All My Senses Were Apparently Frozen

As the blizzard of 2010 approached us I decided to go check out the new movie Frozen. It's a lower-budget independent film that reminded me at once of Open Water--a no-frills movie shot almost entirely in a single oddly claustrophobic set with people you've never seen before.

Let me say that I've enjoyed similar films done in this fashion. Open Water wasn't a great movie but it certainly kept me on the edge of my seat. I'm pointing that out because, quite frankly, it's going to be very hard for any other movie to surpass this one as the worst movie of the year. It's just a complete joke. In most of the reviews I put up I say very little about the story itself but here I can't help but to point out how ludicrous it all is.

Three friends head off to a local mountain to get in some skiing and snowboarding. The group consists of Dan, his best friend Joe and Dan's girlfriend Parker. There's a subplot about Parker's coming along and how it's some sort of direct assault on Dan and Joe's crucial bonding time but, like the rest of the film, you won't care one bit about that.

The three of them, it should be noted, are apparently quite cheap and have no intention of paying for lift tickets. Instead they use Parker to bribe the lift operator into letting them head on up. Now I ski and every mountain I've been to uses lift tickets attached to your jacket as proof of payment. Unless they only plan to ski a single lift all day and hope they get the same operator the entire time this plan doesn't make any sense. No surprise there.

The three spend the day enjoying the mountain and before too long it's getting dark and we're down to the last run. The operator they bribed is shutting down the lift but Dan just has to prove his manhood by talking the guy into one more run. The operator relents and up they go.

Now we get a series of misadventures with the operator. He's called off and the replacement doesn't have all the correct info about who's on the lift. He ultimately comes to the conclusion that it's all clear and shuts it down while our cast is, of course, only part way up the mountain.

Yet again reality takes a nap. Nearly every such lift on any mountain is a direct line up the mountain. Any operator can simply look up the lift and see people on the chair. Furthermore unless it's a tiny resort (and this doesn't appear to be one) there should be people at the top of the lift who can also look down to see them. Nope. Not here. Additionally most mountains include a ski patrol that skis the runs and the lifts to assure no one is left behind. Apparently this resort doesn't believe in such luxuries.

Annoyance then turns to real concern when the lights are turned off. It's not total panic as apparently there are several large moons in orbit on this night given the ease with which we can see every detail. It's then we get another hint of the small nature of the resort as it's mentioned that they won't be open again until the following weekend. Then the hinted-at storm rolls in.

We now get shots of the three complaining endlessly about how cold and biting the storm is but apparently it's not so bad that any of them feel the need to actually zipper up their jackets, pull their hats down, tighten their hoods or put on their goggles. Parker, most obviously, could have just reversed her jacket putting the hood over the front of her face and the warmth of her breath would have worked wonders but not in this movie.

Once the storm abates it's time to consider options. Dan, our dashingly good-looking hero, decides he should jump. They've got to be at least 40 feet up. Somehow none of the three notice that they're sitting on a long padded seat mat that's held to the chair by several bungee cords which would make for a really effective rope system. Dan, flowing with testosterone, doesn't even feel the need to reduce the distance and just pushes forward and launches into the air from a sitting position. To no one's surprise he hits the ground with full force and experiences multiple compound fractures on both legs. Bones sprout out like weeds and he's there with legs splayed in shocking angles. Every so often he manages to shout out "ow" a few times.

Now I've broken lots of things in my life. I've broken my leg skiing and it wasn't even a compound fracture and the pain was absolutely excruciating. I nearly passed out from it. Not our hero Dan. He's having a full-on conversation with Joe and Parker and has to tell them that, no, he doesn't think he'll be able to slide down the mountain. What they expected him to do down there even if he could is a complete mystery.

Joe gets the idea, in ski boots, to climb up the chair and shimmy along the cable to the ladder-equipped support pole. Where's Dan in his snow boarder boots when you need him? Of course that fails miserably. Dan, apparently a cable manufacturer back home, warns that lift cables are razor sharp and I guess we have to take this as fact as we really have no choice. However, having seen these time and again a lift cable spends all day every day getting run through all sorts of compression and looks about as smooth as possible to the eye.

So now we have two people stuck on the lift and Dan incapacitated on the ground with some slightly annoying pain. Then the wolves appear. Thankfully within minutes we no longer have to be bothered by any more of Dan's goofy story line.

Back to Parker and Joe. Sadly we now have to get a lot of back story no one cares about and that just drags the whole thing out longer. Frostbite is setting in but it looks nothing like frostbite and the duo still sees no reason to bundle up.

Through all of the chaos Parker has also lost her right glove and apparently suffers from some malady that prevents her from keeping her hand in her pocket. In fact, it's so debilitating that she manages to not only sleep that night with her hand outside her jacket but firmly squeezing the frozen metal safety bar all night. She awakes in the morning to find it both fully adhered to the bar but also, amazingly, fully functional if a little worse for wear.

Once again Joe decides to try climbing. His method is, like the rest of the film, highly questionable. On his ascent he manages to loosen the mechanism that holds the chair to the cable. Also, instead of pulling up his legs he decides the best method is to just hang by both hands and gloves and use the dangling hand-over-hand attack. Much to everyone's surprise it works. Joe makes the ladder but now, of course, the wolves (who apparently know about weekdays) are back in force. Joe descends right into their midst and manages to stave them off with an errant ski pole because we all know wolves are petrified of ski poles.

Joe then shows us entirely what he's made of by immediately sitting on one of the boards and, using the pole, tries to row down the mountain with the wolves in full pursuit. Parker can rest assured that Joe will have no trouble with this approach and rescue can only be right around the corner.

Then day turns to night and night to day. What could have possibly happened to Joe? Parker then decides to attempt her own escape and wants to jump for it. Having seen Dan's stylistic approach she instead decides to hang down from the chair and then drop. At that moment, of course, the now faulty chair begins to break away from the cable and drops half-way to the ground. Parker drops off it and we're given a brief shot suggesting the falling chair may have grazed her leg. There's an even longer shot of her boot stuck mildly in the back of the chair and with a slight turn it's freed.

She then starts down the mountain laying face down essentially applying a nice swimming stroke. It's then she comes upon Joe and the cadre of wolves still leisurely enjoying their after-dinner mints. They pay little attention to Parker (she is a bit skinny) and she continues down the mountain and onto a two-way road. Wow. A road right in the middle of the trails. That's got to be a safety concern.

Parker gets picked up and we get paroled by the credits. The ride home was filled with more tension than this movie.

The Year In Movies

2009 was a year I'm glad is now behind us. I lost my mother, lost my job, got hit by a drunk driver, saw both of my cars mangled in accidents (in addition to the one with the drunk driver) and, most appropriately, saw less movies as a result. The total was 34 which was down from 49 and that was down from 53 in 2007. The list includes two films--The Uninvited and Cold Souls--that I managed to forget to review and I seem to have one or two of those every year.

I generally felt 2009 was a very down year for films and have to wonder if it's just a result of my having seen less of them or that they just weren't that good.

The list (with my ratings):

• Invictus ***
• Up In The Air ** 1/2
• Avatar ***
• Fantastic Mr. Fox ** 1/2
• The Men Who Stare At Goats ** 1/2
• Pirate Radio *** 1/2
• A Christmas Carol *** 1/2
• Paranormal Activity ** 1/2
• Capitalism: A Love Story **
• The Invention Of Lying **
• Surrogates * 1/2
• 9 **
• Inglorious Basterds ***
• Thirst * 1/2
• District 9 *
• (500) Days Of Summer ****
• Bruno * 1/2
• Moon ****
• Public Enemies * 1/2
• Food, Inc. ** 1/2
• The Hangover ****
• Drag Me To Hell ***
• Up ****
• Star Trek * 1/2
• Monsters Vs. Aliens *
• State Of Play *
• Earth **
• Knowing ** 1/2
• I Love You, Man **
• Watchmen **
• Taken *
  
• Coraline * 1/2
• The Uninvited *
• Cold Souls ** 1/2

Last year was a comparatively flat year for movies but this year beat it in every way for blandness. Yet again the highs weren't as high and the lows were pushing the border of downright ludicrous.

The five best films of the year in order of seeing them were Up, The Hangover, Moon, (500) Days Of Summer and Pirate Radio. With Up we got another Pixar masterpiece that managed to find yet another way for them to move the technology bar. It had more raw emotion than anything they've done so far. The Hangover was the funniest movie I've seen in quite a long time. Scenes still pop into mind now and again and I still don't know what the deal was with the chicken. The most surprising movie of the year for me was Moon. I didn't expect much of anything and it blew me away. It's worth seeing just to experience Kevin Spacey as the latest twist on HAL. (500) Days Of Summer stole my attention away from the first lines and never gave it back. It was so real and so touching and yet also endlessly rewarding. The odd-ball of the lot is Pirate Radio. It didn't do well at the box office and I ran into some who didn't like it but I loved it. It was quirky, imperfect, slow in a spot or two and yet still a wonderful romp.

I'm glad to say that this lot of five is a strong set in an otherwise slow year. It's not easy to choose one but since that's the idea I'm going with (500) Days Of Summer.

The sheer brilliance of the story and the wonderful portrayals from Joseph Gordon-Levitt and the seemingly endlessly talented Zooey Deschanel just sets this movie apart from all the others. I haven't seen it again on cable or on DVD and that's mainly because I didn't want to ruin the feelings I have for it by risking another viewing that might impact my thinking before I could write this entry.

I've enjoyed many similar movies and the one it reminds me most of is Notting Hill. If you're a fan of that film then I'd be extremely surprised if you didn't enjoy this one even more. The realism that's conveyed is also something to be applauded and rewarded. No cheap turns anywhere to be found. Bravo.

Once again choosing the five worst films of the year didn't take long at all. Those would be Taken, The Uninvited, State Of Play, Monsters Vs Aliens and District 9. With this bunch we get a washed-up Liam Neeson in a plot so unbelievable it could only happen in real life. We get Elizabeth Banks in a movie I think she did while sleeping. Then there's Russell Crowe and other forgettable people in a political "thriller" I think I watched while sleeping. We then have a bland animated film that has virtually no discernible benefits and lastly we get a revolting in-your-face message film pasted onto an effects team wet dream.

Out of the bunch the bottom of the barrel has to be Taken. I can find nothing what-so-ever to recommend it. Liam Neeson, nearly 60 and looking every bit of it, tries to look like a 40-ish Dad with a teenage daughter and instead comes off looking like an incestuous pedophile. In nearly every scene I couldn't keep my attention off his overtly artificial dye job. And then there's the story. Take this broken-down guy and then put him in scenes where he's able to eradicate entire teams of commandos without breaking as much as a sweat. You also get completely forgettable efforts from Maggie Grace and, sadly, Famke Janssen. Even the look of the film is bad. I caught this again a month or two ago and saw it for the exact same reason I avoided seeing this year's best movie again. I hoped maybe I was being too harsh. I wasn't. The movie stinks from start to finish.

On the plus side I notice I was right last year when I said I had a hard time believing anything in 2009 could be as bad as the X-Files movie--last year's worst movie of the year.

Plagarist!

A friend sent me a link this morning to a blog on The Daily Beast about how Republicans don't seem to have the ability or desire to remember President Reagan as he actually existed.

I found it quite compelling reading as I'd written virtually the same thing 8 months ago on my own blog. At least I gave this guy a link in my blog. Would it have killed him to do the same?

I've been disturbed at the lengths the Right has gone in re-imagining Reagan. The sad reality is that he doesn't need to be re-imagined. His term was noteworthy in its own, albeit more realistic, right. What Republican zealots are doing now is to attempt to create an entirely new concept of conservatism and shoehorn Reagan into this design even though he doesn't resemble any part of it.

It's one thing to remember people fondly. It's entirely another thing to completely fabricate just about everything regarding someone after they're gone and that's what's been going on in his behalf. His own son has been out there pointing this out at every turn. It's great viewing when some talking head comes on and attempts to tell Ron Reagan about his own father.

I find it galling for people like Sarah Palin and others to invoke Reagan in a manner that simply doesn't reflect reality all in the hopes of riding his coattails to any degree they can pull off. Then you've got Sean Hannity out there who claims to be a Reagan historian but doesn't seem to know the first thing about him after his full name.

What really bugs me is that the Democrats are so brain-dead that all of this is actually working! I just wish we could have an actual functional third, fourth and fifth party to break up this lunacy.

Oddities Abound In A Town Called Panic

This past week I caught my first official film of the 2010 season and it was quite memorable. The film, A Town Called Panic, is quite a strangle experience but well worth the risk. I've come to realize that there's no way to adequately explain the film as it all sounds absolutely ludicrous on the surface. It's one of those films you need to see to get the joke.

The action is all stop-motion. It's distantly reminiscent of Wallace and Gromit but then again not. The story centers around three main characters--a plastic cowboy, indian and horse appriately called Cowboy, Indian and Horse respectively.

In their world nothing with respect to reality matters. You just have to take it all with a grain of salt. The three leads all live together in a surreal abode in an even more surreal setting. The main plot revolves around Cowboy and Indian having forgotten Horse's birthday and in a panic to find an appropriate gift inadvertently order a few too many bricks for the barbecue they intend to build.

The look of the film is like looking at an amateur model railroad layout just after the owner got his first book on how to do paper mache landscapes. Water is painted on. The sky looks like a painted backdrop. All the other characters are random plastic toys (and scale is no hindrance here either).

The movie is out of Belgium and in French with English subtitles and none of that matters with regard to the fun. Our theater was full of laughter throughout most of the film. The jokes even defy explanation except to say they just work. To try and convey them would be an exercise in complete frustration.

That said, the group of us that saw it found ourselves talking about it the entire evening and into the following days. Inside jokes bubbled to the surface that some got but others missed (like the films seemingly odd infatuation with waffles--it's out of Belgium remember).

The scenes are rife with total absurdities (like a horse shower, or a run-away fire under water) and still they work. The first time Horse goes to sleep you'll either be rolling with laughter or simply have no sense of humor.

The film is perhaps a tad too long as the joke runs a slight bit thin towards the end but I don't really care. I'm already looking forward to this one on DVD and sharing it with others. If you can't accept absurdity in your films avoid this like the plague but if you've got the ability to suspend that disbelief, hop right on and enjoy the well-oiled ride.

EGO utor Invictus

This week found me stuffing in another 2009 film in Clint Eastwood's latest film Invictus. The movie focuses on a specific segment of Nelson Mandela's early Presidency in which he enlists the aid of the national rugby team to help cure the ills of his fragile country.

Mandela, played exceptionally by Morgan Freeman (as if he could play a role any other way), having lived through more trying time than anyone should ever be forced to endure, recognizes that revenge isn't the correct path no matter how much the populace may desire it. He sees opportunity in every situation regardless of how isolated or unrelated it may seem to those around him. The team, the Springboks, represent everything about the past regarding South Africa. Whites love the team and blacks root for whoever they play against. The local rugby organization wants to abolish the team, its name, its colors and rebuild it in their own image. Mandela realizes that all this will do is prove to the whites of the country that the blacks are acting exactly as feared and that nothing is safe any longer.

His plan is to express to the team just how important their mission is and how far reaching. He does this by appealing to its captain, Francois Pienaar, played by an overly-buff Matt Damon (he looked so muscular and bloated that I couldn't help but think steroids must have played some part). Thankfully it's a perfect match as the captain knows exactly what Mandela is after and has the ability to overcome his own team's racial bias.

Much of the early part of the film plods along at a very slow pace. People were fidgeting around and cell phones were getting heavy use. I'm not sure, after the fact, if all the setup was really necessary but Eastwood knows a lot more about telling a story than I do. I just know I felt it could have gone more quickly for my tastes. The last third of the movie is entirely a different story. Everything got attentive so much so that when the movie finished not a single person left their seat until mid-way through the final credits.

So what about the movie itself? Well, for one things, if Nelson Mandela is even a tenth of the person they portray in this film then he's one amazing individual the likes of which doesn't come around (at least in politics) very often. His background and the way in which he cuts through the chaff and gets to the meat of an issue is a sight to behold. The rubgy scenes are also well done though it does take a while for non-rugby fans to figure out what's going on during the games.

In the end it's another successful Eastwood entity. How many more can he have in him is what I wonder now. I hope it's a lot more yet. Invictus isn't a perfect movie but it's quite effective and entertaining.

A Small Odd Story You'll Never Hear About

On Thursday the Philadelphia Flyers met the Pittsburgh Penguins in Pittsburgh. These two teams have been building up a rivalry that's getting more feisty with each game.

Late in the second period, with the Flyers shorthanded killing a penality, Flyers forward Simon Gagne took a shot that appeared, on first glance, to have gone into the net. The problem was the the goalie had immediately fallen onto the puck with his pads and then slid backwards into the net. Plain old physics suggests there was no way the puck didn't cross the goal line to count as a goal. However, the referee never signaled a goal and that meant that a mandatory review would take place.

For those who don't know hockey, whenever there's a potential for a disputed goal, all video of the event is sent for immediate review to officials in Toronto. This unit inspects all available angles to determine the outcome and then relays their decision back to the referee at the actual game.

If the video's inconclusive then the on-ice call remains. In this case that meant unless video showed clearly that this was a goal then Gagne wouldn't get it.

All during the stoppage each available angle was shown in slow motion to viewers. Nothing looked conclusive enough to validate overturning the on-ice call of no goal. Even without that it was clear to anyone that there simply was no way the goalie could have covered the puck and kept it out. He'd simply slid too far back into the net. Regardless, Toronto saw nothing conclusive and the play stood without a goal.

In the end it didn't really amount to anything with respect to the Flyers as they went on to win 7-4. That would have been the end of it except for what happened just after Toronto's ruling.

Once the ruling is made play resumes and, at that point, nothing can change no matter what else might come to light. As if on cue the moment the puck was dropped FSN Pittsburgh, the station responsible for providing the TV coverage, showed its audience a different angle of the replay that clearly showed the puck over the goal line and it subsequently being pushed forward by the goalie out of the net. The announcers even seemed shocked with one joking, "we saved that one" meaning that they must have withheld that specific replay.

The NHL decided to investigate why this clearly conclusive replay wasn't sent to the Toronto officials for review. Today's news includes a story noting that FSN Pittsburgh has indefinitely suspended a member of its telecast staff, Lowell MacDonald Jr., son of former Penguins player Lowell MacDonald.

So the son of a former player, and most likely a die-hard Penguins fan, has been indefinitely suspended by the station..... Amazing. What a stupid reason to lose your job especially in this economy. Good luck finding another job in TV kid.

Watch the video of the events as they unfolded on FSN Pittsburgh.

My Plans Were All Up In The Air

I saw George Clooney's latest this past weekend--Up In The Air. The movie's about a consultant who gets paid to fire people for companies that don't want to do the dirty work themselves. It was a bittersweet experience to say the least. My job ended in July and I haven't found anything myself yet so watching endless people get axed by Clooney wasn't exactly a thrill.

Much has been made of this movie calling it a clear Oscar contender so I wanted to be sure I managed to sneak it in before I closed out my 2009 slate of films.

Essentially Clooney's character is enthralled with his airbound life that keeps him away from home for all but roughly two weeks (two weeks that he refers to as hell). He loves the upgrades, the perks, the special treatment he gets for being a top-mile flier. Then his world begins to unravel as a young upstart at his company convinces the boss (played wonderfully by Jason Bateman) that it's time to revolutionize the company by taking all these reps off the road and doing the deed virtually via webcam.

Clooney, in an absolute panic goes right after the plan showing the boss that the young executive might have some great ideas but that she really knows nothing about the actual business that she's attempting to re-invent. The rest of the movie is pretty much about the two of them traveling about while Clooney shows her the harsh realities that make up the bulk of what they really do.

Along the way Clooney also runs into a near-equal counterpart in female form played by the gorgeous Vera Farmiga. We also find out that Clooney really has no connection with his own family since he's never in any one place long enough to put either put down any roots or have anyone tie anything to him.

The film turns out to be a story of awakening. Clooney starts to understand that, while he loves his life, it's not much of an actual life after all.

Clooney does a good job handling the role and the movie moves along pretty much as expected. However, the ending is a complete disappointment. It ends with just a simple hint that he's figured it out but that's it. I'd have really liked to see a bit more than this and the response from those in the theater with me seemed to support my thinking.

So is Up In The Air Oscar material? It will likely be nominated but I've seen several better movies this year and thinking about it against past films there's really nothing special about it. It's just a nice solid film that tells you a decent story for a couple of hours.

Avatar Is No Clone

I have to be honest and say that everything I saw about Avatar before it came out made me think it'd be a complete letdown if not a complete disaster. The only hope I had was that it was being handled by James Cameron. Cameron has been through such concerns before. People may not recall, or be old enough to remember, that Titanic was in the press all the time prior to its release and it was always absolutely negative. It was being compared to the devastating events of the liner at every turn. Cameron's career was over according to many pundits back then. While some didn't like Titanic it was clearly extremely popular with the masses and still one of the biggest success stories in Hollywood. As a Titanic buff I loved it. His attention to detail on the movie was just incredible.

Avatar, however, looked like some fantastical comic book story with sledge-hammer heavy morality as the main thrust of the story. In a pinch for time I decided between this (in 3D) and Up In The Air. My mother passed away on December 27th and the last thing I needed on this day was a movie that might be in any way a downer and Up In The Air seemed to be a bigger risk there so I opted for the risk of the fantastical.

The movie struck me, almost at once, as a deft morphing of Dances With Wolves and Star Wars. It may not be as good as either in the bits that it resembles them but as a whole it holds its own well enough.

The film will, no doubt, spawn a strong following. Much about it lends itself to many types of would-be fanatical followers. I can't image too many groups this effort wouldn't appeal to in some form or another. It really is a major event in movie-making well worth your time. The CGI characters are presented using a new approach invented by Cameron (my apologies if someone else did it and Cameron is getting the credit) and the effect is fantastic. Actors wore headsets that tracked all of their facial movements and the result is the most realistic CGI characters ever produced.

The 3D version is also noteworthy. First, nothing about it is forced anywhere. You don't get 3D effects simply because it's in 3D. In every case they're fully embodied into the environment and so subtle that you have a hard time remembering that what you're seeing is an effect. Second, 3D often has issues with brightness. Up was fantastic in 2D and fairly washed-out and dull in 3D. Here that issue seems to have been paramount in the mind of the creators as the colors and lighting are exceptional.

The movie isn't without its issues. It felt a tad long to me and does have some pretty Hollywood-typical resolutions to plot lines here and there. It also does bring the sledge hammer along at times. However, I have to dig pretty deep to really find anything serious to complain about here. The experience of the movie is so engrossing that the few negatives roll off it like water off a duck.

I'll be stunned if we're not hearing about a sequel very shortly. The movie was absolutely made for it and I think it'd be fiscal lunacy not to do everything possible to try and make it happen.