The final trailer for The Dark Knight Rises finally sells me. I'm officially excited again. It feels good to be back on board.

I'm frankly a little disappointed that Warner Bros. didn't have the courage to just wait a few days and debut this thing in theaters attached to The Avengers.  This is a big-scale trailer and deserves to be seen in theaters before dissecting it on a computer-screen.  Unless they were trying to slightly chip away at The Avengers's opening weekend (re - repeat viewings from those who've attended press/preview screenings), I really don't know why they chickened out at the last minute.  But having said that, this is a pretty terrific trailer.  Yes, much of the material in the first 2/3 is merely extended glimpses of what we've seen before, but this looks like exactly what it needs to be: an emotionally-powerful, socially-relevant action-drama that happens to take place within the world of Batman.  The clip uses the slow rising towards the familiar Batman Begins theme to literally raise goose-bumps.  Bane looks more imposing in action, Hathaway's Catwoman feels surprisingly appropriate and at home in Nolan's Gotham, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt seems to be filling the role of the 'hope' that Jim Gordon has apparently lost (his lack of screentime here makes me all-the-more concerned that he dies in the first act, which in-turn spurs Bruce out of retirement).  Kudos to Warner and Nolan for crafting three trailers that, like The Dark Knight four years ago, only reveal the barest bits of plot and story.  I don't expect this to be a game-changer like The Dark Knight, and I don't expect it to appeal to the inner-Bat geek in me as much as the last iconic Batman/Gordon vs. The Joker epic did.  But there now seems little doubt that The Dark Knight Rises should at least be a damn-good motion picture and a hell of a series finale.  This one drops July 20th.  As always, we'll see, but I'm back on the 'happy train'.

Scott Mendelson 

Weekend Box Office (04/29/12): Think Like a Man tops again as four new releases perform relatively poorly. Oh, and The Avengers assemble overseas to the tune of $178 million.

In the weekend before the official start of the summer season, four new releases, all of which were relatively smaller fare, all debuted to numbers ranging from not awful to genuinely awful (or example 4,321 on why comparing total weekend box office is stupid).  The top film this weekend was once again Think Like A Man, which dropped a surprisingly decent 46%, earning another $18 million.  The ensemble romantic comedy has now earned $60 million, putting it on track to be among the domestic bigger grossers of the first 1/3 of 2012.  If we're specifically talking 'black-films', then the Tim Story picture is a few days from outgrossing every Tyler Perry movie save Madea Goes to Jail, which grossed $90 million three years ago (the second highest-grossing Perry film is the $63 million-grossing Madea's Family Reunion). With a smaller drop and a larger second weekend off a $8 million-smaller opening weekend, it may pass that mark all the way to $100 million if it can hold onto screens as summer begins.  It will soon surpass the $65 million gross of Barbershop 2, the $67 million gross of Waiting to Exhale, and the $75 million gross of Barbershop within the next full week.  It's also out-grosssed and/or will likely out-gross any number of higher-profile 'white' romantic comedies or dramas (the $81 million-grossing Dear John, the $84 million-grossing Stupid, Crazy Love, the $54 million-grossing New Year's Eve, etc).  Usually when a $12 million-budgeted film ends up flirting with $100 million, studios respond with sequels and/or star-vehicles for certain higher-profile cast-members.  We'll see if Hollywood again writes off this 'unconventional' smash hit as a 'fluke' or whether Kevin Hart, Gabrielle Union, and Meagan Good (among others) get any 'bumps' off this film's unquestionable success.

The uber-big overseas news of course came from the foreign debut of The Avengers (review).  Opening in about 70% of the major world markets, the $220 million super-hero team-up picture earned a colossal $178 million over its first five days.  That's the ninth-biggest worldwide opening weekend of all-time, and the biggest for a movie that wasn't explicitly a sequel (semantics perhaps, but bare with me).  Combined with what will surely be a minimum-$135 million US opening next weekend, and the Marvel production should flirt with $400 million in the tank by a week from today.  As of today, it is the tenth-biggest worldwide grosser of 2012 in just five days (it has already outgrossed the $170 million cume of Battleship which has been playing for nearly a month).  By next week, it will be number-two behind only The Hunger Games ($589 million).  The Avengers may or may-not surpass the $372 million-and-counting domestic cume for The Hunger Games, but it is sure to be the worldwide champion of 2012 at-least until The Dark Knight Rises debuts on July 20th.

Back to domestic news, the highest-grossing of the four new releases was The Pirates: Band of Misfits.  The  Aardman Animation stop-motion toon grossed a solid $11.4 million, nearly besting the $12 million debut of Arthur Christmas last Thanksgiving.  That film had strong legs and eventually reached $46 million in the US and $100 million overseas. The $50 million Pirates! Band of Misfits has already amassed $75 million worldwide so it appears that this is another release where the domestic gross is merely icing on the cake.  Universal's The Five-Year Engagement performed rather poorly this weekend, bringing in $11.2 million despite starring Jason Segel and Emily Blunt.  Blunt hasn't really had a chance to test her alleged star-power (she frankly usually plays the needless 'token love interest'), but Segel is a press-friendly star of How I Met Your Mother and a card-carrying member of the Apatow gang with two genuinely solid opening weekends ($17 million for Forgetting Sarah Marshall and I Love You Man respectively).  Still, the film cost just $30 million, so if it doesn't completely die overseas it should break even in the end. The harm is more about the egos of its stars than actual financial loss for the studio.

The next two releases were star-driven, R-rated thrillers that maybe... JUST MAYBE... shouldn't have opened on the same weekend.  Safe (review) may be one of the best films of Jason Statham's career (The Bank Job is arguably better), but a marketing campaign that made it seem like a rhiff on Mercury Rising and a crowded weekend made it among his lowest openings as an action-lead.  The film earned $7.7 million this weekend, meaning it will be lucky to crack $20 million after The Avengers steals away every action junkie on the planet.  There are exceptions here and there, but Jason Statham's career is a lot like Adam Sandler's.  The better and/or more challenging the movie, the worse it performs at the box office.  Relatively moved the John Cusack thriller The Raven into this uber-crowded weekend somewhat at the last minute, and it's obvious they knew they had a critical turd on their hands.  And indeed the 'Edgar Allen Poe catches a serial killer' picture debuted with just $7.2 million. There isn't much to say about this one, other than the truly awful reviews left me disinterested in a film that I secretly hoped would be a trashy good time.  Alas...

The big limited debut was the scorching $30,000 per-screen average of Bernie, which earned $90,000 on three screens.  Still, moral victory and all, this Jack Black/Matthew McConaughey/Shirley MacLaine comedic crime story is just the sort of thing that would have been a wide release just a few years ago.  Hopefully Millennium Entertainment expands it over the summer. In holdover news, uh... not much folks.  The Hunger Games returned for a one-week IMAX re-release, which probably somewhat accounts for the mere 23% dip this weekend.  Still, the legs on this thing have been beyond impressive, especially in this day-and-age.  The Lucky One dropped 49% from last weekend's solid debut, bringing the Zack Efron vehicle to a perfectly healthy $39 million after ten days.  Anything over $50 million is a big win for the romantic drama.  Chimpanzee dropped 46% in weekend two, giving it a solid $19.1 million over ten days.  The Disney Nature documentary will surpass the $19.4 million gross of Oceans in the next day or two, leaving only the $32 million gross of Earth in its path for this specific series of releases.  


Cabin in the Woods (still the year's best film) has amassed a solid $34 million, meaning that the positive word-of-mouth from the horror geeks is somewhat balancing out the confused masses.  The Three Stooges has $37 million, meaning it will likely just-barely pass $50 million.  Wrath of the Titans has $80 million US and $281 million worldwide while Mirror Mirror has $56 million over here and $135 million worldwide (not good enough with that pesky $85 million budget).  American Reunion has proven slightly more successful than expected, with $53 million domestic (low for the series) but $75 million overseas, for a $126 million worldwide total thus far (still below the $200 million+ worldwide grosses of the three prior theatrical entries).  Finally Titanic 3D has $56 million in the US, which is just icing on the cake for its massive $286 million worldwide gross.  Since it's Titanic, I don't want to even try to predict where it will end up globally, but it should be among the biggest worldwide hits of the year even by the time summer ends.

That's it for this weekend.  Join us next time for... um... oh right, The Avengers and really nothing else on a wide scale.  Until then, read my Avengers review, keeping reading, commenting, and sharing accordingly.  Take care.

Scott Mendelson              

         

Another weekend, another perfect example of the utter stupidity of weekend-to-weekend box office comparison...

Granted, I'm going by unofficial weekend estimates based on the Friday box office figures, but it appears that the entire total gross of all films in the box office top-twelve this weekend will equal around $96 million.  This same weekend last year had a total top-12 gross of $145 million, meaning this weekend will be down by about 34%.  I guess according to the standards set by the 'official' box office punditry, that would mean that moviegoing may be in a slump, right?  I mean, weekend-to-weekend totals are down by nearly $50 million compared to 2011 on this specific weekend!  Oh... wait, what's that you say?  Last weekend had the debut of Universal's Fast Five, the much-anticipated fifth installment in the recharged Fast/Furious franchise?  You remember Fast Five, right?  Great reviews, strong marketing, popular franchise... all of these things led to a massive $86 million opening weekend, the biggest in Universal history.  Yes that's right, last year had Universal rolling the dice and successfully kicking off the summer season a week earlier than usual, and it paid off in spades.  So you have a weekend where one film last year made almost as much as the entire top-twelve films' total grosses from this year.  You mean we shouldn't be too surprised if the cumulative might of The Raven, Safe, The Pirates: Band of Misfits, and The Five-Year Engagement couldn't quite measure up to a blockbuster debut like Fast Five? The four openers should gross about $36 million combined over the weekend, or about what Fast Five alone made on its opening day.  Oh right, maybe, just maybe, it IS about the individual movies performing at levels that are judged based on the respective expectations of each specific picture after all!  Four small-ish pictures debuted with relatively small-ish grosses, and their combined might plus the various holdovers weren't enough to equal the juggernaut of a presold (and well-reviewed, natch) blockbuster sequel.

And what about next weekend?  Well, the first weekend in May last year had the $65 million debut of Thor, which led the charge for a top-12 total of $155 million.  How about the first weekend in May this year?  Well, there is a pretty solid chance that The Avengers will both gross $65 million on its first day and gross $155 million all-by-itself, thus guaranteeing that total weekend box office will be far higher for next weekend than it was for the same weekend last year.  The point of all of this is simple.  Using the 'total weekend gross' of a given weekend compared to the same weekend from a prior year is a foolish and detrimental way to judge the success of a movie-going weekend and/or any other portion (month/season/year/etc).  Whatever happens to drop in March 2013, there is a pretty large chance it won't be as massive as the $375 million-and-climbing success of The Hunger Games.  As a result, the entire cumulative box office for March and/or the entire second quarter of 2013 will likely take a big dive compared to 2012.  It won't mean we're in a slump.  It will, as it always does, merely mean that different movies are opening and/or grossing whatever each individual movie will gross.  Box office isn't a team sport.  Universal won't care that Disney's John Carter flopped if Battleship is a hit.  It's not poker. It's blackjack, where each film is individually competing against their own specific expectations designated by their production budget, marketing costs, and other 'anticipation' factors.  As always, box office analysis is and should remain focused on the individual movies and their grosses.

Scott Mendelson              

Review: Safe (2012) delivers brutally polished film noir action drama in what may be Jason Statham's best film yet.

Safe

2012
95 minutes
rated R

by Scott Mendelson

Writer/director Boaz Yakin's Safe is the kind of B-movie action film that does the designation proud.  It is openly thoughtful and intelligent, crafting a truly engrossing bit of character drama while holding the action in reserve until it matters.  It delicately balances a real-world narrative with action sequences that are just a touch over-the-top without ever sacrificing drama for thrills or vice-versa.  It's unapologetically what it is, but Yakin and star Jason Statham have crafted a rock-solid action drama that is rooted in 1940s film-noir transfused with an authentic post-9/11 paranoia New York City milieu.  It's high time I stopped referring to movies like this (adult-skewing R-rated star-driven genre pictures) as 'the kind of films they just don't make anymore', since such films have clearly made a comeback in the last couple years.  And Safe is a sterling example of why they have a genuine value in the cinematic landscape.

There is actually quite a bit of plot, so I'll try to go easy on the synopsis details.  Long-story short, down-on-his-luck Luke Wright (Jason Statham) is a man alone in the world, for reasons made tragically clear in the opening reel.  Intentionally cutting himself off from any real human connections, the former cage-fighter is pulled back into the land of the living when he witnesses a young Asian girl being pursued by several opposing forces, none of which seem to have her best interests at heart.  A moment of decisive action puts young Mei (Catherine Chan, delivering a strong, low-key turn) into Wright's custody and both of them in immediate danger.  As Luke realizes who this girl is and why she is so valuable, he finds himself in the unique position of power broker among a Chinese crime family, the Russian mafia, and corrupt NYC cops who are also trying to play both sides.  None of this is overtly original, but this well-worn story is told with high-style, genuine tension, and a gray amorality that keeps it from becoming a routine 'redemption' journey.

As mentioned above, this is a dark and grimy picture, filled with strong character actors (Chris Sarandon, national treasure James Hong still kicking ass at 83 years old) and authentic New York City locations.  The action and violence is held in check for the first half of the film, as our two leads are fully developed even as they start their journey on opposite shores.  The lone burst of sustained violence in the first act is somewhat of a marvel, a terrifying abduction sequence which is executed in a single child's-eye view take.  But when the film becomes a full-blown action picture, we are treated to a flat-out nuts shoot-out in a public place.  Much of the action is like this.  Instead of empty warehouses or abandoned flame factories, most of the set-pieces take place in full public view.  One could carp that the type of sensational violence that takes place would realistically bring about national scandal to the parties involved, but it's somewhat worth the trade-off for the heightened tension and suspense as civilians and bystanders are put in genuine jeopardy as this crime story unfolds.  While the hand-to-hand fighting is a bit too choppy for my tastes, it is edited with more-than-enough clarity for narrative coherence, and the film earns points for crafting some genuinely unique action set-pieces.

Statham arguably plays his stock character, but like The Bank Job, he does it in a film worthy of his buttoned-down rage.  He's as good here as he's ever been, even if it wouldn't qualify as 'stretching'.  The supporting characters are all genuine human beings; be they on the side of outright evil or only somewhat evil.  Reggie Lee especially shines as Mei's primary captor as he makes the most out of limited screen-time.  He is given a few moments of empathy as it is made clear that he genuinely cares about this young girl as much as his profession allows him to (alas, the picture fails to give him a true 'final scene').  The cast of cops, criminals, and criminal cops may skirt with cliche, but the lived-in performances bring token depth that gives the tale more emotional stakes than you'd expect.  The film has a genuine authenticity, from its locations to its crackling details of casual corruption, that would arguably make James Elroy proud, even as he rolled his eyes at some of the more outlandish action beats.

Safe is an unabashed genre picture, but it also happens to be a damn-good one.  It's tightly constructed and flawlessly acted, with a strong screenplay that balances character, plot, and action without ever letting one overshadow the others.  Whether or not it's better than The Bank Job is merely an arbitrary distinction, as the under-seen Roger Donaldson period-heist picture is such a different kind of picture.  But among the many films where a bad-ass Jason Statham wears a nice suit, beats the hell out of countless thugs and shoots quite a few more, Safe is easily at the top of that admittedly specific sub-genre.

Grade: B+

Please enjoy these 12 character posters from The Expendables 2.

Lionsgate sent these straight to me, a day late per usual.  Actually, I'm not complaining because it means I don't have to track down where each poster debuted yesterday and give each site credit.  That it's the right thing to do doesn't make it less of a pain.  Anyway, enjoy these twelve character posters from The Expendables 2 after the jump.  Coming this August from Lionsgate, featuring as much R-rated violence and gore as post-production CGI can bring you.  Can you guess which of the twelve distinctly looks like he could most-certainly *not* kick your ass?  Well, no besides Chuck Norris...

Scott Mendelson

Review: So close yet so far, Joss Whedon's The Avengers (2012) is an often soaring but occasionally frustrating B-movie with several A+ ingredients.

The Avengers

2012
142 minutes
rated PG-13

by Scott Mendelson

In a film like The Avengers, which brings together strands of several prior pictures into a mostly cohesive whole, it is arguably inevitable that individual pieces will end up working better than the sum of its parts. That the film works at all is almost a miracle, and it's so purely entertaining and contains so much that works like gangbusters that it's tempting to ignore what doesn't work and merely salute the enterprise. It is a relentlessly engaging and confident motion picture, boasting a cast that in a more respected genre would make it an Oscar-bait film. But the film comes so close to out-and-out greatness that it's almost disheartening to point out the core issues at fault, both because it feels petty and because it's almost a genre masterpiece. Still, there is much to like and quite a bit to love about Joss Whedon's The Avengers. On a pure popcorn spectacle scale I can't imagine anyone feeling that they didn't get their money's worth. As a piece of art however, it's a trickier proposition.

I'm forgoing a plot synopsis because I can't imagine anyone reading this who doesn't have a general idea of the film and its characters. First of all, the initial twelve minute pre-credits sequence is absolutely terrible. It's a poorly written, stiltedly-performed set-piece that artlessly reintroduces Tom Hiddleston's Loki (Thor's turncoat brother) and establishes the McGuffin (the rediscovered 'tesseract' from Captain America). It's by-far the worst sequence in the film, so it's mostly uphill from there. Anyway, the rest of the first act is spent reintroducing our favorite Marvel heroes and reestablishing relationships. Captain America-himself, Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) gets somewhat less to do in this early chunk, as the film makes it clear that he is a supporting character in this superhero team-up (it's no secret that a scene involving Rogers trying to reconnect with his old life didn't make the cut). For continuity junkies like myself, it is a thrill to see Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) in a mutually beneficial romantic relationship, and Stark's 'recruitment' moments with SHIELD agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) crackle with familiarity and genuine friendship among all three of them. The introductory bits for Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) are filled with intelligence and wit while the somewhat delayed entrance for Thor (Chris Hemsworth) provides one of the most emotionally compelling moments in the film. The genuine brotherly love that Thor and Loki share gives the hero/villain relationship a deeper shading and Hiddleston once again refuses to play a purely stock villain (his confidence and certainty is a bluff).

This first act ends with most of the heroes introduced to each other and co-existing as they attempt to decipher Loki's master plan. It's this middle 45-minute chunk where the picture soars the highest. The dialogue is vintage Whedon even while every character speaks in a voice uniquely their own. Tony Stark is genuinely thrilled to be conversing with a scientist of Banner's capabilities, and Banner warmly embraces at least one person who cares more about the scientist than the monster inside of him. Downey Jr. gives a better all-around performance here than he did in Iron Man 2, while Mark Ruffalo once again proves how effortlessly he elevates every film he appears in. Johansson gets several enjoyable moments, including an interrogation sequence that both reveals backstory and establishes character. With all the talk about how noted-feminist Joss Whedon would handle a bro-fest like The Avengers, the answer is simple. Neither Natasha Romanoff (IE - Black Widow) or SHIELD agent Maria Hill (Colbie Smulders) are remotely sexualized and their skills are completely taken for granted. Moreover, if you look around the SHIELD aircraft, about half of the onscreen agents just happen to be women. 

 Anyway, this second act is where the picture shines, perfectly balancing character interaction with token plot advancement, while climaxing with a spectacular action set-piece that is both viscerally exciting and emotionally engaging.  Hemsworth gets surprisingly little screen-time overall, considering that the film is most closely connected to Thor, but he gets far more of an opportunity to 'bring the thunder' than he did in his debut picture (at least they bother to explain why Natalie Portman isn't around).  Clark Gregg basically operates as the cool-headed professional amid the carnage as well as occasionally as the audience surrogate, as thrilled to see these guys all in the same room as we theoretically would be.  Smulders is basically an exposition device while Jeremy Renner's Barton (IE - Hawkeye) spends so much time under the brainwashing control of Loki that he doesn't really get to do more than cut loose in the action climax.  Still, pretty much everyone enjoys interacting with everyone else, and the fun is supremely contagious.

Truth be told, the second-act 'conflict' doesn't make sense in hindsight. We're told that these super-powered heroes can't get along, yet they only come to blows when Nick Fury's (a frankly slumming Samuel L. Jackson) subterfuge is revealed. They seem to work together just fine except when SHIELD gets in the way. Still, the second-act climax pushes a token emotional button, and the film even acknowledges that the would-be hero's journey is somewhat fabricated for the sake of uniting these damaged souls. And the whole concept of 'these grand heroes coming together to solve a problem' seems unnecessary. Point being, if aliens invaded the Earth, would it not be expected that Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, and the fellow agents of SHIELD would make a choice to at least pitch in and prevent widespread carnage? The idea that Nick Fury has a grand idea to unite these heroes and that these heroes have to put aside their differences to work as a team seems like an attempt to graft an overriding theme to a story that really doesn't have one. It's a minor quibble, but the whole 'Avengers Initiative' that Nick Fury endlessly babbles about seems like a solution to a non-existent problem.

Furthermore, like so many would-be event pictures, the film's storytelling basically ceases at the 2/3 mark so that the big climactic battle scene can begin. If you've seen any of the marketing, you know that the film ends with an alien invasion in downtown Manhattan. The action itself is fluidly shot, creatively staged, and coherently edited. And while it avoids repetition because it has enough recognizable combatants to always have someone different to cut to, the climax is a purely visceral exercise with just enough crowd-pleasing moments to overcome its familiarity to last summer's Transformers: Dark of the Moon. Unlike last summer's Michael Bay FX demo-reel, the invading aliens seem to go out of their way to not vaporize civilians and bystanders onscreen, to the point where their 'shoot to miss' strategy becomes noticeable. And while Alan Silvestri's score is serviceable, it's badly missing some kind of unifying theme and/or emotional chorus that would give the pyrotechnics a jolt when required (Steve Jablonsky may have cribbed the Zeck Hemsy Inception trailer music for the Transformers 3 climax, but it damn-well worked). And the logistics of Loki's plan call into question the basic intelligence of our heroes, as we ask ourselves why they didn't realize where Loki's attack point was going to be right from the start and/or why that specific building doesn't seem to have even basic security measures. Still, the film does right by each of its heroes, giving them each multiple chances to shine (yes, the Hulk does indeed smash and it is pretty terrific when he does).

The climax also highlights the inherent danger of having a shared universe, as you have to somewhat explain why EVERY capable hero doesn't pitch in when the chips are down. As we see human 'Avengers' like Black Widow and Hawkeye doing a perfectly fine job fending off the invaders, we have to stop and wonder why other equally capable reinforcements didn't show up to help. Why are none of the other SHIELD agents defending the city? Why didn't Stark call in Rhodes to man the War Machine battle-suit? Why doesn't Odin conjure up some dark magic and send Asgardian warriors, since it's his son that's causing this chaos in the first place? And without a super-powered villain to fight/destroy in the finale (Loki is around, but he's basically watching his handiwork and sneering) or any kind of status-quo changing moment to end on, the film lacks an emotional climax of any kind (SPOILER - the film needs to end with the heartbreak of Thor killing Loki, but Marvel doesn't have the courage for that kind of finality). It's all about watching people in candy-colored suits blowing up a vaguely-robotic army. Considering Joss Whedon is known for his unabashedly operatic season finales for Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, it is borderline shocking that the film lacks any kind of story or character-driven climax to go along with its large-scale action beats (the film further annoys in this regard by threatening to kill the one character who you most-certainly know isn't going to die).

So if the film lacks the heart and narrative discipline of Joe Johnston's Captain America, it is easily better, smarter, and just-plain more entertaining than any Marvel Studios production not set in the 1940s. The dialogue is generally whip-smart and laugh-out-loud clever at the same time. All of the principle performers are in peak form, and the picture has a scale that does its four-color origins proud. And while I may have desired more than just fireworks during the third act, those fireworks are quite impressive and are truly cinematic in nature. But the plot is a bit confused, with much of the film spent jogging in place for the inevitable climactic smack-down promised in the trailers. The film opens and ends pretty terribly, with an epilogue that has a bunch of news footage praising and criticizing the newly revealed heroes plus Fury babbling yet again about how the heroes will return when they are needed while brushing off the shocking real-world implications of what just happened (both the invasion and the response).

But the middle two-hours are rock-solid entertainment through-and-through. Tony Stark is allowed genuine character progression while Mark Ruffalo is such a fun Bruce Banner that I'd gladly watch a solo Hulk film where he never actually 'Hulked-out'. When The Avengers highlights the character interaction that makes up the soap opera-ish world of comic books, with great actors digging into genuinely meaty characters, it's firing on all cylinders. And the action sequences, even when they are purely about the action choreography and special effects, are top-notch (even the 3D looks great). Long-story short, I wish The Avengers was a truly terrific film, but I'll have to settle for it merely being a darn-good movie.

Grade: B+

Prior Marvel reviews -
Incredible Hulk
Iron Man 2
Thor
Captain America

John Hillcoat's Lawless gets a just-plain fun trailer.

Let's not pretend that this looks like high art just because it has a terrific cast and a period-set American crime story at its center. But I also won't pretend that this doesn't look like quite a bit of fun. Shia LaBeouf's career as a genuine leading man will live or die based on his reception here, but the cast he is surrounded by (Tom Hardy, Jessica Chaistan, Gary Oldman, Guy Pearce, Mia Wasikowska, Noah Taylor) is so bloody terrific that all he has to do is keep his head above water. The narrative is pretty generic, but this is yet another one of those 'old fashioned movies' that I've been talking about. Real actors and movie stars in knotty, presumably character-driven narratives that don't cost so much that they can be profitable without blockbuster status. There are those who will hyperventilate and swear that Lawless (formally titled The Wettest Country) will be one of the best films of the year, and it very well may be. But for now, let's just take a breath and acknowledge that it looks like an awfully good movie. Lawless debuts courtesy of The Weinstein Company on August 31st. As always, we'll see.

Scott Mendelson

Pixar's Brave gets a tonally awkward and redundant trailer.

The first 90 seconds of this 2.5-minute trailer is basically a distilled version of what's either the first act or the two reel of the film.  It's all stuff we've seen before, with an emphasis on light comedy and the lead's feeling of gender-based disenfranchisement.  But at around the 90-second mark, the trailer completely shifts gears and tries to arbitrarily sell a mythic fantasy picture, despite little in the footage to sell that.  Yes, I like the Celtic music, but putting somber, moving music in a series of somewhat random images does not make a trailer feel epic.  There's obviously a lot that Pixar/Disney isn't revealing in regards to the second half of the first, and more power to them for that.  But if you want to be cryptic, just stop cutting trailers and sell the film based on what you have.  

Just randomly cobbling together footage so you can have a new trailer is genuinely harmful to the ad campaign, as it dilutes the positive feelings left by that gorgeous TV spot that utilized the same music to a more powerful effect (since it wasn't tacked on at the end of 90-seconds of light bawdy comedy).  Pixar's Brave campaign is quickly running into the Green Lantern problem - cutting one trailer after another with the same set of images replayed, suggesting that you don't have anything else to sell.  If Brave hinges on a plot twist that Pixar doesn't want to reveal (and watching the trailer again made me realize there is a big hint hidden in the footage), then just have a little faith in the audience and the marketing power of their own brand.  This is quickly going from 'quit while you're ahead' to 'stop digging'.  Brave debuts on June 22nd.  As always, we'll see.

Scott Mendelson  

GI Joe: Retaliation trailers kill off one of 2012's biggest stars.

Say what you will about hindsight and what-not, but I imagine that Paramount is kicking itself in the ass right now for the decision to kill off Channing Tatum in the opening act (scene?) of this second G.I. Joe film.  No, he wasn't exactly the highlight of The Rise of Cobra, but in the last three years 'that guy from Step Up' has been hacking away at would-be stardom and seems to have hit the jackpot this year.  He's now arguably the king of the romantic drama and scored huzzahs and box office with 21 Jump Street.  Between 21 Jump Street and The Vow (plus Haywire which turned him into Stephen Soderbergh's best buddy), Tatum is easily the 'break-out star of 2012' four months in.  Had Paramount had the good sense to let him stick around, they'd have a film starring Tatum and Dwayne Johnson, whose Journey 2: The Mysterious Island is the second-highest grossing American film at the global box office with $322 million thus far.  Paramount could have had two of the biggest male movie stars around in the same film shooting guns and dodging explosives together, but they (or director Jon Chu) had to listen to fanboy whining.  I wouldn't be the least-bit surprised to see an end-credit cookie showing that Duke really survived after all.

Oh well, what IS on display is pretty impressive, even if (let's be honest) it doesn't look all that different from Stephen Summer's G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra ('Hey look, we blew up London this time instead of Paris!').  The two trailers are pretty identical, save for some added beats in the international trailer to emphasize the worldwide threat.  The color-scheme looks slightly darker and muted, the location work feels more realistic, but it's still the kind of crazy stunt work and reckless action beats that made me rather enjoy the unfairly maligned first picture.  Of course, since I liked the first film I'm glad they didn't make too much of an effort to fix what's broken.  Dwayne Johnson in hard-ass mode is always a treat, Bruce Willis hasn't been in a big action film like this since 2007's Live Free Or Die Hard, and the center-piece 'ninjas attack on a mountain top' sequence looks like (in the mind of my eight-year old self) the greatest thing ever!  And in a world of instant reboots, I'm glad Paramount and Chu had the guts to actually make a real sequel that acknowledged and respected the continuity of the first film (I'm glad they kept the eye-popping cliffhanger from the first film).  Anyway, pundits and fanboys will likely scream about how different this film is from the first.  From what we've seen I would disagree.  And for that I'm a little grateful.  G.I. Joe: Retaliation opens on June 29th (same day as Channing Tatum's Magic Mike, natch).  As always, we'll see.

Scott Mendelson

The not-so subtle negative messaging in Jessica Chastain's Iron Man 3 character description.

The big casting news from yesterday was the announcement that Jessica Chastain is being sought for a major role in Iron Man 3, joining Guy Pearce, Ben Kingsley, and (allegedly) Andy Lau alongside the various returning cast members (basically every surviving character from the first two films save for Sam Rockwell).  The cast listing for the other *male* actors primarily described their occupations and/or role in the story (Kingsley is the villain, Pearce is a 'sinister scientist', Lau is 'a scientist').   But the actress is being touted not just as a scientist but as "a sexy scientist every bit as smart as Tony Stark".  Because despite winning raves in seven films last year, with countless award nominations to go along with it, Ms. Chastain can't just be described as a scientist.  Oh no, she has to be a hot piece of ass who despite being (gasp!) a girl is as intelligent as Mr. Stark.

The quote came from Deadline Hollywood without attribution, so it may just be Finke's own choice of words, but I doubt it.  You rarely see male actors with character descriptions that emphasize their attractiveness, yet when female actors are cast in this film or that, you all-but-always see their characters being described by their attractiveness.  And that's if they get a character description at all, as opposed to just being cast as 'the love interest'.  When actresses are introduced on talk shows, they are described as 'the beautiful, the talented' as if their hotness is more important than their skills at their chosen profession. And it's arguably a redundant description anyway.  Ms. Chastain is an attractive woman and she probably won't appear in a mega-budget movie like Iron Man 3 without a token amount of polish.  So if you're attracted to Jessica Chastain, you're probably going to think she's kinda hot in Iron Man 3.

 The lesson is simple: As a woman, it doesn't matter what your achievements are since they are secondary to your ability to make men fantasize about having sex with you.  And the need to emphasize the fact that she's "just as smart as Tony Stark" sells two memes.  First of all, don't worry boys, she's not *smarter* than Mr. Stark, so she's not too threatening.  Second of all, it's still considered noteworthy in 2012 that (shock!) a girl actually possesses the intelligence and skill-set to be whatever kind of scientist she's going to be. It's no secret that Iron Man 3 is partially based on the "Extremis" story-arc.  Guy Pearce is probably playing Aldrich Killian while Jessica Chastain plays Maya Hansen.  There was no reason to not simply say that Jessica Chastain was playing a fellow scientist or acknowledge that her character has a prior connection to Tony Stark.  But the need to throw in a character description that is both sexist and patronizing at the same time speaks quite a bit to how Hollywood views its leading ladies, even those more known for their skills than their bodies.

 Scott Mendelson

Weekend Box Office (04/22/12): Think Like a Man earns a whopping $33m, The Lucky One earns $22m, The Hunger Games stays strong and tops $350m.

It was an 'everybody wins' weekend at the box office as all three openers outperformed even the most optimistic expectations.  The number one film of the weekend was not The Hunger Games but rather Think Like A Man.  The all-star romantic comedy based off of Steve Harvey's best-selling relationship self-help book grossed a somewhat surprising $33 million on just over 2000 screens.  The Screen Gems film was notable in that the small studio made a real effort to market the African-American-centric rom-com both to black males and white audiences (Vulture has a detailed article about the marketing campaign).  Racial demographics aren't available yet, but the film played 63% female and 62% over 30.  For what it's worth, it earned an A from Cinemascore, including an A+ from audiences under 25. Even more impressive is that the film achieved a near-3x, including a token increase on Saturday (from $12 million to $13 million).  The film has a ton of 'would probably be a bigger star in a color-blind society' actors, including Gabrielle Union, Meagan Good, Michael Ealy, Steve Harvey, and Taraji P. Henson.  But the secret weapon may have been comedian Kevin Hart, who powered his stand-up concert film, Laugh At My Pain to $7 million last September despite playing on less than 300 screens.  Pay no attention to this large opening folks, nothing to see about an under-served audience demographic delivering near-blockbuster numbers on a $13 million budget.  Just move along and keep putting Anthony Mackie in fourth-billed supporting roles.


There will be lots of talk comparing this film to the Tyler Perry cannon, but know this: If the estimates hold up, Tim Story's decidely secular romantic comedy will have opened higher than every Perry feature save the $41 million debut of Madea Goes To Jail.  In fact, aside from that Perry release, I can't think of another African-American comedy or drama that opened as high as this one perhaps ever.  How well the film holds up over the long haul is an open question, and arguably *that's* where the attempt at cross-racial outreach come into play.  If Screen Gems can convince white audiences that this isn't so much a 'black film' as much as it's a Valentine's Day-type ensemble piece that happens to star actors of color, it may have strong legs as its sampled by general moviegoers of all races for the next month (What To Expect When You're Expecting debuts May 18th).  Tim Story's 2002 Barbershop parlayed a $20 million debut into a $75 million total while Screen Gems opened Obsessed to $28 million and finished with $68 million just over three years ago this weekend. A multiplier right in-between those two will net a $100 million domestic total for the $13 million picture.  Next weekend will tell the tale.  The African American moviegoing demographic is a consistently starved one, so there is obviously big profit to be made with mainstream popcorn entertainment that just happens to star actors of color.  We'll see whether Hollywood takes notice *this time* or whether its success is written off yet again as a fluke while they greenlight John Carter 2: The Quickening.

The next big opener of the weekend was The Lucky One.  Starring Zack Efron and based on a Nicolas Sparks novel, the picture debuted with a rock-solid $22 million.  That's pretty much tied with the $23.7 million debut for Efron's more comedic 17 Again which opened exactly three years ago this weekend. It will basically eclipses the $31 million domestic total for Efron's last vehicle, the dark and somber romantic drama  Charlie St. Cloud, which debuted with $12 million late-July 2010.  Among recent romantic drama debuts, it's obviously a lower opening than the $30 million debut of Dear John and the $41 million debut of The Vow. It's obviously superior to the $16 million debuts of The Last Song and Water For Elephants.  17 Again ended up with $64 million and that's a reasonable ending point for The Lucky One as well (the film earned a B+ from Cinemascore, for whatever that's worth).  Warner Bros sold its two key trump cards, Efron and Sparks, and fans of both showed up in solid numbers.  Point being, it's proof-positive that a movie star can open unappealing films to $10-15 million but a movie star can open genuinely appealing films to $20-25 million.

The final wide release was Disney's nature documentary Chimpanzees.  The film earned a surprisingly large $10.2 million, far more than any of the previous openings for the annual Earth Day-centric documentary series.  To its advantage was the fact that Earth Day falls today, on a Sunday, meaning the film wasn't as front-loaded as prior entries (last year's African Cats has the most front-loaded opening weekend in history, with a 1.81x multiplier).  Oceans and African Cats debuted with $6 million in 2010 and 2011 while Earth kicked off the series this weekend in 2009 with $8.8 million.  Earth ended with $32 million, Oceans grossed $19 million, and African Cats ended its brief run with $15 million.  So expect Chimpanzees to pretty much match the $32 million gross of Earth and another one of these well-intentioned and, kid-friendly narration aside, impressive projects coming down the pike this time next year.

In holdover news, The Hunger Games held strong despite the whole 'not being number one' thing, grossing a solid $14.5 million in weekend five.  That gives the picture the ninth-biggest weekend five-gross in history and a domestic cume of $356 million.  In overseas news, Battleship continued to pull in cash in various foreign markets.  The film is opening pretty much everywhere prior to its May 18th US debut, and the strategy seems to be working.  It's pulled in $129 million thus far and should have $200 million in the bank by the time it enters US shores.  Opening next weekend in America, Sony's Pirates: Band of Misfits has been building a steady audience overseas for the last three weeks and has grossed $55 million thus far.The best film of 2012 held on better than expected with second-weekend drop of just 47% (low for a horror film), as The Cabin in the Woods earned $7.7 million in weekend two for a ten-day total of $26 million.  Despite the mediocre audience polling, the genre fans who ate this film up apparently convinced their friends to sample it and/or went back for seconds.

Titanic 3D has $52 million in US ticket sales while it (once again) burns up the international waters to the tune of $175 million and counting (international numbers to be updated later). The top new release of last weekend, The Three Stooges, earned $9.2 million on its second weekend (-45%) bringing its ten-day total to $29 million.  It's pacing slightly ahead of the Farrelly Bros' last three films (Hall Pass, The Heartbreak Kid, and Fever Pitch) and is still looking like a $50 million finisher.  American Reunion has $48 million (with an inexplicably high $56 million overseas to boot) while 21 Jump Street has $127 million thus far.  Wrath of the Titans has $77 million domestic as it nears $275 million worldwide and Mirror Mirror has $55 million on our shores and $120 million worldwide.  Finally, Lockout dropped an okay 50% off a lousy $6 million opening weekend, grossing $3 million and earning $11 million in ten days.

That's it for this weekend.  Join us next time for the pre-summer dump, as four (!) new wide releases enter the fray.  The Raven casts John Cusack as Edgar Allen Poe solving murder mysteries, the aforementioned Pirates: Band of Misfits debuts domestically, Lionsgate releases another Jason Statham vehicle in Safe and Universal debuts the Jason Segel/Emily Blunt romantic comedy The Five-Year Engagement.


Scott Mendelson  

5 comic adaptations that bucked the mold, and still failed.

Actor Tom Hiddleston wrote an eloquent essay yesterday for The Guardian basically praising and defending the sub-genre known as the superhero picture.  Plenty of disdain for the genre comes from the very notion that it's big-budget entertainment based on literature that was technically intended for children that gobbles up production dollars and screen space that otherwise might be allotted for more explicitly grown-up fare.  But at least some of the alleged weariness of this specific type of film (the superhero comic book adaptation) comes from a feeling that all-too many of them are basically telling the same story.  You've generally got the standard origin story which (let's be honest) basically takes Richard Donner's Superman: The Movie and pours it into a different color bottle (I say that as a big fan of Spider-Man and Captain America).  Then you have the sequels, which are quite often merely a case of escalation and/or the hero dealing with self-doubt often while in combat with a 'bigger/badder' version of himself (again, thank you Superman II) or a multiple villains who represent that which he might become if corrupted (Batman Returns).  But over the last twenty years or so, there have been a handful of high-profile comic book films that have attempted to play around with the formula but have artistically failed anyway.  As a rebuttal to the idea that 'all superhero movies are the same' as well as a reaffirmation of the idea that 'it's not what it's about, but how it's about it', let's take a look at five comic book adaptations that didn't play it safe, but didn't come out on top either.

Batman & Robin (1997)
I would argue that it's a sign of maturity among film pundits and critics when they are finally adult enough to realize that Joel Schumacher's Batman & Robin is not the worst film ever made.  Peel away all the attempted camp, the self-depreciating homoerotic jokes, the terrible lead performance from Arnold Schwarzenegger and you're left with simply a good story told very poorly.  As the fourth film in a franchise, Schumacher and company had a bit more leeway in terms of where they wanted to take their film this time around.  And as such, they told a rather thoughtful tale of an adult and sane Bruce Wayne trying to figure out how to be an appropriate head to his surrogate family.  No longer wracked with guilt over his parents' deaths (an essay on Bruce Wayne's character arc through all four original Batman films HERE), Wayne is instead concentrating on being a father himself to a young man who is crying out for more trust and more independence.  Meanwhile, just as Bruce is struggling with building his own brood, he must come to terms with the likely death of his own surrogate father, as Alfred Pennyworth is stricken with a fatal illness.  You'll notice that I haven't mentioned the villains.  No matter how much I appreciate the prurient appeal of a long-haired Uma Thurman dressed as Poison Ivy and seducing every male in sight, there is no denying that it is an overly broad an ineffective performance.  And even fifteen years later, it is harder to think of a less appropriate and less successful lead performance than Schwarzenegger's turn as Mr. Freeze.  He literally kills the whole movie all by himself, both because he is terribly hammy and painfully unfunny and because so many of the supporting cast members used his performance as a cue on how to approach the material.  With a dramatically compelling lead villain and a few script changes (making Robin under the spell of Ivy negates the real Bruce/Dick conflict driving the story), there is no reason that Batman & Robin couldn't have been a slight but engaging entry into the Bat-film cannon.

Hulk (2003)
Oh how I would love to tell you that this Ang Lee drama is a misunderstood masterpiece and proof-positive that mainstream audiences don't want substance and grey morality in their popcorn entertainment (it's FAR superior to The Incredible Hulk).  And it's lightning-fast crash from a $62 million opening weekend to a $132 million domestic total would seem to point that out.  But unfortunately, despite its high aspiration and high-toned pedigree, it's just not a good movie.  The film earns high marks for being not a conventional superhero film but mainly a psychological character study where the lead character occasionally turns into a giant green monster.  The film is obscenely well-acted by Eric Bana, Jennifer Connelly, Nick Nolte, and Sam Elliot. It has a bold and dynamic visual style, telling its dark and brooding story in a rainbow-colored world that renders it the closest thing to a living comic book since Dick Tracy.  It uses split-screen to turn the image into a literal comic book page, showing movement and escalation by darting from one 'panel' to another.  It features adult actors who play adult characters through-and-through.  And while the action is sparse, it has moments of visual poetry and  beauty.  But as a movie, it just doesn't work.  The film is painfully slow, with no clear-cut narrative progression.  It establishes such a realistic tone that even the idea of a cartoonish-looking green monster doesn't quite gel.  And despite game attempts and creating three-dimensional characters, it suffers from as bad a case of 'tell instead of show' that one can remember in modern cinema.  In theory it is the living embodiment of the kind of picture that would ennoble the genre.  In practice it is the definition of a noble failure.

Superman Returns (2006)

Like Ang Lee's Hulk film, this is another somber and morose character study about repressed emotions under the guise of a superhero film.  And like Hulk, I deeply wish that director Bryan Singer had pulled it off purely due to the obvious ambition and passion that he brought to this unconventional superhero sequel.  This is no origin story or escalation adventure, but rather a mournful look at Superman truly coming to terms with his status as an orphan as he realizes that he may be just as alone on Earth as he would be on the dead planet that was once Krypton.  But the devil is in the details and the details are why I rather loathe this film.  Kevin Spacey's Lex Luthor exudes neither successful humor or menace, and his scheme basically amounts to 'do pretty much what I tried to do last time'.  Kate Bosworth is cast as a 35 year old, despite being 23 years old and looking barely old enough to drive a car.  Save for a first act plane-rescue that is basically stolen from the pilot of Superman: The Animated Series, the action is dull and uninspired.  But the core flaw is Singer's personification of Superman's loneliness.  He grieves not for his lost world or for an adapted world that will not bring him peace, but for the romantic attentions of a woman who he knowingly abandoned without warning or notice for five years.  The core dramatic hook of the film is that we are supposed to pity Clark Kent because he made the choice to leave Earth for five years and then is shocked when Earth, including Lois Lane, had the gall to move on with their lives instead of breathlessly anticipating his homecoming.  It's a fatal storytelling choice that, combined with the above flaws, severe pacing issues, and a needless and needlessly long Christ-parable epilogue, kills a film that would otherwise serve as a touchstone in doing a big-budget superhero film that charts its own deeply personal path.

Punisher: War Zone (2008)
The third seemingly wholly separate Punisher film to be released in a 19-year span, this relentlessly violent and grotesque action film tries to bring a slasher-film mentality to the superhero film.  Moreover, instead of being an origin story or even a 'day in the life' story (as the 2004 and 1989 films respectively were), this Lexi Alexander picture is arguably 'the last Punisher story'. While Chris Nolan will justifiably get credit for having the clout to explicitly end his Batman series with no room for further sequels, Alexander arguably tried the same trick four years ago.  But while the action is impressive, the tri-color palette is intriguing, and the use of Ray Stevenson as more of a relentless monster than a superhero is effective (he doesn't speak a line of dialogue for the first 26 minutes), the film falters by introducing too much reality into its fantasy world.  In short the film involves Frank Castle unwittingly murdering an undercover FBI agent and attempting to deal with the fall-out.  In short, the wish-fulfillment fantasy of The Punisher only works if the murderous vigilante only kills the bad guys.  Once he starts popping off cops and civilians, it is impossible to root for him on any plausible level.  Add to that a villain subplot that is stolen from Tim Burton's Batman, and a crime story that basically establishes that Castle did more harm than good merely by not staying in bed on the fateful night the film began (without Castle's interference, all of the bad guys would have been arrested on capital charges within 48 hours anyway), and you have a potentially intriguing 'last Punisher story told as grind house horror' that fails on every dramatic level.
Original theatrical review HERE.  Essay on all three Punisher films HERE.

Iron Man 2 (2010)
From a narrative point of view, this film is basically a glorified remake of Batman Forever (the story beats are identical) and its seemingly kid-friendly presentation flies in the fact of the adult-skewing, hard-edged, and rather violent first Iron Man picture.  The second half of the film is infamously marred by Marvel's insistence that the film work as a backdoor pilot for The Avengers, and Mickey Rourke's allegedly difficult onset behavior led to the film lacking a compelling antagonist.  However, my displeasure with this film is ironic considering my chief annoyance with the first Iron Man.  Simply put, the first film's strongest asset is its adult stars (Robert Downey Jr., Jeff Bridges, Gwyneth Paltrow, etc) and the film was most alive when there were real and substantive adult conversations about the heady matters at hand.  But while the first film was all too willing to tuck its social/political relevance under the rug for escalating action set-pieces, the second Iron Man film is almost nothing but talk.  The idea of a $200 million sequel to a massively popular initial installment basically being a chatty, character-driven two-hour therapy session for its lead character is an intriguing idea.  Albeit, lacking the whole 'Angel of Death' undertones and basically absolving Tony of any guilt associating with his family's legacy of arms sales leaves Tony and friends with little of relevance to talk about this go-around.  While the first film dealt with the idea of a brilliant and creative man realizing that he has used his gifts to spread death and misery around the world, Stark's core conflict in the sequel basically amounts to 'daddy didn't love me'.  A comic book sequel rooted in conversation is inspired, but a lack of nerve left Iron Man 2 without anything interesting to say.
Original theatrical review HERE.

And that's all for now.  It's your turn to share.  Whether you agree, disagree, or have specific choices of your own, please do comment below.

Scott Mendelson

Lionsgate picks Francis Lawrence to helm Hunger Games sequel Catching Fire: When a 'safe', 'cheap' choice is also a good choice.

If you discount his last-minute attempt to salvage Jonah Hex, Francis Lawrence has made three films since 2005 and I have liked all three of them.  As such, while he is not a particularly brave/bold, or outside-the-box choice for Lionsgate to hire to helm the next Hunger Games sequel, Catching Fire, he is a good one.  All three of his films show an emphasis of character and substance over visual razzle-dazzle, and his sure-footed and confident eye will be a relief after sitting through Ross's shakey-cam hysterics.  While I was hoping Lionsgate would pick someone a bit off the beaten path (one of the female directors I mentioned, perhaps?), Francis is a solid choice.  In short, he makes good movies, casts good people in them, and delivers quality mainstream material that entertains without insulting their respective audiences.

His two genre entries, Constantine and I Am Legend, are both rock-solid character-driven dramas that happen to involve the fantastical.  They put plot over spectacle and character over action and while neither rise above good, they earn points for being uncommonly stingy in the realm of needless action set-pieces.  I Am Legend boosts a terrific one-man-show performance by Will Smith and it a fine example of the sort of lean, character-driven, uncompromisingly bleak mass-market entertainment we say we want more of (that it made $256 million is a testament to audiences' good taste).  While the original intended ending is superior, it's hard to carp with the artistic integrity of a finale where the lead character dies violently.  Despite its $150 million budget, I Am Legend is a 'real movie' that genuinely works on an emotional level.  And carp all you want about the last ten minutes of somewhat frantic 'vampires attack' action, but it's an earned action climax to a film that has stayed awfully quiet for the majority of its 100 minute running time.

Constantine is based on a comic book that I never read, so I can't comment on its allegedly infamous inaccuracy, but it works perfectly fine as a stand-alone film.  Keanu Reeves is fine (as he usually is, natch), it has fun supporting turns from Peter Stormare, Pruitt Taylor Vince, and Tilda Swinton.  It also has an ironic co-starring/top-billed turn from Rachel Weisz, ironic because Weisz's first big-studio vehicle was playing the token love-interest to Keanu Reeves in Andrew Davis's mediocre Chain Reaction nine years prior.  Constantine earns kudos for being a straight-forward supernatural variation on the hard-boiled detective movie, with only one genuine action scene and special effects only when the story requires them.  It also has a strong finale, centering not around Reeves having to defeat a villain or defuse an evil device, but rather his doomed character making a proactive and selfless choice that alters the course of events.

His most recent film, 2011's Water For Elephants, is an unabashedly old-fashioned period romance melodrama.  I didn't catch it until it came to Blu-Ray, but it is a fine and emotionally-compelling character drama with an uncommonly moving prologue and epilogue.  While Robert Pattinson and Reese Witherspoon may not share the kind of chemistry that Pattinson shares with Kristen Stewart in the Twilight films (especially the first one), he shines during his often intense moments with romantic rival and antagonist Christoph Waltz.  It's not a great film, the much built-up finale is a bit of a letdown, but it is a good movie, the kind of old-school 'movie' that we are only recently seeing studios making an effort to make more of.  That 20th Century Fox financed the film, that Lawrence delivered it for under $40 million, and that it made $117 million worldwide are all positive things for an industry slowly trying to kick its addiction to all-tentpoles all-the-time.

I'm in a strange situation here, discussing the much-anticipated follow-up to a film I rather hated.  But enough people have told me that the next two novels, especially the third-and-final Mockingjay, have enough to recommend to keep my interest for the time being.  But despite the perception (probably not inaccurate) that Lionsgate went for the best director that was both available *now*, could be controlled by the studio, and that they could get for cheap is belied by the fact that they picked a reliable filmmaker of solidly intelligent mainstream fare.  As always, we'll see...

Scott Mendelson          

Come back from where? How the 'Brave is/must be Pixar's comeback' meme plays into the horse-race mentality of pop-culture.

It's no secret that America loves a comeback narrative.  The only thing mass-media (and its audience) loves more than taking celebrities down a peg is watching them theoretically rise up from the ashes.  I'd argue that the media intentionally creates 'great falls' for allegedly important people purely for the purpose of trumpeting their would-be comeback.  We especially see this in the coverage of political elections where a non-stop horse-race mentality keeps candidates who have no plausible shot of victory making imaginary strides so that the inevitable front-runner can make a 'comeback' victory in this-or-that primary.  We see this in an entertainment journalism arena which declared Christina Aguilera's career in dire straights after a single month of crappy occurrences.  It wasn't just "she's having a bad month" but rather "she's hit rock bottom but she's going to have a grand comeback!" which tied into her joining NBC's The Voice.  Point being, a comeback, at least an artistic one, is predicated on a series of professional disappointments and/or a prolonged period of unwilling under-employment.  John Travolta's star-turn in Pulp Fiction and his several years of peak-stardom was a 'comeback'.  Senator Hillary Clinton winning the New Hampshire presidential primary in January 2008 after losing a single primary a week prior in Iowa was not a comeback.  As such, can we please stop referring to Brave as 'Pixar's comeback film' and/or implying that Pixar really needs to knock it out of the park with Brave lest their entire artistic reputation be undone?

Since 1995, Pixar has made twelve feature films, all of which were financial successes both domestically and overseas, to say nothing of home-video revenue and related merchandise sales.  Of those twelve films, ten of them are unarguably critical successes as well.  The two outliers are of course Cars and Cars 2.  The first Cars, despite a 74% score on Rotten Tomatoes, was considered the comparative weak link in the chain, somewhat hamstrung by its celebrity-vocal cast, its use of pop-culture humor, and its arbitrarily-created world where cars acted as both the transportation and the talking/feeling/thinking dominant species in an otherwise normal world.  But while Cars at least had a strong second act and a surprisingly powerful finale (with Lightning McQueen sacrificing victory to help a retiring racing legend finish his last race after a crippling accident), Cars 2 was indeed a pretty mediocre product.  It's basically a warmed-over remake of the underrated Richard Greico spoof If Looks Could Kill.  It's bright, colorful, and superbly animated, but it merits viewing only for the opening action sequence and a few brief skirmishes during the first 2/3 of the film (ironically, despite its G-rating, it's more violent and has a far-higher onscreen body count than The Incredibles).  So yes Cars 2 was a bad film.  It also was the second-lowest grossing Pixar film in US history ($191 million), although it's the sixth-biggest worldwide grosser in the studio's run ($559 million).  But it's just one film.

Pixar doesn't need a comeback film because it's still on the top of its respective field.  It made one disappointing film out of twelve, a batting average that every other studio would kill for. It's won Best Animated Feature Oscars for six out of the eleven years it has existed (Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Wall-E, Up, and Toy Story 3).  Its closest competitor, Dreamworks, has won just twice, for Shrek and Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit (although they arguably should have won in 2006 for Over the Hedge and last year for Kung Fu Panda 2 as well, natch).  Yes Dreamworks is nipping at its heals in terms of box office (Kung Fu Panda 2 and Puss In Boots made $650 million and $550 million worldwide respectively), but its Shark Tale/Monsters Vs. Aliens-reputation is still strong enough that I still have to defend their artistic achievements. In terms of American animation, Pixar is still the king of the hill.  It needs no defense and requires no 'comeback'.  Only in our hyper-sensationalized media culture would a modest whiff like Cars 2 be treated not just as a catastrophe but as such a disaster that Pixar's entire future was in immediate jeopardy.

They made one bad film... out of twelve thus far.  That's not a slump, merely a statistical probability.           Even if Brave isn't as (uber) good as Finding Nemo or The Incredibles, even if it's only as (awfully) good as Monsters Inc. or A Bug's Life, Pixar will be fine.  Even if Brave grosses closer to the $521 million of Wall-E than the $731 million of Up, Pixar will be fine.  They will be fine because audiences trust Pixar.  Audiences trust Pixar because they have built up an incredible artistic reputation.  They deserve our trust at this point.  And they (among others) deserve more than a hyperventilating mass-media that treats every strike-out like the loss of the whole game purely so they can play up the next home-run as a game-changer.     

Scott Mendelson

Beware the Batman, the eighth Batman cartoon since 1992, gets a teaser.

I'm not a huge fan of the CGI Green Lantern animated series, but I must confess that the writing is pretty sharp and the show plays for keeps.  So it is with cautious optimism that we glance at this 23-second teaser for Beware the Batman, a CGI Batman toon that will debut on Cartoon Network sometime in 2013.  Ironically, that means that there will be no Batman cartoon of any kind on the air throughout 2012, meaning that the 20th-anniversary of Batman: The Animated Series will be celebrated by having a year without Batman on our televisions for the first time since 1996. Batman: The Animated Series ran from 1992-1995, The New Batman Adventures (which was Batman: The Animated Series with streamlined artwork) ran from 1997-1999, Batman Beyond (basically the future-world of the Batman: TAS continuity) ran from 1999-2002. Justice League ran from 2001 until 2004 and Justice League Unlimited (same show, new format and title) ran from 2004 to 2006.  Its conclusion brought a close to the 14-year unofficial DC Animated Universe continuity (a world which also included the superb Superman: The Animated Series, the mediocre The Zeta Project and the often terrific Static Shock).  The Batman (which was mediocre for 60% of its run and rather good for 40%) aired from 2004 until 2008, while Batman: The Brave and the Bold (which began as a lighter, brighter Batman show but evolved into an occasionally hyper-violent examination of the entire Batman mythos from 1939 to 2011) aired from 2008 until 2011.

The official synopsis of this new show promises a more involved Alfred Pennyworth and (this is promising...) the use of villains that haven't been exploited in animation up to this point. Magpie, Professor Pyg, Anarky, and Mister Toad have been name-dropped, and Robin is apparently being replaced by a young female 'swordstress' named Katana. With Green Lantern not quite measuring up for me (to be fair I have only watched 3 of 6 aired episodes), Star Wars: The Clone Wars on season-break hiatus after the god-awful Darth Maul ressurection episodes, and The Ultimate Spider-Man going to bat for the title of 'worst Spider-Man cartoon in at least 15 years' (it removes everything interesting about the Ultimate Spider-Man comic while making Peter into an entitled obnoxious little jackass), this is a dark time to be a 32-year old husband/father who still watches superhero cartoons. At least Young Justice is still delivering rock-solid character drama and engrossing narratives. Anyway, Beware the Batman is coming next year. Of course I'll sample it.You probably will to.

Scott Mendelson

All eight G.I. Joe: Retaliation character posters...

These all went out to different online movie sites during the first part of the morning.  I generally don't do the whole 'cobble together from multiple sites and post them all trick, but I felt like doing so today.  Anyway, Paramount is pretty aggressive with this one as, absent the Marvel movies that dominated their summer last year, this is among their biggest would-be tentpoles.  They only have this film, The Dictator, and the Dreamworks animated sequel, Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted (which arguably sells itself until a week or so out, and which my mother-in-law is dying to see).  Anyway, enjoy the character posters after the jump.  Yo Joe and all that, this one drops June 29th.  As always, we'll see...

Scott Mendelson

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