jOBS (2013)

ADAM BALCAZAR

I must first preface this review for Steve Jobs’ first posthumous biopic by declaring I own not a single apple device. That being said, I was always in awe of Steve Jobs and was interested to see how Ashton Kutcher portrayed the magnanimous CEO and innovator.

Ashton Kutcher delivers a surprisingly deft performance as Jobs here. I think his acting reputation suffers greatly from his days as a goofus on That 70’s Show and other slapstick comedies over the years. However Kutcher can act, and demonstrates it in jOBS. He is helped by the fact that he does resemble the Apple founder and he even does a remarkable job portraying the signature Steve Jobs gait which becomes more pronounced as he neared middle age. He falls even more into the role as the make-up team gives him the signature receding hairline Jobs had his second go around at Apple.

Where Jobs falls flat is it feels really rushed. For such a large life story, I am amazed at how much they omit or gloss over in this one. This is especially true when it comes to Jobs’ personal life. They touch briefly on his time at Atari and college in the first 15 minutes and then it just flies into a frenzy of dialogue and character introductions. At one point we jump from 1985 when Jobs was ousted from Apple to his return to the company in 1995. In that time frame we go from a egomaniacal quirky version of Jobs to a peaceful family orientated complacent suburbanite version, without adequate explanation or exposition. I felt that could’ve been touched on more. The meat of the plot is primarily focused on the development of the Apple II and the Macintosh,  and infighting within Apple’s corporate structure in the early 80’s. I would even say there isn’t too much content in regards to the actual Apple products that changed the computing world forever.  The writers picked a lane on this one for sure; Steve Jobs was really smart and loud but he was a bit of an asshole too. And that’s it.

The film is cast well and all the main players do the best they can with a mediocre script. Josh Gad is lovable and funny as Steve Wozniak and Dermot Mulroney has his moments as Mike Markkula, Apples initial angel investor. A tip of the cap to Kutcher for a vivid portrayal and then let’s just forget about this one. Aaron Sorkin is adapting Walter Isaacson’s biography on Jobs--let’s be honest--we know that one is worth waiting for.

Spring Breakers (2012)

SOPHIE LEGG

Director Harmony Korine is no stranger to controversy. Writing the screen-play for Kids (1995) (with fellow provocateur Larry Clarke) at the tender age of 19, and taking experimental turns with Gummo (1997), Julien Donkey-Boy (2004), and later Trash Humpers (2009), his latest offering Spring Breakers (2013) delves into the sordid hedonism and debauchery of the all-American institution of ‘Spring Break’. On a broader scale however, it asks the question ‘are people always who they appear to be?’ and more importantly, it explores the concepts of good, evil and morality – both within ourselves and within the world around us. 

The film follows a group of friends – the action-seeking and rambunctious Candy (Vanessa Hudgens), Brit (Ashley Benson) and Cotty (Rachel Korine) and devout Christian, aptly named Faith (Selena Gomez). These all-American college girls are bored with their life of studying and responsibility and want to escape to the sex and drug fuelled neon wonderland that is ‘Spring Break’. Low on funds, the more fearless girls in the group decide to rob a local chicken restaurant to fund their vacation. With the immoral attitude that the robbery will be easy - “just like a movie or a videogame” and decked out in their denim mini-shorts and balaclavas, the girls pull off the violent smash and grab and persuade the pious Faith to tag along on their adventure.

On their arrival, the girls are bombarded with, sun, sex and illicit substances as far as the eye can see. Music blares as drunken, tanned, even naked teenagers cavort along the beaches. These girls love this place – there is so much excitement, so much temptation all around. Despite their fun however, after running amok in a hotel room, the girls are arrested for drug use and lewd conduct and thrown in jail. Uh oh! Nobody can save them now – right? Wrong! Their knight in ‘bling-ing’ armour, drug dealer/gangster Alien (James Franco) comes to rescue them, bailing them out of jail and taking them under his wing. To most of these girls, this grill-wearing, tattoo-covered stranger seems dangerous mysterious and even alluring. But is this stranger’s enticing world of fast cars, guns, and flowing cash really where these young girls should be? After questioning her own devotion, Faith decides this is a place of danger and sin and sets off home to a more wholesome environment. The other girls however, who are not religious, stay to continue experiencing Alien’s wild ride. Things escalate and the girls fall deeper into the grips of Alien’s enticing world – with a crazy and violent conclusion.

The whole film seems like one extended rap video complete with partying, scantily clad women, drugs, booze and ‘swagger’. All of this seems to be real, but it is superficially real - an idealised version of reality – what a teenager hopes reality is like. Spring Breakers SHOWS a ridiculously excessive world of money, women and drugs – as Alien so eloquently puts it – “Look at all my shiiiit!” but it is poking fun at this over-the-top lifestyle. This rap-video subculture is tacky and sleazy but it is precisely that which makes it enticing - the same can be said for the film itself. Spring Breakers is fascinating in the way that it simultaneously lampoons these teenagers’ vacuous lifestyles and raunchy, drug-fuelled behaviour, while also inviting us to glamourize and celebrate it.

Korine sets his films in hyper-real worlds – it seems part documentary, part teenage fantasy, part MTV reality show. The film can be read as a tongue-in-check social commentary on teenagers today. Their excessive, wild, and often pornographic behaviour makes us suspicious (and horrified) that this is how young people really act when left to their own devices. Korine wants us to think “look at these pathetic kids and the nonsense they are partaking in!” but simultaneously think “Wow! That looks like a raring good time!” While watching, we are simultaneously disgusted and envious of these girls’ adventures.

The characters in Spring Breakers are purposely underdeveloped, shallow and unlikeable. Despite being in college, these girls appear dumb, ditzy and uninterested about their futures. In a brilliant stroke of comic irony, Korine intentionally casts these ‘young and innocent’ actresses who have previously had wholesome Disney personas to further blur the lines between who is good and who is bad. These girls are confronted with sheer bewildering excitement, but at the same time, potential danger and sleaze at every turn. The most apparent theme in Spring Breakers is the obvious dichotomy of ‘good and evil’- both in our own behaviours and in our own moral judgements. This exploration is most clearly explored through the character of Faith. Faith struggles with her own Gnosticism – simultaneously wanting to stay true to her Christian beliefs while being surrounded by wicked Earthly temptations.  The other girls however, do not fear the inherit danger of their situation – perhaps because they do not fear judgement from God.  But just because they do not believe in God, does that mean these girls are immoral? What is a heavenly excess for some is literal Hell for others. These ‘seemingly sweet’ college girls find themselves falling into a ‘sinful’ world of crime, drugs and violence, and while it may be seedy and forbidding, it is also exhilarating and refreshing – just like the film Spring Breakers.

Now You See Me (2013)

SCOTT MACGREGOR

In what amounts to a magician/trickster-heist movie, FBI agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo) is tracking a group of performance magicians as they seem to be robbing banks and getting away with it since, well, magic isn't real, is it? Rhodes is joined by Interpol agent Alma Dray (Mélanie Laurant), while our heist crew is made up of Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg) McKinney (Woody Harrelson), Wilder (James Franco) and Reeves (Isla Fisher). If you haven't had enough stars yet, Morgan Freeman and Michael Cain round out the supporting cast.

With that cast, and a budget of $75 million, Now You See Me could have been so much more. There is nothing spectacular about either the magic tricks we see, and there isn't a great deal of magic in the way the film is shot, either. The ambition is clearly to create a gripping caper movie in the vein of Christopher Nolan's The Prestige (2006) with a taste of Spielberg's Catch Me If You Can (2002), and this venture simply doesn't reach those heights. The best performance comes from fast-talking Jesse Eisenberg, of whom I've always thought heighly, long before Facebook in his debut in the little-known indie flick Roger Dodger (2002); Ruffalo and Fischer stand out as similarly strong performances, while Cain and Freeman deliver the reliable support we can expect from them.

What really turns me off is the ending. It cannot be discussed without spoiling the movie, but I can say that it feels incredibly cheap. It is a cop-out and I felt cheated by it. Where we needed one good writer to craft a clever ending, five writers fumble it and give us something unbecoming of the time, money and acting talent available. It's worth a watch, but beware the disappointment.

 

Elysium (2013)

ADAM BALCAZAR

I have been anticipating the release of Elysium ever since seeing the trailers, and for two main reasons. First, it's is a blockbuster sci-fi film from somewhere other than Marvel or DC (I’ve had enough for 2013), and second, Neil Blomkamp in only his second feature is all over this one, writing, directing, and co-producing…and if you loved District 9 as much as I did…you know the potential this film has.

Elysium opens with a brief overview of a dystopian Earth (we start in a very dusty L.A.) where pollution and overcrowding have finally made the planet a global slum. The privileged have since moved to a lush habitat in space, 'Elysium'. The structure is magnificent and the habitat is modeled maybe after a lovely gated community in Beverly Hills. On Elysium there is plenty of sun, food, luxury, and an army of robotic servants to perform every menial task. More importantly they have Med-Pods, tanning booth-like machines that can cure any ailment known to man… including cancer. These Med-Pods play an important part in the social undertones of this film. Earth-dwellers pay violent criminals large sums of money to be smuggled into Elysium and cured in these Med-Pods. Think healthcare debate 2154. While some critics have given it flak for not emphasizing the social justice aspect of the story, there was really nothing more to be said without falling into tedium.

Max (Matt Damon) is a semi-reformed local criminal who through a freak radiation accident at his factory job…has only days to live…unless he can get to Elysium. This ignites a period of indentured servitude as he is forced to perform an intellectual property heist in exchange for safe passage to Elysium. The story is busted wide open there and the bullets start flying.

Where I feel it succeeds is the weapons and 22nd century technology Blomkamp drags out for Elysium. Weapons, vehicles, the exoskeleton suit, they are all done in a way that makes them remarkably believable to the viewer, while being incredibly 'cool'. At a running time of less than two hours, Blomkamp had to leave out a lot of details as to the origins of Elysium and it’s technology…a small price to pay for all the other bad ass weaponry. The director has a real niche in his ability to amaze us with portrayals of future technology and I look forward to more films like this from the South African. 

Jodie Foster is decent as Elysium’s callous Secretary of Defense Jessica Delacourt, although I’ve no idea what type of accent she is attempting to pull off. Copley is absolutely magnificent as Agent Kruger, an off the grid sadistic hit man of sorts that Delacourt (Foster) utilizes to neutralize Max’s (Damon) migration to Elysium. Enough cannot be said of Copley’s performance here…you can almost smell him through the screen he’s so menacing. Matt Damon delivers as usual with Max, I am used to seeing him in trouble against bureaucratic forces from the Bourne series. However, it was great to see him lace up his sci-fi boots for the first time and I hope he continues to do so; the genre can always use such monumental talent.

Elysium is shot beautifully, the characters are very well casted (despite Foster's ludicrous accent), and the CGI and props are top notch. I think it will please most sci-fi lovers and many sci-fi skeptics, so I must recommend it. What it lacks in occupy wall street rhetoric it more than makes up for in really cool shit to look at. 

The Conjuring (2013)

SCOTT MACGREGOR


The Conjuring has been one of the most anticipated films of the Northern Hemisphere's summer; it was made on a relatively low budget (for a studio project) and helmed by director James Wan, made famous by his groundbreaking Saw franchise and, more recently, Insidious. As an accounting entry, it looks like a really smart move on the part of the studio: a small-ish budget, a good cast, and a well respected director with experience in the genre. That should be all the necessary components to make a really successful film... right?

The truth is, I hated it. I was genuinely bored by it, and not just slightly. I really found myself counting down the minutes. However, were we go by it's reception at the box office, I'd be completely rebuffed. Financially, The Conjuring has been the most successful film of the year in terms of ROI, costing $13 million, and earning ten times that in it's first weekend in the United States alone. By the objective asses-in-the-seats figures and the subjective word-of-mouth reviews I've heard about it, it has really won over a huge portion of the cinema-going customer base. So am I being a snob? Why such a disconnect?

First, I must explain my hatred for it. The Conjuring basically displays every single haunted house movie trope that has ever been used. The more cliched the trope, the more likely you'll find it in this movie. The creepy puppet, the 'dog's can sense ghosts', the what's-in-the-mirror-isn't-there, the Salem witch trials backstory, the creepy jack-in-the-box, the possession/exorcism gambit, the certain time and/or date is significant. I think I could easily fill three blog posts running through all the tropes used in this film. From an otherwise innovative director (and local boy) James Wan, I think we can expect more. Or am I being cynical? Is there an alternative explanation for the film's success?

Catherine Bray on BBC's The Film Programme offered an alternative explanation: audiences had too many big robots and macho superhero films to chose from and clearly couldnt see all of them; so when a smaller horror film came along, everyone could see that. I don't buy it; if that logic held, then last year's The Woman in Black should have broken $100 million too, but it didn't. Could it be that positive expectation and critics' predisposition to praise the movie gave rise to a wave of positive reaction, despite the film being mediocre? (which would be the inverse and opposite of The Lone Ranger experience, as Johnny Depp and co-stars are now blaming presumptuous negative reviews for the poor performance of The Lone Ranger at the box office). If that were so, It would be a rarity in cinema history.

In the case of The Conjuring, I give up. I just can't understand why such nothing-new, a run of the mill horror flick has performed so fantastically well. I could file it under 'these young kids haven't seen the classics' and 'I've seen too many movies to be impressed by this', but the thing is, I'm only 28, so, this one will remain a mystery.

2 Guns (2013)

ADAM BALCAZAR

You’re shooting a gritty cop thriller; so, when in doubt, pick up the phone and call Denzel Washington’s agent. This often is sufficient in at the very least salvaging your box office hopes heading into pre-production. That appears to be the case with 2 Guns as Icelandic Contraband director Baltasar Kormakur goes for his third American production. With 2 guns, Kormakur again teams up with Mark Wahlberg, casting him alongside Washington. Although good opening weekend box office figures rolled in on Sunday afternoon, proving again that Denzel Washington is arguably Hollywood’s most reliable brand for action drama releases, 2 Guns does the star a great disservice. It’s lack of originality and overly calculated chaos fail to give his character in any sort of depth as we are used to seeing from Washington. Wahlberg can coast through performances with limited dialogue and cutesy tom foolery, but when we see Washington on a poster, we expect a bit more characterization.

2 Guns does not break the mold of most undercover cop dramas released in the last 15 years or so. Our protagonists are two bag men who unbeknownst to either, turn out to be working for different federal agencies. The plot unfolds rather quick at that point and I think that is part of the problem with 2 Guns: it lends no time to figure out exactly who these men really are and what motivates them. Deb (Paula Patton) plays the love interest to Bobby Trench (Washington) and delivers a very forgettable damsel in distress performance and leaves us wondering why the character was even written, as the storyline carries fine without her. Michael Stigman (Wahlberg) just provides comic relief and boyish charm, nothing about him made me sympathetic to his character’s plight. Bill Paxton’s Earl plays a shady overlord of sorts. He plays the part well, and I wish we could have explored this thread in greater detail. It all culminates a climactic shootout (of course), and while I love crime thrillers, this one is as predictable as it gets.

The action sequences are shot brilliantly and vividly which may have been the saving grace for 2 Guns if Hollywood hadn’t already showed us that it can and will be done better elsewhere. Oliver Wood (of the Bourne series fame) onboard as cinematographer is one of the best working today, and should be applauded for bringing us another beautifully shot film full of excellent sequences and perfect lighting.

Kormakur’s 2 Guns has all the necessary ingredients, and Denzel Washington will always provide smooth bad-assness. However, it simply lacks in depth. I left this one not knowing anything about what truly motivated our protagonists. That is what made Man on Fire such a joy to watch. In 2 Guns we get a lot of bangs but no real drama is to be found at its core.

Iron Sky (2012)

I'm glad to follow my Django Unchained review with Iron Sky; they are two films made with a similar idea in mind, but with completely different execution. The concept is that, during WWII, the Nazi's sent a colonizing fleet to the dark side of the moon, and in 2018, they're returning to conquer Earth. Like something Tarantino would make, it nods to the rather ridiculous exploitation films of the 1970s and (hopefully) makes from that a fun, watchable film. The idea came from co-writer Jarmo Puskala, who, apparently, had a dream about Nazis on the moon. He shared the idea with fellow Finn and director Timo Vuorensola in (fittingly, for Scandinavians) a sauna. Vuorensola agreed he'd direct the movie only if they could get 70s exploitation icon Udo Kier on board to star. For a number of years, the duo shopped around with a trailer of a film which didn't yet exist attempting to get financing for it. In the end, about 10% of the film's financing came from fans, Udo Kier did indeed sign up for a role, and Iron Sky was made.

I say it has a completely different execution compared to Django because where Tarantino succeeds is in taking the feeling, the look, the music, the sound and the tropes of old exploitation films, but not the plot. While 'Nazi's from the Moon Attack' necessarily has a 70s exploitation film plot just from the inception, there just isn't enough depth of character to pull it off. Udo Kier is great in his role, although he doesn't get much screen time. Christopher Kirby hams it up, and not in a good way; any time he is on screen, I quickly lose interest. The action set pieces are predictable and, at times a little boring, and the dialogue lacks creativity.

Where the film finds some success is in the gags about current world politics. The Sarah Palin expy president, played by Stephanie Paul has her moments, but is altogether too heavy-handed. In a movie about space Nazi's, the trick really should have been subtly in other areas. I'm disappointed in Iron Sky more than anything because, with better execution, we could have had a romping good cult classic of sci-fi comedy action. Instead, it's a rather bland and slightly immature action flick based on a bizarre concept, and will not stand the test of time.

Django Unchained (2013)

After a 4 year break, critically acclaimed bad-boy director Quentin Tarantino is back with his latest bloodbath Django Unchained. Similar to some of his previous outings, Django Unchained is a roaring rampage of revenge. Set in 1858, two years before the civil war (we're reminded), Django (Jamie Foxx) is a slave once owned by three unscrupulous criminal brothers. He's tracked down by dentist-come-bounty hunter Dr King Schultz (Christoph Waltz), since Django knows from memory the faces of these three. From there, the two form an unlikely partnership as Dr Schultz seeks bounty and Django seeks his wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington) and those who've mistreated and abused her. Already, we have the elements of Christoph Waltz as a slick, smooth talking German in tense negotiation which made Inglorious Basterds such a brilliant film, but also the overwrought three-hours-of-revenge that Kill Bill would have been but for the production company's insistance that it be cleft into two movies since, you know, nobody would want to sit through three hours of exploitation cinema with characters more shallow than a wading pool. So, which way will Django go?

As this is the first Tarantino film I've reviewed, I'd like to briefly preface it by running down my experience with Tarantino and how I understand his filmmaking sensibilities. Tarantino burst onto the scene with Reservoir Dogs in the early 90's, it combined hardcore violence, clever symbolism, real characters, and an offbeat but strangely fitting soundtrack. 

As well as a few other Tarantino signature tropes (the trunk shot, for instance) all of his future films would carry some combination of those elements. More than anything else, Mr Tarantino's genius is not watching a lot of old classic movies, movies we think of as 'good', and then taking the good elements from them and using them in his films; Quentin spent his formative years in a VHS video store watching a lot of bad films, mostly 60s / 70s exploitation films, and from them, taking the good elements and then including them in his own films. In that way, he found an unexploited niche and made it entirely his own. 

After Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, both of which recieved considerable critical acclaim and recognition at prestegious film festivals (Cannes, Sundance etc), he made Jackie Brown, a film heavy on character, heavy on storyline and while moderate on cartoonish sensibility, still carrying plenty of Tarantino's style. Unfortunately, it was a box office flop. This stung, and poor Quentin wouldn't make another film for 6 years. When he returned, he gave us Kill Bill volumes 1 and then 2; which were on the complete opposite end of the Tarantino spectrum from Jackie Brown. Shallow characters, cartoon (literally, at points) visuals, unrealistic and explosive violence, and a simplistic sum-it-up-in-two-words plot. I was disappointed, it's not a film I enjoy watching on my own, I need a few mates around and some beer, having a laugh. Unfortunately, Kill Bill vol's 1 and 2 were box office hits, and Jackie Brown fans like myself were all a little heartbroken that we might never see another Jackie Brown again. A fear only compounded by Grindhouse in 2008.

What we did get instead is a still very enjoyable and unique film in the form of Inglorious Basterds; Tarantino found his niche in a combination of extreme violence, good characters, tense dialogue and even more tense set pieces. It didn't quite have the deep, human realism of Jackie Brown, and it did have a fair measure of the silliness we saw in the Kill Bills and Grindhouse, but without being saturated in such silliness as those earlier films were.

Enter Django Unchained. The direction Tarantino has taken is to embrace the success of Inglorious Basterds and build upon it. Django and Inglorious are really very similar films, not the least accounting for which is Christoph Waltz playing almost identical characters in both. Clearly, Tarantino was told (or knew) that Waltz (who in his native Germany was never actually considered an exceptionally talented actor) was by far the bast thing in the film, and given the tense, clever dialogue which Tarantino delivers at his best, is an engrossing screen presence.  Foxx is functional, if not remarkable, and DiCaprio gives the best performance I've seen from him since What's Eating Gilbert Grape. Considering I'm a big DiCaprio fan, this is truly high praise. Lastly, Samual L Jackson plays a villain, but, unlike anything Tarantino has done in the last decade, plays an exceptionally well balanced and complex villain, and does so beautifully, so much so that I have the boldness to say 'Stephen' is my favourite Samuel L Jackson role of his career.

These characters achieve the same sort of depth and profundity as those Tarantino gave us in Jackie Brown, but where I've changed my mind about Tarantino is that Inglorious Basterds partially, and Django Unchained completely, have lead me to embrace the silliness he uses in his films when (and only when) it's used in good measure. Where Django Unchained really succeeds for me, is including some of that silliness, but paired back enough that we never laugh at the film. I never laughed at Reservoir Dogs, I never laughed at Jackie Brown; this is the third Tarantino film I haven't laughed at, and it is truly marvelous.

The other major area in which Django Unchained succeeds is in the sound and the music. Highly stylised sound effects and unusual and creative music have always been a staple of Tarantino films; even the films of his I don't like, I have to concede that the sound effects and music render them at least watchable. Django Unchained features a well balanced blend of 60's western, R&B, and ambient music pieces which both compliment the film, and truly put Tarantino's signature on the film. 

My niggling issues with the film include the ending, which snakes around and dawdles, the incompleteness of the 'German Legend' metaphor (where was the mountain?), and Tarantino's completely unnecessary Australian Accent. Quite late on, Tarantino and another come on screen with modern Australian accent, I emphasize modern because the modern Australian accent didn't exist in 1858, Australians would have sounded English at the time. While I can embrace the unrealistic nature of bodies exploding when shot (under the Rule of Cool), I just don't understand the need or benefit of Quentin-the-lousy-actor sporting a semi-plausable Australian accent on screen. External criticisms mostly cite that the film is too long, but I don't believe so. Tarantino could have economised some time by combining some of the purely aesthetic shots with the less aesthetic dialogue shots in order to save time, but I didn't find it dragged on at any point. Even the end: I found the problem was indecisiveness on Tarantino's part, not dragging on too long.

I didn't enjoy Django Unchained quite as much as I enjoyed Jackie Brown, but I will say this: I'll be a happy little film buff should Quentin Tarantino continue his career making more Django Unchained's instead of Jackie Brown's. There are a few directors out there that could make a Jackie Brown and do a very good job of it, but only Tarantino could make Django Unchained. Tarantino offers something unique with this film. I realize that the next project he has on the cards is a third installment of Kill Bill, I genuinely hope that that's solely to cash in on a golden goose, and that otherwise the step he took from Inglorious to Django, he'll take again with an even better Tarantino film thereafter, as it now appears he's entering a golden age of his career. 

Salmon Fishing in The Yemen (2012)

Salmon are a fish which require cold, oxygenated water all year round in order to live and to spawn in. Naturally, a project to introduce Salmon to the hot, dry Arabian nation of Yemen is unfeasible--fundamentally unfeasible. Or is it? In this tale of hope-over-adversity and wisdom-in-absurdity, Ewan McGregor, British fisheries expert, is seconded to Yemen to do just that.

I have a problem with the writing in this film; it's really on the nose. Ewan McGregor is a charming screen presence but charm is tarnished by the really mundane lines he's given to deliver. This must have been a problem in the book from which the film was adapted, because the script is adapted by none other than Simon Beaufoy. Beaufoy is a legend in Britain with a list of academic and industry credentials as long as both your arms, and famed for penning the scripts of The Full Monty and Slumdog Millionaire. How the script has come out just so naff and implausible in the case of Salmon Fishing, I can't quite understand.

There is a wonderful performance by Kristen Scott Thomas, playing the Press Secretary to the PM, wonderfully sharp and cutting in the role. The natural grace of Emily Blunt does come through the screen, and there are some genuine laughs here and there. It's a nice movie, it's a charming movie, but it is, unfortunately, entirely forgettable. It's out on DVD now, it's a good flick to watch on a lazy afternoon with nothing better to do, otherwise unremarkable.

Life of Pi (3D) (2012)

About seven or eight years ago, I worked in a book store. My boss at the time, a short, solid man with little round glasses and excellent taste in literature, was reading a curious little novel by Yann Martel called 'Life of Pi'. He would look at customers and myself over those little round glasses and lavish high praise for the novel, and genuinely considered it as art in literature. Seven years later, Ang Lee has directed the movie version with what we can see just from previews and posters to be a visually stunning piece of cinema.

We could easily compare it to Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea; a story of a castaway battling an unforgiving Poseidon and learning about life, the world, and his own humanity. While Hemingway received the Nobel Prize for Literature for that short novel, the film adaptation starring Spencer Tracy was an absolute yawn, capturing none of the romance or profundity which Hemingway gave that novel. When I first saw that Life of Pi was to be adapted, I had the same reservation, that Ang Lee would be making the same mistake the producers of T.O.M.A.T.S. made: filming a completely unfilmable book. When I first saw those posters and those previews, I made an erroneous assumption that Lee would be replacing an unfilmable narrative with pure visual punch.

It was a mistake I carried right until the last 15 minutes: it's not a spoiler to say, but there is a depth and profundity in Ang Lee's Life of Pi which was absent from the film adaptation of T.O.M.A.T.S. The problem--and it is a serious problem--is that the intense visuals and especially the 3D completely distract you from it. So much so that in the last 15 minutes, we're given some exposition of an alternative interpretation of the whole movie, and it's a possible interpretation I would have liked to, and may have, imagined on my own but for the distraction of the visuals. 

Hemingway, once asked what the old man and the big fish 'represent' in The Old Man and the Sea, famously responded:

“There isn't any symbolism. The sea is the sea. The old man is an old man. The boy is a boy and the fish is a fish. The shark are all sharks no better and no worse. All the symbolism that people say is shit. What goes beyond is what you see beyond when you know.”

The same is not true of Life of Pi, not in the film and I'd imagine should we ask my old boss, he'd look at us over his little round glasses and explain the symbolism quite pointedly. In that sense I found the 3D pushed me out of the story, rather than drew me in. 

Now I could re-watch the film in 2D, with that alternative interpretation in mind and before sitting down to write this review, that was genuinely my plan. What changed my mind was the fact that, really, I could re-watch any number of the films I've reviewed in the past, and come back with a more favourable opinion of them, but I don't. So why should Life of Pi get that privilege? After all, for those of you who read my reviews to decide whether to see the film or not, you're not looking for my opinion on what the film is like the second time you see it. 

Life of Pi can really be enjoyed two ways: see it in 3D and immerse yourself in the visual splendour, and don't worry about the symbolism and underlying narrative. Otherwise, see it in 2D and pay close attention to the relationships (especially early relationships) and enjoy a quite clever literary adaptation. The better or 'right' way to see it will just come down to personal taste. I don't think the two can (or perhaps should) be combined. That, I feel, is the problem with this film specifically and the problem with the use and overuse of 3D in cinema today. I liked this film, I really did, but the 3D acting as a distraction from the narrative, and at the same time giving the film visually splendour, makes me both love and hate the stereoscopic illusion all at once.

To wrap up I also should mention the brilliant and caring performance by lead Suraj Sharma; so much is demanded of him, he really is asked to carry the entire film acting against an empty space which will only later be filled in with a CGI tiger. It's a monumental task, but he does it, delivering a wonderful, measured performance. The pace of the film, too, is well measured; it doesn't waste time, but neither is it rushed. Again, I really did enjoy this film, I imagine I'll enjoy it even more the second time around, but for now I'm giving it four stars.

Gangster Squad (2013)

In this late-40s gangster piece, Josh Brolin (son of James Brolin) plays an Irish-American no holds barred cop in a world of East Coast, wild west corruption. LA Kingpin Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn), has the ambition of ruling over all of LA and buying every cop for sale and doing away with the rest; only Brolin's John O'Mara and his carefully arranged team of age- and race-balanced cohorts can stop him.

I guess you can detect already my cynicism for this film, it's very cliched. Really, beginning to end we have an entirely predictable gangster flick, considerably more stylized than it's predecessors (you can tell from the posters: it's a sort of neon-lit plastic-fantastic noir which reminded me of Tim Burton's Batman series; just think of it as Batman Forever without Batman). The film employs the most overused and boring tropes of the crime fiction genre, and I found myself looking at my watch far more often than anyone should in an action blockbuster.

The best thing in the film is Ryan Gosling as the young chain-smoking hot-shot, he plays the role incredibly well (I've done a complete 180 on my opinion of Gosling since The Ides of March). Emma Stone is Gorgeous, and Josh Brolin does something better than the really quite good Tommy Lee Jones impersonation he gave us in Men In Black 3. Perhaps the worst is seeing Sean Penn and Nick Nolte, both truly gifted actors, wasted in their respective, trite roles.

Briefly I also want to mention the target audience: who the hell is it? The film had the overly-stylized, fast-talking quip-spouting tough-guys vs tough-guys sensibility of a film aimed at male teens, but the amount of violence (quite gory at times) precludes it from a rating low enough for that audience to attend (getting away with an MA15+ in Australia, but an R in the United States). I simply do not understand who, precisely, the film is made for.

Gangster Squad is a pedestrian attempt at a period action blockbuster. It's currently number 4 in US box office sales, but I do genuinely believe that that has much more to do with promotion and the posters, than the quality of film or any sort of word-of-mouth popularity. Don't bother with this one.