A Royal Night Out (2015)

"Margaret!" -Everyone, all the time

I am not a royalty nut. In fact, I generally couldn't be bothered. Royalty is a manifestation of history, magic, and escapist fantasy, but tangible and real in our modern world.

So....A Royal Night Out is basically just a filmed fan fic. I don't mean to malign it, but only place it in context.  A+ fan fiction indeed.

So if you want a silly romp of royals out amongst the commons, lindi-hoppin their care away on VE day...A Royal Night Out meets all criteria. If you were looking for anything else, story, plot, historical accuracy, acting, accents, etc, you are out of luck.

Tis a a silly but pleasing fiction.

On a scale of VE day to VD day, I give A Royal Night Out 2.3 out  5 star.

*This is my second movie with Jack Reynor.  I think we should all be on the look for his future.

Sing Street (2016)

"You gotta drive it like you stole it" -Brendan (Jack Reynor)

It's interesting to think about a film as a pure passion project. Passion and work is so much more enjoyable to watch on screen than money. Films that are made as work, look and feel like work. Films that are made out of fun, inspiration, and joy.  Feel like they were made of out of stardust.  

You just can't fake it. 

Sing Street was made by people who clearly love early 80's video pop. It's weird and strange. But they revel in it. All the hair, the colors, the questionable/iconic fashion choices, the metaphors of unrequited love. They love it all, and it shows. The creators were clearly there. They get the details, and put as much on screen as they can. 

So if you are down for a 90 minutes of 80's remembrance, consider, Sing Street. 

Also; 

The songs are really pretty good. 

The teen actors are amazing.

I am sucker for large group dance numbers. 

I miss 1980s endings to films.  -leave in search of adventure. No regrets. Walk away. 

On a scale of Irish brogue to Irish coffee, I give Sing Street 3.7 out of 5 stars. 

Inferno (2016)

"There is a switch. If you throw it, half the people on earth will die, but if you don't, in 100 years, the human race will be extinct." -Bertrand Zobrist

*SPOILERS*  Read further at your own peril.

I have nothing particularly pro or con to say about the acting or execution of Dan Brown's novel, Inferno, as a movie.  I read the book and then was pleasantly surprised to learn the movie was coming out. In fact, the ending of the book I thought one of the more audacious and surprising endings I've read in a while. Inferno is unleashed. The world cannot go back.  1/3 of all people are now sterile and 1/3 of all our progeny will be sterile from this time forward. And we have decide what to do next.

That is an ending. It is chilling and real and full of actual terror about the prospect of what we can do to ourselves, what has been done, and what we will do going forward. Do we work to keep our decreased fecundity a secret? Do we attempt to undo genetic tampering on mass scale? Should we even try? Can we trust ourselves to not screw up worse? The new world Inferno, the book, leaves the reader in is fascinating and plays to our current relationship with our planet, ourselves, and our creator(s) -which is now us.

The movie version ends with Robert Langdon and Co. saving the day before the virus can be released.  No harm.  Earth saved!  Yay!

And it made me incredibly sad.  So, I have to ask, screenplayer writer, David Koepp 1; WHY?

Why change this most magnificent and interesting ending to one so simple? Are audiences not prepared for a more challenging if chilling finale? Does it make for bad ticket sales? Does it make for a poor narrative? Why?

On a scale of Harris Tweed to Chamois cloth, I give Inferno 1.9 out of 5 stars.

London Has Fallen (2016)

SAS SGT: There's more than 100 terrorists in there!

Mike Banning: Yeah? Well, they should've brought more men.

So LHF is nothing special.  Nothin. Everyone has seen this movie before. 

But, it did make me consider some critical questions about America, cinema, and global politics. 

America: If I were a Brit or really any other nationality, wouldn't I consider it kind of arrogant and strange for a pro-america film to take place and destroy somewhere else? Imagine if a film about a French secret service agent protecting the French President devolved into the destruction of iconic symbols of Washington DC and New York City. It would seem strange, but if America does it...everyone seems ok with it.  There have apparently been enough movies like this for no one to take notice of its rather troubling premise.  It's like a film was made on the utter surety that "We're #1" around the world, so we can destroy whatever. 

Cinema: Boy, have we perfected the Secret Service shoot 'em up. LHF in this regard is spectacular. It is the pure essence of mindless patriotic defensive based violence. It's like there is formula and they just followed it. President+Terrorist+Guns+Government traitors+A good hearted secret service agent about to a be a father=a repeatable recipe.

Global Politics: Don't other nationalities and specifically other heads of state just start to feel marginalized by American films? The American President always survives, but the Japanese PM...you know he's not going to make it. German Chancellor? Goner. Leader from outside of the G20? -absolutely no chance.  This hierarchy of importance may not serve to re-enforce the natural order in the way that merits cooperation. 

On a scale of NFL to EPL, I give London Has Fallen 2.3 out of 5 stars. 

Bad Words (2013)

This post will be explicit and full of potty mouth. In case my mother or anyone with delicate ears reads my blog, you've been warned. ( I don't recommend Bad Words for you either.)

"Why don't you take your potty mouth, go locate your pre-teen cock-sucking son and stuff him back up that old blown-out sweat sock of a vagina and scoot off back to whatever shit-kicking town you came from!" -Guy Trilbi

I don't like to swear. I find it crass in most situations. However, I think swearing can also be versatile, potent, endearing, playful, funny, and cathartic. Part of the reason to have defined bad words is to use them to emphatically express with all the precision of a dull surgical axe the things we truly mean. Fuck, Yeah! (Bad Words is not the greatest example of coarse script writing I have ever seen, in fact it's pretty mild, but the juxtaposition of the Spelling Bee with double-teamed menstruating whores gets me to the topic at hand.)

Bad Words is actually an engrossing movie, but most of that is through the consistent and, often brilliant, use of cunts, twats, fucks, shits, dicks, and more in front of children. The gross factor of the script is pretty fucked up. In my mind, after they finished the first draft, I think the writers went back and added an expletive or horrifying descriptive metaphor where ever they could. I would have fun with that as a writer because I'm the kind of guy that finds the idea of pushing a small child off of a tall unicycle during a parade and then farting directly into their tears, hysterical. (mwhahaha).

I also want to congratulate Jason Bateman. This was his directorial debut. He did a great job. Scenes were clean. Camera positions well chosen. Transitions were tight. I do wish he had found a way to withhold critical mystery information till later in the film, but that's a small thing.  I hope he directs other films.

Oh, and Allison Janey, please be in anything you want in any role you want.

On a scale of Douch-baggery to Skull-duggery, I give Bad Words 2.7 out of 5 stars. 

Deadpool (2016)

"Happy Lent" -CopyCat

Sarcasm and witty lines will only take a movie so far. At some point, mouthiness and one-liners are just symptomatic of sadness and a lack of empathy for the audience. It is a pithy, lazy, and convenient way to generate an anti-hero.

That's all I thought about Deadpool. That's it.

Oh and I laughed a few times. -mostly at TJ Miller.

On a scale of Soulless One 1 to James Brown, I give Deadpool 1.989 out of 5 stars. 

Today's Special (2009)

Akbar: they say the Shah of Iran visited India once and said eating with a knife and fork was like making love through an interpreter.

I pretty much watched this because it stars and was written by Asif Mandvi. 

The result is a positive but unremarkable movie. My favorite character was the father, Hakim, played by Harish Patel. He played a perfect combination of concern, former authority figure, father, and disappointment. 

Other stand outs were Naseeruddin Shah and Kumar Pallana.

My big take away was that Today's Special made me think about my mother. She cooks. She doesn't have a recipe. She doesn't measure, and it tastes great.

I wish I had that kind of soul.  I'm a good cook, but I need a plan, and often it tastes like I cooked by numbers. 

Jazz and feel vs. measured and cold classical music

On a scale of Salt n' Pepper vs Masala Curry, I give Today's Special 2.44 out of 5 stars. 

The Fundamentals of Caring (2016)

Dot: I told you I only date assholes.

So, if someone asked me if the idea of Paul Rudd taking a boy with muscular dystrophy to see The World's Biggest Pit was a reasonable premise for a movie, I would have said no.  Don't make it. 

But, they did and I saw the result.  

It is genuinely  nice to be proven wrong. 

The Fundamentals of Caring was not a great movie, but I have positive feelings about it. 

I kinda hate when movie dialogue and shy away from positive asshole-ry.  I think that for a lot of people the closer a relationship the less formal and more raw one can be. This leads to expletives and dark dark jokes that in any other circumstance would be considered abhorrent, but are often delightful. The difference between "I will kill you." and "I will murder you by putting your face in den of fire ants and hungry rats." My own tendency for showing affection through the dark and disturbing puts me at an advantage to empathizing with the main characters of The Fundamentals of Caring. I appreciate the tricky high-wire act that they display. 

If you find this kind of humor and affection unsettling, you might not enjoy The Fundamentals of Caring. 

On a scale of gallows humor to The Pun-itentiary, I give The Fundamentals of Caring 2.5 out of 5 stars. 

Star Trek Beyond (2016)

Spock: Lt. Uhura wears a Vokaya amulet which I presented to her as a token of my affection and respect.

Bones: You gave your girlfriend a radioactive jewelry?

Spock: The emissions is harmless, Doctor. But its unique signature makes it very easy to identify.

Bones: You gave your girlfriend a tracking device?

Spock: [realizing] That was not my intention.

I consider Star Trek Beyond the manifestation of a disturbing trend for commercial film, but also for the Star Trek Franchise. 

I am a Star Trek fan.  My favorite series is DS9. My Captain ranking is Sisko, Picard, Kirk, Archer, Janeway. My favorite species are the Cardassians.  So, I speak from a place of some fan authority when I say:

Star Trek Beyond is not a Star Trek Movie. It is a reasonable science action film; perfectly acceptable; but not a Star Trek movie. 

There have been good Star Trek movies (II, IV, VI, First Contact), marginal ones (V, Generations), bad ones (III, Nemesis), and execrable ones (looking at you "The motion picture", and Insurrection). But it is my contention that since the JJ Abrams reboot, Star Trek has lost its core and descended into indistinguishable sci-fi. 

For me, the core of a "Star Trek" movie is that ultimately it has a higher purpose. They exist to teach us something valuable. A "Star Trek" movie draws parallels to the real world; has opinions about ethical, societal, or emotional problems.  "Star Trek" in my mind means exploring, learning, and discovery for the audience and the crew. Star Trek IV is synonymous with saving whales. V is a journey to find god. VI is an allegory about the end of the Cold War.  These films and episodes have meant something. 

I do love JJ Abrams, but his versions of Star Trek lack the soul of their predecessors. We learn nothing.  The films state no opinions.  They exist to entertain.

I understand how focusing on visual effects, explosions, and character wit, can create a movie that appeals to everyone.  But, it makes me sad that the venerable Star Trek has succumbed to forces of commercialism at the expense of meaning.

 On a scale of Warp 1 to Warp 9.9 sling-shot around a sun, I give Star Trek Beyond 2.0 out of 5 stars. 

oh and here is a video of Karl Urban doing Dancing Queen. LINK

The Shallows (2016)

"I'm not dying here." - Nancy

Blake Lively vs. A Shark:  That's basically it.  I think we've all seen this before.  And it does not disappoint. Blake Lively fights a shark. Yup.   To not disappoint is actually a remarkable achievement. In my mind, The Shallows has put itself in contention for  Top 5 shark movies of all time.  Most are just pure trash. Take a look at this list: 1  In this company, The Shallows is head and shoulders above.  I say well done.   -though can't say that I wouldn't enjoy watching Jersey Shore Shark Attack.

Kudos to the writers of The Shallows for placing our damsel in distress on the back of a rotting whale.  Just wonderful.

On a scale of Mega-Shark to Mecha-Shark, I give The Shallows 3.3 out of 4 stars. 

Me Before You (2016)

"I just…want to be a man who has been to a concert with a girl in a red dress. Just for a few minutes more." -Will Traynor

What a legitimately sad movie. Sad in the best way. Sadness can encompass joy, solace, and relief.  This makes Me Before You a unique and wonderfully strange date movie.  Seriously, this could only be the worst or the best first date movie ever. Nothing in between. At it's best, everyone cries. And everyone emerges from the darkness better for the journey.  At it's worst, the date descends into soul crushing despair and never recovers. 

So in short, most films would stop at nothing to achieve one tenth of the emotional depth of Me Before You. But the rest of the film from acting to writing to editing and music is slightly below average.  So yeah...a really emotionally moving meh. 

Emotional connection is really the hardest thing to engender in a film. Really well done, Director Thea Sharrock.

On a scale of The Marianas Trench to Sea Level, I give Me Before You 3.1 out of 5 stars. 

Finding Dory (2016)

"For a guy with 3 hearts, you're not very nice." -Dory

Hats off to Pixar. They know how to make me feel; happy, sad, solace; you name it. I think that John Lasseter is a true and often unheralded master of cinema today. His cheer and leadership permeates everything Pixar touches. Other studios can copy the look, the sound, even to some degree the feel, but they can never recreate John Lassester.

It's unfortunate that Finding Dory, just wasn't actually a great movie. It was fine. Fun. Cute, and made me sniffle to hold back tears, but the story was difficult to follow, made harder by retrograde amnesia, and just felt like a really great direct to video adventure, not a cinema feature.

On a scale of 1 fish,  2 fish to 1 potato, 2 potato, I give Finding Dory 2.2 out of 5 stars.

A Hologram for the King (2015)

"It was a difficult decision." -Allen Clay in reference to the Schwinn bicycle case

Hologram for the King was a well conceived, well-executed,  and timely movie. It is worth seeing. I expect college classes in 20 years might include it in a syllabus, and that's exactly why it is a financial flop. The entire premise lacked anything that the average audience member could latch onto. I like to think of myself as average, and I do my best to empathize with everyone, but the movies I see and even want to see are a product of years of schooling, training, and my attempts to seem/act/behave smrt. If I lacked the privileges of my circumstance, my guess is that I would have found Hologram for the King, slow, unfunny, boring, and confusing.

But, I want to use HftK as a springboard for something we all want to talk about when it comes to movies: NUDITY!!!!!

Yes, HftK has nudity.

For myself, I think our culture, sensors, and artists, should prioritize violence as a "problem" on screen far far above nudity. I'm even in favor a strict 50/50 policy when it comes to female vs. male nudity.  And no, Tom Hanks does not get naked for this role. HftK only has female nudity.

But what made the nudity of HftK notable is that it wasn't outrageously young pretty people wearing make-up, but rather an attractive woman in her early 50s in the ocean, where light is irregular and no make-up stays put. No pretenses, no camera tricks, no voyeur camera positions, just a character getting naked for the right reasons, in a delightfully understated and tasteful snorkeling sequence. Equality in attractiveness, age, body-type, and gender in cinematic nudity please.

I also found myself comparing the unbuilt tech city and Saudia Arabia itself to Japan in the 1980's into 90s. Wealthy and prosperous in vision for the future; unable to see the emptiness of their affluence in the present.

On a scale of emulated flattery to inimitability, I give Hologram for the King 3.43 out of 5 stars.

Captain America: Civil War (2016)

What defines a movie versus a mini-series versus a serial season?

I honestly don't know. I've commented before that I have thought certain films would have been better served in a different format -Batman: The Dark Knight Rises comes to mind.

And in terms of Captain America: Civil War (CA:CW)C, here is where I am confused.

• CA:CW was crafted with deference to the needs a story arch contained within
• It has a clear 1st, 2nd, 3rd act and a denouement.
• The main theme CA:CW seems to be "things torn apart". The resolution is a torturous break with no catharsis.
• This is not unique to CA:CW, other films choose to end on chaotic notes -The Empire Strikes Back-, but this is a defined commitment from start to finish to dissolution. It isn't its choice as much as its purpose.
• I know that this is part of an extended Universe of which this movie serves a distinct purpose for future films
• CA:CW is a resounding success in its goals: emotional tension, continuity, suspension of disbelief, etc. 

So, here I am wondering if it is even right to rate and judge CA:CW and other franchise universe films under the same criteria as one-off competitors. I'm not sure I want to have to think about Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds and CA:CW as being in the same class of art. 

I realize now that TV, mini-series, seasons, and films/movies are melding together in a way that I enjoy and find upsetting at the same time. I shouldn't be surprised. I consume electronic visual media in an almost uniform fashion. Others are doing the same. I watch movies, episodes, and series generally from home in longer sessions -binges.  If I do go to the cinema, the experience is only occasionally better than my couch. 

Content is coming together as never before.  The only differences are production time, episode time, and length of audience attention during and between engagements. 

It's a brave new world. 

On a scale of One-Time event to On-Demand, I give Captain America: Civil War 3.657 out of 5 stars. 

Chongqing Hot Pot (2016)

If you are going to smoke, I have to be here. Ok, grandpa? -Liu Bo

*More Chinese movies should be showcased in American first run cinemas.

A tale of two halves.

Act 1:  A delightful Chinese bank caper with goofy/sad protagonists and evil mask wearing robbers. I, knowing nothing about the peculiarities of Chongqing caves, Chinese middle schools, or hot pot, was refreshingly out of my element. But, the filmmakers, translators, and actors do a wonderful job suspending any need for inherited cultural associations or assets.  I thought of the first half as Chinese Trailer Park Boys attempting Oceans 11.

Act 2: Despite an impressive act 1, act 2 looses all direction and disregards consequences, reality, and the audience to conclude with a visceral and almost too real fight scene down the streets of Chongqing. Hot Pot ends as if they were making Jason Bourne, because they could. It was too brutal and negated most of my previous affection. *Side note, it was super unclear as to what were the motivations of the masked bank robbers. What I originally thought of as a mysterious background to be revealed later turn out to just be mindless young male violence -like from a bad manga with a bully.

On the whole, Chongqing Hot Pot is acceptable. I am not likely to (want to) watch it again.

On a scale of jumbalaya to stone soup, I give Chongqing Hot Pot 2.1 out of 5 stars.

Zootopia (2016)

"It's called a hustle, honey." -Judy Hopps

Short:

1. A+ for animation, imagery, voice talent, and CUTE
2. C for storyline, plot, and editing

Long:

Oh my is Zootopia a visual treat. It's plot is difficult to follow and its moralizing about predators vs prey is slightly confusing/reductive......but for children I think it is in the top ten of the last 5 years. Funny, positive, pluralistic, beautiful, and encouraging of reaching for dreams.  The Disney recipe to a tee. 

I chose the above quote because it seemed apt that Zootopia in mind was a hustle. For me, I followed the pretty pictures, laughed at the simple jokes, got caught up in the time-honored plot, and left reasonably happy. And like all true hustles, it was too late once I figured out that it had no real soul.

On a scale of Carrots for 1 to Beets for 900, I give Zootopia, 2.9 out of 5 stars.