Box Office Democracy

Year 2 Week 20 Preview

Fri, 17 May 2013 17:46:13 -0400

This totally slipped my mind this week. Star Trek Into Darkness sure looks untouchable

Year 2 Week 19: Iron Man 3

Tue, 14 May 2013 22:24:00 -0400

It looks like I have to recant some of the things I said about this movie last week and even more things that I thought and said privately but didn’t think were fit for publication. Iron Man 3 is a better movie the second time around. It has a cleverness to it that caught me completely by surprise in the second viewing.

I’m still not willing to call it a fantastic movie. The stuff with the little kid is still really grating and out of place. I’d argue he doesn’t even serve to move Tony Stark any further along on his emotional journey. He’s just a walking anxiety attack trigger, exposition monkey, and dumping ground for Stark’s wonderful way of being mean to people. Seriously, is he ever nice to anyone in these movies? Maybe to Pepper and maybe to other people when they aren’t actually around but I swear they keep trying to make the most unlikable protagonist in film and are consistently bailed out by Robert Downey Jr’s unbelievable ability to imbue the role with his own charisma.

This is an excellent script that holds up better the second time around. The payoffs feel a little more earned when you know what’s coming up and can search for the hints. This backfires a little bit because there’s a point in the early second act when Stark basically has all of the information he’s going to get but doesn’t put it together until it’s literally spelled out for him. Hurts the super genius tag a bit. I also have no idea why they need to kill the president except that it raises the stakes for the third act. That was two complaints in a row but I swear I thought much more of this as an action film this time around.

It’s important to heap praise on Don Cheadle this second time around. He does an amazing job with a rather small part (come to think of it I’m not sure anyone other than Downey has what I’d call a big part) of just needing to be the glue of whatever scene he’s in. He can be the concerned friend, the butt of a joke and a really legit action star even outside of his armor. Totally thankless job and he plays it really well. I was completely entertained with him this time through.

Fanboys are still going to hate this movie with a passion in five years. Write that down for me.

Arvin’s Take: Upon second viewing certain perceived plot holes actually closed themselves up, so to Shane Black’s credit, the overall beat-by-beat plot is actually strong for this genre (Avengers’ script is more problematic). He’s clearly of a generation that understands planting and payoff, even if sometimes the plant is really subtle or the payoff is disappointing.

Such is the case with The Mandarin, the portrayal of whom, if I was a die-hard Iron Man fan, would probably offend me even more than I already am. If the reason for neutering his character is to deflect the racist overtones of his character then his reimagining a nationless, cultureless terrorist was more than adequate, and the reveal undercuts the honest work the script had put towards making him a realistic modern villain. It doesn’t help that the marketing of the film up to its release contained a whole bunch of Mandarin lines and imagery that aren’t in the film for some reason.

Year 2 Week 19 Preview

Thu, 09 May 2013 21:34:12 -0400

F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, “There are no second acts in American lives” but this weekend I bet his heirs are hoping there are no second weekends in American blockbusters. I really hate that I just wrote that. Let’s just go.

The Incumbent

Last year, when The Avengers set the record for the highest grossing opening weekend it held surprisingly well for week two. I have to assume Iron Man 3 will do a similar job of holding audience and is prepared to put up something in the very high eight figures.

Opening this Weekend

The Great Gatsby: It’s a shame I probably won’t get to review this movie because a Baz Luhrmann Great Gatsby movie with a soundtrack executive produced by Jay-Z is almost certainly the coolest movie released this year which doesn’t feature The Rock driving a fast car. If only it weren’t in a thousand fewer theaters than Iron Man 3. Or if only overly slick adaptations of books had the same appeal as stuff blowing up. Alas.

Peeples: I’m legitimately stunned that it looks like I’m going to get two full years through this project and not see a single Tyler Perry movie. Thrilled but shocked. I don’t know anything about this movie except it has a billboard on Hollywood Boulevard that seems to indicate it’s about a girl bringing her new boyfriend home to meet her stern father. I would complain about how tired this concept is but I just raved about how much I want to see a movie based on a novel that’s almost 90 years old.

My Prediction: I can’t imagine a scenario where The Great Gatsby has the steam to knock off Iron Man 3. Gatsby has a ceiling that’s likely somewhere around $45 million and that’s best case scenario. If Iron Man 3 makes $43 million this weekend there will be Disney executives throwing themselves out of windows.

Arvin’s Pick: Iron Man 3 is due for about $75 million for its second weekend. Baz Luhrmann has yet to make a movie that’s grossed over $60 million in its entirety. He also hasn’t opened a film at number one since Romeo + Juliet 17 years ago. The Great Gatsby will be his biggest hit ever, but between Iron Man 3 and Star Trek Into Darkness I don’t think we’ll be covering The Great Gatsby in this blog.

Year 2 Week 18: Iron Man 3

Wed, 08 May 2013 15:59:42 -0400

I’ve been kind of agonizing over what to say about Iron Man 3. It’s such a weird pastiche of different ideas that barely feels like a coherent movie. The rational adult in me didn’t much care for it at all. The kid in me was completely blown away.

I walked out of the movie with a smile on my face because it’s a very good big action movie. The action beats are consistently excellent and surprisingly varied considering most of them are “Iron Man fights someone that’s really hot” or some variation thereof. Robert Downey Jr. brings his A game to the non-armored portions of the movie. Mixing in some really nice (if not entirely earned) existential crisis work on top of his usual crackling comedy. If there really won’t be an Iron Man 4 this is a good end to the series and one that’s totally worthy of the standard they established.

Spoilers from here on out. Honestly, grow up, but there’s your warning.

This is a movie that comic nerds will hate in a year and pretend they’ve always hated. There are a lot of silly things in this movie and a lot of cliche things in this movie that won’t age well. No one is going to like the Mandarin plot twist by the time Avengers 2 comes out. It undercuts a lot of the actual dramatic tension of the movie to deliver a couple scenes of cheap actor jokes that we’ve all heard before. it also eliminates one of the only Iron Man villains anyone has actually heard of if the franchise actually does continue. The little kid that dominates the second act feels borrowed from an 80s film and probably should have been left there.

What makes a movie like this a success? The obvious answer is money which this is stacking to the ceiling but is it good? It’ll probably take repeat viewings to be completely sure but I know I walked out of Iron Man 3 wanting to buy as many toys as I could get my hands on and that has to be worth something.

Arvin’s Take:Iron Man 3 has more similarities to Dark Knight Rises than I’d like to admit: both feature their heroes stripped of their costume for most of the story, both have villains using terror tactics and misdirection to exact vengeance on the protagonist, and the hero “gives up” adventuring by the end of the film.

Unfortunately, like The Dark Knight Rises, Iron Man 3 also shows disinterest in the overall concept of its source material. Kudos to Shane Black for making as much of an auteur piece as you can in a comic book film, and indeed the movie nails your nostalgia for 80’s and 90’s action comedies, but it’s clear he’d rather be making another Lethal Weapon or Last Action Hero than telling an iconic tale of Iron Man versus the Mandarin. In fact, neither Iron Man (as one would traditionally envision him) nor the Mandarin feature in the climax of the film at all. It’s the type of diversion from the essence of a character that would maybe work in a comic book where the storyline would be disposable novelty, but as a capper to a trilogy it doesn’t feel like it belongs.

Year 2 Week 18 Preview

Fri, 03 May 2013 13:02:15 -0400

I think Iron Man 3 will make ten times more than the number two movie. i’ll see you all on Thursday.

Year 2 Week 17: Pain & Gain

Wed, 01 May 2013 18:06:13 -0400

Pain & Gain is, visually, a great movie. Like it or not Michael Bay has established a visual aesthetic that has become the dominant style for an entire generation of filmmakers. There’s a slick quality to the movie that really meshes well with the setting of mid-90s Miami and the self-help seminar-obsessed characters. Unfortunately all of this is on top of a terrible movie because Michael Bay has no idea how to make watchable films in general and he especially doesn’t know how to make comedies.

The biggest problem in this movie is that it’s supposed to be a comedy and it’s rarely funny. When it is the joke is driven in to the ground like a young child who says something that makes a room full of adults laugh and then repeats it for the rest of the day hoping to get a repeat of the same reaction. This is especially true of Ken Jeong’s performance. i single him out because this is his second consecutive Michael Bay movie where he’s used in basically the same way. One has to start wondering if this is what Jeong thinks is funny in real life which is inexplicable for such a talented comic actor.

The plot is also boring. I’ve started to judge movies based on how far in to the movie I look at my watch and then how often after. I got around 50 minutes in to Pain & Gain before checking the time and then was checking about every five minutes thereafter. These are not good numbers for a director as frenetic as Bay. There just isn;t enough plot to support a two hour movie and it leads to a lot of repetition of plot points and character moments. I understand that it’s a movie based on a true story and that leads to certain limitations and contrivances but not everything has to be a movie guys.

The Rock is excellent. He’s by far the best part of the movie and he’s doing something different than you’ll see in any of his other movies this year. I hope he starts a religion soon or something because my fanatic love of him needs to make more sense in context.

Before I post Arvin’s thoughts on this movie I want to point out that this man has a film degree from a prestigious film school. You’ve been warned.

Arvin’s Take: Based on our post-movie check-in (I don’t really like talking at great lengths with people about their opinion of a movie immediately after seeing it), I think what I’m about to say will counter what Art’s said, the first time so far this year. Pain & Gain worked for me, in that this is exactly the type of movie you’d expect based on the true story of these sleazy meatheads. It’s intense, over the top, narcissistic, and completely delusional, and if a common wish in these types of movies is to “get inside the head of the criminal,” I think Bay does as good of a job as any other director who would specialize in these genres, like Martin Scorsese or Michael Mann.

The biggest problem with the story is not doing an adequate job transitioning the characters from “I’ve got my eye on the American Dream” to “now let’s commit kidnapping, torture, and extorion” (In reality the guys had been pulling scams consistently leading up to the kidnapping) but again if Mann or Scorsese had tackled this story there’s good odds they would’ve glossed over that part too. So it’s good enough.

Year 2 Week 17 Preview

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 13:07:00 -0400

Next week is the start of summer blockbuster season. This is the last week of picking up the pre-summer scraps. Oh boy!

The Incumbent

I want to believe Oblivion can repeat this weekend but it appears to have a couple big factors working against it. I haven’t heard fantastic word of mouth on it at least anecdotally but more importantly it shares a lot of audience with next week’s Iron Man 3 and might be facing a lack of enthusiasm. I expect a slightly bigger than 50% drop for Oblivion which should take it out of contention for the weekend.

Opening this weekend

The Big Wedding: The previews make this movie look ghastly. It’s a big cast romantic comedy centered around a wedding and I’m not sure what makes it different from all the other movies with about the same premise. None of the actors in this are quite big enough to push this to a number one opening on their own steam certainly not with the theater disadvantage and the relatively weak marketing. A strong third place showing is the likely ceiling for this film.

Pain and Gain: I don’t know that it’s possible for a movie to be running more ads than Pain and Gain is. I’ve been traveling most of the last month and I still feel like I’ve been under a constant barrage of hype for this movie. It seems to be effective as the movie is opening in 300 more theaters than it was projected at last week. Add that to Mark Wahlberg and The Rock and it looks like a winner to me.

My Prediction: This should be a light week and anything over $20 million is likely to walk away with this weekend handily. Pain and Gain is the only movie with that kind of upside this week so it has to be the pick. Someone please shoot me in the head I’ve clearly watched too much NFL Draft coverage as I am using “upside” in sentences.

Arvin’s Pick: Having seen Bad Boys 2 twice in theaters, I rewatched it again earlier this week as a refresher, and it’s finally starting to lose its novelty. The Fast and Furious movies are too classy, I need another fix of Michael Bay action sleaziness. I don’t think audiences liked Oblivion enough to hold it up for another number one, so even with Pain and Gain likely underperforming it should make it to number one. I’m scared that another viewing of Oblivion so soon is going to take away the remaining good impressions I had of it.

Year 2 Week 16: Oblivion

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 22:52:00 -0400

I went in to Oblivion really wanting to like it and I spent most of the movie doing just that. It is, for the most part, a genuinely compelling movie and a solid attempt at making a non-franchise science fiction movie. These are the kind of movies that should be encouraged even if the individual efforts have some odd flaws.

Tom Cruise has to do almost all of the work here. His character is a maintenance technician for autonomous drones so the lion’s share of the dialogue in the first half of the movie is over headsets. I suppose this means Andrea Riseborough is working just as hard as she’s also delivering most of her dialogue through an earpiece but being a vague wet blanket and subject of a bizarre dream sequence appears easier than discovering that everything you know about the world is wrong. My point is you need either a phenomenal actor or a real movie star to anchor a movie with a cast this sparse and Cruise is at least one of those.

There’s a great visual aesthetic here. Director Joseph Kosinski is showing all the chops he showed in Tron: Legacy and I really wish that didn’t sound like an insult. It’s pretty, it’s well-shot, and he uses completely distinct styles to differentiate the different spaces the movie uses. There seems to be some liberal borrowing of other styles going on: the Scavs look an awful lot like Predators and the drones look like they’re taken from the Portal series of video games. There’s an entire sequence late in the film that looks like it could have been a test reel for Portal 3. I’m sure these are intended as homage and I’m not sure either of these visual ideas originated in the movies I attribute them to. This is sort of the nature of science fiction to crib from itself. It doesn’t feel like genre canibalization and should probably be tolerated.

My biggest complaints about this movie relate to plot twists. To start there are about two too many and what might be the best one is given away in the previews. Anyone who’s watched a preview for this movie and seen Morgan Freeman probably has a good idea of what the first plot twist is, that the people Cruise thinks are aliens are, in fact, humans. This doesn’t need to be a revelatory piece of information but the movie seems to think it is as much of the first hour of the movie is dedicated to pondering the mystery of these alien forces and their motivation. I hope that this works for people who managed to avoid the previews but for me I was just begging for them to get the hell on with it by the time they did. After this emphatic change of the tone of the movie there are three more solid “everything you know is wrong” moments and a handful of other big swings in the direction of this movie. It’s too much and it feels like self-parody by the end. I wouldn’t have been surprised if someone removed their face revealing it to be a mask concealing that they’d been a drone the whole time. Maybe that’s too close to Mission: Impossible to do in another Tom Cruise movie.

Arvin’s Take: I really liked Tron: Legacy; it was a gorgeously designed film, mostly coherent and not overstuffed, which raises it above a lot of recent sci-fi flicks. Oblivion might aim a little lower as far as flashy design but its execution might be even better. In all technical respects the film is flawless (no CG Jeff Bridges head). I often lament how bland sci-fi and fantasy movies’ actual imagery looks compared to their concept art; Like Tron: Legacy, Oblivion has no such disconnect, and I can recommend it based on aesthetics alone.

That said, Oblivion falls short with its badly paced story and half-baked themes. It recalls the flimsy high concept that the Matrix films are founded upon, except there’s only about an hour’s worth of ideas in this two-hour film. It would work as a nicely disposable Twilight-Zone-esque short story but stretched to two hours the audience is given too many slow and repetitive moments to dwell on how impractical the overall conceit is.

Year 2 Week 16 Preview

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 20:42:21 -0400

I always feel silly doing the traditional previews when there’s only one movie opening. Let’s try not doing that.

I saw a TV spot for Oblivion today that was actually advertising that it had the director of Tron: Legacy and that was certainly surprising. It’s not like Tron: Legacy did bad business or anything but it wasn’t exactly an acclaimed piece of cinema and I don’t think anyone raved about the direction. Also, Oblivion has Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman in it. That would seem to be the thing to put in the trailers. Not that I think the viewing public is unaware of this fact or that they have much of a choice. Oblivion is opening in 3,800 theaters and nothing else opens wide this week. It should win with a higher gross than the next few movies combined.

Arvin’s Pick: I don’t know why Oblivion isn’t being released in 3d, given how Joseph Kosinski’s last film was Tron. Cruise isn’t a slam-dunk domestic draw anymore so with a film this expensive 3D seemed like a no-brainer. Still, it’s a weak weekend so it looks like we finally get our first straight sci-fi film of 2013 to debut at number one.

Year 2 Week 15: 42

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 02:31:21 -0400

It’s hard to not like 42. I like Jackie Robinson and this is a perfectly adequate telling of his story. My problem is there have been so many sports movies about racism and they all walk the same path that this one comes around and it’s impossible for it to feel fresh.

The first thing I did after watching the movie was to look up Ben Chapman, the manager of the Philadelphia Phillies played by Alan Tudyk, to see if he could possibly be as racist as he was portrayed in the movie. The answer is maybe he was but they attributed to him everything that the entire team did. It’s an entirely fair tool of adaptation and works to streamline the story but it sort of creates this mythological figure of impossible racism that’s hard to shake. The movie also sort of deflates towards the end. The racist villains fall in the middle third of the movie so the climax is all about the effort to win the National League Pennant and that’s just a series of textbook scenes out of any sports movie. I would rather the baseball season have taken a back seat to the personal dramas.

I don’t know what to make of Harrison Ford here. He goes through the entire movie talking through this growl that doesn’t particularly line up with any of the audio of Branch Rickey I can find on the Internet. Maybe this is what you get when you hire Ford these days, he shows up and just does whatever version of growling he feels like. It’s kind of like Johnny Depp deciding he would do Jack Sparrow as Keith Richards but with a lot less success. Chadwick Boseman is much better as Robinson but the montage of photos at the end underscores how little he looks like the real deal.

Arvin’s Take: Yes, of course the story of Jackie Robinson is one of the most uplifting in American history that it’s tough to portray it as anything but inspirational and feel-good, but 42’s script is so one-dimensional and on the nose, it’s easier to single out examples when it shows some wit or subtext (the “Does God love baseball?” exchange is as snappy as it gets). Every line, every scene gets rephrased for greater clarity and emphasis when it was overly explicit to begin with (Jackie’s wife throws up in the bathroom. We assume she’s pregnant. An elderly woman looks at her and says “when was the last time you had your monthly?” Clearly she’s pregnant. Then the elderly woman says, “maybe you’re pregnant”). Every character exists only as one of the four stereotypes in these types of film: unimpeachable blacks, unimpeachable whites, super-racist whites, and whites who change their mind. There’s barely even any scenes of the players just socializing. Only Brooklyn Dodgers manager Leo Durocher’s character (played by Christopher Meloni) is shown any type of actual personal life (related to his suspension-causing extramarital affair) that I wonder why they bothered including it at all.

Year 2 Week 15 Preview

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 17:09:18 -0400

Yeah, I never really nailed down the whole time change thing. I’m coming home soon. In time for what should be a close week. Arvin’s pick is below. I disagree with him, I think Scary Movie 5 has been severely under-marketed and if people were so anxious for a horror parody then A Haunted House wouldn’t have bombed so hard earlier this year. I’ll take 42.

Arvin’s Pick: I prefer comedy over horror, I just don’t like paying to get myself tortured. The only comedy we’ve seen so far has been Identity Thief, and this weekend it looks like Scary Movie 5 will win. I’m worried that I’m going to start to like getting tortured.

Year 2 Week 14: Evil Dead

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 18:54:49 -0400

Andrew’s here again for Evil Dead. I’ll be back next week with quick thoughts on the two movies I missed and a review of a movie that hopefull isn’t Scary Movie 5.

Despite being an ardent Stephen King fan, I’ve never been much for horror movies, especially of the (usually) mindless splatterhouse variety. I haven’t seen the original The Evil Dead (or its sequels) since I first watched them, nearly twenty years ago. I remember liking the sequels more, with their wildly fun comedic bent adding more charm to the first’s go-for-broke gonzo violence. And, of course, there was Bruce Campbell.

Fede Alvarez’s Evil Dead remake is a return to roots in that it has very little comedy in it at all. Also gone is the frenetic (and dangerous) camera work that made the original such an effective thriller. But there in full force is some of the most gruesome blood, guts, and puke-filled in-camera action I’ve seen on the big screen in a long time. One of my favorite things about the remake is the practical effects; there is very little CGI, and the multiple dismemberments, slashings, and bashings are all the more horrendous for it. And this is a straight-up gory horror movie; no twisted human torture porn, no unexplained phenomena, just good old-fashioned (like Grimm’s fairy tale old-fashioned) demon shit.

But what about Ash? Suburgatory’s Jane Levy, her hair criminally dyed black to stress her seriousness as a recovering heroin junkie, holds her own as both protagonist and demon. She’s no Ash, of course, and neither is her brother (Shiloh Fernandez), but I think that is a deliberate choice, and a good one. Overall, the acting is better than your average slasher flick.

If you are the sort of person who enjoys a cinematic bloodbath, I imagine you’ll love Evil Dead. If gore is not your thing, I’d stay far, far away. And if you’re a fan of the originals (and haven’t seen it yet), stick around through the credits to hear the audiotapes from the ’81 flick and a pleasant easter egg at the end.

Arvin’s Take: Evil Dead is fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, it opened with 26 million dollars at number one, was produced by the original filmmakers, and yet exit polling showed audiences gave it a C+. I think audience expectations for what makes a good horror movie ranges wider than any other genre: people have such varying degrees of what’s the proper amount of scary, serious, funny, gore, loud noises, torture, story, and emotional attachment. These elements elicit such visceral reactions that I think it’s just futile to “objectively” “review” a horror film. I liked Evil Dead because it was disturbing and violent but didn’t rely on many jump-scares. However, that’s because I find jump-scares terrifying. I don’t think Evil Dead terrified me much. Does that make it a good horror movie or not? I don’t know.

Year 2 Week 14 Preview

Thu, 04 Apr 2013 20:37:51 -0400

I’m still out of the country and I really don’t have a good idea of what day or time this will be posting.

There’s a couple ways this could go this week. G.I. Joe: Retaliation could easily repeat, it’s probably good for ~$20 million dollars this weekend and this is likely to be a soft weekend. The only thing standing in the way of a repeat is the fact that no one seems to like this movie or want to see it. on Monday and Wednesday this week it was outgrossed by The Croods. The Croods could make a return to the top. That would be pretty surprising but, who knows, maybe this is the defining movie for young people of this generation. A Lion King for kids with bad taste. Then there’s the Evil Dead remake which has incredible buzz but is looking at a pretty unimpressive history of horror remakes. It has great buzz coming out of SXSW and has a wide enough release to do it but it’s a crapshoot.

The right answer, of course, is Jurassic Park 3D but that won’t happen because this is a nation full of people I hate. I’ll take Evil Dead.

Arvin’s Pick: I am excited for the new Evil Dead movie and, as mentioned before, I am not really a horror fan. There’s an unflinching nastiness to this one that sold me as soon as I saw the tongue cutting. All signs point to a strong opening but critical acclaim and horror movie box office is usually inversely related, and right now Evil Dead is at an impressive 68% (for the genre), so let’s just hope.

Year 2 Week 13: G.I. Joe: Retaliation

Wed, 03 Apr 2013 03:34:35 -0400

What’s that? How do time zones work? This should have gone up earlier and it was all ready I just did some subtraction wrong. Here’s Andrew on G.I. Joe: Retaliation followed by Arvin.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra holds the dubious distinction of being the first movie I ever rented from a Redbox and, for just a dollar, it was a pretty good deal. Aside from the cartoonish bodies flying through the streets of Paris and the terrible green Alka Seltzer nanotech effects, for which I retitled it C.G.I. Joe, it had some funny moments and bravura performances from Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Christopher Eccleston. Written by two guys who played a lot of Call of Duty, G.I. Joe: Retaliation has all the charm of a horny, drunken frat boy.

I’m not sure what Art’s policy is on spoilers, but since it’s impossible to spoil something that’s already rotten, I’m gonna go ahead and tell you that Duke (Channing Tatum), the only member left of the first film’s GI Joe unit, dies in the first act, conveniently whittling all the Joes in the world down to the four this film could afford to pay (which is pretty much just The Rock). It’s no secret that, after being shelved last summer to add 3D and avoid The Avengers, the studio added two (very obvious) new scenes between Tatum and The Rock, which give you the only taste of fun in the whole film, and cash in on Tatum’s rising star since 21 Jump Street/Magic Mike.

The disjointed plot leapfrogs from the decimated Joes-in-hiding, Roadblock (El Rocko), Flint (nobody), and Lady Jaye (failed Wonder Woman), to the mostly unrelated ninja family drama, giving us the worst cameo by RZA in anything yet, and introducing another barely-formed female character, Jinx. But no one goes to see these movies for the paper-thin characters, I hear you saying, they go for the ‘splosions.

There is one zip-line sequence that’s pretty cool; it’s the cliffside ninja fight that you’ve seen teased since last spring. And Cobra’s secret weapon, the one time we see it used, is a decent take on the ‘death from space’ trope. But other than those, the action sequences feel like the toy commercials they are, and who really cares what happens to these humorless, poorly-drawn people anyway?

Also, this film underutilizes the usually compelling Walton Goggins (from FX’s Justified), and I fear that an entire generation of people will now only know Jonathan Pryce as “the President from the G.I. Joe movies.” I am really hoping that Evil Dead takes the prize this weekend. If I have to watch this one again, I’ll have to let you know how I REALLY feel.

Arvin’s Take: After the abomination of Rise of Cobra, I went through the list of things I needed to fix the franchise: no silly romantic subplot, a more macho lead, no “urban” comic relief, more ninjas, a more badass Cobra Commander, and more colorful costumes. The trailers for Retaliation looked promising. And, really, the film itself delivers on all of these, but I still found the film, while a noticeable improvement ove its predecessor, still pretty mediocre. I tried to think through what was lacking this time (it was mostly plot issues), but more than anything I realized that I didn’t care; I was never really a GI Joe fan (versus that other Hasbro property), and since I’ll probably never be enthralled by GI Joe brand anyway, I really had no business imposing my demands on the film (I’m happy for fans who liked this film; it certainly felt like it hit more targets than it missed). If they ever really do successfully reboot the project again, I’m open to jumping back in, but in the meantime, I just can’t wait for Fast & Furious 6.

Year 2 Week 13 Preview

Fri, 29 Mar 2013 23:12:28 -0400

I hate to do this again. I’m leaving in the morning for a two week trip to Japan and I have not had the time to type out a preview. Here’s Arvin’s pick and I completely agree with his selection. I will have a fill-in for the blog (the insanely funny Andrew Wollman) and, when I get back I will view both winners. Have fun everyone.

Arvin’s Pick: My fiancee had been putting the fear in me that The Host might give GI Joe a run for its money and given the confusion of GI Joe releasing on a Thursday that might make the tally more murky. But so far the tracking is putting The Host far behind (probably not even 2nd place) so barring a (not impossible) massive underperformance by the delayed Joe sequel, I am super amped to get my first of several anticipated doses of The Rock for the year.

Year 2 Week 12: The Croods

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 21:25:06 -0400

I’m getting flashbacks to Hotel Transylvania. I liked this movie and I can’t figure out if that’s a result of genuine quality or rock-bottom expectations. The Croods is a dramatically better movie than Hotel Transylvania but that’s some of the faintest praise I could give a movie. It’s like complementing a restaurant for not making you shit yourself to death. The Croods is perfectly edible food.

It does not start out as a good movie. The first act didn’t work for me at all. I spent it settling in to dislike this movie. The opening action set piece is frivolous. The humor is at the Flintsones level and I absolutely do not mean that as a compliment. The movie takes a dramatic turn for the better once the movie gets going and a big reason for that change is, I am not kidding even a little bit, the incredible acting of Nicolas Cage.

I know he gets a lot of shit but Cage brings more to the table than he takes off of it and I’ve never thought he was flat-out not trying. He brings so much depth to his character and the movie as a whole. I was fighting back tears near the end and that was 85% Cage right there. The other 15% was Emma Stone but no one doesn’t like her so it’s harder to get enthusiastic about her. Cage is playing basically the same character as Ray Romano was in Ice Age: Continental Drift last year and does it a million times better. Also this movie does the whole continental drift thing better. The score is Croods 2 Ice Age 4 0.

The animation was better than I thought it would be. The main characters are kind of simple and they vary widely in how well they convey emotion (the mom character is seemingly capable of two expressions) but the environments look great. The long journey is never visually boring and I love all of the fake animal monsters that Arvin is going to complain about in a couple paragraphs. With these second tier animation houses (Dreamworks is not on the Pixar level) it usually serves their interests to hide the things they can’t do well. if you can’t nail a saber-toothed tiger make up your own giant cat and you’ll get our suspension of disbelief back. Worked like a charm. It’s too bad that they showed none of the good parts of this aesthetic in the trailer.

Arvin’s take: I admit I’m especially nitpicky about Chris Sanders’ work because I hold his directorial debut, Lilo & Stitch, in such high regard (the same can be said about Brad Bird on account of the Iron Giant). So I’ll get this out of the way: while his movies have gotten steadily less appealing, Chris Sanders has yet to make a bad movie, including The Croods. That said, just like in Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon (his sophomore effort), there are such powerful, nuanced, ideas on display that when the story reverts to one-dimensionalism, it’s more strongly disappointing. Dragon and The Croods both have a strong pro-scientific progress bent which is great (Dragon did it better), but I wish the inquisitive Guy (Ryan Reynolds) had as much to learn from the Crood dad Grug (Cage) as the movie so strongly shows vice-versa. The easiest way to handle it is just to have made Guy more of a vehement loner, who realizes that progress is complemented by support and cooperation.

On a more nitpicky note, I personally have this pet peeve about a portrayal of a prehistoric world where the creatures are just completely made up. There’s a difference between stylizing existing prehistoric animals like saber-toothed tigers and giant birds and insects, and having flying turtle-birds and two-bodied rodents that share a tail. I think prehistoric creatures are fantastical enough without complete fabrication.

Year 2 Week 12 Preview

Fri, 22 Mar 2013 00:07:04 -0400

I’ve been watching basketball for almost 12 hours now. It’s hard to muster up the energy to pretend this will be a competitive weekend. Spring Breakers is being omitted here because it’s under my theater threshold.

The Incumbent

Probably the end of the road for Oz. The big release this week is another family film and one with a hell of a marketing campaign. It’s been a hell of a run and I anxiously await the hastily prepared sequel. Or prequel. Can you do a prequel to a prequel? What’s that called?

Opening this weekend

Admission: I want to believe this could be a break out comedy but none of the trailers I’ve seen for this have made me laugh. How can they make a movie with Tina Fey and Paul Rudd and have it not be funny? I’m sure it’s a completely passable movie and will be very enjoyable on TBS every other month for the next decade. It doesn’t have a chance of winning this weekend though.

The Croods: Arvin is going to mention that The Croods is written and directed by the guy responsible for Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon. He is not going to mention that the other writer and director is responsible for Racing Stripes and Space Chimps. Thats the influence I’m seeing in the ads. It looks like a piece of crap but it’s a CG animated kids movie in over 4,000 theaters. it’s a lock.

Olympus Has Fallen: I don’t understand the marketing for this one bit. They really make it look like Morgan Freeman plays the president in this film and he doesn’t. What a weird thing to be deceptive about. This movie would need a big turnout from men to win and it’s the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament so those men just aren’t out there to watch it. I mean if this didn’t look like a piece of shit. Which it does.

My Prediction: I honestly can’t imagine what would have to happen for The Croods to lose this weekend. Maybe I’m missing some sort of parental fatigue after Oz but that doesn’t seem likely.

Arvin’s Prediction: I’ve become super distanced from children’s advertising the past few years, and The Croods looks like the same type of uninspired entries I’ve had pass my by. It’s directed by Chris Sanders; his Lilo & Stitch was excellent, his How to Train Your Dragon was good, and his caveman film looks to continue the slope. More than anything I just continue to lament these guys’ continued hiatus from 2D animation, but I’m a snob like that, and clearly the audiences this weekend will continue to prove me wrong.

Year 2 Week 11: Oz the Great and Powerful

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 07:00:41 -0400

It’s really hard to review a movie that’s sort of in the middle of the road. It’s even harder to have to review that movie twice. All the things I had to say last week are still true, it’s still a fine movie that shows what can happen if you give a good director a real budget and a cast that’s like a seven out of ten. Here are some admittedly small potatoes observations from a second viewing.

Oz has this fascination with Thomas Edison that feels so much like tacked on bullshit that it defies belief. It’s like after the fourth draft of the script someone asked “Hey, how come there’s so much science stuff in the climax here? How would a stage magician know about all this stuff?” and they had to come up with something. Edison is mentioned in dialogue that seems to have no other connection to other things and I have a lot of trouble believing that a man who grew up idolizing Thomas Edison would become a womanizing pseudo-grifter heart of gold or not. It’s not so much that I mind contrivances like this but they should be put in a little more delicately.

It’s hard to look at any big Disney hit without thinking of how it will be used as the backdrop for the rest of our lives. It could be like The Lion King and treated like a rare treat to be parceled out when Disney believes we’ve been good and given future theatrical releases that also do big business. It could also end up like The Hunchback of Notre Dame a movie which, I believe, if you mention at a Disney Park the cast members are allowed to take their cyanide capsules. Oz will almost certainly wither in the shadow of the 1939 classic and even if it doesn’t Disney might hesitate to beg the comparison in future. It’s a shame because both of my screenings have had delighted children in it. I really don’t know what my point here is. Why isn’t Aladdin on Bluray?

Arvin’s Take: Seeing the movie a second time brings out a lot more of the films’ storytelling problems especially from the standpoint of the witches, whose motivations and backstories seem even more muddled and reductive this time around. That said, the parts I loved I still loved, specifically Finley, the flying monkey voiced by Zach Braff. His character is so unobnoxiously lovable that I found myself docking the movie points for his relative absence in the second half of the film. He might be my favorite non-human sidekick since Teddy from AI.

Year 2 Week 11 Preview

Fri, 15 Mar 2013 14:02:17 -0400

Hey, I have like no time this week and Arvin kind of crushed it. Here’s his pick and I completely agree with him. He left out The Call but won’t we all?

Arvin’s Pick: There’s an old-school quaintness to The Incredible Burt Wonderstone that I find charming, and frankly I’m shocked it’s taken this long to do an A-List broad comedy about magicians. I doubt this’ll be all that memorable but I still have the taste of Identity Thief in my mouth and I just need some soda to wash it down.

OH WAIT I forgot that we’ve got the second weekend of Oz. Time for my second repeat of the year!

Year 2 Week 10: Oz the Great and Powerful

Wed, 13 Mar 2013 21:34:57 -0400

Oz the Great and Powerful is an excellent movie. It’s a big studio film with a name director and, dammit, it’s movies like this that make us go to see big spectacle pictures to begin with. After seeing movies like last week’s Jack the Giant Slayer where the plethora of tragic missteps drown out the things that might have worked it’s so refreshing to see a movie that does so many things spectacularly right that they cover seamlessly for the tiny things that don’t work.

It turns out this is a kids movie. Shut up everyone who spent the last week telling me how obvious that was. It’s a kids movie directed by Sam Rami though so there’s a fair amount of trying to scare the crap out of children with 3d monsters. This is keeping with the grand tradition of the original Wizard of Oz film that famously terrorized two generations of children, one theatrically and then another when it was broadcast on TV once a year. It was serious enough that Mr. Rogers had an entire week of shows about the movie to try and teach kids that movies were fake and that they needn’t be afraid of the Wicked Witch. Sam Raimi adds a bunch of 3d monster attacks to the mix and I’m sure if I were younger it would have been absolutely terrifying. I like this return to scary kids movies though especially because I don’t have any kids that are being kept up all night by it. Bravo.

Jezebel ran an interesting piece last week about how this movie was a step back for women and I made the mistake of reading it before seeing the film (not that reading the article was a mistake just that it colored my viewing of it a little bit). I totally see their point here every woman in this movie is defined by their relationship to Oz and most of them are in love with him in one way or another. This stands in contrast to the male characters who are all defined by their occupations. I don’t know how much better this is but it’s certainly different and absolutely not about sex. I think more problematic is that you can tell if a female character is evil by how much of her boobs you can see. There’s a character that goes from good to evil and she obviously ran straight to the Emerald City Victoria’s Secret to spice up her look. Oz the Great and Powerful goes a long way to prove that push-up bras turn women evil.

Arvin’s Take: Once again in the interest of full disclosure I have zero allegiance to the original Wizard of Oz, only ever having seen it for the first time in the past few years. Oz the Great and Powerful is filled with goodness (a theme of the film), which stems greatly from the effort expended by all involved. There’s a lot of genuine heart in this movie, on screen and off (especially for a light fantasy story, the effects are the perfect balance of whimsy and weight, something that Tim Burton and Bryan Singer have been lax about). James Franco doesn’t disgrace the story, and nobody turns in such stellar work as to make his performance stand out negatively, but if you were expecting him to flip your doubts you’ll be disappointed.

The only thing that really sticks out as problematic is the subtextual portrayal of women, none of whom do much more than act as different one-dimensional counterpoints to men (as a virginal mother, a political rival, and a scorned lover). It sucks because all three actresses turn in solid work in a story that’s, again, genuinely good, about good things, qualities for kids to aspire to.