Cuz We Said So

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #11 - "District 9"

With a summer movie season sprinkled with near-misses and straightforward duds, we can at least be happy that it started with an exceptional film, and ended with another.

There are no stars in this film.  It was directed by someone you never heard of.  It was filmed in a place you've probably never been.  But it was produced by a guy named Peter Jackson, so it got wide release.  And rightly so.

In 1982, an alien spacecraft arrives in the sky over Johannesburg, South Africa.  And just hangs there.  For weeks.  Finally, the South African military flies up and cuts their way through the hull to find a couple million sentient, buglike aliens living in there.  They have run out of fuel, so they can't leave, and they can't even feed themselves.  They didn't actually build the ship: they're an underclass, worker bees, serving under some unseen master race.  (This is the point at which the story diverges from "Alien Nation".)  The South African government herds all the Prawns (as they are colloquially known) into a "planned community" (read "slum") called District 9.  The Prawns are ugly, ill-tempered, strong, large, and fertile.  In a little over twenty years, there are twice as many of them running around.

All of that is backstory, shown to the viewer in a cinema-verite-documentary style series of clips and interviews.  Then, we meet our hero, Wikus Van De Merwe, a chatty bureaucrat who's been put in charge of moving the Prawns from District 9 to a "new community" (read "concentration camp") outside the city.  Wikus is personable, witty, and horrifying.  He is the picture of what a rational, normal person can become when an underclass is systematically dehumanized.  Suffice to say, you won't like him for the first half of the movie.

Then, in a routine eviction, he gets sprayed with some unknown substance.  That's when things take a turn for the worst for Wikus.  I don't want to spoil the suprise, but he becomes the target of his own government, and of a warlord Nigerian who lives and trades with the Prawns.  It's hard to decide which of these groups is more evil (I vote for the South Africans), but Wikus can't survive with either, so he has to side with the aliens he has spent a career treating like garbage.

The film doesn't do a true "Blair Witch" or "Cloverfield" or "Rec" kind of thing.  Lots of it is pieced together "found footage", from documentary crews, or security cameras, or the like.  But many key scenes are traditionally shot.  They are no less dramatic for that.

If, as the director (Niell Blomkamp) has intimated, there might be a sequel on the horizon, I will be the first in line for "District 10".

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #10 (for real) - "G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra"

I wanted to like this one.  I really did.  I like Stephen Sommers (okay, sometimes).  I like Dennis Quaid (usually).  I like Marlon Wayans (to a point).  I like Sienna Miller (kind of).  And I liked the original G.I. Joe cartoon (when I was twelve).

Okay, in retrospect, I'm surprised I was excited about this movie.  But I hoped it would be cheesy fun, and not simply cheesy.  I'm a fan of spectacle, but I found that there's a limit to how much I can stand.  The reveal of the Joe's secret lair in the middle of the Sahara (huh?) is too much.  The abilities that the Joe's evince when wearing their accelerator suits are too much.  The melodrama is way too much.  The reveals in the third act of who's who, and what they've done are too crazy.  The bad guy is that kid from "Third Rock from the Sun".  No, really.

(The one plotline I kind of liked was Snake Eyes lifelong feud with Storm Shadow.  That had the right amount of tongue-in-cheek-ness to make it work.)

When you're watching a film about microscopic machines that tear things apart, and you're wishing you were watching the remake of "The Day the Earth Stood Still" instead, you know you're watching a real dud of a film.

So, I can only assume the sequel will be on theater screen near you in the Summer of 2011.

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #10 - "Aliens in the Attic"

Sorry. Kidding. I never saw this one, and really don't plan to.

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #9 - HPATHBP

"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" is a really long title to use for a blog post, hence my acronymization. (Also, it's a little ridiculous to write a "Summer Blockbuster" review in mid-September, but I'm behind, and I want to catch up.)

The Harry Potter series has been a huge anomaly in the history of film adaptations of novels. Not only have they been churning them out very quickly, not only have they maintained the same cast (barring one sad death) through six films, but the films are of uniformly high quality. (Even the fifth film, "Order of the Phoenix", which I found to be the least impressive of the novels, but one of the best of the movies.)

So, "Half-Blood Prince" is a good movie. I can't give it a thumbs down. But I also can't rave about it. It's easily the least involving of the six films to date. I'm not exactly sure why I think this. It has, objectively, a lot going for it. Ron playing quidditch! Harry kissing Ginny! Dumbledore with an extra-crispy hand!

I think the problem is that, after the pressure-cooker of "Order", this one feels a little less dire. The central problem this time around is to find a hidden memory, locked inside the self-important head of Horace Slughorn, a new teacher at Hogwarts. True, the memory is important, and certainly creepy, and vitally important to their fight against You-Know-Who, which will figure prominently in the following films. But it seems a bit of a breather, after all that's happened up until now.

I have to give props to Tom Felton, who plays Draco Malfoy. There's more subtlety in his performance this time around than in all the previous films put together. We've known for a long time that the Casting Gods had smiled on this series, with Radcliffe, Watson and Grint growing into excellent actors. (And I have a sense we'll be seeing some great things from Matthew Lewis, who plays Neville Longbottom, in the series finale.) But who knew Felton would be so good.

On the other hand, the set piece that happens near the end of the film, with Harry and Dumbledore entering a cave and finding a talisman hidden on a lake... That whole thing I didn't even like in the book.  Rowling has done an amazing job of writing a modern fantasy, that doesn't rely on hoary old Tolkienesque cliches.  Except for that scene, which didn't fit in the rest of the series, either book or film.

My last problem with the film revolves around the ending, which I won't spoil here. The reveal of who the Half-Blood Prince is, is, sadly, something of a footnote to the story. After all the horror that Harry has undergone, that moment wasn't nearly charged with enough anger, or despair, or whatever Harry should have been feeling.

I look forward immensely to the final two films. I just hope they bring back the (pardon the pun) magic.

"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" is a really long title to use for a blog post, hence my acronymization. (Also, it's a little ridiculous to write a "Summer Blockbuster" review in mid-September, but I'm behind, and I want to catch up.)

The Harry Potter series has been a huge anomaly in the history of film adaptations of novels. Not only have they been churning them out very quickly, not only have they maintained the same cast (barring one sad death) through six films, but the films are of uniformly high quality. (Even the fifth film, "Order of the Phoenix", which I found to be the least impressive of the novels, but one of the best of the movies.)

So, "Half-Blood Prince" is a good movie. I can't give it a thumbs down. But I also can't rave about it. It's easily the least involving of the six films to date. I'm not exactly sure why I think this. It has, objectively, a lot going for it. Ron playing quidditch! Harry kissing Ginny! Dumbledore with an extra-crispy hand!

I think the problem is that, after the pressure-cooker of "Order", this one feels a little less dire. The central problem this time around is to find a hidden memory, locked inside the self-important head of Horace Slughorn, a new teacher at Hogwarts. True, the memory is important, and certainly creepy, and vitally important to their fight against You-Know-Who, which will figure prominently in the following films. But it seems a bit of a breather, after all that's happened up until now.

I have to give props to Tom Felton, who plays Draco Malfoy. There's more subtlety in his performance this time around than in all the previous films put together. We've known for a long time that the Casting Gods had smiled on this series, with Radcliffe, Watson and Grint growing into excellent actors. (And I have a sense we'll be seeing some great things from Matthew Lewis, who plays Neville Longbottom, in the series finale.) But who knew Felton would be so good.

On the other hand, the set piece that happens near the end of the film, with Harry and Dumbledore entering a cave and finding a talisman hidden on a lake... That whole thing I didn't even like in the book.  Rowling has done an amazing job of writing a modern fantasy, that doesn't rely on hoary old Tolkienesque cliches.  Except for that scene, which didn't fit in the rest of the series, either book or film.

My last problem with the film revolves around the ending, which I won't spoil here. The reveal of who the Half-Blood Prince is, is, sadly, something of a footnote to the story. After all the horror that Harry has undergone, that moment wasn't nearly charged with enough anger, or despair, or whatever Harry should have been feeling.

I look forward immensely to the final two films. I just hope they bring back the (pardon the pun) magic.

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #8 - "The Proposal"

Films like this are ultimate formula pictures.  The stars (Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds) hate each other, but are forced to be together, so that they realize they really love each other.  (And the audience goes, "Awwwww!")

I've like Ryan Reynolds ever since "Two Guys and a Girl".  (I even watched the show when the title included "...and a Pizza Place".)  He's just got star written all over him.  He's a good actor, and he's funny, and according to the ladies, not bad on the eyes.  I also like Sandra Bullock, who is also a good actor, also funny, and, as one scene verifies, has a killer body.  None of that makes a difference, though, if there's no chemistry between them.  And there is.  They make a little hay out of the age difference, but it really doesn't matter.  The funny part of their relationship isn't that she's older, it's that she has the power.

(Quick plot synopsis: Bullock is a Canadian about to lose her work visa.  Reynolds is her long-suffering administrative assistant.  She forces him to marry her so she can stay in the country.  Hijinks ensue.)

The other fun thing about this kind of film is that when you've got enough star power in the top spots, you generally have enough cash to hire excellent supporting actors, in this case Mary Steenburgen, Craig T. Nelson, and Betty White, as Reynolds's Alaskan family.  A trap a family romantic comedy can fall into is having all the characters be wild and crazy.  (e.g. "Meet the Fockers")  Here, they settle for one: Betty White.  Steenburgen is a straightforward mom-type, and Nelson is a gruff dad.

I really enjoyed the movie, even though it never really surprised me, except perhaps in how charming I found Bullock to be, even when she was supposed to be the "bitch".  That takes some talent.

"The Girlfriend Experience"

Talk about counterprogamming.  In the middle of a summer filled with giant robots and time travelling Vulcans comes a Steven Soderbergh film about the life of a high class call girl.  This is the very definition of a "small" film.  There are no stars (unless you count the lead, Sasha Grey, who is a porn star) and there's very little in the way of production value on the screen.  I think the permits to shoot in Soho (shout out!) probably cost more than the salaries of the entire cast.

But small doesn't mean bad.  Soderbergh does an interesting thing with the editing, switching around between a number of scenes that the girl (Chelsea) is in: talking to a fellow escort, talking to a journalist, talking to her longtime boyfriend, talking to her new john that she starts to fall for.  Her performance is pretty good.  The story implies that she's got a wall up around her at all times, so she seems pretty flat most of the time.  She has a couple of acting scenes (laughing, crying, etc) which work fairly well.  But I'm not holding my breath for a cross-over acting career.

What was kind of surprising (though not in retrospect) is how unsexy the film is.  Even the scenes of sensuality have a kind of plastic coating over them.  It's obvious that Chelsea's "interest" is feigned, and that her clients (except for one memorable guy at the end) see her as a commodity, not a person.

The best scene is one in which Chelsea visits a "sex connoisseur" who offers her an excellent review on his website in exchange for some free sex.  This guy was the most wonderfully unlikeable character I've seen on film in years.  Take this line that comes during his proposal to take Chelsea on a working excursion to Dubai: "The best thing about it is that it sounds like white slavery... but it's not."

All in all, it's a pretty interesting film, and not nearly as seedy as the premise (or the casting) might indicate.

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #7 - "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen"

Here's a refrain that anyone who reads my reviews might recognize: this film was okay, but not as good at its predecessor.  If you don't like big, dumb blockbusters, or if you saw "Transformers" and didn't like it, do not see this one.  In fact, I can't recommend it at all.  It kind of blows.  (But not nearly as much as the other critics think.)

First, the good.  Strangely, I really liked Josh Duhamel's military guy in this one.  He seemed kind of flat in the first film, but he's much better here.  That's the main improvement, as far as I can tell.  There's one really amazing battle sequence in the middle of the film where Optimus has to fight off three Decepticons.  That one raised the bar... which the film never seemed to live up to for the balance of the two-and-a-half hour running time.

Basically, Michael Bay decided to multiply everything about this film.  Some of the increases were okay, but most were just annoying.  I liked the fact that there were more robots to follow, but at some point it just got confusing trying to keep track of them.  There're more action sequences, which is great, and they're bigger, which is also great.  But they're also more disjointed and meandering.  He also greatly increased the danger to humanity in this one compared to the first film... but it seemed strangely tacked on and uninvolving.  I'll go into a little more detail about that in the next section, where I'll be spoiling some of the "plot" points.

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #6 - "The Taking of Pelham 123"

This one I really liked.  Yes, I have a fondness for these kinds of Die-Hard-like films, but I think this example of the genre has a lot of things to recommend it that put it a notch above the average heist-hostage flick.

John Travolta's character takes over a single subway car and then proceeds to send his orders for monetary payment to the transit authority.  Denzel Washington is the guy unlucky enough to answer the call.  The main fun about the movie is the conversations these two guys have.  They're both brilliant, but in very different ways.  Washington is a quick-thinking, logical, pragmatic multi-tasker.  Travolta is a fly-the-the-seat-of-his-pants genius.  Both performances are great, but Travolta gets extra points in my book for making it clear that his character is actually a little bit crazy, while he pretends to be much crazier.

The supporting cast (John Turturro as an FBI agent, James Gandolfini as the Mayor of New York) are good, too.  The action is enjoyable, and the ending is really quite good.  This isn't the best film of the summer (that one had a few more Vulcans in it) but it's definitely a candidate for second place.

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #5 - "Terminator Salvation"

Wow, did the critics hate this one.  I'm not going to be putting it on any Top Ten lists, but I'm also not putting it on any Bottom Ten lists.  So, pretty good, not nearly great is my short review.  For details (and spoilers) read on...

Summer '09 - Blockbuster #4 - "Night at the Museum: BOTS"

I was a fan of the first film in this series.  It was an enjoyable combination of nifty special effects, a sweet story, and Ben Stiller shifting into family-friendly territory with his comedy.  I mean, I loved "Dodgeball", and I loved "Tropic Thunder".  But he's good when he's not edgy, too.

This looked like it was going to be enormously enjoyable from the trailers.  The magical tablet that brought the New York museum to life gets transported to the Smithsonian in Washington; hijinks ensue.

The problem is that there are so many characters to return to, and they have so many new ones to introduce that everyone gets short shrift.  Robin Williams's Teddy Roosevelt is reduced to little more than a cameo.  Owen Wilson and Steve Coogan (as the tiny little cowboy and centurion figurines) have a couple of good scenes.  Sacajawea has almost nothing to do.  Bill Hader and Christopher Guest are funny, but their characters (George Custer and Ivan the Terrible) are barely sketched out.  The second best new character is Hank Azaria's evil Egyptian Pharoah wannabe.  His effete lisp is hilarious.

The best new character is Amy Adams as Amelia Earhart.  She's feisty, just like you imagine Earhart would probably be, which is an excellent excuse for her to tag along with Ben Stiller as he tries to sort everything out and save the day.

I had fun, particularly when the artwork came to life.  (Loved the dancing Koons dog.)  But the film didn't really have the magic of the first. 

But, in its favor, it did have Clint Howard in a fantastic cameo.