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Mom Genes

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Bad Moms

by Hope Madden

A raunchy comedy that peels away all the precious nonsense associated with motherhood and isn’t afraid to get a bit nasty – this feels like a film that’s been a long time coming. It could be a welcome change of pace if done well. Unfortunately, instead we got Bad Moms.

Mila Kunis stars as an overworked, underappreciated, harshly-judged parent. Her husband’s useless, her boss is a joke, and she’s so irredeemably responsible that her life is spiraling out of control. Either that or she is such an overtly clichéd image of every potential mom complaint that no actor could possibly make her a human.

Kunis has strong comic sensibilities, as do the performers playing her two new besties, Kristen Bell and Kathryn Hahn. Hahn’s the unrepentant man- and booze-hound of a single parent, while Bell’s Kiki is the socially awkward stay-at-home mother of 4. Together they have great fun doing all the things no one wants to see their mom do – and thank God for it, because the rest of the film is worthless.

This is a world where not one father contributes. OK, maybe one – but he’s a hot widower, so there’s no mother to help out. Awwww….

The film is co-written and co-directed by Hangover franchise creators Jon Lucas and Scott Moore, but they could have seriously used an assist from Bad Moms co-star Annie Mumolo. Mumolo co-wrote 2011’s Bridesmaids, a film that was capable of producing female-centric comedy with dimension. Even men.

I’m confident that there are times when every parent feels incompetent, where every well-planned family vacation turns into fodder for your child’s first adult conversation with a therapist. Bad Moms brings up loads of great, universal points that will pick those scabs. Unfortunately, the resolution to those issues is always convenient and one-sided to the point of being offensive.

Bad Moms is trying to offend your sensibilities, but it succeeds in the wrong spots. The lengthy sight gag concerning sex with an uncircumcised penis – not offensive, just funny. The problem is the rest of the movie.

At no point in the film Bad Moms is the word “parent” used. Every problem, every responsibility, every joy and obstacle is the sole property of the mom. I’m sure it can feel that way at times, but good comedy rarely comes from such a one-dimensional premise. It certainly doesn’t do so here.

Verdict-2-0-Stars

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The Frontier Strikes Back

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Star Trek Beyond

by George Wolf

Kirk. Spock. Bones. Wisecracks, a villain, and some heroic space swashbuckling. We’re pretty familiar with the Star Trek setup by now, and three flicks into the J.J. Abrams-fueled reboot, the latest seems the most comfortable in its journey. And though Star Trek Beyond doesn’t quite boldly go, it is a fun, satisfying ride.

Three years into a five-year mission, the crew of the Enterprise stops for some downtime at an immense new space station. Kirk (Chris Pine) in awaiting a promotion, Spock (Zachary Quinto) is mulling a return home to Vulcan, and Bones (Karl Urban), good God, man, he has some fun needling Spock about a botched romance with Uhura (Zoe Saldana).

The gang gets back in action to answer the distress call of a stranded crew, but falls into the trap of the Kahn-like Krall (Idris Elba), who’s after a very powerful artifact that Kirk just happens to be holding.

Fast and Furious vet Justin Lin takes over for Abrams in the director’s chair and, working with a snappy script co-written by Simon Pegg (“Scotty”), has the film feeling like a fun Trek TV episode beamed up to the multiplex.

Though the adventure is a little tardy getting its legs, things only get better as they go along. The banter is crisp, the derring-do daring, and the chemistry of the ensemble, so important in a franchise such as this, is undeniable.

Spectacular only in spots, what Beyond does best is honor its own heritage while planning for the future. The nods to its TV past run from cheesy to ingenious, even finding a clever way to acknowledge the effect the entire Star Trek phenomenon has had on popular culture.

After the trying-too-hard reach of Into Darkness, Star Trek Beyond strikes just the right note. More of this? I’m on board.

Verdict-3-5-Stars

 

 

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Circuit Breaker

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Lights Out

by George Wolf

While fright fans continue to argue about the merits of art house horror vs. torture porn, there is another option in 2016. Make America grab their dates again! And just like a convention speech that sounds awfully familiar, Lights Out limps off as a promising platform derailed by borrowed ideas and intermittent ridiculousness.

There aren’t many phobias more basic than a fear of the dark, and Director David F. Sandberg had nifty fun with it in his Lights Out short film from 2013. He gets a producer assist from James Wan (The Conjuring, Insidious) for his big screen debut, and though the opening segment does offer the same spark as that original short, expanding the premise to a mere 81 minutes brings more filler, less killer.

Young Martin (Gabriel Bateman) is increasingly scared to stay in his own house, since his mother (Maria Bello) talks to unseen beings and strange things happen whenever the lights go out. Martin’s older sister Rebecca (Teresa Palmer) is contacted by social services, and she’s instantly reminded of similar trauma from her own childhood. Rebecca sets out on a determined quest to finally uncover the truth about what’s hiding in the dark….which ends after opening the first storage box she sees.

Thanks for neatly organizing all this evidence, Mom! Now how do I get rid of it?

For those tired of all the love art house horror has been getting, Lights Out is your anti-Witch. It’s all about the jump scares, in a universe where major plot turns are explained by “something went wrong” and no one seems to have a job. Don’t think about it, just…boo!

It’s all obvious and mildly jolting, with none of the creepy polish evident in Wan’s own catalog. Sandberg does find some authenticity, though, in his cast. The reliable Bello is effectively sympathetic and Palmer, despite a string of lackluster performances, finally shows the promise of a genuine actor.

Though the bloodletting is always minimal in PG-13 horror, these films can still be effective. The Ring showed they can even be great, and screenwriter Eric Heisserer clearly agrees, which becomes increasingly evident as the structure of his backstory is revealed.

The finale is as abrupt as it is unsatisfying, and though Sandberg flashes chops worthy of a better script (he is directing Wan’s Annabelle 2 next year) Lights Out merely flickers.

Verdict-2-5-Stars

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Whom Might You Telephone?

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Ghostbusters

by George Wolf

Just weeks ago, Dan Aykroyd set the trollosphere into a stage 5 tizzy when he dared to suggest the new Ghostbusters just might be scarier – and funnier – than his 1984 version.

He’s not really wrong.

Simmer down, I’m not saying this new one is a better. It doesn’t match the freshness or overall attitude of the original that, when combined with generational nostalgia and Bill Murray’s ascension to beloved icon, has propelled the film to a slightly more lofty pop culture perch than it deserves.

But, the 2016 GB’s do battle more frightening ghosts and do deliver a solid amount of laughs.

Erin Gilbert (Kristen Wiig) is chasing tenure at Columbia University, and trying to forget her days chasing ghosts. A report of a local haunting reconnects Erin with old partner Abby Yates (Melissa McCarthy) and her new tech wizard Jillian Holtzman (a scene-stealing Kate McKinnon). The trio gets a close encounter of the slimy kind, brings the feisty Patty Tolan (Leslie Jones) on board, and sets up shop in modest digs above a Chinese restaurant, which somehow still doesn’t help them get lunch any faster (delivery guy: “I have bad knees.”)

Director/co-writer Paul Feig gives each actor both the material and the space to carve out distinct characters, and it isn’t long before casting that smelled like a gimmick feels not only inspired, but perhaps the most sensible way to reboot such a classic team.

Giving the ladies an air-headed piece of beefcake named Kevin for a secretary (Chris Hemsworth, having a charming bit of fun with his own image) isn’t a bad move either. The comic benefits are obvious, but it’s also one of the devices the film leans on to throw subtle shade at the misogynistic vitriol that’s been spewing since the female leads were announced.

Stars from the ’84 film make effective and well-placed cameos (extra points for the clever way the late Harold Ramis is included), but eventually the amount of homage feels excessive for a film blazing its own trail. A similar penchant for excess bleeds into the finale, as our heroes face off against a number of spectacular ghouls in a fireworks-laden battle, but can’t wrap it up before an unnecessary serving of schmaltz creeps in.

McCarthy and director/co-writer Paul Feig again prove to be a reliable comedic team, but can’t quite match the sustained hilarity of Bridesmaids or Spy, which is actually a bit ironic. Similar expectations dogged Ramis and Murray after the successes of Caddyshack and Stripes, but initial concerns about their ghost-chasing epic got vaporized in a New York minute.

Can the new look GB’s repeat? They’re off to a solid start, and be sure to stay through the credits for a clue about who they ain’t gonna be afraid of next.

Verdict-3-5-Stars

 

 

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Dogs and Cats, Living Together… Mild Hysteria

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The Secret Life of Pets

by Matt Weiner

For a madcap family movie, The Secret Life of Pets raises some deeply disturbing questions. How much libido could fuel a romantic subplot when the lovers have been neutered? Why does “No Sleep Till Brooklyn” cue up during a drive into Manhattan? And exactly where is the autonomic system located on a sausage?

Alas, The Secret Life of Pets, directed by Chris Renaud and Yarrow Cheney (Despicable Me franchise veterans), answers none of these questions. Instead, the movie offers up a diverting animated comedy with plenty of action but little cohesion or earned emotion to back it up.

The plot, as much as it exists other than to fling a Bronx Zoo’s worth of animals across New York City set pieces, hints at a Toy Story-light conflict between earnest terrier Max (Louis C.K.) and the newly adopted Duke (Eric Stonestreet), a gruff Newfoundland with a sad past.

It’s fitting that Duke, a shaggy dog, gets the action going. Once he and Max find themselves captured by the only two animal control officers in a city of 8 million, the sole remaining tension is whether Max and Duke will learn to get along before or after a successful rescue effort, as led by Gidget the tougher-than-she-looks Pomeranian (Jenny Slate) and Chloe, a scene-stealing cat (Lake Bell).

The Secret Life of Pets features inspired physical comedy, in a Buster-Keaton-meets-future-theme-park-ride kind of way that turned the Minions into cash cows. But it’s Pixar without the pathos: the movie never misses a chance to ignore any avenue for genuine emotion, whether it’s Duke learning what happened to his former owner or the streetwise villain Snowball (Kevin Hart, playing to the back row) hinting at the dark desires that animals really harbor toward their fickle owners.

It’s the single-note drone of the movie’s action that makes the glimpses of what might have been all the more remarkable. An extended fantasy sequence in a Brooklyn sausage factory takes place for no reason other than setting up a song-and-dance number that’s a drugged-out tribute to edible body horror, complete with dancing hot dogs made rapturous by their imminent consumption. None of this advances the plot in any way, but it’s a rare delight in a movie mostly content to coast.

In the end, predators and prey make amends, Max and Duke are ready for a sequel and a reliable supporting cast have made their case for a spinoff. Not bad for a day’s work in New York. But the real secret is that our pets are very much like their human counterparts: they share our likes and dislikes, our strengths and our flaws, and — most of all — our willingness to settle for just good enough.

Verdict-3-0-Stars

 

 

 

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Gorilla Tactics

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The Legend of Tarzan

by George Wolf

Me Tarzan. You Jane?

No, this apeman has a slightly larger vocabulary.

You’ll hear that famous phrase in The Legend of Tarzan, but only for ironic purposes. This new reboot takes its cue from recent superhero films that have embraced the darker side of their legend.

We drop in on Tarzan (Alexander Skarsgard) in the late 1880s, years after his return to Greystoke Manor and the name John Clayton, as he’s living the aristocratic life with wife Jane (Margot Robbie) in a London mansion full of servants. Flashback segments do fill us in on the couple’s jungle past, but credit screenwriters Craig Brewer and Adam Cozad with a welcome pivot from the usual origin story formula.

Clayton is called back to the wilds of the Congo thanks to a devious plan from Leon Rom (Christoph Waltz), special envoy to Belgian King Leopold. Rom can deliver a fortune in diamonds to his King, but only if he can deliver Tarzan to a Congolese chieftain (Djimon Hounsou) looking to settle an old score.

So John and Jane head back “home,” with U.S. envoy George Washington Williams (Samuel L. Jackson) in tow, but when Rom puts his kidnapping plan in motion, Tarzan’s particular set of skills come out to play.

Director David Yates, who guided the Harry Potter film series to an epic conclusion, keeps his camera fluid, his landscapes beautifully panoramic and the action frequently thrilling.  Yes, it gets a bit silly and a bit more anachronistic, but Yates brings an ambitious scope to this modern Tarzan, with a respectable side of social conscience even when it panders.

Skarsgard’s chiseled physique certainly looks the part, and his somewhat robotic lack of range serves him well here. Robbie provides plenty of spunk, but her Victorian-era Jane could have just as easily beamed down from last Halloween. As for their chemistry…hey, those CGI jungle animals look fantastic!

Waltz and Jackson are well, Waltz and Jackson.

It probably won’t set the stage for a string of blockbuster sequels – and to its credit, isn’t trying to – but for most of its nearly two hours, this new Tarzan really swings.

Verdict-3-0-Stars

 

 

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Day of the Dead

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Swiss Army Man

by George Wolf

Makeshift toy boats drift out to sea, carrying cries for help ranging from “I don’t want to die alone” to “I’m so bored.” Swiss Army Man sets its off-kilter tone early, and then things get weird. Fart-powered motor boat weird.

Hank (Paul Dano) is stranded alone on a deserted island, quite literally at the end of his rope. While contemplating his end, he spies a body (Daniel Radcliffe) in the surf and suddenly, Hank has a new friend. His name is Manny, and he’s dead.

Turns out Manny has plenty of uses (like the fart-powered motor boat thing) and before long the stranded pair is singing songs, putting on shows, and ruminating on reasons to live.

In their feature debut, the writer/director team of Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (aka “Daniels”) crafts a wild, imaginative odyssey alive with color and wonderful set pieces. Swiss Army Man has abundant charm, occasional hilarity and a few moments of magic, but the Daniels directing vision is always two steps ahead of their scriptwriting depth.

Excessively revelatory music heralds layers of resonance that never come, and we settle instead for warmed over sentiments about disconnection and vulnerability. The approach is often just too cute for its own good, the Daniels seemingly confident their earnest outlandishness will win you over.

They’re pretty much right.

This is a film that will tweak your curiosity as often as it tests your patience, and the Birdman-style ending may leave you struggling to come up with any reaction other than “that was weird,” but you will be entertained.

Dano and Radcliffe complement each other well, both delivering committed performances that turn Hank and Manny into some sort of bizarro Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.

Sure, Swiss Army Man chases too many windmills, but I’m still anxious to see what Daniels might come up with next.

Verdict-3-0-Stars

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F Is Not for Flatulent?

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The BFG

by Hope Madden

“It was the witching hour, when the boogeyman comes out, when people go missing.”

That’s a proper way to start a story or a film, but who’d have expected less? Roald Dahl knew how to tell a story, and Steven Spielberg knows how to make a film. This summer, Spielberg puts his skills to the test as he takes Dahl’s beloved tale The BFG to the screen.

The tale of a London orphan befriended by a Big Friendly Giant, the story itself is fairly slight, but Spielberg’s imagination is not.

In an era when the third dimension is thrown around the multiplex with needless abandon, The BFG stands out. 3D has rarely been employed so grandly. Spielberg bridges live action and motion-capture animation with a stunningly articulated fantasy world that captures you from the film’s opening moments.

John Williams’s lovely score – part Raiders of the Lost Arc (his own), part Wizard of Oz – matches Spielberg’s overall approach, which employs every modern whistle in service of a film that feels old school.

As the title character, Oscar winner Mark Rylance proves as capable with giant gibberish and motion-capture performance as he is with historical thriller drama. A more endearing giant you’re never likely to find, as Rylance conveys BFG’s tumult of emotions.

Likewise, Ruby Burnhill, as his wee friend Sophie, believably maneuvers between precocious loner and lonesome child with ease.

Flexing vocal muscles to match his animated stature, the always welcome Jemaine Clement fills the frame with blundering menace as BFG’s nemesis and passionate Bean eater, the evil giant Fleshlumpeater.

Spielberg’s problem – or Dahl’s – is lack of momentum. Working from an adaptation by regular contributor Melissa Mathison (E.T.), Spielberg’s take on the story amplifies the relationship and relatedness between Sophie and BFG, but he under-develops the tension and mostly avoids the action. The result is a languid pace that may lose some viewers – especially younger ones.

There are moments when the CGI betrays the action onscreen, but these are few and forgivable considering the magically captivating environment Spielberg and cinematographer – another regular collaborator – Janusz Kaminski have built.

The BFG is a sweet film, finely acted and gorgeously brought to life. If you and yours have the patience to let this tender note on loneliness ring, it offers an immersive experience.

Verdict-3-5-Stars

 

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Shark Sandwich

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The Shallows

by Hope Madden

Is The Shallows – Blake Lively’s new flick about a surfer trying to survive a shark attack – simply a girl power exercise wrapped in a sandy bikini?

Yes.

Still, it gets as much right as it does wrong.

Lively plays Nancy, a med student alone on a secluded, secret beach in Mexico. She’s here to be alone, to mourn, to surf. As the local drops her off on the beach and refuses her offer of cash, he asks how she plans to get back to town.

Excellent question.

There’s a great deal of convenient idiocy in this screenplay, but director Jaume Collet-Serra – who is no comrade of subtlety – actually handles most of these items deftly. After a few middling horror efforts, Collet-Serra made his name with a string of Liam Neeson films, so he knows a little something about a solitary figure fighting deadly odds.

Lively does a fine job in what is essentially a one-surfer-show. Nancy is smart. Not smart enough to avoid surfing alone in an isolated area of a foreign land, but a different kind of smart. MacGyver smart. And it’s with a balance of delicacy and grit that she just about makes you believe the ludicrous.

The Shallows is gorgeously filmed – and not just Lively. Yes, the camera hugs her form more closely than a wet suit, but Collet-Serra treats the surf, sky and sand with as much ardor. A generous reviewer might even say he’s creating a parallel – something about breathtaking beauty that belies serious ferocity. I am not generous enough to buy that theory, but I am generous enough to throw it out there.

For stretches, The Shallows will have you believing you’re watching a tense, thoughtful survival drama. Eventually the shark becomes a vengeful-mythical-beast-warrior-machine-monster, and any hint of credibility is lost at sea. This is the age of Sharknado – maybe Collet-Serra didn’t think he could keep his audience’s attention until the shark tried to scale something with his teeth?

Whatever the case, it’s a wild mashup of efforts: equal parts empowerment and ogling, survival thriller and Sharkasaurus Rex.

Verdict-3-0-Stars

 

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Swampland Rebellion

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Free State of Jones

by George Wolf

For all the onscreen battles in Free State of Jones, a more persistent one dogs the film throughout, as writer/director Gary Ross struggles to find cohesion for elements that too often conflict. The historical drama at the film’s core is so vast, it feels as though Ross just couldn’t bring himself to restrain any part of it.

Matthew McConaughey stars as Newton Knight, a farmer near Jones County, Mississippi who deserted the Confederate Army during the Civil War. As the numbers of fellow deserters grew, Knight led what came to be known as the Knight Company, a small army of Southerners that battled the Confederacy in an attempt to establish the “Free State of Jones.”

Historians still argue over Knight’s true motivations, but the film is less than nuanced at the outset, clearly drawing Knight as a poor man refusing to die in a rich man’s war, and unable to accept “any man telling another man what he’s got to live for, or what he’s got to die for.”

Ross (The Hunger Games, Seabiscuit, Pleasantville) does find more subtlety as the film progresses, but Newton’s heroically righteous nature, albeit delivered through a committed and moving performance from McConaughey, feels manufactured. Ditto the minimal racial tensions present in a unit mixing runaway slaves and AWOL Confederates.

Conversely, amid this idealism, the film is effectively brutal in its depiction of war and the deep, ugly roots of racism. But even here, the pendulum eventually swings back to manipulation, as Ross’s aim seems to be less about learning from history and more about being proud of how badly we feel.

Sparring tones continue, most specifically when the Knight Company uprising is woven through details of a decades-later jury trial involving one of Knight’s descendants from his marriage to a former slave (Gugu Mbatha-Raw). Bridges between each thread are built with dry, history-lecture sequences that are equal parts salient info and narrative distraction.

Ross’s passion is understandable. This truly is an incredible piece of America’s history, but one so expansive that an approach this broad is hampered from the start. Free State of Jones leaves fine performances and effectively-crafted sequences strewn across the battlefield, but the emotional connection needed to bind them remains just over that next hill.

Verdict-3-0-Stars