Movie Review: "The Muppets" by David Pretty

Let's face it: a modern Muppet movie had to be a bit of a gamble. Except for a horde of nostalgic Baby Boomers and Gen X-ers, I really didn't think that the Muppets could possibly generate enough bank to warrant a major new motion picture.

This harsh claim may require some back-up. Technically the Muppets had their rise during the tail end of the Baby Boomer era. Jim Henson certainly wasn't the first guy to use puppets to entertain but he was certainly one of the first to use them to entertain adults. Via a series of snarky commercials and memorable appearances on Saturday Night Live the Muppets began to make some inroads with grown-ups.

But Henson couldn't go as far as he wanted with the mature humor, so he tried to broaden the appeal of his characters with the aptly-named Muppet Show which made its debut on September 6'th 1976 in Britain. Thanks to the Commonwealth connection, I managed to see it not long after on CBC here in Canada. Needless to say, it made a pretty powerful impression on this eternal twelve-year-old. As soon as the five-series run was over, I'd merrily re-watch all one-hundred-and-twenty episodes all over again. And again. And again.

Even as a die-hard fan I thought that the show was oddly dated right out of the gate. Clearly Henson and company were a bunch of aging hippies. Undeniably creative aging hippies but aging hippies nonetheless. Indeed, many of The Muppet Show guests like Ethel Merman, Bob Hope and Milton Berle were waaaaaay before my time. But that didn't stop me from watching. In fact, I owe Henson and his platoon of phelt phreaks a huge debt of gratitude for giving me the very little cultural enrichment that I possess to this day.

Besides, for every Liza Minelli and Ruth Buzzi there were cool older guess like Vincent Price, John Cleese, Jonathan Winters, Carol Burnett, Johnny Cash and Spike Milligan. Even better, Henson wasn't so snooty as to ignore contemporary celebrities so, my favorite pop culture icons like Mark Hamill, Roger Moore, Christopher Reeve, Blondie and Alice Cooper also made memorable appearances.

But here's my vastly prologued point: if the hippie sensibilities, cornball humor, Boomer-era affiliations and dead-as-disco variety show format was noticeably dated to me as a pre-Internet kid in the 80's, then how could the Muppets possibly eke out an audience in this day and age of incessant distractions?

Well, if you're a super-fan like Jason Segel, you quickly own up to these deficits and turn them into a source for humor. Jason is thirty-five-years-old and, like me, he was clearly weaned on reruns of The Muppet Show. As such, he probably can't fathom why they vanished into oblivion. So, with the aid of screenwriting partner Nicholas Stoller, Segal wrote a respectful but honest script that likely got green-lit due to a combination of his own marquee value and / or the intervention of a particularly nostalgic studio head.

One of Segel smarter moves is to introduce a new Muppet that kids can relate to named Walter. Expertly voiced and puppeteered by Peter Linz, Walter represents every younger viewer predisposed to the Muppets by virtue of birth but aren't sure why. Since Walter is essentially an adoptee in Jason's human family, he also acts as a metaphor for the Muppets themselves who are searching for a place in our entertainment-soaked modern world.

Segel also plays Gary, Walter's good-natured, incessantly-cheerful, man-child of a brother. Together they're inseparable, especially when they discover their mutual love for the Muppets. That's right, folks, if you're half as amused as I am by the prospects of seeing Jason Segel and a puppet sit around in their jammies giggling over reruns of The Muppet Show then this is the movie for you.

Realizing that he's finally found his people, Walter dreams of making a pilgrimage to the Muppet theater in Los Angeles. Eventually this dovetails with Gary's plan to take his best girl Mary (Amy Adams) to Hollywood and propose to her. Of course, true to the Muppet's pedigree, this inspires the Mayberry-esque residents of the town to join in on a mass Norman Rockwell-style flash mob / song-n'-dance number.

When the trio finally get to L.A. they discover that the Muppet theater is in dire need of repair and its denizens scattered to the wind like the members of a boy band that was popular, like, six months ago. During their "tour", curiosity gets the better of Walter and he end up eavesdropping on a wealthy oil baron's nasty scheme to buy the theater and demolish it for the oil reserves underneath. Oh, and did I mention that the name of Chris Cooper's evil oil tycoon is Tex Richman?  

In case you haven't guessed, most of the script is about as subtle as Fozzie's one-liners.

Anyway, Walter convinces Gary and Mary (!) to seek help from Kermit the Frog who's now living alone in a gated estate like some sort of amphibious version of Charles Foster Kane. Eventually they spur him into action and the rest of the movie is the Muppet equivalent of Iron Man yelling "Avengers, Assemble!" It's fun to sit there with a checklist as all of your old favorites reunite to mount one last prime-time variety show in an effort to raise the cheddar required to rescue their theater from Richman's nefarious designs.

Okay, let's get the obvious stuff out of the way first: the plot is ridiculously hackneyed. An evil one-percenter who wants to drill under the theater for oil? Really? If not for the fact that this sort of shit actually happens way to often in real life, this would be a game breaker for me. Even as a parody of movie clichés it's not very funny. Chris Cooper does what he can with the cartoony role but ultimately Richman is a pretty boring and one-dimensional villain.

The other thing that irritated the crap out of me is the shallow and vaguely sexist hissy fit that Mary is required to pitch. As soon as the forced Mary to lose her shit on Gary for paying too much attention to Walter I just rolled my eyes. Did you really have to depict the one and only (human) female characters as a petty, insecure, possessive, manipulative, marriage-obsessed diva? Yes, I know that the script had to give the human character some conflict to resolve but I really wish it was something a lot less hackneyed and insulting to women. Thankfully, Adams is so inherently charming that she somehow manages to make Mary unavoidably likable.

Mercifully, the rest of the script is gleefully self-aware and tackles the 800-pound Snuffleupagus in the room. Kermit's majordomo is a hideously-outdated 80's-style robot replete with screeching modem. Most of the guests in Kermit's Rolodex are either dead or long since out of show business. And in one of the most brutally honest scenes, a cynical T.V. exec shows the traumatized Muppets where they reside on the zeitgeist radar. Spoiler alert: they're about as far away from Selena Gomez as Pluto is from the sun.

On the flip side, it's actually a lot of fun watching your favorite Muppets come back into the fold. The fact that Gonzo segued from being a stuntman with a chicken fetish to a highly-efficient toilet salesman with a chicken fetish makes a lot of sense to me. Fozzie is slumming in a cheap nostalgia act calling themselves "The Moopets". Estranged from her froggy paramour, Piggy has moved on and is working as an editor for a "plus-sized" magazine in Paris. And, best of all, Animal has been roped into an anger-management class by, of all people, Jack Black.

Even though many of these classic characters are now being helmed by new puppeteers, they all acquit themselves rather well. I'm pretty sure that this was the very first time that Frank Oz didn't voice Miss Piggy but even cynical ol' me has to admit that Eric Jacobson did a stellar job capturing her voice, her character traits and her "mannerisms". Equally game are Dave Goelz (Gonzo), Bill Barretta (Rowlf), David Rudman (Scooter), and Matt Vogel (Floyd) who each voice what amounts to a small platoon of characters. Also, when Steve Whitmire started doing Kermit after Jim Henson passed away the transition was pretty rough but now he's got the character locked down cold. 

Adding to the film's ample charms is a great soundtrack featuring classic tracks from such diverse acts as Paul Simon, Starship, Gary Numan and Nirvana. Many of the original tunes written by Bret "Flight of the Conchords" McKenzie are ebola-level catchy. I've been humming "Life's A Happy Song" relentlessly for the past few weeks and I'm seriously considering the logistics of getting a lobotomy.

Thankfully, there are also some refreshing and candid twists at the end which really helps to cleanse the palate from the pedestrian set-up. Thanks to Richman's dogged, psychotic and comically-irrational hatred of the Muppets, our heroes don't exactly breeze over the finish line with flying colors. The finale is in doubt right up to the very end, which helps mitigate some of the lazier scripting choices that preceded it.

Overall, The Muppets is a frivolous, yet fun, one-hundred-and-three-minutes well-spent spent with some old friends and serves as a perfect segue into ABC's new prime time television show.

 Tilt: up.

 

Movie Review: "My Name Is Bruce" by David Pretty

 
When I first heard about My Name is Bruce I was pretty freakin' jazzed. After all, I've been a huge fan of Bruce Campbell a.k.a. "The Chin" since 1981's Evil Dead.

The original pitch for this film sounded phenomenal: a group of deluded uber-fans mistake the B-movie actor for his "heroic" alter ego Ash and try to enlist his help in battling some real-life demons. Unfortunately what should have been the perfect excuse for serve up plenty of biting industry commentary, copious amounts of messy gore and tons of Campbell's trademark snark ended up being a complete and total washout.

Where to start? Well, first up, Mark Verheiden's script fails to deliver a compelling story, believable characters or any semblance of a plot. The "humor" in the film is so broad you can see the jokes coming a mile away. There's absolutely no guile or wit here; Campbell might as well be holding up a "THIS IS FUNNY" flash card while he's trying to sell all of the crass dialogue and blatantly-obvious in-jokes.

The emo kid Jeff (Taylor Sharpe), Bruce's love interest Kelly (Grace Thorsen) and the litany of insultingly bad characters Ted Raimi is forced to play are all shockingly underwritten and, in Ted's case, borderline racist. The Chinese demon, though original, is not the slimy, splattery threat that we really want to see Bruce tangle with. Supposedly the film was made for just under $2 million bucks but what's up on the screen looks like it's a few missing zeroes.

But the absolute worst thing about the movie is how Bruce shamelessly sells himself down the river in a sad and desperate bid to generate cheap laughs. Yes, I fully expected him to embrace self-depreciating humor and take the piss out of his cinematic persona, but I really wasn't expecting a character that's completely and utterly devoid of any redeeming qualities whatsoever. And where galloping ego / arrogant blowhard Bruce is great, I really don't care for the alcoholic, deadbeat, nasty creep that's on screen here. He doesn't even exhibit the most basic tenants of personal grooming or base civility, fer Crissakes.

 
The really amazing thing is that Campbell's ample charm still shines through despite the hack job. If not for this, Grace Thorsen's appealing presence and a few awesome cameos, the film would be a complete and total total write-off.

I have no idea what the hell happened here. Mark Verheiden is actually a pretty good genre writer but here he exhibits zero insight into what should have been a no-brainer home run. I just pray that Ash vs. Evil Dead delivers on the promise that My Name Is Bruce only hinted at.

Hopefully it'll be the palate-cleansing Bruce Campbell vehicle that fans have been clamoring for, something that really does justice to the myth, the man, and the legend.

          Tilt: down.

Movie Review: "Ant-Man" by David Pretty

 
Ant-Man is a perfectly serviceable super-hero movie. At face value that might sound like faint praise but as we near the saturation point for this genre the bar of distinction is just gonna keep going up and up for me. Mercifully director Peyton Reed and producer Kevin Feige have come up with something that's reasonably fresh. So even if the final product does feel a little "decision by committee", it's still a fun, engaging, summer romp.

Paul Rudd plays Scott Lang, a top-notch robber, er...burglar who's been stewing in prison for corporate sabotage. After he's paroled for good behavior he hooks up with his old partner Luis (Michael Peña) and his two new "business associates" including Dave (Tim "T.I." Harris) and Kurt (David Dastmalchian). Collectively they try and lure Scott back for one, final, easy job but this time our hero vows to go straight in order to improve his relationship with his estranged wife Maggie (Judy Greer) and justify daughter Cassie's (Abby Ryder Fortson) hero-worship. Natch.

But child support payments don't come easy when you're working for sprinkles at Baskin-Robbins. Scott is fired after his past comes to light so he immediately falls back on his old ways. The "cakewalk" job turns out to be a heist at some rich, old, one-percenter's phat palatial mansion. Scott manages to defeat the estate's high-tech security system and break into the vintage safe but all he finds inside is a helmet and some freaky-looking biker gear.

Turns out he's just pilfered the personal effects of Hank Pym (Michael Douglas), a brilliant scientist who's breakthrough discovery to shrink in size gave him amazing powers. In the guise of "Ant-Man", Pym ran missions for S.H.I.E.L.D. back in the Sixties until they tried to force him to share his secrets. After resigning from the organization under a cloud of ill-will, Pym started up his own private company not long after.

But that wasn't the end of his troubles. Darren Cross (Corey Stoll), the young hotshot protégé that Hank hand-picked to run the operation, has become obsessed with his mentor's guarded attitude towards sharing the Pym Particle technology. With the aid of Hank's estranged daughter Hope (Evangeline Lilly), Darren has all but locked Hank out of his own company. He's also on the verge of producing his own shrinking suit (code-name: Yellowjacket) and he's poised to make a killing in military contracts. Natch.

The balance of the film concerns itself with addressing the questions set up in the first half. Will Scott assume the mantle of Ant-Man and, if so, will he prove to be hero material? Why is Hope so cheesed-off at her father? Can she put aside her differences and mentor Scott? Will this eclectic team congeal before Cross pawns off Hank's potentially-dangerous technology? Things come to a head in a fantastic final act that really catapults the film into the upper echelon of superhero flicks.

And that's what I liked most about Ant-Man: it's attempting to do something different. The whole "ex-criminal-turned-hero" angle hasn't been done yet in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and, frankly,  I really appreciate any deviations from the formula at this stage. Add in a super-fun tech heist, some great performances and the inherently-amusing shrinking gimmicks and you've got yourself a pretty refreshing combo.   

 
Essentially Ant-Man is Honey, I Shrunk The Kids meets Iron-Man, which, let's face it, is a pretty sweet-ass combination. By their very nature, the visual effects alone are a tremendous wellspring of originality. Between Scott's first inadvertent shrinkage in the bathtub to his first tête-à-tête with his insect allies to the final mano-a-mano battle against Yellowjacket over a Thomas the Tank Engine train set, the film is a visual delight.

And, let's face it folks, Ant-Man ain't never gonna be as cool as a Spider-Man or a Wolverine. To offset this the producers have fully embraced the humor inherent in the concept. Since the Pym Particles provide the perfect excuse to film some truly-inventive action sequences, there are tons of dazzling set-pieces. I won't spoil anything; just suffice to say that you're gonna wanna keep a close eye on Hank Pym's personal effects.

Even though Peyton Reed's direction isn't what I'd call "distinctive" I really appreciate his patience in telling Scott's story. By the time things start to percolate we're already emotionally invested in the characters and want to see things work out for them. At first I was concerned that Reed and his editors Dan Lebental and Colby Parker, Jr. had shot and cut every single action sequence w-a-a-a-a-y too close and fast but mercifully this hyperactive style tones down considerably by the time we get to the final tilt. Plus, if nothing else, Reed certainly knows how to exploit the whole shrink-y / grow-y gimmick to maximum effect.

Having said that there are a few things about the film that kinda irked me. Unless you've been living under an ant-hill for the past four years, you'd know that the film's co-scribe Edgar Wright of Shawn of the Dead fame was originally tapped to direct. Unfortunately he had a "creative differences"-style falling out with Marvel Studios which led him walk away from the project. Now if I had to guess as to what caused this rift I'd have say that it had something to do with Ant-Man not being integrated enough in the MCU.

Naturally when things start to get hairy, Scott is forced to ask the perfunctory question on everyone's mind, I.E.: "Why aren't we calling in the Avengers?". Given the current complexity and interdependence of the MCU such questions are necessary but mercifully brief. Which is more than I can say for another superfluous sequence that follows later on in the film which feels a lot more like fan service wankery than anything that's integral to the plot. Again, if I were a betting man I'd wager that Edgar Wright's version of the script probably had a lot less connective tissue with established continuity. Oh, and it was probably a lot funnier, too.

Even though the comic book continuity nerd in me is slightly bummed that Hank Pym didn't get the first at-bat as Ant-Man, I can see why Marvel went this way. As a well-established character that's been around for fifty-three years, Pym's understandably got a lotta baggage. He's constantly flipping out, he's the unofficial punching bag of the Avengers and he's even been guilty of domestic abuse at one point. Needless to say I don't blame Marvel for kicking this series off with the relatively- clean-slate that is Scott Lang.

And as such, I think that Paul Rudd is a great choice for the role. Effortlessly charming, he's equally earnest as a put-upon underdog, a loyal father, an expert safe-cracker and a reluctant hero. You might be hard-pressed to call Scott's journey a "character arc"; after all he's pretty much the same person at the end of the movie as he is at the beginning. It is fun, however, to watch him become increasingly self-assured as a hero and attempt to justify his daughter's blind faith in him.

Michael Douglas is also a solid pick for Hank Pym. He does a stellar job hinting at the character's frailties and foibles while still maintaining an air of authority and experience. During a riveting prologue that uses seamless reverse-aging CGI to show a Wall Street-era Michael Douglas quitting S.H.I.E.L.D. we get a quick and effective snapshot of the guy. Between that scene and the power of command that Douglas wields during the final operation, we get all the Hank Pym-era Ant-Man we need before Rudd takes over as the more sympathetic protagonist.

Evangeline Lilly's Hope van Dyne is actually better written than I expected. As it turns out, she actually has a really good reason to be pissed off with pops, making her initial alliance with Darren Cross somewhat justifiably. But what I liked most about Hope is how outraged she is over the prospects of Scott inheriting the Ant-Man suit. It's as if she's speaking for an entire legion of women who, justifiably so, are wondering why we haven't seen a female-led super-hero movie yet. Even though Hank's reasoning does lead to a reconciliation of sorts between the two it's still a tremendous source of friction that Lilly really runs with. 

As for the movie's main foil, Cory "House of Cards" Stoll gets more to do here then, say, Lee Pace did in Guardians of the Galaxy or Christopher Eccleston did in Thor: The Dark World. Which still isn't saying very much but at least Cross's character has a clearly-defined motivation for turning against Pym. Unfortunately the writer's don't think that Cross's Machiavellian ambitions are enough reason for us to boo and hiss at him, so the character stoops to wanton murder and animal cruelty in order to underscore just how EEEE-VIL he truly is. Credit Cory Stoll's even and vaguely-sympathetic performance which ensures that Cross doesn't drift completely into the realm of caricature.

Finally, Michael Peña deserves a nod as Luis, Scott's eternally-grinning, super-chill partner in "crime". Now I'm sure some people will dismiss Luis as yet another Latino stereotype but I think that's unfair, especially given the character's incongruous penchant for art exhibits and high-class gala luncheons. On the page Luis is reasonably well-sketched, but Peña's fun and memorable interpretation is what makes the character really memorable. It's likely that everyone out there knows at least one guy like Luis, someone who keeps smiling optimistically, regardless of what personal turmoil he's talking about.  

For two hours of entertainment, you could certainly do worse than Ant-Man. Sure, it would have been cool to see what a visionary director like Edgar Wright would have done with this material but I can only review the movie we got and what we got was actually pretty durned good. The heist plot is surprisingly deep, the wise-ass dialogue is amusing, the cast is on-point, the story unfolds organically and the resolution serves up just enough curve-balls to keep us on our toes.

Compared to the bloated, top-heavy Age of Ultron, Ant-Man might be smaller but it's also mightier.

 Tilt: up.

T.V. Review: "Daredevil" by David Pretty

 
Daredevil has officially bumped Guardians of the Galaxy out of my top three favorite Marvel superhero projects to date. So, in light of this, here's my new ranking:

(3) The Avengers
(2) Daredevil 
(1) Captain America: The Winter Soldier

So how did Daredevil billy-club its way into the number two spot? Well, it's because I never, ever thought in my wildest dreams that a big-budgeted T.V. project would come along and give so many casual viewers a reason to love this relatively-obscure character half as much as I do. To this day my top three favorite Marvel superheroes are Spider-Man, Wolverine and Daredevil.

If you haven't already guessed, I'm a big fan of low-powered, underdog superheroes and Daredevil definitely qualifies. At a formative age, young Matt Murdock (Skylar Gaertner) selflessly rescues a pedestrian from certain death but gets doused in a corona of toxic chemicals in the process. This deprives Matt of his eyesight but it also heightens his other perceptions to superhuman levels. With this "radar sense" he can take an instant snapshot of his surroundings, anticipate an incoming attack and even tell when someone is lying just by listening to their elevated heartbeat.

He's doted upon by his dad, "Battlin'" Jack Murdock, a struggling, uneducated prizefighter who does whatever he can to give his son a leg up in life. Realizing that he's more valuable to his son dead than alive, Jack wins a fixed match that he's supposed to throw and a local mob boss has him rubbed out. Young Matt is left alone but thanks to his dad's unexpected windfall he's financially secure for the time being.

During an extended stay in an orphanage, Matt struggles to control his emerging powers. A mysterious benefactor by the name of Stick (Scott Glenn) suddenly comes out of the woodwork to teach the kid how to fight and exploit his new-found abilities. Whatever you think of Stick's hard-assed methods, Matt is both capable and focused by the time his enigmatic mentor vanishes as suddenly as he appeared.

Using his dad's "inheritance" money, adult Matt (Charlie Cox) enters law school. While he's there he meets and befriends the goofy, pure-hearted Franklin "Foggy" Nelson, played by Elden Henson. After a painful internship with a "1-800-SUE-4-CASH" outfit, the two idealistic attorneys strike out by themselves to set up their own defense-based legal practice. Their mission statement: to stand up for the innocent against overwhelming odds.

It isn't very long before their first adversarial Goliath rears his bald pate. Looking to capitalize on the damage done to Hell's Kitchen during the Battle of New York as depicted in The Avengers, shadowy industrialist Wilson Fisk (Vincent D'Onofrio) strives to re-work the venerable borough in his own image. Unfortunately he's doing it with the aid of the Russian mob and a pretty vicious drug ring. He also has serious anger management issues and tends to casually murder anyone who vaguely inconveniences him.

When a former secretary named Karen Page (Deborah Ann Woll) gets an unintended glimpse into Fisk's shady methods, Matt comes to her rescue as the black-garbed "Devil of Hell's Kitchen". Now allied with Foggy, Karen and a world-weary reporter named Ben Urich (Vondie Curtis-Hall), Matt attempts to take down Fisk's criminal empire both in the courts and on the streets. Unfortunately he soon realizes that the forces arrayed against him are virtually insurmountable.

The writing in Daredevil is so patient, so sure-footed and so compelling that you'll be hard-pressed not to binge watch all thirteen episodes in one sitting. Information is meted out in economic little parcels which results in some pretty compulsive viewing. You want to keep watching just to see what precious new tidbit you'll be privy to next. One haunting early image shows the deplorable and inexplicable state of Madame Gao's (Wai Ching Ho) assembly-line workers. We only see them for a few seconds but it's more than enough to make us ponder how many episodes we can watch in a row before losing control of our bodily functions. 

Show runner Steven DeKnight and his screenwriters are clearly fans of ol' Horn Head or at the very least they've digested a metric crap-ton of the character's comic book lore. We've got pivotal scenes set in Josie's Bar, there's an incompetent petty-crook-turned-snitch named Turk and Matt takes solace in his Catholic faith by indulging in soul-searching tête-à-têtes with his spiritual adviser Father Lantom, played by Peter McRobbie. Daredevil even starts his adventuring career wearing the all-black thrift-store ninja outfit with the combat boots, cargo pants, spandex shirt and headband. 

Which brings me to one of the few demerits of the entire series: the red costume that Matt eventually "upgrades" to looks pretty durned goofy. The horn-spiked cowl, with its creepy, glow-in-the-dark eyes, is pretty much spot-on but would it have killed them to stamp a friggin' double-D on the chest? Again this is just a nitpick but it seems like such a no-brainer. Hopefully they'll tweak the design in the second season so that it doesn't just look like a maroon-colored mish-mash of biker gear and hockey equipment.

Now, even though I didn't completely loathe Mark Steven Johnson's Daredevil from back in 2003 (particularly the Director's Cut that followed five years later), this Netflix format already has that movie totally beat. With thirteen, fifty-minute episodes to work with, the producers can really take their time building on and exploring the intense world of Daredevil. Matt's origins, Wilson Fisk's background, and the criminal quagmire that Hell's Kitchen now finds itself mired in is covered with respectful detail.

But that's not to say that the show is pedestrian in any way. Yes, large tracts of screen time tick by without Daredevil showing up but the writing and the performances are so strong that you won't care. I call this the "Iron Man Effect". Even if you completely removed the super-hero quotient from the show you'd still be left with what amounts to a crackerjack legal procedural. In fact, Daredevil often feels like a mash-up between Lawn & Order, The Wire and Chris Nolan's Batman movies. The fact that there's a blind guy with radar vision who shows up periodically to punch people in the mush is almost incidental.

But when Daredevil does show up the tone is electric. The fight scenes are some of the best I've ever seen period: gritty, fast, brutal, and vicious. The brawl that caps out the end of episode two is, by far, the most authentic, dramatic and original fistfight in television history. The only time I've ever seen anything vaguely comparable is in a hard-boiled Korean action movie like Old Boy.

If you've seen this episode you know exactly what I'm talking about. Daredevil invades a rundown tenement where Russian mobsters are holding a little boy hostage. Our hero infiltrates the building, takes a quick inventory of his foes and then systematically goes to work. Already gravely wounded from a previous encounter, Matt tries to end the fight as quickly as possible but things don't go according to plan. Every time he knocks these goons down they just keep getting back up again. And instead of attacking him as if they've taken a number, they swarm him in groups of twos and threes. Slowly Matt starts to get winded. Clearly he's more skilled than these guys but how can he possibly hope to defeat them all?

The battle wears on and on. Slowly, inexorably, Matt uses his special abilities, his fighting skills, his environment, his smarts and a pretty hefty dollop of pain rage to turn the tide. Episode director Phil Abraham and fight coordinator Philip Silvera keep the battle grinding on during one, long, merciless, continuous take. Sometimes we can't see what's going on because the action has spilled into another room but eventually things heave back into our line of sight. When our hero emerges from this epic tilt exhausted, battered and victorious we feel as if we've gone the distance with him. While watching this incredible fight scene I actually felt like a helpless bystander, alternately desperate to throw in the towel or lend a hand. It's a truly historic sequence.

As great as the creative fisticuffs are, it's the contemporary writing that kept me watching obsessively. Thanks to that fucking jerk Giuliani shutting down all the strip bars, Hell's Kitchen isn't quite the cesspool of filth, crime, and human misery that it used to be back in the 80's. It's also why the character of Wilson Fisk is so perfectly depicted here. In the original comics, he's the Kingpin of Crime, a larger-than-life mob boss who's in competition with the Owl, the Yakuza and a slew of other gangs. He's got his pudgy mitts in a slew of stereotypically-shady doings: racketeering, gambling, drugs, prostitution...all the usual vices.

Fast forward to 2014. Petty crime in New York City has dropped considerably but white collar crime is at an all-time high. Nowadays it's all about the vanishingly middle class. Forty-eight percent of the nation's wealth is now in the hands of the richest one-percent and that's exactly what the character of Wilson Fisk is all about.

In his defense, Fisk didn't inherit his wealth; he's a self-made man. Via a series of flashbacks we learn that his dad was a ripe bastard with unrealistic political aspirations that were meant to put him on easy street. He's depicted as an abusive jackass who constantly browbeats (and traditionally beats) his pragmatic wife whilst berating his pudgy son for being "soft". When young Wilson is forced to watch his father beat down a neighborhood punk after the kid casts aspirations on the Fisk name, the programming is set. The best way to answer those who disrespect you is to unleash the beast and let loose with a little bit of the ol' ultra-violence.

For the adult Wilson, control is of the essence. In one episode we get to see his O.C.D.-style daily routine which always seems to involve scrambled eggs, donning the next suit in order on the rack and putting on his dad's cufflinks. It's not a crime empire that Wilson is striving for, it's a world of order and stability. If you're looking for a radical contrast between depictions of the Kingpin compare D'Onofrio's measured, borderline Aspergers-tinged turn versus Michael Clarke Duncan's swagga in the Daredevil movie. To highlight this contrast, the name "Kingpin" isn't even used once during the show's thirteen episode run.

Given his woeful origins, difficulty in relating to people, and his vaguely-noble motivations, you almost feel sorry for the dude. This is all thanks to D'Onofrio who was literally the best possible choice for this role. Each one of his line deliveries is so measured, so telling, and so rife with pathos and barely-coiled rage that he's positively magnetic to watch. The writers of Daredevil abide by the same tenant that I personally subscribe to: antagonists are never completely and wholly evil. D'Onofrio's Kingpin is a foil for the modern age: a super-rich, super-powerful guy who's been living in his own world a bit too long. Fisk is the villain here simply because his methods and motivations don't jibe with most normal people. And frankly this is infinitely more interesting to me than the usual melodramatic, mustache-twirling bad guy.

I first saw Charlie Cox in Stone of Destiny and I really like the guy. His casting wasn't super-obvious to me and I was kind of expecting someone more seasoned but he completely hits it out of the park during his very first scene. Vaguely scruffy with only the slightest intimation of red hair, Cox capably sells the character's physical blindness as well as his unique gifts. Whether he's kicking ass in a desperate fight scene, sharing a tender moment with Clair Temple (Rosario Dawson), delivering a mouthful of legalese or struggling with some huge ethical crisis, Cox is sure-footed throughout. Also, major bonus points to the producers for picking the perfectly-cast Skylar Gaertner as young Matt.

In the comics Foggy Nelson has always been portrayed as Matt's schlubby, goofy wing man; a competent lawyer with his heart in the right place even if his head isn't always in the game. Between the screenwriters and actor Elden Hensen, the character finally feels three-dimensional to me. Foggy is the perfect sounding board for the audience, a guy who's always trying to figure out how a sightless man can be so inhumanly aware of things. Yes, Foggy serves as the primary source of comic relief but his actions are also integral to the plot, particularly where it concerns a past flame, of all things. It also doesn't hurt that Henson is downright hilarious and gets to serve up some of the show's best one-liners. After a mid-series revelation puts him at odds with Matt, Hensen's passionate performance will rend your heart.

Having lived on an emotional roller-coaster for seven seasons as Baby Vamp Jessica on True Blood, Deborah Ann Woll is in fine form here as Karen Page. Writers often fail to deliver tough and interesting female characters, crafting them as nothing more complex than men with boobs but mercifully things are a lot more nuanced here. After barely avoiding an attempt on her life and then watching several innocent people die, Karen finally snaps when she's abducted by Fisk's right-hand man Wesley (Toby Leonard Moore). Deborah does a fine job showing the emotional repercussions of her fateful decision, juggling wounded, evasive, chipper, and resolute with considerable aplomb.

It's my understanding that the character of Karen has come under fire for her single-minded drive to bring Fisk down at any cost. I'd counter this by pointing out that her gambit actually works where everything else failed. Yes, her actions trigger a veritable shit-storm of collateral damage but ultimately it's Fisk who's responsible for all of the mayhem. Just put yourself in her place; if someone wanted you dead and you had absolutely no way to defend yourself and your loved ones, you'd probably take some pretty desperate measures as well.

Vondie Curtis-Hall also deserves major props as old-school reporter Ben Urich. In another timely update, the once-respectable newspaper that he works for has been reduced to a fluffy shadow of its former self. Ben would like nothing more than to take Fisk down but he's been de-fanged by his spineless editors and cowed by threats of financial ruin while caring for his ailing wife. Throughout the entire season Curtis-Hall is an absolute pleasure to watch. His well-worn countenance is used to great effect, conveying a constant diet of unease coupled with renewed vigor after Karen spurs him into action.

A host of A-list talent rounds out a terrific supporting cast. Veteran character actor Bob Gunton is sufficiently bitchy and wise-assed as Fisk's nominal business partner Leland Owlsley. The impeccable Scott Glenn is maddeningly-cold and acerbic as the enigmatic Stick. Wai Ching Ho raises the bar on practiced deception as Madame Gao. Ayelet Zurer is just off-kilter enough to sell her unflappable devotion to Fisk. Rosario Awesome, er, Dawson is a source of comfort and perspective as Claire Temple. Finally Toby Leonard Moore is perfectly tuned as Fisk's unflappable major-domo Wesley.

Now I'm sure some people will bitch that the story just comes down to another mano-a-mano dust-up between the two opposing forces but I'd argue that the way in which this happens is downright brilliant. I love how the screenwriters had plenty of time to incorporate Matt's past failures into an over-arching learning curve. Up until the very last minute it looks as if Fisk is just as untouchable as ever, but Matt and his allies have learned from their past mistakes and the battle is truly joined. It makes for an incredibly tense and thrilling finale.

Seriously, Daredevil is something of a minor miracle. I have no idea what confluence of astrological alignment brought together this particular creative team with this, at best, C-tier Marvel superhero who just so happens to be one of my favorites. Words can't convey how relieved I am that such a relatively intimate, gritty, clarion, surgically-attuned story came out around the same time as the epic-scale puzzle piece that was Age of Ultron. It gives me hope that Marvel Studios can still wring a few more home runs out of the ol' Bullpen before the whole thing inevitably founders under its own weight.

Tilt: up.

Movie Review: "Jurassic Park" by David Pretty

 
Jurassic Park was one of the last major studio summer blockbusters to be made with the skill and sensibilities that characterize 70's and 80's-era film-making. Even though Spielberg had a bunch of fancy new digital toys to play with, it certainly didn't make him complacent. As a result, the movie is well-plotted, well-acted and features interesting character arcs and still-relevant thematic underpinnings.

When paleontologist Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neil) and paleobotanist Dr. Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern) receive an unexpected visit from eccentric one-percenter John Hammond (Richard Attenborough), their curiosity is understandably piqued. Acting like the cat that ate the canary, Hammond tempts them with an offer they can't refuse: if they sign off on his secretive new prehistoric theme park he'll finance their research for the next three years. Naturally they agree to help him.

En route to the park's remote island location we're introduced to rock star mathematician and chaos theory proponent Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum). Malcolm already seems suspicious about Hammond's plan and when they get to the island his skittishness is vindicated. When they arrive on Isla Nublar they discover that the billionaire has used DNA recovered from blood in the bellies of amber-preserved mosquitoes to resurrect real, live dinosaurs.

The park's minor glitches soon go from vaguely annoying to potentially deadly when greedy computer programmer Dennis Nedry (Wayne Knight) disables the park's security systems during a botched heist. This strands Alan, Malcolm, insurance lawyer Donald Genarro (Martin Ferrero) and Hammond's two grand kids Lex (Ariana Richards) and Tim (Joeseph Mazzello) right by the T-Rex paddock. Soon all hell breaks loose and the human characters suddenly find themselves tumbling several steps down the food chain.

Unlike so many contemporary action movies which spoil so much in the trailers, Jurassic Park waits until your ass is firmly ensconced in that theater seat before trotting out the amusement park thrills. Indeed the script's philosophy appears to be "good things come to those who wait". Fortunately this isn't a chore since John Hammond's coy, child-like, "I-know-something-you-don't-know" attitude is ridiculously compelling. You wanna keep watching just to find out what the smarmy old codger is so excited about.

We also get some stellar protagonists to root for right out of the gate. Within a few economic moments of screen time we see that Sam Neill's Dr. Alan Grant is knowledgeable, passionate and hates children almost as much is Donald Trump hates Mexicans. Neill has a lot of fun with the role, throwing in some super-quirky moments which come off as inspired brilliance. I love his weak-in-the-knees reaction to his first dino-sighting, his intense, egg-sniffing soliloquy about the resilience of prehistoric reproduction and the scene in which he scares the fertilizer out of a disrespectful brat for liking velociraptors to giant chickens.

Eventually Spielberg hits us with a double-barreled blast of his trademark wonderment. When we see the first dinosaur at the twenty-minute mark, Sam Neill's reaction pretty much mirrors that of theater-goers back in 1993. The impact of this scene is further jacked up by a tantalizing crane shot that shows the character's stunned reactions, several low P.O.V.'s that Spielberg later exploited in the under-rated War of the Worlds and, of course, that rousing John Williams orchestral score.

 
Even moments of potentially-dry exposition are delivered with flair and originality. Granted original novelist Michael Crichton probably deserves as much credit for this as Spielberg does, but the park's animated orientation sequence is pure genius. Not only does this goofy little cartoon explain all the scientific mumbo-jumbo in an economic and entertaining way, it's also well in-step with the milieu. In a lesser film, like, oh, I dunno, a Star Wars prequel, Hammond would just stand there and yammer at the other characters in a ten-minute orgy of dialogue-delivered exposition.

After buying the film's main conceit wholesale we're then treated to one of the best scenes in cinema history. It's the sort of moment that modern blockbusters don't feel the need to include, always to their detriment. The characters meet over some haute cuisine and debate the ethics of Hammond's venture. Their host is both naïve and blasé about the whole thing, Alan and Ellie are dealing with unexpected feelings of extinction, and the lawyer is presumably touching himself underneath the table while thinking about all of that potentially- filthy lucre.  

Meanwhile Jeff Goldblum calmly packs up the entire scene and walks off with it, delivering one of the best cinematic mic drops evar:

This one simple moment distinguishes Jurassic Park from most of the shitty, interchangeable noisemakers that sluice out of the Hollywood poop chute every summer. It also keeps the film as fresh and relevant as it was back in 1993. The ethical dilemma posed by the same science used to resurrect the dinosaurs could very easily substitute for various contemporary hot button issues like genetic engineering, GMO's and singularity-level artificial intelligence.

That's not to say that the film is just a bunch of eggheads sitting around debating ethics. Things quickly get very hairy at the ol' T-Rex paddock. Spielberg, master showman that he is, has already established this location about fifteen minutes ago when Grant and company first passed by it. As audience members back in 1993 we all smiled with bloodthirsty anticipation as Hammond tried to lure the T-Rex out with a feeder goat. And just like the characters in the movie we were all gravely disappointed when absolutely nothing happened.

But this is exactly what you'd expect at a regular ol' non-dinosaur-related wild game reserve. Sure, you've given the animals a huge enclosure but this makes it a lot harder for us to see them. Clearly Spielberg is telling us that these creatures aren't going to emerge from the woods and start tap-dancing for our amusement. And therein lies the rub. We paid to see some hot dino action, goddammit, and if we don't get it, those Trip Advisor reviews are gonna be carnivore-level vicious!     

Spielberg then proceeds to trot out that old adage "be careful what you wish for." The torrential rain gets worse. After a flash of lightning the feeder goat suddenly vanishes. Intimations of impact tremors are first betrayed by a glass of rippling water. Soon the footfalls become palpable. A bloody goat leg flies out of the jungle and lands on top of the kid's tour car. And then everything goes completely and utterly bat-shit nuts.

Gary Rydstrom's sound design for all of the dinosaurs, particularly the T-Rex, is absolutely brilliant. After the beast heralds its approach with a DTS-optimized roar that sounds like a combination of a rabid elephant and reality rending asunder, we see a tentative limb test the fence for an electrical charge. The creature's subsequent attack on the tour vehicles is such a master class of action and suspense that viewers will find themselves perched on on the edge of their seat the entire time. Credit the actors as well for selling this elaborate smoke n' mirrors trick to a positively stunned audience.

Now admittedly Laura Dern's Ellie Sattler isn't half as interesting as Dern's actual performance. For example, Ellie likes kids because, hey, ALL GIRLS LIKE KIDS. Perhaps her best moment comes when the park first breaks down and they lose contact with the tour. She finds Hammond sulking alone in the cafeteria, gorging himself on the melting ice cream. During this poignant scene she manages to spur him into action all the while reconciling her own fears. I love that little throw-away moment when she absently samples the ice cream and then feels compelled to admit how good it tastes.

"I spared no expense," Hammond says, now resigned to the demise of his childhood dream.

This scene is particularly impactful because, through it all, Hammond has been relentlessly-optimistic, downright positive and impossibly genial. The fact that Richard Attenborough was cast as Santa Claus in the remake of Miracle On 34'th Street is no coincidence. He's just so earnest and wide-eyed that you actually find yourself hoping that this five-masted ship of hubris will right itself, even though it would be detrimental to your entertainment value.

Another choice scene involving Dern and Attenborough occurs much later when Ellie volunteers to manually reactivate the electrical grid. 

John Hammond: It ought to be me really going.
Dr. Ellie Sattler: Why?
John Hammond: Well, I'm a...And you're, um, a...
Dr. Ellie Sattler: Look, we can discuss sexism in survival situations when I get back.

This exchange might sounds a tad anachronistic but coming from the grandfatherly Attenborough the comment almost sounds like misplaced chivalry. Twenty two years ago it gave Dern a chance to remind us all that limitations placed on women in action movies is downright idiotic. Back then she still had to fight for her cinematic rights, even after the trailblazing efforts of Sarah Connor and Ellen Ripley.

 
What I like most about Dern's performance is that it's relatable. Ellie is a paleobotanist, not Lara Croft so it's no surprise that she takes a tumble during her desperate dash for the generator. At one point, the persistently-cranky Samuel L. Jackson gives Spielberg a hand in an impish nod to Jaws. Sorry, but if that shit happened to me I'd be all like ' I don't care if I dropped that four-hundred dollar floodlight on the floor, I'll drag that bitch twenty miles before I stop runnin'.'

After the T-Rex attack, Alan is forced to guide Hammond's two precocious grand kids all the way back to the orientation center. Now under normal circumstances, I'd accuse Spielberg of deliberately pandering to kids if not for the fact that Tim and Lex also appear in Crichton's original novel. At least the kids are well cast, serve up some low-level comic relief and provide grist for Alan's character arc.

The kids are also at the heart of the film's best sequence, the velociraptor attack. You wouldn't think it possible that Spielberg and his team could possibly top the T-Rex scene from earlier but you'd be wrong. Michael Kahn's crackerjack editing gives the set-piece a frenetic pace rarely matched by contemporary blockbusters. And despite the low lighting and a zillion reflective surfaces, master cinematographer Dean Cundey gives the sequence crystal clarity as well as a cool, icy tone that mirrors the dead eyes of the raptors themselves.

And even though I realize how ridiculously improbable it is, that final shot inside the orientation center is pure money. I still get chills hearing the T-Rex proclaim his dominance over the world as the "When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth" banner flutters to the ground in front of him. It's the sort of moment that was clearly brainstormed on set and these little touches make Jurassic Park the stuff of pop culture legend.
 
Three years later Independence Day was released, presaging the end of intelligent blockbusters. Pretty soon it became de rigueur for summer tent pole action movie to blatantly embrace cliches, serve up laughably poor dialogue and / or wallow in rank stupidity. Every once and awhile a movie comes along that manages to incorporate style and substance but for the most part old-school sensibilities like character development, original plots and compelling themes are about as extinct as half of the cast of Jurassic Park.

Thankfully this venerable, twenty-two-year-old classic, forever preserved in digital amber, will always be around to remind us what a real summer action movie used to look like.

     Tilt: up.

Movie Review: "Fight Club" by David Pretty

  
The first time I saw Fight Club my feelings about it were...complicated. I thought the anarchic finale was irresponsible and the twist ending was improbable. Now, after an inconceivable sixteen years worth of retrospect, I can safely say that Fight Club should have won "Best Picture" back in 2000.

That's not to disparage American Beauty, which is an amazing movie in its own right. But I think it scored the Oscar nomination and eventually won, not because it was the better film but because it was made by and for Baby Boomers while Fight Club was targeted at "Generation X". I don't think it's co-incidence that both films came out around the same time, had a lot of the same plot beats and covered similar thematic ground. It was as if two different age groups wanted to go on record to say that the prevailing social paradigm was complete horseshit before everything eventually unraveled during Y2K.

In order for a film to wring a five-star rating out of me, it has to be technically proficient, vaguely relevant to my existence, challenging to watch, original, revelatory and potentially life-altering. No small order, but Fight Club did all of this and more. As a result it's been on my list of Top Ten favorite films of all time since its debut back in 1999.

The movie's IMDb synopsis ("An office employee and a soap salesman build a global organization to help vent male aggression.") sounds like it was written by someone who never saw the film or at least missed the point completely. Even though Fight Club is told from the perspective of two male characters, the film's themes are universal. It's really about recognizing the debt-ridden, advert-soaked existence that corporations want to mire you in and how to break free from this paradigm of modern slavery. It's not enough that you acknowledge this invisible prison, you have to annihilate it, even if it requires a drastic and painful personal metamorphosis.

Ed Norton is our friendly narrator, an office drone who toils away for a morally bankrupt insurance company. His fleeting moments of happiness seem limited to new acquisitions for his extensive Ikea furniture collection. After suffering from chronic insomnia for months and test-driving every standard medical treatment he infiltrates a support group for survivors of testicular cancer. The catharsis that comes from being viscerally and emotionally re-attached to reality again soon has him sleeping like a baby. 

Of course, this dysfunctional bliss can't last forever and the spoiler comes in the form of rival poseur Marla (Helena Bonham Carter). Her presence is like a psychic splinter, reminding our protagonist that the unconventional solution to his plight is nothing more than a band-aid applied to a sucking chest wound. In a deux ex machina-style co-incidence, another avenue of salvation immediately presents itself in the form of Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt), a "single-serving friend" that he meets on a flight. The narrator is immediately taken by this chaotically-dressed, self-assured, soap-making anarchist and when his materially-defined existence is completely annihilated, he soon falls completely under Durden's thrall.

It's easy to understand his fascination at first since Tyler's insight into contemporary existence cuts to the quick of our modern malaise. In what sounds like the natural extension of Lester Burnham's anti-pristine sofa rant in American Beauty, Tyler declares: "Fuck off with your sofa units and strine green stripe patterns, I say never be complete, I say stop being perfect, I say let's evolve, let the chips fall where they may."

The establishment of their verboten-to-talk-about titular organization happens not to "vent male aggression" as the myopic blurb above might suggest but to get people back in touch with the base, primitive definition of what it means to be human. Tyler starts taking some drastic steps to ensure the "evolution" of the Clubs and this is where my initial unease with the film began to creep in.

 
I was fine with Tyler's philosophy but as soon as he began to put his money where his mouth was I wanted to bail on him. When Tyler organizes the Clubs into a bonafide social movement, he starts performing acts of corporate terrorism with the ultimate goal of returning humanity to a more natural state. The lengths that he's willing to go to in order to fulfill this had me squirming uncomfortably in my seat. Clearly, I was still a brainwashed good little serf back then who thought that such actions were genuinely shocking.

Eventually I came to see Tyler Durden as an amalgam of my more challenging friends, one of whom floated his "Thatched Hut" theory a good five years before Chuck Palahniuk's novel was published. This theory maintained that all human beings really need to be happy in life is some sort of menial job, a thatched hut on a beach, friends to keep you company and the ability to get drunk periodically.

At the time I balked at how naive this sounded, since I couldn't reconcile this with my budding Star Wars toy collection or my current generation video game console. As I got older, however, I began to put more credence in Tyler's opinion that "the things you own end up owning you." Then, when you add in many thankless years of work drudgery, discovering the seemingly-limitless depths of corporate greed and realizing how much big business impedes human development, I eventually found myself gravitating towards Tyler's corner. I've even come to the point where the film's shocking denouement seems kinda justified. 

Now I could prattle on endlessly about well-acted, directed and written the film is, but Fight Club almost transcends examination on a mere technical level just because it's so much more than the sum of its cinematic parts. This is a film of tremendous influence and importance and one that I've come to recognize as the embodiment of my own personal credo, a credo that has had a major impact on my life. 

Much like the tortuous "lye test" that Tyler inflicts on the narrator, it's downright painful to unplug yourself from an existence that views the acquisition of wealth and material goods as the ultimate indicator of success. And I'm speaking from experience here. With the ethos of Fight Club still clanging around in my head I decided to opt out of being an interchangeable cog in a corporate machine back in April of 2010. As of this writing the jury's still out as to whether or not I did the right thing. While my heart, soul and mind have experienced a "Durden-esque" Renaissance my finances remain about as bleak as the headquarters of "Project Mayhem".

So when I say that Fight Club changed my life I ain't just whistlin' Dixie. 

http://julianmadesomething.deviantart.com/art/Fight-Club-Quote-397556338

The ballsy conviction and monetary plate-spinning required to liberate yourself from modern slavery isn't just taxing, it's arguably impossible. Despite this truism I can't help but ponder how many other people have used the mental nitroglycerin contained within the fabric of this film to reboot their own lives. Like the corner store clerk that Tyler threatens to execute if he doesn't take immediate steps to pursue his life's dream, I really felt as if the film was pointing a gun at my temple, ordering me to initiate some sort of positive change. In fact I have no idea how someone can watch Fight Club and then willingly and blissfully sink back into the doldrums of their domestic captivity.

I also can't help but wonder if I'll ever see another picture so relevant, so true and so worthy of recognition that I'll still be singing it's praises sixteen years after its release.

Movie Review: "Gladiator" by David Pretty

Color me surprised when I found myself feeling rather disappointed after watching Gladiator. The trailer gave me the impression that I was going to watch an obscure story about a real-life Roman gladiator who became a martyr after opposing the sick whims of a degenerate Emperor. Instead I got yet another color-by-numbers revenge fantasy without a shred of historical context, tons of grungy cinematography, and dated CGI.

First off I'm sick and tired of screenwriters thumbing their nose at historical accuracy. If you're thinking: "C'mon, Dave, we go to the movies to be entertained, not to be educated" I'd counter with "Fuck you, talented and ambitious screenwriters can do both". There's probably a whole slew of legendary tales in the annals of history about gladiator bravery, honor and rebellion, but scribes David Franzoni, John Logan and William Nicholson weren't content with that. Instead they banged out a bland, predictable and homogenized script likely to appease all of the mouth-breathers out there who aren't content unless they can check off every single box on their "Ahm gettin' mah monies wurth" checklist of cliches. 

If you wanna write a completely fictional screenplay with no basis in reality, that's fine by me. But as soon as you start dippin' into the genre of historical drama, you need to adhere to show at least a modicum of respect for the truth. And not just for the benefit of anal-retentive assholes like me, you really have an obligation to all the morons out there who don't know any better. I shudder to think how many idiots out there think that Hitler was killed in a theater in Paris "thanks" to Inglorious Basterds. Or Robert the Bruce deliberately back-stabbed William Wallace because, well...Braveheart. Or that Americans single-handedly retrieved the German's Enigma code machine just like they did in U-571. The general public is misinformed and under-informed enough without Hollywood adding to the problem.   

And so it is with Gladiator, which completely thumbs (down) it's nose at historical accuracy. Minor liberties I can deal with but the whoppers on display here would have changed the entire course of human history forever. If I had my druthers I'd make Franzoni, Logan and Nicholson write "TRUTH IS STRANGER AND OFTEN COOLER THAN FICTION" a hundred times on the blackboard until they learned their lesson. Call me crazy but I think dramatic tension is heightened when the events I'm watching actually happened to real people.

So is Gladiator a complete and total write-off? Fuck, no. The whole thing kicks off with a massive, on-screen pitched battle between a horde of barbarians and the Roman legionary, a crazy spectacle that rivals anything I've ever seen on screen before or since. Indeed, this was one of the last few times when a major studio production used a real environment populated with real extras, props, cavalry, horses and ballistae to re-create a scene of ancient warfare. Many movies that followed, like Troy for example, opted to use large swaths of cartoonish CGI instead which produced less than stellar results.

This epic scrum is followed by a series of escalating mano-a-mano gladiatorial fights. The down n' dirty Moroccan pit-battle segues nicely into an intended rout involving archers and chariots and then moves on to a bold-faced assassination attempt featuring human mountanoid Sven-Ole Thorsen and a litter of pop-o-matic tigers. Unfortunately things eventually come crashing down with a disappointing and laughably-improbable main event.

Even though the battles are well-executed I really wish that director Ridley Scott had kept the camera back a little bit further from the action to really emphasize the scale of these epic tilts. This is further hampered by Pietro Scalia periodic lapses into ginsu-style editing. Having said that nothing in Gladiator is nearly as offensive as the crap on display in your average Michael Bay / Transformers-style A.D.D. visual fuck-fest.

The tremendous cast helps to make amends for the film's "ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!?" desperation to impress. Even though he's about as Roman and / or Spanish as me nan, Russell Crowe is completely convincing as the fictional general Maximus Decimus Meridius. He effortlessly manages to convey the character's power of command, his aptitude in combat and his devotion as a family man. Crowe is a pretty charismatic dude, so he makes it easy to root for Maximus even if our hero is sketched out in the broadest of brushstrokes.

Joachim Phoenix strikes a pretty amazing balance as Commodus. On paper, the Emperor is completely devoid of any redeeming features; he's vindictive, petulant, childish and slimy but somehow Phoenix manages to evoke a twinge of sympathy from time to time. Connie Nielson is appropriately regal and stalwart as Lucilla, even though she's forced into needlessly icky scenes with her on-screen bro and forced to play out the incredibly lazy and seemingly obligatory script contrivance of a past dalliance with Maximus.

Then there's poor Oliver Reed who gives one of the best performances in the film. Unfortunately he died part way through principal photography and was replaced by a CGI doppelganger that looks marginally better than the film's many fake-looking establishing shots. Kinda symbolic.   

And what's with all of the grungy cinematography? I just assumed that the Germania sequences were deliberately shot in a murky fashion to contrast with the inevitable introduction of Rome, or what Maximus wearily describes as the one spot of "light" in the world. But when the action moves to the Eternal City it's just as gloomy, dark and oppressive-looking as anywhere else.

Gladiator was a genuine disappointment to me. It could have been so much more but instead it took the lazy and easy way out by delivering a schlocky, cliche-ridden revenge story that we've seen a million times over.  Even the mighty Colosseum, one of the later-day Wonders of the World, was digitally blown up in scale just to make it more spectacular-looking on screen. And that pretty much sums up the movie to me right there: it isn't content with the inherently-amazing truth of our own human history. It's so pathetically desperate to impress a modern audience that it's willing to blithely adapt tropes more at home in an 80's fantasy film.

Speaking of, since the ludicrous finale seemed less I, Claudius and more Conan the Barbarian, I had to do a bit of independent research.

Yes, there was a Roman Emperor named Commodus. And yes, he liked to participate in gladiatorial games from time to time. But he also liked to dress up like Hercules and was strangled to death in a bathtub.

Now that's interesting.  
                  

  Tilt: down.