Tag: science fiction

Contact (1997)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

Given the pedigree behind this big-budget studio adaptation of Carl Sagan’s source novel, you’d expect… well, I’m not sure exactly what went wrong but you’d expect something more than what ends up on the screen here. The first and most glaring problem the movie has is its main protagonist: As played by Jodie Foster, she’s imbued with a sturdy awareness and steely resolve that’s completely at odds with her character’s dialogue, behavior and goals. In one scene, she’s unreasonable and out-of-line, and five minutes later she’s weak and easily steamrolled over, with no reason or discernable motivation for the inconsistent gap between the two states. Additionally, the screenplay saddles her with a barely-developed romantic interest in the form of Matthew McConaughey, who only functions to show up once in a while to publicly undermine her then condescendingly explain to her that his repeated betrayals are in her best interest. After seeing that play out a number of times, it becomes downright impossible to have any respect for either of them… which isn’t really what you want from your main characters. It’s such a damn shame too, because the storyline and its implications are so fascinating, so thematically potent and rich, so full of potential that it’s impossible to not get frustrated with director Robert Zemeckis and his repeated insistence on focusing on extraneous plot points that either only exist to show off the special effects, or to add unnecessary (and largely unresolved) personal conflicts among its many petty characters. Also, allowing McConaughey to have the last word despite serving no organic narrative purpose ends the movie on a sour note that only highlights how many mistakes are made by focusing on anything other than what made the narrative interesting in the first place. The story , special effects and Foster’s own magnetic sincerity manage to rescue the movie from being a complete misfire and make it at least watchable, but it’s a really, really close call.

Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)

12 Monkeys (1995)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

In the most frustrating, self-negating way, it feels like “12 Monkeys” is two separate movies indiscriminately jammed together. The first half is absolutely brilliant, from a shared thematic, structural and narrative perspective, not to mention a visual style that’s instantly striking, recalling Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s “The City of Lost Children” and pointing to 1998’s “Dark City” at the same time (with plenty of references to director Terry Gilliam’s own “Brazil,” natch). Additionally, Gilliam extracts an impressively effective, poignant performance by Bruce Willis; the performer doesn’t always do it for me and I often find it hard to root for him, but here, he seems engaged and inspired by the material, and he manages to deliver one of his few powerful dramatic performances. Problem is though, by the second half, everything falls apart and the movie takes on a structure more akin to Hollywood mainstream action movies, like car chases and races against time and last-minute reveal after last-minute reveal that end up sapping the movie of any of its momentum or propulsion by constantly delivering ‘one more’ ending. By the time the credits roll, you realize that the movie has deflated like a balloon because its ideas sound absolutely fascinating… but Gilliam doesn’t seem to know how to shepherd them towards any sort of satisfying resolution. But, all that shit-talking out of the way, there’s no denying the power of the first half: It’s just so distinct, hypnotic and spellbinding that it’s hard not to get swept along with it, even if the narrative is unable to sustain its own propulsive, provocative ideas.

Rating: ★★★★ (out of 5)

Pitch Black (2000)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

There are so many neat ideas and cool moments in “Pitch Black” that you just can’t help but get frustrated when director David Twohy keeps stepping on his tie. Indeed, it seems there’s no opportunity for a jump-cut or a slow-mo insert that Twohy can’t pass up, which, while they look cool in music videos or hip commercials, are awfully distracting when indiscriminately parachuted into a serious narrative that practically depends on momentum for its efficacy. Additionally, there’s something off about the movie’s narrative structure; things seem to have quickly and randomly yet have a profound impact on the plot so you need to be on your toes at all times, even as the movie’s rapid cuts insist on taking you out of the experience. But the major problem is that there aren’t many characters to root for. Vin Diesel’s Riddick is the obvious breakout star and he does a terrific job as a stealthy, is-he-or-isn’t-he-trustworthy antihero (and boy can he wear the hell out of a pair of khaki pants) but everyone else is fairly grating, beginning with ostensible lead (and Sigourney Weaver stand-in) Radha Mitchell. I’ve liked Mitchell in a lot of stuff before but she’s just not right here: It reminds me of something I heard Weaver say on one of the “Alien” DVD commentaries, about how she had to learn that, in order to play a tough character, she had to accept that the character’s arc will tell the tale and that not every line delivery needs to be tough-as-nails in order to establish the character’s strength. That’s precisely the problem with Mitchell here (although one could argue that it’s Twohy’s responsibility for directing her that way) – every line is intended to sound badass but it’s impossible to root for a character like that when it’s not backed up with meaningful action or any conviction. All in all, I’d say this is good-but-not-great: It’s got its moments and many aspects of its storyline are really interesting, but the execution is a bit on the overdone side. If Twohy had known to pull back a bit, the ‘less is more’ approach would have softened his movie’s landing, but as it is, it’s one of those ‘almost’ movies.

Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)

Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (2007)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

Let’s make no bones about it: “Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem” is a full-on, balls-to-the-walls Italian splatter movie masquerading as a moderately-budgeted American studio picture. It’s astonishing just how nasty and mean-spirited this one really is: It’s like co-directors Colin Crause and Greg Crause couldn’t wait to paint the walls red the minute they were offered the job, and boy do they deliver. Overall the movie isn’t as interested in furthering the internal mythologies of the two respective universes as much as it wants you to feel like you’re actually playing a video game (which is perfectly appropriate, given its roots). Its interest in its own characters is only to establish a pecking order for its coterie of brutal ways to dispatch those pesky humans in the most violent, visceral ways imaginable. There are definitely a few times where it goes way, way too far (both of them include pregnant women, so… be warned), and it makes me wish those fragments weren’t there because the rest of it is just so delightfully excessive. It’s pure B-movie trash all dressed up for the prom so it looks like a million bucks, for the most part; there are a few moments here and there that are too dimly lit to be particularly clear, but it doesn’t take much away from the experience. This is likely the movie most “Predator” fans were expecting from an “AVP” adaptation, with battles between the Predators and the Xenomorphs galore, limbs and viscera (both human and otherwise) splayed everywhere, and a gallows sense of humor not unlike 2006’s “Black Christmas.” It’s woefully inappropriate and wildly transgressive… which is part of what makes it thrilling to watch.

Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)

Scanners (1981)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

Like the majority of David Cronenberg’s oeuvre, “Scanners” is a study in contrasts: It’s both deadly serious as well as wickedly funny, sophisticated yet viscerally gory, and artsy while rather conventional in structure. Cronenberg’s usual knack with visuals is on full display here, even in the most simple ways: For example, an amphitheater is draped in striking red while its audience is largely dressed in whites thus creating a sharp contrast, while also pointing the way to an unexpectedly grisly narrative that consistently ups the ante with its shock effects. The story itself is interesting in a “pulp fiction” kind of way, almost like the movie could have been made by a major studio just a few years later in the wake of “The Terminator” and “The Hitcher,” but it’s precisely that B-movie looseness crossed with Cronenberg’s hyper-sophisticated directorial approach that makes the project all the more arresting. Unfortunately the acting is a bit of a mixed bag: Leads Jennifer O’Neill and Stephen Lack are disappointingly lackluster, unable to access the dramatic levels of Cronenberg’s material, which unfortunately results in a dulling of its intended impact. Luckily however, Michael Ironside is on hand as antagonist Revok, and he’s absolutely perfect: He’s got the swagger of a young Jack Nicholson and the sniveling insolence of James Dean, making him a villain that you want to see punished but also maybe that not too fast, because well, he’s pretty damn cool and the movie derives a lot of its of impact from his appeal. So, it’s not really for everyone (it’s too slow for mainstream audiences and too pulpy for art house audiences), but a patient, adventurous viewer will likely walk away satisfied.

Rating: ★★★★ (out of 5)

Stargate (1994)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

“Stargate” should be much, much better than it actually is. Its interstellar-travel narrative is rife with exploratory potential, loaded as it is with imagination and grandiose implications for the human race, not to mention the kind of first-rate special effects only top-bidder money could buy at the time and an operatic, majestic score that underscores the narrative’s reach. But somehow, it just never really comes alive, beginning with the sharp contract in the casting of its leads: Kurt Russell is a marvel of charisma, confidence and machismo as Colonel O’Neill but he’s ill-paired with the lifeless, charmless James Spader, who is the cinematic equivalent of a limp noodle here. (It’s hard not to wonder how an appealing, nerdy-brainy actor like, say, Matthew Broderick would have brought the role to life, but as it is, it’s like watching fireworks get rained out right before launch). There’s also the strange case of Jaye Davidson, whose Ra is by the most fascinating thing about the movie but is introduced more than an hour in, and by that point we’re too bored for his enigmatic, visually striking appearance to register. There are some really cool moments and captivating elements here and there, but it’s like director Roland Emmerich seems more interested in showing off his wonderfully ornate sets and his access to the best special effects money can buy than populating his movie with enough likable, interesting characters to get the audience invested in more than his storyline’s flash-and-bang aspects, and sidelines his most interesting performer in the process.

Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)

Screamers (1995)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

I don’t know why it took me so long to get around to watching “Screamers,” but I kinda wish I hadn’t actually watched it because it’s pretty darn boring. As a French Canadian growing up in the ’90s, Roy Dupuis was a big home-turf superstar (thanks to shows like “Lance et Compte” and “Les Filles de Caleb”), so his English-speaking debut here was a big deal for us, but even so, it wasn’t enough to draw me in. There are some good ideas here and there throughout the movie, most of them lifted from “Tremors” and “Mad Max” but effective enough on their own, but for some reason the movie just never comes alive. It feels like a series of repetitive conversations that don’t add up to much, while there’s some action that livens things up here and there, but overall it’s a slog to get through. The special effects are horribly dated (and it’s hard to believe that they would have been considered impressive even in 1995), and leads Peter Weller and Jennifer Rubin look like they’re rather be anywhere other than in the same shot together, so there’s just nothing to go on. I watched it just a few days ago and I’ve already largely forgotten the climax… and I’m not sure I was even paying attention anymore by the time I got there, because finishing the movie had become a “run out the clock” situation.

Rating: ★★ (out of 5)

Godzilla 1985 (1985)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

“Godzilla 1985” is the first Godzilla movie I ever saw so I have some good memories of watching it on TV as a child over and over, but as an adult… oof, it hurts to say but it’s a bit of a turkey. Most of the movie’s footage actually comes from 1984’s “The Return of Godzilla,” a Japanese sequel to 1954’s “Gojira” that’s dubbed in English with American footage added rather unartfully to the proceedings: Raymond J. Burr reprises his role from the similarly-edited “Godzilla: King of the Monsters” but his role is relegated to mostly standing around and praising Godzilla, so he doesn’t exactly add much other than a direct connection to the American version of the original movie. By the time Godzilla destroys Tokyo you’ve kind of zoned out and the rampage itself isn’t really enough to reel you back in, although there’s an admittedly poignant and unexpectedly emotionally resonant climax that ends the movie on a powerful, melancholic note. But yeah, overall it’s a bit on the ‘meh’ side.

Rating: ★★ (out of 5)

I Come in Peace (AKA Dark Angel) (1990)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

On the one hand, this is a supremely silly sci-fi/action hybrid that’s such a B-movie it’s hard to believe it was made by a major studio and sent to cinemas. On the other hand, it’s just so much damn fun that you don’t even care how ridiculous it all initially seems. Dolph Lundgren is perfectly cast as a monosyllabic supercop-type who don’t need no brains when he’s got two beefy arms to do the thinking for him, and to Lundgren’s credit, he’s able to wander through the movie with a nudge and a wink towards the audience that’s charmingly disarming. The movie’s story of an intergalactic drug war between Lundgren’s lawman and a murderous alien on a rampage through Los Angeles on Christmas Eve actually has a lot to say about the various forces that prey on the socially disenfranchised without consequence (for instance, note how many of the alien’s victims are either working class or minorities, sometimes both at once), and that’s one of the things that makes B-movies like this one so thrilling sometimes: Many of them (like “Uncle Sam” and “It’s Alive”) are gleefully disreputable and deliriously lurid so they satisfy a certain bloodlust in their core audience but also manage to sneak in a variety of socially progressive ethos without getting bogged down in soapbox politicizing.

Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)

Hardware (1990)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

Like a veritable hodgepodge of “Blade Runner,” “Brazil,” “Mad Max” and early-’90s MTV-style stylization, Richard Stanley’s directorial debut is a visually striking, forcefully distinctive living nightmare of a movie. The story itself is a fairly straightforward, claustrophobic home invasion plot with an advanced robot stalking the characters in lieu of a burglar, but there are undertones of political strife and corrupt bureaucracy that help make the narrative all the more resonant by rooting it in social uncertainty and rampant (and well-earned) government mistrust. Stanley shoots the movie like a highly stylized video with some pop art thrown in for good measure (it’s no surprise to discover that he got his start in music videos and commercials), accompanied by a soundtrack that’s compellingly all over the place: From industrial to opera, from orchestral to metal, there’s a bit of everything going through just about every shot, not to mention rapid-fire editing that keeps things moving along nicely. The movie’s impact is somewhat diluted by the obvious budgetary limits (which occasionally make the sets and creature design look a little rinky-dink) as well as the overall weak acting and writing, but there’s enough here to suggest a budding auteur finding his voice, and that confidence is palpable and compelling throughout.

Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)

Communion (1989)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

This adaptation of Whitley Strieber’s divisive cult classic is half a good movie, half a fatally miscalculated one. First, the good: Strieber’s real-life account of alien visitors and the subsequent psychological torment left in their wake provides most of the movie’s narrative strengths, in particular its incisive dissection of Strieber’s marriage to his wife Anne. It’s hard to fault Anne for having difficulty accepting her husband’s story given its literal other-wordly basis, which makes the marital trauma they both experience all the more thematically potent and effective. Additionally, Christopher Walken and Lindsay Crouse are both extraordinarily well cast in their respective roles: Walken, in particular, approaches the role with a palpably lived-in, inner rich life for Streiber, and his gradual psychological deterioration is all the more engaging because the audience trusts Walken’s instincts. However, by the time the movie hits the halfway mark, things have taken a turn for the downright ludicrous: Director Philippe Mora has no clue what to do with the actual story at the heart of this movie, so he focuses on a surreal, almost psychedelic approach in the second half that he completely and thoroughly breaks the spell that Walken and Crouse are able to establish in the first half. The rest is jumbled nonsense that undercuts the emotional core of Strieber’s screenplay with ridiculous visuals and ends up damaging the finished product. Admittedly a few scenes near the beginning are strong enough to give a casual viewer the willies, but it’s not enough to rescue the movie from Mora’s incompetence.

Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)

Dark Skies (2013)

by julienhoule, posted in Uncategorized

Not unlike “Sinister” or “Insidious” but with aliens: That’s pretty much the best way to describe this seriously-not-bad genre entry, which has a number of truly effective chills here and there, even as it occasionally borders on unimaginative. It’s a shame that so many of its earlier scenes recall Tobe Hooper’s “Poltergeist” (in particular a scene where Keri Russell finds a number of objects moved around in the kitchen, which strongly recalls the memorable moment in “Poltergeist” when JoBeth Williams finds the kitchen chairs mounted on the table), because it takes you out of its own narrative by reminding you of a better movie. Additionally, Russell isn’t particularly good in the lead role: This seems to be a job-for-hire for the usually-terrific performer, and her disinterested delivery often betrays the unfortunate mediocrity of the screenplay, which is in sharp contrast with co-star Josh Hamilton, who does most of the heavy lifting here, and he’s terrific. It helps that Scott Stewart is a better director than screenwriter, and he manages to extract an impressive amount of genuine scares from the increasingly isolated house setting, while the malevolent presence of the aliens is a constant threat that occasionally delivers scares that could turn your blood cold. So it’s not great, but it’s definitely worth a shot.

Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)