Club Parnassus

In Theaters: Hellboy II: The Golden Army

2008-07-17T14:43:00.002-05:00

I was planning to maybe do something bigger for post number two hundred (which this is), but there are too many other things I want to do first. I'll get to what I was planning later, it's not really time sensitive, but I want to deal with the backlog first.

An unlikely sequel to a film that didn’t make a lot of money to start with, HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY delivers just about everything the first movie did, and a bit more. I liked HELLBOY when I first saw it, and subsequent viewings made me see how well put together a film it really is. This second cinematic outing for Mike Mignola’s unique comics hero is just as entertaining, possibly more so, and after SPEED RACER’s hasty departure from theaters it’s good to have another kind of wild imaginative fantasy to entertain us. There’s a lot to love in this movie, one which manages to be rich and colorful and action-packed while still doing right by its characters.

The film revolves around the legend of the faerie folk, who used to live alongside mankind but have since been forced into the shadows. A long time ago there was a war, which the fey fought with an army of indestructible robotic soldiers who were, you guessed it, gold. A truce was called, and the faerie king (Roy Dotrice) broke up the crown which controlled the army into three pieces. Cut to the present day, where faerie prince Nuada (Luke Goss) has had enough of humanity’s encroachment on their kind, and sets out to retrieve the pieces of the crown- starting with one being sold at auction in Manhattan, which he purloins by killing everyone present.

Enter Hellboy (Ron Perlman). He’s a demon by birth, but was raised from infancy by a human professor (John Hurt) as a result of a transdimensional incident back in WWII, and is now an agent for the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense, working under the exasperated Tom Manning (Jeffrey Tambor.) He lives with his fellow agent and girlfriend Liz Sherman (Selma Blair), who can immolate things in a wide radius, sometimes without even trying. They’ve been having relationship difficulties, which don’t dissipate when an investigation of the Manhattan incident suddenly makes the top secret bureau not so secret. As they get dragged further into the investigation, the noncorporeal but highly authoritarian Johann Krauss (voiced by FAMILY GUY creator Seth MacFarlane) is brought in to try and keep Hellboy under control (it doesn’t work so well), and intellectual amphibian Abe Sapien (Doug Jones) finds himself falling for Nuada’s twin sister Nuala (Anna Walton), who holds a piece of the crown.

This is both a superhero movie of sorts and a monster movie of an entirely different sort, Hellboy himself having been created in a nexus between genres. Influenced in equal parts by H. P. Lovecraft and Marvel comics, Hellboy’s world is one full of nasty squiggly things out to destroy humanity and ancient horrors whose names have been lost to recorded history. Meanwhile, the character himself is a gruff, cigar-chomping bruiser who solves most problems with his stone-like right hand, or if that’s not enough, really big guns.

Having mostly done battle with a horde of tentacled hounds in the first movie, Hellboy now faces a much wider variety of monsters in the employ of the Prince. There’s a horde of carnivorous fairies with huge teeth, a troll looking like he’s stepped out of Middle Earth, a giant forest god, and a few other surprises. It’s almost like a Ray Harryhausen film, where the plot is geared to introduce as many strange creatures as the budget will allow. However, the story isn’t weak because of this; Hellboy continues to crave acceptance from the world around him and Liz in particular, a plotline that diverges significantly from the comics (wherein the BPRD has been public knowledge from the start and Hellboy is a beloved figure) but provides a good character arc without bogging the proceedings down in angst. Abe’s affection for Nuala- who like him, can sense people on a deeper level than us mortals- is played with a similar light touch. Some bits of the plot are kind of predictable, but others do genuinely manage to take us by surprise.

The casting of Ron Perlman as Hellboy was inspired from the start, and the attitude he brings with him helps define the tenor of the whole film. He’s a straightforward and unpretentious kind of guy, fond of TV, beer, jazz LPs, 8-track tapes and other pop culture miscellany. He’s got a messy room and an inclination to punch first and ask questions later. Despite being a demon (who regularly files his horns down into circular stumps), he’s a working joe who isn’t fazed by much, and this helps keep the film grounded. Guillermo Del Toro can give us flights of fancy, show us the wonders of a troll market, the pomp of a faerie court, and moments that are downright poetic, but lest the film take anything too seriously Hellboy and his misfit teammates are there to pop any pretension. Perlman is as on form as ever, and Doug Jones, fresh of an amazing tour de force in Del Toro’s PAN’S LABYRINTH, finally gets to provide the voice of Abe Sapien as well as the body. (In the first film he was dubbed over by David Hyde Pierce at the studio’s insistence, though Pierce, to his credit, refused to be credited.)

The effects in this film are worth remarking upon, if only because they look about twice as good as they cost. The film’s budget was around seventy-five million dollars, which sadly is not that much for a genre film anymore, but not only is there an awful lot of effects work in this picture, it looks brilliant. The combination of CGI and practical work is very smooth, and the look of the film is utterly splendid, rich in reds and golds. The battle with the forest giant has a particularly elegiac ending, of the sort you don’t expect to see.

Flaws crop up here and there, the biggest of which is that Selma Blair as Liz does not get a whole lot to do. She apparently got the short straw as far as character development, and though she has a couple of good scenes her characterization actually feels less consistent than it was in the previous film. I’m not sure how that works. I’m not entirely sure all of the plot holds together, and a couple of story elements- well, they’ll make HELLBOY III complicated if/when that gets made.

My overall impression of this film, though, is that it’s just packed with entertaining things. You have monster fights. You have ancient cities and sinister fairy tale creatures entering the world. You have a love story between an albino and a fish. You have a man made of gas living inside a pressure suit trying to give orders to a surly reformed demon. You have relationship troubles between said demon and a woman who catches fire. And when you think they’ve run out of tricks, we get a song.

In short, this is quality. It’s high on imagination and low on anything that would dilute it, even writing out the “viewpoint” character from the last movie (an agreeable but ultimately redundant figure played by Rupert Evans.) There’s very little of it that doesn’t work, and what doesn’t is quickly glossed over in the mix. It may be a while before we see HELLBOY III, as Del Toro is planning an extended visit to Hobbiton in the near future, but I can’t say we’ve been left unsatisfied.

Based on the comic book created by Mike Mignola
Story by Mike Mignola and Guillermo Del Toro
Written for the screen and directed by Guillermo Del Toro

Grade: A-

Random Movie Report #51: The Man Who Laughs

2008-07-09T14:46:00.001-05:00

This is unfortunate. Because this blog’s had a spate of perhaps unusually positive reviews as of late, I suppose you’re all wondering where the vitriol went if there ever was any. Some of it has gone into another project, where it’ll have to wait, but that’s not my decision. And I really didn’t want it to be this movie.

Make no mistake, I am not the sort of person who cannot appreciate silent films. I enjoy a lot of them; the pure visual storytelling and the creative freedom of pre-sound cinema (which took decades to recover) have a unique appeal, and though you have to roll the dice when it comes to whatever the distributor has put on the soundtrack sometimes you get lucky. (Goodtimes Home Video, of all places, put a really evocative score on an old VHS release of THE THIEF OF BAGHDAD which I treasure dearly.) My problems with THE MAN WHO LAUGHS don’t entirely stem from its age, either. It’s a melodrama, of course, so it hasn’t aged that well, but beyond that there’s a narrative clumsiness that works against the film’s visual style and fine performances, and really makes it hard to get absorbed at all. Perhaps audiences of the day expected this sort of thing or were willing to look beyond it to enjoy the spectacle, but THE MAN WHO LAUGHS simply places too many obstacles in front of what should be a compelling story.

Conrad Veidt stars as Gwynplaine, the lost heir of English nobility, his face carved into a perpetual grin by gypsy surgeons under the order of King James II (Sam De Grasse) and his scheming jester Barkilphedro (Brandon Hurst.) He’s raised by a philosopher named Ursus (Cesare Gravina), and travels with him and the blind, beautiful Dea (Mary Philbin), an orphaned blind girl whom our hero brought to Ursus’ door. They follow carnivals and such, Gwynplaine appearing as The Laughing Man, an acclaimed clown. One of the gypsy surgeon people (George Siegmann) who abandoned Gwynplaine in the rush to get out of England before sees him at the carnival, and this information gets into the hands of Barkilphedro again, who this time is working for the Duchess Josiana (Olga Baclanova), who inherited the lands that rightfully belong to Gwynplaine. She happens to see the Man Who Laughs at the carnival and even tries to seduce him, but when word gets back that she’ll have to marry this man to keep her fortune, she breaks down and shuns him. He, meanwhile, is really in love with Dea, but is ashamed of his deformity which she can’t see. Meanwhile, Barkilphedro is planning... something, and complications abound.

The whole film starts promisingly enough, and the basic premise is a good one. But Victor Hugo was writing at a time when the novel was expected to pile on as many complications as the manuscript could contain, and very little seems to have been cut. There is so much going on here, which I would usually class under “good”, but so little of it actually adds anything. The characters remain two-dimensional at best; the Duchess is spoiled and shallow, Dea is sweet and pure, Barkilphedro is Just Plain Evil, etc. The whole virgin/whore thing works against the “don’t judge people by their appearances” moral, at least in the sense that we’re told we don’t have to extend our empathy to those bastards and really only need care about our protagonist and his one true love.

The major problem of all the pageantry and coming and going from court to carnival is simply this: for huge stretches of time the film fails to be about Gwynplaine at all. Now, I understand Conrad Veidt had to apply a pretty painful appliance to keep his face locked in a grotesque toothy grin, and it shows to great effect. Perhaps this limited how much they could actually show him- not to mention, contemporary audiences were easily disturbed by anything freakish, as Tod Browning would discover a few years later. But Gwynplaine is off screen so much that we genuinely run the risk of forgetting about him, and the sense of his loneliness and anxiety, which should be the focus, is diluted by everything else going on.

The first encounter between him and Josiana takes place nearly halfway into the film, and then she disappears until the third act. Particularly maddening, and probably the breaking point for me, is a stretch of film after Gwynplaine is hauled off to jail for some reason. Ursus follows him there, sees a coffin carried out of the prison, and assumes without asking anyone who might know anything that they’ve killed his adopted son. On this assumption he runs distraught back to the carnival, and in some attempt to keep from breaking the news to Dea, he pretends to put on the show with the other clowns impersonating audience members and cheering for Gwynplaine. This is actually a very well-staged scene in some ways, with great acting and some neat camera tricks (including the multiple fade technique popular at the time, superimposing transparent faces on the background as they tell for Gwynplaine), but it’s undermined by the fact that in order for it to happen you have to assume that A) Ursus is prone to leaping to wild conclusions and not bothering to double-check anything and B) Dea is not only blind but possesses the IQ of a pigeon.

Not helping anything is the soundtrack. This is for all intents and purposes a silent picture, but in 1928 those were starting to go out of fashion, and for this and future releases Universal added a sort of psuedo-track including the score, a number of sound effects, some indistinct voices (including many calling for Gwynplaine in the scene mentioned above), and a song. The kind of really slow boring love song that became a SIMPSONS joke, and which I instantly muted. And really, little of the sound works; the carnival sequences become insufferable because the track is full of high pitched bells and yells and other shrill tones that take the whole thing from “potentially good montage” to “DEAR GOD MAKE IT STOP.” The music is nondescript at best and at worst just as shrill as the sound effects- all quavering strings and the occasional hit of brass, it runs wall to wall without ever adding anything. Perhaps my viewing experience would have been improved if I’d muted the sound and put on something I liked better, but this is what Universal wanted us to hear and I can’t give the film a pass for this.

Of course, I’m looking at this logically. Perhaps this is my problem. Most of the praise for this film is for the material that has nothing to do with the plot. To be sure, director Paul Leni knows what he is doing. The film looks great, it’s well-shot and sumptuously produced. Leni was of the Expressionist school and the film was at times criticized for being the most German-looking film ever set in England, but that’s okay. And he’s good with the actors too- Veidt is marvelous, Baclanova is so sultry and compelling I wish the story didn’t hate her character so much, and Philbin doesn’t get much to do but embodies that ancient kind of movie star glamour where just sitting in place and being photographed was enough to astound anyone setting foot inside a cinema. For me, all the moodiness wasn’t quite enough, because the clunky story kept intruding (whereas in similarly story-light and melodramatic silent films like METROPOLIS or CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI the plot knows well enough to step back and let us be dazzled.)

What Leni and writer J. Grubb Alexander ought to have done at an early stage is gone in and taken an axe to the story. Some really merciless hacking and rearranging would possibly result in a compelling narrative focused on the travails of a man made a freak and his search for love and happiness in the world. It would have been just as melodramatic and shameless in its tearjerking- more so, even, because there’d be less in the way. At an hour and fifty minutes the film was easily long enough and some of the complications of the final act are so arbitrary and require not just Dea but Gwynplaine to so completely lack all powers of perception that it’s obvious they’re just trying to drag this out. A good melodrama does not have to do this, or at least if it does, the audience doesn’t notice because the writers have retroactively made these complications natural and intuitive. I actually have to say that in the last fifteen minutes or so the film does actually get going; Gwynplaine gets a nice speech (or the closest you can get to a speech in a silent), suddenly action and swashbuckling breaks out, townsfolk get in a huff, it’s the sort of thing Old Hollywood was really good at. It’s just not enough to redeem the movie.

I was a bit shocked to find out that the acclaim for this film was as unanimous as it is, and again, I see where everyone else is coming from. There’s a lot of skill on display here, from Paul Leni, from the actors, from the cinematographer and editor, etc. Now, of course, when I defend an underrated film I will hold to the premise that I am right and everyone else is Wrong Wrong Wrong because that sort of argument requires conviction. Going after a film everyone likes is harder, I feel like a bastard doing it and in this case, I’m dealing with an old classic and have to wonder if I’m not too modern-minded to get it. But of course, THE MAN WHO LAUGHS doesn’t need my support and if you like silent movies you’ve either seen this already or you’ll want to for reference. (Also, this movie is apparently where they got the idea for Batman’s archnemesis the Joker, so respect for that is due.)

Nonetheless, as far as I can see, this is a bad film. A bad film made by very talented people, mind you, at some expense, but with a storyline that feels free to completely leave its most interesting character out for long stretches of time and lead him by the nose at others. It is the natural inclination of the melodramatic tearjerker to have a number of really important things going on all at once, but this time the point of the picture gets lost in the confusion. Sometimes great acting or great visuals can indeed make up for problems in a film’s story; here, the problems are just too fundamental. I’d love a movie with the same characters, same actors, same director, etc. in a plot that could do them all justice. This isn’t it.

From the novel by Victor Hugo
Adaptation by J. Grubb Alexander
Directed by Paul Leni

Grade: D+

In Theaters: Wall-E

2008-07-07T23:39:00.004-05:00

WALL-E is not only possibly the best picture of the year, it’s the best science fiction film in a year and a half at least. It’s getting kind of boring to talk about Pixar delivering yet another great animated epic, but even by their standards they may have created something special here. It’s a film that’s almost as dialogue-thin as 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, that tugs on the heartstrings as much as E.T., and that manages the level of social commentary of just about every science fiction film of the early Seventies, but without the unbearable preachiness. Despite all these comparisons, it’s unique. It’s original, something we don’t see enough of from the major studios, and it even defies some of the conventions that Pixar itself is associated with. Above all, though- look at ‘im! He’s adorable! Aww!

Wall-E (voiced, in a sense, by veteran sound effects creator Ben Burtt) is the last of a group of clean-up robots tasked with squaring away the litter of a terminally polluted Earth. Mankind has long since abandoned the planet, and Wall-E is left alone to crush garbage into cubes and stack it in giant towers. In his isolation he has gone a little eccentric; he preserves objects he finds interesting, makes friends with a cockroach, and listens to showtunes as he works. One day, however, his routine is disrupted by the arrival of an Apple-sleek, vaguely feminine robot named EVE (voiced by Elissa Knight), whose mysterious directive involves zooming around scanning the landscape. A friendship of sorts is kindled, and Wall-E has often longed for someone to hold hands with, but when he shows her a plant he discovered, her directive kicks in. A probe ship takes her and the plant away, Wall-E in tow, heading towards the Axiom, a giant worldship carrying all of humanity. They’ve been waiting for Earth to become habitable again for 700 years- at least that’s the mission statement, but in the meantime the species has become entirely fat and sedentary, whizzing about on floating chairs and cared for by the ship’s computer and countless helper robots who really run the Axiom. Worse, when Eve is brought up to the computer to make her report, the plant has gone missing. Eve and Wall-E get carted off as malfunctioning robots, and an unintended prison break has them chased by robot security guards and still trying to find out the fate of the missing plant.

Critics so far have expressed a preference for the film’s first act, in its wordless simplicity and desolate beauty as Wall-E and EVE form a relationship. To be sure, it works brilliantly in and of itself. But the rest of the film shouldn’t be dismissed as lesser, not by a long shot. The shift of tone when we reach the Axiom is jarring, but we end up in the midst of a sparkly, shiny dystopia dominated by consumerism and inactivity, a surprisingly sharp bit of social criticism for a children’s film. But here’s where it gets interesting; the film is not callous towards humanity, even after it’s trashed its home and locked itself in stasis. During his visit Wall-E manages to knock a few people out of their slumber, and when they wake up and look around, they’re not scared by reality, they embrace it. The people in this film aren’t selfish, and as a matter of fact, I’m not sure any character in the film fits that description. What they are is locked in a pattern, and this holds for the robots as well. It takes a force like Wall-E, a new element, to shake them out of it.

The animation continues to extend Pixar’s high standards, with a number of shots that would work perfectly well for a live action feature. The level of detail is utterly amazing, whether we’re dealing with the junk-encrusted Earth or the sparkling Axiom. Weirdly enough, there’s even some live action in the picture, seen on electronic video screens and billboards.

The film mostly forgoes the familiar tradition of having well-known actors and actresses voice the major parts. Burtt “voices” the main character (and several other robots) through his use of sound effects and voice modulation, and the ship’s autopilot is voiced by Apple’s Macintalk text-to-speech system. Sigourney Weaver, Kathy Najimy, and Pixar vet John Ratzenberger all have parts, but they’re outshone by the nearly wordless protagonists. There’s also the immortal Fred Willard appearing in the live action pieces as the President of the world-dominating Buy-N-Large corporation.

Of course, much of what makes Wall-E work is in the simple appeal of the main character. He’s cute, he’s humble, he’s friendly and curious. He’s attracted to EVE first out of his loneliness, but soon sees the virtue of her “directive” and works to preserve the life of the little plant that holds the key to mankind’s future. I’m not sure he ever fully understands what this is all about, but he knows that it’s EVE’s mission and seems to have a respect for all living things.

WALL-E is an extremely intelligent picture that manages to be very simple and fun at the same time. It’s a film with many layers, but it can be engaged with on the most basic level as the story of a lonely robot in love. It has just the right combination of passion and elegance, sweetness and sophistication. Definitely the picture to beat for overall excellence this year.

Written and Directed by Andrew Stanton

Grade: A

Random Movie Report #50: Kingdom of the Spiders

2008-06-30T11:59:00.003-05:00

I wanted to do something special for the fiftieth installment of this feature, which is kind of difficult since how can any “random” report be special? But this qualifies. It’s random because I came across the DVD at a Vintage Stock, but it’s special because this is a bit of an old favorite. KINGDOM OF THE SPIDERS was a film that both terrified and fascinated me when I was much younger, and it pretty much has that same quality now. I’m not an arachnophobe by any means, but spiders can in certain circumstances give me the willies. And hundreds of them crawling all over people and leaping at your face and biting away will no doubt terrify anyone. It goes without saying that arachnaphobics shouldn’t see this movie; Hell, I apologize for that last sentence and for including the DVD cover. Of course, spider... enthusiasts, I guess is the word, might not want to see this movie, for reasons I’ll get into later. But beyond the basic “spiders EVERYWHERE” element, this is a solid thriller that’s decently written, makes good use of its modest budget, and contains a genuinely good performance by William Shatner (well, mostly good.)

The Shat, as he has come to be known, plays “Rack” Hansen, a veterinarian in the small Arizona town of Verde Valley. He’s called out to look at a sick calf owned by Walter Colby (Woody Strode), a struggling farmer hoping to win a prize at the upcoming county fair. The calf dies quickly, and a baffled Hansen sends a saliva sample out to be examined; the local university sends out an astoundingly good-looking entymologist named Diane Ashley (Tiffany Bolling), who has figured out that the calf died from a massive overdose of spider venom. It seems the local tarantulas, their normal food sources killed off by DDT and other pesticides, are ganging up together (something spiders normally don’t do) to bring down larger prey. Colby destroys the “spider hill” next to his farm, but it soon becomes clear the spiders are in this for the long haul, and work their way up to human targets. Soon the entire town is under siege, and just in time for the fair. Oops.

It’s not hard to pick up elements of JAWS and THE BIRDS in this story, and it particularly mirrors the latter in its gradual build-up to the scenes where the animals start attacking. The pace of the film is quite deliberate, and takes a while to really get going. The good news is that the early scenes are really quite entertaining; the characters are nicely defined in that broad suspense thriller way, and more importantly they’re likable. The writing is solid, even clever at times, and though some scenes don’t immediately move the story along they do establish the people and the town in a way that makes the attack resonate more (again, this seems to be a common tack in “nature’s revenge” movies, and may be what I felt was missing in CLOVERFIELD: a sense of community.)

When the spiders finally commence to attackin’, it’s pretty intense, and it may be for the best that the film gives us a breather beforehand. The filmmakers coralled hundreds of the spiders by putting up a general offer for $10 per tarantula, and you can honestly tell that there are a lot of real spiders running around, even in shots where they might have gotten away with fakes (of which there are a few as well). Sadly, as this was a low budget production and done before the ASPCA vetted such things very carefully, it’s plainly obvious that a number of spiders are getting stepped on, thrown from heights or otherwise sent to their maker. Heck, even putting so many tarantulas together on screen was probably hazardous; they are, by nature, solitary and territorial creatures who don’t tolerate each other’s company for long. Some films have been banned in various countries for such blatant animal cruelty, and most famously the makers of the film LIZARD IN A WOMAN’S SKIN had to provide evidence to an Italian court that they had not in fact killed a dog on screen, and yet this film has never received the slightest reprimand or protest. I suppose it’s unfortunate that so many gave their lives, but what’s done is done. (It’s also a bit of a wonder that so many actors and extras consented to being covered in spiders.)

It’s interesting to see how the spiders are actually used on film; since they can’t be trained, the film can’t be terribly elaborate in showing the spiders creeping up on and overruning their prey (except in an early scene using a number of “spider-cam” shots). Instead, they simply seem to materialize, not so much moving as manifesting, which itself is pretty freaky. I suppose this is the root of arachnophobia; a spider generally won’t be inclined to leap at you and bite you, but that they could if they wanted to has to give somebody pause. (Of course, tarantula bites are much like bee stings, painful but harmless unless you’re allergic.) At one point, a recently attacked vacationer says, “One moment they weren’t there, and the next moment they were everywhere!” The simple wrongness of this is very effective.

As I’ve said before, this film gives us William Shatner, an actor who can go from easygoing to scenery-chewing in seconds flat, in one of his better turns. I think at heart the key to Shatner’s acting is that he was trained theatrically; whenever he has a Big Moment, it’s best not to be too close to the screen. There are a couple of scenes like that here, but for the most part Rack is a level headed guy, and so Shatner is mostly in his charismatic, affable mode. He seems to be having some fun, and Bolling makes a nice foil for him. Shatner’s then-wife even shows up, as Rack’s widowed sister-in-law who carries a bit of a torch, and at some point she also ends up overrun by spiders. Somehow the two stayed together for 17 years after this, so make of that what you will. Western veteran Strode is one of many solid character actors rounding out the lineup. The music is interesting, some of it recognizable from old TWILIGHT ZONE episodes while other material seems to be needle-drop, except for four original songs by country artist Dorsey Burnette, including the oddly upbeat opening theme “Peaceful Verde Valley.” He’s actually kind of good, albeit totally out of place.

KINGDOM OF THE SPIDERS is not a great movie, and the debate over whether it was worth dozens of arachnid soul may not be settled anytime soon (bear in mind I’m not even sure if any such debate has taken place.) But it’s a great example of low budget horror filmmaking done right, using a limited number of resources- in this case, Shatner, a country musician, a modest stunt budget, and thousands of tarantulas- to create a genuinely scary experience. Honestly, it’s a shame there hasn’t been a Special Edition DVD yet.

Story by Stephen Lodge and Jeffrey M. Sneller
Written by Richard Robinson and Alan Caillou
Directed by John “Bud” Cardos

Grade: B+

In Theaters: The Incredible Hulk

2008-06-22T16:04:00.001-05:00

So I finally got around to seeing THE INCREDIBLE HULK, delayed as I was by wanting to review the 2003 film first. This entry, which both continues and restarts the franchise at the same time, is being touted as more actiony and less burdened by drama, which is a fair assessment. It’ll please comic fans disappointed by the first movie, but it’s not too bad for those of us who liked the Ang Lee approach either; it’s obviously been made with some care and doesn’t go completely by the numbers. To be sure, sacrificing character development for action has its drawbacks, and the film has been the victim of some behind the scenes editing drama which unfortunately is detectable on screen. It’s not quite all it could be, but it does deliver what you want out of a Hulk movie.

Edward Norton (who helped write the picture, though he doesn’t receive screenplay credit) takes on the role of Bruce Banner, hiding out in Brazil and working on trying to tame the monster inside him. General Ross (William Hurt) is still trying to track him down, and hires mercenary super-soldier Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth) to head up an anti-Hulk task force. But there’s a wrinkle- apparently the experiment that made Bruce all greenish was covertly sponsored by the military in an attempt to develop super soldiers. They’re still working on this, and after an attempt to catch Hulk in Brazil fails disastrously, Blonsky volunteers for a test of the latest super soldier serum. Meanwhile, Bruce has made anonymous contact with a scientist researching gamma radiation poisoning, and he needs the data from the experiment that transformed him. So he makes his way back to the United States, and to the university where the experiment took place. Still working there is Betty Ross (Liv Tyler this time), who hasn’t spoken to Bruce in about a year but hasn’t forgotten about him. She wants to help, and when the military try to capture Bruce on campus, he Hulks out, breaks several of Blonsky’s bones, and escapes with Betty in tow. Blonsky, thanks to the serum, heals remarkably quickly, and soon desires more power so he can battle the Hulk on equal terms. The results of his experimentation are not pretty.

This is not entirely a sequel to the Ang Lee film- we get an origin story in the opening credits that differs a bit- but it’s not entirely a reboot either, and since I liked the earlier movie I decided to take this as a follow-up. In any case the movie benefits from not having to do the origin over again (at least not in any detail); we’re able to jump straight to the action and the plot moves at a steady pace. Even in the slower moments the momentum carries us along, and I wasn’t ever bored.

I could have been impressed more, though. Various stories have gone around about how Marvel and Universal clashed with Edward Norton over the final assembly of the film (with actual director Louis Leterrier apparently undecided), and how Norton wanted more of the script’s psychological and character moments kept in. From at least one account the cut footage totaled about 70 minutes, and though I wonder if I would have noticed this had I not known beforehand, the film bears the marks of some very rigorous editing. Some character relationships seem underdeveloped, most notably Blonsky’s adversarial obsession with the Hulk. I’m not entirely sure of his character’s motivation overall, which is a problem since he’s the villain and unless you’re going for a Michael Meyers “unknowable evil” approach you do want to make clear what the baddie intends to get out of being bad. I think it’s just a fanatical devotion to his initial assignment and wanting to defeat his selected foe by any means necessary, but it could also be a desire to be the strongest and the best at what he does. (And what he does ain’t- sorry, jumped franchises there.) It’s kind of vague. You also have Brazilian model/actress Débora Nascimento as an unnaturally lovely bottling plant worker who theoretically has some chemistry with Bruce, and you can tell that this part was probably bigger at some point because she has no apparent purpose in the final cut. Other characters and elements of the story seem abbreviated as well, and though the plot can still be followed easily, it doesn’t have as much emotional and visceral oomph as it should.

Norton gives a fine performance, and he was a good choice from the start; he has the right blend of vulnerability and intensity, and manages some good comic timing as well. Liv Tyler, though she’s fairly sympathetic, doesn’t make a huge impact as Betty, and I’m starting to think this may be an inherently thankless role. William Hurt also seems flat as General Ross; his style of underplaying is hard to put to really good use, and he may just have been phoning this in. To compensate, though, Roth is superb, and character actor Tim Blake Nelson puts in a very welcome appearance.

Then there’s the Hulk himself, looking more realistic this time around (though I regret the loss of the purple shorts. Visual restraint be damned!) and finally going toe to toe with a monster that’s nearly as brawny. The effects are superb and the action sequences well directed- as I said they don’t have as much impact as they could, but it’s definitely fun to watch, and the final battle is actually pretty intense. I’m happy to report that the Hulk still leaps through the air with the greatest of ease, and has a few lines even, with a voice provided by none other than Lou Ferigno, who also shows up in an extended cameo. Comic fans will get a lot of nice easter eggs in this one, including a tease for a possible sequel villain and a well-advertised one scene appearance by a certain cool exec with a heart of steel.

The tone of this movie shifts a bit, perhaps due to the aforementioned cuts, but overall it’s not quite as serious as its predecessor and more clipped. It’s fun even if it doesn’t blow you away, and perhaps that’s too much to ask of a big summer movie; at heart these things have to appeal to a broad audience, and sometimes accomplishing this requires sacrificing some power. So this Hulk is, ultimately, not the strongest one there is- but it’s still well made and entertaining. I’d like to see a longer version sometime, and since we’ve gotten extended editions of several other Marvel movies I have hopes that this’ll happen. In the meantime, THE INCREDIBLE HULK does what it says on the tin, and well enough for me to recommend it.

I still think the version with the jellyfish was better, though.

Based on the comic character created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
Written by Zak Penn
Directed by Louis Leterrier

Grade: B

Academy of the Underrated: Hulk

2008-06-20T13:19:00.002-05:00

I felt I couldn’t go to see the new INCREDIBLE HULK movie without taking a look back at its predecessor first. Ang Lee’s HULK was, well, controversial to say the least. Its negative reception was and is kind of dispiriting, because it’s a case of audiences (and comic book fans in particular) punishing ambition. The major criticism of the film was that it had too much psychodrama and character business and not enough of the Hulk actually smashing things, and I can still remember when we used to WANT big summer blockbuster movies to be intelligent and not just string action setpieces together. HULK is, to be sure, slower than the norm, particularly in the first half, but there are definitely over-the-top thrills to be had, and more importantly the pace is in service of a good story. It’s a compelling work about fathers and their children that captures the over-the-top melodrama of the Marvel comics which gave birth to old green-skin, and doesn’t skimp on the wild visuals either.

The plot of the film embellishes the beast’s gamma-soaked origins quite a bit. Bruce Banner (played as an adult by Eric Bana) is the son of an eccentric scientist performing biochemical research for the military, and has apparently inherited some of the weird cellular regenerative properties that dad tested on himself before Brucie was conceived (at least I think that’s how that went.) Bruce was sent to a foster family at an early age after something happened to mom and dad, and doesn’t really notice any genetic abnormalities until, as a scientist working on nano-medicines, gets exposed to a big dose of gamma radiation. Soon after the accident he’s contacted by his father, now played by Nick Nolte in a particularly ragged state (so, casual day), who’s interested in what changes may happen to his son. Bruce spurns his not-really-loving-or-particularly-compassionate father, but soon finds that stress and anger turn him into the Hulk, a giant green monster with limitless strength and no apparent weaknesses. He’s captured by the military, at first for safety reasons, but then becomes the target of scientific experiments by Banner’s unscrupulous rival (Josh Lucas), and this, well it doesn’t make him happy.

The plot is actually not as messy as I make it sound. Lee uses some quick transitions to get us to the present day, going back later to fill in the blanks on Bruce’s troubled childhood. In truth it’s the story of two father and child pairings, the second being Bruce’s co-worker Betty Ross (Jennifer Connelly) and her father (Sam Elliott), a general. Their relationship is more strained than anything else; her father is also devoted to his work above anything else and she has trouble fitting into his life. It’s ironic that so soon after Fathers’ Day I’m writing a review of a film in which bad fathers play so much of a role. The major conflict at the film’s center is that Bruce is still his father’s son and manipulated by him from a distance. It doesn’t help when dad decides to expose himself to the nano-gamma combo and becomes a literal parasite able to absorb the properties of anything he touches. The metaphorical nature of his and to some extent Bruce’s powers is very comic booky and especially in-tune with the way Marvel in the Sixties did things; folks like Stan Lee (who has a cameo in the film alongside Lou Ferigno) and Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, et. al., had a way of matching personalities to powers in a way that helped the characters they created resonate with the public. Here it becomes downright Freudian.

Also in a nod to the comic medium, Lee employs an arsenal of unusual frame-like scene and shot transitions that juxtapose his images spatially as well as sequentially. It creates an effect that’s evocative of comic panels, but also uses the motion of film to good effect. There are a number of dreams and montages in the picture as well, creating a surreal and almost poetic effect; briefly seen, but incredibly memorable, is a shot of jellyfish hanging over a desert landscape like space aliens. For all the psychodrama in this film, Lee isn’t afraid of being unrealistic; the Hulk has his trademark purple shorts and bright green skin, leaps through the air with such distance that he almost seems to fly, and treats tanks, helicopters, and missiles like they’re his toys. Indeed there’s something deliberately childlike about the Hulk’s appearance and behavior in this film, suggesting that this is something that Bruce has buried for a very long time.

To be fair to its critics, I must say that the film is slow and possibly more than it needs to be. It’s a good forty minutes or so before the Hulk makes his first appearance, and that’s deliberately shrouded and dark in a horror-movie-style rampage through a laboratory. Of course, looking at it objectively, I don’t see how a film in which the green monster destroys a lab, three mutant dogs (in a scene much criticized but kind of fun, really), an underground base, tanks, and helicopters, and even rides a jet into the stratosphere, can really be called short on action. The film is deliberately paced but it does give us some genuinely over-the-top scenes of carnage and destruction.

I actually wonder if our minimum standards for what constitutes sufficient action in a movie, especially a superhero movie, haven’t risen over the last decade. SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE, after the scene wherein Krypton is destroyed, features a lengthy sequence of Clark Kent growing up in Smallville, discovering his heritage, and traveling to the North Pole or nearabouts to build his fortress and meet his birth father. It has to be an hour into the film before he actually dons the costume. Would modern audiences stand for this, or for his failure to punch anyone in the entire film? (Reaction to SUPERMAN RETURNS suggests no.) I sometimes scoff at the idea that our attention spans are dropping, but this gives me pause. Granted, the Hulk is identified with smashing things even more than the average hero, but if slow buildups now aren’t allowed at all we may be in trouble.

The effects for the film are a bit below expectations- it’s hard to make a character like the Hulk realistically in CGI, though the new film seems to be closer to the mark- but I have to say the overall surreal style of the picture makes this less of a problem. Bana is fairly convincing throughout, though Connelly kind of gets lost in the background- she’s a fine actress but somehow she doesn’t make a big impression. Nolte is mostly good, but has a couple of bits near the end where he goes overboard. The climax of this film is particularly disliked, as it’s a bit obtuse as to the literal action, but I think it works thematically, and in a movie like this the thematic comes close to being the literal. That’s a big part of the appeal of superhero comics, we see abstract things like rage and justice and revenge and insanity given form and physically pitted against each other.

This, then, is the ultimate triumph of Ang Lee’s HULK; it’s a film which takes a story of family and abuse and transmission of rage through generations and turns it into the story of a giant green monster destroying things. It’s almost like a PG-13 version of David Cronenberg’s THE BROOD in that sense, and though it’s not for all tastes, viewed with an open mind it’s a bit of a minor classic. I’m enthusiastic about the new HULK movie, I hope it’s even better, and I’ll likely have seen it by the time you read this. But we as audience members should have room for more daring superhero movies that don’t play by all the rules we set for them. Genre should never be a straitjacket, nor should adaptation, and we shouldn’t let our ideas of what things should be make us unable to enjoy things that are quite good as they are.

Based on the comic book created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
Story by James Schamus
Screenplay by John Turman, Michael France, and James Schamus
Directed by Ang Lee
Grade: A-

Random Movie Report #49: Trancers

2008-06-19T13:45:00.003-05:00

The TRANCERS series is interesting in that nobody seems to have heard of it yet it’s got as many entries as the STAR WARS saga. The reason for this, of course, is that it’s a Charles Band production, and though he had yet to found the Full Moon studio known for direct-to-video epics like the PUPPET MASTER series and DOCTOR MORDRID, his ability to exploit a concept as much as the law would allow was already being developed. I eventually decided I was curious as to just what this series was and rented the first film on that basis, and it’s an odd one. A mash-up of popular sci-fi imagery from the mid-Eighties, the picture makes some good use of a limited budget and has Helen Hunt paying her dues, but ultimately loses its way and fails to deliver on what is some considerable potential. And then there’s the lead.

Tim Thomerson is Jack Deth (I shit you not), a future cop whose job is hunting down Trancers, the mind-slaves of the evil Whistler (Michael Stefani), who wants to rule the world or something. The elite of this post apocalyptic world (we get a nice matte painting of a submerged Los Angeles) are blinking out of existence, and have worked out that Whistler has somehow jumped to the past and is killing them retroactively by going after their ancestors. They send Deth back to apprehend Whistler, and he ends up in mid-80s L.A. in the body of his ancestor Phil Deth (an accountant with the most badass name in history), who has just hooked up with the lovely Leena (Helen Hunt). She quickly gets sucked into the action when Trancers start popping up, and Whistler has the advantage of being in the body of his ancestor, a police detective who quickly enslaves the LAPD to his will, putting Jack and Leena on the run.

So far, so good, right? For a while I actually enjoyed this, as low-rent as it is. Obviously writers Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo smushed together BLADE RUNNER, THE TERMINATOR, and probably SCANNERS; it’s lazy as Hell, but it’s such a pure distillation of 80s science fiction that it almost sums up the state of the genre. Psuedo-cyberpunk, techno-zombies, and time paradoxes, it’s all there. And there’s a quirky sense of humor to a lot of scenes, as when a mall Santa becomes one of Whistler’s slaves, and when Jack and Leena have to talk to some particularly deluded hobos to get information.

Speaking of Leena, Helen Hunt is goddamn awesome in this film. Obviously this was well before she was famous for anything at all, so she’s got a fairly typical “modern LA romantic interest” role, but she totally makes it her own. She’s cute, she’s witty, she’s energetic, she’s got star power galore and is generally much better than the material around her. If you’re a fan of hers you may just have to see this, and not just for purposes of completism.

Jack Deth, meanwhile, is pretty much the embodiment of an 80s B-movie action star. He doesn’t quite have the brawn or firepower of a Schwarzenegger or Stallone, so he compensates with attitude out the rear. He’s the kind of tough future cop who mouths off to his superiors and has a troubled past and a personal vendetta against the villain, because a Trancer killed his wife. It’s pure boilerplate but Thomerson gives it a manly swagger. If you like this sort of thing you’ll be amused.

In the end, though, the film fizzles out, and may ultimately be a victim of its budget. Whistler has big plans for the past, wanting to conquer the world early and making the city’s transients into a legion of Trancer slaves. Now, ladies and gentlemen, somewhere in the dusty books of filmmaking law there is a rarely-cited but ever-important clause: you do not promise the audience a hobo army and then not show it. Not that this is the only problem; the final third of the movie just doesn’t go anywhere interesting, and boils down to some dark fumbling around in a warehouse and a profoundly unspectacular final showdown. The damn thing doesn’t deliver. So there you have it.

Obviously TRANCERS combined enough popular elements to be a commercial success, and it still has some curiosity value. Individual elements of it are kind of neat, but they fail to come together. I can’t quite recommend this film unless you fall into the category of Helen Hunt fan or lover of cop movie clichés (and I’m genuinely curious to know what kind of overlap those categories have), but it’s pretty painless. A middle of the road picture, designed not to linger in the memory, for better or worse.

Written by Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo
Directed by Charles Band

Grade: C

In Theaters: The Happening

2008-06-15T10:49:00.002-05:00

I almost feel sorry for M. Night Shyamalan. Almost, of course, because he’s still a professional filmmaker and I’ve done some things with THE MOVIES, but he may be the most unappreciated filmmaker still able to make major deals. LADY IN THE WATER was, of course, run over the coals because, well, he killed a film critic in the movie and cast himself as an important writer figure; the film was not without flaws but you barely heard them discussed up against the not-actual-aesthetic-problems mentioned above. THE HAPPENING had bad buzz right out of the gate and seems doomed from the start, which is a shame. Mostly, I feel sorry for Shyamalan because he’s a talented and imaginative man working in a style that went out with black and white television. It’s amazing he managed any success at all, but he’s making conceptual melodrama in an environment that is totally not geared for it. Personally, I like this sort of thing, and THE HAPPENING is a solid thriller on that level, creating a strong atmosphere and providing several good shocks despite a certain lumpiness. To be sure, M. Night has certain tendencies to overcome, but I like what he’s doing here, and it’s worth catching.

The plot is as follows. One Tuesday morning, people in Central Park, NYC, start killing themselves for no reason. They become disoriented, then quietly and methodically find the most efficient way to end their own life. The phenomenon starts to spread. A New York school teacher (Mark Wahlberg) hears about what’s happening, and takes his wife (Zooey Deschanel), a fellow professor (John Leguizamo) and his daughter (Ashlyn Sanchez) out of town on the quickest train to Philadelphia. But Philadelphia is quickly hit as well, as is New Jersey, as is Boston, as is the whole Northeast. The train is halted in the middle of nowhere, and our protagonists make their way cross-country, trying to get out of the area of “attack”. The phenomenon, whatever it is, seems to target groups of people, starting with cities and moving to towns and roads and smaller clusters. It also may have something to do with the plants, and the disappearance of bees. The characters find themselves trying to outrun an invisible force, something on the wind that is never quite predictable.

Shyamalan has hit upon a great concept here, as he often does. What, precisely, we’re dealing with is never fully defined. It probably has something to do with plants, it’s almost certainly airborne, it’s strangely localized, and it makes people destroy themselves. The feeling of dread that’s created is palpable because you can never quite tell when things will get worse. I spent a good portion of the film waiting for the other shoe to drop.

I was somewhat obtuse in my earlier comments about Shyamalan’s style, mainly because this is something I need to get into heavy detail about. To put it simply, I believe that M. Night Shyamalan is heavily influenced by THE TWILIGHT ZONE, and not in the simple sense that his movies often have twists in them. (For the record, this one does not.) If you watch THE TWILIGHT ZONE today, what’s noticeable is not just the way the plots turn but how the whole thing is basically contemporary social drama in genre dress. And by contemporary, I mean the dramatics of the fifties and sixties, of Arthur Miller and PLAYHOUSE 90. It’s not naturalistic in the least; it’s a style in which characters are broad and quirky, in which themes are explicitly raised and discussed, and in which everything is, well, slightly theatrical. This, I believe, is Shyamalan’s own approach. He is not a realist, which is a problem because one generally aims for a kind of realism (or at least verisimilitude) in thrillers in order to more easily engage the audience. He is working on this broader, more conceptual, and let’s face it, old-fashioned level, where advancing the idea is more important than making you believe it’s actually happening.

Now, personally, I like this. I think it’s a valid approach, and I like the energy it brings to a project. THE HAPPENING is not a cynical or nihilistic film in which we’re here to watch people whimper as evil overcomes them; it’s more about what’s going on than our helplessness. Though it never fully defines what the problem is, it raises ideas, and provokes thought about how nature will react.

This comes at a price. As I said, it’s not close to realistic, and this mostly shows in the acting. There’s a certain dazed, stiff quality to a lot of people, arguably justifiable by the sheer shock of what’s happening, but it does make it hard to connect. Mark Wahlberg, who has given some very fine performances in the past, is the weak link; all of his readings are slightly off, and I can’t say if that’s his or Shyamalan’s fault. Certainly the director can be faulted for making everyone’s speech so damn declarative; if some of the dialogue were more conversational it would flow a lot better, even if we missed some of it. That said, and this isn’t really a defense, there’s a positive upshot to all this; because everyone’s a little off to start with, you’re never quite sure when the “happening” will take them and they’ll become genuinely doomed. Most of the people look and act like they could snap at any time, and the blasé fashion in which they meet their deaths is genuinely terrifying.

Okay, the one part I’m going to unambiguously slam is the denouement. It’s unnecessary, we know from the start how it will end and as such it takes too long to get there, and it makes far too explicit what was implied well enough by what came before. There’s an obvious point where this film should end and you will all recognize it. I guess either Shyamalan or the studio or a test audience felt it was necessary to clarify things. Bah. Also, yeah, that title’s a bad one. A happening is something that takes place with the aid of LSD and sitar music, and I’m fairly sure these elements are absent from this movie. (Could have been at the end of the credits for all I know.)

To be sure, M. Night Shyamalan could stand to improve in some areas. But he’s doing things in the thriller genre that nobody else is doing, and that need doing. THE HAPPENING is an earnest revisiting of the “nature’s revenge” genre, executed thoughtfully if a little sloppily. I was scared at times, blackly amused at others, and overall provoked to think. This is good. I think this guy is onto something; let’s hope his career doesn’t end before it develops.

Written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan

Grade: B+

Random Movie Report #48: The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells

2008-06-09T13:32:00.003-05:00

After a while of figuring out what my next review should be, I finally chose something I’d seen recently at random. I’ll have to do this more often, it’s a nice motivator. Anyway, THE INFINITE WORLDS OF H. G. WELLS is not properly a movie, but a miniseries produced by Hallmark, but these sorts of things make less difference when you can watch the whole shebang on DVD, so I’m again classing it both ways. I don’t have a good dedicated television category yet.

I initially balked at THE INFINITE WORLDS OF H. G. WELLS due to its length; it’s listed as running at a solid four hours, and I wasn’t sure the premise could hold my interest for that long. I’m a fan of Victorian science fiction, but it took me a while to really invest in watching the whole thing, even with breaking it up into segments. (Something I rarely do for DVDs.) But I warmed to this as time went on, because as basic a concept as it is- inserting the author himself into fantastic scenarios based on his stories- the filmmakers emphasize the human element, giving us a series of vignettes that turns into a very sweet and charming story. It’s still too long, mind you, but not by much.

The framing device of the series is that a reporter (Ellen McGillvray) visits Wells (Tom Ward) in 1946 (shortly before his death) to ask him about a series of incidents from his past- incidents that he ended up writing as stories. She’s got an agenda of her own, but Wells is happy to share, and so we go back to VIctorian times, when he was just a struggling writer with a friend or two at the local university science department, and an eye for Jane Robins (Katy Carmichael), a beautiful researcher with a curiosity that rivals his. Wells comes across a man who moves so quickly he’s seen as invisible, another who gets shot back in time a week and tries to take advantage of his foreknowledge, a meteor that carries images of another world, and other oddities. Wells and Robins grow closer as he investigates, and in the present tense we learn more about the reporter’s real mission.

I confess to not having read the short stories on which this series is based (I’m more familiar with Wells’ novels), but not only do they echo some of the ideas Wells would play with in his longer work, but they’re an interesting snapshot of early science fiction; Well’s big contribution to the genre, apart from being very good at writing in general, was in setting down many concepts we now find familiar. There’s an appealing simplicity to most of the stories presented here, and that frees up the series to focus more on the people involved than on explaining what’s taking place. The story of the man projected back in time becomes a charming narrative about the mostly working class inhabitants of a local pub, and a weirdly O. Henry-esque story about an overly literal potions shop turns into a wonderful romance about weight, class, and mathematics. You’ve got a core of recurring characters at the university, but also a lot of guest turns- it’s almost like an ongoing television series, and you wish it could have been, but by nature the source material is finite.

The casting is especially good; Tom Ward is charming but just standoffish enough to pull off Wells’ intellectualism, and Carmichael is, well, breathtaking. She’s extremely attractive, very sharp, and never less than convincing as an exceptional woman in an age that looked down on such things. The central romance is very sweet, and gently handled; the two take on a Nick and Nora Charles quality as the series unfolds. Nicholas Rowe is also memorable as Professor Gibberne, Wells’ perpetually frazzled friend at the university who goes through lab assistants at an alarming rate.

The series is broken up into three parts, each under 90 minutes and containing two stories plus surrounding material. Because this, like all television, is held to a time limit, and since in this case it’s more a question of filling space rather than fitting into it, the series does feel padded at times. Scenes go on for slightly longer than they should, and sometimes material just seems to be tacked on. The restraints of the series’ budget also show at times, though I didn’t spot any major problems with the period detail. Then again, I probably wouldn’t notice a zeppelin in a Revolutionary War movie.

Overall this is a very pleasant little series, not quite something you’d want to watch all in one go but very enjoyable spaced out over time. At heart, it’s a tribute to Wells and his visionary status, which remains remarkable to this day; the man predicted so many things that he created unfair expectations for every other science fiction writer, most of whom are not in the prediction game to start with. The project is animated by a sincere love for the author and his work, and that gentle good nature permeates everything. I actually watched it a while ago, but apparently it lingers in the memory long enough for me to still want to recommend it to you. That’s a good sign.

Based on the short stories of H. G. Wells (naturally)
Story and Format by Nick Willing
Teleplays by Chris Harrald, Clive Exton, Matthew Faulk, and Mark Skeet
DIrected by Robert Young

Grade: B+

In Theaters: Baby Mama

2008-05-30T14:36:00.001-05:00

BABY MAMA is the sort of film that’s just good enough as to make you wonder why it’s not better. The pairing of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler is a promising one; not only did they have great rapport hosting Weekend Update on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, but Fey of course not only headed up that show but the inexplicably funny 30 ROCK as well, while Poehler is a veteran of the Upright Citizens Brigade improv troupe. Of course, neither of them wrote this picture, which seems like a wasted opportunity, though WGA rules being what they are I’m sure they contributed something and simply haven’t gotten the credit for it. This is a predictable film, and I know I just gave the new INDIANA JONES a pass for that so I can’t be too harsh, but this time the material really does feel stifled by the formula; the plot is by-the-numbers when it doesn’t need to be, and the whole thing depends on its cast to elevate it above average. Which they do, mind you, and I don’t want to overload this piece with vitriol; this is a recommendation, just more qualified than most.

Fey plays Katie Holbrook, an executive at the Round Earth organic foods company headed by an egomaniacal New Ager (Steve Martin). She’s in her late thirties and wanting to have a baby, but quickly discovers that conditions in her womb make conception unlikely. Fortunately for her she discovers a company that provides surrogates, who take the mother’s fertilized eggs and carry them to term, for a hefty fee. Holbrook’s surrogate is Angie Ostrowski (Poehler), a white trash girl with a basically good heart and a sleazy common-law husband (Dax Shepard). Things hit a wrinkle when Angie breaks up with her partner and has to stay at Katie’s apartment; not only is it a classic Felix-and-Oscar situation, but in this case Oscar is carrying Felix’s child. Katie tries to steer Angie onto the path of responsible motherhood, with health drinks and prenatal classes, while also overseeing the building of a new Round Earth store in the city. (Which city I’ve actually forgotten.)

There’s one complication that I actually didn’t see coming at the time, and don’t want to spoil since it is a good one. The structure is off, though, and the plot burdens itself with an adequately written but still not very exciting romance between Katie and a handsome juice store employee (Greg Kinnear) who never quite manages a full personality though he comes close. The plot flails around more uncertainly as the action proceeds, as though writer/director Michael McCullers wasn’t entirely sure where he wanted to go with this. We even get a scene of the two girls singing to a popular song (albeit through a karaoke video game), and a courtroom scene near the end.

Of course, even if the story moves along predictable lines, there are still some fine comic performances to take in. Fey and Poehler are a great team, each knowing just how to play off the other. The film comes alive when they’re together, especially when there aren’t any other significant characters around to confuse things. A scene in which Angie drags Katie out to a club is particularly entertaining (and not just because Fey wears a low-cut dress.) Steve Martin’s work here is a nice reminder of his skills as a comedian, which have sadly been obscured by some bad role choices as of late- he’s playing off his classic blasé and self-absorbed persona, to good effect. A number of SNL alumni pop up here and there (Lorne Michaels was an executive producers), as do Maura Tierney and John Hodgman (at least I don’t think they’ve ever been on the show.) And Dax Shepard continues to be a comic actor worth keeping an eye on.

I think my major issue with the film is not so much the plot per se as the realization I had about two-thirds of the way through that it was headed for a cloyingly conventional resolution. A wealthy single woman hiring a poor woman as a surrogate for her baby is a situation replete with all kinds of sexual and social politics, and though I wasn’t expecting anything too envelope-pushing, Fey and Poehler’s presence had me hoping for something a little less tidy and a little more subversive. Some of that anarchic wit comes through in the dialogue, and this is certainly a clever film- it’s just not a daring one.

Still, one out of two isn’t bad, and BABY MAMA manages to be funny and get you to like the characters enough to stay with them for a couple of hours. It’s forgettable but fun, and though I can hope that Fey and Poehler will find a better vehicle, this at least proves they can carry a picture by themselves. If you’re a fan of either or both actresses it’s worth seeing, and if not, well, I’m not sure I want to know you.

Written and Directed by Michael McCullers
Grade: B-

In Theaters: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

2008-05-24T13:47:00.003-05:00

INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL is the sort of movie where you know what to expect. I don’t mean this in a bad way, since the same can be said of the Bond films, the Godzilla series, etc.; some franchises are built on a formula, and though that makes it difficult to keep things fresh, that challenge often produces interesting results. Of course, this is not only a sequel but the continuation of a saga that seemed to wrap up back in 1989; the idea for a fourth Indiana Jones movie apparently circulated between Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Harrison Ford, and others for years before the project actually came together, making this a big movie geek event. I wasn’t anticipating this film quite as much as some, because although I like all the Indiana Jones films I didn’t really see any pressing need for more of the story. But it’s here, and it’s welcome, a pulp adventure that once more delivers the goods with skill and enthusiasm.

The film takes place in 1957, long past the age of pulp heroes and weekly serials, and our old friend Indy (how old is never quite specified) has gotten himself caught up in a plot by Russian agents to break into Area 51 and make off with... well, something. He escapes but finds himself under surveillance by the FBI, and temporarily suspended from his teaching job as a result. He’s flagged down by Mutt (Shia LaBeouf), a greaser who’s related to an old colleague of Dr. Jones. It seems Professor Oxley (John Hurt) has gone missing, and Mutt wants Indy’s help finding him. Oxley was searching for the legendary crystal skull, a South American artifact with the theoretical power to control a strange kingdom hidden in the Amazon. In order to find Oxley, Indy and Mutt must find the skull itself, and wouldn’t you know it, but the Russians, led by the icy hot Irina Spalko (Cate Blanchett), are after it too, as part of Stalin’s program of expanding research into the psychic. At some point in all this, Indy’s old flame Marion (Karen Allen) shows up, as she happens to be Mutt’s mother. And she’s still feeling punchy.

The film actually does make one break with the past that’s sort of interesting, though it’s also the film’s most controversial aspect. In fact, it’s a bit of a spoiler, so you might want to skip this paragraph, but then again maybe it makes more sense if you’re expecting it as I was. Suffice it to say, the crystal skull is of alien origin, and though the specifics of it are left appropriately vague, it’s definitely science fiction as opposed to the supernatural material of previous movies. For some this will be (and has been) a rough transition, but it’s eased into well, and given the timeframe it’s quite appropriate. By the late 50s the popular imagination had moved on from mystic relics to flying saucers, and pulp is a genre that encompasses science fiction as much as fantasy. I didn’t have a problem with it, your mileage may vary.

In other respects this is a film that follows the Indiana Jones formula for better and for worse. The structure is familiar, again we have the good guys racing the bad guys to the important site and/or artifact, and there are numerous call backs to previous entries. You’ve got the red travel lines, ticking clocks, vehicle chases, villains dying in gruesome ways, Indy’s fear of snakes, none-too-subtle references to past films and general in-jokes, etc. Obviously this film is not going to win points for originality, but the series has lain dormant long enough that it all feels fresh when it’s dragged out again.

It helps that Steven Spielberg is definitely in his element. Though the film does use quite a bit of CGI, especially by comparison to the effective 0% of previous entries, he still manages to give things a rough-and-tumble feel. Indiana Jones has always been the kind of hero who takes a lot of blows and doesn’t execute his stunts flawlessly, and of course compounding that he’s now getting on in years. Things rarely go too smoothly for anyone in this film, and though a few moments stretch credulity more than others, it still stays firmly within the realm of cliffhanger logic.

The old serial feel is pretty strong with this movie overall, as a matter of fact. There’s a wonderfully spooky sequence in a graveyard, where you expect things to get a lot worse at any minute. The skull is treated with the same kind of mysterious reverence that attached to the Ark, the Shankara Stones, and the Holy Grail- we sense there is a power at work beyond what we can actually see. There are narrow escapes and spills and recaptures galore, and the film never loses its momentum.

Harrison Ford remains as firmly in the role as he’s ever been, with the possible exception of one or two lines. He has a very good rapport with LaBeouf, and it’s mostly the two of them for the first half of the picture. Marion is actually introduced unusually late in the proceedings, given that we all knew she was coming back, but Allen hasn’t lost any of her spark either. John Hurt isn’t used to his best advantage as Oxley, who for most of the picture has gone stark raving mad and speaks in cryptic directions, and Ray Winstone could have been more memorable as Mac, Indy’s not-entirely-trustworthy partner. That said, Cate Blanchett excuses many things. Many many things.

The one major problem I have with this film comes near the end. The climax is simply too abrupt, not having the full harrowing effect of earlier entries, and some subplots are closed off more quickly than they should be. The climax of an Indy movie should be as big as the rest of it, and though what happens is definitely at the right scale, it could stand to be longer. There is something to be said for leaving us wanting more, but given that this will probably be the last entry regardless of its box office gross, a little ponderousness would not have been entirely bad. The film feels a bit like a grace note on top of the trilogy, not quite as big or as substantial (as odd a word as that is in regards to any of the movies), but more a celebration.

Celebrations are a lot of fun, mind you, and I still wholeheartedly recommend this movie. INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL is, once again, classic adventure pulp made by people who know and love the genre, and whatever things could have been done better, all of it is done well. It’s not the most memorable entry in the series, but it’s definitely a good finish, and the actual ending is played just right- whether or not we see Indy again, he’s definitely sustained his own legend.

Story by George Lucas and Jeff Nathanson
Screenplay by David Koepp
Directed by Steven Spielberg

Grade: B+

Academy of the Underrated: Godzilla (1998)

2008-05-18T12:26:00.002-05:00

Ten years ago today (more or less), the American remake of GODZILLA was released, and it is a pivotal moment in my history of defending the unloved. Sure, I never quite viewed it with the passion of an AVENGERS or EXORCIST II, but it was one of the first times I really found myself swimming against popular opinion. Made by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich, the once-not-hated duo who had just brought out INDEPENDENCE DAY two years prior, the film was intended as the big ticket release for the summer of 1998. It received some of the most hype I’ve ever seen for a film, and in the end was a victim of its own hard sell; the advertising campaign not only gave audiences high expectations, but genuinely misled them as to what to expect. The marketing and PR promised an intense action spectacle that would blow audiences out of their seats, with “Size Does Matter” as the tagline. But GODZILLA, as an actual movie, is a relatively small scale, almost low-key monster mash marked by a lighthearted tone and an affection for the quirky which matches my own tastes well enough. It’s certainly not without flaws, and it isn’t what anyone (least of all Godzilla fans) expected or hoped for, but it has a charm and some genuinely good aspects that I think are worth revisiting.

The film starts when a mysterious creature sinks a Japanese fishing boat and rampages across the Tahitian countryside before anyone can even get a good look at it. Called in to investigate is Dr. Nick Tatopolous (Matthew Broderick), a geeky biologist studying the effects on radiation on Chernobyl earthworms. He works out that the creature is some kind of hybrid of reptile life that lived in the French Polynesian islands where nuclear tests were recently conducted, and just in time for the beast- identified as “Godzilla” through a mistranslation of a Japanese sailor’s muttering- to make landfall in New York, smashing through Manhattan before going into hiding somewhere underground. The military, working with Tatopolous, manages to lure Godzilla out in the open, but the giant reptile/lizard/whatever is fast, agile, and cold blooded enough to evade missile fire (no, that’s not how being cold blooded works, but hush.) And things get more complicated when Tatopolous discovers that the creature is not only hermaphroditic but has managed to impregnate itself. Godzilla is using Manhattan as a nest, and since an ordinary reptile can lay around a dozen eggs or so, all of mankind is pretty much in deep trouble.

TriStar Pictures was trying to make a Godzilla movie as far back as the early 90s, when the effects technology of JURASSIC PARK made the idea appealing. The reason Ted Elliot and Terry Rossio are given partial story credit on this film is that they worked on an earlier version of the project for director Jan De Bont (though that script cast Godzilla as a genetically altered dinosaur created by aliens to defend Earth against an approaching space monster, and was pretty much different in every other way you can think of as well.) That was scuttled due to cost concerns, though the film ended up costing more than it was supposed to anyway. Emmerich and Devlin were brought on board after ID4 hit and decided to make their Godzilla vastly different from the original, in appearance, powers, and behavior.

This made a lot of people very angry. The general consensus of Godzilla fandom is that A) Devlin and Emmerich are horrible, horrible people, owing to their lying about the creature’s appearance to preserve its secrecy and Devlin eventually losing his temper and snapping at fans at the forum for the film’s website (to be fair, I was there and they weren’t exactly being polite, and if the whole thing still existed it would be a fascinating archive of a point when the internet truly began to change the interaction between creators and audiences), and B) the creature is “Godzilla in name only”, often abbreviated as GINO. Unlike the Japanese Godzilla, the AmeriGoji is not a dinosaur, does not breathe fire (though he appears to a couple of times as an homage), and is vulnerable to bullets and missiles and things that his Japanese predecessor tends to shrug off, and so responds to attacks by evading them and even fleeing at high speed. To a kaiju fan this is nothing short of cowardice.

The question of whether this is “truly” Godzilla is one of those contentious fan thingies you’re better off not getting tangled up in, and when I was more a part of that fandom I tried to defend the monster as being close enough, vacillated on this position, and finally stopped caring. Maybe this is because I started looking at superhero comics later, where, for an example, “Hawkman” is both a reincarnation of an Egyptian prince AND a police officer from outer space. A fictional character can be many things at once, and though some interpretations are more radical than others it doesn’t invalidate any of them. Granted, I do think the film reaches a bit too far to distance itself from the original Godzilla and his campy reputation- change is all well and good but a few dollops of the old theme music or even the Blue Oyster Cult song wouldn’t have killed anyone, especially since the final product isn’t going for gritty realism.

All of which is a very roundabout and tedious way of getting to one point I do want to make in this movie’s favor. The monster, Godzilla, Zilla, GINO, Fred, whatever, is awesome. It’s a beautiful design by Patrick Tatopolous (for whom the film’s protagonist is named), mostly iguana-like but incorporating dinosauric and even dragonish elements, and never looking the same from different angles. One of the drawbacks of the film being so poorly received is that we haven’t seen much more of this beastie (especially considering that most of its appearances in the film are at night)- there was a good animated series that made use of the monster, and he also popped up under the name “Zilla” in GODZILLA: FINAL WARS, if only to get trounced by the original Godzilla as a cheap bit of fanservice. A good monster can excuse many sins, and the US Godzilla not only has a neat appearance, but a distinct personality, motivated to protect its offspring and pulling off some canny moves against her attackers.

(At this point I’m going with whatever pronoun feels right at the time.)

As I’ve said above, this is not a terribly serious movie. The whole thing is laced with humor, mostly of a dumb variety, and I don’t mean that as an insult since I can appreciate dumb jokes as much as anyone. Even when it’s not funny it creates a nice atmosphere; one of the major flaws of INDEPENDENCE DAY was that it would get bogged down in maudlin or overly jingoistic moments when a lighter touch was called for. Of course, in all this, there’s less of a genuine sense of danger, and the film’s physics sometimes stretch plausibility even by big action movie standards. That said, while the film’s action setpieces aren’t really nerve-wracking, they are enjoyable and neat lookin’, with some creative use of the environment and New York landmarks.

The film definitely overplays its hand at a few points. Most glaringly, Maria Petillo is dreadfully miscast as Audrey Timmonds, Nick’s ex-girlfriend and an aspiring reporter who steals a few secrets in confidence and then tries to make it up to him by following him on the search for the nest. She’s far too cherubic for her little slide into corruption to be convincing, and her moping when things go awry gets kind of irritating. An extended in-joke with Michael Lerner playing the pompous Mayor Ebert is severely overplayed, though I have noticed on re-watchings that the character is almost allowed to be sympathetic when the military end up trashing more of the city than Godzilla has in their attempts to fight him. (That he’s assisted by a timid balding man named Gene, played by Lorry Goldman, just belabors the gag even further.) Just because the film is free of ID4’s undue gravitas doesn’t mean it doesn’t pander more than it should.

The film also has the feel of a rough draft. The script that Devlin and Emmerich wrote was apparently accepted without many changes, and the studio’s perhaps-misguided decision to keep the creature’s appearance a secret until the day of release meant that there were no test screenings held (and reportedly post-production was rushed to meet that all-important Memorial Day release. Let this be a lesson.) It would be interesting to see what a more rigorous re-editing could do for this film- there are a lot of minor bits that could be trimmed or re-arranged, and far too much time is spent on a JURASSIC PARK-esque sequence where our heroes try to evade the monster’s ravenous offspring inside their nest in Madison Square Garden; we almost forget about the title critter entirely during that twenty minutes or so, and that’s not good.

But there is something else I genuinely like about this film, and that is that it’s full of misfits. You’ve got a geeky protagonist, his standoffish ex, a suicidally brave cameraman (Hank Azaria), and Jean Reno leading a group of French secret service agents in a clean-up job while trying to find a decent cup of coffee without much success. Okay, he’s pretty fucking badass, but he’s still out of his element. Nick’s partners include NEWSRADIO’s Vicki Lewis as a smitten paleontologist (and frankly why he doesn’t go for her I’ll never know.) Sure, these characters are all sitcom-quirky instead of truly weird, but even that is a welcome touch in a movie like this, and it fits the story, since Godzilla herself is a unique creature, a mutant byproduct of our own carelessness and not really to blame for the destruction he causes. I have to give the filmmakers credit for retaining the creature’s nuclear origins (something the Rossio/Elliot script did away with), and for allowing a certain ambiguity to the creature’s role in the story. As a monster it has to be destroyed, but you can’t help but feel sorry. I also feel like I should mention at some point that the film really looks good, with some really lovely shots of a dark and rain swept Manhattan, and David Arnold’s score is quite strong as well.

In many ways, the movie itself is kind of a mutant; not nearly as aggressive or pumped up as a proper summer blockbuster, having its own cadence. Like all mutations it’s got a few excess bits here and there, not everything working, but I think it works. Though the film was technically profitable and most of the reviews were mediocre rather than terrible, the fact that it was a massively overhyped film that failed to meet expectations made it a slow-moving target for anyone wishing to point out the stupidities and excesses of Hollywood and its brainless summer fare, adding a certain vitriol to the film’s reputation that exceeds its actual shortcomings. (The project seems to have become a permanent black mark against Devlin and Emmerich as well, who disbanded as a team some years after and whose every upcoming film now is looked upon with extreme skepticism at best.)

I understand a lot of the points made against this movie, having become intimately familiar with them over the years. To me, it’s a question of whether those flaws outweigh the movie’s strengths, but I still enjoy the film whenever I see it and think it’s got enough to redeem itself on the cosmic scale of film judgment. Though it may be more memorable to some as an ad campaign than a movie, GODZILLA still has a lopsided charm to it, and in the end is fun enough that I can’t condemn it. Ten years and it’s managed to hold up.

Happy Birthday, Zilla. You’ll always be welcome here at the club.

Story by Ted Elliot & Terry Rossio (sort of, see above) and Dean Devlin & Roland Emmerich
Screenplay by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich
Directed by Roland Emmerich

Grade: B

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In Theaters: Speed Racer

2008-05-11T11:52:00.003-05:00

Ignore the cynical critics, who seem to object to SPEED RACER more on a conceptual level than on anything to do with the film that’s been made. Ignore the fact that this is yet another movie based on a vintage TV show. Ignore the poor box office reports. SPEED RACER is, and I never expected to say this, a truly great film. It does what it sets out to do almost perfectly- you may object to what it sets out to do, especially if you have epilepsy, but there is not only skill in this film’s execution, but genuine heart.

I went into SPEED RACER hoping to enjoy it, but seeing it mostly out of principle. Said principle was that movies are not colorful enough these days, and that anything which embraces the idea of having more than one shade onscreen at a time deserves support. I knew the reviews were not great, and at any moment I expected the film’s massive flaws to reveal themselves, and the divide in opinion (because I’ve heard enthusiastic responses to the film on various fora) would be explained, and I would decide what side I fell on. I actually kinda wish I’d seen what the problem was. Instead, I gotta say, this is a superb spectacle that delivers everything it promises, and the naysayers- I don’t get what their deal is.

If you’ve seen the show (I actually haven’t), you know the story. Speed Racer (Emile Hirsch) is the middle child of the Racer family, who as you might expect are big in the car racing game. Pops Racer (John effing Goodman) builds cars, and big brother Rex Racer (Scott Porter) drives them. But at some point Rex seems to go bad, aggressively pushing off other drivers and seemingly being killed in the middle of a massive cross country race. Years later, though, the Racer tradition lives on, as Speed continues his brother’s legacy in the Mach 5 (in an ingenious touch, the first race sequence slides between Rex and Speed running the same track, eventually racing against each other for the all time record.) After a big win, Speed is approached by Royalton (Roger Allam), head of Royalton Motors, who wants him to race under their banner. However, Speed decides to stick with the family, and this infuriates his would-be boss, who vows that from then on, Speed won’t win, won’t place, won’t even finish a race.

A lot of major companies make a lot of money off of racing, and they negotiate and plan the outcomes of major races. Sure enough, Speed is forced off the track at Fiji, and Pops comes under investigation for alleged IP infringement. But the mysterious Racer X (Matthew Fox) has been investigating the link between the big companies and the underworld (represented by some downright Victorian British gangsters), and on finding out that racer Taejo Togokhan (Korean pop sensation and Stephen Colbert nemesis Rain) has been in their pay to protect his sister Minx (Nayo Wallace), he and the wonderfully named Inspector Detector (Benno Fürmann) try to get him to testify. In exchange, Taejo wants to protect his family’s company from a buyout, and to do that he plans to win the Crucible, the team cross country race that ended Rex’s career. Speed Racer is offered the third position on the team, and sneaks off, over his father’s objections.

All this and more takes place in a universe that is a giant live action and CGI cartoon, rendered in bright basic colors. The drivers race along impossibly twisted tracks, and are saved from crashes and explosions by being encased in spheres of foam. This encourages the racers to get a little violent, and even the good guys have to fight and inevitably force competitors off the road. The race sequences are insanely kinetic, but though the flood of color and motion is overwhelming at first, a rhythm soon emerges, and usually a shot will focus on a specific car or racer. In a way this mimics the look of the cartoon, in which, as in many anime shows, static characters would be surrounded by speed lines and signs of motion. The same balance of images is shown in the less actiony scenes- even though we’re seeing lots of things on screen at once, there are clever emphases and patterns that emerge. Royalton’s office is bedecked in royal purple, and when he tries to convince speed that the racing world is driven entirely by money, background colors fade and we’re surrounded by black and white.

This is a film full of whimsy and imagination, and tiny details and not-quite-necessary things are everywhere. The Crucible race is started when the Queen of Casa Christo looks out and sees the sun; various on-track “assassins” take the form of sexy pink-haired girls with phallic tire spikes a la BEN HUR (Speed combats them with tire shields, and right now Freud wishes he were still alive to analyze that), Viking marauders, and mercenary soldiers; Speed’s younger brother Spridle (Paulie Witt) and his monkey pal Chim Chim imagine themselves in the action of a superhero cartoon they watch; out-of-focus hearts appear in the background when Speed and his best girl Trixie (Christina Ricci, whose looks are made for anime) lay eyes on each other. There are vicious gangsters and ninja and caverns of ice, and the cars themselves have useful gadgets a-plenty, though some are less legal than others (the Mach-5’s jumping springs, which get it out of tight situations, are A-OK, but the spearhook, used to catch cars in a deadlock, is bad form indeed.)

All of this is handled with a good sense of humor; there’s an inevitable level of camp in the proceedings, obviously, though the movie tries not to let that undermine the story. We end up laughing with the film’s absurdities more than at them; we’re not asked to really accept anything as plausible, just as cool. This is a universe where logic and physics are subservient to aesthetics, and everything that happens, happens because it would be totally awesome if it did.

One doesn’t expect much from the acting in a movie like this, but some thought seems to have gone into this as well. To be sure, we’re dealing with cartoon characters, who must be strong and basic in their motivations and drives, but the cast works hard to make these personalities come across. Nobody breaks character, or goes through the motions; in particular Goodman, and Susan Sarandon as his wife,are very strong as Speed’s ever-supportive parents. One part of the film that works very well is its emphasis on family; a lot of kids movies will try to tell us that a given family is strong and supportive and so on, but this one makes us feel it; a bond between the characters is always apparent. Ricci is a treat as well, and there are a few fun cameos here and there. Hirsch carries the lead well, and though there’s not a lot to really distinguish his performance, it’s the kind of work that we would have noticed more had it gone horribly wrong.

Family is one of the main themes of the film, of course, as is the struggle of the athlete against corporate corruption of the sport. Some critics have made a point of calling out the film as insincere on this point, since it is, after all, a big budget summer movie replete with merchandising tie-ins; obviously SOMEONE involved cares about the money. But the point really seems to be that corporations are a bad thing when they try to reduce it to be ONLY about money, when they work against the passion that drives sports as well as filmmaking. The big message of the movie, I think, is a very idealistic one- that you CAN stand against the system. That nothing is so big that it cannot be brought down. And on this point the film is very strong.

I can, off the top of my head, name one flaw in the movie. Spridle and Chim Chim have a little too much screen time. They’re the film’s big comic relief, and though they’re not unfunny, they pop up a little too often. I’m also trying to remember the exact point at which Rex’s fortunes turned, but maybe in a film this overstuffed it’s inevitable that something will slip one’s mind. There is an interesting point where we get what seems like the climax, and an unusually long denouement, until we realize that the third act is in fact still around the corner. This is a long movie, to be sure, but despite that weird shift it’s never dull, and I do have to give the film credit for actually making me buy into the false crisis and false dawn.

And so here I am. I have to give this an A; the film almost never steps wrong, and there were many chances for it to do so. Not only is it fun, not only do we see John Goodman fight a ninja, but so help me God it is genuinely a compelling experience. You want Speed to win and to root out the corruption in his world, and there are moments of true suspense and elation. I cannot fault it. I honestly do not see the problem.

See this picture while you can. The box office apparently has not been good (nowadays we can predict these things before the opening weekend is even over, and if that’s not a grim bit of fatalism infecting the movie world I don’t know what is), and this blast of color and cheer does call for the big screen. SPEED RACER is a wonderland, a feast, a glorious over-the-top sports opera that looks wide-eyed at the drive we feel to be our best and what we have to do to stand up to a world which seeks to crush ambition. It’s fun, it’s funny, it’s clever, and it’s downright heartfelt. It’s honestly better than THE MATRIX, and I think the Wachowskis have genuinely redeemed themselves for the missteps made in the sequels. This film works when it really shouldn’t, and perhaps if you go in skeptical from the start it won’t appeal to you. Better to see it with an open mind and let it wash over you. Trust me, it’s an experience you should have.

Based on characters created by Tatsuo Yoshida
Written and Directed by the Wachowski Brothers

Grade: A