Jon and Scott of the Total Talk Nonsense podcast have an expression they use in evaluating movies. The call them “quality kills”.
“Taken” is all about quality kills. And possibly making Liam Neessn an action star. Tightly edited fight scenes helped with this and Liam Neeson definitely pulled it off, though scenes of him running down the street made him look a bit the the older dad that he was playing.
The story is simple. He will rescue his kidnapped daughter. As a former CIA agent he has “a unique set of skills” that make this just possible.
The enemies are vile and numerous. But he’s a Dad. He’s skilled. He’s determined.
If you like quality kills. You must see “Taken”. If you like deep characterization and complex plot development. Watch something else. I liked it. But its not an academy award winner.
Director Pierre Morel
Writers (WGA):
Luc Besson (written by) &
Robert Mark Kamen (written by)
Release Date:
30 January 2009 (USA) more
Cast
(Cast overview, first billed only)
Liam Neeson … Bryan Mills
Maggie Grace … Kim
Leland Orser … Sam
Jon Gries … Casey
David Warshofsky … Bernie
Holly Valance … Sheerah
Katie Cassidy … Amanda
Xander Berkeley … Stuart
Olivier Rabourdin … Jean-Claude
Gérard Watkins … St-Clair
Famke Janssen … Lenore
5 of 5 Big toothy grinning Smiling Maxes for 3:10 to Yuma. A love story.
Dan Evans (Christian Bale) fought for the North in the war between the states. Ben Wade (Russell Crowe) fights for himself as the fastest shootin’est bad guy in the west. Their lives are about to collide.
Evans took the almost $200 the Federal government gave him as compensation for the loss of his foot, and went out west with his family to try to build a life. His ranch is under pressure from drought and the railroad. People want to take things from Dan.
Ben Wade assembled a group of about 7 or 8 (“which is it, 7 or 8?”) lethal killing machines including a well developed lieutenant character who is a bit of a dandy and stone dead shot with either hand. Ben’s crew has a deadly long range sharp shooter in the troop which adds to the sense that death could come at any moment.
Early on we see this menacing bunch take on and easily destroy a Wells Fargo wagon made of steel and sporting a Gatling gun. This bunch is fearless and lethal.
Shortly after the incident with Wells Fargo Dan and his sons happen upon the result of the attack on the wagon. Dan Evans is facing a group that not only kills, but their leader Ben Wade just killed one of his own who was being held hostage by a wagon survivor.
Ben lets Dan go. Ben gets captured. Dan volunteers to assist in bringing him to the 3:10 train to Yuma for hangin’.
This is a buddy movie. This is a road movie. This is a war movie and a western. It is a morality play and it is a love story. As the story moves we learn that Ben and his crew are just soulless killers. Plain dangerous. Tension builds when Dan brings now prisoner Ben home to where his wife and kids sit down to dinner with this most dangerous man. The way Russell Crowe feels the fork in his hands, deadly quick hands, and right at the table with the rancher’s family forsadows more death at the hands of this most dangerous killer. The ride takes us through Indian country into Yuma and to the train. Dan Evans wants to save his farm with the money he’ll get from Wells Fargo. With the money he’ll get from turning in the man who spared his life.
Additionally Dan hopes to win the respect of his eldest son, a fourteen year old who has witness his father being pushed around by the railroads. The boy dreams of a life of adventure and danger. Does he prefer the adventure in evil Ben Wade to his family man father, who’s courage he questions.
And this story is about courage. We see Dan on the ground as the bad guys burn his barn at the outset. We see him riding tall in the saddle when the first confrontation happens with Ben Wade. Standing tall again in an exchange at the bar with Ben in town, knowing fully who Ben is, how dangerous he is, and how Ben spared Dan’s life, Dan Evans keeps pressing him for cash for his silence. After Ben Wade is captured Dan turns sides and offers to help bring Ben to trial – if Wells Fargo has the right offer.
The pace is modest but presses ever more dangerously increasing the tension the duo encounter continuing and the escalating danger. As Ben learns more about Dan his respect grows and fear never appears. He is as cool as the morning floor, as relaxed as the steel rail.
As any good movie will show, we see evolution in the characters of both Dan and Ben. Revealed as much in what they will not do, as what they must do, the two men draw closer together even as they oppose each other on the journey and their respect for each other grows.
The real life stories of both actors have been in the news. In real life both of these men have created unappealing images of themselves. Yet Russell Crowe seems so easy as Ben Wade his smile so lethal, that we forget Russell Crowe and see only Ben.
Unimpressed by Bale as “Batman” and less impressed with his tirade which was all over the interwebtubes in “3:10 to Yuma” Christian Bale completely wins us over. A subtle modest performance, Bale is both constant as Dan Evans and still grows and stands up as Dan Evans until we admire him most of all, never forgetting the seeming hopelessness of his plight. In a word Bale is great. Award winning caliber acting in a classic story of two men growing and growing closer in the process. In a way, “3:10 to Yuma” is a love story, but unlike some love stories, this one does not end tragically.
Much violence, some of it personal, but the violence doesn’t interfere with the movie. The violence is however, necessary for one of the main themes which is courage and the cost of it. Its fair to say the movie contrasts courage and fearlessness, which are not the same thing.
Its not a movie for the kids. There’s no sexuality in the movie, though Gretchen Mol makes us sad that this should be the case.
This movie never loses focus, builds dramatic tension and ends at the perfect time, and in a manner we can defend.
Great story. Great characters. Great acting, especially Bale, though we should mention Logan Lerman as Dan’s eldest and Peter Fonda as the craggy old Wells Fargo man. Ben Foster as Charlie Prince deserves special mention. His “Prince” is both lethal and stylish something so rare it begs the question when, if ever have we seen a character like this in a western.
Overall 3:10 is a pressing great compelling film. And the relationship is so compelling – your wife will be glad she watched this film too.
Director:
James Mangold
Writers (WGA):
Halsted Welles (screenplay) and
Michael Brandt (screenplay) …
Release Date:
7 September 2007 (USA) more
Awards:
Nominated for 2 Oscars. Another 2 wins & 15 nominations more
Cast
(Cast overview, first billed only)
Russell Crowe … Ben Wade
Christian Bale … Dan Evans
Logan Lerman … William Evans
Dallas Roberts … Grayson Butterfield
Ben Foster … Charlie Prince
Peter Fonda … Byron McElroy
Vinessa Shaw … Emma Nelson
Alan Tudyk … Doc Potter
Luce Rains … Marshal Weathers
Gretchen Mol … Alice Evans
4 of 5 Smiling Maxes. Rent it today. Unless you are passionate about your bible – then you’d better leave it alone.
One of the greatest concepts for a movie in a long time. Ok. Sort of the inverse of Liar Liar. Where Jim Carey can’t lie. Everyone in this world, and its the regular real world we all know, which of course couldn’t exist if nobody ever lied because people would beat each other up, most relationships wouldn’t have happened in the first place so there may not ever actually even be people and at the very least people’s feelings would be hurt pretty much all the time so nobody would be quite as sanguine as they are in this movie. But forget that and let’s just stipulate that it would be really really awkward if nobody ever lied.
Mark Bellison is about to have a bad day. He’s going to get fired. But first he’s going out on a date with a woman who is way out of his league. He admits this as she admits that she was masturbating before he arrived and she wished that he had come later … uh … arrived later.
Imagine the possibilities for farce.
He says he is going to get fired the next day etc etc and this comes to pass. Its all pretty awkward but clever if not belly laugh funny.
This movie, this great concept could have gone in a million different directions.
In “The Invention Of Lying” Mark Bellison, (Ricky Gervais), has an epiphany just when his life seems to get worse over worse as he is evicted for non payment of the rent after he loses his job after Anna McDoogles ( Jennifer Garner) tells him she’ll never go out with him again because she’s out of his league. Which, of course, is true.
There’s a great scene in the bar as he tries to explain to his friends what he’s done when he lied to the bank. But the movie moves to full belly laughs when he brings the word of the “man in the sky” to the people waiting on his lawn.
At times he pace is fairly slow, and you get a bit of appreciation for this sad sack when he lies to his dying mother about what happens after you die.
Most writers and producers stick with the Jim Carey style gawking exaggerated faces and the slapstick surprises you might find with Jim Carey but “The Invention Of Lying” is a more intellectual subtle movie than traditional American comedy.
But if you don’t mind a send up of The Ten Commandments, Ricky Gervais’ delivering of the ten things people should know about the man in the sky is belly laugh hilarious. Albeit irreligious and potentially even blasphemous.
Its really funny.
Overall the movie is a modest movie with a slowish pace and a feeling you want more of the best of it. It focuses on the relationship between Gervais and Garner and while its quite smart its almost too even handed. But really really funny. Almost a great movie, a bit too vulgar for the kids but if you’re not too sensitive about religion, this movie is a must see.
Directors:
Ricky Gervais
Matthew Robinson
Writers (WGA):
Ricky Gervais (written by) &
Matthew Robinson (written by)
Release Date:
2 October 2009 (USA) more
Cast
Ricky Gervais … Mark Bellison
Jennifer Garner … Anna McDoogles
Jonah Hill … Frank
Louis C.K. … Greg
Jeffrey Tambor … Anthony
Fionnula Flanagan … Martha Bellison
Rob Lowe … Brad Kessler
Tina Fey … Shelley
3 of 5 Smiling Maxes. Its a craftily built suspense movie that’s almost too intense to watch. But it finishes weak and sells a less important point.
The “tag line” in the IMDB review below says you’ll know it when you’re in it. Its war. I don’t know war, so I shouldn’t say. But I’m going to say. The tag line of this movie should be, “war is addicting”. They print that text right in the movie. So at the end [BIG SPOILER] when the hero goes back for another tour, you think this movie is about war being addicting. [END SPOILER]
I don’t know war. I hope to never know war. I suspect this movie is really like war. I suspect the stress and tension and craziness is accurately portrayed in “The Hurt Locker”. The acting is tight. Jeremy Renner is first rate as the cool, maybe a little too cool, no, definitely a little too cool, bomb disposal technician who leads his team at just that, in Iraq.
Its a bad place, at a bad time. But Sergeant William James takes over a leaderless bomb disposal team. Anthony Mackie as Sgt. JT Sanborn
is the opposite kind of soldier, smart, careful, professional. Sanborn is NOT happy with James. But they must work together in this most dangerous profession amidst a country of people who neither speak their language nor trust them. And they can’t trust the people around them.
Reality must be hell for these guys. Periods of intense danger followed by times waiting for the next period of intense danger. They must rely on each other, whether they like each other or not.
In a way its a buddy film. Its clearly a war film. Its designed to bring you into the intense danger and boredom of the lives of the bomb disposal team.
The movie is intense.
It may even be real. But somehow I felt cheated after all that stress and tension, and there is a LOT of it. That the point to make is that some people get addicted to the adrenaline rush of war? Is that really your point? Your academy award nominated statement is that people can get addicted to war?
I think its a lame finish to an otherwise great movie. So as a suspense thriller its great. As a buddy movie it works. The characters grow closer. You like them. You buy into the story and the people and the danger. An extremely well made film “The Hurt Locker” will scare the crap out of you. And while it scared the crap out of me I felt cheated by the ending. Its that simple. The hurt locker is a roller coaster ride through hell. Let’s do it again.
No. Not me.
Director:
Kathryn Bigelow
Writer (WGA):
Mark Boal (written by)
Release Date:
10 October 2008 (Italy) more
Tagline:
You’ll know when you’re in it.
Awards:
Nominated for 9 Oscars. Another 53 wins & 50 nominations
Cast
Jeremy Renner … SFC William James
Anthony Mackie … Sgt. JT Sanborn
Brian Geraghty … Spc. Owen Eldridge
Guy Pearce … SSG Matt Thompson
Ralph Fiennes … Contractor Team Leader
David Morse … Colonel Reed
Evangeline Lilly … Connie James
“District 9″ starts slowly. And the lead character is goofy. Frankly it just didn’t grab me at first. I’d seen the tv trailers. Its a monster/alien movie. Something weird. Something different. It looked intriguing enough that I decided I’d watch it. From that point on I don’t like to watch trailers. Typically they give too much away. (But I’ve included one here that leaves the story intact.)
So I go into this movie with an open mind and its set in South Africa? Really? And this guy is … is … well, like “Brownie”. The choice of documentary style is annoying. We don’t have to know who the characters are, just what they do. Most of the people in this movie, just advance the plot. Its not about character … except …
The lead character, I don’t even remember his name, is such a goof. The lead human I should say.
[Spoiler] Looming over Johannesburg is a large ship filled with Aliens. They’ve been parked in the sky for twenty years. The occupants have been brought down to earth and placed in internment camps in District 9 where they’ve lived in close quarters and great poverty for twenty years. South Africa? Separated and poor? Ok. I think I get it. The aliens are derided as “prawns” because they look like prawns to the humans, and are looked down upon. Their numbers are growing and the South African government feels they need to be moved from their shanty town, to a newer larger location. They send this one overwhelmed incompetent little bureaucrat to lead an eviction and relocation. [Spoiler over]
The politics seem a little simplistic. The metaphor obvious. The logic of the basic premise seems flawed. Would “we” just put a whole race of aliens in an interment camp? Probably not, but point taken. The style is like “The Office”. And the characters weak and one dimensional. At least at first.
Yet this movie will grab you.
It builds slowly. The lead character evolves over time. We begin to learn something about the aliens and the action grows leading “District 9″ from a mash-up of Alien and The Office toward an edge of your seat action movie with good guys and bad guys and characters who evolve and grow and that you root for with your whole body.
There’s a lot here, and it does have its symbolism (I’d have to go back and re-watch it for all the metaphor that may just be there) but at first blush its just fun. Much more action than drama.
A great ride that starts slowly but builds and grabs you.
4 of 5 stars for “District 9″. Rent it. Watch it. There’s a great deal of violence in it and it could be a problem for young kids. Older kids will love the action and while the violence is personal and graphic its almost video game violence and probably not nightmare inducing. The payoff is good.
THE HANGOVER is a stupid film … in the best kind of way. Its a buddy film. Its an adventure film. There’s this lingering series of lines of tension that actually keep you on the edge of your seat for pretty much the whole movie. And above all its a fun movie that really doesn’t take itself seriously.
No Oscars here. Is there an Oscar that goes to best actor in a comedy role? Will if there were it wouldn’t go to Ed Helm. There’s just something about him that is not likeable, and yet even he is redeemed by the end of the movie. In fact I could even say he were good if it weren’t for his incessant crowing on tv during the promotion of the film, about how he actually took his tooth out for this movie. Talk about the movie Ed.
“Not you fat Jesus” is probably one of, if not the line to come out of this movie. But then the movie is rampled to the ramparts with physical comedy. Taser humor, in moderation, can be funny. As can testicle humor. You expect that, and you get it. Frankly you expect much more nudity, but this movie doesn’t always go where you expect.
It does however, hold that dramatic tension while still managing to make you laugh over and over and to shake your head.
The breakout actor, the guy you remember in this is Zack Galifianakis as Alan Garner. Alan is primarily responsible for the mess we find our heroes in and seems to be the one we bring with us after the show. Zack is everywhere it seems, these days and Alan Garner is the reason.
If you’ve seen the credits you’ve seen Mike Tyson in this and you’ve seen the tiger in the hotel room. Just unwinding that is enough for this movie, but there’s the baby, the car and of course Heather Graham.
I confess I didn’t even figure out the mystery till the end. I was too distracted with all of the messes that these poor slobs got themselves into, and now have to unravel. Yes, its a mystery too.
4 of 5 Smiling Maxes. Boys behaving badly. Its stupid and its fun.
Director:
Todd Phillips
Writers (WGA):
Jon Lucas (written by) &
Scott Moore (written by)
Release Date:
5 June 2009 (USA) more
Genre:
Comedy more
Tagline:
Some guys just can’t handle Vegas more
Plot:
A Las Vegas-set comedy centered around three groomsmen who lose their about-to-be-wed buddy during their drunken misadventures, then must retrace their steps in order to find him
Cast
Bradley Cooper … Phil Wenneck
Ed Helms … Stu Price
Zach Galifianakis … Alan Garner
Justin Bartha … Doug Billings
Heather Graham … Jade
Sasha Barrese … Tracy Garner
Jeffrey Tambor … Sid Garner
Ken Jeong … Mr. Chow
Rachael Harris … Melissa
Mike Tyson … Himself
Mike Epps … Black Doug
I watched UP again on Christmas. I think this was my favorite sequence:
Dug: I am a great tracker. My pack sent me on a special mission, all by myself. Have you seen a bird? I am going to find one, and I am on the scent. I am a great tracker; did I mention that?
[Dug is suddenly attacked by Kevin, who shrieks in Dug's face after pinning him to the ground] Dug: Hey, that is a bird! I have never seen one up close, but this is a bird. May I take your bird back to camp as my prisoner? Carl Fredricksen: Yes, yes, take it! And on the way, learn how to bark like a real dog! Dug: I can bark.
[barks] Dug: And this is howling.
[howls] Dug: [Kevin screeches] Russell: Can we keep him? Please, please, please?
[Carl says "No."] Carl Fredricksen: No. Russell: But it’s a TALKING DOG!
Watch “Smart People”. I’m probably not smart enough to pick up on the references and symbolism of “Smart People” but I know a good movie when I see it and this is it.
“Smart People” is a gentle, subtle small story of a regular American family. Set in Pittsburgh smart people introduces us to a family of mostly exceptional people, and then sets about proving that they are just like us. Along the way however it never gets preachy and it never clobbers you over the head.
You slowly come to the realization that these people, exceptional though they are, are just like you. Except maybe that you like them more.
Dennis Quaid, whom I thought over acted in “The Rookie” which I just saw on TV, really shone as a young-ish widower with an exceptionally intelligent, but achingly alone daughter, who is emotionally detached but dedicated to her dad. This child, winningly, charmingly, subtly played by Ellen Page is the caretaker of a disfunctional, if kind, typical American family of intellectuals – if such a bear exists.
Thomas Haden Church puts on a fine performance as Quaid’s adopted, neear-do-Well brother, who’s own intelligence falls in the plane of human understanding and kind of brings the family back to a grounded state. The movie begins sometime after the death of Lawrence Wetherhold’s (Quaid’s) wife. And Quaid is sufficiently understated and crumudgenly to be likable while still being so gruff.
Sarah Jessica Parker is a little low energy but still good as the one time student of professor Wetherhold, who is now a doctor, but who once had a crush on her professor.
Ellen Page is phenomenal, if someone so reserved can be a phenomenon. Everything is understated, held back, reserved in her performance, and it makes her bust out of the screen. As in Juno you can’t wait for Ellen Page’s next scene.
The movie moves gently, crisply and wittily through the character’s unveiling of their flaws and demons which are small and easily forgiven and their charms and successes which are substantial and which ultimately win our hearts and make us root for these people. This is a character driven movie which moves gently from mild accommodation of the general miserableness of people toward a place of acceptance and a hope for hope. Its a small film, gently made and smart.
Watch it. Love it. Its ok for the kids who will probably be bored with it because it is written for people older than 11 and there’s just enough (bum) nuditiy and sexual suggestiveness to keep it from a G rating anyway.
Its fine, its fun and its a little movie that you’ll be glad you watched.
5 of 5 Smiling Maxes for “Smart People”.
Director:
Noam Murro
Writer (WGA):
Mark Poirier (written by)
Release Date:
11 April 2008 (USA) more
Awards:
1 nomination
Cast Dennis Quaid … Lawrence Wetherhold
Sarah Jessica Parker … Janet Hartigan
Thomas Haden Church … Chuck Wetherhold
Ellen Page … Vanessa Wetherhold
Ashton Holmes … James Wetherhold
Christine Lahti … Nancy
Slumdog Millionare won the academy award for best picture. That’s a little like Barack Obama winning the Nobel Peace Price. You root for him, but you know he didn’t deserve it.
Slumdog has its moments. Too many moments. But many of them are good. The story follows the format of how could this “Slumdog” kid know all the answers to the India version of “Who Wants to Be A Millionare”. Jamal, a desperately poor Muslim minority child from the worst parts of Mumbai follows the format of the TV show with explanations of how he learned the answers to all of the questions in the show. Improbably answers he seemingly shouldn’t have known, such as who is on an American $100 bill. And who invented the revolver.
Each question is followed by a flashback of some impossible, torturous moment in the lives of Jamal and his brother and a girl they met as they struggle to survive in the filthy and desperation of this overpopulated biggoted city.
The points are clear, if a bit obvious, and you kind of get hit over the head with the moralizing of the story. The whole thing lacks subtlety and pace, however the actors are compelling and the drama builds.
It kind of reminds me of an old American Western with the good guys and the bad guys. There’s something comforting about that lack of grey (though the brother Salim belies this – his character never warms the cock-ells of your heart).
And in the end it just takes to long to get there.
The violence is not great, but it is way too much for children to watch which is too bad because Ayush Mahesh Khedekar, the child who plays youngest Jamal is just perfect, really charming. Steals the show is not too strong to say. And Freida Pinto as oldest Latika could easily win the title of most beautiful girl in the world.
There’s much to like about Slumdog … the problem is it is too much.
3 of 5 Smiling Maxes. Who could disparage a happy ending?
Directors:
Danny Boyle
Loveleen Tandan (co-director: India)
Writers:
Simon Beaufoy (screenplay)
Vikas Swarup (novel)
Awards:
Won 8 Oscars. Another 95 wins & 45 nominations
Cast
Dev Patel … Jamal K. Malik
Saurabh Shukla … Sergeant Srinivas
Anil Kapoor … Prem
Rajendranath Zutshi … Director (as Raj Zutshi)
Jeneva Talwar … Vision Mixer
Freida Pinto … Latika
Irrfan Khan … Police Inspector
Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail … Youngest Salim
Ayush Mahesh Khedekar … Youngest Jamal
The other day I watched a silly movie called Sex Drive. Pretty much of a classic coming of age film. The thing is … I enjoyed it. It was predictable. It was silly. And yes, there were a few naked breasts, but not overly many and a really cool car. The weirdest part was that the kid who played the “player” was the kid who I picked out right away as the nerdy kid. But it had all the feel of a National Lampoon movie meets “American Pie”.
The best part of course, was Seth Green playing an Amish mechanic [spoiler] who fixes the cool car. And if you’ve never seen an Amish with a dry sense of humor then you have to check out this movie.
Its stupid, easy fun.
3 of 5 smiling Maxes for “Sex Drive”.
Overview
User Rating:
6.8/10 21,971 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?
Down 8% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.
Director:
Sean Anders
Writers (WGA):
Sean Anders (screenplay) &
John Morris (screenplay) …
Release Date:
17 October 2008 (USA) more
Cast
Josh Zuckerman … Ian
Amanda Crew … Felicia
Clark Duke … Lance
James Marsden … Rex
Seth Green … Ezekiel
Alice Greczyn … Mary
You’ve heard the accolades for years. Denzel. Denzel. For a spot on performance check out Denzel Washington in “The Taking of Pelham 123″.
For those of you too young to remember. “The Taking of Pelham 123″ is a remake of “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three”, the classic Walter Mathau film from 1974. And even though this Pelham 123 is top notch, do yourself a favor and watch the original.
That said Director Tony Scott’s Pelham is a wild ride. Scott alternates tension and drama on the train and in the control room with rapid fire cuts of the city up top pounding the life of the city against the slow increasing pulse of tension of a hijacked subway car in a tunnel under Manhattan.
Another counterpoint, John Travolta’s wise wildman bad guy leader of a group of hijackers is played against the calm decency of Denzel’s even tempered, yet equally wise family man.
This movie grabs your pulse and drags you up a hundred beats, but it invades your mind as well. Who are these guys? Why are they the same? Why are they different?
John Turturo as a hostage negotiator feels more like a prop than a necessary part, but James Gandolfini as the mayor has an all time moment in a subtle almost throw away scene. As the about to retire mayor Gandolfini isn’t too sure that he wants to invest his soul in what seems like a police matter. Yet he is convinced by an aide to make a comment about this still unraveling event that has gripped the city. So he stops on his way into the train center to speak to the press. After some reassuring words to the crowd he starts walking again. And in a perfect example of our gotcha culture, and misplaced civic priorities, some bozo reporter asks the major about an extramarital affair. Gandolfini shoots him a look that says more than any 1000 words ever could. Small part, great acting.
And getting back to great acting there’s Denzel. Demoted due to the accusation of bribery Denzel as Walter Garber decently goes about his business while the rumors fly and all the while knowing he’s being investigated. Great backstory, handled subtly.
Travolta as “Ryder” plays a crazyman, or is he? An angry vengeful person plotting an ranting against the city that hurt him. He’s cold, deadly and wild, but seems to feel an affinity for Garber whom he sees as also mistreated by the city.
The interplay and contrast between the two make the movie. They do, and director Scott does.
One criticism I have is that I wonder if Travolta’s character, who is so over the top, is wholly consistent but to delve into that would reveal too much of the plot and perhaps is mere nit picking anyway.
“The Taking of Pelham 123″ is fast, and gripping and well worth your investment of time. Some scenes are way too violent for small children whom no doubt could be frightened by this movie.
But after you put the kids to bed, take this movie out and watch it for its pace, its drama, its acting. Its a guy movie your wife will like. And after you watch it. Ask each other “Did he do it?”
4 of 5 Smiling Maxes
Director:
Tony Scott
Brian Helgeland (screenplay)
John Godey (novel)
Release Date:
12 June 2009 (USA) more
Genre:
Crime | Thriller more
Denzel Washington … Walter Garber
John Travolta … Ryder
Luis Guzmán … Phil Ramos
Victor Gojcaj … Bashkim
John Turturro … Camonetti
Michael Rispoli … John Johnson
Ramon Rodriguez … Delgado
James Gandolfini … Mayor
Dan Brown writes fine fantasy. Dan Brown does a great deal of research and can, for a moment, make you think he found something really devastating in its impact on the world. The Davinci Code is still making people think. Still developing controversy with the Church.
So we come to the sequel.
Once again director Ron Howard – the most overrated director in Hollywood teams up with Tom Hanks, still somewhat underrated as an actor, to tell the next story of symbologist Robert Langdon.
This time the story is even more stretched thin, tying in theoretical antimatter with a Vatican Conclave for an adventure where terrorists threaten to blow up the Vatican.
The terrorists? The Illuminati. A group of scientists with a vengefull wrath against the church. These geniuses have broken into the Large Hadron Collider at Cern and moved a large does of antimatter to Vatican City to use science to defeat religion.
And that’s when the plot is on its most solid ground.
The action takes place as Langdon and scientist Vittoria Vetra scramble to find the antimatter before it makes a mess. The bad guys put the good guys on a clock. “We’ll kill a Cardinal (each of whom are the next most likely to become pope) every hour until … wait, what did they want. Just pretty much to kill the church so there is no negotiating. Just that they plan to do this killing along a symbolic and synchronized pathway until the destruction of the church.
Along the way we learn a bit about Rome and a bit about certain arcane rituals of the church which serve the drama but don’t inform or sensationalize our current knowledge of the church as they did in DaVinci.
The biggest problem, and it is infernal and infuriating is the cinematography. Its too damned dark in this movie. 80 – 90 percent of “Angels and Demons” is filmed in such low light that you have to strain your eyes to see it. (I’m told the book was that way, but if the book were about a blind person would there be no black on white type?) With the curtains drawn I could still see my own reflection in the tv more than I could see the actors. I’ll bet that was again brilliant acting by Tom Hanks. Can we blame the cinematographer? Perhaps, but I think not. I think that this is what Ron Howard wanted. Any modern movie has dailies and this “look” would be thrown away and reshot right away if the director wanted his film to be seen. I can only expect that Howard was so ashamed of this film that he wouldn’t let people watch it because its that dark, that often.
Find some way to light the interior scenes so that we can see not only the people’s faces (which most of the time were only 1/2 visible by candle light, but so that we can see where they are in these catacombs and tunnels and indeed Vatican interiors.
Just to make matters worse, there is this systematic turning out of lights in the grid in order to see when the lights would go out on the explosive device, which is lit somewhere in the bowels of Rome and on camera to prove its real.
And if that wasn’t enough to turn you off from Angels and Demons, the plot, which is fairly inorganically constructed to begin with, turns 180 degrees on itself and goes from sappy … to absurd …
[SPOILER] when the modest good guy turns out to be the malevolent bad guy by manner of a little bit of late exposition!
Its unbelievable. Add that to the fact that it is literally unwatchable and “Angels and Demons” goes from a movie I really wanted to like, to one that I cannot recommend.
2 of 5 Smiling Maxes and 3 of 5 frowning Maxes for an exercise in frustration in a movie I wanted to like.
Typical Disney story. Child is cute. Child’s parent gets killed. Child struggles to survive but makes it against all odds learning the true meaning of life along the way.
UP provides us with a different sort of Disney tragedy to start the show. Boy has a dream. Boy meets girl with the same dream, they meet, they fall in love, they can’t have kids. Its always a tragedy.
Sometimes, in “old man” stories, a child arrives to teach the old man life lessons he once knew, all over again.
That’s what happens here.
One of this reviewer’s favorite movie, for any age group, is “Monsters Inc”. Its just thrill ride adventure with tension and more tension at each advance of the plot.
Not surprisingly Peter Docter is lead writer on both movies. UP follows the same thrilling pattern that “Monsters Inc” does. I was squirming on the edge of my seat before the end of the movie, and that was compounded by the hieght, which, was as breathtakingly high as a cartoon/animation can get.
The movie starts slowly. We learn to love the characters, then Ellie is gone and as Karl Fredricksen is, we are sad. And the kid, Dennis, starts out just mildly annoying. We warm up to him. Before long this two against the world story takes us away on a struggle and adventure which provide the old man with a chance for adventure, and a reawakening of his dreams. He and Russell, the originally annoying scout child find through their trials that they need each other and “once again the world is spinning in greased grooves”. But before all is fine, there are threats to life, limb and friends and friendships and new friends and ever and ever more dangerous challenges to overcome.
Its almost as scary as jaws!
If you don’t like hieghts, this could be a tough movie for you even if you know its animated. Its slow, but increasingly scary.
But its fun. And now for the second time in my life, I have to say what a great movie Pete Docter has written.
Watch it with your kids. Watch it with your 88 year old wife. It’ll make you cry. It’ll make you smile and it might just make you bit your fingernails!
5 of 5 Smiling Maxes. Two Thumbs way UP.
Directors:
Pete Docter
Bob Peterson (co-director)
Writers:
Pete Docter (story) and
Bob Peterson (story) …
Release Date:
29 May 2009 (USA) more
Genre:
Animation |Adventure
Edward Asner … Carl Fredricksen (voice) (as Ed Asner)
Christopher Plummer … Charles Muntz (voice)
Jordan Nagai … Russell (voice)
Bob Peterson … Dug / Alpha (voice)
Delroy Lindo … Beta (voice)
Jerome Ranft … Gamma (voice)
John Ratzenberger … Construction Foreman Tom (voice)
I like to listen to Total Talk Nonsense podcast. Jon and Scott do movie reviews among other things. They loved “The Proposal”. I loved it too, though maybe not quite as much.
Ryan Reynolds (the bastard that married my Scarlett in real life) plays a young ambitious Administrative Assistant (Andrew Paxton) who’s tightly wound high strung super business woman editor boss Margaret Tate needs to get married or get deported to Canada.
There’s a bad guy immigration official and the setup is pretty basic romantic comedy stuff. The horrible boss’s heart softens when she see’s the real family her loyal but abused sidekick takes her back home to, so that she can meet his family and fool the customs guy.
You can’t even say hilarity ensues. Just fun.
Sandra Bullock does a fine job as a taught ambitious and none too nice boss and Ryan (I hate him) Reynolds is really excellent as the likable and not-too-dormatish assistant.
Betty White as Grandma Annie steals the show and Mary Steenburgen is charming and a bit too young looking as the mom but the whole thing works. Its easy to watch and the people are beautiful and the characters all make us wish they were our family.
Its easy fun and enjoyable with no nudity and very little even suggestive comedy (a male stripper scene and some suggestive dialogue and covered nudity in the bedroom). Its a high brow hit that won’t make you squirm too much if you watch it with your kids.
Good stuff. 5 of 5 Smiling Maxes
Director:
Anne Fletcher
Pete Chiarelli (written by)
Sandra Bullock … Margaret Tate
Ryan Reynolds … Andrew Paxton
Mary Steenburgen … Grace Paxton
Craig T. Nelson … Joe Paxton
Betty White … Grandma Annie
Unlike the savage satisfaction of Unforgiven, Clint Eastwood’s Walt Kowalski leaves us redeemed for our sins.
Gran Torino is a story of repentance and forgiveness set in a decaying Detroit suburb. Clint is, of course, the hard bitten old guy, now out of place in a world that once made sense to him. Turning away from the church his wife loved, Clint finds redemption in the fragile life of a Hmong boy who moves in next door. The conflict comes with the boy who is pulled by a gang toward a life bound for jail and pulled again by the strong women who rule his house toward an unknown but more peaceful and productive future.
After a failed attempt to pass a gang initiation by stealing the car, Thao is drawn to the powerful masculine role model that is Walt Kowalski.
Walt as a hard bitten Korean veteran almost climbs out of his cliche’ while the remaining characters fill only their role, leaving the film with a sterile, parable like feel.
We like Clint. We like the kid and his sister. We don’t like the bad gang members who have no depth at all nor do we like the bad black guys on the corner who serve the role of allowing Clint to be a hero to the girl.
Only the hard bitten Walt is worth remembering and frankly he was more enjoyable as an ass than as a Christ like … well … we don’t want to spoil it.
People will like this movie, but to this reviewer it felt too mechanical. It got from A to B but it failed to show us much that was new.
3 of 5 Smiling Maxes for Gran Torino. Go see it for Clint.
Director:
Clint Eastwood
Writers (WGA):
Nick Schenk (screenplay)
Dave Johannson (story) …
Release Date:
9 January 2009 (USA) more
Genre:
Crime | Drama more
Awards:
Nominated for Golden Globe. Another 2 wins & 4 nominations more
Cast
Clint Eastwood … Walt Kowalski
Christopher Carley … Father Janovich
Bee Vang … Thao Vang Lor
Ahney Her … Sue Lor
Writing. Good writing. You can have an action thriller with pretty girls and explosions, maybe it will be a good movie, but a great movie requires great writing. Doubt, has great writing. Meld that with superb acting, and you have an oportunity for a classic. Doubt could be a classic.
I have a bias against Meryl Streep. I just don’t like her. And I have heard from an actor I know, that her dialects are sometimes inconsistent across a movie. Actually, I think this may be the case in Doubt as well. But it doesn’t matter. Her characterization of Sister Aloysious is so deep, with moral complexity, idiosyncrasy and ambiguity as well as a rich personal depth that while we don’t like her, we see a complex three dimensional character there.
Contrarily Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s portrayal of Father Flynn displays an open simple love for his parrishoners. Father Flynn runs a new kind of church, or does he? We know for sure that Sister Aloysius runs an old fashioned school.
Sister James (Amy Adams) represents the innocence and naivete of the viewer and as are we, is pulled between the two, in trying to determine who is telling the truth, who is innocent, and what is the moral thing to do when you have no evidence but suspect a wrong has been committed.
I was reminded of the Salem witch trials. With Sister Aloysius as the accuser pressing harder and further with her acusations in her attempts to protect a child, this deeply complex character follows a wrong path in the name of right, pushing the mother of the boy who may have been abused, to the point of abusing the mom. How far do you go in the pursuit of good?
Crisp writing. Great acting. Doubt!
5 of 5 Smiling Maxes for Doubt crisply portrayed and brilliantly written.
Doubt (2008)
Director:
John Patrick Shanley
Writers (WGA):
John Patrick Shanley (screenplay)
John Patrick Shanley (play)
Release Date:
25 December 2008 (USA) more
Awards:
Nominated for 5 Oscars. Another 10 wins & 32 nominations more
Cast
(Cast overview, first billed only)
Meryl Streep … Sister Aloysius Beauvier
Philip Seymour Hoffman … Father Brendan Flynn
Amy Adams … Sister James
Viola Davis … Mrs. Miller
In case you haven’t heard Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston made a movie with a dog.
I’m not going to spend a lot of time on it because everyone has seen it. However … IF … by some chance you haven’t yet seen it yourself, I’m recommending it.
No metaphor. No in depth perception. Just a story about a family and a dog.
I don’t know who is more likeable, Jennifer Aniston or Owen Wilson but they’re both worth watching. You just like them. You’ll like the dog Marley too. And the end [spoiler]will make you cry.
Its a fine film. Its a nice film. Its fun. Its easy. Show the kids. Get kleenex.
I like a good clever movie that makes me think, so I’m not going to give this the full five stars but I highly recommend this movie. If you have kids its even good for life lessons.
[4 of 5 Smiling Maxes for Marley & Me]
Director:
David Frankel
Writers (WGA):
Scott Frank (screenplay) and
Don Roos (screenplay) …
Release Date:
25 December 2008 (USA) more
Genre:
Comedy | Drama | Family | Romance more
This young couple live in Connecticut. They have the house in the suburbs, the car, the kids. April’s husband (Leo DiCaprio) is an ass. We learn this right away when he tells her in the opening sequence how much he’s not an ass. We later learn he doesn’t want to become his dad. He works in the same place as his dad, and is pretty much as fake. No real effort at work. Except for the ladies.
One day April (Kate Winslet) decides they should move to Paris. Make their lives instead of merely reacting to them. A bold step. They’ll sell the house. She’ll be a secretary in Paris where that kind of thing pays well at the embassy. He can … well … just be “a man”. She dares him to be great.
Is this a story of triumph? No. A true American tragedy? No. Its just weird. The characters aren’t real, the “reality” is so manufactured that the only way this clunker can be approved is if it is meant to be surreal. The children. Almost in every case the children are somewhere else. As if real people never see their kids. Then the story takes a (twist?) when an unforseen pregnancy pops up. Quelle surprise!
What ensues is neither hilarity, nor real, nor in any way fun. Fine its a surrealistic tragedy. If, and its a big if, you consider April heroic, for becoming herself, against her programing. It could be considered a successful tragedy.
The only interesting character, the only real? character is the crazy son of the realtor, who is clearly placed, like the children, as a device to let the author explain to us how the characters are lying to themselves. His passion and eccentricity, is at least fun.
But mostly its an unrealistic look at the real world through the eyes of two people who mostly hate themselves.
And one more odd thing. Almost everybody smokes, and indoors, and yet we see about as much smoke as we see children. Its all a big plot device, but without sympathy – who cares?
Two of Five Smiling Maxes. [There's another one in there, you just can't see it]
As for Kate, clearly she needs a better vehicle c.f. The Reader, to bring out her best, though once again she brings that vacant stare to bare in this effort and while I suspect her face is just naturally interesting, and I’m sure she’s done her best here, without enough rationality we just don’t buy April.
And Leo? I still think he looks like a child. However in Revolutionary Road he is consistently good. We don’t like him at first … but maybe we sympathize a bit by the end.
Down 12% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.
Director:
Sam Mendes
Writers (WGA):
Justin Haythe (screenplay)
Richard Yates (novel)
Release Date:
23 January 2009 (USA) more
Genre:
Drama | Romance more
Awards:
Nominated for 3 Oscars. Another 6 wins & 20 nominations more
Cast
(Cast overview, first billed only)
Leonardo DiCaprio … Frank Wheeler
Kate Winslet … April Wheeler
Michael Shannon … John Givings
Ryan Simpkins … Jennifer Wheeler
Ty Simpkins … Michael Wheeler
Kathy Bates … Mrs. Helen Givings
Richard Easton … Mr. Howard Givings
Reality. Most movies try to find it. To display some real part of the human experience. To tell us something that is real.
The Reader comes closer for Kate Winslet than does Revolutionary Road.
At first The Reader just seems like a coming of age story, and while I make no claim to understanding women, seems to almost bring us a real woman – it just doesn’t quite get there yet.
Kate is compelling, but perhaps gets a little too much mileage out of a soft, open, non-expression that works well for her because her one eyebrow naturally curves up giving her a more or less constant relaxed but curious expression. Its complicated.
And so is Hannah Schmitz.
As the story goes on we learn more about Hannah. She’s illiterate. She was a prison guard accused of war crimes. She’s proud. We first find her in a genuine selfless act of kindness.
Her story is a story of almost mechanical thoughtlessness. She just didn’t think. She always reacted.
[Spoilers]The more we learn about Hannah, the more sympathetic she is. This is difficult when at first she seduces a 15 almost 16 year old boy. A story that must surely look different if the genders were reversed. We also learn that despite being a Nazi, she is guileless though not guiltless and we are forced to contest the now familiar WWII Germany questions about why no one stopped this and who is to blame.
We never see Hannah as a guard, but we feel some sympathy for her as she explains, mindlessly, why she did not try to stop 300 women from burning to death during one night of intense bombing. “What was I to do? Let them loose? I was a guard!” (Or words to that affect).
Our young boy, now in college hears the false claims that she was the ring leader and that she wrote the report, something he knows to be false, but which he allows to stand. “Have we learned nothing from the past?” Rohl asks?
[End spoilers]
I felt for the characters, who I thought were at once weak, not sympathetic, strong and sympathetic. So cudos for the writing.
In the end I’m haunted by my own sympathy for Hannah – so clearly Kate did something right, though I wonder if we did need to see the war years.
Four of 5 Smiling Maxes. Definitely NOT for children. It probably would make you uncomfortable watching with your teenagers, but might be worth the conversation afterword. Considerable nudity and sexuality in the beginning. Moral quandry and angst later!
Overview
User Rating:
7.7/10 32,327 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?
Up 3% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.
Director:
Stephen Daldry
Writers (WGA):
David Hare (screenplay)
Bernhard Schlink (book)
Release Date:
9 January 2009 (USA) more
Genre:
Drama | Romance more
Awards:
Won Oscar. Another 11 wins & 24 nominations more
looking at life from both sides more
Cast
Ralph Fiennes … Michael Berg
Jeanette Hain … Brigitte
David Kross … Young Michael Berg
Kate Winslet … Hanna Schmitz
Predisposed as I am, to liking Will Smith movies, I have a couple of problems with “Seven Pounds” that make it a movie I cannot recommend.
Ok. It has Will Smith as I said. And he’s charming. But the story is a downer, and I’m just a little bit tired of the literary device of showing you the beginning of Act III right at the start of the movie. It creates suspense. You think “Does this hold up? Will this really happen?” But the reason you don’t trust it is you’ve seen too many of these movies.
The suspense is all about what they’ve taken away. You hang on trying to figure out where you are in the timeline that will take you up to Act III Scene I and they keep showing you crumbs. This could be a compelling story, though I think it really isn’t, but the director doesn’t believe in the story enough to show you. He just plays out bits and pieces small enough to keep you guessing.
And I think Gabriele Muccino does that because this is not a story you’d like to hear.
Rosario Dawson joins Smith in trying desperately to save “Seven Pounds” and for a while she holds the film, but eventually its too convoluted and just plain sad to save. Barry Pepper who was perfect in “61*” has no hope of making you believe his part of the story, [Big SPOILER] as the best friend who conspires with his childhood best friend to aid his healthy suicide. Its the script, not the actor. Even Woody Harrelson as a blind pianist – no, wait … Woody Harrelson as a blind pianist? Can’t do anything to help. In fact, he makes it worse.
Two smiling Maxes – out of five. Can’t recommend “Seven Pounds” And that’s a surprise given the cast. But surprises are the problem and the cast is the only thing that keep this movie from being awful.
Director:
Gabriele Muccino
Writer (WGA):
Grant Nieporte (written by)
Release Date:
19 December 2008 (USA) more
Genre:
Drama more
