Total Recall (2012)

Total Recall directed by Len Wiseman staring Colin Ferrell, Kate Beckinsale, and Jessica Biel. 

Two hot chicks, a bigger budget than the original, a much sleeker set design, and a more polished film, but yet the original is so much better. This movie never needed to be made. I don’t care how you slice it and dice it but Colin Ferrell will never, ever, be Arnold Schwarzenegger; Kate Beckinsale will never, ever, be Sharon Stone, and Len Wiseman will never, ever, be Paul Verhoeven. I will give Wiseman this I actually thought his direction for this movie wasn’t too bad, but the screenplay was terrible. It played with too many references to the original movie, as basically it just rehashed every scene from the original movie only making them look better with the a higher amount of choreographed action.  But it brought nothing new to the story, which is something a remake needs to do. All this movie did for me was re emphasis how great the original Total Recall was. This movie was basically the sci-fi version of Gus Van Sant’s pointless shot-for-shot remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho. There’s also just something to be said for Arnold just crushing things versus the over the top action fight scenes that are so obviously choreographed down to the last second, punch, and kick. By the time these action scenes were done I was thinking, “If Arnold had been in there, he’d just kill that man instead of dragging out these scenes for so long.” Jess and I basically just sat there the whole time saying what actions scenes we missed, what cheesy one liners we missed, and basically it was Arnold and Verhoeven we missed. They totally made the original movie what it was: a classic B-movie with over the top action, over the top violence, and over the top cheesy one liners. 

The original is still the better by a long shot.

Zero Dark Thirty

Zero Dark Thirty directed by Kathryn Bigelow staring Jason Clarke, Jessica Chastain, Jennifer Ehle, and Joel Edgerton. 

I don’t want to come at this movie based on politics, but I want to write about this movie based on it being a movie. 

Over the years of watching Bigelow films I’ve come to not like her as a director. She was the worst thing about The Hurt Locker and she really hasn’t done a great movie since she started directing them. There have been the few movies that have reached cult status: Near Dark and Point Break but she hasn’t directed a movie so far that would put her in the great film directors.  She hasn't make a movie that has withstood the tests of time. Saying all of that Zero Dark Thirty isn’t going to be that movie either, but it is the best film she’s directed so far to date and it heads and tails better than the overrated The Hurt Locker. Her direction for The Hurt Locker was all over the place with only one scene in that movie being really well directed (the sniper scene was extremely well directed).  But with Zero Dark Thirty she doesn’t let herself get in the way of the story and actually directs it much better than she ever has before. I’m not saying the film doesn’t have problems (which I will get to here shortly) but I don’t think the problems outweigh how good the film is on its own. 

Now to the film itself. Bigelow had one big problem with The Hurt Locker namely that she didn’t want to break down what made the main character do what he did and act how he acted. The main character just seemed to be some adrenaline junkie and no reason was ever given to support how or why he acted like he did. I mean something would have been better than nothing. Bigelow seemed much more interested in the action part of that movie than in actually creating a character for the audience to care about. That is part of the problem with Zero Dark Thirty for at least part of the film. The first hour of the film gives no reason for the main character to really care that much about finding bin Laden except 9-11, which if that’s the reason then shouldn’t everyone in the CIA also be that hell bent on finding him not just the main character? There needs to be something to motivate the main character to do what she does besides she just likes analyzing information, even that isn’t really said. But after the hour mark this problem is solved by having some of her friends get killed by a bomb, while other bombing incidents happen around the world, all claimed by the bin Laden’s group.  She also has an assassination attempt at he home.  These really help to cement her character with motivation and give her justification for the way she throws herself into pursuing bin Laden.  

The first hour felt a little overwhelming and disjointed but I think that part of the reason it was this way was because of all the information they had at the time was all over the place and nothing was really pin pointing anything. But the last hour and half of the film really flies by.  And as the characters get focused, the information gets focused the film becomes a whole new kind of film completely different from the feel of the first part of the movie. The stakes become raised that much higher.  The last 20 minutes of the film, the raiding of bin Laden’s bunker, was amazingly directed with no frills or over-the-top set pieces, just directness and focus with the execution of the mission that has come to define our SEAL teams and Special Forces units. I know the real stars of this kind of fact based movie tend to be the fact based stuff, but Bigelow has gathered some good actors and technical talent to bring this movie to life.  All of them rise to the challenge and make a good movie that serves to give honor to the people killed and people who helped to find Bin Laden.

The Social Network

The Social Network directed by David Fincher starring Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield, Justin Timberlake, and Rooney Mara.

This is one of best movies I’ve seen in a long time and was one of the best movies to come out in a crowded good year for movies, 2011.  I’ve been following David Fincher since I saw his movie Seven and this is his best movie and then comes Seven.  I’ve tried to isolate why I like this movie so much, I’ve seen it 4 times in two years and that’s something I don’t do with a lot of movies, but I can’t pin point why it connects with me so much.  Now I’m going to look at this movie not based on historical accuracies dealing with Mark Zuckerberg, but I’m going to judge this movie based on it being a movie.  I’m only going to look at it from that perspective, because I don’t care about how accurate or truthful everything in this movie is.  I only care about it from a movie perspective. 

It’s one of few movies I’ve seen that takes a theme and carries it all the way through the entire movie, as the theme relates to every character within the movie.  Just about every scene has to deal with the main theme in some way or the other.  It has a universal theme that connects to all people (that might be one of the reasons I like it so much) and that theme is: relationships.  Everything in this movie revolves around and deals with relationships.  

In another rarity for a Hollywood movie the opening scene of The Social Network set the entire theme of the movie up and it one of the best opening scenes in movie history, in my humble opinion.  The movie opens with Mark Zuckerberg (Jessie Eisenberg) on a date with Erica Albright (Rooney Mara) and in this scene everything is laid bare as Zuckerberg and Albright’s relationship is explored through some rapid fire, machine gun like dialogue.  This dialogue perfectly mirrors how relationships in our new digital and technologically advanced world have changed.  In this dialogue their relationship is explored.  A student’s relationship with fraternity clubs is explored.  A person’s relationship with class is explored.  America’s student relationship versus a foreign student’s relationship is explored.  Zuckerberg’s relationship with his intellect versus his relationship in dealing with people is explored.  Everything this movie is about and everything, which happens later after this scene, is all set up because of this scene.  This scene is paramount to the movie, everything hinges on the relationships of this scene.  It is one of the most beautiful scenes I’ve seen in a long time, from the directing to editing to acting, everything is done to perfection in this scene.  When Albright breaks up with Zuckerberg, she sets into motion everything that happens.  The founding of Facebook starts here, from a boy trying to get a girl.  Boy loses girl, it’s one of the most classic story telling scenarios that gets a little jolt from a modern age.  

I like how this movie isn’t afraid to have its main character be an asshole and continue to be an asshole throughout the whole movie, but yet he’s still an interesting character.  This movie has no real villain except Zuckerberg’s own personality, which can put everyone in conflict with him even his best friend Eduardo Saverin.  Who is the real victim of this movie, because if it wasn’t for him Zuckerberg would never have gotten the finances to start Facebook, and then Saverin gets screwed out of his shares of the Facebook for no other reason than pride.  Pride from Zucerberg and pride from Saverin, which comes down to the relationship between these two characters.  You don’t get to 500 million friends without making a few enemies, as the tag line reads.  This is never clearer in the relationship with Zuckerberg and Saverin as the movie show the breakdown of their relationship from the start of Facebook through to the lawsuits against Zuckerberg.  That’s some of the hardest things to watch in the movie is the breakdown of their friendship, because these two clearly had a friendship, but pride and other things kept that relationship from being mended.

Another thing that struck me upon watching it this time around, was how the editing was managed, considering there was at one time 3 different lawsuits going on, while the movie was also telling the main story in flash back with the lawsuits.  I never once got confused as to which lawsuit was being told or how the flash back sequences were being played out.  Everything was streamlined in a way where confusion was nonexistent.  Fincher has to be given a lot of credit here.  He brings a streamlined, polished visual elegance to this movie, along with a clear focus to scenes and editing that would not have been as good if he hadn’t been the one pulling the strings behind the camera.  I like Seven, a lot but this movie is by far his masterpiece.  And the maturity on display is simply amazing.  

But in the end this is still a story about a boy trying to get a girl.  The movie ends with Zuckerberg sending a friend request to Erica Albright.  He then hits refresh, refresh, and refresh as the movie ends with some factoids about the real life characters written over Zuckerberg as he continues to refresh.  A boy trying to get a girl.

Echo

Echo written and drawn by Terry Moore. 

This comic and this story is simply awesome.  I’m going to do my best to write how well done this comic book is because I want everyone to go out and read it.  It simply is that good and I would say it’s one of the best comic books ever written.  It really is that good.

I didn’t quite know what to expect from this story when I first found it at the library.  I passed it by a lot, picking it up every now and then just to see what it looked like.  I’d flip through the over 500 pages and just not get a good feel for what I was seeing, so then I’d put it back on the shelf and just walk by.  This went on for a long time and then one day, after I’d read most of what I really wanted to read from the libraries comic book selection, I pulled it from the shelf and checked it out.  I’ve read it twice now and it was as good the second time around as it was the first time.  

This isn’t simply a comic book and to put it in the comic book section is to do this book a grave disservice.  This is a story, plain and simple.  I’d put it in the same category as Watchmen, Sandman, Y the Last Man, and The Dark Knight Returns, which all told stories, but just used the comic book format to tell a story.  What Moore has done is written a really good sci-fi story.  And he did the one thing most sci-fi writers don’t do: he focused on characters.  There is some crazy sci-fi concepts in this story that have the ring of truth behind them, he then backs up that sci-fi with some good science and philosophical questions.  But Moore then populates the story with some good characters as he doesn’t stay focused on the technology or sci-fi.  This is a very character driven story that happens to be set in a sci-fi world.  He understands this better than half of the sci-fi writers out there right now. 

Are his characters that good?  Absolutely, they are extremely believable and have some funny, realistic conversations that bring them to life in ways I’m not used to seeing in comics, only in books.  Moore also isn’t afraid to explain things that are going on in the story, not being content to leave unexplained.  Unlike some other creators (Lost, X-Files), he actually likes to give answers to questions he’s brought up, so much so that by the end of the story there are little or no loose threads dangling from the story.  He also likes his characters to actually tell each what is going on, instead of letting them just sit around brooding or thinking about things.  He even encourages conversations between them, as those conversations go a long way into developing character, providing motivations, and bringing out emotions.  He does things with these characters that most writers don’t even do in books, movies, and television shows.  After reading through this a second time, it was the characters I was just amazed with, especially the female characters.  Moore doesn’t demean or treat them as a piece of meat.  He has created some intelligent, believable women, and for that alone he should be applauded in a comic industry that abuses and exploits women characters on a frequent basis.

Aressted Development

Arrested Development Season 1-3: staring Jason Batman, David Cross, Jeffery Tambor, Portia de Ross, Michael Cera, Will Arnett, Ali Shawkat, Tony Hale, Jessica Walter.

I haven’t seen this show since it came out, but I figured I might as well give it another run through before the next season comes out on Netflix.  I’m also going to look at this show based on it being a show and put aside all politics and religious beliefs and judge the show on its merits as a show, nothing more.  

First off, this is one of the best ensemble casts ever, for any show I’ve seen and one of the best comedies ever to be on TV.  Every one of the people cast for the Bluth family is perfect and they embody those people with a precision to detail that borders on Daniel Day-Lewis obsessiveness.  It didn’t seem like I was watching a TV show.  It really had the documentary feel they were going for.  This show was doing the fake documentary thing way before The Office started using it and it melded into the show with incredible ease.  Another thing, this show did well that helped to make it as funny and as good as it is, was that it didn’t shoot in front of a live audience.  This means the jokes fly fast and furious, so you’ve got pay attention, because they don’t leave room for a live audience to laugh.  They just keep going with the story line and go from joke to joke to joke without a moment to pause for breath.  How they managed to do all of this with a straight face is well beyond me?  

They storylines are really tight and well-paced.  Things will happen in one episode that don’t make a lot of sense but then a few episodes later they explain what had happened previously and everything makes sense.  They did not treat the audience as if they were stupid, but intelligent enough to pay attention.  This is also one of the few comedies that valued continuity, as they continued to set themselves up later on in earlier episodes.  I just don’t find enough writers that committed to detail, most seem more concerned with other things than actual story and characters.  That is the exact opposite for this show, story detail and characters are at the fore front of everything.  This is one of few shows I’ve seen where I laughed out loud a lot when I was watching it.  This is also a show that revels in the absurd and the more absurd the better.  This is truly a show based on the Theater of the Absurd and one of the few shows I’ve watched that have gotten away with it.  The writers never forget their commitment with the absurd.

Their use of guest actors as characters is the best I’ve seen, hands down.  No other show even compares with how they used guest actors.  And even the in jokes they would use with said guest actors just boggled my mind because the in jokes were so funny and subtle when you figured them out.  They used Scott Baio to replace Henry Winkler, when Scott Baio replaced Henry Winkler’s Fonze on Happy Days.  They use Justine Bateman to possibly be Jason Bateman’s sister and then have them in some incredibly uneasy moments that are truly funny.  Also I didn’t realize how much I missed Justine Bateman until I saw her on this show.  She did such a good job with such a short part.  Even Julia Lewis-Dryfuss has one of her most memorable roles since Seinfeld as a blind/pregnant lawyer.  Those are just to name a few.  

Now if there’s one thing I didn’t like about this show, it was how they used easy targets for comedy: right wing politics and Christianity, to name the most frequent of targets.  Especially for a show as smart as this to frequent these targets was just lazy.  I mean why not target the Muslims or Islamic religion especially since George Bluth had a direct relationship with them and there is a lot of comedic gold to be dug up there.  I’m not a huge fan of South Park, but that’s been one thing Stone and Parker have been very able to do over the years and that’s target everyone for comedy, because in the long run comedy knows no boundaries and everyone is up for grabs.