Up in the Air

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Plot: This is a tragic satire about Ryan who lives his life avoiding commitment, avoiding empathy, and avoiding personal relationships. Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) spends 325 days a year flying around the country and the world, and is only comfortable when he is away from home. He gives inspirational talks about being unattached to possessions and people. His job is firing people. In the movie, he teaches young Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick) his job, and he meets Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga) who is seemingly as unattached and afraid of commitment as he is. 

Review: This movie is a high concept satire of modern living. It shows people superficially connected, but actually very alone. Because it is so high concept, the characters in the movie don't really make sense as people. There is no 35-40 year old woman with Alex Goran's life situation at all -- period. The Alex of the beginning of the movie giving the sad advice to Natalie is not the same Alex as we meet at the end of the movie.

Ryan goes to his niece's wedding, and seems to have a meaningful experience, but then what?

The film gets points for ambition. The greatest image is Ryan (Clooney) alone in the hotel window at high. The film is really saying that people need the people they carry in their"back packs," to make life meaningful even though Ryan doesn't get it. I called Ryan soul-less; my wife asked me what I meant by that. This movie is an exploration of soul-lessness.

Cast: George Clooney, Vera Farmiga, Anna Kendrick

Crew: directed and co-written by Jason Reitman based on the novel by Walter Kim

Rating: 2.5 flasks


More: I have often said that no one makes a movie or book about what it is really like in the business world, and this is not it, but it does come close to addressing some of the issues of traveling a lot. Kim's novel is a lot more like the real business world. I might read it. 

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Best Movies of 2009

1. The Hurt Locker - 4 flasks:  A gripping film that had me so wrapped up in the tension I was tired by the end.

2. Avatar - 4 flasks: A great time at the movies with epic sweep

3. Rachel Getting Married - 3.5 flasks: Great dialog, loved Anne Hatheway.

4. Sunshine Cleaning - 3.5 flasks: A serious comedy about a couple of girls trying to get by. Engaging.

5. Invention of Lying - 3.5 flasks: A fantasy satire with Ricky Gervais that starts funny, and  then digs deep into religion and philosophy.

6. Ponyo  - 3.25 flasks: Sincere, adorable, cute. If you can't handle cute, see Hurt Locker.

7. Duplicity - 3.0 flasks: Intelligent spy thriller with Clive Owen and Julia Roberts

8. Watchmen - 3.0 flasks: An intelligent comic book movie

9. The Proposal - 3.0 flasks: Best romantic comedy of the year; gotta love Sandra

10. Public Enemies - 3.0 flasks: Great work by Johnny Depp and director Michael Mann

Honorable mention - all 3.0 flasks:
The Surrogates, Julie & Julia, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Extract, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, This is It, and Star Trek.
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That is my opinion. I suppose I will still see some officially 2009 Oscar films before Oscar night, but for the year 2009 that is how I see it.
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Top Movies of the Aughties

The Top Ten Movies of the Aughties

1. The Hurt Locker - Gripping, nail-bitting, suspenseful movie about defusing bombs in Iraq

2. Wall*E - Wonderful, heart-warming, clever, fun-to-watch

3. Borat - Clever, very funny, memorable, and socially aware

4. Sideways - great dialog, great characters

5. Passion of the Christ - a religious experience; unlike any other movie

6. Bruce Almighty - Very funny, clever, with a serious message

7. Spiderman 3 - Top action adventure film; fun, and with something to say.

8. Munich - Gripping serious drama about revenge for the Olympic hostage taking

9. Dreamgirls - It's about the lives of the singers, the dream of being famous, and lots of songs

10. Revenge of the Sith - Capstone to a cinematic adventure that I've grown up with.


I think this list is nicely rounded out. I have Spiderman 3  - a blockbuster action movie; Wall*E which is animated; Borat which is a comedy; Dreamgirls which is a musical, and Munich +  Sideways which are serious movies.

I have records of my movie going for the last eight years, and there were twenty 4.0 rated flicks.  I give out about two 4.0's each year. Here are the others.

Doubt - great story, great performances

The Bank Job - like a heist movie should be done; fun-to-watch

Blood Diamond - One of the weakest here; very political; not that fun to watch; I must have been in a good mood to rate it so highly

The Weatherman - Original, thoughtful, funny

Million Dollar Baby - Really good, but too melodramatic for the top ten; probably over-rated at 4 flasks

Cold Mountain - Unmistakable charm

In America - Good serious movie

The Aviator - A poignant tale about a sad genius; really well made.

Matchpoint - Probably number 11, well acted, well made

Avatar - Loved it; may belong in the top ten, but its just too new for me to have perspective.

Brothers

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Plot: Sam Cahill, a soldier (Toby Maguire) is captured in Afghanistan and is presumed dead. Grace, his wife (Natalie Portman) and brother Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal) get together while he is gone and after he is rescued there is an awkward love triangle. Sam was tortured and has post-tramatic stress, so he is emotionally distant and violent.

Review: Brothers is a thin, manipulative melodrama with little meaning beyond its calculated emotional trap. The first hour of the move marches through the story line slowly and mechanically to get the love-triangle set-up. The entire Afghanistan story line is boring and empty with no insight into the prisoner experience nor the reason for the war -- simply a footnote When Sam is released, there is barely any interest in Sam's interior life, just the love story. Similarly loser Brother Tommy suddenly becomes a noble citizen to sharpen up his appeal to Grace.

Natalie Portman's Grace is the only bright spot in this dreary film. There is a wonderful moment when Grace hears that Sam is still alive on the phone. We see realistic facial expressions of disbelief, happiness and fear -- top notch. She had two or three of these brief moments of outstanding facial acting, for example when she kissed Tommy for the first time. Portman shows she is a skilled actress, and I'd like to see her in a better movie.

Cast:Natalie Portman, Toby Maguire, Jake Gyllenhaal

Crew: directed by Jim Sheridan; based on the movie "Brødre" written by Bier and Jensen

Rating: 1 flask: Portman is good enough to make this 1.5 stars, but I hated being at this movie so much, it has to be 1.0


More: I wanted to leave during the middle.


Even more: The most over-rated movie of the year.

Yet more: At the end, the audience jumped up quickly and headed out of the theater like they could not wait to leave.
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Avatar

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Plot: Humans come to the planet Pandora for a rare mineral, and need to displace the native forest people, the Na'vi. Grace (Sigorney Weaver) genetically engineers native bodies that humans can animate like The Matrix or maybe a predator drone. A paraplegic, Jake Sculley (Sam Worthington), becomes a native, and is accepted by the natives and falls in love with Neytiri (Zoe Saltana) a pretty native princess. Initially Jake feeds intelligence to the humans, but later his loyalty becomes divided. 

Review: Great movie entertainment that is simply spectacular with action, emotion, and movie-house morality. I really liked the realistic way the animated Na'vi moved so gracefully though the trees, and later through the air. The movie characters were evocative and emotional -- unlike most motion capture characters, and even better than Lord of the Ring's Gollum -- far better than Disney's A Christmas Carol.

A fast moving story rapidly sets up the conflict between the humans and the Na'vi. Jake and the audience spends a long time with the Na'vi, and the wonderful visual world they inhabit. The audience is won over by the time the bulldozers arrive.

Although the story is predictable, that is because it is archetypal. The story is like the European migration into North America and the displacement of the native Americans. Visually it is more like Europeans coming to tropical Africa -- perhaps like displacement of natives in Nigeria for petroleum. There is the more elemental conflict between the spiritual, grounded and connected natives with the mechanized and money-grubbing humans.

Cast: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saltana, Sigorney Weaver, Steven Lang

Crew: written and directed by James Cameron

Rating: 4.0 flasks


More: I want to see it again.

Even More: I liked the animated Sigorney.
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The Veridian Dynamics Coffee Cup

To celebrate the return of Better Off Ted, the great sitcom on ABC, I want to show off my Veridian Dynamics Coffee cup.

For more on Veridian Dynamics, see my first two posts. 

I decided that I needed a Veridian Dynamics coffee cup, and after searching the ABC fan store, and poking around on eBay, where I found nothing. I ended up at Zazzle. Zazzle is a very cool site where you can make shirts, hats and coffee cups with your own graphics.

There is this technicality that the Veridian Dynamics logo isn't really my graphics, but well, anyway. I made a coffee cup, actually two, and it turned out OK. [A defect is the blue line under the logo, which is actually in the image file. I should have photoshopped that out.]

At Zazzle you can put your items for sale, and collect a little royalty. I tried that, but savvy Disney attorney's made Zazzle take the item off for copyright violations.

Blind Side

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Plot: A white housewife takes in a black boy who later becomes a high school athlete. The boy becomes a member of the family gradually during the movie. At the end, there is controversy involving college recruiting. 

Review: Blind Side is cloying sweet candy soaked in warm-fuzzy melodrama, frosted with after-school-special morality and all dipped in suburban white guilt. No character was realistic; Leigh Ann Touhy (Sandra Bullock) is too perfect and too glib; husband Sean Touhy (Tim McGraw) and daughter Collins Touhy (Lily Collins) are just props for Leigh. The football player, Michael Oher (Quinton Aaron,) tries so heard to prove he is harmless and nice, that he does not have any human emotion.

Jae Head who played the young son, SJ Touhy, steals every scene he is in. He lightens up the action, and is used by the director to move the story along. I doubt there is any documentary accuracy in any of his dialog. Lots of good lines, well delivered. I'd like to see more of Jae Head.

Sandra Bullock also delivers a fun performance in an otherwise dismally cheerful picture.

Cast: Sandra Bullock, Quinton Aaron, Jae Head

Crew: written and directed by John Lee Hancock based on the book by Michael Lewis

Rating: 1.5 flasks - not bad enough to be one star, but really awful. I was going to put up a picture of treacle syrup instead of the movie poster to show what I really thought.


More: I liked the football game scenes. Good photography. Good plotting for these quick scenes.

Even more: Blind Side deals with racial issues. The film is hard on the southern whites who do not accept Michael, but the film does not present positive black role models (aside from the NCAA official at the very end of the film -- who is a 'villain'.) All the younger blacks in this film are hoodlums and drug addicts and all the virtuous adults were white.
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Fantastic Mr Fox

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Plot: Mr Fox steals poultry, and despite his wife's nagging him to quit, he begins a private war on three neighboring farmers. The farmer's retaliate and go after the Mr Fox's family and the other woodland creatures with heavy equipment. Mr Fox makes a plan, gathers a team, and everything turns out fine. 

Review: Fantastic Mr Fox is a high concept comedy that happens to be done in stop-action animation, and for some reason this heightens the novelty and irony. Mr Fox is like George Clooney in Oceans 11/12 making plans, recruiting people and stealing things.

The film is voiced by celebrity actors including George Clooney as Mr. Fox. The animation is servicable, but not really up to the task of communicating the characters motivations and thoughts. We are often viewing doll-heads mouthing lines.

The real star is Wes Anderson who delivers his brand of satire on American society using animals. Anderson who did The Royal Tannenbaums, and The Life Aquatic, enjoys exploring quirky characters and drawing out their likeability. This is a good installment in that series.

The film gets lots of points for being creative and different. It is also fun-to-watch and keeps moving. On the other hand, there is no social message or insights into the psyche here. Mr Fox steals farm goods because "he is a wild animal," and we get no clues into how people should live our lives in a society. I don't think there is a "moral," in this film - just a wry ironic grin.

Crew: directed by Wes Anderson; based on the book by Roald Dahl

Rating: 3.0 flasks: Pluses - creative, fun; Minuses - not a lot of content or drama



More: I loved the side-scrolling video-game-like sequences.

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Disney's A Christmas Carol

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Plot: A straight-forward adaptation of Dicken's book. You know the story . . .

Review: The movie done in CGI 3D animation, and the 3D effect is the best I have seen. It actually enhanced the viewing experience -- not just a novelty. The CGI characters were unevenly rendered.  Scrooge was well done in CGI and seemed to show emotions -- as good as any CGI movie character.  Conversely, the minor characters were not good. Zemeckis was unwilling or unable to make these characters interesting and realistic. They seemed deliberately fuzzy and wooden  -- maybe to save money. Distractingly poor.

There are some great adaptations of this great story, and Disney's does not measure up. The beginning is good, but the Ghosts of Christmas Present and Future miss the mark. The movie is not scary enough and the happy ending is not happy enough. The movie lacks soul and the poor rendering of the minor characters only made that worse.

Voice Actor: Jim Carrey

Crew: Directed by Robert Zemeckis; based on the classic book by Charles Dickens

Rating: 2.0 flasks


More: People who have not read the book are missing something. You should read it -- it's short.

Even More: The title should not be Disney's A Christmas Carol; it is Dicken's A Christmas Carol.
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2012

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Plot: As predicted by the Mayans, the world actually ends in 2012, and geologist Adrian Helmsley (Chiwetel Ejiofor) warns the world's governments, who make plans to save the world -- or at least as much of it as they can. Meantime moonlighting author Jackson Curtis (John Cusack) is tipped off to the disaster, and tries to save his wife Kate (Amanda Peet) and kids Lilly and Noah. They narrowly manage to escape disaster after disaster as they make their way to a secret destination and their destiny.

Review: This is a big, mindless, sloppy action movie suitable for a big bucket of popcorn and not very much internal reflection. The initial set-up of the disaster is okay for science fiction, but each mini-disaster is melodramatic, just-in-time, made-for-video and spectacular -- never any subtlety. People who demand common sense should stay home, or leave their brain in the lobby.

I began to view it as a serious of grand disaster scenes, and on that level it works well. The actors pull of some good lines, and the situations are always death-defying & dramatic. I was often so engaged in the movie, I could barely stand the suspense.

The video is always spectacular, although just too reliably of major landmarks and always right next to our heros. Some of the disaster scenes are outstanding.

Although the movie is long, it does not seem that way. It was a crowd-pleaser. The gang at my theater clapped at the end.

Nonetheless, it is not a great movie since it could have been so much better with a few re-writes. It could not have been more melodramatic.

Cast: John Cusack, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Amanda Peet

Written and directed by:  Roland Emmerich, who made the similar film Independence Day and other mindless entertainment.

Rating: 2.0 flasks; A 1.5 star movie with an extra half because it was fun-to-watch.


More: The least subtle movie I have ever seen.

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The Men Who Stare at Goats

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Plot: The Men Who Stare at Goats is about soldiers who were trained in extra-sensory perception ESP as a battle or intelligence weapon. Vietnam War-era soldiers were trained in "paranormal" combat, and had some success. Now in the 2000's, they are called back together for the war in Iraq.  Journalist Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor) stumbles on the story, and he narrates the film. The movie is an absurd comedy where it is not clear how real the ESP is, or whether the soldiers are insane or geniuses. 

Review: This was an entertaining movie with a comedic, farcical premise. Lyn Cassady (George Clooney) is the main character with the strongest gift. Bob Django (Jeff Bridges) is the hippie founder of the New Earth Battalion, and they adopt old-time hippie practices to tune their abilities.

There are a lot of jokes and absurdities in the film, and I don't think it is trying to make any serious points about the military or the paranormal.

I liked the movie on the level of entertainment, and I think most people would enjoy it.

A decent performance by George Clooney. A nice likeable nuanced performance by Ewan McGregor. I thought Jeff Bridges was annoying, and I thought Kevin Spacy should have been in the movie more.

Cast: George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, Jeff Bridges, Kevin Spacy

Crew: directed by Grant Heslov; written by Peter Staughan; based on the book by Jon Ronson

Rating: 2.5 flasks


More: Were there any women in this movie?

Even More:  I liked the way the goat fell over when it died. Clunk.

This is It

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Plot: This was a making-of video for Michael Jackson's London concert series that he was preparing when he died. It contains all the major songs from the show and backstage development of the show.

Review: This was a lively movie with singing and dancing. The first part of the film was great with powerful dancing and old songs that I forgot that i liked. It showed a dynamic Michael Jackson singing, working and practicing.

The latter part of the movie got repetitive, as the film became predictable. I think the best stuff was at the begining.

The movie is more substantive because it was Michael from beyond the grave. Michael's concert was going to push for action on climate change and environmentalism generally. It was a little corny to hear him preach about that although as you may know from my recent post, I find global warming beyond refute.

Cast: Michael Jackson

Crew: directed by Kenny Ortega

Rating: 3.0 flasks
 Early in the film, it was headed for 4.0, because it was fun and deep, but it kept going and lost a flask.

More: Surprisingly good; recommended. The actual live show would have been something.

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W

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Plot: W is a biography of President George W. Bush with his personal triumphs and personal issues. 

Review: W is uneven. The beginning of the movie gives us some insight in the W's personality, and it is interesting as it shows his life in Texas. The political scenes early in the movie are the highlight with all of the fictionalized political figures. Once the Iraq Wars starts the movie becomes a bore, and eventually the movie fizzles to its 129 minute conclusion. 

Even though President Bush has only been out of office for one year, the film is dated already. The political shots in this movie already seem hollow and transparent rather than biting and insightful.

One constant in this movie is the clever and evocative acting from Josh Brolin -- should have had an Oscar nomination.

Stone's directing is still tops, and the film is well made and well photographed.

Cast: Josh Brolin, James Cromwell, Elizabeth Banks

Directed by: Oliver Stone

Rating: 2.0 flasks


Rating: The scene with the war council wondering without direction around Bush's ranch was a highlight --an example of the clever direction. 

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A Serious Man

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Plot:  The movie opens with an introductory ghost story set in Poland that portends ill events. In the main film, Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg)  is a physics professor whose wife Sarah (Judith McManus) wants to divorce him, his son is doing drugs, and who seems to have multitudinous problems all at once. Periodically he visits his Rabbis for advice, and they are not very helpful. The movie ends very abruptly without resolving most plot lines. 

Review: This is a black comedy, which means it has farcical almost sitcom situations, and the characters are exaggerated, but there are not real jokes. In this type of movie the strangeness of the characters means that the emotions of the characters is disconnected, and that happens here. Still I laughed a number of times.

Larry Gopnik is a serious man because he is trying to do the right thing as he learned in Jewish school and as his parents and Rabbi's taught him. Nonetheless, bad things just keep happening, perhaps because his parents or grandparents  got jinxed by a ghost back in Poland.

The best part of this movie is that it is trying to grapple with big issues like the meaning of life. It does that without any preachy sermons, and I don't think that it leads one to any conclusions except to go on living as best you can.

A Serious Man is a very Jewish movie, and people with a Jewish background would probably identify more.

The movie has a non-ending, where his son has a Bar Mitvah, and the film maker hints bad things start happening to him. Larry's plot lines are left in the air for the audience to guess at. In a real black comedy, there is a happy ending. This movie has a Zen-like non-ending perhaps reflecting the hopelessness of the modern experience.

Cast: Michael Stulhbarg, Judith Barg

Written and directed by:  Ethan and Joel Coen

Rating: 2.5 flasks; worthy of two stars, but and extra half because of its serious topics


More: There was a story about a dentist who found a message from God engraved on one of his patients teeth -- written in Hebrew on the back of his front teeth.  This is a memorable story because we wonder what it means, and because Rabbi Nachtner (George Wyner) tells the story well. The story shows something about how religion talks about God, but does not give specific answers to our problems. Wife Jenny liked it too.

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Capitalism: A Love Story

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Plot: Film-maker and activist Michael Moore raps on wealth, poverty,democracy, plutocracy and the Great Recession, punctuated with a few stunts.  The film has a number of loosely connected segments. 


Review:This movie was entirely too one-sided. I am a fairly moderate person, but this movie had a lot of old-style union rhetoric that left me behind. Michael has lost his populism, and become a preacher for work-place reform.

The best segments are the introduction to capitalism at about ten minutes in, and the interviews with the Socialist Catholic Priests. The worst part is the overly partisan, and biased treatment of complicated subjects. The endless scenes of Michael being blocked by building guards at banks are just boring. How many times do we need to see this?

Cast and Crew: starring, written and directed by Michael Moore

Rating: 1.5 flasks


More: First, this is not "A Love Story," The movie's sub-title had no part in this film. There is no pretense of a love story. If it is sarcasm, then it is pretty weak.

Even More: Second, why can't journalists understand derivatives? They are not that hard. Why is it so common to roll your eyes and pretend the audience is too stupid to understand them.

Yet More: The worst Michael Moore movie of all. Worse than Sicko.

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The Invention of Lying

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Plot: Mark Bellison (Ricky Gervais) lives in a world just like our own, but no one lies there. Everyone is completely honest all the time. The first half of the movie shows Mark's sad life a struggling loser, and how he is insulted by his completely honest coworkers, his Mom, and Anna (Jennifer Garner), his date. His Mom get's sick, and he makes up a story about an afterlife to help comfort his Mom on her deathbed. The second half of the movie is very different -- it becomes a satire about religion. Mark becomes an international authority on the afterlife, and people hound him to learn more. Mark learns to lie to help his friends and perhaps to win the affection of Anna. 

Review: The first half of the movie is pretty funny. I loved the trip to the old folks home, the witty dialog between Mark (Ricky) and his secretary Shelly (Tina Fey,) the waiter at the restaurant, and the surprising frankness of Anna on their first date.

I was surprised how serious the second half of the movie was. It was easy to see when he spins his story of an afterlife for his Mom, that Ricky Gervais was taking a grand swipe at religion generally and Christianity specifically. Later, the film makes points about how an afterlife affects morality and motivation.

The Invention of Lying's strong criticism of religion may offend some people. Others may find it a springboard to conversation. Still others may enjoy the movie on its surface level, and miss the sarcasm.

The weakness of the movie is that there are almost no complex characters except Mark (Ricky). Everyone else is simply playing out the compete honesty premise. It is significant that Anna rejects something that Mark says in the last scene and she ignores him -- which shows some progress toward critical thinking.

Cast: Ricky Gervais, Jennifer Garner

Written and directed: by Ricky Gervais and Matthew Robinson

Rating: 3.5 flasks; Enjoyable and funny with serious issues. This is what movies should strive to do.


More: Funny and serious.

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