Wreck-It Ralph: A sweet surprise

Wreck-It Ralph (2012) • View trailer
Four stars. Rating: PG, for kid-level rude humor and mild action/violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.2.12

I haven’t had this much fun since 1988’s Who Framed Roger Rabbit blended classic Disney and Warner Bros. cartoon characters in a similarly madcap adventure.

After crashing his way into the candy-laden realm of the game Sugar Rush, the clumsy
and destructive Ralph only wants to retrieve his hard-earned gold medal. Alas, impish
Vanellope von Schweetz has her own plans for that medal, and they involve her own
desire for "street cred" among her peers.

Wreck-It Ralph, like numerous fantasies before it, concerns the activities of playthings after pesky humans have gone to bed (or otherwise departed the scene). Pixar owns this sub-genre most recently, with its Toy Story franchise, but the concept is much older, dating back to Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Ballet and Victor Herbert’s 1903 musical, Babes in Toyland. Both have been staged and filmed many, many times.

To my knowledge, Wreck-It Ralph is the first such storyline set in the world of arcade gaming. It boasts a sharp script by Jennifer Lee and Phil Johnston, the latter responsible for writing last year’s delightful Cedar Rapids. Most crucially — and as is the case with the Toy Story films — Wreck-It Ralph takes place in a colorful world that is laden with goofy characters, but includes plenty of droll and clever dialogue.

The result: It will delight both youngsters and their parents, and the latter also will recognize all sorts of inside jokes and familiar references.

The action unfolds at Litwak’s Family Fun Center & Arcade, where — as longstanding tradition demands — local kids reserve next-play status by lining up their quarters. Game choices include everything from the cutesy-poo, animé-flavored Sugar Rush, where players race adorable girl avatars through a track bordered by gumdrops, cotton candy and all manner of sweet stuff; to the hyper-realistic, first-person shooter thrills of Hero’s Duty, a nightmarish storyline right out of Starship Troopers, where a combat platoon battles scary cy-bugs that threaten to annihilate the universe.

Somewhere in between is the retro appeal of Fix-It Felix Jr., a 1980s game mildly reminiscent of Nintendo’s original Mario Bros. (whose characters, perhaps tellingly, are not in this film). The game’s villain, Ralph, is a 643-lb. man monster who is determined to destroy the apartment building that the game’s Nicelanders call home. Players (in our real world) control plucky little Felix, whose magic hammer repairs all the damage. Successfully completing the level means that Ralph gets tossed into a nearby mud puddle.

Unhappily, Ralph (voiced by John C. Reilly) is a sensitive soul, and has grown tired of always being the bad guy, and of living his off-duty hours alone in a brick pile. He even joins a support group, Bad-Anon, where familiar villains from various games (Street Fighter, Altered Beasts) share their tales in sessions hosted by Clyde, the orange ghost from Pac-Man.

Post Grad: Post-mortem

Post Grad (2009) • View trailer for Post Grad
Three stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, and much too harshly, for brief profanity and sexual candor
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.27.09
Buy DVD: Post Grad• Buy Blu-Ray: Post Grad [Blu-ray]

Much like its central character, this movie undoubtedly thought it knew what it wanted to be when it grew up ... but things didn't work out that way.

Kelly Fremon's "original" screenplay, blatantly derived from the dysfunctional-family sub-genre recently popularized by Little Miss Sunshine and Sunshine Cleaning, apparently transitioned into something else when star Alexis Bledel got involved.

It's that perfect moment -- the posed graduation photo -- when grabbing the
entire world still seems possible to Ryden (Alexis Bledel, second from right)
and her longtime friend Adam (Zach Gilford, far right). Alas, nothing will work
out quite right from this point onward, in part due to the involvement of,
clockwise from left, Ryden's father (Michael Keaton), grandmother (Carol
Burnett), mother (Jane Lynch) and younger brother (Bobby Coleman).

Bledel's strength — demonstrated time and again by TV's Gilmore Girls and both big-screen Traveling Pants adaptations — is as a winsome, mildly vulnerable romantic lead, which is pretty much the approach she takes in Post Grad.

Trouble is, the rest of the cast is making some other movie, and Vicky Jenson — an art department veteran and animation director (Shrek, Shark Tale) making her live-action directorial debut here — hasn't the faintest idea how to blend these two disparate halves.

The result is clumsy and unintentionally funny. Bledel's Ryden Malby reminds me unerringly of the role Beverly Owen played on TV's The Munsters back in 1964, as the conventionally attractive (i.e. "normal") teenage daughter who was such an outcast among her hilariously weird parents, grandfather and younger brother.

But this clearly isn't the tone Post Grad is seeking, as is obvious from the way Fremon's script proceeds.

The disconnect is unfortunate, particularly since Jenson opens the film cleverly, with Bledel's Ryden taking us through her computer-based networking activities to supply the necessary backstory. This quite engaging prologue sets up definite expectations, none of which are met as the film continues.

Ryden, having just graduated from college, is all set to sell herself during an interview for what she has regarded as a dream job her entire life: an entry-level position at a Los Angeles publishing firm, where she'll eventually rise to reader and associate editor, and then make her rep by discovering the world's next hot author.

Alas, the job is snatched by condescending college nemesis Jessica Bard (Catherine Reitman, daughter of Ivan Reitman, one of this film's producers), and Ryden's carefully orchestrated post-grad career path is shattered in an instant.