The Neverending Stories: Some Other Movies From 2007 (2)

2021年6月8日星期二

Some Other Movies From 2007 (2)

For further background on the year in film, please refer to the Some Other Movies From 2007 entry.

The following things happened in 2007:

Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone.
Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU.
A total lunar eclipse occurred.
Greensburg, Kansas was devastated by a tornado.
A series of Live Earth concerts were held around the globe to raise environmental awareness.

Linked entries can be viewed in their entirety on YouTube.

Excellent

1. The Kingdom

OK, ignore the prelude, which basically writes a historical check it can't cash.

After that, what you're left with is a tightly plotted action movie that doesn't feel the need to lecture on the subject of U.S.-Saudi Arabian relations. Instead of explaining it demonstrates, and that makes all the difference.

In The Kingdom Jamie Foxx leads a team of FBI agents into Saudi Arabia after a terrorist attack. Director Peter Berg had a good run of movies up to and including this one. After The Kingdom? I'm sorry to say that he's responsible for Hancock, which is a movie best avoided.

2. The Number 23

They overdid the special effects, but this might be my favorite of Jim Carrey's movies. In The Number 23 he stars as a man fixated on a number, and this intricately plotted film will have you guessing this way and that all the way through. Virginia Madsen is also good as his loving if slightly confused wife.

I've also had a couple friends who've gone down similar rabbit holes. Those of us inclined to empiricism will know difference between correlation and causation, but take just about any lonely person, sit them in front of YouTube long enough, and they'll be coming up with their own conspiracies. In this era of fake news and the consolidation of media outlets it's something to be aware of. It's not likely that "they" are out to get you, but a few disconnected facts presented to an unbalanced mind can lead to a lot of confusion.

Surprising Fact: Joel Schumacher directed this. I think between his direction and Carrey's performance they knocked it out of the park. Prior to The Number 23, the two worked together on Batman Forever.

Don't Take My Word for It: Critics hated this movie. Honestly, I don't think they gave it a chance to begin with.

Some Good Ones

1. Elizabeth: The Golden Age

Eh, it's OK. Not nearly as good as the first one. But then again the first one had Vincent Cassell, so there's that to consider. I have to admit I lost interest in this movie halfway through, but Cate Blanchett's performance remains the cornerstone upon which this would-be movie franchise was built. The idea of putting the queen of England at the center of an action movie is so out of left field that I have to admire those involved for their audacity. Critics at the time hated it, but then again critics at the time loved Paranormal Activity.

2. Wrong Turn 2: Dead End

"Almost heaven / West Virginia..."

Reality show contestants vs. cannibalistic hillbillies. It's a movie that knows exactly what it is and what it's trying to do. I watched the unrated version, which is undoubtedly better than the theatrical cut. This sequel easily surpasses the original, which was just another Texas Chainsaw Massacre / Hills Have Eyes retread anyway.

Henry Rollins must have had a blast during filming. Not only does he get to play Rambo, but he gets all the best lines.

3. The Great Debaters

Denzel Washington is a good director. I think this movie takes a slight misstep in linking Washington's character too closely with the Depression-era labor movement, but there are great scenes in this movie and the conclusion is very satisfying.

Fun Fact: Denzel Washington plays the debate team's mentor in this movie. Forest Whitaker plays his colleague. The young actor playing Forest Whitaker's son is Denzel Whitaker, who was named after Denzel Washington.

4. Lars and the Real Girl

Ryan Gosling stars as a man who falls in love with a sex doll. It starts out good but strains its own credibility. That ambulance ride? The "hospitalization?" The funeral? The burial? None of those things would be cheap.

5. Waste is Food

Thought-provoking documentary on biodegradable materials, and "cradle to cradle" production. Parts of this documentary will make you think "Yeah, but what about...?", and it certainly could have gone into more depth, but it's worth watching regardless.

Not So Much Bad as Perplexing

1. Hitman

John Wick before the fact? Kinda. I admire what director Xavier Gens was trying to do, it's just too bad the studio got squeamish and edited the life out of this thing. At times it feels French, at times it feels American, and between the two styles of film-making this film never finds a place to rest. Some interesting scenes for sure, but as an action movie it fails.

This said, if you ever want to see the value of a good actor check out Timothy Olyphant in this movie. He does this half-crazy thing with his eyes, and it almost carries the entire film. Ditto for Olga Kurylenko, who'd go on to do Quantum of Solace the following year.

Fun Fact: Vin Diesel was originally cast as the lead.

Not My Thing

1. The Beatbox Choir

Why am I not surprised that Bjork shows up in the beginning of this documentary? It's exactly her kind of thing. Beatbox ambassador Schlomo assembles a choir (choral ensemble?) for a unique concert. Would I buy the album if there was one? Naw.

Some Bad Ones

1. Paranormal Activity

Remember when every other horror movie was a found footage movie? Paranormal Activity is very much in keeping with that Blair Witch-derived aesthetic. It was cheaply made, neither of the actors were ever famous, and the special effects are decidedly un-special. It would've been a much better movie if they'd just edited a half hour out of it, but then it would have been an hour long, and thus too short for theatrical release.

But hey, IT'S THE MOST PROFITABLE FILM EVER MADE. Really. They filmed it for peanuts and it made millions. They've also made seven of them, with the seventh due sometime soon.

Fun Fact: The principle actors in this movie go by their own names, and most of the dialogue was improvised. They were paid $500 for their work, and filming took place over 7 days.

Cause for Argument: Some people LOVE this movie, and it has done well with critics. In my opinion it's completely derivative, especially given The Blair Witch Project that came before it. Apparently it scared some audience members so badly that they walked out of the theater.

2. The Mist

It starts of well, but the cgi tentacles ruin it. Then the characters that haven't been "tentacled" engage in the most pointless arguments while evading monsters that are somehow powerless against plate glass. It feels like a 70s disaster film, but it's not cheesy enough to be entertaining.

Cause for Argument #2: Again, critics liked this movie, though Roger Ebert agreed with me. I didn't find it particularly "deep" or "politically incisive," but that's what some critics said at the time. The director, Frank Darabont, is an Academy Award nominee several times over, and his previous films included The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile.

3. War

Vengeful cop Jason Statham squares off against ruthless hitman Jet Li. This movie could've used a lot less drama and a lot more action. I got about halfway through and had to tap out. Statham and Li were great together in Unleashed, but that movie is the polar opposite of this one.

4. Dead Silence

More spooky dolls (or in this case ventriloquist dummies) from James Wan. He directed this after Saw III, and comparisons between the dummies/dolls in this movie and Jigsaw's likeness were unavoidable. This film just doesn't have enough of a premise to sustain itself, and making it into a short would have worked much better. As it is it DRAGS, and by the time the town's dark secret is revealed it's hard to care one way or the other.

Fun Fact: Aquaman 2 should start filming this month.

5. Next

Parts of this movie make no sense, the dialogue is awful, and Jessica Biel is a terrible actress.

BUT the premise is fun to think about. If Nicolas Cage can see two minutes into the future, can he see two minutes into EVERY possible future? How would his mind process all of those possible futures? Would he be like a walking quantum computer, using every version of his own mind in a different reality at the same time? Would he be able to process these possibilities, in parallel, to the point where he achieved a godlike intelligence?

And is his foresight something he can switch on and off? Or is it on all the time, dooming him to live in a series of futures he cannot escape? Would he be in effect paralyzed by the consequences of his own and every other person's actions? Would he suffer, knowing the negative consequences that every single one of his decisions inflicts on someone else? Would he cease being human if he was unable to live in the present?

I'm sure that Philip K. Dick, who wrote the story this movie is based on, had a fun time contemplating such matters. It's just too bad that the movie never bothers to do so.

Fun Fact: PKD's original story more closely resembled Theodore Sturgeon's groundbreaking novel More Than Human. "Cris Johnson" as presented in that novel was a much more misanthropic character, driven to the periphery of human society by both his "gift" and his inability to procreate with normal people. The original draft of the script was also very anti-authoritarian, but this aspect of the story was later toned down.