3+1 Short Paragraphs: Kite

2014, Ralph Ziman -- download

I have a thing for movies about violent young women. I blame Luc Besson's La Femme Nikita, my first exposure to a foreign language film. Or maybe his follow-up Léon, otherwise known as The Professional. But I am not alone here; its a pop culture character trait for pretty young things with big guns to appeal to men. The trope considers it Small Girls, Big Guns and its a very big thing in Japanese anime (see Gunslinger Girl as an extreme example), so its not surprising this movie is adapted from such. And while I have seen the anime Kite, I am not sure I can include it in my like category.

The original anime holds the core story -- a very young girl observes the murder of her parents and is taken under the wing of one of the investigating detectives. He raises her as a killer, so she can eventually find and assassinate her parents killer. The anime was much more insidious, having the detective Akai also use her as a (underage) sex slave, which is not present in the live action movie. That's not surprising; can you imagine how that would go over with American audiences?

The movie has Akai played by Samuel L Jackson, in one of his typical over the top cop roles, loudly dressed, loudly acted and doing his own branch of insidious. Sawa is played by Selena Gomez lookalike, India Eisley, last seen in an Underworld movie. It all takes place in a world not quite our own, I envisioned it being the strange pseudo-Europe of the Blade and said Underworld movies.  Its the latest dystopia of post financial collapse (also used in The Rover) that allows lawlessness and corruption to go unchecked, lending itself to ultra violence and kids carrying guns.

Its a stylish violence movie, set entirely in filthy streets showing us only violent people or the people abused by both criminals and the system. Sawa and her head exploding bullets, killing her way up a food chain of bad guys that Jackson gets to see eliminated without a trial. *SPOILER* Of course, he initiated it all, having murdered her parents to begin with, so she ends her spree with him.  But no, its not as stylish as Besson, nor sex-ified as it could have been. In another age, this would have been more indie feeling, honing its story and style down to something more meaty. Unfortunately, its really just grade C violence.

Under The Skin

2014, d. Jonathan Glazer - netflix

(Hey! Spoilers ahead!)

It's astonishing to me that this is only Jonathan Glazer's third film in 14 years, astonishing and a little saddening.  Sure, Glazer has a whole other astounding career as a music video and TV commercial director, but his cinematic hand is so refined that every year that goes by without another Glazer production is a genuine loss for cinephiles the world over.  Sexy Beast marked his auspicious arrival in 2000, a decidedly lower-key British gangster movie that seemed almost a pointed counterpoint to Guy Ritchie's hyperactive, darkly comedic genre pictures.

Beast had elements of music video composition (the opening sequence, playing to The Strangler's "Peaches", followed a giant boulder rolling downhill past a sunbaked Ray Winstone, into his hillside swimming pool) and photography, all established within its opening minutes, but beyond that Glazer drew out astounding performances,  a career resurrecting one for Ben Kingsley (about as far away from Gandhi as you can get).



Nobody was certain what to expect from Glazer's follow-up, but I doubt Birth, 4 years later, was exactly what anyone had in mind.  I was a methodical and tense drama about a woman coming to terms with the death of her husband, and his possible resurrection inside the body of an 10-year-old boy.  The film was positively Kubrickian, in both the meticulousness of the direction and the somewhat unruliness of the story.  It scaled back on the music video elements, straying away from the mixtape soundtrack, instead accompanied by a lavish score by Alexandre Desplat.  Again the opening sequence is a marvel, melding music and imagery, a 2-minute tracking shot of a man jogging through central park in the winter, before cutting to the title card.


From there it's a slow burn through Nicole Kidman's internal distress.  The film requires that you to buy into Kidman's reaction to this young boy claiming to be her husband, especially that her emotional attachment to him at this stage is clearly unhealthy but still honest.  Where Sexy Beast's fantastical elements (the boulder, the heist) are subversive and only marginally weird, certainly not enough to distract from the central emotional conflict, Birth puts the fantastical as the center of the conflict and asks you to believe in its reality, at least enough to question it.

Under The Skin, Glazer's long-awaited third effort, has equal parts that Kubrickian meticulousness and a fascinating improvisational stream.  This one abandons emotional conflict almost entirely (at least until the third act), and instead just asks you to embrace its weirdness, its fantasy.  It seems that no Glazer film can open without a brilliant opening sequence, and here it's a marvel (embed of the video was disabled) of lights and darkenss, circles and halos, eyes and irises, all underpinned by an audiocollage of language and noise and Mika Levi's haunting, screeching score.  It's as bold a title sequence as that of Gaspar Noe's Into The Void or David Fincher's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo: bracing, daring you to continue.

What follows has no clear intention, nothing is spelled out.  It's all intonation and what you take with you.  On a seamlessly white stage, Scarlett Johansson strips a dead woman of her clothes and puts them on.  She gets into a white van and scopes out the streets of Glasgow for, essentially, a victim.  Once she finds her mark, a man with little connections, no real kids or family to speak of, she takes them back to a deserted barn.  Once inside the extremely black room with its glossy black floor, she seduces them.  They follow her breadcrumb trail of clothing, disrobing themselves, stepping forward into darkness, unable to take their gaze off her, unaware of their sinking surroundings.  We learn what happens to these men.  Why?  That's never the clear part, but it's also not really relevant.

There's an extremely potent allegory at play here, as Johansson, in her beefy, bulky white van cruises the street for prey, one cannot help but think of how uncommon it is that a woman is the predator in this manner.  Even though we know she's an alien -- and in that there's the unknown of what she actually is, or what she's capable of -- we still can't help but feel that she's vulnerable just because she's a woman.  Glazer shot these scenes with hidden cameras, with Johansson approaching men on the street (but first waiting for them to be alone or at least distantly separated from a crowd) and conversing with them.  It was a bold choice that is equally distracting and effectively unsettling.  It takes three rounds of abductions before the audience can ease into Johansson's identity as the predator, then feel some sense of anxiety for the fate of the men, but even then it's only because at that stage her victim is a young, shy, lonely man with facial neurofibromatosis.  At that point as well, Johansson's alien is starting to find some connection to humanity, and it lets the man go before it flees into the Scottish Highlands, away from it's motorcyle-driving handlers.

In the Highlands it's greeted with kindness and hospitality by a bachelor, who gives it shelter and food.  The unease of vulnerability is still there, for both of them.  Will ScarJo's alien return to its mission and take advantage of this stranger, or is the stranger taking advantage of the attractive, mysterious woman through the guise of kindness.  Much has been made in advance of Johansson's nudity in advance of the picture, however the sort of defining moment, as the alien examines its female form in the mirror, the film presents Johansson as, plainly, a woman.  In the moment, she's not a superstar, not a pique specimen of femininity or attractiveness, not an object of sexual desire, but rather a representation of the female form, of the human body, of flesh and skin and what it looks and feels like to be alive.

As the creature experiences things for the first time with the samaritan, it also experiences genuine attraction, and, for the first time, it willingly engages, not seduces, only to discover that it is not a whole woman.  It panics and flees into the woods, eventually finding a trail, only to come across a logger with a less than comforting disposition.  It finds a hiking shelter where it curls up to sleep.  It awakens to find its being molested by the logger and it flees, only to be savagely pursued.  It's that undercurrent of fear that permeated the film from the onset, that in spite of the creature's predatory nature, as it's in the skin of a woman, an it exists in a world where its viewed as prey.  The logger, tearing at its clothing also tears at its skin, revealing its inhuman blackness beneath.  The allegory that rape is dehumanizing in full play, but the ultimate denigration, the logger, in abject terror of what he's encountered, douses the alien with gasoline and sets it aflame and walks away.  It's a vessel for his pleasure and disposable when of no use.  It's a sickening moment that the film ends on, watching the creature burn in the snow, any trace of humanity burned away.

The film is one of perpetual unease, a moody (or perhaps moodless) art-piece that isn't so much a story as a concept, a 2-hour art installation about male sexuality in its various forms - primal, tender, brutal - masquerading as entertainment.  For those receptive to such things, it's a must-watch.  For those looking to be engaged more directly, you know, with dialogue, and plot, and action, well, it falls far away from the conventional.

(Read David's take)

3 Short Paragraphs: As Above, So Below

2014, John Erick Dowdle (Quarantine, Devil) -- download

Found footage. So overused these days that even I am tiring of it. In addition to the gimmick, you have to have a hook. What if it was taking place in the actual Paris catacombs? As in those actual tunnels beneath Paris that are filled with the bone remains of millions of people? But not just tunnels of bones, but the adjacent curving paths rarely traversed by people, and definitely not tourists? Add in a bit of medieval mysticism concerning alchemy and treasure troves worthy of Indiana Jones, and maybe you have something intriguing? Passably, but barely, yes.

Scarlett is not your average archaeologist. Her intro finds her in Iran climbing around in caves that are about to be dynamited by the government. She seeks a mythical statue that has some connection to her father's legacy. Of course, she finds it just before she and her GoPro camera are blown into dusty bits. Our first hint that she is not your average archaeologist is just how blasé she is about them blowing up priceless history. Quickly we discover she is more about her own ideals than any connection old stuff has to history.

Scarlett leads the team into the tunnels, led by a Parisian tunnel rat known as Papillon. He knows which tunnels to go down and which ones to avoid. He also is very aware there are weirdos all through the tunnels, not just your run of the mill occultists. What he doesn't know is that they also connect to some sort of alternate reality Hell, like Silent Hill or Grave Encounters. A Hell that punishes you for things you don't really deserve to be punished for, if you feel the least guilty. As a thriller, the movie is actually serviceable with some real scares and the claustrophobia of the catacombs. As a horror its just inexplicable mysticism for the sake of it without any real weight, considering some characters actually escape by just climbing... out. Points for a great poster though.

I Saw This!! The "I've Been Busy With Other Stuff" Edition

I Saw This (double exclamation point) is our all-too regular feature wherein Graig or David attempt to write about a bunch of movies they watched some time ago and meant to write about but just never got around to doing so. Now they they have to strain to say anything meaningful lest they just not say anything at all. And they can't do that, can they? 

In this edition of "I Saw This!!" Graig covers: 

Snowpiercer - 2013, d. Bong Joon-ho - in theatre

A Most Wanted Man - 2014, d. Anton Corbijn - in theatre
Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues - 2013, d. Adam McKay - netflix
Gone Girl - 2014, d. David Fincher - in theatre
The Way Way Back - 2013, d. Nat Faxon & Jim Rash - netflix
50/50 - 2011, d. Jonathan Levine - DVD
Penguins of Madagascar - 2014, d. Eric Darnell & Simon J. Smith - in theatre

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ok here we go
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Snowpiercer was a very hotly anticipated feature here at camp Disagree.  David had been monitoring and keeping me appraised of all the ins and outs of the Weinsteins' mishandling of the feature after they acquired the domestic distribution rights.  The film was a smash hit in Korea (where the director hails from) and France (where the source graphic novel was created) and many other places around the world, but the Weinsteins thought that this film wouldn't be palatable to the American market as is and spent a lot of time and money tinkering futilely with its edit.  They were right, though, this is not a film for the general American audience's tastes. But at the same time director Bong Joon-ho's vision is so distinctly his own that you can't successfully tinker with it...there's no American mass-appeal to be found here.

The plot plays out sort of like a video game, as our protagonist (Chris Evans) leads a band of tail-dwellers on a mission to get to the front of the train and take control.  Each step forward reveals a different environment and a different battle.  One is a locked room, another an exposition step, another a brutal melee with axe-wielding guards, and yet another in a classroom.  Everyone on the train is a survivor of an unclear apocalypse which has thrust the Earth into an uninhabitable ice age.  The train, Snowpiercer, contains what remains of humanity, but in spite of the communal struggle for humanity to survive, the class system still exists.  The rich live further up the train, with more space, better food, a comfortable life, while the tail-enders live in cramped quarters, eating rationed black gelatin bricks, and are at the mercy of the front-end establishment.

What makes Snowpiercer so unpalatable to the common North American audience is its tone.  It's an absurd premise which the film takes seriously enough to present its class-struggle allegory, but at the same time the film is all too aware of its ridiculousness and it plays into it with extreme absurdity. Primely, Tilda Swinton represents the voice of the establishment, a wildly cartoonish, buck-toothed, coke-bottle glasses-wearing, Yorkshire-accented matron who proclaims to have the people's best interests at heart in the exact same sneering tone as when she's punishing them (for their own good).  She's a delightfully evil beast.  Meanwhile, the reveal of what exactly that black gelatin brick is made from is comically horrifying, as is Evan's big end monologue revealing his horrifying history (I had to decide whether this speech missed the mark dramatically or was intended to produce awkward chuckles.  I settled on the latter).  The big fight, taking place in the middle of both the film and the train is a brutal marvel, complete with it's unexpected pause in the film's most brilliant moment.

All that said, I was obviously quite impressed with Snowpiercer -- it's an incredibly well made, often visually stunning movie -- but I wanted to love it more.  The anticipation I had leading into the film wasn't met with disappointment, but at the same time I don't think I was ready for what I got.  I had read the graphic novel prior to its release, and it's a rare film that improves upon its source (Le Transperceneige is equally a class allegory, but its journey from the back to the front is a lot less adventuresome, and the characters of the book have no real personality are are only really there as a givers or receivers of exposition...still an interesting book but not as engaging as the film.) but I certainly wasn't prepared for the tonal juxtapositions and the more extreme elements of it.  I think I need to see it again.

(David's Take)

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I find Cold War era espionage romantic and fantastical, while modern-day espionage is frightening. The modern spy war is more of a one sided effort, with intelligence agencies looking to root out not other spies, but potential terrorists who have infiltrated general society with intent to kill and disrupt everyday life.  This leads to uncomfortable extremes, losses of civil liberties, invasion of privacy, and perpetual surveillance, and that's just for the people who aren't suspected terrorists.

The recent adaptation of John LeCarre's Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy was a brilliant bit of Cold War espionage storytelling.  I went into this adaptation of his novel A Most Wanted Man hoping for more of the same, only slightly disappointed to find it set in the modern day, but otherwise intrigued by the similar themes of political in-fighting that get in the way of agencies effectively doing their jobs, and the turns and double turns of supposed allies that wind up wearing away at the soul of people trying to do the right thing.

Philip Seymore Hoffman, in one of his final roles, surprisingly adopts an accent for the role of German intelligence agent Gunther Bachmann.  He's witnessing the degradation of his department as American intelligence has more and more influence on his ability to do his job, and this current case, following a suspected terrorist illegally immigrating from Hungary, he clutches onto as his last gasp of relevance.  The suspect, Issa Karpov, is potentially innocent, but also potentially very dangerous, and the film yields most of its tension as it attempts to navigate whether Karpov is a victim or a cunning deceiver.

Director Anton Corbijn came to cinema from music videos, like David Fincher and Spike Jonze, but unlike his contemporaries, he doesn't have a distinctively unique style.  He's a steadfastly solid storyteller, but his visual aesthetic is very grey, grainy and dull.  His previous film, the slow-burning George Clooney-is-an-assassin vehicle, The American, dabbled in espionage elements but not nearly to this same level of complexity.

A Most Wanted Man is potent and intense, but at the same time, unfortunately unmemorable.  Hoffman is Hoffman, reliable as always, even in a suspect accent.  Rachel McAdams' accent falters at times (why they didn't just cast a German actress -- Franca Potente maybe? -- I don't know) but she performs well, showing both fear and resolve.  Grigory Dobrygin is amazing as Karpov, providing the perfect amount of nervous energy that could either signify his guilt or innocence.

A slight spoiler: the film ends on a significant down beat, which is entirely apt for Corbijn's cold and dreary production.  Hoffman's unflinchingly dour grimace finds him (and the audience with him) hoping for any shred of victory, but there's a sad-sack, Charlie Brown-ness to him that you just know means he's never going to get ahead.

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A good friend of mine passed away in mid-2013, the year Anchorman 2 was released.  I mention this only because the first Anchorman was one of his favourite films.  It was a quote machine from which we, and other friends, used to pull from liberally, surpassed perhaps only by The Big Lebowski.  When the media hype for Anchorman 2 ramped up prior to its Christmas release, I felt no small sense of anticipation, but also a great deal of sadness.  The first trailer I saw in a theatre made me laugh and cry in equal measure.

Successful comedies are tremendously difficult to go back to the well to.  More so than any other genre, a great comedy is generally lightning in a bottle.  Subsequent episodes lose a lot of the element of surprise.  The characters become known commodities, the actors more famous, the direction a little more assured and adventurous, and more money is thrown into the mix.  There's not a great deal of successful comedy sequels out there.  Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues has in its core a great reason for existing, a great plot premise that justifies another outing, but it's bloated run-time, its over-reliance on stunt casting, and it's increased budget all hamper it from approaching the original in any meaningful way.

The story takes place a decade after the original, in the early 1980s.  Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell) and his co-anchor/wife Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate) are San Diego's premiere nightly news team, but when Veronica is chosen to replace the evening news anchor, Ron is apoplectic, and duly dismissed.  Their marriage falls apart and Ron falls on hard times and dishevelled hair.  But a stranger susses him out, offering him a position on his new 24-hour news channel, the first of its kind.  Ron re-assembles the team: Champ (David Koechner), Brian (Paul Rudd), and Brick (Steve Carell) all game for a new adventure following Ron's lead.

They struggle with finding a home in New York and at the 24-hour station, pulling the 2AM-5AM overnight slot, until such time as they discover, essentially, the "Fox News" formula of "News Reporting" which is full of open ended questions and speculation rather than any true journalism.  Amid all the off-kilter silliness, there's actually an interesting skewering of modern day television journalism.  It's unfortunate though that the filmmakers chose not to do a full lampoon (though that's been done elsewhere, like Sports Night and The Newsroom [Ken Finkleman's Canadian programme, not the Aaron Sorkin HBO show]) choosing some ridiculous side-plots and diversions, which, while fun, don't lend the movie a whole lot of coherence.

I liked Anchorman 2, but not tremendously so, and I wasn't so entertained that I felt the pull to revisit it over and over to catch those wildly quotable lines like with the first film.  It has its moments (the "Ron goes blind" diversion is probably my favourite part of the film), but the battle royale (a repetition of the first film but amped up tremendously) feels shoehorned in, bloated, and it stops the film cold, and Brick's romance with Kristen Wiig doesn't yield the laughs that it should (Brick should be a punchline machine, not a focal character).

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(Warning: Spoilers)

Gone Girl feels like lesser David Fincher, clever pulp fiction that surprises in many ways upon first viewing, but would likely yield diminishing returns upon repeated viewings.  Yet, this is a story that requires the guiding hand of a master director, someone who can navigate the viewer through it's many twists, and manipulate the actors through their varying depths in order to tell the story in such a way that it's not mere pulp, in such a manner that it transcends simplistic labels.  Fincher is an exquisite craftsman and despite the genre trappings of its story, it's a masterpiece of storytelling execution.

The opening act of the film is told by cutting between the present, in which Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) discovers his wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) has gone missing, and the past, as narrated by Amy from her journal.  Initially, those flashbacks feel off, with florid dialogue and almost to surreal details of their courtship, marriage and subsequent relationship troubles.  It's only the reveal at the end of the first act, that Amy has faked her own kidnapping, that the journal's authenticity is called into question.  Meanwhile, Nick is immediately thrust under suspicion, and through the film's first act his innocence is brilliantly called into question.  The story tricks from novelist and screenwriter Gillian Flynn (brilliantly adapting her own material like no author previously has) as well as the visual cues from Fincher and Affleck all build a wonderful tension surrounding Nick, especially as the media begins to weigh in and crucify him.  Is he a brilliant mastermind, or a victim of a smear campaign?  Where most stories would draw this tale out over the film's entirety, by revealing the truth at the conclusion of the first act provides the film a who other, more satisfying direction.

The first act feels almost like a film in itself, but the second act negotiates wonderfully Nick and Amy's separate lives. Nick has to handle the media (a particularly spiteful news channel host, played with full Nancy Grace gusto by Missi Pyle), his sister (marking the brilliant arrival of Carrie Coon), the detective investigating both him and the disappearance (a wonderful Kim Dickens), a secret lover, Amy's Family, and the search for Amy.  To help, he enlists a notorious lawyer (a surprisingly phenomenal Tyler Perry) who is a master of navigating the police, the media, his clients and their families.  Amy, meanwhile, has changed her hair, put on weight and disappeared into lower income middle America, quite please with herself, waiting for the right moment to reinvent herself.  Unfortunately, some things fall out of her control, like desperate neighbours and Nick's brilliant turn facing the media.

The third act weaves a cat-and-mouse tale as Nick tries to negotiate all of Amy's various traps, with the Detective likewise starting to find the cracks in Amy's plans.  Amy starts weaving her own plan by way of an old flame (Neal Patrick Harris) that take a supremely brutal, although perhaps not altogether unexpected turn.  The film's epilogue is a stroke of brilliance, flipping the sensibilities of the opening act cleverly on their head.

The undercurrent of the film teeters perilously close to being dangerous, an anti-woman screed, particularly harmful in a #gamergate environment.  However, with such amazing supporting characters from Coon and Dickens, it holds fast as a singular tale of a particularly brilliant and manipulative person, one who is quite obviously sociopathic.  She reminds me of Alice Morgan from the first season of Luther, which is a disturbing new archetype if more of these types of characters start popping up in the wake of Gone Girl's success.

(Note: now that I've written all this, I want to watch the film again, flipping the sentiments of my opening paragraph on their head)

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I think pretty much every fan of  the TV series Community was surprised to see our own beloved Dean Pelton, Jim Rash, up on stage at the 2012 Academy Awards accepting an Oscar for best adapted screenplay for The Descendants, alongside writing partner Nat Faxon and director Alexander Payne.  We put people into boxes -- actor, writer, singer, cartoonist, whatever -- and it sometimes takes doing something extraordinary to help them break out.

The Oscar win gave Rash and Faxon their opportunity to break out of their expected comedic actor molds (Faxon has cropped up in numerous sitcoms and comedy features over the past half-decade) and to not just get another screenplay produced, but also sit in the director's chair.  The Way Way Back is the amazing result of that, a coming-of-age movie that embraces all the tropes but handles it with even more maturity.

The film follows Duncan, a quiet 14-year-old who is blossoming in puberty and living completely inside himself.  He's forced to go on a "family" vacation to a summer home with his mom, her boyfriend, and his pretty and popular daughter.  As played by Liam James, Duncan is crawling under his own skin.  His gaze is perpetually to the ground, his face conveying little but utter misery, and his life seemingly outside of his own control.  Pam, his mother (the always awesome Toni Colette) is a dominant presence in his life.  She's a coddler, and Ducan is having trouble breaking free from that, or deciding if he wants or needs to.  Trent, his mom's boyfriend (a great turn by Steve Carell) is already adopting the step-father role whether Duncan or Pam want him to or not.  He's not an outright villain, at least at first, he just seems concerned that Duncan isn't very social, but at the same time, his interactions with Duncan come with no spoonfuls of sugar (the film's opening scene has Trent asking Duncan how he thinks he rates on a scale of 1 to 10.  Duncan says "8" while Trent says "5" and proceeds to explain why.  It's a very judicious scene that allows Trent some level of goodwill while still painting him as a bad guy).

At the cottage, Duncan's mom befriends the party-heavy divorcee next door (Allison Janney, amazing as ever) while Duncan's parental issues gives him common ground with her daughter.  With his mom heavily socializing, Duncan escapes on an old banana-seat bicycle he finds in the garage.  He comes across the vacation town's summer water park, run by Owen (the great Sam Rockwell), a fast-talking charmer who senses the boy's need for escape and gives him a job at the park, helping him come out of his shell.  Duncan leads two lives, his quiet, introverted home life, and his king-of-the-world (at least from a 14-year-old's perspective) life at the water park.  He doesn't want his family to know about his other life, he just wants it for himself, a place where he's given responsibility, he has friends, he's treated with respect, and he even has some authority and control.

Rash and Faxon create a realistic daydream for everyone who grew up like Duncan, quiet and unpopular.  Their direction is supremely confident, if straightforward, giving the entire picture a vibrant life that, even around it's darker, unhappier edges, gives the sense that there' always something brighter around the corner.  Personally, as a step-parent, I was sad to see Trent become more of an outright villain, rather than just a villain-by-perspective.  It's a hard role to embrace, step-parenting, and it really does just seems like he's trying to help Duncan, if in a harsh and misguided way.  But his later actions just dismiss any sense of goodwill the character may have had.  Overall, the films a definite charmer, with a terrific cast (Maya Rudolph, Faxon and Rash all have roles in the water park, and some of the ancillary characters, like Janney's lazy-eyed son Peter and the trio of loudmouthed kids at the park really fill out the world) that is everything I had hoped the disappointing Adventureland (2009) would be.

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Today's comedies present a much bawdier version of the double act.  In films mostly spawning from the "Apatow kids" -- those who starred in his short-lived yet beloved TV shows Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared -- and Kevin Smith's camp, there's the funny one, who is as often a background character as co-lead, obsessed with sex, genitalia and profanity with no predilection for tact or decorum.  Their outspokenness and profane barbs are regularly surprising since they're so blatantly things people don't say in polite society.  The straight man, on the other hand, tends to be shier, following their more baroque counterpart's leads in any public situation, while at the same time are typically the center of the film, as they are more relatable, and have more "normal" problems with love or career or whatever, which the funny one tends to interfere with (at first) but then winds up helping out with.  Films like Superbad, Chasing Amy, Goon and here, in 50/50, the formula is showing its seams.

50/50 was marketed as a buddy comedy about a young man (Joseph Gordon Levitt) suddenly facing potentially terminal cancer and his best friend (Seth Rogen) who helps him through it.  That's not quite the story, for better and worse, as Rogen's role is background comic-relief-type stuff and not so much faithful companion at every turn.

When Adam learns he has a potentially deadly form of cancer, he finds life radically changing as he sees its potential end.  His distant girlfriend becomes even more distant, his overbearing mother becomes even more overbearing, and his inappropriately outspoken best friend becomes even more inappropriately outspoken.  But Adam finds a bit of sanctuary and camaraderie with two other chemotherapy patients (Philip Baker Hall and Matt Frewer) and an outlet for his true emotions with novice therapist (Anna Kendrick).

As written by cancer survivor Will Reiser, the cancer story is a formidable one, have the sense of authenticity while still managing to be entertaining and not a dour, treacly Brian's Song-type film.  The reality that Adam faces -- not just death, but how others treat him, and how much of a struggle just going about one's day -- is the journey, and whether he dies or survives isn't really at question so much as what does he go through.  As noted, there's not as much Levitt-Rogen bromance as this film was originally sold with, and while there's possibly a more joke heavy/distasteful comedy to be made with that premise, this one balances the genital humour well with the more dramatic moments.

(David Note: David's take!)

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My 5-year-old daughter has been having difficulty with the cinema as of late.  When we went to see Muppets Most Wanted, she had an epic freak out and I've only been able to get her to the theatre once since (for How To Train Your Dragon 2), where she made it as far as the lobby before she turned around and went home.  I've been trying to get her out to other films that I've/she's been excited about (Big Hero 6! come on!) but to no avail.  Penguins of Madagascar, having seen the innocuous TV show, I knew would be without any real intensity and no true surprises.  It was a known commodity, lacking in any real art, but also harmless.

The big screen version acts as prequel to the series, I guess, it doesn't really matter.  Penguins Skipper, Kowalski, Rico and Private stumble upon a plot by Dr. Octavius Brine (an octopus in a wobbly human disguise, voiced by John Malcovich) to kidnap all the penguins of the world and enact his revenge for their stealing of his aquarium/zoo admirers.  It's thin motivation but the film clings to it, presenting a series of ridiculous hurdles for the Penguins to overcome in order to defeat his evil scheme.  Along the way they team up with The North Wind, a superspy organization manned by polar bear Corporal (Peter Stormare), owl Eva (Annet Mahendru), seal Short Fuse (Ken Jeong) and wolf Classified (Benedict Cumberbatch), who frankly don't think these Penguins are up to the task of saving the world.

The film is, as expected, passably amusing.  The fast-talking Skipper (Tom McGrath) is quite clearly the front man/penguin of the operation and both his speeches and asides are so mile-a-minute that they're really hard to grasp onto fully.  Skipper has a paternal soft-spot for youngest penguin Private, and he continually underestimates Private's abilities as he primarily admires him for his ridiculous cuteness (at least the film posits that Private is ridiculously cute, I didn't really get it).  So the film feature's Private's journey into self-actualization, becoming a real part of the team, like he's always wanted.

It's modestly enjoyable, and imminently forgettable, but on the plus side, my daughter made it through with no freak-outs and no residual after-effects, so it was a win.

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And finally, I finished my book (mostly finished anyway), Quarter City, in December.  Read it on Wattpad, if you like that sort of thing.

Interstellar

2014, Christopher Nolan (Memento, Insomnia) -- cinema

I too often rag on trailers for being out of context caches of the best bits of a movie, often misleading and misdirecting. But the trailer for Interstellar was perfect, spot on, completely covering what the movie is about. The dust bowl of the future, corn farming and the dialogue of Matthew McConaughey  explaining how we used to be explorers, in his best car commercial voice -- it sets the tone of the movie. The world is dying and he is going to leave his family so he can save the planet, but not really, for he is going to save his family. Skip comparing it to 2001, it is its own device, its own view of leaving the planet.

Surprisingly the movie is not really about exploring the stars, nor much about the wonder of space. Its about saviours. The movie is not focused on new journeys via new technologies to unseen stars. That is an element of the movie, but not its focus. Despite the monologue, and how I just said it was spot-on, the movie focuses on even bigger pictures -- the survival and progression of the human race.

So, we have earth in a not too distant future. Or maybe very distant, as they have succeeded in creating and have already abandoned working AIs, because technology is no longer where its at. Growing food is. The blight has come along and wiped out just about every planet material, except corn and okra. Okra's on its last days. The soil is tainted and in the deaths of plants, all plants, said soil turns to dust and blows into our atmosphere making world wide dust storms reminiscent of those during the Great Depression. The world is winding down, most of its population gone and very little to look forward to.

Yet people live on. McConaughey is Cooper, a pilot, engineer now farmer. He keeps his neighbours robot tractors working. He steals solar panels from automated Indian surveillance drones to power his farm. He rails against his son being denied university, so he can become another farmer. He loves his kids dearly. They work, farm, drink beer (synthesized?) and don't ponder the long way off, just the next day. But circumstance and a bit of mystical intervention leads Cooper back to his old job, to pilot a starship. They are to check out three likely planets that previous ships have been sent to. Maybe one will hold life, one will take on the remainder of Earth's people. Maybe. But he has to leave his family behind, he has to travel for unknown years (space still is made up of long distances) and he has to go through a worm hole. His family is devastated. So is he.

The first act of the movie focuses on Cooper and his family and what he is leaving behind. The second act is the journey, the worm hole and the new planets. But unlike a solidly exploratative movie, it still plants itself firmly with Cooper's objectives. Sure, there are really cool AI robots, imposing distant planets and weird space-time anomalies and edge-of-black-hole time bending, but the movie rests itself on Cooper's goal to get this done and get back to his family. And love. I fell into this vortex, wrapped up in these emotions. But the purely logical part of me wrestled with some of the decisions the people make, that are solely based on emotion and not the reams of scientific data they are presented with. That is the point, the theme as you may have it, of the movie. Science only carries you so far; the rest has to be left to faith.

The third act is where all the 2001 comparisons come from as it takes a precisely mind-bendy turn into advanced physics and extreme science as magic. It does away with our reality and lets Cooper's emotions take hold of everything. And lead the entire planet along a path focused on love.

Yes, I loved the movie. It looked good, sounded good and drew me in. I highly recommend.

X Days of Xmas: Tokyo Godfathers

2003, Satoshi Kon (Millenium Actress, Paranoia Agent) -- DVD

This is easily one of my favourite Xmas stories and definitely in my top 10 for all Anime.

As I mentioned last year, its loosely based on 3 Godfathers, a western about 3 bank robbers who find a baby and take care of it, at their own expense. The anime movie (stand alone, no TV series) is about three homeless people who find a baby and via a handful of Christmas eve misadventures, return it to her mother, while being exposed to Xmas miracles. Or coincidences. You decide.

There is Gin, the classic bum, always drunk and smelly. He claims to have a tragic past involving dead children and thrown bicycle races but really, he's just a drunk with a gambling problem. Hana is a drag queen (and drama queen) and kind of obsessed with motherhood. She ended up in the streets after losing her partner and is generally a broken person. I say 'she' not to ascribe to the politics of trans folks, but because she spends the entire movie playing an overwrought mother desperate to take care of little Kiyoko. And then there is teen Miyuki. She's a brat living on the street because of some altercation with her father, a knife and a cat. She won't go home because she stabbed her father, over a cat. That cat came home shortly after, so there is probably an immense amount of shame there. All three work the streets together, squabbling and fighting over space in the box they share, setup in a central Tokyo park. All three end up basically playing godfather to this abandoned baby.

The eve and the following day is played out in so many layers There is the exposure of Tokyo and Christmas culture in Japan, as the three talk about trees and presents and good cheer for all mankind, but stop at a temple to pray surrounded by incense sticks. It takes place on an atypical, snowy night in Tokyo, the kind of night quickly collects on their hats and slows the walking down. And affects the subways and gets cars stuck, like that of the Yakuza oyabun who gets trapped under a car but is rescued by the trio. He takes them to the wedding of his daughter, where Gin recognizes the groom as someone who scammed him into a bad bet, and his current deep state of debt. And then a Spanish speaking gunman shoots up the wedding, taking the baby and Hana gives chase. Characters continue to cross into each other, all solidifying Hana's statement that Kiyoko is a gift from God, on this Christmas eve. Things go wrong but always end up well for the trio. She may be right. And each of them get to acknowledge and deal with their troubles, as only the connecting thread of the baby allows.

The movie is funny and sentimental and tragic and hopeful, as any Xmas movie should be. It is not what you would expect from anime but somehow, I don't see the movie as being as charming if it wasn't animated.

A festival of Rewatch

10 Things I Hate About You -- 1999, d. Gil Junger (DVD)
Scrooged -- 1988, d. Richard Donner (Netflix)
Back to the Future -- 1985, d. Robert Zemeckis (TV)
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace -- 1999, d. George Lucas (DVD)
Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones -- 2002, d. George Lucas (DVD)
Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith -- 2005, d. George Lucas (DVD)

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I like many romantic comedies and certain teen comedies, but I wasn't always so open and welcoming of these genres of film making.  As a teen and 20-something, romantic comedies were "girl stuff"(obviously overlooking the fact that seeing them with girls was totally the point), while teen comedies seemed so crass and patronizing.  As I matured in my film viewing, embracing indie, foreign, horror, short, documentary and other marginalized genres, I came to accept that even rom coms and teen movies in the right hands can be quality viewing.  Of course, quality instances are few and far between... and to actually wade through all the bad ones to discover the good ones is a special circle of hell (or perhaps fodder for a Satellite of Love? Teen Rom Com Theatre 3000 anyone?)

10 Things I Hate About You I passed up in a big way back in 1999.  I was 23, so a teen romantic comedy just didn't seem made for me.  Looking at its promotion, poised around its handsome young star, Heath Ledger, you could tell he was being poised as the next teen heartthrob (and it worked).  No, this wasn't something for me at all.  Years later, an ex-girlfriend put it in the DVD player, and I, being a good boyfriend, didn't object (I was learning), and to my surprise found myself invested and amused, but the experience was largely forgotten.

Years later, my wife (not that same ex-girlfriend) requested a copy of it.  I puzzled as to why until she clarified that it was an adaptation of Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew, and she's a bit of a Shakespeare nut.  Having since seen at least one or two other performances of Taming of the Shrew, the film does indeed take on additional relevance, but I also appreciate it for a few other things, primarily the strong-willed sisters Kat  (Julia Stiles) and Bianca (Larisa Oleynik), although quite differently so.  Kat is very intelligent, headstrong, a proto-feminist, and confidently against-the-herd, leaving her a bit of an outcast in high school and apathetic about it.  Bianca on the other hand is the pretty, popular, boy-crazy cheerleader type who feels under her sisters shadow, largely because her overbearing single father holds Kat up as an example to live by.  Despite Bianca's rebellion and her animosity towards Kat, I see either of them as role models for my own daughter.

The film doesn't shy away from frank sex talk, although the relatively sterile upper-class high school environment the film is set in is probably its biggest weakness.  But then again, Shakespeare didn't really dabble in much class clashing in his original play, so it's mainly the source to blame.  The culmination of the film at the prom or spring formal or whatever it is is such a hoary teen movie staple, but at the same time, the film rather works by playing into conventions (the egregiously 1990's live band excepted).  There's some solid laughs as well as some incredibly forced ones (most delivered either David Krumholtz's dialogue or physical comedy), which should be awful but remain kind of charming, just like the entirety of the film as well as its cast.

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Oh, the holiday season is upon us.  I don't have many holiday films that are a must watch each year... in fact I don't think I have any.  Most of my "must see" of the season stem from television.  My wife and I run through all the Community Christmas episodes on Christmas Eve, and I try to plug in Father Ted's "A Christmassy Ted" most years too.  I have to get the Muppets Family Christmas in as well (thanks youtube), but no film has endeared itself to me as a "must watch" every year.

Scrooged I've seen a handful of times over the years, like 10 Things I Hate About You, it's a "modern" adaptation of a classic story ... Dicken's A Christmas Carol if you hadn't guessed.  I put "modern" in quotes, because, well, 1988 hasn't aged very well.  Within Richard Donner's Scrooged is a skewering of 1980's entertainment and big commerce, but its skewering is so broad and cartoonish that it extends beyond reality.  The film opens with a fake-out, an absurd production where Santa's North Pole workshop is under attack by a black-suited swat team, only to be bailed out by a rugged Lee Majors.  The fourth wall is broken and the soundstage is revealed.  It's a pretty ridiculous and sharp opening which summarizes the excesses of '80's entertainment quite well, but it falters beyond that.

Bill Murray plays Frank Cross, a programming executive at a fictional major network.  He's solely numbers focused -- viewership and money -- and he doesn't take well to contrary opinions.  As Christmas approaches his network is prepping a live rendition of A Christmas Carol (starring Buddy Hackett, Jamie Farr, and Olympic gymnast Mary Lou Retton as Tiny Tim) which takes a charming air of prescience with NBC's now annual foray into live musicals.  I don't know if it's 80's film stock, costuming, or just the overall atmosphere, but the film is grimy from head to toe.  For a holiday film it's dark, dark, dark, but it's not a dark comedy, it's just gross looking.

Frank is visited by his dead mentor (John Forsythe) who warns him of impending ghostly visitations.  Through manipulations of the plot he gets back in touch with his ex-girlfriend of 15-years past, played by the always radiant Karen Allen.  She still seeds the seed of humanity in Cross' dead heart, but he's unable to see it himself.  The ghosts visit, starting with a grimy cab driver Buster Poindexter (ahem David Johansen) taking him through his past sad Christmases.  Carol Kane turns up as the sadistic fairy of Christmas present, and steals the entire movie.  It's a short journey through the present day, but Kane's cartoonish, Bugs Bunny-esque performance is howlingly funny still (did this inspire Harley Quinn from Batman?).  Finally it ends with a grim reaper like ghost who takes Frank on a brief journey to his morbid future where he comes face to face with his own death which turns him around immediately, and unbelievably.

There's no real excuse for Frank to become the man he is (particularly when we see how well-adjusted his brother is) so our sympathies never lie with him, which makes his turnabout even more unbelievable. Add to it Frank's interruption of the live performance so that he can wing a feel good speech at the audience which gets even his irate boss dancing in his living room, and it becomes one of those unearned, saccharine endings that the 80's often would deliver.  The cartoonish levels of absurdity are hard to let go of.  The ghost are an expected suspension of disbelief, but Bobcat Goldthwait's one-day descent into misery and attempted murder is problematic, particularly in Frank's subsequent manipulation of this character into taking hostage the control booth.  There needs to be a film documenting the fallout of Frank's actions, starting with his career suicide, followed by his accessory to kidnapping.

I don't hate this film, not by a longshot, but wow, is it ever a product of its time.

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Even though Scrooged time-traveled with the Ghost of Christmas Past bringing Bill Murray to his 1950's childhood and 1970's early adult life, but it never felt production-wise or stylistically that it left 1988.  Back to the Future, on the other hand, lives in two eras, 1985 and 1955 and at once feels at home in both and yet makes them both its own.  The 1985 Marty McFly starts the film in is identifiably 1985 in many respects, but there's also hints of another reality at play, making Back to the Future a universe of its own: Doc Brown's place with it's Rube Goldberg dog food dispenser and his cuckoo clock collection and his giant speaker system are utterly surreal, but from the onset they inject us into the fantasy of the film, that there's something other going on here.

Marty is your average 20-something-looking teenager who is best friends with the town's resident nutball, has a solid relationship that's going to the next level (sexually), and, despite his size, he's not afraid to stand up to bullies (probably after watching his nerd/wimp father be oppressed for so long).  Michael J. Fox seeps both charm and confidence as Marty, he's such a winning protagonist.  Nobody else could wear his "life preserver" vest.

Christopher Lloyd's Doc Brown, meanwhile, finds the perfect balance between genius and lunacy, ably providing comic relief without making the character the film's jester.  Likewise, Crispin Glover's George McFly provides the perfect blend of helpless, nerdy pathos and weirdness that he transcends being a punchline.  Even Tom Wilson's singularly one-note bully Biff embraces the cliche and embodies it fully.  Then you have Lea Thompson, so fetching as young Lorraine, with wide, batting eyes that betray her lack of innocence.  The uncomfortable ease with which she seduces Marty is perfect for the film, and Fox's awkward reactions in those moments is so note perfect, conveying surprise (because in the future his mom is such a prude), horror at his mother's romantic advances, and even a little confusion over it all (because she is indeed so alluring).

Sure, it's a film from 1985, and yet, its adventure remains timeless.  It subtly addresses sexuality, bullies, rape and racism without ever patronizing, and there's nary a note wrong throughout the entire picture.  Its effects are so deceptively simple that they have barely aged, and it's so easy buying into every conceit the film presents.

I hadn't seen the film since the early 1990's, and I'm a dozen years into swearing off Robert Zemeckis films.  What Lies Beneath, Castaway, Forrest Gump and so many other Zemeckis pictures are so cloying, obvious, manipulative, and patronizing that I just couldn't take it anymore.  I had written Back to the Future off.  But, having just rewatched it on a random TV airing, none of those Zemeckis-isms are present in Back to the Future; it's virtually flawless.  I was drawn in by nostalgia at first but very, very quickly the film's sense of spirit, humor, adventure, and sheer wonder absorbed me completely.  It's so entertaining.  If there's one flaw, and it is a minor one, it's the 1985 make-up job to make Biff, George and Lorraine look 30 years older.  Aging make-up today is rarely successful, so 1985 aging make-up is pretty crummy.  But, again, it's such a small, small thing to quibble about over an otherwise pristine production.

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Oh boy, here we go.  The Star Wars prequels.  *deep breath*
I don`t hate these movies.  I never have.  They`re incredibly flawed, unbearably so at times, but at the same time, I genuinely love elements of the films.  I love how they expanded the Star Wars universe without necessarily doing so in telling a story that advances anything.  There were drawbacks to those universe expansions, so many limitations the films were bound by since they had a predetermined ending, in some respects they`re just filling in the blanks.  But those blanks, they did not exist before.  We had no real concept of what the republic looked like before A New Hope.  We only knew the Empire.


With The Phantom Menace we were introduced to a galaxy of politics, a counsel of Jedi Masters, and all manner of new space ships, alien creatures and weapons technology.  We were also introduced to George Lucas' inability to get a good performance out of his actors, but at the same time the incredible advances in CGI and blue screening make a galaxy teem with life, where it seemed pretty cold and desolate before.

Of the three, The Phantom Menace is the weakest.  Lucas' first directorial effort in decades finds a man unsure of how to negotiate characters with story, and it's evident his interest was far more in using the technology to tell the story than the people.  His story outline isn't the problem, but his execution of it is dire.  All of the actors in all three of the prequels I give a pass to, because it's quite clear that Lucas just didn't care about how they were delivering their lines, instead more focused on ensuring they find their marks and that they get the words right, not the tone.  Actors like Ewen McGregor and Liam Neeson are people that can carry films in spite of their directors, they know what they're doing.  Natalie Portman, though already a veteran by this point, needed guidance, and young Jake Lloyd absolutely needed some.

The thing about The Phantom Menace I realized in this latest watching is it's a kids movie.  My daughter was already a Jar Jar fan before even seeing the film, and upon seeing the podracing sequence, we watched it four times over before advancing to the rest of the film.  The larger political ramblings are a drastic misstep for a kids movie, but the bulk of the action (a bloodless CGI war of clumsy battle droids versus clumsy Gungans is totally meant to appeal to children).  I was 4 or 5 when I first saw Star Wars, and I watched it dozens of times on video before I was 10, so it's always had that appeal.  Childhood nostalgia carried my, and many others' interest in the original trilogy and its off-shoots for decades, so why would it not stand to reason that a new generation's Star Wars should do the same?

Watching The Phantom Menace with my daughter, watching it as a kids movie, it made it much easier to forgive it for its tepid adventure, and to see someone actually appreciate Jar Jar made me dislike him and the Gungans quite a bit less.  Still its fatal flaw still is supremely irksome, the introduction of "midichlorians" demystifies the Force in a manner that continues to slap any fan in the face every time it's mentioned.


Episode II: Attack of the Clones is leaps and bounds a better film than its predecessor, for two acts at least.  The film opens with an attempted assassination that eventually leads to a dynamic chase sequence through the city-planet of Coruscant.  Obi-Wan dons his noir-ish detective hat as he tries to track down the bounty hunter, which leads to the discovery of a missing planet in the Jedi archives, which leads to the discovery of the cloning facility secretly building an army for the republic.  It's an incredible journey with fantastic set pieces, and McGregor own the role and delights in the task before him.  The cloning facility, its exotic operators,  and its rainy, watery planet provide one of Star Wars' most unique environments, the perfect setting for a face off between one of the galaxy's preeminent Jedi and likewise preeminent bounty hunters.

At the same time, Anakin (now played with dead-eyed, monotone anti-charisma by Hayden Christiansen) is assigned to protect Senator Padme Amidala, the older woman he was crushing on 10 years earlier as a mere boy.  The age disparity seems far less than it did in Episode I but at the same time Portman had advanced in prominence as an actress and held some weight in her role, while Christiansen desperately needed direction and received precious little.  The flurry of confused emotions and all the manipulation Anakin faced needed far more nuance than Christiansen provided (and nothing I've seen him in since even indicated he was capable of it).  Christiansen does nail the odd scene, as when he's meant to provide arrogance or menace, he does it ably, but it's the softer touches that escape him.  His romance with Padme is stillborn, there's absolutely no life.  He creeps her out initially, and with good reason.  How he ever wins her over is never satisfactorily shown.  The film tells us she has feelings for him, but we never clearly understand why.  When they go to Tattooine in search of Schmee, Anakin's mother, Christiansen does an admittedly decent job of conveying not only his stress but outrage at her passing, but Padme's consolation after he murders an entire clan of Tusken Raiders seems off.  Where there should be more concern, there's only sympathy, and it doesn't ring true.

The two threads merge in the third act, as Anakin and Padme set out for an ill equipped rescue of Obi-Wan on the planet Genosis.  This leads to a painful video-game challenge sequence in the battle droid factory (with banal physical comedy from R2-D2 and C-3PO) and ultimately Anakin and Padme's capture. They're left strung up in a gladiatorial arena (again, the film noir, the gladiator sequence... Lucas overtly displays his homages and influences) where giant creatures are pushed out from behind gates to go and eat them.  But the Jedi prove to be more of a challenge, and then the cavalry come to the rescue, first a couple dozen Jedi knights and masters, and then the Clone Army.  The fighting is dull, poorly staged, and tedious.  The actors look like LARPers more than skilled warriors as they square off against green screen constructs.  The closing duel between Count Dooku, Obi-Wan, Anakin, and, most surprisingly, Yoda, is better, but still has its share of problems.

Most of Attack of the Clones' first two acts  is on par with the best Star Wars has to offer, Christiansen's awkward delivery, and bland romantic chemistry with Portman notwithstanding,  It leads into the Clone Wars cartoon which manages to redeem Anakin as a character (the voice performance giving the character much more nuance and even making him likeable, something Christiansen never achieved).  In fact, Clone Wars in many ways validates and redeems the trilogy by expanding the galaxy even further, giving the background Jedi more prominence and even introducing some new characters that never appear in the films (Ahsoka, Rex, Ventress) that make Star Wars a better place.  By bridging the second and third movies, the Clone Wars actually make Episode III even more engaging viewing.


Revenge of the Sith opens with a fantastic and dizzying space battle the likes we haven't ever seen in Star Wars (or, really, any other sci-fi to that point).  There's all manner of ships of all different sizes engaging with one another, and it's just inspired.  Lucas' characters may often fall flat, but he knows how to stage sequences like this extremely well.  Anakin and Obi-Wan, more partners than master and student now, five years later, are on a mission to rescue Chancellor Palpatine, who has been kidnapped by Count Dooku's droid army leader, an asthmatic cyborg called General Grievous. The repeat showdown between the Jedi and Dooku displays Anakin's growth in skill, but also his embracing of the Dark Side, with Palpatine goading him on.  Not the kiddie fare of the first film, nor the uneven tone of the second, Anakin has Dooku at his mercy and takes off his head, with Palpatine grinning as he looks on.  The conflict with Grievous that follows is tremendous fun...I have a lot of affection for the wheezy robot man.  The R2-D2 antics that occur concurrently fall too close to unnecessary slapstic, though not the painful comic relief of Jar Jar in the first film, or C-3PO in the second.

Episode III is a lot darker and a lot more nuanced than any Star Wars film before it.  With the Clone Wars cartoon backing it, one understand the dynamic between Dooku, Grievous, and Palpatine much more, and Palpatine's manipulations, his long con, bear the fruit he's sought all along.  There's actually an epic story in the fall of the republic at the hands of a maniacal scheming Sith lord, it's just unfortunate it takes back seat to the inevitable and largely mishandled fall of Anakin to the dark side.  Episode III negotiates this unevenly, but at times believably.  The additional attention to Palpatine's manipulation of Anakin was sorely missing in prior films (and even doesn't have enough prominence in The Clone Wars) but a valiant effort to make up for it here is made.  While the fall of the Jedi at the hands of the Clones ("Order 66") is such utter poppycock and a brutal shorthand to force the story to wind up where it has to by the end of movie, the climax of Obi-Wan and Anakin's showdown is heart-rendering, with McGregor's aching disappointment the most tangible feeling of any of these three films.  Obi-Wan, for his often cold exterior towards Anakin, had such love, hope and promise for him, that his betrayal, one which he had desperately been trying to avoid, hurts tremendously.  He can't bring himself to kill him outright, nor can he in good conscience save him.

The closing moments, again, shorthanded to get the film to a place where it needs to be for the original trilogy to start, are clunky and take away from a largely well made film (it seems any time a montage is used in Star Wars, it's always unnecessary and always poorly done).

For a lot of people, the Prequels were not just hugely disappointing, but soul crushing.  Years of investment were destroyed by some very poor choices on the part of its creator.  But I can't help but see the positive elements through the weaker ones.  I can't help but marvel at some of the lavish settings and costuming, admiring those actors able to shine in the face of an apathetic director (Ian McDiarmid is great as Palpatine throughout, and McGregor rarely has a false move), and enjoy all the universe expanding bits that get lost amid the cartoonier parts of the films.

A Pair of B Movies

The Anomaly, 2014, Noel Clarke -- download
The Hybrid, 2014, Billy O'Brien -- Netflix

B ? C ? Not so bad as to be Z grade but definitely of the straight-to-video ilk.

Noel Clarke (Mickey on Doctor Who) stars and directs in this scifi flick about mind control and terrorists. It takes the premise of someone awakening, finding themselves in the middle of a caper, but not knowing why. Then, only minutes later, they black out and the movie skips ahead to the next time they awake. We learn more as Ryan (Clarke) learns.

When I saw the trailers and clips, I had somehow assumed it was a time travel movie and he was skipping around in time. Alas, no, it was just a middling depiction of evil scientists inventing body/mind control technology and using it to expand their own agenda. A decent if thin premise that they attempt to stretch into a scifi actioner.

Ian Somerhalder (Vampire Diaries, Lost) is one of the Evil Scientists, but also a kickass fighter and gun smith. Don't let the bow ties and tweed suits fool you, he's a mean machine. His father, rarely seen, is Brian Cox suffering from a debilitating disease. Thus his desire to control Ryan as his own new, fresh body. There are further agendas, including tailored viruses and such, but it comes down to Ryan trying to extend the time he is control of his own body so he can stop the bad guys and rescue to Prostitute with a Heart of Gold.

Clarke has ideas. Clarke has ambitions but he is still learning. He obviously had a fondness for well choreographed fight scenes, as this movie is packed with them, obviously padding out the lack of any real plot. The movie also takes place in a glossy, plastic & glass filled future, but at the beginning we are not properly introduced to that so for a while we are not sure if Ryan is aware he is supposed to be then either. I usually love science-fictiony future imagery, but this seemed tacked on for no good reason but to use up the CGI effects budget.

B-Movies can be good, well paced and decently enjoyable and I hope Clarke gets there soon.

Meanwhile, The Hybrid is one that the director does seem to know how to build a good scene but is completely lost without any sort of real plot.  We begin the movie with a man being tortured in an African prison but rescued by his handler, so he can perform a difficult job, for the owners of said prison. There is something a scientist wants in a war torn section of eastern former Soviet block, and his team will get her in and get it out. While his team don't seem to be all that capable, no impression of intense skill or experience but we accept them as seasoned. John Lynch, a North Ireland actor with good intensity plays their leader and carries off his role decently. The rest, including Antonia Thomas from The Misfits just seem to phone it in.

The pacing is decent, the muddy forest could be anywhere and I got the sense this was a 20 minutes into the future setting -- another former eastern European country that has fallen into chaos and desperation, full of guns and ruins. They sneak their way into the bad guy's lair and down into tunnels, to be stalked with creatures left over from a low budget version of Hellboy -- sepia tinted bubble dome helmets, alien clicking sounds and darting moves. The movie falls apart precisely here, as they lose one of their team to swelling pustules and enter the Evil Scientist's lair proper. Things just seem to get ... directionless.

Said Evil Scientist has been experimenting with DNA recovered from a meteor. They have merged it with human DNA and made something creepy, all blinky eyes but not very bright, at least from her limited point of view. Yes, you have a single scientist whose speciality is DNA, genes, etc. also making opinions on the progression and intelligence of a new species. Of course, she is being made a fool of, as alien hybrid boy is much more than he appears to be.

The hybrid is what the movie wanted to be about, but he ends up being just a monster, a terminator, a predator for the mercenary team and the bad guys to fight and be killed by. He is not presented like a horror movie monster, so I assume they wanted to do much more thoughtful exploration of the Frankenstein monster he represented, but they didn't. The plot fell apart very quickly with exploding heads and gun fights and the killing off of the mercenaries one by one to no effect.

The movie left me very disappointed and no whatsoever interested in seeing the next one, which takes place after he magically gets himself and his freaky eyes (and no money, clothes, etc.) to London. For some reason.

I also hesitate in liking a movie that so obviously was renamed for the dull witted.

3 Short Paragraphs: Winter's Tale

2014, Akiva Goldsman (writer A Beautiful Mind, I Am Legend) -- download

This is Goldsman's first movie as director, based on a 1983 novel, and also called A New York Winter's Tale. It is a movie about magic, love and destiny. This is urban fantasy, something in my wheelhouse as they say, and I think is going to be my word of the season. But its not just that, it also takes place in a world that is only very subtly different than our own but still very very much not our world. Does that make sense? Its concerns a term called 'magical realism'. Magic is very real in the world of this movie, but it doesn't play out big. The average person still does not believe in it, see it or acknowledge its existence. And there are fine details to the movie that state very clearly, this is not our world.

Colin Farrell is Peter Lake, an Edwardian street thief on the run from the crime boss Pearly Soames. Soames is not exactly a man, but not fully a demon. Peter stumbles into the house of Beverly Penn, who suffers from a magical form of consumption. I say magical because a symptom is that she runs too hot -- she needs to be kept unnaturally cool and spends her winter nights sleep in an open penthouse pavilion in a sheer gown. Beverly is going to die, it is known and accepted, but despite this they fall in love. And she does die. Her death throws Peter out of his mind to wander NY, lacking any memories of who he was, for decades. He returns to defeat Pearly and find his place in the stars.

The first act of the movie, and I only truly see two clear demarcations in this movie, is what I fell for. Pearly Soames with his scars and imposing figure, only missing a curl of sulphurous smoke from one nostril, was quite the villain. Russell Crowe does a great job. Jessica Brown Findlay as Beverly is ethereal and utterly stunning, in this weird generic British young actress way that I am attracted to. Even with my ability to recognize people, I am constantly mixing her, Lucy Griffiths and Michelle Ryan up. Colin is passable as the hero, even with the annoying undercut haircut. But the latter half of the movie, set in current day, just fades out for me. It seemed tagged on, as if Goldsman really likes the first part of the novel and you could see his love embedded, but didn't put as much passion into this part. Its just not as magical, for me.

3+1 Short Paragraphs: The Maze Runner

2014, Wes Ball -- download

Despite never getting a feature film for Ruin off the ground, Wes Ball was given the adaptation of the young adult novel The Maze Runner, another of the highly bankable post-apocalyptic young adult book series.  Because adaptation is always more value than new content these days. Disappointing as I would love to see that short film come to life on the big screen.

Skipping right past what the movie is about, can I just say it is the most ridiculous explanation behind a high concept plot that I have ever seen? You know the basic premise from the trailers, right? Kids wake up at the centre of a maze, one of high stone walls and moving paths. Why? For frickin' SPOILER sake, to challenge them against adverse conditions and monsters, in order to understand why they are immune to a disease that is ravaging the planet. Seriously, you build a massive structure, and I mean MASSIVE, solely to study kids being tortured, for medical purposes. How long would that take and how many people would die while you submit RFQs to the world's remaining construction companies? And let's not even consider the cost, especially in a post apocalyptic world that is already low on resources. It is a silly silly premise for a decent torture box plot.

But, saying that, the actual depiction of the maze is pretty damn tight. The kids wake up at the centre of the maze, and really the "main character" is so weakly fleshed out, that he is more McGuffin than person. They are without memories but slowly some things come back. They either don't remember they are in a post apocalyptic world or don't bother telling us. But as the movie starts, it is three years since this started happening so a Lost come Lord of the Flies society has built. They support each other, running the maze (yes, they have already mapped it out before the movie starts) but basically playing it safe, sticking to their self imposed rules. New Guy Thomas does not want to play it safe, so he breaks the rules and runs into the maze. Amazingly, or really just because he is Main Character, he survives. And by the end of movie one, they are out of the maze are realizing they are pawns in some weird medical experiment.

I enjoyed the pretense of the movie, the setup of the maze and its dangers. Its tense, exciting, well acted and mysterious. The plot should have just stayed mysterious, not that there are any really good ways to explain such a device, other than maybe aliens or god creatures. But I could not rise above that reveal. And it probably killed my interest in the books.

Strap On Those Sandals

300: Rise of An Empire -- 2014, Zoam Murro -- download
Hercules -- 2014, Brett Ratner  (Red Dragon, X-Men: Last Stand) -- download

No, this isn't the beginning of yet another new recurring segment on We Disagree. Just a way to blend the commentary on two somewhat related movies, i.e. they are both of ancient Greek persuasion. Unless Kent agrees to a series review of all the Sinbad movies, there won't be enough fodder for a new category.

Well, maybe if we do Spartacus, in honour of our visit to the Kubrick exhibit.

300: Rise of an Empire is the side-quel for the Zack Snyder, Frank Miller graphic novel become green screen movie. It happens roughly at the same time as the first movie, but following different characters. This time, not owing its style to recreation of comic panels, it opens up more. The movie connects the first's Battle of Thermopylae to the battle at Marathon, where our main character Themistocles slays the King of Persia but spares his son, Xerxes. It is that event that leads to the fantastical nature of the Persian army that invades Greece ten years later, i.e. Xerxes becoming a god king.

When I mentioned not really having an internal vision of how Persia should be portrayed in fantasy fiction, this movie didn't really help. This is typical of the brown skinned exotic Evil Empire approach. But there is history, so its forgivable, I guess. What isn't history is the backstory they give to Xerxes, the god king of the Persians. Tall, golden and basically hairless, the man walks into a magic bath bearded and normal sized, but emerges as a cross between a diva and a giant. This sort of flies in the face of what the first movie wanted to portray, that he was mortal, after all. Magical transmogrification for appearances only?

His right hand man, er, woman is Artemisia, a Greek who hates Greece and is played by Eva Green channeling her usual scary, sexy goth. Not that I am complaining. She is capable, manipulative and is portrayed as the intelligence behind the whole invasion, with Xerxes as just a pretty golden puppet, albeit 10 feet high.

This is a movie for those who enjoyed the first one and for anyone who has watched the Spartacus: Boobs & Blood TV series. Every battle scene is slow-mo, digital blood spraying every which way, good guys cutting down bad guys with dramatic swipes of their swords, ignoring the armor of the Persians while they fight in speedos. But rather than just men with spears and swords, they toss in a sea battle, ships crunching against each other with a dramatic battle where numerous boats are stuck together and the Greeks and Persians fight from deck to deck. Still not sure why a horse as considered a secret weapon when they could not have predicted the configuration of the tangled decks. These movies are all about cool factor in battle with little sense behind them.

The movie was fun, stylish, well shot (decent CGI) and dramatically acted (I will always enjoy watch Eva Green hamming it up, as long as its not Camelot) but generally forgettable.

I know very little of the graphic novel Hercules is based on. Despite my pirate access to all and every comic, the lack of visits to comic shops has diminished my awareness of the hot titles.  Maybe it wasn't so hot, as the lack of Googlish data says something.  Anyways, I was not aware of it being a comic before the trailers of the movie came out, and I was not aware of the type of movie it was, based on the trailers.

The trailers do a disservice to this movie. They depict a typical, expected adaptation of the Hercules myth, showing his greatest feats, i.e. his Labours. But the movie is not so. This is Hercules, the man behind the myths, picking up years later as he leads a group of mercenaries who bank on his reputation. Whether real or myth, the name sells. Enemies and the rulers of Greek city states believe he did all the feats of heroism by himself, not knowing that this D&D party of variously skilled adventurers helped him accomplish it all. That is what this movie is about.

Even without the myth, Hercules is a dominant warrior, hired for good reason. The movie brings him to Thrace, in eastern Greece, to help a king go up against ruthless rebels. The king needs his army trained and the rebels vanquished. Hercules is not so sure about sending more young men to their deaths, but he wants the coin, so his men and he can retire. Things never go as planned in these movies, as betrayals pile up and Herc must decide who he really is.

Every time someone, usually Iolaus the storyteller, reminds us of how great Hercules was, we get a flashback to his battle with a legendary creature. But we also get hints of the truth behind the hero. These CGI monster laden scenes are what the trailer was telling us to see, but the core of the movie is how Hercules himself can both rise above his mythos and those around can learn to depend on the man. His men (and woman!) trust him, but he must learn to trust himself.

Its a fun movie, where The Rock gets to try his hand at a tortured hero trope. I doubt it had the weight the graphic novel was supposed to have, but it did a decent job of portraying something other than a big screen adaptation of familiar, typical mythos movies.

Really, that is my usual fallback to describing these movies. I don't expect great, I don't even expect good, but if I have fun, then I am usually satisfied. This one fell short of being added to my Swords & ... collection, and I would never have the intention of adding the first one, but I could not not see them. I always see them. And yes, I am the guy who will see Seventh Son with Jeff Bridges, should they actually ever get around to releasing it.