Illumination, the animation giant behind all things Minion, returns to their blandly entertaining dog franchise for the blandly entertaining sequel The Secret Life of Pets 2.
In the 2016 original, Louis C.K. voiced a neurotic terrier named Max who needed to loosen up a little once his beloved owner brought home a huge, lovable Newfie mix (in a NYC apartment?!). And while life lessons were the name of the game, the real gimmick was to take the Toy Story approach to house pets, giving us a glimpse into what they’re up to when we’re not around.
Because we really don’t want to associate him with children anymore, C.K.’s been replaced by Patton Oswalt, whose Max has all new reasons for anxiety. There’s a new baby, whose presence suddenly reinforces all those fears about the big, scary world.
In a move that’s as disjointed as it is interesting,
returning writer Brian Lynch sends Max, Newfie Duke (Eric Stonestreet) and
family on a trip to the country, creating one of three separate episodes that
will eventually intersect. Well, crash into each other, anyway.
The main story deals
with trying to alpha Max up a bit with some problematically “masculine”
training by way of farm dog Rooster (Harrison Ford), who, among other things,
disregards therapy as weakness.
Basically, Lynch and director Chris Renaud think we’re all a
little too precious (the clear message of the original) and what they’d like to
do with their sequel is beat us about the head and neck with that idea.
Meanwhile, back in NYC, Pomeranian Gidget (Jenny Slate) and
Chloe the cat (Lake Bell – the film’s deadpan bright spot) train to retrieve a
chew toy from a crazy cat lady’s feline-overrun apartment. And separately,
Snowball the bunny (Kevin Hart), believing himself to be a super hero,
befriends Shih Tzu Daisy (Tiffany Haddish), and together they save a baby tiger
from an evil Russian circus.
For real.
That last bit gets seriously weird, I have no idea what they
feed this baby tiger the whole time, and on average, the actual lessons learned
are troublingly old school (read: conservative).
Teaching boys that pretending they’re not afraid so they can
take charge of every situation = literally every single problem on earth right
now. So let’s stop doing that.
Otherwise, though, Illumination offers yet another blandly entertaining, cute time waster.
Big, bold, oversized weekend in movies. We talk through Godzilla: King of the Monsters, Rocketman and Ma and hit on all that’s worth a look in new home entertainment.
Must we destroy everything that challenges us, or is humanity’s
only salvation an intentional and aggressive thinning of our herd?
Or is there another way?
Nope, this is not the plot of the last two Avengers movies. Well, I mean, it is, but it’s also the basic underpinning of the monster movie that has always had societal anxieties on its mind.
Born in 1954 of a society reeling from nuclear annihilation, Godzilla was a parable of a world in need of a new god to save it from war and science. Sixty five years later, Godzilla: King of the Monsters recognizes that it’s not just the military and scientists who are destroying us. It’s all of us.
Columbus, Ohio’s own Michael Dougherty (Trick r’ Treat) takes the reins of the king of all kaiju franchises, grounding tensions in family drama and bombarding the audience with monsters, explosions, nuclear monsters, nuclear explosions, good-sized leaps of logic and so much nonsensical dialog.
Kyle Chandler is the handsome, damaged, underwhelming white
guy at the center of things. Lucky, because the rest of the cast—primarily
women and people of color—can’t quite figure out how to move forward without
him to articulate the plan for them.
They talk about it a lot, though. Even when machines are in the midst of exploding, someone has the good sense to tell us, “Something’s wrong!”
When people aren’t droning on with exposition and explanation, we’re treated to plenty monster on monster action—exactly what Gareth Edwards’s 2014 Godzilla did so well. Unfortunately, for all the very cool Titans that director/co-writer Dougherty has to work with, he can’t create a thrilling fight sequence. There are lots of loud noises, plenty of toothy close ups and bright lights galore, but as for distinguishable monster bodies following a logical battle trajectory – nope.
In fact, repeated mentions of activity on “Skull Island” only remind you of the tonal and visual bullseye of Kong: Skull Island, a comparison that does not work in this Godzilla‘s favor.
Longtime kaiju aficionados should appreciate Dougherty’s clear respect for genre history – as well as Bear McCreary’s wonderfully retro score – but this new King is just treading water.
A veritable smorgasbord of films available this weekend – something for every appetite. We run through Aladdin, Booksmart, Brightburn, Shadow, Non-Fiction, The White Crow and all that’s new in home entertainment.
Sort of a mash up of Superman and The Bad Seed, Brightburn wonders what would happen if that special little guy you found in the crashed space ship turned out to be a super villain rather than a super hero.
But this comic book-esque origin story plays more like a straight up horror flick than an evolution of Josh Tank’s underappreciated 2012 SciFi gem Chronicle.
Elizabeth Banks stars as Tori, blue collar Kansasian. (Look
it up.) She and homespun farmer husband Kyle (David Denman) always knew the day
would come when they had to explain some things to their “adopted” son Brandon
(Jackson A. Dunn).
While Brightburn echoes Superman in many ways, it’s far more deeply rooted in coming of age horror. It is on Brandon’s 12th birthday that he begins to change. He’s broody, more aggressive—here is where director David Yarovesky (The Hive) and Brian and Mark Gunn (brother and cousin, respectively, of producer James Gunn) abandon SciFi and dive headlong into horror.
And what we find is that, removed of their comic book splash
and super hero protagonists, super villains don’t really make much of an
impression in horror. Yes, Brandon has basically the same qualities as
Superman—heat vision, flight, super strength—and he seems only vulnerable to
his own ship (or perhaps any trace of his home planet?)—but the question is,
would Evil Superman be that much more destructive than an immortal killing
machine who visits you in your dreams? Or a demon from hell? Meh.
That’s is not to take too much away from Brightburn. It’s a fun B-movie with plenty of blood and gore. (It earns its R rating.) Banks is characteristically strong and Dunn does a fine job of moving from sweet boy to flat-affect sociopath.
There are definitely a couple of moments of inspired gore.
Brightburn is a capably made, well-acted piece of semi-schlock horror. It’s also the third film this year to follow a put-upon mother deciding what to do with a son whose grown almost overnight from precious baby boy to burgeoning psychopath.
And while this is a staple in the genre, Brightburn certainly taps an immediate social preoccupation with that moment that toxic masculinity ruins a boy. The film also mines the guilt that fuels insecure parents who had no real role models of their own.
The film doesn’t wind up being as clever a conceit as you might hope—again, Chronicle did it better. It’s not an entire waste of time, either.
Nothing ever changes. That appears to be the sentiment behind Olivier Assayas’s chamber dramedy Non-Fiction, a tale set in the middle of the dying publishing industry, a relic that either needs to embrace digital disruption or die trying.
Or does it?
Hard to say, although a lot is being said. This is perhaps
Assayas’s talkiest and most Parisian film to date. And yet, it’s breezy and
honest. It’s also cagey and cynical.
What Non-Fiction is depends on your mood, perhaps, because every scene unfolds in about thirty ways. Jubilant performances buoy whip-smart writing that skewers the very platitudes it seems to be promoting.
Novelist and lazy anarchist Leonard (Vincent Macaigne) prefers to ever-so-slightly tweak his own daily life and liaisons than create characters and plots. Unfortunately, the audience at large – and his friend and editor Alain (Guillaume Canet – incredible) in particular – have grown weary. Is it even fiction? And do the women so thinly veiled in the works have any right to their own stories?
Does it even matter? Audio books and eReaders are the hot tickets now, or so says Laure (Christa Théret), sent to the publisher to drum up excitement for a digital transformation.
Well, Alain’s wife Selena (Juliette Binoche, also
spectacular) prefers real, concrete books. She’s an actress coming to terms
with bingeable cop shows rather than stage work, except when she’s not.
Valerie (Nora Hamzawi) turns out to be the only straightforward and entirely decent character in the film. The fact that she is A) the only one entirely outside of entertainment and publishing, and B) indeed in politics, allows Assays to say quite a lot about his feelings for the industry.
And as everyone talks and talks and desperately talks about
changing paradigms in taste, consumption and art, they are eating, drinking and
having sex. Because truly, some things do not change—especially in French
films.
Assayas keeps his incredibly verbose scenes aloft with a
wandering camera that feels like another guest at the party. Bright, funny,
biting performances highlight actors who relish the challenge of bringing the
script to life. Binoche is at her slippery best.
Non-Fiction toes the line of being too smart for its own good, of losing its audience for its serpentine commentary. But it never does. Assayas and his savvy foursome are having too much fun themselves for their effort to do anything other than entertain.
Every generation has its pivotal high school graduation film: Superbad, Say Anything, 10 Things I Hate About You, Grease, High School Musical 3.
I mean, not all of them can be classics. Making her feature debut behind the camera, Olivia Wilde hopes to join the ranks of the classics with her smart, funny, raunchy yet quite loving tale of two besties preparing to go their separate ways, Booksmart.
Amy (Kaitlyn Denver) and Molly (Beanie Feldstein) approach
the last day of high school with a certain earned swagger. Both have been
accepted into the Ivy League by dedicating their previous four years to little
more than study and each other.
And every other soon-to-be graduate? As Molly’s morning ritual self-help tape says, fuck them in their fucking faces.
So, this movie is very definitely R-rated, FYI. But it never loses a sweet silliness, rooting its episodic adventures in a believable bond between two true talents.
The catalyst for their one wild night? Molly realizes at the last possible minute that her classmates all seem destined for just as much post-high school greatness as she, and they also managed to have fun. They had it all, while she had only study and Amy.
And there is just one night left to rectify that wrong.
From a script penned by four (Susanna Fogel, Emily Halpern,
Sarah Haskins and Katie Silberman), Wilde spins a female-centric story without
abandoning the fun, the idiocy or the laughs you hope to find in this very
specific kind of film.
Wilde’s confident direction leans on her leads’ chemistry to drive what could otherwise be a string of sketches. Instead, taken together they provide a riot of color, laughter and misadventure that celebrates sisterhood.
She and her leads are helped immeasurably by one of the strongest casts assembled for a teen party movie. Billie Lourde (Carrie Fisher’s daughter) steals every scene she’s in. Meanwhile Skyler Gisondo and Molly Gordon are both very solid while adults Jason Sudeikis, Will Forte, Lisa Kudrow and Jessica Williams all deliver in small roles.
Some of the bits—Williams’s teacher trajectory, in particular—feel too random, an overall tone that occasionally threatens the narrative. But Wilde’s instinct to keep each situation invested more in the friendship than the sketch pays off.
There are definite missteps. For as much thoughtfulness as the film directs toward the emotional longing of its lesbian protagonist Amy, the movie’s gay male characters are exaggerated stereotypes. Disappointing.
Comparisons to Superbad are unavoidable, particularly since Feldstein’s brother Jonah Hill starred in Greg Mottola’s 2007 high water mark. And while Booksmart may not quite hit that target, Wilde’s comedy is the most fun flick to join the party since McLovin and the Lube.
Why fear the sea? The same reason to see menace in the deep, dark unknown of space or the dense and dizzying claustrophobia of the forest: because it’s really hard to see what’s in there.
That leaves us to our imagination, and when is that ever a good idea? Here, then, are some of the most imaginative ways horror filmmakers terrorized us with tales of what lies beneath.
5. Godzilla (Gojira) (1954)
Up from the depths, 30 stories high, breathing fire…you know the rest. Surely we had to have a Fifties science run amok beastie on this list, and while there was some stiff competition, nothing really bests Godzilla.
As Japan struggled to re-emerge from the 1945 bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, director Ishiro Honda unleashed that dreaded kaiju—followed quickly by a tidal wave of creature features focused on scientists whose ungodly work creates global cataclysm.
Far more pointed and insightful than its American bastardization or any of the sequels or reboots to follow, the 1954 Japanese original mirrored the desperate, helpless impotence of a global population in the face of very real, apocalyptic danger. Sure, that danger breathed fire and came in a rubber suit, but history shows again and again how nature points out the folly of man.
4. Open Water (2003)
Jaws wasn’t cinema’s only powerful shark horror. In 2003, young filmmaker Chris Kentis’s first foray into terror is unerringly realistic and, therefore, deeply disturbing.
From the true events that inspired it to one unreasonably recognizable married couple, from superbly accurate dialog to actual sharks, Open Water’s greatest strength is its unsettling authenticity. Every element benefits from Chris Kentis’s control of the project. Writer, director, cinematographer and editor, Kentis clarifies his conception for this relentless film, and it is devastating.
A couple on vacation (Blanchard Ryan and Daniel Travis) books a trip on a crowded, touristy scuba boat. Once in the water, they swim off on their own – they’re really a little too accomplished to hang with the tourists. And then, when they emerge from the depths, they realize the boat is gone. It’s just empty water in every direction.
Now, sharks aren’t an immediate threat, right? I mean, tourist scuba boats don’t just drop you off in shark infested waters. But the longer you drift, the later it gets, who knows what will happen?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4fxtHQtt4Y
3. The Lure (2015)
Here’s a great Eastern European take on reimagined Eastern European fairy tales, like Norway’s Thale (2012) and Czech Republic’s Little Otik (2000).
Gold (Michalina Olszanska) and Silver (Marta Mazurek) are not your typical movie mermaids, and director Agnieszka Smoczynska’s feature debut The Lure is not your typical – well, anything.
The musical fable offers a vivid mix of fairy tale, socio-political commentary, whimsy and throat tearing. But it’s not as ill-fitting a combination as you might think.
The Little Mermaid is actually a heartbreaking story. Not Disney’s crustacean song-stravaganza, but Hans Christian Andersen’s bleak meditation on the catastrophic consequences of sacrificing who you are for someone undeserving. It’s a cautionary tale for young girls, really, and Lure writer Robert Bolesto remains true to that theme.
The biggest differences between Bolesto’s story and Andersen’s: 80s synth pop, striptease and teeth. At its heart, The Lure is a story about Poland – its self-determination and identity in the Eighties. That’s where Andersen’s work is so poignantly fitting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxhi_3hDUPE
2. The Host (2006)
Visionary director Joon-ho Bong’s film opens in a military lab hospital in 2000. A clearly insane American doctor, repulsed by the dust coating formaldehyde bottles, orders a Korean subordinate to empty it all into the sink. Soon the contents of hundreds of bottles of formaldehyde find its way through the Korean sewer system and into the Han River. This event – allegedly based on fact – eventually leads, not surprisingly, to some pretty gamey drinking water. And also a 25 foot cross between Alien and a giant squid.
Said monster – let’s call him Steve Buscemi (the beast’s actual on-set nickname) – exits the river one bright afternoon in 2006 to run amuck in a very impressive outdoor-chaos-and-bloodshed scene. A dimwitted foodstand clerk witnesses his daughter’s abduction by the beast, and the stage is set.
What follows, rather than a military attack on a marauding Steve Buscemi, is actually one small, unhappy, bickering family’s quest to find and save the little girl. Their journey takes them to poorly organized quarantines, botched security check points, misguided military/Red Cross posts, and through Seoul’s sewer system, all leading to a climactic battle even more impressive than the earlier scene of afternoon chaos.
1. Jaws (1975)
What else – honestly?
Twentysomething Steven Spielberg’s game-changer boasts many things, among them one of the greatest threesomes in cinematic history. The interplay among the grizzled and possibly insane sea captain Quint (Robert Shaw), the wealthy young upstart marine biologist Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss) and the decent lawman/endearing everyman Brody (Roy Scheider) helps the film transcend horror to become simply a great movie.
Perhaps the first summer blockbuster, Jaws inspired the desire to be scared silly. And in doing so it outgrossed all other movies of its time. You couldn’t deny you were seeing something amazing – no clichés, all adventure and thrills and shocking confidence from a young director announcing himself as a presence.
Spielberg achieved one of those rare cinematic feats: he bettered the source material. Though Peter Benchley’s nautical novel attracted droves of fans, Spielberg streamlined the text and surpassed its climax to craft a sleek terror tale.
It’s John Williams’s iconic score; it’s Bill Butler’s camera, capturing all the majesty and the terror, but never too much of the shark; it’s Spielberg’s cinematic eye. The film’s second pivotal threesome works, together with very fine performances, to mine for a primal terror of the unknown, of the natural order of predator and prey.
Jaws is the high water mark for animal terror. Likely it always will be.
