MACHETE (2010)

September 6, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. Sprung from the loins of the fake trailer during the Tarantino/Rodriguez double bill Grindhouse, this one delivers everything it promises: comedy, corn, bloody violence, over-the-top political statements, and wild spoofy stunts. There really is no legitimate way to critique it or review it. If you possess the gene that allowed you to enjoy Grindhouse, you will certainly be entertained by Machete.

Robert Rodriguez co-directed and co-wrote the film and puts his stamp all over it. There is no challenge to discovering where Mr. Rodriguez stands on the immigration issues. He is fortunate enough to be a filmmaker who can deliver a message in ways that very few can. Of course, this is not strictly speaking a message movie. It is better termed a spoof … heck, it’s billed as mexploitation! Danny Trejo, character actor extraordinare, finally gets his chance to carry a movie and he seizes the moment. His portrayal of Machete is with striking force and a straight poker face. There is little doubt that he is the Mexican federale whose family was killed by a drug kingpin (played by Steven Segal). Trejo tries to get on with his life, but is drawn right back in to the battle thanks to a local activist played by Michelle Rodriguez (headquartered in a Taco stand … yes, really), and by Jeff Fahey, henchman to an ultra racist State Senator played by Robert Deniro.

For a movie that prides itself more on brain spatters than brain matter, there are sufficient twists to the story to keep the viewer interested. But the real fun comes in the outrageous moments like opening credits “introducing Don Johnson“, and the cat-like ability of Machete to avoid certain death. Laughs ensue when Machete drags his brother into the fight. His brother? A new-age priest (Cheech Marin) packing an arsenal in the pews.

All of this is going on while an immigration agent played by Jessica Alba is trying to put the squeeze on Latin legend “She”, who she suspects is Michelle Rodriguez. Alba spends her lunch break playing Wii to keep fit. If all this isn’t quirky enough for you, how about Lindsay Lohan playing Fahey’s strung-out daughter, who later in the film dons a nun’s habit and a pistol?

You could think of this movie along the lines of a master spoof, similar to Airplane, only with tons of violence and explosions. The visual gags are on display, as are the one-liners that come out of left field. Mr. Rodriguez has done well for himself and his high expectation fans. I believe he knows what we want because it’s exactly what he wants himself!

SEE THIS MOVIE IF: you loved Grindhouse and can appreciate violent, over-the-top action spoofs … or if you just want to be shocked by seeing Steven Segal onscreen again.

SKIP THIS MOVIE IF: you are “normal”

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Posted by David Ferguson

THE EXPENDABLES (2010)

August 22, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. Well since I got pressured into posting full comments for Eat Pray Love, I figured it was only fair that I also post comments for the other half of my “Cinematic Battle of Estrogen vs. Testosterone.”  The most difficult movies to comment on are those in which even the filmmakers don’t take themselves seriously. Here, Sylvester Stallone creates a movie with his tongue firmly planted in his plastic surgery-enhanced cheek. It is a bit goofy and meant to be so. The good stuff is actually pretty good, but the stuff that misses the mark is a bit painful to watch.

The good stuff includes the already infamous cameo scene with Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger. It has the single best line (maybe two) in the movie and it’s just great to see Arnie back on screen. The other funny touch is the character names: Barney, Christmas, Ying Yang, Gunner, James Munroe, Toll Road, Paine, Hale Caeser, and of course, Tool. More work might have gone into the character names than the balance of the script.

The parts that don’t work include the lame one-liners that Jason Statham is forced to recite throughout. Also, after all these years, Stallone remains in love with his own face. I believe he is off screen for a total of 3 minutes. And enough with the Jet Li short jokes. One was plenty. We could have really used more of Terry Crews. He lights up the screen when he starts his trail of destruction.

Mickey Rourke, Dolph Lundgren, Steve Austin, Eric Roberts, Randy Couture and David Zayas all have their moments. But therein lies the problem. Just can’t do justice to so many characters … or is it caricatures? This one is exactly what it was meant to be. Don’t expect the world’s greatest action film. Think of it as more of a Tribute Film with non-stop stunts. Oh and a blasting version of “Mississippi Queen” by Mountain with Leslie West.

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Posted by David Ferguson

SALT (2010)

July 25, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. Remember the Alamo! Remember the Cold War! OK, the Alamo has nothing to do with this, but if you can remember Russia as a superpower and the bad guy whom the U.S. spent years and billions trying to out-spy and out-defend, then this story might makes some sense to you. Of course, the story matters little here. What matters is the action and it is actually high octane and quite fun.

Angelina Jolie has always reminded me of the scene in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid when Strother Martin is testing out Sundance’s shooting skills. When he misses the first target, Sundance asks “Can I move?”. He then proves he is much better when he moves. Angelina is the same. In her films that let her “move”, she is amazing. Think Mr. and Mrs. Smith vs. Changeling. The first she seems a natural, the second she came across as miscast. In this film, she does things no human being could do, but does these things with such commitment, that we actually believe she is capable. Her actions often border on parkour … especially when in an elevator shaft or bounding from truck to truck on a freeway.  We accept these stunts because it’s Angelina.

Support work is provided by Liev Schreiber and Chiwetel Ejiofor, both who spend much of the movie trying to figure out how Angelina does the things she does … surrounded by their teams of weapons experts. Most of the time, the way she is outnumbered leaves you thinking that if she gets out of this jam, this movie is just stupid. But once she has escaped, you just feel a little more pumped up! That’s a sign of a fun action movie.

Sure, the story is ridiculous at most points and the plot holes are more canyons than holes, but it’s kind of nice to re-visit the double or triple spy days, especially when placed within daring stunts and chases that work.

The director of this is Phillip Noyce, who is best known for a couple of the Tom Clancy adaptations – Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger. Mr. Noyce got me hooked 20 years ago on a little film called Dead Calm, starring a very young Nicole Kidman. That is a taut little thriller that takes place mostly on a sail boat in the middle of the ocean. If you’ve never seen it, you should.

So in regards to Salt, I will say that it’s a fun action-thriller in a twisty little cold war spy setting. Don’t get caught up in the plot details and just enjoy the action sequences by Angelina Jolie. Not very often I recommend ignoring a faulty script, but I actually enjoyed this one.

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Posted by David Ferguson

PREDATORS (2010)

July 10, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. If you are a fan of the 1987 original film directed by John McTiernan (Die Hard) and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, you couldn’t help but be a bit excited about this new one since Robert Rodriguez is involved. What a letdown.  It plays more like an episode of Lost, or even The Twilight Zone.

With films from Mr. Rodriguez, we have always been able to count on creativity, ingenuity, humor and excitement. This one lacks all. Now to be fair, the director is actually Nimrod Antal, whose resume includes Armored and Vacancy, both of which are as empty as this one.  But Mr. Rodriguez was very involved in the details.

Of course when your cast is minus Arnold, you start with a major handicap. When you replace him with Adrien Brody, you appear to be aiming for disappointment. Sure Mr. Brody did a few sit-ups to prep for this role, but he is no action hero, regardless of how he mimics the Christian Bale Batman voice in order to seem tough.

The rest of the bad luck cast of characters is rounded out by Laurence Fishbourne, Alice Braga, the great Danny Trejo (a Rodriguez staple), Topher Grace and Walton Goggins (so great as Boyd Crowder in Justified, TV’s best new series this past season). Just to add to the misery, the film score is simplistic and a bit of a joke itself. It certainly misses the excellent work of Alan Silvestri from the first film.

Not much need to discuss the lack of any real new material here. The bad guys are pretty much the same. The weapons are pretty much the same.  The cast and script are weaker. The real money with this one lies in a “making of” documentary in which the first “pitch” meeting takes place and the producers are presented with the idea to make a thrilling new action movie … a new Predator movie … starring … Adrien Brody and Topher Grace!

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Posted by David Ferguson

KNIGHT AND DAY (2010)

June 29, 2010

Greetings again from the darkness. I really liked director James Mangold‘s two most recent films – Walk the Line, and 3:10 to Yuma. Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz both have great smiles and look really good in swim attire. Paul Dano (There Will Be Blood, Little Miss Sunshine) is well cast as an off-center nerdy scientist. That’s the end of all the positive comments I have for this film.

The negative comments are for just about everything else in this summer “blockbuster”. It is billed as an Action-Comedy. There is plenty of action, though much of it is so far-fetched and ludicrous. There is almost no comedy. The rapid fire banter between Cruise and Diaz would have been much more effective had it been well written, instead of just fast paced.  Even the music is distracting.  Hall & Oates and Christopher Cross are painful enough, but they really should have let the composer watch the film before creating the score.

A quality action movie needs a real force coming from the bad guy. Here, the filmmakers instead provide us with a “is he a good guy or a bad guy” story line with Cruise. Anyone surprised at the real answer? Because of that, we don’t have anyone to root against. Some generic Spainish arms dealer played by Jordi Molla (Blow) and the government agent played generically by Peter Saarsgard. Generic is not a word you want associated with your movie.

This is Cruise and Diaz together for the first time since the far-superior Vanilla Sky. They both deserve better than this slop, though I feel confident they had a good time with the globe-trotting to Spain, Austria, Jamaica and a few U.S. stops in between. The fun they had filming did not translate into fun for me as a viewer. In fact, as they were driving away, I kept hoping for an ending like Thelma and Louise.

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Posted by David Ferguson

JONAH HEX (2010)

June 21, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. Had been looking forward to this one because of the unique source material with a twist on the traditional western revenge. Somehow Josh Brolin provided a brooding, deadpanning, interesting character despite being surrounded by ridiculous ideas, amateurish directing, a boring story and some atrocious supporting acting. This one simply falls flat.

While Brolin deserves the benefit of the doubt … I am sure his vision was better than director Jimmy Hayward’s … there is no logical explanation for the “super weapon” or the “love interest”. The background given for the super weapon is that it’s an Eli Whitney invention, and there is simply no excuse for Megan Fox and her cardboard performance as the hooker with a heart only for Hex.

The other thing that seems pretty basic is that a revenge story needs a strong basis for a burning need to get even. Here we get a weak, aloof bad guy played by John Malkovich, who kills Hex’s family AFTER Hex had killed Malkovich’s son. Oh yeah, almost forgot, Jonah Hex can communicate with the dead. Which is good, because there won’t be any live people in the audience once word spreads on how lousy this movie is. Such a shame.

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Posted by David Ferguson

THE A-TEAM (2010)

June 13, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. Plenty of hating going on by the real film critics for this update of the 80’s TV series. What I saw was a fun, over-the-top action film designed to explode with entertainment value. There are plenty of things that prevent this from being a great movie, but nothing that prevents it from being a good ol’ time at the local cinema.

Writer/Director Joe Carnahan makes some of the same mistakes he made in Smokin’ Aces, but overall, he lets the bigger than life characters control the film … well, except when the sometimes-ridiculous action sequences take over. His casting choices are interesting: Liam Neeson as Hannibal (originally played by George Peppard), Bradley Cooper as pretty boy charmer “Face” (Dirk Benedict on the series), District 9 actor Sharlto Copley as scene-stealing daredevil Murdock (was Dwight Schultz) and UFC bad boy Quinton “Rampage” Jackson replacing the iconic Mr. T as B.A. Baracus.

Neeson handles the Hannibal role with an all-knowing smirk, a Cuban cigar and the knowledge that he is mostly the straight man here. Cooper relishes the chance to remove his shirt and flash his dimples and blue eyes. Copley provides much hope for his acting future since he pretty much takes over the screen in all of his scenes. Jackson, on the other hand, really should consider going back to the UFC world – his acting skills are responsible for some of the weakest moments in the film.

I purposefully chose “some of the weakest moments” so as to make a real point in regards to the deflater of the film. The deflater is the one who causes the film to go flat (the air from the balloon) every time he/she is on screen. Without question, the A-Team deflater is Jessica Biel. Apparently straight from the Elizabeth Berkley school of acting, Biel continues to land gigs because producers find her attractive. The attribute of “attractiveness” is only effective for photographs if not teamed with some type of acting ability. When Ms. Biel holds a gun, emotes or reads a line, the viewer feels nothing but letdown. Despite the carnage reaped by the boys, she out-kills them with her screen time.

The good news is that there are some really funny lines and moments despite the fantastical nature of the action sequences. Also Carnahan and co-writer Brian Bloom (who also plays bad guy Pike) have done an admirable job of paying tribute to the original series. Dirk Benedict and Dwight Schultz have cameos and a brief scene post-credits. Mr. T reportedly rejected a chance to appear and, of course, George Peppard passed many years ago. We even get a tribute (albeit a quick one) to the A-Team van … and it’s nice to hear the familiar sounds of the theme song and series opening.

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Posted by David Ferguson

ROBIN HOOD (2010)

May 20, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. Hard to argue with the box office success when director Ridley Scott teams up with Russell Crowe (Gladiator, American Gangster). Can’t really challenge the resume of writer Bryan Helgeland (Mystic River, L.A. Confidential) or the acting chops of Cate Blanchett, Max von Sydow or William Hurt. And only the most cynical would deny the appeal of the Robin Hood legend … stealing from the rich to give to the poor. So why is it that I feel so cheated and let down by this version?

First of all, it is presented as a prequel to the legend. This is the story of how Robin and his band of merry men (and Maid Marion) came to be united. If it is a prequel, why then is Robin (Russell Crowe) so darn old? There is even a line in the film noting the advanced age of King Richard the Lionheart being 40 or even more! For the times, this was considered old, yet somehow Robin is ready for a career change.

The best parts of the film are the amazing sets and pieces – both the villages and the boats. And we all know that Mr. Scott can film a massive battle scene! There is a touch of Gladiator, Saving Private Ryan and Braveheart in many scenes. All fine, but what I really missed was the flirtatious banter between Robin and Marion. Maybe I am biased, but a Lorena Bobbitt threat doesn’t strike me as light-hearted bed chamber conversation.

My biggest complaint is with the script. It just felt clunky and messy. A couple of scenes were apparently included just so Mark Strong could scowl … and he has a great scowl! Other scenes and lines were seemingly included just to give the film a complex feel. Probably too complex for what it really is.

Oscar Isaac as Prince John was the funniest and most interesting character in the film. The preview made him look like a buffoon, but the film gave him more depth … and a couple of great lines. Danny Huston as Lionheart, Mark Addy as Friar Tuck and Matthew Macfadyen as the Sheriff of Nottingham all add to the luster, but remember this is prior to Robin’s ongoing battles with the Sheriff.

Be cautious with younger kids as it is a strong PG-13. The battle scenes are entertaining, but this is one legend that did not need its roots exposed.

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Posted by David Ferguson

IRON MAN 2 (2010)

May 9, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. No secret that I really enjoyed the first Iron Man movie a couple of years ago. For 2, we get the return of key players: Robert Downey, jr as Tony Stark, Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts, and Jon Favreau in the director chair. We also get an onslaught of new players: Mickey Rourke as Ivan Vanko/Whiplash, Sam Rockwell as Justin Hammer, Scarlett Johansson as Natalie/Natasha/Black Widow, Garry Shandling as Senator Stern and Don Cheadle (replacing Terence Howard) as War Machine.

Onslaught may be the best word I can use to describe the film. It is an onslaught to the senses. There are so many characters – both good guys and bad. There are so many explosions, fights and booms that we resist the urge to blink. There is so much overlapping and oddly paced dialogue that we strain to fill in the blanks. And what of the inside jokes and “advertising” for future Avengers fun? OK, maybe “Fun” is the key word, not onslaught. These characters are a blast (pun, slightly intended). Watching a creepy Mickey Rourke plot revenge in the Russian darkness is terrific. Sam Rockwell chewing scenery is not to be missed. Garry Shandling’s snarky senator is a hoot, especially at the end. And I have been surfing the net all night searching for a suitcase sized Iron Man suit. OK, not really … but that was super cool.

I’ve got it!  “An onslaught of fun!” The great and talented Justin Theroux was brought in to script the multitude of players and story lines … he must be a master juggler as none get cheated in their screen time. Even Samuel L Jackson as Nick Fury is given a much heavier workload than in part one – setting the stage for his NINE scheduled film appearances as Mr. Fury.

The film is huge and spectacular, but falls just short of the first one for a single reason. The wow of discovery can only be had once. That’s not a knock on this one, but timing is crucial. Must also mention the brilliance of Robert Downey, Jr who seems born to play Tony Stark. Of course, the brilliance of Mr. Downey is that he always seems born to play his roles. He is a great actor … check his ability to spout wise cracking one-liners and then mix in a couple of actually tender moments with Paltrow’s Pepper Potts. Not many actors could do that effectively. He pulls it off seamlessly.

What really matters is that it’s a fun trip to theatre. Don’t expect this year’s Best Picture winner. Expect to laugh and be visually wowed. I certainly was.  If you liked the first one, chances are good that you will appreciate this well made sequel.

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Posted by David Ferguson

KICK-ASS (2010)

April 17, 2010

 Greetings again from the darkness. Just when you are convinced the comic book movie genre has been overdone, in swoops director Matthew Vaughn (the rocking Layer Cake) to reach an entirely new level through a unique, unconventional and twisted approach. It does’t take but a few minutes to realize that clichés mixed with shocks will mess with your movie-processing mind!

Somehow we are treated to teen angst,superhero-ism and most every human emotion and type between the two. WARNING: this movie is rated R and it is a strong R … IT IS NOT FOR KIDS! The film slam-dances between ultra violence and uber-geekdom and satire driven slapstick. We get a 12 year old Chloe Moretz as Hit Girl, wielding weapons even more deadly than her shockingly adult tongue. Moretz was also a standout in last year’s 500 Days of Summer. We get her revenge-driven, ex-clean cop Big Daddy father (Nicolas Cage) in Batman costume mentoring her to the ways of a world class assassin. I busted out laughing when I realized that Mr. Cage’s voice mannerism mimic that of the great Adam West while donning the black cape. A very nice touch. Our other home grown, would be superheroes are Aaron Johnson as Kick-ass (replete with green scuba suit) and McLovin (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) as Red Mist. Most of these characters are one step removed from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.

Of course a comic book story must have a top notch villain and these days there are few better than Mark Strong. He delivers another terrific dead-pan performance as a drug lord and father to Red Mist. Strong’s character is the driving force behind Big Daddy’s quest for revenge.

Aaron Johnson’s Kick-ass is an example of the clunky teenager who has a good heart and is desperate for attention from the girls. He even accepts being labeled as gay by the hot chick he adores just so he can spend time with her. He hangs at the comic book store with his equally geeky friends and then “transforms” into Kick-ass, a superhero with no powers other than a desire to do what’s right and help those in need.

Mark Millar’s script balances many cultural and societal observations while delivering a visual parade of images and sounds (wonderful music and score … including ELVIS) and moments that will keep the viewer unsettled. You might think it odd that an early scene lingers on a giant advertisement featuring Claudia Schiffer. Ms. Schiffer is married to the director and becomes one of many tributes and satires throughout the film. This is quite a different experience and one that not all will enjoy … but it is to be admired for reaching for new levels.

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Posted by David Ferguson

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