20 The Debt
Like Spielberg's Munich, The Debt involves IDF (Israel Defense Forces) tasked with a retaliation job. Unlike Munich, it is entirely fictionalized. In the late 1990s, Rachel Singer (The Dame Helen Mirren) is speaking at her daughter's book unveiling, which covers a mission that she undertook in 1966 along with her ex-husband Stephan (Tom Wilkinson) and David (Ciaran Hinds). Rachel and Stephan show up at the unveiling to much applause and reverence; David does not. That's because David has just been flattened by a giant truck.
Rachel and Stephan thus begin to re-hash why exactly David wanted to kill himself and most of that story unfolds via flashback. "Yep, her again" Jessica Chastain (not that this is a bad thing) plays 1966 Rachel, with Sam "Man on Ledge" Worthington as David and Marton Csokas as Stephan. As Mossad agents, their mission is to bring down a Nazi war criminal nicknamed "the Surgeon" who is in hiding out in Berlin. Whether or not they fully accomplish their mission becomes the film's central question, and how that question affects their 1997 lives is also incredibly provocative. Joe Maddon (Shakespeare in Love, Proof) directs, and the way that the film jumps back and forth in time is both effective and easy to follow. The film's weakness is that it hits a decently long lull in the middle that involves the mission, and that the mission itself is less exciting than everything else. But everyone performs well--the 1966 trio pulls off a pretty strange love triangle--and the way that the past interacts with the present is evident in the emotions and worn-out faces of Wilkinson and Mirren. Here, they can't escape the past until they fix the present.
#19 The Guard
When I was a kid, my father wrote and directed a play called "Bon Voyage Brendan" about Ireland's famed explorer, saint Brendan. It was performed later on at Mikeaukee's Irish Fest, and it was there that my dad met a comedy duo called dD'unbelivables, comprised of Irish funnymen John Kenny and Pat Shortt. A couple years later, we would take a trip to Ireland and stay at Jon Kenny's house and hang out with both of said Unbelievables. About 2/3s into the Guard, this fella shows up wearing a cowboy hat and possessing a trunk full o' guns. All these years later, I recognized the Irish cowboy as our old pal Pat Shortt. This wasn't the first time my family had crossed paths with stars-my mom acted with Gary Sinese in high school and her friend Jeff Perry was both Angela Chase's teacher on My So Called Life and shot to death by Sawyer on LOST-but it was just one of the many pleasant surprises in The Guard.
The Guard (police in Ireland are known as Gardai, which is shorthand Gaelic for "Guardians of the Peace of Ireland") stars Brendan Gleeson as a swilling, whoring and absolutely hysterical small-town Irish cop named Gerry Boyle. A couple of uncharacteristic murders stir things up in his neck of the woods, and shortly after he begins investigating them, Agent Wendell Everett (Don Cheadle) shows up as part of a FBI task force that cries foul of international drug trafficking. And yes, he gets paired with the uncouth and racist Boyle to help take the smugglers down. There is a bit of the buddy-cop Gibson/Glover format in place here, but the outrageous performance of Gleeson stops it from ever reaching stale territory. The Guard is the first directorial offering from John Michael McDonagh, who is the brother of famous Irish playwright Martin McDonagh (In Bruges) and it is a very impressive debut. Sure, the small-town murder drug-corruption piece has been done before, as have the witty and verbose criminals. But in Gleeson's Boyle, we get a truly unique and amazingly loutish outlook. Rent this one. Laugh hard at Irish one-liners. Repeat.
title
Thursday, February 16, 2012
2011 Films: #22 & 21
#22 The Ides of March
One of the things Ryan Gosling seems to get better than just about anyone in Hollywood right now is the notion of mystique. As campaign staffer Stephen Meyers, he is the kind of person that stays in poker face mode at all times, despite his somewhat obvious motives of rising to the top of the political heap. In comparison to his counterparts, though, he still shows flashes of idealism. The benefactor of his toils is Governor Mike Morris (George Clooney), all well-coiffed, slicked-back charm. As the movie begins, Morris seems to be the favorite in the Ohio Democratic primary, which as we all know from elections past is a hugely important state that often is decisive and swings momentum towards its winner. Meyers' boss is Paul Zara (Phillip Seymour Hoffman), a competitive type whose cynicism is only matched by his wits. Following a debate between Morris and his challenger, the opposing campaign manager Tom Duffy (Paul Giamatti) mentions a play to try and steal Meyers away from Zara and the Morris campaign. As Zara sputters and curses under his breath, Meyers appears a little intrigued by the offer. When Meyers begins to spend time with young intern Molly Stearns (Evan Rachel Wood) though, he uncovers some harsh truths and learns just how dirty politics can be (duh). Suddenly, he has a choice to make--does he keep things copacetic, or does he take his knowledge and use it as a springboard to relevance?
The movie functions as a pretty interesting character portrait of a young man coming to terms with reality, and feels feasible as a study of the cutthroat nature of American politics. George Clooney, who wrote and directed the film, understands that in order to win in America, you have to meet in the middle both morally and politically. Any time that Meyers recommends Morris to lean left, he pushes towards the center. Gosling and Clooney both turn in great performances as expected. While the ensemble cast is good, PSH is underutilized, and Marisa Tomei (as an obnoxious reporter) and Evan Rachel Wood are limited by the fact that they are women in a game that has always seemed to be for men. I found that aspect of the story to be a little shortsighted in its scope, and I also found that Meyers' path seemed a little too unobstructed. Nonetheless, The Ides of March proved to be a believable story in blemished and downright nasty culture.
#21 The Help
From the second this beast came steamrolling out of the Hollywood studio circuit and cultivating buzz, I thought "Oscar bait". I mean, just look at the story--starry-eyed college grad Skeeter Phelan (Emma Stone), looking for a big scoop to bolster her writing, decides to buck her high society upbringing and create a tell-all book about African-American maids and their hardships in the 1960s Jim-Crow south. I mean, come on. It practically checks off "uplifting", "underdog story" and "socially relevant" within the first fifteen minutes.
Bait or not, The Help is still a good flick, due almost entirely to its performances. The Help at the story's center is Aibeleen Clark (Viola Davis), Skeeter's neighbor's maid, who is more of a mother to the neighbor's children than their mother is. This, it turns out, is par for the course in the south, where wealthy "stay-at-home" moms are more busy drinking Arnold Palmers and talking shit about those who don't dress the part. None more so than the devilish Hilly Holbrook (Bryce Dallas Howard), heading up Home Health Sanitation Initiative, which would basically limit their maids further by creating separate, nastier bathrooms for them to use. One day during a thunderstorm, Minny (Octavia Spencer) refuses to use the outhouse and ends up fired by Holbrook. Skeeter helps Minny find work with the aloof, bubbly Celia (Jessica Chastain), but not before Minny extracts revenge on Hilly in the form of a "chocolate" pie. From there, the war wages on and more and more maids sign on to help Skeeter write her book.
Viola Davis should and most likely will take home the Oscar for her role as Aibeleen, a woman who bottles in all of her struggles because she needs the job and because she genuinely loves all of the children she has raised; her worn face and deep eyes reflect a hundred lifetimes. I personally think the snubbed Keira Knightley (A Dangerous Method) should be taking home the gold in the supporting role, but if Spencer wins as the outspoken and often outrageous Minny, it will be deserved. As far as the white girls, I thought all were good and though Chastain got the nod, Howard killed as the villainous and un-redeemable Hilly Holbrook. Yes, the movie does the struggle-to-uplifting bit to death, and it gets its middle-class viewers to go "Well, I'm not racist because I can identify." But all in all it works. Sometimes you feel like leaving the theater with your heart all warm and gooey, and this one fills that niche admirably.
One of the things Ryan Gosling seems to get better than just about anyone in Hollywood right now is the notion of mystique. As campaign staffer Stephen Meyers, he is the kind of person that stays in poker face mode at all times, despite his somewhat obvious motives of rising to the top of the political heap. In comparison to his counterparts, though, he still shows flashes of idealism. The benefactor of his toils is Governor Mike Morris (George Clooney), all well-coiffed, slicked-back charm. As the movie begins, Morris seems to be the favorite in the Ohio Democratic primary, which as we all know from elections past is a hugely important state that often is decisive and swings momentum towards its winner. Meyers' boss is Paul Zara (Phillip Seymour Hoffman), a competitive type whose cynicism is only matched by his wits. Following a debate between Morris and his challenger, the opposing campaign manager Tom Duffy (Paul Giamatti) mentions a play to try and steal Meyers away from Zara and the Morris campaign. As Zara sputters and curses under his breath, Meyers appears a little intrigued by the offer. When Meyers begins to spend time with young intern Molly Stearns (Evan Rachel Wood) though, he uncovers some harsh truths and learns just how dirty politics can be (duh). Suddenly, he has a choice to make--does he keep things copacetic, or does he take his knowledge and use it as a springboard to relevance?
The movie functions as a pretty interesting character portrait of a young man coming to terms with reality, and feels feasible as a study of the cutthroat nature of American politics. George Clooney, who wrote and directed the film, understands that in order to win in America, you have to meet in the middle both morally and politically. Any time that Meyers recommends Morris to lean left, he pushes towards the center. Gosling and Clooney both turn in great performances as expected. While the ensemble cast is good, PSH is underutilized, and Marisa Tomei (as an obnoxious reporter) and Evan Rachel Wood are limited by the fact that they are women in a game that has always seemed to be for men. I found that aspect of the story to be a little shortsighted in its scope, and I also found that Meyers' path seemed a little too unobstructed. Nonetheless, The Ides of March proved to be a believable story in blemished and downright nasty culture.
#21 The Help
From the second this beast came steamrolling out of the Hollywood studio circuit and cultivating buzz, I thought "Oscar bait". I mean, just look at the story--starry-eyed college grad Skeeter Phelan (Emma Stone), looking for a big scoop to bolster her writing, decides to buck her high society upbringing and create a tell-all book about African-American maids and their hardships in the 1960s Jim-Crow south. I mean, come on. It practically checks off "uplifting", "underdog story" and "socially relevant" within the first fifteen minutes.
Bait or not, The Help is still a good flick, due almost entirely to its performances. The Help at the story's center is Aibeleen Clark (Viola Davis), Skeeter's neighbor's maid, who is more of a mother to the neighbor's children than their mother is. This, it turns out, is par for the course in the south, where wealthy "stay-at-home" moms are more busy drinking Arnold Palmers and talking shit about those who don't dress the part. None more so than the devilish Hilly Holbrook (Bryce Dallas Howard), heading up Home Health Sanitation Initiative, which would basically limit their maids further by creating separate, nastier bathrooms for them to use. One day during a thunderstorm, Minny (Octavia Spencer) refuses to use the outhouse and ends up fired by Holbrook. Skeeter helps Minny find work with the aloof, bubbly Celia (Jessica Chastain), but not before Minny extracts revenge on Hilly in the form of a "chocolate" pie. From there, the war wages on and more and more maids sign on to help Skeeter write her book.
Viola Davis should and most likely will take home the Oscar for her role as Aibeleen, a woman who bottles in all of her struggles because she needs the job and because she genuinely loves all of the children she has raised; her worn face and deep eyes reflect a hundred lifetimes. I personally think the snubbed Keira Knightley (A Dangerous Method) should be taking home the gold in the supporting role, but if Spencer wins as the outspoken and often outrageous Minny, it will be deserved. As far as the white girls, I thought all were good and though Chastain got the nod, Howard killed as the villainous and un-redeemable Hilly Holbrook. Yes, the movie does the struggle-to-uplifting bit to death, and it gets its middle-class viewers to go "Well, I'm not racist because I can identify." But all in all it works. Sometimes you feel like leaving the theater with your heart all warm and gooey, and this one fills that niche admirably.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
2011 Films: #23
#23 Young Adult
There's a part of me that thinks Diablo Cody has a little bit of the Woody Allen thing going on in that oftentimes the lead character in his films is a projection of himself, or part of himself, anyway. Since Annie Hall, Woody-lite has been played by Jason Bigg, Larry David (equally Jewish and neurotic) and most recently Owen Wilson. That said, Cody herself was not a pregnant teen (Juno) or a possessed cheerleader (Jennifer's Body), but YA feels like it could have a few twinges of autobiography in it.
Like Cody, Charlize Theron's Mavis Gary is a divorced writer living in Minneapolis. She generally smokes and drinks her way to passing out face-first alongside her purse dog. Her most successful venture to date is a young adult book series in the vain of Sweet Valley High. Finding herself unmotivated and ducking deadlines, she returns to her hometown of Mercury, Minnesota for a mini-retreat. Cody's script, like Juno, holds nothing back in waging war on small town Minnesota, but whereas in Juno it was kitsch, here it is just mean-spirited. Much of that comes from Mavis' queen bee outlook; she is less than thrilled to be home. Pounding shots at a local watering hole, she runs into ex-classmate Matt Freehauf (an excellent Patton Oswalt), who walks with a cane due to a high school incident. Since Mavis is still stuck in high school, she blows him off completely at first before realizing she can use his help in achieving her ulterior motive--winning back her high school sweetheart Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson). Never mind that he is married with a child--when you're as important as Mavis Gary is to the Mercury community, you can get whatever you want.
Or so she thinks. Theron is absolutely acerbic and brutal to the point of cringing, but more importantly she makes Mavis' inability to move on from the past feel believable. Patrick Wilson is great as a guy who inadvertently lets his ex in more than he means to, and Elisabeth Reaser is cute to the point of making you want to vomit as his wife; she plays drums in a band of all mothers called Nipple Confusion. And Patton Oswalt's Matt provides the voice of reason and harsh reality to Mavis' delusions and as such, the scenes between Oswalt and Theron are far and away the best. This is the second team-up for Cody and director Jason Reitman, and they again prove formidable, giving the audience a dark and often hilarious look at a woman who doesn't even realize she is unraveling. Even if she does--she's not about to admit it.
Happy Valen times!
There's a part of me that thinks Diablo Cody has a little bit of the Woody Allen thing going on in that oftentimes the lead character in his films is a projection of himself, or part of himself, anyway. Since Annie Hall, Woody-lite has been played by Jason Bigg, Larry David (equally Jewish and neurotic) and most recently Owen Wilson. That said, Cody herself was not a pregnant teen (Juno) or a possessed cheerleader (Jennifer's Body), but YA feels like it could have a few twinges of autobiography in it.
Like Cody, Charlize Theron's Mavis Gary is a divorced writer living in Minneapolis. She generally smokes and drinks her way to passing out face-first alongside her purse dog. Her most successful venture to date is a young adult book series in the vain of Sweet Valley High. Finding herself unmotivated and ducking deadlines, she returns to her hometown of Mercury, Minnesota for a mini-retreat. Cody's script, like Juno, holds nothing back in waging war on small town Minnesota, but whereas in Juno it was kitsch, here it is just mean-spirited. Much of that comes from Mavis' queen bee outlook; she is less than thrilled to be home. Pounding shots at a local watering hole, she runs into ex-classmate Matt Freehauf (an excellent Patton Oswalt), who walks with a cane due to a high school incident. Since Mavis is still stuck in high school, she blows him off completely at first before realizing she can use his help in achieving her ulterior motive--winning back her high school sweetheart Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson). Never mind that he is married with a child--when you're as important as Mavis Gary is to the Mercury community, you can get whatever you want.
Or so she thinks. Theron is absolutely acerbic and brutal to the point of cringing, but more importantly she makes Mavis' inability to move on from the past feel believable. Patrick Wilson is great as a guy who inadvertently lets his ex in more than he means to, and Elisabeth Reaser is cute to the point of making you want to vomit as his wife; she plays drums in a band of all mothers called Nipple Confusion. And Patton Oswalt's Matt provides the voice of reason and harsh reality to Mavis' delusions and as such, the scenes between Oswalt and Theron are far and away the best. This is the second team-up for Cody and director Jason Reitman, and they again prove formidable, giving the audience a dark and often hilarious look at a woman who doesn't even realize she is unraveling. Even if she does--she's not about to admit it.
Happy Valen times!
Monday, February 13, 2012
2011 Films: #24
#24 Margin Call
In the wee hours of the morning sometime in 2008, Peter Sullivan (Heroes Zachary Quinto, this time sans Spock ears or the ability to telekinetically cut people's foreheads) takes the USB drive given to him by his fired boss Eric(Stanley Tucci) and opens the report that he had been working on leading up to his termination. What Sullivan discovers is terrifying--the firm is on track to sink big time if their trading continues at its current rate and they will owe much more than they are worth. Yes, this is a dramatization of the hours leading up to the 2008 financial crisis; yes, this takes place at a mortgage securities firm; and yes, by dumbing it down for those of us who know less than nothing about finance, it makes a hard and confusing topic not only understandable, but kind of exciting as well.
From the minute Sullivan figures out the implications, the clock starts ticking to get out fast and save their futures/asses. The news is so huge that it gets all the way to Sullivan's boss's boss's boss's boss in a matter of an hour or less. He calls his buddy Seth (Gossip Girl's Penn Badgley) and his supervisor Will (creepy albino priest vengeful angel Paul Bettany) back in so that they can give him a second opinion. They proceed to hit the panic button and in comes Will's boss Sam (Kevin Spacey) and Sam's boss Jared (Simon Baker) and eventually, via helicopter, everyone's boss John (Jeremy Irons). No one is quite ready to dole out the blame, nor are they ready to give up their Grey Goose and Porsche convertible lifestyles. While Will and the youngsters go off to track down Eric at his Brooklyn home in an attempt to re-hire him, the higher-ups buckle down and try to plot their escape plan. Most conflicted is the veteran Sam, who knows that John and Jared are essentially asking him to put together a fire sale of worthless properties. First-timer J.C. Chandor nails the nuances, partially because his father worked at Merill Lynch for 30 some-odd years. There are some truly amazing shots of New York from their world above the plebes, and while John eats his world-class breakfast just like any other morning, Sarah (Demi Moore) gazes out onto the skyline as if it was a series of giant glass and metal dominoes. The movie falters a little in that it has an emergency board meeting or two too many; it resonates most in the one-on-one conversations. The cast is great (Kevin Spacey and Jeremy Irons? Come on!) and the dialogue generally flows. Margin Call is interesting, but more than that, it is important. Audiences will feel conflicted. On the one hand, we get a close look at the selfish pricks that allowed this to happen and chucked us into this mess. And on the other hand, we get to see that these selfish pricks are also quite human.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
2011 Films: #25
#25 Super 8
In a year of love letters to old cinema (The Artist, Hugo), director J.J. Abrams and producer Steven Spielberg released Super 8. Unlike the other two, this romanticizes the Kodak Super 8 camera and film technology, released in the late 1960s. Abrams, who also wrote the film, remembers fondly making his very first films on his parents Super 8. "There's something about looking at analog movies that is infinitely more powerful than digital," he said in an interview leading up to the release of the film. Super 8, in both influence and actual involvement, feels very Spielberg-ian. It's got the "where the hell are the parents?" childhood adventure vibe of the Goonies and the otherworldly obsession of ET/Close Encounters/War of the Worlds. Make no mistake--it's and Abrams' project, but it has Spielberg all over it.
Super 8 is set in Ohio in 1979 and follows a group of kids trying to make a Super 8 horror film to submit to a film fest in Cleveland. Our main adolescent protagonists are Joe (Joel Courtney), a wide-eyed wanderer with his heart on his sleeve; Charles (Riley Griffiths), the bossy film director; Alice (Elle Fanning), the muse and all-around boyhood crush; and the lovable goofball Cary (Ryan Lee). Joe's mother has just been killed in a crash and his father (Friday Night Lights' Kyle Chandler) is a sheriff who has absolutely no idea how to deal with their mutual grief. Joe, on the other hand, finds a distraction in the form of helping on the film (meant to be a short piece on zombies), and drooling over Alice. The night they go to shoot the movie, they end up capturing a nasty train crash, full of awesome explosions and train cars stacking on train cars. Little do they know, they've uncovered a bizarre army conspiracy.
The movie had some fantastic sequences, and the kids kept up a good and often believable chemistry. The dialogue between them was fun as well, using 70s kids slang like "mint" But when the dust settles on the conspiracy plot, it feels contrived and though its meant to tug at the heartstrings, it ultimately doesn't. Still, a worthwhile flick that fit perfectly into the summer blockbuster genre.
In a year of love letters to old cinema (The Artist, Hugo), director J.J. Abrams and producer Steven Spielberg released Super 8. Unlike the other two, this romanticizes the Kodak Super 8 camera and film technology, released in the late 1960s. Abrams, who also wrote the film, remembers fondly making his very first films on his parents Super 8. "There's something about looking at analog movies that is infinitely more powerful than digital," he said in an interview leading up to the release of the film. Super 8, in both influence and actual involvement, feels very Spielberg-ian. It's got the "where the hell are the parents?" childhood adventure vibe of the Goonies and the otherworldly obsession of ET/Close Encounters/War of the Worlds. Make no mistake--it's and Abrams' project, but it has Spielberg all over it.
Super 8 is set in Ohio in 1979 and follows a group of kids trying to make a Super 8 horror film to submit to a film fest in Cleveland. Our main adolescent protagonists are Joe (Joel Courtney), a wide-eyed wanderer with his heart on his sleeve; Charles (Riley Griffiths), the bossy film director; Alice (Elle Fanning), the muse and all-around boyhood crush; and the lovable goofball Cary (Ryan Lee). Joe's mother has just been killed in a crash and his father (Friday Night Lights' Kyle Chandler) is a sheriff who has absolutely no idea how to deal with their mutual grief. Joe, on the other hand, finds a distraction in the form of helping on the film (meant to be a short piece on zombies), and drooling over Alice. The night they go to shoot the movie, they end up capturing a nasty train crash, full of awesome explosions and train cars stacking on train cars. Little do they know, they've uncovered a bizarre army conspiracy.
The movie had some fantastic sequences, and the kids kept up a good and often believable chemistry. The dialogue between them was fun as well, using 70s kids slang like "mint" But when the dust settles on the conspiracy plot, it feels contrived and though its meant to tug at the heartstrings, it ultimately doesn't. Still, a worthwhile flick that fit perfectly into the summer blockbuster genre.
Friday, February 10, 2012
2011 Film: #26
#26 Mission Impossible: "Protocolo Fantasma"
I saw this film while on vacation in Barcelona. There were posters everywhere on the subway with above Spanish title. I made up a chant. It was in the style of a "Let's! Go! Red!" It went like this:
PROTO COLO FANTASMA!
PROTO COLO FANTASMA!
PROTO COLO FANTASMA!
The friends I was staying with awoke to the sounds of this chant in front of their bedroom at around 1:30 pm on New Year's Day. I make an awesome houseguest.
Upon its release and review, Protocolo Fantasma immediately received the "best of the franchise" tag. I am inclined to agree; even with Phillip Seymour Hoffman's star turn as the badass Owen Davian, the JJ Abrams-helmed MI3 is not quite as good as this one. International super agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) starts the film in Moscow prison. When one of their top agents gets axed, the IMF, led by Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg) and Jane Carter (Paula Patton), sets up and springs Ethan from prison in a rather sweet action sequence. From there, the newly formed IMF squad tries to infiltrate the Kremlin (of course) and capture files on code name Colbalt, a would-be nuclear terrorist. A bomb goes off, everything goes to crap, and the trio escapes. They are blamed for the attack and thus have to institute "protocolo fantasma" (ghost protocol), meaning go completely off the grid. They are joined apprehensively by new IMF intelligence agent Brandt (Jeremy Renner) and follow the Cobalt trail to Dubai. MI4:PF is directed by Brad Bird, an animation veteran who directed The Incredibles and Ratatouille and his vision and experience lend themselves well to much of the big, crazy action in Dubai. There are of course plenty of almost-deaths--most notably the incredibly rad running-down-the-skyscraper stunt that Mr. Cruise performed himself--and plenty of IMF gadgets and gizmos that keep them ahead of the game. Dubai is a giant, futuristic city, perfect for an action flick of enormous magnitude. Total escapist fun.
Top 25 coming up soon!
I saw this film while on vacation in Barcelona. There were posters everywhere on the subway with above Spanish title. I made up a chant. It was in the style of a "Let's! Go! Red!" It went like this:
PROTO COLO FANTASMA!
PROTO COLO FANTASMA!
PROTO COLO FANTASMA!
The friends I was staying with awoke to the sounds of this chant in front of their bedroom at around 1:30 pm on New Year's Day. I make an awesome houseguest.
Upon its release and review, Protocolo Fantasma immediately received the "best of the franchise" tag. I am inclined to agree; even with Phillip Seymour Hoffman's star turn as the badass Owen Davian, the JJ Abrams-helmed MI3 is not quite as good as this one. International super agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) starts the film in Moscow prison. When one of their top agents gets axed, the IMF, led by Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg) and Jane Carter (Paula Patton), sets up and springs Ethan from prison in a rather sweet action sequence. From there, the newly formed IMF squad tries to infiltrate the Kremlin (of course) and capture files on code name Colbalt, a would-be nuclear terrorist. A bomb goes off, everything goes to crap, and the trio escapes. They are blamed for the attack and thus have to institute "protocolo fantasma" (ghost protocol), meaning go completely off the grid. They are joined apprehensively by new IMF intelligence agent Brandt (Jeremy Renner) and follow the Cobalt trail to Dubai. MI4:PF is directed by Brad Bird, an animation veteran who directed The Incredibles and Ratatouille and his vision and experience lend themselves well to much of the big, crazy action in Dubai. There are of course plenty of almost-deaths--most notably the incredibly rad running-down-the-skyscraper stunt that Mr. Cruise performed himself--and plenty of IMF gadgets and gizmos that keep them ahead of the game. Dubai is a giant, futuristic city, perfect for an action flick of enormous magnitude. Total escapist fun.
Top 25 coming up soon!
2011 Film: #28 and #27
#28 A Dangerous Method
This is one of those films that proves why I am not quite in "real film critic" territory--one critic in the Twin Cities had it as his #1 of the year. It's a movie I respect the hell out of, absolutely, but it did not do as much as I had hoped for me considering its unquestionable pedigree. Director David Cronenberg (Eastern Promises, the cult favorite Crash) has a flair for the dark and psychological, so the pairing feels wine and cheese-like in how obvious it is. The film follows pyschoanalyst Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender, ubiquitous in 2011) in the very beginning stages of his work, observing and working on a "talking cure" for Sabrina (Keira Knightley) and forming a relationship with eventual mentor Sigmund Freud (Viggo Mortensen in his third team-up with Cronenberg). Sabrina is prone to strange, almost possessed attacks of bad memories, and Knightley--who should have gotten an Oscar nod for this one--physically nails it, shuddering, spittling, and sticking out her lower mandible like an upset orangutan. Sabrina and Jung's relationship becomes dangerously complex in the process, and as a result, Jung seeks the help of Freud in one of the film's many effective voiceover during letter-writing sections. Mortensen is highly entertaining as a booze-swilling, cigar-smoking Freud and eventually becomes interested in helping Sabrina as well, thus leading to a dangerously complex relationship between he and Jung. There are some very well-thought out shots and costumes, but the highlights in this slowish film are the three lead performances, with a great Fassbender rounding out the trio as a man stuck between his feelings and his professional morality.
#27 Rise of the Planet of the Apes
With his work in Apes and Tintin, Andy Serkis has gone on to prove he once again belongs in a category of his own. He is the King Midas of motion-capture technology. In the Lord of the Rings series, he brought pathos to an unlikeable character, and in King Kong, he found a way to humanize the legendary creature. Ditto goes for his performance as Caesar in the Planet of the Apes re-boot. A good friend of mine worked as assistant to director Rupert Wyatt, whose only previous credit for a feature was a crime drama called The Escapist. Here, he helmed a good reimagining of the series, whose previous claim to fame was possibly the best line of all time in Charlton Heston's "Get your stinking paws off of me, you damn dirty ape (recycled in this one, awesome)." James Franco is Will Rodman, a scientist who watches a young ape show remarkable results after receiving a new drug and then go off the wall. This ape's son (Serkis) is hiding in the wings and rather than kill him like his boss has requested, Will brings him home to his father (John Lithgow), who is living with Alzheimer's and takes an immediate shine to the ape, naming him Caesar. Things are copacetic until a neighborhood incident gets the authorities called on Caesar, and he is forced into a primate sanctuary. Caesar struggles to fit in with the established apes and deals with the abusive, idiot sons of the sanctuary owner, especially Dodge (Tom Felton, better known for playing Draco Malfoy). The plans for an uprising begin. The film is a lot of fun to watch, but I can't say enough about Serkis as Caesar. He captures perfectly the confusion, fear and eventual rage that come with adolescence. He makes Caesar relatable, almost human.
This is one of those films that proves why I am not quite in "real film critic" territory--one critic in the Twin Cities had it as his #1 of the year. It's a movie I respect the hell out of, absolutely, but it did not do as much as I had hoped for me considering its unquestionable pedigree. Director David Cronenberg (Eastern Promises, the cult favorite Crash) has a flair for the dark and psychological, so the pairing feels wine and cheese-like in how obvious it is. The film follows pyschoanalyst Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender, ubiquitous in 2011) in the very beginning stages of his work, observing and working on a "talking cure" for Sabrina (Keira Knightley) and forming a relationship with eventual mentor Sigmund Freud (Viggo Mortensen in his third team-up with Cronenberg). Sabrina is prone to strange, almost possessed attacks of bad memories, and Knightley--who should have gotten an Oscar nod for this one--physically nails it, shuddering, spittling, and sticking out her lower mandible like an upset orangutan. Sabrina and Jung's relationship becomes dangerously complex in the process, and as a result, Jung seeks the help of Freud in one of the film's many effective voiceover during letter-writing sections. Mortensen is highly entertaining as a booze-swilling, cigar-smoking Freud and eventually becomes interested in helping Sabrina as well, thus leading to a dangerously complex relationship between he and Jung. There are some very well-thought out shots and costumes, but the highlights in this slowish film are the three lead performances, with a great Fassbender rounding out the trio as a man stuck between his feelings and his professional morality.
#27 Rise of the Planet of the Apes
With his work in Apes and Tintin, Andy Serkis has gone on to prove he once again belongs in a category of his own. He is the King Midas of motion-capture technology. In the Lord of the Rings series, he brought pathos to an unlikeable character, and in King Kong, he found a way to humanize the legendary creature. Ditto goes for his performance as Caesar in the Planet of the Apes re-boot. A good friend of mine worked as assistant to director Rupert Wyatt, whose only previous credit for a feature was a crime drama called The Escapist. Here, he helmed a good reimagining of the series, whose previous claim to fame was possibly the best line of all time in Charlton Heston's "Get your stinking paws off of me, you damn dirty ape (recycled in this one, awesome)." James Franco is Will Rodman, a scientist who watches a young ape show remarkable results after receiving a new drug and then go off the wall. This ape's son (Serkis) is hiding in the wings and rather than kill him like his boss has requested, Will brings him home to his father (John Lithgow), who is living with Alzheimer's and takes an immediate shine to the ape, naming him Caesar. Things are copacetic until a neighborhood incident gets the authorities called on Caesar, and he is forced into a primate sanctuary. Caesar struggles to fit in with the established apes and deals with the abusive, idiot sons of the sanctuary owner, especially Dodge (Tom Felton, better known for playing Draco Malfoy). The plans for an uprising begin. The film is a lot of fun to watch, but I can't say enough about Serkis as Caesar. He captures perfectly the confusion, fear and eventual rage that come with adolescence. He makes Caesar relatable, almost human.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)