Super (2010)

Tags

Action, Comedy, Ellen Page, Kevin Bacon, Liv Tyler, Michael Rooker, Movie, Nathan Fillion, Rainn Wilson, Sean Gunn, Super

hahaha! it's funny cuz he died...

R

Rainn Wilson, Ellen Page, Kevin Bacon, Liv Tyler, Michael Rooker, Sean Gunn, Nathan Fillion

Frank: People look stupid when they cry.

After his wife is sucked back into the world of drug addiction, Frank (Wilson) decides to invent a superhero and fight crime on his own, with hopes of getting his wife back.

Holy uneven tone, Batman!

This movie is all over the place.  I really didn’t know what to think from moment to moment.  Is it sad and depressing?  No wait, it’s (supposed to be) a comedy!  Hmm, or maybe it’s a super-violent action picture?  Touching love story?  Yikes, nope, depressing and disturbing!  That’s what I’m going with…

I can theorize about what writer/director James Gunn was going for, but I can’t be sure.  It seems like a sort of more realistic spin on what The Watchmen and Kick-Ass were attempting.  That is, average people trying to become superheroes.  Kick-Ass started off with a sort of realism, as we see Dave fail miserably at fighting crime, as he probably would in real life.  But eventually that movie turned its regular people into more comic book like superheroes, which was a little disappointing.  That doesn’t really happen in Super, at least not to the same extent, but that alone doesn’t make it a better movie.

In fact, it’s not a better movie than Kick-Ass.  It could have been, if it had pulled off what it was trying to do…but it just doesn’t.  I like the more realistic approach to violence, even if it’s hard to watch.  Instead of cartoonish action sequences (like an 11 year old girl dodging bullets and leaping around like she’s in the Matrix), in Super, people are stabbed to death, have their heads bashed in on bricks, get blown up by pipe bombs, or just plain shot.  No real theatrics…just blam, dead.  That adds a very dark tone to the movie, which would be fine if the rest of it worked.

It doesn’t.  It’s just not that funny when it’s trying to be funny, and despite a few sweet flashback scenes, I never really bought the relationship between Frank and Sarah (Tyler).  Frank and Libby (Page) have a little more chemistry, but that’s probably just because both of them are borderline psychotic.  Actually, Libby has probably crossed over that line.  I will say, though, it’s good to see Page doing something pretty radically different than what she’s done in the past.  I don’t know from what depths of her soul she found the maniacal laugh she uses as she kills people, but it kinda creeped me out.

I guess the real issue here is that Super is just not a fun movie to watch.  It’s depressingly dark and mean, and after watching it I just sort of felt…bad.  Maybe the movie is right about what sort of person probably would dress up as a superhero and how they’d act.  Maybe it’s right about how the whole situation would eventually turn out.  Maybe the point is, “this is not a good idea!”

Point taken…

Leave crime-fighting to the professionals…like Batman.

10 – 2.4 for a wildly uneven tone – 2.5 for just not being all that funny + .2 because Ellen Page is so darned cute = 5.3

Serenity (2005)

Tags

Adam Baldwin, Alan Tudyk, Gina Torres, Jewel Staite, Morena Baccarin, Nathan Fillion, Sean Maher, Summer Glau

stand over here, where I'm pointing...that way it'll be much easier for me to kick you in the face...

PG-13

Nathan Fillion, Gina Torres, Summer Glau, Alan Tudyk, Adam Baldwin, Jewel Staite, Sean Maher, Morena Baccarin

Zoë: So… trap?
Mal: Trap.
Zoë: We goin’ in?
Mal: Well, it ain’t but a few hours out.
Wash: Yeah, but… remember the part where it’s a trap?
Mal: If that’s the case, then Inara’s already caught in it.  She wouldn’t set us up willin’.  Might be we get a shot at seeing who’s turning these wheels.  We go in.
Kaylee: But how can you be sure Inara don’t just want to see you?  Sometimes people have feelings.  I’m referring here to people…
Mal: Y’all were watching I take it?
Kaylee: Yes…
Mal: Did you see us fight?
Kaylee: No.
Mal: Trap.

River Tam (Glau) is being hunted by the Alliance, the governing body in the human-inhabited universe.  She and her brother, Simon (Maher), have been passengers on board the Serenity, a smuggling spaceship captained by Mal Reynolds (Fillion).  River holds an important secret in her mind that the Alliance will do anything to keep from getting out.

A great movie to cap off a great TV series.  Sadly, the series, Firefly, didn’t last very long on television, but you can find it on DVD (and I highly recommend it).

It’s hard for me to say if this movie would stand on its own if you haven’t seen the series before watching it, but I’ve seen some reviews that seemed to say just that.  It doesn’t leave newcomers out in the cold, but it also doesn’t bore long time fans with a lot of back story that they already know.

In the series and the movie, there’s an odd combination of action, humor, romance, science fiction, and old western themes that seems like it shouldn’t work (and probably doesn’t for some people), but it works well for me.  I like the characters a lot, and really enjoy the fact that there aren’t a bunch of aliens involved like you’d see in most other sci-fi these days.  It’s in the future, and humans have populated other planetary systems, but they’ve yet to encounter any humanoid creatures with varying amounts of bumps on their foreheads.  There are, however, Reavers.  Reavers are just humans that have gone insane and will brutally kill (and eat) anybody who’s not a Reaver.  They are not to be messed with.

The special effects were never a real strong point in the series, and they’re a little lacking at times here, but that’s okay when you’ve got a compelling story.  The secret that River carries is a dark one, and that seriousness brings a lot of weight to the movie.  It’s an important mission that Mal and his crew decide to take on, and not all of them are going to make it through it (don’t worry, I won’t say who lives and who dies).

It’s got to be hard balancing such seriousness with the humor that is injected into the script, but they always managed to do it well in the series, and they do it well again here.  I credit the writers to some extent, but I think the actors are probably a big reason it succeeds.  Nathan Fillion in particular is great at going from goofy to serious in a heartbeat.

The worst thing about watching the series or the movie is that it will just leave you wishing there was more than 14 episodes and 1 movie.  You can tell that the cast and crew had a good time making it, and it is my opinion that you’ll have a good time watching it.

If you’re going to be employed as a person who hunts down and kills other people, be sure to invest in full body armor.

10 – .4 for a few lackluster special effects – .9 for a few scenes that seem a little extraneous and slow = 8.7

Waitress (2007)

Tags

Adrienne Shelly, Andy Griffith, Cheryl Hines, Comedy, Drama, Jeremy Sisto, Keri Russell, Movie, Nathan Fillion, Romance, Waitress

we just wanted to tell you that we think your outfit looks stupid...

PG-13

Keri Russell, Nathan Fillion, Adrienne Shelly, Cheryl Hines, Jeremy Sisto, Andy Griffith

Jenna: I should never have drank!  I do stupid things when I drink…like sleep with my husband.

Jenna (Russell) is an expert pie maker and works as a waitress at a small diner that sells her pies.  She’s been saving money to finally leave her abusive husband, but when she finds out she’s pregnant, escape seems impossible.  Then she meets her new doctor who is everything that her husband is not…except for married.

I really like this movie.  It has a certain something that’s hard to define.  Maybe “heart” would be the right word.  And right at the center of that heart is a great performance by Keri Russell.  I’d never really seen her in anything else, but she definitely won me over with this one.  She has a tough job.  She must charm the audience despite the fact that she’s having an affair with a married man.  We can sympathize with her straying from her no good husband, but Dr. Pomatter (Fillion) has a loving wife.  His indiscretion is a bit harder to overlook.  Though, Nathan Fillion is likable enough to make us (and Jenna) forget about that too.  I guess the two keys are that Jenna has to be charming and sympathetic enough that we’d believe the doc couldn’t help himself, and the abusive husband storyline has to be serious enough that we’d actually root for Jenna to cheat on him.  Mission accomplished, I suppose.

The men in this movie don’t come out looking too good.  Most are either too needy, too mean, or just general losers.  Though, I guess the women don’t fare much better.  They’re either cheating on their husbands or they’re so desperate that they’ll settle from one of said general losers.

Cheryl Hines and Adrienne Shelly are both good as Jenna’s waitress friends.  Sadly, though, this was Shelly’s last time directing and acting, as she was murdered just before the release of the film.  Every time I watch it, I feel a bit sad seeing her as Dawn because she’s just so darned likable and funny.

I guess if you’re going to be remembered for your last film, this is a good one to be remembered by.  It’s funny, looks good, has good performances, good romantic chemistry between the leads, and good general chemistry between everybody.

Oh, and there’s lots of pie.

Seems like you can make a pie out of just about anything…

10 – 1 for a character that’s just too over the top – .4 for the end being a little oversimplified to an unrealistic degree = 8.6

Trucker (2008)

Tags

Benjamin Bratt, Drama, Jimmy Bennett, Joey Lauren Adams, Michelle Monaghan, Movie, Nathan Fillion, Trucker

great job, kid...you ate the ball...now what are we supposed to do?

R

Michelle Monaghan, Jimmy Bennett, Nathan Fillion, Joey Lauren Adams, Benjamin Bratt

Runner: You ever heard of a Jack of all trades?  Well, that’s me.  Actually, I’m more of a 6 of diamonds of all trades…

Diane Ford (Monaghan) is an appropriately named truck driver who is used to her lonely life of long drives and short relationships.  One day, Diane is asked to look after her 11 year old son Peter, whom she abandoned 10 years ago, while his father battles cancer.  Obviously this infringes on her care free life, and the two clash at first.  But maybe, just maybe, they will eventually bond…and they might even teach each other a few valuable lessons about life and love along the way.

Formulaic.  Sometimes one word can say it all, and for me “formulaic” does the trick here.  This is like a remake of Over the Top, but without all the arm wrestling.  It does feature a similarly annoying kid character, though, and a star with the same letter at the beginning of her first and last name, just like Sylvester Stallone in Over the Top.  See?  Same movie.

I will say that Michelle Monaghan turns in a much better performance than Sly did back in 1987, but I can’t say it was entirely convincing.  Maybe if the kid wasn’t such a brat from the get go it would have worked better.  If he had slowly wedged his way into her heart by being nice and patient I would have bought it more easily.  As is, I felt like the character of Diane would have just clobbered the kid a few times and sent him on his way.

It’s always good to see Nathan Fillion in a movie, and he’s amusing again here as Runner, Diane’s married drinking buddy who is obviously sweet on his little truck driving friend.  Their relationship is more interesting, and less predictable, to watch than Diane and Peter’s.

This isn’t a bad movie.  In fact, it’s competently made and acted.  It’s just so familiar and uninspired.  It seems like they were counting on the fact that it’s a woman truck driver reuniting with her son to make the movie more interesting.  That may be a somewhat original perspective to start from, but the story is far from original.

Don’t abandon your kids.  They’ll just end up back in your life anyways.

10 – 3 for being so formulaic and predictable – 1.1 for the annoying kid and the angry relationship between mom and child = 5.9