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Duck Soup Cinema and “The General”
Here in Madison, Wisconsin, the Overture Performing Arts Center screens silent movies with live accompaniment from an organist as part of a program they call, “Duck Soup Cinema”. On April 18th, I had the pleasure of watching Buster Keaton’s, The General in this setting, and it was one of the more fun movie-going experiences I have had in a long time. We were fortunate to experience this film at the hands of Mr. Dennis James, an accomplished organist and lover of silent film.
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The “Vacation” Red Band Trailer: Dirty and Meta
The Red Band trailer for the sequel to the Vacation series was released online yesterday (it isn’t a reboot, as the old characters appear and it is the same timeline). I was surprised to see both raunchy and updated subject matter, and a tongue-in-cheek tone to aspects of the movie. Much as 22 Jump Street remarked on how it was going to be the same thing over again, it appears that Vacation will take the same approach. Ed Helms (playing a grown-up Rusty Griswold) explains to his wife, Debbie (Christina Applegate) that he feels that the family is in a rut, and he proposes a solution: drive to Wally World, just like the vacation he remembers fondly from his childhood. Debbie asks, “So you want to re-do your vacation from 30 years ago?” Rusty: “This will be completely different”. If we don’t get the joke yet, Rusty’s oldest son admits, “I’ve never even heard of the original vacation”, to which Rusty replies, “Doesn’t matter; the new vacation will stand on its own, okay?”
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The Three Tiers of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)
With Avengers: Age of Ultron hitting theaters early in May and Ant-Man putting the finished touches on Phase II, I found myself thinking again about the other ten films that form the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Generally speaking, these blockbusters based on Marvel’s comic book heroes offer a fun movie-going experience, but having seen them all, I think there are a few standouts that contribute more than an enjoyable distraction. It was in this spirit that I began to categorize entries in the MCU into three broad groups, and included this summer’s contributions as well:
- The Solid Superhero Flicks
- The Cash-grab Filler Flicks
- The Overachieving Flicks
Solid Superhero Flicks
The first group, the Solid Superhero group, contains the movies that are enjoyable, have memorable scenes, and generally meet our expectations for a Hollywood blockbuster release. They don’t have particularly interesting choices made by the filmmakers or actors, there are some unnecessary or unfortunate scenes that detract from the film, or maybe the villain is uninspiring. But, these small qualms don’t sour us on the movie in any serious way. There are your solid C- to B+ grade movies.
And there are a ton of ’em.
Movies in this group include: Iron Man, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger, The Avengers, The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Iron Man 3, Ant-Man, Captain America: Civil War, and Doctor Strange. Each of these movies is good, and their flaws are generally inherent to the comic book movie genre itself (MacGuffins all around, semi-disposable bad guys, and no real stakes or danger for our heroes). But, there are a couple of close cases here: Iron Man and Ant-man for the stand-alone films, and both The Avengers and The Avengers: Age of Ultron on the high end, and Captain America on the low end.
I believe that all of these films each have small weaknesses that keep them out of the glorified air of the masterpieces that we will discuss later – but they are so close. Iron Man of course kicked off the MCU, and director Jon Favreau’s style and prowess with witty dialogue and banter mesh brilliantly with Robert Downey Jr.’s lippy portrayal of the engineering genius Tony Stark. The glaring flaw in this film is the unfortunately forgettable enemy in the form of Jeff Bridges’ slightly larger Iron Man suit. Though certainly not the worst baddy in the franchise, it is disappointing that Iron Man seems bereft of bad guys right out of the gate. And frankly, it is amazing how similar Ant-Man is to Iron Man with regard to both its strengths and weaknesses. Paul Rudd and his associated cast are as funny as Robert Downey Jr. and company, there are some great training montages, and the film feels smaller overall than most other Marvel flicks. As far as the weaknesses go – Ant-Man also re-treads the powers of our hero in the form of a slightly more powerful suit. Both of these movies are strong – but these lackluster bad guys mar otherwise amazing films.
As for The Avengers movies (and Avengers 2.5 aka Captain America: Civil War), the problems are more diverse. The original has a different villain problem, as it decides to simply recycle Loki, give him a magical MacGuffin mind-control wand, and provide him with a gigantic alien army. With Joss Whedon’s comic tone and the first appearance of these heroes fighting side-by-side, this film is still great – but it could have been outstanding. This is even more true for Age of Ultron, as the vast array of characters and story lines begin to feel a little forced and tired. Ultron himself was a great villain – and it was disappointing to see him go (although he probably is hiding somewhere, right?), and there are some fantastic action scenes, but Age of Ultron falls just shy of the original – which fell just shy of the higher tier. Captain America: Civil War falls short on the villain as well, but also lose points for being a poor enactment of a freshman 101 political science class. There is too much awkwardness, too many fights that could be solved by a simple discussion, and too few stakes throughout. “The Airport Scene” is fun, but it has very little substance – it’s cotton candy, not a meal.
All of these films mentioned here are above-average, and one could even say “great” – but they are not the height of the MCU.
The Cash-Grab Filler Flicks
The second group, The Cash-Grab Fillers, I’ll admit I have identified with a little more cynicism. These are the movies that just don’t work. Not only do they have some of the same flaws of our previous group, they have multiples, and are often egregious. We probably do not care much about the main character and their story, the villain is completely forgettable, and there is actively poor writing that manifests itself in nonsensical, wandering plots . These movies exist to pass time between the more important movies with interesting characters or things to say. These are not good, and are in the D grade and below.
The Cash Grabbers are: Iron Man 2, The Incredible Hulk, and Thor: The Dark World. I love Mickey Rourke and Sam Rockwell (go watch The Wrestler and Moon, respectively), but they make a terrible bad guy duo in the Iron Man sequel. The Incredible Hulk was a reboot of The Hulk, with only five years in between those two movies, and was so poorly esteemed that the character was rebooted again only four years later for The Avengers! The third time (in a decade) is the charm, I guess, but this second film in the MCU is most certainly the worst and most forgettable. The Thor sequel has almost nothing new to say, and truly feels like spinning the wheels until Avengers: Age of Ultron, especially for Thor, himself; it is entirely skip-able.
The Overachieving Flicks
And finally, we have the Overachieving group. This group not only has interesting characters, great special effects, and able directing / writing and acting, but the movies in this group have something important to say. There are clear stylistic choices, poignant and relevant themes being discussed, and great performances. These movies should not just be considered, “Great comic book movies”, but great films in general. The only movies to ascend to this height so far are: Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy.
Guardians of the Galaxy was a gigantic wildcard for the MCU, and not many people really had it on their RADAR when it came out (myself included). Where Guardians succeeds so well is through the stylized vision of director James Gunn. He is able to place his mark on the genre with his quirky storytelling and peculiar characters, in each of whom we are invested. From the moment Starlord snatches the MacGuffin stone (or whichever one it was), we are enamored with him. And, if you think I am ignoring the MacGuffin in this movie while punishing the one in The Avengers, there’s a reason for that: Guardians calls attention to the absurdity of this plot element, and so achieves a self-deprecating style of humor (which, by the way, Gunn is known for; see Slither, and also anything else he’s ever done). The most glaring problem with Guardians is undoubtedly the disposable bad guy, but at least in this case he is unabashedly evil, almost to the point of caricature. Emphasizing evil to the point of nearly being over-the-top is a more forgivable problem than coming away with a bland evil-doer, so for that reason I am a little less harsh on this movie than I was on something like Iron Man 2. Guardians of the Galaxy is the perfect comic book movie comedy – we care about the main characters, it pokes fun at itself, and it has a great deal to say about relationships.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier goes the other direction as the perfect dramatic comic movie, and it came out of left field for me. The original was very close to landing in the Cash-Grab category, but this sequel is certainly the best movie in the MCU, and likely contends with The Dark Knight for best superhero comic movie of all time. With a feel much more akin to a wartime spy drama, The Winter Soldier transcends the comic genre in a way that no other film in the MCU has yet accomplished. In addition, the theme of the film is the danger of relying on the virtue of a clandestine government agency with few checks on its power, especially with regards to state-sponsored surveillance. This is powerful and important subject matter, particularly in the current political environment, and it is handled very well by what many consider to be just another popcorn flick. The sequel to this film handles a very similar subject matter much worse. The movie is not without its flaws, including some baffling actions by the evil-doers throughout the second act, but for tackling matters fundamentally more important than how angry the Hulk is, or why Thor and Natalie Portman’s character even care about each other, it distinguishes itself beautifully.
So, there you have it: unnecessary labeling of the films in the MCU based solely on my very own criteria. Why am I an idiot? Where have I gone wrong, and would you like to move some films around in my categorized system? Are these categories even legitimate, or have I taken some dumb comics movies too seriously? It pains me to keep Iron Man out of the Overachievers – but the poor imagination shown in developing a villain that is something more than our hero but bigger docks points from them. Throw your voice in the ring in the comments below if you’ve got some kind of opinion on the films of the MCU!
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Time Travelling Film Noir – A Review of “Predestination”
Predestination is a movie which rewards viewers for knowing as few details of the plot as possible, and yet it is hard to talk about this film without revealing at least something, so I will keep discussion of the plot to the first seven minutes of the movie – certainly sufficiently intriguing to whet your interest. The movie, written and directed by the Spierig brothers (Michael and Peter, whose other films include The Daybreakers), opens with Ethan Hawke in voiceover, asking an unseen someone, “What if I could put him in front of you, the man that ruined your life? If I could guarantee that you’d get away with it – would you kill him?” A character is then seen carrying a briefcase and a violin case as he rushes down some stairs into a boiler room. The briefcase morphs into a containment device for a bomb which he discovers almost instantly, as if he knew it was there. But, someone else is in the room with him, and a short firefight erupts. As the bomb ticks below 10 seconds, our character hurries to drop the bomb into the containment device, but he is too late. The bomb ignites. Our character’s face is covered in flame and he writhes in agony on the floor, crawling towards the violin case. The unknown assailant steps out of the shadows, and slowly pushes the case towards the injured man. Then, a single jarring sound and we are transported to a hospital room, with a man covered in bandages.
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“Ex Machina” Portrays a Unique Exploration of Feminine Independence
Ex Machina, the directorial debut of Alex Garland (screenwriter of 28 Days Later, Sunshine, and Dredd), is a fascinating exploration of the essence of humanity which challenges an audience to wonder at the nature of not only consciousness, but independence and justice. The movie opens with a plain title screen and we are introduced to Caleb, working at his desk. He learns that he has won the grand prize of a contest. He rides in a helicopter to an isolated location, navigates through a jungle to a strange futuristic mansion, and meets his benefactor: the hipster-bro head honcho of a giant software company named Nathan (Oscar Issac) who has recruited him for a secret mission: to proctor a Turing test for the newly-developed female artificial intelligence named Ava, portrayed by Swedish actress Alicia Vikander.
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How to Use Spoken Language As Style – “Inglourious Basterds”
Quentin Tarantino’s World War II historical fiction revenge film, Inglourious Basterds, makes specific stylistic choices with regard to language which significantly affect the quality of the film by providing characterization, generating thematic tension, and even directly influencing the plot. Generally speaking, the choice of which language to use in a film is almost done by default, particularly in films where only one language is spoken. Many films which directly portray speakers of different languages interacting choose to ignore the challenges associated with that problem in favor of easily advancing the plot. But, in Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino’s masterful use of language moves beyond a mere aspect of style, and doubles as a strong indicator and generator of specific elements of subject: plot, characterization, and tone. In this piece, we will analyze three scenes which typify how Tarantino takes advantage of language to enhance the story with this unique and fascinating stylistic choice.
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The Basics of the Aesthetics of Film and Cinema
In the mission statement of this blog, I indicated that I would be approaching the field of film criticism from the perspective of a particular school of aesthetics – Romantic Realism. But, in order to establish what is meant by “Romantic Realism”, to explain its principles and apply its methods of analysis, there is a little background work that must be done first. There is a hierarchy to any field in philosophy, and we can’t begin with Romantic Realism without first discussing aesthetics as a whole, particularly in the context of film. This is the purpose of my first post on aesthetics – to define precisely what is meant by “film aesthetics”, and to provide a foundation on which we can build more complex ideas.
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The State of Hollywood and Self-Conflict: A Review of “Birdman”
Alejandro Iñárritu’s Birdman, Or: (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) dedicates itself to providing commentary on the state of the dramatic arts, especially in Hollywood, while also offering a haunting, too-familiar meditation on ego and inner conflict. These two foci are married through telling the story of an actor named Riggan Thomson (Michael Keaton) who is desperately trying to make his mark on the New York drama scene by directing and acting in his own adaptation of a Raymond Carver short story called, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. Years ago, Riggan played a superhero named, “Birdman” in a trilogy of movies that, while successful, labeled him as an unserious, talentless Hollywood actor and he desperately wishes to shed this characterization of himself.
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The Things We Think and Do Not Say – A “Plot and Theme” Mission Statement on Film Critique
I have enjoyed movies for the majority of my life. I think my first memories of movies were seeing Oliver and Company in the theater at the age of three, and watching Star Wars at a similar age and mishearing Darth Vader’s pleas to Luke as, “You don’t know the power of the Duck Side”. Fortunately, my understanding and enjoyment of movies has matured somewhat since then, and in this blog I will make a concerted effort to review and discuss movies in a serious, artistic, and hopefully informing and fun way. In an ideal world, I will not disappear into my own ass.
Film Criticism and Fiction Writing by Derek Jacobs
