Okay, help me out film-buffs: Are all Jim Jarmusch movies as sloppily written and mechanically acted as The Dead Don't Die? Is this the point? I only appear to have seen one other thing on his resumé, but I tend to hear his name spoken with respect and some artistic reverence. And this movie inspires neither.
OUTBREAK The Dead Don't Die is a film where a zombie outbreak occurs in a small, backwater American town. That's about it. There's not really a story, it's more a series of events, most of which are interlinked by the chronology of the piece, if nothing else. The dead come back to life and start attacking the living, a lot of people die as a result. That's about it. Oh, and Iggy Pop in zombie-makeup looks exactly like Iggy Pop. Make of that what you will.
This feels like Jarmusch hates zombie films and has decided to take that out on an unsuspecting genre-audience. The movie is overflowing with clumsy, literal dialogue. Characters narrate their inner monologue, repeat each other as if they're stalling for time and describe everything they do or see. Form an audio standpoint, it's like a badly improvised radio drama that's somehow been caught on film.
The problem could be that stiltedly reproducing something in a wry yet artless manner is not the same as deconstructing it. And if you're not going to deconstruct your subject, don't try to make a smug, arthouse-friendly movie about it. All the knowing glances and fourth-wall-nudging in the world can't stop this from feeling like the first draft of a pastiche written by somebody who's only seen two zombie movies but figures they know enough to have a crack at writing their own anyway. Because if I can't let Crispian Mills get away with using fracking as a plot device, I'm sure as shit not going to let Jim Jarmusch walk out with it under his arm either.
MRS DOUBTFIRE That cast, though. You've got to assume they were drawn in by either the reputation or existing relationship with the director, rather than reading the script. That's assuming there's a script. Most of the delivery here sounds like the cast are either ad-libbing or having their lines fed directly to them through an earpiece as the camera rolls. It's all deliberate of course, but imaging spending this much money just for Bill Murray to look uncomfortably bored. The film has a few wry chuckles and some good ideas, but doesn't employ the vocabulary it needs to express them properly*1.
And because there's no structured story, Jim didn't have to write an ending! The film finishes because the characters die, with no drama, excitement or intrigue. A decomposing, stone-cold mess. Not half as clever as it thinks it is, but twice as boring.
I can tell that Jarmusch is trying to provoke the casual audience who will watch this because of its cast, its title or its poster-art. And if anything, I thoroughly respect the product for being precisely what he intended to make.
But The Dead Don't Die is the emperor's new clothes of zombie movies.
Tellingly, transparently so…
Level 1: Kylo Ren is in this. There's also a Star Destroyer reference which I imagine is supposed to come off as ironic, but it's as self-indulgent as everything else in the film.
*1 Now there's a Film-Twat™ thing to say, and I'm delighted it's come while writing about a Jim Jarmusch movie, if only because I know how vehemently yet disdainfully he'd disagree with it... [ BACK ]
DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.
Stuber Cert: 15 / 93 mins / Dir. Michael Dowse / Trailer
Y'know not long from now, using Uber as a plot-point in your movie is going to look about as cool as a MySpace reference. Tread carefully, writers. Anyway, Stuber is what happens when you put two supporting actors in leading roles*1 and hope that the goodwill of the audience will fill any gaps.
DRIVER Kumail Nanjiani plays Stu, an unassuming Uber driver (this is the joke, do you see? Stu. Uber. 'Stuber'. Do you see?) and sporting-goods store clerk who wants to run his own fitness studio. Dave Bautista plays Vic, an bullish yet efficient police officer who is recovering from laser eye-surgery, meaning he can't drive his own car. Vic books a car via the aforementioned app, and Stu ends up being his unwitting partner in law-enforcement for the day. As this odd couple learn to get along, each realises that the other is exactly what they need right now, and of course there's plenty of ha-ha-hilarity along the way! Also, a lot of people get shot in the face.
Well, if you're in the market for an hour and a half of gunfire and wide-eyed shrieking, your cab has arrived. Apparently Dave Bautista myopically bumping into shit is the new 'Kevin James Falls Over For An Hour And A Half'. When it's being a lightheared actioner, Stuber is just about passable. When the movie is being an outright comedy it really struggles. Which is odd, because both of its starts can do comedy, they're just choosing not to. There's more grunting and tyre-screeching than dialogue in this movie, and Dave still has too many lines. The reason Drax worked is because he didn't say that much.
METRO The frustrated bickering between the two leads means the film squeaks past the six-laugh-test, but only just. In many ways it's a shame that director Michael Dowse is such a fan of bad language and gratuitous headshots, because at heart this is a kids' comedy*2. A buddy-cop movie where only one of them is the cop, this isn't awful but it's certainly unapologetic Filler™. Failing whenever it tries to take itself too seriously (so the first and third acts, basically), the number of quips in the trailer that don't make it into the final cut suggest thousands of miles of B-roll footage (not to mention slack direction). Pity the film's editor, if nothing else.
The likeability of its cast isn't enough to save Stuber, but it may just be enough to elevate it to 'conveniently forgettable'…
Well put it this way, I see Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg have stopped returning 20th Century Fox's calls...
*1"Oh" you exclaim, "Kumail Nanjiani isn't a supporting actor, he was the main dude in The Big Sick!". Yes. This is precisely my point, thank you. [ BACK ]
DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.
The Matrix Cert: 15 / 136 mins / Dir. Lilly Wachowski & Lana Wachowski / Trailer
And so I sat down to watch The Matrix in the cinema for the first time*1 on a Saturday night in 2019. And it was packed. I'm not sure if this is a testament to the pulling power of Keanu Reeves or just a standard weekend attendance. Being massively anti-social and an absolute snob, I usually avoid my local on Friday and Saturday evenings. But I digress.
INDUSTRIAL It's a strong start to The Matrix that we begin in medias res, even if this results in industrial levels of exposition further down the line. And we hit the ground running with beautifully choreographed fight scenes, hyper-kinetic editing and the famous effects-shots. The film is ambitious in its scope (although it wasn't the first to be) but also groundbreaking in its execution - even if Bullet Time isn't quite the jaw-dropper is was in the last millennium. Still not every sci-fi movie gets books of actual essays written about it. The Matrix isn't reinventing the wheel, it's just happy to be a spoke in one which already exists.
The movie's long-lasting appeal lies in it being enjoyable on two levels: throwaway dystopian actioner and/or mythological philosophy piece. Best of all, that balance isn't open to interpretation. No matter which end gives you your kicks, it's overtly a mix of both, and they can be it can be enjoyed on either or both levels simultaneously. Parts two and three went more firmly down that second path of course, hence their more 'mixed' reception*2. But even this first film is loaded with symbolism, numerology and literary references, both on the surface and below it. Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard Of Oz and more biblical nods than you can shake a mitre at.
HOUSING Unlike the majority of action flicks, The Matrix challenges its audience to think. It encourages debate long after the credits have rolled. The characters force the audience to ask some pretty terrifying questions about identity, determinism, society, reality and even farming practices. And while it's tempting to bat these aside (as indeed Neo does, initially), that's the exact point. Because when it comes down to it, both Morpheus and Smith want the same thing - freedom (although the latter is in no way to be interpreted as a sympathetic character). And when the good and the bad guys are raising the same points, it's harder to dismiss them as propaganda or idealism.
Sure, the film is a little clunky in places (the effects-work has aged better than the dialogue), but the definition of Cool™ has evolved over two decades. All of this adds to the charm, and the Wachowskis can be forgiven for the odd falter while taking such large strides.
The Matrix is, by some considerable distance, the best movie they have made.
Dark City, The Thirteenth Floor (both of which pre-date The Matrix).
*1 Yeah, I just didn't get round to it at the time, even though I was in the cinema for the sequels. While it's well acknowledged that the first movie was something of a sleeper hit, I was just preoccupied with a another film in 1999. [ BACK ]
*2 Although I'm more than happy to go on record in saying that I love all three movies and view them as one long story. Mind you, I haven't watched any of the entries for some years now (no agenda behind that, just scheduling issues), and as a result I watched the latter half of The Matrix waiting for events to occur which don't crop up until Reloaded and Revolutions. It's probably time to break those discs out again... [ BACK ]
DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.
"Why do you do it to yourself, Ian?" they ask. A valid question. The closest I can come to an answer is that I've watched all of The Conjuring-universe movies at the cinema so far, they'll be far better in that environment than on a TV and while the overall quality is reminiscent of a rollercoaster, I think I just want to see how bad the series can get before someone pulls the plug.
DOLL Annabelle Comes Home is the third in its particular subset of the Conjuring flicks, taking place after the previous two prequel-type movies and once the killer doll is safely ensconced in The Warren's occult artefact museum. With Ed and Lorraine (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) out of the house for the night*1, they arrange for babysitter Mary Ellen (Madison Iseman) to look after their young daughter Judy (McKenna Grace).
But Mary Ellen's best friend Daniela (Katie Sarife) knows of the Warrens' reputation as ghost-hunters, and has reasons for seeing the inside of their infamous vault herself. To add to this, Mary Ellen's prospective sweetheart Bob (Michael Cimino) seems to have picked the wrong night to come a-courting. Before you can say 'Murphy's Law', the doll is free from its holy glass case*2 and all hell is breaking loose. Literally. Will young Judy demonstrate she's a product of her lineage, or is this the end of the line?
DEAD
Short version: Yeah, it's not very good. Longer version: but does it need to be? The Conjuring movies are to the horror landscape what Will Ferrell and Melissa McCarthy are to comedy. An undemanding and often underwhelming baseline by which we can judge everything else, for better or worse (and there is worse). That doesn't necessarily make them bad, although they frequently appear that way upon closer inspection.
And Annablle Comes Home just isn't good. Not as laughably awful as the first Annabelle, but not as committed to its narrative as Creation. Instead, this is a parade of mechanically constructed feints and jump-scares which could have been assembled by a computer. McKenna Grace does quite well given the ludicrous nature of the screenplay, but let's not forget that she was the lead in Gifted, and is far better than this.
HUNTER
James Wan gets a story-credit as the snake eating its own tail, with his input meaning the film is one beat short of going full Insidious (although make no mistake, director and screenwriter Gary Dauberman shoulders most of the blame here). Once Annabelle is out of the box and acting as a spiritual lodestone, that's a license for the movie to start flinging shit at the wall and seeing what sticks. Bob ends up hiding from a demonic wolf in the chicken house (one of the last places, surely?), Daniela is locked in the museum-room with My Decomposing Dad™ and Mary Ellen ends up padding around the house above avoiding spirits who have dodged The Ferryman. The film basically turns into Poltergeist, leaving Judy and Annabelle literally snoozing through the second act of their own story.
The initial setup is by-the-numbers, even for a series as grounded in classical folklore*3 as this one. The sequence with the doll in the bedroom is well executed, but it's over far too quickly and is in the trailer anyway, so you're already waiting for it. Then the dialogue for the third act consists mostly of screaming. Whether it's our three leads in the house, Sackless Bob out in the shed, or the laundry-list of unhappy spectres appearing like the products of a cursed conveyor belt from the end of The Generation Game. The story seems to have abandoned the twelve-year cycle of events alluded to in previous installments.
JEDI To add insult to injury, the film has the absolute balls to start lecturing the audience in its final moments. Returning for the coda, Lorraine tells Daniela "When I think of all the evil in here, it reminds me of all the good out there…". I nodded in silent agreement, reminded of the other four movies I could have been watching in that same cinema.
DEAD On the plus-side, Annabelle Comes Home cruises the fuck past the Bechdel Test. That's it. Anyway, here's the summary which could have saved all of these words:
Is Annabelle Comes Home just a dip in the cinematic rollercoaster of The Conjuring? Or does this apparently low plateau signify that we're finally approaching the boarding platform and the ride is over?
I imagine that will depend, as most things do these days, not on the quality of the mechanics themselves, but rather how many people are interested in paying for the ride. We await with bated breath…
The other Conjuring movies. At best.
Not when Midsommar is playing at the same time.
Stream it, then work out if it deserves space on your shelf (it doesn't).
Fuck no.
Fuck yes.
No.
Level 2: McKenna Grace is in this, and she's the young Captain Marvel, in a film with Sam 'Windu' Jackson and Ben 'Krennic' Mendelsohn
That's not because the film is bad on a technical level (even though it's far from great), but just because it's not even trying.
*1 Ed and Lorraine had the right idea when they fucked off after the first ten minutes. Probably the most sensible thing they've done in seven movies, to be fair. [ BACK ]
*2 You'd think that with the thoroughly abandoned priest sub-plot, they could finally do a crossover with Father Ted? [ BACK ]
*3 Why doesn't Lorraine just walk back onscreen and say to the camera "By the way, we really want to make a Black Shuck movie, so please create some buzz around these scenes okay thanks bye."? [ BACK ]
DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.
