Oscar Leftovers

OSCAR LEFTOVERS

It's been a while since I've done an update, and my excuse was I wouldn't write any reviews until I had seen all the 10 Oscar nominees. Well it took me half the year, but here we are. In that time I also went on an adventure through the Nevada wilderness, moved a bit farther up the career ladder (for better or worse) and turned 25. Holy shit...25?!?! Dammit, I need to get my act together. Please don't tell me I'm going to be stuck in an editing booth for the rest of my life tricking people into seeing shitty movies...

Anyway, quarter-life crisis aside (although honestly, do these feelings ever REALLY change?), let's do some reviewing!

OLDER MOVIES

"Monsters"

I personally feel like this is a very important film because, like "Moon" and "District 9," it's proving that movies don't need extravagant budgets to tell visually impressive and engaging science fiction stories. A new sub-genre of "indie sci-fi" is almost emerging, and it's awesome that pretty believable effects are becoming easier and easier to achieve for anyone willing to sit down and learn a few new nifty tools. Take the power from the studios and give them back to the filmmakers! The downside of course is that people WITH tech-savvy jobs like mine are becoming easier and easier to come by, making us less important. But I'm all for filmmaking becoming a more artistic singular-driven endeavor than an overblown, sequel-driven, studio-garbled mess. Seriously, fuck Michael Bay and the Transformers movies.

Of course, the movie isn't perfect. In the film giant squid-like aliens have landed in Mexico and set up residence in a huge chunk of the country as their "breeding ground." The lead character, on assignment to photograph one of the creatures and get a bunch of money, is tasked with the job of bringing his boss's runaway daughter back home. At the beginning, the photographer character makes a point about how you can take a thousand beautiful pictures of doves or flowers or whatever (I'm paraphrasing because it's been a while since I saw the movie), but it's the pictures of suffering that actually make you money, like that famous Nat Geo one of the starving kid and the vulture.

Later in the movie there's a pretty cool scene where the group has a nasty run-in with some creatures (nicely handled with only short glimpses of their tentacles and some incredible sound design), and afterward the lead character comes across one of the children that has been killed. A perfect chance to make a statement about our character--have him pull out the camera and snap a photo! OR show that he's changed...have him pull out the camera, but then hesitate and NOT snap the photo (which honestly is a little ham-fisted, but whatever). Instead, we don't really get anything...a wasted opportunity. The same thing happens again towards the end of the film when the photographer has a chance to literally take the photo of the century (though I won't spoil what it is) and just stands there dumbstruck. Dude, I don't care how amazing the things are you're looking at--you have a damn camera around your neck!!! Take a fucking picture!!!

The film is also set up as a love story, and while I liked the relationship that developed between the characters, I honestly felt like it left things hanging and didn't go far enough.

But even so, Gareth Edwards does a fantastic job creating some eerie sequences on a shoe-string budget. The final scene at the gas station, particularly a shot where one of the creatures is revealed by a flash of lightning, reminded me of the masterful sequence where he Rex attacks the jeeps in "Jurassic Park." AND apparently the guy is on his way to directing a new Godzilla movie, so way to go!

"Let Me In"

Speaking of giant monster movies, "Let Me In" is directed by Matt Reeves, the director of "Cloverfield"...so that's neat. If you didn't know, "Let Me In" is the remake of the fantastic Swedish vampire film "Let the Right One In," which I think is arguably one of the best and most interesting vampire flicks ever made. There are many out there who wail, "Why remake it?!" when they see that Hollywood is redoing a foreign film. Generally I agree, but I'm always willing to give the benefit of the doubt and see what a creative American director can do (I didn't really like "The Host," so I'm all for Americans butchering it if they can get it to be any less haphazard).

Unfortunately "Let Me In" is everything I feared it would be. While not quite a shot-for-shot remake of the original film, it doesn't offer a shred of new ideas anywhere. There's nothing all that bad about it, but I'd rather see a movie at least try something new and fail than go through the motions and make some extra cash because the characters are all speaking English now. My advice? Skip it and watch the original if you haven't already.

"Superman 2"

Up until relatively recently, the only Superman movie I had seen was Bryan Singer's "Superman Returns," an at times exciting, but generally pretty flawed film (apparently Superman is the ultimate deadbeat dad).

This movie certainly made me understand the Man of Steel a bit more. I've always been a Spidey fan because I like that Peter Parker is a nerd who can still get his ass kicked. With Superman the question of how this guy would actually save the world never seemed to be a problem since he can basically do anything. "Should I save the world or shouldn't I?" can get sort of interesting, but usually only when it's explored by Alan Moore's Dr. Manhattan. And are we seriously supposed to believe Lois doesn't recognize him under those glasses?

But in "Superman 2" I sort of get it...he's a guy who WANTS to relate to people as much as possible, but can't. Superman is actually who he IS, and Clark Kent is his disguise. Few other superheroes are this way, though I like that it's been touched upon in Nolan's Batman films.

Also, it's weirdly refreshing to see a superhero movie without any of the pretensions that so heavily weigh today's post-modern world. Yes, I love the new Batman movies, but they are so weighty and tense all the time. "Superman 2," with it's bombastic John Williams score and plucky performance from Christopher Reeve is just so much FUN! Also adding in some actual Kryptonians as the villains was awesome. I know comic fans would disagree with me, but it's a little ridiculous that Lex Luthor, who is basically just a smart guy, is supposed to be the arch-nemesis to a man who can fly and shoot lasers out of his eyes. And General Zod is played by Terrence Stamp, one of my favorite character actors of all time!

One thing I will say is that I've heard this film was marred by the studio wrestling it away from Richard Donner, and it certainly shows. Sometimes you'll get dramatic scenes of Superman pondering his new-found humanity and ability to be with Lois, and suddenly you get an ice cream cone falling in a guy's face or Superman throwing his LOGO (?!) at the villains. What?! It certainly makes me want to see the incomplete, but no doubt more interesting, Richard Donner cut available on DVD.

"They Live"

I'm not going to lie. While I know this is a cult classic, I was sorely disappointed in John Carpenter's "They Live." Had it been made early in his career I might have let it slide, but come on...this was done AFTER "Halloween" and "The Thing," two phenomenal horror movies that are the best in their genre. Still I must admit the insanely long fight scene over one character arguing to the other to put on a pair of sunglasses is laughably incredible.

"The Crow" A so-so film with some fun visuals. Not worth killing the lead actor over, though. I don't really have much more to say about this movie other than that it's nice to see a Tim Burton-ish film that ISN'T directed by Tim Burton. Overall it left me feeling the same way I felt about this director's other film, "Dark City." Neat visuals and certainly some original elements, but overall rather unmemorable.

"Psycho"

Yes! Dan the film student had never seen the original "Psycho" until a few weeks ago! And what a film!!! SPOILERS coming (for a movie over 50 years old...).

Even by today's standards, "Psycho" is a pretty amazing feat. I knew Janet Leigh would die in the film, but I had no idea it would take so long. I was expecting something along the lines of Drew Barrymore's death in "Scream," but instead it happens literally halfway through the film. What a way to send the audience reeling! Suddenly we have no idea who our protagonist is, and we have no idea where things are headed. Great!

Also, the way Norman Bates methodically cleans and disposes of the body is eerie too. Rather than cut to the body stuffed in the car and dumped in the swamp, we see every step of Bates' process as he thinks about what to do. Even today it gives the film a hard, realistic, unnerving edge rarely seen. As my friend Sonia (who also had never seen it) remarked, "It reminds me of something out of 'Dexter.'" How true...but now I know where "Dexter" got it!

And the last thing I want to say...Anthony Perkins' performance! In an era where acting was stilted and over-the-top, Perkins plays the whole thing straight, making him all the more creepy. It's a very modern performance that still can get under one's skin today (he reminded me of the late Heath Ledger), and back then it must have been a revelation. What a great job!

While I still adore "Rear Window" and probably regard it as Hitchcock's finest because of it's simplistic premise and perfect execution, "Psycho" might come in at #2. What a great flick...I'm glad I finally saw it. You're the man, Alfred!

MOVIES FROM THIS YEAR

"Source Code"

I already wrote about Gareth Edwards and "Monsters," and how he's moving on to a Godzilla film. Isn't it cool that Duncan Jones has moved from "Moon" to this one?

While not quite as clever or introspective as "Moon," "Source Code" is a fun ride. It's sort of like a sci-fi "Groundhog Day." In the movie Captain Colter Stevens (played by Jake Gyllenhaal, eager for some street cred after "Prince of Persia") is continuously sent back in time to a train that is about to go explodey because of a terrorist on board. Stevens' job is to figure out who the bomber is in the PAST so that the people in the present can find him and bring him to justice.

Of course, there is more to the movie than this...Stevens starts to fall in love with a girl on the train (Michelle Monaghan...understandable). Even though she's already dead, Stevens becomes convinced he can--and must--save her by stopping the bombing from happening.

While there are a couple of loose hinges, "Source Code" is overall a lot of fun and, like "Moon," definitely feels like the genre of movie I'd like to make someday (someday SOON!). It's also the movie that marks my first "finish" as they say in the trailer editing biz, as some radio spots I cut went to air. Hooray, I'm famous! At least they happened for a movie I actually enjoyed.

But I will say the ending of "Source Code" brings up some interesting questions (SPOILERS for those who haven't seen it...)

Isn't this movie kind of a weird twist on the cool guy who steals your boyfriend away from you? What happens to the guy who was inhabiting Sean Fentress before Stevens took his body over? Does he just wink out of existence? It's clear Fentress had a thing for Michelle Monaghan...poor guy.

At the end, Stevens basically becomes Fentress, but in this alternate quantum universe, there is STILL a Stevens at the military facility, waiting to be used by Jeffrey Wright (who gives a terrible performance by the way). So if there are infinite quantum universes, once THIS Stevens goes through the Source Code and saves the day, won't there be TWO Jake Gyllenhaals running around? And what if he winds up in the body of a girl...won't that be weird? Won't there eventually be a universe with TONS of Jake Gyllenhaals? A whole WORLD full of Jake Gyllenhaals? Can you enter the body of a dead dog, and if you do, does that dog gain Jake Gyllenhaal intelligence? Hmmm...

Anyway, fun movie. I look forward to seeing what Duncan Jones does next!

"Cedar Rapids"

"Cedar Rapids" is probably one of the better comedies I've seen in a while. I read somewhere (I think in "Save the Cat") that any story is supposed to be the most interesting thing that will happen to your main character in his or her life. For THIS main character, that just so happens to be going to a company convention in Cedar Rapids! I'm already laughing!

The whole cast, be they lead or supporting, does a great job. And while Ed Helms is memorable as the complete loser protagonist (at least I'm never going to be as bad as HE is), the real star of the show is John C. Reilly in the performance of his career--and that's saying something. Reilly plays Dean Ziegler, the guffawing, booze-guzzling sleazebag with a heart of gold. Comedies rarely get Oscars, and a little movie like this is going to go completely unnoticed, but seriously...the guy is ON FIRE in this film.

What I also like about "Cedar Rapids" is how, despite being an ultimately very sweet story, it doesn't pull any punches. (SPOILERS!) Ed Helms winds up befriending an underage hooker, smoking crack, and sleeping with a married woman...and all the while we still feel like he's a lovable underdog. Not an easy feat to pull of, and with less subtle direction it could have come across as base and hateful.

Anyway, I liked this film...you should go see it, at the very least to see John C. Reilly firing on all cylinders like there's no tomorrow.

"Patisserie"

It's not every day you see a Japanese film about a French bakery, where you'd need to be tri-lingual to get every line of dialogue, but that's why you go to the Santa Barbara Film Festival!

In this cute film, a young (and very pretty) Japanese girl runs away from home and gets a job working in a Patisserie making pastries. As to be expected, she manages to change everyone's life, goes through her own personal drama, and becomes a fantastic chef in her own right by the end. I feel like I've seen a lot of foreign films with this same basic plot (especially at film festivals) but that doesn't make it any less delightful. And damned if my stomach wasn't growling the entire time...the photographers REALLY knew how to make the food look delicious. A cute and tasty treat!

"The Rite"

"The Rite" is an excellent example of why setting the tone of a movie is so important. I had moderately high hopes for this film, as it seemed to promise the possibility of being a smarter horror film, and it was directed by the guy who did "1408," a very flawed--but thoroughly entertaining--creepfest.

Sadly "The Rite" fails mainly because it never commits itself. At times it tries to startle you by being a true blue horror flick, complete with your standard jump scares, while other times it just feels like a slow-moving drama that happens to be about exorcism. The central premise, that a priest with faltering faith must exorcise his older mentor, could be really cool AS a scare flick OR a drama, but in trying to be either the film just drags and rings hollow. Bummer.

"The Adjustment Bureau"

...or as I like to call it, "Cockblockers in Fedoras." Every few years, Hollywood tries to raid the Philip K. Dick short story catalog with the hope of finding a cool premise for a feature film. On very rare occasions this has proven wonderful, as seen with one of my all-time favorites, "Blade Runner." Yet one must remember part of why "Blade Runner" works is because Ridley Scott only used the source material as a jumping point. The same holds true for the enjoyable, if not slightly silly, "Minority Report," which holds the basic elements of the short story, but has an entirely different narrative.

My point is that, Philip K. Dick wrote a lot of great SHORT stories (he also wrote a lot of BAD short stories, but let's ignore that for now). But a good short doesn't necessarily mean a good feature. The overlooked "Imposter" starring Gary Sinise was originally intended to be one part of a science-fiction anthology movie, but when they lost funding it was expanded as a feature. While it is interesting at times, it ultimately felt padded out and didn't work, and "The Adjustment Bureau" has the same problem (I never bothered with "Paycheck").

In the film, Matt Damon plays a charming would-be senator on the road to victory. In a momentary lapse of doubt, he meets sleepy-eyed and highly overrated Emily Blunt, who makes out with him in a bathroom and gives him the energy he needs to keep rocking the campaign trail. Later Damon meets her again on a bus, and the two flirt a bunch, exchange numbers, etc.

Yet after this encounter, Damon is kidnapped by a bunch of weird sketchy dudes in fedora-hats, led by the stone-faced TERRENCE STAMP ("KNEEL BEFORE ZOD")!!! It turns out these big-brother-is-watching-you types control every aspect of our lives and make sure we all are led down the paths destiny has prepared for us. Matt Damon is supposed to be senator (and, it is implied, ultimately president), and this saucy British minx gave him just enough oomph for him to give an impassioned speech and appeal to the voters in exactly the right way to tip the scales. However, he is NOT supposed to wind up with her...their chance encounter on the bus was a mistake, and could doom everything! At this point, Emily Blunt's number is torn into a million pieces in front of Damon and thrown to the wind. He's lost her number forever! Shit...that's even worse than dropping one's cell phone in the pool! We don't get a scene where Matt Damon searches to see if she's on facebook...I guess it was cut for time.

Anyway as a short story premise, this is kind of interesting. We all like to believe we can forge our own destinies, but what if even those decisions are still illusions from some sort of mysterious puppetmasters? It's intriguing enough.

Of course, Matt Damon is fully convinced that the girl who slobbered all over him in the bathroom, and later gave him a boner on the bus, is THE ONE. A few years later (seriously...years?!), he accidentally bumps into her a third time, and makes it his mission to not let her go, no matter how hard the fedora-men try to stop him. At this point the movie gets really stupid really fast. There isn't much else left for the movie to do other than to wear out it's premise, and we get a lot of annoying lofty dialogue of Damon talking about destiny with fedora-people, Emily Blunt crying and looking confused, and the duo running here there and everywhere through New York. I personally found the whole thing a lot MORE entertaining if you believed that Matt Damon wasn't in LOVE with Emily Blunt, but just really, REALLY wanted to bang her. Just once. Maybe she was into freaky stuff. But the agents won't let him because banging this girl could have "unseen consequences" (STDs are serious business!).

Oh yeah, my other favorite part! It isn't just Damon's destiny that will get screwed up...it's Blunt's as well! If Damon winds up with Blunt, somehow he'll ruin her dancing career! She'll lose focus, and instead of performing for thousands on magnificent stages, she'll wind up being a dance instructor for eight-year olds--a fate worse than death!!!

Anyway, the movie eventually ends with a conclusion that isn't really satisfying one way or the other. Nothing particularly enlightening is revealed about this weird plot device...Damon and Blunt get to be with each other, the fedora guys concede, basically shrugging their shoulders and saying, "Well...I guess we'll just have to see!" and the credits roll.

I wouldn't really have any problem with this movie IF it had been fun. "Terminator" is basically one long chase movie, and boy does it work. But if a movie is going to BE so damn pretentious in the first place...filled with such lofty topics as love and destiny, then you damn well better be sure you have something to say about it all. To me, the film is a perfect example of a story that didn't deserve any expansion, and should have just stayed where it was...in a book of sci-fi shorts. Oh well.

PS: Having done a little research, apparently the laughably awful "Next" is also a Philip K. Dick story! Again, interesting premise to read on paper, but it makes for terrible, TERRIBLE cinema. Save yourself a lot of trouble and figure out IF a story is worth translating to screen first, Hollywood!

"Rango"

I'm a little surprised everybody liked "Rango" as much as they did. It got decent reviews, many of my friends seemed to enjoy it, but I thought it was a little pathetic.

However, first off, major kudos to ILM's animation department for delivering their first animated feature. In terms of technical design and creature work, the film is a delight. In the world of animation today Dreamworks movies look like Dreamworks movies, Disney movies look like Disney movies, and even Pixar movies tend to look like Pixar movies. Blue Sky has their look, and even Animal Logic's realistic animals still only look like realistic animals. It's great to have a new animation studio in the mix, and in "Rango" the weird collection of quirky, grotesque, sometimes nightmarish critters is a sight to behold. From the animators to the shaders to the concept artists, "Rango" at the very least has a visual imagination all its own that doesn't feel any pressure to be "cutesy." I would even argue they went a little too far...when your love interest is one of the ugliest-looking creatures ever seen on celluloid, you could have a bit of a problem.

Yet as a story "Rango" fails in the same way Verbinski's other work often has. I definitely think Verbinski can be a great director in a variety of genres. "Mouse Hunt," "The Ring," and of course the first "Pirates of the Caribbean" are all strong films, yet quite different from each other. But at the same time the second two "Pirates" movies showed a lot of unbridled creativity with very little focus; they were kind of just big overblown messes.

This is how I felt about "Rango." The main character, a chameleon made to look like Hunter S. Thompson, is rather selfish and despicable. This is fine, but it's not like he really FIXES this problem by the end of the film. Everything he manages to accomplish happens through sheer buffoonery and dumb luck. Much of the movie is spent coming up with goofy gags and "funny" characters, but rarely does any of it amount to much of anything. Yes, there's an environmental message towards the end, but we've seen it done better a million times before. Here it doesn't feel like the natural conclusion to anything, but tacked on so the filmmakers could feel smug and warm about their film's resolution (I felt the same way about "Happy Feet," which is still one of the most undeserving Oscars I've ever seen the Academy give). Early on the bad guys seem to be a group of tunneling bandits working for a shadowy evil tortoise (who bears fun reference to John Huston's character in "Chinatown"), yet at the end Rango has to face off against Rattlesnake Jake, a slithering viper with a Gatling gun for a tail. Like the "Pirates" sequels, a lot of it is pretty cool, but none of it really pieces together. There's even a sequence where the characters explore an underground cavern and pass by a giant freaky reptilian eyeball. "Cool!" I thought..."Alligators in the sewers or something!" Nope. That's it. The eyeball is there because Verbinski liked the way it looked. OK...

There's a lot better alternative animation out there if you search for it. I say skip this one.

"Your Highness"

Sometimes I just don't agree with the reviewers. Critics seemed to think "Rango" was inspired while I thought it was unfocused. But they hated on "Your Highness" because it was filled with...well, stupid pothead and bathroom humor. OK, fine.

Whatever, I liked it. Irreverent fantasy is something I've always enjoyed, and this movie reminded me a lot of the same stupid shit I would watch at sleepover parties back in junior high and high school (in a GOOD way!). I also appreciated the movie for not riffing on any particular specific fantasy film, but still coming up with it's own fun universe. The guy who created snakes by sticking his hand in a pot of mud was very creative, and the Blade of Unicorn, made from the spine of a dead unicorn's skeleton (using the horn as the hilt!), is actually one of the cooler fantasy weapons I've seen since the triple-bladed sword from "The Sword and the Sorcerer." Some I feel movies get lazy with their spoofing, or even fail to spoof ENOUGH movies (I'm looking at you overrated "Walk Hard"), but this flick generally spoofed only the genre, nothing specific, making it feel a lot more universal and, in my view, fun. It's "Deathstalker 2" with a budget (actually it's not as funny as "Deathstalker 2," but only because "Deathstalker 2" is a masterpiece)! It won't make any of that budget BACK, but who cares? The minotaur penis jokes continuously made me chuckle.

So I don't know...maybe I'm just a juvenile idiot at heart, but I found nothing wrong with "Your Highness" to say the least. It could have been because I was also really, REALLY high* when I saw it, but isn't that how you're supposed to watch movies like this anyway?

"Hanna"

A rare breed of "art-house action movie," "Hanna" at the very least is pretty interesting. It comes from Joe Wright, the guy who did "Atonement" for better or worse, and it's neat to see his take on the action flick. In a set-up that has echoes of "The Hunger Games" (great book series, by the way), a young girl is trained by her father in the Arctic circle to be a stealthy assassin. These early sequences are filled with a great primal tenseness; in the opening scene Hanna ruthlessly tracks down and kills a caribou. Eric Bana plays her father wonderfully, but Saoirse Ronan easily holds her own and makes Hanna a both lovable and frightening character; I have high hopes for this young actress. Plus she has one of the most interesting and expressive faces of anyone her age out there.

Eventually Hanna chooses to leave the safety of the Arctic circle and is drawn up in some sort of weird spy espionage stuff, led by the mysterious Marissa Wiegler, played over-the-top by Cate Blanchett. I like Blanchett, but at times she can be a bit cartoony, and Joe Wright's constant grotesque close-ups on her feet and teeth don't help matters.

Anyway, after a daring escape through techno jail (my favorite scene), Hanna is on the run. Somehow she winds up in Morocco (which at first I thought was Nevada) with an obtuse British family, where she learns a bit about "real" people and how they behave (how many families do you know where every family member knows ALL the lyrics to obscure David Bowie songs? Oh well...). These scenes are kind of nice, but I honestly thought they dragged a bit. If anything, "Hanna" is one of the few films I thought could have used a couple MORE action set pieces rather than character development.

Because the action scenes, at the very least, are very different to the ones we are used to in typical action movies. Though the sequence at the loading docks is underwhelming, many of the others are pretty cool. "Atonement" had that long take of James McAvoy on the beach, but it's nothing compared to the sequence where Eric Bana walks into a subway station and believably takes out a bunch of thugs in one continuous shot. Give the stunt coordinator (and camera operator!) a medal!

Often what really makes these action sequences shine isn't so much the action itself as the SETS. What bizarre set pieces! I already mentioned the techno prison that felt like something out of a rave music video, but we also get a fantastic ending inside some bizarre decrepit Alice and Wonderland theme park (further hinting at the fairytale origins of the story). Adding to the strange intensity is a unique soundtrack from the Chemical Brothers, giving us a cinematic experience unlike that which we are used to.

Yet at the same time, while I liked a lot of this stuff, the film also suffered FROM a lot of art-house tropes. People complain that mainstream movies are constantly full of the same old shit--standard lighting, overly loud action scenes, shaky-cam, plot contrivances for the sake of convenience, the list goes on and on. And I agree! But art-house films have a whole manner of their own pitfalls too--at times "Hanna" gets weird for the sake of...getting weird. I already mentioned the annoying close-ups of Cate Blanchett, which I assume are supposed to hint at her desire to be clean and organized, but just come off as annoyingly fetishist. The same holds true for a scene where we meet one of our bounty hunters tasked with finding Hanna. For whatever reason he is watching an interpretive dance being put on by a transvestite in some sleazy bar. Huh?! Why??? That's like something you add in a film to make FUN of an art-house movie! What happens next, do they all sing Bjork songs in a bathtub full of pudding? And this German character inexplicably whistles and acts super-flamboyant everywhere he goes, despite his violence. Is this supposed to be threatening? You say character trait, I say you're just being weird.

Either way though, "Hanna" is a neat experiment, and I felt really pumped afterward to go shoot an action movie. I just think it could have used a little more Neveldine/Taylor and a little less Luis Bunuel.

"The People vs. George Lucas"

A while back my buddy Boston Chris showed me a doc (which I reviewed) called "Still We Believe," about Boston Red Sox fans. I found the movie a chore to sit through, mainly because I could care less about the Boston Red Sox. Of course a really good doc WILL make you care about something you don't find interesting (i.e. "The King of Kong"), but it definitely makes things more difficult for the filmmaker.

"The People vs. George Lucas" might be my version of "Still We Believe." The Star Wars franchise has been a huge part of my life since I was a kid--it's at least tangentially responsible for why I wound up pursuing filmmaking. But among Star Wars fans there is a very interesting love-hate relationship with its creator, George Lucas. On the one hand, he made films that shaped our childhood. On the other, he has cheapened the saga through the prequels (really not THAT bad) the Clone Wars series, and cheaper and cheaper merchandising (OK, bad). But is that all his fault? We asked for it didn't we? "Give us more!!!" It's an interesting dynamic that makes for a fun doc with lots of funny quips and one-liners from nerds like me. I also appreciated the inventiveness of showing very little of the actual Star Wars movies--most of the visuals are the same scenes reenacted from numerous fan films, which is an excellent way to show the passion and love so many people have for these movies.

If you're a Star Wars fan this is a must see. If you could care less about this (awesome!) franchise though, you probably won't find it that interesting.

"I Am"

It would be very nice of me to give "I Am" a glowing review, because it's a doc with a real positive message about treating everyone nice, ending world hunger, etc. etc. etc. And that's great! But ultimately it doesn't really lead anywhere...it sort of feels like the lead filmmaker Tom Shadyac, director of huge blockbuster comedies such as "Ace Ventura" and "Bruce Almighty" had a mid-life crisis, and got over it by making a film. I'm glad he figured it out, but his doc honestly feels a bit unfocused and scattered. I will say that his heart is in the right place, and when I met him he was an incredibly cool and down-to-earth guy. I suspect he will continue to make docs in the future, and I'm excited to see what else he comes up with now that he's had his "flash of insight."

"The Beaver"

An overall very strange, somewhat dark comedy about a depressed man named Walter who's life is changed after he finds a beaver puppet in the trash. Kicked out of his home, he tries to commit suicide when the puppet (on his hand) starts talking to him...with his own voice, like a bad ventriloquist's dummy. Walter gets back into the swing of things and manages to sort his life out, but at what cost? Is he crazy? Is the Beaver taking over?

I felt kind of bad for a lot of the people involved in this film, because while it is sort of nutty, it's also rather sweetly nutty. And unfortunately the film was delayed because Walter is played by Mel Gibson, who is an altogether a different kind of nutty (it's not the sweet kind). Jodie Foster directs the film with a gentle straightforward approach, and delivers a fine performance herself. And the most interesting story in the film has nothing to do with the Beaver/Walter at all, but the off-kilter high school romance between Walter's son (Anton Yelchin) and the terrified valedictorian who wants him to help her cheat on her end-of-the year speech (the ever-more-beautiful Jennifer Lawrence). Maybe I'm a sucker for young love, but I thought these two up-and-coming actors did a wonderful job. However because Mel Gibson became box-office poison as of late, all these other people had to suffer as their movie (which clearly at least thought it could gun for an Oscar push) was delayed to a limited release in late Spring. Bummer.

Of course Jennifer Lawrence is now an Oscar-nominee, played Mystique in the new X-Men flick, and will soon be Katniss in the upcoming "Hunger Games" (seriously, read it). And Anton Yelchin has already been in "Star Trek" and played Kyle Reese in the latest Terminator movie. Both actors are several years younger than I am, so they're doing just fine.

"Thor"

I'm not a huge fan of the fact that Marvel is now a freaking MOVIE STUDIO, because the over-saturation of superhero flicks is starting to wear out its welcome. However for better or worse, "Thor" is pretty fun. Chris Hemsworth is PERFECT as the pompous swaggering space-god hero, and Kenneth Branagh's Shakespearean upbringing allows him to add the perfect sense of majesty to all this weighty Asgard talk. It's probably because of him that villain Loki winds up being such an interesting character, and the relationship between him, Odin, and Thor grows and develops grandly without feeling too forced. Branagh could take it easy on the Dutch angles though...he uses them as freely as J. J. Abrams uses lens flare.

But the weirdest thing about "Thor" to me is that it felt like two separate movies forced to live together. Half the film is an epic grand weighty action movie that kicks Asgard (har har, I'm sure I'm the first to make THAT joke), and the other half is a dopey fish-out-of-water comedy with Thor on planet Earth. While it is a hoot to see Thor slamming his coffee cup and demanding "Another!" or walking into a pet shop and requesting a horse, I personally would have preferred that the whole thing took place in Asgard, because that stuff was fucking cool. But either way, I didn't entirely feel the two worlds fit together that well; it made for a very schizophrenic film.

Yet at the very least Marvel is getting (slightly) more subtle about their cross-referencing. I hated "Iron Man 2" because the entire thing just felt like a big ad for all their other movies on their slate (eventually gearing up for "The Avengers," which I think could be a huge disaster). I would much rather just see a movie about your main character and nobody else, but if Marvel doesn't want to do things this way, so be it. And when the main spook from S.H.I.E.L.D. asks, "Is this one of yours, Stark?" upon confronting the Norse version of Gort from "The Day the Earth Stood Still," his line didn't bug me as much as it should have. And the Green Arrow cameo worked fluidly within the story also.

Bottom line? Not an insta-classic superhero movie by any means, but the Asgardian poetics were gorgeous enough to be worth catching on the big screen.

"Bridesmaids"

Everybody is raving about this movie and it's doing a bang-up job at the box office, which is GREAT. The fact that a "smart" women-driven comedy can draw big numbers is wonderful, because it makes me hope that we'll see movie execs try a bit harder and not create more and more of the Kate Hudson/Sex and the City-type romantic comedies that are, frankly, so stupid as to be borderline offensive. Feminist or not, women should be insulted. The fact that this movie just works AS a comedy that happens to have an all-woman cast is (sadly) a huge step forward.

But is it really all it's cracked up to be? One of the "greatest comedies I've ever seen" said my mom (said a LOT of moms I'm sure...)? Well, no. Not really. But it's still fun.

The sad truth is that the Apatow formula is starting to wear a little thin, and I'm starting to "get" how he makes a movie now (or in this case, Paul Feig, one of his disciples from the "Freaks and Geeks" days). You cast a bunch of funny people, you have them improv scenes over and over again, you string the best takes together, and voila! Is this a bad way to make a movie? Not really, but at times I really wish I could see something actually well WRITTEN and not just well spontaneously-shouted. As the Apatow crew makes more and more of these, it's starting to show. At times you feel like scenes that "weren't funny enough" were cut out regardless of how they worked in the overall story, while other scenes were left in (or at the very least go on too long) in because they were funny, but don't really add to much else.

My hope is that "Bridesmaids" proves female-centric films can still actually BE decent films, but that we'll also see movies down the line that would also work as sharp screenwriting.

"Midnight in Paris"

I wasn't expecting to like this movie because I'm not the biggest Woody Allen fan (I've remarked before that I don't "get" Annie Hall--go ahead and lynch me). And the trailers made it look like a boring film only for the white privileged upper-class. When watching "8 1/2" with Logan once he remarked, "Is this another movie about people who have problems who don't really have problems?" Looked like the same deal here. However this film turned out be endearing in spite of itself. Owen Wilson is a far more likable "aw-shucks" kind of guy than the neurotic Woody Allen, so when he plays the typical Woody Allen role, you manage to empathize with him a much more easily.

But the biggest surprise in "Midnight in Paris" is that all the marketing has hidden a HUGE fascinating plot point from the audience. Spoilers? Let's just say "Midnight in Paris" has a heck of a lot more to do with "Back to the Future" than the previews would make you realize. Having worked in the world of film marketing for a while now, I must say this is quite a surprise...the central "hook" of the film is so fun, why would you keep that a secret? I admit it was a great surprise once I was watching the movie, but I almost didn't see this movie because it looked so boring! Whatever went on with the marketing creatives behind the scenes on this one has me curious...

Regardless, it's a sweet film. Owen Wilson is charming, Michael Sheen (I peed next to him once) is delightfully smarmy, Marion Cotillard is as sultry as always, and numerous other character actors are clearly having a field day impersonating celebrities from bygone eras with gusto (the Hemingway guy in particular was great).

Yet at the end of the day I can't shake off the feeling that the movie was a tad misogynistic (even if the girl I saw the movie with had no issues). SPOILERS! At the beginning, Owen Wilson is engaged to Rachel McAdams, who is clearly wrong for him. He starts to fall in love with Marion Cotillard (understandable), but when she doesn't share his love for the 1920s, he just drops her and moves on to ANOTHER girl he's met. The movie may talk about "true love" all over the place (it DOES take place in Paris), but don't all these girls come off as interchangeable? And while he's likable, Wilson's character is also kind of a dope. To quote Sam Weir on Freaks and Geeks, "I don't know how you get ONE girl, let alone several." Bah.

I was also a tad miffed because the central idea was one I'd had for a while (though naturally, my character would yearn to live in the 1980s), but no worries. As they say in Paris, c'est la vie!

"Kung Fu Panda 2"

The sequel to what may be Dreamworks best movie isn't that bad, but it isn't very good either. I've been trying to figure out exactly why I enjoyed this one so much less than the first, and it's honestly kind of tricky. The animation is still technically there, and it more-or-less goes through much of the same motions and the characters don't feel too inconsistent--so what happened?

The biggest problem, I think, is focusing the story on Po. Po may be the protagonist of the first film in theory, but as I've said before, the true kung fu panda of the first movie is Dustin Hoffman's Shifu, a red panda. In my mind there is no question Shifu has the more compelling character arc, and his emotional core resonates the strongest. Jack Black's Po may offer some great laughs and make me like the movie on the surface, but Shifu is the reason why I like the first film so much in my heart.

In the second movie the story centers around Po trying to figure out what happened to his parents (done in nifty 2-D flashbacks animated in...well, Flash). But at the end of the day I don't care about Po that much as a central character (plus having his father inexplicably be a goose was one of the better gags of the first movie anyway). Poor Shifu has taken the place of tortoise Oogway as the sage Yoda-like figure, which generally makes him pretty boring--he's just a stock character now. Admittedly maybe his character didn't have anywhere to go since the first film, but it's such a shame to see him stuck on the sidelines. In many ways Angelina Jolie's Tigress plays a bigger part in the sequel, but she's as uninteresting as ever--maybe they should have let Shifu take over elements of her role?

The other missing hole is the action scenes--in the first movie the humor generally came from Po not fitting in with the rest of the group. Yet when it was time for an action set piece, the sequences were dynamic and exciting...like something out of a REAL kung fu movie. Watch the bridge battle or Tai Lung's escape from prison and you'll see that the filmmakers pulled no punches. If anything, the least memorable battle in the first film is the conclusion, where Po manages to defeat Tai Lung by whomping him with his fat belly. Cute, but a bit hard to swallow.

In the second movie Po has been integrated into the Furious Five, so the "fish out of water" jokes are less easy to pull off. Instead of being "awesome" (a word that's starting to get highly overused in this franchise), the action scenes are now the thing that is played for laughs. In a rickshaw chase, Po has to stop and save a handful of baby bunnies. In an opening battle sequence, efforts are made to turn the fighting into a percussive musical sequence like something you'd see at a "Stomp" concert. Cute? I guess. Bad ass? No way. We get tastes of it when Po and the other heroes (including two new characters, Master Ox and Croc) square off against hordes and hordes of cannon wielding wolves, but at that point it's just too little, too late.

The one saving grace of the movie is that they were able to create a bad guy at least as cool as the one from the last film. Gary Oldman (always a treat!) plays Lord Shen, an albino peacock who can shoot deadly knives out of his feathers. Ian McShane's Tai Lung was great as a baddie who fought with brute force and muscle in the first movie; Lord Shen works behind the scenes with a vast wolf army, but can be just as dangerous up close--in a regal sort of way. It's a different type of lethal, and it works wonderfully.

I heard Dreamworks was hoping to do six (seriously...SIX?) of these movies, but seeing as this one didn't do that well, I hope we just have one more to go before we can put the panda to bed (this one ends on a cliffhanger, so we're probably not done QUITE yet).

"Cave of Forgotten Dreams"

As anyone who knows me well is probably aware, I'm a fairly solid Herzog fan. I'm not quite as crazy as he is, but I definitely feel like a kindred spirit to his "enter-the-wild" sensibilities and ability to still be wondrous about the world at the age of 68.

And while "Cave of Forgotten Dreams" certainly offers some fascinating visuals, I wouldn't say it's as well-made as the other documentaries of his I've seen, "Grizzly Man" and "Encounters at the End of the World." This one feels, more so than usual, like Herzog's cool home movie. Sure, he got to take 3-D cameras into these caves, but the entire time you can't shake off the feeling that Herzog is saying, "Look what I got to do! Isn't this COOL?!" rather than actually going much farther. And at times the 3-D itself is distractingly bad. While I'm sure SOME of the film is shot with the actual cameras, you can also tell that other sections are done with stereoscopic conversion--and sometimes it looks pretty terrible (keep an eye out for the sequence where they talk about the red dots).

However, what Herzog is showing us admittedly IS pretty cool. The fact that these beautiful paintings originate from the ICE AGE is quite a mindfuck when you start thinking about it. But unlike "Encounters at the End of the World," which showed a place completely unlike anything I've experienced before, I feel like I've lived much of what Herzog's seeing in "Cave of Forgotten Dreams" because of growing up with my archaeologist father. I might not have seen caves quite as cool as the ones shown here, but it's not too far a stretch.

At the end Herzog tries to bridge the gap and make some sort of odd connection about humanity's place in the universe with some neat footage of an albino alligator. It's nice, but it feels forced and doesn't really flow as beautifully as the quirky deviations from his other films (such as the hilariously poignant deranged penguin). All it really did was remind me of his goofy photography in his version of "Bad Lieutenant."

If you are fascinated by ancient cave drawings or are a Herzog fan, you'll like this one. But it's not as focused as some of his earlier docs.

"Beautiful Boy"

"Beautiful Boy" belongs on my list of well-made movies that nobody wants to see (see also, "Precious" and the review for "Blue Valentine" lower down the page). At the end of Act One, the son of the two parents shoots up his school and commits suicide. The rest of the movie chronicles how the two parents (played by Maria Bello and Michael Sheen) deal with the aftermath. The acting is very good, but it makes for a very depressing movie.

I've gotten in arguments about these sorts of movies before, because I'm of the opinion that these kind of films are often not worth making in the first place. I love a little pathos and sadness in a film, but I still want to feel somewhat uplifted when the credits roll. I don't LIKE being depressed when I leave a theater. Moved? Absolutely. Soul-crushed? No.

For example, I'm probably never going to watch "United 93" again because it was so painful. But was it worth seeing? Absolutely! It was a heroic story of the people who died stopping one of the terrorists on September 11. And Gus van Sant's "Elephant," while also a very depressing film, did wonders by showing us the beauty of day-to-day life in high school and then snatching it all away from us in the final minutes; a haunting piece of work that reminds you how precious even the little moments in life can be.

I will give it to "Beautiful Boy" that showing the perspective of a school shooting from the parents' point-of-view is certainly a new way to view things, and it reminds you that even seriously disturbed kids have families (normal families!) who love them. But did it really take us farther than that? Was it worth bumming me out for two hours, and that evening as I went to bed? Not this time.

"X-Men: First Class"

Best movie of the summer (so far)! I'm generally not a big X-Men fan, mainly because in both the comics and the movies there are simply too many characters and it's hard to know who to focus on. What this movie does so well is make it a clear character study between two opposing ideologies--Magneto's and Professor Xavier's--and the friendship that exists between them despite their differences. In the ending when Magneto walks a separate path from Xavier, he doesn't do it as a villain; we understand why he's made these choices.

It helps that the two leads are played by such charismatic actors. James McAvoy always delivers fine work, but it's Michael Fassbender who walks away with the movie as the stone cold Magneto. And most of the supporting cast does a great job as well, particularly my future wife Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique. In previous movies we've never learned much about her, but in this film she comes across as a fully formed character full of her own conflicts and issues. My only gripe is that once she ACCEPTS her blue form, I don't get to look at Jennifer Lawrence's natural beauty as much as I'd like to...sigh. I'm sure much of this balancing act is due to (mostly) exceptional direction by Matthew Vaughn, who knows how to put together a rocking action scene while still making the characters shine through (though it has it's detractors, I still love "Kick-Ass").

Also, I'm a sucker for period movies, and my favorite thing about "X-Men: First Class" was how it takes place during the 1940s and 1960s, at times reminding me of a classic James Bond film or "Inglourious Basterds" with mutants. Revisionist history--when done right--can be a blast.

But of course, I had some nit-picks. Here they are:

1) The biggest problem--Kevin Bacon's plan didn't make a heck of a lot of sense. Last I checked, you blow up a mutant with an A-bomb, they still die, right?

2) In the climax Kevin Bacon absorbs all this nuclear energy. I expected he would blow up or diffuse it somehow, but then nothing happens (though the way they take him out IS pretty cool). Isn't that what they call a Chekov's gun?

3) One of the neater mutants of the "new" group died WAY too quickly. :-(

4) January Jones' Emma Frost was AWFUL. I've already remarked how cool it was to be in a period film, yet every time she showed up on screen I was reminded that I was in a superhero movie again. Blah. Also, why include a scene where it looks like she escapes from prison, only to later show it never happened? I kept expecting her to pop up in the final battle, but she never did.

Altogether though this was a great summer flick, and probably the best superhero movie I've seen since "The Dark Knight" (admittedly not that long ago, but "The Dark Knight" was also REALLY good). I think it's the best of the X-Men movies. I know there's a lot of love out there for X-2, but I honestly felt that one was just one long commercial for X-3. And a HUGE thanks must be given to the movie for letting it be an X-Men movie and an X-Men movie ONLY. Thank goodness the X-Men are still owned by Fox, which means I don't have to see Marvel shove a bunch of cross-series references down my throat. While there may be a few fun unexpected cameos from other characters (or VERSIONS of characters) in the series, at least it's still just confined to the X-Men world. Sometimes I just like my fantasies to play in their own sandboxes, thank you very much.

OSCAR WRAP-UP

OK, finally finished with all that stuff. Here are my reviews of the remaining 2010 Oscar picks!

"The Fighter"

Pretty solid. Christian Bale was without question the best part, especially when he was jumping into that dumpster. Certainly one of the Bostoniest movies I've ever seen. Honestly, I saw it a while ago, and don't have much else to say about it.

"Blue Valentine"

Ick! Ick! Ick! Why do they make movies like this? I GUESS it's well acted. I GUESS it's shot OK (though I think I could do just as well with a 3-point lighting kit, a couple friends, and a 5D). But how despicable a film!

Basically Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams play an unhappy couple whose marriage is unraveling. In between this unfolding we intercut sequences of them meeting for the first time when they are younger and falling in love. Moral of the story? Don't ever fall in love! Love is a sham! Your marriage will ruin your life, and the lives of the ones you once loved!

You can dress it up as a "character study" all you want, but movies like this are just as pointless as some of the schlocky blockbusters pumped out by the major studios, or the countless crappy Kate Hudson-esque romantic comedies that get made every year. At least THOSE movies know their audience. As a 20-something trying to figure out all this love business, and even contemplating the idea of marriage (as an abstract concept only!), this is exactly the kind of movie I DON'T need to see. Ever. I wish I could unsee it!

"Winter's Bone"

Yup...third time I get to mention Jennifer Lawrence in this batch. Mroww!

Solid low-budget film in the Ozark mountains that really shows what it takes to survive. While it was a tad over-hyped for me, it still kept me tense and worried the entire time, and Lawrence does do a great job. Even better is veteran character actor John Hawkes, who also received an Oscar nomination. The movie certainly didn't make me want to go exploring in the Ozarks anytime soon though (and it crept into my mind during my recent adventure in the Nevada outback). Yikes.

"The Kids Are Alright"

Ugh. As I get older I tend to look forward to Oscar season more and more because a lot of the summer movies start to look the same (though I still like to think this is because the studios are getting more uncreative, not because I am getting more cynical). But even so, there is always Oscar bait that makes you roll your eyes and go, "Really?"

"The Kids Are Alright" is, honest to goodness, a terrible film. If the movie had been about a straight couple, it would have been no better than a soap opera you see on TV. But BECAUSE it's suddenly about lesbians, now it's "progressive" and an Oscar nominee? Please.

The characters are all despicable and selfish. At the very least Mark Ruffalo is well-cast, because I've always thought of him as a douchebag. Also, far too many scenes end with a character shouting "Fuck you" and storming off, as if that's an appropriate way to resolve a scene. This was up for best original screenplay? Seriously?

Let me ask you something, lesbians of the world...while it's nice to finally see movies where people "like you" are represented as the main characters, isn't it MORE insulting when that movie still is basically a trashy sitcom dressed up in liberal's clothing? They just USED lesbians to go for an Oscar push! You were USED! And I'm not even talking about the basic plotline of the story, where Julianne Moore is converted from being a lesbian because Mark Ruffalo is such a hunky dickwad.

At the very least the title of the movie turned out to be true. While I hated every adult character in this self-indulgent piece of trash, the kids (Mia Wasikowska and Josh Hutcherson) were likable and turned in fine performances. Now that these two young actors sold out for their Oscar cred, they should move on to better projects.

"Black Swan"

I avoided seeing this one for a long time because I'm not the biggest Aronofsky fan (though I've warmed up to "The Wrestler") and "Black Swan" not only looked like a pretentious movie, it looked like a pretentious movie ABOUT BALLET DANCING. Plus I've never really liked Natalie Portman all that much. No matter what she does it's hard for me to forgive how flat her deliveries were in the Star Wars prequels.

But I was surprised how much I liked "Black Swan." Movies with subjective points-of-view are always a neat treat, and watching her spiral into her mad state as she gradually transforms into an actual swan was trippy and cool. It's fun to try and figure out how much of what you are seeing is real, and how much is in the characters head. Ultimately that's the POINT of most of these movies--it doesn't usually matter too much because we are supposed to be seeing things from a skewed perspective. Movies like "Fight Club" or "Inception" are stellar for these reasons.

Because of this I wish I could give "Black Swan" an overall glowing review, but unfortunately I will say the entire film is nearly ruined by the ending (spoilers!), where it turns out that in the "imaginary" scene where she stabs Mila Kunis, she actually stabbed herself, so she dies at the end of the Swan Lake performance. Excuse me? Are we supposed to believe she was able to dance perfectly through the entire final act of this play with a shard of glass between her ribs? It certainly stretches the limits of believability, AND ruins all the fun of the earlier subjectivity by giving us such a definitive answer. Sorry goose, but those last few seconds kept this from being a golden egg.

Phew, that took a while. Y'all should also play Portal 2. Later!

* high on LIFE, Mom and Dad.