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John Wick (2014)
Innovative and breathtaking
John Wick is a groundbreaking film in the action genre.
Keanu Reeves, star of such noted actioners as Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, Something's Gotta Give, and Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, plays the titular character. Wick is a retired hit-man whose wife has recently died. He is given a puppy as a condolence and quickly bonds with the dog, who becomes a frequent passenger in Wick's 1969 Mustang. Tragedy strikes, however, when a group of thugs break into Wick's house and kill the dog after robbing him of his beloved Ford. When I say tragedy strikes, I mean it strikes the thugs. John Wick isn't merely a hit-man; he's a well-trained one. After hooking up with some old (and new) allies from the underworld, Wick sets out to avenge the death of his dog. But he quickly finds that the leader of the gang which attacked him is the spoiled son of a Russian mob boss. Upon hearing this, Wick decides his quest for vengeance will be too risky, and the film ends as he settles down into a quiet life with a new kitten.
Actually, just kidding. Wick embarks on a mad hunt for his dog's killer. In his effort to exact revenge for the killing of his dog, he fells at least a hundred enemies in combat. In a crackling showdown, Wick wordlessly shoots the unarmed kid before walking away wordlessly. Figuring the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, Wick pursues the old man and brilliantly fools the gangster into stabbing him. Being that the old man is a hardened Russian gangster, he freezes up after stabbing Wick, giving Reeves a chance to turn the tables after killing a dozen of his henchmen. He gets another dog and everyone is happy.
John Wick is a groundbreaking film in that it eschews the niceties of most modern films, like plot and character. Like a race car stripped of amenities, it jumps straight into the action and never lets up. The scene in which Wick shoots a mob henchman in the head was a standout. The scene in which Wick shoots a mob henchman in the chest was also notably exciting. The scene in which Wick shoots three mob henchmen in the head, chest, and groin was particularly riproaring. One advantage of John Wick is that its action sequences are kept simple and sweet. Films with complex action tend to be boring because they are rather hard to follow. Dialogue is also wisely kept to a minimum. A well-endowed young female assassin is also a clever choice, who also thankfully speaks as little as possible.
Watching John Wick, I was reminded of a much inferior, older film called Die Hard. Wick works for the same reasons Die Hard doesn't. Most of Die Hard revolved around Bruce Willis crawling through air ducts, complaining about his wife, and discussing Westerns over the radio with an overweight police officer. When the action mercifully does occur, it's often burdened by confusing stunts and unnecessary editing. Die Hard is widely regarded as a failure due to its reliance on dialogue and contrived, overly-emotional characters. I saw the film recently on Lifetime with my mother. She was crying when Willis had to drag his feet through broken glass. I, on the other hand, thought it was the most satisfying moment in the entire film. Willis' character (and possibly the actor himself for signing on to this crap) deserved a little bloodletting after spending so much of the movie weeping and failing to kill significant numbers of terrorists. John Wick, on the other hand, would have dispatched the effeminate European terrorists by slapping them and chasing them away. He also would have cheated on his annoying wife with a well-endowed young female assassin—er, secretary. Hopefully we'll be able to see this in the sequel, which was just released recently.
Ocean's Eleven (1960)
Turgid caper
The 2001 version of Ocean's Eleven is one of my personal favorite movies. I had put off seeing it for a while because I tend to be a bit biased against remakes. But after seeing and liking it, I was eager to see the film it was based on. I don't really know what I expected going in to see the 1960 version, but it definitely wasn't what it turned out to be. Frankly, the remake far surpasses the original. I've talked to some people about it and they have said that it is unfair to compare the two films. If you can't compare an original film to its remake, then there is something seriously wrong.
The two films bear little semblance to each other, even in terms of plot. In this movie, the protagonists all conspire to rob five Las Vegas casinos at the same time. Believe it or not, this is far less complicated than the plot of the remake. The idea here is that they cut the power to Vegas, enter the casinos, take the money, and leave. That's it. It's almost an hour before they even start planning the heist, and the sequence itself lasts only about five or ten minutes. Even if the thieves in the remake targeted only one casino, the heist serves as that movie's centerpiece; in the original, it feels like an afterthought. And there's nothing really interesting about how it's done. Some gimmicks are introduced, but they don't play any major role in the long run. For example, the Eleven put infrared paint of some kind around the casinos so they can easily navigate it in the dark. Considering how small the casinos appear to be, it seems like a flashlight would have sufficed.
Another problem with hitting five casinos is that the Eleven are split up into five teams. In other words, we don't really get to know them very much. In the remake, every character had some kind of unique personality or ability. In this version, only a handful of the Eleven are memorable in any way. Peter Lawford plays a ne'er-do-well wealthy mama's boy. Richard Conte plays a Walter White-type who wants to provide for his family in the aftermath of his impending death. But that's pretty much it. When the heist is being planned, the arrival of a cowboy named Jackson is made a big deal of. The guy is then completely dropped from the story and makes no further appearances of note. Does anyone honestly remember the nuances of Henry Silva's character? How about Buddy Lester--how did he distinguish himself from the other actors? Characters should be the crux of a film like this--it's kind of implied in the title, after all.
The movie is also incredibly dated. Most of the "humor" is years past its sell-by date--kind of like the actors. Most of the actors in this film are in their 40s; by modern standards, they look at least 55. Despite this, they are constantly surrounded by horny women who ogle and suck up to the main cast, something that is only in the movie to show how attractive its main characters supposedly are. Frank Sinatra, who also looks far beyond his 44 years, is cheating on his wife with a dissatisfied mistress. The subplot is only mentioned a couple of times before being quickly discarded; it only seems to exist to show that Ocean is a philanderer and therefore cool by the movie's standards. The portrayal of women in this movie was silly in 1960 and is arguably the funniest thing about it now, even if it's unintentional. Most of the actors aren't given any kind of challenging material, so trying to grade their acting is futile; it doesn't offer anything memorable good or bad. But Akim Tamiroff does have something to work with: he plays the perpetually nervous man organizing the heist. He's probably the worst actor I've ever seen. Maybe he just couldn't work with the script, but he bugs his eyes out at every opportunity and whoops and hollers like a rabid chihuahua at the slightest provocation.
By the end of it all I was left wondering what the point had been. A lot of questions remained unanswered. Why did Richard Conte's character die in the middle of the heist after experiencing no symptoms in the few hours prior? What's going to happen between Danny and his wife, especially considering Angie Dickinson is given such high billing? Why did they choose to leave all the money in the garbage, where it could have been found by the police or lost? Why did they hide the money from Santos in the coffin, where it could have easily been discovered by church staff? Why are nubile 20-year-old girls mindlessly throwing themselves at 40+ men, with faces like road maps of Manhattan, within seconds of meeting them? I really wanted to like this movie. The remake is one of my favorites and I was hoping this could match it. It made me realize, however, why remakes should exist: to take sub par movies with interesting premises and make them actually deliver. This is the perfect example of that.
The Boondocks (2005)
RIP Boondocks: 2005-2010 (sort of)
This show should have ended immediately after Aaron MacGruder left. The first season was easily deserving of a 10, the second season a fairly strong follow-up, the third season watchable. But this last season? MacGruder's name is absent from the credits, and the void shows big time.
It would be tough to analyze the vicissitudes of the first two seasons and the last two on an episode-by-episode basis, but just take a look at an episode guide to see how the show has changed. Most of the first season was comprised of sly satire. The second season, though not as potent as its predecessor, still delivered its fair share of laughs with The Story of Thugnificent (who could forget Eff Granddad?) and the return of misanthropic handicapped senior Col. Stinkmeaner. The third season, which shifted the focus from satire to parody, still managed to crank out some entertaining episodes like A Date with the Booty Warrior and the 9/11 parable in It's Going Down. The most recent episode of the fourth season is about the Kardashians.
Had the show premiered in the shape that its fourth season did, it would not have made it to a second running. It's vacuous trash. Periphery characters like Uncle Ruckus once served as outlandish yet deep distractions from the main action; he was a self-hating black racist, yet he had a heart and a personality--remember his consolation of Jazmine during the Christmas episode? Now, he barely even qualifies as a character; he's just a floating hive of virulence and racism who sporadically appears for a cheap laugh.
The animation--and even the premier dates--have been altered to reflect this change in format. Seasons one and two made their debuts in the fall and winter; seasons three and four aired their episodes in the summertime. The animation, which was a smooth western emulation of anime, is now the visual definition of TMI: any character exhibiting a modicum of emotion is drawn turns into a gnarled, demented silent-era movie villain. Just take a look at Granddad's "monkey face" in the season four intro; he barely looks human.
One of my favorite episodes, season one's A Date with the Health Inspector, concludes with Gin Rummy, Ed Wuncler III, Huey, and Riley taking a detour from the location of a free killer (for whose crime Tom was arrested) and stopping at a convenience store. Gin and Ed pull pistols on the Middle Eastern clerk, telling him to drop a gun (which he doesn't have, wink wink), turning the store into a warzone. The duo, having demolished the store, walk out to a volley of applause from a gathered crowd. Soft music plays as newspapers announce that the "war heroes thwart(ed) terror cell" and the screen fades to black.
You just know that, had the episode been made during season four's production, it would have ended with Granddad driving off a cliff.