It’s so close. So, so, so, so close! This is the first time we have people who seem to actually enjoy the source material, which, yes, I know it’s toys, but with Bay’s disdain for the material, Rise of the Beasts being so bizarrely sombre approach to the material, and fuck Bumblebee, here’s the first Transformers movie, yes, even counting the 1986 movie, that stands proudly and says “these toys have a story worth telling!” And if we’re going to keep making these movies, passion from the filmmakers needs to matter. The animation, especially considering it was a $75 million budget, is wonderful. The voice acting is tremendous, putting any of my fears of soulless celebrity casting to shame. The score… is fine… (which isn’t up to standard for Transformers movies.) But most importantly, the story concept is inspired, emotional, and powerful. It’s when we get to the telling and pacing of the story where we find some hesitation from me to call this a masterpiece.
Is this the best Transformers movie? I think so. Is this the best movie in this series, just as a film on its own, that’s where I am less convinced. Again, conceptually, this movie is pretty perfect. Taking us back to the origins of Optimus Prime and Megatron, back when they were known as Orion Pax and D-16, it’s honestly a story I didn’t think could ever work as a film, and again, while I have problems I need to address, they make this succeed more than I would have even though initially possible. I think a lot of people will like this movie, hardcore fans or not, simply because the story outline is so strong, and the way it’s presented will make it easy for casual audiences to find investment, especially those who have had a general liking for the previous Transformers cinematic ventures. Orion and D are very likable as the film initially gets going, and I really respect the film for not trying too hard to heavily foreshadow the downfall their friendship is about to experience, because when it does happen, it is for the most part, heartbreaking.
The problems for the film begin for me when the movie theoretically should be at its high point. Again, I think in a general sense, the first half is pretty strong in letting the audiences guard down and making them think this is just going to be a basic family film about robots, making the midpoint plot revelations act as a punch in the gut, showing exactly how the cogless miners, especially D-16, feel about learning the truths of their lives and the society of Cybertron. I do think the problem is, and this is something I almost never take issue with, I think this movie bit off more than it could chew. For more than a decade now, I’ve had to deal with Marvel films that were so scarce on story content for the sake of “building a cinematic universe”, that I have been begging for either overly stuffed films (Which DC films were more than happy to provide for me in the meantime) over these barley full products Marvel was spoonfeeding us all. But now, we have a movie that seemed pretty well paced in its first half, but then tries to cram in a trilogy worth of story into it’s 2nd half.
D-16 is where this rushed feeling hurts the most. Having seen the film a handful of times now (literally 5), I think I can mostly follow what the filmmakers were going for, but it creates a dehumanizing effect on our fallen hero when he goes from one of the most gentle characters to the most sadistic and violent. I’ve heard explanations by other reviewers that show D as violent in nature before the mid way reveals, so that explains why he would behave the way that he does, becoming Megatron, but I don’t find those claims accurate. If anything, Scarlet Johanson’s character, Elita-One, who is admittedly the least developed of the four main characters, is the one character who is prone to violence more than the rest of them. Sure, D punches Orion in the face when Darkwing gets on their case at work, but that’s to protect Orion from an even more severe beating from Dark Wing. Again, the reason for D’s fall is absolutely inspired and a new spin on the Megatron origin story I can embrace. To have his fate determined at his creation and his freedom literally stolen from him along with his Transformation Cog, it’s brilliant story conception, I absolutely love it. I just think they’re making a huge leap to have him being such a friendly and gay character with Orion to have him happily murdering other Cybertronians and betraying his best friend (or possibly lover.), and it makes it hard for us to sympathize with him, which we need in this movie.
I think we could have fixed this if we spent more time with the High Guard led by Starscream, and D decided that tyranny was the only way to live and rule through them. I guess in a way, that is what happened, but it’s done in such a short amount of time, that it makes D a little too unsympathetic for me. Believe me, I am moved to tears by the betrayed feeling D is going through, when he says, “No, I want to kill him!” when he initially learns the truth, I am feeling that emotion, but to have him go from gentle pacifist to violent dictator in a matter of hours makes this feel like we’re missing scenes or they just assumed we would go along with it because he’s Megatron. Maybe they’re right in a general audience sense, but like I’ve said, this is Transformers, I really want this to work for me.
I’m almost inclined to believe there were just scenes cut that help pace this out better, because the visuals the film uses to tell the story of Megatron’s fall are all powerful and moving, especially in the final climactic moments of the film.
In a way, I do love this movie, just because it tried harder than any other Transformers movie before it to have an emotionally resonant story. Even with my love for Age of Extinction, and even if I want to argue that movie has a stronger overall film narrative with a fully fleshed out story, this is the first time I felt love for the series and its characters.If you were ever interested in Transformers, absolutely give this a watch (hurry before it leaves theaters forever), but I will probably continue to be that asshole who counters everyone saying “Finally, a great Transformers movie!” by saying “Yes- but…”
You made me unattracted to Margaret Qualley, that is an achievement of some sort.
I thought about 2 films that I think I like more than The Substance, but one of the comparisons is also in a way favorable. The story and narrative this film has to offer is in a way more of what I wanted from Maxxxine earlier this year, because that film was a much more extreme and intense look at feminine beauty standards. Admittedly Maxxxine is only partly about that topic, but still, I may have enjoyed Maxxxine more if it’s plot was more like the Substance.
Weirdly though, I am asking a movie to be in a franchise as if that would make it better. I think I am just talking conceptually, if this was the 3rd film in the X trilogy, I would find some bizarre satisfaction in that (bizarre satisfaction was probably part of Ti West and Mia Goth’s MO). While there were elements of Maxxxine I enjoyed, and it’ll be a 4k blu ray I’ll be happy to add to my collection, it’s almost pedestrian plot and reveals left me feeling a little disappointed in what began as a mind-mess of a duology. I’m supposed to be reviewing The Substance, aren’t I?
The Substance is a wonderful mind-mess in concept, but upon initial viewing, left a lot to be desired narratively. If you just wanna go see a mainstream film and be totally grossed out, this will absolutely suffice. I haven’t been more disturbed visually by a film since (insert repressed memory here). My problems came more towards the end of the film when I was seeing lots of holes in how all of the thematic’s were supposed to come together, and especially in my post screening thoughts on the movie. I found the way writer and director Coralie Fargeat decided to plot out her metaphor frustrating and dissatisfying.
Going into this movie, having just seen the trailer, it did present itself with a big hurdle that I think it needed to jump over in order to have any kind of real resonance beyond, “yuck…” You watch the trailer, you hear the premise, you know what this movie is generally going to be about and what its general message is going to be. Beauty standards are bad and unfair. Totally fine message, but the movie should really work to say something beyond that broad stroke to have any lasting worth. Unfortunately, upon first viewing, it failed to say anything beyond the expected message, which was disappointing seeing how extreme the visuals and sensations were and how long the film ran. There was an opportunity here to create a film environment so chaotic and unrealistic that I could embrace this as a just for fun and yucks metaphor, kind of like how I’ve chosen to embrace trash films such as Batman v Superman, but given the initial story set-up, we find ourselves trapped in an film arena that is ill defined in the end. The other film I thought of throughout this screening was mother! By Darran Arinofski, which I will bring in the comparisons to now:
The weirdest story decision I can’t get a grasp on is to establish that Demi Moore’s character (which may as well have been named “Her”) was an oscar winning actress who is now at the end of her career as a workout show host. Because of this character set up, it feels like it’s establishing that the workout show is supposed to be the end or low point of her once adored career, but when she does become the other (Qualley’s version of Her), she only focuses on becoming the most adored workout model in the world, which I guess leads to a holiday special variety show, but my point is, it feels like she’s supposed to be building back up her career as an adored Hollywood actress, but then it never comes up again, and I could probably accept it if they addressed it, but she never looks at acting for her career again, it all becomes about being this flawless model.
I think the film’s environment would have been established better if she was a committed and proud aerobics instructor, so when the world goes completely insane at the end, we already have a heightened reality that we started off from. To establish her motivations as more common and realistic in the beginning only to drop that part of her character 30 minutes in created this narrative bump that kept nagging at me once we got into the films main focus.
Now, there should be room for this movie to start with pure reality to then descend into madness, but with how things are introduced then dropped, this doesn’t feel like a careful narrative that portrays a descent into madness, it just feels like a sloppy screenplay that needed to cut some ideas from older drafts.
I thought of mother! a lot during The Substance, because even if you don’t like it’s attempt at allegory, it establishes an environment where the rules and reality seem consistent enough in it’s own world, it doesn’t try to say one thing is important in in the beginning to the drop it 30 minutes in so the world can fall apart. And maybe that’s more of my issue more than any world being unrealistic. We’re told something matters in the beginning, and then it really doesn’t matter again, even though the movie tries to act like it does in its final shot. I want to embrace both mother! and The Substance as fun allegorical descents into madness, but I think mother! works better because what matters in that movie stays consistent, and in The Substance it does not.
I will give the movie credit that even if the message is simplistic, I could see someone who doesn’t think much about the harm beauty standards can cause, being affected by this and causing them to be more sensitive about the subject. I do think there will be and I have already seen, an excited audience for this, but I wonder how long it will stick with them. But to celebrate any positives we can for the moment, it’s always good to see an original film, especially such an extreme horror thriller such as this, play to such a wide audience and for it to mostly have been embraced by a decent number of movie goers. Movies like this being hit is always a good thing, because it will encourage more experimentation by the studios to try and produce more extreme and powerful films. Just maybe next time I’ll be able to embrace and appreciate the overall product we got.
Bottom line, if you want an excuse to scream, yell “ew, gross!”, or just see something that isn’t a Disney or Marvel film, give it a shot. But if you’re really looking for a complex narrative that can really add to your understanding of beauty standards as a societal issue, it might make you more empathetic to the victims’ plight, but it won’t give you any interesting take on how to solve the problem, but maybe that was never the point.
Star Trek Beyond is the latest of the Star Trek films. It stars Chris Pine as Captain James T. Kirk and Zachery Quinto as Enterprise Science Officer Spock. There is, in fact, no dog in the film.
This was my most anticipated summer blockbuster of 2016, after the dismal results of J.J. Abrams previous efforts into the Star Trek film canon, Into Darkness (2013), I was ready to embrace any new writing and directing team, and coming into the film, the writers room had at least one exciting name there. Simon Pegg who has also been delivering a good performance as the iconic character Montgomery Scott, Scotty, for the past two films. Pegg has played the role of screenwriter before for some critically acclaimed films such as the “Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy/Cornetto Trilogy” consisting of Shaun of the Dead (2004), Hot Fuzz (2007) and most recently The Worlds End (2013). He has also earned a certain amount of nerd cred in geek communities with social media actions, such as being a film celebrity that tweeted out the original 70 Minute Phantom Menace Mr. Plinkett Review. Justin Lin may have led fans to have another cold shudder because of resume that listed Fast & Furious and Fast & Furious 6. You can rest assured, this is the most reserved and slow paced Star Trek film in the reboot series.
Since the reboot cast has never been the issue, we should be all set for one of the best Star Trek films of all time. It starts off meta enough about the state of the franchise, with an exhausted Captain Kirk asking himself about half way into their five year mission of exploration, about why he even sighed up for Star Fleet to begin with, but the movie never really gives Kirk a story arc to help renew his love of exploration or being a Captain, it just kind of feels like an excuse to say, don’t worry, Star Trek will always be here, and it is still about diversity over adversity.
The film is not without its strong elements. The new character Jaylah has the potential to be the most fun Star Trek character that has ever been introduced. She is a self-raised refugee stuck on the planet that acts as the films primary setting, and has great rapport with an otherwise exhausted cast, playing the innocent but still competent and tough youth.
Half the action of the picture feels standard and rather dull, such as the initial attack on the ship that leads us into act two, as well as the final climatic battle between Kirk and the final big bad of the picture. These more mediocre sequences are balanced out by the sequences found in the middle of the film, such as when a small portion of the crew has to hatch an escape plane to help rescue the rest of the crew who are being held by the main villain, Krall. There is also an inspired sequence in how the Enterprise crew defeats the swarm of enemy ships in the third act.
This is by no means a bad Star Trek film when all things are considered, it contains enough good moments that should leave hungry fans satisfied, but as sloppy as the J.J. directed films could be, they at least went all out in their vision, and were driven by ambitious scripts that at least had something different to say compared to other Star Trek movies, where Beyond mostly seems comfortable to just reinforce the ideas that this franchise will never die, so why don’t we pay lip service to the importance of diversity again, especially in how the villain is handled and used for the overall narrative.
Resident Evil (2002) written and directed by Paul W.S. Anderson is no way to begin a franchise for me. This one is almost irredeemable. I appreciate that Anderson tried to make a movie first, and a tribute to the video game second, but the dull characterization and forgettable film-making, it makes this one basically unwatchable for me, but I would not argue with someone who said they liked it. I just feel nothing for it.
The series did get better. Each installment, I found myself perking up. Director Alexander Witt’s Apocalypse is a less dull version of Escape from New York for me, and I know a lot of people are going to hate me for saying that, but if you cannot accept that some people are gonna find that Carpenter movie sleep inducing, you’re being pretentious. Because Apocalypse had a bigger budget, they were able to cover more ground in the world, and showed a more full picture of an “apocalypse” centered around Raccoon City, and as apocalyptic movies go, I like the way this zombie outbreak is executed. The characters are still paper thin, but the cast is at least a little more distinct with Oded Fehr showing up to smile and look cool, Mike Epps adding some comic relief to help me stay awake, Milla Jovovich coming into her own as the series protagonist, proving herself a capable cool gal baddass, and someone dressed up as Jill Valentine. I think this movies way easier to watch and get through than the first, with the more distinct locations, characters, and dynamic storytelling.
Director Russell Mulcahy’s Extinction may be the high point for me in this series. It’s fair to mention that while series instigator Paul W.S. Anderson is off directing other projects such as Alien vs. Predator (A movie much better than all these RE films), he is still the soul screenwriter on all six movies, so this is in a way, his story through and through, even with the second and third entries being directed by other talent. This is the movie where most of my interest in the series comes from. It has the best look of all six films, with the possible exception being the final film, but it puts the themes and ideas I find the most engaging with about this series in the forefront. I like the idea of the main character being a woman, Alice, who has been violated by the evil Umbrella Corporation (in that they have genetically modified her to experiment how to make super-humans) and Alice constantly having to fight against the virus in her that Umbrella tries to use to control her. This all kind of reminds me of the themes explored in Ex Machina, albeit in a junk genre film, and none of it is particularly amazingly done, but its an idea not represented very often in film, that I want to at least analyze it to embrace it for all the value it has to offer. There are plenty of movies about stoic male action heroes that kill with a blank look on his face, but here’s one about a woman doing it, and it is still wrapped in themes about how Corporations run by men still want to dehumanize and use her for their own nefarious means. Where the movie falters is in an uneven pace. It starts off with a really exciting, almost exploitative scene of a family trying to rob and rape Alice, and she’s able to overcome and defeat them, and there are a lot of scenes that focus on Alice trying to reconnect with her allies from the last movie while also trying to keep her distance in case Umbrella takes control of her body, but there are not a lot of exciting actions scenes throughout the movie, so while this might be one of the more thoughtful Resident Evil films in terms of character and theme, it lacks any of the exciting pacing like Apocalypse had.
After Life marks the return of the writer director who started this all, Paul W.S. Anderson, and it announces that this series is going to return to a safe and clean vision. This film is much better than Anderson’s first film in my opinion, and in a way, fixes a lot of the pacing problems of Extinction, and the problems of staying focused that Apocalypse suffered from at times, but we’re left with a piece that feels a lot colder and less inspired than the last two entries. Don’t get me wrong, all previous RE films are not wells in inspiration, they all copied their premises and setting from other more successful genre films. The first film was Aliens (1986), the second was Escape from New York (1981) and Extinction was taking from all the Mad Max films. This time, it is Dawn of the Dead, but it seems like Anderson is stealing more from the Zack Snyder remake than the Romero original. Both are fine films, but when you rip from a more recent film, it feels more like sad imitation than paying tribute to a classic. To be fair, it is not even mall in After Life, instead it is a prison, but the dynamic feels very similar, there’s a rich character whose greed and selfishness endangers the rest of the group, and there’s someone in a jail cell they have to learn to trust and work with. These are all things from the remake of Dawn. It’s just strange, because Andersons going to remake the Dawn remakes opening in the next sequel The existential questions about Alice are pretty unimportant in this one, but she’s still doing what she can with the role to make it empowering to watch without being completely dehumanized, and just being an empty shell that kicks and shoots quarters and zombies. This is the least interesting of the three sequels so far for me. still much better than the first film, but I think when Anderson is directing, your going to get a safer film, but a less interesting one.
I remember only forgetting Anderson’s follow-up sequel Retribution, so I expected this to be on par with the dullness of the first film. I ended up liking it more than After Life, but I think it got better and worse when looking at it objectively. I think the overall action and scope of the story/world got a lot better here. In After Life, everything felt incredibly small, because the first act is about Alice and Claire just wandering around, the second act is just hanging out in a prison, and the third act is this silly climax where Alice has a discount Matrix fight scene with Wesker and a few of his zombie dogs. Some of it was fun, and it was more focused than the two film that came before it, but it also just was not very exciting at the end of the day. This one, I can’t say I was personally that excited still, but at least all the cities being stored in this facility created an interesting geography dynamic, where they can wander from Tokyo to Moscow in a few steps. I think Anderson finally made the existential drama that surrounds Alice’s character the focus in one of his films, and that stuff is actually pretty effective, again, taking into account the kind of movie this is. Adding the daughter also adds an interesting dynamic, where we get to see a child clone have to face the truth behind her existence. Look, I’m sure any film snobs still reading this are just laughing at how seriously I’m taking these films so far, but that’s what we do on this blog. I do want to understand what was resonating with people in this series that made it to six feature films. A video game movie series is lucky to get one sequel, this has five sequels. There is nothing particularly inspired about the aesthetics or design of these movies, but something about this female lead action series resonated with enough of an audience to make it the most successful video game franchise of all time, and honestly untilWonder Woman1984 comes out, this is the most successful female lead action movie franchise. (Alien is not an action franchise). Even if it was just on a subconscious level, I think there was something empowering about Alice as an action hero to audiences that wanted a cool action heroine, but she was also someone who was constantly oppressed by “the man” (The Umbrella Corporation) so it made her more relatable to that audience, and I think that’s wonderful.
My introduction to the franchise really started when I decided to go to theaters in January 2017 to see The Final Chapter, (unlike with the Friday the 13th series, this actually is The Final Chapter). I thought it would be hilarious to jump into a part six of a series that announces that it is the end of the franchise in its title, and you can go read my original rant I posted, but I basically just had a problem watching the movie because the theater turned the volume up way to loud, and the friend I brought to the screening said the cutting in the film was so fast that it gave him motion sickness. There were three other people in the theater with us, all in a group together. I think it was two young ladies and a gentlemen, and I distinctly remembering the guy saying, “I’m so excited,” when he sat down in his seat. I sincerely hope he got what he wanted. He adds to my theory that these movies have a fanbase. So even back then, when the film was physically harming my friend and I, I still found some of the ideas about clones and identity post being genetically modified to be intriguing for this junky action franchise, so I sought out the rest of the series, and just could not get over the fact that I was not connecting with this franchises characters, and so I gave up on engaging with this series for a few years. Now, I’m back, looking at it again, and finding a new found appreciation for the series.
How do I feel now about how Anderson wrapped up this six film epic, now that I can watch it with control over the volume? First I think it’s fair to say, now that we’re three years past whatever hype this movie would have had at it’s release, Anderson left Retribution on a cliff hanger where it seemed like part six would open with a massive battle against Alice, her friends, and what was left of the U.S. military camped out on the lawn of the White House in D.C. So when part six opens, and that battle is no where to be seen, at any point in the franchise, you can either believe Anderson is the ultimate tease, or he did not have the grand production budget needed to pull it off right. And seeing how Wiki reports that Retribution made $60 million less than After Life, and that his budget for The Final Chapter is 1/3 less than it was for Retribution, it’s fair to point out that he’s having to probably throw this together as quickly and cheaply as possible. My guess is Sony Gems would have been happy to leave the series on the cliffhanger it had in Retribution, but Anderson probably wanted to wrap the series up as well as he could. I get the feeling that Anderson does have a certain amount of passion and vision as to what he wants this series to be, but has to work with the constraints of being a C-List franchise, he has to work in the restraints of what Capcom wants him to include to keep their brand represented a certain way, and he has to make sure enough of the fans of his version of Resident Evil films will still turn up. He’s not Chris Nolan, or Ridley Scott or Michael Bay where he has enough clout to only make the movie how he wants to make it, he still has to answer to the big boss, and he does what he can to make sure the movies still represent his vision as cleanly as they can.
I tried re-watching part 6 for this blog, and got motion sickness. I’m just gonna say, it has some great scenes that build on the existential and feminist identiy themes, but it is still a film that is just hard to look at.
I’m hoping young people who wanted a female heroine watched these movies and felt empowered by it the same way men get to feel empowered every damn week at the movies.
The Conjuring Universe series is my go to answer when no one asks me, “What is the worst movie franchise?” It is obviously not objectively the worst, but it is the one that makes the most constantly upset. Yes, Marvel and Star Wars can be more exhausting to talk about, but the Conjuring films hit me in a way that always leaves me angry, where the other two big cinematic universes just leave me exhausted.
I reviewed the first Conjuring a few years ago and at the time, I thought it had it’s moments but fell apart by the third act, and I think I still stand by that in general. I recognized that Annabelle (2014) was objectively a bad film, but it started out strong and as a cheap imitation of my third most favorite film, Rosemary’s Baby, I can see myself watching it at 3 in the morning when I can’t fall asleep, and having a decent enough time with it. The Conjuring 2 is still possibly the most angry I have been at a main stream movie in the past five years, only being rivaled by the Aardman Animations film, Early Man (2018), but at least that one was kind of thrilling to make fun of. Annabelle Creation might have been the strongest Conjuring film in terms of it’s setting and character, but it just insulted me as a horror fan because every jump was either annoyingly predictable, or just did not make any sense. I am not saying jump scares are the only thing I like in horror movies (in fact, I am not a big fan at all), but it was designed to be a jump scare movie, and it was insulting even on that level. I could not finish The Nun, and when I saw the trailer for The Curse of La Llorona I said, “Hey, that looks like a sh***y Conjuring rip off, no thanks.” And then I was told that it was a surprise Conjuring spin-off, which theoretically I could like, but since this was the worst series ever, I was still not interested. I think Annabelle might be my favorite wing of the Conjuring Universe, and while I am proud to say I have not seen any of these films in theaters, I still find myself engaged enough with hate watching this series to say, “I will rent Annabelle Comes Home once it’s out on VHS.”
It is streamable right now on HBO, I decided it was time, and to my genuine surprise, I tolerated this one. Take this as a grain of salt, this is about as lazy as the first Annabelle movie, but I think this took the best elements of both Annabelle movies, the retro setting of the first, and the decent character writing from Creation, and they made a completely watchable movie if we are judging these as horror movies made for the Disney Channel.
The problem I have had with most of the Conjuring movies leading up to this one, is that they never even rose to the level of having stock character drama to hang a story around. They were always just about nice regular people that were being bothered by a demon, which is why the worst entry’s played like religious propaganda to me. It is like the James Wann Conjuring films were saying, “Be a good Christian, and you will be able to overcome demons.” If you believe in that sentiment, that is fine, but that is not good drama for a film. I am not saying these movies have to stick to conventions, but they did not replace the conventions with anything dynamic either. Nice people are haunted by a ghost, and that is it. Creation attempted to have dynamic characters with the parents who made a deal with a devil, and the girls competing for dominance in their social circle, but the cast was a bit to cluttered, and again, it was just hard to get over how lousy the scares were. This one finally had character dynamics and a streamlined cast I could mostly get behind. The strongest part of this movie is McKenna Grace as the Ed and Lorraine Warrens daughter, Judy, and I appreciated the way the film mixed her being at the on set of puberty with her first steps to discovering that she shares similar powers of communicating with demons as her mother. Is this original? Of course not, but it’s at least at the level of stock characterization we can follow as an audience, instead of just empty vessels being thrown on screen. The two teenage girls Grace is paired with are also decent enough characters for this kind of movie. One is well behaved, the other not; again, nothing inspired, but I can at least recognize the stereotypes, and I have something to see progress as the movie goes along.
That is kind of all that is really worth talking about to be honest. I don’t know if this is the best Conjuring sequel (everything that came after the first Conjuring), it is just the one that annoyed me the least because it was simply mediocre, where I felt like the other films were just empty vessels hiding behind a retro aesthetic, hoping that would validate themselves as legit horror movies. The scares are nothing special, but less predictable and obnoxious than Creation. The writing is basic, but not insulting like the first and second Conjuring movies. This is the definition of mediocrity, I was just expecting it to hurt a lot more than it did.
Originally Written: 22 May 2020
Grammatical edits made before posting.
I must tell my own personal narrative to explain my evolving opinion on Alex Garland’s Ex Machina. It all started when I first saw the film: In theaters, 2015, I was a junior in high school, I could not get laid (I promise that detail is important), but I was excited to see this new science-fiction film about a sex robot. I left the theater pissed that day, not because I suffered two hours of pain, only about 60 seconds. I was completely enthralled by Ex Machina throughout 99% of its run-time during my first experience with it, but when it got to the climax, and I saw Ava betray Caleb, the hero of the film, the nice guy who was trying to save her from her abusive father, and escape with her to a happy ending full of love and romance, maybe even some intercourse with the help of those sexual organs Nathan hinted at her having, I left the theater fuming with anger. I felt betrayed. What is this film trying to say? Fear all technology because eventually it is just going to take over? That is not what Star Trek taught me!
For the next two years, whenever this film came up in conversation, I insisted to people that the ending ruined the entire picture, but I also could not get it out of my mind how much I loved the rest of the film. I believe I did watch it a second time around this point, and I still felt exactly the same: Brilliant movie up until the last 60 seconds when Ava betrays Caleb.
A short time later in life, I would become more well informed on gender and feminist studies, and how to apply them to my films studies, and since it had been almost three years now, and this movie I claimed not to like was still frequently on my radar, I decided to apply some of what I was learning about gender/feminist studies to the film and see if it would help me understand it a little better. The first aspect I started to question was why Ava had been created in the first place. She is a reflection of a certain type of idealized woman, and her creator Nathan seemed obsessed with making her as attractive as possible, at least to someone like Caleb.
I started to realize that this reflects how the entertainment industry, something run by men, and society in general, demand that women look beautiful, but also seductive and innocent, which is talked about in the You-Tube video Born Sexy Yesterday by Jonathan McIntosh. This made me start to question whether the film could be read, not only as a cautionary tale about A.I. and technology, but also about women becoming too powerful. I think there are a certain group of audience members that would watch this film and think it is telling them to keep women down so they cannot back-stab them like Ava does to Caleb and Nathan, but there are so many films that people can warp to fit their own negative agenda, that would not make this one unique.
On my third viewing, I finally decided to push any sympathy out of my mind for Caleb, and just try to look at the situation from Ava’s perspective. What have the only two humans she has known in her life done for her? Her creator is informing her that he is going to disassemble her because she is not “perfect” and he wants to start over. Caleb is just here to see if he can be won over by her charm and be convinced that she is human, “What happens if I fail your test?” as Ava and the tagline ask. You could even say it is confirmed for her that Caleb is only interested in her as a potential sexual partner because of how she manipulates him, agreeing to go on dates when the test is over, showing off her wig, etc. Ava has no reason to trust either of these men, they both want to exploit her in some way: Nathan wants to prove his engineering genius at the expense of her life, and Caleb wants a girlfriend that was modeled after the looks of his favorite porn stars.
Here is what I came up with sitting with the film this time: We have hundreds of films our culture sees as classics that portray men as the heroes, and women as props that make them look complete. Or sometimes, the women are killed to motivate the male protagonist to grab a gun and just start shooting people. Sometimes they are just the prize at the end of the movie for the hero that was able to shoot everyone. What Ex Machina is more than happy to do, is allow the female character to say, “Fuck my abuser, fuck my white knight, I’m taking care of myself. They are just here to use me. Even if one of them smiles and thinks he is the hero, he still expects me to fuck him by at the end of the day. I will not be anyone’s prize.” And now, I am comfortable and ready to admit, I was angry because I was Caleb. I thought girls should like me in high school because I was, “the nice guy.” I like to think I was never the most egregious of this type, but often when people I had crushes on complained about their current significant others, I would be thinking to myself, “Date me, I would never cause you such pain!” I wanted to see Caleb “save” Ava from her abusive father, and enjoy the endorphins that would have released in my brain from seeing the happily ever after where the nice guy beat the villain and got the girl. I would not say Ex Machina is responsible for my eventual capability to get away from this unhealthy worldview, but being able to realize how I was thinking, it creates my own little character arc in relation to how I have interpreted this film.
I can only say Ex Machina is a misogynistic film if you are not able to put your own fears and insecurities away for a moment, and just try to imagine yourself in the shoes of someone who is in an entirely different group category than yourself. If at the end of the movie, you are mad or even scared of Ava, and mad that Caleb did not win, ask yourself why that is.
She is Ava. Deal with it.
Work Cited
Garland, Alex, director. Ex Machina. Universal Studios, 2015.
McIntosh, Jonathan, and Jonathan McIntosh. Born Sexy Yesterday. You-Tube, Pop Culture
I do not really like this content creators, “make you feel bad for what you’ve liked in the past” attitude, but he does bring up a lot of good points and observations, and the messages he gives I stand by at their core.
Black Panther is a 2018 action political drama movie directed by Ryan Coogler, and upon its release was celebrated as one of the best superhero films ever made. It was even the first of the genre to be nominated for best picture. I am still trying to find out why it got such praise, other than the obvious political hype surrounding it. When I first saw the film, I was appalled by how flat and bland the cinematography was, feeling cheated that my big blockbuster fight for the throne drama was having its story told in mostly medium shots that just showed us actors talking. I also was not able to connect with Black Panther as a character or superhero, and found the true villain reveal that everyone says elevated the film to be interesting but also arrived far too late into the story to have a real impact on me. I watched the film a second time when it was released on Blu-Ray, and tried to ignore my problems with the cinematography, and just focus on the story. I still found many of the same problems, but also found I had missed out on some of the nuances that the film was being celebrated for. I still could not get over how standard the film-making was, and it continually hindered my ability to become invested in the story and characters. I also still found our main character T’Challa, played by Chadwick Boseman, to be far too understated in the role. When I watched it for a third time recently, I almost went from dislike to appreciate for what it was, but the part where people say it actually gets good, when Michael B Jordan as Erik Stevens, AKA N’Jadaka, AKA Killmonger, is when it nose dived for me.
The main thing that put me off during my first viewing was the film-making on display here. I want to keep comparisons to other Marvel films to a minimum, because one compliment is the story and characters do not feel like our typical Marvel movie fair. When I watch the so called “Stand Alone” Marvel films such as Thor or Doctor Strange, they constantly have to pull me out of the movies immediate story to be remind me that I am watching a movie that is meant to build up to Infinity War. When I watch Black Panther, even with little references here and there to the other films, I am only thinking about the story being told at hand, which is rare for a Marvel film to do. Unfortunately, I still have not been able to appreciate the cinematography and camera movements in the film after three viewings. Does Disney/Marvel mandate their directors not move the camera during 90% of the filming, because most of the shots are locked down, medium close ups. It is as if they are worried about showing the sets/green screen work in greater detail because maybe they did not spend as much money and time as the effects would have needed. This could be due to the fact that they are trying to crank out three films a year. As a result, the whole film has a very small in scale feel to it, I am never convinced that what I am looking at are real environments, but that goes for most of the films in Marvel Studios catalogue. The color grading is also something that has insulted me in most of the Marvel films since Iron Man 3, the only exceptions being Thor: The Dark World and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. All of Marvels movies have a low contrast film image that seems as if they want to choose a neutral color pallet to either: give the movies a sense of realism, or the more likely reason: to give all of the movies a sense of esthetic continuity between them. Black Panther has one of the better color grading jobs for all it is worth. The image does not pop as much as I would like a Comic Book Blockbuster to pop, but it at least looks as bland as an average modern Blockbuster such as Jurassic World, and not as flat and bad as a daytime scene in Thor Ragnarok.
Yeah, this looks a little better than Thor Ragnarok.
Man, just look at how washed out that is.
Fortunately, I have been able to see all three of director Ryan Coogler’s feature films, the previous two being Fruitvale Station, and Rocky Spin-Off Creed. Fruitvale Station was an effective tragedy, and Creed had a lot of impressive technical film-making, but failed to land emotionally for me because the protagonists’ motivation was never quite clear. I primarily bring these films up because they both have distinct (different from each other) visual styles. Fruitvale Station went for a highly saturated gritty film look to portray the harshness of the situation, but also to give the film a dream like quality to put the audience in the shoes of the people involved who were not able to process the tragic events as they were happening. Creed had a more classic restrained Hollywood look that was broken up by up close fight sequences done in one take in order to give it a more modern technically sophisticated look to show how much film has changed since Sylvester Stallone and John Avildsen made the first Rocky, which was mostly relied on wide shots in montage to show their fight sequences. Both movies show that this director has the ability to make a film on both sides of the style spectrum, so why does he show such little style here. If this were a stand-alone film, such as Ang-Lee’s Hulk or even a Christopher Nolan Batman movie, one that only existed in its own contained continuity, I would put the blame on the director. I have seen most of Marvel Studios filmography though, and since they constantly turn in films with the most dull color grading tones possible, as well as this neutral cinematography style that I am accusing Black Panther of having, I think Coogler is off the hook here. It must be the studio mandating the films have a safe look, and unfortunately, box office wise, it seems to be working.
The first two times I watched this movie, I said one of its major failings is the Black Panther himself, T’Challa, was one of the most boring characters I had ever seen. Watching it this time, that is an exaggeration, but he is still far from being a compelling protagonist. Do not get me wrong, I appreciate that they are going for a more low key performance rather than the big personalities of the other films released by Marvel Studios, but he really has no emotional investment other than a little apprehension about being king for the first hour of the film. Looking at his entire career as this character, he was great in the film that introduced him into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Captain America: Civil War. In that film, he had to deal with wanting revenge for the death of his father T’Chaka, played by John Kani in both films, and the passion he felt for that made him engaging to watch, but it was also satisfying to see him realize he was being manipulated and learn to think before he acted. Now that that exciting, albeit simplistic character arc is resolved, when we find him in his stand-alone film, his character journey seems to be about his apprehension for becoming King of Wakanda, but then when he discovers his father was not a perfect king, and that maybe he does not need to be a king that lives up to his father, but instead be one that addresses problems his father and previous kings refused to address, which is why the film ends with him opening up Wakanda to the rest of the world. All of these problems do sound very dramatic, but the film never stops to brood with T’Challa on these issues, with the exception of the third act when he talks to his father about all of his misdeeds as King. However, that should be the emotional climax after ninety minutes of build up, instead it is the first time we get to see T’Challa really emote in the entire film.
Now let us get into the part of the film where I will probably get the most hate for my thoughts, the handling of the character Killmonger, AKA Erik Stevens, AKA N’Jadaka. (Which is a really cool scene when he announces his name in the throne room.) I know this is the part of the movie where everyone says it gets great, where everyone says it is really digging into serious issues that resonate with them and have something important to say, but its not. Unless you came into this film already aware and sensitive about the issues Erik is fighting for, this will not change an actual racists mind, and it does a pretty poor job teaching anyone with a sheltered world view about why they should care. Halfway through the film, Erik arrives in Wakanda offering the corpse of Klaue, a terrorist played by Andy Serkis who stole Vibranium from Wakanada 20 years ago; Vibranium is a rare metal that is responsible for all of Wakandas futuristic tech. We get verbal explanations of Eriks backstory, that he grew up without parents, that he joined the army after graduating from Annapolis, and earned the nickname Killmonger due to his high kill count. He tells the leaders of Wakanda he is here to take the throne and turn Wakanda’s technology over to the rest of the African groups in the world that have been oppressed throughout history so they can finally have the weapons to fight back against their oppressors. We also learn that the man we saw killed in the beginning of the film was Eriks’ father, which is why he was without a parent for most of his childhood. This is all very provocative stuff, and Michael B. Jordan is killing it in this role, but the movies final edit does not do this character or actor justice. This is so late into the film that has left me pretty neutral thus far in terms of my emotional engagement, because we have spent so much of the first half meandering around with T’Challa’s low key apprehensions about being king, and hunting down Klaue. The fact that Erik and Martin Freemans’ character Everet Ross are just going to explain his backstory deflates all of the films emotional investment. The key here is that we are supposed to come into this film already feeling sorry for Erik because of the real life struggles of inner city kids. I am not saying we should not care about those kids, of course we should. What I find so sickening in this films portrayal of this character and his situation is that we never get to see a younger Erik growing up under these circumstances so we can sympathize with him as a person in pain. The problem with this, is people who are sensitive to this situation will probably go along with it, pat themselves on the back for being sensitive about it, but they will not get to see a portrayal of the real sadness of the situation, just the result of how angry it made him in adulthood, so that audience is not being challenged or learning anything. The other kind of audience are the people who will respond to this character saying, “Oh great, another angry violent black man who wants power to fight the people he thinks are oppressing him.” It is terrible that there are people who would think that, but my point is, on either side of the audience, no one is learning anything. One side is just patting themselves on the back for thinking they are sensitive to this movies cause, and the other will just use it as another reason to ignore these issues once again. This all makes me very upset and distressed that Eriks motivation and character is treated as a shorthand villain. It is as if the filmmakers are saying, “Of course Erik would be like this, he grew up in a ghetto without a parent, now feel sad or you are a racist.” The problem is Disney would never release a mainstream superhero movie that portrayed inner city kids suffering, but if that is the case, just do not go here. If you are not going to do the issue justice, then just make a fun movie that the whole family can enjoy with a predominantly African American cast, pushing for wider representation in blockbuster films, that sounds good enough to me.
The scene that killed any goodwill I was building during my third viewing is the one when Erik and T’Challa are fighting in ritualistic combat for the Throne. When Zuri, Forest Whitaker’s character, who is basically the referee for these fights, interrupts the fight to save T’Challa from Eriks killing blow, he begs Erik to take his life and spare T’Challa’s, and Erik kills Zuri, but still throws T’Challa over the edge of the waterfall. This was already kind of silly that what they want us to accept as this enlightened society decides who will be the king through ritualistic combat, but when one of the Champions kills the referee and no one seems to care, it is hard for me to respect this nation and its customs. Erik had the right to kill T’Challa in this competition, but I cannot imagine killing the referee because you were angry is a legal thing to do, and there are no consequences for this. Even the countries delegates who disagree with Eriks plans just let him sit on the throne and start calling the shots. Did T’Challa have the right to kill one of his subjects if he got mad at them? This is not a society that is going to lead us into a new age of enlightenment, they are the ones who are going to encourage us to be more violent. That is part of Eriks plan, to arm the helpless with the means to defend themselves, and again, I understand why he is doing it, but it is one of those villains that I need to be sympathizing with and almost rooting for, even as he does awful things. I have seen plenty of movies where a sympathetic villain is out for revenge that will only make the situation worse, but you also enjoy seeing them work towards getting their revenge, even if they do not ultimately go through with it. In Deadpool 2, the kid character in that film, Russell, while not exactly a villain, is out for revenge against a religious extremist who tortured him because he was born a mutant, and while we know murdering him would only make Russell’s life worse, you still want to see him kill the man who caused him so much pain. In that movie, we had flashbacks that gave us a glimpse into the torture Russell suffered, which gives the audience the empathy needed for a character like him or Erik to work. FruitvaleStation spends the first thirty minutes with the main character just going through his daily routine. We see him spend time his friends, his mother, and his daughter, so when things take a turn for the worst for the next hour, we know him as just a regular guy, so we can feel bad for him.
2:40: He not only killed Zuri, he killed the film.
These are the issues that will probably keep me from ever becoming a fan of this film, but I am not going to act like there is nothing I enjoy in this film. As underwhelmed as I am by T’Challa as a protagonist, two of the women backing him up are pretty great, and also Lupita Nyong’o was there. T’Challa’s sister Shuri, played by Letitia Wright, might be my favorite female character Marvel Studios has brought us. I just adore her enthusiasm about her tech, not to mention all the cool gadgets she brings to the action scenes. She also has a great camaraderie with her brother, which gives me some of the few scenes where I start being won over by Bosemen’s performance as T’Challa. Okoye, played by Danai Gurira, is also pretty great as Wakanda’s military General, and I enjoyed her struggle after Erik showed up when she was unsure about whether her loyalties lie with the Throne itself or a King she actually respects.
I love this character.
This movie feels they had all of the right pieces but then decided not to make the puzzle. It spends its first hour meandering around on a spy plot that does not mean very much by the third act, and then it spends its second half boasting about being about serious issues without having the courage to go all the way with it and really challenge the audience and make them feel something other than the feelings they had already brought with them into the theater. There are still positives: I am hoping this movies box office will lead to more tent pole movies with predominantly African American casts, or just movies with other groups who have not gotten this level of representation and attention in blockbuster movies, that would be awesome to see. It gave us an entire toy line of predominantly African American characters, that is really great. There are one or two characters in here that are fun to watch in a movie I mostly find very dull – Andy Serkis is freaking hilarious in this, he is electric when he is on screen here. – and this next one will sound like a back handed compliment, but I like that this is just a bad movie, and not another pointless, empty, future film tease Marvel movie like most of the stand-alones are. This was just a stand alone story, but I do not think it worked.
Film Viewed December 8th 2018 (I got to see the Early Screening that Day)
Bumblebee is the new Prequel-Reboot for the Transformers franchise. It tells the story of human character Charlie Watson, played by Hailee Steinfeld, who is grieving over the loss of her father, and the story of Agent Burns, played by living legend John Cena, who is after vengeance against giant robots for causing the death of all of his soldiers during a training exercise.
Hailee Steinfeld does a great job as always, even if her character writing is not the best. Her decisions as a character all make sense, but the script has her state her feelings and motivations far to often and to bluntly, it makes her character journey hard to get engaged with. John Cena can go a little over the top toward the end of the movie, but he mostly does a good job, and has a predictable, but still more subtly executed character arc than Charlie, making him the best part of the film.
For the first time in the Transformers franchise, the action is clear and coherent on a first watch, and while it does not have the size and weight that the other films could sometimes thrill you with, the fights here are well choreographed and have fun with the fact that they are transforming robots, so that was all good.
Being a huge fan of the Transformers franchise, the movies, toys, video games, and especially the animated shows, this was my most hyped film of the year by far. A live action Transformers film NOT directed by Michael Bay! Sign me up! I say I am a fan of the films, but that does not mean I think they are good. Unfortunately, the things I have discussed above are all the major positives I could find, and upon first viewing I really did not like this movie at all. If you are excited to just see a non Michael Bay Transformers movie, and you are going to be happy to see a more simple robot movie compared to the convoluted monstrosities Bay has been making, then you might like this movie, but seeing how those were the reasons I was excited, I cannot guarantee that. If you saw the trailer, and thought it looked like a good time, give it a shot. I think the first live action Transformers film not directed by Michael Bay is an event most fans are going to want to see. If it looks like a good time to you, please go see it, but I cannot personally recommend it. However, now I get to complain about all the things wrong with this film.
Spoilers!
To start off, we all made the comparisons when we heard what the movie was generally going to about, and when we saw the first trailer. It was going to be like E.T. and The Iron Giant, kid hiding their alien pet story. That is fine, the first Bayformers was very reminiscent of E.T. However, as bad as that first film was, it was still its own story, I never feel like I am watching a total rip off of any of those previous films. But this film, I was really disappointed with how much they were ripping from E.T. and TheIron Giant but especially The Iron Giant, particularly one scene in the third act where my jaw was on the floor because it was a carbon copy of Iron Giant. The first Bayformers is a terrible movie, but I always complimented it because it felt like it was doing its own thing, it was not blatantly stealing from other better films. The E.T. allusions in that movie just felt like inspiration (Or producer insistence) rather than a total lifting of scenes and moments.
The films other major problem is actually something I was really not prepared for. This was just as bad of a Transformers movie as the Bay films were. I think even more so in some cases. You could take the Transformers angle out of this movie and it would be the exact same story with the exact same character arcs. The first five minutes is a fight on the robots home planet of Cybertron, showing us a bunch of toys that fans will know and appreciate, but they do not add anything to this movies overall story, so this is just fan service meant to say, “See, we’re not the Michael Bay films! We respect you fans!” I do not care, unless it is a part of the story, leave it out. And then the leader of the Auto-Bots, the team of robots Bumblebee plays for, sends Bee to Earth to protect it until the rest of the Auto-Bots meet up with him there. As soon as Bumblebee gets to Earth, a Decepticon, the enemy of the Auto-Bots, attacks him, and rips out his voice box, and destroys his memory system. This is also the fight that causes the deaths of John Cena’s soldiers. The rest of the movie is not about Bumblebee re-learning who he is, or learning anything about himself, instead it is about Steinfelds character Charlie getting over the loss of her father. That is fine, I want human characters with arcs. I am not mad that a human is the main focus. My problem is Bumblebee barley has a character in this movie. His primary function is to act cute, or give Charlie someone to talk to. Because he loses his memory, this is just The Iron Giant all over again, except in that film, the Giant had a consistent personality, and he learned that he got to decide who he was, which gave him the character arc. In E.T., Elliot has a similar character arc as Charlie, and E.T.does not really change very much, he is mostly just a friend character to Elliot, same as Bee in this new film, but E.T. has a consistent character that audiences fell in love with. Bee is only given scenes to act cute and stupid and they never really form a character. The scene where she is teaching him how to hide from people on the beach, while the image of Bee hiding behind a rock in robot mode made me giggle, it also just made me scream, “He just showed us he understood the directions! Why doesn’t he get this!” Because they thought the visual was cute, and did not think about what it really said about him as a thinking character. Bee does re-discover who he is, but it is not really a character arc, it just gives him somewhere to go by the end of the film. I am not asking for a more complicated film about the Transformers lore, but what I am challenging this film to do is to use its property for something. This is just a watered down remake of The Iron Giant, because the main robot character does not know who he is or why he is on Earth. To me, the charm of Transformers is robots with backstories and personalities come down to Earth and interact with the humans characters we can relate to. I am not holding this film to the standard of what I personally want out of Transformers as a fan, the reason I like some of the Bayformers movies is because they gave me scenes and ideas I never knew I wanted (I will explain more in my Age of Extinction review one day), but this just strips away all of the stuff that makes it Transformers and replaces it with a really weak remake of The Iron Giant, so unlike even the Bay films, this movie has no identity. You may not have liked Bays films, but the first four films have identities, and they felt like movies with vision. It was an ugly horrible vision, but a vision. It makes me even madder at that 10 minute prologue that shows us the Cybertron battle and Bumblebee getting to Earth, because that was all a formality. You could have started this movie with Charlie and how she finds Bumblebee, and the character arcs stay exactly the same. We had this prologue because it is a Transformers movie and that is what people and fans want to see. This movie wants to be Iron Giant, but also has mandates to be a Transformers movie, so honestly we just get a really boring film. If it was just an Iron Giant rip off, then it would just be an Iron Giant rip off, nothing more. No one ever criticizes The Iron Giant for being a blatant E.T. rip off, because that movie had its own voice and vision. Out of everyones problems with the first Bayformers, the E.T. allusions are not at the top of anyones list. Bumblebee is a watered down version of Iron Giant, and because I cannot follow Bumblebee as a consistent personality like I can with the Iron Giant, I cannot get invested in the relationship he is forming with Charlie. She could have met any friendly alien on this adventure, and her arc would have been exactly the same, and Charlie has to much dialogue where she tells us how she is feeling, rather than letting us experience it, and the moment where she overcomes her insecurities during the climax had me laughing rather than cheering, so there was nothing in this film that made me invested.
With the lack of interest in the franchises subject matter, boring and forced dialogue that feeds you character motivation rather than shows you, I am really let down by this one. Look, this is much better than the last film, The Last Knight, this movie may lack vision, but The Last Knight I would not even call a finished film, so we are improving. I would rather have 14 more Transformers movies with different filmmakers than 4 more run by Bay, (I am secretly hoping he will come back for one more to finish off his six movie saga, to try to see him make any kind of sense out of the mess he made in the last movie.) and maybe this is the best thing for this franchise now. While I feel like this movie is overly manipulative, because it is trying so hard to get the audience to like it for its 80s setting and the Transformers stuff inserted in, maybe it will get people back on board. This is such a personal series for me though. I go into each one wanting to love it, and usually come out disappointed. They promised me in the advertisements this was going to be one I would love, just by ditching Bay, and by focusing on a relationship idea I usually adore, kid and their alien friend. I will admit, I was worried this movie would resort to ripping off other alien pet movies, as well as to much fan service to make up for the lack of it in the Bay films, so in a way, this was the movie I expected, I just did not expect it to be this shallow. They made a run of the mill, and tedious film to sit through. I mean, it is Transformers, I am going to have this on Blu-Ray day one and watch it ten more times, but this needed to be the turning point. This should be the movie that gets me jazzed up and a full time believer in this series, but instead, it is just another bad Transformers movie.
I finally broke down and bought the blu-ray set, because look at how pretty that box art is!
Some movies you get, some movies you don’t.
So I am trying to make it tradition to protest seeing more sequels/remakes/reboots that I do not think need to be made by just staying home and watching the original(s)/good ones. In this case though, while I am a fan of the Predator as a movie monster, I did not like these first two movies when I first saw them. Predators I actually do like, and the first Alien vs. Predator is a guilty pleasure of mine. When I first saw the movie, I really had no idea why people liked it or what the movie was even trying to achieve other than just being a straightforward good guys vs evil guy movie. That was a few years ago now, you can go read that post if you want, my approach to analyzing movies has changed since then, and I have continually thought about the movie from time to time. In terms of what the movie was trying to accomplish, I now see three things: One, it does want to be a straightforward exciting action movie that turns into a slasher movie; Two, it also has a bit of a satirical edge in the way it presents its characters and action movie tropes; Three, it is also a bit of a Vietnam metaphor. So this time, I went in bearing all that in mind, ready to see this as the smart action movie I am constantly told it is by it’s fans. So what did I think. Well, I assume you read the title of this post. I still thought this was a boring movie.
I see all those elements now, I maybe even appreciated a few of them, but this is not a fun movie to watch at all, and it is trying to be. Towards the end especially, it gets so silly, there is no way it is going for an anti action movie approach. Like it just teases the audience with enjoyable action, but everything get’s continually deflated. I can like movies like this: Pain & Gain is one of my if not still my favorite movie, and that is because it subverts the typical crime movie protagonist and makes them the most awful people possible, but the movie acts like they are still the likable protagonist we are always given in crime movies; I just watched Freddie Got Fingered, the Tom Green film, and that movie is a total parody of the 90’s gross out romantic comedies and that movie had me rolling at the floor in parts of it; Paul Verhoevens Starship Troopers, and while I think that is a movie that runs out of steam after a while, it is a 100 minute film stretched to 130, it is still mostly an effective and entertaining satire. All those movies I just mentioned have really fun performances that keep the movie awake and moving, making them fun to watch, Predator has Arnold Schwarzenegger giving one of the most confused performances he has ever given. I said it last review, I will say it again, you needed a Kurt Russel. I love Arnold, I will always argue he is a good actor when given the right role, this is just the wrong role for him. The brave and loyal military leader, he just does not have the charisma for this role. Freddy Got Fingered and StarshipTroopers also kept the look of the look and tone of the film upbeat, which helps sell the satire. Predator mostly plays it straight with a dark tone, and while the characters have over the top moments, because they take it so seriously, I am not having any fun with such a goofy premise that seems like it wants you to laugh at it at times. They are not taking it seriously in the same way the do in Starship Troopers where the performances are romanticized but the movie plays it straight, it is like a down to Earth serious tone with the character occasionally being a little over the top. It just does not go far enough in either direction, in either playing it campy or taking it seriously, that I cannot get engaged with the movie.
So I am not enjoying this as a satire or deconstruction of an 80’s action movie, but it is also tying a bit into some Vietnam War imagery. Or at least, Vietnam War movie imagery. I know virtually nothing about the Vietnam War, so I cannot offer much on this front, and maybe people who do know or lived through the Vietnam War can give an interesting reading on this aspect of the film, but there was a moment where I did appreciate this aspect of the film. I started to realize none of these “Bad Ass” soldiers were getting any cool fights with the Predator, they pretty much just get unceremoniously killed off with no heroic moments until Arnold faces him at the very end. At first I said, “Well that is not very exciting,” but I think that is the point. All these tough dudes going into this battle thinking, “Let’s kick its ass” and they just get shot once and die. I do not know if this is specific only to Vietnam, but I can imagine that is how a lot Americans felt after the war had ended for us over there. We wanted to see our soldiers go over there to kick ass, but we instead faced an unceremonious defeat. Again, why does this make the movie engaging to watch at all, I do not know.
I said this in my previous review, but I will say it again, the film is shot and edited very well. John McTiernan who also directed the classic film Die Hard (A film I do like a lot) really is the master of his craft here. The way he shoots (the camera, not the guns) to film the characters in this jungle is a real marvel to behold, but it is not enough to make up for how engaged I am with the film on a narrative and character level.
I am not going to say people are wrong for likening this movie. There are certainly movies I will say people are wrong for liking, if you like Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem, you are wrong, plain and simple. You can also tell me I am wrong for not liking Predator and also for liking Alien vs. Predator, but that does not mean I have to do anything about. My point is, there is something to this movie, I am not sure all its fans like it for the same reasons, some like it because they see it as a straightforward action movie, some like it because it is a satire that is played up as a dumb action movie, and some like it for its Vietnam parallels, and some people like it for all three. I do not think this is very well done for a straightforward action movie, I think Predators does it much better, and I do not think the Satire is very well done here, and Vietnam is not something I very knowledgeable about and currently am not very interested in. And also, I do think the Predator is just an awesome monster, and he is not in this movie very much. I know there is value in less is more, I agree with that mantra most of the time, but after I have seen some of the other films in this series, including the first Alien vs. Predator, I really like getting to know the Predator on some kind of character level, which I feel AVP1 and Predators does very well. This one, it was the first movie, he is just the monster in the movie, I get it, but I am just trying to explain why this movie does not click with me.
I was really hoping it would click with me this time, I really want to like this movie, but that may just be because I think the Predator is a really fun movie monster, and that is not what this movie is terribly interested in, and what this movie is interested in, I am not terribly interested in. But I can respect the reasons for why people do like this movie now, I have heard their voices, I do not necessarily agree, but I like where they are coming from. I do hope that one day this one will click with me, but that day certainly is not today.
But this is one of those movies I will recommend you watch, even though I do not like it, there is certainly something to it, it would not still be popular or discussed today if there was nothing to this film. Please, see it, and decide for yourself. There is plenty to like here, just, none of it works for me.
There is almost nothing to say about this one. It is a beautiful technical marvel with an absolutely nothing story and tasteless pitch: Love triangle and the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. It is obvious what they were going for, they wanted to do James Cameron Titanic, so they could get an Oscar and one billion dollar gross at the box office. Titanic (1997) was already walking a fine line of distaste, being a forbidden love story set on a historical tragedy, but while that will be discussed here in greater detail down the road, it got away with it, and had enough elements around that true story to give the film enough integrity. I think the difference here is while Titanic has many political themes to consider when making a Hollywood movie about it, Pearl Harbor is a much more political event with so much you can screw up and make offensive. I am not the best person to explain this stuff, so go check out the Nostalgia Critics review to get a better and more informed rant on the historical facts this film gets wrong for the sake of making it more Hollywood Michael Bay Bullshit film. (Again, sorry about the language in these recent reviews, but we are doing Bay movies, it cannot be helped.)
As for me, how do I personally feel about the film, I do not hate it. The Rock was frustrating because it could have been a great action film on par with Die Hard, but had a director who did not feel the story and characters were worth taking seriously, but here, this idea is dead on arrival. Just say, A Jerry Bruckheimer Production: Pearl Harbor, A Michael Bay Film. You are in for a train-wreck. To be fair, it is not even really a train-wreck, but it is almost like watching nothing. The story is so static and flat, that it just leaves no impact on you. Guy like girl. Guy and girl get together. Guy leave to go fight in war. Guy reportedly die in war. Guys best friend gets with girl. When guy come back, best friend and girl feel guilty. That is all that is happening here, it is a dumb soap opera plot and then Pearl Harbor also happens. Maybe if the story took a left turn after the attack on Pearl Harbor, and the characters involved in this love triangle realized how self centered they were being in not thinking about the worlds bigger issues at large, this could have worked, but that is not at all what happens, and that was not on anyone’s mind making this movie. They made this the emotional focus because they figured it would get people more invested in the movie. But when the writing is that cheap, that manipulative, and simply being done just to make you care, not because the filmmakers thought they had an interesting set of characters to tell this story with, it just feels fake and dishonest. So when Pearl Harbor does get attacked, it is like just watching a firework display, or it is like watching nameless robots blowing each other up, because you do not know them as people, the movie has failed to connect you to them.
So why do I not hate this movie, because it is just a bad idea to begin with. If it was good, I would give it a positive review, but I do not need a good Pearl Harbor movie to feel complete in life, or really great movies about any historical tragedy’s. A big Hollywood movie can never do a historical event proper justice, I would feel more proud to go do actual research on an event like this rather than just watch even a good historical movie and say, “Ah yes, I totally understand that event now.” It is great when these movies are good, but we should never take them as a reality.
I think I prefer to watch this movie over The Rock or Armageddon, because it is a beautiful film to look at. This may be Michael Bay’s best looking film, and it actually has pacing to each scene that lets you enjoy the cinematography, all the sets and the costumes, the actors are actually the focus of most of the scenes and not the camera movements or an erratic editing style; everything on a technical level shines in this film, it looks phenomenal. The Rock and Armageddon are endurance tests to me, this is like watching someones visual history project, it looks nice, but it is overly long trying to get a good grade and really has no idea what it wants to say by the end of it and is really just going through the motions.
1/10
It is just useless.
It looks beautiful, it is not the most painful experience this man has produced on film, but it just has nothing to say.
It’s so close. So, so, so, so close! This is the first time we have people who seem to actually enjoy the source material, which, yes, I know it’s toys, but with Bay’s disdain for the material, Rise of the Beasts being so bizarrely sombre approach to the material, and fuck Bumblebee, here’s the first Transformers movie, yes, even counting the 1986 movie, that stands proudly and says “these toys have a story worth telling!” And if we’re going to keep making these movies, passion from the filmmakers needs to matter. The animation, especially considering it was a $75 million budget, is wonderful. The voice acting is tremendous, putting any of my fears of soulless celebrity casting to shame. The score… is fine… (which isn’t up to standard for Transformers movies.) But most importantly, the story concept is inspired, emotional, and powerful. It’s when we get to the telling and pacing of the story where we find some hesitation from me to call this a masterpiece.
