Kick-Ass 2 (2013) Review

Purchase from Amazon: DVD - Blu-Ray Pros: +Solid action +Chloe Moretz's performance Cons: -Bad writing -Unfunny, tasteless humor -Lackluster direction Other films by Jeff Wadlow: Cry_Wolf, Never Back Down Similar films: Kick-Ass, Super, Defendor

Director: Jeff Wadlow Stars: Chloe Moretz, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Jim Carrey Genre: Superhero, Action, Black Comedy Sequel to 2010's Kick-Ass, based on the comic of the same name by Mark Millar, with artwork by John Romita Jr. Does this sequel live up to the standard set by the first one? Continuing where the last left off: Red Mist, now renamed The Mother Fucker, wants to kill Kick-Ass, who is being trained by Hit-Girl, who has retired her costume and is strictly coaching. With a group of other "superheroes," Kick-Ass joins a team called Justice Forever, who must inevitably do battle with the supervillain team, the Toxic Mega Cunts. The plot follows the comic closely enough. Some of the things from the hyper-violent, tasteless comic have been toned down here: specifically the violence and gore. Quite frankly, I'm not at all a fan of the comics, so the more the film adaptation differs, the better. The only reason I liked the first Kick-Ass movie was because of its differences compared to the source material: whereas the comic tried to be deep and edgy and failed, the movie tried to be over-the-top and campy and succeeded. Does this sequel manage to surpass its source material as well? Well, not really, and if it does, it's not by much. This film tends to be just as mindless, tasteless, and unfun as the comic was. The rape "joke" with The Mother Fucker and Nigh-Bitch in here is dumb, pointless, and most of all unfunny. It may not be as explicit as the scene was in the comic, but it's equally vulgar. Doubled with the fact that Night-Bitch as a character exists solely so this rape joke can be made. Think about it. They changed Night-Bitch from the comics and gave her a weird costumed sexual relationship with Kick-Ass. That's her entire character. There's no more depth to her than that. She exists to have sex with Kick-Ass and to allow rape jokes. Unfortunately, Kick-Ass 2 has many scenes like this that are just plain awful. Perhaps one of the most nonsensical scenes is the one with Lyndsy Fonseca as Katie, Kick-Ass's girlfriend from the last movie. I guess the script had no use for her and wanted to get rid of her so what takes place is one of the most ludicrous and illogical scenes of all-time. Out of nowhere she accuses Dave (Kick-Ass) of cheating on her with Mindy (Hit-Girl), without even giving him time to explain. Didn't she know he was Kick-Ass? In the last film he told her. Why is she acting like she doesn't know? And then, to top it off, she implies that she's been cheating on him this whole time. What!? That makes absolutely no sense given the prior context of this character. Some of the sloppiest writing I've ever witnessed. Oh, and then there's a penis joke. There's a disgusting diarrhea/vomit scene, which is very likely the worst thing I've ever had the displeasure to watch in a movie (I find it even worse that they had to use CGI for shit and vomit, which are like the two easiest practical effects ever). The scene with Chuck Liddell is absolutely cringe-worthy; the whole thing feels so forced and the humor in that scene just doesn't work at all. The boy band scene is almost equally cringe-worthy (I found out only afterwards that the boy band was actually a real band, called Union J). There's a Justin Bieber joke thrown in here also, which just screams "hey, look, we're hip too, guys!" The immodest dance scene (with a 17 year old girl, I might remind) was perhaps the very best example in the history of everything of something being completely and utterly pointless and tasteless. None of that stuff is funny. There's no wit or sophistication or cleverness in there. It's vile, unnecessary, and lacks point. Far too many of the jokes in here failed miserably. It seems as if the film has a very twisted view of what it means to be edgy and cool, and in the end they achieve neither, instead only being forced and ineloquent. Crass and tactless even. The film is as delusional as its characters. The first film may have relied a lot on referential humor, but at least it was mostly funny and well crafted. A lot of people complain about the coming-of-age high school scenes with Hit-Girl. While I didn't particularly like these scenes (especially the aforementioned ones), I didn't find them to be as bad as a lot of the other scenes in the film. At times I was thankful to have a break from sloppy rape jokes and Chuck Liddell, even if the alternative was to watch a girl go through high school. The action in the movie is pretty good. Not as great or well choreographed as the action in the first film, but it was okay, despite some occasional cinematography hiccups that failed to compliment the action. The Mother Russia scenes(s) was really great. The van scene was, even if cliched, pretty good also. The violence wasn't quite as over-the-top and tongue-in-cheek as it was in the first one, which is a big disappointment, but it has its moments. I'm glad we got to see a lot of Hit-Girl in here, she's enjoyable in and out of costume, even if she is little more than a little girl shouting profanities, and delivers some of the film's best action. Justice Forever and Toxic Mega Cunts were huge letdowns--especially their final battle, which could have been way more epic in scale. In the comic it took place in the middle of Times Square; in here it takes place in an empty warehouse. If there's one thing the comic did better it was to give off an apocalyptic, this-is-it vibe, which the movie failed to capture even slightly. The soundtrack, though not bad, is very disappointing compared to the wonderful soundtrack in the first film. Chloe Moretz gives a show-stealing performance here. She carries a lot of the film. McLovin, ehem, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, does a solid job as well. Jim Carrey could have been better, plus he was underused. Everyone else was forgettable. A pretty awful movie all in all. Jeff Wadlow's directing and screenwriting can't even come close to the first one's. The bad scenes far outweigh the good ones, and even the things that this film does well had already been done better in the first film. I'd pass on this one; I can hardly believe I made it all the way through this.

Fantastic Planet (1973) Review

Purchase from Amazon: DVD - VHS Pros: +Stunning Visuals +Great Soundtrack Cons: -Low production values -Poor plot execution Other films by Rene Laloux: Time Masters, Light Years Similar films: Planet of the Apes, Wizards

Director: Rene Laloux Stars: Jean Topart, Jean Valmont Genre: Science Fiction Based on a novella by Stefan Wul, Fantastic Planet (originally La planète sauvage) is an animated science fiction film from France, featuring gorgeous artwork and designs.  The story is essentially an abridged version of the novella (which has only recently been translated into English and is worth a read), set in the future and taking place on an alien planet called Ygam, on which the master race is a species called Traag, which are essentially just giant blue humanoids. The Traags keep Oms, which is their word for humans, as pets and see the Oms as nothing more than unintelligent animals. What they didn't expect is that the Oms are evolving and learning extremely quickly and threaten their position as the master race of Ygam.  The premise is certainly an interesting one, but it never quite matches the depth that the novella had (not that the novella was particularly "deep"). The story is poorly paced, the characters are undeveloped, and the ending is far too sudden. But this is not the sort of film that is watched for its plot.  What Fantastic Planet is known for, and indeed most praised for, are its visuals. It's certainly an interesting style, calling to mind animation from Yellow Submarine to Monty Python's Flying Circus. The artwork is surreal, grotesque, bizarre, and above all fantastic, with mystical landscapes and imaginative character/creature design. The imagery is the work of surrealist author-painter Roland Topor (who film buffs may know as Renfield from Herzog's Nosferatu). To anyone familiar with Topor's art (if not, do a quick Google search of his name) it is evident that no one else could have produced such impressive designs.  Accompanying the wonderful visuals is an equally wonderful soundtrack, filled with jazzy psychedelic space rock tunes, which match the film's style perfectly, building a weird otherworldly atmosphere and evoking feelings which I can only imagine are similar to that of a hallucinogenic trip. The score was composed by Alain Goraguer, and it is certainly some of his finest work.  While the art is great, the actual animation is somewhat crude. This is certainly due to the low-budget. The production values here are certainly not much. The animation is crude, the voice acting is amateur (both English and French), and due to this a world so imaginative and fantastical occasionally feels empty and hollow, like a golden chest with nothing in it. What they did with the budget is admirable, but unfortunately it does take a bit away from the film. I sometimes feel like looking at stills from this film is more enjoyable than actually watching it.  What Fantastic Planet lacks in story, character, and production, it attempts to make up for with visuals and sound. To some extent it achieves this, certainly creating an interesting look and experience, but it still falls short of being completely satisfying and leaves much to be desired. An interesting premise but a poorly executed plot. Beautiful artwork but lackluster animation. Great soundtrack but bad voice acting.  Fantastic Planet is perhaps worth seeing once, just for the cool designs and enjoyable soundtrack, but it certainly didn't leave me very impressed. What it did well only made me sadder to see the missed potential. I can't imagine myself re-watching this anytime soon.

Silent Running (1972) Review

Purchase from Amazon: DVD - VHS - Stream Other films by Douglas Trumbull: Brainstorm Similar films: Moon

Director: Douglas Trumbull Stars: Bruce Dern Genre: Science Fiction Silent Running is a science fiction film from 1972, the directorial debut of Douglas Trumbull, he had previously worked on the special effects in 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Andromeda Strain, two classics of the genre. Since 1972 he has gone on to do special effects on films like Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Blade Runner, and the very recent The Tree of Life. Quite the skilled visual effects creator to say the least, but how's his directing? A dystopia for daisies, an apocalypse for acorns, and a wasteland for willows; Silent Running takes place in a futuristic setting, where the only remaining plant-life exists in a group of spaceships orbiting Saturn. The Earth is nude of vegetation, likely replaced with technology and cities, and these few ships hold the last surviving forests (and seemingly the last forest critters as well). No one even values such things anymore, and fail to see the beauty in a leaf or a flower. Except for crewman Freeman Lowell (Bruce Dern) that is, who, upon being ordered to blowup the last existing forests, steals one of the domes holding a forest, killing his crewmates in the process, and fleeing into the depths of space with it. The film's environmental message is not quite subtle. In fact it's a bit heavy-handed. No that it's a bad message--quite a good one I'd say--it's just a little too blatant for my tastes. But it really depends on how you look at it; indeed I've seen some people interpret it as a liberal film preaching environmentalism and condemning technology, and others as a conservative film warning of the danger that extreme environmentalism can lead to. Nonetheless, to see the message as the film's only purpose, or even one of its main purposes, is an error. The film is actually quite sophisticated and contains much depth beyond its arguable political leanings. Take the main character for instance: Freeman Lowell is the film's main character, but he's certainly not your average movie hero, nor he is your typical villain or antihero. He's almost all three at once, and is probably one of the most morally complex characters ever written in a film. His desire to cherish the forests and to preserve them from extinction is certainly a noble one. Not only that, but it's the duty he swore to when taking the job. But the way he goes about this noble deed is in a completely immoral way: by killing his crewmates. Is killing three men justified by saving the last forest? Not really, and our main character would seem to agree. For the rest of the film we see him dealing with what he had done, what he certainly had regretted doing. It drives him to misery and near insanity. He wanted to save what he thought gave humans their humanity. To him that domed forest was a microcosm of Earth, with infinite beauty. He didn't want an Earth where everything was artificial and utopia produced sameness and dullness. But in trying to save this beacon of humanity he lost his own humanity, compromised one set of morals in order to uphold another. Morally conflicted, and likely confused. While alone in space, realizing, through boring games of pool and poker, that above all it is other humans that give us our humanity. A well written and tragic character no doubt. Bruce Dern was a great choice for such a complex role. This was his first lead role, and he had previously been cast as mostly villainous characters (in The Cowboys, released the very same year, he killed John Wayne). It helps support the moral ambiguity of the character. And he plays it well, giving a good performance, blurring the lines between passion and insanity, even if he may seem a little over-the-top, or even tongue-in-cheek. I'm quite fond of the film's ending [Spoilers in this paragraph]. The main character kills himself out of guilt, or possibly even out of fear or dread of the "foul Earth". But not before sending out his "message in a bottle" into the vast oceans of space, a dome of trees to one day be found by someone hopefully more appreciating of its beauty than the current human race. And on that drifting dome is a single robot taking care of the plants. Technology both destroys and saves nature. On a more technical side, the special effects are pretty impressive. I wouldn't call it Trumbull's prettiest film--it's certainly no 2001 or Blade Runner, but then again it didn't have the budget those two did. For what it is though there are some very solid visuals and great modelwork. The service robots, or drones as they're called (eventually nicknamed Louie, Huey, and Dewey) not only predate R2-D2 but are also probably the most lovable robots of all-time, right up there with WALL-E. The robots function very much like robots, existing only to serve humans (Silent Running was in many ways a response to the humanized machines and dehumanized humans in 2001: A Space Odyssey), and certainly lacking the human personalities of C3PO and R2-D2, but yet the robots have a certain anthropomorphic quality to them, especially in the way they move, that makes them so very likable and bring sadness to viewers whenever they get hurt. This is likely due to the fact that the drones were actually amputees in costume. The drone costumes were specifically designed to fit amputees, which gives them a certain... aliveness. It's genius and a bit scary at the same time. But it worked well. There are some issues I have with the film. Some things just didn't make much sense. Did the film really expect us to believe that a botanist with at least 8 years of experience would forget, and take so long to remember, that plants needed sunlight to grow? Really? That's a bit beyond my suspension of disbelief. Another pet peeve I have is that I wished a bit more time was spent on the actual forest. I would have liked the camera to show me the beauty of nature rather than the main character tell me about it. There's a beautiful opening shot of flowers and snails and there's a few short clips of rabbits eating grass and whatnot, but the forest, for being such a central element, is largely ignored and left to be seen only in the background. Trumbull's inexperience when it comes to directing occasionally shows. Silent Running is far from the perfect film, but what it does achieve is quite impressive. I was a little undecided on it at first. Upon immediate viewing I actually disliked it, but after some thought and sinking in it's only gotten better in my mind--so much so that I can't wait to re-watch it. It's influence can be seen from Star Wars to Battlestar Galactica to Moon.

Kick-Ass (2010) Review

Purchase from Amazon: DVD - Blu-Ray - Stream Other films by Matthew Vaughn: Layer Cake, Stardust, X-Men: First Class Similar films: Kick-Ass 2, Super, Defendor, Watchmen

Director: Matthew Vaughn Stars: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Chloe Moretz, Nicolas Cage, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Lyndsy Fonseca Genre: Superhero, Action, Comedy Based on the comic book of the same name written by Mark Millar with illustrations by John Romita Jr., Kick-Ass is one of the greatest and most enjoyable superhero movies I have ever watched. A certain question comes to high-schooler Dave Lizewski: "why has no one tried to be a superhero before?" It's a question that nags at him until he decides to do it himself. Donning a mask and costume, Dave becomes Kick-Ass, a lackluster crime fighter and a teenager who has no idea what he's getting himself in to. There's plenty of noticeable differences from the comics, but this was actually a good thing in my opinion, as I found the comic to be incredibly mediocre. The comic set up some great potential, but it utterly failed in living up to that potential and ended up being completely mindless, misguided, and convoluted. The film, however, managed to break free from its source material's pretensions and mediocrity. The violence in the film is over-the-top rather than pseudo-realistic and gritty. The action is incredibly enjoyable, well choreographed, and executed to perfection. The violence definitely translates better on screen than it did on page. After watching, you won't soon forget Hit-Girl massacring an entire hallway of armed thugs in well-utilized slow-motion. It's stylish, operatic action that celebrates its exaggerated violence. And it's awesome. The action is over-the-top in the vein of silver age superhero comics; it embraces its comic book nature and takes advantage of its superhero camp. There's plenty of references to catch in here, whether they be visual, vocal, or stylistic, from Spider-Man to Tim Burton's Batman to Hong-Kong action movies. There's a lot; probably more than a single person can ever catch in a single viewing. Admittedly, like in the comics, a lot of the humor revolves around/relies on the referential nature of the film, which may understandably seem cheap to some, but it's done pretty well and most of the time is actually fairly hilarious. Pardon the pun, but the soundtrack is kick ass. It exploits songs we're all familiar with to great effect, like Joan Jett's "Bad Reputation" or the Banana Splits song as covered by The Dickies. There's some excellent, almost satirical, use of Ennio Morricone. Then there's some songs in here that may surprise you; personally, for me, hearing "This Town Ain't Big Enough for the Both of Us" by Sparks, one of my favorite bands, was a great surprise. Some fantastic tracks that amplify the on-screen action well and make the film all the more enjoyable. There's some top-notch acting to be witnessed in Kick-Ass. Chloe Moretz as Hit-Girl does phenomenal as the foul-mouthed killing machine. Not only does a lot of the film's action involve Hit-Girl, but so does a lot of its humor, and Moretz delivers a great performance on both fronts. The always enjoyable Nicolas Cage is on top of his game here as well, playing Big Daddy, Hit-Girl's off-beat and crazy father. With an Adam West-like performance and a voice that is surely a nod at The Dark Knight, Cage brings plenty of great humor and action to the film as well and is unbelievably enjoyable to watch. Christopher Mintz-Plasse, still known to most as McLovin, does a good job here also as the spoiled and snobby rich kid in a superhero costume. Kick-Ass just may be my favorite superhero movie made so far, which surprised me being that I wasn't a big fan of the comics. What's genius about it is that I think while fans of the comic will be satisfied, it also removes a lot of the things non-fans didn't like, making it potentially enjoyable to non-fans of the comic as well. It's a loving homage to comic books and action movies, and it's both a good comic book movie and a good action movie. Though not perfect, it's still a must see for anyone even mildly interested.

Robot Jox (1990) Review

Purchase from Amazon: DVD - VHS Pros: +Cool, though dated, special effects +Enjoyable performances +One of the few live-action mech films Cons: -Simple and typical plot -Convoluted focus Other films by Stuart Gordon: Re-Animator, From Beyond, Dagon, Dolls Similar films: Pacific Rim, Gunhed

Director: Stuart Gordon Stars: Gary Graham, Anne-Marie Johnson, Paul Koslo, Michael Alldredge Genre: Science Fiction, Mecha This is one of the odder entries in Stuart Gordon's filmography, who is known mostly for directing Lovecraftian horror films like Re-Animator, From Beyond, and Dagon. Robot Jox doesn't have any elder gods, giant tentacle monsters, or decapitation though. Robot Jox is a movie about giant robots, or more accurately mechs, fighting each other. The plot, in essence, involves a futuristic post-apocalyptic world where, instead of having wars, countries settle their disputes by fighting giant mechs, operated by a single pilot inside, in an arena. The film takes place during a "settlement" over which nation should control Alaska, and focuses on "robot jox" Achilles. The plot is straight-forward and nothing really special. There's some predictable espionage going on and a love story that never goes anywhere, but those are all just things happening in-between giant robots fighting. At one point the robots go into outer space, which is the one part that shattered my suspension of disbelief. I guess they just really wanted to show some robots in space (which is pretty much always a good idea in my book) and it was pretty cool to see I guess but there was definitely some potential missed when it comes to giant robots fighting in space. The film seems like it's confused between being a movie for kids or for adults. Some scenes seem like they were written to be very family-friendly, and some as if they wanted to be edgy and mature. This hurts the film severely because it doesn't end up achieving either of them very well. It's not really a movie that very young kids should watch (there's cursing and some light nudity, on top of some violence though most of the violence is comic). At the same time it's a bit cartoony and light-hearted for many adults to enjoy. This demographic conflict is likely due to the creative differences between director Stuart Gordon and co-writer Joe Haldeman (who is a popular sci-fi author who has written classics of the genre like The Forever War). Haldeman wanted a more serious and dramatic science-fiction film with deep characters, whereas Gordon wanted an audience-friendly film with character stereotypes and a plot driven by the special-effects. On the conflict between the two Haldeman said: "I would try to change the science into something reasonable; Stuart would change it back to Saturday morning cartoon stuff. I tried to make believable, reasonable characters, and Stuart would insist on throwing in clichés and caricatures. It was especially annoying because it was a story about soldiers, and I was the only person around who'd ever been one." He makes a fair point.  So the plot is simple and missed a lot of potential. Granted. But it's not awful and it does serve its purpose of driving the story to the next special-effects sequence. Plus, there are some other redeemable qualities to the film, among them being the effects. Let me first take a step back and say that this is one of the first live-action mecha films ever made. Which is a pretty big deal to any anime fan. Mecha had really only existed in animation, and the only other live-action film I can think of that came out before Robot Jox and can be called a "Mech film" would be Gunhed, a cyberpunk Japanese film from the year before. Not surprisingly Robot Jox took much inspiration from the Transformers franchise, specifically the toy line, which, at the time, was as popular in the West as Gundam was in the East. But even in the time since Robot Jox we have seen very few live-action mech films. Robt Jox itself spawned a few official and unofficial sequels throughout the 90s (Robot Wars, Robo Warriors, Crash and Burn) and perhaps the most notable example of a live-action mech film was the all too recent Pacific Rim, which is easily the greatest and most proper live-action mech film to date, but the genre of live-action mech films certainly remains small. Now the special effects in Robot Jox aren't quite as impressive as those seen in Pacific Rim (the latter has a time, technological, and budget advantage after all), but they're still pretty awesome. The effects are done with stop-motion animation, and while they're not exactly impressive by 90s standards (keep in mind this film was actually made in the late 80s) they are still very interesting effects and actually look pretty convincing for the most part. And who doesn't love the charm of stop-motion? The two main leads are Gary Graham (Alien Nation, Star Trek) and Anne-Marie Johnson. Both give an alright performance, but in my opinion the real stars here are in the supporting roles. Paul Koslo's performance as the German antagonist is interesting to say the least. It's quite silly in a way, but then so is the rest of the film. It's an enjoyable performance though and it gives a little extra life to the film. Michael Alldredge as Tex also does a charming job. Jeffrey Combs is in here too, a frequent collaborator with Stuart Gordon, but if you blink you'll miss him because he's not in here for long (despite the opening credits saying "starring Jeffrey Combs"). Robot Jox is a nice little cheesy sci-fi flick for fans of the genre and certainly a must see for mecha fans looking for a live-action fix. It has plenty of flaws but at the end of the day remains highly enjoyable. Crash and burn!