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Out in Theaters: HOT TUB TIME MACHINE 2

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Hot Tub Time Machine 2 doesn’t quite make you wish you could go back in time and stop yourself from attending…and then its characters rape each other. Yes, I mean that literally. Puerile, potty-mouthed and purposeless, this five-years-later sequel has the audacity to jettison the whole “likable losers” appeal of the original in favor of three wash-outs crashing parties in the future, solving a hackneyed murder mystery. When John Cusack can’t be bothered to join the reunion party (last year, he had four films score 10% or lower on Rotten Tomatoes), you can assume the settings are off but little can prepare you for how uninspired and piecemeal this never-should-have-happened follow-up is. Set phasers to shun.

In the aftermath of Hot Tub Time Machine, our characters have settled in nicely using their knowledge of future events to make themselves rich and famous. Lou (Rob Corddry) ripped off some Motley Crew songs (renamed *sigh* Motley Lou) before inventing Lougle (yes *sigh* that’s a rip-off of Google) to the tune of someodd billion dollars. Craig Robinson‘s (at least marginally affable) Nick has gone on to rip off countless artists from The Black Eyed Peas to Nirvana and for it is a celebrated artist struggling with identity issues. Well no shit you thieving hack. Cusack, as mentioned, is nowhere to be seen – there’s a brief mention that he penned a popular sci-fi book about Time Lords or whatnot – and we’re lead to believe that Clark Duke‘s baby-faced Jacob just vegged out on the couch and didn’t pursue fame and fortune like his other time traveling cohorts.

Corddry’s Lou is an absolute dick of a human being and a test to withstand. He’s reprehensible in a most off-putting way, so much so that I couldn’t remember if he was this much of a churlish asshole in the original or if his obnoxious, off-putting nature had been ratcheted up to fit the sequel quota of “bigger is better”. Nevertheless, his dickishness leads to his near immediate demise (in a lights-flickering thunderstorm no less) and the trio is forced to travel back in time (more on this soon) to solve his murder before it ever happens.

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It stands to reason that a movie with “hot tub time machine” in the title doesn’t make any sense but the time travel aspects of this film are even more misshapen and whacked out than they once were and our “heroes” wind up in the future – but a future that is still their past. Or something like that. They need to get blackout drunk in order to operate their sudsy time machine, unless screenwriter Josh Heald deems that there’s not enough time to get into another pill-popping, cocaine-eating montage and then it just works with the press of a button. And did I mention that the characters at one point are forced to rape each other? And I don’t mean implied rape, I mean bent-over, screaming-at-the-top-of-your-lungs rape. I just don’t know what to say…

Perhaps the most distracting element of the film is the one that sums it up best: the arrival of the etherial repairman. In the role, Chevy Chase throws down one of the worst cameo appearances of all time, reprising his shtick as a “grandfather time” figure in what might just be the least enthusiastic onscreen appearance of the last decade. You couldn’t have paid him money to make him look less happy to be there. But that pretty much sums up the film in its entirety though: a bunch of people wondering what they’re doing in the midst of a completely defunct comedy. It’s not really a shock that director Steve Pick (Hot Tub Time Machine, About Last Night) falls so hard on his face but it’s nonetheless embarrassing to watch.

Robinson, newcomer Adam Scott and even Corddry give it their all – and do manage to cull some immature laughs with their frequent, obviously improvised riffing – but it’s just far too little in a film that’s far too creatively barren. The actors hack at each other as best they can but their comedy is crude, mean-spirited, cheap and often just sad. In summation: the characters are forced to rape each other.

D+

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Out in Theaters: MCFARLAND USA

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Apparently there’s a place in America called McFarland. Home of the “pickers”, flatlands of the Meheecans, McFarland is California-as-fly-over-state and the perfect staging grounds for an inspirational underdog story. Almost Steinbeckian in its desperate position of agricultural purgatory, McFarland is a training grounds for drop-outs and inmates, the kind of small town that plants their state pen adjacent to their high school with traffic between the two state institutions resembling the systematic marching of ants. But the days of crop picking woes are thrown out the window when a white man sport (cross country running) rears its dignified head and the white man (Kevin Costner) saves the day.

Hollywood has a long history of the flipping the noble savage equation on its head, planting a savior of a white dude in a pit of assorted-colored serpents and seeing what happens when you mix things up. Cool Runnings did it with Jamaicans and bobsleds, James Cameron did it with CGI and the Na’vi, Stand and Deliver did it with James Olmos and Math. In McFarland USA, Disney does it with distance-running Mexicans. It’s the seventh son of a scheming formula that’s as crowd-pleasing as it is emotionally manipulative. And if anyone does emotionally-manipulative right, it’s Disney. Sometimes.

Costner is Jim White, a high-school football coach who gets the proverbial boot when he hucks a cleat at a sassy quarterback and ends up knicking his country club face. It’s one of those classic coaching accident. No pain, no gain right? Unfortunately Coach Taylor’s “clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose” doesn’t really apply when you rough up the ol’ student athlete population. Fired and marked with the scarlet letter of “abuser of children”, White has few options on his once silver platter and is forced to uproot his family of four. Arriving in the dusty nowhere of McFarland, the Whites – if this weren’t based on a true story, the choice of last name would earn far more commentary – are faced with the harsh reality that their the only white face in a hundred mile stretch and the only chow joints in town are taquerias. And they don’t even serve burgers.

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The White family fits into the town like pepperoni pizza into a tamale. Realizing they’re in hostile territory when a bunch of low-riders cruise by bumping the bass (a terrifying prospect), White vows to wife Maria Bello that he’ll get his family out of his Mexican-inhabited lion’s den with two shakes of a lamb’s tail. Playing the oh-so-intriguing role of “supportive wife”, she backs Jim out of his fight-or-flight instinct with the calm rationale that he’s about as desirable a teacher as Mama June is a bikini model. She might have suited up just fine back in her heyday but nowadays the prospects of such a fit aren’t so hot.

As is expected with these kinds of films, Costner’s White becomes an integral part of the community in less time than it takes a Kenyan to clock in a mile, recruiting himself for a position as a cross country coach (met with your standard issue ignorancia response of “cross country what?”) and assembling a sextet of hardworking, fast-running Mexican students because “Damn, look at that boy run!” When he locks down casual sprinter/day-laborer-in-the-making Thomas (Carlos Pratts) – who also serves as a low-broiling love interest for White daughter Julie (Morgan Saylor; 21 playing 15) – the prospects of a McFarland cross country team begins to bloom. The dustbowl of a town sees its first true spark of promise rising like the harsh sun above their endless fields of cabbage.  

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The ups and downs of McFarland USA are as calculatedly high and low as the mounds of discarded almond shells that the runner boys practice on. Dramatic tension is invented for no reason beyond an assumed need for dramatic tension – the Quinceañera parade scene being an aggressive offender of bait-and-swing melodramatic hogwash AND a complete editing miff – while various character arcs are forecast from the moment they arrive on set. A roguish hero with a troubled past overcomes the odds to become a champion, you say? How novel.

That isn’t to say that it doesn’t actually work though. In fact, McFarland USA can be downright rousing, with Antônio Pinto‘s soaring eagle score (complimented by Terry Stacey‘s flag-brandishing cinematography) borderline forcing you at sonic gunpoint to tearfully cheer on its underdogs, even through hard-trained knowledge that McFarland‘s outcome will be as predictably cheerful as a Quinceañera in Beverly Hills. It’s the kind of heart-warming Disney sports movie that serves up its schmaltz in thick, gooey gobs, the brand of pick-me-upper to bring your little league team to but never bother to dig into the meaning behind it. Because beyond the surface layer of faux inspiring hooey balooey, there really isn’t much else there. After all, McFarland USA, or How Kevin Costner Saved the Mexicans From Picking More Crops, doesn’t actually concern itself with going beneath the skin. Even if it did, there really isn’t much else there that needs to be said. Or seen.

C

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The Annual Silver Screen Riot Oscar Contest

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This year’s Oscars are as close to a crap shoot as they’ve been. Sure, it’s a two horse race but it’s a two horse race separated my inches and honestly at this point, I’m not sure which camp I’ll be backing Oscar night. If you don’t already know what I’m referring to, you’re probably in trouble. That doesn’t mean that I won’t give you guys a shot at predicting the Academy Award winners all over again. After all, it’s 2015. Another year, another chance to show your dominance.

As I’ve done in the past, the winner will receive a DVD/Blu-Ray of the film that wins Best Picture – though I’ve been known to be accommodating in the past if that is not your preferred option. Second place will receive a DVD/Blu-ray of one of last year’s Best Picture nominees (select options). Please note that I’ll only be taking the major 21 non-short categories into account, with shorts only functioning as tie-breakers. So even if you get 20/24, you still might end up being 17/21 depending on which categories you fell short in.

This is the first time in a while that I think I might crash and burn (last year I went a mighty 22/24, the same the year before) and might be marking up a score card under 20. Expect my predictions the morning of the Oscars. Meaning, no, you won’t be able to mimic my predictions for this contest. The contest is officially open.

The Rules

  • You must submit your predictions Saturday, February 21st at Midnight Sunday, February 22nd at 4 PST before the Oscar ceremony starts.
  • In order to be eligible to win, you must like Silver Screen Riot on Facebook. If you don’t already, click here to do so now.
  • Only one submission per person.
  • Only submissions placed via page comment (at the bottom of this page) will count. Do not post on the Silver Screen Riot Facebook wall or send me an email or message. Your predictions are only valid if they’re in the right spot. 
  • Vote for every category in order to win. While it’s all well and good to only care about the primary battlefields, if you only submit predictions for Best Performers and Pic/Director, you’ll miss out on all the other categories and will have a small shot at winning.
  • The shorts DO NOT count towards your final tally and will only be accounted for in the case of a tie-breaker. So while it might not matter in the end, if it comes down to a tie, the person with the most wins in shorts will take home gold.
  • In case of a super-way tie (after shorts), the person who predicted first will win, so get your submissions in early.
  • REMEMBER: Please be sure to follow us on Twitter and Facebook in order to be eligible to win.

The Prizes

  • First place will win a DVD or Blu-Ray of the film that wins Best Picture
  • Second place will receive a DVD or Blu-ray of their choice from last year’s Best Picture nominees (select options)

The Nominees

Best Picture
“American Sniper”
“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)”
“Boyhood”
“The Grand Budapest Hotel”
“The Imitation Game”
“Selma”
“The Theory of Everything”
“Whiplash”

Actor
Steve Carell in “Foxcatcher”
Bradley Cooper in “American Sniper”
Benedict Cumberbatch in “The Imitation Game”
Michael Keaton in “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)”
Eddie Redmayne in “The Theory of Everything”

Supporting Actor
Robert Duvall in “The Judge”
Ethan Hawke in “Boyhood”
Edward Norton in “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)”
Mark Ruffalo in “Foxcatcher”
J.K. Simmons in “Whiplash”

Actress
Marion Cotillard in “Two Days, One Night”
Felicity Jones in “The Theory of Everything”
Julianne Moore in “Still Alice”
Rosamund Pike in “Gone Girl”
Reese Witherspoon in “Wild”

Supporting Actress
Patricia Arquette in “Boyhood”
Laura Dern in “Wild”
Keira Knightley in “The Imitation Game”
Emma Stone in “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)”
Meryl Streep in “Into the Woods”

Animated Feature
“Big Hero 6” Don Hall, Chris Williams and Roy Conli
“The Boxtrolls” Anthony Stacchi, Graham Annable and Travis Knight
“How to Train Your Dragon 2” Dean DeBlois and Bonnie Arnold
“Song of the Sea” Tomm Moore and Paul Young
“The Tale of the Princess Kaguya” Isao Takahata and Yoshiaki Nishimura

Adapted Screenplay
“American Sniper” Written by Jason Hall
“The Imitation Game” Written by Graham Moore
“Inherent Vice” Written for the screen by Paul Thomas Anderson
“The Theory of Everything” Screenplay by Anthony McCarten
“Whiplash” Written by Damien Chazelle

Original Screenplay
“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)” Written by Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr. & Armando Bo
“Boyhood” Written by Richard Linklater
“Foxcatcher” Written by E. Max Frye and Dan Futterman
“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Screenplay by Wes Anderson; Story by Wes Anderson & Hugo Guinness
“Nightcrawler” Written by Dan Gilroy

Cinematography
“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)” Emmanuel Lubezki
“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Robert Yeoman
“Ida” Lukasz Zal and Ryszard Lenczewski
“Mr. Turner” Dick Pope
“Unbroken” Roger Deakins

Costume Design
“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Milena Canonero
“Inherent Vice” Mark Bridges
“Into the Woods” Colleen Atwood
“Maleficent” Anna B. Sheppard and Jane Clive
“Mr. Turner” Jacqueline Durran

Director
“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)” Alejandro G. Iñárritu
“Boyhood” Richard Linklater
“Foxcatcher” Bennett Miller
“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Wes Anderson
“The Imitation Game” Morten Tyldum

Documentary Feature
“CitizenFour” Laura Poitras, Mathilde Bonnefoy and Dirk Wilutzky
“Finding Vivian Maier” John Maloof and Charlie Siskel
“Last Days in Vietnam” Rory Kennedy and Keven McAlester
“The Salt of the Earth” Wim Wenders, Juliano Ribeiro Salgado and David Rosier
“Virunga” Orlando von Einsiedel and Joanna Natasegara

Documentary Short Subject
“Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1” Ellen Goosenberg Kent and Dana Perry
“Joanna” Aneta Kopacz
“Our Curse” Tomasz Sliwinski and Maciej Slesicki
“The Reaper (La Parka)” Gabriel Serra Arguello
“White Earth” J. Christian Jensen

Film Editing
“American Sniper” Joel Cox and Gary D. Roach
“Boyhood” Sandra Adair
“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Barney Pilling
“The Imitation Game” William Goldenberg
“Whiplash” Tom Cross

Foreign Language Film
“Ida” Poland
“Leviathan” Russia
“Tangerines” Estonia
“Timbuktu” Mauritania
“Wild Tales” Argentina

Makeup and Hairstyling
“Foxcatcher” Bill Corso and Dennis Liddiard
“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Frances Hannon and Mark Coulier
“Guardians of the Galaxy” Elizabeth Yianni-Georgiou and David White

Original Score
“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Alexandre Desplat
“The Imitation Game” Alexandre Desplat
“Interstellar” Hans Zimmer
“Mr. Turner” Gary Yershon
“The Theory of Everything” Jóhann Jóhannsson

Original Song
“Everything Is Awesome” from “The Lego Movie”
Music and Lyric by Shawn Patterson
“Glory” from “Selma”
Music and Lyric by John Stephens and Lonnie Lynn
“Grateful” from “Beyond the Lights”
Music and Lyric by Diane Warren
“I’m Not Gonna Miss You” from “Glen Campbell…I’ll Be Me”
Music and Lyric by Glen Campbell and Julian Raymond
“Lost Stars” from “Begin Again”
Music and Lyric by Gregg Alexander and Danielle Brisebois

Production Design
“The Grand Budapest Hotel” Production Design: Adam Stockhausen; Set Decoration: Anna Pinnock
“The Imitation Game” Production Design: Maria Djurkovic; Set Decoration: Tatiana Macdonald
“Interstellar” Production Design: Nathan Crowley; Set Decoration: Gary Fettis
“Into the Woods” Production Design: Dennis Gassner; Set Decoration: Anna Pinnock
“Mr. Turner” Production Design: Suzie Davies; Set Decoration: Charlotte Watts

Animated Short Film
“The Bigger Picture” Daisy Jacobs and Christopher Hees
“The Dam Keeper” Robert Kondo and Dice Tsutsumi
“Feast” Patrick Osborne and Kristina Reed
“Me and My Moulton” Torill Kove
“A Single Life” Joris Oprins

Live Action Short Film
“Aya” Oded Binnun and Mihal Brezis
“Boogaloo and Graham” Michael Lennox and Ronan Blaney
“Butter Lamp (La Lampe Au Beurre De Yak)” Hu Wei and Julien Féret
“Parvaneh” Talkhon Hamzavi and Stefan Eichenberger
“The Phone Call” Mat Kirkby and James Lucas

Sound Editing
“American Sniper” Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman
“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)” Martín Hernández and Aaron Glascock
“The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” Brent Burge and Jason Canovas
“Interstellar” Richard King
“Unbroken” Becky Sullivan and Andrew DeCristofaro

Sound Mixing
“American Sniper” John Reitz, Gregg Rudloff and Walt Martin
“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)” Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño and Thomas Varga
“Interstellar” Gary A. Rizzo, Gregg Landaker and Mark Weingarten
“Unbroken” Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño and David Lee
“Whiplash” Craig Mann, Ben Wilkins and Thomas Curley

Visual Effects
“Captain America: The Winter Soldier” Dan DeLeeuw, Russell Earl, Bryan Grill and Dan Sudick
“Dawn of the Planet of the Apes” Joe Letteri, Dan Lemmon, Daniel Barrett and Erik Winquist
“Guardians of the Galaxy” Stephane Ceretti, Nicolas Aithadi, Jonathan Fawkner and Paul Corbould
“Interstellar” Paul Franklin, Andrew Lockley, Ian Hunter and Scott Fisher
“X-Men: Days of Future Past” Richard Stammers, Lou Pecora, Tim Crosbie and Cameron Waldbauer

 

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Please remember to submit predictions in the comments section below and good luck!

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Out in Theaters: WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS

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From 1984 to 2006, Christopher Guest lampooned perplexing cultural phenomenons from dog shows to community theater. Guest was quick to caricature and mock but never did so in lieu of creating earnest characters. Rather, his work paired the easy-to-poke-fun-at ludicrousness of small town obsessions with the genuine earnestness of their salt-of-the-earth makeup. For every Meg and Hamilton Swan and their posh Weimaraner, there was a Harlan Pepper and his basset hound. Were Guest still making movies today, one might expect his signature mockumentary stylings to take on child beauty pageants or vocal protest groups. Or vampire flatmates.   Read More

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Out in Theaters: FIFTY SHADES OF GREY

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When I’m in the mood to do the pant’s dance, you won’t find me reaching for airport smut the likes of Fifty Shades of Grey. Rather, I prefer my sex with a little, uh, sex. I have been told the crop of humans that find this lewd drivel titillating are mostly repressed housewives and jittery virgins. Even then I find it hard to believe that the virginal palette is whetted by domestic abuse dressed up as BDSM and that housewives crave the kind of punishment on display in Fifty Shades of Grey. I imagine the more apt female fantasy involves turning the table and gaining the whip rather than submitting to an older, powerful, pain-obsessed billionaire. I’m willing to admit that maybe I just don’t get it but I have an inclination that I’m standing on the right side with this one.

Fifty Shades of Grey is fifty shades of shady. It’s porn for people who don’t watch porn – filled with nudity (you even snag a glimpse of shaft-top), playroom tools (Mr. Grey keeps his own personal, in-house red light district stocked to the brim but never gets around to using any of his actual instruments. When he does finally turn to his tool box of BDSM trinkets, he uses an ordinary belt? Really? But you have a wall STOCKED with sick canes?!), and waiting – but the film is improbably light on actual sex. And, more importantly, sex appeal. For a movie that’s two hours of contrived tension and nothing in the way of plot, the payoffs suffer creative erectile dysfunction en masse and fail to tick the arousal dial even slightly clockwise.

It’s no surprise to learn that the concept from Fifty Shades was explicitly born from “Twilight” fan fiction. Doing my best to know as little as possible about these kinds of things, I had no idea this was the case when I turned to my girlfriend during the screening and said, “This is just Twilight without the vampires”. After over two hours of Fifty Shades though, I was begging for Twilight. That should give you a sense of just how putrid a product Sam Taylor-Johnson‘s adaptation of  E.L. James‘ bestselling romance novel truly is. At least Twilight had a story. 

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Starring two nobodies that no-one cares about – Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan – Fifty Shades of Grey purports the telling of a peculiar love story but to call what unfolds a story is unfittingly generous. A story involves characters being forced to make choices and subsequently developing because of those choices, their relationships thickening as various circumstances swirl around them, pushing them hither and thither. Fifty Shades revolves around one choice – whether Ana will submit to the dominant Mr. Grey – and only by curtain time has our character made her choice. It’s 125-minutes of will-they-or-won’t-they BDSM-lite cinematic garbage and to spent any more time discussing the “plot” is a waste of resources, yours and mine both.  

Perhaps what is most off-putting about the whole affair is (my admittedly personal) perception that the sexual acts that take place are in no way, shape or form sexy. Their bumping uglies is either as awkward as losing your V-card or as painful to watch as sitting through Blue is the Warmest Color with your parents, and Taylor-Johnson has little to offer in terms of variety to spice things up. Surely she was handed a pile of narrative yuck so it’s hard to put the blame on her for trying to dress that yuck up as pretty as she could. In the midst of the second act, the movie appears as if it might switch gears and turn its engines to full steam ahead but just piddles out shortly thereafter and gets back to the will-they-won’t-they grind.

Not having read the source material, I genuinely wonder if this kind of novella smut could have ever made a good movie. The plain truth of the matter is Fifty Shades of Grey just isn’t a story. There’s no three act structure. There’s hardly characters so much as denuded cardboard cut-outs sticking themselves into each other, brewing with overt undertones of sexual violence.

Damian Grey’s misunderstanding of consensual sexual congress comes cloaked in contracts, a fact that should be an immediate red-flag for any self-respecting female. “Oh, I need to sign my rights away in order to bone you? Sounds legit!” When asked what she gets out of the deal, Grey purrs, “Me”. Fucking spare me.

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When Mr. Grey does let his demons out of the closet and sparks the engines on his lingering dungeon tools, his coital playbook is closer in form to The Rapes of Wrath and Ho-piercer than the soft femininity of Nicholas Spark’s The Throatbook. Even then – in the midst of an aggressive buttocks bludgeoning – I had trouble feeling anything towards the lip-biter on the receiving end because she asked for it AND had a carefully-outlined safe word prepared. If only there had been a safe word to make this movie stop.

Those sexually-repressed tittering housewives looking to get their jollies off in the biggest budget, softest soft-core porno ever, will find their faces fully flushed, hooting and hollering as the hot bodies on screen run their whips across bared flesh and eventually insert themselves in one another. Those who’ve gotten lost in a Borders to find themselves surrounded by self-same covers of disposable romantic novels – those with the bare-chested hunks and the impossibly helpless damsels dangling from them – and have run screaming, those poor few ought prepare for the absolute overdose of senseless smut that is Fifty Shades of Grey.

At the screening I attended, they distributed Fifty Shades fashioned blindfolds before the showing. You wouldn’t be worse off wearing it during the film.

D

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Out in Theaters: KINGSMAN: THE SECRET SERVICE

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Absurdist superspy farce that tips its top-hat to the JB’s (James Bond, Jason Bourne, Jack Bauer) while rampantly assaulting its way into the 21st century, Kingsman: The Secret Service is filmic reassurance that ridiculous fun can still be had in the theater. Over the past decade, the spy spoof (Austin Powers, Spies Like Us) has mostly gone the way of the Crocodile Dundee (unless we’re counting the underwhelming, geri-action Red films. Note: we shouldn’t be). Leave it to genre revivalist Matthew Vaughn to inject that tired and trying genus with the same eye-widening, pulse-quickening hit of adrenaline that he’d previously brought to the superhero and crime genre with Kick-Ass, X-Men: First Class and Layer Cake. Brimming with tactful homage and just enough youthful zest to make its balls-to-the-walls-ness truly one-of-a-kind, Kingsman is a shining, shimmering, splendid example of why we go to the movies.

In Vaughn’s murderous opus, the titular Kingsmen are a copacetic society of mustache-twirling gentleman/gun-totting acrobats renown for their secrecy, military effectiveness and hand-tailored suits. When world leaders want the job done right, they hire the Kingsman and if everything goes according to plan, you don’t hear peep about their success in the papers. One might assume from the cut of their jib that the Kingsmen are a group of pacifist nancies but Vaughn wastes little time conveying just how deadly his crew of well-dressed gentlemen is.

The stage is set with a fortress under siege, explosions tumbling block letter title cards to Dire Straight’s pounding “Money for Nothing″. Through a window, a masked agent informs an Arab man bolt-strapped to a chair that he will count down from ten and if he doesn’t have the information he needs in that time frame, ten will be the last thing he ever hears. There’s no deliberation, no hesitation, just counting. At five, he caps both the captive’s knees. There’s no breathy drawls, no pregnant pauses. This ain’t that kind of movie, bruv. Harry Hart, code name Galahad, counts down like a metronome.

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Caught unawares, Galahad is too late to stop the prisoner from pulling the pin on a stashed grenade, but finds himself and his fellow Kingsmen saved when a fellow super-agent in training throws himself on the explosive. Seventeen years later, Galahad feels indebted to his savior and, with a recently opened spot on the team, seeks out the promising-but-problematic son of the man who saved his life so many years ago, Gary ‘Eggsy’ Unwin (Taron Egerton). Eggsy is a kind-hearted ruffian, loyal to a fault and entangled with the wrong crew because of his mother’s not-so-cunning choice of gentlemen friends.

What transpires next involves a global climate change world domination plot, X-Men: First Class-style training montages, an ultra-violent blitzkrieg in a church that will assuredly go down as one of the year’s most memorable and visually-arresting sequences, Samuel L. Jackson playing a despotic billionaire with a lisp and a soft stomach for blood using the subterfuge of free data plans to “clean the slate” and loads of not-so-subtle James Bond references. If the above does not at least pique your interest, Kingsman is probably not the film for you.

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The film again pairs Vaughn with the authors of the comic book source material on which Kingsman is based; Mark Millar and Dave Gibbons (Kick-Ass). So again if you weren’t won over by the wacky, violent antics of Kick-Ass, this is likely not going to amuse you. And though shy a Hit-Girl, Kingsman has plenty of fun, memorable characters to play with, most notably Colin Firth as Galahad. Liam Neeson reinvented himself as an action hero in his twilight years so why not the King with the lisp? asks Vaughn. Firth makes the most of his pithy dialogue and provides an adroit aging action hero – a lovingly rendered throwback to the age of the smooth-talking British spy. Engaged in a carousel of gun shots and knifings, Firth shines in the action scenes too, even if it’s a fair gamble to say that most of his stunts are mostly the work of computer animations.

There are a few notable sequences that feature spotty CGI work (Eggsy’s mid-air, knife-tipped shoe stab makes him look like a plastic action figure) but in the center of Kingsman go-for-broke, give-em-all-ya-got approach to breathless bombast, it couldn’t matter less. The eyebrow-raising smarm and au courant irreverence of Vaughn’s rhapsodical vision just make for one hell of a show. Plus, there’s nothing quite like capping off your film with the prospect of slamming the back door of a princess. In the end, isn’t that the point of this whole spy venture anyways?

A-

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Out in Theaters: LEVIATHAN

by Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

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Leviathan is the work of an artist struggling with his heritage. Hailing from Novosibirsk, Russia, Andrey Zvyagintsev paints a Roman tragedy with Biblical implications into the modern seascape of Northern Russia’s Barents Sea and the result is staggering. Interpersonal power struggles and structural corruption pollute the scenery of Zvyagintsev’s vision presenting a modern man’s saga of David and Goliath as a simple mechanic faces down an nefarious but forceful mayor.

Russia’s official selection for the 87th Academy Award for Best Foreign Film (and a strong contender for the win) also took home the prize for Best Screenplay at last year’s Cannes Film Festival in large part due to the many layers of Leviathan’s searing and potent critique. Zvyagintsev’s pages cut deep emotional and intellectual slashes, destined to linger long after the curtains are drawn. Aided by Oleg Negin, Zvyagintsev has written a screenplay that reveals itself a piece at a time, delicately peeling back layers of a narrative onion until we’re at its nasty center and likely as tearful as after dicing an onion.

The plight of Zvyagintsev’s characters – each a flawed shade of simpleton doing their best to get by – give emotional weight to his cold, procedural dealings but it’s what he does with the idea of institutional extortion that really transforms Leviathan into a foreign epic worth remembering. After all, when is red tape an equal villain to a vodka-slugging Mafioso?

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Kolya (Alexeï Serebriakov) leads an earnest life with new wife Lilya (Elena Liadova) and son Roma (Sergueï Pokhodaev) as a part time auto-repair mechanic. Recently under one roof, Roma and Lilya have yet to come to an understanding about their newly forged stepson-stepmom relationship, forcing Koyla into an unwelcome focal point between two occasionally feuding forces. Pressure from corrupt major Vadim Shelevyat (Roman Madianov) only further yaws their domestic equilibrium and an all out land war erupts in the form of paperwork, blackmail and eventual murder.
 
Zvyagintsev’s curt and gloomy voice shines through in every scene, lending a pessimistic but pragmatic air to the overwhelming fogginess of his feature. Hope is a long shot but events never feel forcibly grim. Even when they are, there’s an understanding that Zvyagintsev courts his catastrophe with a fair potion of verisimilitude. No matter how black and bleak his world becomes, he approaches despondency from a position of hard-won credibility; credibility that can only be won first-hand from a lifetime of institutional injustice.

This begs the question: is Zvyagintsev’s film a condemnation of his country? According to his own statements, no. “I am deeply convinced that, whatever society each and every one of us lives in, we will all be faced one day with the following alternative: either live as a slave or live as a free man.” Zvyagintsev continues, “And if we naively think that there must be a kind of state power that can free us from that choice, we are seriously mistaken.” A chilly message blasting like a bullet from an even chillier film, and one seriously worthy of your attention. 

B

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Joe Swanberg, Jake Johnson and Rosemarie DeWitt Talk DIGGING FOR FIRE

by Posted in Uncategorized Tagged , , , ,

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Joe Swanberg‘s got a Joe Swanberg way of making movies. Working with a cast of hot shot, big name, creme da la creme names though means Swanberg being, well, a little less Swanberg-y. Instead of just “going for it” with Digging for Fire, Swanberg penned his most complete script yet. About ten pages worth of it. But such is the Swanberg way. Have I said Swanberg enough yet?

Although we had some minor issues with Digging for Fire at its Sundance premiere, the mumblecore maestro nonetheless managed to sink his independent teeth into some interesting territory with a stunning barrage of talent, including Jake Johnson, Rosemarie DeWitt, Brie Larson, Anna Kendrick, Ron Livingston, Sam Elliot, Orlando Bloom, Sam Rockwell, Melanie Lynskey, Chris Messina and a glorified cameo from Jenny Slate. Swanberg, Johnson and DeWitt took to the stage to explore the meaning of Digging for Fire and to illuminate the process of Swanberg filmmaking, from making kids cry to spontaneously hanging dong. Read More

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Weekly Review 71: ERASER, ELEPHANT, VELVET, SAMSARA, COHERENCE, JUDGE

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Weekly Review

Still recovering from Sundance meant a week spent out of the theater…for the most part. I did attend a screening of Jupiter Ascending (to disappointing result) and decided to skip Spongebob: Sponge Out of Water and Seventh Son because they were Spongebob: Sponge Out of Water and Seventh Son. Instead, I took it upon myself to launch into the work of David Lynch – a far superior choice – as well as dive into a wonderful French film called Girlhood (full review upon release). I also scooped up a few Netflix watches as well as The Judge from Redbox in order to judge the worth of Robert Duvall’s Oscar nomination. So onto Weekly Review.

ERASERHEAD (1977)

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It’s been a lifetime of waiting for Mr. David Lynch and me and with Eraserhead, I’ve finally uncovered the beautiful oddities and off-kilter surrealism of the celebrated auteur. Lynch’s jet-black Eraserhead is as much a character study as it is a cultural study, presenting nightmare-scapes rife with character tics and haunting black-and-white cinematography from Frederick Elmes that take subtle jabs at the heteronormativity of male-female relations. From the get-go, one is set off ease by Lynch’s uneasy depiction of sexuality as a living horror show, incomplete without a xenomorphic fetus spawn straight out of the freak show. Lynch’s unsettling portrait of unwanted fatherhood conjures deeply disquieting emotions – feelings expanded upon by Lynch’s soundtrack and’s unforgettable industrial sound design. But underneath its nasty facade, Eraserhead is also a deeply personal, almost intimate film and struggling with its own nihilistic, fatalist outlook that’s very much questioning its own sanity. Eraserhead is without a doubt a wholly fascinating film. (A)

THE ELEPHANT MAN (1980)

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Lynch’s second film is yet another home run, a step sideways into more straightforward filmmaking but one that doesn’t lose one ounce of the hypnotic and affecting power that Lynch harnessed in his debut. Featuring an absolutely knock-out performance from John Hurt as a deformed “circus freak” welcomed into society by a kindly Victorian surgeon (Anthony Hopkins), The Elephant Man is a powerhouse of a revisionist biopic. Lynch reigns in his surrealistic elements without covering them up entirely, allowing him to present a heartbreaking true story with just enough style and character nuance  to make it an engrossing and artistic experience. Coming to a close, Hurt’s performance and Lynch’s linchpin ending left my tear ducts wavering on the verge of breaking. (A-)

BLUE VELVET (1986)

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Very much a precursor to Twin Peaks, Blue Velvet hones Lynch’s fascination with the underbelly of suburbia and plants it in the midst of a sexually charged, off-the-books teenage investigation. Like the Hardy Boys uncovering a prostitution ring, Blue Velvet makes for some harrowing, surrealistic scene work and showcases a totally bonkers performance from Dennis Hopper as a oxygen-huffing sexual deviant. While Eraserhead and The Elephant Man set Lynch up as filmmaker shaping his iconoclastic image, Blue Velvet solidifies his role as a subversive, sexual, singular director in an arena lacking on all of the above. (B+)

SAMSARA (2011)

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Like Planet Earth without David Attenborough’s sultry British baritone, visual collage/wordless documentary Samsara took director Ron Frickle five years to complete. Crossing into 25 countries to observe patterns of human traffic spliced into views of picturesque world wonders, Samsara is a wholly unique offering not best suited for the impatient or the narrative dependent. As a singular film experience though, it’s a sometimes captivating look at the things we do and the places we live and its hallucinatory, high-speed portrait of Earth’s odd regularities is perfectly suitable for any stoney movie explorer. (B-)

COHERENCE (2013)

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A practically unheard of independent release, Coherence came to my attention per a film critic friend’s top ten list. Already anticipating something special, I found myself truly surprised by how immersive a cinematic experience Coherence is. This is the kind of sci-fi misadventure you watch will the lights pulled low and the doors deadlocked shut. It shakes your perception of reality and the boundaries of possibility, all with the minimal usage of multi-colored glow sticks. The story follows a group of eight friends at a dinner party who experience the effects of a meteor passing close overhead. As they content with the Schrodinger-ian notion that all is not necessarily what it seems, circumstances turn dreadfully eerie, begging questions about identity and continuity that would thoroughly benefit any entry level philosophy student. Compelling and creepy throughout, Coherence is a hidden gem demanding a cult status. (A-)

THE JUDGE (2014)

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A mild venture into dramatic territory for jabbermouth Robert Downey Jr., The Judge fills it quotient for melodrama early on but continues to poureth for that sacred saccharine drama-heavy cup. It’s a definitively average film with solid performances from RDJ and Robert Duvall (though I’m entirely unconvinced the latter’s performance is Oscar nomination worthy) that is set on hamstringing its way to the finish line, often at the expense of its own dramatic success. There are elements to The Judge to make it a worthwhile watch but they’re buried within a jello-mold of quizzical small-town whimsy that gives the whole thing an air of fluffy narrative negligence. It’s two hour and twenty minute run time makes it all the more difficult to endure and reccomend. (C)

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Out in Theaters: JUPITER ASCENDING

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The Wachowskis have been getting blank checks from Warner Bros since pulling off The Matrix in 1999 and with Jupiter Ascending have likely made their last boundless blockbuster. In 2012, Cloud Atlas turned a budget north of $100 million (though no official budget was ever released) into a pitiable $27 million domestic return, a figure almost as bad as the lowly $43.9 domestic box office cume from a $120 million investment on 2008’s Speed Racer. With their latest, they’re about to pull off their biggest magic trick yet, making a $175 budget disappear into thin air. To say the bloom is off the rose is a lie by degree. This movie’s gonna get crushed.

And rightly so. The Wachowskis have always skated by on their awesome sense of spectacle, often at the expense of a cohesive story, but Jupiter Ascending is not just their latest but their most egregious offender of complete and utter style over substance. In their defense, the style is often blindingly cool, if only for a brief moment. No scene better utilizes their captivating handle on big budget pageantry than a first act escape scene, one that reportedly took upwards of six months to film. The issue remains: why dump so much time and resource into a glorified stunt and so little into plot, character and general story cohesion? The answer is mindbogglingly unaddressed.

With Jupiter, one established Wachowski mainstay remains in their FX-driven manipulation of gravity. Bullet time has been replaced by gravity boots and Keanu Reeves’ wooden acting is subbed in by a frequently shirtless and rarely compelling Channing Tatum. Tatum plays the role of a warrior “splice” – a genetically engineered part-man, part-dog. He once had cyborg-enhanced wings but got them hacked off Maleficent-style when he bit the wrong rear end. Or was it ear end? His is a lackluster bit of back story that’s never explained or accounted for in a movie full of lackluster bits of back story that are never explained or accounted for. But such is Jupiter Ascending.

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Tatum’s effortlessly seductive (or so we’re told) Caine Wise is tasked with retrieving an Earthling woman at the center of a galactic land grab but in a guns-blazin’ fix gets mixed up and ends up with the wrong chick: a Russian toilet-scrubber by the name of January “I Like Dogs” Jones (Mila Kunis). The maid mix-up winds up COMPLETELY forgotten about as it turns out our heroine is actually an heiress of the highest order – the reincarnation of an interplanetary Tzar and somewhat recently deceased head of family to the Abrasax clan. With a hefty sum of a birthright (including, ya know, the Earth), the rest of the Abrasax fam-damily tries to win over the pea-brained January with various schemes and assaults of paperwork. You can almost hear Wachowski’s whine, “Bureaucracy’s a bitch.” After a few queues to get the ol’ inheritance files in order, many things explodes and Tatum’s dog-boy is called to the rescue – like Lassie with a six pack – more times than I’d like to report on.

In a pinch, Kunis’ Jupiter Jones is as compelling a female lead as Denise Richards’ Christmas Jones and just about as believable as Richards’ is as a rocket scientist. She’s a perma-damsel in distress, haplessly entering herself into laughably dumb situations and finding herself subsequently incapable of getting out without being rescued by her half-canine prince. It makes me wonder why the Wachowskis even bothered making a film with a female protagonist when they’re just going to make her so pathetic and pitiable. It’s an asinine step backwards in an industry that demands two forward. The gross lack of chemistry between Kunis and Tatum doesn’t help either, nor do the odd bestiality undertones.

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And just as Channing Tatum is a dog genetically spliced with a human, Jupiter Ascending is The Princess Bride genetically spliced with Star Fox, a bombastic video game of a space-set fairy tale that feels like it needed something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue in order for the studio to marry it to a budget so high. The result is a rip-off by assault; kitchen sink FX hogwash laid upon tired narrative tactics.

What is truly visionary in terms of set production, lavish costumery and creature design results in something totally and tonally defunct in the story department. As Eddie Redmayne greedily dismantles everything great about his work in The Theory of Everything as a necky, whispering, totally bratty villain, the Wachowskis make a mockery of their own legacy as storytellers. Even when they haven’t been firing on all cylinders, the sibling filmmakers have been able to provide dazzling, heady escapism. Jupiter Ascending though just makes you want to escape the theater.

D+

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