Not a Review: The Fluffy Movie

141. The Fluffy Movie
I don't really feel like I should write an actual review of this, and I won't be assigning it a grade, either. It's not really a movie--it is almost entirely a filmed standup comedy routine. The usual elements of plot and structure I would discuss (the latter being a factor even in documentaries) are not a big issue here.

That being said, I did have a good time. The worst parts, appearing in the very beginning, were actually the most "movie" like. There were a couple short scenes that served as an introduction to the comedy. I found them to be unnecessary. In a "concert" film like this, I prefer they get straight to the concert or, in this case, comedy. Once the comedy does get started, though, it's a lot of fun. Gabriel Iglesias has a charming stage presence and I laughed a lot. It wasn't any better than some of the HBO standup specials I've seen with Ricky Gervais, though (and pales next to the YouTube clips of Jimmy Carr--look him up if you like "offensive" humour), so it's probably not something you'll want to pay to see in theatres. If it starts airing on a cable network in a few months, that would be the time to catch it.

Review: And So It Goes

140. And So It Goes
This is yet the latest example of a film released theatrically that feels more like a television movie. In fact, it may be the best example so far this year. It is perhaps too generous to even say it is of the quality one would expect from a below average film premiering on the Hallmark channel.

The script could have been written in a day. The only aspect of it that surprised me was how ineptly written and clichéd it was. Michael Douglas's character is the stereotypical mean and nasty man who will thaw over the course of the film, revealing the decent person beneath. The device used to accomplish this is when he's forced by his estranged son to take care of a granddaughter he didn't even know he had. Father and son are estranged, you see, because the son is a former drug addict. Now he's going to jail, though his sentence has nothing to do with his past addictions, and he is actually innocent of the current charges. This conveniently allows for a subplot where Douglas manages to get his son released at the film's end, leading to a warm and fuzzy family reunion.

The film's plot quickly becomes an unguided missile. Douglas receives help with the granddaughter from Diane Keaton's character who lives in the apartment next door and has been putting up with his curmudgeonly ways for years. She is also working as a lounge singer and, in another plot thread, Douglas decides to act as her agent, finding her a better paying job at a classier establishment. As all this happens, they (big surprise) gradually start to realize that the other is not so bad after all. Cue the obligatory "romantic" part of the "romantic comedy" (though in this case I use both words very loosely). While all of this is going on, Douglas is also trying to sell a large house that he owns, but no longer lives in, as he prepares to move out of the area. Extra credit if you predicted that this is all an excuse for him to, when the time comes, decide to stay, realizing that he has come to love everyone else in the movie. Throw in scenes where Douglas tries to track down his granddaughter's mother, and one where he is forced to deliver a baby, and you'll have the jumbled mess that is this movie. I would say that jumping between all these disparate storylines made it difficult for any of them to build up momentum, but I don't think any of them would have been at all good on their own. Going back to the theme of it being like a television movie, it really seemed like all this jumping around was so that at any point one of the plot threads could reach a dramatic (again, using the term loosely) moment to lead into a commercial break.

If this film did air on television, I would have flipped past it without a second thought. The script itself is bad enough, but there also didn't seem to be much energy put into the filmmaking itself. It's a lifeless, disjointed, unchallenging mess.

D

Review: Lucy

139. Lucy
A prime display of how style over substance can render that style meaningless, "Lucy" starts with some promise, but quickly descends into a hollow attempt to come across as "deep" without doing any of the necessary work.

The entire film is built on a false premise--that humans only use ten percent of their brains. Being scientifically inaccurate is not automatically a film's death knell. Almost all films are unrealistic in some way, and there are others, like "Lucy", that are entirely built on falsehoods. If the film didn't aspire to be more than a fun action movie, this wouldn't be a problem. I could suspend my disbelief and go along for the ride. But when the film expects me to take its story even somewhat seriously, it can be a hard thing to get past.

Everything starts off well enough. Scarlett Johansson's character is captured by an Asian Drug Cartel. They sew a bag of some new drug inside her so she can act as a mule. The bag leaks, and whatever is inside starts to make her capable of accessing increasingly large portions of her brain. When she then escapes, the seeds of a reasonably entertaining chase movie are planted, but they never really take root. Her powers grow too quickly, which removes almost all the excitement from the situation, as she is more than capable of dealing with any threat. We are somehow meant to believe that accessing larger portions of one's brain would allow them to defy the laws of physics and gain telekinetic powers.

The story from this point on largely makes no sense, either. Johansson's character quickly storms the drug cartel's base of operations, shooting everyone she comes across on her way to the leader, played by Choi Min-sik (who I enjoyed seeing in a mainstream production, and who delivered a good performance despite not having a single line of English dialogue). After reaching Min-sik and using her new powers to read his mind, however, she leaves without killing him. Why? There's no real reason. I suppose it's just so he can continue to be the main bad guy and show up a few more times. There are a few more action sequences thrown into the mix as Johansson makes her way to meet with a professor (Morgan Freeman as, basically, himself). These, and the final action bit (the cartel attacks while Johansson is going on some sort of cosmic journey to...I don't know...transcend time or something?) all fall flat, once again due to how overpowered Johansson has become. The ending is a loud collision of sounds and images that grasp for relevance but fall way short. When there's strange imagery in a film like "2001", you may not know what it means, but there's enough of a sense that it does mean something. I didn't get that sense here. It felt like half the time the filmmakers didn't even know what everything meant.

The most damning thing I can say about this film occurred to me about halfway through writing this. The film did such a bad job at establishing its characters and being memorable that I kept using the words "Johansson's character" when discussing her character because I couldn't remember off the top of my head what her name was. It's the title of the film. I could see it out of the corner of my eye on the image of the poster. But most everything about the film was so unmemorable that I didn't realize this for several minutes.

C

Review: Hercules

138. Hercules
Let's get one thing out of the way upfront: this is by far the best Hercules movie to come out this year. The value of "The Legend of Hercules", released back in January, was that it reached levels of "so bad it's good". This film, simply titled "Hercules", is legitimately good, and I had a lot of fun with it.

The movie's take on its main character is that his mythical exploits we know of through mythology are just that: mythical exploits. While he is a genuinely strong and courageous fighter, we learn that tales of his famed "12 Labors" are greatly exaggerated. In some cases the threats he defeated were not all they were cracked up to be. In other cases he had help from his band of followers. The character embraces the legend to further his reputation, but in reality this is a world in which mythical creatures do not exist, even though many still believe in them. I enjoyed this take on the character. The filmmakers found a way to pay homage to the traditional Hercules story while not being beholden to it. This is the best approach to take with such a character. "The Legend of Hercules" almost completely ignored the actual mythology, to its detriment, as it was a Hercules film in name only. Likewise, a film that sought to faithfully retell the traditional story beat by beat would have felt boring and rote, much like "Son of God" did as it trudged through each of Jesus' exploits in an obligatory manner. By recognizing the existence of the myth of Hercules, then using it as inspiration to go off in their own direction, the filmmakers liberated themselves and the audience from preconceived expectations about the character.

The new adventure the film has for Hercules isn't by any means sensational or groundbreaking, but it's a lot of fun and even has a couple nice twists. As much as I'm capable of analyzing a film after seeing it, I'm also pretty good at shutting my brain off while actually watching, allowing myself to enjoy the film in the moment, without trying to figure out what the next "surprise" might be. Because of this, while others might find the twist midway through the film predictable, I found it to be clever. I knew something had to happen to keep the movie going, and the twist didn't shock me or anything, but it did make me think, "Okay, that's cool. Let's see what happens next."

There are several action sequences in the film, which is to be expected. They are shot and edited well, providing adequate entertainment if no true jaw-dropping moments of spectacle. They benefit from an uncertainty as to exactly what will happen. I've mentioned this before, but it's really becoming clear to me that the best way to make an action sequence boring is for the audience to know how it will end. If the sequence revolved around a MacGuffin like: The hero has to hit the button to stop something bad from happening (this was the gist of  the climax in "Captain America: The Winter Soldier"), then most anything that delays him is pointless unless the filmmakers build up adequate tension. We know the hero is going to succeed in hitting the button, and it feels like killing time to delay the inevitable. "Hercules" doesn't feature any action scenes with drastic levels of tension or uncertainty, but it has a large enough supporting cast that I was willing to believe it might kill off one of them at any time. That small bit of not knowing what's going to happen was enough to make the action more interesting to watch. The actual climax is not a huge scale affair as summer movies go, and perhaps it underwhelms a bit. Still, it leaves room for growth in any potential sequels. After all, there are action sequences in the first act of "Iron Man 2" that dwarf the original film's climax in scale (and prove that bigger action does not always equal a better movie).

Finally, I want to briefly mention the film's cast, as it has a few standouts. John Hurt and Joseph Fiennes give reliably decent performances playing fairly thin characters. Dwayne Johnson is naturally charming and brings a nice edge to the role of Hercules. He bulked up more than usual for the part, and it shows. This Hercules is a man, not the boyish character played by Kellan Lutz in January's film. The real scene-stealer, however, is Ian McShane who plays Amphiaraus, a member of Hercules' crew and a man who receives occasional glimpses of the future "from the gods". He claims to have had a vision of his own death, which emboldens him in battle since he knows his time has not yet come. McShane gets a lot of the film's best comedic moments, but also manages to get serious and deliver a dramatic, intense, and effective pep talk just when Hercules needs it the most.

This is definitely a film worth seeing. It's not high art, but its creative take on the title character and the combination of action, comedy and other elements should make it a real crowd pleaser.

B+

On a side note, I wrote and posted my review for "A Most Wanted Man" yesterday, but decided I wasn't happy with it and rewrote the review a few hours later. If you're interested, check to make sure you've read the latest version.

Review: A Most Wanted Man

137. A Most Wanted Man
One of the best seasons of television I have ever seen was the first season of "In Treatment", an HBO show starring Gabriel Byrne. Byrne played a psychologist, and each episode featured a session between him and a patient. Seasons two and three of the show were good, but the first season was truly extraordinary. Many episodes consisted of nothing but two characters sitting down and talking, but it was absolutely riveting.

The second season of "Homeland" included one of television's greatest scenes. It was a fifteen to twenty minute long, unbroken interrogation scene between Claire Danes and Damian Lewis. It slowly takes Lewis, under suspicion of terrorism, from a position of full denial, to a confession, and finally an agreement to switch sides. It is the gold standard for how to do such a scene, involving callbacks to events from the first season and feeling wholly grounded in the reality of who the characters are--their strengths, their flaws, and their shared history.

I mention these examples to illustrate that large scale action scenes are not necessary to create fascinating filmed drama. Extended scenes of conversation can be more interesting than chases and explosions, even in the espionage/government intelligence genre (of which "Homeland" is a prime example). "A Most Wanted Man" features a lot of dialogue heavy scenes (an understatement, by the way), but, in what I believe is an attempt to strive for "realism", it fails to imbue them with the energy necessary to avoid being an incredibly boring film.

"A Most Wanted Man" includes a scenario vaguely similar to the scene I mentioned from "Homeland". Gunther Bachmann (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) has in custody an attorney (Rachel McAdams) who he believes can help him. He goes into the room where she's being held, they talk for a few minutes, and he leaves. A while later, one of his colleagues goes in, talks for a few more minutes, then leaves. A while after that, Bachmann again enters the room, talks for a few minutes, makes a few new points, and leaves. Within a few minutes, the attorney knocks on the door, now willing to help. There are no real dramatic moments, and the characters have no background with one another to lend multiple layers to the scene. I'm sure this is probably closer to how these kinds of things actually go down than the version portrayed in "Homeland". It also nearly put me to sleep. Movies play fast and loose with reality for a reason: Reality, in its purest form, is not always interesting. This was just one example. The film is full of them. It's obvious where a scene or series of scenes is ultimately going to go, but in the interest of "realism" it takes forever (step by agonizing step) to get there. I know that some people like this type of film. That's why they've made movies like this before (the two previous films based on John le Carre's novels, "The Constant Gardener" and "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy", I found to be similarly tedious), and it's why they'll make more in the future. I, however, kept wishing that Jack Bauer would show up and make things interesting. Everything that gets accomplished in this film, he could have pulled off in half an episode.

I will admit that there is a small payoff to the film's slow pace. There is a genuine sense of tension when something finally happens. The events of the finale have more weight to them because of the slow burn that led up to them. Unfortunately, this payoff is not nearly big enough to justify the two hours of boredom that precede it. Had there been a sense of tension slowly building throughout the film, it could have been effective. But the tension was almost nonexistent until the final few minutes and was ultimately too little, too late.

C-

July 25 Weekly Preview

This is going to be a very busy week for me at the movies. There are six new films opening in local theatres today. I'm not even sure I'll get to see them all this week. There are also a couple foreign films opening as well, but my chances of making it to them are slim.

I'm going to be trying something new this week: adding a ratings system to my reviews. At the end of each review I'll assign the film a letter grade. I considered going back and doing this with my previous reviews as well, but I don't think those films are fresh enough in my mind to ensure accurate ratings.

Hercules- The second Hercules film released this year, unrelated to the first which attained levels of "so bad it's good" back in January. Like that film, this one appears to be playing fast and loose with mythology. My best guess is that it will be a slightly below average action film.

Lucy- I don't hold high expectations for this film. It's concept, while potentially interesting if done right, does not seem particularly compelling based on the trailers. The movie also seems to feature Morgan Freeman playing what, even without him in the part, would be considered the "Morgan Freeman role". He's proven in the past that he has a wide acting range, I just wish he'd use it more often. I am, however, excited that Choi Min-sik has a role. He was fantastic in the South Korean film "Oldboy", and I'm glad to see him in making an appearance in an English language film.

The Fluffy Movie- I think this is less of a movie and more of a filmed standup routine, but it's getting a release in theatres, so I'll go see it. I'm unfamiliar with Gabriel Iglesias aside from his appearance in the abominable "A Haunted House 2".

Wish I Was Here- Not really looking forward to this one, as I don't consider myself a Zach Braff fan and his line readings in the trailers feel like he's condescending towards you with every word he speaks. I'm predicting a desperate attempt for profundity that falls flat on its face. At least Mandy Patinkin is in it.

And So It Goes- I think I might have seen a trailer for this, but I'm not sure. It's Michael Douglas and Diane Keaton in what I'm guessing is a romantic comedy aimed at older audiences. They're good actors, though, so it could be fun.

A Most Wanted Man- This will probably get more media attention for being one of Phillip Seymour Hoffman's last films than for the merits of the film itself. I had trouble getting into "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy", the last film based on a John le Carre novel. There's a fine line between "deliberately paced" and "boring". For me, that film fell on the wrong side of the line. Hopefully this one fares better.

Review: Persecuted

136. Persecuted
If those making message based, right-wing films want themselves to be taken at all seriously, they need to make better films than this. "Persecuted" starts out with an unrealistic premise, then seeks to become a political thriller, but does so with such a lack of finesse or energy that there isn't a single span of even thirty seconds that would keep me from flipping past it if I'd encountered it airing on television.

The film follows a popular televangelist (James Remar) who opposes "Religion Reform" that is on the verge of passage by Congress. Apparently he alone has enough clout to ensure either passage or defeat. A single televangelist having this much power is the least of the film's implausibilities. The reform movement itself is ridiculous. From what I was able to gather, it was something about providing "equal time" to all religions in all locations, basically combining every religion. The senator behind the movement (Bruce Davison) assures the preacher that this bill is good for him, because it will get him coverage in temples and mosques, widening his viewership. I'm not one to summarily dismiss conservative claims about a war on religion, but when they take it to such a ridiculous level, they undermine their own cause. There's such a thing as exaggeration to prove a point, but when the exaggeration is this extreme (I'm convinced any liberals who think about trying to pass such "Religion Reform" will have gotten the idea by hearing about this movie), it makes other, potentially more valid arguments, lose credibility.

When Remar announces his intentions to fight the legislation, he is promptly framed for murder by a "vast left-wing conspiracy" complete with a President inspired by Bill Clinton (way to be timely). If the suspense and thriller elements that this leads to were of high enough quality, they could have saved the film from its ridiculous premise. If it were entertaining I wouldn't be such a stickler for realism. But it is very far from entertaining. The film goes through the standard "man on the run" scenes in an obligatory fashion. Many of those scenes feel ripped directly from "The Fugitive", only with all of the energy squeezed out, replaced instead with moralizing, Bible quoting monologues. Remar does his best with the material he's given, but he's not given very much. Even the plot "twists" feel rote and uneventful.

I can think of nothing in this film to recommend. Even with the actors often doing everything they can, the film's somber tone prevents them from elevating it to a campy level of entertainment. There's a good right-wing political thriller out there, waiting to be made. But as long as producers are content to keep making films like this, that thriller will be waiting a very long time.