Paranormal Activity (2009)

It seems that there has to be at least one horror movie each year that says c'est la vie to conventional cliches and takes on a life of its own. Last years extraordinary Let the Right One In managed to do it, and the year prior to that [rec] managed to do it. This year, it's Paranormal Activity. It essentially takes the formula that Blair Witch Project created and plugs in various different variables.

The plot is nothing exciting. A couple, specifically the girlfriend, are being haunted by a rather unfriendly demon in their California home. Realizing they can't run from it, they instead try to understand it. So, much to the girlfriends (Katie) chagrin, the boyfriend (Micah) purchases a rather expensive video camera to try and catch their house guest on film.

That's how the whole thing is filmed - similar to [rec] or Blair Witch, it's one of the two (usually the boyfriend) holding on to the camera and recording their ordeal. In some films this really, really works against itself (I'm in the minority here, but I really wish they would have just stuck to conventional cinematography in Cloverfield), but here it works. There are a couple things that irked me that also bugged me in [rec] - when the cameraman prioritized the filming over the whole staying alive or protecting your girlfriend aspect. That pops up a couple times in the movie and, for me, really messes with the immersion and atmosphere that the film is trying to create, because absolutely no one is going to go for the camera first when your significant other is letting out a bloody death scream. However, that only happens a couple times, and the rest of the film makes up for it tenfold.

Atmospherically it's the best horror film in a long, long time. The movie doesn't pull any punches - quite frankly, because it doesn't have to. Chances are it's not going to make you jump. But it's going to leave you wondering just what's going to happen next, even when you KNOW something's going to happen. It's absurdly suspenseful, and as creepy as they come. It's the antithesis of this years Drag Me To Hell, which I still think is the best horror film of the year. Where DMTH relied on an old woman jumping out at you, this relies purely on atmosphere and subtly. If there's one word I could use to describe this movie, it would be subtle. It would be pretty easy to dislike this movie for that one simple fact, especially if it wasn't scary. Luckily, it's creepy as hell.

Dear God are the actors horrible though! The girlfriend is passable. She seemed pretty real most of the time. But the boyfriend, oh my goodness. He's god awful. I imagine the director fed him this exact line: "talk like you talk to your wife/girlfriend/boyfriend/whatever." And he still managed to deliver certain lines like a piece of wood. I don't even see how that's possible. Thankfully it really doesn't matter much, seeing as how it's a low budget ($15 grand it costed to make this, and it's already almost grossed 40 mil!) horror movie that isn't exactly reliant on its acting, but c'mon dude. A little effort wouldn't kill you.

There's also been a lot of complaints about the ending. They filmed three endings - one which was originally shown at the festival it debuted at in 2007, one which is the now theatrical ending which the majority of people have seen, and another which likely won't be seen until the DVD release. I've seen both the theatrical and original ending, and the gripes about the theatrical ending has merit. I thought it almost felt like a copout. After managing to crush horror film cliches for an entire movie, they revert to horrible SFX and ruin the entire flow of the movie. The original ending, however, is absolutely sinister, and much better suited for the film. However, chances are most people won't be able to see it until the DVD release. But trust me - if you hated the theatrical ending, the original ending is much better. You can probably read up about it on Wikipedia.

Bottom line though: the movie's great. Drag Me To Hell and this both show me that there's still life to be breathed into the horror genre. It's almost an intelligent horror movie, I'd say. It's incredibly subtle, atmospheric, the sound mixing is perfect, and for the most part it all felt pretty real. It slipped up in some regards (the acting. ugh), but it's still absolutely awesome. It's not something you can watch and expect to jump every five minutes - as I said earlier, that's DMTH's M.O. But this is a movie that will stick with you and legitimately creep you out, almost in a similar vein that The Exorcist did. But if subtly and superb filmmaking are lost on you then hey, Saw 6 opens tomorrow.

8/10

Law Abiding Citizen (2009)

Law Abiding Citizen essentially starts off as every other action/revenge flick does. Sappy family love scene blah blah blah then oh, everyone's dead. Except the dad who makes a living with whatever government agency finding extravagant ways to kill people from an office building. I guess they didn't really consider him a threat. And it never really makes an attempt at logic after that.

It's a powerfully, powerfully stupid movie. If you don't switch your brain off prior to seeing it, there's a solid chance you might actually get offended at just how absurd it is. Which isn't to say that it's bad, really. There's plenty of stupid movies that I'd consider damn near classics. Law Abiding Citizen isn't really overtly bad. It's just dumb.



It's also an enormous waste of talent. Gerard Butler, Jamie Fox, and Viola Davis do as much as they can with their roles, but again: dumb. Why they would sign a bunch of A-list stars to a borderline exploitation movie is beyond me, but hey. It worked, I guess, to an extent.

But, to be honest, I didn't hate the movie. It's a mediocre to decent way to kill a couple of hours on a popcorn movie that came out a few months too late. The action scenes are pretty neat, though the implausibility of the whole thing adds a bit of incredulity to it. But again, keep your brain turned off, because that's your best chance of being able to enjoy it. Thankfully, the movie knows what it is, and doesn't try to be much more. It doesn't really try to touch on all of its moral ambiguities or the whole Man vs. Establishment theme, because if it did, it would only make it dumber. So, here's a short review for a movie that probably wouldn't have it any other way.

6/10

The Informant! (2009)

The Informant! (annoying exclamation point included) is the latest effort from the creative mind of Steven Soderbergh, telling the (for the most part) true story of Mark Whitacre, an exec of a large corn corporation who gets entangled in price fixing, embezzlement, and other such big business shenanigans. Matt Damon plays the rather aloof, erratically unstable main role as the whistleblower who gets fed up trying to live multiple lives and thus attempts to bring the bigwigs down. Of course, it doesn't go quite according to plan; but then again, neither does the film.

There's no real faulting Matt Damon here. Gaining 30 pounds and growing a rather unfitting 'stache was pretty funny to see, to be sure. I thought he was fantastic, and was quite easily the best part of the film, though he may have been just a wee bit miscasted. Of course, the miscasting may have been intentional seeing as how the majority of the film is just an attempt by Soderbergh to yell "hey! Look at how goofy this is!" without making a whole lot of sense or, really, being that funny.

The narrative structure leaves a lot to be desired. The constant hopping around locales and recording evidence without really going anywhere or explaining much of anything just left me wishing the thing would just hurry up and get to the indictments. That really isn't a very good thing for a movie called 'The Informant." I refuse to use that pretentious exclamation point from here on out. Suck it.

Soderbergh really just makes an extravagantly overt effort at trying to convey the goofiness of the movie. It was just very forced, which killed a lot of it for me. Forced absurdity just isn't funny, and the direction just tried to force it far, far too much. Granted, there are funny bits, but the penultimate climax could have been leagues funnier had it just let the mounting absurdity flow naturally. The film would have benefited from a rewrite a lot.

The casting wastes so much talent too. Scott Bakula as the FBI agent assigned to the case is great. However, Joel McHale is utterly wasted as a run of the mill agent who, to my knowledge, didn't even crack a joke the entire film. Tony Hale (probably most easily recognizable as Buster from Arrested Development) has a relatively small part as Whitacres defense attorney - but he didn't crack a joke either, and he's funny as all hell! I have absolutely no clue what they were going for by casting a slew of comedians in seemingly "straight" roles, but it just doesn't work.

The bottom line is that Matt Damon was, for me, the entire reason I saw the film in the first place, and that much of it didn't leave me disappointed. But the disjointed narrative, misfires in almost every comedy aspect, and ridiculous miscasts essentially brought the whole thing crumbling down. If you're big in to corporate scandal movies, you might dig this. It definitely deviates from the norm - it's a satirical approach to a decidedly serious genre, but Soderbergh just stuck his hand in the cookie jar a bit too many times to make it all come together.

5.5/10

District 9 (2009)

I wrote my review for this last week, but there was just something about it that I couldn't put a finger on. I wrote it directly after I got home and did nothing but rave about this and that, but after meditating on it some more I figured out it's just really hard to put my finger on what I thought about this film. It's certainly good, yes, but is it all it's cracked up to be? It's a genre-bending rollercoaster ride of originality from relative newcomer Neill Blomkamp. Part Cloverfield, part Independence Day, part E.T., but all about the human condition.

The film throws us directly into the fray, with only a few slight hints as to the backstory of what really happened. Starved, broken aliens, hiveminds to an apparently deceased leader, have become stuck on Earth, hovering ominously over South Africa. Humanity, not entirely sure of what to expect or how to treat them, sticks all of them in to apartheid like conditions while they figure out their next course of action. The apartheid parallels are loud and booming - a South African born director, and a purely South African cast make up the entire film.

Rarely can a film be nothing but one big not-so-subtle social commentary without becoming cumbersome, offensive, annoying, or all three. The Soloist, released earlier this year, is a shining example of how not to try to inject your message - relying on shocking imagery, taut camerawork, and cinematographic cutaways from the actual film; however, on the other end of the spectrum you have films like It's A Wonderful Life or Philadelphia, which manage to convey their message without any form of subtlety, but with a careful enough hand so as not to force the issue down our throat with sheer blunt determinism. District 9 is on the positive side of the spectrum - it's one big allegory not only for apartheid , but for human compassion, acceptance, and humility.

The thing that really blew me away about this film was the way it managed to have absolutely impeccable timing. Right before something that was really neat would become stale, they switched directions completely. For example, the first part of the film is in an entire faux-documentary setup -- think Cloverfield. It's a pretty neat way of filming it, and creates an absolutely perfect atmosphere for the rest of the film. However, right before the shakycam annoyance kicks in, they switch to a more conventional cinematography. It's absolutely absurd - right when a particular action scene would start to drag on, it would end and cut to something else more interesting, and it kept this pattern for the entire film. You may call it luck, but I call it superb filmmaking.

I have to give props to the casting director for wanting to stick to their guns. A summer blockbuster with not a single big name - in fact, no names at all, was a pretty large gamble. The entire cast consists of South African actors, who, while may not be the best talent around, certainly creates a more believable environment. I wasn't too smitten with the lead actor, Sharlto Copley, who plays the nerdy, business ladder climbing scientist in charge of moving the aliens to their new homes. While he certainly wasn't bad, he just had something about him that didn't completely floor me. For me, if someone better (who I have absolutely no one in mind for) had played his role, it would have skyrocketed to the upper echelons of Sci-Fi cinema. But that isn't to hate on his performance too much, because as I said, he certainly did okay, but he had big shoes to fill, and he only managed to lodge his foot in to one of them.



In this day and age of huge summer blockbusters, where $200 million is naught but a pittance to throw down on gaudy films like Transformers 2, it's rather impressive to see such a low ($30 million -- it's low relative to other films of it's ilk, trust me) budget allocate its resources in a way that maximizes its potential. If I hadn't known better, I would assume that the special effects were a couple orders of magnitude more expensive, because they look damn good. CGI aliens have never looked as real or been as immersed in their environment as they are in this film, and all on a small budget. Hats off to the producers and the director, because that is not an easy feat to accomplish.

All in all, it's got the makings of a classic sci-fi that will linger on for years to come - it isn't a flash in the pan type of generic indie sci-fi that will be here and gone as soon as its opening weekend is over. It's an engrossing, emotional thrillride with so many different genre elements it's hard to pin just what exactly you should call it. It's got everything under the sun, which also detracts from it at times. Occasionally you just wish that they could settle on just what exactly they wanted the film to be, but it doesn't get in the way of it enough to really hurt it. It's pretty damn violent though, so for the more squeamish crowd out there, I'd stay away. But for those of you with iron cast stomachs, I'd recommend it to all of you. A solid movie with an even more solid message - "quit being assholes."

8.5/10

The Time Traveler's Wife (2009)

Every once in awhile you need to clean the bad taste of disappointment out of your mouth; watch some bubbly little feel-good movie that will pick you up from from the bitter taste of your "good movie season" starting with such a falter. If I sound bitter, by the way, it's because I am. But today I elected to watch the adaptation of Audrey Niffeneggers The Time Traveler's Wife. I admittedly have not read the novel, though I want to, but just a heads up that I have no basis for comparison.

The Time Traveler's Wife is exactly what it sounds like, although the titular character is certainly not given as much attention as the Time Traveler himself. Eric Bana is our traveler, zipping in and out of previously occurring or soon-to-occur events that he has absolutely no control over, landing bare ass naked wherever fate decides to drop him. Enter Rachel McAdams, a girl who initially confuses the shit out of poor Eric, telling him she's his best friend and he's been visiting her since she was six years old. I don't think it's altogether too difficult to imply how it goes from here.

I'll be honest: I liked this. Maybe it's just the rebound after breaking up with Tarantino, but it's a movie that manages to pull on your heartstrings like a bastard son of a bitch then leave you hanging by your ankles. The latter half of the film - especially the closing 20 or so minutes, are intensely emotional, managing to leave the conventional, boring, cliche contrivances of every single other time-travelling drama in the dust. That is the films strong point. The first act of the film almost feels completely pointless, almost like you could have just started right before Rachel McAdams shows up. It is very, very fast paced though, so it doesn't linger about for too long.



What is absolutely my main gripe is Rachel McAdams' performance. What should be someone as lost as her time traveling husband comes off as completely wooden and lacking that extra kick that someone in her position should have. The problem of being left alone for weeks at a time while her husband is off in worlds unknown is only touched on briefly, then quickly written off as her husband wins the Powerball for her. Something tells me the character isn't quite that shallow in the book. Blame it on the screenwriting, blame it on the performance, but her character just sucks, and when the film is named after a character that sucks, it takes away quite a bit from the movie.

But overall though, it's a decent way to kill a couple of hours. It won't be your favorite film of the year, but it won't be your least favorite either. It's a decent relationship drama flick that manages to use the time traveling device relatively well - although it does hop around a bit too much, but not so much as to be confusing or hard to follow. The last 30 minutes are pretty damn gutwrenching, and raises all the typical what-ifs in regards to time travel - how would we live our life if we knew when we were going to die? If we could change the past for the better, would we? Is the future as linear as a straight line? The film asks the questions, but doesn't have the depth to try and answer them.

7.333 repeating/10

Inglorious Basterds (2009)

I am officially off of the Tarantino bandwagon. There is a time in every serious movie-goers life where they're forced to take off the rose-tinted glasses and examine one of their favorite filmmakers and go "hey...something's not right here!" This is that film. I was drawn in to this movie expecting a change of pace from Tarantino - a bloody war epic? Holy shit! Brad Pitt calling on his secret group of soldiers to bring him a hundred Nazi scalps? Holy shit! This is going to be the best film of the year! Well, every rose has its thorns - and this film just so happened to be one big fucking thorn.

I'm okay with Tarantino dialogue. No, really, I am. The smarmy, hipster, wise-cracking way he writes his films is enjoyable and oftentimes rather funny. I love the diner scene in Pulp Fiction just as much as the next person. I love the final exchange of Reservoir Dogs just as much as the next person. What I can't stand is him furiously masturbating himself with horrible terrible shit like Death Proof and Inglorious Basterds - thinking he can get away with overly-long (I don't mean a couI jple minutes - I mean 5-15 minutes too long) dialogue sequences that do not go anywhere, are not funny, and drag like a god damn amateur surrealist film. Is every sequence of dialogue bad? No, of course not. There are a few funny moments, and a few signature Tarantino exchanges that obviously have his stamp on them. My problem is the length. Does it really take 20 minutes of lavishly boorish dialogue to start a shootout between Americans and Nazis? No, Tarantino, it doesn't.

It is undeniably well-acted though - Brad Pitt is great as the wisecracking, southern badass Lieutenant Aldo Raine, or "Aldo the Apache". Christopher Waltz is equally great as the sinister, multilingual Hans Landa. The Mike Myers cameo is great, There are almost no faults with the casting or the performances - it's the one shining star among a black hole of shit.



However, the constant namedropping and homages to obscure foreign B-movies, while great in small doses, are way overboard here. Am I supposed to laugh at you cracking jokes about random German propagandist filmmakers from the 40s? Because it went way the fuck over my head, as it will go way over just about everyone elses. The whole damn thing feels like a really bad Sergio Leone movie, just substituting substance with over-stylization. What the fuck was the point of the typeface before you introduced Hugo Stiglitz? That's some retarded 70s disco "groovy!" type shit. How the fuck is that supposed to mesh with a psychopathic ex-Nazi during WWII? But I'm nitpicking, so I digress.

Honestly, I just wanted more scalps, more Nazis, more Basterds, more everything that wasn't an effusive enthusiasm for his own pen. It's the precise problem that plagued Death Proof, but as opposed to that, we never received our adrenaline pumping payoff. While the payoff we got was fine, and probably the best part of the whole movie, it was just a fleeting "Gad damn!" moment; absolutely nothing memorable aside from the closing scene, which was absolutely great. Everything that is Tarantino is there - the dialogue, the violence, the love of cinema - the problem is that it comes together to become one big, glacial-paced mess. I don't think Tarantinos lost it in the least, I just think he's trying to take new directions, which is respectable. Every director should try and branch out of his own niche. But the problem is that he isn't branching out of his niche - he's becoming more and more obsessed with it, and I'm considerably less excited for his future projects because of it.

5.5/10

I Love You, Man (2009)

Sadly, the comedy film seems to be going by the wayside. Much akin to modern horror movies, sifting through the garbage to find a diamond in the rough gets more difficult with each passing season. Being inundated with the trite and offensively bad "Genre Movie" comedies of the last few years makes it even more satisfying to find that one little gem shining amidst all the crap. While I Love You, Man isn't exactly the Hope Diamond, it certainly isn't garbage either. I guess you could say it's cubic zirconia.

Writer and director John Hamburg abandons the conventions of a typical romatic comedy and completely throws them for a loop. Deemed a "bromance", it's more a story about the friendship side of relationships rather than the amorous side. Paul Rudd, a newly engaged real estate agent, has a bit of an "oh shit" moment after he realizes he doesn't have a best man for his wedding. Or any prospects to speak of. In fact, he doesn't really have any 'guy' friends at all. So, we watch him search through personal ads and various other methods until he runs in to Jason Segel. That's where things finally start picking up.

The best thing about this movie is, quite easily, the two main characters. They have an absolutely amazing dude-chemistry that fits the film in such a way that neither of them could be replaced with another actor. If you took out Segel and tried to dump your archetypical unmotivated/lazy actor a la Seth Rogen, Jack Black, et al. the whole thing would just fall apart. That's easily the high point of the movie, and why it worked even half as well as it did.

It's definitely not ball bustingly funny, though. It's got a few laughs, but for the most part it'll just illicit a smile or two. For one, the whole "Paul Rudd is a goofy, awkward guy who says goofy, awkward things!" angle gets played out way too quickly, but no one working on the movie seemed to notice. It also has a tendency to regress to dick and fart jokes at the wrong time. I'm all for dick and fart jokes, guys, but they require the proper setup, timing, and setting. This movie lacked all three in every crude joke it had, which hurt a lot more than helped. But the laughs it does manage to get are really, really damn funny.

John Hamburg rather blatantly stole a page straight out of the Judd Apatow "How To Make A Dramedy" handbook, as well. Which works for Apatow (most of the time), but not for everyone. When it was done with as shameless a pen as Hamburgs, all of the drama elements just ended up feeling like a hollow, played out shell of something we'd seen in an Apatow movie, and I'm not even that big on the guy. I do have to give my compliments to him for making a rather strangely put together "love" triangle work, though. Great in theory, only so-so in execution.

The bottom line, however, is that it's got some laughs. The comedy duo is great, and I hope they do more in the future; not only are they both funny, but they compliment eachother flawlessly. The best way to watch it, though, is to sit down with your best broski or broskies and laugh hysterically every time you hear "slappeh de bass!" But even then, it just isn't funny enough the whole way through to carry it to greatness. Let Judd Apatow make a Judd Apatow movie, Mr. Hamburg!

** out of 4