Directed by McG. Written by Adi Hasak and Luc Besson. Cast: Kevin Costner, Amber Heard, Hailee Steinfeld, Connie Nielsen, Tomas Lemarquis, Richard Sammel, Eriq Ebouaney, Raymond J. Barry, Marc Andreoni, Bruno Ricci. (PG-13, 115 mins)
Luc Besson didn't put forth much effort in the construction of his latest Paris-based actioner 3 DAYS TO KILL. The whole thing feels like a cut-and-paste job comprised of elements pilfered from past Besson projects like THE PROFESSIONAL (1994), TRANSPORTER 2 (2005), TAKEN (2009), and FROM PARIS WITH LOVE (2010). Just a month after we saw him playing the mentor role to the inexperienced titular hero in JACK RYAN: SHADOW RECRUIT, 59-year-old Kevin Costner tries to horn in on Liam Neeson's aging action hero turf but it doesn't work nearly as well. TAKEN was a lightning-in-a-bottle phenomenon, a surprise blockbuster that was almost sent straight-to-DVD before Fox decided to dump it in US theaters a year after its European release. Neeson's career was in a commercial slump and nobody expected much from it. Instead, it became a genuine word-of-mouth hit--something we don't see much of anymore--and it revitalized Neeson's career, making him more popular than ever and now, at 61, he can still be counted on for a TAKEN knockoff almost annually (NON-STOP, aka TAKEN ON A PLANE, is out next week). With his "very particular set of skills," everything just fell into place for Neeson with TAKEN. Costner tries, but doesn't quite pull off the "dangerous badass" bit, though with his character's gravelly voice and his grumpy, sardonic demeanor throughout, he almost approximates what might've happened if the Clint Eastwood of 20 years ago ended up in a Luc Besson joint.
But Costner's not the problem with 3 DAYS TO KILL. With the possible exception of WATERWORLD, he's never really done the "indestructible action hero" thing and seems to be enjoying himself and his paid Paris vacation. Costner is Ethan Renner, a covert CIA operative with a nagging cough who lets a pair of targets--Eurotrash terrorist The Wolf (Richard Sammel) and his right-hand man The Albino (Tomas Lemarquis)--slip away during a botched assignment in Belgrade. While hospitalized, tests show that Ethan is terminally ill with brain cancer that's spread to his lungs. Given three months to live, he decides to quit the business and spend what little time he has left reconnecting with his estranged wife Tina (Connie Nielsen), who works in Paris, and teenage daughter Zooey (Hailee Steinfeld, from the TRUE GRIT remake). It's easier said than done, since they're not pleased that he essentially abandoned them for his job five years earlier (Zooey thinks he's a salesman), but especially when he's hounded by sultry CIA assassin Vivi Delay (Amber Heard), who demands that he finish the job. She even offers him an experimental cancer treatment that might extend his life. The Wolf and The Albino tried to set off a dirty bomb in Belgrade and Vivi has tracked them to Paris, conveniently enough. But when Tina goes away on business for the weekend, Ethan is left to take care of Zooey for three days, which really interferes with his ability to knock off this One Last Job.
Brainless action flicks can be a blast when done right and for a while, under the direction of CHARLIE'S ANGELS hack McG, 3 DAYS TO KILL zips along just fine. But then it starts exhibiting some of the same problems that plague many recent Besson works (especially last year's THE FAMILY) in that he can't settle on a tone or style and the whole thing ends up feeling like a patched-together jumble. 3 DAYS TO KILL is an action thriller, a slapstick comedy, disease-of-the-week melodrama, and sappy daddy/daughter weepie all awkwardly crammed into one. Costner's crankiness provides some amusement (when confronted with one intentionally trite bit of dialogue, he growls "Did you really just say that to me?"), but his scenes with Steinfeld feel forced and never ring true. Sloppy editing doesn't help--after they have a huge blow-up, there's a cut to him showing her how to ride a bike like nothing ever happened. A lot of time is devoted to Ethan shaking down a pair of Wolf flunkies--driver Mitat (Marc Andreoni) and accountant Guido (Bruno Ricci)--with ripped-off armpit hair and car battery-cables-on-the ears torture scenes played for laughs. There's also a "heartwarming" subplot that has Ethan bonding with a family of squatters led by wise patriarch Jules (Eriq Ebouaney, best known as the killer Black Tie in De Palma's FEMME FATALE) who have taken up residence in his Paris apartment. There's also time for Ethan rescuing Zooey from an attempted gang rape at a rave where McG winkingly restages a famous image from THE BODYGUARD, plus a strange scene where Ethan teaches Zooey how to slow dance to Bread's "Make it With You" in a moment that invokes the kind of squirming discomfort not seen since Michael Bluth and Maeby Fünke sang "Afternoon Delight" on ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT.
All of this could be entertaining if Besson could settle on what movie he was telling McG to make. The film often feels like it's been edited at random and may very well have been victimized by post-production reshoots and restructuring. There's a few scenes where the pitch of actors' voices change and the dialogue doesn't match their lip movements. Heard sounds dubbed in a lot of her scenes. She's pretty terrible here in the latest failed attempt to make Amber Heard happen. It doesn't help that Besson and McG have no idea what to do with her, so they just let her periodically drop in, preen, and strut in a variety of wigs and provocative outfits and flirt with Costner. She's basically another incarnation of Kate Nauta's memorably lethal killer in TRANSPORTER 2, but Heard isn't believably intimidating, has no screen presence, and is all vamping and smirks. She looks stunning but there's nothing else there (imagine how much fun someone like Besson's ex-wife Milla Jovovich would've been in this role). You could argue that she doesn't feel like she belongs in the film, but you could say that about every subplot that's randomly inserted by the filmmakers. McG also gets careless when it comes to covering Costner's stunt double, including one badly-blocked fight scene where "Costner" is only shown from the shoulders down with occasional cuts to close-ups of his face in what feels like an homage to the last decade of Steven Seagal's career.
Despite some good work by Costner, it's doubtful 3 DAYS TO KILL will lead to future endeavors for him as a Neeson-esque asskicker for the Social Security set. He's credible in the part and looks much younger than a guy pushing 60, but Costner is an actor whose heroic characters have always been more the pensive, earnest, introspective sort. 3 DAYS TO KILL gives him a nice change of pace but it fails to play to his strengths (though, to its credit, an establishing shot of the Eiffel Tower isn't accompanied by the caption "Paris"). Of course, Neeson wasn't an action guy either until TAKEN happened to make him one, but by this point in time, it's a formula that's getting too predictable to even function as time-killing comfort food. From the moment 3 DAYS TO KILL's trailer bowed a few months back, it was obvious that this was "Kevin Costner's TAKEN." The busy actor (who was also very good in last year's disappointing MAN OF STEEL) will next be seen as the beleaguered general manager of the Cleveland Browns in Ivan Reitman's football saga DRAFT DAY, due out in April, putting Costner back in his familiar BULL DURHAM/TIN CUP/FOR LOVE OF THE GAME sports stomping ground that's always been a proven winner with his fans. But second-rate action movies with Amber Heard? He's getting too old for this shit.
THE COUNSELOR: UNRATED EXTENDED CUT (US/UK - 2013)
Directed by Ridley Scott. Written by Cormac McCarthy. Cast: Michael Fassbender, Penelope Cruz, Cameron Diaz, Javier Bardem, Brad Pitt, Bruno Ganz, Rosie Perez, Ruben Blades, Sam Spruell, Dean Norris, John Leguizamo, Edgar Ramirez, Toby Kebbell, Goran Visnjic, Natalie Dormer, Richard Cabral, Richard Brake, Andrea Deck, Giannina Facio. (Unrated, 138 mins)
Over the course of his lengthy career, Ridley Scott has been one of the key figures in the advent of the "director's cut," largely from his experiences with 1982's BLADE RUNNER. Scott famously clashed with the producers and for a decade, the version of the film that everyone knew was despised by both Scott and star Harrison Ford. Then, in 1992, the Director's Cut was released, only it wasn't a true "director's cut" in the sense that Scott, then busy filming 1492: CONQUEST OF PARADISE, wasn't directly involved in the project, which was assembled based on his notes and what was known to be his original ending. It was close, but not quite a director's cut, though it went a long way in establishing the film as the classic we know today and prompted many critics who dismissed the film in 1982 to reconsider it. In 2007, Scott was able to make subtle changes and "The Final Cut" finally provided fans with the BLADE RUNNER its maker always intended. Scott had similar, though much less drawn-out, experiences with Universal over the 1985 fantasy epic LEGEND. The studio sat on the film for a year and finally released it in 1986 with a different score and 30 minutes cut out.
Years later, DVD and Blu-ray editions of LEGEND featured both the uncut European version (Scott's cut) and the butchered US version, and the 2007 BLADE RUNNER set featured four (!) versions, with a deluxe box set containing a fifth, the pre-release workprint version. These two films are the prime examples of Scott's director's cuts being used to right what he considered a wrong. After the 2003 "Director's Cut" of his 1979 classic ALIEN, Scott refrained from using the term "director's cut" because he felt it implies that the director is unhappy with the previously released version. Scott still considers the 1979 ALIEN the definitive version, but only offered the "director's cut" because fans wanted to see the legendary cut footage of the cocooned Dallas (Tom Skerritt) and Brett (Harry Dean Stanton) being used as food for the alien. Both characters were simply killed off in the '79 version after Scott opted to ditch the "cocoon" feeding angle. On the DVD, Scott explains that both versions are being offered and people don't have to worry that their preferred cut is being "replaced." He basically says "They're both here...watch the one you want to watch." That's been Scott's philosophy with the DVD and eventual Blu-ray presentations of most of his work after that. GLADIATOR (2000), BLACK HAWK DOWN (2001), KINGDOM OF HEAVEN (2005), AMERICAN GANGSTER (2007), and ROBIN HOOD (2010) all have "extended versions" included alongside the standard editions. Sometimes, the changes help--KINGDOM OF HEAVEN's extended version adds 45 minutes that really do enhance and enrich the film--while other times, it's inessential. The 19 minutes added to AMERICAN GANGSTER add little to the film other than superfluous bloat. Scott doesn't offer these alternate cuts to illustrate dissatisfaction but rather, just as a bonus for fans. They're scenes or plot threads he decided not to use, but if you're so inclined, here's what the film looked like at one point. In most cases, Scott's extended versions serve as the cut before the final cut. Oddly, the one recent film of Scott's that feels compromised in its released version and really does warrant a director's cut is 2012's PROMETHEUS, and it has yet to materialize other than a handful of deleted scenes on the Blu-ray.
Scott's 2013 film THE COUNSELOR was just released on Blu-ray with both the 117-minute theatrical version (reviewed here) and a 138-minute "unrated extended cut." The film opened to some of the most toxic reviews of the year in what quickly became a ludicrous pile-on, culminating in numerous blurbs that it was the worst movie of the year, with Salon's Andrew O'Hehir going even further than that by declaring, in a stunning example of over-the-top hyperbole that should effectively prevent him from ever being taken seriously again, "Meet the worst movie ever made." Audiences despised it and the film scored a D on the witless CinemaScore. But then, something odd happened, and it happened quickly. Buzz started spreading around the internet that THE COUNSELOR wasn't nearly as bad as the reviews suggested and that, if approached with an open mind and an appreciation for the work of novelist Cormac McCarthy, making his screenwriting debut, it proved a rewarding experience. By the end of its second, and in most of the country, last week of release, it had already transformed from much-maligned box-office bomb to a genuine cult film that didn't get a fair shake from critics. I was discussing THE COUNSELOR with a friend on Facebook recently and someone commented "Were the critics watching the movie or were they watching each other?"
As I stated in my original review from October 2013, THE COUNSELOR is a mess but it's a fascinating mess. If you didn't like the theatrical version, then there's little chance that the extended cut will change your feelings. Given the verbose nature of what we've already seen, the bulk of the additional 21 minutes primarily consist of dialogue, something which the theatrical cut of THE COUNSELOR certainly wasn't lacking (some of the scenes in the late-going occur in a slightly different order as well). There's some additional dirty talk during the opening with Michael Fassbender and Penelope Cruz in bed. There's a long monologue for Bruno Ganz as the Amsterdam diamond dealer. There's a new intro for drug-running motorcyclist The Green Hornet (Richard Cabral), who tells a joke about dog food and "licking your balls." The already-infamous "Cameron Diaz fucks a car" sequence is augmented by some additional graphic details from Javier Bardem. The death of one major character is much gorier in the extended version. None of these scenes really add any depth to the film, and though Ganz is terrific in his additional footage, you can see it's one of those scenes that an experienced director of Scott's caliber could see wasn't really essential. The same goes for a comical throwaway scene of one of Bardem's cheetahs crashing a neighbor's backyard barbecue.
Aside from the additional 21 minutes (the extended cut is only available on the two-disc Blu-ray set, with the theatrical version on the other disc), the highlight of the second disc is the documentary/visual essay "Truth of the Situation: Making THE COUNSELOR." Described as an "immersive experience" and running a whopping 216 minutes, "Truth" covers just about anything a fan of THE COUNSELOR would want to know. It's part audio commentary with Scott, with the extended version of the film frequently intercut with corresponding behind-the-scenes footage and cast & crew interviews. Scott is blunt about what works and what doesn't (the extended cut contains a gratuitous and unconvincing shot of one character's severed head and Scott says "I think I'm glad I cut that"), and it's the kind of extra usually reserved for something along the lines of a Criterion release, a fascinating journey inside a film whose tattered reputation was already on the mend before it even left theaters.
Scott seems to be of the opinion that he's happy with the theatrical version, and I'd probably go that route on future viewings. It's a film of odd rhythms and heavy dialogue that requires patience, and with the 21 minutes added to the extended cut, things do get occasionally tedious. Admirers of THE COUNSELOR--a continually growing lot--will want to check out the extended cut and the absolutely essential "Truth of the Matter," which will only expand their appreciation of one of 2013's strangest and most misunderstood major-studio releases. And, like Scott has said in the past: both versions are here...choose the one you prefer.
Detroit-born, Canada-based filmmaker Vincenzo Natali's place in the cult movie pantheon was established with his 1997 debut CUBE, but he's largely maintained a low-profile since. CUBE spawned two inferior follow-ups sans Natali, who instead went on to the mandatory unpleasant Miramax experience with the long-shelved CYPHER (dumped on DVD in the US in 2005, four years after it was shot), and then the quirky character piece NOTHING (2003), and a segment in 2006's PARIS, JE T'AIME. He returned to big-screen sci-fi with 2009's bonkers SPLICE, which proved a little too odd for the summer multiplex crowd, which brings us to his latest film, the ghost story HAUNTER. It's refreshingly old-school in its restrained approach, but it has some genuine scares, a sense of unease throughout, and a strong lead performance from LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE Oscar-nominee Abigail Breslin. Breslin is Lisa, a gothy teen in 1985 who seems condemned to live the same GROUNDHOG DAY-type scenario every single day. She lives with her parents (Peter Outerbridge, Michelle Nolden) and little brother (Peter DaCunha), and every day begins the same way, as they eat the same meals, do the same chores, and have the same arguments as Mom asks the same questions and Dad perpetually works on a car that just won't start. The phone is dead and the house is surrounded by thick fog. Only Lisa seems to realize that they're all dead and stuck in some sort of purgatory. Lisa uncovers clues in hidden doors and in the attic, and is visited by an ominously spectral "Pale Man" (a terrifying Stephen McHattie) who warns her to accept that she's dead and to stop trying to contact the living. Lisa has been somehow been summoned by the one of the house's present-day occupants, a teenage girl (Eleanor Zichy) whose father (David Hewlett) is seemingly possessed by the Pale Man, a serial killer who lived in the house prior to Lisa's family moving in. His victims' souls are trapped in the house, kept from rest by the vengeful Pale Man, but Lisa must find a way to cross over into the real world to prevent history from repeating itself with the family now occupying the house.
Natali and screenwriter Brian King (the pair previously collaborated on CYPHER) are wearing a lot of influences on their sleeves here. Not just GROUNDHOG DAY and THE OTHERS, but THE AMITYVILLE HORROR and THE SHINING, and a little of the 1988 cult classic LADY IN WHITE, and a lot of Lucio Fulci's THE HOUSE BY THE CEMETARY with its children reaching out to the living in a cursed house inhabited by a murderer who wreaks supernatural havoc on each new set of tenants. With its foggy surroundings, Natali blankets the film in an almost Euro-horror sheen with some unabashed Spielbergian sentimentality. Other than some cheap, TV-movie-looking visual effects, HAUNTER comes across like the kind of film that could've been made in the 1980s. While the effects are disappointingly-executed at times and Natali goes for some tired RINGU-type ghost action in the finale, HAUNTER succeeds on style and atmosphere and some solid acting all around, particularly Breslin and McHattie. It's not quite THE HAUNTING or THE LEGEND OF HELL HOUSE, but for the most part, it's a nicely low-key and pleasantly surprising little throwback horror film that just fell through the cracks and deserves to find an audience. (Unrated, 97 mins, also available on Netflix Instant)
ENOUGH SAID (US/UK - 2013)
Since her 1996 breakthrough WALKING AND TALKING was released during the height of Miramax's indie heyday, writer/director Nicole Holofcener has been a distinctive voice with smart, insightful movies about women that don't resort to "chick flick" clichés. Her latest, ENOUGH SAID, relies a little more on dumb contrivance than her earlier films, and right down to its title, frequently feels like the kind of pleasant-but-middling effort her one-time mentor Woody Allen (Holofcener was a production assistant on Allen's A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S SEX COMEDY and HANNAH AND HER SISTERS) might crank out between genuinely great films. That's not to say it isn't enjoyable, but were it not for a dumb decision by its main character, there probably wouldn't be a movie. Julia Louis-Dreyfus is excellent as divorced, middle-aged masseuse Eva, stuck in a rut and fearing the empty nest once daughter Ellen (Tracey Fairaway) goes off to college. Dragged to a party by her friend Sarah (Toni Collette), she meets Albert (James Gandolfini), an affable, schlubby sort of guy, and they immediately hit it off. Meanwhile, Eva has a new client in poet Marianne (Holofcener regular Catherine Keener), who does little but trash-talk her ex-husband. Eventually, Eva figures out that Marianne's ex is Albert, and can't stop herself from projecting Marianne's issues back on to him, jeopardizing the relationship (at one point, after an uncomfortable dinner with friends, Albert says "Why do I feel like I just spent the evening with my ex-wife?"). Here's why this whole conceit doesn't work: Marianne is a bitter, pretentious, unlikable bitch, which goes without saying as she's portrayed by Catherine Keener, who, with rare exception, more or less has a lock on this type of character. Eva doesn't seem desperate enough for a friend that she'd latch on to Marianne the way she does, or be so inclined to nitpick to such a level that she'd fatalistically torpedo her relationship with Albert. Yeah, it's a romantic comedy, but real characters in real life--or, at least, characters in earlier Holofcener films, would've resolved this situation in a matter of minutes.
But ENOUGH SAID excels in other areas: Louis-Dreyfus is very good and Eva's parental panic over her baby venturing into the real world is handled in a believable and sympathetic fashion. She's also very funny, especially in a scene late in the film where she's insulted by someone and lets loose with a laugh that displays outrage, dismissal, and hurt all in a matter of seconds, and it's a vintage Louis-Dreyfus moment. And then there's Gandolfini in his penultimate role (his last film, the crime thriller THE DROP, is due out later this year). Released four months after his death, ENOUGH SAID lets the actor show a vulnerable side of himself rarely seen before. You've always heard women say "he just had something about him," but he never really got to play a romantic lead until this and it's a stellar performance. ENOUGH SAID is likable if a little too slight and predictable, but it's a must-see for fans of Louis-Dreyfus, who's really flourished post-SEINFELD (her HBO series VEEP is one of the funniest things on TV), and especially the much-missed Gandolfini. (PG-13, 93 mins)
HOW I LIVE NOW (UK - 2013)
This dumb, drab adaptation of Meg Rosoff's 2004 YA novel about a American teenager's survival in England after the country is leveled by a nuclear attack only made it to 68 screens during its US release. Pick a reason why: is it that it centers on the most abrasive and coarsely unlikable heroine in recent memory? Is it that the target audience is too young to get into R-rated movies? Is it that the central romance in the film is between cousins? Coming off like a TWILIGHT-ized CHILDREN OF MEN and showcasing all the depth of a Taylor Swift song, HOW I LIVE NOW manages to defeat the gifted Saoirse Ronan, who's never turned in a bad performance but can't do much with the bitchy and complaining Daisy, a standard-issue Ugly American spending the summer--against her will, it seems--with some cousins who live in the English countryside. While she churlishly resists any attempts to bond with them until they playfully throw her in a river and goo-goo eyes with the oldest, Eddie (George Mackay), quickly escalates to all-out cousin-fucking, London is nuked, Aunt Penn (Anna Chancellor) disappears, and the military comes through to round up the survivors. The kids--there's also 14-year-old Isaac (Tom Holland, so good in THE IMPOSSIBLE), and nine-year-old Piper (Harley Bird)--are split up, with Daisy and Piper forced to fend for themselves. It's amazing how quickly Daisy goes from spoiled bitch to hard-nosed survivalist almost instantaneously. Even in the context of a fantastical film, it's too much of a stretch and even an actress as good as Ronan can't sell it. There's no suspense, the pace is deadeningly dull, and while it might be aimed at sullen teens, it feels like it's made by them as well, which is quite shocking considering that director Kevin Macdonald (ONE DAY IN SEPTEMBER, TOUCHING THE VOID, THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND) and co-writer Tony Grisoni (the RED RIDING trilogy) have made very good films before (Macdonald is also the grandson of legendary British filmmaker Emeric Pressburger). A meandering misfire from the start, you can probably live the rest of your life without subjecting yourself to HOW I LIVE NOW. (R, 101 mins)
Directed by Jose Padilha. Written by Joshua Zetumer, Edward Neumeier, and Michael Miner. Cast: Joel Kinnaman, Gary Oldman, Michael Keaton, Samuel L. Jackson, Abbie Cornish, Jackie Earle Haley, Michael K. Williams, Jennifer Ehle, Jay Baruchel, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Patrick Garrow, John Paul Ruttan, Aimee Garcia, Zach Grenier, K.C. Collins, Daniel Kash, Douglas Urbanski. (PG-13, 117 mins)
With its perfect mix of action, over-the-top violence and sly, subversive wit, Paul Verhoeven's 1987 classic ROBOCOP still stands as one of the most inspired and original commercial sci-fi films of its decade. The only surprise with the 2014 remake is that it took this long to happen. Like the original film, ROBOCOP '14 has an acclaimed foreign filmmaker trying to make his mark in mainstream Hollywood. In this case, it's Brazilian director Jose Padilha, whose intense, nail-biting, politically-charged thrillers ELITE SQUAD (2007) and ELITE SQUAD: THE ENEMY WITHIN (2011) have earned him significant accolades worldwide. Padilha is an interesting choice to helm a ROBOCOP remake with the obvious idea of spawning a new franchise, but ultimately, starting with its PG-13 rating, ROBOCOP '14 is only as good as it has to be, and even with Padilha's usual concerns of politics and corruption, it stands as yet another cautionary tale of a promising foreign director seduced by Hollywood and likely forced to compromise and acquiesce until the resulting film effectively eliminates all traces of the innovation, vision, and personality that got him the job in the first place.
Having just revisited ROBOCOP '87 in its pristine new Blu-ray edition a couple of nights before seeing the remake, it's fascinating to note how prophetic many of its satirical elements became. From the Halliburton-like OCP Corporation ("Who cares if it worked?") with its profits-before-people priorities ("I'm very disappointed" says the CEO when the demo ED-209 kills a staffer but also threatens to delay the rollout) and the privatization of the police to the Greek chorus of bubbleheaded newscasters Casey Wong and Jessie Perkins--whose utter vacuousness was even funnier considering they were played by actual media personalities Mario Machado and Leeza Gibbons--Verhoeven and writers Edward Neumeier (who would collaborate again on STARSHIP TROOPERS) and Michael Miner created what may stand today as the NETWORK of 1980s sci-fi action movies. Much like the news-as-entertainment doomsday scenario of the 1976 Sidney Lumet/Paddy Chayefsky classic, the satirical elements of Verhoeven's film are the commonplace norm today. With that in mind, there's really no angle for ROBOCOP '14 to tackle from than one of dour, thudding seriousness. When it tries to be funny, all it's doing is pointing out obvious references to our current world, from US military occupation in the Middle East to the bloviating Pat Novak (Samuel L. Jackson), the right-wing, Bill O'Reilly/Glenn Beck-like host of THE NOVAK ELEMENT, a guy prone to cutting off guests who disagree with him. That might've been hilarious 30 years ago, but not so much now when it happens daily on cable news. Padilha and screenwriter Joshua Zetumer (Neumeier and Miner retain presumably WGA-mandated co-writing credits) follow the basic template of Verhoeven's film but to what end? With the possible exception of the 2014 ED-209s moving a little more smoothly than their stop-motion 1987 counterparts, what improvements are made? What insightful reflections are to be found? None. I'm not against remakes if they have something new to bring to the table. Is it a bad movie? No, not at all. But with Verhoeven's film aging like fine wine, there's no reason for Padilha's film to exist. If Verhoeven's film was a satirical reflection of the Reagan era, then what is Padilha's other than a reflection of 2014 mainstream Hollywood as obvious, coasting, and completely out of fresh ideas? It's not "Gus Van Sant's PSYCHO" bad, but it's easily "CARRIE 2013" pointless.
The kind of film that shows an aerial shot of the Capitol Building and the Washington Monument yet still feels the need to include the caption "Washington, D.C.," ROBOCOP '14 presents Alex Murphy (THE KILLING's Joel Kinnaman) as an impulsive Detroit detective after Motor City crime lord Antoine Vallon (Patrick Garrow), who consistently manages to operate unencumbered thanks to numerous Detroit cops on his payroll. When Murphy and partner Lewis (BOARDWALK EMPIRE's Michael K. Williams) go after Vallon on their own, Lewis is shot and a fed-up Vallon has a bomb planted under Murphy's car. Of course it blows up, burning over 80% of his body, shattering his spine, blinding him in one eye, and costing him an arm and a leg. As Murphy barely clings to life, OmniCorp CEO Raymond Sellars (Michael Keaton), who's made billions putting peacekeeping robots and drones in war-ravaged Middle East, finally sees a loophole for his ambition to put mechanized drones on the streets to replace law enforcement. America has a ban on drone officers because they lack the "human" element, but with Murphy's brain still functioning, Sellars sees a way to keep the human element inside the robotic shell, thus skirting the "robophobic" federal ban. Overseeing Murphy's transformation into RoboCop is sympathetic Dr. Dennett Norton (Gary Oldman), who insists that the human element can't be completely eliminated, at least until Sellars orders him to make it happen as Norton essentially rewires Murphy's brain to diminish the emotional receptors. While this makes him a fearless killing machine who's able to apprehend any Detroit bad guy thanks to the entire department database downloaded into his brain, it also makes him unable to relate to or eventually acknowledge his wife (Abbie Cornish) and young son (John Paul Ruttan) as he pursues his single-minded goal of nabbing Vallon and any corrupt cops on the take who had a hand in his attempted murder.
A lot of ROBOCOP '14 focuses on elements that were glossed over by Verhoeven. It's over an hour before Murphy/RoboCop is even out of the lab and on the streets. Verhoeven had Peter Weller's Murphy killed and simply waking up as RoboCop. Padilha gives us all that time in between--the shock of waking up with most of his body gone, the adjustment, the training, etc.--with more of a focus on Murphy's family. Sure, it's a different approach, but was anyone clamoring for that in 1987? Is anyone clamoring for it now? Kinnaman is fine as the sleeker, black-suited RoboCop, with a helmet that makes him look like a third member of Daft Punk, an excellent Oldman is trying much harder than he needs to, and while Keaton's "Michael Keaton" persona is always welcome, he seems a little bored here. And Jackson just registers zero in his scenes as Novak, which of course culminates in him letting loose with a bleeped "motherfucker" on the air, not because he's doing an astute satirical interpretation of a cable news host with an agenda, but because he's Samuel L. Jackson in a movie. Nobody says "motherfucker" like Jackson, but it's a joke that lost its novelty around the time SNAKES ON A PLANE took a 60% drop in its second weekend. As far as villains go, Keaton's Sellars is no Ronny Cox-as-Dick Jones, and Garrow's Vallon isn't given much of a chance to match Kurtwood Smith's Clarence Boddiker, though Sellars hatchet man Mattox (Jackie Earle Haley) arguably shares that function. Padilha and Zetumer spend so much time on Murphy's Robo-angst that they have to rush through the action part of the story, which frequently and predictably resembles a video game with Murphy leaping around and inevitably landing in the three-point, bent-knee hero stance, and the heavily CGI'd scenes of Murphy out of the Robo-suit--essentially reduced to a head, a set of lungs, and a right arm, are unconvincing and a little silly in a BRAIN THAT WOULDN'T DIE way. Nothing about ROBOCOP '14 is terrible, but there's nothing in it to get excited about, either. Verhoeven's film is now 27 years old and people are still talking about it. Will people even be talking about Padilha's version 27 days from now?
Directed by George Clooney. Written by George Clooney and Grant Heslov. Cast: George Clooney, Matt Damon, Cate Blanchett, Bill Murray, John Goodman, Jean Dujardin, Bob Balaban, Hugh Bonneville, Dimitri Leonidas, Justus von Dohnanyi, Holger Handtke, Zahary Baharov, Sam Hazeldine. (PG-13, 118 mins)
For all of George Clooney's fame and tabloid ubiquity over the last 20 years, he hasn't been in a lot of box office blockbusters other than the THE PERFECT STORM, OCEAN'S ELEVEN films and GRAVITY. He's largely chosen quality scripts over easy star vehicles (OUT OF SIGHT, SYRIANA, MICHAEL CLAYTON, UP IN THE AIR), isn't afraid to go for non-commercial material (SOLARIS, THE GOOD GERMAN, THE AMERICAN) and with his matinee idol looks, he's often described as a throwback to the Hollywood of old, a sort-of Cary Grant for today's cinema. For the most part, his directorial career also seems rooted in the past: CONFESSIONS OF A DANGEROUS MIND (2002) was an adaptation of GONG SHOW host Chuck Barris' improbable memoirs, GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK (2005) chronicled CBS News icon Edward R. Murrow and his battle against the McCarthy hearings, LEATHERHEADS (2008) was a screwball romantic comedy set in the world of 1920s football, and THE IDES OF MARCH (2011) was a thriller set in the scheming world of present-day politics but nevertheless felt like the kind of movie Alan J. Pakula, Sidney Lumet, or Sydney Pollack would've made in the 1970s. Clooney has more than established his bona fides as an actor and director, and the WWII epic THE MONUMENTS MEN, with its motley crew of unlikely heroes going into battle, is cut from the same cloth as the grand, large-scale men-on-a-mission classics of the 1960s, like THE GUNS OF NAVARONE (1961), THE TRAIN (1964), THE DIRTY DOZEN (1967), and KELLY'S HEROES (1970) to name just four.
The difference here is that those films didn't have a soapbox to stand on, and if Clooney has a weakness as a filmmaker, it's the need to endlessly speechify with issues of Grand Importance. I enjoyed the relatively light LEATHERHEADS and the conspiratorial suspense of THE IDES OF MARCH, but I found GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK a little too smug and self-satisfied, regardless of how remarkable David Strathairn was as Murrow. Every scene seemed to have someone stopping to mention how what they were doing was Changing the World, and some of that comes into play with THE MONUMENTS MEN. There seems to be no momentum that Clooney the director won't halt in order to allow Clooney the actor one more chance to deliver a windy treatise on The Importance of Art and how they're Preserving History. The constant invocations start to grow wearying after a while and it doesn't help that Clooney can't seem to settle on what kind of WWII movie he wanted to make. Is it lighthearted? Is it a serious memorial to the Greatest Generation? Is it a comedy? Is it transparent Oscar bait? Yes. It's all of those.
Inspired by a true story, THE MONUMENTS MEN is set in the final months of Hitler's reign before Germany's surrender. With word that Der Fuhrer has gathered and stored massive art collections pilfered during the Nazi takeover of Europe, renowned art professor Frank Stokes (Clooney) pleads with FDR to put together a team of art experts and historians to go through the war-torn areas of Europe to salvage and protect the remaining art and recover what's gone missing. This means putting together the usual ragtag group of Unlikely Heroes: Stokes' old friend James Granger (Matt Damon), architect Richard Campbell (Bill Murray), sculptor Walter Garfield (John Goodman), art experts Donald Jeffries (Hugh Bonneville) and Preston Savitz (Bob Balaban), and Frenchman Jean Claude Clermont (Jean Dujardin), plus a bonus recruit in German-speaking Jersey-based private Epstein (Dimitri Leonidas). Damon's Granger spends most of the film on his own separate mission, investigating some missing French art with curator Claire Simone (Cate Blanchett), who's been keeping a log of art stolen by her scheming, Nazi-aligned boss (Justus von Dohnanyi). For about 40 minutes or so, THE MONUMENTS MEN is moving along nicely enough, coasting on the screen presence of its stars and the no-expense-spared production design, but there's a scene with Damon and Blanchett that's so tone-deaf and wrong-headed that you can actually see the film fall on its face and consequently spend the remainder of its running time trying to regain its footing.
Claire takes Granger to a vast and seemingly endless warehouse packed with paintings, furniture, glasses, dishes, books, etc. Granger looks around in wide-eyed wonder.
Granger: "What is all of this?" Claire: "People's lives." Granger: "What people?" Claire: "Jews."
At that moment, Alexandre Desplat's maudlin, manipulative score swells and Granger's sense of wonder sinks with the saddened realization that...the Holocaust was happening? What does he mean "What people?" Where does he think all this stuff came from? How pie-in-the-sky naïve can he be? There had to be a more effective way to convey the horror of concentration camps than making Damon's character look like an idiot.
There's also little sense of camaraderie between the Monuments Men. Clooney and Damon get the bulk of the screen time, with the rest relegated to the sidelines. Sure, Murray, Goodman, and the others are onscreen a lot, but they're just there, and not really given characters to play. Campbell playfully busts Savitz's chops throughout, but they have no other defining characteristics that necessitated them being played by distinctive actors like Murray and Balaban. It's nice to see all these actors working together and there's no doubt they had a good time, but why put Murray, Balaban, and John Goodman together to have them play cardboard characters that anybody could've played? Murray's big scene involves playing a record sent from home with his granddaughter singing "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" as tears well in his eyes. Given the context, it's not a revealing character moment but instead comes off as the kind of cheap, heavy-handed melodrama that someone as sharp as Murray can't possibly be taking seriously.
THE MONUMENTS MEN is passable and it's never boring, but it just misses the mark. Films of this sort had a sense of fun and adventure that this is sorely lacking. They can make big statements without advertising that they're Big Statements. Clooney and writing partner Grant Heslov seem to be in such a mad rush to get to the lecturing and the pontificating that they don't bother establishing anything with the characters. Other than a scene where Campbell and Savitz get the edge on a Nazi art thief, there's rarely a sense of danger or even where they're really at. There's a lot of looking at maps and saying "We have to go here," but it never really registers. They just go from one place to another, Stokes says something like "We're Doing Something Important!" and they find some stashed art, stare at it as Desplat's score tells us to how to feel, and they move on. It looks like a classic WWII movie that belongs on TCM, but in the end, it's just pretending to be one. This was originally scheduled to be released in December 2013, but was abruptly yanked to "finish the visual effects," with the date bounced to the barren wasteland of February. That may be the case, as the film looks superb, but it's hard to ignore the sneaking suspicion that this wasn't the automatic Oscar magnet that Sony and Clooney were hoping it would be.
Directed by Ben Wheatley. Written by Amy Jump. Cast: Reece Shearsmith, Michael Smiley, Peter Ferdinando, Richard Glover, Ryan Pope, Julian Barratt. (Unrated, 90 mins)
With his working-class, financially-strapped characters and his "kitchen sink" aesthetics, British filmmaker Ben Wheatley is frequently described as the Ken Loach or Mike Leigh of horror cinema. Wheatley established a name for himself with his second feature, KILL LIST (2011), which found much praise in cult horror circles but suffered from a young filmmaker too eager to show his hand, thus dampening what he thought was a shocker of a twist ending when in fact, any horror fan worth their salt should've seen it coming 20 minutes into the movie. While KILL LIST could've used some work on the writing end, it was extremely well-made, and Wheatley's next film, SIGHTSEERS (2012), a deadpan black comedy about the world's dullest couple on a serial-killing road trip, was a significant improvement, though some of that may be due to it being written by others. Wheatley's usual writing collaborator is his wife Amy Jump, and she gets sole writing credit for Wheatley's latest film, A FIELD IN ENGLAND, released in the UK last summer but just now arriving in the US, complete with a glowing recommendation from none other than Martin Scorsese.
The kind of film for people who found Nicolas Winding Refn's VALHALLA RISING a little too mainstream, fast-paced, and audience-friendly, A FIELD IN ENGLAND is a departure from Wheatley's usual downtrodden killers and miscreants in bleak surroundings, a psychedelic, mind-altering period piece set in 1648 at the time of the English Civil War--Cromwell is invoked at one point--that could almost be titled VALHALLA TRIPPING. Opening at the conclusion of an offscreen battle, alchemist's assistant Whitehead (Reece Shearsmith) meets a trio of deserters--Jacob (Peter Ferdinando of the Brit cult film TONY), Friend (Richard Glover), and Cutler (Ryan Pope)--and the four make camp in a field as Cutler prepares soup with some mushrooms found in the vicinity. From that moment on, nothing is as it seems as a rope appears as the men seem to engage in a one-sided game of tug-of-war. Materializing at the end of the rope is O'Neil (Michael Smiley, looking like Vincent Price in WITCHFINDER GENERAL), a renegade alchemist who was being hunted by Whitehead. O'Neil has other plans, turning the tables on the four men and forcing them to dig in the field for an alleged buried treasure. Before long, the men are turning on each other, Friend is killed but resurrected, and all are haunted by visions of a black, pulsating sun--even Whitehead, who didn't even eat any of Cutler's soup.
The film opens with a warning that it contains flashing images and stroboscopic sequences, and that's when all hell breaks loose near the finale as O'Neil's psychological grip on the men reaches its apex. It's basically the kind of trippy visuals where any random shot could be freeze-framed and used as a '70s prog rock album cover. Wheatley and Jump are never explicitly clear on anything, but there's obviously some other world/other dimension stuff going on, and classical "death/rebirth" mythic elements. Witness the fact that O'Neil doesn't appear until they've ingested the mushrooms, but it almost feels as if they're "pulling" him from another place during the tug-of-war sequence--or perhaps he's pulling them. Either way, A FIELD IN ENGLAND has "midnight movie" written all over it, like it's gunning to be the EL TOPO of the streaming generation (there's some pretty clear Jodorowsky worship going on in the closing scenes). Shot in black and white, there's no shortage of visually stunning moments, with Wheatley and usual cinematographer Laurie Rose using every bit of the 2.35 frame to maximize the vastness of the field and its simultaneous feeling of trapped claustrophobia. Some of the character arcs are interesting, especially the spineless, cowardly Whitehead's transformation into a badass, earning the respect of the initially dismissive Jacob. Shearsmith runs the gamut of emotions here, the high point being a scene of sustained offscreen screaming followed by a "rebirth" of sorts, emerging from a tent with the most disturbing, almost demonic facial expression you'll ever see. It's a long shot that Wheatley lets play out in slow motion, and it's unforgettable.
There's a whole subgenre of films whose biggest fans insist "You gotta be stoned to get it," and A FIELD IN ENGLAND falls into that...not that I agree with that assessment, but this is that kind of movie. Like VALHALLA RISING, it's an acquired taste (and VALHALLA really is an accessible crowd-pleaser compared to this), and for every person who loves it, there'll be one who loathes it. I wouldn't call it a great film, but I admire its audacity and its individuality. It refuses to be labeled and with every shot, you can tell Wheatley is making the film he wanted to make. By design, it doesn't fully come together on a narrative level (though this is probably a case where layers reveal themselves on repeat viewings), and even with a pace that makes you feel like you took some Slo-Mo from DREDD, Wheatley's enthusiasm and stylish direction shine through. I'm still not ready to anoint him a master of horror, primarily because I'm just not sold on all the KILL LIST love. I still think SIGHTSEERS is his best work thus far, but there's a bold ambition to A FIELD IN ENGLAND that can't be ignored, regardless of your feelings about it. It's such a radical change in style and tone from his past work that I'm wondering if even Ben Wheatley is sick of the Ben Wheatley hype (though it did get him the sweet gig of helming the first two episodes of the Peter Capaldi incarnation of DOCTOR WHO and he's doing the upcoming HBO series SILK ROAD). With shout-outs to the likes of Alejandro Jodorowsky, Ingmar Bergman, and Bela Tarr, A FIELD IN ENGLAND is bound to be a divisive film that provokes as many declarations of brilliance as it does sighs of "What a pretentious asshole," but that's likely the intent.
There's some intriguing ideas in this occasionally effective but more often muddled horror film that has a hard time deciding what it wants to be. Debuting writer/director Blair Erickson shows some promising technique, knows how to use darkness to his advantage and has a clear knack for delaying reveals to the point of nail-biting agony--plus I'm always a sucker for the inherent unease of instantly disturbing garbled radio transmissions--but the movie's a bit of a mess and once everything is laid out, the finale is too predictable to be the shocking twist that Erickson wants it to be. Predominantly straight narrative but mixing in bits of faux doc and found-footage (ugh...I know), BANSHEE CHAPTER focuses on Anne (Katia Winter of DEXTER and SLEEPY HOLLOW), a reporter investigating the disappearance of her friend James (Michael McMillian of TRUE BLOOD). She has some footage of James ingesting a dose of a liquid drug supposedly used in the US government's top-secret MK Ultra mind control experiments of the 1960s. He got the drug from a source in Colorado and upon ingesting it, immediately senses that "they're coming," and a shadowy figure appears by the window as James' face distorts and his eyes bleed and turn black. Anne's investigation leads her to Colorado where she meets James' source: washed-up '60s counterculture hero and gonzo writer/conspiracy theorist Thomas Blackburn (Ted Levine). Blackburn informs her that the drug doesn't cause hallucinations, but rather, allows the user to become a receiver to see our "alternate reality." All clues point to an abandoned military research station, so the pair hit the road, all the while seeing visions of monstrous figures and hearing a nursery rhyme and gibberish coming from a short-wave numbers station.
Playing a lot like a shaky-cam, road-movie version of Stuart Gordon's FROM BEYOND with the Soy Sauce element of Don Coscarelli's JOHN DIES AT THE END, BANSHEE CHAPTER suffers from a clunky, lugubriously-paced first half that takes forever to get going in a typical post-Ti West slow-burn fashion, and the early found-footage sequences just feel like desperate pandering to make sure the film would be able to find a distributor (Anne even starts out filming her trip in faux-doc style, but Erickson abandons that rather quickly). The film gets a lot of mileage out of a strong performance by Winter and a gregarious one by Levine, playing a character clearly based on Hunter S. Thompson. There are some undeniably chilling moments scattered about, especially the long sequence where Anne is in a lab at the abandoned military facility and looks back eight minutes on the security footage and sees that something has entered the room and must still be in there with her. But too much of BANSHEE CHAPTER is derivative and filled with ostensibly smart characters doing dumb things. While his script could've used another polish or two, Erickson demonstrates enough skill behind the camera that I'm intrigued to see what he does next. Zachary Quinto was one of the producers. (R, 87 mins)
RUNNER RUNNER (US - 2013)
Justin Timberlake's status as an iconic pop music figure and his comedic skills on SNL are without question, but he hasn't had a lot of luck on the big screen other than supporting roles in acclaimed films like THE SOCIAL NETWORK and INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS. Duds like IN TIME haven't done much to establish him as a box office draw and that trend continues with RUNNER RUNNER, a bland, boring thriller that audiences pretty much avoided during its theatrical run last fall. It had potential, considering the script was written by ROUNDERS scribes David Levien and Brian Koppelman, but it seems like all they did was rewrite that script and move it to the world of online gambling while half-assedly peppering it with references to the financial meltdown of several years ago. Timberlake is Richie Furst, a former Wall Street hot shot who lost everything in the collapse and is now struggling to pay his way through Princeton, largely through bookmaking and with commission earned by luring profs and fellow students to an online poker site. When he's ordered by the dean (Bob Gunton!) to shut down his operation, Richie gambles his entire savings on a poker site and loses. Sensing something fishy about the algorithms, Richie learns he was scammed and does what any struggling, broke college student would do: flies to Costa Rica to personally confront online gambling magnate Ivan Block (Ben Affleck), who's able to operate unencumbered by US federal laws. He manages a brief meet with Block, who's impressed enough to hire Richie to work for his operation. Now with money beyond his wildest dreams--and getting to sleep with Ivan's sultry assistant/lover (Gemma Arterton)--Richie is living the life. That is, until he's shaken down by overzealous FBI agent Shavers (Anthony Mackie), who's obsessed with bringing down Block and will do anything to nab him, even planting drugs in Richie's luggage to ensure his cooperation.
Unlike ROUNDERS, which felt gritty and real, RUNNER RUNNER is cartoonish and absurd from the start, following a template very much like the structurally similar and equally forgettable financial thriller PARANOIA, right down to the villain threatening the protagonist's father (John Heard shows up for a couple of scenes). RUNNER RUNNER is filled with lazy writing to explain away its endless contrivances (Richie's roommate: "You're about to jet off to a country you've never been to, with a language you don't speak, bluff your way into Ivan Block's posse and expect him to just give your money back?"...next shot, Richie's landing in Costa Rica), and characters who say things like "You know who Meyer Lansky is?" and "You know what Napoleon said?" Even Ivan Block is prefaced by someone saying "He's like the Wizard of fucking Oz...no one gets behind the curtain!" He could've been a fun nemesis along the lines of ROUNDERS' Teddy KGB, so brilliantly played by John Malkovich in that film, but Affleck seems so bored that his performance--essentially a Bond villain version of his BOILER ROOM character--never really comes to life, even when he's dumping liquid chicken fat on some guys and threatening to feed them to his crocodiles (Affleck does get one great line, telling Timberlake's Richie "That's the problem with your generation...you sat around with your vintage T-shirts and your participation medals, but you never did anything"). By the time Richie inevitably devises an elaborate scheme to turn the tables on his mentor, the clichés and trite dialogue are simply out of control: "This isn't poker. This is my life...and I've got one play left." Levien and Koppelman are accomplished writers, but are they even trying here? Lifelessly directed by Brad Furman (THE LINCOLN LAWYER), RUNNER RUNNER is the kind of predictable, paint-by-numbers product that can't even mask how utterly bored it is with itself. (R, 91 mins)
