The Help
The first movie I saw this year was hands down the best. The
Help is reminiscent of The Blind Side
and The King’s Speech as a
thought-provoking film that seemed to come out of nowhere and spoke volumes
about the world in which we live. The
performances are pitch-perfect, from Emma Stone as white writer Skeeter,
deciding to write a book about the plight of black workers in the 60’s (“the
help”), to Viola Davis as put-upon maid Aibileen and Octavia L. Spencer as the
sassy and brassy Minny Jackson, and I’d even have to applaud Bryce Dallas
Howard (Ron Howard’s daughter) as the completely brainwashed southern belle
Hilly Holbrook, who doesn’t see these maids as human beings, and Allison Janney
as Skeeter’s Mom Charlotte, who feels backed into a corner by a group of
overbearing white women, and fires the old black maid Constantine (Cicely
Tyson) her family loved.
The critics were not unanimous in
their praise of this film, the biggest complaint seeming to be the movie’s
broad stereotypical characters and that they aimed for emotion without much
intellectual challenge. After all, this
is the film that gave a new (and amusingly literal) meaning to the phrase “Eat
my s***!” I can see their point, but so
what? This film still manages to breach
a subject that deserves to be breached, and tackles it in a fun, often ballsy,
crowd-pleasing way. I guess I sometimes
enjoy films the critics find easy and trite.
Case in point: New Year’s Eve and Joyful Noise.
Water for Elephants
Not only The Help, but Water for Elephants, the second movie we chose for our Friday night
get-togethers (chosen by yours truly) was also very enjoyable! I like period films like this, with its
luscious cinematography telling a compelling and entertaining story about a
time long ago. It’s like Midnight in Paris, and like the main
character in that film (which I have yet to see), it offers the audience to
step into the past, perhaps an idealized vision of long ago, to experience the
sights and sounds and wonders of the time.
This story takes place in the 1930’s, as Robert Patterson’s character
Jacob, a promising veterinary student, suddenly has his world come crashing
down upon him with the death of his parents, and winds up in a circus, run by a
ruthless man named August who has his sights set on being bigger than
Ringling. He rules his world with an
iron fist, including all the circus workers, the animals, and his wife Marlena
(played by Reese Witherspoon). It isn’t
long before Jacob and Marlena come together over the purchase and training of
an elephant named Rosie.
The tighter
August keeps a grip on everyone and everything around him, the more danger he
causes for all, including Rosie, himself, and the two star-crossed lovers
Jacob and Marlena. Some stony critics
complained that the leads Patterson and Witherspoon didn’t have much chemistry,
but for me, I was completely caught up in the story. This was, for me, a vibrant, nostalgic, and
engaging cinematic treat.
Terminator
Salvation
Even though I
liked it, it's definitely not the best of the Terminator movies.
I didn’t keep up on the TV show Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles,
and I don’t think a lot of people did since it was canceled after only two
seasons (and the first was only 9 episodes).
As for the movies, I was one of the few people who even liked the third
Terminator film when everyone else was saying it wasn’t as good as the first
two. Frankly, they’re right, but that
doesn’t mean I still didn’t enjoy the third film, and I enjoyed this fourth
film too, despite Christian Bale’s performance (still unemotionally growling
like the Dark Knight) and some glaring plot holes, such as the fact that the
unstoppable terminators and the evil cognizant computer system Skynet don’t
immediately kill either John Conner or Kyle Reese when the opportunity presents
itself. Skynet knows young Kyle Reese has
something to do with John Conner, but doesn’t seem able to connect the
dots and realize that Kyle will be sent back in time at some point in the
future to protect John’s mother Sarah, and that in so doing, Kyle will actually
become John’s father. Still, when both
are in Skynet’s clutches, they make a big show of it, but don’t kill them. One terminator, when given the chance,
doesn’t kill Kyle, but instead straps him to a table. In this respect, the terminators aren’t
the unstoppable killing machines they were in the first three movies; instead,
they’re more similar to the Penguin or the Riddler from Batman, devising intricate plans that won’t kill our heroes, and
will allow them the chance to escape!
With this withering critique off my
chest, I will also say that there was a lot here that impressed me. Some of the special effects were great, such
as those unique terminator-motorcycles or those creepy, snake-like terminator
machines called hydrobots. I also really
liked the addition of the character Marcus Wright played by Sam Worthington as
a convict given a new lease on life when he finds himself resurrected in this
future world, only to later discover he is one of the machines. And I’ve always liked Anton Yelchin. He
makes a very believable and sympathetic Kyle Reese here.
Fright Night
This must be the
month of Anton Yelchin! Here, he plays the character of Charlie Brewster in this remake of the
old 80’s horror film about a kid who discovers his next door neighbor is a
vampire. Comparing the two versions side
by side, there are some things I liked about the old version, and some things I
liked about the newer version. As the
characters go, I liked both versions of Charlie and the vampire Jerry Dandrich. Charlie’s mom was better in the new
version, played by Toni Collette. All
the other characters, from Charlie’s girlfriend Amy to his friend Evil Ed to
famous horror movie vampire killer Peter Vincent were all better in the first
movie (Amanda Bearse, Stephen Geoffreys, and Roddy McDowell vs. Imogen Poots, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, and David Tennant). Amy was cuter and Stephen
Geoffrey’s was just so goofy as Ed in the 1985 classic, and Roddy McDowell
brought a certain level of charm that is mostly missing in Tennant’s portrayal
of a Chriss Angel-type of gothic, douchebag illusionist.
Despite the cast mostly being better
in the first film from 1985, this new film boasts a more realistic story, a
darker atmosphere, and a scarier vampire.
Colin Farrell oozes a cool menace here, when he’s not totally vamping
out with the CGI effects. In fact, that
is the film’s major drawback. The creepy
vampires in the original, with the impossibly huge mouths filled with huge
jagged teeth are replaced by rather unreal looking CGI creatures here. There’s something to be said for the more
organic effects of the old days, and perhaps a bit of B-movie charm, which have
been replaced by cold CGI pyrotechnics and the smutty and dark realism in the
remakes.
Still, I was not disappointed in
this film. The best scene: Charlie sneaks into Jerry’s house to save a
female classmate who has just been bitten by the vampire Jerry. As they try to sneak out of the house, Jerry
makes several trips between the living room and kitchen, stopping every so
often and looking around, as if he senses something. Charlie and this girl manage to make it out of
the house, but as they exit the front door, the camera swings back around to
show Jerry in the hallway, watching them leave with a knowing smile on his
lips. The girl is profusely thanking
Charlie for saving her, and they grab hands and start running away from the
house, but as they leave the shadow of the overhang covering Jerry’s front
porch and run out into the sun, the girl suddenly bursts into torrents of blood
and vanishes, leaving Charlie, and the viewer, momentarily shocked. Once bitten, even though still a victim, she
was already a vampire! She just didn't know it yet.
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