Strike Twice

We're finally in August, and as most of this past summer has featured one major movie a week with very little in the way of alternative fare, it's nice to finally see more than a few options on the table. This August not only adds more titles I want to see than existed the entirety of the last few months, but some of the films I've been most anticipating this year. One of those films was the second film directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, Ruby Sparks. Their eventual follow-up to the surprisingly wonderful 2006 movie Little Miss Sunshine, this was a tale with a talented cast, seemingly proven directors, and a fascinating story.

In the screenplay by Zoe Kazan, Calvin (Paul Dano), a once-successful novelist is suffering from a severe case of writer's block. Ten years after writing an extremely popular work of fiction, he is frustrating his agent and publisher with his inability to get anything down on paper. Regular visits to his therapist are little help, until Calvin  literally discovers the girl of his dreams. Inspired, Calvin creates the life of Ruby Sparks, a 26-year-old with a history of romantic follies and a bubbly personality of which he cannot get enough. Calvin falls in love with Ruby, even as he knows that he cannot practically fall in love with his own creation. Then the most amazing thing happens. After a night of writing, Calvin descends into his kitchen to discover Ruby Sparks, just as he has written her. And she is very much real.

Tell me you wouldn't want to wake up to this just once.

That magical element of Ruby Sparks is what makes the film so interesting, and certainly lays the groundwork for the moral dilemmas and questions of what makes you and I real that fill the script. Upon discovering that whatever he writes about Ruby comes true, Calvin at first makes the correct decision and decides not to write anymore, determining that he loves Ruby just the way she is (Ruby in turn doesn't know she's a fictional creation). But when the "honeymoon" portion of their relationship ends and Calvin finds some of Ruby's personality quirks irksome, he is tempted to write one sentence and "fix" things (as you can tell, it doesn't always work out the way he thinks). Burdened by the fallout of his previous failed relationships, Calvin doesn't want to risk losing the supposed love of his life. In Kazan's story, we get to see both sides to the issue, and how none of the decisions made are done so lightly.

Yes, they play brothers. No, I don't buy it either.

Of course, while these moments abound in the film, so too do many dry spells and dead spots thanks to uninteresting or unnecessary characters and a lack of solid ideas. This wouldn't be a problem if the film exhibited the same sort of natural charm that helped Little Miss Sunshine succeed, but the directors strangely struggle in replicating that effort here. That certainly didn't help, especially as every moment past the film's halfway mark makes Calvin less and less sympathetic a character, and unlike his Sunshine co-stars Steve Carrell or Abigail Breslin, Dano does not seem to have the ability to exude charisma on his own. Better is co-star Kazan, who is a ball of energy that can be redirected anywhere at a moment's notice. All of their co-stars, which includes Antonio Banderas, Annette Bening, Steve Coogan, Elliott Gould and Chris Messina, are good talents, but the script restricts just how much they contribute to the story as a whole.

That's a LOT of foliage...

If there's one word with which I could describe how the film made me feel, the most obvious that comes to mind is "uncomfortable". That's mostly in relation to the romance between Calvin and Ruby, and in a way it's the reason the film's story is as solid as it is. Romance in Hollywood tends to be uncomplicated, clean and without major issues. Romance in Ruby Sparks is complicated, messy and full of unseen dangers. In other words, the relationship between Calvin and Ruby is at times uncomfortable to watch because real relationships can in fact be uncomfortable, and being with your "soul mate" is never as easy as fiction would let you believe. Unfortunately, while Kazan manages to encapsulate the ups and downs of real-life romance, it doesn't make for a particularly lovely experience, unless you happen to thrive on conflict. The reason Hollywood romances starring Channing Tatum or Ryan Gosling are so beloved is that they're pipe dreams. Plenty of people already know how complicated real life can be. That's why Sparks is only playing at about a dozen theaters around the country.

As my compatriot used to call it, a "Hot Mess".

Still, I can't help but like Ruby Sparks, even if it didn't live up to my expectations. Kazan is a breakout star, and does a great job carrying the film, whether it was on the acting or writing sides. This movie is a complex mix of fantasy and reality that, while at times seeming a bit too much, really makes you change your perspective on what makes for a "successful" relationship. It's a quality release, and one I'd recommend seeing, though perhaps a film that would be better explored on the small screen.

Sick Day

Trusty film sidekick Anne and I have had a running joke in recent weeks. On the days or nights when we would go to the theater, we would inevitably see a trailer for the new Steven Soderbergh thriller Contagion. No matter how many times we came across it, our thoughts were the same: "It's the film that stars EVERYONE!" This isn't a generalization on our parts, either; besides the big-name stars like Matt Damon, Marion Cotillard and Laurence Fishburne, the trailer alone was full of recognizable actors from Just Shoot Me's Enrico Colantoni to Breaking Bad's Bryan Cranston to Winter's Bone's Acadamy Award nominee John Hawkes. Despite the topical deadly virus story being sold, it was obvious in just under three minutes what the problem with Contagion would be, as the only reason so many big names actors would be rolled out was to camouflage a story that itself was not worth the paper on which it was written. Still, it had an enormously successful opening weekend, and you just can't ignore a film with such a huge pedigree behind it. While Anne hung back in the Reel Cave with a plate of fruit and a looping BSG marathon running, I braved the crowds and elements to find out whether Contagion was SARS come to invade our cinema or a mere throat bug.

Rule #1 of surviving a virus outbreak: avoid hospitals

While returning home from a business trip to China, Beth Emhoff (Gwyneth Paltrow) comes down with what she and everyone else assumes is jet lag. The next day, when she collapses at home, a visit to the hospital eventually confirms that it is not jet lag, but an advanced variation on bird flu that has contaminated her body. Highly infectious, this soon becomes a global epidemic, with cities all over the world suffering the deadly effects of this new disease. The Center for Disease Control, led by Dr. Ellis Cheever (Fishburne), attempt to isolate, contain and cure the outbreak, and the Department of Homeland Security is worried that the virus is the product of a terrorist attack. The race is on to save humanity as a whole, but the question is not whether the mysteries of the virus will be solved, but how much politics and red tape will prevent that from happening.

The least-sexy plastic suit of all time

This is definitely as talented a group of actors as you can expect to find attached to any movie title. With legitimate stars like Damon, Kate Winslet et al, you expect that they'll be at the top of their game. This is true in almost every instance, but the problem with Contagion is that the characters these big stars are hired to play are barely people at all, only suits and skirts designed to fulfill narrative obligations. Each person barely display more than one motivation, and often if they change their minds it is in the most inane way possible. For all the hard work Damon and Fishburne pour into their performances, their characters are remarkably one-noted and interesting only in their intensity. Jude Law taps into his asshole quotient nicely, though his independent reporter making a name (and more than a few bucks) on the back of this epidemic is not a stretch from his usual boring roles. I've only ever liked Law in Sherlock Holmes, and I think he needs to work across from superior actors to force him to raise his game to their level. That isn't present here, and he never really shares the screen with the more talented members of the cast. Paltrow and Winslet are completely wasted in bit parts with no lasting impact on the main story, and I was speaking of Cotillard's character when I was complaining of inane character choices. Some of the smaller roles actually work out well, as Colantoni, Cranston, Hawkes and Elliott Gould do some good in a small amount of time. While there are several talented actors in this film, the best character belonged to somebody you may not recognize, as Jennifer Ehle runs away from the pack as a risk-taking lab doctor who kicks ass in just about every imaginable way.

As if things weren't bad enough, Winslet just learned about the Netflix price restructuring

Of course, Soderbergh only intended one character to be multifaceted, and that was the virus itself. Learning, mutating, growing; this virus did more than any single character in the entire film could claim to have accomplished. In reality, Soderbergh's story can be simply described as dropping the virus in amongst a group and studying what happened. In this you can see the best of his work, as its obvious he left no stone unturned in determining what would happen if person A became sick but did this, this and this before meeting person B. It's almost like looking back at Soderbergh's earlier career when similar films Traffic and Erin Brockovich were mega-hits following other topical situations, garnering critical acclaim and box office records in the process. Since that time Soderbergh hasn't exactly had a lot of success getting either of those, with only the Oceans 11 remake and its subsequent sequels being the obvious exceptions. If Contagion is successful, that might be more remembered than any actual detail of the story herein.

At the Apocalypse, don't worry! Cell reception will be as strong as ever

That's because unfortunately the story tends to get as flat as its characters. For the entirety of the film we're being told that this is a bad thing, and to make sure you are careful with what you interact, otherwise there could be deadly consequences. Reasonable enough, but that this message goes on uninterrupted for just under two hours gets quite a bit boring, and since the film portrays an extreme case situation this message probably won't be heeded by most viewers anyway. Sure there's a little bit in there about the evils and flaws of man in a time of crisis, but that is almost glossed over under the seemingly mistaken impression that these are not problems we can fix. On top of that, after going the entire film without having it revealed what caused the virus in the first place, the finale features Soderbergh going right back to day one to spell out exactly how it happened, making borderline racist commentary in the process. It was a completely unnecessary gesture, one which was probably suggested by brain dead test audiences or confused studio executives rather than anything resembling a logical process.

Well, what can I say? Jude Law isn't a great actor

In the end, I managed to make it through almost the entire screening without being too bothered by the flaws, which was far better than I had expected. Only the ending and the poor character design were serious bummers, though the story as a whole wasn't helped much otherwise. A merely okay film, this is hardly the stellar Soderbergh many people seem to think it is. Instead of a riveting biological drama, it's a political and societal statement, one barely interesting or even intellectually argued. I'm not sure I can recommend Contagion to anyone to see in the theater, though it certainly deserves more attention than the latest entries in the Scream, Pirates of the Caribbean or Transformers franchises, all of which I enjoyed to some degree. Contagion carries itself firmly to the middle of the pack as far as 2011 goes, another forgettable film in a year of epically forgettable films.