Review: Stoker (2013) delivers the gothic goods.

Stoker

2013
100 minutes
rated R

by Scott Mendelson

Park Chan-Wook's Stoker is a delicious hybrid of its influences, which mix into an engaging fable of its own.  Written by Wenworth Miller (yeah, the Prison Break guy), the picture doesn't reinvent any wheels but offers strong genre pleasures for those who like 'this kind of thing'.  To say it's well-acted is almost redundant when your film is toplined by Mia Wasikowska, Matthew Goode, and Nicole Kidman.  Stoker is stylish, thoughtful and wears its influences on its sleeve while stilling spinning its own web.  It is part Shadow of a Doubt, part Hamlet while finding new territory to explore in the somewhat well-worn road of 'a young girl's coming of age/sexual awakening'.  It is a slow but ultimately hypnotic tale that is told with a certain tastefulness that makes its moments of misbehavior all the more jolting.

Review: The Paperboy (2012) is a messy and disjointed, but superbly acted piece of southern film noir.

The Paperboy

2012
106 minutes
rated R

by Scott Mendelson

Lee Daniels's The Paperboy is a movie that frankly skirts by purely on the good will of its actors.  The story is pretty much a wash, even if its mundane nature wins points for probable realism.  The narrative is mostly drained of pulse-quickening melodrama, but with little of substance to take its place.  And the third act simply lounges about before halfheartedly building to a seemingly arbitrary conclusion.  Despite all of these demerits, the picture is mostly entertaining, and pretty much full credit should go to its cast.  Nearly every major cast-member is somewhat playing against type, and the film qualifies in the end as a modest acting treat.  It's not a good film and it barely qualifies as a good movie, but as a showcase of some surprisingly nuanced acting, it merits a viewing and a token recommendation.

07/16/99 - When the studios blew the best chance to legitimize the NC-17.

As seems to happen every year, bloggers, critics, and pundits are up-in-arms over an Oscar-bait film being awarded or threatened with an NC-17.  As usual, the film in question is a critically-acclaimed adult film with strong sexual content.  And once again, the many people arguing about this are missing the real problem.  Yes, it's annoying that ultra-violent horror films like Saw VII get R ratings while adult films with somewhat explicit sexual content get NC-17 ratings.  And yes it's annoying when somewhat more sensationalistic sexual content like that found in Black Swan gets an R while the apparently mature and allegedly thoughtful sexual content in Steve McQueen's Shame gets tagged with an NC-17.  But the problem is not with the rating, but with the enforcement of said rating.  Put simply, if major theater chains were willing to carry NC-17 pictures and mainstream media outlets would carry advertising for NC-17 pictures, then the debate over what film got what rating would be moot.  As it is, the problem with the NC-17 is not its seemingly arbitrary application (IE - far more likely for sex than for violence), but how it is viewed by the industry and the general moviegoers.

An oft-told tale: Why Point Break is this era's Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

The film world rolled their eyes in collective disgust yesterday after it was announced that Warner Bros. was financing and/or distributing a remake of Kathryn Bigelow's Point Break.  That 1991 cult-favorite of course starred Keanu Reeves as FBI Agent Johnny Utah, who goes undercover as a surfer to catch a gang of bank robbers, led by Patrick Swayze, who pull heists to finance their endless summer.  The film is cheesy to the point of being high opera, but I always admired how straight-faced it was, and how seriously it took its violence.  The picture takes awhile to achieve a body count, but when it does, its jolting.  In this film, the loss of any life, be it an innocent bank guard or one of the robbers, was tragic and cause for mourning.  And the finale was refreshingly grim, acknowledging that a violent crime story doesn't have a happy ending just because the bad guys all died.

Weekend Box Office (01/30/11): The Rite tops, The Mechanic opens well, and Oscar nominees continue to soar.

While there were two major openers over the weekend and both of them opened within expectations, the real news was the performance of the various Oscar nominees that were in a position to capitalize on last week's nominations. Generally speaking, the news was good all around. Topping the weekend was The Rite, as the heavily-advertised religious thriller opened with $15 million. As far as religious horror pictures go, it pales to the $30 million scored by The Exorcism of Emily Rose in 2005, the $19 million earned by The Exorcist: The Beginning in 2004, the $20 million earned in the opening jaunt of The Last Exorcism several months ago (a surprisingly terrific little movie, by the way), and even the $19 million opening weekend of Stigmata from way back in September 1999. Still, The Rite had less overtly horror-ific moments to highlight in the ad campaign, as it mainly had a few fleeting shots of supernatural terror plus Anthony Hopkins to sell. The $35 million Warner Bros/New Line Cinema release will do just fine in the long run, and the film (for what it's worth) is Anthony Hopkins's biggest opening weekend for a top-billed star vehicle where he doesn't play Hannibal Lecter.

When a film 'flops', always blame the actress. If a film doesn't flop, call it a flop and blame the actress. If a film is a hit, blame the actor.

The Huffington Post linked to the AP box office analysis piece yesterday with their own headline, titled simply 'Gwyneth flops'. It wasn't a surprise, as Huff Post (which I of course contribute to) and other entertainment websites and publications never miss a chance to trash any given actress for anything whatsoever. Never mind that Country Strong was a $15 million picture that opened with $7.3 million in the first three days, guaranteeing long-term profitability. Never mind that the opening weekend of Country Strong was nearly double the single-largest weekend ($4.2 million) for last year's Crazy Heart. It's no fun to merely report that Paltrow's small picture had a modest opening that was relatively successful in regards to its budget and Paltrow's long untested drawing power. It's so much easier (and more fun) to just proclaim the film a flop and take the bitch down a peg or two. Because it's always the girl's fault, even when there is no fault to be had.