"What movie are we going to go see?" Bekah asked.
"Book of Eli."
"Who's in it?"
"Denzel Washington."
"You know I love me some Denzel. What is it about?"
"30 years after a cataclysmic war..."
"Is it another post-apocalyptic movie?"
I nodded my head, "Yes."
"What is it with you and post-apocalyptic movies?!"
This is how our conversation started as my wife and I left the house on Saturday afternoon. Yes, it is a post-apocalyptic movie, but it’s got Denzel and Bekah is a fan of Denzel.
Now to finish the thought: 30 years after a cataclysmic war, we meet Eli (Denzel Washington). He’s been walking for 30 years because God told him to take the only remaining Bible west to someplace where it would be safe. Religion was blamed for the war and all known religious texts were destroyed. (However, both Mussolini’s biography and Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code survived.)
All is going well. Eli has cat for dinner (which he shares with a mouse), acquires a new pair of boots from a corpse, and falls asleep while listening to Al Green. All Eli has to do is stay on the path. But his MP3 player’s battery dies and needs recharged. He passes through a town that has the ability to recharge electronics and access to clean drinking water (aka – the good stuff). It is at this point that Eli’s path is broken.
The town is ruled by the intelligent yet diabolical Carnegie (Gary Oldman) who is hungry for power. He is an avid reader, and is searching for a Bible. When he finds out Eli has one, Carnegie pursues Eli to forcibly take it. To complicate matters, rebellious girl Solara (Mila Kunis), the daughter of Carnegie’s blind servant wants to go with Eli to where ever he is going. Eli is reluctant (for her own protection) but agrees to her company.
The movie is a sci-fi homage to the western genre (including a mid-town standoff and ensuing shootout). It is also a morality tale filled with religious allegory. God’s word is presented from two diametrically opposite view points: Eli believes the Bible has the power to save humanity, and Carnegie sees it as a weapon. Eli’s violent methods of self defense (and the lengths he takes to protect the Bible) are a stark contrast to his beliefs. In a short explanation for his actions, Eli admits that after reading the Bible every day for 30 years, he’s missed the message it teaches.
Graciously, the film makers do not use the religious tone to harangue non-believers into becoming God-fearing believers. While the message of the movie is about the power of faith, the only condemnation portrayed is a discourse on modern consumerism. Solara asks what life was like before the war; Eli explains we had more than we needed and we threw away stuff that people now kill for.
Coloring is as much a part of the cast as Denzel or Oldman. The Hughes Brothers drained the film of color leaving mostly sepia tints of brown, gray, and green. It is an interesting lesson in using color to tell a story, but in the long run is a burdensome. The desert landscapes and burnt skies set the mood for the movie but it adds a sense of somnolence to an all ready despondent plot. The Hughes Brothers play this aspect of film making to a maddening degree – exploiting it with wide panoramic shots of clouds, distant injections of barren wastelands, excessive close ups, and silhouetted action sequences.
While the coloring is overbearing, it also highlights moments of poignant grief – most memorably (without spoiling the plot) is Eli reading from Second Timothy chapter four in the final scene.
There are bits of biting humor. Eli smelling roadside bandits. Eli sending Solara to retrieve his sunglasses. The crazy old couple serving tea. And in one of my favorite scenes, Solara asks Eli to read the Bible to her (she – like most people under the age of 30 can’t read because they were born after the war). Eli quotes Psalm 23 which Solara states is beautiful. She asks Eli if he wrote it; he answers “yes” before admitting he’s joking.
However, neither heartbreak nor humor is the vehicle that carries this mission of faith. This is more Bekah’s warning than mine: it is a little violent. And by a little, I mean it is violent on an epically gratuitous scale. Limbs are severed, heads are decapitated, the air is filled with gunfire and explosions, and there are several references to cannibalism. Eli handles his weaponry (machete, bow & arrow, pistol and sawed-off shotgun) with surgical accuracy. Carnegie uses a brutally destructive arsenal to hunt down Eli (rocket launchers and gatling guns). And it is all done with the stylistic finesse of the gospel according to Kill Bill.
Be prepared. The pacing is slow. In the first ten minutes of film, the only dialog is Eli talking to a mouse. The tenor of the movie is also unsettling (likely done intentionally). Watching Eli sharpen his machete while listening to How Can You Mend a Broken Heart is a little disconcerting.
The acting is as good as it the post-apocalyptic genre gets. Gary Oldman is convincing in his maniacal thirst for power. Denzel Washington’s devotion (and ultimately compassion) proves his worth in Hollywood. Even Mila Kunis (despite looking like she’s dressed in the best Banana Republic the apocalypse has to offer) perfectly portrays the dichotomy of naïveté and emotional strength. There are also a couple of great cameos from Tom Waits (musician) and Malcolm McDowell (A Clockwork Orange).
Bekah recommends it as a movie worth watching but not one she’d want to see more than once. I want to see it again – if only to see if Denzel’s character stays true to the story’s final twist. The Book of Eli is also a great way to launch conversations about matters of faith. This movie sparked more discussion between Bekah and me than any other movie since... well... that I can remember.
Our dialog continued from the theater to the car (and for most of the drive home from Spokane Valley).
“Would you do that? Would you walk for 30 years?” Bekah asked.
“I don’t know.”
“It was a little too violent... and too much swearing.” Yet she likes the Die Hard movies which expels more bullets than a trigger happy NRA member at a shooting range and drops more f-bombs than a drunken sailor.
“Well,” I rebutted, “most of the violence was in self defense, and the vulgarity was from the bad guys.”
“True. And Eli’s motivation made sense. But still... did they have to show the guys head getting chopped off? And with a machete? It’s just so much more personal.”
PS: for the record, I’ve satisfied my post-apocalyptic fix for a while.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Monday, January 11, 2010
Carriers
What if?
That is the question superior survival movies ask. Not the “what’s going to happen,” “how did it happen,” or “how are they going to fix it.” Those are awful questions.
Enter Carriers. The world has been ravaged by a highly contagious and horrific disease. Most of the population is dead or dying. What if it was you? What would you do? How would you survive? Carriers only asks questions – it proposes no answers. Instead of answers, it gives you something to ponder.
Two brothers (Chris Pine and Lou Taylor Pucci) are driving cross country to return to the beach house they vacationed at as kids. Along for the ride are Pine’s girlfriend (Piper Perabo) and an upper class stranger (Emily VanCamp). They have rules to follow to prevent getting sick: avoid the infected, sanitize everything, etc. They also carry a healthy supply of bleach, duct tape, and bottled water.
Their strategy is flawed as the meet a father who is willing to do anything to save his daughter (Christopher Meloni), a sick doctor who has given up on finding a cure, a team of professionals with a surefire way to thwart infection, and a pair of armed old ladies.
The cause of the disease is never explained (nor is the cause needed), the fate of humanity and the surviving characters is never resolved, and there is no gratifying conclusion, just a somber journey through despair, isolation, and loneliness.
Graciously the melancholic temperament of the film is broken by bits of absurdity (Pine’s character driving a golf cart across abandoned fairways and sand traps with reckless abandon, and the hyper quarreling between the two brothers). Yet despite the humorous interruptions, you still can’t escape the morally challenging queries.
Would you kill to survive? Lie? Steal?
Would you drink yourself into oblivion?
Would you give up hope? Or would you persevere against insurmountable odds?
Would you be willing to abandon someone you love if you knew there was nothing you could do to save them? Would you force someone you love to make that decision?
What would you feel? Bitterness? Despondency?
Would you break the rules – even if you were the one who created the policy?
Again, the movie does not answer any of these questions. The actions and motives of the characters are never justified or rationalized. You will not walk away from watching this movie with a peaceful easy feeling. While a viral pandemic is the backbone of the plot, the real story is about making tough judgments in the face of ghastly circumstances.
My take: The characters are oversimplified archetypes – the jerk (Pine), the bullied genius ( Pucci), the rebellious girl (Perabo), the spoiled rich girl (VanCamp), and the noble father (Meloni). Despite the stereotypes, the acting is superb. The story is depressing, tainted with disturbing imagery, yet it is engaging and thought provoking.
Bekah’s take: What a depressing movie. It did spark some debate. Would I leave her on the side of the road if I found out she was sick and incurable? She swears she’d volunteer to stay behind and give us a better chance at survival. She wouldn’t recommend the movie.
Final word: A hat tip from me but a frown of scorn from Bekah. My recommendation – if you’re going to watch it be prepared, the movie will give you no reason to celebrate humanity and you might want to consume an entire gallon of ice cream (or some other comfort food) afterwords.
That is the question superior survival movies ask. Not the “what’s going to happen,” “how did it happen,” or “how are they going to fix it.” Those are awful questions.
Enter Carriers. The world has been ravaged by a highly contagious and horrific disease. Most of the population is dead or dying. What if it was you? What would you do? How would you survive? Carriers only asks questions – it proposes no answers. Instead of answers, it gives you something to ponder.
Two brothers (Chris Pine and Lou Taylor Pucci) are driving cross country to return to the beach house they vacationed at as kids. Along for the ride are Pine’s girlfriend (Piper Perabo) and an upper class stranger (Emily VanCamp). They have rules to follow to prevent getting sick: avoid the infected, sanitize everything, etc. They also carry a healthy supply of bleach, duct tape, and bottled water.
Their strategy is flawed as the meet a father who is willing to do anything to save his daughter (Christopher Meloni), a sick doctor who has given up on finding a cure, a team of professionals with a surefire way to thwart infection, and a pair of armed old ladies.
The cause of the disease is never explained (nor is the cause needed), the fate of humanity and the surviving characters is never resolved, and there is no gratifying conclusion, just a somber journey through despair, isolation, and loneliness.
Graciously the melancholic temperament of the film is broken by bits of absurdity (Pine’s character driving a golf cart across abandoned fairways and sand traps with reckless abandon, and the hyper quarreling between the two brothers). Yet despite the humorous interruptions, you still can’t escape the morally challenging queries.
Would you kill to survive? Lie? Steal?
Would you drink yourself into oblivion?
Would you give up hope? Or would you persevere against insurmountable odds?
Would you be willing to abandon someone you love if you knew there was nothing you could do to save them? Would you force someone you love to make that decision?
What would you feel? Bitterness? Despondency?
Would you break the rules – even if you were the one who created the policy?
Again, the movie does not answer any of these questions. The actions and motives of the characters are never justified or rationalized. You will not walk away from watching this movie with a peaceful easy feeling. While a viral pandemic is the backbone of the plot, the real story is about making tough judgments in the face of ghastly circumstances.
My take: The characters are oversimplified archetypes – the jerk (Pine), the bullied genius ( Pucci), the rebellious girl (Perabo), the spoiled rich girl (VanCamp), and the noble father (Meloni). Despite the stereotypes, the acting is superb. The story is depressing, tainted with disturbing imagery, yet it is engaging and thought provoking.
Bekah’s take: What a depressing movie. It did spark some debate. Would I leave her on the side of the road if I found out she was sick and incurable? She swears she’d volunteer to stay behind and give us a better chance at survival. She wouldn’t recommend the movie.
Final word: A hat tip from me but a frown of scorn from Bekah. My recommendation – if you’re going to watch it be prepared, the movie will give you no reason to celebrate humanity and you might want to consume an entire gallon of ice cream (or some other comfort food) afterwords.
Saturday, January 09, 2010
The Last Samurai
Pop culture quiz.
Q: After a white American soldier lives with an indigenous population, he begins to understand their ways. He develops sympathies for the culture and falls in love with one of the women there. At the end of the movie, the soldier fights with the natives instead of against them.
This is the plot for what movie?
a) Kevin Kostner's 1990 movie Dancing with Wolves
b) Tom Cruise's 2003 movie The Last Samurai
c) James Cameron's blockbuster from this past holiday season - Avatar
d) All of the above
When it comes to the fundamental plot, The Last Samurai proposes nothing new. It wasn't the first time we saw this story, and Avatar will not be the last.
Each of the three movies are cinematically excellent in their own right. Of the three, The Last Samurai is my favorite. Taking place about the same time frame as Dances with Wolves (1870's), Samurai has a different tone to it. While both stories are completely fictional, Samurai has more of a truthiness feel to it with a greater degree of historical accuracy. The Japanese countryside plays a scenic backdrop far more beautiful than the American plains. And as batty as Cruise is in real life, he is a better actor than Costner.
Cruise plays an American soldier - Captain Nathan Algren - once apart of Custer's 7th cavalry. He's an alcoholic (fairly true to the character of many of Custer's men) with many personal demons. He is hired to train the new Japanese army, many of whom have never held a gun. When the military is prematurely sent to battle, Algren is captured and held prisoner at the Samurai's remote village. It is here that Katsumoto (played by Ken Watanabe) begins to hold conversations with Algren... to practice his English. If you've seen Dances with Wolves (or Avatar for that matter) the rest of the story is predictable. Algren learns ancient Japanese culture and how to fight like a samurai. He earns the respect of his captors and fights side by side with those he once considered an enemy.
The story itself is not based on one singular event in history, but rather an amalgamation of several events - covering a broad scope of both American history (Washita River massacre, Winchester gun shows) and Japanese (Boshin War, the Satsuma Rebellion, real life samurai Saigō Takamori). Through this story we're given lessons in perseverance (there is a fabulous scene when Ujio repeatedly beats Algren with sticks in a mock sword fight and Algren keeps getting off the ground to try again), redemption, honor, personal revenge, the importance of culture, and (of all things) Japanese poetry. The movie doesn't have a happy ending and that is likely the most important lesson of all: in war, there are no happy endings.
My take: gorgeous scenery, masterful recreation of late 19th century Tokyo, thorough attention to detail in costume and prop design, the social commentary is neither preachy nor overbearing, and the familiar storyline is told with the passion of an expert raconteur. Yet it is a sad story with slow pacing, heart-rending flashbacks, and gratuitous blood splatter (a couple people lose heads, others lose limbs, and one soldier - I believe - loses his gluteus maximus).
Bekah's take: Good. A little violent, but good. She didn't remember watching The Last Samurai when we first saw it in the theater, so (for her) this was like seeing it brand new. While true to history, the flashback scenes of the Washita River massacre were distressing. She's always found sorrow in the depiction of violence toward children but more so now than she used to. I'm not sure if the scenes from The Last Samurai were more poignant because we have kids of our own or because our daughter is Native American. During the movie's final battle she remarked at how it was such a sad story.
Overall: As Simon Graham, the British photographer and historian who served as Algren's translator said, jolly good. Only not so jolly, but very good indeed.
Q: After a white American soldier lives with an indigenous population, he begins to understand their ways. He develops sympathies for the culture and falls in love with one of the women there. At the end of the movie, the soldier fights with the natives instead of against them.
This is the plot for what movie?
a) Kevin Kostner's 1990 movie Dancing with Wolves
b) Tom Cruise's 2003 movie The Last Samurai
c) James Cameron's blockbuster from this past holiday season - Avatar
d) All of the above
When it comes to the fundamental plot, The Last Samurai proposes nothing new. It wasn't the first time we saw this story, and Avatar will not be the last.
Each of the three movies are cinematically excellent in their own right. Of the three, The Last Samurai is my favorite. Taking place about the same time frame as Dances with Wolves (1870's), Samurai has a different tone to it. While both stories are completely fictional, Samurai has more of a truthiness feel to it with a greater degree of historical accuracy. The Japanese countryside plays a scenic backdrop far more beautiful than the American plains. And as batty as Cruise is in real life, he is a better actor than Costner.
Cruise plays an American soldier - Captain Nathan Algren - once apart of Custer's 7th cavalry. He's an alcoholic (fairly true to the character of many of Custer's men) with many personal demons. He is hired to train the new Japanese army, many of whom have never held a gun. When the military is prematurely sent to battle, Algren is captured and held prisoner at the Samurai's remote village. It is here that Katsumoto (played by Ken Watanabe) begins to hold conversations with Algren... to practice his English. If you've seen Dances with Wolves (or Avatar for that matter) the rest of the story is predictable. Algren learns ancient Japanese culture and how to fight like a samurai. He earns the respect of his captors and fights side by side with those he once considered an enemy.
The story itself is not based on one singular event in history, but rather an amalgamation of several events - covering a broad scope of both American history (Washita River massacre, Winchester gun shows) and Japanese (Boshin War, the Satsuma Rebellion, real life samurai Saigō Takamori). Through this story we're given lessons in perseverance (there is a fabulous scene when Ujio repeatedly beats Algren with sticks in a mock sword fight and Algren keeps getting off the ground to try again), redemption, honor, personal revenge, the importance of culture, and (of all things) Japanese poetry. The movie doesn't have a happy ending and that is likely the most important lesson of all: in war, there are no happy endings.
My take: gorgeous scenery, masterful recreation of late 19th century Tokyo, thorough attention to detail in costume and prop design, the social commentary is neither preachy nor overbearing, and the familiar storyline is told with the passion of an expert raconteur. Yet it is a sad story with slow pacing, heart-rending flashbacks, and gratuitous blood splatter (a couple people lose heads, others lose limbs, and one soldier - I believe - loses his gluteus maximus).
Bekah's take: Good. A little violent, but good. She didn't remember watching The Last Samurai when we first saw it in the theater, so (for her) this was like seeing it brand new. While true to history, the flashback scenes of the Washita River massacre were distressing. She's always found sorrow in the depiction of violence toward children but more so now than she used to. I'm not sure if the scenes from The Last Samurai were more poignant because we have kids of our own or because our daughter is Native American. During the movie's final battle she remarked at how it was such a sad story.
Overall: As Simon Graham, the British photographer and historian who served as Algren's translator said, jolly good. Only not so jolly, but very good indeed.
Saturday, January 02, 2010
Surf's Up
Who doesn’t like penguins?
And that is the question movie execs everywhere were asking a few years ago. After Madagascar (May 2005), March of the Penguins (July 2005), Happy Feet (November 2006), and farce of the Penguins (February 2007), the answer was… we used to.
So did we really need another penguin movie? That is a question probably not asked at Sony Animation Studios during the creation of Surf’s Up. (Considering it was in Production roughly the same time as Happy Feet, I don’t blame them)
So let’s break the movie apart like a surfboard crashing on the rocks of the boneyard.
The Good:
• The documentary style “camerawork.” Granted, it’s not the smoothest animation (yet the water looks almost real in several shots) but it is an improvement over Sony’s first cartoon Open Season. And the documentary feel reminded me of some great surfing documentaries (Endless Summer, Step Into Liquid). And it distracted from the feel of being in a kids movie feel that you can sometimes get when watching animated films.
• Casting. The Dude as Z and Napoleon Dynamite as the half-baked chicken – genius.
• The story is actually funny. After the beautiful downer March of the Penguins and the copulation driven storyline of Happy Feet it is nice to see wit and sarcasm coming from the beaks of penguins.
• Snide jabs at Happy Feet. What fun is it if you can’t throw elbows at the competition?
• The music. The people in charge of the soundtrack made some smart choices. The songs were well placed, lyrically and stylistically fitting in with the on-screen action - like The Dirty Heads’ Stand Tall and Sugar Ray’s Into Yesterday. I caught Bekah singing along to Incubus’ Drive, but I caught my self singing along with You Get What You Give (the greatest one-hit wonder ever). So I can’t hold it against her.
The Bad:
• Poop jokes. There are a lot of them. (Seriously? I didn’t even know that glow worms pooped)
• A creepy scene with trophies. The bad guy (Tank) is a jerk and we all know it from the minute he’s introduced. But when he takes you behind the curtain to introduce his trophies, we discover his real-life counterpart would be on the sex offender registry. Bad guys in family flicks should be mean – not dirty.
• Pee. As in urine is a proven cure for stepping on a poisonous fire urchin. Funny and disturbing all at the same time.
The Moral:
• You can’t give up because there is someone who is better and/or cooler than you
• Winning isn’t everything.
• Do what you enjoy and enjoy what you do.
• Do the right thing.
Bekah’s thoughts:
It was a little rude for a kids movie. The adult humor was funny but a bit heavy. Thankfully, the grown up stuff was lost on the mind of our five year old. Great lessons for kids to learn and most of the jokes for adults are above most kid’s comprehension level.
Christian’s thoughts:
His favorite part: “When the penguin fell down. It was funny.” He also liked the rockhopper penguin (Cody Maverick).
And that is the question movie execs everywhere were asking a few years ago. After Madagascar (May 2005), March of the Penguins (July 2005), Happy Feet (November 2006), and farce of the Penguins (February 2007), the answer was… we used to.
So did we really need another penguin movie? That is a question probably not asked at Sony Animation Studios during the creation of Surf’s Up. (Considering it was in Production roughly the same time as Happy Feet, I don’t blame them)
So let’s break the movie apart like a surfboard crashing on the rocks of the boneyard.
The Good:
• The documentary style “camerawork.” Granted, it’s not the smoothest animation (yet the water looks almost real in several shots) but it is an improvement over Sony’s first cartoon Open Season. And the documentary feel reminded me of some great surfing documentaries (Endless Summer, Step Into Liquid). And it distracted from the feel of being in a kids movie feel that you can sometimes get when watching animated films.
• Casting. The Dude as Z and Napoleon Dynamite as the half-baked chicken – genius.
• The story is actually funny. After the beautiful downer March of the Penguins and the copulation driven storyline of Happy Feet it is nice to see wit and sarcasm coming from the beaks of penguins.
• Snide jabs at Happy Feet. What fun is it if you can’t throw elbows at the competition?
• The music. The people in charge of the soundtrack made some smart choices. The songs were well placed, lyrically and stylistically fitting in with the on-screen action - like The Dirty Heads’ Stand Tall and Sugar Ray’s Into Yesterday. I caught Bekah singing along to Incubus’ Drive, but I caught my self singing along with You Get What You Give (the greatest one-hit wonder ever). So I can’t hold it against her.
The Bad:
• Poop jokes. There are a lot of them. (Seriously? I didn’t even know that glow worms pooped)
• A creepy scene with trophies. The bad guy (Tank) is a jerk and we all know it from the minute he’s introduced. But when he takes you behind the curtain to introduce his trophies, we discover his real-life counterpart would be on the sex offender registry. Bad guys in family flicks should be mean – not dirty.
• Pee. As in urine is a proven cure for stepping on a poisonous fire urchin. Funny and disturbing all at the same time.
The Moral:
• You can’t give up because there is someone who is better and/or cooler than you
• Winning isn’t everything.
• Do what you enjoy and enjoy what you do.
• Do the right thing.
Bekah’s thoughts:
It was a little rude for a kids movie. The adult humor was funny but a bit heavy. Thankfully, the grown up stuff was lost on the mind of our five year old. Great lessons for kids to learn and most of the jokes for adults are above most kid’s comprehension level.
Christian’s thoughts:
His favorite part: “When the penguin fell down. It was funny.” He also liked the rockhopper penguin (Cody Maverick).
2012
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to set up a bank of TVs and simultaneously play a bunch of disaster flicks on them? The Towering Inferno, Earthquake, Armageddon, The Poseidon Adventure, Dante's Peak, and Hard Rain on a stack of six big screen TV's... I'm sure you haven't, but just in case you have wondered - Roland Emmerich was thinking of you.
Emmerich threw down the gauntlet when he blew up the White House in Independence Day. He is the man who set the standard for the modern era of the disaster genre. Yet, he's never quite lived up to the expectations he created. His movies have been more hype than substance (the quirky Godzilla and the plodding Day After Tomorrow are a couple of examples). Now with 2012 he aims to out do himself (and every other apocalyptic movie ever made) in both it's epic scale and epic duration.
Yes I said duration. It is a long movie. I'd recommend using the facilities immediately before the opening credits. Despite the long running time (158 minutes) Emmerich fills that time wisely. It's not the "when will this movie ever end" kind of Transformers 2 long... just the "my bladder is going to burst at any moment" kind. If it wasn't for the one liter of Mt Dew I chugged prior to the movie's beginning, I would have barely noticed the length.
The scenes of destruction (of which there were many) were evenly spaced - unlike some other movies that pack it all in to the fist 20 minutes of film (I'm talking about you The Core). While the dialog is not Oscar worthy, it's not a distraction. The conversations were practical (all though mildly predictable), punctuated with intentional humor, and a self-parodying outlook on the concept of cataclysmic events.
There are a couple of cheese ball moments (The Governator Schwarzenegger's cameo and an obnoxious fissure that splits a couple after the man mentions feeling like there is something separating them) but those clips are few and do not take away from the grandeur of the total and inescapable destruction that Emmerich celebrates for nearly an two hours and forty minutes.
As California sinks into the Pacific, a cruise ship and aircraft carrier are upended in tidal waves, buildings collapse, Yellowstone explodes, and Woody Harrelson goes crazy, you can't help but think how awesome it all looks. And while we know the story is completely implausible, we enjoy it. We know a puddle-jumper plane can't outrun (outfly?) a pyroclastic flow, but we sit on the edge of our seats to see it happen. We know that the earth will not open up to swallow the Vatican, but it makes compelling cinematography. And amidst the chaos is a plot. A decent one. And while some disaster movies center on one story, 2012 takes on a few. The strength of family, forgiveness, and reconciliation. Political and humanitarian ethics. Sacrifice and hope.
And with all that is splayed on the big screen during 2012, one of my favorite moments came after the movie was over (and I'm not talking about Adam Lambert's caterwauling during the closing credits). On my way out of the theater, I overheard two teen-aged girls talking.
"What sucks is like this is totally going to like happen like three days before Christmas," one of them said. (I wish I was joking.)
First of all... it's not. 2012 is a work of fiction - not a documentary. I won't get into the details, but the world will not end on 12/21/12. Astrophysicists, anthropologists, geologists, and many other scientific peoples have easily discounted the proposed meaning of Mayan prophesies. It is well documented. Google it. So I got a good laugh at the girls' academic naiveté, but I am also a bit puzzled by their arithmetic. The end of the Mayan long count calendar is December 12th of 2012. Last time I checked, Christmas falls on the 25th of December... every year. So, if I do my math correctly, 25 minus 21 is 4... not three. And the movie wasn't vague about the date. But I digress. The movie is well worth the price. Emmerich not only lives up to the expectations, but surpasses it. The sad misguided conversation of two girls who are prone to believe anything is just icing on the cake.
(And (Warning: plot spoiler) good news for dog lovers, a few corgis survive along with a king charles cavalier. Good news for alien lovers, so does District 9)
Emmerich threw down the gauntlet when he blew up the White House in Independence Day. He is the man who set the standard for the modern era of the disaster genre. Yet, he's never quite lived up to the expectations he created. His movies have been more hype than substance (the quirky Godzilla and the plodding Day After Tomorrow are a couple of examples). Now with 2012 he aims to out do himself (and every other apocalyptic movie ever made) in both it's epic scale and epic duration.
Yes I said duration. It is a long movie. I'd recommend using the facilities immediately before the opening credits. Despite the long running time (158 minutes) Emmerich fills that time wisely. It's not the "when will this movie ever end" kind of Transformers 2 long... just the "my bladder is going to burst at any moment" kind. If it wasn't for the one liter of Mt Dew I chugged prior to the movie's beginning, I would have barely noticed the length.
The scenes of destruction (of which there were many) were evenly spaced - unlike some other movies that pack it all in to the fist 20 minutes of film (I'm talking about you The Core). While the dialog is not Oscar worthy, it's not a distraction. The conversations were practical (all though mildly predictable), punctuated with intentional humor, and a self-parodying outlook on the concept of cataclysmic events.
There are a couple of cheese ball moments (The Governator Schwarzenegger's cameo and an obnoxious fissure that splits a couple after the man mentions feeling like there is something separating them) but those clips are few and do not take away from the grandeur of the total and inescapable destruction that Emmerich celebrates for nearly an two hours and forty minutes.
As California sinks into the Pacific, a cruise ship and aircraft carrier are upended in tidal waves, buildings collapse, Yellowstone explodes, and Woody Harrelson goes crazy, you can't help but think how awesome it all looks. And while we know the story is completely implausible, we enjoy it. We know a puddle-jumper plane can't outrun (outfly?) a pyroclastic flow, but we sit on the edge of our seats to see it happen. We know that the earth will not open up to swallow the Vatican, but it makes compelling cinematography. And amidst the chaos is a plot. A decent one. And while some disaster movies center on one story, 2012 takes on a few. The strength of family, forgiveness, and reconciliation. Political and humanitarian ethics. Sacrifice and hope.
And with all that is splayed on the big screen during 2012, one of my favorite moments came after the movie was over (and I'm not talking about Adam Lambert's caterwauling during the closing credits). On my way out of the theater, I overheard two teen-aged girls talking.
"What sucks is like this is totally going to like happen like three days before Christmas," one of them said. (I wish I was joking.)
First of all... it's not. 2012 is a work of fiction - not a documentary. I won't get into the details, but the world will not end on 12/21/12. Astrophysicists, anthropologists, geologists, and many other scientific peoples have easily discounted the proposed meaning of Mayan prophesies. It is well documented. Google it. So I got a good laugh at the girls' academic naiveté, but I am also a bit puzzled by their arithmetic. The end of the Mayan long count calendar is December 12th of 2012. Last time I checked, Christmas falls on the 25th of December... every year. So, if I do my math correctly, 25 minus 21 is 4... not three. And the movie wasn't vague about the date. But I digress. The movie is well worth the price. Emmerich not only lives up to the expectations, but surpasses it. The sad misguided conversation of two girls who are prone to believe anything is just icing on the cake.
(And (Warning: plot spoiler) good news for dog lovers, a few corgis survive along with a king charles cavalier. Good news for alien lovers, so does District 9)
Law Abiding Citizen
Step 1: You watch as home invaders rape and kill your wife and daughter. Step 2: The guy who killed your family goes free due to a flaw in the justice system. Step 3: You seek revenge. On everyone.
Sounds like a run-of-the-mill "vengeance is mine" movie plot. After seeing the 20% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, that is what I was expecting. I was anticipating a plot I’ve seen a million times: the everyman seeks vigilante justice when the legal system fails. Even the plot summary on IMDB states "An everyday guy decides to take justice into his own hands."
I was pleasantly surprised by the film, despite the grammatical error in the title. (It should be Law hyphen Abiding, not Law space Abiding. Sheesh.) Citizen starts off with a bang, like a baseball bat to the face. Actually it was literally a baseball bat to the face, but all things considered, I like the simile. The story begins through the eyes of the protagonist Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler of 300) as he watches his wife die and daughter taken away. When the worst of the two criminals flops on the not-as-bad guy, we follow the case into court to watch the plea bargain play out, only to see Shelton in the background watching the evil dude shake hands with the prosecutor Nick Rice (Jamie Foxx from Ray, Collateral, The Soloist, etc). 10 years later, one of the two home invaders is at the end of his death-row sentence. The execution doesn’t go according to plan, and the murders (paybacks) begin. Shelton is arrested, thrown in jail, and continues to kill people from behind bars. Each escalating killing portrays a staggering work of genius and Rice (with police in tow) race to end the massacre and keep Shelton in prison.
Yet, to describe Law Abiding Citizen as the typical revenge flick overlooks some key elements.
1. The movie’s hero (anti-hero?) is not a normal guy. He’s a tinkerer (as one character in the movie states). With a little foreshadowing, the opening sequence shows him to be adept with electronics and robotics. As the story unfolds, we discover the guy is extraordinary, intelligent, and diabolical. While there is an element of righteous anger that motivates his revenge, there is also a mastermind design behind the brutality that could not be carried out by an "everyday guy."
2. Most revenge plots have one bad guy: the person who escaped justice. Once that person has been killed, the hero can carry on with their life in peace. Not this movie. The brutal killings of the two home invaders (the first one startling, the the second graphic – both disturbing) are just the start for this Citizen. The bad guys in this movie are not the people who first committed the crime, but the entire justice system. The courts are corrupt and Shelton wants to "bring the whole system down." So the scope of retribution span beyond the two thugs. It includes their defense attorney, the judge that threw out key evidence, the prosecutor that made a deal with the guilty defendant, the district attorney, the DA office’s staff, and the mayor. Whew. Talk about a hit list.
3. You’re never sure who to root for. At first we like Clyde Shelton. There is an understandable empathy toward his actions. We cheer him on as he tells off the judge during his bail hearing (people in my theater were clapping). We nervously laugh at his steak dinner and later at an exploding cell phone. But at some point, we no longer see Shelton as a grieving father, but a maniacal lunatic. Nick Rice is a workaholic who seems willing to sacrifice his family’s happiness for his own political ambitions. Throughout the movie he stands by his choices maintaining an "I did the right thing" defense when we all know he made the wrong decision. We want him to man up. Eventually we begin to see him as the hero. (I consider this to be great story telling as characters that are too perfect or too flawed are not believable.)
4. It bucks the traditional ending. The moment we expect (Shelton gets the same deal that Rice struck with the bad man at the beginning of the movie) never happens. We want Shelton to earn his freedom for a while, but then we begin to think he belongs in jail.
5. This is not a feel good movie. The first death looks like a clip from a horror movie. The second fatality is a sociopath’s dream. (We’re spared the viewing of the dissection, but we see the results and the gory details are described within the prison interview room.) The third killing is clinical. The fourth is excessively bloody and the next catches you off guard. The final body count is in double digits. The language is vulgar. The cinematography is sharp and gritty. The pace is unsettling and quick. This is not the type of movie you walk away from thinking "I’d do the same thing if a couple of drug addicts killed my family and got away with it."
My only complaint about the movie is the amount of detective work that Nick Rice accomplished. I understand there is a bit of research that prosecutors have to do to build their case, but Citizen had Rice riding along with the police to every crime scene, and to make every arrest. Well, that complaint and the bad grammar in the title.
Overall, Law Abiding Citizen is not one of the best movies ever made. But it is entertaining. And that’s what movies should be about. I give it 6 exploding cell phones out of 10.
It is rated R for good reason.
Sounds like a run-of-the-mill "vengeance is mine" movie plot. After seeing the 20% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, that is what I was expecting. I was anticipating a plot I’ve seen a million times: the everyman seeks vigilante justice when the legal system fails. Even the plot summary on IMDB states "An everyday guy decides to take justice into his own hands."
I was pleasantly surprised by the film, despite the grammatical error in the title. (It should be Law hyphen Abiding, not Law space Abiding. Sheesh.) Citizen starts off with a bang, like a baseball bat to the face. Actually it was literally a baseball bat to the face, but all things considered, I like the simile. The story begins through the eyes of the protagonist Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler of 300) as he watches his wife die and daughter taken away. When the worst of the two criminals flops on the not-as-bad guy, we follow the case into court to watch the plea bargain play out, only to see Shelton in the background watching the evil dude shake hands with the prosecutor Nick Rice (Jamie Foxx from Ray, Collateral, The Soloist, etc). 10 years later, one of the two home invaders is at the end of his death-row sentence. The execution doesn’t go according to plan, and the murders (paybacks) begin. Shelton is arrested, thrown in jail, and continues to kill people from behind bars. Each escalating killing portrays a staggering work of genius and Rice (with police in tow) race to end the massacre and keep Shelton in prison.
Yet, to describe Law Abiding Citizen as the typical revenge flick overlooks some key elements.
1. The movie’s hero (anti-hero?) is not a normal guy. He’s a tinkerer (as one character in the movie states). With a little foreshadowing, the opening sequence shows him to be adept with electronics and robotics. As the story unfolds, we discover the guy is extraordinary, intelligent, and diabolical. While there is an element of righteous anger that motivates his revenge, there is also a mastermind design behind the brutality that could not be carried out by an "everyday guy."
2. Most revenge plots have one bad guy: the person who escaped justice. Once that person has been killed, the hero can carry on with their life in peace. Not this movie. The brutal killings of the two home invaders (the first one startling, the the second graphic – both disturbing) are just the start for this Citizen. The bad guys in this movie are not the people who first committed the crime, but the entire justice system. The courts are corrupt and Shelton wants to "bring the whole system down." So the scope of retribution span beyond the two thugs. It includes their defense attorney, the judge that threw out key evidence, the prosecutor that made a deal with the guilty defendant, the district attorney, the DA office’s staff, and the mayor. Whew. Talk about a hit list.
3. You’re never sure who to root for. At first we like Clyde Shelton. There is an understandable empathy toward his actions. We cheer him on as he tells off the judge during his bail hearing (people in my theater were clapping). We nervously laugh at his steak dinner and later at an exploding cell phone. But at some point, we no longer see Shelton as a grieving father, but a maniacal lunatic. Nick Rice is a workaholic who seems willing to sacrifice his family’s happiness for his own political ambitions. Throughout the movie he stands by his choices maintaining an "I did the right thing" defense when we all know he made the wrong decision. We want him to man up. Eventually we begin to see him as the hero. (I consider this to be great story telling as characters that are too perfect or too flawed are not believable.)
4. It bucks the traditional ending. The moment we expect (Shelton gets the same deal that Rice struck with the bad man at the beginning of the movie) never happens. We want Shelton to earn his freedom for a while, but then we begin to think he belongs in jail.
5. This is not a feel good movie. The first death looks like a clip from a horror movie. The second fatality is a sociopath’s dream. (We’re spared the viewing of the dissection, but we see the results and the gory details are described within the prison interview room.) The third killing is clinical. The fourth is excessively bloody and the next catches you off guard. The final body count is in double digits. The language is vulgar. The cinematography is sharp and gritty. The pace is unsettling and quick. This is not the type of movie you walk away from thinking "I’d do the same thing if a couple of drug addicts killed my family and got away with it."
My only complaint about the movie is the amount of detective work that Nick Rice accomplished. I understand there is a bit of research that prosecutors have to do to build their case, but Citizen had Rice riding along with the police to every crime scene, and to make every arrest. Well, that complaint and the bad grammar in the title.
Overall, Law Abiding Citizen is not one of the best movies ever made. But it is entertaining. And that’s what movies should be about. I give it 6 exploding cell phones out of 10.
It is rated R for good reason.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)