Tag: Movie Review

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Movie review: Lost in Paris is a slow-moving charmer

Lost in Paris is a French romantic comedy that may miss the mark with American audiences. Courtesy of Oscilloscope

Madcap francophone antics and lanky physical comedy are served aplenty in Lost in Paris, the new film from co-writers, co-directors, co-stars and spouses Dominique Abel and Fiona Gordon. Even without knowing that bit of information about the film’s co-creators, it is clear that the pair constructed the cinematography, set pieces, physical humor and punchlines around their specific strengths and appeal as performers, and it is their charm and enthusiasm that help their story navigate through its unfortunately frequent lulls.

Lost in Paris
NR, 83 minutes
Violet Crown Cinema

Your enjoyment of Lost in Paris will depend mostly on how amused you are by blithe, breezy, directionless silliness, as there is not much else going on here. The film tells the story of Fiona and Dom (their characters’ names), an unlikely pair that cross paths through a series of misunderstandings and unfortunate events. Fiona, who lives in a remote, snow-covered Canadian town, receives a letter from her aunt Martha (legendary French actress Emmanuelle Riva, who passed earlier this year), and goes to visit Martha, who is not altogether mentally sound, in Paris. Fiona arrives at her aunt’s apartment, only to find that Martha is missing. Fiona is then left to her own devices in the City of Lights, with her limited French and impossible quantity of luggage—she packed as though she planned on hiking in the Alps, external frame backpack and all. (Whether this is a joke specifically about Canadians or visitors to France in general is anyone’s guess, as are many of the gags that are silly but often totally pointless.)

Enter Dom, a homeless man who treats his life on the street as a game to find maximum class in minimal resources. When Fiona loses her luggage (don’t worry about why or how, the sole motivator for everything in this movie is antics), Dom is the one who finds it, but treats the money and clothing as his own. When Dom and Fiona finally meet, she is part charmed by his relentless dedication to being an impoverished libertine, then outraged when she realizes he has the belongings she lost. Begin the hatred-to-love story.

Gordon greatly impresses with her exceedingly well choreographed physical comedy. Fiona (the character) is never fully at ease, and even when she is sitting completely still there is an energetic restlessness. But when the scene calls for big gestures and lots of movement, Gordon delivers with the grace and thoughtfulness of a skilled dancer—even if it is just being blown back by a brisk Canadian wind. Similarly, Abel exudes the same irrepressible charm as Dom (the character), who always sees every setback as an opportunity to do something inspired, despite his socioeconomic standing. The French name of the film captures some of this dynamic—Paris Pieds Nus, which approximately translates to Barefoot Paris.

There is a lot to like in Lost in Paris, but as with any story that mostly consists of strung together gags, where every movement and line of dialogue is exaggerated even when it’s not supposed to be funny, finding something to love can be difficult. Though it is only a lean 83 minutes long, it seems that Gordon and Abel use up most of their ideas in the first 30 to 40 minutes. Perhaps there is a uniquely French dynamic to this sense of humor that is missed by an American, judging by the quantity of giggles and French whispers at the press screening. Your mileage with its brand of humor may vary, but it must be said that Lost in Paris is long on charm but short on raison d’être.

Playing this week  

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema
377 Merchant Walk Sq., 326-5056

Annabelle: Creation, Birth of the Dragon, Cars 3, Dunkirk, Good Time, Green Room, The Hitman’s Bodyguard, Ingrid Goes West, Logan Lucky

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213  

All Saints, Annabelle: Creation, The Big Sick, Birth of the Dragon, Cars 3, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Despicable Me 3, Dunkirk, The Emoji Movie, Girls Trip, The Glass Castle, Good Time, The Hitman’s Bodyguard, Ingrid Goes West, Leap!, Logan Lucky, Marvel’s Inhumans, The Nut Job: Nutty by Nature, Spider-man: Homecoming

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000  

An Inconvenient Sequel, The Big Sick, Dunkirk, The Glass Castle, Good Time, The Hitman’s Bodyguard, Ingrid Goes West, Logan Lucky, Tulip Fever, Wind River

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Arts

Annabelle: Creation is a great escape

Annabelle: Creation is a prequel to a spin-off series, and it might be the most fun you have at the movies this summer. Courtesy Warner Brothers

Who would have known a prequel series to a reboot of a movie based on a book based on a hoax would boast some of the most delightful big-budget horror filmmaking in recent memory?

The Annabelle series is one that should not work; kids, spooky dolls and overexplained mythologies are typically the undoing of any horror story, a genre that works best when shrouded in mystery so as to increase suspense. And yet here we are, two entries into a spin-off of James Wan’s The Conjuring films that have a life all their own, blazing a narrative and stylistic path wholly different from the fact-based life of Catholic paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. There is only one “historical” detail about this doll—that it supposedly terrorized its owner before Lorraine determined it was possessed by a spirit named Annabelle Higgins. Everything else in these films falls short of even that level of truth.

Annabelle: Creation
R, 109 minutes
Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, Regal Stonefield Stadium 14 & IMAX and Violet Crown Cinema

Perhaps that is precisely why Annabelle: Creation is the most fun that fans of classic horror can have at the cinema this summer. Because everything is a completely new invention on the part of the filmmakers, this series has become home for set designers, creature creators and more to let their imaginations run wild. There’s only so much you can do with a doll, but if there’s an enormous demon inhabiting that doll with the ability to manifest itself, now we’re talking. Then, the dumb-looking toy becomes a foreshadowing tool rather than the thing that is supposed to be scary in itself, giving director David F. Sandberg (Lights Out) more creative license than one might typically expect in a big-studio horror sequel.

The story finds the tiniest sliver left unexplained by the previous Annabelle—we learned how the doll was let loose on the world, but not how it was first crafted, then possessed. We meet small-town toymaker Samuel Mullins (Anthony LaPaglia) and his wife, Esther (Miranda Otto). Samuel creates the prototype of the Annabelle doll, and advance orders are through the roof. He had only made one, though, when the couple’s daughter is killed in a tragic accident.

Twelve years later, Samuel and Esther allow their home to be used by the church to house orphaned girls, including best friends Janice (Talitha Bateman) and Linda (Lulu Wilson). In the years between, Esther has suffered an accident that leaves her bedridden, while Samuel is extremely protective of his wife and his daughter’s memory—the latter’s room is locked and entry is forbidden. Soon, a voice from the room beckons to Janice, and terror ensues.

Though it runs a touch on the long side, there’s quite a bit to enjoy about Annabelle: Creation. The mood is suitably spooky, the visuals are slyly complex, and the cast of all ages is thoroughly charming with excellent chemistry. There are no huge scares as in The Conjuring (the less said about The Conjuring 2, the better), and in Annabelle, Sandberg masterfully plays with the audience’s instinct for anticipation. Even when the payoff isn’t terribly frightening, arriving there is always a ride.

Without giving anything away, at one point a character exclaims after witnessing something odd, “What was that?” The amazing reply: “Who cares. Run!” That is exactly the type of movie this is—self-aware but never self-parodying—and it’s well worth your time.

Playing this week

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema
377 Merchant Walk Sq., 326-5056

Atomic Blonde, The Dark Tower, Detroit, Dunkirk, Jumanji, Moonrise Kingdom, The Nut Job: Nutty by Nature

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213

Atomic Blonde, The Dark Tower, Despicable Me 3, Detroit, Dunkirk, The Emoji Movie, Girls Trip, The Glass Castle, Kidnap, The Nut Job: Nutty by Nature, Spider-man: Homecoming, Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, War for the Planet of the Apes

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000

Atomic Blonde, Baby Driver, The Big Sick, The Dark Tower, Dunkirk, Detroit, Girls Trip, The Glass Castle, Maudie, The Nut Job: Nutty by Nature, Shrek, Spider-man: Homecoming

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Arts

Spider-Man: Homecoming weaves a brand new thrill

Spider-Man: Homecoming delights faithful fans and brings new ones along in Marvel Cinematic Universe’s instant classic update. Photo courtesy Columbia Pictures

At first, the biggest surprise move made by Marvel was placing fan favorite (yet far-fetched) Thor on equal footing with the iconic Iron Man and Captain America in its Cinematic Universe. Now we accept the character’s presence as a given. Then the studio defied expectations by establishing phase two of its master plan with new-to-film properties such as Ant-Man, Doctor Strange and Guardians of the Galaxy, all of them smash hits at the box office and received well enough by critics. Then many began wondering when Marvel’s impossible winning streak would end (Iron Fist notwithstanding).

With Spider-Man: Homecoming, the MCU has pulled off its biggest surprise yet by not only bringing back one of its previously untouchable properties (Sony owns the film rights to the character), but delivering the best Spidey movie in more than a decade and bringing life to a story that risked exhausting its fanbase with excessive reboots. Homecoming is not only entertaining, funny and well-performed in its own right, but it will instantly win back the affections of fatigued fans with its exciting action, wry wit and genuine desire to do this story justice.

Spider-Man: Homecoming follows Peter Parker’s (Tom Holland) ordeals following his introduction in Captain America: Civil War. Initially recruited under Tony Stark’s tutelage, Parker spends his free time reporting to Stark about his daily activities; sometimes eventful, sometimes not. Mostly, he hops around New York City in a mechanized suit designed by Stark, attempting to do good by its residents and pining for the day he will be called to swing into battle. He refuses most social engagements or extracurricular activities, citing his mysterious internship. He does, after all, still need to navigate high school, and all the awkward crushes, social hierarchies and inherent tension of wanting to grow up as quickly as possible, no matter the cost.

Meanwhile, a contractor named Adrian Toomes (Michael Keaton), tasked with cleaning up the rubble left by the massive battle of 2012’s The Avengers, is irked by the newly formed U.S. Department of Damage Control pushing him out of the job before he or his employees have been fully paid. Before leaving the crash site, he accidentally makes off with alien technology that he learns to harness into powerful weaponry, leading him into a new life as an arms dealer with merchandise found nowhere else.

Both the hero and villain of Homecoming exist as a direct result of events in previous MCU movies, a first for a series that has so far relied on either preexisting yet concealed mythology or an individual rising to the task of history. As a result, Homecoming is as much about the characters’ roles in the world, not just their own individual arcs. Toomes has a working-class, stick-it-to-the-man vendetta. Parker, though recognized as the most brilliant mind in his class, tries not to disappoint those who believe in him, whether that person be Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), his aunt May (Marisa Tomei), his best friend, Ned (Jacob Balaton), or his all-time crush, Liz (Laura Harrier).

Holland brings a new level of teenage enthusiasm to the character (not to mention being the first actor to be believable in the age group). Keaton is fantastically bitter yet very human, and is not out to destroy the world so much as he is to get what he feels he is owed. The New York they inhabit is realistic, and director Jon Watts has a keen eye toward the diversity of modern-day Queens that feels both intentional and natural.

All of the cast, leading and supporting, is excellent. Each of the action sequences is unique and grows directly out of the events of the film itself. We feel the weight if Parker fails—and sometimes he does, or comes very close—and the shame and disappointment in these moments are perhaps the most dramatically significant of the MCU thus far. Spider-Man: Homecoming is far more than an obligatory restart, and if you are a newcomer to the series, it is a perfect place to start.

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Arts

Movie review: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 keeps fans happy

Chris Pratt stars in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 with an all-star cast of characters culled from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Courtesy of Marvel Studios

The A-hole Avengers are back in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, with just as much swagger and ragtag chemistry as ever. It’s easy to forget that the first film was a risk for the unstoppable Marvel Cinematic Universe, a massive introduction to myriad characters, planets, teams and sci-fi concepts for a franchise wedded to the gradual reveal. Adding to the surprise was the hiring of veteran writer-director filmmaker James Gunn, known for his transgressive work (Slither, Super, Tromeo & Juliet). The gamble worked, and Guardians of the Galaxy was one of the strongest entries in the MCU to date, packed with laughs and thrills and characters worth spending more time with.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
PG-13, 136 minutes
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX, Violet Crown Cinema

Vol. 2 finds the team uncontrollable as ever, yet the common goal of survival forces them to put aside their differences (as best they can) to defeat a threat facing the entire galaxy. We meet the Guardians as they battle to protect sacred and powerful batteries belonging to the Sovereign race from an interdimensional beast over the course of an opening credit sequence for the ages. If you recall, Groot ended the previous film as a tiny version of himself, affectionately known as Baby Groot. The team abandons its morale-raising sound system when the monster sneak attacks them, leaving it to Baby Groot to complete the setup, and he dances to charming easy listening, removing focus from the epic battle in the background. It’s the perfect intro, and an effective mirror of the first film’s credits.

When the battle ends, the Guardians must return the batteries to the Sovereign race, but Rocket’s (Bradley Cooper) sticky fingers get them all in trouble. They are rescued by a mysterious figure known as Ego (Kurt Russell)—claiming to be Peter Quill’s (Chris Pratt) father—and return to his planet to learn more about his origins, how he came to find Peter and the Guardians and what he intends to do now that they are his guests (or captives?).

Like the first film, Vol. 2 works best when it’s focused on the team dynamic as the anti-Avengers. They bicker, they rarely see eye-to-eye, yet it is always in their common interest to cooperate, a conflict that mirrors the better-known characters of the Universe. The cast is as great as ever, with new characters such as Mantis (Pom Klementieff) fitting right in. The dialogue is funny and smart, and it packs a surprisingly effective emotional punch in the end.

Despite its strengths, there are notable lags that threaten to pull the movie apart at times. After the initial reveal of Ego’s origins, the time spent on his planet is repetitive and not terribly entertaining or interesting. While that is happening, the sibling rivalry between Gamora (Zoe Saldana) and Nebula (Karen Gillan) is a nonstarter taking up a lot of screen time to go nowhere in particular. Though it does reflect somewhat the theme that family is about more than blood relation—Quill’s mixed relationships with biological parent Ego and father figure Yondu (Michael Rooker), Rocket’s raising of Baby Groot—for the entire middle of the film, several lead characters are doing little more than eating up screen time. If you liked the detour in Avengers: Age of Ultron focusing on Hawkeye’s family, you might enjoy the second act of Guardians Vol. 2, but they are similarly flawed.

Thankfully, the energy picks up for the finale and the characters get back to doing what they do best, and this might be the first MCU movie worth shedding a tear for. Even at its worst, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is totally watchable for fans, rabid and casual alike.

Playing this week

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213

Beauty and the Beast, Born in China, The Circle, Colossal, The Fate of the Furious, Get Out, Gifted, Going in Style, Sleight

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000

Beauty and the Beast, The Boss Baby, The Circle, Colossal, The Fate of the Furious, The Lost City of Z, Their Finest

Categories
Arts

Movie Review: Free Fire can’t get out of its own way

Ben Wheatley’s stylish Free Fire stars Armie Hammer, Brie Larson, Cillian Murphy, Sam Riley and Michael Smiley in an overlong gun battle. Photo courtesy of A24

Ben Wheatley’s obvious joy of filmmaking is contagious. It’s clear from everything he’s ever made that movement, color (or lack of it, as in A Field in England) and the extremes of human behavior compel him to create unique, kinetic films with an energy that bridges the gap between raw inspiration and technical perfectionism. Even when his work misses the mark, dramatically or emotionally, seeing a story through his eyes is always a worthwhile experience.

Free Fire
R, 85 minutes
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX, Violet Crown Cinema

Everything that makes Wheatley great to some and intolerable to others is on full display in Free Fire, a gritty shootout flick with a scaled-down story, taking place entirely in one location following a failed weapons sale. In 1970s Massachusetts, two IRA members—Chris (Cillian Murphy) and Frank (Michael Smiley)—attempt to buy automatic weapons from eccentric South African arms dealer Vernon (Sharlto Copley). Both sides are loosely assembled teams of mercenaries, family and other interested parties of varying levels of intelligence, skill and loyalty. A series of misunderstandings raises the tension of what ought to have been a routine sale, but when two henchmen with a very recent and totally unrelated fight cross paths, the guns emerge and it’s every man for himself.

The biggest strength of Free Fire—as with most of Wheatley’s films—is when dialogue and plot are not the focus, allowing his stylistic indulgences to take over with wild abandon. Several individual moments of Free Fire rank up there with the best set pieces in recent genre films, and the interplay between the actors is often hilarious, surprising or both. As only a few of these people have actual principles and all have different levels of interest in who lives and dies in this exchange, the outcomes are often unpredictable. Drug addict Stevo—one of the henchmen whose antics led to this mess—has been freebasing following the death of his friend and is no longer invested in surviving, so he shoots the loose containers of compressed air. The ensuing explosion levels the playing field, disorienting the experienced criminals, making them as helpless as the loose cannons and junkies. Moments like this are clever subversions of the gangster flick, where the cool and confident always win.

The biggest strength of Free Fire—as with most of Ben Wheatley’s films—is when dialogue and plot are not the focus, allowing his stylistic indulgences to take over with wild abandon.

On its own, an irrelevant plot is not the worst offense, especially in the world of genre. Films are more than live-action SparkNotes, after all, so if the narrative takes a backseat to make room for something spectacular or more artistically significant than people talking, all the better. However, doing this requires a balance; if the plot and characters are intended to be something the audience pays attention to, they need to be invested in the outcome.

This is where Free Fire loses its way, getting stuck in the mud of forgettable dialogue, redundant character-based gags and confusing sequences that look great but always have murky motivation. If you’re wondering why a character is doing something, you’re likely not focused on the artistry or positive aspects. Too often, Free Fire demands you remember a single character’s name in a large cast or tolerate the same kind of joke over and over again because one character is still behind the same cover and has nothing else to do. Brie Larson and Armie Hammer are in Free Fire, but I couldn’t find a way to describe their roles in this review because, although they’re great, what they actually do is simply not memorable, a problem that plagues many fine performances that get lost in the mix.

Wheatley is an exciting talent, and even his misfires are interesting. Unfortunately, despite some inspired moments and the director’s obvious enjoyment of the process of making it, Free Fire strains the patience of anyone except the most devoted Wheatley fans with a repetitive script and a distracting story that needed to be either at the forefront or completely out of the way.

Playing this week

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213

Beauty and the Beast, Born in China, The Boss Baby, The Fate of the Furious, Get Out, Gifted, Going in Style, Kong: Skull Island, Logan, The Promise, Power Rangers, Unforgettable

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000

Beauty and the Beast, The Boss Baby, The Fate of the Furious, Get Out, Gifted, Going in Style, The Lost City of Z, Your Name, The Zookeeper’s Wife

Categories
Arts

Movie review: Fast and Furious series gets better and better

The Fate of the Furious starring Vin Diesel outshines the hard-driving, logic-defying stunts of the series’ seven previous films. Courtesy Universal Pictures

After 16 years—old enough, as it turns out, to finally get its driver’s license—the Fast and Furious series finally has nothing left to prove. There’s no need to explain why good guys turn bad, how a particular bit of technology works or where an improvised ramp came from that Vin Diesel somehow knew would be just the right angle to leap over and save the day in the most spectacular way possible. The Fast and Furious movies have transcended the need to make cinematic sense in any conventionally definable way; they make their own rules, no matter how absurd, then break them before things get too stale.

The Fate of the Furious
PG-13, 136 minutes
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX,
Violet Crown Cinema

The Fate of the Furious—or F8, if you will—sees the team divided as Dominic Toretto (Diesel) goes rogue under the command of mysterious supercriminal Cipher (series newcomer Charlize Theron). We meet Toretto in Havana on his honeymoon, having just married Letty Ortiz (Michelle Rodriguez). An improbable situation, perhaps, but as F8 is the first American film to be shot in Cuba since before the Revolution, director F. Gary Gray (The Italian Job, Friday, Straight Outta Compton) squeezes every ounce of color and excitement out of the island nation’s legendary car culture in a breathtaking opening race. It is there that Cipher corners Toretto with some damning information, using it as leverage for him to do her bidding. Toretto then turns on the gang after stealing an EMP device, a blow so severe that they must now team up with former adversary Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham).

Along the way are some of the most spectacular action sequences of the past decade, or at least since the best entry in the series, Fast & Furious 6. A glorious prison break, a stampede of zombified cars with auto-drive remotely activated in New York, a race to and then away from a nuclear submarine in Russia’s far north—you may forget the plot halfway through, but Gray and company know that it’s just an excuse for insane set pieces and batty dialogue.

Take a moment to consider how far we’ve come from the plot of the original films which was essentially Point Break with cars instead of surfboards. The characters aren’t even the same people. Ludacris somehow became the world’s greatest computer genius, The Rock is evolving into a literal granite monster and Tyrese Gibson’s actual role on the team is unclear as he spends most of his lines bragging and/or complaining.

This is actually a vast improvement on the first movie; platitudes about the importance of family are a lot easier to swallow if you’re willing to blow up a world-ending missile/computer/whatever, than if you’re just driving really fast. The Fast and Furious franchise started as a bro-cop B movie and turned into a playground for the best stunts and action sequences in any modern flick not called Mad Max. We might groan at how silly it is, but we need more films like what the series has become, not where it started. Here’s hoping the franchise survives long enough to be the first American movie filmed in North Korea and they have to stop a space shuttle.

Playing this week

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213

Beauty and the Beast (and Sing-along), The Boss Baby, The Case for Christ, Get Out, Ghost in the Shell, Gifted, Going in Style, Logan, Power Rangers, Smurfs: The Lost Village

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000

Beauty and the Beast, The Boss Baby, Get Out, Gifted, Going in Style, Smurfs: The Lost Village, Your Name, The Zookeeper’s Wife

Categories
Arts

Movie review: The Zookeeper’s Wife struggles while doing the right thing

Jessica Chastain stars in The Zookeeper’s Wife, the true story of a couple who used the Warsaw Zoo to aid Jews in escaping the Holocaust. Courtesy of Focus Features

Between the invasion of Poland in 1939 and the end of World War II, Antonina and Jan Zabinski used the Warsaw Zoo as a staging ground for hiding and evacuating Jews escaping Nazi persecution. Their story is a reminder that bravery takes many forms; sometimes it is picking up a weapon and confronting evil head-on —as Jan did in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944 —and other times it’s a long game, gaining the system’s trust in order to do the right thing. For their deeds, the Zabinskis earned the designation of Righteous Among the Nations, a title bestowed on non-Jews who rescued Jews during the atrocity of the Holocaust.

The Zookeeper’s Wife
PG-13, 124 minutes
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX, Violet Crown Cinema

Niki Caro’s film The Zookeeper’s Wife tells the story of their efforts, beginning with the destruction of their zoo and the formation of their scheme under the nose of Nazi zoologist Lutz Heck (Daniel Brühl). Jessica Chastain and Johan Heldenbergh play the Zabinskis with determination and poise. Their decision to resist is a given; they do not need to be convinced of how awful the occupation is, they do not need to be persecuted to have empathy for those who are. They simply do the right thing from the start for its own sake, beginning with hiding one person in a spare room before creating an elaborate system of tunnels, and using assumed identities and forged papers.

Many of the zoo’s animals were killed by bombs in the initial invasion, while the rest were taken by Heck to Berlin. Heck’s proposal to do so appeared magnanimous at first—save the choice stock, preserve the Zabinski legacy—but he soon arrives wearing full Nazi regalia and shooting all undesirable creatures. Antonina and Jan then create a plan to use the zoo grounds as a pig farm to feed the war effort, feeding the livestock with trash gathered from the Warsaw ghetto. This gains them Heck’s trust, enabling them to smuggle Jews in their trucks and hide them in the basement. Maintaining the ruse undetected proves tricky, requiring careful planning and quick thinking, yet their determination never wavers.

The Zabinski story is a remarkable one that is worth telling, and there are moments of The Zookeeper’s Wife that are tremendously effective in capturing the terror of life under occupation. Everyday life in the Warsaw ghetto is as important to the plot as the events on the zoo grounds, leading to a gripping depiction of the famous 1944 uprising, a historical event that screams for more depiction in film.

However, Caro often falls into the same traps that weigh down many World War II-era films, in that there is little motivating the action beyond good people doing good things and bad people being mean. There are few groups in history as unambiguously evil as the Nazis, but it is rather cheap to suggest that their actions are rooted in negative character traits that have nothing to do with ideology. Though Brühl is great in the role, there is almost nothing driving Heck’s wickedness except a lust for Antonina and a disrespectful attitude toward animals, valuing their breeding capabilities over their rights as living beings—a metaphor, perhaps, for the Nazi treatment of Jews, but an awkward one. (Further, it is a little confusing what his rank would be that he both leads raids and animal husbandry programs.)

When the film focused on how doing the right thing is a struggle, The Zookeeper’s Wife hits its stride as it skillfully depicts sensitive subjects. Yet last year, Poland—the setting for the film—released Demon, perhaps the best film to address the legacy of the Holocaust in recent memory. As extremists grow more confident and powerful here at home, American films desperately need to develop a more sophisticated view of what exactly fascism was and how to confront it.

Playing this week

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213

Beauty and the Beast, The Boss Baby, Chips, Get Out, Ghost in the Shell, Kong: Skull Island, The Lego Batman Movie, Logan, Power Rangers, The Shack, T2: Trainspotting

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000

Beauty and the Beast, The Boss Baby, Get Out, Ghost in the Shell, The Last Word, Life, Logan, Power Rangers

Categories
Arts

Movie review: Life lacks in human connection and atmosphere

Sci-fi thriller Life stars Ryan Reynolds and Jake Gyllenhaal in a lackluster alien-turns-angry trope. Courtesy Sony Pictures

Space. A previously unknown life form that is both beautiful and completely unknowable. Man’s double-edged quest to understand and dominate over all existence. Life really, really should have worked, and the extent to which it fails makes it the biggest waste of potential so far of 2017, if not the single worst film overall.

Life tells the story of an international team orbiting the Earth’s atmosphere, on a mission to analyze soil samples collected from Mars. The team includes representatives from Russia, Japan, Great Britain and the United States. Hugh Derry (Ariyon Bakare) successfully revives a microscopic organism found in the samples, the first confirmed observation of extraterrestrial life. The team is ecstatic, but Derry has become obsessed to the point of disregarding routine safety procedures in order to observe the specimen more closely. The alien is named Calvin after students of Calvin Coolidge High (really), but a puzzling period of hibernation following a security lapse leads them to believe Calvin is dead. They try to wake him up through a mild electric shock, and he starts acting violently toward the crew, though it is unclear if he is acting out of instinct or emotion.

Life
R, 103 minutes
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX, Violet Crown Cinema

Notice that the above description did not include the three biggest stars of Life: Jake Gyllenhaal, Rebecca Ferguson and Ryan Reynolds. This is because every single person in this movie is disposable. The question is never who is going to die next. It’s why we’re supposed to care. The plot is not entirely dissimilar from great films like Ridley Scott’s Alien that have tackled the same questions of isolation and hubris, but Scott showed us the human side of that crew so we understood their fear, even if we momentarily forgot their name or role on the ship. In Life, director Daniel Espinosa barely shows us a single moment of human connection before someone dies—and then he makes us watch the survivors cry over someone we never cared about.

That said, humans can be completely cookie-cutter in otherwise solid genre films. What matters most is atmosphere and creature design—which are two more areas Life blows it. The station is geometrically baffling, leading to more than a few puzzling moments. Rooms have no personality—fitting, perhaps, for a scientific vessel, but totally uninteresting artistically or dramatically. Prepare to have no idea what is happening when key characters meet their fate.

In Life, director Daniel Espinosa barely shows us a single moment of human connection before someone dies, then makes us watch the survivors cry over someone we never cared about.

This brings us to Calvin himself. To stretch the Alien comparison a bit further, that xenomorph was based on real fears and anxieties, namely violation of space and penetration. Everything the creature did grew out of these: The facehuggers planted eggs through a person’s mouth, the eggs hatched and burst through the ribcage, and the final form was an overgrown phallus, creeping unseen until it’s too late. Perhaps there are narrative shortcomings in Alien, but that alone is what made it a classic.

Calvin, meanwhile, looks like an octopus with a flower for a head, more reminiscent of Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors than any nightmare. There are a few references to the nature of life being to destroy and consume, which perhaps informed the hybrid creature design, but they come far too late to save this Life.

Playing this week

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213

The Belko Experiment, Beauty and the Beast, Chips, Get Out, Hidden Figures, Kong: Skull Island, The Lego Batman Movie, Logan, Power Rangers, The Shack

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000

Beauty and the Beast, Get Out, Kong: Skull Island, The Last Word, Logan, Power Rangers

Categories
Arts

Movie Review: Kong: Skull Island stays afloat through visual effects

The real star of Kong: Skull Island is Kong himself, whose emotive performance and immense scars show a lifetime of battle. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

If you thought the only thing missing from Apocalypse Now was literal monsters, not just metaphorical ones, Kong: Skull Island is the movie you’ve been waiting for. To everyone else, it’s a flick with neat effects and lots of great creature design, spectacular visuals and a bevy of utterly forgettable, interchangeable characters who die with hilarious and inconsequential frequency. While there are clearly many external forces dictating what had to be included for the purposes of building Legendary Entertainment’s MonsterVerse, director Jordan Vogt-Roberts knows exactly what elements of this film work and what don’t, allowing the perfunctory moments to pass by unobtrusively to make more room for the excellent set pieces.

Kong: Skull Island
PG-13, 118 minutes
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX

Kong: Skull Island tells the story of an expedition to the titular location in the closing days of the Vietnam War—a fact you’ll never forget thanks to the excessive amount of period-appropriate licensed music. This is the last uncharted land mass on Earth, we are told, and it is mysteriously surrounded by a permanent storm to prevent anything from entering or leaving. The team is organized by Bill Randa (John Goodman) and Houston Brooks (Corey Hawkins), who represent the mysterious scientific organization Monarch. They recruit U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Preston Packard (Samuel L. Jackson), former British SAS Captain James Conrad (Tom Hiddleston), battlefield photographer Mason Weaver (Brie Larson) and a whole lot of other people who either die immediately or have basically no bearing on anything that happens. Upon arrival, the team begins dropping “seismic charges,” which the island’s guardian Kong does not appreciate, so he takes out the helicopters one by one.

From here, the team splits in two: those who follow Colonel Packard in his quest for revenge against Kong, and those who encounter Skull Island’s human population, which views the giant ape as a protector. It is among the natives that they encounter Hank Marlow (John C. Reilly), a pilot who has been marooned on the island since World War II. After regrouping, the two groups attempt unity in order to make the planned rendezvous point and go home, but Packard will not be deterred.

It’s quite a complicated plot for a monster movie about a big ape, and the re-creation of Vietnam-era images and visual references are well studied but empty when it comes to meaning or metaphor. Thankfully, these moments are briskly executed so the real star can shine: Kong himself, as well as the many strange and wonderful creatures that inhabit Skull Island. Some are evil, some are benign, but all are gorgeous. There is real emotion in Kong’s eyes at all times, and his immense scars show a lifetime of battle. This may be the best “performance” given by an entirely digital presence on the screen, and is worth the price of admission alone (along with Reilly’s terrific blend of humor and pathos). There are some homages to the original film, but never to the point of obnoxious winking, self-deflation or irony.

That said, it is difficult to watch Kong: Skull Island without feeling the drag of franchise-mandated characters and side plots—and post-credit sequences that reveal no new information. When was the last time you were ever truly stunned by a post-credits sequence? It wasn’t so long ago that they were cleverly used by studios as a sly means to reward the faithful and promote the future of a franchise while not sullying the integrity of a stand-alone movie. Now they exist as confirmation of already revealed news, fixes for the factoid-addicted fandom that cares more about having its loyalty rewarded than whether the movies are any good. Kong: Skull Island is far better than it had any right to be and knows where its strengths lie, but the idea of further installments and yet another “cinematic universe” with Godzilla is too exhausting to be worth it.

Playing this week

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213

Before I Fall, Fifty Shades Darker, Fist Fight, Get Out, Hidden Figures, John Wick: Chapter 2, La La Land (plus Sing-along), The Lego Batman Movie, Logan, Moonlight, The Shack, Table 19

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000

A United Kingdom, Fifty Shades Darker, Get Out, Hidden Figures, I Am Not Your Negro, La La Land, The Lego Batman Movie, Logan

Categories
Arts

Chinese filmmakers eye the long game with The Great Wall

The Great Wall (starring Matt Damon) may not be great, but it is at least a fascinating milestone in the shift of economic power in the movie world. Courtesy Universal Pictures

Zhang Yimou’s The Great Wall doesn’t really need to be “reviewed” in the traditional sense. It’s a dumb movie about monsters invading medieval China and the brazenly anachronistic army tasked with staving it off, like someone fell asleep during The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and attempted to recreate the Battle of Helm’s Deep based only on the subsequent dreams. Nothing else really needs to be said about the substance of it, other than acknowledging the decent creature design and fabulous costumes.

The Great Wall
PG-13, 120 minutes
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX, Violet Crown Cinema

No, what The Great Wall needs is a graduate thesis titled “Cinematic Postnationalism in an Era of Political Isolationism.” See, despite the initial trepidation around Matt Damon’s starring role, concerns about whitewashing do not even begin to scratch the surface of what’s going on here; The Great Wall is the Chinese film industry asserting itself as a producer of blockbusters, not just a consumer. For those unfamiliar with the modern movie biz, when it comes to big-budget epics, no one really has his eye on the American box office anymore, as the real target is China, India and Russia. This is a large part of why franchises no one seems to care about keep getting sequels, like Mission: Impossible and the upcoming Warcraft sequel, because moviegoers in China demand it.

The same gears are clearly turning in the minds behind The Great Wall, a movie that is going to be a smash hit whether anyone stateside sees it or not. And most likely, no one will. It’s a film made strictly for Chinese audiences that enjoy Western films, not vice versa. Damon plays a wandering mercenary named William, who has come east with his partner in crime, Tovar (Pedro Pascal), in search of the mythic black powder. When night falls, they are attacked by an unseen beast that kills all but William and Tovar, leaving a severed hand as the only indication of its monstrous nature. The pair bring the hand to a gate of the legendary Great Wall, which is guarded by the massive Nameless Order. The two are taken prisoners, but when the wall is attacked by a horde of hideous creatures known as the Tao Tie, they prove themselves in battle and are accepted by their former captors.

From here, William forms a bond with Commander Lin (Jing Tian), a brave warrior who has dedicated her life to preventing the monsters from the mountain from reaching the capital. The Tao Tie do nothing but consume and leave devastation in their wake—a somewhat obvious metaphor for unchecked capitalism, but it’s not as though American propaganda is any more subtle. William begins to regret his initial intent and joins the battle to defeat the Tao Tie.

William is not a white savior—quite the opposite. His function is to arrive and be amazed by the unity and values of his host nation before adopting them as his own, then leave with nothing but the wisdom he gained in the fight. Look at this film from the perspective of a Chinese audience: The cast is filled with pop stars, teen idols and action heroes, and along comes one of the biggest celebrities in the world who is in awe of them all. It is possible that one of the six writers (an incredible list that includes Tony Gilroy, Max Brooks, Edward Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz) intended him to be a Dances with Wolves-style appropriator, but that is nowhere to be found in the final product.

Director Zhang Yimou is one of the most amazing stylists working today, with a rich appreciation for the intersection of visual flair and philosophical depth as seen in Hero and House of Flying Daggers, and his sense of style is not lost here, with the spectacular outfits and choreographed battle scenes. Making a brainless action movie that rests almost entirely on star power might turn some people off, but is that any worse than Kenneth Branagh making Marvel movies?

Playing this week

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213

Arrival, A Cure for Wellness, Disney’s Newsies: The Broadway Musical!, A Dog’s Purpose, Fences, Fifty Shades Darker, Fist Fight, Hidden Figures, John Wick: Chapter 2, La La Land, The Lego Batman Movie, Rings, Split

Violet Crown Cinema
200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000

2017 Oscar Nominated Shorts, Fifty Shades Darker, Fist Fight, Hidden Figures, Jackie, John Wicks: Chapter 2, La La Land, The Lego Batman Movie, Paterson, Strike A Pose