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‘Fast Five’ Review: Bigger, Faster, Dumber, Better

Apr 29 2011

‘Fast Five’ Review: Bigger, Faster, Dumber, Better

PCN RATING:

It was recently announced that Justin Lin might be taking over the Terminator franchise with Arnold Schwarzenneger in tow. After seeing the director’s latest, dumbest—and best!—entry in the Fast and the Furious franchise, I can understand why. Working from a lackluster series of carsploitation flicks, Lin and his team take the most insanely idiotic script of the year and turn it into a high-octane crowd pleaser that actually gets the blood pumping. This is the film last summer’s The Expendables wanted to be.

 Picking up where the fourth film left off, Fast Five begins with Dominic Toretto (Diesel) on his way to prison. This self-imposed (sort of) incarceration is short lived—about 40 seconds or so – because his spunky little sis Mia (Jordana Brewster) and  ex-FBI officer Brian O’Connor (Paul Walker) show up in race cars and annihilate the laws of physics in order to bust him out. Flash now to Rio, where O’Connor and Mia are prepping for the arrival of a baby and Dom and Vince (the original film’s Matt Schulze) have set-up a new gig to grab some stolen cars.

Two new forces threaten the makeshift Toretto clan. One is a corrupt Rio drug lord named Reyes (Almeida) who has the city more or less in his pocket and the other is Special Agent Hobbs (Johnson), a relentless muscle-bound tracker who won’t stop until he’s got Dom and Brian in custody.  A new plan is born when they realize they have the drug delivery schedules for all of Reyes’ operations and assemble a team to steal his empire out from under him.

The smartest turn of the story—indeed perhaps the only one—is the way the film nonchalantly slips from illegal street racing (there’s not a single action scene dedicated to it) to a more traditional heist film that blends The Italian Job and Ocean’s Eleven with the decidedly low-brow FF franchise. It’s here that Lin connects the comic-book infused earlier segments with the central story by bringing in a rogue’s gallery of returning characters from every last one of the other films.

All of the performers are right on target for the material, and Diesel and Johnson in particular know how to respond to those safe pitches the script keeps throwing them. Both actors have untapped stores of charisma and energy in them, but Fast Five never requires any of that. It only wants them oiled up, muscles rippling and  scowls raised as they charge like stampeding bulls over the rickety corrugated tops of the favelas.

When the film eventually gets around to their big brawl, Lin makes it a bone-crunching and virile affair with all the right intensity and impact. There’s a third act arrangement that might not ring completely true, but it fits with the rest of the whacked-out script and deserves to exist for no other reason than to provide the best mutual bicep squeeze since Carl Weathers and Ahnuld had their testosterone-soaked reunion at the start of Predator.

The action in the film is of course the main reason to see it and as presented is the connective tissue that stands in for character motivation and psychology. Everything on the script level is either a brittle cliché (It always had to end like this,’ ‘I won’t lose you again’) or something wonderfully bone-headed. Take for instance one of Hobb’s lackeys saying ‘I’ve got good news and bad news for you’ and then Johnson growling out impatiently ‘You know I like dessert first. Then give me the veggies!’  So, what characters punch, drive, or blow-up defines who they are and in a film like Fast Five, that’s a whole lot of definition.

About those action scenes. They are spectacular,  wildly implausible, and refreshingly coherent visually.  The laws of physics and gravity aren’t simply ignored, they are outright erased from the universe. The set piece involving Dom and Brian racing next to a speeding train and literally ripping a hole into one of the compartments so they can drive off the stolen cars is even less logically motivated than the dreamy action scenes in Inception. But look at it as a piece of kinetic, escapist filmmaking, throwing away earthbound limitations in favor of pure adrenaline, and it becomes a thing of crazed beauty. This is The Great Train Robbery puffed up and inflated for the Grand Theft Auto generation.

The second half of the movie that develops the heist is surprisingly covert in the way it prepares us for the mind-numbing action of the final chase. Lin keeps marching you through the steps,  the practice, a turn here, a turn there. We know how it’s supposed to go down, and so when lunacy breaks out, our mind fills in the parts we have already seen. It boils the scene down to its purest action beats and that’s one of Fast Five’s greatest strengths in general. Despite an overflow of content, it’s surprisingly economical.

This economy also hampers the pic to some degree. Yes, the script is expected to be undercooked, but sometimes it’s baffling in what it leaves out. Dom’s relationship with Elsa Pataky’s noble police officer is occasionally confusing; we suspect she knows something he doesn’t and the script is so vague it’s hard to know if it’s being clever or clumsy. The final revelation after the credits also suggests that some things may not be what they seem. Or maybe FF just dumps in events without thinking about them. It hardly matters because it’s all about the moment here, a visceral thrill, and on that level it’s hard to criticize the film too harshly.

It would be easy to consider Lin’s film a guilty pleasure or a good ‘bad’ movie, but it’s simply too well made for that, no matter how trashy or implausible it gets. Lin elevates willful stupidity to nearly an art form. There’s no better way I can think to start the  summer movie season than with Vin Diesel dragging a bank vault the size of a small apartment through the streets of Rio De Janeiro with nothing more than a nitrus-charged car and one hell of a sturdy chain.

By Bartleby • Featured, Reviews • 0 • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Feb 27 2011

‘Age of Dragons’ Trailer

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Get ready for 3-D elbows to the skull! Chocolate 2 on the way!

Feb 12 2011

Get ready for 3-D elbows to the skull! Chocolate 2 on the way!

After the recent disappointments of both Ong Bak 3 and Raging Phoenix, I suppose this news could be met with trepidation. Put that out of your mind for the moment, close your eyes, and remember the first time you saw that mighty mite of Muy Thai, Jija Yanin beating the everloving crap out of some truly dutiful and insane stuntmen. Because Twitchfilm is reporting that Prachya Pinkaew, the Thai director of Chocolate and the upcoming Kevin Bacon thriller White Elephant, is putting together a sequel in 3D. May I suggest you keep it simple this time fellas? As many flaming leg kicks and elbows of doom as possible, and the melodramatic philosophy stuff to a minimum.

Right now, the plan is for studio Sahmongkol to release the film in 3 dimensions, and I’m personally looking forward to watching Yanin’s flying feet and fists in an extra dimension. Usually Im against it but if anyone can make it viable, it’s those crazy Thailand filmmakers. Bring on Chocolate 2!

Tell us below what kind of irresponsible stunt carnage you’d like to see in a sequel.

 

By Bartleby • news • 3 • Tags: , , , , , ,

RED Review

Oct 15 2010

RED Review

Running time:111 min Rating:  PG-13 for intense sequences of action violence and brief strong language. 

Directed by: Robert Schwentke Written by: Jon and Erich Hober Based on the graphic novel by Warren Ellis & Cully Hammer 

Starring: Bruce Willis, Mary Louise Parker, Helen Mirren, John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman, Brian Cox, Karl Urban, Richard Dreyfuss

PCN Rating:

Open Ratings Snapshot

RED may be adapted from Warren Ellis and Cully Hammer’s energetic graphic novel, but what it really feels like is an extension of a scene in this past summer’s similar action entry, The Expendables.  Even if you haven’t seen the film, you know the moment I mean—where Bruce meets Sly and Arnold in a church, offers them a job, and then jets off again. As it turns out, Robert Schwentke’s leisurely and good-natured RED is where he went next. Existing in an action universe that borders the same realm as Expendables and Knight and Day, Schwentke’s film is a matinee diversion that brings an aging cast of warriors out of retirement for one last big hurrah. This time, we aren’t following a slick package of up-and-comers or a battalion of hardened, past-their-sell-by-date bodybuilders. Instead, Schwentke offers up a team of plucky and intelligent actors who make the experience of watching RED like taking a vacation from the tedium of the modern action movie.

Have you have been hammered into submission by the usual demonic combo of vfx and bone-crushing sound design, ready to duck for cover if you ever hear the mention of  ‘kinetic filmmaking’ again? RED has been made for you, then. It’s light as air and almost inconsequential in terms of its narrative and character inspiration, but what it gets right  is that it understands its audience. The Expendables, The Losers, and A-Team—all reasonably entertaining films in their own right—were built upon nostalgia, special effects or flashy editing. As a viewer, I’m starting to feel like the REDs (retired extremely dangerous) themselves, weary and wary of one more big battle. I’m not looking for new action beats, but a sense of immediacy and intrigue, an adventure with worthwhile characters for traveling companions. At the heart of Red, it’s about this group of actors and the charm and cheer they bring to a thin, routine story.  With a laconic but reinvigorated Willis driving this thing, and Mirren, Malkovich, Freeman and Cox riding shotgun, it becomes a goofy good time. A throwback to old Hollywood matinee comedies that doted on their headliners.

Red opens with Willis as Frank, a retired operative trying to blend in with the banal milieu of Cleveland in the suburbs. When not trying to camoflauge his true identiy with nominal Christmas decorations, he finds himself calling up about his pension checks just to speak to the phone operator, Sarah (Mary Louise Parker).  These early passages, that start to comically sketch a romance between mopey, laid-back Frank and bubbly Sarah, are amusingly interrupted by a squad of assassins that inexplicably want to wipe the old agent off the map. Frank, worried for Sarah’s safety, goes out to Kansas City and abducts her in hopes of protecting her. Abduct might be too strong a word since it’s clear that for Sarah this is an escapist fantasy come true and she isn’t exactly resisting. Her matter-of-fact wonder at the whole thing,a nd her growing admiration/adoration for Willis keeps the routine action scenes moving nimbly forward.  Watching Willis bring Frank out of retirement with that knowing smirk and quizzical head tilt is nearly worth the price of admission alone. Twenty minutes in, we have long forgiven him for last February’s Cop Out.

The main draw of Red, though, isn’t some globe trotting duo adventure with Frank and Sarah, but the assemblied team of retired compatriots that Frank digs up to help him figure out who’s trying to kill them. Among them are the neurotic and paranoid Marvin (John Malkovich, ornery—and dying—Joe (Morgan Freeman), and the stylish, refined Victoria (Helen Mirren). Throw in an old adversary turned ally, the gruff Russian Ivan (Brian Cox) and you have a zany team of oldsters that can elevate the film’s tired view of them as senior citizens with guns. A welcome and spirited cameo by that old codger Ernest Borgnine—who looks like he might be older than all of them put together—seals the deal for the geriatric comedy.

None of it is terribly witty, and Schwentke is guilty of relying too much on the age joke and not enough on the temperments and sensibilities of his team . Still, its refreshing to see this particular group together and it works because they aren’t one note action stars, but the always interesting side players that usually invigorate big movies by being the colorful background. Malkovich and Mirren benefit most from the push to the foreground, and they make screwball action absolutely delightful.  Late-in-the game scenes where Mirren takes Sarah under her wing in a twisted show of maternal affection are made better by Parker’s knack for incredulity and adaptation in the face of gunfire. And unlike the Expendables that crammed its spectacle and carnage into a contained bout in the last third, Red mixes the action into the story, and Schwentke’s understated approach always put emphasis on the actors, not fx. Fanboy churls might rip apart the scene where Willis steps froma twirling car to fire at Karl Urban’s pursuing agent, but its arrangement puts the focus on Bruce’s expression and badass verve, not the cgi that makes it possible.

Red isn’t a great movie, and Schwentke as a director has more of a decorator’s sensibilities than the rythms of a strong storyteller. Like his last venture, The Time Traveler’s Wife, Red looks and feels nice enough, but there is little to cement its events or emotions in the mind of the audience. It’s a sweet little daydream of an action movie that puts all of its energy and effort into small details of surprise invention. Watching Malkovich walk around with a cartoon clock wired to explode strapped to his person is just the start of the insanity. Although this modest approach to the film’s graphic novel pedigree doesn’t accentuate it as an edgy blockbuster, it does allow the human comedy to spring to the fore. The result is a film that triggers our cinematic pleasure centers and delivers a few hours of blissful entertainment, blowing away like errant fall leaves the moment we leave the theater. Still,  for popcorn moviemaking, Red finds the mark with ease.

By Bartleby • Reviews • 2 • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Aug 26 2010

Centurion Review

Running time: 97 minutes Rating: Rated R for sequences of strong bloody violence, grisly images and language. Written and directed by: Neil Marshall

Starring: Michael Fassbender, Dominic West, Olga Kurylenko, Imogen Poots, David Morrissey, Andreas Wisniewski, Dave Legeno, Axelle Carolyn

  

If Neil Marshall’s Centurion can be believed, than the Celtic tribe of Picts, circa 117 AD, were some quite nasty customers. If your interest runs in the study of medieval weapons and battle tactics, including the way a tribal blade can ruefully tear away at a victim’s esophagus, then this bonzo collection of gore, guts and guerrilla warfare might be right up your alley. Even if those grittier bits don’t take, then fans of the historical epic might still want to get in line.  Marshall, ever a canny observer of macho carnage, delivers his tale of a buggered Roman battalion behind enemy lines in bold, bloody strokes that feel immediate and real.

Taking place in Roman occupied Northern Britain, Centurion tells the story of a small handful of Roman soldiers who survive a surprise ambush by Pictish warriors—led by the scout turned traitor Etain (Olga Kurylenko)—and then must make their way across the Scottish hills, evading the Pict hunting party while trying to save their captured commander and themselves. Think of it as The Warriors meets Last of the Mohicans Vs. Gladiator. Marshall is so taken with the details of the time period that often the costuming, set design and cinematography obscure the individuality of his characters. Their fates tied together, the motley group of six survivors are almost indistinguishable from one another. Only Fassbender (Hunger) as the heroic Quintus Dias and Kurylenko as the feral, vengeful Etain make any kind of lasting imprint upon the memory.  What does make an impression is the way Marshall stages his man-on-the-run tale, which manages to entertain at the same time it accurately evokes the cold, inhuman dread of extended warfare.

Although it’s going to be dismissed in some circles as just a tiresome bit of grueling battle porn, that’s far away the truth from what Centurion actually is. Horrifically violent for sure, the film is never exploitative or as indulgent as many of its brethren are (the toonish 300 comes to mind). In fact, while the sound effects guys must have had a ball figuring out how to replicate the sound of a garroted neck falling in sallow earth, we only see quick visual flashes of the moment of impact. Instead, Marshall often focuses in on the facial expressions of those inflicting the damage. There’s a fearsome immediacy to watching Etain’s sadness and rage as she decapitates a soldier that could never be captured by simply watching the blade pass along the throat .When West’s Virilus and his men are set upon by the Picts in the film’s bombastic ambush sequence, Marshall manages to encapsulate the entirety of the historical Roman occupation of Britain into one barbaric collapse. This is one of the finest medieval battle scenes captured on film, and the sense of loss and desolation when it’s over seems to be worthy of a more somber picture.

 Instead of keeping that tone, though, Marshall ramps up the quest of Quintus and his men to get back home. The rest is a fast-paced, single-minded race for survivial. It doesn’t feel like the overheated contents of a two-dimensional graphic novel, but instead hearkens backwards in cinema history to films like The Naked Prey, Jeremiah Johnson and even the silent film version of The Most Dangerous Game. Unlike Zach Snyder, whose output keeps to comics and video games, Marshall seems to have an extensive, intimate knowledge of the history of action filmmaking. The camera cranes across in wide-shots of the Scottish hills, capturing Quintus and company scrabbling like rabbits, while Etain stands like a phantom reaper, looking down on them. As the film progresses, the narrative hits rocky terrain, and by the time we reach the climax, it has all but unraveled. The script is so focused on Quintus, and in contrast, his female Pictish counterpart, that when their struggle is resolved, there’s nowhere else to go.

So, yes, Centurion has started to run out of steam by the time it winds down, and a more textured script, willing to explore the binding ties of men in wartime, might have served it better. Then again, it’s hard to say if it would have the same visceral thump it possesses now. Fassbender gives a strong and believable performance as a man trying to hold onto some sense of moral intuition when his enemies have stopped making sense to him. The men who surround him are little more than faces seen by firelight, or racing, mud covered visages, caught in the heat of combat. Imogen Poots as a suspected sorceress who gives the men refuge provides Centurion with the only traces of softness, compassion and grace that it has. Kurylenko is the scene stealer as a woman whose life was destroyed by the Romans before it had even truly begun, and although her severed tongue prevents her from uttering a word she makes her body language shout bitter, unspoken rage that echoes across the harsh wilderness. West has little more than a small role, but in it he gives a face to the decadence and unfettered lust of Rome the empire.

This is Marshall’s fourth foray into the sub-genre of survival thrillers. His last three, Dog Soldiers, The Descent, and Doomsday were all variations on the theme of what happens to the primal side of human nature when its continued existence is threatened. All were worthy pictures, with Descent being the best of the lot because of the way it attacked genre conventions and our expectations about cinematic aggression. After Centurion, which probably follows as second best of that motley group, this particular well is probably dry. I suspect, Marshall might have done that on purpose. Centurion is so brutal and forthright, so dedicated to the darker, hidden face of savagery, that I think it means to have the final word on the subject of ‘band on the run’. It isn’t often that a single film aspires to gut punch a particular narrative into submission, but Centurion does just that, grinning through bloodied teeth with an irreverent sort of joy.

By Bartleby • Featured, Film • 2 • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Summer Flashback 1999: Run, Lola, Run

Jul 8 2010

Summer Flashback 1999: Run, Lola, Run

The only word I can find that adequately does Run Lola Run justice is “stunning”. This is a film that batters your senses, mixing a dizzying amount of visual style with a breakneck story and a pumping techno soundtrack to leave the viewer staggered, reeling and, well, stunned. This is the film that introduced the world to the gorgeous Franka Potente (shamefully squandered in the Bourne films and that odious tripe Creep), and this is the film that I like to think sums up the late 90’s. 

Run, Lola, Run (Lola Rennt) (R) 81 min.

Written by: Jarv

Ninja Rating:
 
Run Lola Run is a film about chance. I know that sounds a bit unlikely, but the basic premise of the film is that Lola’s imbecilic boyfriend Manni (The Baader-Meinhoff Complex’s Moritz Bleibtreu) has managed to land himself in a world of hurt. He owes some angry drug dealers 100,000 marks, as a direct result of a cretinous blunder, and Lola has precisely 20 minutes to raise the cash for him, if she fails then he’s to be killed. The film plays 3 different scenarios of Lola’s madcap sprint across Berlin to try to raise the cash.
 
The first telling of the story actually came as a bit of a surprise to me on first viewing. I saw it almost completely unspoiled, with my only knowledge of it being a brief review in FHM (I was only 19, leave me alone) that described it in glowing terms, but revealed nothing of the plot. We all know how this type of story is meant to work: Lola raises the cash, saves the day, possibly the dealers die. So when the film cut into the animation sequence of Lola running down the stairs and the soundtrack goes ballistic, I have to say I was caught completely off guard. Then when the story concluded in roughly 20 minutes to reset to the start I was somewhat confused. That isn’t to say I wasn’t enjoying myself, because I was hopping about in my seat with a wide grin plastered across my face (wondering if an E would make the experience even better, actually), just that it wasn’t what I was expecting. By the conclusion of the film I had an almost irrepressible urge to watch it again immediately (and I’m glad I didn’t give in to that one). 
 

Potente’s performance as Lola is hard to describe, and hard to criticise. The nature of the film meant that she had to run (at a fair old clip) over 20 miles per day. Even typing that sentence makes me want a pint and a cigarette. Therefore the film requires a significant amount of physical acting, and a certain presence but doesn’t really give Potente a great chance to shine. That her performance could even be described as memorable is, I believe, a testament to how good she is in this film. Bleibtreu has a similarly thankless task as Manni is a complete dingbat, and that he manages to elicit any sympathy is clearly the mark of a fine actor- he was also excellent as Andreas Baader, another unsympathetic character.
 
However, the star of Run Lola Run is writer/ director Tom Tykwer. Run Lola Run is redolent with his stylistic choices and his flashy editing. This is a film that operates best as an adrenaline rush, there’s a frantic sense of urgency to proceedings that is entirely down to Twyker’s decisions. He hasn’t, I’m sorry to say, made anything remotely as good as this again, but Run Lola Run is a film that would top almost any resume, so that isn’t surprising.
 
Run Lola Run is also a film that rewards repeat viewing. I’ve seen it many times now, and each time I spot something new that reinforces the themes, or notice a tiny detail that has implications for the film. It’s ostensibly a superficial film, but if you scratch at the surface then it has concealed and worthwhile depths. It may appear to be a celluloid amphetamine, but it is actually a well thought out treatise on chance and the implications of our decisions. It’s entirely up to the viewer which of the three versions of the story is the real one, and I think which one you decide depends entirely upon what you bring to the film. Personally, I always go for the happy ending, even if that is the most unlikely one. 
 

Overall, I heartily recommend Run Lola Run. Tykwer’s adrenalised masterpiece is a joy of film. It’s a heart-pumping thriller with hidden depths, and one of the most enjoyable films of the decade. I can happily sit back and have it molest my eyeballs and pound on my ear drums as Run Lola Run is a frankly incomparable film experience and a truly great work, and far more than just a brilliant assault on the senses.

Simply fabulous, and I believe this is the only review of Run Lola Run ever written that doesn’t use the word “kinetic”.

By Bartleby • Featured, Film • 8 • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Now Playing: Cruise and Diaz make it a good ‘Knight’

Jun 24 2010

Now Playing: Cruise and Diaz make it a good ‘Knight’

Knight and Day, in the tradition of the great adventure comedies of the past, like North By Northwest, or The African Queen, positions all of the heavy lifting on the shoulders of its capable stars. While Tom Cruise doesn’t quite have the presence of a Bogart or a Grant, he sells the film with his charm. The result is a refreshingly breezy and tongue-in-cheek summer picture that hooks the audience with its winning and charismatic pairing of an energized Cruise and a dreamy, eager-to-follow Cameron Diaz. It’s as implausible as any Michael Bay action flick and as naïve about real human drama as a typical romantic comedy, but it works because we want to follow these characters and when seen through their eyes, the thrilling stuff actually manages to thrill. Go figure.

 

Written by: Nathan Bartlebaugh

Knight and Day (PG-13) Directed by: James Mangold. Written by: Starring: Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, Peter Saarsgard, Paul Dano, Viola Davis, Marc Blucas. Original Music:  Cinematography:

Ninja Rating:

Roy Miller, Cruise’s suave and batty special agent, runs into slightly daffy June Haven (Diaz) at the airport—literally smashes into her—while she’s on her way in search of car parts to renovate her father’s vintage GTO. June smiles, takes in the handsome devil-may-care vibe from Miller, and assumes their chance encounter is the end of it. Some short time later, she’s running for her life with Roy, who’s apparently gone rogue and is being pursued by the nefarious Agent Fitzgerald (Peter Saarsgard) who wants to retrieve something from him called ‘The Zephyr’.

The Zephyr is a proper movie mcguffin, as perfectly tuned to the rather vague needs of the plot as those of Hitchcock’s day, and Knight doesn’t stop with revealing its function. The audience also gets to meet the Zephyr’s nerdy, socially challenged inventor; the child-like Simon Feck (Paul Dano with a ridiculous fake mustache), who goes on the list of stuff Roy needs to protect when the bad guys find out he’s got the info they need. Feck is mostly an afterthought, but he proves useful for helping explain changes in the Zephyr’s function, and he makes a good hostage when the bad guys need to coerce Ray into playing ball.

 After a few highly amusing action set pieces (one on the highway and another aboard an commercial airliner that has just lost its entire crew), the script sends Diaz and Cruise on a whirlwind, globe-trotting trip that sees them hurtling on a train through Austria or trying to outrun computer animated bulls on a motorcycle in Spain. All around them things are exploding, and slowly Ray and Jane are being pulled into one another’s orbit. She might not be able to trust him, and it’s never clear why he’s being so protective of her, but somewhere in the middle they come together out of the mutual need to not get shot.

 Ray looks invincible here, but as an actor Cruise is sowing seeds of vulnerability into the character under his action man bravado. When he first meets Diaz, he shares his list of things he’s always wanted  to do, if things were different. As the film progresses, we see the list goes deeper than Ray would let on.

As a story, Knight and Day is completely silly. This is not an indictment or a criticism, because the entire enterprise is founded on the idea that the adventures of Roy Miller and June Havens are just a delirious fever dream of action clichés. Mangold, great at fine-tuning and crafting genre throwbacks (see the underrated Identity and the rightly rated 3:10 to Yuma) builds this conceptually into the atmosphere and the performances right from the get-go.

A great example takes place on that plane in the beginning; June is in the bathroom, rehearsing her come-ons to Roy, and trying to muster her courage. When she emerges from the bathroom, Cruise is just sitting there, slightly shaken with a drink in his hand. She’s intent on making her ardor known, he’s recovering from a massive battle he just had with all of the flight’s passengers (undercover agents). When bodies start falling out of their seats and Cruise is playfully explaining how they will need to land the plane because he inadvertently shot the captain, Diaz’s slowly dawning realization is one of inconvenience, not terror. This would be white-knuckle stuff in a different film, but in Knight and Day it’s played for pure amusement.

That’s what this movie is; one big amusement. The plot moves Roy and June in and out of one adventure after the other, and all the while it’s creating a context for Cruise and Diaz to play off of and draw out the individual strengths and quirks that made them popular in the first place. For instance, I’ve never fully realized just how well Cruise can diffuse moments of over-the-top action. He seems plausible enough driving between those stampeding bulls or when falling cheerfully out of the sky onto the windshield of a speeding car. Diaz has a great smile and her facial features are called on here to expand with good-natured exasperation after each new ridiculous predicament.

Saarsgard,  Viola Davis and Dano are all fine in their roles, but they, like the special effects, all take a backseat to Cruise and Diaz. James Mangold has directed Knight and Day as a wind-up toy, and once he’s got everything humming along at a speedy clip, he gets out of his actors way and lets them do the kind of work they have based their careers on. Cruise in particular, seems to be reaching back some 15 years and connecting with his more self-assured, but less grave, persona. Diaz has always been a charmer, but here she’s channeling a kind of disconnected dreamer that matches up with her on-screen identity better than the kinds of characters she’s been playing lately.

I’ve perhaps downplayed the impact of the action and Mangold’s direction of it, but the truth is that Knight and Day has more than its fair share of adrenaline pumping scenes. There’s a real geography and sense of kinetic motion in the hand-to-hand fights and car chases. Instead of witnessing the impact for every crushed hand, gunshot, or car crash, we often see the precisely timed moments that come after them. We aren’t watching Tom Cruise jumping off a falling motorcycle over the turnpike. Instead we see the cycle go up the ramp, and then boom!, there’s  Roy smiling on the front of the car. The same goes for a series of escapades on a train later in the movie that evokes James Bond or maybe the Bourne movies. The much ballyhooed ‘running of the bulls’ might be made of cgi, but I enjoyed the logistics of seeing the animals colliding with vehicles and spilling out into the Spanish streets like a pulsing, dark tide.

Although it isn’t a perfect home run–there are far too many interludes of characters passing out and waking up in new locations– and the plot is simply too thin for the running time, Knight and Day is a superior entry in the romantic espionage genre, and in the rather tepid movie summer of 2010, it could almost be classified as a must see. Reminding us why we liked them in the first place, it earns the admission price by giving us Cruise and Diaz together onscreen, outpacing the explosions.

By Bartleby • Film • 1 • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Luc Besson’s Adele Blanc-Sec Trailer

Jun 11 2010

Luc Besson’s Adele Blanc-Sec Trailer

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Now Playing:Little lost ‘Prince’ doesn’t feel like Persia

May 28 2010

Now Playing:Little lost ‘Prince’ doesn’t feel like Persia

PCN Rating:

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time is possibly the most faithful game-to-cinema adaptation to date. 

Characters run across a whirling digital landscape and leap and jump over walls and rooftops.  All of the actors pop on and off screen speaking in disjointed fragments and half thoughts, as if re-enacting really expensive cut scenes. The main macguffin, a knife with a push-button that turns back time, functions like a built-in do-over. So, yes, despite the presence of Jake Gyllenhaal, Gemma Arterton and Ben Kingsley, this Prince feels as if it were all made up of code and bytes, without the personal spark of human input. It may be a humdinger of a video game but it makes for a really lousy movie.

Opening with a couple of street urchins running across the shanty rooftops of a Persian slum, Newell’s would-be throwback to matinee epics struggles with its influences. A narrative scroll in the beginning wants to be tantalizingly mystical, but instead reads like a New Age Hallmark card. The expansive and detailed sets look as grand as anything from DeMille’s day but they are instantly downsized by less-than-sharp CGI that shrinks the scope and majesty.

Shortly after that initial scene with the young thieves, which reveals the fact that Persian king chose street-boy Dastan as his adopted son, the audience is treated to a massive battle that looks as if it’s being played out by action figures. In the midst of this pinball chaos, Gyllenhaal’s grown-up Dastan and his foster brothers raid the nearby city of Alamut upon suspicion of weapons manufacturing (yes, really, weapons of moderate destruction). Upon seizing the throne, Dastan grabs an ancient dagger as reward and his brother grabs the hand of feisty Princess Tamina (Arterton) in marriage.

This central story set-up, with the falsely accused Alamut, the reluctant princess and the wary king who fears for his sons’ unity in his absence all show promise. It’s the execution that is lacking. Once the narrative wheels are set in motion, and Dastan finds himself falsely accused of his father’s death and on the run with Tamina, the movie goes on autopilot. The rest is a series of incidental chase scenes, too-shiny animated set pieces and a hackneyed mystery that has an obvious solution from the very beginning. By the time Dastan gets around to trying out that magical dagger, and learning that it catapults the user a few moments back in time, there’s not much left for the audience to care about. It’s a poorly constructed film that can’t even raise a single wow from the prospect of a time-traveling weapon.  

It’s a shame that the film fails to the extent that it does, because typically I love the genre it’s working in. Picking up pages from The Arabian Nights and the two cinematic incarnations of Thief of Bagdad (this has more in common with Fairbanks than Sabu), Persia approaches its story with a kind of nostalgic goofiness, more akin to what Stephen Summers did with The Mummy back in 1999.

Newell and his writers and technicians are attempting to add a newer sprightlier edge to the rich fantasy landscape of Arabian folklore. Unfortunately, they drop the ball big time and fail to cast anyone who isn’t part of a clearly Caucasian heritage. If you think Gyllenhaal doesn’t work as a Persian with a British accent, just wait until you see the newly tanned Arterton trying to tune into the graceful sensuality of an Eastern princess.

To be fair, it’s hard to blame the actors for signing up for a project like this, as it could have been terrific fun. Why they agreed to this script is a better question. My guess is they were hoping against hope that magic would happen in the fx studio. After all, large parts of the manuscript must have read like ‘Jake runs in front of green screen’.

 What goes wrong is that no one is having fun, and a score of writers have hammered this thing together like an ill fitting piece of IKEA furniture.  There are dashes of meager invention, and segments clearly prepared to wow, but the whole enterprise lands with a heavy digital thud. In my opinion, this is all down to Persia’s over-reliance on synthetic thrills and character shorthand instead of legitimate depth.

 

But Gyllenhaal and Arterton give it their all, and even though Jake has long been the presumed weak spot of the movie, he’s not as jarring as originally suspected. Part of this is because the entire film lacks a sense of reality or texture, and the other elements, particularly the special effects, don’t make his modernity seem out of place. The other reason is that Gyllenhaal isn’t without talent and charm as a performer, and even though he’s way out of his depth here, he works hard at making Dastan a real character and strives to build a playful interaction with Arterton. For her part, Gemma is radiantly beautiful without being startling, and she has such a pluck about her as an actress that her looks aren’t a detractor. Unfortunately the dialogue and scripting scuttle almost all of their efforts to bring any sense of substance to the runaway style on display.  

The supporting cast is mostly out to lunch. Kingsley, as the oh-so obvious villain, looks like he’s channeling Torin Hatcher’s nefarious wizard from the 1956 Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, with far less dark relish. The brothers and late great king are mostly background dressing, and their scenes are less than perfunctory.

The only truly bright spot in the film is the surprise entrance of Alfred Molina who I wasn’t expecting to see. He’s playing the typical Disney side-character who wants to believe he’s a villain but couldn’t be farther from one; think Long John Silver-lite. He’s even got the best story in the script. Nicknamed ‘The Sheik’, Molina is the head of a faux enclave of brigands, who aren’t bloodthirsty as claimed, but enterprising ostrich racers who want nothing more than find entrepreneurial success and evade excessive taxing.

Unfortunately, there’s only so much even Molina can do with a half-sketched character and although he’s in and out of the film, the promise of seeing an exciting chase scene involving the ostriches is not fulfilled. In fact, empty promises are what Prince of Persia specializes in. There’s more than enough for a ripping adventure, but Newell, who’s done great work elsewhere, can’t seem to get the engine cranked and started.

Showing wit and charm when he took the reins of the Potter franchise, Newell has simply picked the wrong vehicle to transition to a full fledged popcorn picture. There’s nothing in this one that plays to his strengths, and a director who has always been known for dishing up savory interactions between his characters crumbles under the weight of fatuous spectacle and routine action.

By Bartleby • Film • 3 • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Avatar Review

Dec 17 2009

Avatar Review

Running time: 162 Minutes Rating: PG-13 for intense epic battle sequences and warfare, sensuality, language and some smoking.

Written and Directed By: James Cameron Staring: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Giovanni Ribisi, Stephen Lang, Michelle Rodriguez, Joel Moore, Wes Studi, CCH Pounder, and Laz Alonso

PCN Rating:

The lights turn down, the 3-D glasses go on, and what follows is one of the most basic and honest reasons to go the cinema; pure delight. James Cameron finally unveils his Avatar and although he doesn’t bring anything thematically new or riveting to the table, his execution dazzles so completely we barely notice. This is why I love the movies.

Cameron has been promising a technical revolution and he and his team have delivered it, no doubt. From the nearly flawless motion capture to the brighter, clearer 3-D technology, Avatar is an important evolutionary step in the development of the modern blockbuster. Tonight, jungle-covered islands floated before my eyes in a sea of white mist, elegant alien pterosaurs winged their way through amber-soaked skies, careening past our theater seats before vanishing into the horizon. An entire race of azure giants lived and fought and died just inches away from my popcorn bucket.

But no matter how great the special effects or the fancy packaging, Avatar would be lost without a narrative and characters we care about. Cameron’s solution is to give us a protagonist whose introduction to the world of Pandora is similar to ours; Jake Sully is going there as a visitor and he’s along for the ride with a body that technically isn’t his.

The year is 2154 and Sully is a paraplegic Marine whose twin brother was killed, earning him a free pass to an alien world where the current corporate/military regime are chomping at the bit to strip-mine the entire planet. The only thing holding them back are the Na’vi, the indigenous blue-skinned warriors who live there, and a group of crusading scientists led by Dr. Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver). With the help of home-grown human/Na’vi hybrids called Avatars, Grace and her team upload their consciousness into alien skins and then fraternize with the locals. Sully’s deceased bro was one of Grace’s best and brightest, but Sully shares his genetics and therefore can operate the spare avatar.

After getting separated from his crew, Jake finds himself ushered into Na’vi training rituals with his guide Neyetiri, a local alien hottie who saved him from being eaten by Pandoran fauna. When trigger happy Colonel Quaritch (Stephen Lang) decides to unload the heavy ammunition, Jake has to question his own allegiances and the moral implications associated with ‘relocating’ an entire culture. A simple and archetypal story—the stranger in a strange land who learns to walk the walk—is transformed into a wonderwork of movie escapism.

As a story, Avatar is very basic stuff. The jokey comparisons to Dances with Wolves and Fern Gully are eerily accurate. A man is confronted with a culture alien to him and in the process of adapting, considers the value of that culture in the face of his own. It nearly writes itself. The environmentally conscious themes go down easier once Cameron introduces the sci-fi truth behind the Na’vi’s connection with their land; it’s interesting and thought-provoking and it gives them motivation more intrinsic and substantial than the fuel-hungry callousness of the Earthling military.

The delight is in the details and there is no shortage of them here; from the smallest whirling protoplasts to the deadliest flying nightmares, each animal inhabitant of Pandora has a purpose, a mythology and an unique physiology. Sully may be a military man but he comes into his own while with the Na’vi. His transformation, as written, is a plausible one.

Visually, the movie is a revelation. Cameron uses all kinds of spatial orientations to direct our understanding of the physical laws governing Pandora. When Neyetiri and Jake go to wrangle the vicious, pterosaur-like Banshees, and she demonstrates how to fly one, I was taken aback by the singular beauty of the sequence. Not how the scene was put together but by the physical details of it; watching the muscles stretching under the skin, the wind blowing against the leathery wings, and the rider joyously guiding the animal up and around the floating islands. I had stopped processing the scene as special effects and had begun to regard it as a natural event, something singularly unique.

The acting is universally good, and all of the physical actors deliver grounded performances. I liked Lang’s take on the villainous colonel; he makes drinking coffee during genocide a trait of deep significance. Sam Worthington has an easy energy as Sully and he’s far more charismatic and relaxed here than he was in Terminator: Salvation. Sigourney Weaver is a welcome presence in any movie, and I adored her here and oddly enough found her Na’vi avatar to be the most attractive character in the film.

Regarding those Na’vi, they are amazingly rendered to the point that the uncanny valley effect that would make them stiff-necked, dead-eyed puppets is nowhere to be found. There is a texture to the skin, a sag around the mouth or lips and a flare of the nostrils that make them seem as if they are flesh and blood. I did not know Wes Studi was in the film, but I identified him almost immediately based solely upon his Na’vi likeness. Zoe Saldana as Neyetiri is giving a soulful performance that has been expertly tweaked and defined by the animation team.

Although Cameron crams his film with the trappings of space opera and the remnants of hard sci-fi technology, he’s still more enamored with the action sensibilities of his scripts than the intellectual ones. Avatar may be pedestrian on a story level, but in telling that story, it channels all of its resources to deliver something stirring, thrilling and overwhelming in its clarity and energy.The battles that make up the last third of the film are unlike anything I’ve witnessed in fantasy filmmaking. The comic-book scale of the last stand on Pandora is mythic and melodramatic, but both in proper measure. There’s cheese here for sure, but Cameron has the courage of his kooky convictions so we go with it.

No matter, this is a tremendous work, and one likely to find the audience it deserves.

By Bartleby • Reviews • 0 • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,