Red and White House

Early 2013 hasn't shown much love for action movies. There are a couple of reasons for that. First up is the fact that audiences are sick of retro action stars who haven't accepted that they don't have the same level of cachet anymore. We've seen Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Jason Statham and Arnold Schwarzenegger struggling against middling turnouts in what used to be their collective wheelhouse, all the good will from the violently fun Expendables series having apparently dried up. What action we have actually deigned to watch this year was largely franchise fare, with GI Joe getting fans to the cinema and not a whole lot else. But for some reason, people came out to see Olympus Has Fallen, directed by Antoine Fuqua and featuring Hollywood's most charismatic voice (Morgan Freeman), its sharpest chin (Aaron Eckhart), and its most dashing rogue (Gerard Butler). For the record, those are three major (and sometimes underappreciated) talents in one major motion picture.

Yippi-ki Yay.

Surprisingly, what's most interesting about Olympus Has Fallen's story is that it's not exactly original; in fact, Fuqua's film is the first of two "terrorists attack the White House" stories to be released this year, with Roland Emmerich's White House Down due out this summer. That's right, folks: just as 2012 featured dueling Snow White productions, Hollywood has declared war on Washington D.C. in 2013. On a typical day at the White House, President Benjamin Asher (Eckhart) is in a meeting with the Prime Minister of South Korea to discuss the rising tensions with the nation's aggressive neighbor to the north. What follows is most unexpected, as a sudden and violent terrorist attack captures Asher and several members of his staff, securing them in a bunker beneath 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and wiping out the shocked and vulnerable Secret Service in the process. While the Speaker of the House and acting President Allan Trumbull (Freeman) attempts to diplomatically handle the situation, he's got an asset on the ground: disgraced former Secret Service agent Mike Banning (Butler), a former special ops soldier who came to the aid of his fellow agents during the attack. With time running out and a dastardly terrorist plot taking shape, Banning might be all there is between us and nuclear holocaust.

Shoot first and ask questions later.

For Butler, it's a return to ass-kicking after a few years of playing dice with his acting career. While I won't disparage his talents - the man has the ability to play drama or comedy, action or romance at the drop of a hat - rarely do audiences seem to care about his movies unless he's killing others with impunity. People seem to enjoy seeing him as an honorable man who blows shit up (thanks to my friend Anne for that coinage) and that's certainly how Olympus Has Fallen succeeds, putting Butler and his fellow actors forward and letting them carry the story. Say what you will about the movie as a whole (and I will), but the film does a good job utilizing its cast, from the trio of stars to strong supporting turns by the likes of Angela Bassett, Rick Yune, Melissa Leo and Dylan McDermott, among a slew of others.

Rocking the bow tie.

Unfortunately that's about where the only bright spot of this movie lies. While the production values are decent, and the action scenes competent enough to keep your attention, what can't be ignored is just how STUPID the script and the plot are. While you certainly shouldn't expect that the amount of political savvy here would rival the stories of, say, The West Wing, but the inanity of the story is downright silly. Fighter jets lose to a hulking super carrier because they line up perfectly with the plane's mounted machine guns. The bad guy's plans hinge on the US President making the ABSOLUTE wrong decision, and when he does his secret servicemen barely put up a fight about the ignorance of procedure. And speaking of the men tasked with protecting the leader of the free world: when the enemy is advancing under the cover of smoke and firing machineguns and RPGs, standing out in the open to get gunned down is decidedly not decent military training. It's illogical, cringe-worthy idiocy like this that ruins the flow of Olympus, and a little more time penning a reasonable script wouldn't have prevented our hero from kicking ass. Instead we're issued a needlessly hyper-violent movie where everybody is so stupid that the director assumes his audience is as well, and that they'll enjoy two hours of mindless gunfights and blatant pro-US pandering.

Glad I'm not on the janitorial crew...

Normally I'd say something along the lines of turning off your brain for a good time, but while Olympus Has Fallen manages to be among the better action movies released this year, it's still pretty damned mediocre. Being a step up from the worst of Stallone, Statham and Willis is nothing to be proud of, and Fuqua has taken some serious missteps in the time since his Training Day height. If you really, REALLY need to see an action movie before Iron Man 3 comes out next month, then maybe you can stomach the bloody, masochistic silliness that is this newest blend of repetitive explosions and monosyllabic dialogue. But if you can wait for this on DVD - or even skip it entirely - then I recommend you do so. Strong cast aside, there's just not enough reason to pay full price for a ticket, especially when you can wait just a few weeks for loads of better options.

Double Feature: Chasing Mavericks and Silent Hill: Revelation

This is it. I'm finally at the end of reviewing my vacation movies. In seven days I watched nine movies, most of which were the leftover films I had not yet seen in Fall 2012. But the two movies I saw on October 26'th were both (then) new titles, albeit for a weekend disappointing overall for Hollywood. I've already recounted my showing of Cloud Atlas, but how did that weekend's Chasing Mavericks and Silent Hill: Revelation compare?

Chasing Mavericks turned out to be a surprisingly-solid surfing movie directed by noted directors Curtis Hanson and Michael Apted. Telling a fictionalized rendition of the life of legendary surfer Jay Moriarty, played by fresh-faced Jonny Weston, the film chronicles Jay's life as the product of a broken home, bullying schoolmates and romantic rejection. His escape from the troubles of life is surfing, and he idolizes local legend Frosty Hesson (Gerard Butler), whom he considers one of the best. Frosty is always up for a challenge in the waves, and he is part of a crew that regularly surfs Mavericks, huge waves meant for experts only. Jay is insistent on riding one, and while Frosty doesn't approve of the 16 year-old to take such a risk, he agrees to do so because he know that Jay would try even without his consent. As Jay trains to take on the massive wave, he learns a lot about himself, and the effect his life has on others.

Insert your favorite Beach Boys lyric here.

The reason Chasing Mavericks resonates so well is the depth of its acting talent. If the real-life Jay was anything like Weston's performance, it's easy to see why he would be so popular. Weston plants an inscrutably positive attitude on our leading character; in a world where many heroes' motivations trend into grey areas to achieve their goals, it's nice to see a person succeed without giving up their moral backbone and least partially because of that inherent goodness. Butler seems to be on a self-help kick, picking up roles to try and inspire the younger generation. He's fine here, but to be frank any number of similarly-talented actors could have done the job. It's a strange direction, especially as his current career path seems to take him farther and farther from the popular successes of 300 and Law Abiding Citizen. I know he doesn't want to be typecast as a genre actor (who does?), but there's also the idea of playing to your strengths. Butler needs a hit to re-cement his status as a leading man, and I somehow don't think the upcoming Playing for Keeps is going to do it. A solid supporting cast makes their infrequent appearances work, as Elizabeth Shue and Abigail Spencer do good in their limited capacities. Surprisingly good is Levin Rambin, a TV actress given her first big movie role. I'm not surprised she's good - I really liked her performance on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles - but in that it took her this long to make it to the big screen (I'm not counting her tiny role in The Hunger Games). Hopefully, this will just be the first in a slew of opportunities for the still-young actress.

Does California ever gets cold enough for wool caps?

After that, Chasing Mavericks has its share of problems. Supposedly the majority of the story takes place over the course of twelve weeks, but other than that we get little idea of the world outside of this tiny Californian area. Is it Summer, because the water is apparently fine to surf and swim in every day? Is it Fall or Spring, as Jay is (occasionally) shown in school?  Is it winter, because at the end everyone is wearing cold weather clothes? There's no sense of continuity to the story, surprising from the directors with titles such as LA Confidential, 8 Mile, The World is Not Enough and Gorillas in the Mist between them. With a steadier hand, this film might have avoided many of the issues that dogged its creative process and been much better for it.

Butler's next role: Hobo Joe.

It's not all bad; the lessons Jay learns can be taken to heart and applied to anyone's life, the characters are just complex enough without being unfathomable, and the whole thing thankfully doesn't come off as an after-school Saved by the Bell special. It could have used some polish, but Chasing Mavericks deserved more love than the empty theaters it was shown to last weekend. It's a solid piece of work, and one you ought to check out after it swiftly hits the DVD racks.

My second Friday film was the new Silent Hill flick with Todd; she always wants to see the latest horror films, and while I see more movies without her than I do with, I'll always make provisions for the scary movies she wants to see, especially as we both prefer subtle scares and ghost tales to the gory idiocy of torture porn. Despite being based on a second-rate video game series, the first Silent Hill definitely matched that criteria; scaring while also juggling a satanic monster-laden universe wrapped in fog and ash. It stands as one of the better-received video game adaptations, and was anchored by a solid acting team of Radha Mitchell, Sean Bean, Laurie Holden and Deborah Kara Unger. They're all but wiped away in this sequel, which both rewrites and ruins the ending of the first film.

Sharon da Silva (Adelaide Clemens), now going by the name Heather. and her father Christopher/Harry (Sean Bean) have been on the run since the finale of the first Silent Hill. Hunted by the same cult that had kidnapped Heather as a child, Harry has hoped to keep his adopted daughter safe and out of their hands. But somehow their pursuers have caught up with them. They kidnap Harry, dragging him back to the creepy town of Silent Hill, knowing that Heather will follow. With fellow outcast Vincent (Kit Harrington), Heather journeys solely to find her father, but also might discover something terrifying about herself in the process...

Nope, it's not a snow day.

Revelation manages to maintain the SFX production levels of the original despite about half the budget, though with about six years of technology improvement that's hardly surprising. Some scenes feel a bit stretched in terms of resources, but for the most part these are the outliers and not indicative of the effects as a whole. Monsters feel just as gloriously present, and 3D manages to enhance the effects without relying on the "in your face" gimmicks many films still cling to. Unfortunately, you can still tell that there are budget issues (such as only two transformations from the "calm" grey Silent Hill to the "black" violent variety") masked as serious plot lines. It's the sign of a troubled production when the budget precisely dictates the story you can tell, and director Michael Bassett does nobody any favors in directing each scene like a "monster of the moment" ordeal, negating the potential the monsters possess in the world of the movie.

Zombie Nurses: sexy AND scary

A smaller issue with the film, though by no means less noticeable, is that despite the film taking place in America, most of the cast are distinctively not American. Now, I never, EVER mind foreign actors portraying Americans (or other Caucasian races), if they can play it correctly. Guy Pearce, Andrew Garfield, Hugh Laurie, Gary Oldman and Kate Winslet have all done amazing jobs portraying American characters, made more impressive by the complete transformation of their accents in the process. But some actors can't get everything right, not even Sean Bean. I'm sure Clemens and Harrington are more talented than they let on here (I've yet to see Harrington in Game of Thrones, so we'll see) but you can tell they're not used to American accents; every once in a while they simply pronounce words in such a way that just feels plain wrong, causing almost more of a distraction than the silly story and blink-and-they're-gone creatures.

I think someone needs a time out.

Silent Hill: Revelation suffers from a multitude of ailments, but the worst might be that, after six years, the Silent Hill brand is just not as strong as it once was. Where once it commanded respect in the same vein as similar franchises Resident Evil and Dead Space, there just isn't room for another creepy town/monster mash story of the like we see here. If you REALLY want to give Silent Hill a try, just rent the original. Twice much love, attention, and money was put into it, and unlike the direct-to-DVD sequel that will eventually rise from the ashes of Revelation, it will be well worth your money.

Welcome to Dragon Training

It's got to be tough being DreamWorks sometimes. Even though the animation company, launched in 1999 by Steven Speilberg, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg, launched an award-winning, worldwide cultural phenomena with Shrek in 2001, it has been overshadowed by rival Pixar for what feels like forever. Since animated films were finally given their allotted due with the Academy Award for Best Animated being introduced in 2001, DreamWorks has won the award only twice: for Shrek in 2001, and for the stop-motion Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit in 2005. Pixar, meanwhile, has tasted success five times with Finding Nemo (2003), The Incredibles (2004), Ratatouille (2007), WALL-E (2008) and Up (2009), cementing their place as the more celebrated animation studio. And of the two studios, Pixar also has the only film that has broken the one BILLION dollar mark for gross, with this year's Toy Story 3. But give DreamWorks credit: they never give up and released three 3D animated films this year in Shrek Forever After, the recently-released Megamind, and the one that might be up for some awards at year's end, How to Train Your Dragon.

...And THAT'S how you train a dragon

Based on the fictional children's books by Cressida Cowell, How to Train Your Dragon takes place in the Viking island of Berk, where the local populace is tormented by a particular variety of pest. Dragons roam the area, stealing livestock (or anything appropriately food-like) from the villagers, who in turn attempt to capture and kill the invaders. Nobody knows where the dragons attack from, and the leader of the Vikings, Stoick the Vast (Gerard Butler) often leads his warriors in raids on the fog-shrouded dragon territory, usually resulting in disaster. The story focuses on Stoick's son Hiccup (Jay Baruchel), and undersized boy with a penchant for clumsiness and not at all cut out for fighting dragons, much to the embarrassment of his father. He is also the object of scorn from the other young people in the settlement, all looking to become hunters in their own right, especially Astrid (America Ferrera), the girl Hiccup pines over. Hiccup's helplessness reverses when he somehow befriends an injured dragon that he names Toothless, helping the creature re-learn to fly and the two fast becoming best friends. However, it's only a matter of time before he can keep this secret friendship hidden from a society that hates dragons with a burning passion.

The fire effects are especially eye-popping

I'd been trying to get this film for a while now, all the rental places had been out for weeks and it was becoming less and less likely I'd see it before my interest ran out. I had pretty much passed it over when the film was released in March, and only witnessing lavish praise heaped upon it for months after it's release made me think that perhaps I should sit down and watch this. I'm usually not immediately on-board with animated films, even those which have gotten gross recognition. I didn't see last year's Up in theaters, though when I finally got around to seeing it, the film became one of my favorite films of the past decade. I've never seen a Shrek film. I watched Toy Story on TV, but never saw the second, which many hailed as being better than the first. The Incredibles I rented on DVD. I still haven't seen WALL-E or Ratatouille. Despite how much I invariably enjoy animated films, I almost always overlook them when they come out in theaters in favor of other, live-action titles. Maybe some part of me thinks they're for kids? The best animated films can be enjoyed by kids and adults alike, and How to Train Your Dragon is no exception.

...Aaand so are the atmospheric effects

The film is somewhat of a retelling of the classic "boy and his dog" archetype; Hiccup must hide his pet/friend from his father lest there be consequences. That the film does this while incorporating breathtaking visuals and dragon fights is a bonus, and the film is worth watching for it's beautifully-rendered backgrounds and settings alone. And yet it still comes back to the friendship between Hiccup and Toothless, as well as that between Hiccup and his father, that drives the story forward.

Hiccup attempts to protect Old Yeller... I mean Toothless

The voice acting is especially good, even if you take umbrage with Norse warriors being depicted with the Scottish voices of Butler, Colin Ferguson and David Tennant. Butler especially is noticeable in his performance as the great warrior of the village of Berk. He varies between strong warrior and frustrated father with ease. The only unfortunate thing is that he's so recognizable (and he was the only one I KNEW was in the cast before I watched it) that it breaks the suspension of disbelief, with my mind telling me that this was Butler, not Stoick. Ferguson I recognized - though could not name - and enjoyed as Stoick's friend and Hiccup's mentor Gobber the Belch. From his portrayal of the Viking handicapped by years of battle with the dragons, Ferguson conveys a respect for the character inherent in being the buffer between father and son. He does all he can to help Hiccup and persuading Stoick to give his son a chance. America Ferrera does a great job as Astrid, a powerful young warrior who eventually learns to like Hiccup. Though not given a lot to do for the film's first half, she makes it work when it's her time to shine. Other youths take a part of the story, but they don't have a lot to do with the time they're given. That they're so good helps, however, especially T.J. Miller and Kristen Wiig as rival fraternal twins. Jonah Hill and Christopher Mintz-Plasse are also great in limited roles, adding humor and character in small doses to the audience. The only actor who might be considered a disappointment would be Baruchel, whose voice seems to sometimes be perfect to the dialogue he's given, while other times seeming completely out of place. His is a small quibble within a sea of talented voice actors, but since he's the main character it is possible to be sick of hearing his voice by the end.

Like most animated films, human character are just a LITTLE off

The film only has one additional problem in my opinion, and it's with the film's animation style, especially those of the dragons we see during the film. While the backgrounds and distance shots are all beautiful, the movements of the dragons, especially the big ones, see a bit clunky and not nearly as smoothly animated as the rest of the film. While even the human characters stand out a little from the settings they're plunked in, the dragons are even MORE removed, making them seem out of place and almost hokey. Well, okay, Toothless is fine, but I suspect only because the animators put so much more work into him to make it work for the viewer.

Uhm, sure, you can be there for the sequel...

In the end, I'm not even sure How to Train Your Dragon will be remembered as the best ANIMATED film this year, as opposed to some who would seem to think it deserves discussion as best film this year. It certainly deserves a spot on my Top 10 Movies of the Year, but at #9 I wouldn't count on it staying there too long. I really enjoyed this film for it's amazing art and animation, even if the dragons weren't too well incorporated. A little character development would have gone a long way, but I can't complain about a film that was feel-good from beginning to end and succeeded in transporting me to a world where Vikings and dragons co-exist in such an awesome way..If you haven't seen it yet, do so now.

Out on Bail

It was bound to happen.

It seems that every time you turn around, some form of entertainment has romanticized the few things that didn't need to be romanticized, especially employments that aren't, shall we say, deemed very stylish. Sure, A&E's Dog the Bounty Hunter has brought the necessary trade of bounty hunting to the eyes of the public, and there are fewer more memorable characters in pop culture than Star Wars's Bobba Fett. However we've never seen bounty hunters in a very romantic light, so distracted are we by the pursuit of their quarry. We've never had a "Bounty Hunter's Wife", if you will.

Until now.

I'll admit I wasn't in any hurry to see The Bounty Hunter when it was released this past March, so unimpressed I was with the theatrical trailer that I let it drop below my radar. Even when I was hunting down movies to watch recently, seeing it available for rent did not stop me from watching other, more interesting films instead. Despite generally liking Gerard Butler and (to a lesser extent) Jennifer Aniston, there just didn't seem to be enough to the film to keep my interest, at least until I saw another trailer when I rented Youth in Revolt. Maybe I was just in a good mood, but the trailer seemed funnier than I'd remembered, and so, since I like the occasional comedy with all the more action-y and angst-y films I tend to watch, I picked it up on my next go-around at Redbox.

The movie presents us with Butler as Milo, a bounty hunter who has gotten the job of a lifetime: His ex-wife Nicole, played by Aniston, didn't show up for court on an unnamed arrest and now her bail has been revoked, meaning Milo will make $5,000 to take his wife back to jail. Milo, who's run up an impressive gambling debt, and would love an excuse to stick it to the woman who made his life miserable, thinks this will the best, easiest money he ever made. Meanwhile Nicole, a reporter, skipped out on bail to meet with a contact who claimed to have important information for her about the story she's working on, an apparent suicide that doesn't add up and won't let a little thing like a bounty on her head stop her from pursuing the story.

The first thing to note about The Bounty Hunter is how formulaic it is. It's a romantic comedy first, with a few poorly-executed action and suspense scenes thrown in to appease the male audience. The idea of fate drawing Milo and Nicole together under these circumstances is not a little ridiculous and definitely trite, as it's obvious to us, the audience, that the whole premise is to create an argument for these two seemingly-mismatched characters to get back together. However, some of the best scenes in the film are those that prove that fact, such as a few where Milo impresses Nicole with his knowledge of her, and showing a sensitivity she didn't know he had.

The acting is by far the best thing about the film, and that credit belongs by far the most to Butler and Aniston. There's something to be said for having fun on the set, and both actors seem to be having a blast with both the comedic and serious material they're handed, and the natural charisma between the two suggest this won't be the last time they connect on the big screen. They both seem to feed off the other when they're onscreen together, and the scenes where they are together are the best scenes of the film. Butler is roguishly beguiling as Milo, a man who greatly loves his job and always gets his man, but also has a sensitive side and an addictive personality, exacerbated by his gambling debt. Yes, I realize I described Butler as "roguishly beguiling", do you have a problem with that? Aniston is also wonderful if not quite as good as Butler. She's never been a great actress but she plays the same archetype so well, and that's pretty much Nicole to a T. Shamelessly devoted to her job, getting the big story is most important on her list of objectives, all other things falling behind. It's been described to me that Aniston does angry well, and that's certainly true here, where she has plenty of opportunity to express that particular emotion. Their chemistry together really makes the film move forward, and it's by far the only thing I can recommend to people wanting to see this movie.

It's too bad the supporting cast couldn't live up to the talent of it's top-billers. Probably the most disappointing is the lack of a charismatic villain to hound the two heroes. Though there are two antagonists hunting both Nicole and Milo (Peter Greene and Cathy Moriarty, respectively), Moriarty doesn't have much impact as a secondary adversary. She plays a crooked casino owner who wants to collect on Milo's debt. Greene is the primary antagonist, hunting down Nicole so she can't uncover the truth about the story she's investigating, but he's not very interesting and doesn't play a large role in the film, as the crime/action aspect of the story constantly takes a backseat to the romantic angles. Jason Sudekis might be the worst part of the film, a completely superfluous character who has a crush on Nicole and stalks her some ways into the movie after she jumps bail. Between his character's creepiness and Sudekis' pornstache, there's nothing to like about the character, and the movie would have been better off without him. Dorian Messick and Jeff Garlin are fine in small roles, but the best of the supporting cast is by far Christine Baranski as Nicole's mother, a lounge singer in Atlantic City. She's the type of character that never fails to elicit at least a chuckle from me as a slightly perverted, say-anything maternal figure with a cosmo perpetually in their hand, like Jessica Walter's characters in Arrested Development and 90210. It's a shame she's not in more of the movie, but I think too much might have been overkill, so perhaps it's good they didn't over-saturate the film with Baranski's role.

The few suspense and action scenes thrown into the mix don't make the movie much better. In one scene towards the end, especially, it's ridiculous to see Milo searching throughout a warehouse trying his best to look like a real former-cop. The scenes may be the only semblance of a plot in the whole movie, as the romantic angle would be nothing without them, but one wonders if director Andy Tennant could not have done more to make those scenes as important as the rest of the film. On top of that, I can't get over the feeling that if Nicole had simply gone into court that day, there would be no movie. I need my stories to be a little more complex than ones hinging on one precarious plot thread.

In end end, I enjoyed The Bounty Hunter. That is to say, I enjoyed the performances of Gerard Butler and Jennifer Aniston, and the rest of the film could have been performed my monkeys on trampolines and it wouldn't have made a difference. The Bounty Hunter had a lot of things against it, including a nebulous plot, poor action and suspense bits and a mediocre and uninvolved supporting cast. Only the acting of Butler and Aniston and their interactions with one another prevent this movie from being totally unwatchable, though I still don't recommend you rent it unless you've got a hankering for romantic comedies and you've already seen the rest. Date Night, a far superior film, has already been knocked off my Top 10 list, so don't expect this one to hit that list anytime soon. It's better than it has any right being, but not by much.

Game On

Yes, I watched Gamer. Yes, I know it was largely panned. Yes, the trailers looked poor and the movie seemed to be completely unimaginative. Yes, it seemed ridiculous, even. Yes, I had better options for movies to watch (Descent 2 being one of them). No, I'm not sure what I was thinking.

But I was curious. Here was another movie loosely based on the video game industry and reality shows (among other things) and a treatise about how jaded and unsympathetic our world may become if someone really wanted to take that next step.

Some time in the future, the real world sucks. It's a bleak place, with society in general mostly in the toilet. The only bright spots in the future are reality entertainment, created by multi-billionaire Ken Castle (Michael C. Hall). First, Castle created Society, a game not unlike the hugely popular Second Life in which the player takes control of a remote avatar and controls all their actions and interactions with others playing the game. Unlike the digital world of Second Life that people nowadays can subscribe to, however, those avatars are living, breathing people who are paid to be part of this fake reality.

We'll get back to Society later. The reason people tuned into this movie was Castle's other creation: Slayers. In Slayers, Death Row inmates are given the chance to compete in a real-life death match not unlike those in games like Team Fortress 2 or Day of Defeat. The idea is that if they survive 30 battles of Slayer, they get their prison sentences communed. The contestants don't control their own fates however, as their actions in-game are controlled by gamers on the outside. The best of these combatants is John "Kable" Tillman (Gerard Butler), an inmate we meet with just three games left until he can be released. His wife and daughter are on the outside, and are the only things keeping him sane. But even with freedom so close, as the story is told we learn that Ken Castle would very much rather not see Kable go free.

Gamer is a very different film. A large-budget film that feels like a movie half it's budget size, it portrays society in three different lights. The brightest of these shades is Society, where the colors are so vibrant, the sunlight so bright, that you can't help but feel it's fake and showy, which of course is exactly what was intended. The users in Society are portrayed as connoisseurs of the seven deadly sins, exposing themselves, fulfilling rape fantasies or setting up their avatar to suffer bodily harm and laugh as their blood spills from gashes. The people who would subject their bodies to this treatment are usually of the desperate variety, not happy with their predicament but so desperate to escape the cruel outside world that it seems largely appealing by comparison. On the other end of the spectrum is Slayers. It's a dark, gritty, violent existence, where color rarely permeates unless it's blood red. Death can come suddenly, and it's only by the skill of their controllers that the participants make it to the end, or the "Save Point". In between is real life, where it seems poverty is up and nobody seems happy unless they're watching or playing the latest reality PPV. It's arguably the bleakest of the three existences, as people are more than willing to escape into something else, and unwilling to change the things around them.

If there's anything I found surprising about Gamer, it's just how GOOD the movie actually is. The twin writing/directing of Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor (Crank 1 & 2) is solid, especially the camera work, which was often done on the fly by either director. There are definitely some faults, but we'll get to those later. The casting, however, was the truly inspired part of this film. Of course Butler has since moved on to romantic comedies at this point, but this was his first big action hit after 300. He's really a force to behold both in his combat scenes and in his more insular scenes which are more of the film than you might go in expecting. Hall (Six Feet Under, Dexter) is fun as Castle, the villain. He really seems to enjoy being the bad guy here, and it's always good to have a "fun" villain. Amber Valetta (Hitch, Transporter 2) plays Angie, Kable's wife on the outside and works as an Avatar on Society to either pay the bills or escape reality, or both. She was truly the surprise of this film, as I never would have expected her to play this part with such depth, and there's a stark difference in her performance between when she is herself and when she's played by a lascivious user, as there should be. Kyra Sedgewick (The Closer, Justice League: A New Fronteir)  plays an unscrupulous TV reporter and talk show host who is seeking out Kable. Honestly, it's great to see her in a movie but her character is largely unimportant. At least she does it well. Logan Lerman (3:10 to Yuma, Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief) is great as Kable's controller, a widely respected cyber-athlete who's only 17-years-old. He's portrayed as being pretty spoiled and naive in the beginning, but the character goes through changes as the story progresses and Lerman pulls it off very well. Christopher Brian "Ludacris" Bridges (Hustle & Flow, RocknRolla) rounds out the main cast, playing the leader of a (for lack of a better word) terrorist group who call themselves "Humanz" who oppose Castle's evil plans. Kable finds himself tugged between these two factions during the course of the film, and it's good that they are led by Hall and Brown, who are both charismatic and good to see on screen.

There were also a large number of recognizable D and E-List stars who made appearances throughout the film, and it was fun to recognize John Leguizamo (Spawn, Romeo & Juliet), Aaron Yoo (21, Friday the 13'th), Allison Lohman (Drag Me to Hell, Beowulf), Terry Crews (The Expendables, The Longest Yard), Keith David (Platoon, Mass Effect 1 & 2), Milo Ventimiglia (Heroes, Rocky Balboa), Sam Witwer (Battlestar Galactica, Dexter), John de Lancie (Star Trek: The Next Generation, Stargate SG1), and Zoe Bell, who has yet to truly get out from under the shadow of the best damn car chase scene EVER (Death Proof). Even though most of these characters did little to move the pace of the story forward, it was good to see so many recognizable faces, even if they were most definitely not big stars.

Now onto the bad stuff. To be fair, I only have two gripes with this film, but they're big ones.

Gripe #1:  One-dimensional bad guys

Remember how I praised Michael C. Hall's performance? I meant every word. He did an amazing job with that character. The problem was the character was a third-rate James Bond villain, all posturing and posing, never one to miss overlong speeches detailing his great plans and how wonderful he is. Even a surprise song and dance number near the end doesn't make him any more deep or complex, and his mindless exposition makes me wish he at least had an interesting second in command. No such luck, as his cronies are even more boring than he is. At then end, after the day is saved, the second in command says to the hero: "Well played." Yes, he says THOSE exact WORDS. No excuse.

Which brings me to the second gripe:

Gripe #2: Bad ending

There's not really any excuse for how badly the movie ended. The story leading to it was actually pretty good, cloak and dagger mixed with bullets and explosions mixed with exploitation. But the end felt mostly anti-climactic, without anything original, charming or intelligent, followed with a cliche hero driving off into the sunset. For the story to have done so well to end on such a sour note is distressing, after I'd been so pleasantly surprised with the rest of the content.

If you combined Gamer's strengths with that of a more popular summer movie in '09, say Terminator Salvation, you might have had a fantastic movie on your hands. Instead, the duo known as Neveldine/Taylor have made us a merely okay film, with a strong first half, good acting, and great action sequences and camera angles but marred by an incomplete second half and cliche ending. I don't regret watching it.

I just regret watching it FIRST.