(On VHS, December 2001) Is this supposed to be a classic? Never since The Blair Witch Project did a bunch of whiny annoying kids deserve a good cruel and brutal dismemberment. The awful seventies are fully visible on film, and what was intended as pure terror now simply feels like simple stupidity or outright hilarity. Whenever you start cheering for the villains, it’s sign that the protagonists aren’t working. Avoid. Gaah.
(In theaters, December 2001) With the end of the Cold War, it had been a while since the last espionage film, and so Spy Game arrives onscreen with perhaps a touch of nostalgia. Taking place over a period of twenty-odd years (from 1973 to 1991, which is when the movie is set), Spy Game tries to focus on the nitty-gritty of “real” spycraft while adding a touch of excitement. The film works best when grounded in realism; by the time the expected spy romance pops up and the resident spymaster can bankroll a special operation deep behind enemy lines, well, the real world is forgotten. It’s directed in a somewhat inconsistent fashion, with color schemes clearly branding each of the story’s four eras. The recruitment section is the most interesting, but it doesn’t last long. At least Brad Pitt and Robert Redford get the chance to exhibit why there’s more to them than just being pretty-boy types. Spy Game manages to be a good spy thriller without being much more than that. There are a few trade tricks and sequences, but the episodic structure of the film conspires a bit against the pacing and the end impression isn’t as dynamic as one could wish. Still, a solid film.
(On VHS, December 2001) I have a soft spot for silly satiric comedies, and Shriek… definitely hits the right notes by lampooning the Scream-derivatives. Sure, it’s not that funny, nor is it very clever. A lot of the jokes are just duds, such as the “rules of a parody”. And yet, it’s just silly enough that I hopped up on the ride and enjoyed myself. It’s also somewhat good-natured, which works very well: Even if it’s not as hysterically funny or inspired as parts of the similar-themed Scary Movie, it’s more solid overall, and would definitely get my recommendation over the theatrically-released Wayans film. Favorite moments include incidental background murders in school, a pop-up video chase and five flashbacks over “what they did last summer”. No nudity, alas, which is sorely needed in these films. (The lead actress isn’t particularly attractive either, but never mind…) It’s naturally not in the same league as the classic Airplane! or Top Secret!, but if you saw -and liked- stuff like The Silence Of The Hams, rest assured that Shriek… is going to make you laugh for a while. Plus, hey, it’s better than most of the awful Leslie Neilsen spoofs.
(On VHS, December 2001) Ewan McGregor is quite good playing the life story of Nick Leeson, an ambitious trader who eventually managed to accumulate a billion’s worth of debt and bankrupt a venerable financial institution. The film does wonders to explain the complexities of financial trading in an entertaining fashion. There is a notable lull in the pacing about midway through, as the first crisis is past and the second one is building. Naturally, this is a biographical portrait based on Leeson’s book, so expect a certain degree of bias for poor honest Nick. Directing, photography and dialogue are strictly serviceable. Not a bad movie at all, especially given the arcane subject matter.
(In theaters, December 2001) This simply isn’t my type of film. I have no interest whatsoever in an oh-so-courageous biography of a woman who screwed up her life by having a baby during her teenage years. I don’t usually see these movies and normally wouldn’t have seen this one. Should I feel comfortable giving bad marks to this film if it’s not what I’d watch? Well, when it’s as boring as Riding In Cars With Boys (which cars? which boys?), it’s hard to feel guilty doing so. The characters aren’t sympathetic, James Woods is wasted, the structure lacks dramatic intensity and everyone is miserable throughout the film, including me. In fact, the best attribute of Riding In Cars With Boys is to act as a strong warning; Most Americans aren’t smart. Most Americans aren’t interesting. Most Americans don’t deserve our attention. This is how most people live, and it sucks, and I see enough of it in my own life to desperately avoid it in the theater.
(On VHS, December 2001) I borrowed this video by mistake as I thought I was actually renting the original The Philadelphia Experiment. My mistake, in more ways than one; this straight-to-video sequel is just boring. Not much happens, and whatever happens doesn’t make much sense. It’s not an awful concept (Nazis win WW2 when a nuclear-armed Stealth fighter is sent back in time and falls in their hands), and fans of alternate histories will be pleased at some of the details, but the rest is of such illogic (yeah, let’s experiment on a nuclear-armed plane!) that it’s hard to take seriously. Marjean Holden is cute, but she hasn’t done much since. Not bad as much as it’s featureless, The Philadelphia Experiment will do nothing to change your mind about straight-to-video releases.
(On VHS, December 2001) It’s not a very nice to say that someone hasn’t suffered enough to impress us. After watching this fictionalized biography of writer Jerry Stahl’s drug addiction, though, it’s not as if we feel too sorry for the guy. He was a Hollywood writer, he had a beautiful wife, he was good at his job, he had a lot of fun… but, oh, he did drugs. Oooh. The film mostly plays as a dark comedy, not as a heart-wrenching portrait of an addict. (Let’s throw ourselves at the windows! Whee!) Ben Stiller is fine in the lead role, as usual. (Though when Maria Bello announces that she’s leaving for Alaska to manage a bar, I couldn’t resist shouting at the screen “…and I’ll call it Coyote Ugly!”) Not a bad movie -it will hold your interest-, but not a spectacular one either. The epilogue (in which the narrator criticizes those who trivialize his plight) is probably apt for this review.
(On DVD, December 2001) A failed fusion between two very different films. The first one is a relatively clever animated comedy take-off on the buddy-cop concept… in the human body. A young impulsive white cell cop is teamed up with a straight by-the-book cough medicine colleague and, well, we’ve seen the rest, except not as antibodies hunting for a dangerous virus. The fast pacing features plenty of sight-gags to keep up our interest even though it’s all familiar stuff. The second film of Osmosis Jones, however, is an awful gross-out live-action comedy that is not only audience-hostile, but also astonishingly dull. Bill Murray turns in what may very well be his worst performance ever and to put it simply, it doesn’t work. Whenever the live-action segments pop up, we just wish to go back inside Frank’s body. Unfortunately, Osmosis Jones sinks under the weight of its problems, drowning its good animated segments. Too bad. The DVD spends way too much time, money and attention on a poor movie, though it’s nice of them to show us as much Brandy Norwood as they can.
(In theaters, December 2001) It should have been the coolest film of the year. Stephen Soderbergh, George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Las Vegas… All the elements were there for extra-pure fun. Alas, the end movie ends up “just” being fun, and not much more. Oh, it’s entertaining enough: Soderbergh can’t make a bad film, and Ocean’s Eleven is one of the most slickly entertaining adult films of the year. George Clooney is ferociously in command, outshining everyone else. Technically, this is obviously a Soderbergh film: The colors are vivid, there is a touch too much grain and the editing is very, very competent. (Almost everyone who’s seen the original also agrees that the remake is better.) But somehow, it never reaches an extra level, almost as if despite everyone’s intentions, something failed to gel. I could point out various mistakes (such as the EMP effect only “temporarily” disabling the power grid.), lengths (such as the poker game) or weaknesses (the bland bit players, for instance), but that would send an overly harsh message. Suffice to say that Ocean’s Eleven will play well, once, but it’s doubtful that people will want to watch this one over and over again.
(In theaters, December 2001) Make me laugh and I will forgive you anything. While the teen-movie spoof Not Another Teen Movie didn’t inspire gales of hysterical laughter from me, it kept me giggling continuously from start to finish, and for that I’m reluctant to actually condemn it. Its good-natured fun won me over despite raunchy material that would otherwise make me roll my eyes and some seriously lame gags (everything related to Bring It On, for instance, fails miserably, as are the gags about teen movies or the eighties). There is some welcome nudity (with the appropriate subtitles) and a lot of suggestive material, though nowhere near as offensive as with, say, Scary Movie. Favourite moments include the American Beauty gags and almost anything with Mia Kirshner (the “too much information!” exchange would have had me roaring if I didn’t have to worry about scaring the rest of the theater). No, Not Another Teen Movie is not a respectable film or even a good one. But it made me laugh, and for that I can forgive it almost everything.
(In theaters, December 2001) After such films as The Truman Show and Man On The Moon, Jim Carrey doesn’t have to prove himself as a dramatic actor. Still, he’s fine in The Majestic, competently portraying the young professional protagonist. The film itself isn’t bad at all, mixing a strong love of cinema with classic themes of love, community and redemption. But the filmmakers are a bit too deliberate, and the sugar-pumped result looks a bit too fake to be entirely pleasant. It doesn’t help that the film is overly long, almost as if it really wanted to make sure that we got the message and correctly filled out the Academy Awards ballot. Cinephiles will like the film a touch more than casual viewers, given The Majestic‘s obvious love of the medium. (On the other hand, how can it be a true cinephile’s film if Bruce Campbell doesn’t get nearly enough screen time?) In many ways, The Majestic looks like a derivative of director Darabont’s previous The Green Mile, another good, but long-and-preachy film engineered to move audiences. Maybe I’m too sophisticated/jaded to bite at that stuff anymore, but if I liked The Majestic, I’m not totally ready to back it up enthusiastically. It’ll deservedly do great business on video.
(In theaters, December 2001) As someone whose opinion of J.R.R. Tolkien’s original novel is closer to “dull, dull, dull” than “masterpiece!”, I didn’t expect much of the film. So it pleases me immensely to see the film improve sharply on the faults of the written work, up to a level where I saw The Lords of the Rings that I really wanted to see, and not the interminable brick I had read. Peter Jackson’s work on the film version is nothing short of remarkable, adeptly condensing hundreds of pages in less than three exciting hours. Unquestionably, the film is still very long, but it’s almost all good. Good acting, fantastic direction and spectacular visuals easily make this one of the best films of the year. It’s amazing (and reassuring) to see how faithful the film is to the novel and yet how much more entertaining it is. After the awful series of cheap fantasy movies of the past decades, it’s heartening to see someone do it right. That such an eagerly-awaited film would end up being equal to the anticipation is simply miraculous.
(In theaters, December 2001) Kid’s movie, kid’s shmoovie: Jimmy Neutron packs more cool ideas in barely 90 minutes than all other SF films of 2001 together. Not only that, but it’s half the length of A.I. and considerably more fun. Granted, it’s a silly comedy, but don’t let that fool you into thinking that it’s not clever: Watch for the hilarious Blair Witch Project reference, and the seamless Star Trek joke. Jimmy is an enormously sympathetic character, and so are the supporting characters. (Even “the bad kid” gets a few endearing moments or two; watch the end reunion with the parents.) Best of all, Jimmy Neutron is good clean fun, with only one or two innocuous toilet-humor jokes through it all. Even though the garish colors and the simplistic models aren’t as detailed as the Pixar films, they create a lovely style that greatly benefit the film. Kudos to the artists -animators and screenwriters alike-, because the result is a wonderful little film that kept me grinning throughout. Splendid!
(In French, On DVD, December 2001) The biker-gang problem has made quite a few headlines in Quebec during the past few years, and so it’s not a surprise to see an original home-grown thriller that deals with the issue. Here, a young man is gradually brought in a gang, where he’ll eventually discover a deadly secret… It’s really a portrait of how someone from a disadvantaged environment can see crime as an alternative option, and as such is far more honest than dozens of similar films. The raw, naturalistic technique of the film thus works to its advantage. It’s a bit dull at first, but it sharply improves in the second half. Ironically enough, when I tried to find parallels in foreign cinema with Hochelaga, I could only think of Hong Kong Triad films in which similar protagonists are gradually seduced in the power of criminal gangs. In any case, the result is a powerful film, maybe the best French-Canadian film I can recall recently. Definitely worth a look if you can find it. The DVD contains a few serviceable extras such as interviews and an English-language track.
(On VHS, December 2001) This Is Spinal Tap has proved to be a model for a series of pseudo-documentaries about musical bands, which isn’t necessarily bad. You have to wonder, though, if anyone paid attention to the fact that the original was a comedy. Hard Core Logo tries to do a lot of things, but it fails at a consistent tone, what with long dull stretches, a hallucinogenic segment and a last few seconds that take you straight in all-out tragedy. I presume that the musical references are reasonably exact, but I don’t know enough about the Canadian punk scene to say so. Two of the lead actors are initially difficult to distinguish. There are a few good lines, but you’ll have to work hard to distinguish them. A disappointment.