Snowpiercer: The Best Movie This Summer You Haven't Heard Of

Big budgets and no soul.  This epitomizes summer movie faire.  Normally, there's one or two decent big budget movies that sneak by and entertain a lot more than you expected it should (this year it was Edge of Tomorrow) and there's four or five indie movies that come out to select theaters that fly under the radar that really should get more attention it deserves.  And very rarely... you get both.  The successful combination of what appears to be a big budget "popcorn" flick with that indie feel is what Snowpiercer ends up being.  It's a fantastic sci-fi from director Bong Joon-ho (The Host, no not that Stephanie Meyer shit) that is the most unique and fun action movies this year.

The premise is one that in the hands of a lesser writer/director could've gone Transformers very easily.  The government has manufactured a chemical element they believe if they shoot into the atmosphere will end global warming altogether.  They were correct... except that the chemical, once mixed with Earth's atmosphere turned the Earth into an eternal winter.  This, in turn, kills off every living being on the Earth.  The only select few who've survived reside on the Snowpiercer, a high speed train that continuously circles the Earth.  We begin in the lower class car, the back of the train, where we get to know Curtis (Chris Evans) who has plans to take over the train, by way of making his way from the back to the front, killing everything in his path.  The back of the train is overpopulated, it's run almost like an internment camp with daily executions and food rations coming in a small gelatinous protein brick.  The head of the soldier's guarding each door is Mason (Tilda Swinton) who comes off looking more like a Japanese cartoon than a real person, yet she may be the creepiest person on board.

The passengers in the back of the car are tired of their everyday routines.  They're starving, they're tattered, and they want what those in the upper class cars have: a pleasant life. The rest of the film revolves around Curtis and his band of "soldiers" moving their way from car to car in order to take over the engine.  Because he who runs the engine... runs the train.  Each car has something new hidden in it, a new challenge, a new discovery.  Watching these people navigate the train and overcoming incredibly creative obstacles makes for one damn fun movie.

To add to the success of the writing and directing, the cast is superb.  Chris Evans is quickly establishing himself in Hollywood as a very bankable actor.  He exceeded expectations in the Captain America films and he's even grittier and better in this film.  Tilda Swinton, as always is flawless.  

The term "popcorn flick" generally implies that a movie will visually stun you, keep you entertained, while providing little to no substance.  Snowpiercer defies this stigma by providing everything a great movie has to offer.  Yes, there's a few CGI'd scenes that could use a little touch up, but with a budget this low, director Joon-Ho does everything in his power to give his audiences the best summer movie that has yet to be seen.  This is the movie that should've had the powerful July 4th opening weekend instead of sneaking into a local AMC theater, watched by a select few who heard about it via word of mouth instead of being riddled by trailers over movies and TV.  I don't know if it's that easily accessible anymore... it is available on Video On Demand... but however the format, I highly recommend this film.  It's a little strange, it's a bit bizarre, but it's a ton of fun.

A

Lucy: For A Movie About Obtaining A Higher Intelligence... I Feel Significantly Dumber

I would love to sit here and discuss each and every reason why Lucy isn't just the worst movie of the year, but one of the worst movies I've ever seen in my life... however, according to the film, since I only access 10% of my cerebral capacity, and the film is THAT much smarter than I am, I guess I won't be able to do so.  I can tell you this:

Lucy is beyond awful.

Lucy makes absolutely no sense.

Lucy allows you to care about no one.

Lucy does everything it can to appear intelligent... when, in actuality, a monkey throwing shit at another monkey makes more sense than anything in this film.

Lucy will fail once word of mouth has gotten around.

Lucy is a movie that I'm actually very happy I saw as I haven't hated something this much in quite awhile.

Lucy guesses what science stuff actually does... and misses the mark badly.

Lucy would like you to believe that anything they tell you in it is remotely possible.  But, you're much smarter than that and won't buy into it even for a second.

Lucy is far beneath the talent it has employed.

Lucy is one of the only movies I could've walked out of, at any point, and not cared about what happened.

Lucy literally needs no side characters in the film as no one, including the title character, has any agenda or goals.

Lucy doesn't have the cerebral capacity to understand the concept of cerebral capacity.

Lucy has just received Big Peck's Cineflex's very first...

F

The Purge: Anarchy: Resist The Urge To Purge... Again

There are so many things wrong with The Purge franchise that should be right.  The concept for the films are great.  A new law in America allows all citizens one 12-hour night to commit any and all crimes without punishment.  This, in turn, has made the unemployment rate down to less than five percent and crime down to almost 99 percent.  It seems to be a good incentive to Americans who need to commit crime in order to purge their darkest desires in one government-decreed night.  There is SO much potential here to make a riveting film.  Unfortunately, in the first film we have all of America out doing whatever the hell they want to do centralized into a single home.  Not exactly the best of scenarios, but it could've worked had a few pieces actually fit together to make a decent movie.  It did not.  So, writer/director James DeMonaco actually took the criticisms from the first movie and expanded the universe out into the streets.  Yes, if America is out purging on the night of the purge, we want to be everywhere.  We want to see every crime committed by heinous human beings acting out their government-given right.  We want to see how terrifying it would be if someone's car happened to break down miles from their home, just minutes before the purge is to begin.  We want to see how innocents escaping from purgers handle themselves outdoors while trying to survive the night.  We want to see any and all purge scenarios (and there are limitless amounts) because the concept is so great.  And while DeMonaco does a great job in this sequel with his newest concepts... much like the first film, it isn't executed well at all.

This may be the first time in my life's movie history that I despised an original film, then, less than a year later saw a trailer for it's sequel and got excited about it again.  Fool me twice, DeMonaco, that's on me.  It seemed like for everything DeMonaco did right in this film, he did three things wrong.  Perhaps under the guise of a studio (and I will hardly ever say anything like this) it may have been a better film.  But, this falls under the case of the director and the writer being the same person, so there's no one with better judgement looking over the shoulder offering better ideas. This time around, yes, we have expanded the universe from a house to the streets.  We are following a mother and daughter who's apartment is under siege from men dressed all in black with automatic weapons.  There's also a fighting couple who's car has broken down on a bridge right before the purge begins.  Then, finally we're following a single man, willingly outdoors during the purge with an agenda not made entirely clear.  Somehow... and this is where credulity is strained... these people all end up together in the same car and forced to stick together to stay alive during the night. 

It's a stretch to put the only five alive innocents on the streets of (I think) LA.  The film would've served better if it was a series of vignettes put together to show different purge stories and actually give us some cool characters and some truly evil characters put together.  However, we were given three interwoven stories, so we'll stick with these.  The first thing everyone in the theater should notice about this film is how atrocious the dialogue is.  Again, if the director is also the writer, there's no one standing over the shoulders explaining that the dialogue truly needed a beefing up.  It's really bad.  Not one character is apparently allowed to have an independent thought in their head without expelling it out of their mouths.  "I'm scared."  "I think they're here."  "I'm running."  "My heart is beating."  "My acting choices are questionable."  It's all exposition.  We, as an audience, are apparently not allowed to infer anything in the film, instead we have to be spoon fed all thought and emotion spoken by each character which makes for some sloppy writing.

The next huge problem I had with the film was with the new political motivations added in by DeMonaco in order to explain the law of the Purge a little more fully.  This is something that was totally unnecessary.  We don't need to know that America is no longer a Presidential dictatorship, but has essentially turned into a society in which the upper class elite run everything through a group of a few men known as the "founding fathers" who are represented mostly as cult leaders rather than political figures. I know we have a pledge of allegiance, and in certain settings can sound almost cult-like when spoken aloud, but now, apparently, all rich people have resigned to "praise" the fathers and America.  So, before acting out a kill, we get this very cult-like prayer about the fathers and America and the right to Purge the shit out of people.  I get how he wanted to explain why America would allow such a law to be passed, but it's more silly than explanatory.  We didn't need an explanation.  We've already strained believability with the concept of the film and accepted it.  No need to add some culty political overtones in order to give a little more credibility to a film that, astoundingly, didn't need it.

Then, it's just a series of poor choices and miscues.  Situations are set up that even during the Purge, I'm inclined to think is just unbelievable. We don't care about any of the characters, and when we start to, they do something that takes away any credibility they'd briefly earned.  It's a script that could've benefited greatly from an edit and a re-write.  It's also not that scary.  There are a few quick scares in the beginning, but then genre lines are crossed and we've gone from horror film to action film to tense thriller film to attempted grindhouse film.  The concept, yes, is terrifying, but then this is what we've been talking about all along-- failure to do anything right with a brilliant concept.  When the film begins to lose steam and become almost laughable, the ability to scare anyone goes right out the window.

Like I said in my review of the first film, had this idea been an episode or two of The Twilight Zone it would've knocked it out of the park.  The film is already doing very well box office-wise, so we can assume that this isn't the final entry of The Purge series.  Perhaps, if the reigns are handed off to someone a little more capable, maybe, then, we'll have the film we've been hoping for since last year.  It does make me wonder, though, how many times I'll be fooled by the concept of the Purge before giving up on it altogether.  Depending on the trailer, I'm guessing at least one more.

D

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes: Shakespeare With Monkeys

When Rise of the Planet of the Apes first dropped in theaters I was genuinely confused as to why anyone thought there was a market for people who wanted to see a reboot of a movie that is literally about monkeys who can talk and have taken over the Earth.  Oh, people were interested in this forty years ago... I bet they'd be interested to see how it all started.  Shockingly enough, people were.  I don't think it had as much to do with wanting a monkey origin story, but more that the technological advances in CGI implemented in Rise were note-worthy and it was actually a very well-written/directed film. So, naturally when a big summer movie does well (makes a shit ton of money) a sequel is inevitable.  And so, here in 2014 we now have a sequel to a reboot of a movie that was popular over 40 years ago about monkeys that take over the Earth.  And it's fantastic.

There's a fine line to walk when writing a movie about animals vs. humans.  If we're watching animals thriving once a good chunk of the human race has been eradicated do we root for them?  But, we're also humans and I know personally if a bunch of talking monkeys with war paint on their faces tried to kill me, I'd be a little pissed off.  So who do we root for?  The human race or the persecuted/angry monkeys?  Director Matt Reeves has answered this question quite elegantly in that we root for both.  Why not?  Over the course of the film Reeves aims to show that anything animal or human with cognitive abilities and emotion... we're not so different from each other.

 

This time around, we're ten years in the future since the events of the previous film.  Most of the human race has been killed off and none have emerged for the last two years.  The ape nation has expanded and thrives with their leader Caesar (Andy Serkis).  When a group of forrigers looking for an energy source to power their dying San Francisco city led by Malcolm (Jason Clarke) meet the apes... tensions run high.  The humans in their habitat, helmed by an intimidating Dreyfus (Gary Oldman), and the apes are both weary of one another.  However, Caesar and Malcolm make a pact that if the apes allow the humans to fix the power source at the dam so that humans can begin to rebuild, they will leave the apes alone.  This is much to the chagrin of Dreyfus who wants to wipe out the humans, as well as scarred up ape Koba who only knows humans as emotionless and violent towards apes.  Caesar, who has known the kindness of humans is much more trustworthy, yet he still exercises caution when it comes to the humans.

This when some Shakespeare/Lion King shit goes down.  Koba turns on Caesar and takes control of the colony leading an all-out war against the humans.  It might've been a little too on the nose with Caesar being named so aptly in this film, but considering it was his name in the previous movie before, I'm sure, the brain cells required to make this film aligned, I'll let it slide.  But, Julius Caesar this film could be... you know... with monkeys.  In more ways than one the Apes are more intellectually complex than the humans, yet each have that "wildcard" in the group that can fuck everything up.  Not so different from one another.  What's great about this summer popcorn sequel is that it takes a careful path to reach its climax.  It's not just about getting all of the exposition out of the way so it can finally blow some shit up, the film takes its time.  It leaves a queasy feeling in your stomach because you KNOW that shit will go down, but as humans and apes work together, you really just want everything to work out.  Let's make that movie!  Humans and talking apes hang out and fix shit.  I'd watch that.

"That's what he gets for not hailing to the chimp."

The computer animation is fantastic.  Other than a quick scene in the beginning involving deer and a bear, all of the animals in the film look as real as they possibly could.  If we didn't know in the back of our brains that these were computer created apes, you might be a little scared.  It's also a very intelligent film with a lot of political and evolutionary undertones that don't force-feed you messages of how to make the world better.  It has a lot more insight in it that a summer blockbuster ought to have.  It truly is the platform that all the Michael Bay types ought to template their next films after.  Who says you can't have something to say, something to kill, something to blast, and something to laugh at while still implementing some intelligence into the film?  I highly recommend this as the next movie you make it out to see this truly thin summer.

A

22 Jump Street: The Most Meta Action-Comedy Sequel Ever

Most sequels all have the same inherent problem: they try to take all of the best elements of what made the original so successful and expand upon them, make it bigger, and attempt to retain the high quality of the original and make more money.  A lot of the time the sequel becomes a carbon copy of the original, placing the characters in a new setting and tweaking the conflict, but creating what is essentially the same plot (I'm looking right at you Hangover II).  The best sequels expand upon the characters and not the plot.  They create new conflicts and new scenarios for the characters we know and love to have to overcome.  Yes, sequels always get a higher budget and always amp up the energy of the first movie, but the good ones use this budget effectively (Terminator 2, Aliens).  22 Jump Street recognizes both achievements and very unsubtly parodies the outcomes of both sequel scenarios.  In turn, this decision makes 22 Jump Street a highly self-aware and effective sequel.

The plot begins the same.  Jenko (Channing Tatum) and Schmidt (Jonah Hill) are sent undercover as college students (expanding upon the high school students they played in the previous entry) to find the dealers of a new synthetic drug in order to take down the supplier (the exact same thing they did in the previous entry).  This time, instead of Schmidt being taken in as the cool one, and Jenko as the outcast, the roles are switched once again.  They even solve the crime by discovering that it was a teacher on campus who had a hand in the drug distribution... exactly as it was in the previous entry.  Lessons are learned about brotherhood and friendship and what it means to succeed in life and college.  However, this is just the first half of the film.  The second half is about going bigger.  It's about adding a twist to the structure of the first one and a half Jump Street films.  It's about not replicating the same plot from the first film, but about taking the characters we love and bringing them to new, organic conflict that has them dealing with a situation that is out of their league, appears unwinnable, and forces the audience to wonder how in the hell they're going to make it out alive.

This entire plan of mocking sequels, and more specifically action sequels, isn't exactly a subtle artform to directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller.  In 21 Jump Street it was all about mocking how Hollywood is incapable of coming up with new ideas, so they decide to reboot something from the past that no one really gave a shit about in the first place.  It was chock full of "reboot" references and jabs.  This time, it's the action movie sequel.  There are blatant references to Lethal Weapon, Face/Off, Mission: Impossible 2, Iron Man 3, Ice Cube's music career, and loads of 80s action tropes. All of the references successful and even make sense in the what the two cops are trying to accomplish plot-wise.  It's a smart film, if not just a little bit too overt with their tactics.

What's strange about movies today is that most films are critically unsuccessful unless they defy convention or parody it.  A straight sequel to 22 Jump Street would've probably done about the same in the box office.  But, in order to boost that score on rotten tomatoes, they had to satirize everything about what it means to be a sequel.  This is something Muppets Most Wanted attempted briefly, but failed to explain as witty as 22. Originality and self-awareness is the name of the movie game in 2014.  Anything else just comes off as hackneyed and cheap.  Though, I feel a majority of the films released in the last decade have these themes, it's a new day and age where the film industry has done so much we have to parody the parody at this point.

But, it is a very funny movie.  I wouldn't say it's any better or worse than the original.  If you enjoyed 21 Jump Street, then you will be pleased with it's sequel.  It's Channing Tatum as a charming, brutish idiot, something we may not get to see again.  And it's Jonah Hill-- a douche.  But, he's a very funny douche.  He will not fail to make anyone laugh.  There are some fun cameos, and one really stupid one.  Ice Cube steals nearly every scene he's in.  And there's something funny here for everyone.  It's a very successful sequel that doesn't fail to point out why it is successful and how it would've failed.  It's a commentary on the film industry's laziness... with dick jokes.  So, you know... it's a pretty good balance.

B

Edge of Tomorrow: Groundhog Day With More Tom Cruise Dying

Tom Cruise gets a bad rap.  He really does.  Dude honestly picks good movies.  Yeah, he's batshit crazy in real life, but the guy knows how to pick films.  Other than his latest sci-fi failure, Oblivion, his choice in sci-fi/action is generally stellar.  War of the Worlds was underwhelming, but he was good in it and Minority Report is arguably his best work in his lengthy filmography.  Other than the blight of Knight and Day (which we can all agree was ruined completely by Cameron Diaz) and his personal life, there's no reason to distrust Tom Cruise's film choices.  Yeah, he kinda looks like an aged-pretty-boy midget wiener, but he's picking roles now that honor that about him. His role of Cage in Edge of Tomorrow does this best I've seen.  What I'm trying to say is this: of the films released thus far in 2014, Edge of Tomorrow is by far the best.

Edge of Tomorrow will suffer in the box office due to two distributing errors.  One, due to his vomit-inducing craziness, Tom Cruise is a tough box office sell.  And two, here we have another sad case of poor trailer representation.  The trailer doesn't really give much away except that Tom Cruise is in another science fiction movie where he is apparently the sole badass.  The trailer poorly represents the awesomeness that is Edge of Tomorrow.  Cruise plays Cage, a major involved in the PR side of the war against aliens that have come to Earth in an asteroid.  He's not a fighter.  He's a huge wuss that wants nothing to do with the way.  He's the spokesman to the people to let them know that the armed forces are doing everything they can to get rid of the alien force.  Then, when he's unwillingly sent to the beaches of France to fight in the biggest battle yet, he's forced to find the man-testicles that have eluded him in his career thus far.  Unfortunately, they don't last long when he's killed on the beach by an alien, or Mimic.  However, once he dies, he's sent back to the day before the battle has begun to relive the same day over and over and over again.

He doesn't understand how he's achieved this ability, but by having it he's able to join forces with British female badass Rita, dubbed "Full Metal Bitch", train to become the soldier he's portrayed himself to be, and hopefully figure out how to stop these aliens from destroying the planet as we know it.  Without giving anymore away, this is a great premise for a sci-fi.  Taking the best elements from Groundhog Day, combining it with what worked so well in films like District 9 and Independence Day comes one of the best sci-fi flicks I've seen in a long time.

What's great is the Cruise doesn't try to take control of the film with his movie star ego.  He allows everyone else, soldiers who actually have warlike ability, to show off their skills and teach him a thing or two about the fight. It only makes sense that a four-foot-two scientology dwarf would be able to learn any skill, even if that is how to perfectly fight a manic alien force, with the repetition of the same day playing out over the course of what could be years.  Hell, anyone could.  It's how Cruise handles himself as a self-aware puss with no real tactical skills that adds that extra level of sophistication to the already tight script.  Unlike the recent Godzilla, it actually makes time for character development that feels organic to the story.  And, the aliens are actually something new we haven't seen yet that don't look like CGI laziness.

Everything about Edge of Tomorrow works well.  It will probably be one of those films that will do much better at Redbox than it does in theaters.  I strongly suggest anyone reading this to get out there and see it.  It was offered in IMAX and 3D.  Not being a fan of 3D myself, I don't necessarily think this is one that needs to be seen in that format, but IMAX, on the other hand, may just be that perfect, visually powerful sci-fi we've been waiting for.  Great film.

A

A Million Ways To Die In The West: Surprisingly Less MacFarlane-y Than You'd Expect

I have a strong dislike for Seth MacFarlane, and yet I have a very high respect level for him.  He has a unique sense of humor that you either love or hate.  I, personally, hate Family Guy in all its forms.  One, it's essentially a rip-off of one the best show of all time: The Simpsons.  Two, it's a very easy show to write with one-note characters that learn no lessons whatsoever.  It's the callback show.  The remember-the-time-I... joke that a four year old on acid scribbling with an Indian Red crayon could write on a wall.  I don't find it funny.  It goes for cheap laughs and anything that doesn't involve a brain cell I pass on.  However, MacFarlane, himself, is anything but an idiot.  He knows what people like and what the general public will laugh at.  And, with Family Guy, he has run with it for years.  Then, he decided to cross over into live action film with Ted.  Ted still had the same immature toilet, vulgar, potty mouthed humor that Family Guy exudes weekly, but there was more heart and character development and laughs.  It showed Seth MacFarlane's ability to adapt in an unfamiliar territory and provide his same group of followers with a different side of him.

Most of the time a Seth MacFarlane vehicle will feature the same type of laughs: you'll get pushing-the-envelope vulgarity, disgusting sight gags, undeniable political incorrectness, obscure celebrity references/cameos, and drug humor.  Ted was able to do this successfully.  So, going into A Million Ways To Die In The West I was expecting the same type of MacFarlane-ness as his previous work.  I was, strangely, and pleasantly surprised that it was... lacking.  AMWTDITW is shockingly less of a Seth MacFarlane film and more of a mainstream romantic comedy... set in the old west.  There are still plenty of MacFarlane-isms in the film, but they're very scarce and and mild compared to everything else he's done.  A few reviews I've read have even reprimanded him for "losing his touch" and "bitching out."  However, I see this less as a comedian's laziness and more of a step in the direction of comedic maturity.  He could've gone balls out with his idea of western vulgarity and self-awareness, which is what I was expecting.  For a film title involving all the different ways to perish in the old west, I was mostly expecting a cavalcade of over-the-top, gross-out, gruesome death scenes.  And yet, it was reserved in that aspect.  This could be viewed as disappointing to those hoping for MacFarlane's previous work to come forth in his new projects, but I view it as, once again, comedic maturity.  The film is funny enough with the characters he's created and the situations he's put himself into.  And, minus one strange and unfunny drug hallucination, I feel like AMWTDITW hits more positive notes than negative ones.

The film tells the story of Albert (MacFarlane), a cowardly sheep farmer who has just been dumped by the love of his life, Louise (Amanda Seyfried) after chickening out of a gunfight.  Trying to win her back, he challenges her new beau Foy (Neil Patrick Harris) to a gunfight.  Only one problem, Albert has never shot a gun before.  He makes friends with a new beauty that's recently come to town, Anna (Charlize Theron) who has a more than a few tricks up her sleeve.  She just happens to be the wife of the most dangerous outlaw in the territory, Clinch (Liam Neeson) who doesn't take kindly to the fact that she's made "a new friend".  Hilarity ensues, yada yada yada.

It's amazing how well the characters and situations just work in this film.  Anna hates the outlaw life, so she is instantly attracted to the "nice guy" in Albert.  I can't believe this is something I'm actually writing, but MacFarlane and Theron's chemistry is top notch.  One of the positive things I can say about MacFarlane as a writer is that he's got this knack of being able to write dialogue that sounds just like real life.  Their conversations, when they're alone, of pure bullshit sounds like a bullshit conversation two people attracted to one another would have.  It's full of subtle jokes and poking fun at one another without sounding too rehearsed or fake.  It almost has the feel of an improvisation, which I'm sure a majority of it was.  But, the two together have an amazing chemistry that actually makes you feel for them, something that is primarily absent in nearly everything else MacFarlane has done.  Their relationship could be put into any decent romcom and it would work just as well.

There's also other great side characters and scenarios.  Albert's best friend Edward (Giovanni Ribisi) is a virgin engaged to Ruth (Sarah Silverman) who is the town's most successful prostitute.  Yet, the two are Christian and haven't conjugated, so to speak, because they don't want to piss off the Lord.  It's an ironic relationship that is, again, ripe for great comedy.  I feel like I'm praising the movie like I'm biased somehow, but this is actually coming from someone who generally doesn't advocate MacFarlane-esque entertainment.  But, I was wildly impressed with this film.  It's dirty, it's crass, it's fun, it's bloody, it's cute, it's engaging, it's a joy to watch, and most importantly... it's a very funny film.

B+