2011 Films: #43-40

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#43 War Horse


In December of 2010, I got my giant tonsils taken out. They had caused years of, up to a few months before, un-diagnosed sleep apnea, a pulmonary disorder that causes you to stop breathing in your sleep. As a result of my shitty quality of sleep, I would fall asleep in other places throughout the day, such as classrooms, meetings and movie theaters. Since the surgery, I had yet to fall asleep in the theater--until I saw War Horse. Even a genius like Spielberg can have an off-day (see: War of the Worlds), and though I thought Tintin was great (more later), I did not care for this one as much. It is one of those films that seemed as if it were made exclusively for an elder generation. Horses have always been symbolic of beauty, grace, freedom. War Horse, both in it's use of Joey the horse and it's sprawling England landscape, was definitely a pretty film. Spielberg teamed up with his longtime cinematographer Janusz Kaminski (with him since Schindler's List in '93) and created some fantastic shots, especially towards the end. Newcomer Jeremy Irvine plays Albert Naracott, a farm boy who bonds with the horse that his father buys at the market without permission from Albert's mother (Emily Watson). It becomes apparent that the family will not make rent on the farm unless they can plow the field for crops. Enter Joey and Albert, who miraculously get through the tough soil with a crowd of naysayers watching including the shifty landowner (David Thewlis, of Remus Lupin fame). Then World War I comes rolling along and with it, the need for horses and young men. Albert's enlisted in the army, Joey is bought by a colonel, and the rest of the film follows them as they try to find each other through the landscape of mud and trenches and explosions. The last hour of the movie was engaging and easy on the eyes, but the middle hour was molasses-slow and worthy of a decent nap. To paraphrase Billy Madison: "War Horse? More like Bore Horse."


#42 Limitless


In an episode of The Simpsons, Homer stumbles upon Henry Kissinger's glasses in the bathroom of the Springfield Power Plant. Immediately feeling smarter, he says in the mirror "The roots of any two sides of any two sides of an isosceles triangle is equal to the square root of the remaining side." A voice from the stall shouts at him "that's a right triangle, you moron!" On Seinfeld, George gives up sex and becomes a genius, looking up from Tolstoy to casually answer tough Jeopardy! questions. In Limitless, Bradley Cooper finds yet another way to quickly improve his I.Q. He stars as Eddie Morra, a bum of a writer who, during the exposition portion of the film, is shown being late on turning in a draft of his novel, being late turning in his rent, and being dumped by his girlfriend. Wandering aimlessly through the streets in "what does it all mean?" fashion, he runs into his ex-wife's brother, who is hard at work on a new drug. He gives Eddie a sample and the effects are apparent immediately: he impresses his landlord's wife with his sudden confidence and knowledge of the law, and they of course do the deed. From there, he churns out hundreds of book pages on his laptop, cleans his apartment, buys suits and starts working as a stock trader. He becomes the prodigal son of the market, gaining the attention of top exec Carl van Loon (Robert DeNiro). Things look great, but he is against the clock as he starts to realize his supply of NZT-48 (really?) will not last forever, and eventually the wrong people might find out his secret. It's kind of a silly concept and a far fetched execution, but it is a fun movie if you are in the mood for mindless (or is it mindful?) fun.


#41 Friends with Benefits


Jamie (Mila Kunis) is a corporate headhunter who recruits Dylan (Justin Timberlake) to her company, and both recently single (Timberlake is dumped in a funny cameo by 'John f***in Mayer!'-obsessed Emma Stone), begin hooking up. Both believe that the mutual attraction and dedication to avoiding any kind of relationshippy talk will override their emotional baggage. As you can imagine, it doesn't, and everyone--Jamie's mom (Patricia Clarkson), Dylan's gay friend Tommy (Woody Harrelson, great as ever), and Dylan's sister (Jenna Elfman, annoying as ever)--begins to call them on it. She comes to visit his family in California "as friends" and she gets dragged into the family weirdness; Dad (Richard Jenkins) has Alzheimer's and is slowly losing his grip on just about everything, especially his pants. Things thus get strange and relationshippy in a hurry and their "rules" begin to come into question. This is a movie that spends so much time trying to be self-reflexive of its own cliches (flash mob dance numbers, "this is so like college") that it ultimately ends up hitting on those very cliches it wants to avoid. That's okay, though. It's fun and the Kunis/Timberlake chemistry keeps it interesting.

#40 Source Code


Source Code--or as I like to call it Groundhog's Day With a Bomb on a Train--is the second offering from David Bowie's son Duncan Jones. His first, Moon, was an awesome mix of sci-fi and psychosis with Sam Rockwell battling against Sam Rockwell while marooned on a space station(The marquee on the Uptown Theater read SAM ROCKWELL & SAM ROCKWELL in MOON). Source Code, while possessing an interesting concept, did not quite grab my attention as much as Moon did. Jake Gyllenhaal starts the movie as teacher Sean Fentress, who wakes up on a train in the North 'burbs of Chicago across from fellow Chicagoan  Christina Warren (Michelle Monaghan). He is confused by her calling him Sean, and can't seem to grasp what the hell she's talking about. Then a bomb goes off on the train and they explode. Don't worry, this is not giving anything away. He wakes up in a chamber of some sort, facing a television screen with Captain Goodwin (Vera Farmiga) looking down at him. She says "Your name is Colter Stevens, military helicopter pilot." "Ah, that makes more sense," Gyllenhaal thinks to himself. She goes on to say that he will be assuming the body of Chicago resident Sean Fentress via a time-loop program called source code in the hopes that in enough tries at eight minute intervals will allow him to stop the bomb from exploding, thus saving lives and changing the course of history in the process. And from there we have Groundhog Day with a Bomb on a Train, Gyllenhaal learning more and more with each eight-minute jump into Fentress's body, each time retaining enough information to help for the next time. There are cool plot twists and turns along the way and Gyllenhaal and Monaghan become this version's Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell as their relationship develops via ongoing bomb explosions. I ended up needing a few things explained to me after this one was over and I'm not sure if that was a function of my not paying enough attention or the concept being over my head; unfortunately the confusion directly correlated with my enjoyment. I think that I would like to watch this one again because I have the feeling it would make more sense the second time around. A good head-scratcher.