Finally!
That's right, ladies and jellyspoons, at long, long, LONG last, it is time for another old review post. It's...fuck me, what the hell day is it? Working a summer stock schedule is seriously making me have to stop and think to remember what day of the week it is. *goes to check* Okay, it's Saturday, June 12th, The Whipping Man has been selling out every show, Sweeney Todd is set to open next week, and today's old reviews are:
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
2.5 stars
I still remember seeing the first preview for this movie. I was sitting in a theatre, watching a picture of the Earth floating in space, when suddenly it exploded. Moments later, the bright blue words "DON'T PANIC" flashed on the screen, and my friends and I started to get excited.
What remained to be seen was how comparatively little we had to get excited about. Having read the book and listened to the radioplays of Douglas Adams' cult-favorite novel, there were certain expectations that I had going into this movie, and quite frankly only about half of them got met. First of all, the film's story, while starting the same way and containing many of the same elements of the book, seemed to go off in its own direction a few times. I wasn't sure if this was because it was trying to fit in everything it possibly could from the book or because it wanted to add some extra excitement to the book-to-movie transition via action scenes, but it mostly came out muddled and directionally unclear. As a result, the ending seemed to come way out of left field and be wrapped up in a very inexplicable bow. Also, some of the actors--Sam Rockwell in particular--were just ANNOYING. I know Zaphod Beeblebrox is (a) insane and (b) something of a foil for Arthur Dent, but Rockwell's portrayal of him was so far over the top that it made my head hurt. Even Martin Freeman's portrayal of Dent, though fairly true to the character, was often too whiny to really draw my sympathy. And while I like Zooey Deschanel, I liked her less here than in other films (Tin Man, for example).
There were, however, several bright spots. Bill Nighy's Slartibartfast, the portrayal of Deep Thought, and Mos Def as Ford Prefect all worked very well for me. The puppetry and makeup used to make all the various aliens (especially the Vogons, whose stuffy bureaucracy was animated to exacting and hysterical perfection) were very detailed and highly impressive. The narrator ("the Book") and the animated screen shots that accompanied its narration practically stole the whole movie--in fact, they would have, were it not for Alan Rickman's voice as Marvin the depressed android stealing it from them. It either takes an immense amount of talent or no talent at all to act with only one's voice...Rickman has the former, no question.
So this movie splits the difference for me. Parts of it were very good. Parts of it were very not good. So all else being equal, it winds up being a step or two above mediocre.
Van Helsing
2 stars
So...I like Hugh Jackman. I like Kate Beckinsale. I like vampire movies. So what was it about Van Helsing that just didn't do it for me?
Let's start with story crossovers. As we have seen in The Scorpion King 2, Max Payne, and other films like them, the blending of external or independent storylines (especially those drawn from mythology or fantasy) into a storyline that theoretically SHOULD be able to stand on its own is usually a sign of lacking originality. Van Helsing is a character from Bram Stoker's Dracula; well and good, there's a lot that can be done with that character. Frankenstein's monster, the Wolfman, Mr. Hyde, and all the other ghoulies and baddies that get folded into this movie are not only not from Bram Stoker's Dracula, they are Gothic horror characters who share nothing with Dracula or each other but their Gothic horror roots. So while trying to blend them all together into one storyline might theoretically seem feasible given that commonality, in practice it really seems like just plain overcompensation, cramming in as many monsters as possible to make up for lacks in other areas--which this film definitely had.
Speaking of lacking, there's the character of Van Helsing himself. I don't know what it is, but this is probably the one role I've seen Jackman in where I really just didn't like him. Well, actually I do know what it is: it's that Van Helsing is not an action hero, he's a doctor. He's clever as all hell, but he's not a brawny gun-toting Victorian Hercules. So his character in this film just seemed wrong...and since Jackman is such an honest actor, seeing him in a false part just didn't work.
And then of course there's how damn contrived the whole thing seemed. It felt like they took a premise and tried to manufacture a story to fit it. (Oh wait, that's exactly what they did.)
This film did have some positive points, including the action scenes being generally impressive, Kate Beckinsale being gorgeous, and David Wenham being hilarious. But by and large Van Helsing plays second (or third, or fourth) fiddle to most other vampire/monster movies I've seen.
RockNRolla
3 stars
There are some things that Guy Ritchie just does amazingly well. I'm tempted to say "make movies" and just leave it at that, just to be a jerk about it, lol. But I'll elaborate.
One of the things Guy Ritchie does really well is plot connection. The man could give Charles Dickens a run for his money. Everything that happens in his films, no matter how seemingly small and insignificant, has some bearing on the way the story turns out in the end. The man is a master of having characters run into each other randomly, move in and out of the same situations in really interesting and convoluted ways, and then have everything fall together at the end such that you can tell every bit of what happened before was absolutely necessary. And in RocknRolla, he's still at the top of his game in that department.
Another thing Ritchie's usually very good at is casting. One of my favorite things about Snatch is how amazingly well cast it is. Unfortunately, casting was one of the things I didn't actually like that much in RocknRolla. Call me biased, but after seeing Jason Statham playing the lead in several Ritchie films, Gerard Butler just couldn't pull it off by comparison. He's not a bad actor, and he worked well in his character, but he just seemed a bit off. Thandie Newton and the rest of the supporting cast likewise weren't horrible, they just weren't as arresting or amazing as some other Ritche characters I've seen. (Maybe it was the characters themselves that I disliked, rather than the actors. Not 100% sure though.) About the only real bright spot was Tom Wilkinson, who is fast becoming one of the strongest character actors working today.
So RocknRolla worked pretty well for what it was, but I guess you could say it suffered for having been made after Snatch and Lock Stock. It held a pretty good standard, but not one as high as that of its predecessors.
Original Sin
2.5 stars
On occasion, I will write reviews of movies that have fantastic stories but not the strong character actors to make those stories watchable and/or believable. Original Sin was the exact opposite: two great character actors in a story that wasn't believable or watchable enough for them.
Antonio Banderas, despite being somewhat buttonholed into Hispanic roles, has a magnetic and powerful presence onscreen no matter whom he plays opposite. Angelina Jolie, very much a newcomer to film when Original Sin was made, positively smoldered with sensuality while showing some decent dramatic depth at the same time. And the two played well off of each other--I could believe that their love was real, or at least developed into being so.
The problem was how farfetched the whole plot was to begin with. A con artist taking the place of a mail-order bride, okay, that I could see. But the patsy falling so deeply in love or obsession with the con artist (even after she robs him of everything!) that he sacrifices his whole livelihood to follow her? Even with Banderas' acting chops, I had a hard time buying that. Thomas Jane's character, though portrayed with ingenious cruelty, did not help believability, as his presence introduced so many plot twists that after half an hour of him I just wanted the movie to end already.
Original Sin does get props for its dramatic use of the Cuban setting--the countryside was beautiful, the nice areas of the cities were very elegant, and the seedy city areas were more than suitably shady. There were also a few moments of poignant romance, and a few more of decent comedy. But by and large it was not as deep, seductive or satisfying as it seemed to be trying to be.
Pineapple Express
3.5 stars
Seth Rogen is funny. James Franco, surprisingly enough, is even funnier. Amber Heard is gorgeous. And believe it or not, this is actually something of an ACTION movie. What more do you want?
I've heard Pineapple Express called a stoner movie that you don't have to be stoned to enjoy. And you know what? I agree completely. Like all previously reviewed Apatow/Rogen-type films, this movie is so over the top that it somehow actually works. It has the car chases and shootouts of Lethal Weapon, the stoner comedy of Half-Baked, and the wrong-place-wrong-time confusion of The Man Who Knew Too Little. It doesn't really have the positive message undercurrent that Apatow's work often does, but it's zany and nonpretentious enough not to need it.
I'll put it another way. I don't like stoner movies. And I liked this. I think that's all I really need to say.
Next in the Apatow/Rogen series: Zack and Miri Make a Porno.
Alright, that felt good. Now I'm going to get some Wendy's, finish reading Whitechapel Gods, and crash. It's been a long day. Thanks for reading.
FBS
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
2.5 stars
I still remember seeing the first preview for this movie. I was sitting in a theatre, watching a picture of the Earth floating in space, when suddenly it exploded. Moments later, the bright blue words "DON'T PANIC" flashed on the screen, and my friends and I started to get excited.
What remained to be seen was how comparatively little we had to get excited about. Having read the book and listened to the radioplays of Douglas Adams' cult-favorite novel, there were certain expectations that I had going into this movie, and quite frankly only about half of them got met. First of all, the film's story, while starting the same way and containing many of the same elements of the book, seemed to go off in its own direction a few times. I wasn't sure if this was because it was trying to fit in everything it possibly could from the book or because it wanted to add some extra excitement to the book-to-movie transition via action scenes, but it mostly came out muddled and directionally unclear. As a result, the ending seemed to come way out of left field and be wrapped up in a very inexplicable bow. Also, some of the actors--Sam Rockwell in particular--were just ANNOYING. I know Zaphod Beeblebrox is (a) insane and (b) something of a foil for Arthur Dent, but Rockwell's portrayal of him was so far over the top that it made my head hurt. Even Martin Freeman's portrayal of Dent, though fairly true to the character, was often too whiny to really draw my sympathy. And while I like Zooey Deschanel, I liked her less here than in other films (Tin Man, for example).
There were, however, several bright spots. Bill Nighy's Slartibartfast, the portrayal of Deep Thought, and Mos Def as Ford Prefect all worked very well for me. The puppetry and makeup used to make all the various aliens (especially the Vogons, whose stuffy bureaucracy was animated to exacting and hysterical perfection) were very detailed and highly impressive. The narrator ("the Book") and the animated screen shots that accompanied its narration practically stole the whole movie--in fact, they would have, were it not for Alan Rickman's voice as Marvin the depressed android stealing it from them. It either takes an immense amount of talent or no talent at all to act with only one's voice...Rickman has the former, no question.
So this movie splits the difference for me. Parts of it were very good. Parts of it were very not good. So all else being equal, it winds up being a step or two above mediocre.
Van Helsing
2 stars
So...I like Hugh Jackman. I like Kate Beckinsale. I like vampire movies. So what was it about Van Helsing that just didn't do it for me?
Let's start with story crossovers. As we have seen in The Scorpion King 2, Max Payne, and other films like them, the blending of external or independent storylines (especially those drawn from mythology or fantasy) into a storyline that theoretically SHOULD be able to stand on its own is usually a sign of lacking originality. Van Helsing is a character from Bram Stoker's Dracula; well and good, there's a lot that can be done with that character. Frankenstein's monster, the Wolfman, Mr. Hyde, and all the other ghoulies and baddies that get folded into this movie are not only not from Bram Stoker's Dracula, they are Gothic horror characters who share nothing with Dracula or each other but their Gothic horror roots. So while trying to blend them all together into one storyline might theoretically seem feasible given that commonality, in practice it really seems like just plain overcompensation, cramming in as many monsters as possible to make up for lacks in other areas--which this film definitely had.
Speaking of lacking, there's the character of Van Helsing himself. I don't know what it is, but this is probably the one role I've seen Jackman in where I really just didn't like him. Well, actually I do know what it is: it's that Van Helsing is not an action hero, he's a doctor. He's clever as all hell, but he's not a brawny gun-toting Victorian Hercules. So his character in this film just seemed wrong...and since Jackman is such an honest actor, seeing him in a false part just didn't work.
And then of course there's how damn contrived the whole thing seemed. It felt like they took a premise and tried to manufacture a story to fit it. (Oh wait, that's exactly what they did.)
This film did have some positive points, including the action scenes being generally impressive, Kate Beckinsale being gorgeous, and David Wenham being hilarious. But by and large Van Helsing plays second (or third, or fourth) fiddle to most other vampire/monster movies I've seen.
RockNRolla
3 stars
There are some things that Guy Ritchie just does amazingly well. I'm tempted to say "make movies" and just leave it at that, just to be a jerk about it, lol. But I'll elaborate.
One of the things Guy Ritchie does really well is plot connection. The man could give Charles Dickens a run for his money. Everything that happens in his films, no matter how seemingly small and insignificant, has some bearing on the way the story turns out in the end. The man is a master of having characters run into each other randomly, move in and out of the same situations in really interesting and convoluted ways, and then have everything fall together at the end such that you can tell every bit of what happened before was absolutely necessary. And in RocknRolla, he's still at the top of his game in that department.
Another thing Ritchie's usually very good at is casting. One of my favorite things about Snatch is how amazingly well cast it is. Unfortunately, casting was one of the things I didn't actually like that much in RocknRolla. Call me biased, but after seeing Jason Statham playing the lead in several Ritchie films, Gerard Butler just couldn't pull it off by comparison. He's not a bad actor, and he worked well in his character, but he just seemed a bit off. Thandie Newton and the rest of the supporting cast likewise weren't horrible, they just weren't as arresting or amazing as some other Ritche characters I've seen. (Maybe it was the characters themselves that I disliked, rather than the actors. Not 100% sure though.) About the only real bright spot was Tom Wilkinson, who is fast becoming one of the strongest character actors working today.
So RocknRolla worked pretty well for what it was, but I guess you could say it suffered for having been made after Snatch and Lock Stock. It held a pretty good standard, but not one as high as that of its predecessors.
Original Sin
2.5 stars
On occasion, I will write reviews of movies that have fantastic stories but not the strong character actors to make those stories watchable and/or believable. Original Sin was the exact opposite: two great character actors in a story that wasn't believable or watchable enough for them.
Antonio Banderas, despite being somewhat buttonholed into Hispanic roles, has a magnetic and powerful presence onscreen no matter whom he plays opposite. Angelina Jolie, very much a newcomer to film when Original Sin was made, positively smoldered with sensuality while showing some decent dramatic depth at the same time. And the two played well off of each other--I could believe that their love was real, or at least developed into being so.
The problem was how farfetched the whole plot was to begin with. A con artist taking the place of a mail-order bride, okay, that I could see. But the patsy falling so deeply in love or obsession with the con artist (even after she robs him of everything!) that he sacrifices his whole livelihood to follow her? Even with Banderas' acting chops, I had a hard time buying that. Thomas Jane's character, though portrayed with ingenious cruelty, did not help believability, as his presence introduced so many plot twists that after half an hour of him I just wanted the movie to end already.
Original Sin does get props for its dramatic use of the Cuban setting--the countryside was beautiful, the nice areas of the cities were very elegant, and the seedy city areas were more than suitably shady. There were also a few moments of poignant romance, and a few more of decent comedy. But by and large it was not as deep, seductive or satisfying as it seemed to be trying to be.
Pineapple Express
3.5 stars
Seth Rogen is funny. James Franco, surprisingly enough, is even funnier. Amber Heard is gorgeous. And believe it or not, this is actually something of an ACTION movie. What more do you want?
I've heard Pineapple Express called a stoner movie that you don't have to be stoned to enjoy. And you know what? I agree completely. Like all previously reviewed Apatow/Rogen-type films, this movie is so over the top that it somehow actually works. It has the car chases and shootouts of Lethal Weapon, the stoner comedy of Half-Baked, and the wrong-place-wrong-time confusion of The Man Who Knew Too Little. It doesn't really have the positive message undercurrent that Apatow's work often does, but it's zany and nonpretentious enough not to need it.
I'll put it another way. I don't like stoner movies. And I liked this. I think that's all I really need to say.
Next in the Apatow/Rogen series: Zack and Miri Make a Porno.
Alright, that felt good. Now I'm going to get some Wendy's, finish reading Whitechapel Gods, and crash. It's been a long day. Thanks for reading.
FBS