Beverly Hills Cop 4: Axel F — Everything old is (not quite) new again

Beverly Hills Cop 4: Axel F (2024) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated R, for violence, drug use and relentless profanity

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.14.24

The cinema summer of 2024 should be dubbed Return of the Ancient Franchise.

 

Six weeks ago, Garfield the cat returned to the big screen, not quite two decades after his previous appearance. One week later, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence reunited (yet again!) for Bad Boys: Ride or Die. In two weeks, we’re getting Twisters, a sorta-kinda retread of 1996’s Twister. The winner’s trophy, however, goes to Michael Keaton’s return in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice on Sept. 6 ... not quite four decades after he last donned that pasty make-up.

 

Having become reluctant allies, Jane (Taylour Paige) and Bobby (Joseph Gordon-Levitt)
listen attentively as Axel (Eddie Murphy) outlines a plan to gain access to a top floor
private gathering.

Meanwhile, Netflix has given us Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F, 30 years after Eddie Murphy last played the title character.

The good news is that director Mark Molloy and his scripters — Will Beall, Tom Gormican and Kevin Ketten — respect this franchise’s fan base. They’ve delivered a well-assembled product that ticks all the necessary boxes, and — in more ways than one — can be considered a cast reunion and nostalgic throwback to the 1984 original.

 

The soundtrack certainly hasn’t changed; the film opens with the pulsating sax grooves from Glenn Frey’s “The Heat Is On,” and it doesn’t take long for The Pointer Sisters’ “Neutron Dance” and Harold Faltermeyer’s instrumental “Axel F” to arrive. Indeed, the latter pops up, in various arrangements, throughout the entire film (perhaps a bit too frequently).

 

And — of course — Murphy takes every opportunity to deliver Axel’s signature foul-mouthed and smart-assed schtick, often while pretending to be somebody else. It’s part of the character’s charm, and no; it hasn’t worn thin.

 

The bad news is that producer Jerry Bruckheimer’s reputation precedes him, with respect to the ludicrously overblown amount of real estate, vehicles and personal property that gets destroyed during the course of this saga. Bruckheimer remains the poster boy for wretched excess, and Molloy and stunt supervisor Mike Gunther cheerfully oblige.

 

(That said, it’s nice that the original Bruckheimer/Don Simpson logo heralds this new film, by way of acknowledging his late partner’s involvement with the first one.)

 

The action kicks off one evening in Detroit, as Axel interrupts the theft of sports memorabilia from the players’ locker room during an ice hockey game. The subsequent vehicular chase finds Axel in a garbage truck-sized city snowplow, in pursuit of four baddies on peppy quad-cycles: a smash ’n’ crash sequence that destroys a good-sized chunk of the city. 

 

After which, Axel’s only “punishment” is standing back as beloved boss Deputy Chief Friedman (Paul Reiser) falls on his sword and retires, in order to keep his “favorite cop” out of trouble with the Police Commissioner.

 

(As if. One would hope that Beall and the other writers would try a little harder, but this sort of nonsense has long been a franchise hallmark.)

Fast X: Over-revved lunacy

Fast X (2023) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for intense action violence and mild profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 5.19.23

This series has long verged on becoming a live-action cartoon, and the newest installment definitely crosses that line.

 

Physics, vehicular stamina and the frailty of the human body aren’t even an afterthought in director Louis Leterrier’s tenth (!) entry in this hard-charging franchise, but I’ll say this: He’s definitely the man for the job, having long ago helmed 2002’s enormously entertaining The Transporter and its 2005 sequel.

 

Confronted by a massive, spherical bomb rolling its way through the streets of Rome —
target: The Vatican — Dom and his comrades desperately try to re-route the threat.

This turbo-charged Fast escapade also gets plenty of momentum from a dog-nuts script by Dan Mazeau and Justin Lin, along with rat-a-tat editing by Dylan Highsmith and Kelly Matsumoto.

As an added bonus, Jason Momoa is a memorably and thoroughly reprehensible villain: a deranged, giggling sociopath prone to outré outfits and a mincing manner that make him even scarier. If he were granted a Snidely Whiplash mustache, I’m sure he’d twirl it with glee.

 

The story opens with a cleverly tweaked flashback to a key event in 2011’s Fast Five, as Dom (Vin Diesel) and his crew steal a massive bank vault laden with $100 million belonging to drug kingpin Herman Reyes (Joaquim de Almeida). Our heroes subsequently drag the vault through the streets of Rio de Janeiro, laying waste to everything in its path, until the audacious climax on the Teodoro Moscosco Bridge.

 

In this “adjusted” version of events, Reyes perishes on the bridge: a demise witnessed by his violently unbalanced adult son, Dante (Momoa), who barely survives.

 

(This sequence also allows us to spend a few minutes with the late Paul Walker’s Brian O’Connor, which is a nice — and respectful — touch.)

 

As things kick into gear in the present day, Dante — who has spent the intervening 12 years plotting revenge — orchestrates the first in an increasingly lethal series of attacks on everybody Dom holds dear. The goal is not to killDom — at least, not immediately — but to make him suffer the deaths of his friends and family, most particularly main squeeze Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) and their 8-year-old son, Little Brian (Leo Abelo Perry).

 

Meanwhile, Tej (Ludacris), Ramsey (Nathalie Emmanuel), Han (Sung Kang) and Roman (Tyrese Gibson) jet off to Rome, to handle a heist assigned by the clandestine U.S. government “Agency” that runs off-the-books operations, and until recently has been headed by the equally mysterious “Mr. Nobody” (Kurt Russell).

 

Back home in Los Angeles, Dom and Letty get an unexpected visitor: a badly wounded Cipher (Charlize Theron), the über-nasty who bedeviled our heroes in the series’ previous two installments, most notoriously when she killed Diplomatic Security Service Agent Elena (Elsa Pataky) while Dom watched. 

 

Letty would just as soon put a bullet between Cipher’s eyes, but the latter has just barely survived her own unpleasant encounter with Dante. In a nod to the old mantra — “The enemy of my enemy is my friend” — an uneasy truce is struck.

Angel Has Fallen: A devilishly good time

Angel Has Fallen (2019) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated R, for profanity and violence
By Derrick Bang

The third time’s definitely the charm, for this series.

Were it not for A-level casts toplined by Gerard Butler’s indestructible Mike Banning, 2013’s Olympus Has Fallen and 2016’s London Has Fallen would have vanished from the face of the planet, due to their outrageously stupid scripts, unforgivably cowardly characters, and offensively jingoistic political undertone.

On the run, and with almost nobody to trust, Mike Banning (Gerard Butler) chances a
phone call to his wife, knowing full well that the FBI has tapped his home phone.

Both typified the exploitative action swill that Cinemax programmed in late-night time slots, back in the 1980s.

Given that series creators Katrin Benedikt and Creighton Rothenberger have been on board throughout, this third entry was approached with more than a little skepticism. But I’m happy to report that Angel Has Fallen is vastly superior to its predecessors; indeed, you’d never believe it came from any of the same folks. Credit likely belongs to new co-scripters Matt Cook and Robert Mark Kamen, the latter a seasoned veteran who has written and co-written crowd-pleasing hits as diverse as The Karate Kid, The Fifth Element and the Transporter series.

In short, Kamen knows how to concoct and pace an effective thriller. More to the point, his stories always have heart, and this new Fallenentry is no different; it includes a level of emotional gravitas that was completely absent in the first two films, whose characters had the depth of tissue paper.

On top of which, the core plot is an always reliable chestnut invariably tapped during the third or fourth season of successful television investigative dramas: the ol’ “We’ve all trusted this guy for years, but now — solely because of circumstantial evidence — we’re gonna believe that he’s been an evil bastard all along.”

Contrived, yes. But undeniably effective, because it puts our hero in the situation beloved by Alfred Hitchcock: on the run from good guys and bad guys.

In fairness, said circumstantial evidence is quite formidable. While keeping President Allan Trumbull (Morgan Freeman) company during a restful fishing trip in the middle of a freezing-cold lake, Banning and his Secret Service team are attacked by a phalanx of explosive drones. Thanks to quick thinking, Banning saves Trumbull’s life, but only barely; the president remains hospitalized, in a coma. Recovering is uncertain.

Banning, in turn, awakens to find himself handcuffed to a hospital bed. As he stares in disbelief, FBI Special Agent Thompson (Jada Pinkett Smith) coldly informs him that he’s the lone survivor, the entire rest of the Secret Service team having been wiped out. Far more damning, the tech-laden van from which the drones were fired has been found, and it’s laden with Banning’s DNA. The cherry on top: $20 million in a clandestine account under his name, with the funds traced back to — we pause, for emphasis — the Russians.

(How’s that for election interference?)

Hobbs & Shaw: Dumb & dumber

Hobbs & Shaw (2019) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated PG-13, for relentless cartoon violence and fleeting profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.2.19

Too loud, too preposterous, and too bloody long.

This isn’t a movie; it’s a pinball machine, with two-legged combatants randomly rolling around an obstacle-laden playing field, savagely bumping into each other for no particular reason.

With the fate of the entire planet resting on their shoulders, Shaw (Jason Statham, driving)
and Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) get ready for a rather improbable lassoing stunt.

The so-called director of this mess, David Leitch, graduated from stuntman to stunt coordinator over the course of two decades; succumbing to delusions of grandeur, he turned director for Atomic Blonde, Deadpool 2 and this sorta-kinda entry in the Fast and Furious franchise.

All three films have the same thing in common: They’re soulless, live-action cartoons operating under the delusion that relentless mayhem compensates for a complete lack of plot and characterization.

It doesn’t.

Bravura action scenes work best when they’re an explosive surprise amid a story that has built tension, drama and emotional gravitas. (Consider the Matt Damon Bourne films as excellent examples.)

Leitch’s approach is akin to a diet of nothing but ice cream. No matter how much we enjoy such dessert as the delicious conclusion to a savory meal, being force-fed nothing but ice cream for 135 butt-numbing minutes — the length of this cinematic travesty — isn’t merely tedious; it becomes acutely painful.

In fairness, Leitch can’t take the sole blame; this misbegotten script comes from Chris Morgan and Drew Pearce, who deserve some sort of chutzpah award for having been paid for this utter absence of anything resembling an actual story. The 135-minute result actually is rather impressive, for its vacuousness.

Dwayne Johnson’s whup-ass and Jason Statham’s martial-arts beatdowns have been lots of fun in the past, and — goodness knows — both have starred in their share of brain-dead clunkers (Skyscraper and The Meg, respectively, in the recent past). In many cases, the two action stars have skated by via droll ’tude and sheer force of incandescent personality; they’re usually a lot of fun to watch.

That said, I suspect Hobbs & Shaw will task the patience of even their most ardent fans.

Jurassic Park: Fallen Kingdom — 'Sauring' adventure

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, for relentless action violence and all manner of dino rage
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.22.18

This film is a cautionary tale that hearkens back to the immortal line from Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s Frankenstein, which has been paraphrased — in movies, TV shows and other books — many times since:

With a particularly nasty Indoraptor loose in her family's private Cretaceous museum,
young Maisie (Isabella Sermon, far right) hopes that Owen (Chris Pratt) and
Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) can keep her alive.

“Learn from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge.”

Its function as a klaxon-blaring environmental warning aside, this fifth installment in the Jurassic series also is a rip-snortin’ rollercoaster ride. Director J.A. Bayona and editor Bernat Vilaplana maintain an impressive level of intense, edge-of-the-seat suspense for two full hours. Derek Connolly and Colin Trevorrow’s script is cleverly structured into three distinct acts, each laden with distinct goals, challenges and dangerous pitfalls.

At the same time, a thoroughly unsettling message percolates beneath the surface, until finally blossoming — nay, exploding — during the climax.

That’s a problem. The care with which Connolly and Trevorrow have built their plot suddenly sags beneath the weight of too much extraneous exposition during the final 15 minutes: one genuine surprise, a failure to resolve, and a lingering catastrophe that has been foretold by Jeff Goldblum’s Ian Malcolm (and it’s very nice to see him again).

We’re left with enough open-ended material to fuel two or three more films ... which, frankly, is quite irritating.

Up to that point, however, Fallen Kingdom is a lot of fun, in great part because Bayona, Connolly and Trevorrow wisely follow — and often reference — many of the ingredients that made Steven Spielberg’s 1993 handling of Michael Crichton’s original novel so thoroughly absorbing.

Stalwart heroes: check. Well-meaning scientists with their ideals shattered: check. Greedy corporate villains: check. One (and only one) comic-relief character: check. A child in peril: check.

Plenty of unexpected jump-attacks by swiftly moving dinosaurs: Check-check-check.

Justice League: And so it begins...

Justice League (2017) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for sci-fi action and violence
By Derrick Bang

Seeing director Zack Snyder’s name attached to this film was not happy news, given the degree to which he ruined both 2013’s Man of Steel and last year’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

Having responded to the bat-signal illuminated by Police Commissioner Gordon (J.K.
Simmons, far left), the newly formed Justice League — from left, Wonder Woman (Gal
Gadot), Cyborg (Ray Fisher), Batman (Ben Affleck) and The Flash (Ezra Miller) —
learn that Gotham City is, once again, in serious trouble.

Snyder has much in common with director Michael Bay, similarly notorious for the Transformers franchise. Both favor bloated, soulless, humorless slugfests that wreak havoc on landscapes and cityscapes, while casually snuffing hundreds (thousands?) of civilian bystanders. Their films are the very definition of mindless product over art.

On the other hand, I was cheered to note Joss Whedon as co-scripter on Justice League. As the writer/director of 2012’s The Avengers, Whedon established the template for solid, successful superhero epics. Fans have recognized Whedon’s gift since television’s Buffy slayed her first vampire, back in 1996: He has an unerring talent for blending action fantasy with a (frequently droll) human element, which eases our suspension of disbelief.

And is a helluva lot more fun.

It’s easy to spot Whedon’s touch in Justice League, which is most successful during its first and second acts, as the stage is set, and the players assembled. It’s equally easy to see that the third act belongs to Snyder ... but not entirely. Even here, we get the vicarious relief of the unmistakable Whedon touch.

Justice League picks up in the immediate wake of Batman v Superman. The latter is dead, having perished at the hands of a Kryptonian monster genetically engineered by the villainous Lex Luthor. The country (the world?) is sliding quickly into anarchy, humanity apparently having abandoned hope after losing its gallant symbol for truth, justice and the American way.

(Ah ... but is Big Blue really, truly dead?)

Bruce Wayne (Batman) and Diana Prince (the Amazon Wonder Woman) are doing their best to stem the lawless tide, but they operate in the shadows; they’re not “living symbols” in the manner of Superman. Worse yet, Batman has been encountering winged “parademons” — very hard to kill — that seem to be seeking something.

Mindful of the need for additional super-powered allies, in order to hold off whatever comes next, Bruce and Diana reach out to three promising individuals: Barry Allen (Ezra Miller), a twentysomething nerd transformed by a lightning strike into The Flash; Arthur Curry (Jason Momoa), dubbed Aquaman, and heir to the underwater kingdom of Atlantis; and Victor Stone (Ray Fisher), a once-promising college football player nearly killed in a horrific accident, and “saved” when his scientist father Silas (Joe Morton) employed alien tech to transform his son into the biomechanical Cyborg.

Thor: Ragnarok — Thud and blunder

Thor: Ragnarok (2017) • View trailer 
Three stars. Rated PG-13, for intense sci-fi action and violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.3.17

Thor has succumbed to a case of the sillies.

Perhaps concerned by the grim sturm und drang that has turned so many recent superhero epics into dreary slogs, Marvel Studios has authorized a rather drastic realignment of its cinematic God of Thunder. They shifted too far in the opposite direction: The results here feel more like a new try-out team for Guardians of the Galaxy.

Having rather miraculously survived their first gladiatorial punch-out, Thor (Chris
Hemsworth) and the Hulk discover they've been forced to become unlikely roommates
in an oddly appointed cell.

Granted, the myth-specific costumes and flowery Shakespearean dialogue drew snickers in the first two Thor films, but they nonetheless let viewers know that none of it was to be taken seriously. The tone was light, particularly with respect to the sniping between Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and his half-brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston), whose villainy never was as dire as he would have preferred.

But Thor: Ragnarok is a full-blown comedy interrupted only occasionally by super-heroics, and that’s an unfortunate miscalculation. The film’s three credited writers — Eric Pearson, Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost — seem far more interested in replicating the playful banter and witty one-liners that were characteristic of 1930s and ’40s screwball comedies, little realizing that crafting such repartee, and making it sound organic, requires far more skill than is on display here.

Delivering such dialogue also demands a level of thespic skill that Hemsworth sadly lacks. Co-stars Cate Blanchett, Anthony Hopkins and Hiddleston have the acting background required to chew up the scenery, but Hemsworth is far outside his comfort zone. Too many of his line readings smack of desperation.

Worse yet, the core plot — highlighted by Blanchett’s marvelously malevolent über-villainess, Hela — gets sidetracked by an interminable second act that piles on the dumb-bunny gags. It’s sad to see Thor become an object of ridicule in his own series.

The film’s subtitle — ragnarok, also known in Norse mythology as “twilight of the gods” — refers to a final apocalyptic battle that (depending on interpretation) concludes with the destruction of the world, or the universe, or godly realms. For this story, the threat is to Thor’s ancestral home of Asgard, gateway to the “nine realms” that include Midgard (Earth).

Thor seems to have this threat well in hand during a prologue; he handily defeats Surtur, an immense fire demon who is the fabled harbinger of ragnarok. But Loki once again has been up to no good, back in Asgard, having usurped the throne and stripped their father Odin (Hopkins) of his magical power. In this weakened state, he’s no longer able to secure the enchanted prison that has long protected the nine realms from Hela (Blanchett), goddess of death ... and — surprise, surprise — Thor and Loki’s hitherto unknown older sister.

Kingsman: The Golden Circle — More cheerfully deranged spyjinks

Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated R, for strong violence, frequent profanity, drug content and sexual candor
By Derrick Bang

This is the guiltiest of guilty pleasures.

Director Matthew Vaughn’s Kingsman: The Golden Circle is just as hyperkinetically loopy as its 2014 predecessor, and I mean that in the best possible way. Both films are deranged riffs on the 1960s spy craze: from the colorfully mod sets to the manic gadgets and weapons. Think Our Man Flint or The Man from U.N.C.L.E. ... on steroids.

Waitaminute ... isn't he dead? Having tracked the nefarious Golden Circle's drug-dealing
enterprise to a huge lab concealed beneath a mountain ski chalet, Eggsy (Taron Egerton,
left), Galahad (Colin Firth, center) and Whiskey (Pedro Pascal) plan their assault.

The Kingsman films are over the top in all respects, which includes frequent profanity and outrageous dollops of violence, the latter guaranteed to whiten the faces of sensitive viewers. (Consider this ample warning.)

But none of this should be taken seriously. These are comic book-style comedies, even if Vaughn and co-scripter Jane Goldman repeatedly crash the boundaries of good taste. Actually, this sequel is more palatable in one key respect: It lacks the first film’s vulgar sexuality, which is a blessed relief.

On the other hand, this second outing does suffer from bloat. At 141 minutes, Vaughn and Goldman overstay their welcome by at least one frenzied action sequence. Too much of anything becomes tedious.

Following a brilliantly choreographed, pedal-to-the-metal prologue that nearly claims the life of Savile Row-garbed Kingsman agent Eggsy (Taron Egerton), Vaughn and Goldman kick this second global adventure into even higher gear, with an unexpectedly vicious housecleaning: a purge reminiscent of how 1996’s first big-screen Mission: Impossible began. When the dust settles, only Eggsy and Merlin (Mark Strong), the organization’s fastidious Scottish tech guru, are left standing.

Forced to activate their organization’s emergency “Doomsday Protocol,” Eggsy and Merlin are guided to the plains of Kentucky, and the massive Statesman bourbon distillery: actually a front for an even more massive compatriot spy organization that clandestinely protects the civilized world. In its own, inimitably American fashion.

2014’s Kingsman milked considerable humor from the class divide that initially separated Eggsy — introduced as a wayward, uncouth, working-class bloke — from Harry Hart/Galahad (Colin Firth), the seasoned operative who brought the young man into the fold. This film does the same, with even funnier results, as the now-suave Eggsy and (always suave) Merlin confront their rougher, gruffer American counterparts.

Kentucky is cowboy country, and everything about Statesman adheres to that model, starting with boots, pronounced drawls and plenty of denim. The primary Statesman field agents are Tequila (Channing Tatum) and Whiskey (Pedro Pascal); their tech guru — Merlin’s counterpart — is Ginger Ale (Halle Berry).

As for the group’s leader, who else but Jeff Bridges would be cast as Champagne? He has a great time sending up his various cowboy roles, down to little gestures such as Champ’s habit of wiping his mustache with a finger moistened in bourbon.

Spider-Man: Homecoming — A tangled web

Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for sci-fi action and violence, and mild profanity
By Derrick Bang

It’s both ironic and yet appropriate that this newest incarnation of Spider-Man — let’s call it Spider-Man 3.0 — works best when young Peter Parker is out of costume.

Try as he might, Peter (Tom Holland) can't seem to make things work properly ... either
in his personal life, or as the web-slinging would-be hero, Spider-Man.

As originally conceived by writer Stan Lee and artist Steve Ditko, way back in 1962, Peter was an angst-ridden high school outcast: a nerd long before that word became a fashionable descriptor. Eternally abused by campus tormentor Flash Thompson, ignored by all the cool kids, Peter took solace from his scientific curiosity and the protective embrace of home life with his beloved Uncle Ben and Aunt May.

British actor Tom Holland — so powerful as the eldest son forced to help his family cope with a tsunami’s aftermath, in 2012’s The Impossible — persuasively nails this all-essential aspect of Peter’s personality. He has a ready smile that falters at the faintest slight, real or imagined; he’s all gangly limbs and unchecked, hyperactive eagerness. Peter frequently doesn’t know how to handle himself, because he doesn’t yet possess a strong sense of what his “self” actually is.

That said, director/co-scripter Jon Watts’ update of Peter gives the lad a firmer social grounding that he possessed in all those early Marvel comic books. He’s a valued member of his school’s academic decathlon squad, where he’s routinely thrust alongside teammates Flash (Tony Revolori), crush-from-a-distance Liz (Laura Harrier) and the aloof, slightly mysterious Michelle (Zendaya, the effervescent star of TV’s engaging K.C. Undercover).

And — oh, yes — Peter is a-bubble with enthusiasm over the secret he cannot share with anyone: his recent trip to Berlin, supposedly as a science intern for Stark Enterprises, but where he actually joined Iron Man and other super-powered associates and went mano a mano against Captain America (recent back-story details supplied via a clever flashback).

Impetuously assuming that he’ll therefore be made a member of the Avengers, Peter is chagrined when days and weeks pass without a word from Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) or his right-hand man, Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau). I mean, Spidey deflected Captain America’s shield, right? What the heck is Tony waiting for?

Retrieving stolen bicycles and helping little old ladies may establish cred as “your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man,” but it hardly stacks up against saving the world from super-powered bad guys. Peter chafes at being abandoned on the sidelines, and thus makes the mistake that Stark anticipated.

Wholly contrary to the essential divide between civilian and costumed life, Peter begins to employ his alter-ego as a crutch: a means to enhance his social status.

“But I’m nothing without the costume,” he eventually wails, in genuine torment, to Tony.

“If that’s true,” Tony replies, “then you don’t deserve it.”

Despicable Me 3: Third time isn't the charm

Despicable Me 3 (2017) • View trailer 
Three stars. Rated PG, for no particular reason
By Derrick Bang

One should avoid going to the well too often.

At first, Gru (left) is delighted to finally meet Dru, the long-estranged twin brother he never
knew existed. But Dru's wealth, charm and swooningly handsome good looks quickly
prove annoying, particularly since Gru's life and career have bottomed out.

The Despicable Me franchise is showing its age, and for a variety of reasons. Although Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio have scripted all three films — which should ensure continuity of tone and narrative style — they’re clearly running out of ideas. Yes, this third installment is funny (for the most part); and yes, it zips along quickly enough to prevent viewer restlessness.

I’m sure children will be entertained by its colorful wackiness.

But their parents ... not so much. And that’s a shift, because the first two films played far more successfully to all ages.

This film just feels tired, much like bad guy-turned-good guy Gru, referenced by the title. Poor Gru has a constant case of the mopes this time out. Let’s face it: He was a lot more captivating as a villain, when he was, yes, despicable.

Perhaps more insidiously, Gru has been overshadowed by his banana-hued, pint-size subordinates. The Minions are a more fun — and a lot funnier — than anything Gru offers here. And poor Gru seems to know it.

Over at Blue Sky, Chris Wedge and his team have been careful not to let Scrat take over their Ice Age series, instead keeping the prehistoric squirrel/rat on the sidelines, as occasional slapstick relief. Paul, Daurio and returning Despicable co-director Pierre Coffin haven’t been equally cautious, and the result is obvious: The Minions now control the franchise.

Leaving poor Gru a somewhat listless afterthought.

The “despicable” character this time out is Balthazar Bratt (voiced by Trey Parker), a former TV child star who peaked with an evil character his adolescent self played for several seasons in the 1980s. He came complete with signature phrase — “I’ve been a baaaaaad boy!” — and wreaked fictitious havoc on a weekly basis.

Transformers: The Last Knight — Should be junked

Transformers: The Last Knight (2017) • View trailer 
No stars (turkey). Rated PG-13, for relentless sci-fi action violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.23.17

This isn’t even a good video game.

As a movie, it’s a $260 million disaster.

When Col. William Lennox (Josh Duhamel) inexplicably decides that the über-evil
Megatron might help U.S. forces find some all-important Transformers tech, he okays
the release of a ferocious quartet of evil Decepticons. Which immediately start fragging
every human being in sight. Like, anybody expected otherwise?

Actually, the term movie doesn’t even apply. Movies have plots. And characters. This cacophonous monument of soulless wretched excess has neither.

I’m frankly astonished that Art Marcum, Matt Holloway, Ken Nolan and Akiva Goldsman have the audacity to claim credit for a script. The spoken lines in this junkyard dog are so sparse — often limited to monosyllabic exhortations such as “We’ve got to go!,” “Hang on!,” “Good job!” and “Jump!” — and the action so haphazard, that one could watch the entire 149-minute mess with the dialog track eliminated entirely, and have just as much success trying to extract meaning from the bonkers narrative.

That also would spare us from the faux profundities in the film’s hilariously overwrought voice-over narration. The Monty Python gang, at their prime, could not have concocted more ludicrously silly monologues. But helmer Michael Bay intends us to take them seriously.

Bay began his career as a director of music videos, and it could be argued — particularly during the past decade — that he never shifted gears. Such video shorts are no more than a series of flamboyant, hyper-edited visuals solely in service of the music; with very rare exception, there’s no such thing as “story” or “character.”

The same could be said of Transformers: The L(e)ast Knight, fifth entry in this increasingly dismal franchise, which is no more than an overlong showcase reel for numerous special effects companies. Bay couldn’t care less about story, and he obviously couldn’t care less about character; his notion of an “emotional moment” starts and stops with a tight-tight-tight close-up of a given actor’s face, always bearing a silent, stricken, gape-mouthed expression. Pause and hold for what seems an eternity.

Tears are optional (but desired).

The result would be laughable, if the process of watching the damn thing weren’t so relentlessly repetitious, predictable, exhausting and tediously dull.

Bay doesn’t make movies; he makes product. Noisy, lowest-common-denominator trash designed for an indiscriminate international market.

Expensive and impressively mounted trash, to be fair ... but trash nonetheless.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales — Droll skullduggery

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for considerable fantasy violence and mild suggestive content
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 5.26.17

Assuming Disney is telling the truth — that this truly is the final Pirates of the Caribbean entry — the franchise is leaving the stage on a strong note. 

Carina (Kaya Scodelario) tries to maintain her composure, as Capt. Jack Sparrow (Johnny
Depp, far left) hints at dire results if she refuses to answer his questions, while Marty
(Martin Klebba, center left) and Scrum (Stephen Graham) eagerly anticipate whatever
comes next.

Dead Men Tell No Tales suffers from a bit of bloat, but it’s by no means a showpiece of wretched excess akin to the previous two installments. Scripters Jeff Nathanson and Terry Rossio return to the better balanced blend of humor, chills and excitement that characterized the first film, way back in 2003. More crucially, co-directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg — who collaborated on 2012’s ocean-bound Kon-Tiki — maintain a brisk pace while (very important) keeping Johnny Depp’s self-indulgent mugging to a manageable degree.

This new film references earlier chapters while delivering a satisfying sense of closure, and — best of all — a well-conceived and truly terrifying villain, given a significant fright-factor by co-star Javier Bardem. Having set his own standard for disturbing evil in No Country for Old Men, Skyfall and The Counselor, here Bardem oozes wrathful malevolence at a level likely to terrify some of the younger viewers certain to drag their parents into the theater.

Although this film is laden with violence, Rønning and Sandberg (mostly) keep the carnage to a family-friendly level; there’s no gore and very little blood, with the slicing and dicing limited to quick sword thrusts. Plenty of nameless sailors, soldiers and pirates meet unhappy ends, but somehow the core characters — and the half dozen or so supporting players who’ve become familiar — always seem to duck at the right moment.

A prologue finds young Henry Turner (Lewis McGowan) rowing out to a certain spot in the moonlit ocean, where he times the reappearance of the ill-fated Flying Dutchman, the legendary ghost ship doomed to sail the seas forever. Unhappily, its crew includes Henry’s father, Will: a sad fate for the stalwart character Orlando Bloom played so well in the first three films.

Fear not, Henry tells his father; I’ll find Poseidon’s fabled magical trident, rumored to have the power to eradicate all ocean-bound curses.

Flash-forward a number of years, and Henry (now played by Brenton Thwaites) has become a ship’s mate with the British Royal Navy, stationed in the Caribbean colonial town of St. Martin. Despite his warning — Henry having read up on such things — his ship’s captain ventures into the dread Devil’s Triangle, and a fateful encounter with the imposing Silent Mary, the ghostly galleon commanded by the terrifying Capt. Salazar (Bardem) and his cadaverous crew.

Henry is the only survivor, having been spared by Salazar in order to “tell the tale.” Alas, back in St. Martin, Henry is branded a mutinous coward and scheduled to hang.