PROJECT POWER (US - 2020) Directed by Henry Joost & Ariel Schulman. Written by Mattson Tomlin. Cast: Jamie Foxx, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Dominique Fishback, Rodrigo Santoro, Courtney B. Vance, Amy Landecker, Colson Baker, Allen Maldonado, Tait Fletcher, Andrene Ward-Hammond, Kyanna Simpson, CJ LeBlanc, Jazzy De Lisser, Corey DeMeyers, Casey Neistat. (R, 112 mins) If you can imagine Michael Mann directing a hard-R comic book movie, you'll have some idea what to expect with at least the visual and stylistic elements of the Netflix Original film PROJECT POWER. Scripted by Mattson Tomlin (also a co-writer of the forthcoming THE BATMAN) and directed by the "Henry & Rel" team of Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman, best known for the documentary CATFISH and the third and fourth PARANORMAL ACTIVITY entries (they're the ones behind that memorable "fan cam" in the third one), PROJECT POWER scratches that big-budget, VFX-driven summer blockbuster itch that we've been deprived of on the big screen and likewise, its story doesn't hold up under much scrutiny.
New Orleans is the epicenter of a new drug epidemic in the form of Power, given out for free to the city's biggest dealers by severely-scarred criminal Biggie (Rodrigo Santoro). Six weeks later, the city is reeling over the effects of Power, which grants its users unlimited strength and superhuman capabilities in five minute bursts per dose. Everyone's reaction to Power is different--you might become impervious to bullets, you might be set ablaze like Ghost Rider, you might turn into a variation of The Incredible Hulk, it might give you the chameleon-like power of camouflage, or you might have a bad reaction and just melt or explode. Hard-nosed NOPD cop Frank (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) plays by his own rules and goes out on his own sting operations with the help of informant and aspiring freestyle rapper Robin (THE DEUCE's Dominique Fishback), a high-school student who deals Power to pay for her mother's (Andrene Ward-Hammond) cancer treatments. Frank thinks New Orleans' criminal element will use Power to wipe out the cops, but his boss Capt. Crane's (Courtney B. Vance) hands are tied, since every time there's a major bust involving Power, government mystery men in suits and military vehicles show up to pull rank and cut the cops out of the equation.
Frank, Crane, and the government goons are all after "The Major" (Jamie Foxx), a fugitive vigilante who's just arrived in town to track down the source of Power. He immediately has a throwdown with high-on-his-own-supply Power dealer--and Robin's cousin--Newt (Hollywood still trying to make Colson "Machine Gun Kelly" Baker happen) that results in the dealer's explosive death. The cops are led to believe The Major is behind all the mayhem, but he's really after his daughter Tracy (Kyanna Simpson), who appears to have fallen victim to the Power epidemic and has disappeared. But there's more to the story, namely a government conspiracy involving a Tuskegee-type military experiment called "Teleios" that went south in a botched attempt to create the next stage in humanity's evolution. They've been unable to control the results and instead partnered with the criminal element to use the residents of New Orleans as lab rats. Eventually, The Major, Frank, and Robin will join forces, with a nefarious government agent (Amy Landecker) in hot pursuit, and it all ends up--where else?--at an industrial dockyard with cargo ships and stacks of shipping containers.
As far as high concepts go, PROJECT POWER has an intriguing one, but it's a concept that relies too heavily on plot convenience, as almost everyone who takes a dose of Power ends up having it provide exactly the kind of indestructibility they need at that moment (Frank secretly doses on it, and takes a pill right before he gets shot in the head and of course, the bullet leaves a mark but bounces right off of him). With a synth-driven score by Joseph Trapanese and its use of garish color schemes, PROJECT POWER is always fun to watch and it moves fast enough that you won't really question its flaws until it's over. But like Netflix's recent THE OLD GUARD, it's an assembly-line product that won't really stick with you afterward. Not that it really matters, but the closing credits containing a separate "additional photography" crew, cast members, and stunt personnel for just the shipyard climax could be an indication of some hasty eleventh-hour reshoots.
7500 (Germany/Austria/US/France - 2020) Directed by Patrick Vollrath. Written by Patrick Vollrath and Senad Halibasic. Cast: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Omid Memar, Aylin Tezel, Carlo Kitzlinger, Murathan Muslu, Paul Wollin, Passar Hariky, Aurelie Thepaut, Denis Schmidt, Max Schimmelpfennig. (R, 93 mins) In the first half of the 2010s, it seemed like Joseph Gordon-Levitt was everywhere with huge Christopher Nolan blockbusters like INCEPTION and THE DARK KNIGHT RISES, Rian Johnson's LOOPER, Steven Spielberg's LINCOLN, and Robert Zemeckis' THE WALK. He even had enough star power going to direct his own acclaimed 2013 pet project DON JON. Aside from some voice work (including a phone cameo in Johnson's KNIVES OUT), he's been offscreen since Oliver Stone's shameless 2016 hagiography SNOWDEN, but is back with the European-made, real-time hijacking thriller 7500, which was shot back in late 2017 but is only now surfacing on Amazon Prime after the coronavirus nixed a planned theatrical release. 7500--not to be confused with Takashi Shimizu's atrocious 2016 airborne horror film FLIGHT 7500, which was originally titled 7500--is named for the flight term for a hijacking, and feels a bit past its sell-by date as far as post 9/11 thrillers go, but it's a tense, textbook nail-biter, thanks in large part to director/co-writer Patrick Vollrath--the filmmaker with a surname most likely to double as the name of a Viking metal band--playing it smart with his feature debut by keeping the action confined to one location, leaving the audience knowing just as much as the hero about what's going on outside his immediate view.
Gordon-Levitt is Tobias Ellis, the co-pilot on a routine flight from Berlin to Paris. An American expat, Ellis lives in Germany with his half-Turkish/half-German flight attendant girlfriend Gokce (Aylin Tezel) and their two-year-old son. She's on the flight, and though they keep it professional, affable pilot Capt. Michael Lutzmann (Carlo Kitzlinger) is quick to pick up on their connection. Vollrath spends the first 15 minutes of the film moving the camera around the cockpit as the characters are established and the pilots go through the details of their pre-flight checklist. Shortly after takeoff, a quartet of Muslim hijackers attempt to storm the cockpit, with one, Kenan (Murathan Muslu) getting in and stabbing Lutzmann numerous times with a makeshift knife made of glass. Ellis manages to keep the others out and lock the cockpit door, but not before sustaining a serious, gushing wound that immobilizes his left arm. He knocks Kenan unconscious and painstakingly manages to restrain him with his one functioning hand as the captain succumbs to his injuries, forcing Ellis to handle the escalating situation on his own. He notifies air traffic control of the incident and the plane is diverted for an emergency landing in Hanover as he tries to work with an open, nerve-damaging injury and with the other terrorists banging on the cockpit door, which Ellis dutifully refuses to open even after he looks on the monitor and sees the leader, Daniel (Paul Wollin) about to murder one of the passengers by slashing his throat.
Ellis spots a weakness in their group with young Vedat (Omid Memar), who speaks English and is seen on the monitor trying to stop Daniel from killing other people. The hijacking--the terrorists have no demands and only want to crash the plane in a major city--really only takes up the first hour, with the remaining 30 minutes essentially being a two-character piece once Ellis lets a terrified Vedat into the cockpit to save him from his own cohorts. Vollrath walks a fine line in humanizing Vedat as a naive, impressionable 18-year-old who's been goaded by religious extremism into a tragic situation he lacks the maturity to fully comprehend (he even calls his mother to tell her he was a fool to believe them and he just wants to go home). It's essentially CAPTAIN PHILLIPS in a cockpit, but Vollrath's claustrophobic handling of the action and keeping it in such a confined space gives the first hour an effective anxiety attack intensity that does dissipate somewhat once Ellis and Vedat start telling each other about themselves. 7500 also gets a lot from an excellent Gordon-Levitt in a strong and physically demanding performance that quickly makes you forget how he has that pre-INCEPTION Di Caprio thing going on where he still looks like a kid even though he's in his late 30s (his youthful appearance is even worked into the story as Capt. Lutzmann, meeting Ellis for the first time, can't believe he's been flying for ten years). Vollrath also doesn't pull any punches with who he's willing to kill off, which only adds to the nightmarish scenario when Ellis is put in a position to choose between what's best for him versus what's best for the passengers. 7500 probably would've been more "hot button" timely a decade and a half ago, but it's a solid single-set suspense piece with one of Gordon-Levitt's best performances.
Directed by Oliver Stone. Written by Kieran Fitzgerald and Oliver Stone. Cast: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Shailene Woodley, Melissa Leo, Zachary Quinto, Tom Wilkinson, Nicolas Cage, Rhys Ifans, Scott Eastwood, Logan Marshall-Green, Timothy Olyphant, Ben Schnetzer, Lakeith Lee Stanfield, Joely Richardson, Ben Chaplin, Nicholas Rowe, Basker Patel, Edward Snowden. (R, 134 mins) It would be nice if Oscar-winning filmmaker and tinfoil-hat fashionista Oliver Stone was back in provocateur mode with SNOWDEN, but the message is lost in the auteur's didactic execution. Told with myopic tunnelvision and with nothing but gushing admiration for its subject, SNOWDEN lumbers along with little in the way of nuance or subtlety, and nothing in the way of questioning the ex-CIA/NSA whistleblower. It's canonizing hagiography of the most one-sided order, with Edward Snowden the sole voice of morality in a world of evil big government surveillance that exists only to piss on the freedoms of Americans and can't possibly have any positive purpose whatsoever. This should be a nailbiting thriller but Stone is so distracted by his Snowden man-crush that it never has a chance to reach the heights of his in-his-prime conspiracy/paranoia triumphs like JFK or NIXON. It's more in line with the hokey, neutered simplicity of something like WORLD TRADE CENTER. Snowden is a complex, complicated figure, but you wouldn't know it by watching SNOWDEN. Stone isn't interesting in getting in Snowden's head, so you're better off checking out Laura Poitras' Oscar-winning 2014 Snowden documentary CITIZENFOUR instead.
That said, Joseph Gordon-Levitt does a terrific job of capturing Snowden's voice and mannerisms with uncanny accuracy. The film opens in 2013 as an on-the-run Snowden is holed up in a Hong Kong hotel preparing to leak secret CIA and NSA files to documentary filmmaker Poitras (Melissa Leo) and Guardian journalists Glenn Greenwald (Zachary Quinto) and Ewen MacAskill (Tom Wilkinson). Jumping back and forth from 2004 to 2013, we follow Snowden through a short stint in the Army, where his goal of joining the Special Forces is stalled by brittle bones and a pair of fragile legs that get him a discharge. Told by his doctor that there's other ways to serve his country, the conservative, Ayn Rand-admiring Snowden is admitted into The Hill, the CIA training facility in Virginia where he becomes the top prospect of (fictional) instructor Corbin O'Brian (a vampiric Rhys Ifans). He also falls in love with liberal Lindsay Mills (Shailene Woodley), who joins him when his new CIA job takes him to places like Switzerland and Japan, where his focus is cybersecurity and designing programs that are ostensibly used to monitor post-9/11 terrorist activities. He leaves the CIA but works for them on a contractual basis later on, and is disturbed to find that much of the US government's surveillance focus is spying on its own citizens and that one of his programs is used for drone strikes in the Middle East. Growing increasingly concerned about the nature of his work and how far the surveillance goes (he's informed at one point that his suspicions about Lindsay having an affair are unfounded, proof that the omnipresent They are watching her and monitoring her computer and phone activity), he decides to blow the whistle, stealing thousands of secret files and fleeing the country before reaching out to activist filmmaker Poitras.
How heavy-handed is SNOWDEN? The surveillance program is called "Prism," and when invoking it, Stone feels the need to frame shots with a prism effect that's also used when epileptic Snowden has seizures. It actually caused snickering in the audience about the 10th or 12th time it's used. How unsubtle is SNOWDEN? Ifans has been directed to play O'Brian in the most ominously sinister fashion possible, making it difficult to tell if he's a top CIA official or the Antichrist. Watch when he's shown speaking with Snowden in a conference room, Snowden physically there, but O'Brian on a giant, theater-sized screen as Ifans' looming, side-eyed visage takes up the entire display, just in case the whole "Big Brother is watching" concept wasn't already clear. The performances are generally solid, though Nicolas Cage is squandered in an intriguing but tiny role as a benched analyst curating antiquated espionage equipment, his sole purpose being to unknowingly supply the Rubik's Cube that Snowden will use years later to stash the SD card with all the files. But it's Ifans' bizarre portrayal that really sticks out, bringing to mind what might happen if PHANTASM's The Tall Man worked for the CIA. There's a nerve-shredding, Alan J. Pakula-type paranoia thriller to made about Snowden's exploits, and less preachy filmmakers could've done wonders with the subject. Remember that incredible Donald Sutherland exposition drop in JFK? That Oliver Stone could've done something with SNOWDEN. So could Michael Mann in INSIDER mode or David Fincher channeling ZODIAC. There's also a nice Mann vibe in some of Anthony Dod Mantle's digital cinematography in locations all over the world that recalls last year's criminally underrated hacker thriller BLACKHAT. Unfortunately, Stone the filmmaker defers to Dr. Stone the lecturing activist with an agenda. The film completely flies off the rails in a catastrophic climax that recalls Professor Steven Seagal's speech at the end of ON DEADLY GROUND, as Gordon-Levitt actually exits the film and Snowden takes over, playing himself being interviewed via internet from Russia, basking in the standing ovation he gets at a TEDTalk event. This drawn-out finale--more like a tacked-on Snowden infomercial--concludes with an inspirational, manipulative score crescendoing as a pensive Snowden finishes the interview, closes his laptop and turns away, in profile, triumphantly staring out the window of his Russian apartment and smiling, looking like he's waiting for Stone to cue up Foo Fighters' "My Hero" for the closing credits.
Directed by Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller. Written by Frank Miller. Cast: Mickey Rourke, Jessica Alba, Josh Brolin, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Rosario Dawson, Bruce Willis, Eva Green, Powers Boothe, Dennis Haysbert, Ray Liotta, Stacy Keach, Jaime King, Christopher Lloyd, Jamie Chung, Jeremy Piven, Christopher Meloni, Juno Temple, Lady Gaga, Marton Csokas, Julia Garner, Alexa PenaVega, Jude Ciccolella, Johnny Reno. (R, 102 mins)
When the Robert Rodriguez/Frank Miller collaboration SIN CITY was released in 2005, it was hailed as a groundbreaking visual triumph and a trendsetting example of how to adapt a graphic novel--in this case, Miller's legendary series--to the big screen. Nine years later, it holds up beautifully in terms of visuals and its very effective use of CGI, as well as with its loving tribute to the gutsy, hard-boiled prose of a bygone era. While the success of SIN CITY paved the way for other successful graphic novel adaptations like Zack Snyder's 300 (2007), its style is the kind of thing that can't really be repeated without feeling like a tired retread. Look no further than Miller's own disastrous solo directorial outing THE SPIRIT (2008), an excruciatingly awful adaptation of Will Eisner's graphic novel series that came off like a cheap, amateurish ripoff of SIN CITY and was rejected by even the most ardent Miller fanboys. Shot in 2012 and bumped nearly a year from its original October 2013 release date, the belated prequel/sequel combo SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR wasn't really warranted or demanded, and, this far removed from the first film, can't help but pale in comparison to what was so fresh and innovative nearly a decade ago. Rodriguez and Miller seem to recognize that and try to counter it by using 3-D. It makes for some occasionally striking imagery, but remove that superfluous cosmetic addition and you've got a perfectly watchable but thoroughly disposable revamp that plays like a SIN CITY knockoff rather than a follow-up by the same filmmakers. It's almost like a rock band that knocked it out of the park with one instant classic album and followed it with a cash-in comprised of leftover songs that weren't strong enough to make the cut the first time around.
SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR has four segments, only one of which, "A Dame to Kill For," is based on a published Miller work, while the others were written specifically for the film. The time element can be a bit confusing--sometimes it's set in the film's present, other times in the past, which explains the return of some characters killed off in the first film. Ex-boxer and 300-lb killing machine Marv (Mickey Rourke, whose character makeup combined with his own plastic surgery in the years since SIN CITY now have Marv looking like a roid-raging Lionel Stander) disposes of some douchebag college kids who get their kicks by setting bums on fire. Wiseass card sharp Johnny (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) wins a bundle from evil Sen. Roark (Powers Boothe reprises his role) in a backroom card game and lives to regret it. In the longest section, based on "A Dame to Kill For," photographer Dwight (Josh Brolin, replacing Clive Owen), is duped by his femme fatale ex Ava (Eva Green) when she kills her husband (Marton Csokas) and tries to frame him. After being beaten to a pulp by Ava's bodyguard Manute (Dennis Haysbert, replacing the late Michael Clarke Duncan), Dwight teams up with Marv, old flame Gail (a returning Rosario Dawson) and silent assassin Miho (Jamie Chung, replacing Devon Aoki) to exact his revenge. Ava, meanwhile, seduces and manipulates honest cop Mort (Christopher Meloni), despite the warnings of his cynical partner Bob (Jeremy Piven, replacing Michael Madsen). Finally, stripper Nancy (Jessica Alba also returns) is watched over at the sleazy dive bar Kadie's by the ever-present Marv, but she's really waiting for the perfect opportunity to kill Roark, the father of the first film's vicious serial killer The Yellow Bastard. Roark made sure his son's heinous crimes were pinned on pushing-60-with-a-bum-ticker cop Hartigan (Bruce Willis reappears, barely), who was Nancy's guardian angel father figure and was driven to suicide after killing the Yellow Bastard and ensuring her safety.
While SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR has its reasonably entertaining moments and it's never dull, it can't help but feel stale and tired most of the time. Much like the slo-mo and the speed-ramping of 300 have made that the most tired cliche going, the SIN CITY look is something that can only blaze a trail once before everything that comes after is simply following in its path. Miller's writing isn't nearly as good this time around, with the tough-guy narration sounding like cheesy posturing, and there's an almost-total absence of great hard-boiled one-liners that filled the first film, like Hartigan's "When it comes to reassuring a traumatized 19-year-old, I'm as expert as a palsy victim doing brain surgery with a pipe wrench," or Marv, strapped in the electric chair bellowing "Would you get a move on? I ain't got all night!" to a prison chaplain issuing the last rites.
The film does feature some strong performances by a snarling Boothe and a vamping, typically crazy-eyed and frequently nude Green, who almost single-handedly made a must-see film out of 300: RISE OF AN EMPIRE, another unnecessary sequel from earlier this year. There's a large cast of familiar faces here, but very few of them are put to any substantive use. Rourke and Willis were terrific back in 2005, but they're just clocking in for this one (it's easy to forget that, three years before THE WRESTLER, it was his performance in SIN CITY that started the now-squandered Rourkeassaince). Willis' Hartigan only appears fleetingly as a ghost. He has maybe two minutes of screen time and I'd be surprised if he was on the set for more than a day. An unrecognizable Stacy Keach, sporting some Jabba the Hutt-inspired makeup, gets about a minute as big shot mobster Wallenquist. Ray Liotta briefly appears as a philandering businessman in love with a young hooker (Juno Temple). Blink and you'll miss Christopher Lloyd as a drug-addicted, back-alley doc who helps reset Johnny's broken fingers. And Lady Gaga cruises through as a hash-slinging waitress at a skeezy all-night diner. With SIN CITY, even those actors in the smallest roles made an impression (remember Nicky Katt's hapless Stuka and his "Heeeey!" reaction to an arrow through the chest?) because that was a film made with care and precision, but here, they're just distractions (Lady Gaga?) popping into Rodriguez's Troublemaker Studios in Austin for a cameo and a quick run by the craft services table, with their driver presumably leaving the limo running outside. Rodriguez, Miller, and the returning actors don't seem very engaged with the second-rate material that consequently fails to provide much in the way of inspiration for the new cast members. SIN CITY was budgeted at $40 million in 2005, still looks terrific and has aged beautifully. SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR cost $70 million and, factoring out the use of 3-D, more often than not looks and feels like a slipshod, straight-to-DVD knockoff. I didn't hate SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR but unlike its predecessor, it's nothing I'll feel the need to watch again. If nothing else, I guess the best praise to bestow upon it is that it's a masterpiece compared to THE SPIRIT.
BAD GRANDPA is a departure film for the JACKASS team as Johnny Knoxville goes solo in the franchise's first narrative feature. Of course, the plot isn't the focal point of this ramshackle affair as Knoxville, under heavy makeup as lecherous 86-year-old widower Irving Zisman, who goes on a road trip to throw his wife's body off of a bridge (per her final wishes) and turn his eight-year-old grandson Billy (Jackson Nicoll) over to his shitbag father (Greg Harris) when Irving's daughter (Georgina Cates) has to go to jail. The hook here is that other than the primary actors, no other onscreen players are in on what Knoxville and a show-stealing Nicoll are up to as they go on a series of outrageous misadventures that owe more than a slight debt to Sacha Baron Cohen's BORAT and BRUNO. There are quite a few screamingly funny scenes--Irving in an African-American male strip club; Irving sharting in a diner; Irving bringing a margarita blender to a bingo hall; Billy in drag at a beauty pageant, dancing to Warrant's "Cherry Pie"--and quotable dialogue ("They used to call me Jizzy Gillespie in my younger days"), but the whole narrative element is unnecessary and not that interesting. It works best when focused on the shocked reactions of those around them, caught by numerous concealed cameras as shown during the closing credits (usually the owners of the establishments were in on it, but not the patrons). Knoxville has a great rapport with a game Nicoll, a brave and fearless young actor who's so good at staying in character and keeping a straight face that you can see genuine affection and admiration even through the old-man latex on Knoxville's face. It's ragged and inconsistently-paced, but an outrageous, offensive blast all the same. (R, 92 mins; 102-minute unrated version also available)
DON JON (US - 2013)
In films both small (MYSTERIOUS SKIN, THE LOOKOUT) and huge (INCEPTION, THE DARK KNIGHT RISES), Joseph Gordon-Levitt has built a solid reputation as one of the most gifted, natural actors of his generation. He's also an immensely likable guy, though he does seem to occasionally try a little too hard to please, so it's nice to see that his debut as a filmmaker--directing, writing, and starring in DON JON--is indicative of a confidant and assured talent behind the camera as well, the work of someone who's clearly spent a lot of time on movie sets observing and learning from others. It's to Gordon-Levitt's credit that DON JON isn't the vanity project that it could've been, though it's not quite as deep and meaningful as its creator intended. In a role originally planned for Channing Tatum but taken over by Gordon-Levitt himself, the actor plays Jersey meathead Jon, a cartoonish pussy hound who enjoys the simple things in life: working out, clubbing with his bros (Rob Brown, Jeremy Luke), and getting laid. He also has a serious pornography addiction that's rendered real sex with real women unsatisfying, and he goes to church every Sunday to confess his sins, which are usually limited to out-of-wedlock sex and how many times he masturbated to online porn. Thinking a meaningful relationship will make the sex more fulfilling, Jon pursues Barbara Sugarman (Scarlett Johansson), a gum-smacking Jersey goddess who tries to mold him into her image of the perfect guy, including making him watch insipid romantic comedies and badgering him into taking night classes to better himself. While the sex is OK--he laments that she won't do anything but missionary and refuses to give him blowjobs--he genuinely loves her but can't resist the temptations of the anything-goes, money-shot netherworld that awaits him on his laptop.
Since working for her mentor Francois Ozon as an actress (1997's SEE THE SEA, 1998's SITCOM) and as a writer (2002's 8 WOMEN), Marina de Van has demonstrated a no-holds-barred penchant for in-your-face provocation. 2002's IN MY SKIN, her profoundly disturbing directing debut, found the writer/star crafting an almost Cronenbergian take on self-harm and body image, with de Van casting herself as a young woman whose leg injury leads to self-mutilation and eventually graduating to consuming her own flesh. 2009's double-identity head-games thriller DON'T LOOK BACK was purported to be her "maturing" work, though it comes off as a bit too ponderous and gimmicky despite strong performances from Monica Bellucci and Sophie Marceau. Apparently staying behind-the-camera full-time now (she hasn't acted since 2007), de Van returns with DARK TOUCH, which has an almost mainstream air about it (it's also her first English-language film) while still dealing with sensitive and uncomfortable issues. Opening in a disorienting, in medias res cacophony of confusion, 11-year-old Niamh (Missy Keating) flees her house and takes refuge with neighbors/family friends Nat (Marcella Plunkett) and Lucas (Padraic Delaney). Niamh's tongue is cut and she's covered in bruises, which are explained away by her parents Maud (Catherine Walker) and Henry (Richard Dormer) when they arrive to pick her up. The next night, a supernatural force invades Niamh's house, destroying the interior and brutally killing her parents. Her infant brother, also seen covered in bruises, dies as a result of Niamh clutching him too tightly while escaping the destruction. The local Garda attribute it to a home invasion, but nobody seems to do much investigating as Niamh temporarily moves in with Nat and Lucas, who have two children of their own and recently lost their oldest daughter--around Niamh's age--to cancer. Niamh remains unreceptive to any kind of affection and soon demonstrates a telekinetic, CARRIE-like ability to move objects as well as possessing a strange, psychic hold over other children when she feels threatened by them.
Young Keating is very impressive in a demanding, difficult role, and de Van succeeds in weaving a thorny subtext into what plays very much like a commercial horror film. The abuse Niamh endures at the hands of her parents has generated an uncontrollable telekinetic ability born of sheer rage, and it's an anger she uses to take on the adults in her town, even ones like Nat and Lucas, who are trying to help her but don't really know how. Feeling almost like it could've been a British or Italian fright film made in the 1970s, DARK TOUCH uses the classic tropes of the "evil children" subgenre--in addition to CARRIE, you'll spot elements of ORPHAN (2009), Tom Shankland's little-seen gem THE CHILDREN (2009), the OMEN-inspired British cult favorite THE GODSEND (1980), and Narciso Ibanez Serrador's WHO CAN KILL A CHILD? (1976)--to show the horrific effects of child abuse on the victims and those around them. It works merely on a surface level, but de Van is digging for something more and doesn't always find it. Some plot threads are underexplored, perhaps intentionally, and some may find the loose ends frustrating. It's not the confrontational galvanizer that IN MY SKIN was, but de Van continues to be a bold, ballsy voice in European cinema. (Unrated, 92 mins)
Written and directed by Rian Johnson. Cast: Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Emily Blunt, Jeff Daniels, Paul Dano, Noah Segan, Piper Perabo, Garret Dillahunt, Pierce Gagnon, Summer Qing, Tracie Thoms. (R, 118 mins)
Time-travel movies almost always have some logistical flaw or gaping plot hole that would seem to negate everything that happens in the story. LOOPER tries to pre-emptively circumvent any criticisms by having one of the main characters describe the process as "fuzzy," almost as a way of telling nit-picky audiences to just shut up and enjoy the movie. LOOPER's time-travel antics are actually pretty solidly-constructed and very plausible in the confines of its own universe. Upon one viewing, the time-travel element holds together, though other key elements might not. LOOPER is getting some of the most positive reviews of any film released this year. It's a good movie--cleverly-written, imaginative, intelligent, well-acted--though I can't help but wonder if we've become so accustomed to focus-group-induced mediocrity and the go-through-the-motions clock-punching exhibited by so many of today's films that when something relatively smart and inventive like LOOPER comes along and puts forth a little effort, that there isn't a knee-jerk reaction to label it a game-changer. LOOPER is a good movie and it's mostly very entertaining...but it's not some kind of new genre classic, especially when its second hour doesn't live up to the promise of the first.
In 2074, time-travel is invented and immediately outlawed. But the mob decides to use it to go back in time to 2044 and whack people in the past so they don't become an issue in the future. The hitmen who handle these jobs are called "Loopers." And the day will eventually come when a 2044 Looper is forced to kill the 2074 version of himself, in which case they're given a massive payment allowing them to live it up for 30 years, knowing the exact time when their life will be over. One such Looper is Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), who does his job well and enjoys the flashy lifestyle of fast cars, available women, and designer drugs. But he starts noticing that more and more of his Looper associates are being tasked with killing their 2074 selves, meaning their boss--known as The Rainmaker--is terminating the Looper contracts and getting rid of all evidence of their existence in a process known as "closing the loop." Trouble arises when Joe finds himself face-to-face with his 2074 self (Bruce Willis), who gets the upper hand on Joe and manages to escape after a botched shootout at a diner. Old Joe lived a life of killing and drug addiction in Shanghai, and only recently married a loving woman (Summer Qing) who helped him change his ways and he isn't quite ready to call it a life and go out with quiet acceptance of his fate. Convinced he can change his future, Old Joe traveled from 2074 to 2044 to find and kill The Rainmaker before he can take over all organized crime and close the loops. Old Joe has narrowed the potential Rainmakers down to three young boys in 2044, and decides to kill each one in order to change the course of his future. Joe, meanwhile, takes refuge at a farm owned by Sara (Emily Blunt), a "TK," or one of the 10% of the population with a telekinesis mutation, and her son Cid (Pierce Gagnon), who shares a birthday with other two children being sought by Old Joe. Old Joe must kill The Rainmaker to evade death and live his newfound life, but Joe must kill Old Joe to secure his next 30 years.
There's a tremendous complexity to the world of LOOPER, and writer/director Rian Johnson (BRICK, THE BROTHERS BLOOM) has constructed one of the most imaginative sci-fi concepts to hit the screen in some time, even if one of its central elements is a pretty blatant lift from THE TERMINATOR (itself inspired by the works of legendary plaintiff and occasional sci-fi writer Harlan Ellison, who is no doubt tentatively scheduled to file a lawsuit again Johnson and the producers any second now). The first hour of LOOPER is so good that it's a disappointment when it starts to fall apart a bit in the second. The ending is nicely ambiguous on one hand, but it just feels a little weak, and the "TK" element of the story is abandoned for much of the film and never really explored to its full potential other than when it's convenient for the plot (in a scene that borrows a memorable killing from Brian De Palma's 1978 film THE FURY), and I still can't figure out why Johnson chose to have one of the film's key antagonists get killed offscreen. But the first hour has some doozies: one 2074 Looper returns and escapes his 2044 incarnation, and starts literally falling apart when the mob's "Gat Men" torture and dismember his 2044 self; 2044 Loopers can carve notes into their flesh that materialize as scars on their 2074 selves, which leads to one of the film's best lines ("Fewer letters"); and a criminally underused Jeff Daniels steals the film as Abe, the mob's grumpy Looper supervisor, sent from 2074 to 2044 to oversee the operation. Daniels, in one of his career-best performances, is so good here that I wouldn't mind seeing a LOOPER offshoot that centered on his character.
Also of note is that the film is a co-production with China's DMG Entertainment, who provided co-star Qing as well as the visual effects crew. If you haven't seen Chinese visual effects...well, with the exception of the occasional wuxia like CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON or HERO or CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER, they're...not good. Imagine the dodgiest CGI and greenscreen work from an American effects company or the typical work of the Bulgarian outfit Worldwide FX (responsible for the CGI splatter and SyFy-level fake explosions in NuImage fare like THE EXPENDABLES 2), but worse. There's a couple of shots in LOOPER involving a hovercycle-type bike and it's just embarrassing, bush-league greenscreen and matte work. Some of the "TK" destruction shots have a really cheap feel to them that's a distraction when it should be dazzling. But I'm sure that was part of the deal, and it's indicative of just how important the Chinese market has become to worldwide distribution and box office (DMG is also co-financing the upcoming IRON MAN 3). In fact, the version of LOOPER released in China is specifically tailored for that audience, likely removing Piper Perabo's nudity and also including some additional scenes shot with Qing in the brief Shanghai portion of the US version.
Willis and Gordon-Levitt are excellent as both eras of Joe, each inhabting a large gray area of heroism vs. villainy, each with very valid reasons for doing what they do. It's Willis' best role in years, and he's matched by Gordon-Levitt, who's under extensive makeup to resemble a younger Willis, which isn't always convincing, but he really nails a lot of Willis' signature tics, mannerisms and line deliveries. LOOPER isn't quite what it could've--and should've--been, but flaws and all, it's still smarter, wittier, and more inventive than almost anything else out there right now.
Directed by David Koepp. Written by David Koepp & John Kamps. Cast: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Michael Shannon, Dania Ramirez, Jamie Chung, Aasif Mandvi, Wole Parks, Henry O, Christopher Place. (PG-13, 90 mins)
While never quite crashing and burning, PREMIUM RUSH gets off to such an exhilirating, entertaining start that it feels a little more disheartening than you'd expect when it starts sputtering around the midpoint. The major problem is that director/co-writer David Koepp (veteran journeyman screenwriter of films as varied as APARTMENT ZERO, JURASSIC PARK, CARLITO'S WAY, PANIC ROOM, and SPIDER-MAN among many others) can't settle on a tone, and has so many balls juggling throughout that he eventually just gives up and PREMIUM RUSH falls victim to what almost every real-time thriller succumbs: the complete abandonment of anything resembling a plausible time element. This is an inherently cartoonish thriller, starting with the central character's name, but Koepp plays so fast and loose with time that it becomes too distracting and too ludicrous to ignore.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt is Wilee, nicknamed "The Coyote," NYC's top bike messenger. He's a law school graduate who never took the Bar because he thrives on the adrenaline, hates the idea of wearing a suit and working in an office, and just needs to ride! It's what he does. Around 5:15 pm, Wilee is dispatched to Columbia University to deliver an envelope from office employee Nima (Jamie Chung), who happens to be the roommate of Wilee's ex Vanessa (Dania Ramirez), with whom he happens to work, to an address in Chinatown by 7:00 pm, which means Wilee must essentially travel the entire length of NYC in under two hours, during rush hour. With his fixed-gear, no-brake bike, Wilee sees it as a quick job, but things get complicated by the persistent interference of deranged detective Monday (Michael Shannon), who wants what's in Nima's envelope. This sets the film off on what's essentially one long car vs. bike chase through the streets of Manhattan, and a lot of it is very exciting and impressively constructed, even with some subtle CGI enhancements. Koepp occasionally pauses the action when Wilee hits an obstacle (red light, taxi door, pedestrian with a stroller, etc) so he can make a split-second decision on which way to go, and for a while, PREMIUM RUSH has the same sort of adrenalized feel of 2006's CRANK. There's also some inside jokes for movie nerds, with one chase clearly referencing THE FRENCH CONNECTION, and a great running gag with a cackling, twitchy Monday, who's deep in debt to some loan sharks and Triad gangsters and thinks what's in the envelope will bail him out, repeatedly introducing himself as "Forrest J. Ackerman, from the Internal Revenue Service."
But this fun, freewheeling, over-the-top feel is ultimately discarded and the film becomes increasingly predictable and formulaic, and there's simply no way that all of this could take place in the time allotted by Koepp and John Kamps' script. Maybe we're not supposed to notice the bumper-to-bumper rush hour NYC traffic where Monday is still somehow magically able to drive his car beside the bike-riding Wilee at fast speeds while the two engage in back-and-forth smartass banter. Koepp occasionally has a clock appear on the screen and he'll backtrack to earlier that day, to show, for instance, how Monday got into his predicament. It's here where the cracks start to show, right around the time one of these backtracks seems to put Vanessa in two places at once. It's established that she's at work, but the script needs her to be back at her apartment in the middle of the workday--packing her belongings, no less, because Nima has asked her to move out, for reasons that have to do with what's in the envelope. And right about that same time, Vanessa is shown leaving the messenger service's office to go on a delivery. But the worst is when Koepp expects us to believe that Wilee collides with a taxi at 6:33 pm, and is then placed in an ambulance, driven in the ambulance while having a long conversation with a desperate, enraged Monday, then ends up in the backseat of Monday's car as the two drive to another location...by 6:38 pm? In NYC? And about four hours worth of incidents happen before Wilee, of course, just meets the 7:00 pm deadline, and it's already dark outside. Dark at 6:59 pm, Eastern time? On what's clearly established as a hot summer day?
At least Gordon-Levitt and Shannon are fun to watch, and Koepp makes effective use of NYC locations. Shannon, in particular, is having a blast as the more-than-slightly unbalanced Monday in a performance that's fitting for the guy who's frequently been called his generation's Christopher Walken. It's just too bad that PREMIUM RUSH falls victim to such lazy writing, which is shocking for someone with Koepp's level of experience. Ultimately, the film's most interesting scene is an outtake early in the closing credits, showing the aftermath of a stunt gone awry when Gordon-Levitt flew off his bike and into the back window of a taxi. The actor is shown with a gash down his right arm that required 31 stitches (the injury is written into the film, as Gordon-Levitt's arm is wrapped in some of the later scenes), and you can hear Koepp say "I think we better get you to the hospital." The long-delayed PREMIUM RUSH was shot two years ago (as evidenced by a huge Times Square billboard for the endlessly-hyped, short-lived, and already-forgotten NBC series THE EVENT), and was originally set to be released in January 2012 before being bumped to late summer, most likely in an attempt to capitalize on Gordon-Levitt's supporting role in THE DARK KNIGHT RISES.
Gordon-Levitt immediately after an accident during filming
