Shallow | Center

Do You See What I See?

The Fleeing New Yorkers of 'Cloverfield' Need a Better Cameraperson

THE PROBLEM with evaluating Cloverfield is that it's less a movie than a film-school project. It tells the story of a small group of young New Yorkers fleeing the rampage of a huge, malevolent monster that has descended upon the city. The entire film is shot by a hand-held camera, as what you're seeing is supposed to be footage from a recorder, recovered by the Department of Defense, that had been wielded by one of the characters in chronicling the going-away party of another protagonist that night. This first-person camera work is supposed to create a sense of intimacy with the fleeing characters, though I found it to be ironically distancing; the distraction created by the sharp cuts and movements kept me from caring much about what was happening to them. And when the monster itself is seen in all its horrifying fury, in the movie's money shot, I just wasn't all that impressed. It's not that it looked cheesy -- the visual effects were top-notch. But so much of the beast had already been revealed that the intended shock value simply wasn't there.

Will Is Legen ... Wait for It ... Dary

Smith's Deft Performance Carries the Compelling, Intense 'I Am Legend'

LIKE THE charismatic George Clooney, Will Smith has spent much of his film career coasting on his considerable charm. Also like Clooney, Smith has been supplementing his popcorn movies with less conventional roles that require a deeper commitment to his craft. So it is with I Am Legend, on the surface a conventional, kill-the-zombies crowd-pleaser that turns out to be both a complex examination of personal survival and a terrific showcase for Smith's sharpened skills as an actor.

Knocked Around

Inside Judd Apatow's Pregnancy Comedy Is an Insightful Look at Marriage

THERE IS indeed a veiled message inside of Knocked Up, Judd Apatow's amusing follow-up to his smash The 40-Year-Old Virgin, but it's not the one Rick Santorum thinks. Writing in yesterday's Inquirer, the former senator and longtime abortion foe mentioned Knocked Up as among a slew of recent films to contain "life-affirming texts or subtexts," with protagonist Alison deciding to continue her unplanned pregnancy to term. Whether that plot point and others like it signal the cultural shift that Santorum sees is for observers smarter and more immersed than I to determine. Rather, the message I see in Knocked Up has to do with the the challenges in keeping a modern marriage, complete with kids and careers, together.

Light of Gray

Clooney in Fine Form as an Attorney Caught Between Two Unappealing Choices

Michael Clayton is shot through with gray, starting with George Clooney's hair and continuing with the drabness that saturates the film. At one point one of the characters mentions life as being steeped in that noncommittal color, but one look at Clooney's wardrobe puts the lie to that, at least as far as this movie is concerned. As the titular character, the fixer of a major New York law firm, Clooney hesitantly picks his way through the legal underbelly while trying to cover a debt incurred thanks to the failure of a restaurant he had opened. When a colleague defending an agribusiness corporation accused of environmental malfeasance goes off the deep end and starts spouting the truth, thus threatening the firm's entire case, Clayton is faced with the prospect of choosing to save either his wallet or his soul.

Less Than Meets the Eye

'Transformers' Parties Like It's 1984

IN EVERY sense of the phrase, Transformers is a Michael Bay movie. It's loud, too long, preposterous, visually bracing, and kinda fun. Once you get past the reality of watching a film inspired by children's toys, you can settle in and enjoy yourself.

The seamlessness of the CGI robots is breathtaking, which is a good thing, considering you don't -- or shouldn't -- go to a movie like this for plot, character development, or acting. (It should be noted though, that the charismatic Shia LaBeouf acquits himself well, playing matters straight during the rare times it's necessary but mostly skating through the thing with just the right amount of 'tude.) All of the faves from the old cartoon are here, along with a bevy of live-action characters ranging from mildly amusing (John Turturro's slimy fed) to completely ridiculous (Megan Fox's absurdly hot high school student.) When the vehicles are transforming and the battle scenes are underway, it's easy to hunker down into your bucket of popcorn and lose yourself. When the messaging starts -- can the humans learn to get along before they destroy each other and the planet blah blah blah -- get up and go to the bathroom.

Rating: *** (of 5)

Now I Know How the Zombies Felt

Plodding Through the Latest in the Resident Evil Franchise

WHEN IT comes to film there's good-bad and there's bad-bad, and Resident Evil: Extinction falls resolutely into the latter category. I didn't walk into the theater expecting fine cinema, but even by zombie movie standars, RE:E is limp and lifeless. To delve into plot points and other details too much would be giving the film too much credit; suffice it to say there was lots of mutilation, gore, gruesome death, beyond-clunky writing, boring techno music, overacting, and the usual bizarre subplot involving cloning. Worst of all: Milla Jovovich didn't take it off even once. I thought that was supposed to be in her contract.

Rating: *1/2 (of 5)

An Affair to Forget

SUBURBAN ANGST is a staple of pop culture, and Little Children pours the viewer a double shot just to be sure she understands how stifling the nice house, the immaculate yard, and the adorable kid can be. Not only do Sarah and Brad have to deal with marriages made stale by inattentive spouses and the demands of childcare, they also are faced with the ramifications of a sex offender living in their perfect neighborhood. And so, over the course of a summer, while the two protagonists drift into an inevitable affair, Ronnie the perv has to deal with a local vigilante group hassling him and his mother, in whose house he now lives.

If all of this sounds heavy-handed and obvious, well, you've just nailed the movie's biggest flaw.

C'est Magnifique!

THE GENIUS of Pixar is not merely its astounding technical expertise. No, what makes the company's films such rich viewing experiences is that its writers are as gifted as its illustrators. Just as the dazzling animation renders the movies' characters more lifelike than a lot of actual actors, so, too, do their storylines offer surprising depth and insight into the human condition. As a father, for example, I appreciate the difficulty in letting children find their own way, the central tenet of Finding Nemo. As someone once pretty damn uncomfortable in his own skin, I found The Incredibles' focus on individuality versus fitting in awfully familiar. In Pixar's latest gem, Ratatouille, the plot follows a gourmand rat from the French countryside to an upscale Parisian kitchen, where he assists a clueless dishwasher in creating culinary masterpieces. The underlying story, though, is about Remy's efforts to forge his own way, chase his own dreams, create his own life. While his family and friends would happily eat garbage and avoid humanity as much as possible, Remy prefers the road less traveled.

Welcome to the Party, Pal

WRITING IN Slate earlier this week, Eric Lichtenfeld deconstructed the classic "Yippee-kai-yay, motherfucker" line from the original Die Hard and noted that part of its appeal is due to both its homage to action heroes of yore and its in-your-face, throwdown attitude of today. He went on to praise Bruce Willis's absolutely spot-on recitation of the zinger as a reason it's so damn effective:

On either side of the comma, past and present each get four syllables. This balance is manifested in the evenness of Willis' first—and best—delivery of the line. Subtly, he eases off "fucker," the word that, by virtue of its syntactical position, and its very nature, we might expect to land hardest on our ears. That Willis does not employ the same deftness in the sequels is a pity. The phrase is most effective not as a buildup to some hammer punch, but as one seamless unit of defiance.

And there's your explanation for why the film's two previous sequels -- and, from the looks of the commercials the reviews, the just-released sequel -- are so woefully inadequate. Willis plays John McClane in the original as an unsure hero beset by self-doubt and filled with humanity. He beats himself up for not intervening in Takagi's murder, he absentmindedly taps a nudie poster for good luck while skidding through the under-construction top floors at Nakatomi Plaza, he's pissed at his wife over her decision to forge her own path -- all traits that are atypical of action-movie cops. Willis's portrayal lifted Die Hard into a rarefied air of the genre, but by the time the sequels rolled around, McClane's normalcy, at least by film standards, had been replaced by the same tired, cliched cartoon of wisecracking bravado and superhuman feats that make one shoot-'em-up no different than any other. Partly as a result, the movies were nondescript bores, and No. 4 doesn't look a whole lot better. Yippee-kai-yay, indeed.

It's Gonna Be a Great Year for Brad, Rat, and Damone

WATCHING THE Academy Awards telecast is a fool's errand for the parents of young children, one of them an infant. We simply don't get out to the movies much anymore, and, frankly, we're too tired to watch anything that spans longer than an hour, which is why we eighty-sixed our Netflix subscription. And so, while I may (and do) quite enjoy seeing nubile young actresses slither across the stage while poured into very, very snug dresses (hello, Emily Blunt!), from an arts perspective there's not much I can contribute. Which is why the best observation I can make about Sunday's ceremony is that Forest Whitaker's win for The Last King of Scotland officially makes Fast Times at Ridgemont High a harbinger for future awards. Sean Penn and Nicolas Cage have already won Oscars; Anthony Edwards was nominated for several Emmys for his work on ER; and Jennifer Jason Leigh and Eric Stoltz spent years as indie faves and nominees waiting to happen. Look for comebacks from Judge Reinhold, Brian Backer, and Robert Romanus in the years to come.