Thursday, May 30, 2013

The Hangover Part 3

The finale to the most improbable comedy trilogy has arrived. Who would have thought a movie about three dudes who black out in Vegas and have to piece together their night would end up as three movies? Not I, that is for sure. Put me in the camp of people who loved the second movie specifically because it was essentially a retread of the first one. Why wouldn't I want to continue watching these seemingly normal people go through ridiculous stuff? They were hilarious, oddly dark and philosophical about human nature and featured such unbelievable nonsense that I could not help but laugh. I happen to love the shockingly perfect chemistry of the devastatingly handsome Bradley Cooper, the bizarrely sublime Zach Galifinakis, and the hyper preppy attitude of Ed Helms. It just works for me. Well, it worked for me. For two full movies I laughed hard enough to annoy audiences full of people. I saw the Hangover four times in theaters, and because I was working at a theater when it came out, I watched the photos during the end credits over a dozen times. I thought it was wildly inventive and I loved that The Hangover could play as a straight mystery flick if it had a different tone. I was incredibly excited at the prospect of a third one because I imagined them going back to Vegas and having just the craziest, wildest shenanigans. At one point, I thought maybe the film would end with them literally blowing up Las Vegas for ruining their lives, especially Stu's. Alas, it was not to be. The Hangover 3, unfortunately plays like a Mr. Chow (Ken Jeong) spin off, much to the detriment of the film.

Alan (Galifinakis) has completely lose his mind. He bought a giraffe and got it killed in a horrifically graphic accident (don't worry, the giraffe is clearly CGI and it was a poorly done shading job)and then his dad dies and he goes off his meds. In order to get him help, Stu, Phil and Doug agree to drive him to Arizona to go to rehab. So far so good. We have a plausible reason for these four character to get back together on a road trip. Quickly their car is hijacked and they are kidnapped and told that they must hunt down and capture Mr. Chow, who has escaped a Bangkok prison and stole 21 million dollars worth of gold from Marshall (John Goodman). He takes Doug for collateral and we are left with our original trio to hunt down a serious criminal. This is the first flaw of the film. These films work because the characters do ridiculous things without remembering having done them. We were never really meant to see them do these things. Here though, we are supposed to believe 3 "regular" guys are going to hunt down a criminal, and aid him in breaking and entering and kidnapping? It just does not work for me. They track down Chow convinces them to help him get the gold with him so he can return it to Marshall,. He, of course, double crosses them and takes off. The guys found out, they did not get the 21 million dollars worth that Chow had hidden, they accidentally helped Chow take the other 21 million and now they have to go to Vegas and hunt him down again.

There are a myriad of problems with The Hangover 3, but the biggest one is THE COMPLETE LACK OF HUMOR! Pretty much everthing I laughed at in the film, I saw in a trailer. The movie takes itself so criminally serious that I forgot I was watching what was supposed to be a comedy. These characters so great at reacting after the fact, that they do not often get to react as this stuff is happening. Also, it is funny watching a guy react to having a face tattoo, or that he had sex with a transexual stripper, but watching his reaction shot to a guy getting murdered, just is not funny. I do not want to watch Alan, Stu and Phil hunt down a crazy criminal, I want to watch them play sleuths as to what happened during a crazy night of partying. It was as if the stakes in this movie were too high for what we want from this series. My second biggest issue was the over use of the Chow character. In small doses in the first and second films, Chow was funny. Here, he is just whiny, annoying and a bit of a drag. There is never time where he really comes off like a crafty criminal, but here we are supposed to believe he is just that? Give me a break. Ken Jeong, in general, is one of those comic actors I only want in limited screen time. His appeal is short lived and if he lingers just a little bit too long, I get annoyed to a serious degree and he is all over this movie. Plenty of his screen time feels adlibbed in the worst way too. For instance, him eating dog food. It is not needed, it is not funny and it adds nothing whatsoever.

The best moment of the film probably comes from a sweet moment between the newly added Melissa McCarthy character and Galifinakis. They share a scene that moves from kind of funny, the gross, to surprisingly sweet, and then they get to share another moment near the end that wraps up the film. We do not get a fun cameo from Mike Tyson, the Heather Graham cameo is a total waste of time and effort and Mike Epps as Black Doug is totally wasted. They even waste John Goodman. That is the original sin of cinema. DO NOT WASTE JOHN GOODMAN's time and effort! The man makes movies better, he is not to be used in such nonsense. I saw the movie on Saturday night and I could not quote you one line that was not in the trailers. The Hangover was full of these killer quotables and memorable scenarios. This film has none of that. To make matters worse, the film ends, and then they have a quick little scene that is funnier and more in line with the first two movies than the rest of the actual movie. I want the movie birthed out of the in credit scene. Give me that Hangover 3, not this weak ass movie. Ugh, talk about going out with a fizzle.

Star Trek into Darkness (spoilers, sorry)

In the interest of full disclosure, you should all know that I am not, nor have I ever been a Star Trek fan. I have maybe seen 4 of 5 episodes of the various incarnations on television, and I have seen one of the original movies and of course the updated Star Trek movie from four years ago. I am. however, a massive J.J Abrams fan. He plays fast and loose and his eye for the pacing of a story is AWESOME. If you do not believe me, go watch Mission Impossible 3. That movie moves at break neck speeds all while having an emotional core and substantially high stakes. On television Abrams is a risk taker with grand ideas, lofty goals and bumpy follow through. On the big screen, the guy is absolutely polarizing. People whine about his lens flares ad nauseam, and in Super 8, people complained about a whole host of things, while other people (including me) reveled in the nostalgia. One thing I think he does very well is work with groups. He understands the group actor dynamic. That is what made the first Star Trek so much fun. It was not only perfectly cast, the cast worked perfectly with each other. It made for a fun thrilling summer blockbuster. The inherent problem with a sequel is that the expectations get higher. If you recall, the villain in the first movie destroyed ENTIRE PLANETS!! How do you top that? Honestly, it becomes nearly impossible, so instead of shoveling another movie on us quickly to cash in on the sudden rebirth of Star Trek popularity, they waited 4 years to hash out a story, and deliver a screenplay and film worthy of the big screen. Here comes problem number 2: When you wait so long for something, you expect it to deliver BIG TIME. Why did they take so long if they were not going to hit it out of the park These were the questions in my mind as I sat down to watch a film I had heard great things about, but also had a friend whose movie opinion matter a great deal to me that it was the worst movie he had seen all year.

Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) and the crew of the Starship Enterprise are on a mission to save an entire civilization from sure destruction at the hands of a very active volcano, when things start to go very wrong. The entire mission is wrong. They are supposed to observe, not interfere, but Kirk just cannot help himself. Spock (Zachary Quinto) believes he has to sacrifice himself for the mission to be a success, but Kirk does not believe in leaving a man behind, and when it is all said and done, everyone is safe. That is, until they get back to basecamp and Spock's report tells the truth Kirk left out. Kirk loses the ship, and Spock is to be reassigned. Before any of that can happen though, The Starfleet is hit where they live and Kirk's mentor, Pike is killed by a one man wrecking crew. Back as the captain of the Enterprise, Kirk and his crew chase this unknown assailant into Klingon territory and after a brutal fight, this mysterious man (Benedict Cumberbatch) appears to be super human. He is smarter than everyone, a better soldier, can take punches without blinking and has a severe coldness to him. Once aboard the Enterprise, we learn this man's name is Kahn and he is a genetically created thing that the Government created to help them plan wars, or something like that. To be honest, it was not too clear to me, and if I was a Star Trek guy, this might have made more sense. Before they can head back to London, Kirk's ship is ambushed by Marcus (Peter Weller) is who the leader of the Starfleet and wants Kahn dead and he wants Kahn's entire race destroyed. Kirk was supposed to unload 37 missiles at Kahn, and inside those missiles were Kahn;s entire race of super humans. This is why Kahn went on a murderous rampage. He just wanted his family back.

if my synopsis led you to believe I did not like this film, it is understandable. From a story stand point, the further I get from the film, it kind of sucks. Kahn does not make a great super villain and at the end of the third act, he spirals from being a level headed super human into a raging lunatic. Cumberbatch is engaging in the role, and Kahn looks like he is going to be a worthy adversary when the film gets moving and the fight with the Klingons show him to be a kick ass warrior, but once he allows himself to be caught, he loses momentum as a villain. Kirk's arc is too similar to the first movie, but Spock is what drives this film. Quinto's Spock drives this franchise right now and I think it would be wise to let him be the emotional core of the series because he struggles with his emotions. Kirk is all emotion and swagger, which is fun, but Spock is where the depth is. I find that the decisions made when Kirk is in the heat of the moment and Spock is at the helm are the most exhilarating moments in the film. The story is strung together, but the stakes were never high enough until the emotionally manipulative moment towards the end of the film that could have worked as a severely devastating moment if they had not copped out of it.

That being said, I kind of loved the movie. The opening scene is a tight rope stunt of an action sequence with Kirk and Sulu being chased by natives, while a little pod nearly gets burned, then the Enterprise has to make a last second escape, all in the span of five thrilling minutes. Anton Yelchin, John Cho, and Simon Pegg all do great work as the supporting staff of the Enterprise, yet again. Karl Urban is my favorite comic relief character and I will never tire of him uttering the "Damnit Jim, I'm a doctor not a ...." catchphrase. His oafishness, mixed with his clear lack of a sense of danger make him a fun foil for Kirk. They also are competing for the affection of the completely sexy Carol (Alice Eve) and it makes for some fun flirty and awkward moments for Urban's doctor. These actors all have wonderful chemistry together and they make the action scenes feel even more alive, because of that. The stakes may not be high, but we like them, so we care about them and want them all to be alive and well. This movie lives in the action sequences. Kahn's short attack on the Starfleet's commanders is dazzling. The sound editing is crisp, the score is heroic, and blood pumping and Abrams packs each action sequence so tightly that you are always waiting for everything to just erupt into pure chaos, but he has such control over them that they never get away from him. The Klingon fight is all sorts of awesome, and gives us more hand to hand combat than I remember in the previous film and the climatic action sequence may end in a stupid way, but up until that point, I totally loved it. That is not even including the dazzling, breath taking spaceship chase. The action scenes, because it is a fun summer block buster, more than make up for the story weaknesses in my opinion.

My biggest complaint in the film is the complete lack of worth of the female characters. Zoe Saldana is a strong female presence on screen and all her Uhura does in this movie is worry. She worries about the lack of emotions her man shows, and that Kirk shows too much of it. She is a smart character who knows dozens of languages and is clearly useful, but they do nothing with her. Even Alice Eve's character, who is more useless, gets to at least, disarm a bomb. This is not about the objectification of women, because Eve's character is objectified in a moment so utterly stupid and pointless, the screen writer actually apologized for it. This is about showing women as strong independent characters who operate as more than just an emotional receptacle for the men. Saldana is capable of kicking so much ass and even though she is tiny, she is strong and demands your attention, so I wish they had used her better.

It is an imperfect film, but Star Trek into Darkness is a fun summer blockbuster. I probably will not remember much about it in years to come, but I did not think it was one of the worst movies of the year. Yet, I can understand why people out there hate it. As long as you hate it on the merits of the film and not just because you think Star Trek movies should be different, I am all for you having your opinion. I still think Abrams is a top notch Sci-fi genre director and his action pacing is worlds beyond 90% of the directors who try and direct action.

Final Grade: B (if I am being fair, I liked this movie way more coming out of the movie than I do a week or so later)

Monday, May 20, 2013

My All Time Favorite Movie: 8. Casablanca (1942)

I have been toying with the idea of doing a series of posts on my all time favorite movies for a little while now. Working at a movie theater again has started all of these conversations about movies and I always love to hear what people have on their lists of favorite movies. I decided I would take my 20 favorite movies of all time and write a blog entry about each of them. There are no set qualifications for a movie to be on this list. These are simply my 20 favorite movies of all time. They will not be numbered. Do not assume that I am going in order from 20-1. I will probably do that starting at 10, but honestly 11-20 are not numbered. They kind of exist right outside of the top 10. A few things you will realize as the list goes on are how recent so many of them are, and how Americanized the list is. I make no apologies for this. I know most people who are deep into film as I am often have many movies from the pre-1970s on their lists, but you will only find 2 or 3 of those here. I do not dislike "classic" movies in any way, but they have never stuck with me as much. I respect the craft, but I am rarely left feeling like they are my favorite movies. I cannot really explain it further than that. I am not xenophobic, but when it comes to cinema, I just prefer the American Aesthetic. I have roughly 10 foreign films that I love, but they do not make it into this list. Again, it is just my personal taste. Each post will be labeled as "favorite ever" so you can easily find them as I go on. As always, I love to hear feedback, if not on my choices, on your choices for some of your favorite movies of all time. Okay, onto this week's post. Oh and there will probably be spoilers about each title on the list.



We have reached the most classic film on my list. There are many old Hollywood films that I enjoy, but when thinking about my all time favorites, most of them just do not do it for me in the long run. Casablanca has always been the exception. If you have not seen this film, chances are your life has been unfulfilled. Ultimately quotable, featuring one of the best casts ever, Casablanca is the ultimate story of love, loss and sacrifice for the greater good. It is shot gorgeously, it is emotionally outstanding and Humphrey Bogart, who has an entire list of amazing performances, gives his best performance (if you want to say The Treasure of Sierra Madre, that is okay with me, too). What makes this movie so great though, is the story. During World War II, Europeans who were fleeing from the Germans, sought refuge in America. But to get there they would first have to go Casablanca and once they get there, they have to obtain exit visas which people are killing for. Now the hottest spot in all of Casablanca is Rick's Cafe which is operated by Rick Blaine (Bogart), an extremely cynical American expatriate, who for some reason can't return to America. Now it seems that two German couriers were killed and the documents they were carrying were taken. Now one of Rick's regulars, Ugarte (Peter Lorre) entrusts to Rick two letters of transit, which he intends to sell. However,before he does he is arrested for killing the couriers. Captain Renault (Claude Rains), the Chief of Police, who is neutral in his political views, informs Rick that Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid), a resistance leader from Czechoslovakia, is in Casablanca and will do anything to get an exit visa but Renault has been "told" by Major Strasser of the Gestapo, to keep Laszlo in Casablanca. Laszlo goes to Rick's to meet Ugarte, because he was the one Ugarte was going to sell the letters to, but since Ugarte was arrested he has to find another way. Accompanying Lazlo is Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman), who knew Rick when he was in Paris, and when they meet some of Rick's old wounds reopen. It is obvious that Rick's cynical nature was caused by something Llsa did to him in the past. Eventually Laszlo and Llsa learn that Rick has the letters, but he refuses to give them to him, because "he doesn't stick his neck out for anyone".

Casablanca is the kind of film that gets more emotionally gripping after you have already seen it once. That way you have a better understanding of Rick and Llsa and the past love they once shared. You start to see their emotions unfolding in the way their faces are framed in each scene together. The resentment coming out of Rick's mouth bites even harder when you understand how he felt that Llsa left him. Their first few scenes together when the meet again crackle with feeling. Bogart has always been better when playing the wounded anti-hero. Yes, he played some great heroic characters in his day, but Bogart as a vulnerable man just plays so much better. Rick declares his nationality as "I'm a drunkard" in an early scene and Bogart is not afraid to look unlikable in the film. it served him well in his career to every once in a while play character who has some bad in him. That is what makes every character in this film so interesting. They all have good and bad. They are real people with real emotional depth. Even the more minor characters feel flushed out, which is shocking considering there are rumors of writers writing down dialog as they were filming and just handing it to actors to say. I guess, if you have a great feel for characters, and you have amazing actors, the writing will come eventually. Writing in this film was clearly more than just dialog, which is pretty minimal and deeply cynical. However, these characters are all redeemed in some way. They make giant sweeping sacrifices for the greater good of trying to rid the world of Nazi Germany. That is why this film still resonates on an emotional level. We can all relate to making personal sacrifices to help someone we love, or to help a bigger cause.

The black and white cinematography is stunning. It looks better than any black and white film in my opinion. The lighting is exceptional in every scene, but the way the film lights Bergman makes her even more stunning a presence. It is not difficult to understand why Rick is so bitter at everything. it is not difficult to see why he keeps everything inside and why he refuses to help anyone. He got left by this gorgeous woman. The sound design and the crisp sound editing are both executed perfectly throughout the film. That may seem like a smaller detail, but those small details are what make a movie better than it otherwise would have been. They are important to tell this story and they get everything right throughout. Michael Curitz, who directed 173 movies, was working at a master level in this one. The pacing of the film is excellent and each slow reveal is delivered to get the most emotionally resonant response. He understands the importance of actor's faces, especially the actors he has. He never misses the perfect reaction shot, or a quick glance between Rick and Llsa. He captures their complicated chemistry in such a perfect manner, my heart breaks every time I watch the film.

let's be honest though, none of that would be possible if Bogart, Bergman, etc. were not so unbelievable in every single frame of Casablanca. If there is a film out there more perfectly cast than this one, I would have a hard time believing it. Bogart gives a layered, wrenching performance of a man who has been broken by life and is unsure of what to do next. Bergman is gorgeous yes, but she is also fiery and strong and vulnerable in a role that could have easily been nothing but arm candy. Then you have a whole host of supporting roles that are all wonderful Peter Lorre adds a nice touch in his role and Claude Rains gives one of my all time favorite supporting performances. Had Renault been in the hands of a lesser actor, who knows what I would think of the character, but Rains gives him just the right touch of good and evil. They had no idea they were making a classic piece of cinema at the time and they had no idea how many lines from this film would be quoted for decades, but they all acted like they knew exactly what they were making, and it feels like they knew this would be on of the masterpieces of cinema.

Friday, May 17, 2013

My All Time Favorite Movies: 9. O Brother Where Art Thou (2000)

http:/I have been toying with the idea of doing a series of posts on my all time favorite movies for a little while now. Working at a movie theater again has started all of these conversations about movies and I always love to hear what people have on their lists of favorite movies. I decided I would take my 20 favorite movies of all time and write a blog entry about each of them. There are no set qualifications for a movie to be on this list. These are simply my 20 favorite movies of all time. They will not be numbered. Do not assume that I am going in order from 20-1. I will probably do that starting at 10, but honestly 11-20 are not numbered. They kind of exist right outside of the top 10. A few things you will realize as the list goes on are how recent so many of them are, and how Americanized the list is. I make no apologies for this. I know most people who are deep into film as I am often have many movies from the pre-1970s on their lists, but you will only find 2 or 3 of those here. I do not dislike "classic" movies in any way, but they have never stuck with me as much. I respect the craft, but I am rarely left feeling like they are my favorite movies. I cannot really explain it further than that. I am not xenophobic, but when it comes to cinema, I just prefer the American Aesthetic. I have roughly 10 foreign films that I love, but they do not make it into this list. Again, it is just my personal taste. Each post will be labeled as "favorite ever" so you can easily find them as I go on. As always, I love to hear feedback, if not on my choices, on your choices for some of your favorite movies of all time. Okay, onto this week's post. Oh and there will probably be spoilers about each title on the list.



We have reached the highest ranking comedy on my list. I love this movie so much, my dad, brother and I went to see the music live in concert. Yes, I willingly went to a concert full of bluegrass and country music and it was amazing. Of course, the music fits the film perfectly and only adds to the greatness of the film. The Coen Brothers, masters of the weird, off the wall brilliance have crafted 4 movies that many people would call brilliant (this one, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, and No Country for Old Men). In all honesty, I think all four are pretty perfect. I just happen to prefer this one to the others. I am not sure why, Part of it is the re-purposing of Homer's epic poem "The Odyssey." Another part of it has to do with the stellar cast, and the goofy tone. However, it mostly comes down to the writing. Very few great movies have as much fun with dialog as this movie. The dialog has bursts of wit, absurdity, seriousness, insight and even has a tender heart in places, but all of it works. Everything fits and each character has a distinct voice, which is hard to do when all of the characters have below great levels of intelligence.

Set in 1930s Mississippi, O Brother Where Art Thou follows three escaped convicts as they look for the treasure the leader promised the other two that he hid before he was caught. Ulysses Everett McGill (George Clooney) is the leader of this bunch. he is a slick talking con man who probably should never be trusted. Unfortunately, Delmar (Tim Blake Nelson) and Pete (John Turturro) are not exactly bright guys. McGill has convinced them he robbed an armored car and stashed 1.2 million dollars. They are chained together, which is why he tells them this and why they break out together. However, the law is hot on their trail, so they cannot stay in one place for too long. What follows is a wonderful road trip movie where two of the guys get baptized, they meet a black guitarist who may have sold his soul to the devil, they meet Baby Face Nelson and drive his getaway car, they are lured to sleep by sirens, one of them may or may not get turned into a frog and two of them have a confrontation with a mammoth one eyed John Goodman. They also record a massive hit song, and they have a run in with the KKK.

Told with a wacky sense of humor, wonderful music, great acting and the steady hand of the Coen Brothers, O Brother Where Art Thou is one of the more rewatchable movies I know. I desperately wanted to show it to my Freshman class last year after we read The Odyssey, but there was not enough time. No, it is not a perfect adaptation of that story, but it hits a lot of the same story beats. This is not about how good of a version of Homer's poem the film is though. This is about how wonderfully delightful the film is. First off, it is perfectly hilarious. It has clever laugh out loud dialog, immensely successful physical comedy (Clooney trying to box someone takes the cake), and it has off the wall random nonsense that makes me laugh every time, such as Baby Face Nelson's dislike for cows. I think the real treat though, is the throw away lines. The film is full of these one-liners that out of context would make zero sense, but within the film they are just absolutely hilarious. The film never loses this sense of whimsy, and foolish optimism, even when it feels cynical at times. Clooney, Nelson and Turturro could not possibly be more perfect. Clooney, always a master of cool togetherness, allows himself to just get wacky with this film. He plays on Clooney-esque vanity, and he makes a great dimwitted leader. He never thinks of himself as above the silliness and it shows throughout the film. Tim Blake Nelson, who is not a terribly known actor is the perfect fool in the bunch. Not that the other two characters are geniuses, Nelson's Delmar is the most childlike. he is dumb, but sincere and he gets many of the best lines. He has a playfulness that keeps him from seeming too much of an idiot to function. He is instantly likable. Turturro has never used his fiery temper to better use. Turturro is often an actor who can overdo it. He is wonderful with wonderful directors, and here he is exactly at the right level of over doing it. His hot tempered Pete gets, in my opinion, the wackiest stuff and he takes it all in stride.

No matter how ridiculous the road trip element of the story gets, this movie stays from getting too far off course. It is, at its core, the story of three people searching for one thing, but finding something else. The Coen Brothers know exactly how to balance absurdity into a story. Sure, it is absurd that 90% of the stuff that happens in this movie actually happens, but you never stop believing it. There was a moment in this film where I actually thought maybe Pete did get turned into a toad. Why? Because Delmar believed it so much and it may have fit in with the whimsical nature of the film. The Coen Brothers are usually pretty great with film pacing, but I feel like here, they really knocked it out of the park. Road trip movies often get derailed by staying in one place or in one situation for too long. It can get tedious, but this film has no such problem. Characters enter and exit with extreme quickness. Whether we like the cameo character or not, they are not around long enough to outstay their welcome. No, this movie is about McGill, Delmar, and Pete, and how they react to the silliness surrounding them.

the music in the film, as I mentioned is perfect. The song they record "A Man of Constant Sorrow" is a hit record. Seriously, it could be a real hit record. I loved how the film weaved music in organically by having characters singing sngs at appropriate times and the black guitarist they meet plays a wicked guitar in a rather touching sweet scene in the film for all of the characters. There are a lot of movies that have become synonymous with their music, but none have as much fun with it as this movie. Watching Clooney, Turturro, and Nelson lip-sync to "Man of Constant Sorrow" is an absolute joy and I feel like many movies would not have given us the entire song like that. This is a rare movie that knows exactly when a scene should end and exactly when a scene should linger just a little bit longer to give us the laughs.

O Brother Where Art Thou is not the funniest movie in the world, but it is the best movie that is also hilarious. it tells a wonderful story with great acting, great writing, great music and perfectly pacing. The Coen Brothers will probably continue to create brilliant films, but it will be difficult for them to top this in my opinion. It has everything you want a light hearted wacky film to have. When it is over, you will humming the songs and trading one-liners. At least that is what my family does. It stands as one of the Hadley family's favorite movies. My dad and I still quote it to each other on occasion.

My All Tim Favorite Movies: 10. L.A. Confidential (1997)

I have been toying with the idea of doing a series of posts on my all time favorite movies for a little while now. Working at a movie theater again has started all of these conversations about movies and I always love to hear what people have on their lists of favorite movies. I decided I would take my 20 favorite movies of all time and write a blog entry about each of them. There are no set qualifications for a movie to be on this list. These are simply my 20 favorite movies of all time. They will not be numbered. Do not assume that I am going in order from 20-1. I will probably do that starting at 10, but honestly 11-20 are not numbered. They kind of exist right outside of the top 10. A few things you will realize as the list goes on are how recent so many of them are, and how Americanized the list is. I make no apologies for this. I know most people who are deep into film as I am often have many movies from the pre-1970s on their lists, but you will only find 2 or 3 of those here. I do not dislike "classic" movies in any way, but they have never stuck with me as much. I respect the craft, but I am rarely left feeling like they are my favorite movies. I cannot really explain it further than that. I am not xenophobic, but when it comes to cinema, I just prefer the American Aesthetic. I have roughly 10 foreign films that I love, but they do not make it into this list. Again, it is just my personal taste. Each post will be labeled as "favorite ever" so you can easily find them as I go on. As always, I love to hear feedback, if not on my choices, on your choices for some of your favorite movies of all time. Okay, onto this week's post. Oh and there will probably be spoilers about each title on the list.



In 1996 I discovered a love for hard boiled and pulp novels. I started to devour Elmore Leonard novels and short stories. This eventually let to the uniquely hard boiled writing style of James Elroy. Elroy wrote fictional cop stories and also true crime. His books were set in Hollywood's Golden age of the 1940s and 1950s and his cops wanted that Hollywood image. His characters spoke in pulpy short sentences and Elroy's writing style can be difficult to digest at first. Eventually I stumbled onto the novel, L. A. Confidential. It quickly became the gold standard for this type of novel, for me. Everything pulpy, everything with hard boiled detectives and mysterious dames got judged against this novel. The hardest thing to do when you love something in such a way is to watch someone screw it up on screen. Today, I am much more able to separate the love I have of something from its remake or adaptation, but in 1997, I could not. If L.A. Confidential had been a mess, I would have never forgiven anyone involved. Luckily, it was and still is a brilliant detective story full of pulpy twists, wonderful performances, crackling dialog, steamy sexual tension and wonderfully perfect costumes. In fact, I loved this movie so much upon my first viewing that I went back to Blockbuster and rented everything the director, Curtis Hanson, had previously directed. I even went so far as to track down everything the screen writer, Brian Helgeland had written to see if he was always so great (side note, he was not). I could imagine going in how they would get the aura of the novel so well, and they ended up getting everything about what I loved so very right. However, as the years went on and I kept watching the movie, I realized that I loved the movie as a completely separate entity. It was not because it was such a good adaptation, it was because it is just that damn great a movie.

Set in the world of sleaze and glamour of 1950s Hollywood, L.A. Confidential tells the story of three cops all out for a different kind of truth, and realizing that maybe, just maybe, they are all searching for the same thing. Ed Exley (Guy Pearce) is the police force's Golden Boy. He is a pretty face, he is determined and he is always out for truth. He will do anything to get it as long as it stays within the confines of legality. He is a rule follower and it makes him hated among other cops, but loved by his superiors. Bud White (Russel Crowe) uses brute strength to get his justice. He is a cop with a temper and is always on the verge of beating people within inches of their lives. Not known for intelligence, White is feared by all. Finally, Jack Vinscennes (Kevin Spacey) is a pure Hollywood cop,. he wants the glitz and glamour of high profile arrests. He wants to be in the papers and he will always take the easy way out. A multiple homicide in an after hours diner sets the film in motion and the film is about finding out who did the killing, but it is also about uncovering the truth of deep seeded police corruption, a prostitution ring that involves girls made to look like high profile actresses, and the crime boss opening left by Mickey Cohen's arrest.

First of all, L.A. Confidential is based on a novel that runs about 500 pages long. It is a multi layered novel with three cops each getting tons to do. it is the third in Ellroy's L.A. Quartet and some of the characters from the other books show up in this book weaving a complex series of stories spanning years within one book. It is complicated to say the least and Curtin Hanson and Brian Helgeland do an amazing job of capturing the complexities of the stories, and the characrers in the 2 and a half hour film. Every single scene pops with wonderful dialog and insight into this world they recreated with pain staking detail. Hanson blends wonderful action with effective thrills and even manages to have entire scenes of meaty dialog without anything ever feeling boring. The action weaves between the three characters at just the right pace so you do not feel you are missing anything. We are able to digest each new piece of information, but do not have long enough to sit back and wonder what it really means because there is more to chew on coming very quickly. The twists ans turns happen on a dime and even though we follow these three characters, we are never truly sure how many, if any, we can really trust. Dante Spinotti's cinematography manages to perfectly capture both the glitz and the sleaze of Hollywood, which gives the film the perfect backdrop. His camera also captures these wonderfully perfect costumes in all of their glory. The detectives are all in perfectly tailored suits and perfectly fitted fedoras and the girls in wonderfully lush gowns with perfect hair and make up for the time period. These details may seem small, but this is not a small world being created, so every detail helps.

Beyond that, Pearce and Crowe are magnetic. In 1997, Crowe had two American film credits to his name and Pearce had zero. They were nobodies and they were carrying a huge load in this enormous project and they are both outstanding. I have no idea how Pearce did not turn into a massive star after this film launched him. His Exley is the moral center of the film, but he is not always good. He is not always smart. He is kind of weak at first and Pearce shows all of that and as the film goes deeper into sex and murder and mayhem, we see Exley slowly come to terms with what he has to do. He has a few scenes where he just lights up the screen with this intelligent intensity. Crowe, as White makes a seriously imposing figure. It helps that his scenes are in the darkness. His character is not afraid to get dirty and he is no fool, but he lets you believe he is a fool. I feel like Crowe really connected to White's plight in this film. his character, in my opinion, goes through the biggest transformation and he becomes the underdog. He also has some wonderful scenes with Kim Basinger, who won an Oscar for her supporting role as a high class prostitute made to look like Veronica Lake. She and Crowe have a smoldering heat between them. In fact, Pearce and Basinger also have this smoldering tension between them, and the scene where it comes to a head is one of my favorites in the entire film. Crowe and Pearce, while both not being American born, look like they were born to play 1950s cops in Los Angeles. Everything about them works. Of course, Kevin Spacey is no slouch. Coming off a few years where he won an Oscar, played a fearsome serial killer, and the worst boss in the world (The Usual Suspects, Se7en, and Swimming with Sharks, respectively), Spacey is virtual perfection as the ultimate Hollywood cop. He is the collaborating cop on a cop TV show, he gives heads up to gossip rags about drugs and sex busts of high profile actors and Spacey does it all with the easy confidence of a pro. However, he also plays the more intense scenes very well. His ability to move from easy charm to quiet intensity makes Vinscennes my favorite character in the film. If you add James Cromwell and Danny Devito to the mix, you get an incredibly solid cast for an incredibly wonderful film.

L. A. Confidential is telling a tricky story and it allows the film to unfold at exactly the right times. No turn is telegraphed and no twist comes at you too early. It is easily described as Film Noir, but I think it is something different. The story is not really the point. In fact, for much of the film, the events that happen seem incredibly disconnected. What is key to this film is how the characters react. This is a story about how characters are affected and shaped by events. The film is more concerned with how the three protagonists will handle all of the things thrown at them. It is why it was so vital for these roles to be perfectly cast, and they are. The focus on the characters never gets lost, either, even in the most brutal violence and this film has one of the most realistically brutal beat downs I have seen on film. Today, L. A. Confidential seems insanely relevant. We now turn trials into television spectacles and we are all using our cameras to capture wrong doings. We are still obsessed with Hollywood. It would not surprise me if there was a place on-line where you could get girls/guys who look like celebrities to come sleep with you for the right price. That element of the film will probably always be spot on.

For every twist and turn, L. A. Confidential maintains it wonderful easy pacing and its complex characters trying desperately to stay ahead of the criminal underground. It cares about what happens to these people, and it allows us to care about what happened to them. Each of the three protagonists has a distinct personality and a very distinct way of reacting to every single thing that goes on. We understand that morality is not black and white and that these characters are at once, moral and immoral and that is a magical thing to watch.

Friday, May 10, 2013

The Great Gatsby

Before I begin a warning: I am not going to spend much time in this review comparing the movie to the novel from which it is adapted. I believe a film should stand on its own away from the source material. I will be looking at it specifically as a film, with the exception of talking about the words of F. Scott Fitzgerald that are featured in the film. This will not be a place where I hate the film because it can never live up to the book. I cannot count 5 movies that equal or best their source material. I just strongly believe nothing you see on screen can match what you see in your head. What you see on the screen is one man's vision of something millions of people have their own visions of. It is not fair. That being said, The Great Gatsby is one of my five favorite books and it was tough to separate the two In fact, this might have been the most I have struggled with those ideas in terms of comparing a book to the adaptation.

Just who is Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio)? That is the question on Nick Carraway's mind as he moves in next door to him in the early 1920s. Gatsby lives in a castle in the West Egg village of Long Island. Nick moves into a little shack next door for peace and quiet to read up on stock brokerage. Carraway has dreams of being a writer, but he does not think himself very good, so he makes his money in bonds. He hears whispers of this Gatsby fellow, and he can feel Gatsby staring at him from Gatsby's castle, but he has not met him. Hell, even when he does finally meet him, Carraway realizes he knows nothing about this Gatsby character. No one does. There are rumors of course, but who can separate the rumors of murder, espionage,and mob ties from the truth? Perhaps, Carraway's cousin, Daisy Buchanan (Carey Mulligan) can because once, long ago, Daisy and Gatsby were lovers. When Gatsby went to war, she waited and waited but eventually met and married Tom Buchanan (Joel Edgerton). Daisy and Tom are miserable, and Tom has never been faithful to her. In fact, Tom even takes Nick on a trip to the city to pick up his mistress and party with her and her friends. Carraway is unsure of what to make of all of this noise, but he is also getting sucked in deeper and deeper. His submission into this rich world is complete when Jay Gatsby sends him a formal invitation for one of his infamous parties. No one ever gets an invitation, they just show up for the decadence and debauchery. The liquor is freely flowing, the jazz is hot, the morals loose, and the surroundings are lush and vibrant. It is everything the 1920s were if you were lucky enough to have wealth. Eventually Gatsby introduces himself to Carraway and Nick is immediately taken in by Gatsby's charmed life. he even goes as far to set up a meeting between the long lost lovers. Daisy and Gatsby reconnect and it sets off a chain reaction of events that take up the final 45 minutes of the film.

Baz Lurhman is a director who often focuses much on style over substance. His films are lavish, and almost always have an overwrought love affair at their core. I love them all. I think he mixes contemporary visuals with classic stories. I love his visual flair, and his theatricality. He is, in a way, the perfect person to direct this film. He is, in a way, the absolute wrong person to direct this film, as well. The Great Gatsby is a classic American story of the emptiness of the decade of decadence. It is a story that points to the insane differences between the haves and the have nots. The bright, loud colors and parties are starkly contrasted by the greys and dull blues of the city where the poor reside. It is about the waste of the American Dream, the lack of substance and caring of those wealthy people who let everyone else clean up their messes. Baz gets this story half right. His movie is half successful at telling a story with a social conscious. He is, however, fully successful at telling a sweeping romantic tragedy. It will depend on what you want from this story. If you want the lavish parties, the loud music, the wonderful clothes and the debauchery of the roaring 20s, you will be happy. If you want a romantically tragic story between two people who appear destined to be together, but in reality, could not be more different, you will be happy. If you want a film that fully discusses the differences of the class system, of how the roaring 20s were a hollow time for mountains of people, you might find yourself a bit disappointed.

Me, I am in the middle. There are things I absolutely loved about the film. First off, DiCaprio and Mulligan are fantastic. There is no one better for the iconic Jay Gatsby than DiCaprio. He embodies the empty charms of a man who has no idea who he is because he has been lying to everyone. He is utterly magnetic through the entire film, but he is at his best when Jay is coming undone. Mulligan's Daisy is pitch perfect. I wish the script had made her just a bit less whiny and pouty, but Mulligan handles it with grace, charm and ultimately turns Daisy into the vacant obnoxious character she always was. The big confrontation in the final act is perfectly played by her, turning Daisy from someone you are almost rooting for into a character you cannot believe has two men fighting for her. However, the best performance in the bunch belong to Joel Edgerton. His Tom Buchanan lights up the screen. He delivers a layered performance for a character is a bit under written. His Tom rises above being a stock villain of the roaring 1920s. I have enjoyed Edgerton's performances up to now, but here he raises the bar. He almost makes Tom a sympathetic character. There are some great supporting performances as well, and a few nice cameo performances that round out the cast. Then, there is this nagging down spot in the acting, Tobey Maguire. Maguire is first, too old to be believable as the wide eyed Nick Carraway. He is our point of view character, and it is very tough to hear him narrating lines written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. he does not sound right in this time period. His entire performance is all off. I can think of a few actors who would have been much better. In fact, the only thing he does well, is befriend Gatsby, which makes sense because DiCaprio and Maguire are great friends. Their chemistry is good and it almost makes Maguire believable.

Baz' theatricality is also welcome during the first half of the film. The parties are wonderfully shot, edited together and costumed. Everything is in its perfect spot and all of the parties make you wish you were there. The best visual moment of the film, though, is when Carraway first goes to visit Daisy and Tom. Tom opens the door to a lounging room and it is full of white curtains flapping in a clam breeze and we just see the silhouette of Daisy and hear her giggle. It is this wonderful introduction to Daisy. Daisy, draped in the innocent white of these curtains, flashes just her hand at first, then reveals the rest of her and in that moment, we are convince Daisy is as pure as they come. That momentary fantasy is destroyed throughout the course of the film, but man what a gorgeous moment. There are tons of wonderfully gorgeous shots of Gatsby's mansion, and of the Buchanan mansion as well. The staff of these mansions are all perfectly choreographed and impeccably dressed. Gatsby's bright yellow car is a stunning marvel of a vehicle and the sequences of driving are all kind of thrilling. The set up is wonderful. The scene where Daisy and Gatsby get reacquainted in Gatsby's castle is wonderfully romantic and the clothes he throws at her are wonderfully vibrant and that moment is wonderfully rich in depth. A man has so much that he can just throw his clothes around like they were nothing.

Much has been made on-line of the music of the film. Baz has always favored contemporary music in his films and The Great Gatsby is no different. I found the marriage of jazz and contemporary music the most successful thing in the film. The rap music blasts as Nick narrates the story, and then as the focus shifts to being in the scene, the rap fades out, and the jazz comes in full blast. It lets us know that this story is not just about the 1920s, but about our time period now. We are in another decade of decadence where the haves party away ignorant to the struggles of the have nots. Rap music embodies that idea. Gatsby is hip-hop. He is a man who came from nothing and did what he had to do to get where he is. He throws part after party, but is ultimately empty. Rappers love to reference Scarface because they love the decadence, but Gatsby would be a more apt reference, except rappers do not like to talk about the emptiness. They only want to show the excess alcohol, the girls and the drugs. The allusions work for me in this film. The idea is a bit half baked, but because I am in tune to rap culture, I understood what Baz was doing. He blends the ideas incredibly well. He uses the songs from the soundtrack perfectly, especially Beyonce's "Back in Black" and Lana Del Rey's "Young and Beautiful." Actually the melody of "Young and Beautiful" haunts the film on more than one occasion.

Everything else in this movie is a mess. The second half particularly is a mess. Once the story shifts to being completely about Gatsby's obsession for Daisy, the film loses steam and it loses real focus. The second half is a very poorly paced, and there were moments where I was even bored and I have never been bored in a Baz Lurhman film until now. Part of that was me feeling the film was missing a chance to make a bigger statement, part of that was that Lurhman's visual flair gave way to a much more traditional form of story telling. Gone were the weirdly quick edits, and quirky camera work. Everything became very by the numbers. I also loathed the narrative framing device of Carraway telling this story after it happened in a sanitarium. He is writing his story after his doctor at the asylum told him he should write it down and he could even burn it after it was done, but it would be good to write it down. My girlfriend pointed out that it makes Nick an even more unreliable narrator, and I like that explanation, but I have to see the movie again with that lens before I can see if that works for me. Honestly, it felt like a cheap way to allow Carraway to narrate the story and the narration appeared to be the only way for F. Scott's gorgeous words to make it into the movie. I am not sure how else his words could have been worked in because the places where his words were in the dialogue felt out of place because his writing is so unique. However, leaning on F. Scott's words almost point out glaring dialogue miscues because the writing in the film is not up to the level of F. Scott. This leaves us with narration that features lush wonderfully written sentences full of perfect word choices and deep meaning, but dialogue that can be flat, stilted and meandering. Also, the scenes of the character driving into the city do not properly represent the desolation of the poor. The film kind of glosses over that aspect of the 1920s. If they had driven that point home more, you might have felt Gatsby's emptiness more. We might have understood the loneliness of those big lavish parties.

It becomes impossible to talk about the themes of The Great Gatsby without talking about the novel, so I am just going to say this, the film definitely focuses more on the love affair and obsession Gatsby has with Daisy. In that undertaking, the film is successful. You understand, at first, why Gatsby loves Daisy and why Daisy allows herself to get wrapped up in the foolishness of it because she honestly believes "that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool..." It is a quote that girls all over cling to as some romantic idea, but the film exposes it as the thoughts of a shallow girl who toys with people because she has no idea how to be happy. There are definitely opportunities missed to reach something more, but for a piece of mass consumption, The Great Gatsby is probably going to be successful. Baz Lurhman sure knows how to create a functioning world and the first half of this film is a complete and total home run. In the end though, I was left feeling too "ehh" about the whole thing.

Oh for those wondering, most of the most popular quotes from the book are featured in the film.

Final Grade: C+

The Place Beyond the Pines

Any time a movie has the audacity to span generations, I get a bit nervous. I did not going in that this movie was going to be so expansive in its scope of time.. The trailers made me think it was going to be a fairly intimate cops and robbers drama with some family dynamics thrown in. I was wrong. Instead, The Place Beyond the Pines is a grand sprawling drama about fathers and sons and how the actions of men can determine the lives of their sons. It is an ambitious undertaking and director/writer Derek Cianfrance has certainly assembled two great Oscar nominated leading men to help him try and focus this drama. Those two leading men, Ryan Gosling and Bradley Cooper, share only one scene together, but they are as vital to the movie as any leading men.

Luke (Gosling) is a motorcyclist. That is his life. He is the daredevil of a traveling carnival and he is the key draw. Looking like Gosling would certainly help draw people in. When he arrives back in Schenectady, New York he is met by a woman, Romina(Eva Mendes) with whom he once shared a brief but passionate affair. He gives her a ride home and wonders i there could be more there, but she already has a man. Luke shows up to her house before he leaves town and Romina's mother answers the door with a little boy who turns out to be Luke's kid. Luke does not want to be a deadbeat like his own father, so he tries to figure out how to provide for his kid. He meets a man who used to rob banks and this man convince Luke it is easy to rob a bank and soon the two start robbing banks and Luke is able to throw some money at Romina and his kid, but Romina and her new man, are not too terribly keen on it. After a violent confrontation with Romina's new man, Luke realizes he might not be that good of a guy and he wants to leave, but first he wants to leave Romina with enough money to raise the boy. He decides he wants to rob multiple banks in one day, causing his partner to pull out. Luke goes ahead with his plan, but does not realize that his first bank is not a great bank to try and rob. The plan backfires and he finds himself in a chase with the cops. He eludes a few on his motorcycle and is soon being chased by officer Avery Cross (Cooper). After he crashes his motorcycle, he leads Cross on a foot chase. After their one scene together, the entire movie shifts gears and Cross becomes the focus. Labeled a hero for what he did, the wounded cop is forced to a crossroads, and realizes he is not meant for field duty. Cross is the son of a very prominent judge and Cross himself graduated law school and decided he wants to be a cop much to the dismay of his family. Cross gets mixed up with some dirty cops and eventually decides he has to blow the whole thing wide open and use it to his advantage to move up the ranks. His ambition, that he swore he did not really have comes to front as he exposes the entire dirty cop ring. From there, the film shifts focus again, jumping 15 years into the future and dealing with the children of Luke and Avery.

The ambition of the sprawling family drama is admirable. The shifting focus is also admirable and it honestly works better than I expected it to when I realized what was happening. The tone of the film manages to stay very solid even as the film violently shifts focus the first time and then again when it jumps in time and completely changes the kind of film it is. If there is one thing that really nagged at me when the film was over, it was the cleanliness with which it wrapped up. This film felt like it deserved a messier or more ambiguous ending. That is not to say the story wraps up in a bow, but I felt there was too much closure for this kind of film. The film came full circle, almost in a "well duh" kind of way and none of the movie up tot hat point had really followed in that fashion. There are other issues as well, but that was the one I was left with when all was said and done. Cianfrance does a great job of setting his story up and he really drives the themes home without being overtly obvious until the very end.

I was impressed by Gosling and Cooper, but that is not surprising. I have been fans of both men for a long time and in a review of Yes Man many years ago, I wondered why Cooper was not a huge star, and now he is. However, he is proving he is more than just a gorgeous face. His acting breakout in last years The Silver Lining Playbook has opened up a whole new avenue for him and I hope he continues to travel down it and give layered interesting and introspective performances like this one in this film. He ends up carrying a majority of the film, even though he is a supporting character in the third act. He has the most to do in terms of heavy lifting in the acting department. With Luke, Gosling incites the action and he is, of course, great in his minimal approach to acting. The opening scene finds us following the back of Gosling's head in a single take shot through the carnival and it is only when he gets ready to put his motorcycle helmet on that they reveal that pretty face of his. Gosling always fully commits to roles, but here, he goes through a total transformation, from the dozens of character tattoos (including a face tattoo) to the ridiculous clothing, Gosling embodies a man desperate for something bigger, something better. He wants to give his kid what he never had, and when he understands the kid might be better off without him, he tells Romina to not tell their kid the truth about him. That moment sets up the entire third act of the film.

Cianfrance has a great eye for visuals, as the film looks great. He captures the "pines" gorgeously and even though the opening one take shot does not mean anything thematically, it is a great way to grab us from the first moment. He handles the focus shift in an engaging way, which makes sense since he is working from his own shift. However, the most impressive thing about The Place Beyond the Pines is the sound. This might seem like such a small thing in a film, but here it looms large. There is a sequence in the second act where Cross is being led to a secluded spot by one of the crooked cops and the sound design in that moment alone is breathtaking. The screen is almost fuzzy as we hear Cross start to panic as he follows this dirty cop. The less in focus the screen becomes the more prominent the sound of Cross breathing becomes. Soon as he can focus on his how heavy and panicked his breathing has gotten. It is nearly suffocating for us as we beg him to turn around, or roll down a window, or something, anything to make the panic stop. It is claustrophobic in a very real way.

I found the themes of fathers and sons very well done, even to the point where we do not know much about how Cross was raised, but we understand in his two scenes with his father, why he turned out the way he did. Of course, that sets off a chain reaction to how cross treats his son. Cross did not want to be like his father, so he became a cop, and ended up a politician, just like his father. In turn, Cross' kid, AJ(Emory Cohen) is a punk. He talks with an awful Jersey Shore type accent and lingo. He actually seems to embody the Jersey Shore lifestyle. He is looking for drugs when he meets Jason (Dane DeHaan). They form a tumultuous friendship that spirals into craziness because of the secrets of their fathers. Jasons never knew his father and that turned him into an introvert, and a kid who questions everything. He goes searching for the truth about his father and that leads him down a path similar to his father when the film fades to black. Cianfrance is curious about the repercussions our actions have even fifteen years down the road. In order to do that, he has to create a whole world before even getting to the big key of the film. It mostly works, but you have to be willing to go with it.

Final Grade: B

Tuesday, May 07, 2013

Pain and Gain

I love Michael Bay movies. I am not ashamed of this fact. He makes noisy nonsensical movies and I think he makes them better than anyone else. There is something to be said for being the best creator of mass noise. When I first heard he was going to make a smaller action/comedy, I was immediately down for it because the first Bad Boys movie had a smaller feel and is still an excellent movie. When I heard that Anthony Mackie and Mark Wahlberg would be starring in it and that it was going to be based on a truly wild true story, I got even more excited. Then, The Rock joined the cast. If you follow my blog at all, you know I love The Rock. He makes movies better just by being in them. His cartoon like stature has been utilized in action movies and kids movies for the last decade of so, but those of us who watched The WWE know he is hilarious. The man can do comedy and he actually showed it in the ill advised Get Shorty sequel Be Cool way back in 2005. For me, this combination of actors and director could only spell A-W-E-S-O-M-E.

Daniel Lugo (Wahlberg) believes in fitness. He believes he can change the world through being a personal trainer, but he is poor and he is tired of being poor. He has a positive attitude, a great work ethic and now he has a plan. He is going to kidnap Victor Kershaw (Tony Shaloub), and force him to sign over his entire fortune to Lugo. Then he just plans to let him go and move on with his life. He enlists his buddy, Adrian Doorbal(Mackie) and eventually Paul Doyle (The Rock). The three of them make the three stupidest criminals ever, but after 3 failed attempts at kidnapping, they successfully kidnap Kershaw and after a series of ridiculous torture methods convince Kershaw to sign over everything. There is a problem though, with Kershaw being one of Lugo's clients, Kershaw knows it is Lugo and therefore, the trio must kill Kershaw. They force feed him alcohol and try to create a drunk driving accident, but when that does not work, they set him on fire, but that still does not kill him. Eventually Lugo convince Doyle to run over Kershaw's face, but that still does not kill him! Oh, did I meantion this is a true story? It is, and among the points the film gets right, are the failed murder attempts. it is the kind of overly ridiculous film moment if it were not true, but because it is true, it is even more ridiculous and unbelievable. Kershaw gets free and begins to plot his revenge by hiring a Private Investigator to find out what is going on. The cops do not believe him and Lugo has all of the proper legal documents stating that Kershaw signed everything over to him. Of course, once poor people get some money, they will want more and the private investigator starts to worry they will do it again. Of course, Doyle soon runs out of money because of his reoccurring cocaine habit and Doorbal needs money because he spent it all on the house he bought for his new wife, who is also the nurse who ingests him with shots in his penis to get him hard because steroid use has left him impotent. Lugo is the only one doing well, but even he realizes with Kershaw free, they will need more money to get away, so they try and set up the whole thing again.

Told through a series of voice over narrations, flashbacks, and a variety of edits and jump cuts, Pain and Gain is as ridiculous and silly a movie can be that is based on a true story of kidnapping, attempted murder, theft and actual murder. There is never a dull moment and the movie moves at such a quick pace, there is never really a moment to question if this could possibly be real. There is a great moment, when after a super ridiculous and unbeleivable thing happens, text flies across the screen reminding us that yes, this is a true story. Bay manages to direct a really great movie that is basically void of serious explosions and that has a run time under 2 hours and 20 minutes. Often his movies can feel a bit bloated, and while there are things here that I could have done without (Ken Jeong's entire contribution), Pain and Gain never overstays its welcome. Plus, Bay gets to keep his usual visual style of nonsense slow motion, swooping camera shots of people looking up at the sky, the bizarre color pallet, and visual sight gags. In this movie, most of the sight gags involve sex toys, because the guys kidnap and keep Kershaw in an abandoned sex toy warehouse. it is totally pointless, but it adds something to the heightened sense of stupidity to the film. Bay understands how to make everything in the scene add to the theme of how in the world did these idiots pull this off?

Wahlberg plays meatheads very well. This is no surprise. He can also play comedy very well as evidenced by Ted. Here Wahlberg gets a chance to do a bit of everything. He is the "brains" of the operation, and the leader, but he also gets a good amount of comic relief in his flabbergasted state that he is working with people even stupider than he is. Wahlberg does a great job diving into the character of Lugo, who you know is doing a bad thing, but he is not all together unlikable. I would not say I was rooting for him, but I understood that he really believed he was doing a good thing. Kershaw was a total jerk and everyone hated him. Lugo gets the money and does good things with it. He treats the employees of Kershaw's shop better, he starts a Neighborhood Watch in his new mansion and he funds the gym where he works so they can have the best machines. He believe in changing lives through fitness, remember. Mackie is his usual solid self, proving that he is an invaluable character actor. Rebel Wilson, as Mackie's wife is excellent. She does not have much to do, but she is hilarious and the character even breaks your heart just a bit as the whole thing comes crashing down.

However, the MVP of this film is The Rock. Talk about a breakout performance. The Rock's Doyle is a man fresh out of jail, believing God can rehabilitate him. He is a big dumb oaf, who is too trusting and too willing to help. His performance is flat out awesome. It will never get awards notice, but it should. Beyond his intimidating physical bulk, the Rock transforms himself in this role. He throws everything he has at it and we, the audience, are rewarded with a layered performance that is manic, tragic, hilarious and drugged up. The Rock makes the entire film pop every time he is on the screen. If you think I am overselling this, you are wrong. I was rooting for The Rock to find a great break out role and I truly believe this is it. I was laughing hysterically at him when I was supposed to be laughing and I was worried for him as he faced the possibility of killing someone. It was fun to watch someone so scary looking be the one who most despises violence. It leads to a few key moments between Wahlberg and The Rock.

Pain and Gain is hilarious in a dark way and in an unabashedly goofy way, but knowing 85% of the film is the true story makes the ridiculous comedy even more hilarious. Bay directs what is probably his tightest movie and all of actors shine where you need them to shine. The color pallet of the film takes a bit to get used to, if you are not used to Michael Bay's heightened sense of Florida, which I am. I had pretty high expectations for this film and they were all met.

Final Grade: B+

Monday, May 06, 2013

Oblivion

Take every generic moment you can think of from a Science Fiction film trailer, and put them together. That is the trailer for Oblivion. Every single moment from the trailers looked generic. It made the movie look like every other science fiction movie out there. In fact, Oblivion is the first of at least 3 movies coming out this year, where Earth is not the prime place for humanity to reside. I imagine that of those 3 films, Oblivion will be the middle one. After Earth will probably be terrible and Elysium will be awesome. Oblivion falls somewhere between terrible and awesome. Oblivion is a better movie than the trailers suggest, but it suffers mightily under its own crushing weight.

After a war with aliens left Earth depleted, humans left Earth and are living in a spaceship (I think, this was kind of vague). Jack (Tom Cruise) and Victoria (Andrea Risborough) have two weeks left on their mission on Earth before they can go back to their new home. What is their mission to make sure the drones are operational and that the scavs (Their name for the aliens) are not coming back to deplete the resources even more. The humans created this machine that turns the remaining water on Earth into energy in hopes of one day finding a planet on which to live (Again, kind of vague). Jack is bored and he misses Earth. He is having memories, which is impossible because five years ago all of humanity's memories were wiped in case they were caught by the Scavs. Jack and Victoria are co-workers and lovers, but Jack is dreaming of another woman. jack flies around in this ship and repairs drones while Victoria communicates with Sally (Melissa Leo) who is in charge of things wherever the humans are now. Jack questions everything and wants to read books and live in a cabin away from everything. He occasionally disobeys orders and can be reckless. One night there is a crash and when Jack goes to investigate, he stumbles upon a ship of humans in sleeping pods and finds the drones firing on these humans, killing them. He saves one human and is suddenly questioning why the drones, who are supposed to protect humans, are actually killing them. Jack is then kidnapped by a group he believes are Scavs, but they turn out to be human and that possibly everything Jack believes is a lie.

The film opens with voice over narration by Jack explaining everything that happened. It is a tidy bit of exposition, if a bit long winded, vague and convoluted. However, later in the movie when we meet Julia, who has been asleep for 75 years, Jack has to explain everything to her. Therefore we get the exact same piece of exposition twice within 45 minutes. This is the one of the biggest flaws in this film. If you are going to have to give a character the entire exposition speech then why give it to us at the start of the movie? Let us be in the dark a bit, and then fill us in when you fill in the character. As an audience we do not need exposition twice in a movie, especially when the exposition is so vague. It adds unnecessary time to the film and I think, if I had been in the dark during the first half, I would have found it more interesting. Being told everything up front meant I basically did not need to pay much attention to the first 35 minutes of the movie. I already knew everything that was going to happen until the action got moving. Not only did I get 2 sets of exposition, I got 20 minutes at the beginning that filled in the world that was already explained to me! This is simply poor script work by everyone involved.

Once the movie gets going, it gets better. There are two killer action sequences and the twist is kind of neat and I did not really see it going to the place they took it. I really enjoyed that aspect of it. I love the imagination of Jack's flying vehicle, and I loved the design of the home of Jack and Victoria. There are some neat little touches that made me think there could have been a much better movie here. The idea for the film started as a graphic novel, but the graphic novel was never produced and they turned it into this movie instead. Perhaps a graphic novel would have been a better way to go, allowing them to focus on the smaller details more because this film is just so broad. The strokes of this film are too wide. Everything stays so general. Not even Morgan Freeman's presence really saves the film from crushing under bad pacing, poor writing and sloppy editing.

Cruise is good, but I would expect nothing less. He handles the lack of material well. He has always been a believable hero and here he is a believable as a man who wants more, and is frustrated that he has no real memory. Once the twist comes, he handles it very well. There are bound to be some snickers once the reveal comes and the epilogue is kind of weird. It feels a bit creepy, even though I know it is not and it fits with the story. There are elements to many different Science Fiction films to be found here, most specifically Independence Day. The climax feels lifted from Independence Day and while Oblivion's chase scene is dazzling, it does feel like we have seen it before. I definitely preferred this director's vision from Tron: Legacy much more than I enjoyed this knock off.

Oh, one last thing, the sound is incredible in this film. I rarely say that, and I will say that again later this week in another review, but the sound mix was perfection.

Final Grade: D

Iron Man 3

After The Avengers ended Phase One of Marvel's cinematic takeover, I was curious where things would go. We knew we were getting an Iron Man 3, Thor 2, Captain America 2 and The Avengers 2. But, where would the individual series take us? How would the individual movies weave through what came before and would they discuss the other characters, or explain why they do not call The Avengers to help? I feel like those are pretty common questions to have had once Phase Two began this weekend. With the second biggest opening weekend ever, Iron Man 3 proves that marvel is still doing things right, and they managed to create a film that works as a stand alone picture without ignoring the events from The Avengers. If you were looking for something that basically continues the Avengers, you are going to be disappointed. You will also be disappointed if you want a film that plays exactly like Iron Man and Iron Man 2. With Jon Favreau stepping away from the director's chair, Iron Man 3 looked to infuse new blood into the franchise by bringing in Shane Black to direct and co-write the script. If you do not know who Black is, stop reading, go find Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, watch it and you will understand why Black being brought on to this project made me infinitely more excited than I already was. Yet, you will also understand why the movie was probably going to be a bit different. Black likes to turn tropes and cliches on their heads. He likes to fake out the audience and subvert expectations. it is what made him such a highly sought after screenwriter in the early 1990s. Giving Joss Whedon the keys to the franchise for The Avengers showed that Marvel/Disney was not afraid to take chances and letting Black take over the most profitable character that Marvel/Disney have, shows even more guts. And if you think letting Whedon direct the Avengers was not risky, you are a silly human being.

Set months after The Avengers, Iron Man 3 finds our hero, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) still shaken. He does not sleep. He cannot explain what happened to anyone. He experiences severe panic attacks. In order to cope, he tinkers in his workshop all day and night. He is currently working on his 42nd Iron Man suit. There is clearly something wrong, but he cannot figure out how to deal. He stands up Pepper (Gwyneth Pantrow) for date night and eventually breaks down to her, but it does not fix anything. Quickly his world is rocked by a villain who calls himself The Mandarin. The Mandarin is setting off bombs across the world, but no one can find the bomb after the mess clears. He also likes to take control of the airwaves with videos of Anti-American rhetoric, threats and ominous warnings. Stark wants Rhoades (Don Cheadle) to give him some information on The Mandarin, but Rhoades tells him it is not superhero business. Stark lets it go until The Mandarin sets off a bomb in Los Angeles and knocks Stark's former bodyguard Happy (Favreau) into a coma. Then it becomes personal and Stark's ego gets him in trouble when he announces his home address on television daring the Mandarin to come get him. On other side of things there is a man named Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce) who used to know Pepper and actually met Tony in 1999. In 1999 Killian was a nerdy ugly guy with a limp and Tony had some fun at his expense. In 2013 Killian is a very good looking well put together man whose Think Tank has come up with a way to regenerate human limbs. He brings it to Pepper to invest, but she sees it only as a weapon and a way to create super soldiers, so she passes on it. Killian and The Mandarin are working together but in what way?

Iron Man 3 is not perfect, but it is ridiculously entertaining and even reaches beyond just being entertaining. The movie does not, however, deliver on the expected. It is a move that will probably frustrate hordes of comic book fans for years to come, and it was a daring move, but remember what I said in the opening, Shane Black likes to subvert our expectations. Rarely is a summer blockbuster shocking or surprising and honestly Iron Man offers one hell of a shock about 2/3 of the way in. Black and Marvel gets props for being willing to take that risk and while I will not divulge it here, I will say this, it worked for me. It worked for me because the rest of the movie is so awesome and because Ben Kingsley's performance as The Mandarin is so great. He throws himself fully into the character that I wanted to follow it wherever it was going. That being said, I understand why people would be disappointed, but if it is the sole purpose for not liking the movie, I cannot get behind that. Black's screenplay is not perfect and a second viewing pointed out one glaring hole that I cannot seem to reconcile story wise, but his handling of the twist and his handling of Stark's character post The Avengers is excellent. I did miss having Nick Fury and Agent Coulson around and I was a bit dismayed that Coulson did not get a shout out, seeing as how close Pepper and Coulson had gotten, but since this is essentially a stand alone picture, I understand.

For his part, Robert Downey Jr. is mesmerizing. I know it sounds silly to think he should be considered for awards nominations for this, but that is how good I felt he was. He gives Stark a few new layers in this film and he commits to every new layer and every new character development. Yes, the smug wittiness of Stark is still front and center, but the panic attacks, the sudden insomnia all show chinks in his armor. There is even a moment early on when his new suit, the 42, basically attacks him as he tries to get it on. It sets up the metaphor of his suits attacking his life in a great way and that metaphor carries through the movie as his suits are called a distraction by more than one person. For me, through, the greatness of RDJ comes out the most during the middle section when Stark has no suits and he is in Tennessee investigating a bombing that looks eerily similar to The Mandarin's but happened before the Mandarin started taking credit for the bombings. Stark joins forces with an 11 year old kid, Harley (Ty Simpkins) and their chemistry and their rapport are just stellar. I love how Stark talks to the kid like he would any other adult. This shows that A. Stark is a bit out of touch, and B. That smugness of his is not actually a front. It is who he really is. The best lines in the whole film come during their scenes together. It is when the film is at its funniest and also its most interesting because we are not used to seeing Stark in need of anything, well except that whole thing above his heart keeping him alive.

The action sequences are well paced and well timed and they flat out rock. The first big action sequence where Stark's mansion gets destroyed is quite thrilling and quite a feat of Computer generated images. It was very quick and serious demolition and to see Stark's mansion destroyed with such ease was kind of shocking, even though we see it happen in the trailers. There was something about seeing it happen with such ease that put me in the mind that maybe Stark was really going to struggle in this film. The CGI is leaned on heavily in this movie and I felt they did an excellent job. Once the secrets are out about Killian's experiments and we see all of his soldiers with this fiery lava coursing through their veins, the film really takes off in terms of action. Without his suit, Stark has to avoid these seemingly indestructible beings, using just his wits and his fighting technique. He gets tossed around a bit which was, again, weird to see. I loved that action sequence though because it showed that Iron Man is not just a suit of armor. Stark has become heroic in every sense of the word and even without his suits, he finds a way to be a hero. The scene I was most looking forward to in the film was hinted at in the trailer where Stark has to catch a bunch of people who were free falling after Air Force One was compromised. The movie did not disappoint me in that scene. it is not the biggest action scene and it is not a loud explosive scene, but there was this thrilling element to it and even though I figured the outcome, I was still on edge. Plus, it had a weird humor to it and it felt very much like something Black and RDJ would have concocted together.

With any big budget action movie, you have to have a massive scale climatic action sequence and Iron Man 3 is no different. Stark and Rhoades, outnumbered by a whole grip of Super Soldiers, call on Stark's ample supply of Iron Man suits to save the day. What we end up with is these remotely controlled suits battling super soldiers, Rhoades trying to save the President, and Stark trying to fend of Killian and save Pepper all at the same time. It is a dazzling display of camerawork, editing, effects and pacing. There are explosions galore, great hand to hand fights and this incredibly cool sequence of Stark going in and out of all these different Iron Man prototype suits as Killian slices through the metal with his fiery body. The climax is one of my favorites from an action movie in a while. No, it is not as thrilling as The Avengers climax, but what is?

Iron Man 3 is a clever, fast, and thrilling summer blockbuster. it also manages to wonder aloud how a world can be afraid of anything human after they watched aliens and Gods all over television in The Avengers. it turns out the answer is to give them a face on fear. Give them fear they can recognize. Give them a fear that looks an awful lot like the face of fear in a post 9/11 America. It makes perfect sense. The thought might not be fully flushed out in the film, but I can see what Black was going for. There is a pageantry to the human terrorism in this movie and Stark remarks about the theatrical nature of the fear. When we are given a face to put on fear, it focuses us. Killian understand that. This film understands how much fear we still have of people from another country bombing us. We hate fear we cannot understand from humanity. I think that fear from aliens or Gods makes sense, but fear from other humans is still the most terrifying thing.
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Final Grade: A-