Hustle & Flow

I really wanted to see Hustle & Flow since it's triumphant run at Sundance, where it took home all kinds of hardware (including the Audience Award). I figured if a movie about a pimp turned rapper could win over the predominately white, middle aged people at Sundance, then it would probably win me over as well. Craig Brewer's debut film about a pimp at a crossroads is a beautiful and subtle film, buoyed by a dynamite star making performance by Terrence Howard. If you just asked yourself who Terrence Howard is, don't worry, by the end of the year you will know exactly who he is. Hustle & Flow is a movie that seems so authentic, that I was surprised to find out Craig Brewer (the writer and director) was white. He is however from the area of Memphis where this film takes place, which accounts for the realism. Brewer's attention to detail and deeply written 3 dimensional character's along with Howard's star turn as Djay, are the main catalysts that raise Hustle & Flow above the standard fair of it's genre.

Terrence Howard's Djay may be the best performance, but it isn't the only good one. Taryn Manning, Elise Neal, and Paula Jai Parker are all spot on and believable as the women Djay makes his money off of. Djay is small time, getting by on these 3 women and selling some drugs on the side. One of the things that works so well is that Djay and the 3 girls in his stable are treated more like a dysfunctional family. This gives them so much added depth, as you can tell they really care for each other. Taryn Manning does especially good work as Nola, the only girl actually tricking. She is both strong and weak at the same time, a real tricky role that she handles with ease. Anthony Anderson and DJ Qualls also turn in solid performances as the guys brought in to help Djay record his rhymes. But it all comes back to Terrence Howard, who changes emotions on a dime, and gives a depth to Djay that no character in these kinds of movies have ever had. It is the first great performance I have seen this year, and hopefully it will be remembered come Oscar time. He is that good.

This movie is not without it's cliches though. It has a lot of the standard elements of these types of movies, including a character named Skinny Black played by Ludacris. He is a rapper who has hit it big from Memphis, and embodies every bad cliche a rapper can have. Ludacris does what he can with the role, but it just isn't as fleshed out or real feeling as the others. Hustle & Flow is not a perfect movie by any means, but it is probably about as good as a movie about a pimp turned rapper could be. The songs are good, but also believable as the songs of a novice rapper. Equally important is the fact that Terrence Howard is a good rapper, while not coming off too good. This is important for the realistic feel of the film. Howard actually had to learn to rap for the movie, he isn't a fan of rap music, preferring country instead. He may have to warm up to rap music as it may have just made him a star.

Fantastic Four & Charlie And The Chocolate Factory

Fantastic Four is a fun summer blockbuster, the kind we used to get all the time. It works in the way that Armageddon or Bad Boys works, it doesn't pretend to be more than it is. This is a lesson Steven Spielberg should have paid attention to before making the mess that was War Of The Worlds. Fantastic Four is a comic book movie that remembers why the term comic is used. A lot of the really good comic book movies in the last few years have been really serious films, that happen to be based on a comic book. This movie though, seemed to be a comic book come to life. It didn't skimp on funny characters, out of control action scenes, and really evil villains. In other words, this is my kind of comic book movie.

This movie first peaked my interest when I read who they had cast in each of the 5 main roles (the Fantastic 4 and Dr. Doom). The casting with the exception of the terribly miscast Jessica Alba as Sue Storm was spot on. While I always thought George Clooney would have been the perfect Reed Richards, Ioan Gruffudd is a very close second. He looks a lot like the character from the comic book, and really gives off that fatherly vibe that is so important to the character. Sue Storm is supposed to give off a motherly vibe, sadly Jessica Alba is like 19, so while she did what she could, motherly is a bit tough for her to pull off. Chris Evans as the Johnny Storm/Human Torch and Michael Chiklis as the Ben Grimm/The Thing not only are perfect for their roles, but also are great together as what is more less a sibling rivalry. Rounding out the cast is the perfectly slimy Julian McMahon (of the great FX show Nip/Tuck...Chiklis is also from The Shield on FX...FX deserves a producer credit on this) as Dr. Doom, Reed Richards' rival and enemy in pretty much every regard. It was the pitch perfect casting that made this movie work where so many comic book flicks fail.

There is nothing terribly new here, this movie doesn't try to reinvent the wheel. That, along with being the unfortunate comic adaptation to follow Batman Begins has cause a lot of people to be lukewarm to director Tim Story's (of Barbershop and Taxi fame) take on this very popular comic franchise. Now, I am not a comic book guy as I have said many times here, I am aware of the basics of them, but I am not someone complaining over minute details changed from the comic. If you are a fan of fun action movies with out the pretext of being more than that, then this movie is probably for you. If your looking for something with more substance, good luck finding it this summer at a multiplex. You may just have to wait until November before you find a movie that isn't a remake, sequel, or update of a TV show.






Speaking of unnecessary remakes of classic films (am I the king of the segue or what?), Tim Burton's neutered Disney version of Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory is pretty much the first disaster of the new film year (WOTW had enough good to not be classified as a disaster). Ever since this remake got off the ground we were promised that it would be darker...it isn't. We were promised this wouldn't be a remake, but a retelling of the classic kids book...it was pretty close to a copy of the original, except without the good or dark parts. I thought Tim Burton was going to make a dark comedy update of the original, instead he sold out to make some money.

I know what your thinking, how was Johnny Depp? The answer is...slightly amusing. Depp's take on Willy Wonka was pretty much Michael Jackson in Marilyn Manson's clothes. He was more weird and retarded than mean, which keeps with the theme of comercializing the film. Depp did a decent job with what he had to work with, but ultimately he was nothing close to comparing with Gene Wilder. Freddie Highmore, fresh off his performance in Finding Neverland, turns in by far the best performance in the film. He is so wholesome, that you totally believe him as this do the right thing type kid. That is key because we don't see nearly enough of his family to ever get a sense of why he is how he is. Other than Wonka and Charlie, every other character in this movie is a one dimensional character just there to movie the story along. Charlie even has a dad in this one. I bet some genius thought that would add another 5 million in box office.

The biggest problem with the movie is what all they left out or changed. The tunnel scene which is the best part of the original movie is now gone. Slugworth...gone. Wonka turning on Charlie at the end...gone. We even get to see that all the kids are ok and not hurt at the end, cause you can't make 200 million at the box office if people think some kids die in your movie. There were also equally stupid things added to the film. A backstory with Wonka and his dad is pointless and ruins the mystery that should be Willy Wonka. Mike Teevee is now a video game junkie. The goose that lays the golden egg is now squirrels. They even managed to mess up the poor little Oompa Loompas. The choice of using one guy to play all of them was bad enough, but their songs were dreadful, nothing like the great dark songs in the original. I am sure there are probably plenty of other things wrong with this movie, but I am getting annoyed just thinking about it so I better end it now. The most annoying thing of all was that after 2 hours of bad cinema, the soccer moms and 10 year olds at my theater gave it a standing ovation. I guess that means more awful remakes of my childhood favorites are right around the corner. Nora Ephron remaking Goonies perhaps.

Random Top 10 Lists (60's Films)

10. Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid (1969)
9. Breathless (1960)
8. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
7. Psycho (1960)
6. Easy Rider (1969)
5. Bonnie And Clyde (1967)
4. The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
3. Lawrence Of Arabia (1962)
2. The Graduate (1967)
1. Dr. Strangelove (1964)


Just Missed: Cool Hand Luke (1967), Goldfinger (1964), The Hustler (1961), Jules And Jim (1962), Lolita (1962), Midnight Cowboy (1969), Night Of The Living Dead (1968), Planet Of The Apes (1968).

War Of The Worlds

Steven Spielberg's adaptation of the classic H.G. Wells novel is one of the most frustrating films I have seen in quite a while. This movie seemed like a sure thing, a classic novel in the hands of a great director with a first rate cast. Looks can be deceiving. There are 2 basic stories at play in WOTW. One about aliens who come down to earth to take over, and another about a deadbeat dad who tries to keep himself and his kids safe during the invasion. The family drama worked fine, the war was a complete mess.

The one thing I have come to expect from a Steven Spielberg blockbuster is that it will be smarter than the average summer movie. That is not the case here. There are plot holes and holes in the logic of the film big enough to drive a truck through. Why would aliens set all this up thousands of years before humans to wage a war against humans, when they could have just taken the planet then? That is just one of the many examples of the dumbing down of WOTW, a movie that seems to have changed the good and kept the bad from the book. The aliens look like rehashes of previous movie aliens and the effects were not nearly as cool as I was expecting. Of course, the main problem with this movie, the thing that made me go from being mildly amused to totally disappointed is the terrible ending. This is one of the most anticlimactic endings in the history of film. And to make matters worse, it doesn't even fit with the rest of the film. It's as if Spielberg made a popcorn film for an hour and 45 minutes then tried to make it a serious sci-fi movie in the last 10 minutes. It is like A.I. all over again.

What makes this movie infinitely frustrating is that there is also a lot of good stuff here. The family drama portion of the film worked perfectly. Tom Cruise was believable both as the deadbeat dad and the likeable father he becomes. Despite the fact that I am one more stupid comment from wanting to punch Tom Cruise in the face, he is still a solid actor. Justin Chatwin and Dakota Fanning play the 2 kids. Chatwin is solid, but Fanning is the real star, her fear throughout the movie is unnerving and never lets you forget the carnage going on around them. Tim Robbins and Miranda Otto also pop up, but their roles are pretty 1-dimensional. There is a scene however between Robbins and Cruise toward the end of the movie that was a great scene, and much darker than anything you usually see in movies like this. And I think that is what makes this movie so frustrating, it tried to be both a summer blockbuster and a serious science fiction film and ultimately becomes neither.

Spielberg's use of September 11th references and imagery (along with Holocaust and WW2) is unnerving, but works in making you feel the realness of the situation. It was a great risk for him to do that, as most film industry people feel it is still to soon. Spielberg should be applauded for some of the things he does here and booed for others. A smarter script and this movie could have been a classic, but as it is we have a movie that is smart when convenient and dumb when convenient. A terrible ending, tons of plotholes, and a lack of visual originality ultimately doom War Of The Worlds to being one of the few Spielberg letdowns. Here's hoping he rights the ship for his Oscar hopeful Vengeance that's shooting now.

Oscar Predictions (Halfway Point)

As many of my more faithful readers know, I am a bit of an amateur Oscar predictor. I tend to do very well predicting Oscar nominees by simply going by trends and buzz, instead of my personal views of the film. So here is my predictions at the halfway point. Obviously this will radically change as most of these movies have yet to be released and some will likely be pushed back to next year.


Best Picture

Vengeance
Memoirs Of A Geisha
Jarhead
Walk The Line
The New World

Other contenders: Cinderella Man, Brokeback Mountain, Elizabethtown.

Best Actor

Joaquin Phoenix (Walk The Line)
Tommy Lee Jones (The Three Burials Of Melquiades Estrada)
Russell Crowe (Cinderella Man)
George Clooney (Syriana)
Eric Bana (Vengeance)

Other contenders: Sean Penn (All The King's Men), Viggo Mortensen (A History Of Violence), Jake Gyllenhaal (Jarhead), Phillip Seymore Hoffman (Capote).

Best Actress

Felicity Huffman (Transamerica)
Judi Dench (Mrs. Henderson Presents)
Zhang Ziyi (Memoirs Of A Geisha)
Reese Witherspoon (Walk The Line)
Joan Allen (The Upside Of Anger)

Other contenders: Charlize Theron (Class Action), Annette Benning (Running With Scissors), Uma Thurman (Prime).

Best Director

Steven Spielberg (Vengeance)
Rob Marshall (Memoirs Of A Geisha)
Terrence Malick (The New World)
Sam Mendes (Jarhead)
James Mangold (Walk The Line)

Other contenders: Tommy Lee Jones (The Three Burials Of Melquiades Estrada), Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain), Ron Howard (Cinderella Man), Cameron Crowe (Elizabethtown).

Best Supporting Actor

Paul Giamatti (Cinderella Man)
Jude Law (All The King's Men)
Peter Sarsgaard (Jarhead)
Daniel Craig (Vengeance)
Ed Harris (A History Of Violence)

Other contenders: Ken Watanabe (Memoirs Of A Geisha), Christopher Plummer (The New World), Anthony Hopkins (Proof), Matt Damon (Syriana).

Best Supporting Actress

Patricia Clarkson (All The King's Men)
Meryl Streep (Prime)
Susan Sarandon (Elizabethtown)
Toni Collette (In Her Shoes)
Frances McDormand (Class Action)

Other contenders: Maria Bello (A History Of Violence), Rene Zellweger (Cinderella Man), Kirsten Dunst (Elizabethtown), Hope Davis (Proof).

Best Original Screenplay

Vengeance
Elizabethtown
The Three Burials Of Melquiades Estrada
Walk The Line
The New World

Other contenders: Cinderella Man, Match Point, Prime.

Best Adapted Screenplay

Memoirs Of A Geisha
Syriana
Jarhead
Art School Confidential
Brokeback Mountain

Other contenders: In Her Shoes, A History Of Violence, All The King's Men, Class Action, Proof.