Review Catch-Up: “2012″

Run!  It’s the end of the world!  Or so Roland Emmerich would have you believe.  First, he sent aliens to destroy us, then Godzilla came stomping around New York City, and next he froze the world with an ice age.  Now, he throws absolutely everything into a blender in hopes of creating the ultimate disaster movie.  What comes out is stupid, cheesy, and over-the-top.  But it’s also a pretty fun ride.

Plot is of no consequence here, but I’ll give a rundown anyway.  It’s the year 2012, the same year the Mayans supposedly predicted the end of the world.  It’s also the same year there’s a once-in-several-thousand-years alignment of the planets in our solar system, an event that has some negative effects on our sun’s solar flares.  The Earth heats up and the core melts, causing the plates on which our continents sit on to shift around.  Thus, all hell breaks loose as the world is restructured after some dramatic earthquakes, hurricanes, typhoons, tsunamis, etc.

The governments of the world aren’t exactly sitting around doing nothing.  The U.S. has sent Adrian Helmsley (Chiwetel Ejiofor) to get to the bottom of this.  Meanwhile, the governments plan for a contingency: ride out the storm of all storms on gigantic ships designed to ensure the survival of mankind.  In the middle of it all is Jackson Curtis (John Cusack), a failed writer-turned-limo-driver.  He helps his family outrun the end of the world, trying to find a safe place on a planet where there are no safe places.  Anywhere.  Oh yeah, Woody Harrelson is in it as a crazed conspiracy theorist, and Oliver Platt is great as Helmsley’s boss, who is a general asshole.

The real highlight of this movie are the visual effects.  With every movie that Emmerich does, he attempts to outdo himself.  Well, I find it hard for anyone to outdo all the CG carnage featured here.  Yes, there are giant waves hundreds of feet high.  Yes, there are earthquakes that swallow entire cities whole.  Yes, an aircraft carrier gets lifted and tossed onto the White House.  Did I also mention the destruction of Hawaii, a volcanic explosion akin to a nuclear bomb, or the entire state California sliding into the ocean?!  If nature can do it, it’s done here.

I don’t really have too much to say as to why I enjoyed this movie so much.  If this movie piques your interest even in the slightest way, check it out before it leaves theatres.  This is one of those that must be enjoyed on a giant screen with thousands of watts of sound blasting in your ears.  Sure, the plot is dumb, but the actors all seem to have a good time, and if you go in with your expectations in check, you’ll come out with a smile on your face.

7.5/10

Review Catch-up: “Where the Wild Things Are”

Having vaguely remembered the beloved Maurice Sendak children’s book, I went into Spike Jonze’s latest with absolutely no expectations.  And I walked away fairly impressed.

Where the Wild Things Are, in case you haven’t heard, is actually not a children’s movie.  In fact, parents, or adults in general that have read the book, may enjoy it more.  Jonze and co-screenwriter David Eggers have crafted a story that is not about the whimsical nature of youth or imagination, but one that deals with the theme of ‘belonging’.  Young Max (Max Records) is a hyper, imaginative young boy who is still coming to terms with his parents’ divorce.  His mother (Catherine Keener) works hard to support Max and his older sister, but is also on the lookout of a new love.

Skipping over the family drama bits, Max finds himself in a strange land across the sea, a land populated by creatures several times his size.  Most are human-like in speech and behavior, but still retain an element of scariness to them (the sharp teeth don’t exactly endear them to Max).  It is in the world that Max sets himself up to be the king, ruler of all.  Not in a malicious way, but only to help his new friends, especially Carol (voiced by James Gandolfini).  Only when he deals with the responsibilities of being king does he understand how hard it is to make everyone happy, even when the best solution is compromise.

What I find fascinating about this movie are the lessons that he learns while being king, and how they can apply to Max’s “real world”.  There isn’t a sitcom-esque moment where Max has some kind of epiphany and realizes what the real problem is.  In fact, that moment is implied and never really underscored.  Much like in real life, there aren’t really any moments where you can pause and reflect upon your lessons; you’re constantly being challenged to apply the new teachings.  All of the themes of loss, divorce, love, etc come into play during Max’s time among the Wild Things, and he comes back a more enlightened kid because of it.

Many of the themes will probably fly over kids’ heads, which is why critics have said that it’s much less of a children’s flick than it “should” be.  Still, it’s entertaining and certainly ranks among Spike Jonze’s best.

7.5/10

Review Catch-Up: “Fame”

Anyone who as ever aspired to be anything could probably relate to Fame.  The movie interweaves stories from various students from the New York Academy of Performing Arts, showing their dreams and hopes, failures and realizations that either they have or don’t have what it takes.

However, just because you can relate to it doesn’t necessarily mean you should see it.  Fame isn’t terrible, and in spots it is quite entertaining; it just doesn’t do anything new to show us the struggles of up-and-coming performers.

There are a few highlights, such as Naturi Naughton’s stunning solo (which makes me wonder why she isn’t turning out #1 singles by now), and a moments of honest emotional growth of certain characters.  I also appreciate how the movie shows you that not everyone will get what they want.  One character realizes he may be shooting to high and settles for a teaching position at another school.  And another, a budding young filmmaker (of the sort I despise…the ‘pretentious indie’ sort) gets hit with a healthy dose of reality (and fraud) when the money he wants to use for a film gets stolen.

While the main cast is decent, the supporting cast of teachers, featuring such notable names as Kelsey Grammar, Charles S. Dutton, and Megan Mullally, is almost wasted.  I happen to think Grammar is a fine actor, and should be given much more to do other than have a scene or two lecturing students.  The only teacher given any real screen time is Megan Mullally, who plays a singing coach.  Her scene singing karaoke is quite nice, even though there was some editing problems (Kelsey Grammar kind of appears out of nowhere, then disappears without mention).

Fame is a decent movie to watch, and probably a good date movie if your significant other is in to these kinds of flicks.  While the film is good-natured, it just feels like it’s holding my hand the entire time, never really understanding that I’m mature enough for something more…mature.  I’m not saying that there needs to be gratuitous sex or all the students need a drug problem or something; I’m saying that the script is way too ‘by the book’ to warrant any repeat viewings.

6.5/10

Is it me, or is Kay Pannabaker a little miscast for her role?  According to her IMDB profile, she should be 19 by now, but looks like she’s 12.  By the end of the movie, she should be at least 17, and looks like a 14-year-old with a bit of make-up on.  I’m not saying this to slight her, and I don’t think she’s a terrible actress, it was just a little distracting to realize that she was supposed to play someone in her mid- to late-teen’s.

Review: “Paranormal Activity”

Way back in 1999, The Blair Witch Project hit theatres and soon became one of the most successful independent films of all time.  Not only did it prove that all you need was a good idea (or at the very least, a good gimmick) for a movie to be a hit, but it also showcased a new way to advertise.  Instead of spending millions of dollars solely on print, tv, and radio ads, a few tech-savvy people can use the internet for all their marketing purposes.

I remember watching this movie in the theatre with my parents, which turned out to be a bad idea because the movie freaked my mom out so bad she got mad at my dad and I for bringing her to watch it.  Of course, there would be other downsides, such as the inevitable copycat films and the rise of the  gimmicky ‘found video’ subgenre of thrillers.

Enter 2006, and another independent filmmaker has an idea similar to Blair Witch.  Instead of the woods, however, our characters would suffer in their own house.  And instead of a mysterious witch that would mess with you psychologically, writer/director Oren Peli will toss in a demon bent on destroying our protagonists, both physically and emotionally.

The movie starts out obviously enough: a young San Diego couple experiences paranormal activity in their home at night.  To assuage her fears, the boyfriend Micah (Micah Sloat) decides to use a camera and audio recorder to prove to her that the sounds she hears at night are normal.  The girlfriend, Katie (Katie Featherston), is uneasy with this at first, but decides to humor him.  It’s all fun and games until Micah captures evidence on camera that proves there’s something else in the house with them.

I won’t give away all the crazy stuff, as that will ruin all the fun of this movie.  I will say, however, that I had an idea going into the theatre of how the paranormal activity will escalate (start small, end big).  I was partially wrong, as we see during the first night of recording the demon inside the house makes its presence known by more obvious means than just closing and opening a door.

There is also a bit of a story to go with the frights.  Katie’s backstory is explained through dialogue, as it relates very much to the events going on in the house.  Unfortunately, the acting isn’t always up to snuff.  Well, to be more specific, there were times where I was questioning the motivation of the actors.  In some situations, where I would’ve been either absolutely terrified or raging mad, we get somewhat neutral reactions.  Sure, the characters are upset, but given the recorded evidence of an evil spirit stalking around the house, I’d be more than just upset.

Sprinkled throughout the movie are moments of tension-relieving humor.  This definitely isn’t a comedy, but Katie and Micah do a good job of poking fun at their situation, at least in the early stages of the film.  As the story progresses, it stops becoming funny when even skeptical Micah knows somethings is genuinely wrong with his house.

What I found actually pretty interesting was how this movie followed certain rules.  Not necessarily rules of the horror genre, but other ‘real world’ rules.  If you read about reported cases of hauntings or possession, you’ll notice that they usually follow a certain set of rules.  For example, your house may be haunted, but that doesn’t mean the entity doing the haunting is malevolent; it might be that the spirit is ‘lost’ or something like that.  In cases of possession, the victim is almost never possessed outright, they’re always ‘haunted’ for long periods of time, sometimes years in an effort to break down the will of the victim.  While this film takes place over the course of a few weeks, we clearly see the deteriorated state our victims fall into by the end.

If you’ve seen the trailer, then you know this movie can elicit a response from the audience.  During my showing, it most certainly did.  Nearly every scene where we watch Micah’s camera rolling, the audience became more and more nervous.  Once the moments of sheer terror had passed, we all laughed amongst ourselves, but it wasn’t a haughty, prideful laugh like “Oh, that was so stupid I can’t believe we jumped at that!”.  It was more like a a nervous tension kind of laugh, like no one was truly ready to admit that they were absolutely terrified 30 seconds ago.

If there’s any glaring downside to this film, it’s some of the decisions of the characters.  In one scene, they meet a psychic who tells them that this is no normal house haunting; in fact it’s not even haunting a house, it’s haunting them.  He tells them that moving away won’t solve anything, and that they must fight to reclaim their home.  Now, Micah gets all macho and tries to fix the problem himself, but nothing works, it just gets worse.  At that point, person of faith or not, I’d tell them they need to get a priest, rabbi, imam or whoever and bless the snot out of that house.  To be honest, they do absolutely nothing to help themselves, they just make the entity angrier.

Paranormal Activity is one of those movies that proves theatres aren’t dead.  Watching a movie like this on a smaller screen (even on impressive home theatre setups) probably won’t be the same.  You may go in as a skeptic, or a non-believer of any form of life beyond our own death.  But, once you’re packed into a room with about 300 other strangers, all experiencing the same thing, it changes you.  I’m not saying you could walk in an atheist and come out a born-again Christian, I’m just saying that you just might feel a bit on edge every time Katie and Micah turn out the lights at night.

It’s almost as if this movie itself is alive and feeding off our own fears.  I remember, when I was younger, my friends and I daring each other to record ourselves sleeping.  I refused to do it simply because of the ‘What If’.  What if I saw something on the tape that I didn’t want to see?  What if I did see shadows appearing on the wall, doors opening and closing, our the obvious sound of footsteps getting closer and closer to my bed?

The fear of the unknown is what makes us want to keep our lights on at night (at least when we were children), and Paranormal Activity not only shows you what’s in the shadows, but makes you wish you never wanted to look in the first place.

9/10

Review: “9″

The first feature length film from Shane Acker, and based on his award-winning short film of the same name, 9 tells the story of a small band of heroes who must stop an out-of-control machine in a post apocalyptic world.  While the animation is great, and the theme darker in tone that most Hollywood-produced CG animated films, the reach of the story itself falls a little short to consider this one a classic.

Elijah Wood plays 9, the last in a series of tiny machines created during the final days of humanity.  He meets others like himself: 5 (John C. Reilly), 1 (Christopher Plummer), 7 (Jennifer Connelly), 6 (Crispin Glover), and a few more.  1 takes it upon himself to be the group’s leader, with the objective to simply survive in this harsh world.  9, however, feels that they were built for a purpose, and sets out to fulfill his destiny when they fall under attack by vicious machines.

The tone of the movie is considerably darker than films from, say, Pixar, which might turn some parents away from letting their children see this film.  Keep in mind, if you have children younger than 10, this might be a little much for them.  The Earth is decimated: cities are in ruins, the sky is polluted, and a malevolent machine rules over all.  9 is not a ‘happy’ story by any means.

Nor is it a complete downer, either.  At its heart, it’s an action/adventure movie with some very well-choreographed action scenes.  There’s a sequence involving a flying pterodactyl-like machine that’s attacking the group, and the way they bring it down was more exciting than any scene in all of this summer’s Wolverine flick.  Boys especially may get a kick out of this; it’s fun, exciting, and moves at a good pace.  There’s never really a ‘dull’ moment in all of 9.

Unfortunately, the story itself falls short with some plot holes that Shane Acker seems to make us accept without question.  Without spoiling too much, there’s a device that awakens the evil machine, and it’s inadvertently done by 9 himself.  But, that makes me think: ‘What if 9 never did that?  If the machine is never given this device, it never awakes, and doesn’t continue to wreak all this havoc, right?  So, what would’ve happened if 9 never did any of that?  No movie, meaning the heroes’ existence if kind of pointless.’

And there are other questions like “how did the evil machine get deactivated in the first place?”, “how did are heroes ‘awaken’?, “where did all the machines go?” and others that I can’t put here without giving too much of the plot away.  It feels like a story that would’ve been better served as a mini-series, or at least give it a sequel.

Still, 9 is great fun.  I honestly didn’t feel any emotional connection to this like I did with Pixar’s Up, but I still had a good time watching it.  Fans of animated movies should also check this out, since the animation looks brilliant throughout (except for one or two spots where the close-up textures looked kinda flat).  The whole experience was like watching a Saturday morning action cartoon, similar to Batman: The Animated Series from the early 90’s.  If you’re in the mood of a nice adventure flick, 9 isn’t a bad choice.

8/10

(images from Yahoo!)

Rambo VS Predator?

That’s what the most recent synopsis of the new Rambo flick sounds like.  According to the article

Stallone is Turning Hunter Into Rambo V – ComingSoon.net.

there’s been some different versions flying around the net, so who knows which one is legit (other than Stallone)?

The original idea, about Rambo going after human traffickers in Mexico, actually sounded kinda badass.  From what I remember from the Rambo DVD bonus stuff, the human trafficking angle was originally intended for Rambo, but Stallone felt it odd that suddenly John Rambo is back in the U.S. after being in Vietnam, and then Afghanistan in the previous 2.  He needed a story that brought Rambo home, which became last year’s Rambo.

What I like about the human trafficking story is that it has potential to be different without being ridiculous (Rambo movies in general are ridiculous, but Rambo vs a monster is ridiculous).  Think about it: First Blood – Part 2 had Rambo going back to ‘Nam fighting the North Vietnamese.  Rambo III had him in Afghanistan fighting the Soviets.  Rambo put, um… Rambo in Burma fighting the Burmese military.

Sometimes Photoshop can be used for bad, bad things.

What made this last movie work, at least in my own opinion, was that it put John Rambo in his element, and I mean really in his element.  It was so violent, it almost became funny (he shoots a man in half.  Shoots him in half! That’s a pretty funny image, right?).  But, it gave the character a scene, albeit a very brief one, to contemplate his actions and accept who he is, a killing machine.

What Rambo V could be, if they use the Mexico storyline, is a more introspective John Rambo.  Here, he’s not going up against a structured military.  He’s going up against cold-blooded kidnappers, thieves, rapists, etc.  While the people he dispatched in parts 2, 3, and 4 could very well be fighting for something themselves, here you know the people he’s killing are bad to the bone; awful people who have no ideology to fight for, except to continue the evil of slavery in its modern form and profit from it.  Sometimes you’d need a monster to kill a monster, and John Rambo is the perfect killing machine, who just happens to have a bit of a conscience.

This could also bring the series back to the original (and arguably, best entry).  In First Blood, Rambo is going through serious post-traumatic stress, and having an a-hole of a sheriff on your case isn’t helping.  But that’s what the film was centered on: Rambo dealing with his demons from ‘Nam; it’s something personal.  In V, if his goal is to save a girl, a single person with which to focus all his intent, it becomes personal again.  It’s a smaller-scale story, but could yield the highest emotional investment from the character, and potentially the audience.  If Stallone goes the opposite route, and plays it safe with another action plot stuck in the 80’s (like if Rambo were to go back to Afghanistan to search for bin Laden), then it might ring hollow with viewers.

Anyway, that’s my take on this newest Rambo V news.  I’ll still watch whatever the movie turns out to be; I’m a fan enough of Stallone as a director to trust he’ll do the right thing with this character and franchise.

Review: “Inglourious Basterds”

Leave it up to Quentin Tarantino to get the American public flocking to see a foreign film.  Yep, that’s right . . . foreign.  Although produced by Hollywood, it sports a largely European cast with only maybe 20% of the dialogue in English.

Inglourious Basterds is the fictitious tale of Jewish-American soldiers dropped into Nazi-occupied France, with orders to wreak as much havoc as they can upon the German military.  It’s also the story of a young Jewish woman who survived the slaughter of her family by the Nazis in the French countryside.  The two intertwine and meet when the stories’ objectives fall on the premiere of a much-hyped pro-Nazi film.

I won’t go into the details of the plot or the characters, since that’s most of the fun of watching a Tarantino film.  What I want to put down in this blog post is why I think this was Tarantino’s best film since Jackie Brown and why his dialogue no longer annoys me.

It could be argued that Quentin Tarantino makes satires.  Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction might be satires of gangster pictures.  Jackie Brown is a satire of the Blaxploitation movement of the 1960’s and ’70’s.  Kill Bill Vol. 1 is a 70’s chop-socky flick, while Vol. 2 was a spaghetti western.  And Death Proof was a horror/thriller.  Here, we have Tarantino’s satire/spoof/re-imagining of not only the WWII film, but the spy movie as well.  And he pulls it off brilliantly.

While I don’t share Brad Pitt’s sentiment that this is the be-all-end-all of WWII movies, Inglourious Basterds seems to be a refinement of everything Tarantino has done so far.  Every scene, every word uttered moves the story forward.  In Death Proof, one of the things that annoyed me was the dialogue.  Half the time I wanted to yell “Move on!” to the characters when someone’s speech was rambling too much.  Here, you’ll find the trademark dialogue-heavy scenes, but there’s a purpose to each word.  Tarantino is able to build tension easily with the characters and their speech.  Again, in Death Proof, I didn’t feel any tension at all, with the exception of the well-done chase scene.  Here, the opening scene (or opening chapter, as the film groups scenes together by chapter), builds the tension and the drama from the beginning, with the interrogation of a Frenchman suspected of hiding Jews.

Later on the film, a group of undercover Basterds are trying to make contact with an informant, only to be interrupted by a German officer.  Although some I talked to said the scene played on too long, I felt it was just the right length, only straying on the ‘too long’ timeframe.  It slowly escalated the quiet conflict as the question of ‘Will they be discovered?’ played over every line.

The acting is also very good, with an exceptional performance by Christoph Waltz as the Nazi colonel Hans Landa and  and a funny turn by Brad Pitt as the film’s posterboy, American Lt. Aldo Raine.  What I like about the performances, and this could also be applied to Tarantino, is that the actors seem to be given free reign over their characters.  I’m sure Quentin had something in mind when he created Lt. Raine, but I feel as though Pitt came in and was allowed to make the character as over-the-top and ridiculous as he wanted.  Considering the context of this particular film, being ridiculous is hardly out of place.  Waltz’s Landa, to me, is probably one of the best performances of the year.  He’s friendly, personable, cold, calculating, arrogant; you name it, he’s probably got that trait or something like it.  Landa is like the perfect neighbor and your worst nightmare rolled into one.

If there’s one thing glaringly missing from the film is that  the story seems to forget about the rest of the Basterds.  We spend time with maybe only half of them.  The others we don’t really even see except for one scene.  Also, at the end of the movie, BJ Novak’s Pvt. Utivich gets some considerable screen time, but I hardly remember him at all in the previous 2-and-a-half hours.  Someone mentioned to me that there’s probably a longer cut in the works that is able to fit in contributions from the other Basterds.  I’m inclined to agree, since I’d love to see more of Til Schweiger’s Nazi-killing German, Stiglitz

Inglourious Basterds is a return to form, of sorts, for Quentin Tarantino.  It’s sharp, funny, the plot is superbly paced, and all the technical details (cinematography, sound, editing, etc) are spot on.  One of the purest forms of ‘cinema’ I’ve seen so far this year.

9/10

Review: “District 9″

What do you get when you toss in trigger-happy mercenary soldiers, lowly government office workers, and marooned aliens?  Why, Halo Disctrict 9, the first wide-release feature film from South African director Neill Blomkamp and  producer Peter Jackson.

Somewhat born from the ashes that was Universal Pictures’ Halo film project (now possibly resurrected), District 9 is the feature-length film of Blomkamp’s short Alive in Joburg.  D9 follows a momentous event in human history: first contact with extra-terrestrial life, which happens to occur over Johannesburg in South Africa.  Problem is, these aliens, called ‘prawns’ due to their looks, are stuck on Earth.  The prawns and the humans must now learn to co-exist on this planet.  If this sounds like the plot to Alien Nation, it isn’t.  Due to the prawns’ starkly different physiology and culture, and human nature’s tendency to fear anything it doesn’t understand, the South African government decides to separate the two, creating District 9, basically a ghetto, for the aliens.  When the nearby human citizens start to feel threatened by the close proximity of D9, the government employs Multi-National United (MNU), a megacorporation, to carry out the relocation of the prawns to the newly built District 10.

One of the top desk jockeys promoted to execute the evictions is Wikus (Sharlto Copley), an everyman office worker who is on-hand in D9 to ensure the evictions are carried out properly.  Things go wrong when he becomes exposed to some never-before-seen alien technology and must run for his life while trying to solve the mysteries surround District 9.  What follows is a sci-fi movie packed with action, great CG effects, and a compelling story.

The film is shot in a pseudo-documentary style, with a camera crew following Wikus during the opening 20 minutes or so.  In some scenes, the camera perspective will change from the usual handheld to the perspective of a security camera.  This technique serves the story well; it really puts the audience right in the middle of things.  The computer-generated imagery was also well-done.  Unlike last week’s G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, where the CG really stood out in parts (in a bad way), the effects in D9 felt like they were part of the story’s world.  The massive alien ship hovering over Johannesburg really looked and felt like it was there, the aliens wandering the slums of D9 looked real, and the crazy weaponry they wield also made me feel like I was watching a documentary.

District 9’s story also helps draw you in.  It’s a social commentary on segregation and immigration wrapped up in a tale of adventure and corporate intrigue with a sprinkle of action-movie car chases and explosions.  This is quite possibly the ’smartest’ movie of the summer; something that entertains as well as questions and informs.

However, it’s not without its problems.  While the cinema verite style helps the film overall, it does leave some questions.  For example, there’s a camera crew following the characters for the first 20 or so minutes.  It’s obvious because Wikus and others address the cameras and their crew directly.  Once that day is over, it becomes a regular narrative just told almost entirely in Steadicam fashion, much like an episode of Southland or Battlestar Galactica.  Who were these camera operators?  Why were they there?  What happened to them?  It would’ve been interested to see if the whole film could’ve been told from that perspective.

It also loses some of the social commentary once the action-movie cliches kick in.  Toward the end, it becomes a bit of a buddy-movie, with Wikus teaming up with one of the aliens, Christopher, who claims to be able to help Wikus if he can only help the aliens.  However, this doesn’t ruin the picture, or turn it into some kind of Jerry Bruckheimer film (not that I have anything against Bruckheimer pictures), as it does give the film some really good scenes toward the end.

Also, some of the characters could’ve been a little more fleshed out.  I totally bought into Wikus plight and was with him during his journey, but everyone else felt like a stereotype.  There’s the psychotic mercenary hired to track down Wikus, the evil corporate executives, the scared wife.  If Blomkamp wanted the film to return to a ‘traditional narrative’, at least try and give us some backstory to some of these supporting characters.

It’s hard to say whether District 9 will be considered a classic one day.  It does have all the elements: a smart story, lessons to be learned, great visual and special effects, and an underdog hero.  The things that get in the way, mainly the direction of the story during the second act, keep it from being among the greatest.  Still, it’s a memorable film that will please audiences and will probably open up discussions on modern society’s social woes.

9/10

(images from Yahoo!)

Review: “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra”

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra is, for better or for worse, pretty much everything you thought the movie would be.  It’s loud, fast, stupid, and mindless.  But it’s also entertaining.

Following on the heels of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, this Stephen Sommers-helmed pic places the popular action figures on the big screen against the evil members of a shadowy organization bent on world domination.  It’s pretty much the plot of every children’s animated action/adventure show ever made.  To its credit, the script is ‘better’ than Transformers 2, with the characters being a little more fleshed out and the story, by comparison, doesn’t seem so rushed.

The flick follows Duke (Channing Tatum) and Ripcord (Marlon Wayans), the two newest recruits of a secret multi-nation special ops group designed to combat terrorism anywhere in the world, without all the red tape.  Duke, however, has been romantically linked to one of the Joes’ enemies, the Baroness (Sienna Miller), who is now in league with the nefarious arms dealer McCullen (Christopher Eccleston) and his assistant known only as The Doctor (Joseph Gordon-Levitt).  The Joes, led by General Hawk (Dennis Quaid), send a team consisting of mute martial arts expert Snake Eyes (Ray Park), gun nut Heavy Duty (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), genius Breaker (Said Taghmauoi), and beautiful marksman Scarlett (Rachel Nichols) to stop McCullen from using a secret weapon that unleashes nanobots to eat everything.  Mixed in for good measure are some flashbacks that explain a bit of some of the characters’ backstories, massive and improbable underwater bases, and ninja fights.

Yeah.  Oscar-winning, this script isn’t.

But, just like Transformers, that isn’t the point.  Basically, these movies are supposed to put on the big screen all the crazy stuff you put the action figures through when you played with them as a kid.  And that’s pretty much what happens in The Rise of Cobra.  The Joes jump over (and through) buses, run up the sides of buildings, smash into cave walls, get shot at, blown up, thrown around, and slammed into.  Generally, all manner of abuse is dished out on these guys.  And it’s sure fun to watch.

Unfortunately, this isn’t a “perfect” action flick.  Just like other reviewers have commented, the CG effects sometimes look unfinished, as if they finalized the film before the effects were done rendering or something.  For example, some of the desert shots look terribly fake.  By comparison, the desert shots of the pyramids in Transformers 2 looked great; the pyramid shots in G.I. Joe look mediocre by comparison.  Also, no one can direct an action scene like Michael Bay.  Sommers tries, but there’s just a certain flow to a Bay movie that is lacking here.  There’s one sequence involving an attack on the Joes’ HQ.  Despite all the craziness going on, there still seems like there isn’t enough happening.  Even if dialogue is being spoken, the action shouldn’t stop.  I feel as if Sommers lets everything calm down for a second so that the actors can say their lines.  Sure, it might be good for the actors, but it slows down the action.

That being said, the flick still has some great moments.  The chase through Paris is great fun, and I had to restrain myself from squealing like a fanboy when I saw mortal enemies Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow (Brandon Soo Hoo) face off for the first time.  There’s also plenty of eye candy to go around; I know there were girls swooning at the very glimpse of Channing Tatum (despite is one note acting), and the guys have a lot to look at in Sienna Miller and Rachel Nichols.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra won’t exactly win over anyone who despises dumb fun summer flicks (ahem…Roger Ebert), but it will entertain those that grew up playing with the toys.  This movie was made for them, and it doesn’t have to be anything more than that.  Is it stupid?  Oh, yes.  But, will it please its target audience?  Most likely.

7.5/10

(images from Yahoo!)

Review: “Funny People”

The third feature film from writer/director/producer extraordinaire Judd Apatow, Funny People seems to have everything a comedy needs to have: funny actors, a funny script, and the word ‘funny’ in the title.

But it’s not really that funny.

Adam Sandler is  George Simmons, a successful comedian who’s done everything: stand-up, movies, television; you name it, he’s done it.  Now, past what Hollywood would term his ‘prime’, Simmons lives alone in his very large house (except for his small staff), regrets breaking off ties with his ex-girlfriend Laura (Leslie Mann), and generally living his life like a typical Hollywood has-been.  Until he discovers from his doctor that he has a rare form of leukemia and chances of recovery are slim-to-none.  Simmons then hits the stand-up circuit one last time, only the tone of his jokes have changed for the worst.  His jokes are darker, more cynical, and generally not something you’d want to hear at the comedy club.

It’s at one of these stand-up nights he meets Ira Wright (Seth Rogen), an up-and-coming comic who’s roommates also happen to be comics, albeit slightly more successful; Mark (Jason Schwartzman) has his own sitcom and Leo (Jonah Hill) gets more gigs than Ira does.  While Ira wasn’t the best comic performing that night, George takes a liking to him and hires Ira as his new personal assistant, a job that requires setting appointments, entertaining guests, and talking him to sleep at his bedside.  It’s a strange job, but provides Ira the opportunity to write jokes for the legendary comedian.

As the trailer for the movie gave away, we find out that George actually won’t die, that he’s beaten the odds and his disease has gone into remission.  While this should’ve been the happiest part of the movie, it somehow alters the tone of the film, and might work against it in the end.

Adam Sandler gives a strong performance as George Simmons.  While I don’t think this is Oscar-worthy, he definitely has a few scenes here that could count among his best dramatic work (although that’s a short list).  Simmons is basically going through a mid-life crisis on top of the life-threatening disease that’s slowly killing him.  Sandler plays this well; not allowing us to feel sorry for him, but rather except his inevitable death and be entertained as he struggles to put his life in order before he expires.

Seth Rogen is also good here.  I have nothing against him, and I find Rogen very funny in most of his roles, but I think I’m going through a Seth Rogen overdose.  He’s in a new movie every few months!  However, he manages to pull off some pretty good scenes and holds his own well against Sandler.  I actually felt bad for his Ira Wright.  It’s almost pathetic to watch him work behind a deli counter when his roommates are living the life he wants, and that basically means he wants to do what he loves and get paid for it.

Leslie Mann, Apatow’s real-life wife, actually has some good scenes here.  Usually relegated to supporting roles in many films, including her husband’s, she’s given a bigger role here, one that is tied closely with Sandler’s character.  It’s a nice change of pace for her, and I wish she’d get more roles like this.

My issue with the movie is not that it isn’t funny (because it is in some scenes), but that it might be a little too introspective for its own good.  For about 70% of the movie’s  2-hour-and-change runtime, it’s almost like this redemption tale of George Simmons, with Ira Wright as the sidekick.  Then, once he discovers he’s well again, it becomes a morality tale on how to screw up the one chance for a do-over.  Simmons basically turns into an unlikeable character.

It could be said that this was trying to break a formulaic structure (work backwards, essentially.  Have our hero go from bad to worse, instead of from bad to good).  But I feel like the final act was rushed and didn’t resolve much.  That being said, this was possibly Judd Apatow’s most heartfelt story since The 40-Year-Old-Virgin (despite its raunchy comedy, it’s a very sweet film).  Funny People really isn’t about people being funny, it’s really just about people.  Sure, they happen to be comedians and say and do funny things, but don’t ‘regular people’ say and do funny things?  YouTube is a perfectly example for that.

Something must be said of the cinematography.  Janusz Kaminski, Director of Photography on films like Saving Private Ryan and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, lensed this movie.  It’s interesting to see what a cinematographer like him, who’s done some incredible work on some unconventional films, can do on a more conventional movie.  There were a couple of times when I was distracted by his choice of visuals.  One scene featured some strange, old Hollywood-style close-ups and soft focuses on Leslie Mann’s Laura.  Another scene had those flashes of white that generally accompany parts of film being exposed to light, in quick succession while our two leads play with children (Judd Apatow and Leslie Mann’s real children, Maude and Iris).

Funny People may not have the audiences rolling in the aisles, but it’s an interesting movie to watch for its screenplay.  Fans of Adam Sandler may find this a nice medium between roles like Punch Drunk Love and his usual goofball fare.  It is one that I can recommend for the look it gives into the world of up-and-coming comics, and for the message it strives to tell at the end: don’t squander a moment in your life, especially if you’ve been given a second chance to live it.

7.5/10

(images from Yahoo!)