Cruella: Ninety-eight Dalmatians short

Cruella (2021) • View trailer

3.5 stars. Rated PG, for dramatic intensity and mild violence

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.11.21

This is not your grandparents’ Cruella De Vil.

 

Actually, I’m not sure whose Cruella it is.

 

Horace (Paul Walter Hauser, left) and Jasper (Joel Fry) recognize that their equally
larcenous partner, Estella (Emma Store), also has the talent to become a famous
fashion designer ... but the chances of that actually happening seem quite remote.

Director Craig Gillespie’s fresh take on the character — available in movie theaters and via Disney+ — isn’t merely an origin story; it’s an historical re-write. The script — which apparently required five (!) credited writers — has absolutely nothing to do with 1961’s animated film or Dodie Smith’s 1956 novel, aside from borrowing the names of a few characters.

Which therefore begs the usual question: Why employ a well-known pop-culture character at all, if there’s no willingness to honor its roots? Why not simply create a fresh character, and start a new franchise?

 

On top of which, why update a beloved and still-popular children’s story, when the resulting new film is aimed more toward adults, and is likely to bore younger viewers?

 

Hollywood never ceases to bewilder.

 

All this said, Cruella is entertaining — to a point — thanks in great part to Emma Stone’s flamboyant, scenery-chewing performance as the title character. She’s ably supported by the hilariously kitschy efforts of production designer Fiona Crombie and costume designer Jenny Beavan (along with “eyewear designer” Tom Davies, who, quite deservedly, gets his own separate credit).

 

Gillespie and editor Tatiana S. Riegel romp through all these sets and locations with the giddiness of children on a particularly lavish theme park ride: all manner of extended takes, smash close-ups, cockeyed camera angles — cinematographer Nicolas Karakatsanis also deserves a bow — and other visual tics and hiccups.

 

No question: Cruella is fun to watch.

 

For about an hour. Giddiness, for its own sake, isn’t sustainable.

 

At 134 minutes, Gillespie’s self-indulgent film is at least half an hour too long. The momentum begins to wane as we hit the midpoint, and thereafter it’s definitely a case of diminishing returns. The second half never induces outright boredom, but the thin plot does get tedious.

 

Cruella narrates her own saga — Stone’s off-camera voiceover — which begins with a rebellious, erratic childhood that matches her alarmingly unusual hair color. Dad is long gone; her mother Catherine (Emily Beecham) is at wit’s end, trying to deal with her unruly daughter (named Estella at this point, and played by Tipper Seifert-Cleveland).

 

After the school demerits hit critical level — a very droll montage — Estella finally perceives how her behavior is traumatizing her mother.

 

Eager to embrace a promised new beginning, mother and daughter hit the road … but first Catherine stops at an impossibly posh and massive estate, to meet with somebody inside. Disobeying the order to remain in the car, Estella sneaks around the lavish garden and is just in time to witness a disastrous encounter between her mother and three savage Dalmatians.

 

(Done tastefully, despite the horrific result, which is necessary to advance the plot.)

 

1917: Absolutely amazing!

1917 (2019) • View trailer 
Five stars. Rated R, for considerable war violence, dramatic intensity and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.10.20

Oh.

My.

Goodness.

Having made it through the harrowing horrors of No Man's Land, Lance Cpl. Schofield
(George MacKay, left) and Lance Cpl. Blake (Dean-Charles Chapman) marvel at the
artillery weapons and shells that have been abandoned on the German side of the front.

Director/co-writer Sam Mendes’ war drama isn’t merely a crackling suspenser that’ll keep you at the edge of your seat — hand at mouth — for every single moment of its 119-minute run.

It’s also one of the most visually audacious films ever made: a degree of stunning cinematic technical advancement on par with the dinosaurs that knocked our socks off, back in 1993’s Jurassic Park.

Everything you’ve heard about Mendes’ film is true; it’s that awesome.

The simple, pressure-cooker plot begins on April 6, 1917, deep within the Allied trenches in Northern France. The “Great War” has been raging since late July 1914, and will continue until November 1918; American forces have yet to arrive in Western Europe (although the United States officially declared war on Germany on this very day).

German forces have unexpectedly pulled back overnight, encouraging the Allies to mount an offensive and follow. But aerial photos have revealed this to be a ruse; the Germans have feigned this retreat to the Hindenburg Line, in order to ambush the pursuing Devonshire Regiment’s 1,600-man 2nd Battalion. 

Processing this from miles away, the 8th Battalion’s Gen. Erinmore (Colin Firth, in a brief appearance) realizes the result will be a slaughter. Phone lines are down; the only hope is to send messengers — on foot — through No Man’s Land and past the original German front, in order to alert the 2nd Battalion’s commanding officer, and call off the Allied attack … which is scheduled for the very next morning.

The mission falls to two young soldiers: Lance Cpl. Schofield (George MacKay, well remembered as the beleaguered eldest son in 2016’s Captain Fantastic) and Lance Cpl. Blake (Dean-Charles Chapman, a frequent face on HBO’s Game of Thrones). They have less than 24 hours to cover many dangerous miles.

Blake has an additional incentive: His older brother Joseph is a member of the 2nd Battalion.

Shazam!: Power failure

Shazam! (2019) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated PG-13, and quite generously, for scary fantasy violence, intense action and relentless mental cruelty
By Derrick Bang

There’s an old parable about three blind men encountering an elephant for the first time.

“It’s a snake,” says the first, having felt the trunk.

With the eager help of Freddy (Jack Dylan Grazer, left), who imaginatively suggests a
series of potential powers, the newly christened Shazam (Zachary Levi) discovers
that — among other things — he can shoot powerful lightning bolts from his fingers.

“No, it’s a spear,” opines the second, awed by the long, sharp tusk.

“It’s definitely a tree,” insists the third, unable to wrap his arms around one of the huge legs.

Scripters Henry Gayden and Darren Lemke — and, I’m certain, a sizable number of uncredited “sweeteners” — are the blind men, and this film is their elephant.

Shazam! feels like it was “written” by half a dozen people — one of whom is a sadist — working independent of each other. Apparently the resulting pages then were jammed together randomly, with no attempt to integrate tone, characterization or (God forbid) plot continuity.

And, hey presto! That’s how you get a movie as inept, haphazard and insufferably stupid as this one.

Newbie horror director David F. Sandberg (Lights Out, Annabelle: Creation) brings nothing to the party, and how could he? He has no meaningful template, from which to construct anything remotely artistic.

This Frankenstein’s monster of a flick is best described as Big (the 1988 Tom Hanks comedy) meets television’s Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, with the intelligence of the latter. Adults are advised to steer well clear, and I’m pretty sure even children will curl their lips with disgust.

When superhero movies go bad, they go very bad.

You’d think Warner Bros. would have learned, after 2011’s equally atrocious handling of Green Lantern, that the “Oh, wow; aren’t these powers cool?!” approach to these stories doesn’t work. At all.

Mind you, there’s nothing wrong with humor; indeed, a certain degree of smirky self-awareness is essential. But too much disrespects the nobility of these modern mythic characters, who (for the most part) deserve a measure of reverence. They’re not cartoons.

Gayden and Lemke treat this character — who dates back to 1939 (!) — as if he were a 5-minute Saturday Night Live sketch. Trouble is, this film runs a butt-numbing 132 minutes.

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.

Miss Sloane: Superbly written political drama

Miss Sloane (2016) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated R, for profanity and occasional sexuality
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.9.16

Abraham Lincoln tried — and failed — to abolish lobbyists.

“Lobbyists have more offices in Washington than the President,” Will Rogers famously observed. “You see, the President only tells Congress what they should do. Lobbyists tell ’em what they will do.”

Having decided to take a shot at persuading senators to back a bill enhancing gun
background checks, Elizabeth Sloane (Jessica Chastain, foreground) gains the support
of junior lobbyists, from left, Franklin (Noah Robbins), Lauren (Grace Lynn Jung), Alex
(Douglas Smith) and Ross (Al Macadam).

Ayn Rand was somewhat more blunt: “Lobbying ... is the result and creation of a mixed economy: of government by pressure groups. Its methods range from mere social courtesies and cocktail party or luncheon “friendships,” to favors, threats, bribes, blackmail.”

One cringes at the thought of what lobbyists will be able to accomplish, dealing with a president who apparently stalled at fifth grade.

Director John Madden’s Miss Sloane would have been a provocatively charged political drama at any time; given the current circumstances, it’s also quite chilling. First-time writer Jonathan Perera’s electrifying script positively sizzles in the hands of star Jessica Chastain, who tears into the pungent dialogue with the ferocity of a starving lion. She doesn’t merely portray the title character; she charges into the role with messianic fervor.

Perera’s personal saga is just as compelling as his debut screenplay. He was 30 years old, working as an elementary school teacher in South Korea, when he began the project. Once finished, he solicited Hollywood industry reps via cold online queries; his script made the rounds, placing No. 5 on 2015’s celebrated “Black List” of most-liked but as-yet unproduced screenplays.

FilmNation Entertainment picked it up; Madden (Shakespeare in Love, The Debt, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel) signed on to direct; Chastain agreed to star.

Perera’s dialog has the rat-a-tat intensity of Aaron Sorkin’s best work, with similar hot-button political relevance. It’s compelling, fascinating, suspenseful and crazy-making, lifting rocks and shining a light on slimy Capitol “business as usual” practices much the way The Big Short indicted behind-the-scenes banking shenanigans.

Perera retained sole scripting credit: almost unheard of, these days, for a newcomer. He’s guaranteed to garner an Academy Award nomination, as will Chastain.

Her title character, Elizabeth Sloane, is a high-powered lobbyist heading a team for a well-established “white shoe” firm headed by George Dupont (Sam Waterston). She’s brilliant, ruthless and utterly unscrupulous; she also has no life outside of her work. It’s telling that we never see her eating breakfast, changing clothes, watering plants or doing anything else that would suggest a home life.

Kingsman: Gleefully vicious carnage

Kingsman (2015) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated R, for profanity, sexual candor and very strong violence
By Derrick Bang

At its more entertaining moments — which are many — this is a wildly audacious, totally bonkers spy spoof in the classic 1960s mold; the best echoes hearken back to James Coburn’s two grand Derek Flint flicks, Our Man Flint and In Like Flint.

When Harry (Colin Firth, center) brings Eggsy (Taron Egerton, left) to a posh tailor's shop
in order to outfit the young man properly, they're surprised to find Richard Valentine (Samuel
L. Jackson) present for the same reason. "Surprised," because Harry and Valentine already
have learned that they're mortal enemies...

It’s clever, funny, exhilarating and ferociously paced by director Matthew Vaughn and editors Eddie Hamilton and Jon Harris.

Unfortunately, it’s also atrociously, grotesquely violent in spots: “wet” to a degree that makes a mockery of its R rating. Such intentions are signaled quite early, when one of our protagonists is dispatched in a manner more appropriate to gory horror flicks ... and, indeed, I recall seeing precisely such butchery in the gruesome 2001 remake of 13 Ghosts.

Comic-book sensibilities or not, this is pretty repugnant stuff for a mainstream production sporting an A-list cast topped by Colin Firth and Michael Caine. And while this early scene is the worst, it’s by no means alone; one particular character — the aptly named Gazelle, played with panache by Sofia Boutella — is responsible for quite a few sliced and diced limbs.

At the same time...

There’s no denying that Vaughn is playing to his fan base, which enthusiastically embraced his similarly über-violent 2010 adaptation of Kick-Ass. Such folks are guaranteed to cheer an all-stops-out melee that erupts in the third act: a brutally choreographed display of hand-to-hand slaughter on par with Uma Thurman’s assault on “The Crazy 88’s” in Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill.

So be advised: This is humor at its darkest, and definitely not for the faint of heart.

Such cautionary notes aside...

Vaughn and frequent co-scripting colleague Jane Goldman open their film with a couple of prologues that introduce both Harry Hart (Firth) and Kingsman, the outwardly genteel super-super-secret spy agency for which he works, under the code name of Galahad. As befits an organization that bestows such sobriquets, the Kingsman operatives answer to a chief dubbed Arthur (Caine), who dispatches his agents to handle, ah, “messy” world situations that evade both conventional policing and standard-issue covert agencies.

The Imitation Game: What price genius?

The Imitation Game (2014) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, and rather harshly, for mature content and occasional sexual candor
By Derrick Bang

Mankind has an unfortunate tendency to devour its champions. Always has, likely always will.

We’re also not very tolerant of those who are different, whether in appearance or behavior. During times of crisis, such eccentricities are regarded even more suspiciously.

Despite indifference and outright hostility from some of his Bletchley Park colleagues,
Alan Turing (Benedict Cumberbatch) proceeds doggedly with the creation and
construction of a massive "thinking machine" that he hopes will break the German
"Enigma code" that has frustrated Allied efforts for so long.

Norwegian-born director Morten Tyldum’s handling of The Imitation Game employs shaming and ostracization as dramatic plot points: issues every bit as significant as the WWII-era predicament that brings young mathematician Alan Turing to the unusual code-breaking operation at Buckinghamshire’s Bletchley Park.

As scripted by Graham Moore and depicted by star Benedict Cumberbatch, Turing is a social outcast by virtue of his utter obliviousness to decorum and protocol. He affects a level of bland arrogance that infuriates everybody, yet remains utterly bewildered by how he is perceived by others.

This characterization places Turing squarely “on the spectrum,” to acknowledge the phrase du jour ... and I can’t help feeling that this artistic decision may have been propelled more by our current fascination with such characters — think Hugh Laurie’s Dr. Gregory House, or Cumberbatch’s own modern spin on Sherlock Holmes — than by authenticity.

This film’s opening credits are a bit deceptive, implying that Moore concocted this screenplay on his own. Only when we hit the closing credits can sharp-eyed viewers spot, in tiny print, a reference to Moore’s script being adapted from Andrew Hodges’ 1983 biography, Alan Turing: The Enigma. And while Hodges drew upon ample sources to confirm Turing’s impatience with bureaucracy and the grinding sluggishness of the military chain of command, Moore’s decision to re-cast this as full-blown autism is ... well ... historically suspect.

That said, it allows Cumberbatch to inhabit another of his fascinating, eccentricity-laden characters: a fresh performance that never ceases to be both fascinating and entertaining. Tyldum clearly recognizes this, choosing to open his film with Turing’s initial interview in the office of Bletchley Park Commander Alastair Denniston (Charles Dance). It’s a hilarious, impeccably timed display of rat-a-tat dialogue between an increasingly annoyed Denniston and the calmly indifferent Turing.

Indeed, such unruffled disdain later leads to the film’s funniest line, when one of Turing’s colleagues comments, in the aftermath of a particularly blunt display, “Popular in school, were you?”

Likely not, but that’s hardly the point; Turing’s unlikely presence at Bletchley Park, juxtaposed against the increasingly importance of his work, is what makes this film so engaging.

Before I Go to Sleep: A dull, contrived snooze

Before I Go to Sleep (2014) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated R, for violence, pointless profanity and fleeting nudity
By Derrick Bang

This modest thriller opens with an intriguing first act, loses momentum in the second, slides into stupidsville during the climax, and concludes with a sappy epilogue that drew well-deserved snickers of disgust from Wednesday evening’s preview audience.

Truly, a lamentable waste of an A-list cast.

Breakfast is always the worst time of day for Christine Nicole Kidman), for it's when she
 must attempt to absorb two decades' worth of details about a long and happy life spent
with husband Ben (Colin Firth), whom she cannot remember from one day to the next.

UK author S.J. Watson’s Before I Go to Sleep was an auspicious debut novel in the spring of 2011, climbing bestseller lists on both sides of the Atlantic, earning translations in more than 40 countries, and galloping home with two significant crime writers’ awards. I can only assume that the premise and execution worked far better on the printed page than here, via director Rowan Joffe’s screenplay ... although I note that even some of Watson’s complimentary critics complained about his contrived denouement.

Actually, contrived isn’t strong enough. As executed by Joffe — a clumsy scripter thus far known for leaden adaptations of thrillers by Martin Booth (The American) and Graham Greene (Brighton Rock) — this manipulative psychological mystery completely falls apart during post-mortem analysis. It utterly fails the “driving home” test, as unhappy patrons pick apart details and plot element which, in the final analysis, don’t make sense and simply couldn’t happen in the real world.

Which is a shame, because — as a director — Joffe establishes a reasonably tense and unsettling atmosphere as the story begins.

Christine Lucas (Nicole Kidman) wakes each morning frightened and confused, in a bed, bedroom and house that are wholly unfamiliar, having slept next to a man who appears a total stranger. That would be Ben (Colin Firth), who gently, patiently explains that he’s her husband, and that they’ve been married for years. She doesn’t remember any of this, he continues — quiet despair clouding his eyes, as we realize that he has repeated this well-worn script hundreds (thousands?) of times — because she suffers from psychogenic amnesia, the result of a traumatic traffic accident.

Christine begins each day believing that she’s still a single woman in her 20s, when, in fact, she’s a 40-year-old wife. She can absorb and process information each day — assisted by displays of photos and messages that Ben has posted throughout their house — but she forgets all the “new” information each time she sleeps. And then, the following morning, the whole heartbreaking ritual takes place again.

Kidman is persuasively disoriented, her wary eyes flickering between this man she doesn’t recognize, to the rooms of a strange home that are filled with photographic reminders of years spent with him: wedding and vacation pictures, casual shots of her wearing clothes that hang in the closets ... everything that indicates a long and deliriously happy life at Ben’s side.

Ben heads for work each weekday morning — he teaches at a nearby school — and leaves Christine to re-discover her life, become re-acquainted with her surroundings. By dinnertime each evening, she has come to accept and appreciate how ghastly this is for her: and also for sad, faithful Ben, who clearly hopes that, the following morning, she’ll know who she is without being prompted.

But no; the pattern has remained fixed for years.

Zero Dark Thirty: The ultimate manhunt

Zero Dark Thirty (2012) • View trailer
4.5 stars. Rating: R, for considerable violence, torture and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.11.13

Osama bin Laden was executed on May 2, 2011. Given the realities of Hollywood development time, production and post-production work, this film’s arrival in the waning days of 2012 is nothing short of remarkable.

When the SEAL mission finally comes together, Maya (Jessica Chastain) scarcely can
believe it. All her years of research, and of trying to persuade CIA superiors that she
really might have a lead on Osama bin Laden's location ... and now her work may
bear fruit. Or has she been pursuing a useless lead all this time?

That the result is this riveting, is icing on the cake.

It’s easy to understand why director Kathryn Bigelow and writer Mark Boal would select this project as a follow-up to their Oscar-laden triumph with 2009’s The Hurt Locker. Although lacking that film’s nail-biting intensity, Zero Dark Thirty carries the same suspenseful atmosphere of docu-drama verisimilitude. Given the topic, American audiences also can’t help experiencing more than a little cathartic exhilaration.

Unseemly or not, it’s hard to resist the impulse for an exultant “Hell, yeah!” as we hit the story’s payoff.

Despite the perception that fact-based, politics-laden “procedural thrillers” (for want of a better term) are box-office poison, we’ve recently been gifted with two crackling efforts: this one and Argo. Both manage the impressive feat of generating tension and building to exciting climaxes, despite our knowing the respective stories’ outcomes long before entering the theater.

That’s no small thing. Scripter William Goldman’s handling of 1976’s All the President’s Men remains the superlative template for depicting dull-as-dirt research work in a manner that becomes not just fascinating, but downright compelling; Boal obviously took its lessons to heart. Zero Dark Thirty spends a great deal of time watching a lone CIA analyst beat her head against a vague investigative wall, yet these efforts never seem dull or repetitive.

In part, that’s because we know the stakes involved from recent history, and we’re genuinely curious to learn more about what went into this impressively successful covert operation: how the key pieces of information were determined and then properly analyzed. And if Boal takes some dramatic license along the way, well, that’s fine; cinema places its own unique requirements on narrative flow, not the least of which is building our emotional involvement with these characters.

Which brings us to the best weapon in Bigelow’s capable filmmaking arsenal: star Jessica Chastain. As the CIA analyst in question, she drives this story with — by turns — calm intelligence and righteous fury. She’s never less than wholly persuasive, whether cycling grimly through surveillance footage or standing up to overly cautious superiors too concerned about their political reputations.

Even Chastain’s quiet moments are laden with emotional depth, when she sinks, exhausted, into the austere quarters that have become “home.” We understand that this woman has no true home: no family, no friends, no lovers. Nothing but The Mission.