Annihilation (2018)

Tags

Drama, Horror, Mystery, Sci-fi, Thriller

(Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt was for a spooky and mysterious poem. Of course, I could have used either of the movies from the last two days, but this one works too, with its theme of unchecked change hopefully providing the chill factor I was going for.)

The world is changing before my eyes,
And what a surprise
To notice mutations that God never tried
That eons would normally cover and hide.

That tree over there was not always a tree.
Nor was that creature that lurks in its shade.
Should I be afraid?
For I know what they are,
But what kind of people did they use to be?

Betrayed by their cells, too minute to resist,
They changed and exchanged what had made them exist.
What monsters are born from a change so extreme,
A mutable dream
Where men were not always the beasts that they seem?

Are questions of sanity signs that you’re sane?
Just being here mixes unease in my brain.
For I’m not immune;
My own skin’s a cocoon.
When it hatches, how much of myself will remain?
____________________

MPAA Rating: R (for some language and gruesome violence)

From the trailers, Annihilation looked like the kind of movie to follow in the footsteps of Arrival with its slow-burn, high-concept science fiction. Or maybe that’s just what I wished it was. It’s actually closer in spirit to 2001: A Space Odyssey, and while most critics considered that a point in Annihilation’s favor, it’s not for me.

Natalie Portman plays a cellular biologist and ex-soldier named Lena, who recounts her story to a hazmat-suit-wearing Benedict Wong. After her soldier husband Kane (Oscar Isaac) disappears on a mission, he returns a year later changed and distant, and Lena soon learns where he has been: a forested region of Florida, where a shimmering, expanding wall has puzzled scientists and swallowed any team sent to investigate it. Along with a head psychologist (Jennifer Jason Leigh), a paramedic (Gina Rodriguez), a physicist (Tessa Thompson), and a geomorphologist (Tuva Novotny), Lena enters “the Shimmer” in an effort to unravel its mysteries.

I’ll admit writer-director Alex Garland’s Annihilation has the high acting and production standards that modern sci-fi deserves, and it’s a home run at least on a visual level. The set-up is superbly intriguing, and Lena’s journey into the Shimmer is buoyed by the allure of the unknown. Signals and light are unexplainably altered. Monsters and strange species lurk out of sight. The evidence they find of Kane’s mission challenges their sanity.

It’s Alien-level tension and uncertainty (or at least Prometheus-level), but all this mystery has to lead somewhere for it to be worthwhile, and Annihilation’s ending is just too ambiguous for its own good. That’s where the comparisons to 2001 ring true, with the largely wordless climax playing out like a fever dream of compelling but nebulous menace. In the end, though, its unanswered questions just left me puzzled by its enigmatic lack of resolution.

It’s odd that this would be my gripe when I commended the ambiguity of The Endless just a couple days ago. I guess The Endless was open to interpretation in a way that suggested a complexity that was justifiably out of reach (and at least the main plot got some resolution), whereas Annihilation seemed more intentionally esoteric, like a puzzle where the writer was hiding pieces from you and chuckling at his own shrewdness. Maybe that makes no sense, and maybe others will enjoy the film’s mind-twisting, but Annihilation left me unsatisfied, just as my VC was left unsatisfied by the novel on which it was based (and by all the changes made by the filmmakers). I enjoyed the set-up, but not where it led. With its middling box office returns, they may or may not adapt the other books in the series, but either way, I’m not sure the resolution is worth caring about.

Best line: (Dr. Ventress) “Then, as a psychologist, I think you’re confusing suicide with self-destruction. Almost none of us commit suicide, and almost all of us self-destruct. In some way, in some part of our lives. We drink, or we smoke, we destabilize the good job… and a happy marriage. But these aren’t decisions, they’re… they’re impulses. In fact, you’re probably better equipped to explain this than I am.”
(Lena) “What does that mean?”
(Ventress) “You’re a biologist. Isn’t the self-destruction coded into us? Programmed into each cell?”

 

Rank: Dishonorable Mention

 

© 2019 S.G. Liput
625 Followers and Counting

 

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Psycho 2 (1983)

Tags

Horror, Mystery

(Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt was for a poem about loving something dull, so I gave it a bit of a deranged spin, courtesy of Norman Bates.)

It’s just a wig, a ratty thing,
Gray from age and gray from dust,
And yet I cannot help but cling
To something I distrust.

It was my mother’s once, you know;
A hoary halo round her head,
And now no matter where I go,
I see it even though she’s dead.

To keep it still makes her feel close.
Morbid maybe? Yes, it’s true.
But I’m a quite obliging host,
And when I don it out of view…

Hello, Mother, how are you?
______________________________

MPAA rating: R (stronger language and violence than the original, plus brief nudity)

For those who may think that Hollywood’s resurrection of decades-old franchises for the sake of a sequel no one asked for was a recent trend, I will simply point to Psycho II, released 23 years after Hitchcock’s original (not to mention Psycho III three years later and Psycho IV four years after that). I think that the ’80s really kicked off the horror course of endless sequels, and Psycho was just one of many to get that treatment. While this long-delayed follow-up doesn’t compare with Hitchcock’s masterpiece, it’s a tight little slasher mystery in its own right.

Twenty-two years after the events of Psycho, Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins reprising the role) is supposedly rehabilitated and released from an insane asylum, much to the chagrin of Lila Loomis (Vera Drake), who still despises Bates for the murder of her sister Marion Crane. Getting a job at a nearby diner, Norman returns to his motel and the house from the first film, but after befriending a beautiful young coworker (Meg Tilly), he finds himself struggling with his sanity, especially as the body count mysteriously rises.

Psycho II really tries to humanize Norman, making him sympathetic as he wonders whether he can trust his own mind, and Anthony Perkins manages it better than any actor taking his place could have. The mystery of Psycho has become too ingrained in pop culture for it to have much shock value anymore, but Psycho II keeps the characters and audience guessing what’s real and what’s psychosis. I’m rather disappointed in how one character is changed for the sake of the plot, right down to the gruesome way they’re dispatched. Otherwise, though, the mystery has decent twists and performances and even a little dark humor, making Psycho II better than I would expect from a film cashing in on Hitchcock’s legacy.

Best line: (Norman) “Well, I’ll tell you. When I was little, I had a fight with my mother, so I put some poison in her tea, you know. But I’m all right now.”
(Mary) “You sure?”
(Norman) “Sure! Otherwise, they wouldn’t give me a job at a diner, would they?”
(Mary) “I don’t know; it takes a nut to work there.”

 

Rank: Honorable Mention

 

© 2019 S.G. Liput
624 Followers and Counting

 

The Endless (2018)

Tags

Drama, Horror, Mystery, Sci-fi

(Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt was for a poem of origin, so, inspired by the time loops in this film, I focused on how where we’re going might mirror where we’ve been.)

Is darkness our friend?
They say we came from darkness.

We’ve grown up searching for the light
From friends both fickle and contrite,
From dogs that lick and dogs that bite,
And lies that distance and unite.

It feels as though our life’s a loop,
A track so many have run before,
From more to less and less to more,
And ere our ship returns to shore,
Our time is short, but we explore.

The light’s the loop,
The dark’s the end,
They say we’re headed for darkness.
Is darkness still our friend?
____________________

MPAA rating:  Not Rated (R for the language and some violence, though there’s much worse out there)

Not being a huge fan of horror, I’ll admit I’m not very familiar with the works of H.P. Lovecraft, a name I’ve noticed becoming more and more popular lately. What constitutes Lovecraftian horror is new to me, but from what I understand, it deals with terrifying cosmic powers beyond the scope of human understanding, or basically fear of the unknowable. If that’s right, The Endless might be the best example I’ve seen, a fascinating and slow-burning mystery with an undercurrent of paranoia and weirdness.

Two brothers Justin and Aaron (played by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, who also directed and split work on writing, editing, and cinematography) are struggling with normal life some years after escaping from a so-called “UFO death cult” out in the desert. Aaron remembers their time there as one of stability and plenty and wishes to return, and, though Justin is dead-set against it, he agrees to briefly visit their former home after a mysterious video arrives. Strangely, very little seems to have changed, but the longer the brothers stay, the more uncanny events seem to happen, portending a great danger that might be inescapable.

I won’t pretend to claim that I completely understood the film’s plot, but The Endless is well-acted and has intrigue to spare, with mysteries and fear piling on top of each other and most of the questions left largely unanswered by the end. Yet it’s very much a case of what you don’t see being scarier than what you do; there’s not really any nightmarish imagery, more foreboding and unease. A prime example is when the brothers are invited to pull on a rope as one of the community’s confidence exercises. The rope stretches off into the darkness as each person plays tug-of-war with something, with the chill factor coming from the lack of knowing what that something is.

As the film goes on, it enters a wilder side of science fiction, with time loops and fractured dimensions that challenge the mind and don’t provide easy answers, if any, but through it all, the brotherly bond between Justin and Aaron proves to be a strong human element to ground the craziness. I’m curious now to check out one of Benson and Moorhead’s previous films called Resolution, which apparently expands on one of the subplots from this movie, or vice versa. (Fans of theirs were no doubt happy to spot the connection.)

Like Chronesthesia, The Endless is an example of multitasking filmmakers making the most of a limited budget and delivering a surprisingly solid product; the special effects are especially well-done for an independent film. It’s also one of those movies worth rewatching and discussing with others, if only to understand it better, though perhaps that lack of full comprehension is both the point and the appeal.

Best line: (an anonymous quote displayed at the beginning) “Friends tell each other how they feel with relative frequency. Siblings wait for a more convenient time, like their deathbeds.”

 

Rank: List Runner-Up

 

© 2019 S.G. Liput
622 Followers and Counting

 

The Commuter (2018)

Tags

Action, Mystery, Thriller

(Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt was to incorporate some kind of business jargon, but my limited time also limited my thought process on this one, so I skipped the prompt. Just a limerick today, with a bit of dark wordplay.)

There once was a frazzled commuter
Who spent his whole day on computer.
They say that he snapped
After feeling too trapped
And became an acclaimed troubleshooter.
__________________

MPAA rating: PG-13

Liam Neeson just loves these late-in-life thrillers where a 65-year-old can still kick butt. I haven’t kept up with them all so I can’t rightly tell how The Commuter compares, but I for one enjoyed it a lot.

Neeson plays Michael MacCauley, an insurance agent and ex-cop, who on the day he gets laid off meets a mysterious woman (Vera Farmiga) who offers him $100,000 for him to find someone called “Prynne” on the train who doesn’t belong. It’s a vague task, and as Michael gets pulled in further, he soon finds it to be a life-and-death struggle that’s not about to let him go easily.

Despite Neeson’s age, he fits the role like a glove, and the early scenes detailing his daily routine and commute establish him as a likable everyman. Once the action starts, he keeps up admirably, especially during a stand-out one-take fight scene with excellent camera work. The twists and turns offer a few surprises as well, even after what would normally be the final set piece for a film set on a train.

Also starring Elizabeth McGovern, Sam Neill, and Patrick Wilson (shame he had no scenes with fellow Conjuring star Farmiga), The Commuter probably isn’t the kind of movie that is likely to be remembered years from now.  But it’s a fast-paced mystery thriller (albeit with some convolutions and unanswered questions) that proves how watchable Neeson can be.

 

Rank: List Runner-Up

 

© 2019 S.G. Liput
621 Followers and Counting

 

Searching (2018)

Tags

Drama, Mystery, Thriller

Like, share, post, delete,
Play, search, hide, repeat—
On the screen, our lives connect,
While off the screen, they show neglect,
Not knowing how we each affect
Each other in ways indirect.

Liars, lovers, fathers, friends
Dwell online, but each depends
On flesh and blood that can’t suppress
The need to fill its loneliness.
_____________________

MPAA rating: PG-13

Hollywood is all too often invaded by gimmicks. The found-footage style, the zombie craze, the Alien-style plotline (come to think of it, most of them are horror gimmicks) – there’s more than enough copycats to go around, but there’s always that one that did it best and usually first, like Alien or Night of the Living Dead. Using only a computer screen for a movie may have been done before, as in the Unfriended films, but it’s hard to imagine it will ever be done better than in last year’s Searching.

John Cho plays David Kim, a California father whose daughter goes missing, sending him on a frantic search through her online life and uncovering just how little he knew about her. The computer screen “gimmick” is at its best in the opening scenes, which play out in a way reminiscent of the beginning of Up yet exemplify how the computer has become a partner and observer to so many aspects of our lives. I could easily see this beginning as a standalone short film, as it was originally intended, but instead, it simply sets the stage and grounds the story in characters we care about from the start.

My VC was a little tired of the gimmick by the end, but I admire the variety of methods the filmmakers employed to restrict the story to a computer screen while not letting it become dull or overly repetitive. It often depends on David not closing his FaceTime camera window even after a phone call ends, but the story also unfolds through news footage, live recordings, home videos, file searches, and real-time texting. (I couldn’t help but wonder if the texting was at all inspired by the anime Durarara, which also used texts to depict long-distance conversations.) The way it does much of this without spoken words is like a new kind of silent film and is executed brilliantly to suggest emotions we aren’t actually seeing on someone’s face.

Beyond existing for itself, the innovation serves the mystery, a great one full of twists and turns that may not be prediction-proof but offer no shortage of red herrings to keep you guessing. And even once you know the film’s secrets, there’s still more to appreciate; one of the DVD’s bonus features revealed the level of extreme detail that went into creating every web page from scratch, many of which are full of in-jokes, foreshadowing, side plots, and M. Night Shyamalan references. (Even when David’s daughter and an anonymous friend share their favorite Pokémon with each other, those in the know will recognize deeper meaning behind their choices.)

Considering how profitable Searching became, earning back several dozen times its limited budget, there’s no doubt that other films will aspire to emulate its style, but I feel that Searching might be cinematic lightning in a way. I doubt it will hit twice, with any unoriginal copycats likely to overstay their welcome. It’s an outstanding debut from director and former Google employee Aneesh Chaganty, one that uses its gimmick in the best way possible.

 

Rank: List-Worthy

 

© 2018 S.G. Liput
605 Followers and Counting

 

VC Pick: The Hindenburg (1975)

Tags

Disaster, Drama, History, Mystery, Thriller, VC Pick

Surely luxury entails
Safety in its fine details.
Once you’re paying through the nose
You need not doubt the practiced pros.

Once your travel’s well along,
Who’d dare think something might go wrong?
How could pride descend to panic?
Ask the Hindenburg and Titanic.
_________________

MPAA rating: PG

One of the many disaster movies of the 1970s, The Hindenburg will never go down as one of the best of its genre, but it’s by no means among the worst either, despite the pretty scathing reviews it has endured over the years. My VC happens to be quite fond of it, and while her appreciation dwarfs my own, I still consider it a solid film made memorable by its spectacular climax.

One thing everyone should know going in is that this movie is historically inaccurate on many fronts, despite a largely faithful re-creation of the airship itself and a collection of characters based on real people. The main character is Colonel Franz Ritter (George C. Scott), a decorated German air officer who is tasked by Goebbels with preventing a threatened attack on the Nazis’ prize zeppelin, which flies with highly flammable hydrogen rather than helium. While many theories have been proposed on what caused the Hindenburg’s destruction, the movie goes the resistance conspiracy route, which has never been proven but works as a potential reason for what happened.

Scott does well as usual, and the fact that he plays a Nazi is mitigated by his distaste for the regime in light of some recent tragedies. The rest of the cast is full of recognizable names and faces, all of whom are suspects in Ritter’s investigation, including Anne Bancroft as a countess he knows, a young William Atherton as an airship crewman, and René Auberjonois and Burgess Meredith as a pair of gamblers. Having watched a lot of Everybody Loves Raymond recently, I also spotted two recurring stars in Katherine Helmond as a passenger and Charles Durning as the Hindenburg’s captain.

The build-up during the zeppelin’s flight, as Ritter scrutinizes everyone’s motives and opportunity, is unavoidably slow, but the tension does grow as the voyage comes to its historical end. The suspense is a lot like Titanic in that you know generally what will happen and are just waiting for the shoe to drop, and it’s worth it when it does. The Oscar-winning effects are dated but still impressive, and the re-creation of the accident is chaotic and brilliant as the screen fades to black-and-white and seamlessly works in real footage of the Hindenburg’s crash, ending with the iconic radio recording of a terrified onlooker. It’s a case where the last ten minutes makes the rest worthwhile, but you could also just watch the last ten minutes, sacrificing context to save time. Either way, despite being in a film full of historical liberties, it’s an excellent disaster sequence, which alone ought to disprove this film’s harsher critics.

Best line: (Captain Lehmann, ironically as they set off) “I’m to go to Washington to get us helium.”   (Ritter) “I wish we had it this trip.”

 

Rank: Honorable Mention

 

© 2018 S.G. Liput
574 Followers and Counting

 

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004)

Tags

Action, Mystery, Romance, Sci-fi, Thriller

The world of tomorrow was yesterday’s dream.
Today’s that tomorrow, or so it would seem.
Today’s not exactly what yesterday guessed,
But thinking dystopian, maybe that’s best.

Today has its own dreams of what’s on its way
But also thinks fondly about yesterday.
Today is a mess; maybe if we combine
Tomorrow and yesterday, all will be fine.
_________________

MPAA rating: PG

Some films are just unlike any other. The weird thing about Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow is that it’s both utterly unique and yet reminiscent of many other movies before it and since. It’s an unusual blend of the futuristic and the retro, which offers the same kind of entertaining, if not particularly deep, gusto as a pulp magazine from 80+ years ago.

Of course, unlike those magazines or comics, Sky Captain puts its visuals in motion with a distinctly retro, sort of noir visual style, which most reminded me of those Superman cartoons from the 1930s. Shadows are at stark angles, the colors are muted almost to sepia and black-and-white, montages have semi-transparent scenes playing over each other, and many shots have a balanced composition resembling an old war poster. Added to all of this are special effects that, created in 2004, manage to be both well-visualized and just that slightly bit cheesy, minus the extra polish that they would have if made today. Yet the fact that nearly all of the actors’ surroundings are CGI is quite impressive and not immediately obvious. So many films these days end up looking like something else, even if it’s unintentional or trying to be somewhat different (think Pacific Rim vs. Transformers), yet it would take a lot of effort to make anything resembling Sky Captain’s visual flair.

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow is a hodgepodge of genres and story elements from sources ranging from Indiana Jones to those same Superman cartoons I mentioned. Jude Law plays the titular Captain Joe Sullivan, whose tricked-out plane is called in to stop giant robots attacking New York City, while Gwyneth Paltrow is Polly Perkins, a Lois Lane-ish intrepid reporter seeking her next big story. Together, they investigate a worldwide conspiracy that is making famous scientists disappear as part of some unknown master plan by a man called Totenkopf (Laurence Olivier, or rather his likeness since he died in 1989).

Like I said, I was reminded of many films while watching this one, making me wonder why I hadn’t bothered to see it sooner. It’s hard not to think of Salah in Raiders of the Lost Ark when Joe and Polly rendezvous with an old friend to visit Shangri-La, and Sky Captain himself is like an airborne Indy, as his womanizing ways and bickering chemistry with Polly indicate. Yet I was even more stunned by the fact that I was reminded of films that came out after this one and must have drawn some inspiration from it. Angelina Jolie shows up as an old flame of Joe’s, but tell me she’s not a touchstone for Nick Fury when she wears an eyepatch and captains a helicarrier from a bridge that even resembles the one from The Avengers.

More shocking still for me was how similar Sky Captain was to April and the Extraordinary World, a new favorite animated film I praised for its originality just last month. The story just holds too many parallels: a World War II-era setting with unusually advanced technology, famed scientists being mysteriously abducted, a jungle-set climax with a rocket that has more or less the exact same purpose in both films. I can’t say my opinion of April has diminished, but I must admit that it’s not quite as original as I thought. I suppose Sky Captain has absorbed my appreciation in that regard, even if I still like April more.

With my rambling on about uniqueness and originality, I don’t know if this review has made it clear or not, but I highly enjoyed Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. If you can buy into its stylistic distinctiveness, there’s plenty of high-flying, largely family-friendly adventure to be had from its genre blending. As the first film to be (almost) completely shot on blue screen, Sky Captain was clearly a labor of love for director Kerry Conran and remains his only feature film. It is indeed something of a novelty item, as many reviews have called it, but it’s still quite an entertaining one.

Best line: (I’d rather not say since it gives away a major plot point.)

Rank: List-Worthy (tied with April and the Extraordinary World)

 

© 2018 S.G. Liput
573 Followers and Counting

 

2018 Blindspot Pick #4: Clue (1985)

Tags

Comedy, Mystery

(This is my last poem/review for NaPoWriMo, still playing catch-up. Yesterday’s final NaPoWriMo prompt was for a poem dealing with a strange or obscure fact, so I just included a lesser-known one about the famous board game.)

 

Someone is dead, but all others must stay,
For once his heart stops
And we wait for the cops,
It’s time to determine who made him that way.

Someone is dead, and someone here did it.
They picked a good room
To exact the man’s doom
With one of these weapons, since nobody hid it.

Someone is dead, and Miss Scarlet’s suspicious.
Old Mustard looks nervous,
The maid’s out of service,
And both Plum and Peacock appear most pernicious.

Someone is dead; White shows little contrition
And might have begun it,
Or Green could have done it,
Or maybe Miss Peach (in an ‘80s edition).

Someone is dead; someone offed him, but who?
It’s time to be candid
And catch them red-handed,
For every detail is considered a clue!
________________________

MPAA rating: PG

For me, Clue is sort of like The Goonies, an ‘80s film that seems to have developed a cult following out of nostalgia yet I never got to see it as a kid, which is when I probably would have loved it even more. As it is, I truly enjoyed this campy comedy and see why it is considered one of the only good adaptations of a board game.

It’s been so long since I played Clue that I don’t really remember the gameplay, only the variety of characters, locations, and weapons, all of which are included in its film version. The beginning is a bit too slow, but it introduces us one by one to the collection of fake-named strangers who arrive at a mansion on a dark and stormy night: Colonel Mustard (Martin Mull), Miss Scarlet (Lesley Ann Warren), Mrs. White (Madeline Kahn), Mr. Green (Michael McKean), Mrs. Peacock (Eileen Brennan), and Professor Plum (Christopher Lloyd). (Kellye Nakahara from M*A*S*H also has a cameo as the Cook.) All of them are greeted by the house’s butler Wadsworth (Tim Curry) and are soon confronted by Mr. Boddy (Lee Ving), the man who has been blackmailing all of them and who soon ends up dead under mysterious circumstances, leading those gathered to try to figure out who killed him, where, why, and with what weapon.

How much you enjoy Clue likely depends on your capacity for campiness. My VC, who had also not seen Clue before, wished that events had played out with a more serious tone, but considering the number of plot twists and holes, I don’t think the story could work without its tongue-in-cheek levity. The script by John Landis and director Jonathan Lynn is full of chuckle-worthy wordplay and potent quotables, but it’s also so convoluted that, by the end, the characters themselves are pointing out how ridiculous things have gotten (“There’s one thing I don’t understand.”  “One thing?”) Some of the jokes don’t work (Madeline Kahn gets weirdly tongue-tied in one scene), but I was still thoroughly amused, from the Scooby Doo-like exploration of the mansion as the group splits up to the light black comedy as the body count rises.

Clue is also notable for having three alternate endings, which were apparently handed out at random to different theaters. I can see how that gimmick might have affected some opinions at the time since not every ending works as well. The first one is somewhat plausible, the second less so, but I preferred the third ending, which is the one the movie says “really happened.” Still, it’s a cool eccentricity that heightens its board game connection and makes you pay greater attention on the next viewing.

I do wish I had seen Clue when I was younger; if I’d watched it years ago and many times since, I could see it being a favorite. It’s silly but knowingly so, and all of the actors are “game” for the fun (especially Tim Curry), even if some of them can barely keep up with the convoluted dialogue they’re spouting. The mystery itself even kept me guessing. I can see why it has a cult following, and given some time, that might include me as well.

Best line: (Wadsworth) “Professor Plum, you were once a professor of psychiatry specializing in helping paranoid and homicidal lunatics suffering from delusions of grandeur.”   (Professor Plum) “Yes, but now I work for the United Nations.”   (Wadsworth) “So your work has not changed.”

 

Rank: List Runner-Up

 

© 2018 S.G. Liput
567 Followers and Counting

 

A Monster Calls (2016)

Tags

Drama, Fantasy, Mystery

(I’m running a bit behind with this post, but yesterday’s NaPoWriMo prompt was for a prose poem in the vein of a postcard, so I wrote one that I think everyone would like to receive.)

 
Hello, my love,
It’s as wonderful here as we always hoped,
But I miss you terribly, as I know you miss me.
Don’t despair that you couldn’t join me just yet;
I’ve saved you a place next to me
And can’t wait to show you everything I’ve seen.

Hope all is well at home, with life whirling on without me.
I’m just fine here, thank you very much.
Wish you were here (but not too soon)!

Love from Heaven,
Mom
___________________

MPAA rating: PG-13 (only for heavy themes, content is closer to PG)

Based on a novel by Peter Ness (who also wrote the movie), A Monster Calls is a strange beast, a deeply emotional dark fantasy that contrasts a young boy’s fears about mortality with seemingly random lessons taught by a giant tree monster (Liam Neeson). Making a tree monster work as more than just a visual boogeyman is no small task, and chances are that you’ll be surprised at just how much poignancy this concept holds.

The boy of this story is Connor O’Malley (Lewis MacDougall), an oft-bullied twelve-year-old who is plagued by a nightmare and dealing with his mother’s (Felicity Jones) worsening cancer. One night, the yew tree on a nearby hill comes to life like Groot on steroids and promises to tell him three stories, after which Connor must tell “the truth” in a story of his own. At first, Connor refuses, then thinks perhaps these stories are meant to help him with his critical grandmother (Sigourney Weaver) or his distant father (Toby Kebbell), yet the fairy tales told to him elude easy explanation and challenge the way he faces his own grief.

There’s something timeless about this story. Until Connor used a smartphone, I couldn’t tell in what year it was set. The tone, the music, the warm cinematography, the subtle direction by J.A. Bayona (The Impossible and the next Jurassic World sequel) all lend themselves to a sense of dark enchantment and poetry that can swing from quite creepy to quite profound in a matter of minutes, such as how major events repeatedly happen at 12:07. The stories told by the monster are depicted with a unique 3D watercolor-style animation, and while I might have liked them to be more straightforward in their lessons, they leave the viewer and Connor pondering their implications and applications.

The performances really help sell the film’s more fantastical elements, MacDougall especially proving himself to be a child actor worth watching. Anyone who has endured the death of a loved one should easily relate to Connor’s progression through the five stages of grief; at least I know I did. Jones and Weaver provide outstanding support as well. Following a shocking outburst, there’s one almost wordless scene between Connor and his grandmother in which the turmoil of emotions on their faces is intensely felt, making me wonder why this movie was largely ignored by the major awards.

I had a feeling that A Monster Calls would appeal to me, but its emotional depth sneaked up on me in ways you wouldn’t expect from a film with a giant tree monster. Despite its difficulties at the box office, I can see it being rediscovered in the coming years and hailed as a darkly imaginative classic.

Best line: (Connor) “So you didn’t get ‘happily ever after’?”  (his dad) “No, but that’s life, you know. Most of us just get messily ever after. That’s all right.”

 

Rank: List-Worthy

 

© 2018 S.G. Liput
565 Followers and Counting

 

Mojin: The Lost Legend (2015)

Tags

Action, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy, Foreign, Horror, Mystery, Thriller

(Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt was for a poem inspired by our choice of tarot cards, whether the image on it or the symbolism behind it. I went with the Moon, which has some personification and mentions imagination, light, and the unknown.)

 

Where we’ve wandered, none can trace,
For none now live who knew this place.
The darkness creeps from stone to stone
And makes us feel we’re not alone.
Then, from above, the moon appears,
Perhaps to soothe our growing fears.

She peers below through open cave
At we who thought ourselves so brave
And lends us light to glance about
In search of some departure route.
Yet what she shows us haunts our dreams,
And only she can hear our screams.
____________________

MPAA rating: Not Rated (PG-13 content, though the profanity in the subtitles can get strong)

At least one good thing came out of my watching the utter waste of time that was The Assassin: I saw a trailer for Mojin: The Lost Legend and was intrigued enough to seek out this rather fun Chinese adventure movie. Apparently based on a Chinese book series, this tale of three grave robbers may have its weaknesses, but it’s also evidence of the blockbuster action and visual merit that Chinese cinema has to offer.

Hu Bayi (Chen Kun), his temperamental girlfriend Shirley (Shu Qi), and his reckless longtime friend Wang (Huang Bo) were all once Mojin, official treasure seekers and tomb raiders (Lara wasn’t available), but have since fallen into disgrace. Fed up with their washed-up lives in America, Wang is approached by a wealthy patron to locate an ancient Mongolian tomb. Compelled by a personal connection from his past, Wang accepts, dragging Hu Bayi and Shirley back into the dangerous business of booby traps, double-crossing villains, and supernatural(?) threats.

While the acting is all serviceable and sometimes quite good (the heroes are better than the villains), Mojin: The Lost Legend is most interesting as an example of how the Chinese do an Indiana Jones-style adventure. It takes a little while to get into tomb-raiding mode, but once it does, the pace stays brisk, and the set designs are impressive and elaborate, like the Moria of the Orient mixed with the Temple of Doom.  Anyone who enjoyed The Mummy or National Treasure should also find much to enjoy, from the playful banter to the horror elements of a particularly thrilling flashback to the way Chinese history and myth are used as clues and solutions along the way, not that I understood all of it.

While it does mix a lot of aspects of adventure films I love, it is hard not to view those ingredients as copied or borrowed, even if there’s originality in how they are combined. Likewise, the special effects are one of the film’s strengths, yet there are moments that overuse slow motion and CGI to the point of being overblown and almost laughable, especially during the climax. Plus, the whole thing is a little too long for its own good. Yet it’s still a highly visual treasure hunt that even manages to work in some deeper emotions and themes of letting go of past tragedy. Flawed but fun, Mojin: The Lost Legend is an entertaining ride for those curious to see China’s take on their own National Treasure.

 

Rank: Honorable Mention

 

© 2018 S.G. Liput
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