The Man Who Plays With Dolls

‘Welcome to Marwen,’ director Robert Zemeckis’ (‘Back to the Future’ trilogy, ‘Forrest Gump,’ ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit,’ ‘Cast Away’) latest high-concept dramedy mixing live action and CG-mimicked Robot Chicken style stop motion animation, is as ambitious and well-meaning as it is futile and doomed to failure.  A fanciful adaptation of the inspiring and redemptive true story of artist and hate crime victim Mark Hogancamp as chronicled in the 2010 documentary ‘Marwencol,’ WTM failed to connect with the critics and audience in a big way and is on pace to become one of the biggest bombs of 2018.

 

Which leads me to think that the critics and moviegoers really have no clue sometimes,  because WTM is truly a subtly poignant and profound movie of, as The New Yorker film critic Richard Brody put it, “extraordinary virtuosity.”  In depicting the way Hogancamp recovers and copes with his shattered psyche and emotions in the aftermath of being nearly beaten to death, Zemeckis takes it one step further by breathing life into the many characters he created in his lovingly detailed WWII Belgian village in miniature, be they evil Nazis or empowered resistance femmes fatales.  Going by the ease with which Roberta (Merritt Weaver), Julie (Janelle Monáe), Carlala (Eiza González), Anna (Gwendoline Christie) and Suzette (Leslie Zemeckis) dispatched plastic 12” Nazis (Waffen SS no less) in withering hails of gunfire, you don’t want to mess with these “Hogie’s Angels.”

 

Perhaps because Hogancamp is a cross-dresser mistaken for a homosexual who occasionally wore high heels (“the higher the better” as his movie counterpart Steve Carell drunkenly declared before being beaten to a bloody mess) and thereby exhibited deviant behavior violating social norms and expectations, he isn’t nearly as likeable or deserving of our empathy as that dimwitted but loveable “life is like a box of chocolates, ya never know what yer gonna get” schmuck Forrest Gump.  And therein lies the rub with this WWII Toy Story.

Grade: A

A Very British First World War

As an unrepentant WWII buff, I really haven’t paid a great deal of attention to its predecessor, WWI or “The Great War,” until recently.  Indeed, the two world wars are connected such that historians often regard WWII as a continuation of WWI (with an interlude called the “Interwar Years” between them) by dint of the fact that WWI ended without resolving its underlying causes after sacrificing an entire generation of young men through four years of hellish, attritional warfare. Only during the last few years with the commemoration of its 100th Anniversary (2014-2018) have I taken a greater interest in the subject.  So when I heard that ‘The Hobbit’ and LOTR director Peter Jackson has released a new documentary on WWI called ‘They Shall Not Grow Old’ (I guess ‘Only the Good Die Young’ is too cliché) using restored/enhanced and colorized war footages, I knew I had to give it a gander.

 

TSNGO is very much a labor of love and tribute from Jackson to his grandfather (and two other relatives) who fought in the war.  It is also the best documentary to date on WWI in terms of picture and sound quality, as countless hours were spent to improve the visual sharpness, clarity, contrast, fidelity and other qualities of the numerous archive footages available, much of which have degraded or faded with time.  Jackson's intent wasn’t to paint WWI in broad strokes even though there are enough material to do so.  He wanted to make it a more “personal” story from the POV of the PBI, or Poor Bloody Infantry.  So he made TSNGO a focused treatment of WWI which captures the reality and immediacy of the war to the actual men who fought in it.

 

This is the right approach and the film succeeded brilliantly.  Think of TSNGO as an “oral history” of WWI on the big screen.  Narrated by a handful of British veterans who survived the war, we really get a sense of how this tragic war unfolded viscerally through their experiences.  Jackson masterfully and smoothly edited the film, employing not only selective zoomed-in/panned archive footages and stills but also sketch drawings to immerse us into the story.  One thing TSNGO thankfully doesn’t have is interviews with people (either veterans or historians) sitting in chairs or talking heads, because that’s the last thing we want.  As such, TSNGO is more accessible and interesting to the general audience who may not be a history buff or armchair general.

Grade: A

The Once and Future Aquaman

The DC Extended Universe (DCEU) has officially ditched the dark tones and stylings of Zack Snyder and gone full-on Marvel in the brightly colored, beautifully realized and surprisingly fun ‘Aquaman,’ the sixth installment of the DCEU following ‘Man of Steel,’ ‘Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice,’ ‘Suicide Squad,’ ‘Wonder Woman’ and ‘Justice League.’  It was clear that, given the underwhelming box office performances of four of the five previous installments (‘Wonder Woman’ being the only clear “hit” among them that met industry expectations), the DCEU is in dire need of a drastic make-over.  ‘Aquaman’ has the look and feel of a release from the MCU and we can hardly blame DC/Warner Brothers from changing course and copying Marvel’s formula for success.  If you can’t beat them, join them, right?

 

Aquaman first appeared in last year’s ‘Justice League,’ which was a flawed and uneven effort largely due to its troubled development and director switch from Snyder to Joss Whedon while the movie was still being shot, not to mention a lackluster plot and uninspired supervillain in Steppenwolf.  Still, it whetted our appetite for the son of Atlantis to make his first solo appearance.  Genre veteran James Wan, well known for his low budget but commercially successful horror movies, gets a second shot at directing a big-budget blockbuster feature (his first being ‘Fast and Furious 7’) and didn't disappoint, because ‘Aquaman’ is the DC movie we’ve all been waiting for.

 

Believe it or not, I enjoyed ‘Aquaman’ even more than ‘Wonder Woman’ for some reason.  Don’t get me wrong, WW is a solid movie in its own right and Gal Gadot is, well, “hubba hubba!” eye-popping hot, but it also has its boringly slow moments.  ‘Aquaman’ managed to be the first DCEU movie that I thoroughly enjoyed from beginning to end despite its two hours, twenty minutes running time because there's never a dull moment, packed with melodrama, betrayal, power struggles and epic undersea battles. It even took a page right out of 'The Bourne Ultimatum' with its thrilling chase scene over the roof-tops of Sicily.  Never mind that it’s basically the “Sword-in-the-Stone” Arthurian legend (it's no coincidence that Aquaman’s human name is “Arthur” Curry) retold with lots of colorful CG bioluminescent eye candy.  It is THAT good.

Grade: A
 

A Girl and Her Big Yellow Robot

I’ve never been a ‘Transformers’ fan either as a kid or an adult, and the number of ‘Transformers’ movies I’ve seen -- before ‘Bumblebee’ that is -- can be counted with one finger of one hand (the very first one back in 2007 in case you're wondering).  However, the trailer of the new ‘Transformers’ spin-off ‘Bumblebee’ (the sixth installment in the ‘Transformers’ franchise) intrigued me because it promises to be an entirely different kind of movie altogether compared to its predecessors, one which does not aim to pummel the audience senseless with CG-heavy, non-stop action sequences whizzing by across the screen so fast with the barest hint of a plot that we become numb and simply stop caring.

Like the movie it pays homage to (a Spielberg movie about some alien who wanted to “phone home”), ‘Bumblebee’ is set in the 1980’s and is as endearing as it is nostalgic.  The story of a mechanically-inclined outcast teenage tomboy who loves to tinker with cars (Hailee Steinfeld) and her big yellow alien robot (Autobot B-127), which she christened “Bumblebee” because it transforms into a bright yellow 1967 Love Bug in disguise (Transformers, Robots in Disguise!), the movie centers on the special bond and friendship between the two protagonists as much as their attempts to prevent nefarious Decepticons from invading and destroying Earth.

While its story treads familiar territory, ‘Bumblebee’ possesses such heartwarming touch that it’s simply impossible not to love.  The movie perfectly blends drama and action, never losing sight of the humanity of its main characters.  ‘Bumblebee’ is also a love letter to the ‘80’s, infused with so much pop-culture references and music from this beloved era of my youth that I couldn’t give it anything less than the highest grade possible.  Rated at 93 percent “fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes, it appears the critics feel the same way.

Grade: A+

Bad Grandpa

Clint Eastwood truly is one of Hollywood’s great contemporary directors, and one would not be wrong in arguing that he’s more accomplished in the director’s chair than he ever was as an actor, with such movies as ‘The Unforgiven,’ ‘Mystic River,’ ‘The Bridges of Madison County,’ ‘Million Dollar Baby,’ ‘Letters from Iwo Jima,’ ‘American Sniper’ and ‘Sully’ to his credit, even if – like some of the other great directors – he had the rare miss in movies like ‘J. Edgar’ and ‘The 15:17 to Paris’ once in a long while.  At 60 percent “fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes, his latest entry ‘The Mule’ falls somewhere in between but proved to be one of Eastwood’s more personal and affecting character studies.

 

‘The Mule’ tells the story of Earl (Eastwood), an old geezer and talented horticulturist who loves growing pretty flowers so much that he neglected his duties as a husband, father and grandfather.  When he can no longer support himself (despite his talents) selling flowers because of the god-damned “Internet,” he unwittingly (at first at least) fell into a job as a drug runner “mule” making easy money transporting illegal substances into Chicago for a Mexican drug lord (Andy Garcia), not unlike how Mary-Louise Parker’s suburban soccer mom chanced into her career in crime as a queenpin of marijuana in the acclaimed TV series ‘Weeds.’  He’s not a bad guy really, even if he eventually ran afoul of DEA agents played by Bradley Cooper and Michael Peña.

 

Eastwood delivered one of his most personal and vulnerable performances to date as the flawed Earl, and in the final analysis ‘The Mule’ is ultimately a tale of redemption with a twist of dark humor to ease what would otherwise be a joyless and oppressive movie.  While it is far from his best movie as director or actor, ‘The Mule’ is nonetheless a deeply personal triumph that deserves to be seen.

Grade: B+
 

 

Engines of Assimilation

The biggest mega-budget  “epic failure” to crash and burn at the global box office in 2018 isn’t the much maligned ‘Robin Hood,’ which at least boasted some star power in Taron Egerton and Jamie Foxx, but the Peter Jackson-produced steampunk-fantasy adaptation of Philip Reeve’s ‘Mortal Engines’ quartet of YA novels published from 2001-2006.  Grand, sweeping and majestic, first-time helmer Christian Rivers’ ‘Mortal Engines’ sputtered and choked at the box office over the weekend, raking in a disappointing $44 million worldwide ($9 million domestic) against a reported budget of well over $100 million despite being one of my most anticipated “must-see” movies of Q4 2018.

 

Not having read the aforementioned quartet of books or any spoilers plot-wise before going to see ME, I approached this film with a blank slate, open to all its wonders and possibilities.  For those of you unfamiliar with its premise (warning, spoilers ahead), ME is a “steampunk-fantasy” set in a post-apocalyptic universe roamed by giant mobile tracked settlements ranging in size from massive cities to small towns and ruled by Darwinism in its purest survival-of-the-fittest form.  The story follows the exploits of a mysterious masked young woman named Hester Shaw (Hera Hilmar) and a handful of supporting characters after her village was swallowed up by London in the film’s early scenes.

 

Visually and stylistically, I enjoyed ME for its daring and creative vision and world-building.  It has a strong heroine in Hester, interesting supporting characters, a dastardly villain in Thaddeus Valentine played by Hugo Weaving from ‘The Matrix' and ‘The Lord of the Rings’ trilogies and an engaging – if somewhat familiar – good-versus-evil storyline.   ME is also a rollicking adventure in the grand ‘Star Wars’ tradition.  It’s a shame that the movie bombed at the box office because it's behind the 8 ball before it even hits theaters and will certainly suffer a huge loss due to its budget. 

 

Grade: A-

Rocky IV.II

Of all the ‘Rocky’ movies, ‘Rocky IV’ has always been my favorite.  This 1985 third sequel directed by Stallone himself pitted the perennial underdog Rocky Balboa against a hulking Russian übermensch played by Swedish action-star Dolph Lundgren.  With a still raging Cold War as backdrop, ‘Rocky IV’ oozes symbolism with its depiction of the scrappy and resilient "Human Punching Bag" (aka Rocky) against Ivan Drago, the statue-esque specimen of Soviet monolithic perfection. Rambo versus Red Scorpion, what more can we ask for?

 

33 years after Drago fatally knocked out the father-he-never-knew, Rocky's erstwhile enemy-turned-friend Apollo Creed, in the ring as much due to the hubris of the latter as the prowess of the former, Adonis Creed gets a shot at payback against Drago’s own offspring Viktor.  Actually, he couldn’t care less about revenge.  Robbed of the glory he so rightly deserved that fateful day so long ago on his own home-field no less, the disgraced Ivan (Lundgren) has been biding his time, patiently awaiting the day when he can regain the lost glory so unfairly taken away from him through his son Viktor.  Hence we have Rocky IV, Part 2 in this sequel to ‘Creed,’ the successful 2015 spin-off of the popular ‘Rocky’ franchise starring Michael B. Jordan.

 

‘Creed II’ follows the tried-and-true formula of the Rocky films more than its predecessor.  It’s ‘Rocky IV’ by way of ‘Rocky III.’  Like his father Apollo in ‘Rocky IV,’ Adonis was cocky and “underestimated” his challenger, Viktor Drago, who rampaged through the mean underground boxing rings of Ukraine (his dad was exiled to Ukraine for his shame after his loss in 1985), and lost the fight as a result.  And like Rocky in ‘Rocky III’ after being humbled by Mr. T’s Clubber Lang, Adonis sobered up and got down to business for a rematch in classic underdog style.  What did I mean by “underdog style”?  Just as Rocky prepared for his rematch in ‘Rocky IV’ on the frozen tundra of Russia, Adonis forged his mind, body and spirit in the unforgiving crucible of the desert while Viktor enjoyed the luxury of training in a modern gym, because only by depriving himself of all creature comforts can Adonis truly focus and realize his full potential.

Grade: B+