Current Releases
BRIDESHEAD REVISITED Think of this new film version as instant coffee: If you don’t have time to savor the 300-plus pages of Evelyn Waugh’s 1945 novel or all 11 hours of the 1981 British miniseries, then a quick gulp of this 135-minute adaptation might suffice. Roughly set between the two world wars, the story finds middle-class Brit Charles Ryder (Matthew Goode) getting involved with the members of the aristocratic Flyte family. At college, he’s befriended by the rowdy dandy Sebastian (Ben Whishaw), who takes him to his family’s palatial estate, Brideshead. There, Charles meets Sebastian’s sister Julia (Hayley Atwell), and soon he realizes that he’s more comfortable with hetero- rather than homosexual love. Sebastian is heartbroken, while the siblings’ control-freak mother, the devoutly Catholic Lady Marchmain (Emma Thompson), doesn’t consider Charles a proper suitor for her daughter, given the fact that he’s an atheist. Even those not familiar with Waugh’s book or the TV show will get the feeling as they watch this movie that something’s missing. Forget about changes from the original text: On its own terms, this often feels rushed and choppy, with relationships unsatisfactorily turning on a dime and director Julian Jarrold failing to provide the piece with enough of a Merchant-Ivory luster to hide any narrative deficiencies (Jarrold’s Jane Austen yarn, Becoming Jane, was similarly agreeable yet equally uninspired). But the meat-and-potatoes portion of Waugh’s work – the role of religion in a person’s life – remains intact, leading to weighty conflicts rarely seen in modern movies. This focus alone makes the material worth revisiting. **1/2
THE DARK KNIGHT Given the fact that Christopher Nolan’s 2005 Batman Begins ranks as one of the best superhero flicks ever made, then where does that put this sequel that manages to be even more phenomenal than its predecessor? Certainly, it places it somewhere at the head of the class, and there’s a nice symmetry to its release date: After all, it was 30 years ago that the Christopher Reeve version of Superman – still the greatest of all comic book adaptations – was released, and now we have its equal on the other side of the aisle, a superhero saga that’s as dark and deep as its forefather was cheery and colorful. In fact, this might be the first superhero movie that exudes a palpable sense of dread and menace that tugs at our nerves in a way that both disturbs and delights us. Even in superior entertainment like Spider-Man and Iron Man, there’s a feeling that it’s all make-believe, but The Dark Knight offers no such safety net – it wears its danger on its sleeve. In this outing, Batman (Christian Bale) has done a fine job of tightening the reins around the mob bosses who have long controlled Gotham City, and he’s soon aided in his efforts by idealistic district attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart). But their combined attempts to corral the city’s crooks are hampered by the presence of a murderous psychopath known as The Joker (Heath Ledger). Eckhart stands out in what proves to be the picture’s most fully realized characterization, though we all know who’s the MVP of this particular show: The late Ledger is simply mesmerizing as this whirling dervish of cackling, lip-smacking, cheek-sucking sin. ****
HANCOCK The idea behind Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” can be applied to this sci-fi outing that, somewhat surprisingly, ends up taking the path “less traveled by.” Yet equally surprising is the fact that this enjoyable film would have been even better had it played out as expected. The premise is irresistible: Hancock (Will Smith) is an alcoholic, antisocial superhero whose crimefighting exploits usually end up causing millions of dollars in damage to the city of Los Angeles. The residents have had enough of him, and the police even have a warrant out for his arrest. Hancock couldn’t care less until PR guy Ray Embrey (Jason Bateman), despite protests from his wife (Charlize Theron), decides he’s going to help Hancock overhaul his public image by transforming him from a menace to society into a hero worthy of respect. The first half sprints with this plotline, resulting in a movie that’s consistently funny and inventive – even the typically heavy-handed direction by Peter Berg (The Kingdom) can’t dilute the fun. But without warning, scripters Vincent Ngo and Vince Gilligan orchestrate a major plot pirouette, one that dramatically changes the relationships between the characters and allows a sharp satire to mutate into (in no order) a melodrama, a romance, a tragedy, and a myth-building muddle. No movie should survive such a clumsy shift, and yet this manages to get back on its feet, thanks in no small part to the conviction that Smith and Theron bring to their roles. Audience members willing to hop aboard this emotional roller coaster ride will respond to the resultant pathos far better than viewers wondering why the laughs suddenly went MIA. **1/2
JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH Ever since the 3-D process first appeared in cinema in 1952’s Bwana Devil (advertised with the tagline, “A lion in your lap! A lover in your arms!”), filmmakers have attempted to turn this innovative technique into more than just a fad that appears at regular intervals over the years. The pictures have been both good (1953’s Vincent Price chiller House of Wax) and bad (the 1980s’ Jaws 3-D and Friday the 13th Part III), but it wasn’t until last year’s Beowulf that the technology was finally perfected. Seeking to build upon Beowulf‘s breakthrough, Journey to the Center of the Earth takes the 3-D ball and runs with it. In presenting this tale of a scientist (Brendan Fraser) who discovers that Jules Verne’s classic novel is more fact than fiction and subsequently travels beneath the surface with his surly nephew (Josh Hutcherson) and their hottie guide (Anita Briem) in tow, the filmmakers throw everything but a three-dimensional kitchen sink at us: a dinosaur’s snapping jaws, prehistoric piranhas’ pointy teeth, oversized Venus flytraps, bouncing balls, a protruding tape measure, even spittle. It’s all rather nifty, but the problem is that the majority of theaters are not showing the picture in 3-D (most multiplexes don’t have the capability yet). And whereas House of Wax and Beowulf remain entertaining yarns when watched in the normal, flat format, this Journey is so insipid that it’d be a chore trying to sit through the simple-minded narrative without the added incentive. As for Fraser’s overacting, he’s such a ham that his eyes pop out of the screen even more menacingly than those sharp dinosaur choppers. **
MAMMA MIA! Meryl Streep fans and ABBA fans can at least count on those two components firing on all cylinders in this adaptation of the Broadway smash. Everyone else, though, may be forced to rummage through the debris that constitutes the rest of the picture to find anything worth salvaging. Streep is aptly cast as Donna, a former singer raising her daughter Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) at her hotel on a Greek island. Sophie’s about to marry hunky Sky (dull Dominic Cooper), but first she’s determined to learn the identity of her father. The candidates are suave Sam (Pierce Brosnan), uptight Harry (Colin Firth) and rascally Bill (Stellan Skarsgard), and as long as the actors essaying the roles stick to walking and talking, they’re fun to watch. But whenever one of them is called upon to sing, be prepared to duck and cover as their aural ineptitude bombards our eardrums (Brosnan especially looks physically pained choking out the lyrics, as if he’s being subjected to a prostate exam just outside of the camera’s eye). There’s no reason this couldn’t contain all the effulgence and expertise of other musical adaptations like Hairspray and Chicago, but stage director Phyllida Lloyd appears to be so blissfully ignorant of the dynamics of moviemaking that, aside from the songs themselves, there’s little joy to be found in the musical numbers. The clumsy camerawork, editing and staging all diminish rather than enhance the perceived showstoppers, and the choreography ranks among the most dreadful I’ve ever witnessed in a big-budget musical. All of this adds up to produce the biggest disappointment of the summer movie season. **
THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR 1999’s The Mummy was a barely passable Indiana Jones rip-off, while 2001’s The Mummy Returns proved to be rather dismal. This one, though, is the worst of the lot. In the China of 2,000 years ago, a sorceress (Michelle Yeoh) places a curse on an evil emperor (Jet Li) who can now only be awoken by a drop of human blood; cut to 1946, where retired adventurer Rick O’Connell (series star Brendan Fraser) and his wife Evelyn (Maria Bello, replacing Rachel Weisz after the latter declared, “Screw this; I have an Oscar now!”) mope around their English estate while son Alex (Luke Ford) is off digging up the emperor. Plot contrivances reunite all of them – plus Evelyn’s brother Jonathan (returning stooge John Hannah) – in Shanghai, and from there, the gang is forced to fight the now-revived emperor. The sloppiness of the entire enterprise is immediately evident by the fact that the 27-year-old Ford looks nowhere near young enough to be playing the son of 39-year-old Fraser and 41-year-old Bello. From there, the movie only gets more absurd; for example, do the O’Connells really encounter abominable snowmen who, based on the employment of a field goal signal, must subscribe to DIRECTV’s NFL Sunday Ticket package? And do scripters Alfred Gough and Miles Millar think that audiences will be impressed by dialogue that basically consists of variations on Rick yelping, “Well, here I am fighting mummies again!”? This manages to make even an epic battle between armies of the undead a dull undertaking. Clearly, here’s a perfunctory franchise which needs to take a long-overdue dirt nap. *
PINEAPPLE EXPRESS As far as crude, rambling, shaggy-dog comedies go, this one’s better than most of the modern-day crop. In a sense, this harkens back to the “buddy flicks” so rampant in the 1980s, odd-couple outings like 48 HRS. and Midnight Run (no wonder iconic ’80s band Huey Lewis and the News was tapped to belt out the closing-credits title song). Here, the pair are process server Dale Denton (Seth Rogen) and drug dealer Saul Silver (James Franco); they’re forced to take it on the lam after Dale witnesses a drug lord (Gary Cole) and a crooked cop (Rosie Perez) commit cold-blooded murder and the killers are able to trace the rare pot (“Pineapple Express”) that Dale leaves at the crime scene back to the eternally fried Saul. Under the direction of N.C. School of the Arts grad and indie filmmaker David Gordon Green (All the Real Girls), Rogen again scores in his standard role as a disheveled slacker with a way with words, while Danny McBride, another N.C. School of the Arts alumni and star of the disappointing martial arts comedy The Foot Fist Way, offers broad laughs as a duplicitous drug dealer with seemingly more lives than a Looney Tunes character. Yet the biggest surprise is Franco: Generally the blandest of pretty boys, he succeeds in his change-of-pace role as a long-haired stoner. And it’s Franco who’s at the center of what will likely remain the summer’s funniest sight gag. I won’t spoil it here, but let’s just say that viewers probably won’t ever look at car chase clichés the same way again. ***
STEP BROTHERS The battle for the title of Hollywood’s Ultimate Man-Child finds Will Ferrell finally overtaking Adam Sandler. While Sandler plays an actual adult (well, sort of) in the recent You Don’t Mess With the Zohan, Ferrell again adopts an infantile pose, this time in the service of Step Brothers. The law of diminishing returns – to say nothing of Step Brothers‘ cringe-inducing trailer – suggests that this should represent the nadir of Ferrell’s efforts, but the truth is that he’s done worse: This is rescued from the bottom of the sewer by several choice quips as well as a surprising sweetness at the center of its storyline involving family dysfunction. Ferrell and Talladega Nights partner John C. Reilly star as Brennan and Dale, two 40-ish men still living at home with their single parents (Mary Steenburgen and Richard Jenkins, respectively). When said parents decide to marry each other, the two “kids” are forced to not only live under the same roof but also share a bedroom. Initially combative, they become best friends after they’re united by their mutual hatred of Brennan’s smug, perfectionist brother Derek (Adam Scott). As usual, Ferrell doesn’t know where to draw the line when it comes to childish antics on screen. But the theme of how parents and children will often fail each other carries some startling resonance (thanks largely to Steenburgen’s delicate performance), and every time we write off the dialogue as just a string of schoolyard taunts, along comes an unexpected zinger. Step Brothers is clearly a step up from recent Ferrell offerings like Semi-Pro and Blades of Glory, but please, guys, it’s time to grow up and give this formula a rest. **
SWING VOTE There’s a terrific segment in the middle of Swing Vote in which the two men running for U.S. president, Republican incumbent Andrew Boone (Kelsey Grammer) and Democratic challenger Donald Greenleaf (Dennis Hopper), are persuaded by their campaign managers (Stanley Tucci and Nathan Lane, respectively) to do anything to win the favor of Texico, N.M., resident Bud Johnson (Kevin Costner), whose single vote will decide the outcome of the election. So when Bud lets it be known that he doesn’t care what people do in their own homes, even homosexuals, the right-wing Boone is forced to appear in an ad in which, surrounded by members of the gay community, he cheerfully embraces diversity. And when a comment by Bud is misunderstood to mean that he harbors ill will toward Mexican laborers, the left-wing Greenleaf reluctantly films a TV spot in which he rails against illegal immigrants, even as real immigrants hired as extras dash across the set. These bits are funny, biting and provocative, and they demonstrate that this had an opportunity to emerge as a scathing political satire rather than a timid political comedy. But the central thrust isn’t the election as much as it’s the bonding between Bud and his daughter (Madeline Carroll). Costner delivers a fine performance, but we see this type of sentimental film just about every month. We’re here to watch the electoral process receive a sharp kick in the pants, but Swing Vote isn’t inspirational as much as it’s simply afraid to take a stand on anything. Given this narrative trajectory, the film ends just as we suspect it would, not with a bang but with a wimp-out. **1/2
WALL-E This animated effort from Pixar is a treat for the young and old alike, although it might end up endearing itself even more to adults than to kids. And it’s not just because grown-ups will enjoy the usual asides tossed their way (e.g. a witty reference to 2001: A Space Odyssey; Alien star Sigourney Weaver providing the voice of a ship’s computer); it’s also because the plot itself will speak to them in a way that it can’t to humans who still don’t possess all their permanent teeth. For ultimately WALL-E is about nothing less than one of the tenets of human existence: the need to find a partner with whom to share life’s experiences. Of course, the switch here is that it’s a robot, not a human, who’s in need of companionship. WALL-E is the last of his type, a Waste Allocation Load Lifter Earth-class robot who rumbles around a deserted Earth, as all humans have long since abandoned the polluted planet to take up residence in a gargantuan spaceship called the Axiom. (Yes, it’s a pro-environment cartoon, and it’s no accident that our planet’s Public Enemy #1, George W. Bush, is referenced via a CEO urging others to “stay the course.”) When a sleek robot named EVE (Extra-terrestrial Vegetation Evaluator) is dropped off on the planet to search for signs that it might be inhabitable again, WALL-E pursues her like a dog in heat, and once she’s ferried back to the Axiom, our intrepid little Romeo determines not to let her get away. I won’t reveal any of the action that takes place on the spaceship, but rest assured that the movie retains its comic invention while adding slight degrees of action and menace. And who knew that romance between robots could be so affecting? ***1/2
THE X-FILES: I WANT TO BELIEVE Perhaps they should have called it X and the City. Given the $150 million haul of Sex and the City, the makers of this X-Files flick doubtless hope that their adaptation of a TV series will meet with a similar fate. It won’t, but that’s not to say that this is a washout. Although much of the film quickly faded from my mind (hardly a ringing endorsement, I’ll grant), what remains is how it manages to resurrect the eerie aura that marinated the series during its nine-year run. Newbies, be warned: Despite creator Chris Carter’s claims that the movie functions as a stand-alone feature and no knowledge of the show is required, that’s far from the truth. Former FBI agents Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson), now going through life as, respectively, a recluse and a physician, occasionally mention that they’re still haunted by memories of Mulder’s deceased sister and Scully’s deceased child, but as I (a casual viewer, admittedly) couldn’t recall any details as to how the series wrapped up those plotlines, virginal moviegoers will have even less of a clue what these people are yammering about. Where the film works is in sustaining the proper mood: In this typical summer of blockbuster bombast, Carter has dared to remain true to the series’ low-key approach, accentuating shadowy menaces and maintaining the proper friction between Mulder’s desire to believe in the supernatural and Scully’s need to remain grounded in the real world. Carter has taken great pains to insure that plot details remain a secret, so let’s just say that it’s great to see these two characters (and actors) together again. **1/2
OPENS WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 13:
TROPIC THUNDER: Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr.
OPENS FRIDAY, AUGUST 15:
AMERICAN TEEN: Documentary; Hannah Bailey, Colin Clemens.
BIGGER, STRONGER, FASTER*: *THE SIDE EFFECTS OF BEING AMERICAN: Documentary; Christopher Bell, Carl Lewis.
BOTTLE SHOCK: Alan Rickman, Bill Pullman.
FLY ME TO THE MOON 3-D: Animated; voices of Tim Curry, Christopher Lloyd.
HENRY POOLE IS HERE: Luke Wilson, Radha Mitchell.
MIRRORS: Kiefer Sutherland, Amy Smart.
STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS: Animated; voices of Matt Lanter, Tom Kane.
VICKY CRISTINA BARCELONA: Scarlett Johansson, Javier Bardem.
This article appears in Aug 13-19, 2008.
