movie reviews

First off, I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. I sure did.

I drove out to Las Vegas after my last class on Wednesday night. Traffic was backed up on the 15 up until about midnight so I left shortly after 1am. It was freezing! But I had hot coffee and some tunes and my furry hunting hat so the drive wasn't too bad. It was really nice to be able to spend the day with the family. Their new house is really nice. Plus, dinner was delicious. I think it was the tastiest turkey I've ever had. We watched Live Free or Die Hard and then I headed back home at about 9. I'm thankful for the family I have been blessed with. And a car that didn't blow up on the way to see them. And legs that work to push the gas pedals.

I had a day off today so I woke up late and went to the park to read. Then I treated myself to a matinee over at the theater by APU since it's so cheap. Here is my review on The Mist.

THE MIST
C


If I'm going to watch a horror movie, it must meet one of two requirements:
One, it has to be set in a deserted, foggy, mountain town filled with creepy, symbolism-stuffed monsters lurking around. (I highly attribute this to the videogame Silent Hill 2 that me and Adam played in 2002. Definitely one of the most innovative horror/survival videogames ever to be released and the film adapation Silent Hill that came out last year was right up there with good visuals and haunting atmosphere. I'm a huge fan. The main character of Silent Hill was in The Mist as well.)
Or two, it has to have tons of zombies and lots of explosions and shotguns and a group of people trapped in a house or mall or barn, trying to figure a way out. But as long as it has lots of explosions and zombies and zombies exploding, it's a winner.

When I heard about the film adaptation of Stephen King's The Mist, it seemed like a winner. I'll explain why.
The Mist is about a small town in Maine that becomes enshrouded by a thick, ominous fog. While shopping at the local supermarket, the group of shoppers-turned-survivors learn that monsters lurk within the fog and lock themselves inside the store. The main protagonist is a man named David, who cares for his son, Billy. The premise for the story is how people react and change in times of fear. From initial disbelief, ego-fueled denial and outright despair. The group of shoppers split into two factions. David leads a small group, blindly looking for resonable solutions while the religious zealot, Mrs. Carmody, preaches to her newfound followers about the end of days and human sacrifice. The two finally clash in a semi-predictable fashion and thus begins the climax to the story. Those who wish to stay, stay. Those who wish to escape, escape.
This movie had almost everything going for it. The setting was beautifully rendered. The supermarket was small and believable and the monsters made appearances minimally and tastefully. The violence was gruesome at it's respective moments, but was by no means a gore-fest. The monsters, in the form of a tentacles reaching in through the loading dock's doors, pumpkin sized wasps, giant spiders with acid spiderwebs and a giant lobster the size of the Hindenburgh all felt creepy and ominous. They were rarely seen, only imagined from the front windows of the supermarket, through the fog.
The dialogue felt a little funky at the beginning. Not necessarily forced, just somewhat off. From the religious ramblings of Mrs. Carmody to the self-righteous dissent of David's neighbor, they began a little too forward for the beginning of the movie but as the plot picked up, they fit in nicely. There was one scene in the movie where I actually felt like clapping when a certain antogonist kicked the bucket. Big points if you dislike a character so much you feel the need to applaude when they go.
I gave this movie a C because of it's ending. While I understand that it's sort of an acclamation for directors or screenwriters to push ideas that make distributors uneasy, this one made me want to headbutt a brick wall. I appreciate the artsy "you didn't want it to end this way" conclusions so rampant in many films nowadays, but this one went too far. For me at least. I dont like leaving the movies feeling as bad as I felt tonight when I left. I guess that was the effect that they were trying to get but sometimes I prefer to conclude things with satisfaction. A cheesy, predictable satisfaction over a protagonist's success than just a depressing attempt to spin the audience for a loop. I wouldn't normally divuldge an ending if I didn't think it would depress the crap out of whoever watched it. So unless you're an ultimate fan of foggy, deserted mountain towns, watch something a little more light-hearted than The Mist. It will definitely just bum you out in the end.
+Good visuals
+Abhorrent antagonists (three cheers when they bite it!)
+Strong sense of urgency and seclusion
-Weak main character
-Funky(at times) dialogue
-Horrible ending


LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD
A


If John McClane, the Terminator, Robocop and Chuck Norris went to junior high school together, I'll bet dollars to donuts that ol' Robocop, Chuck and Arnold would be whining daily about not having lunch money, their hair still soggy from swirlies and arms still stinging from indian burns. That's just how badass John McClane is.
Live Free Or Die Hard is about the same as every other Die Hard movie. There are terrorists, there's McClane, and then there's a whole lot of McClane smacking the terrorists around. Theres usually help on the side from Carl Winslow, Sammy L. Jackson or the flamboyantly homosexual flight control operator in Die Hard 2. Sometimes McClane's wife or dog or goldfish or flamboyantly homosexual flight control friend gets kidnapped by said terrorists and he must rescue them along with disarming nuclear weapons, snowmobile pursuits and endless butt-kickin'. But in the end, McClane always says something witty like "Yippee Ki Yay" and saves freedom, albeit a pulsing, bloody stump of a NYPD cop.
This time, however, his help is in the form of Farrell, a nerdy computer hacker played by the kid from the Apple commercials. You know him, the one that gets hit in the crotch about 500 times in the movie Dodgeball. The terrorists? A group of computer hackers who take over NSA and disable all power, financial and transit operations by means of a "Firesale". Sounds cool? It's even better. McClane's daughter is kidnapped and what follows are the usual antics between McClane and his bumbling partner, lots of explosions and of course, lots of dead terrorists.
What I really enjoyed about this movie was how they dealt with John McClane's age after almost two decades of Die Hard movies. The entire plot is internet and computer saavy while McClane, still a working class 80's cop who knows little about technology and wants even less to do with it. Him and Farrell make a great duo together, only rivaled by McClane and Samuel Jackson in Die Hard With A Vengeance. The dialogue is funny, the special effects and action sequences are over the top and fun and it's really good to see McClane still busting heads in the twentyfirst century. The only problem I had with the movie was the main villain. He's portrayed as a cold, young NSA reject by some young actor who looks like every other young actor. I really dont feel he got the degree of butt-whoopin' he deserved for messing with old John. I mean, he was probably only 12 when John was lighting 747s on fire, he should have gotten at least one pinkbelly or a noogie.
I cant stress enough the social issues I see underlying the last two Die Hard movies. Issues in regards to the end of the reformative era of policing. An era that Spence worked in, and one that John McClane depicted as well. A crime fighter, a drunk and someone seperated from society over his career. It was the world against the thin blue line for them and I enjoyed watching how his interactions with Zues (the oppressed black technician from Harlem) and Farrell played out to show law enforcement dealing with the changing of times. In DHWAV, McClane and Zues are at each other's throats for half of the movie over racial stereotypes. Is it any coincidence that the movie was released three years after the LA riots? Or that during production, the scene with McClane wearing the infamous "I hate *epipthet*" sandwich boards in the middle of Harlem was really shot in an entirely different part of NY to prevent a riot? In LFODH, McClane must learn that no matter where he is, he is being watched. It's even stated in the first part of the movie where his captain tells him over the radio that lowjack shows where McClane's squad car is. McClane responds with something to the extent of "I'd have never had those installed". I guess I might be looking too deep into it, but if they were filmed with progressive policing as social underpinnings to their plots, I respect the last two Die Hards as true works of art. If not, I guess a few more noogies would have helped.
+its Die Hard!
+McClane is still the toughest person alive
+cool character relationships
+Reformative to Progressive underlying themes?
+explosions
+more explosions
-no noogies