Archive for peter sarsgaard

GREEN LANTERN

Posted in 2011, 3-D, Blockbusters, Cinema Knife Fights, Comic Book Movies, Science Fiction, Superheroes with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 20, 2011 by knifefighter

CINEMA KNIFE FIGHT: GREEN LANTERN (2011)
By Michael Arruda and L.L. Soares

 

(The Scene: A beach at dusk. MICHAEL ARRUDA & L.L. SOARES approach the wreckage of a crashed alien spaceship.)

MA: Wow, we’ve found a real live alien spaceship!

LS: Maybe they’ll abduct you to some distant galaxy so I can be spared your bad taste in movies.

MA: No, I think it’s your mother ship come to take you back home. L.L. phone home!

LS: How dare you compare me to that twerp, E.T.! And, for your information, I was born right here on Earth!

(They hear a groan from the spaceship. They approach to find a dying green alien with a bright pink face. The GREEN ALIEN extends his hand and shows them a green ring.)

GREEN ALIEN: The ring has chosen you.

MA: Hey, bud, you’re not seeing double. There’s actually two of us here. Which one of us did the ring choose?

LS: It obviously chose me. (Reaches out to take ring.)

MA: Not so fast! We don’t know that. Let the alien answer first. Which one of us did the ring choose?

GREEN ALIEN (Points to MA, then to LS): You.

LS: Well, that’s it. This alien is obviously retarded.

MA: This isn’t getting us anywhere. Look, there’s two of us and only one ring, and we can’t share a ring.

LS: Share? There’s no sharing at Cinema Knife Fight! I’m taking it.

(LS grabs ring, as does MA, and as they wrestle over it, they inadvertently toss the ring into the ocean.)

MA: Oops.

LS: Now see what you’ve done!

GREEN ALIEN: The ring—the ring—. (Alien dies.)

MA (Shaking his head): Well, he’s having a bad day. Anyway, with the ring gone, there’s nothing left to distract us, so why don’t we start our review of GREEN LANTERN?

LS: I bet that ring sucked anyway. It sure was ugly. Since he came all the way from another galaxy, that alien could have at least brought us some cool bling.

Yeah, start the review.

MA: GREEN LANTERN (2011) is the latest superhero movie to hit the big screen, and this one comes from the DC universe. It’s about a character not as widely known as some of the other DC superheroes, such as Batman and Superman.

LS: I don’t know about that. In the comics world, Green Lantern is a pretty big deal. He was the central figure of the recent “Darkest Night” and “Brightest Day” storylines, probably the two biggest events in the DC Universe in the past few years. He just never had a movie before. Or a TV show. But comics fans know him very well.

MA: Well, for the rest of us in the real world, he’s not as well known.

GREEN LANTERN is about a carefree pilot named Hal Jordan (Ryan Reynolds), who is chosen by a dying alien to join the ranks of the Green Lanterns, a huge collection of super warriors who protect the universe from evil threats. They do this by showing no fear and by using their will power. They have the power to turn whatever their thinking of into reality. So, they can be as powerful as the limits of their imaginations. It’s kind of a goofy premise when you think about it. I mean, if you have the power to conjure up a ray gun, for example, to shoot your enemy, why not just conjure up a dead enemy and save yourself the trouble? I’m sure the comics did a better job of explaining all this, but it’s not covered in any satisfactory depth in the movie.

LS: I think it’s a key point here that the limits of a Green Lantern’s power is the same as the limits of his or her imagination. If there’s a flaw with this movie—it’s clearly that Hal Jordan doesn’t have much of an imagination. Neither did the writers of this movie.

MA: That’s a really good point, because, as I watched this movie, I kept thinking, where the heck is this guy’s imagination?  Why isn’t he using this new power he has to create all kinds of cool things?

Anyway, Hal becomes a GREEN LANTERN, which is a good thing, because the Earth is now threatened by a bad guy named Hector Hammond (Peter Sarsgaard), a brilliant scientist infected by another alien, the evil Parallax, which turns him into a super intelligent baddie with a big head who looks like the Elephant Man wearing a lab coat.

LS: Hector is not the villain of the movie. He’s a pawn. A sad, dejected man who has great intelligence but still feels he is a failure. He becomes infected, by the way, because he is called in to do an autopsy on the alien who gave Hal his ring. But the alien has a bad wound that still has traces of the creature that killed him in it – Parallax. When he touches the wound in depth, the traces infect him, turning him into the Elephant Man thingie. He suddenly can read people’s minds and has telekinetic powers. He also has very big daddy issues concerning his senator father (Tim Robbins). He grew up with Hal and has always envied him. And he’s in love with Carol Ferris, who loves Hal. Once he gets his “powers,” it’s clear that all Hector wants to do with them is get back at the people who slighted him – his father and Hal – and finally “get the girl.”

MA: Yeah, there’s also a love interest for Hal with the beautiful Carol (Blake Lively) but, like the rest of this movie, this story doesn’t go anywhere.

LS: I thought Lively was a big weak link here. Sure, she’s attractive. But every scene she was in, I thought her acting was atrocious. It was like watching a very pretty robot. I kept thinking—aside from being hot —what does anyone see in this woman? Why do the main characters all want her affection? She just didn’t have any depth at all as a character, and I can’t tell if it’s her fault or the writers. Probably both.

MA: There’s not much else I want to say about the plot since this movie didn’t really do much for me, and I don’t think its story warrants too much retelling. But feel free if you want to fill in the blanks.

LS: No, you just about covered it. The details actually make the story less interesting. We then have to get into the whole significance of colors. Green represents the power of will, which is the source of the Green Lanterns’ great energy. But there’s also, yellow, the color of fear, which was also harnessed by the ancient inhabitants of the planet Oa, who are blue gnome-like creatures who started all this crap. They created the green lanterns and sit on monolithic perches like a group of Yoda wannabes. One of their group turned to “the dark side” and tapped into the power of fear and it corrupted him, so he turned into the super baddie Parallax—the nebulous monster who is going around devouring whole planets (He’s an awful lot like the Marvel villain, Galactus, another bad guy who eats planets, who I like a lot better. Although he’s kind of goofy, too).

Otherwise, that’s it. The Green Lanterns try to stop Parallax as he drifts throughout the universe, devouring worlds. When he comes into the vicinity of Earth, then it’s up to Hal to save the planet. Can he do it? If you really care, go see the movie.

MA: I couldn’t get into GREEN LANTERN from the get-go. I found its opening sequences which explain the whole back story of the Green Lantern world dull, boring, and slow. It reminded me of the scenes on Thor’s planet in THOR (2011), and the scenes of the Jedi Council in the STAR WARS movies. In fact, GREEN LANTERN plays much more like a science fiction/fantasy film than a superhero movie.

LS: Well, it’s supposed to be like a science fiction film. Green Lantern is one of the most science-fiction based superheroes of all time, at least as much as the “alien come to earth” origin of Superman.

But I agree about the opening sequence. It’s meant to bring us up to speed right away, but it’s boring. And the whole thing about green being willpower and yellow being fear seems incredibly dopey to me. Why can’t the green power of the Lanterns just be pure cosmic energy? Why does it have to be willpower? Seems silly. “I will not eat that piece of cake, thus I have wild, green power!”

Also, the whole thing about the actual LANTERN—it’s a device that’s really just a giant battery. It recharges the ring when it runs out of power. I always hated the lantern in the comics, and here it’s no better. Why does the ring need the lantern to recharge it? Doesn’t willpower come from within? And don’t even get me started on the dumb-ass oath the Green Lantern has to spout to get the recharging process to work….

(A green Energizer  Bunny holding a lantern marches by them.)

MA (pointing to Bunny):  Who knew?

LS:  And, now that I think about, why doesn’t the Green Lantern lose his powers and need to recharge himself EVER in the course of a battle in this movie? If you’re going to introduce something as lame as the lantern, then give it some dramatic relevance. As it turns out, he doesn’t even need the damn thing for the rest of the movie, and this was one chance when they could have made an improvement over the comics and just gotten rid of the damn thing entirely.

(GOLLUM from the LORD OF THE RINGS movies appears on the beach, rubbing his hands together)

GOLLUM: Did someone here mention my precious?

MA: No, not that ring! We’re talking about the Green Lantern’s ring.

GOLLUM: Oh, that makes me sad. I will continue to search for my precious….

LS: Get lost, you idiot (Kicks GOLLUM in the butt, hurrying him along the beach and out of sight)

GOLLUM: Ouch.

MA: The story didn’t grab me, the pacing wasn’t there, the characters were not likeable, and the special effects were passable, but that’s it. I also had the choice of seeing this one in 2D or 3D, and I chose 2D because, to be honest, I’m sick and tired of 3D movies coming out every other week , and then not being worth the extra cost of the ticket.  I hope movie audiences start to feel the same way and stop paying the extra money to see these movies.  Maybe they’ll go away.

LS: I saw it in 2D as well, and gladly so. Not only did I save money, but I knew the 3D aspects wouldn’t add anything to the storyline, just like most 3D movies we see. It was nice to avoid the extra tariff we’ve been getting screwed with to see bad 3D movies.

MA: While I like the Green Lantern’s power—he has the ability to turn into reality whatever he’s thinking about—and think it’s really cool, I did have some problems with it. One, it’s not used enough in the movie. I mean, we hardly see the Green Lantern use this ability. And two, when you think about it, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

LS: Yeah, like I said, for a movie about a character whose main power is his imagination, GREEN LANTERN is incredibly mundane. The character and the writers totally drop the ball on this one. The ring should have gone to someone who really would have excelled in using its power – like a fantasy writer perhaps?

MA: I came away from this movie thinking the Green Lantern’s story was rather goofy.

LS: In the comics, the Green Lantern is up there in popularity with DC heroes like Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. Personally, I think he deserved a bigger budget and a better movie. This one seems second-rate compared to the majority of superhero movies we’ve seen lately.

MA: I also didn’t like the characters in this movie. I didn’t hate them, but none of them were that likeable.

Hal Jordan is supposed to be this likeable screw-up. He’s an amazing pilot, but in everything else, he’s a failure, although he means well. However, he doesn’t come off this way in the movie. How do I know he’s supposed to be this way? Because they tell us in the film. This is a classic example of where a story messes up by telling us things rather than showing us. We hardly get to know Hal at all. We see him briefly with his son, briefly with his girlfriend, briefly with his buddy, briefly training as a Green Lantern, basically, briefly doing everything. Hal comes off like a supporting character in a Tom Cruise TOP GUN (1986) movie. Hey, it’s Hal Jordan. He’s the guy with no fear in the cockpit with the son and the girl—yeah, but what do we really know about him? Nothing. And as a result we don’t like him.

LS: I agree. Ryan Reynolds is completely miscast here. Hal Jordan is supposed to be smart and kinda cool. As Reynolds plays him, he’s a smirking idiot who takes stupid chances and comes off as a real jerk. I have to admit, he grew on me as the movie progressed, but a better star would have made this movie a lot better. Reynolds seems like a kid trying to play a leading man. Early on, I actually hated the character. By the end, I just thought he was so-so. And you’re right about the TOP GUN comparison. Early on, I thought I was watching a sequel to TOP GUN, until the injured alien fell from the sky. Hal could have been so much better!

For some reason Hollywood loves Reynolds and thinks he is perfect for superhero movies. He also played Deadpool in the movie X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE (2009). That worked a little better, because Deadpool is supposed to be a cocky clown. But supposedly his supporting role in the WOLVERINE movie went over so well, that a DEADPOOL movie is now in the works. Reynolds can do no wrong in the world of superheroes, I guess. But for me, he was a completely awful choice for Hal Jordan.

Oh, and by the way, as far as I can tell, that kid was not his son. It was his nephew. Although early on the kid is so worried about his uncle, it seems like a father/son bond. Of course, after that scene, we never see the kid again! So I guess that bond wasn’t very important!

MA: Yeah, I found Ryan Reynold’s performance as Hal irritating as well. I couldn’t bring myself to like him, which is not a good thing for a lead character in a movie.

Blake Lively as Carol Ferris, Hal’s love interest, is beautiful, and she’s a good actress, but in this movie the Carol Ferris character doesn’t do much, nor is she interesting. Lively was in THE TOWN (2010) and she was very good in that movie, so she can really act when given a challenging role. Carol Ferris is not that role.

LS: You can say that again. If Lively is a good actress, I certainly didn’t see any evidence of that in GREEN LANTERN. A CGI cartoon would have had more depth. And, while you mention one of her movie roles, you’re missing the fact that Blake Lively is best known for the TV series GOSSIP GIRL, which is about shallow kids screwing each other over. Not exactly Oscar-worthy material.

MA: I did like Peter Sarsgaard as the villain Hector Hammond, and his was probably my favorite performance in the movie. I like Sarsgaard a lot, and we’ve seen him in ORPHAN (2009) and THE SKELETON KEY (2005). However, as much as I like Sarsgaard, the character of Hector Hammond is not much of a villain.

LS: You mentioned two of Sarsgaard’s more mainstream/genre flicks, but he’s also been a hero of the independent film scene for a long time now. He’s been in some really good stuff like the Oscar-winning film BOYS DON’T CRY (1999), Wayne Wang’s provocative THE CENTER OF THE WORLD (2001), and had an excellent turn in the biopic of KINSEY (2004). Clearly, this guy can actually act, and he’s in the wrong movie here. It was kind of a letdown to see someone this good in a movie this mediocre. And you’re right, because of his talent, he made Hector the most interesting character in the whole movie. I wanted the movie to be more about him. But, in the end, he’s not even the central villain here. He’s just a lackey of the main villain.

And there was an issue that really bugged me. Every time Hector Hammond was about to do something evil, and someone’s life was in danger, the Green Lantern would suddenly appear and fight him. This made sense in a scene where Hammond sabotages a helicopter, because both of them are at the lavish party where it happens. But later on, there is no reason why Hal Jordon would know to be at a certain place at the exact moment he is needed. Hammond is the one who can read minds, not Jordon! This just seemed like bad writing to me.

MA: Mark Strong, who was extremely nasty as the villain in KICK-ASS (2010), is completely wasted here as the Green Lantern leader, Sinestro. I found Sinestro boring and annoying.

LS: I liked Sinestro. I thought Mark Strong played him perfectly, as an arrogant, pompous ass. He goes on to become Hal’s number one nemesis in the comics. How would you know this if you don’t read the comics? Easy. The guy’s name is SINESTRO, as in “sinister.” They might as well have named him BADGUY-IO. And this movie is sort of an origin story of him as well—how he becomes a bad guy. In fact, there’s a very important scene during the end credits that follows up on this. So stick around a little after the credits start to roll, so you don’t miss it. This was clearly DC trying to imitate the whole “extra scene” thing that Marvel does in their movies (but which was missing from the recent X-MEN: FIRST CLASS, for some odd reason).

I’m hungry.  Let’s grab a snack.

MA:  Sure.

(LS & MA approach a snack shack on the beach.  A huge order of onion rings flies off the counter and lands in LS’s hands.)

MA:  The onion rings have chosen you.

LS:  I willed it to happen. For I am the Green Onion!

MA: While the acting in GREEN LANTERN is adequate, the characters the actors are playing are not, and so I blame the writing here. The screenplay was written by four writers, Greg Berlanti, Michael Green, Marc Guggenheim, and Michael Goldenberg. Four writers, and they come up with this?

LS: Yeah, that’s sad. With all those rewrites, they still only attain a level that is a disappointment for a big superhero movie like this.
And, for the most part, the acting seemed below-average to me. I liked Peter Sarsgaard a lot. I liked Mark Strong. I even thought Ryan Reynolds, despite being miscast, had his moments. But the rest of the cast was just ugh. Blake Lively seemed like she just wandered on the set and wasn’t sure what she was doing. Tim Robbins—who can be good, when given a decent role—was boring here as yet another evil politician. BORING! And Taika Waititi as Hal’s best friend, Thomas Kalmaku, was just plain grating. The less we see of him, the better.

And there’s so much wasted talent in smaller roles. The great Angela Bassett is reduced to a one-dimensional government drone. And actors like Geoffrey Rush (Tomar-Re) and Michael Clarke Duncan (Kilowog) seem to be having the most fun here, but that’s because they’re only using their voices to bring CGI characters to life. They don’t have to actually appear in the movie, so that frees them up a bit.

A character with the stature of Green Lantern (in comics) deserved better. This movie is going to be a lot of people’s first exposure to the character, and it’s a weak one.

MA: The humor also misfired. There were so many lines of dialogue that were supposed to be funny, but I wasn’t laughing. I think this was because I didn’t really know the characters all that well. And it was hard to laugh with Hal because it was difficult to know if he was a good guy or not. If he’s truly a screw-up, a guy who’s sort of a jerk, then his jokes aren’t that funny, but the film never really delivers in terms of creating a well-rounded fleshed-out Hal Jordan, and as a result, I think a lot of the humor suffers for it.

LS: There were scenes with obvious, cliché jokes where people in the audience laughed and I was thinking “What the hell are they laughing at?” It was like they laughed because they felt they were supposed to. But I think laughs have to be earned. Not just because “Hey, this is supposed to be funny, so laugh.” Real laughter is an involuntary response. I didn’t laugh once during GREEN LANTERN. In fact, the need for such dumb humor in a movie that deserved a more serious tone made me groan a few times instead.

MA: GREEN LANTERN was directed by Martin Campbell, the same man who directed the James Bond films CASINO ROYALE (2006) and GOLDENEYE (1995), two movies that had much more energy and style than this one. GREEN LANTERN looks fine, but its action sequences—and I was surprised by this—were just average. None of the action scenes in this movie blew me away.

In short, the word that best describes GREEN LANTERN is average, and these days, with all the other superhero movie competition out there, films that are genuinely excellent, average just isn’t good enough. I liked the previous two superhero movies we’ve seen this year, X-MEN: FIRST CLASS and THOR, much better than GREEN LANTERN.

LS: I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I have to agree with you on every point. The thing is, I had heard some advance reaction to this movie, and it was almost all completely negative. So I went in to GREEN LANTERN expecting to see something that was the bottom of the bucket. The thing is, with such low expectations, I was surprised to find the movie wasn’t that bad. It’s certainly not the worst movie to come out in 2011. But it is a disappointment—because it could have been so much better.

MA: I give GREEN LANTERN two knives, and I give it two because it’s not awful. It’s just average.

LS: Average just about pegs it. And in a genre where you expect larger-than-life, flashy characters and lots of high-powered action, average is clearly a failure. I give it two knives as well. It was better than I expected. But nothing great.

(Stirring comes from the ocean waters.  MA & LS turn to see ABE SAPIAN from the HELLBOY movies emerging from the ocean.)

ABE SAPIAN:  Look at this ugly ring I just found.  I think I’ll give it to Hellboy for his birthday.

MA:  I don’t know if that’s such a good idea.  With Hellboy’s imagination, who knows what he’ll conjure up with a Green Lantern ring!

LS:  Which is exactly why Abe should give it to him. Someone like Hellboy—with that kind of power.  Now that’s a story I’d like to see!

MA:  I suppose I can’t argue with that.

LS:  You could.  But you’d be wrong as usual.

MA:  The only thing I’m wrong about on a consistent basis is my ongoing decision to team up with you each weekend!  What am I thinking???

Anyway, we’re done here.

LS:  Yep, folks, we’re done.  We’ll see you next weekend with a review of another new movie.

—END—

© Copyright 2011 by Michael Arruda and L.L. Soares

Michael Arruda gives GREEN LANTERN – 2 knives!

LL Soares also gives GREEN LANTERN - 2 knives!

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THE SKELETON KEY

Posted in 2005, Cinema Knife Fights, Ghost Movies, Haunted Houses, Paranormal, Voodoo Movies with tags , , , , , , on March 23, 2010 by knifefighter

(After you read this one, scroll down. There’s a reevaluation of the movie that comes after it. You can see if the critic changed his mind five years later ~ LLS)

CINEMA KNIFE FIGHT: SKELETON KEY (2005)
by Michael Arruda & L.L. Soares

(Outside a sprawling Southern mansion, MICHAEL ARRUDA and L.L. SOARES sit in a garden sipping sweet tea.  Between them sits a grizzled old man resembling John Hurt in a wheelchair with the baby ALIEN protruding from his chest.)

MA:  Today on Cinema Knife Fight we’re looking at the new voodoo thriller, THE SKELETON KEY (2005).

THE SKELETON KEY tells the story of young Caroline Ellis (Kate Hudson) who moves into a New Orleans mansion to care for a recent stroke victim and invalid Ben Devereaux (John Hurt). She also has to deal with Deveraux’s abrasive and protective wife Violet (Gena Rowlands), but she is encouraged to stay on by the young family attorney Luke (Peter Sarsgaard).

When Caroline discovers a secret room in the attic, filled with voodoo artifacts, she learns of the horrifying history of the house.  As things grow more mysterious, Caroline suspects that Ben’s life is in danger, and she tries to determine just who it is who is out to harm him.  Her investigation leads her deep into a world of ghosts and voodoo.

(LS picks up a voodoo doll of MA and starts sticking pins in it)

MA: Ouch! Damn mosquitoes! THE SKELETON KEY is a well-acted, intelligent thriller that in spite of its slow pace, still delivers the goods.  It’s a performance-driven movie, especially from its two female leads, Kate Hudson and Gena Rowlands.   Not to be overlooked, John Hurt does an admirable job playing a man who can’t move or talk.  It’s not as easy as it sounds, and Hurt makes it look effortless.

(ALIEN creature poking out of John Hurt’s chest cheers and hoots.)

MA:  Be quiet, you!  Just because his chest was your film debut is no reason to make a fool of yourself now.  (ALIEN frowns).

The twist ending didn’t knock my socks off, but like the film as a whole, was just good enough for me to recommend it.  How about you?

LS: (puzzled look on his face) Did we see the same movie?

I guess the biggest surprise for me was how totally unscary this movie was. And how predictable. It got better towards the end, as we start to figure out what the “twist” is, but truthfully, it’s not much of a twist. In the old days, THE SKELETON KEY would have made for a mediocre episode of NIGHT GALLERY. Instead, they’ve blown it up to feature length and suckered some decent actors to star in it, all to trick us out of our hard-earned money.

MA:  I disagree completely.  It’s not a waste of money.  It’s actually a film I think people should go out to see.  Is it scary?  Not really, but then again, a horror film doesn’t have to be scary to be successful.  It just has to be entertaining, and THE SKELETON KEY, though slow, is entertaining.

LS: (jabs at voodoo doll) (MA winces): I found this movie too bland and predictable to be entertaining, despite a mostly solid cast.  John Hurt and Gena Rowlands are real actors. Rowlands, in particular, is one of the best American actresses ever. As for Kate Hudson, she’s “adequate” at best here. Where is the charisma she showed back in the film, ALMOST FAMOUS (2000)?

The thing that struck me most while watching THE SKELETON KEY was how I paid ten dollars to sit in a movie theater and watch a bad TV movie. With the PG-13 rating, it’s as safe and generic as anything on basic cable, with pretty much the same script quality. In fact, I’ve seen edgier and scarier TV movies on the Sci-Fi Channel.  I am so sick of pabulum like this being dished into our hungry horror plates on a regular basis.

MA:  I’ll tell you what I’m sick of, films containing one action scene after another, one scene of incredible bloody violence after another.  That bores me to tears.  Here we have a movie with an intelligent script, with wonderful acting by everyone in it, including Hudson, by the way, and you’re going to fault it by calling it pabulum and a bad TV movie?   Why does every film have to be fast-paced?  I think you’re missing the boat here.  This is the kind of film that fans of Val Lewton’s 1940s movies will really enjoy.

LS: You know me better than that. I love the movies Val Lewton produced. And I find it hilarious that you compare this claptrap to classics like that. I’m not saying all horror films need tons of action and gore; all I’m asking for is a decent script. And you’re really exaggerating how intelligent this movie is.  We’ve all seen this story before, and the twist is old hat. The fact that it surprised and entertained you is kind of laughable.

MA:  I didn’t say it surprised me.  The twist is average, I’ll give you that much, and the script isn’t Shakespeare, but it worked for me.

LS:  What do you know?  The film had potential, but never lives up to it.  If you want to see a good voodoo movie, rent something like Wes Craven’s underrated THE SERPENT AND THE RAINBOW (1988), or Val Lewton’s 1943 classic, I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE, or even the 1970s grindhouse classic, SUGAR HILL (1974).

MA:   See, I think THE SKELETON KEY captures the spirit and feel of a movie like I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE.  It’s nowhere near as good, but if you like I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE, chances are, you’ll enjoy this movie.

(LS sticks more pins in the doll)

MA: Ouch!  I’ve had enough.  (turns to BABY ALIEN)  Get him!

(ALIEN jumps out of old man’s chest and attacks LS.)

MA:  In the name of good taste, we will not be showing you the bloody battle going on behind me.  Until next time—.

(Green alien goo spatters MA in face).

MA:  You just had to get that in, didn’t you?

—-END–

(Originally published in the HELLNOTES newsletter on August 25, 2005)

© Copyright 2005 by Michael Arruda and L.L. Soares

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THE SKELETON KEY – REVISITED

Posted in 2005, 2010, Cinema Knife Fights, Ghost Movies, Haunted Houses, LL Soares Reviews, Paranormal, Second Looks, Voodoo Movies with tags , , , , , , on March 23, 2010 by knifefighter

Five years have passed, and I decided to give THE SKELETON KEY a second chance. I rarely feel compelled to do this, but I’m a big fan of voodoo movies as a whole, and several friends have tried to convince me I was wrong about this one.

So I sat back and watched it again. I have to admit, I liked it better the second time, but a lot of my gripes about the film remain the same. It moves pretty slowly at times, especially in the beginning, and there isn’t much in the way of scares. But I do think it’s a little smarter than I originally gave it credit for. And the ending, while still predictable if you are paying attention, wasn’t all that bad.

I think a big problem I had with it was Kate Hudson. I’d previously seen her deliver an amazing performance in an otherwise bland film (ALMOST FAMOUS, from 2000) and I was expecting big things from her. Her role in THE SKELETON KEY was the exact opposite of the role that gave her her breakthrough. Where Penny Lane, the wise-beyond-her-years groupie in ALMOST FAMOUS (a mediocre movie worth seeing only for Hudson’s star-making performance, and Philip Seymour Hoffman as genius rock critic Lester Bangs), was charismatic and sensual, her character of Caroline in THE SKELETON KEY is downright boring. She never really grabbed me as the protagonist. The sad part is, SKELETON KEY is one of her better movies. She’s since sunken into a rut of making one bad romantic comedy after another, and has pretty much abandoned any aspirations she may have had for being a serious actress. (But there may be hope for her after all. I just heard she’s in the Michael Winterbottom remake of Jim Thompson’s THE KILLER INSIDE ME, coming out this year).

The supporting cast is much better. The legendary Gena Rowlands is a stand-out, even if this formula thriller is a far cry from the work she did with her late husband John Cassavetes. Her character of Violet is grating and certainly not much a stretch for Rowlands, but she acquits herself well enough, considering she isn’t given a lot to work with. As does Peter Sarsgaard, an increasingly interesting actor, in his role here as Luke, the young lawyer with a strange secret.

John Hurt, who I always enjoy seeing in a movie, isn’t given much to do here except sit in a wheelchair and look scared, but he does what he can with his thankless role.

I liked the voodoo aspects of the story. But overall, my opinion hasn’t changed too much. SKELETON KEY at least tried to be a solid little genre film. I thought it was watchable, and enjoyed it for what it was. But it’s not a great movie.

Director Iain Softley should get a big part of the blame, too. While the movie is atmospheric at times (mostly due to the location – a wonderful old plantation house in Louisiana – how could it not be atmospheric?), the direction is uninspired and rather generic.

Good actors such as Rowlands and Sarsgaard deserved better. And there is the kernel of a good movie in here. With a more talented director (and, sadly, a better leading lady), this movie could have been a much more satisfying voodoo tale. As is, it was a lost opportunity.

~L.L. Soares
March 2010

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ORPHAN

Posted in 2009, Cinema Knife Fights, Evil Kids! with tags , , , , , , , , , , , on February 16, 2010 by knifefighter

CINEMA KNIFE FIGHT:  ORPHAN
by Michael Arruda and L.L. Soares

FADE IN

(THE SCENE: A classroom, with the desks full of kids. In the front of the room L.L. SOARES is speaking to them.)

LS: Okay, class, today we’re going to have Show and Tell! And our first student will be little Mikey Arruda. Come to the front of the class, Mikey!

(MIKEY ARRUDA squeezes out from the child’s chair and goes to the front of the room.)

LS: What do you have for us today?

MA (in little boy voice):  I drew a picture.

LS:  Can you show it to the class?

(MA unfolds picture and hands it to LS.)

LS (Eyes bulging as he sees drawing of nude woman):  Whoa, baby!  Let’s not show that to the class just yet. Good old Mr. Soares is going to put this away into his private collect— er, into the trash can. Naughty, naughty, little Mikey. What on earth were you thinking?

MA:  I was thinking about the movie we’re reviewing.

LS:  Huh?

MA:  ORPHAN. There are some drawings like this in the film, and I wanted to explain the connection between this gag—.

LS (rolling eyes):  For crying out loud!  Do you have to explain everything?  (Looks at camera)  Does he have to explain everything? (to Mikey) Can’t you just stay in character and let the gag play out?

MA:  It’s hard playing a little kid.

LS:  Quit your whining!  I played a baby in the last column!

MA (sighs):  Yup, playing kids is no easy task. It takes a damned village. Or is it a village of the damned? (grins devilishly).

LS:  Oh stop that grinning devilishly stuff!   I’m moving on with the review.

ORPHAN is the tale of little Esther Coleman, a delightful little girl who is nothing but peaches and cream. But her name isn’t Coleman right off the bat. First she has to get adopted by the nice Coleman family. There’s Momma Kate (Vera  Farmiga) who is so pretty, but sometimes she drinks too much when she thinks about  her third child, little Jessica, who was born dead (in a nightmarish scene that begins the film). There’s Daddy John (Peter Sarsgaard) who wants his family to be whole again. Then there’s cute little Maxine (Aryana Engineer), known as Max,  who is almost completely deaf and uses sign language, and sulky pre-teen Daniel (Jimmy Bennett) who seems to play Guitar Hero 24 hours a day. As Kate says early on, it’s like she had all this love to give baby Jessica, and she wants to give it to someone else instead, so they look into adopting a child from an orphanage.

And that is where we meet inquisitive little Esther (Isabelle Fuhrman), who paints so very well for a child and who is quite mature for her age. It’s clear she’s an outsider, since she doesn’t run around and play with the other children. But it’s her very outsiderness that draws Kate and John to her. They seem to connect right away, and suddenly nervous Kate is very happy they considered adoption.

But, as is the way with these stories, little Esther is not the sweetheart she appears to be. That cute little Russian accent may have fooled us at first, but not for long. You see, bad things start happening, and some people even start turning up dead, and all of the clues seem to point to poor misunderstood Esther, which is most unfortunate.

Personally, I’ve always been a big fan of the evil kid genre, from the first time I was a tyke myself watching THE BAD SEED (1956) on TV—.

MA (interrupting):  Your biography.

(LS whacks MA across the forehead with a ruler.)

MA:  Ouch!

LS:  –ah, yes, I remember having a crush back then on little Patty McCormack, she looked so cute with her little Penmanship medal—up through classics like VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1960), THE EXORCIST (1973), and THE OMEN (1976) – evil kids were big in the 70s – to more recent fair like THE GOOD SON (1993), the only Macaulay Culkin film I ever liked. And then there’s my favorite of this genre, the classic Spanish film WHO CAN KILL A CHILD? (1976), about a whole island full of murderous kids! Yes, I’ve enjoyed the cinematic exploits of murderous children. So I was looking forward to ORPHAN.

MA:  I could take or leave this little subgenre, though I’m also a big fan of THE BAD SEED, VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED, and of course, THE EXORCIST. So, I had no major expectations coming into ORPHAN.

LS:  I have to admit, I thought it was pretty good. First off, the acting is above-average. I’ve always been a fan of Farmiga (you might remember her in Martin Scorcese’s THE DEPARTED and lots of other films), and Sarsgaard is an indie movie mainstay, who’s been in such great flicks as KINSEY. So right off the bat you have a married couple who’s slightly more interesting than is normal for these kinds of movies, just because of the people who are playing them. But the movie itself stands or falls on the shoulders of Isabelle Fuhrman as evil Esther, and she’s more than up for the job. Her performance is pretty terrific, and by the end she enters some very creepy territory.

The other kids are fine too, especially little Max, who Esther uses to her advantage (Max can read lips), and character actors like CCH Pounder as the nun who runs the orphanage, Sister Abigail, and Margo Martindale as Kate’s psychiatrist. All quite good.

As is usual for these films, Kate sees what is going on before anyone else, but because of her history of emotional troubles (between the grief over her dead child, her drinking, and marital woes), everyone is quick to dismiss her fears.

And what did you think, Little Mikey?

(MA sits at a table wearing a bib and eating cereal):  Mikey likes it!

LS:  MIKEY LIKES IT! HEY MIKEY! Er..the movie or the cereal?

MA:  The movie. The cereal tastes like cardboard.

LS:  That’s because it is cardboard, you dolt! You’re eating a prop.

MA:  Really?  Oh well. Gotta get your fiber somehow.

Anyway, I really liked ORPHAN. You know, you and I sat on a movie panel recently at NECON (a New England horror writers’ convention), and we were asked to name our favorite horror movies of the year, and I struggled to find a favorite. Had I seen ORPHAN before the panel, it would have been my pick. So, there you have it, I liked it so much, that it’s my favorite horror film of the year so far.

LS: Well, it’s no MARTYRS, but I enjoyed it quite a bit myself.

MA:  You hit the nail on the head when you talked about the cast. That’s a huge reason why I liked this movie. The acting was excellent. I do remember Vera Farmiga in THE DEPARTED, and she’s terrific again in this movie. And Sarsgaard is a fine actor who doesn’t disappoint here. One of his credits you probably want to forget is his work in another movie we reviewed  a few years back, THE SKELETON KEY, which I didn’t think was a bad movie, but I seem to recall you hated it. That’s going back a few years now.

LS: I think I have warmed a bit to SKELETON KEY over time. I still find Kate Hudson’s performance in that film incredibly boring – she’s just awful – and that hurts the film a lot, since she’s the lead. But I’ve always been a big fan of voodoo. And yes, Sarsgaard is good in that movie, too.

(CHILD in the back row raises her hand)

LS: Yes, little Mary!

CHILD (speaks in manly, Satanic voice): May I be excused. I really gotta go to the bathroom.

LS: But of course!

(CHILD walks past them, she looks up at Mikey)

CHILD: Your auntie eats slugs in hell.

(MA sticks his tongue out at her)

LS: Now, now, children. How about behaving?

(Hits MA across the forehead with a ruler again)

MA: Ouch! What did you do that for?

LS: Because I can. (laughs maniacally).

MA: Bully.

(LS laughs even louder)

MA:  Anyway, back to the review. I really liked CCH Pounder as Sister Abigail, and Margo Martindale as Kate’s psychiatrist was sufficiently frustrating when she was supposed to be.

And as you said, the kids are terrific too. Little Aryana Engineer as Maxine nearly steals every scene she’s in, and Jimmy Bennett as Daniel is also very good. Bennett was also in the new STAR TREK movie, in a brief stint as little boy Captain Kirk.

LS: I thought Daniel was kind of annoying, but that’s the point. He seemed like a real kid. And he sure was fun for Esther to torment.

MA: Of course, the main player here is Isabelle Fuhrman as Esther, and she’s phenomenal. She makes Damien seem like a Brady Bunch kid. Not that I’d want to attend a birthday party with Damien…

LS: I would. In fact, I have a present right here in case he invites me (pulls out a wrapped package).

MA: .. but in the OMEN movies he kinda stood back and let all the devil’s “helpers” do the dirty work. Esther does her own dirty work.

(Behind them, a birthday party scene, with lots of kids and party hats and cake and ice cream. DAMIEN and his friends throw ice cream at MA & LS).

LS:  Knock it off!  I’m not afraid of you!

MA:  Hey, LL, you might want to lighten up. It’s Damien, little Mr. 666 himself!

LS:  Big deal. We’re in good with his cousin, don’t forget.

MA:  Cousin?

(HELLBOY pops up with a can of beer and a donkey piñata):  Who’s up for a game of “Beat the Crap Out of the Donkey”?  (Children cheer)

MA:  It’s tempting to say that the kids, who are so good in this film, steal the movie, but it’s not true, because the adults in this flick are just as good.

While the acting is excellent, it’s not my favorite part of the movie. That would be the screenplay by David Johnson. He has written a script which could have very easily gone the way of cliché. Instead, he’s written an intelligent tale in which the people act the way they’re supposed to act. True, the script loses some of this intelligence towards the end, when the action takes over, and believability is strained somewhat, but by this point the film has earned its place as a smart thriller.

LS: Yes, it did lose its way a bit at the very end, and strained credibility. All I will say is that I found it odd how the characters all seemed immune to hypothermia.

MA: Good point!  I really liked the relationship between the husband and wife, John and Kate. I thought it was realistic. I liked the way they handled their family, especially how they dealt with the “F-bombs.”  This is important, because it makes their later arguments all the more painful to watch, and better yet, these disagreements unfold in a believable way.

LS: God, I hate wimpified terms like “f-bomb.” But you’re right. Their arguments didn’t feel forced. They seemed genuine.

MA: I also thought the Sister Abigail character was portrayed realistically. She was a character who could have very easily been written as a cliché. Instead, her reactions here are very real. Early on at the orphanage, she sees the parents interacting well with Esther, and she says as much. She doesn’t utter cliché dire warnings (“Nooo, not that child!) or act in a silly overly frightened manner. And later, her suspicions about Esther come off as real and authentic.

LS: We’re using words like “genuine” and “authentic” a lot, but I think what it amounts to is “good acting.”

MA:  But it’s more than that, though. It’s the writing too, as these characters, admittedly brought to life on screen by some fine acting, appear in situations that seem real, as opposed to some of the forced situations we so often see in horror movies. I don’t want to give anything away, but in a disturbing scene near the end involving Esther and John, I loved John’s reaction to her. It’s great acting, yes, but it’s also very good writing, having the character of John react in a way that’s believable. I kept waiting for him to give in to her and then be attacked because his giving in would have made him a creep, which would have been out of character for him. But this doesn’t happen.

And this movie earns its R-rating. While it’s not filled with one violent scene after another, the few it includes are powerful and heavy hitting. I thought the murder scenes were intense.

LS: Well, it earned its R-rating, but only slightly. There’s no nudity (Farmiga even leaves her bra on during a sex scene), and the blood is minimal. I thought little Esther’s acts of violence were a bit subdued for my tastes.

MA:  Well, yeah, for your tastes, ye who watches TOKYO GORE POLICE for fun. I didn’t find this movie subdued at all. I found it intense. I actually saw a couple of people sitting on the edge of their seats towards the end of the movie. Director Jaume Collet-Serra does a nice job building up the tension. I had a good time watching this movie. For those of you who like to be scared, this is a movie for you.

There are some truly great fright scenes. The road attack sequence when Esther attacks one of the characters with a hammer packs a real wallop (heh, heh). And I loved the scene when she pulls a razor blade on her brother while he’s in his bed. The line she utters to him— great stuff!  You gotta see this movie!

Sure, it has its flaws. I thought it was way too easy the way they adopted Esther. It was like, “we’ll take her.”  OK. All done. Granted, I think some time passes before they are allowed to bring Esther home, but it still seemed too easy. It takes more paperwork to adopt a dog from the pound these days than it did for these parents to adopt Esther!

LS: Yeah, that was a bit rushed. But we can forgive that because it was meant to move the movie along.

MA: And there were too many false scares for my liking, although most of these came early on in the movie. By the time the film really gets going, the scares are genuine.

LS: I found that irritating as well. But you’re right. That happens mostly in the early part of the film. I especially hate the way music is used to set us up for a scare that doesn’t happen. It’s a bit ham-fisted.

MA: I also liked the scene where we see Esther’s artwork on the walls of her room illuminated by the fish tank lighting. I thought this was a creepy scene.

LS: Yes, what was that? Ultraviolet paint?

MA: I’m not sure. But it reminded me of the paint used in some of the fun houses I went through as a kid.

I had little or no expectations regarding ORPHAN, and so I was more than pleasantly surprised. Right now, it’s my pick for best horror movie of the year. Go see ORPHAN!

LS:  Looks like one of the rare times that we agree about a movie. What can I say, except this one’s worth checking out.

Okay, little Mikey, Show and Tell is over. It’s off to detention for you!

MA:  Detention?

LS:  You draw dirty pictures in my classroom, you get a detention! (MA grumbles). Don’t worry. I’ll say so long to the folks for you. (MA Exits). Can’t have pictures like this in a classroom, that’s for sure. (Opens a door to reveal a room with purple fluorescent lighting and all sorts of sordid pictures on the wall). But a secret room hidden in the wall – that’s a different story!

Until next time—.

(CUT to MA sitting in detention next to Damien, Linda Blair, the Bad Seed and some of the  evil children from VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED).

MA:  Anyone have any gum?

–FADE OUT–

(First published on Fear Zone on 7/27/2009)

© Copyright 2009 by Michael Arruda and L.L. Soares

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