Two posts in one week? For serious?
No no, hell has not frozen over. Although it is getting colder...stupid winter in the midwest. Blah. Anyway, it's now (by 14 minutes as I begin this) Saturday, November 21st, and today's old reviews are:
Next
3 stars
Nicholas Cage is one of those actors who picks just enough good roles to counterbalance his bad ones, and just enough bad ones to keep himself from being really great. This was one of his better ones. In fact, of his two recent supernatural movies--this and Ghost Rider--he did a much better job in Next. Then again, the vehicle helped a lot--the way the filmmakers captured his looking forward in time and then returning to the present to act on what he saw was very, very cool. I also liked how Jessica Biel was a real person, not idealized. And the ending twist was one of the better ones I've seen recently.
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Scary Movie
0.5 stars (if that)
Worthless. It wasn't scary, it wasn't funny, its gags ranged from the mundanely predictable to the disgustingly puerile to the downright mean, and it spawned three sequels? Four? Spare me. This movie is like Communism: conceptually, it sounds awesome. In reality, it doesn't work--and scares away even those who aren't involved in it.
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Death Proof and Planet Terror
3 stars and 3.5 stars, respectively
I'm pairing these in review because they were paired in release, as part of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez' Grindhouse Presents.
Quentin Tarantino's films to me represent two things: great action and great dialogue. Of course, by great action I mean lots of blood and gore, complete with creative ways of obtaining same. And by great dialogue I mean dialogue that takes up anywhere from 40-80% of the movie and usually seems mostly pointless until connections start to appear (usually sometime within the last third of the film). Reader, I'll let you decide how sarcastic this paragraph has been.
Suffice it to say that Death Proof has a fair amount of gore (though less than Tarantino's usual work) and a lot of character-developing dialogue, and if you go into it with an open enough mind to appreciate those factors, you will enjoy the movie. If you like looking at lots of pretty girls, that will help. If you like Kurt Russell as a dirty old sociopathic man, that will help too. Oh yeah, and Tarantino also does one other thing awesomely--soundtracks. This one's quality is made even more significant by much of the movie taking place in or around cars and/or jukeboxes. Tracie Thoms, Rose McGowan and Vanessa Ferlito stand out, and not because Vanessa does a clothed lap dance.
Okay okay, not JUST because of that. :P
You could almost call Planet Terror so bad it's good. In fact, you could almost remove the word "almost" from the last sentence. Planet Terror is, like many zombie-movie send-ups, so far removed from believability that you, the viewer, are perfectly comfortable sitting back, relaxing, and screaming without any expectations of seeing quality cinema--and that trait, all by itself, makes the movie into quality cinema. This movie had gore, sex, shootouts, military assholes, an apocalyptic setting--for a moment I thought someone had actually made another Resident Evil sequel! Also, I didn't like Rose McGowan much before I saw this movie, but her badass-cum-vulnerable attitude was perfect in it, and now I like her a whole lot more. Freddy Rodriguez, Marley Shelton and Bruce Willis provided great character support.
Anyway, I would recommend seeing these two movies once each, as they were billed and shown as a double feature. (There are even references in one to things you'll see or hear in the other one, which is a cool side benefit of pairing them.) If you like it/them, great. If not, you never have to watch a Tarantino flick again, because between the two they pretty much have him covered.
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Enchanted
2 stars
It amazes me how hit-or-miss Disney is seeming to be these days. On the one hand, they have the Pirates and National Treasure movies, which are clear hits. On the other, they have the forthcoming Martin Lawrence slapstick/crapstick College Road Trip, which is a definite miss. And then there is Enchanted, which as far as I am concerned is...honestly? Neither. When it worked, it worked amazingly. When it didn't work, it REALLY didn't work.
What worked: Idina Menzel and James Marsden as supporting characters; the pace of the movie, which surprisingly was not at all rushed; the send-up of Snow White's "Whistle While You Work" (in which Amy Adams' character, summoning animals to help her clean an NYC apartment, winds up with rats, roaches and pigeons--and still gets the apartment spic-and-span); the concept in general of fairy-tale and modern world coming together; the way the "happy ending" actually worked; Giselle and the prince NOT being compatible in the real world.
What didn't work: How overdone the sweet and innocent princess act was for the first two-thirds of the movie--I know it was purposeful, but it was also saccharine enough to make my teeth ache; the (only) three songs, likewise ridiculously sappy; the fact that Idina did not sing (okay, personal bias there); and then there's the fact that I was shaking my head and going "You have got to be kidding me" almost every five minutes. It seemed like every tacky, campy, cheesy and silly fairy tale cliche and stereotype (and some from the real world, too) was crammed into this movie just on principle, and for me it really detracted from the presentation.
I think Enchanted's problem was partially that several other movies have already done what it was trying to do. The Princess Bride comes to mind, as do Stardust, The Princess Diaries and even the Shrek trilogy. Combining fantasy and reality is no longer nouveau riche, and thus it requires (as does any genre) increasing mastery to pull off successfully. Don't get me wrong, Enchanted did not do a bad job--there were several hilarious moments, good acting and a great overall message--but neither did it do a great one. And since it wasn't a hit or a miss per se, I would call Enchanted the seventh-inning stretch: you're glad it's there, but it's not the point of the game and eventually you want it to end. Enchanted is a decent break with reality, but unlike with The Princess Bride and Stardust, when Enchanted was over I was more than ready for reality to return.
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See, I told you we'd be getting into a few longer ones pretty soon. Hope you enjoyed these. I'll be in Colorado next week, so I can't promise another post until after Thanksgiving, but I'll see what I can do. Maybe there will be time. Anyway, till next time, thanks for reading, and have a great turkey day.
FBS
Next
3 stars
Nicholas Cage is one of those actors who picks just enough good roles to counterbalance his bad ones, and just enough bad ones to keep himself from being really great. This was one of his better ones. In fact, of his two recent supernatural movies--this and Ghost Rider--he did a much better job in Next. Then again, the vehicle helped a lot--the way the filmmakers captured his looking forward in time and then returning to the present to act on what he saw was very, very cool. I also liked how Jessica Biel was a real person, not idealized. And the ending twist was one of the better ones I've seen recently.
---
Scary Movie
0.5 stars (if that)
Worthless. It wasn't scary, it wasn't funny, its gags ranged from the mundanely predictable to the disgustingly puerile to the downright mean, and it spawned three sequels? Four? Spare me. This movie is like Communism: conceptually, it sounds awesome. In reality, it doesn't work--and scares away even those who aren't involved in it.
---
Death Proof and Planet Terror
3 stars and 3.5 stars, respectively
I'm pairing these in review because they were paired in release, as part of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez' Grindhouse Presents.
Quentin Tarantino's films to me represent two things: great action and great dialogue. Of course, by great action I mean lots of blood and gore, complete with creative ways of obtaining same. And by great dialogue I mean dialogue that takes up anywhere from 40-80% of the movie and usually seems mostly pointless until connections start to appear (usually sometime within the last third of the film). Reader, I'll let you decide how sarcastic this paragraph has been.
Suffice it to say that Death Proof has a fair amount of gore (though less than Tarantino's usual work) and a lot of character-developing dialogue, and if you go into it with an open enough mind to appreciate those factors, you will enjoy the movie. If you like looking at lots of pretty girls, that will help. If you like Kurt Russell as a dirty old sociopathic man, that will help too. Oh yeah, and Tarantino also does one other thing awesomely--soundtracks. This one's quality is made even more significant by much of the movie taking place in or around cars and/or jukeboxes. Tracie Thoms, Rose McGowan and Vanessa Ferlito stand out, and not because Vanessa does a clothed lap dance.
Okay okay, not JUST because of that. :P
You could almost call Planet Terror so bad it's good. In fact, you could almost remove the word "almost" from the last sentence. Planet Terror is, like many zombie-movie send-ups, so far removed from believability that you, the viewer, are perfectly comfortable sitting back, relaxing, and screaming without any expectations of seeing quality cinema--and that trait, all by itself, makes the movie into quality cinema. This movie had gore, sex, shootouts, military assholes, an apocalyptic setting--for a moment I thought someone had actually made another Resident Evil sequel! Also, I didn't like Rose McGowan much before I saw this movie, but her badass-cum-vulnerable attitude was perfect in it, and now I like her a whole lot more. Freddy Rodriguez, Marley Shelton and Bruce Willis provided great character support.
Anyway, I would recommend seeing these two movies once each, as they were billed and shown as a double feature. (There are even references in one to things you'll see or hear in the other one, which is a cool side benefit of pairing them.) If you like it/them, great. If not, you never have to watch a Tarantino flick again, because between the two they pretty much have him covered.
---
Enchanted
2 stars
It amazes me how hit-or-miss Disney is seeming to be these days. On the one hand, they have the Pirates and National Treasure movies, which are clear hits. On the other, they have the forthcoming Martin Lawrence slapstick/crapstick College Road Trip, which is a definite miss. And then there is Enchanted, which as far as I am concerned is...honestly? Neither. When it worked, it worked amazingly. When it didn't work, it REALLY didn't work.
What worked: Idina Menzel and James Marsden as supporting characters; the pace of the movie, which surprisingly was not at all rushed; the send-up of Snow White's "Whistle While You Work" (in which Amy Adams' character, summoning animals to help her clean an NYC apartment, winds up with rats, roaches and pigeons--and still gets the apartment spic-and-span); the concept in general of fairy-tale and modern world coming together; the way the "happy ending" actually worked; Giselle and the prince NOT being compatible in the real world.
What didn't work: How overdone the sweet and innocent princess act was for the first two-thirds of the movie--I know it was purposeful, but it was also saccharine enough to make my teeth ache; the (only) three songs, likewise ridiculously sappy; the fact that Idina did not sing (okay, personal bias there); and then there's the fact that I was shaking my head and going "You have got to be kidding me" almost every five minutes. It seemed like every tacky, campy, cheesy and silly fairy tale cliche and stereotype (and some from the real world, too) was crammed into this movie just on principle, and for me it really detracted from the presentation.
I think Enchanted's problem was partially that several other movies have already done what it was trying to do. The Princess Bride comes to mind, as do Stardust, The Princess Diaries and even the Shrek trilogy. Combining fantasy and reality is no longer nouveau riche, and thus it requires (as does any genre) increasing mastery to pull off successfully. Don't get me wrong, Enchanted did not do a bad job--there were several hilarious moments, good acting and a great overall message--but neither did it do a great one. And since it wasn't a hit or a miss per se, I would call Enchanted the seventh-inning stretch: you're glad it's there, but it's not the point of the game and eventually you want it to end. Enchanted is a decent break with reality, but unlike with The Princess Bride and Stardust, when Enchanted was over I was more than ready for reality to return.
---
See, I told you we'd be getting into a few longer ones pretty soon. Hope you enjoyed these. I'll be in Colorado next week, so I can't promise another post until after Thanksgiving, but I'll see what I can do. Maybe there will be time. Anyway, till next time, thanks for reading, and have a great turkey day.
FBS