Deadpool: Gleefully revolting

Deadpool (2016) • View trailer 
Three stars. Rated R, for strong violence, gore, relentless profanity, sexual content and graphic nudity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 2.12.16

This is a flick for folks who felt the Kick-Ass movies weren’t violent enough.

And those who believe that Melissa McCarthy and Amy Schumer could be more potty-mouthed, if they worked harder at it.

Much to the disgust of companions Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand)
and Colossus, and moments before facing dozens of gun-toting thugs, Deadpool (Ryan
Reynolds) addresses his audience directly, to discuss precisely how silly everything
has been, up to this moment.

Which is to say, Deadpool is outrageously smutty, profane and gory: about as far from the usually family-friendly Marvel Universe movies as could be imagined. It’s another of those merrily anarchic Hollywood projects that makes ultra-conservatives fret about the end of Western Civilization as we know it.

It’s also rather funny at times, in a tasteless, dark-humor sort of way. But only at times; the shtick wears thin rapidly. Not even Ryan Reynolds can hold our interest with 108 minutes of nonstop mugging and smart-assery. Although — give him credit — he makes a game effort.

The character has an odd history in Marvel’s comic book world, having been introduced in the early 1990s as a villain in various X-Men titles. He gradually morphed into an amoral antihero with a back-story as an unscrupulous mercenary for hire, eventually granted the mutant power of accelerated healing at the cellular level.

Meaning, he can’t be killed in the usual sense. Bullets perforating his body, a knife to the head ... no problem. Hack off a limb, and it regenerates, like a lizard’s tail.

You can imagine what today’s unrestrained special effects wizards can make of that gimmick ... and director Tim Miller — a CGI/VFX designer/producer making his feature directorial debut here — is just the guy to orchestrate the requisite mayhem.

But messy invulnerability isn’t Deadpool’s primary characteristic; he’s best known for his refusal to acknowledge his role as a member of the tightly plotted Marvel Universe. Deadpool knows that he’s a comic book character; he frequently breaks the fourth wall and addresses the readers, or indulges in arguments with the writers who concoct his word balloons.

In that sense, Deadpool is a smug and sassy, 21st century update of Marvel's equally cynical 1970s icon, Howard the Duck. Deadpool also upsets the “regular” Marvel superheroes, who can’t be their usual, carefully scripted selves with this loose cannon shredding the pages.

I’m also reminded of Jasper Fforde’s marvelously whimsical novels, with heroine Thursday Next as a “literary detective” who can jump into classic books, interact with their characters, and even change the endings of stories we know and love. Except that, well, Deadpool is a lot nastier. And more callous. And unapologetically juvenile.

And ... you get the idea.

Fast & Furious 6: Still accelerating

Fast & Furious 6 (2013) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rating: PG-13, and somewhat generously, for intense and relentless violence, action and mayhem, along with occasional profanity and sensuality
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 5.24.13

Longest...

...airport...

...runway...

...ever.

The Fast & Furious series has long been known for physics-defying stunts that strain credibility, while nonetheless inspiring well-deserved admiration for the way so many of these crazy chases and assorted skirmishes look (somewhat) authentic, as opposed to the obvious fakery of computer-enhanced sweetening. (Make no mistake: CGI plays an important role in these films, but much of the driving is real.)

When a high-speed pursuit veers badly out of control, thanks to the bad guys wielding
a vehicle-crushing tank, Dom (Vin Diesel) realizes that one of his team is seconds
away from certain death. The only possible solution? An insane leap from his speeding
car, of course!

Even by those standards, however, Fast & Furious 6 boasts audacious, jaw-dropping set-pieces that are just plain nuts.

But they’re also tautly edited, reasonably suspenseful and quite entertaining. As comic book movies go, this series delivers ingenious thrills ... even if they are guaranteed to make mechanical and aerospace engineers snort with laughter.

Director Justin Lin and screenwriter Chris Morgan deserve considerable credit. They’ve collaborated on four of these films now — all but the first two — and they have the formula down cold. Take an ever-expanding “family” of familiar characters, grant them plenty of interactive banter, season with vehicular chases every 15 minutes or so, and blend with aggressive punching matches between good guys and bad guys, usually one on one, but sometimes two on two.

Toss in a James Bondian “head villain” with an equally malevolent sidekick, spice with babe shots — because under-dressed women are such an essential part of street-racing — and call it a movie.

And yes, before you ask: Morgan already is scripting Fast & Furious 7 for new director James Wan (Saw, Insidious), which will add Jason Statham to the mix when it roars into theaters next summer.

It’s all absolute and utter nonsense, but thrilling and adrenaline-pumping nonetheless. No doubt responding to demands for bigger and better, Lin and Morgan have customized 6 with road-rage chases involving all manner of souped-up cars, not to mention a tank and a massive Antonov 124 cargo plane (!). And yes, the latter eye-widening melee, during which half a dozen four-wheeled vehicles try to prevent said plane from lifting off, occupies 15 climactic minutes, during which the accelerating plane magically never runs out of runway.

Heck, even allowing for the cross-cutting needed to show simultaneous action on the ground and inside the plane, I figure that runway must’ve stretched at least 20 miles. Land must be cheap in Spain.

Haywire: Trust nobody

Haywire (2012) • View trailer
3.5 stars. Rating: R, and needlessly, for action violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.20.12


Movies are all about make-believe: our willing suspension of skepticism in exchange for a good time. We tolerate the impossible — varying degrees of the impossible, depending on the genre — because it’s part of the fantasy.

Although her team's human target has been rescued and safely stowed away,
Mallory (Gina Carano) is a consummate professional who hates loose ends. She
therefore pursues the one antagonist who dashes off, even though his escape can't
compromise her efforts. Cue an energetic foot chase with lots of running.

Unfortunately, like a drug addiction that requires an ever-increasing dosage, filmmakers are forever seeking new ways to up the ante and further impress us: to once again deliver a fresh jolt of eyebrow-raising amazement.

Consider the action hero. Back in 1963, the climactic fist-fight between James Bond and Red Grant, in the close confines of a train compartment in From Russia with Love, set a new standard for brutal, claustrophobic mano a mano combat. For the next several decades, film fans and movie stuntmen alike cited that scene as one of the finest ever caught on camera. Indeed, director Terence Young’s work was potent enough to bother British film censors.

Flash-forward to 2007’s The Bourne Ultimatum, when director Paul Greengrass and editor Christopher Rouse staged an even more jaw-dropping skirmish in London’s Waterloo Station: a melee involving Jason Bourne and several antagonists that was so ferociously intense, viewers actually applauded as the scene concluded. It, too, felt real.

That’s the key: credibility.

Trouble is, many directors push the envelope too far, particularly in the action thriller genre. Escalate the violence too much — turn the obligatory fight scenes into cartoons, with heroes and villains somehow enduring bone-crushing punishment — and we simply scoff and roll our eyes over the sheer stupidity of the whole thing. (Exhibit A, with a bullet: last year’s laughably idiotic Sucker Punch.)

Director Steven Soderbergh understands this: recognizes how “inflated thrills” have ruined many otherwise decent pictures. Haywire is his captivating, energized response: a spy drama with action scenes — very much in the mold of From Russia with Love, which he cites in his film’s press notes — rather than a wall-to-wall action flick with minimal story and progressively sillier fight scenes.

Soderbergh wants us to believe that the action elements in this film are punishing but reasonable: not so acrobatic or dangerous that a human being couldn’t possibly handle them.

His secret weapon: mixed martial arts champion Gina Carano, whose fighting styles include Muay Thai, karate, jiu jitsu, judo, wrestling, boxing, sambo, kick-boxing and kung fu ... all in a taut and unexpectedly hot bod. At first glance, during deceptively calm moments, she’s precisely the sort of individual who’d be underestimated right up to the moment she’d flip across the room, slam you to the floor and crush the air out of you — permanently — with a vicious, leg-twisting headlock.