Movie Review King Arthur

King Arthur (2004) 

Directed by Antoine Fuqua 

Written by David Pranzoni 

Starring Clive Owen, Keira Knightley, Stellan Skarsgard, Hugh Dancy, Til Schweiger, Ioan Gruffaud 

Release Date July 7th, 2004 

Published July 5th, 2004

Jerry Bruckheimer’s slavish devotion to commerce may satisfy capitalistic business plans, but as for making enjoyable films, those have been few and far between. Okay, I can’t deny that Pirates Of The Caribbean was a slick, exciting bit of entertainment fluff but I cannot forget the nightmare that was Kangaroo Jack or the most dreadful blockbuster in history, Armageddon.

Bruckheimer’s latest film, King Arthur, combines the commercial slickness of Pirates with the dreary sadness of most of the films that carry his name. King Arthur is an attempt at an authentic historical epic, the so-called “real” story behind the legend of King Arthur and his Knights of The Roundtable. However, the film has no answer to the question “Why would anyone want a history lesson from the man who brought us Con-Air?”

Clive Owen stars as the legendary British/Roman King, Arthur, the greatest warrior in all of the land. Arthur’s legend has grown as he and his loyal band have helped to secure Roman rule in Britain. However with the slow decline of the empire and the encroachment of a warrior horde called the Saxons, the Romans have decided to pull out of Britain. Though Arthur and his knight were to have completed their service, they are asked for one more battle while Rome runs for the hills.

Arthur’s knights include his loyal second Lancelot (Ioan Gruffudd), Tristan the lookout (Mads Mikkelson), childish Galahad (Hugh Dancy), brave Daganet (Ray Stevenson) and tough guy Boers (Ray Winstone). Together they have never lost a battle but this mission is more dangerous than ever before. The final mission, saving a family whose son may be the next Pope, takes them not only toward the vicious Saxons but also into the midst of Merlin and the Britons whom the Romans had been fighting for control of the country.

Once they reach the family they are to save, Arthur finds these religious people may not be as pious as they seem. As the Saxons quickly advance, Arthur and his men rescue a number of abused slaves and captive Britons, including the lovely Briton warrior Guinivere (Keira Knightley). With the slaves and the family in tow, they must outrun the Saxons and eventually form a tenuous pact with the Britons to fight the common enemy.

Jerry Bruckheimer and director Antoine Fuqua have a number of surprises in store in King Arthur but few of them are welcome. Most shocking is the outright overt hatred of religion, specifically Christians. Every religious authority in the film is corrupt to a disturbing degree. The Knights despise religion and as for Arthur, he considers himself loyal to the Pope but also follows a man who is considered a heretic.

When his religious superiors are exposed as bad people, Arthur doesn’t just question his faith; he abandons it with little inner turmoil. As an atheist, I am sympathetic to the film’s looking down at religion but this blatant hatred of religion will turn off a number of everyday filmgoers, and worse, it’s entirely unnecessary.

Another controversial element of King Arthur is its PG 13 rating. Jerry Bruckheimer, the commercial whore that he is, somehow wrangled a PG-13 from the geniuses at the MPAA for a film filled with R-rated violence. Just because there is very little blood actually seen doesn’t make the film less violent. Those are still piles of bodies lying on the ground, those are still guys catching flaming arrows in their chests.

I’m no prude, in fact I wish the film had been more blatantly violent, the punches pulled are purely commercial in nature. The film would have been helped by some honest bloody violence instead of trying to pretend no one really got hurt. Families who go to see King Arthur thinking it’s appropriate for 13 year olds will get a disturbing surprise.

Director Antoine Fuqua is a competent technical director who films action with a professional flair. His actors, especially Clive Owen, Ioan Gruffudd, and Ray Winstone, are pros that easily sell you on their character’s heroism and toughness. It's a shame that they are given a script by writer David Franzoni that is amazingly scattershot.

The script ricochets from staid drama, to well-conceived violence then tosses in cheesy dialogue bits and the unnecessary religion bashing. Director Fuqua and his actors actually hold the film together pretty well. Well enough to give the film the conventional blockbuster look that is portrayed in the film’s advertising. Watching the film however, you will be surprised at how unconventional, or if you’re so inclined, offensive, the film is.

This is definitely not your father’s King Arthur. Forget what you know of the mythic Knights. This is a grittier, more realistic telling of the legendary story. Obviously liberties are taken, I doubt Guinivere was really the kind of girl-power heroine she is portrayed as here. As played by the gorgeous Keira Knightley, Guinivere is the kind of post-feminist heroine that is badass, politically correct and easily marketable.

Of course anyone relying on the producer of Kangaroo Jack for a history lesson gets what they pay for. Bruckheimer’s approach is all about the Benjamins, which probably means that history occasionally took a backseat. Of course Bruckheimer’s commercial approach makes the film all the more curious considering how non-commercial much of the film’s content is. Did he read this script or just commission the poster?

Movie Review Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life

Lara Croft Tomb Raider The Cradle of Life 

Directed by Jan De Bont

Written by Dean Georgaris 

Starring Angelina Jolie, Gerard Butler, Noah Taylor, Ciaran Hinds, Djimon Hounsou, Til Schweiger 

Release Date July 25th, 2003

Published July 24th, 2003 

The first Tomb Raider, directed by action hack Simon West, was typical Hollywood action. Big, dumb and loud. That the film was even mildly watchable can only be attributed to its star, the charismatic, sexy Angelina Jolie. Despite the underperformance of the film at the box office, Paramount locked into a sequel even before the first film was completed. Enter director Jan De Bont, master of the big, dumb, loud action picture and what you get is another dull exercise in Hollywood action movie-making with another performance by Angelina Jolie that is the film’s only strong point.

Lady Croft is back in tomb raiding mode after an earthquake off the coast of Greece opens an underwater tomb that once belonged to Alexander the Great. Croft, with a pair of assistants, raids the tomb and finds a number of valuable artifacts. Most important to Lara is a glowing orb of indeterminate origin. Croft doesn't get much of a chance to investigate it as she and her assistants are attacked by members of a Chinese gang who steal the orb and leave Croft for dead.

Naturally Lara escapes and with the help of British intelligence learns that the gang members were working on behalf of the world’s most wanted terrorist, a former Nobel prize winning scientist named Jonathan Reiss. The orb that Reiss is purchasing from the gang members is actually a map that leads to the most dangerous weapons in the world, Pandora's Box.

It's Lara's mission to steal the orb from the Chinese gang before they can sell it to Reiss but to do that she needs the help of an ex-flame and former army colonel named Terry Sheridan. However, Sheridan will need to be sprung from prison before he can help. Sheridan is in jail in Russia after betraying his troops and selling secrets to an unnamed enemy. The past between Sheridan and Lara as well as Sheridan's treachery add an interesting level to the partnership and Jolie and Butler have a good chemistry.

All of that setup takes a while and even as it happens, we are treated to a number of big, dumb, loud action scenes. The tomb that once belonged to Alexander The Great is completely destroyed in Lara's shootout with gang members. This sequence features some God-awful effects. Especially bad is a scene where Lara climbs a large stone likeness of Alexander to get to the glowing orb. Lara is obviously not Angelina Jolie or even a stunt double. 

It looked to me as though it were the CGI video game Lara Croft. The action sequence that followed the fight and the destruction of the tomb is just as bad as Lara cuts her arm to attract a shark, which she then punches in the face and rides to the surface. It would have been more appropriate had Lara jumped the shark. Once on the surface Lara finds her boat has been sunk and she is left floating on a piece of it for three days, the cut on her arm and the sharks conveniently forgotten.

From there it's more big, dumb action. Bullets are fired at a rate that would make our military blush and more bad CGI stunt sequences test the patience of attentive audience members. The film’s most unintentionally funny moment happens when a camera travels over the ocean, a chuckle-inducing reminder of De Bont's Speed 2.

The only appealing aspect of Tomb Raider is star Angelina Jolie. The star is the only person involved in the film who isn't on autopilot. Her charisma is undeniable and can't be reigned in by the weak script and weaker action. Her co-star Gerard Butler wakes up occasionally to spark some sexual chemistry with Jolie but he is too busy auditioning to be the next James Bond to become a fully fleshed out character in Tomb Raider. Jolie's real co-star is that silver bodysuit she wears in the underwater tomb sequence, a wardrobe piece that will fuel the fantasies of teenage boys for years to come.

For all of Jolie's effort, she never really had a chance. The producers of Tomb Raider 2 wanted a by the numbers action movie that capitalized on the video game’s built in appeal and they got it. Just like the original Tomb Raider, the sequel hits all the usual action beats that are familiar to audiences. Paramount pictures will likely get exactly the results they were looking for from Tomb Raider 2. (Ed. Note – They didn’t, much to your pleasure)

Movie Review Inglorious Basterds

Inglorious Basterds (2009) 

Directed by Quentin Tarentino 

Written by Quentin Tarentino 

Starring Brad Pitt, Christoph Waltz, Til Schweiger, Diane Kruger, Melanie Laurent, Michael Fassbender

Release Date August 21st, 2009 

Published August 20th, 2009 

Quentin Tarentino is now 5 for 5 in making masterpieces. The writer-director has nailed it out of the park with each movie he has made and his latest, Inglorious Basterds, is arguably his best work yet. Wildly violent, irreverent and strangely humorous, Inglorious Basterds reimagines World War 2 history with the kind of blood and guts guile that only Tarentino could muster.

Inglourious Basterds tells a story on two tracks. In one story a Jewish woman, Shoshanna (Melanie Laurent), escapes the murder of her family and seeks vengeance on the Nazis. In the other story a group of American Jewish soldiers are dropped behind enemy lines in Nazi controlled Paris under orders to kill and maim as many Nazi soldiers as they can. Boy, do they ever.

The Basterds, as they call themselves, are a bloodthirsty lot. Led by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) the Basterds seek scalps, literally they scalp Nazis. Raine came to be known as 'the apache'. Another member of the Bastards becomes the fearful 'Bear Jew'. He's played by horror director Eli Roth who brings the same vicious streak demonstrated in his Hostel film series to a role that has him beating Nazis to death with a baseball bat. I have always suspected that Roth enjoyed his brutality, Inglorious Basterds provides the visual evidence.

Another of the Bastards is too brutal for a nickname. He is Stiglitz (Til Schweiger) a former German soldier who, despite not even being Jewish, began beheading Nazis for fun. Stiglitz is such a badass that the movie pauses to pay tribute to him with a montage narrated by Samuel L. Jackson.

The two stories of Inglorious Basterds collide when Shoshanna, now living in Paris under an assumed name and running a movie theater, gets her opportunity for vengeance with, of all things, the premiere of a German propaganda film at her theater. She plans to burn the place down with all of the Nazis inside. Meanwhile, the Basterds also plan on being at the movie premiere, especially after hearing that the Fuhrer himself will be attending.

The plot of Inglorious Basterds also makes room for a British Film Critic turned soldier (Michael Fassbender), and a German movie star (Diane Kruger) turned spy who help the Bastards get into the movie premiere. Trust me when I tell you that you will be surprised at the fates of each of these exceptionally well drawn characters.

Of course, a Quentin Tarentino movie is as much about a strong plot as it is about style and Inglorious Basterds is no different. Though the tone is a muddled mix of dark violence and darker comedy, Inglorious Basterds is, in classic Tarentino style, also a talky, literate, cinematic homage to all the movies QT loves. Stylish in the strangest ways, there are moments in Inglorious Basterds that approach elegance, especially scenes set in that gorgeous Parisian movie theater.

Brad Pitt is the headliner of one knockout cast. In one of the least glamorous roles since his redneck debut in Thelma & Louise, Pitt shows the ease and charm of a huge movie star and the grit of a classically Tarentino hero. Combining a dark sense of humor with the witty candor of Tarentino, Pitt surprises at every turn and is the glue of the movie.

But, Brad Pitt is far from the only standout. Christoph Waltz is Oscar Worthy as the Nazi known as the Jew Hunter. Daniel Bruhl also strikes all the right notes as a humble Nazi war hero turned propaganda movie star, and newcomer Melanie Laurent is a real scene stealer as Shoshanna whose revenge on the Nazis is a real cinematic treat.

Quentin Tarentino tames a wildly irreverent story by directing the violence, dark humor and endless talk as one giant symphony. His graceful movements from violence to verbiage are almost elegant in their ease and flow. Where some would argue that Tarentino's chapter to chapter style in Pulp Fiction and the Kill Bill movies could be choppy and disjointed, that same style rolls effortlessly in Inglorious Basterds. Wildly violent and yet smooth in its way, Inglourious Basterds is Quentin Tarentino at his auteurist best. Few directors have a style all their own, Tarentino is one the few and arguably the best working today.