Just out on DVD, Whiteout was a relatively big-budget thriller starring Kate Beckinsale.  It appeared in theaters for approximately 17 minutes, barely long enough for it to be panned by critics and irritate the two guys who wanted to see.  One of those men was me, the other happened to be the mother of the film’s director.

In fact, so universal was the disdain for Whiteout that it actually appeared on RottenTomatoes.com’s 100 worst rated films of the 2000’s decade.  RottenTomatoes scores are based on a compiled consensus of positive/negative grades given by film critics and general movie fans.  Whiteout barely beat out Mariah Carey’s opus Glitter on the list.  Whiteout scored a paltry 7% positive on the tomato-meter.  For a point-of-comparison, the brainless, Gerard Butler action film Gamer that also just came out on DVD — and happens to be the only film of the decade that both my brother and I walked out of — scored 29%.

Being a glutton for bad movies, I had to check Whiteout out.

The premise of Whiteout is actually an intriguing one.  There is a scientific outpost in the arctic wasteland that is Antarctica.   As the outpost prepares to shutdown for “the winter” (isn’t it always winter in Antarctica?) a dead body is discovered.  ‘Twasn’t an accident, suspects the U.S. Marshall (Beckinsale) on site, who opens the first murder investigation in Antarctica history.  Who killed who and why?  Who’s going to get killed next and why?  How does it involve the contents of a Russian plane that crashed decades earlier?  Who let the dogs out?

So instead of the murder-mystery-thriller story featuring a cast of characters trapped in a house, a resort, a boat, or some other remote locale, Whiteout uses an entire continent to create a sense of isolation.  Granted, it’s a continent where at times you die in mere seconds if you venture outside unprotected.

The negatives to the film are plentiful if you choose to dwell on them.  Other than Beckinsale as the lead and reliable character actor Tom Skerritt as “Doc,” the cast is forgettable.  There’s a death-defying escape that defies logic or explanation.  The criticism on the TV show At The Movies was that the plot moves slow, you can’t tell what’s happening in some scenes where characters fight in blinding arctic conditions known as a “whiteout,” and there aren’t any penguins.

While I must confess there are no penguins, I sheepishly admit I kinda liked Whiteout.  Not enough to fully recommend you spend money on it, but when it’s on TV give it a shot and see for yourself.  I dug the locale (Canada standing in for Antartica) and the story (based on a comic book, believe it or not) held my interest.  I even liked Kate Beckinsale’s plucky heroine.  While I must stress it isn’t a “good movie,” it is rather “an all right, I can watch this movie.”  Low expectations certainly help.

A side-note: Perhaps feeling shame over the film’s critical performance, the marketing team has attempted to disguise the nature of Whiteout.   The DVD cover features a close-up photograph of the lovely Kate Beckinsale in exaggerated black and white.  Based on the picture, I would surmise that Whiteout is the tale of a blind albino attempting to make her way in the cruel world of modeling.  While this is an intriguing premise similar to my unsold screenplay, Rhonda The Pale Supermodel Who Fell Off the Runway, is not what Whiteout is about.

Watching the trailer after watching the movie is rather astounding, and it’s obvious they were trying to promote a different movie than what the filmmakers made. The chain events in the trailer after the line, “we hit something big” are so misleading it is ridiculous. This is a “murder mystery” and they are trying to make it look like it’s about an extraterrestrial invasion of some variety.

Sometimes it seems the makers of these films elicit revulsion and mistake it for laughter.  Or perhaps the younger generation is simply unaware that boobs, buttocks, and bowel movements are not intrinsically funny.  Look to early Mel Brooks (Young Frankenstein, Blazing Saddles, etc.) for examples of rude and offensive humor with wit behind the indecency whether you enjoy it or not.

While I do not wish to crown the Hangover as heir to Mel Brooks’ legacy, it is laugh out loud funny.  Amount of laughter is the most objective method of rating a comedy, and there is a manner of cleverness to the plot and how it unfolds.

The story of the Hangover involves a bachelor party in Las Vegas that goes horribly wrong.  The groom-to-be, his two best friends (Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms), and his man-child of a future brother-in-law (Zach Galifianakis) go to Vegas.  They enjoy a rooftop toast overlooking the gorgeous Vegas skyline prior to their evening on the town.  The next thing they know the best men wake up in their hotel room the next morning with no memory of what happened.  Exactly what occurred to the hungover trio is of particular importance since the groom-to-be is nowhere to be found.

The clues to the forgotten events of decadence and debauchery include, but are not limited to, the following: One of them has a missing tooth; one has a bracelet from a hospital on his wrist; there’s a tiger in the bathroom; there’s a baby in the room; and when their car is returned from the valet parking it is not what they arrived in Vegas in but rather a police car.

The film is a quest to backtrack the previous night’s antics, which requires following the clues, each one with its own payoff.  Granted, it’s not exactly Hercule Poirot material.  Also, in my favorite Poirot mystery, Death on the Nile, I do not recollect there being so very much gratuitous nudity, violence, and/or profanity as the Hangover features in droves.  But I should be grateful that a film that subsists in a genre where the cheap and easy laugh is generally the only laugh pursued placed some thought and consideration behind the storyline.

The three leads form an offbeat but effective trio.  Cooper is a classic leading man type with a droll delivery; Daily Show veteran Helms presents himself as the ultimate emasculated coward, subservient of his demonstrative girlfriend to the point of lying about his trip and defending the fact that she once cheated on him; and best of all is Galifianakis, a stand-up comedian/actor whose unorthodox mannerism and style add extra punch to his bizarre character.

My recommendation for the Hangover comes with the obvious caveat: It’s filthy and perverse.  If you can manage to deactivate your internal moral compass for an hour and a half, the Hangover will reach your funny bone, I have no doubt.

Starring: Steve Zahn, Milla Jovovich, Timothy Olyphant, Kiele Sanchez
Directed By: David Twohy

A Perfect Getaway is the kind of thriller where you just know there is going to be a twist ending.  The way my mind works, when I suspect a shocking twist is afoot, I can guess what it is going to be 94.7% of the time.  When you’re playing the “who’s the killer” game, generally it is as simple as  picking the individual the movie wants you to suspect the least.  For an example of how this ending can make you so mad you’ll want to find the screenwriter and sternly wag your finger in his direction, see my review of Halle Berry/Bruce Willis’ cinematic abomination Perfect Stranger.

I ended up liking A Perfect Getaway more than enough to recommend it as a “renter,” so I’m going to be rather vague and unspecific so as not to spoil aforementioned twist. Although if you are unable to guess the twist based off the following description and my assurance that there is a twist, I will be forced to ban you from this site forever. Be warned, be warners:

Here is the setup: Newlyweds Cliff (Steve Zahn) and Cydney (Milla Jovovich) are on their way to an exotic honeymoon, hiking on the remote islands of Hawaii.  On the way to the trail, they have a run-in with a menacing, foreboding couple, Kale (Chris Hemsworth) and Cleo (Marley Shelton).  On the hike, Cliff and Cydney encounter an affable, zany character named Nick (Timothy Olyphant) and the three of them hike together for a spell.  On the trail they learn that on a neighboring island, another couple on their honeymoon was murdered and a unidentified man and woman are suspected.

This becomes particularly alarming to Cliff and Cydney after they discover their new companion Nick is going back to his girlfriend Gina (Kiele Sanchez).  Nick + Gina = Couple!  *Gulp*   The longer the two couples are together the more they learn about Nick, who is an ex-military man full of outlandish stories who has a bow and arrow as well as a knife and a hatchet.  If that’s not enough, the creepy Kale and Cleo appear to be following them.  Just to throw another monkey wrench in things, there also is yet another couple out there who appear to be following Cliff and Cydney for a different reason.

Even if you guess the “stunning” twist-a-roonie at the twenty minute mark like I did, A Perfect Getaway uncorks the revelation with about 30 minutes of movie left.  There is a prolonged flashback sequence where you see the culprits and the potential victims in a new light.  The double-meanings and deceptions in earlier scenes are aplenty.  Key moments from earlier in the movie are filled in in addition to scenes from before the narrative began, tying everything nicely together.

After redefining the characters, the protagonists and antagonists are off to the races in a battle for survival in tropical paradise. 

A Perfect Getawaywas written and directed by David Twohy, who has done some really good stuff the last several years.  Twohy possesses a gift for dialogue and he knows how to tell a story.  The dialogue in A Perfect Getaway does get dangerously “cute.” By which I mean there are throwaway lines like “plenty of twists and turns ahead” as a warning from a passing hiker about the trail. *wink wink*  Cliff is a screenwriter, which transitions into “insider movie” lingo.  For example, Nick asks Cliff in the first twenty minutes, “So, you got a good act two twist?”  And later Nick foreshadows future events by saying how movies “bring in a character just to (mess) with an audience just to throw them off the track.” 

On the plus side, Twohy must know how to work with actors because he made good movies with Charlie Sheen and Vin Diesel, if you can believe that.  Twohy was behind the above average alien invasion movie The Arrival (1996), starring Sheen, which is the only Sheen movie other than Major League and Hot Shotsthat I’ve actually liked.  Next Twohy brought the world the cult hit Pitch Black (2000) with Vin Diesel, a great science fiction/horror/action movie.  In 2002, Twohy made a mostly ignored but highly entertaining flick called Below.  Below, which I wrote about here, can best be described as “a ghost story mystery taking place during World War II on a submarine.”  How cool is that?

(You’ll note I totally ignore Twohy’s wretched 2004 sequel to Pitch Black, The Chronicles of Riddick. *shudder* Pitch Black I liked so much I saw it in theaters twice; The Chronicles of Riddick was so painful that it gave me a headache the one time I saw it.)

In A Perfect Getaway, Twohy gets a great performance from Timothy Olyphant as Nick the self-professed “American Jedi” with a steel plate in his head.  The last two films I saw Olyphant in, Hitman and Live Free or Die Hard, I thought he was dreadful.  But in A Perfect Getaway, the man steals the show.  (The scene where he mocks Nicolas Cage is a sure way to win points with me: “Nick Cage is always money in my book.  I like how he gets all intense RIGHT AT THE END OF A SENTENCE!”  The Cage impression comes complete with exaggerated hand gestures – classic!)

A Perfect Getaway is a very good, not quite “great,” little thriller worth checking out. Rent it!

There’s a lot working for Heartbreak Ridge, one being director and star Clint Eastwood.  Eastwood rarely makes movies that aren’t either “darn good” or  “a lot of fun,” although I should note that I have yet to see any movies where he co-starred with a monkey.  Just a note on that note: I have no intention of EVER seeing any of those Eastwood monkey movies, as I have maintained my respect for him even after seeing him singing with Lee Marvin.

Eastwood plays grizzled old Marine, Sargent Highway.  The fact that his character is named “Highway” really bothered me – I couldn’t hear someone say that name without having to be oriented as to whether we had someone slipped into a travelogue or someone was giving directions.  If you’re not going to use a commonplace, normal name like “Jones,” “Smith,” “Williams,” or “Roos,” you might as well go into something outrageous and name the guy Sargent Stud McRockHunkingtonly.

Forgive the digression.  It’s 1983, and Sgt. Highway is in the twilight of his career, frustrated that his military service has one loss (Viet Nam, with the stated caveat the U.S. Military won the battles) and one draw (Korea).  Highway gets the not so plumb assignment of molding some new recruits from malcontents to Marines.

The recruits are a generic band of misfits, reluctant to yield to their gruff, new drill Sargent.  Now I can understand the recruits not being too happy with someone waking them up earlier than normal and running them harder than ever, but these guys act like they didn’t expect the Marines to be any work, like they’ve been signed up for playtime Army camp by their parents.  (The only recruit who makes any kind of impression is Mario Van Peebles, who plays a wannabe Jimi Hendrix-style rockstar molded with Eddie Murphy-style comedian; he’s not very good as an entertainer, but that’s why he’s in the Marines, I guess, the requisite scoundrel with a heart of gold.)

The arc of the story is nothing terribly innovative or brilliant, the recruits eventual warm to Highway as his tough love elevates them from laughingstocks to laughERstocks.  Highway re-courts his ex-wife, working at a local bar and going steady with the smug bar owner, who doesn’t like Highway very much.

As I mentioned the film is set in 1983; it’s remarkable how they captured that bygone era when the movie was made, 1986.  (I didn’t spot a single ‘85 Chevy in the entire movie!)  But the reason we’re in ‘83 is because that’s when the Grenada invasion happened.  Grenada is one of those neglected military conflicts, because there really wasn’t a whole lot of conflict or scandal.  Marxists rebels (backed by Cuban military aid) took over the small island off the coast of Venezuela, took some American students hostage, Reagan said (and I paraphrase) “Aw, hell, no!”, unleashed the U.S. military, and we won in about thirteen minutes and twenty seconds with very few casualties (18).

There’s a certain karmic justice that a rugged vet like Highway would get to go out with an undisputed victory, giving him 1 win, 1 loss, and 1 tie on the record. 

After watching approximately 100,052 depressing Viet Nam movies, it’s nice to see the single greatest Grenada movie.  All right, this is the only Grenada movie ever made, to the best of my knowledge, and I doubt there’s a fresh batch coming, despite there being more than enough material for one, maybe two more short films. Sadly, every day it becomes harder and harder for filmmakers to re-capture that lost time that is 1983 . . .

In the end, Heartbreak Ridge sort of falls in that “pretty good,” not great but not bad category. It’s not quite a comedy, not quite an action movie, not quite a drama, not quite a romance, and not quite a full fledged war movie, though it’s a combination of all those elements. It’s just sort of there. How’s that for a ringing endorsement that will never see the cover of a DVD? “It’s just sort of there!” – Daniel J. Roos, film.Ispwn.com

–Daniel J. Roos

Not one to dip my toes in the pool but rather one to jump head first into the deep end, my next paying customer excursion to the theaters post-Gamer was for yet another Gerard Butler film, this time a thriller opposite with Jamie Foxx, Law-Abiding Citizen.

The story of Law-Abiding Citizen is that a decent, law-abiding citizen named Clyde (Butler, who is Scottish, although I assume his character is meant to be a law-abiding U.S. citizen) sees his wife and daughter murdered (and worse) in a home invasion which he barely survives.  Flash forward a bit and the two hoods who committed the deed are going on trial, and the actual killer, Darby (Christian Stolte) might get off Scot-free (pun-intended) due to some inadmissible evidence, but Darby is willing to cut a plea deal to rat on his accomplice Ames (Josh Stewart).  Hotshot prosecutor Nick Rice (Foxx) makes the deal, which effectively gives the hapless Ames the death penalty and the real scumbag Darby is out after three years.  Clyde ain’t happy, but it turns out he all-knowing, vengeful, and extraordinarily patient.

Clyde waits ten years, plotting out his revenge on his family’s killers and anyone involved in the case that remotely allowed Darby to cut a deal.  The first strike is Ames himself, whose humanitarian execution is co-opted into a torturous death by Clyde’s tampering.  Next up is Darby, who Clyde concocts an unnecessarily complex, elaborate scheme to lure to a remote warehouse, where Clyde proceeds to torture and kill Darby in true torture-porn style.  This isn’t for the weak of heart, and just so you know, when people say “not for the weak of heart” what they mean is “not for Daniel Roos.”

After Darby is found and Clyde mails a DVD of the Saw-like execution to Nick’s house, Clyde is nabbed pretty quickly.  Of course, in true super-villain fashion, being arrested, thrown in jail, and being pitted against now assistant D.A. Nick is all part of Clyde’s master plan.

Even from the comfort of prison, Clyde continues to exact his revenge.  For example, he buried Darby’s attorney underground with only so much oxygen, and wants a timely and delicious lunch in exchange for the attorney’s location.  That’s the tip of the iceberg, as there are oodles of impossibly timed and placed explosives and various other fun and games that bring havoc and carnage down on the head of everyone associated with the prosecution of Darby, including the judge.

Clyde’s near omnipresence is explained off by the fact that he is apparently a covert operations stategery guru whose job was planning unique ways to eliminate the bad guys.  Nick has a Deep Throat-style back alley meeting with a spook who tells the tale of how Butler once killed a man who could not be found with a rigged necktie.  The only way to stop Clyde is to just kill him, we’re told.

It’s implied that Clyde has an accomplice helping him pull off his improbable stunts, and while I won’t spoil the big twist, I will say it is rather disappointing.  My brother leaned over in the middle of Law-Abiding Citizen and whispered his theory on the accomplice, which actually made a lot of sense based on seemingly innocuous clues we’re fed (and then go nowhere), and I think his theory about the accomplice being one character who seemingly dies (and hypothetically faked said death) at the midway point would have worked a heck of a lot better than the eye-rolling twist and then poor man’s action-movie-caliber finale.

I will say that I find the big twist to be utterly ludicrous (spoiler warning ahead, rest of the paragraph) based on the fact that it relies on Clyde, public enemy number one locked away in solitary confinement, has hours at a time in his cell without being monitored or checked on in any capacity.  I’d think if there was a guy capable of killing high-profile government officials from his prison cell, that guy would be under constant surveillance by video, or something.

There are a lot of those nagging questions that annoyed me about Law-Abiding Citizen, and the moral question bothered me too.  It’s certainly understandable that Clyde would be furious about his family’s killer skirting justice, but attempting to assassinate mayors and judges as a result?  It’s fine and dandy for villains to have poorly defined moral standards, but Clyde is (I thought) intended to be sympathetic based on his victimization.  Heck, the only guy who gets some laughs is Clyde, making quips after taking (relatively) innocent lives.  All that aside, honestly, what turned me off the most was the gruesome violence.  Hey, I’m squeamish, give me a break.

In the end, Law-Abiding Citizen is a watchable thriller, though I would say it’s not worth going out of your way to see.  You can wait until it’s edited for TV on TNT in about, oh, a year-and-a-half.

To add one random thought on the future career prospects of Gerard Butler: There is more than a passing connection between Gamer — an unwatchable tale of near-future, grotesque, immoral, video-gaming culture morphed with exploitative to the point of being murderous reality TV — and Law-Abiding Citizen — a watchable film about a seemingly omnipresent avenger taking out his grief about his murdered family on the perpetrators and the justice system.  You see, Gamer featured former Star Trek: The Next Generation recurring guest star John de Lancie (alias Q) in a minor role and Law-Abiding Citizen featured former Star Trek: The Next Generation semi-regular Colm Meaney (O’Brien) in a supporting role.  It only takes two to determine a pattern, and based on the fact that Butler’s two movies got increasingly better with the increased involvement of Star Trek: Next Gen part-timers, I therefore deduce that Gerard Butler’s next movie will be a great film wherein he co-stars with Diana Muldaur, who played Dr. Pulaski on Season Two of ST:TNG.  You heard it here first.

–Daniel J. Roos has never mis-predicted a pairing of Gerard Butler and a ST:TNG cast member to date.

Taking away that rather cryptic summary and just examining the ingredients, there’s a lot going for The Bone Collector to be a good movie.  Of course, filet mignon, chocolate, french toast, and grapes are great, but not necessarily together if you catch my drift.

The Bone Collector has a good director in Phillip Noyce, the man behind the best of the Jack Ryan films and one of the better political thrillers, Clear and Present Danger.  The stars are no less than two of the best actors working, Denzel Washington and Angelina Jolie (before she was an A-lister).  And it’s based on a novel – and all novels are inherently good, right?  Still, at best the movie feels like you are witnessing spare parts of better movies and at worst like they were kind of making the story up as they went.  I believe the great Michael J. Nelson once referred to a movie made from leftovers of better flicks as a “movieloaf” – and the Bone Collector is the perfect embodiment of a movieloaf.

If you hadn’t guessed, the movie stinks like fried ox excrement on a stick.  Why?  I’m glad you asked.  Let’s find out together, shallst we?  And by “we” I mean “me,” of course, you don’t have to watch the bad movie, unless you already did, and if so, why didn’t you warn me to avoid it?  But let’s not dwell on the past wrongs you have done to me, I’m a big enough man to look past it and still write about this movieloaf.

The plot features Denzel Washington as a brilliant, New York homicide detective named – and I promise you I’m not joking – Lincoln Rhymes.  Before watching the Bone Collector, if you had asked me who “Lincoln Rhymes” was, I would probably guess an Illinois rapper wearing a stovepipe hat.  Feel free to use that name, if you happen to be an up-and-comer in the Illinois hip hop scene.  If you don’t like that one, try DJ Emancipator.

Anyhoo, Lincoln is paralyzed in the opening scene in a shocking accident at a crime scene.  I say “shocking” because if you aren’t safe at a crime scene located in the sewers of New York City, where are you safe?  As Lincoln is a bed-ridden paraplegic with a sassy nurse played by Queen Latifah, he is trying to convince the authorities to let him die before he degenerates in a vegetable.  Well, the whole impending vegetabledom is the excuse Lincoln espouses, but I think he wants life to be over because he has to spend all day with Queen Latifah without the ability to get up and walk out.  (I kid Her Majesty, of course.)

Meanwhile, a gaudy serial killer (is there any other kind in movies?) is terrorizing New York with the audacity to kill rich, influential people but the courtesy to leave carefully chosen clues at the dumping ground of his victims.  Sadly, the police do not have Batman’s patented “Bat-Riddle-Solving” machine at their disposal to handle the situation, but someone out there really needs to get off their duff and invent that thing.

At the first crime scene, rookie cop Amelia (Jolie) is the one who arrives at the staged crime scene and manages to prevent a train from disrupting the evidence.  MC Rail Spitter — I mean, Lincoln Rhymes — is brought in as a consultant on the case despite his frequent seizures and profound death wish that would make Dr. Kevorkian proud, and is thoroughly impressed with how Amelia preserved the crime scene and just knows that she’ll make a great forensic detective even if it’s against her well.  This leads to a scene where Amelia is brought to visit Lincoln, and Lincoln railroads Amelia against her will to be on the case, telling her:  “Pull up a chair.  I want you to tell me everything you know about the crime scene. . .   I want to know what you felt.  What you feel in the deepest recesses of your senses.”  Denzel is an amazing actor, but even he can’t make dialogue like that work.

Pretty soon Lincoln’s luxury apartment is turned into a satellite police headquarters, with Amelia the rookie cop who has no business being there and no motivation to be there running point on the most critical investigation in the city.  A paralyzed detective inches from death (and trying to crawl toward said death) and a rookie beat cop irritated that her transfer to a different assignment has been delayed due to the case might play a pivotal role in Salt Lick, Kentucky, but not New York City.  Even at its best moments, the student/teacher rapport between Amelia and Lincoln, which really comes off as gimmicky and contrived.

The other selling point for the film is the mysterious, cab-driving serial killer stalking the streets from the shadows, taunting the police with clues only a single notch more low-key than the Riddler.  If that’s not enough, when the killer is revealed to be an already introduced character who I had to struggle to remember who the heck he (or she) was and how he (or she) had figured into the movie before that very moment.  The killer gets to explain his (or her!) motivations, including great bon mots such as: “I gave you so many clues and you failed!”  It’s perhaps one of the most utterly unsatisfying conclusions to a big-budget mystery/thriller I’ve ever seen, and I have seen Perfect Stranger.  They would have been far better off making the killer totally unrelated to the other characters, something like the aforementioned Silence of the Lambs, and everyone would feel less cheated.

But cheated we are by the Bone Collector, for by its very presence it mocks good movie making and — dare I say it? — entertainment itself.  Skip it!

–Daniel J. Roos thinks the coolest thing about the Bone Collector is that Optimus Prime does the voice-over for the trailer:

There is no “dream” sequence in director Bryan Singer’s the Usual Suspects, but, without revealing too much, the movie takes incredible liberties with its narrative.  I’ve seen the movie from beginning to end eight times or more, and it’s a matter of debate and interpretation exactly what happens to who and when.  For a lesser film, this would likely be infuriating.  But the Usual Suspects is so exceptional in conception, acting, and execution, in this case I don’t mind the muddle ambiguity,  In fact, I love it.  (Please, Hollywood, this kind of story telling works much better as the exception and not the rule.  Don’t overdo it.  This means you, M. Night Shyamalan!)

The Usual Suspects takes place after a shootout on a boat docked in a harbor, which has left dozens of men dead and even more questions for the authorities trying to figure out who did what to who and why.  The initial report is a cocaine-deal gone bad, but there is no evidence of cocaine, just a large sum of money left at the scene. There are two survivors, one suffering severe burns and is on the verge of death; the other is a cripple named Verbal Kint (Kevin Spacey).

It seems someone very powerful is pulling strings to get Verbal, a run-of-the-mill con man hanging on to the lint of the criminal underbellybutton, released.  Agent Kujan (Chazz Palminteri) is determined to squeeze answers out of Verbal and his incomplete, inconsistent statement prior to his release.  The story goes back and forth between the interrogation and Verbal’s recounting of the events that led to the shootout.

Verbal’s story, the meat of the narrative, is hampered by the fact that he’s either unaware of all the facts, not entirely forthcoming about all the details, or a combination of both.  When Agent Kujan interjects that he knows certain details or reveals a key name, Verbal’s tale changes accordingly.

The tale in and of itself is fascinating, how a group of five shady characters including Verbal are rounded up after an armed robbery and thrown in a holding cell after the police lineup.  Other than Verbal, there’s the hothead McManus (Stephen Baldwin, yes, a Baldwin of the non-Alec variety is actually in a great movie giving a great performance), the incomprehensible Fenster (Benecio Del Toro), the munitions man Hockney (Kevin Pollak), and allegedly reformed criminal mastermind Dean (no relation to Diane) Keaton (Gabriel Byrne).

The most famous name to come out of the Usual Suspects is Kayser Soze, and more precisely, who is Kayser Soze.  Soze is the mythical underworld figure allegedly pulling the strings behind the scenes, manipulating the robbery, and arranging Verbal’s release.  Watching the movie the first time through, we were all convinced that one of the usual suspects was Soze, which is pretty apparent.  Keaton is the obvious red herring, which basically eliminates him as a suspect.  The big reveal as to Kayser’s identity is extraordinarily satisfying, the ultimate “Whoa!” moment that doesn’t involve Keanu Reeves.

I first saw the film when it was released on VHS (consult your local Wikipedia if you don’t know what VHS is, kids), and if memory serves I watched it with my Mom.  After the twist ending, we were blown away while simultaneously confused and fascinated.  Following a hearty debate about what really had gone down, we took a break, got some snacks, and rewound the video and watched it from beginning to end again, the same night. I can’t think of another movie I’ve ever done that for, not even my favorite film of all-time, Memento.

It only recently came to my attention that this masterpiece of 90s film noir was given one-and-a-half stars by renowned film critic Roger Ebert.  While I have been entertained and informed by Mr. Ebert’s reviews, iconic television show, and books in the past, I feel compelled to rip him a new one: You gave The Usual Suspects one-and-a-half stars and gave Nicolas Cage’s turd sandwich Knowing the full-four flippin’ stars?  Are you going soft in the noggin’, Roger?  And what about giving that unwatchable car crash X-Files: I Want to Believe?  That was three-and-a-half stars but The Usual frickin’ Suspects was one-and-a-half stars?  Why don’t you just endorse Gamer for Best Picture and be done with it, you hack!!!!!?????

*Sigh* *Deep breath* You know, after getting that off my chest, I feel better. 

As I was saying, the Usual Suspects remains a personal favorite, one of those movies I could pop in any night of the week and enjoy it just as much as that first night.

–Daniel J. Roos

I don’t believe I’ve enjoyed watching a movie more in a very long time. It seems clear to me that Director Nicolas Winding Refn had a clear vision when he chose to venture into this film. He was determined and he pulled together an outstanding cast and crew to see it into fruition. Tom Hardy as “England’s most violent criminal” is spot-on. His performance is dark and menacing, without remorse and completely insane. Exactly the type of man I rather imagine Bronson to be. There is no sanity to this film. No character to stabilize you. You feel constantly at odds against the main character, much, I imagine, like the prison guards must have felt these thirty years.

This is not a film about the politics of prison, rehabilitation vs. punishment. Though there was some mention of what might be considered excessive solitary confinement. The movie doesn’t seem interested in discussing why Bronson has found himself in prison or why he’s inclined to fight which forces him to stay in prison longer. Bronson is violent because he is.

Watching this movie I loved his madness. Perhaps it attached me to the madness within myself, albeit drastically more mild and less violent. I felt that I was finally given the view of a man who wasn’t complicated; he’s not surrounded by subplots and pretentious inventions of film makers. This movie was about a character, a showman, a charmer of sorts. Imagine Glenn Beck, in his feistiness and ability to rile people up, now tie it to violence and a lack of remorse. That is the Charles Bronson displayed here.

Some moments of this film were in my opinion pure genius. A scene wherein Bronson is telling the story of a conversation he had with a nurse. The back and forth is dark and angry, yet humorous.  The opening scene of him boxing bare knuckled against the grates of his cell, flooded with red light and grimace that would melt the heart of any guard, and the war cry that echoes down the corridor of the prison as guards rush in to subdue him. The film felt original even as it paid homage to Nicholson’s Joker and A Clockwork Orange.

There are plenty of questions of the accuracy to the story. According to Wikipedia, the first crime of Bronson (then going by his birth name of Michael Peterson) netted only 26 pound, not the 46 or so displayed in the film. Wikipedia insists that he was never released from prison once entering. But this does not damage the movie for me. On the contrary, I think it more easily allows the movie to be what it was: the study of madness and the question of how we define where our humanity begins and ends. The scene of him fighting dogs, I imagine, is supposed to make us wonder if he is more man or animal.

It is not common for me to endorse a movie so highly. In fact, it’s not common for me to enjoy a movie so thoroughly. However, it is a dark story about a very distressed man. Be aware of what you’re going to see.

I would like to say Thank You to the Charlotte Film Festival for inviting us to come. My first film festival has so far been an excellent experience.

But this is the story of the opposite, where I didn’t like a movie at first, but it’s fondness has actually increased over the years until I think it’s pretty good (I said “good,” not “great,” mind you).  I speak of Clint Eastwood’s cinematic “eh, that was okay” flick, Blood Work.

I initially entered Blood Work with expectations a little too high, methinks, if for no other reason than its star/director is none other than Clint Eastwood, a man who, in my opinion, has had a better 2 1/2 decades as a filmmaker than Francis Ford Coppola or Martin Scorsese.  Not only do we have Clint’s involvement, but Blood Work boasts a screenplay by Brian Helgeland (L.A. Confidential) and is based on a smash-hit, bestselling novel by Michael Connelly (City of Bones), so it certainly possessed the pedigree to be a classic thriller.  Long story short, it’s not a new classic.  It is good however, and ain’t that enough sometimes?  Not every movie can be as good as Eastwood’s opus Unforgiven.

The story revolves around high-profile San Francisco Det. Terry McCaleb (Eastwood), who isn’t quite Dirty Harry with an AARP card, but he’s close; McCaleb is an obsessive cop but also is a tad bit of a gloryhound and media hog despised by some of his cohorts.   McCaleb is hot on the trail of a serial killer known as “the Cemetery Man,” who leaves him notes including seemingly random nine digit numbers at the crime scene (hint: the numbers are random but they aren’t random, for those of you who enjoy solving murder mysteries).  At the latest crime scene, McCaleb spots a suspicious character in the crowd and runs in pursuit.  In the middle of the chase, McCaleb crumbles over with a heart attack, and the Cemetery Man actually shows a measure of concern before McCaleb shoots at him, scaring him off.  Helpful note to all you kids out there: If you shoot at a guy, he is much less likely to come to your aid.  Of course, he’s also much less likely to dissect you, so there is a trade-off.

Months later, the Cemetery Man hasn’t been heard from after the incident; perhaps after witnessing McCaleb’s heart attack he realised how precious life was and decided to stop killing people and leaving clues.  Okay, I made that up.

Anyhoo, McCaleb is unhappily retired and is fresh off of a heart transplant.  Graciella (Wanda De Jesus), the sister of the woman whose heart McCaleb received, finds him and asks him to look into the murder of her sister.  It’s kind of hard to argue with someone who could have your heart repossessed.  Reluctantly, McCaleb agrees to look into it more to just appease the woman and his own guilt more than anything else.  The more McCaleb digs, the more curious facts he uncovers, and it turns into a bonafide investigation.

McCaleb loves being back in the hunt, though he is saddled by certain limitations, like he could pass out and die at almost any second if he over exerts himself, a fact pointed out by his doctor (Anjelica Huston) who frets over McCaleb taking up such strenuous, stressful activity a mere sixty days after surgery.  McCaleb can’t even drive himself around to interview suspects (as he can’t drive a car with an airbag due to his medical condition), so he has to recruit Buddy Noone (Jeff Daniels), McCaleb’s laid back, beach bum of a neighbor/comic relief who eagerly asserts himself as McCaleb’s partner in the investigation, though the ex-cop insists he just needs a driver.

The murder appears to be a random convenience store robbery gone wrong at first, though the masked killer winks at the security camera.  A similar murder occurred earlier at an ATM, the only connection between the victims turns out to be their blood type, which just happens to be McCaleb’s blood type.  The killer, it seems, wanted to make sure McCaleb got a new heart.  Is it the Cemetery Man wanting to keep McCaleb alive and back in the game?  Someone else?  McCaleb himself?

The “big reveal” about the killer’s identity was a let down to me the first time through, methinks.  When I watched Blood Work years later, knowing full well who the Cemetery Man was from the opening scene, I enjoyed Blood Work a lot more.  I enjoyed the mystery, I enjoyed picking up on the clues, I enjoyed watching Daniels and Clint play off of each other, and I got a kick out of Clint playing off his mystique as an unstoppable, tough guy cop addled with a heart condition and its limitations.

Blood Work is three stars, one and a half thumbs up, not a home run but a ground rule double, and any other way I can say “good, not great.”  See it . . . eventually.

–Daniel J. Roos

Being a half-grizzly/half-human hybrid movie blogger, naturally I’m bit of a sucker for a bear movie.  Please note that I don’t say, “I’m a sucker for a GOOD bear movie,” because if I were there would be precisely one entry on the list: Anthony Hopkins & Alec Baldwin in the Edge, written by the great David Mamet.  Because I am so open minded for bear films of any quality (I gave a glowing review to the Country Bears, for Pete’s sake!), I am hence a sucker for a bad movie prominently featuring a bear, and today’s entry Grizzly Park certainly falls into the “bad” movie category.

Man oh man Grizzly Park is some kind of terrible.  It’s filled past the breaking point with terrible acting, stupid characters doing and saying idiotic things, and corny horror gore. On the plus side, it does have some things going for it, well only three. There’s 1) plenty of Brody the Bear, the same bear who fought to a draw with Walker, Texas Ranger; 2) it stars Glenn Morshower a.k.a. Secret Service Agent Aaron from the TV show 24, a likable character actor whose last name “Morshower” translates from the Comanche word for “He who should take more showers”; and 3) a twist ending so absurd and implausible that I genuinely liked it.  (I’ll be giving away said plot twist later on, so be warned and get the popcorn, ’cause this is The Village quality.)

Here’s the premise of Grizzly Park: Eight teenagers are assigned to go into a forest called “Grizzly Park” after it is closed for the winter in order to pick up trash, which is part of their court mandated community service.  If the litter-removal plotline is not enough drama for you, an escaped serial killer named Butch has killed and taken the place of the corrections officer sent to transport the kids to the park.  Curiously, Butch actually does take the kids to the park and carries out the charade successfully despite the copious amount of his victim’s blood on his shirt.

Supervising the Breakfast Club’s forest outing is trusty albeit humorless Ranger Bob (Morshower), who offers stern advice and wilderness survival instructions that are all disregarded instantaneously.

The eight teenagers are straight from Hollywood, being four hot girls and four hunky guys, including a Latina gangster, an Asian girl, a black dude/tech geek, a preppie, an unfunny comedian, a clueless Valley Girl, a gas-sniffing white supremacist, and Bebe (Emily Foxler) who happens to be the dumbest human being who ever walked the face of the Earth.  Other than the airhead Bebe, all the teens give Ranger Bob a hard time, and they all prove to have committed heinous crimes that somehow got reduced to community service (one is a prostitute, one poisoned their mother, one caused the deaths of two senior citizens he was scamming, one put an under aged girl in a coma during a kinky sex act, etc.).  As such, they all deserve to die by scary movie logic, and that’s why we have . . . The Bear (cue applause)!

The Valley Girl (Julie Skon) might seem a little dense, only bringing high-heeled shoes to a six-day hike (a decision which she defends to Ranger Bob by pointing out they cost $300), but she doesn’t come close to Bebe in terms of moronicicity . . . yes, I know “moronicicity” is not a word, but Bebe is such a storon I had to make up a word to describe her.  Here’s Bebe’s greatest hits:

• Bebe ignores Ranger Bob’s advice never to feed animals and gives food to a skunk, which promptly follows her back to camp where they all get skunked.  Bebe defends herself by saying of the skunk: “I thought it was a forest cat.”
• When one of the men leaves a campfire to, in his words, “drain the dragon,” Bebe is excited: “You have a dragon?  I love dragons!”

Serial killer Butch proves to be a red herring, serving basically no purpose other than becoming the first victim of . . . The Bear (and the crowd goes wild).  The Bear is hilariously effective at sneaking up on folks, which as a half-man/half-bear I can attest to being pretty ridiculous; I have trouble sneaking up on a ham sandwich, let alone serial killers.  Another characteristic of the Bear is that he is a bit of a voyeur prone to watching humans from the edge of the forest prior to attacking, which as a half-man/half-bear I can attest to being pretty realistic.  You know that movie Sliver?  Based on the life of a bear.  True story.

Anyhoo, back to Bear-on-Brat violence: Two punks leave the group unbeknownst to Ranger Bob for a “shortcut” and, shockingly, they get lost and end up  the first of the irredeemable teens to get picked off by the Bear — though one was killed by wolves before the Bear could get there, sadly.  When Ranger Bob goes to look for the missing pair, the rest of the gang is the victim of a bloody bear massacre, which only the naive bimbo Bebe survives, hilariously locking a compatriot in a death trap during a panicked escape.

Are you ready for the shocking twist?  You might think you’re ready, but you’re not.  Before proceeding to the following sentence, please strap yourself down to the chair so you cannot hurt yourself or others.  It might be a good idea to go to the bathroom prior to the whole strapping yourself down thing.  All right here we go:

It’s really a two-for one, the first being: Bebe really isn’t stupid, but was playing dumb for no particular reason to cover up being sinister(!?).  After being rescued by Ranger Bob, Bebe gets on a cell-phone that one of the teens had smuggled on the trip and calls a friend, where she outlines how she fooled them all and she could have even tricked the Bear if she’d wanted to.  Bebe has a gun (also taken from a now-dead-teen), and announces that she’ll kill Ranger Bob as soon as he gets her back to civilization.  It’s important to note that Bebe does this about thirty seconds after Ranger Bob leaves her alone, so in revealing that she’s not the dumbest human being ever, she does something monumentally dumb because Ranger Bob is right outside and overhears the whole thing.

Let’s hit the pause button before part two of the twist ending that made M. Night Shyamalan roll his eyes so far back in his head he couldn’t see how absurd The Happening was: Why/how is Bebe a master criminal?  If she’s really so major league, why would she agree to go on a community service hiking trip?  What did she gain by playing dumb? If she acquiesced to the trip because she needed to keep her record clean before going back to her regular life, what’s the point in murdering the one guy who can validate your story of surviving a bear attack so that no one will suspect that you’re some sort of criminal mastermind caught in a sinister web of community service?

All right, here’s part two of the whopper of an ending: It was Ranger Bob who dispatched his friend the Bear to kill the teenagers!  Bebe only survived because she was nice to Ranger Bob, but when he overhears her plot, the Bear kills her seconds later. There is some mild, motivational pretense to support the twist, such as Ranger Bob trying to find out if any of the mass murderers in his community service care have remorse for their misdeeds — they don’t, so they die.  The film leaves some logistical questions unanswered as to how Ranger Bob communicates which kid to kill and which to allow to survive, but even so . . . COME ON!!

In short, to sum up Grizzly Park in two words, all I can say is: COME ON!!

–Daniel J. Roos recommends you see the Edge if you want to see a good Bear movie.