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Twilight – New Moon: New Director, Same Failures

Yes, this is the only facial expression I have. Why do you ask?

Rating: 2 out of 10

At the screaming and preening delight of tweens across the nation, the second installment of the uber-popular Twilight franchise hit the screens at midnight Thursday and proceeded to break numerous first-day records. Leaving Dark Knight in the dust, New Moon separated tween parents from the money in their wallets at a rate of $72 million dollars in the first 24 hours. It slipped a little bit in the weekend total and five-day gross, so in the end Dark Knight and a few other choice films still rank higher, but Summit Entertainment and Twilight fans alike know their precious franchise is very much alive and cemented in cinema futures for the next few years.

For those who might not already know, New Moon takes the love story between Edward and Bella and drops in the ever-so-popular third wheel, Jacob. Edward bails from the gray and rainy world of Forks because he believes he will only end up hurting Bella more and in his absence Jacob grows to be more than just the nice kid form the reservation. She allows him to drag her up from the depression Edward left her in and finds herself caught even more now in the middle of not just a battle for the hearts of two men, but two monsters as Jacob reveals he too is more than meets the eye.

Let me just tell you all up front that after seeing the first Twilight film and finding it to be fairly abysmal, I borrowed all four books from a co-worker and read them over the period of a week. My reason for doing this was I wanted to know if all the blame for the movie’s faults could be laid upon the shoulders of Catherine Hardwicke and her newly famous cast, but I came to realize that not all of it was hers to bear. That shared responsibility continues in this new chapter as the reins got taken over by Chris Weitz, who last graced the screen helming the CGI-cluster bomb The Golden Compass (another example of shared blame between director and source material). So to be fair, the volume of issues there are in this film are not with the movie alone, but with the source material it is born from.

My main and most pounding issue with New Moon is the length. There is no reason for nearly two-and-a-half hours of this. If you cut out even half of the strained dramatic pauses in every piece of dialogue, this could possibly make the cut as a one-hour TV special. Not a single person in the film seems to be able to finish a sentence without stopping and staring at something or someone, forcing unnecessary importance on what they are about to say next. Again, this is inherent in the books, although in that medium, you as the reader can just choose to read faster (which admittedly, these are incredibly fast reads). In the darkness of the movie theater you are trapped, glued by the increasing price of the movie ticket you bought to get in, to stay there and suffer through page after page of visual ellipses.

Secondly, when I was finished with the books I actually had hope for this movie because I felt it was the most enjoyable of the books. The relationship that grows between Bella and Jacob is actually the only relationship in the entire series that you get to witness blossom and actually believe in. Bella and Edward seem to fall hopelessly and endlessly in love with each other from first glance and they spend the next two-thousand pages trying to prove it to each other, but as a reader and audience member we don’t get to really witness that journey. It all feels too heavy without any foundation. Unfortunately, after only one pleasing montage of Bella and Jacob, the super-buff best friend spends the rest of the movie taking on every boring and melodramatic trait of his vampire nemesis. Long stares, brooding glances into the distance, gruff sighs between each and every word. Be still my beating…oh wait, it is still, aw crap, this movie put me in a coma.

Lastly, without dragging this out too long, New Moon actually increases one of the main problems from the first chapter; Bella is not a likable character, not in the least. Without being able to root for her, we can’t honestly route for either of the pseudo-men fighting for her affections. She mopes, whines and is overall gloomy from front to back in this film and she gives you nothing to attach to in order to want her to be happy.

In terms of the acting, it’s patently unfair to critique these people on performances largely hobbled by the books themselves. Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner are all suffering from what I politely refer to as “The Star Wars Prequel Phenomenon.” After those movies, hordes of people walked around tearing apart Natalie Portman, Hayden Christensen, Ewen McGregor and Liam Neeson, but true movie fans knew all along that their horrid performances were not accurate representations of their actual ability. It’s just what happens when talented people are stuck in untalented movies. Kristen was redeeming in Adventureland, Robert got amazing reviews for Little Ashes and Taylor, well, he might not have a ton to his credit yet, but he’s the only one who actually seems to have the ability to shine at all in this franchise, so I expect big things from him once the caskets are finally snapped shut here. Even the addition of an acting prodigy like Dakota Fanning didn’t raise the bar even an inch (although to be fair, she gets approximately four minutes of screen time in this chapter; she’ll be much more featured in the ones to come). The reality of the situation is hidden just beneath the surface during a particular scene where Bella and Edward are in class together and everyone is watching Romeo and Juliet. This is high school melodrama, this is uber-heightened puppy love built up beyond all possible boundaries and while that works for classic stories like Romeo and Juliet, New Moon and it’s associated books fail completely to even dip their sparkly-toed feet into such hallowed waters.

The End of the Page Recommendation: Obviously Twilight fanatics don’t need to read a review to figure out whether or not to see this, but for the rest of the reading audience, if you haven’t read the books, this is not going to bring you anything but confusion as to why it’s making such ridiculous money.

Coraline: Amazing Fantasy Story (for the older kids out there)

“I swear I saw a little Chinese kid looking right back at me from the other end.”

Rating: 9 out of 10

There are a wide variety of animation styles out there in the cinematic landscape ranging from the subdued tones of Les Triplettes de Belleville to the mind warping surrealism of Heavy Metal, and that doesn’t even begin to jump into the realm of anime (Japanese animation). Each style brings its own level of emotional connection and differing amount of level of disbelief the audience allows, but the one style that consistently reaches across that fictional landscape and grasps the hearts and minds of audiences the world over is stop-motion animation. Something about the effect of having physical 3-dimensional objects, not purely pictures someone created, either on screen or on paper, allows the audience to feel the reality of the character no matter how fantastical they look. If they think they can actually touch it, then they can connect to it. There have been some masters of this style over the years (Nick Park for one), but the one who holds the reins of this current generation is none other than the visionary director of the holiday masterpiece, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Henry Selick. He recently graced us with his new creation, Coraline.

Coraline is a young girl, uprooted from her familiar surroundings by busy, career-minded parents on the move. Landing squarely in the middle of nowhere, Coraline begins to investigate her lonely and droll surroundings. She meets the boy from over the hill and a handful of odd characters that inhabit the rest of the apartment building, but what finally turns the crank of interest in her mind is a small door she finds covered up in her living room. Beyond the door lay a parallel world; the same, yet different; familiar, yet full of discovery; and charming, yet deceitful. Like when curiosity kills the cat, Coraline quickly finds herself part of a dastardly trap to keep her in the “other place” forever.

Right off the bat, before talking about the content of the film itself, a definite stand out point in this case is the movie was made from the beginning with 3-D animation in mind. It was never a 2-D animation that got the new technology run over it, this was planned from the get go with 3-D visuals in effect and that early knowledge gives Coraline a much better grasp on what that technology can do to affect the story and mood. The usage of 3-D here is much better than in my most recent foray into dimension-shattering cinema. The makers of Coraline created a flow and balance of how the technology plays out, using very subtle examples of it in the beginning, more to help create depth than anything else, but as the story unfolds and the rabbit hole runs deeper, the animation and technology bleed into each other for a much more exciting and chilling effect. Towards the end they even toss in a few of the crowd favorites with nasty looking pointy bits jaunting out of the screen, threatening to brush your cheek.

As for Coraline herself, the character is one I think many people can actually relate to, whether as an adult or a child. Her main dilemma is she was yanked out of her comfortable life and dropped into unfamiliar surroundings. Finding herself lonely and unattended to she wanders restlessly hoping to find a purpose for being there. She’s young, precocious and battle-ready at the drop of a hat, but really she just wants someone to show they care about her. Once resigned to her new living situation, she soon finds herself pestered and pursued by a nearby neighbor, a young boy named Wybie. Wybie actually provides one of the most charming and laughably honest moments in the film as he acts out this delicate dance between excited young boy and angst-ridden soul child. Some incredibly amusing barbs are fired from Coraline towards Wybie, both in the real world and the alternate version.

There is a colorful menagerie of side characters that fill out the story and various quests Coraline must go on to reach her goal. Two of these are a pair of ex-vaudeville acrobatic entertainers who live downstairs. Still clinging to the memories of their heyday, these sisters launch into a flashback dousing the film with a light blue humor. Some of their section might not be totally appropriate for young kids and I was honestly surprised the movie wasn’t touting a PG-13 rating. Also falling under that topic would be the villainess, the Other-Mother, who takes on a most frightening and gruesome shape towards the end. Even at my ever-so-advanced age, I still sat back a bit and thought, “Please don’t let me dream of her tonight.”

Voicing the characters are some big names, like Dakota Fanning (Coraline), Teri Hatcher (Mother/Other-Mother), John Hodgman (Father/Other-Father), Ian McShane (Mr. Bobinsky) and Keith David (the cat). All these people showed a great amount of dedication to the project because it took five full years to complete. Of course, not all the actors were voicing the characters from beginning to end, but Fanning did begin working on it at nine years old and didn’t speak her last line until she was fourteen. Surprisingly enough, you wouldn’t even know it was her in the film. All the other voices are fairly recognizable, but Fanning once again shows impressive acting chops and crafts her own voice around the character of Coraline.

Recommendation: Coraline satisfies on a number of levels; as a fairy tale, a moral lesson and lastly, as an entertaining adventure. Once again, not something I would bring the youngest of the clan to see, but I think parents will find it more interesting and enjoyable than they first imagined. Oh, the movie is also an adaptation of a popular childrens book, which you can check out here.

Push: Borrowed Style Replaces Substance

“Wait a sec,  she’s only thirteen?!”

“Wait one more sec, he was in Fantastic Four? I can’t be seen with him.”

Rating: 4 out of 10

Just over three years ago hordes of people sat in their living rooms and bore witness to the birth of a phenomenon (however short it may have lasted). Heroes debuted and quickly gained a worldwide following as people everywhere attached themselves to the notion of ordinary people suddenly becoming extraordinary. While being glued to the comic-book styled serial every week, we all silently asked ourselves what power we would want, what would we do with those powers and would we turn into a ‘hero’ or a ‘villain’. No matter what the end result of those internal polls was, we were hooked to the live-action X-Men update and the rest of Hollywood was quick to make a note of that. Cut to three years later, Heroes is fighting to regain its mass appeal and while the shine has worn off of our shiny new TV toy, Hollywood unleashed their response to the comic book craze, Push.

Push takes place in a world where descendants of human experiments conducted under the Nazi regime have evolved into modern-day test subjects for the U.S. Government. Powers are unveiled, but not controlled, so a group known as Division is created to hunt down and collect ‘special’ people. In all the various types of powerful people, one group  is called the Watchers, who see the future, and a young, inexperienced Watcher has a vision which she must change, because if she doesn’t, she and others will die. A ragtag group of mutant outcasts on the run is brought together to fight Division and take possession of the one object they need to bring the whole conspiracy down to its knees and finally find their freedom.

On paper you have everything you need for a youthful, superhero-laden smackdown between the forces of good and evil, but what Push delivers is a badly paced, clunky, big-brother-esque mess only working its way up to four points on my ratings scale due to a fantastic fight scene at the end. In truth, those points might be cancelled out since while gaining points for the badass action sequence, it lost equal points for proving it could make great action scene and just chose not to. I fully support the right to try and create something new in an over-worked genre, but there are particular criteria which remain steadfast and necessary, like a training montage (such a popular tool, the South Park fellas made a song about it). We were supposed to buy the transformation of a main character from barely being able to mentally tip over a pair of dice to yanking down entire building structures without any increased practice with his powers. Beyond the holes in the structure, the visuals also leave something to be desired since numerous times throughout the film it cuts to grainy, 16mm-looking stock in an effort to make it look cool and edgy, but while dazzling you with the flashy technique they hope you won’t notice the scene is either totally unnecessary or unmotivated. I celebrate stylistic choices, but using them purely to make up for a bad script is sacrilege. Another sacrilegious thing is using a cinematic style that is a poor representation of Danny Boyle. Slumdog Millionaire is not a fluke, he’s just that good.

Flexing their dramatic abilities in this colorful mess is a group of young actors with a couple seasoned vets tossed in for critical weight. First in the brat pack is Chris Evans, who is no stranger to the land of comic book inspired cinema. He lit it up as The Human Torch in the pair of Fantastic Four movies and I will give him a certain amount of credit for being one of the only things done right in those tragedies. Evans gets a touch lost in the current landscape of young male leads, but he has done a decent job in the roles he sneaks in. He actually gave a surprisingly good show in the dark sci-fi thriller, Sunshine (directed by none other than Danny Boyle, coincidence?). Evans plays Nick, our reticent hero with the ability to move things with his mind, but unfortunately for the audience he is unable to move them for most of the running time of the movie. Next in line, stepping out of her creepy adult-like doll phase, is Dakota Fanning, who plays Cassie, the inexperienced and willfull Watcher who sees bad things ahead for her band of misfits (does she possibly see the sequel?). Fanning is doing her best to remind people she is a teenage girl and growing like a chemically-laden flower. There are a few moments where I think they took her need to look more adult a touch too far, considering she was thirteen when she shot it in Tokyo, but then again, Fanning played a rape victim at twelve, so nothing is really going to push her too far at this point. She still proves her level of talent and in a few scenes manages to vault herself above her castmates, but in the end the project felt more like a choice to open her up to a broader audience instead of being base don the merit of the story. Camilla Belle rounds out the youthful runts of Push, playing Kira, the mind-controlling supersoldier escaped from government hands. Of course, she also has a few hidden plot twists up her sleeve, but those never seem to play out right or feel supported in any fashion. They mostly appear in moments where the writer was thinking, “I bet they think it is going to go this way. It should go that way. Logically hat way makes sense. So I’ll do something totally different and they’ll love it because it’s unexpected.” Such a simple and flawed argument. Bringing in a touch of critical weight, beyond Fanning, is Djimon Hounsou, who first burst onto the scene as the earnest and determined slave looking for human rights in Amistad, which won him a Golden Globe nomination as well. Hounsou plays Carter, a powerful mind-controller on the government’s side who is on the hunt for Kira and has no qualms about who or what gets in his way, even his own people. While there is no doubt Hounsou has the ability to be amazingly intimidating, his stone-like stares and deep intensity have no context in the movie and never really get the chance to grow. His smoothness is indisputable, but the audience never truly gets to see how he backs up all that confidence. Not to be left out, Ming Na and Cliff Curtis have side roles as a “sniffer” who can figure out google-levels of information from the scent of anything and a “shifter”, which is basically a fancy term for an illusionist, respectively. Both do a decent job, but I know their work is much more layered when given better environments to perform in.

My last issue with Push is it repeats one of the worst things about Jumper, which easily qualifies as one of the worst sci-fi flicks of last year. Both films fail to adequately resolve the main story and arrogantly tease a sequel they fully expect us to beg for. Although Push gets to walk a couple spaces ahead of Jumper in the line of quality, neither is deserving of a second go-around.

Recommendation: My review isn’t all doom and gloom. There is a kick-ass fight scene at the end, which hopefully will be properly emulated if the filmmakers use some sort of mutant power of their own and manage to create a sequel. Wait until this hits cable TV, unless you have never learned to properly cook a decent hot dog, then go to the Arclight for a matinee.
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