Movie Review Lemony Snicket's As Series of Unfortunate Events

Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004) 

Directed by Brad Silberling 

Written by Robert Gordon 

Starring Jim Carrey, Jude Law, Liam Aiken, Emily Browning, Timothy Spall, Catherine O'Hara, Meryl Streep

Release Date December 17th, 2004 

I am unfamiliar with the books of the Lemony Snicket series written by Daniel Handler. I can however appreciate the wit and nerve it must take to write on the book jacket that your story is very dark and depressing and recommend that readers find something more pleasant to read. Like any one of a curious nature, when someone tells me not to do something I’m even more intrigued to try it.

It is with that same sense that I went into the film version of Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, which used a similar campaign as the book to entice people into theaters. Simply tell people not to come, and why, and they will come in droves. Unfortunately those appealingly off-putting ads are more prescient than expected. Lemony Snicket is, as they tell you, dark and disturbing and maybe you should take the advice and find another movie.

This is the story of the Beaudelaire children, or rather the Beaudelaire orphans after their parents perish in a fire. Violet (Emily Browning) is the oldest, an inventor with a keen sense of danger. Her younger brother is Klaus (Liam Aiken), an inquisitive child who reads voraciously and retains every piece of information. And finally, their younger sister two year old Sunny (Kara & Shelby Hoffman) who’s preternaturally smart, she has her own language, and loves to bite things. Anything at all.

After being informed of their parents death the children are taken by their court appointed lawyer Mr. Poe to their closest living relative Count Olaf. By closest living relative, Mr. Poe means that he lives only four blocks away which is a hint of the cluelessness to come. Count Olaf (Jim Carrey) is a failed actor living in a rundown mansion that is the sort of place your dared to visit on Halloween.

Violet, ever the inquisitor, immediately senses that Olaf is not taking the children in out of the kindness of his heart. Indeed he even tells them that he has his eye on the fortune they are to inherit. As soon as Olaf takes on legal custody of the children he plans to murder them and run off with the inheritance money.

The story is narrated by the shadowed visage of Lemony Snicket (Jude Law). Glimpsed only in silhouette, Lemony Snicket tells this tale with wit and misdirection. As he says, and the title well states, this is a story of a series of unfortunate events that befall these plucky kids. They must outwit the murderous count and weather a series of wacky parental stand ins that include Billy Connelly and Meryl Streep.

This is not a bad story but as it is presented by Director Brad Silberling it’s disturbing and highly off putting. This is supposed to be a family movie yet we see murders, blatant child abuse, and a Jim Carrey performance that hits more wrong notes than The Cable Guy.

Just because your narrator states in the opening scenes that your movie is unpleasant and recommends that you go see another film while still can does not give you an excuse to make a film as unpleasant and disturbing as this movie is. Maybe a familiarity with the book somehow makes the themes of murder and abuse palatable but as presented here they make me question how a major children’s entertainment company like Nickelodeon Pictures became involved with it.

As in movies like this the children are geniuses the adults are all clueless dolts. Even the great Meryl Streep can’t escape this hackneyed trope, she plays a shrill agoraphobic who inherits the children and must protect them from Olaf. Sadly, and, of course, she’s so clueless that when Olaf arrives in a terrible costume she falls for him. Other clueless adults include Cedric The Entertainer as a clueless cop and Catherine O’Hara as a clueless Judge.

What is good about the film is the set design and cinematography that evokes the best work of Tim Burton and the silent era gothic films. Emmanuel Lubezki handles the Cinematography and delivers Oscar quality visuals. Set Designer Rick Heinrichs is also award worthy especially for his work on Streep’s lake adjacent home on the side of a cliff.

Director Brad Silberling crafts the work of his cinematographer and set designer quite well but could have done a better job reigning in his clowning preening star who does not steal scenes as much as he invades them with a sickening presence. Carrey’s attempts at improv humor are a counter point to his character's malevolent nature and just do not work. I find that a murderer, especially one in a KIDS movie, had better be darn funny to make me laugh otherwise it’s just creepy and out of place.

The only funny moments in the movie go to the baby who speaks in gibberish but has cute funny subtitles. The rest of the film is like an attempt to glom on to the Harry Potter formula but without the magic and without the intelligent appealing and benevolent characters.

For fans of the books, maybe you can find something to like. For fans of technical filmmaking absolutely. But for general family audiences where this film is targeted I suggest you take the films advice and see what’s playing in theater 2.

Movie Review The Damned United

The Damned United (2009) 

Directed by Tom Hooper

Written by Peter Morgan

Starring Michael Sheen, Timothy Spall, Colm Meaney, Jim Broadbent

Release Date March 27th, 2009 

Published November 14th, 2009

Michael Sheen has a knack for playing modern historic Englishmen. He rose to stardom playing former British Prime Minister Tony Blair three times. He gained massive acclaim playing flashy TV presenter David Frost in the Oscar nominee Frost/Nixon. For his latest English icon Sheen tackles an English football legend.

Brian Clough's career as the manager of a soccer club almost went down in infamy. He was the manager of England's number 1 soccer club Leeds United for only 44 days. The story of how he got there and what he did to blow the gig is one of the most bizarre and humiliating stories in the history of soccer.

In 1968 Brian Clough was the manager of a small, 3rd Division soccer club in Derby. His team has just gotten a huge break, they will host a game against the number one club in all of England, Leeds United and Brian plans to host their legendary manager Don Revie. Things do not go as planned. Leeds humiliates Derby, with a little cheating and a lot of talent, and Don Revie blows off Clough completely.

Find my full length review at Cleats.Media

Movie Review: Enchanted

Enchanted (2007) 

Directed by Kevin Lima 

Written by Bill Kelly 

Starring Amy Adams, Patrick Dempsey, James Marsden, Timothy Spall, Idina Menzel, Susan Sarandon

Release Date November 21st, 2007

Published November 21st, 2007 

Historically, Disney has not been comfortable having their history poked fun at. Indeed, there have been lawsuits and recriminations when anyone would dare to make light of Disney's fairy tales. Well that was the old Disney. The new Disney attitude arrives with the release of Enchanted a film that doesn't so much make fun of Disney's past but rather is playfully irreverent toward it; while also reinventing and reinvigorating the formulas.

Most importantly, Enchanted brings to a mass audience the charming young star Amy Adams who following this starring role should break out into major stardom.

The kingdom of Andalasia is a cartoon paradise where a beautiful young peasant sings a song with her animal friends and awaits the arrival of her prince and her happily ever after. The peasant girl is Giselle (Amy Adams) and her prince is Edward (James Marsden) a vainglorious but good natured blowhard. The two fall immediately in love and are to married moments after meeting.

The couple's marriage plans are derailed however when the prince's step mother Queen Narissa (Susan Sarandon) see's Giselle as a threat to her thrown. Taking on the classic look of crone, the Queen tricks Giselle into falling into a magical waterfall that transports her to an entirely different dimension. When Giselle comes around she finds herself in a strange place, New York City circa 2007.

Trapped with no way home, Giselle wanders the streets and hopes for Edward to rescue her. In the meantime she is taken in by Robert (Patrick Dempsey) and his six year old daughter Morgan(Rachel Covey). Morgan is convinced that Giselle is a real princess, Robert is more than just skeptical, he thinks she's a loon.

Enchanted, directed by animation vet Kevin Lima (Tarzan), sends up a number of classically Disney set pieces. From helpful woodland creatures, given a disturbingly New York twist, too characters breaking into impromptu song and dance routines choreographed as if Busby Berkley just happened to walk down the street spilling his imagination all over the place. Everything classically Disney is given a playful tweak.

Shrek tried and sometimes succeed in pulling  off the same irreverent trick but Enchanted is free of the snarkiness of the green ogre's jibes and the baggage of the Jeffrey Katzenberg litigiousness. It's nice to see Disney finally have a sense of humor about it's past and director Kevin Lima and writer Bill Kelly made that possible by not trying to destroy the tradition of the mouse house but reinvent it with a more modern sense of humor.

Of course, the real reason that Enchanted is so enchanting is star Amy Adams. This lovely young actress who burst on the scene with her Oscar nominated performance in Junebug, is the perfect choice to play a princess. With her warm welcoming eyes and her wonderful heart on her sleeve, Adams is exceptional in the role of Giselle. So good in fact is Ms. Adams that she could win an Oscar for this feather light comedy, she's that good here.

Patrick Dempsey, so charming as television's McDreamy on Grey's Anatomy, tones down the charm to play a classic romantic male lead, the hard hearted stuffed shirt who is softened by love and romance. Providing some grounding for the more magical elements of Enchanted, keep an on Dempsey for some of the films big visual gags as slowly but surely he gives into to all of the singing and dancing magic.

Enchanted is one of the best live action family films to come along in this decade. It's also one of the better romantic comedies as well. The magical premise, the bursts of music and humor make Enchanted truly a joy to behold. Best of all, the film delivers Amy Adams to mass audiences that didn't see Junebug or somehow missed her terrific supporting turn in Catch Me If You Can.

The tremendous star turn of Amy Adams combined with the heart filled yet irreverent script of Bill Kelly and the well managed direction of Kevin Lima make Enchanted a delight for families and romantics alike.

Movie Review Sweeney Todd The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Sweeney Todd The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) 

Directed by Tim Burton

Written by John Logan

Starring Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman, Timothy Spall, Sacha Baron Cohen

Release Date December 21st, 2007

Published December 21st, 2007

Tim Burton and Johnny Depp's Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street is filled with such self congratulatory irony that one is forced to call it arrogant. Arrogance is often seen as a negative quality and it is certainly nothing less than a pejorative here. However, the line between arrogance and confidence is thin here because of the talent involved.

It grows odd then that some of the arrogance of the creators of this Steven Sondheim adaptation comes from insecurity. Tim Burton is no fan of musicals. He never wanted to make one. He chose to make Sweeney Todd because of the almost anti-musical qualities of Sondheim's creation. This however, leads to a violent form of ironic detachment from the music and sentiment of the songs that leaves the filmgoer outside the emotion of the piece.

In not wanting to make a musical, Burton has attempted to make an anti-musical and as such forgotten that involving an audience is necessary even when you are rebelling against a form many audiences find so easily involving.

Johnny Depp stars as Sweeney Todd, though Barker is his real name, he became Todd in a British prison colony. When he was a young man Benjamin Barker's wife and child were taken from him by the jealous machinations of one Judge Turpin (Alan Rickman). Envious of the young barber, his beautiful wife (Laura Michelle Kelly) and baby, Turpin had Barker arrested on a trumped up charge and sent to Australia, then a British penal colony.

Returning 15 years later as Todd, Benjamin Barker seeks his revenge on Turpin and the hellhole London that has risen up around him. Returning to his old shop where his former landlady Mrs. Lovett (Helena Bonham Carter) has kept his beloved silver razors, Sweeney will pick the shave business and use it as a base of operations for his revenge.

The sub story of Sweeney Todd involves the young sailor Anthony (Jamie Campbell Bower) who rescued Sweeney at sea and brought him to London and who also happens to fall for Sweeney's now teenage daughter Johanna (Jane Wisener), now a captive in Judge Turpin's home staring listlessly from a gilded cage. The teenage lovers work to leave the oppressive violence and sadness of the Sweeney story and the young actors are effective in that.

Now if only Tim Burton gave a damn about them, we'd have something here. Unfortunately, Burton doesn't take much care with the young lovers, bungling their coupling and their involvement with Sweeney to the point that what should be a major revealing moment hits with little flourish and is shuffled quickly offstage in favor of more revenge and viscera.

Fans of Viscera, I'm talking serious blood and guts here, will be more than satisfied with Sweeney Todd. The film is soaked in viscous fluid. However, do not mistake Sweeney for the blood stopped likes of Hostel or Halloween. No, Tim Burton is more humorous in his detachment than the frightening seriousness of Eli Roth or Rob Zombie who come off as real life Sweeney's seeking revenge on humanity in their hateful attacks on audiences.

Oddly enough, Burton would have to be more engaged in Sweeney Todd for that level of commitment to hatred. Thus Sweeney has an ironic detachment that leaves audiences little place to be appalled, repelled or won over by it. We are left merely as observers of rich cinematography, performances of great commitment and songs that offer glimpses of emotional involvement and dark humor.

Tim Burton has always been the disaffected genius working within the system and subverting it with his art-pop. Conversely, at a certain age disaffection becomes an old pose struck with boredom and stagnation. Sweeney Todd is far too big budget busy to be boring but stagnant is not far off. From a creative perspective Tim Burton's imaginative whimsy and his attempt to subvert it by covering it in blood fails to beat away the stagnating emotional distance.

In interviews Burton has discussed how the Broadway approach to Sweeney's blood soaked tragedy, the belt it back of the room, typical Broadway approach, was inappropriate for such dark brooding material. Yet here he seems to demonstrate that a more dramatic, Broadway approach, heightened emotions, heightened reality, may be the only way to render such awesome grand guignol tragedies.

I can tell you that Burton's minimalist approach takes the wind out of the sails and translates what should be grand emotional developments into something we in the audience merely observe without involvement.

Movie Review The Last Samurai

The Last Samurai (2003) 

Directed by Ed Zwick 

Written by John Logan, Ed Zwick, Marshall Herskowitz 

Starring Tom Cruise, Timothy Spall, Ken Watanabe, Billy Connelly, Tony Goldwyn 

Release Date December 5th, 2003 

Published December 4th, 2003 

In his nearly 20-year career as a director, Ed Zwick has yet to show the auteur's spark that separates great directors from good directors. Like a modern Michael Curtiz, Zwick shows flairs of brilliance here and there and, like Curtiz, he makes wonderful, studio-driven pictures, but has yet to find a style of his own. Curtiz made one masterpiece: Casablanca. Zwick has yet to make his masterpiece though, his latest picture, The Last Samurai, approaches greatness, it's conventional, unmemorable style keeps it from being called a masterpiece.

The Last Samurai stars Tom Cruise as a former civil war hero named Nathan Ahlgren who has spent his time since the end of the war inside a whiskey bottle. Working for a company demonstrating firearms for pennies, Ahlgen is trying to forget the horrors of the war by drinking himself to death. Things change when his former army friend Zeb Gant (Billy Connolly) offers him an opportunity to make a lot of money doing what he does best: making war.

The job is to go to Japan and help train the Japanese army in modern warfare. The Japanese are only beginning to use guns and artillery in battle and the emperor of Japan has ordered his closest advisor, Mr. Omura (Japanese director Masato Harada), to bring in the Americans to train the peasant army. The emperor’s advisor is in a precarious situation and must ready the army for war against a rising tide of Samurai warriors who oppose the rapid modernization of their homeland.

The samurai are being displaced as the protectors of Japan by the modern army but, more importantly, their code of conduct--the Bushido--is being pushed aside by the rapid modernization that has brought an influx of foreigners to Japan looking to take advantage of a new market. The samurai don't wish to stand in the way of progress but merely to slow it to a point where history will not be forgotten or, rather, completely erased by so-called progress.

The samurai are lead by the charismatic Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe), the last living head of a samurai clan. Once an advisor to the empower, he was cast aside for opposing the encroachment of foreigners. On the battlefield, his prowess as a tactician and warrior has helped his samurai army overcome an army with swords defeating guns.

When Ahlgren, under the command of his former Civil war Colonel Bagley (Tony Goldwyn), is forced to lead an unprepared Japanese army against Katsumoto's samurai, Ahlgren is nearly killed as his platoon of soldiers are slaughtered by the samurai. Katsumoto spares Ahlgren's life after watching him hold off several samurai with merely a broken flagpole. Ahlgren is taken as a prisoner back to the samurais’ mountain enclave. There, his wounds are tended by Katsumoto's sister, Taka (Koyuki). There is a great deal of tension in their relationship for reasons that are best left unsaid.

Ahlgren is held captive throughout the winter and he and Katsumoto develop an uneasy friendship through their quiet conversations about war. Katsumoto reads Ahlgren's journals detailing the Civil War as well as the American army's eradication of the American Indian, something Ahlgren feels gravely guilty about. Gradually, Ahlgren assimilates into the samurai culture and soon he will be forced to choose sides in an inevitable war between the past and the future of Japan.

For Cruise, The Last Samurai marks yet another stellar performance that will likely be overshadowed by his stature as a sex symbol. It doesn't seem to matter how well Cruise performs in any film, his looks and image always get the attention. It's a terrible shame because Cruise is, in my opinion, turning out some of the finest work of any actor working today. His role in The Last Samurai is deserving of a Best Actor nomination and, in a weak field, he is likely to get it. He deserves to win but he deserved to win a couple of times and did not, so I won't get my hopes up.

Watanabe may actually outshine Cruise on Oscar night. His portrayal of Katsumoto is a complicated and brilliant performance that captures the essence of what Zwick wants us to understand of the samurai. Watanabe personifies the samurai warrior code, and communicates its importance to the audience with his subtle intelligence and spirit. If he doesn't win Best Supporting Actor, I will be very disappointed.

For Zwick, The Last Samurai is another signpost on the way to a potential masterpiece. It's an epic work of directorial craftsmanship. What Zwick lacks is a signature style that tells you this is an Ed Zwick film. The Last Samurai is a slave to conventional three-act filmmaking and conventional shooting styles. It is, without a doubt, a terrific work, but it comes up short of being a masterpiece because it's too slick and stylish. The film is too easily fit into a Hollywood marketing campaign to be a significant work of art.

The Last Samurai must settle for being a terrific work of pop entertainment, a conventional Hollywood work of crafty brilliance that showcases a star at the height of his abilities and a director with the potential for greatness.