Despite The Dated Elements, Aladdin Still Entertains!

The Good: Strong female protagonist, Some impressive animation, Decent moral, Good voicework
The Bad: Some simplistic elements, Overwhelmed with sidekicks, Incongruent Genie schtick
The Basics: Aladdin is fun, but much of what makes it fun makes the film an erratically-executed story.


I have an interesting history with the film Aladdin. Back when I was in high school, I went on an almost surreal date one night. The local movie theater near me played double features and it was playing Aladdin and What's Love Got To Do With It? (the Tina Turner biopic). The surreal element came from how memorable the incongruent pairing of the films actually was. Until today, I had not seen Aladdin again. My wife, however, is a huge fan of Disney films and Aladdin in specific, and she has been waiting for so many years for the film to be released to own it for our personal library. We're on our second viewing again already and as she sings excitedly next to me, I find myself considering the film.

Aladdin is good, but the more I've learned about the film, the more it seems like its potential exceeded its execution. Perhaps made so popular by Robin Williams's voicing the Genie, Aladdin is shockingly dated - the half-life of an Arsenio Hall reference is remarkably short, it turns out! The mix of simplistic story for children and the volume of adult references (how many children will recognize a Jack Nickolson impression?!) seemed more disconcerting than smooth. Robin Williams might steal the show when he appears as the Genie, but he does so as a non-sequitor; the movie takes an abrupt turn for his schtick and has some trouble re-establishing itself when the title character is focused on again.

Starting with a peddler on the streets of Agrabah, telling the story that follows, Aladdin quickly flashes back to the story of Jafar the wicked adviser to the Sultan. He hires Gazeem to enter the Cave Of Wonders to recover a magic lamp, but the Cave Of Wonders rejects the servant. On the streets of Agrabah, the young Aladdin steals a loaf of bread to survive and, with his monkey companion, Abu, he manages to stay one step ahead of the lawmen pursuing him. Aladdin steps in when a Prince coming to woo the Princess acts abusively toward other children living on the streets. Inside the Palace, Princess Jasmine is feeling confined and loathes the idea of being forced to marry a Prince she neither knows, nor loves. As the Sultan laments his daughter's actions, Jafar bewitches the leader to try to find the identity of the person he might use to enter the Cave Of Wonders.

Sneaking out of the palace, Princess Jasmine gets into trouble trying to give an apple from a merchant's cart to a child. She is rescued by Aladdin, who takes her back to his hole in the wall, where they share a real conversation before the constables catch up with Aladdin. Aladdin is incarcerated by Jafar and Jasmine is told that Aladdin was put to death. Aladdin is used by Jafar to enter the Cave Of Wonders and recover a magical lamp. There, Abu discovers a magic carpet and when they become trapped int he Cave, Aladdin inspects the lamp and frees a Genie from it. The powerful Genie helps Aladdin by granting him wishes, with Aladdin promising Genie freedom as his last wish. But when Aladdin wishes to become a Prince, he draws the attention of Jafar, who steals the lamp to take over Agrabah and become all-powerful.

Aladdin has a lot to recommend it, not the least of which is a Princess who might be second only to Mulan (reviewed here!) on the strong and independent scale. Jasmine is likable, smart and independent. While she does not challenge having to marry someone, she challenges the Sultans law that she must marry a Prince, as opposed to someone she actually loves. Despite a climactic battle moment where Jafar entraps her, Jasmine is hardly a damsel in distress. Because Jasmine is characterized as both smart and independent, one of the most interesting aspects of her character becomes that she has a forgiving nature.

Aladdin, on the other hand, is characterized mostly as a liar, though he has a core of kindness. Aladdin is how he comes to learn the value of telling the truth.

Some of the moralization is prioritized over making sense for the story and for the characters. If the big moral of Aladdin is that there is value in honesty, the power of the wishes is oddly incongruent. Aladdin wishes to be made a prince in order to be able to woo Jasmine. Once the wish is granted, outside his name, he is not actually lying to Jasmine about who he is. If Aladdin wished to be, for example, a natural blonde and his hair turned blonde and he was then asked "are you a natural blonde?" reality would have been altered such that the answer would be, of course, "Yes." Aladdin is never asked "were you always a Prince?" But, either way, once the wish is granted, he is a Prince and it's not lying when he claims that he is. The defeat of Jafar is similarly a troublingly poor execution on the writing front. "All-powerful" is trumped, apparently, by the fundamental definition of what a Genie is. I was so shocked that the writers included the words "all-powerful" in Jafar's line because it just begs the contradiction.

Aladdin is filled with sidekicks, which is something I never noticed before. The three main characters - Aladdin, Jasmine, and Jafar - each have animal familiars and how they treat them is used as a form of characterization. That's pretty cool, but Iago is pretty obnoxious and the addition of the Carpet as a second sidekick for Aladdin seems more like a plot conceit or merchandising point than a genuine character.

The voice acting and the music in Aladdin are excellent. Despite the way that Robin Williams ad libs his way into making the Genie into a watchable, entertaining character who steals scenes, all of the voice performers do an excellent job at emoting. And the songs are fun and memorable.

Ultimately, Aladdin is fun and has some wonderful moments, but it is somewhat unsurprising that Aladdin is overshadowed by the Genie, Jasmine and even Jafar. Between their characters or their voice acting, they make Aladdin seem more mediocre than a character worthy of a princess.

For other works with Gilbert Gottfried, please check out my reviews of:
Seth MacFarlane's Cavalcade Of Cartoon Comedy
Farce Of The Penguins
Clerks: The Animated Series

7/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

HAPPY Aladdin Release Day! The 2015 "Yo, Rugman!" Ornament Starts The Day Off Right!

The Good: Coloring, Good sculpt, Awesome sound clips
The Bad: Front-heavy, Seams
The Basics: The 2015 "Yo, Rugman!" ornament from Aladdin is a neat tribute to the iconic character Robin Williams voiced, but it is, unfortunately, not perfect.


Today, one of my wife's many long-held dreams comes true. She has been waiting for the Disney film Aladdin to be released for years and today is the day that happens! While I will probably get dragged into watching the film several times today, I thought I would start the day out with checking out the first Aladdin Hallmark ornament in many years. The ornament is the "Yo, Rugman!" ornament and it is a wonderful embodiment of the Genie that was voiced by Robin Williams.

For those unfamiliar with Aladdin (reviewed here!), the title character unleashes a Genie from a lamp and helps Aladdin along on a magical journey. The Genie is rambunctious and energetic and he tries to advise Aladdin well, but is forced to grant wishes . . . even when he suspects they will have bad consequences.

It is the Genie rising up from a patch of sand upon which his lamp lays that is the subject of the 2015 "Yo, Rugman!" ornament.

Basics

The "Yo, Rugman!" ornament recreates the Genie as he appeared in Aladdin, though not in a specific moment. Still, the ornament is sculpted with a dynamic and energetic look to it, which captures the character very well. The ornament, released in 2015, was used to help promote the Blu-Ray release of Aladdin and generate enthusiasm for the film (and vice versa). Based on my wife's reactions, it worked!

Measuring four and a quarter inches tall by three and a quarter inches wide by two and one-quarter inches deep, the "Yo, Rugman!" ornament is a larger than normal-sized Disney character ornaments. As well, it is one of the more affordable ones at only $17.95 (which is pretty awesome for an ornament that has a sound chip).

The Hallmark "Yo, Rugman!" ornament is made of a durable plastic and has the Genie rising up, left hand up, right hand point a friendly fingergun and a wide smile on his face. The sand base is a simple disc and the lamp is embedded into it, as if it is stuck in the dirt. The Genie has a curled beard, topknot, and bracelets that are appropriate to the character. Hallmark sculptor Jake Angell even got the Genie's pointed ears perfectly right! Unfortunately, the sculpt is one of two problems with the ornament. There are deep seams at the neck (or where it would be if the character had a clearly-defined neck!), tail, waist and both shoulders. If this were a toy, those would suggest articulated joints. As it is, they are simply points from which the ornament was assembled and that looks sloppy especially when stacked up against most other Disney Hallmark ornaments.

The ornament's coloring is dominated by a monotonal bright blue, which is perfect for the character.

Features

As a Hallmark Keepsake ornament, "Yo, Rugman!" is wonderfully accented by a sound chip. Powered by a pair of watch-style batteries that the ornament comes with, a press of a button on the right side of the base activates the sound chip. There are four wonderful and distinctive lines from the Genie that play! The sound clip uses Robin Williams's actual dialogue from the film and this actually seemed to be one of the loudest ornaments I've encountered this year! The ornament's title comes from the Genie seeing the magic carpet and giving it a high five - and it is one of the four clips from the ornament! The sound chip enhances the ornament's value and is a nice touch.

Balance

As with all ornaments, the intent of the Hallmark Keepsake "Yo, Rugman!" ornament is to be hung on a Christmas Tree. And for those creating the ultimate Disney movie Christmas Tree, the "Yo, Rugman!" ornament could be the essential Aladdin ornament, at least for the Genie. The ornament has the standard steel hook loop embedded into the character's left shoulder. This is fairly obvious and necessary for the ornament. Unfortunately, at that position, the "Yo, Rugman!" ornament hangs with a clear front bias; the ornament is a heavy one and it leans forward.

Collectibility

Hallmark Keepsake began delving into the collectibles market in 1991 with Star Trek when it introduced the exceptionally limited edition original U.S.S. Enterprise ornament (reviewed here!). Within a few years, every major franchise from Star Wars to A Nightmare Before Christmas to Indiana Jones started making Hallmark ornaments. "Yo, Rugman!" is one of a handful of Aladdin ornaments (this is the first one in MANY years) the company has released and one of several Disney ornaments on the market for 2015. This ornament has not yet sold out, but given the popularity of Aladdin, it seems entirely possible that it will, despite the minor flaws it possesses. Anyone who loves Disney's Aladdin will find this to be an essential holiday ornament and with nostalgia for Robin Williams being fairly high given the anniversary of his death, it seems like many collectors will overlook the ornament's quality issues. Given the sound chip and size, it seems like a viable investment piece at the original issue price of $17.95.

Overview

Fans of Aladdin, Robin Williams, Disney, and Hallmark ornaments are likely to be happy that the "Yo, Rugman!" ornament exists and forgive Hallmark its flaws, even if the objective reviewer cannot!

For other Disney-themed Hallmark ornaments, please check out my reviews of:
2015 Olaf In Summer Frozen Ornament
2015 Jiminy Cricket Pinocchio Limited Edition ornament
2015 WALL-E
2015 Rapunzel And Pascal Tangled ornament
2015 Tiana Ballerina The Princess And The Frog
2015 Ariel's Thingamabobs The Little Mermaid ornament
2014 Queen Elsa Frozen Limited Edition
2014 Bank On Hamm Toy Story ornament
2014 Jack's Peculiar Pet The Nightmare Before Christmas ornament
2014 The Daring Princess The Princess And The Frog ornament
2014 Rapunzel's Long Locks Tangled ornament
2014 The Little Mermaid 25th Anniversary ornament
2014 "This Is Halloween" The Nightmare Before Christmas ornament
2014 All Eyes On Belle Beauty And The Beast ornament
2014 Olaf Frozen ornament
2013 Under The Sea The Little Mermaid
2013 The Nightmare Before Christmas Jack’s Sleigh O’Scares
2013 Tiana's Party Dress The Princess And The Frog ornament
2013 Beautiful Belle Beauty And The Beast
2013 Fierce With A Frying Pan Tangled ornament
2013 Ariel's Big Dream The Little Mermaid ornament
2013 Merida The Archer Brave ornament
2012 The Circle Of Life The Lion King ornament
2012 Jack Sneaks A Peek The Nightmare Before Christmas ornament
2012 Monsters, Inc. ornament
2012 Merida Brave ornament
2012 It's All About The Hair Tangled ornament
2011 Rapunzel Tangled ornament
2011 CLU’s Light Cycle from Tron: Legacy ornament
2011 Up ornament
2011 A Snowy Surprise The Nightmare Before Christmas ornament
2011 Captain Jack Sparrow Pirates Of The Caribbean ornament
2010 Tron: Legacy Light Cycle ornament
2009 Welcome To Christmastown The Nightmare Before Christmas ornament

8/10

For other ornament reviews, please visit my Ornament Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

The Search For The Zero Theorem Results In . . . Well, Nothing, Really.

The Good: Excellent direction, Good concept, Decent performances
The Bad: Convoluted (lack of) plot, Protagonist never becomes likable or interesting enough to care about, Minutia
The Basics: Terry Gilliam’s film The Zero Theorem is complicated and cluttered and fails to create a film with essential Gilliam characters.


For the past year, since I learned of the film’s existence, the movie I have wanted most to see is The Zero Theorem. Terry Gilliam’s The Zero Theorem was completed late last year and its release has been peppered around the world and in the U.S. in film festivals. It is not getting a wide release in the U.S. and now that it is in limited release, I’ve managed to see it as part of my wife’s early birthday celebration to me. Fortunately, The Zero Theorem is better than the last film I greatly anticipated and was able to see as a birthday gift from her, The Master (reviewed here!). Even so, The Zero Theorem is not the masterwork I hoped it would be from Terry Gilliam who has created my two favorite films of all time Brazil (reviewed here!) and The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus (reviewed here!).

While The Zero Theorem has been compared to Brazil by a number of reviewers, but I am not going to be one of them. Having watched The Zero Theorem twice now, I think the essential difference between the two films is in the level of character the two films portray. While both movies feature dystopian, Orwellian-style oppressive futures where people are worked to death, Brazil has interesting, likable, quirky characters who have a base of realism to them. Brazil is led by a protagonist who could be anyone living in an oppressively capitalist country, coming alive enough to reclaim his own sense of soul and self. The Zero Theorem is far more esoteric and the protagonist fails to have a connectable quality.

Qohen Leth works for Mancom, a giant company that seems to be involved with programming everything in the world of the near-future. Leth lives in an abandoned church and is petitioning Mancom to get put on disability so he can work from home, instead of being forced to go into Mancom’s offices each day and work on his own next to others working alone. Qohen has been waiting his entire life for a specific telephone call, so working from home is ideal for him and he is disappointed when the company’s doctors will not approve his request. Leth’s supervisor, Joby, invites him to a party where Qohen is able to meet with the mysterious head of Mancom, Management. Management makes an exception to the company’s doctors’ recommendation and sends Qohen home the next day, with the intent that he will work on their Zero Theorem project. In his house, Qohen starts working on plugging random figures into an insanely complex creation with the intent of getting zero in the equation to reach 100%.

Monitored by Management, Leth’s efforts to get zero to 100% show almost no progress. To try to shake things up, Management hires Bainsley, a virtual-reality prostitute (she strips online and only allows “clients” to have contact with her through virtual-reality bodysuits so she does not actually have sex with them) to try to make a connection with Leth. After Leth’s frustration with the project reaches a new high and he crushes his equipment, Management’s son, Bob, comes to Leth’s house to repair the equipment. Bob’s presence aids Leth in both the work on the Zero Theorem and in his personal life. Exposing Management’s plan as a form of control over Leth and revealing everyone under the influence of Management to be tools of Management’s machinations, Bob draws Leth away from his virtual world and back into the real world.

Much of The Zero Theorem is devoted to creating mood and embellishing the setting of Terry Gilliam’s near-future. Unfortunately for viewers, the hyperbolic setting of The Zero Theorem is chaotic to the point of being entirely overbearing. Qohen Leth’s world is not supposed to be an inviting vision of the future, but we get that almost immediately in The Zero Theorem. After leaving his burnt-out, graffiti-covered church home, Qohen Leth steps out into a world where everyone is self-absorbed and plugged into personal electronic devices. To combat that, the city is packed with advertisements that chase down citizens as they try to move around. The setting is big, obvious, oppressive . . . and Gilliam beats the viewer to death with it. Unfortunately, Gilliam seems to be under the impression that his viewers are not particularly attentive: the first time Leth is out in the city, one of the news crawls on the wall has a story of a six inch gap in the train tracks being filled with ice cream; after months of working from home, Leth goes back out and the news feed has the same story!

The attention to setting and creating a visually-impressive film preoccupies Gilliam past the point of reason or sensibility in The Zero Theorem. I “get” what Qohen Leth is working on and how he is going his work. Unlike Pi (reviewed here!) where the film is so esoteric that only a mathematician is able to understand even a fraction of what is going on with the work being pursued, Gilliam does not get obsessed with the minutiae in The Zero Theorem. But in not presenting the actual work on the Zero Theorem in a rational way on Management’s work, Gilliam creates a concept that only works as a cinematic visual effect. Qohen Leth uses an interface that is very much like a video game; his work on the Zero Theorem is presented much like a three-dimensional game of Tetris. Leth shoots blocks that represent mathematical elements to create factor cubes and then he plugs those cubes into the immense equation that represents the larger Zero Theorem. Sometimes, that moves the equation forward, other times it causes the collapse of previously-established structures in the equation. This is an intriguing visual representation of pursuing a mathematical proof; the new information disproves a previously-assumed component of the equation. We get it.

The problem with The Zero Theorem is that Qohen Leth does not seem to have any form of intellectual or creative drive to actually work on the equation. Leth seems to randomly create the blocks and plugs them into the equation with equal randomness. To understand the problem, look at this review. Seriously, the form mirrors the evaluation; trying to describe the setting takes up so much space, but finding space to discuss how Qohen Leth interacts with it is pretty much a non-starter. Qohen Leth is like a random element in The Zero Theorem; he is a product of the setting, but does not actually do much of anything in that setting. Leth’s work is random and nonsensical in a world where technology is overbearing. Given the randomness of the interface for the work that Leth is working on, it seems like a computer program would actually be able to make sense of the work faster and better than any person (i.e. the only way the computer program could work, rationally, is by being programmed with elements and any possible combination of those elements that would be combined to form the factors for the larger equation and then plugged into the equation could be formed faster and in infinite combinations by the computer once the smallest building blocks were entered into the interface).

So, complex and pointless, but visually impressive; that’s the bulk of The Zero Theorem. What saves The Zero Theorem, even if it took me multiple viewings of the film to get there, is the acting and the (eventual) character development. Qohen Leth is pushed into the world, out of his simple, focused, world in front of the computer monitor. He interacts virtually and in the real world with Bainsley and Bob and that does make Leth evolve. He stops using the first person plural and he actually becomes invested in trying to solve the Zero Theorem. Leth accepts that he has been a tool, but he seems to genuinely want to get zero closer to 100% (even if the methods used are somewhat nonsensical).

Outside his role in The Green Hornet (reviewed here!), I had never seen Christoph Waltz in anything. In The Zero Theorem, he plays an uptight, reclusive, and entirely off-putting computer programmer and he does it exceptionally well. Waltz is difficult to watch as Qohen Leth, but part of that is because Waltz is able to so completely and realistically bury his humanity to make the character come alive. As Leth develops, Waltz plays off Lucas Hedges’s Bob brilliantly. Hedges brings youth and exuberance to the role of Bob and the more he and Waltz interact, the more Waltz infuses Leth with subtle eye movements and facial expressions that make Leth more relatable and human. Waltz slowly infuses Leth with soul and that makes for a memorable and complex performance.

Similarly, Melanie Thierry plays Bainsley as a seemingly generic sex object, but is able to completely sell the moment Bainsley develops more. Thierry and Lucas Hedges have great on-screen chemistry with Waltz. Tilda Swinton and Matt Damon have wonderful supporting roles in The Zero Theorem as the computer-generated therapist and Management, respectively. Swinton’s part is reminiscent of Ricardo Montalban’s portrayal of Khan in Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan (reviewed here!); the way Swinton interacts with Waltz is so convincing one never thinks about how Swinton and Waltz are never in the same room together.

The Zero Theorem asks viewers to invest a lot to get to a point that is not as satisfying as a lobotomized rebel, but the journey is clever-enough to be watchable. Terry Gilliam created a mess with The Zero Theorem, but he populated it with exceptional performers playing at the top of their game and a visual sensibility that is incredible, if overwhelming and it’s still better than Tideland (reviewed here!)!

For other films currently in theaters, please check out my reviews of:
10,000 Days
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1
Interstellar
Hit By Lightning
Horns
John Wick
Listen Up Philip
The Best Of Me
The Judge
Dracula Untold
The Equalizer
The Maze Runner
This Is Where I Leave You
The Giver
Guardians Of The Galaxy
Life Of Crime

7.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

Fun, But By No Means Good: Flubber Fizzles!

The Good: Moments of performance and direction
The Bad: Utterly predictable, Simplistic character arcs, Erratic execution of special effects
The Basics: Flubber is a flop of a family film, despite having an impressive cast.


As the world copes with the suicide of Robin Williams, many of us are finding solace in watching his works. For me, that means rewatching films of his that impressed me, like The Fisher King (reviewed here!); for my wife, it means revisiting the films that delighted her in her childhood. It was she who wanted to watch Flubber, which I had never seen. While I was suitably pleased with the quality of the cast, Flubber is a ridiculous movie that sacrifices most of its moments of merit in order to be family-friendly. The humor is slapstick, the plot and character arcs are thoroughly predictable and the direction is so sloppy in relation to the special effects that only a child will not notice.

Flubber is a Disney live-action film that trades on simplicity and a sense of movement that is more significant than anything in the movie is substantive. As a result, the film features a villain who is adversarial for the sake of being antagonistic, an utterly unrealistic savior (in the form of big business!), and human relationships that are so poorly-conceived as to border on the ridiculous. Despite its many faults, Flubber is fun and easy-to-watch, is more than can be said for some of Robin Williams’s other films geared toward children.

Professor Philip Brainard is such an absentminded professor that he has missed his wedding to Dr. Sara Jean Reynolds two times before. While he promises not to miss it a third time (this time planned to be a big event purposely so he might remember it), Brainard’s floating robot, Weebo (who does all of his scheduling) fails to remind him of it the night before. As a result, the next day Brainard’s experiments in trying to create a sustainable power supply explode and distract him long enough to miss his own wedding. In the process, Brainard inadvertently creates a semi-conscious goo that is exceptionally elastic and has the potential to be used for an unlimited power supply.

But Brainard’s discovery does not solve all of his problems. Instead, Dr. Reynolds is wooed by Brainard’s competitor at the college, Wilson Croft, and the college is due to be shut down due to the machinations of Chester Hoenicker. To try to thwart both, Brainard uses the flubber to help the basketball team thwart their rivals – which costs Hoenicker quite a bit of money and helps Reynolds win a bet against Croft. While Hoenicker sends goons to steal the flubber, Brainard illustrates its uses to Reynolds and together the two work to save the university.

The flubber is a bright green goo that moves on its own and causes anything to which it is attached to bounce in violation of all of the traditional laws of physics. The creation serves as an excuse to have characters like the basketball players bounce across the court in a single leap or bounce back when they fall on their butts. Brainard uses the flubber to make his car fly and that becomes the method by which he and Dr. Reynolds figure out a way to earn enough money to save the college.

The character arcs in Flubber are painfully predictable. Brainard is set up as such an unfocused genius at the outset that any sort of wholesale change to the character in the course of the film would be unrealistic. As a result, much of the character development in Flubber is focused on how the other characters interact with him. Croft is a generic adversary for Brainard in both the personal and professional arena. Croft somehow has survived at the college long enough to live in Brainard’s shadow and steal some of his prior discoveries . . . without ever being reprimanded for it. Similarly, Croft only seems to have any potential for a relationship with Reynolds by the fact that he shows up. Reynolds seems not at all interested in him, but his advances are met with something other than indifference once Brainard misses their third wedding attempt.

While I am always thrilled to see Wil Wheaton in any of his post-Star Trek: The Next Generation roles, his part as Bennett Hoenicker is a distracting enemy that is essentially a third goon from his father. Wheaton’s role is entirely unnecessary and it interfaces poorly with Brainard’s storyline. At least Clancy Brown and Ted Levine might be relegated to the roles of Hoenicker’s goons, but at least they are supposed to be somewhat generic thugs: the addition of a son for Chester adds nothing to the story. Robin Williams and Marcia Gay Harden have fine on-screen chemistry, even if they are not a great cinematic couple.

Flubber makes decent use of Robin Williams’s manic physical acting style, but director Les Mayfield is sloppy with the special effects. The flubber moves at an incredible speed and Mayfield does not make sure to line up the eyelines of Williams or most of the other characters. As a result, most of the characters are not looking anywhere near the flubber or flubber-affected characters when they are bouncing around.

The result is that Flubber is a disappointing film that is utterly forgettable even though it is not unenjoyable while it is on.

For other Disney live-action works, please check out my reviews of:
Saving Mr. Banks
The Lone Ranger
Oz The Great And Powerful
The Odd Life Of Timothy Green
John Carter
Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
Tron: Legacy
Oceans
Prince Of Persia: The Sands Of Time
Alice In Wonderland
Old Dogs
G-Force
Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World's End
Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe
Pirates Of The Caribbean: The Curse Of The Black Pearl
The Princess Diaries 2: A Royal Engagement
The Princess Diaries
Tron

2.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

Aging No Better Than Its Initial Release, Hook Is Bloated And Boring!

The Good: Decent character arc for the protagonist
The Bad: Mediocre performances all around, Varying quality of special effects, Plot progression in the midsection is dull
The Basics: A family adventure that provides a live-action Peter Pan story, Hook is an unfortunately dull take that has the lawyer Peter Banning put on a quest to save his children by reverting to his prior persona of Peter Pan.


Last month, with the untimely death of Robin Williams, my wife and I felt an instant desire to rewatch works by Robin Williams that we had not seen in quite some time. For me, that took the form of wanting to watch The Fisher King (reviewed here!), for her she had a powerful desire to rewatch Hook. Hook was one of those films that I had managed to avoid in my young adulthood – when it was released, I was past the age where I had any interest in kid’s movies and I was still too young for the adult themes in Hook to resonate – but, as it turns out, it was one of the formative films for my wife. I recall the movie being on in the staff lounge when I worked at a summer camp (I avoided it by going off on my own to read, as I frequently did), but until my wife sat us down to watch it, I had never actually seen Hook. In watching Hook, I realized that I never paid tribute to the passing of Bob Hoskins, who also died this year (I’ll rectify that later this week!). Unfortunately for the legacies of Robin Williams, Bob Hoskins and the rest of the cast who will one day leave this work behind as part of their legacy, Hook is not an exceptional film in any way.

Steven Spielberg, who directed Hook, is famously quoted as saying “People have forgotten how to tell a story. Stories don't have a middle or an end any more. They usually have a beginning that never stops beginning” and he certainly is right about that. Most movies do not develop or only do so in truly predictable, banal ways. Unfortunately, with Hook, Spielberg (who was not involved with writing the film) illustrates well that even with a solid sense of development, it is possible to make a pretty terrible movie. Hook is not the worst movie ever, but it is a film crippled by mediocrity, hampered by predictability and is so concerned with telling a specific story of one character’s arc that is completely neglects a sensible development for several of the other characters (most notably the titled villain).

While finding an audience should not be a huge problem, rewatching Hook is a great example of how a movie without a clear focus of to whom the story is being told can be troubling. The film is painfully boring for children for almost the first third, too goofy for adults in the second and third parts to pay off for adults and ultimately acts as an overlong The Little Rascals sketch with an obscenely long build-up.

Peter Banning is an American lawyer who hates flying on planes, is tremendously focused on his work, and neglects his two children most of the time. After missing his son, Jack’s, baseball game, Peter, his wife, and children head to London where Peter’s “great grandmother” Wendy is being honored for her lifetime of charity work for orphans. While Peter, Wendy and Moira are out at the dinner, Jack and Maggie are kidnapped from their beds by the malicious Captain Hook. Peter is miffed, though Wendy tries to get him to believe that he has to go to find the children. Peter is visited by Tinkerbell, who takes him to Neverland.

There, Peter awakens in the pirate’s village where he finds his children and Captain Hook. Hook slowly comes to accept that Banning is Peter Pan (even though Banning does not), but finds the straight-laced lawyer an unworthy opponent for his wrath. To save Peter’s life and the life of his children, Tinkerbell tells Hook that she can get Peter to remember who he is within three days and they can have the battle Hook wants. So, while Hook tries to convert Jack to his cause, Peter is taken to the Lost Boys where Rufio and his child gang retrain him to use his imagination and recall that he is Peter Pan.

The thing about Hook is that Hook is so dramatically underdeveloped in contrast to Peter that he comes across as a monolithic villain. He has had decades to get over the fact that Peter Pan cost him his hand and he essentially rules the seas around Neverland, so provoking a fight with Peter that could cause him to lose everything seems utterly moronic. Lacking a compelling villain who has a clear and compelling need for revenge, Hook becomes a somewhat ridiculous grudge match where one of the participants does not even bear a grudge!

Fortunately, Captain Hook is given the whole plotline that has him turning Jack Banning to his side, to drive a wedge between Peter and his own son. That concept at least makes Hook smart and gives Dustin Hoffman as Hook additional screentime.

But Hook is too straightforward otherwise to keep the interest of the viewer. Peter Banning was always going to go through the journey to realize that he was Peter Pan; everyone around him has been right all along. This was never going to be a reality-bending film experience where people surrounding Peter Banning are all crazy and they get wrong who Peter Pan has become. So, going into Hook, the deck is stacked against those hoping for an audacious film experience. Peter Banning’s arc from uptight lawyer to Peter Pan is actually remarkably good and well-developed. The entire film smartly moves Peter along on his journey of self-discovery (or rediscovery) in a way that works beautifully.

The acting in Hook is mediocre. Dustin Hoffman plays Hook as bored and goofy as opposed to truly menacing, so the hold Hook has over the other pirates does not seem at all realistic. Julia Roberts, due to the special effects process of making her appear smaller, seldom gets eyelines right for interacting with other actors. As a result, Tinkerbell seems disconnected from other characters and Roberts is clearly not interacting with Robin Williams or Dustin Hoffman in most of the scenes they share. Robin Williams is fine as Peter, though he has absolutely no on-screen chemistry with Caroline Goodall (who plays Peter’s wife, Moira) and he fails to land a key scene where Peter Pan tells Jack that the happy thought that allows him to fly is related to his son. Poor Bob Hoskins is relegated to the role of ridiculous Disney-style comic relief sidekick as Smee.

The result is that Hook has a clear beginning, middle, and end and a protagonist whose story develops, but none of it is truly compelling. Too slow to be a great kid’s movie, too goofy to entertain adults, Hook fizzles.

For other works with Caroline Goodall, please check out my reviews of:
My Life In Ruins
Alias - Season 5
The Princess Diaries 2: A Royal Engagement
The Princess Diaries
The Mists Of Avalon
Schindler’s List

3/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

R.I.P. Robin Williams: The Fisher King Is Part Of An Incredible Legacy

The Good: Characters, Performances, Direction, General plot
The Bad: Editing
The Basics: One of the most powerful, diverse performances by Robin Williams came in The Fisher King, one of Terry Gilliam’s most profound explorations of human suffering.


Yesterday, the world lost an immense talent with the suicide of Robin Williams. For the past day, my wife and I have been strangely in shock; for her, this is the first celebrity death she has experienced that has genuinely shaken her. For me, I’ve been trying to find a way to commemorate the actor that does not lead me to a rant about how Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film can never be realized (and fuck you, American financers for not seeing the potential of that a decade ago!). One of my fondest memories of all stand-up comedy was Robin Williams doing Shakespeare: “Look! The moon, like a testicle, hangs low in the sky!” But amid his life of comedy films, what shocked me the most about the life of Robin Williams was how masterful a dramatic actor he was. In some ways, with his range and ability to portray dramatic depth and blistering emotions, the suicide of Robin Williams is unsurprising; such greatness, intelligence and emotional realization seldom comes without a price. So, to commemorate the life of Robin Williams, today I thought to take in one of his films that I had – surprisingly – not yet reviewed: The Fisher King.

Before today, I had only seen The Fisher King once, back when I was in college. I had not been prepared for Robin Williams in a serious, not-funny, role, but his portrayal of Parry caused me to entirely rethink who Williams was as an actor. Rewatching the film now, as an adult, The Fisher King is a powerful film that illustrates the talent Terry Gilliam has for direction, storytelling and getting great performances out of his actors. While Gilliam’s style is evident in almost every single shot of The Fisher King, the story he and writer Richard LaGravenese tell is much more universal than some of Gilliam’s more fantastic works. The Fisher King is intense and quirky and it is unsurprising it was nominated for many awards; perhaps the only real surprise for me was how many of those nominations did not materialize with wins. Given that The Fisher King was up against Silence Of The Lambs (reviewed here!) and that Robin Williams lost his Best Actor Oscar to Anthony Hopkins that year, there was no shame in Williams’ loss and it is all the more surprising that a genre film walked away with the uncommon Best Picture win that year. The Fisher King is a film that does not fit into any easy boxes for defining, though the dramatic elements certainly overwhelm the comedic and romantic aspects, so those expecting a Robin Williams comedy will be surprised.

Jack Lucas is a radio shock jock in New York City who is callous and hates yuppies. On the eve of his breakout from radio to television, Jack makes an offhanded comment to a caller that pushes the caller to go into a yuppie bar where he shoots several patrons and then himself. Three years later, Lucas is stuck working at a video store for his girlfriend, Anne. Drunk, despondent and only marginally functional, Jack pushes Anne away and goes out into the night where he prepares to kill himself. At the edge of the Hudson River, Jack is about to jump when two yuppie thugs come out of nowhere and begin beating him up. Before they can set him on fire, Jack is rescued by Parry, a bum who rallies other homeless people to save man getting mugged. Waking up in Parry’s home – the boiler room of an apartment building - Jack learns from the landlord that Parry’s wife was one of the victims in the shooting and his sense of guilt overwhelms him.

Parry is convinced that billionaire Langdon Carmichael’s house has the Holy Grail and he tries to enlist Jack to help him break in. But when Jack tries to pull Parry into the real world, Parry has a hallucination of the Red Knight, who makes him flee. When Parry calms down, he reveals to Jack that he is smitten with a woman he follows daily. To alleviate his guilt, Jack (with the reluctant aid of Anne) helps Parry woo the woman, Lydia. But after their successful first date, Parry’s feelings for Lydia cause him to remember the incident and he runs off into the night, where hoodlums beat him nearly to death. With Jack’s career restored, he begins to cut his ties to Anne and the comatose Parry . . . until his sense of guilt moves him to take up Parry’s quest!

The Fisher King is a character-driven story and unlike so many of Terry Gilliam’s works where Society is the villain, most of the conflict in this film comes from internal sources. Parry is an obviously tortured character from the beginning, but what makes Jeff Bridges’s Jack such an interesting character is that his humanity is evident from almost the first scene. While on his radio show, Jack is abrasive and dislikable, but the moment the news breaks about the shooting, he is shocked and culpable. The consequences of his indifference to Edwin (the shooter) breaks Jack much the way the shooting destroys Parry’s life. So, despite seeming at times like an asshole, Jack is a character who is surprisingly easy to empathize with and the viewer wants to see him grow through his interactions with Parry.

Parry is appropriately shellshocked by the night at the bar where his wife was killed. The Fisher King smartly rounds out Parry’s story with a smart backstory and a solid basis for the character to be both lost and found through his interactions with Jack. The process is not simple, nor is it easy to watch, but the film is rewarding if for no other reason than it captures both the resilience of the human spirit and a revival of the fantastic. While mythological imagery acts as a plague to Parry, the desire to take up a quest and do a good thing becomes an inspiration for Jack and plays well for the viewer.

Jeff Bridges plays both the wounded and reborn versions of Jack very well. Robin Williams gives one of the best performances of his life as Parry, credibly playing the dignified professor in flashbacks and loopy, heartbroken man for the bulk of the film. Williams plays the erratic nature of Parry well and he was obviously cast, in part, for his mastery of comic timing. But more than just being comedic relief in The Fisher King, Williams is able to capture strong emotions and Terry Gilliam captures an exceptional performance from Williams where the actor uses only one side of his face in one of Parry’s first breakdowns in the film. Williams and Amanda Plummer play off one another well-enough for Parry and Lydia to be a credible romantic couple.

What surprised me was the range actress Mercedes Ruehl brought to the supporting role of Anne. Ruehl was only familiar to me from her role of Kate Costas in the third season of Frasier (reviewed here!) and in The Fisher King she plays virtually every emotion possible as Anne. The role could be an erratic one if delivered by a less-gifted actress, but Ruehl nails every beat, easily earning her Best Supporting Actress Oscar for the role. While Williams is an actor I’ve come to expect some range from, Ruehl ruled every scene she was in in The Fisher King.

Depressing without being overbearing, The Fisher King holds up remarkably well (despite some troublingly skippy cuts in the film) and is a masterwork for Terry Gilliam, Mercedes Ruehl, and Robin Williams. Now, it stands as one of the crown jewels in the legacy of Robin Williams.

For other works with Robin Williams, please visit my reviews of:
The Big Wedding
Old Dogs
World’s Greatest Dad
Night At The Museum
Happy Feet
Man Of The Year
A.I.: Artificial Intelligence
Bicentennial Man
What Dreams May Come
Jumanji
Fern Gully: The Last Rainforest
Awakenings
The Adventures Of Baron Munchausen

8/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

So Much Time Spent On One Seriously Unlikable Character Undermines World’s Greatest Dad!

The Good: Moments of humor, Acting, Well-defined characters, Direction
The Bad: Predictable plot progression, Obnoxious antagonist, Oppressive mood
The Basics: Bobcat Goldthwait gets so much right that he undermines his own endeavor, making World’s Greatest Dad largely unwatchable.


In an effort to spend time together, my wife has been pulling movies for us to watch together lately. The thing is, I’ve been very busy and there are several movies she set aside for us to watch together that she has gone ahead, watched, and decided it was not worth sharing with me already. The only film to survive the cull and that she actually insisted we watch sooner as opposed to later was World’s Greatest Dad. World’s Greatest Dad was an underappreciated Robin Williams vehicle which had the distinction of being written and directed by Bobcat Goldthwait. Given the high credibility Goldthwait earned with me with his film God Bless America (reviewed here!), had I known that World’s Greatest Dad was one of his works, I certainly would have gotten to it sooner!

And now that I have . . . I find myself contemplating the film more in terms of what went wrong as opposed to what I liked. To clarify: I think World’s Greatest Dad is a wonderfully made film. Writer/director Bobcat Goldthwait deserves a lot of credit for taking a story that is difficult to make entertaining and packs it with amazing performers, who play their roles exceptionally well, and directing in such a way that the pace of the movie does not drag. Goldthwait very effectively manipulates the mood of the viewer as well, but this becomes a double-edged sword. Long before he plunges the protagonist into a powerful tragedy that screams for the viewer’s empathy, Goldthwait packs the screen with wince-inducing utterances from one of the most obnoxious characters to grace the big screen and a flighty love interest who is either oblivious to the point of cruel or uses her ADD as a prophylactic. The film being dominated by unlikable characters, and focusing on a man who has been beaten down by the world to the point that he is a milquetoast pushover makes the first half (at least) of World’s Greatest Dad more or less unwatchable.

Lance Clayton is a high school English teacher whose passion is for poetry and writing novels. He is stuck in academia, having never been published (though it is not from a lack of him trying). His poetry class, an elective, is on the cutting block thanks to student interest in Mike Lane’s Creative Writing class, though Lance has a bright spot at school; he has the affection of the younger, flightier Claire Reed. Lance’s life is complicated by his fifteen year-old son, Kyle. Kyle hates everyone and everything, save his friend Andrew (who he pushes around and grosses out more than actually likes) and masturbating. Kyle gets in fights at school, which puts Lance in a tough spot with the school’s principal, is hostile and mean to Lance and is antisocial to an unhealthy extent.

As Lance is reeling from Mike getting published in The New Yorker on his first attempt, Claire dropping plans with him to spend time with Mike and Principal Anderson expressing his desire to put Kyle into a remedial learning environment at a special school, Lance arrives home to discover that Kyle has died from autoerotic asphyxiation while masturbating. Loathe to have his son found in such a way, Lance rearranges the body to make it look like Kyle killed himself (via hanging). After the funeral and a short mourning period, Lance returns to school, where Claire is sympathetic, students transfer into Lance’s poetry class (largely to express interest in Kyle) and life is remarkably uncomplicated. But when Lance shares “Kyle’s” suicide note (which Lance himself wrote) with Claire, fortunes shift in Lance’s favor. When the suicide note is published in the school paper, Kyle becomes a sudden hero to everyone at the school. Lance fabricates a journal which he shows to the school’s grief counselor. Soon, the students who reviled and ignored Kyle are rallying around his words and Lance is reaping the benefits of his writing. But gaining celebrity and getting the girl do not stop Andrew from questioning the journal and it does not alleviate the guilt Lance has about who he has become and how his son has been elevated to the status of icon.

World’s Greatest Dad is worth seeing if for nothing else than the masterful performances Bobcat Goldthwait gets out of Robin Williams and Daryl Sabara. Sabara was a child actor, best known for the Spy Kids franchise, who has been making the transition to adult acting jobs with reasonable success. Playing as far from a safe, likable, family-friendly character as he possibly could, Sabara makes Kyle seem like a living breathing character instead of an amalgamation of the worst possible teenage traits written into one person. Sabara so perfectly plays Kyle that on comes to hate virtually every moment he is on screen and that takes some talent to execute.

Perhaps even more impressive is Robin Williams. Williams has an exceptional body of work and, despite his history of treading toward the comedic, he has played roles with an incredible amount of range over the years. Parts in films like Bicentennial Man (reviewed here!) and Awakenings (reviewed here!) have shown that he has the ability to powerfully evoke emotions using finely-honed dramatic presentation of his lines. In World’s Greatest Dad, Williams plays Lance Clayton with a browbeaten quality; his posture is slumped, his eyes emote sadness constantly and he has the ability to – with the most subtle movement of his eyes, lips and tilt of the head – play Lance with moments of silent, desperate hope before his posture reverts to one that is clearly the embodiment of defeat. Bobcat Goldthwait incredibly gets the camera to focus on each nuance of Williams’ performance and he captures Robin Williams without a hint of goofiness or the actor who is playing the role. Every moment Lance Clayton is on screen, we are watching him; not the actor portraying him. That is exceptional acting.

As for the rest, World’s Greatest Dad is far from a perfect film. How neither Mike Lane (who is motivated to knock Lance down a few pegs) nor Claire Reed figure out that “Kyle’s” writing is Lance’s, especially when Claire has read so much of Lance’s other works, remains a severe problem. For someone who has been writing for as long as Lance has, it is virtually impossible to take on a different narrative style. While virtually all of the characters question how smart Kyle appeared posthumously, none seem to realize that his “voice” tracks with Lance’s.

In a similar way, World’s Greatest Dad tires the viewer out with Claire. Claire begins the film as the lone ray of light in Lance’s rejection-filled world. Soon, though, that is taken from him by the younger, flashier model and as Claire ping-pongs between Lance and Mike the viewer is left with the feeling that both men can (and should) do better than the low-hanging, capricious fruit. Alexie Gilmore plays the role well-enough, but her quality of performance does not make the character any more enjoyable to watch.

That is World’s Greatest Dad in a nutshell: it’s a decent-enough story made up of superlative ingredients, but the result is still unpleasant. World’s Greatest Dad is a misery cake; it does not matter how fine the ingredients are, the result is still something one is not likely to take a second slice of.

For other works with Daryl Sabara, please visit my reviews of:
Weeds - Season 8
John Carter
A Christmas Carol

6.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

So Many Great Actors Fail To Impress In The Big Wedding!

The Good: Moments of performance
The Bad: Predictable plot, Droll character arcs, Much of the direction and acting, Jokes and dramatic moments alike fall flat.
The Basics: Despite having an Oscarbait cast, The Big Wedding gives women and adults nothing substantial to watch this Summer Blockbuster Season.


I cannot think of a film in recent memory where I was so uninvested in how the film’s characters and plotlines would reach a resolution as with The Big Wedding. The last few years, as Summer Blockbuster Season has loomed, many of the smaller or more substantive production companies try to release counterprogramming to the big special effects-driven movies. They go after a mature audience and women with films like last year’s Hope Springs (reviewed here!). This year, Lionsgate tried to get into that niche right out of the gate with The Big Wedding.

They failed.

The Big Wedding is intended to be a family comedy with the usual tearjerker moments, but the film directed by its co-writer (or co-adapter, as it appears to have been based upon a French film) Justin Zackham is so thoroughly obvious and banal that most of the surprises are anything but and both the humor and dramatic moments fall painfully flat. The Big Wedding reminded me of a limited season television series The Big Day, which was also about a family gathering for a wedding and all of the mayhem that ensues. The difference is that that summer television show had a less well-known cast, but used all the players exceptionally well. The Big Wedding hopes the viewer will be blown away by the presence of Robert De Niro, Diane Keaton, Susan Sarandon, Robin Williams, Amanda Seyfried, and (I suppose) Katherine Heigl and Topher Grace that they won’t notice how poorly those performers are being used. Out of the bunch, only Susan Sarandon is given the chance to truly blow the audience away and she does in a single scene where her character, Bebe, does not say a word, but witnesses Don (her longterm boyfriend) and Ellie (her best friend, from whom she stole Don away years before, breaking up their marriage) having a moment where their chemistry is evident and Sarandon emotes so much with her face that one has to feel sorry for Bebe.

But, alas, one moment and one decent line (which, I swear, I have already forgotten, but it comes near the end of the movie) are not enough to make a flick worth watching and The Big Wedding falls into exactly that trap.

Alejandro, the adopted son of Don and Ellie, is getting married to his virtual nonentity of a girlfriend, Missy. So, the families are converging on Don and Bebe’s, despite there being a lot of tension in the family. Lyla’s marriage is falling apart and she is estrange from her father, Don. Lyla is feeling sick from something entirely obvious that her sexually unfulfilled doctor brother, Jared, investigates for her on their way to their parent’s house. Ellie, arriving early, lets herself in and comes across her good friend and her ex-husband and feels out of place. When Alejandro arrives, he breaks some bad news to his parents; his biological mother, Madonna, who has been invited to the wedding, thinks divorce is the greatest sin imaginable.

Rather than telling her to stuff it, in America we have divorce and the family is not as Super Catholic as she is, everyone decides to bend over backwards for the woman who gave Alejandro up for adoption. This means that Bebe, who has been like a mother to Alejandro, bows out (though she soon resurfaces as part of the catering staff for the wedding) and Don and Ellie pretend for Madonna that they are still married. At the same time, Jared hits very heavily on Alejandro’s biological sister and Lyla whines about the past as Ellie comes to the realizations that she truly is over Don.

The Big Wedding is just, unfortunately, stupid. We’ve seen all the clichés in movies in recent years. The whole “exes hook up” thing was done much better in It’s Complicated (reviewed here!) and the elements of addition featuring prominently at a wedding was Rachel Getting Married (reviewed here!) in a nutshell. But, any film that belabors a woman with marital issues getting queasy constantly and then acts like it is a huge revelation that the character is pregnant is just insulting. I swear, Katherine Heigl’s Lyla is the last one to figure out she’s pregnant.

What The Big Wedding has outside belabored exposition and a painfully ridiculous plot that would be a farce if only it were funny, so it is just mind-numbingly pathetic as it is here as (at best) a dramedy, is an impressive cast. Unfortunately, the cast is not used very well at all. Amanda Seyfried plays Missy (the bride) and she makes so little impression in this role that one wonders why she chose to do it at all. That’s okay because, despite being Latino, Alejandro (played by Ben Barnes) is such a white bread character that the two fit one another perfectly. Robin Williams’ role as the Catholic Priest Father Moinighan would have been audacious . . . if only Justin Zackham had produced the film fifteen years ago. As it stands, though, the ironic casting and usage of Williams as a Priest is a flat retreading of what Kevin Smith did with George Carlin (to much better effect) in Dogma (reviewed here!).

Topher Grace is fine as Jared, Katherine Heigl might as well be going for her Razzie as Lyla (you can always count on Heigl for doing that dumbstruck expression once per film, much like how Ben Affleck used to cry once per movie, and she doesn’t disappoint for the miniscule niche audience that still finds that charming or original), and the powerhouse casting of Robert De Niro, Susan Sarandon and Diane Keaton results in three performers constantly straining to do interesting things with their listless characters. Sarandon gets her moment and De Niro reminds us that he can perform when Don gets drunk, but Keaton’s part is unfortunately interchangeable with so many others she has had over the years . . . except here her character comes to an obvious conclusion she seemed to come into the film with.

The Big Wedding is not worth watching; not on the big screen, not on DVD when it comes out and not even when it is on network television edited for content and bloated with commercials. It is one of the surest racehorses for next year’s Razzies . . . if only the pundits even remember it exists at that time.

For other works with Topher Grace, please check out my reviews of:
Predators
Valentine's Day
Spider-Man 3
In Good Company

2/10

For other film reviews, please visit my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

Part Political Comedy, Part Political Thriller, All Entertaining: Man Of The Year!

The Good: Funny, Interesting concept, Some good acting, Some decent characters
The Bad: Robin Williams entertains but does not act much
The Basics: Clever and alternately funny and intense, Man Of The Year creates a political satire that is populated with interesting characters and generally good performances.


While I often attempt to interject my personality - and certainly my views - in my reviews, I try to leave myself out of my reviews as much as possible. But on this occasion, I would like to open my review with a little personal history. In 2005, I ran for the United States House of Representatives as an Independent candidate in New York's 23rd Congressional District. For those checking the dates, you'll note that 2005 was not an election year. My strategy, as it was, was to spend two years campaigning and in that fashion give people in the district a chance to know me and what I stood for. Circumstances having less to do with the campaign, combined with my inability to raise a lot of money to campaign, forced me to fold the campaign after six months. From the first moments I campaigned, I knew I was a long shot, but I was undeterred because I believe there are certain principles in democracy that have been mortgaged in the United States in our times.

Tom Dobbs, a political satirist with a late night show, takes a cue from a fan and decides to get involved in the political process by running for president of the Unites States. Aided by his manager, Jack, and his television production staff, Dobbs makes a serious run for the Presidency and inadvertently wins. Dobbs is elected using new voting machines that have a serious flaw in their programming, a flaw realized by the program's designer. Once Dobbs is elected, Eleanor does her best to come forward, but she finds herself hunted by the company she worked for and her life is put in jeopardy.

What I enjoyed most about Man Of The Year was the political philosophy of it. Writer/Director Barry Levinson, well known for political movies like Wag The Dog, nails it on the head again with the concept that American politics is ruled by special interests, that the political candidates - professional politicians - are a huge part of the problem and that the American people are kept away from the machinations that control their fate. It's refreshing to see a movie rail so effectively against the flaws in the systems of our great nation. It's refreshing to hear characters arguing for a future in such a way that none of our elected officials actually do.

Man Of The Year ought to be required viewing for members of Congress.

This is not to say that Man Of The Year is a perfect film; it's not. But what it does succeed at is being clever. A portion of the movie is political satire. Lewis Black and Robin Williams deliver shtick that is often hilarious. This is an excellent use of their comic talents and they use the forum to make jokes that (at least Williams) they might not otherwise have a forum for.

Equally smart, perhaps more biting, is the latter half of the movie, which focuses more on Eleanor as she deals with the voting machine company. Intent on protecting their ill-gotten stock gains and government contracts, the company drugs, assaults and hunts Eleanor, even waging a media campaign to discredit her. What resonates about this is the fanatical devotion to profit that such companies operate with. Man Of The Year correctly exposes the motivation of such companies and it is not the integrity of the voting system. Sadly, and too few people know this, the only thing that it checked in order for a voting machine to be certified by the federal government is power supply integrity. The FEC certifies voting machines based on whether they turn on and stay on, not for the accuracy of how they collect data. It's enough to make one want paper ballots.

The film moves well as a political thriller, which is what it essentially becomes when the chase of Eleanor begins. Dobbs stops appearing on screen as a wisecracking host and takes on a mantle of credible disbelief while interacting with Eleanor after she reveals the truth to him. And overall, this ends up as a decent mix of political philosophy and entertainment.

In fact, one of the few things that does not work especially well in Man Of The Year is Robin Williams. Williams works very well as comedian Tom Dobbs, the problem is it's not much of an acting job. Williams is presenting standup and it feels like Robin Williams. It's entirely possible that this would have been a better film as a mockumentary of Robin Williams running for president, as opposed to creating a fictional character who so closely resembled Williams's stage performance as to distract those who were appreciators of his art.

Conversely, in the latter half of the movie, Williams illustrates he can act by playing Dobbs playing the president-elect. In the latter half of the movie, Williams plays a character struggling with a very real ethical dilemma and it is there that he convinces us of his abilities.

Man Of The Year has an exceptional supporting cast. Christopher Walken plays Jack and he does it with a detachment that is different from any other role I've seen him in. Jeff Goldblum makes occasional appearances as the company executive who understands how disastrous Eleanor's information could be to the company. Goldblum plays the role with a menace that perfectly portrays the self-preservation instinct of Big Capitalism. Lewis Black delivers very funny lines, though it doesn't seem like much of an acting stretch for him.

It is Laura Linney who is the surprise performance of Man Of The Year. As Eleanor, Linney - who was awesome in Love, Actually (reviewed here!) - must convince the audience she is credible and her attempts to convince others have to be questionable. Linney does this by creating an utterly believable aura of paranoia and articulation. She's the one to watch here.

Man Of The Year is a success for Barry Levinson and - as a reviewer, political columnist, and former candidate - it's a shame that this movie was not better received. It certainly is timely enough. What I wish it wasn't!

For other works by Barry Levinson, be sure to check out my reviews of:
Envy
Bandits
Homicide: The Movie
Homicide: Life On The Street
Rain Man

8/10

For other films, be sure to check out my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

| | |