Category: Reviews

Box Office Democracy: The Lego Batman Movie

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I wonder if there’s a pop culture franchise I wouldn’t be excited to see turned in to a Lego production at this point.  The Lego Batman Movie could have so easily been an uninspired cash-in to take advantage of how profitable Batman is as a character and the good will we all still feel from The Lego Movie but instead we have a movie chock full of funny jokes, intriguing themes, and most importantly a monumental amount of effort.  This is such a strong children’s movie that I saw it in a packed house on a Saturday night with basically no children, and it was the most boisterous crowd I’ve been a part of in recent memory.  Lego Batman is a triumph, a shining beacon, that every other DC movie should be trying to reach the same level of competence or at least figuring out how to fake it to the studio executives.  Perhaps Ben Affleck is not actually trying to get out if his obligation to play Batman not because of creative differences but because he’s worried about being overshadowed by Will Arnett.

There’s nothing to the plot of The Lego Batman Movie that you haven’t seen elsewhere— it’s just kind of unique to see these elements in a superhero story and, perhaps more importantly, in a movie about a hero so associated with hypermasculinity.  This is a story about Batman needing to connect with people, to construct a family out of the people in his life to replace the one he lost.  Interestingly, instead of making this a source of external conflict, it’s only a source of internal conflict; almost every important supporting character is falling over themselves to become an essential part of Batman’s life, from the obvious examples of Alfred and Robin to the quasi-adversarial Barbara Gordon who might not approve of Batman’s methods but wants to be close to him, and even the Joker wants to destroy all of Gotham City but more than that he wants Batman to acknowledge that he’s important in his life.  The actual plot elements are a little thin, many elements of the evil plot seem designed to shoehorn in as many other licensed characters as possible, and while those are some fun cameos it doesn’t make for a complex story.

One thing that kind of bugged me about The Lego Batman Movie is that it doesn’t play with the idea of being toys the way The Lego Movie did.  It’s clearly supposed to be the same world and all the weapons make “pew pew” sounds like a child is making them, but it never pulls back to the “real world” layer to see Will Farrell’s kid.  I’m not sure what it would have been— the obvious answer seems to be about the death of a parent and that may have been a little dark, perhaps giving this story a chance to reflect a slightly more real situation would have helped it land a little harder.  As it is we get a great movie, but one that fails to land with quite the same impact as The Lego Movie.  Not that “slightly worse than The Lego Movie” is a particularly stern critique; I just wanted a bit more depth.

Will Arnett is an absolute treasure as Batman.  I’m not entirely sure how strong any of the material he was given was in an objective sense because it feels like he could reenact the end of Old Yeller in that voice and it would get huge laughs.  I would watch a live action Batman movie starring Arnett and I would promise to ignore the fact that he would never be in the kind of shape you expect to see The Caped Crusader in.  Rosario Dawson is a pleasant surprise as Barbara Gordon making a deep character at what could have been a thankless role.  Michael Cera is great at awestruck and overly affectionate, I wonder if we couldn’t have seen a little more range from him as that bit can wear a little thin.  It’s so thrilling to hear Billy Dee Williams voice Two Face that you can easily overlook that the part has fewer than five lines.

It is so refreshing to get a DC Comics movie that isn’t taking itself so seriously.  The Lego Batman Movie is fun before it’s anything else.  It isn’t obsessed with continuity (although it does reference in some way almost every other on-screen depiction of Batman to date), or with having a dark tone, or with proving the comics are for grown-ups.  This is a movie that just wants to be fun— and that’s so refreshing after two Superman movies that seemed fixated on generating the biggest body counts.  I need some childlike wonder in my superhero movies; I can get gritty nihilism from the real world.

Box Office Democracy: Rings

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Most of the time when a studio looks to revive or remake an old property it’s a desperate grasp for more money, but I’m willing to give the people behind Rings a little more credit than that.  The Ring is about a shared video, and the ways in which we share and consume videos has changed so much in the 15 years since the original came out.  Rings exists to carry the franchise into the YouTube era, and it pays off on a lot of the promise offered by the new technology (although not actually YouTube which was strange).  Rings is a clever movie, but clever isn’t enough on its own— and unfortunately, clever is all Rings has.

I absolutely adored the use of new technology.  There’s a sequence where Samara emerges from a flat screen TV that has fallen face down on the floor that never would have happened 15 years ago and looks amazing.  I’m sure the actual technology to do that effect has been around for decades (at least since Thing in The Addams Family I reckon) but it looks like a million bucks and it feels new.  While not exactly showing off new technology, there’s a shot right before the credits where a character looks fearfully out a window while it’s raining, and when the lightning lights up the window it becomes the well shot from the cursed tape and that was my favorite shot of the whole film.  Again, there are good ideas here through the haze of mediocre filmmaking.

The story is convoluted, and while it contains interesting ideas it ends up right back where every other Ring movie has been.  We start out with this interesting idea about studying the tape as a scientific phenomenon with an infrastructure built in a college to keep passing the curse along so it can be studied.  This idea is tossed aside at the end of the first act and we get to more exploring the circumstances of Samara’s life in an attempt to break the curse just like we did in The Ring and The Ring Two.  There’s a mildly interesting twist, but it all ends up about where one would expect and that’s not even taking in to account that much of the end of the movie is contained in the trailer.

Through all this narrative malaise the entire enterprise is almost saved by two bigger name actors slumming it through Rings.  Johnny Galecki is playing a creepy version of his character from The Big Bang Theory and he simply outclasses the array of marginal TV actors and performers I’ve never seen before that he’s put with in this film.  It’s not a huge part but Galecki looks like a movie star, which might serve him well if he ever gets tired of sitting around on his giant pile of money after his TV show wraps up.  Vincent D’Onofrio is given the most leeway by the script and he turns in a powerful performance.  D’Onofrio is capable of switching from unassuming to terribly menacing in the blink of an eye.  It’s almost like he never stopped playing Wilson Fisk; he’s the best thing about the film even if his mere presence feels like a bit of a spoiler the first time you see him.

We have to be willing to accept that just about half of movies will be below average, and Rings is certainly in that half, but that that effort separates the mundane from the awful.  Rings isn’t a good movie, perhaps because the two lead actors are amazingly boring, but it’s trying.  It knows what it has to add to the mythos and it tries to weave those additions seamlessly in to the established formula.  The result is a bland retread, but one with moments and performances that will endure— hopefully as inspiration for a better movie down the road.

REVIEW: Justice League Dark

jldark-box-art-3d-e1479329949742-1499071The concept of the DC Comics’ mystical characters gathering to combat occult evil always sounds good but of course, execution is everything. When it was done sparingly, as in Swamp Thing #50, it was quite effective. As an ongoing series, it proved tough to manage since each player was plucked from a title that had a fairly unique look and feel.

That said, the newly released animated Justice League Dark film is incredibly entertaining and certainly a cut above the last half-dozen releases. From a story by JLD writer J.M. DeMatteis and Ernie Altbacker, Altbacker’s script shifts the super-heroic DC Universe to supernatural threats that Superman (Jerry O’Connell), Wonder Woman (Rosario Dawson), Green Lantern (Roger Cross) and the others are less equipped to handle. Altbacker is no stranger to heroes and magicians with credits including Spooksville and Green Lantern: The Animated Series and he does a fine job weaving the various threads.

A series of disconnected people around America and then the world think they are seeing demons and a puzzled JLA feels a bit out of their depths. Batman (Jason O’Mara), the logical character to bridge the worlds, is at first skeptical until Deadman (Nicholas Turturro) arrives to possess him and insist he seek out John Constantine (Matt Ryan). To find the Brit, he reconnects with his old friend Zatanna (Camilla Luddington) and from there, the path takes them to Constantine, living in the House of Mystery. Along the way, they collect Jason Blood (Ray Chase), which means we get plenty of doggerel from his counterpart Etrigan the Demon,

Thankfully, the story pauses now and then to give us brief origins which will certainly help introduce these lesser known players to a wider audience.

To locate the cause of the supernatural infestation, Constantine once again uses and abuses friends in trademark fashion. There’s a nice exchange when he must summon Swamp Thing (Roger Cross) for help.

The DC Animated Universe differs sharply from the DC Universe and Cinematic Universe not just in how characters look but also their back stories. The biggest change here is Black Orchid (Colleen Villard), now a spirit protecting the House of Mystery’s artifacts. There’s another substantive change at the end which I won’t mention.

Amped up beyond anything we’ve seen in the comics is Felix Faust (Enrico Colantoni), who seems super-charged as he magically duels the entire team. Later we get an almost unrecognizable Doctor Destiny, here a centuries-old being called only Destiny (Alfred Molina).

The movie moves along at a lovely clip and director Jay Oliva excels with the magic battles, refreshed after growing a tad tiresome of the superhero fights. He brings a nice moody look and feel to the entire production which is most welcome.

Vocally, the cast is strong, of course, and the banter between Luddington (Grey’s Anatomy) and Ryan (live-action’s Constantine) is a highlight.

The two-disc gift set comes with a Constantine figurine. Special features on the Blu-ray include an enticing look at this spring’s Teen Titans: The Judas Contract, also from Altbacker. There’s a very nice featurette on The Story of Swamp Thing, featuring cocreator Len Wein and artist Kelley Jones address the creature’s origins and the stunning art from cocreator Bernie Wrightson. There are a series of short, almost pointless, Did You Know?s including Constantine origin, Color of Magic, Black Orchid, and Deadman. A 2016 NY Comic Con Panel is included. Finally, From the DC Vault offers up Batman: The Brave and the Bold, “Dawn of the Dead Man!” and Batman: The Brave and the Bold, “Trials of the Demon!”

REVIEW: Frankenstein: The Real Story/The Real Wolfman

3d-dvd-box-art-e1484683306943-7070450The History Channel has occasionally explored the roots of the monsters that thrilled and chilled our childhood and Lionsgate Home Entertainment has dutifully released them on disc every now and then. Coming Tuesday is a nice little double feature package collecting the previously released Frankenstein: The Real Story and The Real Wolfman on a single standard DVD for the bargain price of $12.98.

While overwrought and overly dramatic with some cheesy music and effects, both creations are worth a look if only because it gives us a chance to look at things in context.

We begin with three pieces exploring Frankenstein and his monster. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s novel, as many know, was written as a result of a ghost story contest among her literary peers. What the In Search of the Real Frankenstein does is explore the quickly evolving world of science in the early nineteenth century. Scientists had used electricity to animate animal limbs and others tried shocking humans as well. And while touring Europe with Percy Shelley, she is likely to have heard about Konrad Dippel, who conducted unsavory experiments in the real Frankenstein castle. All of which acts are prelude to the second piece, Frankenstein, which is more biographical about Shelley herself. Her scandalous affair with Percy, who left his pregnant wife to tour with her, and life after his death are nicely covered along with the novel itself, which first appeared without her byline. She finally affixed her name to it five years later for the second edition.

The final piece is It’s Alive! The True Story of Frankenstein, narrated by Roger Moore (one wonders why he was chosen). Here, the many stage and screen adaptations of her work, are examined and I am pleased the Hammer films get their due so the focus isn’t just on Universal’s output. There are nice interviews with Mel Brooks, Gene Wilder, special effects wizard Rick Baker, film historian David Skal, Sara Karloff, Kenneth Branagh, and, Peter Bogdanovich. While the most familiar of the three, it is satisfying.

What most fans may be less aware of is covered in The Real Wolfman, a 90-minute exploration of the thing called Gevaudan that is credited with killing 100 people in France at the end of the eighteenth century. Similar to Ghost Hunters, the film features George Deucher, a retired policeman and criminal profiler, and Ken Gerhard, a crypto-zoologist as they journey to France in search of the truth behind the legend. They come off as somewhat clueless and at times erratic as they interview historians and descendants of the people who were there during the attacks. Most interesting is the story of Jean Chastel, credited with ending the threat, possibly using silver bullets he made and then had blessed by a priest. Some coverage is devoted to the history of werewolves, which puts Gevaudan into perspective. The reenactments are nicely done and add a quality touch to the production.

This disc is a representation of the previous releases and appears in 1.33:1 standard ratio with Dolby digital 2 channel audio. As a result, everything is perfectly acceptable for home viewing.

There are no extras presented with this fun double-feature.

Box Office Democracy: Split

Split is over a week old and that’s usually enough to disqualify a movie from coverage here.  (This is the policy that keeps me from reviewing Blade 2 every six months in a vain attempt to force it in to the conversation for best superhero movie of all time.)  But Split had a secret, and that secret didn’t get out until the movie had released and I had already watched the movie for last week.  I’m going to talk about this secret right off the bat so if you have somehow avoided this piece of information I will tell you that Split is an excellent horror movie that might be a bit tame in the sheer terror aspects but is totally worth watching especially if you’ve liked M. Night Shyamalan’s works in the past.  From here on it’s spoilers on; stop reading if you want that undisturbed experience.

We’ll wait for you below.

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Box Office Democracy: xXx: Return of Xander Cage

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I was extremely excited when I walked out of the original xXx back in the summer of 2002.  Finally, a spy film for my generation.  Something that could mix international espionage and the X-Games aesthetic that seemed poised to take over the world.  I’ve rewatched xXx recently and it does not hold up at all.  Also, I never participated in any extreme sports or watched very much of any X-Games so I have no idea why embracing this culture appealed to me at all.  In retrospect, the original xXx was an okay action movie with some fantastic costuming and an awful lot of dated references.  15 years later xXx: Return of Xander Cage is still trying to traffic in counter-culture hipness, but it doesn’t feel like anyone involved in the production has talked to a cool person or a youth in decades.  Return of Xander Cage is jam-packed with the kind of disingenuous focus-grouped edginess the characters would claim to hate.  Too bad they’re fictional and not writing this or any other better movies.

In Return of Xander Cage everyone who is part of the establishment is bad.  I’m not against this general ethos, the establishment is generally a terrible thing— but the medium has to inform the message.  This is a film made by a major studio, so when the burly special forces soldier who doesn’t care for Xander Cage and his alternative ways taunts him saying that he must love Red Bull and Mountain Dew, I can’t help but wonder if those companies paid for that placement.  I see the two leads of these extreme spy teams being played by two actors with a combined age of 102 and I can’t help but think of that 30 Rock meme with Steve Buscemi pretending to be a high school student.

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Return of Xander Cage could be so much more cool if it wasn’t so intent on telling me that it was cool all the time.  (I don’t even want to get in to how 44 year-old Toni Collette is kind of made to look like an old crone next to her older male co-stars but it’s also bad, I just don’t want to be here all night.)

There’s also a sense that Return of Xander Cage is trying to capture some of the magic of Vin Diesel’s other, more successful franchise, The Fast and the Furious, but it’s not clear that anyone involved knows what made those work.  They copied the big multicultural cast, they copied the never-ending banter, they copied the ambitious action sequence, and they copied the requirement of having a few party scenes full of beautiful people dancing to music.  None of it works as well.  Most of the supporting characters feel like quick thumbnail sketches instead of people, and for a movie that literally circumnavigates the world it feels rather small.  There’s a secret sauce in the Fast and Furious movies and it might just be as simple as star power or sharper action choreography or even just familiarity with the universe, but those movies are just as far fetched and just as ridiculous and they work.

I’m usually not on a high horse about sequels or Hollywood running out of ideas, but this feels like a spot that should have gone to a new idea.  Return of Xander Cage feels weighed down with the baggage of the two previous movies and I can’t imagine that enough people where clamoring for more xXx to necessitate this (and the box office results seem to back me up on that).  There are a couple usable ideas here, and maybe on their own they could have blossomed in to something else but instead they’re just drowned out by the baggage of trying to live up to this X-Games early-2000s rebelliousness.  Return of Xander Cage is the cinematic equivalent of the guy in his early 20s hanging around the park with high school kids— it isn’t making him seem cool and everyone there just kind of wishes he was doing something else.

REVIEW: Newsprints

Newsprints
By Ru Xu
208 pages, Scholastic Graphix, $12.99

newsprints-e1483024173946-4505740A world eerily familiar to our own but not, a time of war between two neighboring nations, and a girl masquerading as a boy because she loves selling newspapers. Toss in some steampunk, some science fiction, some gender roles and identity issues, stir vigorously and you have Newsprints a refreshingly original graphic novel from Ru Xu.

Best known for her webcomic Saint for Rent (http://www.saintforrent.com/comic/the-cloverhouse-inn), the SCAD graduate moves from serialized storytelling to a done-in-one adventure that breezily moves along. Lavender Blue has come to work at the Bugle, living with her fellow newsies and keeping her sex a secret because, for some inexplicable reason, girls can’t sell newspapers.

On her website, Xu states, “I’m really excited about the first book because it explores a lot of eye-opening feelings I had toward fitting in while growing up, gender identity, and dealing with the expectations of adults. I got to draw a backdrop inspired by the early 20th century and dieselpunk,”

Adolescent Blue is content for now, although she is aware her body will betray her soon enough. She winds up meeting Jack, an inventor of some sort, working in secret. They become friends and she apprentices herself to him. As a result, he brings her with him on his travels which leads to her accidental meeting with the muffled figure who only names himself Crow. She warms to the odd figure and they spend time together but slowly, we learn, that Crow is a robot, a product of Jack’s intelligence and early use of Artificial Intelligence. He was a prototype for a war machine but he chose to leave his country Grimmaea for refuge in Nautilene.

There are chases, secrets learned, relationships altered, and the like before things reach its anticipated climax and resolution. Xu tackles lots of issues and themes here and for me one of keenest was her sense of betrayal when she comes to realize the truth is the first casualty of war. Gender politics comes into play with Blue but also with an adult, Jill, who comes to play a pivotal role.

It’s 1924 and there are phrases like AI that get used so this alternate reality isn’t totally divorced from our world but the worldbuilding is sketchy at best so we don’t understand why things are the way they are or what is at stake during the prolonged war. Blue, Jack, and Crow are the only characters to move beyond two dimensions which is shame since the others, Hector, the Mayor, and Jill among them, who could use some depth and complexity.

Visually, Xu’s work is minimalist with a strong sense of design. Still, the broad strokes and spare use of line means expressions can lack subtlety when called for. Sometimes figures are moving in a panel and you can’t quite tell what is happening. Xu fills the pages and paces things nicely, sparing with splash pages or complicated designs. Xu’s color, done with her brother Eric and Liz Fleming, does a nice job with a limited palette. In Saint for Rent, she has been very disciplined with color because she embeds GIFs to enhance the webcomic and the colors have to be harmonious. Here, she works with broader colors without getting garish, helping give us a sense this is not our world.

The 8-12 year olds this is aimed at will find plenty to like and hopefully read some things that gets to them to think a bit. This nice debut work shows plenty of promise for the future.

Tweeks Review March Book One by John Lewis

While we were off school for MLK Jr. Day, we decided to spend some time honoring the incredible Congressman John Lewis and his March graphic novel trilogy with a review of the first book & rebuke to some decidedly unpresidental tweets

 

 

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