Waitress (R-2007)

I've complained before about how independent film has become just as cookie cutter as mainstream movies, mainly the quirky lead character blueprint.  "Waitress" follows that and also include the assortment of quirky supporting cast that often fills the bill.  Jenna (Keri Russell) is a waitress in a pie diner, who also has a talent for creating interesting pies of her own.  As the movie opens, she learns she is pregnant.  She is not thrilled with the news, as she is in the middle of a horrible marriage to an abusive husband (Jeremy Sisto), who may also be one of the most irritating characters on film (HONK, HONK, HONK!!).  The movie follows us through her pregnancy and her incredibly inappropriate relationship with her obstetrician (Nathan Fillion), along with the struggles of dealing with her husband, who she wants nothing more than to get away from.  The setting in the deep south and its offbeat people makes this slightly reminiscent of the work of the Coen Brothers, except not nearly as good.  As "chick flicks" go, this one is better than most.  Andy Griffith (who has become so old he is almost unrecognizable) is one of the bright spots of the movie as the eccentric old man who owns the diner and always seems to be able to read exactly what is going on in Jenna's life.  He informally becomes her conscience, giving her unsolicited advice based on what he believes she is up to (and seems to always be right).  The odd pacing and storytelling (pies are often shown being made with voice-over to explain how those pies reflect her feelings) took a little getting used to, as did the diner setting which was way too similar to the TV show "Alice".  The bottom line is that this is a pretty good "chick flick", but at the end of the day, it IS a "chick flick".

Grade: C

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The Forbidden Kingdom (PG-13-2008)

Hack movie critic time: Here are some other possible titles for "The Forbidden Kingdom": "Lord of the Mings" or "The Dragon of Oz". Basically, this film follows the "quest" blueprint of those films and has many common themes. Of course, the source material for this movie comes from Chinese folklore and probably pre-dates either of those films or the books they were based on. "The Forbidden Kingdom" unites Jackin Chan and Jet Li for the first time on film. While they come from very different martial art film backgrounds (Chan is usually in lighter, fun martial arts film, while Li leans toward more darker fare), the collaboration works very well. The film begins with the story of Jason Tripitikas (Michael Angarano), a boy in South Boston obsessed with kung fu movies, who finds himself forced by neighborhood thugs to help them rob a Chinese pawn shop he frequents. During the robbery, he is given an ancient staff by the store owner (Jackie Chan) and told to return it to its rightful owner. He finds himself transported to China many years in the past (the exact time period is unclear), where he meets a drunken master (Jackie Chan), who will assist him in his quest. The "rightful owner" of the staff is the Monkey King (Jet Li), who is being held after being transformed to stone. Along the way, they meet The Silent Monk (Jet Li) and Golden Sparrow (Yifei Liu), who also agree to assist them on their mission. Along the way, they are met with many obstacles and good old-fashioned adventure as Jason is taught the ways of "gung-fu". This is a very fun adventure film and I was actually very impressed with the performances of Jackie Chan and Jet Li. They really complemented each other perfectly in this film and their differing styles meshed very well. As far as the films referenced earlier, this is a little darker in tone than "The Wizard of Oz" and not quite as dark as "The Lord of the Rings". This movie is a fun adventure story where you actually get to learn a little bit about some of the characters that make up Chinese folklore.

Grade: B-

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American History X (R-1998)

It's been out for 10 years and I have finally gotten around to seeing "American History X". While I am a big Edward Norton fan, there is one scene in the film that is so brutal, just hearing about it made me avoid the film. While the scene in question was brutal, it was merely one of several scenes of brutality and ugliness. Edward Norton plays Derek Vinyard, a vehement racist who leads a group of white supremacists in urban Los Angeles. When he violently confronts a group of black men who are breaking into his car, he finds himself going to prison for his actions. While he is in prison, his younger brother, Danny (Edward Furlong), becomes more and more deeply involved with the gang of white supremacists. When Derek is released, he is hailed as a returning hero but he is a very changed man. He no longer believes in the extreme racism he once championed and is driven to get his brother back on the straight and narrow. His transformation is so complete, it actually comes off as unrealistic. This was a bad dude, hell-bent at being on the forefront of the race war and now, he is a reasonable man who hates all that he once stood for. It does not seem realistic that such a complete reversal would take place while in prison. Using black-and-white flashbacks, the film does an excellent job at explaining this transformation, while also detailing the genesis of his hatred. Edward Norton and Edward Furlong are fantastic in this film. People familiar with Ethan Suplee from "My Name is Earl" and several Kevin Smith films will be amazed by the utterly reprehensible character he plays in this film. There are also very good performances by Stacy Keach, Beverly D'Angelo, Elliot Gould and Avery Brooks, who has been a personal favorite of mine since his role as "Hawk" in "Spenser: For Hire". If you having been living under a rock like I have with regards to this movie, I highly recommend getting up to speed and seeing this powerful film.

Grade: B+

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Redbelt (R-2008)

Screenwriter/director David Mamet explores the corrupt world of prize-fighting, using Mixed Martial Arts as the setting, in this gripping drama. Mike Terry (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is an honorable jiu-jitsu instructor struggling to make ends meet as his gym is struggling. An incident in his gym starts a chain of events that have him faced with the prospect of losing everything. Reluctantly, he accepts a proposal to enter the undercard of a mixed martial arts event, where he comes face to face with the corruption that exists in the fight game. Despite being rooted in martial arts, this is not an action film, by any means. It is a slow moving, yet riveting human drama of a man faced with the dilemma of doing what is right, against heavy pressures to take the easy way out. Ejiofor, a very unknown actor, is straddled with the task of carrying this film as he appears in almost every scene and he pulls it off beautifully. His struggles, his confusion, his agony are all written on his face and there to illustrate the tough choices he faces. The plot has several twists, some of which are shocking, which help keep your interest in this movie glued, even as the plot itself moves along slowly. While it seems there are several subplots going on, the strings of these all get tied together, showing them to be all related. Mamet has a great writing resume ("Glengary Glen Ross") and this is one of those films where the star of the film is the script. The dialogue is well-written and the plot, while intricate, is never confusing. While I do not follow mixed martial arts fighting, this did not deter one bit from the movie. This story might have worked equally well with a boxing backdrop, but the philosophies and teachings of martial arts help to set up some of the dilemmas faced by the main character.

Grade: B-

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Superhero Movie (PG-13-2008)

There are several reasons not to bother with this movie: it was not screened for critics, it did horrible box office and the theater-to-DVD turnaround time was very quick. Those are usually the ingredients for a horrible movie. There is only one reason to actually give the movie a chance: It is actually pretty funny. Using the framework of the first "Spider-Man" film, "Superhero Movie" spoofs the comic-book movie genre and actually does so pretty effectively. One of the problems with many of these modern spoof movies is a tendency to throw everything into the mix to see what sticks, paying no attention to whether any of it makes sense or maintaining narrative flow. "Superhero Movie" goes back to the "Airplane!" method of spoofing the genre while telling the story in a cohesive way. Make no mistake, the comparison to "Airplane!" does not put this film in that class. Many of these films, e.g, "Scary Movie" try too hard to shoe-horn as many movie references as possible, whether they fit or not. "Superhero movie" at least sticks to the genre it is spoofing and rarely makes a tangent just to fit something else in. Two instances where it does so are a Tom Cruise You-Tube spoof that is actually pretty funny and a Pamela Anderson cameo that is really not. The Pamela Anderson cameo is part of an X-Men tangent that the movie could have done without. Another problem with the movie is, surprisingly, Leslie Nielsen. With "Airplane!" and "The Naked Gun" on his resume, he is arguably a master of the spoof genre. However, somewhere along the way, he forgot the basic element to what made those films a success: Play the comedy straight. In "Superhero Movie", he is way over the top, making him sort of a parody of himself. The bottom line is that this a much-maligned movie, sometime for good reason, but one that actually made me laugh quite a few times. It is hardly a great movie, but no nearly as bad as you may have been led to believe.

Grade: C-

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Vantage Point (PG-13-2008)

"Vantage Point" refers to the different points of view individuals have of the same event.  This storytelling device was made famous by the Japanese film "Rashomon".  In this instance, the event in question is the shooting of an American President (William Hurt) when appearing at an anti-terrorism summit in Spain.  The movie opens with the arrival of the President, protected by his Secret Service detail, Thomas Barnes (Dennis Quaid) and Kent Taylor (Matthew Fox).  For Barnes, it is his first assignment on the presidential detail since recovering from a bullet he took for the President some time ago (apparently, people like shooting at this president).  The story continues to the shooting, followed by some explosions as we have a full-scale terrorist attack.  Then, the movie stops and starts again as we see this unfold from another vantage point.  This happens around five or six times, so it does get a little frustrating watching the same thing happen over and over and over again.  They do manage to feed little details each time to keep it interesting.  Once we have gone through all of the different viewpoints, the rest of the film is non-stop action as the Secret Service, led by Barnes, close in on the bad guys.  There are a couple of interesting plot twists, some of which you don't see coming (one of which is a bit of a "cheat", but I can't expand on that without giving it away).  The cast is very good and this is an entertaining movie overall.  It is not without some problems, however.  One issue was the character of Howard Lewis (Forest Whitaker), an American tourist with a video camera who, for some reason, decides he is the only man that can save the world.  The things he does as the movie unfolds are just not realistic at all.  One of the other issues was one particular dialogue exchange.  The President is being pressured by one of his National Security staffers (Bruce McGill) to give an order to strike a suspected terrorist camp.  "We have to act strong", he says.  "No, we have to BE strong", the President responds, "We have the world on our side, we must respect that and not squander it."  It was an incredibly transparent dig at the current administration and actually took me out of the movie.  Why Hollywood insists on doing stuff like this is beyond me.  If you can get past seeing the same events over and over for a while, though, you have a pretty entertaining movie. 

Grade:  C+

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Baby Mama (R-2008)

The Saturday Night Live duo of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler move to the big screen in this surrogate mother comedy.  Fey plays Kate Holbrook, a successful career-driven woman who decides she wants to have a baby.  After striking out using sperm donor services, she finds a service that provides surrogate mothers.  Enter Angie Ostrowiski (Poehler), a lower income, much less sophisticated woman with boyfriend (Dax Shepard) issues.  After being implanted with embryos to carry for Kate, she ends up leaving her boyfriend and ends up having to live with Kate.  This bascially sets up the tried-and-true "Odd Couple" scenario for most of the rest of the film.  There are a few subplots and, of course, an eventual romantic interest (Greg Kinnear), but most of the story and comedy revolves around the chemistry of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, who clearly enjoy working together and seem to be having fun in this film.  It is not laugh-out-loud funny and sort of leans more toward the "chick flick"genre, but it still works.   It would definitely be funnier for women who have had children and even the men who shared the experience with them as they hit all of the points parents end up talking about:  lamaze classes, eating right, and even the childbirthing videos that almost look like amateur porn.  Overall, a funny movie and a good excuse for these two to work together again.

Grade: C+

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The Gravedancers (R-2006)

So, let's get this straight: dancing on people's grave is NOT a good thing??? "The Gravedancers" takes that fairly obvious piece of advice and builds a movie on the consequences of grave desecration. Four friends stop by the grave of their recently deceased friend and find an envelope with a poem telling them the proper way to mourn is to "rejoice" and, of course, dance. Having had a few drinks, they decide to do just that, dancing around the graveyard. It does not take long for them to start hearing things go bump in the night and be visited by ghosts. When they bring in a "ghost-hunting" duo (well, who ya gonna call??), they find that they were dancing on the graves in the "undesirable" section of the graveyard. Apparently, this graveyard is set up like the preppie frat house in "Animal House". The graves they were dancing on turn out to be those of some very notorious murderers...and they're pissed. That's the basic plotline of what ends up as an OK ghost story. It starts out more promising than it ends up. It starts to lose some steam with the introduction of the ghost-hunters. This duo must be smart, right? I mean, he has a heavy European accent and she wears glasses and a turtleneck. Her outfit officially turns this into a glorified "Scooby-Doo" movie as she greatly resembles Daphne. For half of this film, you get a creepy ghost story which uses suspense, not effects, to scare. As you move into the second half, the effects get dialed up and the writing takes a pass. One climactic sequence is so over the top, the effects resemble the Mummy films. The effects are fine in the Mummy films, but noticeably out of place here. Overall, an OK effort that could have been very good.

Grade: C-

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Transamerica (R-2005)

"Bring an open mind" is the tagline for the poster.  Not being very interested in the subject of "gender correction", I will admit that I did not have much of an open mind.  In fact, it took 3 years for me to even consider watching this movie.  Having done so, I would say the poster has a point.  If you have an "open mind", this is actually a pretty good film.  Felicity Huffman as pre-op transexual Bree does an amazing job (no surprise there as she won several awards and was nominated for an Oscar).   The real surprise is Kevin Zegers, who plays her newly discovered son, and is extremely good in his role.  It sort of makes you wonder why his career did not take off.  Bree is in the final stages of becoming a woman and only needs the final surgery when she discovers she has a son, who is in trouble in New York City.   Under the advice of the psychiatrist who must sign off on the final surgery, she goes to bail him out and begins a cross-country trip of discovery for both herself and her son.  Toby (Zegers) is a bit of a confused soul himself, a drifter who supports himself as a male prostitute and seems to believe  the only way to get people to accept him is to offer some kind of sexual favors.  This, of course, leads to some very awkward and very uncomfortable moments.  Bree, you see, takes her time telling him that she is a) his "father" and b) a man.  The movie is funny at times, uncomfirtable at times and very moving.  If you can "open your mind", you might actually find yourself entertained.  

Grade: B

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Drillbit Taylor (PG-13-2008)

"Drillbit Taylor" is Judd Apatow/Seth Rogen "lite". The directing/writing tries their hand at PG-13 non-raunchy comedy here. Owen Wilson plays the titular "Drillbit Tayor", a former military man, who is now homeless in California, looking for a way to get to Canada to get a fresh start on life. Meanwhile, in a local high school, three high school freshmen are having a very hard time dealing with the school's resident bullies (Alex Frost and Josh Peck). Interestingly, the three freshman resemble the leads in "Superbad" enough that the movie plays almost as a prequel to that movie. The freshman decide the only option for them is to find a bodyguard. The premise is similar to the film "My Bodyguard". In fact, there is a brief tip of the hat to that film that is especially funny if you are familiar with it. These lives converge when Drillbit gets himself hired to be that bodyguard. While Wilson is funny in the role and handles it very well, the character itself is not really very likable at times. He has no intention of meeting his end of the bargain and only intends to milk these kids for as much cash as he can. The movie is moderately funny most of the way through and does include some laugh out loud moments. It is an "OK" movie, nothing more, nothing less. Actually, it's PG-13 rating hurts it a little bit. They seem to be aiming for a younger audience, but still include some material that is inappropriate for younger audiences. It seems like they should have either chosen to go the family film route or stuck to the edgier material they are more comfortable with. It does not completely undermine the film, but it sort of makes it feel like a confused effort.

Grade: C

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Funny Games (R-2007)

"Funny Games" looked like a very interesting, promising premise, with a similar look and feel to "A Clockwork Orange". You have two incredibly polite young men dressed in upper-crust tennis clothing who are actually psychotic and revel in the mental and physical torture of others. They use their politeness and charm to gain a foothold into the home of a family who has just arrived in their summer home. You start to see them toying with the family in odd ways before turning it up many notches, escalating to psychological and physical torture "games". They eventually spell out their objective: They explain to the family that they want to make a bet: They bet that the family will be dead within 12 hours and they assume the family will take the opposite bet. At this point, the protagonist, Paul (Michael Pitt) turns to the camera and asks the audience who they will be betting on, breaking the fourth wall. This is where the wheels really start to come off the wagon. What follows is a night of agony for the family, but somehow this moves along very slowly and could have been saved with some tighter editing. There is one sequence where the mother (Naomi Watts) is struggling around the room, bound, ever so slowly while the camera remains in one stationery position. As it turns out, this whole exercise is meant to be a commentary on film audience's thirst for blood, a la "Saw" and "Hostel" films. The problem is you really never get that point. If you are trying to make a point and no one gets it, you have failed to make that point. The aforementioned "A Clockwork Orange" made similar points about violence much more effectively. The movie is very white (alll of the walls, the fence, much of the clothes, including the white gloves worn by the psychos) and incredibly quiet. There is no soundtrack at all, other than music the characters listen to in certain sequences. This is probably supposed to add to the effect that you are a voyeur in this night of "funny games" and not a movie watcher. It succeeds on that level, but only on that level. During one scene, Paul is very angry at something the mother has done and actually uses the family's remote control to "rewind" the movie to change the outcome. At this point, it crosses over into silliness. It seems the director was trying too hard to make an arty, intellectual piece, but it didn't work for me at all. I've read that others "got it" and loved it, but I wasn't one of them. The cast was all very good, but that was not enough to save the movie for me.

Grade: D-

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Fool's Gold (PG-13)

It is hard to believe such a talented cast was put together for such a terrible movie.  Besides the two leads, you had Donald Sutherland and Ray Winstone, two very good actors (Winstone was fantastic in "The Proposition"), all involved in a movie with no direction and little of interest.  The premise sounds promising:  McConaughey plays Ben Finnegan, a lovable loser type who dreams a finding a fabled Spanish treasure ship that he believes lies somewhere off the Florida Keys.  Tess (Kate Hudson) is his wife, who is looking to finalize their divorce.  Finnegan is in over his head with a local gang and is racing the clock to find the treasure.  What looks to be a fun treasure hunt movie rapidly deteriorates as the movie goes from adventure to romantic comedy to goofy comedy and back and forth, never really settling on any one course.  It is fine for a movie not to tie itself to any one genre, but this one lacks any cohesiveness at all.  Having Kate Hudson in a bikini and Matthew McConaughey shirtless much of the time is still not enough to hold anyone's interest.  In fact, if it was just a still photo of them on the screen for an hour and a half, it would have been more interesting.  There is also a rich girl character (Alexis Dziena) who is such a stereotypical bimbo, it is annoying from her first appearance and continues to annoy every time she appears on screen.  She also spends a lot of her time in a bikini, again probably for eye candy purposes, but she is so young looking, it actually borders on uncomfortable.   When it is over, you just wonder how such a good cast can end up in such a bad movie!  The real "Fool's Gold" here is any money spent on tickets and DVDs.

Grade: D-

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Journey to the Center of the Earth 3-D (PG)

For a 3-D movie to work, it has to be able to stand alone as a 2-D movie.  The 3-D effects, when done well, are great and all, but with nothing behind them, they can get stale fast.  "Journey to the Center of the Earth" hits both marks pretty well.  The effects and 3-D are amazing and the movie itself is great fun.  Make no mistakes:  this is a pure adventure movie which does not let real science get in its way.  Brendan Fraser is perfect in these films.  He has the stuff to be an action hero, but is able to play the comic relief moments very well, also.  He is like a living cartoon character sometimes.  The story basically follows the Jules Verne novel while using the novel as a "character" in the film.  Fraser plays Trevor Anderson, a professor studying seismology and carrying on the work of his missing brother.  Anderson finds a copy of Verne's novel with some familiar notations which lead him on a search for his missing brother, yes, to the center of the earth.  His brother was a "Vernian", a person who believes Verne's book chronicled actual events.   Trevor brings his brother's son, Sean (Josh Hutcherson) along and, of course, there is a love interest (Anita Briemm) along for good measure.  The movie is a thrill-ride from start to finish.  There are some silly moments ("Pirahna baseball" comes to mind), but they are consistent with the overall adventurous tone of the movie.  This is great fun for the family. More sophisticated adult audiences might not accept a lot of the liberties taken to tell the story, but the adults I was with, including myself, had fun with it. The younger audience members were thrilled (although it could be too scary for toddlers, especially in 3-D).

Grade: B

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