The Monster – 5 stars

June 11, 2013
2 stars, 2013, Scary
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While there are a few scary moments, and the young actor who plays the “disfigured baby” grown up is, in fact, truly terrifying, there are just too many problems to recommend the picture, including–

*  thematic confusion – is this a comedy?  Because if it is, casting such a frightening actor as the demon is a mistake.  Why is the screenwriter wearing sunglasses inside in the middle of winter?  Why is the neighbor wearing a Virginia Tech hoodie?  And why does he smile so much and then screech intermittently?

*  mumble mouth dialogue from the young actor playing the neighbor (he tells us the story of the house but we can’t understand him) and over-acting (“Who could that be?”) from the protagonist, who distrusts the script and opts for a play-by-play narrative.

*  sloppy editing – why use tracking shots if your actors are going to be looking back as if being chased by the camera?

*  poor scene locations – the haunted house is dank and scary, but it seems that a young screenplay writer who just moved into it would not have a Batman pillow case and  a life size figurine of Batman.

*  Will Larroca’s insistence on playing the lead was too much of a distraction.  He seems to be giving non-verbal direction to the camerman.

Again, this is a shame, because the actor playing “The Monster” is bone-chillingly good.

Word on the street is that the writer/director/star is in pre-production for another horror film, and he has some money behind it.  It may be make or break.

UPDATE:  My review has been reviewed, and rather unkindly

Mama – 4.25 stars

June 9, 2013
2013, 4 stars, Scary
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This Guillermo del Toro produced ghost story is scary, judiciously using the shock techniques of The Woman in Black, and intriguing, developing an actual mystery behind the horror.  First time director Andres Muschietti is confident, evoking the creepy feel of The Ring, and Jessica Chastain and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jamie Lannister in Game of Thrones) are convincing as the caretakers of two girls found abandoned in a Virginia cabin 5 years after their father (Coster-Waldau’s brother) absconded with them and disappeared. Upon discovery, it turns out the girls have been adopted by a new, more sinister force. A little more patience and exposition prior to the gripping finale, and less of a CGI bonanza during that finale, could have made this a horror classic. As it is, it’s pretty damn good.

High Plains Drifter – 4.25 stars

June 4, 2013
4 stars, 70s, Western
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Was John Wayne being an old Green Beret stick-in-the-mud when, after seeing High Plains Drifter, he wrote to its director and star Clint Eastwood, “This isn’t what the West was all about. That isn’t the American people who settled this country”?

Wayne was never a lover of nuance, and he had little patience for depicting the darker side of the American psyche, as is evident from his evaluation of another film: “High Noon was the most un-American thing I have ever seen in my whole life. The last thing in the picture is ol’ Coop [Gary Cooper] putting the United States marshal’s badge under his foot and stepping on it. I’ll never regret having run [screenwriter Carl Foreman] out of this country.”

Eastwood second directorial effort was released in 1973, and he wasn’t interested in Wayne’s myth.  It was a time of callous selfishness and a vicious appraisal of the institutions so revered by Wayne, hardly the environment for an uplifting Western about the strong stock of the frontier.

Eastwood’s story of a drifter returning incognito to the town that ran him out via a brutal whipping is assured (he was clearly taking mental notes when directed by Sergio Leone and Don Siegel with this bizarre, even trippy revenge flick).  It is also supremely cynical.  Nearly everyone in the town is guilty of either directing the whipping or standing by when it happened, frauds and cowards all, and these villains unwittingly give Eastwood a run of the place so he’ll protect them from the very same thugs (newly released from prison) the town set on Eastwood. Eastwood enjoys the power, as well as sticking it to townsfolk for their hypocrisy, per this exchange with a preacher upbraiding Eastwood for evicting people from the town hotel:

PREACHER
You can’t turn all these people out into the night. It is inhuman, brother. Inhuman!

EASTWOOD
I’m not your brother.

PREACHER
We are all brothers in the eyes of God.

EASTWOOD
All these people, are they your sisters and brothers?

PREACHER
They most certainly are!

EASTWOOD
Then you won’t mind if they stay at your place, will ya?

PREACHER
All right, folks, let’s go. Put your bags here. Friends, don’t worry. We shall find haven for you in our own homes… and it won’t cost you one cent more than regular hotel rates.

But let’s not dismiss that old fuddy duddy Wayne out of hand.  High Plains Drifter is also groundbreaking in a different, uglier way. Eastwood’s character rapes a woman in the first 15 minutes of the film, yet his status as the anti-hero is none the worse for wear. While she was a complicit bystander in his whipping, even cheering, when she tries to shoot Eastwood (and misses), he asks, “I wonder why it took her so long to get mad?” to which a character replies, “Because maybe you didn’t go back for more.”

Compare and contrast Wayne: “I want to play a real man in all my films, and I define manhood simply: men should be tough, fair, and courageous, never petty, never looking for a fight, but never backing down from one either” and you can better understand his distaste.

Behind the Candelabra – 1 star

June 1, 2013
1 star, 2013, Drama, Historical
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Behind the Candelabra (2013) - Rotten Tomatoes

This is Steven Soderbergh’s last picture? A flimsy, small biopic about a kitschy figure (Michael Douglas as Liberace) and his boy toy (Matt Damon as Scott Thorson), arguing over dog poop in the mansion, plastic surgery and the fact that Thorson won’t agree to be on the receiving end in sex? There is no insight, Liberace’s fear of being outed is without nuance, and Soderbergh doesn’t have any fun with the Vegas excess, so the film fails as a character study and as a mindless guilty pleasure, ala’ Mommy Dearest. At its best, it is a decent VH1 “Behind the Music” as Thorson’s descent progresses. Mainly, it is clumsy and pedestrian and really disappointing when we realize this is Thorson’s story (Liberace is the reasonable one pretty much throughout).

Douglas has some strong moments, especially during his last visit with Thorson as he lay dying of AIDS, but Damon is way past “boy” much less “toy” (Thorson met Liberace when has was 17 and stayed with him until he was in his mid 20s) and he is unconvincing.

This is the filmic equivalent of Bjorn Borg’s comeback and the subject matter is Soderbergh’s wooden racket.

Hearts and Minds – 1 star

June 1, 2013
1 star, 70s, Documentary
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This 1974 documentary is devoid of voicever narrative, alternating between footage of the Vietnam War, news footage of the era, anti-communist propaganda documentary clips, movie clips, and interviews with ordinary American citizens, Vietnamese villagers, American soldiers and policymakers.  The thrust of the documentary is that the conflict was precipitated by a racist, warrior society (high school football being an engine of the former malady), a hysterical fear of communism, and a hubristic, imperial policy.  It is skillful, affecting and pernicious, simplifying a complicated reality with editing that feels deceptively selective.  Worse, because it is comprised of raw footage and heartfelt interviews, it presents as an honest portrayal.  As Roger Ebert noted, “Here is a documentary about Vietnam that doesn’t really level with us … If we know something about how footage is obtained and how editing can make points, it sometimes looks like propaganda … And yet, in scene after scene, the raw material itself is so devastating that it brushes the tricks aside.”

An example: interviews with American bombers, where we never hear the documentarians, but it is clear the answers of the fliers have been elicited by questions about the experience, followed by footage of Vietnamese peasants, who are asked to recount the effect.  I imagine most viewers would deem this strategy hunky dory, but the effect is to create an easy falsity-our boys dig on the need for speed and the kick-ass of it all, encased in their imperialistic manned drones, while the carnage below them escapes their notice.  Indeed, I saw this storyline on an episode of M*A*S*H.

Another: the treatment of the policymaker interviewees.  The anti-war Senator Fullbright and Daniel Ellsberg are edited as erudite, comprehensive and certain, and Ellsberg is even filmed breaking down recounting the assassination of Robert Kennedy. Walt Rostow’s contribution as selected is halting, petulant and confused. William Westmoreland seems near-sandbagged, even in a sit down interview.

Finally, if there is a patriotic rally or demonstration, the filmmakers always find the most extreme commenter, generally dressed up in a historical costume to punctuate his inevitable, “America, love it or leave it!”

This film is the father to the staged propaganda of Michael Moore, saying less about the subject matter and everything about how the filmmakers want you to feel about the subject matter (it is an indictment of Moore’s skills that he must insert himself as the center of his films to hammer home his points). In that manner, it is comprehensive, a cinematic Cliffs Notes to the most basic conventional wisdom about the conflict.

The picture was also clearly influential on Oliver Stone’s Platoon and Born on the Fourth of July and Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket.

The Last Stand – 3 stars

May 28, 2013
2013, 3 stars, Action/Disaster, Crime/Mystery
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The Last Stand is as formulaic as they come and is strangely populated by 5 characters sporting near-incomprehensible accents: Arnold Schwarzenegger (born in Thal, Styria, Austria), as a retired LA narcotics detective who is the sheriff of a small town on the Mexican border; Forest Whittaker (born in Longview, Texas), as the out-of-breath, over-salivating, beleaguered FBI agent who has lost a major cartel figure in an attempt to transfer him from Las Vegas to a super max prison; Eduardo Noriega (born in Santander, Cantabria, Spain), as that cartel figure, who is hurtling at 200 MPH in a tricked-out sports car, hoping to make the border; Peter Stormare (born in Arbrå, Gävleborgs län, Sweden), Noriega’s henchman, who is clearing the path for Noriega’s arrival by trying to kill Schwarzenegger and his motley crew of small town defenders (Stormare’s southern accent is hilarious, half ABBA, half Foghorn Leghorn); and Rodrigo Santoro (born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), one of those defenders, an Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran locked up on a drunk and disorderly, deputized to assist Schwarzenegger.

Since you can’t understand what most of the people are saying, the pedestrian script is mooted, leaving you free to enjoy director Kim Jee-Woon’s (born in Seoul, South Korea) impressive chase scenes and shoot ’em ups.

I’ve seen worse, and Schwarzegger maintains an irrepressible likeability that makes for an enjoyable ride.

Donnie Brasco – 4.5 stars

May 28, 2013
4 stars, 90s, Crime/Mystery
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A year or so before The Sopranos, Mike Newell’s Donnie Brasco offered a glimpse of the series with this sharp, “deep cover” mob flick, alternatively brutal and funny, and at the end, touching. Donnie Brasco (Johnny Depp) is actually FBI agent Joe Pistone, who goes undercover to break a mob crew led by Michael Madsen. His entree is provided by a lower-level made guy, Lefty (Al Pacino), who vouches for Donnie, shows him the ropes, and, as Donnie loses his moorings and allegiances (to both the FBI and his suffering wife, Anne Heche), becomes a father figure.

Paul Attanasio’s (Quiz Show, Disclosure, and several episodes of Homicide: Life on the Street) script is tight and playful. We get harrowing scenes where Donnie is conscripted to dispose of a body via hacksaw or merely nearly found out:

These scenes are followed by amusing vignettes of what mobsters do on vacation in Miami (water slides, burying colleagues in sand, bad tennis) or the everyday humdrum of the criminal life, stealing boxes of steak knives or parking meters.  Attanasio even includes a wry stab at marriage counseling between Depp and Heche. David Chase would do the same thing for Tony and Carmella Soprano a few years latter, to similar tragicomic effect.

As Donnie becomes enmeshed in his crew, the audience becomes invested in their survival, if not from the FBI, from rival mob crews. Depp sells this kinship very effectively. This was one of his first major dramatic roles and he shows a depth and darkness that is highlighted by Heche’s increasing frustration and anger. Tempering both performances is a rare restrained turn by Pacino, who becomes Donnie’s family. It is always a treat to see an older Pacino performance that shelves histrionics.

There are a few weaknesses. The Heche-Depp marriage, rocky as it is, seems too indomitable for reality, and Depp’s introduction into the crew seems a tad effortless. But this is a picture every bit as strong as the best of The Sopranos episodes.

The Bay – 0 stars

May 27, 2013
0 stars, 2012, Scary
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Image result for The Bay

The Bay had a few things in its favor going in.  Director Barry Levinson is no slouch.  The “found media” approach is appealing to me, as is evidenced by my affection for the Paranormal Activity movies. And the premise – a small Maryland town is plagued by a bacteria that cuts through it on a July 4th celebration – had promise.  Two factors, one personal to me and the other a colossally stupid decision on Levinson’s part, resulted in my turning the flick off about a third in.

I’ll take my lumps first.  I can handle slashers (if not gore porn), serial killers, unsettled ghosts, zombies . . . you name it.  But a plague of pustules and vomiting blood and boils? A very, very hard ask.  And then, there were afflicted children.  Damn, this better be good.

It wasn’t. Levinson was more interested in making an eco-horror tract than an actual scary movie.  As such, once his narrator (a witness to the July 4th disaster who is video-blogging) introduces us to the source of the plague (apparently, chicken shit being run off into the Chesapeake Bay), we learn that near everybody but our narrator dies.  At the outset!  She even points out people in the collated footage and says, “he dies” and “he doesn’t survive the day.” So, within 15 minutes, the audience knows the source of the killings and pretty much who dies.

Hell if I’m going to sit through pustules and boils on children under such circumstances.

Planet Terror – 0 stars

May 19, 2013
0 stars, 00s, Scary
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In evaluating Robert Rodriguez’s half of the Grindhouse double feature experiment/debacle with Quentin Tarantino, one has to remember that the insistence on an homage to 70s drive-in crap was an insurmountable mistake.  

A small Texas town is beleaguered by zombies, created by a military experiment gone bad. All hell breaks loose. Not really funny and not at all terrifying, mostly boring, often disgusting. But in the ultimate structural pass, Rodriguez is not responsible for a lazy, uninteresting film, because he is patterning his movie on same.  Along with Tarantino’s Death Proof, there are few greater examples of Hollywood hubris.

Entertainment Weekly called it “crazily funny and exciting tribute to the grimy glory days of 1970s exploitation films” that “will leave you laughing, gasping, thrilled at a movie that knows, at long last, how to put the bad back in badass”, proving that some critics will go to great lengths for fear of seeming uncool.

It was, however, kind of gutsy to cast a near midget (Freddie Rodriguez) as the strong, silent hero.