As the end of 2011 is almost here, I will spending a great deal of time catching up on this year’s movies that I wasn’t able to see in the motion picture house. These “filling in the blanks” posts will contain very short opinions of 2011 movies that I didn’t review because a) I didn’t see them in a timely fashion, or b) I didn’t really want to. Here’s the first edition of my quest through the movies I missed.
The Debt (Dir: John Madden)
It was a long road to release for The Debt, the perfectly mediocre spy thriller from Shakespeare in Love director/ex-Raiders head coach John Madden. Originally slated to be an Oscar contender in 2010, the film was one of the casualties of the great Miramax crisis, and thus it did not get to theaters until late this summer. Not that it was ever going to win that many awards anyway; it doesn’t go for prestige so much as it goes for mild intrigue and some thrills. It more or less delivers in those arenas, but as a film it never makes that much of an impact. Not until late in the film—with the addition of a pretty ridiculous twist—that it completely comes off the rails. It also focuses too much on trivialities like a central love triangle that doesn’t really matter to the audience when it should be making a Munich-esque statement on the damage revenge can do. At its best, The Debt is a reasonably tense political thriller. The problem is that it is concerned more with surface-level stuff than it is in actually being about anything.
Grade: C+
Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark (Dir: Troy Nixey)
Another casualty of the aforementioned Miramax crisis is Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark, aka Pan’s Labyrinth Lite. Also, like The Debt, it winds up being little more than mediocre film that doesn’t fully exploit the possibilities of its premise. It is rated R, but only in a few moments does it actually earn this rating. It is a film that’s either too tame or too violent, and possibly both. Worse yet, it does absolutely nothing to leave a lasting impact on its audience. There are a few moments of genuine terror—a sequence involving bed sheets comes to mind—but when I left the theater at no point did I think I was going to have any nightmares. A product of the Guillermo Del Toro machine, Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark constantly gives us flashes of the film it could have been, but lazy writing and an overall forgettable story ultimately led it to be cast aside.
Grade: C+
The Help (Dir: Tate Taylor)
Based on who you’ve talked to, The Help is either not as bad as you’ve heard or not as good as you’ve heard. It is a well-performed and frequently entertaining film, but it often feels too much like a Hollywood-ization of history that ultimately makes the material far too easy to swallow. We are disgusted by what we see, but it doesn’t feel like our eyes are ever truly opened. However, complaints that The Help paints the white Emma Stone as the savior of the African American race are—for my money—overstated. Stone is very much one of the movie’s heroes, but I never got the impression that director Tate Taylor and company were giving her all of the credit. If anything, The Help is a celebration of all the black women who had to endure an ugly era in American history. It isn’t entirely successful at that, but it is never the offense that some made it out to be. Of course, it isn’t the masterpiece that some made it out to be either. Any film that focuses so unbearably long on a single poop joke can’t be that terrific.
Grade: B-
A Good Old Fashioned Orgy (Dir: Alex Gregory & Peter Huyck)
This may wind up being one of the worst comedies of the year, simply because it is a gargantuan waste of resources that fails to even understand the basic concept of a “joke.” You see, a “joke” is comprised of a set-up and a punchline. A Good Old Fashioned Orgy is all set up and no punchline; the nadir of the recent “let’s just get funny people and have them improv for a bit” trend in cinematic comedy. That Apatovian mentality has produced some great movies, but this film seems to throw the entire idea of “form” out the window in favor of a trifling series of scenes that ultimately add up to nothing. And I mean nothing. What got me into the theater was the promising cast full of funny people: Jason Sudeikis, Lake Bell, Nick Kroll, Martin Starr, Lucy Punch and Will Forte, among others. How do you mess that up? A Good Old Fashioned Orgy finds a way, and every last second of it is painful. This may be the flimsiest, most disposable and empty film of the year. It is little more than a single concept, and the filmmakers fail to even craft it into something with a discernable beginning, middle and end.
Grade: D
The Guard (Dir: John Michael McDonagh)
A modest but really fun entry into the world of foulmouthed Irish black comedies, The Guard is about little more than the crazy world of Sergeant Garry Boyle (Brendan Gleeson), a policeman who frequently engages in unorthodox behavior while also trying to do his job. He is not the most efficient or ethical of law enforcers, but he’s a fascinating character to hang out with for a couple hours. Other than that, there’s not a whole lot to it. The Guard features (perfectly fine) performances from the likes of Don Cheadle and Mark Strong, but it’s at its best when we just sit back and watch Gleeson work his magic. His character isn’t always that easy to understand, but that just adds to the fun of it all. Plus, this movie is frequently quite funny in that Irish black comedy way. It’s a minor little thing, but it’s worthwhile.
Grade: B
Margin Call (Dir: J.C. Chandor)
Also worthwhile is the recession drama Margin Call, in which we are supposed to sympathize with many of the men who are responsible for the economic collapse in 2008. While we never completely come over to their side (obviously), this proves to be an admirable and gripping account of the night when it all went down the toilet. Margin Call’s weakest moments come in the first half, when we are treated to a repetitive journey up the Wall Street food chain. At each step, the entire situation is explained to us again and again—and in the usual Hollywood “tell me like I’m stupid” fashion—and for a while I was about ready to jump ship. Luckily, the film really hits its stride at the halfway mark, and it places a shockingly human face on one of the most sinister events in Wall Street history. These are not the good guys, but they are people, and Margin Call has us watch while these select few await the apocalypse that only they know is going to happen. (IFC.com writer Matt Singer even tweeted about how the film mirrors a Biblical apocalypse.)
Grade: B
Meek’s Cutoff (Dir: Kelly Reichardt)
An art house western that is focused more on creating a feeling of dread than it is on telling an actual story, Meek’s Cutoff winds up being a wonderfully engrossing film that feels like it plants you right in the middle of a forgotten era. As a group of settlers travel across the desert in search of water—guided by the obviously lost Stephen Meek—director Kelly Reichardt watches as each of them grows increasingly unsure of their situation. The film begins with a series of shots that plant the viewer right in the middle of the film’s completely immersive (and barren) setting. These do not feel like western characters thrown into a movie; these are people that have lived off the land for a very long time. As the water drains away, so does all hope, and throw some paranoia on top of that once they capture a Native American. Meek’s Cutoff brilliantly captures the feeling of being lost in a strange land with no idea where to go, and as time goes on the characters’ ability to trust each other is tested.
This film is just a quick adrenaline shot away from absolute greatness. As it stands right now it’s terrific, but Reichardt’s penchant for long takes of mundane activities can grow wearying at times. It’s a style that works more often than it does not, but when it doesn’t work it feels like she’s just being different for the sake of being different. That said, Meek’s Cutoff has plenty of strong moments that will likely put it in contention for my “Best of 2011” list that will likely come in late December/early January. It tells a great tale of survival while also slowly bringing the tension to a boil, and once you can’t take it anymore it provides you with one of those frustrating-yet-brilliant ambiguous endings that I love so very, very much.
Grade: A-
Puss in Boots (Dir: Chris Miller)
When I first heard DreamWorks was making Puss in Boots, it sounded rather desperate. After all, once you’ve squeezed all the juice out of the orange that is the Shrek franchise, the only thing left to do is make a spin-off. Puss in Boots may be little more than a stab at making some money through the sale of spare parts, but darn it all if it isn’t a really entertaining family adventure. (And also, if I may, one of the straight-up funnier movies I’ve seen this year.) The best decision DreamWorks made with this film was to make it more in the style of Kung Fu Panda than Shrek, and thus instead of a Family Guy-esque trip through barely-connected pop culture jokes, we got a movie that puts the action and adventure before the jokes. As a result, the humor doesn’t feel forced. Puss in Boots is nothing revelatory and it has no reason to exist, but it sure is a blast while it lasts.
Grade: B+
Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Dir: Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
A thoughtful meditation on the afterlife, Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives takes the languid filmmaking style I discussed with Meek’s Cutoff and multiplies it tenfold. As a result, it can be a bit too slow for many (read: most) tastes. But when it works, it works, and you can’t help but admire this film’s audacity and ambition. It’s incredibly difficult to articulate what this movie’s weirdness means, but more often than not it feels profound; not simply cobbled together. The best sequences—for my money—come when the living have various interactions with the dead (one scene, in which a ghost completely sneaks up on everyone, is particularly masterful) and the audience is forced to think about life and death in a way they haven’t before. This movie can likely be skipped if you consider yourself impatient, but if you simply let Uncle Boonmee happen to you then you may come out the other end grateful. After all, it’s not every film that features a sex scene between a human and a catfish.
Grade: B
Warrior (Dir: Gavin O’Connor)
Gavin O’Connor’s Warrior is a sports film that does absolutely nothing new. Not one single thing. And yet it’s one of the more surprisingly thrilling films of the year; a brilliantly-performed tale about two brothers who are forced into the MMA ring in order to pay the bills. The central concept of Warrior is simple but rather genius: instead of telling one underdog sports story, let’s tell two of them in a single movie. That way, they both wind up fighting each other in The Big Fight™, and people will be rooting for each of them! That’s precisely how Warrior plays out, and I was shocked to discover just how invested I was in the story by the time we got to the climax. It’s a film that still indulges in most of the genre’s more annoying clichés, but it performs them so well that it’s deserving of the critical love it received. Unfortunately, the public rejected Warrior in the theater. If I do my second annual “Rejects of the Year” list, there will be a special place for this.
Grade: B+
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