Current Releases:
ASHES OF TIME REDUX The motion picture as mood ring, Ashes of Time Redux is another Wong Kar Wei production that relies as much (if not more) on the sensations created by its aural and visual flourishes than on any narrative devices. Originally released in 1994 as Ashes of Time, the movie has since faced challenges both from within (a deteriorating negative) and without (bootleg copies all over the planet). Thus, the Hong King auteur decided to construct what’s basically a “director’s cut,” and this tinkering has effectively brought the film back from the margins of Wong’s canon. Leslie Cheung plays the central part of Ouyang Feng, a martial arts killer-for-hire who resides in a distant desert. Within the span of one year, he’s visited by an assortment of allies, enemies and strangers – among them are a feuding brother and sister (both played by Brigitte Lin) who just might turn out to be the same person; a blind swordsman (Tony Leung Chiu Wai) prepared to go out in a blaze of glory; and a poor warrior (Jacky Cheung) who agrees to help a young woman (Charlie Yeung) out for revenge. Ashes of Time (and, by extension, Ashes of Time Redux) earned a reputation for shouldering an impenetrable narrative, but the truth is that the story isn’t nearly as complicated as one might expect. Its denseness instead comes from the fact that it holds less interest to Wong than the images he creates for the screen. Through cinematographer Christopher Doyle’s visions – and with a powerful assist from composers Frankie Chan and Roel A. Garcia – Wong wordlessly ensnares viewers in his movie’s tightening web of wonders. ***
THE BOY IN THE STRIPED PAJAMAS Movies about the Holocaust seem to automatically earn R ratings, yet perhaps because it’s based on a novel (by John Boyne) that was originally targeted to teen readers, this one escapes with a PG-13. That’s the appropriate rating, I think, since children who can handle (and learn from) the material should not be denied the chance to see it. The film is told from the viewpoint of a young German lad who unwittingly has a front-row seat to the horrors instigated by the Nazi regime during World War II. Eight-year-old Bruno (Asa Butterfield, just perfect) is saddened when his father, a Nazi officer (David Thewlis), moves the family from Berlin to a remote country estate. Bored and lonely, Bruno defies his parents’ orders and checks out what his mother (Vera Farmiga) has told him is a farm, a mysterious place where all the prisoners wear pajamas and billowing smoke from the chimneys constantly blackens the sky. There, he strikes up a friendship with Shmuel (Jack Scanlon), a Jewish boy residing on the other side of the barbed wire fence. Credibility takes a serious beating in this picture, which is clearly intended as a fable about how hatred can destroy even the most innocent among us. Bruno’s naiveté provides the picture with its initial childlike charm, yet the movie is complicated enough to explore the conflicting emotions among the adult characters. But even in its lighter moments, it never downplays the horror of the situation, and the devastating ending is potent enough to affect even those viewers who write it off as nothing more than a sensationalist stunt. ***
CHANGELING Like Mystic River and Flags of Our Fathers, Changeling is good, not great, Clint Eastwood, although as far as emotional resonance is concerned, the latest from the consummate director reverberates more strongly than either of those other features. A true story brought to the screen via an ambitious screenplay by J. Michael Straczynski, this stars Angelina Jolie as Christine Collins, a single mom whose only son (Gattlin Griffith) goes missing one afternoon in 1928. The Los Angeles Police Department, mired at the time in corruption, spots an opportunity to do something right and eventually reunites the mother with her boy. The only problem is that they bring back the wrong child, but rather than risk further embarrassment, a zealous captain (Jeffrey Donovan) decides to drown out Christine’s protests by any means necessary, including labeling her as an unfit mother and having her locked up in a mental institution. Eastwood’s stately picture slowly extends its reach, as various other plot elements circle the central story; while some suffer in the mix (John Malkovich, as a crusading reverend, could have benefited from more scenes), the overall result is a movie that will disappoint only those who require tidy endings wrapped up in pretty bows. Along the same lines, those who find fault with the brutish depiction of Christine’s tormenters fail to grasp the patriarchy of the period (the story takes place a mere eight years after American women were given the right to vote). Jolie, on the other hand, understands this angle and aptly plays Christine as a woman whose frustrations with the system often match her fear for the safety of her child. ***
HAPPY-GO-LUCKY Any movie character who bears even the slightest resemblance to Robin Williams’ insufferable Patch Adams deserves no less a fate than being simultaneously electrocuted and beheaded at film’s end, yet here’s writer-director Mike Leigh bucking the odds by bringing us such a person yet somehow keeping our collective wrath in check. Poppy (played by Sally Hawkins) is the eternal Pollyanna, a 30-year-old schoolteacher so chipper that, upon discovering her bike has been stolen, merely shrugs and states, “I didn’t have a chance to say my goodbyes.” To her friends, she evokes that familiar line from the theme song to The Mary Tyler Moore Show (“Who can turn the world on with her smile?”); to strangers, she’s a baffling figure indeed, perhaps even psychotic. As in many Leigh pictures, including his two best ones (Secrets & Lies and Topsy-Turvy), narrative structure isn’t nearly as important as character examination, and here that’s a risky proposition, considering that spending so much time in the presence of such a live wire can lead to viewer irritation and exhaustion as much as it can evolve into acceptance and appreciation. But thanks to Leigh’s lack of pretense and Hawkins’ perfectly modulated performance, Happy-Go-Lucky eventually compels rather than repels, with some poignant encounters (chiefly between Poppy and her grouchy driving instructor, nicely played by Eddie Marsan) adding heft to what otherwise could have been dismissed out of hand as an airy confection. ***
MADAGASCAR: ESCAPE 2 AFRICA Anyone who thinks that the Madagascar franchise is all about the Benjamin (Stiller, that is) has seriously overrated the importance of marquee names to animated flicks. With rare exception (say, Eddie Murphy in the Shrek works), the most memorable cartoon characters have nothing to do with A-list casting (who even remembers that Bruce Willis starred in Over the Hedge?) and everything to do with matching the tone with the toon (what superstar could have done better than relatively unknown Patton Oswalt as Ratatouille‘s Remy?). So while the casts of Madagascar and this sequel are headed by Stiller, Chris Rock, David Schwimmer and Jada Pinkett Smith, it’s really all about the penguins, baby. Certainly, Stiller (as Alex the lion), Schwimmer (Melman the giraffe), Pinkett Smith (Gloria the hippo) and especially Rock (Marty the zebra) do their part to make these movies two of the few tolerable non-Pixar/non-Miyazaki toon tales of recent times, but what truly blesses the pair is the presence of the flightless fowl. Led by Skipper (voiced by Tom McGrath, co-director of both films), these penguins are among the least sentimental of all animated characters in the history of the film medium. If this follow-up isn’t as good as its predecessor, that’s largely because the warmed-over central storyline, largely lifted from The Lion King, has to compete with various other plot threads so diffuse that no real narrative momentum is ever established; there’s a rushed sense that wasn’t present in the first picture. But whenever the penguins pop up for their welcome routine, the movie takes flight. **1/2
MAX PAYNE Imagine The Constant Gardener after a frontal lobotomy, and that’s basically Max Payne in a nutshell. The latest bomb based on a popular video game, this stars Mark Wahlberg as a New York cop who, years after the fact, is still solely obsessed with solving the murders of his wife and baby. It sounds like standard Death Wish fare; the picture even opens with Max luring three drug addicts into a subway restroom, then proceeding to inflict Payne – excuse me, pain – on them. But as in The Constant Gardener, a major pharmaceutical outfit figures into the proceedings, though it’s safe to say that Ralph Fiennes never had to contend with winged demons flying all over the cityscape. That’s not the case with Wahlberg, whose character also has to deal with invincible super-soldiers, a leggy druggie (Olga Kurylenko) and a career assassin (a miscast Mila Kunis) who’s about as menacing as a Scooby-Doo plush doll. Rather than focusing on making a kick-ass action flick (presumably what fans of the video game would crave), director John Moore and novice scripter Beau Thorne dress up their simplistic revenge yarn with various twists and turns – all of which are absurdly easy to predict (if the revelation of the piece’s final villain surprises you, you really need to add more mysteries to your moviegoing diet). Yet even when they do get around to the shootouts and fisticuffs, they prove to be flagrantly opportunistic, rehashing both The Matrix and the John Woo oeuvre to diminishing returns. Incidentally, stay through the final credits to see the coda that promises a sequel. My bet is that it will star Donnie Wahlberg instead of Mark and debut directly on DVD. *
PRIDE AND GLORY The award for the year’s most generic title thus far handily goes to Pride and Glory, a moniker so instantly forgettable that, in just a few short weeks, folks will be remembering the film as Honor and Justice or Law and Order or Cops and Crooks or, with apologies to Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment. Then again, this snoozy title reflects the picture bearing it, since this is nothing but one more look at police corruption, a subgenre that’s become especially threadbare during the course of this decade (Narc, Dark Blue, We Own the Night). What’s especially lamentable is that this movie strands yet another exemplary turn by Edward Norton, who once again is superior to the material surrounding him. Here, he plays Ray Tierney, part of a clan of cops: His father (Jon Voight), his brother Francis (Noah Emmerich) and his brother-in-law Jimmy (Colin Farrell) also have NYPD blood coursing through their veins. Troubled by a past tragedy and therefore satisfied to be working a quiet desk job, Ray is reluctantly pulled back onto the streets after four police officers are fatally gunned down in the line of duty. As Ray works his connections in the back alleys and juggles a handful of clues, he makes the startling discovery that the murders are connected to dealings within his own family. For the first hour, Pride and Glory wears its formulaic trappings fairly well, but a movie that refuses to offer anything fresh – watching Farrell go hyper for the umpteenth time in his career certainly doesn’t qualify – has no reason to clock in at a strenuous 125 minutes. **
QUANTUM OF SOLACE Casino Royale, the 2006 revamp of the 007 film franchise, turned out to be the best James Bond outing since the start of Reagan’s first term, so expecting Quantum of Solace to match it was probably asking too much. And indeed, this second effort starring Daniel Craig gets off to a rough start, simply because the two elements we can always rely on – the opening credits and the theme song – are particularly dreadful. Fortunately, it isn’t long before we’re again immersed in the 007 mystique. Half gentleman, half bruiser, Craig’s Bond is still learning the ropes of his newly designated status as a field operative, and it’s up to his superior, M (again played by Judi Dench with the right mix of pissed-off exasperation at the monster she helped create and barely concealed pride at the confident, competent male she’s released to the world), to try to keep him in line. In a first for the 46-year-old series, this is a direct sequel to its predecessor: To watch it without having seen Casino Royale would be akin to viewing The Empire Strikes Back without having seen Star Wars. In short, the villainous organization from the previous picture is still operating full speed ahead, and revenge for the death of a loved one remains foremost on our hero’s mind. One of the keys to this franchise’s longevity is each entry’s ability to adapt to the times, and Quantum of Solace is no exception. But don’t think for a moment that real-world issues dominate the movie: The stunts are as outlandish as ever, the typically lavish settings allow us to live vicariously through Bond, and fans of the Connery/Moore eras will spot a few neat touches, including an homage to Goldfinger. If I rated with numbers instead of stars, it would merit – dare I type it? – a 007 out of 10. ***
RACHEL GETTING MARRIED Rarely has patience been such a virtue than when faced with Rachel Getting Married, which gets off to an extremely rough start before eventually finding its stride. Movies about dysfunctional families are trotted out by indie-minded filmmakers with alarming regularity, but better to spend some time with Rachel at the wedding than with Margot at the Wedding. Anne Hathaway, unfairly overlooked in such efforts as Brokeback Mountain and The Devil Wears Prada, commands most of the attention – from both audience members and the other actors – as Kym, a recovering drug addict who returns home to attend the wedding of her sister Rachel (Rosemarie DeWitt). Kym, who still feels guilty for a past tragedy, is a complete mess and thus is usually at the center of attention. Naturally, Rachel feels resentment while other family members, including the well-meaning dad (Bill Irwin, excellent) and his icy ex-wife (Debra Winger), are at a loss for how to handle Kym and her frequent outbursts. Because the characters created by writer Jenny Lumet (Sidney’s daughter) are nothing but brittle and bitchy at the start, it takes some time to warm up to these people and their plights (it’s impossible, however, to ever warm up to the film’s handheld camera technique, which is so 1990s). But Lumet and director Jonathan Demme ask us to respect their characters’ space, and this leisurely approach allows us to more fully appreciate and understand the situations at hand. By the end, we’re happy to have been invited. ***
WHAT JUST HAPPENED From Sullivan’s Travels and Sunset Boulevard to S.O.B. and The Player, I’ve always been a sucker for movies about the movie business, since the inside-Hollywood info at the filmmakers’ disposal tends to reach the screen in a raw, uncut form that allows every blemish to be tantalizingly exposed and magnified. What Just Happened, however, is only partly successful in its attempts to wallow in the wickedness of the motion picture industry, as a scattershot screenplay by veteran producer Art Linson (adapting his own memoir) perpetually keeps losing sight of the important targets. Robert De Niro plays Ben, who’s experiencing major difficulties with both films on which he’s currently serving as producer. The violent drama Fiercely (starring Sean Penn) is set to debut at the Cannes Film Festival, but a disastrous test screening places Ben in the middle of a spat between the studio head (Catherine Keener) who wants to recut the picture and the director (Michael Wincott) who insists any changes will destroy the purity of his vision. Meanwhile, Ben is also having trouble getting Bruce Willis (as himself), the star of his next action movie, to shave an imposing beard that makes him look like Grizzly Adams. Linson’s industry jabs are frequently amusing but rarely uncover anything new, and his sidebars involving Ben’s family woes add nothing to the mix; meanwhile, Barry Levinson directs with little sense of passion or purpose. There’s added (and perhaps unintentional) humor, though, when Willis, the star of Hudson Hawk and Armageddon (among many other stinkbombs), stands around yammering about his artistic integrity. **1/2
ZACK AND MIRI MAKE A PORNO The latest from writer-director Kevin Smith is always likable even if it isn’t always inspired. As he proved with Chasing Amy (still the Citizen Kane of his output), Smith can deftly pull off the proper mix of sweet and funny and raunchy; in this case, though, only the “funny” clears all hurdles, as the “sweet” is of the standard variety while the “raunchy” often overwhelms the picture. Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks are aptly cast as Zack and Miri, lifelong best friends and present-day roommates who are so broke that they can’t even afford to pay their utility bills. After a life-altering high school reunion, Zack hits upon the brilliant idea of making their own hardcore adult film in order to raise significant amounts of green. Initially, the eight-person cast and crew (played by, among others, Smith vets Jason “Jay” Mewes and Jeff Anderson and former porn star Traci Lords) plan to mount a Star Wars spoof titled Star Whores (featuring such characters as Hung Solo, Princess Layher and Darth Vibrator), but after that falls through, they opt to use a coffeehouse as their setting. Rogen and Banks are both utterly winning, and their charisma helps offset the fact that their characters’ romance takes off down a disappointingly predictable path (remove the risqué trimmings, and we’re left with a Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan rom-com). The vulgar material is alternately hilarious and off-putting, although any movie with the imagination to cast perpetually boyish Justin Long as a gravel-voiced Hollywood gay porn star obviously has much to recommend it. **1/2
OPENS WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 26:
AUSTRALIA: Nicole Kidman, Hugh Jackman.
FOUR CHRISTMASES: Reese Witherspoon, Vince Vaughn.
LET THE RIGHT ONE IN: Kare Hedebrant, Lina Leandersson.
SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Samantha Morton.
TRANSPORTER 3: Jason Statham, Jeroen Krabbe.
This article appears in Nov 24 – Dec 2, 2008.
