RELEASE
September 18, 2015 (IMAX 3D)
September 25, 2015 (WIDE)
DIRECTOR
Baltasar Kormákur
STUDIO
Universal Pictures
RUNNING TIME
2 hours 1 minute
STARS
***
REVIEW:
Climbing Mount Everest takes courage, strength, and lots of equipment. Even with all of the necessary requirements, though, things can still go awry on the world's tallest mountain. "Everest," from director Baltasar Kormákur, tells the true story of one such event. In 1996, a group of climbers on an expedition to the top of the mountain ended up facing a severe snow storm that tests them all in more ways than one. The beginning was slow, having the film itself take a bit before becoming investing. The ending of the movie, ironically enough, is very rushed and wraps things up too quickly for the audience to fully process what just happened. Having said that, I would still recommend checking out "Everest." The acting work is strong all around though Jake Gyllenhaal is severely underused in the movie, the visuals are stunning, and the 3D is very good. It's not necessarily worth paying extra for "The IMAX 3D Experience," but the 3D is a lot better than most post-converted movies to come out these days. I can't say this is something one should rush out to see, but if it's still playing in theaters around you, or if you're just looking for a beautiful 3D movie to watch just for kicks, then this is one that I'd say is worth seeing.
The main inspiration for Jack Nicholson's character in Martin Scorsese's "The Departed," Frank Costello, was famed Boston Irish-American gangster Whitey Bulger. In the time since that film was released, there have been two films about the life of Bulger that have come to the silver screen. The first was a documentary entitled "Whitey: United States of America v. James J. Bulger," and the second one was a narrative feature from director Scott Cooper called "Black Mass." The latter is what I'm here to talk about today. "Black Mass" stars Johnny Depp as Bulger, and the film depicts how he became an informant for the FBI and soon began to use them to get to the top of the Italian Mafia.
People have been saying that this is Johnny Depp's "comeback" to good roles though I'd honestly disagree. While his recent choices have either involved acting in Disney adaptations, playing absurd characters in either micro-budgeted indies or Tim Burton movies, and starring in some critically panned films, I don't think he necessarily "left." Having said that, this is hands down the best work Depp has delivered since his portrayal of "Sweeney Todd." His green contacts get distracting at times, but other than that Depp loses himself as Bulger and plays this sadistic gangster madman with grace and menace. The rest of the cast as a whole is very good though one performance I'm going to address is Joel Edgerton's as FBI agent John Connolly.
Edgerton is a great actor, and maybe an even better writer/director, as shown in his work on "The Gift." Looking back on this movie and the performance he gives in it, though, there are problems present. His performance overall is not bad, and I don't blame what I'm going to be criticizing entirely on him. First off, the Boston accent Edgerton uses throughout the movie felt forced and exaggerated. The second big problem I have with Edgerton, and this I'm mostly going to be blaming on the writing, is that his dialogue gets repetitive. In fact, his dialogue gets so repetitive to the point where you can make a drinking game out of every time he references how he and the Bulger brothers grew up together and are from "Southie." The third problem I had with him, and this could be blamed more on the director, is that his character became too much of an annoying and whiny baby when it came to talking to other characters about seeing the current predicaments happening his way. Joel Edgerton gives a fine performance, but the material and direction given to him made it hard to take him seriously 100% of the time.
Other than what I had to say about Edgerton's character, I honestly have nothing else negative to say about "Black Mass." Johnny Depp gives one hell of an amazing performance and makes the movie his playground. Everyone else does a fine job, and the story that they're in is very interesting to watch. There are some bits of dialogue that don't hit as hard as others, but the screenplay as a whole it pretty top notch. I haven't seen any of Scott Cooper's other films, but I could tell here that he understood how to make a striking and flowing gangster biopic. I doubt this will go down as one of the best gangster films of the modern era, but "Black Mass" is undeniably a strong and engaging movie that flows smoothly and never bores.
The concept for the horror-comedy "Cooties" is a strong one: a zombie epidemic occurs when a poisoned chicken nugget starts turning children who haven't gone through puberty yet into ravenous, cannibalistic monsters. The staff at a local elementary school get wrapped up in the middle of all of this, and together they must fend for their lives and possibly stop the virus from spreading anywhere else. As I was watching this movie, I found myself digging and enjoying everything happening on screen. Reflecting on it afterward, though, I started to notice the flaws that I didn't initially notice. There are characters and certain jokes here that are set up and shown but ultimately have no purpose to the story whatsoever. For example, a character will be shown doing something, yet they won't serve any point of being in the movie until the very end. The middle of the film drags at times, making it feel more like 105-120 minutes than 87 minutes. That reminds me; the movie should have been a lot longer than it was. The ending of the movie comes so abruptly and feels incredibly rushed. Plus it seemed only to have one purpose: to set up for a sequel that may never even get made.
It might sound like I have a lot more cons to say than pros, but as a whole I do see this as a solid little movie. The blood and gore featured were incredibly well done, there are plenty moments of humor that are hilarious, and the cast is pretty damn great here. Everyone seemed to be having a fun time making this, allowing the audience and myself to have a fun time with them. There's one pretty meta joke at the beginning the film that got a pretty big laugh out of myself and the other members of my audience. I can see "Cooties" having the potential to become something of a cult classic down the road. Unfortunately, it's hard for me not to notice the flaws that took this down from being a great movie to just a plain old good movie. "Cooties" had more good elements than bad, but at the end of the day it's hard not to notice that this could have been something a lot better than it ultimately ended up being.
Every once in a while, there is a movie that comes out that I simply can't understand why other people enjoy it. "Queen of Earth" has a 91% on Rotten Tomatoes and has received constant praise from fellow colleagues of mine. I wish I could see what they see in this indie drama-thriller. The movie comes to us from writer/director Alex Ross Perry, who made a movie last year called "Listen Up Phillip" that I never got around to seeing. Elisabeth Moss from "Mad Men" plays Catherine, a damaged woman who is dealing with her boyfriend breaking up with her and, soon after, the death of her father. She ends up staying with her best friend Virginia, played by Katherine Waterston from "Inherent Vice," at her lake house for some much-needed relaxation. From there shenanigans ensue, and the realization that they've been drifting apart for so long slowly comes crawling upon them.
I'll give the movie some credit and say the acting was fine, and the cinematography is solid. Having said that, every single character in this movie is so unlikeable, and not in a fascinating or entertaining way. Every single character in this movie, and the cast is very small mind you, are absolute swine. The things they say were so vile and irritating that I could believe that the dialogue came straight out of their asses. Not to mention, at times it seemed like the characters had bipolar disorder in which their moods and attitudes change so abruptly. To be fair, a portion of the movie is told through flashbacks, but even when it's in the modern day setting everyone's emotions were all over the place.
It's fine when movies try to have flawed and unlikable characters in a psychological storyline. Llewyn Davis in "Inside Llewyn Davis," for example, was a flawed individual who clearly wasn't a great guy, yet was constantly captivating to watch thanks to great writing and a great performance to go with it. The way this movie showcased its characters felt very pompous and melodramatic in my eyes. There are also points where it's hard to get a grasp on what's real and what's happening inside someone's head. Again, movies can make wonders doing this, but here it felt like a desperate attempt to show off the "talents" of the writer/director and be super artsy.
The editing is very odd at times, particularly with its absurd fetish to cut to black. Random and awkward scene cuts also seem to be this movie's best friend. Alex Ross Perry can direct a movie fine, and I'm sure his other movies are good (hopefully), but this film's screenplay felt so grim and so full-of-it that I kept getting more and more frustrated as the movie went along. Not to mention, it seemed like there were moments that were supposed to be funny, but rather these parts came off as awkward and bizarre. I got sent a screener for this movie a while back and watched the movie via my laptop. Despite the movie being only 90 minutes long, it took me 2 and a half hours to sit through this. That was mainly since I kept pausing it in order to process what the hell I was watching and control the slow-rising rage boiling inside me from this.
As I said before, I'm in the minority in regards to this movie. If you're a fan of the films of Alex Ross Perry, then chances are you will like this. If you like psychological studies of really unlikable characters, again you may like this. "Queen of Earth" just wasn't my cup of tea, for lack of a better term. Then again I did enjoy such critically panned films as "Pixels," "A Million Ways To Die In The West," and anything else that can come to mind, so my opinion may not be just on this. If you want to see the movie, go ahead and see the movie. You may enjoy it, and I would be really happy about that. People shouldn't go into movies expecting them to suck. That might explain why I enjoy so many movies and dislike so few of them. Sadly, this is one of those few I dislike. In my eyes, "Queen of Earth" is a self-absorbed, vile and overly-artsy indie that feels like it's saying and doing more than it is.
DIRECTOR(S)
Anouk Whissell,
François Simard,
Yoann-Karl Whissell
STUDIO
Epic Pictures Group
RUNNING TIME
1 hour 33 minutes
STARS
***3/4
REVIEW:
Films like "Turbo Kid" scream "cult status" simply by their existence. This particular film, brought to us by French-Canadian filmmaking group RKSS, takes place in a post-apocalyptic version of the year 1997. In this world, water is scarce, and survival is everything, a la "Mad Max: Fury Road." Munro Chambers plays a loner kid who, while trying to survive, also happens to be a big fan of the comic book hero Turbo Rider. After meeting up with the eccentric Apple, played by Laurence Lebeouf, "The Kid" ends up discovering equipment that will allow him to become just like the Turbo Rider. Using these powers for justice, The Kid plans to stop the maniac running the town, played by Michael Ironside, before any more damage can be done to others.
Aside from obviously paying homage to "Mad Max" with its post-apocalyptic water-scarce desert setting, the filmmakers behind this also show a true love for 80s exploitation/Grindhouse movies and the use of practical effects. In fact, this has some of the goriest and most inventive deaths in any movie to come out this year. Even if Gore isn't your strong suit, most of, if not all of the blood and guts poured out of victims and onto the screen are played for laughs. These three filmmakers clearly show a passion for what they're making, and it's obvious from every scene that they're having a blast every second of the way. Aside from the pacing being off at times, this is an insanely fun homage to campy 80s movies. Imagine if the apocalyptic setting of "Mad Max," the quirkiness of "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World," a hypnotically synthetic 80s-esque soundtrack, and the ultraviolence of an exploitation film were all thrown into a blender; this is the protein shake that would come oozing out. Grab a bunch of friends together along with a giant tub of popcorn and experience this retro indie as soon as you can. "Turbo Kid" might not be for everyone, but it's hard to deny how inventive and ridiculous this movie is overall.
