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They talk poppers, January Jones, and other sleep inducing items.

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Kate Beckinsale returns as Selene for her third time around in black leather.  The last film in the series was a prequel not involving her character.  She is actually the only returning actor from any of the previous films.  Besides from the opening flashback re-telling story scene and a Scott Speedman look-a-like she is the only character as well.  After viewing the film, I felt the Resident Evil vibe here which is not a good thing in my opinion.  What I mean by this that the story is getting away the original source and going into obscure directions just to progress storyline.  Plus introducing new characters without really keeping the original ones besides the main one.

This is a great picture, 3 things here are smoking.

Directors Mans Marlind and Bjorn Stein share the helm and start off the film with showing via television newscast what takes place after humans find out about the other two races that live among them. After brief altercations involving Selene, we get a time jump 12 years later to see what has happened.  As it turns out Selene was incapacitated and unaware of the happenings….again like the main character Alice in Resident Evil going from the first to second films.  After her awakening, as the title dictates, we watch as she pieces everything together and eventually get back to vampires versus werewolves as it should be.

Underworld: Awakening really to me was a movie that didn’t need to be made.  It progressed the film into a direction not needed to be told and actually weakens the series in my eyes.  The acting was sub par, Beckinsale was acceptable but really didn’t offer much more than eye candy both with her outfit and the hundreds of bullets she shot out with the dual guns she equips.  Providing supporting acting is Stephen Rea, Michael Ealy, Theo James, and Kris Holden-Ried amongst others including child actor India Eisley.  Rea and Holden-Ried provide the bad guy element with wooden stale acting while Ealy and James provide the ally element just the same way.  Eisley came off as she just was released from the well in The Ring and really didn’t provide much to the film as the daughter of Selene and the vampire/werewolf hybrid Michael.

I really wanted to like this film more than I did because I love the series and the characters that we have seen previously.  However I just can’t give it more than 2 pitchforks and that is semi generous.

50/50 is the story of Adam and the unpronounceable cancer that invades his body. Once diagnosed with cancer Adam begins looking for support from the people in his life only to find that some forms of help are better left unexplored.

50/50 skirts the line between maudlin and farcical, which is a very difficult balance to manage. If the story becomes too sentimental, then it simply becomes every schmaltzy film that ever covered the subject. If they opt to go for nothing but laughs, then it becomes too unbelievable and will lack any real truth, and will thus lose all credibility. Luckily, the film makes it work by allowing each humorous interaction to end with an emotionally truthful moment.

One of my biggest pet peeves in the filmic, or even literary world is the use of “false foreshadowing”. F.F. occurs when a very blatant statement or action is forced into a scene and serves to presage an event. Sometimes even events that viewers or readers are already expecting based on the premise of the story. 50/50 has this in spades, as one event or interaction informs another, and so on and so forth. This of course makes the film mildly predictable, but in the end, you are really only worried about one outcome, and that is implied in the title.

Levitt shows his comedic chops, though more often than not he is the straight man to Seth Rogen’s over the top buffoon of a best friend. And while Rogen continually brings the funny, Levitt manages to tug at the heart strings with his earnest performance. Beside the two male leads, other performances worth noting are Angelica Huston as Levitt’s onscreen mother and Philip Baker Hall as an ailing accomplice for Levitt.

50/50 is a heartfelt and subtle comedy, with some very strong and poignant performances. Despite the overuse of carelessly blatant foreshadowing, the film still manages to tells a story worth watching. Odds are, viewers with discerning taste will enjoy this film.

Real Steel takes place in the near future, in a world pretty much exactly like ours but for the fact that, in an attempt to satisfy America’s bloodlust for a bigger and more “complete” fight-viewing experience, robots have replaced humans in boxing, pro-wrestling, and MMA rings. Hugh Jackman plays Charlie Kenton, a down-on-his-luck former champion (of actual boxing) who now makes a nominal living hustling robot fights in low-rent county fairs and the underground fight circuit. After another hustle, in which he gets temporary custody of his estranged son Max (Dakota Goyo), the boy blackmails Charlie into taking him along on a fight, and the two eventually happen upon an old sparring bot named “Atom”. With a bit of technical know-how, a little “training” (programming, basically), and more than a little luck, the trio gains the attention of the media and fight promoters, and they quickly make their way from the underground circuit to the glossy, professional big-show. But does Atom have it in him to win the big fight? Will love and family triumph over all? Can Charlie redeem himself, or at least prove himself worthy of redemption, for all his years of being a horrible human being?

The answers to none of these questions will shock you as, story-wise, Real Steel is a bit predictable and a little cheesy, with entirely too much dancing for my liking (don’t ask). The biggest surprises and twists are, in fact, when you find yourself actually caring about the different characters, their relationships, and yes, even rooting for the scrappy little (relatively speaking) training robot. As a bit of Friday night family fun, I guarantee that you’ve sat through far worse. There are a few odd bits of story dropped that don’t ultimately lead anywhere (Max speaks Japanese? Is Atom becoming self-aware, somehow, a little bit?), that I will happily chalk up to me reading too much into what is essentially a pretty uncomplicated movie.

Look at me and listen, you may be 10 tons of steel but DAMMIT I"M THE WOLVERINE AND CAN TAKE YOU IF I WANT!

Director Shawn Levy isn’t my favorite filmmaker (though I did enjoy last year’s Date Night), but here he surprises us by dropping some of his usual “tricks” while still staying firmly in family-picture mode. Levy succeeds in filling the screen with little touches that make the “world”, and the characters inhabiting it, real: shabby, gritty, lived in, a bit sad. The robots themselves are a seamless combination of CGI for the big fight scenes (shot with motion capture of actual fighters, overseen by living boxing legend “Sugar Ray” Leonard) and practical for close-ups and “hero” shots. The robots, and even the cars and other bits of tools and tech laying around, fit perfectly in the world of the movie: industrial, beat up, rusted, and a bit dangerous (in the watch-out-for-random-engine-fires sense).

I’m a huge Hugh Jackman fan and would pay to watch him just reading the phone book (I actually have, once – it was called Kate & Leopold. Ooh! Burn!), and as a fan I was definitely not disappointed (though, to be honest, I rarely am) with Jackman’s portrayal – a “lost soul” who is ultimately quite surprised to find that he’s still a good person inside. Dakota Goyo as Max is good in the way that many child actors are good when they just play kids, rather than “child actor playing a kid”. And though I continue, in theory, to enjoy seeing Evangeline Lilly in movies, here she continues her trend of being typecast as long-suffering-wife/girlfriend-back-home. She does have a certain star-quality, but I find her acting style a bit “busy” – she can’t seem to simply deliver a line without a toss of the hair, a fluttering of eyelashes, or a throw of her arms into the air (I think it’s a TV thing).

Real Steel is based on a short story by Richard Matheson (if it’s science fiction and not based on a comic, a Saturday morning cartoon, or a well-known novel by Asimov, Bradbury, or Clarke – trust me, it’s either Phillip K. Dick or Richard Matheson). The movie doesn’t have much connection to the original story other than the basic premise of robot fighting having taken over human fighting in popularity, and the vague notion that this is a redemption story (to see a more thematically accurate “modern update” to the original story, look for the battlebots episode of The Simpsons) though, for what it’s worth, Matheson has nodded his approval to the final product. Real Steel is a “real” story that happens to take place in a sci-fi-ish world, and in this particular case I’m glad that the story isn’t “about” its sci-fi elements. The same story could have been told with poker, car racing, or karaoke. The presence of 10-foot-tall robots punching the crap out of each other is, for me, just sweet, sweet gravy.

The hero of our story is Jodie Foster, playing a recently divorced mother. She and her 12-ish year-old daughter, played by Kristen Stewart, purchase and move into an impossibly spacious New York City home. Like, so big it’s suspension of disbelief-breaking. In real life this house would cost what I assume would be a billion dollars. Anyway, the house was previously owned by a reclusive millionaire who passed away. It’s mentioned in passing that it’s rumored there were millions of dollars squirreled away in the house somewhere, but no one thinks much of it.

No one but Jared Leto, Forest Whitaker, and Dwight Yoakam, who play somewhat inept would-be robbers. Well, Leto is inept; Whitaker knows what he’s doing, but is in over his head dealing with the other two; and Yoakam is a psychopath. They don’t realize Foster and Stewart are in the house, because the house was supposed to be vacant for another week, so that obviously complicates things. Upon realizing they have intruders, mom and daughter hide out in the titular panic room. This is really inconvenient for the crooks, because what they need is in the panic room. Hijinks  ensue.

Panic Room displays a mastery of tension building rarely seen in modern thrillers. Parts of this building effort are mentioned in passing and then never revisited—namely, Foster’s hinted-at claustrophobia—but at no point does Fincher resort to cheap jump-scares or deus ex machina problems or solutions. As the movie goes on, the situation just gets worse and worse for everyone involved and the tension becomes almost unbearable. It’s great.

Worth noting, due to developments occurring after Panic Room‘s release, Kristen Stewart? Actually a pretty decent actress when not working on garbage scripts. She’s good in Panic Room; not run-and-tell-your-friends good, but child actor good. (She’s also good in Runaways, where she played Joan Jett; and decent in Adventureland; her wooden reputation is Twilight‘s fault, is what I’m getting at.)

Overall, Panic Room is both a very satisfying thriller, and one of Fincher’s least weird films. This is a movie you can safely watch with your mom, unlike Girl with the Dragon Tattoo or Seven (by the way, Dave, thanks for that). It’s also on Netflix Instant (for now), so there’s no excuse! Watch it now.

How and why Eva got to this state is at the core of We Need to Talk About Kevin, based on the novel by Lionel Shriver, co-adapted to screen and directed by Lynne Ramsay (Ratcatcher, Morvern Callar), who does slow, mournful, and contemplative like few others. We’re cued in early on to Eva’s circumstances – her son Kevin (played at three different ages by Rock Duer, Jasper Newell, and Ezra Miller) has gone on a psychotic killing spree at his high school. The world at large blames Eva, but only because she’s there (Kevin himself now in juvenile prison), and people need to blame somebody.

WHOA!....that's a lot of Tomato Soup.

With Eva, we flashback to different points in the past to see where it all may have gone wrong. In earlier times, Eva was a famous and successful travel writer. She falls in love with and marries the affable Franklin (John C. Reilly). They have a child, though she doesn’t particularly want one. Kevin might be a bad seed from birth. Eva might be causing (or at least contributing to) this through her coldness, her indifference, her anger. Franklin always takes Kevin’s side over hers. Against all common sense, Eva has another child, Celia (Ashley Gerasimovich), partly as science experiment (am I really such a bad mother?), partly just to have someone on her side for once. Things go badly. And then things go badly. And then things go very, very badly.

Watching the story unfold, I decided early on that if the movie could not convince me why Eva would still be living in this town after everything that happened, why she would not simply move far, far away, change her name and start life anew, then it had failed. By the end, I was convinced. The movie reveals just enough to give some credible theories, without beating anyone over the head with them. Yes, she wants to stay close enough to the prison so that she can visit Kevin (but again, why?), but it’s never just that simple. Partly, she is punishing herself. Partly, she is in denial – even aggressively so, we realize, once we see her living situation. Mostly, it’s that her mind has all but completely shut down. In the beginning, we wonder if she is even alive. At the end, we’re still wondering.

In the incredibly challenging role of Eva, Tilda Swinton is phenomenal – but when is she ever not? John C. Reilly, while properly infuriating and likeable as the oblivious husband and father, feels a bit miscast. I’ve seen and liked him in dramatic roles before, but he just doesn’t fit in this world. It may be purely physical, but his very presence is far too “goofy” for the rest of this movie. The three actors playing Kevin, meanwhile, are all very good, particularly Ezra Miller – he certainly shows the cold, calculating, evil side of the boy, and if there is a lack of any further levels to his character (until pretty much the final moments of the movie), that is likely by design of the script, not a flaw of the acting.

It’s the whole nature vs. nurture argument, of course, except not only does the movie not offer any answers, it doesn’t even offer much evidence. Eva is a cold mother. Kevin is just awful, from birth. That’s pretty much it. But We Need to Talk About Kevin isn’t about making arguments, but watching someone make them – weighing the sides, wondering to themselves, is this my fault? Did I do this? How can I have prevented this? And when all the masks finally come off in the end, we realize with Eva that in all the time we’ve spent jumping to defend one side or the other, we’ve missed the real point of the story entirely – yes, Eva has been trying to find some connection with Kevin, but in the end we realize that Kevin, in his own mysterious and twisted way, has been trying to “speak” to her, too.

We Need to Talk About Kevin might best be approached as a horror movie, but one without any supernatural elements, thrills, or jump-out-at-you moments, only pure horror in the sense of dread, sadness, help- and hopelessness – like watching a train running over a kitten at 4 miles an hour (or watching a Michael Haneke movie – your choice). The emotions are raw, the blood real, the story upsetting and aggravating and will punch you in the stomach and bruise your soul, and without any actual emotional payoff in the end, you may leave the theater asking yourself, why did I just pay money to go through that?

Movie:

Tilda Swinton:

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1. Monty Python & the Holy Grail
2. The Wizard of Oz
3. The Prestige
4. Bedknobs and Broomsticks
5. Edward Scissorhands
6. Terminator 2: Judgement Day
7. Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
8. Raiders of the Lost Arc
9. Gangs of New York
10. The Godfather
11. The Godfather, Part 2
12. Goodfellas
13. Reservoir Dogs
14. Kill Bill (chapters 1 and 2*)
15. A Clockwork Orange
16. Leon: The Professional
17. Die Hard
18. The Shawshank Redemption
19. One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest
20. The Green Mile
21. Chicago
22. There Will Be Blood
23. Titus
24. The World’s Fastest Indian
25. Up
26. Big Fish
27. Kramer vs. Kramer
28. Philadelphia
29. Rocky
30. Black Swan
31. The Shining
32. Alien
33. Saving Private Ryan
34. Full Metal Jacket
35. Apocalypse Now

It’s your last year on Earth, right? Do you really want to waste it watching movies that are not certified great? I didn’t think so.

*Kill Bill is, for all intents and purposes, a single movie, divided for marketing purposes. If Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair is ever** released, watch that instead.

**“Ever” meaning, of course, before the arrival of Ixpiyacoc.

A vengeful husband, found at the scene of his wife’s murder, a murder to which he has willingly confessed. Surely, it should be a simple open and shut case?

So why can’t the young and successful prosecutor William Beachum (Ryan Gosling) manage to get all the obvious evidence to stick?

Gosling is in disbelief when Hopkins can't stop doing Hannibal Lecter lines.

Instead, the charismatic Crawford, acting as his own lawyer and showing unnerving knowledge of the law and its processes, skillfully manipulates the justice system to get away with the crime.

As Crawford escapes a murder sentence, a frustrated Beachum engages him in a dangerous game of legal and mental wits, one that could end up having higher stakes then Beachum can afford to gamble with.

This is a great film, with commanding performances from the two leads. Hopkins, as per usual, is an acting powerhouse as the intellectual murderer Ted Crawford, a character which has more then a whiff of Hannibal Lector about him at times. The games of intellectual chess Crawford plays are handled with just the right amount of scenery munching, allowing Hopkins’ younger co-star to shine through.

Ryan Gosling, who I’d previously only seen in the entertaining Murder By Numbers, also about trying to achieve the perfect murder, really steps up to the mark and holds his own opposite Hopkins, who could easily have stolen the film, as he often does for me.

I really recommend this film. As an example of how a more experienced actor can elevate another, it is second to none. Hopkins’ Ted Crawford is perfectly acted as the counterpart to Gosling’s initially cocky Beachum, and each sly look and comment delivered with Hopkins’ matured talents allows Gosling to demonstrate his own not inconsiderable skills.

Though I’m not particularly a fan of legal dramas, Hopkins and Gosling were enough to persuade me to give Fracture a go, and I’m glad I did. I think you wouldn’t regret giving it a watch either.

]]> http://damrb.wordpress.com/2012/01/16/fracture-2007-dvd-just-for-the-hell-of-it/feed/ 0 24fpsmoviereviews www.devilsadvocatesmoviereviews.com - Devils Advocates Movie Reviews - Fracture - Ryan Gosling - Anthony Hopkins - David Strathairn - Rosamund Pike - Embeth Davidtz 3 and half pitchforks - www.devilsadvocatesmoviereviews.com - Devils Advocates Movie Reviews http://damrb.wordpress.com/2012/01/13/director-spotlight-fight-club/ http://damrb.wordpress.com/2012/01/13/director-spotlight-fight-club/#comments Fri, 13 Jan 2012 14:00:31 +0000 Mike Pampinella http://damrb.wordpress.com/?p=7589 ]]>

“I am Jack’s smirking revenge”

The second film in our David Fincher spotlight is…you do not talk about Fight Club.  Which will make this rather difficult, so I’m going to break that rule at the risk of incurring the wrath of Tyler Durden.  

Fight Club, released in 1999,  is the story of Tyler Durden, the film’s nameless narrator, and the club that shall not be named.   Everything starts innocently, with men simply beating each other senseless, but then it becomes something much more nefarious.  Pre-9/11, the story takes on a strange homegrown terrorist subplot, which serves to expose aspects of the story that are unspoken in the early stages of the film.

This film, which is an adaptation of a Chuck Palahniuk novel, is a crazy menagerie of revelations and plot twists.  With so many strange turns, Fincher and his editing crew deserve a lifetime achievement award of some sort.  While Fincher gets so many things right, including stylistic choices, frenetic action, and quick cut moments, the thing he truly gets right is creating the illusion that there is no real illusion.  For 9/10ths of  the film, everything seems ordinary, or as ordinary as things can in the world Palahniuk created.  Then, suddenly the rug is pulled out, and there is no hardwood floors, but rather a strange substance hereto unknown to us.  Palahniuk’s words, combined with Fincher’s amazing eye, brought into the world a gamechanger that has been copied time after time to no avail.

I am Jack's lack of self confidence.

While the source material and directing are key to the film’s success, Brad Pitt and Edward Norton’s performances are what keeps the audience captivated.  Pitt, in what is likely his funniest role, is brilliant and Norton is a spectacle.  Both actors are at their peak in this movie, displaying a side of themselves previously unseen.

The first rule of Fight Club is, you don’t talk about Fight Club, with good reason.  If I continue I will reveal a part of the film that is so pure and vital to the story that I would never forgive myself.  In this day and age, people do sometimes wait for the right time to view a film, and I do not want to be the harbinger of awesome news that might ruin their viewing experience.  So I will close with a quote from Tyler Durden: “You are not special. You are not a beautiful or unique snowflake. You’re the same decaying organic matter as everything else.”  And while we are not special in Tyler Durden’s eyes, he and his story are worth seeing, again and again.

No witty caption here, just 2 people from the movie.

In politically and socially tumultuous late 1960s Japan, quiet Tokyo college student Watanabe (Matsuyama) wanders adrift in the world since the suicide of his childhood friend Kizuki (Kengo Kôra). After a chance run-in with another childhood friend (and Kizuki’s girlfriend) Naoko (Kikuchi), the two embark on a brief but significant relationship which ends with the deeply troubled Naoko needing to “go away for a while” – we later learn, to a sanitarium deep in the mountains. As Watanabe tries to carry on a once-monthly relationship with the isolated Naoko, he fills his hours “picking up girls” at nightclubs with his playboy classmate Nagasawa (Tetsuji Tamayama) (though the resultant sexcapades are curiously glossed over, and largely only implied) and with the awkward courtship of a pretty classmate, the brash and forward (and also troubled) Midori (Kiko Mizuhara).

As earnestly as the action in Norwegian Wood plays out, the movie unfortunately feels a bit thin to me, a bit light, playing more like a straight, point-A-to-point-B telling of plot elements than the fine-edged character study that it aspires to be. Director Tran, one feels, came to a point where he had to choose between character and plot, and chose the latter. As a result, while we see and follow the action unfolding around Watanabe, many supporting characters (Nagasawa’s long-suffering girlfriend Hatsumi (Eriko Hatsune), Naoko’s sanitarium roommate Reiko (Reika Kirishima), etc.), steeped in unspoken importance, flit in and out of frame without terribly much to say, do or contribute, other than to overall mood.

In terms of atmosphere and visuals, Norwegian Wood is masterful – how great it is to have a movie full of period nostalgia without having to resort to color filters and smoke machines (hello, Wong Kar Wai); however, those seeking any more than that may leave a bit disappointed. While aspiring to take on such weighty themes as memory, nostalgia, longing, loss, aging, madness, death and, of course, love, Norwegian Wood is, in the end, like the best one night stands, pleasant enough while it lasts but will, for better or worse, slowly fade from memory.

They talk fetishism, bad accents, and The Hot Chick.

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So for this first post, I thought I’d give my 2011 top 10 movies (we will soon be doing a podcast along a similar vein, as well); these aren’t necessarily the best movies that came out, but they’re my favorite of what I saw. What better way to get to know my ins and outs? Right, ladies?

10. Tree of Life
Here’s the thing with Tree of Life, Terrance Malick’s latest film: I have no idea what it was supposed to mean. Theoretically the story of a boy growing up and the effect his father and mother had on him, it ventures into some weird and seemingly unconnected sidebars about life and nature and the universe. However, it’s a visually beautiful film, and some of Brad Pitt’s best acting in recent years.

9.  The Thing
The inexplicably same-named prequel of John Carpenter’s The Thing did a good job of paying homage to the original while being it’s own story. It was well-acted, well-paced, and a fun ride. The only weakness–and something of a crippling one, giving the subject matter–was the weak CHI used for the creature.

8. Super
This indie film starring Rainn Wilson, Ellen Paige,and Kevin Bacon is fun, funny, and emotionally impactful. Essentially, it does what Kick-Ass tried to do, but actually works.

7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2
The final(?)  installment of the Potter franchise delivers in almost every way it should. We get the end of our heroes’ journey through their school years, the resolution (perhaps somewhat unsatisfactorily, but that’s J.K. Rowling’s fault) of the overarching Voldemort plotline, some extremely emotional and well-acted moments, and, most importantly, it was entertaining as all get-out.

6. X-Men: First Class
A great film with a few crippling weaknesses, namely, the first class themselves (comprised almost entirely–excepting Beast–of mutants that almost no one cares about). However, Xavier and Magneto steal the show, with Michael Fassbender  finally getting some well-deserved popular acclaim outside of his native land. I did not think they could possibly make this film work, and they succeeded far beyond my–and possibly everyone else’s–expectations, probably saving the X-Men franchise for Fox.

5. The Ides of March
The Ides of March isn’t a thrill-a-minute joyride; it is a very slow, deliberate slow-burn of a political thriller, which I appreciated. It’s also George Clooney’s best directing to date, and alerted me to Ryan Gosling being more than a pretty face for the ladies.

4. The Muppets
Who doesn’t love the Muppets? Finally coming back in force, The Muppets delivers as hard as a bunch of felt puppets can. Slightly hampered by the Jason Segel/Amy Adams/Gary plotline, as well as really sad Kermit, it’s saved by the unavoidable joy that the Muppets themselves must always return to, and Chris Cooper’s hilariously over-the-top villain. Maniacal laugh! MANIACAL LAUGH!

3. Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol
Mission Impossible has been a franchise of lows and lowish highs. Brad Bird manages to elevate it into the most thrilling action flick of the year, though, even overcoming my natural distaste for Tom Cruise’s whacky self. The Burj Khalifa sequence alone is worth the price of admission.

2. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
I did not see the Swedish first attempt at this story, due to my burning hatred of the Swedes and subtitles, and I was unable to get into the novel upon which both are based. Like the novel upon which it’s based, the film has some structural problems, namely Daniel Craig’s character’s plot line being kinda boring until Lisbeth joins him. That being said, once it actually kicks into gear, about an hour in (!), it presents a rich mystery. Also, Mara Rooney’s Lisbeth Salander is one of the most interesting and compelling characters to come along in quite a while.

1. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
While I am a fan of John Le’Carre’s spy novels, I have not read this one, so I went in not knowing what to expect. It is a fantastic spy thriller, the likes of which is rarely seen these days. Gary Oldman truly inhabits his role of tired, old spymaster, and the cast surrounding him is equally great.

Some films that, based on hearsay, might have made the list if I’d been able to see them include Take Shelter, Midnight in Paris, The Guard, and Martha, Marcy, May, Marlene.

Come back next week for more rambling nonsense! Who knows what might happen!