Oblivion - Guest Review

Oblivion – 126 Min – PG-13
by C. L. Cadwallader

Tom Cruise gets a bad rap with a lot of people. “Tom Cruise Crazy” anyone? Is it the Scientology? The couch-hopping? Breaking Nicole Kidman’s heart? (She seems to have come out on the top side of that deal.)I don’t know. What I do know is that he seriously brought his ‘A Game’ to this movie. Oblivion is beautifully shot, well-acted and exciting. It gets a green light from me.

The movie opens on a near-future Earth ravaged by an alien invasion. Jack Harper (Cruise) is a drone repairman, one of the last humans remaining on the planet. He lives with his partner/lover, Victoria (Andrea Riseborough) on a kind of floating station. Together they keep the machines harvesting the last of Earth’s resources while they wait to join the rest of humanity on Saturn’s moon Titan.

I’m going to stop there with the summary and talk instead about the trailers for Oblivion. For months leading up to this movie, I watched the trailers, growing increasingly intrigued. Cruise’s voiceover tells us that humanity won the war, but lost the planet. He pretends to play a little football in a ruined stadium. Morgan Freeman’s voice says everything we believe is a lie. Flash! Bang! Action! Something kills some humans and Tom Cruise doesn’t like it. What do we know from this trailer? We know Tom Cruise is some kind of hot shot pilot who like sports and might be a bit of a goof-off, probably not too concerned with the rules. Morgan Freeman is a mysterious stranger who may or may not be on his side. We suspect there’s something going on beneath the surface.
What is it? Who are the good guys really? What’s the deal with Jack and Victoria?

We don’t know. That’s the key here. Now, I will admit, I do like a good Tom Cruise movie (Top Gun, MI:Ghost Protocal, The Last Samurai, Jerry Maguire, etc.). I’m also a sucker for flashy sci-fi movies, so I would probably have seen this movie anyway, but the trailers sealed it for me. The premise was intriguing; it had Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman, and I DIDN’T KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT. The trailers gave me just enough information without giving away ANY of the secrets. I enjoyed following along with Jack Harper as he learned the things that had been hidden from him. At each step, I was asking questions, and eagerly awaiting the answers. I felt satisfied at every point through the film. I wasn’t left hanging with questions for too long, nor were the answers too easily provided. The trailer did exactly what a trailer is supposed to do. It made me want to see the movie.

I think this is important to point out because so many trailers have turned into a mini summary of the movie. The recent RomZomCom Warm Bodies comes to mind. The trailers for that movie told me at least 80% of the entire plot. Sure, the details are what makes the film, but if I want a recap, I’ll read Wikipedia. The trailer should raise questions, but never answer them. The trailers for Oblivion do that, and even if the movie hadn’t lived up to expectations, I would applaud the producers for their good work getting me there based on the trailer.

Rise of the Guardians - Guest Review

Rise of the Guardians - 97min - PG
by C. L. Cadwallader

This is not a movie I was looking forward to. I had never heard of the books on which it was based, and I had seen only one short trailer. I get nervous when the celebrity voices of an animated kids movie are touted as the primary draw. If I want to see Chris Pine or Hugh Jackman, I'll go see Star Trek or Real Steel. In an animated movie, I want to see the right voice for the part - not big names. But, we needed some good family entertainment, and had already seen Wreck It Ralph, so Guardians was the choice.

It was a good choice. Rise of the Guardians delivers on all fronts. It's one of those rare films that pleased the whole family - from the 10-year-old to the parents and even the sullen teenager who hates everything. I'm giving this one a big green light for all ages.

The movie opens with narration from Jack Frost (Chris Pine). He is remembering how The Man in the Moon chose him as a winter spirit - but he doesn't know why. He has no purpose in life. He spends his time creating snow days for children and playing winter games in a world that doesn't believe he exists. Cut to North, aka Santa Claus (Alec Baldin). While prepping for the next Christmas, he receives a visitation from Pitch (Jude Law) - the spirit of nightmares who was thought defeated hundreds of years ago. North gathers the other Guardians together - Sandman (a mute who communicated with magical sand images), the Tooth Fairy (Isla Fisher) and the Easter Bunny (Hugh Jackman). The Man in the Moon informs them they will need to add a new Guardian to their number in order to defeat Pitch - none other than young Jack Frost. What follows is an exciting and heart-warming adventure that touches on the nature of childhood, belief and heroism while not ever descending into the realm of the "After School Special" to deliver its message.

I found this movie to be thoroughly entertaining. It has inspired me to get the Guardians of Childhood books by William Joyce for my own 10-year-old son. (Honestly. They're for the kid. Stop looking at me like that.)

Parents should be aware that for very young children, Pitch might be a bit too scary. I wouldn't say he's any more frightening than Scar in The Lion King or Sid's toys in Toy Story. If your child is old enough to handle that level of darkness, they should be OK in Guardians.

Skyfall - Guest Review

Skyfall - 143min - PG13
by C. L. Cadwallader

I love James Bond movies. I watched "For Your Eyes Only" at least a dozen times on HBO when I was a kid. It hooked me on Bond and I've stayed hooked. I am not ashamed to say that I can find something to like about every single Bond movie from "Dr. No" forward. I like Connery, Lazenby, Moore, Brosnan. I even like Timothy Dalton.

Above all these movies and actors that I have enjoyed, Daniel Craig's performance as Bond in 2006's "Casino Royale" ranks #1 in my book. "Skyfall" is Craig's third turn at Bond, and he continues his portrayal of a harder, more visceral secret agent for the 21st Century -- more reliant on basic bullets and brains than snazzy devices from Q and witty repartee. Here we see a Bond who is far from invulnerable. He's suave and tough of course he rocks a tuxedo like no one else, but if you cut him, he bleeds. "Skyfall" goes out of its way to show us Bond as a person -- someone with a past who exists in a dangerously real world. I give it a green light as an exciting and entertaining continuation of a series I hope to continue seeing for decades to come.

In the traditional Bond cold-open "Skyfall" shows us Bond and his young female protégé chasing a lost computer hard drive through Istanbul. The chase ends when Bond is shot and presumed killed by friendly fire. Bond returns to action when an attack takes out MI-6 headquarters. His quest to find those responsible leads him to Raoul Silva (Javier Bardem), a former MI-6 agent with a serious axe to grind against M (Judi Dench). In the meantime, M has problems of her own, in the form of MP Gareth Mallory (Ralph Fiennes) who thinks she no longer has what it takes to run a 21st Century intelligence operation.

Every performance in this movie is top-shelf. Daniel Craig is as smooth and tough as ever. Judi Dench is terrific as a woman born to be tough, but with just the right touch of sentiment and humor. Javier Bardem is creepy, brilliant and diabolical like the Bond villains of old. And how can you go wrong with actors like Ralph Feinnes and Albert Finney supporting roles?

If there was one thing to criticize about this movie, it would be the 143 minute running time. The third act drags on a bit while we set up for the inevitable final confrontation. Once we got to that fight though, I forgot about checking my watch (and breathing at times) and went along for an action-packed ride worthy of any Bond film.

Long live Bond. When is 24 coming out?

Looper - Guest Review

Looper - 118m - R
by C. L. Cadwallader

Several months ago, I saw a teaser trailer for an upcoming Science Fiction film. It looked like a low-budget film from a writer/director I had never heard of, a young actor I was only mildly familiar with, and maybe an appearance by Bruce Willis. I thought it looked like an interesting concept, but I kind of forgot about it after seeing the first teaser trailer.

The movie was, of course, "Looper." The young actor was Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who I look forward to seeing more of, and the appearance by Bruce Willis was an action-packed co-starring role. "Looper" is a rare breed: a thought-provoking action movie with a tight script, great acting and white-knuckle tension that you will be talking about for days afterward. On the Fat Samurai scale, this one gets an enthusiastic green light.

The movie takes place in the near future. The society in which Joseph Gordon-Levitt's Joe has grown up is a sad, dangerous, dirty place. He is a man without a future, but he doesn't care. The future is tomorrow. Today, he is one of a group of highly paid assassins called Loopers. They are paid by the mafia lords of the future to kill people sent back in time from thirty years in the future. They murder hooded victims by day and party all night. The name Looper comes from their final task, their big payday – they kill their own future selves, "close the loop" and retire. When it comes Joe's turn to close his loop, things do not go smoothly. Old Joe, in the form of Bruce Willis, escapes and things get complicated.

Another director might have used old person make-up and cast Gordon-Levitt in a dual role, or CGI and tried to use Willis for both parts, but either of those would have been obviously fake (see "Tron Legacy" or anything where they try to make a young person look old.). Having two actors playing the role might have been a risk, but it works fantastically in this movie. Gordon-Levitt had the help of contact lenses and some prosthetic make-up to look a bit like a young Bruce Willis, but what really sold it were his mannerisms. He has obviously studied Willis. He moves like him, and even smirks like him when being lectured by his boss (Jeff Daniels).

My advice to viewers is not to analyze the time travel premise too closely before the end of the movie. It needs no more analysis than the premise that the best plan a race of intelligent machines can come up with is to send an assassin back in time to kill the rebel leader's mother – for four movies. Just accept it as fact and watch the movie from there. It's not the time travel that makes the film. It's the characters and the richly drawn but thoroughly disturbing world they inhabit that make the move everything it is. "Looper" is one of those films you should just watch and enjoy. Then go back to the beginning and do it again.