Fury October 2o14

or

How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Loved the CGI!



 

Naturalism

1. (in art and literature) a style and theory of representation based on the accurate depiction of detail.

2. a philosophical viewpoint according to which everything arises from natural properties and causes, and supernatural or spiritual explanations are excluded or discounted.
 

Wardaddy: Ideals are peaceful. History is violent.
 

You know, everything about this naturalistic movie is working. They just plop the audience down smack in the middle of WWII, and brother, it's a jolt. This isn't a story about WWII, it is as close as we can get to the experience of WWII without actually being there. Sure, Saving Private Ryan does most of that, but this is even more surreal, horrifying without being preachy about the wrong or right of war.

 

And the characters are so existential. We really don't know much about them except for their job description: "We kill Nazis." But we do identify with them because no matter how they try to hide it this killing Nazi thing gets to them.

 

So, this is a great film with one giant drawback: CGI muzzle flashes! I know, it's the thing today. I guess it saves money on blank ammunition, maybe safer for the actors, and maybe they use it to get the gamer crowd to put down the Halo or whatever phony baloney first-person video game kids are playing these days and watch, actually watch a movie . . . or maybe they, the production team just thinks its cool to turn WWII into Star Wars. Whatever the excuse . . . I hate it. I hate it with such a passion. I'm surprised that Brad Pitt let them get away with it. It doesn't fit in a naturalist WWII film to have "cartoonish" animation for gunfire. It looks ridiculous. Why aren't more people offended by this? Anyway, if you are going to try and depict an actual war, the way war really is get rid of the CGI!

 

 

Gone Girl October 2o14

Gone Girl
A Sort of Review,

Sort of

 

I like to consider myself an adventurous movie goer, somewhat like Frank Buck: Bring ‘Em Back Alive . . .only I do my big game hunting with a medium popcorn (no butter) in one hand and a large ice tea (LOTS of ice!) in the other, sitting in my favorite seat, in an air-conditioned, big screen movie theatre with whomever I can talk into going with me. I don’t like to know much about the movie I’m going to see. I don’t read reviews because I don’t want to know the story or what some other "big game hunter" thought about the film. I do look at posters, and I’ve gotten pretty good at deciding whether or not a movie is worth my time by watching a little bit of the trailers. Sure, trailers are design to con you into believing that the movie they advertise is “The greatest movie in MOVIE HISTORY!” But if you know what to look for in a trailer, you can tell whether or not the advertisement guys are lying to you about the quality of the movie being promoted. Word of mouth is a good device for making your decision to see or not see a certain movie.

ME: How was the movie?
Mouth: Oh, it was okay . . .

or

ME: How was the movie?

Mouth: Man, That movie really SUCKED!

Either one of those answers to my question, "How was the movie?" is not a great indicator as to whether or not a movie is worth my viewing time. Let’s face it, people have different tastes. An audience member might not like a movie for other reasons than the movie itself. For example: back in 1989, I'd just finished watching Field of Dreams when I ran into an old (girl) friend of mine who had also just seen it. “How was the movie?” I asked. She replied, “It was all about MEN! Why was it all about what MEN WANT? What about us, WOMEN? Why isn’t there a Field of Dreams for WOMEN?!”  Hmmm, a good point, but it doesn’t really have anything to do with whether the movie was good or not. The only word of mouth review of a movie you can trust is:

ME: How was the movie?
Mouth: (smiling) Go see it.

Me: Okay, but how was it?
Mouth (bigger smile): Just go see it.

There’re a couple of important points you should get from my dialogue with Mouth: 1. Mouth is reluctant to tell me anything about the movie. 2. Mouth is smiling. Those two things tell me that it’s a sure bet that if I go to that particular movie, I'm going to see something . . . good/bad? Who knows, but I'm definitely gonna see . . . something worth my time.

 

So, what the hell does all this have to do with a review of Gone Girl? Actually, it has everything to do with Gone Girl. Gone Girl is one of those movies that you should go see without knowing much or anything about it. For me it’s one of those films that I really WANT to talk about, but only with people who have already seen it. Hell, I may have said too much all ready. Anyway, stop listening to me or to any reviewer, get you popcorn, ice tea, find a great seat in a theatre and just watch . . . Gone Girl.

The Equalizer September 2014

or
Home Mart: Let’s Kill Something Together

 

!MAYBE A FEW SPOILERS!

What the Fuqua, Antoine?! How the heck can you mess up a movie that has a decent enough revenge script, Denzel Washington as your lead (along with a killer support cast) AND some of the most beautiful cinematography I’ve ever seen? What the hell were you thinking? Okay, you didn’t make a terrible movie, but you surely didn’t make a great movie either. Instead, you took all those wonderful elements mentioned above and created a steaming pile of mediocrity, and that is worse than making something completely awful!

The script was solid, a great storyline about a mild mannered hardware store employee who has a black op, ass kicking demon hiding behind his smile, and one day something happens to force that demon out in the open. And yeah, I know, we’ve seen it all before in First Blood (1982), Valdez is Coming (1971) Death Wish (1974). . . Hell, almost every Marvel character is based on the “mild mannered” appearing schmuck who has a secret, superhero identity.  But what makes this script interesting to me is not that you have the demon hiding out in the average Joe type character, but the length of time the script takes in exploring the transformation from nice guy to cold blooded assassin. Unlike Banner’s Hulk personality that doesn’t need more than a dirty look to get him all “smashing” mad, Robert McCall’s dark side is buried so deep that it takes the attempted murder of the teenage prostitute he’s befriended to finely get him to his Popeye Moment: That’s all I can stands, I can’t stands no more! For me this was the best part of the movie. The quiet moments in your movie, Antoine, are where you excel.

And yeah, your casting was perfect. Denzel (the good guy psychopathic killer) and Marton Csokas (Teddy, the evil psycho killer) . . . wow! Their interactions were so intense I was nervously chewing up the theatre seat cushion! (Sorry, Warren Theatre. I’ll pay for that.) And no matter what the other ‘reviewers” say, Chloë Grace Moretz was brilliant as the young hooker looking for a way out of “the life.” And I’m gonna give you credit for picking Mauro Fiore as your cinematographer. Man, he sure has a way of getting that dark, depressing look of the big city . . . and also finding the beauty in that darkness. I was a little bit annoyed with the final shot of McCall sitting at a booth in his favorite café, reading a book and sipping tea. It was a bit too reminiscent of Edward Hopper’s  Nighthawks (1942).

BUT where you went wrong, Antoine, were the fight scenes! What the heck, man! The whole first part of the movie is a build up to that first fight scene! It’s the payoff for us sitting with Robert McCall as he struggles with the question: “Should I let the demon out, make things right?” It’s the moment we, the audience, are waiting for. NOW we’re gonna see that demon from hell pull out a big old can of kick ass! And what did you do with the scene, Antoine? You jump cut the crap out of it! Audience couldn’t see the action. Couldn’t see the fight! It was such a bland scene, totally uninteresting to watch, and every fight scene in this movie was awful. Antoine, buddy, you need to take Hitchcock’s advice about action sequences. “If you are going to have a crop duster in your movie, it must dust crops.” Antoine, if you bill a character as a bad ass, ass kicker, then we, the audience, must see him KICK some major gluteus maximus! I don’t know what it is with you directors these days. You really think that shooting a fight scene in close ups and jump cutting it until it turns into blurry goo is the way it should be done? Well, if God had known how you were going to direct the action sequences in this movie, there would have been an 11^th commandment: THOU SHALL NOT DIRECT ACTION SEQUENCES, ANTOINE!