The Croods — A New Age: Feels somewhat primitive

The Croods: A New Age (2020) • View trailer

Three stars. Rated PG, for mild rude humor

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.27.20

The Croods: A New Age — now playing in whatever theaters are open, and available via video-on-demand closer to Christmas — is akin to its 2013 ancestor … only much more so. 

 

Eep displays her strength by hoisting new best friend Dawn aloft, while the others — from
left, Ugga, Grug, Guy, Hope and Phil — watch with a blend of admiration and concern.

Director Joel Crawford eschews the subtler wit that filmmakers Kirk DeMicco and Chris Sanders brought to the original, instead favoring relentless pacing and a shrieking tone; both prove exhausting before this new film is even half over. These characters rarely chat; they’re always yelling, screaming, bellowing, howling … well, you get the point.

 

We’re once again in an imaginary prehistoric past, set — as DeMicco and Sanders cheekily suggested — somewhere between the Jurassic Age and the “Katzenzoic Era.” The entire voice cast has returned; the cave-dwelling Croods consist of father figure Grug (Nicholas Cage) and his wife Ugga (Catherine Keener); their teenage daughter Eep (Emma Stone), adolescent son Thunk (Clark Duke) and toddler Sandy (still not speaking); and Ugga’s mother Gran (Cloris Leachman).

 

As before, Grug maintains an inflexible set of rules intended to ensure their survival, most notably that the pack (which is to say, the family) Must. Stay. Together. Alas, this is becoming less likely, because Eep and Guy (Ryan Reynolds) — the young man they came across in the first film — have become a serious item, and are thinking about starting their own pack. 

 

It’s every father’s nightmare, and Cage once again is hilarious in full-tilt exasperation mode.

 

This sequel grants Guy a back-story, during a prologue that picks up years before the first film’s events, when — as a young boy — he’s orphaned during a close encounter with a tar pit (a rather grim opening for a family-friendly animated film). His parents’ final words direct him to “follow the light, to find tomorrow,” so the boy wanders … and wanders … and wanders.

 

Along the way, he finds the cuddly three-toed sloth, Belt, that becomes his constant companion and fashion statement. Years pass, and they eventually meet up with the Croods, and so forth.

 

Moving forward, the search for food remains a constant challenge that hasn’t gone well of late. The pack therefore is astonished to discover an idyllic, impressively farmed, food-laden paradise sheltered behind tall wooden walls. This proves to be the home of the aptly named Bettermans: Phil (Peter Dinklage), wife Hope (Leslie Mann) and teenage daughter Dawn (Kelly Marie Tran).

The Comedian: Can't work the crowd

The Comedian (2016) • View trailer 
2.5 stars. Rated R, for relentless profanity and crude humor
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 2.3.17

Portions of this film possess the buoyant, effervescent spontaneity of the sublime jazz score by celebrated trumpeter Terence Blanchard.

But only portions.

When Jackie (Robert De Niro) is invited to his niece's wedding, he impulsively asks new
friend Harmony (Leslie Mann) to tag along, little anticipating her questionable taste in
attire. Worse yet, he fails to foresee that his doting niece will expect him to "say a few
words" ... never a good idea for Jackie, in front of a conservative crowd.

Lengthy chunks of the wildly uneven screenplay — Art Linson, Jeffrey Ross, Richard LaGravenese and Lewis Friedman obviously having been too many scripting cooks in the kitchen — ring entirely false. The core relationship isn’t credible for a moment, and the rest of the story can’t rise above that shortcoming.

Nor can Taylor Hackford pull things together. The one-time A-list director of hits such as An Officer and a Gentleman and Against All Odds has stumbled lately, with 2004’s Ray being his most recent success. Love Ranch and Parker did nothing for his résumé, and this new effort doesn’t improve matters. It won’t make a dime.

Other films have covered this ground more successfully, from 1969’s The Comic to 1988’s Punchline and 1992’s Mr. Saturday Night. For that matter, Robert De Niro himself did far better back in ’82, in Martin Scorsese’s acid-hued The King of Comedy.

The Comedian is the familiar story of a once-great talent grown embittered by the fact that people only recognize him for something he did 20 years earlier. In this case, it’s insult stand-up comic Jackie Burke (De Niro), who back in the day lucked into a wildly popular TV sitcom, Eddie’s Home.

Two decades later, fans haven’t the slightest interest in his current material; they only want to hear him shout that show’s signature line — “AR-leeeeeeeeeen!” — delivered every time his blue-collar character was exasperated by his ditsy wife. (The echo of Jackie Gleason’s similar bellow, in TV’s long-ago The Honeymooners, seems deliberate.) Worse yet, people insist on calling him Eddie.

That might be tolerable, if Jackie still could command headlines. But these days he’s relegated to the likes of the tiny, half-empty Long Island club where the story begins: a miserable fate that he has helped create, in part because of his spiteful, intolerant tendency to diss people offstage, they way he insults them from behind a microphone.

Much to the ongoing dismay of his loyal but long-suffering manager, Miller (Edie Falco).

The Croods: Stone Age family frolic

The Croods (2013) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rating: PG, and needlessly, as this film is fine for all ages
By Derrick Bang

Although the enormously successful Ice Age franchise would seem to have captured the market for animated features set in prehistoric times, that series has focused exclusively on animals, while ignoring the early stirrings of humanity.

Clearly, that oversight begs to be addressed, and The Croods does so with considerable humor: much of it derived from the cheekily anachronistic manner in which these characters interact with an environment that never quite existed in our own past. Writer/directors Chris Sanders and Kirk DeMicco have set their saga — in their own words — somewhere between the Jurassic Age and the “Katzenzoic Era” ... which explains the colorful assortment of birds, reptiles and mammals that we’re unlikely to find in the fossil record.

Think of television’s The Flintstones, although considerably more primitive, and with a lot more attitude.

The Croods can be transfixed by the simplest things, and so we frequently see
expressions of awe fill the faces of, from left, Gran, Eep, Grug, Thunk, Sandy and
Ugga. And things get even better when they meet the new neighbor...

Our family is composed of a father figure, Grug (voiced by Nicholas Cage), who does his best to preserve the safety of his mate, Ugga (Catherine Keener); their adolescent son, Thunk (Clark Duke); and toddler Sandy (not really talking yet). The clan also includes Grug’s mother-in-law, Gran (Cloris Leachman); and typically rebellious teenage daughter Eep (Emma Stone).

At first blush, it wouldn’t seem that Eep has much to rebel against, but in fact her home life has become insufferably claustrophobic. The Croods once shared their valley with several other family units, all of which have perished, often in some larger predator’s stomach.

As a result, the iron-handed Grug has issued a series of edicts that allows his family only two activities: foraging for food, and hunkering for safety in a dark cave. He regards their continued existence as proof that his various credos are the height of wisdom: Fear is good, change is bad; Anything fun is bad; and Never not be afraid.

A rather stifling set of rules, particularly for a headstrong and curious young woman who wants to live, and see more of her world.

Following a brief explanatory prologue, in order to set the stage, Sanders and DeMicco open their story with a frenetic set piece: a typical egg hunt, in order to secure breakfast. This hilarious sequence has the rip-snortin’ pace of a classic Warner Bros. cartoon short, with Alan Silvestri’s equally tumultuous score further propelling the action. I promise, you’ll gasp for breath, mostly from laughing so hard.

It’s a great way to introduce these six characters, and their dangerous environment.