Child-free Jurassic World Might Not Have Sucked.

The Good: Moments of effect, Some of the performances
The Bad: Unlikable characters, Ridiculous and predictable plot, Thematically heavyhanded
The Basics: Jurassic World is another cheap re-do of Jurassic Park: this time with undertones of sexism and an overt "family values" message likely to disgust viewers more than the killer dinosaurs will!


Jurassic World is, as I write this, the third top-grossing film of all time and already has a sequel in development. I waited weeks to watch Jurassic World because I have not, traditionally, been a fan of the Jurassic Park film franchise. In fact, I only recently realized that I have only seen and reviewed the first Jurassic Park (reviewed here!) before taking in Jurassic World. While I was not super-impressed by Jurassic Park, I was actively bored and repulsed while watching Jurassic World.

Before watching Jurassic World, I had some inklings that it might not become my favorite film of all time. My wife asked me if I grade on a curve for "b" movies and I told her "no" - I review and rate Casablanca with the same criteria as Step-Brothers and Just Friends - and we had heard some rumblings that it had some distinctly anti-child-free elements to the film. What surprised me most about Jurassic World was how dramatically sexist the film was. And yes, for those who are deliberately child-free, there is something distinctly offensive about the death of Zara in the film (this is not a significant spoiler at all). Zara is the personal assistant to Claire, who is saddled with childcare duties that are nowhere near in her job description and as "punishment" for her failure to look out for the child protagonists of Jurassic World, she endures the longest on-screen human death sequence of any of the human characters (only one of the dinosaur characters is brutalized longer on-screen than Zara is!). For those of us who are deliberately child-free, the message from screenwriters Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, Colin Trevorrow (who also directed the film!) and Derek Connolly is pretty clear: everyone should want to have children in their life or die horribly for not protecting kids!

More than Twenty years after the planned Jurassic Park was scrapped, Isla Nublar is up and running as a successful theme park known as Jurassic World. Despite having more than twenty thousand visitors to Jurassic World a day, the park's director, Claire, is anxious about the bottomline and has had her team of scientists developing new human-engineered dinosaurs. Claire is meeting with the corporate director, Masrani, and sponsors who are funding the research for developing the new dinosaurs, when her sister sends her nephews - Gray and Zach - to the park. Unprepared for their visit, Claire fobs the kids off on her assistant, Zara, and tries to keep the park up and running.

But the new genetically-engineered dinosaur, Indominus Rex, decides now is the time to fake out its overseers and it pretends to escape its enclosure, which sets up for her actual escape. Claire is forced to rely upon the velociraptor trainer, Owen, to find her nephews who are lost in the park when Indominous Rex breaks out and the rides get shut down. While Owen and Claire are out trying to save the children, the military contractor Hoskins siezes the opportunity to fill the power vacuum by bringing the velociraptors into the field against the Indominus Rex. While trying to get the human visitors to safety, the dinosaurs are set against each other.

Every now and then, there is a movie that has a conflict that has such a stupidly complex story when the simple solution is the most sensible and Jurassic World is exactly that kind of movie. Jurassic World is populated by characters who learned absolutely nothing from Jurassic Park and live in a world where our technological achievements did not occur. In Jurassic Park, DNA from other animals was spliced with the dinosaur DNA to fill in, essentially, the introns, because computers of the day did not have the processing speed to analyze full DNA strands in a timely manner. That is not the case now. Computer speeds have become so very much faster that it would no longer take decades or even years to render a single dinosaur's DNA strand. In other words, all of the evolutionary benefits the Indominus Rex gets from its spliced DNA are entirely unnecessary.

But beyond that, Jurassic World suffers from being a victim to simple numbers. The Indominus Rex has $26,000,000 worth of research and development poured into it, which is why Claire is anxious to not kill it right away. But the potential lawsuits from deaths of visitors to Jurassic World with the utterly foreseeable event of a giant genetically-engineered dinosaur escaping and killing or maiming anyone is entirely forseeable to exceed $26,000,000. So, simple business insurance would have Jurassic World preparing for foreseeable disasters with a killswitch (i.e. it is more cost-effective to insure the research and development on a new dinosaur than it is to insure against the deaths of up to 20,000 visitors to Jurassic World). Jurassic World makes a piss-poor run-around the concept with "shock collars" and "trackers." The moment the threat of Indominus Rex was revealed in the film, I sat up and asked "Why didn't they install an explosive in the dinosaur so if it left the enclosure or they couldn't find it, they could just blow its head off?" The writers of Jurassic World are not so smart. They thought "we'll give it a tracker." But even there, why wouldn't they put a small load of Cesium in the tracker? Cesium explodes in oxygen and if the dinosaur was smart enough to remove the tracker, the process of removing it would kill the dinosaur. How is it that pretty much anyone watching Jurassic World will be smarter than the people who are supposed to exist in the world where engineering dinosaurs for fun and profit is real?!

So, back to the actual film Jurassic World. It's a lot of running around. It's a lot of computer-generated dinosaurs running around and attacking people. There are a lot of guns that shoot dinosaurs and don't seem to cut them down nearly as fast as one might expect. And there are a lot of surprisingly weak women. I love Judy Greer. Greer plays Karen in Jurassic World, the mother of Gray and Zach. In her professional workplace setting, Karen begins crying while on the phone with Claire for no particular reason other than the fact that Claire is not actually spending time with her children (nothing bad has yet happened to them to their knowledge). Zara is a nonentity who is not so vital that she cannot be fobbed off on babysitting duty (and fails horribly at that because she can't stay off her smartphone). Claire constantly defers to men in the film; she is the director of Jurassic World, though she gets a verbal spanking from Masrani for not understanding the philosophy behind the park (though this is not a new job for her!) and turns to Owen for in-field help at the first sign of trouble. The most competent female character in Jurassic World is Vivian, a control-room operator who is horrified when things go wrong at the park, but stands her ground against inappropriate inter-office contact when it comes time for her to evacuate.

The acting in Jurassic World is fine, save the preponderance of shots where child actors fail to get eyelines or emotional reactions right while working with virtual characters.

The dinosaurs are big, but hardly special in Jurassic World and there my analysis ends: Jurassic World is a long, painful, dull before is rushes into a derivative chase movie that viewers have already seen.

For other films currently in theaters, please check out my reviews of:
Dragon Blade
Fantastic 4
Jenny's Wedding
Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation
Ant-Man
Lila & Eve
Minions
No Way Jose
Terminator Genisys
Inside Out

2.5/10

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.
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A Study Of Inconsistent Details: The 2014 Great White Menace Jaws Ornament Is More Ridiculous Than Fear-Inspiring!

The Good: Generally good sculpt, Part of the sound clip, Generally affordable, Good balance
The Bad: Inconsistent paint detailing, Truncated sound clip
The Basics: An atypical subject for a holiday ornament, the Jaws Great White Menace is more silly than terrifying!


There is something hilarious to me about how people complain to and about Hallmark for their ornaments. Amid this year’s Ornament Release Weekend complaints, there were a number of complaints on the Hallmark Facebook page wherein people kvetched about how some of Hallmark’s ornaments had a Hanukah theme to them (or at least had a Star Of David on them). This is a bit ridiculous for those who look objectively at the Hallmark ornament line because there are some great ornaments that are not even remotely Christmasy – one of my favorites being the 2009 “Frankly, My Dear” Gone With The Wind ornament (reviewed here!) – including ones like this year’s Lockheed Martin SR-71 Blackbird (that’s a stealth-style military bomber!) ornament. As far as genre ornaments, it is hard to get farther away from the Christmas holiday than the Great White Menace Jaws ornament. Yes, this year Hallmark invites consumers to put a giant shark on their Christmas tree!

Hallmark created an ornament that is evocative of the film shark with the Great White Menace ornament. For those not familiar with Jaws (reviewed here!), the villain was a great white shark. After the shark has been encountered a few times, it is harpooned with buoys and it is the shark after it has been stuck twice that is the subject of the Great White Menace ornament!

Basics

Great White Menace ornament faithfully presents the villainous “shark” with two harpoons with floats sticking out of the back of the shark. The sculpt is simple, but recognizable for anyone who has seen Jaws. The ornament, released in 2014, is one of the largest ornaments Hallmark released this year. Measuring six inches long by two inches tall by two and five-eighths inches wide, the Great White Menace ornament came with an original retail price of $17.95 and I have not found it sold out at any Hallmark stores I have yet been to.

The Hallmark Great White Menace ornament is made of durable plastic. The great white shark is colored in simplistic blue-gray and white. The thing is, the sculpt of the shark, harpoons, and floating barrels is cool and accurate. The coloring of the subject of the Great White Menace ornament is exceptionally erratic in its execution. On the plus side, the barrels are not a monolithic yellow, with some brown on them as well. They look photo realistic. Also incredible is the shark’s mouth. The mouth of the great white shark is speckled with red for blood and the teeth are yellower than the bottom of the shark.

Unfortunately, the rest of the ornament is ridiculously simple on the coloring front. Hallmark did not accent the shark’s gill slits and the skin tones for the shark are monotonal blue-gray and white. In other words, this looks like a well-sculpted animated shark with an amazing mouth, stabbed with real harpoons.

Features

As a Hallmark Keepsake ornament, Great White Menace has a sound chip, but not a light-up function. The Great White Menace ornament comes with batteries and with the push of a button hidden on the bottom of the ornament, the theme from Jaws begins to play out the speaker in the bottom of the shark. The sound clip is not the entire, familiar, menacing main theme of Jaws and as a result, the clip seems annoyingly truncated. Just as the music gets going and tense, it cuts out mid-note!

Balance

As with all ornaments, the intent of the Hallmark Keepsake Great White Menace ornament is to be hung on a Christmas Tree. For those creating the ultimate classic movie Christmas Tree, the Great White Menace ornament should have been an indispensible ornament. Because of the coloring, it falls a little short. Where it does not fall shy of its goals is in the balance. The ornament has the standard steel hook loop embedded into the top, near the dorsal fin. From there, the ornament, when affixed to a tree with a hook, swings very easily and is able to hang level as the ornaments ought to.

Collectibility

Hallmark Keepsake began delving into the collectibles market in 1991 with Star Trek when it introduced the exceptionally limited edition U.S.S. Enterprise ornament (reviewed here!). Since then, they have made ornament replicas of almost all major franchises like DC comics, The Wizard Of Oz and Harry Potter. The Great White Menace ornament is the only one to-date from Jaws and it does not seem to be lighting the world on fire. It is, instead, a lukewarm seller. I suspect that this will be easy to find after the holidays and when it is discounted, I have a hard time believing its value will rebound.

Overview

Fans of classic films, great white sharks and Jaws are likely to find the Great White Menace ornament underwhelming compared to the idea of it. Many other ornaments have realistic depth and shading that this ornament lacks. As a result, it is less likely to wow consumers, even those who accept that not all Christmas ornaments need to be religiously-themed.

For other film-based Hallmark ornaments, please check out my reviews of:
2014 Olaf Frozen ornament
2014 35th Anniversary Alien Alien ornament
2014 “This Is Halloween” The Nightmare Before Christmas ornament
2014 Web-Slinging Wonder The Amazing Spider-Man 2 Ornament
2014 The Sorting Hat Harry Potter And The Sorcerer’s Stone ornament
2014 War Machine Iron Man 3 ornament
2014 U.S.S. Vengeance Star Trek Into Darkness ornament
2014 Sandcrawler from A New Hope
2013 Milton Waddams Office Space ornament
2013 Limited Edition Mockingjay Catching Fire ornament
2013 Bilbo Baggins The Hobbit ornament

5/10

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

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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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.
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Ponderous And Slow, Lincoln Was Certainly Not The Best Picture Of 2012!

The Good: Amazing cast, Decent concept
The Bad: Weird characters, Very slow, Dull direction
The Basics: Vastly overrated, Lincoln is little more than a political process story with one of the weirdest characters in recent memory.


When it comes to Oscar Pandering Season, there are several films that have counted on a “shock and awe” approach to getting nominated. I was actually quite thrilled that last year, Argo (reviewed here!) won the Best Picture. I was happy because, for the first time in quite some time, the winner was not a December release that was counting on the fervor of award season to get nominated. It was a smart, well-developed film with all the aspects that make for a great film worthy of the Best Picture honor. There were a number of films last year that I did not manage to see prior to the award ceremony and the one I wanted to see most was Lincoln .

I’m over that now. Having sat through Lincoln, I was surprised by how very little I enjoyed it. Lincoln is a great example of a film with an amazing cast with a story and characters that does little to allow them to actually rise to the heights of their talents. But more importantly, Lincoln does what something like The West Wing (reviewed here!) was often too smart to avoid doing; it shows the full intricacies of a process story. Behind the scenes of politics is often disappointing, but (as Lincoln proves adequately) it is even more often boring. Not so much about Abraham Lincoln, Lincoln is about the harrowing process of getting the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution (abolition of slavery) passed. It’s a lot of wheeling and dealing and it is not at all exciting or even particularly engaging.

Two months after Abraham Lincoln’s re-election to the Presidency of the United States of America, the American Civil War is stretching into its fourth bloody year. After visiting the Front, Lincoln returns to Washington, determined to get the House Of Representatives to pass his Amendment to the Constitution that would Constitutionally abolish slavery and create equal rights under the law. Lincoln explains to his cabinet that the Amendment is necessary to both ending the Civil War and avoiding the legal quagmires that the Emancipation Proclamation created.

As Lincoln meets with his visiting son, the President’s lackeys Bilbo and Latham, try to sway the few Democrats they need to pass the Amendment through patronage and bribes. With envoys of the Confederacy approaching to talk peace, Lincoln and the chief advocate for equality in the House, Thaddeus Stevens, work desperately to pass the Amendment . . . regardless of the consequences.

The story is far less a character study, which is what makes Lincoln so pedantic. Instead, it is a blend of Abraham Lincoln characterized as a meandering weirdo, unable to keep real focus or make a point concisely, and long stretches of political process. The personal aspects of Lincoln are most frequently part of subplots illustrating Lincoln’s relationships with his son Robert – who stands up for himself to enlist – and Mary Todd (who spends time acting appropriately unbalanced). Neither of those subplots are particularly compelling.

More than the writing, I blame this on the direction. Given how the movie poster for Lincoln is a tight shot of Daniel Day-Lewis as Abraham Lincoln, close and craggy-faced, it is astonishing how little Spielberg actually goes in for the close shot. Yelling, in a quiet conversation with Elizabeth Keckley, and seldom else does Spielberg go in for the close shot to actually allow Day-Lewis’s performance occupy the screen. As a result, the viewer is left disconnected from Abraham Lincoln and Daniel Day-Lewis’s odd portrayal of him.

As a result, it is Tommy Lee Jones as Stevens who actually steals Lincoln (as much as such a theft is possible). Stevens is principled and smart and he represents a focused strategist in the fight to pass the Amendment. Tommy Lee Jones plays Stevens as passionate and aged beyond his years, making for a compelling performance. And Steven Spielberg actually puts the camera close on him to make him more than just a setpiece in a large room.

Lincoln is a lot of talking and I can enjoy a good movie that is filled with people talking. But Lincoln is seldom interesting characters saying any compelling, intrinsically human, truth. Instead, far more often, it is a bunch of old white men bitching about the process to pass a vote. For this particular story, there need not be such a quality cast; the impressive cast here cannot rise to the occasion to make it engaging.

For other historical dramas, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
Gandhi
All The President’s Men
Frost/Nixon

4/10

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

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Is Britain For Me? Not If The Dull The Queen Is Any Indication!

The Good: Acting
The Bad: Lack of compelling plot, Dull characters, Pacing is deathly slow
The Basics: Dull, plodding along and essentially British, The Queen has inspired performances but little else, including a lack of entertainment or educational value.


Every now and then I have a feeling I am watching a film that is too soon, too specific and too weird for my comprehension in relation to the rest of the world. When The Queen began to get rave reviews by almost every critic I could find, I began to wonder what was so great about the movie. All I knew about it was that the film was about Queen Elizabeth (II, the current one) and how she reacted to the death of Princess Diana when Di was killed in the late '90s in a car accident as a result of being chased by the paparazzi. Sadly, the plot is grossly overstated in such a phrasing.

Shortly after Tony Blair is elected Prime Minister of England and assumes the reins of government, he finds himself deeply intertwined with the royal family when Princess Diana abruptly dies in a car accident. Blair begins to express his sorrow for the nation's loss while the Queen remains publicly silent on the issue. The Queen decides that the grief the family feels ought to be kept private and that because Princess Diana no longer was a royal (following her divorce from Charles), she was not entitled to royal treatment and/or burial. While Blair and Prince Charles try to convince her to adapt to changing times, the Queen spends a week debating whether or not to address the public about the death of Diana.

The entire plot is the belaboring of a decision and as an American, it's terribly hard to see the appeal of a film where someone takes a week to make up their mind as to whether to speak or not. Already I envision the next Morgan/Frears hit wherein the Queen Mother spends a week deciding whether or not to eat a cookie. As cruel as it may sound, the belaboring of the decision feels analogous in The Queen. The Queen is clinging to tradition and the reticence that is befitting her post. I can dig that as a character aspect, but making a movie over people's reaction to grief seems dull and cheesy for a real-life event so close to it (and timed so appropriately to the descent of Tony Blair).

The reticence of the Queen makes the British people begin once again to doubt the necessity of the monarchy and, again, as an American, I find the whole debate pointless and silly. Even more unfortunate in both reality and in the film is the way decisions are all absolutes. I'm going to ignore reality from here on out (this is a historical fiction/drama, more than a documentary and simply by the way some of the scenes are filmed there are obvious extrapolations) and simply focus on the film, so when I talk about characters, live with it, please. The characters in The Queen are caught in ridiculous dialectics where everything is framed in black and white and the damage this does to the story is extensive.

The Queen is obsessed with maintaining tradition and the badge of office. Tony Blair is concerned with keeping the citizenry on his side and he savvily observes their moods and understands their need to express their grief. But the movie soon degenerates into ridiculous and pointless debates about protocol and the belaboring making a decision. Blair counsels the Queen to speak to the British people, she resists.

I suppose to the British, this sort of thing is important, but I tend to live with the idea that I do not need others to tell me how to feel (or suggest how I ought to cope). As a result, the hours it takes in real time and the days it takes cinematically for this decision to be made feels like a waste of time.

But then there's the real problem; the Queen goes through this immense and pointless debate for one reason: she is clinging to tradition and as such seeks to maintain the power of the throne. Why then does she eventually capitulate on all fronts? The people want a flag flown at half-mast above the palace; the flag is only flown when the royals are home. As a result, when they go on holiday in the country, there's no flag flown. Even if the Queen capitulates to appearing before the British people, why doesn't she just explain, "This is how the flag works. Live with it." Instead, the whole debate becomes pointless when what she seeks to protect through her reticence is gutted by her complete capitulation.

No wonder the British lost respect for their monarch.

The purpose of debating the entire lack of plot of The Queen is that the film is plot-heavy with no plot (decision belabored; that's what the movie is about) and to illustrate the fact that The Queen is not entertaining. It's not terribly enlightening; I could have read a magazine article, a newspaper article, or a one-paragraph blog that would have told me all of the key information presented in this film and lost nothing and saved a couple of hours.

But then, I would not have had the crazy-boring British experience.

I also would not have been able to watch Helen Mirren perform. Mirren plays The Queen and her performance outshines the character. I had recently seen Mirren in The Clearing (reviewed here!) and Painted Lady (reviewed here!) and what impressed me about this movie was that her portrayal of the Queen was so dramatically different from her performance in either other movie that it astonished me to think she was the same actress. If one must watch a woman working to make a decision on screen for a couple of hours, this would seem to be the actress to do it.

The real winner is actor Michael Sheen who plays Tony Blair and who holds his own opposite Mirren. In all honesty, all of the fuss over Mirren as the Queen led to a neglect of Sheen. I've seen a great deal of footage of Blair and Sheen has him pegged. He looks like him (enough), sounds like him and carries himself with the same posture and self-assured body language. The movie makes Blair out as the reasonable hero and Sheen embodies that perfectly. Sheen is so good in this that he redeems himself for appearing in Underworld (reviewed here!).

On DVD, there was a commentary track and previews (sorry, I cannot say how decent the commentary was as I was so bored with the movie that I wasn't about to rewatch it to hear British people blather on more about it). The packaging is nice, though.

In all, though, The Queen benefited from the hype that surrounded it, but it ends up as a film that has great actors playing marginal characters in a situation so dull as to make it difficult to believe it was put on screen. It certainly did not deserve to be nominated for Best Picture; fortunately, it did not win.

For other works with Helen Mirren, check out my reviews of:
Glee - Season 3
Inkheart
The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy
Gosford Park

4/10

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

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

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And Yet, They Allowed Him To Continue Making Movies . . . 1941

The Good: I'm stretching here, so I'll say the cast
The Bad: Not funny, Acting is terrible, Just about everything
The Basics: Despite generally talented cast members, 1941 is terribly unfunny and it demeans the career of Steven Spielberg to consider he ever directed it.


Sometimes, there comes a movie that is so terrible that all one wishes to do is erase it from their memory. Wrong Turn, which is my all-time most hated movie is almost completely forgotten by me. I know I don't like Wrong Turn (reviewed here!), but I don't even remember why. I'd have to go read my review and I know enough about how much I hated that movie to know I shouldn't do that. Similarly, every now and then I hear a song from Bush's album Sixteen Stone (reviewed here!) and I develop a bit of a tick. Steven Spielberg, apparently tuckered out from making classic films like Jaws (reviewed here!) and Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, squeezed out 1941 before making Raiders Of The Lost Ark (reviewed here!). Checking out the IMDB, none of the titles under his directing credit since then jump out as comedies. Perhaps he learned his lesson. I learned my lesson and I'm filing this movie in the Outbox of my brain with other movies I loathed.

1941, appropriately enough, happens in 1941. Approximately one week after the attack on Pearl Harbor, a Japanese submarine ends up lost near Hollywood, fueling the belief that the Japanese are about to attack California. Sgt. Frank Tree prepares for the attack by trying to get the military organized. The crazy and frenetic Captain Wild Bill Kelso is determined to keep the skies clear of Japanese and generally California goes into hysteria as relations between the Germans and the Japanese on the submarine fall apart.

1941 is a comedy with what could have been a clever concept. Instead, it's just plain dumb. Most of the humor is slapstick, which is the lowest form of comedy. None of it is particularly clever. Things crash, houses get run into by tanks, it's pretty basic stupidity humor. There is nothing clever in the execution of 1941.

The idea, though, is not bad. The idea of California going into hysteria following the attack on Pear Harbor is a decent enough idea. I'm not sure how well it works as a comedic idea, but it certainly does not work in this comic rendition of it. Instead, we are subjected to slapstick gags, banal character and obvious attempts for cheap laughs.

A perfect example of this is embodied by Captain Kelso. Wild Bill Kelso is played by John Belushi and the role runs like an extended Saturday Night Live sketch. Belushi as Kelso falls down, bugs out his eyes, chomps on cigars in a parody of masculinity of the time and blusters his way through even the least complicated of lines. The thing is, we've seen Belushi act like this. It's familiar. It's not Kelso, it's Belushi and that's poor use of the actor or poor acting.

Similarly, Dan Aykroyd, who plays Tree, is familiar for his overly serious delivery, much like how he played the anchor on the Saturday Night Live news. John Candy is in the movie far too briefly and if you blink, you miss Christopher Lee. In short, any talent that could have made the movie funny or allow it to possess a certain quality is lost in either preconceived notions of how the actors ought to be used or drown in a terrible script.

And Steven Spielberg phones this one in. There is nothing spectacular in the direction. In fact, there is nothing even visually interesting in 1941. And the problem is, where some truly lame movies do not take themselves seriously, like camp classic The Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes, 1941 does take itself seriously. So there are no gaffs with production design or production elements. Things like the house being barreled into with a tank happen in a meticulously constructed way that a serious director would.

Still, the net effect is garbage. 1941 is not funny. It is not entertaining and I shudder to think that there now exists an even longer Director's Cut. Part of the shudder is astonishment that Steven Spielberg would admit he remembered making this movie. I know I shall do my best to forget it.

For other works with Tim Matheson, be sure to check out my reviews of:
No Strings Attached
The West Wing
The Story Of Us

2/10

Check out all the movies that were better than this one and read reviews by visiting my Movie Review Index Page where films are organized best to worst!

© 2012, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Mars Attacks: The Not-Exactly-Tough-Call On Spielberg's Magnum Blah.

The Good: Decent enough acting, General plot is cool
The Bad: Characters don't pop, Confused details, Mediocre use of best actors, Problematic specific plot
The Basics: When martians invade, Tom Cruise proves he can act like a jerk and the audience finds themselves left with special effects movie that does not add up.


I have to give some credit to anyone who tries to remake something that has been made in at least three formats and tries to put their own touch on something that is essentially already ingrained in the American collective unconscious. That said, Steven Spielberg's stab at War Of The Worlds fails to recreate the experience of the alien invasion hoax perpetrated on the radio, the intrigue of H.G. Well's novel or even add something extraordinary and new. Instead, in his attempt to visualize an alien invasion from Martians, Spielberg and his writing staff create a jumble of images tied together by unlikable characters and mediocre acting.

Ray Ferrier, day laborer and weekend father of two, has his children for the weekend. Lucky him. Instead of having a great time together, Ray, Robbie and Rachel (yes, the names in the movie are that bad) end up on the forefront of an extraterrestrial invasion. Giant tripods rise from the earth bearing martians bent on blowing up everything in their path. And that just so happens to be the Ferrier family as they flee from the New York City area toward Boston. The martians are everywhere, blowing everything up.

Or capturing people.

Or bothering to look into basements.

Or creating some sort of larger biological organism over apparently random surfaces.

It's not quite clear. The best potential strength of War Of The Worlds (which is more accurately titled "Humans Getting Their Asses Kicked By Invading Martians") is also its greatest weakness. Ray Ferrier and his family are pretty much common folks. An alien invasion from their perspective has the potential to be interesting. They aren't scientists, they aren't military. So whatever they experience, they are clueless as to the motives, biology or methods of the alien invaders. That's a cool idea, as far as I'm concerned.

The problem is, we are left wondering about a lot of key aspects of important concepts in the movie. So, we hear a lot of theories in War Of The Worlds and it is pretty well established that the martians deposited their tripods on Earth underground some time ago (a reasonable estimate would be at least 600 years ago, as there are several under the New York City area that would have been pretty hard to disguise dropping off once the city was there) but we have no real idea when. Some characters theorize they've been underground for millions of years, which seems silly. After all, the further back the plans for alien conquest go, the more ridiculous the waiting period becomes (i.e. it's much easier to conquer cavemen than it is to enslave 21rst Century folk).

Spielberg, unfortunately, deals with the problem of perspective by simply adding a great number of levels to the invading force. This is problematic because they are contradictory and confusing, not from a perspective sense but from a basic storytelling concept. So, for example, when we first see the martians, they are microwaving every person in their path. Okay, the viewer is meant to understand they are hostile and are out to destroy all human life. We can live with this. Near the end of the movie, however, humans are being captured and liquefied by the martians for either power source, food or to create the strange biological mass that is growing all around places the martians have effectively cleared out. The martians have pretty sophisticated shielding, so unless they are even more wasteful than humans, this weird development near the end seems like it ought to have happened right away. Unless, of course, one is simply making a movie with special effects and assumes the audience has no reasoning skills or desire to understand what the movie is actually about.

The secondary problem with this type of perspective is that when we are following ordinary people, one would expect them to have pretty ordinary experiences, even in the midst of an alien invasion. In this incarnation of War Of The Worlds, Ray Ferrier and family are the ordinary people who happen to be in all the right places at the right time to learn about the invaders, witness all the phases, provide information and help do their part to repel the aliens. It's silly. Dreamcatcher (reviewed here!) had the potential to explore this perspective better, as did Signs (reviewed here!). I've yet to see a film where the common person dealing with the invasion is explored effectively and realistically.

The tragedy here is that Spielberg had the chance to truly nail it with his attempt. With War Of The Worlds, most all viewers already know how it ends. The magic of this particular story is that because (essentially) random chance foils the martians, we don't need our protagonist to be a hero or even remotely heroic. We don't even need our protagonist to survive necessarily.

Spielberg seemed to realize this in part by having us follow a fairly unlikable protagonist. Ray Ferrier is portrayed as a jerk. He's not terribly into his children or his job and his initial characterization could have worked wonderfully, had it only stuck. Instead, Spielberg's obsession with heroes comes into play and most of Ray's negative qualities are sublimated for the chance to contribute and be heroic, even if in minor ways.

Far more interesting is his daughter, Rachel. The story would have been the ultimate in creepy and intriguing had Ray been killed early in the movie, leaving poor Rachel to fend for herself. Instead, Rachel is dragged along as a character foil for Ray, not developing a character, delivering the few clever lines of the movie, and mostly relegated to standing in the background screaming.

Rachel is played by Dakota Fanning, who I've oft cited as one of the few talents evident already in the next generation of actresses. War Of The Worlds wastes the considerable talents of the girl who blew audiences away in I Am Sam. Fanning is condemned to a role of screaming and not doing much other than that. She does it well, though.

The lead, Ray, is played by Tom Cruise and I suppose he is acting well in War Of The Worlds. His character is unlikable and he comes across as ultimately unlikable. He's a jerk. Cruise plays that well.

It's not enough to recommend the movie, though. This incarnation of War Of The Worlds takes on just a little too much to keep us with such improbable protagonists (the last portion of the movie, where Ray and Rachel are hiding out in a survivalist's basement just does not fit) and there are a lot of editing decisions that are noticeable and awkward. There are cuts while Ray is driving, for example, that simply aren't timed right making the visual impression of the film more sloppy than chaotic.

For other alien invasion films, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Alien Trespass
Battleship
Battlefield Earth

5.5/10

For other film reviews, check out my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing of all the films I have reviewed!

© 2012, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Waiting For The End And A Purpose: The Terminal Leaves Me Unimpressed.

The Good: Likable protagonist, Generally good acting, Interesting initial plot
The Bad: Ridiculous turn of antagonist, Pacing, Plummets into boring
The Basics: As a man caught in an administrative crack, Viktor Navorski is forced to live in an airport, with consequences that quickly become dull and uncompelling in The Terminal.


It is easy to see, after the first half hour of The Terminal why this movie did not generate boatloads of money to help United Airlines. According the the trivia before the movies open, Steven Spielberg has been quoted as saying "Most movies have a beginning and just keep beginning." Spielberg doesn't know when to end movies. Like A.I. (reviewed here!), The Terminal drags on and on after the first half hour, begging the viewer to ask "Why am I still sitting here?"

The Terminal begins with real potential, more than I would have thought. Viktor Navorski arrives at JFK Airport in New York City and learns that his nation has become engulfed in a civil war. As a result, there is no legitimate nation of Krakozha and thus his passport is no longer a legal passport. Without a legal passport, he may not get a visa to enter the United States and he is forced to reside within the confines of the airport terminal.

Navorski is sentenced to live in the terminal by Frank Dixon, a field agent with the Department of Homeland Security. Dixon is simply doing his job, which is waiting out the Krakozhian civil war so that Navorski may either return home or enter the United States. The main problem with the film develops when Dixon becomes obsessed with Navorski's presence. Navorski is not harming anyone, he is not a nuisance in any real way, and is not even terribly conspicuous. Dixon becomes determined to pass the Navorski problem onto someone else, though Navorski is not a problem anyone would notice except the Department of Homeland Security.

For example, at JFK, there is are carts that may be used to aid passengers in transporting their luggage. Unfortunately, most people do not bring the carts back to their designated areas. So, there is a system that rewards those who do bring the carts back with a quarter. Navorski soon realizes that if he rounds up the carts and returns them all, he can make enough money to buy food at the Burger King within the terminal. Dixon sees Navorski doing this and, rather than tacitly approve of it, he thwarts Navorski's efforts by hiring a new staffmember whose sole job is to return the carts to where they belong. Dixon's determination to rid the terminal of Navorski climaxes in the most over-the-top way and then senselessly disappears.

In short, The Terminal suffers greatly from a forced antagonist that, in the final analysis, makes little to no sense. And the film does not need a man vs. man conflict, the piece would work extraordinarily well as a man vs. society piece. But Dixon does not simply represent the overbearing society created by the Department of Homeland Security, he reveals personal ambition and a serious emotional stake in getting rid of Navorski.

And then there's the romantic subplot. While residing in the airport, Navorski falls for a flight attendant named Amelia. The relationship between Navorski and Amelia is far less interesting than the relationships Navorski makes to survive in the airport, like his relationship with janitor Gupta.

What does work is the acting. Catherine Zeta-Jones is well-used as Amelia and she manages to not steal the scenes she is in. In fact, it is more a movie displaying the talents of Stanley Tucci. Whatever the faults with the character of Frank Dixon, Tucci portrays him well and with as much consistency as the script will allow. Tucci plays reasonable very well and, while it is inconsistent with the established character, he is able to make over-the-top anger seem very realistic.

The film rests on Tom Hanks, though and he delivers as usual. Hanks appears somewhat bloated and only slips out of character once when yelling. The majority of the movie, he looks like Ed O'Ross (Nikolai from Six Feet Under) and his transformed body language and accent work quite convincingly to establish his character.

Even Hanks cannot save The Terminal, though. The idea is not bad, but the execution of it is. Spielberg and the film's writers try to create intrigue by providing Navorski with a reason for wanting to come to New York City, clouding it in the peanut can he carries with him constantly. The problem is, by the time we learn what is in the can, it is almost impossible to care. The movie has stretched on for far too long.

And once we do learn why Navorski is in New York City, it makes even less sense that he would be willing to stay in the terminal as opposed to making a run for the City outside. The last half hour of the movie is an uncompelling plodding experience to try to resolve all of the plot and character aspects introduced earlier in the movie. The problem is, by the time they start to be resolved, Dixon is ridiculously villainous and the rest of the aspects seem far too removed from our interest to be compelling.
The Terminal lures the viewer in with a deceptively good beginning that quickly takes a turn toward the boring and ultimately the disappointing. There are better Spielberg and Hanks films. There are a lot of movies that are better. Period.

For other films with Zoe Saldana, please check out my reviews of:
Columbiana
Avatar
Star Trek

4.5/10

For other film reviews, please visit my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing of all the movies I have reviewed!

© 2012, 2005 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Steven Spielberg's Argument Against Having Children . . . Or Robots: A.I.: Artificial Intelligence!

The Good: Essentially good philosophical question, Some acting
The Bad: Overly graphic, Thematically heavy-handed, Characters that are difficult to connect with, Loses focus
The Basics: The MPAA drops the ball on not rating this nightmarish fairy tale “R.” Otherwise, there is little of note here.


It did not take watching A.I. or Artificial Intelligence long to realize that Steven Spielberg was the wrong director for this movie. At best, no other director could be accused of trying to capitalize on the same type feelings as E.T, at worst, no other director would be a target for trying so desperately to make a hit film. Artificial Intelligence fails to be as simply endearing as E.T. was upon its release and too pointlessly graphic and needlessly complicated to be the real hit that he wanted.

When Henry Swinton believes he has found the solution to his wife's heartbreak over their son's apparent coma, he purchases a robot (mecha) that has the ability to love her without question. David, the mecha, takes a while to endear himself to Monica and eventually, she begins to return his affection. When her biological son reanimates, there is natural conflict between the two children and Monica decides to abandon David. David, unalterably programmed to love Monica, begins a search for the Blue Fairy from Pinocchio in an attempt to become human. In the process, he flees the most dangerous element of humanity, the Flesh Fair, and journeys to the submerged Manhattan to try to become human.

First of all, if you are not a fan of Pinocchio-type stories, this will be a huge let down for you. Essentially, it is a souped up fairy tale with all the simplicity and none of the charm. Haley Joel Osment does a fine job portraying David with simplistic, childlike wonder, but there is no magic in his performance. There's no spark of joy in him, which makes watching Osment's David difficult.

If you read my reviews, you will no I am not a prude for most of the things Conservatives decry are wrong with movies. I was disappointed at how sexually graphic Henry And June (reviewed here!) wasn't and the ultra-violent "Empok Nor" rates as one of the best Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episodes in my book. That said, the MPAA completely dropped the ball when it came to rating this movie. Whatever dolts at the MPAA slapped a PG-13 on this movie instead of an "R" deserved to be fired.

Why? A significant portion of Artificial Intelligence happens at a Flesh Fair. The Flesh Fair is basically a bunch of hicks getting together and tearing apart robots. In the scene, we see a robot shot from a cannon, through a ring of fire and into a jet engine where it is destroyed, another is drawn and quartered before our eyes and yet another is melted completely with acid. The purpose of the scene is to illustrate what monsters humans have become in relation to their servants. This horrific scene immediately follows a scene wherein a dump truck of already destroyed robots attempt to reconstruct themselves and includes such things as one robot tearing jaws off other dead droids to find one that fits. The problems of these scenes are twofold. 1. They do what they do exceptionally well, to the point of being overbearing, oppressive and gross. In the robot dump scene, we see quite comprehensively how poorly the robots have been treated and any viewer with a brain is going to feel the sense of injustice and "get" that this situation is absolutely wrong. The scene that follows with the chase and torture of robots is therefore unnecessary. Add to that, the scene is supposed to illustrate how inhumanely the robots are being treated by showing their torture and we are to understand how wrong that is. The MPAA completely dropped the ball on this one in that it uses the excuse that the beings being tortured are simply inanimate objects to justify showing things it would never allow to be illustrated with human beings. Thus, the MPAA is desensitized, becoming in itself a flesh fair. It is unethical and desensitizing to allow such graphic torture to be shown, especially to youngsters and the idiocy of the MPAA's decision to rate this PG-13 is that the robots are, of course, humans in actuality! The second problem is both of these intense, graphic scenes of dismemberment, torture and destruction are too long. We get the thesis of the scenes. They feel like the Ripley Clone Room scene in Alien Resurrection (reviewed here!) - we got it, get on with it.

Following the disgusting and inappropriately rated Flesh Fair scene, the movie falls completely into chaos. The comic relief provided by Jude Law's character Gigolo Joe wears thin immediately such that the viewer is not disappointed by his rapid exit from the movie soon after. Then the movie descends into a weird fairy tale involving massive passages of time and alien beings.

The problem, ultimately, with Artificial Intelligence is that it does not seem to know what it wants to be. Too often, it is an oversimplified fairy tale. Other moments, however, it rises to a wrenchingly graphic and adult portrayal of ostracization and loneliness. In the end, none of the characters come alive. David is simplistic and monotonous, Monica is pretty much the worst mother ever, Joe is a one trick joke, and Professor Allen Hobby, who has great potential as a philosopher somehow loses his way in the last scenes we see of him. His philosophical quest motivates the movie, yet his actions at the end are inexplicable; until he knew the outcome of the David experiment, why would he start other such experiments?

In contrast to the characters, the acting is halfway decent. Almost redeeming the movie are the performances of William Hurt, who plays Hobby as intelligent and compassionate, and Haley Joel Osment, who earns his fee easily with his weird, robotic performance of David. The contrast between the warmly emotional Hurt and the quirky, quasi-dispassionate Osment works quite well.

Unfortunately, it is not enough to save this movie. It lacks serious direction other than trying to prove that the responsibility one would have to an artificial life form is the same as one would have to a biological entity, but that is proven rather quickly. The lack of purpose through much of the movie is complicated by a situation devoid of empathetic characters and ruined by an unnecessarily gruesome set of scenes that defy good taste. If you want a better time making an ethical argument over robots, I strongly recommend "Measure Of A Man" from Star Trek The Next Generation's second season. They say that if a movie resonates emotionally with you, it's good regardless; I say if it resonates only in that it makes you nauseous and others when you describe it, it's garbage. There's no antacid that counteracts the Flesh Fair and only sadness that 28 Days Later's Brendan Gleeson was a part of it.

For other big science fiction films, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Bicentennial Man
Inception
Minority Report

3.5/10

For other film reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2003 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Paul Is A Surprisingly Fun Movie . . . After A Time

The Good: Very funny, Good character development, Decent plot progression, Amazing special effects, Good DVD bonus features
The Bad: Rocky beginning
The Basics: Unfathomably underwhelming in its box office performance, Paul is a winning science fiction comedy worth checking out!


At this point, there are very few movies I have missed in theaters that I have been excited about seeing now on DVD. Fortunately, one of them came along last night in the form of a science fiction comedy. The movie is Paul and it has left me utterly baffled. First, I am surprised that it did not do better in the theaters. Paul is exceptionally funny, well-developed and all-around interesting after a somewhat rocky start (the first five minutes are wonderful, but then the movie drags for about twenty minutes before getting and staying good).

The other big surprise for me was that the DVD came with both an “R”-rated and “Unrated” version of the movie. My wife and I, not at all easily offended, watched the “Unrated” version of the film and we could not determine what was not worthy of just an “R” rating in it. I’ve seen movies with worse language, more nudity and more violence/gore than Paul had, so whatever aspect the MPAA wouldn’t let pass without going past “R” is not immediately evident. This just reaffirms the idea that the MPAA is a ridiculous organization.

Graeme Willy and his best friend Clive Gollings are visiting the San Diego Comic Con from the UK. After days of geeking out and meeting their favorite science fiction writer, Adam Shadowchild, the pair prepares to tour the great U.F.O. hotspots in the American Midwest. After encountering two homophobes in a weird diner, Graeme and Clive flee – extensively damaging the homophobe’s truck in the process – in their RV. That night, they believe they are being pursued by the two men when a car accelerates past them in the desert before careening out of control. Rushing to the aid of the driver, they discover the driver is an alien, Paul, and he needs their help to get back home.

Seeking refuge at a trailer park, run by Evangelical Christians, Graeme finds himself smitten with Ruth Buggs, the one-eyed daughter of the trailer park owner. When Paul cures her of her backward notions on denying evolution, Ruth is compelled to join the men in their quest to get Paul back to where his friends will pick him up. The alien, men, and Ruth are hunted by a Man In Black, Zoil, two Federal agents, the two homophobes and Ruth’s distraught father who believes she has been abducted, in a cross-country adventure that is exceptionally funny.

Paul gets an admittedly rough start. The movie very sensibly takes its time to establish Graeme and Clive well in advance of Paul’s first appearance. This makes sense, it is entirely necessary (far too many films just right into the action without establishing the characters enough), but Simon Pegg, Nick Frost (as both writers and actors) and director Greg Mottola just do not land it. The movie trundles along until Ruth encounters Paul and it is an unfortunate, meandering start fraught with pacing issues and gags that do not hold up after the first viewing.

That said, there is so much to recommend about Paul. Far from being dull at all, once Paul takes off, it truly is engaging in every frame. To wit, the movie establishes moments well and even though they might be predictable in their structure, Paul makes it work. So, for example, in a key scene at a farmhouse, we see someone trying to light a stove before Paul distracts them. When a shootout ensues, the seasoned moviegoer knows that the house is going to explode at some point because the gas from the stove is still on. Yet, even with that foreshadowing, the execution of it is incredible and fun.

The characters in Paul are fun and they actually develop over the course of the film. Graeme easily embraces Paul and his mission, while Clive is resistant to getting involved. While there is a wonderful moment wherein Clive explains to Paul why he is jealous of the alien, the movie neglects to address the fundamental flaw in Clive’s character. Clive is an uber-geek who is meeting a real, live extraterrestrial, yet he is sullen and bored. Sure, he faints when he first sees Paul (which is the source of a running joke about Clive’s urine-soaked pants), but he never seems excited about just what it means for him to be sitting beside an alien life form.

Paul himself is a likable character. The alien is entirely computer-generated and voiced by Seth Rogen. He is a wisecracking alien who is remarkably tied to humanity. He has been on earth for decades and still feels bad about how he arrived there, leading him to an act of penance as the film goes on. The high-minded sensibility Paul articulates in combatting Ruth is enjoyable to watch and is refreshing to hear in a movie these days. Paul’s sensibility easily outshines how Graeme is essentially falling in love with the first woman he sees.

The other superlative aspect of Paul is the acting. Simon Pegg gives his usual funny performance and to the best of my recollection, this is the first time I have seen Nick Frost in a film. The support cast of Jane Lynch, Jeffrey Tambor, David Koechner, Bill Hader, and John Carrol Lynch is extraordinary. This is also one of Kristen Wiig’s best performances. She is funny as Ruth and her performance is not reminiscent of any of the many, many other character she has played in recent films.

But by far the best performance in Paul comes from Jason Bateman. Bateman plays Agent Zoil and he even holds himself different from his usual body language in other movies. It is odd seeing Bateman play a complete badass, but he pulls it off expertly in Paul.

On DVD, Paul comes with a blooper reel and the ability to watch the film as an unrated version with six additional minutes of movie. I recommend the unrated version. There are other featurettes on the making of Paul, but some of them are just repetitive. That should not be enough to steer one away from Paul, though. This is an exceptionally funny, well-executed science fiction comedy that is well worth seeing!

For other science fiction comedies, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
Men In Black
Planet 51

7/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my index page by clicking here!

© 2011 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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The Politics of Fear: How To Make A Horror Movie PG: Jaws

The Good: Interesting story, Good characters, Moments of tension, Lead acting, Direction
The Bad: Bogged in politics, Some very lame acting moments
The Basics: Well-directed and frightening both for the shark and the capitalist issues, Jaws is a well-developed argument against blind capitalism.


Back in the day, my life took an awkward and abrupt turn from The Way Things Were Supposed To Go to The Way Things Are Going. My training in my childhood and the beginning of my young adulthood was in marine biology, specifically the study of sharks. Unlike the usual childhood "phase" where "sharks are cool," I spent years voraciously eating any information I could find on sharks. I was set to become a marine biologist (though my mother, for some inexplicable reason, always thought "oceanographer") and live by the ocean studying sharks. Then there was the right turn in my path and I became a writer (novelist) instead. My mother's been cheesed with me ever since.

From an early age, therefore, I was exposed to Jaws, the classic shark horror movie that spawned multiple sequels and is now available in a beautiful 30th Anniversary 2-disc DVD set. My father was never worried about Jaws scarring me because: 1. It's rated PG (he has a lot of faith in the MPAA) and 2. He watched it and realized what any objective viewer would; it's more about politics than the shark attacks.

Police Chief Martin Brody is working Amity - a summer beach town - for the first time as the head of the police and finding himself on the outs with local politicians and businesspeople when a young woman is killed by a shark. Brody is pressured to keep the beaches open - and the local economy alive - despite the fatality and soon the presence of the monstrous shark is undeniable when it kills a boy in the middle of the day in front of hundreds of people. Brody acts quickly to bring the carnage to and end by closing the beach, but locals demand the economy not suffer and the beaches be open on the Fourth of July.

The bodies begin to mount (or disappear) as the locals begin a shark hunt, which is complicated by mayor Vaughn keeping the beaches open. Brody enlists the aid of shark researcher Matt Hooper, who determines that the shark is still at large (hunters kill one, smaller shark and assume it is the one). When more people die in ways that Vaughn cannot deny, Brody enlists the aid of the dark fisherman Quint, who takes Brody and Hooper out to hunt the beast.

Jaws is billed as a groundbreaking horror movie, which on the DVD release's commentary becomes a function of failed technology (Spielberg could not get the mechanical sharks to work, so a number of shots that were intended to have the shark were scrapped, which in turn added to the menace), but while this movie has horrific moments (very mild by today's standards), it is no more a horror movie than Wall Street (reviewed here!) is. Like Wall Street, Jaws is about the influence of capitalism on our society. In the case of Jaws, capitalism becomes so overwhelming as to put people in mortal danger to satisfy those dependent on this economic system.

Brody is arguably the socialist character; his job is to enforce laws and basically establish a border between right and wrong. As a result, he is the character least motivated by money (though as a rich-beyond-care scientist, Hooper is right up there). Immediately upon the revelation of the problem, Brody declares that the right thing to do is shut down the beaches to prevent any further deaths.

The main conflict in the movie is not man vs. nature (Quint/Brody/Hooper vs. the shark) until the very end. Far more predominant is the conflict of man vs. society as Brody takes on the local politicians and businesses in his quest to simply do the right thing. The capitalist forces rise up against Brody embodied by Mayor Vaughn and the local businesspeople who want the beaches open so they won't "have to be on welfare all winter." Rather than rely on right and wrong - as meted out by Brody, Vaughn and the locals are ruled by the pursuit of money and they override Brody in the attempt to financially gain. Quint, the shark hunter, becomes just another piece in the capitalist dogma that dominates Jaws. Quint is the embodiment of the demands of the market, which capitalists believe control everything. Others attempt to catch or kill the shark and fail. Quint names his price and the market (the local businesses and government) eventually agree to pay it because he is in a position to provide a service they are dependent on and their greed calculates that the price is reasonable vs. the potential loss of not being able to keep the beaches and their businesses open. For those of us socialists watching Jaws, the richness of this argument is that while Quint is a symbol of the Capitalism ideal of the Market, at the end of the day, he's just a man. Socialists like to remind Capitalists that the Market is not a nebulous force, but actually made up of people.

Ironically, mega-rich director Steven Spielberg - who, to be fair was not as rich when he made this movie - seems to want to remind the audience of that as well. Brody is given moments of character that are soft and deep, where he watches his son imitating his actions at the dinner table. Humanizing Brody this way, and none of the other characters, illustrates an affection for placing morality and human togetherness above the pursuit of personal wealth. At the end of the day, Brody is motivated by the desire to protect and do right. Spielberg and writers Peter Benchley and Carl Gottlieb emphasize his goodness and place in the world constantly through his relationships and conflicts.

More than just a Socialist argument, Jaws does tell an entertaining story about men on a boat fighting a shark in a decent "man vs. nature" tale. Jaws is well-paced and it devotes a lot of time to building mood, despite the first hour of politics. Out on the open sea, where money matters little, the struggle becomes between protectionist humans and a creature who is just doing what it was made to do (eat!).

It is on the Orca, Quint's boat, that Brody, Hooper and Quint begin to illustrate real amounts of character as they begin to relate to one another. The latter half of the movie - far more referenced than the overtly political first half - involves male bonding and the pursuit of victory over a heartless killer. It's a pretty old story, but Jaws tells it well. All three characters are well-defined on the boat, believable and they play off one another well.

Part of what makes the characters is the acting. One of the few weaknesses of Jaws is in the background actors. One of the local businesswomen, for example, delivers her lines with a very clunky and unconvincing delivery that noticeably shakes up the flow of the film. The extras are unimpressive and they distract a lot from the better performances. Murray Hamilton, however, rounds out the main cast well with a very understated performance as Mayor Vaughn. Hamilton is quiet and insistent and when he breaks, he breaks well, making his character almost sympathetic with his slumped body language and quiet delivery.

It is no surprise to me that Roy Scheider, Robert Shaw and Richard Dreyfuss share top-billing in Jaws. These three are masterful as Brody, Quint and Hooper. Robert Shaw is the embodiment of the salty fisherman as Quint and he has a greasy quality to his performance that makes his character utterly believable. Indeed, having read the novel by Peter Benchley before seeing the movie the first time, Shaw was perfectly cast to embody the knowledgeable but somewhat overconfident fisherman.

Richard Dreyfuss illustrates why he has become the actor of such distinction as he has. Dreyfuss is young, eager and rich as Matt Hooper and he plays the role with the wide-eyed enthusiasm that one associates with youth and arrogance. This is a performance unlike any other on Dreyfuss's resume, with an inherent goodness and scholarly quality that illustrates his talent as an actor.

But it is Roy Schieder who is given the most legwork as Police Chief Martin Brody. Schieder is well-chosen as he carries in his face - from the beginning of the movie - the fatigue of a police officer who has seen a lot, yet still believes in a distinction between right and wrong. Schieder's ability to emote disgust, love and fear make his performance memorable and completely realistic for a man being pressured by so many sources.

Ultimately, Jaws is a decent story of the conflict between socialism and capitalism embodied by one man who must take on the local society to put right over the almighty dollar with a nice literal man vs. shark story to carry the heavy philosophies embodied within it. It's entertaining and at PG, there's no reason your children should not be exposed to it. Odds are they won't catch the politics or economic issues; that goes over the head of most adults, too.

For other films Steven Spielberg directed, check out my reviews of:
Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull
Minority Report
Schindler's List
Jurassic Park
The Indiana Jones Trilogy

9/10

For other movie reviews, click here to see my index page of all I have reviewed!

© 2011, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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