Mini Reviews: 8/27/13

Explorers:  1985 sci fi movie written by Eric Luke, directed by Joe Dante, and starring Ethan Hawke, River Phoenix and Jason Presson.  Preteen science-fiction buff Ben has been having vivid dreams about flying over a giant circuit board.  He shares these nightly visions with his best friend Wolfgang, a nerdly engineering genius who turns Ben’s dreams into reality.  With the help of a surly kid named Darren they create a working flying saucer and set out to discover who – or what – has been communicating with Ben in his sleep.

It started out strong but kind of petered out by the end.  I loved the first hour or so when they’re building the spaceship and doing test runs and figuring out their new friendship with Darren; but once they go on their first real flight it really jumps the shark.  Hawke, Phoenix and Presson are adorable and do a great job with what they were given.  I just couldn’t stay into it.  Give it a shot if you run across it on cable, maybe.

Room 237:  2012 documentary directed by Rodney Ascher, about the potential hidden meaning of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining.  It interviews fans of the horror movie about their theories regarding it – that it was about the genocide of Native Americans, or the Holocaust, or Kubrick’s alleged involvement with allegedly faking the alleged Apollo 11 moon landing.

Who cares.  Honestly.  Watching this movie was like being trapped in an endless one-sided conversation at a bad college party with someone who is really high.  Yes, I can see that through your obsessive watching of The Shining you’ve picked out a few weird little tidbits and strung them together into a conspiracy theory . . . and?  So what?  The only theory that seemed to have any, like, purpose was the moon landing.  At least that was an indication of an actual conspiracy.  There was one part where some guy laid two copies of the movie directly on top of each other and screened it, first frame to last frame – because of Kubrick’s freakish attention to symmetry it looked really cool.  That was the only redeeming scene for me.  It was way too long, not that interesting, and generally pointless – The Shining is an amazing movie all on its own, why the need to look for more within it?

The Great Dictator:  1940 dramedy written, starring and directed by Charlie Chaplin, with Paulette Goddard, Jack Oakie and Reginald Gardiner.  After The Barber was injured during World War I he spent many years convalescing in a hospital with amnesia.  When he returns to his shop in the Jewish ghetto of the fictional country Tomainia he is unaware that the country has come under the control of ruthless fascist dictator Adenoid Hynkel.  Hynkel is masterminding a vast plot to persecute the Jewish citizens of Tomania, form an alliance with the dictator of Bacteria, and eventually to conquer the world.  After some hilarious missteps and hijinks The Barber joins the Resistance, and is aided by his striking resemblance to Hynkel in gaining access to the ruler’s inner circle.

I absolutely loved this movie.  It’s viciously witty, a brilliant combination of sight gags and spoken humor, of silly and serious, of lighthearted and devastating.  This is Chaplin’s first true “talkie,” after the release of the still mostly silent Modern Times in 1936.  Apparently his inspiration came from studying Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will, and it shows.  Even if you have only a basic knowledge of World War II history, you will be blown away by how perfectly Chaplin skewers the Third Reich:  Hynkel’s mannerisms and the German-inspired gibberish language, the buffoonery of supporting characters (Garbitsch = Goebbels, Herring = Goring, Benzino Napaloni = Benito Mussolini) – it’s all so spot-on.  At the time this was filmed little of the world at large knew the full extent of the Nazi atrocities against Jews and other minorities, and Chaplin later wrote that had he known he never would have made this movie.  Modern audiences know what he didn’t, and so viewed now it has even more bite, and it’s easy to see why it was so popular, and so successfully used as propaganda.

It’s spectacular, and worth watching for the globe scene and the ending scene alone.

Bachelorette:  2012 dark comedy directed by Leslye Headland and starring Kirsten Dunst, Lizzy Caplan, Isla Fisher, Rebel Wilson, Adam Scott, James Marsden, and Kyle Bornheimer.  A trio of women in their early thirties reunites for the wedding of a friend.  To clarify:  Regan the Bitter & Miserable, Gena the Angry & Cruel, and Katie the High & Stupid reunite for the wedding of Becky the “Fat.”  The night of the rehearsal dinner quickly turns sour after Gena publicly reveals the bride’s bulimic past, the stripper they hired for Becky calls her “pigface,” and the wedding dress gets ripped and bled on.  Awesome.  Redemption time.

You will hate the first 30 minutes or so if you’re not a sociopath.  Like I HATED these women.  It made me so angry that I stopped watching it, but then I forced myself to go back to it.  I just couldn’t believe that so many actors I like would involve themselves in something so irredeemably awful.  I picked up where I’d left off and by the end I actually loved it?  All of these horrible people slowly start acting more human and decent, they begin to redeem themselves and suddenly it’s a quirky, fucked-up rom-com.  You learn why these bitches so cray.  You see that Becky needs Dunst to be awful.  It all works out.

Approach it with caution, know that you will hate the first half-hour.  Stay with it.  Maybe watch it twice.  It’s worth it once you come around.

Doomsday:  2008 sci fi thriller written and directed by Neil Marshall and starring Rhona Mitra, Bob Hoskins, David O’Hara, and Craig Conway.  In 2008 the Reaper Virus rapidly spreads across Scotland, turning its victims into savage, zombified killers.  With no cure in sight, the British government decides to wall off Scotland – essentially brick in the entire population and leave them to die.  Over the next few decades the rest of the world cuts ties with the U.K. in response to this atrocity, and the island degenerates under massive social unrest.  When evidence of the Reaper Virus is discovered in London, the brutal new regime orders a team into Scotland to find a cure – because somehow there are still survivors.

           Hahahaha what is this movie even?  So, they cross the border because some guy who had been developing a cure was left in the hot zone because why?  And then all of a sudden it’s like Warriors Beyond Thunderdome?  But then it’s like Medieval Times and also Malcolm McDowell is there?  It’s idiotic, the music is hilarious, the action is super gory and over the top and the plot has holes so large you could drive your Mad Max off-road vehicle right through them, but whatever.  I doubt I’d watch it again, but it was mildly entertaining.  Didn’t totally hate it.

Did you take my hairspray?

Mini Reviews: 8/21/13

The Loneliest Planet:  2011 drama written and directed by Julia Loktev and starring Gael Garcia Bernal, Hani Furstenberg, and Bidzina Gujabidze.  Alex and Nica are young, seasoned travelers, very much in love and trekking through Georgia (country, not state) on a bright new adventure.  They hire a local guide to take them backpacking through the Caucasus Mountains.  Nica is spirited, vivacious, and keen to learn and do things on her own!  Needs no help!  And then Alex fails her in a split-second moment of weakness and their relationship is suddenly thrown into question.

I hated this movie.  I knew from the synopsis that something terrible would happen to change their relationship but when that scene FINALLY arrives it doesn’t seem as earth-shattering as I’d been expecting.  Especially after all that build up.  It’s insufferably slow – they could have accomplished the exact same thing in 30 minutes, so it’s strikes me as masturbatory.  A poor excuse to use the word “meditative.”  Fuck meditative, it was boring as hell.  And REALLY with that ending?

Red Dawn:  2012 action movie directed by Dan Bradley and starring Chris Hemsworth, Josh Peck, Josh Hutcherson, Adrianne Palicki, Isabel Lucas, and Jeffrey Dean Morgan.  A group of young adults in Spokane, Washington wake up one morning to find that their town has been invaded by North Korea.  As the grown-ups around them begin to either cooperate with their new overlords or die fighting, they scatter into the woods and decide to start a rebellion.  Jed, a U.S. Marine on leave when the invasion occurred, starts training his brother and their friends in guerilla warfare, and they call themselves The Wolverines.  After some successes and setbacks they hook up with other Marines – what, are they just like everywhere? – and learn that only the coasts have been hit, leaving a huge stretch of unconquered land now called Free America.  Their plan is to find the enemy’s secret weapon, which would allow the crippled U.S. command to rally their remaining forces and launch a counteroffensive from the Midwest.

                I really liked it!  Sure, the plot is ludicrous and I find Josh Peck obnoxious and it got a little maudlin at times.  But it has The Hemsworth.  And Hutcherson in his small role is proving he can handle movies beyond the Hunger Games franchise.  It was chock-a-block with action sequences, it wasn’t afraid to kill off major characters, and it didn’t get too wrapped up in its own patriotic fervor.  If you’re looking for something fluffy, give it a shot.  I’m totally going to watch the original now, how have I not seen it yet?

The Boys From Brazil:  1978 British-American thriller directed by Franklin J. Schaffner and starring Gregory Peck, Laurence Olivier, James Mason, Lilli Palmer and Jeremy Black.  Elderly Nazi hunter Ezra Lieberman learns that former SS Officer Josef Mengele, the infamous Auschwitz Angel of Death, has been holding top-secret meetings In Paraguay where he lives in exile.  Lieberman follows up on a related tip and begins investigating the mysterious deaths of civil servants in the U.S. and Europe – all of whom have adopted children that look remarkably alike.  What is Mengele up to, and can his mysterious plan be stopped in time?

It’s a little preposterous, but I still liked it.  Peck and Olivier are both amazing, even if they do lay it on too thick at times.  It was tense and interesting and kept me guessing until the very last scene.

Butter:  2011 comedy directed by Jim Field Smith and starring Jennifer Garner, Yara Shahidi, Ty Burrell, Olivia Wilde, Rob Corddry, Ashley Greene, Alicia Silverstone, and Hugh Jackman.  When 10 year-old Destiny visits the Iowa State Fair with her new foster parents and sees the butter sculptures, she falls in love with the craft and they encourage her to give it a try.  Turns out she’s a natural.  Meanwhile, the reigning butter champ has been pushed into “retirement,” much to his wife Laura’s displeasure.  Destiny and Laura enter the county prelims and it is on like Donkey Kong.  But how could Laura ever hope to defeat the tiny phenom?  Especially when Destiny is being helped by a stripper looking to humiliate Laura’s husband into paying the money he owes her.

It’s like Election but not as good and without the bite.  Corddry is hysterical as the foster dad, and his rapport with Shahidi is adorable.  And it’s nice to see Silverstone.  The cast all around was pretty solid.  It was a good effort, but far too predictable. 

Heartburn:  1986 drama directed by Mike Nichols, written by Nora Ephron, and starring Meryl Streep, Jack Nicholson, Stockard Channing, Jeff Daniels, and Milos Forman.  Rachel is a food writer, Mark is a political columnist, and after they meet at a mutual friend’s wedding and have a speedy courtship they marry and buy a fixer-upper.  Their relationship seems solid, if a little rocky due to travel for work and the endless renovations on the house.  Then during her second pregnancy Rachel discovers evidence of an affair and must decide whether to stay with her husband and try to make things work or leave with her children.

         I am not doing this movie any service whatsoever with that plot summary.  It is so quietly, heartbreakingly good.  The acting is phenomenal, of course.  It’s funny and dotted with little devastating moments and it’s all too real.  It is definitely a movie that will appeal primarily to women, but it is not a Chick Flick in the least.  It makes me miss Ephron.

Mini Reviews: 8/5/13

Kids:  1995 drama written by Harmony Korine, directed by Larry Clark, and starring Chloe Sevigne, Leo Fitzpatrick, Justin Pierce, Harold Hunter and Rosario Dawson.  A teenage girl tests positive for HIV and spends the day trying to track down the 16 year-old lothario who gave it to her, hoping to prevent him from exposing anyone else.  The surrounding plot is a mess of teenage drinking, drug use, violence, sex, and rape.  At its low points it’s a glamorization of asshole behavior disguised as harmless rebelliousness, meant to shock and titillate viewers into ignoring its utter lack of substance.  In the very few moments of redemption it’s a study in ‘90s urban teen life, poignant and heartbreaking.  But for me those moments were too sparse.  I tried to view it through the eyes of my high school self, to no avail.  I don’t know if I’m too square to appreciate this movie or if it’s really a total pile of shit.  Probably a little bit of both.

The Imposter:  2012 documentary directed by Bart Layton.  In 1994, 13 year-old Nicholas Barclay disappeared from San Antonio, Texas.  Three years later, authorities call his family with amazing news – he’s been found alive.  In Spain.  What follows is an account of how a French con man named Frederic Bourdin impersonated this missing boy, fooling U.S. and Spanish authorities and even the Barclay family – despite being in his early 20s and looking almost nothing like Nicholas.  Yeah . . . how did he manage to convince the Barclay’s?  HOW, INDEED. 

It’s a visually gorgeous movie with unexpected twists that kept me on my toes until the very end.  The reenactments were a bit much at times, and the ending was kind of unsatisfying.  Even though the lack of resolution made me feel weird, I still liked it a lot.

Margin Call:  2011 indie drama directed by J.C. Chandor and starring Kevin Spacey, Paul Bettany, Jeremy Irons, Zachary Quinto, Penn Badgley, Simon Baker, Demi Moore, and Stanley Tucci.  Junior risk analyst – no seriously, stay with me – Seth starts an ordinary workday by watching his boss get fired in a mass layoff.  His boss then quietly palms him a USB drive and says he should “be careful.”  By the end of the day Seth has discovered that his firm is holding a serious amount of toxic assets and is about to suffer a severe loss.  He takes it to his supervisor and the dominos start to fall.  People are fired and rehired when it’s determined they have value to add or secrets to protect, severance packages are doled out, fingers are pointed, people are unceremoniously thrown under proverbial buses, and the world of international finance braces itself for collapse.

I think this would have been more shocking like 10 years ago.  None of this is surprising even though it’s clear that’s what they were aiming for.  If you’ve paid any attention to the global recession then none of this will be new to you.  The acting is pretty solid, only a few empty shirts.  It’s decent, not great.

The Watch:  2012 sci fi comedy directed by Akiva Schaffer and starring Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, Jonah Hill, and Richard Ayoade.  Evan is a hyper-productive citizen of Glenview, Ohio, where he manages the local Costco.  When the night security guard at his store is murdered and the bumbling local authorities take little interest in the case, he decides to form a neighborhood watch.  He teams up with a construction worker looking for some Quality Dude Time away from his family, a high-school dropout looking for redemption after failing to pass the police academy exam, and a recent divorcee looking to impress the ladies with a semi-dashing volunteer gig.  And then I guess they accidentally stumble across some aliens.  I honestly didn’t make it that far into the movie.

                  It’s crap, and I’m honestly surprised.  It was written in part by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, the same duo responsible for Superbad, Pineapple Express and This Is the End.  I freaking love Richard Ayoade, and Ben Stiller is slowly redeeming himself to me with movies like Tropic Thunder and Greenberg.  But ouch, this.  It wasn’t funny, even Vaughn looked tired with his own schtick, and after 30 minutes of hoping it would turn around I gave up.

Chernobyl Diaries:  2012 horror film directed by Brad Parker and starring Jesse McCartney, Olivia Taylor Dudley, Devin Kelley, and Jonathan Sadowski.  A group of Americans visiting Kiev decide to go off the beaten tourist path with an “extreme tour” of Pripyat, the abandoned town in the shadow of Chernobyl.  They team up with Uri, their local guide, and another intrepid tourist couple, and head to the Exclusion Zone where they enter through an unmanned checkpoint.  After exploring the creepy deserted apartment complexes they return to their van that night to find that the wiring has been chewed through.  There’s no hope of fixing their ride, their radio calls to the military go unanswered, and they’re starting to hear strange noises outside the van. 

At first I thought it might be an interesting twist on the zombie genre – a nice premise, poorly executed.  It provided a few little jumps, and considering the material the acting was solid all around.  So much more could have been done with this idea, and it just sort of fizzled out by the end.  I’d say give it a shot if you come across it randomly, I wouldn’t seek it out.

The Day of the Jackal:  1973 thriller directed by Fred Zinneman and starring an large ensemble cast including Edward Fox and Michael Lonsdale.  It’s the summer of 1963.  A French militant organization called OAS is livid after the liberation of Algeria.  Their first attempt to assassinate President Charles de Gaulle in retaliation was a massive failure, and now they are underground after the capture and execution of several OAS leaders.  They decide to hire a hit man known only as The Jackal and he begins his preparations.  Meanwhile, French Intelligence has discovered the outline of the plot and is feverishly working to prevent the assassination.

This is such a good thriller – it has a nice balance of tension, surprise, and dry humor.  And I loved that the movie skips back and forth between The Jackal and the French deputy commissioner on his trail.  The juxtaposition is excellent:  the Jackal – a slight, blonde, dashing assassin – as he commissions a custom rifle, works on his disguise, and scouts the perfect location; and Claude Lebel – quiet and lumbering, with basset hound eyes – as he tracks down leads, uncovers OAS moles, and races against the clock to save de Gaulle.  It’s the detective thriller versus the spy movie, all in one.

Maybe when this was made a history lesson wasn’t necessary, but as a modern viewer I needed it.  That being said, I loved it.