Short Take: "Mirror Mirror", "Safe House", "Chronicle".

If ever a movie was victim to terrible, misleading advertising, this would be definitely be it. Tarsem Singh's retelling of the Snow White story is an exuberant, breathtakingly beautiful take on an old tale, that manages to update it without the forced quality of movies like Shrek. What the movie presents us with is a revisionist tale, in which the Evil Queen (a simply delicious Julia Roberts) doesn't hate Snow White (Lily Collins) "just because" but due to her insecurity (both fiscal and personal). Even the Prince (Armie Hammer looking positively dashing) in question arrives for an unconventional reason, as the Queen sees in him the opportunity to save her kingdom from bankruptcy as well as satisfying her sexual needs.

This is probably what the movie gets so well, Snow White and the Queen aren't stereotypes but actual "women" who crave different things and aren't afraid of expressing it. Like an inverse version of Tarsem's The Cell with less creepiness obviously, the film grabs a woman's psyche and expresses it through the lavish set design and costumes. Jennifer Lopez's character in The Cell was trying to hide and escape from the mind of a killer, the women here want their psyches to expand into the real world. What we get then is a battle between women trying to find their places in a world that suggests only one of them is fit to inhabit it. Whether they became enemies because of taxes, beauty or men, the honest truth is that they are all factors uncontrollable by them and demanded by society. Who knew you could gather such a rich post-feminist message from a children's movie?

Safe House is the kind of movie where the main characters spend 80% of the movie as moving targets for gangsters, CIA agents and honest but expendable police men, while barely missing bullets, yet they get shot at the last minute just in time to have an epiphany.
As usual Denzel Washington plays the "mentor" to a less experienced movie star who crosses his character's path. In this case Ryan Reynolds plays the goody-two-shoes' safe house guard who ends up trying to catch a suave criminal he was supposed to look after. We are never asked to really understand the characters' motivations, other than the fact that they are who they are and the action should keep us entertained without thinking. The problem is that Denzel has been playing the same character for more than a decade and this movie feels like it's the continuation of whatever train/plane/evil cop/martyred bodyguard movie he released last year. Reynolds holds no candle to Denzel's charm but he and we deserve much better than this by the numbers thriller.

The been-there-done-that feel of "found footage" films almost seemed to  have been refreshed at the start of Chronicle. Unlike most movies of its type where we spend the whole time wondering why the hell won't they drop the camera when they're being followed by ghosts, Blair witches or monsters, this one actually grabs the concept selfconsciously as characters question why is nerdy, unpopular Andrew (Dane DeHaan) carrying a video camera everywhere. This becomes obvious when we run into the film's major plot twist, after an encounter with a strange crystal he and two other teenagers gain telekinetic powers. The most delightful part of the movie has the young men try out their new powers in ways teenagers would, by pulling pranks on people or using them to hit on girls. For a while the movie feels like an FX-laden version of Jackass until the filmmakers found the need to be moralizing and show us that unrestrained power can bring disaster (something that, thank you very much, no other superhero movie has done as perfectly as Spider-Man). The movie then reveals its true colors and how in its search to be original, it just ended up turning "found footage" into an even more offensive gimmick. By the time we have two crazed teenagers destroying the city of Seattle and still not dropping the freaking camera, all you want is for the Blair with to come and be done with them.

Grades:
Mirror Mirror ***
Safe House *
Chronicle *

Short Take: Three Horror Movies.

The scariest thing about the Paranormal Activity movies is still how popular they are. How this brand of cheaply done and cheaply looking films can manage to outgross much better projects is a sad reminder that today's audiences are victim of cattle thinking. Once they get used to a "series", they don't care how many times they are told the same story. These movies prove that audiences enjoy the act of not thinking. The third installment in the series, goes back to the very beginning and explores why numbers 1 and 2 happened. To say the reasons are preposterous would be nothing compared to the way in which the filmmakers rely on facile trickery and obvious techniques to try and scare us. The effects have been getting consistently better, something which can't be said about the acting and plot devices. This one, set in the 80s, has us wondering how did these progressive people guess that everything should've been filmed in case a movie was made about them decades later. The film doesn't rely try to adjust itself to the settings and to the spirit of the era, it goes straight for the established process that's worked for them in the past, the only thing they've changed is the medium by which we see the demonic activities. One must wonder, by the time they get to Paranormal Activity 45 will the stories be displayed using cave paintings? Grade *

The only good thing that came out of Dream House must've been Daniel Craig and Rachel Weisz getting married. The rest is an outrageously bad attempt at mating Shutter Island, Memento and any Stephen King novel involving snow and houses. If you've seen the trailer, you don't need to bother with the rest of the movie. What remains mysterious is why people like Sheridan, Watts and pretty much everyone else involved in the production (the underrated Elias Koteas for example) saw in the lazy screenplay and the redundant characters.  Grade *

The Change-Up tries to invent the wheel by taking Freaky Friday and adding curse words, boobs and poop jokes. Jason Bateman and Ryan Reynolds play bets buds who go through a body exchange situation after peeing in a magical fountain. One's a control freak lawyer, the other's a slacker. You don't need to try hard to guess which one plays which; one of the many reasons why you wonder why was this movie even made. Everything about it has been done before and in much better ways. Props to Leslie Mann for always adding a very human layer to her characters. Grade *

Very Short Takes: Sci-fi and Rachel and Abs! (Oh My!)

Daniel Craig seems to be having the time of his life in Jon Favreau's Cowboys and Aliens an awkwardly titled nod to B movies, trashy sci-fi and the sexiness of the rugged male hero. Craig plays the lead opposite the aging, but still fantastically charming Harrison Ford (who plays a villain!). The movie lingers too much on character details that eventually make no difference - nobody came to this movie for John Ford melancholy - and by the time we get to the showdown between the title characters, our interest might've drifted elsewhere. Mostly meant for fans of the Western, the film takes too long to figure out exactly what it wants to be and other than Daniel Craig's ass in leather chaps, it offers nothing new, or exciting under the sun.
Grade: **

Out of all the comic book movies that have come out in recent years, none have been less spectacular, thrilling or fun than Green Lantern. Martin Campbell's film is an ode to how wrong CGI can go when used for the wrong reasons (a respectable superhero message if that's what he was truly going for). Ryan Reynolds tries to hold the movie together as the title superhero, even if the effects that make up his suit often make us think his head will move in the opposite direction of his body and you have to respect him for not relying on his abs so much this time around. Blake Lively gives rocks a run for their money in the dull department (all of her lines elicit laughter) and poor Peter Sarsgaard is relegated to playing a giant bugger. Then again, what can you expect of a movie that features a character who looks like a devil, is named Siniestro (Mark Strong) and still thinks we'll be shocked upon realizing he's a villain...
Grade: *

Rachel Weisz means business in The Whistleblower a real life story where she plays an American police officer who becomes part of a peace keeping committee in war ravaged Bosnia. Once there she realizes there's a huge human trafficking ring that involves UN members, army officers and even diplomats. Weisz remains a beacon of serenity and morality throughout the film and infuses her character with some rich ambiguities, reminding us of her brilliant portrayal in The Constant Gardener. The film however doesn't know what to do when she's not in the scene and makes a waste out of perfectly good actors like Vanessa Redgrave and David Strathairn. For a movie that tries to paint a time appropriate tale of corruption, the villains and heroes are too clearly divided most of the time and for those inclined to a good old fashioned social heroine tale, the lead never feels under actual danger, the cause in the end feeling like something she does out of an ulterior motive, in the very same way the movie feels made to get its leading lady some awards.
Grade: **½

If Alfred Hitchcock and Chris Marker decided to have a baby, it would be something like Source Code, this sci-fi thriller feels like a hybrid of Strangers on a Train and la Jetée. Jake Gyllenhaal plays a time traveling soldier sent to prevent a mission not even he's aware of. Revealing too much about this movie's plot is to deny the audience of the rich writing in Duncan Jones' sophomore feature. After the breathtaking Moon it's perhaps safe to say that the genre is in good hands with David Bowie's son. With moving performances, an unexpected climax and one of the most sincere romances portrayed in recent cinema, Source Code sends you away with a feeling of utter exhilaration. Like one of its major plot twists all you want to do is revisit it the minute it's over.

Grade: ***½

Sheet-y Saturday.

Where we take a look at posters for upcoming features.


I could start making all sorts of snobby jokes about the fact that Ryan Reynolds is in a movie called Buried. I won't.
Instead let's praise the people behind the utterly brilliant marketing campaign for this horror movie. The teaser above is all kinds of magnificent. No title, no floating heads, we can't even see who the star is and yet we are drawn to that little yellow box. Once we see what's inside, there's a pervading, almost perverse, feeling of claustrophobia that takes over you.


If the teaser above wasn't enough, take a look at how they worked with-and not around-the tacky critics' blurbs that usually make posters feel degrading and whorish.
The way in which the words are arranged, gives the poster a tri-dimensional feeling, as if each quote was a step of sorts, perhaps a layer of ground, to get to the center of the concept.
Take a closer look and you'll read stuff like "would have made Hitchcock proud!" (they should've added Saul Bass too). I for one am honestly eager to watch a Reynolds movie for the first time in my life.

Did these images achieve that for you too?

The Proposal **1/2

Director: Anne Fletcher
Cast: Sandra Bullock, Ryan Reynolds
Mary Steenburgen, Craig T. Nelson, Denis O'Hare
Malin Akerman, Betty White

"The Proposal" is by the numbers, full of clichés, stereotypes and a plot so obvious you need just see the poster to know how it will end.
With that said, it's also rather fun to watch and on occasion even gets to be funny!
Sandra Bullock plays Margaret Tate, a book editor from hell who inspires her employees to act like stock characters from "The Devil Wears Prada" did whenever Meryl was onscreen.
Her assistant Andrew (Reynolds) bears with all her demands even if it means he's stopped living a life of his own.
When Margaret faces deportation-she's Canadian-she blackmails Andrew into marriage and to satisfy the migratory officer (O'Hare) she spends a weekend at Andrew's family home in Alaska.
The tough girl's heart melts with the townsfolk, Andrew realizes she's only evil because she has issues (and a great body for her age) and sparks obviously rise between them.
Reynolds and Bullock have amazing chemistry, his naive face and her devilish brow raises work some sort of summer movie magic and before long the film's chaotic, forced situations elicit some laughter.
It's of course Betty White as Andrew's grandma who owns the movie giving a loony, adorable performance, her type of timeless comedy makes you wonder if Bullock will be as effective 40 years from now...

Why can't he act as good as he looks?

X-Men Origins: Wolverine *

Director: Gavin Hood
Cast: Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston
Ryan Reynolds, Dominic Monaghan, Lynn Collins
will.i.am, Daniel Henney, Kevin Durand, Taylor Kitsch

This prequel to the "X-Men" series commits the cardinal sin of action film/comic book/summer blockbusters: it's terribly un-entertaining.
Wolverine/Logan as played by Hugh Jackman was consistently one of the best elements in the ensemble of the previous trilogy; combining raw power, a dark sense of humor and animalistic sexuality.
Once you leave him on his own though, he's just not that interesting. The film begins in 1845 where we learn about Logan's birthplace and his power to regenerate as well as his relationship with his older brother Victor (played by Schreiber). Through the credits sequence (which perhaps would've made a better film) we follow the siblings through most of the wars in the twentieth century finishing in Vietnam where they are approached by William Stryker (Huston) who asks him to joing a special team he's putting together.
The group is made out of other mutants including the invulnerable Fred Dukes (Durand), teleportating Kestrel (will.i.am), Bolt who manipulates electricity (Monaghan), expert gunsman Agent Zero (Henney) and sword fighter Wade Wilson (Reynolds).
Stryker uses them as mercenaries who commit vicious crimes to get what they want. Logan becomes disgusted by this and leaves the group, retiring peacefully to Canada where he lives with his girlfriend Kayla (Collins).
Years later his brother Victor tracks him down and kills his girlfriend setting Logan on a search for revenge. He is approached by Stryker who offers to help him become invincible in order to fulfill his mission. Logan accepts and undergoes a procedure where his skeleton is reinforced with the indestructible metal adamantium.
Logan later learns that Stryker has been in league with Victor all along and escapes, taking on the name of Wolverine in search of vengeance.
Then there's a rescue mission, more mutant cameos than you can shake a stick at and the eventual finale which neatly ties up events so that the first "X-Men" movie makes more sense.
One would assume that the purpose of a prequel would be to establish things otherwise we wouldn't have way of knowing or that at least in some way influenced the behavior of the characters when we met them.
The people involved in making this film however only saw in it the opportunity to make a buck and Wolverine becomes but a puppet in a constant sequence of events and action sequences trying to top the previous one in terms of grandiosity.
As much as Jackman tries to invest something into his character, the screenplay provides him with some ridiculous scenes (not to mention cringe-worthy one liners, which they probably are using for the tie-in video game) that lack a flashy comic book feel and certainly never achieve some sort of hyperrealism.
In the same way the action sequences often come close to turning into selfparodies (unlike the cheesy glory of Sam Raimi's "Spider-Man" series) that make us believe that the characters are actually doing them just because the actors playing them are getting paid.
When the film tries to humanize Logan it does so with the subtlety of a nuclear bomb, throwing in ridiculous flashbacks and an even dumber story his girlfriend tells him straight out of the "chick flick book of mythology".
When "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" is over you too will have grown claws from boredom and will wish to tear the screen down.

Definitely, Maybe **

Director: Adam Brooks
Cast: Ryan Reynolds, Abigail Breslin
Isla Fisher, Elizabeth Banks, Rachel Weisz
Kevin Kline, Derek Luke

After learning about sex at school, 10 year old Maya (Breslin) begins to question her father, Will,(Reynolds) about his own experience before her mom.
Slightly surprised by this request Will comes up with the original idea to tell his daughter the story of his life, but changes the names of the women in order for her to guess which is her mom.
Flash back to 1992 when Will is working for Bill Clinton's campaign and the three mother candidates are: Emily (Banks), Will's college sweetheart who is having trouble following his pace, sexy erudite Summer (Weisz) who has a thing for a seasoned writer (Kline) but can't help liking Will and finally April (Fisher) a kooky, free spirit working as copygirl for the campaign.
While original in concept, the film lacks spirit in the execution and before long ends up feeling like the extension of a joke that wasn't so good to begin with.
Sometimes forgetting that it's supposed to feel like a love jigsaw, it tries to cover all the right bases and instead of focusing on something, goes for a "feel good" sense in every single way.
Nobody is dislikeable and the script manages to be condescending without ever feeling selfconscious.
Reynolds makes for a satisfying lead, even if his performance is fueled by inertia more than anything else, since he knows everyone can overact him here, which is why it's the girls who stay with you the most.
Banks' "all American" beauty has a sweet effervescent mood, while Weisz is sexy, intriguing and the most real of the characters.
But leaving the film you will probably have stronger impressions from Fisher who does her best Amy Adams impersonation to become the girl you root for the most and of course Breslin, who unlike other child actresses is able to keep a balance between being a child and a child thinking they can act like an adult, which helps her deliver a performance that goes from "staple cute kid" to fully formed character.
While it's true that revisiting our love histories is a double edged sword, "Definitely, Maybe" has the innocence none of its characters does and is able to remain hopeful amidst a world that constantly tries to remind you hope is practically gone.
Whatever you decide to make out of it, the one unforgivable thing the film does is try to treat you like Maya, when truth is even she knows best...