NEW RELEASES
CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY Forrest Gump’s mama famously declared that “Life is like a box of chocolates; you never know what you’re going to get.” You never know what you’re going to get with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, either, given that director Tim Burton tends to fluctuate between enfant terrible and rank sentimentalist. Burton, last seen lunging for Oscar gold with the forced whimsy of Big Fish, is back on steadier ground, helming the second screen version of Roald Dahl’s 41-year-old novel. Johnny Depp headlines as Willy Wonka, the eccentric candymaker who allows five children to take a tour through his gargantuan factory. Young Charlie Bucket (Freddie Highmore, Depp’s Finding Neverland co-star) is a perfect angel, but the other four kids prove to be such brats that they all eventually get their comeuppance within the walls of Wonka’s candy-coated fortress. In most respects, this surpasses the previous screen incarnation, 1971’s Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory: It’s funnier, faster and more visually stimulating. But Burton’s maudlin streak gets the best of him via a needless back story that explains Wonka’s affinity for candy, and this plot strand leads to a soggy finale that’s easily bested by the final act of the 71 model. Depp, whose Wonka seems to be a cross between Michael Jackson and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari‘s somnambulist Cesare, delivers an engaging surface performance, though I prefer the more measured madness of Gene Wilder’s interpretation.
MARCH OF THE PENGUINS It’s awfully hard – maybe even impossible – to resist the charms of March of the Penguins, a documentary that’s as single-minded in its approach as its protagonists prove to be in their determination to keep their species alive and kicking. Originally a French film filled with first-person – uh, first-penguin – narration (yes, it anthropomorphized the animals) and unorthodox pop songs, this has been refashioned for American audiences as a traditional documentary, with pleasant theme music on the soundtrack and soothing narration provided by Morgan Freeman. At the risk of sounding like a xenophobic clod who would endorse “Freedom fries,” I have to say I approve of the changes – hearing a baby penguin exclaim the Gallic version of “Gosh, Dad, it sure is cold with all this ice!” would surely have made me cringe. Director Luc Jacquet and his crew deliver 80 minutes worth of compelling footage, focusing on the annual ritual that finds the emperor penguins embarking on a lengthy, perilous journey to the spot where they’ll hook up with mates and then protect the resultant eggs from the punishing elements. The French are apparently second to none when it comes to making movies that champion wildlife, and March of the Penguins joins Winged Migration, The Bear and Two Brothers as sterling examples of the form.
WEDDING CRASHERS Modern movie comedies are starting to resemble nothing so much as the board game Clue, with its limited number of characters rotating throughout the confines of an established milieu. Is it Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson in the Christmas comedy about an eccentric family? Is it Stiller and Vince Vaughn in the summer comedy about an underdog sports team? Is it Stiller, Wilson and Will Ferrell in the fall comedy about the fashion models? Or is it Stiller, Wilson, Vaughn and Ferrell in the spring comedy about a pair of TV cops? Wedding Crashers shuffles around Wilson, Vaughn and one “surprise” cameo player in just the sort of picture we’ve come to expect from this Hollywood version of a theatrical repertory company: rude, ragged and funny more often than not. Wilson and Vaughn play John and Jeremy, longtime buddies who crash weddings in order to sleep with the emotionally vulnerable women they encounter there. But the pair’s successful operation hits a snag once they infiltrate a wedding that’s under the auspices of Treasury Secretary William Cleary (Christopher Walken): John falls in love with Cleary’s level-headed daughter Claire (Rachel McAdams) while Jeremy finds himself being terrorized by the politico’s seemingly psychotic daughter Gloria (Isla Fisher). While it could be construed as a tragedy if Hollywood has already started steering McAdams (Mean Girls, The Notebook) into standard “girlfriend” roles, it should be noted that her vitality and Fisher’s zaniness match up nicely against the leading actors’ personalities. For their part, Wilson and Vaughn are in exemplary comic form, doing their best to lift a clunky screenplay that’s bogged down by the usual stock characters (overbearing fiancé, creepy gay kid, etc.).
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Current Releases
BATMAN BEGINS One of the finest superhero films ever made, Batman Begins marks the beginning of a beautiful friendship – between the creative forces who have resurrected a popular franchise and the fans who felt betrayed when that same franchise went belly-up in the late 90s. Never afraid to peer into the darkest recesses of the mind, director Christopher Nolan (Memento, Insomnia) has created a brooding picture that has as much in common with his previous works as it does with the storied saga of the Caped Crusader. To dismiss this as escapist fare would be to ignore the myriad adult themes that bulk up the picture, issues ranging from the duality of man to the politics of fear. Christian Bale leads a sterling cast that also includes Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman and Liam Neeson; their committed performances help make this that rare summer movie in which thought often speaks louder than either action or words.
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BEWITCHED As far as ill-advised Nicole Kidman vehicles that plunder past artifacts of pop culture are concerned, the nicest thing one can say about Bewitched is that it’s an improvement over The Stepford Wives. That’s primarily because of Kidman herself, who manages to harness her maddeningly inconsistent role with such success that the result is an offbeat and original characterization. Otherwise, this initially clever comedy, in which a real witch (Kidman) is cast as a fictional one on an update of the Bewitched TV series, takes one wrong turn after another beginning around the halfway mark. As Kidman’s unlikely love interest, a miscast Will Ferrell delivers a manic performance that quickly grows tiresome, while old pros Michael Caine and Shirley MacLaine are wasted in malnourished roles.
CINDERELLA MAN No filmmaker in his right mind would want his boxing picture to be released a scant few months after Million Dollar Baby, but Cinderella Man is so structurally and tonally different from Clint Eastwood’s masterwork that it might as well be about jai alai. Almost every summer has one tony Oscar-bait production geared toward older audiences, and Cinderella Man, which relates the real-life story of pugilist James J. Braddock, adequately fills that designation. Russell Crowe’s touching portrayal is instrumental in recruiting the audience’s sympathies from the get-go, and director Ron Howard and his A Beautiful Mind writer Akiva Goldsman take care to spend as much time detailing the ravages of the Depression as they do Braddock’s exploits in the ring. This film may not break new ground, but in its ability to provide old-fashioned entertainment, the gloves come flying off.
DARK WATER As far as American remakes of Japanese horror flicks go, this one’s better than either The Ring or The Grudge, trading in cheap thrills for an understated intelligence. Jennifer Connelly plays Dahlia, an emotionally fragile divorcee who moves into a decrepit – and possibly haunted – apartment with her young daughter (Ariel Gade). The horror angle isn’t nearly as compelling as the other topics explored by director Walter Salles (The Motorcycle Diaries) and scripter Rafael Yglesias (Fearless), among them parental anxiety, urban decay and the indifference of strangers. Connelly anchors this with a strong performance, though the film is stolen by supporting players Pete Postlethwaite (as the building’s gruff janitor), Tim Roth (as Dahlia’s adept lawyer) and especially John C. Reilly (as the sleazy landlord).
FANTASTIC FOUR Assign acclaimed directors to superhero flicks and you get the likes of the Spider-Man pair, the X-Men duo and Batman Begins. Assign any Tom, Hack or Harry and you get flaccid duds like Elektra, The Punisher and now Fantastic Four. It’s shocking that 20th Century Fox didn’t treat this with the same care as their classy (and successful) X-Men franchise; instead, they handed the directorial reins to Tim Story (Barbershop and the Jimmy Fallon bomb Taxi), resulting in a half-assed cheeseball confection. Among the heroes, Michael Chiklis fares best as the tortured Thing, but Julian McMahon makes a pitiable Dr. Doom, a towering comic book villain (think of him as the forerunner to Darth Vader) reduced to a wimpy matinee crook. The engaging special effects help.
HERBIE: FULLY LOADED The notion of a supercharged Volkswagen beetle seems quaint in this age of monolithic, gas-guzzling SUVs – indeed, the first Herbie picture, The Love Bug, hit theaters back in 1969 – yet given the sort of cacophonous kiddie dreck that routinely fills auditoriums today, this blast of old-fashioned sentiment isn’t half-bad. Lindsey Lohan, whose tight outfits continually threaten to put the kibosh on the film’s G rating, plays a speed racer who finds herself competing on the NASCAR circuit after she discovers that the rusty VW she rescues from a junkyard is magically endowed. The wavering quality of the special effects – more special in some scenes than others – will pass unnoticed by the little ones, while parents will enjoy revisiting their youth via the mix of rock oldies on the soundtrack.
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HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE American animated features, even the best of them, are invariably bound by tradition and convention, but the movies of Japan’s Hayao Miyazaki remain free from the shackles of conformity. His films are a sight for soaring eyes, ocular treats for moviegoers on the prowl for new experiences and new sensations. His latest release is nowhere in the same league as his masterpiece, the Oscar-winning Spirited Away, but the visuals more than carry the film. This tale of a teenage girl who turns to a handsome wizard to help her break a spell incorporates Miyazaki’s recurring themes of courage, sacrifice and environmental awareness, yet the results are too scattershot to make any lasting impression. Still, glitches in storytelling and stunt casting (Billy Crystal is jarring as the voice of a wisecracking fire demon) can’t overshadow the wondrous sights that Miyazaki doles out for our approval.
KICKING & SCREAMING The “underdog sports comedy,” which hasn’t been run into the ground as much as it’s been pureed in a top-model blender, travels as far as it probably can go these days in this immensely likable if somewhat toothless family film. Will Ferrell ably tackles his most complete role to date, as a wimpy dad who elects to coach a losing boys soccer team. As Ferrell’s macho dad, Robert Duvall seems to have wandered in from a much more serious movie, and the usual sports flick cliches are repeated verbatim. What elevates the movie is Ferrell himself: While his patented shtick can often grow tiresome, here it’s in the service of an actual character, and that seems to make all the difference. Rather than random acts of lunacy, the insecure Phil’s outbursts are hardwired into his psyche, which allows us the luxury of feeling sorry for the guy even as we’re laughing at him.
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LAND OF THE DEAD George Romero has always been as much a social commentator as a horror filmmaker, which is why his zombie flicks have always remained as popular with critics as with cultists. Two decades after his last foray into the genre, Romero has decided to add a fourth chapter onto his established trilogy; it’s good, gory fun, even if its satiric jabs are more heavy-handed than in the past. This entry centers on a conscientious mercenary (Simon Baker) who has to contend with a ruthless CEO (Dennis Hopper) who caters to the wealthy while ignoring the unwashed masses, a hired gun (John Leguizamo) with his own agenda, and hordes of zombies who are starting to take baby steps up the evolutionary ladder. Romero’s wit remains intact, but his allusions to modern-day America (Dennis Hopper’s raging capitalist even states, “We do not negotiate with terrorists!”) seem more obvious this time around.
MR. AND MRS. SMITH Based on the countless scenes in which Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie strip down to their undergarments, it’s clear there isn’t an ounce of flab on either of those bodies – it’s just too bad the same can’t be said about the film itself. Playing a suburban couple who are actually both skilled assassins, Brad and Angelina gleefully throw themselves into this chaotic action flick in which the sharp dialogue too often gets drowned out by the incessant explosions. The film begins promisingly, with Simon Kinberg contributing a script that’s full of wry observations about the level of secrecy that’s inherent in most marriages, and how the stakes might be raised exponentially when the spousal subterfuge occurs between people who kill for a living. But once the emphasis shifts from the characters to the hardware they employ, it becomes just another noisy spectacle.
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THE PERFECT MAN Hilary Duff, the personable but one-note Disney Channel star, plays Holly Hamilton, a teen who fabricates a Mr. Right to cheer up her lonely single mom (Heather Locklear). But it never occurs to Holly that, duh, her mom might eventually want to meet this seemingly perfect man in the flesh, and that’s when her scheme begins to unravel. Even allowing that this is supposed to be a frothy comedy aimed at younger viewers, the film is so casually cruel in its treatment of its characters (particular Locklear’s, who craves a man like a junkie craves a fix), a bad taste lingers even after everybody instantly learns their valuable life lessons during the final 10 minutes.
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WAR OF THE WORLDS Steven Spielberg, who’s helmed several of the greatest popcorn entertainments of the past 30 years, has now given us a popcorn picture with a difference – this one’s been generously sprinkled with salt, causing a stinging sensation as it rubs against the open wound of our national psyche. Spielberg has crafted War of the Worlds as a fantasy film for a post-9/11 age, a work that, in the same manner as his excellent 2002 Minority Report, views science fiction not as a source of endless wonder and delight but as a realm fraught with cautionary tales about the erosion of our personal freedoms and our sense of despair in an increasingly hostile world. Americanizing and updating H.G. Wells’ novel, this follows a working-class dad (Tom Cruise) and his kids as they attempt to escape the aliens wiping out mankind. Boasting excellent effects, this is a harrowing thrill ride that’s merciless in its methods, though it’s hampered by a warm and fuzzy conclusion that’s simply shameless.
This article appears in Jul 20-26, 2005.
