Movie Review: Tomorrowland

Movie: Tomorrowland

Directed by: Brad Bird

Starring: George Clooney, Hugh Laurie, Britt Robertson

Verdict:

Brad Bird’s aggressively optimistic Sci-fi utopia flick tries hard to dazzle with visions of a possible tomorrow, but while Raffey Cassidy’s performance as Athena simmers alongside the special effects, neither were enough to uplift the film’s horrendous pacing and tragically underwhelming plot to anywhere near its promise.

In depth:

For such an effects-heavy film, Tomorrowland was surprisingly muted in most of its previews, being more focused on building an optimistic vibe and buoyant, hopeful atmosphere, rather than on wowing the audience with special effects.  I was initially pleased with this angle, for despite my love of Blade Runner and the rest of the Cyberpunk canon, years of relentlessly bleak and nihilistic dystopian science fiction had ground me low, and while I couldn't stomach a return to the Space Age euphoria of The Jetsons and its relatives, Tomorrowland's exaltation of scientific possibilities as per the previews showed promise in filling a void left in me since Disney’s 2007 animated feature Meet the Robinsons.  Unfortunately, the previews went well beyond merely “doing justice” to the movie - they were downright disingenuous.  Like the film’s hapless protagonists, I felt duped, deceived by a glossy veneer of thoughtful utopian futurism which turned out to mask a spastic and unwieldy film, with seemingly minimal direction and only a heavy-handed “message,” delivered with all the subtlety of a back alley mugger, to greet me at the end.  

Our mournful tale centers around two decidedly different protagonists, both of whom have had their lives altered by contact with the eponymous location. We’re introduced to Frank Walker (Clooney), a bitter and cynical man who is apparently addressing an undisclosed audience about “how we got to here.”  The film throws us back to the 1964 World’s Fair, where an eleven-year-old Walker is gearing up to present his homemade “jetpack” to a very bored Hugh Laurie.  I’ll admit that this is the first - and sadly, only - hope spot in the entire film; the scenery was bright and colorful, and the quasi-philosophical exchange between the boy-genius and Laurie’s character Nix, though hurried and shallow compared to presentations in other movies, did strike at the story’s main nerve: that the invention of any dream, any idea - however fuzzy or incomplete - may spark the seeds of tomorrow’s innovations, if only by willing the heart to consider possibilities.  However, the best part of the beginning was undoubtedly the introduction of Raffey Cassidy as Athena, a young girl with a secret who takes a liking to young Frank and gives him the pin that functions as a pass to Tomorrowland - the hyper-futuristic, creative utopia where all the world’s best minds gather to make the impossible happen.  Yes, it’s true that “English little girl” is usually more than enough characterization to stand out in an American production, but in this case she actually has some meat to her.  Throughout the beginning and going the full nine yards, Cassidy was one snarky, sardonic, butt-kicking, heart string-pulling fountain after another, and the fact that she’s barely past the puberty gateway only makes her ability to meet most of the expectations placed on her all the more impressive.  Her charm and sincerity are all natural, and I wonder what her future has in store for her.

But still, it’s got to be pointed out that Cassidy’s acting chops, even allowing for her age, are only somewhat above adequate, and really only stand out because most of her castmates are sort of a let down.  While I usually enjoy Clooney in most of the films he’s in, this time he came up rather short, playing to stock the most conventional kind of curmudgeon-scorned you could possibly imagine.  However, the exemplary irritation in the acting department  resides squarely with Britt Robertson and her character Casey, the shrill and annoying magnet for most of my frustrations with Tomorrowland.  Playing opposite Clooney as the young, bright, and optimistic science enthusiast, Robertson promised to drive the film’s direction, perhaps bringing Clooney out of the dark and setting a good pace for the rest of the movie.  Unfortunately, she turned out to be a dud, a quintessential example of character shilling who, while smart, never did much more than shout and have her common sense observations called out as “brilliant.”  As with Clooney, her scenes and motivation all amounted to a big “ho-hum,” though I suspect that I probably wouldn’t have noticed as much were I fifteen years younger.  

Worse yet, her appearance coincided with where the plot takes a real nosedive...and pretty much stays at low altitude for over 90 percent of the remainder of the movie.  Story rot doesn’t even begin to cover it; everything spanning from the time she discovered the Tomorrowland pin, until she actually arrives there, was the most bloated, meandering and drawn out stretch of cinema I’ve seen in the past year.  This was supposed to be the point where the plot hits its “meat” - when we learn that not all is sunshine and sprinkles in Tomorrowland, and a contingent of creepy robots are sent to silence Casey from discovering the truth.   Unfortunately, we’re treated to a couple of robot fights, a few extended chases, and a lot of fluff and filler.  It had its moments, I admit - for example, seeing Frank Walker’s near Batman-levels of prepared ingenuity when the bad guys follow Casey to his home was good fun, and one of the best scenes in the movie.  But by and large this hour-long stretch, in an already overly-long 130-minute movie, limped on with little direction, dragging the viewer along while giving no incentive to command our attention other than a sub-adequate jigsaw plot.  Of course, piecing together the story’s “puzzle” might have been fun were there anything at the end of the road worth discovering, but alas, no; they don't even arrive in Tomorrowland until the last 30 or so minutes of the movie, after which everything resolves on the words of the villain’s rather illogical 2-minute diatribe, and not even the surprising maturity by which the movie’s message is presented could offset its heavy-handed delivery, or Tomorrowland's many failings in general.

So was there anything good in this movie?  Well, aside from Cassidy and her antics, the special effects were great, as to be expected.  They were dazzling on their own, but what really stood out was how they dovetailed into the movie’s wider theme of optimism and possibility; the effects, along with the various props accompanying them, had a very “classic” feel, almost as if they were cooked up in the mind of an imaginative ten-year-old - which, when you think about it, may have been the point.  Likewise, they weren’t splattered everywhere, giving the viewer new distractions every 3 seconds, but were used economically, mainly to punctuate how this or that event was in some way “amazing” - and to be honest, it usually worked.  Too bad that even this concession merely damns by faint praise, since the concentrated usage of special effects only highlighted the absolute barrenness of the rest of the film; the draw of flickering lights or a CGI explosion every minute has been the saving throw of many a sub-par movie, as they at least keep the adrenaline amped and the mind numb. But with no such salvation in Tomorrowland, the long desert between the first and last 20 minutes of the movie where nothing of real substance happened felt that much longer.

It’s easy to sneer at my harsh critique - to call me a tin bully, to chide me for cutting down a movie obviously meant to appeal to children.  But that all misses the point; there are many, many, many movies, for children and for adults, that push the same optimistic message of “dream big” with a grace, subtlety, or charm Tomorrowland couldn’t hope to achieve.  While it definitely contained within it the seeds of a solid, mature reconstruction of the future utopianism it tried to embody, we will have to wait another day for a film that can bring those seeds to bloom.

Grade: D

Movie Review: The Age of Adaline

Movie: Age of Adaline

Directed by: Lee Toland Cooper

Starring: Blake Lively, Harrison Ford, Michiel Huisman

Verdict:

Director Lee Toland Cooper delivers an epic romance with Age of Adaline, enlivening an often overwrought archetype with dazzling performances by Blake Lively and Harrison Ford and a good dose of heart, and in the process just barely rising above an overindulgence in romantic cliches and a barrage of implausible coincidences.

In depth:

I came into Age of Adaline not really knowing what to expect.  I knew very little about the movie right up to the premiere, and even less about its leading lady, Blake Lively.   Still, the intriguing premise promised, I thought, some similarity to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and other films of that type, so I was willing to give it a shot.  I’m glad I did, for despite some surprising shifts in focus and a few horrible choices in storytelling, Age of Adaline proved quite capable of breathing fresh life, and more than a little warmth, into a tired old genre.  Advertised as a romantic drama  with a fantasy twist, it chronicles the cross generational journey of  Adaline Bowman, a normal woman in San Francisco who had been rendered ageless in the 1930s by a freak and horribly implausible incident involving a car accident, near-frozen water, and a defibrillating bolt of lightning.  Going into any further detail - and the film’s pseudo scientific hand wave of how it happened - would surely make your head explode at the sheer nonsense of it all, but that doesn’t matter. The filmmakers aren’t going for a science fiction thriller, but rather a slow, patient exploration of still life, in which Adaline, forever forced to move around due to her “condition,” reconsiders after catching the eye of Ellis Jones (Huisman), a young and scarily persistent philanthropist determined to win her heart.  While on the surface seemingly another romance with a lame gimmick and a foundation built on sand, it works once you get past the strangeness of the scenario and truly immerse yourself in the meat of the story .

That said, the first road block to said immersion pops up right at the start, for even before the opening sequence we are treated to a virtual fountain of information diarrhea  from an unknown and unseen narrator.  This wasn’t a major irritant at first; though I generally frown upon exposition on principle unless it’s somehow built into the story, the very beginning at least  kept its focus of our lovely lead where it belonged, following her mysterious trek through downtown San Francisco, and only occasionally interrupted by the prattling of our off-center commentator.  The atmosphere builds to a muted, almost sad crescendo, and I’m left wondering how the tension would break.  This all changes, though, once we reach Adaline’s library, when the narration vomits up a full exposition of Adeline’s life, up to and including delivering the weak, quasi-fantastic explanation for how she came to be.  As far as the art of story-crafting is concerned, this isn’t just a cardinal sin - it’s a card for eternal damnation, one likely to earn you a cold seat in Satan’s bloated rear-end.  Show, Don’t Tell, is (or should be) the holy mantra of any writer, in any medium, around the world, and for good reason; with precious few exceptions, the inclusion of a Mr(s). Exposition never contributes much beyond a break in immersion and a loss in tempo.  You could argue, I suppose, that the limitations of time and the construction of the plot demanded some exposition, but not a full ten minute’s worth, and certainly not when there’s no clear link between the expositor and the story.  Indeed, the info dump seemed completely utilitarian, carrying no purpose other than to bring the moviegoer “up to speed” on Adaline’s life, and then clearing out for a huge stretch of the film in order to make way for the actual story.  This kind of thing alone can break a movie experience for me, as I subsequently spent a significant portion of my time stewing in irritation at what I'd just been put through, and the failure of the movie to provide it with context.

Fortunately, this rather shoddy choice on the part of the filmmakers wasn’t enough to completely turn me off, and Blake Lively’s shimmering performance more than made up for the major headaches at the start.  Once freed from the confines of enclosed library room for the term of her exposition,  Lively sweeps us along with her convincing portrayal of a world-weary immortal - a woman at once classy and magnetic, yet withdrawn from her surroundings and isolated from the people whom she knows she will outlive.  Some, to be sure, might see her as muted, even emotionless; I disagree - in fact, I consider Adaline to be a rather accurate portrayal of a normal person’s confrontation with agelessness.  Adaline isn’t an immortal android, nor an impassive guardian over the currents of time; she is, right down to it, a normal woman, with a grown, elderly daughter - played by a delightfully crisp and spirited Ellen Burstyn - and no greater eccentricities than a justified knack for trivia and an eye for detail born of experience.  While the tortuous exposition does give a nob to the obligatory “government men” pursuing Adaline for what we can only guess were nefarious purposes, the film thankfully does not dwell on this, setting The Age of Adaline apart from the other films in this unique genre.  More than anything, Blake Lively gives Adaline a touch of sadness which radiates throughout the rest of the movie, lending real emotional torque in a genre so often obsessed with the more cerebral ramifications of eternal life, and she pulls it off commandingly.

Besides Lively and her reserved yet powerful performance, the rest of the cast also take their fair share of the accolades (and blame) for the film’s power.  I hate to admit that Michiel Huisman did very little in his role as Adaline’s love interest; as a character he is the most shallow and conventional of the lot, and frankly, his behavior - constantly following Adaline, “randomly” running into her home since “she won’t return his calls” - would likely lead to a restraining order in real life, or any other context for that matter.  He lives solely as a means to spur Adaline’s out of her 70-year emotional lethargy, and while he serves admirably to that end, I’ve never been fond of characters being used as props for a screenwriter’s idea.  Far more interesting is Harrison Ford as Ellis’ father, a thoughtful yet hard-nosed man with a connection to Adaline’s past.  It was pure joy to see Ford in such a melancholy and contemplative role, adding to the film’s snug atmosphere and playing counterpoint to Adaline regarding the struggle to move on in life. I won’t divulge the details of his link to her (FYI: you’ll probably see it coming a mile away) but suffice it to say that Ford’s soulful portrayal of a man who, while not clinging to an unattainable past and appreciative of his present, still wonders “what might have been,” is a believable and pleasant contrast to both Lively's willful detachment and Huisman’s stock characterization.  

Unfortunately, the movie’s pacing, which up to this point had been painless and rather well-oiled, begins to lag as the sad and heartfelt examination of a life unlived and the redemptive power of love decays into tacky melodrama that nearly implodes on itself in the home stretch.  In fact, the entirety of last third or so of the movie was almost a complete bust between the melodrama, a series of mounting and irritating coincidences, and the return of the verbose exposition to explain exactly what was happening in the plot.  It’s hard to tell which of these sins is the most damning, but the coincidences hit particularly hard, as they both compounded and highlighted the very poor storytelling choices, impacting enjoyment and even the suspension of disbelief.  While it’s alright to use a technical contingency from time to time to get your characters in trouble, over using unlikely or rare occurrences simply to move your plot along - by revealing an identifying scar on Adaline’s hand, for example, or outright recreating the event of her initial, one-in-a-million accident in order to dissolve the story’s central conflict - is sloppy to an unforgivable degree, and like the use and misuse of exposition (which by this point was so out-of-place it was actually hilarious) should have been apparent to the filmmakers from the word go.  As a result, I found myself cringing yet again at the silliness of the whole thing, which is never a good point on which to leave a heartfelt romance.

My judgement, unminced and seemingly harsh as it is, should not be taken as a condemnation of the film as a whole.  I enjoyed Adaline on a personal level, and it left me with more food for thought than I expected.  For a plot bearing so close a family resemblance to cerebral heavyweights like Benjamin Button and A.I., it puts a much-needed focus on the emotional impact such a lifestyle would have an an ordinary woman, one merely wanting to love and be loved.  In fact, I would go so far as to say that The Age of Adeline is the complimentary “heart” to the aforementioned films' “head,” with a nice enough romance and an expected but well executed message on the importance of simply living, regardless of what life's put you through.  It’s just too bad that it’s relatively few flaws are so glaring and boneheaded as to nearly bring down the feel of the whole film.  I guess only time will tell if Adeline will be recalled fondly in the future, or left buried in the sands of time.

Rating: C

Manga review: Koharu no Hibi

(WARNING:  This review/analysis contains spoilers.  You have been warned)

Koharu no Hibi

Created by: OOSHIRO Youkou

Completed: 2012

Boredom can sometimes sprout into a pleasant serendipity.  I discovered this little gem over the weekend when my life raised objections to my desires to see, well, any movie I wanted, really.  Errands, car troubles, family visits, and general burnout put a beating on me for just about three weeks straight.  So in response, I hit the Internet, not searching for anything in particular - perhaps just my next review - when somehow, someway, I landed before this: Koharu no Hibi, what promised to be a highly unconventional romance.

Plot Synopsis

Torii Akira (your typical Ordinary High School Student protagonist) was heading home on the subway when he suddenly catches a young underclassman as she tripped.  He helped her with her books - to her profuse gratitude - and promptly went home, thinking nothing more of it.  The next day, said underclassman - a small, impossibly adorable girl named Mutsuki Koharu - was waiting for him by the school gate.  She continues to lavish praise and attention on him, to which he’s initially quite pleased...until he catches her after school having an intimate, spit-swapping make-out session - with his flute.  While he’s understandably freaked out, his abnormal admirer seems fully unperturbed; in fact, she uses this awkward moment as an opportunity to confess her feelings...all while Akira’s backed against the class wall with the look of a bleeding seal facing down a Great White.  Unfortunately, what should be an easy “No Deal!” for any normal guy gets complicated by Akira’s confusion/curiosity, and the meddling of Natsuki, a childhood friend who is hell bent on hooking the two of them up.  And so begins Akira’s long and troubling courtship with a most unusual - and enthusiastic - devotee.

Story

This manga is quite the strange egg, I must admit; much like its leading lady, you’re never quite sure how you’re supposed to feel, and often find yourself surprised even when you know, deep down, you shouldn’t be.  While in the end  there’s nothing exceptionally groundbreaking going on here, you get the feeling very early on that you’re reading something quite unlike both your typical rom-com manga, and your typical “crazy-stalker-girl-with-obsessive-crush” manga.  (Don’t believe that’s an expansive genre?  Scour the backwaters of the anime/manga torrent - trust me, it’ll leave you enlightened and terrified.)  The first half is mainly devoted to building on this odd couple’s “relationship,” which relies heavily on the likability of its two leads and the masochistic push and pull that binds them.  Akira is fairly typical as your romantic “hero” in this setting - not much in the way of back story, and his personality pretty much surmounts to “spastic reaction” to Koharu’s craziness.  Still, he’s likable enough, and has a bit more fire than you’d expect; I got a sick little thrill seeing him doll out the physical punishment to other characters, rather than the other way around as is the usual case.  But honestly, we’re not here for him; his purpose is to serve as audience proxy for the antics of the titular character, who is the real star of the show.  Koharu blends sweetness and an unshakable devotion to Akira, with a bizarre and downright creepy thought process that’s eerily close to how stalkers actually think.  She seems so oblivious to how her actions come across to others that it makes you wonder if there’s a real-life psychological condition underlying her obsessive behavior, which ranges from the mildly strange to beyond creepy.  This whole setup works because, unlike most protagonists in similar manga, Akira is aware of how totally not alright any of this is.  Whenever Koharu does something over the top - like making a bento lunch and informing him that she stuffed it full of her “love,” or trying to glue their hands together so as to make a special moment during a date last forever - Akira freaks out as any normal person would, and his fear is played completely straight.  Yet he, like us, keeps getting back up for another round - drawn in, perhaps, by curiosity, but more so (I suspect) by a sense of social duty; you get the feeling he’s doing society at large a favor by being the lightning rod for this wacko’s affections.  It’s all so hilariously creepy that you immediately feel bad the moment you catch yourself laughing out loud - which, for me at least, was more often than I’d care to admit.

Of course, the story does have its weaknesses; the rest of the cast, for instance, had little more than wire-frame personalities at best.  And while the second half of the series starts off with a bang by introducing Mika, another childhood friend of Akira’s/rival for his affection who eventually kicks Koharu’s previously mild displays of insanity into truly troubling depths, this particular storyline ends up going nowhere special.  While Mika herself is a fun, pleasant little addition, almost immediately deconstructing Koharu’s inane thinking behind her “love” at first sight, and steering the story towards what appeared to be a tense and nail-biting climax, the arc in which she appeared came to an astoundingly lame conclusion, one that smacked of an oddly enforced status quo.  It’s almost as if the mangaka ran out of steam or ideas towards the end, and while the last 5 or so chapters were no less enjoyable than, say, the ones in the first half, after the tense high point just a few chapters earlier, the manga ended in a tragically anticlimactic fashion.  Rating: 8/10

Art

While Koharu no Hibi’s story is fresh and interesting, its artwork is really nothing to write home about.  Much of the generic manga flare and techniques are on full display here, which to its credit grants it no disservice, but the only thing of note really is Koharu herself, whose huge, round eyes blotted with crystalline detail raise her a notch above the "generic cuteness" scale.  It’s a wonder what OOSHIRO Youkou accomplished with just her eyes alone; while her expressions generally don’t vary much over the course of the manga, watching her eyes lose their prismatic sheen and either dull out of unhappiness, or sharpen to monochromic intensity in the presence of Mika, opened a clear window to her disturbed psyche, and can be quite unsettling at the right moments.  Unfortunately, the remaining cast (skeletal as it is) share Koharu’s muted emotions, but possessed no vehicle to express them with; Akira, Natsuki, and even Mika are all generic and plain-looking, like they were pulled from a big list of manga visual archetypes with little or no embellishment, and in all honesty, Koharu sticks out like a sore, psychotic thumb whenever she's with them as a result.   Rather, OOSHIRO Youkou’s strength is in his reactions and emotion shots.  As mentioned above, most of this manga’s unsettling humor draws from Akira’s responses to Koharu’s craziness, and if the fear wasn’t written so vividly on his face whenever she had him cornered, it wouldn’t have been nearly as effective.  Mika really takes the cake and runs with it, though; she’s the only one besides Akira who sees Koharu for the disturbing nutcase she is, and the culmination of their conflict - which to me is the climax of the story, rest of the manga be damned - leaves Mika believably horrified when Koharu...well, you just have to read it to really understand.  Still, much like the story itself, the artwork slides into decay for the last few chapters, which is a sure sign yet again that the creator really let things go towards the end.  Rating: 6/10

Despite some last minute laziness, this short little series was fun, funny, and leaves you with quite a bit food for thought, if you’re willing to “go there” with its uncommon interpretation of a wacky yandere plot.  Total: 14/20 = C+

April 2015 Releases

April Releases 

You know what time it is.  April promises to be an exciting month with a ton of great stuff coming out all across the board, though as expected the TV side of things is a little dry:

Movies

http://www.movieinsider.com/movies/april/2015/

Games

http://www.ign.com/games/upcoming?time=1m

Books

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/u/books-coming-soon/379003626/

Television

http://www.tvguide.com/special/winter-preview/calendar/

See you all at the movies!

Criticism Concepts: Part 1: Emotion and Reaction

(This is the first part in a planned series on the constriction of a critique, and the criticism enterprise in general)

Critics get a bad rap, which is a little odd when you consider how we all place ourselves in the critic’s booth at one time or another. Amazon, Youtube, and just about every video game site is loaded with reviews of all kinds and of varying quality - from short, one-sentence diatribes, to extended essays damning or eulogizing a particular work in question.  What, if anything, does this constant stream of amateur expression have in common with the supposedly refined and impartial writings of a professional critic?  What ties reviews of all sorts under the single heading of “critique”?  Or does such a unity in fact even exist?

Let’s try to put these questions to a process, shall we?  Imagine this: you are sitting at home after a long day of work, trying to unwind while clicking through a seemingly endless series of cable channels. Suddenly, your eyes light up as you land on a movie some friend of a friend of a coworker mentioned a while back.  Curious and with nothing else pressing, you decide to have a looksie.  An hour and a half flies by, and the movie closes, leaving you feeling...

Now here is the critical point.  How, exactly, do you feel by the end of it?   Elated for the good fortune to have stumbled across such a masterpiece?  Angry for the 90 minutes now lost that can never be recovered?  Or, perhaps, simply bored, neither hot nor cold, and ready to embark on yet another quest for a moment’s distraction?  The specific emotion matters less than the act of feeling itself, for this is the initial spark, the impetus that could propel you towards crafting a developed critique, should you prove willing.

Unfortunately, this is where the process usually ends for many would-be critics. One has only to scan a few web comments to notice that most “reviews” amount to little more than a base emotional reaction thrown around with little forethought or reflection.  This can sometimes be harder to spot than you’d think, since so much of it is cloaked in flowery or rigorous-sounding words. In fact, for the more cynical among us, this may be all that criticism amounts to - high-falutin words meant to conceal a single and simple binary: “This rocks!” or “This sucks!”

So how do we move beyond that?  Or are the cynics right in declaring that there is no point beyond where our personal feelings of like or dislike take us?

I find this line of thinking completely unacceptable.  

I'll admit that there is a certain appeal in saying “Everything is relative, so think what you want!”  But most of us don’t buy that line when it comes to a deeply held conviction, like religion or politics.  Even a commitment to the belief that “you shouldn't judge the beliefs of others” requires...well, a commitment, and if you won’t commit to something you think is The Truth, than what’s the point?  And I have encountered very few good arguments that in any way spell out how the Arts differ from any other topic of note.  Aesthetics - the branch of philosophy dealing with the the nature of beauty and artistic taste - has many thousands of years of dedicated pursuit of an objective criterion of “art” under its belt, and the insight from its many champions are well worth a gander if you have the interest.  That said, most people - critics or not - have neither the time nor the patience to digest dense tomes tackling (or attempting to, anyway) the definition of art, the gendered hierarchy of criticism, or the applicability of “sublime” to any piece worthy of critiquing.  Furthermore, the pronouncements of these great minds, profound as they are, feel as though they are missing something very basic - namely, feeling itself.  Emotion was always something of a blind spot at the heart of philosophy, even aesthetics, and to many looking in from the outside, philosophers lose sight of the basic joy of experience in the process of formulating their arcane theories.  I’ll have a lot more to say on the great range and enormous depth of aesthetics later, but suffice it to say that the public perception that most philosophy is “all head and no heart” isn't far off the mark.

So it seems that we have come full circle.  While I don’t believe that emotional reactions are the be-all and end-all of a good critique, they shouldn't be completely cut from the process either.  So where does that leave us?  If emotion is the “spark” of the critiquing process, where lies the tinder?  While your gut feelings and immediate emotional reactions should not - indeed, cannot - be stifled, one should still hold them at a comfortable distance, letting them settle to the bottom while you sift through the sediments with a relatively clear mind.  Once the initially tight wad of charged emotions unwinds into something beyond “It sucked” and “It rocked,” an intelligible reader response forms: “outrage” becomes “disappointed at the unresolved plot threads in the ending”; “joy” becomes “good chemistry between the two lead that end on a high note”; and so on.  It isn't quite a critique, not yet, but it’s certainly a step in the right direction.  With a little clarity towards why you responded the way you did, you can move beyond crude rocks/sucks binaries and embrace a more complex - and dare I say, more accurate - picture of your 90-minute distraction.

If anyone has anything else to share, feel free to post below.

See you at the movies!

Movie Review: Focus

Movie: Focus

Directed By: Glenn Ficarra and John Requa

Starring: Will Smith, Margot Robbie, Rodrigo Santora

Verdict:

While Smith is hardly breaking new ground with this latest performance, the easy likability of the main cast and cheeky self-awareness shines through in a film otherwise bogged down by a bizarre romantic plot, an unfortunate love affair with too many so-called “twists,” and a complete lack of “focus” on what it wants to be.

In-depth:

I must admit that  I was looking forward to seeing Focus when I first heard about it - not only because I had already made up my mind to make it my inaugural viewing at the wonderful Starlight Drive In, but because I was giddy with anticipation on seeing Will Smith depart from the generic "nice guy with silly quirk” hole that has more or less defined his movie career since Men In Black.  The story seemed promising: Smith plays con artist extraordinaire Nicky Spurgeon, whose latest “job” gets complicated when Jess Barrett (Margot Robbie), a former pupil-turned-lover, steps back into the picture after he left her cold three years earlier.  On paper, this sounded intriguing; while con/caper movies are a dime a dozen, and I still cringe at the mention of Now You See Me even after two years, it struck me as so contrary to what I’d expect from the Will Smith Toolbox that I was more than willing to give it a go.  

I’ve only seen a few TV spots, and none of the trailers, though I figured that it wouldn’t affect my perception of what I was going to see.  Boy was I wrong, for no sooner had the first 20 minutes passed that the movie pulled its biggest (and best) plot twist: it was actually a romantic comedy disguised as a heist thriller.  Granted, those first 20 minutes gave me a good ride, brief as they were.  Say what you want about Smith’s lack of movie diversity, but he certainly plays “disarming charm” with the best of them, and Robbie approaches her role with a sincere and refreshing geekiness quite unlike the now-standard Too-Hip Chick personas in most modern caper flicks. Of course, this was also the first sign that I was watching something very unlike what I was initially expecting.  The pair’s first sustained dialogue scene, in which the experienced con gives his would-be apprentice a crash course on misdirection, was cute - so cute, in fact, that you knew almost immediately where their relationship was heading, even if you came into it with very little prior knowledge like me.  And, like me, this realization in all likelihood induced a gag reflex on first blush, considering the 22-year difference in age between the two actors.  Still, their chemistry as student and pupil, and then boss and employee after she officially joins his den of thieves, was convincing and genuine, and would have kept me happy had it remained at that level throughout the entire production.

It was when the relationship turned romantic that everything went downhill.  The bitter aftertaste of this hookup was not, as in other romantic comedies, solely a function of the compatibility (or lack there of) of the leading pair; in fact, the continued chemistry and playful back-and-forth between Smith and Robbie was the only consistently enjoyable thread throughout the first half of the film.  Rather, the problem lies in just how out-of-place it seems in a movie still trying to masquerade as a caper flick, even after its true colors are revealed.  Despite the massive set up for their relationship, Focus had trouble keeping, well, focus, on Smith and Robbie, and frequently digressed into the long and honestly inconsequential flashback sequences/voice over expositions so commonplace in most modern heist movies.  One especially glaring example happened not long after Nicky and Jess’ initial hook up; I’ll spare the details since that would ruin the “surprise” factor, but it occupied a good ten minutes of screen time and ultimately served no purpose for either the development of their romance or the advancement of the plot.  It didn’t even have the courtesy to show up later ala Chekhov's Gun to explain on overlooked piece of the story cleverly concealed until that very moment.  I can’t pin down why Ficarra and Requa bothered to add it in the first place, since while it was fun to watch - and was the only point in the movie Smith deviated ever-so-slightly away from the “Nice Guy” mold - it was so unnecessary that I couldn't help but feel a little cheated at the end of it.

Despite that, most of the standard heist tropes and devices following this scene were more tolerable, since they highlighted the film’s playful self-awareness.  It was as if the directors knew that the jig was up, so throughout the movie’s second half  - set three years later in Argentina - the con caper aspects were played with as the romantic comedy core unfurled.  Whereas before the exposition scenes were played horribly straight, now there is a slight sense of mocking, putting a stamp on how ridiculous the whole thing was is.  There was one point when Nicky, after dropping what seemed like  the mother of all flashbacks, is left reeling when Jess reveals that nearly everything she told me about herself and why she was in Argentina was comically off the mark.  This was a refreshing contrast to Now You See Me, which had a similar obsession with verbose exposition but possessed neither Focus’ delightful cast, not its ability to treat its accumulated film baggage with a sense of humor.  Adding to the near parody was the timely inclusion of Gerald McRaney to the roster as Owens, the uptight head of security for Rafael Garriga, billionaire motor team owner and Nicky’s latest contract.  McRaney brings a colorful interpretation to a tired old stock, as likely to lecture Nicky on his work ethic and the quality of his acting as he is to threaten him into keeping up his end of the bargain with Garriga.  He’s a walking reminder that we’re not supposed to take the caper elements of the movie too seriously, and it’s all the better for it.

Unfortunately, not even McRaney could save the movie’s tired romantic plot, which by the end was a vestigial appendage bloated near the point of bursting.  Despite being what the movie is supposedly “about,” the romantic subplot had long lost what little potency and charm it had, even though, paradoxically, Smith and Robbie in and of themselves did not.  I blame the stockpile of contrivances and “turns” accumulated by the end, for despite the welcomed switch to gentle parody, they still muddled the movie’s genre, and hence, its focus.  As I mentioned in my review of The Interview, it is crucial that a movie commits to one particular representation of its own making; while the ability to wear multiple genre hats is admirable if pulled off successfully, you're much more likely to stumble over yourself and fall short in delivery in any direction, and that’s exactly what happened in Focus.  By the end, the natural chemistry between Smith and Robbie that somehow persisted despite the disturbing age difference came to nothing memorable, and even the amusement provided by the playful plot twists and flashback scenes had run dry.  When the end launched one last “shocking” salvo at the audience, I was past the point of caring, ready to drive off from what I knew would prove to be yet another cute, but completely forgettable film.

Grade C

March 2015 Releases and Premieres

March Releases 

 

Well, it's that time again, and March is underway with some impressive debuts.  Here's what's going on this month:

 Movies

http://www.movieinsider.com/movies/march/2015/ 

Games

http://www.ign.com/games/upcoming?time=1m 

Books

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/u/books-coming-soon/379003626/ 

Television

http://www.tvguide.com/special/winter-preview/calendar/ 

See you all at the movies!