Jessica Alba

  • Awake (2007)

    Awake (2007)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Youtube Streaming, December 2020) The hook to Awake is as terrifying as it is simple: What if, during open-heart surgery, you remained awake and heard… the doctor plotting to kill you? Of course, getting to that point requires a few specific circumstances that the film is happy to set up: Young billionaire, hot girlfriend, heart-surgeon friend and domineering mother – all the ingredients for a wild thriller. To its credit, Awake understands that it’s completely preposterous, and goes even further into the madness: not content with having the character awake during his own open-heart surgery, it goes for astral projection and lets him roam the corridors of the hospital during the surgery, free to collect the clues that will explain what’s going on. Then things get kicked up another melodramatic notch, as some people realize what is going on and try to save the billionaire from a murderously conceived operation. Awake ends far closer to fantasy than to medical thriller, but it’s not a terrible ride after all. Sure, there are plenty of plot contrivances and slack moments and some annoying mid-2000s directorial tricks. But it keeps viewers’ attention throughout, and can benefit from an interesting cast, whether it’s Hayden Christensen as a billionaire, Jessica Alba as his new wife, Lena Olin as a mother more complicated than at first glance, or Terrence Howard as a heart surgeon. Awake is not that good of a movie — but it’s fun, and I’ve seen far worse mediocre ones.

  • Good Luck Chuck (2007)

    Good Luck Chuck (2007)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, October 2017) Given the subject matter (a man discovers that his romantic flings all go on to find their true love), it’s no surprise if Good Luck Chuck plays significantly coarser than the average romantic comedy. And therein lies a problem, because for all of its potential as a hard-R erotic comedy, the film is only too happy to pour itself in the usual R-rated rom-com mould, using its soft-R rating as an excuse for crudity rather than an honest treatment of its premise. It’s also ludicrously unaware of anything close to female agency. The case-in-point example scene has to do with a conventionally unattractive employee of the lead character throwing herself at him in romantic desperation—Good Luck Chuck plays the scene for laughs whereas there’s a lot more to explore here if it had the guts to do so. If the film works, it’s almost solely because of the charm of the lead actors—while Dane Cook may not be highly regarded as a stand-up comedian, he does play a likable lead, and Jessica Alba is up to her usual standards as the lead heroine. Still, there are plenty of missed opportunities—I kept waiting for a revelation that the lead female character’s impressive klutziness was a curse equivalent to the protagonist’s own, but that seems to have been forgotten somewhere along the way. The film picks up one lone point for having been obviously shot in Vancouver—the entrance to the aquarium is instantly recognizable even to a tourist. Otherwise, Good Luck Chuck is the kind of instantly forgettable romp, less obviously offensive than the slew of gross-out comedies from the early 2000s, but wasting so many opportunities along the way that it becomes vexing the moment you think too long about it.

  • The Love Guru (2008)

    The Love Guru (2008)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, December 2016) Some film pundits often refer to The Love Guru as the film that killed Mike Myers’ film career and while that’s a harsh assessment (I suspect that Myers’ own oft-reported personal issues largely played a role in his disappearance from the big screen—studio executives are more forgiving of box-office failure if they happen to people they like) it does acknowledge the fact that it’s simply not a good film. This being said, there are bits and pieces that sound great on paper: A movie largely revolving around the Toronto Maple Leaf hockey team? Faux-Indian rendition of songs such as The Joker and 9 to 5? Featured roles for Jessica Alba, with appearances by John Oliver and Stephen Colbert? Justin Timberlake as a secondary character gleefully perpetuating the stereotype of French-Canadians with legendary intimate attributes? How can I not get on-board with that? Alas, it takes a remarkably short time for the wheels to fall off The Love Guru. The stereotypical humour begins from the first shot of the film, while various comic bits feel old barely two minutes after being introduced and repeated. It gets progressively worse, as the film’s self-satisfied comic arrogance mugs for laughs that don’t exist, introduces pauses for laughter that never comes and revels in gross-out humour ten years after everyone else … all the way to a strikingly inappropriate animal sex sequence played on ice. (There’s a joke about Mariska Hargitay that’s as dumb as anything else ever dreamed up—the kind of stuff that should never survive a first draft.) Given Mike Myer’s roles as producer writer and star, as well as the example set by his previous feature films, it’s not hard to find someone to blame for The Love Guru’s unfunny pileup. In any other film, the portrayal of Hindi culture would have been offensive—here’s it’s just stuck in a much bigger mess. Despite my best intentions, the film simply doesn’t work.

  • Into the Blue (2005)

    Into the Blue (2005)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Netflix Streaming, January 2016) While Into the Blue wasn’t favourably reviewed upon release, it’s the fast-paced thrills-and-romance tropical adventure that it wants to be. Who doesn’t love sympathetic protagonists being stuck between two criminal groups as they hunt a lost Spanish treasure and discover a downed plane filled with drugs? With Paul Walker in the kind of charming-action-hero role he did best, Jessica Alba looking remarkably good, director John Stockwell capturing immersive underwater sequences and clean cinematography, this is an unassuming and enjoyable B-grade thriller. (It’s quite a bit more memorable than the similar Fool’s Gold, for instance.) The Caribbean scenery is used judiciously, the underwater set pieces successfully navigate a line between excitement and ridiculousness, everyone is ludicrously good-looking and there isn’t much time to get bored as the plot goes from one thing to another. This is not a great movie, but it’s an enjoyable one for what it tries to do. Keep your expectations in check and the result will leave you smiling and possibly booking a flight to the Bahamas.

  • Spy Kids: All the Time in the World in 4D (2011)

    Spy Kids: All the Time in the World in 4D (2011)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, May 2013) As much as I’m favourably predisposed toward writer/director Robert Rodriguez’s work (including his movies aimed at kids), it feels as if I’ve been making more and more excuses in order to enjoy his latest work.  The first two Spy Kids movies stand tall as fine examples of adult-friendly kid cinema, but this fourth entry is a bit of a disappointment closer to Shorts or The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3-D: The script is easy, the themes are close to the surface, the dialogues are often too obvious (the endless puns on time eventually take their toll) and the originality of the previous films seem toned down.  It’s still fun to watch on account of pure forward rhythm and interesting visuals, but it does leave viewers a bit unsatisfied by the end of the show.  Still, I would call it anything harsher than a disappointment: It’s fun to see Jessica Alba as a spy-mom, Alexa Vega, Daryl Sabara and Danny Trejo all make short-but-welcome appearances to tie this fourth installment to the first four films in the series, and the family-positive message of the film shouldn’t be discounted.  It does all amount to a thin new film by Robert Rodriguez, though, and looking at the rest of his recent-or-upcoming filmography (filled with Machetes and Sin Citys) it would be nice to see him attempt something more ambitious than spinoffs of his previous films.

  • The Killer Inside Me (2010)

    The Killer Inside Me (2010)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On DVD, October 2010) Medium-budget films featuring a cast of known actors but popping up unexpectedly on DVD shelves always present a challenge for viewers: Is it possible to guess why the film wasn’t given a wide theatrical release?  In the case of The Killer Inside Me, the truth gradually dawns that in-between the period setting, awkward staging, rough sex and unconvincing script, the film would have been savaged by reviewers looking for a middle-of-the-road thriller.  And yet, the cast remains impressive, with a few standouts being Jessica Alba as a prostitute who gets the worst of a bad deal, whereas Kate Hudson is strangely credible as a white-trash woman and Casey Affleck becomes as repulsive as he can be as a deputy sheriff gradually revealed as a full-blown psychopath.  The period setting is a hint that the film is adapted from a classic noir novel by Jim Thompson, but a bigger clue is found in the strikingly clumsy staging and character motivations as portrayed on-screen: Novels allow for inner monologues that don’t always translate harmoniously to the big screen, and The Killer Inside Me often feels forced in its graphic violence against women, unexplainable character motivations and repellent protagonist.  A novel getting in the head of a criminal is something that a film simply portraying that violence can’t aspire to.  Numerous decisions, such as the graphic brutality directed at women, the loathsome protagonist and the slow pacing, end up grating more than they convince.  As such, the adaptation can’t aspire to much more than a curiosity for noir fans, even though the period detail is convincing (except for the anachronistic trailer-tanker that shows up during a chase sequence) and the acting talent does the best with the script it’s given.  By the end of the film, there’s no doubt that its proper place is on DVD shelves, and then on to oblivion for most viewers.

  • Machete (2010)

    Machete (2010)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In theaters, September 2010) When a trailer for then-fake film Machete appeared attached to Grindhouse three years ago, the joke worked pretty well.  But would it survive being turned into a feature-length film?  As it turns out, Machete the film is what Machete the fake-film trailer had promised: A fully entertaining mixture of exploitation filmmaking, populist indignation and self-aware cinematic winks.  Bolstered by one of the most amazing cast in recent memory, Machete finally gives a much-deserved featured role to the mesmerising Danny Trejo, with fun parts for such notables as Robert De Niro, Steven Seagal, Lindsey Lohan, Jessica Alba and Michelle Rodriguez.  Everyone looks like they’re having fun, which is in keeping with the film’s mexploitation theme: if you’re going to make a movie that plays to the audience’s bases desires for nudity, action and revenge, why not do it well?  Writer/Director/Editor Robert Rodriguez certainly knows what he’s doing: the editing lingers on the nudity, stays long enough on the action and flashes past the goriest violence so that we can enjoy the film’s dark humour without being repulsed by its excesses.  (Rodriguez may not have been the film’s sole director, but it’s unmistakably his film.)  It’s a terrific piece of grindhouse cinema, but it comes with quite a bit of populist decency.  The Latino diaspora is colourfully represented by food, more food, Catholic symbolism and a distinctive aesthetics: Add to that a striking case for respecting immigrant rights, and Machete becomes a film that speaks loudly about basic human rights while still delivering a hefty dose of disreputable entertainment.  In short, it’s a film that works on a number of levels, not the least of which is a considerable amount of sheer movie-going pleasure.  Knowing Rodriguez’s considerable personal charm and fondness for explaining the movie-making process, I can’t wait until it comes out on video.

  • 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer aka Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer (2007)

    4: Rise of the Silver Surfer aka Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer (2007)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In theaters, June 2007) To say that 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer is a better movie than its predecessor Fantastic Four does no one any favour: It’s like praising a casual acquaintance by saying that they’re probably better than Jack the Ripper. Chances are that everyone will feel slighted by the obvious comparison. It’s perhaps more useful to say that if this sequel isn’t as exasperating as its predecessor, it’s still pretty dumb and still not much fun. Fortunately, it does have a certain interest: the painful origins story being a thing of the first film, the Fantastic Four are here presented at the height of their powers, with consequent public attention –though still flying coach. There is, simply put, more joy here than in the first film. They’re also faced with a decent problem in the form of an all-reflective Silver Surfer that goes and pokes holes around the Earth. Some power-switching shtick makes for passable comedy, though the script also misstep badly with an embarrassing “bachelor party” sequence and a pretty complete lack of any chemistry between the too-be-wed couple. Bad dialogue completes the whole, especially when it surrounds snippets of passable writing. (I liked the “triumphant nrrrd” speech, for instance, but it feels clumsily pasted in the middle of a contrived scene.) At least guys will have something to look at, in between the action scenes, Kerry Washington and a bespectacled plastic replica of Jessica Alba. Heck, the film even allows itself an anti-torture PSA when it points out that excessive torture will tarnish the finish of even the best silver surfers. Now that’s quality film-making with a moral centre! Otherwise, well, this sequel spares no effort to raise itself to the level of mere competency with a side-order of silliness. It’ll do for the younger members of the audience, especially given the bloodless nature of the action.

  • Fantastic Four (2005)

    Fantastic Four (2005)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In theaters, July 2005) Well, that was bland. The nice thing about good superhero movies is that they make it easier to point at the bad ones and say “this is not how it should be done!” And so, Fantastic Four is not how it should be done: By-the-number script, languid pacing and pedestrian special effects. Well, actually the script is closer to “bad” than simply “by-the-numbers” (the Ben Grimm romantic subplot alone is worth a howl), but let’s be generous. As an origin story, it’s too long, and doesn’t contain enough stuff. There are two-and-a-half action sequences in the story (one of which being a disaster created by the Fantastic Fours themselves, in an eerie echo of the much-better The Incredibles) and that, too, is not enough. Casting-wise, Jessica Alba simply doesn’t measure up as “The Invisible Woman”, although her lack of impact as a character supposed to be shy-and-effacing may have more to do with the script than acting talent. The rest of the cast does better, although the main villain is simply yawn-inducing. Perhaps the best sequences of the film are those in which Johnny Storm (Chris Evans) expresses his sheer joy at his new-found abilities; the rest is just dour and featureless. This film won’t even be worth a passing trivia questions five years from now.