Anomalisa review
3 ½ (out of 4)
While Inside Out seemed to advance the true potential of modern animated cinema this past summer, Anomalisa arrives to push the expressive possibilities of the field even further.
Charlie Kaufman, gifted screenwriter of great films like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Adaptation., executed his intricate directorial debut Synecdoche, New York back in 2008, and his latest creation is the result of a play he wrote back in 2005.
Michael Stone (the gravelly British voice of David Thewlis), an aging author on the subject of customer service, departs for a convention in Cincinnati to speak on his latest book. We witness Michael’s social disconnect and self-diagnosed "psychological problems" over this weekend excursion. Michael has a consistent perspective wherein every other person possesses the same unspecific face and clean robotic voice (Tom Noonan).
In perfect casting, Noonan’s soothing yet unsettling vocal presence fills out the film’s background with a satirical, and at times ominous, aura. This key aspect of the film can be taken as a representation Michael’s possibly deteriorating mental health or for metaphorical weight, and while both are true I find the latter more important. The implication of living in a world of nearly infinite strangers is the gloomy backbone of the film.
After his uncomfortable yet hilarious interactions with various service industry employees, an irony the film does well to understate, Michael attempts a reconnection with an ex, Bella, whom he has lately obsessed. His tact fails him and it ends in anger, but he is soon brought out of his loneliness back at his hotel. Overhearing Lisa (voiced affectionately by Jennifer Jason Leigh) somehow punctures through his isolation, and he is captivated by her unique face and voice, despite her general lack of self-esteem and unglamorous persona. She is the only secondary character in the film free of anonymity.
Kaufman’s weary existentialism and delicate sense of the surreal have given his works powerful resonance and distinctiveness in the past, and Anomalisa is no exception. The film’s slightness in scope, narrative and setting is perhaps the film’s only flaw, yet it is the crux of all of its virtues.
Beyond the compact story and premise, the animation does plenty to highlight the minimalism at the heart of Anomalisa. With characters created from 3D printers and a very real world setting, the film feels visually sparse; the stop motion photography fosters the homespun, unfussy atmosphere. The animation in general appears to have been a choice for the sake of the story, expressing the film’s obvious subtext of solitude, and the way we idealize others, by means live action could not achieve. Furthermore it shatters previous popular ideas of animation with a well-earned R-rating showcasing less savory language, as well as sex and nudity, with steadfast candor.
Above all Kaufman, alongside small-time director Duke Johnson, has formulated another melancholy yet remarkably insightful film, wringing out potent emotional truths about romance from all sides through the brief anomaly that is Michael’s encounter with Lisa. Anomalisa is also very funny and laced with moments of rich, thoughtful philosophical musings.
And for all the painstaking trials of stop-motion animation, the intentions are clearly focused more on its mature subject and themes. Anomalisa finds Kaufman in a typically self-reflexive state, investigating his own eccentric genius while appealing to universal truths, and moreover in top form.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / January 25th, 2016
While Inside Out seemed to advance the true potential of modern animated cinema this past summer, Anomalisa arrives to push the expressive possibilities of the field even further.
Charlie Kaufman, gifted screenwriter of great films like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Adaptation., executed his intricate directorial debut Synecdoche, New York back in 2008, and his latest creation is the result of a play he wrote back in 2005.
Michael Stone (the gravelly British voice of David Thewlis), an aging author on the subject of customer service, departs for a convention in Cincinnati to speak on his latest book. We witness Michael’s social disconnect and self-diagnosed "psychological problems" over this weekend excursion. Michael has a consistent perspective wherein every other person possesses the same unspecific face and clean robotic voice (Tom Noonan).
In perfect casting, Noonan’s soothing yet unsettling vocal presence fills out the film’s background with a satirical, and at times ominous, aura. This key aspect of the film can be taken as a representation Michael’s possibly deteriorating mental health or for metaphorical weight, and while both are true I find the latter more important. The implication of living in a world of nearly infinite strangers is the gloomy backbone of the film.
After his uncomfortable yet hilarious interactions with various service industry employees, an irony the film does well to understate, Michael attempts a reconnection with an ex, Bella, whom he has lately obsessed. His tact fails him and it ends in anger, but he is soon brought out of his loneliness back at his hotel. Overhearing Lisa (voiced affectionately by Jennifer Jason Leigh) somehow punctures through his isolation, and he is captivated by her unique face and voice, despite her general lack of self-esteem and unglamorous persona. She is the only secondary character in the film free of anonymity.
Kaufman’s weary existentialism and delicate sense of the surreal have given his works powerful resonance and distinctiveness in the past, and Anomalisa is no exception. The film’s slightness in scope, narrative and setting is perhaps the film’s only flaw, yet it is the crux of all of its virtues.
Beyond the compact story and premise, the animation does plenty to highlight the minimalism at the heart of Anomalisa. With characters created from 3D printers and a very real world setting, the film feels visually sparse; the stop motion photography fosters the homespun, unfussy atmosphere. The animation in general appears to have been a choice for the sake of the story, expressing the film’s obvious subtext of solitude, and the way we idealize others, by means live action could not achieve. Furthermore it shatters previous popular ideas of animation with a well-earned R-rating showcasing less savory language, as well as sex and nudity, with steadfast candor.
Above all Kaufman, alongside small-time director Duke Johnson, has formulated another melancholy yet remarkably insightful film, wringing out potent emotional truths about romance from all sides through the brief anomaly that is Michael’s encounter with Lisa. Anomalisa is also very funny and laced with moments of rich, thoughtful philosophical musings.
And for all the painstaking trials of stop-motion animation, the intentions are clearly focused more on its mature subject and themes. Anomalisa finds Kaufman in a typically self-reflexive state, investigating his own eccentric genius while appealing to universal truths, and moreover in top form.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / January 25th, 2016
The Hateful Eight review
2 ½ (out of 4)
Tarantino, so often acclaimed for his tendencies for diversion, finds himself in a state of falling into a self-created cliché of himself in The Hateful Eight. His latest film’s whopping three-hour runtime is populated with precisely what you’d expect from the eccentric filmmaker — shock violence, rambling dialogue and hilarity via overt self-awareness. By typical standards, his new Western is gleefully entertaining, a sprawling if disjointed pleasure. And although stacked with moments of Tarantino’s idiosyncratic genius, the film is underwhelming relative to his standard and a thoroughly, numbingly pointless project.
As much as I respect Tarantino’s passion in shooting The Hateful Eight in 70mm format as a daring filmmaking choice and a way to call back to antiquated movie-going traditions, this choice almost feels like a counterbalance to the film’s simple and unfulfilled premise.
Though it appears to be a box film, it takes nearly an hour before our important players are together under one roof. John Ruth (Kurt Russell) is on his way to the town of Red Rock to hang his prisoner Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh). The film opens as comes across Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson), a fellow bounty hunter and later Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins), who claims to be the new sheriff of Red Rock. Their stagecoach arrives just in time to Minnie’s Haberdashery in order to take shelter from an approaching blizzard. The crew of strangers encounter more upon arrival — the refined Englishman Oswaldo Mobray (Tim Roth), the soft-spoken Joe Cage (Michael Madsen), the elderly Sanford Smithers (Bruce Dern) and Bob (Demián Bichir) a Mexican who claims to be taking over for the temporarily absent Minnie. Distrust and the imminence of bloodshed then turn the wheels of Tarantino’s latest concoction.
Tarantino is so comfortable in the craft of dialogue and molding conversations that almost surgically mount tension and facilitate oft amusing and memorable character interactions. While The Hateful Eight is humorous enough to be considered a comedy, his ability to provide a unique brand of visceral thrills through discourse has been somewhat sapped from this film. The paranoia, mystery and anticipation of the film’s first half left me intoxicated with the possibilities for how Tarantino would unravel his cleverly arranged situation. His roadshow experience is divided by an intermission and also features an overture and extended runtime. Sadly, upon experiencing the latter half, I watched the film come undone.
The violence in this film is, even by Tarantino’s standard, gratuitous. The Hateful Eight is at first rather engrossing as Tarantino coordinates all of his players for an exciting finish. But by the time blood begins to spill, the film quickly becomes redundant and passively pleased with its own recklessness. Furthermore this section of the film is overly familiar to the extreme violence of the finales of his previous films (Django’s revenge, or the theater scene involving Hitler's murder in Inglourious) — just longer and more insufferable. Tarantino in his best saves violence for real astonishment, but here you laugh at pretty horrific sights only because the believability has been quickly evaporating with each nasty death.
The highlights of Tarantino’s recent best, like Michael Fassbender’s undercover sequence in Inglourious Basterds, or Leo’s act of Django Unchained, have been exquisite for their mastery in creating suspense through words and a good premise. The Hateful Eight, however, is stretched out for an overindulgent three hours, to obviously diminishing returns in the pleasures of actually getting lost in a Tarantino movie. On a different but important note, this Oscar-winning screenwriter-director needs to shed his obsession with the N-word, historical context or no. We get it Quentin, you wish you were black.
All is not in vain though. The cast is excellent wall to wall, particularly Russell, Goggins, and Roth who generate a majority of the film’s laughs, but its Leigh particularly who gives a truly committed performance. The cinematography is captivating, especially in the early sequences outside the Haberdashery, and Tarantino’s continues to show he has an ear for good movie music without appearing purposely contradictory as he backdrops a Civil War era setting with pop songs. And the film inherently possesses Tarantino’s delirious singularity in vision, capable of showing you a dangerously fun time.
The Hateful Eight is supremely entertaining in its own right — a bloodthirsty, sometimes maniacally toned black comedy. Mediocre Tarantino, thankfully, equals out to a decent film nonetheless.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / January 12th, 2016
Tarantino, so often acclaimed for his tendencies for diversion, finds himself in a state of falling into a self-created cliché of himself in The Hateful Eight. His latest film’s whopping three-hour runtime is populated with precisely what you’d expect from the eccentric filmmaker — shock violence, rambling dialogue and hilarity via overt self-awareness. By typical standards, his new Western is gleefully entertaining, a sprawling if disjointed pleasure. And although stacked with moments of Tarantino’s idiosyncratic genius, the film is underwhelming relative to his standard and a thoroughly, numbingly pointless project.
As much as I respect Tarantino’s passion in shooting The Hateful Eight in 70mm format as a daring filmmaking choice and a way to call back to antiquated movie-going traditions, this choice almost feels like a counterbalance to the film’s simple and unfulfilled premise.
Though it appears to be a box film, it takes nearly an hour before our important players are together under one roof. John Ruth (Kurt Russell) is on his way to the town of Red Rock to hang his prisoner Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh). The film opens as comes across Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson), a fellow bounty hunter and later Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins), who claims to be the new sheriff of Red Rock. Their stagecoach arrives just in time to Minnie’s Haberdashery in order to take shelter from an approaching blizzard. The crew of strangers encounter more upon arrival — the refined Englishman Oswaldo Mobray (Tim Roth), the soft-spoken Joe Cage (Michael Madsen), the elderly Sanford Smithers (Bruce Dern) and Bob (Demián Bichir) a Mexican who claims to be taking over for the temporarily absent Minnie. Distrust and the imminence of bloodshed then turn the wheels of Tarantino’s latest concoction.
Tarantino is so comfortable in the craft of dialogue and molding conversations that almost surgically mount tension and facilitate oft amusing and memorable character interactions. While The Hateful Eight is humorous enough to be considered a comedy, his ability to provide a unique brand of visceral thrills through discourse has been somewhat sapped from this film. The paranoia, mystery and anticipation of the film’s first half left me intoxicated with the possibilities for how Tarantino would unravel his cleverly arranged situation. His roadshow experience is divided by an intermission and also features an overture and extended runtime. Sadly, upon experiencing the latter half, I watched the film come undone.
The violence in this film is, even by Tarantino’s standard, gratuitous. The Hateful Eight is at first rather engrossing as Tarantino coordinates all of his players for an exciting finish. But by the time blood begins to spill, the film quickly becomes redundant and passively pleased with its own recklessness. Furthermore this section of the film is overly familiar to the extreme violence of the finales of his previous films (Django’s revenge, or the theater scene involving Hitler's murder in Inglourious) — just longer and more insufferable. Tarantino in his best saves violence for real astonishment, but here you laugh at pretty horrific sights only because the believability has been quickly evaporating with each nasty death.
The highlights of Tarantino’s recent best, like Michael Fassbender’s undercover sequence in Inglourious Basterds, or Leo’s act of Django Unchained, have been exquisite for their mastery in creating suspense through words and a good premise. The Hateful Eight, however, is stretched out for an overindulgent three hours, to obviously diminishing returns in the pleasures of actually getting lost in a Tarantino movie. On a different but important note, this Oscar-winning screenwriter-director needs to shed his obsession with the N-word, historical context or no. We get it Quentin, you wish you were black.
All is not in vain though. The cast is excellent wall to wall, particularly Russell, Goggins, and Roth who generate a majority of the film’s laughs, but its Leigh particularly who gives a truly committed performance. The cinematography is captivating, especially in the early sequences outside the Haberdashery, and Tarantino’s continues to show he has an ear for good movie music without appearing purposely contradictory as he backdrops a Civil War era setting with pop songs. And the film inherently possesses Tarantino’s delirious singularity in vision, capable of showing you a dangerously fun time.
The Hateful Eight is supremely entertaining in its own right — a bloodthirsty, sometimes maniacally toned black comedy. Mediocre Tarantino, thankfully, equals out to a decent film nonetheless.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / January 12th, 2016
Brooklyn review
3 (out of 4)
From its universal ideas to its Oscar bait period piece aura, everything about Brooklyn feels familiar but only in the best ways. The film’s magnetic central performance in Saoirse Ronan alone would be enough to warrant Academy attention but Brooklyn is an otherwise elegant and enrapturing examination of an Irish girl’s emigration to the United States.
The film’s trailer does an excellent job of spoiling Brooklyn’s narrative outline, but I’ll try to be more sensitive — it is 1952 and the early-20-something Eilis Lacey (Ronan) is quickly sent off to America by her older sister Rose (Fiona Glascott). Displaced from her small town Irish lifestyle, Eilis is faced with homesickness and the alien chaos of New York at its peak population. She stays in a boarding house run by Madge Kehoe (Julie Walters) and is soon able to adjust once she encounters romance in Tony (Emory Cohen), an earnest Italian boy she meets at a dance.
Brooklyn employs the necessary conflicts between her old home and the new one, but handles its simple themes of change and personal responsibilities with sincerity, never submitting to easy emotional stabs or banal observations. Director John Crowley, who works mostly in theater, crafts his film with stateliness and refinement — matched with cinematographer Yvez Bélanger (who brought a similarly unblemished guise to other recent awards fair like Dallas Buyers Club and Wild), Brooklyn is a vibrantly staged historical piece, its bygone otherworldliness accentuated by some divine costume design.
The film’s script by Nick Hornby, who also adapted the source material of Wild, is based on the 2009 Colm Tóibín novel of the same name. The plot of Brooklyn could easily equate to maudlin mediocrity, yet the film resists all temptations to sink into sentimentality, managing to be sweet and gentle without sacrificing seriousness.
An exceptional cast also buoys the film’s favor. Reliable British names such as Jim Broadbent, Julie Walters, and Domhnall Gleeson (all of whom lent smaller roles to the Harry Potter franchise) populate the greater supporting parts. Ronan’s work in the lead is easily the film’s highlight, however, as she renders exquisite subtlety from her soft-spoken character’s gradual transformation. At 21, Ronan’s early adulthood is complimented by her innocence, not to mention her Irish roots — she is an ideal casting choice that commands Eilis’ essence with ease.
Emory Cohen’s convincing turn as Eilis’ endearingly mawkish American boyfriend is a recurring high note for Brooklyn. His giddy, plausible charisma provides the film’s courtship with proper gravitas, meeting Ronan’s efforts halfway.
For all its narrative simplicities, Brooklyn is sparingly brief, smoothly paced and never less than engaging. A great deal of the film is a delight to watch and its truthfulness penetrates through the surface level clichés of the material.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / December 8th, 2015
From its universal ideas to its Oscar bait period piece aura, everything about Brooklyn feels familiar but only in the best ways. The film’s magnetic central performance in Saoirse Ronan alone would be enough to warrant Academy attention but Brooklyn is an otherwise elegant and enrapturing examination of an Irish girl’s emigration to the United States.
The film’s trailer does an excellent job of spoiling Brooklyn’s narrative outline, but I’ll try to be more sensitive — it is 1952 and the early-20-something Eilis Lacey (Ronan) is quickly sent off to America by her older sister Rose (Fiona Glascott). Displaced from her small town Irish lifestyle, Eilis is faced with homesickness and the alien chaos of New York at its peak population. She stays in a boarding house run by Madge Kehoe (Julie Walters) and is soon able to adjust once she encounters romance in Tony (Emory Cohen), an earnest Italian boy she meets at a dance.
Brooklyn employs the necessary conflicts between her old home and the new one, but handles its simple themes of change and personal responsibilities with sincerity, never submitting to easy emotional stabs or banal observations. Director John Crowley, who works mostly in theater, crafts his film with stateliness and refinement — matched with cinematographer Yvez Bélanger (who brought a similarly unblemished guise to other recent awards fair like Dallas Buyers Club and Wild), Brooklyn is a vibrantly staged historical piece, its bygone otherworldliness accentuated by some divine costume design.
The film’s script by Nick Hornby, who also adapted the source material of Wild, is based on the 2009 Colm Tóibín novel of the same name. The plot of Brooklyn could easily equate to maudlin mediocrity, yet the film resists all temptations to sink into sentimentality, managing to be sweet and gentle without sacrificing seriousness.
An exceptional cast also buoys the film’s favor. Reliable British names such as Jim Broadbent, Julie Walters, and Domhnall Gleeson (all of whom lent smaller roles to the Harry Potter franchise) populate the greater supporting parts. Ronan’s work in the lead is easily the film’s highlight, however, as she renders exquisite subtlety from her soft-spoken character’s gradual transformation. At 21, Ronan’s early adulthood is complimented by her innocence, not to mention her Irish roots — she is an ideal casting choice that commands Eilis’ essence with ease.
Emory Cohen’s convincing turn as Eilis’ endearingly mawkish American boyfriend is a recurring high note for Brooklyn. His giddy, plausible charisma provides the film’s courtship with proper gravitas, meeting Ronan’s efforts halfway.
For all its narrative simplicities, Brooklyn is sparingly brief, smoothly paced and never less than engaging. A great deal of the film is a delight to watch and its truthfulness penetrates through the surface level clichés of the material.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / December 8th, 2015
Spectre review
2 (out of 4)
The Bond formula has proven itself well over the span of the last 23 films. For better and sometimes much, much worse, the varying manifestations of the male fantasy during the past 50 years have satiated the appetite of the average guy’s daydream. And in the present we can be grateful we have Daniel Craig, though he deserves to anchor a marginally better film than Spectre.
After putting a chiseled face to 21st century Bond over the most artistic and emotional films of the franchise — the all too necessary ‘real-world’ reboot Casino Royale and the visually sumptuous Skyfall — the 24th entry in the longest running film franchise in history fails to honor the gravitas Craig brings to the immortal role. Spectre has everything going for it to join the ranks of the current Bond classics but is severely undermined by a confused script, which is comprised of many jarring intentions.
Spectre, the longest and most expensive Bond film to date, is a compulsively conflicted film, snagged between business-as-usual Bond and somehow a culmination of the entire Craig series as well. And I’ll have to say it sometime: Sam Smith should be out of a job.
But whereas Skyfall forged a new path for the franchise, Spectre is stuck in the past — Bond has received secret orders from the late M (Judi Dench in the briefest of cameos) to kill Marco Sciarra (Alessandro Cremona) and attend his funeral. This assassination is the basis of the film’s exhilarating opening sequence — beginning with an ambitious tracking shot through a Day of the Dead celebration in Mexico City and featuring some typically awe-inspiring stunts. Once Bond seduces Sciarro’s wife Lucia (Monica Belluci) for information of her late husband’s career, he is led to a meeting of the ominous crime organization Spectre, headed by Franz Oberhauser (an underused Christoph Waltz). Bond then traces a lead back to Mr. White, a minor villain from the earlier Craig films, who in turn tells Bond that his daughter Madeline Swann (Léa Seydoux) can help him locate the main facility of Spectre.
Sam Mendes’ elegant portrayal of the contemporary action film paired with Hoyte van Hoytema’s dazzling camerawork (echoing the moody clarity Roger Deakin’s work in Skyfall), makes Spectre an impeccable visual conception. A middle act sequence in Austria has particularly splendid production and is one of the film’s scenic highlights. The stunning cinematography carries Spectre through what may be too little action for some considering it’s generous runtime; but when the action hits, it’s brutal and grandiose, and sometimes astoundingly campy.
For instance, in the aforementioned Mexico sequence, Bond is saved from a long fall in a crumbling building by plopping comically on a couch, interrupting the otherwise epic action of the scene. Similarly in a hard-hitting fight with Mr. Hinx (Dave Bautista) — a monstrous henchman character à la Jaws of the Moore era — Bond vanquishes his foe in near-slapstick fashion. Some humor really works but these goofy moments hinder the sense of real danger and big stakes for a film that wants to be taken so seriously.
In Spectre, there is less homage to the classic Bond tropes — of which these 21st century ‘mature’ Bond films hope to translate — than there are simply pointless callbacks to the plots and characters of previous Craig entries. Waltz’ villain laying claim to orchestrating the dark deeds of the past three villains is easily the most egregious of these. This lazy plot point not only reduces the impact and overall importance of the Craig’s other films, but Spectre itself. By piggybacking on past emotions, the film is never given a chance to stand on its own feet. If we learned anything from Craig’s superior films, it’s that Bond films are better self-contained.
Spectre may not be quite as disposable as the sorely ill-conceived Quantum of Solace, but similarly it lives in its predecessor’s shadow, banking on the goodwill of the last installment’s newly inhabited roles of Q (Ben Whishaw), Moneypenny (Naomie Harris), and the new M (Ralph Fiennes), all of whom are shoved off to unremarkable subplots.
Perhaps we all were spoiled by the uniform excellence of Skyfall to think that Mendes could produce another great Bond film, but the squandered potential of the talent involved by way of a subpar script alone is such a pity and denies Spectre of the cinematic heights it clamors for.
Which is a shame because there’s so much to praise. Craig is on fire — four entries in he wears the Bond bravado like a glove. Seydoux is easily the best Bond girl since Eva Green’s Vesper from Casino, given a character with significant depth for a role that typically requires little more than talking eye candy. And though Spectre consistently stands in its own way, there are many flashes of Bond brilliance over its sprawling runtime.
The ending, thankfully, seems to tie up most loose ends for the series. Hopefully Craig’s last film, sans Mendes, will sprint in newer directions.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / November 12th, 2015
The Bond formula has proven itself well over the span of the last 23 films. For better and sometimes much, much worse, the varying manifestations of the male fantasy during the past 50 years have satiated the appetite of the average guy’s daydream. And in the present we can be grateful we have Daniel Craig, though he deserves to anchor a marginally better film than Spectre.
After putting a chiseled face to 21st century Bond over the most artistic and emotional films of the franchise — the all too necessary ‘real-world’ reboot Casino Royale and the visually sumptuous Skyfall — the 24th entry in the longest running film franchise in history fails to honor the gravitas Craig brings to the immortal role. Spectre has everything going for it to join the ranks of the current Bond classics but is severely undermined by a confused script, which is comprised of many jarring intentions.
Spectre, the longest and most expensive Bond film to date, is a compulsively conflicted film, snagged between business-as-usual Bond and somehow a culmination of the entire Craig series as well. And I’ll have to say it sometime: Sam Smith should be out of a job.
But whereas Skyfall forged a new path for the franchise, Spectre is stuck in the past — Bond has received secret orders from the late M (Judi Dench in the briefest of cameos) to kill Marco Sciarra (Alessandro Cremona) and attend his funeral. This assassination is the basis of the film’s exhilarating opening sequence — beginning with an ambitious tracking shot through a Day of the Dead celebration in Mexico City and featuring some typically awe-inspiring stunts. Once Bond seduces Sciarro’s wife Lucia (Monica Belluci) for information of her late husband’s career, he is led to a meeting of the ominous crime organization Spectre, headed by Franz Oberhauser (an underused Christoph Waltz). Bond then traces a lead back to Mr. White, a minor villain from the earlier Craig films, who in turn tells Bond that his daughter Madeline Swann (Léa Seydoux) can help him locate the main facility of Spectre.
Sam Mendes’ elegant portrayal of the contemporary action film paired with Hoyte van Hoytema’s dazzling camerawork (echoing the moody clarity Roger Deakin’s work in Skyfall), makes Spectre an impeccable visual conception. A middle act sequence in Austria has particularly splendid production and is one of the film’s scenic highlights. The stunning cinematography carries Spectre through what may be too little action for some considering it’s generous runtime; but when the action hits, it’s brutal and grandiose, and sometimes astoundingly campy.
For instance, in the aforementioned Mexico sequence, Bond is saved from a long fall in a crumbling building by plopping comically on a couch, interrupting the otherwise epic action of the scene. Similarly in a hard-hitting fight with Mr. Hinx (Dave Bautista) — a monstrous henchman character à la Jaws of the Moore era — Bond vanquishes his foe in near-slapstick fashion. Some humor really works but these goofy moments hinder the sense of real danger and big stakes for a film that wants to be taken so seriously.
In Spectre, there is less homage to the classic Bond tropes — of which these 21st century ‘mature’ Bond films hope to translate — than there are simply pointless callbacks to the plots and characters of previous Craig entries. Waltz’ villain laying claim to orchestrating the dark deeds of the past three villains is easily the most egregious of these. This lazy plot point not only reduces the impact and overall importance of the Craig’s other films, but Spectre itself. By piggybacking on past emotions, the film is never given a chance to stand on its own feet. If we learned anything from Craig’s superior films, it’s that Bond films are better self-contained.
Spectre may not be quite as disposable as the sorely ill-conceived Quantum of Solace, but similarly it lives in its predecessor’s shadow, banking on the goodwill of the last installment’s newly inhabited roles of Q (Ben Whishaw), Moneypenny (Naomie Harris), and the new M (Ralph Fiennes), all of whom are shoved off to unremarkable subplots.
Perhaps we all were spoiled by the uniform excellence of Skyfall to think that Mendes could produce another great Bond film, but the squandered potential of the talent involved by way of a subpar script alone is such a pity and denies Spectre of the cinematic heights it clamors for.
Which is a shame because there’s so much to praise. Craig is on fire — four entries in he wears the Bond bravado like a glove. Seydoux is easily the best Bond girl since Eva Green’s Vesper from Casino, given a character with significant depth for a role that typically requires little more than talking eye candy. And though Spectre consistently stands in its own way, there are many flashes of Bond brilliance over its sprawling runtime.
The ending, thankfully, seems to tie up most loose ends for the series. Hopefully Craig’s last film, sans Mendes, will sprint in newer directions.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / November 12th, 2015
Room review
3 ½ (out of 4)
Some films try to make you see the world in a new way; Room tries to make you feel like you’re seeing the world for the first time. It’s no easy task, but indie director Lenny Abrahamson (Frank) plunges face-first into the pain of desperation, the euphoria of liberation, and the strangeness of discovery. Room essentially redefines the term "emotional roller coaster."
Room is undeniably powerful, a near-transcendental experience brimming with feeling and wonder. Adapted from her novel of the same name, Emma Donoghue’s harrowing drama as seen from the eyes of unfettered innocence manages to remain an emphatically hopeful film.
Loosely based on real events in Austria, the story follows Joy Newsome (Brie Larson) and her five-year-old son Jack (Jacob Tremblay) during and after their imprisonment in a shed by Old Nick (Sean Bridgers). Old Nick has kept Newsome in confinement for seven years since the age of 17 and is also Jack’s father. Joy has told Jack that "Room" is all of existence — beyond the walls is outer space and the television broadcasts from other planets. She later tells him the truth so Jack can help both of them escape — yet eventual freedom only poses newer challenges, such as Joy’s reconnection with family, the nosiness of the media and of course the Jack’s incredibly rare psychological journey — ripped from imposed ignorance of "Room" to the world at large.
Like the novel, Room is all from the vantage of Jack — we are kept in the dark when Jack is shielded from the more sickly moments of his time between four walls and the humdrum of quotidian life that we know is made alien and astounding when seen from an untarnished perspective. In this way the story avoids any pathos-tugging or relentlessly bleak melodrama.
But for all of the narrative’s wise moves, the performances are the film’s firmest asset. Larson’s work is superb — so much of the film’s overwhelming power hinges on her remarkably nuanced and believable acting, and her commitment ensures nothing of the dramatic heft is lost. And Tremblay, though nearly overshadowed by Larson, is equally commendable as a truly sympathetic central character. His frailty and cuteness is, like the rest of the tactfully arranged picture, never exploited for tear-jerks or schmaltz.
That isn’t to say that this film won’t likely wreck you — it gave me glassy eyes and a runny nose long before I anticipated. Yet there is little of the obvious music swells or inserted insights that beckon you to grab a tissue. Room is beautifully restrained and, paradoxically, it's in how many punches it pulls that makes it so marvelously gripping.
Though most definitely a drama, Room is at times a nerve-twisting thriller, a candid investigation of existence and morality, and a classic tale of strife surmounted. And Jack’s underlying trip from obliviousness to truth bears all the mind-bending philosophical implications of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave.
Room in its totality is gracefully scripted and inhabited, devastatingly emotional and nothing less than cathartic.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / November 10th, 2015
Some films try to make you see the world in a new way; Room tries to make you feel like you’re seeing the world for the first time. It’s no easy task, but indie director Lenny Abrahamson (Frank) plunges face-first into the pain of desperation, the euphoria of liberation, and the strangeness of discovery. Room essentially redefines the term "emotional roller coaster."
Room is undeniably powerful, a near-transcendental experience brimming with feeling and wonder. Adapted from her novel of the same name, Emma Donoghue’s harrowing drama as seen from the eyes of unfettered innocence manages to remain an emphatically hopeful film.
Loosely based on real events in Austria, the story follows Joy Newsome (Brie Larson) and her five-year-old son Jack (Jacob Tremblay) during and after their imprisonment in a shed by Old Nick (Sean Bridgers). Old Nick has kept Newsome in confinement for seven years since the age of 17 and is also Jack’s father. Joy has told Jack that "Room" is all of existence — beyond the walls is outer space and the television broadcasts from other planets. She later tells him the truth so Jack can help both of them escape — yet eventual freedom only poses newer challenges, such as Joy’s reconnection with family, the nosiness of the media and of course the Jack’s incredibly rare psychological journey — ripped from imposed ignorance of "Room" to the world at large.
Like the novel, Room is all from the vantage of Jack — we are kept in the dark when Jack is shielded from the more sickly moments of his time between four walls and the humdrum of quotidian life that we know is made alien and astounding when seen from an untarnished perspective. In this way the story avoids any pathos-tugging or relentlessly bleak melodrama.
But for all of the narrative’s wise moves, the performances are the film’s firmest asset. Larson’s work is superb — so much of the film’s overwhelming power hinges on her remarkably nuanced and believable acting, and her commitment ensures nothing of the dramatic heft is lost. And Tremblay, though nearly overshadowed by Larson, is equally commendable as a truly sympathetic central character. His frailty and cuteness is, like the rest of the tactfully arranged picture, never exploited for tear-jerks or schmaltz.
That isn’t to say that this film won’t likely wreck you — it gave me glassy eyes and a runny nose long before I anticipated. Yet there is little of the obvious music swells or inserted insights that beckon you to grab a tissue. Room is beautifully restrained and, paradoxically, it's in how many punches it pulls that makes it so marvelously gripping.
Though most definitely a drama, Room is at times a nerve-twisting thriller, a candid investigation of existence and morality, and a classic tale of strife surmounted. And Jack’s underlying trip from obliviousness to truth bears all the mind-bending philosophical implications of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave.
Room in its totality is gracefully scripted and inhabited, devastatingly emotional and nothing less than cathartic.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / November 10th, 2015
The Walk review
3 (out of 4)
If you didn’t soak up each stranger-than-fiction detail of Philippe Petit’s unbelievable tightrope walk between the towers of the World Trade Center in the 2008 documentary Man on Wire, the inspired pairing of star Joseph Gordon-Levitt and director Robert Zemeckis lends the account the grand-scale cinematic treatment it deserves in The Walk.
For someone who spends so much effort on his visual creation with only middling results (i.e. The Polar Express, Beowulf), Zemeckis finally lets modern technology elevate the pleasures of the film experience rather than distract from them. Though the resurged popularity of 3D has long overstayed its welcome, the film’s climactic sequence is as exhilarating as one would hope, and in IMAX 3D it’s so easy to become immersed in the beauty and dread of Petit’s insane artistic stunt.
The Walk as a whole is a thrilling crowd-pleaser and though the film’s buoyancy and wide-eyed optimism can sometimes border on overplayed or overstated, it’s hard not to be ultimately won over by the sincerity of both Gordon-Levitt’s sprightly, theatrical central performance and Zemeckis’s smooth, visually accomplished direction.
Gordon-Levitt, under convincing make-up work (though he remains far prettier than the real Petit), plays to all of his strengths of showmanship and likability as the street performer turned daring tightrope auteur. In his early years, Petit learned his skill from his mentor Papa Rudy (Ben Kingsley), who would advise him from his first public performances to his most ludicrous attempts. In his younger years in Europe, Petit met Annie (Charlotte Le Bon), who would become both his romantic partner and support him, along with other acquaintances, in his more elaborate, less legal performances, such as walking a tightrope mounted on the Notre Dame Cathedral.
It would be all too easy to dismiss the film’s cuteness and fluff, from the Hollywoodization of the events to Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s narration from atop the Statue of Liberty. But what may have become a cynical cash-grab capitalizing on another ‘unbelievable’ true story is instead a deeply genuine retelling of Petit’s tale, with Zemeckis wringing out all of the ripest details of it for all their worth.
Gordon-Levitt reportedly trained with Petit in order to learn how to walk the tightrope, and his manifestation of the wildly ambitious and sometimes infuriatingly obsessive performer is a heartfelt portrait, and furthermore some fine casting.
Yet beyond how well the film translates Petit’s life and dreams, The Walk is an enormously entertaining film in its own right, from its endlessly engaging cinematography to the masterfully mounted tension of it’s second half. The palm-sweating adrenaline of the titular sequence alone is worth the price of a ticket.
If there’s one way this film improves on Man on Wire it’s that it puts the viewer where Petit is, and what everyone else once only imagined can now be lived. As a biopic or a true-life thriller, The Walk is altogether a spectacular and passionately constructed film.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / October 14th, 2015
If you didn’t soak up each stranger-than-fiction detail of Philippe Petit’s unbelievable tightrope walk between the towers of the World Trade Center in the 2008 documentary Man on Wire, the inspired pairing of star Joseph Gordon-Levitt and director Robert Zemeckis lends the account the grand-scale cinematic treatment it deserves in The Walk.
For someone who spends so much effort on his visual creation with only middling results (i.e. The Polar Express, Beowulf), Zemeckis finally lets modern technology elevate the pleasures of the film experience rather than distract from them. Though the resurged popularity of 3D has long overstayed its welcome, the film’s climactic sequence is as exhilarating as one would hope, and in IMAX 3D it’s so easy to become immersed in the beauty and dread of Petit’s insane artistic stunt.
The Walk as a whole is a thrilling crowd-pleaser and though the film’s buoyancy and wide-eyed optimism can sometimes border on overplayed or overstated, it’s hard not to be ultimately won over by the sincerity of both Gordon-Levitt’s sprightly, theatrical central performance and Zemeckis’s smooth, visually accomplished direction.
Gordon-Levitt, under convincing make-up work (though he remains far prettier than the real Petit), plays to all of his strengths of showmanship and likability as the street performer turned daring tightrope auteur. In his early years, Petit learned his skill from his mentor Papa Rudy (Ben Kingsley), who would advise him from his first public performances to his most ludicrous attempts. In his younger years in Europe, Petit met Annie (Charlotte Le Bon), who would become both his romantic partner and support him, along with other acquaintances, in his more elaborate, less legal performances, such as walking a tightrope mounted on the Notre Dame Cathedral.
It would be all too easy to dismiss the film’s cuteness and fluff, from the Hollywoodization of the events to Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s narration from atop the Statue of Liberty. But what may have become a cynical cash-grab capitalizing on another ‘unbelievable’ true story is instead a deeply genuine retelling of Petit’s tale, with Zemeckis wringing out all of the ripest details of it for all their worth.
Gordon-Levitt reportedly trained with Petit in order to learn how to walk the tightrope, and his manifestation of the wildly ambitious and sometimes infuriatingly obsessive performer is a heartfelt portrait, and furthermore some fine casting.
Yet beyond how well the film translates Petit’s life and dreams, The Walk is an enormously entertaining film in its own right, from its endlessly engaging cinematography to the masterfully mounted tension of it’s second half. The palm-sweating adrenaline of the titular sequence alone is worth the price of a ticket.
If there’s one way this film improves on Man on Wire it’s that it puts the viewer where Petit is, and what everyone else once only imagined can now be lived. As a biopic or a true-life thriller, The Walk is altogether a spectacular and passionately constructed film.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / October 14th, 2015
Ex Machina review
3 ½ (out of 4)
Even in our rapidly advancing technological age, artificial intelligence somehow seems far off. In film, thinking robots have typically been part of some shiny distant future, but Alex Garland’s Ex Machina brings us very close to this possibly imminent and groundbreaking creation.
For all we know, the film could take place in present day. Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson), an unassuming programmer for a Google-esque search engine company, has won an office lottery to spend a week with the CEO Nathan (Oscar Isaac) in his estate and research facility in the mountains. There, Nathan reveals that, during the course of his stay, Caleb will be delivering a Turing Test to his latest prototype of artificial intelligence — a female robot named Ava (Alicia Vikander). What appears to be the opportunity of a lifetime slowly dissolves into conflict and suspicion as Nathan’s alcoholism and cavalier attitude, along with Ava’s flirtation and manipulation, give Caleb cause to question each of their motives.
Though Ex Machina possesses a general simplicity — one real location, essentially only three characters — Garland’s crafty writing and elegant direction elevate its well-worn premise into intellectually engaging sci-fi. The film is stylish in its minimalism, approaching its premise with deadpan seriousness. And it discusses big ideas without condescending and the plot frequently travels in unexpected directions.
Ex Machina benefits further from fine performances. Vikander is exceptional as our android, and her scrupulous acting contributes enormously to the film’s overall believability alongside the seamless visual effects. Isaac is commendable for bringing his serious chops to such a silly character — his portrayal of a genius drunk who prefers guy talk to heady science jargon shouldn’t work so well. Gleeson is easily the weakest link, due to his stiff American accent and vanilla personality, but he plays the everyman as well as he has in the past.
The pacing of Ex Machina may be deliberate, but the film’s chilly cinematography and electronic score provide a gripping atmosphere to an otherwise meditative experience. Garland is able to build tension so naturally there is no need for off-the-wall third act craziness à la explosions or anything else straining to sustain viewer attention. The film’s quiet climax is all the more tangibly exciting for its resistance to cheap gimmicks and false thrills.
Though slight in nature, Ex Machina banks its significance in earnest expression. The film’s highlight moments are often found in the near-comic banter between Caleb and Nathan, the former with plenty of knowledge and genuine interest and the latter with much greater knowledge and far less concern for it. Garland’s dialogue makes the abstract conversational, and extracts all the mind-bending delights from his own concoction of hard science fiction.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / April 15th, 2015
Even in our rapidly advancing technological age, artificial intelligence somehow seems far off. In film, thinking robots have typically been part of some shiny distant future, but Alex Garland’s Ex Machina brings us very close to this possibly imminent and groundbreaking creation.
For all we know, the film could take place in present day. Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson), an unassuming programmer for a Google-esque search engine company, has won an office lottery to spend a week with the CEO Nathan (Oscar Isaac) in his estate and research facility in the mountains. There, Nathan reveals that, during the course of his stay, Caleb will be delivering a Turing Test to his latest prototype of artificial intelligence — a female robot named Ava (Alicia Vikander). What appears to be the opportunity of a lifetime slowly dissolves into conflict and suspicion as Nathan’s alcoholism and cavalier attitude, along with Ava’s flirtation and manipulation, give Caleb cause to question each of their motives.
Though Ex Machina possesses a general simplicity — one real location, essentially only three characters — Garland’s crafty writing and elegant direction elevate its well-worn premise into intellectually engaging sci-fi. The film is stylish in its minimalism, approaching its premise with deadpan seriousness. And it discusses big ideas without condescending and the plot frequently travels in unexpected directions.
Ex Machina benefits further from fine performances. Vikander is exceptional as our android, and her scrupulous acting contributes enormously to the film’s overall believability alongside the seamless visual effects. Isaac is commendable for bringing his serious chops to such a silly character — his portrayal of a genius drunk who prefers guy talk to heady science jargon shouldn’t work so well. Gleeson is easily the weakest link, due to his stiff American accent and vanilla personality, but he plays the everyman as well as he has in the past.
The pacing of Ex Machina may be deliberate, but the film’s chilly cinematography and electronic score provide a gripping atmosphere to an otherwise meditative experience. Garland is able to build tension so naturally there is no need for off-the-wall third act craziness à la explosions or anything else straining to sustain viewer attention. The film’s quiet climax is all the more tangibly exciting for its resistance to cheap gimmicks and false thrills.
Though slight in nature, Ex Machina banks its significance in earnest expression. The film’s highlight moments are often found in the near-comic banter between Caleb and Nathan, the former with plenty of knowledge and genuine interest and the latter with much greater knowledge and far less concern for it. Garland’s dialogue makes the abstract conversational, and extracts all the mind-bending delights from his own concoction of hard science fiction.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / April 15th, 2015
While We're Young review
3 (out of 4)
Youth is wasted on the old — or so Noah Baumbach’s new film seems to argue. While We’re Young discusses many things, from generational conflict to concepts of objective truth and originality, but Baumbach — like most of his catalogue — hints at something bigger, like a desire to feel life fully even in the most everyday of circumstances, even late in one’s existence.
Though he is unable to reach the heights of the understated delights of Frances Ha, this is arguably Baumbach’s most assured work. His skills have been refined since he broke out on the scene with his shrewdly raw The Squid and the Whale in 2006, and his latest is precisely edited, unfailingly funny and loaded with a fresh bag of dynamic dialogue, enlightening insights and honest ruminations on modern American life.
Our finely detailed lead characters are two couples — Josh (Ben Stiller) and Cornelia (Naomi Watts) become good friends with married partners Jamie (Adam Driver) and Darby (Amanda Seyfried) who are both nearly 20 years younger. Josh and Jamie connect based on their careers as independent documentarians — Josh has been working on the same piece for a decade and Jamie is looking to make his first mark. Though initially invigorated by interacting with the optimistic youth, Josh becomes suspicious of Jamie’s intentions after he agrees to help him with his first project and Jamie all too easily becomes affiliated with Josh’s father in-law and famed filmmaker Leslie Breitbart (Charles Grodin).
The plot is much thornier than his earlier works, yet that does not stop Baumbach from reflecting the reality of modern-day life, flawlessly depicting hipster culture, social etiquette and the spontaneity and rhythm of natural conversation. He is able to make the mundane both whimsical and unsentimental and, like the better moments of Woody Allen’s work, is able to disguise a tactful and intellectual piece of social commentary as a bright indie comedy without jeopardizing brains or laughs in the process.
The cast of familiars is to the film’s advantage as well — Stiller and Watts are reliable actors worthy of Baumbach believably flawed written characters. Driver’s charms are not only put to good use but, by the end of his arc, the themes of While We’re Young challenge the sincerity of the goofy cool guy persona he so frequently embodies. Even Seyfried is in top form, sporting comedy chops and a rare glimpse at her charisma that is most often buried in her many inferior roles.
While We’re Young channels the border between the cinematic and the naturalistic, grounded in writing that brims with spot-on witticisms, delectable exchanges and conversational explorations of existential truths and questions. And despite the temptations of infusing obvious meta humor due to its filmmakers-as-characters premise, Baumbach manages to be knowing without being smug, opting for sophistication rather than condescension.
There is an earnest humanism that bubbles beneath this and many other Baumbach films. While We’re Young is both vibrant and wise, modern and mature; some brilliant business-as-usual for its gifted creator.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / April 14th, 2015
Youth is wasted on the old — or so Noah Baumbach’s new film seems to argue. While We’re Young discusses many things, from generational conflict to concepts of objective truth and originality, but Baumbach — like most of his catalogue — hints at something bigger, like a desire to feel life fully even in the most everyday of circumstances, even late in one’s existence.
Though he is unable to reach the heights of the understated delights of Frances Ha, this is arguably Baumbach’s most assured work. His skills have been refined since he broke out on the scene with his shrewdly raw The Squid and the Whale in 2006, and his latest is precisely edited, unfailingly funny and loaded with a fresh bag of dynamic dialogue, enlightening insights and honest ruminations on modern American life.
Our finely detailed lead characters are two couples — Josh (Ben Stiller) and Cornelia (Naomi Watts) become good friends with married partners Jamie (Adam Driver) and Darby (Amanda Seyfried) who are both nearly 20 years younger. Josh and Jamie connect based on their careers as independent documentarians — Josh has been working on the same piece for a decade and Jamie is looking to make his first mark. Though initially invigorated by interacting with the optimistic youth, Josh becomes suspicious of Jamie’s intentions after he agrees to help him with his first project and Jamie all too easily becomes affiliated with Josh’s father in-law and famed filmmaker Leslie Breitbart (Charles Grodin).
The plot is much thornier than his earlier works, yet that does not stop Baumbach from reflecting the reality of modern-day life, flawlessly depicting hipster culture, social etiquette and the spontaneity and rhythm of natural conversation. He is able to make the mundane both whimsical and unsentimental and, like the better moments of Woody Allen’s work, is able to disguise a tactful and intellectual piece of social commentary as a bright indie comedy without jeopardizing brains or laughs in the process.
The cast of familiars is to the film’s advantage as well — Stiller and Watts are reliable actors worthy of Baumbach believably flawed written characters. Driver’s charms are not only put to good use but, by the end of his arc, the themes of While We’re Young challenge the sincerity of the goofy cool guy persona he so frequently embodies. Even Seyfried is in top form, sporting comedy chops and a rare glimpse at her charisma that is most often buried in her many inferior roles.
While We’re Young channels the border between the cinematic and the naturalistic, grounded in writing that brims with spot-on witticisms, delectable exchanges and conversational explorations of existential truths and questions. And despite the temptations of infusing obvious meta humor due to its filmmakers-as-characters premise, Baumbach manages to be knowing without being smug, opting for sophistication rather than condescension.
There is an earnest humanism that bubbles beneath this and many other Baumbach films. While We’re Young is both vibrant and wise, modern and mature; some brilliant business-as-usual for its gifted creator.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / April 14th, 2015
Jupiter Ascending review
1 ½ (out of 4)
The dumping ground that is the first few months of the movie calendar just received a new shipment: the overblown and thoroughly generic Jupiter Ascending.
The Wachowski siblings Lana and Andrew — still living off goodwill from the first Matrix film — have concocted another ambitious sci-fi epic, one it seems they hope is in the vein of the scope and intelligence of their last film Cloud Atlas. But the end product has far more in common with the colorful, repetitive folly of Speed Racer.
The borderline self-parody sounds about as corny and contrived on paper as it feels on-screen: Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis) is a disgruntled caretaker, unaware of her status as royalty — something of a reincarnation of the late queen of Abrasax, a powerful alien dynasty. The family has control over the earth, which is ripe for harvesting the human population for an elixir that induces immortality, but Jones’ presence makes Earth’s future uncertain. Titus (Douglas Booth), one of three heirs to the throne, hires out hunter and half-wolf half-man Caine (Channing Tatum) to locate her and bring her to him for marriage so that he may take control of the Earth. Balem (Eddie Redmayne), the other male heir, has equally nefarious plans of his own.
What sounds like it barely qualifies for a TV movie is pumped with a 175 million dollar budget and taken all too seriously. The Wachowski's attempt at an original science fiction universe is admirable, but it comes off as a rip off of Star Wars, Star Trek and damn near anything in between — it's a melting pot of nerdy, half-baked ideas. And while the result is visually impressive, it does not elevate the legitimacy of the project but only makes it more obvious how little originality and purpose lies in the film’s lifeless script. The same goes for Michael Giacchino’s score that blows a blood vessel straining to be epic.
If only Ascending could be saved by its performances. Kunis has yet to really prove that she can be at the center of any sort of dramatic material but her lack of charisma and presence is almost befitting of such schlock. Tatum is fine and he pulls off his elf ears better than expected, but his emotionless character gives him little to do. The only consistent bright spot is Redmayne, clearly aware of the ridiculousness of the laughable space opera surrounding him — the villainous turn is both menacing and slyly tongue-in-cheek.
Jupiter Ascending is, at the very least, watchable trash. Caine’s anti-gravity boots, which he uses to skate through space, are neat but shamelessly overused as the basis of nearly every action scene. Jupiter Jones falls, enter slo-mo, Caine catches her — the exact sequence is repeated multiple times. And despite one long slog of a midsection and an overly generous runtime, the Wachowski’s squeeze every bit of underdeveloped drama, hackneyed romance and unneeded visual bedazzlement they can pull out of their ‘original’ creation.
As risky as it is terrible, Jupiter Ascending makes you wonder how it possibly got made at every turn. If only there was a real reason for its existence.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / April 4th, 2015
The dumping ground that is the first few months of the movie calendar just received a new shipment: the overblown and thoroughly generic Jupiter Ascending.
The Wachowski siblings Lana and Andrew — still living off goodwill from the first Matrix film — have concocted another ambitious sci-fi epic, one it seems they hope is in the vein of the scope and intelligence of their last film Cloud Atlas. But the end product has far more in common with the colorful, repetitive folly of Speed Racer.
The borderline self-parody sounds about as corny and contrived on paper as it feels on-screen: Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis) is a disgruntled caretaker, unaware of her status as royalty — something of a reincarnation of the late queen of Abrasax, a powerful alien dynasty. The family has control over the earth, which is ripe for harvesting the human population for an elixir that induces immortality, but Jones’ presence makes Earth’s future uncertain. Titus (Douglas Booth), one of three heirs to the throne, hires out hunter and half-wolf half-man Caine (Channing Tatum) to locate her and bring her to him for marriage so that he may take control of the Earth. Balem (Eddie Redmayne), the other male heir, has equally nefarious plans of his own.
What sounds like it barely qualifies for a TV movie is pumped with a 175 million dollar budget and taken all too seriously. The Wachowski's attempt at an original science fiction universe is admirable, but it comes off as a rip off of Star Wars, Star Trek and damn near anything in between — it's a melting pot of nerdy, half-baked ideas. And while the result is visually impressive, it does not elevate the legitimacy of the project but only makes it more obvious how little originality and purpose lies in the film’s lifeless script. The same goes for Michael Giacchino’s score that blows a blood vessel straining to be epic.
If only Ascending could be saved by its performances. Kunis has yet to really prove that she can be at the center of any sort of dramatic material but her lack of charisma and presence is almost befitting of such schlock. Tatum is fine and he pulls off his elf ears better than expected, but his emotionless character gives him little to do. The only consistent bright spot is Redmayne, clearly aware of the ridiculousness of the laughable space opera surrounding him — the villainous turn is both menacing and slyly tongue-in-cheek.
Jupiter Ascending is, at the very least, watchable trash. Caine’s anti-gravity boots, which he uses to skate through space, are neat but shamelessly overused as the basis of nearly every action scene. Jupiter Jones falls, enter slo-mo, Caine catches her — the exact sequence is repeated multiple times. And despite one long slog of a midsection and an overly generous runtime, the Wachowski’s squeeze every bit of underdeveloped drama, hackneyed romance and unneeded visual bedazzlement they can pull out of their ‘original’ creation.
As risky as it is terrible, Jupiter Ascending makes you wonder how it possibly got made at every turn. If only there was a real reason for its existence.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / April 4th, 2015
Project Almanac review
2 ½ (out of 4)
It may not contribute anything groundbreaking to either the time travel genre or the now-fading found footage canon, but Project Almanac is nonetheless a diverting, breathless sci-fi yarn provided you don’t think too hard about it.
The heavily flawed film remains endearing mainly because it is so eager to please — Almanac charges forward at a breakneck pace, reveling in its own lucid, frenetic energy. The film would be far more respectable if its story held up to the slightest bit of scrutiny after the fact.
But we mustn’t get too worked up about the coherence of a time travel movies. It should be easy to forgive certain things, such as how a group of high-school students are able to construct a portable time travelling device. The teenage collective, led by brainiac David (Jonny Weston), are able to do this — after a great deal of trial and error — once they discover instructions and equipment for the machine left by David’s late father.
It’s not really the assembly that is hardest to swallow but the choices made by our supposedly whip-smart protagonists once they begin to venture into the past. Getting rich fast with knowledge of the future and living it up at Lollapalooza are easy decisions to accept by impulsive youth, but going to their school to get better grades? It may seem petty, but what if one of their peers were to notice two versions of any of the five of them walking through the hallways? Coming into contact with your past self could rip a hole in the universe, but it’s the first thing these geniuses do with their newfound power.
The group includes David’s sister (Virginia Gardner) — who is mostly off-screen filming the events of the movie — his two buddies Quinn (Sam Lerner) and Adam (Allen Evangelista), and the obligatory romantic interest Jessie (Sofia Black-D’Elia). They all make a pact to never jump through time alone but when David misses his shot with Jess during the debauchery of the music festival he goes back solo to get another chance. He is pleased to return to a present where the two of them are happily entangled, but he also finds that an unbelievable chain reaction has created new tragedies in the process.
The drama of the final act involves David repeatedly returning to the past to solve a problem he created by returning to the past earlier, but it takes awhile for him to realize the irony of his situation. The film is sloppy about explaining how each new negative change is manifested but the implied sentiment about karma, and the inevitable balance of the universe, is appreciated. We can’t have it all.
The cast of unknowns is fun to watch and the script’s tendency for humor keeps things relaxed just when it’s easiest to pick apart the blatant logical inconsistencies. But for every neat trick the film pulls, it turns around and breaks its own rules. The science fiction is almost digestible before the convoluted incoherence of its latter half.
Project Almanac is more concerned with cheap thrills than making sense and also gives little reason for utilizing the well-worn found-footage gimmick. It makes basic mistakes of this format too — being able to hear characters from across a crowd, infinite battery life, etc. — and tries to cover its tracks by moving faster than it hopes the audience can think.
What was probably intended as a thrilling head-trip settles for being a brainlessly giddy time-waster. If you really need your fix of fantastical found-footage romps, just revisit the superior Chronicle.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / February 2nd, 2015
It may not contribute anything groundbreaking to either the time travel genre or the now-fading found footage canon, but Project Almanac is nonetheless a diverting, breathless sci-fi yarn provided you don’t think too hard about it.
The heavily flawed film remains endearing mainly because it is so eager to please — Almanac charges forward at a breakneck pace, reveling in its own lucid, frenetic energy. The film would be far more respectable if its story held up to the slightest bit of scrutiny after the fact.
But we mustn’t get too worked up about the coherence of a time travel movies. It should be easy to forgive certain things, such as how a group of high-school students are able to construct a portable time travelling device. The teenage collective, led by brainiac David (Jonny Weston), are able to do this — after a great deal of trial and error — once they discover instructions and equipment for the machine left by David’s late father.
It’s not really the assembly that is hardest to swallow but the choices made by our supposedly whip-smart protagonists once they begin to venture into the past. Getting rich fast with knowledge of the future and living it up at Lollapalooza are easy decisions to accept by impulsive youth, but going to their school to get better grades? It may seem petty, but what if one of their peers were to notice two versions of any of the five of them walking through the hallways? Coming into contact with your past self could rip a hole in the universe, but it’s the first thing these geniuses do with their newfound power.
The group includes David’s sister (Virginia Gardner) — who is mostly off-screen filming the events of the movie — his two buddies Quinn (Sam Lerner) and Adam (Allen Evangelista), and the obligatory romantic interest Jessie (Sofia Black-D’Elia). They all make a pact to never jump through time alone but when David misses his shot with Jess during the debauchery of the music festival he goes back solo to get another chance. He is pleased to return to a present where the two of them are happily entangled, but he also finds that an unbelievable chain reaction has created new tragedies in the process.
The drama of the final act involves David repeatedly returning to the past to solve a problem he created by returning to the past earlier, but it takes awhile for him to realize the irony of his situation. The film is sloppy about explaining how each new negative change is manifested but the implied sentiment about karma, and the inevitable balance of the universe, is appreciated. We can’t have it all.
The cast of unknowns is fun to watch and the script’s tendency for humor keeps things relaxed just when it’s easiest to pick apart the blatant logical inconsistencies. But for every neat trick the film pulls, it turns around and breaks its own rules. The science fiction is almost digestible before the convoluted incoherence of its latter half.
Project Almanac is more concerned with cheap thrills than making sense and also gives little reason for utilizing the well-worn found-footage gimmick. It makes basic mistakes of this format too — being able to hear characters from across a crowd, infinite battery life, etc. — and tries to cover its tracks by moving faster than it hopes the audience can think.
What was probably intended as a thrilling head-trip settles for being a brainlessly giddy time-waster. If you really need your fix of fantastical found-footage romps, just revisit the superior Chronicle.
*Edited version published in The Pitt News / February 2nd, 2015