The Hangover (2009, Phillips)

"We're a wolf pack of four, wandering the desert, searching for strippers and cocaine." -Alan Garner, The Hangover (2009)

The Hangover is about what you'd expect from Todd Phillips, and is very much in the vein of Old School. Take a trio of up-and-coming actors, two of them fairly funny comic actors still perfecting their comic voices, throw them in an outrageous, high-concept fratboy picture that still has a heart beating somewhere inside, and set to frappe. Not all of the jokes hit, and when looked at squarely and incisively, there's not much substance supporting the fluff.

At the same time, Helms and Galifianakis in particular work the hell out of the material they're given, and Cooper's charisma is tangible to the point that there's no doubt he's a superstar on the rise. In fact, when looked at objectively, I'm at a loss to explain why Cooper would accept the role of Phil Wenneck simply because there's so very little for him to work with. Yet his screen presence is memorable enough that his role feels much more substantial than it really is. And his presence, along with Justin Bartha's, provides a needed counterpoint for Galifianakis, operating at full-tilt absurd. Somewhere navigating middle ground is Helms, who in my opinion steals the show and cleanly walks the tightrope between some of the more absurdist comedy while making his character both believably nebbish and sympathetic in a fully-realized way, no small feat in a film like this. If Helms is surrounding himself with the right people, he'll be able to greenlight his The 40 Year Old Virgin in the wake of The Hangover's success.

Perhaps wisely, The Hangover doesn't try to clean up its leads too much in the film's third act, apologize for them, or arrange a tidy ending that ties every character thread or puts everything neatly in its place. The film lives or dies by its jokes, and when viewed without too many demands, it pleases more often than not. It's not the kind of tightly calculated comedy destined to become a comedy classic, it simply succeeds based on the good-natured chemistry of its male leads. Likewise Phillips has been around the block enough to know that his greatest talent, after assembling his winning cast, is simply to set the scenes and then get out of the way and allow the magic to happen whenever possible.

If you do decide to see The Hangover, stay through the closing credit sequence; it keeps pace with the best moments of the rest of the film and delivers many a chuckle. All in all, not necessarily the most glowing of reviews, but The Hangover seems to be proving a sleeper hit this summer, delivering more than its share of anticipated entertainment. It certainly helps that there's no associated franchise baggage, no weighted or lofty expectations, and that the film has been allowed to operate without castrating it for family viewing. And as relatively mindless, R-rated summer fun, it's operating uncontested at the moment with several more weeks until the arrival of probable home runs Bruno and Funny People.

7/10

Drag Me to Hell (2009, Raimi)

"You will be surprised what you will be willing to do when the Lamia comes for you!" -Rahm Jas, Drag Me to Hell (2009)

I've been quite the fan of Raimi's recent Spider-Man films, but even so, his return to the horror genre is one of the most refreshing breaths of fresh air in the film world of the past few years. I'm hard-pressed to think of any horror films in the last decade that aren't either torture porn or simplistic, ineffective, artless remakes and regurgitations aimed at the multiplex-going tween crowd. A pair of exceptions are Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later and Neil Marshall's The Descent, but there's nothing that approaches Raimi's brand of expertly-crafted jump scares, creative gore, and horror comedy.

He's back in full Evil Dead 2/Army of Darkness mode here, something that becomes evident once the film has unspooled to the parking lot confrontation scene. That's when I knew that Raimi wasn't going to be compromising with something bland aimed at mainstream acceptance. And yet, the movie is so balls-to-the-wall, over-the-top entertaining that it's impossible to imagine most audiences not revelling in squeamish delight at the roller-coaster ride that Raimi has no doubt cooked up with devilish glee. In fact, one male audience member sitting in front of me was on pins and needles for the entire screening, screaming like a little girl, and as the end credits rolled, proclaiming to his friends "What was that?!? That was the craziest thing I've ever seen in my entire life!!!"

The movie has a lot in common with Evil Dead 2, from playful jump scares and an unrelentingly maintained tone of foreboding and dread, to similar thematic elements like abusive airborne spirits and an increasingly determined hero, this time a heroine, besieged by escalating horror comedy grossery. Yet despite the shared elements and stylistic shorthands, Drag Me still stands squarely on its own. It reaps the benefits both from the Hollywood slickness Raimi has been able to cultivate over the past decade working on Spider-Man, and his increasing facility work effortlessly with actors.

Lohman is exceedingly well-cast, and as much as I like early contender Ellen Page, Lohman is a far better fit for the role. Likewise Justin Long brings the perfect balance to his part. He's proven himself a very capable, realistic actor, and though somewhat unlikely, a charming leading man, while also retaining a character actor's sense of timing and skill with dialogue. And Lorna Raver, not a Hollywood mainstay by any means, makes the most of every line of dialogue and character flourish as the antagonistic Mrs. Ganush. She is nothing short of fabulous and fantastic, and as so much of the quality of the movie ultimately rests on her shoulders, her casting and performance deserve the highest kudos.

I don't want to reveal any of the marvelously icky scares or set-pieces, or too much of the third act. But it's characterized throughout by Raimi's unique talent at anticipating audience reaction, playing to it, turning it on it's side, and slyly nodding while pulling the bottom out from underneath. He's the carnival barker of high-budgeted horror comedy, and nothing is ever quite safe, even when he takes the audience by its hand and offers almost-believed promises, save for a sparkle and glint of the eye. Cinematographer Peter Deming works so collaboratively and successfully with Raimi that both the director's vision and heroine's point-of-view are perfectly balanced in the mind's eye of the audience; we're intimately brought into Christine Brown's world while Raimi's ironic storyteller's distance is simultaneously maintained, and this is no easy balancing act. There's even room for a term paper thesis supporting the interpretation that Christine Brown's haunting is all a figment of her own imagination and the result of a potential eating disorder; and this kind of narrative possibility and playfulness will only serve to reward multiple viewings, and ensure the Drag Me's life as a cult favorite.

I know from interviews that Raimi is headed back to work on Spider-Man 4 feeling rejuvenated in a way after the shooting of this film that he hasn't felt in years, and excited to bring that energy back into the Spider-Man franchise. I can only hope that between every future major Hollywood film, he decides the best thing for him creatively is to go off and make one of his signature horror films. It's as much fun as Star Trek, as certainly the only fun the horror genre has seen in years.

I won't go so far as to say that Drag Me is a perfect film. It still has elements of B-moviedom to it, yet that's also part of its unassuming charm. It's the balance between this and its Hollywood gloss, all orchestrated by Raimi with such confidence and flair, that makes it such a success as pure entertainment. The genre needs Raimi, and it finds him here at his most creatively gonzo and brilliantly inventive.

9/10

Terminator: Salvation (2009, McG)

"Two day old coyote. It's better than three day old coyote." -Kyle Reese, Terminator: Salvation (2009)

In the words of comic book artist Jhonen Vasquez, "Terminator: Salvation the movie was no Terminator: Salvation the trailer."

There's been a lot of hype and anticipation for this latest installment in what has become the Terminator franchise. The first film launched the career of James Cameron; the sequel was a technological masterpiece. A decade later, Jonathan Mostow's workmanlike effort of the third in the series was forgettable at best, and appeared to signal not only the death knell of Arnold Schwarzenegger's acting career, but also that of the Terminator films itself, ostensibly coming one film too late.

So the announcement of a new trilogy several years after that came as a shock to most. The news that followed was a series of ups and downs: the film would take place in the future, and focus on John Connor and the war against Skynet and the machines, up; McG was selected to direct, down; Christian Bale was cast as John Connor, up; McG was still directing the picture, down. Then the trailers began to hit, and damn it if they didn't look promising and like a big step forward for McG's directing career. Simultaneously, one had to remember that this was going to be an action picture after all, and thus McG couldn't screw it up too much. And his football movie We Are Marshall had been a big step forward itself from his previous Charlie's Angels pictures. On top of everything else, the involvement of Jonathan Nolan, screenwriter of the recent Christopher Nolan/Christian Bale Batman films, as a script re-writer/editor held some degree of promise.

And so I went into the film, expectations buoyed by the trailer even in light of the publicized Bale rant, hoping that the discovery contained in the trailer that Marcus was a cyborg wouldn't spoil the film. The short answer is that it doesn't-- it's fairly obvious from the opening of T:S, even though the film simultaneously telegraphs this dynamic while also trying to use it as a surprise about an hour into the film. I'm also very happy to report that McG doesn't screw up the film; he does an admirable job of stepping up to the plate and hitting the action sequences out of the park. However, one can still hold him ultimately responsible for the reasons the film fails.

And that pair of reasons are screenwriters John Brancato and Michael Ferris, and overinflated star Christian Bale. Brancato and Ferris were responsible for Mostow's substandard third Terminator film, so why anyone would begin a new iteration of the series with their shoddy writing is beyond me. Yet, there were a few ballsy, near-genius ideas in their early drafts, but those ideas were jettisoned once Bale came on board. It seems the original draft had Conner barely seen throughout the film, leading the resistance largely by radio broadcasts, and then dying at the end of the film, with his face being transplanted onto cyborg Wright. Thus it was Wright who would go on to lead the resistance in the guise of Conner, and become the future hero that the first films had led us all to believe was Conner's destiny. Once these plot details were leaked, internet bloggers and fanboys were up in arms, decrying what seemed to be a betrayal of the Terminator audience and the already-established Terminator history.

Then there was Bale, who declined the offered role of Marcus Wright and insisted on playing John Conner, and then on having the script rewritten and revised to beef up the Conner role. This meant that subplots developing both the Wright and Reese characters were truncated, replaced by unnecessary and extraneous scenes of Conner yelling and taking charge. And quite frankly, as good an actor as Bale is, his angry grumbling/muttering act has worn its course and reached the point of semi-self-parody. While it's possible and even likely that Conner dying and Brancato and Ferris' planned twist would have angered many an audience, it was also the biggest ambition their screenplay boasted. By eliminating this detail and rewriting per Bale's specifications, the project resulted in the worst and most mechanical of what all three writers had to offer.

And while all of this story structure tug-of-war was going on, it seems no one was on dialogue detail. What remains is a B-movie with some fantastic action and laughable dialogue, that never does anything beyond treading water. And bookending the visually inspired action sequences are a somewhat painful and belabored opening focusing on Marcus Wright and the poorly-served Helena Bonham Carter, and a castrated version of the orginal ending that lacks any real emotional resonance or sense of purpose. It manages to set up the rest of the new trilogy with about as much promise as it destroyed for itself over the course of its own production, but the actual production of the rest of the announced trilogy now seems unlikely, as the box office for the first installment has been a big disappointment for the studio.

Still, while nowhere in the realm of T2, and not even matching the lower-budgeted yet oft-inspired original Terminator, T:S is still a big improvement over T3. At its worst, it's a big, dumb summer action movie with shit that blows up good, a feat that T3 couldn't even satisfyingly muster. If T:S somehow manages to scrape together enough global box office, DVD sales, and good will to warrant the greenlight for the sequels, we can only hope that Nolan will be retained, Brancato and Ferris ejected post-haste, and Bale told to concentrate on finding some nuance to his brooding instead of interfering with the screenwriting process. This would leave Nolan free to pen some believable dialogue, so that I can watch the sequels without the constant, well-deserved sidelong glances and eye-rolling from my much-beloved girlfriend.

7/10

The Girlfriend Experience (2009, Soderbergh)

"How the fuck are ya... like what I haven't done with the place?" -Internet Blogger, The Girlfriend Experience (2009)

Sasha Grey is one of porn's hottest rising starlets: extremely young, aggressive, and hyper sexual, there's seemingly nothing she won't do and enjoy. Following in the footsteps of recent gonzo marquee names like Bella Donna and Flower Tucci, she combines their zest for sexuality and sexual acts, enjoyment of sexual boundary-pushing, and a celebration of and revelling in all things sexual; with filmic and literary knowledge, artistic aspirations, and multi-media ambition. Paired with filmmaker Steven Soderbergh, a director who has always played with and against his mainstream success as much as he's embraced it, there are the makings here for at least one cinematic masterpiece.

While Grey is attractive, alluring, and a sexual compulsive, there's also something very detached about her. Not necessarily as a porn starlet uncomfortable with her chosen profession, but as someone whose intelligence far exceeds her purely sexual exploits; watching her films you can sense that as much as she's enjoying fully submitting to her carnal appetites and riding a wave of pure bestial nature; there's also a part of her watching herself from the outside, wondering where she can take things next, what it all means, and what the next step is in that evolution. There's something of the Marquis de Sade to Grey, a sexual carnivore lurking behind the youthful idealism and yes, even innocence, that are still somehow present in her persona. In this digital age, we've reached a place where such a cocktail of personality traits can somehow co-exist; young women can be this sexually empowered, materially savvy, and still ultimately naive. All of which is to say there is a wealth of material present in everything from our current society's sexual morals, technology, and Grey herself to provide a truly insightful and studied look at our culture and where our sexuality is headed.

But while Soderbergh starts with all of the necessary ingredients, he never combines them into anything worth a damn. Grey plays high-class escort Chelsea, balancing clients, finances, marketing strategies, and a struggle for some kind of protected, personal life and even intimacy. But Soderbergh populates the film with such on-the-nose economic discussions between financial investment ex-fratboys, and overly obvious financial observations and advice from poorly-portrayed wealthy clients, that the end result never really scrapes below the surface. We get it: the world is in a tough economic place right now, and Chelsea, like every one else, is feeling the burn, and is intelligent enough to be financially aware and ask questions about her own financial planning. But these economic discoveries need to be the starting point of a journey; they need to be the window-dressing setting the tone, skewing things slightly off-center and interesting the viewer enough to follow this character and her plight-- not be the central theme or final summation of some half-baked thesis. "Hooker with a heart of gold" is not a story-- it's a character description, and a stereotypical one at that. As is "financially-aware and somewhat emotionally vulnerable high class escort." This should be the beginning set-up for the "and then what?" that drives an actual plot or character study.

But evidently the end result is that we're supposed to marvel that the girl has these kinds of smarts; and we're supposed to see some kind of emotional struggle with intimacy and relationships resulting from her flirtation with a potential client and her whimsical thoughts about leaving her boyfriend. The latter fails because Grey, as fascinating a person as she is, just doesn't have the acting chops to pull off anything in the film beyond naturalism. The moment she's required to pull out some emotion while remaining believable, things quickly detour to the kind of whiny, embarrassed acting that populates beginning acting classes. Yet the failure of the film isn't entirely, or even primarily, her fault. Soderbergh, being the skilled and experienced director that he is, should have been more than capable of directing this non-actor through scenarios and story lines capitalizing on her numerous talents and naturally-present behavior and emotions. We don't need to see some Streepian range of emotion from her; we just need to see the sides of her that anyone who's familiar with her already knows exist, and have those sides explored through well-choreographed story points.

The truly intimate moments between Chelsea and her personal trainer boyfriend Chris, while present, are few and far between. Their mundaneness would have been a legitimate choice, if paired with a deeper exploration into Chelsea's character and her desires. But that doesn't seem to be what Soderbergh is aiming for anyway, nor does a sparseness of intimacy. Rather, the problem seems to lie with Soderbergh's overweighting both Chris and Chelsea's business savvy, and the constant strategizing and marketing considerations of their not dissimilar businesses. What little screen time remains is spent exploring Chelsea's compulsive pseudo-spirituality culled from half-understood numerology books. It would seem Soderbergh is ultimately trying to paint a portrait of someone lost in a world of constantly increasing technology, managing to keep pace professionally while floundering personally.

Perhaps the problem lies in the fact that Soderbergh is too determined not to find fault with Chelsea and her chosen profession, is too determined to champion it as a legitimate choice and then use her as a craftily-cast sort of everywoman for our times; and ultimately, wants too much to buddy up to his leading lady. In order for this sort of take to have worked, a deeper exploration into the more vulnerable and human side of Chelsea would have been required-- more innocence, more confusion, more of both the failed and successful attempts at controlling her career. What we're instead offered in its place, from the compulsive and misunderstood numerology to the awkwardly forced emotions and whiny, bratty, illogical, and annoying argumentativeness, simply reduces the character to an embarrassing joke. We get neither a biting social critique nor a profound exploration into the human condition in the vein of Grey's beloved French New Wave auteurs, who were also so influential towards shaping Soderbergh's own work, but instead exactly the kind of limp, impotent, and lazy effort that usually requires either a little blue pill or an extremely motivated fluffer.

So what begins as a somewhat experimental possible exploration into contemporary sexuality and personality ends as nothing more than a failed experiment, with nothing to say beyond the obvious and cursory. Grey's persona will undoubtedly remain unscathed by the endeavor, because there's really no down side to the project for her, even as a failure. Yet it's a shame that somewhere in this bundle of film lies a lost Godardian classic, and a missed opportunity for her to create exactly the kind of art she's always aimed for. As for Soderbergh, I'm still grateful that he's willing to try things like this, and take his artistic lumps like a man, rather than simply phoning in the pre-packaged Hollywood product like so many purely mainstream directors.

5/10

Angels & Demons (2009, Howard)

"Fellas, you called me." -Robert Langdon, Angels & Demons (2009)

Ugh. If I had to review this film in one word, that would be it.

Let's start with the fact that Dan Brown may not be the world's greatest writer, but contrary to some elitist opinions, he's actually an extremely skilled writer of the pseudo-political/technological thriller. His books are the kind where you devour hundreds of pages at a time, continuing to read at a breakneck speed and page forward to keep pace with the momentum of the protagonist and the unspooling plot.

Enter Ron Howard, champion of the mediocre. Ron Howard appears to be one of the nicest guys in Hollywood, and I have to assume that he's exactly that, treating both actors and crew with nothing but complete respect and kindness. It would go a long way to explaining his current status as seeming Hollywood royalty, considering the fact that almost every one of his films is generic mediocrity that panders to the multiplex crowd and the lowest common denominator. And based on his track record of always attempting to please the senseless masses, it comes as no surprise that he'd miscast universally-loved Tom Hanks in the ill-fitting role of Robert Langdon. This is a character that was originally conceived with Harrison Ford in mind-- picture the schoolteacher persona from Indiana Jones taking center stage and solving puzzles sans whip and fedora, but instead solely through intellect and spectacles. The reason for Ford seems to be a likeness to author Dan Brown himself, and Ford's visage a romanticized version of Brown's. Nevertheless, the Langdon is obviously based on 80's Ford, something that Ford himself is now too long in the tooth to embody. Of course, leave it to Howard to not understand this fact and to pursue Ford for The Da Vinci Code, before settling on Hanks after Ford was unavailable.

I have yet to see the film version of The Da Vinci Code, a result of the presence of the mediocre Howard and the miscast Hanks, after thoroughly enjoying all of Brown's books for the light, fluffy beach-reads they are, and not wanting to witness the elements of the books unsuccessfully butchered. Just as Angels & Demons was the stronger, though less successful of the two, so have I heard that Angels & Demons is the stronger of the two film adaptations. So it was that I decided to kill a couple of hours waiting for a friend to arrive at LAX, when there was nothing left playing in theatres that I was genuinely interested to see.

Hanks does better in the role that I had anticipated. He puts a lid on the usual Hanks' enthusiasm and off-kilter boisterousness, yet doesn't quite sink into the kind of tedious, self-imposed gravitas that marked his performance in Saving Private Ryan. And, of course, he returns to the role of Langdon without the long-haired coif of Da Vinci that made him a veritable laughing-stock. Nevertheless, Hanks lacks the two primary aspects required of the role; I don't buy him as either the intellectual professor or the hidden athlete. He's too everyman with a homey demeanor to capture the requisite intellectual, bow-tie precision; and he's too doughy and complacently settled to believably rip out with Langdon's more athletic side. It's a shame when someone like Patrick Wilson (Little Children, Watchmen), admittedly less of a marquee name, would have made such a spot-on Langdon.

The supporting cast are filled with some wonderful actors-- Stellan Skarsgard, Ewan McGregor, Armin Mueller-Stahl-- but they're either phoning in their performances or just given so little to work with in the scope of the story structure that the difference is negligible. And actress Ayelet Zurer doesn't fare so well as to come off as simply useless; she unfortunately borders on the obnoxious and annoying.

Howard tries his best to make the film a visual affair, and I suppose there's some kind of effort to make the technology sound convincing; but he fails on both counts. Whereas Brown has a facility to blow through technology and junk-science making it sound plausible enough to proceed with the plot, Howard trips and stumbles over his own feet right out of the starting gate. From there Howard fails to capture what makes the books such page-turning adventures; instead of little mysteries and plot details building suspense and continuously accelerating the speed toward the impending climax, Howard ticks off each little mystery as it appears, explaining it immediately and keeping things in a constant state of deflation.

By the time the film has come to an end, we're past the point of caring about the plot or any of its characters. This is multiplex fodder at its most banal; something that may hold your attention for its overlong running time, or may not, yet which hardly matters as the likely nap is probably equally invigorating; and something that will find any partial recall hours later a larger mental challenge than the viewing experience itself.

4/10

The Brothers Bloom (2009, Johnson)

I have to admit to strongly disliking Rian Johnson's debut Brick. The noirish dialogue that he inserted into the mouths of his teenage characters was so affected and out of place that it grated at every turn and made the film extremely unwatchable for me. It was obvious that the director had a sharp intellect and a puzzle-creator's Goldbergian eye for detail, but nonetheless everything felt overly designed and very heavy-handed. It was a case of style over substance to the nth degree, and it didn't help that the film felt emotionally hollow and, in the end, nothing more than a self-congratulatory stylistic exercise. It's one thing to design the hell out of your story structure; it's another to direct your film in such a way that it calls attention to itself in a "Hey Mom, look, I'm directing!" kind-of-way. If anything, far more mileage can be gotten out of hiding any intricacies behind the magician's curtain in service of the act. But sensing Johnson's obvious talent, I was very hopeful for a big leap forward in maturity with his next film. The superb, offbeat cast and jaunty trailers for The Brothers Bloom only served to feed my expectations.

And so I'm happy to report that The Brothers Bloom delivered on all of my expectations. Yes, it's true that the narration provided by Ricky Jay has made some pull out comparisons to Magnolia, based on little more than the narration itself. There are somewhat more justifiable comparisons being made to the films of Wes Anderson-- a result of hand-drawn journal titles separating the film into acts much as the curtains did in Rushmore, the presence of Darjeeling actor Adrien Brody, and in general a tight and intimate production design and quirky, often very self-aware characters with a penchant for poetic, haunted romanticism. Nevertheless, this doesn't feel like an Anderson film to me. While Anderson and Johnson may share a love of the complex and layered, at the end of the day Anderson's films service his characters whereas Johnson's films service his plot and story structure. Yet, Johnson has matured with The Brothers Bloom to a point where his characters are emotionally full and resonant, and unlike Brick, the complex story structure here serves the characters instead of feeling like a pointless exercise in moving the pieces around a structural chessboard.

It certainly helps that he's cast Adrien Brody and Mark Ruffalo as the two titular brothers. They are two of the best actors working today, and underutilized for various reasons. Brody looks physically awkward enough that mainstream Hollywood doesn't quite know what to do with him. His gangly body-type and hangdog looks don't quite mesh with his charm or onscreen charisma. He was a great fit in Hollywoodland a few years back, because there's something about him that seems more at place in old Hollywood. Ruffalo has more of the stereotypical leading man looks, yet he's a very emotionally sensitive actor with great vulnerability; he reminds one of Brando back in his heyday, and seems to have much more interest in character roles than generic paycheck parts. Both of these actors would have had so much more material to work with if they'd only been in their prime back in the 70s, when Hollywood wasn't run by a bunch of faceless corporate suits more concerned with 7-part franchises and adaptations of toy lines, as with films focused on exploring the human condition or the social themes of our times.

In addition, Rachel Weisz gives one of the most infectious performances of her career. She's an actress who can do just about anything, and here she adds the kind of fun, jaunty, vaudevillian performance again seen in those screwball comedies of yesteryear to her proven portfolio. Rinko Kikuchi, probably best know to Western audiences from Babel, has far less to do; yet her role and performance aren't quite so reductive to be one-note, and she makes the most of a role that has a little more depth and detail to it that one might assume.

Which in general can be said for The Brothers Bloom as a whole. I won't go into the plot, other than to say it's a con man/caper movie, which should be obvious from the trailer. But it's the kind of film where the journey and the reveals are what make it so enjoyable. So to include any kind of plot summary would simply be to distill the experience and ruin the movie. Rest assured that if you like the cast, quirky Anderson-like films, screwball comedies, intelligent scripts, and fun yet densely-plotted caper movies with plenty of twists and turns-- then this film should prove very satisfying, if not a home run. Everything about the film from the cinematography to the production design is a step forward from Johnson's previous effort. But most importantly, the depth and detail found across the production, particularly in the more organic and emotionally-realized characters, strikes a much more satisfying balance with Johnson's penchant for the kind of intricately designed story structure and makes for a wholly more satisfying viewing experience.

9/10

Monsters vs Aliens (2009, Letterman & Vernon)

"Boys, set the terror level at code brown, 'cause I need to change my pants." -The President of the United States, Monsters vs Aliens (2009)

Not exactly the height of comedic dialogue, and to put it simply, it’s no Shrek. Hell, it’s no Shrek the Third. With Monsters vs Aliens, Dreamworks proves that their Shrek films have been an anomaly, and that Pixar still reigns supreme in the computer-animated genre with little significant competition.

What’s mind-blowing about Monsters vs Aliens is the cast. It’s like a who’s who of comedy today, and includes everyone from Seth Rogen to Paul Rudd to Rainn Wilson to Will Arnett to Stephen Colbert. For pedigree, there’s everyone’s favorite girl-next-door Reese Witherspoon, House’s Hugh Laurie, and Keifer Sutherland doing a fantastic R. Lee Ermey impersonation. But I can’t for the life of me figure out how such a stellar cast was assembled for this project— because it obviously wasn’t a result of the material. And therein lies the problem.

There are a few chuckles here and there and one semi-interesting action set-piece. Reese Witherspoon’s 50’s-era housewife has a character arc involving learning to stand up for herself instead of in her husband’s shadow that riffs nicely off of the source material Attack of the 50 Foot Woman. The other characters include Will Arnett’s The Missing Link (Creature from the Black Lagoon), Seth Rogen’s B.O.B (The Blob), and Hugh Laurie’s Dr. Cockroach PhD (The Fly). But the high-concept and the monster-movie-inspired characters offer up so many rich story possibilities and details which go unexplored or undeveloped, that for every smart idea which actually made it into the script is a treasure trove of unused material.

In fact, the movie is so underwhelming that I began to imagine the script had originally been intended as live action, and how much more exciting it would have been to see a chase around the streets of San Francisco if it had actually been done with live actors and real sets. It’s never a good thing when a movie is so boring that you’re imagining a better version of it while watching the film on a first viewing. The sharp color palette and the 3D computer animation were probably the only things keeping my attention, and I think seeing a non-3D print would have been a coma-inducing experience, taking away the best element the movie had to offer. Of course, if you catch it on DVD or Blue-Ray, it won’t be in 3D.

The film suffers most in its third act, which feels like a clichéd, harried ending more fitting as the final act of some kiddie animation produced for Saturday morning television. It loses any of the meager pop and excitement it had going for it and just quietly fizzles out at the end of its very short running time.

If Dreamworks wants to be able to compete with Pixar, they need to realize that sharp, crisp animation isn’t everything; and that the most important element in Pixar's outstanding films are the intelligently-written, visually and emotionally-textured scripts where ideas have been developed and layered, and characters have truly been given life.

4/10

Star Trek (2009, Abrams)

"These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Her ongoing mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life-forms and new civilizations; to boldly go where no one has gone before." -Spock-Prime, Star Trek (2009)

J.J. Abrams & co-producer Damon Lindelof are a very pop-culture savvy pair, and an enormous amount of credit is due to them for their ability to take a dying American franchise and to not only reinvigorate it, but by doing so to permanently install it as timeless American iconography.

Lindelof may have only been a co-producer on the maiden voyage of this new outing, but he's already at work co-writing the sequel with screenwriters Orci & Kurtzman. Nevertheless, Orci & Kurtzman have gone on record to say that this first new Trek film still carries Abrams and Lindelof's fingerprints all over the script development process, and I think it's obvious that the central idea behind the franchise reboot probably owes its genesis to Lindelof's work at Marvel Comics on Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk.

Marvel's Ultimate line is essentially a modernization of their characters for a new generation. Marvel and their competition at DC seem to do this every 10-20 years or so, and the Ultimates is the latest retcon at "the House of Ideas." Essentially it's a way to throw out clunky old continuity while preserving what works, revitalize classic story arcs with new variations, spin characterizations in different directions, and generally freshen up something that may be aging past its current shelf life. It's also a way to simply start over and attract a new readership with a fresh and shiny beginning devoid of decades of attached history. And when it's done right, with talented creators behind it, the old fans line up as well-- excited at the new life that has been breathed into characters dear to their hearts, and interested to follow a new journey that may share some parallels to what went before, but which may also diverge into unexpectedly different directions.

And of course, this also perfectly describes the new Star Trek film. Abrams and Lindelof have been very savvy with how they've gone about it-- using Leonard Nimoy as fan-favorite Spock to not only midwife this new reinterpretation into existence, but to seal the entire project with a stamp of approval. In addition to revitalizing Star Trek, this strategy immortalizes it. No longer is history stuck with one interpretation of Spock, Kirk, or likely Khan... but the characters are transformed into archetypal icons that can be reinterpreted and passed down from generation to generation, much like we've see happen within comic-dom and across media with the likes of Batman, Superman, Spider-Man, and the X-Men. Captain Kirk is no longer just William Shatner; Captain Kirk is now simply Captain Kirk. And ironically, by doing this, Abrams and Lindelof will likely also generate more interest in the original Star Trek than simply continuing on with more flaccid sequels ever would have. Because now as new sequels and iterations are able to capture the zeitgeist, fascinated and curious audiences will always be able to go back and re-discover the original interpretations of the characters that started it all. And everything old will be new again once more.

As for the new film itself, it's certainly not flawless... but then again, no Star Trek film ever was. There are a few over-the-top attempts at crowd-pleasing that probably go too far, and a whole new generation of Trek fans is already debating things like the validity of Spock's justification in jettisoning Kirk in a safety pod down to a Hoth-like planet home to some large, predatory creatures ("... but the automated message in the pod told him to wait there for Starfleet to pick him up!").

But damn it, it's fun. The new film captures an excitement and a visceral crackle that no prior Trek film has ever quite achieved. Part of this is simply due to film technology being more advanced than it was at the time when other standouts in the series like The Wrath of Khan and First Contact were produced. The Onion even ran a story with the headline "Trekkies Bash New Star Trek Film as 'Fun, Watchable'." But at the same time, it's reverential of its characters while reinventing them. Every classic core Trek character gets to steal at least a scene or two. And in typical Abrams' fashion, the casting is inspired and spot-on across the board, and all of the actors do a fantastic job in their roles. From Karl Urban's interpretation of McCoy's brash and bitter attitude, to Chekov's battle with his accent so that the ship's computer can understand him, to Sulu demonstrating his badass fencing skills-- the reintroduction of all of the classic characters and elements is done with tremendous energy and success. On top of that, Abrams finds a way to include everything from big, high-energy moments like Kirk's encounter with the aforementioned nasty alien predators on a Hoth-like ice planet (Abrams and Lindelof love their Star Wars, of which there are more than a few nods throughout) to more character-driven, broader, humorous moments like McCoy following Kirk around the ship and repeatedly inoculating him, or Kirk's infamous defeat of the Kobayashi Maru simulation. Abrams even finds a way to sneak in his beloved Red Matter MacGuffin. There's such a variety of invention throughout the film, that the leanness of the story never becomes much of an issue, especially when countered with the forward-positioning for future installments.

And with Lindelof on board the sequel as a co-writer and not just a co-producer, any lingering doubts or minor quibbles and worries should be provided their salve. At the end of the day, not only is Star Trek pure, unadulterated fun, but it's also ripe with the promise of future voyages that look very bright for the first time in years.

9/10