directed by Avid Liongoren written by Charlene Sawit-Esguerra
It isn't often that I view writing movie reviews, which I do mainly for my own pleasure, as a form of advocacy, but in the case of Saving Sally, as in the case of last year's Heneral Luna, that is very much the case.
Saving Sally, the first live-action/animation hybrid feature film in the Philippines, or at least, the first in a long, long time, is a film that deserves, and unfortunately, needs to be championed.
It is the story of student/comic-book creator Marty (Enzo Marcos) and the love of his life, the spunky inventor Sally (Rhian Ramos), his best friend who lives under the close watch of her abusive foster parents (Archie Adamos and Shamaine Buencamino), and who longs to be free. Marty, in the meantime, longs to tell Sally how he feels about her but can never muster up the courage. When she hooks up with the self-absorbed, shallow alpha-male Nick (TJ Trinidad), Marty is, of course devastated, and to show the extent of his devotion, volunteers to be the messenger between Nick and Sally when she is grounded by her draconian foster parents. Marty stays true to his friendship with Sally, as frustrating as it is, and gets words of wisdom and moral support from his dad (Bodjie Pascua) and mom (Carme Sanchez). From this ongoing frustration, Marty draws inspiration for a story that may or may not land him a job writing and drawing a comic book for publisher Renegade Comics (Peejo Pilar). What matters most to Marty, however, is the well-being of his beloved Sally.
The film is not quite the grab-you-by-the-balls, narrative tour de force that Heneral Luna was when it graced movie theaters last year, but I'm honestly hard-pressed to think of any other film which can boast this much painstaking effort packed into each and every frame. This film was ten years in the making, and it shows in the sheer detail and craft of the images on the screen. The environments are mostly, if not entirely animated.
It doesn't exactly have anything particularly profound to say about the human condition, but really, it doesn't have to be that kind of story. I'm fairly certain it will resonate with anyone who's ever ached from the pain of unrequited love, as well as the comic-book/pop culture geeks to whom it lovingly pays tribute. There's also a shout-out to every nice guy (or every person who fancies himself a nice guy) who has ever felt frustration at the girl of his dreams falling for a bad boy. It touches on the evils of child abuse, and indeed that's what drives quite a bit of the narrative, but it is, at its heart, a love story and it is a rather tender one at that. It avoids sentimentality, and, for a fantasy movie, has a remarkably grounded take on human relationships, whether it's between parents and children or friends. Sure, a number of story tropes play out here, but many of them feel valid because they happen in real life.
Also, I'd like to give kudos to this crew for daring to film almost the entirety of the film's dialogue in English. It showcases just how proficient Filipinos are in the language, and how naturally they can act in it without coming across as overly theatrical. I hope this gives the movie's international prospects a boost.
This film is about to be pulled out of theaters after today, but I hope it finds its audience abroad and on home video.
8.5/10
Tuesday, December 27, 2016
Monday, December 19, 2016
More "War" Than "Star": A Review of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Mild Spoilers)
directed by Gareth Edwards
written by Chris Weitz, Tony Gilroy, John Knoll and Gary Whitta
The very first thing I'll say about this film arguably the most "spoilery;" its story leads directly into the events of the very first Star Wars film.
"Rogue One" is primarily the story of the scrappy Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones) the daughter of Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen) an Imperial Scientist who is forced out of an early retirement by an ambitious officer (Ben Mendelsohn) who has plans for his brains. The forced re-recruitment ends in tragedy as the young Jyn (Beau Gadsdon) is separated from her father, and then raised by Clone Wars veteran Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker).
Years later, Jyn, a hustler and small-time criminal, is rescued from an Imperial penal convoy by the Rebel Alliance, who send her along with Captain Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and reprogrammed Imperial Droid K-2S0 (Alan Tudyk) on a mission to visit Gerrera on the planet Jedha, whom the Alliance believes will lead her to her father and find out whatever it is he's reportedly built for the empire, especially since they have received reports that an Imperial cargo pilot Bodhi Rook (Riz Ahmed) has already gone to Gerrera to relay a message from Erso. Jyn is told the plan is to extract her father from the Empire once he has been located, but Andor is secretly given a much more grim order as to what to do with him. When the small troop of rebels learns what exactly Erso has built for the Empire, they realize it's something worse than anything they could ever have imagined, and the future of the rebellion itself is cast into doubt.
Of course, the vast majority of people who walk into this movie will know how the saga eventually plays out, but the fact that, but for a few cameos by some of the franchise's best known characters, most of the cast is new, the storytelling still manages to feel fresh, especially considering the unconventional and, to my mind at least, extremely gratifying casting choices.
No doubt, people have been writing about Jones' plucky heroine Jyn or Donnie Yen's awesome blind space monk Chirrut Imwe or even Alan Tudyk's snarky former Imperial droid, but for me the best character of the bunch was Diego Luna's Andor, arguably the most nuanced character ever to step into the Star Wars Universe. He's basically the dark underbelly of the rebellion that no one in the original trilogy ever spoke of. There's been quite a bit of dialogue in the original films about people dying for the rebellion, but none about people killing for it...until now, and I don't mean the righteous kills like shooting down stormtroopers but the kind of cutthroat aggressiveness that actual rebellions have to be made of to survive. Maybe casting a Latin American was a bit of a nod to all of the insurgencies that have been waged in that part of the world, complete with the murky moral compass that has characterized many of those movements.
Luna himself comes across as a curious choice for the role, which could have gone to any of a number of British or American actors, but to me I think he essayed the role perfectly. Unlike Oscar Isaac, whose Poe Dameron in last years The Force Awakens was more of an archetype, Luna, with his lean and mean look, really does come across as a battle-hardened veteran ready to do anything and everything in the name of his cause. The accent helps too, especially when played off against the well-known American accents of the stormtroopers, the effete British accents of the Imperial officers, and the hodgepodge of different accents of the new cast, which include a curious concoction by Whitaker, who basically wheezes all of his lines, apparently because his character is on some form of perpetual life support. Jones still has to hold the film together, though, and to her credit she does a great job of it. For the second year and Star Wars movie in a row the story is anchored on a solid performance by a British actor. Fellow Brit Riz Ahmed, on that note, does an engaging job as Bodhi Rook. The duo of defrocked kyber crystal monks Imwe and Malbus (Wen Jiang) make for some wonderful onscreen comedy and action, with Donnie Yen putting on display the best hand-to-hand combat ever seen in a Star Wars movie, and even getting one of the film's best lines as a bag is shoved over his head: "Are you kidding me? I'm blind!"
The approach Edwards has taken to the narrative, a much grittier one than the franchise is used to, is a most welcome one. While the franchise has always had a political undercurrent, with George Lucas taking not-so-subtle jabs at the second Bush administration in 2005's Revenge of the Sith, this is probably the closest a Star Wars film has actually come to depicting a war, and I think Edwards and his screenwriters deserve a big pat on the back for that.
I was also glad to note that CGI was avoided whenever possible. It was also nice to see that the actual use of CG was so well-done that the aerial dogfights in the film were pretty outstanding and could easily count among the franchise's best. The Force Awakens lacked some proper X-Wing-on-Tie-Fighter action, in my opinion, and this movie more than made up for that deficiency in its own third act. My memories of the prequels with their godawful video game graphics has effectively been banished, for the most part. I say for the most part, because I feel the decision to feature Moff Tarkin, played in the original Star Wars by the late Peter Cushing, in the film was an unfortunate mistake. Tarkin is played here by a body double, with his likeness digitally imposed, and in all honestly it is never fully convincing. Another well-known character makes a prominent digital appearance right at the film's end, but that was judiciously timed and presented. Tarkin's appearance was just creepy, and for me, a major drawback, one that not even Darth Vader's well-written and staged appearance could offset.
That flaw notwithstanding, however, this is definitely a worthy addition to the canon, and one I easily enjoyed more than last year's entertaining but dishearteningly safe "The Force Awakens." Notably absent from the crew of this film is legendary composer John Williams, though his iconic themes are peppered through the film and grace the end credits. Michael Giacchino, a last-minute replacement for Alexandre Desplat, turns in admirable, if slightly unremarkable work; that he was just pinch-hitting really shows here.
It's funny to think that I hadn't even planned on seeing it. I was suffering from some serious prequel fatigue, and I'll admit that some of the glowing reviews, which I basically just skimmed, got me rather curious. Well, my curiosity has since been satisfied and I am genuinely happy to have seen this film.
8.5/10
written by Chris Weitz, Tony Gilroy, John Knoll and Gary Whitta
The very first thing I'll say about this film arguably the most "spoilery;" its story leads directly into the events of the very first Star Wars film.
"Rogue One" is primarily the story of the scrappy Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones) the daughter of Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen) an Imperial Scientist who is forced out of an early retirement by an ambitious officer (Ben Mendelsohn) who has plans for his brains. The forced re-recruitment ends in tragedy as the young Jyn (Beau Gadsdon) is separated from her father, and then raised by Clone Wars veteran Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker).
Years later, Jyn, a hustler and small-time criminal, is rescued from an Imperial penal convoy by the Rebel Alliance, who send her along with Captain Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and reprogrammed Imperial Droid K-2S0 (Alan Tudyk) on a mission to visit Gerrera on the planet Jedha, whom the Alliance believes will lead her to her father and find out whatever it is he's reportedly built for the empire, especially since they have received reports that an Imperial cargo pilot Bodhi Rook (Riz Ahmed) has already gone to Gerrera to relay a message from Erso. Jyn is told the plan is to extract her father from the Empire once he has been located, but Andor is secretly given a much more grim order as to what to do with him. When the small troop of rebels learns what exactly Erso has built for the Empire, they realize it's something worse than anything they could ever have imagined, and the future of the rebellion itself is cast into doubt.
Of course, the vast majority of people who walk into this movie will know how the saga eventually plays out, but the fact that, but for a few cameos by some of the franchise's best known characters, most of the cast is new, the storytelling still manages to feel fresh, especially considering the unconventional and, to my mind at least, extremely gratifying casting choices.
No doubt, people have been writing about Jones' plucky heroine Jyn or Donnie Yen's awesome blind space monk Chirrut Imwe or even Alan Tudyk's snarky former Imperial droid, but for me the best character of the bunch was Diego Luna's Andor, arguably the most nuanced character ever to step into the Star Wars Universe. He's basically the dark underbelly of the rebellion that no one in the original trilogy ever spoke of. There's been quite a bit of dialogue in the original films about people dying for the rebellion, but none about people killing for it...until now, and I don't mean the righteous kills like shooting down stormtroopers but the kind of cutthroat aggressiveness that actual rebellions have to be made of to survive. Maybe casting a Latin American was a bit of a nod to all of the insurgencies that have been waged in that part of the world, complete with the murky moral compass that has characterized many of those movements.
Luna himself comes across as a curious choice for the role, which could have gone to any of a number of British or American actors, but to me I think he essayed the role perfectly. Unlike Oscar Isaac, whose Poe Dameron in last years The Force Awakens was more of an archetype, Luna, with his lean and mean look, really does come across as a battle-hardened veteran ready to do anything and everything in the name of his cause. The accent helps too, especially when played off against the well-known American accents of the stormtroopers, the effete British accents of the Imperial officers, and the hodgepodge of different accents of the new cast, which include a curious concoction by Whitaker, who basically wheezes all of his lines, apparently because his character is on some form of perpetual life support. Jones still has to hold the film together, though, and to her credit she does a great job of it. For the second year and Star Wars movie in a row the story is anchored on a solid performance by a British actor. Fellow Brit Riz Ahmed, on that note, does an engaging job as Bodhi Rook. The duo of defrocked kyber crystal monks Imwe and Malbus (Wen Jiang) make for some wonderful onscreen comedy and action, with Donnie Yen putting on display the best hand-to-hand combat ever seen in a Star Wars movie, and even getting one of the film's best lines as a bag is shoved over his head: "Are you kidding me? I'm blind!"
The approach Edwards has taken to the narrative, a much grittier one than the franchise is used to, is a most welcome one. While the franchise has always had a political undercurrent, with George Lucas taking not-so-subtle jabs at the second Bush administration in 2005's Revenge of the Sith, this is probably the closest a Star Wars film has actually come to depicting a war, and I think Edwards and his screenwriters deserve a big pat on the back for that.
I was also glad to note that CGI was avoided whenever possible. It was also nice to see that the actual use of CG was so well-done that the aerial dogfights in the film were pretty outstanding and could easily count among the franchise's best. The Force Awakens lacked some proper X-Wing-on-Tie-Fighter action, in my opinion, and this movie more than made up for that deficiency in its own third act. My memories of the prequels with their godawful video game graphics has effectively been banished, for the most part. I say for the most part, because I feel the decision to feature Moff Tarkin, played in the original Star Wars by the late Peter Cushing, in the film was an unfortunate mistake. Tarkin is played here by a body double, with his likeness digitally imposed, and in all honestly it is never fully convincing. Another well-known character makes a prominent digital appearance right at the film's end, but that was judiciously timed and presented. Tarkin's appearance was just creepy, and for me, a major drawback, one that not even Darth Vader's well-written and staged appearance could offset.
That flaw notwithstanding, however, this is definitely a worthy addition to the canon, and one I easily enjoyed more than last year's entertaining but dishearteningly safe "The Force Awakens." Notably absent from the crew of this film is legendary composer John Williams, though his iconic themes are peppered through the film and grace the end credits. Michael Giacchino, a last-minute replacement for Alexandre Desplat, turns in admirable, if slightly unremarkable work; that he was just pinch-hitting really shows here.
It's funny to think that I hadn't even planned on seeing it. I was suffering from some serious prequel fatigue, and I'll admit that some of the glowing reviews, which I basically just skimmed, got me rather curious. Well, my curiosity has since been satisfied and I am genuinely happy to have seen this film.
8.5/10
The New and Improved Metro Manila Film Festival
Starting every December 25 since the 1970s, movies houses in Metro Manila, and later all around the country, have shown exclusively Filipino-made movies for a two-week period. I imagine that in the beginning, the idea was to showcase the very best films Filipino filmmakers had to offer, and I can even remember a period of time when this was so.
For many years, however, it seemed that the festival, once meant to showcase Philippine cinema's finest became just a protectionist cash grab designed to benefit whoever was most capable of pandering to the lowest common denominator.
Lately, it seems, the festival has been invigorated with an exclusively "independent" film slate, which means, as it does in Hollywood, a bunch of Filipino movies financed independently of any major studios, and freed of the constraints of commercial filmmaking. In short, these are movies produced by filmmakers driven solely by the imperative of telling the stories they want to tell, and not of cramming as many lowbrow jokes and movie stars mugs into the running time as they possibly can.
For the first time in years, I find myself looking forward not just to one or two films in the festival (because even at its worst, the MMFF has always managed to have a few gems amidst all of the dreck), but to the festival itself. I can also say, with complete honesty, that I am looking forward to at least one movie in this festival more than I was to Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. This is a refreshing turnaround from the years in which I groaned at the knowledge that my beloved Hollywood films would be booted out of cinemas to make way for trashy local movies.
Come Christmas Day, I am happy to say this year that I will be excited to go to the movies!
For many years, however, it seemed that the festival, once meant to showcase Philippine cinema's finest became just a protectionist cash grab designed to benefit whoever was most capable of pandering to the lowest common denominator.
Lately, it seems, the festival has been invigorated with an exclusively "independent" film slate, which means, as it does in Hollywood, a bunch of Filipino movies financed independently of any major studios, and freed of the constraints of commercial filmmaking. In short, these are movies produced by filmmakers driven solely by the imperative of telling the stories they want to tell, and not of cramming as many lowbrow jokes and movie stars mugs into the running time as they possibly can.
For the first time in years, I find myself looking forward not just to one or two films in the festival (because even at its worst, the MMFF has always managed to have a few gems amidst all of the dreck), but to the festival itself. I can also say, with complete honesty, that I am looking forward to at least one movie in this festival more than I was to Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. This is a refreshing turnaround from the years in which I groaned at the knowledge that my beloved Hollywood films would be booted out of cinemas to make way for trashy local movies.
Come Christmas Day, I am happy to say this year that I will be excited to go to the movies!
Saturday, December 10, 2016
Disney's Sailing Princess: A Review of Moana
directed by Ron Clements, John Musker, Don Hall and Chris Williams
screenplay by Jared Bush
Following the fantastic Zootopia, I was expecting very good things from Disney with their animated tale Moana, which tells the story of a chieftain's daughter from the South Pacific who sets sail to appease an angry god and save her people.
Inspired by folk tales from the South Pacific, this film is the story of Moana (Auli'i Cravalho), the daughter of the chieftain of the island community of Motunui, grows up captivated by two things: the ocean, and the stories she hears from her grandmother (Jenny House), particularly the tale of how demi-god Maui (Dwayne Johnson) stole the heart (actually a jewel) from the island goddess Te Fiti (sort of a Mother Earth figure). One day, these two converge as Moana, trying to settle into her role as the next in line to lead her people, is confronted with a frightening phenomenon; her people are unable to catch fish or harvest coconuts or crops. Moana's grandmother is convinced that the world is cursed as a result of Maui's theft of Te Fiti's heart. The Moana must then find Maui and travel with him to Te Fiti's island in order to restore her heart and end the curse, over the objections of her protective father (Temeura Morrison). The question is whether or not Moana can get the egotistical Maui to cooperate long enough to save the world.
There's a lot to love about this movie, from the gorgeous South Pacific island backdrops to the high seas adventure to the catchy songs by Lin Manuel Miranda and Opetaia Foa'i, to the lead character herself, Moana, and her burly traveling companion, the demi-god Maui, who is Johnson at his comedic best. I doubt if anyone watching World Wrestling Entertainment in the 1990s and early 2000s ever imagined "The Rock" would one day be singing in a Disney film -(and singing well, too!)-but here he is, with a whole song number to himself. The casting of unknown Cravalho was a canny, if not necessarily inspired choice.
Ultimately, though, this was the movie with which Disney followed up Zootopia, and as such it is, well, a bit of a step down.
Moana's journey to redeem her people and find herself feels vaguely like Fa Mulan's journey to preserve her father's honor in 1998's Mulan, albeit without the war and gender-bending. That's not particularly detrimental, but next to Zootopia's decidedly more subversive storytelling it has a slightly well-worn feel to it. Moana's songs are certainly catchier than Mulan's, especially the signature "How Far I'll Go" as well as Johnson's "You're Welcome." Also, as fresh as the movie feels from a visual perspective, a lot of the territory seems distinctly familiar. Zootopia wore its film noir, buddy-cop influences on its sleeve but used them to come up with something surprisingly new. Moana isn't quite as brave. A lot of the homages were distinctly fun, though; the Mad Max-inspired sequence involving demon coconuts was a laugh riot!
The bottom line for me is that this movie is worth the trip to the cinema, but it wasn't quite the home run for me that Zootopia was.
They should have the Oscar for Best Original Song in the bag, though.
7/10
screenplay by Jared Bush
Following the fantastic Zootopia, I was expecting very good things from Disney with their animated tale Moana, which tells the story of a chieftain's daughter from the South Pacific who sets sail to appease an angry god and save her people.
Inspired by folk tales from the South Pacific, this film is the story of Moana (Auli'i Cravalho), the daughter of the chieftain of the island community of Motunui, grows up captivated by two things: the ocean, and the stories she hears from her grandmother (Jenny House), particularly the tale of how demi-god Maui (Dwayne Johnson) stole the heart (actually a jewel) from the island goddess Te Fiti (sort of a Mother Earth figure). One day, these two converge as Moana, trying to settle into her role as the next in line to lead her people, is confronted with a frightening phenomenon; her people are unable to catch fish or harvest coconuts or crops. Moana's grandmother is convinced that the world is cursed as a result of Maui's theft of Te Fiti's heart. The Moana must then find Maui and travel with him to Te Fiti's island in order to restore her heart and end the curse, over the objections of her protective father (Temeura Morrison). The question is whether or not Moana can get the egotistical Maui to cooperate long enough to save the world.
There's a lot to love about this movie, from the gorgeous South Pacific island backdrops to the high seas adventure to the catchy songs by Lin Manuel Miranda and Opetaia Foa'i, to the lead character herself, Moana, and her burly traveling companion, the demi-god Maui, who is Johnson at his comedic best. I doubt if anyone watching World Wrestling Entertainment in the 1990s and early 2000s ever imagined "The Rock" would one day be singing in a Disney film -(and singing well, too!)-but here he is, with a whole song number to himself. The casting of unknown Cravalho was a canny, if not necessarily inspired choice.
Ultimately, though, this was the movie with which Disney followed up Zootopia, and as such it is, well, a bit of a step down.
Moana's journey to redeem her people and find herself feels vaguely like Fa Mulan's journey to preserve her father's honor in 1998's Mulan, albeit without the war and gender-bending. That's not particularly detrimental, but next to Zootopia's decidedly more subversive storytelling it has a slightly well-worn feel to it. Moana's songs are certainly catchier than Mulan's, especially the signature "How Far I'll Go" as well as Johnson's "You're Welcome." Also, as fresh as the movie feels from a visual perspective, a lot of the territory seems distinctly familiar. Zootopia wore its film noir, buddy-cop influences on its sleeve but used them to come up with something surprisingly new. Moana isn't quite as brave. A lot of the homages were distinctly fun, though; the Mad Max-inspired sequence involving demon coconuts was a laugh riot!
The bottom line for me is that this movie is worth the trip to the cinema, but it wasn't quite the home run for me that Zootopia was.
They should have the Oscar for Best Original Song in the bag, though.
7/10
Saturday, November 5, 2016
How WB/DC Definitively Beat Disney/Marvel
A couple of days ago, Warner Brothers released the second trailer for its upcoming comic-book-based blockbuster-in-waiting Wonder Woman. This is a fully-realized, big-budget feature film by the director of the Academy-Award-winning film Monster (though perhaps notably, not much else), which will be in theaters less than a year from now. And if the trailers are any indication, it promises to be one hell of an action-packed movie.
Now, since Marvel/Disney pioneered the concept of a shared cinematic universe for several of its characters with The Avengers, the studio has gone from strength to strength. Kevin Feige and his army of directors, writers and producers have successfully launched four solo properties (Iron Man, Cap, Thor, Ant-Man), two team properties (Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy) and the first, and so far, only, interconnected cinematic world. Other companies have taken notice, such as Universal Studios, and have tried to replicate the formula, but as the saying goes, "often imitated, never duplicated."
For all of that, however, there has been an underlying "safeness" to a lot of the decisions that Marvel's head honchos have taken in their filmmaking approach, and I might as well get right to it: all their lead actors so far, ALL of them, no exceptions, have been white, straight, Caucasian males. I don't really consider myself a gender or racial equality activist, and I can honestly say I wouldn't raise a hue and a cry if an LGBTQ character never anchors a superhero movie (though Marvel's openly gay Wiccan character is brilliant), but I raise this point to offer a bit of a reality check to this claim that Marvel are somehow especially brave in their filmmaking choices. Once upon a time, that was true, right up until The Avengers scored a record $207 million on its opening weekend at the North American box office. Since then, every single film has been made in accordance with a set of core specifications. The good news is that it's a formula that allows filmmakers quite a bit of creative latitude, and has resulted in several very enjoyable films, but it's still a formula.
What's sad about this is that one can see strong female characters sprinkled throughout the MCU, from Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow to Zoe Saldana's Gamora to Evangeline Lilly's Wasp, and there are hundreds more from Marvel's comics catalog, but thanks to the likes of Ike Perlmutter, who reportedly blocked the idea of female-led Marvel movies for years, citing 1984's Supergirl and 2004's Catwoman as his arguments, they've always remained stuck in the back seat.
Wonder Woman's journey to the big screen has been, as in the case of many high-profile comic-book adaptations, a troubled one. Arguably the most high-profile attempt to bring her to the big screen involved no less than Avengers director Joss Whedon, who had proposed to make the film a period film set in World War II, which didn't pan out. In fact, production for the current iteration of the movie only finally fell into place two years ago, twelve years after Spider-Man became the first movie in history to gross more than $100 million in North America on its opening weekend, six years after Iron Man proved that Marvel could produce a movie without the backing of a major studio (with Paramount only distributing) and two years after The Avengers became the first movie in history to gross more than $200 million in North America on its opening weekend. In short, in the time it took for WB/DC to get their act together and decide to make a Wonder Woman movie, Disney/Marvel could easily have come up with a fantastic movie featuring any of a number of rich, multi-dimensional female characters, but it didn't. With their hard-won clout and credibility Kevin Feige and his crew could easily have beaten WB/DC to the punch at a true landmark: the first female-anchored superhero movie.
To rub salt in the sound, Marvel's first female-anchored movie, Captain Marvel, is over two years away, even though the actress who will play her, Brie Larson has already been cast.
People will debate the quality of Disney/Marvel films versus the quality of WB/DC films; art is an inherently subjective experience shaped by experiences and biases, but it cannot be debated that WB/DC beat Disney/Marvel to a significant comic-book-movie milestone.
What hurts me, as a Marvel fan, is that they had every opportunity to do it first but because of a nauseatingly sexist head honcho (or a bunch of them), it didn't happen.
I'm happy to report to those that don't know that Perlmutter is no longer running the movie division of Marvel Studios.
Now maybe we can see some real diversity, and not just some contemptuous tokenism.
Now, since Marvel/Disney pioneered the concept of a shared cinematic universe for several of its characters with The Avengers, the studio has gone from strength to strength. Kevin Feige and his army of directors, writers and producers have successfully launched four solo properties (Iron Man, Cap, Thor, Ant-Man), two team properties (Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy) and the first, and so far, only, interconnected cinematic world. Other companies have taken notice, such as Universal Studios, and have tried to replicate the formula, but as the saying goes, "often imitated, never duplicated."
For all of that, however, there has been an underlying "safeness" to a lot of the decisions that Marvel's head honchos have taken in their filmmaking approach, and I might as well get right to it: all their lead actors so far, ALL of them, no exceptions, have been white, straight, Caucasian males. I don't really consider myself a gender or racial equality activist, and I can honestly say I wouldn't raise a hue and a cry if an LGBTQ character never anchors a superhero movie (though Marvel's openly gay Wiccan character is brilliant), but I raise this point to offer a bit of a reality check to this claim that Marvel are somehow especially brave in their filmmaking choices. Once upon a time, that was true, right up until The Avengers scored a record $207 million on its opening weekend at the North American box office. Since then, every single film has been made in accordance with a set of core specifications. The good news is that it's a formula that allows filmmakers quite a bit of creative latitude, and has resulted in several very enjoyable films, but it's still a formula.
What's sad about this is that one can see strong female characters sprinkled throughout the MCU, from Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow to Zoe Saldana's Gamora to Evangeline Lilly's Wasp, and there are hundreds more from Marvel's comics catalog, but thanks to the likes of Ike Perlmutter, who reportedly blocked the idea of female-led Marvel movies for years, citing 1984's Supergirl and 2004's Catwoman as his arguments, they've always remained stuck in the back seat.
Wonder Woman's journey to the big screen has been, as in the case of many high-profile comic-book adaptations, a troubled one. Arguably the most high-profile attempt to bring her to the big screen involved no less than Avengers director Joss Whedon, who had proposed to make the film a period film set in World War II, which didn't pan out. In fact, production for the current iteration of the movie only finally fell into place two years ago, twelve years after Spider-Man became the first movie in history to gross more than $100 million in North America on its opening weekend, six years after Iron Man proved that Marvel could produce a movie without the backing of a major studio (with Paramount only distributing) and two years after The Avengers became the first movie in history to gross more than $200 million in North America on its opening weekend. In short, in the time it took for WB/DC to get their act together and decide to make a Wonder Woman movie, Disney/Marvel could easily have come up with a fantastic movie featuring any of a number of rich, multi-dimensional female characters, but it didn't. With their hard-won clout and credibility Kevin Feige and his crew could easily have beaten WB/DC to the punch at a true landmark: the first female-anchored superhero movie.
To rub salt in the sound, Marvel's first female-anchored movie, Captain Marvel, is over two years away, even though the actress who will play her, Brie Larson has already been cast.
People will debate the quality of Disney/Marvel films versus the quality of WB/DC films; art is an inherently subjective experience shaped by experiences and biases, but it cannot be debated that WB/DC beat Disney/Marvel to a significant comic-book-movie milestone.
What hurts me, as a Marvel fan, is that they had every opportunity to do it first but because of a nauseatingly sexist head honcho (or a bunch of them), it didn't happen.
I'm happy to report to those that don't know that Perlmutter is no longer running the movie division of Marvel Studios.
Now maybe we can see some real diversity, and not just some contemptuous tokenism.
Monday, October 31, 2016
Sorcerer Supreme? More Like Pretty Cool Conjurer: A Review of Doctor Strange
directed by Scott Derrickson
written by Jon Spaihts, Derrickson and C. Robert Cargill
When I learned two years ago that Marvel Studios had cast British actor Benedict Cumberbatch as Doctor Stephen Strange, I considered it a casting coup on par with their casting of Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, a decision which, as every self-respecting Marvel fan knows, kick-started the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Having seen Doctor Strange, I am happy to report that Cumberbatch does not disappoint in the least, and neither does the visual effects crew that have produced the most eye-popping, mind-bending sensory experience to come out of the Marvel Studios stable to date.
Stephen Strange (Cumberbatch) is a brilliant but arrogant neurosurgeon whose hands are severely injured in a horrific car crash. Desperate to recover the use of his hands, Strange spends every last penny on expensive, experimental treatments and ultimately finds himself in Nepal, where he comes face-to-face with a mysterious guru known only as the Ancient One (Tilda Swinton), who, with the help of her disciple Mordo (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and a curmudgeonly librarian Wong (Benedict Wong), shows him a different path in life from that which he has been following so far, and he begins the process of learning an altogether new art, a far more ancient and powerful one than the one he used to practice. This happens not a moment too soon, as one of the Ancient One's former disciples Kaecilius (Mads Mikkelsen) has stolen pages out of her mystical books for a ritual that could result in the total annihilation of the whole world. Strange has a lot to learn about the mystic arts, but unfortunately not a whole lot of time to learn it.
This film exemplifies several of the qualities that have made Marvel Studios films consistently entertaining if not always outstanding: an all-too-human, well-realized hero with complexities, frailties and insecurities, incredible production value in the form of meticulously-realized sets, costumes and locations, and state-of-the-art visual effects. Cumberbatch in particular was the absolute star of the show, which was no mean feat considering the weight of expectations he bore upon entering into the production as, arguably, the highest-profile star ever to throw his hat into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. While the MCU revived Downey Jr.'s career, Cumberbatch took this on while his was very much on the upswing, which made it a bit of a risk for him, albeit one which has definitely paid off in spades.
I'm happy to note that we've come a long way from the Nevada desert doubling for the Middle East (Iron Man), or Cleveland doubling for Germany (The Avengers). I loved that the film was actually shot in Nepal, Hong Kong, New York and London. It's also worth noting there's a bit of "house style" as evidenced by the presence of Director of Photography Ben Davis and Costume Designer Alexandra Byrne who, between the two of them, have worked on eight Marvel Studios films, which is over half of the entire catalog of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Little details like this, as well as the references to the Avengers in the script, are a subtle way of reminding the audience that this film still forms part of a bigger tapestry, even as it stands quite well on its own. Another regular Marvel collaborator, Industrial Light and Magic, turns in sensational work here, deftly mixing and seriously upgrading earlier reality-bending effects from films like The Matrix and Inception. These sequences looked great in IMAX 3-D.
All that said, the film suffers from some of Marvel's frequent shortcomings, starting, unfortunately, with their virtually-trademarked cookie-cutter villain, with Kaecilius' only truly remarkable feature being his wildly colorful eye make-up. It's sad to think that the reasonably talented Mikkelsen passed up the chance to play one generic Marvel bad guy years ago in Thor: The Dark World, only to play another one three years later. Equally listless here is Rachel McAdams as Strange's throwaway love interest Dr. Christine Palmer, who at the very least fares better here than in the last movie in which I saw her, Antoine Fuqua's Southpaw (in which her sole purpose was to catalyze the hero's journey towards redemption by dying), but that doesn't say much at all.
To be honest, I think Marvel should really make it a point to hire scriptwriters who specialize in creating memorable villains, as this has really been a glaring deficiency in their storytelling. To be fair, apart from Heath Ledger's Joker, the folks at Warner Brothers/DC have not exactly come up with a particularly memorable heavy, but Marvel Studios' inability to come up with a truly menacing villain (apart, perhaps from Loki), has practically become the stuff of legend (or internet jokes) by now. Marvel villains are not only not memorable, by now many of them have a distinctly generic feel to them. It's a serious structural flaw in their storytelling that needs to be remedied, especially considering their rather formidable rogues' gallery from the comic books. Also, the script made a couple of annoying shortcuts, notably Strange's immediate acquisition of serious mystical skills, as well as some logical gaffes in the climactic sequences of the film.
It's not all bad news, though. I had originally written off Ejiofor's Baron Mordo, based on what I had seen in the promotional material, as yet another black sidekick in the mold of Don Cheadle's War Machine, Anthony Mackie's Falcon and Idris Elba's Heimdall, but as it turns out Mordo undergoes his own journey in the course of the film, one that, in a way, parallels that of Strange, and is notable for the fact that he ends up somewhere very different from where Strange does. Swinton, for all of the bellyaching that her casting spawned, is marvelous in her role as the Ancient One, and Benedict Wong, as Wong, essentially the film's deadpan comic relief, is also a welcome presence. Marvel geeks will recognize the weapon he wields in the film's climax as the Wand of Watoomb, among several other Easter Eggs liberally sprinkled throughout the film.
It's still, overall, a very safe Marvel film, and one can almost see the boxes the producers ticked when they made it, but the good news is that there was room for quite a bit of extra imagination here, and for a newly-minted Marvel superstar to flex his thespic muscles. Another plus for this film is that it features a genuine rarity in Marvel Studios productions these days: an outstanding music score, courtesy of Oscar winner Michael Giacchino.
Still, one would think that after fourteen movies, Marvel would finally have gotten a handle on their more conspicuous problems like mediocre villains and love interests who are basically just attractive wallpaper. Had this been one of the earlier films in their catalog I would almost certainly have given this movie a higher score, but after all this time, Marvel should really know better.
7.9/10
written by Jon Spaihts, Derrickson and C. Robert Cargill
When I learned two years ago that Marvel Studios had cast British actor Benedict Cumberbatch as Doctor Stephen Strange, I considered it a casting coup on par with their casting of Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, a decision which, as every self-respecting Marvel fan knows, kick-started the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Having seen Doctor Strange, I am happy to report that Cumberbatch does not disappoint in the least, and neither does the visual effects crew that have produced the most eye-popping, mind-bending sensory experience to come out of the Marvel Studios stable to date.
Stephen Strange (Cumberbatch) is a brilliant but arrogant neurosurgeon whose hands are severely injured in a horrific car crash. Desperate to recover the use of his hands, Strange spends every last penny on expensive, experimental treatments and ultimately finds himself in Nepal, where he comes face-to-face with a mysterious guru known only as the Ancient One (Tilda Swinton), who, with the help of her disciple Mordo (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and a curmudgeonly librarian Wong (Benedict Wong), shows him a different path in life from that which he has been following so far, and he begins the process of learning an altogether new art, a far more ancient and powerful one than the one he used to practice. This happens not a moment too soon, as one of the Ancient One's former disciples Kaecilius (Mads Mikkelsen) has stolen pages out of her mystical books for a ritual that could result in the total annihilation of the whole world. Strange has a lot to learn about the mystic arts, but unfortunately not a whole lot of time to learn it.
This film exemplifies several of the qualities that have made Marvel Studios films consistently entertaining if not always outstanding: an all-too-human, well-realized hero with complexities, frailties and insecurities, incredible production value in the form of meticulously-realized sets, costumes and locations, and state-of-the-art visual effects. Cumberbatch in particular was the absolute star of the show, which was no mean feat considering the weight of expectations he bore upon entering into the production as, arguably, the highest-profile star ever to throw his hat into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. While the MCU revived Downey Jr.'s career, Cumberbatch took this on while his was very much on the upswing, which made it a bit of a risk for him, albeit one which has definitely paid off in spades.
I'm happy to note that we've come a long way from the Nevada desert doubling for the Middle East (Iron Man), or Cleveland doubling for Germany (The Avengers). I loved that the film was actually shot in Nepal, Hong Kong, New York and London. It's also worth noting there's a bit of "house style" as evidenced by the presence of Director of Photography Ben Davis and Costume Designer Alexandra Byrne who, between the two of them, have worked on eight Marvel Studios films, which is over half of the entire catalog of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Little details like this, as well as the references to the Avengers in the script, are a subtle way of reminding the audience that this film still forms part of a bigger tapestry, even as it stands quite well on its own. Another regular Marvel collaborator, Industrial Light and Magic, turns in sensational work here, deftly mixing and seriously upgrading earlier reality-bending effects from films like The Matrix and Inception. These sequences looked great in IMAX 3-D.
All that said, the film suffers from some of Marvel's frequent shortcomings, starting, unfortunately, with their virtually-trademarked cookie-cutter villain, with Kaecilius' only truly remarkable feature being his wildly colorful eye make-up. It's sad to think that the reasonably talented Mikkelsen passed up the chance to play one generic Marvel bad guy years ago in Thor: The Dark World, only to play another one three years later. Equally listless here is Rachel McAdams as Strange's throwaway love interest Dr. Christine Palmer, who at the very least fares better here than in the last movie in which I saw her, Antoine Fuqua's Southpaw (in which her sole purpose was to catalyze the hero's journey towards redemption by dying), but that doesn't say much at all.
To be honest, I think Marvel should really make it a point to hire scriptwriters who specialize in creating memorable villains, as this has really been a glaring deficiency in their storytelling. To be fair, apart from Heath Ledger's Joker, the folks at Warner Brothers/DC have not exactly come up with a particularly memorable heavy, but Marvel Studios' inability to come up with a truly menacing villain (apart, perhaps from Loki), has practically become the stuff of legend (or internet jokes) by now. Marvel villains are not only not memorable, by now many of them have a distinctly generic feel to them. It's a serious structural flaw in their storytelling that needs to be remedied, especially considering their rather formidable rogues' gallery from the comic books. Also, the script made a couple of annoying shortcuts, notably Strange's immediate acquisition of serious mystical skills, as well as some logical gaffes in the climactic sequences of the film.
It's not all bad news, though. I had originally written off Ejiofor's Baron Mordo, based on what I had seen in the promotional material, as yet another black sidekick in the mold of Don Cheadle's War Machine, Anthony Mackie's Falcon and Idris Elba's Heimdall, but as it turns out Mordo undergoes his own journey in the course of the film, one that, in a way, parallels that of Strange, and is notable for the fact that he ends up somewhere very different from where Strange does. Swinton, for all of the bellyaching that her casting spawned, is marvelous in her role as the Ancient One, and Benedict Wong, as Wong, essentially the film's deadpan comic relief, is also a welcome presence. Marvel geeks will recognize the weapon he wields in the film's climax as the Wand of Watoomb, among several other Easter Eggs liberally sprinkled throughout the film.
It's still, overall, a very safe Marvel film, and one can almost see the boxes the producers ticked when they made it, but the good news is that there was room for quite a bit of extra imagination here, and for a newly-minted Marvel superstar to flex his thespic muscles. Another plus for this film is that it features a genuine rarity in Marvel Studios productions these days: an outstanding music score, courtesy of Oscar winner Michael Giacchino.
Still, one would think that after fourteen movies, Marvel would finally have gotten a handle on their more conspicuous problems like mediocre villains and love interests who are basically just attractive wallpaper. Had this been one of the earlier films in their catalog I would almost certainly have given this movie a higher score, but after all this time, Marvel should really know better.
7.9/10
Sunday, October 30, 2016
Brave, Tragic and Utterly Beautiful: A Review of Kubo and the Two Strings
directed by Travis Knight
written by Marc Haimes, Chris Butler, and Shannon Tindle
Since they burst onto the scene seven years ago with their acclaimed adaptation of Neil Gaiman and Dave Mckean's modern classic children's book Coraline, Laika Productions has produced consistently astonishing movies featuring off-beat stories and unusual heroes. Kubo and the Two Strings continues that proud tradition, and I dare say, on both a technical and storytelling level, it is their best work yet.
Kubo (voiced by Art Parkinson) is a one-eyed Japanese boy who lives on a cliff with his mother, a half-catatonic woman with a mysterious past who washed up on shore one late evening with her newborn baby whose eye had just been plucked out. Kubo spends his days and earning a living of sorts entertaining people from the nearby village with his storytelling, in which he uses what appear to be magically-animated origami figures and the skillful playing of his shamisen to captivate his audience. He leaves before the sun goes down, however, on his mother's warning not to stay out after dark. Kubo's heart aches, though, because of the absence of his father, whom his mother explains was killed when he was a baby. One day, at a festival for the dead, Kubo stays out late, hoping to commune with his father's spirit, and tragedy strikes. Now, to save himself from dark forces out to harm him, he must find a magical, mystical suit of armor, which he can only do with the help of his friend, a magical monkey sent to protect him (also Theron) and a mysterious warrior beetle (Matthew McConaughey). He'll need all the help he can get against the power of his mother's malevolent sisters (both voiced by Rooney Mara) and the powerful, sinister Moon King (Ralph Fiennes).
Anyone who reads this blog knows I have great affection for Disney's Zootopia, a film I ranked a perfect 10, for its blend of entertainment and its unflinching look at racial prejudice, at a time when a stand on the issue had to be taken. As much as I love that film, though, and as brave as I felt it was, this, in my honest estimation, felt even braver, with its mutilated hero, dark subject matter, and equally unflinching look at the importance of human kindness, which, per this story, must be extended to even the most odious of beings.
Laika's craftsmanship is, as it always has been, vastly impressive, and has significantly improved since the days of Coraline. It's a pretty awesome marriage of the age-old technique of stop-motion animation and modern day technology. Even with all the advances, though, it took a total of five years to make this film.
However sophisticated the storytelling tools, however, they are nothing without a good story to tell (just look at several of Dreamworks Animation's recent offerings), but the good news is that the ladies and gentlemen at Laika have that bit pretty much down pat.
As delightful as it was to hear Oscar-winners Theron and McConaughey voice key characters in the story, it's Parkinson's earnest performance that does the heavy lifting in this film as Kubo is defined by his imagination and ultimately his compassion, all of which come through in Parkinson's voice acting.
I realize I'm venturing into slight spoiler territory when I say this, but this film is quite defiantly not-entirely-kid-friendly with some frightening antagonists (my three-year-old turned away in fear at the ghostly twin ninja sisters of Kubo's mother), and its surprisingly tragic tone near the end. That's what makes it rather endearing in my eyes; the studio could probably have made a couple of more million at the box office with more conventional storytelling, which makes their act of sticking to their narrative guns all the more impressive.
This film is a classic in the mold of a Studio Ghibli production; it's completely uncompromising, and utterly mesmerizing.
10/10
written by Marc Haimes, Chris Butler, and Shannon Tindle
Since they burst onto the scene seven years ago with their acclaimed adaptation of Neil Gaiman and Dave Mckean's modern classic children's book Coraline, Laika Productions has produced consistently astonishing movies featuring off-beat stories and unusual heroes. Kubo and the Two Strings continues that proud tradition, and I dare say, on both a technical and storytelling level, it is their best work yet.
Kubo (voiced by Art Parkinson) is a one-eyed Japanese boy who lives on a cliff with his mother, a half-catatonic woman with a mysterious past who washed up on shore one late evening with her newborn baby whose eye had just been plucked out. Kubo spends his days and earning a living of sorts entertaining people from the nearby village with his storytelling, in which he uses what appear to be magically-animated origami figures and the skillful playing of his shamisen to captivate his audience. He leaves before the sun goes down, however, on his mother's warning not to stay out after dark. Kubo's heart aches, though, because of the absence of his father, whom his mother explains was killed when he was a baby. One day, at a festival for the dead, Kubo stays out late, hoping to commune with his father's spirit, and tragedy strikes. Now, to save himself from dark forces out to harm him, he must find a magical, mystical suit of armor, which he can only do with the help of his friend, a magical monkey sent to protect him (also Theron) and a mysterious warrior beetle (Matthew McConaughey). He'll need all the help he can get against the power of his mother's malevolent sisters (both voiced by Rooney Mara) and the powerful, sinister Moon King (Ralph Fiennes).
Anyone who reads this blog knows I have great affection for Disney's Zootopia, a film I ranked a perfect 10, for its blend of entertainment and its unflinching look at racial prejudice, at a time when a stand on the issue had to be taken. As much as I love that film, though, and as brave as I felt it was, this, in my honest estimation, felt even braver, with its mutilated hero, dark subject matter, and equally unflinching look at the importance of human kindness, which, per this story, must be extended to even the most odious of beings.
Laika's craftsmanship is, as it always has been, vastly impressive, and has significantly improved since the days of Coraline. It's a pretty awesome marriage of the age-old technique of stop-motion animation and modern day technology. Even with all the advances, though, it took a total of five years to make this film.
However sophisticated the storytelling tools, however, they are nothing without a good story to tell (just look at several of Dreamworks Animation's recent offerings), but the good news is that the ladies and gentlemen at Laika have that bit pretty much down pat.
As delightful as it was to hear Oscar-winners Theron and McConaughey voice key characters in the story, it's Parkinson's earnest performance that does the heavy lifting in this film as Kubo is defined by his imagination and ultimately his compassion, all of which come through in Parkinson's voice acting.
I realize I'm venturing into slight spoiler territory when I say this, but this film is quite defiantly not-entirely-kid-friendly with some frightening antagonists (my three-year-old turned away in fear at the ghostly twin ninja sisters of Kubo's mother), and its surprisingly tragic tone near the end. That's what makes it rather endearing in my eyes; the studio could probably have made a couple of more million at the box office with more conventional storytelling, which makes their act of sticking to their narrative guns all the more impressive.
This film is a classic in the mold of a Studio Ghibli production; it's completely uncompromising, and utterly mesmerizing.
10/10
Sunday, September 25, 2016
Solid, if Not Quite Magnificent Action: A Review of "The Magnificent Seven"
directed by Antoine Fuqua
written by Nic Pizzolatto and Richard Wenk
I was never much one for Westerns, but I have been more or less consistently a fan of Denzel Washington since watching his Oscar-winning performance in Edward Zwick's Glory back in 1989. In fact, I've watched almost every one of his films this millennium, whether on the big or small screen. This film marks his third collaboration with director Antoine Fuqua, who directed him to a Best Actor Oscar in 2001's Training Day.
The town of Rose Creek is besieged by the murderous prospector Bartholomew Bogue (Peter Sarsgaard), who, with his thugs, burns their church and beats their Pastor (Mark Ashworth) to within an inch of his life. One of the townspeople, Matthew Cullen (Matt Bomer) speaks out against Bogue and is shot, along with several other townspeople. Desperate, Cullen's widow Emma (Haley Bennett) seeks out men who will help their town, and finds warrant officer Sam Chisholm (Denzel Washington). Sam, turn recruits a somewhat motley bunch: gambler Josh Faraday (Chris Pratt), Civil War sharpshooter Goodnight Robicheaux (Ethan Hawke) and his traveling companion Billy Rocks (Byung Hun Lee), outlaw Vasquez (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo), tracker Jack Horne (Vincent D'Onofrio), and Comanche warrior Red Harvest (Martin Sensmeier). They are all highly-capable, and make a considerable impression on Bogue's goons when they enter the town. In response, Bogue assembles an army, and the seven get to work training the townspeople of Rose Creek to fight one hell of a battle.
While I never saw the 1960 film by John Sturges which was the direct progenitor of this film, I did watch the 1954 film Seven Samurai, which inspired both of them back when I was in college, and as a result I did have some basis for comparison. Truth be told, I remember very little about that film save for the lovable buffoon played by Toshiro Mifune and the deadly swordsman of the group who could kill an enemy with one sword stroke, who may have been the inspiration for Ethan Hawke's sharpshooter character, but I do remember the climactic battle of the older film, and in that aspect at least, this film compares pretty well.
In terms of setting up the conflict, introducing the seven and leading up to the big showdown at the end, Fuqua and his screenwriters pretty much play the movie by the numbers, but there is some real joy here in seeing the actors who portray the seven play off each other. Washington's Chisolm and Pratt's Faraday have a fairly easy chemistry, as do Chisolm and his long-time friend Robicheaux, perhaps a shout-out to Washington's and Hawke's first on-screen reunion since Training Day. Less well-defined but occasionally amusing is the friendly rivalry between Faraday and Vasquez, which occasionally ventures into vaguely racist quips by from Faraday. Sensmeier's Red Harvest is kind of just...there, while Lee's Billy Rocks character, of unspecified ethnicity (his description as a Chinaman is a bit of deception in the film) gets quite a bit of screen time, mainly to show off his mad skills with knives. I did enjoy D'Onofrio's Jack Horne, though, as he turned in a particularly quirky performance for this character, including an odd bit of falsetto for much of the film. Washington offers another turn as the noble bad-ass he has played to perfection since 2004's Man on Fire, though with a couple of twists this time. Pratt, similarly, is also pretty much the lovable cad from Guardians of the Galaxy. Sarsgaard and the men playing his goons make some effort at being bad but in the end they might as well be villains out of a Marvel movie; they're basically people who do very bad things but fail to come off as particularly memorable, though there is considerable satisfaction when Bogue gets his inevitable comeuppance. Bennett does a creditable turn as one of the film's many innovations over its predecessor: the strong female character.
While some hype has been made about the film's diversity, in terms of actual execution, it feels more like a marketing gimmick than an attempt at meaningful storytelling, and in truth the closest the film ever gets to talking about racial tension is the throwaway jokes between Faraday and Vasquez. This was something that could really have set it apart from its predecessors, whose septets were ethnically homogeneous, and while I understand Fuqua and his writers weren't exactly shooting for Oscar glory here, I really think there were quite a few wasted opportunities, especially since there seem to be vague attempts to liken the bad guy to Donald Trump.
Where the film succeeded for me, though, was the action sequences, and Fuqua, his actors and his stunt crew really pulled out the stops for these scenes, and they are at least as intense as a PG-13 rating (R-13 here in the Philippines) would allow them to be, which, as it turns out was quite a bit. I had approached this film with a measure of trepidation after Fuqua (and Washington) had let me down a bit with The Equalizer, which had the one outstanding action scene and a bunch of lethargic ones, and as a result I was quite pleasantly surprised by how Fuqua put together his vision of the iconic showdown from the first two movies, complete with its blazing gunfights and staggering body count. I found the action quite well-choreographed, and even though some moments (including death scenes) worked better than others, I thought that it played out quite well on the whole. I know stuntmen took over for much of this, but the actors, particularly Washington, got some pretty generous face time during these sequences.
Particularly remarkable for me is how credible Denzel Washington, at the ripe old age of 61, still is as an action hero. For reference, when he was 60, Harrison Ford starred as a submarine commander in K:19 the Widowmaker, not exactly the kind of role that had him running around, and appeared as an old codger of a crime-lord in Cowboys and Aliens. Washington isn't exactly denying his years--in 2010's Unstoppable he played a long-time train operator approaching retirment--but the fact that he can pull off this role by simply dyeing his hair roots a little bit was really something special to behold. I would love for Chris Pratt to rope him into a future Guardians of the Galaxy cameo one day.
Fuqua makes clear his affection for the Western with his sweeping vistas, and while it's hard not to think of what this film could have been I still found myself appreciating it for what it was: a reasonably entertaining romp. Also, while I would have wanted something a little more high-profile as the last project for my favorite composer James Horner, this movie feels like a much better sendoff than Fuqua's boxing drama Southpaw or the little seen mining drama The 33 would have been. Horner's music pervades throughout the film and even though the score was co-composed by frequent Horner collaborator Simon Franglen I really got the sense there was an effort to hew as closely to Horner's style as possible. It's also a bit sad that Horner's music was inevitably overshadowed by Elmer Bernstein's iconic theme, but if nothing else I am grateful that, thanks to this film and much more restrictive bans on tobacco advertising than the ones I grew up with, there is now a whole generation of viewers that will properly identify the theme of The Magnificent Seven with The Magnificent Seven, and not with some cigarette commercial like I did. If for this and nothing else, this movie deserves my genuine affection.
7/10
written by Nic Pizzolatto and Richard Wenk
I was never much one for Westerns, but I have been more or less consistently a fan of Denzel Washington since watching his Oscar-winning performance in Edward Zwick's Glory back in 1989. In fact, I've watched almost every one of his films this millennium, whether on the big or small screen. This film marks his third collaboration with director Antoine Fuqua, who directed him to a Best Actor Oscar in 2001's Training Day.
The town of Rose Creek is besieged by the murderous prospector Bartholomew Bogue (Peter Sarsgaard), who, with his thugs, burns their church and beats their Pastor (Mark Ashworth) to within an inch of his life. One of the townspeople, Matthew Cullen (Matt Bomer) speaks out against Bogue and is shot, along with several other townspeople. Desperate, Cullen's widow Emma (Haley Bennett) seeks out men who will help their town, and finds warrant officer Sam Chisholm (Denzel Washington). Sam, turn recruits a somewhat motley bunch: gambler Josh Faraday (Chris Pratt), Civil War sharpshooter Goodnight Robicheaux (Ethan Hawke) and his traveling companion Billy Rocks (Byung Hun Lee), outlaw Vasquez (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo), tracker Jack Horne (Vincent D'Onofrio), and Comanche warrior Red Harvest (Martin Sensmeier). They are all highly-capable, and make a considerable impression on Bogue's goons when they enter the town. In response, Bogue assembles an army, and the seven get to work training the townspeople of Rose Creek to fight one hell of a battle.
While I never saw the 1960 film by John Sturges which was the direct progenitor of this film, I did watch the 1954 film Seven Samurai, which inspired both of them back when I was in college, and as a result I did have some basis for comparison. Truth be told, I remember very little about that film save for the lovable buffoon played by Toshiro Mifune and the deadly swordsman of the group who could kill an enemy with one sword stroke, who may have been the inspiration for Ethan Hawke's sharpshooter character, but I do remember the climactic battle of the older film, and in that aspect at least, this film compares pretty well.
In terms of setting up the conflict, introducing the seven and leading up to the big showdown at the end, Fuqua and his screenwriters pretty much play the movie by the numbers, but there is some real joy here in seeing the actors who portray the seven play off each other. Washington's Chisolm and Pratt's Faraday have a fairly easy chemistry, as do Chisolm and his long-time friend Robicheaux, perhaps a shout-out to Washington's and Hawke's first on-screen reunion since Training Day. Less well-defined but occasionally amusing is the friendly rivalry between Faraday and Vasquez, which occasionally ventures into vaguely racist quips by from Faraday. Sensmeier's Red Harvest is kind of just...there, while Lee's Billy Rocks character, of unspecified ethnicity (his description as a Chinaman is a bit of deception in the film) gets quite a bit of screen time, mainly to show off his mad skills with knives. I did enjoy D'Onofrio's Jack Horne, though, as he turned in a particularly quirky performance for this character, including an odd bit of falsetto for much of the film. Washington offers another turn as the noble bad-ass he has played to perfection since 2004's Man on Fire, though with a couple of twists this time. Pratt, similarly, is also pretty much the lovable cad from Guardians of the Galaxy. Sarsgaard and the men playing his goons make some effort at being bad but in the end they might as well be villains out of a Marvel movie; they're basically people who do very bad things but fail to come off as particularly memorable, though there is considerable satisfaction when Bogue gets his inevitable comeuppance. Bennett does a creditable turn as one of the film's many innovations over its predecessor: the strong female character.
While some hype has been made about the film's diversity, in terms of actual execution, it feels more like a marketing gimmick than an attempt at meaningful storytelling, and in truth the closest the film ever gets to talking about racial tension is the throwaway jokes between Faraday and Vasquez. This was something that could really have set it apart from its predecessors, whose septets were ethnically homogeneous, and while I understand Fuqua and his writers weren't exactly shooting for Oscar glory here, I really think there were quite a few wasted opportunities, especially since there seem to be vague attempts to liken the bad guy to Donald Trump.
Where the film succeeded for me, though, was the action sequences, and Fuqua, his actors and his stunt crew really pulled out the stops for these scenes, and they are at least as intense as a PG-13 rating (R-13 here in the Philippines) would allow them to be, which, as it turns out was quite a bit. I had approached this film with a measure of trepidation after Fuqua (and Washington) had let me down a bit with The Equalizer, which had the one outstanding action scene and a bunch of lethargic ones, and as a result I was quite pleasantly surprised by how Fuqua put together his vision of the iconic showdown from the first two movies, complete with its blazing gunfights and staggering body count. I found the action quite well-choreographed, and even though some moments (including death scenes) worked better than others, I thought that it played out quite well on the whole. I know stuntmen took over for much of this, but the actors, particularly Washington, got some pretty generous face time during these sequences.
Particularly remarkable for me is how credible Denzel Washington, at the ripe old age of 61, still is as an action hero. For reference, when he was 60, Harrison Ford starred as a submarine commander in K:19 the Widowmaker, not exactly the kind of role that had him running around, and appeared as an old codger of a crime-lord in Cowboys and Aliens. Washington isn't exactly denying his years--in 2010's Unstoppable he played a long-time train operator approaching retirment--but the fact that he can pull off this role by simply dyeing his hair roots a little bit was really something special to behold. I would love for Chris Pratt to rope him into a future Guardians of the Galaxy cameo one day.
Fuqua makes clear his affection for the Western with his sweeping vistas, and while it's hard not to think of what this film could have been I still found myself appreciating it for what it was: a reasonably entertaining romp. Also, while I would have wanted something a little more high-profile as the last project for my favorite composer James Horner, this movie feels like a much better sendoff than Fuqua's boxing drama Southpaw or the little seen mining drama The 33 would have been. Horner's music pervades throughout the film and even though the score was co-composed by frequent Horner collaborator Simon Franglen I really got the sense there was an effort to hew as closely to Horner's style as possible. It's also a bit sad that Horner's music was inevitably overshadowed by Elmer Bernstein's iconic theme, but if nothing else I am grateful that, thanks to this film and much more restrictive bans on tobacco advertising than the ones I grew up with, there is now a whole generation of viewers that will properly identify the theme of The Magnificent Seven with The Magnificent Seven, and not with some cigarette commercial like I did. If for this and nothing else, this movie deserves my genuine affection.
7/10
Monday, September 5, 2016
Something Cool Happened While I Wasn't Looking...
A few days ago I was feeling pretty good about myself...somewhat heroic, in fact, and so to reward myself I went onto youtube to listen to my favorite "heroic" themes, such as the main theme from Gladiator by Hans Zimmer and the original Marvel's Avengers theme by Alan Silvestri. While listening to the latter, I found myself scrolling through the comments to find, to my delight, that Silvestri, whom Marvel replaced in last year's Avengers sequel with Danny Elfman and Brian Tyler will be returning as composer for the next two Avengers films. It turns out, this was announced three months ago.
This may not mean much to people who aren't movie nerds, or comic-book nerds, or comic-book movie nerds, or movie music nerds, but Silvestri, along with the likes of Elfman, Zimmer, the late James Horner, Bruce Broughton and a handful of other composers were a staple of the movies I grew up with in the 1980s, many of whom worked with the soaring orchestral sounds perfected by industry legends John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith. Silvestri, whose signature soundtrack will, to me, always be his Back to the Future theme, is among the very best of that bunch, and arguably one of the most prolific next to Hans Zimmer.
Anyway, the bottom line is I'll be very happy to welcome Mr. Silvestri back to the MCU!
This may not mean much to people who aren't movie nerds, or comic-book nerds, or comic-book movie nerds, or movie music nerds, but Silvestri, along with the likes of Elfman, Zimmer, the late James Horner, Bruce Broughton and a handful of other composers were a staple of the movies I grew up with in the 1980s, many of whom worked with the soaring orchestral sounds perfected by industry legends John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith. Silvestri, whose signature soundtrack will, to me, always be his Back to the Future theme, is among the very best of that bunch, and arguably one of the most prolific next to Hans Zimmer.
Anyway, the bottom line is I'll be very happy to welcome Mr. Silvestri back to the MCU!
Wednesday, August 31, 2016
Woody the Cowboy and Buzz Lightyear as Dogs: A Review of The Secret Life of Pets
directed by Chris Renaud
written by Brian Lynch, Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio
From Illumination Studios, the people who brought us one highly entertaining, original film with Despicable Me and a string of cookie cutter follow-ups after that comes one of the biggest box-offices successes of 2016, The Secret Life of Pets a movie that purports to tell us viewers what our pets, be they dogs, cats, birds or fish, get up to when we leave them to go to work.
The "hero" pet of this film is Max (voiced by Louis CK) a Jack Russell terrier who adores and is adored by his owner Katie (Ellie Kemper), whose return from work he patiently awaits every day, until one day she brings home a new dog she rescued from the pound, the large, hairy mongrel, Duke (Eric Stonestreet). Max, whose happy little bubble is threatened, shows dislike towards Duke, who responds with aggression as he threatens Max point blank that he will get rid of him if he has to. Max responds by breaking various items belonging to Katie and threatening to frame Duke for it, which causes him, in turn to submit to Max. The conflict only escalates, however, and eventually the two dogs find themselves lost and surrounded by all manner of urban perils, including an army of stray cats, animal control hot on their tails, and later, an army of bitter, rejected pets led by a vengeful rabbit (Kevin Hart). Max's disappearance prompts his secret admirer Gidget (Jenny Slate) to lead a motley bunch of pets including three dogs, a cat, a hawk and a hamster, to find him. Ultimately, though two dogs who hate each other must learn to work together if they are to have any chance of getting home.
Basically, this movie is Pixar's Toy Story but with pets instead of toys. I'm surprised I didn't pick up on this from one of the later trailers, but sitting through the movie, I found the the similarities too glaring to ignore. The main character who is used to being the center of his beloved owner's attention, is displaced by a new object of affection, and this leads to conflict between them. The only difference is that here, Duke, the Buzz Lightyear analogue, is antagonistic to Max almost immediately, and does not harbor fanciful delusions of living a different life the way Buzz does. Basically Max and Duke are Woody and Buzz, but without any of the quirky charm of either of those characters. In fact, they're both downright unlikable.
None of the characters, in fact, is particularly memorable, save perhaps for Kevin Hart's Snowball, and maybe Albert Brooks' hawk Tiberius. Every other character is fairly disposable, and even worse, with few exceptions, none of the voice actors is even particularly funny.
In an era in which animated films can intelligently tackle such hot-button topics as racial intolerance, like Zootopia, or even child prostitution, like Spirited Away, a movie that rehashes a twenty-one year old animated film feels distinctly uninspired. This movie isn't even anywhere near as good as the first Despicable Me.
The good news, though, is that there's plenty of slapstick comedy, which I honestly enjoyed, the animation is topnotch, and the score by Alexandre Desplat is a snazzy, jazzy delight. I found it exceptional, in fact. It's been a while since I've heard a music score for an animated film this lively.
Overall, The Secret Life of Pets is a reasonably fun watch, especially for those with children, though, and it did get me to look forward to Illumination Studios' next offering, the musical Sing.
6.5/10
written by Brian Lynch, Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio
From Illumination Studios, the people who brought us one highly entertaining, original film with Despicable Me and a string of cookie cutter follow-ups after that comes one of the biggest box-offices successes of 2016, The Secret Life of Pets a movie that purports to tell us viewers what our pets, be they dogs, cats, birds or fish, get up to when we leave them to go to work.
The "hero" pet of this film is Max (voiced by Louis CK) a Jack Russell terrier who adores and is adored by his owner Katie (Ellie Kemper), whose return from work he patiently awaits every day, until one day she brings home a new dog she rescued from the pound, the large, hairy mongrel, Duke (Eric Stonestreet). Max, whose happy little bubble is threatened, shows dislike towards Duke, who responds with aggression as he threatens Max point blank that he will get rid of him if he has to. Max responds by breaking various items belonging to Katie and threatening to frame Duke for it, which causes him, in turn to submit to Max. The conflict only escalates, however, and eventually the two dogs find themselves lost and surrounded by all manner of urban perils, including an army of stray cats, animal control hot on their tails, and later, an army of bitter, rejected pets led by a vengeful rabbit (Kevin Hart). Max's disappearance prompts his secret admirer Gidget (Jenny Slate) to lead a motley bunch of pets including three dogs, a cat, a hawk and a hamster, to find him. Ultimately, though two dogs who hate each other must learn to work together if they are to have any chance of getting home.
Basically, this movie is Pixar's Toy Story but with pets instead of toys. I'm surprised I didn't pick up on this from one of the later trailers, but sitting through the movie, I found the the similarities too glaring to ignore. The main character who is used to being the center of his beloved owner's attention, is displaced by a new object of affection, and this leads to conflict between them. The only difference is that here, Duke, the Buzz Lightyear analogue, is antagonistic to Max almost immediately, and does not harbor fanciful delusions of living a different life the way Buzz does. Basically Max and Duke are Woody and Buzz, but without any of the quirky charm of either of those characters. In fact, they're both downright unlikable.
None of the characters, in fact, is particularly memorable, save perhaps for Kevin Hart's Snowball, and maybe Albert Brooks' hawk Tiberius. Every other character is fairly disposable, and even worse, with few exceptions, none of the voice actors is even particularly funny.
In an era in which animated films can intelligently tackle such hot-button topics as racial intolerance, like Zootopia, or even child prostitution, like Spirited Away, a movie that rehashes a twenty-one year old animated film feels distinctly uninspired. This movie isn't even anywhere near as good as the first Despicable Me.
The good news, though, is that there's plenty of slapstick comedy, which I honestly enjoyed, the animation is topnotch, and the score by Alexandre Desplat is a snazzy, jazzy delight. I found it exceptional, in fact. It's been a while since I've heard a music score for an animated film this lively.
Overall, The Secret Life of Pets is a reasonably fun watch, especially for those with children, though, and it did get me to look forward to Illumination Studios' next offering, the musical Sing.
6.5/10
Tuesday, August 23, 2016
Sitting Through a Two-Hour Commercial for a Video Game: A Review of Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV
directed by Takeshi Nozue
written by Hajime Tabata
In 2001, Sony Pictures released Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, an ambitious, purely motion-capture animated film that was intended to usher in a new era of animated films, riding on the popularity of the Final Fantasy video games, even though the film itself had nothing to do with the storyline of those games. The era never took off, though, as the film flopped at the international box office and was largely seen as the reason why the studio that made it, Square Pictures, went bankrupt.
Since then, rather than continue to venture into feature-length animated films designed for a wide audience, Square Enix, the video game developers who effectively absorbed Square Pictures, have used the feature film as a marketing platform for the aforementioned Final Fantasy video game. They did it in 2005 with the release of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, and have done it yet again with Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV.
Kingsglaive is set in the fictional world of Eos, in which the Kingdom of Niflheim has conquered just about every other nation or kingdom in the world save for the Kingdom of Lucis, with which it is currently at war. While the royal city of Insomnia remains under the protection of a magical force field, the remainder of the territories of Lucis are under constant attack. Among those fighting to protect Lucis are the king's loyal elite guard, the Kingsglaive. After a battle in one of Lucis' territories results in heavy losses for the kingdom, Niflheim sends its Chancellor Ardyn Izunia to offer a truce to Lucis' king, Regis Lucis Caelum CXIII (voiced Sean Bean, one of the three known actors in this production) under which Lucis will cede all of its territories beyond the city of Insomnia to Niflheim in exchange for peace. Then there's the bit about Lucis' prince Noctis, supposedly an important character but one never seen onscreen, marrying the princess Lunafreya (Lena Headey). In any case, the Kingsglaive, many of whom come from homes outside the city, feel betrayed by their king, with the exception of Nyx (Aaron Paul), who remains loyal and determined to protect the king as the day of signing the truce approaches. The problem, though, is that, as is usually the case, things are not what they seem.
After failing to appeal to broad audiences with Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, I guess it makes some sense that Square Enix crafted this film exclusively for fans of the FF games, but watching this film it still irked me that its makers apparently couldn't be bothered to tell the story a little more effectively for the rest of us. There's a perfunctory bit of exposition at the beginning of the film for the uninitiated, but really, the filmmakers basically just drop the viewer into the thick of things without really demonstrating why one should really care what happens to any of these characters. There's a story here, but the writer didn't really feel obligated to tell it.
What was even more grating than the underdeveloped story, though, was the cringe-inducing dialogue and voice-acting. Basically, apart from Paul, Bean and Headey, just about every other performer in the film is either not an actor by profession (several of them appeared to be animators), or not a very good actor at all. Several of the scenes without the three leads were somewhat painful to listen to, and even the leads themselves seemed to be struggling with some of the leaden dialogue. One actor who particularly grated on me was the Chancellor of Niflheim, whose acting was easily the most overdone of all them.
There is no denying that this movie is utterly gorgeous to behold, but really, the filmmakers seemed to forget their first job was to tell a story. Not only that, but the action which was supposed to be a major selling point of this film had a distinctly muddled, chaotic look that makes the much-maligned quick-cut, shaky-cam action of many Hollywood blockbusters look as clear as day. Also, some of the rather silly character designs significantly diminished the otherwise striking photo-realism of the characters, like the utterly absurd design of the Chancellor, who looked like he had a plastic wing strapped to one arm, and the generic anime design of Lunafreya. For heaven's sake, they got the gorgeous Lena Headey to appear in their movie, one would think they could have gotten permission to incorporate at least some of her striking features into the character. Paul's and Bean's characters are less distracting, but for the mullet that Nyx sports, though personally I was struck by how much Nyx resembled former Walking Dead actor Jon Bernthal.
One writer said it quite well; this entire experience is basically one long "cutscene;" it never quite feels like an actual movie. I'd probably be kinder to it if I had seen it on television (where the resolution would no doubt have been better), secure in the knowledge that I had not paid to sit sit through it, but, well, I didn't.
3.5/10
written by Hajime Tabata
In 2001, Sony Pictures released Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, an ambitious, purely motion-capture animated film that was intended to usher in a new era of animated films, riding on the popularity of the Final Fantasy video games, even though the film itself had nothing to do with the storyline of those games. The era never took off, though, as the film flopped at the international box office and was largely seen as the reason why the studio that made it, Square Pictures, went bankrupt.
Since then, rather than continue to venture into feature-length animated films designed for a wide audience, Square Enix, the video game developers who effectively absorbed Square Pictures, have used the feature film as a marketing platform for the aforementioned Final Fantasy video game. They did it in 2005 with the release of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, and have done it yet again with Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV.
Kingsglaive is set in the fictional world of Eos, in which the Kingdom of Niflheim has conquered just about every other nation or kingdom in the world save for the Kingdom of Lucis, with which it is currently at war. While the royal city of Insomnia remains under the protection of a magical force field, the remainder of the territories of Lucis are under constant attack. Among those fighting to protect Lucis are the king's loyal elite guard, the Kingsglaive. After a battle in one of Lucis' territories results in heavy losses for the kingdom, Niflheim sends its Chancellor Ardyn Izunia to offer a truce to Lucis' king, Regis Lucis Caelum CXIII (voiced Sean Bean, one of the three known actors in this production) under which Lucis will cede all of its territories beyond the city of Insomnia to Niflheim in exchange for peace. Then there's the bit about Lucis' prince Noctis, supposedly an important character but one never seen onscreen, marrying the princess Lunafreya (Lena Headey). In any case, the Kingsglaive, many of whom come from homes outside the city, feel betrayed by their king, with the exception of Nyx (Aaron Paul), who remains loyal and determined to protect the king as the day of signing the truce approaches. The problem, though, is that, as is usually the case, things are not what they seem.
After failing to appeal to broad audiences with Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, I guess it makes some sense that Square Enix crafted this film exclusively for fans of the FF games, but watching this film it still irked me that its makers apparently couldn't be bothered to tell the story a little more effectively for the rest of us. There's a perfunctory bit of exposition at the beginning of the film for the uninitiated, but really, the filmmakers basically just drop the viewer into the thick of things without really demonstrating why one should really care what happens to any of these characters. There's a story here, but the writer didn't really feel obligated to tell it.
What was even more grating than the underdeveloped story, though, was the cringe-inducing dialogue and voice-acting. Basically, apart from Paul, Bean and Headey, just about every other performer in the film is either not an actor by profession (several of them appeared to be animators), or not a very good actor at all. Several of the scenes without the three leads were somewhat painful to listen to, and even the leads themselves seemed to be struggling with some of the leaden dialogue. One actor who particularly grated on me was the Chancellor of Niflheim, whose acting was easily the most overdone of all them.
There is no denying that this movie is utterly gorgeous to behold, but really, the filmmakers seemed to forget their first job was to tell a story. Not only that, but the action which was supposed to be a major selling point of this film had a distinctly muddled, chaotic look that makes the much-maligned quick-cut, shaky-cam action of many Hollywood blockbusters look as clear as day. Also, some of the rather silly character designs significantly diminished the otherwise striking photo-realism of the characters, like the utterly absurd design of the Chancellor, who looked like he had a plastic wing strapped to one arm, and the generic anime design of Lunafreya. For heaven's sake, they got the gorgeous Lena Headey to appear in their movie, one would think they could have gotten permission to incorporate at least some of her striking features into the character. Paul's and Bean's characters are less distracting, but for the mullet that Nyx sports, though personally I was struck by how much Nyx resembled former Walking Dead actor Jon Bernthal.
One writer said it quite well; this entire experience is basically one long "cutscene;" it never quite feels like an actual movie. I'd probably be kinder to it if I had seen it on television (where the resolution would no doubt have been better), secure in the knowledge that I had not paid to sit sit through it, but, well, I didn't.
3.5/10
Sunday, August 14, 2016
With Charm to Spare: A Review of The BFG
directed by Steven Spielberg
written by Melissa Mathison
After sitting through a glut of sequels, reboots or remakes over the last few months, the quality of which has ranged from the fantastic (Civil War) to the distinctly uninspired (Jason Bourne), I fervently longed to watch a new film, meaning something that is neither a sequel or a remake, regardless of whether it was original material or adapted from another medium. I thought I'd found it in Warner Brothers' Suicide Squad, which presented the novel idea of a superhero film centered around supervillains, but while it was decent, that turned out to be a somewhat derivative action flick.
Truth be told, I hadn't even really planned on watching Steven Spielberg's adaptation of the Roald Dahl novel The BFG; I had thought of just getting it on DVD or watching it on cable, but when my daughter asked me very nicely if we could see it, I really couldn't resist and so we went to see it, and boy, am I glad we did.
Sophie (Ruby Barnhill) is an orphan who lives and a London orphanage and who can't sleep at night, as a result of which she walks around the orphanage in the wee hours. During one such nightly patrol, she sees a giant hand picking up a trash can, and as she gasps in fright she alerts the giant (Mark Rylance) who, fearing that she will betray his existence to the world, kidnaps her and brings her back to his land, giant country. There, after being understandably upset at being kidnapped, Sophie learns more about the "Big Friendly Giant" and comes to empathize with him. She also eventually discovers why he was wandering around London in the first place: he gives people their dreams, which he harvests from a magical tree. As wonderful as this is, she also discovers the BFG's unpleasant reality: he is regularly bullied by nine much bigger giants than he, led by the fearsome Fleshlumpeater (Jemaine Clement). Unlike the BFG, who only eats an awful vegetable that grows in his country, the giants eat flesh, and in fact ate the last human the BFG brought to his home. Sophie then hatches a plan to deal with the brutes once and for all.
The BFG marks Spielberg's return to live-action pop culture for the first time since he made the reviled 2008 sequel to the Indiana Jones franchise, and while this movie may not have had the built-in box-office strength of that sturdy franchise, it was head and shoulders its superior in terms of sheer storytelling. This movie has the kind of storytelling verve that made kid-oriented movies like E.T. so eminently watchable; the lead characters Sophie and the titular BFG, are eminently likable, which is really quite something considering that the latter is effectively a kidnapper. Credit must go to Rylance for a truly endearing performance; I missed his Oscar-winning turn in last year's Bridge of Spies, but after this film, I'm definitely a fan and will check out Spielberg's Cold War opus as soon as I am able. Newcomer Barnhill channels the charm of one-time child actress and fellow Dahl veteran Mara Wilson, who played the title character in the 1996 adaptation of Matilda.
But there's more to it than the performances; the visuals, the music and the overall storytelling evoke a wonderful sense of whimsy I haven't seen in a while. I'm a fan of Roald Dahl adaptations like Henry Selick's James and the Giant Peach and Wes Anderson's The Fantastic Mr. Fox, both stop-motion animated films, more than the somewhat perfunctory live-action adaptation of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Tim Burton (which, incidentally, remains the most successful adaptation of a Roald Dahl novel to date), and The BFG feels a lot more like its stop-motion siblings than its live-action one. There's quite a lot of heart to it, as well. The scene in which the BFG shows Sophie his "dream catching ground" which can only be reached by jumping into an enchanted lake and coming out on the other side, is just pure magic. It also helps that the legendary John Williams is in top form here, doing so much more than the rehashing of Star Wars themes that kept him busy last year.
For some reason, Roald Dahl adaptations, with the exception of the aforementioned Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, do not fare particularly well at the box-office, despite several adaptations that date back to the 1990s. It saddens me that a storyteller whose work has been embraced by generations of readers, for some reason, is not similarly appreciated on the big screen. The Fantastic Mr. Fox did not even come out here in theaters in the Philippines. Maybe someday, someone will crack the secret to both winning box-office battles and crafting a film that captures the magic of his books, but until then I will be happy to patronize films like this one.
7.5/10
written by Melissa Mathison
After sitting through a glut of sequels, reboots or remakes over the last few months, the quality of which has ranged from the fantastic (Civil War) to the distinctly uninspired (Jason Bourne), I fervently longed to watch a new film, meaning something that is neither a sequel or a remake, regardless of whether it was original material or adapted from another medium. I thought I'd found it in Warner Brothers' Suicide Squad, which presented the novel idea of a superhero film centered around supervillains, but while it was decent, that turned out to be a somewhat derivative action flick.
Truth be told, I hadn't even really planned on watching Steven Spielberg's adaptation of the Roald Dahl novel The BFG; I had thought of just getting it on DVD or watching it on cable, but when my daughter asked me very nicely if we could see it, I really couldn't resist and so we went to see it, and boy, am I glad we did.
Sophie (Ruby Barnhill) is an orphan who lives and a London orphanage and who can't sleep at night, as a result of which she walks around the orphanage in the wee hours. During one such nightly patrol, she sees a giant hand picking up a trash can, and as she gasps in fright she alerts the giant (Mark Rylance) who, fearing that she will betray his existence to the world, kidnaps her and brings her back to his land, giant country. There, after being understandably upset at being kidnapped, Sophie learns more about the "Big Friendly Giant" and comes to empathize with him. She also eventually discovers why he was wandering around London in the first place: he gives people their dreams, which he harvests from a magical tree. As wonderful as this is, she also discovers the BFG's unpleasant reality: he is regularly bullied by nine much bigger giants than he, led by the fearsome Fleshlumpeater (Jemaine Clement). Unlike the BFG, who only eats an awful vegetable that grows in his country, the giants eat flesh, and in fact ate the last human the BFG brought to his home. Sophie then hatches a plan to deal with the brutes once and for all.
The BFG marks Spielberg's return to live-action pop culture for the first time since he made the reviled 2008 sequel to the Indiana Jones franchise, and while this movie may not have had the built-in box-office strength of that sturdy franchise, it was head and shoulders its superior in terms of sheer storytelling. This movie has the kind of storytelling verve that made kid-oriented movies like E.T. so eminently watchable; the lead characters Sophie and the titular BFG, are eminently likable, which is really quite something considering that the latter is effectively a kidnapper. Credit must go to Rylance for a truly endearing performance; I missed his Oscar-winning turn in last year's Bridge of Spies, but after this film, I'm definitely a fan and will check out Spielberg's Cold War opus as soon as I am able. Newcomer Barnhill channels the charm of one-time child actress and fellow Dahl veteran Mara Wilson, who played the title character in the 1996 adaptation of Matilda.
But there's more to it than the performances; the visuals, the music and the overall storytelling evoke a wonderful sense of whimsy I haven't seen in a while. I'm a fan of Roald Dahl adaptations like Henry Selick's James and the Giant Peach and Wes Anderson's The Fantastic Mr. Fox, both stop-motion animated films, more than the somewhat perfunctory live-action adaptation of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Tim Burton (which, incidentally, remains the most successful adaptation of a Roald Dahl novel to date), and The BFG feels a lot more like its stop-motion siblings than its live-action one. There's quite a lot of heart to it, as well. The scene in which the BFG shows Sophie his "dream catching ground" which can only be reached by jumping into an enchanted lake and coming out on the other side, is just pure magic. It also helps that the legendary John Williams is in top form here, doing so much more than the rehashing of Star Wars themes that kept him busy last year.
For some reason, Roald Dahl adaptations, with the exception of the aforementioned Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, do not fare particularly well at the box-office, despite several adaptations that date back to the 1990s. It saddens me that a storyteller whose work has been embraced by generations of readers, for some reason, is not similarly appreciated on the big screen. The Fantastic Mr. Fox did not even come out here in theaters in the Philippines. Maybe someday, someone will crack the secret to both winning box-office battles and crafting a film that captures the magic of his books, but until then I will be happy to patronize films like this one.
7.5/10
Saturday, August 6, 2016
Seen at Home: A Review of Risen (Um...spoilers?)
directed by Kevin Reynolds
written by Kevin Reynolds and Paul Aiello
Christian movies are a curious thing; they kind of exist outside of the mainstream of filmed entertainment. With few exceptions they are relatively small earners; their theatrical release is generally limited to the United States or other select countries, and in terms of critical reception they receive middling reviews at best. On average, Christian-themed movies tend to get poorly reviewed. I have a number of theories, one being that critics don't like religion mixed in with their entertainment, another being that people don't like being preached to (though the success of films like Schindler's List and any number of movies geared towards social justice would seem to indicate otherwise), and another still being that for the most part, Christianity-themed movies simply aren't very-well made.
The thing is, I can't be sure that the third theory holds any water, having seen the quite obviously Christianity-themed film Risen, which tells the story of Christ's resurrection from the point of view of a Roman Tribune named Clavius (played by Joseph Fiennes). He's not a person mentioned in the Biblical account of the crucifixion or resurrection, so this story can best be described the way my son described it, as "Bible fan fiction." We didn't get a theatrical release of this in the Philippines, so I had to content myself with a DVD viewing.
Anyway, Clavius is an ambitious young Tribune working in Judea during the time of Jesus, and the film opens just around the time of the Crucifixion, with him and his troops quashing a sudden uprising by Jewish Zealots and killing the ringleader, who happens to be the Biblical Barabbas. His mission a success, Clavius is then tasked by Pontius Pilate (Peter Firth) to ensure that the crucified Yeshua (Cliff Curtis) dies and the body properly disposed of, lest his disciples steal it and declare him resurrected. Fortunately, a wealthy philanthropist, Joseph of Arimathea (Antonio Gil) offers his family tomb for Christ's interment. The body is entombed, with a heavy stone rolled over the entrace which is in turn then sealed with wax, with guards posted to watch it, all done at the insistence of the Jewish Sanhedrin, led by Caiaphas (Stephen Greif). When Christ's body is gone three days later, Clavius, with his subordinate Lucius (Tom Felton), is on a frantic mission to find it before the body decomposes beyond recognition and the disciples are able to claim that their leader has truly risen from the dead. What the unbelieving Clavius finds is enough to change his life forever.
The production value of this film, which was shot on location in Malta and Spain, is really quite striking. Oddly enough, it's not the first time I've seen a movie like this; it bears some similarity to the 2006 film The Final Inquiry which I saw on television some years ago.
This film is a more interesting take on that kind of story because it plays out like a police procedural, with Clavius leaving no stone unturned in his search for Yeshua's body. The film being a Christian film, and not the kind that leaves ambiguity in order for the viewer's own beliefs to fill in the gap, the risen Christ does appear, and I have to say I am a really big fan of Cliff Curtis' performance, which he reportedly achieved through a curious bit of method acting. While casting a Maori to play a Middle Eastern man is still not ethnically accurate, I was glad that the producers at least went for a person of color for this role rather than going for the usual generic Caucasian. Curtis' portrayal, as brief as it may be, is still something special, with its gentleness, and with the love he shows his disciples, all of whom are racked with guilt at having abandoned him at the hour of his death. As a Catholic I have to give special mention to the shot in which Curtis depicts the dead Christ, with eyes open, and a look of profound sorrow and pain frozen on his face. It's the visage many of us Catholics see in church when we look up and see Jesus on the cross, and Curtis nailed it (pun intended).
Fiennes, as the lead actor, does a creditable job carrying a movie with a fairly thin premise. As the driven but cynical Clavius, he effectively depicts a man struggling with his own convictions, especially when they are shaken by things he cannot explain. Tom Felton pretty much played his role as he was expected to, having been typecast thanks to the Harry Potter films. Firth and the actors who play the apostles contribute to the overall atmosphere of tension and urgency.
It is a shame, though, that the film delivers its emotional payoff relatively early (though still quite late in the film), as this is clearly meant to be a film about a man struggling with great inner conflict and in search of peace, a fact the character himself states in one way or another more than once through the film. What works well for me, though is that even after Clavius has his epiphany, he remains cautious and skeptical, and at a loss as to what to do next. He does not drop everything to become an apostle, and in fact the film is framed by him sitting alone in a sort of tavern, trying to figure out what to do with himself following his life-changing discovery. This, I think, mirrors the struggle that the movie's intended audience faces.
I got the impression that, the "non-believer" protagonist notwithstanding, the movie isn't meant to convert anyone who doesn't already have some kind of religious upbringing, but rather has a very specific audience in mind: agnostics, or people who were raised with a belief in God, and who have every reason to believe in the presence of God in their lives but who, for one reason or another, have drifted away from their faith while in pursuit of other things. Clavius is young, driven and arguably quite career-oriented, but in the end what he really wants is to live in peace, which mirrors the situation of a lot of young Christians today. Clavius is challenged, as are the agnostics watching: the key to obtaining peace is right before you; all you have to do is take it. It definitely preaches, but shows surprising, and commendable restraint towards the end.
As message movies go, this movie was not a bad one at all.
7.7/10
written by Kevin Reynolds and Paul Aiello
Christian movies are a curious thing; they kind of exist outside of the mainstream of filmed entertainment. With few exceptions they are relatively small earners; their theatrical release is generally limited to the United States or other select countries, and in terms of critical reception they receive middling reviews at best. On average, Christian-themed movies tend to get poorly reviewed. I have a number of theories, one being that critics don't like religion mixed in with their entertainment, another being that people don't like being preached to (though the success of films like Schindler's List and any number of movies geared towards social justice would seem to indicate otherwise), and another still being that for the most part, Christianity-themed movies simply aren't very-well made.
The thing is, I can't be sure that the third theory holds any water, having seen the quite obviously Christianity-themed film Risen, which tells the story of Christ's resurrection from the point of view of a Roman Tribune named Clavius (played by Joseph Fiennes). He's not a person mentioned in the Biblical account of the crucifixion or resurrection, so this story can best be described the way my son described it, as "Bible fan fiction." We didn't get a theatrical release of this in the Philippines, so I had to content myself with a DVD viewing.
Anyway, Clavius is an ambitious young Tribune working in Judea during the time of Jesus, and the film opens just around the time of the Crucifixion, with him and his troops quashing a sudden uprising by Jewish Zealots and killing the ringleader, who happens to be the Biblical Barabbas. His mission a success, Clavius is then tasked by Pontius Pilate (Peter Firth) to ensure that the crucified Yeshua (Cliff Curtis) dies and the body properly disposed of, lest his disciples steal it and declare him resurrected. Fortunately, a wealthy philanthropist, Joseph of Arimathea (Antonio Gil) offers his family tomb for Christ's interment. The body is entombed, with a heavy stone rolled over the entrace which is in turn then sealed with wax, with guards posted to watch it, all done at the insistence of the Jewish Sanhedrin, led by Caiaphas (Stephen Greif). When Christ's body is gone three days later, Clavius, with his subordinate Lucius (Tom Felton), is on a frantic mission to find it before the body decomposes beyond recognition and the disciples are able to claim that their leader has truly risen from the dead. What the unbelieving Clavius finds is enough to change his life forever.
The production value of this film, which was shot on location in Malta and Spain, is really quite striking. Oddly enough, it's not the first time I've seen a movie like this; it bears some similarity to the 2006 film The Final Inquiry which I saw on television some years ago.
This film is a more interesting take on that kind of story because it plays out like a police procedural, with Clavius leaving no stone unturned in his search for Yeshua's body. The film being a Christian film, and not the kind that leaves ambiguity in order for the viewer's own beliefs to fill in the gap, the risen Christ does appear, and I have to say I am a really big fan of Cliff Curtis' performance, which he reportedly achieved through a curious bit of method acting. While casting a Maori to play a Middle Eastern man is still not ethnically accurate, I was glad that the producers at least went for a person of color for this role rather than going for the usual generic Caucasian. Curtis' portrayal, as brief as it may be, is still something special, with its gentleness, and with the love he shows his disciples, all of whom are racked with guilt at having abandoned him at the hour of his death. As a Catholic I have to give special mention to the shot in which Curtis depicts the dead Christ, with eyes open, and a look of profound sorrow and pain frozen on his face. It's the visage many of us Catholics see in church when we look up and see Jesus on the cross, and Curtis nailed it (pun intended).
Fiennes, as the lead actor, does a creditable job carrying a movie with a fairly thin premise. As the driven but cynical Clavius, he effectively depicts a man struggling with his own convictions, especially when they are shaken by things he cannot explain. Tom Felton pretty much played his role as he was expected to, having been typecast thanks to the Harry Potter films. Firth and the actors who play the apostles contribute to the overall atmosphere of tension and urgency.
It is a shame, though, that the film delivers its emotional payoff relatively early (though still quite late in the film), as this is clearly meant to be a film about a man struggling with great inner conflict and in search of peace, a fact the character himself states in one way or another more than once through the film. What works well for me, though is that even after Clavius has his epiphany, he remains cautious and skeptical, and at a loss as to what to do next. He does not drop everything to become an apostle, and in fact the film is framed by him sitting alone in a sort of tavern, trying to figure out what to do with himself following his life-changing discovery. This, I think, mirrors the struggle that the movie's intended audience faces.
I got the impression that, the "non-believer" protagonist notwithstanding, the movie isn't meant to convert anyone who doesn't already have some kind of religious upbringing, but rather has a very specific audience in mind: agnostics, or people who were raised with a belief in God, and who have every reason to believe in the presence of God in their lives but who, for one reason or another, have drifted away from their faith while in pursuit of other things. Clavius is young, driven and arguably quite career-oriented, but in the end what he really wants is to live in peace, which mirrors the situation of a lot of young Christians today. Clavius is challenged, as are the agnostics watching: the key to obtaining peace is right before you; all you have to do is take it. It definitely preaches, but shows surprising, and commendable restraint towards the end.
As message movies go, this movie was not a bad one at all.
7.7/10
Thursday, August 4, 2016
It Could Have Been Worse: A Review of Suicide Squad
written and directed by David Ayer
With Batman vs. Superman having left theaters a couple of months ago, it seems film critics were in need of a new whipping boy, and in Warner Brothers' new film Suicide Squad, they have found one. Inspired by the comics of the same name, as well as the 1967 film The Dirty Dozen, the film tells the story of a team of supervillains recruited by the United States government to fight superhuman threats.
Following the events of Batman vs. Superman, high-level government honcho Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) makes a pitch to the highest echelons of the United States government's security apparatus to put together a team of super-powered individuals (referred to here as "metahumans") to serve as a response to future Supermen who might not be as friendly. The twist is that each and every one of the proposed individuals is either a convicted felon or, in one case, a potentially-world ending threat that is extremely difficult to control. This roster includes assassin-for-hire Deadshot (Will Smith), who never misses a shot, psychiatrist-turned-psychotic-criminal Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), the girlfriend of notorious criminal the Joker (Jared Leto), East-LA gangbanger Diablo (Jay Hernandez) who can manipulate fire but who, following personal tragedy, is reluctant to use his powers, sewer-dwelling, reptilian human Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnoye-Agbaje), who is super strong and feral, Australian bank robber Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney) who is extremely proficient in the use of...well...you know...and finally, the super-powerful but highly unstable Enchantress, an entity thousands of years old that happens to have taken possession of archaeologist June Moone (Cara Delevingne). Enchantress is easily the most dangerous of the group, but Waller is confident she has her under control, because she has her heart in her briefcase. Waller convinces the government to sign off on her plan, and in short order, after a world-ending threat emerges, the team is activated, but under the close watch of Col. Rick Flagg (Joel Kinnaman) a Navy SEAL who also happens to be Dr. Moone's boyfriend and the mysterious Katana (Karen Fukuhara) armed with a sword that steals people's souls. As an extra safety measure, the members of "Task Force X" ("Suicide Squad" is a name thought up by Deadshot) are fitted with explosive devices in their necks lest any of them get any ideas about escaping. Considering the magnitude of the threat, even Waller's motley crew may not be enough to save the day.
Now, does this film deserve the critical thrashing it's been getting over the last couple of days?
Well, no, not to the extent that it's been criticized, but it's far from a perfect movie.
The writing, for one thing, leaves quite a bit to be desired. Not only is Waller's grand plan to have a bunch of extremely dangerous people serve as some kind of deterrent against threats kind of inherently untenable, as the development of the story reveals, but her idea of a "failsafe" in the event her plan goes wrong is basically laughable. While her characterization as Machiavellian and utterly amoral is well-done and, to the best of my recollection, in keeping with the comics, her incompetence rather took me out of the story on more than one occasion. Not only that, but Rick Flagg, supposedly the lone "straight" man in the team as he is the mobile "warden" of the jailbirds, is a thoroughly unlikable character, and while Davis does her best with some really bad scripting, the failings of Flagg are equal parts Ayer (and his presumed ghost-writers) and Kinnaman. Also, the movie suffers some serious internal logic failure as the script cannot seem to decide exactly how fragile or tough the zombie minions against which the team face off are supposed to be. At some times they can take a hail of bullets but at others all it takes is a baseball bat to the head to take them down.
The editing is chaotic, and the sound editing or mixing even worse, as I had to strain to hear a lot of the dialogue over the pop music blaring while it was going on. I get the gripe about there being a "tonal shift" from one scene to another, but it wasn't that jarring for me, though far too often, the bad writing was.
For all that, this film is not the cinematic apocalypse some reviewers make it out to be. The lead performances, for one, are pretty solid, with Will Smith's Deadshot marking a return to action-movie form for him after the disastrous After Earth almost killed his career. Whether the rumors are true that there were re-shoots to make the film "funnier" I can be pretty sure that Smith brought the humor up front, as it has been a defining aspect of his career, really. Ayer wisely anchors the movie on his character, for the most part. Robbie is also a hoot as Quinn, though her somewhat exploitative outfit somewhat undermines the film's aspirations towards subversiveness (more on that later). The scene in which she is "reborn" by jumping into a vat of chemicals at the behest of her beloved Joker, with its mix of candy colors against the white goo, is haunting and quite honestly belongs in a different movie, which is something that, to be fair, can be said for quite a few of the visuals here. One wonders if Ayer's vision wasn't somehow adulterated by meddling suits.
As the fourth onscreen iteration of the Joker (including the one from the 1966 Batman movie), Leto does what he can to make the role his own, and succeeds for the most part, but his participation in the story is quite peripheral. It would be interesting to see him face off against Ben Affleck's Batman (who does show up in flashbacks, incidentally, but only opposite Deadshot and Harley Quinn). Hernandez's Diablo infuses the movie with a little bit of soul, though his arc is more than a little hackneyed. Incidentally, I was happy to see quite a bit of ethnic diversity among the lead actors (you HEAR that, Marvel? Black guys/cultural minorities can be more than SIDEKICKS!), though I will dock WB/DC points on the diversity score for the fact that Native American actor Adam Beach basically showed up just so that Amanda Waller could show the team she wasn't messing around about the neck explosives. That is not a spoiler in any meaningful way.
The action, while uneven and chaotic at some points (again, due to internal logic issues, among other things), is still pretty watchable, and pretty much every team member gets to showcase his or her signature talent once or twice.
I suppose what rankles critics is the notion being peddled by some that this movie is in any way subversive, because really, it's not. It falls quite readily on the "crooks with hearts of gold" story trope, as well as several others, and the fact that Harley Quinn's choice of wardrobe is designed to get male butts into the seats really debunks any notion that this movie is some groundbreaking statement on female empowerment as some people tried to suggest early in the film's marketing phase. It's basically one's average male-centric action movie that follows a fairly standard formula. It's hardly a storytelling maverick.
Fortunately, it's not the creative black hole it's made out to be by critics, and with better writing and editing, a sequel to this could actually be quite entertaining.
It's a decent way to kill time at the mall...but not much else.
6/10
With Batman vs. Superman having left theaters a couple of months ago, it seems film critics were in need of a new whipping boy, and in Warner Brothers' new film Suicide Squad, they have found one. Inspired by the comics of the same name, as well as the 1967 film The Dirty Dozen, the film tells the story of a team of supervillains recruited by the United States government to fight superhuman threats.
Following the events of Batman vs. Superman, high-level government honcho Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) makes a pitch to the highest echelons of the United States government's security apparatus to put together a team of super-powered individuals (referred to here as "metahumans") to serve as a response to future Supermen who might not be as friendly. The twist is that each and every one of the proposed individuals is either a convicted felon or, in one case, a potentially-world ending threat that is extremely difficult to control. This roster includes assassin-for-hire Deadshot (Will Smith), who never misses a shot, psychiatrist-turned-psychotic-criminal Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), the girlfriend of notorious criminal the Joker (Jared Leto), East-LA gangbanger Diablo (Jay Hernandez) who can manipulate fire but who, following personal tragedy, is reluctant to use his powers, sewer-dwelling, reptilian human Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnoye-Agbaje), who is super strong and feral, Australian bank robber Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney) who is extremely proficient in the use of...well...you know...and finally, the super-powerful but highly unstable Enchantress, an entity thousands of years old that happens to have taken possession of archaeologist June Moone (Cara Delevingne). Enchantress is easily the most dangerous of the group, but Waller is confident she has her under control, because she has her heart in her briefcase. Waller convinces the government to sign off on her plan, and in short order, after a world-ending threat emerges, the team is activated, but under the close watch of Col. Rick Flagg (Joel Kinnaman) a Navy SEAL who also happens to be Dr. Moone's boyfriend and the mysterious Katana (Karen Fukuhara) armed with a sword that steals people's souls. As an extra safety measure, the members of "Task Force X" ("Suicide Squad" is a name thought up by Deadshot) are fitted with explosive devices in their necks lest any of them get any ideas about escaping. Considering the magnitude of the threat, even Waller's motley crew may not be enough to save the day.
Now, does this film deserve the critical thrashing it's been getting over the last couple of days?
Well, no, not to the extent that it's been criticized, but it's far from a perfect movie.
The writing, for one thing, leaves quite a bit to be desired. Not only is Waller's grand plan to have a bunch of extremely dangerous people serve as some kind of deterrent against threats kind of inherently untenable, as the development of the story reveals, but her idea of a "failsafe" in the event her plan goes wrong is basically laughable. While her characterization as Machiavellian and utterly amoral is well-done and, to the best of my recollection, in keeping with the comics, her incompetence rather took me out of the story on more than one occasion. Not only that, but Rick Flagg, supposedly the lone "straight" man in the team as he is the mobile "warden" of the jailbirds, is a thoroughly unlikable character, and while Davis does her best with some really bad scripting, the failings of Flagg are equal parts Ayer (and his presumed ghost-writers) and Kinnaman. Also, the movie suffers some serious internal logic failure as the script cannot seem to decide exactly how fragile or tough the zombie minions against which the team face off are supposed to be. At some times they can take a hail of bullets but at others all it takes is a baseball bat to the head to take them down.
The editing is chaotic, and the sound editing or mixing even worse, as I had to strain to hear a lot of the dialogue over the pop music blaring while it was going on. I get the gripe about there being a "tonal shift" from one scene to another, but it wasn't that jarring for me, though far too often, the bad writing was.
For all that, this film is not the cinematic apocalypse some reviewers make it out to be. The lead performances, for one, are pretty solid, with Will Smith's Deadshot marking a return to action-movie form for him after the disastrous After Earth almost killed his career. Whether the rumors are true that there were re-shoots to make the film "funnier" I can be pretty sure that Smith brought the humor up front, as it has been a defining aspect of his career, really. Ayer wisely anchors the movie on his character, for the most part. Robbie is also a hoot as Quinn, though her somewhat exploitative outfit somewhat undermines the film's aspirations towards subversiveness (more on that later). The scene in which she is "reborn" by jumping into a vat of chemicals at the behest of her beloved Joker, with its mix of candy colors against the white goo, is haunting and quite honestly belongs in a different movie, which is something that, to be fair, can be said for quite a few of the visuals here. One wonders if Ayer's vision wasn't somehow adulterated by meddling suits.
As the fourth onscreen iteration of the Joker (including the one from the 1966 Batman movie), Leto does what he can to make the role his own, and succeeds for the most part, but his participation in the story is quite peripheral. It would be interesting to see him face off against Ben Affleck's Batman (who does show up in flashbacks, incidentally, but only opposite Deadshot and Harley Quinn). Hernandez's Diablo infuses the movie with a little bit of soul, though his arc is more than a little hackneyed. Incidentally, I was happy to see quite a bit of ethnic diversity among the lead actors (you HEAR that, Marvel? Black guys/cultural minorities can be more than SIDEKICKS!), though I will dock WB/DC points on the diversity score for the fact that Native American actor Adam Beach basically showed up just so that Amanda Waller could show the team she wasn't messing around about the neck explosives. That is not a spoiler in any meaningful way.
The action, while uneven and chaotic at some points (again, due to internal logic issues, among other things), is still pretty watchable, and pretty much every team member gets to showcase his or her signature talent once or twice.
I suppose what rankles critics is the notion being peddled by some that this movie is in any way subversive, because really, it's not. It falls quite readily on the "crooks with hearts of gold" story trope, as well as several others, and the fact that Harley Quinn's choice of wardrobe is designed to get male butts into the seats really debunks any notion that this movie is some groundbreaking statement on female empowerment as some people tried to suggest early in the film's marketing phase. It's basically one's average male-centric action movie that follows a fairly standard formula. It's hardly a storytelling maverick.
Fortunately, it's not the creative black hole it's made out to be by critics, and with better writing and editing, a sequel to this could actually be quite entertaining.
It's a decent way to kill time at the mall...but not much else.
6/10
Sunday, July 31, 2016
Comfortable Old Shoes: A Review of Jason Bourne
directed by Paul Greengrass
written by Paul Greengrass and Christopher Rouse
Whatever one feels about Universal Pictures' Bourne series of films starring Matt Damon, one cannot deny that it has been a remarkable action movie franchise. Each film has earned more at the box office than the last, and has gotten better reviews than the last. Their hot streak broke a few years back when neither director Paul Greengrass, who helmed The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum nor star Matt Damon was interested in making a new film, and Universal unwisely decided to make a spin-off/sequel hybrid with then "it boy" Jeremy Renner playing a different character, albeit one similarly conditioned as Jason Bourne. That film was not well received critically or commercially, and the studio was at a loss as to where to go next.
Fortunately for Universal, Greengrass finally decided a year or two ago that he was interested in giving the franchise another go, and with Damon in tow they proceeded to make the first movie featuring Jason Bourne in nearly a decade entitled, aptly enough, Jason Bourne.
It's been several years since the events of The Bourne Ultimatum (with the events in The Bourne Legacy spinoff having been conveniently ignored) and former amnesiac assassin for the Central Intelligence Agency Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) is spending his days as a bare-knuckle boxer somewhere in Greece. Meanwhile, his erstwhile colleague and fellow CIA operative gone rogue Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles) has unearthed a chilling new black-ops program of the CIA involving online invasion of privacy that could be even worse than the one that created Jason Bourne. In hacking into the system, Parson has put herself in the crosshairs of the CIA, now headed by Robert Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones) with the help of IT wizard Heather Lee (Alicia Vikander). She also learns crucial information about the only person she knows who could blow this whole thing wide open: Jason Bourne, whom she tracks down in Greece. Unfortunately, that puts him in the CIA's sights as well, particularly a rather nasty assassin with a score to settle (Vincent Cassel). Bourne's a bit older, and considerably more world weary, but this time he has good reason to come in out of the cold: this time it's personal.
As much as I have enjoyed all of the Bourne films prior to this one, I have to admit they all follow a very similar narrative structure: Bourne unearths a mystery that involves his past with the CIA, fights through a bunch of throwaway CIA agents, including at least one "boss battle" (in the first one, there were two), gets involved in a lengthy car chase, then manages to ruin the big bad guy without his fists. It's a perfect balance of exposition and action, a formula from which the last film, the one without Jason Bourne in it deviated, for which they paid dearly.
Well, with the return of Greengrass, Damon and Jason Bourne to the series after a one-film and nine-year hiatus, we also see a return of the old formula, complete with the mystery, the boss battle and the car chase, albeit in a slightly different order, and to be honest, for the most part, I didn't mind. It was the cinematic equivalent of eating comfort food.
The thing is, while Greengrass still has serious action storytelling chops and while Damon still has the edginess that made Bourne such a watchable character, I could not get around how tacked on this movie felt. For example, the given reasons for Bourne getting back "in the game," especially considering how neatly The Bourne Ultimatum tied up the trilogy felt a tad forced. Basically, Greengrass (who co-wrote this film with film editor Christopher Rouse) retroactively gave Bourne yet another axe to grind against the CIA. I'm also not sure I really care for the subtext behind that particular plot device. Are the writers suggesting that Bourne won't do anything to stop the CIA (which has a particularly insidious scheme in this film) if it doesn't somehow involve tidbits of his past?
Not only that, but as gratifying as the action sequences are, they definitely have a been-there-done-that feel to them. Greengrass's fight scenes still pack a wallop and Damon looks great, even at 45, but really, after Gareth Evans' The Raid films, the Russo brothers' Captain America movies and even Netflix's Daredevil series took bone-crunching hand-to-hand action to another level, the onus was on the Bourne crew to step things up a bit as well. They didn't do their fight scenes any favors by having several of the sequences semi-obscured by darkness, including a climactic fight scene. The "boss battles" in the first three Bourne movies still stand out for me, especially since they were all filmed in daylight.
Finally, Greengrass and company approach the requisite car chase with somewhat uncharacteristic bombast and excess, the sort of over-the-top, illogical approach one would see in a Michael Bay movie. The chase in Doug Liman's The Bourne Identity, involving a Mini Cooper and the streets of Paris, was so well-done that it compares favorably to such classic car-chase scenes as those in Ronin or The French Connection. The chase here, set along the Las Vegas strip and which features an armored truck which is more like a cross between a Lamborghini and a tank, looks like it came out of a Transformers movie and, unbelievably enough, actually manages to take too long. My 14-year-old son, a huge fan of the series who has seen every one of the original films on DVD at least twice, fell asleep during the chase, and while I did not doze off (at least not during that particular sequence), I cannot say I blame him.
The performances, fortunately, are generally good. Damon and Stiles, the only veterans from the original films, slip quite comfortably into their roles again, and I was grateful that, in a day and age in which digital de-aging and botox are all the rage, the actors wear their wrinkles quite prominently. Tommy Lee Jones is, well, Tommy Lee Jones again as he puts a somewhat malevolent spin on his federal marshal from The Fugitive. Vincent Cassel was appropriately stoical as an unnamed CIA asset (I'm serious; in the credits, his character is identified solely as "Asset"), but I have to reiterate that he was totally wasted in the climactic fight scene. I'd known this guy could do impressive onscreen fighting since I saw him in 2000's The Crimson Rivers and 2002's The Brotherhood of the Wolf, and when I read he was cast in this film I was genuinely excited to see his character throw down with Bourne. There was quite a gap, unfortunately, between expectation and the actual product. Alicia Vikander turned in a decent performance as Heather Lee, but as a Swede playing an American she seemed to be struggling with her accent, not completely unlike the way her compatriot Noomi Rapace strained a bit to play an Englishwoman in Prometheus. One performance that stood out for me was that of Riz Ahmend as Aaron Kapoor, a Mark-Zuckerberg-like IT magnate who makes a deal with the devil and is keen to wiggle out of it.
The good news for me is that I think Greengrass and Damon still have a few stories left to tell with this character, and judging from the grosses, it looks like they'll get to tell them. I just hope they feel a little fresher than this one does.
6.4/10
written by Paul Greengrass and Christopher Rouse
Whatever one feels about Universal Pictures' Bourne series of films starring Matt Damon, one cannot deny that it has been a remarkable action movie franchise. Each film has earned more at the box office than the last, and has gotten better reviews than the last. Their hot streak broke a few years back when neither director Paul Greengrass, who helmed The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum nor star Matt Damon was interested in making a new film, and Universal unwisely decided to make a spin-off/sequel hybrid with then "it boy" Jeremy Renner playing a different character, albeit one similarly conditioned as Jason Bourne. That film was not well received critically or commercially, and the studio was at a loss as to where to go next.
Fortunately for Universal, Greengrass finally decided a year or two ago that he was interested in giving the franchise another go, and with Damon in tow they proceeded to make the first movie featuring Jason Bourne in nearly a decade entitled, aptly enough, Jason Bourne.
It's been several years since the events of The Bourne Ultimatum (with the events in The Bourne Legacy spinoff having been conveniently ignored) and former amnesiac assassin for the Central Intelligence Agency Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) is spending his days as a bare-knuckle boxer somewhere in Greece. Meanwhile, his erstwhile colleague and fellow CIA operative gone rogue Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles) has unearthed a chilling new black-ops program of the CIA involving online invasion of privacy that could be even worse than the one that created Jason Bourne. In hacking into the system, Parson has put herself in the crosshairs of the CIA, now headed by Robert Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones) with the help of IT wizard Heather Lee (Alicia Vikander). She also learns crucial information about the only person she knows who could blow this whole thing wide open: Jason Bourne, whom she tracks down in Greece. Unfortunately, that puts him in the CIA's sights as well, particularly a rather nasty assassin with a score to settle (Vincent Cassel). Bourne's a bit older, and considerably more world weary, but this time he has good reason to come in out of the cold: this time it's personal.
As much as I have enjoyed all of the Bourne films prior to this one, I have to admit they all follow a very similar narrative structure: Bourne unearths a mystery that involves his past with the CIA, fights through a bunch of throwaway CIA agents, including at least one "boss battle" (in the first one, there were two), gets involved in a lengthy car chase, then manages to ruin the big bad guy without his fists. It's a perfect balance of exposition and action, a formula from which the last film, the one without Jason Bourne in it deviated, for which they paid dearly.
Well, with the return of Greengrass, Damon and Jason Bourne to the series after a one-film and nine-year hiatus, we also see a return of the old formula, complete with the mystery, the boss battle and the car chase, albeit in a slightly different order, and to be honest, for the most part, I didn't mind. It was the cinematic equivalent of eating comfort food.
The thing is, while Greengrass still has serious action storytelling chops and while Damon still has the edginess that made Bourne such a watchable character, I could not get around how tacked on this movie felt. For example, the given reasons for Bourne getting back "in the game," especially considering how neatly The Bourne Ultimatum tied up the trilogy felt a tad forced. Basically, Greengrass (who co-wrote this film with film editor Christopher Rouse) retroactively gave Bourne yet another axe to grind against the CIA. I'm also not sure I really care for the subtext behind that particular plot device. Are the writers suggesting that Bourne won't do anything to stop the CIA (which has a particularly insidious scheme in this film) if it doesn't somehow involve tidbits of his past?
Not only that, but as gratifying as the action sequences are, they definitely have a been-there-done-that feel to them. Greengrass's fight scenes still pack a wallop and Damon looks great, even at 45, but really, after Gareth Evans' The Raid films, the Russo brothers' Captain America movies and even Netflix's Daredevil series took bone-crunching hand-to-hand action to another level, the onus was on the Bourne crew to step things up a bit as well. They didn't do their fight scenes any favors by having several of the sequences semi-obscured by darkness, including a climactic fight scene. The "boss battles" in the first three Bourne movies still stand out for me, especially since they were all filmed in daylight.
Finally, Greengrass and company approach the requisite car chase with somewhat uncharacteristic bombast and excess, the sort of over-the-top, illogical approach one would see in a Michael Bay movie. The chase in Doug Liman's The Bourne Identity, involving a Mini Cooper and the streets of Paris, was so well-done that it compares favorably to such classic car-chase scenes as those in Ronin or The French Connection. The chase here, set along the Las Vegas strip and which features an armored truck which is more like a cross between a Lamborghini and a tank, looks like it came out of a Transformers movie and, unbelievably enough, actually manages to take too long. My 14-year-old son, a huge fan of the series who has seen every one of the original films on DVD at least twice, fell asleep during the chase, and while I did not doze off (at least not during that particular sequence), I cannot say I blame him.
The performances, fortunately, are generally good. Damon and Stiles, the only veterans from the original films, slip quite comfortably into their roles again, and I was grateful that, in a day and age in which digital de-aging and botox are all the rage, the actors wear their wrinkles quite prominently. Tommy Lee Jones is, well, Tommy Lee Jones again as he puts a somewhat malevolent spin on his federal marshal from The Fugitive. Vincent Cassel was appropriately stoical as an unnamed CIA asset (I'm serious; in the credits, his character is identified solely as "Asset"), but I have to reiterate that he was totally wasted in the climactic fight scene. I'd known this guy could do impressive onscreen fighting since I saw him in 2000's The Crimson Rivers and 2002's The Brotherhood of the Wolf, and when I read he was cast in this film I was genuinely excited to see his character throw down with Bourne. There was quite a gap, unfortunately, between expectation and the actual product. Alicia Vikander turned in a decent performance as Heather Lee, but as a Swede playing an American she seemed to be struggling with her accent, not completely unlike the way her compatriot Noomi Rapace strained a bit to play an Englishwoman in Prometheus. One performance that stood out for me was that of Riz Ahmend as Aaron Kapoor, a Mark-Zuckerberg-like IT magnate who makes a deal with the devil and is keen to wiggle out of it.
The good news for me is that I think Greengrass and Damon still have a few stories left to tell with this character, and judging from the grosses, it looks like they'll get to tell them. I just hope they feel a little fresher than this one does.
6.4/10
Love Letter to a Saint: A Review of Ignacio de Loyola
written and directed by Paolo Dy
To honor the saint who was largely responsible for the foundation of the Society of Jesus, Jesuit Communications Philippines has produced a film dramatizing his conversion from a Spanish aristocrat obsessed with the notion of a romantic death in battle to a simply, holy man dedicated to serving others in the name of Christ.
Born to an affluent family, Inigo Lopez de Loyola (Andreas Munoz) is the youngest of several children. With his mother having died in childbirth, he is raised by a blacksmith while his father grieves, and as he loses a brother to armed conflict Inigo himself grows up fixated on the idea of a hero's death in battle himself. He nearly gets his wish when, during an invasion of the fortress of Pamplona by French-Navarese forces, his leg is crushed in the course of battle by a falling rampart. As he convalesces, he despairs at the knowledge that, having been crippled by his injury, he will never be a soldier again. While at home, though, he reads of the lives of the saints (which are the only books to be found in the house) and finds a new calling: that of the holy man. He determines to live the simple life of a holy pilgrim, inspired by the example of St. Francis of Assisi. He begins a journey to discover God that will transform not only his own life, but those of the people whose lives he touches with his kindness.
One thing that really struck me about this film was the attention to detail, from Dy's taut script, to the costume design, to the choice of location, this film is truly a labor not only of love but of extremely meticulous planning and execution. It calls to mind another Filipino film which, a little under a year ago, was making waves on social media, Heneral Luna. I am overjoyed to live in an era when passion projects like this, Heneral Luna, and films like Brillante Mendoza's Ma'Rosa, among many others, are being made. Even though they face tall odds in the form of generic Hollywood blockbusters or lowest-common denominator pap, Filipino filmmakers, much like Dy's take on St. Ignatius, hurl themselves into the breach.
As was the case with Heneral Luna, one can see the seams in the film's visual effects, which is to be expected as these filmmakers do not have a whole lot of money to work with, but Dy unfortunately makes the mistake of asking a little too much of his effects team in a particularly stylized sequence in which Inigo faces off against an antagonistic specter who may well be his own tortured subconscious. The result is a little wince-inducing. I also noticed repeatedly throughout the film that the camera would, at somewhat inopportune moments, suddenly lose focus. I think I get what Dy was going for in those sequences, but I feel his timing might have been a bit off.
While I appreciated the script's reverence towards the title character, I was a little disappointed by how relatively little attention was paid to how he was antagonized by the Catholic Church in the film's third act. This a period in the Church's history where they were basically killing people for the simple act of disagreeing with them. To be honest, this was, for me at least, a wasted opportunity, especially considering that the current Pope is a Jesuit and much could therefore have been made about St. Ignatius winning over his doubters. As cinematic bad guys go, one couldn't have gotten juicier material than the Inquisition-era Catholic Church; they're right up there with the Nazis in terms of sheer malevolence. While the ending had all the requisite beats of a good confrontation, I feel it wasn't quite as emotionally charged as it should have been.
Also, while the script was quite lyrical at times, it didn't quite have the gut-punch that I thought a film championing Ignacio's impact on Christianity should have, and there weren't quite any zingers like Antonio Luna's now-famous line: "You're like virgins believing in the love of a whore." Interestingly enough, one particularly engaging scene for me was one in which the newly-converted Inigo, upon a visit to a brothel instigated by his brother Beltran (Lucas Fuica) and cousin and confidant Xanti (Javier Godino), rather than lie with the woman he has been presented, actually talks to her and shows her compassion she has never before known in her life. It's a quiet, but moving scene, and Munoz and the actress who played the prostitute Ana (whose name unfortunately escapes me and is not listed on the internet), really sell it well. The film, unfortunately, does not have quite enough scenes like this, which could have helped it more than the somewhat generic battle sequence in the beginning and the repeated focus on Ignacio's daddy issues.
It's really a shame, because lead actor Munoz really gives his all in essaying this role. While there were other notables in the cast like Godino as Xanti, Fuica as Don Beltran, Julio Perillan as Father Sanchez and a whole host of other very capable Spanish actors selected for their skill and their facility with the English language, Munoz carries the film, just as John Arcilla very ably anchored Heneral Luna last year. Unfortunately, though, there were some actors with small but pivotal roles whose grasp of English was apparently so bad that Dy made the creative decision to have Filipino actors dub their dialogue, and in one case the substitution was embarrassingly obvious. In the other case, fortunately, the swap was a bit muted.
One thing that definitely wasn't muted, and which deserves prominent mention is Ryan Cayabyab's soaring musical score, which for me is easily a highlight of this film. I really appreciated how he employed a full orchestra and choir for some of the film's more "epic" scenes but did not hesitate to have solos by guitarists or other instrumentalists during the film's more intimate moments.
Ultimately, I appreciate this film for having quite a bit of heart, even for all its flaws, though I can't quite be sure if people not at all familiar with St. Ignatius would really get into it. Still, one compliment I can pay the film is this; I walked into it having had minimal sleep in the last 24 hours and I was fully expecting to doze off at some point into it, but I didn't sleep a wink. I can't even say that about the action film Jason Bourne, which I will review next.
8/10
To honor the saint who was largely responsible for the foundation of the Society of Jesus, Jesuit Communications Philippines has produced a film dramatizing his conversion from a Spanish aristocrat obsessed with the notion of a romantic death in battle to a simply, holy man dedicated to serving others in the name of Christ.
Born to an affluent family, Inigo Lopez de Loyola (Andreas Munoz) is the youngest of several children. With his mother having died in childbirth, he is raised by a blacksmith while his father grieves, and as he loses a brother to armed conflict Inigo himself grows up fixated on the idea of a hero's death in battle himself. He nearly gets his wish when, during an invasion of the fortress of Pamplona by French-Navarese forces, his leg is crushed in the course of battle by a falling rampart. As he convalesces, he despairs at the knowledge that, having been crippled by his injury, he will never be a soldier again. While at home, though, he reads of the lives of the saints (which are the only books to be found in the house) and finds a new calling: that of the holy man. He determines to live the simple life of a holy pilgrim, inspired by the example of St. Francis of Assisi. He begins a journey to discover God that will transform not only his own life, but those of the people whose lives he touches with his kindness.
One thing that really struck me about this film was the attention to detail, from Dy's taut script, to the costume design, to the choice of location, this film is truly a labor not only of love but of extremely meticulous planning and execution. It calls to mind another Filipino film which, a little under a year ago, was making waves on social media, Heneral Luna. I am overjoyed to live in an era when passion projects like this, Heneral Luna, and films like Brillante Mendoza's Ma'Rosa, among many others, are being made. Even though they face tall odds in the form of generic Hollywood blockbusters or lowest-common denominator pap, Filipino filmmakers, much like Dy's take on St. Ignatius, hurl themselves into the breach.
As was the case with Heneral Luna, one can see the seams in the film's visual effects, which is to be expected as these filmmakers do not have a whole lot of money to work with, but Dy unfortunately makes the mistake of asking a little too much of his effects team in a particularly stylized sequence in which Inigo faces off against an antagonistic specter who may well be his own tortured subconscious. The result is a little wince-inducing. I also noticed repeatedly throughout the film that the camera would, at somewhat inopportune moments, suddenly lose focus. I think I get what Dy was going for in those sequences, but I feel his timing might have been a bit off.
While I appreciated the script's reverence towards the title character, I was a little disappointed by how relatively little attention was paid to how he was antagonized by the Catholic Church in the film's third act. This a period in the Church's history where they were basically killing people for the simple act of disagreeing with them. To be honest, this was, for me at least, a wasted opportunity, especially considering that the current Pope is a Jesuit and much could therefore have been made about St. Ignatius winning over his doubters. As cinematic bad guys go, one couldn't have gotten juicier material than the Inquisition-era Catholic Church; they're right up there with the Nazis in terms of sheer malevolence. While the ending had all the requisite beats of a good confrontation, I feel it wasn't quite as emotionally charged as it should have been.
Also, while the script was quite lyrical at times, it didn't quite have the gut-punch that I thought a film championing Ignacio's impact on Christianity should have, and there weren't quite any zingers like Antonio Luna's now-famous line: "You're like virgins believing in the love of a whore." Interestingly enough, one particularly engaging scene for me was one in which the newly-converted Inigo, upon a visit to a brothel instigated by his brother Beltran (Lucas Fuica) and cousin and confidant Xanti (Javier Godino), rather than lie with the woman he has been presented, actually talks to her and shows her compassion she has never before known in her life. It's a quiet, but moving scene, and Munoz and the actress who played the prostitute Ana (whose name unfortunately escapes me and is not listed on the internet), really sell it well. The film, unfortunately, does not have quite enough scenes like this, which could have helped it more than the somewhat generic battle sequence in the beginning and the repeated focus on Ignacio's daddy issues.
It's really a shame, because lead actor Munoz really gives his all in essaying this role. While there were other notables in the cast like Godino as Xanti, Fuica as Don Beltran, Julio Perillan as Father Sanchez and a whole host of other very capable Spanish actors selected for their skill and their facility with the English language, Munoz carries the film, just as John Arcilla very ably anchored Heneral Luna last year. Unfortunately, though, there were some actors with small but pivotal roles whose grasp of English was apparently so bad that Dy made the creative decision to have Filipino actors dub their dialogue, and in one case the substitution was embarrassingly obvious. In the other case, fortunately, the swap was a bit muted.
One thing that definitely wasn't muted, and which deserves prominent mention is Ryan Cayabyab's soaring musical score, which for me is easily a highlight of this film. I really appreciated how he employed a full orchestra and choir for some of the film's more "epic" scenes but did not hesitate to have solos by guitarists or other instrumentalists during the film's more intimate moments.
Ultimately, I appreciate this film for having quite a bit of heart, even for all its flaws, though I can't quite be sure if people not at all familiar with St. Ignatius would really get into it. Still, one compliment I can pay the film is this; I walked into it having had minimal sleep in the last 24 hours and I was fully expecting to doze off at some point into it, but I didn't sleep a wink. I can't even say that about the action film Jason Bourne, which I will review next.
8/10
Saturday, July 30, 2016
Abrams Passes the Baton: A Review of Star Trek Beyond
directed by Justin Lin
written by Simon Pegg and Doug Jung
I may be in the minority, but I quite honestly liked JJ Abrams' resuscitation of the Star Trek film franchise better than his record-shattering sequel to the Star Wars saga. I can even go as far as to say I enjoyed the much-maligned Star Trek Into Darkness which is now described as a poorly-realized remake of the well-loved Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. The decision to watch Star Trek Beyond, even with a new director at the helm, was a bit of a no-brainer.
In this new film, Captain James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) and the crew of the USS Enterprise are halfway through their five-year mission to explore deep space, and feelings of boredom and monotony have started to set in, at least as far as Kirk is concerned. The crew dock at the space station Yorktown to fill up on supplies, and Kirk finds himself at a bit of a crossroads, with a chance at a juicy promotion that would mean leaving the Enterprise, while his First Officer Spock (Zachary Quinto) learns sad news that influences a decision on his part that will also entail him leaving the Enterprise. This is all put on hold, though, when the Yorktown receives a mysterious distress call from an uncharted nebula. The Enterprise responds, and disaster ensues, with the mysterious and brutal Krall (Idris Elba) attacking them. Kirk, Spock, Bones (Karl Urban), Uhura (Zoe Saldana), Sulu (John Cho), Chekhov (the late Anton Yelchin), and Scotty (Simon Pegg, pulling double-duty as screenwriter here), will have to summon all of their skills to deal with this unique and formidable threat, though they will have help from the fierce and clever Jaylah (Sophie Boutella). There is more, however to Krall than meets the eye.
While Lin's hyperkinetic approach to narrative, honed on several Fast and Furious movies did not really rock my world the way Abrams' did seven years ago, I found the film enjoyable enough and that whatever over-the-top excesses Lin may have indulged (Kirk's motorcycle riding comes to mind as well as a couple of others) were tempered by the script Pegg co-wrote with Doug Jung, which endeavors to preserve the Abrams vibe and even maintain a sense of connection to the original series of films. The opening scene, in which Kirk basically laments how monotonous his mission has come to feel, and the quieter moments, like Kirk and McCoy toasting over an empty glass of Chekhov's vodka (which proved to be oddly prescient given Yelchin's death just a month before the film's release), provide moments for the characters to shine. Also, while there is still quite a daredevil in him as evidenced by his motorcycle scene, this Kirk is a bit less brash than he was in the first couple of movies, having benefited quite a bit from his experience as a starship captain.
As always it's a challenge to give screen time to the ensemble, but Lin and his writers have managed this quite handily by having the characters pair off midway through the film, Kirk with Chekhov, Scotty with the newbie Jaylah, and most notably Spock with Bones. Karl Urban's take on the character popularized by DeForest Kelley is one of things I quite like about this new iteration of the franchise.
Elba's Krall is an improvement over Benedict Cumberbatch's Khan from the last film and Eric Bana's Nero from the first in the new series, and while neither set a particularly high bar to hurdle (particularly Bana), Elba vests this role with as much menace as he can muster, and his performance is especially impressive considering the amount of makeup he has to act through.
I really like the fact that the whole reboot concept has allowed audiences to see the world of the 1960s television series with updated visual effects, and the Yorktown sequence is particularly rewarding in this regard; the cityscape in space is a wonder to behold, and while computer-generated imagery is a dime-a-dozen these days, here it was put to particularly good use.
I still liked 2009's reboot the best, but this film, to my mind at least, does a good job of keeping the franchise going.
7.5/10
written by Simon Pegg and Doug Jung
I may be in the minority, but I quite honestly liked JJ Abrams' resuscitation of the Star Trek film franchise better than his record-shattering sequel to the Star Wars saga. I can even go as far as to say I enjoyed the much-maligned Star Trek Into Darkness which is now described as a poorly-realized remake of the well-loved Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. The decision to watch Star Trek Beyond, even with a new director at the helm, was a bit of a no-brainer.
In this new film, Captain James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) and the crew of the USS Enterprise are halfway through their five-year mission to explore deep space, and feelings of boredom and monotony have started to set in, at least as far as Kirk is concerned. The crew dock at the space station Yorktown to fill up on supplies, and Kirk finds himself at a bit of a crossroads, with a chance at a juicy promotion that would mean leaving the Enterprise, while his First Officer Spock (Zachary Quinto) learns sad news that influences a decision on his part that will also entail him leaving the Enterprise. This is all put on hold, though, when the Yorktown receives a mysterious distress call from an uncharted nebula. The Enterprise responds, and disaster ensues, with the mysterious and brutal Krall (Idris Elba) attacking them. Kirk, Spock, Bones (Karl Urban), Uhura (Zoe Saldana), Sulu (John Cho), Chekhov (the late Anton Yelchin), and Scotty (Simon Pegg, pulling double-duty as screenwriter here), will have to summon all of their skills to deal with this unique and formidable threat, though they will have help from the fierce and clever Jaylah (Sophie Boutella). There is more, however to Krall than meets the eye.
While Lin's hyperkinetic approach to narrative, honed on several Fast and Furious movies did not really rock my world the way Abrams' did seven years ago, I found the film enjoyable enough and that whatever over-the-top excesses Lin may have indulged (Kirk's motorcycle riding comes to mind as well as a couple of others) were tempered by the script Pegg co-wrote with Doug Jung, which endeavors to preserve the Abrams vibe and even maintain a sense of connection to the original series of films. The opening scene, in which Kirk basically laments how monotonous his mission has come to feel, and the quieter moments, like Kirk and McCoy toasting over an empty glass of Chekhov's vodka (which proved to be oddly prescient given Yelchin's death just a month before the film's release), provide moments for the characters to shine. Also, while there is still quite a daredevil in him as evidenced by his motorcycle scene, this Kirk is a bit less brash than he was in the first couple of movies, having benefited quite a bit from his experience as a starship captain.
As always it's a challenge to give screen time to the ensemble, but Lin and his writers have managed this quite handily by having the characters pair off midway through the film, Kirk with Chekhov, Scotty with the newbie Jaylah, and most notably Spock with Bones. Karl Urban's take on the character popularized by DeForest Kelley is one of things I quite like about this new iteration of the franchise.
Elba's Krall is an improvement over Benedict Cumberbatch's Khan from the last film and Eric Bana's Nero from the first in the new series, and while neither set a particularly high bar to hurdle (particularly Bana), Elba vests this role with as much menace as he can muster, and his performance is especially impressive considering the amount of makeup he has to act through.
I really like the fact that the whole reboot concept has allowed audiences to see the world of the 1960s television series with updated visual effects, and the Yorktown sequence is particularly rewarding in this regard; the cityscape in space is a wonder to behold, and while computer-generated imagery is a dime-a-dozen these days, here it was put to particularly good use.
I still liked 2009's reboot the best, but this film, to my mind at least, does a good job of keeping the franchise going.
7.5/10
Sunday, July 17, 2016
Who You Gonna Call? A Review of the Ghostbusters Remake
directed by Paul Feig
written by Kate Dippold and Paul Feig
Few films have come into theaters with more concerted efforts by outside forces to ensure their failure than this one. When it was announced that Paul Feig would helm the long-gestating "Ghostbusters" sequel, which eventually metamorphosed into the remake it now is, and that all of the leads would be female, a vocal population of male netizens probably best described as trolls was quite vocal in their outrage and campaigned quite vigorously against this film. Apparently, in the hierarchy of obnoxiousness of fanboys, DC and Marvel fanboys have absolutely nothing on Ghostbusters fanboys in terms of sheer vileness.
Unfortunately for those fanboys, however, this film is nowhere near the train wreck that they were desperately hoping it would be.
Erin Gilbert (Kristen Wiig) is a physics professor at Columbia University just on the brink of acquiring tenure when a little bit of her past comes back to haunt her: a book she co-wrote with her friend and former colleague Abigail Yates (Melissa McCarthy) about the paranormal, a book she thought had never been published, surfaces in the hands of a man (Ed Begley Jr.) who believes a house-turned-museum that he is managing to be haunted. Incensed, Erin confronts Abby, who is continuing her research on the paranormal at a small college with her colleague Jill (Kate McKinnon). Abby agrees to take the book out of circulation as long as Erin introduces her to the man seeking help with his supernatural problem. When the three of them actually find an honest-to-goodness ghost, they are elated, and start pursuing their research more doggedly, and not a moment too soon, as the mysterious Rowan (Neil Casey), a loner working in the basement of a hotel, seems to be actively inviting ghosts from the other side, which include the malevolent spirit of a rich heiress and an electrocuted convict. Erin, Abby and Jill, along with subway ticket seller Patty (Leslie Jones), who volunteers to help them after seeing one of ghosts herself, set out to save the city, and possibly the world, from this supernatural threat, with or without the help of their thoroughly useless assistant Kevin (Chris Hemsworth).
This movie spent the better part of the last three decades in what can politely be described as development hell and the fact that they were able to get it done at all is a minor Hollywood miracle. It's even more impressive that it was as good as it turned out to be.
The storytelling was reasonably taut, the characters gelled well, and the visual effects were a nice update on the ones that appeared in the thirty-two year old original. No new ground was broken here, as the filmmakers basically went for what worked in the original, with the pseudo-science, soft horror and broad comedy, and, thankfully, removed the bit about one of the main characters stalking one of the team's clients. It was a clean-sheet remake; I had half-expected (and hoped for) some kind of torch-passing sequel, but I can understand why the filmmakers decide to just start from scratch. Speaking of passing the torch, though, almost all of the living main cast members (Harold Ramis passed away three years ago) showed up in cameo roles to lend their support. Sigourney Weaver looks awesome; the years have been kind. It was a flawed movie, to be sure, but still a lot of good fun. It does not deserve anywhere near the amount of pre-cooked hatred that was aimed at it.
Oddly enough, what disappointed me about this film was that, as films by Paul Feig starring Melissa McCarthy go, it was rather tame, even taking into account the PG-13 rating that is out of the pair's usual R-18 wheelhouse. I had expected Kristen Wiig to be the "straight" character to McCarthy's zany one, but what I didn't expect was that over the course of the movie, McCarthy would end up playing it straight as well. It's almost as if she can't be as funny without a potty mouth. McKinnon and Jones were absolutely delightful all throughout, though, as was Hemsworth as the clueless Kevin. McKinnon, in particular, was the standout as, apart from being funny, she was also the team's weapons designer, and in that aspect brought some freshness to the movie as they went beyond the traditional proton packs and traps. She's also the star of some pretty snazzy "proton fu" during the film's climax.
Obviously, there's some franchise-building here as the film has a post-credits stinger setting up a sequel, but fortunately, this film stands on its own just fine. If indeed this turns out to be a franchise, it's off to a reasonably decent start.
7/10
written by Kate Dippold and Paul Feig
Few films have come into theaters with more concerted efforts by outside forces to ensure their failure than this one. When it was announced that Paul Feig would helm the long-gestating "Ghostbusters" sequel, which eventually metamorphosed into the remake it now is, and that all of the leads would be female, a vocal population of male netizens probably best described as trolls was quite vocal in their outrage and campaigned quite vigorously against this film. Apparently, in the hierarchy of obnoxiousness of fanboys, DC and Marvel fanboys have absolutely nothing on Ghostbusters fanboys in terms of sheer vileness.
Unfortunately for those fanboys, however, this film is nowhere near the train wreck that they were desperately hoping it would be.
Erin Gilbert (Kristen Wiig) is a physics professor at Columbia University just on the brink of acquiring tenure when a little bit of her past comes back to haunt her: a book she co-wrote with her friend and former colleague Abigail Yates (Melissa McCarthy) about the paranormal, a book she thought had never been published, surfaces in the hands of a man (Ed Begley Jr.) who believes a house-turned-museum that he is managing to be haunted. Incensed, Erin confronts Abby, who is continuing her research on the paranormal at a small college with her colleague Jill (Kate McKinnon). Abby agrees to take the book out of circulation as long as Erin introduces her to the man seeking help with his supernatural problem. When the three of them actually find an honest-to-goodness ghost, they are elated, and start pursuing their research more doggedly, and not a moment too soon, as the mysterious Rowan (Neil Casey), a loner working in the basement of a hotel, seems to be actively inviting ghosts from the other side, which include the malevolent spirit of a rich heiress and an electrocuted convict. Erin, Abby and Jill, along with subway ticket seller Patty (Leslie Jones), who volunteers to help them after seeing one of ghosts herself, set out to save the city, and possibly the world, from this supernatural threat, with or without the help of their thoroughly useless assistant Kevin (Chris Hemsworth).
This movie spent the better part of the last three decades in what can politely be described as development hell and the fact that they were able to get it done at all is a minor Hollywood miracle. It's even more impressive that it was as good as it turned out to be.
The storytelling was reasonably taut, the characters gelled well, and the visual effects were a nice update on the ones that appeared in the thirty-two year old original. No new ground was broken here, as the filmmakers basically went for what worked in the original, with the pseudo-science, soft horror and broad comedy, and, thankfully, removed the bit about one of the main characters stalking one of the team's clients. It was a clean-sheet remake; I had half-expected (and hoped for) some kind of torch-passing sequel, but I can understand why the filmmakers decide to just start from scratch. Speaking of passing the torch, though, almost all of the living main cast members (Harold Ramis passed away three years ago) showed up in cameo roles to lend their support. Sigourney Weaver looks awesome; the years have been kind. It was a flawed movie, to be sure, but still a lot of good fun. It does not deserve anywhere near the amount of pre-cooked hatred that was aimed at it.
Oddly enough, what disappointed me about this film was that, as films by Paul Feig starring Melissa McCarthy go, it was rather tame, even taking into account the PG-13 rating that is out of the pair's usual R-18 wheelhouse. I had expected Kristen Wiig to be the "straight" character to McCarthy's zany one, but what I didn't expect was that over the course of the movie, McCarthy would end up playing it straight as well. It's almost as if she can't be as funny without a potty mouth. McKinnon and Jones were absolutely delightful all throughout, though, as was Hemsworth as the clueless Kevin. McKinnon, in particular, was the standout as, apart from being funny, she was also the team's weapons designer, and in that aspect brought some freshness to the movie as they went beyond the traditional proton packs and traps. She's also the star of some pretty snazzy "proton fu" during the film's climax.
Obviously, there's some franchise-building here as the film has a post-credits stinger setting up a sequel, but fortunately, this film stands on its own just fine. If indeed this turns out to be a franchise, it's off to a reasonably decent start.
7/10
Wednesday, June 15, 2016
Big-Budget Live Action Role-Play: A Review of Warcraft: The Beginning
directed by Duncan Jones
written by Jones and Charles Leavitt
I played the strategy game Warcraft II for a few months after I had graduated from college.It was engaging, and I welcomed the distraction from the rigors of law school, but beyond that I never truly felt invested in this world or its characters, and by the time it basically exploded as a worldwide online gaming phenomenon spawning expansion sets, sequels and spinoffs, I had long moved on to other things.
My lack of personal investment in the game notwithstanding, I found myself with some time to kill and had some interest in watching the film adaptation. For one thing, I had enjoyed the work of director Duncan Jones such as Moon and Source Code, and, having enjoyed the game to an extent back when I played it nearly twenty years ago, I was genuinely curious. I like to think, however, that I had kept expectations reasonably in check, especially given how little I thought of the trailers.
Apparently, my expectations weren't quite low enough.
The film begins with a voice-over narration explaining that humans and orcs have been enemies since time out of mind, then proceeds to show the story of how this came to be. The orc world, Draenor, is dying, and all of the tribes of orcs follow the sorcerer Gul'dan (Daniel Wu) who, using the life force of various prisoners and a dark magic known as the Fel, conjures up a portal to another world, the world of Azeroth, populated by humans, elves and dwarves. There are only enough prisoners to send through a small war party, but the plan is to round up enough prisoners to bring all the orc race through. While the orcs favor this plan, one chieftan, Durotan (Toby Kebbell) has his misgivings, as he recalls how the Fel has destroyed their world, and fears the same thing is happening here on Azeroth.
In the meantime, the orcs' widespread plunder and abduction catch the attention of the humans, elves and other races in Azeroth. King Llane (Dominic Cooper) must decide how best to protect his realm, with the help of his greatest warrior Anduin Lothar (Travis Fimmel), a young mage named Khadgar (Ben Schnetzer) and Azeroth's appointed guardian, the powerful sorcerer Medivh (Ben Foster). They may even have a little help from a half-breed orc named Garona (Paula Patton), but Gul'dan, his lieutenant Blackhand (Clancy Brown), the might of the Orc Horde, and the Fel may be too much for even the champions of Azeroth to handle.
Growing up, I used to watch quite a few movies on television which were cheaper, obvious knockoffs of better, more expensive, and more successful films. These films were made without even a token attempt by the filmmakers to approximate the quality of the films they were ripping off. When we finally got cable television I watched quite a few of them, and years later I finally learned that they actually had a name: they are called mockbusters. Sitting through this film I was reminded of those.
My first problem was with the acting, or more specifically, the fact that all of the actors apparently came to work and, presumably at the behest of director Duncan Jones, began reciting their lines in their native accents, with one exception. I can imagine and to an extent understand why Jones might be peeved by the time-worn movie trope that in any English-language fantasy film or period piece, even if the characters aren't actually supposed to be speaking English, they all have English accents. It's convenient and lazy, and spares the filmmakers the effort of having to figure out ancient linguistic nuance or invent new speech patterns and tics for imaginary worlds. Also, to paraphrase Neil Patrick Harris, everything sounds better with an English accent.
James Gunn apparently came up with a different solution to this when he made the blockbuster Guardians of the Galaxy: have everyone speak in an American accent, which explains why the Scotswoman Karen Gillan spoke with a distinctly American accent (though English actor Peter Serafinowicz was the lone actor who broke ranks).
Jones' approach feels like he basically told the actors to speak in whatever accent made them comfortable, and the results alternate between hilarious and cringe-inducing. Cooper speaks in his native English accent, Foster speaks in his native American accent, as does Schnetzer (on whose "acting" I will have quite a bit to say shortly), but for some reason, Fimmel, rather than speak in his native Australian accent or put on an English accent similar to Cooper's, dusts off the proto-Scandinavian accent he puts on when playing Ragnar Lothbrok in the Vikings television series. On top of that, Lothar has a son named Callum played by Canadian actor Burkley Duffield, who, despite having been raised solely by his father with the weird Viking accent, has a distinctly North American accent as well. I really don't know what kind of effect Jones was going for with this absurd hodgepodge, but it sure as hell didn't help his storytelling in any way. The Orcs, with the exception of Patton's half-orc (and Shrek cosplayer) Garona, all speak with British accents, but their voices were so heavily filtered they might as well have all been played by one person. And for all of the effort that went into rendering them, they were never able to convince me that they were anything more than video game characters. Think of Ang Lee's Hulk with braided long hair, a loin cloth and big teeth and multiply that several times over, and that's the general appearance of the Horde.
Going back to Schnetzer, of the many things I despised about the film, his performance was hands-down the worst; it was what inspired the title of this review. He comes across as an American student immersed in a role-playing game with his school buddies. There was nothing urgent or convincing about his performance, and the problems go well beyond his accent. He could not have been more out of place had he been talking like Michael Pena in "Ant-Man," and because for some reason he vaguely resembles him, at some points during the movie I actually found myself envisioning the character speaking in Pena's voice. Ben Foster likewise speaks with an American accent but manages to imbue his performance with some level of credibility. It occurred to me that perhaps Schnetzer's Khadgar was written as the avatar for all the Warcraft nerds in the audience.
Apart from the acting, I had serious issues with the script, both in terms of story and dialogue. There's something distinctly depressing about being able to foresee a "twist" in the story the moment the character involved in the twist actually shows his face, but what's even more depressing is reading about how Jones rewrote the script wanting to remove the narrative cliche of humans being good and orcs being bad, and then seeing a number of other story tropes, like revenge, interspecies romance and other time worn story devices play out on the screen. The movie trotted out one cliche after another.
Finally, while I could see the considerable effort that Industrial Light and Magic's animators invested into creating the Orc Horde and the movie's other visual effects like the gryphons and the fantastical cityscapes, none of them was able to transcend their obviously synthetic origins in the way that, say, the Lord of the Rings movies were. Virtually every effects-laden shot made me feel that I was watching a computer game "cut scene" rather than a feature length motion picture. This was down to the fact that none of the performances was particularly compelling, or at least compelling enough to get me to suspend my disbelief that these fantastical creatures or this fantastical world could exist. This has to have been ILM's lowest moment since "The Scorpion King" though to be fair to them, the movie was let down more by the humans acting onscreen than anything to do with the visual effects.
On a positive note, Game of Thrones composer Ramin Djawadi came up with a pretty decent if slightly generic music score.
I really should have waited for this movie to come out on cable television; then at least I could turn it off without thinking of the money I had spent watching it.
3.5/10
written by Jones and Charles Leavitt
I played the strategy game Warcraft II for a few months after I had graduated from college.It was engaging, and I welcomed the distraction from the rigors of law school, but beyond that I never truly felt invested in this world or its characters, and by the time it basically exploded as a worldwide online gaming phenomenon spawning expansion sets, sequels and spinoffs, I had long moved on to other things.
My lack of personal investment in the game notwithstanding, I found myself with some time to kill and had some interest in watching the film adaptation. For one thing, I had enjoyed the work of director Duncan Jones such as Moon and Source Code, and, having enjoyed the game to an extent back when I played it nearly twenty years ago, I was genuinely curious. I like to think, however, that I had kept expectations reasonably in check, especially given how little I thought of the trailers.
Apparently, my expectations weren't quite low enough.
The film begins with a voice-over narration explaining that humans and orcs have been enemies since time out of mind, then proceeds to show the story of how this came to be. The orc world, Draenor, is dying, and all of the tribes of orcs follow the sorcerer Gul'dan (Daniel Wu) who, using the life force of various prisoners and a dark magic known as the Fel, conjures up a portal to another world, the world of Azeroth, populated by humans, elves and dwarves. There are only enough prisoners to send through a small war party, but the plan is to round up enough prisoners to bring all the orc race through. While the orcs favor this plan, one chieftan, Durotan (Toby Kebbell) has his misgivings, as he recalls how the Fel has destroyed their world, and fears the same thing is happening here on Azeroth.
In the meantime, the orcs' widespread plunder and abduction catch the attention of the humans, elves and other races in Azeroth. King Llane (Dominic Cooper) must decide how best to protect his realm, with the help of his greatest warrior Anduin Lothar (Travis Fimmel), a young mage named Khadgar (Ben Schnetzer) and Azeroth's appointed guardian, the powerful sorcerer Medivh (Ben Foster). They may even have a little help from a half-breed orc named Garona (Paula Patton), but Gul'dan, his lieutenant Blackhand (Clancy Brown), the might of the Orc Horde, and the Fel may be too much for even the champions of Azeroth to handle.
Growing up, I used to watch quite a few movies on television which were cheaper, obvious knockoffs of better, more expensive, and more successful films. These films were made without even a token attempt by the filmmakers to approximate the quality of the films they were ripping off. When we finally got cable television I watched quite a few of them, and years later I finally learned that they actually had a name: they are called mockbusters. Sitting through this film I was reminded of those.
My first problem was with the acting, or more specifically, the fact that all of the actors apparently came to work and, presumably at the behest of director Duncan Jones, began reciting their lines in their native accents, with one exception. I can imagine and to an extent understand why Jones might be peeved by the time-worn movie trope that in any English-language fantasy film or period piece, even if the characters aren't actually supposed to be speaking English, they all have English accents. It's convenient and lazy, and spares the filmmakers the effort of having to figure out ancient linguistic nuance or invent new speech patterns and tics for imaginary worlds. Also, to paraphrase Neil Patrick Harris, everything sounds better with an English accent.
James Gunn apparently came up with a different solution to this when he made the blockbuster Guardians of the Galaxy: have everyone speak in an American accent, which explains why the Scotswoman Karen Gillan spoke with a distinctly American accent (though English actor Peter Serafinowicz was the lone actor who broke ranks).
Jones' approach feels like he basically told the actors to speak in whatever accent made them comfortable, and the results alternate between hilarious and cringe-inducing. Cooper speaks in his native English accent, Foster speaks in his native American accent, as does Schnetzer (on whose "acting" I will have quite a bit to say shortly), but for some reason, Fimmel, rather than speak in his native Australian accent or put on an English accent similar to Cooper's, dusts off the proto-Scandinavian accent he puts on when playing Ragnar Lothbrok in the Vikings television series. On top of that, Lothar has a son named Callum played by Canadian actor Burkley Duffield, who, despite having been raised solely by his father with the weird Viking accent, has a distinctly North American accent as well. I really don't know what kind of effect Jones was going for with this absurd hodgepodge, but it sure as hell didn't help his storytelling in any way. The Orcs, with the exception of Patton's half-orc (and Shrek cosplayer) Garona, all speak with British accents, but their voices were so heavily filtered they might as well have all been played by one person. And for all of the effort that went into rendering them, they were never able to convince me that they were anything more than video game characters. Think of Ang Lee's Hulk with braided long hair, a loin cloth and big teeth and multiply that several times over, and that's the general appearance of the Horde.
Going back to Schnetzer, of the many things I despised about the film, his performance was hands-down the worst; it was what inspired the title of this review. He comes across as an American student immersed in a role-playing game with his school buddies. There was nothing urgent or convincing about his performance, and the problems go well beyond his accent. He could not have been more out of place had he been talking like Michael Pena in "Ant-Man," and because for some reason he vaguely resembles him, at some points during the movie I actually found myself envisioning the character speaking in Pena's voice. Ben Foster likewise speaks with an American accent but manages to imbue his performance with some level of credibility. It occurred to me that perhaps Schnetzer's Khadgar was written as the avatar for all the Warcraft nerds in the audience.
Apart from the acting, I had serious issues with the script, both in terms of story and dialogue. There's something distinctly depressing about being able to foresee a "twist" in the story the moment the character involved in the twist actually shows his face, but what's even more depressing is reading about how Jones rewrote the script wanting to remove the narrative cliche of humans being good and orcs being bad, and then seeing a number of other story tropes, like revenge, interspecies romance and other time worn story devices play out on the screen. The movie trotted out one cliche after another.
Finally, while I could see the considerable effort that Industrial Light and Magic's animators invested into creating the Orc Horde and the movie's other visual effects like the gryphons and the fantastical cityscapes, none of them was able to transcend their obviously synthetic origins in the way that, say, the Lord of the Rings movies were. Virtually every effects-laden shot made me feel that I was watching a computer game "cut scene" rather than a feature length motion picture. This was down to the fact that none of the performances was particularly compelling, or at least compelling enough to get me to suspend my disbelief that these fantastical creatures or this fantastical world could exist. This has to have been ILM's lowest moment since "The Scorpion King" though to be fair to them, the movie was let down more by the humans acting onscreen than anything to do with the visual effects.
On a positive note, Game of Thrones composer Ramin Djawadi came up with a pretty decent if slightly generic music score.
I really should have waited for this movie to come out on cable television; then at least I could turn it off without thinking of the money I had spent watching it.
3.5/10
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