Ah, Wednesday is hump day, and right about now I feel like I am on that slippery slide down the other side of the mountain, because I can already taste the weekend approaching. Yesterday I rifled through my weekly to-do list -- laundry, grocery shopping, haircut, etc. -- and I'm not primed and ready for a relaxing weekend. Personally, this whole week I am slowly just getting caught up in a general state of geeking out. The State is out on DVD. Michael & Michael have issues, the new Comedy Central series from two of The State and Stella's funniest members (Michael Showalter and Michael Ian Black, dudes), premieres tonight. And the San Diego Comic-Con is now only a week away, and I'm already brain-storming my plan of attack, scoping out the best panels (Avatar, anyone?) and the coolest post-show parties.
Anyways ...
As mentioned earlier in the week, I do still have a couple of big movie reviews up my sleeve for this week. To start with, I want to talk about the latest from the Woodmeister himself, Woody Allen. Yep, I'm talkin' 'bout Whatever Works.
WHATEVER WORKS Review:
- At this stage in the game, Woody Allen films aren't typically great movies in and of themselves, but when they are at least watchable, as this one is, they tend to be fairly fascinating journeys into the psyche of their iconoclastic creator. Whatever Works can be hamfisted, awkward, and unfocused, but at the same time, it's an interesting movie to watch. As with so many of Allen's recent films, the movie is often worth checking out simply because a Woody Allen film in 2009 is so, so different from any other movie released in that same year. It's a throwback, and sometime a painfully dated one at that. But this is certainly not in the style of a Match Point or Vicky Christina Barcelona, two movies that tried for a sleeker, more modern sensibility. In contrast, Whatever Works is set in New York, features a neurotic Jewish intellectual as its protagonist, and could probably just as easily have been made 30 years ago as today (and, in fact, the script is supposedly a couple of decades old).
What is unique about this one though is that it marks the first-ever match-made-in-comedy-heaven teaming of Woody Allen with Larry David. On paper, this seems like a veritable dream team - both comedians are two of the most distinct comedic writers of all time, both specializing in idiosyncratic, neurotic, often-times pessimistic characters.
However, there is undoubtedly a bit of shakiness in this comedy mash-up. For one thing, Larry David is such a singular personality that it's odd to see him playing the latest in a long line of Woody Allen proxies. Secondly, David as an actor is known mostly for the highly improvised Curb Your Enthusiasm - and to that end, it's kind of jarring to see him act in such a heavily-scripted, almost stageplay-esque film. It's funny because watching Whatever Works is almost like watching Larry learn as he goes. He starts out sort of wobbly in the beginning, sometimes seeming to recite his lines from memory rather than *acting* them. And yet, as the movie progresses, David seems to settle more and more into his role, and ultimately puts on a pretty good performance. Part of it is just that David is such a naturally funny and charismatic guy that he can pull off something like this and overcome that initial awkwardness. It helps that he is surrounded by a supremely talented cast. Evan Rachel Wood, for one, is superb in this one, yet another female actress who excels in an Allan picture, Wood takes a somewhat cartoonish character and really brings her to life. There's also Ed Begley Jr. as her repressed southern father, and Patricia Clarkson as her equally repressed mother.
Basically, the plot sees Larry David's curmudgeonly character, sporting the over-the-top name of Boris Yellnikoff, grudgingly befriend a naive souther runaway, the much younger Melodie, played by Wood. This being a Woody movie, the charmingly dimwitted shiksa ultimately falls for the older Jewish man's charms, and the two begin an unlikely relationship, as Boris slowly but surely teaches Melodie to understand and appreciate his fatalist views of life, love, and the universe. And soon enough, the god-fearing good-ol' gal absorbs some of Boris' east-coast liberalism. This is all fine and dandy until her dixieland parents come a-callin', and both are equally shocked and horrified by their daughter's transformation and her odd choice of romantic partner. But the big joke in Whatever Works is that, as soon as these middle-America conservative are exposed to the bright lights of the Big Apple, their repressed and secret desires come into full view. The punchline is that true happiness comes in all shapes and sizes, popular gospel and social norms be damned. In the end, you've got go with "whatever works" for you, no matter how strange or unconventional or unlikely it may be.
This larger philisophical point was to me the most memorable aspect of Whatever Works. You had to wonder: was this Woody's way of rationalizing or justifying his own somewhat unconventional love life? In any case, I think Allen makes his point in a simple-to-grasp and entertaining manner. It might be a somewhat predictable and heavy-handed series of twists and turns, but hey, it works.
That said, I can certainly see how some might get annoyed with this movie. It definitely feels a bit dated, a bit heavy-handed, and a bit out of touch with modern sensibilities. It also feels like it's covering well-worn territory for Allen to some extent, and what's more, it sometimes feels like Woody's strong voice as a writer and his desire to get all his random neuroses and philosophies into the script bogs down the actual plot of the movie. It does make you wonder - how many Woody Allen surrogates do we need? A movie like Vicky Christina Barcelona was refreshing in that it had actual, fleshed-out characters that weren't simply one man's persona transplanted into a fictionalized representation.
But here's the thing - at the same time, I appreciate the chance to spend a little time inside Woody's brain. It might, at times, be slow, awkward, anachronistic, etc. ... but it sure is a more interesting place to be than the average written-by-committee braindead blockbuster. It's for that reason alone that Whatever Works is, to me, well worth a watch despite its overall unevenness.
My Grade: B
- Alright, next up: Bruno!
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Oh No! I spilled a-meatsauce all over my new-a white-a suit, and THE STATE IS OUT ON DVD - Hells Yeah!
What's up everyone? Even though today is one of those days where I would have liked to just stay in bed all day, it is a glorious day indeed. For after many long years of waiting, today is the day that THE STATE, finally, comes out on DVD!
This whole thing has almost taken on a bigger-than-life stature at this point. And I daresay that The State is perhaps the last, great, unreleased TV DVD. But it is a legendary release in its own right. I mean, when DVD first exploded onto the scene, it seemed like every crappy TV series ever made was getting the deluxe treatment. Everything from The A-Team to Mr. Belvedere was hitting storeshelves with director commentary and bright, shiny packaging. And yet ... where was The State? Tied up in all kinds of rights and clearances issues, not getting full support from MTV / Viacom, etc. Sure, there were music clearance issues (back in the day, shows on MTV were given free reign to utilize songs played on MTV - now, those rights have expired, making music clearances for old MTV stuff a nightmare). But, hope was continually kept alive. Every so often, some tidbit of news would emerge. A member of The State would assure us that the DVD was on the way. There were multiple stops and starts, numerous times when the loyal fans of The State thought they had reason to rejoice, only to inevitably go back to playing the waiting game. There's no doubt about it: The State is one of the great pieces of vaporware in the world of home entertainment.
I even created a Facebook group a couple of years back to express my frustration with the lack of THE STATE on DVD, entitled: "How is THE STATE still not on DVD? Are you kidding me, MTV?!?!" It was amazing, because I had never really done such a thing before, and I kind of created the group for fun and thought that maybe a couple of people would join. But check this out, fools: the group now has ALMOST 900 MEMBERS. That's ridiculous! The FB group page even received posts from members of The State!
The group mission statement was a humble one, and read as follows:
"For those of us who are huge fans of one of the greatest sketch comedy shows ever made, THE STATE, and who have been patiently waiting for it to come out on DVD since like, well, the beginning of time. When it was announced that it was finally coming out a few months back, we rejoiced. But now, MTV has decided to cancel its release ...? WTF?!?! We the people who have awesome taste in comedy demand for this to be released ASAP. We need our Doug, our Louie, and our Porcupine Racetrack, and we need to be able to watch these classic sketches over and over again at our convenience, and finally show all of our dumbass friends who never watched THE STATE what the hell it is we've been referencing all these years. Dammit all, we want THE STATE on DVD.~!"
So it was a true moment of glory when, a couple of months ago, word spread on the interwebs that, after all this time, The State was really, actually, positively headed to DVD on July 14th. You could practically hear the collective cries of "I wanna dip my balls in it!" from the masses.
And you know what? This isn't just about a beloved sketch comedy show finally becoming available for new fans to discover and old fans to rediscover. Well, it mostly is. But also, this is about fighting the good fight, making our voices heard, and showing that the fans can in fact make an impact. Sure, I may now be a bigtime Hollywood professional (sort of), but I am and always will be a fan first. And by gum, today is a victory for fans everywhere, so take that heartless multinational entertainment corporations!
But let me talk for a minute about THE STATE, specifically, why it is, in fact, so damn funny. I think that, for me, the show was kind of the logical progression of all the absurdist humor that I was steadily growing to love as a kid. The Simpsons, Ren & Stimpy, You Can't Do That On Television, etc., all gave me an early love for humor that was funny by virtue of circumventing reality and reveling in its own wackiness. Unlike the more straightforward Saturday Night Live, The State was a show that, during my middle school years, just blew me away with its inventiveness and flat-out hilarity. The show was completely self-aware and played upon the various conventions of sketch comedy. It didn't waste time with obligatory pop-culture parodies, instead every sketch had some crazy *new* idea that was thought up for no other reason other than that the premise itself was inherently hilarious.
I'm not sure how or why, exactly, but in my small Jewish day school of Solomon Schechter in West Hartford, CT, The State became something of a phenomenon among the boys in our class. I'm not sure what it is about the comedy of The State that so connects with young east-coast Jewish boys, but a lot of it probably has to do with the fact that guys like Michael Showalter, Michael Ian-Black, and David Wain (aka Stella) were, in fact, young Jewish guys from the east coast. But yeah, back in the day I think we all stumbled onto The State because all of us 13 year old boys were already MTV junkies. And in between Nirvana and Alice in Chains videos, we watched Beavis & Butthead, The Maxx, Aeon Flux, and yes, The State. Oh man, what a channel MTV was back in the mid 90's. But I digress ... the point is - we all become State-quoting comedy afficionados. I even remember that my friends and I once made a project for Bible class (like I said, it was a Jewish day school) called "The Garden," in which we took the premise of various sketches from The State and twisted them around to be biblical parables. Damn, we were some creative and sophisticated seventh graders. And yes, just to show you how cool I was, I even had The State's logo on my 8th grade yearbook page, alongside Playstation, Aerosmith, and quotes from Fox Mulder. Yep, I was pretty much the man at that point ...
If you aren't one of the initiated, I can only say that The State is the kind of show that will instantly expand your comedy horizons beyond the all-too-often formulaic confines of the Saturday Night Live mold. If you like your comedy crazy, random, smart, and off-the-wall, The State is for you. Perhaps you may have enjoyed some of the great post-State work that the members of the troup have done? Wet Hot American Summer. Stella. Reno 9-11. The Ten. Role Models. Or maybe, just maybe, you've heard somebody exclaim "I wanna dip my balls in it!" and wondered "hmm, I wonder what in the blue hell he's talking about?"
There are so, so many classic sketches to discover and/or re-watch ...
- Louie, the "I wanna dip my balls in it" guy
- Doug
- the perverted lighthouse keeper
- sideways house
- "I'm a blueberry"
- "get the man a grape soda, Karl!"
- father-son racing
- Porcupine Racetrack
- Barry and Levon
- sideways house
- "please lord, kill this boy"
- The Jew, the Italian and the Redhead Gay
- "toothbrush, you've started a family!"
- the pope is coming
- the monkeys do it
So run out to Best Buy on your lunch break, break out $5,000 worth of pudding, and pop in The State on your DVD player and bask in its comedic glory. You know you want to.
Holy crap, THE STATE is actually out on DVD.
Victory!
This whole thing has almost taken on a bigger-than-life stature at this point. And I daresay that The State is perhaps the last, great, unreleased TV DVD. But it is a legendary release in its own right. I mean, when DVD first exploded onto the scene, it seemed like every crappy TV series ever made was getting the deluxe treatment. Everything from The A-Team to Mr. Belvedere was hitting storeshelves with director commentary and bright, shiny packaging. And yet ... where was The State? Tied up in all kinds of rights and clearances issues, not getting full support from MTV / Viacom, etc. Sure, there were music clearance issues (back in the day, shows on MTV were given free reign to utilize songs played on MTV - now, those rights have expired, making music clearances for old MTV stuff a nightmare). But, hope was continually kept alive. Every so often, some tidbit of news would emerge. A member of The State would assure us that the DVD was on the way. There were multiple stops and starts, numerous times when the loyal fans of The State thought they had reason to rejoice, only to inevitably go back to playing the waiting game. There's no doubt about it: The State is one of the great pieces of vaporware in the world of home entertainment.
I even created a Facebook group a couple of years back to express my frustration with the lack of THE STATE on DVD, entitled: "How is THE STATE still not on DVD? Are you kidding me, MTV?!?!" It was amazing, because I had never really done such a thing before, and I kind of created the group for fun and thought that maybe a couple of people would join. But check this out, fools: the group now has ALMOST 900 MEMBERS. That's ridiculous! The FB group page even received posts from members of The State!
The group mission statement was a humble one, and read as follows:
"For those of us who are huge fans of one of the greatest sketch comedy shows ever made, THE STATE, and who have been patiently waiting for it to come out on DVD since like, well, the beginning of time. When it was announced that it was finally coming out a few months back, we rejoiced. But now, MTV has decided to cancel its release ...? WTF?!?! We the people who have awesome taste in comedy demand for this to be released ASAP. We need our Doug, our Louie, and our Porcupine Racetrack, and we need to be able to watch these classic sketches over and over again at our convenience, and finally show all of our dumbass friends who never watched THE STATE what the hell it is we've been referencing all these years. Dammit all, we want THE STATE on DVD.~!"
So it was a true moment of glory when, a couple of months ago, word spread on the interwebs that, after all this time, The State was really, actually, positively headed to DVD on July 14th. You could practically hear the collective cries of "I wanna dip my balls in it!" from the masses.
And you know what? This isn't just about a beloved sketch comedy show finally becoming available for new fans to discover and old fans to rediscover. Well, it mostly is. But also, this is about fighting the good fight, making our voices heard, and showing that the fans can in fact make an impact. Sure, I may now be a bigtime Hollywood professional (sort of), but I am and always will be a fan first. And by gum, today is a victory for fans everywhere, so take that heartless multinational entertainment corporations!
But let me talk for a minute about THE STATE, specifically, why it is, in fact, so damn funny. I think that, for me, the show was kind of the logical progression of all the absurdist humor that I was steadily growing to love as a kid. The Simpsons, Ren & Stimpy, You Can't Do That On Television, etc., all gave me an early love for humor that was funny by virtue of circumventing reality and reveling in its own wackiness. Unlike the more straightforward Saturday Night Live, The State was a show that, during my middle school years, just blew me away with its inventiveness and flat-out hilarity. The show was completely self-aware and played upon the various conventions of sketch comedy. It didn't waste time with obligatory pop-culture parodies, instead every sketch had some crazy *new* idea that was thought up for no other reason other than that the premise itself was inherently hilarious.
I'm not sure how or why, exactly, but in my small Jewish day school of Solomon Schechter in West Hartford, CT, The State became something of a phenomenon among the boys in our class. I'm not sure what it is about the comedy of The State that so connects with young east-coast Jewish boys, but a lot of it probably has to do with the fact that guys like Michael Showalter, Michael Ian-Black, and David Wain (aka Stella) were, in fact, young Jewish guys from the east coast. But yeah, back in the day I think we all stumbled onto The State because all of us 13 year old boys were already MTV junkies. And in between Nirvana and Alice in Chains videos, we watched Beavis & Butthead, The Maxx, Aeon Flux, and yes, The State. Oh man, what a channel MTV was back in the mid 90's. But I digress ... the point is - we all become State-quoting comedy afficionados. I even remember that my friends and I once made a project for Bible class (like I said, it was a Jewish day school) called "The Garden," in which we took the premise of various sketches from The State and twisted them around to be biblical parables. Damn, we were some creative and sophisticated seventh graders. And yes, just to show you how cool I was, I even had The State's logo on my 8th grade yearbook page, alongside Playstation, Aerosmith, and quotes from Fox Mulder. Yep, I was pretty much the man at that point ...
If you aren't one of the initiated, I can only say that The State is the kind of show that will instantly expand your comedy horizons beyond the all-too-often formulaic confines of the Saturday Night Live mold. If you like your comedy crazy, random, smart, and off-the-wall, The State is for you. Perhaps you may have enjoyed some of the great post-State work that the members of the troup have done? Wet Hot American Summer. Stella. Reno 9-11. The Ten. Role Models. Or maybe, just maybe, you've heard somebody exclaim "I wanna dip my balls in it!" and wondered "hmm, I wonder what in the blue hell he's talking about?"
There are so, so many classic sketches to discover and/or re-watch ...
- Louie, the "I wanna dip my balls in it" guy
- Doug
- the perverted lighthouse keeper
- sideways house
- "I'm a blueberry"
- "get the man a grape soda, Karl!"
- father-son racing
- Porcupine Racetrack
- Barry and Levon
- sideways house
- "please lord, kill this boy"
- The Jew, the Italian and the Redhead Gay
- "toothbrush, you've started a family!"
- the pope is coming
- the monkeys do it
So run out to Best Buy on your lunch break, break out $5,000 worth of pudding, and pop in The State on your DVD player and bask in its comedic glory. You know you want to.
Holy crap, THE STATE is actually out on DVD.
Victory!
Friday, July 10, 2009
America's Most Wanted: PUBLIC ENEMIES Review, and MORE!
Wow, it's been way too long since my last post. What can I say, it's been a crazy week or so. Work's been busy, and things have otherwise just been seeming to go nonstop as of late. I can't friggin' believe it's already the middle of July. Ahhh where is the summer going?! I feel like I'm working just as much if not more than I was in the winter, and I for one am ready for a nice long vacation (though not of the "you're fired" variety, FYI). Anyways, crap, it's almost Monday. But it was in fact a fun weekend ...
... First off, I saw BRUNO on Friday, which, long-story-short, was completely hilarious. I am VERY behind on my movie reviews though, so I am going to save the full Bruno review for a later post that will hopefully be coming your way shortly. Something to look forward to, right?
... Also, I lucked out in that a friend of mine had an extra ticket to go see the RISE AGAINST and RANCID show at The Forum here in LA, which took place on Saturday. It's not a concert that I probably would have normally shelled out big bucks for under normal circumstances, but, in this case, it was too good an offer to pass up! And overall, the concert was pretty rockin'. I was pretty excited to see Rancid, who I became a fan of back in college when a couple of their songs were in regular rotation on Boston modern-rock radio. Songs like Ruby Soho became some of my favorites of the pop-punk genre. Meanwhile, I can't say I'm a *huge* Rise Against fan, but I think most rock n' roll fans will agree that some of their hits like Ready To Fall and Prayer For the Refugee are fairly badass tunes that are perfect when you're in that fight-the-man / screw-the-world state of mind. So yeah, the show was really enjoyable top to bottom. Rancid was great, but I think their performance was slightly lacking only because the crowd seemed more into Rise Against, so people weren't going as nuts as they should have for classics like "Time Bomb." But hey, it was a thrill to hear that one, Ruby Soho, etc. live. Kickass. As for Rise Against, they had a pretty solid showing - they breezed through a bunch of songs with barely a pause in between. They had a section in the middle of the show where they slowed things down and performed two accoustic songs, but then ended on a rush of adrenaline with an encore that included Ready to Fall as the finale. And yeah, that was pretty awesome. Still, to me, I enjoyed the hits, but just found that a lot of the other songs seemed to blend together a bit. Overall though - a really rockin' show. And really, this was my first big concert of the summer, and it was cool to just be in The Forum among tons of rabid fans pumping my fist to some great bands doing their thing. RAWK.
- Okay, I mentioned earlier that I'm way behind on my movie reviews. So I'm going to back up a bit and review a film I saw last weekend, that being Michael Mann's latest -- Public Enemies. Yes, right here in this very blog. What's coming up? Well, I have to review Woody Allen's WHATEVER WORKS. And of course, BRUNO. And I hope everyone reading this read my earlier review of THE HURT LOCKER, right? Regardless, please run out and see that amazing movie ASAP.
PUBLIC ENEMIES Review:
- For me, Public Enemies was one of the absolute most-anticipated movies of this summer. It seemed to have it all: Michael Mann, one of the best modern action flick directors there is, Johnny Depp and Christian Bale, two of the best actors of their generation, and a true-life story of guns and gangsters that seemed like the perfect subject matter to bring together all of these heavywights. So yeah, I did have pretty high expectations for this one, and I really, really wanted it to be great. The fact is that Public Enemies isn't exactly a great movie, but it is a very good one. As expected, it's ably directed, well-acted, and contains at least a couple of action scenes that scream "vintage Michael Mann." But ... the movie sometimes struggles to really pop. It reminds me a bit of another recent star-power-packin' crime movie - American Gangster. Like Ridley Scott's true-life epic, Mann's latest doesn't quite live up to its potential, but still packs enough of a punch to be a fun and at times riveting film, that is still well worth checking out.
Public Enemies tells the story of John Dillinger, a career criminal who was America's most infamous and celebrated bankrobber in the pre-war 1930's. The movie portrays Dillinger as sort of the last of a dying breed - the last of the old-school crooks who flamboyantly committed his crimes with a sense of theatricality and panache. As J. Edgar Hoover's FBI begins to crack down on crime, the criminals become increasingly less visible and more white-collar. Some of Public Enemies' most fascinating moments concern Hoover's one-man war on crime -- and Billy Crudup does an excellent job as the enigmatic but tough-talking FBI boss. Taking things a step further than what was the norm at the time, Hoover dispatches a take-no-prisoners squad of elite agents to hunt down Dillinger and co. Chief among them is Christian Bale as the unfortunately-named Melvin Purvis, a stone-faced agent who made his rep by taking down gang members in cold blood if need be. Bale is good here, but to be honest he isn't given much to do. Mann doesn't spend much time diving too deep into Purvis' psyche, and I think that, ultimately, it hurts the film a bit. But then again, despite the Bale and Depp's double-billing, this really is Depp's movie. Bale is kind of the inhuman, unstoppable force coming after Depp's Dillinger - the guy who doesn't play by the old rules and will cross whatever lines he has to to get his man.
It's interesting though, as a couple of surprise players really end up shining in this one. I mentioned Billy Crudup, for example. But how about Marion Cotillard as Dillinger's loyal gal, Billie. Cotillard is great here - again, not so much because she is give a ton to work with, but because she brings a real presence to the role. She has some great scenes with Depp, both during his initial courtship and later on, when she has gone past the point of no return and been irreversably caught up in Dillinger's fast and furious lifestyle of crime. In fact, the romance between John and Billie is easily the heart and soul of the movie - it's the one area in which the movie really sucks you in and grabs you, and it's the area that delivers a real knockout punch or two to the audience. This dovetails nicely with another unsung hero of the movie - Stephen Lang as an imposing lawman who Purvis recruits to his cause. The veteran Lang brings a concentrated dose of gravitas to the movie, and amazingly, he does it with a minimum amount of dialogue. But with an Aaron Pierce-esque presence of badassness about him, Lang kind of lingers in the peripherey of the movie, and then steps up in the movie's crushing final scene and puts the exclamation point on the film in a way that only he likely could - in a key exchange with Cotillard. Good stuff. Really good, even.
But again, Public Enemies has all this cool periphery stuff going on, and of course there is that intriguing Depp-Cotillard chemistry. But ... the main attraction here was supposed to be Depp vs. Bale, and that showdown never really manifests in the way that you want it to. Part of the problem is that, as I alluded to, Mann doesn't paint a full pictur of what makes these guys tick. He tells us that Purvis is a haunted badass, but we only *see* that once or twice. We are told that Dillinger is this beloved folk hero of sorts, but again, we don't exactly *see* this play out so much as we are just told it.
As far as the action goes - it's pretty good overall but there isn't really one particularly standout scene. There's a fun chase scene in woods as Dillinger and Purvis' respective teams finally converge, but it's another instance where so many of the characters tend to blend together that it's hard to tell who just got shot and who did the shooting. A guy like Lang kind of rises above the fray through sheer force of will, but a lot of the other supporting players do tend to get lost in the shuffle.
In the end, what all this adds up to is that Public Enemies is a very good movie, but not the *great* movie that it very well could have been with a little more focus on character and storytelling. As always though, Mann creates a heightened reality that draws you in with its visual crispness and iconic characters. This is a great turn from Depp. A standout role for Cotillard. Bale is a badass as per usual. And there are some intriguing themes at play here, a little slice of true-crime history. So even if this isn't quite all it's cracked up to be, it's still a movie that's well worth checking out.
My Grade: B+
Alright -- stay tuned for some big movie reviews in the next few days. Peace out.
... First off, I saw BRUNO on Friday, which, long-story-short, was completely hilarious. I am VERY behind on my movie reviews though, so I am going to save the full Bruno review for a later post that will hopefully be coming your way shortly. Something to look forward to, right?
... Also, I lucked out in that a friend of mine had an extra ticket to go see the RISE AGAINST and RANCID show at The Forum here in LA, which took place on Saturday. It's not a concert that I probably would have normally shelled out big bucks for under normal circumstances, but, in this case, it was too good an offer to pass up! And overall, the concert was pretty rockin'. I was pretty excited to see Rancid, who I became a fan of back in college when a couple of their songs were in regular rotation on Boston modern-rock radio. Songs like Ruby Soho became some of my favorites of the pop-punk genre. Meanwhile, I can't say I'm a *huge* Rise Against fan, but I think most rock n' roll fans will agree that some of their hits like Ready To Fall and Prayer For the Refugee are fairly badass tunes that are perfect when you're in that fight-the-man / screw-the-world state of mind. So yeah, the show was really enjoyable top to bottom. Rancid was great, but I think their performance was slightly lacking only because the crowd seemed more into Rise Against, so people weren't going as nuts as they should have for classics like "Time Bomb." But hey, it was a thrill to hear that one, Ruby Soho, etc. live. Kickass. As for Rise Against, they had a pretty solid showing - they breezed through a bunch of songs with barely a pause in between. They had a section in the middle of the show where they slowed things down and performed two accoustic songs, but then ended on a rush of adrenaline with an encore that included Ready to Fall as the finale. And yeah, that was pretty awesome. Still, to me, I enjoyed the hits, but just found that a lot of the other songs seemed to blend together a bit. Overall though - a really rockin' show. And really, this was my first big concert of the summer, and it was cool to just be in The Forum among tons of rabid fans pumping my fist to some great bands doing their thing. RAWK.
- Okay, I mentioned earlier that I'm way behind on my movie reviews. So I'm going to back up a bit and review a film I saw last weekend, that being Michael Mann's latest -- Public Enemies. Yes, right here in this very blog. What's coming up? Well, I have to review Woody Allen's WHATEVER WORKS. And of course, BRUNO. And I hope everyone reading this read my earlier review of THE HURT LOCKER, right? Regardless, please run out and see that amazing movie ASAP.
PUBLIC ENEMIES Review:
- For me, Public Enemies was one of the absolute most-anticipated movies of this summer. It seemed to have it all: Michael Mann, one of the best modern action flick directors there is, Johnny Depp and Christian Bale, two of the best actors of their generation, and a true-life story of guns and gangsters that seemed like the perfect subject matter to bring together all of these heavywights. So yeah, I did have pretty high expectations for this one, and I really, really wanted it to be great. The fact is that Public Enemies isn't exactly a great movie, but it is a very good one. As expected, it's ably directed, well-acted, and contains at least a couple of action scenes that scream "vintage Michael Mann." But ... the movie sometimes struggles to really pop. It reminds me a bit of another recent star-power-packin' crime movie - American Gangster. Like Ridley Scott's true-life epic, Mann's latest doesn't quite live up to its potential, but still packs enough of a punch to be a fun and at times riveting film, that is still well worth checking out.
Public Enemies tells the story of John Dillinger, a career criminal who was America's most infamous and celebrated bankrobber in the pre-war 1930's. The movie portrays Dillinger as sort of the last of a dying breed - the last of the old-school crooks who flamboyantly committed his crimes with a sense of theatricality and panache. As J. Edgar Hoover's FBI begins to crack down on crime, the criminals become increasingly less visible and more white-collar. Some of Public Enemies' most fascinating moments concern Hoover's one-man war on crime -- and Billy Crudup does an excellent job as the enigmatic but tough-talking FBI boss. Taking things a step further than what was the norm at the time, Hoover dispatches a take-no-prisoners squad of elite agents to hunt down Dillinger and co. Chief among them is Christian Bale as the unfortunately-named Melvin Purvis, a stone-faced agent who made his rep by taking down gang members in cold blood if need be. Bale is good here, but to be honest he isn't given much to do. Mann doesn't spend much time diving too deep into Purvis' psyche, and I think that, ultimately, it hurts the film a bit. But then again, despite the Bale and Depp's double-billing, this really is Depp's movie. Bale is kind of the inhuman, unstoppable force coming after Depp's Dillinger - the guy who doesn't play by the old rules and will cross whatever lines he has to to get his man.
It's interesting though, as a couple of surprise players really end up shining in this one. I mentioned Billy Crudup, for example. But how about Marion Cotillard as Dillinger's loyal gal, Billie. Cotillard is great here - again, not so much because she is give a ton to work with, but because she brings a real presence to the role. She has some great scenes with Depp, both during his initial courtship and later on, when she has gone past the point of no return and been irreversably caught up in Dillinger's fast and furious lifestyle of crime. In fact, the romance between John and Billie is easily the heart and soul of the movie - it's the one area in which the movie really sucks you in and grabs you, and it's the area that delivers a real knockout punch or two to the audience. This dovetails nicely with another unsung hero of the movie - Stephen Lang as an imposing lawman who Purvis recruits to his cause. The veteran Lang brings a concentrated dose of gravitas to the movie, and amazingly, he does it with a minimum amount of dialogue. But with an Aaron Pierce-esque presence of badassness about him, Lang kind of lingers in the peripherey of the movie, and then steps up in the movie's crushing final scene and puts the exclamation point on the film in a way that only he likely could - in a key exchange with Cotillard. Good stuff. Really good, even.
But again, Public Enemies has all this cool periphery stuff going on, and of course there is that intriguing Depp-Cotillard chemistry. But ... the main attraction here was supposed to be Depp vs. Bale, and that showdown never really manifests in the way that you want it to. Part of the problem is that, as I alluded to, Mann doesn't paint a full pictur of what makes these guys tick. He tells us that Purvis is a haunted badass, but we only *see* that once or twice. We are told that Dillinger is this beloved folk hero of sorts, but again, we don't exactly *see* this play out so much as we are just told it.
As far as the action goes - it's pretty good overall but there isn't really one particularly standout scene. There's a fun chase scene in woods as Dillinger and Purvis' respective teams finally converge, but it's another instance where so many of the characters tend to blend together that it's hard to tell who just got shot and who did the shooting. A guy like Lang kind of rises above the fray through sheer force of will, but a lot of the other supporting players do tend to get lost in the shuffle.
In the end, what all this adds up to is that Public Enemies is a very good movie, but not the *great* movie that it very well could have been with a little more focus on character and storytelling. As always though, Mann creates a heightened reality that draws you in with its visual crispness and iconic characters. This is a great turn from Depp. A standout role for Cotillard. Bale is a badass as per usual. And there are some intriguing themes at play here, a little slice of true-crime history. So even if this isn't quite all it's cracked up to be, it's still a movie that's well worth checking out.
My Grade: B+
Alright -- stay tuned for some big movie reviews in the next few days. Peace out.
Saturday, July 04, 2009
Blog Of Independence: THE HURT LOCKER, Maybe THE Must-See Movie of 2009, Reviewed!
Happy 4th, everyone. Hope everyone is having a great holiday weekend.
So in honor of Independence Day, I've got a special movie review for you - for a film that is not only ultra-appropriate, given the holiday, but is in and of itself among the best movies of the year thus far, and perhaps will even top many year-end best-of lists when all is said and done. With that said ...
THE HURT LOCKER Review:
- If nothing else, The Hurt Locker is one intense movie. Everything is life or death. Cut the wire. And cut the tension with a knife. Because man, The Hurt Locker is balls-to-the-wall filmmaking. Gritty, poignant, epic, and brutal all in one, Katherine Bigelow's latest movie may just be the best film of 2009 thus far. In short: go see this one - now.
The Hurt Locker is a movie about the Iraq War, but it's not really a political movie. What it is is an edge-of-your-seat thriller. What it is is a character study. It's a look at the men who choose to serve as part of a volunteer army, who choose to put their lives on the line in order to serve their country in a time of war. These men and women get shipped out to places that can best be described as "hell on earth", and yet, they go to these places of their own volition. Some, as we see in the movie, even end up going back for seconds. The Hurt Locker is a movie that makes you think about the very nature of war and of soldiers. Why do we fight, and what compels us to surround ourselves with violence? Is war a drug? Is violence and danger an addiction? If so, what kind of person succumbs to it, and is that person crazy, or is that risktaker mentality the only sane response to an insane world?
Katherine Bigelow has dabbled before in the arena of posing philisophical questions in the context of action movies. Point Break, anyone? But while Point Break is a campy and fun cult favorite, The Hurt Locker is Bigelow's true masterpiece. A painstakingly detailed and affecting drama that looks at the lives of soldiers - and not just any soldiers, but those who diffuse bombs for a living - and examines what makes these people tick, so to speak. It's hard from clips and previews alone to tell exactly what to expect in the film, but the truth is this: The Hurt Locker is an absolute must-see.
But this isn't just a philisophical excercise, oh no. The action and overall intensity of the movie is plain and simply off the chain. One scene after another had me biting my nails and clamming up with anticipation for what might happen next. In particular, there is a sniper gun-fight that basically bleeds intensity. But there are also several scenes in which bombs are being diffused that put most generic TV show scenes of the red-wire-or-green-wire variety to shame. This is the real deal. Give a ton of credit to Bigelow and her team - the direction is gritty and has a you-are-there immediacy, but doesn't fall prey to the quick cuts and ADD sloppiness of certain other directors who pride themselves on being action flick masters (cough*Bay*cough). Instead, the film mixes a "reportorial" / journalistic style with maximum-intensity, visceral combat scenes that don't just blow things up for the hell of it, but use the action to tell a story, and to give real insight into the characters.
The direction is superb, but I also give credit to the script. Like the direction, the script is gritty and feels totally authentic. It's not melodramatic, but there is melodrama beneath the surface. But what really impressed me about the script was its structure - each and every scene feels vitally important to the characters' journey, and what ends up on screen is a vibrant tapestry of individual scenes that paint a startling picture of the war in Iraq and the soldiers who fight it. The movie is structured in a way that hits you hard from moment one and never lets up. Immediately, the opening scene is packed with tension, as a squad leader, played by Guy Pierce, dons the astronaut-like safety suit of the bomb squad and goes into action in a packed Iraqi street. Without revealing what happens, Bigelow and co. quickly establish that this is high stakes stuff, life and death at every turn, and that as far as this movie goes, anything can happen - all bets, as they say, are off. Same goes for the ending. Again, without revealing anything, this movie had one of the hardest-hitting endings I've seen in a while. The build-up to it was near-perfect, and like all great endings, it put the rest of the film into a whole new perspective.
Incredible direction, an outstanding script ... I also need to talk about the completely killer cast. Firstly, Jeremy Renner is amazing in this film. As William James, Renner is both a likable average Joe but also a potentially dangerous and slightly off-kilter daredevil. Renner plays a character that is infinitely complex but endlessly fascinating - a brilliant bomb-diffuser who both loathes and lives for the hell of war and the thrill of danger. The movie follows his journey, and Renner takes us along for the ride, as we hang on his every emotion, conflict, victory, and loss. This is Best Actor material, easily, and I have no doubt Renner will soon be in many, many more big movies in the near future. But Anthonie Mackie is similarly superb as Sgt. Sanborn, James' right-hand-man who is on one hand quite the badass but on the other hand, a guy who has slowly been broken down by years of combat. Whereas James is cavalier at times, Sanborn is simply ruthlessly efficient. The wildcard is Brian Geraghty as Eldridge, the youngest member of the bomb squad and the one most likely to truly crack under the pressure. Eldridge has regular chats with an army psychologist, in a great turn from Christian Camargo, and through their talks you can't help but think of all of the young soldiers who are out there right now in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. You can listen to Iron Maiden, play Gears of War, pump yourself up and get jacked up, but when every day you're in the warzone, you've got to wonder how these guys keep it together. Eldridge is that young soldier - whereas James and Sanborn are somewhat veteran badasses, Eldridge is the guy who, like most of us, may simply not be able to take the heat. Aside from the principal actors, The Hurt Locker has some very notable cameos. Guy Pierce is great in his scenes at the beginning of the film. Ralph Fiennes is also pretty awesome as a terrorist-hunting, mercenary leader whose team encounters James and Sanborn in the Iraqi desert. David Morse has some great dialogue in his scenes as an army Colonel. And hey, Evangeline Lilly of Lost even appears in a couple of quick scenes as Renner's holdin'-down-the-homefront wife.
In the end, I can't recommend The Hurt Locker enough. It has hard-hitting action that is some of the most entertainingly intense that you will find, even in a summer overflowing with big-budget blockbusters. But more than that, it's a character study and a drama that leaves a mark on your psyche. This movie left me and a packed audience at the Arclight staring at the screen in stunned silence as the credits rolled. We were, I think, quite simply floored by what we had just witnessed. And I say witnessed because the movie has that you-are-there quality that is like a punch to the gut. Intense. Epic. Memorable. This is a stunner.
My Grade: A
- Okay, once again, Happy 4th of July and stay tuned for more, coming soon!
So in honor of Independence Day, I've got a special movie review for you - for a film that is not only ultra-appropriate, given the holiday, but is in and of itself among the best movies of the year thus far, and perhaps will even top many year-end best-of lists when all is said and done. With that said ...
THE HURT LOCKER Review:
- If nothing else, The Hurt Locker is one intense movie. Everything is life or death. Cut the wire. And cut the tension with a knife. Because man, The Hurt Locker is balls-to-the-wall filmmaking. Gritty, poignant, epic, and brutal all in one, Katherine Bigelow's latest movie may just be the best film of 2009 thus far. In short: go see this one - now.
The Hurt Locker is a movie about the Iraq War, but it's not really a political movie. What it is is an edge-of-your-seat thriller. What it is is a character study. It's a look at the men who choose to serve as part of a volunteer army, who choose to put their lives on the line in order to serve their country in a time of war. These men and women get shipped out to places that can best be described as "hell on earth", and yet, they go to these places of their own volition. Some, as we see in the movie, even end up going back for seconds. The Hurt Locker is a movie that makes you think about the very nature of war and of soldiers. Why do we fight, and what compels us to surround ourselves with violence? Is war a drug? Is violence and danger an addiction? If so, what kind of person succumbs to it, and is that person crazy, or is that risktaker mentality the only sane response to an insane world?
Katherine Bigelow has dabbled before in the arena of posing philisophical questions in the context of action movies. Point Break, anyone? But while Point Break is a campy and fun cult favorite, The Hurt Locker is Bigelow's true masterpiece. A painstakingly detailed and affecting drama that looks at the lives of soldiers - and not just any soldiers, but those who diffuse bombs for a living - and examines what makes these people tick, so to speak. It's hard from clips and previews alone to tell exactly what to expect in the film, but the truth is this: The Hurt Locker is an absolute must-see.
But this isn't just a philisophical excercise, oh no. The action and overall intensity of the movie is plain and simply off the chain. One scene after another had me biting my nails and clamming up with anticipation for what might happen next. In particular, there is a sniper gun-fight that basically bleeds intensity. But there are also several scenes in which bombs are being diffused that put most generic TV show scenes of the red-wire-or-green-wire variety to shame. This is the real deal. Give a ton of credit to Bigelow and her team - the direction is gritty and has a you-are-there immediacy, but doesn't fall prey to the quick cuts and ADD sloppiness of certain other directors who pride themselves on being action flick masters (cough*Bay*cough). Instead, the film mixes a "reportorial" / journalistic style with maximum-intensity, visceral combat scenes that don't just blow things up for the hell of it, but use the action to tell a story, and to give real insight into the characters.
The direction is superb, but I also give credit to the script. Like the direction, the script is gritty and feels totally authentic. It's not melodramatic, but there is melodrama beneath the surface. But what really impressed me about the script was its structure - each and every scene feels vitally important to the characters' journey, and what ends up on screen is a vibrant tapestry of individual scenes that paint a startling picture of the war in Iraq and the soldiers who fight it. The movie is structured in a way that hits you hard from moment one and never lets up. Immediately, the opening scene is packed with tension, as a squad leader, played by Guy Pierce, dons the astronaut-like safety suit of the bomb squad and goes into action in a packed Iraqi street. Without revealing what happens, Bigelow and co. quickly establish that this is high stakes stuff, life and death at every turn, and that as far as this movie goes, anything can happen - all bets, as they say, are off. Same goes for the ending. Again, without revealing anything, this movie had one of the hardest-hitting endings I've seen in a while. The build-up to it was near-perfect, and like all great endings, it put the rest of the film into a whole new perspective.
Incredible direction, an outstanding script ... I also need to talk about the completely killer cast. Firstly, Jeremy Renner is amazing in this film. As William James, Renner is both a likable average Joe but also a potentially dangerous and slightly off-kilter daredevil. Renner plays a character that is infinitely complex but endlessly fascinating - a brilliant bomb-diffuser who both loathes and lives for the hell of war and the thrill of danger. The movie follows his journey, and Renner takes us along for the ride, as we hang on his every emotion, conflict, victory, and loss. This is Best Actor material, easily, and I have no doubt Renner will soon be in many, many more big movies in the near future. But Anthonie Mackie is similarly superb as Sgt. Sanborn, James' right-hand-man who is on one hand quite the badass but on the other hand, a guy who has slowly been broken down by years of combat. Whereas James is cavalier at times, Sanborn is simply ruthlessly efficient. The wildcard is Brian Geraghty as Eldridge, the youngest member of the bomb squad and the one most likely to truly crack under the pressure. Eldridge has regular chats with an army psychologist, in a great turn from Christian Camargo, and through their talks you can't help but think of all of the young soldiers who are out there right now in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. You can listen to Iron Maiden, play Gears of War, pump yourself up and get jacked up, but when every day you're in the warzone, you've got to wonder how these guys keep it together. Eldridge is that young soldier - whereas James and Sanborn are somewhat veteran badasses, Eldridge is the guy who, like most of us, may simply not be able to take the heat. Aside from the principal actors, The Hurt Locker has some very notable cameos. Guy Pierce is great in his scenes at the beginning of the film. Ralph Fiennes is also pretty awesome as a terrorist-hunting, mercenary leader whose team encounters James and Sanborn in the Iraqi desert. David Morse has some great dialogue in his scenes as an army Colonel. And hey, Evangeline Lilly of Lost even appears in a couple of quick scenes as Renner's holdin'-down-the-homefront wife.
In the end, I can't recommend The Hurt Locker enough. It has hard-hitting action that is some of the most entertainingly intense that you will find, even in a summer overflowing with big-budget blockbusters. But more than that, it's a character study and a drama that leaves a mark on your psyche. This movie left me and a packed audience at the Arclight staring at the screen in stunned silence as the credits rolled. We were, I think, quite simply floored by what we had just witnessed. And I say witnessed because the movie has that you-are-there quality that is like a punch to the gut. Intense. Epic. Memorable. This is a stunner.
My Grade: A
- Okay, once again, Happy 4th of July and stay tuned for more, coming soon!
Monday, June 29, 2009
Fate Does Not Smile Upon TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN
Man, Mondays can be tough, especially when your work week starts out with a trip to the dentist. Agh, good times. I need an Advil.
Speaking of which, here's my review of Michael Bay's latest ...
TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN Review:
- I'd need to do some serious bad-movie watching to prove this, but is it possible that Michael Bay made a great movie in THE ROCK and that each subsequent film has gotten progressively worse? Is it possible that, with each new film, Bay shows less and less restraint when it comes to giving in to his worst creative impulses? Is it possible that with each new Bay film, the blow-'em-up filmmaker increasingly forgets about making a great movie and, instead, simply panders more and more the absolute lowest common denominator? The first Transformers movie was pretty bad, but if nothing else it was worth seeing for its eye-popping f/x. Now that the novelty of the CGI is gone though, what is left for the bigger and badder sequel? How about a script that makes less sense than ever, a story devoid of heart and soul, direction that is obnoxiously ADD, and despite all that, a running time that is way, way too long.
Transformers has a couple of things going for it. Let me list them for you:
a.) The guy who plays AARON PIERCE on 24 is in this. Even though his character is given nothing cool to say or do whatsoever, the mere fact that it's AARON PIERCE: AGENT OF AWESOME in the movie, or a character who might as well be him for all we care, is kind of cool if you're a 24 fan. At the least, if you get bored or frustrated with the movie, you can look forward to not-Aaron Pierce showing up and giving the movie a slight injection of gravitas.
b.) Peter Cullen as the voice of Optimus Prime. As in part 1, everything Optimus Prime says is pretty darn awesome simply because he has an incredibly badass cartoon superhero voice. Even the most cheesy line sounds pretty kickass when Prime says it. So of course, this means that OP barely talks or is given any real characterization throughout the entire 2 1/2 hour movie.
c.) There is one pretty cool, and surprisingly coherant, fight scene about halfway through the movie, in which Optimus and co. duke it out with the Decepticons in the middle of a forest. Pretty badass hand-to-hand robot fighting here, and Bay reigns it in enough so the fight actually has a bit of dramatic momentum and gravity. Of course, this is not emblematic of the movie's action scenes as a whole. The movie's final half hour is basically one giant shoot-em-'up action scene that pretty much makes no sense, has no internal logic, and cuts back and forth between characters with reckless abandon. Dammit all.
d.) The opening two minutes or so of the movie is pretty sweet - I'm not sure what happened, but it's Optimus Prime's narration telling us something about how Transformers met humans way back in ancient times, and they fought or something. But basically just the juxtaposition of the narration with some random scene of dudes with spears fighting some giant robot is kinda cool.
And ... yeah. Everything else is pretty bad. The script is bad. But maybe, just maybe, the over-the-top plotline about an ancient race of Transformers called The Fallen COULD have been kinda cool if given more time to be fleshed out. But instead, we get endless "humor" in the form of dogs humping each other, Shia LeBuff's mom eating a pot brownie, etc. Oh yeah, there's two jive-talkin' sidekick robots who make Black Vulcan and Apache Chief from Superfriends look like racially-progressive characters. As for Shia, he's just flat-out goofy for most of the movie. You never once buy him as a dramatic lead, and there's never any real suspense around his character. He just kind of runs around aimlessly, and there's really no good reason why he's supposed to be some kind of chosen one. There's brief moments of him saying how he just wants to be a normal college kid, etc. But we never really explore that. But, guess what?! We do spend several scenes with Shia and Megan Fox and the big drama that threatens to tear their relationship asunder: will he or won't he say "I love you." Dude, I just spent a whole season watching that storyline play out on Gossip Girl (seriously), and I don't need to see it in friggin' Transformers!
Meanwhile, a ton of cool actors are pretty much wasted. John Turturro is one of my fave actors, but his character is annoying as hell here. He's like Jeff Goldblum in Independence Day except if you took away every shred of what made that character work. And Michael Bay's spastic editing ADD doesn't help. I mean, in the final, climactic battle scene, Turturro gives a whole speech about how this is his big moment to do something good for his country. He proceeds to climb a giant pyramid on which is affixed a planet-eating doomsday device. On top of the pyramid is an evil Decepticon looking to activate the device. Now, Turturro climbs the pyramid, and we keep cutting to him flailing away and yelling every five seconds. But what is he trying to do?! Why is he climbing a giant pyramid? When he gets near the top of the pyramid, he enacts his heroic plan ... he radios for help from a nearby aircraft carrier! And why did he need to climb a giant pyramid to do that? Damn you, Michael Bay.
Let's see ... Rainn Wilson of The Office is in the movie for a couple of minutes. Megan Fox does nothing the whole movie, except, if she bats an eyelash it gets its own slo-mo shot. There's something about how her father just got out of prison and how she is conflicted about a long-distance relationship with Sam (Shia), but hey, that's all a lot to process when we've got things to blow up. And I just found this out: the great Hugo Weaving is the voice of Megatron. And Tony Todd is The Fallen?! Wow, they really took advantage of their talents in this one, folks!
The crazy part is that with the movie being so long and drawn out, the actual robots seem like they're barely there. The three most featured good-guy robots are all comic relief - the blaxploitation twins and then Bumblebee, who's isn't-he-cute not-talking schtick was old halfway through Part 1. Optimus is cool when he's actually on-screen, and the other Autobots are rlegated to background players. And hey, how about the villains? They should be cool, right? Well, the main "villain" in terms of screentime is a miniscule Decepticon who eventually becomes good and likes to hump Megan Fox's leg. Yeah, there's a lot of humping in this movie. Megatron and Starscream don't do much at all, except there's one scene where Megatron randomly beats down his weaselly lackey that is sort of cool. But yeah, the new big bad here is The Fallen, who I guess is like The Emperor to Megatron's Darth Vader. Except whereas the Emperor kicked ass, The Fallen is just another robot who doesn't seem all that different or more dangerous than any of the other robots. Except he can only be killed by a "Prime," of which Optimus is one (duh). Why that is, I don't think we know, and by that point in the movie, we probably don't much care, either.
What kills me about this movie is that it has a couple of cool moments, but there's no way in hell you can tell me it's a good movie. There's the camp that says "oh it's a big fun summer movie and I have no expectations for it other than Megan Fox and explosions." To anyone that says that: you are a moron. There is an art to making quality films of any genre, and that includes blockbuster action movies. And on most counts, Transformers 2 fails. There aren't characters that you care about. There isn't a plot that gets you invested in the action. Even the action doesn't get you invested in the action, because every time dramatic momentum begins to build up, we cut away to a random shot of F-16's zooming through the air or random soldiers walking on an aircraft carrier in front of a red horizon. WTF. Not only that, but the tone is all over the place. I'm all for well-timed comic relief, but you can't have an epic movie about killer robots also feature approximately one leg-humping joke a minute. It doesn't work that way. But back to the artform of blockbuster action movie-making: look at movies like Jurassic Park, Raiders of the Lost Arc, Lord of the Rings, Wall-E, King Kong, Die Hard, The Dark Knight, Spiderman, Star Wars, Star Trek, and countless others - these movies combined style with substance, action and wit, visual flair with iconic characters. Transformers may be the equal to those movies in box office gross, but in all other ways, it's not in the same league, no way, no how. Even campier, less serious films like The Mummy and Independence Day make Transformers look completely weak by comparison. When the basic storytelling of a movie doesn't hold up, it's hard to give it high marks. Even visually, as cool as some of the CGI is, the art style is more often than not like a bad Rob Liefield drawing come to life, with so much unnecessary visual detail that the robots become a chore to look at and to try to follow. What happened to simple and iconic design?
This is Action Movies for Dumb People. There's no imagination, no drama, no momentum. I know, what do you expect, it's a movie based on an 80's toy-line and Saturday morning cartoon, right? But man, those old cartoons had spark, they had imagination, they had characters that kids loved. This movie isn't even appropriate for kids - it's too focused on leg-humping and sex-appeal to remember that it's supposed to be a giant robots movie for ten year olds. Sadly, the cartoons for ten year olds back in the day were way smarter than this.
My Grade: C-
- And that's all for now - until next time!
Speaking of which, here's my review of Michael Bay's latest ...
TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN Review:
- I'd need to do some serious bad-movie watching to prove this, but is it possible that Michael Bay made a great movie in THE ROCK and that each subsequent film has gotten progressively worse? Is it possible that, with each new film, Bay shows less and less restraint when it comes to giving in to his worst creative impulses? Is it possible that with each new Bay film, the blow-'em-up filmmaker increasingly forgets about making a great movie and, instead, simply panders more and more the absolute lowest common denominator? The first Transformers movie was pretty bad, but if nothing else it was worth seeing for its eye-popping f/x. Now that the novelty of the CGI is gone though, what is left for the bigger and badder sequel? How about a script that makes less sense than ever, a story devoid of heart and soul, direction that is obnoxiously ADD, and despite all that, a running time that is way, way too long.
Transformers has a couple of things going for it. Let me list them for you:
a.) The guy who plays AARON PIERCE on 24 is in this. Even though his character is given nothing cool to say or do whatsoever, the mere fact that it's AARON PIERCE: AGENT OF AWESOME in the movie, or a character who might as well be him for all we care, is kind of cool if you're a 24 fan. At the least, if you get bored or frustrated with the movie, you can look forward to not-Aaron Pierce showing up and giving the movie a slight injection of gravitas.
b.) Peter Cullen as the voice of Optimus Prime. As in part 1, everything Optimus Prime says is pretty darn awesome simply because he has an incredibly badass cartoon superhero voice. Even the most cheesy line sounds pretty kickass when Prime says it. So of course, this means that OP barely talks or is given any real characterization throughout the entire 2 1/2 hour movie.
c.) There is one pretty cool, and surprisingly coherant, fight scene about halfway through the movie, in which Optimus and co. duke it out with the Decepticons in the middle of a forest. Pretty badass hand-to-hand robot fighting here, and Bay reigns it in enough so the fight actually has a bit of dramatic momentum and gravity. Of course, this is not emblematic of the movie's action scenes as a whole. The movie's final half hour is basically one giant shoot-em-'up action scene that pretty much makes no sense, has no internal logic, and cuts back and forth between characters with reckless abandon. Dammit all.
d.) The opening two minutes or so of the movie is pretty sweet - I'm not sure what happened, but it's Optimus Prime's narration telling us something about how Transformers met humans way back in ancient times, and they fought or something. But basically just the juxtaposition of the narration with some random scene of dudes with spears fighting some giant robot is kinda cool.
And ... yeah. Everything else is pretty bad. The script is bad. But maybe, just maybe, the over-the-top plotline about an ancient race of Transformers called The Fallen COULD have been kinda cool if given more time to be fleshed out. But instead, we get endless "humor" in the form of dogs humping each other, Shia LeBuff's mom eating a pot brownie, etc. Oh yeah, there's two jive-talkin' sidekick robots who make Black Vulcan and Apache Chief from Superfriends look like racially-progressive characters. As for Shia, he's just flat-out goofy for most of the movie. You never once buy him as a dramatic lead, and there's never any real suspense around his character. He just kind of runs around aimlessly, and there's really no good reason why he's supposed to be some kind of chosen one. There's brief moments of him saying how he just wants to be a normal college kid, etc. But we never really explore that. But, guess what?! We do spend several scenes with Shia and Megan Fox and the big drama that threatens to tear their relationship asunder: will he or won't he say "I love you." Dude, I just spent a whole season watching that storyline play out on Gossip Girl (seriously), and I don't need to see it in friggin' Transformers!
Meanwhile, a ton of cool actors are pretty much wasted. John Turturro is one of my fave actors, but his character is annoying as hell here. He's like Jeff Goldblum in Independence Day except if you took away every shred of what made that character work. And Michael Bay's spastic editing ADD doesn't help. I mean, in the final, climactic battle scene, Turturro gives a whole speech about how this is his big moment to do something good for his country. He proceeds to climb a giant pyramid on which is affixed a planet-eating doomsday device. On top of the pyramid is an evil Decepticon looking to activate the device. Now, Turturro climbs the pyramid, and we keep cutting to him flailing away and yelling every five seconds. But what is he trying to do?! Why is he climbing a giant pyramid? When he gets near the top of the pyramid, he enacts his heroic plan ... he radios for help from a nearby aircraft carrier! And why did he need to climb a giant pyramid to do that? Damn you, Michael Bay.
Let's see ... Rainn Wilson of The Office is in the movie for a couple of minutes. Megan Fox does nothing the whole movie, except, if she bats an eyelash it gets its own slo-mo shot. There's something about how her father just got out of prison and how she is conflicted about a long-distance relationship with Sam (Shia), but hey, that's all a lot to process when we've got things to blow up. And I just found this out: the great Hugo Weaving is the voice of Megatron. And Tony Todd is The Fallen?! Wow, they really took advantage of their talents in this one, folks!
The crazy part is that with the movie being so long and drawn out, the actual robots seem like they're barely there. The three most featured good-guy robots are all comic relief - the blaxploitation twins and then Bumblebee, who's isn't-he-cute not-talking schtick was old halfway through Part 1. Optimus is cool when he's actually on-screen, and the other Autobots are rlegated to background players. And hey, how about the villains? They should be cool, right? Well, the main "villain" in terms of screentime is a miniscule Decepticon who eventually becomes good and likes to hump Megan Fox's leg. Yeah, there's a lot of humping in this movie. Megatron and Starscream don't do much at all, except there's one scene where Megatron randomly beats down his weaselly lackey that is sort of cool. But yeah, the new big bad here is The Fallen, who I guess is like The Emperor to Megatron's Darth Vader. Except whereas the Emperor kicked ass, The Fallen is just another robot who doesn't seem all that different or more dangerous than any of the other robots. Except he can only be killed by a "Prime," of which Optimus is one (duh). Why that is, I don't think we know, and by that point in the movie, we probably don't much care, either.
What kills me about this movie is that it has a couple of cool moments, but there's no way in hell you can tell me it's a good movie. There's the camp that says "oh it's a big fun summer movie and I have no expectations for it other than Megan Fox and explosions." To anyone that says that: you are a moron. There is an art to making quality films of any genre, and that includes blockbuster action movies. And on most counts, Transformers 2 fails. There aren't characters that you care about. There isn't a plot that gets you invested in the action. Even the action doesn't get you invested in the action, because every time dramatic momentum begins to build up, we cut away to a random shot of F-16's zooming through the air or random soldiers walking on an aircraft carrier in front of a red horizon. WTF. Not only that, but the tone is all over the place. I'm all for well-timed comic relief, but you can't have an epic movie about killer robots also feature approximately one leg-humping joke a minute. It doesn't work that way. But back to the artform of blockbuster action movie-making: look at movies like Jurassic Park, Raiders of the Lost Arc, Lord of the Rings, Wall-E, King Kong, Die Hard, The Dark Knight, Spiderman, Star Wars, Star Trek, and countless others - these movies combined style with substance, action and wit, visual flair with iconic characters. Transformers may be the equal to those movies in box office gross, but in all other ways, it's not in the same league, no way, no how. Even campier, less serious films like The Mummy and Independence Day make Transformers look completely weak by comparison. When the basic storytelling of a movie doesn't hold up, it's hard to give it high marks. Even visually, as cool as some of the CGI is, the art style is more often than not like a bad Rob Liefield drawing come to life, with so much unnecessary visual detail that the robots become a chore to look at and to try to follow. What happened to simple and iconic design?
This is Action Movies for Dumb People. There's no imagination, no drama, no momentum. I know, what do you expect, it's a movie based on an 80's toy-line and Saturday morning cartoon, right? But man, those old cartoons had spark, they had imagination, they had characters that kids loved. This movie isn't even appropriate for kids - it's too focused on leg-humping and sex-appeal to remember that it's supposed to be a giant robots movie for ten year olds. Sadly, the cartoons for ten year olds back in the day were way smarter than this.
My Grade: C-
- And that's all for now - until next time!
Friday, June 26, 2009
Pop Is Dead: Thoughts and Reflections on the Death of Michael Jackson
- What a weird day yesterday was, and what a confused jumble of pop-cultural craziness is today. Michael Jackson is dead at 50. The boy-king who never wanted to grow up never did. He died before he had a chance to get old. And on one hand, you have everyone trying to all of a sudden ignore the freakshow and focus on the music. And on the other hand, it's pretty much impossible to ignore what might be one of the strangest, most disturbing, most fascinating, and maybe the most tragic stories in the history of pop culture.
It's hard not to think that Michael Jackson was the tipping point - his astronomical rise to fame represented the moment when celebrity culture had finally and devastatingly gone too far. Jackson became so big and so huge that his life no longer bore any semblance to that of a normal human being. As his appearance became increasingly grotesque, so too did his public persona. On the news networks today, everyone is trying their hardest to focus on the music and not the person. But man, all one needs to do is look at a photo of Jackson from the last several years. And as much as the man was one of the iconic figures in music and entertainment, how can you not think: "good lord, what the hell happened?"
I say that because I am just old enough, at 26, to remember a time when MJ still represented the absolute epitomy of cool. Like many of my generation, I vividly remember going to Disneyworld as a young kid, watching the 3-D movie/attraction Captain EO, and thinking that it, and in turn MJ, was the coolest thing since sliced bread. Even at that point, Jackson had that otherworldly, cosmic quality to him, but it manifested in a way such that you couldn't help but admire him. Captain EO freaking rocked.
A little bit later on, I became an MTV junkie and, back then, you'd get a healthy mix of older videos alongside the newer stuff. Every so often, there was a retrospective or countdown of some sort that would feature the Thriller music video, and every single time it was an event. I'd watch it from beginning to end, and if the video was accompanied by the behind-the-scenes documentary that showed how John Landis and Rick Baker put together the makeup and costumes for the shoot, well, even better. I mean, Thriller, in addition to being the ultimate pop song, is pretty much the ultimate geek music video. Rick Baker, Vincent Price's incredible narration, zombies, ghouls, and werewolves? It's sad to think what might have been - between Captain EO, Thriller, that classic un-billed Simpsons role ("Lisa it's your birthday!") and the old Sega-made Moonwalker videogame, Michael Jackson was practically a fanboy icon at one point. I mean, how many kids developed a love of classic horror thanks to Thriller? It's weird to see Thriller now though, in that the zombiefied version of MJ in that legendary video is actually less frightening than what Jackson actually became. I guess it was a sadly prophetic statement when he said "I can scare you more than any ghoul would ever dare try." Sad but true.
When the album Dangerous came out, I and everyone else was already pretty weary of the man behind the mirror. Even in grade-school, you knew something was off about the guy. But still, I bought Dangerous on cassette tape and listened to it about a million times. I loved the album's cover-art. Black or White, at the time, was rock n' roll awesomeness - a very 90's but still very cool track that fused rock and rap, that still gets you up and excited every time you hear that killer opening guitar riff. As a budding young rock n' roller, I loved the collaboration with Slash on Give In To Me. As a young NBA basketball fan, I got a kick out of the Michael Jackson-Michael Jordan mash-up on the music video for JAM. And I still somehow know most of the lyrics to Who Is It. But even by this point, you could't just enjoy Michael Jackson's music without thinking about the oddity he had become. I remember the parody they did on In Living Color, "Black or White," which at the time I thought was completely hilarious, and the thing that really kid of hammered it home: this guy was a bit off.
Jackson's music really was so good though that you wanted to root for him in spite of everything else. I remember watching the 1995 MTV Video Music Awards, which featured an absolutely KILLER opening medley from MJ, that featured him owning it up onstage alongside guitar virtuoso Slash. That was one of those big moments for me where I didn't care about any of the weirdness. MJ was on stage with freaking Slash and he was kicking ass seven ways to Sunday. This was right after Scream had come out, I believe, which was probably the last truly GREAT Michael Jackson song / music video. But it's funny watching the clip on YouTube now - this performance is probably the last time Jackson just seemed downright badass. And man, did he rock. As many have said, his talent was simply off the charts amazing. You really wish that all the other stuff wasn't part of the equation.
But as the years went on, and the trials and the scandals piled on top of each other, the sad truth was that Michael Jackson wasn't just eccentric, but seriously and disturbingly damaged. The epitomy of this might have been the special that aired in 2004 when Jackson was interviewed by Martin Bashir in a hugely-watched TV special. I was actually doing my semester in England when this aired in the UK prior to being re-edited for American TV, so I believe the version that we saw was longer and more in-depth. In England, the two-part special was watched by an astonishing percentage of the country, and for good reason - it was hugely compelling, yet completely disturbing TV. Jackson, looking stranger and more alien than ever, talked openly about sleeping with young boys and other bizarro aspects of his truth-is-stranger-than-fiction life. You couldn't stop watching, but at the same time, it was just horrifying to see what this man had become - a complete mental case, a living monster of plastic surgery nightmares, and very possibly a criminal and child molester.
It's for this reason that I am really bothered by the hardcore Jackson fans who act as if he was some kind of uber-benevalant deity. As much as you wish that the Jackson of 1987 could emerge from the ether and declare this other guy to be a fraud and an imposter, the two are one and the same. And look, I am all for eccentricity. It's what makes life interesting. But there is a big distinction between eccentricity and flat-out psychosis. And man, is it ever tragic. It's tragic to think of all the factors that pushed this beloved icon into this world of insanity. What would ever make a global pop star want to alter his appearance as MJ did? Why was this guy, who had so many fans and supporters, spending his time in creepy relationships with random kids? Why couldn't he have just been about the music and the entertainment and the charity works and good deeds? Why did it all have to morph into this scary sideshow of the bizarre? But to simply ignore all that and paint this guy as a martyr? To me that's simply being naive. He was an amazing artist, and iconic performer. But yesterday wasn't the day a hero died - it was the day that a chapter closed on one of the biggest, strangest, most disturbing stories of our lifetime. For ages and ages, people will be wondering: "Who was Michael Jackson, really? And how could such a seemingly great American story take such a twisted and tragic turn?"
The achievements can't be denied. The music will last forever. Decades from now, a DJ will play "Billie Jean" and it will, as always, get the crowd moovin' and groovin' to that classic beat. Thriller will always be *the* all-time great music video, a Halloween classic and a pop cultural touchstone. The albums, the songs, the history, the breaking down of racial barriers, the influence on countless pop stars across multiple genres and generations ... all of that is indisputable. But there will, sadly, always be that big asterik. That looming question of "what happened?" It's the beginning of the end of one of the most fascinating personalities in modern history. It's strange, tragic, and I don't yet know quite what to think ... and I doubt I ever will.
It's hard not to think that Michael Jackson was the tipping point - his astronomical rise to fame represented the moment when celebrity culture had finally and devastatingly gone too far. Jackson became so big and so huge that his life no longer bore any semblance to that of a normal human being. As his appearance became increasingly grotesque, so too did his public persona. On the news networks today, everyone is trying their hardest to focus on the music and not the person. But man, all one needs to do is look at a photo of Jackson from the last several years. And as much as the man was one of the iconic figures in music and entertainment, how can you not think: "good lord, what the hell happened?"
I say that because I am just old enough, at 26, to remember a time when MJ still represented the absolute epitomy of cool. Like many of my generation, I vividly remember going to Disneyworld as a young kid, watching the 3-D movie/attraction Captain EO, and thinking that it, and in turn MJ, was the coolest thing since sliced bread. Even at that point, Jackson had that otherworldly, cosmic quality to him, but it manifested in a way such that you couldn't help but admire him. Captain EO freaking rocked.
A little bit later on, I became an MTV junkie and, back then, you'd get a healthy mix of older videos alongside the newer stuff. Every so often, there was a retrospective or countdown of some sort that would feature the Thriller music video, and every single time it was an event. I'd watch it from beginning to end, and if the video was accompanied by the behind-the-scenes documentary that showed how John Landis and Rick Baker put together the makeup and costumes for the shoot, well, even better. I mean, Thriller, in addition to being the ultimate pop song, is pretty much the ultimate geek music video. Rick Baker, Vincent Price's incredible narration, zombies, ghouls, and werewolves? It's sad to think what might have been - between Captain EO, Thriller, that classic un-billed Simpsons role ("Lisa it's your birthday!") and the old Sega-made Moonwalker videogame, Michael Jackson was practically a fanboy icon at one point. I mean, how many kids developed a love of classic horror thanks to Thriller? It's weird to see Thriller now though, in that the zombiefied version of MJ in that legendary video is actually less frightening than what Jackson actually became. I guess it was a sadly prophetic statement when he said "I can scare you more than any ghoul would ever dare try." Sad but true.
When the album Dangerous came out, I and everyone else was already pretty weary of the man behind the mirror. Even in grade-school, you knew something was off about the guy. But still, I bought Dangerous on cassette tape and listened to it about a million times. I loved the album's cover-art. Black or White, at the time, was rock n' roll awesomeness - a very 90's but still very cool track that fused rock and rap, that still gets you up and excited every time you hear that killer opening guitar riff. As a budding young rock n' roller, I loved the collaboration with Slash on Give In To Me. As a young NBA basketball fan, I got a kick out of the Michael Jackson-Michael Jordan mash-up on the music video for JAM. And I still somehow know most of the lyrics to Who Is It. But even by this point, you could't just enjoy Michael Jackson's music without thinking about the oddity he had become. I remember the parody they did on In Living Color, "Black or White," which at the time I thought was completely hilarious, and the thing that really kid of hammered it home: this guy was a bit off.
Jackson's music really was so good though that you wanted to root for him in spite of everything else. I remember watching the 1995 MTV Video Music Awards, which featured an absolutely KILLER opening medley from MJ, that featured him owning it up onstage alongside guitar virtuoso Slash. That was one of those big moments for me where I didn't care about any of the weirdness. MJ was on stage with freaking Slash and he was kicking ass seven ways to Sunday. This was right after Scream had come out, I believe, which was probably the last truly GREAT Michael Jackson song / music video. But it's funny watching the clip on YouTube now - this performance is probably the last time Jackson just seemed downright badass. And man, did he rock. As many have said, his talent was simply off the charts amazing. You really wish that all the other stuff wasn't part of the equation.
But as the years went on, and the trials and the scandals piled on top of each other, the sad truth was that Michael Jackson wasn't just eccentric, but seriously and disturbingly damaged. The epitomy of this might have been the special that aired in 2004 when Jackson was interviewed by Martin Bashir in a hugely-watched TV special. I was actually doing my semester in England when this aired in the UK prior to being re-edited for American TV, so I believe the version that we saw was longer and more in-depth. In England, the two-part special was watched by an astonishing percentage of the country, and for good reason - it was hugely compelling, yet completely disturbing TV. Jackson, looking stranger and more alien than ever, talked openly about sleeping with young boys and other bizarro aspects of his truth-is-stranger-than-fiction life. You couldn't stop watching, but at the same time, it was just horrifying to see what this man had become - a complete mental case, a living monster of plastic surgery nightmares, and very possibly a criminal and child molester.
It's for this reason that I am really bothered by the hardcore Jackson fans who act as if he was some kind of uber-benevalant deity. As much as you wish that the Jackson of 1987 could emerge from the ether and declare this other guy to be a fraud and an imposter, the two are one and the same. And look, I am all for eccentricity. It's what makes life interesting. But there is a big distinction between eccentricity and flat-out psychosis. And man, is it ever tragic. It's tragic to think of all the factors that pushed this beloved icon into this world of insanity. What would ever make a global pop star want to alter his appearance as MJ did? Why was this guy, who had so many fans and supporters, spending his time in creepy relationships with random kids? Why couldn't he have just been about the music and the entertainment and the charity works and good deeds? Why did it all have to morph into this scary sideshow of the bizarre? But to simply ignore all that and paint this guy as a martyr? To me that's simply being naive. He was an amazing artist, and iconic performer. But yesterday wasn't the day a hero died - it was the day that a chapter closed on one of the biggest, strangest, most disturbing stories of our lifetime. For ages and ages, people will be wondering: "Who was Michael Jackson, really? And how could such a seemingly great American story take such a twisted and tragic turn?"
The achievements can't be denied. The music will last forever. Decades from now, a DJ will play "Billie Jean" and it will, as always, get the crowd moovin' and groovin' to that classic beat. Thriller will always be *the* all-time great music video, a Halloween classic and a pop cultural touchstone. The albums, the songs, the history, the breaking down of racial barriers, the influence on countless pop stars across multiple genres and generations ... all of that is indisputable. But there will, sadly, always be that big asterik. That looming question of "what happened?" It's the beginning of the end of one of the most fascinating personalities in modern history. It's strange, tragic, and I don't yet know quite what to think ... and I doubt I ever will.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Danny Baram: Year One. I review YEAR ONE, Plus: A SC Governor RANT O' DOOM!
Well, I'm back, in the midst of what's already been a fairly crazy week. Operating on too little sleep, I'm runnin' on pure adrenaline, baby. But I am here with an all-new all-awesome blog for your reading pleasure, so strap in and keep reading ...
First of all, I would like to mention a couple of pieces of sad news from the last few weeks.
- For one thing, a fond farewell to ED MCMAHON. I'm not old enough to have really enjoyed Ed during his long stint on The Tonight Show, but after having worked on the show for over a year as an NBC Page, part of what made the experience so memorable was the sense of history and tradition that the show did and still carries with it. One of the standout moments for me was the special edition of the show the day after Johnny Carson passed away. Standing there in the studio and watching so many legends, including Ed McMahon, wax nostalgically about the old days ... it really hit home that I was in that instant a small part of a grand showbiz tradition. Very sad to see one of the true TV icons go.
- I'd also like to make mention of DAVID CARRADINE. A true badass of television and cinema, Carradine was one of those mythical performers who didn't seem all that removed from the iconic characters that he played. Thanks to the Kill Bill movies, I and many others of my generation became familiar with the kung-fu icon, and Carradine made you believe that, with a flick of the wrist, he could truly bring you to your knees with the Five Point Exploding Heart Technique. So long, Cain, may your adventures continue in the great beyond.
Also, I want to comment on Mark Sanford, the governor of South Carolina ... but, honestly, I don't even know what to say. I think what kills me is: okay, he had an affair. It's not the end of the world. But why did he have to be such a lying a-hole about it? And like so many creepy politicians, he had the hubris to believe that he could somehow get away with all of these shenanigans. Not the affair, per se, but the whole flying to Argentina without telling anyone, even his family or staff. For the last time: in this day and age, NOTHING IS SECRET! Why can't people get this through their heads? WTF! Why do we go through this ridiculous cycle of lie, cover-up, confession/apology?! Why can't politicians, celebrities, etc., just be honest about how they live their lives? In America, it's proven that you can still enjoy great personal and professional success even if: you really like the ladies, you're gay, both, etc. SO JUST ADMIT IT! And if your lifestyle doesn't jive with the professed values of the "Grand Old Party," then for god's sake, don't get into politics, and don't pretend to espouse values that you don't actually believe in. And geez, don't be stupid about it! Why can't this guy just have had an affair? If that had been it, few would have cared, and he'd have a bright political future still ahead of him ... maybe. But now he's a lying creep who goes on unannounced sex vacations. That's ridiculous. And the irony is that the Republican army comes out on the news shows and defends the guy for stepping up and being a man and admitting his mistake. Um, hello! He should have done that BEFORE HE TOOK A MYSTERIOUS TRIP TO ARGENTINA WITHOUT TELLING ANYONE! Then I'd be like, okay, this guy has a shred of integrity left. Now, not so much. Ugh.
- Alright, time for a movie review, this time of Harold Ramis' latest:
YEAR ONE Review:
- I really, really wanted to like Year One. To me, it looked like exactly what the comedy doctor ordered - a throwback to the old-school humor of movies like History of the World Part 1 - movies that didn't have to be biting satire or edgy or ironic. I'm talking comedies that are just unabashadly goofy. Comedies with a fun, high-concept premise, that are really only concerned with making you laugh. In some ways, Year One is in that Mel Brooks-ian tradition. But in execution, it too often falls flat, and worst of all, just feels lazy. Whereas the classic Brooks films are notable for their slavish attention to detail, Year One doesn't quite seem to know what it is as a movie. Is it a caveman comedy? A biblical parody? An ironic "let's give ancient guys modern sensibilities" flick? Rather than focusing on any of these areas in aprticular, Year One makes the mistake of just slapping all of these concepts together in a giant comedy stew.
To be honest, the result kind of insults my intelligence. Not that a movie like this needs to be 100% historically or biblically accurate, but ... what the hell? Our main characters in this movie start out living in caveman-like huts. Soon after they meet the bible's Cain and Abel, and their father (Adam, presumably, though I don't think his name is mentioned). Later on they meet Abraham and Isaac, who live amongst a tribe of Jews. After that, they learn that Sodom and Gomorrah are about to be destroyed. At some point, there are Roman-esque slave-traders right out of Gladiator. You can see where I'm going with this, and you can see how things don't stack up to the academically-accurate Mel Brooks films. I'm sorry, but all of the blatant and unexplained inaccuracies are just pointless and lame.
That's not to say that the movie isn't funny, or that it doesn't work in some important ways. The truth is, Year One is a decently entertaining movie. A number of the jokes do click, and a lot (and I mean A LOT) of that is largely due to the awesome cast assembled here. Look, think what you want about Jack Black and Michael Cera, but the two are at the top of their games here in terms of selling the material they have to work with. Black makes a lot of lines funny simply by virtue of his over the top delivery, and Cera's mumblecore stammer is the perfect compliment to Black's runaway train excitement. Honestly, I would love to see these two paired up again - it's actually crazy how good of a comedic duo they could be with the right material. This is a movie that basically kind of coasts on their established personas. Some may get really turned off by that, but I'm a big enough fan of both that they kept me chuckling throughout the movie.
And like I said, the supporting cast is pretty damn amazing. And even when the writing is flat, the actors help make things at least watchable. I mean, David Cross had to me maybe the weakest and most poorly-written role in the movie as the murder-lovin' Cain. But Cross is naturally funny and entertaining enough that he is almost able to make it work, and at the least make the character watchable. Same goes for Paul Rudd as Abel, even though his role (understandably ...) is much smaller.
But I think what keeps this movie afloat is that Black, Cera, Cross, Rudd, and everyone else just seems to be kind of goffing off and having a ton of fun making the movie. Even when the plot gets really dumb and the jokes don't work, you often smile or laugh thanks to the performers' expert timing and pitch-perfect delivery. Take Oliver Platt as a big gay advisor to the King of Sodom. It's a pretty stupid role on paper, but Platt seems to be having a blast playing it, and goes all out with his goofy lisp, uncomfortable come-ons to Cera, etc. Despite the inherent stupidity, I admit that I got a pretty big kick out of Platt here. Even the really small roles get extra love and care from talents like Bill Hader, Hank Azaria, Kyle Gas, Olivia Wilde, Paul Scheer, and McLovin' himself, Christopher Mintz-Plasse. I give credit to Harold Ramis and producer Judd Apatow for assembling such a great group of talent.
Still ... all the talent in the world can't make up for a script that is, aside from some inspired jokes here and there, pretty weak. A movie like this doesn't need a great or layered plot, but this movie's plot is just plain weak. There's some half-hearted thread about Jack Black being some kind of "chosen one" that is never really picked up on. There's a barely-there dual love-story, but he female characters here barely get in more than a couple of lines, and have less personality than the princesses in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. And the fact that the timeline of the movie is completely broken is a recurring annoyance - it makes it pretty difficult for the film to have any sense of flow or continuity. If this were strictly a series of sketches like THE TEN, it'd be one thing, but the movie tries to be loose and sketch-y yet still have a more traditional and big plotline. Not good.
I was pretty back and forth on whether to check this one out in the first place, given the mostly mediocre reviews. But in the end I felt like the dream-team comedy duo of Jack Black and Michael Cera had too much potential for hilarity for me to pass up. In the end, I was proved somewhat right, as I did overall enjoy the movie, despite its flaws, and to me the handful of genuinely very funny moments and lines of dialogue, and the generally fun pairing of Black and Cera, made this worth a watch. But as a movie on the whole? This one has some serious and noticable flaws, and a plotline that feels rushed and scattershot. History of the World is not going to be usurped anytime soon as the king of historical comedies.
My Grade: B-
- Alright, that's all for now. Peace out, peeps.
First of all, I would like to mention a couple of pieces of sad news from the last few weeks.
- For one thing, a fond farewell to ED MCMAHON. I'm not old enough to have really enjoyed Ed during his long stint on The Tonight Show, but after having worked on the show for over a year as an NBC Page, part of what made the experience so memorable was the sense of history and tradition that the show did and still carries with it. One of the standout moments for me was the special edition of the show the day after Johnny Carson passed away. Standing there in the studio and watching so many legends, including Ed McMahon, wax nostalgically about the old days ... it really hit home that I was in that instant a small part of a grand showbiz tradition. Very sad to see one of the true TV icons go.
- I'd also like to make mention of DAVID CARRADINE. A true badass of television and cinema, Carradine was one of those mythical performers who didn't seem all that removed from the iconic characters that he played. Thanks to the Kill Bill movies, I and many others of my generation became familiar with the kung-fu icon, and Carradine made you believe that, with a flick of the wrist, he could truly bring you to your knees with the Five Point Exploding Heart Technique. So long, Cain, may your adventures continue in the great beyond.
Also, I want to comment on Mark Sanford, the governor of South Carolina ... but, honestly, I don't even know what to say. I think what kills me is: okay, he had an affair. It's not the end of the world. But why did he have to be such a lying a-hole about it? And like so many creepy politicians, he had the hubris to believe that he could somehow get away with all of these shenanigans. Not the affair, per se, but the whole flying to Argentina without telling anyone, even his family or staff. For the last time: in this day and age, NOTHING IS SECRET! Why can't people get this through their heads? WTF! Why do we go through this ridiculous cycle of lie, cover-up, confession/apology?! Why can't politicians, celebrities, etc., just be honest about how they live their lives? In America, it's proven that you can still enjoy great personal and professional success even if: you really like the ladies, you're gay, both, etc. SO JUST ADMIT IT! And if your lifestyle doesn't jive with the professed values of the "Grand Old Party," then for god's sake, don't get into politics, and don't pretend to espouse values that you don't actually believe in. And geez, don't be stupid about it! Why can't this guy just have had an affair? If that had been it, few would have cared, and he'd have a bright political future still ahead of him ... maybe. But now he's a lying creep who goes on unannounced sex vacations. That's ridiculous. And the irony is that the Republican army comes out on the news shows and defends the guy for stepping up and being a man and admitting his mistake. Um, hello! He should have done that BEFORE HE TOOK A MYSTERIOUS TRIP TO ARGENTINA WITHOUT TELLING ANYONE! Then I'd be like, okay, this guy has a shred of integrity left. Now, not so much. Ugh.
- Alright, time for a movie review, this time of Harold Ramis' latest:
YEAR ONE Review:
- I really, really wanted to like Year One. To me, it looked like exactly what the comedy doctor ordered - a throwback to the old-school humor of movies like History of the World Part 1 - movies that didn't have to be biting satire or edgy or ironic. I'm talking comedies that are just unabashadly goofy. Comedies with a fun, high-concept premise, that are really only concerned with making you laugh. In some ways, Year One is in that Mel Brooks-ian tradition. But in execution, it too often falls flat, and worst of all, just feels lazy. Whereas the classic Brooks films are notable for their slavish attention to detail, Year One doesn't quite seem to know what it is as a movie. Is it a caveman comedy? A biblical parody? An ironic "let's give ancient guys modern sensibilities" flick? Rather than focusing on any of these areas in aprticular, Year One makes the mistake of just slapping all of these concepts together in a giant comedy stew.
To be honest, the result kind of insults my intelligence. Not that a movie like this needs to be 100% historically or biblically accurate, but ... what the hell? Our main characters in this movie start out living in caveman-like huts. Soon after they meet the bible's Cain and Abel, and their father (Adam, presumably, though I don't think his name is mentioned). Later on they meet Abraham and Isaac, who live amongst a tribe of Jews. After that, they learn that Sodom and Gomorrah are about to be destroyed. At some point, there are Roman-esque slave-traders right out of Gladiator. You can see where I'm going with this, and you can see how things don't stack up to the academically-accurate Mel Brooks films. I'm sorry, but all of the blatant and unexplained inaccuracies are just pointless and lame.
That's not to say that the movie isn't funny, or that it doesn't work in some important ways. The truth is, Year One is a decently entertaining movie. A number of the jokes do click, and a lot (and I mean A LOT) of that is largely due to the awesome cast assembled here. Look, think what you want about Jack Black and Michael Cera, but the two are at the top of their games here in terms of selling the material they have to work with. Black makes a lot of lines funny simply by virtue of his over the top delivery, and Cera's mumblecore stammer is the perfect compliment to Black's runaway train excitement. Honestly, I would love to see these two paired up again - it's actually crazy how good of a comedic duo they could be with the right material. This is a movie that basically kind of coasts on their established personas. Some may get really turned off by that, but I'm a big enough fan of both that they kept me chuckling throughout the movie.
And like I said, the supporting cast is pretty damn amazing. And even when the writing is flat, the actors help make things at least watchable. I mean, David Cross had to me maybe the weakest and most poorly-written role in the movie as the murder-lovin' Cain. But Cross is naturally funny and entertaining enough that he is almost able to make it work, and at the least make the character watchable. Same goes for Paul Rudd as Abel, even though his role (understandably ...) is much smaller.
But I think what keeps this movie afloat is that Black, Cera, Cross, Rudd, and everyone else just seems to be kind of goffing off and having a ton of fun making the movie. Even when the plot gets really dumb and the jokes don't work, you often smile or laugh thanks to the performers' expert timing and pitch-perfect delivery. Take Oliver Platt as a big gay advisor to the King of Sodom. It's a pretty stupid role on paper, but Platt seems to be having a blast playing it, and goes all out with his goofy lisp, uncomfortable come-ons to Cera, etc. Despite the inherent stupidity, I admit that I got a pretty big kick out of Platt here. Even the really small roles get extra love and care from talents like Bill Hader, Hank Azaria, Kyle Gas, Olivia Wilde, Paul Scheer, and McLovin' himself, Christopher Mintz-Plasse. I give credit to Harold Ramis and producer Judd Apatow for assembling such a great group of talent.
Still ... all the talent in the world can't make up for a script that is, aside from some inspired jokes here and there, pretty weak. A movie like this doesn't need a great or layered plot, but this movie's plot is just plain weak. There's some half-hearted thread about Jack Black being some kind of "chosen one" that is never really picked up on. There's a barely-there dual love-story, but he female characters here barely get in more than a couple of lines, and have less personality than the princesses in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. And the fact that the timeline of the movie is completely broken is a recurring annoyance - it makes it pretty difficult for the film to have any sense of flow or continuity. If this were strictly a series of sketches like THE TEN, it'd be one thing, but the movie tries to be loose and sketch-y yet still have a more traditional and big plotline. Not good.
I was pretty back and forth on whether to check this one out in the first place, given the mostly mediocre reviews. But in the end I felt like the dream-team comedy duo of Jack Black and Michael Cera had too much potential for hilarity for me to pass up. In the end, I was proved somewhat right, as I did overall enjoy the movie, despite its flaws, and to me the handful of genuinely very funny moments and lines of dialogue, and the generally fun pairing of Black and Cera, made this worth a watch. But as a movie on the whole? This one has some serious and noticable flaws, and a plotline that feels rushed and scattershot. History of the World is not going to be usurped anytime soon as the king of historical comedies.
My Grade: B-
- Alright, that's all for now. Peace out, peeps.
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