(no subject)
Titles Covered: Kubo and the Two Strings, The Mermaid, Backdraft, Boy and the World, 10 Cloverfield Lane, Hail Caesar, Kung Fu Panda 3, Jason Bourne.
Kubo and the Two Strings (**** and a half)
Folks, see this movie.
Look, I understand why the best movies often don't make the most money. It's no surprise to me that Room and Spotlight made much less than the latest Fast and Furious movie. But Laika has made an exciting, beautiful, family-friendly movie with fanciful characters and epic fight scenes, and audiences have completely ignored it. That makes me sad.
The story of “Kubo” concerns a family of celestial beings from the Moon kingdom. Kubo carries their legacy, but hides on earth among the mortals, only using his magical powers to entertain the villagers. When a pair of creepy moon sisters attack his village, Kubo must go on a quest to obtain the mystical armament needed to fight back. The movie is sort of like “The Legend of Zelda,” complete with quests and boss fights.
The plot might not sound terribly great, but it's helped enormously by the fantastic world-building and great characters. The film has its own mythology, one which isn't always explicitly explained, but illustrated such that you can follow along and fill in the gaps. The characters have a lot of soul to them, particularly “Monkey,” a grumpy talking animal sidekick who provides a surprising amount of wisdom. Even minor side-characters, like George Takei's cameo (including his famous catchphrase...), exude charm and emotions. This is a movie that tugs on the heartstrings a lot.
On that note, I love that this movie challenges kids. While the content stays safely within the PG rating, the movie challenges its audience to feel, to think, to wonder, and to be afraid. The villains are frightening, the heroes face death and disability, and Kubo has to learn some serious lessons. “The stronger you get; the more you are challenged,” quips Monkey, dealing hard truth to a generation that might believe that everything gets easier in adulthood.
Of course, the imagery is also beautiful, welding stop-motion puppetry with CGI. Stop motion cartoons often take place in constrained locations (because they require physical sets), but Kubo takes place in a vast world with endless landscapes. The effect is that the characters retain the hard, physical look of puppets while also allowing the scale and action of CGI movies. And oh my lord does the action get good! Two scenes in particular that deserve mention: In one, the characters battle a monster so large, that the real-life puppet had to be built 16 feet tall in order to preserve proper scale with the main characters. However, my favorite bit was a more personal battle, between Monkey and a masked villain. The fight is absolutely furious, and setting it aboard a sinking ship makes it all the better.
Flaws? Um... The ending is a bit weird, and that's probably the biggest issue. The defeat of the main villain is unexpected, but also seemed a bit cheap. Also, there's a repeated edit where a fight scene will end abruptly with a fade-to-white, which gets old fast.
Kubo and the Two Strings is the best movie Laika has made since Coraline, and probably the best movie of the year so far. It deserves to be seen by every child who can handle a slightly more intense cartoon.
The Mermaid (*** and a half)
Believe it or not, but The Mermaid is one of the highest-grossing movies of 2016, having made about half a billion dollars in China. This is why more and more American movies are adding Chinese actors and settings. The Mermaid is a dark comedy by Stephen Chow (Shaolin Soccer) about a mermaid who falls in love with a human. I know what you're thinking... it's the same as Splash and Little Mermaid, right? Well, not really. The titular mermaid is an endangered species, and most of her people have died or fallen ill due to pollution. When their last habitat is threatened by a real estate mogul, mermaid “Shan” mutilates her fin in order to walk upright like a human, and goes on land to kill the man threatening her species. However, she turns out to be the world's worst assassin, and the land developer falls in love with her instead. What follows is a bizarre adventure that combines silly slapstick comedy with political commentary and some shocking violence.
The humor is very effective, and translates surprisingly well to an American audience. Physical comedy is pretty universally understood, and some of sequences are like something out of a Pink Panther movie. Especially delightful is the long slapstick sequence of Shan failing miserably as an assassin. It seemed a little weird to see a woman on the receiving end of slapstick violence, but the movie finds the right balance. The movie is very good at obeying the rule “show, don't tell”, so even the puns and absurdism make sense translated to English. I laughed hard at scenes like a police sketch artist struggling to draw a mermaid based on a worded description.
There are some major weaknesses that must be acknowledged. The CGI is weak, bearing resemblance to effects-heavy movies of the mid-to-late 90's. Also, there's a few scenes and gags that fall flat. In particular, a weird scene with an octopus chef is both hard to believe and very gross.
The Mermaid is fun and funny. The plot gets a bit weird and violent towards the end, but the movie is a winner, and well worth watching even if you're not into foreign cinema.
Backdraft (***)
Backdraft is one of those movies that I know well from the Universal Studios show. Also, it was a rated-R movie that came out right when I was too young to see them, but old enough to be interested. However, I never actually watched it back then, save for a few bits on TV.
I feel like the 90's was a great decade for experimentation in special effects, and Backdraft is mostly known for its elaborate pyrotechnics. Though there are some shady humans doing evil things, the real villain is “fire,” and the flames are portrayed as an adversary with a life of its own. The movie uses extensive practical fire effects to create all types of fires: slow burns, explosions, creeping flames, and fiery whirlwinds. It's really cool, and adds a lot to the movie. The action scenes are staged very well, creating a constant sense of danger, and some fist-pumping heroic moments.
The story on the other hand... It's OK. The plot is a very standard thriller template, just with firemen instead of police officers. Thus, the beats are all very predictable, and the drama feels flat. There are a few actors who stand out, however. The best is Donald Sutherland, as a loopy pyromaniac. He plays a role similar to Hannibal Lector in Silence of the Lambs, as the scary guy whose crimes and downfall occurred prior to the movie's timeline. There's also an interesting subplot concerning Kurt Russell's character, who is separated from his wife and child. Although the couple are clearly very much in love, their relationship has been strained by Russell's hero complex, which constantly puts him in danger. Alas, the other female character doesn't fare so well. Jennifer Jason Leigh plays a disposable love interest who exists for the purpose of a sex scene (on top of a firetruck...), after which she promptly disappears from the story.
Overall, Backdraft holds up for what it is. See it for the special effects and action scenes, and a story that won't make you cringe too much.
Boy and the World (** and a half)
At this year's Academy awards, there were five nominees in the Animated category: Inside Out (the well-deserving winner), Shaun the Sheep (super-cute, but not terribly substantial), When Marnie was There (interesting if unexceptional), Anomalisa (blah...), and this strange Brazilian cartoon. Boy and the World might be the weirdest movie to ever be nominated for Best Animated Picture. It's not even a traditional movie. It's more like a class project made by that weirdo art student you knew in high school.
The movie has no dialogue, little cohesive plot, and no consistency in setting. Very little about the movie can be taken literally, since everything is dripping in symbolism and abstract imagery. If I were to take the movie literally, I'd tell you that it's about a boy who was raised by his future time traveling self after his dad was cloned to fuel a war machine designed to fight a giant bird made of yarn. Seriously.
I'm a little torn on this movie. It certainly has its moments of brilliance, and some of the animation, imagery, and music is fantastic. An early segment of an endless field of cotton-pickers shows what simple animation can do at its best. When Boy and the World running on all cylinders, it's kind of a magical experience. The problem is that most of the movie isn't that great, and the various bits don't connect very well. It's hard to follow the movie because it's so abstract and disjointed.
For what it's worth, I did think the movie came together in the last 20 minutes. After an hour of randomness, the ending sort of ties everything together into a statement about the effects of industrialization and war machines. There are some powerful moments, and the brief use of live-action footage is well-placed.
Boy and the World is interesting art... but bad entertainment. Serious animation buffs will be interested in it, but I think everyone else can skip it.
10 Cloverfield Lane (****)
Apparently, 10 Cloverfield Lane is a semi-sequel to the 2008 movie Cloverfield, although the plot connections are loose at best. Also, there is no “found footage” camerawork (Thank. God.) and the characters are much more interesting than those in Cloverfield.
Near the beginning of the movie, Mary Elizabeth Winstead wakes up in a concrete bunker after surviving a near-fatal car accident. Her captor (a very scary John Goodman) claims to have rescued her and locked her in the bunker to protect her from a chemical-weapon terrorist attack. Or maybe it's actually a nuclear war with the Russians. Or maybe it's an alien invasion. John Goodman is definitely completely nuts... but could he also be telling the truth? As the saying goes, even a broken clock is right twice a day.
On the surface, 10 Cloverfield Lane might seem like an average thriller with above-average actors. However, the movie excels at constantly adding new layers to its premise, such that initial assumptions about the story and the characters have to be constantly revised. In other words, imagine a movie with 3 Shyamalan “twists,” except that the twists build on the previously-established rules rather than contradicting them.
The ending might divide people, but I loved it. To me, it took a small-scale conflict and a larger-scale conflict and synergized them, such that the small one had more context and the larger one felt more real. The final decision of the main character wraps up an arc that had been continuing since the first scene, and is a fist-pumping “hell yeah!” moment.
10 Cloverfield Lane is one of those movies that's great to watch exactly once. A lot of the appeal of the movie is the way it plays on your expectations, and simultaneously fulfills and subverts them. It might not hold up well once you know where the story is going, but it's a fantastically enjoyable first view.
Hail, Caesar! (**)
Well, this disappointing...
I've never been a big fan of the Coen Brothers, but this seemed like a sure-fire win. A colorful, satirical re-creation of 1950's Hollywood with big musical numbers and Scarlet Johanson doing a water ballet? Sign me up!
And indeed, Hail, Caesar does have some delightful in-jokes about the film industry and classic Hollywood in particular. The titular “Hail, Caesar” movie-within-a-movie is a clear rip-off of Ben Hur, and one of the best scenes shows a producer consulting with Jewish, Catholic, Protestant, and Eastern Orthodox clergymen to ensure that the movie does not offend anyone. Meanwhile, there are jokes about manufactured romances, tabloid journalists, charismatic actors who can't actually act, and the vast distance between the performer and their public image. Scarlet Johanson does a startling transformation mid-scene: she's presented as a glamorous starlet until she suddenly drops the act and turns into something else entirely.
For all that, the movie simply doesn't work. Hail Caesar contains a lot of set-ups with no punchlines. Early on we're introduced to twin sisters who are rival gossip reporters. It's a great concept that's completely wasted, as the characters never confront each other or have anything to do with the plot. Scarlet Johanson isn't relevant to the plot at all, and neither is Ralph Feinnes. Channing Tatum is apparently an important character, but he completely lacks backstory and motivations, so his whole inclusion seems completely random. Meanwhile the cowboy character only interacts with the story through random coincidence, and never really wraps up his character arc. The whole script feels like an unfinished draft of cool ideas that were never fleshed out. They central story about Communist screenwriters should have been a hilarious send-up of the HUAC panic, but instead it's just a mildly amusing subplot without an ending.
I loved the portrayal of golden-age Hollywood, but the rest of the movie is a mixed bag at best. The sad thing is... I was probably the perfect target for this movie, being a lover of this era in film history and someone who's studied Arthur Miller's interrogation by HUAC. Better luck next time.
Kung Fu Panda 3 (** and a half)
The original Kung Fu Panda was a huge hit, especially in Asia, so naturally it got a sequel. I actually liked Kung Fu Panda 2 much better than the original, for its wacky fight scenes and interesting villain. I hoped to find similar quality in Kung Fu Panda 3... and to be honest, I watched this movie a few weeks ago and am straining to remember half of it.
It was OK, I think, but not much better. There was this interesting idea early on that giant pandas are masters of chi. That would actually make sense in the mythology of the series, explaining why pandas are a threat to the bad guys we had seen in the previous movies. Minor spoiler: This idea is squandered, since the pandas don't know anything about chi (or much else, for that matter), until suddenly they do for no reason. By the way the villain is basically the same as the first movie: a boring growly guy who wants some source of power that turns out to be totally underwhelming. Except that this bad guy uses the chain-swords from “God of War.” I guess that's something.
Truth be told, the movie is fine. It's well-animated, and some of the jokes and fight scenes are fun There is a bit of heart in a subplot revolving around Po meeting his biological father, and the subsequent rivalry between two dads. Overall, Kung Fu Panda 3 is OK kids fare, but also an underwhelming continuation of the series.
Jason Bourne (***)
The original Bourne Identity was a surprisingly good film that turned Matt Damon into an action star. I remember liking the sequels alright, but I also can't really remember what happened in them. It's all a blur. After a spinoff with Jeremy Remner, the series is back with Matt Damon in a long-awaited continuation. The new Jason Bourne is pretty much more of the same, for better or worse.
Once again, Bourne will uncover some stuff about his forgotten past, team up with a girl, and run away from evil secret agents. Once again, the fights are furious, and the camerawork is way to shaky. And once again, there's a premise that is sort of interesting but also kind of inconsequential to the framework of the movie. If you liked the previous movies and want more, you'll get what you expect.
That said, there are a two things that really stood out to me. The first was an action scene set during a riot. The integration with real-life politics (in this case, the Greek economic crisis) is clever, and I loved the chaos and intricacy of setting an extended chase scene amid a full-scale riot with hundreds of people going berserk. It's really an impressive feat.
The second thing that stood out to me is the performance of Alicia Vickander, as a CIA analyst with ambiguous motives. She's sort of on Bourne's side, but clearly has her own agenda, and provides an interesting foil. I wish her subplot had been given more resolution... but sequel needs prevail over all, I guess.
Jason Bourne is solid summer fare. It's nothing amazing, but I wasn't disappointed.