ARTHUR (2011 remake) (a review)

ARTHUR (2011 remake) (a review)

This is a remake of the classic Dudley Moore movie about a constantly drunk millionaire who is forced to choose between his money (and marrying a woman he doesn't love) or the woman he loves. This version stars Russell Brand in I believe his 1st starring role in a big American film after having small roles in movies like FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL and hosting the MTV awards and marrying Katy Perry.

The story: Arthur (Brand) is a child-like billionaire, who avoids work and responsibility and anything remotely not-silly or un-childlike. His mother wants the family to continue running their company and clearly he is incompetant for it, so she wants him to marry some corporate woman who will be able to take over. Arthur doesn't want to -- he doesn't like the woman although I believe he has already slept with her before -- but his mother threatens to cut him off financially so he agrees. And then he meets a woman he actually connects to and falls in love with her. That starts the central question -- love or money -- who will Arthur marry?

Was it good?

No. The biggest problem was Brand as Arthur. The weird silly child thing combined with the playboy sex addict just wasn't interested. And it just wasn't funny. I'm too tired to write more. There really just wasn't anything that worked for me here. There's this idea (I think) that some childhood trauma made him now reject the grown-up world and pursue childhood fantasy...except he doesn't really do that in any real way. He is childlike and they want to make it seem like he has more going on, but really he's just kind of a selfish dick. I mean, with his money -- if he wanted to pursue the childlike sense of wonder -- he could be entertaining children or doing children's theater or running a play group. In fact, a story where he is running an elementary school that emphasizes play and imagination but his mom wants him to take over the company would have been much more interested. Here, he's just a brat. And really not even love redeemed him of that.

*** AVOID ***

GREEN LANTERN (2011) (a review)

GREEN LANTERN (2011) (a review)

This is the big budget ($200M+) comic book adaptation. It's the first big superhero movie by DC that wasn't Superman or Batman. It starts Ryan Reynolds with Blake Lively as the girlfriend. Directed by Martin Campbell who directed Mask of Zorro and the sequel...which I never even knew existed before I just looked it up.

The story: Hal Jordan (Reynolds) is a test pilot who finds a crashed alien ship. Inside the ship, the alien gives him the Green Lantern ring which gives him the power to create anything he can imagine. However, he needs training so he goes off into space to learn about the Green Lantern Corps, a whole bunch of Green Lanterns from around the universe who fight evil, and to learn to not be afraid. Back on Earth, this other guy has been infected by a bad space alien and he has mutated into this weird dude and taken Jordan's girl hostage so he has to save him, but then an even bigger space alien appears and now Jordan has to fight this final alien that could destroy the world, and he has to do it without the help of the Green Lantern Corps who are worried that they will lose.

Was it good?

No.

It wasn't horrible-horrible, and I'm sure kids would like it, but as a movie that might also appeal to adults the way the Batman or Spider-Man or Iron Man or X-Men or even Thor did, it's really bad.

First, I didn't like Reynolds as the superhero. Reynolds, for me, is basically a smart ass. Which is fine for a comedy like THE PROPOSAL or his role in SCRUBS, but for this movie, where he occasionally has to give dramatic superhero lines at key moments...well, none of them worked for me.

Then there are a lot of things that didn't connect. Like Hal Jordan is a fearless fighter pilot. Then he gets the ring and suddenly he is afraid? How does that make sense? Or the whole idea of the Green Lanterns is to not give in to fear, but the reason why the Lanterns won't help Hal fight the big bad evil is because they are afraid of what will happen if they lose. Huh? Aren't they supposed to be the ones without fear?

I also didn't get the love story. I mean, they know each other and maybe used to be an item, but then aren't and why? Then he's a superhero so they are a couple again? Really? That's all there is to it?

The Marvel movies work when they take a person with an interesting problem (can't get the girl, manufacturing weapons, etc) and then find a way to externalize it into a superhero story. Here, I don't know what the story of Hal Jordan was supposed to be. It wasn't about not being afraid -- he wasn't afraid before! It's not about the girl. It's not about anything.

It's part of the reason why the movie, for all the action and special effects feels so hollow.

It's a shame. I was hoping to like this. I was hoping that DC had figured out how to make movies out of their characters so we could get a Flash movie and Wonder Woman and all the other cool DC characters. Instead, this looks like a huge step back for them.

Still, for kids it's good enough to see. For adults, if you are interested then you can wait until it's out in dvd.

**** RENTAL ****

SUPER 8 (2011) (a review)

SUPER 8 (2011) (a review)

The kids version of CLOVERFIELD. A modern ET. The sci-fi version of GOONIES. This movie is a bit of a hodgepodge of classic Spielberg from the 80's and modern day JJ Abrams. It's no surprise that is was directed by Abrams and executive produced by Spielberg.

The story: Four months after his mom is killed in an industrial accident, a boy and his friends witness a train crash while making a Super 8 movie. It wasn't an accident -- one of their teachers deliberately drove his car onto the tracks to make the train crash. The air force comes in to clean it up, but strange things begin to happen -- power outages and disappearing animals and electronics. The kids realize that something got off the train -- something alien -- and now they and the Air Force are trying to find it.

Was it good?

It was good. Almost very good. This is definitely a movie I'm recommending, but it was also frustrating because I kept feeling that it should have been better.

The story starts out both slow and strong, telling the story of these kids. A boy who lost his mother but now has a crush on the daughter of the man people blame for her death (he called in sick because he was drunk so she had to go into work the day she was killed). The group of kids who are outcasts who are making this movie. It's simple but has some wonderful stuff. In fact one of the best scenes happens before the first big thing -- the train accident.

Oddly enough, while the train crash is exciting, afterwards everything goes almost back to normal. For another 10 minutes there's no tension to the story. The biggest question is whether or not one boy will let his friend blow up his model train for the movie. During this there is some conflict with the Air Force who are hiding things and weird power outages and things going missing, but they always take a back seat to the kids.

The problem is that none of these elements really mesh and it feels like Abrams is trying to force all these elements together -- the big mystery...the Air Force hiding something from the father...the kids making a movie...the boy dealing with his mother's death -- but none of them really mesh.

Compare that to two of the movies SUPER 8 is going to be compared to:

CLOVERFIELD -- after a girl run out from a party, a guy finally admits that he loves her and goes to get her back, but a giant monster attacks New York City and now he has to run out to save her life. He will save her and they will be together, only to find out it is too late.

ET -- a boy who feels lonely and friendless finds and befriends an abandoned alien. The boy helps him get home, losing his new friend, but the adventure will bond him with other kids, thus gaining the friends he always wanted.

What you can see from both these movies is that they have a wonderful parallel -- the interior stories (man loves woman and wants to save a relationship, a lonely boy who wants a friend) and the exterior stories (man trying to save woman from monster, boy helping an alien get home).

This is what SUPER 8 lacks. I'm not really sure what the interior stories for these kids, and the main kid especially is supposed to be. It's kind of a love story, it's kind of him getting over his mother's death...these just isn't a strong central question for him. And similarly, I'm not sure what the big external question is either. Because Abrams tries to hide the monster for so long, it just doesn't seem important. Even when all the backstory is revealed, it just doesn't feel like it matters because we haven't been engaged with the monster at all. We don't know it. We don't like it. We don't fear it. It's just this weird thing in the background that suddenly everyone is acting like it is incredibly important.

Maybe this is Abram's downfall. The man is one of the best in the world at the use of mystery to engage the audience, but he it feels like he sacrifices story for mystery and it throws everything off. The big climatic third act feels more tacked on than a natural extention of the movie. And the lack of parallel between the inner emotions of the characters and their outer events surrounding them, make the ending feel less like a powerful moments, then just a rehash of a more (emotionally) successful Spielberg film.

Still, there are a lot of wonderful moments here. The kids themselves are fantastic and Abrams finds lots of small moments that are incribly satisfying. This is a movie where you definitely get your money's worth...but because the parts seem greater than the whole, you also might feel like the movie was disappointing compared to what it could have been.

Still, for all the good stuff in it I'm still going to give it a...

*** RECOMMEND ***

X-MEN: FIRST CLASS (2011) (a review)

X-MEN FIRST CLASS (2011) (a review)

This is the reboot of the X-Men franchise after two successful X-Men films by Bryan Singer, a less successful movie by Brett Ratner, and a semi-successful Wolverine movie. It features a young group of X-Men and an all new cast, but with cameos by the original Wolverine and Mystique. It stars James McAvoy, Michael Fastbender, January Jones, Kevin Bacon, Jennifer Lawrence and a bunch of others. Directed by Matthew Vaughn (who was going to direct X3 but left the project).

The story: A young Erik Lensherr (who will become Magneto) sees his mother is killed in a concentration camp as the camp leader, Sebastian Shaw tries to get him to exhibit his powers. Meanwhile, a young Charles Xavier and a young girl he takes in named Raven (later to become Mystique) are studying mutations. Xavier is brought into a government project about mutants and Erik comes to join him as they gather a team of mutants. Shaw is trying to escalate the tension between USA and USSR to invoke a new world war from which mutants will rise as the dominant species. Xavier and Erik and their young mutants go to stop them and prevent the war, even as humanity is turning on mutants and even as Xavier and Erik begin to turn on each other.

Was it good?

Kind of? I mean, in some ways it was campy fun, it some ways it was pretty cool, and in some ways it felt pretty dumb. The problem these origin stories have is that we know how they will all end up, so unless you have something really cool in there a lot of it feel kind of hokey -- like when Xavier gets shot and then can't feel his legs. It's a tough line to walk -- part of the fun is seeing how people get to where we know they will be, but since we already know it the twists and turns can feel like obligation than storytelling.

I also didn't really understand the whole evil mutant plot. I mean, a nuclear war? How is that good for mutants? A world without tv and pro sports -- that's what they want? None of it really made sense to me.

There was a lot of good stuff. One nice things about the X-Men movies is that it makes it easy to talk about being an outsider and wanting acceptance and what that means. It makes them instantly work on levels that many, many action/blockbuster type movie don't. Here, it was a lot of stuff we have already heard before, some of which worked and some didn't. The problem is that the movie just didn't feel well constructed around it's theme. And for a movie that was supposed to launch a new franchise it was weird that they essentially solved all the "how they got there" questions in the first movie.

Still, there was a lot to enjoy. It isn't the best X-Men movie, but it's worth a watch.

*** RECOMMEND ***

IRON INVADER (aka SPACE TRANSFORMERS) (a review)

IRON INVADER (aka SPACE TRANSFORMERS) (2011) (a review)

This is basically low budget rip-off of Transformers. Giant mechanical monster...people running around...B-actors...bad script with lame dialog... I'll give the movie one thing -- it makes you appreciate Michael Bay, that's for sure!

The story: a metorite crashes with a bacteria that animates a metal statue and raves the iron in human blood. This guy who is deep in debt while he fixes up an inn and his brother and the girl he loved as a teen and the shariff and some other people try to figure out how to stop it.

Was it good?

No. It wasn't the worst movie ever, but it's such a lame Transformers-lite that it's hard to enjoy any of it. The characters a lame -- you have two brothers fixing up an inn and deep in debt...which has nothing to do with anything. Then you have the guy in love with the girl who comes back into town after getting a divorce and their story which is boring with so much bad dialog that it is more painful for the audience than it is for the woman's daughter who has to listen to the two of them. Now of course no one is renting the movie for that, but it takes up a good chunk of the film (probably because filming people is a lot cheaper than the special effects to animate the iron golumn) and it's all basically worthless. Might as well just fast forward through all of it.

The one thing they add that is unique is that the space-iron-thng kills by infecting people's blood, except I'm not sure how that makes sense. It seems to want iron and is attracted to the iron in people's blood, but it doesn't eat the iron or use it...it just goes after the people and then infects them and they die.

Huh?

Anyway, ignoring that there are some decent shots of the iron golumn, but the action-y scenes just don't have anything special about them -- no sense of humor, no real tension -- and because none of the character clicked at all.

There are two basic ways to construct screenplays (and by no means do all movies have to conform to this, but it's what most will do). Either (A) you have a character whose inner goal is parallel to his outer goal (such as in DIE HARD where McClane wants to save his marriage, but then he has to save his wife from the terrorists) or they are in opposition to each other (as in MINORITY REPORT where the main guy wants the future cops program to work, but then he is accused of a crime and now he will have to prove it doesn't work to prove his innocence). This movie doesn't have anything like that. No real goals, no real character work...just random people with a lame and very forced love story.

They would have been better off cutting all of it and just filling in that time with something cool. Like jokes that didn't make it into the Hangover.

Still...for younger kids on a Saturday afternoon the movie is probably fine. It'll be slow, but harmless and they might like the iron golumn aspect. For adults it doesn't nearly have any of the spark or creativity it takes to make a low budget rip-off really work. (A sense of humor would have especially been a good idea.)

*** AVOID ***

CEDAR RAPIDS (2011) (a review)

CEDAR RAPIDS (2011) (a review)

An indy, quirky comedy starring Ed Helms (The Office, the Hangover 1 & 2), John C Reilly (Cyrus, Step Brothers, Walk Hard: the Dewey Cox Story), Anne Heche and Sigourney Weaver.

The story: an idealist insurance salesman (Helms) is sent to an insurance conference when the other lead salesman dies in an auto-erotic asphyxiation accident. He is told he must win the prestigious "Two Diamond" award. However, his idealism will be challenged by the other agents partying ways, various woman, and ultimately the corruption of the award and his business itself.

Was it good?

No. It has the problem that a lot of these little quicky indy films have -- they are so target specific often that if you aren't in just the sweet spot for who the target audience is then it will fall completely flat. And I am not in the target audience for this film. I just didn't care about any of it. I just didn't care about any of it. I didn't think it was funny. And while I like Helms at times, here it felt like he was doing the same awkward guy schtick I've seen in the past, but more awkward and it just wasn't working.

I don't want to make it sound like it was the actors fault -- the script just didn't push Helms in any interesting directions. For instance, John C Reilly plays a kind of party animal, but I thought the movie would have been much more interesting if Reilly had been the guy who was really going after the award and Helms was the party animal. That at least would have switched things up and been a little more fun.

I simply didn't care about the award, I didn't see why it mattered so much (although we find out by the end), and I didn't get the big idealism about insurance, which is what the main character's focus is. Maybe it's because I'm from Florida where insurers drop people's home policies because of the threat of hurricanes, or because I know something about health insurance, but that kind of naivite and idealism just rang false. And without buying into that, the movie just isn't going to work.

And for me the comedy bits just didn't connect. I didn't laugh. A lot of it seemed predictable and never really hit any interesting parts.

I like the actors in the movie, and I think they did a good job portraying their characters, and there wasn't anything specific about the directing. It all came down to the script for me, which I just didn't connect to at all.

*** AVOID ***

UNKNOWN (2011) (a review)

UNKNOWN (2011) (a review)

This is the action/thriller starring Liam Neeson he made as a follow-up to his hit film TAKEN. Also stars Diane Kruger and January Jones.

The story: Dr Martin Harris arrives in Germany for a conference. He leaves his briefcase at the airport and has to go back for it, but his car gets into an accident and he goes into a coma for four days. When he awakens and tries to find his wife, she denies knowing him and is with another man who claims that HE is Dr Martin Harris. Now he has to unravel the mystery to get his life back even as mysterious men begin to follow him.

Was it good?

It was okay. Not bad, but completely forgettable. The movie is light a brainless version of THE NET (with Sandra Bullock) or FLIGHT PLAN (with Jodie Foster). Both of those movies packed a much stronger punch because they really hammered where it hurts -- the feeling of losing something precious to you. In THE NET it was her life and her identity. She was someone who did everything on computer/over the internet and so had very few physical contacts with people and then suddenly she is on the outside of her own life. In FLIGHT PLAN it was a woman who had lost her husband and now was missing her daughter and no one believes her. This movie hits some of the same chords, but they never seem to resonate as hard. When his wife says she doesn't recognize him, they shuttle him off and the two are seperated quickly. There just wasn't much emotion there.

The other problem the movie has is the antagonist. In NET and FLIGHT PLAN, the antagonists seemed much more active, much more aggressive. In THE NET, they steal her identity to make her come to them after she received a disk, so we know what they are after at least. In FLIGHT PLAN, they try very hard to convince her she is crazy, but then use her daughter as bait because they need something from her. In UNKNOWN, they don't need him and they don't want him. Even when they are coming after him it feels more like an after thought. So while there is some tension, it just isn't that strong because their pursuit of him seems more like an after thought instead of him being an important part of their plan.

Still, it has a lot of fun stuff. It's great seeing Neeson in stuff like this (which I liked a lot more than AFTERLIFE or CHLOE). So if you are up for brain dead actiony fun, this is okay (but forgetable).

*** RENTAL ***

HANNA (2011) (a review)

HANNA (2011) (a review)

Hey, look, it's a teen girl assassin movie! Maybe I'm just sensitive about the subject because I have an idea for one that I haven't gotten a chance to write yet, but with Hanna and Hit-Girl from the movie KICK ASS it seems to be the current trend. Directed by acclaimed director Joe Wright (Pride and Prejudice, Atonement) with a script that landed on the Black List (a list of the best unproduced screenplays in America) not once but twice! Also stars Eric Bana and Cate Blanchet.

The story: Hanna is a teen girl who has been raised in complete isolation by her father who trains her to be a perfect fighter. However, she becomes bored of the isolation and wants to leave. To do that however will set the CIA operative who killed her mother and wants Hanna on her trail. Hanna does it anyway which sets a cat-and-mouse game to the powerful conclusion.

Was it good?

Kind of. I mean, it wasn't horrible and it had a lot of fun in it, but like with KICK ASS, it's one of those movies that you can't think about because none of it makes sense. At all. Really...at all.

And part of the diff with Hanna is that it seems to want to be about something, this idea of kids having to grow up and enter the world, but that metaphore (which I like) just doesn't work in the movie. Part of this is the central problem with the script -- things in a small scale might make sense, but then they don't. For instance, the female agent that wants to kill/capture them. Um, why? I get that she might want to finish the job when she killed the mom, but there really isn't anything behind it. If Hanna's desire to go into the world is a metaphore for kids wanting to grow up, then she is a metaphore for people that want to kill them? Or stop them from growing up...except that doesn't seem to be what she wants because she never mentions anything. She doesn't seem to want a relationship with the child or anything, it's just kill her.

Also, for a girl that wants to leave the weird life of isolation, the only other people she stumbles on are the strange kind of hippy people that she befriends for a short time. Again, it's not like she gets a shot at normal. So is it just that she wants adventure? Because that isn't the feel and the fact that *** SPOILER *** her father dies *** ----------- doesn't really make it seem worth it. In the end, she might have her freedom (unless the agency sends someone else after her now that she has killed a dozen operatives), but she is lost in a world totally strange to her, with no family, no friends...how the hell is that a good thing? What has she really won?

It reminded me of the end of FROM DUSK TIL DAWN when Clooney leaves the girl stranded there by the bar and she just has nothing. Um...yay?

That said, there is a lot of fun stuff in the movie, and as a mindless action movie it does a good job. But this is a movie that screams that it wants to be something more, and the something more just doesn't work.

Still, there's enough good stuff that if you are in the mood with an action movie with a European sensibilty (i.e. slower pacing, weird characters, some plotless mood segments) then it's a good one to check out.

**** RENTAL ****

STAKE LAND (2011) (a review)

STAKE LAND (2011) (a review)

This movie might sound like a rip off of ZOMBIELAND, but that movie had humor. This is more like THE ROAD with vampires. Stars Conner Paolo (Gossip Girl), Danielle Harris, Kelly McGillis, Nick Damici and Michael Cerveris.

The story: America is over. A plague of vampirism has caused the collapse of the nation. Now a man who hunters vampires befriends an orphaned boy and teaches him to fend off the vampires. They meet various people -- some good, some bad -- while killing vamps and trying to find a plae they can live (Canada).

Was it good?

Kind of. There's some nice stuff in here and some good moments, but it is all so dreary and monotone. For minimalist stories like this to work they need to be full of theme. I mean absolutely dripping with it. LOST IN TRANSLATION is the best example of this -- a movie that just got into you how lost and lonely those two people were and how important that connection they made was. The book THE ROAD worked because it focused on that father/son relationship, which was in the movie, but the nuance didn't come through.

Here, I just didn't feel it. I honestly don't know what the theme is. Maybe it's about connection or hope or something, but I just didn't feel it. Eventually, even though there were a lot of good moments, the quiets and the monotones just grew tiresome.

I'm sure the movie will have fans -- and it does enough good things that I think it deserves to have fans -- but there weren't enough to make a fan out of me.

*** AVOID ***

KNOWING (a review)

KNOWING (2009) (a review)

An action sci-fi movie starring Nicholas Cage.

The story: Jonathan Koestler (Nick Cage) is a single father. When his son's school opens a time capsule, his son gets a piece of paper with weird numbers on it. His father realizes it is a code and that the numbers refer to disasters that happened AFTER the time capsule was buried. There are also three numbers unaccounted for -- three disasters yet to come. He tries to warn them, but only becomes a suspect himself. There are other strange people gathering children as well. And John needs to reconcile with his father. The disasters get worse as John realizes the final one will mean the end of the world...

Was it good?

Kind of. A lot of the movie worked. And I liked Nick Cage in this role. He makes a lot of bad films, but in the right role he can still be a superb actor. However, the movie does have the problems. First is that it's a downer. I mean, yeah, it's an end of the world movie but 2012 (for all it's hokum) at least got right that the movie should end with hope. This movie felt like a downer.

Also, the people kidnapping children and stuff...I mean it just felt so off. It was like a different movie entirely. This movie kept feeling like it was getting pulled in different directions -- it's about stopping the disasters, it's about his father (which was okay), then it's about this girl he meets, then it's about these kidnapping... It meant that what started out as a pretty cool first half just unraveled into a lot of unfocused hokum in the second half. My guess (and it's purely a guess) is that the writer didn't know what to do once he realized he had set out an end of the world scenario where it would be impossible to save people. Now what do you do? Well you intro new elements and try to throw in some weirdness. In all fairness, they did manage to avoid that "Hollywood" cliche ending, but unfortunately they didn't replace it with a better ending.

The funny thing is that it is all made up, so if you've come up with a scenario that is giving you problems...just change the scenario! It's fiction -- you can change whatever you want! If they had kept this movie on concept -- a message in a time capsule that fortells three disasters and a man's attempt to stop them -- it could have been pretty cool. Once they abandon that (basically once he realizes that it is impossible to do anything) is when most of the unraveling happens.

It's a shame because the first half I liked a lot. Enough to...

*** RECOMMEND FOR RENTAL ***

S DARKO (a reivew)

S DARKO (a review)

This is a sort-a sequel to DONNIE DARKO, a film that launched the careers of Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal and is considered by many a classic of strange sci-fi and cool mood music (most notably the remake of "Mad World"). This sort-a sequel focuses on the younger sister, Sam, played by the original actress Daveigh Chase. Rickard Kelly, the writer and director of the original, had no involment at all in this film.

The story: Sam, the younger sister of Donnie, goes on a road trip with her best friend with the dream of becoming professional dancers. Their car breaks down in the desert and weird things begin to happen, incluidng visions and masks and stuff falling from the sky.

Was it good?

No. It was horrible, almost unwatchable.

What makes the first movie work sooo well (for the people that liked it) was that it wasn't about the weird sci-fi stuff -- it really was about Donnie, this nice kid who is kind of isolated and sees all this hypocracy in the way adults act and just really doesn't seem to like the world -- a world that on the surface is a nice suburban world, but is less nice underneath. Like the movie HEATHERS, it tapped into that teen dissatisfaction of the life you see around you and the frustrations teen feel. They even mention a James Joyce story were kids destroy a home just because they enjoyed destroying it and in maybe ways as Donnie becomes more destructive we as both with him and against him, enjoying his lashing out and knowing it is a dangerous path he is going down. Even if you took out the sci-fi elements and just made it about a kid going off his meds, it would be fascinating. With the sci-fi elements adds extra weirdness and complexity that created a movie that could be watched again and again and discussed and argued about again and again.

That's why it became a cult hit.

This movie lacks all of that. First, the portrayal of Sam is weak. She's just this annoying kid who goes on a road trip. Also, but putting her in a road trip (instead of in her home) it guts that central element fromt he first film that made it so connactable. Now we don't connect to Sam, we don't care about any of the people, and we don't really care what happens. The weird elements don't seem to build off anything -- they are just thrown in there because the first movie had them, but they don't seem to have any real purpose. In fact ***SPOILER**** when they kill Sam late in the movie, it is an empty act. There's no emotion that comes with it, because we don't care about her at all. And the rest of the movie just seems empty. If the movie, called S DARKO, isn't about Sam then what the hell is it?

It's a mess, that's what it is.

*** AVOID ***

THE SHRINE (2010) (a reivew)

THE SHRINE (2010) (a review)

A little horror movie starring Cindy Sampson and Aaron Ashmore (Smallville)

The story: a journalist goes looking for a story about missing people that her editor doesn't want. Once at the small village, she and her friends find the people don't want them there and then they encounter a mysterious fog that hides a dark secret.

Was it good?

No. It tries to do the slow build sort of thing, which I can enjoy when the character work is interesting. Here we have a bunch of cliches -- the girl who puts work before her boyfriend, the journalist who wants a story that the editor doesn't believe in so she runs off for it anyway, etc. Once they get to the village it's all very one note. They don't want them. We get it. Compare that to AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON where the boys land at the pub -- a scene that mixes laughter with tension.

Once they go off into the woods and encounter the mysterious fog it gets more actiony as they become pursued by the villagers who ***SPOILER ALERT**** are actually monsters. Which if you've never read any Lovecraft might be a shock, but if you have then it's pretty standard.

Unfortunately, while the movie tries hard and I do like the slow build concept, there just isn't enough here to recommend. It does a lot of things that an non-inspired monster movie would do but doesn't do any of them especially well and then it doesn't do anything special that could make you really take notice of it. There's no interesting character work, there's no interesting theme, the material is approached in a very straight-forward way and just never finds anything special.

***AVOID ***

CAPTAIN AMERICA (1990) (a review)

CAPTAIN AMERICA, the movie (1990) (a review)

Yes, before this summer's blockbuster film there was an earlier version of Captain America back in the 90's. It starred Matt Salinger (the son of JD Salinger). And yes, it was bad. But was it cheesy fun bad or just bad????

The story: In 1936, the Fascist Italians are trying to create a super soldier. A female scientist objects and runs to the US. The fascist super soldier becomes the Red Skull. The American becomes Captain America. Captain America is sent to defeat the Red Skull and deactivate a missile, which he does but then he falls into the water and is frozen for fifty years. The Red Skull gets cosmtic surgery and becomes the leader of a crime family. Captain America is then revived in the present (1990's) and has to adjust before going to defeat his arch nemesis...the Red Skull.

Was it good?

No. It follows a lot of the comic book beats, which is nice. Maybe if they had made it a little lighter, a little more fun, it would have come off as campy, but it is just so serious about everything. Yikes! Some of the other decisions are strange. Giving the Red Skull cosmetic surgery doesn't make sense...he isn't the Red Skull anymore! And they have Cap doing stuff like stealing a car and abandoning a woman that are very un-Cap like. There are things that are good about the movie...dealing with Cap awakening fifty years later, including Cap's shield (although not much and not well, but at least they tried.)

At best this is a cheesy film to watch and enjoy for it's bad-ness. Or maybe the best thing about it is that it makes us hope that the Cap movie coming out this summer will be better.

*** AVOID ***

(unless you are a total geek like me :) )

THE HOST (2006) (a review)

THE HOST (2006) (a review)

This is a Korean film by visionary director Bong Joon-Ho. It is a monster movie, but a very different one. He certianly has his own unique vision. It was the talk of the 2006 Cannes and has been praised by Quintan Tartantino and made it onto many top ten lists. The version I saw was dubbed.

The story: Bad formaldehyde is illegally dunped into the Han River (South Korea). From this a strange mutant monster appears and begins a rampage. The youngest daughter of a family that runs a food stand is captured. However, the authorities become worried about the spread of a virus and isolate everyone who has come in contact with the monster, including her family. Now they have to break out and try to rescue her even as the authorities try to shut everything down to prevent the spread of the virus.

Was it good?

Yeah...but weird. This doesn't work like a normal monster movie even though it has a lot of elements you would expect -- like a monster, but also the child getting captured, the family trying to save her, the authorities getting in the way, etc. a lot of time is spent with the characters away from the monster. The authorities for the most part seem more concerned with the spread of the virus, which becomes a very large part of the movie as well. There definitely is a strong anti-authority vibe through the movie.

There is also a lot of humor in the film. Like during the first attack by the monster, a woman is trying to get inside a shelter but the people won't open the door. Then she dives out of the way and the monster smashes through the door and kills all the people inside. Nice!

The monster itself is interesting. It runs and swims, but also does acrobatics. They also don't try to hide the monster, letting it run around in full sunlight, unlike many monster movies that put everything in deep shadow. And while the SFX aren't amazing, they are good enough to be cool.

Ultimately, while it is hard to describe, it is certainly an interesting film. Much like LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, the brilliant Swedish vampire film that became a very mediocre American remake, there is just a certain vision to the film that sets it apart.

One thing -- I have read comments that people saw a strong anti-American sentiment in the film. It is an American responsible for the chemical being poured int he river, the American military take over the South Koreans and do some pretty rough stuff. However, I didn't feel like it was specifically an anti-American movie. I thought it was more anti-authority as all the authorities are pitted against the family and their quest to save their daughter. I think to label it as anti-American you would have to be pretty over-sensitive. It's a monster movie with acrobatic monsters. Lighten up.

Also: I have no idea what the title means. At first I thought it was about the virus they keep talking about, but that's not where the movie goes so I am clueless!

*** RECOMMEND ***