Generic Justice League: How Warner Bros. Limped Across The Finish Line.

The Good: Moments of characterization, The acting is fine, Some of the humor works well
The Bad: Incredibly basic plot, Utterly generic villain, Painfully derivative plot development, Troublesome continuity, Familiar final battle sequence
The Basics: Justice League arrives and it is hard not to feel like it is a missed opportunity on almost every front.


It's tough to sit down to a film that has been built to in an inefficient way when there is such a good example of building a franchise the right way. The DC Comics Cinematic Universe, sadly, lives in the shadow of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. For all of the problems with the Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase 1 (reviewed here!), the franchise was built well over several years. The Marvel Cinematic Universe took a bunch of mediocre super hero films that were focused on (generally) a single character, loosely tied them together and when they were put together in The Avengers (reviewed here!), that movie succeeded largely because the scale was appropriate to the threat. As well, the essential characterization was already done in the foundation films, so The Avengers was able to illustrate just what those heroes could do, as opposed to giving out basic information about who was fighting.

Justice League has no such grace.

Justice League is the DC Comics Cinematic Universe answer to The Avengers and the immediate tragedy of it is that it comes so late to an already-saturated market (doing anything fresh in superhero films is tough these days!), the foundation work was not actually finished, and there were huge issues with the foundation films that go unanswered going into Justice League. Three major characters in Justice League were virtually unexplored going into the film: Aquaman, The Flash, and Cyborg. Cyborg, especially, suffers in Justice League because his backstory is done more or less on the fly and he ends up seeming like a generic super hero who is intended to fill the same functional niche in Justice League as Iron Man did in The Avengers. Indeed, it is hard for comic book and super hero film fans to not wince when Cyborg appears and to show off his evolving abilities, he levitates much like Iron Man.

The failures in the foundation work make Justice League a tougher sell than it ought to be. Wonder Woman (reviewed here!) left the lingering question: If the God Of War was defeated, how the hell do all subsequent wars on Earth actually occur? (Justice League might have been a conceptual smash if the history of the DC Cinematic Universe included a retcon that showed no wars in that universe followed World War I and Earth was left defenseless against the villains in the new chapter.) If the final shot of Batman Vs. Superman: Dawn Of Justice (reviewed here!) insinuated that Superman was still alive or there was still some form of power in his Kryptonian corpse, how did he let the Motherbox problem escalate to this point? [That question, at least, is satisfactorily answered in Justice League.] And if the parademon threat is growing so fast, would this not be the very definition of an "all hands on deck" situation? Where, then, is the Suicide Squad to help out with basic combat/demolition? It seems like they would have been ideal for the Russian front, at the nuclear reactor. And if Bruce Wayne had the vision of Superman being used by the same entities using the parademons, why would someone so smart attempt to resurrect the dead Kryptonian?

So, Justice League begins from a disadvantageous position where the universe of the DC Cinematic Universe is not fleshed out well-enough on screen (comic book fans have a distinct advantage going into the film, obviously) to absolutely invest in the film's threat. The best analogy I have is that it took until the commentary track for Return Of The Jedi (reviewed here!) when it was explicitly stated that the point of much of the dialogue in the final throne room scene was to sell the audience on the idea that Luke Skywalker could actually go over to the Dark Side and join the Emperor. I must have seen Return Of The Jedi thirty-five (or more) times before listening to that commentary track and the moment never once landed where that occurred to me. It was so ineffectively done that the suspension of disbelief did not happen. With Justice League, there is a similar sense of lack of suspension of disbelief to the threat: of course the one character not put into the promotions will show up in the film, of course the team will manage to come together, and there is never a doubt that the invading threat will be repelled. Warner Bros. is building a franchise: of course that reality would not be undone and remade in the first big team-up film.

But, there's Justice League arrived at without all the essential prep work and perhaps the real problem with arriving so late to the marketplace is that the parallels in narrative structure and character beg comparisons to The Avengers. No doubt, someone will soon do a comparative analysis that lines the two films up, side by side, and it would be unsurprising if the rampage in Justice League came about right around the same time in the film as the Hulk smashing through the helecarrier in The Avengers.

So, what is Justice League?

Following the death of Superman, the world has more or less fallen in to chaos. While Wonder Woman deals with street level crimes - terrorists attempting to blow up a bank - Batman is active again in Gotham City, combating a random parademon that arrived in the city. Encountering the alien invader, and having vague information about the Motherboxes on Earth, Bruce Wayne reasons that it is Superman's absence that is drawing the interstellar threats and that it is time to assemble his team. While Arthur Curry rejects Wayne's offer, a Motherbox on Themyscira becomes active. Steppenwolf arrives through a Boom Tube on Themyscira and attempts to wipe out Hippolyta and the Amazons, but the force of numbers causes Steppenwolf to beat a hasty retreat . . . with a Motherbox. Hippolyta lights a warning fire, which informs Diana that the invasion has begun and Diana meets with Bruce Wayne to tell him exactly what they are up against.

While Bruce Wayne easily recruits Barry Allen to his team, Victor Stone (a cyborg altered through a Motherbox and other technology in a scientific accident) reaches out to Diana. When Steppenwolf attacks Atlantis for the Motherbox hidden there, Arthur Curry joins Batman's team. Bruce Wayne believes that the only way to save Earth from Steppenwolf and protect the final Motherbox is to resurrect Superman using the Motherbox Victor Stone brought him. While Diana advises him against it, Wayne and Cyborg agree on the course of action and Barry Allen goes along with them. But when Superman is resurrected, he comes back wrong and triggers Cyborg's technology against Stone's directives. In the ensuing conflict, Steppenwolf is able to get control of the final Motherbox and he takes it to Russia where he begins rewriting reality in order to attempt to make Earth into a primordial wasteland that he can rule.

Within the narrative, Justice League suffers from being That Kind Of Movie. This is a big-budget super hero film and to make a threat worth assembling the biggest DC Universe characters, it requires something incredible. But the name is a misnomer. Justice League is not about justice; there is no higher principle in play in the film. Justice League is entirely preoccupied with survival as all of reality is threatened by Steppenwolf and the power of the Motherboxes. Like its predecessors, Justice League suffers mightily from leaving huge gaps in the narrative for a reasonable sense of continuity: the moment Steppenwolf stole the Motherbox from Themyscira, why didn't Hippolyta reach out to the Atlanteans? There is an allusion that a war occurred between the Amazons and the Atlanteans at least one generation prior to Aquaman's ascendance, but to stop Steppenwolf from getting his hands on the Motherbox in Atlantis, is seems like someone in the know like Hippolyta would have volunteered her forces instead of simply obliquely alerting Diana . . .

The lack of an underlying principle or theme in Justice League becomes painfully clear during the Motherboxes backstory. Justice League manages not to simply copy from The Lord Of The Rings (reviewed here!) with how the backstory is related, but the parallels in the stories are pretty obvious. Sauron, having created the One Ring, plans to cast Middle Earth into darkness, but he is repelled by the combined forces of Elves, Dwarves and Men . . . er, strike that, Steppenwolf brought the Motherboxes to Earth where he planned to rewrite reality, but the combined forces of Themyscirans, Atlantians, Gods, humans and Green Lanterns managed to repel him. The Motherboxes were then hidden, not destroyed, and apparently the governments became idiotic (the moment the Motherbox backstory was related in Justice League, my first thought was "the moment the space program began or Superman started exhibiting his powers, why wasn't one of the Motherboxes taken to the Moon?" and "Why didn't the Green Lantern for Earth get one of the Motherboxes off planet . . . the Corps must have known the three Motherboxes were there after they defeated Steppenwolf?").

So, there's no real thematic strength in Justice League and instead of any rhetorical argument, much of the film comes down to, sigh, yet another fist fight. Steppenwolf is an unfortunately generic villain for Justice League. He is characterized as the Destroyer Of Worlds, so what is his preoccupation with Earth? Earth was the site of his first defeat; what has he been doing since he was repelled the last time? If he's been out destroying worlds without his Motherboxes since he was first defeated, why does he rely upon their power again for his second stab at Earth?! And if he has been out destroying worlds, what the hell happened to the Green Lantern Corps? And if he hasn't been out wreaking havoc in the galaxy for thousands of years since his botched attempt to take Earth, doesn't that just make him the biggest poseur villain in cinematic history? The fact that these questions come up after only a moment's consideration of the adversary illustrates how flimsy his construction is within the movie.

And for a DC Cinematic Universe work, the final battle once again feels familiar. Night and darkness are used in Zack Snyder's films to hide details, which makes the special effects easier to execute, but make for far less complicated or compelling battle sequences. It's a pretty sad world where the attention to fine details is greater in video games than in major blockbuster films.

So, what works in Justice League? The snippets of character for the new protagonists all work. Barry Allen is characterized well and the fact that the defining characteristic for him outside his speed is his insatiable hunger is something that instantly sets him apart from the current television incarnation of the character. In a similar way, Cyborg is characterized intriguingly as a young man who is tormented by his own body and is not at all entirely in control of his powers, abilities, and technology. Aquaman delivers a decent assessment of the team before reducing Diana to a sex object (grumble. And, seriously - and I write this as a lifelong Wonder Woman fan! - Curry starts ogling Diana after leaving Mera under the sea; what does Diana have to offer Aquaman that Mera doesn't?!).

Justice League might not be a slam dunk of a film, but it puts its emphasis on far too many of the wrong things. The moment I enjoyed most was a simple exchange between Bruce Wayne and Diana. Wayne explains that he is getting too old for this kind of fight and he implores Diana to make her super hero alter-ego more available to the fights for which she is needed. It's a quiet moment, but a compelling one.

But, that's not what Justice League is about. It's about getting the team together, resurrecting a guy who can punch harder than the others (shouldn't Cyborg's technology have been able to evaluate Steppenwolf's vulnerability to freezing and given him an ice cannon?!), and making a giant effects-driven fight sequence to save the world from someone who never really had a chance to destroy it. The net result is a fast-paced popcorn movie that lacks resonance once it is over.

For other DC Comics Cinematic Universe works, please check out my reviews of:
Suicide Squad
Green Lantern
Man Of Steel

3.5/10

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

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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This Year's NASA-Approved Oscarbait Is Arrival!

The Good: Decent performances, Good concept, Moments of realism, Sound editing/effects
The Bad: Pacing, Some forced character aspects, Soundtrack
The Basics: Arrival is a high-concept science fiction film that works hard to get where it is going and, in the process, makes an ambitious movie that is mostly satisfying.


For the last three years, Oscar Pandering Season has included a serious contender for some of the big awards that is preoccupied with space travel. This year, the niche is being filled by a movie that explores what might happen if extraterrestrials came to Earth - and it has been some time since a film like that has been a contender. The film is called Arrival and while it has science fiction elements in the form of alien ships coming to Earth, it is skewed definitely toward being a character drama.

Arrival is reminiscent of the Star Trek The Next Generation episode "Darmok" (reviewed here!), where the principle adversary is language. The mood of Arrival is ponderous and cerebral, which helped get Interstellar (reviewed here!) an Oscar nod, but makes for a slow film that takes a lot of faith for the viewer to invest in. And the faith the viewer puts in is largely rewarded, though the journey is not as exciting as the previous space-related films that have been contenders.

Opening with Dr. Louise Banks experiencing loss as her daughter's brief life is cut short, Banks finds herself teaching on the day alien ships start hovering around the Earth. Twelve ships appear on Earth and shortly thereafter, Dr. Banks is approached by Colonel Weber, who brings her an audio file that he needs translated. The audio file contains an interrogation by U.S. personnel and indecipherable answers from the visiting extraterrestrials. Banks is hired by the U.S. government to try to figure out why the aliens have come to Earth by deciphering their language. Banks is paired with theoretical physicist Ian Donnelly to decipher the alien language and give the aliens mathematical problems to build an understanding of their technological levels.

Banks quickly learns that oral communication between humans and the heptapods is impossible, but that written communication has some chance for success. Communicating with teams in other nations who are working on deciphering the same linguistic problems, Banks and Donnelly quickly learn that worldwide tensions are on the rise when multiple teams reach the conclusion that one of the words that the aliens are using at multiple sites is "weapons." Banks continues to be plagued by visions of her daughter while she works with the hectapods, while tensions within the military rise over what some extremists believe is an impending threat. After an attack on the Montana ship, Donnelly recognizes that some of the symbols the aliens are writing with relate to time. Reopening communications with the heptapods allows Banks to try to understand both the aliens and what is happening with her, but when the Chinese prepare to attack one of the ships over China (fearing that they will attack, not knowing Donnelly's time theory), Banks must figure out how to convince the Chinese to back down.

Arrival is one of the rare films where the payoff is worthwhile, though the process to get there is not overly engaging. While the mystery surrounding Banks and her daughter is not incredible, the mechanism by which Banks works to save the world with the Chinese General is pretty incredible. The highbrow nature of the temporal concepts raised in Arrival are generally accessible, especially in a world where multiverse theory has been made commonplace through television shows and movies based on comic book sources. While the essential military conflict might be a subplot that comes in fairly late in the story, Arrival resolves it in an intriguing and well-conceived way.

The temporal mystery surrounding Hannah, however, guts the Dr. Banks character in many ways. At the outset of Arrival, Banks is standoffish and inaccessible as a character. That makes some sense if she is suffering the loss of her daughter. But the emotional ramifications of Banks losing a romantic relationship and a daughter working backwards in time is presented in a far less compelling or interesting way. As a result, much of Amy Adams's performance is good for the moments of the character working, but not particularly good for the moments where she is portraying a human being.

In a similar fashion, Arrival has incredible sound effects and sound editing, but a terrible soundtrack. The alien ships and the aliens use sound waves to repulse themselves above the ground and to communicate, so each time one of the alien "shells" is on screen, there is a booming sound that vibrates through the viewer. The sound effect is cool and the heptapod's language is similar. Arrival employs a dramatic soundtrack, too, though, and that blends poorly with the sound effects for the alien speech and the ship sounds. In many ways, Arrival might have worked better to contrast the sound effects with the stark reality of no musical accompaniment to make it resonate better.

Jeremy Renner is fine as Dr. Donnelly, though his romantic subplot with Adams's Banks is painfully generic. Forest Whitaker is equally good as Colonel Weber, though the character is presented as a pretty generic military officer, without much in the way of depth and shading.

Arrival realistically paints the potential of an alien encounter and the inherent difficulties with humans attempting to understand them. The film gets very right the human instinct to leap to a worst-case scenario and leap to military action, but the resolution is a refreshing change from the action adventure blockbuster science fiction films, which tend to prioritize violence over reasoning. In that way, Arrival is very successful; but for coming together in a fully entertaining, well-rounded, well-conceived way, Arrival is more average than exceptional.

For other movies currently in theaters, please check out my reviews of:
Doctor Strange
Oasis: Supersonic
The Accountant
Cardboard Boxer
The Whole Truth

6/10

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

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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As Bad As One Might Suspect: Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice Belabors Set-Up And Spectacle Over Substance!

The Good: Moments of Henry Cavill's performance, Moments of plot concept for the conspiracy
The Bad: Dull, Preposterous, Overlong, Ridiculous characterization, Terrible writing
The Basics: Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice sucks.


When it comes to blockbuster movies, there are few movies I can think of that disappointed me more when I went back to them than Man Of Steel (reviewed here!). Seeing Man Of Steel on the big screen, early, it was a real thrill . . . but time, distance, and rewatching the movie truly lessened the film for me. So, when I first sat down to Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice, I was very concerned that history would either repeat itself (and I would be too lenient on the film) or I would over-compensate and be overly hard on the movie. The latter was a real concern for me from the moment Gal Godot was cast as Wonder Woman, as I have long advocated for Anne Hathaway for the role (check out that article here!).

After watching Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice, I am finally ready to write a review the way my wife has often ask that I do. My wife hates it when I waste my time writing long, well-conceived, complicated analyses of products and events that are very simply bad. Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice is simple and bad . . . but most of it is not the fault of the performers or even director Zack Snyder. The problems with Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice all start with the writing.

Conceptually, Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice tries to do too much, so it does none of it particularly well. The film is a belabored set-up to the forthcoming Justice League film and the scene that features Diana Prince (Wonder Woman) effectively introducing the other three members of the League (Green Lantern is not included!) stops the movie dead. It would have been better as a post-credits scene than a component of Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice.

Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice starts as a potential reflection on the nature of Superman and his role in the world. After Metropolis was virtually destroyed in Man Of Steel, Superman has become a divisive concept; a messianic figure and a potential threat to humanity for his autonomous, unaccountable, nature. That concept is blended poorly with Bruce Wayne's desire to reign in Superman, as he witnessed the carnage in Metropolis 18 months prior and experiences yet another loss in his life as a result. Rather than staying focused on either concept, Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice becomes mired in a painfully simplistic conspiracy put together by Lex Luthor.

Lex Luthor in Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice is, arguably, the worst interpretation of the character ever and while actor Jesse Eisenberg is taking a lot of flack for it, he deserves remarkably little blame. Lex Luthor in Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice is written as The Joker. Eisenberg plays him as appropriately twitchy and unsettled and I just kept waiting for the movie to take a clever turn what would have made it explicit that Lex Luthor was the Joker (elements like the Polaroid photos of Martha Kent seemed like foreshadowing in that regard). That moment never comes and instead of Lex Luthor being a genius who is actually motivated by the desire to save the world from its dependence on Superman, he is just a non-committed, rich version of The Joker.

Lois Lane and Clark Kent's relationship is portrayed as simplistic and bland. When Doomsday finally pops up, it looks like leftover footage of Cave Trolls from The Lord Of The Rings. And it is hard not to imagine Joss Whedon cringing as Wonder Woman finally makes her big screen debut as a half-rate sidekick who ultimately appears as muscle (virtually nothing of her cerebral nature is present)(Whedon having famously written a pitch or spec. script for Wonder Woman more than a decade ago, only to have it go nowhere).

Despite the spectacle (though most of it is surprisingly dark), simplistic and bland is an apropos description of Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice. When the biggest geek-out factor is recognizing actors (on screen and voices) from Watchmen (reviewed here!) in the film, the movie has serious problems. More could be said, but it would be pointless: bad is bad and Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice is bad.

For other live-action DC superhero works, please check out my reviews of:
Suicide Squad
The Dark Knight Trilogy
Green Lantern
Jonah Hex
Superman Returns
Catwoman
Batman: The Motion Picture Anthology 1989 - 1997
Supergirl
Superman
Wonder Woman

2.5/10

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

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Not Bending The World As Much As We Think, Why Her Is The Best Film Of The Year!

The Good: Excellent acting, Intriguing plot, Interesting characters
The Bad: Somewhat oppressive tone
The Basics: Her is a smart, clever film that has a lonely man bonding with his smartphone’s operating system and developing real love for the artificial life form.


A few days ago, my wife and I celebrated our four and three quarter year anniversary of our marriage. Even though it was an obscure anniversary, we continue to give gifts to one another and she actually surprised me by getting me the Blu-Ray of Where The Wild Things Are (reviewed here!). I was the only person I knew who actually liked the movie and my wife got it for me to connect me to a youthful sensibility I sometimes lack. So, I was actually primed to take in Spike Jonze’s latest film, Her . . . and I know that I will not be the only person I know who loves this film. Her is smart, quirky, and deep, instantly reminiscent of Jonze’s Being John Malkovich in tone and weirdness.

Her is released as Oscarbait, but while the studios might be marketing it toward award season, there is a sense of wry observation and universal loneliness that would have made it the film of the year regardless of when it was released. While films like Gravity (reviewed here!) have been leaving audiences marveled for the spectacle they bring to the big screen, it has lacked something beyond the confines of the story it tells. Spike Jonze has never been limited in that way and Her is no exception. Her tells a story set in a slightly sideways view of the world, but resonates with genuine human emotions and a story that is far less quirky (and much more insightful) than one might think from its plot.

Theodore is a professional transcriber for BeautifulWrittenLetters.com where he spends his days handwriting affectionate letters for customers. He is going through a rough divorce, though Catherine has clearly moved on from him, and he is lonely. Outside work, he spends time with his friend Amy, who spends her free time playing an online game where she earns points for being a good mother in the virtual world. Theodore’s own outlet with the virtual world or artificial intelligences comes when he activates his new operating system for his smartphone. Samantha talks to Theodore and he finds in the responsive program a companion more than a technological tool.

As Theodore asks his phone questions and responds to Samantha’s observations, he starts to bond with Samantha the way he would with an actual person. Theodore begins to become emotionally entangled with Samantha and that eases his loneliness. But as Theodore develops the relationship, he is forced to wrestle with the feelings he is has for Amy, Catherine, Samantha, and, perhaps most importantly, himself.

Her had a familiar quality to it; the emotional distance and sense of connection coming through technological devices is a similar plot to this year’s A Perfect Men (reviewed here!). The sense of familiarity also resonates for anyone who saw and understood A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (reviewed here!); Samantha in Her is treated like a life form in some very real ways. Interestingly, the elements that seem familiar combine to create something that is remarkable fresh.

The thing is, Her seems audacious and original in its plotting and set-up, but Spike Jonze drives the movie with a character who is easy to empathize with and a tone that is universal (though hardly pleasant). Theodore seems to meet the stereotype of being a smart man who is socially or emotionally disconnected, with limited ability to express the depths of his feelings. While Jonze created yet another smart character who clearly feels, he is put on the spot to define his emotions and falls down. Her might use a technological conceit, but it explores a complicated series of emotions and has something to say about relationships that is seldom brought to the screen with such realism.

While there are moments that get bogged down in the oppressive tone inherent to loneliness, Her succeeds because it balances the loneliness with the excitement of the discovery that comes with a new relationship. While there is a somewhat bipolar nature to the plot, the overall cinematic experience is surprisingly enjoyable.

A lot of the credit for the success of Her goes to Joaquin Phoenix. While I have never been a fan of Phoenix’s works, in Her he performs with an incredible range of emotions that is uncommon for him. Phoenix plays the quiet loneliness of Theodore’s initial character exceptionally well, but it is when he transforms into a bright-eyed, eager man outside his home that Phoenix gives us something completely new. I cannot recall a time when I’ve seen Phoenix on screen smiling and portraying a truly vibrant human being.

In a similar fashion, Amy Adams’s role in Her is unlike others she has had. More than just appearing with disheveled hair, Adams uses her time on the screen to play a type of obsession she has not played in her other works (at least none I have ever seen).

Her has a touching human message and it is delivered expertly in a way that makes it a film bound to stand the tests of time.

For other works featuring Olivia Wilde, please check out my reviews of:
The Incredible Burt Wonderstone
The Words
People Like Us
In Time
Butter
The Change-Up
Cowboys And Aliens
Tron: Legacy
The Next Three Days
Year One
House, M.D. - Season Four

9/10

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

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Not The Movie Of The Year, Incredible Acting Saves The Formulaic American Hustle!

The Good: Incredible acting, Some entertaining one-liners, Effects (costumes, soundtrack)
The Bad: Entirely predictable genre plot, Lack of thematic resonance
The Basics: While American Hustle is entertaining and worth watching, it lacks a sense of enduring greatness beyond the performances to make it a reasonable contender during Oscar Pandering Season.


As we reach the end of the year, films being released are designed to pander to the short memory of the Academy voters. While in recent years there have been a few films nominated for Best Picture that were not released in the post-Thanksgiving Oscar Pandering Season, the majority of films nominated for Best Picture still are released in November and December and this year, perhaps the most obvious attempt to bait Oscar voters is American Hustle. American Hustle has the flash of Oscarbait in its direction, costumes, and sense of humor, backed by the substance of a quintet of performers that the Academy has shown quite a bit of love for in recent years (Christian Bale, Jennifer Lawrence, Amy Adams, Bradley Cooper, and Jeremy Renner).

Unfortunately, what American Hustle lacks is a larger sense of theme and characters who make a statement. David O. Russell knows how to make a great film with deeper themes and meaning; he did it with Silver Linings Playbook (reviewed here!), which smartly worked its romantic plot to build to a larger statement on healing and the power love has to trump loss. It might seem ironic or contradictory that I, who openly advocated that Argo (reviewed here!) was worthy of the Best Picture Oscar last year and condemn the obvious frontrunner in Oscar Pandering Season this year for lacking themes. But Argo was more than a plot-based film that illustrated the resiliency of humanity; it became an implicit argument on the strength of pacifism and the power of resolve needed to nonviolently execute a nonviolent plan. American Hustle, however, is a con film. If you’ve seen two or three, you’ve seen pretty much all of them and sadly, despite the enjoyable nature of it, American Hustle does not buck that trend.

Irving Rosenfeld is a conman, so invested in his deceitful plans that his first major deception is to completely alter is face and physique. Disguising himself as a younger, more svelte man, Irving scams his marks successfully. Despite being married to Rosalyn, the transformed Irving discovers he has amazing chemistry with Sydney Prosser. Irving and Sydney work their scams together while having an affair. Their scams bring them to the attention of the ambitious Richie DiMaso, an FBI Agent who is looking to advance quickly by building a record of success by catching bigger fish than Irving and Sydney. To that end, DiMaso uses the pair to run a con on his behalf.

As the casino business explodes in Atlantic City, DiMaso decides to go after corrupt politicians in New Jersey. Starting with the mayor of Camden, Carmen Polito, DiMaso uses Irving and Sydney to go after government officials. As aides to “Sheik Abdullah” (an agent who pretends to be a wealthy investor in Atlantic City construction), Irving and Sydney hook Polito and soon they are using him to get access to corrupt Congressmen and Senators. While DiMaso works to nail the corrupt politicians, he does so outside the guidelines laid down by his boss, which puts his career at risk, a risk amplified by the fact that Irving and Sydney are not simply playing by DiMaso’s rules or solely for his goals.

American Hustle is a showcase of amazing performances – Jeremy Renner stands out for having vastly more opportunities to illustrate depth and substance than he was afforded in The Avengers (reviewed here!) – but the characters are almost entirely unlikable. Renner’s Polito seems instantly corruptible, but Renner is given softer moments (usually opposite Polito’s family members) to quietly and subtly illustrate that he is not monolithic. Polito’s motivations might be presented as the most complicated and empathetic (especially when mobsters begin exerting influence in the scam) and Renner rises to the challenges of giving the character layers.

That said, the rest of the characters in American Hustle (and I reference them as characters because this is a review of the film, not the historical incidents upon which the movie’s events are based) are presented more as archetypes than well-rounded individuals. Jennifer Lawrence’s Rosalyn has a manipulative quality to her that is used in the film largely to keep Irving in line and to sell the practicality of the budding relationship between DiMaso and Sydney. While Sydney and Irving seem to have instant and powerful chemistry, the viewer constantly wonders if the attraction Sydney has for DiMaso is just another scam. Amy Adams plays her attraction for Cooper’s DiMaso with an ambiguity that makes the potential for her character to betray him more obvious than surprising. Christian Bale’s best performances are when his character is at his most vulnerable. When he strides around confidently as a con artist, Bale’s Irving seems painfully familiar for anyone who enjoyed Bale in The Dark Knight Trilogy (reviewed here!). But, when Irving is preparing, when he is shaken, Bale is utterly convincing.

Those moments might be impressive moments of performance, but they are all part of the plot conceits one expects from a con film. In that regard, American Hustle has nothing new to offer viewers. Unlike Argo, where the educated viewer knows the resolution to the film before it begins, but the story is so effective that the viewer invests and is excited by the end, American Hustle fails to suck the viewer in so far. Instead, the rising action builds to the genre conceits the viewer expects as opposed to something surprising. Lacking surprise, American Hustle would have worked if the viewer cared about the characters, but the constant deceptions in the film make it hard to invest. That makes American Hustle worth watching and enjoying, but hardly the best film of the year.

For other works with Jennifer Lawrence, check out my reviews of:
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
The Hunger Games
X-Men: First Class
Like Crazy

6/10

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

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Summer Blockbuster Season’s Big Legitimate Hit Is Made With Man Of Steel!

The Good: Character, Most of the performances, Special effects
The Bad: Plot progression is painfully predictable.
The Basics: A complete reboot of Superman, Man Of Steel presents a more angsty version of Clark Kent and Kal-El and a bigger threat to Earth in his first real adventure.


I am not a fan of Superman. The character spent decades as a monolithic ideal who evolved from an ultra-powerful man who helped cats out of trees into a blandly virtuous, virtually invincible fighter for peace, justice, the “American Way” and the protection of Earth. In recent years, the Superman comic books have moved away from the absolutism that defined the character, but he’s not been placed in a situation like Wonder Woman where to save the world from an unstoppable killing machine, a human being has to die, like Wonder Woman did in The OMAC Project (reviewed here!). So, the idea of the new reboot of the Superman cinematic franchise with Man Of Steel had no inherent draw to me and, if anything, I was biased against it.

First, I felt bad for Bryan Singer and Brandon Routh. For all of the problems with Superman Returns (reviewed here!), Routh’s performance was not the reason the film failed. Routh took the blame much like Eric Bana did for Hulk (reviewed here!). And after seeing Immortals (reviewed here!), I was not convinced Henry Cavill was the one to take up the role of Clark Kent/Superman. But, with Man Of Steel he lands it and the film works becoming a surprisingly compelling super hero film that ups the stakes for the DC (cinematic) universe and gives viewers a smarter superhero film than they have seen in some time.

As an environmental calamity sweeps over the ancient planet Krypton, the infamous General Zod seizes the opportunity for a political coup. Opposing his political action, but agreeing with his desire to save the Kryptonian people, the scientist, Jor-El, makes a final bid to save the genetic coding of the planned Kryptonians. Sending his newborn son, Kal-El - the first naturally born Kryptonian in generations - off-planet, Jor-El seeks to save the Kryptonian genome. With his political revolution ending in failure, Zod and his forces are sentenced to a sleep prison in the phantom zone where they survive the destruction of Krypton.

Meanwhile, on Earth Kal-El grows up as the son of Jonathan and Martha Kent. Raised to be virtuous, kind, and giving, Jonathan also raised his adopted son to be cautious and not reveal his extraordinary abilities – like amazing strength and speed. Despite some incidents, like saving a bus load of children from an accident as a youth, Clark Kent (as Kal-El goes by in his life “passing” as a human) gets by. In his young adulthood, though, he begins to feel isolated and he starts to avoid people in order to not have his incredible abilities discovered. His journey of self discovery brings him to an abandoned craft frozen beneath a glacier that was also from Krypton. There, under the tutalege of a holographic version of his father he learns of his Kryptonian heritage.

In exploring his abilities, Kal-El comes to the attention of the U.S. military and Lois Lane, intrepid reporter from Metropolis. The curiosity about his nature, though, quickly is trumped when an alien invasion force arrives. Led by General Zod, Jor-El’s enemy, the Kryptonian force comes for Kal-El and when Zod’s forces begin laying waste to Earth, Kal-El decides to step up and become humanity’s savior.

Having recently watched the 1970’s Superman (reviewed here!), it is worth noting that Man Of Steel distances itself well from that vision of Superman. Man Of Steel is darker and works to fit Clark Kent into more of a real world than a fantastic or cinematic rendition of our world (though everyone looks Hollywood beautiful in Man Of Steel). Thus, Man Of Steel sacrifices much of the charm of Christopher Reeves’s Superman in favor of an outsider protagonist who is caught between using his powers to help people and struggling to avoid persecution that his alien nature will bring from the xenophobic and fearful humans (who could desperately use his help).

The biggest tone change is the lack of humor in Man Of Steel. This Clark Kent is not an “aww shucks” farm boy, he’s a guy who has methodically covered his tracks to avoid making a splash until normal human incident after normal human incident conspires to reveal his true nature (by him using his extraordinary and inhuman abilities to help other people). Man Of Steel has a few amusing lines, but for the most part, it is a much more stark, character-driven piece with a protagonist who is far more consciously created as an outsider than prior renditions (at least cinematically) of Superman have been. This, naturally, is expected of the director of Watchmen (reviewed here!) and Zack Snyder’s trend for delivering characters who face overwhelming odds and making smarter-than-average super hero films remains unchallenged.

Significant in Man Of Steel is the tone. The set-up for Clark Kent and coming to terms with his identity as Kal-El is appropriately belabored and conflicted, drawn out until General Zod returns to the narrative. But when Zod arrives at Earth, the film takes a somewhat troubling turn toward the familiar. Man Of Steel was delayed from a planned release last year and while the studio’s reason might be that they wanted to get the effects (especially 3-D conversion) right, it is not long into Zod’s reign of terror that loyal viewers of DC-based films will suspect that they did not want viewers to start noting the plot comparisons (the whole “under siege” plot) with The Dark Knight Rises (reviewed here!). And as one of the few fans of the cinematic Green Lantern (reviewed here!), the whole DC Universe problem with Man Of Steel is certainly the lack of presence of the space cops of the galaxy. After all, prior incarnations which had Clark Kent as the sole surviving Kryptonian did not exactly warrant the presence of the interstellar police force, but in Man Of Steel, Zod and his allies come in force with an invasion plan and weapons which seem like they would fall pretty safely under the purview of the Green Lantern Corps . . .

. . . so, Man Of Steel is plotted like a super hero origin story. That’s fine, it is what it is. The character front has Man Of Steel making a fresh take on the familiar elements of the Superman story and it makes Kal-El’s alien nature – something which the graphic novels have only focused on in the past few decades as a source of conflict with the more refined version of Lex Luthor – an issue that is presented in an unfortunately realistic way. Yes, human beings are not the most accepting race and Jonathan Kent is proven right for urging his son to be cautious in his exposing himself to humans. Human xenophobia and fear is a predominate theme in Man Of Steel (much like fear was in Batman Begins) and writers David S. Goyer and Christopher Nolan do a decent job of making the film about more than just an alien with incredible abilities and, instead, about broader themes about the state of humanity and how we treat one another. Fortunately, Clark Kent’s ethics prevent him from simply imposing growth on our backwards planet – a point which is driven home when General Zod and his soldiers come to extort humanity and destroy the masses who cannot reasonably stand in his way.

On the acting front, I wanted to start my commentary of Man Of Steel with the note that my longstanding disdain of Russell Crowe’s narrow acting range does not prevent me from openly acknowledging that he takes the role of Jor-El (who comparatively has exceptionally little screentime) and makes him empathetic and seem like a father deeply torn between having the life he wants (with his family) and trying to protect his son and his planet. Crowe is decent for the part of Jor-El and his performance makes the mentoring that Jor-El provides his son seem like more than banal exposition or bland moralizing and actually seem inspiring.

The supporting cast in Man Of Steel is fleshed out well. Like Crowe, Kevin Costner is given the role of Jonathan Kent, which could have been presented as campy or over-the-top and Costner delivers subtle and restrained. Michael Shannon’s General Zod is powerful in voice and posture, even if the character is incredibly monolithic and utterly unsympathetic and Richard Schiff and Christopher Meloni make their roles as Dr. Emil Hamilton and Colonel Hardy seem like quite a bit more than background characters. Schiff and Meloni embody their characters in such a way that makes them seem like their entire existence does not revolve around Kal-El, like they were living in a world before his appearance and they have other things going on besides him and the plot of Man Of Steel. I like the sense that such comparatively minor characters have an identity that is not simply built around the one story. Laurence Fishburne is characteristically great as Lois Lane’s boss at The Daily Planet, Perry White.

That brings us to Amy Adams. Adams plays Lois Lane in Man Of Steel and she brings all the pluck and determination fans of the Superman franchise would expect from Lois Lane. More importantly, Adams has great on-screen chemistry with the film’s star Henry Cavill.

Henry Cavill is more than just a pair of toned pectoral muscles and abs that won’t quit as Kal-El. Just as Christopher Reeve brought a wholesome and obviously kind disposition to his version of Clark Kent, Cavill is able to portray conflict and uncertainty well . . . then change it up plausibly with powerful and unafraid. At his best, Henry Cavill uses his eyes to emote and express the idea that Kal-El is terrified of what the people in the world will do to him, while knowing that he could change everything. His scenes opposite Michael Shannon’s Zod give him the chance to both show of physical strength and spout noble aphorisms.

On the effects front, Man Of Steel is good, but not (pardon the pun) super. I cannot speak to the 3-D, but the standard CG effects look great, though many of the attack sequences happen at a speed that does not allow the viewer to appreciate them or the consequences of them. So, for example, the shots of Kal-El’s cape when he is in his Kryptonian suits looks real (Snyder and his effects team got the effects right) and the digital models of Cavill when he is flying look like they are in the real world as well. But at the other end of the spectrum, characters moving with super speed are basically a blink of an eye and buildings fall and ships fire without enough time to truly appreciate the level of special effects devastation as the scenes are occurring. Snyder owes a great debt to Firefly (reviewed here!) for the style with the camerawork blending with the effects and at times it is nauseating, but in general the effects are decent.

Despite the issues where Man Of Steel is plotted like a familiar super hero origin story, the film feels fresher than most and is not only solidly entertaining, it makes a decent commentary on the human and alien here on Earth.

For other live-action DC superhero works, please check out my reviews of:
The Dark Knight Trilogy
Jonah Hex
Watchmen
Catwoman
Batman: The Motion Picture Anthology 1989 - 1997
Supergirl
Wonder Woman

7/10

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

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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P.T. Anderson Loses It (And Me) With The Master!

The Good: Costumes, Cinematography
The Bad: Plot, Acting, Characters, Lack of spark
The Basics: The Master is P.T. Anderson’s cinematic low point.


I am a fan of P.T. Anderson’s works. In fact, I like the guy, too. I had the chance to meet him a few years back in Rochester, New York, when Boogie Nights and Punch-Drunk Love were inducted into the permanent collection at the George Eastman House. I know I was the biggest fan of P.T. Anderson’s works at the screening and Q&A session because I was the only person who asked a question (two, actually) that could not have been asked by simply watching any of P.T. Anderson’s films with the commentary tracks on (or any of the other bonus features). It was pretty cool to stump the director of a film by asking an insightful, unexpected question.

Living in Northern Michigan, there was nowhere local that was getting P.T. Anderson’s latest film, The Master. So, as the centerpiece to my birthday celebration, my wife and I drove 282.4 miles (round trip) to go downstate to one of the theaters that was playing The Master. All of this is to explain just how much I appreciate the works of P.T. Anderson and how much I was looking forward to The Master. Only when a reader understands that about me and understands that I have not at all changed my standards to review the film, can they understand the full impact and truth behind my analysis of the experience of seeing The Master in theaters:

The flavoring on the popcorn, a bacon cheddar sprinkle on flavoring, and the orange frozen drink that tasted exactly like a creamsicle, were the high points of the film experience.

Yes, as unfortunate as it is to say, P.T. Anderson managed to make his utter dud right after one of my other favorite directors, Kevin Smith, made his big dud. Red State (reviewed here!) was a real shift in Kevin Smith’s works and it made for an abrupt change in his works, isolating much of his fan base. The Master is a similarly abrupt and disturbingly bad work by P.T. Anderson. (Terry Gilliam’s next work had better not suck, lest I lose my faith in American filmmakers altogether!)

For fans of P.T. Anderson, The Master shows some incredible departures from P.T. Anderson’s style and expertise. Unlike his prior works, the film is noticeably lacking in an immediate musical impression (Anderson frequently uses music to enhance mood and establish character aspects and conflicts that are not immediately evident) and the silence that opens the film is continued through the awkward and consistently unpleasant characters and the aimless, plotless, story. The Master lacks the strong themes, articulate dialog, interesting characters, and all-around excellence in filmmaking that one expects from P.T. Anderson.

Freddie Quell is a veteran coming out of the second World War. Pretty much a psychopath who can’t keep a job and who drinks any liquid that he comes across – fluid from bombs, photographic chemicals, etc. – Quell is having trouble adjusting to post-war life. One night, he sneaks on a ship, the boat that Lancaster Dodd and his family are traveling on. Following his daughter’s wedding on the ship, Lancaster – known as The Master to most around him – and his wife Peggy reveal that Lancaster is working on his second book and he and his followers are doing research aboard the boat.

Quell falls in with the group, becoming a de facto enforcer against those who speak out against the teachings of the Master. Struggling to quit drinking and reign in his animal impulses, Freddie finds himself in conflict with the burgeoning philosophical group. As Lancaster Dodd releases his second book, his followers and Freddie find themselves in a state of perpetual conflict.

The Master includes Anderson’s regular Philip Seymour Hoffman and Hoffman seems lost amid Anderson’s uncharacteristically droll dialogue. Lancaster Dodd hardly speaks like a human being and the lack of poetics in the script make one feel like they are listening to a composer who suddenly lost all ability to hear music. Anderson’s language has previously had a music to it, but The Master is entirely tonedeaf.

Joaquin Phoenix plays Freddie Quell and the entire length of The Master all I saw was Sean Penn. Phoenix is performing Sean Penn in one of Penn’s eccentric roles and he’s doing a second-rate impression. Freddie Quell is twitchy and drunk, with an incestuous past and a pedophilic desire for a local girl he left year before. Phoenix sells the role only to the extent that he gets through the part, making one believe he is actually drinking toxic beverages. But for the most part, Joaquin Phoenix plays Sean Penn playing a twitchy jerk.

Amy Adams is similarly unimpressive as Peggy, Lancaster’s wife. Very early on in the film, she presents the character in such a way that makes it clear that she is the Master, the puppeteer behind the puppet that is Lancaster.

But that simple reversal does not make The Master any more intriguing or good. Instead, the most the film has going for it is one or two stray shots (the water behind the boat at the opening and middle of the film is very pretty) and the costuming which clearly establishes the 1950s exceptionally well. The rumor surrounding The Master is that Scientologists had problems with the film because of the cultlike nature of Dodd’s works and the devotion of his followers (many of which parallel Philip K. Dick’s creation of Scientology). While some Scientologists might take issue with the idea that the author, like Lancaster Dodd, just made things up as he went along, far more offensive (I would suspect) is how the movie is just plain bad. After all, it is one thing to have one’s religion, cult, or belief system lampooned, it is entirely another to have it play a mediocre role in a terrible film with underdeveloped characters, a lousy sense of conflict, an utter lack of visual or auditory poetry, and performances that only highlight the lack of a crisp script.

For other films by P.T. Anderson, please check out my reviews of:
Hard Eight
Boogie Nights
Magnolia
Punch-Drunk Love

2/10

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

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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More Funny Than Not, Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby Amuses.

The Good: Funny parody, Opens John C. Reilly up to comedy beautifully, Decent DVD bonus features
The Bad: Some predictable humor, pacing
The Basics: Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby might not be a perfect comedy, but it has a lot of humor that endures from the broad attacks on NASCAR/NASCAR culture!


When one becomes involved romantically with another, they tend to share things. I think that is actually one of the more exciting aspects of relationships and I have found myself more delighted than not to share my DVD collection with my partner and have my partner share DVDs with me. This has led me to watch any number of movies - mostly comedies - that I would not have otherwise checked out. Indeed, when I sat down to watch the copy of Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby from my partner's shelf, I did so with the thought that this was one of the last movies in the world that I would have guessed I would ever watch.

That said, this Will Ferrell comedy that saw Ferrell pairing with one of my favorites - John C. Reilly - actually was amusing and offered enough for me to watch it not just once, but pretty much whenever my partner sits down to watch it. If that's not love, I don't know what is! In truth, though, Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby does what it sets out to do; it is funny and the performers in it get behind their roles in completely convincing ways. In other words, despite any of the movie's faults, I laughed . . . a lot. This is, at the very least, what one ought to demand of their comedies and the truth is, I had fun watching this movie.

Growing up without a father, NASCAR racer Ricky Bobby feels the need for speed and does little in his life well outside race cars. With his hot wife, Carley, and best friend Cal Naughton Jr., Ricky Bobby wins every race he is put into. But when a French Formula One driver comes to America to race Ricky Bobby, Bobby and Naughton feel threatened. Engaging the Frenchman in a race, Bobby's car is damaged and he is psychologically wounded, arguably also as a result of his deadbeat dad showing back up in his life.

Recovering from his failure to beat the Frenchman, Ricky Bobby works his way back from losing everything to try to race again. In the process, Cal takes his wife, wins a race on his own and Ricky Bobby must learn to stand on his own two feet (not as much of a problem given that his crash did not actually break his legs). As he comes back from incredible odds, he learns the true value of friendship and romance and racing.

Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby is, at its core, a parody of the sports movies where the protagonist struggles against very real obstacles and odds to overcome adversities that illustrate their prowess and skill. Writers Will Ferrell and Adam McKay (who directed the film) picked the perfect sport to make a parody of sports movies with. Ricky Bobby is part of a national phenomenon where people sit and watch other people drive fast in a circle. Having been a runner, I can understand racing around a track (though cross country was always more interesting as a runner than track was) and the athleticism involved. But NASCAR racing is much more about equipment and avoiding other contestants than anything having to do with skill or even willpower. As a result, characters like Ricky Bobby who are hapless idiots make for probable and fun protagonists in movies just like this one. In other words, by picking NASCAR to make fun of, writer/director McKay hits a goldmine; the struggle back to greatness is as simple and witless as the task of getting to "greatness" in the first place.

Ricky Bobby, then, is a great protagonist for just such a struggle of ridiculous proportions. Bobby possesses no special skills, but a desire to go fast and his complete pursuit of that goal. Moreover, because Ricky Bobby surrounds himself with doormats like Carley and Cal, he is able to achieve greatness equally through his own efforts and those of others not improving themselves. So, because Cal promises to let Ricky Bobby win and he is content to be in second place for years, Ricky Bobby becomes a celebrity. Cal enjoys the light near the spotlight and Cal enjoys the vicarious benefits of winning. But when Cal challenges the dynamic and Ricky Bobby is challenged by the Frenchman and the reappearance of his father, the utter lack of skill that got Ricky Bobby where he ended up becomes pretty evident.

Obvious comedies have to be looked at for exactly what they are and Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby does not promise to be anything either terribly unique or extraordinarily complex. Instead, it takes a simple premise - mocking sports movies and NASCAR culture - and running with it. Will Farrell is the perfect performer to embody such a quirky and dim sports figure and he hams it up, though in truth this is not an exceptional leap from his caricature of George W. Bush. As Ricky Bobby, Ferrell screws up his face in a blank expression and looks confused for laughs. Between that and selling such gags as telling off his father-in-law when his children act up at the dinner table, Farrell reminds viewers why he is considered a wonderful comedian without truly offering the viewer anything new outside delivering new lines.

The person who does rock Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby is actor John C. Reilly. Perfect as a dramatic heavy, Reilly becomes the ultimate costar for Ferrell by playing off him and accenting Ferrell's absurd sense of physical comedy with a strong deadpan ability. Reilly is surprisingly adept with his comic timing, something bound to surprise fans of his more respected works. Together Reilly and Ferrell lead the supporting cast of Sacha Baron Cohen, David Koechner, and Gary Cole to a good number of laughs.

On DVD, the movie has a decent number of bonus features, including a commentary track and a number of deleted scenes. There are alternate takes which are certainly not appropriate for the PG-13 audience, but the movie is not exactly oriented toward that market anyway. The DVD has enough in the way of featurettes and comedic gags to make the DVD worthwhile for comedy fans.

But the movie is predictable and the humor is not classy. But for those looking for sophomoric and fun, Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby actually delivers and it makes good use of talented performers who pull out the stops to entertain!

For other works with Gary Cole, please check out my reviews of:
Extract
Psych - Season 3
Pineapple Express
The West Wing
Crusade
Office Space

7/10

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

© 2012, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Half Worthwhile, Half Annoying, Ultimately Worth Only One Viewing: Julie & Julia Disappoints.

The Good: The entire Julia Child plot, Most of the performances
The Bad: Almost the entire Julie Powell plot, Moments when Streep slips out of character
The Basics: Erratic in the way it mixes a past and contemporary plot, Julie & Julia is lackluster chick flick fare which fails to resonate even with its target demographic.


[Note: As there are almost no experiences my mother and I shared together, I am opting to keep the opening to this review – which was originally written based on a preview screening of the film over a month prior to the cinematic release – unchanged. Enjoy!

There are few times I actually consider the theatrical experience, despite the fact that I often find myself these days in crowded movie theaters watching the latest movies with large audiences. But sometimes, I encounter something of note that leaves me baffled and feeling the need to discuss the phenomenon outside the work that inspired it. Today, what has me baffled was a result of the film Julie & Julia. I caught an early screening of the film a few nights ago - I was able to take my mother, which made her happy, as she is a big fan of Nora Ephron's works - and as the movie plodded along, I watched and listened to the audience. There were few laughs, few moments when anyone reacted. I thought this odd because preview screenings like the one I attended tend to be filled with people who are predisposed toward a work. Throughout the movie, the audience was largely quiet; they did not laugh, they did not cheer, they did not react for almost the entire film. But when the movie was over, the horde of women (the screening was predominately women) began to erupt into enthusiastic conversations about how much they had enjoyed the movie they had just seen.

Here's the thing, I'm a respectful first-viewer, but I find myself smiling, laughing or otherwise reacting during movies. As a seasoned viewer and reviewer, it did not take me long to realize that the reason I was able to observe so much of the audience during Julie & Julia was because I was largely bored with the movie. I suspect that most of the screening audience was and while there were certainly elements to praise about Julie & Julia, on the balance it is an erratic work whose most significant moments were shown in the preview trailers and that this is a film where the longer people have away from it, the less they will enjoy about it. In fact, my bet would be that people who were at the same screening as me would have little to say about the movie other than "Meryl Streep was great as Julia Child." She was, but even her performance was not flawless and one has to wonder why director Nora Ephron included certain takes in the film's final print.

Julie & Julia is a blending of two stories, poorly, one contemporary, one from the past. In 1945, Julia Child and her husband, Paul, arrive in France to work at the United States Embassy. As Paul establishes himself, Julia flounders and searches for something to do which will make her feel (and be) useful. In 2002, Julie Powell arrives with her husband Eric in Queens where the two take up residence over a pizza place so Eric may be closer to his work. Amid the pressure from her successful friends, Julie strives to actually do something with her life, as she spends her days working for the Lower Manhattan Development Corp and has no real authority of zest in her life.

Julie's solution is to start a blog and for one year, she begins going through the recipes of Julia Child from Child's famous book on cooking French cuisine. As Julie struggles to maintain her goal and grows in popularity on the internet, the film looks back to Julia Child, who becomes one of the first women to take advanced cooking lessons at the prestigious French culinary school, Le Cordon Bleu. As she learns to cook, she finds herself in the company of two French women who are looking to teach cooking and sell a book in the United States on French cooking.

The plot is remarkably simple and the title implies it all and the film's trailers reveal it all: Julie Powell seeks gratification and acknowledgment as a writer by taking on the task of cooking all 524 recipes in Julia Child's cookbook over the course of 365 days. While she wends her way through the cookbook, the film flashes back to the process of Julia Child becoming the world-renowned chef she was ultimately considered. The only question potential viewers will have after seeing the trailer is "Does Julie Powell succeed in her goal?"

The problem is, after the first few minutes of the movie, it is almost impossible to care. (Actually, attentive viewers to the trailer can figure out the answer as some of the final shots from the film are in the revealing promotional trailer.) The viewer knows the outcome of the Julia Child plot: Child will succeed in getting her cookbook published and readers everywhere will eventually flock to it. So, the only question in the Julia Child section is "how does Child get the book published?" Unfortunately, much of the beginning of the movie is bogged down with the Julie Powell plot and it is such a dud that it almost instantly crushes the momentum of the film.

Julie Powell, in Julie & Julia (I've never met the Julie Powell in real life) is boring, whiny and utterly without qualities worth watching. She complains about her job and the move with her husband and as she whines through the early scenes, viewers are unlikely to care whether or not she makes a goal and sticks to it, we just want her to grow up! In fact, her irksome tendency to complain is epitomized in such melodramatic phrases as "Ritual cobb salad lunch tomorrow. Dreading. Dreading. Dreading." In this stereotypical chick-flick scene, Julie gets together with her three friends, they all order variants of cobb salads and complain about their work (though her friends spend most of the time on their cell phones or digital voice recorders). Powell is characterized not so much as a woman who has friends with incongruent lifestyles, but rather as a woman content to be walked all over by her friends and otherwise neglected. When Powell declares that she has thoughts she could blog about, it comes at a point where most viewers will not care what those thoughts are and as she winds through the recipes in Julia Child's cookbook, the cooking takes place as quick cuts and final product shots and most of the plot is mired in the melodrama of Powell's home life.

By contrast, the Julia Child sections of the movie are wonderful and they become a welcome respite for the viewer from the whiny, annoying and over-the-top Powell. The irony here is that Julia Child is a tall, loud, energetic woman who is presented as over-the-top, but her struggles are more compelling and interesting than the faux-conflicts that come up with Powell, who has disproportionately (childlike) meltdowns over them. Child labors for respect only after she is actualized by her desire to be useful to herself and her husband. Her sections of the film are welcome respites from the Powell plot and the moment the film shifts back from the past to contemporary times, my stomach sank almost every time.

Nora Ephron, who adapted the books this movie was based upon into the screenplay and then directed the film, does a decent job of creating the two stories and developing them, but she is trapped using material that is half wonderful, half not so much. Ephron, who proved her ability to write complex and engaging romantic storylines with When Harry Met Sally is unfortunately given two stories that do not work nearly so well interweaving with Julie & Julia; and Ephron sure tries. Opening with what might seem like a schmaltzy shot of ground zero in Manhattan, Ephron quickly recovers by explaining away the use of the World Trade Center rubble for the necessary explanation of Julie Powell's ennui. Ephron then attempts to make parallels between not only the characters of Julie Powell and Julia Child (both government workers, both escaped their monotony through cooking, both were married, etc.) but the time periods. And while there are great parallels to be made between the early 1950s and the rise of McCarthyism and the reign of George W. Bush, Ephron makes weak connections. Paul Child is targeted by McCarthy and his goons and he and Julia suffer transfers as a result. Julie Powell and her husband have no similar political ramifications for their backstories, so Ephron's attempt falls terribly short (for a much better peek into the McCarthy-like parallels during the George W. Bush years, please check out Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip, reviewed here).

One of the things Ephron does quite well is not insult the intelligence of her audience. Julia Child is motivated in this by a need to feel useful, at least in part, by the fact that she is barren. One scene easily establishes this idea without making it explicit and another reinforces it wonderfully. Ephron never states it directly and this is a pleasant surprise for viewers. Unfortunately, so much of the rest of Julie & Julia is formulaic in the most unpleasant ways. As a result, Julie and her husband have all of the predictable conflicts and reconciliations that the film seems to feel the need to have. Unfortunately, they are formulaic and they are presented without any real emotional depth to them.

What Ephron does well is she fixes her mediocre recipe using great ingredients. Amy Adams is hard to discuss as Julie Powell because the character is so annoying and difficult to watch and her costar, Chris Messina is relegated to generic spouse status as Eric Powell, but both seem to be adequate in Julie & Julia. Meryl Streep is amazing as Julia Child, though. Ephron cast Streep perfectly and Streep lives up to the challenge, creating the flamboyant and fun Child in a way that makes it possible for the viewer to close their eyes and hear Julia Child perfectly. Unfortunately, even Streep's performance is not the absolute gem most would want it to be. While Streep is great, there are at least three moments in the film where Streep stops using the Julia Child voice and falls into her own. These moments stand out as memorable because in those few moments, Streep does not even carry herself the way she does the rest of the movie.

But the one who never slips is Stanley Tucci. It might seem odd in a film geared toward women with an amazing cast of prestigious or great actresses that the most laudable performance would come from a man, but Stanley Tucci does it perfectly as Paul Child. He plays Paul with a great emotional range, from quiet and supportive to eager and giddy and in every moment, he is unlike any other character he has played. His performance is so good, one wishes that he were in the movie more and that this had simply been a film about the life of Paul and Julia Child.

Ultimately, the best I can recommend is if you have the chance, see Julie & Julia once, but when it comes out on DVD don't bother with adding it to your collection. And in the hard and fast system of "thumbs up, thumbs down" or "recommend, not recommend," this is too tough a sell to advocate recommending. There is just not enough to keep viewers engaged and certainly not enough to come back to again and again.

For other works with Amy Adams, be sure to check out my reviews of:
Leap Year
Charlie Wilson’s War

6/10

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

© 2012, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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