More movie reviews
Titles Covered: Captain Marvel (both versions), The King of Comedy, Godzilla King of Monsters (2019), The Kid, The Jazz Singer, Missing Link, and Unplanned.
Captain Marvel (****) -aka “Shazam”
“I see what you did there...”
Competing with Marvel's famous cinematic universe, DC has tried to create its own cross-continuity comicbook series. The results have been mixed; Wonderwoman is the only entry that everyone seems to like. Well, now there's a second great entry in the series, one that I'd argue is a bit more cohesive than Wonderwoman.
Shazam follows the adventures of a foster kid searching for his long-lost mother. He gets magical powers from an ancient wizard, and is able to transform into a superhero by shouting the word “Shazam.” The result is an action comedy that combines superhero action with much silliness, as the buffed-out superhero (who goes by many names) is ultimately an immature and cowardly kid inside.
The film juggles several different ideas: a comedy in the same vein as Big, a spoof of the superhero genre (“Are you making a big villain speech?”), a magic-themed superhero movie, and a drama about a lost child trying to find where he belongs. Oddly enough, that last bit might be the most successful, with a charming and sweet portrayal of group homes and a heartbreaking reveal in the 3rd act. I've seen comments on the Internet to the effect of “I hated the mom more than I hated the actual villain.”
Two problems: First of all, Shazam is almost a kid-friendly movie, but has a few scenes that are so gruesome that I can't recommend it to kids. This frustrated me, because the disturbing violence seemed to clash with the rest of the movie. Second, the pacing has some problems. The villain's arc is too sparse and choppy, immediately jumping from “guy searching for answers” to “full on supervillain” in about one scene. Meanwhile, the movie spends a bit too much time with the main character acting like a jerk, and also too much time on the final battle, which bops around aimlessly for about 10 minutes before finally getting to the point.
Shazam isn't perfect, but the good parts are great, and the eventual resolution of the story fantastically combines the superhero plot with the dramatic bits.
OK, for real, here's Captain Marvel...
Captain Marvel (***)
I disliked the character of Captain Marvel in Avengers: Endgame, and was ready to hate her solo movie. And yet... I don't. Captain Marvel is fine. It's a nostalgic trip back to the 1990's, and in a lot of ways comes off as a cool 90's action movie. I could imagine my highschool-aged self absolutely loving Captain Marvel if it came out in 1995, as competition for Batman Forever. Nowadays, we're in a superhero rennaisance, so I have to compare it against the likes of much better movies such as Avengers: Infinity War, The Incredibles, Into the Spiderverse, Wonderwoman, etc..
Anyway, the plot concerns “Vers,” an amnesiac warrior among the Kree aliens, who fights against a race of shapeshifters. The battle takes her to earth, where she has a past life that the audience figures out WAY before the movie reveals it. Anyway, the plot of the movie teams Vers up with a digitally de-aged Samuel Jackson, who completely steals the show as a young Nick Fury. The plot is mostly predictable, but has some fun putting Vers and Fury between the quarrels of 2 different alien races. The action scenes are also pretty good, particularly a bit in which Vers chases a shapeshifting alien onto a commuter train.
Oddly enough, Vers herself is a confusing mess of a character that never quite gels. She's kind of snarky, kind of confidant, and kind of oblivious... always “kind of” this or that without ever giving us a real character. Much criticism has been levied at Brie Larson, but I think the writers and directors need to share some blame. The story seemed built around Vers being told to control her emotions, but this plot thread rang completely false. “Control your emotions” just meant “Please don't use your OP laser fists.” At no point did she show other emotions that bothered anyone.
Overall, Captain Marvel is mid-tier Marvel, perhaps about on par with Age of Ultron or the Iron Man sequels. After all the online drama, I guess I was pleasantly surprised that it didn't suck.
The King of Comedy (*** and a half)
Recently, there's been much hype about the movie Joker, with comparisons made to Martin Scorsese's The King of Comedy. I'd never heard of this movie before, but was intrigued enough to give it a shot.
The plot concerns a wannabe stand-up comedian named Rupert Pupkin (a name nobody can get right) who wants to be on TV. He obsessess over an imagined friendship with Jerry Lewis, and ends up kidnapping Jerry in order to secure a late-night slot. The film juggles a few different inter-related themes, mainly about the American dream and celebrity worship.
Pupkin is a lot more charming and less violent than most Scorsese protagonists, though he's also unhinged enough to be slightly scary. He's an intriguing and frustrating character: he has big dreams, but is unwilling to really work for them. Over and over again he's told to start small by preforming in bars and comedy clubs. Instead, Pupkin would rather spend his time pestering people until they put him on TV.
Overall, The King of Comedy is an interesting movie with some great preformances and a creative plot. Robert Deniro disappears into the role of Pupkin, and I loved Jerry Lewis' character choices as a lonely grinch-like comedian. However the movie has the same problem I have with most Scorsese movies: lack of any moral dimension. By the end, there's no sense that any of the characters learned anything, nor any moment that hammers down the point of the movie. Still, The King of Comedy is an intriguing movie, and I enjoyed it as a “small” story among Scorsese's more famous gangster epics.
Godzilla: King of the Monsters (**)
One of the stranger on-going attempts at a cinematic universe has been the Monsterverse (not to be confused with the other monsterverse), a cross-over franchise about giant monsters. I guess King of the Monsters is therefore the Monsterverse version of The Avengers, where all the famous monsters come out to fight.
Frankly, King of the Monsters is kind of a mess. It doesn’t really work as a franchise-climax, lacking a movie between Godzilla and King of the Monsters to get us to this point (Kong: Skull Island doesn’t count, since it’s a prequel). But King of Monsters also doesn’t work as its own story, a convoluted mess of character motivations that all seem unnecessary for a story about city-sized monsters.
Anyway, apparently a lot happened after the 2014 Godzilla movie. There’s now a very large group of super-sized monsters contained in stages of hibernation, and a well-armed gang of ecoterrorists who want to release all the monsters to destroy humanity. Also, the main characters invented a MacGuffin that can control the monsters. This is all fine on paper, but unconvincing when illustrated on film. The MacGuffin does a few things when the plot requires it, but otherwise doesn’t seem to work. The terrorists pop out of nowhere and nobody knows how to stop them. And the monsters are overpowered to the point that the humans seem like pointless spectators. Speaking of which, the film also imagines that these “titans” are gods and caretakers of earth, another idea that doesn’t gel in a convincing way. Sure, the end-credits state that they make rainforests pop out of thin air, but did any of them seem capable of doing anything other than roaring and smashing stuff?
Perhaps I’m being overly harsh. King of the Monsters is a lavish production. I’m sure plenty of film-watchers will be dazzled by the big special effects, action scenes, and monsters. The actors are all vastly overqualified for this movie, and do the best they can with the muddled script. I do believe that there’s room for silly movies that don’t need well-written screenplays. I’d just wish for one that’s at least 30 minutes shorter than King of Monsters.
The Kid (****)
The Kid features a bizarre scene in which Charlie Chaplin goes to heaven and meets a flirtatious angel who looks to be about 12 or 13 years old. Having learned about Mr. Chaplin’s scandalous personal life, I had a hunch… yep, they had an affair (and later married).
Putting aside Chaplin’s personal deficiencies, The Kid is a pretty awesome movie, and one with some subversive moral and political messaging. The film starts with a single mother trying to unload her baby onto a wealthy stranger. Through a series of mishaps and misunderstandings ,the child ends up in the care of Chaplin’s “Little Tramp” instead, and learns to cheat and steal. One of the funnier scams involves the child going around breaking windows, whereupon the Tramp will show up selling replacement windows.
The humor is pretty awesome in the Kid, making excellent use of the silent format to tell stories and jokes without too many title cards. One of my favorite scenes involves the Tramp setting up streetfights between little boys. The scene is deliciously politically-incorrect, and hilarious in that special way where you almost feel bad for laughing at it. The slapstick is top-notch, and the 1920’s setting gives the humor an edge that now feels fresh in 2019.
And yet… the film isn’t entirely silly. The plight of the abandoned child and the estranged mother is taken seriously. The opening title cards describe the “crime of motherhood,” and the kid eventually has to be forcibly removed from his adoptive father by the law. The combination of silly slapstick with dark sentimentality is masterfully done, and probably makes The Kid Chaplin’s best movie. The ending’s a bit rushed, though.
The Jazz Singer (*** and a half)
I think everyone has at least heard of The Jazz Singer, widely recognized as the first “talkie.” Thus, it surprised me that the movie is mostly silent. Most scenes use facial reactions or title cards to communicate the story, with sound reserved for the musical numbers and exactly one scene of dialogue.
Surprisingly, this technical marvel from 1927 has a plot that may seem very cliché in 2019. The main character hails from a traditional Jewish family that looks down on modern music, so he runs away from home in order to make it as a professional musician. Hollywood has always loved this story: “See, Dad? My arts degree wasn’t a complete waste, because now I can make movies about how you were wrong!”
Snarkiness aside, The Jazz Singer is actually a relatively mature and poignant version of a somewhat tired plot. The chemistry between the main character and his mother is very sweet, and the climax gives him a real dilemma. The final shot in particular is very moving and memorable.
And… then there’s “blackface,” an uncomfortable bit of history that is featured prominently in the movie. The main character doesn’t just preform jazz, but does so in full blackface and afro wig. He doesn’t really do anything with his “black” persona in his act, which made me wonder what the point was. Apparently the film-maker’s intention was to make a statement: performers hide who they really are.
Putting aside The Jazz Singer’s historical importance, it might not be a super-great movie, but it’s definitely a good one.
Missing Link (** and a half)
I really hate having to give a Laika movie a mediocre review. I loved Coraline and Kubo, and also enjoyed The Boxtrolls and ParaNorman (which goes over better on second viewing). I’d like nothing more than to rave about Missing Link and declare that everyone needs to go see it. But… I can’t.
The story of Missing Link concerns an explorer who wants to find the Sasquatch in order to join a prestigious club of adventurers. It turns out that the Sasquatch can speak and actually wants to be discovered so that he can find more of his kind. Not a bad plot, and I did like Zach Galifinakas as the soft-spoken Bigfoot monster. There’s a lot of fun action bits, amusing sight gags, and some cool animation tricks. The end-credits showed how the animators portrayed character interaction atop a moving elephant, and it’s a really cool effect.
Unfortunately, the story progression is very choppy and feels more like a series of small episodes than an epic journey. The film jumps quickly from one location to the next, and none of the locations are very magical or detailed. Laika’s previous movie, Kubo and the Two Strings, portrayed a vast and epic world, whereas Missing Link feels more like a series of small set pieces. Also, the antagonists are dumb and poorly-motivated, coming off as parodies of cartoon baddies rather than legitimate villains. Actually, I take that back: there is a convincing villain portrayed by Emma Thompson, but she’s only in a small part of the movie.
Missing Link is OK. Nobody’s going to hate it, but it should have been lot better, given the amount of work that goes into these sorts of movies.
Unplanned (***)
I debated whether I should review this one or not. The movie Unplanned has been very controversial. Many media outlets refused to advertise the movie. Despite all that, the movie was a modest success at the box office, and people I trust have said it’s the first legit-good Christian movie in a long time. I agree. In contrast to the strawman silliness of God’s Not Dead or the bad acting of Fireproof, Unplanned stands out. Whether it offends you or not, it’s a pretty good movie. Just not a great one.
OK, let’s address the elephant in the room... I stand ambivalent on the issue of abortion, and mostly stay out of the debate. I understand the point of view that the world is better with Planned Parenthood than without it. That said, I’m baffled that Planned Parenthood has become such a sacred cow to the mainstream media, to the point where any criticism is slammed down instantly.
Anyway, can I just review the movie? As a movie, it’s pretty good. The actors are all very credible, the editing is tight, and it feels like a legitimate film, not a hokey morality play. This is a film that shows good and bad people on all sides, and credibly portrays the protagonist’s journey: a Christian girl who needed two abortions herself, was convinced that Planned Parenthood would prevent cases like herself, and slowly turned against the organization largely due to conflicts with her unscrupulous supervisor. The supervisor is the villain of the story, and also the most one-note character (though she has one line of hard truth: “’Non-profit’ is a tax status, not a business model.”). The other abortion clinic workers are decent and likeable, and the film is not shy about the uglier aspects of the pro-life movement. I bring this up because artists are at their most honest when they go against their biases. Author-surrogate or strawman characters are obnoxious and generally poorly written.
That said, Unplanned is still (mostly) preaching to the choir, and there’s a few melodramatic scenes that seem very silly. I also question the choice to start the film with the character’s conversion to pro-life, rather than telling it in strict chronological order to make her shifting mentality more clear. On the balance, Unplanned is a solid but unexceptional drama, possible accuracy issues aside.