Fast Five (2011)

As a car enthusiast I'm not a fan of the first film, The Fast and the Furious (2001); it didn’t seem to know much about cars and the underworld racing culture isn’t interesting to me because drag racing is about as intense as fly fishing. I hate the second film, 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003); I love the third film, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006), which is a standalone film; and I hate the fourth film, Fast & Furious (2009).

Fast Five, I kind of like.

There is a story embedded somewhere within this film but it’s not interesting or important, and nor does it really need to exist. There just has to be a reason for random things to happen between one action sequence and the next. And no one really needs to watch any of the other F&F films in order to enjoy this one.

But for the sake of tradition…

Fast Five takes place exactly where the fourth film had ended, in which Dom (Vin Diesel) was escorted via prison bus to serve a 25-year sentence without parole. His best friend and his sister, played by Paul Walker and Jordana Brewster break him out by flipping the bus over (magically without hurting anyone on it!) and they all take off to live in Rio de Janeiro (hopefully they didn’t drive there). Once there, Dom and the gang meet up with his brother, who’d been absent since the first film, and immediately they team up to pull off a job where muscle cars are extracted from within a moving train. It’s implausible and improbable but the film, from its first opening minute, announces its hatred for anything physics related and breaks every rule in the universe. The end result is that it’s fun. Who cares when it’s fun, right?

Dwayne Johnson leads a team of special ops in the US and is called to Brazil to apprehend Dom and the gang. That’s’ really all there is for him to do. Aside from a Parkour chase in the slums and a good ol' fashion fist with between him and Vin Diesel, there’s not much for him to do.

There’s another story involving the biggest crook in all of Rio and in order to destroy him, the entire cast from every single F&F film joins the current cast and they form a team, turning the second half of this film into an Ocean’s Eleven repeat. But it’s still a fun repeat.

There is no acting power in this film. I know, from the bottom of my heart that Vin Diesel and Paul Walker cannot act and this film is further proof of that, but in order to combat the obvious, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges and Tyrese Gibson offer terrific comic relief, thankfully throughout, and the return of Han (Sung Kang), in a strange alternate universe “the third film will always be the last film in the series” is a nice welcome.

I like the character of Han. He’s actually the only character that I’d ever liked from all five films. In the first film, all of the protagonists were thieves by day and illegal street racers by night. The real hero was an undercover FBI agent who befriended the criminals and eventually they became best friends. There was absolutely nothing to like about any of them; and Dom spouting gospels about family and loyalty got very old, very fast. Han, he’s mellow. He races for fun, for skill, and, obviously for women. But he’s a very nice guy. Clearly he doesn’t belong in this film series but having him in the third film, playing mellow and cool, and bringing him back to this fifth installment is a very nice touch.

There is plenty of action in this film, as absurd and physics defying as it is and, thankfully, almost no racing. There is a short drag race in the middle of the film that doesn’t make any sense and doesn’t need to exist either, but I have a feeling that without it fans of the series would be upset. The pacing of the film is decent, even though the film is over two hours in length, and there is plenty of humor to be found.

This is a film that's almost entirely designed for fanboys of the series. If you liked the first four films, or any of them you will love this film. If not, this is still an improvement over the first, second, and fourth films put together. Within the first thirty minutes I had a rating of 3 stars in mind; within half of the film I lowered it down to 2 stars. By its end, the film received a solid 2 1/2 rating. It’s almost a pass. But remember: check your brain at the door, along with your cell phone.

The American (2010)

It might seem unusual for director Anton Corbijn (Control, 2007) to direct a spy/assassin thriller, one that takes place almost entirely at the Castel Del Monte hillside commune. But one would be wrong in assuming that a) this is a spy or assassin film, and b) that this is a thriller. Well, it is and it isn’t. More on that in a bit.

The American is what I like to call a “state of mind” film. It’s a film genre name that I’d created (or maybe I didn't) in order to explain, simply, that what we [the audience] are subjected to is the state of mind and state of consciousness of a specific character, usually the protagonist. We follow the character around, everywhere that he or she walks, runs, or drives to, we see what they see, and we experience everything from their point of view. Also, we experience how they relate to the happenings that transpire around them and before them, be they good or bad happenings.

The quintessential “state of mind” film is Jean-Pierre Melville’s classic gangster drama Le Samourai (1967), which stars one of Frances greatest screen actors Alain Delon. In Le Samourai, Delon plays Jef Costello, a hitman. Dressed in impeccable taste and to the fashions of the decade, and always armed with a trench coat, fedora, and white pair of gloves, Costello spends most of his time lying or sitting still inside his Paris apartment, listening to his caged bird chirp and awaiting a purpose in life; a phone call with information regarding his next kill. Costello speaks very little throughout the film and Delon almost never carries an expression of any kind on his face, a performance that was made famously into a style by Buster Keaton.

The reason that I’d sidetracked into Melville’s territory is because The American borrows greatly from it in atmosphere and character treatment. George Clooney plays Jack, and sometimes Edward. During the film’s intro we see him living with a woman in a cabin, surrounded by snow and mountains; they are in Sweden. After an assassin attempts to kill Jack in the open, jacks one-ups him and then shoots the woman that’d accompanied him.

Who was she? And was she really an enemy or did Jack only think that and kill her out of paranoia? Those questions needn’t be asked because they set up the rest of the film, and paranoia is the key ingredient of the film.

We follow Jack as he travels to Italy and we stay with him almost entirely within the confines of the hillside commune. We follow him everywhere that he goes, we watch him eat, and we listen to his phone conversations with his employer who tells him that there’s another job lined up for him and that it doesn’t involve killing. For his new job Jack is to manufacture an untraceable rifle for a woman, and after meeting with her and getting the specifics for the job he begins to assemble the rifle from scratch. The task is showcased in sequences spread throughout the entire film and we see Jack assemble an entire rifle by hand, by feel, and to perfection. Watching those scenes makes one warm inside; they are wonderful to behold.

Whenever he feels the urge, Jack frequents a brothel and fornicates with only one prostitute, Clara (Violante Placido). What we are subject to is Jack’s inability to experience anything more than lust and all that we get is animalistic sex (not that there’s anything wrong with that). Clara is beautiful and yet her beauty alone is what transpires the lust in Jack. He can’t feel real emotions aside from fright and feeling suspense (or fright) is a state of mind, not feeling therefore Jack, basically, lacks the capacity to experience and/or showcase any and all emotions. What we have is the shell of a man, one that looks, sounds, and physically feels like we all do but can’t experience or express emotions and this film being shot in the “state of mind” approach is essential in inflicting Jack’s state of paranoid mind upon us. We feel his paranoia because he feels it; we see what he does and doesn’t see, and we feel the fear that he feels just by exiting his home.

I don’t believe that I have to mention how good of an actor George Clooney is, seeing that he can play an action hero (From Dusk Till Dawn), an intelligent, undercover CIA agent that’s being framed by his own employers (Syriana), and a goofball (‘O Brother, Where Art Thou? and Burn after Reading). In The American, Clooney delivers his best performance to date. He never breaks out of character and I sympathized with Jack throughout the film simply because of Clooney’s depiction of mounting paranoia.

Take a look at this series of shots from the film and take note of Jack’s growing paranoia and Clooney’s depiction of the madness:

If there’s one thing that I’d never seen in a hitman/assassin film is the assassin himself feeling scared. Jack is scared all the time even if he doesn’t show it. He is a professional at his calling and even though he lacks feeling as a whole he shows us that he’s human by fearing for his life. So why is he scared? Why wouldn’t he be scared? He doesn’t even know why he’s being targeted for assassination.

And now onto the visuals of the film: The American is, as mentioned by every viewer of the film, a gorgeous looking film but it’s very easy to shoot gorgeous looking films. Therefore, Corbijn chooses each and every single frame carefully and not a single shot in this film is pointless. Every shot crafts Jacks’ present state of mind and the people that frequent the shots come and go as they please, some simply disappear just in the corner of our eyes. Sometimes a man might be sitting in his car watching Jack and as Jack looks around to try and spot potential danger, upon looking back the man is no longer in the car. Which begs the question: was a man actually in the car all along or did Jack imagine him? Again, we are subjected to Jack’s present state of mind and so we see what he may or may not see. And these kinds of tricks happen throughout the film frequently. The fact that the film is slow in pace is essential in inflicting fear in the audience because we begin to feel for Jack. And even after the film is over, we know nothing about him at all, not even his real name, but the director had managed to make us care for a complete unknown without even providing personal detail about him.

There isn't any exposition in the film, plot or character oriented; just visual quirks that remind us where we are and why we’re there. Again, it’s very essential to make every single shot in the film mean something: the quiet Italian streets at night, the lack of dialogue that Jack outpours (or doesn’t), and lack of love between him and Clara until the third act, although I am convinced that it’s her beauty and his lust for her that propels him into an “I’ve fallen in love with her” situation. And the fact that she knows nothing about him, just like us, makes for a sad relationship that’s doomed from the start.

This is not a boring film nor is it a pointless film. Every single film in existence has a story to tell and a story behind it. This one tells a sad story very simply, but there is a story here and it’s a good one. If one watches any pointless film that is nothing more than schlock I can guarantee that there is a story to within it regardless; we simply need to find out from the director what the story is. Many directors do a good job of riding their films of plot and visually, or audibly punctuating the story with the talent for cinema storytelling; this is a visual medium after all.

Lastly, The American can be viewed as a silent film. I recommend to silent film era aficionados that this film be watched without any sound, except for subtitles, and they’ll quickly notice everything that they’d missed the first time around. It’s that good of a film that does a terrific job that took me only one viewing to notice how good it is simply by following the craftsmanship behind it. Don’t listen to what people say about this film, it being pointless, boring, and unintelligent. Judge it for yourself by understanding first and foremost what you’re about to watch, prepare yourself for a “state of mind” film, and enjoy the scenery.

Iron Man 2 (2010)

*Note as of 07/14/12* - Click here to read my updated review for Iron Man 2 on Commentary Track.

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Iron Man 2 takes off from exactly where the first film ended: Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) revealed to the world that he is Iron Man and is now basking in fame. He’s also dying of palladium poisoning from the Arc Reactor fixated within his chest. But the latter is a secret well kept from the entire world and even from his closest friend Lt. Colonel James “Rhodey” Rhodes (Don Cheadle) and his trusted assistant Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow). Downey Jr. is still a fantastic Tony Stark, riddled with ADD but this time focusing more on his alcoholism and Paltrow is great as Pepper, keeping her possible affections for Stark a secret even from the audience. But Cheadle’s Rhodey has almost no chemistry with Stark because of script problems.

To add to the roster of excellent actors and their fantastic performances in this film we have Mickey Rourke playing Ivan Vanko, a Russian scientist who believes that his father was the original inventor of the Arc Reactor technology and who wants to exact revenge upon Tony Stark for not recognizing that fact, and Sam Rockwell playing Justin Hammer, an industrialist who competes with Stark Industries in weapons manufacturing and who hates Tony Stark (and vice versa).

Vanko manufactures a suit that uses the Arc reactor and incorporates a pair of electric whips, walks onto the race track of a Formula 1 race in Monaco, and destroys a few of the cars competing, including one being driven by Tony Stark himself. Stark then meets his match in a menacing, gold tooth capped, tattooed walking wall of muscle. And when Justin Hammer sees Vanko’s destructive style on TV he immediately assists in faking Vanko’s death and recruits him so as to build robots for him and help him destroy Tony Stark.

They’re a terrific duo of bad guys. Their chemistry is evident from the get go and they clearly have fun playing the badass Ivan Vanko and the snaky Justin Hammer.

Here’s the first big problem with this sequel: aside from the two new bad guys (whom are awesome), there are even more new characters. Nick Fury is not a new character but has almost ten minutes of screen time in this film. The problem with Nick Fury’s existence in this film is that he mostly explains to Tony that he’s being recruited for the Avengers initiative and seeing that The Avengers will have their own film, I don’t understand why an Iron Man film has to focus on that. It’s an Iron Man film. The first movie showed an appearance from Nick Fury for a minute, after the end credits, where he simply whispered the Avengers initiative. That was enough to excite the fans. But he returns here and simply focuses on news about another movie and, therefore doesn’t need to be in this movie.

The other new character is Natalie Rushman/Natasha Romanoff (Scarlet Johansson) and she works in Stark Industries’ legal department. She’s gorgeous, she's deadly, and secretly works for S.H.I.E.L.D., under Nick Fury’s jurisdiction. However, as beautiful as she is her character is unnecessary in this film.

So we have a Tony Stark that’s dying and tries to live life to the fullest. He throws a party, gets ridiculously drunk, and almost destroys his house while showing off to party attendants what his Iron Man suit can do. Rhodey shows up, puts on another Iron Man suit, the War Machine, and beats up Stark. Where that character trait came from, I don’t know. He also steals the suit and hands it over to Hammer Industries. That, also doesn't make sense.

The movie is terribly uneven. It seems to suffer from the ADD that Stark suffers from, except for the middle segment which mostly develops character that was already developed in the first film. The bad guys are under developed and so the third act doesn’t work well because their true intentions are even kept a secret from the audience. Even though Cheadle is a better choice for Rhodey than Terrence Howard was, he doesn’t have any chemistry with Tony Stark and that’s the screenwriter’s and director’s faults. The action is good and the CGI is even better than the first film’s but there is a large lack of physics and the Iron Man seems to lack weight and mass. The structure is all over the place and yet the beginning, middle, and end are directly borrowed from the first film. This movie has the exact same ending as the first film but doesn’t deserve to because Vanko is not Obadiah; he’s not personally close to Stark. The character arc that Stark goes through in the first film is strong and relates to the overall ending and here it’s just a generic standoff.

I like this film for trying to be bigger and better than the first, I like the action in it, and I like that Senator Stern (Garry Shandling) is trying to persuade Tony Stark to hand over the Iron Man as a weapon. He refuses to do so because he IS the Iron Man and it’s not JUST a machine. The movie has good ideas but the lack of proper structure causes the film to suffer greatly; there are too many peaks on this mountain. The performances are terrific but there are too many characters. Tony Stark is too erratic and although fun, he drains the audience’s energy. The bad guys, again, are underdeveloped. There is too much happening here and within too little time and then there's too much left out.

Many will compare this film to The Dark Knight (2008), in terms of them both being sequels but are incomparable because in The Dark Knight, everything that happens there happens for a reason (cause and consequence) and every character that is introduced exists with a purpose. Here, there’s too much happening at all times and some happenings and characters don’t need to be here.

It’s a nice try but it's not nearly as perfect as the first film.

Saw VI (2009)

Jigsaw takes on investment bankers and America’s health care, and it’s pretty darn funny.

I will not recap the five previous films, because this film series is almost solely existent on retcons (retroactive continuity) and has a history of concocting new characters and having the audacity to pretend that they’ve existed throughout the film series' story all along. In short, Hoffman (Costas Mandylor), the new Jigsaw who’d taken over for John (Tobin Bell), the original Jigsaw who died by the end of the third film was, apparently, around since even before the happenings of the first film and even before Jigsaw’s “first” protégé Amanda (Shawnee Smith) came to light. Hoffman is a detective who's on the Jigsaw case and must juggle two jobs at once: protecting the innocent and murdering the guilty.

The story of Saw VI centers on the fact that corporations run the country and to the screenwriters, apparently that’s news. The problem with the script is that Original Jigsaw wasn’t aware that the corporate world had existed until recently and had found out about health insurance the hard way: he was dying of cancer and his health insurance company had turned him down because of company policy: “we are not certain that the procedure, one having a 30-40% chance of success will succeed and also, because you are old we have to turn down your insurance claim, etc... more lawyer speak.”

The film’s protagonist, William Easton (Peter Outerbridge -that's right, Jigsaw should never be the protagonist-) was the man who had turned John “Jigsaw” down and therefore, must be punished. He finds himself kidnapped and he must survive a series of traps that result in slight personal mutilation, be they physical or mental, that mostly result in others being murdered. The idea, like in the previous Saw films is that the person that pulls the trigger is the one that commits the murders and not Jigsaw and William must learn what it means to actually “live” through the ideal of facing death. However, Jigsaw’s still a tad bit of a jerk because he’s attempting to save lives through the process of teaching and preaching about torture and the possibilities of death. Once again, Jigsaw takes on the corporate world believing that they are unaware of the decisions that they make and in there lies a terrible screenplay.

To add insult to injury, not a single one of the Saw films is ever shot well, lit well, or edited properly. They're concocted with a strenuous low budget and won’t have it any other way. They are incomprehensible (some are far dumber than even what was thought to be the dumbest) and the performances are always poorly acted. Also, they are always entirely existent throughout flashbacks (this Saw film is at least 50% flashback and they have all been fabricated for this film alone). On all of those notes, the Saw films are consistent and to that I add a very unenthusiastic yay.

I don’t hate these films because on several accounts I'd laughed and laughed hard. No Saw film has managed to make me laugh more than this one because during its intro Jigsaw was actually heard saying to the investment bankers, and I loosely quote: “You have consistently provided citizens with payments that they could never afford throughout the entirety of their lives and for that you are being punished. How much will you sacrifice in order to set your guilty consciences free?” Again, I did not make that up but someone got paid very well to write that drivel.

I laughed throughout this film and I was also bored in the middle of it for a good thirty minutes. It’s normal for a Saw film to significantly slow down in the middle but one never turns it off because terribly, cheesy special effects are just around the corner; a remarkably dumb trap is there to make us feel better while reminding us of how stupid we are for watching these ridiculous films.

During this last paragraph I will mention that I liked Saw V (5) more than any other Saw film because of the fact that it was the first Saw film that didn't take itself seriously. It was a ton of fun and was made for laughs and kicks. Then we come full circle and back to this dreck that believes in what it preaches and that was always what made these Saw films terrible. It’s like when an Evangelical Christian preaches to one The Word and when listeners don’t like what they hear or disbelieve in God they are automatically wrong. If one was to go to a forum discussing Saw VI and claiming that it’s one of the worst movies in the series and of this year they, too are in the wrong. Well, soooooory!

Watchmen (2009)

Alan Moore’s 12-issue, 800 page graphic novel from 1985 was deemed unfilmable for over two decades. Breaking barriers and taboos in the graphic novel realm, Watchmen contains the ideal of superheroes that are average human beings.

In an alternate reality, basing itself in the 1930’s and moving forward through to the 1980’s, average citizens disguise themselves in costumes and parade into the night, fighting crime. They form a group called The Minutemen and are condoned by the police force and government. Fast forward to the present, the year being 1985 because the novel was written and drawn at that time, the Minutemen have changed into The Watchmen and they are a collective of second-generation superheroes, in some cases they are the original members’ offspring. What's interesting about the concept of average citizens fighting crime on their own time is that they have their own personal demons and problems; drugs and other addictions for one, and a lack of super powers.

In the film, faithfully borrowing from the graphic novel, the Watchmen are Dan Dreiberg/Night Owl II (Patrick Wilson), a scientist who had inherited his father’s millions and designed costumed suits for combat and a floating airship; Laurie Jupiter/Silk Spectre II (Malin Akerman), who reluctantly inherited the title from her former superhero mother Sally Jupiter/Silk Spectre I (Carla Gugino); Adrian Veidt/Ozymandias (Matthew Goode) is the self-proclaimed “Smartest Man in the World” who had built an empire through technological wonders, political support and intel, and action figures; Rorschach/Walter Kovacs (Jackie Earle Haley), who wears a mask that shifts Rorschach Test blot images that symbolize his thoughts and feelings, and is slightly on the unstable side; Edward Blake/The Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), who supported and fought for his country from WWII to Viet Nam, performed political assassinations, and found out how depressing the American Dream really is; and Jon Osterman/Dr. Manhattan (Billy Crudup) was a nuclear physicist who, in a freak accident was ripped apart atom by atom, and in a parallel universe had pieced himself back together. Now he is a sort of demi-God.

Dr. Manhattan is the most fascinating character in the film because he can see and sense existence in a quantum universe and existence, and sees time in a none-linear manner. He grows bored on Earth, teleports himself to Mars, constructs a fortress out of glass and ponders his own existence and purpose behind his past.

The best performance in the film, unanimously, is that of Jackie Earle Haley’s Rorschach but I still find the performance to be sub-par because he is masked throughout most of the film and speaks in a gruff voice, channeling Christian Bale’s Batman. My favourite performance, however is a split between Billy Crudup and Patrick Wilson. Crudup plays Dr. Manhattan to perfection: he’s calm and speaks in a tranquil voice, channeling melancholy, has the body of Adonis (thanks to decent CGI work), and always looks and sounds depressed. When he says that he had lost faith in mankind and needs a good reason to save them we feel his pain; Patrick Wilson plays Night Owl II like a very average, slightly chunky man who wears prescription glasses and is slightly impotent, but he plays him with conviction. We sense that Dan Dreiberg is average and doesn’t care about his past as a superhero.

Watching the film we notice that it’s entirely a character-driven piece. However, the drawback is that the film is three hours long so developing six main characters while providing intensive back-stories becomes tiresome rather quickly. We do not lose interest in the characters, only in the flow of the film.

There is some action in the film but it’s designed to sound and feel cheesy, and I don’t know why. When someone swings a punch we hear the air whooshing and the connecting punch’s sound effect is like that of a video game; the choreography is similar to Kung Fu flicks’ and director Zack Snyder insists on super slow motion throughout a good half of the film. What results is that we see someone walking towards the camera in normal speed that turns into slow motion, and then the speed slows down even more. Snyder does that many times throughout the film and eventually we realize that we are watching many montages. Every character’s back-story is simply a montage showcasing the time periods changing, and played to appropriate pop cultural music. It’s easy to follow but one cannot take the film seriously. For example the film’s opening credits showcase the 1930’s to the 1980’s in a long, super slow motion montage that plays Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’”. It’s a nice piece of cinema but ultimately, Snyder uses that technique throughout the three hours following and we grow tiresome of the film’s style and notice the lack of substance.

Where the film has the most substance is in its beginning, where The Comedian's murder by a shadowy assassin provides the film with a detective story aspect, a flash-back structure, and finally, at the end when the “bad guy” is revealed and is revealed to be doing something terrible for the greater good. There is a lot of philosophy in the film in many different aspects, and especially in its third act, but I find the film as a whole to lack substance and decent performances. I liked only three characters and their actors in the film, and their combined determination to find out the truth is muddled by MTV-style music videos, criminally overused slow motion, lackluster CGI, and a musical score that changes styles with each montage. Plus, every licensed song in the film is a remix or cover. Ugh... terrible soundtrack.
Fans of the graphic novel will notice that Zack Snyder emulates images from the source material faithfully into his film. Some shots are exactly similar in composition and colour but that‘s just using the novel as a storyboard. The rest is in the screenplay which is faithful and ironically, therefore, doesn’t work as a three hour film.

Maybe if Zack Snyder invested the budget toward a Made-for-TV, 10 hour mini-series we’d see something worth mentioning. As the story is already fragmented in its entirety, a miniseries makes a lot more sense.

Watchmen is far too long and mostly uninspired but contains some very interesting ideals, like the Keene Act: in 1977, Senator Keene passed a bill that outlawed vigilantism and asked all costumed heroes to reveal their true selves. Everyone except Rorschach and The Comedian had done so. Rorschach is slightly nuts and his mask is his actual personality, removing it showcases the true face he had lost in the past and hates; The Comedian still works for the government but under guise, and Dr. Manhattan works for the government as well, until a conspiracy had led him to outcast himself to his Martian fortress.

Good storytelling exists in the graphic novel and it contains drab, primary colours that insinuate a dreary existence. New York City looked like the real one: decrepit, beautiful, and old; not without its ups and downs. But in Snyder’s film, the entire universe is colourful and glossy. It’s not the “film effect” because in post-production everything can change; day can become night and gloss can be superimposed to apply a surreal effect. The graphic novel contains certain realism and the film lacks it entirely.

To sum it up, I should have watched the film before reading the entire graphic novel. I would have found it to be “full of itself” in style but containing great idealism. Having read the novel first, I thought the novel was, overall pretty good and the film weak. In almost every aspect the film is weak but at least it looks nice, which is ironic because the novel wasn’t glossy and didn’t pull any punches.

Public Enemies (2009)

We are thrust into the 1930’s without a warning, like being dropped into a cave without a flashlight. We wait for all available light to cast outlines of every object and person and we listen to surrounding sounds ion order to find out where you are. Such is the style of director Michael Mann’s biopic on John Dillinger and his short lived career. It lacks drama and character but it showcases the period with great respect.

Public Enemies opens with John Dillinger (Johnny Depp) being thrown into a prison and within minutes he manages to escape with a group of inmates. The group hides out in a house in the middle of a field, in the middle of nowhere; we identify Dillinger as a bad guy. Then we see FBI Agent Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale) chasing a man that’s armed with a Tommy gun through an apple orchard and with his rifle, Purvis shoots the pursued man dead. We identify Purvis as a good guy, as he is surrounded and backed up by cops. We come to understand that John Dillinger is a notorious gangster and that FBI Agent Melvin Purvis is hot on his trail.

The film’s style is curious because it features the period of the 1930’s but it isn’t shot or directed like a movie from that period; it’s very avant-garde. Michael Mann chose to shoot the movie with an extremely expensive, high definition digital video camera and handheld. Because of that decision two things happen: 1) we have a period-piece that is shot in a semi-documentary style and we feel like we are actually in the 1930’s, 2) we have an ugly looking HD movie that tries to be a period piece but looks like Mann’s traveled back in time with a camcorder. The end-result is paradoxical and is hugely hit and miss; much more miss than hit. Audience’s opinion differs greatly on the final product solely because of the choice Mann made of shooting the movie in High Definition.

Depp wisely plays Dillinger like an average Joe. It allows him to portray the character naturally and the audience relates to him as to a normal man. This version of Dillinger doesn’t care about anything, not even his life. He doesn’t even care that he doesn’t care. He never offers more than a smirk and that’s seen only when he’s having fun with the cops. It’s a nice touch but nothing outstanding. Ultimately Dillinger becomes nothing more your average Joe.

Early in the film, Dillinger picks up a coat-check girl named Billie Frechette (Marion Cotillard) who becomes his woman because he told her so, and even his pick-up sounds threatening.

The fact that the film offers no background to any character within it is a huge step backwards and we eventually don’t care much for Depp’s Dillinger, either.

Bale plays Purvis like a proficient cop and a competent predator. We notice his determination to uphold the law due to his perfect posture, and his cocky style showcases a hotshot that gets work done. The irony here is that cocky cops in movies end up getting killed because they try to be “cool” at the wrong time. Here Purvis is always in control and Bale pulls off this minor character better than Depp does his, and he showcases Purvis with his entire body.

The weakest link of the film is the screenplay, or lack of. Between the opening jail-break and second jail-break in the middle of the movie, a nighttime shoot-out later on, and the eventual death of Dillinger outside of the Biograph Theater in Chicago, nothing much happens in between that is of any importance to the plot progression. A screenplay must contain a story and within it, possibly a plot. The story itself must have three acts: a beginning, middle, and an end. Public Enemies does not contain a specific beginning, middle, or end because we are not provided with any information about the characters in the movie, save for their jobs. “You are what you do” is a terrible cliché that incorporates itself with this movie and outside of their jobs, these characters to do exist.

Dillinger is a bank robber/cop killer and because we aren’t given insight as to his past or childhood we forget to care. Purvis is a good cop with a great attitude but what had made him so determined to be so good and insistent? And who is Billie? She’s simply Dillinger’s girl for an X-amount of time. Before Dillinger’s appearance and after his death she ceases to exist.

The film doesn’t drag because the plot never slows down, and that's because there isn’t a plot. That’s an enormous drawback. The conversations in the film don't contain any exposition and drama is never actually developed. However, top marks are earned by the art direction department. Like aforementioned, it feels as if Mann and the cast and crew had traveled back in time to the 1930, bought clothes, cars and guns during that time and shot the movie while enjoying their stay. Then they had traveled back in time to the present and edited the movie. I did feel like I was transported back in time a few times but I didn’t exist before the 1980’s and so I also felt a tad detached.

Cinematographer Dante Spinotti shoots almost every shot in a close-up or tight shot and the camera almost always shakes, which reminds us of Mann’s time travel escapades once again and throughout.

I wanted to like this movie or, at least enjoy it but there is too little to offer. Good costume designs and art direction do not make a movie good. Here, the performances are natural but they lack a bite and conviction because of the lack of drama within the screenplay. The direction is under par because Michael Mann threw all accessible and comprehensible film compositions out of the window in the pre-production stages, and the cinematography is made up of 140 minutes of close-ups showcasing Dillinger, Purvis, and Frechette’s pores.

I like some of Mann’s work but if he insists on shooting the rest his movies from now on entirely in HD I might just skip them altogether.

GREAT MOVIES: Akira (1988)

"Humans were like monkeys once; and before that, like reptiles and fish; and before that, plankton and amoebas... Even creatures like those have incredible energy inside them. What if there was some mistake in evolution and the progression went wrong, and something like an amoeba was given power like a human's?"

In Tokyo, on 07.16.1988, a huge explosion takes place and destroys the entire city. World War III is in effect and this story takes place 31 years later, in 2019 A.D. Neo Tokyo. The government of Neo Tokyo is in a type of dictatorship but a megapolis manages to thrive, nevertheless. The citizens need their high-rises and 100-foot tall bridges/promenades that connect between buildings. Biker gangs rule the city and the police force, surprisingly cannot handle them. The average citizen is terrorized only slightly because most of them collaborate. And the school system has crumbled beyond repair. The colors of the city are lush and buildings stand taller than needs be. This, among Blade Runner and Dark City is one of the best films of its kind since Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1926).

Akira is about a teenager named Tetsuo whom has a history of being picked on, and his childhood foster-school friend Kaneda who is always there for him. He always helps Tetsuo in any situation and therefore, becomes like a father-figure to him. Kaneda and Tetsuo are in their late teens and they belong to a popular biker gang.

The film opens with a gang battle between Kaneda’s gang and a gang of youths that somewhat resembles clowns. "The Clowns” lose the fight and the police are on its way; pity that Kaneda’s bike just got warmed up. Soon after, Tetsuo has a motorcycle accident and military troops come to claim him. They perform tests on him while his biker friends are worried about his well being.

All of the youths in Neo Tokyo hate its government, its military, and its police force, and so does a guerrilla troop that attempts to uncover a government conspiracy, one that involves three children that may have telekinetic powers; those kids have gray shriveled skin and Tetsuo is given the same treatment as them. He finds out that he does have telekinetic powers and lets the power go to his head. When Kaneda tries to rescue Tetsuo from the military hospital he is confronted by Tetsuo and is told that he doesn’t need his help anymore, that he can take care of himself now. Tetsuo ties a long red cloth around his neck, like a sort of cape, and flies across the city like a superhero; but he destroys anyone that is in his path. He has single-handedly become Kaneda’s antagonist.

This film carries two major themes: the first theme is of ‘youth gone wild’ in a city that had brought the situation upon itself, and the second theme is of a boy that hates being helpless. Tetsuo hates being helped more than being unable to help himself. The army attempts to destroy him using riot squads and tanks, and even resorts to firing a particle-beam satellite onto him from space. Tetsuo then flies out of the atmosphere and destroys the satellite with his new found powers. The themes collide well: we see bikers roaming the street with blunt metal instruments at hand, and later we see a teenage boy (Tetsuo) destroy an entire bridge using only his mind. The first group rebels against authority and Tetsuo rebels against everyone that stands in his way.

The first act of the film is the bikers and the youths, the most violent part of the film. The second act is of the powers that were vested within a few individuals and of the system being brought down from within. The third act is the most strange and gruesome one, like when Tetsuo loses his right arm to the particle-beam satellite and replaces it with metallic component (wires and such). My favorite act is the first one: it may be the most violent but it feels the most free. It packs a wallop to see such young people terrorizing citizens simply because they have nothing better to do. It reminds me of the first act of Kubrick’s classic A Clockwork Orange (1971): we do not condone what these youth do to for kicks but we can’t look away. It’s fascinating to see what triggers certain people and we almost forget that what is happening on screen is terrible because the filmmaking has so much energy to it.

The ideal behind Akira is that Akira has turned into the form of pure energy. As a child he was unable to control his mysterious powers and the scientists who were in control took measures of securing his powers from overtaking him and destroying the city. Some say that the nuclear bomb was Akira. Tetsuo is on the same path Akira was and cannot control his power because human beings cannot have such power. The tragedy is that even if we have it we simply cannot control it, for it is not designed for us. The power takes over Tetsuo and the three other “special” children team up to revive Akira in order to stop Tetsuo.

Akira premiered in 1988 and became an instant landmark in animation, graphics, and storytelling that was geared for adults. Claiming that the rating for this film is Restricted is an understatement but because it is animated the rating is suitable; we all need suspension of disbelief.

I mentioned that the animation is fantastic but that, too, is an understatement. It is due to the arduous work of animating frame by frame. When viewing the film shot by shot one notices that buildings and walls are present in almost every shot. It gives off the feeling of being closed in, of being a part of an organized machine, and when we see open roads and bikers, the sides of the frames are more empty signifying a feel of freedom.

Akira is, rightly the most famous anime of all time, in North America and probably, also the most popular anime in the world. It is a pinnacle in animation and imagination and is the father of many other popular anime films and series; most distinctly Dragonball Z. Many segments from this film are copied outright; especially what Kaneda does with his awesome motorcycle. This film has received the Blu-ray treatment and is being released on that medium on February 24, 2009. Trust me, buy it at any cost. This one is truly a keeper.

GREAT MOVIES: Hana-Bi (aka Fireworks, 1997)

*Note as of 07/14/12* - Click here to read my updated review for Hana-Bi on Commentary Track.

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Nishi (played by “Beat” Takeshi Kitano) is a no-nonsense but quiet man, and is the quintessential protagonist found in most of Kitano’s films. He’s a cop whose daughter had suddenly died, a fact mentioned only in gossip by co-workers and whose wife, Miyuki (Kayoko Kishimoto) has developed leukemia; possibly any disease would suffice the screenplay in order to signify that a mental illness can cause a physical one. Nishi wears dark sunglasses and sits around most of the time, smoking and contemplating the quiet brought forth by sudden death. However, he’s never suicidal because of his strong bond with his wife.

The film sees Nishi as a normal person but he can also be seen as a psychopath, due to his tendency to suddenly attack others and decimate them quickly. Be they Yakuza punks or straightforward, undisciplined youths Nishi is quick to anger and he strikes as quick as lightning. But he always wears a blank expression. He’s simply a wall, lacking all emotion yet somehow that we know he means well.

Nishi is indebted to the Yakuza and refuses to pay them back simply because he doesn’t want to, nor does he like to be hurried; the Yakuza apparently don’t frighten him. He’s even audacious enough to ask the block leader’s boss for another 4 million yen (approximately $40,000 USD) so that he could place it towards his wife’s medical bills; nothing is more important to him than the well being of his loved ones, an admirable theme that is present in most of Kitano’s tragedies.

Nishi’s best friend Horibe (Ren Osugi), also a cop, is shot in the line of duty and is crippled and in the process, left wheelchair bound. Horibe’s wife and daughter leave him and he tries to commit suicide, but his friends save him in time. He eventually agrees to see the brighter side of life and does what he can, taking up painting; his paintings depict bizarrely beautiful people and creatures with flowers for heads.

The shooting of Horibe and the later killing of another cop on the police force are showcased, with some realism throughout the film in fragmented flashbacks, adding to the film’s dramatic arc and sense of gratuitous violence. There is a puzzle for the audience to solve and the film unravels it ever so eloquently. There are many layers to the story of the film and the use of a fragmented timeline is very suitable towards making this an art-house project not a Michael Bay movie.

The plot centers on Nishi quitting the police force and eventually having to contemplate robbing a bank in order to pay off the Yakuza once and for all. But because he’s no longer a cop, the Yakuza don’t take his games lightly and pursues him further. But before more graphic violence ensues, Nishi takes Miyuki to the beach and they have a wonderful and, ironically melancholy time.

The robbery is ironic in that it consists of Nishi dressing up a stolen taxi cab as a police cruiser, dressing himself up as a cop, and walking into a bank with a pistol and simply demanding cash without even speaking. I will say nothing further on the matter except that it’s brilliant and is entirely within character.

Does this film sound exciting or depressing? Well, Kitano’s cops and Yakuza epics are filled with philosophical intrigues, the contemplation of death or suicide, murder, brutal beatings, and above all a mysteriously poignant and startling beauty. He uses a minimalist approach in his filmmaking: his characters do not walk or talk much; they barely react to happenings outside of their surroundings. And when all a character must do in a single scene is walk the camera is fixated upon him or her for minutes on end until he or she leaves the frame. Kitano also likes to leave the shot on screen after said character had already walked out of frame for a few seconds more so that the audience can feel the time go by, and also to punctuate the scene with a moment of minimalist serenity. I believe that he’s borrowing from the great Yasujiro Ozu and Andrei Tarkovsky who are, personally the greatest masters of minimalism.

The violence in Kitano’s films, as I’d mentioned earlier is showcased like a flash of lightning; we never see it coming. And when it does, it lingers in our minds for a few seconds while we slowly process what we’d just witnessed. By the time the following scene takes place we understand exactly who had died and who did the killing and why. As an example, early in the film Nishi is seated in a bar and two Yakuza youths approach him. They pester him about overdue payments until he grabs a pair of chopsticks and stabs the Yakuza youth that’s standing behind him in his eyes. In the next shot, we see that the other Yakuza youth had fallen off his stool and as Nishi stands up he kicks the youth in the mouth and walks away; all in one swift movement. The youth on the ground is bewildered and spewing blood. There is a story in the violence that’s on screen and the film’s story is dependent on violence depicted within.

I love Kitano’s cinema. His movies look and feel like they were directed and shot by young, indie filmmakers who know how to tell their stories without having to resort to clichés or unnecessary dialogue. The minimalism approach is used in all of Kitano’s films and while watching any of his films we should embrace it with all our hearts. So what if the film is violent? Through the way it is constructed not a single shot goes to waste and everything means exactly what need it needs to; no punches are pulled. I am reminded of style of the French New Wave, the way that useless actions and pointless dialogue are cut out.

Kitano is a superstar and had made a great impression on me from very early on. I will follow his cinema until he stops breathing and I hope there’s still a long way to go.