Category Archives: Film Review

A Quickie With Lisa Marie: Higher Ground (dir. by Vera Farmiga)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last August, I saw a wonderful film called Higher Ground.  Despite the fact that it had gotten a rapturous review in our local news paper, I was one of the only people in the theater.  Higher Ground played for a week before leaving and it’s been rather ignored during Oscar season.  And that’s a shame because I think that Higher Ground is one of the best films of 2011.  It’s certainly one of my personal favorites.

Taking place over the course of several decade, Higher Ground follows Corinne (Vera Farmiga) as she goes from being married and pregnant at 18 to eventually following her husband into joining a commune of self-described “Jesus Freaks.”  The commune, while being undeniably well-meaning, is also male-dominated and follows an extremely fundamentalist interpretation of the bible.  The previously fiercely independent Corinne quickly settles in to being a compliant housewife with her social life being pretty much limited to hanging out with the other housewives in the commune.  As the years progress, Corinne struggles to balance her own independence with her own religious beliefs until finally, she starts to both question her faith and the life she’s lived for the past 20 years.

For the most part, American cinema doesn’t have a very good track record when it comes to religious themes.  Regardless of whether a film is pro-religion or anti-religion, the final result often times seems to be heavy-handed, simple-minded, and finally rather condescending.  (I always roll my eyes whenever a white, Southern-accented preacher shows up in a movie because I know that he’s going to turn out to be a villain within the next 30 minutes).  It’s very rare to find a film that treats religion and the issues of faith (and the lack of it) with anything resembling intelligence.  Higher Ground is one of those rare films and, for the reason alone, it deserves to be seen.  A typical and lesser film would have taken sides and would have given us a bunch of easy judgments and hissable villains.  Higher Ground, however, is far too subtle and intelligent to give us any easy answers.  In the end, its portrait of religion and faith is intriguingly ambiguous and one that forces the viewer to reconsider their own feelings as well.

Ultimately, Higher Ground is triumph for Vera Farmiga, who both stars and makes her directorial debut with this film.  As both a director and a star, she contributes some very subtle work here and, as a result, the film almost takes you be surprise as you suddenly realize just how wrapped of you gotten in its story.  Farmiga’s direction is so assured that she even gets away with a few showy fantasy sequences where Corinne reveals what’s going on behind her devout facade.  It’s a triumphant directorial debut and I’m looking forward to seeing what Farmiga does in the future.

What Lisa Marie Watched Last Night: A Friend of the Family (dir. by Stuart Gillard)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

What did I watch last night?  I watched A Friend of the Family, a 2007 film that shows up on the Lifetime Movie Network every couple of weeks.

Why Was I Watching It?

Ennui.

What Was It About?

Well, it’s yet another Canadian true crime, exploitation film that has found a second life on Lifetime.  Newly weds Allison and Darrin (Laura Harris and Erik Johnson) move to a small town in Canada.  Darrin befriends and goes into business with David (Kim Coates) and David is like so obviously a serial killer but Allison is the only one who notices.  And then, when Allison attempts to let people know that David’s the one who has been killing all the blonde waitresses in town, everyone responds by saying that she’s the one who is being silly and emotional!

What Worked

It all worked!  Well, okay, not all of it but enough of it worked that I had fun curling up on the couch and watching it.  Laura Harris was a sympathetic heroine (and she played her character with just a hint of instability so you wondered sometimes if maybe she was just imagining it all), Kim Coates was creepy in that Kim Coates way, and Erik Johnson — Oh. My. God.  So. Cute.

Add to that, I could relate to this film.  Nobody believed me when I said the janitor in high school was a serial killer and I’m still pretty sure I was right about that.

What Didn’t Work?

You know what?  It all worked, as far as I’m concerned.

“Oh my God!  Just like me!” Moments

There were several, most of them having to do with Alison’s struggle to get people to listen to what she was saying.  Seriously, men need to lean how to shut up and listen when it comes to potential serial killers living next door.

Lessons Learned

The main lesson was the same one that’s taught by most Lifetime movies: If you ever think the guy next door might be obsessed with you and plotting to kill you, take the law in your own hands.  Seriously, all the men in your life are worthless when it comes to these situations. 

 

Film Review: Shame (dir. by Steve McQueen)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Earlier this month, Jeff and I saw the new film Shame.  Shame has gotten a lot of attention because 1) it’s rated NC-17 and 2) it stars a frequently naked Michael Fassbender (or, as me and my girlfriends call it, “the Full Fassbender.”)  I’m sure that some people out there will find Shame to be either too shocking or too disturbing or too explict for its own good but you know what?  Those people are idiots.  Shame is one of the best films of 2011.

(An extra benefit of Shame being rated NC-17 is that I was asked to show ID before I was allowed to enter the theater.  Usually, this is where I would do one of my patented “Don’t Tell Me What I Can’t See!” rants but, honestly, I had just recently “celebrated” my birthday and being mistaken for 16 made my day.)

In Shame, Michael Fassbender plays a succesful, outwardly confident New Yorker named Brandon.  Though the film never offers up a clinical diagnosis, Brandon is a sex addict who spends his time having anonymous sex with prostitutes, watching pornography on his computer, and apparently masturbating every chance he gets.  We discover this via an opening montage which quickly establishes both the pattern of Brandon’s life and that sex for Brandon is more about maintaining order than getting any sort of pleasure.  We watch as Brandon awkwardly flirts with an attractive co-worker and reluctantly goes out drinking with his boss and it quickly becomes obvious that Brandon is incapable of maintaining any sort of “real” relationship. 

Eventually, Brandon’s life is disrupted when his self-destructive sister Sissy (Carey Mulligan) shows up at his apartment and proceeds to move in with him.  Though Sissy and Brandon are obviously close, it also becomes apparent that Sissy is everything that Brandon isn’t.  Whereas Brandon is rigidly controlled and closed-off, Sissy is erratic and demanding.  With Sissy’s arrival, Brandon quickly starts to spiral as his own behavior lurches out of his control, leading to one harrowing night that forces both Mulligan and Fassbender to confront who they are, each in their own individual way.

Obviously, for Shame to work, it has to strike a perfect balance.  With this material, it’s very easy to go overboard and come up with something that feels histrionic and false.  Fortunately, director Steve McQueen finds that perfect balance.  McQueen mixes scenes of clinic observation with almost lyrical montages in a style that reminds one of some of David Cronenberg’s better film. 

McQueen’s direction is matched by the performances of Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan.  Playing the role of Brandon, Fassbender finds the perfect balance between self-loathing and narcissism and he makes blatant self-destruction both scary and compelling.  It’s impossible to imagine this movie working with anyone but Fassbender in the lead role.  He has more than enough talent and charisma to keep us watching even when we want to look away.  (And, let’s be honest, the fact that he’s naked for most of the film helps too.)  As Sissy, Mulligan runs the risk of being overshadowed by Fassbender’s performance but she more than holds her own while paying a character that will probably inspire mixed feelings in most viewers.  Debatably, Mulligan gives an even braver performance than Fassbender.  It takes guts to be this potentially unlikable on-screen and it takes talent to make us still care about the character and, fortunately, Mulligan has both.

I’ve heard a few people complain about the fact that McQueen declines to spell out any easy motivation for why Fassbender and Mulligan behave the way that they do.  I would argue that this is the film’s greatest strength.  Any possible explanation that McQueen could have offered would have just served to render what happens on screen simplistic.  Ultimately, the characters played by Fassbender and Mulligan are mysteries to themselves as well as to the audience.  That said, McQueen does offer up several clues.  To his credit as a director, McQueen has faith in the ability of his audience to notice those clues without having to have things spelled out.

After watching Shame, all I can say is that perhaps, in the future, all movies should be rated NC-17.

A Quickie with Lisa Marie: Like Crazy (dir. by Drake Doremus)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Like Crazy tells the story of Anna (Felicity Jones) and Jacob (Anton Yelchin), two college students who start dating as graduation nears and eventually come to discover that they love each other “like crazy.”  Unfortunately, U.S. immigration officials don’t care how much they love each other and when the British Anna overstays on her visa, she is promptly sent back home and told that she cannot reenter the U.S.  While Anna continues to pursue her literary career in England, Jacob runs a succesful design business in America.  Anna and Jacob struggle to maintain their long distance relationship, even while both of them are tempted by others (played quite well by Jennifer Lawrence and Charlie Brewley, both of whom give nuanced performances that make their characters into more than just romantic complications). 

While the plot might sound like the formula for your standard romcom, Like Crazy is actually a surprisingly mature and realistic film that also manages to be gloriously romantic and just a little sad (yes, Lisa cried a lot).  You really come to care about not only about Jacob and Anna but you also come to feel less like your watching a movie and instead like you’re literally eavesdropping on real life.  This is director Drake Doremus’s third film and his work here is almost like a blue print of how to make a film like this work.  When the film starts, his hand-held cameras is jittery and nervous, reflecting the rush of hope and fear that we all feel at the beginning of a new relationship.  As the film progresses, Doremus’s camera also calms down and it makes it impossible for us to look away, even when it almost feels as if we’ve intruded too far on the lives and feelings of our two lovers.

Doremus is helped by the fact that his two lovers are perfectly cast and totally believable and likable delivering dialogue that was reportedly improvised during filming.  I’ve seen Anton Yelchin in a few films but this is the first time that he ever truly impressed me as an actor.  One need only compare his vulnerable performance here to his more showy (and less effective) performance in The Beaver to see just how much Yelchin benefits from the improvised nature of Doremus’s film.  As Anna, Felicity Jones proves that a previously unknown actress doesn’t need a gimmick (like a dragon tattoo) to give a breakthrough performance.  Yelchin and Jones have a very real chemistry and you sincerely care about them. 

The end result is a wonderful film that deserves to be seen.  Like Crazy was one of the best films of 2011 and it’s a shame that it’s being overshadowed a bit by the bigger, more traditional films that have been released at the end of the year.

Film Review: Martha Marcy May Marlene (directed by Sean Durkin)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Martha Marcy May Marlene was, for me, one of the most surprising films of 2011.  I wasn’t expecting much when I went to see it because so much of the film’s publicity centered on the fact that it starred Elizabeth Olsen, the younger sister of the Olsen Twins.  Needless to say, we don’t usually associate the Olsen Twins with challenging and mature filmmaking and, even though they had nothing to do with Martha Marcy May Marlene, it was impossible to read or hear about the film without them being mentioned.  For a lot of people, this led to Martha Marcy May Marlene being dismissed by association.  That’s really not fair to the film or Elizabeth Olsen (or the Olsen Twins, for that matter).  Martha Marcy May Marlene is a haunting and disturbing little psychological thriller and one of the best films of 2011.

Olsen plays Martha, a young woman who, one day, shows up at the home of her older sister and her husband (played by Sarah Paulson and Hugh Dancy).  Though the film never gets into the specific details, it becomes apparent that Paulson and Olsen are the products of a dysfunctional background.  Olsen escaped by running away from home while Paulson found her exit by marrying the rather arrogant Dancy.  Hoping to repair their own strained relationship, Paulson agrees to let Olsen stay with them, despite both the objections of Dancy and Olsen’s refusal to say where she’s been.  No sooner has Olsen moved in then it starts to become apparent that she’s not the same person that Paulson remembers. When Paulson asks Olsen if she wants to take a swim in the nearby lake, Olsen responds by stripping off her clothes in front of Dancy and when Paulson and Dancy are trying to conceive their first child, Olsen sees nothing wrong with casually walking into the room and laying down on the bed beside them.  More ominously, Olsen soon reveals herself to be paranoid of strangers.  As Paulson struggles to understand her sister, we see flashbacks of a much more open (and trusting) Olsen joining a cult-like group, led by a magnetic John Hawkes.

Director Sean Durkin makes an assured debut with this film, subtly shifting between the present and the past and filling the screen with beautifully placid images that somehow manage to leave the audience with an unshakeable sense of menace and foreboding.  As a storyteller, Durkin keeps the audience guessing and wondering about both who Martha once was, who she eventually became, and who she’s going to be in the future.  Wisely Durkin doesn’t provide any easy solutions as much as he poses questions and then suggests a possible answer. 

If you’re like and you’re a true crime and/or exploitation junkie (I’m both), you’ll realize immediately that the character played by John Hawkes is pretty blatantly based on Charles Manson and his followers are the equivalent of Manson’s “family.”  What’s interesting is how Hawkes manages to keep his character both threatening and intriguing even after this become apparent.  Hawkes radiates such charisma in the beginning of the film that the scenes where he eventually reveals his true colors are shocking, despite the fact that you know they’re coming.  It’s a performance that proves that Hawkes is one of the best character actors working today and Durkin skillfully contrasts Hawkes’s more subtle form of domination with Hugh Dancy’s more obvious technique with the film ultimately suggesting that both of these patriarchal characters are just two sides of the same coin.

Ultimately, though, the film is dominated by Elizabeth Olsen who gives a performance that is simply brilliant.  Alternatively innocent and calculating, Martha is a fascinating character and Olsen brings her to haunting life.  As a result of Olsen’s brave performance, Martha Marcy May Marlene joins with Hanna and Shame as a great modern film about the search for identity.  This has been a year full of strong female performances and Olsen gives one of the strongest.  The next time some shyster tries to sell you on the idea that Rooney Mara is the actress of the future, tell them to go see Martha Marcy May Marlene.

Quick Review: A Separation (dir. Asghar Farhadi)

Posted on by leonth3duke

Elevated by a brilliant screenplay and some of the year’s best performances, the Iranian “A Separation” is a compelling and complex examination of cultural barriers, religious conflict, and responsibility all set within a simple domestic drama.

   

It focuses on a married couple, Nader (Payman Moadi) and Simin (Leila Hatami), who start the film off in front of a judge. Simin wants a divorce because Nader will not leave the country for Europe with her. She wants a better life for her daughter Termeh, but he cannot leave his father who is suffering from Alzheimer’s. When Simin goes to live with her parents out of anger over Nader’s refusal to leave, Nader hires a housemaid, Razieh, to help out around the house and take care of his sick father when he is at work. She is deeply religious and pregnant, though not many know, and when her duties begin to conflict with her religious beliefs she quits though offers her husband Hodjat to take over. He is deeply in debt and constantly abused by creditors. Razieh does not want him to know she has been working for Nader, but when Hodjat misses his first day she steps in. Unfortunately complications arise that result in a messy situation with Nader’s father, causing him to get angry and all the tension that had been boil between them all erupts with tragic results. They all find themselves in the middle of a legal dispute, with both sides making accusations even though they have secrets that could destroy their cases and families. During all this director Asghar Farhadi refuses to take sides, and instead focuses on the internal moral struggles of all parties affected by issues often not within their control; while also making these cultural, judicial and religious dilemmas, although set in Iran, feel universal.

What is truly remarkable is how he holds all these layers together with intricate but not blatantly obvious details put into the exposition. Asghar Farhadi’s handling of at times controversial subjects and the characters involved results in a fluid and consistently absorbing story from start to finish. Add onto that some of the more destructive yet quiet, emotional but subtle and complicated performances of the year and you get a film that cannot be ignored. A definite must see.

A Quickie With Lisa Marie: Melancholia (dir. by Lars Von Trier)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Let us take a moment to consider the career of film director Lars Von Trier.  Is Von Trier a visionary?  Is he a genius?  Is he an artist who forces us to look at the world in a different way?  Is he one of the major voices working in the world of cinema today?  Or is he just full of crap?  This is the debate that always seems to come up whenever one talks about Lars Von Trier and a pretty good case can be made that the man is both a genius and an idiot, an artist and a charlatan.  How, we ask ourselves, do we reconcile the fact that this man who has directed so many memorable films is also the same man who goes to Cannes and hints that he might be sympathetic to Hitler.  As a result, Von Trier’s films seem to act as both aesthetic statements and as evidence in the never-ending trial to determine whether or not Lars Von Trier is worth all the trouble.  Melancholia — which is currently both playing at theaters and available OnDemand — is the latest exhibit in a long trial.

Melancholia is both the story of the relationship of two sisters (played by Charlotte Gainsbourg and Kirsten Dunst, who deservedly won best actress at Cannes for her performance here) and the story of what happens when a new planet called Melancholia appears in the sky and then promptly starts to move closer to the Earth.

The film is divided into two parts.  The first part takes place over the course of one long night.  Justine (Dunst) and her new husband Michael (Alexander Skarsgard who looks so amazing in a tux) attend a wedding reception at a mansion owned by Justine sister Clare (Gainsbourg) and Clare’s well-meaning but condescending husband John (Kiefer Sutherland).  While Justine and Michael, at first, appear to be the perfect couple, it slowly becomes apparent that the truth is far more complex.  The first part of the film takes its time establishing the characters and how they relate to each other but it never drags, largely because of the chemistry between Dunst and Skarsgard but also because Von Trier proves himself to be far more subtle director here than he’s usually given credit for being.  The first half of the film is full of details — some small and some not — that make us believe that these very familiar actors actually are the characters that they are portraying.  While Von Trier never explicitly show us what’s at the heart of Skarsgard and Dunst’s trouble relationship, he includes enough details that we, as the viewer, can figure it out.  Under Von Trier’s skilled direction, even such little things as Dunst’s constant struggle to keep her dress up take on an added and poignant significance.

In the second half of the film, a depressed Dunst is now living in the mansion with Gainsbourgh and Sutherland.  Despite the fact that Dunst is nearly catatonic, Sutherland has little sympathy for her and makes no secret of the fact that he’s not happy to have her living in his home.  However, things change rather quickly once it is learned that the new planet Melancholia is on a collision course with Earth.  While Sutherland insists that the two planets will not actually collide and Gainsbourgh panics, Dunst starts to find herself oddly rejuvenated by the prospect that the world might end…

If you were dismissive of Von Trier before this movie came out, I doubt watching Melancholia will change your mind.  In many ways, this film epitomizes everything that people tend to hate about his movies.  However, I loved Melancholia.  Visually, it’s beautiful and the film student in me loved the film simply for the many homages to Last Year at Marienbad.  Von Trier gets excellent performance from the entire cast but really, this is Kristen Dunst’s film and she proves that she’s capable of a lot more than just being a Manic Pixie Dream Girl.  Speaking of someone who has battled depression all of her life, I have to say that Dunst gets it right, capturing not only the pain of permanent sadness but also the odd moments of clarity that seem to come with it.  Finally, this is a unique film and it’s unique because Von Trier is a director that’s not afraid to be an egocentric asshole when it comes to telling the story that he wants to tell. 

I could spend hours debating what exactly Melancholia means and I’d probably change my mind several times during the conversation.  However, one thing is for sure: Melancholia is one of the best of films of 2011.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (dir. David Fincher)

Posted on by leonth3duke

I’ve probably gone back and rewritten this review multiple times over the past few hours. I’ve been struggling to come to a final conclusion to how I felt about the film. On one hand it is a hollow crime thriller, all polish and no substance, and on the other it is an exceptionally crafted dark and mysterious tale of sex, corruption and murder that oozes with atmosphere. One could make the case for either, and many critics have argued in favor of one side or the other. After a lot of contemplation, I’ve come to decide that it actually seems to rely on both being hollow and atmospheric, but what continues to conflict me is whether the former can truly be overlooked even if crucial to the final product.

‘The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo’ stars Daniel Craig as Mikael Blomkvist, a journalist who has recently come under a lot of scrutiny after being accused of making up a story about a wealthy executive and losing the case of libel brought upon him. Facing financial and credibility problems he is hired by Henrik Vanger (Christopher Plummer) a wealthy entrepreneur  who wants Mikael to solve a ‘cold case’ that has haunted him for forty years, that being the disappearance of his grand-niece Harriet who he believes was murdered by a member of his corrupt family filled with Nazis and recluses. As Mikael delves deeper into the mystery of her disappearance he hires the assistance of Lisbeth Salander, a goth-hacker with a dark past who has her own personal issues to deal with, specifically a financial guardian who wants sexual favors in order for her to access her money. When they are finally brought together they discover the dark secrets of the Vanger family and its links to a serial murderer case that begins to threaten their own lives.

David Fincher, who directed ‘Zodiac’ and ‘Se7en’, is no stranger to graphic and dark thrillers so it is no surprise that he handles the creation of ‘The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo’ with a level of competence few other directors could have. Along with the help of cinematographer Jeff Cronenweth and being set in Sweden the film has a very dark and cold (often literally) tone, making an atmosphere just as chilling as the subject matter and beautiful to look at. Sadly under the gorgeous and dark visuals and the bleak and mysterious atmosphere there isn’t much to be had. There is a real lack of emotion and soul.

I can only assume that Fincher’s intentions from the beginning were to avoid any real substance, and to make a film just as hollow and sadistic as the story is was trying to tell. There is just about no emotion and so no reason to be attached to anyone except Lisbeth, but our empathy for her stems more from the vial acts we see acted upon her and less from truly knowing who she is, and why she is so emotionally restrained. It is not until the last twenty minutes that she gets any sort of development, but was it too little too late? Again I cannot decide. One could argue that this insight into the character earlier on would have made us care for her more, which I can understand. But I also question whether or not she could have even opened up the way she does at the end without having first gone through the events of the film, in particular the relationship she has with Mikael. Either way, I’m just glad Fincher went with Rooney Mara to play Lisbeth.

It is hard not to compare both film versions of the Lisbeth character, and even harder to choose which was better. This is mainly because both films, although similar in many ways, have very different tones. The Swedish version is a much more straight forward thriller and Rapace’s Lisbeth fits that film in being just a strong and tough individual, though there doesn’t seem to be too much below her surface and most of the development of her past is shown. Mara’s Lisbeth is a much more complex character, and although the film doesn’t give her much depth in terms of story until the very end, Mara gives off hints of a disturbing past just in the way she talks and moves, especially when men get too close to her. In reality she is a much weaker character than in the Swedish version. I personally liked that soft side because it makes her feel more like a vulnerable woman so when she fights back it feels more powerful.

It is this humanization that really helps propel Fincher’s adaptation over the Swedish version in my eyes. Even Daniel Craig, who put on a very good performance, is given a lot more to do and a much more interesting personality. He gives the character a bit of charisma, and wasn’t just a monotonous individual, like in the original, making it easier for us to care for both him and Lisbeth. It also makes their odd but provocative relationship seem more genuine and intimate.

All of this stuff I loved…but then I fall back to feeling like it was all for nothing. I mean it looks pretty, and the mystery is intriguing and the atmosphere is dark and cool, but once it is all over nothing really sticks other than the technical aspects. This isn’t helped by the fact that it over stays its welcome for the last few minutes, even if it adds to the characters. Luckily the pacing is done well enough to never make it feel boring but it does end up being rather anti-climactic. But I feel a second viewing is necessary.

With that said, as conflicted I am about everything else one thing that I can say for certain was fantastic is the score. It was crucial in the creation of the moody and dark atmosphere. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, who did the Oscar winning score for ‘The Social Network’, continue to impress and help give the film a pounding and chilling heartbeat. Also the ‘Bondesque’ opening credits, a brilliant animation of dark tar, leather and gothic imagery set to Karen O’s cover of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Immigrant Song’, was absolutely stunning.

So overall I will say that it is an incredibly well-crafted and dark thriller with fantastic visuals and a wonderful performance by Rooney Mara and because of that it certainly deserves a lot of credit but below the surface it is a rather hollow and anti-climactic story making it hard for me to love it as much as I might have wanted to. It also did not help that going into it my anticipation was at an all-time low due to the hype that was built up around it and by how much I liked the original. So for now I’ll just say I enjoyed it for what it was, it certainly is well crafted enough to deserves the praise it is getting, but a second viewing will determine whether or not I truly thought it was a great film. Still I recommend it for those interested.

A Quickie With Lisa Marie: The Adventures of TinTin (dir. by Steven Spielberg)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Originally, this was supposed to be the year of Steven Spielberg.  After all, Spielberg had two major films open within days of each other and, earlier this year, various know-it-all pundits declared that both of these films (along with David Fincher’s dumbed down version of Girl With The Dragon Tattoo) would be major awards contenders.  This was, of course, before films like Hanna, The Artist, Drive, and The Tree Of Life came out and made Spielberg’s trademark suburban cinematic vision seem almost quaint.  Spielberg’s two films — The Adventures of TinTin and War Horse — both very much remain in the hunt for nominations but few seem to be expecting them to actually win anything.  Oddly enough, it’s as if Spielberg’s films somehow went from being overrated to underrated before they were even released.

I haven’t seen War Horse yet (and the commercials don’t fill me with hope) but, in the case of TinTin, this is unfortunate because I saw the film on Friday and it’s a perfectly enjoyable animated film that, while never reaching the intertextual heights of Rango or matching the “awww” factor of Puss in Boots , is still a bit more memorable than Pixar’s Cars 2.  Based on a Belgian comic book, (which I had never heard of before so don’t expect me to get into the whole debate about whether Spielberg does the original justice) The Adventures of TinTin is about a “boy reporter” named TinTin (voiced by the always likable Jamie Bell) who, along with his adorable dog Snowy, ends up going on a quest for lost treasure.  The film plays out like an old-fashioned adventure film with TinTin and Snowy’s quest taking them from one exotic locale to another.  Continually, they find themselves getting captured by various bad guys and having to escape in some properly exciting manner.  Along with the way, they meet an alcoholic sea captain (voiced by Andy Serkis) and a whole variety of flamboyant characters.  My favorite characters were the two well-meaning but inept police detectives, Thompson and Thompson.  Thompson and Thompson are voiced by Simon Pegg and Nick Frost and the two of them have so much chemistry and play off each other so well that they’re even fun to just listen to.

When I saw The Adventures of TinTin, I was sincerely surprised by how quickly the film moved.  Usually, I find that the majority of Spielberg films tend to drag in the middle.  Whenever there’s nothing to blow up or an excuse to fill the scene with soaring music conducted by John Williams, Spielberg seems to lose his way as a filmmaker and can almost seem desperate in his attempts to convince us that he’s a serious artist.  However, it almost seemed as if The Adventures of TinTin was over before it even started.  This is not a film that drags but instead one that cheerfully leaps from one action sequence to another.  It’s as if working on an animated film freed Spielberg up from his inherent need to remind us that he’s a respectable filmmaker.  For once, he’s willing to just have fun without trying to justify it.  Since I was seeing the film with two hyperactive children (my nephew who is five and my niece who is three), I was happy and relieved that the film didn’t have any slow spots.  The movie, as a matter of fact, held their attention better than it held mine and all three of us loved Snowy.  An important lesson for all aspiring filmmakers: If you’re ever in doubt, always cut to a small animal doing something cute.

Ultimately, TinTin is an enjoyable little film that really doesn’t add up too much.  This isn’t another Toy Story 3 or a How To Train Your Dragon.  This is not a film to bring tears to your eyes but it’s enjoyable enough and it’s a rare Spielberg film that seems to be unashamed of simply being message-free entertainment.

Happy Holidays From The Shattered Lens (And Especially Lisa and Erin!)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Hi, everyone!  Now, I know that some of you may be saying, “It’s Saturday.  Where are the trailers, Ms. Bowman?”  Well, rest assured, a new entry in Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation Trailers will be posted next week.  However, today, me and the one and only Dazzling Erin are in Ft. Worth, hanging out with our family and trying to get those final few presents wrapped before Christmas morning. 

(Luckily, we live in America and not Europe or else it already would be Christmas and then we’d really be in a spot.)

So, again, the trailers will resume next week.  For today, however, I’d rather share with you one of my favorite movie endings of all time.  Yes, you’ve seen it a hundred times and you might be watching it on TV right now.  But I don’t care.  The ending of It’s a Wonderful Life always brings a tear to my eye.

Happy Holidays!