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A review of Season 1 of “Jessica Jones” (2015)

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Netflix’ “Jessica Jones” (2015) is easily one of the best things in the Marvel Cinematic Universe; I’d rate it a 9 out of 10.  It’s smart, it’s funny and it’s extremely dark — I don’t want to spoil too much by revealing the modus operandi of Season 1’s villain, but his manner of destroying his victims is utterly disturbing.  (I’ve mentioned before how his powers seem like a plot device from a Stephen King novel.)  Although this series excellently retains a “comic book” feel (due in part to its episodic format), its story elements frequently feel like something out of a John Carpenter film.  And, although I know I’m repeating myself yet again, this Hell’s Kitchen niche of the MCU feels like its chosen stage for horror-thrillers.

The cast is excellent.  Krysten Ritter is perfect as the titular, hard-drinking, antihero private detective.  Mike Colter is nearly as good in the role of Luke Cage, another low-level hero in the Marvel universe.  Colter’s talent is evident by the fact that Cage could so easily come across as a one-dimensional character.  (And, Jesus, doesn’t the guy look the part?)

The story’s villain, Kilgrave, is played by fan-favorite David Tennant.  (Yes, the name “Kilgrave” is stupid and is lifted from the comic book source material.  Its silliness is lampshaded in the series several times by other characters making fun of it.)  Tennant is an actor I’ve abhorred in the past.  There was no logical reason for it — there used to be just something about his voice and his face that made me cringe.  It was a running joke for a while among me and my female sci-fi friends.  (Good Lord, how the ladies adore that man.)  My admittedly irrational dislike of the man even detracted from my enjoyment of the otherwise quite enjoyable 2011 “Fright Night” remake.

He’s phenomenal here.  He’s perfect for the part, as Ritter and Colter are for theirs, and he was alternately menacing and quite funny.  (He has perfect timing and line delivery, as Ritter often does.)  I really liked watching him.

“Jessica Jones” might succeed more than any other MCU property in terms of dialogue and character development — although the “Iron Man” and “Daredevil” series also do great work there.  (It’s a tough call.)  The show also seems to flesh out the MCU into a kind of “lived in” universe in a way that other Marvel properties usually haven’t — by creating detailed, three-dimensional protagonists out of characters that have no superpowers whatsoever.  They’re not “sidekicks” (a trope that the script that slyly winks at); they’re realistic characters that affect the plot.  When one or two actually appear to develop superpowers toward the end of the season, the consequences are unexpected and dire.  (There is a truly kickass Easter egg here that will please longtime readers of Marvel Comics.)  Furthermore, Jones, Cage and most of the other characters have power sets that pale in comparison to M.C.U. heavy hitters like Thor, the Hulk or the Vision. The result is that the MCU feels more … integrated and nuanced, with a blurrier line between superheroes and everyday people.  I liked that a hell of a lot.

The show is not entirely without its failings.  Despite what I said above about the show’s attention to ordinary characters, I still think it went a bit overboard here.  The character of Malcom (nicely portrayed by Eka Darville) began as a hugely interesting supporting character.  So, too, did other residents of the heroine’s apartment building.  It was a nice touch that expanded the show’s scope and depth … until the law of diminishing returns kicked in.  By the end of Season 1’s 13-episode arc, I felt that they’d received far too much screen time.  The support group that one character attends started out as an intelligent subplot, but then eventually grew tiresome.  (Again, I’m being necessarily vague here to avoid spoilers.)  Towards the finale, I actually felt that these minor characters were padding the plot and dragging down the narrative.

Which brings me to another criticism — the narrative’s length.  This is yet another show that I felt could be edited down a bit.  As much as I loved Tennant here and found Kilgrave to be an interesting villain, I’m not sure that Jones’s conflict with him warranted 12 52-minute episodes.  This could have been abridged to eight or ten, I think.

Another criticism I had of “Jessica Jones” was its fight choreography.  For a show that succeeds on so many levels, the action sequences were sometimes surprisingly poor.  Why do brawls between superpowered individuals include so much polite (and bloodless) grabbing and throwing?  Especially when a single punch or kick could easily kill or incapacitate an opponent?  The answer, of course, is that those kinds of melees are easy to film, with minimal training for the actors.  It’s especially noticeable here because this show’s sibling, “Daredevil,” has fight choreography that is some of the best I’ve ever seen.  (If you’re curious, then search for “Daredevil stairwell fight” on Youtube sometime.)

The rudimentary effects were usually even poor when depicting the title character’s “jumping” scenes.  (She has super strength, so she can virtually “fly” short distances by literally jumping.)  These shots looked like something out of a primetime 80’s action show.

All in all, though, this was indeed a great show.  Don’t shy away from it, as I initially did, because you’re unfamiliar with the title character.  It’s among the best that Marvel has to offer.

 

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A tiny review of “Dead Rush” (2016)

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“Dead Rush” (2016) isn’t quite as bad as other reviewers have made it out to be; it’s a passably entertaining zombie feature that I’d rate a 6 out of 10.  It occasionally rises above its central gimmick to create a few moments of suspense and emotion.  (The gimmick here is that the entire film is shot from the point-of-view of one man in the middle of a zombie apocalypse.)

That point-of-view device does wear a little thin by the end of this feature-length film … and I’m a found-footage horror movie fan who usually doesn’t mind that sort of thing.  This movie might have been better overall if the viewer weren’t required to follow those “shaky-cam”-type visuals for quite so long; my understanding is that it was adapted from a well received short film.

If there was one thing that bothered me the most, though, it wasn’t the POV.  There is a recurring shot in “Dead Rush” that I liked a hell of a lot, involving the main character’s memory of a loved one.  It’s made even better when it is rather creatively used as a framing device at the film’s end.  A little reflection, though, made me remember that this shot seems to crib a little too much from a similar effective recurring shot in 2011’s “The Grey.”

What the hell … if you need a zombie horror fix, you could do worse than “Dead Rush.”

 

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A baffled review of “Lucy” (2014)

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Everything you’ve heard about “Lucy” (2014) is correct — it’s exactly as trite and nonsensical as its multitude of unfavorable reviews have described it.  Maybe this was intended as some sort of weird, meta, inside joke by writer and director Luc Besson … after all, it’s a movie about increased “brain capacity” that is, ironically, really dumb.

I can’t imagine why Scarlett Johansson and Morgan Freeman would sully their reputations by starring in this film.  Although, sadly, even the wonderful Johansson is not at her best here.  She seems to try to portray increased intelligence by delivering some of her lines like a robot.  (Seriously, she reads some of her lines like a speedy automaton, and it’s a bad creative decision for her performance.)

I could go on and on about the silly things in this movie.  So could you, if you’ve seen it.  But it’s a lot more fun listening to the surly wise-asses over at Cinema Sins.  Their trademark “Everything Wrong With” video for “Lucy” is particularly harsh.  At one point they call it “an aggressive dickhead of a movie.”  Here’s the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3rZmnJ66Po

There is one overriding problem I need to address myself … and that’s how its premise seems to relate so little to the events of the story.  We begin by understanding that the titular Lucy is affected by a drug that increases her brain capacity.  Before the movie reaches its halfway mark, she appears to gain omniscience.  (She doesn’t need to actually learn anything — she simply knows virtually everything already.  This is evinced by her ability to translate foreign languages instantly, with no books or instruction at all.)  She also appears omnipotent by the film’s end.  Her powers become literally godlike.  And I’m not talking about Thor or Odin from the Marvel Cinematic Universe — we’re talking the all-powerful,  Old Testament God of Abraham.

Why?  Why should increased intelligence, no matter how incredibly vast, give her power of matter, space and even time?  If she were as smart as a thousand Stephen Hawkings, she still shouldn’t be able to do the things she does in the movie.

Believe it or not, I’d rate this movie a 4 out of 10.  (That’s far kinder than the other reviews I’ve read.)  I managed to have fun with this movie by rewriting some of it in my head while I watched.  Instead of Lucy benefiting from a drug that increases her brain capacity (which borrows a bit from 2011’s excellent “Limitless,” anyway), I pretended that I was watching a movie in which Scarlett Johansson became God.  (Think of 2003’s “Bruce Almighty.”)  Honestly.  I swapped out the plot device in my head, and imagined a different movie.  That made it fun — watching Scarlett Johansson as a wrathful God was strangely satisfying, especially when she wreaks havoc on the bad guys.

And speaking of bad guys … that is actually one thing that this otherwise clueless movie manages to get right.  No, I’m not kidding — the Taipei gangsters that serve as the story’s antagonists were performed to perfection by their actors.  The villains were repulsive and terrifying, and they aroused more interest in me than the good guys.  Min-sik Choi was terrific as the homicidal patriarch of the Taiwanese crime syndicate.  Even better, though, was Nicolas Phongbeth as the cherubic-faced, vaguely androgynous, sociopathic lieutenant.  If they were vanquished in this brainless movie, it’d be nice to see them resurrected in a James Bond film or a season of Fox’s “24.”  It’s weird seeing a movie so bad do one important thing so successfully.

There are really only two reasons why anybody should see “Lucy.”  One is morbid curiosity.  Two is if they are a learning to be a screenwriter, and are looking for a feature-length example of what NOT to do.

 

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A few quick words on The CW’s “Containment” (2016)

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The poster for The CW’s new “Containment” seems like a ripoff for some exceptional poster art for 2007’s outstanding horror movie, “28 Weeks Later.”  That is just one of a few offhand references that the TV pilot seems to make to the film.  At one point, a panicked character blurts out the phrase “zombie apocalypse,” even though that has nothing to do with the plot.

Whatever.  Judging from the pilot, the new sci-fi thriller seems like a more or less average outing.  It isn’t bad, exactly, but it’s got plenty of room to grow.  Right now it seems like a undistinguished, mainstream television treatment of “Contagion” (2011).  I’d give it a 6 out of 10.

And, hey … just to add to the confusion, last year there was a really good British independent sci-fi-thriller, also entitled “Containment,” that also portrays a fatal disease outbreak.  I reviewed it here at the blog.  It almost seems like The CW is adopting the “mockbuster” strategy of capitalizing on viewers’ confusion of their show with superior properties.

Oh, well.

 

 

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A very short review of “10 Cloverfield Lane” (2016)

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“10 Cloverfield Lane” (2016) is a capably written and well performed thriller; it might not be quite worth the high praise it seems to be receiving elsewhere, but I’d still give it an 8 out of 10.

Mary Elizabeth Winstead actually is terrific actress.  She has far more to do here than her one-note heroine in 2011’s underrated “The  Thing” prequel, and she performs beautifully.  John Goodman is perfect as a mentally ill, dubious savior.  John Gallagher, Jr. does just fine as a good-natured everyman in over his head.

I did think that “10 Cloverfield Lane” ran a little long for its content.  This could have easily been an especially well executed episode of a one-hour show like “The Outer Limits” or “The Twilight Zone.”  It’s feature-length format felt a little padded.  We don’t need the prologue explaining why Winstead’s character is traveling.  Nor do we need the movie’s slowly building character arc for Goodman’s “Howard.”  (We know to suspect his stability from the trailer.)

This appears to have very little to do with “Cloverfield” (2008).

 

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“Emilie” (2015) is a superb, gut-wrenching thriller.

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I’ll come straight to the point — “Emilie” is an exceptional horror-thriller that belongs on your list of films to see, provided you can stomach some disturbing content.  This movie hooked me in under a minute, even before its title appeared on screen.  Then it kept me glued to it throughout most of its running length.  It could have been an even better film — a classic on par with “Psycho” (1960) or “Fatal Attraction”(1987), were it not for some key creative choices about halfway through.

I’d give this movie a 9 out of 10.  It succeeds for two reasons — great acting and a script that perfectly employs dialogue that is at first subtle and nuanced, and then increasingly frightening.  The title character is a babysitter who is not what the parents expected, in more ways than one.  After some deliberately awkward character interaction with the departing parents, she proceeds to subject the children to a series of progressively more demented psychological games.  What follows is a thriller brimming with pathos.  The movie reminded me a lot of the critically acclaimed and controversial “Funny Games” (2007). That film also showed ostensibly innocent adversaries entering a family’s home after gaining their trust, and then doing awful things.

Emilie is played to perfection by Sarah Bolger, who has a beautiful, kind face, which only makes the character’s incongruous psychopathy even more unsettling for the viewer.  It took me a while to place the actress’ face, until I recognized her as the somewhat feckless protagonist of 2011’s “The Moth Diaries.”  I was impressed with her talent then as a hapless good guy, and I think her performance here was phenomenal.  She plays the innocent-looking, yet icy antagonist here with subtle, unnerving malice.  The rest of the cast is also uniformly quite good.  This is true even of the young child actors, but most especially of Joshua Rush.

The movie is briskly paced, but its sparing dialogue still manages to rattle and then shock.  It’s a sometimes obscene story of imperiled children that really gets under your skin.  Most of its directing is clean and clear.  Combined with the unusual score, it gives the story a dreamlike quality.

The movie loses its way just a little at about the 40-minute mark, when its perverse, moody dialogue and strictly psychological horror give way to the familiar elements of a boilerplate thriller.  An unnecessary backstory is given for our antagonist, delivered by an overly convenient, standard flashback sequence that feels out of place and that disrupts the pacing.  (“Her mind was shattered.”)  Then, other plot points also feel just a little by-the-numbers, moving “Emilie” away from true cinematic greatness and toward just being a very good horror flick.

Finally, Bolger’s villain is defanged a little when the script calls for her to lose her calm demeanor after the plucky, oldest child (Rush) defies her, in a well executed but entirely predictable David and Goliath story.  And her character’s reliance on a nameless, voiceless and superfluous confederate here also makes her a little less enigmatic.

How much greater would this movie have been if Emilie’s motivations remained a mystery?  What if, like “Funny Games” or “The Strangers” (2008), all we knew is that she was an highly intelligent sociopath acting for no discernible reason?  What if she were acting entirely alone?

And what if the horror remained strictly psychological, with no actual violence to up the ante until the closing minutes?  The most disturbing scenario I can think of is this — what if she were able to psychologically manipulate the children to violently turn against one another, or against their parents upon their return?  That could be an ambiguous, darker and far more thematic story than the second half of the film we see here.

Still, this was a damned effective scary movie, and that’s good enough.  I recommend it.

One more thing — there actually is a famous, heartwarming French romantic comedy entitled “Amelie” (2001), which I have not seen.  I think it would be blackly funny if some sentimental filmgoers wanted to rent that and accidentally picked up “Emilie.”

 

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“Berlin Undead” is playing for free over at Hulu.

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There’s a German zombie movie over at Hulu that I highly recommend.  Its name is “Rammbock” (2011); the somewhat unimaginative Americanized title is “Berlin Undead.”  (And that’s also inaccurate, because the baddies chasing us are infected people, a la “28 Days Later.”  A Hulu membership isn’t required.  The film is in German, with English subtitles.

I’m surprised I don’t hear more praise for this movie among zombie horror fans.  It’s nicely made, and it’s scary in parts.  Its lovelorn, likeable oaf of a protagonist (Michael Fuith) is such an everyman that he’s easy to identify with.  And his cunning high school-age companion (Theo Trebs) seems like he would be the coolest foreign exchange student ever.

Check it out:

http://www.hulu.com/watch/398201

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http://www.hulu.com/watch/398201

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A short review of “The Gift” (2015)

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I guess the formula for “The Gift” (2015) is pretty simple — hand a superb script to three superb actors.  Here, they are Jason Bateman, Rebecca Hall and Joel Edgerton, and the dark drama they bring to life is driven by dialogue and unexpected character development, instead of jump scares and dark hallways and other conventional thriller conventions.  (Edgerton, who I last saw as a boilerplate good guy in 2011’s “The Thing” prequel, is also the director here.)  The three actors are magic together.  I became uncomfortable (as was the filmmaker’s intention) even during the first apparently innocuous conversation when the three interact for the first time at a chance meeting in a department store.

In fact, I’m not sure that “The  Gift”  is even a thriller instead of a particularly disturbing drama.  Like other viewers, I’d suggest that what filmgoers see is not what the movie’s trailer suggests.  This is yet another film that reviewers can’t describe in detail for fear of spoilers.

I’d give this a 9 out of 10.  My only criticisms are very mild.  I think Bateman underplayed the distress his character ought to have felt in the last 10 minutes or so.  Also, I found myself wanting more closure and less ambiguity in the ending, as well more of a standard climax.   But that probably just reflects my expectations as a traditional horror-thriller fan, and not any real failings of the movie.

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“Annabelle” (2014) scared the $#@& out of me!!

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“Annabelle” seems like precisely the sort of horror film that shouldn’t work.  Thinly drawn characters wind their way through a series of overly familiar tropes, including, of course, the titular possessed doll.  These characters make the same baffling decisions that only people in horror movies are stupid enough to make, and cavalierly remain in dangerous situations long after you and I would have gotten the hell out of there.  The film is so reminiscent of “Rosemary’s Baby” (1968) that for a while I actually wondered if it was a remake.  And the script is pretty clunky — especially the coda at the church.

Yet … “Annabelle” still works.  This is a frikkin’ scary movie.  I’d give it a 9 out of 10.

There are a couple of reasons for the movie’s success, I think.  First, it’s beautifully shot and directed throughout an especially creepy apartment building. Our supernatural antagonists are (at first) wisely seen down long corridors and stairwells.  There are some static shots of the doll but none of the silly cut-and-cut-back tricks to explain that it is moving on its own.

Second, there is no ham-handed CGI to make the action cartoonish; there are only sparsely placed practical effects, and they work quite well.  This felt like an effective old-fashioned 1970’s horror movie about the devil.

Third, Annabelle Wallis does well in her role as the wife in the young married couple targeted by Satan. She underplays it quite a bit, but she’s still a good actress.  (The beautiful Wallis is none other than the college student that young Charles Xavier tried to pick up in 2011’s “X-Men: First Class.”  And, yes, she does have the same first name as the demonic doll.  Weird world.)

I was confused at first about the awkward and confusing bookends to the film; they’re distracting and unnecessary.  Wikipedia informs me that these are intended to remind viewers that this movie is a spinoff of “The Conjuring” (2013), which is regarded by horror fans as superior to this film.  I guess I’ll need to watch that soon.

 

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Oh! Just one more Thing tonight!!

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You’re glad I reminded you, aren’t you?

I told Pete Harrison the other night that I watched the 2011 prequel to John Carpenter’s 1982 masterpiece, “The Thing.”

He simply responded, “Why?”

To me and undoubtedly many others, the 80’s classic will always be the paradigmatic horror – science fiction movie.  Because I admire a well made house as much as anyone, but AIN’T NO CARPENTER LIKE JOHN CARPENTER.  (Nobody repeat that, I want to copyright it and sell bumper stickers at horror conventions.)

Yes, the recent prequel inexplicably has the exact same title as the 1982 movie, and I have no frikkin’ idea why.  That just seems … deliberately stupid.  Nor is that the 2011 film’s only flaw … it’s universally maligned.

Does the 2011 outing really deserve all its bad press?  I say no.  Among other things, it delivered some fine goopity-gloppity monster goodness, delivered by an archetypal flying saucer, no less.  That’s something that I find refreshing in a horror movie marketplace that just seems inundated with demons and ghosts.  (I loved “Insidious,” but enough already.)

C’mon, Hollywood.  There are plenty of horror fans out there who grew up loving giant ants, Marine-baiting “Aliens,” werewolves, swarms of spiders troubling William Shatner, and the adversaries of Godzilla.  It’s why I gave a positive review to this year’s “Jurassic World,” despite a script of the same quality as that of “Gilligan’s Island.”  I want to see velociraptors chase a speeding truck.  I will ALWAYS want to see velociraptors chase a speeding truck.

And … I liked the 2011 movie’s protagonist!  Trying to mimic MacReady’s cunning anti-hero would have redundant!  This story featured a smart, young lady scientist who turned out to be tough under pressure.  That kinda worked for me.

I actually have seen 1951’s “The Thing From Another World,” but that was 30 years ago on VHS, with my “Movie Uncle,” John Muth.  I have NOT read “Who Goes There?,” John W. Campbell, Jr.’s 1938 novella upon which all of these films were based.  But I’m planning to.  (Last time I checked, it was floating around online somewhere.)

I’m just waiting for the first big blizzard to hit next winter.  Because ATMOSPHERE.