Sneakin’ In Da Movies

This should about catch me up on movies for now. Some good, some… well… not so much.

First, there was Hollywoodland. This is the true story of an actor that started out playing in a few significant films, but never as the star. As his career progressed, he found himself relegated to lesser roles than for which he had hoped. He had a “pose” for every situation, and relied on his good looks and strong chin to lead the way for him, but he never garnered significant respect for his acting. Instead, he relied upon his connections with other more successful people in the movie industry to keep him afloat. No, the film isn’t actually about Ben Affleck, but he does portray the actor in question. The movie analyzes the events leading up to and surrounding the apparent suicide of George Reeves, the man best known for his portrayal of Superman in the 50’s television series. In fairness to Mr. Reeves, the tv series was wildly successful with its target audience for a time. What I liked about the movie: I can’t vouch for its accuracy (I never lived in the 1950’s), but the sense of time for the film seemed very real to me. I also appreciated the performances of particularly Adrien Brody and also Diane Lane. Their characters were both rather real for me and moved through a developmental arc throughout the picture. It will not surprise you to hear that though the role provided the opportunity, Affleck’s character didn’t develop quite as much. The various scenes portraying alternative explanations for the end of his life may have had something to do with the muddled mess the character seemed to be. I also could have done without the multiple gratuitous bare buttocks shots I had to endure from Mr. Affleck. Overall, I don’t find this piece of history to be terribly compelling, but it was a nice period piece with a bit of noir/big hollywood feel. IMDB gives it a 6.6, and for what it is, that probably is close enough.

For our next entry, let’s take a look at Eragon. This film was based on a book I read a couple of years ago. Picking up the book, I thought I was getting something in the vein of Harry Potter, or other similarly good literature aimed at children. Although not nearly as good as Rowling, the book did not disappoint in this regard. Some folks have opined that Eragon lifted a bit too shamelessly and liberally from the works of Tolkien. I believe this only to be true insomuch as both relied on heroic archetypes. That was the book. This is the movie. The story was not the movie’s problem. One incredibly horrible screenplay was. Or was it slash and burn editing? Hard to tell. The one thing for certain is that the movie was a near-incoherent mess. The characters were incredibly shallow and unsympathetic. The action scenes were OK in places, but in most unremarkable. If this was to serve as the foundation for a movie on Paolini’s second book, Eldest, the whole mess will undoubtedly sink into a fantastical abyss under it’s own weight. The 4.9 it received on IMDB is generous, but anything under a 5 really isn’t worth rating with any greater specificity.

Next was the Guardian. This Costner/Kutcher flick was in many ways predictable. Its a tale of a “changing of the guard” of a sorts within the US Coast Guard, as one legendary rescue swimmer takes a role training the next generation. You could cynically condense the film into Officer and a Gentleman meets the Perfect Storm meets Top Gun. While this distillation may be cynical, its not far off either. However, I wouldn’t dismiss the film on these grounds. Here are the points of redemption: 1) Costner is likable. Has he even not been? He’s fun to watch and easy to identify with. 2) Kutcher is actually believable. This is one of the questions I watched the movie to answer. Would I constantly be waiting for him to grin and tell me I had been Punk’d for renting it? As it turns out, no. He does a good job creating the character for which the script was written. If the right movie comes along, I’d want to see him in another dramatic role. 3) This is a good flick. It’s not great, and it’s not high art, but it is a good story with good characters and, yes, good special effects. IMDB gives up a 6.6. I’d probably push it over the 7 mark.

Finally (for this installment, anyway) there is Million Dollar Baby. To me, one of the marks of a truly great film is its ability to continue to insinuate itself into your consciousness for days or even weeks after you see it. I don’t mean this in the sort of way that some annoying children’s tune or 80’s song gets in your head either. I mean in the sort of way that you know you have seen something significant and that there are questions poised that just aren’t that easy to puzzle out. That there are images that are so enduring you know it will take a long time to shake them. Being left with the feeling that not only did you not see something coming, but that when you are caught off guard by it, it wasn’t just trickery or emotional or intellectual dishonesty that caused the story to go that way, but rather fantastic story telling. This is that sort of film. Here’s the really great thing though: this film is not only good strategically. It’s also excellent tactically. I’m not giving away any spoilers to say that when the film is over, I wanted to listen to Frankie and Scrap banter more. I wanted to know Maggie better. I wanted to know what the deal was with the minister. I simply wanted more and knew there wasn’t any more. You may be saying at this point “Are you going to tell us what the movie is about?”. In short, no. In part, that’s because I am still working that part out. And that, in part, is why this movie is as great as it is. IMDB gave this one an 8.3. That’s too dang low. Buy it, watch it, then watch it again.

Must Not See List

I just got through watching Benchwarmers with Becky. If you like, you can consider that statement a confession of sorts. Keeping it real, I didn’t expect it to actually be good. I just didn’t expect it to be this bad. Don’t get me wrong. There were definately portions of the movie that had me laughing out loud. Most of them revolved around John Lovitz’s character, an uber-nerd that became a millionaire. He uses his wealth to get all of the toys nerds of my generation aspired to, including a personal robot and multiple life-size statues of starwars characters in his house. Beyond that, most of the laughs were of the “no they didn’t just do that” variety. Let me keep it simple: this is lowest common denominator humor. It’s not just that it was crude. It was also cheap. The thought I came out of my viewing with was, “Of all the movies in the history of hollywood, I just watched this”. To hammer home the point, if Jon Heder picked his nose in this movie less than 50 times, I would be amazed. IMDB gave it a 5.4. There is much generosity in the IMDB votership. Think sub-4. Don’t buy. Don’t rent. Don’t collect $200.

End of the Drought

It goes without saying that I’ve been in the midst of a significant blogging drought. It’s not so much that I don’t have anything to say, but more that what I have to say I have not wanted to say here. However, I have decided that it’s time to break the silence and to do so in a way that is innocuous, but perhaps useful.

Many of my readers (both of them) know that I have become a rather compulsive collector of movies. In order to prevent this activity from breaking my personal bank, I have also refined my ability to find the movies I buy at bargain prices. In fact, a rarely broken rule is that any movie I buy must be less than $10.

In recent months, however, my journeys down the aisles of Blockbuster, Circuit City, and Target had begun to yield less and less fruit. The problem seems to be that there are fewer and fewer movies that meet the intersection of “desired price range” and “worthy of ownership”. In the interest of preventing my habit from driving me to purchase any more films like Oceans 12, I had to find another approach. Enter my new Blockbuster Online account. Going in this direction presented several immediate benefits: 1) I could scout for movies that might be worthy of ownership, 2) I could intentionally watch movies I suspected were bad but possibly fun, and 3) I would get one free game rental per month. All of these benefits could be had for the cost of 2 copies of Oceans 12, and with none of the associated regrets.

With this preamble, I now enter the crowded and contentious territory of movie reviews. Please understand that there are MANY more movies in category 2 (listed just above) than in category 1 (also listed above). As a result, I will kindly suggest that if you are going to mock my choice in movies, that you at least make such mockery entertaining for the other(s) that read this esteemed blog. I will, at least, attempt to make the depth of review of marginal movies consistent with the depth of quality. Unless a film reaches to new depths of abysmalality, I will not give bad films much ink (many pixels?). Without further ado, here are the first round:

Accepted – I selected this film because I wanted the answer to one question: If a person wanted to create a completely fictitious university, how would that person go about it? While the movie, as expected, did not delve too deeply into the answer to this question (or any other for that matter), it did provide some (very) cheap laughs. Let me be clear: this movie relied on crude humor, merciless stereotyping, and a predictable plot line. This isn’t Shakespeare, folks. Still, it was more or less fun in a I-should-be-disappointed-in-myself kind of way. If there was nothing else to see, I might have caught it once at the dollar theater. It does, by the way, give you a chance to see the “I’m a Mac” guy on a slightly larger stage. IMDB: 6.2 – that’s in the right ballpark.

Fantastic 4 – When I was a kid, I liked to watch the SuperFriends. I even owned a comic book or two. Now that I’m grown up, I really like a great superhero movie, like Batman Returns. I also get really annoyed when Hollywood puts out junk in the guise of a super hero movie, like Batman and Robin. My definition, in fairness, tends to include that the movie have grown-up appeal, if a protagonist in tights (Shakespeare not included) can be considered grown-up. I think people like me are the reason that Fantastic 4 got panned. The thing is, when you think about the 5-8 year old set, Fantastic Four was actually a decent flick. As it turned out, my oldest daughter (6.5 years old) watched most of this one with me and actually liked it. The savvy reader may deduce from this that the movie was pretty tame. The savvy reader would be right. There were plenty of special effects. I imagine that the human torch and Thing would be the two favorites among little boys. Sorry, Plastic Man. Reed Richards is a pretty lame dude. That’s just the way it is. I’m curious to see what they do with the soon-to-be-released Silver Surfer Sequel. IMDB: 5.9 – For a kid-friendly flick, I think this is low. If you’re comparing it to Batman Begins, it may be a bit high.

Invincible – It’s a sports movie. It’s based on a true story. It involves a bartender that tries out for and makes the NFL. There’s nothing much left to the imagination after that. Yeah, we’ve all seen movies like this. They don’t make “based on a true story” sports movies about the wannabe baseball pitcher, football player, or Olympic hockey team that gave it their all and fought through adversity to still, well, suck. This movie is nothing if not predictable. But I liked it anyway. Seeing the 70’s cars, haircuts, clothes, and hearing the pretty cool soundtrack were half the fun. And while the heroes never suck in the end of movies like this, the bottom line is that they are all based on compelling stories. The only thing I wanted at the end was a little more “where they are now”, particularly a bit about his ex-wife. If you’ve seen the movie, you know what I mean. IMDB: 7.0 – Sounds good to me.

Casino Royale – Bond, James Bond. To say that this movie redefines the character may in fact be understating the point. Gone is the reliance on cheesy gadgets and cheesier villains. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t know that I have ever seen a Bond movie that I didn’t enjoy on some level. The fact is, however, that Bond was becoming more and more like Dirk Pitt (for those of you that have read a Cussler novel). This movie reverses that trend. James is still skilled, suave, and fun to watch. But this time around, there is an attempt to make things a bit more realistic. For instance, the primary plot device is not “villain bent on destroying all of human kind”. There is also more depth to James. You actually see something bordering on emotion. Furthermore, there is an attempt to explain some of what we have seen of Bond in other movies. Don’t take all this to mean that 007 spends the entire movie staring at the moon and thinking about his inner self. This movie has some classic scenes in it. Near the beginning of the movie is what may very well be the best “on foot” chase scene I have ever seen. There is also a torture scene a bit further along that will leave the guys that see it cringing just a bit. The bottom line is that this is a rental that I will go back and buy. If you care for spy flicks at all, you should check this one out. IMDB gives this one a 7.9. I would probably bump it to 8.5.

I would like to dedicate this post to MA and JS, who have harassed me without ceasing about my absence from the blogosphere. This one is for you.