Short Reviews #22
Children of Men (2006)
Alfonso Cuarón was always one of those directors to watch. His versatility is amazing. Initially it was the fantastic Y tu mamá también that caught my attention. Then he went on to Hollywood and made the best Harry Potter film, The Prisoner of Azkaban. Now he’s turned his experience with a larger crew and budget to produce one of his best films - Children of Men. This apocalyptic drama, based on the P.D. James novel, is set in the near future of London (2027) where the ability for humans to reproduce has vanished (no reason given) and the people are governed by ruthless dictatorship. Essentially, the world resembles scenes from WW2 with many people being confined to concentration camps under a strict military presence. But there’s also an uprising within from rebels who have in their possession, a young pregnant woman – the first in 18 years. Everybody has an agenda and it’s not always in the best interest of humanity.
What impressed me most about Children of Men is first and foremost the visual element. Cuarón teams up once again with cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki to paint a truly realistic and bleak future of London. There are a few scenes of long, seemingly continuous shots that are breathtakingly realized and will leave you picking your jaw up off the ground. And the CGI is seamless. Performances are all great too. What prevents this from being a 4 star movie is the script. For such a fascinating concept, there could have been more room for density and a slightly larger scope. It’s a very small qualm, but when you strip back the visuals, arguably there isn’t a great deal of depth to the film. Still, this has to be one of the best apocalyptic films to deal with a post-millennium world absorbed in very real and current issues.
Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
Slightly overpraised but highly enjoyable road flick about a dysfunctional family who decide to drive 700 miles to enter their young daughter into a beauty contest. Excellent performances from the entire cast drive this one home (no pun intended) although special mention has to go to Alan Arkin as the heroin snorting grandpa and Abigail Breslin, the 10-year old actress who matches her co-stars every step of the way. Steve Carrell perhaps surprises the most playing very low key and not at all like his other comedy roles (although this film is more a drama than a comedy). Ultimately, there’s a lot to like about Little Miss Sunshine but it’s not quite in ‘indie classic’ territory. Perhaps if the film had more scenes with as much passion and excitement as the truly hilarious, uplifting finale, then it would earn its place amongst the greats. But I’d still highly recommend this for anyone looking for an emotional boost and the fantastic soundtrack by DeVotchka and Sufjan Stevens.
The Illusionist (2006)
Typical Hollywood tactics releasing two ‘magician’ movies within a similar timeframe. Comparisons are therefore inevitable and while I prefer The Prestige in terms of its complexity and philosophical aspects, The Illusionist excels at keeping things much simpler and adding a stronger romantic angle. Both are visually fantastic (although The Illusionist had a much smaller budget) and the performances from Paul Giamatti and Jessica Biel were better than I was expecting. Edward Norton is fine also but far from delivering his best work. The final revelation isn’t too difficult to pick too although the intricacies might leave you scratching your head. Some people call this an arthouse flick but with a big-name American cast and a fairly stock standard Hollywood story, I’d say it’s leaning more towards mainstream sensibilities. Enjoyable but not quite on the same cinematic level as The Prestige.
The Last Kiss (2006)
Look out! It’s Garden State 2! Okay well not really but it stars Zach Braff as a indecisive, angsty male coming to terms with his future, features an ‘indie’ soundtrack that could be mistaken for the Garden State soundtrack and has lots of dramatic ‘coming of age’ moments. I’d say this is another of those guy chick flicks that you’ll enjoy if you liked Garden State, you’re male and around the age of these characters. Well I fall into that category so I more or less liked the film even though Garden State is the better film. But I can see this film really dividing its intended audience. Some will like it and others will hate it with a passion. But hey – if we all agreed on everything the world would be a boring place. This is definitely a more heavy-handed dramatic film than Garden State but it does hit home on a number of levels. The man-who-writes-every-script-in-Hollywood Paul Haggis penned the screenplay and it was better than expected but it’s not without its faults. However he manages to flesh the characters out well enough to make them plausible, even if they’re not particularly likable. Braff goes into quite heavily dramatic territory this time around and he’s not always successful. That honour goes to Jacinta Barrett as his long-term girlfriend Jenna. She steals the movie and gives their relationship a solid grounding and realness. The OC’s Rachel Bilson is cute as hell in her feature debut but not really given much more to work with. Tom Wilkinson and Blythe Danner add more emotional weight as the parents but aren’t really given enough screen time to develop their characters. All up, not a bad attempt at a relationship drama taken from a male’s perspective but how much of it will resonate is highly arguable and dependant on the viewer.
Snakes on a Plane (2006)
Whoooooooooohoooooooooo!!!! Had I seen this in 2006, it definitely would have ended up as the biggest disappointment of the year. All that internet hype, Jackson appearing on every blog, video site and publication on the earth to promote it and I at least hoped for a “So bad it’s good right?” Muahahahaha fuck that! “So bad I wish I could have the past year of my life back to when I even thought this would be a fun movie!”. The one star of this review goes to Jackson for saying “Enough is enough! I have had it with these motherfucking snakes on this motherfucking plane!” because that’s essentially why I wanted to see this in the first place. He says it suitably cheesy and angry but at the frickin’ 90 minute mark! I kept waiting and waiting for it to come and had to endure the torture of the rest of the movie to hear it! No it wasn’t worth it. Nothing is worth seeing this complete disaster of a film and I was even pretty drunk when I watched it! Someone should have told director David R. Ellis to take a note out of James Gunn’s book of how to make great B-grade entertainment.
