Movie Review - Public Enemies

Genre: Crime Drama
Director: Michael Mann
Starring: Johnny Depp, Christian Bale, Marion Cotillard, Billy Crudup
Running Time: 139 minutes (plus trailers)

“We're having too good a time today, we ain't thinking about tomorrow.”

Set against the backdrop of depression era-America, Public Enemies tells the real life story of John Dillinger, famed bank robber and public enemy number one. A roguish, charming anti-hero, Dillinger (played by Johnny Depp) is beloved by the working class, and makes a mockery of the FBI and its lead investigator Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale). With a gorgeous gal (Marion Cotillard) on his arm and a gang of loyal friends by his side, Dillinger is living the high life, but the changing climate of the criminal underworld and the increasingly brutal tactics of the bureau soon bring his world crashing down. Directed in digital by acclaimed film-maker Michael Mann, and featuring some of the hottest talent in Hollywood, Public Enemies never the less manages to be one of the more unremarkable affairs of the 2009 cinema season.

Like Mann’s two previous films (Collateral, Miami Vice) Public Enemies is shot on high definition digital cameras, a technique that has proven divisive amongst critics. Personally, I fall well and truly into the “it looks like crap” camp; it’s true that the detail in some of the close ups is spectacular, but any time there is significant movement on screen, the motion blur rips you out of the film. This distracting cinematography proves particularly frustrating in some of the films heist scenes and shootouts – there is an action sequence set in a forest that is so poorly photographed and edited that I was convinced that Dillinger had been riddled with bullets – turns out he wasn’t even in the scene! I applaud Mann for exploring different techniques, but this movie further cements in my mind digital's status as a failed experiment.

The other big problem with Public Enemies (which is highlighted by the documentary style cinematography) is an enormous sense of separation. The entire time I was watching the movie, I felt as though I was being held at an arms length from the characters and events on screen. I had no emotional investment in anything or anyone, and Dillinger especially makes for a surprisingly boring protagonist. Mann clearly wants to build the man up as this mythic anti-hero, but as an audience member I was never offered any real reason as to why I should like him. Depp’s acting is good, but it’s never enough to overcome the banality of his character. Likewise, Bale and Cotillard turn in quality performances, but at the end of the day I didn’t care about the characters they played. Purvis is void of personality, and the romance between Dillinger and Cotillard’s “Billie” is much like the rest of the film: forgettable.

Public Enemies is by no means terrible. Parts of the story are interesting, the acting is all good, and the action sequences (barring the aforementioned forest fight) and jail break scenes are quite exciting. The other massive plus is that the sets, costumes and cars are all gorgeous. But never for a second did this movie captivate me, and ultimately I was left wondering why Mann picked Dillinger’s story to be the focus of a movie. It’s an interesting period of history, sure, but the way this story is told doesn’t make it seem that way. The movie is also irritatingly bound by true events – Mann wants to stay accurate, so we get a ton of poorly developed minor characters and a massive anti-climax for an ending. He’d have been better off coming up with a fictional character and giving him an interesting fictional life story. Instead, he told Dillinger’s tale, and wasted his own time, and mine.



Public Enemies is in cinemas now

Movie Review - X-Men Origins: Wolverine

Genre: Action, Comic Book Adaptation
Director: Gavin Hood
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston, Lynn Collins, Taylor Kitsch
Running Time: 107 minutes (plus trailers)

Bryan Singers 2000 film X-Men was the beginning of the re-emergence of the superhero movie, a genre that has since become the cornerstone of the summer blockbuster season. It proved that comic book films could be dark and serious and (to a certain extent) grounded in reality. Sam Raimi’s Spiderman, John Favreau’s Iron Man and of course Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight are just a few of the now hundred million dollar film franchises that have been spawned in the last decade, and one could argue that none of them would exist without Singers original. The X-Men series has itself enjoyed two massively popular sequels, as well as now what will surely be the first of many spin-offs. In X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Hugh Jackman reprises his career making role as the adamantium clawed rogue mutant set on revenge. Taking place before the first X-Men, this film sheds light on Wolverines past, his troubled relationship with his brother Victor a.k.a Sabretooth and his involvement in the Weapon X program under Col. William Stryker (the bad guy from the second film). With the commercial and critical success of the earlier films (or at the least the first two), X-Men Origins: Wolverine has a lot to live up to. And sadly, it most certainly does not.

When you sit down to watch Wolverine, something that becomes very clear very quickly is that it is not a smart movie. Whereas X-Men spent enormous time on fleshing out well rounded characters, this movie gets most of its character development out of the way in the opening credits. Where X-Men explored themes of intolerance and belonging, Wolverine explores themes of shit blowing up. Not that there’s anything wrong with action – indeed, one major criticism of the first X-Men film is that there barely is any – but a little balance would be nice. The character work really is the low point of the film; there are so many beloved characters in the comics that didn’t make it into the original trilogy, and so it seemed as though the goal of this movie was to fit everyone in. Therefore, fans will get to see Gambit, Emma Frost and Blob, but their appearances are so brief and/or pointless that it is impossible to form any attachment to them. Don’t worry though...I’m sure they’ll all get their own origin movie eventually.

Not everything story wise is a bust. I found the relationship between Wolverine and Sabretooth really compelling, thanks mainly to the great performances by Jackman and Liev Schreiber. While in X-Men Sabretooth was just a minion, here he is a fairly complex character (complex for a Hollywood action film at least) who becomes consumed by his bloodlust, and Schreiber performs admirably. And of course Wolverine is who Jackman was born to play, and he is excellent in every scene; it’s just a shame that a lot of his role comes down to roaring at the sky and stretching his arms out as far as he can. The dynamic between the brothers is the base on which the whole movie is built, and thankfully it holds up, even when the other major relationship - between Wolverine and his love interest - fails completely.

One thing about this film that surprised me was how mediocre the action was. There’s plenty of it, but poor editing sometimes makes it hard to figure out what is going on. Director Gavin Hood previously made Tsotsi and Rendition, so I’m not entirely sure how he got a job behind the helm of a major action film. A bigger problem than the editing though is that barring the ‘Lagos’ sequence and the final fight scene (which I really enjoyed), most of the action pieces are exactly the same. Wolverine and Sabretooth face off from opposite ends of a room…charge at each other in slow-motion…go flying through a wall/window (also in slow-motion)…trade a few blows until one of them is pinned. Then rather than delivering a kill strike, they chose to exchange banter for a while, during which a distractions comes along and breaks up the fight. Until next round, that is. It’s becomes very boring, and dodgy CGI in many places doesn’t help.

Overall, I think that X-Men Origins: Wolverine succeeds in being entertaining…barely. However, it lacks the intelligence of Bryan Singers films, whose directorial skills are also sorely missed. The last half hour really redeems the film – the quality of the action and special effects pick up considerably, leading to a very thrilling final showdown (even if it is against one of the stupidest looking final bosses of all time.) Jackman is great, and Ryan Reynolds in a brief appearance as the wise-cracking mercenary Deadpool is another highlight. The good news is that since this movie made a huge chunk of cash on its opening weekend, a Deadpool spin-off has been announced, with Reynolds set to reprise his role. Not only that, but Wolverine 2 is also in the works. The truth is that this franchise is a huge cash cow for Fox Studios, and so we can look forward to many, many X-Men Origins films in the future. Let’s just hope they improve.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is in cinemas now



P.S. The Blob? That's a character you probably want to keep confined to the pages of a comic.

P.S.S The CGI claws look retarded. I don't care if he did accidentally stab a stuntwoman, give him a prop!

Movie Review - Revolutionary Road

Genre: Drama

Director: Sam Mendes

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Kathy Bates, Michael Shannon, David Harbour

Running Time: 119 minutes (plus trailers)

In 1999, director Sam Mendes broke onto the directorial scene with the critically acclaimed American Beauty. The Best Picture winning film featured brilliant performances from both its lead actors and utilized a combination of drama and dark comedy to expose the sinister side of suburban life. Now, ten years later, Mendes returns to the location that launched his career with Revolutionary Road, based on the 1961 novel of the same name by Richard Yates. Set in 1950’s Connecticut, Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet play Frank and April Wheeler, a young couple who have recently moved to the suburbs. April, a failed actress soon becomes dissatisfied with her buttoned down life and dreams of seeing Paris, while Frank works in a boring job in order to provide for his family, while at the same time carrying on an affair with his secretary. Unable to stand the mediocrity any longer, the Wheelers decide to escape their lives and move to Europe, but ultimately they find themselves fighting a losing battle to break free from society’s rules.

There are three big comparisons one can make with Revolutionary Road. The first, as was mentioned above is to American Beauty. That film was certainly a superior, which one can attribute to the morbidly funny script by Alan Ball, who would later go onto create the critically acclaimed television drama Six Feet Under. While Revolutionary Road explores many of the same themes, it delivers none of the sly humour or voyeuristic thrills that made American Beauty so captivating. The second comparison is to Titanic, which was of course the last film in which DiCaprio and Winslet played lovers. But while in Titanic the relationship was new and filled with promise, this film follows a couple who have been together long enough for the initial excitement of young love to fade, and who now find themselves feeling trapped and desperate. People have correctly pointed out that the relationship between Frank and April might very well be where Jack and Rose would have ended up if (spoiler alert) the titanic hadn’t sunk.

The third comparison is to most readers probably the least obvious, but I believe it is the one that will best highlight this films flaws. The Golden Globe winning television program Mad Men shares enormous similarities with Revolutionary Road. Set in the early 60’s in New York, the series is based in an advertising firm, and follows numerous characters, both male and female as they attempt to navigate the conservative, misogynist world in which they live. The characters of Don and Betty Draper face many of the same employment, marital and emotional problems that Frank and Alice do, but they’re character arcs unfold over a full season of television, whereas Frank and Alice only have two hours. Because of this, the characters in the film are not nearly as complex, and in some cases are plain one-dimensional. When we first meet the Wheelers, their relationship is already clearly breaking down, and although the film uses flashbacks in an attempt to show how the relationship developed, all the audience is ever really shown are two people, one of whom is unkind and the other who is borderline mentally unstable. The supporting characters suffer from the same problem. Kathy Bates plays an older neighbour, who fills the very standard mould of the gossipy neighbour, and Michael Shannon plays her mental patient son, a character who represents the epitome of lazy screenwriting. His tirades against society sums up what the filmmakers want the audience to feel, but it is so unsubtle that it feels like he is slapping you in the face, and although Shannon does a good job acting, there is only so much you can do with a character that feels as though he’s made out of cardboard.

There is some good here, but it simply does not out way the bad. The costumes and production design is great, and they lend themselves to some great pieces of cinematography, such as when Frank gets of the train and is instantly lost in a sea of business suits. Obviously, they’re has been a lot hype about the performances, particularly Winslets, and it is not unreasonable to assume that she will take home the Oscar. The raw emotion that we see on display in this film is can be very moving at times, but it is also a tad repetitive. I said in my summation of the trailer that the Wheelers seem to spend the entire film arguing, and I wasn’t that far off. And while both lead actors should be commended for what are really quite brave performances, the arguments they have feel very scripted. It is never a good sign when a film resorts to the following cliché: while in a rage someone either sweeps a bunch of stuff off of a desk or punches an inanimate object. I’m sorry, but I don’t think that ever really happens unless you’re drunk. I guess this isn’t a major problem…it just bugs me. The ending of this film grows more infuriating in my mind as time goes on, predominately because their were about ten better endings before it. There is one great scene in the last ten minutes where the two of them sit down and cordially eat breakfast. It is here, I believe that the film should have ended, but instead it keeps going. From then on, every scene would have made a better conclusion to the scene the follows it, and by the time we actually reach the end, it is so breathtakingly unnecessary and unsubtle that you want to sprint out of the cinema before they try to add yet another ending.

Perhaps the reason that this film didn’t capture my imagine is because I plain don’t agree with the premise. The suburbs just aren’t that bad. They can be stifling, and boring, and you may dream of escape, but this film presents the absolute worse case scenario. In American Beauty (sorry to keep returning to this comparison) the message seems to be that it is the people behind the white picket fences that are wacky and/or repressed, but the contention of Revolutionary Roads is that the suburbs will plain out destroy your soul, and anyone who likes living there is either repressed or crazy. And that simply isn’t true. After all, I grew up in the suburbs and I am perfectly well adjusted.

Right?

Revolutionary Road is in cinemas now. But wouldn’t you rather rent American Beauty?

Movie Review - Quantum of Solace

Genre: James Bond

Director: Marc Forester (god knows why)

Starring: Daniel Craig, Olga Kurylenko, Mathieu Almaric, Judi Dench

Running Time: 106 minutes (plus trailers)

I actually saw Quantum of Solace more than three weeks ago, but it has taken me all this time to recover enough faith in humanity to write this review. How’s that for an opening paragraph?

When ‘Casino Royale’ hit the screens and the world was introduced to a new kind of 007. Gone were the gadgets, the one-liners and the suave sophistication, and in its place was gritty action and a Bond that wasn’t afraid to get his hands dirty, played with brutal realism by Daniel Craig. The film was a massive success both commercially and critically, but aside from that it was also successful in reinventing Ian Flemings beloved secret agent. By the end of the Pierce Bronson run of films, the character had basically become a joke (Die Another Day: The movie with laser beams from space, invisible cars, ice palaces and an Asian villain who has so much plastic surgery that he becomes a British guy) and audiences turned there attentions to another spy: Jason Bourne. The Bourne films reinvigorated the spy genre with heat-racing gritty action sequences and (relatively) believable plotlines, and it was these movies that inspired Casino Royale. The movie, released in 2006, balanced story with action almost perfectly, as well as paying homage to the Bond clichés without being overly cheesy. And so while it will never have the same place in my heart as ‘From Russian With Love’ or ‘License to Kill’, Casino Royale was to me a great action film that brought 007 racing into the 21^st century, and the last scene in the film promised more to come.

Quantum is the first direct sequel in the Bond franchise, picking up an hour after the end of Casino. I entered the film having read a lot of negative reviews online, but still, I was hoping that I had been mislead. From the opening minute however, it was clear that this was not the case. The action, obviously an important component of this franchise, looked like it had been shot by a monkey with Parkinson’s disease. The movie opens with a car chase, which would have been really exciting if you could tell what the hell was going on. The camera was never more than a foot away from the cars, and the editing was abhorrent. The second action sequence – a chase over the rooftops of Spain – suffered from the same problems, plus some really obvious CGI. The choice of director for this film was ridiculous; Marc Forester, who is best known for ‘Monsters Ball’ and ‘Stranger than Fiction’. Both are very good, but why on earth would you give this man an action film? The story was…I don’t know. I don’t think there was a story. Something about water, but to be honest you will not care. The film was sold in the advertising material as a revenge story, with Bond out to get the people who where responsible for the death of his girlfriend from the first film, but the resolution to that story is incredibly unsatisfying.

There are also enormous logical problems (if your parachute opens five metres from the ground, you don’t get up again. And who builds a luxury hotel in the middle of a desert?)

But to me, what was worst of all was the complete lack of respect the writers and director had from one of cinemas most beloved franchises. Casino Royale took some of the properties most beloved staples (Bond James Bond, shaken not stirred, the opening gun barrel sequence) and twisted them in a way that was refreshing and exciting to watch, but this film just completely ignores them. The bad guy was boring and even the opening credits sucked (although I did like the song.) In case I’m not making myself clear, I hated Quantum of Solace.

But perhaps I’m being unfair. I read through what I’ve written so far, and I notice how much I’ve mentioned Casino Royale. The reason is because I love James Bond; I own all 21 films, and have watched each of them multiple times. But even I, a die hard fan, realised that the more recent movies were becoming a parody of themselves, and so when Casino Royale was released it was a sign of the franchises redemption. Quantum ruined this. It’s certainly not the worst thing I’ve seen this year (cough*Body of Lies* cough.) but as a Bond fan I was heartbroken. Some of the action, particularly the plane chase and the final showdown, was quite exciting, and the acting, particularly from Daniel Craig and Judi Dench, was very good. One good thing I can say is that the movie is never boring; many people had a problem with extensive poker scenes in Casino, but Quantum moves along at a good speed. As a James Bond film, it is insulting, and as a sequel to Casino Royale, it is incredibly disappointing, but as an average popcorn movie…it’s alright. If you really want to see it, you probably already have. My advice to those who haven’t is to watch Casino Royale again instead.

Rating: 4/10