Just in time for Halloween: 11 of the better (best?) horror sequels in recent history.

I've tried to do some kind of list every Halloween but stumbled into a bit of writer's block this year.  When you've already written about the worst horror films your wife has made you watch, the best direct-to-DVD horror films and the plain-scariest theatrical horror films in the last twenty years, there's not as much room to play as you might think (best remakes?).  So allow me a little latitude, as I run down ten of the better (best?) horror film sequels in recent memory.  It is ironic that while no genre is more likely to produce sequel-spawning franchises, so few horror sequels are actually any good.  A caveat... this list will not include arguably two of my favorite horror sequels as I've already written about them extensively elsewhere.  If you can't already guess which two I'm referring to, read up here and here.  And now, in glorious alphabetical order (with the exception of the 'number #1 pick')...

Cabin Fever 2: Spring Breakdown (2009) - Between this, House of the Devil, and the upcoming The Inkeepers, it is clear that Ti West is a straight-A student of the 80s horror genre in all its myriad forms.  While this heavily compromised entry will likely end up near the bottom of its highlight reel, it's still a surprisingly solid homage to the school dance-massacre sub-genre.  The violence and gore are copious, the special effects are old-fashionedly icky, and it contains at least one great 'dramatic' scene.  There are billions of movies where the awkward male lead is somewhat cock-teased by an assuming 'dream girl' who thinks nothing of somewhat unknowingly flirting with the nerd while still running off to the dance with her no-good boyfriend.  This is one film where said nerd (Noah Segan) explicitly calls her (Alexi Wesser) out on it, and it does so without making her into a villain in the process.

Evil Dead II (1987) - I'm not as obsessed with Sam Raimi's trilogy of terror as other genre fans happen to be, but that doesn't mean I don't appreciate the craft at work in both the genuinely unnerving original film and the bawdy and over-the-top comic sequel.  The film, which basically stars Bruce Campbell in a one-man show, is groundbreaking in the way in combines gruesome horror with slapstick comedy.  It also paved the way, for better or worse, for sequels that were basically bigger-budgeted remakes of the original (Desperado, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, etc).  It may not be The Godfather part II of the horror genre, but it's a pretty solid bit of comic horror.

Final Destination 5 (2011) - It has been a dreadful year for theatrical horror films, so it is almost by default (and the fact that I have major issues with the finale of Insidious) that this inexplicably delightful entry in the long-running franchise is the best theatrical horror film of the year so far.  What a shock, following the un-watchable The Final Destination, that this fifth entry is not only the best sequel in the series, but perhaps the best part V in horror film history.  The ingredients are the same as always, but the characters are ever-so slightly more developed and sympathetic, while the death scenes are eye-poppingly (in one case, literally so) spectacular and fiendishly clever.  Toss in maybe the best death in the whole series, plus a doozy of a finale, and you have the recipe for a top-notch entry in a generally sub-par series.

Friday the 13th part VI: Jason Lives (1986) - I will admit that true fans of the series will probably prefer The Final Chapter or one of the first two entries, but this is the very first one I saw and it remains arguably my favorite.  I distinctly remember laughing out loud at least twice and thinking to myself, at the tender age of nine, "Are these movies supposed to be funny?".  The death scenes are appropriately grotesque and the film takes the cake if only for the great moment where one young camper asks another "Well, what were you going to be when you grew up?".

Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982) - It may be cheating to pick a sequel that really isn't connected to the franchise for which it is named after, but so be it.  The film is forever loathed and underrated due to the fact that it has nothing to do with Michael Meyers, Dr. Loomis, and friends.  But taken on its own, it's still one of the creepiest and most out-there original horror films of the 1980s.  It is less a gore-drenched slasher picture than an R-rated Scoobie Doo episode of sorts, with Tom Atkins and Stacey Nelkin investigating how a random homicide inside a hospital leads to a world-changing supernatural plot.  And while it doesn't revel in violence and gore, it delivers the R-rated goods when required.  The third act absolutely delivers, the fiendish scheme is one for the ages, and you will never, ever be able to get the Silver Shamrock theme out of your head for the rest of your days.

Hostel 2 (2007) - It's a weird conundrum as while this film is superior to the 2006 original, it does contain a single moment that is both unfaithful to the tone of the series and is one of the more loathsome bits of pointless savagery in recent years. Thus, I must note my distaste for the protracted and highly distasteful Heather Matarazzo murder scene (which, aside from being a textbook example of misogynism in horror films, violates the series's otherwise realistic and earthbound tone) and move on.  Other than that extended bit, the film works splendidly as an examination of how otherwise normal people could find themselves in a place where they would pay in order to be able to torture and murder another human being.  Despite the series's reputation as 'torture porn', the majority of the violence (again, excepting said Elizabeth Bathory homage) is, like the original, relatively muted and often offscreen or implied.  As a character study of the evil that otherwise normal men and women do, it works.

A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: The Dream Warriors (1987) - I was tempted to include A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge if only because I believe the film is often unfairly dumped upon.  But while I do think the film is underrated, in the end the fact that it's a big metaphor for a young man's unwillingness to accept his own homosexuality isn't enough to completely forgive its narrative faults (also on its side, the scariest Freddy make-up this side of Wes Craven's New Nightmare, plus a controversial moment where Freddy enters the real world and racks up a record body count).  The very best traditional Nightmare On Elm Street sequel remains the third entry.

With Chuck Russell directing and Wes Craven returning to produce, this straight sequel to the 1984 original does a number of things very right.  First of all, it changes the rules just a bit, telling the extended dream sequences from the point of view of Freddy instead of the doomed teens.  As such, the film is allowed to become a special effects fantasy nirvana, something that separated it from the other major 80s franchises and their comparably cheap and realistic slash-and-kill stories.  There are a number of classic kills and even if the heightened humor led the way to the series's descent into pure camp, the balance is just right here.  The return of Heather Lankencamp and John Saxon, plus Craig Wasson given credibility to the proceedings, makes this a more intelligent and thoughtful horror sequel than most of its 80s ilk.  Put simply, the focus is as much on the intelligent and rational adults as the sympathetic and likable kids.  Freddy may be slowly becoming the star, but the focus is still on those being hunted and the picture achieves just the right balance of special-effects fantasy and genuine horror.

Saw VI (2009) -  As I wrote back in 2009, the only thing rarer than a franchise that actually makes it to six movies is a franchise where the sixth film is actually the best of the series (a touchstone only shared by Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country). This astounding comeback film temporarily regained its footing by returning to its roots. By putting Tobin Bell back on the center stage, using the health insurance industry as an antithesis for John Kramer's philosophy, and actually creating tension, suspense, and the possibility of survival in each Jigsaw trap, this sixth entry was easily the best film of the series.  And thanks to a narrative that actually makes Jigsaw's victims sympathetic, traps that make sense, and a refusal to apologize for Jigsaw's outright villainy (none of this 'He's trying to HELP people!' garbage), it stands on its own as a bloody-good horror film.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning (2006) - I have long argued that this Jonathan Leibesman-helmed prequel is a criminally-underrated horror gem.  Point being, it may have some silly 'birth of Leatherface' bits in the first act, but it remains a genuinely scary and sad horror film.  The film bluntly, but effectively, uses its time period to craft an ironic parable of sorts.  The four doomed kids are taking one last trip before the men of the group are sent off to Vietnam.  While they wrestle with whether or not to dodge the draft, they of course encounter a domestic battlefield that is every bit as dangerous and ultimately fatal.  The kids (led by Jordanna Brewster) are genuinely sympathetic, so you actually don't want them to die. Adding to the tension is the fact that, without going into details, most of the victims stay alive for a large portion of the movie, creating tension and suspense as opposed to an assembly-line body count.  The violence is gruesome and realistic, while the film rightly highlights not Leatherface but R. Lee Ermey's murderous patriarch as the primary representation of evil.  Whether or not this series needed a prequel, this mournful and openly sad horror film is genuinely scary and works both as a genre exercise and as a distinctly American tragedy.

Wrong Turn 3 (2009) - The original basically reinvented the grind-house horror genre after decades of slasher-film dominance.  I have no harsh words to say about it, only to mention that the direct-to-DVD third installment in unexpectedly good.  I have little love for the 'cannibals slaughter reality show contestents' first sequel, but this Declan O'Brian-helmed installment works.  The plot basically concerns the lone survivor of a prior rampage running smack-dab into a crew of escaped criminals and the two cops (Tom Frederic and Charles Venn) they have taken hostage.  What follows is a generally intelligent and relatively tense battle of wills as the 'good guys' have to survive both the murderous criminals as well as the cannibalistic mutants who are picking them off one-by-one.  The film cleverly solves the problem that plagues any number of 'and then there were none'-type horror films.  Making the victims a bunch of convicts allows the audience to take more pleasure in their violent demises, yet robs the viewers of the sort of sympathy that creates tension and suspense.  By placing three sympathetic characters in the midst of the carnage, the film gets to have its cake and eat it too.

And, if I may say so, we come to the very best horror film sequel of all time.  It's an easy choice, really.

The Silence of the Lambs (1991) - It's hard to believe that this film is 20 years old.  Harder still to believe that, with the arguable exception of David Fincher's Se7en, it has yet to be topped in the sub-genre (adult serial killer horror film) that it more-or-less 'invented' (just as Michael Jackson 'invented' the moonwalk).  What makes this film stand so high above those that followed in its wake is its mythology.  And it truly is a myth, a dark fairy tale for grown ups with two very scary big bad wolves.  Everyone remembers Anthony Hopkins's Oscar-winning turn as Hannibal Lecter, but equally chilling (and certainly more realistic) is Ted Levine's creepy and unnerving turn as Jamie Gumb, better known as Buffalo Bill.  Jonathan Demme's film loses some of Gumb's character bits from the novel, including a now-cliche back-story (abandoned by his prostitute mother, alcoholic, etc) and a wonderful final line, but the skin-crawling realism of Levine's work still shines through.  Equally as unheralded is Scott Glenn's complicated turn as Jack Crawford, whose relationship with Jodie Foster's Clarice Starling (truly one of the great screen heroines of our time) constantly straddles the line between implicitly paternal and accidentally patronizing.  The film achieves greatness because it is so much more than a rote 'catch the killer' entry.  It is a fiercely feminist crime drama that uses its genre trappings to create a modern myth that still remains one of the finest horror films ever made.

And that's it for this season.  I'm sure I've left off some of your favorites, so tell me all about it below.  Happy Halloween, folks.

Scott Mendelson

Weekend Box Office (10/30/11): Puss In Boots makes muted (for Dreamworks) number-one debut, while Timberlake/Seyfried's In Time and Depp's Rum Diary underwhelm.

 

Dreamworks seems to have paid a price for their risky release date, as Puss In Boots (review) debuted with a comparatively soft $34 million over the weekend.  We'll find out for sure on Monday if it broke the Halloween opening weekend record (Saw III grossed $33 million on this weekend in 2006), it's still a pretty disappointing number and well below the norm for major Dreamworks cartoons.  The studio has had a healthy run on the first weekend in November for the last several years (Megamind, Madagascar 2, Bee Movie, Flushed Away), but the decision was made recently to move the film back one weekend right into the heart of the kid-friendly holiday known as Halloween. As it stands for the $130 million production, the debut is the lowest opening for a Dreamworks cartoon since Flushed Away, which debuted with just $18.8 million in November 2006 (an Aardman Animations production, it nearly doubled its $64 million US gross overseas).  While a massive snowstorm on the East Coast likely kept moviegoers indoors on Saturday and possibly Sunday, the film's $9.6 million opening day was below par as well.  As it is, the film played 59% female and 55% over-25.  It also played to a 35% Hispanic audience, while 51% of the tickets were in 3D and 7% were in IMAX.  The comparative uptick in 3D sales makes sense, since it's some of the better 3D we've seen to date.

Perhaps they wanted an extra week before the deluge of kid-friendly competition starting November 18th (Happy Feet 2, Hugo, Arthur Christmas, The Muppets, Alvin and the Chipmunks 3, The Adventures of Tintin).  Maybe they hoped the genuinely good movie could parlay word of mouth into two solid weekends instead of one massive debut.  But whatever the case, they now have to counter the sense of disappointment, at least stateside (Kung Fu Panda 2 made a somewhat underwhelming $165 million domestic but $663 million worldwide).  At the risk of speculating, this may be a case of a 'No no... wait, it really is good!' movie.  In that sense, it was marketed as an overly jokey spin-off, the kind of cheap, seemingly throw-away product that might have otherwise gone straight-to-DVD without the 3D element.  In fact, it's a pretty terrific cartoon, full of the studio's usual technical polish and a stand-alone narrative free of dated pop-culture references or up-to-the-minute soundtrack choices.  The mostly positive reviews reflected that (and most of the negative reviews probably came from dog people).  If the film has solid legs and holds strong next weekend, the new release date will be vindicated.  If not, expect Rise of the Guardians to move from its Thanksgiving berth right back to November 2nd.

There were two major openers and one limited 200-screen release of note this weekend.  None of them performed all that well.  Fox's Andrew Niccol sci-fi chase picture In Time debuted with $12 million, which isn't a disaster (the film only cost $35 million), but was slightly under expectations.  The unexpectedly timely thriller (it serves as a parable for the current Occupy Wall Street movements) was a test for Justin Timberlake as a leading man.  He didn't quite pass.  If this were a low-budget drama or something less overtly commercial, $12 million would be fine.  But that number for a sci-fi action picture suggests that Timberlake didn't add anything to the opening weekend gross.  Amanda Seyfried, as the token hostage/love interest, isn't helped either. This one is actually lower than the $14 million that Red Riding Hood opened to with only Seyfried to sell it.  Most of the reviews seemed to criticize her for daring to change her hair.  Still, Fox seems almost dismissive of domestic box office these days, as they have an unparalleled overseas track record.  Don't be too surprised if this one fizzles at $25 million but takes in double or triple that in foreign markets.

Johnny Depp's third foray into the world of Hunter S. Thompson (he narrated a terrific documentary about the man back in 2008) yielded unsurprisingly mediocre results.  The Rum Diary opened with $5 million, which is about what should be expected of an adaption of a lesser-known Thompson story distributed by an upstart like FilmDistrict.  This is actually the kind of offbeat project that got Johnny Depp labeled as box office poison all through the 1990s (ah, the days when Tim Burton had to beg to cast Depp...), so it's refreshing to see him diving back into that pool after reaping the copious box office rewards of Jack Sparrow.  The only real harm is that this picture somehow cost $45 million to produce.  I've said this before in one form or another, but if studios can't make cheap movies cheaply anymore, then we are all in a lot of trouble.  On just over 250 screens, Roland Emmerich's Shakespeare conspiracy thriller Anonymous grossed $1 million.  It was a surprisingly limited debut for a film that Sony is clearly hoping will garner positive word of mouth (it received an A- from Cinemascore).  The big news, however, was overseas, as Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson's The Adventures of Tintin debuted with an eye-popping $55 million in 19 overseas markets.  The motion-capture 3D action adventure debuts in America on December 23rd, by which point it will already be a huge smash hit.

In holdover news, the drops were large and plentiful.  Paranormal Activity 3 (review) took the expected 64% second weekend drop, although expect a bump on Monday for Halloween night.  The threequel has now grossed $81 million, which puts it $16 million ahead of Paranormal Activity 2 after ten days (the second film opened $12 million smaller and dropped 59% in weekend two).  Real Steel (review) ran into its first kid-competition and took a dive, dropping 55%, but ending the weekend with $74 million.  It's nearing $100 million overseas and may just make it over the century mark stateside.  So it will be a solid hit, but won't spawn a franchise.  Footloose dropped 47% in weekend three, ending its seventeenth day with $38 million.  It's no Karate Kid, but the $24 million Paramount remake will be just fine.  The Ides of March is slowly plowing through the genre known as 'George Clooney's cheap adult genre films'.  It now sits with about $33 million, meaning it has surpassed Good Night and Good Luck ($31 million) and The Men Who Stare At Goats ($32 million) it will soon surpass The American ($33 million).   Johnny English Reborn (review) dropped 57% and now has $6.4 million after ten days.  Disaster right?  Nope, because the film has grossed $125 million worldwide, and will soon surpass the $133 million global take of the first Johnny English.

That's it for this weekend.  As always, the above are estimates unless otherwise noted.  Join us next weekend when Brett Ratner's all-star heist picture Tower Heist (trailer) squares off against A Very Harold and Kumar Christmas 3D (trailer HERE, review when the embargo breaks around Thursday).            

Scott Mendelson

Brad Bird's Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol gets a second trailer, this time with proper music (but a lot more spoilers regarding the plot)!

This is a bit too spoilery for my tastes (Tom Wilkinsen IS Donald Sutherland!), but this second trailer for the Brad Bird-directed adventure is a solid bit of marketing none-the-less.  The violence does seem jolting and brutal while the familiar theme music (thank you...) gets an effective remixing.  Considering how much emphasis Paramount is putting on the IMAX version of this picture, it makes sense that they are selling the sheer scale and scope of the action sequences.  One caveat - the bit at 2:15 shows Tom Cruise apparently making out with female lead Paula Patton.  Fair enough, except isn't Ethan Hunt supposed to be married to Michelle Monaghan's Julia, whom we met in J.J. Abrams's prior installment?  This series has been one of the chief offenders of the whole 'revolving door of female leads' meme that often infects male-driven franchises (IE - each installment brings a new random babe and forgets about the prior romantic interest), but weren't we supposed to believe that Monoghan was basically the Tracy Di Vicenzo of the franchise?  Anyway, I don't want to obsess over a random moment that may be out of proper context.  The trailer itself looks snazzy and exciting.  This one debuts on December 16th in IMAX (yes, apparently with a six-minute Dark Knight Rises trailer attached) and December 21st everywhere.  As always, we'll see.

Scott Mendelson         

One last parody Muppet trailer, arguably the best one yet...

I've already got my unofficial invite for the All-Media screening on November 17th.  The question is now merely who I'm taking with me.  I'd like to take Allison, but she so-far seems legitimately uninterested.  So either I have a month to get her interested or I end up one of those losers who ends up seeing The Muppets without kids in tow.  Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I CAN be that loser!

Scott Mendelson  

07/16/99 - When the studios blew the best chance to legitimize the NC-17.

As seems to happen every year, bloggers, critics, and pundits are up-in-arms over an Oscar-bait film being awarded or threatened with an NC-17.  As usual, the film in question is a critically-acclaimed adult film with strong sexual content.  And once again, the many people arguing about this are missing the real problem.  Yes, it's annoying that ultra-violent horror films like Saw VII get R ratings while adult films with somewhat explicit sexual content get NC-17 ratings.  And yes it's annoying when somewhat more sensationalistic sexual content like that found in Black Swan gets an R while the apparently mature and allegedly thoughtful sexual content in Steve McQueen's Shame gets tagged with an NC-17.  But the problem is not with the rating, but with the enforcement of said rating.  Put simply, if major theater chains were willing to carry NC-17 pictures and mainstream media outlets would carry advertising for NC-17 pictures, then the debate over what film got what rating would be moot.  As it is, the problem with the NC-17 is not its seemingly arbitrary application (IE - far more likely for sex than for violence), but how it is viewed by the industry and the general moviegoers.

Almost since conception, the NC-17 rating has been 'illegitimate', not the 'for truly adult films' rating that it was intended, but another way to ghettoize adult films in the same way that the X was ghettoized due to its association with pornography.  As it is, until a major studio takes a financial risk by allowing a major motion picture to be released in 2,000-3,000 theaters with that NC-17 rating, the rating will continue to be a blockade against the mainstreaming of adult films with adult sexuality.  We had a chance twelve years ago, but Warner Bros. let it go.  As you probably recall, the MPAA initially tagged Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut with an NC-17 prior to its July 16th, 1999 release.  Warner Bros was in a bit of a pickle, since Kubrick had actually passed away several months prior.  So Warner Bros. was in the position of basically having to alter the final film from a legendary auteur without his consent or risk the financial peril that the NC-17 brings.  Instead of being brave, they merely put CGI-figures over the offending sexual content, creating something akin to the Austin Powers films (the running gag where nudity is obscured by random objects or other people walking in and out of frame).

But what if, way back when, Warner Bros. had stood its ground?  What if they had decided to not alter the film and release it as intended?  Would the theater chains who otherwise would refuse to carry NC-17 films really turn down a big-budget 'erotic thriller' starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman at the height of their fame?  Would the various media outlets really not conduct press for the movie, thus turning down interviews with the most famous Hollywood couple around at the time?  And if the film had gone into wide release as it was originally shot, what would have been the result?  Were there that many adult moviegoers who flocked to see a clearly adult erotic picture starring Cruise and Kidman who would shunned the film without that precious R?  The picture as is opened with $22 million before somewhat crumpling (it was sold more as a thriller than the drama that it was) and ending up with $56 million domestic and an additional $106 million overseas on a $65 million budget.  Assuming that the film had been on the same number of screens and received the same amount of pre-release publicity, does it not stand to reason that the film would have made about the same amount of money even with the dreaded NC-17?

The NC-17 will continue to be a 'scarlet letter' until a major studio is willing to risk releasing a major genre film with that adults-only rating and basically dare chains like AMC, Regal, and Cinemark not to carry it.  Be it an ultra-violent horror film or action picture, or a sexually-charged genre film, the NC-17 will not be saved by the moderate success of small-budgeted art-house fare like Shame or Lust, Caution.  Of course, in a post-Columbine era where Sony is taking a financial risk merely by releasing a big-budgeted genre thriller (The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo) with a mere R rating*, we're a long way off from that.  We may have had our best chance to salvage the NC-17 and the very idea of mainstream adult cinema twelve years ago.  And now it's gone...   As always, share your thoughts below.

Scott Mendelson

More of this nature -
How the Columbine shootings and Joe Lieberman killed the R-rating in 2001 HERE.
Why educational films like The Tillman Story should have trimmed for the lower rating HERE.
Last year's MPAA Oscar-bait controversy HERE.

Pity on the working man: Why Batman: Arkham City is a better, more enjoyable game than Batman: Arkham Asylum.

So now you know why I haven't posted much in the last few days.  Last week, I retweeted my two-year old whine fest about Batman: Arkham Asylum, basically asking whether or not I should buy the sequel.  The general answer was a qualified 'no' or at least 'not until you have lots of free time to blow'.  Alas, a surprise Best Buy gift card and a more flexible work schedule proved a lethal combination, and I ended up purchasing Batman: Arkham City on Monday evening.  Since that time, I've played maybe 3-4 hours worth, sneaking in an hour here or twenty-minutes there as time allows.  To my relief and/or surprise, not only is it a pretty terrific game, it's actually far more enjoyable.  Its improvements in fact imply (falsely I'm sure) that the developers read my rant two years ago and took my concerns to heart.  Intentional or coincidentally, the game-play and narrative changes basically fixes nearly every annoyance I had with the first game.

While the game is still long and overly complicated, the challenge level seems decreased for those losers like myself who select 'EASY' and 'YES' for onscreen hints.  I no longer find myself getting killed in six seconds flat when confronted with armed thugs, and I am able to actually enjoy the impressive combat functionality rather than merely feverishly pushing the buttons for survival.  And while the general narrative is as extensive as the last time around, the addition of side-missions and a more open-world environment make the game more suited for those like myself who no longer have hours-on end to play a game in a single sitting.  If I feel like playing and only have twenty minutes, I can either make as much progress as I can in the main mission, or I can go off on a side mission.  Or, thanks to the open-world environment, I can swing and glide around the city and find random thugs to beat the crap out of.  Point being, the new format is far more suited for casual play as well as concentrated   And unlike the last game, where getting from A to B was a boring chore, this time the journey is at least as much fun as the destination.

The first game was a generally earthbound 'Batman walks from room to room and occasionally gets into a fight' affair.  Aside from the occasional 'hide on a random perch in the ceiling' moments, it was basically a brawler without a ton of brawls and with an uncommonly harsh difficulty curve.  This time Rocksteady Studios took their cues from the better Spider-Man games.  Like Spider-Man 2 (and pretty much any Spidey game that came afterward), Batman: Arkham City lets players sail over the city and swing from building to building with the greatest of ease.  Merely jumping off a building and landing on a bad guy is entertainment all by itself, as are any number of the 'be Batman' scenarios littered throughout the game as a matter of course.  At this point, I'm probably 1/4 through the main narrative, with few of the side missions currently in progress and maybe 15% of the Riddler trophies already found.  I may never complete 100% of what the game has to offer.  But the fact that the moment-by-moment gameplay is actually more entertaining this time around makes me want to keep playing for my own amusement, rather than my own sense of obligation.


Batman: Arkham City is precisely what I wanted Batman: Arkham City to be.  It looks and sounds gorgeous of course, but the key is the accessibility.  The game, at least on the difficulty level I have selected, is far easier to play and progress, while the open-world format offers both a distraction from the core narrative and the means to actually indulge in the world that the game has created.  Merely swinging and gliding from rooftop to rooftop while occasionally pouncing on random bad guys is by-itself more entertaining that anything in the last game.  The technical specs are every bit as glorious as last time.  Plus, by offering a more forgiving difficulty level (complete with instructions for time-sensitive idiots like myself), a more expansive world, a variety of quickie side-missions, and an environment that is terrifically fun just to exist within, Batman: Arkham City is everything we liked about Batman: Arkham Asylum, as well as everything I wanted two years ago.  I may not beat the game anytime soon, but I'm going to sure-as hell enjoy trying this time around.

Scott Mendelson 

Weekend Box Office (10/23/11): Paranormal Activity 3 scores record October debut with $52.6 million (but it's not the top horror opening).

Despite what everyone else is reporting, Paranormal Activity 3 (review) did not set a record this weekend for the biggest opening for a horror film.  Lest we forget, Hannibal (review) opened with $58 million in February of 2001, which was actually the biggest R-rated opening ever at the time.  Anyway, Paramount's threequel/prequel will have to settle with merely being the second- biggest horror debut ever, the eighth-biggest R-rated opening, and the top October launch.  Tragic, I know. The $5 million film grossed a massive $54 million this weekend, which is a 29% jump from Paranormal Activity 2's $40.6 million opening this time last year.  The film had a massively front loaded weekend, the ninth-biggest on record, with a mere 2.02x weekend multiplier.  Still, that was better than the 2.01x weekend multiplier for Paranormal Activity 2 last year (the sixth-smallest such multiplier).  The picture played 53% under-25 and 54% female.  Considering the film pulled just in $1.7 million more at midnight, the $26 million opening day (around $6 million more than Paranormal Activity 2's $20.6 million Friday) and $12 million jump in total opening weekend compared to the last film, there is a clear growth in this series.


The first film opened very slowly, with massive per-screen averages leading up to a pre-Halloween wide release that grossed $21 million against the opening weekend of the comparatively under performing Saw VI (review) ($14 million).  Paranormal Activity (review) ended up with $109 million, while the sequel opened with a massive $40 million weekend but ended with just $84 million (a meager 2.1x weekend-to-final gross multiplier).  Even if the third picture manages equally poor legs, it will still end up with $110 million. Whether or not the series has peaked with the third installment like Saw III, this uber-cheap franchise has been a licence to print money for the last three years and should continue to be so for the next few Halloweens.  Paramount has scored a studio's dream - blockbuster grosses on a franchise with minuscule costs.  It's already done $26 million worldwide, giving the film a massive (for a cheap horror film) $80 million worldwide debut.  Come what may, they will be milking this series until the audience stops caring.

The other two wide releases were both domestic bombs, but both have already scored overseas.  The Three Musketeers (review), Paul W.S. Anderson's 3D version of the classic novel, grossed just $8.8 million.  That's lower than the $10.3 million opening for The Musketeer back in 2001, and even the $10.6 million opening for Disney's The Three Muskteers back in 1993.  The poorly-reviewed film played 50/50 across gender lines, with 36% under-25 and a Cinemascore grade of 'B'.  Still, the film has done solid business in European markets for the last month, with a worldwide gross of $73 million already racked up for the $75 million production.  Also scoring overseas was Universal's Johnny English Reborn (review).  The sequel to the 2003 Rowan Atkinson spy-spoof grossed just $3.8 million this weekend stateside, but has already amassed $108 million worldwide.

In limited-release news, Margin Call (one of the better films of the season, natch) grossed a solid $582,000 on 56 screens, for a solid $10,930 per-screen average.  The financial-crisis drama (starring Kevin Spacey, Stanley Tucci, Demi Moore, and Jeremy Irons among others) is also available as a Video On Demand title, making its theatrical performance all the more impressive.  Martha Marcy May Marlene, the allegedly terrific Elizabeth Olsen drama about a young woman who escapes from a cult (my wife wants to see it so I'm waiting) scored $34,000 per-screen on four screens, while the documentary Being Elmo earned $25,000 on a single screen.  The Mighty Macs, a family-friendly film about girls' basketball, grossed $1,000 per screen in 975 theaters.  Snowmen (review), another family film, debuted with $73,000 on 19 screens.

Nearly everything held up pretty well among older releases.  Real Steel (review) dropped just 30% in its third weekend, ending its 17th day with $67 million domestic and $153 million worldwide.  Footloose also dropped 30% and ended its second weekend with a decent $30 million (it cost just $24 million).  Nearing $30 million is The Ides of March, the $12 million political drama has held steady like prior George Clooney dramas like Syriana and Michael Clayton, so a similar $50 million total should be in store.  ALSO just under $30 million is the $8 million cancer comedy 50/50, which has rode solid word of mouth past its small $8.6 million debut to a near-4x weekend-to-total multiplier.  The major casualty among holdovers was The Thing, which was unloved by critics and audiences and plummeted 63% in weekend two.  The $38 million horror prequel now has $14 million after ten days.  Dolphin Tale is at $64 million while Moneyball (review) is at $63 million, and both should end with around $70-75 million (the latter could stick around depending on year-end love).

That's it for this weekend.  Join us next weekend when Puss In Boots (review) squares off against the Justin Timberlake/Amanda Seyfried sci-fi thriller In Time and Johnny Depp's second time playing Hunter S. Thompson in The Rum Diary (third if you count his narration of the terrific documentary Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson).  In limited release, Roland Emmerich's allegedly solid attempt at historical fiction Anonymous, opens on 200 screens.

Scott Mendelson           

Review: Puss In Boots (2011) is enjoyable, exciting, and intelligent all-ages entertainment plus a master-class in doing 3D 'right'.

Puss In Boots

2011
90 minutes
rated PG

by Scott Mendelson

Puss In Boots could have just been a 'one-off' picture from the prolific Dreamworks Animation department.  As a spin-off for a popular supporting character from the Shrek series, it has arguably more built-in appeal than something along the lines of How to Train Your Dragon or Megamind.  The film is already likely to be a big hit no matter how good or bad it is.  But the gang at the current House of Katzenberg refuse to take such easy roads to profitability.  What could have been a cheap and easy spin-off is instead a surprisingly engaging and richly constructed adventure film.  It is yet another sign that Dreamworks is every bit the equal of the Mouse House and they plan on staying there not by 'having their finger on the pulse of popular culture', but by merely making really good cartoons that respect their audience.  And that's what Puss In Boots is.  It's not as breathlessly exciting as How to Train Your Dragon nor is it as epic and emotionally profound as Kung Fu Panda 2.  With strong vocals, a simple-but-satisfying story, occasionally eye-popping visuals, and another master-class in 3D, Puss In Boots is simply a darn good cartoon.

A token amount of plot: Puss In Boots (Antonio Banderas, obviously having a blast being back in this sand... err... litter box) is an outlaw of sorts, a mercenary for-hire who attempts to maintain a token amount of morality as he goes about his business.  But a chance run-in with fellow 'cat-burglar' Kitty Softpaws (Salma Hayek) leads to a reunion with Humpty Dumpty (Zach Galifianakis, in a surprisingly compelling emotional turn), his former best who betrayed him into a life of crime seven years ago.  Mr. Dumpty offers a chance at a big score, with a chance for Puss to redeem himself by atoning for the original sin that turned him into an outlaw.  But as the trio attempt to steal magic beans from the murderous outlaws Jack (Billy Bob Thornton) and Jill (Amy Sedaris), Mr. Boots finds that redemption is not as easy as he thought, and survival may be the biggest challenge of all.

While technically a prequel to Shrek 2, this picture stands completely alone from the world of Fiona and Donkey.  It is merely a fantastical adventure that happens to star a character whom we've met before.  The story is relatively simple, while the complexity lies in the character arcs.  Despite ads that highlighted the comedic material (and there are several hearty laughs to be had), the film is a generally straight-ahead action picture, with the requisite fights, escapes, and stand-offs.  While the film doesn't approach the tragic pathos of Kung Fu Panda 2, the action sequences are shot and edited for maximum intensity even while the bloodshed and hard violence is kept to a minimum.  There are a few frightening moments and scenes of apparent danger, but Chris Miller deftly creates vicious villains that are none-the-less amusing in nature, which should limit the amount of frightened youngsters (my four-year old hid her eyes a couple times, but there was no lasting trauma).  The film's morality is a little complex, as our titular hero is clearly doing bad things for clearly good reasons, which is nothing unusual in adult fiction but may need some explaining to the youngest of audiences.

While the film is not a non-stop joke fest, nor (thankfully) is it riddled with pop-culture references, it does earn the laughs it goes for.  The comedy is generally either character-based or, um... 'cat-based'.  Cat people will frankly adore this picture, as there are any number of clever visual jokes and off-hand bits of dialogue that pay ode to the superior domestic animal (all due respect to my readers, but suck it, dog people!).  Kitty Softpaws's explanation for why she has no claws will resonate with cat owners, as will Puss's casual reaction.  After decades of cats being treated as one-dimensional villains (Cats and Dogs, Babe, etc) or being horribly murdered as a means of building suspense in horror films (let's just say there is no way that the makers of The Roommate would have thrown a dog into a dryer), it's a little refreshing to see a movie where the feline is both the star and the hero, and where the makers have a clear understanding of what it's like to be a cat and/or love a cat.  Again, I say this with utmost respect for the feelings and intelligence of my readers, but go lick your own balls, ye dog lovers (yes, I'm trying to impress my wife)!

It has become a cliche over the last decade to talk about how visually impressive and/or well-animated the latest big-budget animated feature happens to be.  So I'll keep this short.  The film is a glorious visual delight.  It is richly detailed (quite a bit of it is 'shot' in close-up for extra emphasis on facial features) and splendidly colorful.  If I may pay notice to one specific moment; there is a scene about halfway through the picture where our trio end up climbing 'the beanstalk' up to the giant's tower.  Without going into details, this moment is truly awe-inspiring and a wonder to behold.  It is for this sequence alone that the film merits viewing in 3D and on an IMAX screen unless you have financial or health-related objections to 3D.  Dreamworks has been playing around with 3D long-before Avatar.  They are at-this point unmatched when it comes to combining a genuinely immersive environment while providing eye-popping 3D moments that don't feel out of context.  Point being, Puss In Boots is a technical marvel in every plausible way.      

It is a testament to how committed Dreamworks is to delivering the goods each time out that this seemingly financially-mandated cash-in is as good as it is.  While it may not be fair to compare Puss In Boots to Cars 2 (which was part merchandise-bonanza, part Lasseter passion project), the truth is that Dreamworks created a solidly entertaining, visceral exciting, and visually dynamic adventure from their 'one for them' project, while Pixar's latest film, um... did not (it's no war crime, but Cars 2 is indeed pretty bad).  As it stands, the artistic failure of Cars 2 and artistic triumph of Puss In Boots can only be a good thing for lovers of animation.  The rare Pixar whiff, combined with Dreamworks being on a two-year hot streak, will only motivate Pixar not to get complacent about their place at the top.  And Dreamworks' continual desire for the respect and acclamation that Pixar receives, as well as the automatic cultural acceptance that comes with being a Walt Disney cartoon, will keep Dreamworks pushing ever harder.  Puss In Boots is no great artistic achievement, but it's a pretty terrific animated film that shows how far the studio has come in regards to raising their own personal bar.  They are a long way from A Shark Tale.

Grade: B+

PS - My four-year old also quite enjoyed herself (even if she didn't wear the 3D glasses for very long).  She liked the main characters and asked relevant questions afterward about the story.  For what it's worth, her favorite scene: 'where the two cats dance' is indeed one of the best moments in the film.

Review: Paranormal Activity 3 (2011) proves that the third time is not the charm.

Paranormal Activity 3
2011
81 minutes
rated R

by Scott Mendelson

For better or worse, the Paranormal Activity series is the Where's Waldo? of horror films.  You know when the lights go down and a graphic pops up on the screen telling you what day it is that something SPOOKY is going to occur.  But since you don't know what it is, you somewhat nervously scan the screen for any clue at where the creepy sight or randomly loud noise might come from.  It's an effect that makes the film the closest thing to actually walking through a haunted house ("Hey, that door's unlocked... look out!"), which explains much of the franchise's appeal.  Half of the fun of this kind of movie is watching the crowded audience react like puppets at just the right moments.  It's ironic that this series, which arguably looks and sounds no better on a big screen than it would as a bootleg viewed on a smart phone, is one of the few that absolutely demands to be seen in the biggest, most packed theater one can find.  As a party movie, a game of sorts among friends or fellow moviegoers, it has its value.  But as a movie, this third installment is both a bit of a cop-out and, thanks to its status as a prequel, a bit of a narrative cheat.

The plot - It's 1988 and young Katie Ray (Chloe Csengery) and Kristi Ray (Jessica Tyler Brown) are living with their parents when things indeed start to go bump in the night.  Since their father (Christopher Nicholas Smith) is a videographer by trade, he soon decides to set up cameras around the house in hopes of figuring out why all the weird stuff keeps happening.  And that's about it.  The fact that this is a prequel hampers the film in several potent ways.  First of all, we know that the two young girls are in no mortal danger, since we see their eventual fates in the earlier pictures.  Second of all, the fact that this film involves a family of four with two young girls puts a damper on the level of intensity for most of the film.  Put simply, it takes a lot less for a family with kids in it to get scared into getting the hell out of the house than it would for a young childless couple.

So for 2/3 of the picture, there are next-to-no real scares, with two of the biggest 'jump' moments literally being fake outs.  We play the usual waiting game, but it becomes quickly apparent that nothing scary is going to happen during the day (which was a problem in the earlier films as well), and very little pronounced imagery or noises are going to be seen or heard until pretty close to the end.  There is an early tease that is surprisingly potent (it involves more special effects than this series is known for), but nothing particularly disturbing happens for nearly the entire film.  We wait for loud noises and/or startling sights but they rarely if ever come.  Obviously the anticipation of fear is scarier than the shock itself, but after so many false beats or ineffective would-be jolts, the anticipation wears off and leaves only boredom.

Equally as troubling is the absolute lack of tension in this household.  The first Paranormal Activity (review HERE) at least worked as a compelling portrait of a young woman driven insane by a seemingly random haunting.  When we weren't being scared, we were somewhat engaged in her personal drama.  The second film also had a token amount of tension as the young couple struggled with the unexplained phenomena that threatened their newborn son.  But this time around, the mood in inexplicably light.  There is more humor this time around and, more importantly, an air of carefree lightness.  Since there are few true shocks, there is little real trauma for our characters.  Thus there is no drama to compensate for the lack of scares.  For nearly the entire picture, we are simply watching a happy and uninteresting family go about their business while a light occasionally falls from the ceiling.  And when the third-act tension does finally come, the film shoots itself in the narrative foot by making the mother (Lauren Bittner) into a classic 'continuously wrongheaded authority figure'.  She always says just the wrong thing and/or refuses to look at the video that would clearly prove that something is amiss, which turns much of the last third of the film into a giant Idiot Plot.

Then there is the finale.  I would not dream of revealing what occurs, but I will try to make some spoiler-free comments about it (if you want to skip this paragraph just to be safe, I won't be offended).  This is of course a prequel and since the prior two films make next-to-no mention of the events of this picture, it would stand to reason that nothing all-that traumatic occurred back in 1988.  But, without going into details, the finale of this picture certainly fits into the kind of climax that this series is known for.  So, we are left wondering just why the grown-up sisters are seemingly unscathed by the major events that occur during this prequel.  If the events of this picture happened to me when I was ten years old, I'd be pretty horribly scarred by them and I certainly wouldn't seemingly forget about the whole thing.

Anyway, Paranormal Activity 3 is hobbled both by its status as a prequel (which makes the last reel quite confusing) and by its strangely lighthearted tone.  With a lack of any real dramatic tension, as well as a surprising lack of potent scares, the film exists only as a fun-house exercise, something to be enjoyed with friends.  In that sense, it is somewhat effective (I did enjoy watching the other audience members watch the film with their hands over their eyes), but as a stand-alone horror film, it's pretty worthless.

Grade: C-  

Midnight Box Office (10/21/11): Paranormal Activity 3 scores $8 million in "midnight" shows. It's looking like a $48-52 million opening weekend.

I put the word "midnight" is quotes because Paramount was nice enough to offer 10pm shows in many theaters last night as well as the customary 12:01am screenings.  So, with the announcement that Paranormal Activity 3 made $8 million last night, I'm going to assume that they mean the 10pm and 12:01am shows.  While there may be some folks (like myself in fact) who checked out a 10pm screening who would not have bothered with a midnight showing, it stands to reason that most of the people who checked out a 10pm screening probably wouldn't have had much of a problem pulling a midnight shift either, so for the moment let's presume the effect of those blessed 10pm showings are negligible.  The math on this one is pretty easy.  If you recall, it was Paranormal Activity 2 and it's $6.3 million midnight gross this time last year that led me to start playing this game of 'midnight-to-weekend math'.  That sequel scored a record at the time for an R-rated midnight debut, which has since been beaten by the $10 million 12:01am showings of The Hangover part II.  Paranormal Activity 2, befitting its appeal as a midnight party movie (last night's audience was more fun than the movie itself), pulled in a hefty 15.5% of its $40.6 million weekend total at midnight.  A similar performance for this picture would give it an opening weekend total of $51 million.  So it stands to reason that the third picture should do about the same number, perhaps a little more due to progressive sequel-front-loading.  So, offhand, the opening weekend for Paranormal Activity 3 should fall somewhere between $48 million (if the number is 16.5% of its total) and $59 million (if the midnight number is just an unlikely 13.5% of its total).  Either way, Paramount has another cheap smash hit on its hand, which guarantees that we'll be seeing Paranormal Activity 4 this time next year.  Now I'm off to write my review.

Scott Mendelson     

Review: Paul W.S. Anderson's The Three Musketeers (2011) makes the (underrated) Disney version look like The Mask of Zorro.

The Three Musketeers
2011
110 minutes
rated PG-13

by Scott Mendelson

What is most unexpected about this umpteenth version of the Alexander Dumas novel is how generic it feels. Despite the use of 3D (FYI - I watched this film in glorious 2D) and a few bits of Mila Jovovich choreography, this movie could very well have been made in 1993 or 2001, which is when of course the last two stabs at this story were released.  It's the general same plot as always, with a few bits of the comparatively faithful Richard Lester versions from 1973 and 1974 thrown in (the last two didn't spent much time on stolen jewelry), and lacking any real visual reinvention that would make it stand out.  The lack of anything 'new' wouldn't be as much of a problem if the ingredients weren't so half-baked.  But Paul W.S. Anderson's The Three Musketeers is pretty much just another mediocre adaptation.  It's better than The Musketeer (IE - Three Musketeers with a bit of wire-kung fu), but that's not saying much.  At best, it makes one realize how good that oft-maligned Disney adaptation from 1993 really was.  Stephen Herek's all-star version may have been overtly kid-friendly, but it got the basics right.  As always, if you don't like the actual Musketeers, you aren't going to get much out of their adventure.

The plot.... well, it's the same as always.  Young D'Artagnan (Logan Lerman) sets off to fulfill his childhood dream of becoming a Musketeer, only to find that the legendary group has been disbanded.  Fortunately for him, there are treacherous plots afoot, as Milady de Winter (Mila Jovovich) schemes with Cardinal Richelieu (Christoph Waltz, seriously slumming) in a scheme to seriously mess with King Louis XIII and imperil all of France.  So, as always, it's up to three disgraced former Musketeers - Athos (Matthew Macfadyen), Porthos (Ray Stevenson), and Amaris (Luke Evans) to bring the would-be young Musketeer up to speed and save all of France.  But the pieces don't quite click this time around.  Lerman again proves that he is ill-suited to be an action hero, as his D'Artangnan never quite makes the leap from annoyingly cocky to heroically cocky.

The three title characters barely register, and it is here that the film most fails in comparison to its predecessors (come what may, the 1993 version introduced me to the wonderful Oliver Platt). This leaves the villains to provide most of the entertainment.  Jovovich delivers in her one major action sequence, but otherwise exists purely as eye candy.  Waltz is occasionally amusing, but he frankly pales in comparison to Tim Curry's splendidly wicked turn eighteen years ago in the same role (in what was arguably one of Curry's last great theatrical roles).  Mads Mikkelsen's Rochfort exists purely to have someone to duel for the action finale, but he lacks Michael Wincott's gravely menace or Tim Roth's haughty arrogance (Roth didn't play Rochfort, but his 'man in black' served the same purpose back in 2001).  The only villainous turn that registers is Orlando Bloom's Duke of Buckingham.  It's not a great performance, but it's obvious that Bloom is relishing his chance to overact for perhaps the first time in his career, and the fun is contagious.

The action scenes are surprisingly sparse and relatively bland.  The one positive is that Anderson, perhaps 'hobbled' by 3D cameras, shoots the scenes in long, wide, and fluid takes, rendering the relatively unimpressive choreography at least comprehensible and watchable.  If I say that I enjoyed the final sword fight, it is only because I am a sucker for duels to the death atop high structures.  The film feels lifeless and bland, to the point where what should be a wondrous sight (two airships blowing each other to pieces high above the clouds with cannonballs, machine guns, and flamethrowers) is very nearly dull.  It's a great visual idea, but Anderson never does anything remotely clever with it.

In the end, Paul W.S. Anderson's The Three Musketeers isn't so-much wretched so much as it is rendered unnecessary by its lack of imagination and rote casting decisions.  It's not very well acted, with a lack of clever writing and a shocking lack of major action sequences.  Without the ability to get the basics right, and without any real invention brought to this old story, it lacks anything aside from 3D to make it remotely worth.  This new Three Musketeers does little more than make you appreciate Richard Lester and/or Stephen Herek.   In the end, it's all for one, but all for naught.

Grade: C-

A Very Harold and Kumar Christmas gets a red-band trailer.

While this is just a touch spoilery, it does seem to be an improvement over the wretched second picture.  It's obvious that this franchise is going ever-more surreal, leaving behind the quasi-realism (stoned jaguars aside) of the first film.  One thing that does impress me is the continued presence of Paula Garcés.  She was basically Harold's 'prize to be won' in the first film, while she barely merited a cameo in the second, yet she again appears here, apparently now as Harold's wife.  In an age when male-centric franchises treat their female characters like disposables to be replaced by the newest flavor of the month in the next installment, it is refreshing that this series has bothered to maintain continuity (the Kumar's would-be love interest from Escape From Guantanamo Bay, Danneel Ackles, also makes a return appearance).  But on a different note, not only is Christopher Meloni apparently absent from this go-around, but his identical twin Elias Koteas is listed on the IMDB cast page as "Sergei Katsov".  Me thinks that Meloni was unavailable so the producers went for the logical replacement.  Anyway, this one drops on November 4th, and I can't imagine it will be worse than the first sequel, although hoping for something as brilliant as the initial installment is a fool's errand.

Scott Mendelson   

Review: Snowmen (2011) is a lightweight family film that doesn't pander to its young audience and deals frankly with mortality.

Snowmen
2011
85 minutes
rated PG

by Scott Mendelson

When I was quite a bit younger, I was always impressed by family films and/or kid-pics that acknowledged harsh truths of life and/or dealt frankly with darker subject matters.  Of course, in today's marketplace, what we consider 'kids films' are basically the same PG-13 rated blockbusters that everyone else sees and/or the mass-market PG-rated animated pictures that attempt to entertain adults and kids at the same time.  Since there are fewer and fewer big-studio films made for adults, it stands to reason that there is less of a need for explicitly kid-friendly movies of this nature.  Nonetheless, if you have young kids and want some middle ground between Cars 2 and Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Snowmen will likely fit the bill.  It is a throwback of sorts to the kind of movie that seemed tailor-made to be screened in elementary schools during 'movie day'.  It is a product of an age where kids still needed movies that were appropriate for them and didn't always have to talk down to them.

The plot, slight as it is, concerns the plight of young Billy Kirkfield (Bobby Coleman), a young boy who has been suffering from a reoccurring cancer for several years.  After overhearing word from his doctor that his health is not improving, Billy sets out on a quest of sorts to give his life some meaning in the time he thinks he has left (he wants, to paraphrase Roger from Rent, 'one great song before he dies').  Spurred on the local media coverage when Billy and his friends discover a frozen corpse in their backyard, Billy sets out to set a record, any record, that will get him into the Guinness Book of World Records.  Billy quickly settles on setting a new mark for the most amount of snowmen built at one time, and thus the proverbial clock is set.

While the film is less overtly morose than something like One Last Thing, the picture never shies away from the reality that Billy may not have much time left.  His father, Reggie Kirkfield (a fine Ray Liotta) slowly realizes that he has been playing the role of the obsessively positive patriarch not for Billy's sake, but for his own, while Billy's friends are relatively casual about their friend's condition.  Aside from the obvious undertones that exist, the film works as a relatively amusing, if occasionally generic coming-of-age story (confrontation with bullies, dealing with first crushes, etc).  At its core, writer/director Robert Kirbyson's obvious labor of love comes off like a toned-down, somewhat more realistic variation on Mark Steven Johnson's often fantastical Simon Birch.  To its credit, it does contain a glorified cameo from Christopher Lloyd in a wonderful scene which contains the actor's best theatrical role since, I dunno, Angels in the Outfield.

Snowmen is a simple pleasure, an unpretentious and generally charming kids' film that will remind you of the kind of stuff that your parents used to force you to watch instead of letting you watch Robocop or Silence of the Lambs.  It is unapologetic about its subject matter and only occasionally goes for the easy emotional beat.  It earns points for not pandering to its younger audience members, as well as kudos for not drowning in time-sensitive pop-culture references (as such, the film has a timeless quality that will serve it well).  It has simple and small-scale goals and achieves all of them with a token amount of class.  Come what may, Snowmen is a fun little movie for an audience that no longer has films made specifically for them.

Grade: B-

Review: Johnny English Reborn (2011) is mostly uninspired, but it's painless and harmless with at least one great scene.

Johnny English Reborn

2011
101 minutes
rated PG

by Scott Mendelson

It's obviously a bit of a left-handed compliment to refer to a film as 'not torture' or 'relatively watchable', but sometimes there are no better adjectives.  Johnny English Reborn is a slight film, a generally by-the-numbers spy spoof greenlit primarily because the first film grossed $160 million worldwide back in 2003 (most of that from overseas markets).  The first Johnny English was notable mostly for John Malkovich hamming it up as the villain, in a performance that contained an atrociously funny French accent and a nugget of trivia for those who've seen Being John Malkovich (hint - his character steals the Crown Jewels).  Revisiting it, it is remarkable how much its narrative (bumbling paper-pusher gets to be a real agent when the other secret operatives are massacred offscreen) was stolen for the Steve Carrell/Anne Hathaway Get Smart adaptation five years later.  So, nine years later, we now have Johnny English Reborn.

While it is not what anyone would call 'a good movie', it has a humble charm and a light and unpretentious air about it.  As spy spoofs go, it's not as ambitious but far less insufferable than either of the Austin Powers sequels, but lacks the cleverness of Undercover Brother.  Rowan Atkinson is the whole show here, and while he is game and occasionally funny, the film desperately needs a couple more comedic players.  Gillian Anderson is sadly given nothing to do as MI-7 leader Pegasus, while 31-year old Rosamund Pike (who was actually a Bond villain in Die Another Day back in 2002) is tasked with playing the love interest to 56-year old Atkinson.  No one, not the two female leads nor Dominic West as the revered Ambrose nor even English's young sidekick played by Daniel Kaluuya gets any real comic opportunities.  Even poor Richard Schiff makes a blink-and-you-miss it cameo in a role pretty identical to the one he played on Burn Notice a few years back.  Pik Sen Lim scores a few chuckles purely by playing a ruthless assassin with expected aplomb.  As noted, the first film has the hamming efforts of Mr. Malkovich, and this film desperately needs a villain of equal stature or presence.

Since it is purely a vehicle for Atkinson, it is somewhat revealing that he still knows how to deliver his shtick.  The former Mr. Bean is now 56 years old, but rather than ignore this factoid (what is mandatory retirement age at the real MI-5 anyway?), the film openly acknowledges it in the film's one great sequence.  The film's first major set piece is a gloriously clever foot chase involving Johnny English tracking down a murderous operative. Without going into details, the bad guy uses every action cliche in the book to evade capture while Johnny barely breaks a sweat.  It's a genuinely inventive and witty scene, and it surely makes the film worth a sample when it arrives on DVD or Netflix Streaming.  Still, aside from that great gag set and a handful of amusing bits (one of which involving a seemingly doomed cat), the film alternates between running on fumes and recycling jokes that the first film stole from The Naked Gun 2 1/2 in the first place.

As noted above, Johnny English Reborn is a not an ugly or evil film.  It is rated PG and is perfectly appropriate for younger audiences while giving them enough danger and violence to create actual suspense.  There are surely better films of this ilk (the Peter Sellers Pink Panther films for starters), but it's also rarely boring and just amusing enough to merit a viewing if one is so inclined.  As it stands, it earns most of its points for its general inoffensiveness and its occasionally winning moments of physical comedy.  But one can only imagine how much more this film (or this series really) could have been if Atkinson wasn't the only thing worth watching.

Grade: C+            

Review: Lucky McGee and Jack Ketchum's The Woman (2011) is thoughtful and insightful, but more entertaining to talk about than to watch.

The Woman
2011
101 minutes
rated R

by Scott Mendelson

Lucky McGee's The Woman, based on a novel written by McGee and novelist Jack Ketchum, is at once a probing bit of social commentary and a relatively dry horror picture.  It is easy to respect and admire due to its thesis, while it must be acknowledged that it gets where it wants to go pretty quickly and spends much of the rest of the film biding time.  The picture does build tension through silence, and its performances are spot-on throughout.  But its intentions are not subtle and McGee and company plays their hand by the end of the first act.  As a thoughtful and pointed examination of how the patriarchy operates as a tool for gender domination, as well as a look at how society plays 'Pygmalion' to women as a whole, it is worth a look and worthy of merit.  But it works better as a thesis statement than as a piece of genre entertainment.

A token amount of plot.  The film (and novel) is technically a sequel to Offspring. Without going into spoiler-y details for that earlier picture (which I seem to have liked more than most), this film concerns a stereotypical American family whose patriarch captures what is apparently the last remaining member of a violent and 'uncivilized' backwoods clan that has roamed the Northeast Coast for decades prior.  Capturing this young woman (Pollyanna McIntosh) and locking her in his basement, local lawyer Chris Cleek (Sean Bridges) basically attempts to 're-civilize' this apparent savage.  As the 'indoctrination' process proceeds, the Cleek family attempts to make some sense of their father's experiment and different family members react in different ways.  Needless to say, this don't end on an entirely happy note for at least a couple of these people.

The film, at its core, is basically contrasting the forced indoctrination of this 'untamed savage' with the same fear and violence-based methods that he uses to control his wife and daughters.  McGee and Ketchum also comment on the sort of nationwide (planet-wide?) forced-education that affects females, which teaches (nay forces?) women to act in certain ways and dress in certain ways in order to gain the acceptance of those around them.  At the core of the movie is the idea that the point of this widespread process (through enforced gender roles fed through mass media and political discourse) is intended to render women suited for the sexual appetites of men, with no other real need or purpose in civilized society.  In the film, and (implicitly) in modern life, sex is used as a tool of control, but is also the intended end-game in much of how we (as a society) teach women how to behave.

So while the film has a lot on its mind, as well as a thesis statement that I wholly agree with (without endorsing of course), it isn't quite as engaging as a film.  Once the picture establishes its basic plot, it's a somewhat long slog to the admittedly gripping finale (which is where most of the film's violence occurs).  The film does work as a disconcerting character drama, but those expecting a traditional horror film and/or more than a few moments of genuine tension may be disappointed.  The narrative through-line ends up resembling a variation on Jack Ketchum's earlier novel/film The Girl Next Door.  I do not wish the fault the picture for not fitting in a specific genre box, but there is a certain repetitiousness nature to the middle hour of the film.

In the end, The Woman is a film that is arguably more fun to talk about than it is to actually watch.  Playing like a horror film-variation on Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo (how society trains women to meet certain standards of behavior) and Zack Snyder's Sucker Punch (how society views women as primarily objects to be exploited sexually), Lucky McGee's picture is uncommonly smart and arguably bold in how bluntly he states his criticisms.   Like Snyder, McGee takes a risk in aiming at least some of his ire at the the very people who would enjoy his pictures.  If the film isn't as successful as entertainment as it is as a discussion piece, it can be recommended purely on account of its obvious intelligence.  It may not be a great horror movie, but The Woman is a pretty good film and a wonderful piece of social discourse.

Grade: B                          

Would Warner risk hurting Sherlock Holmes 2 to promote The Dark Knight Rises?

Put this one in the 'crazy rumor that seems self-defeating' category.  Slashfilm is reporting (as a rumor, to be fair) that Warner Bros. may be attaching an eight-minute IMAX preview of The Dark Knight Rises to IMAX prints of Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol.  On the surface, it makes sense. Warner Bros. debuted the shot-in-IMAX prologue for The Dark Knight in front of IMAX prints of I Am Legend back in December 2007 while debuting the conventional two-minute trailer in front of 35mm prints of the same film on the same day.  Since Warner Bros doesn't have an IMAX film coming out this holiday season, and since Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol has about 25 minutes worth of IMAX footage, it certainly seems a logical match. But there is a BIG 'BUT' here.

Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol will be debuting in IMAX five days ahead of its conventional 35mm release date.  So the technical premiere of this Dark Knight Rises footage would be December 16th, 2011.  Well, that is of course the same day as the opening of Warner Bros' Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.  I've long presumed that we'd see the second teaser-trailer in front of Sherlock Holmes 2, following the same general pattern as The Dark Knight's marketing schedule (which would include a longer trailer attached to The Avengers in May).  So, with Warner Bros. debuting its own highly valuable franchise sequel on December 16th, with the option of debuting an 'exclusive' teaser for The Dark Knight Rises, why would they help Paramount by offering Mission: Impossible IV its own 'exclusive' IMAX sneak-peak, on the same day no-less?  Of course, Warner Bros. may feel that the IMAX opening weekend of Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol will not cut into the opening weekend of Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, but why-oh-why would Warner Bros. be willing to help a rival studio's franchise in such a way?

Obviously this will be confirmed or denied in the next few days or so, but it will be interesting to see if Warner Bros. is so exclusively concerned with hyping The Dark Knight Rises (a film that arguably doesn't need any hype at all) that they are willing to shoot their other films in the foot in the process.  What do you think?  If this is true, does it make sense for Warner Bros to risk the opening weekend of Sherlock Holmes 2 in order to further-tease The Dark Knight Rises?

Scott Mendelson

Now THAT'S more like it! Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows gets a darker, more engrossing trailer that highlights Moriarty accordingly.

It is perhaps worth noting that this sequel was intended to be in 3D when it was announced early last year, but now the plan seems to be going for pure 2D.  Make of that what you will... I'm still miffed that Jared Harris is not getting billing as arch-fiend Professor James Moriarty, but that's a small quibble.  What matters is that this trailer sets up a darker, more violent, and more expansive adventure rather than just selling overly broad humor.  Yes, there is some bawdiness, but there is a clear establishing of the grand stakes, along with the implication that Moriarty is racking up a tidy body count in the process.  I wish they hadn't revealed the respective gag at 1:55, but I am glad that they've stopped hiding the fact that Rachel McAdams is indeed returning for this go-around.  While the trailer does seem action-packed, with explosions and gunfire galore, it is heartening to notice that most of the action beats seem to be from two major sequences (a chase/gun-battle in the woods and the train sequence).  I'm also glad to see Eddie Marsan returning as Inspector Lestrade, both because I like the actor and I'm a big proponent of maintaining character continuity for sequels of this nature.  Anyway, this is a far superior trailer to the one that debuted in July, so hopes remain high that the sequel will at least be as good as the rock-solid original picture.  No, Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes wasn't as good as the BBC Sherlock series.  Yes, I'm still allowed to enjoy them both.  Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows opens on December 16th, so as always, we'll see...

Scott Mendelson   

The Adventures of Tintin gets a dynamite domestic trailer and moody poster.

The poster came from Drew McWeeny's HitFix (click to 'embiggen'), so credit where credit is due.  What's best about this trailer, aside from the overall quality of what is shown, is the implication that Steven Spielberg and Paramount are in fact holding back the really good stuff for actual ticket-buyers.  I'm not one to speak about 'American Exceptionalism' and/or 'Manifest Destiny', but I do take great umbrage at Paramount's decision to open this one in Europe two months before we Americans get to sample it.  I get the concept.  The characters are far more popular in Europe and other foreign markets than they are in America, so Paramount wants to use the likely overseas success to build word of mouth and positive reviews.  But skimming the rave reviews that have already come out while knowing we still have two months to wait is the rare sort of thing to make me openly whine about 'America First!' and all that silliness.  We're Americans after all, so we expect instant gratification!  Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson's The Adventures of Tintin: We want it NOW!

Scott Mendelson