Author: Christian Sauvé

(In theaters, March 2002) Just as, after Harry Potter and The Lord Of The Rings, we were wondering if Hollywood had finally mastered the art of faithful adaptation, here comes a film to reassure us that nothing has really changed. If you have fond memories of H.G. Wells’s original novel, you might want to avoid this 2002 adaptation which rips out the guts of the novel by trying to “improve” the plot. It doesn’t take five minutes (at which point the fiancée of the protagonist is killed by a strangely unconvincing ruffian) to understand that this is going to be not only a bad adaptation, but an awful film in its own right. The rest of the film is -alternately- dull, stupid, loud, cliché, ugly, nonsensical and worse. Guy Pearce does his best with the trash he’s given as dialogue, but there’s a limit to what he can do in the middle of the paucity of imagination surrounding him; for SF fans, it’s excruciatingly painful to see the wasted potential of his trip through future New York. Granted, there’s one thing that saves The Time Machine from complete failure, and it’s the visuals. Some accelerated-time shots are impressive, and some images are truly arresting. Alas, most of it is thrown on-screen as mere eye-candy; the bulk of the story is a boring caveman-versus-monsters story we’ve seen countless times before. Oh, and lest you ask; all the sociological subtext of Wells’s story has been excised; now the Eloi are simply prey, without any exchange between them and the Morlock, who are now simply bestial. (The make-up job on the Morlocks is one of the most awful thing I’ve seen in years of special effects.) The script is filled with gigantic logical holes (parts of New York survive an ice age and massive erosion intact, pieces of the moon still orbit in roughly-identical position after epochs, etc…) and the main story isn’t directed with enough competence to make us care. Just avoid, okay, avoid. The only reason I kept a minimal interest in the film is because I was, at the time, playing around with a wireless web browser in the theater.

(In theaters, March 2002) An early contender for worst-film-of-the-year awards, Slackers‘ biggest problem is that it features no characters to cheer for. The “hero”, aptly played by Devon Sawa, is a world-class liar and cheater whose attempts at being honest feel like the biggest cheats of all. His slacker friends have all of his faults and none of his charisma. The antagonist is the worst uber-nrrrd to disgrace the silver screen in a long while. (It’s incarnated by Jason Shwartzman, almost as a dark parody of his already borderline-loathsome character in Rushmore) You might think that the poor stalked heroine would be left as the protagonist-by-default, but she’s so damnably boring that we come to wish the worst indignities on her simply for extra sadistic fun. (Fortunately, there’s a somewhat amusing gallery of supporting characters, from a militaristic teacher’s assistant to a sluttish roommate) Already starting from a character deficit, the screenplay mixes a few amusing vignettes with loads of gross-out humor and an inconsistent tone for a comedy experience that’s simply unpleasant. Even though I can name five to ten little moments that I liked in Slackers, the rest of the film is so worthless that I’d be hard-pressed to recommend it at all.

(In theaters, March 2002) While I recognize the artistic qualities of writer/director Wes Anderson’s previous Rushmore, I doubt that I’ll ever manage to like it. I was prepared for more of the same with The Royal Tenenbaums, and so my feeling at the end of the film is one of relief. Yes, it’s more or less the same approach than Rushmore, but this time the discomfort factor of the first film is toned down and the characters are more broadly sympathetic. The result is a much more enjoyable film. The acting talent present in the film is awe-inspiring; Hackman, Huston, Glover, Stiller, Wilson [x2], Paltrow… aside from Bill Murray (in a role that could have been played by anyone), few of them are wasted. There are still uncomfortable moments (the Paul Wilson plot-line, for instance) but the writers’ love for their characters shines through and carries the audience over the less pleasant moments. The direction is appropriate, though occasionally a touch too pedestrian especially given the flourishes shown elsewhere in the film. While I’m not particularly enthusiastic over The Royal Tenenbaums, it’s a definite step up from Rushmore and a quirky comedy in its own right. Definitely worth a look on video if that’s your type of film.

(In theaters, March 2002) Even though it was marketed as just another road-trip teen comedy, Orange County has a bit more to offer. It’s the “oh-so-sweet” story of a teen trying to find his way in life, despite his tortured family, troublesome friends and incompetent adult figures. The journey isn’t as raucous nor as raunchy as some of the trailers would like you to believe. A bunch of mostly-unknown young actors get to beef up their resume with some skill (along with a few more familiar faces, from supporting players John Lithgow and Jack Black to cameos by Kevin Kline and Ben Stiller); we’ll probably see them in other movies soon. The pacing is okay though not spectacular, and that ultimately stands as an assessment of the film as a whole: Better than most teen comedies, sure, but ultimately nothing overly remarkable. The conclusion is of the “awww” variety, though one is compelled to wonder if the protagonist is ultimately one of those pitiful one-true-story type of writer.

(In theaters, March 2002) Finally, Canadians now have a darn good reason to be culturally chauvinist! Deliberately engineered to tickle typically Canadian chords, Men With Brooms takes the usual sports/romance comedy template and applies it to the god-sent sport of curling, with highly enjoyable results. Writer/Director/Star Paul Gross does his best with a low budget (the deficiencies are most visible during the curling scenes, which aren’t much flashier than televised curling) but the real strength of the film is the script’s sense of fun. Good humour permeates Men With Brooms and ensures a constant level of giggling. It helps that the characters are enormously likeable, with particular props to the Gross/Molly Parker lead couple. Men With Brooms is shamelessly manipulative, but it works. (What doesn’t work as well is the whole wacky-Americans/NASA subplot, which feels a touch too contrived. Similarly, there are occasional tonal problems, especially in the third quarter.) The film even features digitally-created beavers, which somehow pushes back the state of the art in computer-generated special effects. All too often, local movies leave us saying a vaguely guilty “it’s good, for a Canadian film.”, but Men With Brooms actually warrants a “It’s good, because it’s a Canadian film.” Shoo, Atom Egoyan and your depressing work; the new hip Canadian cinema is here!

(In theaters, March 2002) It’s always risky to pre-judge a film on its trailer. Ice Age‘s trailer promised us a madcap cartoon with animal characters. The film itself includes the trailer as its first few minutes, but then continues on to tell us a far more conventional kid’s story in the Disney rather than the Warners style. Even though the end result is a fine piece of film for the kids, I’m still disappointed. Granted, I started as a hostile audience given my lack of affection for the look of the film; I thought the character designs were some of the ugliest things I’d seen in a while. That impression gradually disappeared though the movie, to be replaced by a far more substantial shortcoming: Ice Age is a bunch of very funny vignettes strung together with only an adequate plot. It’s probably all right for kids, but as an adult I though that there were some seriously dull stretches in between Squeak’s antics and the other action highlights (like the dodo segment or the wild ice cavern sequence) Ice Age has occasional charm, but it’s not an all-and-out success.

(In theaters, March 2002) For some reason, swashbuckling adventure is a genre that, if well-executed, never fails to set my spirits soaring. The romance, the action, the drama of it all! The Count Of Monte Cristo is the first such good film since 1998’s The Mask Of Zorro and the wait has been worth it. Here, the filmmakers run back to the classics for source material (Alexandre Dumas’ eponymous novel) and run with the concept, producing a film that has the feel of a timeless treat. Jim Caviezel surprises as Edmund Dantes, the innocent-to-awesome hero of the story; while Caviezel’s previous roles have been serviceable but hardly impressive, here he gets the chance to exhibit a great deal of range, strut a badass attitude and triumph against all odds. (He even exhibits a killer goatee) In comparison, even the dependable Guy Pearce is over-staged. (On the other hand, Luis Guzman finally gets a juicy supporting role!) Technically, the film is highly successful, with limpid directing, a good screenplay and top-notch cinematography. Even though the film is a solid 135+ minutes, it feels more epic than overlong. The epitome of good fun for everyone, The Count Of Monte Cristo is an unqualified success. There’s no reason to bitch and moan about the level of quality of Hollywood movies as long as films like this one continue to be released; go, rent, watch and enjoy!

(In French, In theaters, March 2002) French-Canadian cinema has, in the past ten years, adopted many marketing tactics from Hollywood, and here comes yet another one; the bestseller adaptation. Given the success of Chrystine Brouillet’s mystery series starring inspector Maud “Biscuit” Graham, its cinema incarnation was inevitable. The result is not bad, though it feels heavily derivative of everything else in the American serial-killer tradition, perhaps unjustly; is it possible to read a profiler story nowadays without thinking about Silence of the Lambs? From a technical standpoint, there isn’t much to complain about in Le Collectionneur; the direction is efficient, the overall level of quality is comparable or even higher than most low-budget crime thrillers. The script, on the other hand, is a mixed bag; levels of language vary widely, often even in the same scene with the same characters. The “edgy” child-prostitute sidekick feels gratuitous and annoying. Even the acting had occasional bad moment; Maude Guerin is often flat as the heroine, usually-dependable regulars like Yvan Ponton and Yves Corbeil are unnoticeable and the child actors are only a notch above annoying. Luc Picard mails in his performance as the psycho; it’s a good one, but it’s not up to his usual intensity levels. Still, the film has a definitely local atmosphere, and isn’t bad at all when seen as a whole.

(In theaters, March 2002) Whenever you get tired of loud action-packed WW2 dramas, why not go for quiet drama-packed WW2 dramas? Charlotte Gray takes a different approach to a common historical subject, almost a feminine/romantic angle as compared to the usual masculine/action focus. The incomparable Cate Blanchett plays the titular heroine, a young Scottish woman send deep behind the lines of Vichy France to liaise between the French Resistance and the English Secret Service. What follows is a long, sometimes dull, drama involving collaborators, resistance, Jewish children and Gray herself. While not overly absorbing, it’s a nice change of pace from the usual war film, and it manages to build up to a credible climax. Some threads -probably inherited from the source novel- are a bit superfluous and should have been strengthened or cut entirely. The acting is fine, though purists like your reviewer would have liked it best that the characters would have spoken the appropriate languages. (Here, like in Chocolat, everyone speaks British English, except for the rustic French, who speak English with a French accent… sigh…)

(In theaters, March 2002) I can recognize that Michael Mann is a great director, but goodness—please give him some espresso so that his films move more quickly. It’s not enough to spend the first twenty minutes of the film on a single fight, but we have to spend another five minutes later on jogging through the capital of Zaire and interminable moments on trivial details of Muhammad Ali’s life. It’s not only slow; it’s wasteful! Ali doesn’t add up, despite the best efforts of everyone involved, to a very good biography of its title subject; Seeing the documentary When We Were Kings immediately after this film gives an idea of the real significance of Ali, and how Mann’s Ali completely misses the target with a plodding, anecdotic narrative. Will Smith only looks like the younger Ali (not the older one of the “Rumble in the Jungle”) but whenever he talks, his voice inflexions are undistinguishable from the real Ali. It’s a courageous film (the political dimension of Muhammad Ali is never too far away) but ultimately a flawed one that ultimately squanders precious talent on a script that doesn’t give us a true measure of the man. Too bad!