There’s really not much to say about a picture like Step Up Revolution, the fourth of its name. If anything, I admire it for daring to be anything more than a movie about Kids With Dreams striving to realize those dreams, though that’s not saying much. Like the other Step Up films, and last year’s remake of Footloose, Step Up Revolution has one raison d’êtere, and that’s to thrill audiences with great dancing in increasingly elaborate dance numbers. Judged on that criteria alone, the film succeeds as a light, well-intentioned but charmingly dopey crowd-pleaser. Just don’t go in expecting the elements of civil disobedience captured in the marketing to add…
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G-S-T Review…The Watch
A sincere question for my readers: is it worse for a movie to be derivative or lifeless? The Watch, the second feature by The Lonely Island’s Akiva Schaeffer, borrows liberally from science fiction cinema classics like Invasion of the Body Snatchers (take your pick between the ’56 and ’78 versions) as well as contemporary greats like last year’s excellent Attack the Block, but the film’s worst transgression isn’t its unapologetic mimicry. Calling on decades-old genre traditions is one thing; turning out an embarrassingly brainless, thoroughly bland, and criminally unfunny attempt at sci-fi comedy is another entirely. The Watch shows as little interest in its aliens as its punchlines. Not to mention its characters. Like the best…
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Sweet Trailer…'Life of Pi'
I have no opinion whatsoever on Life of Pi, the novel by French Canadian author Yann Martel; I haven’t read it in the decade-and-change since its 2001 publication. But that might change with the release of the trailer for Ang Lee’s upcoming adaptation of the book. Quick reaction– it looks absolutely gorgeous. Have a look below: Breathtaking visuals aren’t anything new to Lee’s cinema– he brings his brand of ocular magic to every film he shoots, if you ask me– but some of the images in here are pretty startling even coming from him. Watching the footage, there are a number of shots here that evoke urgency, wonder, fear, and awe,…
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G-S-T Review…Rock of Ages
Full disclosure: I’ve never seen Rock of Ages live on stage. I have no idea if its sprawling, loosely connected storylines intersect in a more satisfying way when played out before a live, active, participating audience. I don’t know if the theater, rather than the multiplex, represents a more comfortable and better-suited environment in which the particulars of musicals can thrive. So, in short, I don’t really know where primary authorship of Rock of Ages‘ film adaptation lies– it’s with either Chris D’Arienzo or Adam Shankman– but I do know a train wreck when I see one because, as that locomotive cliche dictates, I’m unable to look away. That mesmerizing quality represents…
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G-S-T Review…Chernobyl Diaries
Curiously enough, Chernobyl Diaries may mark the first non-found footage found footage film. While constructed using mostly a straight narrative approach, there’s a nagging sense that this cautionary horror jaunt (penned and backed by Paranormal Activity mastermind Oren Peli) may have actually benefited from more fully embracing the tricky conceit; it’s shot like a found footage movie, it’s crafted like a found footage movie, it scares like a found footage movie, and the title’s reference to “diaries” naturally leads us to conclude that someone, somewhere, came across the footage we’re watching by unhappy accident. But those eponymous documents are nowhere to be found in an hour and a half of story. Chernobyl Diaries bases…
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G-S-T Review…Battleship
If you feel the need to blame someone for the birth, production, and release of Battleship— as I do– look no further than Michael Bay. The proprietor of shining contemporary examples of big spectacle gone very, very stupid, Bay brought the “movies based on toy lines” movement to life in 2007 with Transformers; two sequels and a G.I. Joe film later (which itself is getting sequelized this summer), and that childish aesthetic shows no signs of abating in the near future. Battleship proves to be the loudest and dumbest toy-to-cinema adaptation yet (barring last year’s Transformers: Dark of the Moon), a soulless, pointless, hollow cacophony of trite cliches and boring…
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G-S-T Review…Dark Shadows
A common fact easily overlooked: television isn’t the same medium as film. As modes of visual storytelling, they may bear a family resemblance, but they represent long-form versus short-form approaches to narrative. In short, the rules, as well as the limitations and advantages, differ greatly for both. A television show has room to breathe and stretch its legs by its very nature, for example, while a movie is more contained by its own. Conflating the two, then, is a mistake, and one which Tim Burton makes repeatedly throughout Dark Shadows, his interpretation of the identically-titled 1960s/70s televised Gothic soap opera; the result is so overstuffed and hopelessly rushed that there’s…
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[IFFBoston Review]…We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists
Brian Knappenberger’s We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists is a lot of things, but first and foremost it’s an outstanding example of documentary filmmaking done perfectly; it’s exciting, it’s propulsive, it’s entertaining, and it’s insightful. Documentaries should be educational and thorough as a rule, and We Are Legion doesn’t disappoint in that respect, but Knappenberger’s film– despite all of its historical and academic value– regardless manages to carry out its purpose with tongue firmly in cheek. And maybe there’s a point to that. After all, there’s something intrinsically bizarre about the idea that Knappenberger’s subject, the online, multi-faceted group of prankster-activists, Anonymous, actually has become a genuine catalyst for…
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[IFFBoston Review]…Polisse
Think of Polisse as a towering and worthy successor to television shows like The Shield and, far more accurately, The Wire. Dedicated to portraying its events and characters by way of a realistic mien, the film revolves around the lives of the Paris CPU (Child Protection Unit) both on the job and at home; the focus isn’t on a single narrative through-line carrying the picture from start to finish but rather on the people behind the armbands and badges and what motivates them and what haunts them. Polisse‘s stylistic bent lends itself to a sense of disarray, but while the movie may read as somewhat helter-skelter as it leaps from…
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[IFFBoston Review]…Sleepwalk With Me
If Sleepwalk With Me does one thing well, it’s strike a balance between truth and delusion. For a film that grounds itself so heavily in reality while simultaneously reveling in the dreams of its protagonist, equilibrium is paramount; mercifully, the line between waking life and fantasy is never irreparably, irresponsibly blurred. We may not be able to immediately identify when our protagonist is dreaming– neither can he– but Sleepwalk With Me clues us in quickly enough so as to avoid leaving us in the lurch, establishing a clear relationship between the stages of awareness experienced by Matt, the aimless, disconnected, would-be comedian serving as our anchor. And why not? Dreams…
