I’m off to Wondercon
My apologies for not posting anything recently but things are super busy. I did see Draft Day the other night and have some funny thoughts on it but I am scrambling to pack shirts for the amazing Wondercon in Anaheim, California. If you are going to be there stop by our booth (1541) and say hi (or at least talk to some of the girls I hired to work the booth).
When I get back I’m going to throw myself into blogging big time, at least until the next big show creeps up on me. I have about 8 hours of driving to do today and that’s the easy part. 
Tons of movies to see coming up so look for more reviews shortly, plus my fascinating recap of all the Star Trek episodes, like this gem Space Seed. I pulled this shirt from our Star Trek t shirt collection and plan to wear it at the show. I just wish I had more time for cosplay as I have a couple of really good ideas.
Seriously if you are a reader and are going to be at Wondercon stop by. I would love to speak with you and find out if what I am writing is hitting anyone or if I am tilting at windmills. Have a great week and speak to you soon.
Dave
Captain America: the Winter Soldier Review
Pretty frickin’ awesome.
It cannot be said that either DC or Marvel is batting 1000 when it comes to movies but I have to say for the most part Marvel does way better than DC. Sure, they have had their Hulks, Wolverine Origins, Howard the Ducks, Ghost Riders, Daredevils, and Electras but for the most part when they set out to do a cinema exxxxxxxtravaganza they pull it off and it has only gotten better since Disney took over (thanks Disney. You are still evil but I appreciate your movies). DC, on the other hand, is still struggling to do anything more than mediocre with any comic book that doesn’t have “Bat” in the title (and even the last Batman kind of sucked. Plus let us never forget or forgive Batnipples). If you lower things down the the base level and compare worst to worst Electra was better than Catwoman, Ghost Rider was better than Green Lantern, Daredevil was better than Jonah Hex, and the collective sum of all the evils released by Pandora that plague mankind is better than Batman and Robin (Haw. Mythology humor. Every day I get better and better).
Of course my Review-y sense tingles whenever I see the trailers for Guardians of the Galaxy. I want my comic book movies to be taken seriously by the studio, not turned into a laugh-a-minute circus. Hooked on a Feeling by Blue Swede is not a song designed to make you take anything seriously. Time will tell.
All that aside I thought Captain America: the Winter Soldier was freaking awesome. It had almost all the elements needed for a fun, exciting movie: a story with drama, great action, great special effects, appealing characters, excellent camera work and editing, a guy with a shield, and S.H.I.E.L.D. They stayed true to the Captain America from Civil War in that he believes in the true freedom of America rather than the compromises we seem to be making every day (Retro Capt. image courtesy of the Marvel Comic t shirt category).
Of course the true strength of a comic book movie comes from the villain rather than the hero and in this the Winter Soldier excels. He is truly bad ass and strong enough to kick the hell out of Captain America but not so over the top that they have to come up with a magic bullet to kill him. In this regard Captain America is probably one of the best super heroes in that he is powerful but not so powerful that you have to have him fighting a god like Thor or Superman. When villains and heroes are on the level that a human could at least compete with them through luck or skill than they become much more interesting and engaging. I would be a grease stain on the sole of General Zod’s boot but against Scarecrow I could get lucky if I held my breath. It wouldn’t feel like a total waste of effort to try to run him over in my ’79 Thunderbird.
Naturally it wouldn’t be one of my reviews if I didn’t find something to bitch about. I can’t really talk about this without dropping some spoilers so skip ahead to the last couple paragraphs if that bothers you. SPOILER ALERT! The part that bugged the hell out of me is how freaking stupid the bad guys plan is. How exactly does a successful, rational human being working in politics decide the thing to do is follow the plan of a captured Nazi scientist to control the world through what can only be described as Nazi tactics? A scientist who wants everyone who is part of his secret plan to swear fealty to Hydra and whisper Hail Hydra in each others ear? And his plan is to launch three flying death fortresses that will kill 20,000,000 people based on an algorithm developed by that scientist around his own already proven murky sense of morality? The one who used to work for the most evil regime in history and who looks and sounds like he heats his house in the winter by throwing babies in the furnace? Who wants to recreate an organization that was so evil and dangerous that they had to form a special task force just to stop them? That guy?
Also how about that guy having his consciousness transferred into a computer made of reel to reel machines circa 1976? My iPhone has about 10000 times the computing power.
They just can’t let go of the scope issues. Instead of making this about a power struggle inside S.H.I.E.L.D. it has to be about Hydra somehow infiltrating the organization created to fight against them and then coming up with a really dumb and expensive plan to kill millions. How about a S.H.I.E.L.D. plan to read every email, text, and listen to every phone call in order to restrict our freedoms? Or is that hitting too close to home? I don’t know. I just found the whole base concept stupid. An analogy I thought of while headed home last night is that a movie is like a submarine, navigating the Sea of Disbelief. A good plot cruises long on the surface, enjoying the sun and fresh air. Every time you do something that makes the audience say “huh?” you dive another hundred feet under the water, causing the hull to strain as all the pressure of disbelief gets stronger and stronger. Some movies creak and groan, some movies spring leaks, and some are totally crushed like a beer can against a frat boys forehead.
This movie wasn’t on the crushed side but I could definitely hear the hull plates groaning. The story starts off with Captain America (Chris Evans-What’s Your Number?, the Avengers, Scott Pilgrim versus the World) running laps with his African American side kick (are we not as a nation over that yet?) Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie-Real Steel, Hurt Locker, Pain and Gain). He gets picked up by Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson-Her, The Prestige, We Bought a Zoo) in a Corvette and goes off on a mission to save a SHIELD ship from pirates. If you saw the opening scene from the Expendables you have seen this segment, except Captain America gets into an extended fight against the main pirate.
They rescue a bunch of hostages including SHIELD Agent Sitwell (Maximiliano Hernández-Warrior, Thor, the Avengers). Black Widow reveals she has a secret mission to recover data from the computer, a fact that pisses off Captain America. Back in the USA Nick Fury (Samual L. Jackson-Pulp Fiction, Django Unchained, the Incredibles) tells him to suck it up and then shows the Captain a secret project to launch three giant flying death stars who’s job is to assassinate enemies from the air using sophisticated targeting. Captain Americas belief in the American way makes him very unhappy with that.
On the drive home Nick is attacked by a ton of guys and barely manages to escape. He shows up wounded to Captain America’s apartment and tells the Capt that SHIELD is compromised. He gives Steve a USB drive right before he gets shot by an assassin. The assassin is the mythical Winter Solder and kicks 7 kinds of crap out of Captain America every time they meet.
Fury dies and the Captain goes to SHIELD headquarters. He is double crossed and has to flee. He hooks up with Black Widow and together they try to figure out who is behind the whole thing. Guys get shot, Winter Solder kicks more crap out of Captain America, giant flying aircraft carriers shoot at stuff, and bad guys never learn to try to shoot at Captain America’s legs under his shield. A master plan to control the world is revealed and Capt has to stop it with help from Black Widow, Falcon, and the woman of my dreams Colby Smoulders. Some old faces from the last movie surface to screw with Steve’s head.
The stars:
Great comic book movie. Two stars. Now that I’m used to him being Captain America I really liked Chris Evans in this film. The rest of the cast nailed it too. One star. Great action, especially for PG-13. They kind of pushed the envelope and didn’t shy away from collateral casualties. One star. The Winter Soldier was freaking awesome. One star. My future wife Colby Smoulders was in this one and looking super hot. Somebody let her know she is destined to marry me. One star. Awesome CGI and special effects. One star. The back story of the Winter Soldier and Captain America was great and almost made up for the stupidity of the rest of the evil plot. One black hole. Robert Redford resurfaced and rocked it. One star. Overall super fun and exciting to watch. Three stars. Total: twelves stars.
The black holes:
Not a lot, but the one I have is pretty big. The whole Hydra/SHIELD/flying death star evil plot was like the finest 40 year old oak fermented wine, only substitute stupidity for wine. Sorry but it really pulled me out of the theater into the back ally where it gave my suspension of disbelief a sound thrashing. Two black holes. The 40 year old reel to reel computer housing the downloaded intellect of a human was super dumb too. It really felt like Disney was clearing out an old props warehouse and decided to get one more run out of the props from War Games before selling them off for scrap. One black hole. Total: three black holes.
A grand total of nine stars. Very fun and well worth your time. Date movie? Sure if she likes comic book movies and super heroes. Otherwise take her to see the Grand Budapest Hotel. Bathroom break? The film runs a whopping 136 minutes so odds are you will need it. There’s a scene towards the last 1/3rd where Captain America is on a bridge looking wistful and trying to sort out the morality of something that is pretty disposable. Most of the non-action scenes that don’t involve Nick Fury don’t contribute much to the movie so honestly any time you see Steve and Black Widow not blowing stuff up is a great time.
Thanks for reading. Fun movie to see and review. Most other films took the wise road and opted to not go head to head with this juggernaut so not a lot to see. I think I’m going to see Cesar Chavez on Sunday with a person I am very interested in (more optimistic souls might call it a third date but I am just going to try to enjoy the day) so look for that review soon. I have a big tournament coming up and am going to spend a lot of time this next week painting some new figures. I’ll try to get some stuff written this week (probably more Star Trek). Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu and post comments on this film or review here. Off topic questions or suggestions can be sent to [email protected]. Have a great weekend and enjoy this film. Talk to you soon.
Dave Inman
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 47 the Immunity Syndrome
This is another one that is at the same time great and stupid. I liked it a lot because it showed the bonds of friendship between Kirk, Spock, and McCoy as well as showed Mr. Spock at his logical best. However, the solution they came up with is dumb. Spock mentions antibodies and that makes Kirk think of antimatter? Why not antitrust? Or antiserum? One thing that always bugs me about TOS episodes is how often they rely on random coincidences on words from a language spoken on one part of one tiny planet in the universe (Yangs=Yankees, Son=Sun, etc).
Also Spocks data makes Kirk think of creating an antimatter bomb and dropping in on the nucleus of the giant space amoeba? Excuse me but how is that different from carpet bombing the nucleus with photon torpedoes? If I had the ability to create an antimatter bomb that would be the third thing I tried after phasers and photon torpedoes failed, not the last thing after sending my best friend to his death. If you are going to get sucked into a giant space amoeba anyway why not rush in while you still have power and drop every weapon you have that’s stronger than a fart inside the creature? 
Hell I’d be beaming red shirts out armed with phasers set on overload if nothing else (sorry, but you signed up for Starfleet and put on a red shirt. You knew what you were getting into. Red shirt image courtesy of the Star Trek t shirt category).
Also, if the space amoeba was capable of destroying the universe once it divided what happened to the thousands of other amoebas that it must have spawned from? Shouldn’t this one be the first of a huge wave of giant space amoebas?
However, take all that out of the equation and you have a pretty good episode. Not great but very decent in my opinion.
Dave
Noah Movie Review
Ever wonder what the most holy document in Western Culture would look like as cheesy action movie? Wonder no more!
Religious themed movies are a bit of a conundrum for me. An astute regular reader might have noticed that I tend to be pretty forthcoming with my opinion on bad or good movies. Normally when the movie subject is giant robots fighting each other or chicks coming to terms with stuff the danger of that opinion offending someone is reasonably minimal. However religion and politics are two areas where just having an opinion will automatically alienate half of your potential readers. For this reason I did not review Son of God even though I saw it.
This problem was binding me up as I sat in the theater for Noah. However, as questions kept coming to mind like “Hmm. I don’t remember the Biblical story of Noah having giant rock lava monsters who helped him build his ark” or “Pre-flood Biblical people had magical metal nuggets that could start a fire, do a pregnancy test, or be used to build shoulder launched RPGs? I did not know that” I slowly came to realize that this film was not a religious movie at all but instead a creature that I have hunted down and slaughtered dozens of times before; a horrible sci fi adaptation of a novel.
Yes, it’s our old friend the bad Hollywood version of an otherwise innocent story. Like Hercules, the Golden Compass, Daredevil, the Cat in the Hat, and Ghost Rider this is another story that should have either been treated with the respect it’s fans demand or just left alone. And like most bad adaptations it’s a craptastic movie.
I can say that without fear of repercussions because if I were a hard core Christian I think I would find this movie to be on the border of sacrilege and heresy. Every lame element that Hollywood smears over every film has been forced onto this story: giant CGI monsters, magic, bad romantic sub plot, a villain who is evil for evils sake, gargantuan plot holes, and historical continuity errors. I think it a sign of massive ego and arrogance that Darren Aronfsky and Russell Crowe requested a private audience with the Pope based on the fact that they made this bad science fiction movie. Honestly I think Will Smith has about as much right to do so for making thinly veiled Scientology movie After Earth. It has about as much to do with the Bible.
This film is another example of the brilliance of Hollywood film marketing departments. I have seen the trailer for this at least 20 times and never once caught wind of giant rock monsters, glowing radioactive power stones, or magical beans. It’s clear that some talented director of marketing sniffed out the elements of this film that truly sucked and opted to leave them on the cutting room floor when it came time to create the trailer. By the way, if you check out the Noah official site you will not see a single rock monster image. Smart. Would that Darren had consulted them sooner.
The other thing that is weird about this film is like most design by committee Hollywood BS it sits firmly on the fence in fear of offending one side or another. Is this a Bible movie or not? If it is I think it fair to to call God God instead of the very PC and gutless “Creator”. During the tale of creation as told by Noah to his sons they more or less screwed up the timing and instead of showing God creating life as we know it it shows a montage of sped up evolution. Is this Creationism? Is this intelligent design? Is it true evolution? It’s like they are trying to alienate both the religious and non religious audience members.
Plus a lot of the stuff they added made no sense. So Noah and his wife find a drug they give to all the animals that let’s them sleep for nine months straight (or at least as long as it takes made up character Ila to go from barely pregnant to giving birth. At the bare minimum it should have been 40 days and 40 nights, right?) but somehow they don’t need food or water while asleep? Is it true stasis? It shows all the animals breathing while asleep so they are processing something? Is this a miracle? If so why do they need the herb? Also if so why did no one on the Ark remark upon it? What the hell was that glowing explosive metal? Where did an ancient army get stainless steel armor and weapons that would have made a 12th century army proud?
You see, the issues of feeding thousands of animals, having the carnivores not eat every herbivore as soon as they get off the boat, genetic degradation from massive inbreeding, and the ability of a boat to house millions of tons of animal flesh are endemic to the story of Noah and need to be explained by the hand of God in order to work but by making changes to solve some of them but not all of them you only make them more obvious. Add in all the historical continuity issues and the fact that the main character Noah spends the entire film being a class one dick to everyone around him and you end up with a film buried under it’s own problems.
Oh, while this movie might have been inspired by the Bible it was also “inspired” by about 10 movies including the Lord of the Rings, Gladiator, and the Dark Crystal. Original thought is not this films catch phrase. I find this odd since until now I would have said Darren Aronofsky was one of a few really creative writer/directors.
The story, I guess. Did you ever read the story of Noah from the Bible? If so try to forget it as it will have very little bearing on your comprehension of this film. That being said there are a few spoilers coming. It starts off with humanity being broken up into two groups; the evil descendants of Cain and the good descendants of Seth. However the Seth guys are literally killed down to one man and his son. The man is killed by a king named Tubal-Cain (Ray Winstone-Sexy Beast, Hugo, Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Crystal Skull) and his son, Noah, escapes. Noah grows up and has a family with Naameh (Jennifer Connelly-Hulk, Requiem for a Dream, Winters Tale) and his sons.
(Wait a minute. If Noah is the last descendant of Seth and all the descendants of Cain are evil where did he find Naameh? Did he convert her over to Seth-ism?)
Anyway, Noah has a dream where he sees massive flooding and death. His dream needs interpreting so he takes his family to see his grandfather Methuselah (? Anthony Hopkins-the Silence of the Lambs, Beowolf, Meet Joe Black). On the way to see Methuselah Noah and his family get captured by giant rock monsters (looking suspiciously Ent-like in my opinion) who decide to let the family die of dehydration in a canyon. One of the rock monsters (if only they were Monsters of Rock. Haw!) decides to help them…for some reason. They get to the mountain where Methuselah lives.
Once there Methuselah and Noah figure out the “the Creator” (I’m going to keep putting that in quotes to drive home how lame and sackless it is) plans to destroy the world because the Cain-ites are evil and have corrupted the planet. Noah decides he needs to build an Ark. Methuselah give him a magic bean from the Garden of Eden (?) that Noah plants and overnight grows into a huge forest, giving him the wood he needs. The rock monsters, as servants of “the Creator”, decide to help him.
Skip forward a few years and the ark is nearly built. Noah’s sons are grown up (mostly). The oldest, Shem (Douglas Booth-Worried About the Boy, LOL, Romeo and Juliet), is kind of a kiss ass but has a girlfriend in Ila (Emma Watson-Harry Potter, This is the End, the Perks of Being a Wallflower) who is barren. His next oldest son Ham (Logan Lerman-Percy Jackson, 3:10 to Yuma, Perks of Being a Wallflower) is a horny teenage boy who kind of resents the fact that Shem has a hot girlfriend and he is stuck with the old manual override (if you know what I mean). His youngest son is Japheth (Leo McHugh Carroll-no other credits), who is pretty much a non-entity as far as the movie goes. The ark is huge (and honestly kind of what I would imagine the ark would look like. I’ll give good credit to the art director).
Anyway, Tubal-Cain shows up with an army drafted off the field from the Battle of Hastings and demands…something of Noah? Fealty? He tells Noah that if and when the flood comes he will be on that ark. Noah says no way and scares him off with the rock monsters.
(I’d like to bitch about this scene for a second. This was the pivotal scene in that trailer I mentioned before. Tubal-Cain says “I have men at my back and you defy me” and Noah replies “I’m not alone” in a very prophetic tone of voice. The trailer cut out at that point and very, VERY strongly implied that somehow the hand of God (or “the Creator”) intervened to help Noah but in the movie the rock monsters just stand up and scare the men away. I am savoring the irony of me complaining about not enough deus ex machina in a film but if that isn’t bait and switch I don’t know what is.)
Meanwhile Ham has the very legitimate concern about how is he ever going to have kids on a boat with him mother and the barren girlfriend of his brother. Noah sets out to procure wives for him and Japheth (Wive-R-Us? Or was he just going to hypnotize two ladies with the gravelly sound of his voice? By the way if there is a place called Wives-R-Us someone let me know. Thanks) but when he gets to Tubal-Cain’s encampment he finds every sin possible. He goes back to the arc and tells his family that the human race needs to die out so good luck with all those teenage hormones Ham and Japheth.
Ham is a little bent out of shape and runs off to find his own wife. At the encampment he falls into a mass grave and meets a cute girl named Na’el (Madison Davenport-Over the Hedge, the Possession, Horton Hears a Who) (By the way, a pit full of rotting corpses seems about as reasonable a place to meet women as anywhere else I’ve tried and with the exception of the girl I’m going to go out with this upcoming weekend better than online dating). The rain starts and it’s a race to get back to the ark before Tubal-Cain and his army arrive. Na’el steps on a bear trap (invented in the 18th century for those who care). Noah runs up to save Ham and leaves Na’el to literally be trampled to death by the crowd.
At the ark the rock monsters re-enact the scene where the Ents attack Isengard from the Two Towers except now they are on the defense and loose. Tubal-Cain brought some homemade RPGs and is blowing them up. The massive flooding arrives to wipe off all the humans although Tubal-Cain manages to stow away on the Ark (what Bible passage was that, exactly?). He hides among the sleeping animals and eats more than a few of them (Noah and his family are vegetarian. Didn’t you know that?).
Meanwhile Ila is pregnant (oh, yeah. Methuselah healed her. Which passage was that one?) and Noah, after consulting with “the Creator”, says that if it is a girl he will kill the baby to keep the human race from breeding. Tubal-Cain heals and turns Ham’s horny head away from Noah. Nine months later he attacks Noah while Ila gives birth to twin girls. Noah fights him off with help from Ham and at the last minute his love prevents him from killing the babies. Naameth realizes that with the birth of twin girls the ratio is now right and her two other sons can now marry their nieces (ewww).
Some other crap happens and Ham leaves the family to wander alone leaving Japheth behind to impregnate both of his nieces (double ewww).
The stars:
CGI and special effects were decent. One star. The director told Russell Crowe to be an intense, abusive a hole and he ran with it. One star. The rest of the acting was really good. One star. If you forget the source material and treat this as a cheesy Lord of the Rings knock off it can be fun. One star. Total: four stars.
The black holes:
Were I a religious man I would find this movie sacrilegious as hell. Even were I not I find movies that claim to be adapted from literature but then twist in into some bad “re-imagined” Hollywood effluvia insulting. Two black holes. The sci fi elements they added to the story really compounded this issue. Rocket Propelled Grenades? One black hole. Massive plot holes. How did all those animals sleep for nine months with no food or water? You can’t say “miracle” without throwing us some sign of an actual miracle happening. One black hole. Noah’s character was a total bastard to his family. It’s tough to identify with a guy who is in all ways every stereotype of an abusive father. 
He even turns into an alcoholic at the end in order to more cater to his trope (Beer Magnet image courtesy of the Cheap T Shirt category). One black hole. Plans for future incest with girls who are infants is never a good story element. One black hole. Rock monsters. One black hole. 138 minutes is a really long time to spend looking at Russell Crowe looking like a homeless leather mug maker from a Renaissance Faire. One black hole. Total: eight black holes.
A grand total of four black holes. Kind of crappy. Should you see it? Probably not. If you are religious you will feel insulted and if not you will feel, well, kind of insulted. I know a lot of people are going to see it because it’s a religious film and they feel some obligation but at the end of the film as I walked out the fairly large crowd seemed really subdued, like they didn’t know how to process what just happened. They all kind of look liked they had just had a medical exam that may or may not have had the doctor touching them in a weird way and were all trying to figure out if they should say something or not. Date movie? No, for all the reasons I just gave plus the whole “baby murder/incest” thing might not be well received by your date. Bathroom break? The whole scene with Ham meeting Na’el among the rotting corpses does absolutely nothing since she is destined to be left to die by Noah in ten minutes anyway. Perfect time IMO.
Thanks for reading. Nothing on deck until tomorrow so I might just do a couple Star Trek retrospectives. Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu and like us on FB. Feel free to post comments here with regards to this movie or my review. Off topic questions or suggestions can be emailed to [email protected]. Talk to you soon.
Dave Inman
Bad Words Review
Funny, clever, and full of bad words.
I have not to date been a fan of Jason Bateman. Sure I loved Arrested Development but he was the least interesting character on there, and since then every time I see him he is in a movie that seems to think someone eating excrement is the epitome of humor and cleverness (I’m literally talking literally BTW). I heard Identity Thief was decent but I still had the sour aftertaste of Horrible Bosses and the Change-Up causing me to dry heave and managed to miss it.
So I was not exactly chomping at the bit to see this one. I did listen to a great interview with Jason on the Howard Stern Show and he managed to warm me up to the base concept of the film. I rolled into a late showing with my mind relatively open and the thoughts “How bad could it be? It’s not like he’s co-starring with Ryan Reynolds again.”
89 minutes later I rolled out having laughed my way through most of it. Not only was it funny without devolving to the lowest strata of humor it was actually clever and well written. You really get to connect with the two main characters in spite of the fact that one of them is painfully repulsive. I went on a date this last weekend (with a human female!) and as part of our very pleasant conversation the girl told me about the six elements of a play according to Aristotle. They are plot, character, theme, language, rhythm, and spectacle. I think these could be translated in modern movies to story, character, tone, dialog, pacing, and cinematography. Any movie that nails two of these six is on track to be a winner and both Aristotle and I seem to agree that plot and character are the most important (yeah, Ari and I are going to grab a beer later). It’s tragic how few movies try to achieve more than even one of these and how many manage to not hit even one. This one managed to hit 5 of the six and even the cinematography was decent.
(Note-if you are a regular reader and are reeling in shock at the twin ideas of me using a classical literature reference and having a date with a girl you are no more stunned than I. I’m still waiting for the Earth to reverse the direction of it’s spin. Shakespeare image courtesy of the funny t shirt category)
Once in a while this “job” affords me moments of deep satisfaction and this is one of them. If you recall when I reviewed the medical waste of a film Jack and Jill one of the few stars that movie earned was for the Indian kid who played Jack’s adopted son. 
I thought Rohan Chand was cute, funny, and talented and at the time said I hoped his first movie roll being the cinema equivalent of a sucking chest wound would not inhibit his future career. I was gratified to see him resurface as the other main character in this project and he nailed it. If that kid doesn’t Macaulay Culkin it he is going to be a big name in future film. I just hope they don’t turn him into the go to guy for every movie that needs a token Indian character.
The story is about a grown man named Guy Trilby (Jason Bateman-Arrested Development, Identify Thief, Horrible Bosses) who uses a loophole in the rules to enter a spelling bee for kids. He is aided by internet journalist Jenny Widgen (Kathryn Hahn-We’re the Millers, the Secret Life of Walter Mitty, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days) and they bully their way into the qualifying match. He more or less has a photographic memory and crushes the competition. He is also a complete ass hat and verbally abuses everyone around him.
On the plane ride to the national finals he meets Chaitanya Chopra (Rohan Chand-Jack and Jill, Lone Survivor, Homeland), another competitor. Chaitanya annoys him and Guy tells him to shut up in a very inappropriate and borderline racist manner. The next day he is told by the spelling bee officiator (Allison Janney-Finding Nemo, Juno, American Beauty) that he is not welcome and is only going to embarrass himself. She puts him up in a storage closet at the hotel.
At that point it is just a series of really funny set pieces where Guy screws up his competitor while offending people. He is heartless and has no remorse regarding ruining the dreams of young kids. The officiator (under pressure from assorted parents) tries to cheat him out of the running. 
Guy has a very dysfunctional relationship with Jenny. He develops a weird friendship with Chaitanya (who’s own dad is kind of a dick). Eventually he is confronted by the main spelling bee guy Dr. Bowman (Philip Baker Hall-Bruce Almighty, the Insider, 50/50) who more or less calls him a lifelong loser.
I don’t want to delve in too deep in the story as it is really good. Sufficed to say I was very pleased with the direction the plot took and it where the story ended up.
The stars:
Guy is an awesome character that you can’t help but like and root for in spite of the fact that he is a total dick. One star. All the rest of the cast was all very agreeable characters and well portrayed. One star. Rohan Chand was perfect as the kid competitor. One star. Story was great and not at all what I expected. One star. The dialog was brilliant, especially for Guy. His insults would peel paint. One star. A rated R movie that functioned well as rated R. They didn’t just throw stuff in the qualify as rated R to suckle off the Hangover teat. One star. In a weird way one of the more believable stories I have seen in a while. One star. Really, really funny. Two stars. In the end a great time watching. Two stars. Total: eleven stars.
The black holes:
It honestly felt short. The ending kind of ran up on you and resolved itself a little fast IMO. At 89 minutes I don’t think anyone would have objected to another 10 minutes. One black hole. If you are the type who is bothered by kids listening to profanity or being injected into other wildly inappropriate situations prepare to have your ears bleed. A couple of the scenes with Rohan you almost expect the police raid the set. One black hole. Total: two black holes.
A grand total of nine stars and my rousing recommendation that you see it. One of the best comedies I have seen in a couple years. I am now a Jason Bateman fan and will go back and see some of the films I missed. Should you see it? Yes. Yes you should. Date movie? If your date has a good sense of humor absolutely. If not or you are not sure don’t take the chance. This film is potentially very polarizing. Either she will love it or hate it and hate you through association. Bathroom break? Hmm. Good question. The film is short and most of the scenes are really funny. I think if I really needed to go I would choose the scene where Jenny hooks up with her FBI ex boyfriend at a bar in order to get some background info on Guy. Nothing critical happens and any of the scenes without Guy in it are less interesting.
Thanks for reading. I am going to go see Noah tonight and will consider writing it up tomorrow. I tend to steer clear of the religious stuff but from what I can see this movie has very little to do with the Bible. I’ll probably do it but am kind of dreading it. Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu and like us on Facebook up at the top. If you have a comment on this film or my review post it here, and if you have an off topic question or suggestion feel free to email me at [email protected] (especially if you want to advertize on the blog and/or can get me free movie tickets or advanced screenings. Money for popcorn and tickets doesn’t grow on trees you know (unless it’s paper money)). Talk to you soon.
Dave Inman
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 48 A Private Little War
Some Star Trek episodes are more subtle than others. This is not one of those. This episode was so clearly an allegory about Vietnam that they might as well called the villagers the Viet Cong and the Klingons the Chinese (although in truth the Viet Cong was getting a lot more help from the Russians than the Chinese).
This episode was also an example of the thin veil of racism that Star Trek labored under in spite of Gene Roddenberry’s best intentions. It really, really wasn’t his intension but when writing and casting this episode it just made sense to the producers that the villagers be Asian and the friendly Hill People be white. In this day and age such a thing would probably not go by unremarked but back in 1968 it seemed so obvious that no one even questioned it.
All that aside this is a great episode for one simple reason: mugato. Yes, the furry poisoned fanged spike backed white super gorilla. Awesome. It also showed more accurately what alien exploration is probably going to be like. You see, for every intelligent creature you might encounter out there there are probably millions of dangerous animals who would think nothing of tearing your face off. If aliens had landed on Earth a few hundred years ago tried running around North America odds are they would get chomped on by a grizzly or bitten by a rattlesnake long before running into a Native American tribe. If you want to see what I’m talking about check out the book Expendable by James Alan Gardener. In it the guys who hit dirt assume every creature in sight wants to kill them and for the most part they are correct.
Dave
Episode image courtesy of the Star Trek T Shirt category, BTW.
Sabotage Review
I don’t say sabotage. I say sabataage.
For every job there is a specific tool. You wouldn’t use a scalpel to cut a path through a rain forest and you wouldn’t use garden shears to give yourself a haircut (at least, I don’t anymore). If there were a tool perfect for use in this movie it would be Arnold Schwarzenegger.
I’m not saying he doesn’t do well in other roles, although the comedy movie he did recently in the Last Stand did not serve him at all. However it appears director David Ayer (End of Watch, Training Day, the Fast and the Furious) took a hard look at Arnold’s careers and realized his best roles had a minimum of comedy to them (except for maybe Kindergarten Cop) and he is best when he is deadly serious. He then collected a very talented cast of equally bad asses, employed more than the Hollywood minimum 88 IQ when writing the script, and mixed in some great action scenes and camera technique and like a casserole made of good leftovers came up with an extremely palatable meal.
So yes I enjoyed it and couldn’t be happier. I am a fan of Arnold the Actor (Arnold the Governor is another story, but we can put that behind us) and want to see his career flourish. Like the tool used for it’s correct function when he is given a role that suites his style he is really good. David Ayers managed to keep a lot of the things that make Arnold Arnold; muscles, a workout scene at the gym, machismo, giant cigars. However he cut out all the crap that has attached itself to Arnold like muck in a rain gutter: cheesy one liners, “comedy” sidekicks, the need to be super human at all times. The film took a nose dive into that bad campyness in the denouement but managed to pull out before impacting the deck. Overall a fun movie with more complexity than one would expect based on any other movie he has done since True Lies.
Not to say the film is flawless. The complexity of the plot and motivations of the individual characters gets downright murky at times, and the pacing shifts from 33 to 45 in the last 15 minutes. Even I, with my stupendously massive brain (and modesty) found my head being scratched and the word “huh?” escaping my lips upon occasion. (As an aside in the world of dating you would be surprised how unimpressive a high IQ is to most women. Not that I’m bitter). For the most part however I found the story tight and the characters appealing. What more could one ask for?
The story is of John “Breacher” Wharton (Arnold Schwartzenegger-Terminator, Total Recall, Conan the Barbarian) and his elite special operations team of the DEA. His team is comprised of James “Monster” Murray (Sam Worthington-Avatar, Wrath of the Titans, the Debt), Joe “Grinder” Phillips (Joe Mangeniello-Spider-Man, Magic Mike, What to Expect when You’re Expecting), Eddie “Neck” Jordan (Josh Holloway-Paranoia, Battle of the Year, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol), Julius “Sugar” Edmonds (Terrence Howard-Iron Man, Prisoners, Red Tails), Tom “Pyro” Roberts (Max Martini-Pacific Rim, Captain Phillips, Saving Private Ryan), Bryce “Tripod” McNeely (Kevin Vance-End of Watch), “Smoke” Jennings (Mark Schlegel), and Lizzy Murray (I guess only the dudes get ma
cho nicknames like they are Medal of Honor avatars played by 13 year old boys. Mireille Enos-World War Z, the Killing, Gangster Squad. MOH logo courtesy of the Video Game T Shirt category).
They raid the house of a drug cartel and during the raid as a group steal $10 million and flush it down the toilet (literally). However when they get down to the sewer the money is all gone. They are all investigated for the theft (somehow the FBI could tell there was $10 mil missing off the monstrous pile of money that got set on fire) and are on suspension. Eventually the investigation is dropped and they get together only to find that none of them trust each other.
At that point someone starts killing them off one by one. The movie basically turns into a game of Clue with guns. Police investigator Caroline (Olivia Williams-the Sixth Sense, Rus
hmore, the Postman) is looking into it while dealing with testosterone charged troublesome personalities. Clues are uncovered, houses are raided, and the surprise twist is revealed (I actually saw it coming but never forget that stupendously massive brain). In the last 15 minutes the movie takes a slight detour into cheesy action movie ending but then gets back on track.
The stars:
I love the idea of an action movie with more story than just “the bad guy killed my family/stole my money (or top secret list of US spies)/is a drug dealer/wants to blow something up because he is some kind of unspecified terrorist/kidnapped my girlfriend. One star. Arnold Schwarzenegger will always get a star even in the worst film for me (well, maybe not Batman and Robin or Junior), and this film suited him very well without catering to the crappy “Schwarzeneggerisms” that drag down a lot of his films. Two stars. The rest of the cast really nailed it and made us care about them collectively. One star. Olivia Williams was exceptionally good, and super hot. Some women can really pull off short hair. One star. Great action sequences. If you liked the action from Training Day and End of Watch you will love it. One star. A little bit of nudity goes a long way, especially when most of the screen is filled with macho white trash dudes. One star. In general a fun movie. One star. Total: eight stars.
The black holes:
The story was complicated and not in the clever way of “Oh, that totally makes sense” as the credits role. One black hole. The motivations for any of the characters to do almost any of the things they do is tertiary at best. I don’t want to spoil this film but a lot of it boiled down to “These characters are crazy and willing to throw their lives away because…they are crazy.” Very weak. One black hole. As much as I liked most of the characters the idea that this bunch of red neck militia mercenaries and drug addicts are part of an elite law enforcement unit was kind of laughable. One black hole. The weird shift of tone in the last 15 minutes only to shift back had all the spoor of the director caving in to either some studio executives or Arnold himself. It felt really out of place. One black hole. Total: four black holes.
A grand total of four stars. That’s in the good zone for me but just barely (mediocre is 2 black holes to about 3 stars). Definitely worth seeing but set your expectations realistically. I think this movie will not do well at the box office due to lack of audience focus to be honest. It’s too much a shoot ’em up for the people who like complicated stories and too convoluted for those who just like to see people shooting each other. Date movie? Nope. Bathroom break? Any of the scenes between Olivia and Arnold where they are not with anyone else could be missed pretty easily.
Thanks for reading. I have Bad Words lined up for tonight and am really looking forward to it. I haven’t had a lot of luck with Jason Bateman films in the past but after hearing his interview on Howard Stern I have to give it a fair shake. It sounds pretty hilarious. I might not write it up until Sunday as all the planets seemed to have aligned themselves and I have a second date tomorrow afternoon. Wish me luck. Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu. If you have a comment on this film or my review please leave it here and if you have an off topic question or suggestion email it to [email protected]. Talk to you soon.
Dave
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 49 Return to Tomorrow
Sorry I haven’t written anything in the last five days. Things are crazy for me right now and I had to take a quick road trip. I did see a Wind Rises but honestly what would a review of a Hayao Miyazaki film net you? It’s going to be brilliant and maybe heartwarming (this one really wasn’t actually). If I get enough request I will write it up but honestly I think I will give it a go.
I am scheduled to go see Sabatage tonight and will definitely write that one up first thing tomorrow morning. Schwarzenegger movies are like a heroin fix for reviewers of a certain mindset. I sincerely hope it doesn’t suck but will have my rapier like wit sharpened in case it does.
So Episode 49 Return to Tomorrow. This is the glowing globes episode (said globes were destined to resurface later in the Enterprise Incident). I have said before I am a Spock fan and whenever they write him as doing something other than being his awesome self I find myself throwing a little temper tantrum. I very much did not like Spock as controlled by Henoch. Also, if Henoch was Sargons enemy why would Sargon trust him?
Actually the whole creation process is kind of dumb. Couldn’t Sargon just tell Spock or whomever how to make the artificial bodies? The Enterprise had replicator technology so creating the components should have been relatively easy. Also Kirk has said many times that his ship is not a democracy yet calls for a vote to help the aliens. Again, out of character behavior always bugs me. Also what exactly was Henoch’s exit strategy? Even Spock at his best would have had a hard time taking on the entire crew of the Enterprise, which is pretty much what Henoch would have had to do.
That being said the twist at the end was pretty cool. Cleverly done. Also since Nurse Chapel has been carrying a torch for Spock since the beginning it seems a little apropos that she finally got Spock into her (haw!). It’s also funny that even when possessed by aliens creatures Kirk gets to hook up with the nearest hottie. Did Shattner have some kind of blackmail over the writers? It’s like if I were 14 and had control over the writers of my life. 
I would be making out and hooking up with every hot girl in Northern California. Borderline ridiculous. I kind of see the whole show as Shattner’s way of trolling chicks without actually having to put any work in. (Pick Up line shirt comes to us from the Cheap T Shirt category)
Dave
By the way consciousness storage was yet another idea that Star Trek invented. Star Trek invented everything.
Muppets Most Wanted Review
I would want to see it even if it weren’t my job.
As I typed that title I realized that really is the measure of a fun movie for me. I see a lot of films and while I can enjoy and appreciate a great film I wouldn’t otherwise choose to go see (Dallas Buyers Club, for example) the part where my job gets fun is when there is a movie that I would want to see and it turns out to meet or exceed my expectations.
On the other hand the films that feel my bile and contempt the most are the ones where I really wanted to see it and it sucks. This could probably describe the entire Transformers series (or Green Lantern. Or Star Trek. Actually the list could go one quite a while) but the other part about seeing a lot of movies is you see a lot of trailers too so I tend to have an expectation that is almost inevitably exceeded or failed to meet.
The point is as a fan of the Muppets TV show and the more recent Muppets movie I was really looking forward to seeing this one and am very happy to report that it met or exceeded my expectations. In many ways it improved dramatically on the first one in ways that I specifically had issues with, leading me to believe that the writers and director of this film are among my 18 regular readers (either that or I am not the observational genius I like to believe I am and other people more involved in the film industry had the same criticisms I had. No way that could be possible however).
The main issue I had with the last film that they more or less eliminated in this one was too many humans, not enough Muppets. In the last film something like 80% of the screen time was filled with Jason Segals big meaty face and his romance story with Amy Adams (her face is much more appealing but she was definitely not dressed as she was in American Hustle, if you catch my drift). If I want to see Jason Segal acting like a wimpy douche I will watch reruns of How I Met Your Mother, thank you. I don’t watch porn for the drama and I don’t watch Transformers movies to see Shia Laeouf whine and bumble his way through life with the hottest girlfriends ever. I don’t watch the Muppets for the humans and the last movie had way toooooo much of them. This one solves the problem nicely by having the only recurring humans be the bad guy (that pronounced Bad-gee. It’s French) and the enormously talented Tina Fey, both in supporting roles. The rest of the humans were really good for little cameos and bits but otherwise kept to a minimum.
The other elephant in the room from the last movie that they shrank down to mouse sized and stuck in a terrarium was Walter. In the last film whatever scene wasn’t up to it’s neck in Jason Segal was smeared with the least appealing Muppet character ever created. Sorry but I hated Walter. I would seriously rather see the entire cast of the Garbage Pail Kids live action movie in this film than have him in even one scene. He is boring looking and has the personality of a Muppet without a hand in its ass. In this film he does a few lines mostly as support and otherwise spends his time under a rock (I assume). Well done. Stick with the Muppets created by Jim Henson jackasses. They don’t need a creative re-imagining thank you.
On the other hand this film more or less ignored all the beloved supporting characters and focused almost entirely on Kermit and Piggy. This was a mistake in that to be honest the main three Muppets (these two and Fozzie) were always the least interesting or appealing characters. This movie made Kermit much more interesting by mixing him up with Constantine, the worlds most dangerous frog. In other words when Kermit has been replaced by a Russian criminal mastermind he gets funny and interesting. However, one minute of Gonzo the Great is worth 15 minutes of Kermit, 45 minutes of Piggy, and 10,243,534,834 minutes of Fozzie Bear. Each of them showed up (including a great scene for the Swedish Chef early on) but once they made their token appearance they slunk back into the background and more or less faded out (actually Dr. Bunsen Honeydew and Beeker had a great part towards the end and I love the latest invention to come out of Muppet Labs).
For the record the actual world’s most dangers frog, Phyllobates terribilis AKA the South American poison dart frog, secrets a skin poison that is 400 times more deadly than cobra venom. It is considered the most dangerous animal in the world and is a bright orange with black spots. People who vacation in the Amazon rain forests are idiots.
The story. The film starts at the wrap up of the last film (sans Jason and Amy). The Muppets are told they got picked up for a sequel and decide to do a world tour. 
They meet up with world tour manager Dominic Badguy (Pronounced Bad-gee. It’s French. Ricky Gervais-the Invention of Lying, Cemetery Junction) who, with a little input from Walter, convinces them to go on a world tour. Meanwhile Constantine, the worlds most dangerous frog escapes from a Russian Gulag.
The Muppets end up in Berlin where Dominic convinces Kermit to take a walk. Constantine glues a mole on his face and Kermit gets arrested as Constantine puts makeup on his and takes over his life with the Muppets. They do their show while Dominic and Constantine break into the museum next door and steal a painting. They take the Muppets from city to city robbing something in each one. Each robbery gets them closer to their goal: the crown jewels of England.
Meanwhile Sam Eagle shows up to investigate and hooks up with Interpol agent Jean Pierre Napoleon (Ty Burrell-Mr. Peabody and Sherman, Goats, the Skeleton Twins). They have a hilarious team up with a lot of jokes at the fun of the European work ethic.
Kermit lands in the Russian Gulag under the thumb of dragon queen Nadya (Tina Fey-Admission, 30 Rock, Megamind) and mixed in with some great cameos (including the great Danny Trejo, who later has one of the best jokes of the movie). They figure out quickly that he is not Constantine. She later recruits Kermit to produce and star in the prison musical.
Eventually Animal (who knew Constantine was not Kermit from the beginning), Fozzie, and Walter track Kermit down and use the prison musical as a cover for a mass escape. They get to England to try to prevent Constantine from marrying Piggy and stealing the jewels.
The stars:
Muppets. One star. Three of my favorite Muppets had big parts; Beeker, Animal, and Dr. Honeydew. One star. Really, really funny jokes, especially the Danny Trejo one (actually he had two great jokes now that I think about it). Two stars. Less humans, and the humans that were in it enhanced the Muppets rather than distracted you away from them. One star. 
Tina Fey was especially good (and really good looking. Ending 30 Rock was a great thing for her. Tina if you have ever had a fantasy of dating one of your fans email me). One star. Constantine was freaking brilliant, and the scenes where he is pretending to be Kermit were hilarious. One star. The Sam the Eagle sub plot was also great and helped punctuate the scene shifts from the Muppets on tour to Kermit in prison. An excellent choice in my opinion. One star. It’s rare that I give a star for something that is not in a film, but less Walter was a great move. One star. The musical numbers were all super fun. One star. Some awesome celebrity cameos. The Celine Dion ones were especially brilliant. One star. In general a great time. Two stars. Total: 13 stars.
The black holes:
The lack of time for the supporting characters bummed me out. I really wanted to see more Gonzo, or Lew Zealand and his Boomerang Fish. They are all just more interesting. One black hole. While most of the celebrity cameos were fun, funny, and organic the Usher one felt as unnatural, awkward and unnecessary as skin suit made of steel wool and poison ivy. Normally I wouldn’t black hole for something this minor but at the time it really threw me out of the movie. One black hole. Total: two black holes.
Eleven stars. What a great score. Of course as a fan of the Muppets from my childhood you have to consider the fact that I am very nostalgic but still really fun time. Should you see it? If fun is something you enjoy then yes. If you have no sense of humor or spend all your time worried about conspiracies and politics probably not. Date movie? Hell yes! If she doesn’t enjoy this film and you for bringing her to it odds are she has already been replaced by a Pod Person. Don’t accept her invitation for a walk through her garden. Bathroom break? Hold it in. Every scene is worth watching. If I had to pick one scene to miss I’d say the solo song with Miss Piggy towards the end is the least critical, but if you miss it you will miss a really funny cameo too. Run and don’t wash (eww).
Thanks for reading. To celebrate seeing this Muppets film I am going to see another great Jim Henson film, Labyrinth, tonight at the Castro Theater in San Francisco. It’s going to be classically epic (Labyrinth image comes from my movie t shirt category). Feel free to post here if you have comments on this film or my review. Off topic questions or suggestions can be emailed to [email protected]. Have a great weekend. Talk to you soon.
Dave
Divergent Review
I kind of liked it.
Yeah, not bad. It’s definitely better than all the Twilight movies lumped together. Not as good as the Hunger Games IMO but if this were a a fancy awards banquet the two movies could sit at the same table rather than out in the alley dining on fried rat like the Host or Mortal Instruments. Of all the lame attempts to launch a new franchise for teenie bopper girls since Hunger Games this is probably the one most likely to succeed.
Why is it not as good as Hunger Games? Well, I think Catniss is a more interesting character and the girl playing her does a more credible job but honestly it boils down to how many questions come to my mind about the society the movie is sent in and how dumb it sounds. The world of the Hunger Games kind of makes sense to me. After a revolution the country is broken up into districts where the lower classes are repressed while the upper crust lives a lavish and decadent lifestyle with a taste for blood sports (1,000 years from now when historians are discussing the decline and fall of Western civilization (haw!) it will be realized that Reality TV is the gladiatorial blood sport of the first part of this millenia). It all makes a kind of sense to me and with a realistic future context the movie does too.
Much less so with this film. In the world of Divergent society has been broken up into five factions: Abnegation (The Selfless), who live a life of poverty and community service; Erudite (The Intelligent), who are the brainy scientists and big brain thinkers; Dauntless (The Brave), who are super sexy soldiers and action guys; Amity (The Peaceful), who are farmers and such; and Candor (The Honest), who tell the truth always and tend to be judges and lawyers (there’s the very first real disconnect). Each kid is given a test to recommend what group to join but at 18 they can go anywhere they like. So at age 18 a kid is supposed to choose to be a super cool action hero, a nerdy scientist, or one of three types of slave. Anyone else see a problem with that? Why would any kid not choose Dauntless? Within a generation the society would be like 88% Dauntless, 6% Erudite, 3% Candor, and the remaining 3% would choose the life of a street cleaner or plow horse. You make your decision in the space of a few seconds and are committed for life. A life of poverty and selflessness is something you decide to do at 45, not 18.
There is a lot of talk about how this is the perfect society but does forcing a kid at 18 to choose his or her life forever with no chance of change sound like a recipe for happiness? Also what is up with this breakdown of humanity into five groups? Dauntless is supposed to be there to protect everyone from…something? Someone? In the first ten minutes I figured out that the only group that Dauntless would have to protect their society from would be Dauntless and lo was it so. They made an effort to show that the groups were more or less equal in numbers so that means that this society has a standing army of 20% of it’s population? Who grow nothing and contribute nothing to the betterment of society other than protecting everyone from some threat that hasn’t manifested itself in over 100 years? 20% is lawyers, 20% public servants, etc. It doesn’t make sense. The story is basically about Erudite using Dauntless to take over the society but the leaders of Dauntless all seemed like a-hole sociopaths too so why did Dauntless not take over like 80 years ago?
Also only 20% of the population is farmers who look like they farm by hand. Seems like not a lot of food production going on. Also who manufactures all the high tech semi-automatic rifles and brain control drugs? If 80% of your society is in the military, government, law, and science that puts a lot of pressure on the last 20% all of whom seem to think that a three crop rotation system is a newfangled idea.
Also the city of Chicago is pretty well wrecked but they have the resources to build hi tech research facilities? No one has the inclination or resources to rebuild or knock down wrecked buildings? No danger of any of them collapsing and killing a few hundred people. They had the resources to build the worlds biggest wall to protect them from…who was that again? I’m a big fan of dystopian and post-apocalyptic futures but you can’t have your cake and eat it too. You can’t have your characters wandering the set of Escape from New York and then hang out in the Apple Store.
Speaking of the wall they talk about how it works to protect the city from…someone. I guess their mysterious enemies have forgotten the secret of gunpowder and artillery. Static walls as a defense went the way of the crossbow about the time Napoleon was conquering the Europe.
So the Erudites develop mind control technology and use it to get control of Dauntless and take over the city at gun point. Why not just say “Hey, we’ve developed a new immunization for the dread disease Exploding Head Syndrome (EHS). Everyone in the city come get it in the next two weeks” and then just run the show?
You see what I mean? The more questions that come to mind of an average everyman such as myself the less believable the whole premise is. Every time an audience member says “Hmm…” you are bleeding credibility. All that aside (plus a few more that I didn’t bother to add to this review) the movie was engaging and interesting.
However let me talk about one thing last thing. I guess since Twilight the recipe for success with teenage girls who read this sort of thing is a main female character who as bland as possible and Tris could win a lifetime achievement award for being the blandiest. I’m not kidding when I say that every supporting character in this film was more interesting than she up to and including her super bland brother. I’m willing to bet that a lot of marketing research goes into this sort of thing and Hollywood has determined that teenage girls find it easier to project themselves into the main role when that character has the personality of a human shaped Roomba. It works but makes things harder for those of us who appreciate a little complexity in our characters. I’m not looking for Roy Batty or Marge Gunderson here but give me something more interesting than the HAL 9000.
Spoilers incoming so if you are going to see it and haven’t read the book skip ahead. The story is of young Tris (Shailene Woodley-the Descendants, the Magnificent Now, the Secret Life of an American Teenager), a girl who grew up in Abnegation with her mother Natalie (Ashley Judd-Heat, Double Jeopardy, Olympus has Fallen), father Andrew (Tony Goldwyn-the Last Samurai, Ghost, the 6th Day), and brother Caleb (Ansel Elgort-Carrie, the Fault in Our Stars, Men Women and Children). She goes in for her test and is told by tester Tori (Maggie Q-Priest, Live Free or Die Hard, Nikita) that she failed to qualify for any of the factions and is Divergent. You wouldn’t think that such a big deal since each kid can choose anyway but apparently it is. She is told to say she tested out Abnegation.
The next day at the choosing ceremony her brother goes Erudite and she goes Dauntless. This is a big deal as it severely discredits Abnegation’s qualifications to run the city or something. She then enters a fairly cool training sequence (as a fan of Kung Fu movies I love training montages) with fellow novices Christina (Zoe Kravitz-X Men First Class, After Earth, the Brave One. Lenny Kravitz daughter BTW and looking super duper cute), Will (Ben Lloyd-Hughes-The Scapegoat, Tormented, Great Expectations), Al (Christian Madsen-the Brazen Bull, Lost in the Woods, Refuge from the Storm), and jerk Peter (Miles Teller-can someone please tell Hollywood that I hate this guy? I have despised every other movie that he as done and were we in high school together I would want to see him get his ass kicked daily. 
Here are three movies that I crapped all over with him in them: Project X, 21 and Over, That Awkward Moment. So Annoying image from the Funny T Shirt collection). Their trainer is Four (Theo James-the Inbetweeners, You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, Underworld: Awakening) under his commander Eric (Jai Courtney-Jack Reacher, I Frankenstein, A Good Day to Die Hard).
The training is hard and the lowest ranked trainees are destined to be kicked out to be homeless. At first Tris sucks but over time gets better. However her Divergent nature is constantly in danger of being recognized and that would result in her death. Four coaches her. She passes her test but it turns out that the reason Divergents are hated is that the mind control technology doesn’t work on them. Erudite tries to take over and things fall apart.
The stars:
Unlike Twilight there was some cool action, and unlike Mortal Instruments it wasn’t all about some Buffy wannabe kicking the crap out of people. Kind of fun and believable. One star. In spite of all my questions the story wasn’t irredeemable. It was like Swiss cheese. Full of (plot) holes but the stuff surrounding the holes was good to eat. One star. Most of the characters were engaging. Even Shailene Woodley did the best she could with the role she was given. One star. A good training montage is a balm to my reviewer soul. One star. I’ve had a thing for Maggie Q ever since Priest, and Zoe Kravitz is a heartbreaker. Shailene is easy to look at too. One star. There were some really good cinematographics. The hallucinations were good and there was a zip line sequence that I enjoyed watching a lot. One star. The wrecked Chicago sets were cool, especially the flying over the city panning shots. One star. In general a fun movie. Two stars. Total: nine stars.
The black holes:
No way I can let that many plot and setting holes slip by unscathed. Look at the list of questions from above. Two black holes. The whole super hi tech society living hand in hand with the set of the Road Warrior hurt the tone. Make up your mind. One black hole. Normally I would ding a film like this for PG-13 but honestly it didn’t hurt the action much and I didn’t feel any need for nudity (well, any more than I do on a daily basis). No black hole there. The blandness of the main character drained my ability to connect with her and the romance between Tris and Four had all the chemistry of mixing two different brands of bottled water together. One black hole. Total: four black holes.
A grand total of 5 stars. Honestly not bad, and when compared to the other plastic surgery disasters (haw! again. I’m really feeling my punk rock roots today) jumping on board the “this is the new Twilight” train quite good. Should you watch it? If you liked Hunger Games absolutely. If you like fun movies yes. If you want a complex character to sink your brain teeth into probably not. Date movie? For sure. You will not be bored yourself and if my theory on bland female teenage action movie protagonists holds true you will have a greatly enhanced chance of getting laid (my own chance might have even skyrocketed into the positive integers!). Bathroom break? This film clocks in at a massive 139 minutes so odds are you will need one. I’d say the scene right after Four rescues Tris from some of her classmates could be missed pretty easily.
Thanks for reading. I will be seeing the new Muppets movie shortly and will try to write it up tomorrow. Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu. Post comments on this film here or send off topic questions and suggestions to [email protected]. Talk to you soon.
Dave
