The American

Some movie titles are fairly self-explanatory. Nobody went into Dude Where's My Car expecting to see a subtle yet complex commentary on the human condition. Showgirls was also one of those titles that pretty much tipped its hand as to what kind of movie-going experience you were about to get. But when I saw the title The American, I was puzzled. What exactly was this movie going to be? Would be a movie about:

• A guy who couldn't pick out his home state on a map?
  
• A guy who believes Barrack Obama is really a secret Muslim
  
• A guy who is convinced we (Canadians) all live in igloos and take sled dogs to work
  
• A guy who could name all the cast members of Jersey Shore but not one Supreme Court Justice.
  

Of course, it wasn't any of those movies (although I am actively pitching two of them). In fact, this movie was nothing like I thought it would be. It was slow, methodical, nuanced, character rich, and unpredictable. When compared to other Hollywood Studio Films, it would be considered...well... un-American.

The American tells the story of Jack, a seasoned veteran of the spy world played by George Clooney. In the opening scene we see Jack spending some quality time with a lady friend in a remote winter cabin in Sweden. Snipers try to take Jack out but he manages to foil the hit and get away to fight another day. Of course we see what Jack must do to ensure his safety and we are instantly acutely aware of just how high the stakes are in Jack's world.

Director Anton Corbijn has a background in stills photography and this is evident from the very first image in the screen. This film is set in Sweden and Italy and the aesthetics in this film are magnificent. But at the same time, Corbijn is able to make the danger and suspense feel real. This isn't like a Bond film where we are aware we are watching a popcorn film. This movie feels more like a documentary crew followed an international covert hitman for a while. The tension is real and visceral.

This is especially true when Jack takes up residence in Italy for a few months. He is given a cell phone and other gear by his contact/handler but Jack doesn't keep it. He is suspicious about how he was found in Sweden and now can't trust even those who were his closest allies. But without certainty that they are working against him, he takes a job assisting a female hitman. Hitwoman? Hitperson? Assassin! She needs a special compact sniper rifle and Jack's job is to build it for her.

At this point in the film, I kept waiting for the pace and action to ramp up. Certainly there must be double-crosses and high speed highway chases coming but alas, they did not. See what I mean about refreshing? The majority of this storyline involves Jack collecting materials, building and testing this custom made sniper rifle. The other major storyline involves Jack's budding relationship with an Italian prostitute he visits named Carla played by the very beautiful Italian actress Violante Placido. Two things I could tell about this actress right off the top: she is very charming on screen and her agent has never heard of a no-nudity clause.

Very slowly and very methodically, these two storylines start to come together. Jack is becoming more and more suspicious about this job he is doing while at the same time, his relationship with Carla goes from professional to authentic. And while he wants to believe she is really falling for him, he can't allow himself to be taken in by her. Though he never says it aloud, we are thinking the exact same thing he is – could she be a spy plotting his assassination. What this film does exceptionally well is allowing these suspicions to fester without being ham-fisted about it. Yes there are some things that seem off but they are also easily explained. So what is the truth? The audience's frustration exactly mirrors what Jack must feel every moment of his life. We get a taste of what it is like never knowing if we can believe what is unfolding in front of our very eyes.

Methodical as it may be, this film does build to a climax where both storylines are resolved. We finally find out what is real and what is not. But again, even though there final confrontations and cat and mouse chases, it still feels very muted. The best sequence in the movie comes when Jack delivers the rifle to the hit-…assassin. Here is another great cat and mouse scene except we're never really sure who is the cat and who is the mouse.

This is a movie that is not for everyone. If you need the MTV style of lots of action, lots of smash cuts to hold your attention, this movie is not for you. However if you want a refreshing change and a well told, if understates suspense piece, you should see this movie.

But don't be fooled by its title. With a Dutch director, methodical story space, frequent nudity, and lack of explosions, what are you really seeing?

The European.

 

Tomorrow’s Review is Reader’s Choice

There are two new movies opening up Friday: (1) Going the Distance, a Drew Barrymore and Justin Long Romantic Comedy. (2) The American, a George Clooney movie which I assume is about a guy who couldn't identify France on a world map. Or it could be a romantic spy drama but that seems unlikely. I would also entertain votes for Machete.

Which one will I see and review? That's up to you. Vote for your choice either in the comments section below or on the Facebook page for Seluke's Movie reviews. Whichever movie gets the most votes will be reviewed.

Act now. Operators are standing by.

The Last Exorcism

Here's something you may not know about me – I only really hate three things in this world: old people, puppies, and scary movies. It's true. I hate scary movies. Always have; always will.

I just don't enjoy the experience of being frightened or startled. I find it unpleasant and I don't know why people pay $12 for the experience. Needless to say, I have never been a big fan of the horror movie genre. I find these movies fall into one of two categories of unpleasantness: (1 )Stupid people doing stupid things resulting in a stupid movie (See any slasher franchise) or (2) Genuinely frightening (The Exorcist, Amityville Horror, It). The second category tends to involve supernatural thrillers involving demons or evil spirits and this invariably freaks me out for a good two to three weeks after seeing it.

So when my colleagues at CBC Information Morning assigned The Last Exorcist as our next on air review, I knew I was in for another unpleasant movie-going experience. And that's exactly what I got. What I didn't know however, was why. I thought it would be a category 2 situation but instead turned into category 1. This is remarkable considering how great this movie started out.

The Last Exorcist takes the form of a mockumentary that follows Cotton Marcus (Patrick Fabian), a huckster country preacher who is more showman than man-of-God. His greatest talent as a showman is faking exorcisms. He still believes he is doing a good deed because if the people truly believe they have had demons cast out of them, they can go on living their lives.

But after he reads about a young boys death while having an exorcism performed on him, he has decided that he is getting out of that racket for good. But not before he exposes it for the smoke-and-mirrors con game that he knows it to be. So he's decides he's going to do one more phony exorcism and let a camera crew follow him, documenting the key parts of scam as he goes along. The case involves a 16 year-old girl named Nell (Ashley Bell) who appears to suffer from demonic possession. This will be Cotton's last exorcism.

What director Daniel Stamm has done beautifully here is set up a con-man-about-to-meet-the-real-thing story where we genuinely sympathize with the con man. We believe Cotton is basically a decent man who is performing a service for people who want it. He's simply trying to provide for his family, at one point saying "I used to wish for my own evangelical TV program but right now I'd just like to have health insurance."

So Cotton and his team meet Nell, her uber-fundamental, father Louis (Louis Herthum) and overly intense brother Caleb (Caleb Landry Jones). Cotton goes through his whole routine, faking bed shaking and shrieks as he does his act. He believes it to be a success and when he finishes counting his thick wad of bills for another job well done, he goes back to the hotel for a good night's sleep.

And this is where Cotton's plan goes awry.

Nell shows up at Cotton's motel in the middle of the night only she's not quite Nell. She's nowhere near the head-spinning, pea-soup puking girl that Linda Blair portrayed in the 1973 classic. But there is clearly something not right with this Nell. What Cotton does next is very telling. Instead of assuming genuine possession, he rushes her to the hospital assuming there must be something physically wrong with her. At his core, he still believes in secular explanations.

At this point, this film has my complete and undivided attention. It has set up a beautiful two part narrative question: is Nell really suffering from demonic possession and if so, can the con man summon enough genuine faith to save her? Very few movies have so skilfully set up the second half of the movie for what has to be a rich and rewarding payoff. The only thing that is missing in this film is a rich and rewarding payoff.

Without going into too many plot points, the movie never fully realizes its potential in the con man vs. real demons story. There is one brief scene in the barn where the demon seems to make an appearance and taunts Cotton for his lack of faith. But it never goes any further than that.

MAJOR SPOLIER WARNING HERE!!!!

The entire third act feels like it was stolen from The Blair Witch Project (1999). It involves lots of shaky-cam POV shots as they run through the woods trying to identify the location of certain screams. And when they stumble upon the source of the screams, the movie rushes to a lightning fast and unsatisfying ending. The filmmakers thought they were executing a nice reveal but in going out of their way to deliver this twist reveal, they abandoned what was working so well before. This ending doesn't answer either of the fundamental story questions addressed above.

Was she really possessed? This question becomes moot when you see the ending of this movie. Does Cotton find his genuine faith? Again, never answered and not relevant in this ending. So bottom line, this movie fails miserably in delivering on the promise of its set up.

It's a shame too because there was a lot to like in this film. Fabian and Bell were riveting in their scenes together. These were two really solid performances that sadly went to waste.

But at least the movie confirmed my long-held belief that I don't enjoy scary movies. As for the other things I mentioned off the top, I was just joking.

I don't hate puppies.

 

Piranha 3D

People come up to me all the time and ask "Tony, why do write your blog?" Is it for the money, the women, the overwhelming sense of machismo? And each time, I look them straight in the eye and say the exact same thing – "How dare you talk to me." Then, having sufficiently scolded them, I go on to answer their question. "No, the reason I write this blog is for the same reason anyone writes a blog – to save lives."

And lately it has come time my attention that there is a clear and present danger that threatens our summer fun. This threat can turn an innocent beachside wet T-shirt contest into a bloody, gory massacre in minutes. This threat is of course, prehistoric piranhas which were trapped in a subterranean lake and recently released after seismic activity created a portal to the earth's surface. It's a story as old as time.

But after watching Alendre Aja's Piranha in 3D, I feel like I am now something of a piranha survival expert. And since being attacked by these prehistoric killers is a matter of when and not if, I feel like it is my duty to once again use my writing to save lives. Here is EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT SURVIVING A PREHISTORIC PIRANHA ATTACK.

1. Piranhas, like early 80's slasher villains, have a very strict moral code. I can't be sure what denomination they are (Could be Lutherans but I'm thinking Methodists) but piranhas will not stand for consuming alcohol, dancing suggestively to hip hop music, foul language, or premarital relations of any kind. And what they really hate is public nudity. One can only assume that being trapped in a subterranean lake for millions of years has given them time to develop a very strong moral code. In any event, it seems that if you engage in any kind of risqué behaviour, you will be devoured by piranhas. Only the good will survive. So if you're Billy Joel, surviving a piranha attack may seem counter-intuitive.
   

   
    

2. You're going to need a bigger boat. The opening scene of the movie features a character named Matt who looks a lot like the Matt from another monster-in-the-water movie. This Matt is fishing in the middle of the lake when he his flung from his boat and devoured by a pack of piranha's. We learn right away that piranhas hunt in packs. Not unlike those douche bags on Jersey Shore. And because they attack in such great numbers no small watercraft will keep you safe. Many times people tried to flee in small boats and every time they wound up eaten. To be really safe you want to make sure you are on something the size of a cruise ship. Just make sure it's not a celebrity cruise ship or you might encounter the only thing worse than prehistoric piranha – those douche bags from Jersey Shore.
   

   
    

3. Hand-to-hand combat is not recommended when fighting piranhas. This may seem like common sense but too many characters perished by trying to fight off the piranhas with blunt instruments with not much success. You could be like the Ving Rhames character and find yourself grabbing an outboard motor and using the propeller as a weapon. This could have been successful but Ving made the classic mistake of yelling "Choke on this Motherf**kers" as he was fighting them. As we established in survival tip #1, piranhas don't care much for the salty talk. Sadly, there was only one way this was going to end and this is the last we saw of Ving.
   

Look, I could go on but I think you get the point. The truth is that developing a survival strategy against prehistoric piranhas is really the only reason to go see this movie. I was hoping for so much more and found myself underwhelmed when I left the theatre. Not because there was too much cheese and gore but rather because there was not enough cheese and gore.

I thought this was going to be a throwback to the old drive in 3D monster movies. It would be wall to wall, over the top scenes of killer piranhas attacking unsuspecting boaters and swimmers. Instead they took the same approach as Jaws and only gave us a dabbling of piranha attacks in the first half of the movie. Aja must have figured this would be a nice build up to the feeding frenzy that takes place for the last 25 minutes of the film. He could not be more wrong.

I think there may have been two scenes of piranha attacks in the first hour of this movie. So if there weren't piranha attacks, what was in the first hour of the movie? The answer is character and storyline introductions that lead to nowhere. We meet Sherriff Julie (Elizabeth Shue) whose job it is to keep the area safe during Spring Break. She finds the half-eaten body of Matt and wants to shut down the beach but is reminded this is the busiest time of the tourist season. Sound familiar? But instead of developing this as a fully fleshed out storyline, this is the last we hear of it.

We also meet hall of fame sleaze peddler Derrick Jones (Jerry O'Connell) whose 'Wild Wild Girls website is not even thinly veiled as Joe Francis' Girls Gone Wild site. O'Connell does a great job of playing this sleaze-bag whose only function in the movie is to be a reason to have hot topless women on the screen. If you want to do that, fine. But why spend all the time setting up the relationship between Jones and Julie's son Jake (Steven McQueen (yes, grandson)). Jones appears like he's going to be a mentor figure for the shy Jake but again, this storyline goes nowhere.

Even worse is there is no third act. The way they neutralize the threat was accidental more than planned. And it wasn't necessary in the escape scene in which it took place. It's like they had no way of ending it and threw something in that was really nonsensical.

The only reason why I am deconstructing character motivations and storylines in a 3D Piranha movie was because the filmmakers made the mistake of introducing them for the first half of this film. The big scene late in this movie is fun and is the reason why someone would pay money to see it. So my point is why hold it back to the end? It should have been like that all the way through. Because if you try to pass this off as a regular film with characters and storylines, you have to make it make sense.

And when these don't make sense, it makes me so mad I want to curse a blue streak. But I don't. Why?

PIRANHAS DON"T CARE FOR THE SALTY TALK.

People you have to learn the rules. It will save your life one day.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

Here are three ways the world has gotten worse and not better in the past 15 years:

1. We live in a world where "The Situation" has more adulation and recognition than David Mamet. To fully explore the degree to which this is a crime against humanity would require more time and words than I could possibly muster right now.
   
2. It is now considered bad form to ask people out on dates either in person or on the phone. Today's kids believe it is to be done over text or email so as not to put the other person on the spot. Maybe one day we will get to the point where we can completely remove all genuine human interaction from our daily lives.
   
3. Filmmaker's today seem to believe that style is a legitimate substitute for story. It used to be that to be a wildly successful film, you had to craft a meaningful story to engage an audience to get them to keep coming back. Then Pulp Fiction (1994) happened and with it came a generation of directors who seemed more concerned with creating a slick, stylistic film than telling a great story.
   

And it is this last point that has caused the most consternation over recent years. It seems like time after time after time, I would come out of a theatre after seeing one of these slick, stylistic exercises in cinematic masturbation and think "How great could that have been if they combined that style with story? What would you get if one day someone had the crazy idea to tell a well crafted story with a fresh stylistic approach?"

The answer is Scott Pilgrim vs. The World.

This is a movie that is clearly targeted to a specific generation. The entire motif of the film is an homage to the Nintendo and X-Box fighting games that were ubiquitous in the 1990's and 2000's. The opening shot of the Universal Logo is done as if it done on the Nintendo gaming system circa 1990. Director Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) got permission to use the music from the game The Legend of Zelda (1986) because he believed it to be "The nursery rhyme of this generation."

So this film comes flying out of the gate with so many stylistic devices that speak to the MTV and video game generation that I'm bracing myself for another style-over-substance piece of dreck. I am almost white-knuckling the arm rests waiting for the combination of despair and anger to begin to wash over me. And even though I am being bombarded with cuts so quick it is difficult to keep track of what is real and what is fantasy, a strange realization starts to take hold of me. It occurs to me, I am not hating this movie. And here's why.

Just underneath the very stylized surface of this film is a story about a lost and adrift youth named Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera) who plays in a garage band and spends time with his Asian pseudo girlfriend named Knives (Ellen Wong). Scott keeps having these dreams where he sees this pink haired beauty named Ramona (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) who all but ignores him completely even in his own dreams. Then one night at a party, he sees this same girl and approaches her and awkwardly and clumsily asks her out. He is of course blown off completely but it doesn't dissuade him from making it his mission to win her over.

Now right here, despite all the video game gimmicks, they have cleverly set up a classic boy meets girl story. Due in large part to the boyish charm of Michael Cera, we like Scott and want to see him develop something with Ramona.

So we have the classic set up. Now to fully realize a second act, we're going to need a series of obstacles and challenges that our protagonist must overcome to succeed in his mission. And this is where this film really pays off in merging the style with substance. Because instead the obstacles being the nauseating and tiresome teen angst that makes you want to poke out both your eyes with sharpened number 2 pencils (Twilight series, call your office) this film establishes Ramona's exes as the obstacles Scott must overcome.

One by one, Scott faces one of her seven exes and must fight them in a Mortal Combat style. It is during these fight scenes where we get the full effect of the video game style. But it works brilliantly because only through this style would we accept it as being believable. And it makes the fighting fun without seeming gory and violent. In each battle Scott must find a new and ingenious way to overcome these stronger and more powerful enemies.

Across the board the cast did a great job at making these characters fantastical yet believable at the same time. Cera and Winstead are very compelling in their respective roles but it was relative newcomer Ellen Wong who really impressed me with her portrayal of Knives. With this character she takes her from shy Asian school girl to badass martial arts fighter. At the same time she needs to uphold the critical third part of the romantic triangle that evolves between Scott, Ramona, and Knives. This romantic triangle is so well executed that even at the very end, I was not sure either who Scott would end up with or who he should end up with.

Perhaps the greatest achievement Edgar Wright boasts in this film is turning the final showdown between the hero and antagonist into a genuinely suspenseful and anticipated event rather than the usual eye-rolling bore. When Scott faces off against Gideon, we want to see him kick some ass. This segment provides enough genuine surprises to keep it fresh and interesting.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World succeeds by complimenting style with story. It is fun and fresh and certainly worth checking out in the theatre. It is probably the best date movie out in the theatres right now.

Should you want to bring a date, whatever you do – do not ask them in person. That is so 1998!

 

 

Rejuvenated and Rededicated

To the readers of this blog I have one thing to say – I am back and better than ever. One of those is actually true. I don't know if anyone missed reading this review blog while I was gone but I assure you I missed writing it. And so I return with a set schedule for upcoming blogs. From here on in you will find regular postings on Wednesday mornings and Friday afternoons.

The Friday afternoon review will be the biggest film of the weekend. The one you are most likely considering seeing that weekend. The Wednesday review will be whatever I felt like seeing the previous day.

If you have suggestions for movies you'd like reviewed, feel free to let me know either on Facebook, Twitter, or in the comments section of the latest review.

Tune in first thing Wednesday morning for the next review – Scott Pilgrim vs. The World.

The Switch

It has been three months and seven days since my last written review. That is 99 days in total. I apologize to my massive fan base (don't snicker, they could be out there) for my lengthy absence but I have been busy working on my own movie and TV stuff. So what cinematic achievement brought me out from my self-imposed exile? What could be so remarkable that I had to share my views with the world? Only one of the rarest phenomenons found on this earth.

First, let me give you some context. Here are some things that are incredibly rare in ascending order of rarity:

 

1. Ice Circles – This is a real thing, check it out here http://videosift.com/video/Ice-Circle-Extremely-rare-cold-weather-phenomenon
   

   
    

2. A Blue Sun – Now before you think I'm making this up take a look for yourself http://hubpages.com/hub/Blue-Sun---A-rare-phenomenon-captured-at-the-Pyramids-in-Egypt
   

   
    

3. The Udumbara Flower – according to Buddhist scripture blossoms every 3000 years before the coming of the next Buddha or Tathagata. I don't have a link for this but trust me, it is pretty rare.
   

   
    

But only one thing on this planet is more scarce than a profit-predicting flower found once every 3000 years and that is…the pretty good Jennifer Aniston romantic comedy. Faithful readers of this blog (seriously, again with the snickering?) will recall that back in March I predicted that the Jennifer Aniston vehicle The Bounty Hunter would kill the Romantic Comedy genre for good. Let's not forget that her other Rom Coms include: Love Happens, Rumour Has It, Along Came Polly, and Picture Perfect just to name a few.

So who exactly is picking these scripts for her? The only people more out of touch than her career advisers are LeBron James' PR team. I wouldn't have been surprised to see her on a one hour special on The E Network announcing "I'm taking my talents to The Switch". But in the face of history and the natural order of the universe, The Switch is a fun, enjoyable, and dare I say, touching film. So the burning question is WHY? The answer may surprise you.

The Switch is a comedy from the directing team of Josh Gordon and Will Speck (Blades of Glory) based on the short story by Jeffery Eugenides. Eugenides is a Pulitzer Prize winning writer so even without having read the short story, I'm going to go ahead and assume they had some strong story material from which to begin. The premise of the switch is that 40 year-old Kassie (Aniston) decides that she is going to have a baby despite not having a man in her life. The closest thing to a man in her life is her best friend Wally Mars (played brilliantly by Jason Bateman) who we know right away is in love with her. Kassie finds Roland (Patrick Wilson) a handsome Ken doll type to be the sperm donor. Of course things go comically awry when Wally accidently destroys Roland's specimen and, in a drunken haze, replaces it with his own. Flash ahead seven years and Kassie calls Wally out of the blue to tell him she and her son Sebastian (Thomas Robinson) are moving back to the city. When Wally meets Sebastian for the first time, he can't help but notice the similarities and, in time, realizes what happened. But how can he tell Kassie without losing her from his life?

Now if we stop right here, we can see that we have a fairly contrived comedic premise that appears to promise broad, over-the top gags and almost no genuine character development. And yet that's not at all what we get so again, the question is why? Much of the answer can be found within the two leads themselves.

Where this film succeeds where The Bounty Hunter failed is in the casting of Jennifer Aniston's love interest. In the Bounty Hunter, Gerard Butler was way over the top trying to wring big laughs out of every situation. He doesn't get many comedies and it seems like he was trying to get all of his comedic abilities out in one fell swoop. But here Jason Bateman does what he does best – play a character with understated charm that makes us feel like we are watching a real person rather than a stock sit-com character. As Wally, he is a neurotic, self absorbed man-child who doesn't have the courage to tell Kassie how he really feels for her. He doesn't play him for laughs but instead, holds back, giving the character real vulnerability.

And because Bateman is brilliantly understated, this allows Aniston to be portrayed in the best possible light. When she doesn't have to match Gerard Butler's frantic comic energy she can be the best version of herself as an actress. Don't mistake the opening of this review as Jennifer Aniston bashing. I think she is a tremendous talent. One need only see her in Friends With Money or The Good Girl to see just how great she can be. And here we get a glimpse of this again. (Minor Spoiler Alert) In the scene when Wally finally tells her the truth about being Sebastian's real father the camera stays on her reaction. We wait for her to get angry or sad or any other one note emotion. Instead her face reflects a combination of anger and sadness and a little bit of relief at the same time. It is this kind of depth that makes us keep coming back to her movies.

But perhaps the real secret to the success of The Switch is that the relationship that captures our attention is not that of Wally and Kassie but rather that of Wally and Sebastian. Robinson is amazing at matching Bateman's gloomy neurotic energy. As the movie progresses we see not only them becoming closer but more importantly, how they influence change in each other for the better. This relationship saves the film from having to go through the clichéd pitfalls of the boy-girl plotlines.

Alas, The Switch does have its missteps. After going almost the whole movie avoiding unmotivated and nonsensical character choices, we have the first encounter between Kassie and Wally after the truth has come out. I thought the last 10 minutes of the film was the ending to another, less sharp film. It left me a little uneasy but was not enough to ruin the movie for me. I just wish they would have worked a little harder at showing us why Kassie does what she does.

Don't expect this film to be single out on Oscar night but if you want to see a fresh, fun Jennifer Aniston romantic comedy, I would suggest you check it out. After all, how often do these come around?

By my count, once in a blue sun.