Land of the Lost…
After my disaster experience with Year One I had low hopes for Land of the Lost, but it surprises. Not redefining or earth shattering, but LOTL has enough laughs to make it worth a rental. The best scenes come early and late, most of them involving Matt Lauer. But outside of those scenes you won’t remember much of this film after a few days. I still contend that Farrell is a better side kick than leading man, but he’s not bad here.
Rent. And Suck It Matt Lauer!
Year One…
So this was supposed to be a comedy, but I didn’t laugh. Fail! Going into the movie I thought it was about cave men, and while Jake Black and Michael Cera are cave men their journeys have them bumping into Jews, Romans, and Cain & Abel. All groups intermingling as if they all existed at the same time. Chilling out as if it were one big fraternity. Now I wasn’t looking for nor expecting historical accuracy, but this just seemed so blatant that I kept pulling me out of the movie experience and nagged at me the entire time.
And Oliva Wilde is barely in it. Double Fail!
Stay away from this one.
Inglourious Basterds…
I’m undecided on Tarantino. Reservoir Dogs, great. Kill Bill Part 1, also great. Kill Bill Part 2, little boring but still good. Pulp Fiction, good. From Dusk Till Dawn, fun and enjoyable. All those films and so much indecision, it’s almost illogical. His films are always stylized with his signature conversations, but for all his hype he never feels ground breaking to me. Maybe a little bit retro in that he pays homage to whatever genre he is making, or maybe too much retro since I’m sure many of his references go right over people’s heads. Too self indulgent at times? Or cocky enough to say “Fuck the audience; I’m doing what I want here.”
And that brings us to Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino’s war action genre flick. Which is a lot deeper than the advertisements would lead you to believe. It’s not just a gratuitous version of the Dirty Dozen; way more depth and less Pitt than one would think. Brad Pitt really shares the bill with Mélanie Laurent who plays a young Jewish woman living a secret life in Nazi occupied France, in comparison to Pitt who plays the leader of a all Jewish gorilla commando team hell bent on scalping Nazis and shoving a big one up Hitler’s ass.
And stick one to Hitler is what this film is about, the Revenge of the Jews. I guess the Weinsteins’ felt that Middle America would want nothing to with Jew on Nazi violence, because the chosen people completely absent from the American advertisements. But whatever, killing Nazis is always pure gold, it’s the main reason why so many first person shooters are WWII based. And Kill Nazis they do. Oh how they do. It’s bloody, over the top, and unapologetic.
Pitt is great as the commando leader and I’m sure that people will be quoting his lines for years to come. But the real star of this film is Laurent. Her story line is the one that I really cared about. You know how it’s going to end up a third of the way through, but it doesn’t matter you still root for her regardless. And how Pitt and Laurent’s story line entwine is a nice little twist considering the genre.
But as good as all the above is, the film has its share of problems. A good number of the scenes seem to go on and on, you fight a constant battle between boredom and engagement. At 153 minutes parts will so engage you that you will think the film is a third that length, while others will make you swear it’s the second reincarnate of Return of the King. Which is a shame because it really pulls you out of the viewing experience.
Inglourious Basterds is vintage Tarantino for better or worse.
***
Fighting…
I’m always in the movie for a good brawler movie. Not just a marital arts movie, but a brawler. Not as polished, just raw and in your face. So when Fighting came out, I certainly took notice of it. Not enough notice to go see it in the theater, but enough to remember it when it came out to video.
So like any brawler file, Fighting is not that complex. Channing Tatum is an ex high school wrestler living in poverty big apple style. While attempting to sell bootleg goods, he gets into a rather unimpressive tussle with Terrence Howard’s crew, who has a striking similarity to Fagin and his band of pickpockets. Howard sees the potential that is Channing Tatum and becomes his manager setting him up in back alley fights across New York. All of this builds up to the not so exciting climatic conclusion where Tatum has to fight the top street brawler, who by the way just happens to be part of Tatum’s mysterious past. Riveting! (If only that statement was actually true.)
Oliver Twist comparisons aside, which there are a number, but this film does not warrant such a deep deconstruction, this movie was incredibly dull and lack luster. Tatum barely says more than four words at a time and Howard with his soft voice never sells the fight coach/hustler/leader of young me. In fact, I don’t even know what Howard was supposed to be. He has a small apartment in nice looking brown stone, but the interior is crappy, he doesn’t have a real job, and hangs out with young men all day long. He wears the same suit the entire movie, so I’m assuming he to in living in poverty but trying to hide it.
But who gives a shit? This movie is called Fighting and is about fighting. So how is the fighting? It’s pretty lack luster. Tatum is never that impressive, nor is the fight choreography. It looks like they were trying to go for realism instead of excitement, which is a shame, because I was really in the mood for some stylized brawling. But oh well, I’ll have to go elsewhere. And I suggest you do the same.
*
The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard…
The Goods is the latest comedy of the summer. It serves its purpose to make you laugh, but fails in being memorable. The movie’s bread and butter is the outrageous, however when not outrageous the Goods ain’t so good. It’s more acceptably decent than good. In fact the only scene I really remember is the cameo by Will Ferrell, probably not the best thing especially when it’s just a cameo and not from the main cast.
While walking out of the theater my colleague mentioned that he kept thinking Vince Vaughn when looking at Jeremy Piven. It’s not so much that Piven was bad, but Vaughn would have been so much better. Piven just never owns the role; his performance is pretty much a carbon copy of Ari Gold with a five o’clock shadow and a little bit more hick. Is he forever destined to be known as Ari Gold? He can act, I’ve seen him in many other roles, but currently, in my mind, he is defined as Ari Gold. Not that Vaughn is much of a character actor, considering ever single role of his is the same. And based off his documentary of his comedy tour I’m 95% sure he just shows up on set and plays himself in every film.
So wait for the inevitable unrated blu-ray, which will most likely have even more outrageous moments, other wise cable it.
