The Top Ten Worst Movies of 2016

It was actually a little difficult for me to find 10 movies worthy enough to be considered The Worst of 2016, but that doesn't mean 2016 was a vast improvement over previous years. Hollywood still churned out plenty of crap. I just avoided watching it more than usual. With each mini-review I include the movie's "Hail Mary", some small nugget of legitimate entertainment where I briefly didn't hate what I was watching. Fair warning, some of these really don't have any.

These are listed in order from least worst (10) to absolute worst (1).

Fun fact: 4 out of 10 of these are comic book movies and 3 out of 10 have colons ( : ) in their titles!

Enjoy!






10. Sully

Director: Clint Eastwood

A movie made exclusively for the ultra jingoistic, Clint Eastwood’s latest continues his streak of not making a single movie worth watching since 2008’s Gran Torino. Mining the drama out of the drama-less Miracle on the Hudson, the film focuses on Captain Sullenberger’s landing and subsequent hearing to determine whether or not he was justified in landing on the water. There is thematic potential in a story about how bureaucrats and the media always need someone to blame for a disaster (or in this case, a sort of near miss), but the film plays it safe and by the numbers. The movie’s court room climax is ludicrous, where Tom Hanks’ character of Sully saves his bacon and outwits the investigation board by suggesting during the hearing itself that they factor in human reaction time to their computer simulations of the Hudson landing. This one change of course immediately absolves Sully of the accusations. Any investigator who hadn’t already tried all possible factors in the simulations before the hearing would be horribly incompetent and probably fired. This movie was made solely for Americans who need to applaud and clap themselves on the back every chance they can get. And it isn’t the only one on this list.  

The Hail Mary:  The actual sequence of Tom Hanks and Aaron Eckhart dealing with the engine malfunction and landing the plane on the Hudson River is a solid and tense piece of filmmaking procedural. Unfortunately it is only a fraction of the entire movie and Tom Hanks has tackled this kind of realistic reenactment before in two much more entertaining films, Captain Philips and Apollo 13.

9. Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children

Director: Tim Burton

Tim Burton’s 2016 adaptation of the Ransom Riggs YA novel was doomed well before the brief white-washing controversy, although Burton’s defense for only casting white actors as the titular children certainly didn’t save this one. Eva Mendes tries to lend some authority to her role as Miss. Peregrine, the caretaker of the film’s Peculiar Children, and Sam Jackson is at least somewhat fun as his occasionally unsettling villain, but Asa Butterfield is a walking statue giving the most wooden performance I have ever seen in a big Hollywood production (and he has enough work under his belt to be past this stage in his young career). Completely by the numbers, and unfortunately driving full steam ahead into Hollywood’s desire to turn every property into a Cinematic Universe, Tim Burton’s latest proves that he is no longer the same man who once gave us Ed Wood, Big Fish, and Sweeny Todd. And he hasn’t been for some time.

The Hail Mary:  An interesting visual display when we see how Miss. Peregrine and her children travel through time to create an alternate universe sanctuary around their house. The ending boardwalk battle with reanimated skeletons and H.R. Giger rip off monsters also gives a brief breath of fresh air while reminding us that Burton once had a soul.

8. Hacksaw Ridge

Director: Mel Gibson

It has been pointed out numerous times by film critics that only Mel Gibson could ironically make a violent, ultra bloody war movie out of a story about a conscientious objector. Plenty of great movies about soldiers and war have been made in Hollywood’s history (Saving Private Ryan, The Thin Red Line, Full Metal Jacket, Apocalypse Now) but none so boilerplate while simultaneously applauded by the Academy (6 Oscar nominations). Hacksaw Ridge is easily the most decorated movie on this list. Like so many war films since Saving Private Ryan, Gibson throws at us the over imitated moment where an explosive goes off and a character’s ears ring as they stand around dazed, watching as their brothers in arms around them are brutally shot down. The acting overall is nothing to write home about (Andrew Garfield does the best he can, but I’m just going to pretend that his Best Actor nomination was really for Silence) and the plot is nothing we haven’t seen a hundred times before.

The Hail Mary:  From an artistic point of view, there isn’t much here worth a second viewing. However, if the film’s depiction of Desmond Doss and his convictions, not to mention his feats as a medic during battle, are half as accurate as they were in real life, then he is definitely a war hero in every sense of the word and deserves to be celebrated. But it should be through the lens of a better movie.

7. Yoga Hosers

Director: Kevin Smith

Plenty of films are released which feel disingenuous and reek of studio meddling. Plenty are passion projects bogged down with self-indulgence due to a filmmaker having full creative control of their project. Yoga Hosers is the latter, although it’s hard to figure out where director Kevin Smith’s passion went. Less a film than Kevin Smith’s expensive adaptation of one of his Smodcast stories, Yoga Hosers stars Kevin Smith’s daughter Harley Quinn and Johnny Depp’s daughter Lily-Rose as Canadian convenient store clerks (this movie will make you pine for the days of Jeff Anderson and Brian O’Halloran discussing hermaphrodite porn) who battle bratwurst Nazi creatures, called Bratzis, just…just because. Kevin Smith’s Red State was a tense, political game changer which opened up the door for the filmmaker to create a more mature slate of films, and Tusk, the first film in his True North Trilogy, was one part brilliant, one part God awful, but all enthralling horror comedy. Yoga Hosers is written and directed with none of Smith’s signature wit and characterization, especially not as entertaining as the Smodcast episode which spawned it. Filled with nothing but cliché and looooooow brow jabs at teenagers and Canadian stereotypes (young people are obsessed with their phones and Canadians say “aboot” a lot. I bet you didn’t know that), the film has more Tusk alumni (Justin Long, Johnny Depp, Haley Joel Osment) than actual laughs. But hey, Moose Jaws is just right around the corner.

The Hail Mary:  An amusing cameo by Batman: the Animated Series voice actor Kevin Conroy and an appearance by True North Trilogy private investigator Guy Lapointe, once again played with gusto by Johnny Depp (although his shtick is already growing stale).

6. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows

Director: Dave Green

This one should have been an obvious warning flag ever since it was green lit after 2014’s Michael Bay fest, but I’ve seen it. So I have to talk about it. While a slight improvement over its insincere, winking at the camera predecessor, TMNT 2 is still the sequel to its insincere predecessor. A slight improvement is no improvement at all. CGI apocalyptic mayhem and nonsense, complete with my oh-so favorite kind of climax, involving a giant portal in the sky that must be closed in order to prevent more CGI from coming through, and Megan Fox being forced to catwalk strut wearing a midriff-revealing schoolgirl outfit (and after Michael Bay’s treatment of her during the filming of Bad Boys II, I honestly do feel bad for her), let us know that it’s business as usual in the current TMNT movie universe. But at least we get a giggling Tyler Perry as Baxter Stockman. That’s at least…something.

The Hail Mary: Bebop and Rocksteady! And best of all…Krang! But I guess a Brundlefly Baxter Stockman would have just been silly.

5. X-Men: Apocalypse 

Director: Bryan Singer

There isn’t a whole lot to say about this one except that X2: X-Men United is still the Gold Standard for Marvel superhero movies and Bryan Singer was once a good filmmaker. Although flawed, 2014’s X-Men: Days of Future Past and 2011’s First Class revived the franchise and returned it to what made audiences fall in love with cinema’s merry mutants in the first place. Age of Apocalypse, however, completely squandered whatever momentum was reborn with its predecessors. An overall boring, stale, and paint by numbers CGI fest, Apocalypse has more in common with the worst summer blockbusters Hollywood has to offer than the genuinely human and fun X-Men movies of the 2000 and 2003. James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence, and Michael Fassbender are given nothing to work with and Oscar Issaac is utterly wasted covered in CGI makeup and voice modulation as the titular villain Apocalypse. Like all terrible popcorn movies, this third entry in the First Class trilogy is a complete snooze fest. It should also be noted that in a superhero series guilty of ignoring continuity and shifting timelines (and I don’t mean how Days of Future Past sort of “erased” The Last Stand), Singer can’t even keep the continuity intact between direct sequels.

The Hail Mary:  A completely unnecessary, and distracting, side trip to the Weapon X facility at Alkali Lake at least offers comic audiences the one scene they’ve been waiting since 2003 to see done right. Wolverine’s iconic, and bloody, escape from captivity and brutal eviscerating of the Weapon X scientists and guards. But at two-thirds through the movie, the audience might already be too busy sleeping to notice.

4. Doctor Strange

Director: Scott Derrickson

It is no real surprise that the quality of movies churned out by Marvel Studios have taken a large dip ever since 2008’s Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk. For the most part they have provided mild doses of fun (except for the Thors) but nothing worthy of the almost universal praise by both critics and fans. While early 2016’s Captain America: Civil War was an entertaining, Avengers-sized slugfest (and if you’re down for seeing big named heroes wallop on each other, vastly preferable to Batman V Superman), late 2016’s Doctor Strange was nothing more than a stale, overlong preview for future Marvel movies  (like most of their origin stories tend to be). It’s safe to say I’ve never been more angry watching a Marvel movie than I had been during Doctor Strange. An origin (and protagonist) more or less repeated from Iron Man, utterly atrocious and abysmal humor (before you watch this one, it’s important to know that “Single Ladies” is a song), and Benedict Cumberbatch giving the most wooden and stale performance of any titular Marvel hero (the other Avengers actors give their all and at least have fun playing their roles), Doctor Strange ranks down there with the two Thor movies as being the most factory-assembled Marvel product to date. I was ready to walk out of the theater during the scene where Strange makes fun of Wong’s name by listing off pop stars like Adele and Drake (this is how Marvel makes their movies genuine and realistic, by the way). And surprise, surprise, in the end our hero has to close a giant portal in the sky.

The Hail Mary: I would pay to watch Mads Mikkelsen read the phone book. And while the requisite end credits scene is as convoluted as in any other Marvel movie, at least it gives us a glimpse into the only Avengers movie worth being excited for, Taika Waititi’s Thor: Ragnarok. That’s of course only if Marvel actually lets Waititi make an actual movie with an actual point of view.

3. Don't Breathe

Director: Fede Alvarez

Extremely unpleasant and cliché-ridden thriller proves that no matter how clever you think your premise is, execution is everything. Stereotypical trio of young thieves break into the home of a blind war vet in the hopes of scoring easy money. Soon the hunters become the hunted but the Blind Man also becomes as unsympathetic as his intruders when the story dives right into queasy, brutal horror territory. Usually a more charismatic actor, Stephen Lang doesn’t have much to work with as the Blind Man but he doesn’t bring much to the table either. The script does its absolute best to hit the bull’s-eye of every cliché target in an effort to simply keep the thieves inside of the house as long as possible. The Blind Man struggles to navigate his house and shoot his intruders during the first half of the movie, but in the second half he magically becomes a crack shot and slasher killer worthy of Jason when the structure calls for a character to die. A character is impaled with shears and thought to be dead, only to magically come back to life to save another character at the last second (and then to be shot dead for real five minutes later). When your script as no concept of a thematic endgame, you extend the story for as long as possible in order to reach the 80 minute mark. Director Fede Alvarez brought some fun and ingenuity to his 2013 Evil Dead remake, but Don’t Breathe is just a slog.

The Hail Mary:  Nothing in this movie warrants a second viewing. There are scenes that make me ashamed that Sam Raimi’s name is attached to it.

2. Suicide Squad

Director: David Ayer

There were plenty of big studio superhero movies worth avoiding in 2016, but while star hitter Marvel at least provides some semblance of fun, Warner Brothers keeps tripping over their own feet as they stumble up to the plate. David Ayer has proven himself a competent, successful filmmaker (2014’s Fury is all the convincing I need), but DC is clearly not interested in creating competent films. Only (financially) successful ones. You can almost forgive Marvel for using their current movies to plug future ones, because both of DC’s 2016 outings are tapestries of over indulgence, concerned more with 2017’s Justice League than with whatever junk fest they got you to buy a ticket for (don’t believe me? The five second cameo of Batman is, I guess, the most entertaining part of the movie). Boring and murky, bogged down by too many characters who’s backgrounds are explained with literal trading cards full of stats in the very first scene of the movie instead of through organic storytelling, complete disregard for creativity of any kind, and a soundtrack bombarding the audience with hits so that the studio executives can let you know that they’ve seen Guardians of the Galaxy, Suicide Squad brings absolutely nothing new to the action movie table. But at least Justice League helmer Zak Snyder was humble enough to climb down from the Heavens and bless us with his genius for that awe inspiring Flash scene…

The Hail Mary: There is none. At least, none on the screen. But the instant Jared Leto said in an early interview that his performance of the Joker was going to make you forget about Heath Ledger, I knew that I could never like this movie. His portrayal is nothing but a complete rip-off of Ledger’s and anyone who says otherwise is an idiot. The only possible saving grace for this movie is that Leto’s Joker scenes were cut out so viciously that he’s only in the finished product for about five minutes. I guess studio execs aren’t all bad.

1. Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice

I don’t even know where to begin, because it’s all been said before and it’s all 100% correct. Zak Snyder’s second foray into the Warner Brothers DC Universe is an overlong, over packed, nonsensical, dour, joyless, passionless, slog. Even the titular fight between Batman and Superman (you know, the whole reason anyone actually paid money to see this garbage) is dull and poorly staged (and happens about 2 hours in). DC’s mad dash to beat Marvel in the superhero movie race is the equivalent of a hung-over student waking up to realize that the paper worth a third of their grade is due, so they copy and paste their research from ten different articles into a word document in the hopes that no one will notice. The most entertaining, and most competent, scene in the movie where Ben Affleck’s Batman fights off armed goons in an abandoned warehouse  is still just a pooooooor man’s Batman Begins or The Dark Knight action sequence (and let’s face it, it’s a rip off). After sitting through this, I pined for The Dark Knight Rises. Hell, I pined for Batman and Robin. The golden days of Christopher Nolan’s caped crusader are over, boys and girls. From here on out Bats is doomed to a life regulated by a 13 year old boy (from Green Bay too, ugh) armed with film equipment and an allowance from the Brothers Warner.

The Hail Mary: At least the movie ends.

10 Movies To Carve Pumpkins To

For those who pay attention to the precise moment when the leaves begin to die and the package of pumpkin spice whatever hits the shelves, October can easily be divided into two halves.  The first half is for smelling the air every morning when you step outside, preferably while wearing a sweater and on your way to purchase your first aforementioned flavored latte.  And the second half is for the true reason why we love October...

Halloween.

AMC seems content on pushing this yearly holiday mile marker back further and further every year, until one day we'll start seeing "The Walking Dead" premiere and "Jason Takes Manhattan" on our new Black Friday purchased HD TV.  Despite American Movie Classics being plagued with the same "Friday" sequels and that zombie show every year, I still feel that spine tingling itch of excitement with the "Fear Fest" logo materializes in the bottom corner of my screen.  The instant I step into my house, before I even throw my shoes off or satiate the whining of Ripley because I hadn't fed her since eight that morning, I flip on channel 59 and enjoy the ambiance of 80s quality acting and censored blood splatters.

But with so little time jammed into this month, with Halloween Express trips to run and Snickers bags you have no desire to hand out to kids to purchase, you've gotta squeeze in a Jack O' Lantern carving or two before October 31st.  And that leaves no time for waiting until AMC starts rolling the occasional gold.  Your Halloween time is much too precious for that!

Here I present to you the top 10 movies to get you into the All Hallow's Eve mood while perfecting your pumpkin artisan skills.

10.  Sleepy Hollow 

 If there's one thing Tim Burton is good at, it's creating moving picture images perfect for adorning your computer's screen saver during your Halloween party.  The second thing he's good at is putting Johnny Depp into his movies.  Burton's 1999 retelling of Jonathon Irving's story features a ho-hum conspiracy to sap a small New England town of its five acre land, Christopher Walken chopping up American revolutionaries, and one-liners of the same quality as "Heads will roll" and "Watch your head".  Like most Burton movies, there's no story worth paying attention to, so just enjoy some haunting imagery accompanied by a classic Danny Elfman score and don't worry about hitting pause if you have to make another candle run.

9.  Cabin in the Woods

While not quite the genre-bending horror masterpiece the internet praised it of being, the Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard flick has its moments of humor accompanied with throwbacks to the classic era of slashers.  The assembly of monsters wreaking havoc on Richard Jenkins and Bradley Whitford's company at the end is a glorious ode to all gore fans out there.  But for those whose ears are offended by Whedon's overly snarky dialogue, you want to avoid this one.

8.  Child's Play

Hailed as the "Citizen Kane" of "evil toys possessed by serial killers" movies, "Child's Play" does a surprisingly good job of mixing eye-rolling schlock with moments of genuine creepiness.  Brad Dourif's voice is an interesting choice to embody a supposedly frightening doll, but mostly he brings a grindhouse level of legitimacy to the tone.  Clearly the filmmakers realized halfway through shooting that no one is really scared of a monster in baby overalls.  "Child's Play" does for Toys R Us what "Jaws" did for showers.

7.  Beetlejuice

While certainly not a horror movie, Tim Burton's sophomore effort following "Pee Wee's Big Adventure" also features the director's first use of Michel Keaton playing a character whose name starts with "B".  Easily Keaton's best performance ever and Burton makes full use of his rare, non-Johnny Depp star.  Plenty of claymation sandworms and other monster imagery perfect for getting you into that October 31st spirit.

6.  Trick R' Treat

Considered to be the new millennium's "Halloween", this Bryan Singer produced anthology film throws everything but the kitchen sink at you in the spirit of the season.  A psycho principle who murders trick or treaters, ghost stories, werewolves, and a lovable Halloween sprite named Sam who punishes pumpkin smashers.  Plenty of fun with a cast that includes Rogue, William Stryker, and The Lizard, guaranteed to become your yearly staple after one viewing.  Also, enough Jack O' Lanterns to get you into the mood to carve your own.

5.  1408

Easily the greatest movie ever to be based off of a Stephen King Ghost Hotel story, "1408" features a fantastic, and pretty much solo, performance from John Cusack.  Samuel L. Jackson takes the other half of the top billing, otherwise it's the Cusack alone in a hotel room show.  Legitimately creepy, with a surprising dose of emotion, the film takes the correct route in spinning a spooky yarn and never explains the reason why room 1408 does what it does.  It focuses on the protagonist and his growth, never on satiating audience questions.  All you need to know is, "It's an evil fucking room."  Perfect for after that Jack O' Lantern is lit and all of the lights are off.

4.  Ghost Busters

"It's true, this man has no dick."  If "1408" creeped you out too much, just throw this on to remind yourself that you "ain't afraid of no ghost."

3.  Night of the Living Dead

Legendary for being the first horror movie to star a black character who doesn't die first, George Romero's classic is required viewing every October.  The ambiance is Romero's signature strength with this film, and its sequel "Dawn of the Dead".  You truly feel the country side surround you, along with the boarded up entrances of a zombie-besieged farmhouse.  One of the few films in existence that will convince you that the month is October, no matter what time of the year it really is.

2.  Evil Dead II

Sam Rami's greatest achievement and with Bruce Campbell at his most Shempiest, the perfect follow up to "Night of the Living Dead" for your trapped-in-a-cabin-or-farmhouse marathon.  A deadly mixture of both humor and horror, get ready for haunted P.O.V camera shots, laughing lamps, boomsticks, and severed demon hands giving you the bird.  The scent of the season is just as pungent as gasoline smoke chugging from a chainsaw.  And if your pumpkin carving takes you over the 90 minute mark, you can always throw in "Army of Darkness" for good measure.

1.  Halloween

Duh.

2015 Milwaukee Film Festival

There are several reasons why October is my favorite month of the year (the temperature is no longer ungodly scorching, AMC continues its tradition of running the same four "Friday" and "Halloween" sequels back-to-back daily, "pumpkin spice" is a staple of every other spoken sentence) and no better way to kick off the Fall than the annual Milwaukee Film Festival.

Living within walking distance of both the Oriental and Downer Landmark theaters means smelling digital emulsion and excitement on the air for the entire two week run (the longest run yet) of the festival.  All I have to do is take a glance down Murray to spot the flashing bulbs of the Oriental's marquee and lines wrapped around the corner where Twisted Fork and Replay used to be.

Today marks Day 10 of the festival, with Thursday, October 8th the end date.  Here is my quick analysis of what I've seen, what I want to see, and what I was supposed to see what didn't in order to avoid a complete film burnout.

Youth

Seen It:  Thursday, September 24th at the Oriental

Review:  Oscar Winner (2013's "The Great Beauty") Paolo Sorrentino's follow up borrows plenty from Bergman in terms of visuals and a cast of stars playing elderly artists reflecting on their respective swan songs.  Word on the award street is that Michael Caine and Harvey Keitel are on the Oscar hunt this year, as is Jane Fonda (who appears for a whole five minutes playing basically herself).  The cast brings their all, giving more to their characters than what appears on paper.  But the real star is the camera, which paints each frame with a gorgeous surrealist brush.  "Youth" won't be appearing on my 2015 Top Ten (unless "Spectre" and "The Force Awakens" go horribly, horribly wrong) but there's enough here to engage of the interests of anyone with more than six Criterions on their shelf at home.

Neptune

Seen It:  Wednesday, September 30th at the Oriental 

Review:  An impressive independent debut from filmmaker Derek Kimball and co-writer Matthew Brown (from Milwaukee) shot mostly in Mane but with some footage in Milwaukee as well.  The cast brings some serious talent (especially lead actress Jane Ackermann) although the dialogue isn't the strongest tool in the box.  As with "Youth", the camera muscle was one most exercised with plenty of shots to make one forget about the low budget nature of the film.  The story packs heart and ideas about the social pedestals people put themselves on when religion and class come into play.  

The Look of Silence

Seen It:  Friday, October 2nd at the Downer

See It:  Monday, October 5th at the Avalon Theater

Review:  Joshua Oppenheimer's follow-up to 2012's "The Act of Killing" continues to explore the 1965 ant-communist genocide conducted in Indonesian.  While Oppenheimer's first film points the camera directly at the leaders of the former death squads and gradually forces them to see themselves as the monsters they are, "The Look of Silence" focuses on the victims of the crimes.  A man named Adi, who was born in 1968, not only interviews his family about the violent period but also directly confronts the men responsible for his brother's brutal murder.  Just like with "The Act of Killing", Oppenheimer isn't afraid to keep the camera going even when accused murderers are demanding that he shut it off.  He gets right where the emotion is and with many uses of the name "Anonymous" in the credits, this clearly wasn't a safe film to make.  Powerful doesn't begin to describe what is shown on screen.  There were tears and audience members walking out at my showing.

Turbo Kid

Seen It:  ...I didn't.

Review:  Yeah, this one was at midnight and I pretty much just needed another ticket to fill out my six-pack.  But hey, at least my money went to supporting the festival, so whatever.  Sometimes you just need to pace yourself.  Or apparently I only enjoy bummer documentaries.

Stop Making Sense

Seen It:  Saturday, October 3rd at the Oriental

Review:  Easily the most fun concert video ever, directed by Jonathan Demme ("The Silence of the Lambs").  It was like being at an actual concert, complete with obnoxious drunk people and beach balls.  The film itself isn't anything you really need to own, but being with a live audience granted permission to dance is a blast.  And yes, David Byrne wears the suit in this one.

The Seventh Seal

See It:  Sunday, October 4th at the Oriental

What to Expect:  Even though this Criterion has been sitting on my shelf forever, I've only ever seen the first twenty minutes.  I easily could've skipped this and just popped it into my DVD player, but nothing beats black and white 35mm prints on the big screen.  Anyway, a Knight plays chess with Death for the fate of the world or something.

The Armor of Light

See it:  Sunday, October 4th at Fox Bay Cinema and Wednesday, October 7th at the Oriental

What to Expect:  A documentary which is sure to have the Festival's 99% liberal audience standing and applauding.  A minister finds his own pro-life beliefs at odds with his pro-gun ones after witnessing the epidemic of mass shootings taking hold of this country.  I'm hoping that this film focuses more on personal growth and ideals rather than politics, but I'm expecting the camera to lean pretty heavily towards the left.

The Shining

See It:  Tuesday, October 6th at the Oriental

Review:  Just like "2001:  A Space Odyssey" and "Dr. Strangelove" before it, this one will be projected in 35mm film (and presented by former Brewers pitcher and film fan John Axford).  Easily the best horror movie of all time, and in contention with "2001" for best Kubrick movie of all time, start your Halloween season off right.  And remember, no TV and no beer make Homer something, something.

2015 Film Festival Secret Screening

See It:  Wednesday, October 7th at the Oriental (for Film Members only)

What To Expect:  Usually this film festival gets the Chicago film festival's table scraps, but last year's doc "Last Days In Vietnam" went on to receive an Oscar nomination and one year the festival screened "Silver Lining's Playbook", so who knows.  My guess is "Captain America:  Civil War".

Cartel Land

See It:  Wednesday, October 7th at the Times Cinema and Thursday, October 8th at the Downer

What To Expect:  Easily the film I'm most excited to see at this festival will also be my last.  Every year there is a documentary about the cartel issue in Mexico, but none have looked more intense than this one.  Executive Produced by Kathryn Bigelow ("The Hurt Locker" and "Zero Dark Thirty"), the film focuses on two vigilante groups, one in Mexico and the other in the Arizona desert, battling to put an end to cartel violence once and for all.

 2015 Film Festival Sponsor Trailer

See It:  Before every film at this year's festival.

What To Expect:  Dogs!

Ant Man: Review

I distinctly remember how the theater reacted when the end credits of "Ant-Man" began to roll.  This was before the two-for-one post-credits bonus scene announcing "Don't worry, more of these movies are still coming out."  The entire theater burst into applause, clapping, laughing, and high-fiving each other.

I looked around in confusion.  Had I watched a different movie?

Apparently all Marvel has to do these days is show up, because "Ant-Man" was garbage.

Now, it's very easy to dismiss any negative reviews of Marvel's latest darling as the bitter ramblings of dejected Edgar Wright ("Hot Fuzz", "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World") fan boy.  To be fair, the second the announcement of Wright's departure from the project hit the net, I was among the first to wash my hands of the movie.  But less we forget, Wright had been working on his "Ant-Man" script since before 2008's "Iron Man" had even come out.

The film follows ex-con Scott Lang (Paul Rudd), who wants to give up the life of a professional thief in order to go straight so he can be a father to his daughter.  Of course, Marvel wants us to root for anti-heroes but without the annoyances of real depth or inner conflict (think of the brainwashed Hawkeye in the first "Avengers" or the brainwashed Winter Soldier in the second "Captain America"), so Scott was wrongfully jailed for stealing from the rich and giving to the poor.  But Scott falls back to his thieving ways and breaks into the home of Hank Pym (Michael Douglas).  Hank trains Scott on how to use his super hero suit, giving him the powers of an ant, with the intent of using Scott to steal his secret Yellowjacket suit from the generic bad guy Darren Cross (Corey Stoll).  Hank's daughter Hope (Evangeline Lilly, who probably gives the only somewhat decent performance of the movie) is there too because she has to become Wasp in the sequel.

Marvel's horde of fans defend this film as being "a really fun heist movie", yet it's anything but.  Think of all the great cinematic heists ("Heat", "Ocean's 11-13", "The Sting") and aside from characters, story, and execution, you'll pinpoint the one other trait those films have that "Ant-Man" lacks:  tension.  There's no intricacy to the plan to break into Cross's company and steal the thing Yellowjacket suit.  The resulting battle between Ant-Man and Yellowjacket is kind of fun, especially when they both duke it out on a toy train and are forced to submit to the stakes of such a situation (although the punch line of this fight is wasted in the trailer).  But there's never any feeling of danger.  There's no reason to care, except that they throw some flashy CGI on screen with jokes.

Speaking of the humor, it's abysmal.  Speaking of the effects sequences, same answer.  I maybe chuckled once.  And I never once thought that I was really watching someone shrink and navigate a sewer system.  If a stunt man was wearing at Ant-Man costume, he's clearly in front of a green screen.  But I'm sure that Ant-Man himself was just a cgi affect too.  There's no care, no thought put into what happens on screen.  The execution is generic, just another example of Marvel Studios printing their own money.  And a great cast (including Bobby Cannavale, Judy Greer, Hayley Atwell, John Slattery, Michael Pena, and Anthony Mackie in a distracting, yet somehow the most fun moment in the movie, Falcon cameo) can't change that.

While Marvel keeps reigning supreme at the box office, most of their films are still just generic trash (the "Thors", "Iron Man 2 and 3").  Yet even they still have successes ("The Incredible Hulk", "Captain America:  The Winter Soldier").  One key word separates the hits from the misses:  execution.  Careful writing, casting, planning, and directing is the difference between the bottom of the barrel blockbusters and the ones people remember.  It's not that Marvel is incapable of creating good, but the box office success of "Ant-Man" proves that they really don't have to.

Rating:  * out of ****

The Purge: Anarchy

Christopher Nolan is a filmmaker famous for incorporating the themes and ideas of his stories into his direction.  In Memento, the audience experiences the same journey of recreating memory as the protagonist.  The Prestige is structurally a trick as magical as the ones perfected by its rival magicians.

Writer/Director James DeMonaco is no different.  Once every year, audiences are forced to suffer the same crap for what seems like twelve hours.

The Purge:  Anarchy follows the exact premise as its 2013 predecessor where in a dystopia run by a mysterious Tea Party-esque government called The Founding Fathers of America, once every year for 12 hours all crime is declared legal.  This annual Purging (if you will) is a government-sanctioned law enacted for controlling the population…and for rich white people to kill off middle and lower class all other people.  In Anarchy, we follow three groups of characters who ultimately intersect and band together to survive the night.  One of these characters has got, surprise surprise, back story and a mysterious agenda that no audience member who has seen more than one movie in their entire life could possibly care about.  (SPOILER:  His son was killed by a drunk driver who, wow, got off with a technicality and now he wants revenge in a plot which has literally never been done in a movie before).

Frank Grillo (Captain America:  The Winter Soldier) plays the pissed off ex-dad and basically The Punisher with his black armored car, black coat, and shitload of guns that also somehow make him the guy all of the other useless characters want to stick with in order to survive the 12 hours.  The other, I guess, protagonists include a single mother (Carmen Ejogo) who waitresses to take care of her daughter and elderly, dying father (which of course makes her oh so very sympathetic), and young couple (Kiele Sanchez from Lost and Zach Gilford from Friday Night Lights) who are in the middle of a marriage/relationship-ending separation (which of course makes them oh so very sympathetic).  At least Michael K. Williams (Boardwalk Empire) is around a bit as an anti-rich people revolutionary to make a few scenes at least somewhat not unbearable.  Thank goodness his character existed for the sole purpose of showing up at the last second to save the rag tag band of misfits who came together to find themselves and capture our hearts all within the same sequel.

Oh, and as for characters being saved at the last second…there’s a lot of that going around.  A lot of Bad Guys pointing guns at Good Guys, making speeches, then getting shot just before they can execute said Good Guys.  For a movie as politically-charged as DeMonaco thinks it is, there sure ain't a whole lotta original ideas being tossed around.  At least with the first The Purge, the concept was still fresh and we had Lena Headey (The Purge) and Ethan Hawke (The Purge) to care about, just because they were Lena Headey (Oh yeah, Game of Thrones) and Ethan Hawke (Explorers), and the simplicity of a story about a family just trying to survive the night while their home was besieged kept the furnaces fueled for at least the first hour.  But while DeMonaco thought of an interesting bare bones concept…he definitely neglected to think of much else.  For a futuristic dystopia, there sure ain’t a whole lot of world-building.  The annual Purge automatically transforms every human being on Earth into a sociopath who only drives around firing guns into the air and screaming.  If all crime is legal, shouldn’t more than just one crime be committed?  And DeMonaco’s politics aren’t thinly-veiled…they’re buck-ass streaking.  Every rich person is not only white, but also a machete-wielding Libertarian Frankensteined together from every The Most Dangerous Game rip-off in literature and cinema.  Ultimately, the style and feel of the movie is what kills it.  It’s not gritty enough like the John Carpenter action films of the 80s, nor tongue-in-cheek enough like Paul Verhoeven science fiction.  It’s Hollywood assembly-line product. 

I’ll give the film credit where credit’s due.  The last line before the credits is truly terrifying.

364 days until the next Purge…

Christ.

Rating: * out of ****

(in theaters July 18th, 2014)

August: Oscar County

It seems that the Weinsteins have already started their Oscar Christmas list. ‘August: Osage County’ follows an Oklahoma family bearing the storm of their patriarch’s suicide as skeletons come tumbling out of the closet over a couple days at the ‘ole homestead. Barbara Weston (Julia Roberts) is The Black Sheep in a family chock full of them, who returns home dragging the cross of her own fallen marriage with separated scholar husband Bill (Ewan McGregor) and rebellious daughter Jean (Abigail Breslin). Her sister Ivy (Julianne Nicholson) is the One Who Stayed Behind With Mom and Dad, and completing the sibling tri-fecta is Karen (Juliette Lewis, who we’ve probably last seen in ‘Natural Born Killers’), toting her flavor of the month fiancé Steve (Dermot Mulroney). The Weston sisters have come together, or are trying to pretend to have come together, in support of their cancer-recovering mother Violet (Meryl Streep, who has literally a zero chance of being snubbed for at least Best Supporting Actress for every award possible). The crux of the story’s tension revolves around Sam Shepherd’s brief, but lingering, cameo as the father Beverly Weston. Rounding out the family is Violet’s sister Mattie (Margo Martindale) and husband Charles (Chris Cooper), who obviously have good chemistry together as an aging couple at odds because it’s fucking Margo Martindale and Chris Cooper playing an aging couple at odds. And to no surprise, Benedict Cumberbatch provides the freshest, probably miscast, performance as Charles and Mattie’s neurotic son Little Charles. He probably won’t make the award circuit cut, but his vulnerable turn in ‘Osage County’, along with Kahn, Smaug, the Wikileaks Guy, and whoever he amazingly portrays in the upcoming ’12 Years A Slave’, proves that in 2013 Benedict Cumberbatch played literally everyone. Playwright Tracy Letts, who adapted the script from his own stage play, most recently explored the dynamic of hateful southern families in 2012’s ultra-violent, genre-breaking ‘Killer Joe’, so it’s no surprise to see the post-mourning dinner table become a snarling, hair-grabbing warzone shout-match pitting daughters against mother and mother against everyone. But where Letts buried the theme of dysfunctional family under layers disguised as a crime thriller in ‘Joe’, he puts it square in his sights and unfortunately, all his cards on the table too early. The conflict is there, in spades, and so is the Weston’s shaky history, but most of it is spat out in furious dialogue and Letts doesn’t seem too comfortable with shaking off the script’s theatricality. It dresses itself up as a film, but with director John Wells insistence of letting the words and powerhouse cast do all of the work, ‘Osage’ never makes the full rebirth onto the screen. Sure, it’s shot on location, but the cinematography does very little besides keep the camera nice and steady for those actor’s monologues. As far as performances go, there are very few surprises here, although come December there’s no doubt the world will be cheering for Streep, whose drug-addicted and half out of her gourd Violet is not entirely transformative but everything casual film fans love to see. It’s a good performance, and it’s out of Streep’s comfort zone, but aside from a powerful scene of subtlety where Violet recounts a hurtful Christmas morning, she does little more than a strong imitation of addiction and dementia. Julia Roberts stands toe-to-toe with Streep, snapping back with her shouted arsenal of ‘Fucks’, and she’s locked into eyeing up the Oscar gold when spring 2014 rolls around as well. The only real surprise is who will get ‘Actress’ and who will get ‘Supporting’, seeing as how the protagonist meter only begins to tilt into Barbara’s court during the last twenty minutes of the film. To be fair, Roberts does polish her acting chops for this role, but sadly, like most of the cast, director Wells lets her most powerful scenes dissolve into matches of screaming rage. Both Roberts and Streep should’ve kept a tighter grip on the reins because those moments of quiet reflection after the shit-storms showcase their best. Chris Cooper is never bad, but in this case it’s because he does a really excellent job of playing Chris Cooper (although he does turn things up a notch with a monologue all his own). Ditto goes for Martindale and Juliette Lewis is fine as the sister who must always be engaged to somebody but her performance tells us little more than her scripted dialogue. Julianne Nicholson brings the strongest turn as Ivy, the sister who’s taboo relationship with her first cousin Little Charles (Cumberbatch) takes a dark turn in the third act due to a twist in family history. She’s the sister who never left, staying behind for mom and dad, and Nicholson feels the burden of that responsibility with quiet dignity. And the pain hits home true when Ivy learns a harsh Weston truth. Nicholson and Cumberbatch develop the best chemistry on screen as the most innocent members of the family, punished for daring to want something real and pure in a life plagued with secrets. It’s clear that Letts understands the concept of “With family like this, who needs enemies?” But in ‘August: Osage County’ he doesn’t take the time to root the conflict and back-story organically. Even in a piece entirely about characters, he uses small bursts of plot to keep things moving, such as Steve (Mulroney) hungering for 14-year old Jean (Breslin) and how the native American housekeeper Johnna (Misty Upham) resolves everything with frankly a very left-field approach. Director Wells understands that this movie is about his actors, more than their characters, and doesn’t bother getting in their way—or creating a voice of his own. And the Weinsteins understand how the awards season works. But the film has its merits and its cast never allows its 130 minute runtime to grow dull. It’s a film about family, and it takes a different approach than its December 25th release date would have you believe. Rating: 2 ½ out of 4