Movie Review

  • Fruits of the Heart (2021)

    Fruits of the Heart (2021)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, June 2021) Criticism-by-comparison is rarely fair, but it’s almost mandatory to mention the similarities between Fruits of the Heart and the Oscar-winning Terms of Endearment. The basics are unerringly similar: Both films are about the relationship between a mother and her daughter through many years, with an old-fashioned weeper of a conclusion to make sure that viewers understand that this is meant as drama. Even if we accept that Fruits of the Heart’s writer/director Coke Daniels may not be aware of the earlier film, comparisons between the two are not to its advantage — and I say that as someone who didn’t particularly care for Terms of Endearment. For one thing, the tone of Fruits of the Heart is all over the place, going from comedy to drama to romance to hard-hitting tragedy. There are basic credibility problems (such as the mother’s vast mansion without the means of supporting it) that exacerbate some chaotic plotting that seems even more arbitrary in the context of squeezing years of melodrama in less than two hours. Things happen, but the time-skips make those developments seem more arbitrary than organic — if there’s a kind of story that called for a miniseries, this would be it. I’m not normally so harsh on BET Original movies (there’s a reason why I keep watching them, after all), and to be fair, there are some interesting things here. There’s some visual style that could have been developed further. Dorien Wilson plays what feels like a fun supporting character that becomes annoying the moment he tries to become a main character. Lil Mama and Wendy Raquel Robinson make for good anchors for the rest of the film. But ultimately, the constant swerves of Fruits of the Heart’s change of tone are a bit hard to follow, and the ultimate aim of making viewers burst into tears does feel unwarranted by the material that precedes it. It’s a mess, and a waste as well — there are many ways the story could have gone in more satisfying ways. Terms of Endearment, it isn’t.

  • The Croods: A New Age (2020)

    The Croods: A New Age (2020)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, June 2021) I don’t recall being overly impressed by the first film in the Croods series, but sequel The Croods: A New Age does feel like a step-up. Now that the tedious origin story is done, the script seems freer to go in interesting directions, and so this one brings the Croods in contact with more modern counterparts. The result occasionally feels a lot like a modernized version of The Flintstones, what with stone-age inventions meant to highlight comic anachronisms. While A New Age doesn’t quite let go of the sentimentalism of the first film, it manages to integrate it far better with the jokes and the narrative — as a result, there are fewer dull moments and a climax that does bring everything in service of a strong finish. Vocally, the standout duo here is Nicolas Cage going against Peter Dinklage, although Emma Stone and Ryan Reynolds are also distinctive. Still, much of the film’s fun is in the sight gags and energetic animation — with a few recurring gags, such as the antagonists taking every opportunity to learn from the protagonists’ efforts to escape. It’s not exactly a great family movie, but it’s more than good enough to be worth a look, and it’s entertaining throughout without losing itself along the way. While I didn’t exactly ask for A New Age, I’m now not completely against a third one in the series…

  • El arte de morir [The Art of Dying] (2000)

    El arte de morir [The Art of Dying] (2000)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2021) The base level of horror is the monster killing characters. Most of the terrible horror movies stop there, with no theme and no other point except staging elaborate death sequences. The next level up is horror as cheap morality play, with people having done bad things being punished (usually through elaborate death sequences —it’s not that much of a step-up). At times, The Art of Dying does feel like that: morality play (bad things happen to bad people) fused with a dying revelation. That’s dull enough by itself, and then you get into the style of the film that now seems quite dated (and copied from other Hollywood horror films of the period). To its credit, The Art of Dying is not quite as bad as many other horror films and does have some style to distinguish it from so many lower-budgeted efforts. On the other hand, director Álvaro Fernández Armero can’t rein in pretentiousness and deliberate obfuscation. It’s not a pain to watch, but it’s occasionally a chore, and the final result isn’t necessarily worth it.

  • War of the Dead (2011)

    War of the Dead (2011)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2021) On paper, “Nazi zombies” still does sound really good — as an excuse for good guys to mow down hordes of villains, it’s got an irresistible two-punch: They’re undead and super-racists! It’s a premise so good, in fact, that it has spawned its own action/horror subgenre with its own Wikipedia page. Alas, anyone acquainted with that subgenre will tell you that there isn’t much good in it — Dead Snow aside, and also putting aside the big-budgeted Overlord (which was itself a bit disappointing), much of the rest is a low-budget ephemera produced with more ambition than adequate means, and using the premise as a crutch given a lack of ability to deliver. Writer-director Marko Mäkilaakso’s War of the Dead is really no different from those other disappointments: it seems to believe that Nazi zombies are interesting enough to compensate for a forgettable script, indifferent acting and underwhelming execution. It’s surprisingly forgettable and even skimps on the gore in order to focus on action that simply isn’t all that exciting nor plentiful. I wouldn’t normally complain (I don’t like gore), but it’s likely to limit its appeal to horror fans. The nature of the premise and the historical absurdities required to make it work would suggest a tongue-in-cheek approach, but War of the Dead stubbornly remains stone-faced throughout its duration, not even having any self-awareness. I’d call it a disappointment except, well — given the subgenre’s poor track record, was anyone expecting any different?

  • The Office Mix-Up (2020)

    The Office Mix-Up (2020)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, June 2021) It’s one thing to see romantic comedies use idiot-plotting to stretch a thin premise to feature-film length, but it’s another to see one build itself entirely on an idiot-plotting trick. Alas, that’s where director Andrew Lawrence’s The Office Mix-Up goes, using an identity misunderstanding to send its ambitious protagonist inside a marketing agency when she’s mistaken for someone else. Despite her best friend’s warning that this is fraud and cannot possibly end well, the protagonist decides to keep up the lie — at least until an anticipated opportunity to tell the truth a few days later. Of course, complications ensue; the main romantic plot thread emerges and before long no one is able to extricate themselves gracefully from the situation, to which any viewer of average intelligence will roll their eyes in I-told-you-so exasperation. But you can reasonably argue that made-for-TV romantic comedies like The Office Mix-Up (surprisingly enough, not a Lifetime nor Hallmark special, but not a theatrical release either) voluntarily lower their ambitions to make viewers feel better about themselves. Having audiences put together most of the film from the tell-all trailer is not considered a problem when the goal is familiarity and comfort. Even the lifeless direction is unobtrusive in getting the narrative delivered as transparently as possible. The heroine is bland, plays bland, feels bland and that’s by design as to create identification against a mostly bland (uh, blank) canvas. Same goes for the male romantic interest, strictly defined by his inexplicable attraction to the heroine — this being a female-driven film, it’s rather amusing to see objectification going the other way. But even with those lacklustre traits, The Office Mix-Up remains mildly engaging. The failure mode of straight-to-video romcoms is fairly generous, and it’s the kind of film almost meant to be watched as background noise — everything is repeated thrice, there are no real doubts about what’s going to happen next nor where it’s ultimately going. A more serious problem is a lack of flavour in the details of the execution — it’s featureless and few of the supporting characters or details provide much mirth, the closest being a security guard with a specific obsession that comes across as irritating more than amusing. I don’t think it’s possible to hate The Office Mix-Up, but you can either take it as it is, or dismiss it for exactly the same reasons.

  • Night of the Comet (1984)

    Night of the Comet (1984)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2021) I’m not sure how I went so long without seeing Night of the Comet, but here we are — even in a far more saturated genre environment than the mid-1980s, it still has a pleasant looniness and period charm. Nominally about the apocalyptic passage of a comet transforming many into red dust and others into dangerous zombies, the film is at its most distinctive in taking a decidedly breezy approach to the apocalypse. Our two sister protagonists take the near-eradication of human life on Earth in stride, appreciating what it means for shopping while being perhaps most concerned about what it does to their dating prospects. As could be expected, the opening set-up and immediate fun-and-games of two young women in a traffic-free Los Angeles are better than the rest of the film, especially after nosy scientists and more survivors make their appearance. The plotting remains crazier than the norm, but there aren’t as many opportunities afterwards for our heroines to be as insouciant about the entire thing. Still, the result does remain more memorable than many films of the time — while Night of the Comet’s smart-aleck tone has become far more prevalent in the past few decades, it’s something else to see it done with primary-source 1984 fashions and aesthetics. Mary Woronov shows up at one point to make it all more interesting, but really the film belongs to Catherine Mary Stewart and Kelli Maroney as the two unflustered sisters. Well worth a look, especially in a late-night-movie frame of mind, Night of the Comet remains a minor reference for 1980s Science Fiction for some still-valid reasons.

  • Rampage: President Down (2016)

    Rampage: President Down (2016)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, June 2021) Writer/director Uwe Boll made few friends during his (first?) seventeen-year rampage through the North American film industry. Known for his threadbare production values, paper-thin scripts, pugilistic stance toward reviewers and provocative subject matter, Boll eventually left the industry to become a Vancouver-based restaurateur. While rumours strongly suggest that he’s coming back, Rampage: President Down was billed as his retirement film. As such, it’s surprisingly representative of the career that preceded it: it’s deliberately aggressive, cheaply shot, incompetently scripted and yet, somehow, weirdly political in a fashion that is rarely explored elsewhere in filmmaking. While I haven’t (yet?) seen the first two Rampage films, the title is explicit enough—what with a powerfully armed protagonist killing a lot of people as he airs his grievances. Quite a bit of it is linked to a reasonable amount of anger: In the film’s many, many uninterrupted rants, Boll takes aim at an increasingly unequal society, with corrupt politicians, rapacious corporate interests and the marginalization of citizens’ interests. It’s not hard to make the parallel here between the film’s exasperated discourse and the state of American politics, with populist forces leading to excesses of anger with counterproductive results. In that, Rampage: President Down (repetitively?) joins other Boll films, such as Assault on Wall Street in which anger leads to violence. If nothing else, it’s a raw expression of rage that finds few equals in so-called more respectable corners of the film industry. Alas, this doesn’t do much to make anyone feel any better at the nihilistic violence espoused by its anti-hero. If anything else, it probably exposes Boll’s rants as an ill-fitting justification for exploitative shootouts, neither all that clever nor thematically aligned. Of course, it’s easier to feel cynical when the film clearly doesn’t have the budget or the wit to fulfill its ambitions — Much of what’s dramatically interesting about the film happens off-screen, described by news anchors alongside stock footage, or narrated by YouTube-like shots by the film’s anti-hero. Structurally, the film is an amateurish mess with a lousy populist wrap-up that would have been interesting if someone with more cleverness had shaped the material into something more interesting. Rampage: President Down may be more interesting at a glimpse of what the discourse can become when so few other controlling interests are involved — as well as the limitations that a limited budget and a slapdash filmmaker can bring on themselves.

  • The Unfinished Dance (1947)

    The Unfinished Dance (1947)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, June 2021) There are many intriguing elements in The Unfinished Dance that, by all rights, should make it a better film than it is. All of it revolves around ballet, and specifically a school where the young protagonist idolizes a dancer (played by Cyd Charisse, with her customary dancing excellence) and despises another, an obsession that soon leads to her causing an accident with life-changing consequences. Executed with all of the gloss of MGM musicals of the time but very little of the humour, it’s an excessively melodramatic film all the way to the weepy forgiveness that caps the film. I can see how the film is best suited to a specific public: Like The Red Shoes a year later, it’s a perfect film for young ballerinas and anyone else interested in the art form. But by being so exceptionally focused, The Unfinished Dance doesn’t quite manage to rally larger audiences, and the lack of humour doesn’t help either — although it would have been difficult to be otherwise considering the film’s central drama. Margaret O’Brien is quite good in the lead role, with Charisse providing dancing firepower when the film needs it and Karin Booth getting a rare prestige leading role as the other dancer, even though her lacks of dancing abilities are more apparent. While I don’t exactly dislike the result, The Unfinished Dance didn’t grab me as readily nor as profoundly as other musicals of the time — it’s a bit of a niche film, and I happen to be standing outside of it.

  • Walk a Crooked Mile (1948)

    Walk a Crooked Mile (1948)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, June 2021) It would be a stretch to call Walk a Crooked Mile a good film, but as a cauldron in which the late 1940s poured their insecurities, stylistic quirks, social prejudices, technological developments and vision of authority, it almost becomes fascinating. Often presented as noir thriller, it’s a film that’s perhaps best described as an espionage procedural with a heavy dash of two-fisted action. Mainly concerned about tracking down anti-American communist spies sniffing around the edges of the nuclear program, it’s a thriller with a heavy narrative voice to reassure viewers on what to think, clearly highlighting the new techniques that the homeland has at its disposal to identify and catch those who would threaten the nascent American hegemony. If this sounds heavy-handed… you haven’t seen the way director Gordon Douglas goes about it. The heroes (all males) fit within the very specific Anglo-Saxon ethnic mould that the FBI and Scotland Yard identified for its agents, while our villain (Raymond Burr in an early-career role) is conveniently labelled as not-like-us with a conspicuous goatee. There’s a sequence in which scientists are introduced with their career accomplishments, immediately followed by something along the lines of “and this brilliant woman, speaking five languages, is their secretary.” (While not uncommon for films of this era, this systemic marginalization of a female character is more infuriating here because it’s sandwiched in the middle of an authoritative tone that clearly tells viewers what is right and correct.) While Walk a Crooked Mile’s style is a blend of realism and noir flair, its attempts to stick to reality are not always helped by bombastic, dramatic scenes — such as the torture sequence in which the beaten-down immigrant American (a woman) spits in the faces of her torturers by telling them that she knows what dictatorship is like and she won’t help them. There is some interest in the breathless description of new gadgets that the all-virtuous never-wrong police services are starting to use. While I do have some innate fondness for that kind of nascent techno-thriller and the clean, straightforward style that the film takes on, I did have a bigger problem than usual going along with Walk a Crooked Mile’s unexamined ideological assumptions — I suspect that much of my reluctance comes from its daddy-knows-best tone, coupled with the knowledge that it supported a worldview that led to minority oppression, HUAC witch-hunting and rampant abuse of power. Classic Hollywood was a white man’s power fantasy, and Walk a Crooked Mile clearly fits the mould. Fascinating, but not necessarily good, nor a good thing.

  • The Smallest Show on Earth (1957)

    The Smallest Show on Earth (1957)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, June 2021) There are plenty of movies about moviemaking, but far fewer movies about moviegoing. This makes The Smallest Show on Earth distinctive even today, as it details the adventures of a young British couple who inherit a decrepit movie theatre located between two train tracks and despair to get any profit out of the property. The local movie mogul (owner of the city’s other theatres) is only interested in offering them a pittance for bulldozing the lot and putting up a parking lot, while the theatre’s three elderly employees fear for their continued employment. (Peter Sellers plays one of those three employees, but he’s near-unrecognizable in heavy makeup, and doesn’t break away from a mercifully toned-down character.)  More of an affectionate look at moviegoing more than an outright laughing marathon (although the antics of the rowdy audience get a few chuckles), The Smallest Show on Earth is not a big movie, but it’s warm, sympathetic, features likable leads and wraps up in a typically wry (and not entirely law-abiding) British comedy fashion. I liked it quite a bit, even if I’ve accepted that single-screen movie theatres are fading away. In fact, I may like it because they’re fading away.

  • The Astronaut Farmer (2006)

    The Astronaut Farmer (2006)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2021) Despite decades of ardent movie-watching, I still find films that I regret missing upon release, and The Astronaut Farmer is merely the latest in a long list. I’m not sure why I haven’t seen this film in theatres upon release — I’ve always been interested in space stories, and this film, about a man putting together a rocket in his barn with the intent of launching it for an orbit or two, is clearly along the lines of favourites, such as The Right Stuff and October Sky. No matter — even if it’s fifteen years later, there I am admiring the result. Billy Bob Thornton anchors the film as the cantankerous farmer (formerly pilot and astronaut-in-training) defying advice and good sense in putting together a rocket. The Astronaut Farmer handwaves a major objection by telling us he’s buying parts from rocket manufacturers — the major sticking point is obtaining the fuel, which brings him to the attention of the federal government, national security agents and an unsympathetically portrayed FAA. Much of the film plays like a modern fantasy, with a rugged individualist going through incredible trials to thumb his nose at his doubters. On paper, it sounds iffy, but it plays much better on-screen thanks to well-grounded handling by writer-director Michael Polish and good performances from Thornton and Virginia Madsen. It’s still not completely convincing (my own sticking point is how the rocket launches without setting fire to the hay-filled barn and much of the surrounding farm), but it’s curiously effective as a tale of wonder and ambition. Much of the media circus that comes to dominate the film’s middle third also feels reasonably accurate. The Astronaut Farmer is not a great film, but it’s a good one, and I regret missing it on the big screen.

  • The Man in the Moon (1991)

    The Man in the Moon (1991)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On TV, June 2021) As a big southern summertime coming-of-age melodrama, The Man in the Moon is made out of familiar parts, arranged in predictable order and going for viewers’ emotions in a predictable way. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it does place a lot more emphasis on the film’s rather well-done atmosphere. By having a rote story, viewers can tune out and take in the sense of time and place of 1950s rural Louisiana, shot in glossy yellow light. The other standout element of the film is the debut screen performance from 14-year-old Reese Witherspoon, who retroactively became the film’s biggest name. Otherwise, there isn’t much to The Man in the Moon — considering how much the setting overpowers the narrative, it’s probably best when taken in as a tonal piece rather than a story.

  • Dead Season (2012)

    Dead Season (2012)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2021) While set in sunny Florida, Dead Season is in many ways as bleak and repellent as most other low-end American zombie films. Picking up a year after the initial zombie uprising, it follows a pair of survivors as they make their way to an island where other survivors have established a small colony. But of course (we’ve seen this movie before), other humans are just as big a threat as the undead, and it doesn’t take much time for this colony to fall apart. There’s an attempt at a mildly shocking plot point midway through, but it’s not particularly effective either at being interesting or gross—the film makes a big deal out of it, while viewers are liable to shrug and wonder what the fuss—this is a zombie horror film, and we already expect the worst. It certainly doesn’t contribute much to Dead Season’s overall impression: it’s dull and dreary, and rather obvious in the way it unfolds. Writer-director Adam Deyoe doesn’t bring much to the genre, even if he avoids the rather deep bottom of the barrel that zombie movies often have to offer. By the end of Dead Season, the ending is a relief to viewers that it’s finally over.

  • Zombibi [Kill Zombie!] (2012)

    Zombibi [Kill Zombie!] (2012)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2021) When it comes to zombie movies, my preference is clear and definitive: I like them comic, hopeful, brash, loud, action-filled and not too dumb if possible. Like Shaun of the Dead and Cockneys vs. Zombies, Dutch horror/comedy Zombibi checks off a lot of the boxes. Taking place in Amsterdam and featuring a plucky crew of survivors, it’s a film that definitely has fun with the idea of zombie outbreaks. The overall story isn’t all that much (a geeky office guy going back downtown to rescue his crush), but the fun of it is in the light, fast-paced execution. Largely shot in daytime, the film enjoys its ensemble cast of characters, giving them distinctive gags and following through on them. While not necessarily crossing the line into parody, it also messes with some of the fetishes of its own genre. The cast is more diverse than I would have expected (but that’s just my ignorance talking —Amsterdam has been a trade nexus of Europe for centuries), and Zombibi’s apparent budget is higher as well: there’s a lot of fortunately-green splattered gore along the way, fizzy intertitles and intermissions, a good chunk of CGI and an energetic directing style from Martijn Smits and Erwin van den Eshof that relies on fast-paced editing. It’s far more fun than the average zombie film, even if it does operate in a now-familiar vein for zombie comedies. Still, fun is fun — There are a few things I would have changed (such as the fate of the indomitable TV reporter who pops up now and then) and I’m sure that I’ve missed tons of Dutch-specific references. Still, compared to the usual slew of uninspired downbeat zombie films, Zombibi is definitely a highlight.

  • The Dead 2: India (2013)

    The Dead 2: India (2013)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2021) Considering that the first film in The Dead series had an American protagonist fighting zombies in West Africa, it makes sense that the sequel would follow the series’ non-traditional setting by featuring an American character fighting zombies in India. In some ways, this sequel is better than the original — and in one significant aspect, it’s much worse. First, the good: I like the Indian setting a lot, and the protagonist’s dramatic arc in going to rescue his Indian girlfriend both lessens the impression of exoticism, while keeping the road-movie concept of the first film. The idea of making a kid out of the travel companion pays off quite well toward the end as well. The film feels more colourful, directed with a bit more assurance (although this may be due to the not-so-horrid production of the sequel as compared to the first film) and the protagonist’s job as an engineer takes us away from the tired cliché of having a soldier mowing down hordes of undead. But for all that The Dead 2 does well, it doesn’t quite manage to rise above much of the morass of featureless zombie films — take out the setting, and there’s not much left to distinguish it. As a result, it’s hard to get excited or even interested in the film as it plods forward. But the one thing that writers-directors Howard J. Ford and Jon Ford do badly comes toward the very end, as it dangles the possibility of a not-so-bad ending, then quickly snatches it away in a fit of nihilistic pique in order to do the exact same thing as far too many other zombie films. Too bad, because I almost came to like The Dead 2 in its optimistic period — taking that away feels a lot like making the entire thing pointless.