Brave

***

Pretend I’m Merida, speak to me. “Ooooooh! I don’t want to get married, I want to stay single and let my hair flow in the wind as I ride through the glen firing arrows into the sunset.”

Brave © 2012 Disney.

This is a very pretty movie. Like really, really pretty. And it is cute. Pretty cute.

It was also a bit contrived and annoying also though. Sometimes they say you yell at characters because you are so invested in them. If that were true, then I truly cared about Princess Merida in a way that I did not about Jason Bourne or my own brother. On the other hand, at least I chose to watch this and not Cars 2. Which brings me to my bias—this is a Pixar film. If this were not, perhaps I would not have been so frustrated with it and less likely to try to give it **½.

The Great Gatsby

Can’t repeat the past? No, why, of course you can… of course you can.

A better question is can you create the past? Even as it was written, The Great Gatsby was a tale of the past. Each movie adaptation has attempted to recreate that past, which never existed. One of the best things about Baz Luhrmann’s update was the rejection of old-timey music. But mentioning the excellent usage of the song “No Church in the Wild,” evokes the wonderful trailer released for this film. It was the best preview of the year.

Carey Mulligan (Daisy) and Joel Edgerton (Tom), at Gatsby’s. © 2013 Warner Bros.

Unfortunately, the best part of the trailer does not make it in the film! That being the Filter version of “Happy Together.” Still, this is a complex story, so it must have been difficult to cut together an accurate preview. From the preview I expected Joel Edgerton’s character, Tom Buchanan to be more of a villain. He is simply who he is. A well educated, small minded lout, who does not mind slapping his mistress for badmouthing his wife. But he is not a criminal and not a murderer, just an entitled adulterer. He is married to the much sought after Daisy Buchanan–Carey Mulligan. Mulligan’s performance stole the film. She maintains a consistency throughout all that she faces, allowing the audience to see anything they want in her, much like the men in the film do. Her companion, Elizabeth Debicki, shows more personality, but also the twinge of self-doubt as she is more athletic and taller than might be generally found to be ladylike. I am a bit surprised in how her fledgling relationship with Tobey Maguire’s Nick Carroway seems to fizzle out. And the last actress to mention is the 1920′s pinup bombshell version of Isla Fisher—most famous for Wedding Crashers. With so much to get through for the main characters, I understand why she disappears from the film, but this could have been done more gradually.

Isla Fisher as Myrtle Wilson, in the single terrible costume in the otherwise cosmetically flawless  Warner Bros. Pictures’ The Great Gatsby.

Even more impressive than the varied beauties provided in the film are the dynamic looks of its heroes, Carraway and Gatsby–Leonardo DiCaprio. The film opens with a weakened, alcoholic Carraway, which made me think that this was simply how Maguire looks today. That is absolutely not the case, as he looks chipper and dapper as a man in his late 20′s dressing for work, recreation, and dining. Gatsby, on the other hand, mostly appears in the visage of a movie star. Yet in one wet scene, even his perfect hair betrays his age as he mats it down like aging dog, long left out in the rain. Together they simultaneously show the grandeur of the Jazz Age, as well as the emptiness of its boozing elites.

DiCaprio as Jay Gatsby, Maguire as Carraway and Debicki as Jordan Baker in Village Roadshow Pictures’ drama “The Great Gatsby.”

One criticism I heard leveled against this film is that it is too slow and too long. I disagree. The measured pace works for me, and it made the exciting parties and drives seem that much faster. To give this *** is to say that I did not know what to do with this film. It has provided me with so much to think about and so much to take in. On the other hand, it was a huge disappointment compared to that perfect preview. So there it is: ***

Furious 6

**½

This code you live by makes you predictable. In our line of work predictable makes you vulnerable. I can reach out and break you any time I want.

Luke Evans (Shaw) driving a “ramp car” in Furious 6, © 2013 Universal Pictures.

It was truly difficult for me to give this flaming pile of garbage 2&½ stars. It was an impressive pile of garbage with fancy cars and fun actors and explosions and the flames were humongous, but it still made about as much sense as lighting a trashcan on fire and standing around watching it. I say, get some marshmallows and some cheap “domestic” beer, then get ready to feel the heat and enjoy some laughs. For instance, there is one scene were Vin Diesel flies out of a car across a divider to tackle Michelle Rodriguez who is flying perpendicular to him off of the barrel of a tank. When they land, about 25 feet away, I hope that Justin Lin gave the audience a pause for the laughter that ensues. This scene is certainly a sequel to the Fast 5 moment where Diesel and Paul Walker drive a car off a cliff into a lake without dying.

Michelle Rodriguez (Letty) and Vin Diesel (Dom) mid-air. As you can guess, they both are about to die. © 2013, Universal Pictures.

One major criticism of Fast 5 was that it was a street racing movie with no legitimate scenes of street racing. 6 changes that. There were tons of cool and interesting driving sequences. 5 played fast and loose with story and logic, but this just throws logic and a coherent plot out of the window. Here are my top 12 dumpster fire worthy moments:

1. The opening credits–they showed clips from all of the previous movies without any narrative arc. It was like as if someone edited together clips with the clearance to see those clips, but not to read the current script.
2. The world’s longest runway—in a climatic scene there is a plane that lands about halfway down a runway in front of some cars. The plane never stops. And after a minute it has vehicles on it. And then accelerates. And then tries to take off. For about ten minutes. Takeoff for this “planet”, as Tyrese Gibson calls it, would require at least 180 mph. Ignoring the fact that a car was driving faster than it by the end, this would still require a runway between 7 and 17 MILES.
3. Elsa Pataky’s and Vin Diesel’s relationship–first she is with him and sleeping naked, then he leaves to find Michelle Rodriguez, then she is not heard from at all—she is just chilling with Jordana Brewster and the baby—then she saves the baby and…then the movie gives us no information until the last scene where she has a badge again and says that her family has always been the police. She was a Brazilian cop for like 2 years and quickly sided with some criminals AND went into hiding with one of them. She has always been a cop like Donnie Brasco was always in the mafia.
4. Jordana Brewster’s failure to escape with her baby–she is literally handing the baby down to Elsa when she shakes her head no and chooses not follow Elsa, instead she runs back into the house to get kidnapped, or something. Just a nonsensical scene.
5. The Rock having only one fellow officer on his team–as impressive as Gina Carano’s Riley is, it seems stupid to have no other agents along with him, just these Fast and Furious Fools.
6. The first raid to get Luke Evans (Shaw)–ignoring how much of a disaster it was, Interpol wired up their prisoner and had him walk in to get killed by their target directly in front of his front door. Also, had they shown up two minutes earlier they might have just captured Evans.
7. That the Rock puts the gun to the head of a NATO general in order to hypothetically save Brewster’s life, even if it costs the death of millions of people by letting Evans leave with the super computer chip. This was worse than him destroying a room with the prisoner at Interpol. He has replaced Paul Walker as the poster child for NOT A GOOD LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICER.
8. Vin Diesel drives a car through the front of a burning plane. And he magically has the briefcase with magical micro chip.
9. NATO decides to transport the secret micro chip in an unmanned tank inside of a big truck–I think that NATO’s idea was, well, if anyone is clever enough to watch Dark Knight Rises and tries to hop into our big sturdy truck, they deserve to have an armed, unguarded tank as a bonus.
10. In a movie that takes place over a span of approximately 5 days, Paul Walker leaves London to fly to California, where he spends 24 hours in jail, to learn something that Evans could have just told any character at any point in time. I say this because when he returns with the “crucial” information as to why Rodriguez has become a villain-criminal, Vin says, “Don’t tell me. That was for you.”
11. Someone has amnesia.
12. The ads for this say Fast & Furious 6, but in the movie itself the title is “Furious 6.” I think that refers to Vin, Ludacris, Gal Gadot, Tyrese, Walker and Sung Kang. But I would hesitate to call them furious. Vin is mostly slow spoken. Ludacris and Tyrese seem to be having fun cracking jokes. Gal Gadot seems down for whatever. Walker gets seriously scared when people try to kill him and legitimately furious when his wife has been kidnapped. And Sung Kang seems melancholy. Fast 6 would have made more sense.

5 of the Furious 6: Sung Kang, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, Gal Gadot, Vin Diesel, and Paul Walker. © 2013 Universal Pics.

All that madness aside this movie had some major positives: It is a truly multi-ethnic movie; there are cross racial relationships; there are strong female characters; and more action than all of the other Fast & Furious movies combined. And, in spite of the nonsensical opening clips, the traditional credits before the movie were a pleasant surprise.

The Rock flying clothesline on Kim Kold with the Vin’s assistance. © 2013 Universal Pics.

Oh yeah and THE F’N ROCK was in this. I felt like his best moment came while clotheslining his larger, German-er version. A nice thing about the cheesy matching team of bad guys, is that the film itself acknowledged what it had done. Indeed, Tyrese gets off some good lines about them. If I could have edited this script, I would have either tried to make it better, or let it move into so bad it’s good territory. Instead, the movies navigates amidst all three places with too much in the bland middle.

Ultimate Avengers: The Movie

**½

Any questions? Any questions not about the Hulk?

As a longtime comic book fan I rejected the “Ultimate” line from Marvel Comics. The “Ultimates” were a reboot of the Marvel Comics universe without any overlap or baggage from the true universe. Their artwork seemed geared towards children and appeared to rehash the origins I already knew. So I chose not to read any Ultimate Spider-Man, or whatever other books they released, until that universe came crashing down, killing off a great deal of its main characters. That no longer seemed like kid’s stuff to me.

Black Widow, Captain America, and Gen. Nick Fury

I would say that these are not the Avengers familiar to those who have enjoyed Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Thor, and Captain America: The First Avenger, and The Avengers, but that would be a lie. At first I thought the only connection between those movies and the “Ultimates” was that Nick Fury went from a white, cigar chomping, one eyed, World War II veteran to a comic rendering of Samuel L. Jackson, who was too young to have fought in WWII. In fact, most of the storyline elements come from this “Ultimates” timeline.

Most of the Avengers: Captain America, Iron Man, Black Widow and the Wasp.

As I did not read those books, I gleaned a lot from this 2006 cartoon movie. I would recommend this 75 minute movie as a history lesson. It was one for me. And here are some of the differences between the Marvel canon and from The Avengers and Ultimate Avengers: The Movie.

• Dr. Bruce Banner and becoming the Hulk — originally Dr. Banner turned into the Hulk when a nuclear gamma bomb doused him in a huge amount of gamma radiation; but in the Ultimates he was attempting to recreate the Super Soldier Serum©.
• Steve Rogers and becoming Captain America — this origin is consistent, it is the rebirth that differs. Originally the Avengers find Cap’n America in the late 1960′s, but now it is S.H.I.E.L.D. and his recovery is much later.
• The Wasp and Ant Man, aka Giant Man — originally the Black Widow was a villain and the Wasp–Janet Van Dyne–was the only female founding member of the Avengers. She had a relationship with Hank Pym, who could initially only shrink down, but eventually learned to turn himself gigantic. Pym was the resident genius ahead of Iron Man, who kept his identity secret longer in the Marvel comics than in the Ultimates or in Iron Man.
• The formation of the Avengers — the Avengers were initially formed as a response to Loki…but there was no S.H.I.E.L.D. and Nick Fury had nothing to do with it. In the Ultimates Fury seems to have recruited them, as shown in live action movie as well. In fact, the Chitauri invade in both of these movies as well, but without Loki’s assistance in Ultimate Avengers: The Movie.
• Back to the Black Widow — I guess at some time she did join S.H.I.E.L.D., but that was long after she joined the second iteration of the Avengers. Hawkeye, “Agent Barton” in Thor and The Avengers was also a reformed villain who aligned with Captain America when the original Avengers quit; but in the Ultimates Black Widow’s past is already behind her and she is a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent.
• And lastly Thor — Thor gets his costume from Thor in the Ultimates universe, although Mjolnir—his hammer—looks unlike either the Marvel universe or movie versions. His origins on Earth differ in this movie, his movie, and in the original Marvel comics.

Thor trying to stop the Hulk, with Mjolnir’s help.

As I said, this is a colorful, and at times enjoyable, history lesson. It could use an English accent for some narration, but otherwise this would have been a dream come true to watch in 9th grade history class.

Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work

**½

All standups are innately insecure. Who would stand on a stage, by themselves, and say “Laugh. Laugh at me, laugh with me, I don’t care, just laugh.”

Wow Joan Rivers has issues. It should go without saying, but she is one of the most important comedians of the past 100 years ago. That she clearly wanted to be an actress and not a comedian ties into that unquenchable need for validation. Fortunately, as she puts it, “anger” fuels comedy.

And Joan Rivers, when she is performing, is really, really funny. The clips they show from her standup are phenomenal. But, aside from some archival footage for context, this is a documentary of one year in Joan Rivers’ life. It is hard to make an uplifting story about a troubled 70-something year old woman. And this documentary fails to do so. Moreover, it failed to make an enjoyable movie, which seems difficult when dealing with such a damaged and hilarious subject.

Iron Sky

Stephanie Paul as the President of the United States in Iron Sky, © Blind Spot Pictures Oy, 2012

*½

Remember me? The moon spook you turned into a snowflake?

The one saving grace of this super depressing parody of a Nazi invasion of Sarah Palin’s–Stephanie Paul–America is Julia Dietze as one of my guilty pleasures. That guilty pleasure first reared its head in the form of Alison Doody’s Dr. Elsa Schneider in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

Alison Doody as Dr. Elsa Schneider in 1989′s Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

Smart, sexy women who dress as Nazis, but have a redeemable quality that some might call “are not trying to kill all the Jews.” In this far lesser movie the sexy, innocent “Nazi” is named Renate Richter.

Renate Richter (Julia Dietze) teaching her class in Iron Sky.

Like Schneider she optimistically supports Nazism because she only sees a part of it. To be fair, Dr. Schneider just wanted to find the Holy Grail and saw the Nazis are her ticket to it, but she was still a Nazi. Anyways, as a moon nazi—yes, in this movie there are Nazis on the dark side of the moon—born long after World Word II Renate has no contact with “history” apart from the party line told by Nazi propaganda. So she, as a school teacher, is unfamiliar with violence. In keeping with the reality of this film, while in New York City she stumbles across a theater showing black & white hits and sees The Great Dictator, but now realizes that Charlie Chaplin was mocking Hitler, not lauding him.

And to be clear, one good actress a good film does not make. A further clarification, the “moon spook” line I quoted above, that involves whiteface. At least it was not blackface, I guess…

June Preview

Welcome to June! Different format this month: “watch this, not that.”

June 7: Watch either After Earth if you want some Shakespearan style dialogue and watch Much Ado About Nothing if you are ready for some scifi action. But seriously, I probably trust Joss Whedon–The Avengers–and Nathan Fillion–”Castle”–more with scifi than Will Smith and M. Night Shyamalan with it, but both look like good movies. Do not watch The Internship because the premise is cheesy pie and the preview does not make me laugh. But what do I know, I would not have watched Old School based on its preview.

June 12/14: Watch This Is The End, not The Bling Ring. Both have Emma Watson in them. She would have been the only reason to see The Bling Ring, which has the dubious distinction of being both a pun, and a terrible name even if you ignore the pun.

June 21: Watch Unfinished Song, not World War Z or Monsters University. Maybe WWZ will kick ass, maybe. Maybe MU will be half as good as the original, maybe. But Unfinished Song is the type of movie that everyone enjoys, but no-one bothers to see. It has Terrance Stamp–The Limey–as a widower who fills in for his late wife in her choir. It will be funny, touching, and bittersweet.

June 28: Do not watch The Heat, but really do not watch White House Down. Unfunny female odd-couple buddy cop flick with Sandra Bullock or Roland “Some people just want to watch the world burn” Emmerich blowing up the White House while a rent-a-cop tries to juggle saving the president and his son. Rent Heat and wait for July. Or go see Unfinished Song since you did not listen to me last week.