Aloha

Released:  May 29^th, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Sony Pictures

Starring:  Bradley Cooper, Emma Stone, Rachel McAdams, Bill Murray, John Krasinski, Danny McBride, Alec Baldwin

Directed by:  Cameron Crowe

Written by:  Cameron Crowe

Personal Bias Alert:  huge Almost Famous fan, didn’t think Aloha could be as bad as people were saying

3 of 10

            There’s a certain fascination that overcomes you when watching this big of a train wreck.  It’s not so much a question of how it happened; movies are big, complicated beasts that can go wrong in more ways than you can count, but there is a sense of wonderment about how the film before you got released.  Someone, somewhere sat back after watching it, locked down the edit, and sent it out as a finished product to their bosses and to the world.  The shame and trepidation that must have enveloped them before hitting that send key had to be overwhelming, because no one can look at the final cut of Aloha and see a competent film.

            Competent, mind you, is a very low bar.  I’m talking about something that has a coherent plot and characters paired with an audio and visual presentation that isn’t off-putting.  That’s bare minimum of what a film should be, and Aloha manages to fail at three of these four things.  The first half is such chaos that it’s sort of stunning because you know the people in front of and behind the camera, can tell that they aren’t phoning it in, and it’s still a complete mess.  The film jumps around without any idea of where it’s going, the characters don’t have clear goals, the dialogue is, at times, nonsensical, the shot composition is occasionally ugly, and there’s jarring edits that interrupt any flow that the film manages to start.  The back half settles into something approaching coherence and gives you hints about what the film was supposed to be about, but irreparable damage has been done and you no longer care.

            What I think the film was supposed to be about is Brian Gilcrest’s (Bradley Cooper) struggle for morality.  As the opening narration explains, he once dreamed of going to space, but circumstances far from his control caused his aspirations to become mired in the dirty business of earning his spot.  After a failure and a long recovery, he returns to Hawaii for a chance to get his life back on some sort of track, and whether he chooses the right or wrong direction seems to be the film’s largest question.  Complicating matters is the love triangle between himself, a serious ex-girlfriend (Rachel McAdams), and his young, overly perky military liaison (Emma Stone).  Setting a story like this in Hawaii and steeping it in U.S. military and native Hawaiian culture is actually kind of genius as the relatively short battle between these two groups have gone down as one of the most corrupt and bullying engagements the U.S. has ever embarked upon (I recommend Sarah Vowell’s Unfamiliar Fishes for an entertaining history lesson).  If put together correctly, this could’ve been a rich film about a man and a country’s struggle to achieve noble aspirations in spite of their old, dishonorable habits.

            Unfortunately, Aloha doesn’t cobble this message together until late in the film, and even then it remains murky.  This is one of the films that got caught up in the Sony hacking incident late last year, with reports surfacing that the film was a mess and had to undergo extensive re-edits.  How bad it actually was to begin with isn’t currently known, but whatever edits they did make certainly didn’t improve it.  The final cut is so nonsensical that entire conversations have no meaning and have nothing to do with what happened in the scene before.  It’s as if they hired someone with brain damage, one of those unfortunate people who can’t remember things for more than 30 seconds, and paid them to edit the film.  Someone like that would probably like Aloha, because for all its shortcomings the cast is still likable and Hawaii is still beautiful.  On a moment to moment basis, the character’s arguments and motivations might make sense and the occasional horrendous shot could be quickly forgotten.  But most of us do have long-term memory, and Aloha is a film that will stay in there for all the wrong reasons.

Other Notes:

Ø  The opening credits roll over two entirely different setups.  One is a music montage over images of Hawaiian culture while the other is Bradley Cooper narrating his character’s background.  Neither go together and the transition between the two is abrupt.  It’s like they had two ideas for how to open the film and couldn’t decide which to go with, so they went halfsies in such a way that everyone lost instead of won.

Ø  The romance doesn’t work.  I have no clue if that’s due to the awful edit or a lack of chemistry.  Your guess is as good as mine.

Ø  I don’t think this film is guilty of whitewashing Hawaiian culture, but Emma Stone’s character is certainly whitewashed.  I still love Emma Stone, though.

San Andreas

Released:  May 29^th, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Warner Bros.

Starring:  Dwayne Johnson, Carla Gugino, Alexandra Daddario, Hugo Johnstone-Burt, Art Parkinson, Paul Giamatti, Archie Panjabi

Directed by:  Brad Peyton        

Written by:  Carlton Cuse

Personal Bias Alert:  expected a lot of cheese, tired of seeing the Golden Gate Bridge destroyed

6.5 of 10

            From the opening frame, San Andreas nods assuredly at the audience and delivers what people came for.  It takes mere seconds for big, dumb danger to race to the forefront, and the sequence that follows hits you with goofy dialogue, implausible action, and Dwayne Johnson saving the day.  This down and dirty approach works in disaster films, especially when the filmmakers are smart enough to minimize plot and character, providing audiences with fleeting thrills at a much cheaper rate than their local theme park.

            San Andreas is, of course, named after the San Andreas Fault, a tectonic boundary running through the west coast of the US that is prone to large earthquakes.  Paul Giamatti’s Lawrence, a seismologist, gives a rundown of the history and the devastating effects of such quakes early on so you don’t have to rely on your memories of middle school geology.  Lawrence pops in throughout the film to give helpful explanations of just what’s coming, but most of the film focuses on the family of Johnson’s Ray as they try to find each other during the largest recorded earthquake in human history (because what’s the point of a disaster movie if you’re not destroying things at ridiculously epic proportions).

            And destroy things it does, with a CGI triple whammy of LA, San Francisco, and the Hoover Dam getting the shakes.  These three spots give the film plenty of famous landmarks to crumble, and the spacing of these and the rest of the action sequences are the film’s strongest aspect.  They’re close without being too close, maintaining tension and suspense without getting numbing.  The brief interludes are filled in with material that variously does and doesn’t work, but the scale tips just towards working.  Giamatti is used sparingly, but his weathered delivery of portentous lines bounces well off of Archie Panjabi’s stoic reporter.  However, the strongest pauses belong to the young threesome played by Alexandra Daddario, Hugo Johnstone-Burt, and Art Parkinson.  They’re trying to survive the epicenter that is San Francisco, all while Daddario and Johnstone-Burt strike up a surprisingly easy and genuine-feeling romance.  Parkinson is relegated to the little brother tag along, but even he gets what might be the funniest line in the movie.

What doesn’t work as well is the interludes with Johnson’s Ray and Gugino’s Emma, who are trying to get to their daughter (Daddario) while awkwardly bickering about their failed marriage.  It suffers from the insertion of an unnecessary plot point that doesn’t have enough time to be fleshed out and never adds much to the story.  The rest of the plot is intelligently small in scale, focusing on a group of basic but likable characters who let the big action take the forefront.  Too much plot is often a killer in disaster films, grinding the tension to a halt while characters chat about problems that are inconsequential compared to the grand things going on around them.  Ray and Emma’s exchanges often start the gears grinding, but they thankfully never bring the thing to a complete halt.

What’s most disappointing are the times when the CGI budget fails to render director Brad Peyton’s vision.  San Andreas worked with about half the budget of many modern summer blockbusters, but its destruction scale far surpasses most of these films.  This means that Peyton had to rely on lots CGI, and even with that budget concession there are still shots that were obviously a low priority.  There’s the occasional rubbery people and crumbling debris that fall with entirely the wrong amount of weight, but in the film’s defense, most of the sequences seem breathtakingly real, otherwise the film wouldn’t hold together.

No one will come out of San Andreas touting its labyrinthine plot and deep characters, but anyone expecting these things from it must not live in the same world as the rest of us.  The film just wants to give you some thrills and a bit of spectacle, which it delivers in a well-paced, agreeable package.  And then The Rock skydives out of a plane.

Other Notes (Ridiculous Disaster Version)

Ø  There’s a lot of ample-chested women running in bras that aren’t made for running.

Ø  I feel like the laws of physics wouldn’t have allowed them to get over that tsunami wave.

Ø  Why does Ray know how to drive everything?

Ø  How do your legs get stuck by debris without injury or at least a tear in your jeans?

Other Notes (Regular Version)

Ø  Archie Panjabi!

Ø  I appreciate that the main characters, particularly the women, knew what to do and weren’t putting themselves in unnecessary danger.

Ø  No, this is not a movie version of the Grand Theft Auto game.

Turner and Hooch

Released:  July 28^th, 1989

Rated:  PG

Distributor:  Buena Vista Pictures

Starring:  Tom Hanks, Mare Winningham, Craig T. Nelson, Reginald VelJohnson

Directed by:  Roger Spottiswoode

Written by:  Dennis Shryack, Michael Blodgett, Daniel Petrie Jr., Jim Cash, Jack Epps Jr.

Personal Bias Alert:  not a fan of broad comedy, likes Tom Hanks

3.5 of 10

            Perhaps everyone doesn’t think of Turner and Hooch as a ubiquitous movie.  Perhaps you weren’t born at the right time, weren’t developing into a little kid as the movie and its star was peaking in popularity.  Some of us, myself included, did come along at just the right time, and for us Turner and Hooch are as basic a duo as Abbott and Costello, Cagney and Lacey, or Thelma and Louise.  As with most ubiquitous pop culture from your early childhood, I’d never actually seen the film.  I always seemed to know that it was a cop comedy, which isn’t entirely true, but who wants to explain to a kid that the film suffers from horrendous tonal issues and can’t decide a genre it wants to stick to.

            As far as the primary plot, my childhood remembrances are mostly correct.  Turner and Hooch is a buddy cop movie, with Investigator Turner (Tom Hanks) pairing up with the dog of a murder victim.  The relationship is tenuous at first; Turner is a control freak while Hooch is a slobbering, chewing, door-busting menace.  To say that Hooch brings havoc to Turner’s life is an understatement.  In addition to the bad dog routine that the audience is supposed to find funny, he also introduces Turner to the new vet in town.  Obviously, she’s an appropriately aged woman who comes on to him very quickly, because the movie’s been making a point that Turner needs a girlfriend.  But there’s also that very serious murder case that Turner must solve before he leaves for a new job, and the clock is constantly ticking.  Experiencing whiplash yet?  Remember, all this is crammed into a mere 97 minutes, delivering essentially three crappy movies for the condensed time and price of one.

            Why, you may be asking, are all three mini-movies crappy?  It’s because each follow such basic and clichéd outlines that the audience may as well be watching a ten year old doing some paint by number kit.  The kid may be a bit too old for such activities, but he plods along anyway, turning in a competent rendering of the picture he was instructed to create before tossing it aside with the rest of the trash.  He’ll never remember he did it, you’ll never remember you watched it, and the world won’t give a crap that it ever happened.  Competent is just plain boring, especially when it comes to movies, and Turner and Hooch’s parts are nothing more than a poorly assembled blob of competence.

            In fact, its flaws are one of the few things that’ll keep your attention.  The jostling of these genres are so abrupt and mismanaged that it’s no surprise to find that some jostling occurred behind the camera as well.  Director Roger Spottiswoode took over the helm two weeks into filming after original director Henry Winkler (yep, The Fonz) was fired.  Then there’s the big group of less than distinguished writers that contributed to the screenplay:  pairs Dennis Shryack and Michael Blodgett (Rent-a-Cop), Jim Cash and Jack Epps Jr. (Anaconda), and loner Daniel Petrie Jr. (all three Beverly Hills Cop films).  The fact that this large of a group significantly contributed to the screenplay makes fluidity near impossible, and a last-minute director that inevitably didn’t have time to examine the material certainly led to the scattershot effort that is Turner and Hooch.

            There is a silver lining to this movie, and it’s the most obvious silver lining there is:  Tom Hanks.  The man is one of the most versatile actors out there, so of course he can do the romantically studious cop getting dragged through doors by a dog trick.  All he has to do is flash that smile and we all love him.  If it needs to be said, this is far from Hank’s best role, but he goes all in as he usually does, throwing his body (which we see an awful lot of thanks to a pair of black briefs) into the action and the comedy.  He’s got good rapport with Mare Winningham as his love interest, too, and his efforts make the first hour of the film passable.  But the material can’t support your attention for much longer than that, no matter how charming your leads are.

            I suppose we need to keep this film around for the Tom Hanks completists out there, but for everyone else this film should be skipped.  There are better representations of funny Tom Hanks, of buddy cops, of destructive dogs, better everything that this film has to offer.  As for me, I’m taking Turner and Hooch off my list of dynamic duos.

Other Notes:

Ø  Uh oh, that music from 2001: A Space Odyssey was used for the dog’s entrance.  He must be a handful, and this film must be devoid of subtlety.

Ø  Should dogs drink beer?

Ø  What a waste of a muffin.

Tomorrowland

Released:  May 22^nd, 2015

Rated:  PG

Distributor:  Walt Disney Studios

Starring:  Britt Robertson, George Clooney, Hugh Laurie, Raffey Cassidy

Directed by:  Brad Bird

Written by:  Damon Lindelof, Brad Bird

Personal Bias Alert:  not a Disney devotee, not enamored with Brad Bird’s catalogue

7 of 10

            The trailer for Tomorrowland instantly got my attention.  Not for the flying cars or the magical pin or George Clooney.  It was the teenage girl wearing a baggy sweatshirt carrying a ball cap and a money clip.  It was me in all my societal-norms ignoring glory, preferring to dress and carry myself in a way that lets me do whatever the hell I want without having to lug a purse or maintain an outfit.  Watching the film only makes me love this representation more.  The way she presents herself is never commented on, even for a joke, and no ever tells her to get back home to her boyfriend or the mall or any other teenage girl clichés.  It’s a subtly progressive step forward in the portrayal of young women, catering to those of us who have ideas, dreams, and senses of purpose entirely independent of our gender.

            These ideals are exactly the kind of thing Tomorrowland is trying to promote, if in a more broad sense.  The girl in question, Casey (Britt Robertson), is chosen for the adventure exactly because she doesn’t think like everyone else.  She dreams of a better world, or at least one where she can go to space, and stubbornly refuses to admit defeat.  So when a recruiter shows up looking for new blood to go to the futuristic Tomorrowland, she gets a golden ticket pin.

            It’s a tricky role for Robertson as plucky optimist shares a border with annoying twerp, but she always keeps Casey on the right side of the line.  Between this and The Longest Ride, she’s proving her worth as a genuinely likable young actress.  George Clooney brings a toned-down version of his usual gruffness as the guy helping her get into Tomorrowland, but the big surprise is Raffey Cassidy, a child actor who you probably last saw as the younger version of Kristen Stewart in Snow White and the Huntsman.  She has a very large role here as the recruiter, possibly the most complex of all the leads, and makes it believable every step of the way.  The details of why she’s so great would bring up spoilers, but suffice it to say that she’s an actress you should keep your eye on.

            Where the film drags is in its plot, which doesn’t overly surprise me given its writer/director team.  Brad Bird makes likable films, but they often lack the emotional punch that comes with true greatness.  Damon Lindelof has an even sketchier history, with his writing having been featured in uneven projects like Prometheus, Cowboys and Aliens, and Lost while also creating and writing a very interesting adaptation of The Leftovers for HBO.  Here, there’s a lack of purpose to the whole plot beyond a vague sense of wanting to get to Tomorrowland.  What will happen once they get there is never clearly established, and without that there’s nothing they’re clearly fighting against.  So the story meanders and the climax fizzles.  In fact, they don’t actually succeed at fixing what seems to be the main threat.  They start down the road but don’t complete the task before the credits role.  I guess it’s supposed to be enough that they’re working on it?

Even with this meandering, Tomorrowland never lost my attention.  There’s too much wonder floating around to get frustrated with it, peppered as it is with exciting, imaginative scenes that give the film that Disney sense of magic.  Let’s face it, a world with jetpacks and spaceships and elaborate diving contraptions stay cool long into your adulthood, and Brad Bird delivers the glorious looking world that’s promised in the trailer.  Almost everyone will want to visit Tomorrowland, and the brief time you get to spend there in this film is a satisfactory way to spend your afternoon.

This is a family film, so the events never get too dark or scary.  Still, it’s a strong PG, so beware with very young kids.  Older children and adults will enjoy the film’s inventive action and cheeky sense of humor, although the lack of punch will probably keep it from becoming a Disney classic.

Other Notes:

Ø  I like that the utopia of Tomorrowland includes scientists, artists, and dreamers of all kind.

Ø  That memorabilia store is pretty much my version of heaven.

Ø  Hugh Laurie to George Clooney:  “Age suits you well.”

Ø  This and Mad Max are battling it out for the most beautifully rendered vision of the future so far this year.  I recommend seeing them both to decide which one you want to see come true.

Poltergeist

Released:  May 22^nd, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  20^th Century Fox

Starring:  Sam Rockwell, Rosemarie DeWitt, Jared Harris, Jane Adams, Kennedi Clements, Kyle Catlett, Saxon Sharbino

Directed by:  Gil Kenan

Written by:  David Lindsay-Abaire

Personal Bias Alert:  never seen the original, sucker for father-daughter stuff

5.2 of 10

            How does one get roped into working on a surefire disappointment like the remake of Poltergeist?  If you’re director Gil Kenan, then it’s because you made a film that lost $38 million, and a hit is your only chance to keep your career alive.  The remake is sure to put people’s butts in the seats, giving you a win and the opportunity to make another film that can be your own.  Kenan doesn’t phone in the remake, though, delivering a solid, if forgettable, horror film.

            As Poltergeist is the story of a family being haunted by some very active ghosts, the best thing Kenan and company did for themselves was land two great actors to play the mother and father.  Sam Rockwell is someone you’ll certainly recognize and immediately like, with his everyman rascal quality going a long way to making this film work.  Rosemarie DeWitt is again cast as the loving foil (maybe someday she’ll get to be the crazy one), and although she has less to do than Rockwell, they make for an excellent pair.  Their three kids are played by relative unknowns who turn in some uneven performances, but they all succeed in their main job, which is to make the family seem average and hence relatable then run around screaming until the credits role.

            The youngest girl is the focal point of the haunting, but what makes this film better than your average horror film is its focus on the characters surrounding her, feeding instead off of their distress for her predicament.  This is certainly a carryover from the 1982 original, which was co-written by Stephen Spielberg.  His ability to root genre stories with empathetic characters is one of his greatest strengths, and it again proves to be an effective formula.

            The biggest problem with this horror remake is that it never proves to be very scary.  Thanks to all the original’s replicators, the haunted house story is now too familiar to be frightening on its own, and the bigger moments that should ratchet up the fear are mishandled.  An overreliance on modern horror techniques like jump scares and CGI simply doesn’t cut it, particularly when the CGI is as bad as it is here.  Instead of rendering some creepy visuals, it surrounds the characters with muddled masses of greys and blacks, robbing what should have been horrifying moments of all their punch.  The ending is the ultimate soft blow, as it never achieves anything that feels like a climax and then fades to black.

            And yet there’s enough tension running through the film to keep your attention.  The family’s love and concern for their youngest member is upsetting, and the moments when they run into the action instead of away from it are almost touching.  This isn’t a film where you question why they’re staying around while a bunch of crazy stuff happens.  They stay because they can’t leave someone they love behind, and they try to leave as soon as they’re back together.

            The strengths of this film may very well stem from the original, but it remains a solid horror story.  On its own, it should be considered an above average horror flick, but it has a legacy to live up to, and nothing about it screams a modern classic.

Other Notes:

Ø  Lots of potential themes are picked up and disappointingly dropped.

Ø  There’s some really good humor peppered in here.

Ø  I thought for sure that huge teddy bear was going to come alive at some point.

Ø  Who shrugs off a collection of clown dolls and leaves them in their kid’s room?

Alien

Released:  June 22^nd, 1979

Rated:  R

Distributor:  20^th Century Fox

Starring:  Sigourney Weaver, Tom Skerritt, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm, Yaphet Kotto

Directed by:  Ridley Scott

Written by:  Dan O’Bannon

Personal Bias Alert:  saw Prometheus before seeing its predecessors, was hyped for a good horror flick

7 of 10

            Alien is one of those films that everyone knows, and its revered legacy sets up a new viewer to expect something great.  A legacy like that is something that very few films can actually live up to, and while Alien does prove to be a well-paced horror film, it’s muddled, throw-everything-at-the-wall style of writing holds it back from being anything too eye-opening.

            The plot is largely a mish-mash of points borrowed from other material, something writer Dan O’Bannon readily admits.  An isolated crew being attacked by an alien is straight out of the novella Who Goes There?, which served as the basis for the 1951 film The Thing from Another World and the 1982 and 2011 films The Thing.  O’Bannon transposed the novella’s premise onto a space ship and structured it to have a long, tense setup similar to Jaws.  None of these were bad ideas as the confined area the characters are smooshed into lends itself to pot-boiling.  A sense of foreboding hangs over every scene, even when only small things are going wrong.  Early on, the crew squabbles over incidentals and clearly isn’t functioning as a team, something that comes to haunt them once they begin getting picked off.  Director Ridley Scott and his editing team kept the story lean and mean, even before the alien’s appearance, with nary a comfortable scene in sight.

            The issues come when you try to examine anything beyond the basic premise.  Several characters are remarkably thin, with Veronica Cartwright’s Lambert being such a weak sniveler that I wanted someone to sacrifice her to the alien just to make her shut up.  Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley and Tom Skerritt’s Dallas have some nice texturing in regards to their leadership roles, but none of this is used to effectively enhance the horror.  Consider Jaws again.  One of the most affecting scenes doesn’t feature the shark at all but is a simple recounting of battle wounds that culminates in Quint’s terrifying account of the sinking of the USS Indianapolis.  Nothing of that sort can be found in Alien as much of the dialogue is perfunctory arguments that quickly dissipate once the alien gets serious.  This lack of character depth plays against its building tension, leaving the audience without much to care about when it comes to the individuals being killed.

            Much has been written about Alien’s gender politics and the enduring question of whether it’s anti- or pro- feminism.  My stance is that the confusion stems from the film’s own lack of stance in the first place.  As already noted, the primary writer admits that the story was inspired by several different works and that many of the phallic or seemingly pivotal scenes to either side of the feminist stance were spur of the moment ideas (the alien impregnation storyline was allegedly thought up in the middle of the night).  Weaver told Hero Complex just last year that she didn’t think Scott had “any great feminist sentiment” toward Ripley or the film as a whole.  In fact, despite Ripley being renowned as a feminist icon, there’s an unavoidably objectifying scene where she strips to her underwear and trounces around with part of her butt hanging out.  The mixed messages in Alien is likely due to the extensive rewrites that occurred during pre-production, muddling attempts to add sex to the mix that were never intended to have any political meaning.

            What’s essential to evaluate in Alien is its horror, which plays out in dripping, oozing glory.  Yes, it’s over the top with its blood and guts, which is a brand of horror that I’m anesthetized to (my job has me handling the stuff every day), but there’s still that excellent plot construction to keep you on the edge of your seat.

Other Notes:

Ø  I wasn’t a big fan of the cinematography here.  There was precursor found-footage stuff, excessive shaking, and manipulative camera angles that only worked to keep the alien obscured.

Ø  I think that cat was secretly homicidal.

Ø  Seriously though, the amount of phallic imagery was just ridiculous.

Ø  “This place gives me the creeps.”  What gives you the creeps, the half-translated alien warning or the octopus thing attached to your friend’s face?

Ø  Hero Complex’s interview with Sigourney Weaver can be found here:  http://herocomplex.latimes.com/movies/alien-at-35-sigourney-weaver-reflects-on-ridley-scotts-masterpiece/#/0

Mad Max: Fury Road

Released:  May 15, 2015

Rated:  R

Distributor:  Warner Bros.

Starring:  Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Riley Keough, Zoë Kravitz, Abbey Lee, Courtney Eaton

Directed by:  George Miller

Written by:  George Miller, Brendan McCarthy, Nick Lathouris

Personal Bias Alert:  didn’t like the original Mad Max, wasn’t excited for another entry in the franchise 

8.2 of 10

            No one knew what to expect from Mad Max:  Fury Road as its production and release was the definition of mixed signals.  As the fourth entry in the Mad Max franchise, it comes a full thirty years after the last entry, with about fifteen of those spent in development hell due to war, financial troubles, prior commitments, and torrential rain (the pre-production of this film would make one hell of a documentary, am I right?).  But on the other hand, it has two accomplished leads in Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron and was screened out-of-competition at the prestigious (and snobby) Cannes Film Festival.  This is a post-apocalyptic action franchise with weird costumes and characters named Toecutter and Fifi, none of which screams Cannes.  But there it was, and now the confusion has come to a theater near you.  I’m here to clear the air and tell you, along with pretty much every other movie critic, that you should definitely go see this film.

            Now despite all the vocal adoration, understand that this is a Mad Max film, so it’s all about the action.  There’s very little meaning to this piece and that’s okay, because its goal of big, continuous action is delivered in spades.  Writer/director George Miller believes in the power of live stunts, but more importantly he has a unique vision on what stunts can be.  In the same way that Guillermo del Toro brings a uniquely inventive eye to his visuals, Miller brings the same level of artistry to the construction of his action sequences in Fury Road.  Too often the action in films feels repetitive, with the same gunfights, punches, and building smashing simply transposed onto new set pieces (I’m looking at you MCU).  Here, Miller delivers a two hour chase film that’s almost entirely action, and none of it feels like it’s copying itself.  His insane world of tricked out cars gives the characters plenty of toys to play with, and everything (including a flame-throwing guitar) gets used as a weapon.  This variety sustains the film’s long runtime, which you never come anywhere to close to noticing.

            The main beneficiary of the live stunts is actually the cinematography, as it allows for massive wide shots and dynamic camerawork that CGI-laden action can’t deliver.  Cinematographer John Seale, whose work is littered with beautiful films like The English Patient, Children of a Lesser God, and Cold Mountain, frames the car chases with panoramas of the desert wasteland that the world’s become, free to use every angle and camera move at his seasoned disposal.  This, along with an equally diverse and spot-on score, gives Fury Road it’s breathlessly operatic tone.  There’s moments you wish the film would stop so you could take it all in, but everything zips by so fast that you’re left with a feeling of unending splendor.

            The story is much more modest than the action, with Max (Hardy) joining up with a warrior named Imperator Furiosa (Theron) to smuggle a group of women being kept as breeders away from clan leader Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne, the same actor who played the villain leader in the original Mad Max).  Furiosa, who’s just as capable on the road as Max, has stolen a War Rig to transport the women, and the action centers around their protection of the women and the rig.  The story is basically that of a hero, a heroine, and an ark, but instead of enduring floods the parental duo must protect their cargo from marauding psychos.  The mutual respect that forms between Furiosa and Max makes for a surprisingly strong bond that’s conveyed seamlessly by Hardy and Theron.  There’s minimal dialogue in the film, which is why their ability to do a lot with very small moments is crucial.  Lesser actors in these two roles would certainly make the audience care less.  With them, the film’s a bombastic but grounded piece.

            There’s some moments that drag in the latter half and a bit too much craziness for craziness’s sake, but there’s always Seale’s elegant cinematography and Hardy and Theron’s performances to see it through.  Mad Max:  Road Fury may be just an action film, but it’s one that takes its audience seriously.  It doles out breathless action that has serious consequences, a surprisingly rare treat in modern, big-budget cinema.

Other Notes:

Ø  Props must also go out to everyone who worked on the design of this film.  Miller wanted to avoid the grey-and-black desaturated look that’s present in every post-apocalypse nowadays, and this contributed greatly to the glorious visuals.

Ø  Keep in mind, I’m not a big action fan.  This is about as good a reaction that an action film can get from me.

Ø  Lots of people are discussing the gender politics of this film.  It’s sad that featuring females that are equal to their male counterparts is considered political.

Marley & Me

Released:  December 25^th, 2008

Rated:  PG

Distributor:  20^th Century Fox

Starring:  Owen Wilson, Jennifer Aniston, Eric Dane, Alan Arkin

Directed by:  David Frankel

Written by:  Scott Frank, Don Roos

Personal Bias Alert:  wasn’t expecting much, a sucker for dogs

6.7 of 10

            There must’ve been some big piles of Kleenex on Christmas Day, 2008.  Seriously, the theaters showing Marley & Me should’ve replaced the cup holders with trash receptacles, because everyone showing up that day for this family-friendly dogpile was leaving a snot-filled heap.  Not that any of us should’ve been surprised; the great tragedy of dog ownership is known to all, but the wallop of authenticity that Marley & Me hits its audience with is a shocking surprise after a first act of bad dog hijinks.

            The Me in Marley & Me refers to newspaper man John Grogan (Owen Wilson), who adopts the bullheaded lab Marley to stall he and his wife’s progression towards children.  John still has vague aspirations to be a big-time reporter but instead winds up as a columnist.  Without thought, he writes about Marley.  The dog is a bit of a terror, and his eating, shredding, and peeing escapades takes up an unneeded 40 minutes of this film.  These jokes are all slapstick and schmaltz, with the lab wrecking everything and leaving John with nothing to do but smile, dumbfounded at his tornado of a pet.  To call this section repetitive would be an understatement, and just when it seems destined wear down everyone’s patience, the film turns on the drop of a dime.

            Grogan, who wrote the memoir on which the film’s based, must’ve experienced a similarly abrupt turn in his own life when his first child was lost to a miscarriage.  As depicted in the film, he and his wife, Jenny (Jennifer Aniston), return home not knowing what to do.  Marley, following instinct, makes the right call and mopes with Jenny, unknowingly nudging the family to confront what’s happened so they can move on.  It’s this moment and others like it that show a dog’s worth, and this fictional version of Marley proves to be worth every cent of his damages.  After that, a string of healthy children appear and Grogan’s career takes off, moving the family in unexpected directions but always finding a humorous anchor in Marley’s consistent wreckage. 

            The film is markedly more serious and slightly less schmaltzy after the miscarriage, and the realities that the couple encounter as they transition into middle age are remarkably well-portrayed.  Aniston and Wilson take a satisfying bite out of the mix of comedy and drama, turning John and Jenny into characters you want to root for even when they’re coming apart at the seams.  What the audience becomes invested in is their burgeoning family.  Marley’s just there to push the couple past the starting line.

            As enriching as this serious turn is, it skirts the real thorny issues this couple certainly faced.  Even when things become dark, John’s oafish good humor keeps thing from appearing hopeless.  Any emotionally charged moments are quickly washed down with a shot of sweet memories, peppering in just enough weight for the adults to be satisfied without scaring away the kids.  This is a family movie, after all, so it can’t get too real.

            Even though it can’t go all the way, what’s great about Marley & Me is that Grogan put himself and his family in there.  The slapstick comedy and overreliance on cute moments gets in the way, but the ten-plus year journey that John, Jenny, and Marley go on is substantive enough to get behind.  The ending is one of the most overblown odes I’ve seen, but for those who’ve loved a dog, every moment rings true.  Now hand me the Kleenex.

Other Notes:

Ø  This is a very racy PG.

Ø  I was dangerously close to checking out after the first 30 minutes.  That destructive dog stuff is just not funny to me.

Ø  This is one of only four films that has ever made me cry.

Hot Pursuit

Released:  May 8^th, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Warner Bros.

Starring:  Reese Witherspoon, Sofía Vergara

Directed by:  Anne Fletcher

Written by:  David Feeney, John Quaintance

Personal Bias Alert:  dislikes sexism, saw the trailer several times in theaters and heard people audibly grumble in response

3.1 of 10

            The saddest part of seeing Hot Pursuit (and yes, there’s many sad parts to this attempted comedy) is when you’re sitting in your seat not laughing and it dawns on you just how many people must’ve thought this film was a good idea.  They got an experienced director, a healthy $35 million budget, a strong supporting cast, and two leads with robust careers.  How, you ask?  That question, like many other things in life, will likely remain a mystery until the day you die.

            Okay, let’s take a step back.  This movie isn’t bad enough to start contemplating your own death.  Reese Witherspoon as an uptight cop trying to protect Sofía Vergara’s cartel-targeted witness at least gives us two game performers, with Witherspoon and Vergara throwing their backs into every lazy joke and sight gag that this film tries to pass off as comedy, and they succeed in making it an endurable hour and a half.  With less committed leads, this film could’ve become downright hateful, an abomination to the eyes and ears of those tricked into seeing it.  With them, it almost succeeds at being an innocuously unfunny distraction.  Almost.

            Letting down the two leads is pretty much everything surrounding them, with the bulk of the failure falling on writers David Feeney and John Quaintance.  Both make their living as sitcom writers, and not for the smart comedies that edged into the market in the ‘00s.  Nope, these guys write for dull, setup-punchline machines like Joey, 2 Broke Girls, and According to Jim.  For the sake of yuks, let’s compare the low bar that these shows set for themselves to Hot Pursuit.  Does the film complete this hurdle?  No, it trips during the approach and face plants into the track.  Its characters aren’t likable, its jokes aren’t based on any sort of reality (there’s a running gag about Witherspoon’s character having a mustache, which she never has), and the audience may as well be crickets considering the amount of times I heard anyone laugh.  The script is best described as sophomoric, attempting to apply the odd couple formula to an action-comedy and update it by putting two females in the leads.  Instead, its tired setup lays there like a slug, and the presence of females only encourages a vague sense of misogyny.  It’s clear from the beginning that we shouldn’t expect much from the women in this film, and when they do pull off anything it should be treated as something approaching a miracle.  The fact that this conceit still exists in the time of Leslie Knope, Katniss Everdeen, or even Witherspoon’s own Cheryl Strayed is just plain disheartening.

            In discussing how director Anne Fletcher let down her leads, I would again like to point out that this film had a $35 million budget.  I can only imagine that it sunk that money into its sporadic action sequences, because everything else looks like crap.  The laziness that went into the shot setup here is epic, featuring an opening foot pursuit staged so poorly that the actors appear to be stumbling instead of running and an entire scene set in the bed of a truck that’s supposed to be on the road but wasn’t given enough fake wind to even blow Vergara’s loose hair.  The fact that Fletcher couldn’t even make the film look passably realistic, which is a very basic part of the director’s job, should indicate how badly she failed at more complex tasks like constructing comedic timing and imbuing any sort of tone.

            With all this failure surrounding them, it’s shocking that Witherspoon and Vergara manage the three or four laughs they do get.  How they were brought on in the first place is beyond me, and the fact that people will spend their precious time seeing this film is just sad.

Other Notes:

Ø  They couldn’t even get the runtime to 90 minutes.

Ø  Matthew Del Negro is a discount Matthew McConaughey.

Ø  How does this exist?