Saturday, June 28, 2014

Chef (2014): Short Review


There’s no denying it; the studio system currently dominates the film industry and because of it, many argue that this is diminishing the value of true artistic visions from directors because nowadays most of them have to adhere to some occasionally very strict studio guidelines. Now while I’m not a filmmaker myself and I do feel that there are still some directors out there who are able to express their vision in the films that they make even with the occasional studio interference, I still can definitely see where a lot of these frustrated filmmakers are coming from and as proven by his new film ‘Chef’, Jon Favreau is one of those directors. In the film, he plays a chef named Carl Casper who’s the head chef at a successful restaurant in Los Angeles. But while he eagerly looks to try and cook some new menu items, he’s told to ‘stick to the classics’ by his boss Riva (Dustin Hoffman). This results in a famous food critic (Oliver Platt) giving the restaurant an unfavorable review, which then results in Carl berating him both online and in person, ultimately becoming a sensation on social media. With nowhere else to go, Carl ends up getting a food truck where he looks to both better express his culinary creativity and to also reconnect with his ex-wife Inez (Sofia Vergara) and their son Percy (EmJay Anthony).

It’s very much clear that this film represents Favreau’s own frustration with the studio system after he spent the last few years doing nothing but big-budget action films like the ‘Iron Man’ movies and ‘Cowboys and Aliens’; this time he’s able to make the film that he wanted to make without any sign of studio interference. Because of this, I really enjoyed this film’s message that emphasizes freedom of expression. This results in a very heartwarming and feel-good movie that is a nice change of pace from all of the summer blockbusters. Really, this is just a very pleasant movie, especially when Carl actually gets his new food truck and goes on a cross-country trip with his son and his friend Martin (John Leguizamo). I think that section of the film is its best part. Now, I don’t think that this is one of the ‘best’ films of the year, mainly because I didn’t really find the film to be as ‘funny’ as a lot of critics were saying it was. I mean sure, there were a few funny bits of dialogue peppered in here and there (no pun intended) but not really enough for me to say that it succeeds at being a ‘comedy’. Regardless of that, I still really enjoyed the film because of its charm, its solid cast (I’d say this is Favreau’s best performance to date as an actor, as his own frustrations with Hollywood really translate well into his character’s dilemmas), and of course its great message to be true to yourself. All of this makes ‘Chef’ a very satisfying treat… and of course, to quote IGN’s Chris Tilly, make sure that you “don’t go on an empty stomach”.

Rating: 4/5

Thursday, June 26, 2014

Transformers Trilogy (2007-2011) Reviews: Michael Bay Retrospective Part 2


A few days ago, I looked at the almost-complete directorial filmography of Michael Bay from his first film, 1995’s ‘Bad Boys’, to his most recent, 2013’s ‘Pain and Gain’. I say ‘almost complete’ because I skipped over a certain trilogy of films that he directed between 2007 and 2011 because I wanted to save these three for another post that would be published a little bit closer to the debut of Bay’s newest film, which just so happens to be the follow-up to the trilogy of films that I’m looking at today; Michael Bay’s live-action Transformers trilogy based off of the toy line and subsequent media franchise developed by Takara Tomy and Hasbro. This new film, ‘Transformers: Age of Extinction’, is the fourth film in the series but features a brand new cast of characters taking over for the cast of the original trilogy, taking place a few years after the events of the third film. It is also reportedly set to be the first in a new trilogy of films however it’s unclear if Bay will return for the next two films, meaning that it’s likely that this will be Michael Bay’s last Transformers film (and on that note, without saying anything further about it, I already know how a lot of you would react to that if that happened considering the typical reception towards these films).

Now I’m going into this new Transformers film with an open mind and that is due to the three films that precede it or, as I like to call them, the most hated film trilogy since the Star Wars prequels. Sure, the first film got decent enough reviews from critics but then came the sequels, both of which have been universally bashed by pretty much everybody in the world. So to those who really, really dislike these movies… prepare to disagree with me quite a bit. Now I’m going on record and saying that when I was younger, I really enjoyed all three of these films and I even passionately defended the two sequels against their harshest critics. Did I think that they were perfect? Absolutely not, but at the same time, I never thought that they were the worst films in the world and I’ve heard plenty of people declare them to be the worst films of all time which for the record I find to be a little too much exaggerated, just like the whole thing that I mentioned last time about Bay being the ‘worst director’ ever. But you see… this is where things start to get interesting for this is actually the first time in a few years since I’ve seen all of these films. I’m very interested in seeing if they hold up as well as I had once thought of them. Will my opinion of them change? Well, you’re just going to have to keep reading to find out.

But first, I’m adding in a little bonus and will be starting this retrospective with a review of the ‘first’ Transformers film… and no, it’s not the one that Bay directed.

THE TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE (1986)


Easily one of the most famous cartoons from the 1980’s, ‘The Transformers’ ran for four seasons as it followed the war between the two factions of alien robots known as the Autobots and Decepticons. Midway through the series’ run, there came ‘The Transformers: The Movie’, which some like to refer to as an 84-minute toy commercial. In a way, it probably is but even with that in mind, there are still some pretty interesting aspects about this movie that do make it worthwhile to check out. For one thing, most of the Autobots in this film are actually killed off, including Optimus Prime, which I’m pretty sure must’ve come as a major shock for fans of the show. As for that scene where Prime dies, while I never really watched the original series that much (though I did watch a few episodes before watching this movie), I will admit that this scene is a legitimately sad moment. You really have to give this movie credit; it has major cojones for killing off most of the characters that audiences had grown attached to through the TV series. Because of this, a new set of characters were introduced in this film and became the new main characters of the TV series for the rest of its run.

This movie also has some pretty good voice acting from the likes of Judd Nelson as Hot Rod (who’s sort of the Luke Skywalker of the film… yeah, this film has a lot in common with ‘Star Wars’, by the way), Leonard Nimoy as Galvatron (the revived form of Megatron), and Orson Welles in his final film role as Unicron. While it has been reported that Welles wasn’t too enthusiastic about the project, his voice (which for the record had to be synthesized in post-production because it was very weak when he recorded the dialogue… he died only five days after he finished working on the film) actually is a really nice fit for the role of the planet-sized Transformer. In fact, I would really love to see Unicron appear in the live-action Transformers movies. That would be awesome. As for this film’s soundtrack, which is the very definition of an 80’s film soundtrack, there are a lot of good tunes in the film though at the same time, some feel rather distracting at certain points like during some of the fight scenes. Still, ‘The Transformers: The Movie’ is a pretty solid animated film and while I may not have grown up watching the original TV series this is based on, this will definitely serve as a nostalgic trip down memory lane for those who did.

Rating: 4/5

TRANSFORMERS (2007)


When it first came out in 2007, the first live-action ‘Transformers’ film received generally decent reviews from critics. I mean to be more specific, not all of the reviews were positive but at the end of the day the reviews for this film were much better than the reviews were for its two sequels. However, I kind of get the feeling that the reaction towards this film became a bit more negative after its sequels came out. I really don’t get why that is because, I’m just going to say it… this is a great movie. Nearly a decade after its release, this film still holds up incredibly well. The biggest reason for this is that most of the problems that a lot of people had with the sequels aren’t as big of a problem in this film. The writing is pretty solid in regards to establishing the lore and the main characters and while the film may focus more on the human characters more than the Transformers themselves (something that I’m well aware has been a major disappointment for fans of the franchise), there are at least a few decent character arcs in this film (I’ll get into why that becomes a problem later on in the series when I get to the third film) so it’s not like the human characters in this are completely bland. The acting, for an action movie, is solid enough in this one and in the lead role of Sam Witwicky, Shia LaBeouf actually does a pretty good job here, again mostly because his character does have a solid arc and in this film LaBeouf actually does manage to make the character sympathetic and relatable.

As with any Michael Bay film, the action sequences in this are fantastic and amidst all of the CGI in this film (which for the record is still really good CGI), you do have to appreciate the fact that there were also quite a lot of practical effects in this film as well. My personal favorite sequence of the film would have to be the opening scene where the Decepticon Blackout attacks the U.S. Military at their base in Qatar. This to me was a phenomenal way to start off the movie though again all of the action scenes here are excellent. Also, while this film may be nearly two and a half hours long, the pacing in this is actually pretty good and I never felt that the film dragged at any point. So, with all of that said, the first of Michael Bay’s ‘Transformers’ films still holds up very well upon re-watch and if I were to rank my Top 10 favorite films from 2007, I guarantee that this film would have easily made my Top 10 as I find it to be one of the best action/sci-fi films of this past decade. Even if you didn’t like this film’s sequels, one thing is for certain; this film doesn’t deserve the same hate as those films because it truly is the best of the trilogy and as such, I believe that it is one of Michael Bay’s best films, if arguably not his best.

Rating: 5/5!

TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN (2009)


I know that last time I said that I believe that ‘Pearl Harbor’ was Michael Bay’s most hated movie because it was based on an actual event in U.S. history and not a toy franchise aimed at kids. But you know the more that I think about it… really there’s no denying it. I think it’s safe to say that ‘Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen’ has to be the most universally despised summer blockbuster in recent memory, if not all time. I mean, not even the ‘Star Wars’ prequels, for as reviled as they are, got this much criticism. I guarantee you that it will be very hard to find someone who actually likes this film and I’m not talking about the few critics who gave it positive reviews when it came out. I mean someone who actually really likes this film in the five years since it was released… well, guess what… you’ve already found one of them. Now before any of you stop reading this post (and let’s be honest, I’m fairly certain some of you have already done that once you read that I did like this film), let me be clear about something. While I do still really like this film, I don’t necessarily ‘love it’ as I too agree that it has some noticeable problems but to me these problems aren’t really the ones that everyone likes to point out (and believe me, they have done so quite a lot these last few years).

Obviously the main problem with the film lies within the writing but while some have said that this movie’s plot is incomprehensible and that it makes no sense, I feel that it’s a different problem entirely. For you see, the first half of this film is actually quite aimless. There is ‘some’ remnants of a plot in this part of the film, but they literally don’t explain what it is that the Decepticons are looking for, the Matrix of Leadership (the same object that the two factions fought for in ‘The Transformers: The Movie’, by the way) until halfway through the movie (believe me, I’ve timed it; just under one hour and thirty minutes). I mean, that is quite amazing actually that a film this big in scale could go on for nearly one and a half hours and yet have nothing much going in regards to developing the plot. I mean, they do indicate that the Decepticons are looking for a new source of Energon, the Transformers’ main source of energy, but again that doesn’t really become relevant until the movie’s half-way over. But really when it comes to this film’s shortcomings in the writing department, I mostly attribute this to the fact that the filmmakers had to deal with the Writers Guild of America strike that took place from November 2007 to February 2008 so I can see how it makes sense that this film ended up being a little rushed because of that. I bet that if they didn’t have to deal with this strike then the movie could’ve possibly turned out to be much better.

But with all of that said, why then do I still like this movie? Well, to put it bluntly, it’s the main reason why I like most of Michael Bay’s films in the first place; I still found this movie to be very entertaining and again I was never bored by it, though I will say that the final fight in Egypt does go on quite a bit too long. It’s still an awesome action sequence but it could’ve really been trimmed. I never really felt angry while watching this film, and that’s saying a lot considering the multiple aspects of the film that have negatively received by almost everyone who’s seen it, one of the most infamous being the twin Autobots Mudflaps and Skids for ‘embodying racial stereotypes’. Now, I never want to address anything racism-related when it comes to movies because quite frankly I just don’t want to do it so I’m not going to say anything further about these characters. So in short, while I don’t think that this movie is perfect and ultimately the first of Bay’s ‘Transformers’ films is the highly superior movie, I don’t think this one is as bad as a lot of people put it out to be. And hey, if you don’t like it, that’s fine; I’m not trying to spite anyone here by saying that I like this movie. I’m just saying that I still enjoy this movie and most of the problems that people had with it didn’t really bother me that much.

Rating: 3.5/5

TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON (2011)


So even though ‘Revenge of the Fallen’ got trashed by critics and audiences, it was still a big success at the box office, meaning that those who really hated it… apparently saw it more than once, which I find quite a bit odd because why then would these people see it again if they hated it so much. This becomes even more peculiar when discussing the next film, ‘Dark of the Moon’. Now the reviews for this film were a bit better than the previous film but for the most part they were still rather negative… and yet this film grossed over $1 billion dollars worldwide. While I’m always glad to see films do successful at the box office, I’m still wondering how this one managed to get into the billion dollar club. Because again, I’ve heard plenty of people say that they hated this film, some of whom hated it just as much as the last film. Well, with that said, if these people hated it so much… why then did they apparently see it at least twice in theaters? It just makes no sense. Now, I was one of those people who did see this movie twice in theaters (both times in 3-D… which was actually well-worth it by the way because while I’m aware that a good chunk of the film was post-converted into the format, at least seventy percent of the film was shot in 3-D so the film was at least intended to be filmed that way) but unlike a lot of people, I did like the film when I first saw it. Having watched it again, I still like it. I like it more than ‘Revenge of the Fallen’ but still not as much as the first film.

This film thankfully improves on the story problems that plagued the previous film. This time, the plot for the film was actually pretty interesting, revolving around how an old Cybertronian spacecraft that had crash-landed on the moon resulted in the Apollo 11 mission, which in this movie was a cover so that the ship could be properly investigated. The ship contained the original leader of the Autobots, Sentinel Prime, and his inventions, a bunch of Pillars used to create a space bridge to transport matter between two points. After Sentinel Prime is awakened, he is then revealed to be working with the Decepticons so that they could restore their planet Cybertron to its former glory. I must say that this whole plot development with Sentinel was actually a pretty interesting one because his betrayal was genuinely unexpected and we did see that it affected Optimus quite a lot because he trusted Sentinel so much. I thought this was all handled very well and that Leonard Nimoy did a great job voicing Sentinel. Though as some have already pointed out, there is kind of a glaring issue when it comes to the first three ‘Transformers’ films; for you see, all three of these films literally have the exact same general plot-points; the Decepticons are looking for an artifact so that they can win the war, Sam Witwicky ends up getting involved in one way or another, etc. Hopefully ‘Age of Extinction’ doesn’t follow the exact same beats as these three films did.

But whereas the story for this film was better than in the last one, this time it comes at the expense of good character development. As I said before, I found that the first ‘Transformers’ film actually did have a decent amount of character development, which is quite impressive actually especially when considering the fact that this is a film about giant robots fighting each other. But basically all of those arcs were already completed after that film so by this point, it becomes rather pointless that a lot of these characters are still around after their arcs were already completed in previous films. Like remember in the first film how Captain William Lennox (Josh Duhamel) was trying to get home to his wife and their newborn daughter? Well, while Lennox does still play a major role in the action for the next two films, his family is never seen again for the rest of the series. As for his friend Epps (Tyrese Gibson)… well, in this film Epps literally doesn’t show up until halfway through the movie. I’m guessing this might’ve been because Gibson was also working on ‘Fast Five’ at the time, but still these two are just there to be a part of the final battle and really nothing else.

Then we get to Sam Witwicky whose character arc was already completed in the first film so at this point he really has nowhere to go having already helped save the world twice. I’ve never been that critical of Shia LaBeouf’s performances in these three movies, but here I will agree that he does start to get a bit too annoying but again, that’s just because he quite frankly doesn’t have much to work with in this. There are multiple times in this movie where Sam complains about how he should be working with the Autobots and not having to live a normal life instead… even though at the beginning of the second film, he was actually looking for things to return to normal for him. Why all of this changed… I have no idea. This movie also kind of hastily switches girlfriends on him, though this is mostly because of a behind-the-scenes incident where Megan Fox reportedly called Michael Bay ‘Hitler’, resulting in him and Spielberg kicking her off the project, replacing her with Rosie Huntington-Whiteley. Though to the filmmakers’ credit, this change is actually handled pretty well considering the whole situation they were in and while I’m not saying that Whiteley does a ‘great’ job in this, I actually like her more than Fox because I felt that her character Carly came off as being more likable and that her and LaBeouf actually had pretty good chemistry.

But one of my biggest problems with the film actually isn’t anything within the actual film itself. It is actually in regards to how the film was marketed. Before the film came out, I remember watching interviews where the cast and crew were saying that the film was going to be much more serious in tone. Bay even said that the film was going to be like ‘Black Hawk Down’ but with ‘Transformers’… which could’ve been really, really cool. But guess what… that’s not the case with the final product. It’s just another Michael Bay ‘Transformers’ film that does have a fairly large-scale final battle but doesn’t have the emotional depth that those involved were claiming that it had. I feel that some of the main characters should have died in this. Now, the death of Ironhide did work because it was unexpected, but aside from him, only a few of the protagonists are killed off. Maybe they could have killed off Lennox or Epps if only just because, like I said earlier, they were just there to be a part of the action; they already went through their character arcs. But nope… instead, the majority of the main characters survive just as they did in the previous films. This movie tried to be much more serious and while I do give it credit for attempting to do so, it could’ve done a lot better in trying to establish a more serious tone.

But yet again, I never found the film to be boring. The final fight in Chicago is easily the highlight of the movie, which is greatly benefitted by the 3-D. This fight thankfully never feels like it drags at any point which as I said earlier was the main problem with the finale of ‘Revenge of the Fallen’. And yes, the majority of the action is actually reserved for the finale whereas the first half hour of the film is mostly reserved for the story but even then I still found the movie to be pretty engaging. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… Michael Bay’s movies are never boring. So ultimately, I feel that ‘Dark of the Moon’ is a superior sequel to ‘Revenge of the Fallen’ but due to some issues it’s still not as good as the first film. I do kind of feel like this movie got some unfair flack, if only because I feel that some were a little biased towards it because of their hate for ‘Revenge of the Fallen’. I’m just going to say it… this film is not ‘Revenge of the Fallen’. It is easily better than that film but again, if you still don’t like this film that’s fine. I still really enjoyed ‘Dark of the Moon’ and I’m eagerly waiting to see ‘Transformers: Age of Extinction’. I know I said earlier that I’m going into that film with an open mind, but in reality I’m actually really excited for it and that is because I love this trilogy of films.


Rating: 4/5

Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Director Retrospective: Michael Bay (Part 1)


With the release of ‘Transformers: Age of Extinction’ soon upon us, it’s time for another directorial retrospective. Today, we’ll be looking at the films of director Michael Bay. And I’m not going to lie… this is going to be a rather ‘interesting’ retrospective mainly because of the typical critical reception towards the majority of Bay’s films. For you see, while a lot of them have been pretty successful at the box office, they haven’t had the same success with critics. If you look at his filmography on Rotten Tomatoes, only one film has earned a ‘fresh’ Tomatometer score and I’m pretty sure that many people like to refer to him as either one of the worst directors working today or one of the worst directors period (possibly both, if not the worst). But you might be surprised to find that… I’m not really one of them. Believe it or not, I actually do like most of Michael Bay’s films. Granted, I don’t think any of them are really ‘great’ films but to his credit, none of his films are ever boring. They’re ‘popcorn’ flicks and sometimes that’s all that I’m looking for in a movie. As for that whole thing about him being one of the worst directors out there… I feel that it’s a little overblown because honestly there are FAR worse directors than him out there. Anyway, this will be a two-part retrospective and today we’ll be looking at all of Bay’s films minus a certain trilogy of films that he did which I’ll be covering next time.

BAD BOYS (1995)


Like a lot of directors, Michael Bay started out small before he went big; his first film, ‘Bad Boys’, is his lowest budgeted film to date at only $19 million. Since then, he’s only made two films under $100 million; ‘The Rock’ ($75 million) and ‘Pain and Gain’, the latter being the lowest budgeted film Bay has made since ‘Bad Boys’ at only $26 million, which definitely highlights the fact that Bay has continued to go bigger and bigger since his directorial debut. As for ‘Bad Boys’, Bay’s first film mainly works for one reason; its two leads, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence. The two of them have excellent camaraderie and great comedic timing. It also helps that they improvised a lot of their dialogue (which you can partially credit to Bay because he had suggested that they do so… definitely one of the smartest directorial moves Bay has ever made, even if that may not exactly be saying much). I will admit that there’s not really much else that I can say about this film; I mean, it’s really just your basic buddy cop movie and aside from Smith and Lawrence there’s not really anything else that stands out. Still, this is an entertaining popcorn flick that kick started the career of Michael Bay and overall I’d say it’s worth checking out.

Rating: 3.5/5

THE ROCK (1996)


Following the fairly solid success of ‘Bad Boys’ at the box office ($141 million on a $19 million budget), Bay teamed up again with producers Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer (the latter of whom Bay would continue to work with until ‘Bad Boys II’… this was Simpson’s last film before he died) for ‘The Rock’ which is currently, at the time I’m writing this, the highest rated film that Bay has ever made. On Rotten Tomatoes, it’s the only film of his with a fresh Tomatometer score. Sure enough, it is definitely one of Bay’s best films. His fast-paced style of action certainly works well for this film and sure, like a lot of his movies, the writing may not be the ‘best’ but the film is so entertaining that it’s easy to ignore it. It’s definitely one of those cases of movie ‘escapism’ and I believe that’s something that Bay is really good at. This film also benefits from having Sean Connery in the lead role of John Mason, a British Spy who is recruited by the government to deal with a hostage situation taking place on Alcatraz, because he is the only one who ever escaped the presumably ‘inescapable’ prison. I mean, let’s face it… he’s the best part of the movie. He has a terrific screen presence, is a total badass in this, and heck I can even see a bit of James Bond still in him, which isn’t that farfetched considering that his character in this film was a former MI6 agent.

But including Connery, this film does have a pretty solid trio of leads. Connery and Nicholas Cage (who plays Stanley Goodspeed, a chemical weapons expert who is sent on the mission along with Connery’s character) have a good back-and-forth interplay and Cage certainly brings his usual… shall I say ‘eccentric’ style of acting to this movie. As for Ed Harris as the main villain General Frank Hummel, I actually really liked how he wasn’t a straight-up bad guy; he was just a disenchanted war veteran who was frustrated with the government for not compensating for the families of the soldiers who died while under his command, and while he does lead the takeover of Alcatraz, he wouldn’t go as far as to kill innocent civilians. All of this makes the character a pretty interesting villain. So overall, with some excellent action sequences (the shootout between Hummel’s forces and the Navy SEALs in one of Alcatraz’s shower rooms is probably the best action sequence in the entire movie), a great score by Hans Zimmer, and overall just a good sense of fun, ‘The Rock’ is definitely a stand-out in Michael Bay’s filmography. In fact, I’d say it’s the one that I would generally recommend the most out of all of Bay’s films.

Rating: 4.5/5

ARMAGEDDON (1998)


While ‘Bad Boys’ was a pretty solid commercial success when it came out, ‘The Rock’ was an even bigger hit at the box office and it basically established Michael Bay’s reputation as a high-profile action director in Hollywood. That financial success continued with ‘Armageddon’, which ended up being the highest grossing movie of 1998, even though it actually opened two and a half months after another asteroid film, ‘Deep Impact’ was released. ‘Deep Impact’ was considered to be more scientifically accurate but ‘Armageddon’ was more financially successful and like a lot of Bay’s films it got a generally mixed to negative reaction though from what I keep hearing, this is one of those films that some actually like but don’t really want to admit it. Likewise, I too think that this movie’s actually pretty good. I mean, obviously this movie’s premise is fairly stupid; a team of oil drillers are trained to be astronauts and are sent into space to destroy a massive asteroid before it hits Earth. Even Michael Bay admitted that this premise is unrealistic; also, NASA uses this film as part of their training program by having new managers looking for errors in the film. I haven’t seen ‘Deep Impact’ but I can already tell that that movie clearly must be more scientifically accurate.  

Still, the movie manages to be pretty entertaining even though its main premise is technically impossible to do. Like ‘The Rock’, it has a pretty darn good performance from its lead actor, in this case Bruce Willis, as well as some pretty good supporting members as well like Steve Buscemi, Will Patton, and Ben Affleck (yes, this is a case during Affleck’s pre-directing days where he did do a pretty good job… we’ll get to his next role in a Michael Bay film in a bit). And as for the finale where Willis’ character Harry says goodbye to his daughter Grace before sacrificing himself to save the world… I’m not afraid to admit that I was shedding tears during this scene because it’s a legitimately poignant moment and the fact that this is occurring in a big-budget sci-fi action movie is pretty impressive. So in the end, ‘Armageddon’ isn’t the smartest movie ever made, and even the filmmakers know that. Also if I had any complaints, sometimes Bay’s fast-editing gets a bit too crazy, particularly in the scene where the shuttle Independence crashes onto the asteroid, where the editing is so fast that it’s actually pretty hard to tell what’s happening. But overall it is still a pretty entertaining movie that manages to work around the unrealistic premise. I know I keep bringing it up, but again, this is another case of good old fashioned Hollywood escapism.

Rating: 4/5

PEARL HARBOR (2001)


As I’ve already noted, Michael Bay’s films have rarely fared well with critics and, in some cases, audiences for that matter. Sure, a lot of his films have been big hits at the box office but I have the feeling that most of the time, audiences aren’t too positive about his films. In that sense, the two films that are probably the most hated of his amongst critics and audiences are ‘Pearl Harbor’ and ‘Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen’. In terms of which one is the more reviled one, I think the edge has to go to ‘Pearl Harbor’ because really, regardless of whether or not you actually liked ‘Revenge of the Fallen’, it’s just a movie based on a toy franchise whereas ‘Pearl Harbor’ is based on an actual event in U.S. history; the bombing of the Pearl Harbor naval base in Hawaii by the Japanese Navy on December 7, 1941. So in that case, it can be argued that this film got a bit more critical bashing than Transformers 2 but… against my better judgment, I’m just going to put it out there. I don’t hate this film… in fact I actually kind of like it. I never use the term ‘guilty pleasure’ because I’m not shy when it comes to the films that I like, but in this case, I guess you can sort of say it’s a ‘guilty pleasure’ of mine considering that I certainly must be in the extreme minority on this.

Now first off I just want to address this film’s main problem; for a movie that’s based on a true event, it instead puts its main focus on a trio of fictional characters and the love triangle that emerges amongst them rather than those who were actually there when it happened and also there are definitely a few historical inaccuracies in this film. Now, technically this was also how James Cameron’s ‘Titanic’ was too, but that film did a much better job at letting us get to know those who were really on the ship before it crashed even though the film still kept the main focus on a fictional couple and to be frank, the writing for the romance in that film was done much better there than in this movie. While I’m not saying that this love story is that bad, at the same time it’s still rather clichĂ©d at certain points. It’s simply the scenario where two friends find themselves both in love with the same person and at one point their friendship is threatened when one of them learns about this. Plus, the main character Rafe (Ben Affleck, who to his credit manages to make the most out of what he had to work with; at the end of the day, he’s not that bad in this (or at least not as bad as a lot of people claim he is) comes off a bit too much like a selfish jerk at a certain point in a crucial part of the film after being absent for almost an hour of screen-time.

Now for the record, everything’s fine in regards to him in the first act of the film; he falls in love with Evelyn (Kate Beckinsale, who manages to come off of this with the best performance of the three leads), the nurse who let him keep his wings despite his condition (dyslexia) but then he heads off to Britain to fight in the war after being accepted by the Eagle Squadron. He is then presumed to be killed in action and months later Evelyn falls in love with Rafe’s best friend Danny (Josh Hartnett, who’s kind of in the same field as Affleck in terms of their performances). It is then revealed that Rafe survived and when he returns to Evelyn and learns that she’s now with Danny, what does he do? He complains about it... even though it’s really not Danny and Evelyn’s fault because they thought he was dead. Plus, as noted in the film, it took quite a bit of time for him to let them know that he was alive. Well… to his credit, Rafe at least manages to redeem himself by the end of the film and the camaraderie between Affleck and Hartnett in the scenes where they’re not fighting with each other is actually pretty good.

So even though the film doesn’t have the right focus and in some areas is fairly historically inaccurate, there are still some good things about it. For one thing, as everyone has already pointed out, the actual sequence of the attack on Pearl Harbor is phenomenal. This clearly wasn’t an easy sequence to film and at the end of the day it turns out to be the highlight of the entire film so all of that hard work clearly paid off. The three main leads are okay, but this film really benefits more from the supporting cast, which includes Dan Aykroyd, Mako, and Jon Voight. There has been a lot of debate over whether or not this film is ‘offensive’ towards those who were at Pearl Harbor on that ‘day of infamy’. As for me, I don’t think it’s nothing ‘too bad’. Having watched some of the behind-the-scenes videos, I can see that Bay and his crew were trying to do their best to respect those who had witnessed the attack firsthand… you have to give them credit for that… they at least tried. But as I said before, this movie did not really give these real people the proper treatment they deserve by having the film focus on fictional characters instead of those who were really there when it happened. So overall, I’m not saying that ‘Pearl Harbor’ is a perfect movie. But at the same time, I found it to be entertaining even with a 3-hour runtime; heck, even the scenes that weren’t related to the actual attack kept my interest. So overall, I don’t think this film is ‘as bad’ as what a lot of people are saying.

Rating: 3.5/5

BAD BOYS II (2003)


Now there’s some irony to be found when it comes to what I think about the 2003 sequel to ‘Bad Boys’, ‘Bad Boys II’. From what I’ve heard online, while this film has gotten the typical critical reaction that Bay’s films usually get, I’m finding that even some of Bay’s biggest critics actually sort of like this film. Well, guess what... this is the ONE Michael Bay film that I don’t like. Now, let me start by saying that despite what I just said, I don’t ‘hate’ this film because I do feel like there are some good things in it. Once again, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are great together, this film has some really nice action sequences, and this film’s story is thankfully not as ‘standard’ as the previous film was. But you know some of the biggest complaints that a lot of people have with most of Bay’s films, like for them being too long or them having humor that’s too crude? Well for some odd reason I’ve never been bothered by that in any of his films… except for this one. This film is nearly two and a half hours long… it could’ve been trimmed. As for the humor… well, to put it quite simply, this film has a scene where two rats are f***ing (and to those who haven’t seen this film yet, no you didn’t read that wrong… rats f***ing!). I don’t think I need to say anything more after that. I mean, I’ll give ‘Bad Boys II’ credit for being an entertaining film (again, no one can make an entertaining action film quite like Michael Bay), but out of all of Michael Bay’s films, this one is my least favorite.  

Rating: 2.5/5

THE ISLAND (2005)


To date, ‘The Island’ is Michael Bay’s least successful film to date from a box office perspective. It isn’t the lowest-grossing of his films, but this film was made on a $126 million budget… and only grossed around $36 million in the United States apparently due to poor marketing. Had it not been for the international box office, this could’ve been a major flop but it at least managed to make its budget back. What does this all mean? Well, it means that I think that ‘The Island’ is a bit underrated. Now I don’t think that it’s necessarily Bay’s best film but of course would expect from a Michael Bay film, it keeps your interest and has some really nice action sequences/visuals. It’s also pretty well-acted from a cast that includes Ewan McGregor, Scarlett Johansson, Sean Bean, and Steve Buscemi. This is sort of like the first ‘Bad Boys’ where there’s not much else I can say about this film, but if you haven’t seen it yet, I actually kind of recommend it. No, it’s not the smartest film out there (as is, let’s face it, pretty much every Michael Bay film), but it’s still pretty entertaining.

Rating: 4/5

PAIN AND GAIN (2013)


Now I had previously reviewed this film back when it came out in April 2013 and I originally gave it a score of 3.5/5 and I have to admit that, for a while, I was actually this close to listing it as one of my ‘disappointments’ for the year because I was sort of looking forward to it and while I didn’t think it was bad, I was hoping it would have been a bit better than how it ultimately turned out. But I gave it a second chance recently and I have warmed up to it a bit more though I still think it has a few glaring problems. The most notable problem is that in a few areas it’s pretty uneven. Not only does almost every main character in this film have their own bit of narration at one point or another, but for a film that is intended to be a black comedy, the second half of the movie is actually quite a bit darker in tone than the first due to the fact that the main characters accidentally kill two people, resulting in them frantically trying to cover it up. There are still a few bits of comedy in this part of the film, like this one bit where they buy a chainsaw that ends up not working, but overall it’s not as consistent as the first half of the film.

And that first half of the film, where the three main characters are trying to kidnap a rich, spoiled businessman, is where the film’s attempt at comedy really shines, mostly due to how the whole ‘kidnapping’ ultimately plays out. Now while this film is focusing on a true story and the criminals of that story are this film’s ‘protagonists’, the movie isn’t really trying to glorify them in anyway; it shows that they were greedy, mean, and most importantly, pretty damn stupid. They think they know what they’re doing but in reality, pretty much all of their plans end up backfiring on them and that is where most of the film’s comedy comes from; the fact that these guys were just a bunch of incompetent idiots. The film features a very solid cast led by the trio of Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, and Anthony Mackie. Johnson is the biggest standout of the film as the only member of the main group of three who sort of comes off as sympathetic being that he’s a born-again Christian and by the end of the film is the only one who is legitimately sorry for his actions… plus, he has the best line in the film. “Jesus Christ himself has blessed me with many gifts, one of them is knocking someone the f*** out!” But of course, Wahlberg and Mackie are really good in this too, as well as others in the cast like Ed Harris and Tony Shalhoub.

So that’s ‘Pain and Gain’. I said that this film ‘attempted’ to do comedy and that sort of sums up this film as a whole. I can’t say that it completely succeeds at being a black comedy because the film is pretty uneven as a whole. That might be because of the subject material it’s based on. Sure, the film is focusing on a bunch of morons whose plans are always getting messed up but these morons were also murderers, extortionists, criminals, etc. and although the film doesn't really try to ‘glorify’ them in any way, the film also doesn't have us sympathizing with their victims that much either. But to the film’s credit, it does have plenty of funny moments and the script does frequently acknowledge how ridiculous this true story is, so it is at least self-aware of the ludicrous nature of its premise. And of course, like the majority of Bay’s films, I was never bored by it though this film even though it was sort of a bit too long (like I said earlier with ‘Bad Boys II’, that’s sort of been the thing with a lot of Bay’s films but I’ve never been too bothered by that). So overall, ‘Pain and Gain’ is a solid popcorn flick that manages to work despite the fact that there are a few noticeable flaws.

Rating: 4/5 (previously 3.5/5)


Stay tuned for Part 2 of this Michael Bay directorial retrospective where we’ll be looking at the original Transformers live-action trilogy.

Sunday, June 22, 2014

Jersey Boys (2014) review


This is one of those cases where you have a movie that is directed by someone that quite frankly you would have never expected to make a movie that was a part of that genre given the director’s previous filmography. I mean, with a movie like ‘Jersey Boys’, based off of the four-time Tony Award winning Broadway musical of the same name which debuted in 2005 dramatizing the rise and fall of the famous 60’s rock group ‘The Four Seasons’, who would you think would have been a good choice to direct the film? Maybe someone who has directed musicals before like Rob Marshall (‘Chicago’), but would you have ever guessed that we would see a musical directed by Clint Eastwood… yes, the Clint Eastwood, the same man known for directing movies such as ‘Unforgiven’ and ‘Million Dollar Baby’. That alone made me interested in seeing this film. And I have to say that for a movie that’s currently getting rather mixed reviews right now and one that wasn’t too big of a hit at the box office during its first weekend, I thoroughly enjoyed it. While I do have some minor issues with the film’s length, I found the film to be very enjoyable and while it may sort of be your typical musical ‘biopic’, it benefits heavily from some great music, a good cast, and a pretty laid-back pace.

It all started in 1953 in Newark, New Jersey when Tommy DeVito (Vincent Piazza), a native of the area who constantly found himself getting into trouble with the police, forms a band called ‘The Variety Trio’ with his brother Nick and their friend Nick Massi (Michael Lomenda). Around that same time, Tommy befriends Frankie Valli (John Lloyd Young), taking him under his wing and eventually letting him join the group where he ends up taking the place of Tommy’s brother. However, the three-man band continues to find little success up until they recruit a fourth member, singer/songwriter Bob Gaudio (Erich Bergen), change their name to the ‘Four Seasons’, and sign a contract deal. While at first they find themselves as back-up singers, they soon release a couple of number one hits, including ‘Sherry’ and ‘Walk Like a Man’, propelling them to superstardom. However, the relationships between the four members of the group start to become strained after it is revealed that Tommy is in serious debt having owed $150,000 to a loan shark.

The film does take a little bit to get going, about twenty minutes or so, but once the four main guys actually get together, that was when the film really started to pick up. I do sort of feel like the movie was ultimately just a little bit too long, but at the same time, there wasn’t really any instances where I started to get bored because I was really getting into the film. I felt that the four main guys had a really nice camaraderie/group dynamic, which really shows in regards to the music, which of course is fantastic. Call me an old-timer all you want, but I just love this kind of music and while the movie is sort of more focused on the behind-the-scenes developments of the group rather than their music, I guarantee you that this movie has its fair share of toe-tapping musical moments. I’ve heard a lot of critics say that this film could’ve had a bit more faster pace but I did kind of like that the film went at a pretty relaxing speed. For the record, I haven’t seen the musical itself so I don’t know the kind of pacing that it had compared to the film and yes, this film’s pacing probably is the main reason why I did feel that the movie went on just a bit longer than it needed to be but again, I didn’t think that the movie was ‘overlong’, per se.

Aside from Vincent Piazza as Tommy DeVito, pretty much every member of the main cast were all stage actors who had played these roles before, whether on Broadway or on national tours. Most notably John Lloyd Young returns to the role of Frankie Valli having originated the role when the musical first debuted, which won him a Tony in 2006. Some might say that because of this, the actors give off a bit too much of a ‘Broadway’ vibe but overall I think they all did a really good job. As I said earlier, Young, Piazza, Bergen, and Lomenda have a great camaraderie and they all did a great job performance-wise with the music. I won’t go as far as to choose the ‘standout’ of the four, though I will say that out of the four guys, I liked Young and Bergen the most in regards to their performances, not because these two are probably focused on the most in regards to the members of the group, but because I found that both came off as being pretty likable. Christopher Walken also has a nice minor role in this as Gyp DeCarlo, a mob boss with whom Frankie and Tommy have a good relationship with. He’s only in the movie for a few scenes, but of course, he’s Christopher Walken and he commands the stage whenever he’s on-screen.

I never thought that we would ever see Clint Eastwood direct a musical, but now he has and overall I’d say that it turned out to be pretty good. I’ve never seen the actual Broadway musical so I can’t say whether or not this movie is faithful to it, but I still found it to be an entertaining movie. Not only did I love the music, but I did actually like the fact that this movie didn’t try to speed through everything and that it had a pretty nice relaxing laid-back pace. And while I do feel that the movie was just a little bit too long, I’m not going to hold that against it because while the film did take a little bit to get going, after twenty minutes or so I was really getting into it and that is because I felt that the four main guys were really good and I found the story of the ‘Four Seasons’ to be pretty interesting, though I am aware that because this is a dramatization of their story, not all of what happened in this movie is ‘true’. Still, I do recommend this film, especially if you love this kind of music. It’s not exactly doing well right now at the box office though I do want to note when I did see this movie, the theater that I saw it in was actually packed so this film at least does have an audience though if you haven’t seen it yet, it’s worth checking out.


Rating: 4/5

Wednesday, June 18, 2014

22 Jump Street (2014) review


At the beginning of ‘22 Jump Street’, Officers Schmidt and Jenko are in the office of Deputy Chief Hardy who says the following statement to them; “Ladies, no one gave a s*** about the Jump Street reboot but you got lucky…” That statement alone can pretty much sum up how 2012’s ‘21 Jump Street’ turned out. I mean, I doubt that many people were actually looking forward to the film, being that it was a film based off of an old TV show of the same name from the 1980’s that was perhaps most famous for launching the career of Johnny Depp more than anything else. But in the end, ‘21 Jump Street’ ended up being one of the funniest films of that year and now directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who are coming into this fresh off of this year’s smash hit ‘The LEGO Movie’, and the main cast return for the sequel, ‘22 Jump Street’. Now of course, we all know that most comedy sequels tend to be pretty inferior to their predecessors, usually because a lot of them just copy the same plot as the first film but don’t have the same good material to work with. And while this film does basically copy the same plot of its predecessor, at the same time the filmmakers are completely aware of that and because of that, ‘22 Jump Street’ turns out to be one of the best comedy sequels of all time due to the fact that it’s so self-aware of what it is doing.

After their successful stint going undercover as high school students as part of the resurrected ‘Jump Street’ program, Officers Morton Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Greg Jenko (Channing Tatum) are eager to continue working as regular police officers. However, after a botched attempt at capturing a group of drug dealers, Deputy Chief Hardy (Nick Offerman) puts them back into the program (now located at 22 Jump Street after the Koreans bought back the church at 21 Jump Street) because, as he puts it, the reason they failed to catch the drug dealers was because they weren’t doing the ‘same undercover student thing’ that they did the first time. As for this time, Schmidt and Jenko are assigned by Captain Dickson (Ice Cube) to go undercover at M.C. State in order to locate the supplier of a new drug referred to as WHYPHY which, like the drug from the last film, resulted in the death of a student. While their mission seems simple enough (after all, this is the same exact mission they did before when they went undercover as high school students), Schmidt and Jenko’s relationship starts to be challenged when Jenko befriends a jock on the football team named Zook (Wyatt Russell), resulting in Schmidt beginning to feel left out.

So yeah, this film’s plot is basically just rehashing the same beats from the first film with not too many differences in regards to how it’s structured; Schmidt and Jenko try to do their jobs as cops, they mess up, they’re sent undercover to find a drug supplier, and their relationship starts to become strained when one of them becomes more popular than the other. Really the only difference here is that Jenko is the one who becomes popular, not Schmidt. So with all of that said, why then is the material here just as good as it was in the previous film, if arguably not better? Well, the main reason for this is, as I stated earlier, the cast and crew do realize that they are copying the same plot as the first film. The amount of meta humor in this film is ridiculously high. It constantly acknowledges the similar plot threads along with the fact that they have a bigger budget this time to work with ($50 million compared to the first film’s $42 million budget) although, halfway through the movie, it’s noted that they’re really starting to run out of money. Because of this, this film could probably go down as one of the smartest comedy films of all time for managing to have so much great humor in this film while also playing off of the fact that we’ve seen all of this already in the previous film.

As in the first film, Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum are both terrific here and of course one of the greatest strengths of the film as a whole is their camaraderie with each other (or, to reference the RT consensus, ‘bromantic chemistry’). These two work off each other so well and I really like how in this film, Tatum does some really impressive stunt work in this that doesn’t really seem that possible for anyone to do (in fact, I’m pretty sure I recall that at one point, Schmidt (who of course they play up as not being as fit as Jenko) says that he’s like Superman or something… ironic considering how Tatum played Superman in ‘The LEGO Movie’). They also give Ice Cube more to do here than in the first film (where really all he did was just yell at Schmidt and Jenko… this time he becomes much more involved in the plot) which then results in one of the film’s funniest moments. Now don’t worry, I won’t dare give it away but I will say that it does revolve around an incredibly awkward situation that emerges between him and Schmidt due to something that the latter does in this that, simply put, the Captain doesn’t approve of. The other new additions to the cast, including Wyatt Russell, Amber Stevens, and Jillian Bell also do really good jobs as well.

I know that I talked about this a few months ago when I reviewed ‘The LEGO Movie’ but after seeing how this film turned out I once again have to point out directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s phenomenal track record. They’ve made two excellent animated films; one based off of a very short children’s book and the other based off a toy line, the latter of which could have easily have ended up being nothing more than a commercial for the brand. Then they made an excellent live-action comedy out of an old TV show, which ironically was a drama in its first iteration. Now, they’ve made quite frankly one of the best comedy sequels of all time, if arguably not the best. These two have made a name for themselves when it comes to taking projects that don’t seem like they would be able to work and being able to make phenomenal films out of them. And in regards to this film, that’s saying a lot considering that this film’s plot is a near ‘carbon-copy’ of the first film. But thankfully, everyone involved realized this resulting in a film that is incredibly self-aware of what it’s doing with excellent material that has quite a lot of meta humor in it. This is easily my favorite comedy of the year so far; in fact, dare I say it, I think this film’s even better than the first one.

(P.S. Make sure to stick around for the first half of the end credits. Why? Because you don’t want to miss some of the best ending credits to ever be in a film.)


Rating: 4.5/5

Sunday, June 15, 2014

Edge of Tomorrow (2014) review


Easily one of the most notable comedies of all time is 1993’s ‘Groundhog Day’, which revolved around an arrogant TV weatherman who finds himself caught in a time loop, reliving the same day over and over again. The concept of a character ending up in a time loop has also been seen in a few other movies such as ‘Source Code’ and ’12 Monkeys’ and that idea is also prominent in director Doug Liman’s ‘Edge of Tomorrow’, which is based off of a 2004 Japanese light novel, ‘All You Need is Kill’ by Hiroshi Sakurazaka. I have to say… I was quite surprised when I saw that this film was getting really good reviews (it currently stands at an 90% rating on Rotten Tomatoes) because going in, I was sort of expecting to have a RT rating somewhere in the 60’s or lower but instead it’s currently one of the best-reviewed films of this summer… and in its opening weekend, it only grossed $28.8 million here in the U.S. Oh man, that’s sad, especially when considering that this really is one of the best films of the year so far. A far more original film than what we’re usually seeing these days (I mean… original as much as being based a ‘light novel’ can be but I digress), ‘Edge of Tomorrow’ features some great action sequences and Tom Cruise at the best that’s he’s ever been in quite some time.

For the last five years, a war has been going on between humanity and an alien species known as the Mimics, and while at first the aliens continued to defeat the humans in battle, the United Defense Forces have been able to turn the odds around with the introduction of armed exoskeletons to help soldiers in battle. As the UDF intends to launch an invasion against the Mimics in France, UDF spokesman Major William Cage (Tom Cruise) learns that he has been ordered to cover the action on the beaches, despite the fact that he’s completely inexperienced when it comes to combat. Not wanting to go, even going so far as to blackmail his superior officer, Cage ultimately ends up getting stripped of his rank and is put into battle with the first wave of soldiers, who are quickly annihilated by the Mimics, who have anticipated the attack in advance. Cage ends up getting killed after destroying a larger Mimic but ends up getting doused in its blood, resulting in him getting stuck in a time loop as he finds himself continuously resetting back to the day before he’s sent into battle every time he dies. Cage soon teams up with Sergeant Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt), one of the UDF’s top soldiers who, as it turns out, was also in a time loop during a battle, as she helps him train while they work together to try and find a way to defeat the Mimics before the invasion in France ever begins.

The whole scenario of a character getting caught in a time loop can run the risk of becoming tiresome after a while but thankfully that’s not the case here. Obviously, as is typical with this scenario, there are times where, after Cage has been through the time loop a few times, he is able to anticipate what’s going to happen but it’s not really done by having the same scene run over and over again. Instead, at certain points the movie is already at the point where Cage knows what’s going to happen instead of just showing him continuously failing over and over again which again could get rather tedious if we were watching the same thing happen repeatedly. In fact, the whole scenario about Cage’s method of trial-and-error ultimately results in the film’s greatest strength; its humor. There are a lot of funny moments revolving around a lot of the mistakes that Cage makes while in the time loop, like one particularly funny moment that I won’t dare spoil here but I will say that it happens before Cage even steps into battle. Speaking of battles, the action in this movie is well-shot, those mech suits are pretty darn cool, and the film has a very nice pace to it, always keeping your interest at all times.

Whether you like him or not, there’s no denying that Tom Cruise is a fantastic action star and here I’d say that he’s the best that he’s ever been for quite some time. For one thing, I really like that the character he plays in this doesn’t start out as a badass soldier (like, let’s be honest, most of his action roles these days), but rather an inexperienced spokesman for the UDF who so does not want to go into battle that he’s willing to blackmail the commander of the UDF so that he doesn’t have to fight. Obviously that doesn’t work for him, but overall this serves as a very nice change of pace from what we usually see from the characters that Tom Cruise plays while Cruise still maintains a lot of charm and wit while in the role. Equally excellent here is Emily Blunt, in her second straight great sci-fi film in a row following 2012’s ‘Looper’. Her character Rita is such a terrific action heroine that really, this movie didn’t even need Tom Cruise’s character because she could have probably done everything on her own, though with that said Cruise and Blunt do have some really nice chemistry and camaraderie. Hopefully this means that Blunt will get some action roles in the future because I could definitely see her in more action roles, especially if they’re written as well as her role in this film was.

It’s kind of sad that this movie didn’t do so well in its opening weekend. I mean, here we have one of the best-reviewed films of this summer and one that really lives up to that pedigree thanks to excellent action sequences, a great pair of leads, and most importantly, a good sense of humor. But instead, less than $30 million worth of people saw this film when it debuted. Thank god for the international box office then because otherwise this film could’ve ended up being a big box office flop. Whatever the reason was for this film’s weak opening weekend, whether it be because of a bad marketing campaign that might have made some audience members think this was another ‘Oblivion’ (a film which, for the record, I did like but overall it wasn’t as well-received as this one) or because of how, in these days, Hollywood isn’t too keen on more original material (though again, as I said, this is based on a light novel though it’s still fairly more original than a lot of other films these days), one thing is for certain. If you haven’t seen this movie yet, I highly recommend that you do because this is one of the best films of the year so far and I do feel that you’ll be satisfied by what you see.


Rating: 4.5/5

Friday, June 6, 2014

Thoughts on the Marvel Studios 'Ant-Man' controversy


(UPDATE: After a few weeks, the search for Wright's successor has now come to an end. Peyton Reed ('Yes Man') has been hired to direct the film and although Adam McKay had dropped out of directing the film, he is still on as one of the screenwriters... thank god this mess is finally over!)
 
There have been plenty of films that have had a fairly nightmarish production, including ‘Apocalypse Now’, ‘Cleopatra’, and ‘Waterworld’… and that’s just to name a few. As for the major reasons why a film production can run into trouble, there can be plenty of ways that could happen, like a change in director halfway through the shoot (e.g. Richard Donner with ‘Superman II’), location problems (mostly weather-related), or even some hot-headed actors. But at this moment, Marvel Studios is enduring probably one of the messiest ‘production nightmares’ of all time, or at least in recent memory… and the irony is that the film in question hasn’t even started shooting yet. I am of course referring to ‘Ant-Man’, which is currently set to be released in July 2015. However, due to some recent controversy surrounding the film, it’s starting to look like the film won’t be able to make that release date. That is mainly due to the fact that Marvel’s original choice to direct the film recently left the project recently left the project due to complications surrounding the script and right now Marvel is currently looking for someone to take over as director of the film. However, they haven’t been so lucky yet in regards to finding a successor, so much so that it’s almost like this troubled production is actually cursed in the wake of the original director’s departure.


It all started in 2006, before the Marvel Cinematic Universe even got started, when the then recently formed Marvel Studios hired Edgar Wright, fresh off of ‘Shaun of the Dead’ and before he did ‘Hot Fuzz’, to write and direct a film adaptation of the character Ant-Man. Wright co-wrote the script with Joe Cornish and after going through a few re-writes, partially done in order for the film to fit into the continuity of the MCU, it seemed like things would be going smoothly. Michael Douglas and Paul Rudd were cast in the roles of the first two characters from the comics that adopted the Ant-Man persona, Hank Pym and Scott Lang, respectively. Other additions to the cast were made, including Michael Pena, Evangeline Lilly, and Patrick Wilson and soon the film was set to go into principal photography… then on May 23, 2014, a bombshell was dropped as it was revealed that Wright had left the project due to ‘creative differences’ with Marvel Studios. It was later confirmed that Marvel was unhappy with Wright’s vision for the film and had ordered rewrites done without Wright’s involvement. Obviously, Wright wasn’t too pleased with these new developments so he decided to leave the project.


Ironically, barely just 24 hours after the announcement of Wright’s departure, another key director stepped down from an upcoming MCU project; Drew Goddard, who was set to be the show-runner for the first of Marvel’s Netflix TV shows, ‘Daredevil’. However, in his case, it wasn’t due to ‘creative differences’ but because he would have had scheduling conflicts with the other superhero property he was tapped to direct, Sony’s ‘Sinister Six’ film. Almost immediately after his departure, Marvel announced that Steven S. DeKnight (‘Spartacus’) would take over Goddard’s duties as show-runner. However, in the case of ‘Ant-Man’… they’re still looking for a replacement for Wright. Adam McKay (‘Anchorman’, ‘Talladega Nights’) was reported to have entered negotiations to direct, but ending up pulling out. Then the next top candidate was Rawson Marshall Thurber (‘Dodgeball’, ‘We’re the Millers’)… he too dropped out of the running. There have been numerous names thrown out as possible contenders for the job, including Ruben Fleischer ('Zombieland'), Nicholas Stoller ('Neighbors'), and Michael Dowse ('Goon'), but there have been some reports claiming that some of these directors have either passed on the job or weren't even considered to be begin with so overall you're going to have to take these bits of news with a grain of salt.


All of this recent controversy has led to some debate in regards to the state of Phase Three of the MCU and some believe that Wright’s departure is going to result in a drop of quality for the films past ‘The Avengers: Age of Ultron’. Heck some are even saying the studio lost all of their good will because of this whole debacle (which for the record I think is B.S., but that’s beside the point). Really, I’m not too worried about Marvel Studios right now, and no it’s not because I’ve pretty much made it clear that I’m a big fan of their films. The point is that I feel that at this point in time, Marvel Studios has done such a good job at establishing their Cinematic Universe and to date have not made a bad film that I think that ‘Ant-Man’ is going to turn out okay, even if it will probably not turn out as good as it could have been under Wright’s direction. And yes, it does suck so much that Wright’s no longer attached to the film and the fact that all of the hard work that he put into it these past eight years is now going to waste is very, very depressing. But regardless of the sad truth, Marvel has to move on from this and I believe that they will. From the list of directors they’re pursuing to take over the film, it’s clear that they’re looking for a comedic director and that’s fine. After all, if the Russo brothers could come from a comedic background and end up making the best solo film in the MCU to date (yes, I think ‘Winter Soldier’ is even better than ‘Iron Man’), then I think that whoever takes over ‘Ant-Man’ is going to turn out a good film… but again, the film hasn’t even started shooting yet so we’re just going to have to wait and see about that.


As much as they might try to deny it, the studio is technically to blame for this as they were the ones who did the rewrites of the script behind Wright’s back. All I’m going to say about that is that I hope that this is not a sign that Marvel is trying to ‘play it safe’. Of course, this is coming after the release of ‘Iron Man 3’. Sure, the film grossed a billion dollars at the box office and got pretty solid reviews from critics but the whole controversy surrounding the infamous Mandarin twist definitely cast a dark shadow over the film, which is really sad considering that, as I’ve noted before in my review of the film, the twist actually did work. But regardless, it still pissed off a lot of fans and I have a bad feeling that this might have influenced Marvel’s recent actions. Now, I’m not saying that this influenced some of the other films in Phase Two, though ‘Thor: The Dark World’ definitely felt more like it was playing things safer. But anyway, this whole idea of Marvel ‘playing it safe’ is also part of why some fear that the quality is going to drop. Maybe it will, but I won’t be that worried about it and really, even if Marvel Studios ends up making a bad film sometime soon, so what? After all, in Hollywood nothing’s perfect and while I would hate to see it, I have the feeling that one bad MCU film will happen sometime in the future. When it does, I don’t think it’ll be that big of a deal because it was bound to happen sooner or later.



But with all that has been said here, going back to the whole ‘Ant-Man’ debacle, I believe that Marvel Studios should do the following. They should postpone the film until they can get things settled. I know that’s probably not what Marvel wants to do right now but at this point I doubt that they will be able to make their proposed July 2015 release date, at least at this rate. I mean, even if they do find a director in the next few days, the film is still set to start shooting mid-2014, which is technically any day now. Whoever this new director will be should at least have some time to prepare before he starts filming it. After all, there’s no greater example of when a director had little time to prepare for a film than in 1992 when David Fincher was hired to direct ‘Alien 3’… and we all know how that one turned out. So overall, I think that Marvel should probably postpone the film at least back to their previously scheduled release date of November 6, 2015. Maybe that will give Wright’s successor enough time to prepare before the film starts shooting. But right now, Marvel is still (emphasis on ‘still’) looking for that successor. While I’m guessing that the final product won’t turn out as good as it would have been under Wright’s direction, I’m still going to stay optimistic about this whole scenario and I don’t think that this will have an extremely negative effect on the future of the MCU. I mean, at this point, just one film can't hurt this studio's incredibly good reputation that much.

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

Maleficent (2014) review


In 1959, Disney released their 16th feature-length animated film, ‘Sleeping Beauty’, based on the 1697 fairytale ‘La Belle au bois dormant’ by Charles Perrault, which was later adapted by the Brothers Grimm in 1812 as ‘Little Briar Rose’. While the film received generally mixed reviews at the time of its release and it also performed rather disappointingly at the box office, it has since become a Disney classic and one of the greatest elements of the entire film was its main villain, Maleficent. Easily one of Disney’s finest villains, Maleficent was graceful and elegant, but also incredibly sinister at the same time, even if her motivations in the film were rather questionable, being that she was ‘offended’ at not getting an invitation to Princess Aurora’s christening. Still, she was a great villain and now with this new film ‘Maleficent’ we get to see her side of the story because this basically is the live-action version of the story but told from Maleficent’s point of view. Because of this, this film offers quite a different take on the story than one might expect, but overall it does offer an intriguing new look on the story ‘we thought we knew’ and of course is headlined by the terrific performance by the perfectly cast Angelina Jolie as the ‘Mistress of All Evil’.

Before she became known as the ‘Mistress of All Evil’, Maleficent (Angelina Jolie) was once a young fairy who lived in a magical realm known as the Moors, which bordered a human kingdom. One day, she meets and befriends a peasant boy named Stefan and eventually they fall in love. However years later, when Stefan (Sharlto Copley) returns to her after having not seen her for a long time, he ends up betraying her by cutting off her wings so that he can become king. Heartbroken and outraged, Maleficent enacts revenge on Stefan on the day of his daughter Aurora’s christening. Maleficent curses the infant child proclaiming that on her 16th birthday, she will prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel and fall into a sleep-like death, and can only be awakened by true love’s kiss. In the hopes that this curse can be avoided, Stefan has Aurora sent away from the kingdom to live in hiding with three pixies (Imelda Staunton, Lesley Manville, and Juno Temple) until the day after her 16th birthday. But as Aurora (Elle Fanning) starts to grow up, Maleficent, who ends up taking care of her more than the pixies do, begins to grow more attached to her, resulting in her trying to find a way to remove the curse from Aurora before it’s too late.

Now if you’re coming into this expecting Maleficent to be the bad guy, you’re probably going to be rather disappointed because it’s more like ‘Wicked’ in that she’s the protagonist in this. Sure she does curse Aurora with the sleeping curse and for a little while early on she doesn’t like her that much, but for most of the movie she’s just a misunderstood character who was betrayed by King Stefan, the real main antagonist of the film, which ends up leading her on a path of revenge. But she soon starts to care more for Aurora, whose cheerful persona starts to change Maleficent’s outlook on humans. Overall, the relationship between the two, which is sort of like a ‘mother-daughter’ relationship, is the best part, and ultimately the heart, of the movie. The movie also benefits from some pretty excellent visuals, which is not that surprising seeing how this was directed by someone who’s been a production designer, which help immerse us in this film’s universe. Plus, at just 97 minutes, making it the shortest of Disney’s recent live-action fairytales, the film doesn’t overstay its welcome and never drags at any point.   

As it’s been well documented by pretty much everyone who’s seen this movie, Angelina Jolie does a fantastic job as Maleficent. She looks the part, acts the part, and was just a perfect choice to portray the character. She’s so good here that… well, she admittedly overshadows everyone else in the film. Now I’m not saying that the rest of the cast is bad; it’s just that this movie really belongs to Jolie and the fact is that Maleficent is focused on the most here more than anyone else. While Aurora is just your average ‘nice’ princess (Prince Phillip (Brenton Thwaites) is really just serving as a cameo here), if I remember correctly she wasn’t the most compelling lead in the original animated film either. Still, Elle Fanning does do a very good job with the rather limited material she has to work with but as I stated earlier, the relationship between her and Jolie in this movie is really top-notch. Sharlto Copley also doesn’t really have as much to work with as Stefan but he also does a pretty good job here as well. However, the three pixies here do get rather annoying at times, not in their performances but how they are portrayed in this. I haven’t seen the original ‘Sleeping Beauty’ film in quite some time, but I don’t recall the three fairies in that film being as incompetent as these three are. It’s clearly shown that Maleficent is a far better caretaker of Aurora than them. I really don’t know what went wrong in the translation from animation to live-action, but here they’re more like the Three Stooges.

When it comes to Disney’s recent big-budget live-action fairytales, I find that I like ‘Maleficent’ more than ‘Alice in Wonderland’ and almost as I much as I liked ‘Oz the Great and Powerful’. At the end of the day, ‘Maleficent’ turns out to be a pretty good film. Director Robert Stromberg, who has been mostly known for his work as a fantastic production designer on films like ‘Avatar’ as well as the previously mentioned ‘Alice’ and ‘Oz’, makes a pretty good first debut with this film and a lot of that is because of the brilliant performance by Angelina Jolie as Maleficent. Sure, she’s not the bad guy in this, which I’m guessing will be rather disappointing for some people, but her relationship with Aurora in this film certainly makes up for it. And while Jolie does overshadow everyone else in the film, they all do a pretty fine job even if they don’t have as much to work with. Plus, the film has really nice visuals and doesn’t really drag at any point seeing how it is much shorter than both ‘Oz’ and ‘Alice’. So overall, if you’re okay with the fact that this film’s Maleficent isn’t the main villain, then I do recommend this movie because I don’t think that having Maleficent be the protagonist in this betrays who the character was in the original film. It’s just a very interesting new take on the story of ‘Sleeping Beauty’ from her perspective.


Rating: 4/5

Sunday, June 1, 2014

A Million Ways to Die in the West (2014) review


After establishing his own animation empire with ‘Family Guy’, which continues to run after surviving not one but two cancellations, ‘American Dad!’, and ‘The Cleveland Show’, Seth MacFarlane transitioned into film with his directorial debut, ‘Ted’, and the film was a pretty big hit when it released in June 2012. Not only did it receive generally solid reviews from critics, but it also ended up becoming the highest grossing original comedy of all time with nearly $550 million worldwide at the box office. A few months later, MacFarlane was selected to host the 85th Academy Awards and while he, as usual, attracted a lot of controversy due to his trademark style of humor, I was one of those who thought that he did a really good job and felt that his turn as host was a breath of fresh air for the annual awards ceremony. But now he’s back with his next directorial effort, ‘A Million Ways to Die in the West’, and this time instead of just portraying a motion capture character as he did in ‘Ted’, he makes his live-action debut in the lead role. So how does this film hold up? Well, ultimately I can’t say that it was as good as ‘Ted’ for a few glaring reasons but overall it still provided a decent amount of laughs though how it will fare with audiences could ultimately depend on whether or not you’re a fan of MacFarlane’s work.

The film centers on Albert Stark (Seth MacFarlane), a cowardly sheep farmer in Arizona who constantly complains about how awful the Wild West in 1882 is, and that’s mostly because there are multiple ways (‘a million’ to be specific) to die there; disease, outlaws, animals, the doctor, etc. His lack of courage ends up resulting in him losing his girlfriend Louise (Amanda Seyfried) to the town’s moustache shop owner Foy (Neil Patrick Harris) after he withdraws from a duel. Albert then decides to leave for San Francisco, but ends up staying when a mysterious woman named Anna (Charlize Theron) moves into town. As she and Albert start to become friends, he starts to gain a bit more confidence as he attempts to win back the heart of Louise. But soon he finds himself having to stand his ground not against Foy, but against Anna’s husband, the notorious outlaw Clinch Leatherwood (Liam Neeson), when he arrives in town seeking revenge on Stark after he started to develop a relationship with Anna. In order to deal with this, Anna helps Albert by teaching him how to shoot better so that Albert can stand a chance against the most vicious gunslinger in the territory.

This film’s humor is exactly what you would expect from MacFarlane given his line of work; fairly crass and juvenile. If you’re someone who likes that kind of humor, you’ll probably enjoy this movie and overall there are a solid amount of funny moments in this film. I’ve heard some people say that the best stuff is in the trailer and for the most part they’re fairly right but there were still a few good funny moments peppered in here and there that weren’t featured in the trailers. However, the big problem here is that there are a few instances where there’s no humor at all. And you know some comedies do have moments where the humor doesn’t fly well but that’s not the case here because there are a few instances where nothing funny is happening for a good 10 to 15 minutes. A lot of critics have said that this film is ‘overlong’, and I have to say that I do agree with that. This film may only be about 10 minutes longer than ‘Ted’, but that film’s humor was much more consistent and ultimately had enough material to justify its runtime. This film, sadly, doesn’t have enough material to be nearly two hours long. In fact, the whole plot involving Liam Neeson’s character… is actually more or less just the subplot for the third act. Seriously, most of the movie’s buildup revolves around a duel between Albert and Foy, not with Albert and Clinch as the trailers are indicating.

But still, this film does benefit from a pretty solid cast even if they don’t always have enough good material to work with. In his first major live-action leading role, MacFarlane does a pretty good job and his chemistry with Theron, who’s really good here as well, is also really good. It always helps in a movie like this when the chemistry between the two leads is really good though remember what I said about those instances that had a severe lack of humor? That’s because those scenes are mainly focused on developing the relationship between the two and though it really is a nice little romance that these two develop, this film sort of focuses on that relationship a bit too much. All of the other major members of the cast, including Seyfried, Harris, Giovanni Ribisi, who plays Albert’s best friend Edward, and Sarah Silverman, who plays Edward’s fiancĂ© Ruth, have their own moments to shine here as well. Unfortunately though, Liam Neeson doesn’t get much to do here; his character is pretty one-note, which is a shame after his hilarious turn as Bad Cop/Good Cop in ‘The LEGO Movie’. As for the multiple cameos in this movie (another thing you can expect from a MacFarlane production), there a few really noteworthy cameos here that produce some quality laughs though one cameo unfortunately had to be involved in probably the weakest post-credits scene ever. It’s a fairly brief scene and the cameo itself was pretty cool but quite frankly it just isn’t worth it after waiting through the entire credits.

I don’t think ‘A Million Ways to Die in the West’ is that bad; I feel that it’s better than a lot of comedies that are coming out these days and at the end of the day there are a good decent amount of laughs to be had here. However, as far as MacFarlane’s directorial efforts go, ‘Ted’ was the funnier film. This film just doesn’t have enough material to justify a near two-hour runtime. There are at least two or three instances where no humor is occurring for at least 10-15 minutes and while those scenes are setting up a nice little romance between MacFarlane and Theron’s characters, that romance is focused on just a bit too much. Still, the cast is pretty game for the material, there are a few really fun cameos here, and overall if you’re a fan of MacFarlane’s work you’ll probably like this. If you’re not a fan, well, obviously you’re probably not going to like this film. But really, if you haven’t seen ‘Neighbors’ yet, I’d recommend that film over this one because at the end of the day that is still the best comedy of this year so far. Again, I don’t think this film was that bad, but it’s a rather disappointing follow-up to ‘Ted’ and it could have been a lot funnier.


Rating: 3/5