A Good Day to Die Hard

Posted on February 13, 2013 at 6:00 pm

Chases. Explosions. Guns. Crashes. Wisecracks. Punches. Repeat. Repeat again. Yes, it’s the fifth “Die Hard” movie.

Bruce Willis returns as cop John McClane and this time the setting is Moscow. Though he repeatedly says throughout the film’s zippy 90 minutes that he is on vacation, McClane is in Russia to help his estranged son Jack (Australian actor Jai Courtney of “Spartacus”), who has been arrested for attempted murder. It turns out that Jack, who uses his mother’s last name and has not spoken to John in years, is actually under cover for the CIA. Both the Russians and the Americans want a “file” that has been hidden away by a man named Komorov (Sebastian Koch), who is about to go on trial. It contains incriminating information about a high-ranking Russian official. He wants it destroyed. The Americans want to use it to discredit him. The stakes are very high. The chases are very fast. The explosions are very big. The repartee is….not great, but thankfully minimal.

Unlike his “Expendables” colleagues Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, whose 2013 action film releases managed to be both lackluster and overheated, with so much work done on their faces they looked like bad copies of Madame Tussaud’s replicas of themselves, Willis is every bit as good and better than he was in the first “Die Hard” film a quarter century ago. Regrettably, we get only a glimpse of the fabulous Mary Elizabeth Winstead, briefly returning as John’s daughter, Lucy, to drop him at the airport and admonish him to behave (as if!). But Courtney is well-matched to Willis, with their bullet heads, truculent glares, and cocky pleasure in their own outrageous badassery. John may pause for a brief “Cat’s in the Cradle” reverie with Komorov in between dodging bullets, as they ruefully reflect on their failures as fathers, but shortly afterward, as John and Jack awkwardly observe a tender parent-child reunion, they agree that nothing like that would work for them. “We’re not a hugging family,” Jack says. “Damn straight,” agrees his father.

The locations are exotic, and the chase scene through the streets of Moscow is wilder than any since the last “Die Hard.” The titles may be getting increasingly labored but Willis and the stunts make it work.

Parents should know that this film has constant peril and violence. Many characters are injured and killed, and there is a lot of shooting, punching, chases and explosions, some graphic and disturbing images, and strong language.

Family discussion: How are John and Jack alike? Why was Jack so angry with John? What changed his mind?

If you like this, try: the other “Die Hard” movies, especially the first and third

Identity Thief

Posted on February 7, 2013 at 6:00 pm

How did so many great performers get stuck in this awful movie? And why, why?

There’s one scene in this ugly and poorly paced road trip comedy that has the straight-laced Sandy (co-producer and star Jason Bateman) hiding in the bathroom because he is so agonized by what is going on in his hotel room. The scammer who stole his identity (Melissa McCarthy) is drunkenly seducing an even tipsier guy named “Big Chuck” (“Modern Family’s” Eric Stonestreet) and two heavy people wanting to have sex must be funny, right? Sandy runs the water in the bathroom and wraps his head in a towel to block out the sounds and thoughts. As we went back and forth between the not-funny gyrations in the bedroom and the not-funny disgust in the bathroom, I was wishing I had a towel to wrap around my ears. And my eyes.

Sandy Bigelow Patterson is a loving husband and father with a pregnant wife (Amanda Peet) holding onto a $50,000-a-year job at a financial institution where the big bosses are getting million-dollar bonuses, not for performance but for “retention.” Director Jon Favreau (“Iron Man”) has a small role as the obnoxious partner who explains why he is worth all that money and a monkey could do Sandy’s job. “I’m going to get you a copy of The Fountainhead,” he says, an overused signifier of soul-less arrogance.

Then, out of the blue, a group from Sandy’s office splits off and hires him at five times his old salary. But his happily ever after is ruined when an identify thief takes advantage of his gender-neutral name (many not-funny jokes are made about Sandy’s overall unmanliness and how girly the name “Sandy” is). She has not just blown out his credit card accounts; she has outstanding arrest warrants. Sandy’s new boss gives him one week to straighten it out and the mild-mannered Sandy decides that what makes sense is for him to leave his family in Colorado and go to Winter Park, Florida to find the other Sandy and somehow bring her back to Colorado and get her to confess her crimes.

But she does not want to go, so she puts up a fight. Worse, she loudly sings along to the car radio. Even worse, through all kinds of trauma and misery she still manages to sport pale blue eye shadow left over from the 1960’s. To further complicate things, she is being chased by a skip tracer because she owes a lot of money (Robert Patrick) and by a couple of elegant-looking hoods under orders from an imprisoned crime kingpin who wants her killed.

A sloppy script from Craig Mazin (some of the mid-“Scary Movie” franchise and the lackluster “Hangover II”) shows no sense of character, and dragged-out direction from Seth Gordon (the wonderful “King of Kong” and the hideously awful “Four Christmases”) shows no understanding of comic momentum. And the film criminally mis-uses not just the exceptional talents of its two leads but also Stonestreet (we are subjected not just to disconcerting, almost random personality shifts and casual racism but also his bare butt), rapper/actor T.I., Genesis Rodriguez (she needs a new agent after this and Schwarzenegger’s “Last Stand”), and Robert Patrick (ditto after this and “Gangster Squad”). McCarthy is as good as it gets in full-on, fearless, “yes, and” commitment to the moment that should be ideal for a character whose skill is constant re-invention and on-the-fly assessment — is this a time for aggression? a play for sympathy? But it is all surface, and an unpleasant surface at that. Sandy #2 is both selfish and needy, the relentless morphing leaving us with nothing — no one — to connect to. And when the classic-turned cliché mismatched road trip formula requires the pair to develop growing sympathy and respect from each other and from us, including, ugh, a makeover, it just collapses.

Parents should know that this movie includes extended sexual humor with very explicit and crude references and explicit situations, brief nudity, drinking and drunkenness, some drug references, very strong language, violence including shooting, punching, collisions, theft and fraud.

Family discussion: What made the characters change their minds about each other? How did Sandy and Diana see the rights and feelings of other people differently? What do you learn about Diana from her encounter with Big Chuck?

If you like this, try: “Midnight Run”

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Comedy Crime

Stand Up Guys

Posted on January 31, 2013 at 6:23 pm

A little bit “Goodfellas” and a little bit “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” this is a life-in-a-day story about aging criminals. Unlike Ferris, these guys have had too many days off and are very happy to return to their old haunts and activities.

Val (Al Pacino) gets out of prison after 28 years. He has been a “stand up guy.” He never told on his friends. One of those friends is there to pick him up, still in the same car he had back when Val went away. They greet each other warmly. “You look like s***.” “You look worse.” A brief hug feels “weird.” But that’s just their way of saying how glad they are to see each other.

Val is eager to get back in the game, meaning food, alcohol, girls, and stirring up trouble. But he is not the only one whose life has been on hold. Doc has been waiting for Val to get out of prison because he he missed his friend but also because he has a job to do. A thuggish and brutal crime boss named Claphands (Mark Margolis) has a hit out on Val and he insists that Doc be the one to do it. Val wants to live it up because he just got out of prison. Doc wants to help him live it up because he will have just one more night before he is killed. Val gets the picture pretty quickly.

So, they round up their old friend Hirsch (Alan Arkin), who is in a nursing home breathing from an oxygen tank and steal a car that happens to belong to two other thugs known for their brutality (“These are the kind of guys who take your kidney and don’t even sell it”). They go out for an outrageous joyride that includes a couple of visits to a sympathetic madam (Lucy Punch), some big meals, a bit of breaking and entering and light robbery, a visit to the emergency room for a very intimate procedure assisted by a nurse they knew when she was a child (Julianna Margulies of “A Good Wife”), a game of pool, a poignant but courtly slow dance that seems directly lifted from Pacino’s own “Scent of a Woman,” an impromptu burial, some revenge beat-downs, some thoughts about life and aging and a friendly young waitress with beautiful eyes. “It’s like the old days,” says Hirsch. “No, it’s better. This time, we can appreciate it.”

The story is preposterous, but the coincidences and improbabilities (like the almost-complete absence of any other people) just add to the fairy tale or dreamlike quality. The story could almost exist as a fantasy created by the imprisoned Val. It is not just Val and Doc who want a chance to show their vitality and know-how in the face of their mortality. Pacino, Walken, and Arkin show all of that and the pure joy of performing in the knowledge that they are better than ever. “That’s got no flavor, no style,” one of them says dismissively. These guys have all the flavor and style in the world and it is always fun to see them show it. And this time, we can appreciate it.

Parents should know that this film has constant very strong and crude language, explicit sexual references and situations including nudity, Viagra use and prostitutes, criminal behavior, references to rape, drinking, smoking, drug use, and extensive violence with some disturbing images with characters injured and killed.

Family discussion: What is the difference between Val, Doc, Claphands, the Jargoniews and Wendy in the way they set and enforce rules? What makes someone a “stand up guy?”

If you like this, try: “Midnight Run,” “Gran Torino,” and “Going in Style”

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Comedy Crime Drama

Broken City

Posted on January 17, 2013 at 6:00 pm

Another January weekend, another dumb shoot-out.

Last weekend, it was 1950’s Los Angeles. This week, it’s contemporary New York. It’s still about corruption, betrayal, and bang-bang. Co-producer Mark Wahlberg plays Billy, a cop exonerated after he killed a suspect because there was not enough evidence to refute his claim of self-defense. Mayor Nick Hostetler (Russell Crowe in a very bad Boehner-orange spray tan) congratulates him and then explains with engaging directness and considerable charm why Billy still has to leave the police force. “It is a necessity that we remain un-f’d.”

Seven years later, Billy is almost making a living as a private investigator. He is good at his job but he is too nice a guy to push for payment. His loyal and very beautiful assistant Katy (a likably sharp performance by Alona Tal) reminds him that they are broke because their overdue accounts amount to $42,000, which leads to a pointless scene of phone calls using assorted tactics to get people to pay. There are a bunch more pointless scenes in the film but I cannot say they are any worse than the pointed ones.

Billy hears from Mayor Hostetler, who wants to hire him for the same purpose as all of his other clients but for a lot more money. Hostetler wants to pay Billy $50,000 to find out who is having an affair with his wife, Cathleen (Catherine Zeta Jones). Billy takes the pictures but then, just as the mayor snatches them out of his pocket, it begins to dawn on him (he may be a cop, but he is not much of a detective) that things may not be what they seem and people may not be telling the truth, starting with the mayor.

All of this is happening in the midst of a tough re-election campaign. Hostetler likes to come across as one of the guys, rough, sometimes crude, but effective. He tries to paint his opponent, Jack Valiant (Barry Pepper) — names are not this movie’s strong point — as an out of touch elitist who comes from Connecticut and went to Harvard. But a controversial sweetheart sale of public housing to a private developer (a seedy-looking Griffin Dunne) has tightened the race. Guess what! That surveillance job was not about an affair after all. One clue? Despite a massive shredding operation in the bad guy’s expensive lair/manor, the evidence conveniently shows up in the garbage can in mint condition, not even any coffee grounds or banana peels stuck to it.

It feels like they were making this up as they went along, without regard to what has already happened. A detour about Billy’s actress girlfriend (the very lovely Natalie Martinez) and his fall off the wagon just drags things out in between the chases and shoot-outs. It’s too bad to see top talent slumming in an underwritten, under-thought, under-whelming piece of multiplex fodder.

Parents should know that this film has constant very strong and crude language, sexual references and explicit situations with brief nudity, drinking and drunkenness, shooting, fighting, car crash, corruption, rape (offscreen), and characters who are injured and killed.

Family discussion: What did Billy’s relationship with Natalie tell you about him? Why did he visit her parents? What will happen to him?

If you like this, try: “Inside Man”

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Crime Politics

The Last Stand

Posted on January 17, 2013 at 6:00 pm

The NRA should forget that ad about the Obama girls and use this movie instead. The entire storyline can be summarized in the words of NRA head Wayne LaPierre: “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” Or, in this case, a ragtag bunch of good guys with many, many, many, many guns. It’s basically a co-commercial for the NRA and AARP.

Arnold Schwarzenegger returns from his decade detour into politics to play Ray, a former LA cop turned sheriff in a sleepy Arizona border town. With most of the residents out of town for a high school basketball team away game, he is taking a day off. A dangerous prisoner escapes while being transported by the FBI and hops into a souped-up supercar. “It’s a psychopath in the Batmobile,” says the furious agent in charge (Forest Whitaker). And he’s taken a hostage with him, another agent (Genesis Rodriguez).

But just like the “Manhunt” episode of “The Andy Griffith Show” where the state police think that the local law enforcement are a bunch of rubes who can’t handle an escaped prisoner, Sheriff Ray has some surprises in store. And a lot of firepower, thanks to Johnny Knoxville as the town nutball-with-a-gun “museum,” an excuse for stockpiling all kinds of exotic weapons, including medieval spiked battle flails and WWII machine guns.

The bad guy is a third generation drug lord (handsome Spanish actor Eduardo Noriega) who has sent an advance team to build a bridge over a narrow canyon between Arizona and Mexico. All that lies between him and escape is Sheriff Ray, his young and beautiful deputy (“Thor’s” Jaimie Alexander), the comic relief deputy (Luiz Guzmán), the drunk and disorderly prisoner (think “Andy Griffith Show’s” Otis, except young, handsome, ex-military, and the ex of the beautiful deputy), and the crazy guy with the arsenal. Can they stop the head of a drug cartel with unlimited resources, a paramilitary operation, a car that goes faster than a plane, and all of the freedom from doubt that comes from being a sociopath? What do you think?

It’s set-piece after set-piece, with many capably staged showdowns and lots of macho posturing (several “let’s play”-style comments), plus numbingly predictable dialog with a few winks at Schwarzenegger’s age. Audiences may be less enthusiastic about the entertainment value of whole-sale carnage these days, less able to suspend any thoughts of what the reality looks like. I hope so.

Parents should know that this film features major non-stop carnage with constant shoot-outs, chases, and fights, many characters who are injured and killed, and strong language.

Family discussion: How does the movie acknowledge the real-life circumstances of its star? Who is right about what kind of life to choose, Ray or Jerry?

If you like this, try: “Con Air”

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Action/Adventure Crime