I didn't catch last year's The Hunger Games in movie theaters. I suppose I was just too busy, though later that year I caught it on DVD and was reasonably entertained. I've always been a fan of dystopian, post apocalyptic fiction and this movie put a bit of new, if slightly disturbing, twist on the concept. It wasn't among my favorites of last year, but I was definitely entertained, so much so that I was more than willing to see the sequel in the movie theater. As much as I enjoyed the first one, the follow-up was head and shoulders the superior film.
The events of the story directly follow those of the first film, so knowledge of what came before is a must. Having won the 74th Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson) have moved into the "Victor's Village" of District 12, and into relatively opulent houses. They're celebrities for life now, thanks not only to their victory but their sham "love story," something which irks Katniss' close friend Gale (Liam Hemsworth) who is not entirely convinced it was a sham. Katniss has bigger problems, though, as her and Peeta's unique victory, as well as her widely televised act of sympathy for fallen tribute Rue, has sparked uprisings all throughout Panem, to the extent that the despotic President Snow (Donald Sutherland) pays her a visit and basically threatens to kill her family and everyone she loves if she doesn't play ball and use her newly-won influence to tell everyone how wonderful the Capitol is. Key to selling this fiction is also selling her fake love story with Peeta...for the rest of her life. The uprisings, however, prove extremely difficult to suppress, and eventually Snow decides to recruit Katniss and Peeta into a "special edition" Hunger Games known as the "Quarter Quell" which only takes place once every 25 years. This time, every one of their opponents is a past winner of the games, and with a ruthless new game master Plutarch Heavensbee (Philip Seymour Hoffman), frightening times lie ahead for Katniss and Peeta.
I have not read any of Suzanne Collins' bestselling Hunger Games books, and at this point that's deliberate; I want whatever surprises the films have to throw at me to remain surprises. What I appreciate most about the movies is how they serve as a graphic metaphor for class inequality, and considering that this was intended for American readers, many if not most of whom probably can't find any country other than their own a world map, the message these films convey remains quite relevant, if a little heavy-handed at times. I have no idea how the books read but for the most part the script by Michael Arndt (Toy Story 3) and Simon Beaufoy (Slumdog Millionaire) exudes an intelligence which does justice to the book's underlying themes even as it keeps things easy to understand for younger viewers.
Of course, the material would still feel a little schlocky in some places were it not for the utter conviction of the performers, particularly Jennifer Lawrence in her role as Katniss, who does an amazing job at conveying her character's range of emotions from fear to inner conflict. Most of the key supporting players from the first film, including Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks and Lenny Kravitz are back, and this time they are joined by several welcome new additions like Hoffman, Jeffrey Wright, Amanda Plummer and Sam Claflin as former HG winners Beetee, Wiress and Finnick, to name a few. Of course, the problem with a cast this big is that not everyone will get the character development they arguably deserve, even with a two-and-a-half hour running time.
To director Francis Lawrence's credit, though, he manages to balance the most crucial of the characters and story elements while at the same time elevating the production value of this sequel well past its predecessor. Granted, the budget from the last film was basically doubled, but every last penny of that $140 million was well spent, from the computer-generated threats the tributes faced in the arena to the sets, to the hovercraft that actually showed up on screen this time. The first film told a good story, but the penny-pinching was quite evident, especially in the last few scenes in which laughably fake computer-generated wolves showed up. This time the producers went all-out. One thing that really struck me was the imposing architecture of the Capitol, which was embarrassingly minimalist in the first film. This film is bigger and better in every way than its predecessor, and from the look of things, audiences around the world think so too.
It wasn't flawless storytelling, though. I can point to one scene that really made me cringe: Katniss and Peeta are attending a party in the Capitol, when one of the guests invites Peeta to try some French macaroons. Peeta declares that he's too full to eat anymore, and the guest offers him a drink which is meant to make him vomit so that he can eat some more. This scene is considerably powerful given that, at this point in the story, the audience knows that people all over Panem are starving. Peeta blunts the impact of this obscenity by actually saying that people in the Districts are starving while people in the Capitol are throwing up their food. The writers either forgot the "show, don't tell rule" or figured the audience would be too slow to get the message without spelling it out in neon lights as bright as the wigs worn by Elizabeth Banks' Effie.
This little quibble notwithstanding this was easily one of the most engaging movies I've seen all year, and I find myself looking forward to the next installment in the saga of Panem.
4/5
Friday, November 29, 2013
Saturday, November 2, 2013
"Dark" but No Less Fun: A Review of Thor: The Dark World
While I enjoyed 2011's Thor, there was something that felt somehow off about it to me. The fact that so much of an action fantasy was set in the relatively mundane New Mexico, the fact that the titular superhero spent most of the movie out of costume and without any superpowers, and finally, the fact that this was Marvel Studios' first action/fantasy hybrid after three straight sci-fi flavored movies (two Iron Man films and one Hulk film) gave the first movie a strangely half-baked feel for me.
Not so, however the sequel, titled Thor: The Dark World.
Like the first film, this film begins with a prologue set in ancient times, so ancient that they actually predate Odin Allfather (Anthony Hopkins) himself. In fact, it falls upon Odin's father Bor (Tony Curran) to stop the menace of the Dark Elves of Svartalfheim, led by Malekith (Christopher Eccleston) and his loyal lieutenant Algrim (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje). The Dark Elves lived in the darkness that thrived before the universe was born, and through their indestructible energy weapon, the Aether, they seek to destroy the universe and restore the darkness that once reigned, but Bor defeats them and hides the Aether. Malekith sacrifices the bulk of his armies and in the chaos flees, going into hiding, and apparently suspended animation, for thousands of years.
The film then shifts to the present, which happens to be two years after the first Thor film, and one year after Marvel's The Avengers. Loki (Tom Hiddleston) is imprisoned for his crimes on earth, and Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and his companions, the Warriors Three (Volstagg - Ray Stevenson, Fandrall - Zachary Levi, Hogun - Tadanobu Asane) and Sif (Jamie Alexander), are dispatched across the nine realms to bring peace to these troubled worlds. Meanwhile, on Earth, astrophysicist Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) the object of Thor's affection, is trying to move on from Thor. She has moved to London and is actually on a date with an amiable local (Chris O' Dowd), when her assistant, Darcy Lewis (Kat Dennings) interrupts her date and calls her attention to an anomaly in the space-time continuum. Jane follows Darcy to the site of the disturbance, which turns out to be several portals between worlds, one brought about by a celestial event called the convergence, which only occurs once in several thousand years, and in which all nine realms align perfectly. Quite by accident, Jane stumbles on the place where the Asgardians hid the Aether, and the energy actually enters her body, with sometimes explosive consequences for those who try to touch her after that.
Eventually, Thor finds his way to Jane, and whisks her off to Asgard on the now-repaired Bifrost, thinking it would be the best place to keep her safe from the deadly energy inside her. Unfortunately, the Aether awakens Malekith and the remainder of his Dark Elves, and they attack an unsuspecting Asgard with catastrophic consequences.
Thor realizes the magnitude of the threat faced not only by Asgard but by all the Nine Realms, one that will require more than just the power of Mjolnir to vanquish. In fact, he comes to realize that he may require help from one of the most unexpected of places.
Like the first film, this one takes place both on Earth and on other, fantastical realms, but this time around it's the other worlds that get the lion's share of screen time, with Asgard and Svartalfheim proving pivotal to the plot, and another world, Vanaheim, serving as the staging point for the film's first kick-ass action sequence. In this respect, the second film definitely steps things up several notches from its predecessor; not only are there more action set pieces here in comparison to the first film, but they are noticeably better choreographed and more elaborate. They are also abetted by much better computer-generated imagery than the first film had to offer.
Not only that, but there's also a bit more urgency in the battles here; the death of a pivotal supporting character midway through the film tells the audience that this time, the menace is real. In that sense, the film does live up to its title in a way, though the titular "dark world" refers to the home of the Dark Elves and not really to a significant shift in tone from the first film to this one.
That's actually a good thing; Marvel has, for the most part, kept what worked very well for the first film, and for most of Marvel's films in general: the humor. This time, they don't get by on fish-out-of-the-water jokes, but instead pepper the script with more witty exchanges in general between the characters. Hiddleston's Loki, of course, gets the best lines. It was, to me, impressive that Marvel was able to keep this crucial element in despite a nastier set of bad guys than the last film had. Also, director Alan Taylor (who takes over the director's chair from Kenneth Branagh) and his screenwriters make it a point to preserve the other things that worked about the first movie as well, such as the chemistry between lead actor Hemsworth and the various other actors in the film, like Portman, Hopkins, and Hiddleston. Of the performers here, Hopkins feels a little less enthusiastic than he was the first time around, but it doesn't hurt the storytelling that much. A bit of bonus is the fact that for the first time, Portman's Foster gets to interact with the Asgardians, including Odin, Frigga (Rene Russo) and of course Loki.
Of the new elements in the film, Ecclestone's Malekith feels like the least impressive, though really, buried under all that makeup and without particularly memorable dialogue, I'm hard-pressed to think of what more he could have done. Also, personally I felt a little strange seeing swords and battle axes mixing it up with laser cannons on the screen, though considering that George Lucas created a whole genre out of such strange marriages with his Star Wars films I suppose this isn't the first time two seemingly disparate narrative styles have melded on the big screen. In any case, it was only in the first few fight scenes that I thought it looked particularly strange. This little quibble notwithstanding, the major battles were still quite impressive on the whole.
Speaking of climactic battles, this film has one of the most imaginative ones I've seen in a while, one that effectively mixes humor and thrills. It's the sort of thing that has to be seen to be best appreciated.
As with all Marvel films, there were treats to be had after the film, with mid-credits AND post-credits Easter Eggs. I'm pretty sure it's not really spoiling anything to say that at least one of them is clearly setting up a future Marvel Studios blockbuster. Personally, I wasn't particularly enthused about it, even though I'm sure comic-book nerds everywhere were ecstatic about its implications.
But really, my unhappiness with future teasers and some niggles in the script notwithstanding, Thor: The Dark World was definitely worth the trip to the movie theater, though this time, I didn't bother with the 3-D premium considering I wasn't particularly impressed with the 3-D conversions of The Avengers or Iron Man 3.
3.5/5
Not so, however the sequel, titled Thor: The Dark World.
Like the first film, this film begins with a prologue set in ancient times, so ancient that they actually predate Odin Allfather (Anthony Hopkins) himself. In fact, it falls upon Odin's father Bor (Tony Curran) to stop the menace of the Dark Elves of Svartalfheim, led by Malekith (Christopher Eccleston) and his loyal lieutenant Algrim (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje). The Dark Elves lived in the darkness that thrived before the universe was born, and through their indestructible energy weapon, the Aether, they seek to destroy the universe and restore the darkness that once reigned, but Bor defeats them and hides the Aether. Malekith sacrifices the bulk of his armies and in the chaos flees, going into hiding, and apparently suspended animation, for thousands of years.
The film then shifts to the present, which happens to be two years after the first Thor film, and one year after Marvel's The Avengers. Loki (Tom Hiddleston) is imprisoned for his crimes on earth, and Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and his companions, the Warriors Three (Volstagg - Ray Stevenson, Fandrall - Zachary Levi, Hogun - Tadanobu Asane) and Sif (Jamie Alexander), are dispatched across the nine realms to bring peace to these troubled worlds. Meanwhile, on Earth, astrophysicist Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) the object of Thor's affection, is trying to move on from Thor. She has moved to London and is actually on a date with an amiable local (Chris O' Dowd), when her assistant, Darcy Lewis (Kat Dennings) interrupts her date and calls her attention to an anomaly in the space-time continuum. Jane follows Darcy to the site of the disturbance, which turns out to be several portals between worlds, one brought about by a celestial event called the convergence, which only occurs once in several thousand years, and in which all nine realms align perfectly. Quite by accident, Jane stumbles on the place where the Asgardians hid the Aether, and the energy actually enters her body, with sometimes explosive consequences for those who try to touch her after that.
Eventually, Thor finds his way to Jane, and whisks her off to Asgard on the now-repaired Bifrost, thinking it would be the best place to keep her safe from the deadly energy inside her. Unfortunately, the Aether awakens Malekith and the remainder of his Dark Elves, and they attack an unsuspecting Asgard with catastrophic consequences.
Thor realizes the magnitude of the threat faced not only by Asgard but by all the Nine Realms, one that will require more than just the power of Mjolnir to vanquish. In fact, he comes to realize that he may require help from one of the most unexpected of places.
Like the first film, this one takes place both on Earth and on other, fantastical realms, but this time around it's the other worlds that get the lion's share of screen time, with Asgard and Svartalfheim proving pivotal to the plot, and another world, Vanaheim, serving as the staging point for the film's first kick-ass action sequence. In this respect, the second film definitely steps things up several notches from its predecessor; not only are there more action set pieces here in comparison to the first film, but they are noticeably better choreographed and more elaborate. They are also abetted by much better computer-generated imagery than the first film had to offer.
Not only that, but there's also a bit more urgency in the battles here; the death of a pivotal supporting character midway through the film tells the audience that this time, the menace is real. In that sense, the film does live up to its title in a way, though the titular "dark world" refers to the home of the Dark Elves and not really to a significant shift in tone from the first film to this one.
That's actually a good thing; Marvel has, for the most part, kept what worked very well for the first film, and for most of Marvel's films in general: the humor. This time, they don't get by on fish-out-of-the-water jokes, but instead pepper the script with more witty exchanges in general between the characters. Hiddleston's Loki, of course, gets the best lines. It was, to me, impressive that Marvel was able to keep this crucial element in despite a nastier set of bad guys than the last film had. Also, director Alan Taylor (who takes over the director's chair from Kenneth Branagh) and his screenwriters make it a point to preserve the other things that worked about the first movie as well, such as the chemistry between lead actor Hemsworth and the various other actors in the film, like Portman, Hopkins, and Hiddleston. Of the performers here, Hopkins feels a little less enthusiastic than he was the first time around, but it doesn't hurt the storytelling that much. A bit of bonus is the fact that for the first time, Portman's Foster gets to interact with the Asgardians, including Odin, Frigga (Rene Russo) and of course Loki.
Of the new elements in the film, Ecclestone's Malekith feels like the least impressive, though really, buried under all that makeup and without particularly memorable dialogue, I'm hard-pressed to think of what more he could have done. Also, personally I felt a little strange seeing swords and battle axes mixing it up with laser cannons on the screen, though considering that George Lucas created a whole genre out of such strange marriages with his Star Wars films I suppose this isn't the first time two seemingly disparate narrative styles have melded on the big screen. In any case, it was only in the first few fight scenes that I thought it looked particularly strange. This little quibble notwithstanding, the major battles were still quite impressive on the whole.
Speaking of climactic battles, this film has one of the most imaginative ones I've seen in a while, one that effectively mixes humor and thrills. It's the sort of thing that has to be seen to be best appreciated.
As with all Marvel films, there were treats to be had after the film, with mid-credits AND post-credits Easter Eggs. I'm pretty sure it's not really spoiling anything to say that at least one of them is clearly setting up a future Marvel Studios blockbuster. Personally, I wasn't particularly enthused about it, even though I'm sure comic-book nerds everywhere were ecstatic about its implications.
But really, my unhappiness with future teasers and some niggles in the script notwithstanding, Thor: The Dark World was definitely worth the trip to the movie theater, though this time, I didn't bother with the 3-D premium considering I wasn't particularly impressed with the 3-D conversions of The Avengers or Iron Man 3.
3.5/5
Friday, November 1, 2013
Piracy on the High Seas, Sans Flamboyance: A Review of Captain Phillips
While the depredations of Somali pirates plying the waters just off the coast of the African continent have, in the last few years, grabbed headlines every now and then for raiding ships hauling valuable cargo to and from the area, they rarely seemed as urgent as car-bombs in urban centers or disenfranchised Arabs trying to tear down their governments, with massive carnage ensuring. Personally, as someone living in a country living with massive poverty, violence in the countrysides, and a whole host of problems, I confess I did not find these incidents particularly relevant to my daily life. Basically, and to be more crass about it, poor people with high-powered firearms hijacking cargo ships thousands of miles away felt more like a rich man's problem than anything else.
Director Paul Greengrass, whose gripping Bourne films basically sent a new standard in action-thriller filmmaking, gave viewers a much more personal perspective of a Somali pirate attack with his new film Captain Phillips, in which Tom Hanks stars as the title character, an actual mariner whose cargo ship was attacked by four Somali pirates in 2009.
There's not much more to tell by way of the plot than to say that Hanks' character, Richard Phillips, is the Captain of a cargo vessel MV Maersk Alabama, that gets hijacked in the high seas, just off the Somalian coast, by a quartet of armed Somali pirates headed by a hardened pirate named Muse (newcomer Barkhad Abdi), but as with many truly compelling films, it is all in the telling, as with the Bourne movies, Greengrass does a terrific job of building up tension, even though the ultimate outcome of the story is but a Google search away.
Hanks, acclaimed and award-winning actor that he is, excels, as expected, in the role of Phillips; he is key to drawing us into this world. More than the editing and the music and the gunfire, it is Hanks' performance that is instrumental to drawing the audience into Phillips' world, to convincing us just how terrifying his experience actually was. Sure, they could have stuck a competent actor in the role and the audience could still have recognized the peril the character was in, but Hanks really puts us in the moment, and even though he's still one of the most recognizable actors in the English speaking world, he difficult Richard Phillips' experience must have been.
Abdi, however, and his Somalian costars, are the revelation here. I suppose it was better to cast actual Somalians than to get African-American actors to go all "method" and lose what would probably have been the equivalent weight of two or three adults to play these characters; none of the pirates in the movie looks like he eats more than once every other day. A detail like this, and the opening scene in which the goons of a Somalian warlord storm into the village where Muse and his cohorts live and remind them rather forcefully that they need to make money, make it hard to hate the pirates the way one would hate a traditional Hollywood villain, which these guys are anything but. If anything, the fact that these men are basically destitute and desperate makes them even more dangerous, which is why staying away from that Google search is a particularly good idea.
This film is not exactly a thrill-ride in the vein of Gravity, but it's a highly engaging peek into recent historical events that is definitely worth a look.
5/5
Director Paul Greengrass, whose gripping Bourne films basically sent a new standard in action-thriller filmmaking, gave viewers a much more personal perspective of a Somali pirate attack with his new film Captain Phillips, in which Tom Hanks stars as the title character, an actual mariner whose cargo ship was attacked by four Somali pirates in 2009.
There's not much more to tell by way of the plot than to say that Hanks' character, Richard Phillips, is the Captain of a cargo vessel MV Maersk Alabama, that gets hijacked in the high seas, just off the Somalian coast, by a quartet of armed Somali pirates headed by a hardened pirate named Muse (newcomer Barkhad Abdi), but as with many truly compelling films, it is all in the telling, as with the Bourne movies, Greengrass does a terrific job of building up tension, even though the ultimate outcome of the story is but a Google search away.
Hanks, acclaimed and award-winning actor that he is, excels, as expected, in the role of Phillips; he is key to drawing us into this world. More than the editing and the music and the gunfire, it is Hanks' performance that is instrumental to drawing the audience into Phillips' world, to convincing us just how terrifying his experience actually was. Sure, they could have stuck a competent actor in the role and the audience could still have recognized the peril the character was in, but Hanks really puts us in the moment, and even though he's still one of the most recognizable actors in the English speaking world, he difficult Richard Phillips' experience must have been.
Abdi, however, and his Somalian costars, are the revelation here. I suppose it was better to cast actual Somalians than to get African-American actors to go all "method" and lose what would probably have been the equivalent weight of two or three adults to play these characters; none of the pirates in the movie looks like he eats more than once every other day. A detail like this, and the opening scene in which the goons of a Somalian warlord storm into the village where Muse and his cohorts live and remind them rather forcefully that they need to make money, make it hard to hate the pirates the way one would hate a traditional Hollywood villain, which these guys are anything but. If anything, the fact that these men are basically destitute and desperate makes them even more dangerous, which is why staying away from that Google search is a particularly good idea.
This film is not exactly a thrill-ride in the vein of Gravity, but it's a highly engaging peek into recent historical events that is definitely worth a look.
5/5
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