MacGruber: Da Bomb?

Sometimes you want a juicy steak, Fillet Mignon. And sometimes you want a huge cone of cotton candy.

I'm paraphrasing a line my father still uses to this day (I say "paraphrase" because you know fathers; they never say it the same way twice). What he means by this is that quality is subjective to mood. Sometimes want that fancy meal, that diamond necklace, those tickets to Phantom of the Opera. In film terms, it would refer to the surefire Oscar darlings and critically reviewed of previewed films. Inception fits here, as do the upcoming Black Swan and The King's Speech. But sometimes you just want to kick back and relax with junk food, beer, and tickets to a WWE show. Sometimes going the trashy route is exactly what your body needs, what your mind craves. And sometimes, even knowing that you're involved in something tawdry, you can still be surprised by the product involved.

This is the best America has to offer

By all intents and purposes, MacGruber should have been a crap film. The Saturday Night Live series of skits has been possibly one of the most popular skits in SNL's last decade, if not the entire show's run. Created by SNL scribe Jorma Taccone, the character - a direct parody of the famous Richard Dean Anderson hero MacGuyver - first made his appearance alongside show host Jeremy Piven in January 2007, starring Will Forte in the titular role of the bumbling government agent who would attempt to disable a bomb but be distracted by personal problems, resulting in explosion and (presumably) death, only to be resurrected the next week and placed in a whole new bomb-diffusing scenario. They're ridiculous. They're silly. They're often quite funny. What they are NOT is high caliber comedy. They're of a closer bloodline to Family Guy than The Naked Gun, graduates of the Judd Apatow school of toilet humor, and for thirty-second skits, that's fine. Watch, get a chuckle, see an explosion, and then check the other channels to see if there's anything else on.

How the mighty have fallen...

When news was announced that a movie was actually going to be built from this funny-but-limited sketch, skepticism was of course warranted. After all, how funny could a one-note joke really be over 90 minutes? As it turns out, pretty funny. After terrorists hijack a nuclear missile and threaten to blow up the US Capitol, the military seeks out the best man for the job. MacGruber (still played by SNL's Will Forte)  puts together a team including his former assistant Vicki St. Elmo (Kristin Wiig) and young hotshot Dixon Piper (Ryan Phillippe) in order to find and disarm the weapon, currently in the clutches of MacGruber's nemesis, businessman Dieter Von Cunth (Val Kilmer). What follows is more gross-out humor than explosions, but thankfully it's more than a one-note sideshow.

So THAT'S where the $10 million went!

The key to this film might be it's connections to the original creative team. Taccone makes his cinema directorial debut here, and is a big part of the reason the story remains on track for much of the film. The script was even penned by the show's writers: Forte, Taccone and John Solomon. Even original Macgruber assistant Maya Rudolph has a small role in the film, cementing it's origins. For the first time in a long time, SNL didn't entrust their creation to the treatment of a foreign power. Instead they decided to trust that their own people, who had cared and nurtured their favored character to this point, could oversee this final step. It's giving credit where credit's due and daring your creative team to do better than their best day so far, and in this case it produces a better experience for the audience than the film rightly should be doling out.

Literally holding the audience captive

I would be hard-pressed to say that there's any good acting in MacGruber, instead pointing out that there's more ham than you can get from a whole pig and more posturing than a Calvin Klein ad. Forte plays off dozens of action hero stereotypes as the the film's hero, a self-assured, arrogant wise-ass who breaks down emotionally on a regular basis and can rig anything into some type of weapon or tool to do what needs to be done. He really hams up the role, important since that's the major way he evokes his original character's silliness, a must-have for the film to be any good. Wiig is quite enjoyable as the assistant St. Elmo, an apparent espionage master (despite the fact that she fools nobody in her disguises) and singer who's falling for her former boss. You can debate whether or not she deserves her Emmy nominations, but the timeless quality to her humor makes her one of the few current SNL'ers to keep an eye on in the future. Phillippe and Powers Booth play military men and straight men to Forte's nut job, and both do okay jobs in that regard, grounding the film in some small semblance of reality. Phillippe does have a couple of comedic moments to keep his character from being completely boring, but I stand by all earlier statements calling him overrated and over-hyped. He's simply not a good actor, never has been. Val Kilmer's once-good looks have faded to the wrinkles of husky-boy syndrome, but he's actually pretty good as the comic-book style villain Cunth. His best scene is one where he holds a conversation with his stolen missile, one where even though it appears liberally in the trailer, still can elicit a chuckle. Maya Rudolph, playing former MacGruber assistant and wife Casey Sullivan, is probably the most disappointing in the cast. I say that well knowing that anything since her Golden Globe nominated performance in Away We Go would be, but this is further down than even I thought she would go. The film's budget was only $10 million, so they couldn't have paid her THAT much to reprise her small role. Her role, while somewhat important to the main story, is hardly necessary, and less talented actresses could have been brought in for all the effort put into the part.

You know they're evil because they're wearing black in the desert

The story is hardly a home run shot either, as the movie takes the Parody Express, borrowing from every 80's and 90's action films that have been on the big screen.  it even seems to borrow from other parodies, most notably those of the hilarious Hot Shots films. This was to be expected in the news of it's production, but you still can't help but be disappointed when the film fails to be innovative. As noted before, it relies heavily on gross-out humor ("I like holes") in it's execution, and very little of the film feels at all "smart". While it's by far the best SNL-skit film since the original Wayne's World, it's nowhere near the older film's level of IQ or humor. It does however retain the charm of the original skit, thanks mostly to the performances of it's leads.

He's more of a "three wire" guy

Though MacGruber does run out of steam towards the end, it was great to see the climactic "bomb diffusing" scene play straight out of a SNL skit, and it was very surprising to find that this film was much funnier than it had any business being, considering the source. Though a long way away from their best films,MacGruber may be the beginning of a new series of films from Lorne Michael's skit library. And if those films can come anywhere close to MacGruber, than they'll be funnier than a hundred Coneheads or It's Pat. It's funny. It's silly. It has little in the way of redeemable qualities, and it was a box office flop for a reason. But it's cotton candy.

And that's okay.

Gone Fishing

Online dating is nothing new. Pretty much since the invention of the Internet males and females of all ages have attempted to use the tools available on the inter-web to meet, greet, and facilitate communication with people of the opposite sex. There are thousands of sites out there with the expressed purpose of getting to to see someone, even specialized sites for any subgroup you might want to focus on, such as Jewish, environmentally friendly, or even video gamers. Millions of people are currently signed up for one of these sites, but often you don't have to be to meet someone online.

Catfish looks at the modern day relationship by examining NYC photographer Nev Schulman, who has recently made the acquaintance of an 8-year old art prodigy from Michigan, Abby Pierce, who saw one of his paintings in a newspaper and sends him a painting of it. Nev is so impressed that he begins personal relations with the Pierce family, who continue to send him paintings of his photos as he talks to mother Angela on the phone, and becomes Facebook friends with the entire family, including Abby's father, brother, and finally her sister Megan. All this is captured on film by Nev's filmmaker brother Ariel Schulman and friend Henry Joost, who try to get every moment even when Nev is in no mood for their company. They're simply looking to make a documentary about the friendship between Nev and Abby, but end up with something completely different.

The resemblance was much more uncanny in a dark theater

It's obvious from the word go that Nev is very attracted to sister Megan. Megan works as a veterinarian, but is also artistically talented, as we as the viewing audience are treated to songs she's apparently sung, art she's apparently painted, and she is also a big fan of dance and ballet, which is often the subject of Nev's work. Very quickly (and under the watchful eye of Ariel and Henry), Nev is constantly in conversation with Megan, whether on the phone, on Facebook or via text message, but never in person. That is, until one of the crew finally speaks up and says they should visit Megan in Michigan as a surprise.

The perfect online girlfriend, Megan Faccio

You very quickly become accustomed to the film's playful tone as you watch this modern-day romance play out in front of you. Ariel and Henry are constantly playing around, and not always to the purpose of cheering up Nev from one of his moods. Nev seemingly doesn't like the fact that his life is supposedly under 24-hour surveillance, but the others prevail and we get pretty much a whole story told in 94 minutes, with a fun musical playlist accompanying the action on screen when applicable. It's obviously an upbeat film, not one to easily dismiss and draw your attention away, as my inability to draw my attention from the screen for about 90% of the film's screen time would attest. And it ends on such a sweet note you're not sure what you're feeling for hours after you leave the theater.

Road trip! Wooo!

There has been tons of speculation as to whether this film is really a documentary or in fact a fictional story done in a documentary fashion. I'm not sure where the idea for this came from, as while it's not like you're normal documentary like Supersize Me or An Inconvenient Truth where you're bombarded with facts left and right, there certainly seems to be nothing SO out of the realm of possibility as to be obviously in error. It's a very confined story, by no means anything more than a romantic story between Nev and the woman in Michigan, and not meant to be an allegory to online dating or Facebook in general. In truth, do I believe what happened in this film to be factual? To be honest, it was so unbelievable an experience, I think it MUST be true.

Spending a little too much time online

The film does have some slow parts towards the end, mostly in wrapping up the story and summarizing. These are merely nitpicks, however, as even as a factual event this is one of the best stories I've seen this year and don't doubt it speaks more to the Internet's influence on everyday life and society than David Fichner's biopic of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg could hope to (not that I know for certain, and I still plan to see it). In the end, Catfish is a sweet, fun, unique and unusual love story that you'd better not let anyone spoil for you so you can enjoy it to the full extent you should. I've got it at #4 for the year, I enjoyed it that much.

Awww, look at the happily Photoshopped, naked couple

One last word, thanks and shoutout to my buddy Dan J. for getting me to see this film (even if he only wanted someone to talk to about it) and providing the movie gift card that paid for it.

Push Back

I'm pretty lucky to have friends who like the same sort of movies I do. When Push came out last year, I never had the chance to see it in theaters, and it's time in the theater was short, anyway. I never really had a chance to see it, so when the opportunity to borrow someone's copy came up, I leaped at the chance to temporarily acquire this for my viewing pleasure. After all, an alternative to the over-the-top superhero stories that Marvel and DC have been cranking out with their favorite children in the lead, let alone marketing such an independent superhuman film to the big screen, is no small feat. Even if it had been a financial failure (which it wasn't), it would have been a victory for the independent filmmakers who don't want to make the next Superman or Spiderman films.

Funny meeting you here...

Push, obviously not the movie based on the Sapphire book of the same name, takes place almost entirely in Hong Kong. Nick Grant (Chris Evans) is a second-generation superhuman. Nick's father was a powerful type of superhuman known as a Mover, someone who could move objects with his mind. Nick can Move, too, but his talents are relatively weak, mostly honed by trying to rig back-alley dice games. Nick's father was killed by a secret organization of the US government known as Division, when he refused to join the organization. Nick, running away, has ended up here to avoid them. There are numerous types of superpowered beings in the world, we are told. Watchers can predict the future. Sniffers are like human bloodhounds. Bleeders send out sonic pulses that tear you apart from the inside. Shifters can manipulate an item's appearance. Shadows can block the tracking ability of Sniffers and sometimes Watchers. And Pushers can implant ideas and memories into your head that are so real you're convinced they really happened. Division wants all these superhumans in one place, for use by the government as weapons against their enemies. To that effect, they've been developing a drug to boost the powers of superhumans, only the drug has the nasty side effect of killing everyone who's injected with the serum. At least, until one unlucky soul survives, and escapes to Hong Kong...

Perhaps not surprisingly, this new Chinese pop duo haven't quite worked out

The film has on tap a surprisingly talented cast of people, whether on-the-way-up stars or underrated performers. I've seen a lot of Chris Evans lately, and his talents are obvious to anyone bothering to pay attention. He plays his role as the perfect blend of in over his head bravado and sincere honesty. I wonder how good he'll be for the starring role in next year's Captain America, but only because that character is so relatively simpler than many of the roles he's done in recent years. But even he's overshadowed by Dakota Fanning, whose superpower seems to be acting circles around everybody else in the room with her. She plays a punk-ish second generation Watcher who wants to break her mother out of a Division holding area back home. Fanning is another one of those actors who I've witnessed be lauded without having actually seen any of her work. Now I know, and it's damned mystifying how someone so young could be so imbued with talent that it's actually SCARY. At least it doesn't seem to be going to waste, even if Oscar roles haven't reared their heads her way yet.Camilla Belle is surprisingly good as the Pusher who manages to escape from Division. I say surprisingly good because I really hadn't seen her in anything and had all but tossed her aside as another side effect of the Twilight phenomena. So she has actual talent? Nice. She has great charisma for the screen, especially with Evans, which is good since their on-screen romance is half the point of the film.

Hounsou (l) and Belle are equally good here

Great small roles don't go to waste when you cast Cliff Curtis, Ming Na, Maggie Siff and Xiao Lu Li as acquaintances and enemies to the heroes. Xiao, a Golden Calf-winning Chinese actress, is a treat as one of the more charismatic villains of the film, and it's a pleasure to see Siff in anything since I have enjoyed her performance in what I've seen of Mad Men. The only really disappointing role in the film is that of the main bad guy. Don't get me wrong: Djimon Hounsou is a damned talented actor, and I believe he did everything he could with this role, that of the human face of Division, a Pusher who is attempting to find Belle's escaped inmate. His character is also the one who killed Nick's dad so long ago. The problem is the filmmakers never seem to know whether this guy is straight up badass or confusingly sympathetic. Maybe he's more like a Lex Luthor type, so arrogant that he simply fails to bother to cover his tracks or make sure everything is working right as to leave himself open for Nick's Superman. Okay, that makes some sense, but it wasn't obvious while I was watching that this was the case, nor did he make too convincing a bad man. Thankfully, he's not the only villain on the scene, as a Hong Kong Triad of superpowered Bleeders balance out the battlefield somewhat, lending more threat to the evil permeating the film.

No, this isn't a scene from the new Home Alone flick...

As I mentioned, the film was shot in Hong Kong, and it makes for a viable and unique location for this type of film. It's gritty, messy, choked with people, simultaneously the best and worst place to hide from the world. The narrow streets and passages combined with the occasional wide-open basketball courts and sky-rise rooftops make for an interesting environment in which to make this movie. Simply put, Push doesn't FEEL  like other films of it's type because it's like if the X-Men were living in a dirty slummy apartment complex instead of a quiet suburban mansion (yes, I know the X-Men now live on an island off the coast of California, but the X-Mansion is more well known). It's a different world for superhumans than we're used to from comics, and it's a refreshing change of pace.

She'll simply watch your every move... THEN she'll kill ya

The special effects are something to see. While decidedly low-tech, the effects are nonetheless engaging and realistic, perhaps due to their low-tech origins. The film's aforementioned grittiness lends itself well to this end, making things like energy balls, shattering glass, collapsing structures and dilating pupils are so real they seamlessly blend into the rest of the setting. Director Paul McGuigan can be properly given credit here for his great work using all the tools at his disposal to make each scene work. Is it as thrilling as the best parts of Watchmen or Resident Evil or even Scott Pilgrim? No, but nor does it have the lulls in between that harm action films so much. It simply is a well-balanced movie that doesn't take itself too seriously to detract from the action while also not letting the fights draw you out of the story. Unlike so many similar films, everything happens for a reason, and it all makes sense.

"So... how much do you think it's worth?"

To sum up, Push is an interesting, exciting, but also thought-provoking film that definitely stands out as one of last year's underrated titles. It's not perfect, as a little more attention to Hounsou's character would have made the film much better, but what little is wrong with it doesn't detract from what's enjoyable. If you're looking for a superhero-type film with enough action to get by but not the cliched caricatures from fifty years ago, give this a shot.

I Don't Like Sand...

Oh, how I wish I had the Sands of Time right now. Their ability to turn back time might be beneficial so that I never have to watch this Jerry Bruckheimer-produced piece of pap, the video-game inspired Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, and spend my time that I had taken watching this film doing something vastly more productive, like mime. Lacking such mystical artifacts, however, means I can only send this warning out across the web, hoping to stop any as foolish as I from falling into this film's snares.

Kingley's knighting was not as exciting as you might think

I rented this on DVD because, frankly, there wasn't anything else interesting available at the time. While I had low expectations concerning this title anyway I thought that there was no way I could be disappointed with what I saw. Besides, I was a huge fan of the Prince of Persia series of games from which this was based. The games are amazing, pitting the player as a nameless prince who discovers a magical time-reversing dagger that he can use to fix mistakes or avoid getting flattened by the evil powers he unwittingly helps unleash over the course of the game. It also featured amazing platforming puzzles, featuring risky jumps, wall-running and pole-swinging that figured to appear prominently in the film. It's a very fun series of games, and it would have to be a much more superior film than it looked like to match up accordingly.

There's a lot of jumping... shame there wasn't more

It doesn't. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time had a lot of red flags up against it. Despite being set at the height of the Persian Empire, every major character in the film is not only white, but speaks with a noticeable British accent. It's a pseudo-violent film produced by family-friendly Disney Studios. Most damningly, it is produced by Bruckheimer, for whom even his best films have big weaknesses, and rarely survive translation to sequels if successful. Nobody doubts Bruckheimer's ability to blow stuff up, it's just that every film he does nowadays ONLY knows how to do that. Big actors like Johnny Depp can't always save his pieces from the trash heap (and Depp couldn't save the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels at all), but he does instill just enough big name prowess and a little but of humor to get by. This would explain his once-kinship with Michael Bay, as the duo knew how to get people into the theaters. Regardless, such a big film - and one based on video game, no less - is right up my alley, and it would be truly be against my nature to at least give it a look.

Dastan and Tamina get in a quick wet t-shirt contest

The film opens with a silly narrative opening, explaining to the audience exactly who the Persians where and the history of the royal family, starting off by insulting the intelligence of the audience while telling us something we didn't need to immediately know. We learn that the King of the Persian Empire (Ronald Pickup, the worst name for an actor I've ever heard) has had a strong rule, two strong sons, and a brother (Ben Kingsley) who is his closest adviser. He adopted an orphan from the streets after witnessing bravery in him of some sort (I'm a little hazy on how it was so brave, but whatever), who grew up as his third son, Dastan (Jake Gyllenhaal). The kingdom is ruled under a mantle of brotherhood above all else, but that's really only a cheap plot point. The fact of the matter is, we didn't NEED all this info up front. If it had been leaked a little bit at a time to the audience over the course of the film, it would have been much more effective to the storytelling aspects of the film. Instead, we get an insulting intro.

The tension in this film is about what you can garner from this photo

After the King's first son leads an invasion of the city of Alamut, which is suspected of selling weapons to the Empire's enemies, Dastan manages to get his hands on a beautiful dagger by chance, only to later find out that this dagger was the sole reason for the invasion of the city. Soon, after being framed for his father's murder, Dastan mus go on the run with Alamut's ruler, Princess Tamina (Gemma Arterton) and try to find out who really murdered the king and to what end. It's almost laughably cliche, the plot put together for this film. Oh, a traitor, you say? Shocking! There's not a single surprising thing about this film, unless you count the fact that it for a millisecond fakes you into thinking someone else is the evil character here when everyone and their dog knows it's Ben Kingsley.

Uhm, yeah, that'll work

The film does have some good points, most notably the special effects. With some of the bigger CGI-laden scenes such as the time-traveling aspect or even one early scene with Dastan atop a pillar high above the city of Alamut, the background graphics practically scream green screen. However, the sweeping desert scenes are quite pretty, and some of the fight scenes are pretty well executed. The violence is largely bloodless, thanks to papa Disney holding the reigns. The best parts might be those decidedly low-tech, as Dastan has the natural ability, from his young life as an orphan, to climb, jump and maneuver quickly to any point to avoid capture. It's a major aspect of the games, and that the movie gives it attention at all is at least a sign that director Mike Newell was paying attention to his assistant's notes (The assistant is the one who actually played the game to give Newell all the important info he should know when he was brought in to direct, what a professional).

As a demented Jessica Rabbit clone might say: "A Maaaayn!"

The acting here is pretty bad. I won't go into the racist casting put in here, and a bulked up Gyllenhaal and the beautiful Arterton are actually not a bad pairing here, if not terribly exciting. They have good charisma together, and when they have scenes with one another, they really do have a connection between them. Gyllenhaal gets a chance to display a charm I've never seen him really put on, and Arterton has a husky voice made for these types of roles, which unfortunately doesn't mean much if she can't branch out into new character types. Most of the rest of the cast however is a mishmash of uninspired and overrated talents, many of whom have done better work elsewhere. The best of the worst is a nearly unrecognizable Alfred Molina as a desert Sheik who excels at mincing words like a used car salesman. Kingsley once again seems to have a painful disregard for the projects he signs on, as there's little in this role of the King's evil brother that needs his Oscar-winning pedigree. Steve Toussaint would have had an interesting character if it couldn't simply be boiled down to "black sidekick". Gisli Om Garoarsson is simply campy and ineffectual as the leader of a secret assassin order, called the Hassansins. I guess it's apparently taken from the real-life Hashshanshin, or Nizari Ismailis as is their true name, assassins operating at that time. Why for the film they use this similar but made up name instead of what the real name was (or why not simply "assassin"?) may not be known. Best not to dwell on it.

Being comfortable with your body is key

There wasn't really any point during this film that I was actually excited. Take away the special effects and what you're left with is a story that doesn't have too many unique elements to it (and is told poorly, to boot), plot holes you can clear in a hang glider, uninspired and uninteresting characters and the shallowest of efforts by the production team. To say I didn't like Prince of Persia would be an understatement. Perhaps the story of the game doesn't translate well to a non-interactive medium like film, but that's fine by me. I'll just pop my copy into the PS2 and enjoy myself for a spell. I've got to get Jake's pecs out of my head, after all.

Paul W.S. Anderson, Resident Genius

Thank goodness for Paul W.S. Anderson. Okay, yes, the films he has directed or produced have varied widely in quality, with Mortal Kombat, Event Horizon, Alien vs. Predator and Pandorum falling on both sides of the good/bad quality line. He's been one of the more frustrating movie makers in recent years, as for every indication he gives that he is able to make quality entertainment, the next picture he produces reeks of overly stylized, arrogant turd. Resident Evil, which he directed way back in 2002, stands as one of his better works behind the camera. Despite writing the first two sequels, Resident Evil: Apocalypse and Resident Evil: Extinction, directors Alexander Witt and Russell Mulcahy failed to match Anderson's tone and talent, leading to sequentially mediocre films that, despite their modest intent, were ultimately found lacking, especially for those like me who are fans of the games the films are based on. Anderson, however, seems to have turned a corner, choosing - instead of simply writing and funding a fourth Resident Evil film - to once again step behind the camera and put his money where his script is.

Okay, I just wanted to download some Femme Fatale images

If you HAVE been following the movies up to this point (and give yourself a round of applause if you have for making it), you probably know that what happens in the films bears little resemblance as to what happened in the original games. Yes, there are zombies, but whereas the games contained any widespread infection via natural or man-made methods, the second and third movies pretty much resulted in worldwide infection, leaving the world with little in the way of human survivors. That's where Alice comes in. Still played by Anderson's wife Milla Jovovich, Alice is still something of a mystery. Originally just an employee of the evil Umbrella Corporation (who manufactured the T-Virus that caused all the problems), Alice has been experimented on, displaying fantastic abilities and mental powers. Now, with an army of clones (experiments discovered at the end of Extinction) as her own personal army, Alice has taken the fight to Umbrella with the intent of destroying them permanently.

Oh, my, what big... swords... you have...

At least, that's how Resident Evil: Afterlight begins. Thankfully, after being treated to an explosive and bloody opening of Alice's army overtaking and destroying a secret Umbrella facility in Japan, all that is taken away by the purposeful destruction of the base (taking all the Alice clones with it), and Umbrella chairman Albert Wesker (Shawn Roberts, replacing Jason O'Mara from the original) slipping a drug into the original Alice that counteracts the virus that brought on her psychic powers in the first place. This thankfully saves the film from being a wrong-sided one-sided battle, forcing Alice to retreat and regroup. Attempting to link up with Claire Redfield (Ali Larter), who escaped to Alaska with a number of other survivors trying to find a safe haven in this hell. When she does find where the survivors escaped to however, she only finds an amnesiac Claire and no sign of any such safe location. And so the two must search for more survivors as it looks quite grim for the human race with Umbrella and billions of zombies left in charge.

Trying to look cool, Chris gets a boot in the face half a second later

Resident Evil: Afterlife was filmed using the same 3D technology James Cameron used in Avatar, and it shines more brightly here than any other 3D film released this year. Though still sometimes used for the expressed effect of the viewer feeling that something is coming right at him (not that I'm complaining, it's actually compelling here), the 3D also does a bang-up job of immersing the viewer in the environment of the movie at all times. Clouds, fog banks, running water, all are beautifully filmed to stunning effect with little to nothing looking like it doesn't belong. Five years after worldwide infection, the world has degraded, some areas worse than others. While rural Alaska is practically untouched by the zombie horde, Los Angeles is a gutted mess, with burning buildings the norm and a maximum security prison the only safe place. Anderson does a grand job of capturing the two moods, the blissful tranquility versus a dark, gloomy hole. Unlike the claustrophobic and similar-looking hallways of the original film, the director really gets a chance to play contrast, and it works out to the betterment of the film.

This image doesn't do it justice... the 3D water effects are AMAZING

The acting here is surprisingly good as well, with Jovovich all but born to play the main protagonist, Alice. As a fan of the games, it does bother me a little that a character that has no bases in the games has become the defining face of the films. Several characters from the games, from Leon Kennedy to Ada Wong have never even appeared in the films, yet Alice is probably more well known now than either. I know since the films don't share the same canon as the games, but it can still be irksome. Thankfully, Jovovich has never failed to entertain in this role, so my initial dislike can only go so far before I'm hooked. Her obnoxious voice overs aside, Alice is a force, and Jovovich carefully maintains that character well through the course of the movie, overshadowing her co-stars, though not by much. Larter puts on one of her better performances as Claire, a survivalist slowly regaining her memory over the course of the film's timeline. Prison Break's Wentworth Miller makes a great addition to the cast as Claire's brother (and RE1 original) Chris Redfield, who Alice and Claire meet in Los Angeles. In Chris, we have a soldier shocked to discover that his sister has survived the apocalypse that has swallowed the world, and Miller does a great job of conveying his strength, professionalism, and determination with little need for overly dramatic dialogue to prove the fact. Other notable additions to the cast are Boris Kodjoe as a former professional athlete and celebrity who shares some tender moments with Alice, and Kim Coates as a one-time Hollywood agent who has had a difficult time of establishing himself in this new world. Roberts is good in an over-the-top way as Albert Wesker, doing a good approximation of Wesker a la Code Veronica. Sure, he's almost hokey, but considering the character was always somewhat hokey in the games (when he wasn't deadly dangerous), it fits the character profile perfectly. This is by far the most impressive cast put together for this film franchise, and the movie comes out amazingly for it.

Whoops, now you've done it!

The game again borrows liberally from the monster gallery that inhabits the games, including two never before seen enemy types to the film. Well, moviegoers like myself might not have recognized them, but a little research does wonders. All new zombies with faces that part to show tendrils and teeth manage to dig their way into more than a few crevices, and a huge, lumbering monster with a hood over his head and a ginormous axe for a weapon are the main additions to the series, known as "majini" and the "Executioner", respectively. Both come from the Resident Evil 5 game, which of course is the only game in the main series I've yet to even play. Their addition was made welcome by the fact that they created a whole new dynamic from the typical zombie fare, and the tremendous 3D effects meant that unlike the Nemesis in Apocalypse or the Tyrant in Extinction, you never felt like Alice was just fighting a guy in a rubber suit (which, when they took a punch, the costume would depress in such a way as to actually look like a rubber suit) when taking on the Executioner. The monster effects are amazing overall, and never detract from the movie for one iota.

Yeah, I'd add "run" to the top of my "to do" list about now...

Cynics will critique Resident Evil: Afterlight for not being true canon, as prescribed by the games. I won't argue with that fact. At first, it seemed like the films in this series were trying to establish a new story based on the same continuity, but now what seems to be happening is the opposite. While still respecting the source material when relating to characters from the game, the film franchise has become something else entirely, using those same characters, monsters and relationships to tell it's OWN continuity, something I didn't think I'd see from this series. It's quite impressive what Anderson's been able to accomplish here, and I have to give him credit for not being handicapped by the original material and putting together his own interpretation of where the series wants to go.

It ended in 2009, but Miller is still trying to stage a Prison Break

Is Resident Evil: Afterlight a perfect movie? Heck, no. Like the earlier movies, it has little to no regard for it's original characters, killing off the most useless ones quickly and messily. Also, while the plot is better than those of the last two films, that's not saying much, and the quick reboot of Alice's powers and clones is a clear sign that Anderson knew he made a mistake introducing those elements in the last movie. It's still the best 3D movie I've seen this year, however, even beating out the very fun Piranha 3D, and I'm as shocked as you to announce that it's now my new #7 film of 2010. It probably won't stay there, but as the reigning king of 3D films, it earned it's spot.

Yeah, my thoughts exactly

Now if you'll excuse me, I've got six different Resident Evil games on my living room shelf that are now begging to be picked up and replayed.

Good Morning Sunshine, The Earth Says Hello...

It's quite often that I miss films in the theater. I may be looking forward to a movie and it may simply pass without my knowledge or ability to get a chance to see it, or it may simply be too far down my list of titles to see that by the time I get around to it, it's out of theaters. This happens often, and usually the only way to rectify that situation is to nab a rental copy and hope your home setup is good enough to watch movies on. This happened three years ago for me with Sunshine, the 2007 sci-fi film directed by Danny Boyle and written by Alex Garland about a group of astronauts and scientists sent on a mission to save the planet.

The problem is the sun, which by the year 2057 has diminished in it's brightness, leading to the Earth undergoing a new Ice Age. Icarus II is the second ship to attempt this dangerous mission, to deliver a "stellar bomb" to attempt to reignite the sun and return it to full brightness. The first Icarus failed it's mission seven years ago after losing contact with Earth, and if Icarus II fails there will be no further Icarus missions, as Icarus II has used up the Earth's supply of fusion materials. The team of eight includes physicist Robert Capa (Cillian Murphy), who is the only crew member who can properly operate the bomb; Kaneda (Hiroyuki Saneda), the ship's captain; hotheaded engineer Mace (Chris Evans); Harvey (Troy Garity), the ship's communications officer and second in command; biologist Corazon (Michelle Yeoh), who maintains the ship's oxygen garden; Cassie (Rose Byrne), the pilot; Searle (Cliff Curtis), the doctor and psychological officer; and Trey (Benedict Wong), the navigator. They've been living together en route to their destination for about fifteen months, and are on the last leg of their journey. Nerves are starting to fray due to the insularity of the mission and solar radiation cutting off communication from home. However, the estimates of oxygen supply and food look good, and the people aboard are fairly confident that they have enough resources to return home once their mission is complete.

Then things begin to go horribly wrong.

And to think, in three years he's on Lost

One of the reasons I wanted to see this film was all the good names attached to it. Danny Boyle made one of my favorite zombie films 28 Days Later, and it would be just one more year until his triumphant Slumdog Millionaire made him a superstar. Alex Garland may have also penned the screenplay for The Beach, which is almost unforgivable, but he is a talented writer with interesting ideas, and I loved his books The Beach (for which the movie was based) and The Tesseract, and he also wrote the screenplay for 28 Days Later. Chris Evans, though I'd seen nothing by him at the time, was an up-and-coming star. Michelle Yeoh was a superstar both here and at home in Hong Kong. All you needed at this point was a believable (or at least theoretically possible) premise and scenarios to make the whole thing salable, and thankfully, that's what Boyle does in telling this story.

No, in this film she doesn't rounhouse kick anyone

The ensemble acting cast does a fantastic job of portraying the everyday lives of deep space astronauts, each with varied quirks and breaking points. Murphy, as the brainy scientist, plays up his relative social inexperience well, as he speaks on a more blunt and scientific level than most on the ship. Evans plays the more typical military type, and though that type of character has little imagination in fiction, Evans does good work with it. Yeoh and Saneda make good mentors, Saneda's captain willing to risk anything for the mission to succeed, and Yeoh cultivates a believable relationship with her work, the oxygen garden she builds almost like her own baby. Byrne and Wong are both good, though neither is given too terribly much to do. Wong's character does go through a believable mental breakdown (as do most of the characters, to some degree) but neither really steals the spotlight from the others. Garity makes a great transformation from strong second in command to mewling child when adversity hits, and Curtis is possibly the best performer of them, a psychologist who seems to have an unhealthy fascination with the brightness of the sun. With this well balanced cast, we really get attached to most of them and are upset when the bad things that eventually happen come to be.

Wow, just... wow.

The special effects here are also larger than life, as they would have to be in most outer space filmography. The design of Icarus II is intricately designed, and looks amazing against the setting of deep space. Sunlight and solar flares twinkle realistically, and explosions, decompression and scorching do a great job of showing the dangers inherent in space travel. That said, some of the best effects of the film are appreciably better on a small scale, as most of the scenes are set in the almost claustrophobic halls of the ship. Boyle was inspired by Wolfgang Petersen's Das Boot in this way, and also has noted inspiration from other famous works, including 2001: A Space Odyssey, Alien, and the original Solaris.

Unfortunately, that's where the good in Sunshine ends. The final act is an unbelievable and oddly mediocre change of pace for the film, like something out of Event Horizon instead of the film I thought Sunshine was. To say anything more would spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen the film, but it seems lie the change might have been made to reach out to a wider audience. Also, so much derivative material means there's precious little that Doyle or Garland thought up on their own, making this film somewhat less special than it could have been. There are parts you will see coming a mile away, people you will know to be killed long before it happens, and only sterling acting and amazing effects prevent these parts from being such trite rubbish as they threaten to be.

Murphy literally plans to touch the sky here

Ultimately, I liked Sunshine. I do wish I'd seen the film in theaters, especially since it was a bomb and didn't make back it's $40 million price tag due mostly to nearly nonexistent marketing here in the States. Seeing it finally three years later however let me appreciate it for what it is, however, not what it was supposed to be then. In the end it's an interesting take on the "saving the world" tale, with a great ensemble cast and enough gritty storytelling to make the shoddy ending bearable. If you haven't seen it yet, I definitely recommend it.

Do the Machete Mambo

Three years ago, at the beginning of the evening showing of Grindhouse, the twin-bill homage to exploitation films of yesteryear by bro-mancers and directors Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, there was a trailer - a fake, mind you - of an ultraviolent film featuring a Mexican vigilante aiming to take out opponents of illegal immigration. At the end of the carnage-filled trailer, my immediate thought - like, I imagine, so many who watched that evening - was, God help me, I'd watch that if it was real. Apparently Robert Rodriguez thought so, too. And so, Machete has come to a theater near you.

Danny Trejo: The ugliest lead action star ever

Starring Rodriguez regular Danny Trejo in his first starring role as the titular Machete Cortez (yes, folks, that's apparently his real name), the film doesn't deviate much from it's original trailer, as Machete, an immigrant to the state of Texas after being driven out of his home Mexico by evil drug cartels, is hired off the street to assassinate a Senator with a hard-nosed stance against illegal immigration (Robert Deniro) by an unscrupulous businessman (Jeff Fahey). However, Machete is double-crossed, and soon finds himself surrounded on all sides by enemies, from the Senator and the businessman to a suspiciously-funded group of border vigilantes led by a man named Von (Don Johnson), and the rapidly-expanding drug cartel led by the man who drove Machete out of Mexico, Torrez (Steven Seagal). Machete's allies? The Network, a group of immigrants led by the mysterious She (Michelle Rodriguez), who work tirelessly to help people over the border and find work, and possibly an INS agent by the name of Sartana (Jessica Alba), who is the first to learn of Machete's former Federale status.

The shots are more lovely than Trejo... okay, that's not saying much

The first thing you notice about this film is the mostly-Latin cast. Of course you have Trejo, who is of Mexican descent, and so are Alba and another Rodriguez regular, Cheech Marin. Rodriguez' family is from Puerto Rico, and most of the "good guy" characters, and almost all the supporting and minor characters, are played by Latin American actors. In fact, the only non-Latin actors in the movie portray the bad guys, with Fahey, Deniro, Johnson, Tom Savini, Shea Wigham and Seagal being Machete's opposition, though Seagal does portray a Mexican character. It seems an odd choice, but Rodriguez was probably attempting to not have any Latin actor be the bad guy and instead led them be the universally good characters this time around. The only possible exception to the bad-white-guy rule would be Lindsay Lohan's portrayal of Fahey's character's daughter, but that's a whole can of beans I'll open up later.

Trejo looks for a bear to wrestle

The acting here is mostly poor and cliched, but let's face it: Acting was never to be the main draw of Machete. Trejo is out of his element and league as an actor in the leading role. Usually good as a backup character or supporting role, his muscled frame matches what's needed for a physically-demanding role like this, but the character doesn't have much personality to express in the movie. He's a Mexican ex-Federale with a penchant for blades, that's pretty much it. Trejo doesn't so much act as grimace his way throughout the film, not helped at all by the cliched dialogue. It wouldn't be so bad if I didn't know that he could do better, but he comes off as a poor-man's Mexican Seagal instead of a potential future leading actor. Speaking of Seagal, his performance as the drug lord Torrez is laughably bad, speaking as to why he hasn't had a theatrically-released film since 2001.

Rodriguez actually displays some emotion in Machete... but not THAT much

Better are some of the supporting cast, including Michelle Rodriguez, who actually puts hints of emotion into her performance, as opposed to her usual tough-girl act. Alba is solid as well, though her character gets a little off-the-wall towards the end. I can only attribute this to the material given her rather than her talent, which is pretty good. Fahey, who I loved as pilot Frank Lapidus in Lost, also grimaces his way through this film, though he shows a little more charisma than Trejo. Deniro, the only legitimate big name on the cast, is actually surprisingly good as good-old-boy Senator McLaughlin, as he actually seems to act his way through scenes, as opposed to simply showing up. This is a credit to Deniro - who certainly did not have a serious, award-winning role on his hands - to be the consummate professional and give his all to the performance. Johnson is mediocre but with a small enough role that his performance can be overlooked, and Cheech Marin is okay as Machete's priest brother who is also good at handling firearms. At least their characters are important to the movie's plot. Lohan's character doesn't do THAT much, as her drug-addicted Internet whore turned gun-wielding nun is about as necessary as it sounds. I feel bad that Lohan's potential talent has gone to waste in recent years due to personal issues and drug problems, but the director did her no favors with this casting as the role was completely unnecessary. It wasn't even as if the film needed another strong female character, as Alba and Rodriguez had that covered.

There's no excuse for putting Steven Seagal in a theatrical release

The film starts off with a bang, with Machete and his... um... machete cutting a bloody swath through a number of Mexican drug-runners in an amazing opening sequence that features blood, dismemberment, and nudity, each in vast quantities. From this opening sequence, you imagine that the film will be full of amazing sequences, but it's something of a sham. The opener is the best, most exciting part of the film, even with Seagal as part of it. From there, however, the action tones down considerably and we're part of a completely different film, though the action sequences do make sporadic appearances. These scenes fail to match the intensity of the opener, but there are a few imaginative scenes that make up for it (such as Machete using one man's intestines as a rappelling line) and they never fail to pick up the viewer's interest if it's wandered. The sexuality of the film also tones down, with Rodriguez and Alba, while both could be defined as sex symbols, rarely over-provocative in their dress. They did keep in the nude pool scene from the original trailer, but that's the most stimulating the movie gets in that aspect. When the final battle comes, it's disappointing in it's execution, as what could have been more of a big show is muddled into a weak fight, lousy climax, and uninspired ending.

The "Grindhouse Twins" reappear in grand fashion

You have to give credit where credit is due. Robert Rodriguez came out to make HIS movie, a Mex-ploitation with a name-brand cast, a memorable title character, and good tongue-in-cheek humor. But that's also the problem, as Rodriguez, while obviously compelled to recreate the exploitation and blackspoitation films of yesteryear, adds little more than his heritage to a genre that went out of mainstream fashion decades ago. The film is good enough to get by, but it's neither the best action film of the year nor even the best with Rodriguez' name attached to it (that would be the Rodriguez-produced Predators). My friend Ed asked me recently if whether I thought Machete or The Expendables was the better action film this year. My answer? Machete might have had the better humor and a story debating the illegal immigration issue, but it just doesn't compare to The Expendables, as the latter was the better overall film. In the end, Machete might distract you with it's laughs, violence and multicultural cast, but that doesn't make it as good a movie as you might think. It's okay, but not much more than that.

Raise your Machete if need to use the head!