REVIEW: Man of Steel

This is a fantasy. A careless product of wild imagination. And my good friends, Man of Steel is all the better for it.

For months, I actively worried about this movie. The last one, Superman Returns, was better than most people say it is, but those who complained it was too meditative and ponderous had a point.  When I realized that Zack Snyder was directing the new movie, I swallowed hard. I had greatly enjoyed his debut film, the Dawn of the Dead remake, but each successive film got worse, culminating in the juvenile rampage called Sucker Punch. And yet, I held out hope because Christopher Nolan was producing and co-writing the story. Maybe he would keep Snyder's excesses in check.

As it turns out, he hasn't. Man of Steel bears all the hallmarks of Snyder's hyperactive approach, and if anything, his direction is wilder than ever. But what's different this time is that the material actually supports and merits the over-the-top style. This is a film about what would happen to Earth if a platoon of Kryptonian soldiers decided to invade, and Superman put up a fight. The planet gets shellacking of absolutely immense proportions

But that's what woud happen in a Superman story with ultra-high stakes. No other movie has captured the adrenaline rush of a superhero story with such unbridled abandon. Drew McWeeny of Hitfix raised my eyebrows when he said the action made The Avengers look quaint. He wasn't kidding. Man of Steel left me breathless and exhilarated in a way I haven't felt in a very long time. THIS is the kind of gargantuan action that Michael Bay has been trying, and mostly failing to mount for decades. Snyder choreographs his action with just enough control that I was always dizzy, but never lost.

Even more importantly, the action, powerful though it is, does not snuff out the drama. As they did in Batman Begins, Nolan and co-writer David S. Goyer move forwards and backwards in time to show how the past influences the present. Superman Returns had the noble intent of exploring the loneliness of a god-like alien, but became lugubrious along the way. In Man of Steel, we more directly see the cause and effect as young Clark wants to use his powers but can't, giving Superman's conflict the emotional import it needs. At the same time, Nolan and Goyer add novel tweak the Superman mythology, such as making Kal-El the rare natural birth on Krypton - and making his parents criminals in the process.

The actors, by and large, are terrific. It's no surprise that Michael Shannon (General Zod) plays menace well, and Amy Adams (Lois Lane) elevates every project she does with her intelligent sunniness. Diane Lane is somewhat underused as Martha Kent, but Kevin Costner has his best role in years, as does Russell Crowe, playing Superman's father.

Then there's Henry Cavill in the title role. Ever since Christopher Reeve left his indelible mark, other actors have been unable to escape his shadow.That's because none played Clark Kent as well as Reeve. Playing Superman isn't so hard, but making the Kent disguise believable is.  So Cavill, for the most part, doesn't try. This story doesn't require it. He brings the appropriate physicality to the role without overdosing on moodiness.  How well he plays Clark will be best explored in future movies, but I'm confident he'll pull it off.

That said, when the credits rolled, I could only wonder how the sequel could possibly match the sheer scale of this movie. I'm very anxious to find out, when the first movie is the best one I've seen so far in 2013.

GRADE: A+

REVIEW: The Great Gatsby

In my younger and more vulnerable years, I might have felt more generous toward Baz Luhrmann's wild take on F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic novel. But as it stands, it's more like The Good Gatsby.

It's certainly more praiseworthy than most critics have said, but when the best praise I can give it is in comparison to the 1974 film, that's not saying enough. Back then, The Great Gatsby wasn't so much filmed as it was embalmed. With the lead roles miscast and a leaden pace, the whole thing felt as stiff as a starched collar. It had no pulse.

Baz Luhrmann's Gatsby certainly has a pulse, but it's an erratic one. At first, it's mesmerizing. The director's florid visuals explode off the screen with quite literal fireworks, while Gershwin and Beyonce (together at last) blare forth on the soundtrack. His 1920s roar with blinding colors and dizzying camera tricks. The use of 3D is enveloping as our point of view careens from New York's skyscrapers and zooms through the city streets. Moulin Gatsby, anyone?

So the problem isn't so much that it's over the top. With Luhrmmann at the controls, that's a given. The eye candy certainly fits the themes of putting on false fronts. But eventually, the stylistics become wearying.

In Luhrmann's past movies, the wild visuals seemed to flow from the material. The heated emotions of Romeo + Juliet made a wild style fitting. Moulin Rouge was such a unique world, it couldn't help but be delirious. This time, Lurhmann's hyperactivity feels grafted on to the material, and it doesn't always reflect Fitzgerald's graceful prose.

Case in point: in one shot we see a billboard with the familiar book cover art of the eyes looming over the city. That might have been clever if used once or twice, but Luhrmann beats us over the head with it like a desperate Cliffs Notes writer. His style makes Gatsby seem more like Charles Foster Kane, an error the 1974 movie also committed.

And yet, I still recommend Luhrmann's Gatsby, largely because of the actors, who sell the material. Leonardo DiCaprio's Gatsby looms larger than life but is touchingly vulnerable. No longer is he merely a romantic cypher. Joel Edgerton makes for a genuinely menacing Tom, and with Carey Mulligan, I finally understood why Gatsby made such a fuss over her. Only Tobey Maguire disappoints as the rather dull narrator.

I am thankful that we finally have a cinematic Great Gatsby that is worth seeing. I only wish that it was as good as it could have been.

 

GRADE: B

 

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The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Probably the best compliment I can give Peter Jackson's first Hobbit movie is that I now understand the need for two movies. However, I remain unconvinced of the need for three.

My eyebrows raised when it was announced The Hobbit would be split in two, considering The Hobbit is shorter than any of the Lord of the Rings books, and each Rings book only got one movie. (Maybe one and a half if you count the extended editions.) Extending it into three movies makes it sound like the third movie ought to be subtitled, "Journey to the Center of the Wallet."

On the basis of this first movie, however, I will say the time was well spent, if somewhat overspent. Jackson crams so much detail into the story that at times he weighs it down, especially in the first hour. Most of the dwarves blended into each other, and I could have done without quite so many songs. And since we're taking all this time to drink in all this detail, why doesn't Jackson explain why Gandalf can only super-bomb a horde of ugly things only once?

It seems like Jackson and his co-writers Fran Walsh, Phillipa Boyens and Guillermo del Toro made the movie for Tolkein geeks like them - people who know can speak the languages and who know the thread counts of the costumes. If the rest of us got bored, we'd have to grin and bear it.

Fortunately, we don't have to bear it for too long. Once everyone leaves the shire, the movie picks up the pace, and Jackson's fluid camerawork is more exciting than ever. The viewpoint swoops and ducks to breathtaking effect, particularly in a battle between two giant stone mountains. Adding to the drama is the clever foreshadowing of the evil that will come into full flower later.

And even the quieter scenes become more effective in the second half. The game of riddles between Bilbo and Gollum plays wonderfully, alternating between laughs and chills. Gollum seems more alive and present than ever before. As excellent as the effects work was in the Rings movies, there still tended to be a slight remove between the digital creature and the real actors. Here, any blur between reality and fantasy vanishes into thin air.

Speaking of blur, or lack of same, I saw the movie in the much-discussed new format of 48 frames per second, double the normal rate. Theoretically, the idea is to improve the clarity of the images by eliminating motion blur, but sometimes it's clear to a fault. Indoor scenes, with less camera movement have that eerie "soap opera" effect where it looks too pristine to be true. In action scenes and long outdoor shots, however, the effect is indeed immersive. I would have to see the film in standard format to make a thorough comparison.

Luckily, the best parts of the film are good enough for a repeat viewing, especially in 3D. It's the best use of the format I've seen, along with Hugo and Avatar. Like Bilbo Baggins, I went in with fear, but came out glad that I went - even if I was a little worse for the wear.

 

GRADE: B+

 

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REVIEW: Lincoln

Most people would rank Abraham Lincoln at or near the top of the roster of US Presidents. I would rank Steven Spielberg's Lincoln at or near the top of the roster of this year's movies.

And yet, it may not be quite the film people are expecting. It is not a Civil War epic. The ads prominently feature battle scenes, but those scenes are contained within the first five minutes of the film. If you want battles, watch Glory.

Nor is the movie truly a Lincoln biopic, despite its title. It does not follow the journey of the man from humble Illinois lawyer to mythical president. That story has been ably told before, via Abe Lincoln in Illinois and John Ford's Young Mr. Lincoln. The new movie focuses solely on the last few months of the president's life, and, more importantly, his battle to pass the 13th amendment that will abolish slavery.

And yet, Lincoln himself is very much front and center, because that particular battle embodies the man and his legacy. By focusing on this sliver of the man's life, Tony Kushner's screenplay illuminates Lincoln as he has never been before.

This is due in no small part to the masterful portrayal by Daniel Day-Lewis, who is now the definitive cinematic Lincoln. The actor is famous for burying himself in his roles, but he has never done so with greater impact than he has here. Daniel Plainview (There Will Be Blood) did not make me forget Bill the Butcher (Gangs of New York). Bill the Butcher did not make me forget Christy Brown (My Left Foot). But Abraham Lincoln very much made me forget Daniel Plainview, Bill the Butcher and Christy Brown. The actor reveals the president to be a Rubik's Cube of a man, a puzzle that is fascinating no matter what side he displays.

But Day-Lewis is not the only one who disappears into the film. So does Steven Spielberg. Lincoln is unlike any film the director has made before. He delved into this same time period in the underrated Amistad, but that film had visual sweep. Even Schindler's List, which was considered a major departure for Spielberg, had bravura sequences.

Spielberg keeps showy visuals and camera movements to a bare minimum. More than anything else, his new film is a chamber piece. It's essentially two hours-plus of people talking. But that talk crackles with energy and gamesmanship. The film means to make us a witness to history, and it's a riveting master class.

Spielberg is not typically thought of as an actor's director, but he has assembled a brilliant cast with a multitude of well-known names: David Strathairn, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Jackie Earle Haley and Hal Holbrook, to name just a few. Chief among the supporting players is Tommy Lee Jones as abolitionist Congressman Thadeus Stevens. He passionately believes in outlawing slavery but has to swallow hard when he must compromise his principles and not do it in quite the way he wants. That issue is more than a little timely when partisan gridlock is the order of the day.

The film doesn't conquer all its own problems. I found the material involving Mary Lincoln (Sally Field) a distraction, as was the overextended ending. Spielberg has problems sticking his landings. It's no spoiler to say the film ends with Lincoln's assassination, but showing it is unnecessary. What's more important is what historian Shelby Foote meant when he said that "everything Lincoln did was calculated for effect."

That effect resonates even more thanks to this film.

GRADE: A

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REVIEW: Skyfall

How great is Skyfall?

At the packed screening I saw, the movie got applause no less than three times.

In one astonishing long, unbroken shot, Javier Bardem takes the mantel of best Bond villain of all time, and never lets go.

It's the best-looking Bond movie bar none, brilliantly shot by the great Roger Deakins, who lenses most of the Coen brothers' movies.

The action scenes are fantastic, with Stuart Baird's punchy editing obliterating the memory of the confused blur that was Quantum of Solace.

Daniel Craig proves that the older and more rugged you get as Bond, the better.

The excellent screenplay by Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and John Logan, delves into Bond's early years in a way no other Bond film has.

The movie blends new technology with good old-fashioned ruthlessness, deconstructing the Bond mythos much the same way Christopher Nolan did in his Batman movies.

It's a bit light on Bond girls, and I missed that element, but only one Bond girl really matters here is Judi Dench's M. Enough said.

Q is back, played with just the the right touch of brashness by Ben Wishaw.

Another Bond favorite is back too. Again, enough said.

In 1999, director Sam Mendes made a film called American Beauty that so entranced me, I turned right around to see it again the same weekend.

In 2012, director Sam Mendes made a film that so thrilled me, I was disappointed I couldn't see it again immediately, since I saw it early.

How great is Skyfall?

It's one of the very best films of the the year.

GRADE: A+

 

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REVIEW: Wreck-It Ralph

INSERT COINS

_ ONE READER  _ TWO READERS

GO!

Don't look now, but Disney just beat Pixar at its own game.

Wreck-it Ralph not only is terrific fun, it's the best movie made by Walt Disney Feature Animation since its glory days in the 90s. Heartfelt, visually dazzling and wonderfully clever, the movie tops such recent Disney efforts as Tangled and Pixar's Brave - both films I very much enjoyed -  but with reservations. Reservations are absent this time.

That's largely because, in a way, Disney has truly begun to assimilate Pixar and its storytelling techniques. All of Disney's feature films since Meet the Robinsons have been overseen to some degree by Pixar guru John Lasseter. But this is the first time Disney has truly mastered the mix of humor and heart that makes Pixar so potent. I expected to have fun, but not this much fun.

Like the Toy Story films, Wreck it Ralph takes kind of a behind-the-scenes look at a very familiar world. This time, it's the world of 80s/90s video games. Many people have said the game in the movie, Fix-It Felix, resembles Donkey Kong, and it does, but it most reminded me of another 80s game called Crazy Climber, the first game I can recall that talked. Your climber character said "Ouch" when people dropped things on its head, and then screamed "Oh nooooooo!" when you finally fell off.

I digress, but this movie was a nostalgic blast that constantly reminded me of games of yore. But even better, that conceit isn't just a gimmick. It's a doorway to a well-thought-out story where Wreck-It Ralph (John C. Reilly) tires of being a villain and jumps to other games to be more heroic. One of the other games is called Sugar Rush, which is like Candy Lane gone delectably berserk. There, Ralph meets the impetuous but endearing Vanellope (Sarah Silverman) who enlists Ralph's help to race in a go-kart game.

Wreck-It-Ralph blends the best of its Disney and Pixar fathers. Ralph's quest to be loved is not unlike the "I Want" quest of Disney princesses. And the relationship between Ralph and Vanellope is like a slightly more mature take on Sully and Boo in Monsters Inc. And just as Pixar made Larry the Cable Guy endearing, Wreck It Ralph pulls a similar miracle here with Sarah Silverman, who normally annoys me, but utterly won me over here.  For the first I laughed at loud at Oreos, and more than once, I had to adjust my 3D glasses because I had something wet in my eye.

So yes, it's emotional and flashy, in all the best ways. All the gameplay will appeal to boys, but Vanellope is a much stronger character than the ads let on, so girls will love it too.

Most movies based on video games falter because it's like watching someone else play. This one scores because it lets us all in - even a guy like me, who has  never owned a video game console. Not even an Atari 2600.

GRADE: A

REVIEW OVER

REVIEW: Argo

Argo lies beautifully while telling the truth. That's what makes it the best film of the year thus far.

Usually, when a movie declares that it's "based on a true story," it already feels patently false. That phrase is usually code for, "We based the idea on reality, but then made the rest of it up." Argo is based on the declassified true story of a CIA agent, Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck) who concocted a harebrained scheme to free six Americans from Iran during the 1979-1981 hostage crisis. He actually told the Iranians they were a Canadian filmmaking crew scouting locations for a cheeseball sci-fi movie. I defy even the most imaginative novel writer to hatch such a plot.

Working from a great screenplay by Chris Terrio, Ben Affleck cements his status as a great actor-director. Showing great promise with his debut, Gone Baby Gone, then skillfully refining his craft with The Town, Affleck progresses to his most impressive feat of all: making a crackling thriller-comedy.

Yes, comedy. Of course, there's nothing funny at all about the Iranian hostage crisis. But there is something morbidly amusing about how this rescue unfolded. Consider that one of the operatives was makeup man John Chambers, who won an Oscar for Planet of the Apes. He's played by the always terrific John Goodman, who cracks that the target audience of a movie is "people with eyes." Matching Goodman zinger for zinger is Alan Arkin as producer Lester Siegel, who boasts that he knows Warren Beatty because he "took a leak next to him at the Golden Globes."

Juxtaposing these wiseacres with a perilous life or death rescue mission could have derailed the movie, but Affleck masterfully balances the tones. Not only does he shoot logistically complex sequences with painstaking historical detail, but he knows just when to release the tension with a well-timed joke. And in so doing, Affleck gets inside the wonder of movies as a whole. He shows how the movies are so captivating, the allure of even a fake one is enough to deter hostile Iranian guards. I daresay the mix of suspense and humor is on the level of Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove. I can only applaud a movie that throws in a reference to Muppets Statler and Waldorf.

Comparing Affleck to Kubrick is high praise indeed, but that's just how impressive Affleck's skills have become. I've already seen the movie twice, projected digitally both times. Yet Affleck fills the opening titles with the kind of speckles you'd see on a movie print from the 70s. Those don't appear in digital projection unless you put them there. So even the technical BS is a marvel. Maybe Argo fudges a few details to pump up the drama, but when the very subject of a movie is the art of lying, such deceit is commendable.



GRADE: A+

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REVIEW: Frankenweenie

Going into Tim Burton's Frankenweenie scared me - and not for the right reasons.

Burton has been in a slump of late. Alice in Wonderland was hugely popular, but I couldn't see why. I thought it was cluttered whimsy that tried too hard to make sense of nonsense. HIs last film, Dark Shadows, was even worse, representing the nadir of his career. He hadn't made an A-range film since Sleepy Hollow. And his last foray into animation, Corpse Bride, was underwhelming too.

Still, I took solace in the fact that instead of grafting his twisted sensibility onto someone else's idea, Burton adapted himself. Frankenweenie began life as an animated short that got Burton, a onetime Disney animator, Hollywood attention. Now he's expanded it into a feature - and thankfully, it's kind of a return to form.

I'd stop well short of calling it a great movie. As is so often the case, Burton excels at creating worlds but stumbles creating fully realized characters. The lead character, a young Victor Frankenstein, is sweet but dull, at least for a kid who reanimates his own dog. And the other kids aren't terribly interesting either. The most fun character is the spooky science teacher, wonderfully voiced by Martin Landau, whom Burton directed to an Oscar for playing Bela Lugosi in Ed Wood.

Since the kids are rather plain, it took me a while to develop rooting interest in the story. Then, thankfully, things get really wacky when the other kids try to replicate Burton's experiment, with wonderfully bizarre results. I don't want to give away too many visuals, but I'll give you this clue - the nastiest Sea Monkeys you've ever seen.

It also helps that this material is obviously close to Burton's heart, making the emotional pull stronger as the movie goes along. And I can't help but enjoy a stop-motion animated film in black and white. Frakenweenie isn't the great movie it could have been, but it at least gives me hope that Burton's career is alive ... It's alive, it's ALIVE!

 

GRADE: B

 

PS: The 3D here is decent, but inessential. You won't miss anything if you see it flat.

 

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REVIEW: Pitch Perfect

They say that the quickest way to a man's heart is through his stomach. Not me. The way to this man's heart is through his ears. If a talented actress can also sing, any crush I already have only intensifies. I already had a crush on Anna Kendrick. Turns out she sings quite well. Ergo, Pitch Perfect was fun for my ears.

Yet, returning to some semblance of level-headedness that I abandoned in my lead paragraph, I must confess that Kendrick and the other actresses aside, Pitch Perfect isn't as fun as it could have been.

The movie, directed by Jason Moore of Avenue Q fame, has some of the same scrappy, perverse charm that stage musical did. It just doesn't have quite enough of it. What might have been Glee with teeth is more akin to Revenge of the Nerds with acapella and projectile vomit.

You heard me. Projectile vomit. This movie not only has several puking scenes, but the plot hinges around a bitchy leader of an acapella group (Anna Camp). She so dramatically loses her lunch, even Linda Blair would flinch. On top of that, most of the men in this movie are about as thrilling as a bottle of Kaopectate.

The gross-out jokes and for that matter, the dullard males are quite unnecessary because the girls truly carry this show - and their vocals and comic chops had me smiling broadly. As she did in Up in the Air, Kendrick plays an outwardly aloof girl who eventually softens and becomes more charming than she thought possible. This time out, though, she has a sassier side who sings a sharp version of "Cups" by Lulu and the Lampshades.

Rebel Wilson (Bridesmiads) has been touted as the movie's scene stealer, and indeed she robs them left and right. But I also liked the comic spark of Brittany Snow (Hairspray) playing Chloe, the perky singer who finds a heretofore undiscovered low register. Then there's the terminally undervalued Elizabeth Banks, one of the movie's producers, playing a singing competition commentator alongside John Michael Higgins. Clearly, these two made their lines up as they went along, and they seem to have more fun than anyone.

I wish I liked Pitch Perfect more than I did, but the movie sings more often than it croaks. Now excuse me while I download Anna's songs from the soundtrack.

 

GRADE: B

 

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Combo (Sorta) Review: Looper/The Master

One thing I like about being the master of my own blog is that I can take my time with reviews if I need to. And last week, I saw two films that simply couldn't be reviewed right off the bat: Rian Johnson's Looper and Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master.

I very much admired both, but I couldn't quite wrap my viewing arms around either one, partly because both films play with time. Looper does so by dint of being a time travel thriller, while The Master's deliberate pacing made me feel like I was watching it in a state of suspended animation. Time doesn't tick by in either one of these films so much as swirl around you.

These two films wouldn't seem to have much in common, but they share one conundrum: How do you evaluate films in which the lead characters are, not to put too fine a point on it, pricks? Do you have to like films where you don't like the people? Can you?

The short answer is, sure you can. Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull centers around a particularly savage prick named Jake La Motta, and that's the one of the best films ever made. The key is either to lock into a secondary character, or to at least find the central figure a fascinating train wreck. Looper takes the former route; The Master the latter.

Since Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis play the same aloof, unpleasant character, it's like having two strikes rolled into one. But there are mitigating factors: the sheer charisma of both, and the emotional draw of the character played by Emily Blunt.

Levitt/Willis is not a model citizen, but it's fun and really spellbinding to watch the two of them play the same characters at different ages in the same space. But it's Blunt who really provides the emotional center of gravity in the movie as the forlorn, mysterious woman Gordon-Levitt stumbles across. She has already gone on record to say Looper is the best movie she's ever been in. I would also argue it's her best performance.

That I've spent this much time discussing the characters in a Rian Johnson film is telling. The rub against Johnson has been that he's more clever than assured as a storyteller, but Looper finally finds Johnson connecting on both visual and emotional levels. Johnson has a vivid imagination that doesn't make the future look like a variation on Back to the Future or Blade Runner - it feels lived in, even while it's turning the world upside down. The film can't escape a certain aloof quality, and Bruce Willis made a better time travel movie with 12 Monkeys, but Looper is so dizzying that I didn't always know which way was up - and that's all to the good.

I also often didn't know which way was up in The Master, and there, the disorientation is more troubling. People have complained, not unreasonably, that the lead character played by Joaquin Phoenix, is too opaque and the storytelling too elliptical. It is indeed difficult to draw a bead on a character who may be beyond redemption.

And yet, that may be precisely the point.

The Master is a journey into the soul of someone who seems to have lost his soul. Phoenix's Freddie Quell, a vet struggling after World War II - is certainly not unemotional - he's prone to violent outbursts. But he is also surely a man without a center of gravity, and so it might be fitting that the movie seems aimless and distant. So is Freddie.

But he's not the only lost soul here. I would also argue that Philip Seymour Hoffman's Lancaster Dodd is too, in his own way - and that's why Freddie fascinates him. Sure, Dodd is more certain of himself and what he knows - or thinks he knows - but he's also prone to outbursts whenever anyone challenges his outlandish faith. And what does it say about a man who radiates magnetism on the one hand, yet allows himself to be emasculated by his stern wife, played by Amy Adams?

This much is not in dispute: the acting is fiercely good. Hoffman is eerie yet assured, while Phoenix radiates a magnetic vibe of anxiety, of sheer intensity, that rivals that of Daniel Day-Lewis. Adams proves once Again that she's not all sweetness and light. We saw her play tough in The Fighter, here, she gets to play chilling.

Those who dismiss The Master are, I fear, being too facile. This is not a film that can be absorbed in one sitting. By the same token, It may not be a masterpiece either - it takes too many detours and leaves them dangling for that. I can't grade it right now - but I also can't shake it. That means something.

Looper: A-

The Master: Incomplete (good thing I'm not on Metacritic)

 

 

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REVIEW: The Bourne Legacy

Cast: Jeremy Renner, Rachel Weisz, Edward Norton,

Director: Tony Gilroy

Writers: Tony and Dan Gilroy

When I saw it: August 15, 2011

Where I saw it: Rave Cinemas at The Greene

Why I saw it: It's a Bourne movie. Duh.

When Universal announced plans to make a Bourne movie without Matt Damon, many people cried foul. But the problem with the underwhelming Bourne Legacy isn't that Damon is missing - it's that precious directors Doug Liman (Identity) and Paul Greengrass (Supremacy, Ultimatum)

On the surface, handing the reigns to Tony Gilroy made sense. He had a had in writing all the previous Bourne movies. He's shown himself a very capable director, with his excellent first film, Michael Clayton scoring Oscar nominations, and a win for Tilda Swinton. My only concern was that Gilroy wasn't proven as an action director.

But Gilroy stages the action very well, especially the climactic motorcycle chase. Unfortunately, there's too little action and too many plot threads, turning the first half in particular into a muddled mess. Gilroy's Achilles heel as a writer-director is that he's too fascinated with making his stories into puzzles. There are so many subplots, diversions and reversals that they obfuscate and diminish the story. That flaw kept Duplicity from being as good as it could have been, and it kept the Bourne Legacy from being as good as it should have been.

This is not to say that The Bourne Legacy is a bad movie, but I can only give it the slimmest recommendation. What keeps it afloat are the action scenes, and the performances by Jeremy Renner, Rachel Weisz and Edward Norton. All of them hold the screen extremely well, and when the relationship between Renner and Weisz finally comes to the fore, the movie finally comes alive.

At the same time, I wished that the movie were as good as that trio. I'd like to see them in another Bourne movie - hopefully with a director who is more disciplined.

GRADE: B-

Cinematographer: Robert Elswit, who is especially skilled with action, having shot Tomorrow Never Dies, Salt and Mission: Impossible Ghost Protocol

Aspect ratio: 2.35: 1

Runtime: 135 minutes

MPAA: PG-13

 

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REVIEW: Hope Springs

Cast: Meryl Streep, Tommy Lee Jones, Steve Carell

Writer: Vanessa Taylor

Director: David Frankel (The Devil Wears Prada)

When I saw it: Aug. 7, 2012

Where I saw it: Rave Dayton South

Why I saw it: Love the two leads.

Quick. Think about two people older than 60 having sex.

What was your reaction? To giggle? To grimace? To understand? Or to know?

Whatever your reaction might have been, Hope Springs just might  surprise you. It certainly did me. It pulls off something even more trickier than a Christopher Nolan plot: It talks a lot about sex with people who have a lot of birthdays - and takes it absolutely seriously.

The trailer for this movie make it look like a breezy, light romantic comedy. It doesn't exactly lie - the movie is often light and breezy. But just as often, it's dramatic, moving and even revelatory.

When most movies feature older people in a sexy context, it's usually for cheap laughs, whether it's the horny grandmother in Runaway Bride or the sight of Terry Bradshaw's bare ass in the aptly named Failure to Launch. But Hope Springs is a refreshingly different animal.

Meryl Streep and Tommy Lee Jones star as a couple nearing retirement age. There's nothing really wrong with their marriage. They don't fight, they're not harboring deep, dark secrets, and they're well-adjusted to being empty-nesters.

And yet, at the same time, everything is wrong with their marriage, because whether they're willing to admit it or not, Jones and Streep are miserable. One day, Streep finds a book about how to put "that spark" back in your marriage, and she resolves to take the author's therapy, much to Jones' dismay.

It all sounds like the setup for easy, predictable laughs - oh, look, the old couple is embarrassed to talk ab out sex. Ha-ha. But as the movie goes on, it only becomes more serious - and more impactful.

This is due in no small part to the stellar cast. It's no surprise that Tommy Lee Jones and Meryl Streep can act the hell out of a scene. What is something of a surprise is to watch them do it without their usual affectations. For once, Street isn't putting on an accent, prosthetics, or a giant attitude. Jones doesn't try to get laughs just by being deadpan. Both of them are playing utterly normal people - and that only makes their performances more engaging. The same, too, must be said for Steve Carell, who has a knack for playing button-downed, stressed out geeks. Here, he plays the role of the doctor absolutely straight - and is wonderfully empathetic as a result.

I was only sorry to see Elisabeth Shue playing such a tiny, inconsequential part as a barmaid. Considering her stature, it was disappointing to see her in what amounted to a walk-on role with only about four lines. I can only guess that her role must have been downsized in the editing room. Considering how well the movie turned out, I wanted to see more of her.

It's also gratifying to see the screenplay not resort to all the old cliches. There's not a tearful confession about some heretofore untold sins of the past. There's no scene with the grown-up kid being the wise old sage. This is a movie about two people trying to learn to love one another again and finding out that's easier said than done.

One could argue the movie ends a little too neatly, but regardless, this is a sleeper that's bound to wake more than a few couples up. In an age where sex talk is reduced to sniggering over 50 Shades of Grey, it's nice to see instead men and women of many more shades.

GRADE: A-

Cinematographer: Florian Ballhaus, son of Michael Ballhaus, whose credits include Goodfellas and The Departed

Aspect ratio: 2.35: 1

Runtime: 100 minutes

MPAA:  PG-13, which is a little surprising considering the sex talk is rather frank.

REVIEW: The Amazing Spider-Man

J. Jonah Jameson was right. That wall crawler is a thief after all.

At least, The Amazing Spider-Man is. This uninspired movie has robbed a once-stellar franchise of its goodwill. This is the biggest disappointment of the year.

Like many people, I was puzzled by Sony's decision to restart the franchise. After all, the first Spider-Man movie is only 10 years old, and doesn't everyone already know the origin? Sure, the marketing folks may say this new movie is "the untold story," but it's bait without the switch. This movie doesn't rebuild a franchise from the ground up, the way Batman Begins did. It merely slaps on a new coat of paint. There's not much imagination in this reimagining.

I wanted to give the new movie a chance. I loved the previous film by director Marc Webb, 500 Days of Summer. But showing visual flair in an indie romantic comedy is a far cry from directing a tentpole action movie. Webb pulls off a few decent action moments, but the director is clearly out of his depth, right down to the use of 3D. Even though The Amazing Spider-Man was shot in 3D, Webb barely makes use of it outside of the action scenes. I took my glasses off a few times and found the picture to be hardly blurred at all. And even in the action scenes, the editing is too choppy. Shots in 3D movies need to be allowed to linger for the effect to register. Even Michael Bay got this right in the third Transformers movie. Webb doesn't.

An even bigger problem is the slapdash script, credited to James Vanderbilt (Zodiac), Alvin Sargent (Spider-Man 2) and Steve Kloves (most of the Harry Potter films). All three writers have done much better work. Here, the screenplay huffs and puffs, trying to add layers to Peter Parker's backstory that add up to nothing, and futzing the logic with Spidey's powers, just so we can get cheap gags like computer keys coming off in his hands. The villain the Lizard (Rhys Ifans) is all unrealized potential, with half-baked attempts to make him both bad and good.

The saving grace of the film is most of the cast, especially the two leads. Andrew Garfield plays Peter Parker more as sullen outcast than geeky nerd, but the chip on his shoulder gives the role gravitas. Emma Stone is typically delightful as his paramour Gwen Stacy. I liked the two of them so much, I would rather have seen Webb direct them in a romantic comedy.

But affecting as they are, even Garfield and Stone never manage an iconic moment like Maguire and Dunst's upside-down kiss. Say what you will about the mess that was Spider-Man 3, its emotional core still came througth. I'd much rather watch it again than a perfunctory movie like The Amazing Spider-Man. Never mind what the studio says, this isn't so much a reboot as it is a refinancing of Sony Pictures' coffers.

GRADE: C

 

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REVIEW: Magic Mike

Sometimes you can tell a lot about what a crowd thinks of a movie by how they don't react. Such is the case with Steven Soderbergh's Magic Mike.

I saw the film at a screening where the gender ratio in the audience must have been at least seven girls for every boy. (Eat your heart out, Jan and Dean). Not at all surprising, considering this was a movie about male strippers. And sure enough, when the movie started, the vibe in the theater became less movie and more rock concert. Girls hooted and hollered with wild abandon as Matthew McConaughey strutted his stuff. I didn't turn to look and see if anyone was holding up dollar bills, but I wouldn't have been surprised.

But then I noticed something. As the movie went on, the girls got quieter. Oh sure, they cheered again when it was time to peel off fabric, but the cheering became less boisterous as the movie went on. I like to think that was because the ladies were getting into the story. Or maybe they were bored. In any event, the hook of this movie is supposedly that it turns an old cliche on its head - let's see the guys exploited for a change. But it is worth noting that Magic Mike was written and directed by men. So whom exactly is the joke on?

This movie felt rather like a low-key version of Boogie Nights, only with fewer characters and without Paul Thomas Anderson's visual acrobatics. Both films are about the seamy side of a prurient industry, which turns out to be not as sexy as advertised. Soderbergh directs most of the movie in the fly-on-the-wall style of his experimental movies like Bubble and The Girlfriend Experience, with bits of the Oceans movies thrown in during the stripping. One of Soderbergh's cheekier jokes is that the one glimpse we get of the male anatomy is decidedly non-sexual.

The story is so low key it's a bit too slow to take off at first, but once it does, it's compelling. Reid Carolin's screenplay takes showbiz movie tropes (brash new guy upends old pro) and gives them a gritty, lived-in feeling.

What truly puts the movie across, however, are the performances. Alex Pettyfer is solid as the reckless new pro, and Channing Tatum again proves there's more to him than beefcake. This isn't even the first time the actor played role reversal - he got his butt kicked by a girl earlier this year in Haywire, also directed by Soderbergh. The actor is nothing if not a trooper. And there are some nice female turns as well, from Olivia Munn as one of Tatum's recurring flings, and especially from the appealing Cody Horn, who plays the new guy's more sensible sister.

And then there's McConaughey as the cocky MC of the male revue. The actor has made himself the butt of many a joke for being a little too slick and casual, but his star power here is undeniable. He owns the camera and anyone he looks at, male or female. For contrast, check out his very different performance in Richard Linklater's docu-comedy Bernie. The man has range, and I'd actually argue his Magic Mike performance is Oscar-worthy. Seriously.

Females expecting nothing more than Showboys might be put off, but there's a real movie underneath all those rippling pectorals. And it's a very good one.

 

GRADE: B+

 

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REVIEW: Rock of Ages

I had worried that Rock of Ages would remind me of my high school years, in that I would be watching people I really like singing a lot of music I really hate. Read: Hair metal can suck it.

That said, the problem with Rock of Ages is not that it celebrates hair metal. Despite what the ads may tell you, this movie isn't really hair-metal centric. If, for instance, "We Built This City" is hair metal, then I'm Grace Slick. The soundtrack is more a grab bag of an "I Love the 80s" Internet radio station. Some of the music is good, some of it isn't. I'll take "Pour Some Sugar on Me," but I don't have much patience for people who labor under the delusion that "Every Rose has its Thorn" is a great song.

But I didn't dislike Rock of Ages because it fondly recalls a decade as vacuous as Paris Hilton. I disliked Rock of Ages because I really don't care for Ken and Barbie dolls. And that's what the two lead characters of this movie are.

I don't mean to disparage Julianne Hough. She may be playing a plastic character, but at least she has a winning screen presence. That's the opposite of the dullard male lead played by the charisma-free Diego Bonita. When I can't care about the main couple, I can't get into the movie.

It's a shame,because most of the actors are actually quite good and throw themselves into the movie with gusto. Alec Baldwin and Russel Brand play off each other well as a club owner and his flunkie, with Brand being especially funny because he ad-libs left and right. Catherine Zeta-Jones has a nothing part as a PMRC-type zealot, but she at least puts her songs across with verve. Malin Akerman is sexy/funny, bearing more than a passing resemblance to MTV's Nina Blackwood. And Tom Cruise again travels the Tropic Thunder path of a zany supporting part. Director Adam Shankman told Cruise to play up everyone's worst perception of - Tom Cruise. And he delivers.

But that was one of the few smart moves Shankman made. He directs the movie with the color-coding of an exploding candy store and the attention span of a gnat. There may be a lot of big hair in this movie, but I missed the fleeter footing of Shankman's Hairspray. And the screenplay, based on the stage musical, is as flat as a stage.

Some audience members at my screening seemed to be surprised they were watching a full-on musical and not a concert movie. But even people who are not averse to musicals may be disappointed that the title song is thrown away, and that the movie doesn't take full advantage of the fact that the lead character's name is Sherrie.

After all, what can you say when a movie's climactic number, "Don't Stop Believin'" was performed with more panache by the cast of Glee?

GRADE: C

 

REVIEW: Prometheus

Yes, it's a prequel to Alien. And no, that's not a spoiler. But Ridley Scott's long-awaited return to the franchise is something much more important: it's the second great film of the year (after The Avengers).

There has been a lot of confusing double-talk about whether this film was a prequel to Scott's 1979 classic. All one has to do is look at the producing credits that show David Giler and Walter Hill's names. They had a hand in producing the first three Alien movies, so that's a giveaway right there.

But while Prometheus both follows in and anticipates the footsteps of Alien, it accomplishes something that's been a hallmark of this series: It isn't quite like any of the other films.

Although this is the first time in this series that a director has repeated, Prometheus is a very different animal from Alien. That was a horror film; Prometheus is not. It's telling that one of the very first images of the film is a DNA stand mutating.

This movie has some scary moments, to be sure, but it's also not mainly an action film like Aliens or a philosophical prison drama like Alien 3, or the strange art house creature feature of Alien: Resurrection. Prometheus is the most pure sci-fi film of the lot, because it dares to ponder not only why we're here, but how we got here. That may disapoint viewers looking looking only for action and horror. The movie throws in some slimy little buggers besides, but it's got a lot more on its plate, and that's all to the good.

It's no surprise that the film looks great. That's true of every Ridley Scott film, including the bad ones, and his use of 3D is a wondrous must-see. But it's most invigorating to see the director truly swing for the fences when he has recently turned out such forgettable fare as Body of Lies and most recently, Robin Hood. This is the first film of the Alien franchise, and Scott's first film since Blade Runner, that truly inspired a sense of wonder in me. A sense of awe, even.

The film is certainly not the equal of Alien or Blade Runner. Prometheus bites off a little more than it should chew, featuring too many characters that makes the focus diffuse at times. Charlize Theron and Guy Pearce aren't used especially well, but that's mitigated by fierce work from Noomi Rapace, and a spellbinding performance by Michael Fassbender as the requisite robot. The model for his performance is inspired. I don't want to give it away, but I'll tell you this - it isn't Ian Holm or Lance Henriksen.

Endless arguements have sprung up about how well the film's logic holds up - or doesn't. But it's important to remember that most sci-fi films worth their salt ask more question than they answer. In an age when Hollywood usually wants to wow only our eyes, it's refreshing to see a movie like Prometheus that wows the mind as well.

GRADE: A

 

Snow White and the Huntsman/Mirror Mirror

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the fairest one of all?

At the risk of sounding redundant, I vote for Mirror Mirror. And that surprises me.

Months ago, when the trailers for Mirror Mirror and Snow White and the Huntsman played endlessly in theaters, the former looked like pretty but pointless kiddie junk, replete with bad puns like "Snow Way." The latter looked like an exciting take on the fairy tale, filled with action and drama. Charlize Theron looked deliciously nasty as an evil queen, while Julia Roberts seemed to be mostly mugging.

Now that I've seen both movies, the opposite has panned out. The Lily Collins/Julia Roberts version roundly trounces the Kristen Stewart/Charlize Theron version. Mirror mirror indeed.

How did this happen? Mirror Mirror knew exactly what it was - a silly, peppy kid-friendly version of the classic fairy tale. Snow White and the Huntsman, on the other hand, is a turgid, unfocused mess that wants to be the Lord of the Rings version of Snow White, but fails to live up to either of its antecedents.

Mirror Mirror is far from a great movie. It's slight and innocuous, but it at least boasts moments of real visual imagination courtesy of director Tarsem Singh (The Cell), who has fun with swirling camera movements and inventive visual gags like the seven dwarfs using stilts to rob and fight people. And the writers had the good sense to jettison some of the lame jokes in the trailers.

But Snow White and the Huntsman is a physically ugly film, replete with gray skies, globs of mud and battle scenes that barely make sense. First time director Rupert Sanders pulls off a handful of interesting effects, but his storytelling is terrible. The romance, supposedly one of the key components of the film, is a complete bust, with the title characters having no chemistry whatsoever.

The two Snow White actresses acquit themselves fairly well. Collins isn't terribly distinct, but she's energetic and plays along with the laughs quite nicely. The awful movie surrounding Stewart leaves her somewhat at sea, but she at least makes a solid effort to carry the film.

Theron, on the other hand, tries TOO hard to carry the film. Sure, the evil queen is supposed to chew the scenery, but Theron devours it like the Tasmanian Devil, to stifling effect. She plays almost every scene with the volume turned up to 11, barking like a very pretty mad dog. She's worse than evil - she's annoying.

The trailers for Mirror Mirror made Roberts seem like she was out of her depth, but she gamely rolls with the whimsical tone of the film and is clearly having fun. It's hard to buy her as truly evil, but she does manage to be engagingly nasty.

It's not like turning Snow White into an adventure heroine is a bad idea - Ginnifer Goodwin manages to be both fair and ferocious in the ABC series Once Upon a Time. That series can spin yarns with the skill of Rumplestiltskin. It beasts either of the features. If you only have time for one movie, look into Mirror Mirror. Snow White and the Huntsman is a rotten, poisonous apple.

 

MIRROR MIRROR: B

SNOW WHITE AND THE HUNTSMAN: D

 

REVIEW: Men in Black 3

Since Men in Black 3 trades heavily in alternate realities, I'll give the movie an alternate title: Men in Black to the Future 3.

And I mean that as a compliment. Quality-wise, Men in Black follows the same trajectory as the Back to the Future trilogy: Terrific opening, problematic sequel, much-improved third installment.

But it's not enough to say that Men in Black 3 is an improvement over 2. That wouldn't take much. The second movie wasn't awful, it was just kind of ... there. Typical middling sequel. Didn't hate it, didn't really like it either. So I'm very happy - and very pleasantly surprised - to report that the third movie is actually kind of great.

That threw me, given all the reports I read about this movie's chaotic production. I was especially troubled by the fact they started filming without a finished script - a bad idea for any movie, but especially for an action comedy, which requires a lot of fine tuning if it's going to work. And amazingly, Men in Black 3 works wonders.

One of the smartest moves by the filmmakers was to put J back in a place akin to where he was in the first film - stuck in an unfamiliar world. This time, the unfamiliar world is 1969, where J has time-traveled to prevent the demise of K. I really shouldn't say more than about the plot - the less you know, the better.

What I can tell you is something that was evident in the trailers: Josh Brolin is fantastic as the young K - and he doesn't just copy Tommy Lee Jones. Brolin conveys some of the same deadpan stoicism, but this younger K is also a bit lighter on his feet - he's not quite so world-weary yet, and he plays off Will Smith extremely well.

The picture's midsection moves in fits and starts but recovers for a great third act that packs something even the first movie didn't have: an emotional wallop. I daresay I was really moved in a way that I never thought I would be.

Oh sure, you'll always have people who complain about the plot holes in the time travel, but you know what? When you have an alien with hand vaginas that shoot poison darts, you're allowed to break a few time travel rules. If it leads to an ending that's actually touching, we'll give logic a break.

And here's an added bonus: Even the post-converted 3D is terrific. Although director Barry Sonnenfeld didn't shoot in 3D, he clearly designed his shots for the format, with a lot of zany pop-out effects that are actually worth the upcharge.

Much has been made of the third movie's soft opening at the box office, but the opening was soft because a lot of people didn't like the second movie. I hope they give the third movie legs. I know I found my time - and this franchise - were redeemed.

 

GRADE: A-




 

REVIEW: Dark Shadows

Last week, I wrote that The Avengers was more than the sum of its parts. This week, I'm sorry to report that Tim Burton's Dark Shadows is less than the sum of its parts. Indeed, it's Burton's weakest film to date.

At first glance, Dark Shadows and Tim Burton seem tailor-made for each other. The trailer indicated a goofy/scary good time, not unlike Beetlejuice. The prologue is certainly ravishing, with sweeping imagery and oozing portent. When, as the trailers foretold, the story flashes forward to 1972, and the humor gets sillier, the movie somehow manages to hang together.

But then, slowly but surely, Dark Shadows begins to unravel. Plot threads and characters drop in and out with no rhyme or reason, except to set up redundant action scenes. It's as if Burton and his writer, Seth Grahame-Smith (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies) can't decide on a tone, or even whose story to tell. By the end of the movie, when we get the inevitable drop for a sequel, I could only roll my eyes and say, "Good luck with that."

I can't fault the cast. Depp has come under fair criticsm lately for flying on kind of a zany autopilot, which I thought he was doing in Burton's overrated Alice in Wonderland. This time, at least, he pours his heart into his performance, having fun with the dual nature of Barnabas Collins. Depp is one of the few actors who can say a line like, "It is with sincere regret that I must kill you all," and make it sound both intimidating and sad.

The other actors try their best, but are undone by sloppy, shallow writing. It's nice to see Michelle Pfeiffer reunited with her Batman Returns director, but she's given almost nothing to do. Eva Green sexes it up nicely as Collins' nemesis, in a role Pfeiffer might have once played, but her character is poorly defined almost from the start. Helena Bonham Barter has too little screen time as a duplicitous doctor, and the misuse of the talented Chloe Grace Moretz (Kick Ass, Hugo) via a dumb third act revelation, is unforgivable.

I wish that Burton would produce an original property rather than try to graft his sensibility on an existing property, which he has now done for four movies (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Sweeney Todd, Alice in Wonderland and now Dark Shdows). At least with the upcoming Frankenweenie, he's adapting himself.


I have only a passing familiarity with the original Dark Shadows, but I can't imagine it would have developed its devoted following if it were as scattershot as Burton has made it. His trajectory of late is worrying. I thought Alice was a misfire, but that at least had great performances by Bonham Carter and Mia Wasikowska to keep it afloat. Despite Depp's best efforts, Dark Shadows sinks.

GRADE: C-

 

REVIEW: The Avengers

I'll get back to my long-delayed wrap-up of Ebertfest shortly. First thing's first.

People sometimes say that movies are greater than the sum of their parts. I don't think that's ever been truer than with Joss Whedon's The Avengers.

Truth be told, I didn't love the movies leading up to The Avengers. The most immediate predecessors, Iron Man 2, Captain America and Thor, were all decent but underwhelming. I expected more form each. I didn't care for Louis Letterer's The Incredible Hulk, and I even thought the original Iron Man was a bit overrated. Great first two-thirds, lame climax brought down by lame villain.

it was Iron Man 2, Thor and Captain America that caused the gravest concern, however. I thought every one of those movies bogged down because they concentrated too hard on setting up Avengers and not hard enough telling their own stories. They felt scattershot. It's very telling that my favorite scene in Captain America was the musical number written by Alan Menken.

So I actually approached The Avengers biting my nails a bit. Having seen the movie now, I can say without hesitation that I'm happily eating crow. Simply put, the movie is the best one yet produced by Marvel Studios by far.

The action scenes are astounding. They held me in the kind of breathless thrall that James Cameron usually creates - but I wasn't really surprised by that. For all the movie's technical flair, its canniest feat is actually in Whedon's writing.

With so many A-list heroes occupying the screen, The Avengers could have easily become bloated, to say nothing of confusing. Thankfully, it's neither. (It helps, but it is not absolutely essential, to see any of the previous films. Thor is probably the one that has the most backstory for this movie. Whedon so skillfully juggles multiple story lines that no one character dominates the movie - visually or thematically (unless you count the Hulk, 'cos he's fricken huge). Among superhero epics, this one is truly a team effort, and you will rarely find a more persuasive argument for the phrase "Better Together."

Speaking of the Hulk, I still feel that too many people were unduly harsh to the Ang Lee film. However, I have to concede, the character's never been put to better use than in The Avengers. Whedon smartly acknowledges the green guys's gravitas while actually having a lot of fun with him. (I do wish Whedon had better explained who Cobie Smulders' Agent Hill was.)

So is The Avengers the best superhero movie of all time? No. It does not have the emotional oomph of Spider-Man 2 or The Dark Knight Rises, but I can say without equivocation that it is the first great film of 2012.

 

GRADE: A

PS: Make sure you stay ALL THE WAY through the credits - even past all the tech folks - or you'll miss the biggest laugh of the movie.