goldwriting Reviews

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

Age of Ultron Keeps the Pressure On

[9/10 · 5 May 2015]

The steamrolling new cinematic world of Marvel movies continues with round two of the Avengers storyline, Avengers: Age of Ultron. With Joss Whedon once again behind the camera and behind the pen, the bar was set pretty high, but he met expectations in more ways than one.

Avengers: Age of Ultron deals with the central fear of Tony Stark, who has seen through the looking glass into the universe beyond and knows what's out there. No known power on Earth can stop what's coming, even his new team of superheroes, so Stark decides to build an artificial weapon strong enough to defend the planet for them. Not the most unique of ideas, but anytime someone builds artificial intelligence, it inevitably turns against them.

The Avengers must come together quickly to fix Stark's mistake, while dealing with the introduction of two new mutants, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch, who have a deep seated hatred for Stark and his history of weapons manufacturing.

Going into this film, it is impossible to truly measure the cultural and economic weight it was under. The first film grossed over $1.5 billion dollars, which because of other massive tentpole successes, $1 billion dollars is slowly becoming the threshold to pass in order to be called a "huge win" for the studio.

On top of that, The Avengers created the new algorithm for bringing a number of unique comic book hero movies together into one grand franchise. This is already being repeated by other studios (especially Warner Brothers and DC Comics) and it will continue to be the pattern for the foreseeable future. Marvel figured out the key and it unlocked the movie universe for decades to come.

The performances in Age of Ultron were mostly up to my expectations. Robert Downey Jr. continues to bring depth and failings to Iron Man, while Mark Ruffalo rages forward as the best actor to ever play the Hulk (sorry, Bill Bixby.) Chris Hemsworth and Chris Evans hold up their end of the bargain as Thor and Captain America, respectively. No one falls behind, even with the cameos of Don Cheadle as War Machine, Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury, and Anthony Mackie as The Falcon.

Yet, to me the standouts in relation to the returning cast have to go to Scarlett Johansson (as Black Widow) and Jeremy Renner (as Hawkeye.) Johansson continues to peel back the layers of Black Widow's early childhood trauma and the effects of her brutal training as one of the world's best assassins. Renner stands alone in this movie as the emotional glue, the magnet that holds together the theme in this chapter, which is family.

Newcomers Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen move far beyond their brief cameo in Captain America: Winter Soldier as the dangerous Russian twins, Quicksilver and Scarlett Witch. Taylor-Johnson gets to play both the smoldering anger of a child who's seen too much horror and the protective older brother who would do anything to protect surviving member of his family. Olsen also has similar traits, but her power burns much stronger and with it also comes her frailty in how to use and control it. She's not yet a soldier when the film begins, but the events that unfold force her to make that choice.

James Spader provides the sinister voice and machine madness of Ultron. Once again a massively popular household name, Spader brings much of the same arrogance of his lead character in the hit TV show, The Blacklist, but here it's as if that character loses his cool. Insanely brilliant, insanely powerful, and just plain insane.

Balancing him out is the final character premier in the film, Vision, played beautifully by Paul Bettany. I was worried because Vision is a hard character to make emotionally compelling since he is almost purely logical and they could have easily fallen into the same trap as The Watchmen and the character of Dr. Manhattan. Yet, Bettany showed once again why he is one of the best in his generation and why Marvel does not skimp on effort or money to get the most talented people for the part. He overlays his logic with love, his power with purpose, and his intensity with intelligence. This is a character I am going to really enjoy watching grow in the coming films.

Another impressively well written, structured and acted film from the Marvel universe, Avengers: Age of Ultron will not disappoint new fans, old fans, or go down in film history as "the weak part of the franchise."

Looper (2012)

Let's agree to disagree (with myself)

[6/10 · 3 October 2012]

First thing, if you haven't seen Brick, stop reading this and go watch it. If you have seen Brick, stop reading this and go watch it again. Great, now that you're back, you're welcome and let's continue.

Looper is the third film from writer/director Rian Johnson, who blasted onto the indie filmmaking scene with the aforementioned Brick, creating an instant stir and a huge level of expectation for future projects. He followed it up with The Brothers Bloom, a quirky and more humorously emotional film than his debut. Four years later, we finally get the next volume in Johnson's catalog, and many of us have been waiting with baited breath.

Looper is a sci-fi time travel tale about an assassin in the not-too- distant future who kills people sent back to him from the slightly-more- distant future. This cold-blooded killer, Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is known as a Looper, and he knows one day the person sent back to die will be himself, thereby closing the loop. Yet when faced with the older version of Joe (Bruce Willis), the present-day version fails to get the job done and begins a harrowing chase to settle the score and figure out why the future version of him wants to live so badly.

The description is above is fully accurate, but it leaves out a huge plot point in the story because it's a spoiler. So if you don't want to know any more about the film, stop here and come back when you've seen it for yourself.

OK, now that you've been warned (SPOILERS AHEAD, second and last warning) here's the rest. Willis comes back hunting for a mythical mobster from the future called The Rainmaker, who in his time period is closing all the loops en masse. He is also partially responsible for killing Willis' future wife, something Willis is determined to fix in the past by finding and killing The Rainmaker as a child.

The biggest problem with Looper overall is both plot descriptions are true, but they could be entire movies on their own. Tied together into one script the balance between the two is shaky. For the first half of the movie it is nearly all about Levitt versus Willis in a game of cat and mouse, all while trying to avoid the present-day mafia who are trying to kill them both. Yet somewhere around the halfway mark, the movie slows down considerably while we dive into the deep end of the pool with the Rainmaker storyline, with added performances from Emily Blunt and Pierce Gagnon on a random stretch of farmland.

Script issues aside, there is always going to be a debate on the topic of time travel and how it plays out in the film. In this realm, Johnson tosses the logic and technology of it out the window with pleasant abandon, even having Willis yell out in a critical scene, "It doesn't matter!" For me it was a nice touch and should be heeded by future filmmakers who dare to use time travel as a plot device. Don't get bogged down in the details of how it works (because in the end, it doesn't).

The performances are also worth mentioning here with a special nod to the makeup department. Levitt underwent a truly amazing and subtle transformation into a younger version of Willis, and it definitely had an effect on not only how he played the character, but how the audience reacts to him. Levitt is reaching a level of star status that will soon overcome his on-screen characters because we will all know exactly who he is (currently known as the Tom Cruise effect), but with the slight manipulation of Levitt's face, it was almost hard to remember it was actually him on screen. He delivered the same quality and intensity we have become accustomed to, and that helps buoy the film during the slower portions. Also, Pierce Gagnon is incredibly intense for such a young kid. Keep an eye on him if they ever do another sequel to the Children of the Corn franchise. He'd be a shoe-in.

In an overall look back, there is a moral question that pervades the film and strains to link the two stories, but both weren't necessary to answer it and a strong choice as to what the film was really about would have simplified it and delivered a much stronger final product.

The Master (2012)

Masterful acting, but not so much in pure storytelling.

[6/10 · 26 September 2012]

It has been five years since we witnessed Daniel Day-Lewis put on a clinic about on-screen intensity (while also creating a short-lived internet meme about drinking everyone's milkshake). That was in the last film from critically acclaimed director Paul Thomas Anderson, who burst into the Hollywood spotlight with Boogie Nights, (which he followed up by the epic oddity of Magnolia and dark humor of Punch-Drunk Love). While Anderson's movies have a tendency to elicit extreme reactions from viewers – both positive and negative in equal amounts – it is never in question whether you will get something worth talking about. If there is a genre for coffee-table, quiet café discussion directors, Anderson would reign over it as its modern-day king.

Anderson's newest project is The Master follows Freddie Quell (Joaquin Phoenix), a perpetual drunk with no direction in life who literally stumbles into the calm clutches of Lancaster Dodd (Philip Seymour Hoffman). Dodd is a new-age cult leader who sees something in Freddie worth molding and sculpting. Dodd turns Freddie Quell into his prodigy with mixed results, often creating a battle not only between Quell's lightning-quick rage and his sanity, but also between Dodd and his own followers. It all intensifies as Dodd's following grows ever larger but more skeptical about whether what the man preaches is real or just a story he lost the thread to years ago.

The real impact of the film comes from the performances. Anderson, in my eyes, has been an actor's director from day one. He is someone who will create amazingly beautiful and poignant scenes where these brilliant moments can live and breathe. Once you add in a cast of extremely talented actors, as exists in The Master, you know what you are about to experience is worth the ticket price.

Hoffman and Phoenix put on a virtual master class in acting. It feels like a piece of prime theater, paced with precision and directed with wonderful simplicity. Phoenix reportedly studied caged animals at the zoo in order to bring that physical quality to Quell's nervous posture. It has worked wonders for him because there are only rare moments when you aren't holding your breath waiting for him to explode. Hoffman also displays the potential for violence, but it is handled with much more grace and charm. He brings forth a man with a world of his own creation on his shoulders, beaming with pride, yet weakened by the weight of it all.

My main issue with the film didn't appear until after I had finished watching it and I began to wonder what the story really was about. What was the point of it all? Was there a message in the madness of Quell or the mastery of Dodd? People can easily debate this, but it feels as if Quell makes no real change from the beginning to the end. Dodd surely changes, at least in his circumstances, but it's not completely clear if changes occur in any other way to him or Quell.

In the end, it is amazingly portrayed, but woefully told.

The Avengers (2012)

The Hulk (and Others) Smash Expectations

[10/10 · 8 May 2012]

This is what we have been waiting for. The culmination of years of planning, years of filming and years of cross-pollination of characters throughout the Marvel movie universe. The bar was set unbelievably high and I did my best to temper my expectations as I walked into the theater along with the millions upon millions of moviegoers this opening weekend. When the lights dropped, I mentally wiped the slate clean and hoped beyond hope that it was good (at least better than Iron Man 2). As so many other people have said by now, I was more than pleased.

The Avengers follows the beginning of one of Marvel comics most powerful supergroups, as the world finds itself woefully unprepared for an alien onslaught led by the scorned demi-god, Loki. While the various heroes don't play nicely together at first, they come together when the time comes and prove they are much more powerful together than apart. Together, they are unstoppable.

Many of the reviews have been focusing on Mark Ruffalo and his charismatic portrayal of Bruce Banner, aka The Hulk. Originally much of the focus was on him because he is now the third actor in as many films to play the legendary green behemoth. Yet after the release, the buzz stayed on him because he brought something to Hulk that was sorely lacking before, humanity. Arguably Ruffalo wasn't on screen a ton and it's hard to say whether we have been so amazed with his performance if it was ninety minutes or more, but since Marvel and company immediately signed him to a six-picture deal to continue being big, green and angry, we will all get our chance to test the theory out. I've always loved Ruffalo as an actor and I have all the faith in the world he can make this rage monster a dynamic character to watch, but the real gamble will come in the script. We've seen full movies with Eric Bana and Edward Norton already, so this next one (or two, or three) need to bring something different, not just a rehash of those before. Luckily, the Avengers phenomenon also allows the next Hulk picture to skip over the origin story, since it's fairly unnecessary now.

While Ruffalo can rightly bask in the glow of a job exceedingly well done, the rest of the cast deserves praise as well. Everyone up and down the line brought their A-game and they played off each other incredibly well. Robert Downey Jr. can sometimes overshadow people on screen, just due to his charisma, but he did exactly what he said his character of Tony Stark, aka Iron Man, couldn't do…play nicely with others. However, the pressure was really more on Jeremy Renner (as Hawkeye) and Scarlett Johansson (as Black Widow) since they were only side jobs in some of the previous Marvel chapters. Each did a great job, with extra credit given to Johannson (and possibly her fight double if she had one) for her intro sequence with the Russian mobsters.

I can't close this review out without bringing up one of the real-life superheros of the story, writer/director Joss Whedon. The man is a living legend in the geek community and this film proves the accolades and unending praise are well-founded. He achieved a perfect balance of action, pace, and story all while managing to encompass the overabundance of characters. Jokes were well-timed and well-delivered and he allowed for possibly risky moments to go all out, resulting in one of the most hilarious and enjoyable scenes in Marvel movie history (you'll know it when you see it).

Sure, there are some nit-picky moments that you can dig up if you're so inclined. Feel free to send me what you think those might be and I'll gladly drop in some of mine. Yet, in the end, the experience is what counts and I couldn't wipe the smile off my face as I left (and not just because the final extra scene at the end of the final credits was pure genius). This movie captured absolutely every bit of the tone and energy of a comic book summer blockbuster and if Whedon was a professor, this would be his Master Class.

Lockout (2012)

Campy, but no Cult Favorite.

[4/10 · 27 April 2012]

There is something inherently wonderful about those movies that take themselves to a place of pure absurdity, somewhere so devoid of logic or reason that it allows them to drop any and all pretense of the story taking place in a realistic world. Without the shackles of rules and meaning to hold them down, these stories run wild, fully exploiting each and every moment for pure humor, action, machismo, sexuality, or pretty much any emotion under the sun. It's silly, it's meaningless and it can be absolutely necessary to any true movie fan's collection. These campy, cult masterpieces are a true form of filmmaking, but this particular entry into that world doesn't quite make the "must see" list.

Lockout is the futuristic tale of Agent Snow, an anti-hero pegged with a murder he didn't commit. His only hope for good favor is to fly out into space, penetrate a floating maximum security prison and rescue the daughter of the President before she is turned into fresh meat for the space crazed psychopaths.

The idea for this outer space romp sprung from the mind of Luc Besson, known as a legend for Leon: The Professional, La Femme Nikita and The Fifth Element. He is also well loved in the action-camp world for bringing us the fast driving, feet flying magic of the Transporter series. So with a resume like that backing this up, there is a certain level of high-paced insanity you expect waiting behind the curtain. Yet what we get here is a transplanted homage to John Carpenter, another legend of camp cinema, and his masterpiece, Escape from New York. Even down to the performance of Guy Pearce (as Agent Snow) it hearkens immediately back to Kurt Russell and his iconic turn as Snake Plissken. That is not to necessarily say it was bad solely because of Pierce, just that it didn't inspire any surprise or intrigue during the movie.

Pierce defiantly gives it his all as the gruff, chain smoking, joke tossing anti-hero, but try as he might to elevate this into the cult upper echelon, the rest of the movie just settles into a straight-to-DVD experience. Although, I will give a special mention to Joseph Gilgun, who played the maniacally unstable Hydell, the crazed little brother of the leader of the inmates. He really got down into the insanity and playful craziness that infused all of his scenes with a chuckle and a shudder.

The Hunger Games (2012)

The Next Bog Thing (But Does It Deserve It?)

[6/10 · 30 March 2012]

Out with the old (Potter and those shiny vampires), in with the new! The Hunger Games is the next in line of young adult adaptations steamrolling their way into the theaters, to the extreme delight and disappointment of fans of the books.

The arguments are eternal: Did it really capture the tone of the book? Did they get all the details right? Did that character actually look like that?

On and on they go, but really, the only question that should be asked is, did they make a good movie? In order to get that answer, let's move right ahead into the review and see what made it onto the big screen.

The Hunger Games is a dystopian tale of twelve outlying districts that must sacrifice one young boy and one young girl up to their capital every year to participate in a televised battle to the death. Katniss Everdeen volunteers herself in place of her younger sister and we follow her into battle, not only over the other "tributes", but also over the deadly pitfalls in the arena and the bloodthirsty nature of a society that allows these games to continue.

First off, this movie clocked in at just under two and a half hours, which is incredibly long for a teen flick. Even Harry Potter didn't dare create such a marathon until well into the franchise where they knew fans would eat up every minute of it. Also highlighting the length was the incredibly slow pacing. The experience was oddly reminiscent of seeing The Da Vinci Code, where the original book was an eye-popping page turner, but the on-screen rendition seemed to suck all the life out of it. The Hunger Games didn't quite starve itself into a cinematic coma, but there certainly was a momentum and energy missing in the translation.

As for the actors, Jennifer Lawrence was the prodigal choice and really brought much of that angst, conflict and fire-in-the-belly attitude Katniss needed to have. Josh Hutcherson also displayed a great deal of the heartfelt charm and inner strength that made Peeta such an easy character to root for in the books. Wes Bentley also gets a special mention for pulling off the expertly choreographed beard, but I missed a touch of the creepiness I expected from the Head Gamekeeper. Beyond that, everyone I felt did what they needed to do, but there weren't any stand out performances.

The story was there, the pages played out on-screen almost right off the page, but it felt like they tried too hard to capture everything from the book, making it overly long, yet dropped particular sections that would have better served the overall experience. In that regard, without going into too much detail, I'll point to the mutts and how disappointing that entire sequence was. The whole point of who and what they were was lost, making them nothing more than aggressive bulldogs.

Now there have been reviews buzzing around all weekend about this movie, so this will likely get swept away in the digital wind of the internet, but I must say this in closing. To those people who were upset because Rue and Thresh were cast as African-Americans, while Suzanne Collins didn't feel the need to spend a whole lot of time and energy repeatedly describing the races of her characters, those two were in fact written as "dark skinned", so the casting was not "politically correct", just correct. Secondly, to those people who went the step further to say that you felt less when they died because of that casting, yep, you guessed it, you're racist.

21 Jump Street (2012)

Retro Remake Delivers Laughs Galore

[8/10 · 21 March 2012]

I was there. I remember the moment when this project got announced and I felt the familiar tearing of a piece of my childhood ripped violently from my past and stomped on the ground in front of me. We've been trained by a culture of recycled and rehashed content, making what was once hilarious into something kitschy and embarrassing, turning us into shell-shocked survivors of our own cherished memories. So to say the bar was set low for this would be an understatement of epic proportions, but that's where the creators get their edge, because there is nowhere to go but up. And they did.

21 Jump Street follows two former high school enemies who become best friends while training together in the police academy. They find themselves busted down into an undercover program specializing in investigating high schools. Assigned to root out the supply chain of a dangerous new synthetic drug, the two partners try to balance doing their job against the opportunity to re-live high school, for better or for worse.

One of the best things about moving something from the TV to the big screen (which may be one of the only things) is it can open up the latitudes of what those characters can say, do and get away with. How many times did you wish one of our 80s sitcom heroes would just drop that bad guy off the roof, saying "Seriously, that guy deserved it." 21 Jump Street recognizes that freedom and relishes it from beginning to end without making the classic mistake of overdoing it. They remembered the simple fact that there was a story still needing to be told in order to bring it all together. It's a delicate balancing act; expanding on the original TV concept, catering to the die-hard fans and making it enjoyable for the newcomers. The people at the helm were able to achieve it with apparent ease, but what may surprise some people is just who those people are: Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum.

Beyond starring in the film, and reportedly becoming best friends off- screen in the process, Hill and Tatum are listed as Executive Producers on the film. While that title holds many different meanings in Hollywood, from complete controlling interest in a project to just some guy with a checkbook who never even steps on the set, the fact that Hill and Tatum are listed I believe showed a surprising dedication to the project not common to the actors of their generation. Hill is also credited as co-writer of the story, which as I mentioned before, is an integral part of what made this remake a success. The balance between buddy comedy, coming-of-age, action and tempered sex comedy brought so many flavors to the table it was nearly impossible to walk out and say nothing on-screen actually made you laugh.

The cast choices were also spot on with current comedic favorites like Rob Riggle, Ellie Kemper and Nick Offerman. This trio shaped and smoothed out the comedic arcs when the main characters had to focus on actually moving the story along. Then comes two of the best cameos of all time: Johnny Depp and Peter DeLuise, original cast members from the TV show. They bridged the gap between history and present day in an incredibly hilarious scene, which can only be seen to be fully appreciated. Not to be left out, fellow original cast members Holly Robinson Peete had a walk on in an early motor pool scene and Dustin Nguyen is actually on a TV in the background later in the film.

Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience (2007)

Words From The Front Lines

[8/10 · 6 February 2012]

There are experiences that can never be truly traded away or passed along, no matter how hard we try. The amazement and beauty of childbirth, the crushing sorrow of losing a parent, or even the serenity of knowing a job is well done. Try as we might, these things exist inside us and everyone else will only feel a sliver of what it is like through how we describe it. One of the most profound and life altering experiences is war and no one is affected by it more than those on the front lines. There is always training, there is always a new method to try to prepare, but no one comes back from war the way they went in. Our country is now in the midst of welcoming home thousands upon thousands of soldiers from the fighting in Middle East and those brave warriors face not only the struggles of reintegrating into society (and finding a job), but figuring out rote answers to that all too common question, "What was it like?" Those can be extremely hard conversations to have, but this film documents a program trying to help those soldier find a path to communication.

Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience is an essay/memoir writing program that teaches soldiers how to use creative and journal style writing to get their thoughts and experiences cohesively onto paper. These tales of horror, fright, bravery and solitude pull the curtains away from the glorified image of war and patriotism, humanizing the soldiers.

The film brings together not only some of the authors of the essays, but also fellow writers, professionals in telling stories, who happen to also have personal experiences with wartime and being soldiers themselves. Together they weave a painfully accurate and unflinching tapestry of what wartime is really like, not painted in the bright red, white and blue of the flag, but doused in the blackest of night and dripping with the deep red of dead enemies, comrades and innocents. Some of them show the confusion suffered at the other end of a motor attack, while others detail the adrenaline rush of being ambushed and making the split second decisions on whether the person your sights is a combatant or a bystander, and does it even matter.

One by one, you hear about the deconstruction of the basic human belief to protect life as it rages against the programmed need to defend your country, your fellow soldiers and yourself. The documentary does not play itself out as a case for pacifism by any means, but there lingers a certain belief when the screen finally goes black that philosophers have intoned for years: in war, there is no winner.

Politics and beliefs aside, the real effort and success of this is the program itself and how it helps those soldiers returning from a living hell on earth, find their way back into a society that will never be completely theirs. It allows them to find a method of communication, almost a new way of speaking to the uninitiated about the nightmares they have lived through and continue to struggle with. More and more soldiers are coming back with PTSD and a variety of psychological issues, leading to drinking, drugs and a silently suffering uptick in post-return suicides. This program is certainly not the only weapon needed in the fight for the mental health of our returning warriors, but every effort counts and they're are worth it.

Haywire (2011)

Meet Bourne's Big Sister

[7/10 · 21 January 2012]

Once a mold is created for a certain genre of film, it can be hard to make anything to rattle the cages again. Anything stepping past that invisible line is referred to as "not really a horror movie" (even though it is), "not quite a sci-fi film" (except that it was), or "a film that defies genre" (which likely means it is just a good film firing on all cylinders). The challenge here is how we as an audience react to a film that dares to peek outside our tiny genre box; every so often we need to just stretch our fingers over the lip of the box to feel for something more. In Haywire, we get our newest example of stretching those boundaries to see what happens when you try to film something "more than just an action movie."

Haywire is the tension-filled tale of Mallory, a soldier for hire under a private contractor. She is sent on an assignment that goes south fast. Dodging enemies and former colleagues from all sides, she has to find out who burned her and why.

The first thing pulling Haywire out of the box is its director, Steven Soderbergh. Well known for his award-winning films, Traffic and Erin Brokovich, he also found huge success with his rat pack team of A-list actors in the Oceans series. With the dollars he made in the big budget world, he also found time to keep his imagination on its toes with experimental films like Bubble and The Girlfriend Experience. In that last film, Soderbergh tried out a formula, which he continued in Haywire, filling your lead role with someone outside the acting world, someone who actually lives much closer to the part in real life. In Girlfriend, he hired porn star Sasha Grey as the emotionally complicated high-priced escort. In Haywire, he filled the role of ex-marine Mallory with MMA fighter Gina Carano. Obviously this tactic does not always work (just look at 99% of the movies WWE Studios puts out), but when you have an eye for quality and depth like Soderbergh's, your rate of success is bound to be higher.

Carano is straight street toughness all the way from the first moment we see her on screen to the final intense stare in her eyes. Her real life fighting abilities helped Soderbergh craft a much deeper sense of realism in the action movie violence. No double twisting backflip kicks, no catching swinging sword blade between the palms of your hands, just straight up hand- to-hand, gun-toting reality. He even pulled down the sound effects that we are used to with muted gunshots and thick sounding punches. All of those choices brought together helped you look at the action on screen and say, "Yep, she could totally do that (and likely kick my ass to boot)." He also surrounded her with talented help, like Ewan McGregor, Michael Douglas, Antonio Banderas, Bill Paxton and the recently unstoppable Michael Fassbender (seriously, how many movies has this guy had waiting to come out at the same time?). Even Channing Tatum comes in to give her a reasonable love interest for a moment, a guy who might be able to go toe-to-toe with her in a fight.

While the movie succeeds in the action and tension department, it also falls a little flat in an area not uncommon to Soderbergh films: it just stops. The story plays nicely with the subtlety of the situation Carano finds herself in, but takes so much time showing all the intricacies that it fails to feel completely wrapped up when it goes to black. Making it even worse is the movie clocks in around ninety minutes, meaning there really was plenty of time to give this a more well-rounded ending.

The Anatomy of Hate (2009)

Thoughtful, Painful and Balanced

[9/10 · 5 January 2012]

Watching the daily news each day, you could easily believe we live in a time increasingly overwhelmed by fear and hatred. We could easily slip into depression over the current direction of our governments, our politics and our people and a downward spiral would only lead us into more fear and more hatred.

For as long as there has been good, there has been bad. One cannot exist without the other, but that doesn't mean we cannot explore their definitions and what makes them tick. The more we understand about the two sides of the coin, the more we can help to influence which side is facing up when we look down upon our world.

The Anatomy of Hate: A Dialogue to Hope is an impressive and sometimes unforgiving documentary by Mike Ramsdell. He takes a balanced and unbiased look at where hate springs forth and what spurs it onward. Bravely walking into virtual lion's nests of right-wing fanatics, religious zealots and culture warriors, Ramsdell allows the viewer into the living room of "the enemy" (who might only be labeled as such because they feel the same about everyone else).

What sets this film apart from the array of past hate group documentaries is it makes a gallant attempt to get underneath the heated rhetoric and display some of the reasoning behind it. In some cases, such as the white supremacy groups, the reasoning is as flawed as you might imagine, but The Anatomy of Hate gives us a glimpse on how those cycles of hatred spin out of control in the tightly knit echo chambers of small communities. In the section detailing the infamous Westboro Baptist Church, the same logic applies since the congregation mainly consists of one single family.

The movie truly finds it legs in the section regarding the Israel/Palestine conflict that has been raging for years. In interwoven interviews, Ramsdell talks to a woman who lost her son and husband to Palestinian attacks in a very short period and then to young boys on the other side of the wall who believe the Israelis only goal is to wipe them off the planet. It becomes an unending spiral of "who killed who first" with repetitive and deadly repercussions.

Ramsdell also grounds these stories with interviews with various sociology and psychology professionals, who try to unravel the underpinnings to why these rivalries began and what keeps them fueled. One of the more poignant theories is that each of these groups, and many others, share a common fear of the loss of culture. Once we doomed ourselves by understanding our own mortality, we quickly created social contracts to ensure what we created won't disappear when we die. These groups live under a persistent panic that their culture will be wiped away into the annals of history if not immediately secured away from everyone else through secession or killing off those who challenge it.

This was a valid fear many years ago, but the world has moved on since then, yet these collected pockets hold themselves back like road bumps to evolution. They see the coming interconnected nature of the world population not as a bonus to understanding, but as a muddying of the waters from which they sprang.

The Anatomy of Hate ends on a positive note, focusing on stories of hope and change. Some of these include the very same culture warriors from earlier on, who once calmly spoke of destroying the enemy and the beauty of martyrdom, who now calmly preach dialogue as the true path forward to peace. These beautiful and necessary moments help end the film on a note of hope, a breath of clean air in polluted world of hate.

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011)

Downey Charms Inside Surprisingly Simple Plot

[6/10 · 20 December 2011]

I couldn't wait for the weekend to begin because I knew I was going to hit up a popcorn, blockbuster double-header in the theater, Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, a back- to-back pairing almost unmatched this year. Two incredibly big budget franchises with two incredibly charismatic leading men. These are the box office battles I just live for. Since the weekend numbers have already come in, we've seen Sherlock Holmes dominate the weekend ($40 million vs. $13 million for Mission Impossible), so the honor of first review goes to them.

Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows picks up fairly close to where the last one left off. Watson is getting married and Holmes is closing in on his arch-enemy, Professor Moriarty. The two masterminds face off against each other in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse which threatens not only the life of our quixotic hero, but his best friend and possibly the entire world beyond.

It's likely been said before, and as much as I hate repetition I'll forego it this one time, Robert Downey Jr. was born for this role. Obviously the historical version of Holmes was tweaked and crafted around Downey's skills and persona, but the magical merge between the real person and the literary classic created something perfect which will be cherished by viewers for generations to come. All future attempts at playing Holmes, which I am sure there will be someday, will be weighed against Downey, a bar now set incredibly high. His charm, wit and energy flow through the scenes effortlessly, keeping the audience in tow no matter what is going on. He also lets his co-stars, like Jude Law (as Dr. Watson) and Jared Harris (as Prof. Moriarty) own the moment equally, not overshadowing their own crisp deliveries and subtle mannerisms. From back-to-front, the performances throughout were playful, charming and more than enough to please any afternoon crowd.

So if everyone was so great in it, why is the rating so low? That is a fantastic question.

The downfall here is the script. If you are going to create a story for the world's most renowned investigator, you need to plunge the imagination of the audience into a world of multiple story lines, interconnecting webs of deceit and subterfuge, something only Holmes could solve. The first film had this, but Game of Shadows rolls out a plot all too plain for such a complicated enemy like Moriarty. There seemed to be an effort to cover that up by actually showing a room full of interconnecting threads built by Holmes, to demonstrate how complicated this all really was, but that felt a cheap way out for writing a more complex story. Moriarty is the epitome of villains, the mental match for Sherlock Holmes, and in the end he just turns out to be greedy, a motive far below the weight of his character.

Guy Ritchie, the returning director, held up his side of the bargain, but didn't push anything forward in terms of the style and execution. We got more slam-to-slow-motion shots and a couple good moments of Holmes playing out the oncoming violence in his head in order to predict the exact counter maneuvers. I will give both Ritchie and the screenwriters credit through for the final scene between Holmes and Moriarty, which I won't go into detail about, but it was a nice twist on a familiar theme in this franchise.

Hugo (2011)

Finding the Magic in Dreams

[7/10 · 5 December 2011]

Yes, this 3D trend has gotten a little more than annoying recently, but mainly my rage about it is focused at studios that purposefully add this gimmick only to jack up the ticket price and bring nothing additional to the movie experience when the film wasn't shot in 3D. I avoid tempting my anger over this issue by mostly seeing everything in 2D when offered (unless I know for a fact it was shot in 3D) and this tip keeps me calm and content during my numerous cinema trips. Yet, when a legend in the industry, like Martin Scorsese, decides to shoot his new film in 3D, that can be enough to tempt me into dropping the few extra dollars. So I went, I watched, and I fell into his fantastical world.

Hugo is the story of a small orphan boy who lives in the train station. His sole obsession is to finish fixing a small robotic person that his father found. Hoping to build himself a new friend, Hugo slowly gains the support of a young girl and together they chase after the breadcrumbs of a mystery that very well may link them together in ways they never dreamed of.

Since I led this review with my feelings on 3D, let me first congratulate Scorcese on achieving a beauty and simplicity for this technology seemingly avoided by most other directors (James Cameron gets a pass on this too, since the 3D in Avatar was insanely well done). Right off the bat, the snow falling in the foreground was amazing and added a rich texture to the scene. That straightforward approach to the use of 3D held on through the rest of the film, not overdoing it with overtly sensationalized moments, but using the technology to enhance the depth and reality of the story on screen. Chalk this up as another point for those directors and studios who choose to use 3D from the outset to enrich the experience instead of after the fact in order to enrich their pockets.

** Spoilers ahead – Hard to avoid when talking about the story on this one. **

Now comes the story, or I should correctly say "stories", both rich enough to be their own movie. You have the original story of Hugo and his mysterious machine boy, then later comes another adventure about legendary film auteur, George Melies, who was believed to have died in the war, but turns out to be living in an apartment in Paris trying to forget everything about those magical movie-making times. Screenwriter John Logan captured exactly the magic I feel when I sit in that darkened room and am transported away to an unlimited number of worlds. I relished those touching moments where Melies waxed poetically about where dreams came from and how we could all live better lives by helping bring those into reality. I loved both story lines, but found the connection between them a little forced and unfinished.

Another portion of Hugo's personal story, the one about the machine, which strongly resonated with me was his desire to always fix things. There are few things in this world more pure than a desire just to see everyone and everything working at their utmost intended perfection. We all want to be the best versions of ourselves and most of us would also lend a hand if it meant bringing someone else to their pinnacle as well. It rang a touch similar to Pay It Forward, but not nearly as heavy- handed.

Scorcese and Logan did an amazing job in creating a rich and lavish landscape of characters inside the train station, but I ended up wanting Hugo to interact with them much more. Since he really doesn't, it makes all those layers feel superfluous and unnecessary.

J. Edgar (2011)

The Crown Weighs Heavy on This One

[6/10 · 27 November 2011]

Every director certainly has a style and while some may try to shake things up every now and again, keep people on their toes, others stay the course and deliver time and time again what you have come to expect from them. That's not always a bad thing, especially when you have serious accolades and awards already under your belt, but it can also set up a certain type of expectation about the quality and depth of each story you bring to the screen, which sometimes can be a lot to overcome. The truth is there is no end to the sophomore curse. Your last fantastic picture is always quickly overshadowed by your current less than stellar outing. Clint Eastwood is the man under the spotlight right now and what he brings to the table is another tale of power, passion and persecution, all inside one continuously conflicted person.

J. Edgar is one theory of the story behind the story, the man behind the machine that created the F.B.I. and reportedly had the skeletons of scores of American citizens, including the presidents he served under. The film follows his rise to power, his curious relationship with his number two man, and his own seemingly unquenchable need to be feared and revered, leaving a legacy that could never be tarnished.

J. Edgar offers a scenario of what might have went on behind closed doors between Hoover and Tolsen, his number two man, and what motivated Hoover to push himself as hard as he did. Much of it is based on circumstance and conjecture though, so it'd be best to view this film as an imaginative or (at best) a mildly educated guess about the truth behind the most feared man in decades.

Eastwood delivers yet again another deep, layered and complex narrative about a troubled protagonist, someone who you are never really sure whether you want to root for. The film is extremely slow paced and at times drags in its repetition, showing Hoover in one situation after another where his power is called into question. Jumping back and forth between his later life and his early years was a nice touch in the beginning, but by the end, it felt disjointed, like you were being dragged back into the past or thrust into the future just at the moment when things were getting good right where you were. I might have thought about just using the older version of Hoover as bookends to the story and play it out more along a traditional timeline, but who knows, that very well could have dragged as well.

The performances are always the most important part of these types of biopics. You need to be able to lose sight of the actor, usually someone incredibly well known, and truly see the person he is trying to represent. Look at Frank Langella as Nixon in Frost/Nixon, Will Smith as Muhammad Ali in Ali, even our man here, Leonardo DiCaprio as Howard Hughes in The Aviator, these are invested performances that elevate the movie beyond just a mere educational stroll in the cinematic park. Yet, DiCaprio falters this time in capturing his past fervor, not for lack of trying, just due to a lack of foundation underneath the moments. Naomi Watts also struggles to really find footing as the dutiful secretary, Helen Gandy. The true breakout here is Armie Hammer as Tolson, who brings a magical assured quality to his early life and a beautiful gentleness in his senior years. Hammer truly burst onto the scene last year in his dual performance as the Winklevoss twins in The Social Network, but in J. Edgar he shows he can handle much more than just overconfidence. Tolson is really the moral compass of the film and the only avenue for the audience to navigate their way in, but even with such a virtuoso performance from Hammer, it wasn't enough to pull the whole film together in the end.

Eastwood's decision to use younger actors in dramatically older roles also may not have worked to the film's advantage. I understand it allows a connection, both physical and emotional, between the two versions of the character on screen, but sometimes it can also feel jarring. While we have come light years ahead in the technology of makeup, truly transforming these early birds into aged senior citizens, the one thing that remains is the sound and tenor of their voice. There is something so unique and distinct about a voice that has been speaking for seventy or eighty years, something that is nearly impossible for these youthful actors to capture. Once again, Hammer seemed to outshine DiCaprio in this arena as well, but I still feel it might have been more powerful to have actual older actors in those roles.

The Rum Diary (2011)

The Rum Diary: Love Letter from One Icon to Another

[7 November 2011]

When you come across someone like Hunter S. Thompson you do either one of two things: allow yourself to be drawn into his hyper-vivid world of words and violent expression or you can run screaming. When Johnny Depp took on the role of Thompson for the epic drug trip Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Depp not only went willingly inside that world, he became its new champion, vowing to carry on the legend after what everyone knew would be the inevitable death of its creator. While Depp hasn't tried to transform himself into Thompson outside the silver screen (thank god, I don't think another human being could ever contain that level of energy) he has attempted at length to let people know who the real man was, the forever beating heart behind the literary lion.

The Rum Diary reports the semi-true story of Paul Kemp (Thompson's pseudonym for this tale), a struggling novelist looking for his true voice, mostly in the bottom of various bottles of alcohol. He finds himself in Puerto Rico working for the local paper, The San Juan Star, where the publication was already sounding the death knells, but he tries to make the best of it by making friends with locals and criminals alike. Finding himself embroiled in a land grab scheme and madly in love with another man's fiancée, Kemp fights to keep himself on the right side of his own ethical boundaries. The pressure may have crushed some men, but instead it only crystallizes his purpose in life.

There is a message in the film, but before we get to that, let's take a look at the package the message is wrapped in. Most people will remember Depp from his first foray into the mind of Thompson and likely come to the theater expecting more of the same drug-fueled insanity. That would be a dreadful mistake. With only one mildly hallucinogenic scene in the entire film, this is largely a straight forward story, with only a mild level of drunkenness in comparison to Fear and Loathing. While there is an inordinate amount of rum imbibed by nearly every person on screen, the core is really two love stories, one between Thompson and his femme fatale, the other between Thompson and his writing. Depp smoothly portrays the deeper and more thought-provoking side of Thompson, but I imagine many audience members left feeling disappointed by the absence of sheer lunacy which they have come to recognize as Thompson's foremost personality trait. Aaron Eckhart is seamless in his white collar criminal role, pillaging the pristine land of South America for the richest of the rich businessmen, but what is missing is a catharsis or closure to his storyline. By the time he turns, back to the camera and walks away, it lacks any real sense of importance. The other main role goes to Amber Heard (recently seen heading the now defunct TV show, The Playboy Club). She steals Thompson's heart (both on screen and in real life, she went on to become his wife, one of them) but her on-screen counterpart fails to really bring anything to the table except her looks. There was a wild impetuousness which helped frame the character, but it got old as the film ran on.

Now that we have firmly stomped some some of the reasons for this not being a wild success, let's look into what is really done well here and where the true heart lies. This is less of a traditional story and more about the formation of a moment in time, the moment where Hunter S. Thompson became the raging, unafraid, unabashed lunatic of the literary world. What you witness on screen is a depiction of the moment when he finds his real purpose, his true voice, and for a fellow writer like myself, this is a awe-inspiring and beautiful thing to see. The character ponders halfway through the film about where he is in his life as a writer, lamenting that he has not learned to write like himself yet. For aspiring writers there are few things more painful and frustrating than that. It is the key to our literary lives and once Thompson found his, he didn't just walk through the door, proud of his accomplishment, nay, he kicked the door off the hinges with a size thirteen and told everyone else in the room (past, present and future) to get the hell out of his way. There were few like him before and I imagine there will be even fewer after.

Moneyball (2011)

Pitt Swings for the Fences

[6 October 2011]

As we start heading into the commonly known "Oscar season", I just get more and more excited each weekend. There is always some movie sparking my interest just around the corner, a new film I've been reading about for months and trying with all my powers to not let the bar of hope get raised too high. There are always going to be disappointments, even when they are good films, because I was waiting for great, but what keeps me going are those films who look up at the bar and say, "Oh yeah, not a problem." Welcome to one of those films…

Moneyball is based on the true story of Billy Beane, a one-time possible superstar in the MLB who turned general manager of the Oakland A's. After missing once again on his chance for the World Series crown, Beane went rogue, adopted a new system and went after players using a statistical model instead of banking on superstars. It threatened everything the game was built on, it threatened the way things were done in sports, and worst of all…it worked.

Aaron Sorkin's name on the poster was the first thing to catch my eye. I sat there as the lights went down and wondered if he could keep his winning streak going (his last two, Charlie Wilson's War and The Social Network being two of my favorite all time movies). So without wanting to, my bar was already set high into the stratosphere, but as the credits rolled, I felt the film had touched the clouds. Maybe it didn't hit open space, but still miles above most of what we see on a week-to-week basis. You could feel his power in the dialogue; some classic Sorkin work. I could almost feel particular scenes the way they would have been played on stage. The film wasn't loaded up with as many quick witted tit-for-tat moments as his last two films, instead it flowed with much more subtlety, using a more even keel in order to lead the audience through an entire season of baseball. I don't want to give all the credit to Sorkin, since the writing credit is split between himself and Steven Zallian (an Oscar winner himself), but I really don't know how the work balanced out between them. That split might also be some of the reason why Moneyball doesn't have that normal Sorkin whip-crack pacing.

Yet, no matter how well the words are written, they still have to be delivered by someone with the skill and sincerity to make them land and Brad Pitt did not disappoint. Without knowing too much of the original story beforehand I was a little concerned with seeing Pitt in this role, which I previously only thought of as a general manager of a baseball team. What really saves him and grounds it in believability is the history of Billy Beane being a failed baseball superstar. Pitt brought the subtle sorrow, the underlying regret he always had nipping at his heels, which helps fuel his desire not only to win, but also to see the game fundamentally changed. What I found most impressive was somewhere along the way, I forgot I was watching Brad Pitt. He disappeared into a dip-spitting, hand-nosed gambler just trying his damnedest to pull off the greatest underdog victory in history. Those are rare performances and they should be recognized as such.

Jonah Hill came along for the ride, playing Peter Brand, the young economics genius who helped develop the formula Beane uses to build his new championship-hopeful team. It definitely is the most dramatic role Hill has tackled so far and put him toe-to-toe with a modern-day film legend in Pitt. Hill held his own and refused to settle for sitting in Pitt's shadow. In terms of the performances, my only disappointment was with one of my favorite living actors, Philip Seymour Hoffman. It has nothing to do with his take on Art Howe, the coach of the team under Beane. It was more to do with him barely being a part of the story. He got a precious few scenes early on in the film and then disappeared completely almost halfway through the movie. I just wish we could have gotten more of him and Pitt dueling, as he did so brilliantly with Tom Hanks in Charlie Wilson's War.

In the end, Moneyball did reach my bar of hope and expectation, but it didn't blow if off the chart as his past two films have.

The Help (2011)

The Help: A Delicate Dance

[8 September 2011]

There are many stories in our sordid and sorry history that deserve reverence and a delicate hand when talked about. They should all be told, absolutely, and hopefully learned from, but we must always remember that how the story is told can influence the listener almost as much as the story itself. It can be a tightrope walk along the line between pride and piety and you want to be careful which side it falls on.

The Help is set in Jackson, Mississippi during the central part of the civil rights movement. A young white woman named Skeeter wants to write something real, something special and she finds it in the socialized and institutionalized mistreatment of the African-American hired help. She ventures to gain their trust and their stories in a dangerous effort to give a voice to the silent underbelly of high Southern society.

This film has been #1 at the box office for three weeks and already is a huge success for the studios. It marches along each weekend as the little movie that could. Some will credit that to the original book already being a best-seller, but we've seen plenty of best-seller adaptations that fizzle sadly on the big screen. Even a well-told story needs excellent execution in order to swing a whole new audience and The Help is boiling over with just that.

Emma Stone, as the stubborn and righteous Skeeter, delivers her most dramatic turn to date and does not fail to impress. Yet the real power comes from the surrounding cast, packed with outstanding performances ranging from beautifully heart-wrenching to disgustingly evil. Starting with the two maids, shown with touching grace and power by Viola Davis (as Aibileen) and Octavia Spencer (as Minny), these wonderful actresses anchor the film in layers upon layers of honesty and courage. On the complete other side of the spectrum, Bryce Dallas Howard delivers a stunningly devious performance as Hilly Holbrook, the resident alpha Stepford wife, clinging to the old ways and old hatreds, fighting the oncoming social change with each of her pearly white teeth and perfectly french-tipped nails. Her quietly controlled rage reminded me constantly of Glenn Close as Cruella De Vil, such poise built around such poison. Jessica Chastain also did a splendid job as Celia Foote, trying desperately to get acceptance from anyone at all, even if it comes from her maid.

As director, Tate Taylor, tried to softly, but honestly, capture the time and place of 1960s Mississippi. There was tension throughout the movie, keeping the audience wondering when the violence of racism was going to strike, but Taylor always kept it just off screen, tempting the horror without needing to show it up close. He also crafted some wonderfully delicate scenes with the character of Celia, shedding light on yet another part of women's history kept in the dark for far too long.

However, as I mentioned earlier, it is a delicate dance and this story can be seen from the angle of another "white person ends racism" story, but I feel that would be shortchanging the core of the story. Stone's character doesn't free the maids from servitude, she just gives them a voice, an outlet which was up to that point held far out of reach.

One of the few things I found unnecessary was Stone's boyfriend Stuart (played by Chris Lowell). Stone feels much more natural and relatable as an gawky outcast, never fitting in with all her married high society friends. The need to show her swing back and forth in the world of troubled relationships just felt like a step too far.

Attack the Block (2011)

The Kids Are More Than Alright

[6 August 2011]

Attack the Block at its core is two films in one: an alien attack movie with huge ape-like creatures with no eyes and green glowing teeth, while also a redemption tale for a young gang of hoodlums who become the first and only defenders of Earth, or more importantly their housing project, known as The Block. The aliens descend from the sky without warning, but what they find in the rough and tumble part of South London is not part of their master plan.

There are certain teams in the movie industry you just look for – people who all work together, maybe grew up together, and somehow they always manage to create some really wonderful films when they're all working as one. Judd Apatow has his gang (his wife chief among those), Adam Sandler has his gang (Rob Schneider seemingly holds top cameo in that gang) and, of course, King of the Cult Worship, Kevin Smith (nevermind box office revenues, this dude has an entire posse of creative types on speed dial). Yet, over the last decade or so, one group has knocked it out of the park on virtually every occasion, crossing nearly every genre and making it look nearly effortless (which I am sure it is not). That honor goes to Edgar Wright and the dynamic duo of Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. Jumping onto the scene stateside with Shaun of the Dead, then following up with Hot Fuzz and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (which was only Edgar Wright involved there), they piled up an amazing and impressive fan base, much deserved. So my hopes were high for this film with Edgar Wright listed as an Executive Producer and Joe Cornish at the helm (who also had incredibly small roles in Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz) and my expectations were soundly met and beaten.

So many things went right in the making of this movie, but as with every great movie ever made the success of it always begins with an amazingly written script. Coming in at a tight 88 minutes long, the story never felt rushed or over-motivated. The pace is perfect and the sequence of events moves along in balanced time, keeping the believability of the universe intact the entire way. The arrival of the aliens is handled brilliantly basically by not handling it at all. They show up and they're killing people; deal with it. Then the ending, which I will not at all give away here, is so beautifully simple and ingenious that for once I was completely caught off-guard. I found myself turning to my friend and saying, "Holy crap, that actually makes sense! It's an alien flick and that made sense!" So my first kudos here goes to Joe Cornish who not only directed this, but wrote it as well (which IMDb quotes the inspiration coming from his own mugging by a group of young kids).

I could go on now and say all the wonderful directing choices Cornish makes throughout the film, but that would take many hours and I'm writing this late in the evening, so I'll just mention two. Making this movie for an estimated price tag of nine million pounds, this is a low budget flick, but instead of giving into that sensibility and trying to hack bigger and badder special effects, Cornish correctly crafts the story in such a way where he doesn't need elaborate CGI to tell the story. Most of it is set in one building and the creatures have one unique characteristic (the glowing teeth), but are otherwise dudes in suits. Honestly, not once did I ever feel they looked cheap or did they take me out of the moment. Secondly, some particularly well-shot slow motion moments in the latter stages of the film were spot on and made what could have been a rushed and hectic moment into something tension-filled and exciting.

So now you have a great script and a visionary director manning the helm, but you still need a talented cast to bring the whole thing to life and this film shoots the moon. Nick Frost has a charming and welcome side character as the front man for the main drug dealer in The Block, but he really is there to provide a safety net to the humor of the film. The lead ensemble of gang kids and the young woman they mug in the opening scene are exceptional. I honestly was fully prepared to read an article about how these kids were literally ripped right off the streets and put in front of a camera, ala Edward Furlong for Terminator 2: Judgment Day (although he was ripped from a mall arcade, but same difference). John Boyega anchors the cast as Moses, the gang leader, and he delivers such honesty and truth to the part, it's shocking to see this listed as his debut project. While the strength and comedic moments he brings are huge in the film, it's the heart he puts out there, hidden on his sleeve underneath the puffy coat, that's what brings everything together into a meaningful and enjoyable experience for the viewer.

Walking out of the theater, I felt really happy not only that I had seen the movie, but also that I had paid full price for my ticket. These are the ones you want to support. These are the movies we need more of out there and the only way that will happen is by getting butts in the seats in numbers great enough to warrant greenlighting another project from this crew of people. So if it's playing nearby you, I think you know what I'm telling you to do.

Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

The Real Hero is Underneath the Mask.

[27 July 2011]

Yes, this is yet another comic book superhero movie. Yes, this is another Marvel comic big- budget franchise trying to get off the ground. You might start to wonder why you should bother seeing any of these if a new one just hits the screens one month later. First off, it definitely helps to be a comic book fan from the start, but beyond that, in terms of pure movie magic and box office trending, this newest chapter gets a little boost from being the last in a long line of films leading to a culminating epic fanboys have been frothing over for years now The Avengers! But, I'll dip more into that later, for now, let's look at the throwback hero of the group who takes us back to a time when heroes were not only cheered for their strength, but also for their conduct.

Captain America: The First Avenger details the transformation of a skinny kid named Steve Rogers into the national icon (and medically-induced super-soldier) known as Captain America. Rogers is created into this new evolution of man in order to combat Hydra, the deep science/black arts division of the Nazi army, led by a ruthless tyrant named Johann Schmidt, who is more frighteningly referred to as The Red Skull (you know, cause his face fell off and such). Captain America must prove to the people who gave him his powers, and to himself, that he was the right man to do the job of saving the world from utter annihilation.

I had fairly muted expectations going into this movie, mainly because Captain America is essentially a retro-hero, a classic clean-cut good guy with no character flaws. He always does the right thing, or at least attempts to, no matter the cost to himself. It flies in the face of everything we have been seeing in terms of comic book heroes over the last decade. The grief and anger of Batman, the drunken power trips or Spider-man, the ego and pride of Thor; all these traits give the characters layers that assist in making them human, someone the audience can try to relate to. Captain America really doesn't have any of those flaws, but here's the surprise they made it work anyway. The opening thirty minutes of the film we see Steve Rogers pre-magic-roid-juice, where he is a ninety-pound poster boy for the "Before" shot in workout ad campaigns. In those early scenes his struggle is how to find a way to match his frail muscles outside with his unbreakable drive inside. We find ourselves in the hopeful spot of routing for the little guy (and I mean really, really little, like me in high school) and those opening scenes help pull the crowd in, hopefully holding them there through what comes later.

Once we lose the physicality of the "before" picture and it's replaced with superhuman "after" shot, it loses a bit of the charm. Chris Evans should take no blame for this, in fact I think he was cast perfectly. He held on nicely to the innocence of his smaller self and truthfully brought to life the heroic nature of those comics from the late 40′s and early 50′s. The real downfall was that he didn't face any real obstacle after he got his new physical form. We never really felt he was ever in any real danger because he could basically accomplish anything that came to mind, no matter how insane.

On the topic of the shield, our iconic piece of comic book memorabilia, I was torn on it. I liked the design and the fact it could get scuffed up, dirtied and otherwise sullied, but I would have appreciated one scene where we got to see him learn to throw it. Within one scene of him picking it up for the first time, he was chucking it around like a world-class discuss champion, fully expecting it to return to him, instead of wondering how the hell that worked. The minor flaw sort of mirrors the bigger issue that the latter half of the movie was really just a long montage of Captain America jumping, swinging, shield tossing and otherwise being heroic (lots of it in slow motion). The heart fell out of it and the movie descended into flashy colors and catch phrases.

In terms of the cast, as I said before, Chris Evans did a hell of a job and I look forward to him building up the character even more, hopefully with more internal struggles in movies to come.

*minor spoiler coming*

Sadly gone after the first thirty minutes, Stanley Tucci was wonderful as Dr. Abraham Erskine , the scientist behind the super-serum, which made the man out of the molehill. Tucci worked in such charm and natural flavor into his German accent and characterizations, I really wish he could have stayed on screen much longer.

*spoiler over*

Getting back to the real buzz around this movie, the next film in line for Marvel Studios is The Avengers, the first time any studio in the recent decades has tried to tie together a handful of other movie franchises into one single film. The Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, Nick Fury, Hawkeye (who Jeremy Renner cameoed as in Thor) and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson in Iron Man 2) will all assemble on screen for the eagerly anticipated culmination of Marvel's long term film plan. The genius inside is they are using all the original actors who made these roles so popular (with the exception of Hulk, who was played by Edward Norton in the franchise film and now replaced by Mark Ruffalo). For me, as a movie junkie, this is where the franchise will become something truly special. Just to see all those actors on screen playing off of each other is immediately worth the price of admission (and maybe a box of Raisinettes too).

Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)

Transformers: Dark of the Moon - Some Things Never Change

[3/10 · 8 July 2011]

I'm going to commit what to many will seem like film geek treason, I will now connect Michael Bay and Terrence Malick into one theory of filmmaking.

Yep, deal with it.

Malick and Bay share one important thing and that is a completely unabashed tunnelvision for the type of film they want, damn the naysayers, critics and crowds. They both make movies mainly for themselves and in truth, there is nothing wrong with that. As an audience member you need to know going in exactly what you are going to get. It is the only way to really enjoy anything that falls from the cameras of these two (and some other notables). With that said, let's dive headlong into the metallic masterpiece of summertime popcorn, Transformers!

Transformers: Dark of the Moon continues the story of Sam Witwicky and his Autobot friends. While Sam struggles to gain a purpose in life outside of Decepticon attacks, the Autobots are off helping the government on secret missions. Then everything is torn apart by the discovery of the original Autobot escape ship, known as The Ark, and the captain of that ship, Sentinel Prime. He alone holds the key to technology that could either help reshape the Transformers home world or completely destroy ours. The Decepticons, completely aware of this discovery, make an immediate power play and the war is back, bigger than ever.

Kids buying the Transformer toys today only want one thing, huge robots in spectacular 3D slow motion destroying each other and every building in sight. From this narrow viewpoint, Bay delivers in bulk. The highway fight sequence brought back memories of other high-speed terror scenes like in Matrix Reloaded and The Island (maybe a little too reminiscent of that last one according to some eagle eyed movie nerds). Since Bay actually filmed these scenes in the latest and greatest 3D technology, it was admittedly pretty amazing to watch. In other scenes, some of the CGI was so intensely crisp that it actually started popping too far from the live footage, making it stand out, which ruins a little of the illusion.

So the special effects is where it was at. Big robots, big explosions, big buildings falling down. Those were the high points.

The low points were pretty much everything else.

Standing in the center of all the toys-on-roids insanity is Shia LaBeouf, who in my opinion is a really good actor banking inside really bad movies. I can't fault him for taking parts in some of the biggest franchises in movie history (Transformers and Indiana Jones) because the exposure and paycheck are nearly impossible to pass up, but in terms of showing his skills as an actor, those hefty titles have done him nothing but a painful disservice. He made his big splash on the scene in the Disney TV show Even Stevens and then on the big screen in the Rear Window update, Disturbia. Many people also don't remember one of my personal favorite performances in the Project Greenlight-sponsored film, The Battle of Shaker Heights. Shia has the chops, but gets surrounded by weak emotional performances, both from CGI and real people. In this outing, Megan Fox's eye candy character was replaced by Victoria Secret's model (and current Jason Statham girlfriend), Rosie Huntington-Whiteley. Whiteley was an improvement in sense of acting ability, but the part was written levels below what Fox was given. The original love interest had layers, depth and some edge, while Whiteley was given virtually no background, no emotional outlet and nothing to do but stand there and be hot. Sure, the 12-year old in the audience doesn't want or need more, but to them I say, "Go grab a Victoria Secret's catalog from your parent's bathroom and stay out of my movie."

Beyond the magical pair of leads, Bay brings back the regular tough guys, Josh Duhamel and Tyrese Gibson, to keep on keeping on. They both do fine jobs and don't try to make this more than it is. Coming in for the first time in the franchise is Frances McDormand, an Academy Award winner to class up the joint. While she was amusing and brought a little more skill to the screen, her part was borderline over-the-top, even in a movie with three story tall robots, because she had to balance out John Tuturro who drifts somewhere off to Hunter S. Thompson land. As if they weren't enough, Bay decides to bring in an unusual amount of big name cameos, including John Malkovich (who does a decent job in his few scenes) and Ken Jeong (who seems to be acting in a completely different movie, possibly thinks he's filming Hangover 3). I saved the best for last though, my personal favorite and the only person I was actually thrilled to see appear on screen, Alan Tudyk (who plays Tuturo's assistant/bodyguard). Tudyk is a cult TV and film legend to his legions of fans spanning from the days of Firefly, Dollhouse and other projects not created by Joss Wheedon. Tudyk was the one person I actually cheered form when he magically appeared on screen.

I could go into a section now where I talk about the story, the plot lines, the connective tissue of the writing, but in reality, Bay didn't really care and neither do the younger members of the crowd, so let's just skip it.

The End of the Page recommendation: Transformers: Dark of the Moon starts slow, goes out with a bang and delivers surface entertainment for the middle school crowd.

Green Lantern (2011)

Green Lantern: Shines Dimly Behind Reynold's Charm

[5/10 · 24 June 2011]

Every trend in the movies goes through the same motions. They come out of left field when no one thought it would be a viable idea, then instantly becoming the most watched genre in years, finally over- extending itself to the point of pure silver screen saturation and the profits nose dive off the celluloid cliff. You can usually mark the first movie going over the edge by how far it pushes the genre out beyond the norm. For fans of the comic book genre, even knowing that Iron Man 3, Captain America and The Avengers are still on their way, this weekends superhero offering gave many pause, wondering if this was one spandex'd crusader too many. Did the curtain begin to fall?

Nope. Not quite yet.

Green Lantern tells the story of Hal Jordan, a reckless flyboy who is chosen by a magical ring to protect his planet from destruction. Never one to follow through on anything, Jordan must struggle to discover the hero he never imagined was waiting inside.

I was going to start with some of the struggles and hardships that this story and script had to work through, but really, let's get down to the green, glowing tacks here…Ryan Reynolds. He is not just playing a superhero, the man actually is one. No matter how bad the dialogue, no matter how convoluted the script, no matter what crazy situation you put him in, his charm and nearly flawless ease on screen allows him to raise that bar a little higher. I'm not saying that all these things were necessarily terrible here, but they could have been and Reynolds still would have found a way to make it work. Following his career since the Van Wilder days, Reynolds has never failed to enliven each and every project and provide at least one or two solid moments of wit and enjoyment on screen. For his generation of actors, I believe he is the closest they will get to George Clooney, a man who can truly balance comedy, action and drama all while looking like he was born to play that part.

Now that we have that out of the way, back to the problems. With all the comic book movies capturing the audiences recently, most are earth-bound or at least set mostly in an environment we can all easily recognize. Thor was the first in the new battalion of superhero flicks to test the waters of magical landscapes and far away universes and it succeeded fairly well. Without that preceding it, Green Lantern might have suffered more by spending so much time in outer space, but Thor built a bridge to that arena (and then busted it at the end of the movie…*in- joke*) so Green Lantern flew right over and pushed even farther out into the cosmos. Instead, the surrounding characters and subplots became the weakest links. Sadly the first half of the movie had to do so much of the heavy lifting: establishing the universe, literally, and giving some foundation for all these new and outlandish creatures, while still getting enough time to bring in their human counterparts back home. Peter Sarsgaard pulled out some decent angst and rage, but was never given enough time to really fuel the fire. Even worse was Blake Lively, who was given absolutely no room to breathe in a virtually lifeless character. Her introduction as a fellow fighter pilot was painfully unnecessary and forced her to try and work her way back into relevancy, which might have worked if given time, but she really wasn't. As for the arch-villain CGI cloud creature, Parallax, the effects were impressive, but the story behind him felt flawed and unstable, so he never brought a whole lot of weight or tension to the scenes.

Overall, I still give this a five rating because it brings us back to those true summertime carefree flicks that didn't try to give more than we bargained for. People who say this is a failure because it isn't Dark Knight are making unfair and outlandish comparisons. Director Martin Campbell (who helmed two of the more successful recent Bond chapters, Goldeneye and Casino Royale) wasn't going for grit and bones, he wanted light, fun and entertaining for the few moments he had you trapped in the theater. In that context, and with the effortless abilities of Ryan Reynolds, they achieved their goal, albeit one set far lower than what audiences may have envisioned.

The End of the Page recommendation: Green Lantern may hold a little more light for the comic book enthusiast, but for the mainstream moviegoer, this is only a mildly flickering flame, not a bright light of the summer.

Super 8 (2011)

Super 8: The Super Combo Delivers Best of the Year

[10/10 · 17 June 2011]

One is a legend in the movie industry, the other is the current hot ticket with a winning streak not seen in a long, long time. Sometimes when teams like this are paired up, the expectations can be unbearable and completely fantastical, but J.J. Abrams and Steven Spielberg are not ones to break under the pressure of expectations. The stage was set perfectly for them and they delivered brilliantly with an homage to each other's previous works and the simple storytelling styles of film classics gone by.

Super 8 surrounds a group of movie loving misfits who find their town the unwilling center of a government takeover after a terrible and deadly train accident. While filming their own Super 8 movie for a local festival, they bear witness to the escape of something unexplainable, setting up a quest the kids must all rise to complete or watch their friends, families and entire town get erased from the map.

Jeff Goldsmith, the Q&A master behind the popular podcast The Q&A with Jeff Goldsmith sent out this tweet after screening this new summer throwback:

"I just saw Super 8. Wanna know the guarded "secret" behind it? Abrams uses plenty of screen time to develop characters you'll care about. (@yogoldsmith)"

As usual, Jeff nailed it on the head. Above and beyond all the other things that done right in the making of this film, it is the writing and careful execution of creating characters that are human, real and inherently lovable. Super 8 brings back the youthful purity of classics like E.T., The Goonies and Stand by Me, something the movie industry has been woefully lacking in the last few years. The story gently reels you in until you almost look at their story as your own, a memory being perfectly played out they way you wish it happened to you.

Then comes the picture perfect casting, where I was compelled instantly by the innocence of Joel Courtney (as Joe Lamb), who is the first young actor since Patrick Fugit in Almost Famous to truly capture that wide- eyed stare into the possible purity of the future. Another factor connecting the audience to Courtney was our shared need to care for and protect the young damsel in distress, Elle Fanning (playing Alice Dainard). Fanning is the epitome of the first girl we all fell in love with in elementary school and she holds the audience in the palm of her hand throughout every scene. Not to be outdone, Riley Griffiths (playing Charles, the young film director), taps into the other side of the coin, the best friend who always wanted to be the hero, but never quite made it to center stage.

Behind the camera, Abrams and Spielberg may have just cemented themselves as the ultimate dynamic duo. Spielberg is still a legend in Hollywood and has incredibly well tuned story senses, but some of his recent efforts (Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, War of the Worlds) have been slightly off from his previous greatness. Abrams, on the other hand, is still a relative newcomer to the big screen (only directing Mission Impossible III and Star Trek), but has proved himself a near master of the current form, grown on the sensibilities of a changing and ever adapting crowd. Abrams took this story and crafted it into a beautiful homage to the man sitting right next to him. Super 8 is a throwback to Spielberg's younger days, giving a whole new generation of movie watchers a glimpse into what others grew up with in the late 70's and early 80's. The balance of character development, action sequences and well-paced comedy beats really gives this film a perfect blend for nearly every audience member.

The End of the Page recommendation: Super 8 is a perfectly crafted summer blockbuster. It just doesn't get better, at least not this year.

The Tree of Life (2011)

Movie? Maybe. Art? Maybe. Pretentious? Absolutely.

[1/10 · 6 June 2011]

Many movies have gone down in history as pushing the envelope, changing the way critics and audiences perceive movie making as a whole. Citizen Kane, Psycho and A Clockwork Orange are only a few to raise the bar on how effective a film can be on a viewer. Sometimes those filmmakers go down in history as visionaries, decorated time and again by journalists, historians and movie fans alike, but pushing the envelope can also bring about the opposite reaction. Every now what comes along is something that few understand and even fewer care to try. For the reclusive director, Terrence Malick, he doesn't seem to care which category he falls in and maybe that's the best way to play it. He makes his movies as a personal statement and they represent exactly what he wants to say, never mind what people want to hear. Lofty and admirable as that outlook may be, it can make for an incredibly risky movie-going experience. There are already heated words being tossed all over blogs and movie sites everywhere, so here's my two cents in the debate.

The Tree of Life is a visual and ethereal poem about loss, despair, God and the search for faith and reconciliation.

(I usually write much more about the basic plot of the movie for the review, but honestly, there wasn't much of a plot or story to speak of.)

From the opening whispers of narration, I knew that we were in for something a little off the beaten path, which in itself is not automatically a bad thing. Challenging the norm should be done on a regular basis, but that comes with its own risks. With only a few precious moments of actual characters to speak of, The Tree of Life launches into a 45 operatic display of the birth of the universe. Within the first few minutes I felt I thoroughly understood the director's point of view, which admittedly may have been wrong, but either way I definitely got what we were witnessing. The main issue here is there was absolutely no need to witness it for 45 minutes. While listening to a tremendously overblown and self-indulgent score, nearly a dozen people walked out of the theater in that opening sequence. After twenty-to- thirty minutes of something more akin to a Discovery Channel special on the universe, the audience began feeling like there was no point being made and an actual narrative story was nowhere to be found. I've made a promise to myself never to walk out of a movie, but I was dangerously close. I knew Brad Pitt and Sean Penn were cast in this for some reason; I was waiting to find out what that was.

Sadly, there really is no reason. There are a small handful of poignant moments from the various cast members, but they could never separate themselves from the poor cinematic experience or even truly showcase why they were cast. In the end I felt like any actor could have played these parts because each scene was only tangentially connected to the next, a feather-light spiderweb string trying to keep some type of flow or momentum, but it continually snapped under the hot air blown by Malick.

The real debate here is whether or not this even qualifies as a movie (or "film" for the pretentious). Even farther down the philosophical debate is whether or not movies are "art", which this piece clearly strives to be. For me, this would have made a much better impression and found a more receptive audience if it was screened in the MOCA or LACMA or any museum. It felt completely out of context shown in a normal movie theater. Some people will point to this winning the Palme d'Or at the legendary Cannes film festival as proof of its value and credit as a great movie, but I would pleasantly remind those people that it was also roundly booed by half of the audience afterwards, something only reserved for the most detested of films in the festival. The Tree of Life is being hailed by critics everywhere, who mostly can't put into words what it is about or why they liked it, but in turn reviled and railed against by audiences, who walk out by the dozen and request their money back (true story, happened in my screening and in each of the ones attended by friends of mine). If anything this will help remind movie lovers everywhere, don't listen to critics, including me. Make up your own mind, at your own risk. In the end we are all critics, just some are louder than others.

The End of the Page Recommendation: The Tree of Life wilts under the scrutiny of any audience not sitting in a museum or on hallucinogenics.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010)

Truly Hip to Be Square

[10/10 · 25 August 2010]

Could it really be possible? Could one movie company really release two movies in under two months deserving of my greatest accolade: a perfect score? I don't give them out easily, many times feeling at least one little thing was out of place or lacking in the overall composition of the film, but almost in back-to-back form Universal Studios has made their mark on the summer with the release of one of the most anticipated comic book adaptations of the summer (at least by a small group of fanboys and fangirls).

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World brings to life the tale of an adorably square hipster/bass player named Scott Pilgrim. While trying to mend his broken heart and shake his unwelcomed status of 'dump-ee', he dreams about a punk-chic on roller blades and his world trips down the rabbit hole when he finds that the dream girl is real. Compelled to court her, he discovers that to win her companionship he must defeat in battle her seven evil Ex's, each still equally enchanted and desperate for the love of this oddly endearing young girl.

While so many things came together in perfect harmony here, for the first time in a long while, first credit and top billing for the success needs to go to the man on top of the totem pole, director Edgar Wright. Erupting from the mind that brought us Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz (plus the equally amazing, but woefully less well-known, Spaced), Scott Pilgrim displays the same skill and amazing amounts of research into the genre, which helped transform his earlier efforts into trophy case pieces of what makes a great film. So many tiny moments, pixelated pop-ups and even audio reminders of the original Nintendo generation helped shape the universe of Pilgrim into one we not only believed in, but recognized from our youth. The tone, the atmosphere, even the overly romanticized quest, it all hearkens back to the roots of comic book caricature mixed with action hero devotion. Without diving into too much more detail and turning this into a novella of wonderment about Wright and his talents, I will just say that as the captain of this ship, he steered brilliantly and I would very much like to see him awarded for it, even if that seems unlikely (although with a 10 movie Best Picture category, it's not impossible).

Moving on to those lucky souls who got to inhabit these wonderful characters, it is a pantheon of young Hollywood elite who earn each and every second of their on-screen glory. Michael Cera, once dangerously on the verge of over-exposure and being perennially typecast, has surged back with his touchingly awkward, yet awesomely heroic rendition of the lead, Scott Pilgrim. This time Cera really feels like he is fully in touch with his capabilities and embraces the geek charm which many were beginning to feel was holding him back and turning him into a cultural antique before its time. What was also great is no one would really find a fight scene with Michael Cera truly believable in a normal world, but the world of Scott Pilgrim is legions away from normal. Blending comic book candor, anime stylings and 8-bit video game action gave Cera a universe he could truly become the nerd warrior of our fantasies. As the woman of his quirky and vivid dreams, Mary Elizabeth Winstead delights as Ramona Flowers, creating one of those tragically cute girls all men want to win and make happy for the rest of their days. She also tiptoes down that tightrope between confidence and cowardice, showing humanity in its most simple and pure form. Peppering the outskirts of this incredibly creative world, much can be said about the co-stars and side characters. Amazing on all counts, they helped firm up the reality of the world by embracing their individual quirks and all playing in that same wonderful tone. A special mention needs to go out to Kieran Culkin, who played Pilgrim's sexually voracious gay roommate. His darkly comic timing and constant calling of 'bullsh*t' to the rest of the characters helped keep the story from spiraling off into a cartoonish purgatory.

Anyone who owned the original Nintendo should love this film. This is made specifically for you. As for the rest of the world, there is heart and humor to be had, but it might get lost on you behind the screen of random quick edits and constant cultural in-jokes. It has not gotten its due in the box office, but I guarantee this will become a cult classic on the DVD market. I'm already dusting off a space on my shelf for it.

The Sorcerer's Apprentice (2010)

The Sorcerer's Apprentice: Magically Likable

[7/10 · 19 July 2010]

Summertime is a wonderful season for hiding from the baking, burning heat inside a cool, dark theater and being transported to endless imaginative worlds. Sometimes these worlds can be overwhelmingly complex and force you to think deeply about everything going on, and those create a very particular kind of enjoyment, but the season of the sun seems to lean more towards movies that allow you to put your brain on cruise control, sit back, sip your Coke and try not to smile. This recent cinematic offering is definitely one of those.

The Sorcerer's Apprentice follows the story of a young man, Dave, who finds out at too young an age that he is chosen by destiny to become an all-powerful sorcerer for the side of good in a millennia-long battle for the safety of the world. His mentor, Balthazar, does his best to prepare him for the upcoming battles, while also keeping Dave's focus off the one thing impossible to resist, love.

This popcorn presentation is brought to us from the minds at Disney who seem hell-bent on plunging the depths of the Mouse House catalog for anything and everything that could be transformed into a full-length feature film. The title of the film is taken from the famous scene in Fantasia where Mickey Mouse enchants all the mops, brooms and assorted cleaning products to do his chores for him. That moment is directly lifted up and dropped into this live-action semi-adaptation, and actually fits surprisingly well, but the rest of the story is completely fresh, at least where previous Disney stories are concerned. I can't blame Disney for their addiction to recycling, it certainly worked well with their multi-million dollar Pirates franchise, but I don't see this one landing as well with audiences and certainly very little in terms of continuing sequels.

Now, before I get into where the movie takes its many missteps, let me engage you on why I still gave it a fairly high ranking. Jay Baruchel is truly riding the roller-coaster of success right now and while some may complain that he is typecast and plays virtually the same person in each film, the same can be said of Steve Carell and many others. If they play the part well, let them play on. Baruchel epitomizes the adorably awkward geek who never sees himself as cool as the people around him do. The rest of the story notwithstanding, it is always enjoyable for me to watch characters like these grow and step into their confidence and full potential. It's a classic and well-used storyline for sure, but that's because people respond to it consistently. He holds the heart of the film tenderly in his charmingly goofy expressions and timing. On the other hand, Nicholas Cage delivers what we've come to expect from him, a quirky, oddity of a person, yet performed with the commitment and dedication that can almost only come from someone equally quirky and odd in real life. Cage has made a long and prolific career from taking roles almost no one saw as playable and inserting a real person where only a caricature was found before. That being said, if you weren't a fan of him before, he doesn't add anything here that will sweep you to the other side.

With the good stuff resting comfortably above, here are some of the downsides to this spellbound selection. Numerous plot holes are completely ignored as the movie races to keep up with a fairly energetic pace. This actually pales in comparison to the story points and moments of character development that could've been easily achieved if the writing was just that much tighter. In scene after scene I felt there were set-ups that were not paid off and you just feel the air slip out of scenes that had real potential. The ending makes painfully little sense when weighed against all the information given throughout the film and you once again feel things really needed to play out a different way to achieve full redemption. I'm not going to say the version playing out in my head would've worked better, you never really know, but it certainly made more sense to me.

The End of the Page Recommendation: If you are a real fan of either of the two main cast members, this should give you a smile somewhere along the way, but keep some change in your pocket and catch the matinée (or even wait until DVD).

What did you think? Feel any comparison's to National Treasure? Where does it rank on you Cage scale?

MacGruber (2010)

Better than the box office numbers give it credit for.

[8/10 · 28 May 2010]

It seems to be the hidden goal of every idea in the universe to end up in movie form. Whether it started as a TV show, comic book, video game or an action figure (possibly featuring kung-fu grip); everything strives to be blown up and projected to a captive audience. Many of them fail, in extraordinary fashion (ahem… McHale's Navy, Steel, Double Dragon and Masters of the Universe, respectively), but some break through the barrier of novelty and succeed as memorable theatrical experiences (the recent J.J. Abrams reboot of Star Trek deserves mention, along with the Gothic wonderment of The Dark Knight). In the particular world of translating comedy skits, Saturday Night Live takes center stage as the longest running live comedy show with a continually growing treasure trove of material, but they are equally challenged with bringing about quality movies. While many will celebrate the original Wayne's World and The Blues Brothers, we also hope beyond hope to block out train wrecks like It's Pat. The newest effort to come out of the SNL think-tank, after a decade-long hiatus, seems primed to ride the wave of 80's nostalgia, but will it catch hold? Read on… MacGruber is an absurdist parody of the 80's adventure show starring the jack-of-all-trades namesake, MacGuyver. In the original SNL skits, each one only ran thirty seconds while MacGruber would ask for random knick-knacks in order to build a bomb-defusing device and save everyone trapped inside a repeatedly locked room. He never fails to distract himself past the point of detonation, killing everyone. The feature length version finds MacGruber yanked out of seclusion into the armed forces as the only one who can track down his arch-enemy, Dieter Von Cunth, who gains possession of a nuclear warhead and plans to reduce Washington D.C. to tiny piles of radioactive dust.

I'll fully admit the first time I heard they were pushing forward with the idea of a MacGruber feature film, I thought it would be a waste of time, space and celluloid. Yet, months later when that first trailer rolled out I found myself shocked to actually be chuckling and thinking it actually had a shot at being something worth watching. Many people believed it couldn't be done, that an absurdist parody born from a 30-second skit could never last for over 80 minutes, but writers John Solomon, Jorma Taccone and co-writer/star Will Forte succeeded at just that. As numerous film business outlets have reported by now, the opening weekend box numbers were dismal and some are already calling it the 'bomb of the year', a moniker I strongly feel is undeserved, at least not in terms of quality. One of the keys to triumph was pushing each and every joke just a handful of beats past the point of normal, 'safer' comedies. Both of the main SNL alums, Will Forte and Kristen Wiig held on doggedly to drain each moment of the last possible chuckle, which for some audience members actually makes it even funnier. I felt Ryan Phillipe was an odd choice for the straight man because I didn't think he could hold the screen against Forte, but he grew on me during the film and in the end proved that he was indeed willing to 'go there' to get the laughs. As for the villainous Val Kilmer and his portrayal of Von Cunth, he's at his best when his characters are smarter than the rest of the people on screen, and the crowd, and the writers (see Real Genius or Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang). While Kilmer doesn't come near that level of comedic ownership, he does balance out nicely with the rest of the cast and digs into the second-grade humor when it's called for.

While it may play out to be one of the year's biggest box office disasters, MacGruber will ride on and gain a solid life on DVD as a cult comedy, not unlike Hot Rod, starring Andy Samberg, another SNL superstar. No matter what happens, they can always rest easy knowing it's still better than It's Pat.