Tag Archives: adventure movies

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Queen of the Mountain

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Infinite Storm

by George Wolf

Just last month, The Desperate Hour showcased Naomi Watts in an almost one woman show. Infinite Storm adds a few more cast members, and this time Watts isn’t just figuratively carrying a film on her back, she’s literally carrying another human.

Based on the true life adventure that found search and rescue climber Pam Bales trying to descend New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington before a storm hits, the film leans heavily on Watts to make a rescue infinitely more emotional.

On her way down the mountain in Oct. 2010, Bales encountered a lone climber she called “John” (Billy Howle) immobile and unprepared for the bitter cold and biting, 50 mph winds. Risking her own life, Bales’s extensive training was often rebuffed by the uncooperative John as she tried to get them both safely home.

First-time screenwriter Joshua Rollins adapts Ty Gagne’s New Hampshire Union Leader article with added layers of sympathy designed to quicken our emotional attachment. Pam’s chosen to ignore the weather forecast and climb because it’s the anniversary of something traumatic in her life, and climbing “is cheaper than therapy.”

This isn’t a documentary, so bulking up the narrative is a smart play by Rollins and director Malgorzata Szumowska (whose excellent The Other Lamb was woefully underseen). Szumowska employs onscreen digital timekeeping to keep the pressure on, while deftly weaving Pam’s flashbacks into the harrowing, well-crafted set pieces filmed in the Slovenian Alps (cheaper than N.H.). Yes, we do eventually get to the source of Pam’s trauma, but the reveal is just slightly askew from what we’re expecting, which is welcome.

Watts again proves she’s more than capable of handling a film’s heavy lifting. She’s rugged throughout the physicality that’s required, and effortlessly human within the ordeal. Pam may not understand why John is acting the way he is, but her commitment never feels false or convenient.

And even if John is sometimes unresponsive, Watts has someone to talk to this time, helping Pam’s expressed inner thoughts feel more organic.

The common challenge for adventure films like this is to make an individual experience speak in universal terms. Watts pushes Infinite Storm past some by-the-numbers moments for a worthy reflection on struggle and healing.

Not to mention the value of a dry pair of socks.

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Muzzled

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The Call of the Wild

by George Wolf

Look, we’re all thinking it, so let’s just get it out there.

Raiders of the Lost Bark.

Happy now? Okay, we can move on.

Truth is, there’s plenty of bark in this latest adaptation of Jack London’s classic novel, but not much bite to be found.

We’re still introduced to Buck, the sturdy St. Bernard-Scotch Collie mix, as the spoiled pet of a wealthy California judge (Bradley Whitford) in the late 1800s. Stolen and sold as a sled dog to French-Canadian mail dispatchers, Buck adapts to the pack mentality and the harsh conditions of the Alaskan wilderness, eventually teaming up with the grizzled Thorton (Harrison Ford) for a journey into the Yukon.

It should come as no surprise that Ford is effortlessly affecting as a world weary mountain man. What is surprising is his endearing rapport with a CGI dog (motioned-captured by Terry Notary). Ford’s narration is earnest enough to soften its heavy hands, drawing Thorton and Buck as two kindred spirits, both lost in their own wilderness.

While taking the actual wild out of The Call of the Wild seems sadly ironic, the computer-generated beasts come to fall perfectly in line with director Chris Sanders’ family-ready vision for the enduring tale.

Stripped of any bloody carnage, cultural insensitivities or harsh realities, Sanders (How to Train Your Dragon, Lilo & Stitch, The Croods) and writer Michael Green (Logan, Blade Runner 2049) fill the gaps with obvious questions, easy answers, and a flesh and blood bad guy (Dan Stevens in full Snidley Whiplash mode) who manages to be the biggest cartoon in a film full of computer animation.

Buck himself – looking fine but landing a notch below the motion capture high water of the last Planet of the Apes trilogy – is often stuck between Lassie and Scooby, heroically loyal while seeming to instantly understand everything from English to drunkenness.

With the sharp edges ground down, this Call of the Wild becomes a pleasant metaphor for the simple life, and for finding your place in it. In short, it’s a PG-rated primer, meant to hold a place until the kids are ready for the real thing.

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Extra Life

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Jumanji: The Next Level

by George Wolf

Recent box office totals have sent a pretty clear message: if you want a butts-in-seats reboot, you gotta come with a strong new hook.

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle got it right two years ago, and now most of that gang is back for The Next Level, which is smart enough to add a few new wrinkles (plus some trusty old ones) for freshness.

We catch up with our four young heroes a year removed from high school and trying hard to keep in touch. Over Christmas break from college, Spencer (Alex Wolff), Martha (Morgan Turner), Bethany (Madison Iseman) and Fridge (Ser’Darius Blain) make plans for a meetup, but Spencer doesn’t show.

Hearing those familiar drums, the other three quickly figure out he’s been sucked back into Jumanji, and decide to go after him. I mean, they beat it once, right?

New game, new rules, brand new hook.

Bethany is left behind, but two new players aren’t: Spencer’s grandpa Eddie (Danny DeVito) and Eddie’s ex-best friend Milo (Danny Glover). Know what else? Everyone gets a new avatar.

Well, not Martha, she’s still badass Ruby Roundhouse (Karen Gillan). But this time, it’s Eddie who gets the smoldering heroic intensity of Dr. Bravestone (Dwayne Johnson), while Fridge is portly Professor Shelly Oberon (Jack Black), Milo is diminutive zoologist Moose Finbar (Kevin Hart) and Spencer is newly-added cat burglar Ming Fleetfoot (Awkwafina).

The next level mission: free Jumanji from the evil clutches of Jurgen the Brutal (GOT‘s Rory McCann), or die trying. Game on!

Watching the four adult stars channel teenagers in the first film was a blast, but the avatar switches here are the smart plays, and the body swaps don’t stop once the game begins. Some of the gags do settle for low hanging fruit (i.e. old people are easily confused) but plenty others are clever and inspired.

The film itself even gets in on the switcheroo spirit, with fewer solid laughs but a markedly better adventure. Welcome to the Jungle’s riffs on The Breakfast Club make way for director Jake Kasdan’s set piece homages to Mission Impossible, Indiana Jones, Kingsman and even Peter Jackson’s King Kong in a thrilling escape from angry mandrills.

Writers Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers do not return, which I’m guessing is a major reason the life lesson feels don’t land as smoothly this time. But Kasdan and his team hit the big shots. They give us a reason to be interested in a return to Jumanji, and plenty of fun once we get there.

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High Tension

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The Aeronauts

by George Wolf

Director Tom Harper wastes little time in taking The Aeronauts into the wild blue, but I’m not complaining. Once we’re up there, I didn’t want to come down, no matter how many knots my stomach was twisting into.

Based on some of the true-life events outlined in Richard Holmes’ book Falling Upwards: How We Took to the Air, screenwriter Jack Thorne imagines how a spunky daredevil balloon pilot heroine might have helped pioneering London meteorologist James Glaisher break the world altitude record in 1862.

Oscar winner Eddie Redmayne crafts Glaisher as a politely determined man out to prove to his shirt-stuffed, muttoned-chopped colleagues that it just might be possible to predict the weather.

What Glaisher needed was to take temperature and humidity readings at the highest level of the atmosphere. If he failed, the ribbings from the boys at the Royal Society would be fierce. But if he prevailed, he would take the first step toward scaring the shit out of your mom on the 6 o’clock news.

And yeah, also make a huge scientific advancement.

While history remembers Glaisher’s partner was actually balloonist Henry Coxwell (hello, ladies), for these narrative purposes it is defiant aeronaut Amelia Wren (Felicity Jones). She’s haunted by a tragic memory from the past, but won’t let that – or the usual boys club baffoonery – deny her destiny as a “creature of the sky.”

I take no issue with the liberties taken. This isn’t a documentary, Jones is an Oscar nominee who shares a sweet brother/sisterly chemistry with Redmayne, and her character adds a welcome layer of mischief to a backstory that badly needs it.

Most importantly, as the focus quickly settles on two people in a balloon gondola, Amelia brings a sharp contrast to James that just makes the ride more fun and – thanks to the breathless visual gymnastics – sometimes downright terrifying.

Seriously, this film should come with a trigger warning for acrophobics, because Harper (Wild Rose, TV’s Peaky Blinders) and cinematographer George Steel unveil some truly awe-inspiring, anxiety-inducing set pieces begging for IMAX, or 70mm, whatever you can find.

The Aeronauts may give gentle reminders about the importance of science, but it pounds a visual fist in defense of the big screen. The film’s ultimate calling card is not the story but the ride (in real time, no less!), and a smaller canvas just will not do it justice.

Strap in tight, and enjoy the thrill.

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Into the Woods

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A Walk in the Woods

by Hope Madden

In 1998, Bill Bryson published the funny human adventure A Walk in the Woods – the tale of a man grappling with his morality by walking the Appalachian Trail. To stave off boredom he invites (perhaps mistakenly) a friend. Though it lumbers at times, the book is a fun odd couple account of human frailty and the vastness of the natural world.

It’s 2015, and Robert Redford has released a broad, uninspired treatment/vanity project. Redford plays Bryson, the travel writer bristling against age and stagnation. Nick Nolte is Stephen Katz, the overweight, gimpy recovering alcoholic eager to accompany him on his journey.

It’s hard to understand what made Redford want to create this wisp of a comedy road trip after last year’s gripping The Wild, a film that treads very similar ground. But where Reese Witherspoon’s Oscar nominated flick illustrated personal exploration and the redemptive power of nature, Redford’s is content with lazy gags and hollow attempts at profundity.

Redford and Nolte lack chemistry, and while Nolte entertains in several humorous moments, Redford’s utter lack of comic timing is itself kind of awe inspiring.

It’s also absurd casting, given that Bryson – in his 40s when he attempted the trail – was facing a midlife crisis, yet feared he may be too old to make the trip. Nick Nolte is 71 and Robert Redford is 79, for lord’s sake.

At least you can expect a breathtaking view, though, right? Wrong. Director Ken Kwapis misses every opportunity to exploit the sheer gorgeousness of the AT, providing no more than 3 lovely, if brief, images of natural beauty. Nor can he authentically express the passage of time, articulate the grueling nature of the journey, or build tension, and he and his writers (Rick Kerb and Bill Holderman) utterly abandon the enjoyably creepy representation of the South you’ll find in Bryson’s text.

An early draft of the script came from Michael Arndt, whose work on Little Miss Sunshine and Toy Story 3 suggests the kind of playful humor and storytelling skill the project deserved. Unfortunately, the end product came from the keystrokes of Redford’s regular contributor Holderman, which may be why Redford so rarely makes decent movies anymore.

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