This Means War

First Hit: Parts of this were enjoyable but mostly it was a highly improbable mindless piece of fluff.

At the beginning of the film I questioned that the disparate parts would come together and give us a film worth watching.

Reese Witherspoon plays Lauren a woman who has an old boyfriend whom she caught cheating on her. There are two awkward scenes where she runs into her old boyfriend; both of these scenes were not required for the film.

Lauren is head of some consumer protection agency and her character loves her job. She has a friend Trish (Chelsea Handler) who is happily married and really wanting Lauren to find a lover so she posts her name and picture on a dating website.

Two CIA operatives FDR Foster and Tuck (played by Chris Pine and Tom Hardy respectively) live an incorrect and improbable wealthy lifestyle for being government agents.

Their opening scene has them doing some amazing fighting and gun slinging. Tuck responds to Lauren’s website post but then she leaves the date and runs into FDR who tries (unknowingly that she just spent time with his partner Tuck) to pick her up. Tuck and FDR find out they both want to date the same girl so now we, the audience, have the film’s premise.

The boys want to stay best friends and working partners but they both want the same girl. The film attempts to test their friendship, technology, Lauren’s resolve and love. The part that works is some of the comedy.

I enjoyed Lauren’s face as Tuck took out the entire paintball war. I thought that FDR was effectively embarrassed as his grandmother shared his youthful problem with wetting his pants.

Witherspoon is her usual lighthearted character but this film isn’t going to further her career. Pine is a good pretty boy and he did show some depth. Hardy seemed the most comfortable in his role and when he gut punched the karate instructor it was perfect. Handler was one of the more interesting characters as she kept pushing the film along. Timothy Dowling and Simon Kinberg wrote this somewhat mindless script. McG (Joseph McGinty Nichol) directed this and maybe if he owned his full name he might make a fully integrated film.

Overall:  Although enjoyable this film is forgettable within a half hour after walking out of the theater.

Safe House

First Hit:  A lot of shooting, confusing story, and Denzel has some nice lines to say.

The story is somewhat confusing because we never deeply understand why Tobin Frost (played by Denzel Washington) decides to become a rogue agent.

Once a premier CIA agent, he splits from the agency and starts trading in top secrets and information to other people and agencies throughout the world. There is a moment where he tries to share his angst for killing innocent people but it falls flat.

The film starts with Frost picking up and getting ready to sell some files about MI6 and CIA agents. A group tries to kill him after he picks up the electronic files encased in a small capsule so, for safety, he runs to the U.S. embassy and turns himself in.

He’s taken to a “Safe House” run by Matt Weston (played by Ryan Reynolds). Weston is bored with his job because no one stays at his house. He lies to his live-in girlfriend Ana (played by Nora Arnezeder) that he does different work. He makes up excuses to not be available to her when Frost is taken his “Safe House” for interrogation.

However, Matt does love Ana which is one part of the story that works. While being interrogated, the “Safe House” is raided by the same guys who were trying to kill Frost earlier, so Weston grabs Frost and escapes through a secret hall out of the house.

Stealing a car he calls the CIA and gets instructions about what to do next. Frost, who likes to get into people's heads, asks Matt how the assassins knew he was in the “Safe House”? It took Weston most of the film to figure it out, while most of the film audience knew who sold him out much earlier.

There are lots of chases, some good like the initial car chase and some not so good, like one of the rooftop chases (too long). The CIA heads who are assisting Weston were his boss David Barlow (played by Brendan Gleeson), Catherine Linklater (played by Vera Farmiga), and their boss Harlan Whitford (played by Sam Shepard).

Washington is OK in this role but hampered by the script and direction. The story didn’t let him expand and create a deeper more interesting character. Reynolds was better as the restless “Safe House” keeper. His character was expanded by his love for Ana and some real questions about his job choice. Arnezeder was OK in this limited role. Gleeson was too transparent and his real role slipped out too early. Farmiga was out of her element and didn’t come off as a real, let alone strong CIA team leader. Shepard was strong in his role. David Guggenheim wrote a poorly constructed script with little depth. It stayed on the surface and there was little character development. Daniel Espinosa directed this with little regard for depth but very long on shooting and killing action.

Overall:  This film had a lot of violence which took away from what could have been something thrilling.

The OSCARS and Other Notes

It is that time of season again and although this year wasn't an especially great year for films, a couple of interesting and outstanding "out of the box films" caught my eye: "The Artist", The Tree of Life" and "Melancholia".

On the other side of the coin, I'm grateful that the Harry Potter series has ended as they became painful to watch. And the Sherlock Holmes film was also very bad.

Some performances I would have like to have been honored but weren't would include: Michael Fassbender in "Shame", Kirsten Dunst in "Melancholia", Charlize Theron in "Young Adult", Carey Mulligan  in "Shame" (cannot give enough credit for her singing "New York, New York" as though she was standing on the edge of a cliff ready to fall at any moment), Christoph Waltz in "Carnage", and Albert Brooks in "Drive". 

Given the selected honorees by the academy, here are my picks for some of the categories:

• Best Picture: "The Artist"

• Actor in a Leading Role: Jean Dujardin in "The Artist"

• Actor in a Supporting Role: Christopher Plummer in "The Beginners"

• Actress in a Leading Role: Michelle Williams in "My Week with Marilyn"

• Actress in a Supporting Role: Octavia Spencer in "The Help"

• Cinematography: "The Tree of Life" Emmanuel Lubezki

• Directing: Michel Hazanavicius for "The Artist"

• Film Editing: "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall

• Adapted Screenplay: "The Descendants" Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash

• Original Screenplay: "Margin Call" J.C. Chandor

To all of you: Thank you for coming to my site and reading my reviews. The number of views has grown tremendously over this past year. There are now over 550 reviewed films and it is fun for me to post and read your comments.

May this new year bring on better films with new ideas tested and old ones enhanced. I know I'll be there in the 5th or 6th row center ready to suspend belief into someone else's story.

May you

Be Well...

Michael

Man on a Ledge

First Hit:  Parts were fun and interesting others just poorly constructed.

At the end of this film, it is all supposed to come together and it does, but it was not satisfying nor did it feel complete.

Nick Cassidy (played by Sam Worthington) is a former cop and in prison because he’s been accused of stealing a $40M diamond from David Englander (played by Ed Harris). However he claims he is innocence and was set-up and wants to make his name right. He attends his father’s funeral and escapes from his guards.

After being in hiding for a few weeks, he checks into an expensive hotel, eats a fancy meal, leaves a note (claiming his innocence) and climbs out on the ledge 21 floors up. While the cops, news people, news people, and public are focused on him from the street below, his brother Joey (played by Jamie Bell) and his brother’s girlfriend Angie (played by Genesis Rodriguez) are breaking into the building across the street actually stealing the diamond. In this way Nick can prove his innocence.

Englander is characterized as someone having some of the arrogance and stupidity of Donald Trump and the controlled focus and untouchable qualities of a mobster. He uses cops as his dirty work guys whom will kill for him at a price.

This is the underlying scenario as the film unfolds as it includes Nick's working partner as one who was dirty as well.

Lastly, the film also has a focus on a police psychologist Lydia Mercer (played by Elizabeth Banks) who just recently lost one of her “jumpers” and is struggling with the pain. Nick specifically asks for her as a way to help her move through her past event.

The film has enough good shots in it to make it very interesting. The overhead, looking over the ledge and Worthington’s ability to make it seem he could have fallen at any moment, was very good. What didn’t work was that it was far too easy to see, and know, which cops were crooked - they even looked crooked. In other words, in some places the movie, had little too much telegraphing of characterizations and situations.

Worthington was strong and believable in his role although the film teetered as not being believable. Harris was a wonderful arrogant ass who felt entitled to his arrogance. Bell was very good as the brother who wanted to do right for his family. Rodriguez was strong, funny, and vulnerable in her role as accomplice and girlfriend. Banks was OK as the psychologist who is charged with talking down a jumper. Edward Burns, played another police person charged with talking down jumpers and I didn’t think this was of his better work. He seemed to not have a mind of his own and wasn’t convincing why he changed to support Banks role. Pablo F. Fenjves wrote a fairly interesting script. Asger Leth directed some of the ledge and robbery scenes with aplomb while other sections didn’t quite work as well.

Overall: It was interesting while watching it, but it has no legs because the very next day – it is forgotten.

The Grey

First Hit: This film’s scenery was to die for, but the film died a long slow death. 

The scene is a far northern section of Alaska where Anchorage is way south. It is cold and the land beautiful. An oil refinery is where all the workers toil and in a bar is where they play hard at night.

As the opening monologue states, most of the people working here are parolees or are guys who are very hardened by the life they’ve led. Ottway (played by Liam Neeson) is a protector. He protects outside workers from beasts who might see the workers as food. It is mostly wolves he has to shoot.

Ottway has many dreams of his wife who has passed away. He’s lonely and likes to be left alone in his sadness. A group of workers are headed back to Anchorage for an R&R. The scene of them loading the plane shows how intense the storm is. They are deicing the plane until it takes off. There a large bumps as they fly and most everyone is on edge.

The plane crashes and only 7 survive. There is a good scene as Ottway escorts one of the dying to their death. The 7 survivors are tough in their own way and Ottway immediately takes charge. Of course he is challenged.

Wolves surround and start to track the survivors and begin to pick them off one by one. Only Ottway has some intelligent information about how the wolves act. He notes that alpha wolf is in charge.

This is a story about survival, religious beliefs, men, and alpha men.

The animatronic wolves were mediocre at best and the alpha was black in color (so why was it called Grey).

The mixing of religious and non-religious beliefs didn’t work well and the scene where Ottway is speaking to God asking for some direct sign is a copy of Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke where Luke stands in the church yelling at God for a sign – he got it and so does Ottway.

 Neeson is always a strong character regardless of the lines his character has to say. Here he says them with authority and strength, his character is believable. The rest of the cast was good but nothing outstanding. The problem with this film was the laborious script and the direction. The film needed about 20 – 30 minutes cut out of it to make it work. Joe Carnahan and Ian Mackenzie Jeffers wrote this overly cooked script while Carnahan, as director, didn’t reign in the scope. The cinematography of the area fully captured the cold intensity of the foreboding area of the country.

 Overall: If you’ve got two hours to kill on a Sunday evening watch the DVD version.