Motherless Brooklyn: The Big Apple's rotten core

Motherless Brooklyn (2019) • View trailer 
4.5 stars. Rated R, for violence, profanity and drug use
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.1.19

Fans of Jonathan Lethem’s award-winning 1999 crime fiction novel will be quite surprised by what director/scripter Edward Norton has done with it.

The spider and the fly: Thoroughly irritated by the persistent investigation mounted by
private detective Lionel Essrog (Edward Norton, right), rapacious New York City developer
Moses Randolph (Alec Baldwin) demands a face-to-face, hoping to make an offer his
pipsqueak tormentor dare not refuse.

Lethem’s Motherless Brooklyn, although contemporary to its late 20th century arrival, has the attitude, atmosphere and plot stylings of 1940s and ’50s pulp detective thrillers. Revering that style as a jumping-off point, Norton has retained the primary character — and very little else — while bouncing him back to 1957, and dropping him into an entirely new story that blends fact, fiction and noir sensibilities in a manner we’ve not seen since 1974’s Chinatown.

In a word, the result is mesmerizing.

Chinatown scripter Robert Towne ingeniously employed a “simple” gumshoe case to illuminate the real-world corruption and power-mongering behind Los Angeles’ bureaucratic theft of Owens River water, as ruthlessly orchestrated by civil engineer William Mulholland (fictionalized by John Huston’s Noah Cross). 

Norton, in turn, dumps Lethem’s intriguing protagonist into the clandestine, Tammany Hall-style empire ruled by the even more powerful Robert Moses, the mid-20th century developer/builder who — by manipulating politicians behind the scenes — ruthlessly transformed New York City into his vision of a metropolis. It’s a fascinating slice of history, which Norton cleverly blends with the character that he also plays in this thoroughly absorbing drama … but it has absolutely nothing to do with Lethem’s novel.

The film opens at a sprint: Lionel Essrog (Norton) and colleague Gilbert Coney (Ethan Suplee), both operatives of a small-time detective agency run by Frank Minna (Bruce Willis), accompany their boss when he arranges a meeting with shadowy figures left unspecified. The acutely perceptive Lionel knows that Frank is up to something, and likely something dangerous; this hunch proves accurate in the worst possible way, when Minna winds up dead.

Frank was more than merely a boss to Lionel; he also was mentor, friend and protector. Indeed, all four agency operatives — including Tony (Bobby Cannavale) and Danny (Dallas Roberts) — emerged from the same Catholic orphanage, back in the day, where Minna became their father-figure. 

His murder therefore hits Lionel quite hard, particularly since he is far from “normal.” Lionel is obsessive/compulsive and also suffers from an uncontrollable tendency to erupt in nonsense speech: often punning, rhyming and “clanging” against what somebody else has just said. He’s constantly forced to apologize for the “glass in the brain” that prompts such spontaneous outbursts; we recognize this as Tourette Syndrome, a designation not at all familiar to the characters in this re-imagined 1950s version of Lethem’s novel.

Glass: Should be shattered

Glass (2019) • View trailer 
Turkey (zero stars). Rated PG-13, and much too generously, for gore, violence, dramatic intensity and profanity
By Derrick Bang

This may not be M. Night Shyamalan’s worst film — The Last Airbender will hold that trophy, forever and always — but damn, it runs a close second.

Restrained and shackled for a group interview, our three misfits — from left, Elijah Price
(Samuel L. Jackson), Kevin Wendell Crumb (James McAvoy) and Davis Dunn
(Bruce Willis) — await their next encounter with specialist shrink Dr. Ellie Staple.

Mind you, this is amid considerable competition; Shyamalan also is responsible for bottom-of-the-barrel dreck such as The Visit, Lady in the Water and After Earth.

Nor do these statements tell the entire story. Airbender isn’t merely a Shyamalan stinker; it was by far the worst big-budget studio film of 2010. And even though we’re only halfway through January, I feel quite confident in dismissing Glass as the worst studio film of this year.

Shyamalan has become an insufferably arrogant and self-indulgent filmmaker: one who feels that his cinematic contributions are akin to Moses delivering unto us the 10 Commandments. The signs are obvious: the measured, portentous line readings, with individual words separated by pauses so pregnant they could deliver; the needlessly weird camera angles, which serve no purpose save to call attention to themselves; the protracted, silent close-ups on cast members, as if to suggest they’re always Thinking Weighty Thoughts; and a torturously lethargic pace — and deadly dull storyline — that could make watching paint dry the height of entertainment.

I long ago grew suspicious of any film that opens in the office of a psychiatrist or psychologist; with very few exceptions, they’re inevitably bombs. And while it’s true Glass doesn’t do so, we spend an unbearable amount of time listening to shrink Ellie Staple (Sarah Paulson) prattle away, often with cinematographer Mike Gioulakis’ camera just this side of being jammed up her nostrils.

On top of which, poor Paulson spends most of the film buried beneath enough make-up to satisfy every member of the Radio City Rockettes. Honestly, she looks like an embalmed corpse, newly risen from the grave.

Is all this pancake, rouge and eye shadow somehow intended to be Significant? Who knows? Who cares?

Shyamalan would have us believe that Glass is the final installment in his so-called “Eastrail 177 Trilogy,” supposedly gestating ever since 2000’s Unbreakable. To borrow the phrase that has become the rallying cry of Florida’s Parkland teen activists, I call bullshit. Shyamalan’s merely re-writing history to grant his newest film even more cachet, when it deserves none at all.

Death Wish: A fate this film deserves

Death Wish (2018) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated R, for profanity, dramatic intensity, strong violence and gore
By Derrick Bang

If director Eli Roth is hoping for mainstream respectability, this isn’t the right path.

The original Charles Bronson Death Wish was a cultural flashpoint back in 1974 (its four progressively tawdry sequels, not so much). The political divide was incendiary, with mounting raucous protests ultimately helping to force a corrupt president from office; big-city crime and street violence were out of control; the older generation was dismayed by a younger generation that seemed not to care about much of anything.

While working his way up the bad guy food chain in pursuit of the creep who orchestrated
the invasion of his home, Paul Kersey (Bruce Willis, right) employs rather unsual tactics
to extract information from a thug.

Half the country viewed Bronson’s film as a fascist nightmare; the other half thought his character’s actions fell under the heading of Damn Well About Time.

Things change ... not so much.

There’s no question that Roth and scripter Joe Carnahan’s updated remake is well-timed, but — sadly — reaction to this film is likely to be even more polarized. Half the audience will regard it as an irresponsible NRA recruitment tool; the other half, once again, will smile in satisfaction and think, Hey, that’s a good way to solve some problems.

The third half, based on Wednesday evening’s preview screening, will chortle gleefully each time Bruce Willis dispatches a baddie. And that’s perhaps even more disturbing.

Granted, this updated Death Wish has some mild laugh lines; most, however, derive from the verbal skirmishes between Paul Kersey (Willis) and investigating detectives Kevin Raines (Dean Norris) and Leonore Jackson (Kimberly Elise).

I fail to see how watching some guy’s eyes pop out of his graphically crushed head warrants a chuckle, let alone rip-snortin’ peals of laughter. But that’s to be expected from Roth’s core fan base, which — let us recall — laps up the torture-porn trash for which he is best known: Cabin Fever, The Green Inferno, the Hostel series and others I’ve blissfully forgotten.

Roth may have attracted a solid cast for this outing, and the film may benefit from whatever name-brand recognition its predecessor still delivers ... but as the (original) saying goes, a hog in a silk waistcoat is still a hog.

The core story hasn’t changed much. Dedicated Chicago surgeon Paul Kersey has it all: a hospital practice at which he excels; a loving wife (Elisabeth Shue, as Lucy); a devoted daughter (Camila Morrone, as Jordan), who just got into the college of her choice; and a gorgeous home in an upscale neighborhood.

No sign of a dog. Seems like they should have a dog.

Rock the Kasbah: The day the music died

Rock the Kasbah (2015) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated R, for profanity, violence, drug use and sexual candor
By Derrick Bang

Bill Murray has been Hollywood’s magic bullet for a little over than a decade now, ever since delivering such a memorable performance in 2003’s Lost in Translation.

See anything you like? Richie Lanz (Bill Murray) is unsurprisingly awed by his first glimpse
of Merci (Kate Hudson), little realizing that she'll soon become a business partner.

His presence automatically enhances the quality of a given film, no matter how small the role. As a star, he can elevate familiar and otherwise mediocre material (as with, say, St. Vincent); as a supporting or bit player, his scenes are standouts. (Olive Kitteridge and Zombieland come to mind.)

There’s something about Murray’s deadpan expression that speaks volumes, but defies ready description. World-weary but not defeated. Smugly condescending, but not to the point of cruelty. Skeptical but, nonetheless, open-minded.

His characters always seem on the verge of saying something along the lines of “Show me what you’ve got; I’m ready to be amazed” ... even as his glance implies serious doubt that the person in question has anything, let alone anything amazing.

In short, Murray is a guaranteed treat.

But not even he can save this film.

A closing-credits text blurb explains that Rock the Kasbah honors Setara Hussainzada, the “girl who danced” during her 2008 performance on Afghan Star, Afghanistan’s answer to our own American Idol. Merely singing on live TV in that country is highly dangerous for women; to do so brands them as blasphemers in the eyes of fundamentalists, who are inclined to view killing such “transgressors” as wholly justified.

But to compound the felony by dancing? Unthinkable.

Okay, Hussainzada’s courageous act definitely demands a story, and scripter Mitch Glazer has embraced that challenge. But rather poorly, as it turns out. Rock the Kasbah hasn’t the faintest idea what it wants to be — comedy, drama or rock-hued homage — and not even a director as talented as Barry Levinson can create a pearl from this tone-deaf grain of sand.

Sin City: A Dame to Kill For — Not nearly sinful enough

Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (2014) • View trailer 
2.5 stars. Rated R, for nudity, sexual content, brief drug use and relentless strong violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.5.14

Nine years is a long time to wait for a sequel, particularly one with interlinked stories that weave in and around the first film’s similarly interconnected narrative.

Johnny (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) roars into Sin City, a man on a mission. He's determined to
out-play the local power-monger during a high-stakes poker game ... but, in fact, Johnny
also has a lot more on his mind. What else would drive such a flashy young man to such
suicidal behavior?

My memory isn’t up to that challenge. And I’d argue that a film’s potential success shouldn’t rest on a viewer’s willingness to embark on deep research, in order to have a better idea of what’s going on.

But that isn’t the only problem with Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, once again adapted by comic book impresario Frank Miller, from his macabre and über-cynical Sin City graphic novel series. The far bigger flaw is that Miller obviously cherry-picked his best stories for the first film, whereas this one is laden with leftovers and sloppy seconds.

The result is a common cinematic disease: all style and very little substance.

To be sure, Miller and gonzo co-director Robert Rodriguez once again deliver the material with the seamy, amped-up decadence and hard-bitten dialogue that will amuse fans of 1940s and ’50s film noir classics. The atmosphere oozes with scandal: the tough guys hard as granite (literally); the dames, floozies and femme fatales straight out of Hammett and Chandler ... assuming, of course, that their women would have pranced about in cleavage-enhancing goth/punk corsets and garters. Or nothing at all.

But do bear in mind — as with the first film — that only the actors are real here; the rest is CGI fabrication. That means all the buildings and streets in (Ba)sin City, not to mention all the action scenes, car chases and death-with-prejudice fist fights, maimings, decapitations and defenestrations, not to mention samurai-style limb slicing and arrows through eyeballs. No more “real” than the gladiator nonsense of 300 and its recent sequel.

As further befitting the material’s noir sensibilities, this is a primarily black-and-white universe, aside from occasional splashes of red (lipstick, blood) or full color, the latter generally employed — with heavy irony — to suggest a character’s innocence.

This is deliberate, of course; the goal is to bring Miller’s savage comic book artwork and sensibilities to the screen. Literally. He and Rodriguez once again succeed, catching the feverish artistic vitality that crackles like heat lightning on every one of Miller’s blasphemously violent pages.

But our potential engagement with the results — as always is the case with live-action movies, as well — depends upon engaging characters and compelling storylines.

And that’s where this sequel falls flat.

RED 2: Twice the goofiness

RED 2 (2013) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rating: PG-13, for constant action and violence, frenetic gunplay and fleeting profanity
By Derrick Bang

This one’s a triumph of star power over script shortcomings.

RED 2 doesn’t even try for logic or verisimilitude; it’s a globe-trotting, live-action cartoon that does little but place its characters into improbable situations that prompt wry one-liners from the seasoned cast.

Having arrived in Moscow, Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker, center) is annoyed to discover
that boyfriend Frank (Bruce Willis) and Russian agent Katja (Catherine Zeta-Jones)
have some history ... and that Katja seems eager to resume their studies.

In most cases, that’s good enough ... because when the cast is this polished, and their comic timing so well established, we can’t help enjoying the result. Scripters Jon and Erich Hoeber have strayed even further afield from the original graphic novel by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner, but that really doesn’t matter. Films of this sort may be no more than a guilty pleasure, but there’s no denying the entertainment factor.

I’m sure 2010’s RED was envisioned as a one-off, but the global box-office must have been a pleasant surprise ... and we all know how Hollywood operates. On top of which, it probably wasn’t hard to persuade Bruce Willis, John Malkovich and Helen Mirren to reprise their roles as aging former spies — RED stands for “retired, extremely dangerous” — who are granted yet another chance to show up their condescending younger colleagues.

Hoeber and Hoeber have reprised their scripting chores, but director Dean Parisot is a series newcomer, taking over for Robert Schwentke. It’s a good trade; Parisot helmed 1999’s cheeky sci-fi spoof, Galaxy Quest, so he clearly understands the tone required by this equally snarky franchise.

Having survived the events of their previous adventure, veteran spy Frank Moses (Willis) and girlfriend Sarah Ross (Mary-Louise Parker) are attempting to solidify their unlikely relationship. They’re crazy about each other, but that doesn’t seem to be enough; the protective Frank wants to ensure that Sarah remains out of harm’s way — rather difficult, given his history — while she pouts over the prospect of missing another dose of dangerous fun.

Be advised: Parker has one of the best pouts in the business. Parisot clearly understands the power of her stricken expressions, and finds ample opportunity to showcase them.

Alas, Frank isn’t destined for a quiet retirement. Paranoid best friend Marvin Boggs (Malkovich) barely has time to deliver a warning, before being blown up by Forces Unknown. Moments later, Frank is snatched by U.S. black ops thugs operating under orders from the malevolent Jack Horton (Neal McDonough, making the most of his deliciously nasty bad-guy role). Somehow, these events have something to do with a next-gen weapon code-named Nightshade: a remnant from Frank and Marvin’s Cold War past.

A Good Day to Die Hard: A bad way to spend an evening

A Good Day to Die Hard (2013) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rating: R, for profanity and relentless violence
By Derrick Bang

The results of the 2013 Geezer Action Flick trifecta are in, and the winner remains the first contestant out of the gate: Arnold Schwarzenegger, who displayed the good sense to insist upon solid supporting characters and a reasonably logical script in The Last Stand, while poking good-natured fun at his own advanced age.

Let's go do what we do best, John McClane (Bruce Willis, left) cheerfully advises long-
estranged son Jack (Jai Courtney). What they do best always involves lots of running,
jumping and gunplay, which rarely musses their hair. Ah, the life of a movie star in a
laughably stupid action flick...

Sylvester Stallone remains dead last, his laughably stiff granite features unable to breathe any life into Bullet to the Head, a tawdry, nasty excuse for tasteless, tawdry brutality.

Which brings us to Bruce Willis, only marginally better than Stallone, due to an impressively stupid script that eschews any semblance of plot logic, while wreaking havoc with the natural laws of physics and numerous other well-known areas of science.

Hollywood has made an art of brain-dead displays of mayhem, but A Good Day to Die Hard may be in a class all its own. I can’t recall ever seeing so much personal property destroyed during the course of a 97-minute movie, and I’m certain this display of wretched excess sets a new record for smashed, crushed and otherwise mangled moving vehicles.

Mind you, the human bodies involved in all this carnage should be reduced to pulped hamburger dozens of times over, and yet everybody — good guys and bad — somehow survives multi-story falls, endless hails of bullets, hard landings within construction sites, shard-laden plunges through plate-glass windows, and accelerated spins into the air during highway pile-ups involving multiple vehicles (no air bags in sight) ... with no more than a few scratches and minor contusions.

Really, Willis should just acknowledge the obvious and don the blue uniform and red cape. At least that would explain his character’s apparent invulnerability.

Have you noticed, over time, how the military-grade weapons used in movies of this nature have gotten larger, faster and deadlier ... and all concerned still can’t hit the broad side of a barn? Not even armor-piercing sniper rifles can draw a bead on Willis’ immortal John McClane, and if that isn’t silly enough, he’s also able to avoid batteries from Russian Mi:24 and Mi:26 attack helicopters, as if engaged in nothing more troublesome than a spirited round of dodgeball.

It reaches a point — rapidly, in this flick — when all the on-screen carnage just becomes silly and tiresome. Even for a live-action cartoon, Skip Woods’ mess of a script goes way beyond dumb.

When one despicable fellow confronts our hero while smiling and chomping on a carrot — an affectation apparently intended to display the villain’s bad-ass nature — I honestly expected him to say “What’s up, John?”

Heck, that would have drawn a more generous laugh than any of the clumsy lines that pass for humor in this mess.

Looper: What goes around, comes around

Looper (2012) • View trailer
Three stars. Rating: R, for strong violence, gore, profanity, nudity, sexuality and drug use
By Derrick Bang

Clever time travel stories can be intriguing head-scratchers; I just wish Looper weren’t so vicious, nasty and morally bankrupt.

Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, right), a professional assassin for a mob boss in the year
2044, should have killed his future self, "Old Joe" (Bruce Willis), in order to retire
gracefully on his hard-earned savings. But Old Joe isn't interested in being offed, and
in fact offers a partnership with his hot-headed younger self, in order to tackle a
bigger enemy whose activities will affect them both. Confused yet? The time-travel
issues only get more complicated...

This is one of those stories populated solely by thugs, killers and other assorted low-life scum; by the time our one truly sympathetic character steps onto the stage, we’ve been numbed almost senseless.

Writer/director Rian Johnson is known for his off-center sensibilities, which have ranged from the whimsically eccentric (2008’s The Brothers Bloom) to the downright brutal (a few episodes of TV’s Breaking Bad). His career-making debut, 2005’s Brick, starred Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a teenage loner who turns amateur Sam Spade in order to figure out who killed his former girlfriend; rarely has high school looked so corrupt and seamy.

Johnson re-unites with Gordon-Levitt for Looper, another in a recent line of science-fiction concepts that takes place in a near future where society and compassionate behavior have gone straight to hell. (See In Time, Repo Men and the remake of Total Recall, among others.) Such films borrow strongly from Blade Runner, but generally without the intelligence, wit and fascinating ethical undercurrents of that 1982 classic.

That said, I give Johnson credit for an intriguing premise. The year is 2044, the setting a major American metropolis that has failed, its dilapidated infrastructure barely able to support the 99 percent who now appear to live in slums, and look with envy upon the few sophisticates wealthy enough to purchase things such as slick hover vehicles. The economy has fallen apart, and manufacturing appears to have stopped; as a result, the “common folk” drive old cars and live in apartments that could have sprung from a 1950s-era Raymond Chandler novel.

And, as with the sci-fi/western mash-up Joss Whedon concocted for his short-lived but much-loved TV series, Firefly, the weapons of choice are 19th century pistols and a shotgun-esque nightmare known as a blunderbuss.

Time travel doesn’t yet exist, but it’s known to have been invented 30 years in the future, where it’s illegal and available only on the black market. Since disposing of a dead body is near impossible in 2074, mobsters employ time travel in order to “vanish” their enemies. The hapless victims pop up at pre-determined spots in 2044, where a “looper” — a hired killer — blows them away and then cremates the remains. No muss, no fuss.

The Expendables 2: More mindless mayhem

The Expendables 2 (2012) • View trailer
Three stars. Rating: R, for strong bloody violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.24.12

It’s time once again to buy stock in ordnance manufacturers; Sylvester Stallone and his geezer squad are back to wreak more havoc and shoot up fresh landscapes.

Determined to rescue a lone American trapped by gun-toting
mercenaries, our heroes — from left, Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone),
Lee Christmas (Jason Statham) and Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) — blast
their way into a fortified compound, and then prepare to eliminate any
two-legged signs of resistance. It's just another day at the office for
these guys...

Really, even by the already crazed standards of Hollywood’s exaggerated action flicks, I’ve rarely seen so much gunfire. Or so many blood squibs spurting from the chests, limbs and heads of obligingly posed victims. Particularly the goons shot by long-range, high-power sniper rifle, whose heads explode in a spray of viscera.

It’s almost enough to harsh the laughably ludicrous vibe of this otherwise mindless live-action cartoon.

The Expendables 2 is even sillier than its 2010 predecessor, an AARP spin on The Seven Samurai, The Dirty Dozen and all sorts of other gang-of-losers-against-insurmountable-odds epics. Ironically enough, "sillier" means better, in this case; thanks to the lighter tone, this sequel is quite a bit more entertaining. The notion that Stallone and his old coot buddies still can raise hell, definitely raises smiles ... and, yeah, it's a kick to see so many familiar faces.

With tongue even more firmly in cheek, Stallone once again shares screenwriting credit, but this time hands the directing chores to Simon West, a veteran of similar high-octane action fare such as Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, last year’s remake of The Mechanic and TV’s much-loved (if woefully short-lived) 2003 cop series, Keen Eddie.

The first Expendables at least made an effort to blend some actual character drama with its grim doings, with Dolph Lundgren’s Gunnar Jensen failing to play nice with the rest of the crew, most particularly Jet Li’s Yin Yang. Lundgren is sweetness and light this time — and has inherited a college-educated science background (!) — but Li makes little more than a token appearance in an audacious pre-credits rescue mission, which pretty much sets the tone for what follows.

Indeed, West errs slightly with this prologue; it’s far better staged than most of what follows. The folks who make these sorts of films really need to stop front-loading their best stuff; the rest of the film invariably feels anti-climactic.

But back to basics.

Any trace of squabbling has vanished, with Barney Ross (Stallone) and the rest of his crew — Lee Christmas (Jason Statham), Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) and Toll Road (Randy Couture) — joking and tossing brewskies like seasoned best buds. They’ve also taken on a rookie, a talented sharpshooter dubbed Billy the Kid (Liam Hemsworth), who seems to fit right in with the gang.

Moonrise Kingdom: Casts a gentle glow

Moonrise Kingdom (2012) • View trailer
3.5 stars. Rating: PG-13, and needlessly, for fleeting profanity
By Derrick Bang

All kids — particularly those who read books — dream of having adventures in faraway lands, ideally with exotic companions. Adults rarely figure into such fantasies, except as vague background entities, and the imagined adventures generally exist in a heightened reality that might look familiar, but isn’t quite our workaday world.

Having ditched the adults in their lives, Suzy (Kara Hayward) and
Sam (Jared Gilman) ponder a map of tiny New Penzance island, to
work out the best route to a sheltered cove that will become their
runaway home from home. Sam, you'll notice, is properly equipped
for a long hike. Suzy ... not so much.

We grow up, we get “serious” — not always a good thing — and cast aside such childhood reveries.

Clearly, filmmaker Wes Anderson escaped that fate and remains firmly in touch with his inner child. Moonrise Kingdom offers ample proof: It’s a droll, stylized, kid-oriented fable about misfits, underdogs and blossoming young love. By turns adorable and unapologetically weird, this film nonetheless charms from beginning to end.

That’s not always the case with Anderson’s eclectic oeuvre. Every engaging hit (Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums) has been followed by self-indulgent junk that verges on the unwatchable (The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, The Darjeeling Limited). That’s an occupational hazard for a filmmaker so clearly obsessed with exaggerated characters who play out their anxieties in tightly enclosed little worlds that can tilt far left of center.

Greet a neighbor cheerfully on an average morning; if he regards you gravely and replies, a propos of nothing, that the howling wolves kept him awake last night — and the nearest wolf is hundreds of miles away — then you’re dealing with a Wes Anderson character.

Suzy Bishop (Kara Hayward) and Sam Shakusky (Jared Gilman), both 12 years old, live on New Penzance, a tiny island off the coast of New England. The year is 1965, as an on-camera narrator (Bob Balaban) meticulously informs us, and we’re a few days away from a cataclysmic storm that will wreak havoc along the entire coast.

Although precociously intelligent and a gifted camper and woodsman, Sam — an orphan — is dismissed as an outcast, constantly humiliated by the other kids in his foster home. Even as a Khaki Scout, in an element where he should shine, Sam is taunted by his young peers.

Scoutmaster Ward (Edward Norton) clearly has a soft spot for Sam, but that’s not enough to prevent the boy from feeling isolated and deeply lonely.

RED: Risible, Energetic and Delightful

RED (2010) • View trailer for RED

3.5 stars (out of five) • Rated PG-13 for brief profanity and plenty of violence

By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.15.10

Some concepts are can't-miss, and that's certainly the case with RED, based on the deliciously snarky graphic novel by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner.

Screenwriters Jon and Erich Hoeber maintain an appropriately wry tone, and the dry, deadpan one-liners are delivered with panache by veteran scene-stealers such as Bruce Willis, John Malkovich and Helen Mirren.

Victoria (Helen Mirren) speaks softly, but carries a very big
gun, which she's not shy about using. She's also quite good
at keeping the paranoid Marvin (John Malkovich) focused
on the task at hand, which grows ever more complicated as
these retired black-ops agents find themselves targeted by
well-trained -- and much younger -- CIA assassins.

Director Robert Schwentke maintains a brisk pace, moving things along rapidly enough to compensate for the plot's comic book-style sensibilities. The narrative is jes' plain silly right outta the gate, but the overall tone is so whimsical that you're unlikely to mind.

Things begin mildly as Frank Moses (Willis), living a calm suburban life, makes another in a long line of calls to a cheerful bureaucratic drone named Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker). Frank has fallen in like with Sarah's telephone voice, and so keeps shredding checks that her company is supposed to send him, just so he can claim that "It still hasn't arrived" as an excuse to call her again.

Sarah, for her part, finds Frank far more charming than the losers she keeps dating.

Frank's sedentary life takes a noisy turn late one night, when ninja-garbed assassins do their best to put numerous holes in him. They fail, which leads Frank — clearly not your average civilian retiree, as we're learning — to travel hastily to Kansas City, in order to protect Sarah. Frank realizes that his thus-far-unspecified enemies probably tapped his phone, and therefore are likely to kidnap Sarah as a bargaining chip.

So Frank kidnaps her first. Duct tape and all.

The Expendables: Flush This Mush

The Expendables (2010) • View trailer for The Expendables
Two stars (out of five). Rating: R, for violence, profanity and gobs o' gore
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.19.10
Buy DVD: The Expendables • Buy Blu-Ray: The Expendables (Three-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + Digital Copy)

They certainly are. 

On paper, the concept of The Expendables must have seemed like a sure thing: a testosterone-fueled mash-up of The Magnificent Seven and The Wild Bunch, populated by a dream team of fresh and fading cinema action stars. 

On the big screen, the results are dark, dismal and sniggeringly stupid: a clumsy, ludicrous exercise that can't even fulfill the basic requirements of a grade-C action epic. 

Oh, and it's loud. Very loud. Excessively loud. Between supercharged gunfire, bombs and gasoline-enhanced explosions, this flick may be responsible for viewer hearing loss. 

When Gunner Jensen (Dolph Lundgren, center) loses his cool and seems poised
to kill his fellow mercenary, Yin Yang (Jet Li, left), team leader Barney Ross
(Sylvester Stallone) has to get equally serious while trying to defuse the
situation. The Expendables is filled with hilariously improbable scenes just
like this one, and they only get sillier as the film unspools.

As noisy as all the pyrotechniques are, though, they don't drown out the tin-eared dialogue. 

More's the pity. 

For once in his life, the egomaniacal Sylvester Stallone should have stepped back and allowed input from other, more talented hands. Sly's participation should have been limited to his starring role; he has gotten pretty good at playing his one-note self. He's a hack writer at best — he shares screen credit here with David Callaham — but he's a truly deplorable director without the slightest idea of where to place the camera, how to light a scene, or how to orchestrate a fight sequence or vehicular chase. 

What is the sense of casting martial-arts fan favorites such as Jet Li and Jason Statham, if their considerable skills are lost amid badly lit scenes and smash-cut editing, which make it impossible to enjoy their work? 

And it's not just Li and Statham. Much (most?) of the hare-brained action is handled by the actors or stunt doubles, rather than being "sweetened" by computer enhancements, and it's vexing to miss the details. This film's sizable stunt team clearly put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into this flick, and a lot of their effort goes unappreciated. 

That's the frustrating part: the realization that, all other elements being equal, The Expendables could have been a decent action flick, given a better director and a savvy script doctor. 

As it is ... little more than bumbling junk. 

Stallone stars as Barney Ross, head of a squad of seasoned mercenaries who've retained enough humanity to accept only good-guy assignments. We meet them during a confrontation with Somali pirates; needless the say, the pirates get wasted while our heroes — and all the hostages — apparently suffer nary a scratch. 

Neat trick, that, with so many bullets flying all over the place. 

Cop Out: Over and out

Cop Out (2010) • View trailer for Cop Out
No stars [turkey]. Rating: R, for violence, relentless profanity, smutty dialogue and frequent drug references
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 3.4.10
Buy DVD: Cop Out • Buy Blu-Ray: Cop Out


The lunatics are running the asylum.

Bruce Willis must be incredibly desperate, because nothing else would explain why he'd sign up for this appalling project. It's difficult to believe he found some merit in Robb and Mark Cullen's creative typing: simply astonishing, because their efforts aren't even good enough to be called "writing."

When NYPD cops Jimmy Monroe (Bruce Willis, left) and Paul Hodges (Tracy
Morgan, right) need to break into a Mexican gangster's home, they enlist the
talents of a stoner burglar (Seann William Scott): a plan that comes to a
bewilderingly clumsy end ... as if Scott suddenly decided he no longer
wanted to be a part of this debacle. The whole film feels that way...

More than anything else, Cop Out is a stab at mainstream glory for a numb-nuts spoof project along the lines of Dance Flick, Date Movie, Epic Movie, Meet the Spartans, Superhero Movie, Disaster Movie and a dozen other recent no-name-cast turkeys that somehow secured theatrical release — for two mercifully quick weeks — instead of being buried in the purgatory of late-night cable and satellite TV.

Every one of the above-named flicks was dead on arrival, and consider yourself lucky if you've never heard of them.

Cop Out belongs in their company.

This miserable excuse for exposed celluloid has a bit of cachet only because it's directed by cult fave Kevin Smith, the impresario behind Clerks, Chasing Amy, Jersey Girl and — whoops! — 2008's deservedly ignored Zack and Miri Make a Porno. But even Smith's fans may have trouble digesting Cop Out, because this is his first effort as a true hired gun: directing a movie he did not write, or co-write.

Frankly, I don't think he even bothered to go to work each day. This film wasn't directed; it just sort of hatched.

My 5-year-old nephew could have made a better film. His 3-year-old brother could have acted circles around everybody present in this dreck.

Cop Out is made by giggling arrested adolescents who regard poo-poo jokes as the height of humor, and I don't even want to speculate about the mindset of the viewers who, at last week's preview screening, seemed to be having a good time. I fear for the future of our country, if those folks are gonna wind up running things some day.