Movie Review: The Secret Life of Bees

The Secret Life of Bees (2008) 

Director Gina Prince Blythewood 

Written by Gina Prince Blythewood 

Starring Dakota Fanning, Queen Latifah, Alicia Keys Jennifer Russell, Sophie Okenedo, Paul Bettany

Release Date October 17th, 2008

Published October 16th, 2008 

The Secret Life of Bees is one of the most manipulative movies ever made. It takes lovable little Dakota Fanning, she of the apple cheeks and blond curls, and has her utter lines about being unlovable and never knowing her mom. Then, she is given a picture of her late, dead, mother holding her when she is a baby.

If you can get through these scenes without bawling like a baby you are a better man than me. Yes, The Secret Life of Bees is Machiavellian in it's pushy way but my heart did ache for this little girl and yes, I did cry. In an early 1960's I'm sure of someone's memory, if not exactly the collective historical memory, a little girl named Lily (Dakota Fanning) is running away from her bullying father (Paul Bettany). With her caretaker Rosaleen (Jennifer Hudson) in tow, Lilly makes her way to a small town in South Carolina where a memory of her mother exists.

A scrap of paper with a black Mother Mary on it leads Lilly and Rosaleen to a bright pink house where three sisters, August (Queen Latifah), June (Alicia Keyes) and May (Sophie Okenedo), live in a bright  make a very good living cultivating and selling honey. Lilly's mother indeed has a lingering presence here and though she tries to be a stranger, August knows the little girl isn't here by accident. Running parallel to Lilly's journey are the racial politics of the early 1960's. June spends her time registering voters while Rosaleen is beaten up for trying to register.

The racial politics get only a blush, the focus of director Gina Prince Blythewood's story remains focused on Lilly and her journey toward accepting her tragic past and the role of her mother in her life all too briefly. In sticking to this story, Blythewood is blessed with Fanning's winning innocence and Queen Latifah's comforting motherly presence. The scenes between Latifah and Fanning are charged with joy and sadness and love that permeates the whole production of The Secret Life of Bees. The film radiates warmth and good feelings, pausing only briefly to acknowledge the ugliness of the time period.

Many will fault The Secret Life Of Bees for not taking more care to describe the challenges of the timeperiod. Many of those criticisms will likely fall on the character of May played by Sophie Okenedo. Her character provides shorthand for dealing with the sadness of the times. It's a cheat, there is no denying it, but I willingly looked past it toward what is very good about The Secret Life of Bees because what is good, is often very good. 

And that good comes from Latifah and Fanning whose warm glow engulfs the audience and allows them and us to forget about all of the ugliness in the world, then and now, for just a little while. Yes, the moments are manipulative but they are manipulative in ways that work. I cried. I never cry. That tells me all I need to know about the effectiveness of The Secret Life of Bees.

Movie Review: The Savages

The Savages (2007) 

Directed by Tamara Jenkins

Written by Tamara Jenkins 

Starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Laura Linney, Phillip Bosco 

Release Date November 28th, 2007

Published January 31st 2008 

Brother and Siste, John (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) and Wendy (Laura Linney) Savage, haven't heard from their father in more than 20 years. That isn't such a bad thing, he wasn't a very good father anyway. Now, as he drifts off into dementia, he is thrust back into their lives. Having lived with a woman in Arizona for years when she passes away, dad is now their problem whether they like it or not. Placing dad in a nursing home not far from John's Buffalo new York home, John seems content to wait for dad's last days. Wendy on the other hand is a mess of concern who fusses and worries and searches for a home that will dress up dad's last days with a nice view and some fresh air.

Directed by Tamara Jenkins, inconspicuous since her hip debut flick Slums of Beverly Hills nearly a decade ago, The Savages plays realistically with a sad situation. So real that you may want to prepare yourselves with a bottle of anti-depressants or at least a bowl of ice cream. The sad story is compounded by Jenkins' script which offers these characters nothing beyond grief and sadness. Aside from moments of dark humor that are more apparent to us than to them, John and Wendy live lives of perpetual depression and disappointment.

Essentially, both characters begin the movie miserable. They become progressively more miserable during the story, and then, finally, end up back where they started but with a vague hint of possible good fortune tacked on to the end. The oppressive sadness of The Savages is its defining characteristic, even beyond the strong lead performances of Hoffman and Linney, Linney even having been Oscar nominated for this role. Not every movie has to be entertaining or leave the audience with hope or inspiration. Life doesn't always put a perfect little bow on things and it can be welcome when a movie so readily acknowledges that not everything is perfect. That said, The Savages is not itself, a welcome respite from the sunny aspiration of so many other family dramas, The Savages rather, is simply too sad. It is too oppressive, too unpleasant even for the sad subject at its center.

I was taken back to my feelings about Paul Greengrass's exceptional 9/11 movie United 93. Everything about that film, from an artistic standpoint, was phenomenal and yet I couldn't find one reason to recommend people go see it. Why anyone would want to live those moments again, no matter how skillfully rendered, was simply beyond me. I feel the same way about The Savages. Even with the skilled performances of Hoffman and Linney and director Tamara Jenkins' well demonstrated skills, I can't see one reason why anyone would want the depressing experience of The Savages.

I would love to tell you that you could marvel at Laura Linney's remarkable range or Phillip Seymour Hoffman's uncanny ability for communicating soul deep sadness, but as remarkably realistic as these performances are, the result is so sad, heartbreaking, and relentless that there is simply no way I can recommend it. The Savages is a rare movie that is too good for its own good. It's so well acted and well crafted that it leaves you deeply, woefully sad in a deeply unpleasant fashion that proves to be too much for any general audience movie. 

Movie Review: The Santa Clause 2

The Santa Clause 2 (2002) 

Directed by Michael Lembeck 

Written by Don Rhymer, Cinco Paul, Ken Daurio, Ed Decker, John J. Strauss 

Starring Tim Allen, Elizabeth Mitchell, Judge Reinhold, Wendy Crewson, David Krumholz 

Release Date November 1st 2002

Published October 31st, 2002 

How can a movie whose premise begins with a guy accidentally killing Santa Claus become a huge family hit? Have it star one of TV's biggest stars and slap that Disney label on it, that's how. Unfortunately for Tim Allen, his non-Santa roles have been like coal in a Christmas stocking. With the exception of his voice work in the Toy Story movies and the modest success of Galaxy Quest, Allan has yet to have a real blockbuster since he donned Santa's trademark clothes. So it only makes sense that Allan would once again put on the beard and the belly, what doesn't make sense is how a sequel could be so much better than it's original.

As we rejoin the man formerly known as Scott Calvin, now St. Nick, he is overseeing the creation of this year's toy supply with the help of his top assistant Bernard (David Krumholz) and Santa's top gadget elf, Curtis (Spencer Breslin). Everything is ship shape until Santa gets the naughty list and finds his son Charlie is on it. Charlie (Eric Lloyd) has been acting out in school, in part to get attention from a girl, but also to rebel against his school's Christmas hating Principal Mrs. Newman (the lovely Elizabeth Mitchell).

To make matters worse the elves have a secret to tell Santa. It seems there is another clause (ho ho) in the Santa contract called the Mrs. Clause. Essentially, Santa has to get married by Christmas Eve or he will no longer be Santa and there will no longer be a Christmas. So Santa must return to his old life as Scott, but before he goes he agrees to be cloned so that the elves won't be worried while he's gone. The clone unfortunately is a nut who threatens to give all the kids in the world coal. 

Scott doesn't know that though because he is back home dealing with Charlie as well as his ex-wife (Wendy Crewson), and her new husband (the ever goofy Judge Reinhold). With the help of his ex-wife he begins going out on a series of bad dates while feuding with Charlie's shrewish principal. If you need to be told what happens between Scott and the principal you might need to buy my new book, Genre Movies for Dummies.

Reminiscent of another recent genre film, the horror movie Ghost Ship, Santa Clause 2 isn't about where the story is going but about how it gets there. Garish sets and charming lead performances by Allen and Mitchell combine with a sweet, if entirely predictable, script for a film that is far better than the sum of it's parts. Considering that it took 5 credited screenwriters, and two more writers with Story credit, it's a miracle that The Santa Clause 2 is even remotely coherent, let alone entertaining. 

The script is surprisingly sharp especially the opening which parodies classic sub-movie clichés with the North Pole running full silent at Elfcon One as they avoid the sonar detection of a weather plane. Also funny is Santa's meeting with fellow legends Mother Nature (Aiesha Tyler), Cupid (Kevin Pollack), The Tooth Fairy (Art La Fleuer) and Father Time (Peter Boyle). These ace supporting players are having an absolute ball in this otherwise superfluous scene and I loved it. 

As I look back on Santa Clause 2, the holes in the plot grow bigger and the problems I ignored at first glance become more pronounced. Still I have to go with my initial gut reaction which was that I laughed a lot watching this film. For all of my irony soaked bravado about my indie movie loving credentials, I am forced to admit that I laughed a lot while watching a formula Disney holiday movie credited to FIVE screenwriters. Credit veteran TV director Michael Lembeck, in his feature debut, with creating a fun and lively atmosphere and allowing Allan's quick wit and charm to work around the script holes. Lembeck performed an absolutely incredible trick getting this shambles of a story into shape, smartly allowing a veteran cast to punch up the loose material with big laughs.

I would describe The Santa Clause 2 as a genre film guilty pleasure. A movie I am nearly ashamed to say I liked, but like it I did.

Movie Review: The Salton Sea

The Salton Sea (2002) 

Directed by D.J Caruso

Written by Tony Gayton 

Starring Val Kilmer, Vincent D'Onofrio, Adam Goldberg, Luis Guzman, Peter Sarsgard 

Release Date April 26th, 2002 

Published Apil 25th, 2002 

Stories about Val Kilmer's attitude and ego have clouded such varied productions as The Doors, Batman Forever, and Mission To Mars. It's been reported that on the set of Mission To Mars Kilmer and co-star Tom Sizemore actually came to blows. No matter what is said about Kilmer's attitude, his talent is undeniable, even though his ability to choose good material is questionable (At First Sight, The Saint), But when he does get good material, Kilmer is as good as anyone working today. In the thriller The Salton Sea, Kilmer has excellent material and he is more than equal to it.

Directed by feature film first-timer DJ Caruso, The Salton Sea at first stars Kilmer as our unnamed narrator. Sitting in a burning hotel room holding a trumpet and surrounded by flaming dollar bills, we get a sense of an unfolding noir, but as the narrator leads into his story we get so much more. As our narrator explains he isn't sure who he really is. At one point he was Tom Van Allen, a jazz musician weeks away from marrying the girl of his dreams, Liz (Chandra West). Most recently he was Danny Parker, a speed freak turned police informant. How Tom becomes Danny is told in a flashback within a flashback. To explain that further would destroy one of the films great plot twists. Let's just say that the connection is a little strained but pays off well.

As Danny, our narrator explains his dealings with two cops, Morgan played by The Green Mile's Doug Hutchinson and Garcetti played by the ever reliable Anthony LaPaglia. To keep the cops from busting him, Danny offers to help the cops catch a drug dealer named Pooh Bear. Vincent D'onfrio plays Pooh Bear, one of the most unique and fascinating film characters in a long time. As Pooh Bear, D'onofrio communicates menace with a nasal southern drawl made scarier by the fact that the character has no nose. 

You see, in the lore of The Salton Sea, Pooh Bear sniffed so much speed that his nose had to be removed. He covers the hole in his face with a plastic nose that when taken off delivers a visual punch not soon forgotten. Pooh Bear's unique hobbies include recreating the Kennedy Assassination with pet pigeons in place of the president and Mrs. Kennedy, and torturing his enemies by setting rabid animals loose on their exposed genitals. These unusual traits could make for an over the top and unbelievable character but Pooh Bear's strange southern folksiness and D'onofrio's amazing talent bring the character down to earth and make the character frighteningly believable.

The Salton Sea twists and turns like a combination of Memento and Pulp Fiction run through a blender. Writer Tony Gayton, whose previous credit was the slick detective story Murder By Numbers, here shows a flair for dialogue and characters that is very unexpected when compared to the prepackaged thriller characters he previously put in place. With Director DJ Caruso providing the grimy imagery and Gayton drawing uniquely wild characters, The Salton Sea transcends it's comparisons to stand on it's own as an exciting grunge noir. Though it's not as good as Pulp Fiction or Memento, The Salton Sea shows that it's creators have the potential to do something great.

Val Kilmer and Vincent D'ofrio each deliver career best performances in The Salton Sea. While they could easily have relied on character quirks and lazily gotten by, both actors appear deeply invested in these characters and giving them life. They are both weird and complicated, just the kind of juicy role that a Capital A Actor would want, neither Kilmer or D'onofrio are resting on the wilder aspects of their character. Both actors masterful compel the audience through their energy, the emotion, and the physical presence of these characters. By making Danny and Pooh Bear plausible they make them feel real, even as each are recognizable as characters within an outsized, manipulated noir mystery universe. 

The Salton Sea is one of the best movies of 2002. 

Movie Review: The Rundown

The Rundown (2003) 

Directed by Peter Berg 

Written by R.J Stewart, James Vanderbilt 

Starring Dwayne The Rock Johnson, Seann William Scott, Christopher Walken, Rosario Dawson

Release Date September 26th, 2003 

Published September 25th, 2003 

After The Scorpion King made Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson a viable action superstar, many were quick to anoint him as the heir apparent to the Schwarzenegger-Stallone action star crown. The Rock need only prove himself in a film that wasn't connected to a previously successful vehicle (Scorpion King being a continuation of a character from The Mummy franchise).That proof of The Rock's star-power comes with his star turn in The Rundown, an action comedy that pairs the Rock's muscles with the motor mouth comedy of Seann William Scott for a fun action spectacle.

In The Rundown The Rock takes on the role of Beck, a henchman for some kind of mob figure. After failing to retrieve a debt for his boss, Beck is given the option of one more job. This job that will get Beck the money he needs to get out of the thug business and into his dream gig, owning a restaurant. However, this not your everyday gig for a thug. Instead, this job involves going into the dangerous jungles of Brazil to capture the mobster’s erstwhile son and return him to Los Angeles. 

On the surface, that might sounds simple enough but when Beck gets to the city of El Dorado, or as the locals have dubbed it, Helldorado, it's hot, it's dangerous and it's run by a whacked-out nut job played by Christopher Walken. Beck is quick to find the kid, Travis (Seann William Scott), but Walken's weirdo dictator and his wacky henchmen have plans of their own for Travis. Seems the kid has happened upon the whereabouts of a valuable artifact that could be worth millions.

Walken isn't the only one with designs on Travis either. Jungle rebels lead by the lovely Marianna (Rosario Dawson) also want to get their hands on the artifact so that they can get their people out from under Walken's tyrannous reign. This leaves Beck stuck in the middle of all of the fighting between Walken's thugs, the rebel’s, and in one scene some various amorous monkeys. And Beck is also fighting with Travis who's motor mouth is far more brutal than his fighting.

The Rundown is predictable, certainly not high minded or idealistic. What the movie does have going for it however, is some fun action scenes, some truly brutal looking stunt work, and a strong enough amount of wit provided by The Rock's put upon performance. Johnson's incredulous reactions to the numerous indignities visited upon his character is the film’s strongest source of comedy. That and it's physical humor which has the Rock hanging upside down, fighting monkeys and getting beat up by a group of Brazilian Little People. 

The films stunt work does press the boundaries of believability, such as an early scene where Rock and Scott roll down a hill and take a brutal amount of punishment. It's nothing a little suspension of disbelief can't get you past but it does feel a bit excessive. As directed by Peter Berg, The Rundown combines the kind of 80's style action movie where no one runs out of bullets with the 90's style action movie where you shoot and pause for an ironic aside before shooting again. It's clichéd but the actors make it tolerable with fun, witty, and knowing performances.

And then, Christopher Walken delivers yet another of his iconic weirdo performances. Be sure to watch out for a particularly peculiar rant from Walken's would be dictator about the tooth fairy. It's a bizarrely long monologue that is delivered in a way that only Christopher Walken could deliver it. Walken gives this monologue with his entire being, his fully physicality embodies this moment. It's completely outside of the movie and stops the whole story dead in its tracks but, it's worth it because Walken is incredibly entertaining. 

Even with a show stealer like Christopher Walken however, The Rundown belongs to The Rock, who I realize wants to be known as Dwayne Johnson but as a wrestling fan he will always be The Rock to me. Top lining his first stand-alone action vehicle, The Rock oozes the kind of star quality that you just can't teach. It's a great star making performance in a film that I hope will make him a star for good. The action genre needs The Rock's cool and charisma to carry it over clichéd plots and endless violence of stock action movies like The Ruindown. 

Movie Review: The Runaways

The Runaways (2010) 

Directed by Fioria Sigismondi 

Written by Fioria Sigismondi 

Starring Kristen Stewart, Dakota Fanning, Michael Shannon 

Release Date March 19th, 2010 

Published March 18th, 2010 

No wonder we are so hyper-vigilant about teen sexuality these days. Apparently in the 1970's every adult in the country was looking the other way. How else to explain how “The Runaways” became overnight sensations selling the sexuality of 15 year old lead singer Cherie Currie all the way to world tours and platinum records.

Now, I'm sure there was outrage at the time but that is not in the movie “The Runaways.” Instead we get a film that is as eager to capitalize on the sexuality of 16 year old Dakota Fanning as much as real life record exec Kim Fowley, portrayed in the film by Oscar nominee Michael Shannon, who eagerly and greedily exploited the real Cherie Currie.

Based on Currie's biographical account of her life, “Neon Angel,” “The Runaways” stars Fanning as the David Bowie influenced Currie and “Twiilght's” Kristen Stewart as the Suzy Quatro loving Joan Jett. Thrust together by record exec Kim Fowley, who saw the novel possibilities of an all girl punk band just as punk was bubbling up to the mainstream, the two teenagers from broken homes bonded and made memorable music and more together.

Find my full length review at Beat.Media 

Movie Review: The Ruins

The Ruins (2008) 

Directed by Carter Smith 

Written by Scott Smith 

Starring Jonathan Tucker, Jena Malone, Shawn Ashmore, Laura Ramsey, Joe Anderson 

Release Date April 4th, 2008

Published April 3rd, 2008 

For the past couple of years we have been saddled with horror porn assaulting moviegoers across the country with the ugliest possible images sick minds could think to film. This has served to both cause many critics to wretch uncontrollably and to distract critics from the other forms of junk horror being dumped onto the other screens. Take for instance The Ruins a goofball horror flick too squeamish to be horror porn but not smart enough or wild enough to be in the intellectual vain of Saw or the freewheeling thrills of Nightmare on Elm Street. Rather, The Ruins settles in to that awkward middle ground inhabited by junk horror like The Ring and The Grudge and other such ’The’ horror films.

Jonathan Tucker stars in The Ruins as Jeff a med student on vacation with his girlfriend Jenny (Jena Malone), her best friend Stacy (Laura Ramsey), and Stacy's boyfriend Eric (Shawn Ashmore). Together they have spent the week lounging by the pool and getting drunker and drunker. On their last day at this Mexican resort they have been enticed by a fellow traveler named Mathias (John Anderson) to get away from the drinks and the pool and get some culture. Mathias has a map to some ancient ruins that is not on any of the sanctioned maps of the countryside.

They will journey deep into the jungle where Mathias expects his brother will be waiting for them. The trip is not all that arduous, they find the ruins with little challenge. However, once they arrive at the ruins the tourists find themselves surrounded by locals who won’t let them leave. Their only option is to climb to the top of the ruins and hope the locals will leave. When the locals refuse to follow them and instead begin to quarantine the area, our heroes quickly realize there is something very wrong with these ruins. The vines and weeds that surround the the giant temple are coming to life and soon the ancient curse will reveal itself.

If we wanted to try and apply a meaning to The Ruins, perhaps, we could infer that he weeds that surround the ruins and begin sucking bodies into them, hissing at our heroes, crawling into and out of their bodies, could be seen as some kind of drug metaphor. The movie kind of reminded me of those extremely lame and heavy-handed ONDCP ads that show kids burning their possessions or building weed cocoons and emerging as middle aged fat guys. It's possible that the makers of The Ruins could be positing an anti-pot message that says if you smoke weed it invades your entire body, eating you from the inside out but that's a big stretch. Nothing in the movie indicates that anything means anything beyond being kind of gross. 

The Ruins is based on a novel by Scott B. Smith, and directed by Carter Smith and is typical of the junk horror genre that has delivered movies like Turistas or Cabin Fever. It features some of the same cardboard characters, the same shallow anti-American stereotypes, and the same Clearasil splashed teen heartthrobs who seem to gravitate toward death by serial killer or supernatural force in movies like this. There is absolutely nothing special, memorable, or remotely interesting in The Ruins. The film enacts a familiar plot in the most basic way, provides a couple of grossout moments and is over so fast you will likely forget you saw it before you get to your car.