THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU (2011) (a review)

THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU (2011) (a review)

Movie loosely based on a short story by Philip K Dick, which pits a man against his destiny. Stars Matt Damon and Emily Blunt.

The story: David (Damon) fails to win a seat in congress. While practicing his concession speech he meets a beautiful girl Elise, (Emily Blunt) and is instantly attracted to her. Three years later he is preparing another run for Congress, this one sure to win when he runs into her again. The problem is now she might ruin his chance for Congress and later the Presidency because with her in his life he wn't feel that desperate need that is driving him toward public office. Now fate (or God or angels or whatever) has decided that they want his to be president so they attempt to break the couple up and David and Elise will have to go on the run to try to escape their fates to be together.

Was it good?

Almost. Parts of it were good, but it has a few problems.

First, the whole fate thing is pretty far-fetched. I mean, it's just really hard to by into, and then they have all these guys wearing hats like if fate were such an important thing then they would really let it be decided by whether or not someone is wearing a hat! So the concept itself is pretty weak.

Also, the whole driving force is that fate wants Damon to be president, but there is never any sense of why he needs to be president. So there isn't really a strong struggle here -- he could be with the woman he loves and be happy, or be president which would fulfill someone else's desire which is supposed to be important for some reason.

Now for all the hokeiness to it there are some things that work. The whole idea of fighting fate, of feeling like you are supposed to do something and struggling against it for your own happiness...well, it has a certain Romeo and Juliet quality that works.

And they did a decent job with the romance. It was easy to get a feel for why these two people, who really only spend a couple days together spread out over several years, would fight to be together. However, ultimately the problem is that the story wanders. If they had avoided the beat at the end of the second act when David breaks up with Elise so she can achieve her dream (without even talking to her about it!) and kept it about fate trying to seperate them, it would have worked better. The problem is that there's a difference in a story that is about two people who want to be together but fate is keeping them apart and a story about a man struggling with two choice on where his life should go, and this movie seems to confuse the two.

Still, even for all the hokeiness and story problems, if you are specificlly looking for an actiony-romance this will probably fill your need. And because I can be a sucker too...

*** RENTAL ***

THE WOLFMAN (2010) (a review)

THE WOLFMAN (2010) (a review)

This is the new reboot of the Universal monster classic. This movie actually feels like a cross between the original and AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON (with a big side dish of THE HULK for some reason). Stars enecio del Toro, Anthony Hopkins and Emily Blunt.

The story? A renowned Shakespearean actor (del Toro) is told his brother is missing. He reutrns home for the first time in decades to be told his brother is dead. Locals believe it was the work of a werewolf. While investigating among the local gypsies he is attack and bitten by the werewolf. He then find out his father is the original werewolf and that he killed his mother and brother and has the actor locked in an insane asylum for years to keep him safe. The moon rises. The father is locked in a special cage, but the actor isn't and he turned into a werewolf and rampages around killing innocent people. In the morning his father leads police to him and he is taken back to the insane asylum where they are going to perform experiments on him in front of an audience. Except the moon rises and he turns again and rampages around. Back as a human he goes back to his house to confront his father. They both turn into werewolves and he kills his father and then is shot by his brother's ex-fiance whom he has fallen in love with.

Was it good?

No.

I mean, just read the synopsis. How the hell does any of that make sense? And where does all the father vs son stuff come in? I've never seen the original Lon Cheney version, but it felt more like THE HULK than a Wolfman story to me and why anyone would want to crib from The Hulk is beyond me!

There are other bad things about it. Like the acting. They feel like they are sleepwalking. Hopkins especially seems to just toy with his lines, like he knows they aren't worth bothering with. Of course, it's impossible to know if it's him tanking it or if the director was telling him to do it or if he knew that the whole thing was a mess and was trying to find some way of making it interesting.

The saddest part about all this -- aside from just the collossal waste of talent and money and time -- is that this director is the guy who is going to direct CAPTAIN AMERICA, the movie I was most looking forward to from all the Marvel movies. And this movie, along with the fact that they cast Chris Evans, just makes me want to hurl.

Now I probably shouldn't rag on the movie completely. Maybe it works if you are just looking for stupid, goofy fun. But the movie doesn't really have the feel of a goofy, stupid fun movie so that's not how I watched it. Anyway...

*** AVOID ***