Strange, in a francise that relies so heavily on its history, that this movie should regurgitate a whopping chunk of it -- the first film, Star Wars, from 1977 -- coming across more like the first theatrical Star Trek, a movie that impressed the hell out of itself with its own past glory. In galaxies far, far away, evidently, history does in fact repeat itself. This one has most of the old beloved characters along with several new ones, playing younger versions of the oldsters, running through a story that mirrors that of the original film. Had the Great Capitalist still been in charge, things would have been different; but he sold Lucasfilm to Disney, and Disney figured it knew almost as much about making money as Lucas -- proving it, actually, with this "film for the fans" and record box office returns. Is it any good? No -- maybe -- who knows? The only thing sure is that it is unnecessary and redundant and that there is still only one truly remarkable film in the entire franchise. No, not The Empire Strikes Back and not even A New Hope. Star Wars, a movie that was so fun, so unique, so imaginative, that it didn't need a prefabricated history (nor one back-grafted onto it) to thrill its audiences.
**
Strange, in a francise that relies so heavily on its history, that this movie should regurgitate a whopping chunk of it -- the first film, Star Wars, from 1977 -- coming across more like the first theatrical Star Trek, a movie that impressed the hell out of itself with its own past glory. In galaxies far, far away, evidently, history does in fact repeat itself. This one has most of the old beloved characters along with several new ones, playing younger versions of the oldsters, running through a story that mirrors that of the original film. Had the Great Capitalist still been in charge, things would have been different; but he sold Lucasfilm to Disney, and Disney figured it knew almost as much about making money as Lucas -- proving it, actually, with this "film for the fans" and record box office returns. Is it any good? No -- maybe -- who knows? The only thing sure is that it is unnecessary and redundant and that there is still only one truly remarkable film in the entire franchise. No, not The Empire Strikes Back and not even A New Hope. Star Wars, a movie that was so fun, so unique, so imaginative, that it didn't need a prefabricated history (nor one back-grafted onto it) to thrill its audiences.
0 Comments
***** George Orwell's dystopian warning about the dangers of a police state, thought-control, and the forced abrogation of individuality is a glorious satire, chock full of details and terminology that can be profitably applied to any number of real-world situations. And as science fiction, it still stands as a thoughtful, mature work that deserves its place on all those lists of the best books in the genre. Well-written, observant, and with a diabolic internal logic it tells the story of Winston Smith, a man trapped in the iron grip of a society that controls every aspect of his dreary existence through indoctrination, surveillance, torture, and fear. His minor rebellions lead him into the arms of Julia, a younger woman with whom he shares a hatred of the system, and eventually into contact with a man representing the rumored underground of resistance fighters. But what the book is really about is the society itself, its principles, how it operates, and what it does to its people. A genuine classic, both funny and frightening. ** Broadly satirical, and hence largely unfunny, take on Ira Levin's much wittier novel about a career woman (Nicole Kidman) who finds herself in the small Connecticut town of Stepford, where the men are always happy and their wives are all buxom, beautiful, and completely housebroken. A $90 million joke for high-powered New Yorkers and Hollywood types, as Oz and writer Paul Rudnick go out of their way to undercut any universality in the message with their unpleasant, self-indulgent characters -- no, not the men, but the "normal" women (plus, not surprisingly, a flamboyantly effiminate gay man). Shallow and vaguely insulting, with a plot that just gets dumber as it goes along. Also starring Matthew Broderick, Bette Midler, Glenn Close, and Christopher Walken. Levin's book was previously (and more successfully) adapted in 1975. Addendum (8/22/16) Listed #8 in Variety's 2016 list of the 10 Worst Movie Remakes of All Time. **** Snatch teams of a far future in which humans are horribly mutated kidnap those about to die in past catastrophes in order to people a new, healthy world. Fun time-travel adventure narrated by Louise Baltimore, a tough and cynical snatch team leader, and, alternately, by Bill Smith, the unhappy NTSB man in charge of investigating the 1980 mid-air collision of two passenger jets. Varley makes even his time-travel theory go down smoothly by giving us characters we not only care about, but who for the most part don't understand it any better than we do. Exciting and funny, and based on the author's own excellent short story "Air Raid." Varley also wrote the script for 1989's Millennium, starring Kris Kristofferson and Cheryl Ladd. ** Arnold Schwarzenegger is about the only reason to see this unconvincing time-jumble in which just about anything can happen, and does. As much a pastiche of the first two films as a story in its own right, this one features an alternate reality in which Sarah was taken in hand by Schwarzenegger's Terminator at the age of seven so by the time Reese arrives in 1984 it is she (and Arnold) who help him rather than the other way around. He needs help because Skynet has been replaced by the super-program Genisys (amusingly described as an "app" at one point) and Genisys is about to take over the world. With the help, of course, of another brand new Terminator. But when anything goes, nothing matters, and with its overlapping timelines and alternate reality premise the whole thing comes off as ennervatingly pointless. The special effects are all right, though, even if the characters interacting with them are much less engaging here than in Terminator I and II. *** Psychology professor (William Hurt) using psychoactive drugs and an isolation tank to probe genetic memory discovers the means of externalizing past states of existence. Ultra-serious tone accompanied by earnest performances and Ken Russell's surreal imagery makes for an entertaining first half, but the film loses momentum in the second as special effects take over en route to dissatisfying and unimaginative "ultimate truth." With Blair Brown, Bob Balaban, and Charles Haid. Written by Paddy Chayefsky (as Sidney Aaron), based on his own novel. ** Compendium of two volumes originally published in French by Le Rouge in 1908 and 1909, translated by David Beus and Brian Evenson, and presented here as part of the University of Nebraska's Bison Frontiers of Imagination series. Note, however, that the provenance of the books is never discussed, with the translators pretending that the story is real, tossing off "sizable" third act gaps in the first volume as holes in the historical record. The conceit, though reprehensible, is, from a literary standpoint, almost justified, as Volume One is an episodic work that doesn't greatly suffer from the loss. Together, the two books tell the story of Robert Darvel, a brilliant French engineer, who is stranded on Mars and of his friends and ladylove, back on Earth, working to bring him home. Stilted and facile, yet not altogether without merit. The detailed manner in which Darvel reaches Mars -- a combination of science and the focused willpower of hundreds of Indian Brahmins -- has the grandiose flair of a mad scientist, a Herbert West, and one or two other ideas point to what could have been an exciting horror story. Ultimately, though, this is science fiction, and that is its undoing. Guided by Le Rouge's idea that there is nothing new under the sun (a strange thought for this type of story), Mars turns out to be another Earth, with much the same flora and fauna, albeit differently colored. Significantly, Le Rouge spends almost as much time rhapsodizing over the wonders of Earth as those of Mars. Meanwhile, the vampires themselves are little more than overgrown vampire bats. With a few lengthy yet irrelevant asides -- including an Allan Quartermain-type adventure of lost treasure and, incomprehensibly, the backstory of a chef -- and a hero who, at one point, dismisses the horrible deaths of his brave but simpleminded saviors as the insignificant loss of a bunch of "savages." ** World War starts in 1940 and is still raging 20 years later when a new government run by scientists and engineers finally forces peace on the people of Earth. Not to stop all the killing, not to provide a better life for the common man, but simply so that the privileged can work in peace and quiet. Elitist horror dressed up as science fiction, written by none other than H. G. Wells, based on his book The Shape of Things to Come. Wells' vapid characters and stilted dialogue don't help. With, however, some nice special effects and visual design, and a dark-haired woman (Sophie Stewart) who comes on the screen dressed half like a dominatrix and half like a harem girl, who says, "I don't suppose any man has ever understood any woman since the beginning of things." Well, hell, girl, you're a walking contradiction; what do you expect? ***** Though it eventually degenerates into rather dull roboto-a-roboto action, the humor- and character-driven first half of this science fiction film is so blazingly fun that it is one of the most enjoyable movies ever made. Shia LeBeouf plays manic teenager Sam Witwicky who unwittingly holds the key to a war between robot-like alien beings, but would much rather unlock the mysteries of Megan Fox. Witty and exciting, with an unparalleled opening in the deserts of Qatar, the site of mankind's first battle with the evil Decepticons. Sam, meanwhile, meets one of the good guys -- in a used car lot. Based on the Transformers toy line and succeeded by several inferior sequels. Turn That Frown Upside Down Funny quotations from negative reviews. "...most of the Autobots take the shape of GM vehicles, including Ratchet (a Hummer H2) and Ironhide (a TopKick pickup truck). The only Autobot that doesn’t wear that troubled automaker’s logo is the leader, Optimus Prime (a generic 18-wheeler tractor). Maybe that’s because the company didn’t want to be represented by a character that promises to blow itself up for the greater good, as Optimus does..." - Manohla Dargis, The New York Times “'Transformers' knows its demographic. A computer hacker being sweated by the FBI protests, 'I'm a virgin!' The actor who says these words is 36. At another point, a guy shopping for a car with his dad protests that he doesn't want a beater because it says '40-year-old virgin' to him. That one over there? It says '50-year-old virgin.' Members of the audience will titter nervously, thinking about their large collections of factory-sealed action figures. But no matter. Perhaps their Jedi mastery of 'Grand Theft Auto' will make Natalie Portman show up at their door?" - Kyle Smith, New York Post "(BTW, if you were known as a Decepticon, wouldn't it be kind of hard for you to...deceive anybody?)" - Richard Corliss, Time "A filmmaker who has profitably plundered his own arrested adolescence in movies like 'Bad Boys,' 'The Rock' and 'Armageddon,' director Michael Bay got his fingers burned two years ago with the relatively sophisticated sci-fi flop 'The Island.' It's obvious he's not going to be caught overestimating his audience twice." - Tom Charity, CNN "Now these delightful objets d’art have a movie to themselves. We should not be surprised. Long ago, when the impact of 'Star Wars' was beefed up by a line of merchandise, some of us noticed that the five-inch Lukes and Leias possessed a depth and mobility that was denied to their onscreen counterparts, and, decades later, we have reached the reductio ad absurdum of that rivalry: rather than spin the toys off from the movie, why not build the movie from the toys? 'Transformers' is not the first effort in this direction; I distinctly remember finding a couchful of children enraptured by a DVD of 'Barbie of Swan Lake' and realizing that Ingmar Bergman’s 'Persona' had not, after all, signalled the final disintegration of human personality." - Anthony Lane, The New Yorker ** Adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle's exciting novel of explorers finding prehistoric life on a South American plateau is rough going for adventure fans as Irwin Allen tosses ditzy Jill St. John into the mix, then populates his lost world with modern reptiles. We get an iguanodon played by an iguana with horns glued to its head, a stegosaurus played by a monitor lizard, and so on. When the chief scientist first catches a glimpse of the iguana, he tells his companions he thinks it might have been a brontosaurus! It's all less convincing than The Giant Gila Monster, which at least produced one of the great MST3K episodes. Oh, and there's also a giant green-glowing tarantula. (The tarantula scene does have one saving grace, however: an opportunity to look past it at Vitina Marcus, an American actress of intriguing beauty, being of Sicilian and Hungarian descent, who plays a native girl captured by the explorers.) The actors aren't bad here -- Claude Rains, Michael Rennie, David Hedison, and Fernando Llamas -- but they've got nothing to work with. Their best scenes all take place at the beginning of the film, before they ever get to the silly plateau. |
KinoLivresBooks. Movies. Mostly. Archives
July 2017
Categories
All
|