Dawn of the Planet of the Apes Review

When reviewing movies, you always have to be aware of the idea of “spoilers”.  While the whole “spoiler” notion had gotten way out of hand, most of us would prefer to learn the major plot events the way the creators intended, through experiencing it first.  However, sometimes the “spoiler” is right there in the title, as has been the case with Rise of The Planet of the Apes and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, its new sequel.  Regardless of how one may end, ultimately the series is going to end with the humans losing big and the apes taking control.  So ultimately the answers we look for with these sequels isn’t “what” so much as “how” and as both ROTPOTA and DOTPOTA prove, it is all about the presentation that makes it an entertaining ride.

The film begins with a callback to the credit sequence from ROTPOTA, as red lines circle the globe, spreading what the film calls “Simian Flu” around the world.  It destroys the majority of humanity to the point where a decade after the first film the apes hadn’t had any contact with humans in two years.  The apes, led by Caesar (Andy Serkis) from the first film, have created their own society.  It is practically a utopia until they come across a human expedition.  This incident shatters the isolation of both communities, as the humans need to reach into ape territory to access a power plant in hopes of solving an energy crisis.  The apes agree but the uneasy agreement that, as you can expect, eventually crumbles.

The story is ultimately a tragedy, as the humans are afraid of these hyper intelligent apes while the apes, in particular former lab experiment Koba (Toby Kebbell), have some issues trusting the humans as well.  Ultimately it can only result in the world from the original series of films, but it is still compelling to see that process unfold.  It doesn’t get quite as dark as I wanted, but considering the box office this film is raking, we’ll be seeing increasingly grim chapters to come.

Of course you can’t mention this film without praising the work of Andy Serkis.  Serkis, who I believe gets top billing for the first time in his career, continues to shine as ape leader Caesar.  Serkis is best known for his work in motion capture acting, roles that don’t get him even the glory of a great character actor, but he deserves all the praise he’s gotten for Caesar.  His work here rivals that of his other best known work, Gollum in the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit series.  Serkis conveys all of the confusion Caesar had as far as supporting his apes, but still caring about the humanity that raised him.  It is a shame his work isn’t considered Academy worthy.

The great acting is assisted in superb special effects.  From the first shot after the prologue, the level of detail of the apes is stunning.  Director Matt Reeves (Let Me In), coming in after ROTPOTA’s Rupert Wyatt, does a great job in blending the effects into real world.  He also handles the action well as the apes and humans have their inevitable showdown (a particular POV shot from a tank is a highlight).

Although it may be saving the darkest stuff for future films, DOTPOTA is an exciting, entertaining film.  Much like what made the initial reboot work, they were able to mine a human story (mutual distrust between factions with different agendas trying to co-exist but escalating into all-out war) and use state of the art special effects well in service of that story.  This series is heading towards the inevitable moment where the title is the truth rather than the promise.  Despite knowing that fact, it doesn’t hinder the enjoyment of this new series one bit.

Grade: B+

Notes (SPOILERS):

-It may be splitting hairs, but I think Rise would’ve been the more appropriate word for this film title.  The first film in the reboot showed the beginnings of apes becoming smarter (the dawn), now we see them form their society and begin setting the stage for the war (the rise)

-I probably should mention something about the human characters, who are also good, but really, we’re here for the apes riding horses with a machine gun in each hand.  Jason Clarke’s Malcolm and Gary Oldman’s Dreyfus serve as a parallel to Caesar and Koba, and those fundamental differences between the two eventually lead to the war that humanity will lose.

-In a way, Caesar and Koba’s struggles mirror another conflicting relationship from earlier this summer, the one between Charles Xavier and Magneto from X-Men. 

-How long do you think we’ll have to wait until the Statue of Liberty falls?  I figure the next one, and that’ll be the stinger for the trailer.

-The dream director for a future installment would be Herzog, whose oeuvre is filled with nature overpowering humanity, but that would likely be another “Edgar Wright directing Ant-Man” scenario.

-I was expecting maybe a grizzled James Franco to make a cameo.  It is interesting to have a franchise like this where none of the human characters from the first one are in the second.

-Caesar’s son gets his scars so we can tell him apart from the other apes, right?

-I think it is telling that Koba’s ultimate fall to his death (nice foreshadowing with the gesture of forgiveness resembling helping someone up) isn’t just a straight fall, but one punctuated by him getting caught on a wire and hitting some equipment, then falling.  Definitely a major sea change in the ape world.

The Raid 2 Review

Released stateside two years ago, Gareth Evans’ The Raid: Redemption was a surprise hit.  The Indonesian martial arts film was a shot of pure adrenaline for action movie fans.  Its concept was simple: a SWAT team is sent to take out a 30 story building filled with criminals and psychopaths.  Evans made a simple martial arts movie because he couldn’t get funding for the film he really wanted to make.  What he lacked in budget he made up for in some of the most dazzling fight choreography in years.  Rather than helm the English language remake, Evans decided to make the film he really wanted to do as the sequel.  The Raid 2 (sometimes subtitled Berandal) is a larger scale, more expensive follow up that still delivers the thrills of the original.

Before he can even recuperate from the events of the first film, SWAT Team rookie (and one of the few survivors of the first film) Rama (Iko Uwais) is recruited to infiltrate a powerful gang to expose the corruption of the police force.  As he befriends a major mob boss’ son (Afirin Putra), Rama finds himself spending years in prison building a cover while his wife and infant son go on without him.  Meanwhile, the Indonesian mob Rama infiltrates finds itself on unstable ground with the Japanese, while independent mobster Bejo (Alex Abbad) proves to be a wild card.

As that previous paragraph indicates, there is a lot more plot and character moments in this film than in The Raid.  It is almost 50 minutes longer, but with probably the same amount of time spent on the fights.  Unfortunately the plot isn’t that great and it could’ve been trimmed down or clarified.  Between the warring factions, the dirty cops and Bejo, it’s hard to keep track of what is happening and why whereas the original was rather straightforward.  That said, the shortcomings of the plot are more than forgiven in the fights, which are just as good if not better in some cases than the ones from the original.  Evans had a bigger budget and the money is there, with plenty of variety in daring set pieces.  They also seem to want to challenge themselves in the fights, with several fights taking place in confined spaces or using just about anything in the room to help out in a fight.

There are no weak links in the fighters in this film.  Uwais has to be in the vanguard of the next generation of martial arts stars.  The things he and his co-stars do in this film boggle the mind.  There are prison fights, an elaborate car chase and a brother/sister assassin combo who are adept at baseball bats and hammers respectively.  The punches and kicks come so fast you’d think these guys weren’t human.  I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a bathtub filled with ice for Uwais (or just about anyone else) that he could lie down in during breaks in filming.  These fights look brutal and real to the point where one fighter towards the end has his entire face red from bruises.  Best of all, there isn’t a clunker among the fights to be found.

They’re all serviced by Evans’ direction.  For everyone sick of rapid cutting and incoherent action, The Raid films are for you.  Alongside the recent Fast and Furious films, The Raid 2 shows us the action and doesn’t jumble it up in excessive (and probably concealing) editing.  Even in the chaos of the rapid fire blows dished out, it’s not at all confusing.  When someone delivers a painful blow, you feel it too.  It’d be hard to see these guys dealing out this type of punishment without garnering a reaction.

Even with a subpar plot, The Raid 2 still shows Hollywood action movies (often made for much more than The Raid 2’s $4.5 million budget) how it’s done.  The original is a leaner production for sure, but this one takes advantage of having more money and a bigger canvas to use.  These films should be game changers for how action is seen in movies these days, or at least the perfect film to show a group of people looking to discover something many bigger productions have been missing: a series that blends both brutality and vitality equally.

Grade: B

22 Jump Street Review

I’m not the first to say this, but of the genres, it seems that comedies have the hardest time making a good sequel.  Sequels often get bogged down with the mindset of “do what you did in the first one, but more of it”.  This leads to comedies that tell basically the same jokes, just search and replaced to make it different enough.  We get the comfort of the familiar, but not the thrill of discovery (look no further than the difference between the cameo filled fight scenes in Anchorman and Anchorman 2).  This is at the forefront of the minds of Phil Lord & Chris Miller, the directors behind 22 Jump Street, as well as its predecessor 21 Jump Street and this year’s The Lego Movie.  These seem to be the guys you go to to make well received hits out of concepts that on paper look like surefire flops, and 22 Jump Street continues that trend.

22 Jump Street finds the undercover odd couple Schmidt (Jonah Hill) & Jenko (Channing Tatum) infiltrating a school (again) looking to stop a new street drug from spreading beyond the campus (again).  The film is so meta you’d think Abed from Community wrote the script.  Certainly the self-referential jokes, including the introductory spiel by their chief (Nick Offerman), are very funny, but in between those winks to the audience is a sharp lampooning of sequels and the mindset that goes into making them.  Throughout the film the characters will literally tell each other to do what they did the first time.  However, in a fun commentary on the diminishing returns of sequels going back the well, what worked the first time doesn’t always work again.

What does work again this time around is the chemistry between Hill and Tatum.  21 Jump Street showed Tatum’s surprising comedic chops which he continues to showcase here with Hill.  Their relationship ultimately drives the film.  This time Jenko finds himself attached to the frat/jock side of college, bonding with a possible lead (Wyatt Russell) who is hilariously similar to himself, while Schmidt bonds with an art student (Amber Stevens).  Schmidt and Jenko’s relationship works so much that it helps give the film something substantial on top of the jabs made at lazy sequels.  The rest of the cast is also solid.  Ice Cube’s no nonsense Captain Dickson is often a part of some of the biggest laughs, Peter Stormare is just one of those character actors I always enjoy and keep an eye out for a ton of cameos.

In a time when the summer movie season has found itself a victim of diminishing returns from overextended franchises a little more each year, 22 Jump Street is a welcome change.  While it is on the surface a sign of Hollywood’s creative bankruptcy, actually watching you see a film that is clever and fun.  Lord and Miller continue to take a questionable idea at best and make it fresh.  That they made a good comedy sequel is reason enough to celebrate.  If only there were more of these guys for some of the direst movies in production.

Grade: B

Random notes:

-I was disappointed that there was no mention of Schmidt’s love interest from the first film, Molly (Brie Larson).  Perhaps her rising star made her unavailable to be in this one, but it feels like a missed opportunity not to make a joke about that cliché of sweeping the love interest in the first film under the rug in the sequel.

-Definitely stick around for the credit sequence, although you’re fine skipping the post-credits scene.

The Last Playlist

It’s hard to believe it’s been a year since my dad passed.  I still don’t know exactly what to say.  Obviously the past year has been difficult and it’s hard to sum up all that in a blog entry, nor is much of it stuff I want to air out in public.  For this sad anniversary, I wanted to focus on what may be considered a small detail of his memorial service: the music played beforehand.  As far as I know he never gave any specific requests as to what he wanted to be played.  Ultimately, I took it on myself to craft about an hour or so of music that was not only appropriate for a funeral, but also music I knew he enjoyed.  In the end I whittled it down to 18 songs, and was proud of the end product.

Playlists were something my dad really got attached to when he found iTunes, and that was something I had in mind while making it.  It wasn’t just 18 songs played at random, I wanted a certain rhythm and flow to it: to have the songs about mourning the loss early on and finish with celebrating what we had, touching upon some of his favorites along the way.  So here is a breakdown of that ultimate playlist, with a little commentary:

1) “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” – Bob Dylan

The funeral staples are a little tricky, but fortunately this was a right fit.  My dad was a big fan of Dylan, and this was a good choice to kick it off.

2, 4-6) “Day After Day” – Badfinger, “Time of the Season” – The Zombies, “Johnny Too Bad” – Taj Mahal & “Spooky” – Classics IV

I lump these together because they aren’t really funeral type stuff (although The Zombies doesn’t sound like a band you would want to play at a funeral) and were songs my dad really liked to listen to.  These songs were frequent in playlists he’d play on Saturday afternoons (music on Saturdays were an unofficial tradition growing up) after we transitioned to playing the music primarily on the computer.

3)  “In My Life” – The Beatles

Another funeral staple.  My parents turned me on to the Beatles and this song is one of their best.  Perhaps it has a different meaning for my generation than the previous one since John Lennon was dead before I was even born.  Now it seems more like looking back at someone already gone than someone looking back on their own life.  Regardless, I knew the Fab Four needed to be represented somewhere.

7) Nightswimming – R.E.M.

I picked this one because it feels bittersweet, as the song’s narrator reflects on the passage of time and how fleeting things are (“September’s coming soon”).  It’s also just a gorgeous song and I will take advantage of any excuse I have to play it.

8) “Keep Me in Your Heart” – Warren Zevon

I think this may be the only funeral staple made by someone who was near the end of his life (the album was released about a week and a half before Zevon died from cancer in 2003).  It always amazes me when an artist can hit something as profoundly true as he does here, facing the end.  It acknowledges the sadness of death, but also the fact that life goes on, and the memories of those we’ve lost stay with us.

9) “Hey Jude” – The Mutato Musika Orchestra (From the film The Royal Tenenbaums)

Here is where I tried to turn it around a little bit, leading to the uplift at the end.  I’d already used a song the Beatles wrote, but The Royal Tenenbaums was a favorite of ours, and for a hint at what’s to come, this soundtrack has a lot of songs that work for funerals.

10) “(The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes” – Elvis Costello

My dad was a huge fan of Elvis Costello.  He owned an enormous, wall sized poster of him that he’d put up in his office (I believe my sister has it these days).  We even saw Costello do an acoustic set at Woodstock 99.  Most of his music I found a little hard to fit with the rest of the playlist, but with the title I couldn’t resist (though I don’t remember my dad owning any red shoes).

11) “I’ll Fly Away” – Alison Kraus and Gillian Welch

My dad became more in touch with his spiritual side in the last decade of his life, and I wanted to include that in the playlist.  Plus I really enjoyed this version, recorded for the O Brother, Where Art Thou? Soundtrack.

12) “The Fairest of the Seasons” – Nico

The second song from The Royal Tenenbaums, maybe the most somber from the second half, but it felt right as a part of saying goodbye.

13) “What a Wonderful World” – Louis Armstrong

Perhaps the funeral staple, if not top 5.  My dad loved jazz and Louis Armstrong.  Armstrong’s music played at the house all the time, especially his work with Ella Fitzgerald.

14) “We’ll Meet Again” – Vera Lynn

Besides the spiritual implications this song can have in the funeral context, this song has a connection to my relationship with my dad because of its use during the end sequence of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.  Dr. Strangelove was one of the first films my dad showed me when I started to get interested in movies beyond entertainment and it is still one of my favorite films.  Plus it adds to the uplift I was hoping to get as the mix nears its close.

15) “This Must Be the Place (Naïve Melody)” – Talking Heads

Of course our parents influence our tastes by passing down what they liked to us, and my dad loved Talking Heads.  So I wound up loving them too.  This song is simple and beautiful and evokes a strong feeling of peace (I could see the song working at a wedding as well).

16) “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” – The Rolling Stones

This song definitely encapsulates the “acceptance” piece of the grieving process.  Obviously it was tough to lose my dad at only 60 years old and I’ve done a lot of thinking about it.  While I’m still making my way there, I know ultimately that life isn’t going to be fair and that this ordeal will make me stronger.

17) “Everyone” – Van Morrison

The third and final song used in The Royal Tenenbaums (not meant to imply dad was anything like Royal).  I loved how it ended the film, as the characters moved on from the experiences and how that was ultimately a good thing.  Also the Moondance album this is from got a lot of play growing up.

18) “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life” – Monty Python (From the film Monty Python’s Life of Brian)

Like it was going to end with anything else.  Dad turned me on to Monty Python and their brilliant comedy when I was a teenager and it was a major building block for my sense of humor and the way I’d see the world.  While we feel pain for what we’ve lost in funerals, we also need to remember how much good they brought us.

There are of course dozens, if not hundreds, of more songs I could’ve put in but for an hour’s worth of material, I think he would’ve liked it.  It was obviously the toughest playlist I’ve ever had to assemble, but it needed to be done.  He would’ve wanted something carefully and thoughtfully curated because that is some small bit of his legacy carrying on to me.  Of course I got a lot more out of my dad than that, but it is something like this that gives me a little comfort as I continue to process life without him.

Escape from Tomorrow Review

Watching Escape from Tomorrow, the much buzzed about film from last year’s Sundance Film Festival, I was reminded of a test Gene Siskel coined for judging movies.  The test is this: “Is this film more interesting than a documentary of the same actors having lunch?”  For Escape from Tomorrow there has to be some version of that rule where instead of the cast eating lunch, it’s the behind the scenes story of how the film got made.  The film, shot without permission at Disney resorts, certainly has audacity when you think of all the work that had to go into making it.  Unfortunately, all that effort went into making a film that is unwatchable.

Escape from Tomorrow is about a married father of two (Roy Abramsohn) who finds out he’s lost his job just as his family begins the last day of their vacation at the resort.  As the day wears on, he slowly loses his mind, leading to bizarre, Lynchian imagery and scenes.  What sinks the film is the complete lack of any cohesion.  Is the film supposed to be a black comedy?  A satire of the contrived pleasure of theme parks?  Horror about the dark side to “the happiest place on earth”?  The longer the film goes, the more it falls apart.  They even introduce science fiction late into the movie (it may still be taking place in his head).  It feels like it changes dramatically every five to ten minutes.

One of the primary problems of this film is that there is no one to sympathize with.  In theory it should be on the father, but he quickly spends that good will by leering at and stalking two teenage girls (Danielle Safady and The Americans’ Annet Mahendru).  Perhaps it is commenting on how vacations can bring out the worst in us, but doesn’t work because we can’t see things his way.  It shouldn’t be this hard.  He’s stressed out trying to have fun on an expensive vacation, but he’s burdened by the thoughts that this trip cost him money he now desperately needs to stay afloat while he looks for work elsewhere.  That’s all you need for a baseline, and knock it off with him being creepy.

Also, perhaps to avoid legal trouble, they sometimes blink.  The only time I remember Disney said aloud by name is bleeped out.  Sometimes it feels like they go out of their way to avoid saying it.  Probably the biggest cop out is that some scenes are clearly shot in front of a green screen.  It tampers the danger that garnered this film so much of its buzz.  It is amazing how much of what is shot on site looks like a legitimate movie, but clearly they couldn’t quite get what they wanted.

Some movies, like Fitzcaraldo and Apocalypse Now (whose backstories were made into documentaries), have behind the scenes stories that rival what the film audiences saw.  Sadly, Escape from Tomorrow is one of those films where the story about how it got made is miles beyond what we ended up seeing.  The characters are horrible, the story is incoherent and there a little too much gross out stuff that isn’t earned (a scene late in the film in a bathroom is the low point).  Ultimately the biggest problem is likely that to get this any release, it had to be neutered, leaving a pointless mess in its wake.  For such a risky endeavor, it’s a shame that exciting behind the scenes story never made it to the screen.

Grade: D-

X-Men: Days of Future Past Review

Ever since The Avengers made all of the money two summers ago, every other studio with rights to a superhero property has been trying desperately to catch up, whether it’s rushing reboots into production to keep the rights from falling into Marvel’s hands or figuring any movie that does well can be the foundation for an Avengers sized franchise.  The results have been iffy: The Amazing Spider-Man was unnecessary and forgettable (and apparently the sequel wasn’t much better) and the more I hear about Batman V Superman, the more I’m convinced it’ll be the film that’ll burst the superhero movie bubble.  However, Fox is the only one doing it right with their treatment of X-Men.  X-Men made some pretty lousy movies (Last Stand & Origins: Wolverine) to keep the rights, but ever since the Marvel Cinematic Universe started gaining traction, the X-Men series has stepped up their game.  X-Men: First Class was the type of relaunch any franchise owner dreams of: while the prequel format could’ve easily just been a reboot, they decided there was enough good from the previous films (namely the first two) that they could build upon it.  While I would still love to see some type of collaboration with Marvel Studios and Fox, I am OK with them keeping the rights, so long as they continue to make films like First Class and its latest, Days of Future Past.

Days of Future Past, arguably the most famous X-Men story, is the perfect story to mine for inspiration.  It ties the original trilogy cast, stuck in a dystopian future where they are being hunted down, to the new series, as Wolverine (Hugh Jackman, the constant between the two casts) is sent back in time to stop this darkest timeline from ever beginning.  Specifically, he has to stop the assassination of an anti-mutant scientist Bolivar Trask (Peter Dinklage), the inventor of robotic mutant hunters the Sentinels, by Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), who has gone rogue after Magneto (Michael Fassbender) was detained.  Needless to say, Magneto isn’t detained for long and both sides race against time to change the future, albeit directed by their different philosophies.  On top of that, Wolverine is working on a deadline: he has to avert this dark timeline before the sentinels (in 2024) arrive and take out the surviving X-Men.

As you can imagine, DOFP is ambitious because it is so risky: they have two large ensembles, a complicated timeline & the rules of time travel and they have to update us on what the First Class crew have been doing in the decade since their first movie.  Luckily the source story is so short.  It could’ve easily failed under the tremendous weight, but manages to be breezy fun, in part of knowing what to emphasize.  While the original cast serves as a framework, it is more a film continuation of First Class.  Unfortunately they run into the problem of trying to cram so many characters into a movie, like Mystique’s arc is a little underserved (perhaps a result of how far Lawrence’s star power has risen since the first film) and I would’ve loved to see more between Xavier and Magneto, whose relationship has always been the X-Men series’ most compelling story.  However, it never becomes a significant problem.  Not to mention having Jackman as the top billed and ostensibly the main character helps: 14 years on and he is still fun to watch.

As much as this film is about averting a disastrous future, it is also about a broken man finding his purpose again.  When Wolverine finds Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) in the 70s he is a broken man: a man who saw his ambitious dreams crumble.  He’s getting loaded on a drug that allows him to walk, but at the expense of his telepathy.  Unlike the usual hero’s journey many comic book films employ, prequels give us a chance of seeing the modern day elder statesman as one plagued by many of the same doubts his future students will grapple with.  However, unlike Obi-Wan in the Star Wars prequels, we see Xavier on journey bouncing back from his disappointment.  While I wanted to see a little more between Xavier and Magneto, as their long, complicated history is the richest element of this world, seeing Xavier get his mojo back was satisfying.

After the disappointment of Godzilla and skipping Amazing Spider-Man 2, X-Men: Days of Future Past feels like the real beginning of the summer movie season.  Although it isn’t as good as First Class, it pulled off a difficult arc and shows the prequel’s quality wasn’t an accident and like everyone else, they are setting up plans for the next one in this film.  Certainly I would love to see Wolverine pop up in an Avengers movie (like just about anyone), but if Marvel can’t have the rights, I’m OK with Fox keeping it.  There’s no need for them to catch up: they’re already there.  All they have to do now is maintain it.

Grade: B+

Miscellaneous (SPOILER ALERT!)

-I don’t want to get into the scandal director Bryan Singer is involved in (the whole art from the artist is a can of worms), but I wonder how it will affect the series going forward.

-As for the question who is the better Quicksilver (the character is the only one so far in both non-Marvel and Marvel films not counting the possible Scarlet Witch cameo in this film), Fox is off to a promising start with Evan Peters.  The “Time In a Bottle” sequence was a high point.  Like many people I had issues with Aaron Taylor-Johnson in Godzilla, but maybe with Joss Whedon’s touch he could be a formidable version.

-I guess one of the selling points Fox has with their properties is they go a little further content wise.  Marvel’s movies are generally mild PG-13, knowing full well a good chunk of the audience is under 13.  DOFP has more swearing (including the one PG-13 f-word PG-13 movies can use), the violence is a little more graphic and I think this is the first PG-13 comic book movie with nudity in it.

-It was kind of nice to have all those excessive characters from the first one bumped off in between movies.  I guess Emma Frost had to go because her planet needed her (and she subsequently died on her voyage back).

-So Anna Paquin is on screen for like 10 seconds, has no lines, and gets billed above Ellen Page.

-Magneto and Xavier must be in their 90s in the darkest timeline portion.

-The timeline for this, needless to say, is pretty confusing.  Besides whatever they retconned from The Last Stand and Origins (before Wolverine seemingly retconned the whole thing), I’m not sure where The Wolverine, and it’s mid credits scene, stand in the chronology.  I’m sure someone is creating a fun video detailing the timeline.

-I don’t think the post-credit scene, which features a young Apocalypse single handedly building a pyramid and being worshiped as a god, is going to resonate much with casual filmgoers.  Certainly he is powerful, but we also saw Magneto lift an entire football stadium and drop it over The White House.

-To be honest, I bumped up the grade because it more or less means The Last Stand & Origins: Wolverine are no longer canon.  Even if this is the swan song of the original cast, I’m OK with it.  It’s hard not to read this film as an apology for those two other films.

Godzilla (2014) Review

Well this summer is off to a rough start, huh?  First we had The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which is fading fast at the box office due to toxic word of mouth.  Now we have Godzilla which went from being one of the summer’s most anticipated films to being one of the most polarizing.  A lot of people are simply happy it isn’t the 1998 version, which admittedly I’ve never seen, but going in having seen only one Godzilla movie (the 1954 original) I have to say this one left a lot to be desired.

The reboot of the iconic movie monster series brings the franchise into the modern era, though this film owes a lot to the series’ origin.  The original, which came out 60 years ago, was a serious reaction to the atomic bomb dropping in Japan at the end of WWII.  They even had Takashi Shimura, a mainstay of Akira Kurosawa’s films, star as the lead.  While the Cold War is over, incidents like the one in Fukushima in 2011 show that our fears about nuclear power are alive and well.  From the beginning it’s clear that was a key influence on the new one as nuclear tests and power plants help bring about the title monster, along with some as far as I know new ones to do battle in several metropolitan areas.

The script is a mess.  Though it has two people credited (one for story, one for screenplay), it has the feel of a script that went through a few doctors to polish it up.  It’s not really clear who the main character is until around a half hour in, when they finally get around to his nonsensical “save the cat” moment.  His arc at the beginning shifts dramatically when the main motivation for his character gets tossed out, after that he’s a mostly forgettable hero archetype (for a better version of what they were going for, look no further than Chris Evans’ Captain America).  Certain characters, like Ken Wantanabe’s & Sally Hawkins’ characters, just pop up here and there as if the writers forgot they were in the movie and needed to put them back in occasionally.

The only time the movie came to life was when Godzilla was on it, especially doing his signature roar.  When the camera pans up, it’s hard not to think “Oh man, here we go!”  But it never pays off satisfactorily.  Unlike the 98 version, this version’s appearance is true to the Toho version, but brought to life with some stellar effects.  Sadly, Godzilla isn’t in a whole lot of the movie (we don’t see him until about the hour point).  I knew that coming in, but I didn’t know just how little Godzilla we were getting.  As the film wore on it really felt like the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead of monster movies, which would be OK if the characters were worth investing in.  The shark isn’t in much of Jaws, but this Godzilla has no Brody, Quint or Hooper.  As much as I don’t want to be the guy who complains about not seeing a lot of action, it’s called Godzilla, and we go see Godzilla movies to see monsters fight.

Perhaps this is a result of timing: it’ll be hard to see destruction like the kind featured here and not think of 9/11, and although it is not as overt as the nuclear themes, the idea of global warming devastating civilian areas (we see several areas flooded as the monsters create massive tidal waves) is extremely potent idea the film taps into, although it never quite gets there.  Maybe, like the original film, it will be different in tone to future installments, which will be more about who Godzilla is fighting and what other monsters are there.  Whatever the case is, I just want to see more of him next time.

Grade: C-

Observations: (SPOILER ALERT)

-When you have a character who has a contentious relationship with his father and set it up to be a huge part in the story, don’t kill off the father a half hour in, especially when he’s played by Bryan Cranston.

-That Cranston has such a small role really reinforces my usual behavior of avoiding trailers.  It’s hard not to think he would playing a pivotal role in the entire film based on it and the part he’s in.  Not to mention the rather unceremonious way they dispatch him.

-Not to mention Juliette Binoche is in the movie for what couldn’t have been more than five minutes.

-I kinda wish Godzilla had been a villain in this one as he was in the original: that would’ve been truer to the mission statement the film set out with.  But then again, it’d put the kibosh on sequels.  Although the way he killed the MUTO by opening his jaw and breathing that electric fire or whatever was the kind of awesome moment this film needed more of.

-The film in general looked very good.  In particular the scene where the soldiers parachute in to the city with the streams of red smoke lead to the best imagery.  The score in this scene was also very effective.

-So does Aaron Johnson’s character Ford just get in with the troops because they take him at his word?  I’m sure they could do some background check off camera, but this still felt very weird.

-I see Godzilla has followed Pacific Rim’s example of shooting many of the creature fights at night and/or in the rain.  Godzilla’s effects were better and there were a few more scenes during the day, but c’mon, I want to see some more action like in Pacific Rim.

-Random detail that bothered me: BS on there being a news report on in a casino.  Casinos are designed so you have no idea what time of day it is, much less what’s going on in the outside world.

-I couldn’t quite see it, but there was a Mothra Easter egg when they’re in the abandoned city (it’s a sticker on a fish tank).

-This issue I had with Ford’s “save the cat” moment was while he was concerned about helping the kid, he didn’t seem as concerned about the other people in the train car who plunged to their deaths as he did about this kid, not to mention there really wasn’t any satisfying payoff to this bit.

-Better luck next summer Aaron Johnson and Elizabeth Olson.