thursday, august 28, 2003
jayplay.21
4
Mark Wahlberg - showing off a lighter side we haven't seen enough of - plays cool-headed mastermind Charlie, who pulls off an elaborate "Italian job" before he and his crew are side-swiped on a Venice bridge by a greedy comrade named Frezelli (Edward Norton). Charlie tracks Frezelli to the States to reclaim his booty and hook up with his mentor's squeaky-clean daughter, Stella, played by super-babe Charlize Theron.
What follows isn't so much about the logistics of revenge as it is about the winning comic banter of Charlie's team, made up of computer-nerd Seth Green (Austin Powers), ladies-man Jason Statham (Snatch) and explosives-expert Mos Def (Bamboozled). Crime definitely pays in The Italian Job - for the cast, for the viewer and especially for F. Gary Gray, whose suave direction has kept the movie's box-office grosses at a steady pace for three months.
Stephen Shupe Grade: A-
JEEPERS CREEPERS 2
R. 106 minutes, South Wind 12
The Creeper's hunger strike is over and it's back terrorizing the kids along the infamous East 9 Highway. After winning a championship game, a busload of basketball players, cheerleaders and coaches journey home, only to break down on the side of the road. Of course, the Creeper — up to the usual feeding-frenzy tricks as its flesh-eating 23 days come to a close — is to blame.
The teens must ban together and fight this winged demon before the body count reaches the heavens. Writer-director Victor Salva returns, again with a cast of unknowns, a low budget and, from the looks of the trailers, the same visually superlative sense of camera placement and stunt work.
Stephen Shupe Not reviewed
MARCI X
R,100 minutes,South Wind 12
(Friends) and Damon Wayans (Bamboozled) star in what was probably supposed to be a satirical look at the world of hip-hop and corporate America. Instead, it's an hour and a half of boring dialogue, over-the-top characters and an almost inexplicable plot.
In Marci X, Lisä Kudrow
Kudrow plays Marci, a New York socialite who takes over her father's business after he suffers a heart attack. Marci must tackle the controversy surrounding an album released by Dr. S (Wayans), whose record label is a subsidiary of Marci's inherited company.
Marci and Dr. S inevitably bump heads, find out they have a lot in common and settle everything in the end in a nice, happy bowtie way.
A central theme to this movie is being "real", true and honest, which seems incredibly hypocritical considering the film is riddled with stereotypes, caricatures and flat, static characters who seem to learn nothing.
Cal Creek
Grade:D-
THE MEDALLION
PG-13, 90 minutes, South Wind 12
Think The Golden Childbut good.
Foppish actor Lee Evans, as a bumbling fellow agent named Watson, contributes heavily to the film's broad comic streak which, combined with the relative bloodlessness of the fight scenes, make this a worthy entertainment for both kids and adults. Some of the dialogue looks dubbed, as if subtitles were planned then later dropped. But
Jackie Chan, 49 and still steamrolling along, plays an Interpol agent who's after an ancient medallion, "the holy grail of eastern mythology." A little Asian boy controls the medallion's power to give immortality, which makes him a target for a voluptuously evil villain named Snakehead (Julian Sands). Snake's flamboyant red robes and castle dwellings play up the fact that this is really a live-action video game; it's all crisp cuts and cool mystique.
the fights and chases are kind of exhilarating, attaining a level of anti-gravity that leaves almost everyone airborne. Bullets couldn't fly this fast, and how refreshing that they don't in this era of the mean-spirited action movie.
—Stephen Shupe
Grade: B
OPEN RANGE
PG-13. 117 minutes. South Wind 12
Kevin Costner's beautifully handmade new western offers downbeat, alternative programming at the end of a summer when movies pummeled audiences into a brain-dead stupor. The film's slow pacing and patient attention to detail make it a risky proposition for the college crowd. But kinetic or not, the movie is made to last where others are content to rip you off in the opening weekend before fizzling out.
Costner crafts a familiar tale about good cowboys and corrupt lawmen primed for a bloody showdown, but he directs with the same humanistic spin that warmed white audiences to Dances With Wolves, a three-hour epic about the slaughter of Native Americans.
Open Range feels a bit laborious in its middle parts, and a more disciplined director might have chopped off the film's drawn-out closing sequences. But the first act is truly lovely, with idyllic images of the Rocky Mountains providing a backdrop for another wonderful performance by the young Mexican actor Diego Luna (Y Tu Mama Tambien). Costner's stylish climactic shootout proves he may yet live down the critical drubbing he took for The Postman.
—Stephen Shupe Grade: B+
S.W.A.T
PG-13, 117 minutes. South Wind 12
The star-packed police action movie S.W.A.T. brings nothing new or original to its genre. Director Clark Johnson and his plethora of screenwriters have
delivered one of the most clichéd vehicles to hit the screen all summer.
S. W.A.T. is really a two-part movie. The first part explains how Sgt. Hondo (Samuel L. Jackson, Pulp Fiction) puts together a ragtag group of outcasts to form his S.W.A.T. team. This includes unoriginal training montages and their first series of boring assignments.
The second part of the film pits the S.W.A.T. team against a terrorist who promises $100 million to anyone who can free him from U.S. custody.
This movie is so amazingly clichéd that it has characters with names like Street and Gamble and a "paper-pushingjerk of a captain." It plays on racial stereotypes, and delivers dialogue that's really just a series of oneliners fired from one character to another.
The movie gets progressively boring with each minute that passes and all the explosions in the world cannot save the predictably formulaic ending.
It is unfortunate that a cast of relatively accomplished actors like Jackson, Rodriguez and Farrell were not given more to work with.
Cal Creek Grade:D
SWIMMING POOL
R. 102 minutes. Liberty Hall
Offering an intriguing perspective on the new movie game of shifting identities and doubling realities (see Fight Club, A Beautiful Mind, Identity...), Swimming Pool stars Charlotte Rampling as mystery author Sarah Morton.
Sarah arrives at her publisher's secluded French villa to write a book and lounge around the swimming pool. Trouble shows up in the form of the publisher's daughter, Julie (Ludivine Sagnier), who proceeds to bring home new lovers each night to have rude sex with.
But there's more, or maybe not. Swimming Pool's revelations are in keeping with the director whose work it most closely resembles: Brian De Palma. Like De Palma's masterful suspense shockers such as Dressed to Kill and Blowout, this playful, ingeniously designed French thriller introduces twists too melodramatic to believe, but treats them too seriously to dismiss.
—Stephen Shupe
Grade: A-
After a single viewing, the movie ultimately leaves too many unanswered questions, but pay attention to the clues (a window frame, a dream sequence by the pool) given by cowriter/director Francois Ozon.
X2: X-MEN UNITED
PG-13. 124 minutes. Woodruff Auditorium (SUA)
Director Bryan Singer and his poor misunderstood mutants return for a second go-around. This time, a military scientist named Stryker launches an attack on Professor Xavier's mansion, ending in a full-on war between mutants and humans. Singer still can't direct action with any amount of competence, but his characters are vibrant and their dialogue snappy. (I'll admit it: Cynical Steve underrated this one when it was released last May.)
It's called X-Men United but it feels like X-Men the Next Generation as the script focuses on youthful mutants such as Pyro, a brooding outcast who can manipulate fire, and Iceman, Rogue's chill-inducing boyfriend. By the end, Pyro switches over to the dark side, a development that could have climaxed in a kick-ass fight between him and Iceman that, alas, never arrives.
The sequel may lack the gothart touches that make Tim Burton movies so impressive, but it's redeemed by solid acting work from reliable Brits such as Brian Cox, Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellan.
—Stephen Shupe
Grade: B
Theater locations:
Liberty Hall. 642 Massachusetts St.
(749-1912)
South Wind 12 Theatres. 3433 Iowa St.
(832-0880)