Film Review - THE INTERNSHIP

What’s become of Vince Vaughn? That once great, lumbering huckster motormouth, whose inspired rat-a-tat-tat stream-of-consciousness verbal diarrhea propelled hits like The Wedding Crashers and Swingers? I sincerely miss that Vaughn, because there’s little endearing about watching him transform into a hollow corporate shill. As if the 2012 alien invader Costco commercial The Watch wasn’t bad enough, he’s back with The Internship, a weary “comic” tribute to the infinite wonders of Google. And he’s even dragged along his wedding crashing buddy Owen Wilson for company! Shameless. Just shameless.

Co-written and produced by the lanky star, The Internship is a stale trudge through the dustiest tropes in Comedy Land. Both a fish-out-of-water yarn and an Animal House-style Nerds vs. Jocks underdog story, the film casts Vaughn and Wilson as over-confident salesmen who find themselves tossed out on their asses after their small-time outfit collapses. Computer-illiterate and without job skills, the duo inexplicably snag intern spots at almighty Google after one wildly disastrous video conference interview. Assigned to a group with four other misfits — the cynical kid who hates everything (Dylan O’Brien), the hyper-anxious Asian boy with severe mommy issues (Tobit Raphael), the white nerd who acts gangsta (Josh Brener) and the sexy girl who’s more innocent than she acts (Tiya Sircar) — the guys must undergo a grueling series of team challenges (Quidditch included) with only a precious handful of jobs awaiting the champions.

The dusty screenplay for The Internship, co-written by Jared Stern, feels a decade old (neither lead understands the term “online”) and has zero surprises up its sleeves as it lazily meanders through clichés we’ve seen done better elsewhere. The cute-but-icy female romantic interest (Rose Byrne) who refuses to date Wilson? A life-changing trip to a strip club where the most introverted team-member goes drunken loco? How about a huge public comeuppance for our heroes’ cartoonishly sadistic nemesis (Max Minghella)?

In clever hands, these chestnuts might be more effective, however, under the eye of directorial gun-for-hire Shawn Levy (Night at the Museum, Real Steel), The Internship has no energy, no sense of urgency. It’s as safe and lethargically middle-of-the-road stupid as a Happy Madison production, only with 10 times the product placement. Incessant Google business aside – all of the company’s accomplishments is exhaustively catalogued – the film also crowbars in multiple awkward X-Men references. Why, you ask? Probably because the studio, 20th Century Fox, is releasing The Wolverine next month (Huzza for cross-promotion!).

Damned as the whole enterprise is, Vaughn and Wilson are still an engaging team and manage some amusing riffing. The picture is not devoid of very mild laughs (Wilson’s date with Byrne features some fun banter, and Vaughn’s countless Flashdance metaphors earn smiles). Yet, it’d likely be more entertaining to watch two hours of these actors improv-ing in front of a sheet than to sit through this crass, opportunistic exercise in brand-brainwashing. It’s a criminal waste of time, for the talent and the audience. In fact, The Internship is so dumbly condescending in its intentions that you may even – crazy as it sounds – find yourself debating whether to give Bing another chance.

1.5 out of 5

*Originally published at BeatRoute Magazine.

Film Review - NOW YOU SEE ME

“The secret impresses no one. The trick you use it for is everything.”
 - Christian Bale, The Prestige.

In his captivating, noir-tinged 2006 dueling illusionists tale, Christopher Nolan touched upon an essential truth about both the art of magic and cinema that’s beautifully expressed in the above quote. Essentially, that film argued that, though audiences yearn to be surprised and astonished, learning the methods behind the manipulation only leaves them feeling unsatisfied. Further, the skills and technique – no matter how clever - are ultimately meaningless if the act isn’t up to snuff.

Such is the case with Now You See Me, director Louis Leterrier’s lively-but-disappointing magic-themed caper thriller, which brings boundless energy and Hollywood flash-and-dazzle to a fairly unspectacular show. You certainly can’t blame the gimmick – a quartet of illusionists pulling off impossible crimes while being pursued by the law – because it’s a damn neat hook. No, the problem here is that, for all of the convoluted cinematic sleight-of-hand hijinx, we’re never transported anywhere particularly new or awesome. And when the curtain finally falls, and all cards are revealed, we’re left a little deflated, asking ourselves “is that all?” Yes… Yes it is, folks.

At the very least, Now You See Me does start off strongly, with its team of talented tricksters – Jesse Eisenberg’s arrogant big timer, Woody Harrelson’s blackmailing mentalist, Isla Fisher’s up-and-coming escape artist and Dave Franco’s scrappy street magician – assembled for mysterious reasons and tasked with committing incredible feats of remarkable showmanship. Blowing up into a hot headlining act almost overnight, the newly dubbed Four Horsemen brashly grab the world’s attention after they inexplicably rob a Parisian bank as part of their MGM Grand performance in Las Vegas. This audacious exploit sends the FBI into action, who put tough-talking agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo) and his French Interpol liaison Alma Dray (Melanie Laurent) on the case. Aided by notorious illusion-debunker Thaddeus Bradley (Morgan Freeman), the partners quickly find themselves running in circles, lost in a web of disorienting misdirection and mind-boggling endeavors.

Any twist-oriented picture demands a tightly written screenplay, otherwise the needlessly overcomplicated plot strands pile up like a rush hour car wreck. The narrative spine of Now You See Me, penned by Ed Solomon (Men In Black), Boaz Yakin (Prince of Persia: The Sands Of Time) and first-timer Edward Ricourt, is something of a mess, robbing interesting personalities of dimension and meandering when it should be laser-focused. Worse, it attempts to explain away its many logical gaps, utterly unrealistic (CG-aided) stage illusions and character deficiencies by waving its hand over the viewer’s eyes and declaring that nothing has to make sense because magic is involved. Which is just plain lazy.

And, yet, for all of Now You See Me’s stumblings, it’s hard not to admire the crackling, playful pulse generated by helmer Leterrier. Having proven himself capable of crafting stylish, fun B-movies (The Incredible Hulk, The Transporter and Unleashed speak to his strengths, 2010’s Clash of the Titans most certainly does not), the director’s fast-paced Ocean’s Eleven-like vibe is the film’s best weapon. This is shaggy material, but he does everything he can to jolt it to life. The second half of the picture gradually defeats him, however he still manages to go down swinging.

Leterrier has great collaborators in his attention-grabbing cast. Our avatar down this rabbit hole, Ruffalo, does cynical affability better than almost anyone, and his pithy worldliness is nicely contrasted against Laurent’s cheerful childlike sense of wonder. Freeman is a wily treat and it’s always a blast to see Michael Caine, as the criminals’ financial backer, in greedy bastard mode. The Four Horsemen – as unfortunately underdeveloped as they are – are intriguing creations, and enjoyable to watch bounce off one another. Eisenberg remixes his Mark Zuckerberg performance with an added layer of celebrity egomania to potent effect, and Harrelson delivers another of his lovable rascal turns. Fisher and Franco have less to do, although each is given an amusing moment or two (Franco’s trick-infused tussle with Ruffalo is a highlight). All that said, the group does fall short at playing convincing stage performers, lacking the storytelling brilliance and charisma exemplified by authentic superstars such as David Copperfield, Criss Angel or Penn & Teller. They behave more like hopped-up cheerleaders.


Intermittently engaging, and not without the odd burst of charm, the movie comes oh-so-close to working that its inability to do so chafes that much more. Given the concept and cast, this could have been a glossy, cool crowd-pleaser. Now You See Me, at the end of the day, is merely an empty, pretty diversion, vanishing from the recesses of the mind faster than one can even exclaim “Presto!”

2.5 out of 5

*Originally published at BeatRoute Magazine.

Film Review - FAST & FURIOUS 6

The Fast and the Furious franchise is the rarest of cinematic beasts: a series that’s miraculously improving beyond the halfway marker to double-digit sequels. 2011’s Fast Five was easily the best entry – a propulsive party movie packed with incredible stunts and larger than life performances – and handily replenished the property’s sputtering fuel tanks. This latest installment, Fast & Furious 6 (or, according to credits, Furious 6) doesn’t quite match the inspired craziness of its predecessor, though it’s still a gloriously dopey spectacle that won’t disappoint the die hards and may provoke an appreciative “WHOA!” or two.

The key to Fast’s longevity is its body snatcher-like propensity for swapping genre models with each passing film. Having already offered B-movie variations on Point Break, Miami Vice, The Karate Kid and Ocean’s Eleven, Furious 6 goes full-on Mission: Impossible/A-Team, transforming Vin Diesel’s gang of road-ripping rogues into heroic, resourceful do-gooders-for-hire. It’s an inevitable creative choice, really. Nevertheless, it works.

Picking up shortly after the last picture, Dominic Toretto (Diesel), Brian O’Conner (Paul Walker) et al. are filthy rich and living it up in Spain, wanted fugitives in their homeland US of A. Enter hulking Interpol agent Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson); seems an international criminal named Shaw (Luke Evans) is building a super-weapon capable of knocking out military electronics (or something like that – it’s vaguely defined), and he’s employing Dom’s lost love Letty (Michelle Rodriguez), thought dead since 2009’s Fast & Furious. Offered full pardons for their voluminous past misdeeds, the gang heads to London to chase down the ruthless criminal and return their former friend to the fold.

As has classically been the case, the screenplay - by regular series scribe Chris Morgan – is mostly a nonsensical clothesline for huge action sequences and barn-door-broad humour (there’s a running gag about comic relief Tyrese Gibson’s big forehead that dies on-screen every time). However, under the stylish eye of returning helmer Justin Lin, Furious 6 hums with colorful, goofy energy and big-time rousing high speed car-nage. Although he never tops his safe-swinging Fast Five finale, Lin stages two extended set-pieces – one involving a tank, the other a huge cargo plane – that reach apex after apex, constantly offering new absurd reasons to applaud. And, while the middle section of the movie meanders a bit, the helmer does a fantastic job juggling his ensemble cast (take note Star Trek into Darkness) and making their interactions lively and light.

These are not actor’s films, yet the amiable cast is invaluable in investing us in the preposterousness. Diesel’s moody outlaw philosophizing, Johnson’s sweaty intensity and Walker’s, uh, Walkerness ground Furious 6, while endearing supporting characters like Sung Kang’s Han, Ludacris’s Tej and Gibson’s doltish Roman inject much-appreciated charisma. Rodriguez has her tough girl act down cold, and shares a killer fight scene with Haywire’s Gina Carano (a tough, sexy physical presence who looks like an awkward contest winner in dialogue scenes).

Chances are, this far into the series, you know whether this flick is for you or not. Fair enough. Furious 6 is unlikely to change opinions of the franchise, but it offers the requisite empty-calorie thrills and macho camp you’ve come to expect. And, as far as summer blockbusters go, this one guns its engines with confidence and a big dumb grin.

3 out of 5

*Originally published at BeatRoute Magazine.

Film Review - MUD

There are few sensations more exhilarating for a cinema lover than the discovery of a bold, exciting new talent. With 2011’s haunting apocalyptic supernatural thriller/character study Take Shelter, writer/director Jeff Nichols proved himself a storyteller capable of masterful subtlety, atmosphere and profoundly impactful raw human emotion. It was a dark, ominous picture that wrapped itself tightly around your brain and refused to let go, inspiring multiple interpretations and analysis. In short, it was one hell of a film!

And now, with his latest, the Southern Gothic-tinged coming-of-age tale Mud, Nichols manages to wondrously outdo himself. A poignant, powerful examination of friendship and loss of innocence, this captivating effort – which brings to mind Clint Eastwood’s criminally forgotten 1993 work A Perfect World - solidifies the helmer as one of the most promising emerging American film voices. This movie is a treasure.

Mud stars Tye Sheridan as Ellis, a curious and strong-willed adolescent Arkansas boy whose comfortable world is nearing tumultuous upheaval. His parents (Ray McKinnon and Sarah Paulson) are on the verge of divorce, which would yank him away from both his cherished Mississippi river-situated home and scrappy best friend Neckbone (Jacob Lofland), and he’s awkwardly on the verge of romantic involvements with the opposite sex. During a secret journey to a nearby island to visit a mysterious tree-lodged boat, he encounters the enigmatic, vaguely threatening homeless title figure, played by Matthew McConaughey, who persuades the two boys to bring him food and run letters to his troubled girlfriend (Reese Witherspoon). In this shifty stranger, the troubled Ellis sees an idealized reflection of his own naïve feelings of masculinity, chivalry and pure, simplified love, and becomes entranced by him, leading to a bond that becomes dangerously complicated – once Mud’s true secrets come to light – and forever changes both men for the better.

Nichols’ stages this tricky material with minimal stylistic fuss and a keen insight into teenage male psychology and their limited emotional intelligence, bringing a true naturalistic tone to the picture and Ellis’s arc. Buoyed by fantastic turns from Sheridan and McConaughey (who brilliantly continues his fascinating transformation from bland hunk-for-hire into top-rate character actor), Mud paints an immersive, layered world, populated by intriguing side-players, such as Sam Shephard’s ornery neighbor, Paul Sparks’ vicious bounty hunter or Michael Shannon’s wacky scuba-diving uncle. Through it all, these people feel like real people, with dreams, weaknesses and inner-strengths, and it’s a joy to merely bask in their company, leisurely taking it all in. Frankly, I would have happily watched them go about their lives for another hour or so.

Make no mistake, though, Mud is also frequently gripping and tension-filled. Mixing in recognizable thriller and film noir tropes, Nichols skillfully weaves a snake-like thread of authentic menace throughout, raising the stakes over the course of the picture. We can always sense something bad just around the corner but, because we’re so invested in the personalities involved, we anticipate the impending revelation with anxiety, not eagerness. 

 The first legitimately great picture of 2013, Mud, akin to Malick’s The Tree of Life, Truffaut’s The 400 Blows or Spielberg’s E.T. before it, implicitly understands the complications of dawning male maturity, and wraps its honest truths in a riveting tapestry of perceptive cinematic beauty. If there’s one drawback to this endlessly rewarding film, it’s that it leaves you with an irresistible urge to see what Nichols has up his sleeve for next time. One’s things for certain: coming off this picture, the sky in the limit.

5 out of 5

*Originally printed in BeatRoute Magazine.   

Film Review - PAIN AND GAIN

Despite years spent devolving into parody, there was always a sliver of hope that, given strong material, Michael Bay was capable of proving himself more than just a shallow exploiter of explosions. Alas, that optimism dies hard with Pain and Gain, a stupid, unpleasant and tedious patchwork consisting of all the director’s most mean-spirited and gaudy fixations, including rampant misogyny and homophobia, toilet humor and distastefully-portrayed violence, blown up to hideous new heights. And the worst part? The potential was here for something genuinely clever and cool! All it needed was competent hands to guide it.

Inspired by a real-life Florida case, Pain and Gain stars Mark Wahlberg as Miami Beach local Daniel Lugo, a sociopathic personal trainer who sees his ripped physique as an embodiment of the American dream and yearns for more. After attending a seminar by an infomercial huckster, Lugo is transformed into a “doer,” and recruits two of his gym buddies – ex-con Jesus freak Paul (Dwayne Johnson) and sexually dysfunctional steroid case Adrian (Anthony Mackie) – to bilk crooked entrepreneur Tony Shalhoub out of his millions. Kidnapping and torturing him, the trio experience short-term success, but it isn’t long before ugly unexpected complications rear their unwanted heads.


The strangeness of this story is undeniably intriguing; however Bay – working from a script by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely (Captain America) – cuts the film’s legs out almost immediately by blowing its main “based on true events” conceit. There’s no believable reality in Pain and Gain; it’s a garish world populated by grotesque caricatures, where busty, slutted-up Maxim models constantly linger in the background and everything glistens with artificial music video sheen. With Fargo – the director’s oft-mentioned influence – the Coen brothers slyly inserted the “true story” tag as a dry joke to convince the viewer the not-totally-unbelievable insanity actually transpired. Here – where that promise is actually authentic! – the helmer fumbles the gimmick by creating a effort that doesn’t support it.

This tonal miscalculation wouldn’t be so bothersome if the movie entertained. Yet it doesn’t. Great black comedy requires a light touch and sophisticated edge the director doesn’t grasp. Pain and Gain is lumbering and meandering (it runs over two hours), effectively killing all comic momentum. The humor rarely transcends the Bay standard – an explosive diarrhea sight gag got the biggest laugh at my screening – and nets more misses than hits. Unlike Spring Breakers, which weaved a similar tale while skillfully ridiculing its heroes, this film’s stabs at incisive self-awareness are undercut by its dumb sledgehammer obviousness and obnoxious crassness.

The actors (futilely) do their best to right the capsizing ship. Wahlberg has actually rarely been better – there’s definitely some Diggler DNA in Lugo – and him, Johnson and Mackie make a decent touched-in-the-head team. Chasing them, Shalhoub is hyper-sleaze personified and a terse Ed Harris, as a P.I., is the only character who seems human. In a fairly thankless role, Rebel Wilson is funny and oddly sweet as Mackie’s lusty nurse girlfriend.

It’s sad to see so much visibly-engaged talent wasted on a misguided passion project this mind-numbing. Collapsing under the crushing weight of its own botched crazy ambitions, Pain and Gain leaves only a weird, visually dynamic shell devoid of emotion, tension or depth. And again we’re left wondering if Bay, an obviously gifted stylist, will ever conjure up a picture that brings as much brain to the table as brawn. On the evidence of this effort, it’s probably wise not to hold our collective breaths.

1.5 out of 5

*Originally published at BeatRoute Magazine.

Film Review - SPRING BREAKERS

It takes balls to make a film that takes disapproving aim at an entire generation. But it takes even bigger balls to fashion one that cleverly disguises itself as an empowerment message for those it’s so visibly perturbed by. Such is the case with Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers, a chaotic, pulsing napalm bomb of disdain and awe that stares curiously into the hyper-sexed, hard-partying soul of Generation Y America and finds only superficiality and apathy. This is cinema as incisive, subversive social criticism, clad in slutty exploitation clothing and scored to Skrillex.

Following a numbing near-pornographic opening credit sequence of hedonistic beach bash debauchery, Spring Breakers introduces a quartet of vacuous nubile college students – Selena Gomez, Ashley Benson, Vanessa Hudgens and Rachel Korine - who yearn only for escape from the tedium of their existence. Financially strapped, the girls turn to armed robbery for cash and book it to Florida, where they become entrenched in the booze-soaked reverie of the annual festivities. Fate takes a turn for the weird, however, when a drug bust inadvertently draws them into the realm of Alien (James Franco), a grilled and blinged-out rapper/gangster with dreams of moving up in the underworld. Soon, the bikini babes are donning ski masks and packing shotguns, giddily intent on living the thug life, the hell with repercussions!

A provocateur from day one, when he penned Larry Clark’s Kids at the age of 19, Korine isn’t a particularly subtle filmmaker (the male gaze is cranked up to intentionally creepy extremes here), yet he is a fearless one. Trapping the audience in his female protagonists’ warped, stunted headspace, he subjects us to their banal thoughts, which are often drearily repetitive, disconnected from reality (“Pretend it’s a video game or a movie!”) or amoral. One sequence features a voice over from Gomez’s Faith – the one sorta-good-girl in the group – wherein she describes the “spiritual” experience she’s having in un-self-aware, trite drivel. Today’s entitled American youth, the director seems to argue, lack imagination and insight, and share no contemporary artistic common ground profounder than Britney Spears (whose auto-tuned anthems feature in two key scenes).

If the film is intriguing in its first half, it becomes utterly entrancing once Franco’s Alien commands center stage. Visually repulsive, slurring his words through a stoned drawl, he’s a true darkly comic original; a societal outcast with a tragic backstory (determining whether its fiction or not is part of the fun) who learned everything he knew from his black crime boss friend (Gucci Mane). Rejoicing in his cliché material possessions – including nunchuks, guns and TVs that play Scarface (of course) on a loop – he’s a clown in wolf’s clothing, unprepared for his new charges’ dangerous detachment from reality. Franco masterfully disappears into the flashy role, and Spring Breakers ignites every time he’s free to cut loose and do his thang.

Korine hasn’t created an easily digestible work here. This is a picture destined to be misinterpreted, ridiculed and dismissed by many. But those tuned into its queasy wavelength will discover likely one of 2013’s most remarkable efforts; a movie that dares you to revel in its gaudy orgy of bad behavior while slyly flipping off those who would do just that. Spring Breakers lives boldly in the moment, and mournfully shakes its head for the future.

4 out of 5

*Originally published in BeatRoute Magazine.

Film Review - G.I. JOE: RETALIATION

There’s one sequence in G.I. Joe: Retaliation that exemplifies exactly what a decent G.I. Joe movie should be. Brave ass-kicking good guys Snake Eyes (Ray Park) and Jinx (Elodie Yung) have kidnapped Cobra baddie Storm Shadow (Byung-hun Lee) from a mountain lair and, during their rapid descent, are pursued by a squadron of katana-wielding ninjas decked out in matching crimson outfits. Racing across the snowy, craggy terrain via zip-line, swords slash flesh, body parts pound into jagged rock, and casualties plummet helplessly into the ominous foggy abyss. Played entirely in tense silence, this fast and furious set-piece is pure popcorn silliness; comic-booky in the best way and filled with fun little bursts of giddy imagination.

Alas, rather than construct an energetic story around these ten cool minutes, director Jon M. Chu (Step Up 3D, Justin Bieber: Never Say Never) and Zombieland screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick use it as a crutch to prop up one of the most embarrassing examples of fan-film moviemaking in recent memory. Cutting loose most of the material established in Stephen Sommers’ campy 2009 guilty pleasure Rise of Cobra, the trio has crafted a dumb, convoluted adaptation of the 1980s animated show/toy commercial that’s short on thrills, laughs or surprise, yet brimming with pandering shout outs. Want to see a Cobra H.I.S.S. tank realized (and blown up) on screen? You’re in luck! Looking for memorable characters or crazy over-the-top combat? Best search elsewhere.

Picking up shortly after the tragic Nano-mite War depicted in Rise of Cobra, Retaliation finds Duke (Channing Tatum), Roadblock (Dwayne Johnson) and co. tracking down nuclear warheads in Pakistan, at the order of counterfeit U.S. president Jonathan Pryce (who is being impersonated by sinister master of disguise Zartan). However, shortly after completing their assignment, the fighting force is ambushed by Cobra forces and almost entirely wiped out. Only Roadblock, Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki) and Flint (personality vacuum D.J. Cotrona) remain, forced to go underground and scout out a means of taking down their country’s imposter leader and the newly freed Cobra Commander (Luke Bracey). They’re aided in their top-secret operation by General Joe Colton (Bruce Willis), the original Real American Hero, and ninja warriors Snake Eyes and Jinx – who have their own mystery to unravel regarding the murder of the former’s beloved sensei.

Drastically scaled back from the mega-budget excesses of its predecessor, Retaliation aims for a more realistic vibe - the Joes use actual ammunition, as opposed to lasers, and real world political events are referenced - while nonetheless packing in ludicrous nonsense like explosive lightning bugs and a sci-fi-ish subterranean prison fortress that apparently houses only two convicts. The clashing tones don’t work. Just when we’re starting to chuckle – as when RZA pops up as Blind Master, spouting hilarious ninja lore jibberish – the picture retreats back to the mundane. There are an extraordinary number of scenes of characters hanging out in nondescript locations spouting mind-numbing exposition at one another. Fine, if it were well written, but the dialogue here rarely rises above wretched. Even the comedic banter (“’Prepare for extraction?’ What are we? Teeth?!”) is cringe-inducing.

While the original cartoon may not have been high art, it could be at least counted on to supply plenty of engaging larger-than-life personalities. Retaliation’s greatest failing is that no one on-screen is very charismatic or interesting. Sure, Johnson is enjoyable. However, this says more about his inherent likeability as an actor than the project (for further current evidence of this phenomenon see exhibit B: Snitch). Tatum and fan fave Snake Eyes are sadly underutilized, while newcomers Flint, Mouse (Joseph Mazzello) and Jaye - who spends most of the film in various states of undress - are woefully vanilla. And the less said about Willis’s paycheck appearance, the better. It’s highly probable defibrillator paddles were needed to jolt him to life each day on set. Even bitchy old Cobra Commander disappoints - a killer costume in search of an identity. Only an eye-poppingly possessed Pryce and Ray Stevenson (using a bizarro southern gentleman drawl as the assassin Firefly) seem to understand what kind of movie they’re in and revel in the absurdity.

All might be forgiven, had the film delivered on the action front but, aside from the aforementioned vertiginous dust-up, Chu comes up woefully short at crafting memorable battles. The shootouts are generically staged, free of excitement, and the physical clashes are a sad continuation of the current shaky-cam/spastic editing trend. It’s a sign of Retaliation’s incompetence that it even manages to make the climactic sight of Johnson decimating Cobra minions in a heavy-duty one-man tank boring.
It’s frustrating how unremarkable G.I. Joe: Retaliation truly is. The flick doesn’t even manage to suck on the amazing level of its other foul Hasbro cinematic brethren Battleship or the Transformers trilogy. No, this is a nothing movie; a soulless corporate product that aspires only to keep the brand name in the public consciousness another couple years. Mission accomplished, I guess. Hoorah.

1.5 out of 5

*Originally published at BeatRoute Magazine.  

Film Review - OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN

Had Steven Seagal not collapsed so spectacularly into the parodic fat Elvis phase of his career a couple decades ago, Olympus Has Fallen might have wound up being a really kickass Under Siege threequel. For here is one of the most ludicrous, straight-faced entries in the “Die-Hard-in-a-[Insert Confined Location Here]” action subgenre in years; an absurd throwback to ’90s kill-em-all extravaganzas that honors its forebears while still being a really solid, memorable formula entry. No cheesy fourth-wall-breaking winks or sad attempts to nab the youth market (*cough* The Expendables *cough*), just two hours of skillful hard-R carnage, pyrotechnics and irresponsible ultraviolence. Thank the movie gods for minor miracles.

Beefy, hulking Gerard Butler confidently occupies the eye of Olympus’ hurricane, playing Mike Banning, a top-notch Presidential guard (“He moves mountains or dies trying!”) relocated to the Treasury Department after a tragic nighttime accident on an icy bridge. However, he abruptly proves to be the country’s only hope when President Asher (Aaron Eckhart) is taken hostage by a North Korean extremist icily played by Rick Yune. Conveniently trapped alone in the terrorist-ruled White House, Banning stealthily begins picking off adversaries, intent on protecting the President’s son (Finley Jacobsen) and liberating his former boss. He’s aided from afar by Speaker of the House Morgan Freeman, who understands the full magnitude of the arch-villain’s cataclysmic plot against America’s fair people.


Eschewing the tedious shaky-cam/rapid fire-editing aesthetic that has plagued contemporary action films, director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, Shooter) goes for a more classic feel, conveying his considerable mayhem in relatively clean, comprehensible shots. Dodgy CG aside – there is a really cruddy-looking plane crash early on – the action in Olympus feels refreshingly old school, with a good handle on geography and cause and effect. It’s also exciting! And the violence is brutal and impactful (critics who fretted over Zero Dark Thirty’s portrayal of torture may have an aneurism watching Banning interrogate two bound-and-gagged goons). The script, by newcomers Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt, won’t win any awards for its clunky dialogue or logic, but there’s genuine rising tension; the more things go wrong, the more we’re pulled in and the climax doesn’t disappoint.

As a tough-guy hero, Butler isn’t one of our more charismatic stars. That said, his terse delivery and blunt force physicality serve him quite well here. He’s a dependable lead, with a few choice quips, who we believe is capable of stopping a small army single-handed. Offering strong support is Eckhart, as the resilient, iron-willed commander-in-chief, and Dylan McDermott, demonstrating amusingly snaky attitude as an aging Secret Service man. Freeman, Angela Bassett and Robert Forster cash paychecks with admirable gravitas as Banning’s top-rank advisors, while a gutsy, electric Melissa Leo – seemingly unaware that she’s acting in a big, dumb B-movie – compellingly endures horrific trauma as the captive Secretary of Defense. Look no further for a portrait of true professionalism, folks!

Silly and energetic, this picture should make for a great opening-weekend crowd experience, where its unironic blend of overkill, cornball flag-waving and endearing over-earnestness guarantees to produce no shortage of laughs and fist-pumping enthusiasm. It’s often easy to dismiss films like this, but Fuqua has crafted a fun shoot ‘em up and it’s worth recognizing a job done pretty damn well. Now, will someone please get started on the inevitable (and welcome) sequel, Olympus Has Fallen Harder?

3.5 out of 5

*Originally printed in BeatRoute Magazine.

Film Review - A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD

A Good Day to Die Hard is a chaotic portrait of one man’s wearying struggle to keep his head held high while braving a seemingly unconquerable bad situation. Unfortunately, this time around, it isn’t really perpetually unlucky NYDP cop John McClane being run mercilessly through the ringer before our eyes. No, its series star Bruce Willis, who trudges through his fifth tour of Die Hard duty wearing the tired, reluctant frown of an actor well aware that he’s a long, sad way from Nakatomi Tower.

Wandering through a gauntlet of slapped-together noisy nonsense constructed by the hacky 20th Century Fox lackey duo of helmer John Moore (Max Payne, Behind Enemy Lines) and screenwriter Skip Woods (X-Men Origins: Wolverine, The A-Team), Willis smirks dutifully, however the surly spark is gone. The once ornery John McClane has been replaced by a largely emotionless killing machine that unflinchingly mows down villains by the dozen and walks away from near-death experiences with nary a scratch. As an entry in a franchise built around the concept of a flawed, all-too-human hero dragging himself through hell while bitching all the way, A Good Day to Die Hard misses more notes than a tone-deaf kazoo novice.

Going international for the first time, McClane’s latest body count-clocking escapade sends him to Russia in order to attend the trial of his estranged son Jack (Jai Courtney), an undercover CIA agent secretly assigned to protect a political prisoner (Sebastian Koch) from his deadly former colleagues. Fate intervenes, though, when the courtroom is demolished by armed mercenaries and the two quarreling relations are thrown together on a desperate chase to recover a top secret file containing, uh, top secret stuff! About nuclear weapons and so forth! Of course, this being a Die Hard picture, there are plenty of hazards on the road to massive property (and collateral) damage-causing victory and familial fence-mending, including an evil hot babe (Yuliya Snigir – whose heavily advertised motorcycle gear stripping scene is absent from the finished film. Just sayin’!) and a tattooed soft shoe routine-performing thug (Radivoje Bukvic).

While all these elements sound workable on paper, A Good Day to Die Hard is depressingly lazy and uninterested in delivering the classic elements that have kept the series vital. McClane feels neutered, transformed into a one-note destructive tagalong without any good wiseass quips or apprehension, and he’s stuck with a wooden ally devoid of dimension. Courtney is a capable physical presence – as evidenced in Jack Reacher – yet his underwritten character only serves to underscore the fact that, as a sidekick, he seriously lacks the charisma of Samuel L. Jackson or Justin Long.

Worse, the bad guys this go-around are flat-out disposable bores. Die Hard has a rich history of eccentric villainous personalities, and these anonymous jokers feel like placeholders for more memorable, layered antagonists. They aren’t threatening or compelling – their master plan is labyrinthine in its ludicrous convolution – and the waves of masked pop-up henchmen resemble easy obstacles in a video game.

As an example of unrelenting action spectacle, the picture strains vainly to reach the low bar marked “competent.” Moore doesn’t have any personality behind the camera, and his large-scale set-pieces – executed by an admirably committed team of stuntmen and technicians – suffer for it. The rushing impact of an early extended sequence of multi-vehicle annihilation is weakened by sloppy editing that makes a mockery of geography and dulls the coolest bits. The same can be said for the climactic assault, which features abundant gunfire and deadly helicopter hijinx but – minus an ambitious final pyro-happy money shot – not a whole lotta excitement.

Say what you will about the series’ previous sequels, there were at least conscious attempts made to push McClane into clever new places and create explosive scenarios that topped what came before. This lame entry doesn’t even try for innovation; it’s a generic, forgettable product churned out by filmmakers ill-fitted for handling the responsibility of the beloved property they’ve taken ownership of.

For the Die Hard brand, this is anything but a good day.

2 out of 5

*Originally published at BeatRoute Magazine.

Film Review - PARKER

Jason Statham is such a charismatic force-of-nature presence that it’s painful to see his considerable kick-ass talents pissed away on middling C-grade junk. Seemingly born a couple decades too late, he’s a natural movie star who could have shared the Action God throne with the big three, Arnie, Sly and Bruce, in the gloriously pumped-up ’80s and ’90s. Imagine him occupying his own crazy Total Recall, Rambo or Die Hard picture, as opposed to Killer Elite, Transporter or The Mechanic. Ah, what might have been…

His latest, Parker, doesn’t even come close to reversing this woeful trend. A limp, bottom drawer adaptation of Donald E. Westlake’s beloved literary antihero – who previously shot up the silver screen in 1967’s Point Blank and 1999’s Payback – this film is perhaps the worst entry in Statham’s not-exactly-stellar filmography since 2007’s atrocious War. I’ll leave you to ponder that one for a minute.

Sleepily directed by Taylor Hackford (Ray), Parker casts Statham as a low-level thief who, during a daring daylight costumed county fair robbery, is double-crossed and left for dead by his crooked associates, headed by The Shield’s Michael Chiklis. Hell-bent on revenge, the rapidly recovered bastard-with-an-honour-code tracks his dangerous quarry to Palm Beach, Florida, where they’re planning an even larger con. Aiding Parker on his brutal quest is struggling real estate agent Jennifer Lopez, who yearns to gather enough cash to move out of her wacky mother’s house. Obviously, it goes without saying that, by film’s end, bullets will have been unloaded en masse, necks snapped and middle-aged sex symbols disrobed. Not necessarily in that order.

Unfortunately, whereas previous cinematic takes on the character produced blackly funny, mean crime thrillers, Parker is almost remarkably toothless and plodding. The characteristic Statham icy attitude and coiled violence is overwhelmed by a DOA screenplay, which spends an inordinate amount of time going nowhere – J.Lo’s floundering job and home life receive a baffling amount of attention – only to climax on a note of perfunctory, unsatisfying chaos. There’s no inspired anarchic spirit here. No willingness to revel in nasty, blood-spattered fun (like Statham’s decent 2012 effort Safe did).

Frankly, this is a blip of a movie; 118 minutes of tedious, dim-witted nonsense that dissipates into thin air the second the credits role. The star deserves better, as do audiences. At the end of the day, the only thing Parker succeeds at is making off with is your precious time and money.

1 out of 5

*Originally published at BeatRoute Magazine.