Red Digital Readout

Hitman (2007)

2007-12-09T11:57:00.000-08:00

I’ve always enjoyed the “Hitman” series of games. Playing a bald assassin with a barcode tattooed on the back of his head, you travel to exotic locales, meet interesting people, and then kill them. Sounds like fun, yes? Kinda like being in the army, only with much better pay.

Much to my surprise, I also enjoyed “Hitman,” the film adaptation of the video games. It’s a glossy, plot-heavy actioneer that does more than expected in the process of pleasing fans of the games, along with whoever else wanders into the theater.

Timothy Olyphant takes the title role, originally meant for Vin Diesel. Raised from birth by a shadowy organization with a lot of time and money on its hands to be a perfect assassin, he doesn’t have a name, but a number: 47. Presumably he has some sort of alias to put on his passport, but we never learn for sure.

After an assignment that sees him putting a bullet through the nasal passages of Russia’s West-friendly president (how nice that would be), he turns on the news to discover that his target, or someone who looks like him, is still breathing and speechmaking. After withstanding an assault from a Russian SWAT team, 47 sets out to discover who set him up, taking Nika (Olga Kurylenko), a sex slave with key information, along for the ride.

The plot, which sees an Interpol agent (Dougray Scott) pursuing 47 all over Europe becomes much more complicated than necessary. But I suspect that most audience members aren’t expecting a killer story, just a story about a killer, and in that department “Hitman” delivers.

It’s a capably acted film, with Olyphant imbuing 47 with just enough sympathy to be likeable, yet keeping him vicious enough to be threatening. 47 even has a sense of humor, a nice touch in a contract killer. On the other side, Kurylenko does well enough with a stock role that many of the best scenes are about the awkward relationship between the two.

47 doesn’t seem to have ever been taught anything about sex and love, and she seemingly picks up on this. At one point, Nika asks him to spare the life of that Interpol agent, and to our surprise, he does. We then realize that 47 has probably never had a woman ask him to do anything before, so how could he say no? When she attempts to seduce him, he responds by hitting her with a tranquilizer dart, not because he doesn’t like her, but because he probably wouldn’t know what to do.

Those not interested in the romantic escapades of a virgin mass-murderer will be happy to find a few good action scenes. Director Xavier Gens doesn’t butcher the violence with dozens of quick cuts, but demonstrates enough patience to just let us see what the hell is going on.

The many scenes that stray from 47’s course aren’t even remotely interesting, although we’re usually rewarded when it returns. The visuals are often pretty and the bloodletting plentiful, enough so that at least 90 of the 107 minutes are justified.

Although the video games actually reward silent murders made to look like accidents and low-body counts, the screen 47 prefers shootouts and explosions, which are admittedly more entertaining to the target audience. While few would consider the sub-genre of video game to film adaptations to be littered with cinematic gems, we can lament the misses and enjoy the occasional hit, pardon the pun.

3 out of 5

Spider-Man 3 (2007)

2007-06-13T12:38:00.000-07:00

Spider-Man 3 begins with our hero in a place we’ve never seen him: on top of the world. Sure, Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) lives in an awful apartment, has barely a dime to his name, and regularly gets pelted with spitballs during science class, but his alter-ego is the most beloved figure in New York City. Best off all, he’s securely bagged Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst)

Spider-Man 3 may be the third film in the series, but it could have also been the fourth. It runs nearly two and a half hours, has roughly 20 characters, loads of crisscrossing plot lines, and was rumored to cost more money than the previous installments combined. Even with so much running time director Sam Raimi still manages to skimp on developing the villains and minor characters, though we do get intimately acquainted with Peter’s high school-esque romance with Mary Jane and bitter feud with best friend Harry Osborne (James Franco).

The film has several plot lines that mostly intertwine for the 5 minute stretches necessary for action sequences that cost enough to fund several Babel and United 93’s. One plot covers we Peter’s personal life, which concerns his marriage proposal to Mary Jane and consultations with the greeting card advice dispensing Aunt May (Rosemary Harris). Another follows Peter as he dons his Spider-Man costume and acts as a cheerleader for anyone fortunate enough to catch him on the street, as well as the occasional bout of saving people from getting hit by things (falling objects, the ground, etc.).

But Peter’s side-profession becomes a lot more dangerous, because otherwise there wouldn’t be much to put in the trailer. First, Harry raids his dead father’s gadget and weapon filled closet, taking on the Green Goblin mantle and chasing Peter all over town. Next, small time crook Flint Marko (Thomas Haden Church) wanders into a fancy giant paint mixer and turns into the Sandman, an even fancier sand monster capable of smashing things up real good.

Lastly, black alien goo crawls out of a meteorite and onto Peter’s moped, which then bonds with our hero with strange results. Peter gets himself a stupid hairstyle, revs up the aggression, and struts through the streets as if he were the coolest cat in Squaresville. Some viewers hated this development, but I liked it; at least Peter becomes seriously interesting for a half-hour, using his powers for the kind of things the less disciplined amongst us would. Later, this goo falls onto the head of Eddie Brock (Topher Grace), a sniveling jerk with a grudge against Peter, turning him into Venom, essentially an evil Spider-Man with too many teeth.

I could go well over my 500-word minimum just describing the first half of the story, which is certainly convoluted, but also watchable. Despite the length, surprisingly little of Spider-Man 3 feels tedious or forced. Rather than shortening the main story as many critics have suggested, Raimi would have been well served to cut the Eddie Brock/Venom section entirely. It adds little excitement and was fairly lame in the comics to begin with. Spidey’s battles with Sandman, a villain tricky but certainly not impossible to defeat, make for a much more riveting screen struggle, as do his violent encounters with Harry, or the New Goblin as the credits label him.

Spider-Manwas a disappointing train wreck of a comic book movie, mediocre or worse in every way. Spider-Man 2 was an amazing, spectacular web of superhero majesty, probably the best comic movie ever made. Spider-Man 3 swings into the middle, as superior to the first as it is inferior to the second.

Children of Men (2006)

2007-01-29T07:46:00.000-08:00

What a terrifying film this is. Many sci-fi and horror films use monsters and aliens and psychotic killers to generate temporary fear, but Alfonso Cuarón’s "Children of Men" has a premise so diabolical that I am hard pressed to think of one to match it in sheer dread.

We are introduced to London, circa 2027. For reasons unknown, humanity has ceased to be fertile. The youngest person on the planet is 18 years old, such a worldwide celebrity that his murder provokes an outcry that makes the one caused by Princess Diana’s death seem tame. Many have no memory of what children even look like.

It’s a world that simultaneously seems unrecognizable and painfully familiar. Britain’s geographic position makes it the sole remaining power, one ruled by a fascist government that herds hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants into concentration camps that bring images of the Holocaust to mind. Bombs blow people apart at coffee shops and stormtroopers viciously beat and gun down immigrants on sight. The rebel organization fighting against the government lends credence to the belief that "freedom fighter" is merely a euphemism for "terrorist."

The contemplation of one’s demise is hard enough on its own. Here, the death of each person represents not only an individual end, but also a step towards the curtain call of the entire human race. We’re watching not just the characters, but humanity itself as a bloated, decaying organism, collapsing on itself in unbridled fear. And with the cruelty and hatred of man blazing full force, we reluctantly ask ourselves, do we even deserve to survive as a species?

Theo Faron (Clive Owen) doesn’t seem like a man who would think so. A bored office drone who lost his concern for life when his infant son died 20 years ago, he survives a horrific bombing, only to trudge to work and fake despair to get the day off. Things begin to turn around when Julian (Julianne Moore), his ex-wife and now terror cell leader, recruits (read: bribes) him to secure travel papers from his cousin, a government subsidized artist.

In a brief scene that paints the human condition as well as any film this year, Theo asks his cousin how he continues to produce art even though in less than a hundred years no one on earth will be around to see it. The cousin smiles and simply replies "I just don’t think about it."

The papers are for Kee (Claire-Hope Ashitey), a young woman of seemingly minute importance. That is, until she brings Theo aside and reveals her very pregnant figure. In the blink of an eye, reality has warped yet again, and hope, which has been an antiquated notion for two decades, has returned in force. Theo tries to get Kee and her miraculous baby to a near-mythical group of scientists that may or may not actually exist, with the help of Miriam (Pam Ferris), a midwife who was at the front lines of humanity’s disintegration, and Jasper (Michael Caine), a political cartoonist turned pot grower.

Cuarón’s direction and the cinematography of Emmanuel Lubezki are nothing short of stunning. The documentary style shots are very long and thoughtful, rarely cutting even when it seems impossible that the camera could hold its place. A long shot seen from entirely within an SUV has the characters go from idle chitchat to running for their lives from a mob and the police. And a battle sequence throughout a concentration camp has scores of gunfire, dead bodies, tanks and explosions, all without a cut. I would accuse Cuarón of trying too hard to artistically top directors such as Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg if he didn’t actually succeed so well at doing so.

But the most moving and memorable component of "Children of Men" is in the story. By illustrating the stark brutality of mankind, Cuarón highlights what makes us worth saving. It takes violence and evil to make kindness, perseverance, and sacrifice truly inspiring. That a film this scary and tragic can imbue the viewer with such hope truly is a miracle.

5 out of 5

Ripley's Game (2002)

2006-07-28T09:08:00.000-07:00

Many people will claim not to understand humanity, but Tom Ripley (John Malkovich) really doesn’t. He watches, speaks to, manipulates and kills people, but for the life of him, he can’t connect with them. When asked about his conscience, Ripley responds "When I was young, my lack of conscience concerned me. Now it doesn’t."

Not to say Ripley lacks any and all feeling towards other people; he can grow fond of them much in the way an average person enjoys a trusty pet. In Ripley's Game, he feels this way about his beautiful Italian wife and Jonathan(Dougray Scott), a local picture-framer suffering from leukemia. Jonathan first gets set in Ripley’s sights when he badmouths Ripley to a room full of party guests.

Seriously unamused by any affront to his taste, Ripley doesn’t hesitate to suggest Jonathan as a hitman to Reeves(Winstone), a criminal associate. Jonathan abhors the thought of harming another human being, but with limited time and money, he wants something to leave behind for his wife and son. At first, Ripley doesn’t make his involvement known, but shows up very unexpectedly to loan assistance during a complicated hit on a train ("Hold my watch, because if it breaks, I’ll kill everyone on this fucking train," Ripley remarks while preparing a garrote).

Ripley watches bemusedly as this mild-mannered man becomes a reluctant yet cold-blooded mob hitman. His involvement with the scheme is purely for entertainment purposes, as he already has a gorgeous Italian estate and millions in cash lying around the house. But the prospect of manipulating Jonathan through a web of sordid murder happens to be as much of a psychology project as a game, with all the players functioning as ants in Ripley’s quest to extract some meaning from the men around him. Despite Ripley’s seeming complete lack of empathy, he begins to take on feelings towards Jonathan that would qualify as endearment for a normal person, and for him are a gigantic step forward.

John Malkovich slips into the difficult role like a glove, with a predatory expression and unwaveringly calm, almost apathetic voice. No doubt about it, Malkovich inhabits Ripley’s skin in a way that would be nearly impossible for another actor to match, much less surpass. There are five other films featuring Ripley, each with a different actor, but this one leaves little reason to see the others. After Malkovich’s cool, sophisticated, and brilliant embodiment, picturing Matt Damon or Dennis Hopper as Ripley seems nearly laughable.

Despite his clearly evil actions, Ripley gains our sympathy. At one point, I slowly realized I actually was starting to admire him. It then occurred to me that we don’t like Ripley in spite of his faults, but because of them. In the world we inhabit, Ripley’s lack of conscience and willingness to use his gifts for evil at his leisure are extremely valuable assets, ones that ensure he will never lose, nor even come very close. That his actions make perfect sense to him in turn come to mean that they make perfect sense for us, even as we occasionally turn away at their horror.

But he isn’t just a one-note sociopath. Observe how he goes to great trouble to obtain an antique piano for his wife, and takes joy in holding her as she plays. Notice how he, without a second thought, rushes to rescue Jonathan, the man who may be the closest thing to a friend Ripley has ever had. When Jonathan saves Ripley’s life, all a befuddled Ripley can say in response is ‘Why did you do that?’ Later, when Ripley watches his wife play piano for Rome’s elite, he thinks about everything that has happened, and a smile creeps across his face. For once, even if just for a split second, Ripley understands what humanity is all about. What he will do with the revelation, we can only guess.

5 out of 5

Domino (2005)

2006-05-12T16:04:00.000-07:00

Once in a while, an artist friend and I get together, grab a video camera, and make movies. Nothing too fancy, mind you, with budgets as low as $0, but we’ve turned out some interesting stuff. Little action pieces, parodies, weird editing, bizarre colors, and surrealism permeate every frame of our makeshift experiments, which may or may not be loosely connected to each other.

Director Tony Scott is unapologetic in his use of these techniques for Domino, a film so hyper-kinetic that it doesn’t stay still long enough to be assigned a genre. There may be a story buried underneath mountains of unprocessed film, but a plot definitely does exist, though not one that can be made sense of. Reflecting on it, I’ve concluded that it wasn’t meant to make sense; in the same way action films use plot as a clothesline to hang action scenes on, Domino uses plot to hang a dozens of frantically edited snippets of cinema.

I do mean dozens. By the closing credits, the audience has seen shootouts, explosions, sex scenes, pornography, severed limbs, thievery, Jerry Springer, detailed discussions on race mixing, satire of reality TV, satire of upper-class British families, religious commentary, scores of different color filters, bank robbers dressed as living first ladies, lots of subtitles, computerized visual aides, and Mickey Rourke. In short, meet Tony Scott, the world’s most experienced, well-budgeted film student.

Domino Harvey (Kiera Knightly), the film’s primary reoccurring character, serves as the nexus of the swirling insanity. The wealthy daughter of an old movie star (The Manchurian Candidate’s Laurence Harvey), Domino joins Ed (Mickey Rourke), the world’s ugliest bounty hunter, to become the world’s prettiest bounty hunter. What possesses her to abandon a comfortable life to get in the dirt with society’s dregs? An interesting question, but the film doesn’t care, because such an answer could take more than a shot of Domino punching out frat girls to understand.

Kiera Knightly gets the role half-right, half-wrong. The bitchy part she has down pat, but she looks too much like a cute girl at a costume party with a biker theme. Looking at Domino, one never gets the impression that this 100 pound girl could seriously stand up to Mexican gang bangers and mobsters, who could snap her in half like a Popsicle stick without a second thought. There are successful female bounty hunters working today, but I doubt many of them try to pay their tipsters in lap dances.

It may sound like I dislike the film, but perhaps I am being glib. While it possesses the attention span of a gnat and spends two hours assaulting our senses with barely comprehensible vignettes, there exists a palatable talent underneath the mayhem. I’ve seen films by terrible directors, and Domino clearly wasn’t made by one of them. The wild variety exhibited from frame to frame couldn’t be done by a hack. Only a good filmmaker with an unfortunate lack of focus could make this, an explosive mess that manages to be entertaining by the sheer power of its scattergun approach to storytelling. I’m hopeful that next time, Tony Scott will pay less attention to the editing machine and a bit more to the typewriter.

2.5 out of 5

Derailed (2005)

2006-04-22T09:13:00.000-07:00

Note to the filmmakers of Derailed: the Everyman hero is only sympathetic when he falls into a hole, not when he digs the hole himself. Charles Schine(Clive Owen) seems like a decent enough man, but every choice he makes spectacularly detonates in his face. We’re on his side at first, but by the fifth time Charles has a critical lapse in judgement, our faith in him has disintegrated, along with our patience.

The film starts promisingly enough. Charles, a middle class Chicago banker (with Clive Owen’s Brit accent), meets Lucinda (Jennifer Anniston, trying too hard to get away from Rachel) on the train to work. They hit it off, even though Charles has a wife and extremely sick daughter at home. Charles and his wife haven’t been getting along well, while Lucinda and her husband rarely speak. The scenes where they reluctantly but dangerously connect could put us off to Charles, but instead it appears to be an understandable mistake (the last one he’ll make in the film).

They rent a fleabag motel room to seal the deal, but the film switches tracks when LaRouche (Vincent Cassel), a vile thug, robs them both and rapes Lucinda. After he leaves, Charles suggests they call the police, but Lucinda stubbornly refuses. She doesn’t want her husband to know, although Charles’ face suggests that he is aware hiding this sort of thing can't work out.

So why doesn’t he call the cops anyway? Does it seem like a good idea for Charles to use the money for his daughter’s kidney medicine to pay off LaRouche when he comes snooping around the house? Could Charles at least go buy his own gun for protection? Whatever Charles should do, he glumly does the opposite, though a phone call could end the madness at any time.

Owen does what he can to make Charles likeable, but the script works feverishly against him. It even relies on one of those Clever Bad Guy Schemes where the hero must do exactly what they planned, or the evil lattice would break apart. Sprinkled into the already derivative mix are several scenes where Charles awkwardly stands around, trying to hide a secret from the cops, his wife, his coworkers, etc.

Derailed has good performances, and scores a few points at the end with some bloody revenge, though even those scenes come at the cost of character continuity. Any thriller where the audience contemplates whether or not the Everyman hero has earned his misfortune will find itself plunging off the tracks. Which reminds me, I would like to suggest that a film with a title like Derailed should be a guaranteed masterpiece from the start, because the invitation to write a negative pun gets more tempting than an eager and willing Jennifer Anniston. And that’s a lot.

2 out of 5

Grizzly Man

2006-04-02T11:28:00.000-07:00

Substance addicts come in all shapes and sizes, but they all have one thing in common; their addictions. The addict may be hooked on heroin, meth, pills, or booze, but for whatever reason they started, the addiction becomes engrained into their body and soul. If the addict manages to give up the substance, a black chasm ruptures across his psyche, and an obsession must be cultivated in order to plug the gap.

Timothy Treadwell choose to live amongst wild bears in Alaska in order to replace his drug addiction, unusual because recovering addicts rarely pick something more dangerous than being a junkie. For 13 years he recklessly inserted himself into the bears living space, shooting thousands of hours of film and getting so close to some that he could reach out and touch. He was dismissive of the suggestion that he carry a weapon, cheerfully stating that he would never dream of harming a bear, even in self-defense. Perhaps that stance did take a small degree of insane courage, though when you find out that a bear did in fact kill and eat him, you can’t help but think that it would have been considerate of him to arm his girlfriend, who suffered the same gruesome fate.

Grizzly Man uses both interviews and Treadwell’s own footage to analyze and ponder the man and his death. Director Werner Herzog weaves a glum and surprising picture of both Treadwell and the bears he dedicated his life to. Unlike many nature films, Grizzly Man has a healthy distrust for animals, and Herzog scoffs at granting them anthropomorphic qualities. Treadwell does not escape criticism in death, and Herzog never hesitates to paint an unflattering portrait.

Take the scene where Treadwell weeps over the body of a dead fox. Though he claims to have a sort of psychic connection to nature, his treatment of it rarely surpasses childish and selfish. At one point, he constructs a makeshift damn to increase the bear’s food supply, which doesn’t suggest much of a genuine love for the way nature works. When we interview his family, we discover that Tredwell wasn’t even his real name, but an invented one, along with a phony Australian accent and back story that even his close friends thought was true.

When narrating to his camera, Treadwell performs dozens of takes, the subject almost never the bears, but his perceived rapport with them. Near the end, he engages in a long, profanity-ridden rant where he proclaims himself the sole protector of bears on the earth.

Despite Treadwell’s feverishness, this was never the case. Herzog interviews many people who point out that his brazen mingling with the bears was detrimental, as it taught bears to be unafraid of humans. Treadwell argues that he prevents poaching, which the local environmentalists agree happens so rarely that it is a non-issue.

Grizzly Man works splendidly as both character study and warning against Treadwell’s type of behavior, and not just what occupied the surface. His attitude provides an intriguing parallel to all sorts of politicians and self-proclaimed do-gooders who express interest in causes such as the poor, nature, minorities, and soldiers, but really use them as an excuse to pat themselves on the back, or worse, for self-gain. Herzog, the legendary director of the brilliant Aguire, Wrath of God, has gained respect for making intelligent films that pointedly tackle bizarre and harmful behavior. With Grizzly Man, he could have gotten away with just editing Treadwell’s footage, but true to form, Herzog goes the extra mile.

4.5 out of 5

King Kong

2006-04-02T11:19:00.000-07:00

Peter Jackson’s King Kong is an marvelous achievement that carries astonishing clarity and vision within every frame. 2005 was a year that saw cinematic masterpieces such as Capote and Munich, but King Kong successfully embodies and often elevates to a new level the elements of storytelling, action, and visual effects that made cinema emerge as the 20th century’s premier art form.

King Kong seizes on the story provided by the 1933 original and expands upon it in the way some great films bring novels to a vibrant life no one could have imagined the material was capable of. Taking place during the Great Depression, we meet Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts), a struggling actress and performer. She has a good heart, but her life has been little more than a series of crippling disappointments. In a seemingly divine stroke of luck, movie producer Carl Denham (Jack Black) approaches Ann on the street, offering her the chance to star in one of his films. Unbeknownst to her, Denham’s plans are to travel the Pacific in search of a mysterious island, misleading both film and ship crews to get there.

The voyage to Skull Island receives most of the first hour of screen time, but never does it become tedious. Jackson’s characters are likeable and clear, the dialogue never attempting to be clever or flashy, but a perfect component to lay out the action ahead. Already a good film, the film rushes forward at breakneck pace upon reaching Skull Island, never missing a step or skipping a beat. Skull Island may be the most malevolent location ever put to film, replete with vile monsters that could each serve as their own horror series.

When King Kong (Andy Sekris) finally arrives, he occupies the screen with a dazzling sense of power and flawless movement. Sekris, who did the fabulous movements of Gollum in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, works with special effects to bring the giant ape to life in way that outshines that of most human actors.

Outwardly vicious and intimidating, Kong grows attached to Ann. She performs her vaudeville act for Kong, an enthusiastic audience who may not have ever received kind attention from another being. We slowly realize the two share a sort of connection that goes deeper than words. Both are outcasts in their societies, living solitary existences defined primarily by their physical traits. Kong protects Ann from the appalling creatures on Skull Island, and after the humans capture the great beast, Ann tries to protect him.

Perhaps the film’s most insightful scene occurs when Kong and Ann slide across a frozen pond, their gentle delight capturing their understanding better than dialogue could hope to.The knockout action sequences come furiously during the film’s latter 2/3’s, utilizing state of the art f/x and imagination for all they are worth. During one breathtaking sequence, Kong battles three tyrannosaurs rex’s while holding Ann in alternating hands, while in another terrifying sequence, the film crew comes under assault from thousands of disgusting insects. Each sequence would likely be the highlight of the average film, but when Kong runs amok in New York City, the exhilarating payoff never falls short of awe-inspiring.

Peter Jackson has come a long way. Originally known as the director of cult horror schlock such as Dead Alive, he shot to worldwide fame as the driving force behind the superb Lord of the Rings films. With King Kong, he proves himself to be an artist with phenomenal potential to add his name to the lexicon of great filmmakers.

When Kong brings Ann to the top of the Empire State building, he looks longingly at her, his deepest sadness being that their time together has run out, and I tearfully felt the same way. Roger Ebert often states "No bad film is short enough, while no good film is long enough." These words rang true throughout my psyche as this exciting, wonderful, deeply sad, and beautiful film came to a close.

5 out of 5

Doom

2006-03-21T15:59:00.000-08:00

Doom is a film based on an extremely bloody video game shooter, only the filmmakers decided that the shooting part wasn’t as important as the bloody. By the time the first half hour ticks by, we’ve seen buckets of gore, but not a single shot fired. If Doom’s goal was to suggest that films can poison the mind just as easily as video games, then mission accomplished (for real).

It seems as if the director had only seen one movie before, James Cameron’s Aliens. Only the DVD must have been damaged, because the only scenes he could study were the ones where the Marines slowly walk around the abandoned space outpost, the lights at the end of their weapons providing the only illumination. Doom’s run time clocks in at a criminal 113 minutes, 90 of which consist of scenes where the Marines split into pairs and clear dark rooms.

In between those, we have lots of childish expository talking, along with poorly choreographed shots of Marines plowing bullets into monsters. The visual effects crew obviously missed the rest of Aliens as well, because where Aliens' creatures were creepy and sleek, Doom’s demons resemble rugby players drenched in mud. Perhaps they figured that the brazen lack of lighting would make this a moot point?

Exactly why the filmmakers mostly ignored the vile looking monsters of the source material is hard to explain, as is the complete lack of interesting violence or combat. People get butchered, Marines shoot machine guns, they move on. Most films of this nature are ruthlessly mean-spirited and cynical, but Doom merely operates on fumes, gliding from one stupid scene to the next. Gore sickos will have much more fun with smut like Saw II or Wolf Creek, while action fans can find more inspiring material in the typical B western. A bright 6th grader or a stupid English grad student could have reasonably written the plot, which is so worthless that it doesn’t deserve description.

Doom offers surprise only in the astonishing boredom of each frame. I can’t even despise Doom, because to do so would require the far more energy than the film possesses. If for some reason you are forced to watch Doom, I suggest a game; close your eyes, listen to the dialogue, and make your own pictures. Rest assured, what you think of will be much more enjoyable than what actually exists. Even better, suggest an alternative activity. How about a good book? Video games can be so dull.

0.5 out of 5

Sky High

2006-03-21T15:57:00.000-08:00

Sky High is the newest film to tackle super-heroes, a topic that has become so common in film that it should soon be awarded its own genre. The characters are all original, so no ridiculously long running concepts have to be honored, but the film dives into comic book stereotypes with unusual candor.

Will Stronghold (Michael Angarano) dreads his first dead of high school, but not for the reasons most kids do. His parents are the Commander (Kurt Russell) and Jetstream (Kelly Preston), the world’s most famous super-heroes on an earth replete with meta-humans. Instead of one of the boring schools mere mortals attend, he’ll be going to Sky High, a flying fortress where all the super-heroes go.

The school’s selection and education process is one that would likely result in lawsuits, if it weren’t out of the legal jurisdiction of every court on earth. On the first day, the students are herded into a gym, where Bruce Campbell (or Sonic Boom, depending on how you choose to listen) demands a demonstration. Kids with useful powers such as flight or super strength get to be ‘heroes’, while those with less useful powers such as the ability to glow in the dark are discarded into the ‘hero support’ pile. The supporters are so disdained that Will had never even heard of his father’s sidekick, who ruefully notes "I suppose he doesn’t have time to sit around all day and look through scrapbooks that I made him." Will has yet to develop any powers, a shortcoming that will crush his father, who doesn’t know (let us hope Will never gets offered drugs).

Sky High makes good use of the material it has. I chuckled at a character named Warren Peace and liked how they covered nearly ever superhero power imaginable. Couldn’t more have been done, however? By the end, we are given the standard comic book plot, where Will saves the day, all the sidekicks get to use their nearly useless powers to prove their worth, and a PG rated kiss is exchanged.

With the exotic setting and dozens of possibilities posed by mixing teenagers imbued with godly powers, did the central problem need to be an attack by a goofy villain? I was much more interested in the rivalry between Will and a fire-wielding punk who’s fathers were arch enemies. What about learning not to abuse the astonishing gifts they have received? Unfortunately, the film skips most of this, more satisfied with the standard Disney plot.

It would be difficult, if not impossible, to avoid comparing Sky High to the animated The Incredibles. The latter sharply but respectfully satirizes comics while utilizing the material to make a visually dazzling family film with a good message. Sky High plays the comic cannon straight, in the process appealing to the same children that most of those dopey comics do, but leaving the adults with little more than gentle grins. Does the embrace of comic values make a great children’s flick? Yes, but will adults find themselves more than mildly entertained? Holy frijoles, Batman, no!

3 out of 5

The Constant Gardener (2005)

2006-03-13T15:58:00.000-08:00

Diplomat Justin Quayle (Ralph Fiennes) receives news that his wife Tessa (Rachel Weisz) has been killed in Kenya. Justin’s British reserve goes so deep that he hardly blinks, and apologizes to the man who had to bear the news. Despite the calm formality, his eyes flicker with pain.

The Constant Gardener is a decidedly British film, a political thriller that displays low-key intelligence and yet crackles with intrigue. There are no shootouts or heroics, nor are there dramatic clues left behind at every location. Instead we are given a complicated, intersecting web of seedy diplomats, greedy corporations, battered third-world war zones, and merciless contract killers. Beneath all this, a touching human story punctuates every frame.

Before her death, Tessa was a leftist activist who traveled throughout Africa. Treading through Kenya alone would be dangerous for anyone, much less a pregnant British woman, but she does so with naïve zeal, desperate to help anyone she can. Although Justin found these qualities attractive in the first place, they are getting tiresome. Tessa rarely comes home, and spends a startling amount of time with an African doctor, a sore point that generates no shortage of rumor. At the time of her suspicious death, Tessa was a key component of an investigation into the habits of a parsimonious pharmaceutical company, and Justin finds himself quickly sucked into his wife’s work. Obsessively diving into the Africa his wife knew, Justin begins to acquire the same qualities that made Tessa a great person, and got her killed.

The Constant Gardener pays great respect to the intelligence of the audience, all but unheard of for a left-leaning political thriller. Tessa’s death comes right away, but almost immediately the film cuts to flashbacks, correctly assuming that attentive audience members don’t need it spelled out. The British nature of the story works very well; characters rarely say exactly what runs through their minds, but use subtle wording and veiled threats to convey the plot. Instead of long-winded monologues of The Contender or Good Night, and Good Luck, we simply watch events play out, free to make up our own minds.

Yet, most interesting is the story of Justin and Tessa’s marriage. Justin had a deep but almost bemused love for his wife, who never seemed to forget about her humanitarian work for a minute. At the time of her death, the marriage appeared to be crumbling, Justin nearing the end of his rope with her secrecy and absences.

Through the course of his investigation, he discovers things about Tessa that he never knew, peeling back the layers until he sees what sort of person she really was at the core. Her generosity was infectious, and changes him profoundly. Many of us wish for a few more minutes with someone that we lost; Justin’s longing for Tessa builds in his eyes until looking at him is like peering into the sun.

The Constant Gardener works splendidly on every level it exists. Simultaneously suspenseful, touching, and thought provoking, the film can justly take a seat with the other great issue pieces of 2005, though it will not be remembered solely for its views on drug companies. Any film maker who wants to touch on politics should take a note; lectures are boring, great stories are not.

4 out of 5

Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972)

2006-03-10T14:38:00.000-08:00

In the 16th century, an expedition of Spanish soldiers, lead by Francisco Pizarro, travels down the Amazon in search of gold. The journey becomes more perilous with every step, the Spanish and their Indian slaves rapidly falling victim to the elements. Pizarro declares that a scouting party led will move ahead, and must return within two weeks. Don Ursua will lead the party, with Don Aguirre second in command.

Werner Herzog’s Aguirre, the Wrath of God plunges the viewer into the heart of madness, fully realized through the eyes of a man with a lust for power that triumphs over all else. The scouting party makes its way through an Amazon jungle teeming with billions of shades of green, which spiral into seeming eternity. Food is scarce, hostile natives are plentiful, and the Spanish are greatly outmatched. They may be settlers, but the jungle seems dizzyingly claustrophobic, natures coiled as if it may spring to life and devour every foreign element that dare trespass. Where many films use nature as a beautiful symbol for harmony, in this film, it is a WMD.

The scouting party rapidly falls apart. Aguirre (Klaus Klinski) moves with a queasy limp, with a head that seems to swivel 360 degrees, his intense eyes not possessing bright intelligence, but dark cunning. He cares not for gold, but for power, and gleefully seizes the chance to overthrow Ursua. Aguirre declares independence Spain, claiming South America as his territory, a bold claim considering the size of the scouting party. He appoints a fat, lazy bureaucrat to be his puppet king, though Aguirre finds this man to be unsatisfactory as well. Little time passes before Aguirre declares himself the new king, feverishly driving the party forward on a giant raft.

Food quickly runs out, Indian attacks intensify. The tragic excess of old Europe sticks out like a sore thumb; the party has cannon, horse, and a sedan chair for Aguirre’s daughter, but rotten fruit for nutrition. Aguirre becomes increasingly unstable, pompously bragging about his hollow empire, ruthlessly striking down any member of his own party that utter a word of doubt. As we watch Aguirre’s sanity deteriorate under the crushing weight of his failed dream, images of Adolf Hitler pounding a battle map and ordering non-existent armies into battle flood into our minds.

Watching the film, one can imagine a similar intensity from Herzog. There is much labor to every movement, a numbing energy to the slow river voyage. Herzog and his crew of eight worked through conditions similar to the horrific ones the party faces, with violent tempers and an aura of lawlessness decorating the production. Incidents involving Herzog, Klinski, and pistols have become filmmaking legend. Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now became well known for a similarly hellish production and themes, but Herzog did it first, and better.

Aguirre, the Wrath of God paints a searing indictment of those who would forsake everyone in their vicious quest for power, and serves as a deadly warning to those who would attempt to indulge their insane fantasies. Herzog suggests that whatever mad dream a greedy villain may possess, the forces of nature will inevitably shatter it to pieces, along with those who follow. We can only hope so.

5 out of 5

Running Scared

2006-03-05T12:31:00.000-08:00

Many have labeled Running Scared a hard boiled crime film, but the label doesn’t fit. It would be better described as a hyper-kinetic trip through one’s worst nightmares. Not nightmarish, but an unfiltered, wake up drenched in sweat nightmare, the kind that sticks with you for the remainder of your days, where you’re lucky if you only have it once. It not feature a scene where the hero literally wakes up, though the film’s dreamlike quality permeates nearly every frame.

Like a dream, the story makes little practical sense, but manages to click together in the manner only the darkest recesses of the brain can comprehend. The hero (dreamer?) of the film, Joey Gazelle(Paul Walker), finds himself bombarded with off the wall scenarios that link together through his relentless quest for a stolen gun. By the time things have come to a close, Joey has crossed paths with mobsters, Russian psychopaths, pimps, hookers, crooked cops, and a very angry wife, usually with bloody, profane results. I haven’t even mentioned the horrific stopover at the home of loathsome, married child molesters.

Running Scared is a mess, but there exists a surprising method to writer/director Wayne Kramer’s madness. Kramer last directed The Cooler an almost pensive examination of Las Vegas gansters. He must have felt bored with taking it slow, because Running Scared crosses a line that few films are willing to. People’s skulls are vaporized with shotguns, female genitalia make gleeful appearances, and children swear like sailors. At one point, the hero gets held down and tortured by having hockey pucks slammed at his skull, the only lighting being the black lights hanging from the ceiling. Like any good nightmare, the torturers dressed in full hockey garb.

Running Scared’s scattergun methodology ensures a lack of greatness, but won’t be forgotten anytime soon by its audience. Kramer as a director enters Michael Bay territory, orchestrating the ludicrous material by punctuating every scene with a huge exclamation point. Even if one hates the material, how can one hold a grudge against a film with the balls and the confidence to hold a shootout in a black-lit hockey rink? I know I can’t.

3 out of 5

Lord of War

2006-03-05T00:25:00.000-08:00

Yuri Orlov (Nicolas Cage) finds himself face to face with his worst enemy, tied to a chair. A Liberian dictator gleefully hands Yuri a gun and tells him to fire away, but Yuri is terrified. The dictator takes Yuri’s hands as if he were helping a child and helps him fire, blowing the other man’s brains out. Yuri may have sold millions of weapons to people all over the world, but he has never fired a single shot.

This was Lord of War’s best scene, a glaring standout in a film soaked with mediocre, gloomy cynicism. Writer/Director Andrew Niccol desperately wants to say something about the arms trade that gives people in third-world countries the means to butcher each other, but his obvious lack of answers infects the entire screenplay. By the end, Niccol’s desperation is palatable as the final ten minutes spirals into an entirely different message than the 110 that preceded it.

Growing up a Ukrainian immigrant in New York, Yuri works at his father’s restaurant. After witnessing a gang shooting, he realizes that he should sell something that everyone needs other than food. He works his way from selling Uzi’s to thugs to bringing shiploads of AK-47’s to dictators. Though a relentless Interpool agent (Ethan Hawke, playing self as a naïve doofus) hounds him at times, Yuri finds the arms trade to be eerily lucrative.

An atheist-existentialist, Yuri never so much as shrugs at the suggestion that his actions are wrong. He hurls heavy handed lines like "You know who's going to inherit the world? Arms dealers. Because everyone else is too busy killing each other," every thirty seconds or so, in case we forget that he possesses a cynical world-view. He traipses around the world, narrating in monotone about how much profitable arms sales are, people killing each other, not giving a shit, etc.

Nearly every line and character exists solely for the purpose of illustrating a message Niccol isn’t even certain of. Never does the film make a serious attempt at balancing the gloom and doom. Yuri’s trophy wife lives the high life off his blood money, then dubiously insists he quit. Yuri brings coke-head brother (Jared Leto) along for no reason other than that the screenplay needs a martyr. And in case we didn’t think Yuri was bad enough, the vicious Liberian murders his underlings on a whim. There have been Bond films with more layered characters, and I’ve seen a few with Roger Moore.

Lord of War gets a few shots into the 10-ring with some black humor and appropriately grim photography, but results in a total misfire. Someone should send Andrew Niccol a memo explaining that relentless cynicism unopposed results in mere whining; Lord of War whines so loud it could be heard over a volley of the machine guns Yuri uses to pay for his limo.

2 out of 5

Brokeback Mountain

2006-03-05T00:09:00.000-08:00

During the first twenty minutes or so of Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain, we are introduced to Ennis and Jack, two cowboys watching over sheep in Wyoming. Ennis, a sulky, quiet redneck type, feels right at home being a cowboy. Bright eyed and chatty, Jack seems like he would have been better off growing up in the city. The two men watch over the sheep, hunt, and get to know each other. The film plays these scenes in a straightforward, simple manner, and if not for the massive hype surrounding the film’s content, it would be a total shock when they begin to have sex.

Quiet subtlety is Brokeback Mountain’s greatest asset. If a hundred directors were assigned to make a film about gay cowboys, it is doubtful that many would be more subtle than Ang Lee. The film does not take great pains to show us they are in love, nor does it twelve scenes where the characters spell out their every thought with tears streaming down their faces, nor does it stick around for soft pornography. The majority of what is going in is expressed in the characters faces, actions, and simple but effective dialogue. Heath Leder turns in a phenomenal performance as Ennis, who even when in a moment of peace, seems to be in agony. Jake Gyllenhaal is nearly as good as Jack, who impatiently wades through his life, waiting for the happiness he knows must be around the corner.

Ennis and Jack part when the summer is over, Ennis staying in Wyoming, Jack moving to Texas. Neither one is overly enthused about their lives, which include wives and children, but they carry on. One day, Ennis receives a postcard from Jack, and before you know it the two are going on "fishing trips" where no fishing takes place. Jack declares that the two should leave their families and get a farm together, but Ennis quietly scoffs. It is still the 1960’s, and as a boy, his father showed him firsthand the potentially violent death that can await a homosexual.

Brokeback Mountain is not so much about homosexuality or love as it is unfulfilled desire. Jack can not have what he badly wants, and Ennis’ is not willing to take the steps towards his own possible happiness. The film is not nearly as pro-homosexuality as some would have you believe; indeed, throughout the film, Ennis and Jack’s relationship destroys their own lives and badly damages that of others. Instead of giving into their desires or suppressing them entirely, they try halfway, which does not work. In one scene, Ennis ignores his own children in his desperation to run off to a motel with Jack. In another, Jack slinks through a Mexican border town, searching for a male prostitute. These are not happy men, certainly not the characters GLAAD would push.

Brokeback Mountain is a magnificent story of men doomed by impulses they would each rather not possess. One’s own opinions of the politics and morality of homosexuality need not matter much, as everyone can connect to the pain of not having what it is you want most. Is there any feeling much worse than that?

4 out of 5

Capote

2006-03-05T00:08:00.000-08:00

Within the first several minutes of Capote, Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s performance as the title character reveals itself as phenomenal, the complete transformation in character that most actors could only dream of. Every solitary word, movement, and gesture is flawless, engrossing in ways equal to the best work of Brando, Di Niro, Olivier, and Penn. As far as reviewing films go, Capote plays out like a baseball game where one team scores 20 runs before the first out.

Truman Capote, the (in)famous writer and celebrity gossip machine, was not an easy figure to grasp. He was a brilliant writer and man in general, with no qualms about gleefully showing his genius off. He was also as effeminate as three Miss America pageants, deeply insecure, with a childhood that would outright obliterate lesser men. Early in the film we see him as the center of attention at a hip New York party, but minutes later he pays a bellhop to rave about his works in front of a pre-TKAM Harper Lee.

Capote is drawn, almost mysteriously, to a small Kansas town where a family was brutally shot-gunned for no apparent reason. The locals do not quite know what to make of him, but he is charming and manipulative in a way they have never seen, and before long he has befriended everyone he needs to, including the sheriff (Chris Cooper). His ability to recall 94% of what he reads comes in handy for both interviews as well as impressing the citizenry. When the murderers are apprehended, he nearly jumps for joy, seeing an opportunity to write an amazing book, a ‘non-fiction novel’.

Exploiting someone for material for a book isn’t a pleasant experience, even if they are a murderer. Capote, ever seeking approval in a world he can never call home, barely even tries to defend himself when others accuse him of exploitation. When one of the killers asks Capote about the book’s title, claims not to know, neglecting to mention that In Cold Blood has been decided upon.

He immediately finds himself attracted to Perry Smith (Clifton Collins Jr.), a soft spoken but undeniably chilling man with whom Capote sees as both a kindred spirit and a gold mine. His visits to Smith on death row are light on homo-eroticism and heavy on desperation. Smith desperately needs a friend, and does not want to be remembered as a monster; Capote must balance his attraction and desire to help Smith with the fact that he needs a gruesome re-telling of the murder, and most morbidly, a final ending to his book. Life in prison won’t do the trick.

Capote’s relationship with Smith and experience when writing his masterpiece becomes all consuming, dragging his psyche into places more horrific than even he imagined. Smith can appear gentle and pained, but the vicious murderer never moves far under the surface. When Capote finally hears Smith’s calm and straightforward description of how he murdered an entire family with no remorse, Capote’s soul crosses the point of no return.

Nothing short of spellbinding, gut-wrenching, and brilliant, Capote deserves recognition as an instant classic. Masterfully crafted on every level and with physically palatable power, it epitomizes why the movies are the most poignant and relevant art form today.

5 out of 5

Ultraviolet (2006)

2006-03-05T00:01:00.000-08:00

Ultraviolet may be the best video game movie ever made, even though a video game version has yet to be produced. The cheap CGI is plentiful, the colors vivid, the heroine single-handedly takes on hundreds of men at once, weapons quite literally appearing in her hands out of nowhere. I interpreted the recent film Running Scared as a long nightmare, and it’s tempting to interpret Ultraviolet as a nerdy teenager playing a T-rated Xbox 360 game.

The film’s plot transparently serves as nothing more than a string from which to hang ten or so action massacres. Violet (the criminally beautiful Milla Jovovich), the heroine, flips from one scene to the next, clad in laughably revealing outfits, butchering anyone that crosses her sight. It’s not that the gunfights aren’t well done, but without even a limp effort at storytelling, all we get are the mish-mash of comic book colors on screen. Later in the film, Violet refuses to attack a building guarded by 700 soldiers, citing superior numbers, though by now nothing has indicated she can be harmed by anything short of terminal cancer.

Within Ultraviolet’s 84 minute running time (including credits), two different resurrections occur, neither with any accompanying explanation. Perhaps Player 1 had several more lives left and the Pre-Algebra homework could wait, though an extra lives meter at the top of the screen could have been useful to the audience.

In 2002, Ultraviolet writer/director Kurt Wimmer’s Equilibrium was released. Barely heard of in the U.S. until its DVD release, the film was a sci-fi/action masterpiece, a wildly fun, visually stunning, shatteringly touching assault on the senses. Where Equilibrium’s action was over the top but crisp and sharp, Ultraviolet’s fight scenes simply ratchet up the body count until Violet moves on to the next level. Equilibrium’s dark, moody tones gave way to occasional bursts of vibrant color, while Ultraviolet splatters every frame with techno-comic ink that could give migraines to a child.

What I missed most from Equilibrium was a story that worked, with characters and events that I could care about. In Equilibrium’s best sequence, the hero watches a recording of his wife being tried and executed, and rushes prevent another woman he loves from meeting the same fate. Ultraviolet has a scene where Violet tries to rescue a child, but it makes no sense, giving us not a sliver of believable dialogue or action that would imply she would care. Every interaction in the film reeks of phoniness; it could be taught to show why action flicks really do need good characters, after all.

Wimmer may have gotten a bigger budget with Ultraviolet, but jumped several steps backwards. The filmography seems to be reversed, Ultraviolet looking like the experiment, Equilibrium the glorious result. If none of Wimmer’s fans ask "What happened?", he can assume they’re busy playing video games. Good ones.

1.5 out of 5