Movie Review

(In theaters, September 2007) After the collective war-lust that led the United States to invade and pillage Iraq in 2003, the uncomfortable reality of a prolonged quagmire has led a number of Americans to confront Yet Another Generational Sacrifice. It’s no accident if In The Valley Of Elah is written and directed by Canadian-born Paul Haggis, seeing how it tries really hard to be both non-partisan and blatantly political. At first glance, this is a soft-edged procedural thriller about a father’s investigation in the death of his son, recently returned from Iraq. At second glance, it’s a slow-paced character portrait of grieving father and a community in shock. At third glance, it’s a meditation about the price to pay for war. But little of that will be obvious if you allow yourself to be swept into the low-key investigation that forms the film’s backbone. Tommy Lee Jones is at his laconic best as an ex-Military Policeman using his experience to put together his son’s last few moments, with the help of a embittered Charlize Theron as a policewoman in a male-dominated environment. It’s smooth, but ultimately a bit dull: One jolt of action can’t mask the flat cinematography and the lengthy pacing. The end also gets a bit too obvious, though nowhere near as annoyingly so as in Haggis’ previous Crash. It’s a long sit (and as such, won’t please everyone all the time), but it’s got a certain dramatic heft and finds a place in the pack of meditative thrillers to emerge from contemporary Hollywood cinema. It could have been tighter, leaner, better, but it’s already halfway there.

(In theaters, September 2007) As a pretty sarcastic guy myself, I feel a strong kinship to films that keep pointing out the unconscious absurdity of the world out there. You would think that a sardonic based-on-reality comedy like The Hunting Party (in which a group of journalists goes hunting for a war criminal… and finds him) would appeal, and it does: at its best, writer/director Richard Shepard’s film pulls off a very entertaining mixture of smart-ass narration, dark humour and hard realpolitiks. The characters thrive in senseless situations, and the machine that they set in motion has a well-worn implacability that feels right. By the time the film ends by putting in words what every viewer has been working out for themselves, The Hunting Party feels like the find of cute little hidden film that rewards those who scour the shelves of their local videoclub. But it’s not a complete success, and it’s the very qualities that make the film work that also make it sputter in place. The tonal shifts of the picture are particularly annoying, especially when they don’t work: Having established early on that the film is going to be a comedy, the script never manages to instill any degree of suspense, and it just digs itself in a hole when it tries to do so. The tragic subplot involving the lead character’s history also sticks out as a mismatched heartfelt section in a generally cynical landscape. The parts of the film keep working against each other and the result often feels like missed opportunities to go even deeper in the ridiculousness of the situation. It’s not a complete failure, but it’s frustrating enough as a faint success.

(In theaters, September 2007) Sure, go ahead, say the nicest things about Jodie Foster and how she delicately portrays the trauma that sudden violence can inflict on ordinary lives. When you’ll be done, I will still be laughing about the ridiculously contrived script that serves as an excuse for this film. Casual brutal violence, OK. But the odds of the same characters being involved in a convenience store robbery, in a subway mugging, in a violent pimp/prostitute business, in tracking criminals and hunting them down? This is Death Wish crossed with some of the most coincidence-laden plotting ever imagined. It makes it hard to take the film seriously, as either a serious drama or a crime thriller. At some point, the somber tone of “Foster-the-victim” snaps and leads to “oh, come on, what’s next?” I laughed uncontrollably, then waited impatiently for the film to end. Never mind the syrupy music and the slow fade-outs: This is even less respectable than Shoot’em Up which, at least, didn’t puff itself in importance when it knew it was trash.

(In theaters, September 2007) Oh, hey, it’s that time of the decade again, the brief season when “The western is back!” You keep telling yourself that, John Wayne wannabes. Meanwhile, I’ll enjoy 3:10 To Yuma on its own term, that of a historical drama/thriller that happens to be set in the far-west. The quality of the project starts with two solid lead actors (Christian Bale and Russell Crowe, who’s particularly good as a likable villain), but the script is really what elevates this film over similar recent romps such as American Outlaws: here, the setting becomes a backdrop to a reasonably complex tale of redemption, revenge, duty and honour. Big honking concepts, but they go down easily when wrapped in decent film-making, slick acting and a few thrilling sequences. It all wraps up decently, paying off what could otherwise have been a slightly overlong film. Pulling together character drama and gun-shot entertainment, 3:10 To Yuma is all you’d want in a western. Or any Hollywood film, really.

(On TV, August 2007) Low-budget Canadian comedy alert! Run for cover! Naah, I kid: though it can be laborious at times, incoherent at others and just plain disappointing at the finish, there’s a lot to like in Waydowntown. As a study of four young people stuck in a silly bet to see who can last the longest without going outside (thanks to an effective use of Calgary’s +15 system of passageways), the film is never quite as formulaic than you’d think. And it wisely doesn’t limit itself to that single premise: other obstacles keep up our attention, including a mystery object of attraction, impending adultery, a kleptomaniac retiree and a suicidal colleague. But if you’re hoping that this will eventually result in a crescendo of laughs and sudden meaning, well, you may be disappointed: The ending sort of peters out without much of a point (because really, if “alienation from your cubicle job” is the best you can do…), leaving us without a proper send-off. A disappointment, especially given how the film generally works until that point.

(In theaters, August 2007) The most remarkable thing about this film is how unremarkable it is. Despite action icons Jet Li and Jason Statham, this plodding police action film putters from one slight action scene to another, strictly going by the numbers until a whopper of a third-act twist comes along to boggle everyone’s minds. The problem, though, is that the film is so routine until then that the twist seems an act of desperation to fluff up a movie that deserved no such complications. More seriously, the twist also locks the film is a no-win logic from which there can be no satisfactory conclusion from the audience’s point of view. From hum-drum, War (whose title leads to much bigger expectations) becomes unpleasant. Which should be proof that Hollywood can, in fact, be too clever for its own good.

(Third viewing, On DVD, August 2007) The amazing thing about this film is how well it does most things, regardless of how it was the first computer-animated feature film in history. The boys at Pixar obviously knew what they were doing even there (despite their protests elsewhere on the disc) and the result is, even despite the advances in technology in twelve years, still a pleasure to watch. The lavish tenth-anniversary DVD takes its time to explain to jaded audience what was so revolutionary from Toy Story back in the prehistoric days of 1995, but the gem still remains the film itself. See it again!

(On DVD, August 2007) Forget special effects, forget laughs, forget even plot: The Station Agent is about character, mood, tone, emotion and even the absence of anything interesting happening. It end during what most people would see as a lull in the action, and that’s the point of the film: how unlikely friends can find comfort in not having anything happen to them. This, obviously, is an independent film, with all of the quirks and abrupt moments and lack of polish that it implies. It doesn’t really go anywhere, but that will either plays as a feature or a bug. Comedy or drama? A bit of both, and enough so that it doesn’t matter. Call it ninety minutes with people unlike you.

(In theaters, August 2007) Now here’s a charming little film that will fly under most people’s radar. A hybrid of romance, fantasy and adventure (call it a fairy tale for grown-ups), Stardust takes a while to get going and isn’t without dumb plot contrivances regarding walls, distances and magic, but it keeps building as it goes on, and eventually starts hitting all of its targets. The dialogue is amusing, the actors generally go well (although Michelle Pfeiffer gets all of the attention with a rare alluring role for a woman on the verge of fifty), the special effects do their job and the entire film is powered on charm. The final act is where it all comes together, with enough swash-buckling and romance to satisfy everyone. It would have been better had it been shorter, but it’s decent enough and should reach its intended audience once it hits the DVD market. In the meantime, fantasy audiences and Neil Gaiman fans won’t regret seeing this adaptation.

(On DVD, August 2007) There are a lot of bad horror films out there, and a lot of bad videogame adaptations too, so I ask for forgiveness in thinking that a horror film adapted from a videogame wouldn’t be much better. But it is. While Silent Hill will not claim any top spots on any horror movie list, the result is a creepy and visually interesting film that a great deal more solid than it had any right to be. The visual polish of the three planes of Silent Hill does a lot to compensate for the silliness of the script, but there are other things that work in the film’s favour: The predominance of female characters, the way the film plays on creepiness a long time before the last-minute gore (for the record, when I thought “It looks as if someone’s going to be violated with barbed wire!”, I wasn’t actually thinking it would happen.) and the ambiguous ending may or may not please, but they certainly give to Silent Hill a polish that is quite unlike most other horror films. I’m really not so fond of the script (which relies on silliness to get to Silent Hill, betrays the gaming origins of the story by making the characters race for plot coupons and then loses its way in pseudo-religious claptrap shortly before the end), but with the dialogues turned down, Silent Hill is far better than you’d expect. The DVD includes a decent amount of behind-the-scene material, though it remains coys on the film’s ultimate interpretation.

(In theaters, August 2007) Third time definitely isn’t the charm for this aggressively irritating comedy. From the very introduction of the Chris Tucker character, he starts grating on everyone’s nerves: his one-note shtick has seldom been as exasperating as in here. Who could actually believe that such a person would remain a gainfully employed policeman? But Tucker alone could be accommodated by a much-better film. Sadly, the rest of Rush Hour 3 seems to take its lead from him: the film is clunky, charmless and even Jackie Chan (now noticeably older) can’t do much to save it. Lousy jokes (including a hammered-in version of the old “Who’s on first” routine), blunt stereotypes and ghastly coincidences are enough to make us long for the breath of fresh air that had been the first Rush Hour. But there are serious problems here, and all of them can be explained either by stupidity or laziness. Even the blatant exploitation of women in this film doesn’t betray misogyny as much as it exposes the puerile minds writing or directing the film. Dumb script, lazy direction and irritating protagonist: After that, it’s a wonder if anything of note emerges from the film. Fortunately, Noémie Lenoir is captivating. Still, if a 5’10” ebony supermodel is the only reason why a movie isn’t a complete disaster, there may be something wrong with the rest of it.

(In theaters, August 2007) There are at least two ways this film should have failed. On one hand, it tries really hard to pump up a myth-making link between ancient Rome and the Arthurian legend, with some of the pretentious twaddle that implies. On the other, it’s a decidedly low-brow affair with contrived situations, predictable plotting and by-the-numbers dialogue. The budget of the doesn’t quite reach its ambitions, and the mis-mash between said ambitions and the quasi-juvenile adventure that follows is in itself an issue. But despite all expectations, the film has an amiable disposition, and far better casting than it deserves: Colin Firth and Ben Kingsley give undeserved gravitas to the film, whereas Ashwarya Rai alone is worth ten thousand special effect shots. (No, seriously: with the help of a few good stunts-people, she kicks serious ass and even makes a play for the “dark and sultry Angelina Jolie” role. It’s a nice stretch from her usual romantic lead roles and I want more of it.) While the film keeps hearkening back to other better-made films and practically wallows in it own cheapness, it’s not unpleasant by itself and works a lot better than other more respectable movies. Certainly not worth a huge amount of trouble (except for Ashwarya Rai fans), but not a complete disaster. There’s even something oddly charming about it.