Adult-aimed animated films are few and far between here in the states. In Japan, anime runs free, existing in any genre it pleases, satisfying both young and old on different levels. There is no need to dumb down and add fun things for kids in the anime world. In some ways I wish that existed here in the states; then maybe Sausage Party, the new Seth Rogen-Evan Goldberg comedy, wouldn't feel compelled to litter the script with so much profanity and could instead focus on being a little more clever.
A Pixar parody, Sausage Party poses the question "what if food had feelings the same way the toys in Toy Story (1995) did?" The food in a supermarket dream of being taken by the "Gods" (a.k.a. humans) into the great beyond where they will enter nirvana. In one of the movie's funniest scenes, food quickly realizes that the great beyond is not so pleasant.
A feisty sausage named Frank (Seth Rogen) learns the truth through other means, and sets out on a quest along with his sweetheart Brenda (Kristen Wiig), a hot dog bun, and two foods named Lavash (David Krumholtz) and Sammy (Edward Norton), a bagel. They come across several other food items, and slowly Frank realizes he must try and spread the truth to the other foods.
The movie is often pretty funny, providing a surprising analogy to real world religion and atheism. Lavash and Sammy both clearly represent Palestinian and Israeli relations, and several other ethnic stereotypes are on display, including a taco voiced by Salma Hayek, and tubes of sauerkraut dressed like the SS that are determined to exterminate the "juice."
It also takes full advantage of it's R rating and goes places I didn't fully expect and was surprised and shocked by. There is a final montage near the end that I won't dare spoil that definitely pushes the bounds of taste and will leave your audience in stitches or in disbelief.
But, on some level, I wish the movie had been cleverer with it's R rating. The first word uttered is "Shit" and the opening number, written by Alan Menken (who has written his fair share of Disney songs), is surprisingly profanity laden. On one level, it is probably Rogen and company simply stating to any foolish parents who wandered in with their child "leave now, while you still can, because this movie is going places."
But, I dunno, to really do the religion parallel it would have been interesting to see the food actually have language befitting a Christian (at least at church), and then as the veil is lifted, their language is also corrupted. I don't really know how that would work, but it also gets a little numbing hearing a "hot dog" say fuck a lot, and less would be more.
It's also troubling to hear reports coming out about the animators on the film supposedly working tons of overtime for no pay, to keep the film coming in at an amazingly cheap $19 million (for comparison, June's Finding Dory cost an estimated $200 million). All the characters are well rendered, although the backgrounds and feel of the world leave something to be desired. It's understandable that adult animated movies are not a sure thing, but that doesn't excuse abuse of workers.
Controversy aside, the final product is overall a very fun, funny time. You'll probably know within five minutes of the movie if you are in or out. Rogen and Goldberg, along with co-writers Ariel Shaffir and Kyle Hunter, and directors Greg Tiernan and Conrad Vernon have delivered a raunchy sex-comedy about food that offends in the right ways and pushes the boundary of taste beyond what I thought was possible. It doesn't outdo South Park, but it comes close.
Monday, August 15, 2016
Friday, August 12, 2016
Swiss Army Man (2016)
It's been a pretty disappointing summer; there has really been no Mad Max: Fury Road or Inside Out to stand above the endless deluge of sequels and reboots that is Hollywood's stock-in-trade these days. Afraid to take a risk, studios try and feed us the same crap over and over again, and if box office receipts are any indication (currently $1 billion less than last summer), the general public is a little fatigued.
And while Swiss Army Man doesn't exactly live up to last summer's best, it certainly does something else; it's bold, exciting, interesting, and worth thinking about, if ultimately what it has to offer up isn't particularly deep.
Opening on a desolate island, a man named Hank (Paul Dano) is attempting to hang himself, until he sees a flatulent corpse (Daniel Radcliffe) washed up on the shore. Harnessing the power of his farts to propel him through the water, Hank uses the corpse as a jet ski to get him to the mainland. He drags the corpse along on his journey to civilization, and soon the corpse begins to talk.
Named Manny, the corpse possesses a childlike outlook on the world; reanimated, he has forgotten his current life and so questions everything Hank tells him, wondering why humans are isolated and lonely, and more importantly, why we are uncomfortable farting in front of each other.
These aren't exactly hard hitting questions; any freshman philosophy major has surely pondered questions far beyond these. But the way the movie presents these queries is unique enough that you forgive it for not diving a little bit deeper. Manny's wonderment and Hank's explanations lead to some truly beautiful passages in the film, and Hank recreates society out of garbage strewn through the woods they traverse.
The film is written and directed by Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, who collectively call themselves Daniels, best known as music video directors (their most well-known probably being the outrageous, shocking Turn Down For What video, in which people's body parts lose control to the beat of DJ Snake's rhythm). As visual artists, they are ones to be reckoned with, as the truly best parts of the film are those that come closest to being a music video. Accompanying a score by Andy Hull and Robert McDowell (both from the band Manchester Orchestra), there are some sequences here that people will refer back to as I guarantee this movie will attain a sort of cult status in the years to come. The production design by David Duarte is also spectacular, creating a tactile, alternate world out of the trash in the woods.
But, unfortunately, the movie can't sustain itself and falls apart in the end. Without giving too much away, the movie goes to a bold place that unfortunately doesn't work, and leaves you with a bit of a sour taste in your mouth. What had been, up until that point, a morbid but surprisingly touching meditation on life devolves into a stalker creep show. I give the movie props for trying, but it also tries to take the easy way out with it's final images, and the clash doesn't work.
Overall, though, the movie billed as the farting-corpse film surprisingly works very well. Paul Dano and Daniel Radcliffe are both stellar in the film, Radcliffe especially as the corpse. They achieve a touching relationship, and bizarre as that sounds that a man and a corpse bond, it's a least something refreshing that's worth talking about.
And while Swiss Army Man doesn't exactly live up to last summer's best, it certainly does something else; it's bold, exciting, interesting, and worth thinking about, if ultimately what it has to offer up isn't particularly deep.
Opening on a desolate island, a man named Hank (Paul Dano) is attempting to hang himself, until he sees a flatulent corpse (Daniel Radcliffe) washed up on the shore. Harnessing the power of his farts to propel him through the water, Hank uses the corpse as a jet ski to get him to the mainland. He drags the corpse along on his journey to civilization, and soon the corpse begins to talk.
Named Manny, the corpse possesses a childlike outlook on the world; reanimated, he has forgotten his current life and so questions everything Hank tells him, wondering why humans are isolated and lonely, and more importantly, why we are uncomfortable farting in front of each other.
These aren't exactly hard hitting questions; any freshman philosophy major has surely pondered questions far beyond these. But the way the movie presents these queries is unique enough that you forgive it for not diving a little bit deeper. Manny's wonderment and Hank's explanations lead to some truly beautiful passages in the film, and Hank recreates society out of garbage strewn through the woods they traverse.
The film is written and directed by Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, who collectively call themselves Daniels, best known as music video directors (their most well-known probably being the outrageous, shocking Turn Down For What video, in which people's body parts lose control to the beat of DJ Snake's rhythm). As visual artists, they are ones to be reckoned with, as the truly best parts of the film are those that come closest to being a music video. Accompanying a score by Andy Hull and Robert McDowell (both from the band Manchester Orchestra), there are some sequences here that people will refer back to as I guarantee this movie will attain a sort of cult status in the years to come. The production design by David Duarte is also spectacular, creating a tactile, alternate world out of the trash in the woods.
But, unfortunately, the movie can't sustain itself and falls apart in the end. Without giving too much away, the movie goes to a bold place that unfortunately doesn't work, and leaves you with a bit of a sour taste in your mouth. What had been, up until that point, a morbid but surprisingly touching meditation on life devolves into a stalker creep show. I give the movie props for trying, but it also tries to take the easy way out with it's final images, and the clash doesn't work.
Overall, though, the movie billed as the farting-corpse film surprisingly works very well. Paul Dano and Daniel Radcliffe are both stellar in the film, Radcliffe especially as the corpse. They achieve a touching relationship, and bizarre as that sounds that a man and a corpse bond, it's a least something refreshing that's worth talking about.
Saturday, August 6, 2016
Star Trek Beyond (2016)
As far as the new series of Star Trek movies go, Star Trek Beyond is the most enjoyable, probably in part because it was co-written by Simon Pegg, who you can feel is a real fan of the series. Not to say that previous scribes Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci weren't, or director J.J. Abrams, but there's something about this one that just feels more Star Trek than what we've gotten before.
Set 3 years into the 5 year deep-space mission of the USS Enterprise, we pick up on a Kirk (Chris Pine) bored with the journey and looking to make a career move, a Spock (Zachary Quinto) who learns of the death of his alternate universe self (the late Leonard Nimoy) and decides maybe he should do more to help his endangered race, and a crew that still more or less functions as a whole.
After a stopover at a Federation port, the crew comes across a refugee from an alien attack in a nearby nebulae, and jump on the opportunity to investigate the misdeeds. It's not long until the Enterprise is under attack and crashes on a nearby planet, where the crew is separated and must journey to reunite with each other.
As directed by Justin Lin, best known for reviving the Fast and the Furious movies into a lucrative franchise, the film is chockfull of delightful, fun action sequences that vibrate with a unique pulse and entertain. He's helped by Pegg's script, co-written with Doug Jung, which makes Pine's Kirk bearable for the first time in the franchise, and unites the crew in a way we haven't really seen in this series.
Back again are Zoe Saldana as Uhura, Karl Urban as Bones, Pegg as Scotty, John Cho as Sulu, and the late Anton Yelchin as Chekov, all comfortable and making the roles their own, the pressures of living up to the original cast all but a distant memory. Joining the cast are Sofia Boutella as Jayla, an alien the crew stumbles across on the foreign planet, and Idris Elba as Krall, a rather boring bad guy whose motivations and twists are a little too confusing and muddied.
While the film is entertaining, there are large portions that jump incredible logic, and you kind of just accept it because it's sci-fi and that's what happens. But too many times the film does this and at some point it feels a little convenient for convenience sake.
But my quibbles are minor; this film is a great step-up from the dour tone of Into Darkness, which was more obsessed with being a mirror to The Wrath of Khan than being it's own unique piece. While the first in this series ingeniously set-up a new universe where new stories could be told, the second squandered this potential by paying too much homage to a classic. Beyond, hate or love it, at least tries to tell a new story, familiar as it may be to other Trek films.
And Lin, surprisingly, is a director I don't mind. This is the first of his films I've seen, and while I don't consider him a great auteur, he has an effortless, entertaining way of delivering his films that make them palatable. Sadly, this is something that many directors today can't do, and while we shouldn't praise serviceable entertainment for doing the bare minimum, it's somewhat needed to prop up films like this that, at the very least, go one step beyond.
Set 3 years into the 5 year deep-space mission of the USS Enterprise, we pick up on a Kirk (Chris Pine) bored with the journey and looking to make a career move, a Spock (Zachary Quinto) who learns of the death of his alternate universe self (the late Leonard Nimoy) and decides maybe he should do more to help his endangered race, and a crew that still more or less functions as a whole.
After a stopover at a Federation port, the crew comes across a refugee from an alien attack in a nearby nebulae, and jump on the opportunity to investigate the misdeeds. It's not long until the Enterprise is under attack and crashes on a nearby planet, where the crew is separated and must journey to reunite with each other.
As directed by Justin Lin, best known for reviving the Fast and the Furious movies into a lucrative franchise, the film is chockfull of delightful, fun action sequences that vibrate with a unique pulse and entertain. He's helped by Pegg's script, co-written with Doug Jung, which makes Pine's Kirk bearable for the first time in the franchise, and unites the crew in a way we haven't really seen in this series.
Back again are Zoe Saldana as Uhura, Karl Urban as Bones, Pegg as Scotty, John Cho as Sulu, and the late Anton Yelchin as Chekov, all comfortable and making the roles their own, the pressures of living up to the original cast all but a distant memory. Joining the cast are Sofia Boutella as Jayla, an alien the crew stumbles across on the foreign planet, and Idris Elba as Krall, a rather boring bad guy whose motivations and twists are a little too confusing and muddied.
While the film is entertaining, there are large portions that jump incredible logic, and you kind of just accept it because it's sci-fi and that's what happens. But too many times the film does this and at some point it feels a little convenient for convenience sake.
But my quibbles are minor; this film is a great step-up from the dour tone of Into Darkness, which was more obsessed with being a mirror to The Wrath of Khan than being it's own unique piece. While the first in this series ingeniously set-up a new universe where new stories could be told, the second squandered this potential by paying too much homage to a classic. Beyond, hate or love it, at least tries to tell a new story, familiar as it may be to other Trek films.
And Lin, surprisingly, is a director I don't mind. This is the first of his films I've seen, and while I don't consider him a great auteur, he has an effortless, entertaining way of delivering his films that make them palatable. Sadly, this is something that many directors today can't do, and while we shouldn't praise serviceable entertainment for doing the bare minimum, it's somewhat needed to prop up films like this that, at the very least, go one step beyond.
Wednesday, August 3, 2016
Lights Out (2016)
It seems that horror films today feel they need one unique gimmick to stand out from the scores of slasher and ghost flicks to really make an impact and draw interest. Paranormal Activity (2007) did this fairly well with a stationary camera watching a couple sleeping, except when something spooky happened like a blanket moving or door creaking; Saw (2004) brought horror-torture to the mainstream, the first a fairly straightforward thriller, the rest showcases of escalating gruesomeness.
Lights Out, directing by first-timer David F. Sandberg, based on a short film he made with Lotta Losten, has one ingeniously chilling effect that it succeeds in not over-doing throughout its brisk 81-minute runtime: when the lights goes out, a shadow materializes, and when the lights go on, the shadow is gone.
The initial visual was a great sell in the trailer, but sadly the movie dispenses with the best shot early, as a factory worker sees the ghoulish specter as she leaves, flipping the lights on and off revealing and disappearing the shadow, in a set-up that is both comedic and frightening. And after that, the movie really has nowhere to go from there.
Opening with the murder of Rebecca's (Teresa Palmer) dad (Billy Burke) at the hands of the photophobic ghoul, the film sets about with a fairly routine story; the main girl, who is relationship-adverse to her otherwise charming and committed beau, Bret (Alexander DiPersia); the child (Gabriel Bateman) who knows something is wrong yet is not believed by adults; and the crazy mother (Maria Bello) who is harboring a secret.
There's nothing bad about the movie, and the scares are rather well done, if they conform to the usual routine of being very loud to startle you. Fighting a ghost adverse to light can seem like a silly task when you just leave the lights on, but of course the ghost seems to be able to cut power to a whole house so that tension can mount.
And the performers are all around pretty good. Maria Bello is a welcome sight, and is a strong addition to the cast. The direction is fine, as Mr. Palmer has been assigned to direct the forthcoming Annabelle 2, part of a spin-off The Conjuring series. Maybe he can envision more ingenious images that illicit fright, as he does so well with the initial shots of this film.
But the movie could have benefited from a little Jaws style horror, where the ghost isn't "seen" (although it never really is) until later in the movie. And the reason behind who-and-what this ghost is is a little disappointing. I understand too much ambiguity can be frustrating and lazy, but too much clarification balances the scales in the other direction. I don't mind the ghost has a backstory, but it's so definitive and finite that it takes away some of the scares. We know Freddy's backstory in A Nightmare in Elm Street, but we're never sure why he is in people's dreams (at least in the initial film).
Overall, as far as horror films go, you could do a lot worse. This one is short on gore, but the tension is real, and for a hot summer day, it's a fun respite from the heat.
Lights Out, directing by first-timer David F. Sandberg, based on a short film he made with Lotta Losten, has one ingeniously chilling effect that it succeeds in not over-doing throughout its brisk 81-minute runtime: when the lights goes out, a shadow materializes, and when the lights go on, the shadow is gone.
The initial visual was a great sell in the trailer, but sadly the movie dispenses with the best shot early, as a factory worker sees the ghoulish specter as she leaves, flipping the lights on and off revealing and disappearing the shadow, in a set-up that is both comedic and frightening. And after that, the movie really has nowhere to go from there.
Opening with the murder of Rebecca's (Teresa Palmer) dad (Billy Burke) at the hands of the photophobic ghoul, the film sets about with a fairly routine story; the main girl, who is relationship-adverse to her otherwise charming and committed beau, Bret (Alexander DiPersia); the child (Gabriel Bateman) who knows something is wrong yet is not believed by adults; and the crazy mother (Maria Bello) who is harboring a secret.
There's nothing bad about the movie, and the scares are rather well done, if they conform to the usual routine of being very loud to startle you. Fighting a ghost adverse to light can seem like a silly task when you just leave the lights on, but of course the ghost seems to be able to cut power to a whole house so that tension can mount.
And the performers are all around pretty good. Maria Bello is a welcome sight, and is a strong addition to the cast. The direction is fine, as Mr. Palmer has been assigned to direct the forthcoming Annabelle 2, part of a spin-off The Conjuring series. Maybe he can envision more ingenious images that illicit fright, as he does so well with the initial shots of this film.
But the movie could have benefited from a little Jaws style horror, where the ghost isn't "seen" (although it never really is) until later in the movie. And the reason behind who-and-what this ghost is is a little disappointing. I understand too much ambiguity can be frustrating and lazy, but too much clarification balances the scales in the other direction. I don't mind the ghost has a backstory, but it's so definitive and finite that it takes away some of the scares. We know Freddy's backstory in A Nightmare in Elm Street, but we're never sure why he is in people's dreams (at least in the initial film).
Overall, as far as horror films go, you could do a lot worse. This one is short on gore, but the tension is real, and for a hot summer day, it's a fun respite from the heat.
Tuesday, August 2, 2016
The Nice Guys (2016)
As far as films like The Nice Guys (2016) go, you can't do much worse in a summer packed full of even more sequels and unimaginative reboots then ever thought possible (although I'm sure 2017 and on will wear us down just as much). I don't know if it's fair to say "They don't make them like this anymore," but The Nice Guys has a sort of easy enjoyability that doesn't insult your intelligence too much and is an all around good time.
Set in 1970s Los Angeles, the film follows two private eyes, Jackson (Russell Crowe) and Holland (Ryan Gosling), who cross paths while investigating the same missing girl. What seems like a fairly open-and-shut case spirals out of control as a conspiracy plot is unveiled that leads high up in ranking officials.
The film is written and directed by Shane Black, best known for writing the Lethal Weapon series and directing Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (2005) and Iron Man 3 (2013). Like most of those other films, the plot involves two guys, one a loose canon/alcoholic, the other a "trained professional." To say the man has a pattern is an understatement, but if it ain't broke, don't fix it. And he does it mighty well.
But certain issues still pervade this film; for one, almost all the female characters exist in the porn industry, accept Holland's daughter Holly (Angourie Rice), a spunky little pistol of her own right who doesn't listen to her dad and tags along. There is also a certain disregard for casualties that abound in the movie; while most of the central characters stay alive, many bystanders who have little to no bearing on the plot meet untimely ends.
Which I guess is fine; mass casualties are kind of a stock-in-trade for films like this. But the film makes a big deal out of one major character's redemption near the end by convincing him killing is wrong, which I would buy if maybe the person spared hadn't just caused several other deaths. It's a bit backwards for the film to decide mercy is the way when for so long people are just mowed down in the background for no cause.
Crowe and Gosling make a fun combo, and the well-rounded supporting cast include Matt Bomer, Keith David, and Kim Basinger (fascinating to see Crowe and Basinger reunited in a LA period piece nearly two decades after the superb L.A. Confidential (1997)). Really, there's not much to say other than the movie is fairly enjoyable and will hold your interest for its near two-hour running time. Sometimes, in a summer full of mediocrity, that's just enough.
Set in 1970s Los Angeles, the film follows two private eyes, Jackson (Russell Crowe) and Holland (Ryan Gosling), who cross paths while investigating the same missing girl. What seems like a fairly open-and-shut case spirals out of control as a conspiracy plot is unveiled that leads high up in ranking officials.
The film is written and directed by Shane Black, best known for writing the Lethal Weapon series and directing Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (2005) and Iron Man 3 (2013). Like most of those other films, the plot involves two guys, one a loose canon/alcoholic, the other a "trained professional." To say the man has a pattern is an understatement, but if it ain't broke, don't fix it. And he does it mighty well.
But certain issues still pervade this film; for one, almost all the female characters exist in the porn industry, accept Holland's daughter Holly (Angourie Rice), a spunky little pistol of her own right who doesn't listen to her dad and tags along. There is also a certain disregard for casualties that abound in the movie; while most of the central characters stay alive, many bystanders who have little to no bearing on the plot meet untimely ends.
Which I guess is fine; mass casualties are kind of a stock-in-trade for films like this. But the film makes a big deal out of one major character's redemption near the end by convincing him killing is wrong, which I would buy if maybe the person spared hadn't just caused several other deaths. It's a bit backwards for the film to decide mercy is the way when for so long people are just mowed down in the background for no cause.
Crowe and Gosling make a fun combo, and the well-rounded supporting cast include Matt Bomer, Keith David, and Kim Basinger (fascinating to see Crowe and Basinger reunited in a LA period piece nearly two decades after the superb L.A. Confidential (1997)). Really, there's not much to say other than the movie is fairly enjoyable and will hold your interest for its near two-hour running time. Sometimes, in a summer full of mediocrity, that's just enough.
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