Sunday, October 21, 2007

30 Days of Night; The Darjeeling Limited

30 Days of Night (David Slade, 2007) - B-

Slade knows from scary, and gets off to a dynamite start -- it helps that Barrow, AK is a killer setting, becoming sort of supernatural in its own right as we see 2/3 of its population catch the last plane out before the sun can drop below the horizon, not to be seen again for a month. The frigid melancholy of the first twenty minutes, as Hartnett's Sheriff Oleson makes the rounds in preparation for the annual shut-down, got under my skin a hundred times more than the armies of vicious blood-sucking creatures Slade busts out shortly thereafter. But at first that too seems promising -- Slade has a knack for recognizing unsettling imagery, an understanding of why a momentary glimpse of something in a corner of the frame can be much scarier than a full view, and a sense of what it is about vampires that makes them so enduringly frightening. A third of the way through, I was genuinely excited. Then the movie becomes a pretty generic piece of survival horror, without any characters that really connect, and I started to get bored. On the whole 30 Days of Night is still kind of awesome -- I love the fact that Danny Huston plays the lead villain, Josh Hartnett is effortlessly believable as the Barrow sheriff, the movie is imposingly gory, and the first act portended the best movie of the year -- but it can't sustain momentum, and at 113 minutes, that stings.

The Darjeeling Limited (Wes Anderson, 2007) - C

Bite me.

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

The Seeker; The Last Season

The Seeker: The Dark is Rising (David L. Cunningham, 2007) - C-

You can attribute my absurd optimism about this one to Post-Harry Potter Stress Disorder, but I really should have known once studio marketing drones changed the title from the simple and elegant The Dark is Rising to the nonsensical and ugly (but less depressing!) The Seeker: The Dark is Rising. None the wiser, I remained vaguely intrigued until roughly 40 minutes into the film, when I thought it might be playing around with the question of why most modern fantasy involves a retreat into something resembling the Middle Ages, with swordfights and horseback riding accompanying the sorcery. And it does sort of address it -- the first scene is the last day of school, accompanied by the entire student body flipping open their cell phones in unison; we then transition to the 14 year-old protagonist's house, where an XBox and a flat-screen tv blare across the room while the huge nuclear family tries to have dinner; meanwhile our hero, who will soon discover his supernatural powers and destiny to save the universe, is forced to move up to the rustic attic by the arrival of his big brother from college; soon enough the menacing Rider makes his appearance and we're off to the Medieval races -- but that doesn't really excuse the arbitrary mish-mash of fantasy clichés that, it turns out, comprises the storyline. My heart sank as the serviceable half hour of what-the-hell-is-going-on set-up turned into useless blather about battling forces of light and dark (a scientific concept, apparently, though the film only feints toward explaining it), Old Ones, Chosen Ones, six signs (one of which may or may not be locked away in someone's being), etc. Silliness isn't the problem (surely you know me better than that); the problem is how lazy, thin and insubstantial all of it is, with the fantasy elements seeming totally random and the characters uniformly worthless. Even Frances Conroy and Ian McShane can't give this stuff any weight. Can't speak to the Susan Cooper novel, which is apparently pretty good, but kids will forget the movie within minutes.

The Last Season (David Mickey Evans, 2007) - D+

I almost never walk out, but I would have bolted had I not read (in the Chicago Reader, no less) that The Last Season pulls itself together in the last act. That's sort of true, at least insofar as the Big Game focuses on the baseball rather than school consolidation or the purity of Sean Astin's soul. But this is still the most overbearing sports movie I've ever seen, demolishing all rationality and common sense in pursuit of its anti-consolidation message, preferring to manufacture absurd villains and a symbolic underdog story that's just not there rather than acknowledge that maybe the merits of its cause are kind of ambiguous. Astonishingly, insufferably corny, dragging in a pointless love subplot to supplement all the sickening hero worship and (for the first 90 minutes at least) ignoring the baseball altogether. Most movies about "underdog" teams at least address the mechanics of the team rising from zero to hero; The Last Season doesn't give a damn. Footnote: since when is Michael Angarano getting the reverse-prestigious last-in-the-credits spot? Is Sky High that popular?

Sunday, October 14, 2007

Elizabeth: The Golden Age

Elizabeth: The Golden Age (Shekhar Kapur, 2007) - C

The mistake is straining to turn Elizabeth (or "Lizzie," as I like to call her) into a full-fledged, sentimentalized hero -- and sometimes, as when she stands on a cliff in a flowing dress, overlooking the burning Spanish Armada, nearly a superhero. I just wasn't feelin' it; Kapur seems awed by his protagonist more than anything else this time around, which would be okay except that it apparently prevents him from treating her thoughtfully. He makes some token nods to the ambiguity that made Elizabeth so compelling in the first film, with a few scenes were she laments giving up her life for England, or gets really angry, or what have you, but the movie is mostly interested in lionizing her without doing the legwork. Kind of oppressive in its opulence, with lots of expensive costumes and birds-eye-view shots from 50-foot vaulted ceilings, and ultimately makes a hollow noise when you thump it. The portrayal of King Philip II is hilarious, as he walks around dark corridors clutching rosaries and calling Elizabeth a "blood-soaked virgin." Lovely guy.

Sunday, October 7, 2007

In the Valley of Elah

In the Valley of Elah (Paul Haggis, 2007) - B

Oh boy could this have been worse. After watching Haggis bamboozle everyone from my neighbors to Roger Ebert with the screenwriting grad student's wet dream that was Crash, I panicked upon learning that, apparently having defeated racism, he was now taking on Iraq. And in some ways, he is indeed up to his old tricks -- most reasonable people will agree, I hope, that the stunt with the flag is basically unforgivable. That aside, though, this is a surprisingly strong effort, reminding us that the wounds of Iraq, like the wounds of Vietnam, are going to remain long after the next presidential election is a distant memory. The interesting thing is how immediate it is -- the basic thesis is "the Army fucks people up," but what makes the film powerful is everything we know about Iraq that goes more-or-less unsaid here. It's hard to imagine Elah working in 10 years, but it sure as hell works now. Tommy Lee Jones is remarkable, though is the idea here that the last generation's career officers simply became emotionally constipated OCD-ers while today's wind up charred and decapitated? Jesus.