Movie Reviews

Seldom does a Hollywood heavyweight depart the scene with less pomp and more circumstance than did Paul Newman last week when he succumbed to cancer at age 83. The blue-eyed heart-throb of the 50s and 60s was an instant hit and became a mega star who extended a smoldering rebel personna career throughout a half century of memorable film performances. Starring vehicles such as "Hud", "Cool Hand Luke", "The Verdict", "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid", "Somebody Up There Likes Me", "The Hustler", "Sweet Bird of Youth" and "Long Hot Summer" will delight movie goers for decades to come. His elderly turn as a mob kingpin in 2002's "Road to Perdition" was a fitting bow to a storied career that ranked him alongside film legends John Wayne and James Stewart. And, like them, he was able to disassociate his spectacular career from his private life.

Watching a new Clint Eastwood movie is like listening to an old record for the first time – you expect it to be great, partly because of the pedigree, and partly because it’s withstood the test of time. And indeed what you get is a classically mastered artistic output, laced with grandeur and an aura of importance. But being “classic” unfortunately does not necessarily translate into “great.” Sure, there will be good qualities – the artist/art is classic for a reason. It certainly isn’t guaranteed to live up to your expectations.
Such is the case with Eastwood’s latest Oscar bid, Changeling. Graced with a seasoned, studied hand and emotionally arresting story material, Changeling is sensational in concept but middling in execution. It LOOKS great, of course, and it presents itself as nothing short of masterful. And anyone not made of stone will surely fall victim to the emotional pits and falls of a mother battling police corruption and oppression in a quest for the safe return of her kidnapped son.

Pride and Glory isn’t really anything to be proud of and definitely isn’t glorious. Like last year’s We Own the Night, it’s a NYC police drama about a family full of cops dirtying in the muck tracked in by the familial black sheep. Only whereas Night emphasized an organic narrative sense, Pride emphasizes fractured grit. Whereas Night danced along on sleek camerawork and directorial knowhow, Pride is clumsy and amateurish. And whereas Night was flawed but occasionally gripping, Pride is really just flawed.
But of course it is. It’s suffered numerous set backs, release date changes and festival booings. It stars a Box Office-allergic Colin Farrell rocking a poorly masked Irish accent, while playing a New York native (I like this guy, I really do…but he’s pretty much a curse at this point). And the final draft was rewritten by Joe Carnahan (Smokin’ Aces), a writer/director who seems just about as overrated as anybody can be.

George W. Bush is a lot of things to a lot of people, but rarely is he viewed as a celebrity. In actuality, he may be more that than anything else…or at least that’s the theory posited by director Oliver Stone and the folks behind W. Whereas previous White House based flicks from Stone center on particular events or crises (Watergate, The Bay of Pigs), W. only loosely weaves in an out of our President’s decision to invade Iraq and instead largely concentrates on his long, bumpy road to being the man that would make such a decision. It’s a lot of ground to cover, and the film covers what it can, but essentially adds up to nothing more than well-packaged, well-presented cliff notes.
But that isn’t really very surprising. What’s really surprising is that the film generally comes across with little to no political agenda. Bush is portrayed as both dimwitted and intelligent, sympathetic and spoiled. He’s never really presented as a competent president, but he’s also never seen as anything really horrible – at worst, he’s a man (perhaps too easily) led astray. All in all, however, Stone looks to portray an evenly unbiased and insightful picture.

Body of Lies

As far as next wave geo-politcal thrillers go, Body of Lies is standard theatrical entertainment. It traverses territories in Jordan and Iraq, wields over-zealous government official and stereotypical evil Islams, and sails through the twists and turns of a structural roller coaster ride. All the while it fails to challenge anything within you – like so many of its brethren, this film is passably entertaining but generically forgettable.
Directed by Ridley Scott and written by The Departed’s foul mouthed scribe William Monahan, Body of Lies aims for deception as an art form but settles for trickery as a cliché. Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Special Agent Ferris, a dedicated field op who’s lost his wife and sense of normalcy to a life abroad. He’s the street team for Russell Crowe’s bureaucratic Ed Hoffman, a man who treats the war on terror like fantasy football. He does the research, makes the calls, subs his players and watches the game, but he’s never REALLY a part of it. He’s involved, yet detached. And Ferris resents him for it.

The air is crisper. The mornings are darker. The leaves are cluttering the long. And as we embrace these changes as shift towards a cozier Holiday season, so to must we embrace Hollywood’s annual shift from summer fun to fall quality. Each year it never fails – the “serious” films of “artistic integrity” are backloaded to these final few months before the awards season, replacing the innocently fun and intentionally stupid with the occasionally existentially stupid. Here’s a list of buzz-gathering films to look forward to this season.
Appaloosa – Directed by Ed Harris, written by Ed Harris, and starring Ed Harris, this western revival is just screaming for an Oscar (the last Ed Harris-helmed film was the award winning Pollock). Riding sadle-by-sadle with Vigo Mortenson as law men looking to clear out tough-guy Jeremy Irons, Harris will look to clear out the Oscars as well. And as an added bonus, the movie’s supposed to be quite good.

Eagle Eye is about as implausible, circumstantial, unoriginal and unbelievable as a film comes, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t fun. Like the last collaboration between director DJ Caruso and star Shia LaBeouf (last year’s equally questionable yet entertaining Disturbia), it’s heavily influenced by (aka borrows a lot from) previous films, this time siphoning from the likes of War Games and Enemy of the State. It tiptoes the line separating “familiar” from “derivative,” using its desire for popcorn entertainment glory like a balancing pole.
Still, there are moments in this film when none of this actually matters, when the goal of blockbuster entertainment is accomplished with such rip-roaring authority that it’s darn near impossible to drift away with thoughts of implausibility.

Remember the early 1990s, when the political thriller was the go to video store rental? The Jack Ryan flicks, the White House conspiracy theories, the urgent threats to the presidency – these flicks hypothesized and capitalized on a fear of a threat too close to home, on the idea of faceless, accent-less “outsiders” infiltrating our American kingdom. Maybe the bad guys haven’t really changed much, but Hollywood’s approach to the political thriller has.

The Movie Gal hated this movie. She thought it was boring, gross, occasionally funny, but mostly just boring and gross. Why? Because Tropic Thunder is designed to be the ultimate dude movie. It’s filled with explosions, guts, and boy humor. It offers nothing resembling a romantic storyline or heartfelt gravitas. It is loud, obnoxious, sometimes disturbing, often hilarious. Like Pineapple Express, it aims for action/comedy hybrid entertainment and succeeds, but when it hits, it hits harder and funnier than that film and most others. This is good, shockingly smart, masculine fun. But it darn sure isn’t for everybody.

The stoner comedy is a peculiar cinematic creature. It’s popular enough to set Box Office records on a Wednesday in August, but it doesn’t have the broad, everyman appeal to win the number one spot in its debut weekend. From Cheech and Chong to Kumar and the like, these flicks have a way of seeping into the cracks of our popular culture, but never commandeering it, changing it, or really ever mattering to it. Like the slackers they portray, these flicks just wanna do their thing, stay out of your way and have a good time.
Pineapple Express, to both its credit and its demerit, wants more. It aims to spearhead a movement toward outrageous action comedies, to up the Lethal Weapon antics to outrageous proportions. It wants artistic credibility, and holsters indie-minded director David Gordon Green as its secret weapon. It desires to further strengthen the Apatow brand with pinnacle, R-rated, repeat viewing success…to be the next Superbad…to be classic. It wants everything, and it wants to get it easily. And that’s why this Express derails.