Avengers: Infinity War — Too much of a good thing?

Avengers: Infinity War (2018) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, and perhaps generously, for relentless brutal violence and destruction, fleeting profanity and occasional crude references
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.27.18

Way back in the day, Universal Studios had the bright idea to gather all of their movie creatures together in a couple of glorious monster mashes — 1944’s House of Frankenstein, and 1945’s House of Dracula — after their individual franchises had run out of steam.

With Thanos due at any moment on the devastated planet titan, our already exhausted
heroes — from left, Spider-Man (Tom Holland), Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Drax
(Dave Bautista), Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) and Mantis (Pom Klementieff) — prepare for
a final battle.

Marvel Studios has unleashed the same superhero romp for precisely the opposite reason. Having meticulously set the stage each year since 2008’s Iron Man — carefully bringing new characters into an overall continuity akin to what has been crafted in Marvel Comics since 1962 — Avengers: Infinity War is the undeniably awesome result of a shrewd master plan that only gained momentum during the past decade.

No doubt about it: This film is a comic book geek’s dream come true: bigger, better (in some ways) and badder (in other ways) than everything that has come before. Directors Anthony Russo and Joe Russo — allied with scripters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, along with the legion of Marvel Comics writers and artists acknowledged in the end credits — have wrought nothing less than dense cinematic myth-making on the scale of Star Trek and Star Wars.

(Needless to say, all of the above owe a huge debt to J.R.R. Tolkien and other veteran sci-fi and fantasy authors.)

Disclosure No. 1: Uninitiated mainstream viewers are likely to have no idea what the heck is going down. To be sure, the broad stroke is obvious: Big, bad Thanos (Josh Brolin, barely recognizable beneath impressive layers of costuming, make-up and CGI) must be stopped by just about everybody else. But the fine points are likely to be lost on anybody who hasn’t avidly devoured every Marvel Studios entry to this point.

Like — for example — why Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) and Steve Rogers/Captain American (Chris Evans) aren’t talking to each other. Or what U.S. Secretary of State Thaddeus Ross (William Hurt) has to do with that. Or why Thor and his fellow Asgardians are journeying between the stars in immense spacecraft. Or why Vision (Paul Bettany) and Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) are hiding in Scotland.

Or — most obviously — who the heck some of these characters even are.

I Feel Pretty: Sweet self-empowerment saga

I Feel Pretty (2018) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for fleeting nudity, sexual candor and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.20.18

Here’s a nice surprise.

Few actors could rebound so successfully from a bomb the size of last year’s Snatched, but Amy Schumer has managed a reasonably graceful landing.

Believing that their chances of scoring online dates will increase if they tackle the problem
en masse, Vivian (Aidy Bryant, left), Jane (Busy Philipps) and Renee (Amy Schumer)
strike a pose for a group selfie.

I Feel Pretty blends (mostly) gentle romantic comedy with a well-delivered message on the importance of self-worth: of being not merely resigned to the hand one has been dealt, but celebrating it, each and every day. That’s a valuable lesson in an era when, everywhere we look, we’re encouraged to emulate — nay, become — akin to the media-splashed icons of physical perfection who surround us.

An impossible task. And one that can’t help feeding natural insecurities.

High fives, then, to Schumer and the writing/directing team of Abby Kohn and Marc Silverstein, for concocting such a (mostly) delightful rebuttal to such nonsense.

(The “mostly” applies because Schumer indulges in occasional bits of needless vulgarity that — in each case — briefly bring the film to a screeching halt. Apparently she can’t help herself.)

New Yorker Renee Bennett (Schumer) lives each day beneath a hovering cloud of low self-esteem and minimal expectations, convinced that she’s not “good enough” to share space with those who invariably seem to be something “better.” Such feelings are exacerbated by her job: toiling mostly unseen in a basement server room as one of two employees who handle Internet orders for cosmetic giant Lily LeClair’s upscale Fifth Avenue headquarters.

Renee shares this grimy garret with the misanthropic Mason (Adrian Martinez, an understated hoot), who — were he asked — probably prefers such surroundings.

Down time is spent with best buds Jane (Busy Philipps) and Vivian (Aidy Bryant); they collectively view themselves as three musketeers mounting frequent assaults on dating web sites ... never breaking past the outer ramparts.

And everywhere Renee goes — whether spin class at SoulCycle, or infrequent visits to Lily LeClair HQ — she’s all but invisible to the beautiful people who surround her. With one exception: Mallory (Emily Ratajkowski), who, despite being a flawless model like so many others, is a genuine human being with both heart and soul.

No surprise, then, that Renee — at a despairing low point — impulsively makes a big, tall wish (after seeing the similar moment while catching up with the movie Big).

Beirut: A savvy espionage thriller

Beirut (2018) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated R, for violence and profanity
By Derrick Bang

Tony Gilroy has a flair for placing compelling characters at the heart of world-shattering events, whether wholly imagined or extracted from actual history, thereby involving viewers on a more comprehensible and intimate level.

Mason Skiles (Jon Hamm, center) quickly realizes that he has been dragged back to
Beirut under false pretenses, the actual reasons soon to be explained by CIA
operatives Sandy Crowder (Rosamund Pike) and Donald Gaines (Dean Norris).

He tells complex stories through the eyes of just a few (more or less) ordinary folks, often in a manner that feels Hitchcockian: the hero besieged on all sides, uncertain who to trust, often in way over his head. This talent brought Gilroy a well-deserved Oscar nomination for 2007’s Michael Clayton, and he did a similarly fine job on the 2009 adaptation of State of Play.

Then, too, Gilroy knows his way around adrenaline-charged espionage thrillers, having scripted — and, in one case, directed — four of the recent Bourne entries.

All these elements are in play with Beirut, an audaciously clever and suspenseful drama set during the eponymous city’s catastrophic transition from picturesque cultural melting pot to violence-ridden war zone. The focus is on one man who reluctantly returns to a land he once loved, but which now yields only nightmares, and has become ludicrously dangerous: where “truth,” if it exists at all, emerges only when it’s convenient ... or, more likely, when it’s profitable.

Gilroy’s story can’t help feeling far-fetched, particularly as matters grow increasingly complicated. But, sadly, it probably isn’t.

We meet American diplomat Mason Skiles (Jon Hamm) under happy circumstances in 1972, hosting a lavish dinner party at his Beirut estate; the attendees include dignitaries, movers and shakers from various neighboring countries, and even an American senator. Mason is at his best, gliding from one guest to another: telling an insightful story here, facilitating a mutually beneficial introduction there.

It becomes clear, from Mason’s smooth patter, that he’s a fixer: a negotiator (and, frankly, that would have been a better title for this film) able to analyze both people and situations with uncanny accuracy. “Don’t play poker with him,” somebody later cautions, when describing Mason.

The party’s carefully established convivial balance tips with the late arrival of Mason’s best friend, CIA agent Cal Rily (Mark Pellegrino). Moments later — likely not coincidence — the gathering erupts in lethally violent chaos. Mason’s world is shattered in a heartbeat.

Rampage: Nothing but noise

Rampage (2018) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated PG-13, and quite generously, for violence, gore, destruction, dramatic intensity and brief profanity
By Derrick Bang

Art often responds to life.

Back in the 1950s, rising Cold War paranoia and atomic-era anxiety prompted Hollywood to uncork a series of “giant whatzis” movies: giant ants (Them), giant spiders (Tarantula), giant scorpions (The Black Scorpion), and even — I’m not making this up — giant grasshoppers (Beginning of the End).

With Chicago being demolished by a couple of extremely nasty monsters, can one man and
his faithful albino gorilla companion make a difference? This flick would like you to
think so...

These days, the night terrors are induced by misguided genetic editing and greed-driven corporate malfeasance. But the results are the same: giant whatzis movies.

And, frankly, Rampage isn’t much better than most of those 1950s clunkers.

Modern golly-gee-wow special effects can’t conceal the fact that this is a laughably inept flick fueled by a bone-stupid script that can’t even follow its own interior logic. (Actually, “logic” and Rampage are oxymorons.) Four writers take the blame for this kitchen-sink mess — Ryan Engle, Carlton Cuse, Ryan J. Condal and Adam Sztykiel — and I’m amazed they had the collective chutzpah to demand credit for stuff they swiped from other films, and then stitched together like Frankenstein’s monster.

But, then, what can we expect of a movie “developed” from an arcade game?

I wish Mystery Science Theater 3000 still were around; the ’bots would have a great time dissing this dumb turkey.

In fairness, Rampage has one thing going for it: the incandescent presence of Dwayne Johnson. He may have rolled his eyes in private, when the script pages were delivered, but he nonetheless gives an impressively earnest performance. Those who doubt the power of “movie star charisma” need look no further than this misbegotten flick.

Director Brad Peyton certainly doesn’t bring anything to the party; he basically points and shoots, hoping that Johnson’s reasonably well-timed quips will compensate for the sins that sheer momentum can’t conceal. The two of them did the same a few years ago, when they teamed for San Andreas.

To cases, then:

During a prologue that’s a blatant mash-up (and rip-off) of Gravity and Life, we learn that Chicago-based Wyden Technologies, via their Energyne genetics lab, has been conducting naughty — and highly illegal — experiments in an orbiting space station. Things go awry; three small canisters containing Bad Stuff hurl through our atmosphere, meteorite-like, and plow into different parts of the United States.

Pandas: Far more than mere pandemonium

Pandas (2018) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated G, and suitable for all ages
By Derrick Bang

The English language isn’t up to the challenge of discussing this film.

The usual go-to words — cute, adorable — simply aren’t sufficient.

In the safety of China's Chengdu Panda Base, American
conservation biologist Jake Owens soon develops an
impressive bond with Qian Qian, a young, captive-born
female panda that he and fellow scientists hope to
introduce into the wild.

Pandas clearly is being marketed on the basis of its awwwwwww factor; IMAX and Warner Bros. would be foolish to do otherwise. And, yes, this 43-minute charmer spends considerable time with the poignant and often hilarious antics of roly-poly infant pandas: sequences that we wish could run longer, because they’re just too, ah, cute for words.

But the best IMAX documentaries also draw their emotional power from a compelling through-story, and this one’s no different. Filmmakers David Douglas and Drew Fellman — who also brought us 2011’s Born to Be Wild and 2014’s Islands of Lemurs: Madagascar — focus on China’s noble effort to avert catastrophe, by reversing a man-made crisis.

Specifically, the decline of the giant panda population, as a result of their traditional habitat being drastically reduced by human development. As narrator Kristen Bell soberly informs us, toward the beginning of this film, roughly 300 pandas currently are in captivity in facilities (zoos, etc.) around the globe, and only about 2,000 remain in the wild. And the latter are divided into isolated pockets within central China’s Sichuan, Shaanzi and Gansu Provinces, thereby minimizing gene pools and preventing the desired cross-breeding that would enhance hybrid vigor.

A potential solution, long in coming, began with a captive breeding program at the Chengdu Panda Base, where scientist Hou Rong has been director of research since 1994. Douglas and Fellman begin their film by introducing her, along with the most recent infants — some reference sources insist on the term “cupboard,” for a group of pandas — among the more than 200 baby pandas that have been born and raised during her tenure.

The current goal of this soft-spoken “Panda Mom” is to facilitate the release, into the wild, of at least some of her clinic-bred charges. Her desire to maximize the chances of success takes her across the globe, to the woods of northeast New Hampshire, in order to collaborate with Ben Kilham. Back in 1992, he and his sister Phoebe were granted a state license to rehabilitate orphaned black bear cubs; since then, the Kilham Bear Center has successfully returned more than 160 cubs to the wild.

We’re granted intimate access not only to the eight-acre enclosure that provides these cubs with everything they need to socialize, climb trees and forage for food; but also to the endearingly boisterous, yet oddly intimate process of bottle-feeding three tiny cubs in the Kilham living room.

The Miracle Season: Failure to spike

The Miracle Season (2018) • View trailer 
2.5 stars. Rated PG, for no particular reason
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.6.18

Inspirational sports sagas tend to be bullet-proof, and even this one builds to an exhilarating climax.

Getting there, however, is another matter entirely.

Caroline "Line" Found (Danika Yarosh, No, 9) and a cluster of her teammates — from left,
Kelley Fliehler (Erin Moriarty, No. 19), Taylor (Lillian Doucet-Roche, No. 14), Brie (Tiera
Skovbye, No. 8) and Mack (Natalie Sharp) — get ready for another intense volleyball drill.

Granted, The Miracle Season is based on actual events, but that’s no excuse for director Sean McNamara — aided and abetted by scripters David Aaron Cohen and Elissa Matsuida — to lard the pathos with a trowel. So many tight-tight-tight close-ups of tears and quivering lips. The pregnant pauses, long-suffering sighs and anguished glances heavenward. Melodramatic dialogue so insufferably sugary-sweet that it’ll send insulin-dependent viewers into a diabetic coma. The swelling orchestral flourishes from Roque Baños’ histrionic score.

McNamara makes no secret of his desire to craft — whether as director, writer or producer — wholesome, family-friendly dramas; one need only read his IMDB bio. That’s well and good, but there’s a chasm of atmospheric distinction between “wholesome” and “gag-inducing sentimental slush.”

I kept waiting for some of this film’s performers to throw up their arms, burst into a heartrending Shakespearean soliloquy, and expire on camera.

It genuinely grieves me to be so mean-spirited, given McNamara’s sincere intent, and the authentic real-world tragedy-turned-triumph that inspired his film ... but that’s the problem. He tries much, much too hard; he should have had more faith in the strength of the story itself, and trusted his audience to “get it,” without jerking his puppet master strings so blatantly. And repeatedly.

The setting is Iowa City’s West High School, where newly minted seniors and longtime best buds Caroline Found (Danika Yarosh) and Kelley Fliehler (Erin Moriarty) eagerly await the start of volleyball season, revved up to repeat their previous year’s championship victory. Coach Kathy “Brez” Bresnahan (Helen Hunt), while sharing this desire, wisely cautions against cockiness and entitlement.

As a redundant voice-over narrator needlessly informs us, during a Hallmark greeting-card prologue, Caroline — everybody calls her “Line” — is one of the magical, charismatic wonders who inspires everybody to be better versions of themselves.