Simpsons Movie; Captivity

The Simpsons Movie (David Silverman, 2007) - B+

Funny how after all these years, and the recent incessant complaints about The Simpsons having "jumped the shark," the long-awaited film opens with a huge splash, and droves of critics and filmgoers return to fawning over Matt Groening's now-timeless satire masterpiece. Truth is, the show has never lost its edge, and the Movie s less a "return to form" than a particularly polished iteration of its brilliance. The material does lose something in its translation to the big screen, as gags that would have been showstoppers in tv viewing sort of float by serenely in the larger context. But the show's notorious arsenal of humor - social satire, pop culture jabs, general weirdness (the riotous opening sequence awesomely embodying all three) -- s in fine shape, the laughs coming furiously and some of the jokes immediately attaining classic Simpsons status. The show has been the best thing on tv for 18 years, or at least since the demise of Twin Peaks; it makes a certain sense that its cinematic incarnation is better than most of what's in theaters this summer.




Captivity (Roland Joffe, 2007) - F

I hate to say it, but this lends credibility to certain pundits' otherwise retarded tirades against what they call the torture porn genre. Not that the movie is all that graphic, or all that horrifying -- in fact it fakes us out so many times that we quickly learn to disbelieve what we see, no matter how gruesome. It's just that it's so schlocky, dumb and nonsensical that prevailing sight-unseen impression of films in this sub-genre* (because of course these people are too outraged to actually watch them) consisting of "just people being tortured" might as well be true. The twisted, baroque storytelling of the Saws and the sly satire of the Hostels is nowhere to be found here. Not sure what the deal is with the suggestion that Cuthbert's character is the "girl with no heart," but if the notion is one of conquest -- the big reveal has the villains wind up talking about their predictions about how long it would take for her to submit to "hero sex" -- then I have only two things to say: 1) eew; and 2) the accusations of moral depravity might actually be on point for once.

*I feel like I'm surrendering just by calling it a "sub-genre," since really they're just horror films like any other, but it's hard to ignore trends.