Movie Review Little Fockers

Little Fockers (2010) 

Directed by Paul Weitz

Written by John Hamburg, Larry Stuckey

Starring Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro, Blythe Danner, Dustin Hoffman, Barbra Streisand, Owen Wilson, Teri Polo

Release Date December 22nd, 2010 

Published December 23rd, 2010 

What a difference a good director makes. Director Jay Roach took the thin concept of a man meeting his girlfriend's parents for the first time and mined it for bigger laughs than were likely in the script. Stretching that thin concept for a sequel about meeting the boyfriend's parents, Roach again found laughs that other directors might not have found.

Unfortunately, for fans of “Meet the Parents” and “Meet the Fockers,” Jay Roach could see that the premise was played out and while producers pushed for “Little Fockers,” aka ‘Meet the Kids,’ the one director who might have been able to find the funny in this idea dropped out. Picking up the scraps is director Paul Weitz (American Pie) who, though not untalented, fails in every way to find something funny in vomit, booger and erectile dysfunction jokes.

When last we left the Byrnes Family Circle of Trust Gaylord 'Greg' Focker (Ben Stiller) had married Pam Byrnes and the two were expecting a child. Well, it turns out they were expecting twins and five years later, Grandpa Jack (Robert De Niro), Grandma Dina (Blythe Danner) and Focker grandparents Bernie (Dustin Hoffman) and Roz (Barbra Streisand) are coming to Chicago for a birthday party.

Meanwhile, at work Greg has been promoted to head of nursing, a gig that comes with the added bonus of a sexy drug rep named Andi (Jessica Alba) who wants to pay Greg big bucks to be a paid medical spokesman for a new erectile dysfunction drug. Andi, last name Garcia, yes that joke gets old real fast, also has a huge crush on Greg that plays out with humiliating complications and misunderstandings.

Also back for this third outing is Kevin (Owen Wilson), Pam's ex who still carries a torch for her as evidenced by a tattoo on his lower back that is one of the few gags that actually plays to big laughs in “Little Fockers.” And speaking of Little Fockers, this movie is supposed to be about the newest additions to the Focker clan. Sadly, the twins played by Daisy Tahan and Colin Baiocchi are poorly used characters who don't really become part of the action.

The Little Fockers are merely set pieces in Paul Weitz's poorly conceived plot which is  just a series of tasteless jokes and dopey misunderstandings that sometimes payoff and sometimes don't. Take Alba's drug rep for instance. One minute she is seducing Greg, in arguably the saddest moment of Jessica Alba's career, yes likely even worse than “Good Luck Chuck,” the next minute she is out of the movie with little explanation or payoff.

Two other well known actors are also marched out on screen for a moment and can consider themselves lucky to have narrowly escaped the humiliation heaped upon Ms. Alba. Harvey Keitel plays the desperately underwritten role of Greg's crooked home contractor and he plays the role solely so he and Mr. De Niro, his longtime friend and “Mean Streets” co-star can have one meaningless stare down.

Poor Laura Dern is dropped into an even less interesting and poorly fleshed out role as the head of an exclusive private school. The school is called the Little Human Academy and apparently director Paul Weitz thought that the phrase ‘Little Humans’ was funny enough that he didn't bother to include any other notable jokes for Dern, Stiller or De Niro to play in the school scenes.

Dustin Hoffman meanwhile, did not want to return for “Little Fockers.” In fact, according to sources, shooting on “Little Fockers” was five days from complete when a deal was struck for the Oscar winner to reprise his role as Bernie Focker with re-shoots needed to shoehorn Bernie into the story with embarrassing results for the poor editing team tasked with forcing Hoffman into the movie.

Embarrassing is the operative word for all of “Little Fockers” even stars Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro. Though they remain a terrific comic team with a strong instinct for each other's brand of comedy, Stiller and De Niro aren't given much good to play and thus fall back, often as possible, on the things they've done before in a fit of desperate recycling.

The few new gags the duo is given are just unfortunate, especially the erectile dysfunction bit that producers thought was hilarious enough to include in ads for the film and thus destroyed as a gag in the film. 

Little Fockers is a disaster and should have been aborted the moment Jay Roach turned down the chance to direct. Stiller and De Niro are the faces of this franchise but the talent was clearly Mr. Roach without whom everything falls to pieces. Without Roach's guiding hand “Little Fockers” plays as a series of lowbrow gags instead of being what the first two movies were, family stories that happened to include a number of lowbrow gags.

Movie Review She's Outta My League

She's Outta My League

Directed by Jim Field Smith

Written by Sean Anders, John Morris

Starring Jay Baruchel, Alice Eve, T.J Miller, Mike Vogel, Krysten Ritter

Release Date March 12th, 2010 

Published March 12th, 2010 

Anyone who thinks actor Jay Baruchel is an unlikely star of a major mainstream comedy must have never seen him on the brilliant and unfortunately brief TV series Undeclared. Baruchel was a natural comic lead, sympathetic, self deprecating and very funny. He brings that same mix of vulnerability, angst and good humor to She's out of My League and while it's not Undeclared, it is a modestly funny distraction worth the price of a movie ticket.

Kirk (Baruchel) works in airport security with his three closest pals, Stainer (TJ Miller), Devon (Nate Torrence) and Jack (Mike Vogel) because he really can't think of anything better to do. He wants to be a pilot but lacks the ambition to pursue a pilot's license, content to hang out with his friends. Kirk's life gets a jolt when by chance he catches the eye of Molly (Alice Eve) a smoking hot blonde who accidentally leaves her phone at Kirk's security post. She repays him with a date and then another date before Kirk finally understands that she is honestly, romantically interested in him.

Thanks to years of low self esteem and his friend's awful ability to have his back, Kirk has an impossible time believing a woman as beautiful and successful as Molly could really be interested in him. For her part, Molly admits to her friend Patty (Krysten Ritter) that Kirk is a safe choice because he is unlikely to break her heart.

The conflict is believable and while it plays for laughs it works as a strong roadblock for Kirk and Molly's romance. Baruchel and Alice Eve have a strong chemistry playing first the mismatch and eventually settling into a strong romantic vibe. The strength of She's out of My League is Baruchel and Eve's ability to make us care about them while the film whirls from one lowbrow gag to the next.

Playing Kirk's best friend Stainer T.J Miller tries a little too hard to be the missing member of the Knocked Up supporting cast. That said, Miller has a few strong moments, especially when he's playing in his awesome cover band "Adult Education." If you don't know what the band is covering, you aren't trying hard enough. Stainer is pivotal to the film's finish but I could have done without much of his act.

Not all of She's out of My League works but what does is very strong. Jay Baruchel has strong comic instincts and the film plays well to his strengths, vulnerability and a strong sense of who he is. Alice Eve is beautiful and rounds out the character with honesty and self awareness. The romance has depth beyond the wild gags, as the best of this kind of comedy does, and that make She's out of My League worth your time at the theater.

Movie Review: Cadillac Man

Cadillac Man (1990) 

Directed by Roger Donaldson 

Written by Ken Friedman

Starring Robin Williams, Tim Robbins, Paul Guilfoyle, Annabella Sciorra

Release Date May 18th, 1990

Published May 18th 2020

“Movies are machines that generate empathy” Roger Ebert 

My favorite theme in a movie is compassion. Watching genuine compassion from a character in a movie almost always gets to me. Cadillac Man was not a movie I expected to have compassion as a theme. On the surface, Cadillac Man is about a supremely selfish, self-involved car salesman who is taken hostage and has to use his ability to lie, cheat and steal to get himself out the jam. 

That’s just the surface, in the performance of Robin Williams as Joey, we have a desperately soul-sick man whose shallowness is beginning to wear away his will to live. He doesn’t want to die, he doesn’t even want to change too much, but Williams in his sweaty, sleezy, gesticulating performance, communicates Joey’s emotional emptiness and the desire he has to be better, even if he doesn’t realize it yet. 

Joey’s about to be forced to have the realization that he wants to be better in a highly stressful and dangerous way. As he’s desperately trying to sell cars to save his soul-sucking job, Joey winds up in the middle of a hostage situation. Into the scene comes Larry (Tim Robbins), the crazed husband of one of Joey’s co-workers, Donna (Annabella Sciorra). Donna’s been sleeping with the boss’s son, Little Jack (Paul Guilfoyle) and Larry has come to the dealership with an automatic weapon to exact revenge. 

Again, that’s the surface of the situation. Yes, Donna is cheating with the boss’s son, but Larry doesn’t really have a plan for revenge. He has the gun and what he claims are plastic explosives, but in reality, he’s the same kind of sad sack, lost soul that Joey is, only not nearly as self aware, intelligent, or brazen. Larry is like a lost child who just needs someone to care about him a little and Joey is a man who knows how to read people, sizes him up right away. 

Sensing that he can get everyone out safely, Joey turns to his skill as a salesman and sets about calming Larry down, serving his emotional needs, and almost instinctively, the goodness in Joey becomes the driving force of what comes next. For the next hour, Joey sets about becoming Larry’s friend, soothing his ego, nursing him and along the way, Joey transforms from a desperate man trying to save himself to a genuine person, who wants nothing more than to save everyone. 

That’s never on the surface of Cadillac Man. You get all of that just from Robin Williams’ incredible performance. The turn that Joey makes from self-obsessed con-artist to Larry’s friend and the protector of everyone in the car dealership happens steadily over the length of the midpoint of the movie, and through the final act. It begins as an act of a desperate man and becomes genuine compassion and empathy from one desperate, sad, man to another. 

All while this is happening director Roger Donaldson keeps up a relentless pace. Cadillac Man rarely lets up on the pace. The dialogue, the plot, the scenes, move with great quickness. Even before Larry arrives, about 40 minutes into the movie, he makes an early cameo but Robbins doesn’t arrive fully until the midpoint, the story sets the table incredibly well by introducing the competing ways in which Joey has dug himself into a seemingly inescapable hole of his own careless and callow creation. 

The opening act, with a motormouthed Joey talking directly to the camera before getting to work, allows Williams to be dynamic and of the kind of Robin Williams we know. As the act progresses though, and the walls start to crumble around Joey and this empty, selfish place he's created for himself, the film begins to take shape. Larry then enters in full chaos and shakes the foundations of the movie. Joey's resolve to keep his various lies in place begins fall down and as we watch the man reborn into a place where he is a genuine person it's fascinating to watch. 

Williams acts the role of Joey with his entire body. The sweaty energy that Williams brings to his broad stand up comedy here is inverted into drama as the quick wit searches for real answers instead of punchlines and pathos in instead of laughing payoffs. It's really rather extraordinary and unlike any other Robin Williams performance. Williams takes an empty suited, selfish, borderline villainous character, breaks him down to pieces and rebuilds him before our eyes without ever letting up on the pace of the story being told. 

Cadillac Man is desperately underrated and cruelly forgotten by time. Williams, known for his broad comedic roles, has a legend that overshadows his often brilliant dramatic work. That's why I wrote this review, I want to get people to see what I think is arguably the best Robin Williams performance. The one least seen by the masses and one that can work to remind people just how brilliant Robin Williams could be in just about any role. 

Cadillac Man is maybe my favorite movie of 1990. 

Movie Review The Crazies

The Crazies (2010) 

Directed by Breck Eisner 

Written by Scott Kosar

Starring Timothy Olyphant. Radha Mitchell, Joe Anderson

Release Date February 26th, 2010

In a world of been there, done that, sometimes the best a filmmaker can do is improve upon the things that have been done before. That is exactly what director Breck Eisner does with the pseudo-zombie flick The Crazies. Eisner takes the elements we've seen before from movies like Resident Evil or 28 Days Later or George Romero's oeuvre and simply does the same thing better or at least with a neat twist. The result is a smart, atmospheric, fast paced horror flick that entertains from beginning to end with strong characters and a clever spin on expected scenes.

Something strange is taking place in Ogden Marsh Iowa. In the midst of a High School baseball game a guy everyone in town knows wanders onto the field carrying a shotgun. The field is cleared and the man is confronted by the local sheriff, Dave Dutton (Timothy Olyphant). Dave is eventually forced to shoot and kill the man in front of most of the population of Ogden Marsh.

Later, another fine, up-standing citizen of Ogden Marsh burns down his house with his wife and child inside and no indication of a motive. Sheriff Dave, being smarter than most movie versions of small town sheriffs, quickly surmises something beyond mere coincidence in these crimes. With his deputy Russell (Joe Anderson) and his wife Judy (Radha Mitchell), Sheriff Dave discovers the sinister origins of what eventual military invaders of the town call 'The Crazies.'

To give away too much of the plot would spoil the fun of this clever, quirky and even humorous film. The humor is subjective and maybe unintentional, but I laughed a few times at the unique twists and turns of this exceptionally well made genre movie. Director Breck Eisner takes a highly familiar premise and jazzes it up with odd angles and nimble inversions of expectations.

Timothy Olyphant is the perfect star for The Crazies. He's handsome with a relaxed, good ol' boy manner. His toughness was solidified by his role on HBO's beloved Cowboy series Deadwood and he has a classic John Wayne sort of swagger that makes him just the guy you want to be behind when the stuff hits the fan.

Radha Mitchell is a slightly esoteric choice to play the sheriff's wife but she has a number of effective scenes, especially as the damsel in distress late in the film and one seriously butt kicking scene that will have audiences cheering. A hint about Mitchell's big scene: keep an eye on the three big redneck hunters who pop up at unexpected moments.

The Crazies is a genre movie that embraces its genre-ness; takes the conventions head on and is effective for the minor twists on what is expected. You've seen this type of movie before but you don't often see it with this much visual wit, skill and savvy. The Crazies is, quite surprisingly, one of my early favorites of 2010.

Movie Review: Cop Out

Cop Out (2010) 

Directed by Kevin Smith

Written by Kevin Smith

Starring Bruce Willis, Tracy Morgan, Rashida Jones, Michelle Trachtenberg

Release Date February 26th, 2010 

Published February 25th, 2010 

Let's get one thing straight, I am in fact a Kevin Smith apologist. I have loved all of Kevin's movies, yes even Jersey Girl, loved it. Thus, I remove any thought of objectivity from this review of Cop Out. I am a Kevin Smith fan and I liked Cop Out. While other critics seem to delight in trashing this harmless, filthy mouthed throwback to 80's buddy cop movies, I sat back and laughed uproariously.

Cop Out stars Bruce Willis and Tracey Morgan as detectives Jimmy Monroe and Paul Hodges. They seem like total opposites; Jimmy is laid back yet menacing while Paul is wild and outlandish. Yet, they have been partners for years with a notable reputation, good cops who tend to find trouble.

The latest trouble involves getting an informant killed and blowing a major undercover drug sting. This gets them suspended for a month. Meanwhile, Jimmy is trying to find the cash to pay for his daughter's (Michelle Trachtenberg) wedding and Paul suspects that his wife (Rashida Jones). These subplots offer funny sidelights for Jason Lee and Sean William Scott.

The meat of the plot unfolds when Jimmy gets robbed of a valuable baseball card and he and Jimmy set out to retrieve it. Naturally, the card lands in the hands of the drug dealer who they were after in the first place and none of this is really all that interesting or important. The plot of Cop Out is secondary to Smith, Willis and Morgan hamming it up in homage to the great buddy cop movies of the 80's.

Kevin Smith is the perfect director for Cop Out. The film is both a send up of and a loving tribute to goofball buddy cop movies. Smith being a virtual pop culture almanac delivers on every beat of the buddy cop movies we love right down to a synth pop score that only Harold Faltermeyer could really appreciate.

Kevin Smith, Bruce Willis and Tracey Morgan dive headlong into the parody fun not with obvious, Naked Gun style gags but by doing exactly what an 80's buddy cop movie did but with Kevin Smith style language, filled with plenty of four letter words and references that will someday make a great drinking game.

Is Cop Out a great movie? No. The plot is slapdash the subplot payoffs are meaningless and don't even start on the continuity errors. None of that however, really matters because Cop Out is what it sets out to be, a goofball tribute to the buddy cop movies that dominated the 1980's. Forget the Filmmaker Magazine critiques; this is fun stuff for an audience seeking a mindless toss back to the movies they loved in the 80's.

Movie Review Shutter Island

Shutter Island (2010)

Directed by Martin Scorsese 

Written by Laeta Kalogridis

Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Michelle Williams, Max Von Sydow, Ben Kingsley

Release Date February 19th, 2010

Published February 18th, 2010

This is one of the most difficult reviews I have ever had to write. Martin Scorsese is, arguably, the finest filmmaker I have written about in my lifetime. I have an unending amount of respect and even awe for the man and his movies. Seeing one of his films is about as close as I come to a religious experience.

So, seeing one of his films and feeling that the film came up short of my expectations is not easy. It's not that Shutter Island is a bad movie but rather that I expect so much more from a filmmaker as great as Martin Scorsese. To watch as he steps into one of the biggest movie potholes in history is a little devastating for me.

Shutter Island stars Scorsese's most frequent, recent collaborator Leonardo DiCaprio as a Federal Marshall named Teddy Daniels. Teddy with his new partner Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo) has been dispatched to a place called Shutter Island, a mental institute for the criminally insane, where a patient/inmate has gone missing.

There is no possible way that the patient, Rachel Solando (Emily Mortimer), actually escaped. Shutter Island is an actual island several chilly miles off the coast of Massachusetts. Installed on what used to be a Civil War base, Shutter Island is a forbidding structure that getting into is hard enough, getting out is unthinkable.

And yet, Rachel Solando is missing and no one seems to know how she got out. Why a Federal Marshall is needed for this case is a question never asked. Rachel didn't get off the island and is dead if she did. The hospital has a staff of ex-military and police officers for security who are searching for Rachel when the Marshalls arrive.

Teddy has a secret of his own related to the island but I will leave you to discover that. There are a number of nimble twists and turns to Scorsese's storytelling in Shutter Island. The screenplay was adapted by Laeta Kalogridis from a novel by Dennis Lehane whose novels Mystic River and Gone Baby Gone have previously been adapted into excellent movies. Ms. Kalogridis had an exceptionally daunting task in adapting Dennis Lehane's novel for a script by Martin Scorsese and that may be where the film's biggest problems lie.

The cinematic touches of Shutter Island are remarkable. Scorsese's eye is perfectly intact as he and cinematographer Robert Richardson pay homage to Hitchcock, noir detective stories and The Twilight Zone. Especially effective are Teddy's artful nightmares which contain stirring and terrifying imagery. For the visuals alone I could recommend Shutter Island.

The cast is solid as well as we continue to watch the evolution of Leonardo DiCaprio through the eyes of Martin Scorsese. In his non-Scorsese work DiCaprio's boyishness always seems to get played up. His pudgy cheeks and wet eyes were the central image of the failed Revolutionary Road, directed by Sam Mendes. Scorsese however,  pushes DiCaprio to be a man on screen and DiCaprio rises to each challenge. 

The rest of the cast is well populated with figures of menace and intrigue. Ben Kingsley and Max Von Sydow seem as if they have played the roles of the menacing doctor's at Shutter Island before. Mark Ruffalo perfectly balances insistent camaraderie with his new partner with enough skepticism to keep Teddy from suspecting him.

Emily Mortimer and Patricia Clarkson play two halves of a whole character and could not be better at getting under DiCaprio's skin. Michelle Williams rounds out the cast as Teddy's late wife and the less said about her the better. It's a very strong performance but so key to the plot that I don't want to spoil it with detail.

The final moments of Shutter Island however, for me, are a massive disappointment. I cannot go into detail because you might see the movie and disagree with my assessment. I don't want to rob you of the chance to find the ending satisfying. I didn't find it satisfying, indeed I found it insulting, especially after the exhausting and exciting journey to get there. 

Honestly, I predicted Teddy's fate from the first trailer I saw for Shutter Island several months ago. I have not read Dennis Lehane's novel, choosing to avoid it and avoid spoiling the film. Yet, I was able to predict what would happen at the end of Shutter Island. I hoped Scorsese might find a way to surprise or come up with a way to get the same conclusion in a less predictable fashion. Instead, the structure of the plot makes the ending all the more painfully predictable and irritatingly unsatisfying when it comes.

Shutter Island is exceptionally well crafted and everything that leads up to the final moments is spectacular in its cinematic detail. Sadly, the final moments are such a disappointment that recommending the film is difficult if not impossible. I guess I can’t say don’t see it; there is too much good work not to. Just be prepared for a disappointing end and the rare occasion of being disappointed by Martin Scorsese.

Movie Review: Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day (2010) 

Directed by Garry Marshall 

Written by Katherine Fugate 

Starring Jessica Alba, Patrick Dempsey, Anne Hathaway, Queen Latifah, Ashton Kutcher, Jennifer Garner

Release Date February 12th, 2010

Published February 14th, 2010 

Garry Marshall, how do I loathe thee, let me count the ways. I have loathed every inch of film you have ever cut and print. Every word on the page of one of your scripts has been like a dagger in my chest. Your magnum opus Pretty Woman is one of the most loathsome, irresponsible and despicable fantasies ever crafted.

I still have nightmares of your attempt to make an S & M themed romantic comedy starring Dan Akroyd and Rosie O'Donnell. In all seriousness, which concentric circle of hell did you escape from? Mr. Marshall's latest bit of awfulness is arguably his most banal, rendered so by having so much star power you may be to blind to realize how you're being terrorized.

Valentine's Day is ostensibly about love and its many complications played out over the hallmark crafted Holiday. 20 or some odd number of characters each has an interconnected part to play in this series of failed single romantic comedies wrapped into one massive failure.

Among the glitterati to loan there sheen to Mr. Marshall's failed vision of comic romance are Ashton Kutcher as a flower shop owner and Jennifer Garner as, prepare for the surprising twist, the best friend he's always loved but didn't know it. He's just become engaged to Morley (Jessica Alba) who is carrying on an affair with her blackberry. Meanwhile the best friend is sleeping with a married man (Patrick Dempsey).

Don't worry, like all despicable married men in romantic comedies, he's leaving his fabulously wealthy wife and children to be with his poor school teacher mistress. I must say, I did marvel at Mr. Marshall's ability to cram that many well wrung clichés into one storyline.

There are several thousand other stars in Valentine's Day including Oscar winners (Julia Roberts, Shirley MacLaine), Oscar nominees (Anne Hathaway, Queen Latifah), TV stars (Eric Dane and Dempsey both from Grey's Anatomy, Kutcher and Topher Grace from That 70's Show) and even pop stars and Twilighters (Taylor Swift and Taylor Lautner as the most vapid characters in an entirely vapid movie).

There are still countless other well known people in Valentine's Day but who really cares. At some point we in the audience belong to some weird version of Hollywood census takers, right down to the questions of demography as many characters are defined by their race in the most statistical of fashion. 

To count the ways that Valentine's Day is offensive would actually take longer than my list of reasons for hating director Garry Marshall. The film isn't merely a recycling dump of romantic clichés; it's also a garbage dump of racial and sexual stereotypes. Oh. And don't even ask about sex because despite the theme, sex is purely something that exists the night before Valentine's Day and not the day of. 

Ludicrously awful, Valentine's Day attempts to mask the odor of it's inanity with a traffic jam of celebrity. The pretty people wandering in and out of the 50 or so failed movies jammed into this one movie fails to distract from the sheer brainless insipidity of Valentine's Day.

Movie Review: An Education

An Education (2010) 

Directed by Lone Scherfig

Written by Nick Hornby

Starring Carey Mulligan, Peter Sarsgard, Alfred Molina, Rosamund Pike, Dominic Cooper, Emma Thompson

Release Date February 5th, 2010

Published March 17th, 2010 

Wading through the “A Star is Born” hype surrounding Carey Mulligan in “An Education” is a bit of a chore. Coming to the movie late as I am; research is filled with endless paeans to her brilliance and innumerable comparisons of Carey Mulligan to Audrey Hepburn. If I sound a little bitter it has nothing to do with Ms. Mulligan's actual performance. It's that I find it hard to move about the muck of repeated praise and find my own feelings.

Carey Mulligan stars in “An Education” as Jenny, a 16-year-old with dreams of Oxford University and romantic sojourns to Paris with some lovely boy of her future. Jenny's parents, Jack and Marjorie (Alfred Molina and Cara Seymour), don't mind Jenny’s daydreaming as long as it doesn't interfere with good grades and extracurricular activities such as band.

Jenny's first real distraction arrives in the form of a sports car and the charming cad inside. The cad is David and while he feigns interest in keeping Jenny’s cello from getting wet in the rain, his real interest is apparent to everyone. Jenny is naïve but not unaware. She accepts the ride home and is soon accepting much more.

David offers Jenny the life she has daydreamed about; including that romantic Parisian adventure. Meanwhile he charms her parents so thoroughly that he could have his way with Jenny in their home if he chose to. If 35-year-old David's designs on 16-year-old Jenny weren't troubling enough, he has even more sinister secrets waiting to be revealed.

“An Education” was directed by Lone Scherfig, a Danish director making her English language debut. Scherfig shows that a young girl coming of age is a relatively universal story no matter your country of origin. Many a beautiful young girl will find elements of their own lives reflected in Jenny's wide eyed willingness to be seduced. The allure of the older man, with the daddy issues inherent, is yet another seemingly universal story reflected in “An Education.”

The script from Nick Hornby, only his second screenplay, the first not based on his own work, is bittersweet, intelligent and warm in its way. Jenny's life at home is not miserable or drab, just realistically dull, as seen from the perspective of a 16-year-old girl. Hornby does a terrific job of balancing the dull home life with the adventurous life with David, never making either seem overly hellish or overly romantic.

Ms. Mulligan is a radiant presence who never overplays Jenny's youth or faux worldliness. Her talent with Jenny is capturing the moment and one in particular stands out. In a nightclub with David and his friends after a night at the symphony, Jenny smokes her first cigarette. Watch the way she balances Jenny's embarrassment with a desperate attempt to look like she belongs. It's a little detail but so knowing and a great instinctual acting moment. None of the other characters had taken notice, well aware of how young she really is, but Jenny knew and that's what Ms. Mulligan knew.

Carey Mulligan adds these seemingly minor but brilliant touches throughout “An Education.” Her supporting cast is right there with her. Peter Sarsgard has not been this good since his degenerate performance in Zach Braff's, “Garden State.” Alfred Molina deserves an Oscar nomination for his controlled doddering as Jenny's dad and Cara Seymour is the quiet soul of the film, supportive, frightened but stalwart and trusting.

It's a fabulous cast and a very well told story. So what is holding back my appreciation? There is a musty quality to “An Education.” The film is set in the 60's so, of course, the filmmakers want to give a feel for the time, I get that. What I am talking about is content not quality; it's an exceptional re-creation of period. My issue is the values and ideas of the film that feel old and dated. The link that baby boomers have to Paris as the embodiment of sophistication and romantic adventure is severed for my generation. We are more likely to think of New York or even London before Paris. The idea makes the film feel old, even if it is true for the character and her time.

Emma Thompson's cameo as an officious schoolmarm holds one of the film's other pitfalls. As she shoulders her way into the film as a representation of an authority the film simply doesn't need, Ms. Thompson’s cameo sticks out, calls attention to itself.

Finally, in the third act another actress is employed to force the ending back to an acceptable place for the simple audience. Olivia Williams plays a teacher with convenient sympathies and paves the way to a much easier ending than what may have been true for the situation.

These are minor quibbles really. “An Education” is in so many ways a brilliant movie, maybe one of the best of the year. Just, be forewarned if you are approaching “An Education” based on the amazing hype you may come away as slightly disappointed as I am.

Movie Review: Dear John

Dear John (2010) 

Directed by Lasse Hallstrom

Written by Jamie Linden 

Starring Channing Tatum, Amanda Seyfried, Henry Thomas, Richard Jenkins 

Release Date February 5th, 2010

Published February 4th, 2010 

Dear John is a romance starring actor Channing Tatum's abs and actress Amanda Seyfried's eyes. As he takes his shirt off to reveal his ripples her wide, deep eyes travel the lengths of his musculature and boom you have a movie. This will be enough to satisfy the depraved teenage girls whose eyes will also travel the full length of Mr. Tatum's tummy again and again.

For the rest of us however, those not inclined to stare longingly at Mr. Tatum's Playgirl centerfold audition, Dear John is a dreary bore of romantic cliché and moony mawkishness.

I already described the plot, he takes his shirt off, she stares, the end, but I am sure some of you would like a little more detail. After all, Dear John did not begin life as an adaptation of Jergen De Mey's bestseller The Action Hero Body but rather as an adaptation of one of Nicholas Sparks's astonishing series of simpleminded romance hits.

Dear John tells the story of John, how inventive right. John is a soldier who while home on leave in early 2001 meets cute with Savannah (Seyfried) when she loses her purse in the ocean and he dives in to save it. She's with a boy when this happens but he has a shirt on, John doesn't and his glistening, rippling self is all it takes for that guy to go away, hell I can't even remember who he was.

John joins Savannah for a party at her home and an introduction to the special needs child she spends time with seals their fate as lifetime lovers. The love birds spend the summer together, her appreciating his repeated shirtlessness, he staring longingly if emptily into her wide pool-like eyes. Things are said but nothing is more important than their respective beauty.

Then John has to ship out and since this story is set in 2001 there is a pretty big twist coming up, wink wink. Yes, 9/11 is a plot point in this dopey romance and as the film manages to make sex, romance, mental illness, war and death trivial even the deadliest terror attack in American history can be rendered inferior when compared to the romance of two extraordinarily self important beautiful people.

What is supposed to be dramatic and romantic is captured by director Lasse Hallstrom in his typically vacant, pretty postcard style. It's a style that is relatively well placed in a film about two pretty people being pretty and for those who watch with the sound off, the style may enhance the experience. This is not an option of course for most theatergoers who will have to endure dialogue so benign and simple you can hear the breeze emanating in the characters ears as they speak. Cheesy platitudes meet at the intersection exposition and bland pop music scoring to create a mind numbing throb of vapidity. 

An ode to the ab workout, Dear John succeeds in providing fantasy material for those inclined toward Channing Tatum's rippling-ness. Otherwise, the film is one massive bore that manages to trivialize war, sex, autism and yes even 9/11. It's really rather remarkable that a film could be so offensive in such a forgettable fashion. Dear John is so dull that I can hardly muster the bile to be offended by it.

Movie Review: When in Rome

When in Rome (2010) 

Directed by Mark Steven Johnson

Written by Mark Steven Johnson, David Diamond, David Weissman

Starring Kristen Bell, Josh Duhamel, Will Arnett, Jon Heder, Dax Shepard

Release Date January 29th, 2010

Published January 30th, 2010

An explanation: In the past I have been accused of being too hard on kid’s movies while going easy on cheesy romantic comedies. This is not inconsistency or hypocrisy. The fact is that children with their still forming brains in desperate need of development in the area of critical thinking must be protected. Teens and adults, the audiences for cheesy romance, need no such protection.

Fully aware of the dopey clichés of the romantic comedy, the teen and adult audience can safely view even the lamest examples of the genre with little damage. Occasionally, some of these overly familiar, simpleminded romances are so simple and so aware of their limitations that our lowered standards are appropriate and fair ways to judge them. Kristen Bell and Josh Duhamel's When in Rome is a perfect example. Dull witted with terrible supporting characters, the film has charms for the forgiving audience.

In When in Rome Kristen Bell stars as Beth a museum curator who is shocked when her little sister Joan (Alexis Dziena) shows up at her door engaged to be married. Joan is getting married to man she met on a plane and has known for about two weeks. He's from Rome and the wedding will be there forcing Beth to drop everything, including an important bit of work, to run off for two days.

At the wedding Beth meets Nick (Josh Duhamel), the Best Man. The two have a couple of charming romantic and funny moments. With Beth flubbing a couple wedding traditions and Nick's penchant for stumbling about, these two bond quickly with each other and we with them.

Naturally, it is too early in the film for them to be together. Thus, Director Mark Steven Johnson separates the two with a typical misunderstanding, this one leaving Beth drunkenly dancing in the Fountain De Amore, the Fountain of Love, where she steals some coins tossed by men searching for love. The coins are enchanted and the men will follow her back to New York to try to win her heart. So will Nick, but is one of the coins his?

Yes, the plot is lame and worse yet, several of the supporting performances are abysmal. Jon Heder plays a terribly unfunny street magician. Will Arnett wears a ridiculous wig and an even more ridiculous Italian accent as a wannabe artist. Dax Shepard is an offensively self involved male model who though enchanted struggles to like Beth as much as he likes himself.

Danny Devito is the only one among the group to salvage any dignity as a sausage magnate tries to impress Beth with gifts of meat. Devito gets a nice moment late in the film explaining the motivation behind his coin in the fountain; it's all that keeps him from being as humiliated as Heder, Arnett and Shepard.

The supporting players are, aside from Devito, pretty terrible but thankfully not so bad that they sink the whole film. That is because Kristen Bell, in her first starring role, and Josh Duhamel have such great chemistry. The two former TV stars, she on Veronica Mars, he opposite James Caan on Las Vegas, are just so darn cute together.

Bell has an edgy almost angry energy that is leavened by a great smile and ability to roll with the punches as the humiliations pile up. Duhamel undercuts his handsomeness with some good solid slapstick. Nick stumbles, walks into walls and drops down shafts and Duhamel plays the pain well. His back story as a former College Football star famous for one shocking moment on the field plays to his clumsiness.

Do not be mistaken, When in Rome is far from great. The film requires a great deal of patience and willingness to suspend judgment but for the willing Bell and Duhamel make a charming and great looking pair. While she smiles and takes her many humiliations in stride, he just stumbles about and they never stop being likable. That was enough for me to recommend When in Rome.

Movie Review: Edge of Darkness

Edge of Darkness (2010)

Directed by Martin Campbell 

Written by William Monahan, Andrew Bovell 

Starring Mel Gibson, Ray Winstone, Danny Huston

Release Date January 29th, 2010

Published January 29th, 2010 

No one is likely to forget Mel Gibson's off-screen issues anytime soon, nor should they, he's awful. From his disturbing 'Passion' to his arrest and subsequent bashing of the Jewish people, Mel Gibson's private life has become very public and it affects everything the public perceives about him. All of this is part of what makes his performance in the thriller Edge of Darkness so remarkable.

Less than 10 to 15 minutes into what you are expecting to be a rather generic thriller, based on the somewhat innocuous title and vacuous TV campaign, Mel Gibson and director Martin Campbell make you forget, if only briefly, about Mel Gibson's character issues, focus on his movie character and the snaky, violent plot in front of him.

In Edge of Darkness Mel Gibson is Boston police detective Tommy Craven. He has just welcomed home his only child, Emma (Bojana Novakovic) and brought her home. The welcome is short-lived as Emma falls ill and Tommy rushes her to the hospital. That was the plan anyway, just as Craven opens the door to his home a man calls out his name and a shotgun blast blows Emma right back through the doorway.

The violence in this scene is quick and merciless and sets the tone for the rest of the picture. Naturally, Tommy will conduct his own investigation of his daughter's murder. From here you may expect Edge of Darkness to become predictable and fall into typical thriller beats. It does not, in fact Gibson and Director Campbell forcefully make moves in this plot to avoid the typical and drive toward a narrative filled with surprise and suspense.

Lost in all of Mel Gibson's off-screen issues is the fact that he has always been exceptionally talented. His intensity, his physicality, his self effacing humor have all played a role in defining him as an actor capable of moving audiences in many different ways. He makes use of all of his gifts in Edge of Darkness and crafts his best performance since Braveheart.

Director Martin Campbell is a rising star. He was the director who re-launched the Bond series with the adrenalin fueled Casino Royale. Campbell has always been a strong action director but in Edge of Darkness he takes great care to deliver a directorial style that is free of the typical action beats and gets right to point of each scene.

There is very little wasted effort in Edge of Darkness. Take a scene where Craven is kidnapped. We've been here before, we know what to expect. All of sudden the scene is over and we are back into the plot. No talking killer, very little dialogue at all. It's a minor tweak of what is expected but it seems any departure from the expected can be a welcome change in this day and age.

Edge of Darkness does not reinvent the thriller, it's just made better. Better performances, better direction and most importantly, better Mel Gibson. After wandering off the path of stardom with his unfortunate behavior, Mel Gibson is poised for a strong career third act. Let's hope that his off-screen stuff is behind him and more films with the quality and excitement of Edge of Darkness are ahead.

Movie Review Legion

Legion (2010)

Directed by Scott Stewart

Written by Scott Stewart

Starring Paul Bettany, Adrianne Palicki, Willa Holland, Kevin Durand, Charles S. Dutton, Dennis Quaid

Release Date January 22nd, 2010

Published January 22nd, 2010 

When a movie's opening voiceover narration intones that God lost faith in humanity because 'he got tired of all the bullshit' you have to lower your expectations. Unfortunately, there just are not expectations low enough for a post-apocalyptic thriller as dopey as Legion. Paul Bettany, one of my favorite actors, stars in Legion as the archangel Michael, a General in God's Army. As God has lost faith in humanity, God sends Michael to earth with a mission. Michael however, is not going to obey orders. Seems God has ordered Michael to exterminate humanity.

Instead Michael travels to a diner in the middle of nowhere New Mexico where a disparate group of people sits patiently waiting for the plot to kick in. Among them are the diner's owner Bob (Dennis Quaid), his son Jeep (Lucas Black), Bob's old army buddy Percy (Charles S. Dutton), A WASP couple (Jon Tenney and Kate Walsh) and their bitchy daughter (Willa Holland).

Most important in this group is Charlie (Adrianne Palicki) who is with a child from some anonymous hookup but by some luck happens to be the savior of all mankind. As Michael informs Charlie, and us, if the baby is born he will lead humanity out of the darkness. Before the baby comes they must fight off God's Army of Angels led by Michael's long time friend and fellow Angel Gabriel (Kevin Durand).

The Archangel Michael is mentioned only once in the Hebrew Bible. It is said that he will stand for the people of Israel at the end of days. Not that the movie Legion gives a crap about the biblical arcana from which its main character came from. Director and co-writer Scott Stewart merely uses Angels and Archangels as a device for apocalypse. Legion exists only to place Paul Bettany in fetish wear, long leather coat, bandoleer, and lots and lots of guns, and watch him shoot people. He and the cast pile up a few bodies and then die in a particular order until the screen time runs out. Nothing much of interest happens and certainly nothing you cannot anticipate without seeing the movie.

Dennis Quaid continues a sad, pathetic career decline. It's hard to recall the last time Quaid was in a film worth watching. In Legion the most notable aspect of Quaid's performance is his dopey lopsided haircut. Yes, he gets a big moment near the end but by then you won't really care.

Paul Bettany is not the typical idea of a lead in an action movie. He brings a different energy to the role than your average action movie star might but sadly little more than looking cool in a leather jacket holding two giant machine guns is required of him. We’ve seen him do more, we want him to do more and we just don’t get it in Legion.

Little more than an idea, Legion drones and wheezes through a series of violent scenes briefly interrupted by mindless expository dialogue before reaching its violent and predictable end, Legion should be mindless fun but instead is just mindless. Remember the opening narration I mentioned about God giving up on humanity because God got tired of all the bullshit, I think I know how God might feel watching Legion.

Movie Review: Extraordinary Measures

Extraordinary Measures (2010) 

Directed by Tom Vaughn

Written by Robert Nelson Jacobs

Starring Harrison Ford, Brendan Fraser, Keri Russell

Release Date January 15th, 2010

Published January 14th, 2010

Harrison Ford reminds me of a great athlete in the late portion of a career. Not as embarrassing or sad as Joe Naimath with the Rams or Willie Mays with the Mets, but Joe Montana with the Chiefs is a good comparison. Like Montana in that late stage, Ford has lost a step but there are flashes of the old mastery of the game.

Extraordinary Measures has moments when the Harrison Ford we love shines through. Sadly, Ford is shuffled off screen far too often in favor of a turgid family melodrama that would be more at home on the ABC Family Channel than on the big screen.

Brenden Fraser is the star of Extraordinary Measures as John Crowley a father of 3 kids, 2 of whom were born with a rare genetic disorder known as Pompe. The disease will take the kids lives very young which presents John with a very difficult choice. John can spend as much time with his kids, alongside his wife Aileen (Keri Russell), or he can search for a miracle.

The search will involve flying half way across the country to Nebraska where a scientist, Dr. Robert Stonehill (Harrison Ford) has a theory that could be a cure. All that stands in there way is cash, a lot of cash, and Dr. Stonehill's cantankerous, off-putting nature. Can they raise the money, work together and cure the kids or has John made the wrong choice?

If you cannot answer that question then clearly you don't see many movies. This isn't a spoiler, the movie is based on a true story. Reporter Geeta Anand wrote the extraordinary non-fiction book The Cure about the real John and Aileen Crowley who did indeed risk everything to save their kids and the historic medical breakthroughs that risk lead to.

There was no Dr. Stonehill however; he is one of many dramatic contrivances made by director Scott Vaughan. Extraordinary Measures is a movie built on melodramatic contrivances from Dr. Stonehill being based on 2 or 3 different brilliant doctors to the odd choice to change the ages of John and Aileen Crowley's children from babies to precocious pre-tweens.

In reality John and Aileen Crowley's children were 5 months and 17 months old respectively. In the film the kids are 7 and 9 and Megan Crowley, played by Mereditch Droeger, is a precocious little plot device used with saccharine glee to push and manipulate audiences with her cuteness. 

The story as written by Geeta Anand in The Cure did not need such melodramatic embellishment. The Cure is told with a journalistic urgency that is a rush to read. It's dramatic because the story is inherently dramatic, heart-rending and moving. The movie goes for a sappy movie-ness that compromises the urgent drama in favor of faux uplift and the jerking of tears. 

Brenden Fraser is an actor I have liked a lot over the years but he is all wrong in Extraordinary Measures. With his big wet eyes and doughy physique, Fraser seems to mistake his physicality for dramatic acting. Keri Russell is capable of far more than she is given to work with here. Shuffled aside for the male bonding of Fraser and Ford, Russell cries on cue, comforts the children and is supportive and that is the extent of the role. 

Harrison Ford is not great at playing second fiddle. Though he has aged he remains compelling and charismatic, more so than the younger Mr. Fraser. The scenes they share, Ford is the more interesting actor with the more complex and interesting character and Fraser suffers in comparison.  

Returning to my earlier point about Ford compared to a great athlete, there was a night in Joe Montana's final year when he threw for over 300 yards and won a game in overtime on Monday Night Football. It was Montana's last great game. Harrison Ford, I believe has that one last great game in him but Extraordinary Measures is not it. 

There are flashes here of the roguish, grumpy charmer that we came to love all those years ago from Star Wars to Indiana Jones to Working Girl and Regarding Henry. His late career has become something of a caricature, Ford barking a line or two and going through the motions. Extraordinary Measures is one of those performances but the flashes give you hope. That one big game is still out there for Ford. Let's hope it arrives soon. 

Movie Review: Bitch Slap

Bitch Slap (2010) 

Directed by Rick Jacobson

Written by Rick Jacobson

Starring Julia Voth, Erin Cummings, America Olivo

Release Date January 8th, 2010 

Published August 4th, 2010

Checking the credits on Bitch Slap you find all the right credentials for a low budget exploitation flick. The director/producer worked for Roger Corman and Rob Tapert (Xena Warrior Princess) at different times in their careers. The cast includes one actress credited as Dubai Girl in Iron Man and another who starred in something called After Midnight: Life Behind Bars.

Those credits inform you well of what you are getting into in Bitch Slap a low budget girls and guns epic of exploitation badness. Accept it on those terms and enjoy, intellectualize it too much at your peril and disappointment.

Erin Cummings leads the cast of Bitch Slap as Hel, an undercover agent of some sort ostensibly seeking a diamond stash with her criminal cohorts Camero (America Olivo) and Trixie (Julia Voth) but really seeking a dangerous weapon wanted by terrorists. The three have kidnapped an arms dealer (Michael Hurst) and as we join the story they are removing him from the trunk.

The set up is terrific with each of the girls in various forms of fetish wear, high heels and fishnets for Hel, go go dancer mini-dress for Trixie and a ripped up tiny t-shirt and leather boots for Camero. They arrive in the hot, sweaty desert in a black muscle car with Camero packing heat and looking for a fight, Hel with her dominatrix carriage and Trixie perfectly bubble brained.

From there the girls engage in water fights, for no other reason than that there are buckets of water and the ladies look sexy wet and rolling around together, some lesbian groping, did I mention that all three girls are lesbians? And, eventually gunplay and one of the sickest girl on girl fight scenes in film history.

The plot is entirely unimportant, the film sets out to be exploitation and taken at that level it works as camp mindlessness and minor masturbatory fantasy for the teens who find it someday on late night cable. Bitch Slap is everything its creators set out to make and in that it works brilliantly.

One could ask about how exploitation movies fit into a more permissive modern society or, as the Los Angeles Times asked back in January during the film's modest theatrical run, wonder about whether Bitch Slap empowers or merely exploits women but such conversations are unimportant in relation such minor league ridiculousness as Bitch Slap.

The film exist solely as titillation and as such is successful, especially during the film's centerpiece a seemingly endless ultra-violent chick fight that rumbles past exploitation into a sort of fetishistic violence that will either make you laugh or, more disturbingly, turn you on.

I don't know if I was turned on by Bitch Slap, aside from how completely gorgeous the three leads are, but I definitely laughed. Bitch Slap has modest means and modest expectations and exceeds them effortlessly. For fans of Roger Corman, Russ Meyer, Sin City and Quentin Tarentino, Bitch Slap is silly fun, worthy of a rental with friends and lots of beer.

Movie Review Leap Year

Leap Year (2010) 

Directed by Anand Tucker

Written by Harry Elfont

Starring Amy Adams, Matthew Goode, Adam Scott 

Release Date January 8th, 2010 

Published January 8th, 2010

The women's liberation movement in the universe of film consists of empowering women economically; they all get fabulous jobs in fashion or real estate or owning uncommonly successful restaurants. The liberation stops however once they have found a man. Such is the case of the new romantic comedy Leap Year starring the plucky Amy Adams.

Adams stars in Leap Year as Anna whose job is setting up apartments for sale. She doesn't sell the apartments; she merely dresses them for sale and makes fabulous amounts of money doing it. In a rare twist, Anna has already met a man, Jeremy (Adam Scott), who shares her love of status symbols and just the right apartment.

Anna and Jeremy have been together four years and just before he leaves for Ireland on a business trip Anna gets in her head that he is finally going to propose to her, so convinced that she and a friend actually practice being surprised when he asks. No surprise to anyone who's seen the film's trailer, Jeremy doesn't ask and Anna is briefly devastated.

After Jeremy's left a plan is hatched, Anna will fly to Ireland just in time for Leap Day, February 29th, a day in Irish tradition when a woman can ask a man to marry her. Now, the liberated woman of today might ask why a holiday is needed for a woman to ask a man to marry her. The makers of Leap Year ladies are unconcerned with such questions.

The leap day thing is merely a device to propel Anna on a madcap dash to Dublin. First her plane is diverted to Scotland then she gets stranded in an Irish village called Dingle where she seeks a ride from one of the locals. The only driver available is also the local pub and hotelier, Declan (Matthew Goode).

Surprise, surprise, Anna and Declan immediately choose to dislike each other. She's a shrewish, entitled bitch and he's easygoing, handsome charmer with a secret reason for not trusting women. If your eyes weren't rolling through the back of your head as you read that you have more self control than I.

So, off they go on a trip across the Irish countryside arguing and uh-oh falling in love with all of the requisite dopey rom-com roadblocks checked off like a shopping list at a cliché outlet. No surprise then to learn, the script comes from the makers of Made of Honor and Josie and the Pussycats.

We all know how this will end, anyone who’s seen the trailer for Leap Year knows how it will end. It's a romantic comedy and experience tells us that it is the journey and not the destination when it comes to the modern rom-com. Sadly, the journey in Leap Year is mostly tedious.

I say mostly tedious because along the way, though all the predictable beats are there, somehow a few grace notes sneak in. A script polish by Oscar winner Simon Beaufoy likely brought the scene where Anna and Declan clash at a wedding and then share a romantic walk in Dublin before she meets up with Jeremy.

These few good scenes however cannot make up for the inept series of clichés that precede them. Add to that the anti-feminist vibe of the whole thing. In the end, after all of the predictable crap plays out Anna throws everything away, the job she loved, the things she worked hard for just so that she can live the life of a doting wife. Yes, she's in love but why does that require her to give up all that she was.

Leap Year is yet another movie that falls back on supposed traditional values, the lazy notion that true fulfillment for a woman can only come in a traditional marriage, their hopes and dreams be damned.  . Don't be mistaken, choosing to be a wife and mother is as feminist as getting into the rat race but when a character is presented like Anna as having her own life and job, a genuine career that she appears to love and be quite good at, that the movie simply has her chuck aside for the desperate pursuit of traditional marriage, is this movie lazily reinforcing traditional stereotypical and anti-feminist values. 

I don't think the makers of Leap Year set out to undermine the notion of a working woman. Rather, I think Leap Year is a dimwitted comedy that lazily falls back on traditional gender roles because it's easier than trying to create fully fleshed out characters with lives of their own who have to choose to make compromises and sacrifices if they want to have a family and a marriage. Leap Year has no time for complexity or even a modicum of depth. And since the film also fails at being funny, there is little else to think about than how the movie lazily reinforces stereotypes. 

I realize that I am not supposed to care. I get that the filmmakers don't want to talk about this but the ignorance of these facts is a plague that infects far too many modern so-called romances. Leap Year is just the latest symptom of said plague.

Movie Review Righteous Kill

Righteous Kill (2008) 

Directed by Jon Avnet

Written by Russell Gewirtz 

Starring Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Curtis Jackson Carla Gugino

Release Date September 12th, 2008

Published September 11th, 2008

20 years ago people buzzed about the idea of Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino working together. 20 years ago, people would have lined up around the block and Oscar voters would salivate over the chance to vote for a Pacino-DeNiro teaming. 20 Years is a long time ago. DeNiro and Pacino did tease fans a little in their brief scenes together in Michael Mann's Heat but one could argue, with the length and breadth of that film. even with one scene together, they are barely in the same movie.

Thus Righteous Kill really is the first time Pacino and DeNiro, two of the finest actors of the last 50 years have teamed up. 20 since the teaming would have had relevance and buzz, Righteous Kill arrives after DeNiro has begun to lower his profile and work less and less and after Pacino has stumbled through a series of failures.

In Righteous Kill Robert DeNiro is Turk, a detective on the beat for years. Al Pacino is his partner Rooster and together they have done questionable things to get the bad guys. Lately, someone has been doing Turk and Rooster's job for them, hunting down and killing New York's worst of the worst. A series of murders where the killer leaves behind a poem referring to the crimes committed by the deceased.

Bodies pile up like cordwood and the evidence begins to point to a cop. In fact, the evidence seems to lead right to Turk. Rooster backs his partner, but even Turk's girlfriend (Carla Gugino) , a forensics expert, seems suspicious. John Leguizamo and Donnie Wahlberg play a pair of fellow cops who also caught one of the poetry murders and come to suspect Turk.

I would love to tell you that director Jon Avnett takes this premise and uses it to keep you on the edge of your seat. I would love to be able to tell you that the plot is tight and lean and to the point but I can't. The fact is Righteous Kill is one of the sloppiest thrillers of the last decade. Though slightly better than Avnet's last teaming with Pacino, the abysmal 88 Minutes, Righteous Kill is as incomprehensible and ludicrous as any movie of the last decade.

Scenes pile up and go nowhere. Scenes of suspense and misdirection turn confusing and messy. Even as we are baffled by scenes that don't seem to make any sense, we still somehow are not the least bit surprised when the end arrives and the killer is revealed. Such is the botched effort of Righteous Kill, it's not even confusing enough to engender suspense from its own muddled nature.

As bad as Righteous Kill is, I cannot deny being compelled, ever so briefly, by DeNiro and Pacino. These two veterans, even far from the tops of their game, are still so charismatic that their talent can shine through the morass of something as awful and convoluted as this. As the film devolves and the two begin stagey speeches that go nowhere, you can't help admire the skill and commitment of these two legends.

Righteous Kill is a sloppy, slipshod effort that tries and fails to capitalize on the presence of two exceptional actors. It goes to show that no matter how good the actor, no one can overcome bad direction, bad plotting and bad editing. Really, Righteous Kill is just bad everything. Even bad DeNiro and Pacino who need to be called out for indulging such an incomprehensible mess.

Movie Review Revolutionary Road

Revolutionary Road (2008) 

Directed by Sam Mendes 

Written by Justin Haythe 

Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Kathy Bates, Michael Shannon

Release Date December 26th, 2008

Published December 25th, 2008 

I am beginning to wonder if director Sam Mendes is really just M. Night Shyamalan with neuroses. The career correlatives are compelling. They broke out together in 1999 with a pair of at least slightly overrated Oscar nominees, American Beauty and The Sixth Sense, and have ever since delivered diminishing returns.

Both directors are self consciously arty and humorless about their work. However, Mendes has yet to deliver something as career devastatingly bad as The Happening. Unlike Shyamalan's latest, Mendes' Revolutionary Road is merely bad, not a trainwreck.

Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio, our Titanic dream couple, are all growed up and sad as suburbanites Frank and April Wheeler. I call them suburbanites but Frank and April would chafe at such a label. No, despite the manicured lawn, lacquered grinning neighbors, and 2.0 kids, Frank and April are above the title suburbanite.

Or so they believe. One day, when April takes out the garbage and see's rows and rows of the exact same garbage cans on her street, she realizes that she is no different than the average, white wine in the afternoon suburban mommy. This desperate revelation inspires a wild idea for Frank's upcoming 30th birthday.

April wants to move to Paris. There, she will work and Frank can pursue himself, find whatever it is that he is. Too bad for April that Frank has given up their petty dreams and found himself a comfortable rut selling whatever a Knox 500 is. Though he initially goes along with April's wacky scheme, we know he is just playing the part of supportive husband.

We know from the beginning of Frank and April's blissful 'we're moving to Paris' phase that the rug will be pulled out from under them, the question becomes how. The answer is dramatic but also slightly inert. If you can't see where this is all heading, you're really not trying.

It's not that Revolutionary Road is devastatingly predictable. Rather, it is the way in which it is predictable. The choices that unfold and the way they unfold feel duly preconceived though we sense they are supposed to be tragic or moving. Each scene is pushily meant to symbolize Frank and April's alienation but each lingers on the point far past necessity.

Revolutionary Road is one of those films that feigns depth by dramatically being all things to all viewers. If you want to read anti-feminism or even misogyny into the work, you can. If you want to read the same suburban misanthropy of Mendes's American Beauty in Revolutionary Road, you can.

You can take individual scenes and characters and spin them off in wild, fictive fantasies of meaning and depth and the film can match whatever emotionally resonant thing you seek. For me, it all seemed an aimless mélange of sadness that relies heavily on stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet and Oscar nominee Michael Shannon to give it any meaning whatsoever.

That each of these talented actors come close to delivering through the murk of Revolutionary Road is quite a feat. Winslet especially is swimming upstream as this irrational flibbertigibbet who could set the women's movement back 20 or 30 years with the power of her suburban angst.

DiCaprio is the most comfortable in his role. With his baby fat pudge evading his man-boy status without him having to say a word, DiCaprio settles in to delve deeply into Frank's fears and desires and nearly makes it all work. If only what was surrounding him weren't so aimless.

Finally there is Michael Shannon who earns every inch of his Oscar nomination. You can debate the necessity of his character. You can fairly question his role as that of a creative device employed to craft tension but you cannot deny his intensity and resonant power. In just three scenes, Shannon devastates and exits in unforgettable fashion.

Give Sam Mendes this, like his counterpart Mr. Shyamalan, his failures are memorable. Revolutionary Road unquestionably fails but it does so in ways that you will remember and discuss long after the film is over.

Movie Review Resident Evil Afterlife 3D

Resident Evil Afterlife (2010) 

Directed by Paul W.S Anderson

Written by Paul W.S Anderson 

Starring Milla Jovovich, Ali Larter, Kim Coates, Wentworth Miller, Boris Kodjoe

Release Date September 10th, 2010 

Published September 10th, 2010 

The idea behind each of the “Resident Evil” films is watching Milla Jovovich in states of undress or in exceptionally tight fitting outfits. Jovovich is a walking fetish for director Paul W.S Anderson and a legion of geek fans who flock even to the shoddiest made films to see the object of their lust.

Now, Milla Jovavich in tight leather and in 3D threatens to make going to see “Resident Evil: Afterlife 3D” something akin to attending a porn film with greasy, glassy eyed geeks under giant coats ducking low so what they're doing cannot be seen. Sure, there are zombies and guns, but if you can’t figure the true interest of the “Resident Evil” creators and fans, consider yourself naïve but also kind of lucky. I wish I didn’t know.

In this 3rd or 4th or who the hell cares numbered sequel in the video game to movie franchise, Alice (Jovovich) is in Japan seeking the headquarters of the evil umbrella corporation. They are the ones who invented the T-Virus that has turned most of humanity into flesh eating zombies while turning Alice superhuman.

Yes, Alice is infected by the T Virus but something makes her immune and adaptive and superhuman, thus she is perfect to take on an entire army of faceless corporate mercenaries. Oh, but Alice is not alone, in a move that will no doubt please the geeks in most disturbing fashion, Alice has been cloned and several of her are on the attack in tight leather jumpsuits.

That's just the opening minutes, once we've been whittled down to just the original Alice, we get to the much more dull story of Alice's travel to Alaska seeking her former friends and the search for a place called Arcadia that claims to be a disease free paradise filled with survivors and supplies.

Soon, Alice is reunited with Claire (fellow fetish object Ali Larter) and though Claire has lost her memory, they soon are traveling to Los Angeles searching for Arcadia and more survivors. The few they find are hiding in a giant prison surrounded by the undead. Boris Kodjoe and Wentworth Miller lead a ragtag bunch of cannon fodder destined to die horribly for our amusement.

The best of the supporting cast is not one of the survivors but rather a reject from another movie, a zombie giant with an ax/hammer he intends to use to crush all non-zombies. Where did this freak come from? Why is he killing survivors and not crushing zombies? Who knows, he makes for a cool visual and a strong foe for Alice and that's all that matters.

Sadly, the zombie giant ax/hammer guy, who looks like he wandered over from the unmade sequel to Silent Hill, is not the big bad in Resident Evil Afterlife. He's barely a foe at all, dispatched in a single scene with barely a fight. I wasn't rooting for the bad guy but he was the most interesting looking thing in the film, not counting Ms. Jovovich, and the film definitely loses something after his scene ends.

Don't let me overstate, the giant ax/hammer zombie dude is certainly not enough to recommend the dull slog of zombie goofiness that is “Resident Evil Afterlife.” There is no doubt that Milla Jovavich is completely gorgeous and looks amazing but this type of puerile interest cannot sustain interest in a full length feature and is really better suited to the privacy of home viewing, even without the 3D.

Documentary Review Religulous

Religulous (2008) 

Directed by Larry Charles

Written by Documentary

Starring Bill Maher

Release Date October 1st, 2008 

Published October 1st, 2008

I struggled for a very long time with atheism. There was a sort of emptiness to not having faith in something bigger. Confronting the world knowing there was no plan, no creator who could set things right if things went horrible was a frightening concept. It was only in the wake of 9/11 that I realized the whole god thing didn't make sense for me.

Bill Maher's new documentary Religulous is the perfect movie for me because it affirmed everything I have ever believed about organized religion. Part polemic, part comedy, all passion, Religulous will anger many and convert more.

The premise is not Bill Maher trying to convince you to give up your faith. Rather, he is curious about certainty. How and why can anyone be so certain about something that cannot be proven. A number of random Americans, some at a truck stop church in a converted truck trailer, then across the US and to Israel and Palestine give Maher reasons why they believe. This however, only sets Maher off further.

The question turns on the person answering it however. How can it be faith if you feel the need to defend what you believe with proof. Maher saves his biggest satirical bombs for a trio of easy targets. Arkansas is the home of the Creation Museum, a place where people can see paintings and sculptures of people in Jesus's day and age riding dinosaurs, which proves not the coexistence of Jesus and dinosaurs, but rather, Hanna and Barbara.

Then there is the Gay No More organization where Maher encounters a very confused man who believes he is former gay thanks to Jesus. In a conversation that last maybe five minutes the man contradicts himself on the issue of being born gay. Then Maher travels to a Christian theme park where Maher is the one nearly knocked off his high horse. Ever so briefly Maher is confronted by someone, an actor playing Jesus, who has a good sound reasoning for his belief buried inside a complex metaphor.

While Religulous is a grenade throwing polemic against organized religion, and quite a powerful one when it wants to be, it's also very funny. Watching Maher with his mother confronting when they began to drift from the church is revealing and sweet. Then there is Maher's interactions in the Vatican where he encounters a pair of priests who defy conventions and work for the Vatican.

One of these wonderful old priests is the Vatican's own science expert who blows up the idea of a creation museum. Even the Vatican thinks that's crazy. The other knocks his own church for its excesses and simply urges people to believe regardless of where or why. This gregarious gentlemen is no doubt a favorite of Maher's, interviewed right outside the Vatican, he laughs off nearly all of the hardcore believers in his urging toward a faith that doesn't require proof.

The final thesis of Religulous turns on the dangers and excesses of organized religion. It's about the need to check the beliefs of our leaders before we elect them. How religious beliefs can be a danger to the world when the powerful mix with the faithful. President Bush is an evangelical christian who believes the world will end in his lifetime. How do you figure that belief plays into his views on the environment? Or our current economic crisis? If you don't believe there is a future beyond your lifetime, what do you care if the thieves are robbing the temple? 

When Congress opens a session with a prayer, how many of those Senators are praying to a god they believe will return in their lifetime?

Can you trust a politician who tells you they can leave their faith at the door? How can you tell you at every turn how much their faith shapes what they believe? The next time a politician tells you they believe in the state of Israel shouldn't you ask them if they believe it is because the Jewish people deserve a homeland or because they believe that Israel is where Jesus will return and the Jews need to be there to be converted or die when he comes back?

These issues of the faith of our political leaders are dangerous to us all and need to be checked. Somehow it has become taboo to question people about faith. Thus, who better than the former host of Politically Incorrect to force the question.

Will Religulous give some people the urge to abandon their faith? Maybe. But if you are truly a person of faith nothing should shake that. The real, relative importance of Religion is to ask you to be smarter about faith and the faithful. There are inherent dangers in being blindly certain of just about anything. Blind certainty, blind faith, these are as dangerous to all as they are comforting to some. Bill Maher shines a light on these dangers and hopes that satire is the best way to illuminate them.

For those who think Maher is simply being mocking and self-serving , the comedian states clearly that he is not certain there is no god. Rather, he states plainly, he just doesn't know. He has a lot of questions and the people who try to answer them often only make things worse.

Movie Review Replicas

Replicas (2019) 

Directed by Jeffrey Nachmanoff 

Written by Chad St. John

Starring Keanu Reeves, Thomas Middleditch, Alice Eve, John Ortiz

Release Date January 11th, 2019

Published January 11th, 2019

Replicas isn’t as bad as I assumed it would be. Instead, Replicas are just bad in a more bland and general fashion. Where I have spent the last couple of days praising Keanu Reeves’ blank slate approach to being an action hero, here that blankness is more dead eyed and bored. Reeves isn’t holding back to give the audience an avatar, he’s checked out in the way that big time actors can tend to check out when they are just collecting a paycheck.

In Replicas, Keanu Reeves stars as Bill, a big shot scientist attempting to copy a human mind into a computer. We watch as a dead body arrives having only died hours before. This dead man volunteered to have his brain mapped and attempted to be copied and put into a robot. Unfortunately, the man’s mind rejects the robot body, even going so far as to try and punch its own mind out.

With this failure it appears that Bill might lose his job and the company itself may go out of business according to Bill’s boss, Jones (John Ortiz). Meanwhile, Bill is leaving on vacation that same day. Bill’s family are going to take out a boat owned by Bill’s co-worker Ed (Thomas Middleditch) but unfortunately, on the way to the boat, Bill and his family are in a car wreck that kills Bill’s wife (Alice Eve) and their three children.

Devastated in the immediate aftermath of the accident, Bill doesn’t contact the authorities. Instead, he calls Ed and has him bring his brain mapping equipment. Bill then sets about copying the minds of his wife and children as he did the dead man in his experiment. You might assume from this that he is going to make robot copies of his family, given that is what has been introduced already but you would be wrong.

Turns out, Ed is an expert in cloning and Bill wants Ed to clone his dead family. The two then set about stealing 4 million dollars worth of company property and taking three cloning pods and various genetic materials to Bill’s home. They do this despite the security protocols the script setup prior to this scene. Ed tells Bill that in 17 days, if all goes well, he will have three members of his family back but it will be up to him to choose which three and whether he can give them the memories and personalities they once had.

Have you got all of that nonsense because the film is so convoluted you might need to take notes. And yet, the film is equally as empty headed as it is overcomplicated. Keanu Reeves could not possibly care less about this movie. Take for instance the car wreck aftermath scenes. Keanu reacts to the death of his family with the same level of concern one might have for being cut off in traffic, he appears aggravated with a touch of confusion.

Middleditch meanwhile has exactly zero chemistry with Reeves despite the two apparently being close friends, according to the script. Middleditch is a mess of tics and awkward attempts at humor and while it is similar to his work on HBO’s Silicon Valley it doesn’t fit the serious tone cultivated by director Jeffrey Nachmanoff, a television veteran whose only other feature was the similarly sedate and confused Traitor in 2008.

Nachmanoff also wrote the screenplay for the similarly overstuffed The Day After Tomorrow. Much like that film, Replicas is a jumble of competing ideas. We start with a robot and then leap over to cloning. The cloning is relatively meaningless as it only leads to a series of action movie confrontations and a chase scene. The clones wind up being a plot driver but there is little consequence to the clones as characters.

Alice Eve is completely wasted in the role of wife and clone wife. The young star who made a strong impression in Star Trek a few years ago has almost zero presence in Replicas. You might expect from this premise that the clones would have a sinister air, perhaps a Twilight Zone like consequence, but no, they’re just perfect copies of Bill’s family, minus his young daughter because he only had three pods.

The film tries to mine some depth from Bill erasing his youngest daughter from the clones’ memories but Keanu Reeves can’t be bothered to express any genuine angst over this development and thus we don’t care much either. Much like how he reacted to the death of his family, Reeves’ Bill appears mildly befuddled by the decision to erase his daughter. Then, with no build up or drama, he eventually just tells his wife she’s a clone and that he erased their daughter. What should have been an important moment plays like Bill admitting he was the one who ate the last of pudding pops.

Replicas are really dopey but, to be fair, I was expecting a trainwreck. The film’s trailer and marketing campaign made the film appear to be something akin to a Tommy Wiseau movie, minus the charm. Keanu Reeves is bored, Thomas Middleditch is irksome and Alice Eve is absent. Replicas are forgettably bad, just competent enough for it to slip your memory just as quickly as you leave the theater.