John Gosling previews the weekend's new films (09-28-12)

Looper is a new science-fiction feature from Brick director, Rian Johnson and stars Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis and Emily Blunt. Levitt plays Joseph Simmons, a 'looper' who works for the mob. A very well paid assassin, it's his job to kill people sent back from the future, where time travel has been perfected, but outlawed. 'Loopers' only operate on one rule - never let your target escape. Major problems arise when Simmons comes face to face with his next hit and discovers it is a future version of himself (Played by Willis). In the confusion, the older version escapes, leaving a young Simmons in a race against time to put things right before the mob step in - all the while knowing that if he succeeds, he will become his own murderer.  Johnson began developing Looper once production on his previous film, The Brothers Bloom was completed in 2008, with a view to start work some time in 2009. While things didn't come together as quickly as anticipated, by May 2010 he had script and had cast Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the lead role, the two having previously worked together on 2005's Brick. Willis would join the picture later that same month, with Blunt added to the cast in October. Shooting on the $60M Looper got underway in January 2011 (after a short delay while Levitt worked on Premium Rush) taking in Louisiana and Shanghai among its locations.

Review: Looper (2012) is thoughtful and intelligent sci-fi.

Looper

2012
119 minutes
rated R

by Scott Mendelson

Rian Johnson's Looper is less an out-and-out original work as a hodgepodge made up from bits and pieces from other iconic science fiction stories stirred into a relatively tasty stew.  It has an admirable courage, both in content and structure.  It is unafraid to go to some very dark places and it establishes a perfectly clever initial premise but uses it merely as a springboard for a whole different kind of tale.  Its first half is relentlessly entertaining, clever, and unpredictable.  But once Johnson settles into his story of choice, the film becomes somewhat of a waiting game while we merely attempt to guess if Johnson has any more tricks up his sleeve and what they might be if he does.  But make no mistake, Looper is a strongly conceived and character-driven character drama wrapped up in a science-fiction thriller.  It is well-acted and expertly constructed, and I appreciated its eventual intentions.

No girls allowed? On the value of *not* arbitrarily inserting token love interests into male-centric genre films.

Let us for a moment highlight two of the many would-be Oscar bait pictures rolling out in the next couple months. Ben Affleck's Argo, which opens today, has instantly shot up to the upper-levels of many filmgoers' 'must see' list for the Fall.  Also pretty high on the list for film buffs is Andrew Dominik's Killing Them Softly.  Aside from the strong reviews that both films have already racked up prior to even being screened for most critics (ah, the festival circuit!), the one thing that sticks out about both films is the near absence of females in major roles.  The trailer for Killing Them Softly was notable for its complete absence of females.  Argo has few women in its trailer and seemingly only has female characters where they would make sense, be they among the Americans caught in Iran during the 1979 hostage crisis or people in the government who just happen to be female (the most notable seems to be Adrienne Barbeau).  Point being, having now seen both films, both are very very good and neither of these films felt the need to shoe-horn in female characters in otherwise all-male stories, and both films are better for it.  

Weekend Box Office (04/29/12): Think Like a Man tops again as four new releases perform relatively poorly. Oh, and The Avengers assemble overseas to the tune of $178 million.

In the weekend before the official start of the summer season, four new releases, all of which were relatively smaller fare, all debuted to numbers ranging from not awful to genuinely awful (or example 4,321 on why comparing total weekend box office is stupid).  The top film this weekend was once again Think Like A Man, which dropped a surprisingly decent 46%, earning another $18 million.  The ensemble romantic comedy has now earned $60 million, putting it on track to be among the domestic bigger grossers of the first 1/3 of 2012.  If we're specifically talking 'black-films', then the Tim Story picture is a few days from outgrossing every Tyler Perry movie save Madea Goes to Jail, which grossed $90 million three years ago (the second highest-grossing Perry film is the $63 million-grossing Madea's Family Reunion). With a smaller drop and a larger second weekend off a $8 million-smaller opening weekend, it may pass that mark all the way to $100 million if it can hold onto screens as summer begins.  It will soon surpass the $65 million gross of Barbershop 2, the $67 million gross of Waiting to Exhale, and the $75 million gross of Barbershop within the next full week.  It's also out-grosssed and/or will likely out-gross any number of higher-profile 'white' romantic comedies or dramas (the $81 million-grossing Dear John, the $84 million-grossing Stupid, Crazy Love, the $54 million-grossing New Year's Eve, etc).  Usually when a $12 million-budgeted film ends up flirting with $100 million, studios respond with sequels and/or star-vehicles for certain higher-profile cast-members.  We'll see if Hollywood again writes off this 'unconventional' smash hit as a 'fluke' or whether Kevin Hart, Gabrielle Union, and Meagan Good (among others) get any 'bumps' off this film's unquestionable success.

Trailer: Looper looks like an old-school 'movie' in the best sense of the word.

Well, this looks like pure unadulterated genre fun.  Yes it looks not all-that different from any number of action thrillers, but I'm the guy who gave a "B" to Lockout.  Kudos for apparently casting Emily Blunt as something other than the stock love-interest (Piper Perabo seems to be filling that role, despite being five-years older than Joseph Gordon-Levitt no less). Kudos for getting the exposition out of the way and not revealing all-that much after the first-act hook.  There are certainly hints of twists and turns (Jeff Daniels looks like a walking story turn) and this looks like a rock-solid B-movie blast.  Point being, this is another fine example of the most promising trend of the last few years: the return of the 'movie'.  You know what I mean.  It doesn't cost $150-$300 million.  It has real stars and real character actors playing in the genre sandbox.  It's not based on a well-known source material and it may even be wholly original.  It's not a tentpole or would-be franchise starter, it's just (hopefully) a good story well-told with good actors delivering sharp dialogue.  You know... a 'movie'.  *That's* what Looper looks like and what it represents.  Looper drops September 28th.  As always, we'll see...

Scott Mendelson 

Waited for DVD: The Adjustment Bureau - Free will is terrific, except when it's really destiny in disguise.

The Adjustment Bureau
2011
105 minutes
rated PG-13

by Scott Mendelson

There are any number of movies that make less sense after you think about them then they did as you were watching them.  But The Adjustment Bureau is not only a movie that makes little sense as your watching it, but basically betrays its own philosophy in the process.  Since this is a DVD review, I'm going to be more spoilery than I otherwise would be for a pre-theatrical glance.  There are three major problems with the picture that render the well-intentioned romantic thriller relatively useless as both an emotional entertainment and as an intellectual exercise.  So, if I may forgo the usual plot synopsis, let me cut to the chase...

Weekend Box Office (03/06/11): Two openers (Rango and Adjustment Bureau) win, two openers (Beastly, Take Me Home Tonight) lose.

Paramount released its first non-Dreamworks cartoon in nearly five years this weekend. And indeed, the number one film by a long shot was Gore Verbinski's Rango (teaser/review). The critically-acclaimed and nearly-existential Johnny Depp vehicle grossed $38 million over the three-day weekend. That's the biggest opening for a Paramount animated feature not from Dreamworks, although it's slightly behind in attendance compared to the $32 million opening of The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie back in November of 2004. Paramount's animated fare has been exclusively Dreamworks since the August 2006 release of Barnyard: The Original Party Animals. Since they acquired Dreamworks in early 2006, they've basically been just releasing the Katzenberg cartoons. But prior to that, they actually had a good thing going with Nickelodeon, although they have released a few Nickelodeon live-action co-ventures over the last few years (Charlotte's Web, Hotel For Dogs, etc). This will hopefully mark the return of Nickelodeon-funded animated features. Can't let Disney have all the fun.

Guest Review: The Adjustment Bureau (2011)

As happens from time to time, a reader and collegue was able to attend an early screening of an upcoming release and was willing to send his thoughts along. This time, Brandon Peters offers a spoiler-free look at The Adjustment Bureau, which opens this Friday.

The Adjustment Bureau
2011
99 minutes
PG-13

by Brandon Peters

The Adjustment Bureau is an adaptation from the Philip K. Dick short The Adjustment Team. A Philip K. Dick fan am I, however I have not read any of his shorts collections. So, I cannot supply comparisons to the source material. While The Adjustment Bureau is not quite a film spawned from Dick’s works like Blade Runner, Total Recall or A Scanner Darkly, it is nowhere close to the likes of Next or Imposter.

When the MPAA spoils the movie: Rated 'Annoying' for overly descriptive ratings explanations.

While The Adjustment Bureau looks like a pretty mediocre movie on its own, there is now yet another reason it may not be worth checking out. Judging from the trailer, much of the film seems to involve Matt Damon dragging Emily Blunt by the hand as they outrun a bunch of black-suited men who basically want to tune their fates. Yes, it's another movie where the girl is apparently incapable of running away from danger by herself, even when she's a professional ballet dancer. But I digress... the film is theoretically a suspense picture, so we're theoretically supposed to be in suspense when Damon and Blunt attempt to escape their nefarious pursuers. But I won't be. Not because I do or don't care whether or not Damon screws over the ambitions and dreams of a girl he barely knows because he thinks she's pretty. No, it's because, thanks to the MPAA, I know that no harm will actually befall them. The Adjustment Bureau is rated PG-13 for "for brief strong language, some sexuality and a violent image". Yes, just one violent image in the whole movie. So cheer up Damon and Blunt, you're probably going to be just fine.

The Adjustment Bureau gets two awful posters.

These may be two of the lamest pieces of poster art in a long time. Aside from the fact that Emily Blunt apparently cannot run without the help of Matt Damon (she plays a ballet dancer, which means she's probably in much better shape than he is), the entire layout looks poorly photoshopped and not the least bit serious. If this movie is somekind of jokey nod to Hitchcock's man-on-the-run thrillers, then so be it. But the trailer seems to be selling this as a serious thriller. I don't think anyone can look at these posters, especially the tall one with its 'okay, pose for the camera and pretend to run... now!' character shots, and do anything but giggle. Poster fail.

Scott Mendelson