Screen Rant » 1 star movies

Pandorum Review

Kofi Outlaw — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 22:45:35 +0000

Short Version: Pandorum is a mess of a movie that squanders a lot of potential.

Screen Rant Reviews Pandorum

Movies often fail for varying reasons; sometimes the fatal flaw is in the script, sometimes the performances of the actors and sometimes because of the filmmaker’s total ineptness. Pandorum suffers from the latter case: director Christian Alvart has stitched together a patchwork of scenes that never really cohere into an actual movie. It’s a real tragedy, considering the potential this film had.

Pandorum opens as Corporal Bower (Ben Foster) wakes from cryogenic sleep aboard the starship Elysium (clever pun), whose mission is to ferry the last remnants of humanity to a new home planet. Bower wakes with all of his technical memory intact – how to operate the ship’s equipment, his military protocol – but his personal memories (events leading up to waking, such as where he is and how he got there) are all foggy. The room he wakes up in is sealed shut, and the ship’s power supply is in disarray due to a reactor malfunction. Soon after Bower gets on his feet, another cryo-pod pops open and Lieutenant Payton (Dennis Quaid) joins party.

As the slimmer man, Bower heads up into the ventilation ducts bound for the ship’s reactor, which he seems to recall being assigned to operate and fix. With Payton guiding him via comm link, Bower enters the bowels of the ship and steps right into a living nightmare.

Monsters have taken over the ship (as if you didn’t already know). They are a species of pale white, inhumanly fast and strong warrior-killers, who spend their days hunting down the remaining humans and feasting on their bodies. After narrowly escaping the creatures, Bower meets a pretty ecologist-turned-survival expert named Nadia (Antje Traue) and a hunter-warrior named Manh (martial arts star Cung Le). After a violent introduction, the three humans band together to venture into the heart of the ship and reset the reactor before the vessel loses all power and the last of humanity dies in space.

While the field team is at work, Payton is running point from the cryo-chamber room and is eventually joined by Corporal Gallo (Cam Gigandet), who claims to be one of three crew members awake for the Elysium’s initial lift-off from Earth. According to Gallo, his crewmates became afflicted with the space madness known as “pandorum,” forcing Gallo to kill them all. The corporal tells Payton that Bower might also be suffering from pandorum, since he ventured out on a veritable suicide mission; for the good of the ship, Payton should seize control of the situation.

What unfolds from there is as predictable as your first guess and is even less exciting than you imagine. Like I said, this film is a patchwork of scenes that never feel connected, set in the framework of a film that never can decide which story to tell. Is the focus Bower and Payton’s mysterious pasts? Is it a survival story? Is it a psychological thriller about space madness (what the hell is “pandorum,” exactly)? And where did those creatures come from and what are they after? That last question does get some explanation (I think), but again, even the story behind the story is such a mess that I’m not quite clear what the explanation was. The shots and action sequences are often so incoherent that you’ll lose track of where YOU are or what is going on, just the characters themselves. It’s not a favorable position to put a movie audience in.

I will take a minute to absolve the stars of Pandorum of blame, since I don’t believe the fatal fault lies with them. Everybody on screen looks lost and/or confused most of the time (see pic above), and rightly so: most of the scenes look like they were shot with the director sitting up on a high chair yelling “Do This! Ok… Now do that!” in random increments over a megaphone while the actors just tried to keep up. There is no character development (we’re supposed to believe that these characters’ choices are their choices just because the film says they are), and worst of all, I didn’t like, dislike or connect in any way to even one character in this film, and when you can remain that indifferent for an hour and a half…

Instead of depth and meaning we get a mindless progression – Event A, followed by Event B, followed by Event C. Whatever happens, happens, with absolutely no regard for whether or not the occurrences are consistent with the characters, or whether or not they make any narrative sense. It’s storytelling in the dark. Poor Dennis Quaid suffers the brunt of it – his entire role is set in the cryo-room, engaged in increasingly ridiculous back-and-forths with Gigandet. God bless him – I would have shot myself.

As for the monsters – which Pandorum kept veiled in secrecy during the ad campaigns – they’re badass, but unfortunately just as hollow and flimsy as everything else in this movie. And oh man, by the time you get to the “twist ending” you’ll want to hunt down the filmmakers, bop them on the head with a rolled up newspaper and say, “Bad dog! No! No!”

In the end, there is nothing redeeming about this movie. For the first twenty minutes you’ll be handed the promise of a freaky sci-fi thriller (thank Foster, as usual, for making a lot out of a little), but after that, if you hang around for the rest of Pandorum, you too will be forced to watch that promise denigrate into cosmic slop.

Welcome to the first real disappointment of the fall 2009 movie season.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Jennifer’s Body Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 05:24:58 +0000

Short Version: Overall Jennifer’s Body is just a boring movie – punctuated by occasional humor and fewer scares.

Screen Rant reviews Jennifer’s Body

Let’s just get this right out of the way: Megan Fox does not appear naked in Jennifer’s Body.

So if that’s the main reason you want to go see this film, you’re out of luck. If the other reason you want to see the film is for the girl/girl makeout scene – there is a very brief scene of a kiss between Megan and Amanda Seyfried, and it’s shot in such an extreme close-up that for all I know they might have had “stunt doubles” do it.

Now that we have that out of the way, on to the review.

Megan Fox plays Jennifer, the uber-hot, like, totally popular babe at high school that girls envy and boys want desperately. She’s a typical movie hot-chick high school cheerleader, caring more about parties, guys and what she looks like than things like schoolwork. Her long-time best friend is Needy Lesnicky (played by Amanda Seyfried, obvious pretty-girl-hiding-behind-glasses-bad-hair-and-bad-clothes). It’s obvious quite early on that their friendship is not exactly balanced, with Needy cowtowing to Jennifer in every way, but happy to do it due to a misplaced sense of loyalty and the fact that being so UNpopular she of course gets a thrill out of being the popular girl’s best friend.

Jennifer being Jennifer, she gets into groupie mode over the lead singer of a visiting band (played by Adam Brody). She persuades Needy to ditch her “good guy” boyfriend Chip (Johnny Simmons) and to go with her to the only bar in town to watch the band play. By the end of the evening, Jennifer ends up taking off with the boys in the band, who are obviously not exactly Boy Scouts. Later that evening Jennifer turns up bruised and bloody at Needy’s house, acting strange, creepy and threatening.

A bloody Megan Fox in "Jennifer's Body"

Soon thereafter a series of grisly murders invade the small, usually quiet town, and Needy starts putting two and two together. Of course her boyfriend won’t believe her when she tries to tell him what’s going on, our main characters end up in grave danger, etc., etc.

Jennifer’s Body was written by Diablo Cody, the woman who wrote the critically acclaimed Juno – so despite the fact that this film was starring Megan Fox, people were hoping for something worthwhile. However where the dialog in Juno flowed easily and naturally, and the wit came easy, here it all seems forced and you get the sense that they’re just trying too hard to be hip – and failing.

You want an example? How about “They’re agents of Satan… with cool haircuts.”

Oh, hang on a sec – I’ve got to step away from the keyboard due to the non-stop laughter that won’t let me type.

The movie actually starts to get interesting once the creature appears and the killing starts – actually that’s when it starts to get at least a bit funny. There were maybe two or three times that I laughed during the entire film. So OK, but is it scary, then? No, not really. Right at the start of the film there is the weakest “jump scare” I have ever seen in a film, and while there are maybe a couple of horror movie-worthy scenes, overall it doesn’t work on that level either. I will admit that the smile that Megan Fox gave when she first showed up covered in blood DID creep me the hell out.

There were a few laughs here and there, one early on when Jennifer heads off in the band van and one funny bit during an awkward teenage sex scene (no, it doesn’t involve Fox, sorry).

And then there’s Megan Fox. For the guys, this still from the film shows more of her than you’ll see in the entire movie, so you can just get your fill right here:

Frankly, based on what I’ve read about Fox and from her in the form of interviews, it seemed to me that the character she was playing was pretty close to just being herself – not much of a stretch. The Jennifer character seemed so close to reports of those who’ve worked with Fox, and based on the sort of statements she herself has made – I just couldn’t buy into the character. I just saw Megan being Megan (except of course for the whole fangs and eating entrails thing).

Highlights? J.K. Simmons appears here and once again plays a slightly off-center supporting character. Love the man’s delivery of even the most basic lines of dialog. Amanda Seyfried did a nice job as the nerdy protagonist, and Johnny Simmons was convincingly sincere. And Adam Brody did some scenery chewing in his brief scenes that made it look like he was having fun with the role.

As Annalee Newitz of io9.com pointed out, Jennifer’s Body is about the horror of abusive female friendships instead of the more common female sexuality angle – and it’s commendable that writer Diablo Cody and director Karyn Kusama wanted to try something different… it’s too bad that it just doesn’t work.

But hey if you just can’t get enough of Megan Fox on the big screen and acting sexy, supposedly hip dialog, awkward teenage sex, a bit of gore and mild scares, then maybe this movie’s for you. Me? I was bored and for a 102 minute movie it felt WAY longer.

Oh, if you do go, stay through the credits for some “closure.”

You Might Also Be Interested In:

The Final Destination Review

Paul Young — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 23:07:31 +0000

Short Version: The Final Destination is poorly written, poorly executed, and poorly acted -but still managed to “kill” at the box office on its opening weekend.

Screen Rant’s Paul Young reviews Final Destination

While Vic (Screen Rant head honcho) gets to review all the good movies like Inglourious Basterds, District 9 and even G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra, I’m stuck watching I volunteer to watch the movies no one else wants to see. So, when I walked into The Final Destination tonight firmly grasping the my flimsy short straw, I fully expected the worst, planned for no better than OK and hoped for the best.

Guess which one I got?

It’s mostly my fault I suppose. I had to choose wisely between either The Final Destination or Halloween 2, which is sort of like choosing wisely between a kid to hitting me in the crotch with either a baseball bat or a golf club. But like a good reviewer, I cinched up my petticoat and walked blindly into the awaiting danger, screaming at that kid with the blunt ball-busting instrument: “COME ON KID! GIVE ME YOUR BEST SHOT! I CAN TAKE IT!”

Well, it would seem that I can’t take it – and after 80 grueling, boring, predictable minutes, I hobbled out of the theater with a bag of ice strapped to my crotch as the kid ridiculed me, pointing and laughing at my intense displeasure. And much like my flimsy straw, The Final Destination was just as flimsy in plot, characters, FX and ending.

The Final Destination, which is the official title because supposedly “The” implies it’s the last of the quadrilogy, fails with just about every task it sets out to accomplish. I’ll start with the 3D aspect of the film. I’m so tired of the worn out, generic, feeble (NAY, pathetic) attempts of directors today to use 3D technology. Every 3D scene in the movie is predictable and most, if not all, were done in very bad CGI (not G.I. Joe-bad mind, you but still pretty sad). They start out decent enough, with race cars driving into your face but then quickly move to the old stand-by “lookout here comes a flying object towards you so duck like you believe something is actually leaving the screen and going to hit you in the face” routine. In fact, after the race scene, most of the 3D “effects” (and I use that term for lack of a better descriptive word) are objects flying at our faces.

They even throw in the obligatory “CGI champagne cork popping up in the air” scene – and it was about that time I audibly groaned. At this point, I wondered why they didn’t just have someone stand in front of the camera for twenty minutes pushing a stick in and out at the audience making a “Ohhhhhh” sound to get the most of their 3D budget. (Kid-1 Paul -0)

I really did enjoy the first two Final Destination films, the third wasn’t so hot, but each of them had the same writer so I figured if he was back for this one then at least the story would be decent. Only time I have ever been more wrong was Spring Break in Key West at a club called Diva’s with a “girl” named Adam.

Eric Bress and Jeffery Reddick are on full cruise control here, giving us characters we absolutely care nothing about, therefore have no vested interest in whether they live or die. The only actor worth mentioning is Mykelti Williamson as the security guard. He is given the funniest scene of the film and some of the best lines but without giving anything away, let’s just say that Mykelti and L.L. Cool J have nothing in common.

For reasons that escaped me, the writers decided to throw in a hefty serving of stereotyping. We’re given two different types of rednecks at the race track, the obnoxious white trash dirt bag with a cute girl and the racist hell-bent on burning a cross in the front yard of the security guard on whom he blames his wife’s death; and to round out the southern stereotype, both rednecks work in the automotive industry, one is a custom car mechanic and the other drives a tow truck and drinks beer.

The girls in the film are drab and unimportant and for the most part written as overly emotional and illogical. I would have preferred to just see them offed early on and been done with it; and the “hero,” if you will, didn’t grab my attention once. Then we get the obnoxious, skirt chasing, frat guy who cares more about getting laid than anything or anyone else around him. His scene at the pool has a healthy dose of female nudity so parents beware if you still for some bizarre reason (too cheap to pop for a babysitter?) consider bringing your young kids to this movie.

*TANGENT* Folks I am by no means telling you how to be parents but I promise you this is not a film for kids – teens maybe, but no way should children see this. I say that because a woman, who I assume was the “cool mom,” walked in with children ranging from 15 down to 8 years old! I’m surprised she didn’t just pass around a Jack Daniels bottle and a doobie. *END TANGENT*

Continue reading The Final Destination review.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

The Day The Earth Stood Still Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 04:30:17 +0000

Short version: If all you ask from a movie is cool CGI effects, The Day the Earth Stood Still is for you. Look for any more than that and you’ll be sorely disappointed.

Screen Rant reviews The Day the Earth Stood Still

You know, I can understand the desire to remake The Day the Earth Stood Still… I really can. The original film had a great concept, it’s stood the test of time, and the temptation to revisit it with today’s visual effects must have been overwhelming.

But one of the first rules of remakes is: You don’t remake classic films.

You don’t remake Gone With the Wind, you don’t remake Casablanca and you don’t even TRY to remake Citizen Kane. It’s a losing proposition – remakes that work are few and far between, and often they’re based on obscure or poorly made originals.

Now that I’ve got you thinking that my entire review will be based on comparing this new version to the original, let me tell you: This version doesn’t even work as a stand alone film. This could have been titled Alien Retribution and it still wouldn’t have been any good.

If you’re not familiar with the story, it basically goes like this: An alien spacecraft suddenly appears, an alien comes out to greet us (followed by very large protective robot), is mistakenly shot, questioned by the U.S. government, escapes, is befriended by a woman and her son, and it is revealed that (and here is where the plot diverts from the original) he is here to destroy mankind in order to save the Earth.

The film starts interestingly enough – with Keanu Reeves as a mountain explorer in 1928, apparently up in the Himalayas. He’s alone and there’s a pretty good snowstorm blowing, and he comes across an ice covered globe about 10 feet in diameter. He chips away at the ice, and something happens to him which forms the basis for how he (or someone who looks like him) returns to earth present day.

Present day, the always beautiful Jennifer Connelly plays college professor Helen Benson. She has a son, played by Jaden Smith, but I’ll get to him later. Federal agents soon appear and sweep her away with virtually no explanation to join a bunch of other similarly clueless scientists and engineers. Soon they are informed of the object heading towards Earth, apparently set to collide with a very prominent city and cause millions of deaths.

Of course it doesn’t crash but lands. It is a gigantic sphere that looks like it contains spinning liquids/gas. From it emerges a humanoid alien creature, who approaches Benson very slowly and carefully, extending its hand slowly in what is obviously a handshake. This is when he is shot by a nervous soldier (who, I assume, had never seen Close Encounters of the Third Kind) and frankly, I found the shot completely contrived. At least in the original the alien (Klaatu) was holding a device which suddenly sprang open in the appearance of a weapon. Here it seemed as if the writer said “oh, here’s where the alien gets shot, let’s just get it done.”

A gigantic robot (Gort) emerges from the ship and commences to destroy all weapons within line of sight – he only stops when Klaatu orders him to (it was hard to make out but I believe this is where they inserted the famous line “Klaatu Barada Nikto”).

Klaatu (Keanu Reeves) is taken to a secure medical facility in order to try to help him, and there is actually some cool conceptual stuff going on here with the alien organism side of things. Soon he’s healed and is shakily adapting to his human body. Kathy Bates plays Secretary of Defense and is not wearing kid gloves in her approach to getting information out of the apparently human alien.

It becomes apparent that this Klaatu has powers over electricty and more, and he soon escapes with the help of Benson. She continues to believe he is here for the good of humanity and is determined to help him stay away from authorities long enough to get him in front of the United Nations to address the world. As it turns out he isn’t here to save humanity, he’s here to save the planet Earth from humanity.

The plan is to wipe human beings from the planet because “only a handful of planets in the universe can support complex life.” I literally laughed out loud when I heard that line – so in order to save a rare planet that can support complex life, his “federation” of aliens is going to wipe out the most complex life form on the planet?? What puts an exclamation point on the joke is when we’re shown tons of spheres all over the world collecting specimens of animal and insect life presumably to whisk them off the planet (just in case?). So snakes and squids are worth saving, but humans aren’t.

The best thing in this movie was watching Jennifer Connelly on screen – she was great in her role. John Cleese has a small and surprisingly serious cameo in the film which worked as well. Reeves was… well… Reeves. There wasn’t much he could do with the role as given, playing it very cold and unemotionally. Jaden Smith’s character however, annoyed the living heck out of me. He looks like he’s about nine years old and he played this incredibly snarky, back-talking character to his (as it turns out) step-mother, Helen. With every exchange between him and her I was torn between wanting to slap some parenting sense into her or some discipline into him. If they had cast a 14-16 year old I would have bought it, but a kid that young with that much lip? Not in my house.

Compound that with the fact that later on in the film we’re supposed to feel compassion for him when he finally “turns around.” He either wasn’t given the dialog to do it or just doesn’t have the acting chops to pull it off. That’s a major problem with the film – Outside of Benson, I didn’t really care about anyone or what might happen to them. I felt disconnected from the film and it just never really engaged me. For all the visual effects in the film, the overall feel of the film is fairly flat and boring.

Then there’s the whole “kill the humans to save the Earth” message – frankly I found that ludicrous. Here’s a supposedly highly evolved race that apparently has no problems with just murdering all of humanity. For what? Do they plan on populating Earth themselves? Replace us with “good” people who know how to take care of the planet?

I mean seriously, they should just be patient – if we’re that close to self-destruction just come back in a few thousand years. Does anyone really believe that humanity can actually pollute the planet to death? If anything the worry should be that we’ll make it uninhabitable for ourselves – give the Earth 10,000 years without us and it’ll be back to a lush paradise on its own.

There are other things as well, if Klaatu’s true alien appearance would be “frightening” (as he stated in the film), one would assume it is completly alien-looking – so why is Gort humanoid in appearance? Then there’s a “spy” who has been on Earth for 70 years, who Klaatu confers with before his final decision to destroy us. They guy tells him about how he’s come to love humanity, but we won’t change our ways. In view of how the film ends, this ends up making absolutely zero sense. There are also a couple of rather jarringly obvious product placements, and the ending is completely ambiguous.

In the original Klaatu left us with a warning… basically: “Get your act together and stop being so violent. We’ll be watching.” Here, Klaatu finally stops the destruction, but he just… leaves. How far will his message of why he came get? Will anyone hear it? Did he decide humanity is so noble that they don’t care what we do to the planet any more? Why didn’t he listen to the old guy he talked to earlier? Why didn’t the guy make a better case for humanity?

I swear I expected Al Gore to have a cameo in this film at some point. When Benson rescues Klaatu, my first thought when they got to her car was “good thing she doesn’t drive an SUV!” Despite this, the film never has the guts to go all the way and use the term “global warming” or say “you’re destroying the environment with your pollution.”

The Day the Earth Stood Still is all about the visual effects. They are cool, but I need more than that from a film in order to call it “good.” As a matter of fact, for all its spectacle, the film is pretty flat and boring.

So if you’re into seeing lots of cool CGI on the big screen – and plot and characters don’t mean that much to you, by all means, go check this out. On the other hand if those things DO matter to you, go rent the original and enjoy that instead.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: The Happening

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 04:30:58 +0000

Short version: If you’re in the mood for an absurd film that alternates between boring and comedy, this is the movie for you.

I thought The Sixth Sense was awesome. I loved Unbreakable. I thought Signs was OK, except for the premise of aliens allergic to water invading a planet 2/3 covered by it. I didn’t hate The Village, but I thought Lady in the Water was terrible.

Are you seeing a trend there? Well guess what, it hasn’t been broken.

I don’t know how reviews for M. Night Shyamalans’s The Happening are going to roll, but this one isn’t going to be pretty.

Going in, I was hopeful that this might actually turn out to be decent, despite what I had heard regarding the ultimate plot of the film. I even hoped that maybe that was a new twist by Shyamalan – misdirection outside the confines of the movie itself… but sadly this was not the case. It is indeed as absurd as I had feared.

The film opens rather abruptly, not really giving the audience any time to get to know anyone. We’re in Central Park in New York City, watching a couple of attractive twenty-something women (presumably on a lunch break) sitting on a bench enjoying the day, chit-chatting about whatever. One of them hears what she thinks is a faint scream off in the distance, and asks her friend if she heard it. The friend who was normal a second earlier, starts to seem disoriented, having lost her place in the book she’s reading, and begins repeating this. When the other woman looks up and sees everyone within view frozen in their tracks, and then they start to walk slowly backwards (which I thought was weird).

Her pal then pulls what looks like a long knitting needle out of her hair (it was holding her hair in a bun), and proceeds to do something rather unpleasant to herself with it. From there we cut across the city and see people committing suicide en masse. One thing I’ll say I was impressed with: finally someone showed a realistic depiction of what someone who’s fallen from a great height looks like when they hit the ground. It’s not comfortable to look at (remember, this is Shyamalan’s first R-rated film).

We soon meet mild mannered science teacher Elliot Moore, played by Mark Wahlberg. He’s so low key he’s likely to put his students to sleep, but is witty enough to coax an answer to a science question from the class “hunk.” Soon the faculty is gathered to hear what’s going on in NYC (they’re in Philadelphia) and that school will be dismissed. Among the faculty is a math teacher played by John Leguizamo.

Elliot is having wife troubles and mistakenly confides in his pal who is not a master of subtlety when he comes face to face with her (the ever-ephemeral and doe-eyed Zooey Deschanel). Anyway, it seems that whatever hit NYC (it’s assumed to be a terrorist attack) seems to be also affecting other cities, so they decide to get out of town by train.

Things rapidly get out of control as whatever is happening spreads to more and more cities and towns, eventually leaving our intrepid band (including the little girl in the image above) stranded in some nowhere town. How far will it spread and when will it end? No one knows.

The Happening is slow-moving, as M. Night’s movies tend to be, but aside from one scene in an old house that actually gave me the creeps for a few moments, there is no payoff. At least none that won’t leave you rolling your eyes and possibly laughing out loud. I know Wahlberg is a good actor – I’ve seen him deliver a good performance in other films, but here he’s so washed out and hokey that he’s hard to look at in some scenes.

At the most general level, one might cut the story concept some slack, but the devil is in the details here – ascribing sentience and the ability to communicate instantaneously to the source of this pandemic to a degree that is simply ludicrous. There was one scene in particular where I just had to laugh out loud… when they’re trying to stay away from whatever it is that’s causing people to kill themselves and Wahlberg says “We have to stay ahead of the wind!”

How in the hell does one “stay ahead of the wind,” exactly?

It gets more ridiculous as it goes on, and when we get to the end and we hear one scientist’s speculation on what happened all I could think was “Oh, PLEASE.”

The opening credits state: Written/Produced/Directed by M. Night Shyamalan, so I guess the buck stops there. Personally, I think the guy is done unless he lowers his level of hubris and starts collaborating with others.

Unless you’re anyone but the most rabid environmentalist, I just can’t see folks thinking this is anything but a very silly movie.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: You Don’t Mess With The Zohan

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 05:42:22 +0000

Short version: There are a few laugh out loud moments, but you have to sit through a whole lot of stupid stuff to get to those few gems.

I apologize for the unsavory image to the left, but there’s a reason for it. You see you’re looking at the star of You Don’t Mess with the Zohan. No, not Adam Sandler – the star of Zohan is Adam Sandler’s crotch.

I have an axiom that has, with few exception, stood the test of time for me: If a book or movie is terrible in the first 10 minutes of reading or viewing, it’s pretty certain that the entire thing will be awful. Once again it has served me well.

In this case however, it didn’t take 10 minutes or even 5… I knew what I was in for literally in the first 5 seconds of the film, when after the studio logo the first frame of the film filled the screen with a close up of Adam Sandler’s groin area. From there, it zoomed out to show him frolicking on the beach and performing superhuman stunts, but his crotch was clearly the focus.

Of the entire movie.

Sandler plays Israeli counter-terrorism uber-dude “Zohan,” who is apparently blessed with near-superhuman (well, really, super-human) abilities and is a one-man army sent in to capture Palestinian terrorists. The thing is, he’s tired of all the hate and the fact that he captures really bad guys and they are given up in trade a couple of months later.

Secretly he pines to be a hair stylist and to move to America where he can work for the famous Paul Mitchell (for the guys, he’s a super famous hair stylist dude). When he tells his parents, it doesn’t go well and the first of many non-politically-correct jokes are launched when the call him “fagola” which, having grown up in New Jersey, I know is an ethnic term for homosexual.

He manages to make it to the States, goes under a false name and attempts to break into the hair stylist biz. Things don’t go well since he has no experience, just a passion for the work, and he’s basing his technique on a book of hairstyles from the 1980s. The scenes where he attempts to find a job are actually among the funniest in the movie, including one where he doesn’t quite know what to make of dreadlocks. Also the scene where he does a Vulcan nerve pinch on a small boy in a barber’s chair is a bit different from the trailer and quite funny.

From there he finally gets his foot in the door of a salon run by a gorgeous Palestinian woman played by Emmanuelle Chriqui. It takes her a while to let him actually cut anyone’s hair, but as seen in the trailer he has, to put it mildly, a rather unique approach. The initial scenes here where he seduces much older women are also pretty funny.

Eventually a Palestinian cab driver (Rob Scheider in very “tan” make-up) recognizes Zohan and that makes his life a bit complicated.

Now there ARE some funny bits scattered here and there, but I swear to you, never have a seen so many “dick jokes” in one movie. Throughout the first half of the film the audience actually laughed quite a bit (much more than I did) but getting towards the end even they quieted down as the repetitiveness of the gags got old. There are only so many times that a close up of a distortedly large crotch is funny. Like maybe, once. You really do have to sit through a lot of stupid stuff to get to the few decent laughs, and even those are short lived.

And some of the stuff in the movie just seemed way out of left field and made no sense even within the movie itself. There’s scene early on where Zohan is at the beach with a geeky friend and about 3 super hot babes – they’re all wearing bathing suits, but he’s naked. And barbecuing. Why is he naked? Who knows. And yeah, sure – I’ll have some of what they’re having.

There are other moments like this like where he’s demonstrating his prowess at pushups, and eventually starts doing them with no hands. Huh? Ok, he’s crazy fast and super-agile, but does he have the power of levitation as well?

We also get the whole “why can’t we all just get along” thing, which you see coming a mile away, and seems pretty ridiculous considering the animosity between the two countries. I found this even more surprising in view of the fact that I learned the other day that Sandler is one of the few Conservatives in Hollywood.

Judd Apatow, who is pretty much a golden boy in Hollywood these days when it comes to comedies, is listed as a writer on this. Yikes. I hope his upcoming druggie comedy Pineapple Express is much better than this thing.

And finally, how the hell did this movie get a PG-13 rating? Has the MPAA finally gotten tired of all the bad press on how they allow violence to slip through but no sex, that they’re caving? This movie is crass and obvious, and I’m flabbergasted it didn’t get an R. I suppose multiple shots of a guy’s bare butt and that of an overweight, older woman’s (look away!) are ok, but I’ll bet a bare skin shot of Chriqui’s would have launched this into R territory. (Of course the one bare backside a guy wouldn’t mind seeing is the only one that isn’t shown.) The entire movie’s humor is based on the guys genitals and what he does with them.

Anyway, even if you’re fan of crass comedy, I don’t think this one will carry you all the way through. If you think this sort of thing is just stupid, stay away. And for God’s sake, don’t bring the kids!

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Downloading Nancy

Vic Holtreman — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 19:22:21 +0000

By Vic Holtreman

Short version: A bleak and starkly shot film that left me feeling like I needed a shower after watching it.

Downloading Nancy premiered here at Sundance 2008 and is the story of Nancy (played by Maria Bello), a severely emotionally damaged woman married to and emotionally cold man (Rufus Sewell as Albert) who turns to the internet for companionship.

The film opens with Nancy discussing her thoughts on what happens after you die with another woman. At this point it sounds like she is optimistic about the afterlife while her friend is very negative and keeps bringing up counterpoints to make it sound like she could be somehow trapped in some way after death. As it turns out, the friend turns out to be a therapist who is trying to convince Nancy that death is not an escape or freedom.

Her husband Albert is a successful businessman in the golf industry, and it consumes his life. He is very cold to his wife, which is doubly unfortunate because of the fact that she has deep emotional problems stemming from being the victim of sexual abuse as a child. She is teeming with self-loathing and his attitude towards her certainly doesn’t help matters.

She turns to Louis (Jason Patric), who she has exchanged hundreds of emails and instant messages with for comfort, or as close a thing to comfort as she is able to achieve. She self-mutilates with razor blades and she enjoys pain, all due to her uber-negative self image.

One night she leaves home, leaving nothing more than a note for Albert stating that she is going to stay with friends in Baltimore. Instead she heads off to meet Louis, and their initial meeting, now in the real world seems awkward.

Of course at first we think it is going to be nothing more than a brief sexual affair, but as it turns out Louis has walls lined with homemade videotapes (we never discover exactly what is on those tapes, but we can make a pretty good guess). The situation takes an even odder turn when Nancy mentions that she has “brought the money” that he has asked for.

As the story moves forward it becomes clear that what Nancy wants from Louis is for him to kill her, and release her from her torturous existence. Nancy’s therapist (played by Amy Brenneman) tries and tries to get through to her, but to no avail.

The story is disjointed in that time-wise it jumps all over the place. In the end it does paint a picture of Nancy and Albert’s life and the growth of the relationship between her and Louis.

Now to some of you this may sound interesting, and I suppose it could have been, but the overall effect of this movie with it’s bland, bright and washed out colors on the screen and the details of the relationships that we are subjected to is quite depressing (yes, I get it, that’s the point) and to be honest left me feeling more than a bit dirty to have been witness to all this. Not “porn” dirty, but “slimey” dirty, like going through someones dirty laundry.

I watched this at a press screening and about a dozen people got up and walked out during the showing. About two or three actually applauded at the end of it, but I guess there’s no accounting for taste.

The closer the film got to the end the more ridiculous it became in conjunction with the boredom and frankly, repulsive stuff going on.

About 3/4 of the way through the film I was hoping for “release” almost as much as Nancy. I honestly don’t understand how an actor can look at a script like this and not just say: “Damn, that is f’ed up!” and just move on to the next one.

I’m giving this one star out of deference to the acting and the editing, but that’s it. Big thumbs down from me.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: The Number 23

Brian Rentschler — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 00:13:53 +0000

By Brian Rentschler

Short version: This movie drives an already silly premise straight into the ground, primarily with a weak script and uneven direction.

I have been a big fan of Jim Carrey ever since the premiere of my all-time favorite TV show, In Living Color. I mean, what could be better than his Fire Marshal Bill skits? The original Ace Ventura and Dumb and Dumber are movies that I am proud to count among my all-time favorite comedies. Jim Carrey is one of the finest comedic actors I have seen on the big or small screen, but I really don’t know what on earth could have interested him in The Number 23. Maybe I don’t want to know… He’s not going for comedy in this movie; he’s going for a dramatic performance. That’s understandable to some degree; he doesn’t want to be pigeonholed into doing only physical comedy. He has certainly shown that he has some range; The Truman Show and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind are two examples that come to mind. But the two aforementioned examples are good movies, and The Number 23 is not.

Joel Schumacher’s movies have always been hit-or-miss for me. I really liked Falling Down, but Batman and Robin was a stinkbomb. Veronica Guerin was well-made (albeit morbid), but Phone Booth was underwhelming. His directing style in this movie is uneven; some parts are hokey and overblown, while others seem to be just right. Overall, the problem is that the weak script (written by Fernley Phillips) just doesn’t give him much to work with. There is plenty of talent and technical competence on display here; it’s just utilized in the wrong way.

Almost from the first frame, this movie lets the viewer know that weird things are happening. Walter Sparrow (played by Jim Carrey) is an animal control officer who tries to catch a stray dog. He does that kind of thing all the time, but somehow he ends up being bitten by the dog. He tries to catch the same dog a little later, but the dog disappears after he chases it into a cemetery.

Movie cliché #827: Strange things always happen in cemeteries.

While he is talking to his wife Agatha (played by Virginia Madsen) about the incident, she mentions to him that she has come across an interesting book. It’s called The Number 23, and it’s by an unknown author named Topsy Kretts. Walter quickly becomes engrossed in the book, written from a first-hand perspective about a detective named Fingerling (played by Jim Carrey). There is a suicide blonde (quite literally) who causes Fingerling’s life to take a turn for the worse, mainly because of her obsession with the number 23. Anytime she sees the two numbers forwards, backwards or in a combination that can be added up to 23, she goes farther and farther off the deep end. Fingerling quickly develops the same obsession with the number 23, and that obsession starts to have an effect on his life. In particular, it affects his relationship with his girlfriend, Fabrizia (played by Virginia Madsen), who ends up leaving him for his colleague, Dr. Miles Phoenix (played by Danny Huston). Fabrizia soon turns up dead, and through an unfortunate series of events, Dr. Phoenix takes the fall for the murder even though he’s innocent.

As Walter reads through the book, he is astonished by the similarities between Fingerling and himself — details about his upbringing, details about his current life, etc. He goes to talk to Professor Isaac French (played by Danny Huston), who is a friend of the family. Professor French explains that the person who wrote the book is undoubtedly someone who knows Walter, and that the number 23 has actually had a great deal of significance throughout history. At this point, Walter realizes he is becoming obsessed with the number 23 himself. His relationship with his wife begins to suffer, and he starts having nightmares about her being murdered. Their son Robin (played by Logan Lerman) realizes that he may have found a way to get in contact with the author of the book, and Walter figures out that by circling every 23^rd word on every 23^rd page, he can reveal a message that could give him all the answers he is seeking. But will he be able to figure everything out before his obsession with the number 23 completely destroys his life?

The main problem with this movie is the script. Being obsessed with a particular number is just a hokey, silly premise in the first place. In the hands of the right people, I suppose it might have been possible to develop a compelling storyline, but this movie doesn’t help the viewer get to know the characters well enough for the story to be truly scary and creepy. The reason behind the obsession with the number 23 is explained (sort of), but it’s hardly a revelation. There were also a surprising number of details and story developments that I thought were pertinent to what was revealed at the end, but they only turned out to be red herrings. I can tolerate a few red herrings in a story if there is a bigger payoff at the end, but that didn’t happen here. The way the whole story was told and the way the ending was revealed just didn’t work for me; the big payoff wasn’t there.

Jim Carrey, Virginia Madsen and Danny Huston are all capable actors. Each of them has done work over the years that is worth seeing, but not in this movie. They seem to be doing the best they can with the material they have, but without a strong script, even the best actors on the planet would have a tough time pulling things out of the gutter. Overall, I didn’t find the movie very scary, suspenseful or compelling. The ending was not predictable enough for me to guess, but I still felt underwhelmed and frustrated after the movie was over. Jim Carrey has shown that he can do more than just maniacal comedy, but he can do better than The Number 23.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Weapons

Vic Holtreman — Sat, 27 Jan 2007 12:35:52 +0000

By Vic Holtreman

Short version: An interesting idea poorly executed.

(Image from Cinempire.com)

In order to make it to the showing of Weapons at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival I had to leave the post-movie Q&A for Black Snake Moan early. The only reason I’m not totally annoyed with myself for doing that is that the short film preceding the main feature, A Nick in Time by Be’ Garrett was outstanding.

When I read the description for director/screenwriter Adam Bhala Lough’s Weapons, I had a feeling it might not be up my alley but I figured I’d give it a shot anyway. In the end I should have passed on it, and many people I spoke to after the showing had the same, if not stronger opinions to the negative as well. It’s never a good sign when people start leaving in droves before the Director Q&A session…

Weapons is yet another movie that starts with the ending. Coincidentally, The Good Life which starred Mark Webber, who is also in this film also started the same way. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Once the movie was through it became obvious why it was done that way, but that doesn’t exactly mean that it worked well. The opening scene with it’s lingering, slow camera shot is indicative of more of the same to come. It starts quite literally with a bang that is not for the feint hearted.

The film then goes to Sean (played by the up and coming Mark Webber) and his friends Jason and Chris. Chris tries to film everything (”I’m making a movie.”) and is what I would call a dangerous geek. Dorky, can’t get a girl, and drives around with a shotgun in back of his car in case he “wants to shoot someone”. Jason is cocky and a tough guy, while Sean is just back from college, although he’s easily sucked back into his friends’ dead end lifestyle.

The main story involves Reggie (played by Nick Cannon) becoming obsessed with tracking down and killing the man who raped and beat on his younger sister Sabrina (played by Regine Nehy). Due to the start of the film, we already know what will happen to him and for me, that ruined the movie quite a bit. Reggie, who does not seem to be a gangster-type, surprises us with his attitude and commitment in finding a gun and setting out with his friends to kill the rapist ASAP. He goes to his friends Mikey and younger James (who is supposed to be Sabrina’s boyfriend) to demand their help.

Sabrina says that Jason is the one who did it to her and that is Reggie’s target. He and his friends go find Mikey’s uncle who has apparently smoked one too many joints and is very strange. Despite this he tries to talk them out of what they’re going to do and they respond by beating the heck out of him.

About the best thing in the movie actually happens here, when the uncle has Reggie pinned against the wall and asks him about the genocide in Rwanda, to which Reggie replies “Who’s Rwanda?”

Weapons was the first film I saw at Sundance that had an “indie” feel to it – grainy film, hand held camera, and wierd things that I guess were supposed to be “artistic” but fell flat. For one thing Lough did the old “watch events from different points of view” thing, but all that did was make me feel like I had to sit through a bad film three times instead of just one. Then he had this habit of holding a shot on a face or scene where nothing was happening WAY too long. It almost felt as if in a few scenes he just forgot to say “cut!” Finally, in the middle of the film he inserted this weird, freeze frame montage of the main and supporting characters.

I really did want to give this a chance and for about the first 15 or 20 minutes although I didn’t think it was great, I thought it was ok and moving in an interesting direction. Unfortunately it really fell apart as it got further along. The style of the film actually reminded me of the controversial movie Kids by director Larry Clarke, which although it was more about teen sex than violence and was considered exploitative, really got the point of the nothing to lose, dead end lives of it’s characters than this film managed to do.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Body Double

Brian Rentschler — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 05:24:00 +0000

By Brian Rentschler

Short version: Unlikable characters, pretentious writing and misguided direction make this movie a total mess from start to finish.

I have a confession to make. It’s not easy, but I need to get this off my chest. Okay, here goes: Sometimes I miss the mid-80’s. There, I’ve said it. Seriously, most (not all) of the music in the mid-80’s was at least decent, if not exceptional. Gangsta rap was at least a few years away, and country music was only played on the country stations. And the movies… some real classics came out in the mid-80’s. Splash, The Goonies, Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop, Back to the Future… the list goes on. So when I rented Body Double, I thought I was in for a good movie. After all, it was produced, directed and co-written by Brian DePalma. Aside from having an awesome first name (and spelled the right way), DePalma has been behind the camera on some of my favorite movies. If there is a better adaptation of a Stephen King horror movie than Carrie, I haven’t seen it. A long time ago, Kevin Costner used to star in good movies, and The Untouchables ranks high on that list. And who wouldn’t want to say hello to my little friend, Scarface? Okay, so maybe Scarface was a little over-the-top, but I enjoyed it. To me, it will always be a classic. So how did Body Double compare to those movies? Let’s put it this way: After watching it, I was reminded that DePalma has also been involved in a number of genuine stinkbombs. To that list, I (not so) proudly add Body Double.

The story is set in (where else?) Los Angeles. Jake Scully (played by Craig Wasson) is a struggling actor. Jake is also extremely claustrophobic; his entire body freezes up when he’s in a confined space. That causes all sorts of problems when Jake is cast as a vampire in a B-movie and can’t shoot his coffin scenes. After he messes up take after take, the director (played by Dennis Franz) sends him home and ends up casting a different actor in the role. To make matters worse, Jake arrives home only to find his girlfriend in bed with another man. Having job and woman troubles, Jake drowns his sorrows in booze and acting classes. Sadly, even the acting classes aren’t enough to snap Jake out of his downward spiral; his overwhelming fear is preventing him from achieving his true potential as an actor. But all is not lost; a mysterious fellow by the name of Sam Bouchard (played by Gregg Henry) befriends Jake and helps to pull him out of the proverbial gutter.

Jake needs a place to sleep, now that his relationship has gone the way of the dodo. As luck would have it, Sam needs someone to watch his place while he’s out of town. Things aren’t all rosy, though, because we quickly find out that Sam is a “peeping tom.” Sam has a female neighbor who has a peculiar habit of dancing suggestively in various states of undress at the same time every night, and he likes to enjoy the show through his telescope. Fortunately for Sam, Jake is also a pervert, so he enjoys the “peep show” with the same vigor as Sam. After Sam leaves town, Jake continues to enjoy the neighbor’s “peep show” to the point that he becomes obsessed with her. He even starts to stalk her in his own caring way, especially after he notices that an Indian man has been stalking her as well. A normal man would introduce himself to her, but not Jake. He’s a shy stalker; he follows her to the mall, where he’s nearly arrested for stalking (surprise!). From there, he follows her to the beach, where he finally gets up the courage to talk to her. He warns her that someone is following her, and she thinks Jake is talking about himself. (Hmmm… now why would she think that?) Before they can say too much, though, the Indian man appears and snatches her purse. Jake pursues the Indian, but he ultimately gets away. It’s at this point that we learn that the woman’s name is Gloria Revelle (played by Deborah Shelton). Faster than you can say “totally unrealistic,” Gloria and Jake exchange a long kiss worthy of a soap opera, and Gloria runs off.

Later that night, Jake is peering into his telescope, hoping to see more of Gloria in action, but instead — to his horror — he sees that the Indian man is inside Gloria’s house, and Gloria is home. Frantically, Jake calls Gloria and tries to warn her, but the Indian man is already attacking her. While Gloria is struggling, Jake runs over to her house as fast as he can, but he’s too late. The method in which Gloria is killed is presumably meant to be gruesome, but it’s so over-the-top that it’s rather silly and unintentionally funny. Needless to say, the Indian man escapes unnoticed, and the police initially suspect Jake of the crime, although he’s quickly cleared. It turns out that Gloria was married, and the police can’t find her husband. As if the movie isn’t weird enough already, it becomes downright bizarre at this point.

Jake is quite upset by Gloria’s death, so of course he deals with his grief by watching lots of late-night TV. He is dumbstruck when he sees a woman on TV dancing exactly the same way Gloria did every night, so of course he has to meet this woman. She turns out to be an adult film actress named Holly Body (played by Melanie Griffith), and before you can say “You must be kidding,” Jake is starring in an adult film with Holly. (I only wish I were making this up.) I was about ready to turn the movie off, because I really don’t care for that subject matter, but those scenes were mercifully short. In typical fashion for him, Jake lies through his teeth and tells Holly that he’s a movie producer, and that he has a role in mind for her in his next movie. It doesn’t take her long to realize that Jake’s a fraud, but by that time, Jake is starting to wonder if it was really Gloria he was seeing through the window every night. Is everything as it seems, or is something more sinister taking place?

All throughout the movie, it is obvious that Brian DePalma wants to be that generation’s Alfred Hitchcock. It has been said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but I doubt whether Hitchcock would be flattered by this movie. Many of the scenes feel like they’re ripped off from Hitchcock classics, especially Rear Window and Vertigo. While Hitchcock went for scary, DePalma goes for gory. While Hitchcock went for intriguing, DePalma goes for lurid. The movie tries to redeem itself during the finale, but it ultimately falls completely flat. I’m trying to think of a single thing this movie did right, and aside from a few genuinely suspenseful scenes, I really can’t think of anything. Most of the necessary elements to make a good movie are there, but they’re thrown together in such a disjointed and pretentious way that it’s far more frustrating than entertaining.

So is this movie worth seeing? Quite honestly, I can’t think of anyone for whom the answer is yes. Not one single character in the movie is likable; all of them are either morons, jerks or both. The storyline revolves around an actor’s struggle to succeed in the business, as well as the adult film industry. I couldn’t care less about either subject, so how was I supposed to enjoy the movie? The lead character, Jake, is a pervert, a creep and a moron. How was I supposed to enjoy the movie if I wasn’t even rooting for the lead character to succeed? I was actually hoping it would be Jake who met a gruesomely violent end instead of Gloria. If you’re a big fan of DePalma, do yourself a big favor and rent one of his better movies like Carrie, The Untouchables or even Scarface. But if you insist on seeing Body Double because, like its lead character, your curiosity gets the better of you and you just have to watch, set your expectations appropriately low and try to resist the urge to bang your head into a wall during the movie. Consider yourself warned.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: The Cell

Brian Rentschler — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 16:45:00 +0000

By Brian Rentschler

Short version: This movie had some impressive imagery at times, but overall it was downright awful.

Eek! Please, mommy, make the bad movie stop!

Okay, now that my inner child has said what it wanted to say, let me start out by talking about the director of this cinematic train wreck, Tarsem Singh. According to IMDB, he hasn’t had much of a feature film career since directing The Cell, which shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who has seen it. I’m sure Singh did a great job with the commercials and music videos that defined his early career, but as a feature film director, he created a real mess. I must admit, the imagery in The Cell is very impressive, but that’s only one of many components required for a movie to truly hit it out of the park. I have always found Jennifer Lopez underwhelming as an actress, but here she seems nearly comatose. Vince Vaughn did such a great job in Swingers, but you wouldn’t know it by watching this movie. He’s positively slumming it here. I was absolutely floored when I read that Roger Ebert thought this was one of the best movies of 2000. Did he see another movie called The Cell that I didn’t hear about?

Sometimes I’m not sure what to think of Jennifer Lopez’s career. She gained recognition as a Fly Girl on In Living Color, then she became a bona fide star after her breakout performance in Selena, making her the first Latina actress to earn $1 million for a movie role. With luck and talent squarely on her side, what movies did she choose to follow up her star-making performance? Of course, she chose two stinkbombs — Anaconda and U-Turn. Surprisingly, I have found the majority of her movie choices to be anywhere from mediocre to downright awful. For every Out of Sight or An Unfinished Life, there is a Gigli or The Cell to balance it out. So it’s not surprising that in most of her movies, she strikes me as the wrong casting choice for that role. That was certainly true of The Cell. But before I start getting all the hate mail and death threats from people who think I’m wrongly hating on their revered J-Lo ™, I should add that there are quite a few talented actors who are completely wasted in this movie.

Most of the movie happens in a research facility whose research is funded entirely by the rich parents of the facility’s only patient, a comatose boy. The facility has some sort of equipment that allows Catherine Deane (played by Jennifer Lopez) to literally go inside people’s heads. Interestingly, once she’s inside their heads, everything looks like it belongs in a Nine Inch Nails video. Naturally, Catherine has two sidekicks (played by Marianne Jean-Baptiste and Dylan Baker) who work behind the scenes and constantly warn her to avoid going too far inside the boy’s head, whatever that means. (The movie must have been going too far inside my head, because I was getting a headache at that point.) Catherine has had limited success in her interactions with the comatose boy, but before you can say “Where’s the fast-forward button?” we find out that FBI Agent Peter Novak (played by Vince Vaughn) has a second patient for her.

Carl Stargher (played by Vincent D’Onofrio) is a serial killer. But Carl isn’t just your run-of-the-mill, garden variety serial killer. He has a sophisticated cell where he keeps his female victim. There is a water line into the cell that turns on for a short time every now and then. After about two days of this, the water stays on until the cell fills completely with water and drowns his victim. Although he’s not there at the time, he has several video cameras to record all the fun. After the victim is dead, he hoists himself above the dead body using a series of rings that are pierced into his back (!), starts playing back the tape and does some things that are rather unbecoming of a gentleman while he watches the tape. In other words, he is a seriously sick dude. It turns out that the FBI’s investigation has led them to suspect Stargher of committing the murders. They also learn that another woman has gone missing, and they suspect that Stargher has abducted her. Based on their knowledge of his methods, they know that the current victim has less than two days to live unless they can catch Stargher.

To the FBI’s surprise, Stargher is at home when they raid his place, but there are two problems. First, his current victim is not there. Second, Stargher has unexpectedly lapsed into a coma, so there’s no way for him to tell anyone where she is. That’s why Agent Novak contacts Catherine Deane — to see if she can get inside Stargher’s head and see if he can tell her where the FBI can find the current victim before she drowns. She agrees, but needless to say, the inside of Stargher’s head is a messed-up place. As with most serial killers, he had a childhood that put the “fun” in “dysfunctional.” What’s even more incredible is that Deane actually starts to emphatize with Stargher, much to the dismay of her sidekicks, who are afraid that she will go too far inside his head. Seriously, once she goes inside his head, it’s like a big blur after that. I remember a cow getting sliced up, Catherine falling down some hole and a dude with horns. (Don’t worry, it won’t make sense after you watch it either.) Otherwise, I didn’t really know what the heck was going on, although the visuals were impressive. There are so many questions at this point in the story. Will Catherine save the day by doing her Vulcan mind meld with Stargher? Will she be able to enter Stargher’s mind without doing damage to her own mind? Will the FBI be able to save the current victim before she drowns? Will the audience care? As usual, I won’t give away the ending, but I will say that the final outcome forced me to wonder why it was so absolutely necessary to cast Jennifer Lopez in this movie (aside from getting people into theater seats, of course).

Okay, I’ve done plenty of J-Lo bashing; now we move on to Vincent D’Onofrio. Vincent, Vincent, Vincent… Et tu, Vincent? Ever since I first saw his performance as Private Pyle in Full Metal Jacket, he has been one of my favorite actors, but I would love to know what in the world possessed him to star in this crapfest. (On second thought, maybe I don’t want to know.) I suppose it could be argued that his role as Stargher was challenging for him and allowed him to stretch his abilities as an actor, but so would Hamlet. With such a long and distinguished career as his, couldn’t he have chosen something better than The Cell? And Vince Vaughn… you know, come to think of it, his career has a few similarities to Lopez’s career. He had a breakout performance in Swingers, then he followed it up with The Lost World. That was a smart move, but then his follow-up projects were Return to Paradise, Clay Pigeons and a mediocre remake of Psycho. Huh? Don’t get me wrong; Vince Vaughn is a talented actor, but you wouldn’t know it by watching The Cell. He might as well have phoned it in.

Bottom line, this movie suffered from an underwhelming script, a miscast lead actress and direction that could generously be described as weak and misguided. If you like impressive visuals without a compelling story to go along with them, grab a bag of popcorn and your favorite two-liter and enjoy. But if you demand an intelligent, coherent storyline along with strong acting performances and competent direction, The Cell is not the movie for you.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Clerks II

Vic Holtreman — Sun, 23 Jul 2006 05:26:33 +0000

By Vic Holtreman

Short version: Clerks II can only possibly be enjoyed by hardcore fans of the original. It was like digging through a huge pile of cow dung to get to a very small pearl at the bottom.

Since I don’t generally write objective reviews, here’s what you need to know before you read this:

1. When the original Clerks first came out, I kind of enjoyed it in a looking-at-bugs-in-a-jar kind of way.
2. I was raised in New Jersey.
3. I am more than 10 years older than the main characters in the movie.

Got all that? Good. For the most part, Clerks II was excruciatingly vile. I almost got up and walked out more than once, but made myself stay seated because first, I can’t write a review of a film I haven’t seen all the way through, and also due to morbid curiosity of where it would end up.

My rationale for the rating is that I would have given it a 1/2, but the last 10 minutes bumped it up half a point. I wouldn’t have gone lower than a half star because (if you don’t mind or can get past the HUGE crassness of this film), it did make me chuckle a couple of times.

The film opens in black and white, with Dante (Brian O’Halloran, reprising his role, as do all the actors in the film) arriving at the Quick Mart (or whatever it was called, opening the security door and finding it completely ablaze. His best friend Randal (or as I like to call him: Diarrhea Mouth) shows up and walks right past the firefighters and into the charred store, completely oblivious to the goings on. Cut to “Mooby’s” the film’s version of every fast food joint out there. Mooby’s was actually the source of quite a few chuckles (for me, anyway) with the little signs and mottos in the background (Try Mooby’s Cow Pies!)

Anyway our two intrepid losers, er, I mean “heroes” have shifted from the Quick Mart to Mooby’s as far as their regular jobs are concerned. Yeah, ok, I get it… that’s the POINT of the movie, but man… early 30’s and working at a fast food joint? NOT as a manager?

All right, short plot summary: our main guy finally landed an uber-babe with great looks and money. The problem is that she’s got about 10 years on him and is totally controlling. They’re going to dump Jersey, head to Florida where he will be beholding to his in-laws in regards to a new home and a job. Another problem is that there is an obvious attraction between him and the manager of Mooby’s, longtime friend and simmering-beneath-the-surface romantic interest Becky (played by Rosario Dawson). And of course, best buddy doesn’t want him to leave.

The two icons of Clerks return as well after 6 months of rehab and apparently having found Jesus. Although I always enjoy Kevin Smith in his role as the silent one, the other guy is starting to also seem too old to be hanging out in front of a fast food joint selling drugs. Again, yeah, I know “these guys never grew up.”

So the main questions are will Dante leave for Florida and get married, finally getting the fresh start he’s wanted his whole life (albeit with some major strings attached), or will he stay in Joisey and solidify his relationship with Becky?

Now that doesn’t make for too bad of a journey, the problem is what we have to endure along the way. The character of Randall could not be more idiotic, mean and despicable. He’s just an immature dirtbag to the core, who rationalizes it with a view that his best friend exists to be his counterbalance. The sheer amount of rank dialogue you will have to endure if you show up for this flick would curdle milk. It’s not just the endless profanity, but the lousy attitudes, the sick sexual stuff that is discussed in excruciating detail, and the portrayal of a young geeky Christian guy as a total and complete idiot who of course needs to have his eyes opened by Randall, the great and wise.

I read about Joel Siegel leaving a screening of Clerks II due to an explicit conversation centered on human/donkey relations and I have got to tell you, I don’t blame the guy. I found it funny how Smith came back and railed against Seigel’s use of “cutesy” headlines when endorsing films, which yes, is a bit corny… but geez, how about a middle ground?

The movie gets progressively harder to take, and the gross factor peaks right before the last 10 minutes or so that somewhat bring the dial ever so slightly to the “redeeming” side. I liked how the end showed a good compromise between being the Jersey slackers that they were, staying put, and actually taking on some responsibility.

However, as I stated above, the overall effect is like digging through a huge pile of cow dung in order to finally retrieve a very small pearl. Maybe I’ve just outgrown this stuff, after all one of my favorite movies a long time ago was Animal House, and I wonder what I’d think of it if I saw it again today. The thing that struck me was that all around me the 20-something crowd were laughing their heads off throughout the movie, so maybe I just don’t know what I’m talking about.

Either that or I was in an audience comprised exclusively of hard core Kevin Smith/Clerks fans. If you don’t fall into either of those categories, I would highly suggest that you give Clerks II a pass.

Oh, and if it’s a case of “I just don’t get it.”, I’ll tell you what: I don’t WANT to get it, m’kay?

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle

Vic Holtreman — Wed, 07 Dec 2005 16:48:57 +0000

By Vic Holtreman

Short version: Oh my God, this movie actually made a profit?

Ok, so I’m late to the party reviewing Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle. I certainly wasn’t going to pay good money to see it, and I didn’t even want it to soil my Netflix queue, but when I stumbled across it in upcoming movies on my satellite box, I figured I’d Tivo it for when I was particularly bored.

So where do I begin? Perhaps with a call to my lawyer so that I can sue for emotional damage incurred by having sat through the entire movie.

This wasn’t just bad, it was B-A-D. Actually it was bad enough to cross over into the hallowed ground of Mystery Science Theater 3000. If you want to see this movie, buy a case of beer, invite a bunch of buddies over, send the wives out for the evening and let the exclamations of amazement begin.

This is a review of the broadcast TV version of the movie, which was bad enough, so I have no idea what additional masturbatory footage is in the “Unrated” version of Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle.

The movie (I just can’t bring myself to call this a “film”) opens in Outer Mongolia or some such place, with the setting and a drinking scene obviously paying homage to (or ripping off) Raiders of the Lost Ark. There are many little nods in this movie to other films like Flashdance, The Sound of Music and Singing in the Rain as well as the TV series Starsky and Hutch.

The “Angels” are there to rescue a government-type who it seems has been kidnapped just for the ring he is wearing, which is one half of a pair of rings that when combined provide access to (are you ready?) the entire witness protection program database. The other ring is worn by another government guy (details really are unimportant in regards to this movie) who is played by Bruce Willis in a cameo.

Right from the start the uber-silliness/titillation begins with Cameron Diaz showing up in some mini-skirt Swedish fantasy outfit and commences to ride a mechanical bull looking device with plenty of eye candy available. The girls must then face off a room of 50 guys including just one (apparently) with a machine gun, which of course miraculously misses them as they do their gymnastics.

They rescue the guy and end up back at their HQ where we meet the new Bosley, played by Bernie Mac. I’m not clear on whether Bill Murray (Bosley in the first movie) was supposed to be his adopted brother or what. In any case Mac seems to be uncomfortable within his own skin through the entire movie. I don’t know if that’s his “schtick” or whether on some level he understood what a horrible situation he was trapped in. I found the character just plain annoying and out of place even in the extreme fantasy that comprises the world of Charlie’s Angels.

That’s all I’ll bother to mention about the story, since that is pretty much incidental. Demi Moore appears in the film as an ex-Angel, showing off her hard-body in a scene with Diaz which seems like a prelude to a lesbian love scene. Jaclyn Smith (one of the original “Angels” from the TV series) also makes an appearance, with much glowing and soft focus effects.

There are action sequences that are so over the top that I’d have a hard time suspending disbelief watching them even if this were a comic book superhero movie. There is more wirework here than on a prototype nuclear bomb, and the way these characters escape virtually unscathed from high speed impacts is truly laughable. In one scene Lucy Liu is launched from an airborne car moving at what must be over 60MPH through the air and through a plate glass window and comes out of it with a few smudges of dirt on her face.

But the real topper (even moreso than the sequence at the start of the movie where the girls all grab onto a helicopter falling off a bridge, start it and take off) is a scene towards the end where they are all swinging over the city on electrical cords looking for all the world like Spiderman. Just to really put it over the top, they are chasing Demi Moore who has spread the “cape” on her dress (which is obviously made from a gauze-like material) as she glides over the city looking like Batman in Batman Begins!

I don’t know how actresses can play parts like these and look themselves in the mirror in the morning. Honestly, if I ever hear any of the female stars of this movie speaking out against female stereotypes I will just pop my top.

If the big action sequences were toned down a bit budget-wise, this would have been a typical TV movie-of-the-week. It was just utterly awful and aimed squarely at teenage boys who would go home after the movie was over to fantasize about what they had seen on-screen.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Ladder 49

Brian Rentschler — Wed, 04 May 2005 05:34:01 +0000

By Brian Rentschler

Short version: This movie took an intriguing idea and ran it straight into the ground with a weak script and lousy direction. The clichés are so pervasive that it’s sometimes hard to believe this movie was meant to be taken seriously. The heroic efforts of our firefighters deserve a much better showcase than this crapfest.

After seeing this movie, I decided to go back and look at the filmography of Joaquin Phoenix. I wanted to pinpoint the last time I thought he played a role effectively in a movie. As it turned out, the movie was To Die For, released in 1995. Granted, I haven’t seen every movie in which he has starred since 1995, but it seems to me that his best performances are smaller roles that have top-notch directors presiding over them. As his Hollywood star grows ever bigger and his roles increase in size, I don’t find the quality of his performances growing with them. If anything, it’s the opposite. After seeing The Village last year, I thought he had hit a new low, but sadly, his performance in Ladder 49 was even worse.

Even though John Travolta is featured prominently in most of the poster and TV ads for the movie, the vast majority of it focuses on Jack Morrison (played by Joaquin Phoenix). Set in present-day Baltimore, Maryland, the movie starts out with Jack trying to rescue a victim from a burning building, when the floor collapses under him and he falls into the building. The rest of the movie consists of flashbacks of Jack’s life throughout the past 10 years, interspersed with some scenes in the present time where Jack’s colleagues are trying to find him and get him out of the building. At first, I liked the idea of doing flashbacks because it could help the audience really learn who the characters are. The problem is that director Jay Russell does a lousy job of tying those scenes into the overall story. It seemed like most of the flashback scenes were meant to emphasize the bond between the firefighters rather than develop characters, but even those scenes weren’t done very well. How many scenes do we need to see with the firefighters getting drunk in a pub or playing pranks on each other? Okay, they’re bestest buddy pals; we get it. It’s hard to believe this movie was written by Lewis Colick, the same guy who wrote the screenplay for the excellent October Sky.

Ironically, one of the biggest clichés in the movie is how Jack meets his soulmate, Linda (played by Jacinda Barrett). He and his best friend/coworker Dennis (played by Billy Burke) meet Linda and a friend of hers in a grocery store. Okay, quick show of hands. How many people met their significant other in a grocery store? Oh, not so unusual? Well, what if I told you that Jack and Dennis lied to Linda and her friend about their ranks in the fire department? Call me crazy, but if I were trying to meet a complete stranger in a grocery store and she caught me in even a small lie, I would think a restraining order would be more realistic than a romantic dinner. But in the very next scene, Jack and Linda are having a romantic dinner. Before you can say “bad movie cliché,” Jack and Linda are married. A little while later, the boys are in a pub, and Linda is with them. Despite the fact that she regularly drinks, she refuses a beer that’s offered to her. Wanna guess why? And one of the most groan-inducing moments is when all the guys sing along to the Ohio Players song “Fire.” I guess when you’re a firefighter, anything that doesn’t somehow involve fire — even in your personal life — is verboten.

When Jack first starts out at the fire station, he’s a wide-eyed, aw-shucks kid who looks exactly the same as he does in the beginning of the movie, even though he’s supposedly 10 years younger in that scene. Obviously, everyone is obliged to treat him like an outsider and give him a hard time as the mandatory initiation into their self-imposed fraternity. When Jack first meets Captain Mike Kennedy (played by John Travolta), the captain is half-asleep and he is not wearing his pants. (I’m pretty sure that would violate some sort of fire department policy in real life.) Naturally, Jack “passes” the initiation and becomes one of the guys, but despite all the camaraderie, you need at least one jerk among the sweetie-pies for sake of variation. That sad task falls upon Robert Patrick, who plays Lenny. (What happened to his career anyway?) Despite a few roadblocks in the relationship, do Lenny and Jack end up at least respecting each other? You get three guesses.

Oh, but life isn’t all champagne and soda crackers for Jack. His life can be really tough. His wife has a hard time dealing with the fact that he has such a risky job. Several of his coworkers are injured or killed over the years, forcing him to wonder if he should be doing something a little less risky. After the flashback sequences are mercifully over and the movie concentrates more on the present-day dilemma of Jack having fallen through the floor, things start to get a little more interesting. The problem is that there are only two possible outcomes: Either Jack is alive at the end of the movie, or he’s not. I won’t reveal which one it is, but I will say that the ending feels like it was stamped with a cookie cutter. As with the rest of the movie, there is nothing original or even mildly groundbreaking about the ending.

Overall, Ladder 49 is a disjointed mess, and it’s hard to figure out what point it’s trying to make. Is it trying to say that firefighters are heroes? Absolutely, but we already knew that. It needs to say something more, but it doesn’t. Given my tepid reaction to the trailer, I wasn’t expecting it to be the Citizen Kane of firefighter movies, but I wasn’t expecting it to be this bad either. I have great respect for our firefighters; they deserve a high-quality movie that allows audiences to see and feel the reality of the heroic work they do. Ladder 49 is not that movie.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: The Punisher

Vic Holtreman — Mon, 21 Mar 2005 16:15:14 +0000

By Vic Holtreman

Short version: Except for bad acting, a bad soundtrack, and a bad script, it’s not that bad a movie.

The word on The Punisher was not good before the movie came out, and after it’s release it only got worse. Forewarned is forearmed, so I passed on seeing it on the big screen. However… being a fan of comic books and the movies they inspire, combined with the fact that I had read a number of “Hey, it wasn’t that bad.” posts on various message boards, I decided to add it to my Netflix queue and give it a look.

The folks on the message boards were right, sort of. Except for the bad acting, a bad soundtrack, and a bad script, it’s not that bad a movie.

The movie opens with what seems to be an illegal arms deal gone wrong. Macho posturing ensues, FBI shows up, and the “money man” for the deal, who seems to be rather green at this sort of thing, is killed. It turns out that the German arms supplier with the bad accent is our hero, Frank Castle (played by the terribly miscast Thomas Jane). Frank, it turns out, is going to retire from the FBI at the ripe old age of about 35. Why, we have no idea… he’s a squeaky clean kind of guy so there’s no possibility he’s been skimming cash from drug busts. Maybe he became an agent at age 15 and the government has a killer pension plan.

After this we get to meet Frank’s wife and son and there is a bit of time dedicated in an attempt to make us care about him and his family. Kind of works, but not especially well. It just all seems pretty “canned”, and Thomas Jane’s “kinder/gentler” voice seemed to me like a bad cross between Clint Eastwood and a therapist. Really cringe-worthy.

It turns out that the young man killed in during the arms deal sting was the son of an extremely rich businessman played by John Travolta, whose wealth is not all derived from legal enterprises. Travolta looks like he had fun playing the part, and as usual I enjoyed watching him on screen. It almost looked like he took his Vincent Vega character from Pulp Fiction uptown. Anyway, he doesn’t take kindly to the death of his son, and his wife even less so. While he decides to have Castle killed, the wife chimes in with the command that Castle’s entire family be executed.

Here’s where we come to one part of the movie that I thought was a great concept… the idea of not only Castle’s wife and son being killed, but his entire extended family: In-Laws, father, brothers, cousins, etc. The assassins show up at a family reunion, the first in a few years, and they kill everyone. Of course Castle’s wife and son are left for last.

I thought this was a great setup for motivating Frank Castle as the spirit of vengeance. Upping the ante considerably from the Batman mythos of having his parents killed in front of him. I was also (pleasantly) suprised to see Roy Sheider appear briefly as Frank’s father.

This great setup was immediately crushed when the assassins come upon Castle, shoot him repeatedly in the chest, douse a pier in gasoline and blow it up with Frank on it. He is blown into the ocean and presumed to be dead. Hours later Frank washes ashore, is found by a local guy who the other locals believe is into Voodoo, and over a couple of months is healed of his injuries.

Right there, I had a “let me get this straight” moment: Multiple gunshots to the chest, the concussive force of an explosion, he lies untreated and bleeding for hours, but a voodoo guy nurses him back to health without hospitalization.

From this point on I can’t help but look at this as junk.

Cut to Castle (who shall heretofore be referred to as “The Punisher”) setting up his base of operation in an old warehouse semi-converted to a ratty living space. Of course also living in the building is a hottie who for some unexplained reason is roomates with a couple of guys who look like they would still be living in their parent’s basement watching Star Trek if their parents hadn’t kicked them out. We have shots of him building his armored car and hiding weapons all over his living space. I wondered why he would hide weapons everywhere if he was planning on taking the fight to the enemy, but I digress.

The film actually got a bit creative in how The Punisher set things in place for part of his revenge. Instead of a frontal assault, he planted seeds that would grow into mistrust between Travolta, his wife, and his right hand man. Not a bad idea, but I actually thought considering the tone of the rest of the film that it got a bit convoluted. In the end of course, it worked at destroying Travolta’s family from within.

Finally, at the end we got some more of what the target audience for this film paid to see: Stuff blowing up and plenty of high caliber gunfire. This bought the movie a few points for me, but then right at the end they pull way back for a completely cheesy Punisher logo shot that I’m sure was supposed to elicit a collective “Cool!” from the audience, but got no more than a groan out of me.

I really thought that Thomas Jane was miscast as The Punisher. Sure, he was buff, but he didn’t pull off the dark, obsessed, ex-special forces thing for me. He tried to do it by talking in a semi-whisper, but it just didn’t work. Another thing that didn’t work was setting this thing in Tampa, Florida. Why Tampa? Why not just make it New York City? That really would have fit the film much better. Sure it’s typical, but what in this film wasn’t? Oh, and I forgot to mention the soundtrack… right off the start it sounded like it came from a bad TV movie. Again here was something that if done differently could have at least made the movie work a bit better, but didn’t.

There was a seed of a good movie in there somewhere, but unfortunately it stayed buried and never saw the light of day.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Hide and Seek

Brian Rentschler — Mon, 31 Jan 2005 07:02:30 +0000

By Brian Rentschler

Short version: A disappointing mess. The script and direction are sub-par, and you could open a fish market with all the red herrings in the story.

I don’t think anyone can deny that Robert DeNiro is a very talented actor, but given the incredible missteps in his career over the past few years (Godsend, City by the Sea, The Score), it seems like his career is headed towards the same downward spiral as Harrison Ford’s career. (Random Hearts, anyone?) The latest example is Hide and Seek. Robert DeNiro and Dakota Fanning do admirable acting jobs with the material they are given, but even they can’t save the movie from a lousy script and terribly overblown direction. It is almost completely devoid of scares and suspense, unless you count the plethora of pedestrian “jump scares.”

The credentials of the people behind the scenes don’t exactly inspire confidence. Director John Polson is an Aussie actor whose biggest directing project prior to this one was Swimfan. Writer Ari Schlossberg is a relative newbie; his only previous writing credit on IMDB is a shared story credit for a movie called Lucky 13. And in both their cases, their inexperience sticks out like a sore thumb. Schlossberg’s script is light on scares and suspense, with plot elements that fall mostly flat. I kept getting the impression that he wanted to write a script that would put him in the same league as M. Night Shyamalan, but he didn’t even come close. Besides, after seeing The Village, I’m not sure if aspiring to be Shyamalan is such a good thing.

Far worse than Schlossberg’s lousy script, however, is John Polson’s terrible direction. Quite honestly, it has been a while since I saw a movie directed this badly. The story is full of red herrings, some of which can be attributed to the script, but many of them are courtesy of Polson’s directing. More on that a little later…

The story, such as it is, begins in New York City. Dr. David Callaway (played by Robert DeNiro) is a successful psychologist, but he and his wife Alison (played by Amy Irving) are having serious marital problems. Within the first few minutes of the movie, David finds Alison dead in the bathtub, having committed suicide by slitting her wrists. Their daughter Emily (played by Dakota Fanning) comes into the bathroom and sees her mother’s dead body, although David does not notice that she’s there. The story picks up again several months later in a New York City children’s hospital, where Emily is being evaluated by a shrink named Katherine (played by Famke Janssen), who is a friend and former student of David. The problem is, rather than go through the normal seven stages of grief like everybody else, Emily seems to be getting worse. David decides the best therapy for Emily (and himself) is to move someplace else and start over. Next stop: Woodland, New York.

I have lived in a few small towns throughout my life, and I don’t remember my realtor and the sheriff being on hand to let me in the house, but I suppose in Woodland, that’s standard procedure. At this point, Polson’s weak direction really starts to show. Every person in that town (and I mean every person) immediately starts to come across as ominous. First, it’s the sheriff, who is not quite as friendly as David thought. Then there’s his realtor, Mr. Haskins, whom David finds sneaking outside his house at two o’clock in the morning. Then there are his neighbors, who seem like they’re about ready to go off the deep end. And what’s the significance of all these ominous people? Well, Emily has developed some serious social problems, and she will only confide in an imaginary friend named Charlie. At first David doesn’t think anything of it, but then he starts to find some parts of the house vandalized. He scolds Emily for doing that, but she insists it was Charlie. Before long, Emily is blaming Charlie for things that are far worse than vandalism. At that point, the audience is forced to wonder whether Emily could do all that on her own, or if Charlie might be a real person after all.

With everyone portrayed as ominous, the idea is that Charlie could be anybody. He could even be a figment of Emily’s imagination. There are several obvious ploys throughout the story to make you think you have uncovered the secret of Charlie, but they exist only to drag the movie out even longer. There were at least two endings that I thought were endings, but the movie kept going and going and going and going and…

I won’t dare give away the ending, just in case you are a glutton for punishment and want to see this crapfest for yourself, but don’t expect anything spectacular. You might have fun seeing how long it takes you to figure out the ending ahead of time, or if you can guess the ending. (I didn’t guess the ending right; I wonder what that says about my intelligence level.) Overall, this movie was a disappointing mess. Here we have yet another movie starring Dakota Fanning that I didn’t like. Let’s hope her role in the upcoming War of the Worlds will start to reverse that trend. She’s a very good actress, and she deserves better material than this.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: The Boondock Saints

Brian Rentschler — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 08:05:11 +0000

By Brian Rentschler

Short version: This movie took a half-baked idea and executed it so poorly that the end result is almost unwatchable. This is a cinematic disaster that should be avoided at all costs.

First, I should give you a little background. You may be wondering why I am reviewing a movie that was released in 1999. Well, what sparked my interest in it was the fact that there is another movie in theaters right now, called Overnight, about the rise and fall of Troy Duffy, the writer/director of The Boondock Saints. To make a long story short, Troy Duffy was a bartender in Boston who was plucked out of obscurity by being in the right place at the right time. His script for The Boondock Saints went into a bidding war and was ultimately picked up by Harvey Weinstein, the head of Miramax Studios. Duffy ended up with a sweetheart deal that landed him in the director’s chair. With expectations so high, it was not surprising that Duffy failed to live up to the hype. He ended up alienating the studio as well as his own friends, and Miramax dropped their interest in the film. A small independent studio called Franchise ended up making the film for a fraction of the budget Miramax had offered. Slaughtered by critics, the film ended up on video without ever seeing a wide release in theaters.

After hearing all the bad buzz about The Boondock Saints, I thought to myself, “The subject of the movie is intriguing. Surely it can’t be that bad.” So I watched it to see for myself. Yup, it was that bad. Actually, it was much worse than I expected. Nearly every noteworthy scene is blatantly ripped off from other (better) movies, mostly by Quentin Tarantino. As if that’s not bad enough, there are so many bad-movie clichés that this movie should be bookmarked as a definitive reference. Here are just a few examples:

FBI agents are 100 times smarter than the bumbling local cops, figure out everything (even with little or no evidence) by getting inside the killer’s head and treat everyone like crap
After a massive shootout with hundreds of bullets fired, there are no deaths and only a few minor wounds
People shot from 10 yards away die instantly, but a guy who is shot at point blank range keeps fighting
A murder investigation leads police to a strip club
Someone crawls through the building’s air ducts and falls through the ceiling into the right room
A dangerous assassin is paroled(!) just in time to do an important hit for a crime boss

…and that’s only the tip of the iceberg.

The storyline centers around Connor McManus (Sean Patrick Flanery) and his fraternal twin Murphy (Norman Reedus). They are Irishmen who live in a Boston neighborhood that is mostly controlled by the Russian mafia. Tired of being bullied, they start to form the belief that God wants them to dispose of the bad guys. Their call to action comes in the form of a sermon in which the priest talks about the indifference of good people. Not long after that, they encounter some Russians who are trying to forcefully take over a bar that they frequent. They choose to fight, and the Russians end up dead. After taking the dead Russians’ guns and money, Connor and Murphy realize that they can make a better living by disposing of bad guys than they can from the menial jobs they currently have. They end up going to the police station and telling FBI agent Paul Smecker (Willem Dafoe) that they killed the Russians in self-defense. (They leave out the part where they took the guns and money.) Smecker lets the twins go, and they receive quite a bit of public adoration for disposing of the scumbags. Before long, the twins embark on their new “career,” and more dead bodies start piling up. Almost immediately, Agent Smecker figures out who is doing the killings, and he starts to mount a case against the twins. Things are complicated by the fact that the mob retaliates against the twins by hiring an assassin (Billy Connolly) to kill them, as well as the fact that the public appreciates what the twins (by now known as “The Saints” in the press) are doing.

This is far from an original concept (ever heard of Natural Born Killers?), but the idea is at least intriguing. The problem is, I have never seen it executed well (no pun intended). I hated Natural Born Killers, and this movie certainly didn’t raise the bar on the genre. For starters, almost every role in this movie was horribly miscast. Only Carlo Rota, who plays a crime boss, does a halfway decent acting job, and even he is over the top sometimes. Norman Reedus’ Irish accent is especially troublesome, and Willem Dafoe is so over the top that he seems to be channeling Jeremy Irons from Dungeons and Dragons. Even worse is the character of “Funny Man” (David Della Rocco). In real life, he never did any acting before (or after) this movie, and it shows. His frenzied, over-the-top hamola performance sticks out like a sore thumb, and that’s really saying something considering how bad the other actors are. Note to aspiring filmmakers: If you need to cast a sleazy mob character, there are better choices than porno actor Ron Jeremy. And if you need to cast a dangerous assassin, there are better choices than comedian Billy Connolly. (Trivia alert: Another movie featuring Billy Connolly, Timeline, was also slaughtered on this site.) And finally, if you’re casting a lead role, it might be wise to think twice before you hire someone who also starred in a romantic comedy featuring a magical crab. (I only wish I were making that up.)

Without giving away any crucial details (just in case you want to see this train wreck for yourself), there were three scenes that were awful enough to deserve a special mention:

The scene where Agent Smecker is describing the “Armageddon firefight” that occurred
The scene where “Funny Man” goes along with the twins to take out some bad guys
The scene where Agent Smecker goes “undercover”

According to SlashFilm, the ostensibly long-awaited sequel has been greenlit. If only there were some “saints” who disposed of crappy movies…

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Alien vs Predator (AVP)

Vic Holtreman — Sat, 21 Aug 2004 07:14:31 +0000

By Vic Holtreman

Short version: A lame attempt to cash in on both franchises, but if you skip the first half of the movie, the second half provides some worthwhile action.

I finally had the chance to watch Aliens vs Predator (or as it’s affectionately known: AVP) tonight at a drive-in if you can believe it. It was that or Princess Diaries 2 (which my wife and daughter selected) so I was quite happy with my viewing choice. Here’s a tip: Show up about 30 minutes late and you’ll really enjoy this movie. Seriously.

Of the two images to the right, the top one is what makes this movie work. The bottom image is what makes it painful. I don’t think I’ll spoil much by letting you know that most everyone in the photo will be dead by the end of the movie… and let me tell you, that can’t happen fast enough. They drag the movie like a boat anchor, and once it’s free of them and concentrates on the Aliens and the Predators it takes off pretty well.

The basic story is a corporate satellite picks up a “heat bloom” in Antarctica. The satellite belongs to Weyland corporation (a nod to the awesome Aliens) and it is run by Charles Bishop Weyland as played by Lance Henriksen. If you recall, Henriksen played the android (named Bishop) in the aforementioned Aliens, which was created by the still existent Weyland corp. This is just one of a number of nods to the source films upon which this was based.

Anyway, Weyland determines that there is a huge pyramid at that location, 2000 feet under the ice. He has some sort of terminal disease that causes a lot of coughing and is helped by his breathing into something that looks like my cylindrical toothbrush travel container. He of course assembles a crack team of archaelogists and some other non-specific folks, along with experienced ice-trekker Alexa (played by Sanaa Lathan).

At this point the groan factor increases as we have some major over-acting and cliched lines. I wasn’t sure if this was kind of a tribute to the original Predator (where for some reason, it worked) or if it was just bad writing/acting/directing. I’m pretty sure it was the latter.

Weyland wants to leave immediately, Alexa says they need weeks just to get ready and refuses to go (riiiiiiiiight). So we have the handsome archaelogist with a foreign accent, the father of two who’s geeky but doesn’t seem to realize it, and a blonde with a butch haircut who’s bringing a gun because “it’s like a condom: I’d rather have it and not need it, than not have it and need it”. And no, I did not just make that up.

This was all major A1 level boring, but I got my first jolt of excitement when they cut to a ship in space, and eventually they do a Predator reveal. Cool. Next bit of coolness is when we see our first Alien, frozen and captured, being revived after a century of captivity and apparent death.

Our explorers find a perfectly circular tunnel that goes down to the pyramid “at a perfect 30 degree angle”. No one on earth could have done this in 24 hours, so hmmm… whatever, lets just go down the tunnel. There was another little tribute here echoing the scene from Aliens where Bishop is being dragged across the deck at the end of the movie.

There’s lots of exploring and getting split up so they can get picked off, and at some point an explanation is given for how and why both races are here. No point in my giving more detail than that. What I really didn’t like during this part of the film was that I felt like I was watching two different movies that had been spliced together: a Predator film and an Alien film. Things just didn’t mesh well here. At one point a bunch of characters pull machine guns out of their backpacks, gear, or whatever. I don’t understand why they brought machine guns on an archaelogical expedition, and it’s never explained.

Another odd thing was how fast the gestation of the Aliens happened here… in the original Alien it took about 24 hours for the face-hugger to fall off and then about another hour for the little fella to come out of someone’s chest, and then a few more hours for the creature to become full-grown. In AVP this whole process seems to happen in about 30 minutes tops.

Paul Anderson, who wrote and directed, did put in some great moments with our two antagonists, it’s just his people stuff that was awful. The first meeting between a Predator and Alien just brought a big fat smile to my face, and the ensuing battle truly fit the opponents. This was no cakewalk for either of them. It was brutal and they were pretty evenly matched: The Aliens’ ferocity vs the Predators’ fearlessness and skill. There were some great wins on both sides during various fight scenes, and I felt that they fit well as opposed to feeling that they were just trying to give each side a win, tit for tat.

If you’re a fan of the Predator movies and think there’s no cooler villain than those in the Alien series, just show up late, sit back, and enjoy the battle without the nuisance of speaking characters. Don’t look for deep thoughts here, just check your brain at the door and enjoy the ride.

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Exorcist IV (The Beginning)

Brian Rentschler — Fri, 20 Aug 2004 23:20:58 +0000

By Brian Rentschler

Short version: A major disappointment that relies more on jump scares than genuine scares. The script is sub-par, and Renny Harlin’s direction is even worse. Don’t waste your time or money on this crapfest.

When a movie studio doesn’t show a particular movie to critics ahead of time, that’s usually not a good sign. Sadly, such was the case with Exorcist: The Beginning. Given that fact, plus the fact that Renny Harlin was directing, I went into this movie with fairly low expectations. Incredibly, this movie did not even meet those.

This movie is a prequel to the original. The story is set in 1949, several years after World War II has ended. Father Merrin (played by Stellan Skarsgård), who would later be called upon to exorcise the demon from Regan MacNeil, is a troubled soul. The problem is, Father Merrin saw the Nazis do things during World War II that caused him to question his faith. Before you can say “Jack Daniel’s,” he has resigned from the priesthood and become a hard-drinking, tough-talking archaeologist. In a scene that looks blatantly ripped off from an Indiana Jones movie, a collector ends up hiring him to work with an archaeological team that has discovered an old church in Africa.

Movie cliché #720:

Person #1: “You’re assuming I’ll say yes.”
Person #2: “You already have.”

What is puzzling everybody is the fact that the church appears to be in pristine condition, like it was buried immediately after it was built. The other big question is how a Christian church could be built centuries before Christianity was formally established as a religion. The African tribe in the nearby village refuses to go into the church because they are afraid of its evil spirits. When Father Merrin and his team go inside the church, they find some things that seem rather out of place in a house of worship, to say the least.

Pop quiz: The African tribe has already had a few bizarre things happen. After Father Merrin and his team go inside the church, what happens to the frequency of bizarre events?

A) Increases
B) Decreases
C) Stops completely
D) Lags behind the NASDAQ

I’ll give you a hint: It’s the obvious answer. The tribe really starts freaking out when even more bad events start to befall them. Eventually, the British Army becomes involved, and Father Merrin finds himself virtually reliving the events from World War II that he had hoped to forget. There was one line uttered by Father Merrin that got a slight chuckle from me: “In my experience, getting soldiers involved in any situation is always a bad idea.” There are so many questions at this point. Will Father Merrin witness events that cause him to renew his faith? Will Father Merrin end up exorcising a demon at some point? Will Father Merrin react with shock to a “plot twist” we all figured out 20 minutes before he did?

I must admit, I kind of like the ideas behind the story, but thanks to Harlin’s inept direction, it falls completely flat. The subtle creepiness of the original has been replaced with gory shock value in this one. He tries to throw in all kinds of plot twists and surprises, but almost all of them are “red herrings” that anyone with a pulse can spot a mile away. With the exception of a few “jump scares,” this movie is not frightening in the least. Well, actually, let me correct myself. The only thing that frightened me about this movie was how mediocre it was. Even the musical score by Trevor Rabin was bland, which is not good when you’re doing a horror movie. As much as I hate to say this, I thought the criminally overrated Blair Witch Project was scarier than this crapfest. (And no, that’s not a compliment to either film.) The one-two punch of a bad script and bad direction makes every scene so predictable that you can almost write each scene in your mind before it happens.

Pop quiz: A man is crawling down a cave when his lamp goes out. After he gets the flame going in the lamp again and holds it out in front of him, what will be six inches from his face?

A) A demonically possessed person
B) The holy grail (but he must choose wisely)
C) A magical rod that attracts red dragons
D) A briefcase belonging to Marsellus Wallace

Now if you don’t know the answer to that one, you need to get out to the movie theater more often. If you have followed all the films in this series, you know that as long as you stay away from Maryland and Africa, you should be fine.

Overall, this movie was a tremendous disappointment. I wasn’t expecting it to be great, but when it’s this bad, you have to wonder why Morgan Creek even bothered making it in the first place. The actors all do admirable jobs, but with a lousy script and inept direction, even they can’t pull this movie out of the gutter. The original still remains my favorite; no other film in this series can match it. I have read reports that William Peter Blatty, who wrote the first and third films in this series and directed the third, was pleased with Paul Schrader’s version of the fourth film. However, Morgan Creek chose to shelve that version and completely reshoot the film with Renny Harlin at the helm. The good news is that since Schrader’s version is totally separate, there’s a good chance we may end up seeing it on DVD fairly soon. Let’s hope… In the meantime, don’t waste your time and money on the Renny Harlin version of this crapfest, unless you’re a die-hard fan (no pun intended).

You Might Also Be Interested In:

Review: Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy

Vic Holtreman — Mon, 02 Aug 2004 03:57:34 +0000

By Vic Holtreman

Short version: This might have made a good 3 minute skit, but there’s not enough here to fill a movie that feels like it’s 4 hours long.

You’re probably familiar with the theory that with comedies, the funniest parts are usually in the trailer, not leaving much unseen when it comes to the film itself.

I’m here to tell you that Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy sadly, does not break that rule. Having recently seen the very funny Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, I really was hoping for the best here.

It starts out with a voiceover talking about local news shows and how much weight they carried back in the days before cable. Yes, for some of you reading it may come as a shock, but cable TV did not always exist. There was some promise in the opening, which described the state of affairs back then with just enough tounge-in-cheek to make me think I was in for a witty backhanded salute to the early 70’s (which seems to be when the movie takes place).

At first I wasn’t disappointed, although the most the movie elicited from me (and the audience) was a slight chuckle here and there. I was expecting the early part of the film to be a warm up for the good stuff, but unfortunately from there (with a few exceptions), the film slides into just plain silliness, and from there dumbness.

The jist of the film is the end of the male newsanchor era, with the first woman (Christina Applegate) trying to break into the business, and how the guys behind the newsdesk are fighting it. Christina was actually the bright spot in the film, and whenever she was on screen things improved considerably. The male news team is led by Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell) and they’re just a bunch of stereotypical characters. You’ve got the ringleader Ron, then there’s the guy who’s a ladies man in his own mind, the tough-guy sportscaster who gives unsubtle hints that he’s in the closet, and then the requisite stupid character (the weatherman, with a self-professed IQ of 48).

We have your basic story of gorgeous, intelligent woman who for some bizarre reason falls in love with egotistical, moronic man. In addition, without exception every male character in this film is portrayed as an idiot. Fred Willard as the station manager shows some bit of intelligence, but that is shot through by the running gag concerning his lack of handling his troublemaker son in Catholic school.

The film gets weirder as it goes on and attempts to pay homage to a number of movies and TV shows, including Planet of the Apes and The Six Million Dollar Man.

Bottom line, Anchorman would have been a funny SNL skit (actually it was, wasn’t it?) and it felt more like 4 hours than 90 minutes long. If I wasn’t going to see another movie afterwards, I probably would have walked out.

If you’re in the mood for a comedy, go check out Dodgeball before it’s gone. Trust me.

You Might Also Be Interested In: