of hand pretty quickly as they encounter overbearing policemen, tent fires, and a paint-by-numbers motorcycle gang called the Del Fuegos who does not suffer posers gladly.  It’s too bad that the road trip has so many missed opportunities, as this type of setup is essentially a blank canvas for which to create any number of potentially funny situations.  But rather than trying to be creative or interesting, the movie races straight to junior-high humor and stays there.  We are treated to gags about bodily fluids, mishaps with wild animals, and a scene in which the guys decide to go skinny dipping in a hot spring only to be interrupted by (who else?) an unsuspecting vacationing family (oh the hilarity!).  Of all the possibilities afforded by the road trip setup and the four talented actors on display here, we instead get poop jokes and gay cops.

Something resembling a conflict enters the mix when the Wild Hogs set out to save a small town from the terrorizing throes of the  Del Fuegos and their schoolyard bully leader Jack (Ray Liotta).  Dudley (William H. Macy) also finds himself a love interest named Maggie (Marisa Tomei) who runs the local diner and could sure use a biker in shining leather to save her from the mean Del Fuego men.  Like the rest of the movie, it’s a by-the-book setup that plays out exactly how you think it will, which is again kind of sad given the sheer number of missed opportunities to be truly creative.  And despite good performances from Allen, Lawrence, and Liotta, there is very little here to recommend to anyone.

Rating:[Rating:1/5]

Filed Under: Comedy Tagged With: , , , , ,

The Fighter

December 23, 2010 by

With no shortage of first-class boxing dramas in the last forty years, it seems only fitting that The Fighter join former heavyweight champs Rocky, Raging Bull, Million Dollar Baby, The Hurricane, Cinderella Man, and Ali as a major contender in the ring of motion picture greatness.  David O’Russell’s darkly funny and tragic film springs from the ropes this holiday season, boasting some of the year’s standout performances and solidifying its place as a serious contender for award recognition.

The Fighter focuses on 1980s Lowell, Massachusetts boxer Micky Ward.  Never heard of him?  Neither had I.  Oscar nominee Mark Wahlberg takes on the role of the 31-year-old small-town fighter whose quest for success in the ring is hindered by the extreme dysfunction of his family.  Completely overshadowing him is older half-brother Dicky Eklund (Christian Bale), a former boxer under the weight of a severe drug addiction.  He spends his time training Micky and participates in a ‘real-life’ documentary in development by HBO that he thinks is chronicling his big comeback—Dicky did knock Sugar Ray Leonard down once upon a time (or so he believes).  Micky’s mother (Melissa Leo) acts as his manager, finding big fights to put her son on the map—fights that nearly land him in a coffin.  With her line-up of crazy sisters to back her up, Micky’s mother and most of his family fail to realize how ignorant they are of the man’s own desires and goals.  Enter Charlene (Amy Adams), a local bartender who sees potential in Micky and the madness of those closest to him holding him back from greatness.  When she begins a relationship with him, Micky starts to understand from an outside perspective just how buried he is and decides to seek out new management and training, a choice that will hopefully lead him to a shot at the Welterweight title.  In the process it may cost him the only life he’s ever known and the only family he’s ever had.

Luckily Director O’Russell knows not to let The Fighter remain yet another underdog boxing story—it is exactly that to be sure—but the film keeps its eyes fixated on the emotional strings and hardships tied between Micky and his family.  This isn’t a movie about ‘boxing’, it’s a film about a boxer and the people enveloping his existence.  We follow these characters and believe them wholeheartedly, partly because they are so well-acted, and also partly because they are based on truth.  In many ways I can understand the criticism of Micky’s character being completely overshadowed and dull in comparison to the supporting characters around him, but I believe that’s the point of the story.  Eventually Charlene becomes exactly what Micky’s family became, and Micky can’t please anybody because no one wants to let him make his own decisions in life.  Micky is constantly overlooked and left unheard while everyone else directs his path.  Mark Wahlberg captures the stress of his character beat for beat, and because he isn’t portraying a showy and rigorous character as attention-hogging as Bale or Leo, it doesn’t make him any less powerful.  Wahlberg’s dedication to the role and to making sure this movie was produced shows clearly.

Christian Bale lights a fire hard to extinguish.  Once he enters the film from the get-go he dominates his every scene.  Bale has been known to be completely consumed by the characters he plays, and he plays Dicky Eklund as though it’s the performance of his career.  Again shedding the poundage as he did in The Machinist years back, Bale portrays Dicky as consciously lost as can be.  The performance wreaks of despair and hilarity in equal measure, and I mean that as a compliment.  Much of The Fighter comes across surprisingly and overwhelmingly darkly comical, but I suppose this is a David O’Russell film.  Bale seems perfectly tuned to the tone of the film and is able to deliver a very complex performance that the Academy will be hard pressed to dismiss.  And don’t forget about former nominee Melissa Leo as Micky’s dominating, guilt-tripping mother either—she’s as engulfed as Bale and as equally heartbreaking.

The Fighter has a lot to say to audiences.  It is extremely dark, comical, heartbreaking, gritty, exciting and often painful—a grab-bag of emotional drama.  You come away from a movie like this rooting for the protagonist and yet feeling extremely thankful you didn’t endure his situation (or come from a family as dysfunctional as his).  Many viewers may be turned away from the harshness of some of the material on display here, but this is Micky’s story and O’Russell serves it up for all it’s worth and delivers a brutal knockout that had me floored.

[Rating:4.5/5]

Filed Under: Drama, Sports Tagged With: , , , ,

Tron Legacy

December 21, 2010 by

Greetings once again, Walking Taco readers!

I’ve been MIA for a bit, but as a newlywed, I’m sure you’ll forgive me for spending less time at my computer, and more time with my wife.

Speaking of spending time with my wife, we made it out to the theatre for the first time in a while to see the new film Tron Legacy. Now, once upon a time, I saw the original Tron, and I remember at the time thinking it was cool, and edgy, and all the effects were so ahead of their time. (which they were) But nowadays, Tron holds on to the hearts of the masses through the sheer willpower of nostalgia. It’s similar to how fans approached the Star Wars prequels. They loved the originals, so why wouldn’t it be 10 times better with new visual effects, right?

Quick summary – Sam Flynn, son of Kevin Flynn, a game designer from the 80s, is inactive CEO of Encom, a Microsoft-esque company his father started before his sudden disappearance. After 20 years of being out of his life, a friend of his father’s receives a page. Sam goes to the arcade his father used to run, discovers a hidden room and running workstation, and inadvertently inserts himself into “the Grid”, a digital world his father created. Once here he meets his father, discovers a plot by a program his father created called “CLU” and strikes out with his father to escape the Grid and stop CLU from carrying out his evil plan.

To quote Will Smith "I have got to get me one of these!"

Tron Legacy was, to be frank, a visual effects feast. Similar to how thrilled I was in Superman Returns to see Superman moving in a freeform fashion instead of laying on a bluescreen table and leaning left and right, it was thrilling to see light cycles and disc battles using today’s cutting-edge CGI technology. These scenes were the first to be presented to the fans over a year ago, and really, they’re probably the coolest elements to the film. Alas, they are also the shortest scenes of the film. I would say in the over 2-hour runtime, you see maybe 5 minutes of disc battles, and 8 minutes of light cycles. Oh, there are plenty of other CGI effects, including the entire world of the Grid, but those two sequences are what fans of the original came to see, and they deliver in a way only nostalgia-fueled reminiscing can fully enjoy.

Jeff's evil twin-brother - Faux Bridges

There is, of course, one other major CGI element, and that is the young version of Jeff Bridges. The makers of Tron Legacy decided that to make a 20-year younger Jeff Bridges, they’d use the same motion capture technology used to make Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen look younger for X3. Problem is, it looked creepy then, and it looked creepy now. Long ago, people at Pixar realized that trying to make CG people look 100% real was very off-putting to audiences. There are so many imperfections to human expression that to attempt to recreate it in a computer almost always resulted in an indescribably unnatural effect. So, Pixar steered clear and went with the more cartoony humans we know and love.

I do have to say that I’m okay with this concept when the technology is used to create CLU, the avatar version of Flynn, because he exists solely in a computer world, and could therefore look artificial. However, when they try to pass it off for the few real world scenes, it’s eerie, and discomforting to watch. I appreciate that they tried, and didn’t just use a lot of back shots and cleverly concealed faces, but maybe casting a younger actor to play Flynn in those few flashback scenes would have been a better bet. They also used this technique for Bruce Boxleitner to create the younger version of Tron, who makes a few appearances via flashback, but it was far less noticeable in these scenes.

Outside of the effects, this movie is fairly lackluster. The acting is passable, but never really reaches any sort of noteworthy performance. Perhaps the closest would be Olivia Wilde as Quorra, who has to have an almost child-like, artificiality to her, and she does this well. Martin Sheen takes a break from his overly dramatic roles to do a mean David Bowie impression as Castor, Beau Garrett gets her first notable role playing some spandex-clad eye candy as Gem.

The plot of the film is clearly aimed at fans of the original, relying on a lot of “wink wink” allusions to the first film in order to garner full enjoyment. It was predictable at times, and I found I had little emotional investment in the film, primarily because the characters lacked any emotional investment. After not seeing his father for the 20 most developmental years of his life, Sam and Kevin see each other and it’s merely a “haven’t seen you in a while *tear*… so, yeah, how about we get out of here?” moment. They circle the father-son relationship concept but never really delve too deeply into it. Kevin Flynn has the personality of a burned out druggie, ending most sentences with the colloquialism “man” to make sure the audience never forgets that he last left Earth in the 80s and was clearly a product of the 60s and 70s. Most of the other characters were artificial beings, so their lack of humanity is somewhat excusable.

You'd have to be "daft" to not enjoy this soundtrack!

The last note I have to make is in regards to the soundtrack, which is expertly executed by Daft Punk. Interestingly, this is the element of the film getting some of the most buzz. I can’t say that I’d want to listen to this Soundtrack much outside of the film, but as a part of the whole, it’s perfect. Plus their outfits are pretty much made to cameo in this film – which they do – so, bonus there.

Sort of a quick side note, we saw the film in 3D due to lack of other time options, and the film opened with a disclaimer saying many of the scenes are presented in 2D because that’s how they were intended. I applaud Disney for the bold choice, however some scenes, such as the light cycles and many of the scenes in the Grid offered some very cool 3D effects, but the shift between 2D and 3D scenes was occasionally jarring, and not always justified. I could buy using 2D for the real world, and 3D for the Grid, sort of ala Wizard of Oz and its use of color, but not all of the Grid was in 3D, and sometimes it was just shots of a character standing there that got the upconvert, which made for a very disorienting moment. I leave it to you to decide if 3D is worth the extra money for you or not.

To sum up, Tron Legacy is an exciting return visit to the world of Tron, with a much needed update to the visual effects. The story is relatively flat, but serves to move us from one visual sequence to the next, and the acting is what it is for the confines of the story. For those that haven’t seen the original Tron, there’s a convenient bit of exposition at the beginning to catch you up, so you won’t be lost. (My wife hadn’t seen the original and still enjoyed the film.) I would say I enjoyed seeing the film, and would recommend seeing it in the theatres for the spectacle, just don’t expect Oscar-worthy film-making (outside of the CGI effects).

[Rating:3/5]

Filed Under: Movies, Science Fiction Tagged With: , , , , ,
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