Movie Reviews – January 2008

We saw a lot of movies this month. Here is what we saw:

Here are my reviews:

The Golden Compass

Set in an alternate reality, Lyra is a tomboy living in the sheltered environment of Jordon College, Oxford. People in this world have souls that walk beside them as animal totems. A mysterious woman wants to take Lyra to the north with her. Lyra wants to go because she wants to find her uncle who has disappeared there. Before she leaves, the head of the college gives her a gift, a Alethiometer or golden compass, a device for showing the holder the underlying truth of a situation. Lyra is the only one who can make it work making her something special. I love this stuff. The bad guys, the Magisterium are after the compass and almost get it a couple of times. Lyra has many adventures; at the Magisterium’s secret research facility, in a far north frontier town, on the open ice, and in the hall of the polar bear warriors. Debts must be settled and justice done and there is a big showdown back at the research facility. The look of the movie is top notch. The technology is futuristic Victorian. I would have given this movie a 4 except for a slightly dissatisfying ending.
Theater – 3 stars

Art in the 21st Century

These shows aired on public television. The DVD contains the first 4 shows of season one. Each show features the works of 4 artists for a grand total of 16 artists. With that many artists you are sure to like some and dislike some. All in all I liked most of them. For a sculptor, watching shows like these is a bit like reading a professional journal. Not only do you get to see a wide variety of work, but the artists talk about those works while you are looking at them and give you some of their artistic philosophy as well. Most of the artists were pretty weird. Weirder than I think I am myself. I’m sure someone will be correcting me on that score in the comments.
Netflix – 3 stars

Bridge to Terabithia (2 versions)

[Spoiler alert, if you plan to see this movie, stop here] Two lonely, semi-outcast young teens become fast friends. The girl has tremendous writing talent and the boy is a skilled artist. But they are picked on at school and create a make-believe land called Terabithia across the creek from where they live. The theatrical version has scenes of them interacting with the animated inhabitants where the Wonderworks version just shows the actors pretending. The teacher at their school takes an interest in the boy’s art and takes him on a field trip to an art museum. While he is gone with her, the girl goes to Terabithia and falls in the rain swollen stream and drowns.

When this movie was in the theaters and I had just put it on my Netflix queue, I discovered that it had been made for TV’s Wonderworks in 1985. Like Beowulf, I thought comparing them would be interesting. Both versions had storylines that matched each other almost perfectly. The theatrical version was better because of a bigger budget and the magical performance of AnnaSophia Robb. Through CG animation it included the magical characters that inhabited Terabithia. I thought that the kids’ imaginations and the magic land they created was going to be the point of the movie. But wham, the grief the death causes is the real point. We got the first version, the theatrical one, at Christmas time when Wendy was home. She said she read it in junior high and remembers laying in bed sobbing and sobbing. I can see why.
Netflix – 3 stars each, maybe 4

Seducing Doctor Lewis

The mayor of a small village in Quebec runs off to the big city to get a job as a highway patrolman. He was overwhelmed by the job of trying to find a doctor for this small fishing village of 120. The fishing industry is dead there and everyone is on the dole, a demoralizing situation for them. A doctor is one of the requirements of a company that wants to open a factory in the village so the hunt is on. Our hero, Germain, takes over where the former mayor left off and sends a xeroxed advertisement to every doctor in Quebec. No one is interested until the former mayor busts a doctor speeding home from a cricket match and offers to let him off if he will be the village’s doctor for a month. The doctor accepts. In that month the villagers will have to seduce him into staying on. Most of the movie centers around what they do to make that happen. This is a small movie, shot in Quebec in French with subtitles. The characters are endearing, there are no villains, and their schemes are rediculous. From the beginning there is no chance that the doctor won’t eventually accept. Of course there are some complications right up till the final minute but that’s to be expected.
Netflix – 3 stars

National Treasure: Book of Secrets

This time our heroes are in search of Cibola, the City of Gold. They are in a race with the bad guy who appears to be nasty and is, but who is not so bad by the end. There are a couple of unsatisfying, dizzying car chases, and “breakins” at the Paris Statue of Liberty, Buckingham Palace, the White House, Mount Vernon, the Library of Congress and Mount Rushmore. It’s reassuring that security at any of these places is so easily breached. There is also the mystery of the “Book of Secrets”, a book that compiles the writings of Presidents only for future Presidents. Of course our heroes get a look at it and not only does it give them the next clue but the stage is set for National Treasure 3 with unclarified references to the mysterious events described on page 47. The whole plot is completely preposterous but everyone dreams of finding a fabulous treasure and the movie gives you that in spades. The producers make no apologies for how outrageous the whole business is and it’s a fun ride.
Theater – 3 stars

Twilight Samurai

Set in Japan in about 1870 the movie opens with the funeral of our hero’s wife. She was from a social station a couple of rungs above him so an appropriate funeral practically bankrupts him. He is left with two young daughters and a senile mother to support. He has to sell his sword and do piecework making cricket cages to make ends meet. He lets himself go, wearing tattered clothes and neglecting his personal hygiene and gets called to task for it at work. His best friend tells him that he has petitioned the court to grant a divorce for his sister who is married to a drunken lout who beats her. The sister is our hero’s childhood sweetheart. When the lout comes to the friend’s house to make trouble and challenge the friend to a duel, our hero offers to fight in his place. Showing up at the duel with only a wooden club (because he has no sword) he handily beats the lout who is an expert swordsman. This brings him a certain notoriety and the top warrior in the town stops by and asks our hero if he would like to have a friendly match. Our hero declines. When the emperor dies there is a lot of political intrigue with the top warrior chosing the wrong side. He is told to commit suicide, but refuses. He dispatches everyone who is sent to get him. So finally our hero is ordered to go in and kill him. The big battle is the climax of the movie. This is a samurai movie but the swordplay and daring-do are only secondary. Mostly it is about this modest man’s everyday life and the problems he faces. The look of the picture is great and I loved the architecture which I assume is authentic for the time. I didn’t really mind the subtitles which I usually object to.
Netflix – 4 stars

The Astronaut Farmer

An Aeronautical Engineer quits the space program to help his family when his father commits suicide. All through his life he regrets that decision and has to face the fact that he will never be in space. He has designed a rocket and for years he has been putting it together bit by bit. But it’s taking its toll. He is deeply in debt and when he makes enquiries about high grade rocket fuel he comes to the attention of any number of government officials. They are out to stop him from launching the rocket. In a desparate attempt to get into orbit he tries a different fuel mixture to disasterous results. While recovering, his father-in-law dies leaving his daughter a substantial inheritance. The farm is saved and he begins again. Do you think he makes it into space? Here is a man living his dream. He is deeply committed to the point where he is just on the edge of being obsessed. In fact, some of the film’s characters believe he may have crossed that line, neglecting and maybe even endangering his family. But, this is one of those movies that makes you feel good all over.
Netflix – 3 stars

Zodiac

This movie is about the investigations into the Zodiac killings in the San Francisco Bay area in the late 60’s and early 70’s. It is not about the killings themselves although a couple are fairly graphically represented. There is the official investigation conducted by the law enforcement agencies in various jurisdictions and the unofficial investigation by members of the San Francisco Chronicle. The main reporter leaves the scene fairly early and the crusade is taken up by a cartoonist as the case starts to get cold. He has pretty good investigative and cryptography skills. The cases were never solved. Just about as they were ready to make an arrest, the prime suspect died of a heart attack so he was never convicted. San Francisco closed the case but it is still open in several of the surrounding jurisdictions. This is a long movie, 2 hrs and 38 mins, but is does not seem to drag at all
Netflix – 3 stars

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer

Set in France in the 1700’s a boy is orphaned at birth and sent to an orphange. He has a remarkable gift, an extremely acute sense of smell. As a teen he is sold to a leather tanner, a hard life but rich in scents to be sure. It is limiting however. One day he makes a delivery to a perfumier. His whole world changes. He demonstrates his abilities to the perfumier and asks that he buy him out of servitude and teach him the trade. The perfumier does this and has great success because of this young man’s abilities. At one point the boy accidentally kills a young woman and is obsessed by her fragrance. This is the smell of her actual body. When he learns as much as he can, he asks if there are other ways to get frangrances. This leads him on a quest to a distant city. He learns the other method and tries to use it to obtain the essense of a young woman that he murders. This is a success and leads to a series of murders with him extracting the aromas of the young women. This sends the town into a panic and after the final murder he is captured and sentenced to death. The ending of the movie is preposterous however. And the movie is over long but it has a good look to it.
Netflix – 3 stars

Hot Fuzz

A crackerjack English police officer is reassigned to a small village because his success is making everyone else look bad. After he arrives a strange series of “accidents” starts to happen. His partner, the son of the police chief, is inept but a good buddy. In a drunken bonding session one night he introduces the London cop to grade B police movies. The accidents really turn out to be murders as our hero suspects but who commits them is the point of the movie. And a rediculous one at that. The finale has an over the top shoot out that is supposed to be a satire of the previously mentioned B movies, but really isn’t all that funny. This movie gets a 3, but a very low one
Netflix – 3 stars

Pathfinder

A viking boy who is on a raiding party to North America gets left behind. He is raised by the very Indians the vikings have been raiding. Fifteen years later the vikings are back and our hero helps the Indians fight against them. As you might expect, the vikings are eventually defeated. This was a bad movie. The vikings are something out of Frank Frezetta rather than anything realistic. They have only one aim and that is to kill as many Indians as possible. Why? There is no booty, they don’t make them slaves. What is the point? The cinematography is very dark, making it almost impossible to see what is going on. It is filmed in winter but there is always a mist to obscure the action. They arrive on the coast, but within minutes they are in Alpine country, thousands of feet above sea level. Is Labrador like that? The viking lad somehow becomes an expert swordsman and horseman as he grows up and he can speak fluent vikingese even after 15 years. P U.
Netflix – 2 stars

300

The king of Sparta, Leonidis, takes 300 men to defend the kingdom against the invading Persians. He does so against the oracle that says he will lose and the national council’s will. He strategically places his men at Thermopylae, a narrow gorge that limits the number of Persians that can be brought to bear at any one time. The 300 are eventually defeated but I guess they saved the day. The movie does not explain why Xerxes didn’t simply go on to take Sparta and in the end we see thousands of Spartans prepared for battle but we don’t really know what happens next. I disliked this film. It was based on a graphic novel, read comic book, and it had the storyline and dialog to prove it. It was done in the style of Sin City or the newest Beowulf, animation over the top of live action but it looked more like live action to me. The point of this movie was the blood spattered battle scenes with any number of decapitations and limbs flying off into the wings. Ugh.
Netflix – 2 stars

Wild Hogs

Four socially disfunctional middle aged men decide they need to take their Harleys on a road trip from Cincinati to LA. Along the way they have stupid adventures till they get to New Mexico where they have the misfortune to run into the infamous Del Fuegos motorcycle gang and get on their bad side. Cornered in a small town they make a stand for what’s right and just barely get by. The activitity in the closing credits is one of the best parts. Mostly stupid, this movie does have occasional funny parts which didn’t happen as frequently as I would have liked. There’s a nice little surprise at the end. Then the credits. Low 3.
Netflix – 3 stars

The Lookout

A high school sports hero is showing off for his friends and girl in his convertible on a summer night and gets into a crash. Flash forward. He is now in rehab after a serious head injury having to write down everything just to remember what to do next. In a bar a friend of his older sister recognizes him and strikes up a friendship. The “friend” is just setting up our hero to be a lookout for a robbery at a bank where our hero works. They commit the robbery but things go wrong. Surprise, surprise. This movie started out pretty slow and built in anxiety all the way through. You know nothing good is going to happen to this poor guy.
Netflix – 3 stars