The Wayward Cynic

director: Wolfgang Peterson
starring: Josh Lucas, Kurt Russell, Richard Dreyfus, Emmy Rossum, Andre Braugher

I’m not sure what the point of making this flick was, as it cost $160 million to make and has only made just over $45 million as of May 30th. The problem, past the cost, is that the movie is NOTHING but special effects. There’s no real plot, no real characters, no real emotional investment. The characters are all one-dimensional, stereotypical archetypes amalgamated from the cliched dreck of disaster movies past. Early on, there are a few half-lines of dialogue that attempt to paint some sort of picture of each character’s history, but to call it superficial would be to put it too lightly.

But no matter, as disaster ensues very early on in the flick, courtesy of a “rogue wave,” which capsizes the Poseidon, a massive luxury liner. Where exactly they’re going, and where exactly they are is never explained, but no matter, because there are lots of explosions, lots of electrical fires, lots of flooding, and lots of death. But you’re not gonna care about any of these deaths, because each character might as well be nothing more than a stand-up cardboard cut-out. Kevin Dillon’s “Lucky Larry” character has the most personality out of anyone and he’s got about 3 minutes of screen time before a ridiculously-predictable “conclusion” to his character arc. There are some early attempts at creating some trivial character arcs, but they’re quickly abandoned in the face of enclosed spaces filling with water and exploding engines.

Two reasons to see the flick, though: Emmy Rossum and IMAX.

There’s a fantastic shot of the ship at the beginning that is part live-action, part special effects that is nearly breathtaking on the IMAX screen. Equally breathtaking is Emmy Rossum on a giant screen. Do what you will with this information. Oh, and Fergie’s not bad either.

On somewhat of a tangent, Kurt Russell, Richard Dreyfuss, and Andre Braugher must really be hurting for work, because there’s basically nothing more for them to do in Poseidon other than displaying various looks of shock, anger or sadness. I guess it was all about the paycheck.

director: Ron Howard
starring: Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou, Jean Reno, Ian McKellan, Paul Bettany

The much-anticipated big screen version of the best-selling book has finally arrived, and regardless of its quality, is sure to do big box office because of the book’s success. But taking all that out of the equation, does the movie live up to the hype of its text source? Yes and no. The combination of historical accounting and stretching the truth that made the book’s plot so provocative is still here, but there doesn’t seem to be any passion or excitement in the film’s narrative. It’s simply a series of drawn-out scene after drawn-out scene. The movie never really gets going, choosing instead to slowly build up steam but never “letting loose.” The result is more boring than thought-provoking.

I think a large part of the problem lies with the the casting of the protagonist, Robert Langdon. Tom Hanks never seems comfortable as Langdon, reciting his lines as if he were doing voiceover work for a history book instead of being a passionate symbologist genuinely excited by the mysteries he was uncovering. I think going younger with the casting would have aided the film in perhaps providing a bit more spirit and vigor to the role and, thus, the plot. The albino monk, Silas, is portrayed fantastically by Paul Bettany, who gives a–dare I say it?–deft and nuanced performance. The rest of the cast is pretty much uniformly good, though Ian McKellan’s portrayal of an aging Grail hunter felt a bit cliched and affected at times.

The other facet that contributes to the lack of exciting pacing is the editing, particularly early on. The opening scene with the curator of Paris’ Louvre Museum running from an unseen assailant offered a great chance to set a specific, foreboding atmosphere to the film, and ratchet up the tension from there. Instead, the scene is intercut with Langdon giving a speech and an Opus Dei priest talking to a reporter. While there is certainly a lot of exposition to get through early on, I think the film would’ve been better served by trimming a lot of that and sticking with the stuff in the Louvre. The movie never really hits its stride because of the early missteps.

Everything certainly looks good, and director Ron Howard seems to know what he’s doing when in the director’s chair, and uses the exquisite backdrop of Paris to great effect. When all is said and done, I think you can view the film version of The da Vinci Code as somewhat of a letdown–but I’m not sure it’s possible to live up to the book’s storied success to this point. Definitely worth seeing to, if nothing else, infuriate all these people protesting the story’s implications. When you boil it down, isn’t the main implication of the story that women have been treated unjustly by the Church, and that true equality is something worth striving for? Why would they be protesting that? Ooooooh, I know–it’s because THEY’RE INSANE.

director: Brett Ratner
starring: Hugh Jackman, Halle Berry, Patrick Stewart, Famke Janssen, Ian McKellen

The final entry in the X-Men trilogy has arrived and while it has its share of fantastic moments and homages to the original comic book, as a whole it’s relatively underwhelming. It never transcends its genre and feels more like a cheesy comic book take-off than a real, slambang action movie with a soul (as X2 was).

The first flick was all about setting up authentic characters you could root for, if not relate to, while the second raised the bar a notch with the action X-Men comic fans had all been waiting for. The third time around, while there is certainly an emphasis on the action, the characters get lost in the mayhem. The acting is wooden pretty much all around, and when it is good, the dialogue is laugh-out-loud awful.

Halle Berry had been openly annoyed with the lack of work she had in the first two movies, and she seems to have gotten her wish this time around, as she features prominently. The problem is that it’s apparent she can’t act unless she’s naked on a couch with Billy Bob Thornton. As much as I liked some of the quotes lifted right from the books, it felt like they’d been shoehorned in to give the old “wink and a nod” to the fans. I think a lot of the unevenness of the movie is attributable to both the loss of X1 and X2 director Bryan Singer and the lack of adequate pre-production time for the movie. Fox, as it did with the first movie, rushed this through production, and X3 suffers for it. More time needed to be spent on the script and dialogue, as you’re never really given satisfying justifications for a lot of what’s taking place onscreen.

So, chalk X3 up as another mindless popcorn flick for the summer and you should enjoy it just fine. If you’re a diehard X-Men fan and are expecting the transcendent X-flick we’ve all been waiting for….keep waiting.