Avengers: Endgame (2019)

The Low-Down: Statistically, the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has achieved a great deal: over 11 years and 21 films, it has introduced dozens of relatively obscure characters into mainstream pop culture. More importantly, however, the franchise has proven that long-form storytelling can work in a cinematic context – as long as you balance plot with heart and humour, prizing character development over spectacle. That’s no small feat, and it’s even more remarkable that a movie with the gargantuan scale and ambition of Avengers: Endgame doesn’t fall apart beneath the weight of an unwieldy script or great expectations. In fact, this is the MCU’s crowning achievement: a heartfelt love letter to the Avengers, their stories, the actors who play them, and to the fans.

The Story: That damn Snap, eh? At the end of Avengers: Infinity War, Thanos wiped out half of the galaxy’s population with a snap of his Infinity-Stone-enhanced fingers. After bearing witness to teammates and loved ones vanishing in swirls of dust and ash, the remaining Avengers struggle to live with the crippling grief and guilt of surviving the Snap… and of failing to prevent it. Some characters spiral into darkness; others are frozen in place – a few even manage to move on. But hope is rekindled when Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) returns from the mysterious Quantum Realm, where the usual laws of physics, space and time do not apply…

The Great: Endgame is a storytelling triumph – not only does it bring together and pay off plots and ideas that were seeded over a decade ago, it builds solid, powerful, heartrendingly emotional narrative arcs for almost all of the original Avengers. Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) must grapple with their pasts to figure out their futures, while Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) and Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner) find themselves literally fighting to save their families. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) might provide much of the film’s comic relief, but both characters are also gifted with grace notes, growth and moments of true peace.

The Super-Great: The ability to juggle and create space for multiple perspectives and storylines in one film has been honed to a fine art by directors Anthony and Joe Russo and screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely. But their narrative strategy feels virtuosic in Endgame, paired as it is with an ingenious plot device that allows the film to truly acknowledge the staggering depth and breadth of its own history. Suddenly, the emotional and narrative stakes are raised, as beloved characters are forced to re-examine their lives, stories and priorities. You might find yourself in tears and in stitches, frequently in the same scene, and this happens throughout the film – a testament to the Russo Brothers’ genius and their skills at anchoring even the most outlandish of storylines in humour and humanity.

The Not-So-Great: This is emphatically not a film for casual viewers – there is no entry point, no easing in, no exposition, to help you understand what the heck is going on if you haven’t watched most of the preceding films in the MCU. There are also a few logical fallacies and plotholes scattered throughout Endgame that will puzzle you the more you think about them – from the wobbly rules governing time travel to the fractured way in which the too-conveniently hyper-powered Carol Danvers (Brie Larson) pops in and out of the story.

Stan Service: This film, above all others in the MCU, feels like a heartfelt tribute to the very concept of Marvel itself, finding numerous ways to reward and delight true-blue fans. Naturally, it includes Stan Lee’s final appearance in the MCU, while folding in a host of other cameos and callbacks that reinforce the interconnectedness of the entire franchise – of all the stories that have been told before, especially the movie that started it all (Iron Man in 2008). There are even a couple of brilliant nods to comics lore, largely centred around the character of Captain America, that feel like the Russo Brothers are deliberately righting a few wrongs where some of Marvel Comics’ more controversial plot twists are concerned. (See: Nick Spencer’s run on Captain America: Steve Rogers.)

Cast-Iron MVP: Casting outside of the box has always been one of the MCU’s core strengths, with Oscar winners/nominees and character actors regularly popping up to play heroes and villains alike. That canny casting strategy pays off in spades in Endgame – especially when certain characters have relatively limited screen time but manage to make it count anyway. The undisputed stars of the movie, however, are the Avengers who started it all. Hemsworth continues to brilliantly dance along the knife-edge between comedy and pathos, while Ruffalo radiates charm and intelligence through ever-improving CGI as Banner and his not-so-mean, green alter ego: The Hulk. Johansson and Renner are given more to do in this film than ever before, and their combined efforts will shred your soul to pieces. Evans brings great warmth and strength to his stoic role, making it perfectly legitimate for you to weep and whoop for a man who’s – somewhat ridiculously – wrapped in an American flag. Above all, this double-whammy of Avengers films belongs, most fittingly, to Downey Jr. He still effortlessly injects Tony with snark and swagger, but also beautifully conveys every shade and layer of his character’s hard-won growth and maturity – giving us all the proof that we have never needed that Tony Stark has a heart.

Recommended? In every imaginable way. Endgame sets the bar as high as it can possibly go for superhero epics that balance enormous scale and jaw-dropping ambition with actual substance and genuine emotion. It’s the blockbuster movie event of our lifetimes, for very good reason – and it’s worth every minute you’ve invested in the MCU since 2008.

Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

Over the past decade, Marvel has earned itself the benefit of the doubt. The studio has consistently delivered smart, funny, brave films that both embrace and transcend their comic-book origins. The 18 blockbuster movies produced since Iron Man first blasted off into the stratosphere in 2008 have not only reinvented superhero films as a genre – they’ve helped to legitimise it. Indeed, Marvel’s two most recent films – Thor: Ragnarok and Black Panther – have received the kind of accolades usually reserved for edgy arthouse flicks.

And yet, it’s perfectly reasonable to be apprehensive about Avengers: Infinity War. This is a blockbuster film that’s been ten years in the making, its plot hinted at and scattered throughout 18 other movies. It features 30 or so characters, each with their own complex backstories and motivations. And all of them are coming together in a bid to stop a giant purple alien dude from destroying the universe. It sounds ridiculous, and feels impossible.

But that’s precisely what makes the final product such a monumental achievement. Masterfully directed by Anthony and Joe Russo, Infinity War is bold, brainy filmmaking at its very best: the kind that will lift your spirits, blow your mind and shatter your soul – occasionally in the same scene. It demonstrates on an epic scale what Marvel has known all along: that special effects and tightly choreographed action are there to serve the story. For all its blockbuster spectacle (and there’s almost too much of that), the film is anchored by the heart, humour and humanity of its characters.

The film’s basic plot is simple: Thanos (played via motion-capture by Josh Brolin), intergalactic purveyor of death and destruction, has long been on the hunt for the six Infinity Stones that will give him complete control over the elemental building blocks of the universe. He dispatches his acolytes to Earth to retrieve the Time Stone, currently in the possession of Dr. Stephen Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch), and carve the Mind Stone out of the forehead of Vision (Paul Bettany). It’s a literal existential threat so terrifying that all the heroes we’ve come to know and love – from the Avengers to the Guardians of the Galaxy – must put aside their differences and unite against a common foe.

From the outset, it’s immediately clear that neither the film’s directors nor screenwriters (Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely) are interested in playing it safe. Most other superhero films are bled of high stakes – the hero in the title might suffer untold trauma, but it’s a super-safe bet that he or she will make it to the end alive. There’s no such guarantee here. Within the first ten minutes, we are confronted with the dark, twisted depths to which Thanos and his acolytes in the Black Order will sink in order to achieve their goals. Death, as well as genuine loss and sacrifice, is intrinsic to the narrative drumbeat that drives Infinity War ever forward, and the film is all the better for it.

That’s not to say the movie is a morbid and depressing experience. What’s so impressive about Infinity War is how it expertly juggles its constantly shifting tones and moods. When it’s funny (and it very often is), it’s deeply, truly funny. The film finds maximum joy in flinging characters together with merry abandon, mixing and matching ones you’d never have expected to share scenes or trade banter. Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) is floored by Thor’s (Chris Hemsworth) godly muscles. Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) is charmed by the wit and intelligence of Shuri (Letitia Wright). And it’d be impossible to not be utterly delighted by Peter Dinklage’s inspired cameo. It’s a blithely tongue-in-cheek sensibility shared by Marvel’s best comic books, which understand that humour can make you care when it really counts.

And, boy, does Infinity War make it count. There are many heartbreakingly human moments threaded throughout the film: from the charming surrogate father-son dynamic shared by Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr) and Peter Parker (Tom Holland), to the undeniable love that ties Vision and Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) together. In many ways, the film stands as a testament to the human capacity not just to love, but to love fiercely and beyond all logic. It’s right there when the unfailingly noble Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) declares, “We don’t trade lives”, even when giving up one could save billions.

There’s even a chilling echo of it in Thanos himself. A lesser film would have turned Thanos into a one-dimensional villain, much the way he’s all monster and maniac in the comic books. In Infinity War, however, Thanos’ end goal is surprisingly relevant when it comes to thinking and talking about the staggeringly overpopulated world in which we live today. There is, as it turns out, method to Thanos’ madness. It makes the tragic twists and turns in his relationships with his estranged adopted daughters, Gamora (Zoe Saldana) and Nebula (Karen Gillan), all the more unsettling.

For the most part, Infinity War does justice, too, to the many heroes who have been assembled for the film. The Russo brothers displayed great skill at interweaving multiple perspectives and character trajectories in Captain America: Civil War, and they do so again here, with twice as many characters. Even the most minor of supporting players, like Don Cheadle’s James Rhodes/War Machine, are given story beats that land. It helps that Marvel has always taken care to cast genuinely good actors in roles that might otherwise come off as silly and slight.

Even so, there are a few standouts amongst this enormous and enormously talented cast. Emotionally speaking, this is Downey’s film. He plays every note of Tony’s reluctant courage and bone-deep trauma, as he embarks on what he’s convinced is a suicide mission. He’s ably matched by Cumberbatch, who finds vulnerability even in his character’s most cunning and calculative move. Hemsworth, meanwhile, is given free rein to import the big-hearted comedic swagger of Thor: Ragnarok into this film – while also layering it with a deeply-felt, jagged grief for the losses he has suffered at the hands of Thanos and the universe.

In a film with so many moving parts, some elements don’t work quite as well. A couple of characters that you might have expected to be right at the forefront – including an original Avenger or two – fade into the background. The film tumbles from dizzying fight scene to dizzying fight scene, and while most of them are fantastically choreographed, there are some purely dumb moments that literally revolve around attempts to prevent Thanos from clenching his fist. In effect, this is a superhero mêlée that’s part over-the-top and part overkill, and might prove too much for those who don’t already care for this franchise and the characters in it.

Minor quibbles aside, though, Infinity War is yet another step in the right direction for Marvel. It continues the studio’s tradition of placing a premium on rich, complex storytelling that respects both its characters and its audiences. But it also refuses to make things easy for itself. The film ends even more bravely than it began, with a final ten minutes that will haunt and horrify you in equal measure. It’s a stroke of bold, brilliant genius – a narrative risk so audacious that you’ll want to follow Marvel wherever it goes next.

Basically: This movie will blow your mind and break your heart – and make you desperate to go back for more. Brave, brilliant and better than it has any right to be.

 

The Book Of Life (2014)

Many things could have gone wrong with The Book Of Life. This boisterous, big-hearted animated film is bursting with ideas and colour, stuffed to the brim with – one suspects – pretty much every idea that struck writer-director Jorge Gutierrez’s fancy. Indeed, the final film plays very much like the charming but unpolished debut of a filmmaker who can’t quite believe he was lucky enough to get the attention of producer Guillermo del Toro, and has no intention of wasting the opportunity in case it never comes around again. As a result, The Book Of Life practically trembles with too many ideas and influences, but remains so earnest and inventive that it’s easy to forgive its predictable, overstuffed plot.

In a small Mexican town on the Day Of The Dead, we meet the protagonists of the story: steadfast, earnest Manolo (voiced by Diego Luna), who would rather strum a guitar than fight a bull in the tradition of his forefathers; brash, adventurous Joaquin (Channing Tatum), who becomes the town hero in trying to avenge the murder of his father by bandits; and spunky, intelligent Maria (Zoe Saldana), daughter of the mayor who inevitably wins the hearts of both young men. The stakes, however, are higher than they could ever imagine: the two godly rulers of the underworld, La Muerte (Kate del Castillo) and Xibalba (Ron Perlman), have gambled dominion over each other’s lands on the outcome of the love triangle.

It would be an understatement to say that there’s a lot going on in The Book Of Life. The film covers everything from a mystical medal that lends invulnerability to anyone who wears it, to a tantalising love-hate relationship between the two gods, while spiced up with musical interludes galore. (It’s not often that the film’s hero will pause to belt out a soul-searching rendition of Radiohead’s Creep, but that kind of thing happens all the time in The Book Of Life.) Mix it all up with retellings of Mexican folklore, including visits to the joyously colourful Land of the Remembered and the ghostly grey Land of the Forgotten, and the film can be a somewhat frenetic viewing experience, to say the least.

But, for all that Gutierrez packs his film full of ideas and details, he also manages to make most of it work very well. The love triangle may be trite, but there’s nevertheless enough heart and humour holding Manolo, Maria and Joaquin together. Manolo’s relationships with his dad Carlos (Hector Elizondo) and his departed mom Carmen (Ana de la Reguera) are coloured in with surprising depth as well. It’s also wonderful to see a love triangle centred around a girl who knows her own mind – and rest assured that Maria speaks it often enough to make a real impact.

The Book Of Life also doubles as a very welcome riot of imagination and tradition. Every frame of the film is beautifully and thoughtfully designed, down to the fact that Manolo seems to have been intricately crafted out of wood. Moreover, instead of shying away from its Mexican roots to increase its global marketability, the film firmly embraces them. This gives Gutierrez room to craft some delicately dark moments in a graveyard or two, reminding everyone that those who have died can still live as long as they’re remembered by the ones who loved them. And yet, the film never descends into darkness, instead tapping into the giddying energy of a fiesta – most memorably in a journey through the Land of the Remembered – complete with heady bursts of colour and music.

There’s no denying that Gutierrez’s film can occasionally be too much to handle. It’s loud and almost cheerfully silly, tossing pop songs and Mexican folklore into a mix that sometimes doesn’t work. But, at its best, The Book Of Life is like a rambunctious puppy: messy, loud and insistent, but radiating so much life and charm that it becomes quite impossible to resist.

Basically: Messy and overstuffed, but crackling with life, energy and colour.

Guardians Of The Galaxy (2014)

You might expect a movie studio at the top of its game to play it safe – to stick to the tried-and-tested rather than to strike out in new, odd, bizarre directions. Certainly, it’s hard to imagine any other studio giving the greenlight to Guardians Of The Galaxy – a huge, clearly expensive blockbuster movie based on a title unfamiliar to anyone who isn’t a comics aficionado, starring a relatively unknown actor playing a character most people have never heard of. And yet, Marvel scores big once again with its willingness to head off the beaten track. Guardians is a fun, fizzy delight, even as it mines some surprising depths of emotion from its ragtag group of anti-heroes – all of whom really belong more in a jail than in civil society.

Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) – a human abducted from Earth as a child – has grown up into an intergalactic thief who has no idea what he’s getting into when he takes possession of a mysterious Orb. All he wants to do is to sell it to the highest bidder. Little does he know that Ronan (Lee Pace) – a ruthless, genocidal Kree radical – will do just about anything to get his hands on said Orb, including sending genetically-modified alien assassin Gamora (Zoe Saldana) after it. Gamora, as it turns out, has an agenda of her own. Trapped in an intergalactic prison (long story), Peter and Gamora are forced into an uneasy alliance with three other misfits: a brainy, sarcastic raccoon-like creature named Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper), a giant tree by the name of Groot (Vin Diesel), and the solely vengeance-minded Drax The Destroyer (Dave Bautista).

The truth is that there’s almost too much going on in Guardians. Not only do we meet a host of characters we’ve never met before, on a raft of new planets teeming with brightly coloured life and detail, we’re also introduced to several plotlines all stuffed somewhat awkwardly into the film. We have Ronan’s planet-destroying aspirations, which are somehow bound up with the evil plans of Thanos – that creepy purple-skinned dude who popped up at the end of The Avengers. Peter’s kidnappers turned surrogate ‘family’, led by blue-skinned bandit Yondu (Michael Rooker), are also on the trail of the Orb, turning up at moments both enormously convenient and inconvenient to the plot. It all makes sense in the end, more or less, but until it all clicks into place, it can make for a rushed, unsettling experience.

But there’s so much to enjoy in Guardians that it’s easy to forgive the film its occasionally unwieldy script. This is, by far, the most visually inventive and ambitious film Marvel has produced to date: it swoops from the homey interior of Peter’s rickety spaceship, equipped with an old-fashioned tape deck that ties him to his past, into the rocky alien vista of a discarded world, or the bustling streets of an outer-space hyper-market. The CGI – used to render gigantic mid-air battles, spectacular chase sequences in space, as well as turn Rocket and Groot photo-real – is beautifully done, adding to the bright, kitschy polish that characterises the film’s aesthetic.

Beyond the sheer look of it, Guardians triumphs because of the gang of scruffy losers (a term that will take on a different, more heartfelt meaning during the film) at its heart. Director James Gunn, who co-wrote the script, clearly feels a strong affinity for each one of these outcasts, all of whom are easily outlaws in some (if not all) parts of the solar system, each one battling – at least initially – to save his or her own skin rather than to save the world. It’s fascinating to watch the five members of this unusual, unlikely group trade disdain for respect as they slowly banter, bicker and batter their way into becoming a team.

Most joyfully of all, Gunn never loses sight of the prickly, selfish side of his characters.  He gives them plenty of rich, emotional moments – whether it’s Peter and Gamora bonding over the loss of their parents, or the fact that Rocket can read a whole range of meaning into Groot’s extremely limited vocabulary (‘I am Groot’) – but is always ready with a quip and a wink to keep the film from descending into dangerously sentimental territory.

In fact, Gunn pumps up proceedings with a healthy, hearty dose of humour. Films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) have always been more tongue-in-cheek than the likes of the considerably more dour Dark Knight franchise, but Guardians is a heady trip of a different order. It practically delights in bursts of odd, subversive comedy, and actually dares to punctuate its most epic face-off with a sly homage to, of all things, Footloose.

Pratt – so winning a comedian in TV’s Parks And Recreation – holds the emotional and (slightly a)moral core of the film together. He exudes an easy, rakish charm that makes Peter both dashingly arrogant and achingly vulnerable. He’s matched very well by Saldana, who is clearly delighting in the opportunity to play the world-weary, no-nonsense Gamora – bred into a killer, born a fighter. The rest of the cast does justice, too, to the film’s cheerful swing from drama to comedy and back again: Bautista brings unexpected pathos to Drax’s occasionally comical determination to avenge his family against Ronan, while Cooper sounds completely unlike himself – in a very good way – as a creature who hides a world of hurt beneath his mouthy exterior. Even Diesel manages to find a great deal of depth in a CGI character who only speaks in the same languid burst of three words.

If anything, Guardians is let down by a trio of not particularly threatening villains. Pace snarls and spits in heavy make-up, but can’t quite rustle up much in the way of nuance or genuine menace. Ronan is a one-note madman, with so little in the way of backstory that he automatically becomes less interesting. Thanos, too, now voiced and performed in motion-capture by Josh Brolin, doesn’t get a whole lot to do beyond lounge on his space throne. Only Karen Gillan’s blue-hued cyborg Nebula manages a smidgen of complexity; even then, she struggles to be half as fascinating as her conflicted “sister”, Gamora.

Before the film was even released in cinemas, Marvel announced that a sequel would be coming in 2017. It’s a no-brainer as to why. The film is smart, funny and quite wonderful on its own merits. But, even more crucially, Guardians is a gamble that pays off handsomely for Marvel. It opens up the MCU in, quite literally, all directions. Don’t be surprised if you see our more earth-bound heroes heading into the deepest, darkest reaches of space, sooner rather than later. Not only that, the film adds a new cast of wacky, loveable rogues to the MCU’s roster of characters: a gang who, one might say, are actually all the more heroic for being people who would ordinarily be running in the opposite direction from any galaxy-guarding duties. Frankly, we can’t wait to see what they get up to next.

Basically: Bold, brave and beautifully weird.

Out Of The Furnace (2013)

It’s hard to decide just what to make of Out Of The Furnace, a potboiler of a drama that grapples with the complexities of family, war, violence, rage and vengeance – stewed together in an uneasy blend that works, more or less, but never really takes off. That the cast is so unreservedly excellent makes it even tougher to dismiss Out Of The Furnace as an awkwardly-scripted curio. They’re so good – even with shakily-developed characters and dialogue – that the film often comes off as better than it is.

Russell Baze (Christian Bale) is a loving brother and filial son who works hard at the local steel mill to bring home the bacon for his girlfriend Lena (Zoe Saldana). He just wants his war-shattered brother Rodney (Casey Affleck) to get his act together instead of pissing away money he doesn’t have on gambling and drinking. When tragedy strikes, Russell must pick up the pieces of his life again – only to discover that his brother has had an unfortunate run-in with ultra-creepy thug Harlan DeGroat (Woody Harrelson), and the authorities are unlikely to be much help in finding out what really happened.

The story is interesting, but the script somewhat less so – apart from Rodney, the characters are sketched in broad strokes and archetypes, and points are driven home with little care for subtlety. We’re treated to numerous instances of Russell’s innate goodness: he spruces up the house while Rodney is getting roughed up in yet another illegal brawl, and studiously avoids shooting a deer when he goes hunting with his uncle Gerald (Sam Shepard).  There aren’t a whole lot of grey areas, either, when it comes to Harlan: he’s mean and vicious without the hint of even a lost or broken soul to add some complexity to his character.

And yet, Out Of The Furnace remains fascinating because director Scott Cooper has assembled a truly astounding cast. Bale sinks completely into his role, somehow making it believable that Russell’s final-act resolve is not wildly out of character. Meanwhile, Affleck has some riveting moments as the boy broken by the demons living within him. Harrelson, for all that his character is ridiculously overblown, snarls his way through the film – menacing and cowing even the likes of Willem Dafoe, who plays a small-time crook trying his best (and failing) to protect Rodney. Saldana’s reaction to Russell when he returns to her, after time spent far away, is heartbreaking, and Forest Whitaker has a small role as a cop trying to keep Russell from going off the rails in search of Rodney. Collectively, the ensemble make the clunky dialogue and odd genre changes work.

This makes for a strange but compelling drama – a film that limps and shuffles along as it shifts from brotherly conflict to a brutal game of cat-and-mouse, all of it underscored by a soundtrack of extreme despair. There are good ideas and performances on display, but these often get snowed under by a script that doesn’t give its characters room to grow and live. As a result, Out Of The Furnace frequently feels under-cooked, although its cast does a pretty good job of turning up the heat just enough to keep viewers hooked.

Basically: A slow burn that never really catches fire, but it’s compelling viewing nonetheless.

Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)

On almost all counts, Star Trek Into Darkness is an impressive achievement: it’s a smart, thrilling blockbuster that actually lavishes as much time and care on character development as it does on its big action set-pieces. Director J.J. Abrams has managed to create a film that is huge in every way, but feels startlingly intimate and small where it really counts. If the film ends a little bit abruptly… well, that’s a minor enough criticism.

Inveterate rule-breaker Captain James Kirk (Chris Pine) starts the film breaking one rule too many. He’s understandably upset with his first mate/best friend Spock (Zachary Quinto) for contributing to his demotion – but there’s little time for them to dwell on their differences after John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch) launches a full-out terrorist assault on a Starfleet installation in central London. Enraged by a very personal loss, Kirk asks to be reinstated as Captain of the Enterprise so he can hunt down John Harrison in the forbidden reaches of the dread Klingon homeworld.

Perhaps the best thing about Star Trek Into Darkness is that it’s a sequel that doesn’t feel like a sequel at all. There’s a bit of business from the 2009 film – largely centred on Spock’s troubled relationship with Uhura (Zoe Saldana) – that informs the narrative this time round, but it’s something that a new viewer would be able to pick up on within minutes. Abrams artfully distills all the key relationships into a potent chemical brew very quickly, making it easy to see how the entire crew fits together… and just why Kirk would, quite literally, be willing to go down with his ship.

In fact, that’s the huge, beating heart of the entire movie. Where Kirk was collecting his crew in Star Trek, he’s protecting his family in this film, and it’s wonderful to see him bicker and banter with everyone – including supporting players Bones (Karl Urban), Scotty (Simon Pegg) and Sulu (John Cho). It allows Abrams to up the emotional stakes across the board, while still tying everything back to the friendship that forms the bedrock of the Enterprise. The great insight we’re afforded into Spock’s resolutely logical approach to all aspects of his life is  welcome not just for his best friend and girlfriend, but also for the audience.

Abrams benefits from a cast of actors who work wonderfully well together. Playing diametrically opposite characters, Pine and Quinto manage to find enough common ground to draw viewers into what is technically a completely unlikely friendship. Quinto, in particular, impressively summons up deep reservoirs of feeling for a character whose face barely registers a shift even in the throes of grave emotional trauma. Cumberbatch, meanwhile, makes for a delicious villain, all cold calculation and silky menace – working for or against the crew of the Enterprise as it fits his narrowly-defined interests. His John Harrison is very much what Spock could be without that core of humanity tying him to Kirk and Uhura.

For anyone who’s concerned that Star Trek Into Darkness is all heart and no spectacle, never fear: there’s plenty of guts and glory on display here, whether it’s debris or an enormous ship crashing down on a shocked London. Abrams pumps up the action just as much as he does the emotion, flinging his characters into an up-ended spaceship or, well, into deep space itself in scenes as heart-racingly thrilling as anything you’ll see in a cinema this year.

The problem with Star Trek Into Darkness is that it sometimes gets a bit lost in the shuffle of all its characters, emotion and action. With practically every scene (especially after the halfway mark in the film) hitting some kind of emotional or action-packed climax, the actual ending of the film arrives quite suddenly and with next to no fanfare. It’s almost as if Abrams had so much fun making a really good movie that he forgot he had to end it.

That’s hardly an indictment of Abrams’ film, however. Actually, it’s a fantastic movie for him to release following the recent news that he’ll be in charge of bringing the world back into the universe of Luke, Leia and Star Wars Episode VII. Not only has he helped reboot a decades-old franchise, he’s actually managed to create a sequel that at least equals, if not betters, its predecessor(s). If nothing else, Star Trek Into Darkness is proof positive that Abrams can indeed be trusted to do justice to one of the biggest sci-fi franchises in the world. 

Basically: Not just a great sequel, but a pretty great movie on its own merits.

The Words (2012)

It’s happened before – I’ve read poor to middling reviews for a film, wandered into the cinema with my expectations accordingly dialled down as low as they can go… and wound up really enjoying myself. I figured that could be the case for The Words, which has pretty much been slammed from all corners in a way that suggests either (a) it’s really quite terrible, or (b) it’s one of those oddball cult movies that’s likely to gain its own small, loyal following. So I went in with an open mind – and came away with the unfortunate conviction that The Words is every bit as bad as reviews will have you believe.

The film opens with celebrated author Clay Hammond (Dennis Quaid) reading from his latest novel, which tells the story of Rory Jansen (Bradley Cooper). Rory’s life looks like a charmed one – he’s the new darling of the literary world following the publication of his book, The Window Tears, and he’s deeply in love with his beautiful, supportive wife Dora (Zoe Saldana). But then he meets a mysterious old man (Jeremy Irons), weighed down by years and secrets and pain… and Rory’s fictional world starts to crumble even as Clay finds himself defending his book and protagonist to grad student Daniella (Olivia Wilde), one of his most ardent fans.

To be charitable, I suppose Brian Krugman and Lee Sternthal – who are both credited as directors and writers for The Words – had grand ambitions of devising a profound, literate drama blending a wealth of intriguing questions and themes: what is reality, and what is fiction? What happens when you’re not as good as you hope to be? How far will you go to get what you want? Is it really your story if you don’t get to tell it yourself? Certainly it sounds like an intriguing movie could be concocted out of these elements, one which darts from reality to fiction and back, weaving a cinematic spell from lies and fiction until reality itself is warped and changed.

The Words is not that movie. For much of its running time, it’s pretty inoffensive – a half-baked drama that plods along in its mediocre fashion, with nothing that particularly recommends or condemns it. It’s pretty to look at, Rory and Dora seem like a sweet couple, and the old man’s story is interesting enough as sepia-tinted tales of falling in love on the cobblestoned streets of Paris go.

But then the film reaches its climax, which is a misnomer in this instance because there’s nothing especially exciting about it. At that point, the film actually manages to plunge downhill from its steady plateau. Laughably bad dialogue abounds, the sort that is so clunky that Cooper’s best efforts can’t rescue it. Sometimes, the performances in a film can salvage it from the dustbin of history and The Words really does boast an unusually impressive cast. Tragically, not even Irons can do much to elevate the distinctly poor script, while actors who usually do solid character work like Quaid and Wilde seem to be sleepwalking through their scenes. It feels almost as if the directors cobbled their cast together by calling in favours from the biggest names on their Facebook friends list.

How Klugman and Sternthal’s script ended up on the Black List in 2005, an annual compilation of the best unproduced scripts making the rounds in Hollywood, is a mystery to me. Somehow, from script to screen, the movie floundered and wound up committing the greatest crime imaginable for a film so concerned with the power of language – it failed to find the right words to tell its story.

Basically: A waste of words.

 

 

Published in F*** Magazine (October 2012, issue #33)