The Amazing Spider-Man: Film Review

Opens: Tuesday, July 3 (Columbia Pictures)

Production companies: Columbia Pictures, Marvel Entertainment

Cast: Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Rhys Ifans, Denis Leary, Martin Sheen, Sally Field, Irrfan Khan, Chris Zylka

Director: Marc Webb

Screenwriters: James Vanderbilt, Alvin Sargent, Steve Kloves, from a story by James Vanderbilt, based on the Marvel comic book by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko

Producers: Avi Arad, Laura Ziskin, Matt Tolmach

Executive producers: Stan Lee, Michael Grillo, Kevin Feige

Director of photography: John Schwartzman

Production designer: J. Michael Riva

Music: James Horner

Costume designer: Kym Barrett

Editors: Alan Edward Bell, Pietro Scalia

Visual effects: Sony Pictures Imageworks.

Visual effects supervisor: Jerome Chen

Special effects supervisor: John Frazier

3D special effects supervisor: Rob Engle

Stunt coordinators: Andy Armstrong, Vic Armstrong

PG-13 rating

Trailer:

Review:
Leaping back onto the screen with a new cast, crew, costume and a whole new array of daddy issues,The Amazing Spider-Man reboots the top-grossing Marvel franchise to altogether satisfying results.


Directed with emotional depth and plenty of comedic touches byMarc Webb (no pun intended), this somewhat darker depiction of your friendly neighborhood superhero inserts a touching portrait of adolescent angst into an otherwise predictable dose of CGI-fueled action, with stars Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone breathing new life into Stan Lee’s 50-year-old creation. With a stateside release set on the cusp of an extended Independence Day holiday weekend, one hardly needs Spidey sense to predict huge worldwide returns for Sony in the first frame, though long-term theatrical might be hindered by the arrival of Warner’s The Dark Knight Rises only two weeks later.

Just a decade after Sam Raimi’s original Spider-Man propelled the wisecracking, web-slinging teenager into the box-office stratosphere, launching a (some would say endless) wave of comic book blockbusters where visual effects tend to stand in for veritable character development, it’s encouraging to see Webb and screenwriters James Vanderbilt, Alvin Sargent and Steve Klovesbuild up a convincing Peter Parker origin story here, combining tongue-in-cheek high jinks with a more downbeat tale of childhood trauma and attempting to answer those viewers wondering why they ever did a remake in the first place.

Opening with a flashback revealing how the young Parker (Max Charles) was suddenly and mysteriously entrusted to his Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen) and Aunt May (Sally Field) by his father (Campbell Scott) -- a renowned scientist whose studies in all things arachnid give hints of what’s to come -- the story quickly shifts to the present, where 17-year-old Peter (Garfield) is introduced as a brooding skater with bad posture and an eye for science, photography and his cute and clever classmate, Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone).

After suffering a few obligatory high school humiliations and striking out at least once with Gwen, Peter comes across his dad’s old research papers, sending him on a stealth mission to the laboratory of Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans), who runs the state-of-the-art biochemical facility at the all-powerful Oscorp. While snooping around the lab’s massive web-churning cylinder experiment -- one of several impressive set pieces by production designer J. Michael Rival (Iron Man) -- Peter gets bitten by a genetically modified spider, and when he’s assaulted on the train ride home, his powers unexpectedly come out in full force.

Not unlike Raimi, Webb has much fun revealing Peter’s newfound capabilities early on, highlighted by the subway scene and a hilarious basketball sequence where he schools the class bully (Chris Zylka) with his superhuman court skills. But such playful moments soon give way to some more despair when Uncle Ben is abruptly -- and perhaps all too conveniently for plot purposes -- murdered by a fleeing street thug, sending Peter on a vigilante mission that eventually transforms him into the masked crusader, Spider-Man.

It came as somewhat of a surprise when commercials veteran Webb, with only one indie feature under his belt, was chosen to take the reins of the billion-dollar commodity, but it’s clear in the film’s first half what the maker of (500) Days of Summer is bringing to the table here. Not unlike the forlorn greeting card writer of that catchy rom-com, Peter is depicted as a smart but downtrodden outsider who truly comes to life when he’s alongside his object of desire, and the scenes between Garfield and Stone have a witty and realistic edge to them that’s rare for a comic book romance.

Such moments, combined with Peter’s eternal quest for the father he never knew, help carry the narrative through the mandatory denouement of fights, chases, mutant transformations and a rather lengthy final showdown set – surprise! – at the top of a skyscraper, as if Marvel simply swapped out the Stark Enterprises sign of The Avengers for the Oscorp one here. An earlier action scene on a traffic-jammed Williamsburg Bridge shows more inventiveness, even if the visual effects (headed up by Jerome Chen, Beowulf) are top-notch, filled with POV shots of Spidey swinging down Fifth Avenue or in combat mode with his high-tech web shooters -- which, along with the more latex-heavy costume, reveal how our hero has been updated from previous installments. (The other update being that he relies a lot on his cell phone.)

While the two leads deliver the goods and manage to combine a frisky sense of first love with the movie’s gloomier arc, they are well-served by a terrific supporting cast, with Sheen as Peter’s tough-loving guardian angel, Denis Leary as Gwen’s overprotective policeman dad and Ifans as an increasingly mad scientist whose reptile leather fetish yields disastrous results.

The swooping score by James Horner blends well with the crime-fighter’s many leaps and bounds, while cinematographer John Schwartzman, shooting in 5K with the Red Epic, gets plenty of mileage out of the film’s various night sequences. Beyond a few brief flourishes, the 3D hardly feels necessary here, serving no other clear purpose than to sling a few additional dollars into Spidey’s web of worldwide ticket sales.

Brave: Film Review

Venue: Sydney Film Festival (opening night)

Opens: June 22 (Disney)

Production: Pixar Animation Studios

Voice cast: Kelly Macdonald, Billy Connolly, Emma Thompson, Julie Walters, Robbie Coltrane, Kevin McKidd, Craig Ferguson, Sally Kinghom, Eilidh Fraser, Peigi Barker, Steven Cree, Steve Purcell, Callum O'Neill, Patrick Doyle, John Ratzenberger

Directors: Mark Andrews, Brenda Chapman

Co-director: Steve Purcell

Screenwriters

: Mark Andrews, Steve Purcell, Brenda Chapman, Irene Mecchi, story by Brenda Chapman

Producer: Katherine Sarafian

Executive producers: John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter

Directors of photography: Robert Anderson (camera), Danielle Feinberg (lighting)

Production designer: Steve Pilcher

Editor: Nicholas C. Smith

Music: Patrick Doyle

PG rating

Trailer: 

Pixar's 13th film, which follows an adventurous Scottish princess, is visually stunning and strongly voiced, but doesn't take any real risks.

 The season's latest feature destined to boost the demand for kids' archery lessons, Brave may disappoint many ardent Pixar loyalists while simultaneously delighting old-time Disney fans.
The 13th animated feature from the world's most consistently successful film company is its first set in that version of the past forever favored by Disney, that of princesses, kings, queens, witches, evil spells and prankish secondary characters. For all its pictorial and vocal beauty, the film's emotional line and dramatic contrivances are both more familiar and less inventive than what's usually delivered by the studio. Younger kids won't mind but many viewers accustomed to relying upon Pixar for something special will feel a sense of letdown due to the lack of adventurousness. A muscular box office ride is virtually a given.

Part of the problem is that Brave never becomes the film that seems to be promised at the outset. After a beautiful and eventful prologue in which flaming-maned Scottish princess Merida receives an archery bow for her birthday, glimpses blue will-o'-the-wisps floating through the forest and sees her father, King Fergus (Billy Connolly), lose a leg to a ferocious bear, the action jumps ahead to her adolescence and her obligation to get married.

Under the strict tutelage of loving but demanding mother Elinor (Emma Thomson), Merida (Kelly Macdonald) has learned the necessities but is a wild lass at heart, desperate for her days off when she can ride off on horseback and perfect her archery. As for marriage, nothing could be less appealing: “I don't want my life to be over,” she rails to her mother. “I want my freedom.”

One look at the top suitors offered up by the three other leading clans and you can see what she means; they're the three stooges of Scotland, whose beefy kinsmen would sooner brawl than shake your hand. Once Merida shows them all up in an archery contest and her furious mother tosses her daughter's prize bow in the fireplace, the headstrong girl takes off on her enormous steed, Angus.

It stands to reason that this first half-hour sets up expectations of a story in some way involving a renegade princess, trouble among the clans and/or a mysterious adventure involving the wisps and some Stonehenge-like arrangements that come into play. The left-turn taken by the script co-authored by Mark Andrews, Steve Purcell, Brenda Chapman and Irene Mecchi, from a story by Chapman, who co-directed with Andrews, might be embraced by those comforted by the familiar. But it's a move that channels the film into startlingly well-worn territory, that of a conventionally toothless and whiskered old witch (Julie Walters) willing to cast a spell to grant Merida's wish to change her mother so as to alter her own fate.

The spell, lo and behold, turns Elinor into an enormous bear, one that retains Elinor's brain and heart but cannot speak. Thus ensues a lot of not-so-hot slapstick as bear Elinor knocks about in quarters too small for her and tries to communicate while Merida feels remorse and endeavors to reverse the spell.

What results is a film that starts off big and promising but diminishes into a rather wee thing as it chugs along, with climactic drama that is both too conveniently wrapped up and hinges on magical elements that are somewhat confusing to boot. Not only is the tale laden with standard-issue fairy tale and familiar girl empowerment tropes, but the entire project lacks the imaginative leaps, unexpected jokes and sense of fun and wonder that habitually set Pixar productions apart from the pack. Its ideas seem Earthbound.

On a sensory level, however, Brave is almost entirely a delight. The wild beauty of Scotland, of the verdant forests and the craggy peaks, is lovingly rendered with a gorgeous palette of painterly colors and in very agreeable 3D. Even better, the voicings here are among the most exceptional and pleasurable of any animated film you might care to name. Working in pronounced Scottish accents that, to be sure, don't approach the often undecipherable ones heard in Ken Loach films, Scottish actors Macdonald and Connolly are a joy to listen to, as is Thompson, even if too many of the conversations are argumentative in a repetitive vein. Patrick Doyle's active and resourceful score is another major plus in a film that has played it safe instead of taking chances and going for something new.

Rock of Ages: Film Review

Openening:June 15 (Warner Bros.)

Cast:Julianne Hough, Diego Boneta, Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, Russell Brand, Paul Giamatti, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Malin Akerman, Mary J. Blige, Bryan Cranston.

Director:Adam Shankman.

Screenwriters:Justin Theroux, Chris D'Arienzo, Allan Loeb.

Trailer: 

Julianne Hough and Diego Boneta play the small-town girl and city boy in this tribute to '80s hair metal and the L.A. rock scene, with Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, Russell Brand, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Paul Giamatti and Mary J. Blige.

NEW YORK – Basically a Mamma Mia! with ‘80s hair metal in place of Abba, Rock of Ages is a jukebox musical wrapped in vinyl nostalgia that has been playing to modest but steady business on Broadway for the past three years. However, the headbanger party owes some of its notoriety to Poison frontman Bret Michaels getting accidentally brained during a production number from the show at the 2009 Tony Awards. Nobody gets clobbered in the New Line movie, but perhaps directorAdam Shankman should. He succeeds in draining most of the fun from a vehicle that was all about the winking humor of its flagrant cheesiness.

hankman did a serviceable job on New Line’s 2007 screen redo of Hairspray. But he was handed more winning material and songs crafted expressly to tell a story, not generic anthems shoehorned into a jokey construct.

Working with screenwriters Justin Theroux, Chris D’Arienzo and Allan Loeb, who adapted D’Arienzo’s original book for Rock of Ages, the director has not found a way to translate the musical’s affectionately mocking humor to film. Shankman lacks a light touch. Only when the invaluable Russell Brand is onscreen – playing a droll variation of his Get Him to the Greek character with a Nikki Sixx makeover – does this bloated, gratuitously star-laden rethink come close to hitting the right tone.

The main attraction no doubt will be Tom Cruise in another stunt performance to pair with hisTropic Thunder role. First seen in bejeweled leonine codpiece, assless chaps and some elaborate ink, emerging from beneath a blanket of hot groupies, he channels Axl Rose as Stacee Jaxx, an out-of-control rock god rarely separated from a bottle of scotch or from the monkey sidekick he calls Hey Man.

Mary J. Blige turns up late in the action as Justice, den mother of The Venus Club for Gentlemen, where Sherrie takes a job in her hour of need. Blige lends her soulful pipes to a few numbers, but like Cruise, she outstays her usefulness.

Production designer Jon Hutman does a solid job of recreating 1980s Sunset Strip sleaze, and costumer Rita Ryack hits the right notes in reviving contemporary fashion’s ugliest decade, without going over the top. A handful of rock and pop figures from the period show up in cameos, includingDebbie Gibson, Sebastian Bach, Kevin Cronin, Nuno Bettencourt and Joel Hoekstra. ButRock of Ages neither evokes an authentic feeling to celebrate the era nor spreads much joy making fun of it. Instead, it just drones on like a limp cover version.

Starbuck: Film Review

Venue: Seattle International Film Festival, Gala Presentations
Production Company: Caramel Films
Cast: Patrick Huard, Antoine Bertrand, Julie le Breton, David Michael, Patrick Martin
Director: Ken Scott
Screenwriters: Ken Scott, Martin Petit
Producers: Andre Rouleau, Valerie d’Auteuil, Jasmyrh Lemoine, Danny Rosner
Director of photography: Pierre Gill
Production designer: Danielle Labrie
Music: David Lafleche
Costume designer: Sharon Scott
Editor: Yvann Thibaudeau
Sales: Charlotte Mickie, eOne Entertainment
No rating


A lovable underachiever unwittingly spawns his own village in Starbuck, Ken Scott's crowd-pleasing comedy exploring various meanings of fatherhood in the modern age. Already slated for a Dreamworks remake starring Vince Vaughn, the Montreal-set charmer would be an easy sell in multiplexes if not for pesky French subtitles.
 
Patrick Huard plays David, a delivery man for his family's butcher shop who learns that his lucrative late-80s stint as a sperm donor has resulted in a staggering 533 successful pregnancies. Over a hundred of those now-twentysomethings, having learned they share the same biological father, are suing the fertility clinic to reveal the identity of the prolific donor code-named Starbuck.

Panicked by the prospect of being unmasked, but curious about his progeny, David becomes a covert guardian angel. Working through plaintiffs like the list-checking hero of My Name is Earl, he spies on youths and finds himself doing favors both small and life-altering; eventually he joins their community of fellow-adoptees, making a half-true excuse to get to know them without revealing himself.

Huard, whiskered and beer-bellied, projects a bumbling benevolence that works well here, leaving David -- a man-child who has avoided fatherhood in its traditional form, and whose girlfriend is understandably reluctant to share her surprise pregnancy with him -- pleasantly surprised at how well these encounters play out. Viewers will likely share that surprise, as will cynics who understandably expect much more sappiness than the film delivers. (Opportunities for sentimentality are everywhere, of course, but a comically oversized group hug is about as syrupy as things get.)

Scott and collaborator Martin Petit's script never really explains the urgency of the legal battles over David's anonymity, and some ante-upping contrivances in the third act ring false. But the laughs don't flag, thanks in part to David's friend Paul (Antoine Bertrand), a dad who has actually had to live with the kids he fathered: Acting as David's attorney, he does everything he can to keep his pal away from the joys of parenthood.

Trailer:

Pink Ribbons, Inc.: Film Review

Provocative and well-argued doc criticizes mainstream breast cancer charities as "pinkwashes" that do far less than they could to end the disease.

Opens: Friday, June 1 (First Run Features)
Production Company: National Film Board of Canada
Director: Léa Pool
Screenwriters: Nancy Guerin, Patricia Kearns, Léa Pool
Producer: Ravida Din
Directors of photography: Sylvaine Dufaux, Daniel Jobin, Nathalie Moliavko-Visotzky
Music: Peter Scherer
Editor: Oana Suteu Khintirian
No rating

Trailer:

Review:


Making a slew of excellent points many well-intentioned people won't want to hear, Léa Pool's Pink Ribbons, Inc. argues persuasively that much of what we're currently doing to fight breast cancer is feel-good nonsense or worse. It's easy to imagine exhibitors running scared from the doc, but auds who find it will be rewarded with a serious and provocative film.

Based on the book of the same name by Samantha King, the doc isn't what some viewers might expect: No mention is made of the controversy the Susan Komen foundation (the most prominently featured group here) has faced this year regarding Planned Parenthood, nor is the film an exposé claiming to find bureaucratic waste or fraud within a group that reportedly pays its CEO close to half a million dollars annually.

Instead the film, like its most convincing interviewees, prefers to tackle more complicated questions. It argues, counterintuitively but persuasively, that spending hundreds of millions on pursuing medical cures for cancer isn't nearly as promising as investing in prevention. It lambastes the onslaught of pink-branded consumer goods, whose purchase makes people feel they're doing something but often contributes little to the cause (while draping an ugly, hateful disease in the color of valentines and Disney princesses). Author Barbara Ehrenreich is particularly vocal on the latter point, noting (as do members of a stage-IV support group in Austin) how little comfort all that pastel iconography gave during her own experience with the disease.

More damningly, the film takes a scientific tack, noting that many of the corporations most closely associated with cancer-related charities owe much of their income to products made with carcinogens. Cosmetics companies try to look righteous while refusing to make safety studies of their wares public; auto manufacturers offer "cure"-themed cars made in factories whose workers suffer tremendous cancer rates.

Throughout, Pool juxtaposes well-reasoned, impassioned arguments from activists with images of various events and marketing pitches intended to make curing cancer seem as simple as buying the right yogurt or taking the weekend off to walk with like-minded women. Pool's footage emphasizes the cattle-like, cheerleading aspect of these events; though that effect is tempered late in the film by shots of individual marchers discussing their reasons for participating, walkers would be justified in complaining that the film portrays them as simpletons. (Or, when footage of slow-trudging demonstrators is paired with Peter Scherer's needlessly ominous score, as zombies.)

Then again, it's hard to fault Pool for not giving more credit to pink-clad crowds who are so loudly praised by Revlon, Avon, and other entities -- all crowing about the millions they've raised, but saying little about what their research has accomplished or how their own bottom lines might depend on chemicals many suspect have exacerbated cancer rates worldwide.

Bottom Line: Provocative and well-argued doc criticizes mainstream breast cancer charities as "pinkwashes" that do far less than they could to end the disease

6 Month Rule: Film Review

Writer/director Blayne Weaver stars in his own film as an irresistible womanizer; the film might have worked if he displayed the sort of devastating sex appeal that would make his character’s comeuppance satisfying.

Opened June 1 (Abramorama).
Production: Secret Identity Productions, Steakhaus Productions.
Cast: Blayne Weaver, Martin Starr, Natalie Morales, Patrick J. Adams, Vanessa Branch, Dave Foley, John Michael Higgins, Jaime Pressly.
Director/screenwriter: Blayne Weaver.
Producers: Brandon Barrera, Steak House.
Executive producer: James Ballengee.
Director of photography: Daniel Stoloff.
Editor: Abe Levy.
Production designer: Michael Fitzgerald.
Costume designers: Sarah Trost, Glenda Maddox.
Music: Andrew Hollander.
Rated R, 95 min.  

Trailer:

Review:

There should be a psychological study commissioned of filmmakers who star in their own movies as men seemingly irresistible to women, with the spectrum running everywhere from the totally believable (Ed Burns) to the not-so-much (Eric Schaeffer). The latest poster boy for this syndrome is Blayne Weaver, whose 6 Month Rule features him playing--you guessed it--a womanizing cad who’s catnip to the ladies.

The writer/director stars as Tyler, a photographer whose busy love life is conducted by a rigorous set of rules, including the one providing the film’s title specifying that there’s no woman that can’t be forgotten in six months.

Helping him stick to his non-committal ways is his friend with benefits, a model (literally, since she’s played by cover girl Vanessa Branch) who apparently does little more than wait around her apartment clad in sexy lingerie waiting for him to make an appearance.

Tyler meets his match, naturally, in the form of the beautiful Sophie (Natalie Morales), who sees through his womanizing ways and constantly shoots him down with a series of withering quips. The suddenly lovelorn cad is reduced to desperately trying to win her away from her rock star boyfriend (Patrick J. Adams), in between counseling his sad-sack best friend (Martin Starr) who’s been unceremoniously dumped by his longtime fiancée (Jaime Pressly).

While the film might have worked if Weaver displayed the sort of devastating sex appeal that would make his character’s comeuppance satisfying, viewers are more likely to be left wondering why it didn’t simply happen sooner.

The generic goings-on are somewhat alleviated by the dryly funny if unfortunately brief appearances by comic veterans Dave Foley and John Michael Higgins as minor characters who bemusedly observe the romantic machinations.

Meanwhile, Morales is so sexily appealing as the object of Tyler’s affections that she puts viewers in the atypical position of hoping that the hero doesn’t get the girl.

Bottom Line: An ineffective indie variation on the sort of generic romantic comedy that should be starring Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson.