Inside Man

So, off we go to Hollywood Bitch-Slap, but for a taste... Note the new 5-star system for consistency with HBS.

Inside Man
Seen March 26, 2006; AMC Boston Common
* * * * (out of five)

Apparently, Spike Lee isn’t all style. And he’s not just controversy. He can do all that, and make a damn fun movie, too.

Inside Man is one hell of a change for Lee. It’s his most expensive film to date, with a bottom line of roughly $45 million, and it really, really shows. The film has a more polished look than 25th Hour, and even that wasn’t too shabby. He again has the benefit of a giant cast of brilliant character actors to make his film very pleasing to watch – Denzel Washington, Clive Owen and Jodie Foster topline, and they are backed up by Willem Dafoe, Christopher Plummer and Chiwetel Ejiofor. With those names on the top, I was already interested.

Denzel is Keith Frazier, a detective for NYPD who is in hot water because $140,000 disappeared from a case he was working on. But the head detective is out on this particular day, so when word comes in that a major bank is being robbed, the job falls to Frazier and his partner (Ejiofor). At the scene, they meet the officer in charge of the tactical operation (Dafoe) and figure out pretty immediately that this isn’t going to be a typical bank robbery (if there is such a thing). Within the first half hour we meet the perp, Dalton Russell (Owen), who isn’t shy in telling us that he’s planned the perfect heist. We also meet Madeline White (Foster), a person of questionable morality working for the bank’s owner (Plummer) to protect certain interests at this particular branch. Whew! All of this revolves around a safety deposit box that everyone seems interested in, but the audience is left in the cold with Frazier to figure things out as they happen.

That’s what hooked me about Inside Man. It’s a police thriller, sure, but to a certain extent it’s a mystery. And it’s not even hiding anything from the audience. Lee shows actions inside and outside the bank, conversations between Foster and Plummer; everything proceeds normally, but the audience is left without a single answer. It’s a nice feeling to get to play along with the “hero” (we’ll get to whether or not Denzel deserves that title later) for once, and not be smacking your head against the seat while you watch him go do something you know to be stupid.

Read on at Hollywood Bitch-Slap!

Hollywood Bitch-Slap

So, I got picked up as a reviewer for Hollywood Bitch-Slap, which is going to change the blog a little bit. I think I'll probably (at least for the time being) adopt Jay's style - posting the first part of a review here, and link the rest to HBS. I'll also be going back and truncating some of the longer/better reviews, so I don't look quite so new. So for all 4 of you loyal readers, hopefully the jump to HBS/eFilmCritic won't bother you. One should be up later today for Inside Man.

This is kind of cool, considering Jay has been with them for some time, and has been able to get a press pass to a few events. Someday, perhaps...

Spring Movie Preview: May

I'm bored at work, so I suppose I can keep going here...

MAY 5
Mission: Impossible III
Say what you want to say about Tom Cruise being crazy - I agree. That doesn't mean his movies are any less entertaining. He was a fine observer in War of the Worlds, and Minority Report is one of my favorite movies of the last couple years. And no one can convince me he wasn't great in Collateral. M:i:III is not a big corner for him to turn, but I'll be damned if it doesn't look kind of fun. The first in the series was well-written, and John Woo blew shit up but good in the second. I'm not sure what to expect from "Lost" creator J.J. Abrams, but the previews look more promising than anything else coming out that week. Also, they caught a good viral marketing campaign with the Global Hunt, which I've been doing for the last several weeks. This movie certainly isn't necessary, but Philip Seymour Hoffman looks like he's having fun. He might just make up for Cruise's lost credibility.
Website: MissionImpossible.com

An American Haunting
I'm kind of excited about actual scary-looking movies coming out. This one looks to be the closest match to last year's The Exorcism of Emily Rose, which scared the begeezus out of my girlfriend... and yeah, of me too. It's a colonial-era ghost story, apparently based on true events, about "The Bell Witch," an evil spirit that took up residence with a settler's family in their home, and is allegedly "the only documented case in U.S. history when a spirit actually caused a man's death." Not too sure about that, but the previews have some nice freaky moments. I can't imagine why more period horror movies haven't happened... it's much harder to get light into those dark, secretive corners when you have to fumble with matches and a lantern to do it in. A solid if smaller-name lead cast of Donald Sutherland and Sissy Spacek headline. I'm hoping for something as fun and as well put-together as Emily Rose, but that benefited greatly from the courtroom drama stuff, so we'll have to see.
Website: AnAmericanHauntingOnline.com

MAY 12
Poseidon
Yeah, it's a remake. But it's a remake with Kurt Russell, so that ought to score it a few points. One of the things I really liked about Red Eye was this very claustrophobic feeling you got from Rachel McAdams for 2/3rds of the movie. Once the plane landed, it lost a lot of the lovely tension. I feel like this has the potential for that sort of build. Yeah, a cruise ship is enormous, but once it capsizes, a lot of that space becomes cut off and unusable. The cast is a bunch of midcarders who have something to prove, which is that they can match Kurt Russell's Cool Old(er) Guy schtick. I'm hoping that will lead to some good performances. The previews make it looks like Josh Lucas is making a bid to steal this movie. Will Snake Plisskin allow it? The effects look pretty fun too, so hopefully they'll get the right feel and tension build to make this one a lot of fun. Wolfgang Petersen is somewhat hit or miss... Air Force One was ridiculous, unrealistic fun, while Troy took things a little too far. Also, A Perfect Storm proved he can handle himself with water, so that's promising.
Website: PoseidonMovie.com

Alpha Dog
I have yet to actually hear anything about this one, but it popped up on ComingSoon's release database. It's got a couple of people I like, and it sounds kind of interesting. Emile Hirsch plays a young drug dealer who begins to move up through the ranks of his ring, eventually becoming the youngest person to ever appear on the FBI's Most Wanted list at 19. After a bad deal, he plots a kidnapping, which naturally goes horribly wrong. Hirsch made The Girl Next Door a little more than it probably would have been with someone less competent. Bruce Willis also shows up, which is cool. And we finally get to see if Justin Timberlake has any acting talent, which I've been holding my breath about for some time now. Good talent at the top, with Nick Cassavetes picking and interesting choice to follow up The Notebook. He also wrote Blow, which isn't the best movie, but I liked it, and it proves that Cassavetes knows what he's doing when it comes to the drug stuff.
Website: AlphaDogMovie.com

MAY 19
The Da Vinci Code
Part of this movie still scares me a little bit. It used to scare me a LOT, until I saw the first full trailer. At least it looks engaging. Dan Brown's book is probably the most well-regarded and popular pop mystery ever written. And deservedly so. It's really, really good. But the minute I started to hear names associated the movie, I got scared. Ron Howard? OK, I'll buy that - I'm not sure there's a genre the man CAN'T do. But Tom Hanks? Ehhhhhhh... I like Tom Hanks as much as anyone, but he doesn't quite match the description of Robert Langdon. He's supposed to be a slightly less kickass Professor Jones. But with the incredible backup cast (and the fact that they took about 10 years off Hanks's look) I am willing to go in with no prejudice. From the moment I read this - actually, from the moment I read Angels and Demons, the first Langdon book - I knew they were bound for licensing and eventual film productions. I just hope they'll be able to maintain the same breakneck pace that Brown captured in his writing. The supporting cast - Jean Reno, Audrey Tatou, Ian McKellen, Alfred Molina and Paul Bettany - is almost guaranteed to keep this one interesting.
Website: SoDarktheConofMan.com

MAY 26
X-Men: The Last Stand
So many unknowns here. I am with a lot of people in my belief that X2 was a great movie, easily better than the original X-Men. And yet everything I've heard about X3 terrifies me. Brett Ratner as the director doesn't send me into shock, as it has some people online (I'm looking at you, Harry Knowles) , but it doesn't get me terribly excited, either. In fact, very little that I've seen has gotten me excited about this movie, except for the inclusion of Beast, and nowI'm not even sold on that. The plot doesn't do a whole lot for me. It's another serum that could "cure" mutants, and Professor X and Magneto have two wildly different views on how to handle it. I'm sorry, but I just don't buy Ian McKellen as a villainous character anymore. Plus, we're kind of lacking progress in this, aren't we? It's basically been the same issue over and over again in all three movies. Plus, I never liked the Dark Phoenix story arc to begin with, so that leaves me feeling pretty meh. But I will probably give it a shot, if only to see how the series ends. Who knows? Maybe they'll prove me wrong.
Website: X-MenTheLastStand.com

So there's May. Look at this, me all on time! Doesn't happen often, but I'll try to keep it up as much as I can. Enjoy.

Spring Movie Preview - March/April

As of yesterday, it's officially spring. But since I live in Boston, and it is probably going to continue to be cold as hell for an extended period of time, I'd prefer to spend as much time as possible indoors... perhaps in theaters? Let's take a week-by-week look at what spring has to offer. In most cases I'm going to pick the standout per week, but in some cases I might do two. Release schedule courtesy of ComingSoon.net, and I am sticking to wide release dates, not limited or NY/LA. Title links are going to jump to IMDb listings.

THIS WEEK: March 24
INSIDE MAN
The latest Spike Lee joint seems to be a bit more mainstream than his usual fare, but that little touch of Hollywood looks to be creating something interesting. He's putting Denzel Washington and Clive Owen on opposing sides of a bank job that Owen has masterminded. When the "perfect heist" goes to hell, he's forced to take hostages, and Washington is the detective who has to talk him out of doing anything crazy. Sounds pretty typical. The interesting twist comes from Jodie Foster, playing a power broker for unknown parties that apparently have an interest in how this situation plays out. This one has a kickass cast, with a couple of big supporting names as well (Christopher Plummer and Willem Dafoe both show up). I just recently had my first real exposure to Spike Lee watching Do the Right Thingfor a class. This is CLEARLY a different movie, but the previews look very, very promising. It's become apparent that the cop movie is not old and tired - 16 Blocks and the preview for this one make that clear. You just need to put good people behind it to start, and this one looks to be off and running.
Website: InsideMan.net

MARCH 31
Ice Age 2: The Meltdown
I don't need this movie. What I need is an hour and a half of the sabertooth squirrel Scrat trying to get ahold of that damned acorn. Save the Happy Feet promos, the Ice Age 2 teasers make me laugh harder than most other trailers out right now. But I suppose to get my Scrat fill, I'll have to deal with the rest of the cast as well, which probably isn't as bad as I make it sound. I enjoyed the first one, and knew a sequel was more or less a given, but I still don't see it as a good replacement for the 30-minute Scrat TV series that we all really want. But the voice cast is good (Denis Leary, Ray Romano and John Leguizamo return), with a lot of fun people in the supporting cast as well, so all I can do is hope for some funny moments to balance out the rest, and fill in the non-Scrat time.
Website: IceAgetheMovie.com

Slither
I can't quite decide on this one. I sort of like the trailers... except that I've seen one trailer that pushes this as a pretty extreme gross-out horror movie, and another that tries really hard to sell it as a gross-out comedy in horror clothes. So we know one thing - it's gross... which could be fun. Aliens in the form of little maggot-like critters invade a little rural town, turning the residents into zombies in all manner of disgusting fashion. The survivors, led by Nathan Fillion and Elizabeth Banks, have to try and find a way to end the infestation, or get the hell out. I think this might be a nice, welcome break from the string of "real" horror movies that seem to come out every weekend, because there is no indication from any of the promotional stuff I've seen that this movie takes itself seriously on any level. I've also got some loyal to Fillion after his "Firefly"/Serenity days, so that might push me over the edge and get me into this one... but we'll have to see if that extends to White Noise 2 later this year.
Website: SlitherMovie.net

And yes, Sharon Stone's breasts come out to play this week as well, and more power to her for it. I just have no interest.

APRIL 7
Lucky Number Slevin
Another film with a pretty ridiculous cast that should make it fun to watch. Josh Hartnett is the title character Slevin, who gets caught in the middle of a mob war being waged between Morgan Freeman's gang and Ben Kingsley's gang... which I think would be a sweet movie without being fiction. Mix in Stanley Tucci and Bruce Willis as people observing Slevin for different reasons (a cop and a hitman, respectively), AND throw in Lucy Liu as a scenario-muddling love interest, and this is one hell of a start. I've only seen one of the director's films (The Reckoning) which was OK, if a little standard. What that did prove is that he knows how to get good performances out of good people, or how to leave them alone to let those performances develop. I'm more and more a fan of the quirky crime films - Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang and The Matador stick in my head very fondly - and hopefully my general disinterest in all things Josh Hartnett will be disproved and dismantled.
Website: Slevin-Movie.com

APRIL 14
Nothing of any real interest this week. I refuse to write about Scary Movie 4, because that's just unnecessary and ridiculous. The only thing other than that is The Wild, an animated adventure with uninspiring trailers. The voice cast is an interesting mix, though. Kiefer "Jack Bauer" Sutherland heads it up, with Jim Belushi, Janeane Garofolo and Eddie Izzard backing him up. Is it bad that I even think the lion in The Wild is picking up a little Jack Bauer personality? I love Jack Bauer.

APRIL 21
This is probably the best week of this two month period, with a little something for everyone.

American Dreamz
There is nothing more fun to watch than Hugh Grant sleazing it up. The dirtier and meaner he is, the more fun he is to watch. This blatant rip on reality competition shows (and "American Idol" directly) looks to be poking fun at everyone involved, just like a good satire should. Paul Weitz has a good track record for this kind of funny, since he hit the nail pretty squarely on the head in the original American Pie. He got the best out of Hugh Grant in About a Boy, and he can actually be heartwarming and touching a la In Good Company. He pulled the best from all those casts for this one, revolving around an out of touch president (Dennis Quaid) who goes on the "Idol"-esque singing competition to prove he's not crazy. Add in Willem Dafoe in a REALLY funny Dick Cheney costume, Mandy Moore as the star contestant, Jennifer Coolidge and a handful of other people who have worked with Weitz before, and even if this one misfires, there is bound to be some pretty amazing comedic moments in it. I will drop the money just to see the lead-in and follow-up to some moments from the trailer - the President/VP combo of Quaid and Dafoe is sheer brilliance.
Website: AmericanDreamzMovie.com

Silent Hill
That's right. Christophe Gans is going to prove that video game adaptations don't have to suck. And neither do non-remake horror movies. I admit, the survival-horror-videogame adaptations have not been what most people would call "good" (if you saw Alone in the Dark, get off of my blog right now!), but I put any and all faith I have in Gans. He directed Le Pacte de loups (Brotherhood of the Wolf for everyone else), which is easily my favorite foreign film of all time, and pretty high on the general all time list as well. He has a nice, varied and experienced primary cast to work with in Radha Mitchell, Sean Bean, Deborah Unger and Laurie Holden, and some of the pictures I've seen popping up have been downright freaky. Also, the poster is perfect AND the trailer is nice and ambiguous - it gives you the mood and feel of the movie without really giving anything away. Gans is one helluva storyteller, especially visually, and I can't wait to see what he pulls out for this, his first full-blown Hollywood production. I can only hope Mark Dacascos cameos somewhere.
Website: WelcometoSilentHill.com

Honorable mention this week goes to The Sentinel, because Kiefer Sutherland will never play anyone but Jack Bauer with a different name ever again. And he's hunting Michael Douglas.

APRIL 28
Another largely unimpressive week, despite quite a few releases. The most promising is...

Akeelah and the Bee
Who said that inspirational movies had to be about sports? This one follows an 11-year old girl from South LA who enters into the National Spelling Bee, despite a doubtful mother and educational disadvantages. After Spellbound from a few years ago, I suppose it was only a matter of time until a fictional account came out, but this one looks like it could be a winner. It's got a good supporting cast in Angela Bassett and Laurence Fishburne, and Keke Palmer herself has a good list of credits for a 13-year old.
Website: AkeelahandtheBee.com

That's what I've got so far. Hopefully May will go up before May actually arrives, and that could lead into a summer preview too! Enjoy!

The Matador

The Matador
January/February (ish); Loews Boston Common
* * * 1/2 (out of 4)

If there were a category at some award show for "Best Breakout Performance by an Actor Who Has Worked Successfully for Nearly 30 Years," Pierce Brosnan would OWN that category this year. With this, he firmly severs his ties with the 007 series, and probably betters his reputation because of it. This felt very much like Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang to me, which isn't at all a bad thing, because I loved that movie, too. It's got this not-quite-independent feel to it, but it's small enough to make festival circuits and to slip under the rader of a lot of people. Sad for them. This is a very funny, very dark little movie.

Pierce Brosnan plays the anti-Bond Julian Noble, who is an unforgiving hitman who is starting to question what it is he's doing with his life as his skills begin to give way. He meets Danny Wright (Greg Kinnear) in Mexico while Wright is on a business trip, and after a long exchange in the bar, the two become cautious friends. This is a great dynamic since they couldn't be any more different. After Wright heads home, Noble shows up on his doorstep asking for help with a job. Naturally, this doesn't sit well with the straight-laced, uptight Wright... but he owes Noble. One can only imagine what for.

This is Brosnan's movie. He owns it, he loves it, he wallows in the rottenness. It must have been such a relief to get away from the formulaic spy crap that had been lingering over the Bond series, and that he had taken primary blame for - I didn't like him as Bond, but I certainly didn't think it was entirely his fault as some people did - but he washes all of it away here. Julian is a killer. He likes (or liked) doing it. There aren't perks like Bond had. This is just a cheap thrill. Brosnan very skillfully shows that breakdown from enjoying his job to cowering in fear and self-pity... quite the change from anything Bond ever would have done. And you know what? Brosnan is better at this sort of thing.

Greg Kinnear is here too, and does a good job, but he graciously bows to Brosnan for this one. Kinnear recognizes whose movie this is, and fills out the film where Brosnan cannot. As Noble breaks down, Wright has such a buildup of intensity and insanity that the eventual blowout is so well worth it. The other great thing that I can remember was the soundtrack, featuring nothing I'd ever heard before, but each track fit the featured scene so well that it stuck with me.

If you missed this one, you missed out. The DVD is due out next month, so pick it up. It's a lot of fun, and it will wash The World is Not Gold Enough to Never Die Another Tomorrow right out of your mind. You can thank me later.

Long past due... Brokeback Mountain

Still not seeing too much in the way of movies... my show is taking up tons of time right now, cause we open next week. Not only time, but that takes me away from working, so I don't have much in the way of disposable income. But I'm bored at work, so maybe I can hammer a few long-overdue reviews.

Brokeback Mountain
Sometime in January; Loews Boston Common
* * * 1/4 (out of 4)

Controversy aside, I had little interest in seeing this one. Previews and all the hype around it made it sound like not at all my type of film. I actually only ended up seeing it because I was at the theater with my girlfriend, it happened to be playing next, and I decided I was in the right sort of mood (no idea what that mood actually was, but it worked). I was nicely surprised - and she was somewhat disappointed, because she had much higher expectations going in.

As everyone knows now, Brokeback Mountain follows two cowboys who meet on a sheepherding job in Wyoming in the early 1960s and form a highly unorthodox and unusually close bond. They return every couple years together to Brokeback, striking a very precarious balance between their home lives (both are eventually married and have children) and the secret they keep with each other, which eventually rips their everyday lives apart through divorce, abandonment and death.

I've had a bad experience with E. Annie Proulx. I read The Shipping News in high school, and it was painful to fight through. So I was very impressed with the fluidity of the story. A lot of what makes the scenes flow nicely comes from the dialogue, more of a credit to Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, who have now won Oscars for their efforts, and Heath Ledger, who handled the minimal and dry part of Ennis with grace and obvious emotion. Without these elements to guide me through (assuming all the others were of the same quality) I would not have enjoyed Brokeback as much as I did.


Read on at HBS!

I'm a bad, bad blogger... Oscar thoughts

Yeah. It's nearly been two months again. Since the last Netflix post, I've rehearsed and performed one play, and I'm now in rehearsal for another, directed a 15-minute piece, and done the normal classes-work-play balance as well.

But last night was the Oscars, which is worth a quick note, I think. Twas a fun show, helped in no small part by the fun little party my girlfriend and I organized (and by the sufficient amount of wine I consumed at said party). Here are a few of my personal favorite moments from last night's show.

- Jon Stewart making a Death to Smoochy joke, and a good portion of the audience not knowing what he was talking about.

- The March of the Penguin guys bringing stuffed penguins to the stage with them.

- Nick Park and Co. wearing Wallace bow-ties, and bringing enough to share.

- Jon Stewart: "Do you think if we teamed up and pulled this statue down... democracy would flourish in Hollywood?"

- The long-overdue admission, acceptance and celebration of the fact that the entire world is in love with George Clooney. A couple Clooney-lights :

- The winner for one of the short categories thanking the Academy for seating her next to George at one of the luncheons.

- The Chronicles of Narnia makeup team: "I'm just glad Clooney doesn't do makeup."

- Clooney's own acceptance speech, starting with, "So I guess I'm not getting best director."

- His part in Jon Stewart's opening montage.

- Finally, in a sea of traditionally garish and overdone costumes (though more subdued this year than in the past), Clooney will still be named the sexiest man there, simply wearing a no-frills black tux.

Still a few things disappointing during the show, though. Jon Stewart seemed nervous, and his typical Daily Show style didn't seem to be playing the crowd too well. I think that was more them taking themselves too seriously than Stewart bombing, cause I thought he was pretty spot-on. Certainly beat the last few years. Also, I am upset about the complete lack of love for Good Night, and Good Luck, which deserved each and every award it was up for (yes, I too am in love with George Clooney). And Crash is NOT the best picture of last year. Sorry. Not happening. In my opinion, it was GN&GL, but I was expecting that Brokeback would shut Paul Haggis down. My faith is misplaced.

So for next year:

- Get Stewart back. Hopefully he can be more comfortable, and really cut loose. Though I did like that he didn't really cut into anyone like Chris Rock did. Stewart was funny, but still respectful.

- Lock Randy Newman in a studio at Pixar so we have some real Best Song nominees. I don't care if he competes against himself. Just no more of that crap from last night.

- Add the Best Ensemble Cast category. I have heard it mentioned by journalists many, many times, but considering how long it took to get an animated feature category, I won't hold my breath.

- Give Clooney an Honorary Oscar for "Most Beautiful, Amazing Thing Ever Created." We all know he deserves it.