Movie Reviews, Weekend of March 10, 2006

Two Vamps and a Pickled Cop (Printable Version , E-mail to a Friend )
Must be the week after the Academy Awards

Okay, I won’t lie. I had the Oscars on in the background while I was writing my column. I’m gonna go ahead and blame all the typos on that.

I still think they stink. The Oscars, not the typos, though I’m not overly fond of typos either.

At the basest level, I just don’t like the production of it all. I don’t care about songs that were irrelevant to the film. I don’t care about host jokes or crappy segues from actors who’ve never read a teleprompter in their lives.

Honestly, I’d rather have watched Grey’s Anatomy, ‘cause that’s a helluva show.

Better still, I wish on Oscar Sunday, they’d just send out the list of winners to the various news outlets and be done with it.

Bah!

And what is up with the Oscar folks basically begging us to go to the movies? Every time I looked up, I heard an actor or producer or someone talking about how watching films on DVD was a poor substitution for a trip to the theatre.

I wouldn’t disagree.

But the problem isn’t the DVDs.

It’s the value of the theatre-going experience.

We spend somewhere in the neighborhood of $30 for a date night at the movies. It lasts around two hours. People talk near us, answer their cell phones. And then we usually suffer the indignation of a bad film.

Hollywood, listen up. People aren’t going to the movies anymore because your product is crap. It’s crap. Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap.

Ninety percent of the films I watch I forget about by the next weekend, sometimes by the next day. I don’t forget about them because I have a bad memory. I forget about them because they’re not worth remembering.

If it were just me saying this, a critic, it wouldn’t mean as much.

But it’s not just me. It’s you. You’re voting with your pocketbook. And it is making a difference or the usually indifferent, above-it-all Hollywood clique wouldn’t be making these embarrassing appeals for you to support their gravy train.

Again, I can’t buy that piracy is robbing the industry of ticket sales. I just can’t. I agree. A poor copy on a burnt DVD cannot compare to seeing a flick in the theatre.

But I refuse to feel sorry for the industry. I’d rather have fewer better films than many crappy ones.

So if you want to stay home on the couch until you see a trailer worth your time and gas money, you just keep on sitting on the couch.

Sooner or later, they’ll get the clue.

Enough of that. Let’s get on with the reviews.

Drac’s Roiling in His Grave

Okay, what’s the deal with vampires?

Two of the movies I watched last weekend had vampires in them. Neither film treated vampires in the “traditional” way. No garlic, no crosses. None of that kind of thing. None of the superstition. But there were vampires nonetheless.

There are new vampire movies every year. Plural. It’d be one thing if there was just one vampire here and there, but there are tons.

Why?

What’s the attraction?

Is it the blood? The fangs? The immortality?

Don’t get me wrong. I have it, too, whatever it is. I read all the Anne Rice books when I was in college (but gave her up later on when I knew better). I’ve read all the Anita Blake books by Laurel K. Hamilton and just finished reading The Historian. I’ve got a handful of vampire flicks on DVD.

Vampire stories have been popular for a long, long time. First in myth and folklore, then in literature, then in the movies.

I like vampire stories.

I just don’t know why. It makes no sense. But Hollywood is full of bloodsuckers, so it makes sense. They know how to pander to the base interests of their constituency.

Ultraviolet had a kind of vampire, a hemophage (I think that’s the term they bandied about for the length of the flick).

Violet (Milla Jovovich) is a hemophage, or vampire, if you will. She’s smarter, faster and tougher than a normal human, though she doesn’t seem to have a need for blood. She lives in a futuristic society where humans walk in fear of disease and are controlled by some kind of dystopian medical hegemony.

As our film starts, Violet penetrates the defenses of the headquarters of the hegemony and steals a biological weapon. The weapon turns out to be a kid who thinks his name is Six.

Before she realizes it, she’s on the run from her own kind as well as the hegemony. She’s no damsel in distress, however. She’s got all manner of technology, extra-dimensional wristbands she can load with tons of guns, swords, whatever. She’s got a device that’ll let her manipulate gravity. She’s not afraid to use any of it.

Most of the flick is Violet kicking the crap out of people, and that kind of ends up being the point to attend.

If you’re into kinetic sci-fi, you might dig Ultraviolet. There’s not a lot present beyond that. Sure, it’s fun to look at for it appears almost all the film’s backgrounds and sets were computer-generated.

It’s kind of retarded, really. I liked Equilibrium, director Kurt Wimmer’s first film, was much better. And they’re similar films.

I think Ultraviolet tries too hard to be The Matrix and comes off as a cheap knockoff. But it’ll have a place on the DVD shelves of sci-fi fanboys all across the country. You know who you are.

From Russia, with Something Different

Next up, Night Watch, coming at you all the way from Russia.

It’s a fantasy film when it comes down to it. It’s a tale of the epic struggle between good and evil, light and dark.

In the world of Night Watch, the forces of dark and the forces of light are called Others. Others can take the form of vampires, shapeshifters, psychics and witches.

During the Middle Ages, war was waged between the armies of the light and the armies of the dark. The armies were evenly matched, so the leaders got together and forged a truce. Each Other, when he or she awakens to what they are, gets the choice: serve the light or serve the dark.

Anton Gorodetsky goes to visit a wise woman to have her make his girlfriend stop having an affair. The wise woman, or witch, or whatever she is, tells him that not only is his girlfriend having an affair, but she’s pregnant and the baby isn’t his.

Just as he’s about to curse himself, the Night Watch--soldiers of Light who patrol the dark--show up and stop the witch from killing the unborn child. At the same time, Anton awakens to the fact that he’s an Other. He has visions of the future.

Twelve years later, Anton works for the Night Watch. He’s on patrol one evening, trying to stop some vampires from preying upon a little kid, and ends up killing the vampire. That’s a no-no, apparently. Eye for an eye between the good guys and the bad guys, you know?

The kid turns out to be pretty important, like the most powerful Other ever, said to be able to tip the balance one way or the other. Like Anakin Skywalker.

Or somesuch.

There are a lot of near-cliches at work here. But for two-thirds of the film, that doesn’t matter. It’s an interesting, kind of quirky look at subject matter that’s been handled over and over again. It’s a fresh look at it, which is always good.

It just doesn’t end well. The wheels sort of fall off. It’s still worth watching if you want to try out something different. It kind of reminds me of a lot of different filmmakers’ styles. It’s like a blend of Fincher and Gilliam mixed in with some Gaiman writing.

Honestly, I can’t tell if I’m recommending or not. It’s an interesting film. Take it or leave it.

Cops Gone Wild

And that leaves us with our vampireless film of the week, 16 Blocks.

Detective Jack Mosley (Bruce Willis) hates his life. He’s a burnt out cop with a guilty conscience and nothing to live for, so he drowns himself in alcohol and pretends to not care.

He’s just getting off the night shift when his lieutenant asks him to run a prisoner to the courthouse. He’s got to get the guy there by 10am. It’s two after eight and he’s got 16 blocks to go.

The prisoner he’s got to escort, Eddie Bunker (Mos Def), is a bit of a motormouth. Talks nonstop, and sounds kinda funny. And he’s a little off. He’s got this book he carries around with him full of recipes. And he’s on a mission. Being a career criminal trying to turn his life around, he’s got a deal to testify before a grand jury that’ll get him a clean record.

It’s the subject of his testimony that’s causing all the trouble.

Jack loads Eddie up in the car, drives a few blocks, then parks and goes to get a bottle of booze. While he’s in the store, a cop tries to assassinate Eddie. Jack saves him.

They end up hiding out in a nearby bar. Jack calls for back up. A bunch of cops show up, including his old partner, Frank (David Morse). The cops basically tell Jack that Eddie is going to testify against them, because they’re dirty, and they are going to kill him before he can.

Jack puts a stop to it but then the chase is on. Time is wasting and he’s got a whole police department looking for him. In just over an hour, Jack’s going to learn a lot about himself and the kind of life he’s led.

Oh, and he’s going to get shot at and stuff.

16 Blocks mostly works, but it’s a mighty bit slower than I think it should be. It sacrifices pace for character development. It’s mostly a good trade off. It gives you time to get to know Jack and Eddie and to empathize with their plight. You care what happens to them instead of just looking for the next shootout or explosion.

It’s a decent matinee. Then again, these days, a movie has to blow me away to get a full-price recommendation.

So that’s that. See ya next week.