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Posted on March 26, 2015 at 5:59 pm

B+

Lowest Recommended Age:	Kindergarten - 3rd Grade
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG for mild action and some rude humor
Profanity:	None
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Comic/cartoon-style/sci-fi peril and violence, no one badly hurt but some mildly scary images
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	March 27, 2015
Date Released to DVD:	July 27, 2015
Amazon.com ASIN:	B00XRDYK1C

“Home” is a cute and colorful movie about an alien invasion with an important safety tip concerning one of the most destructive forces in the universe, causing utter devastation to every known life form. Yes, it is hitting the dreaded “send to all.”

This is the catastrophe that strikes Oh (Jim Parsons), part of an alien invasion by the Boov, a civilization known for their primary cultural attribute — running away from danger, from problems, and from learning that some of what they believe about the universe may not be right. They are led by the egotistical Smek (Steve Martin), never in doubt and always willing to cut off any disagreement by smacking his fellow Boov with his “susher,” a staff topped by a rock he grabbed during his last unsuccessful negotiation with a terrifying armored alien Commander of a race called Gorg. The Gorg want to destroy the Boov, so the Boov are constantly seeking planets where they can hide. Earth seems homey, so they vacuum up all of the humans and send them off to Australia and settle into their new domicile.

The Boov are not much for socializing, but Oh wants to make friends. He sends out invitations to a housewarming party, but accidentally hits “send to all,” and “all” somehow includes the Gorg. Oh has just alerted their worst enemy to their location. This is one too many mistakes for him (Boov are allowed just three and he is well over that), so he runs away. And that is how he meets Gratuity “Tip” Tucci (Rihanna), a plucky middle-schooler with a cat named Pig. Tip was missed by the Boov vacuums because Pig was on her head so she was not identified as human.

When Oh fixes Tip’s car and promises to help her find her mother, the two of them (plus Pig) go off on a wild ride that includes an upside-down floating Eiffel Tower, plugging themselves into the Boov brain trust network (with a very funny joke about passwords), and, of course, learning a little bit about each other and themselves.

It’s nice to see a person of color as the lead in an animated film and Rihanna gives a warm, spirited vocal performance as Tip, who shares her West Indies heritage. The character design is cute but uninspired. Same for the storyline. But it is bright and colorful — literally. The Boov turn a crayon box of colors to show their emotions. And the briefly glimpsed Gorg add some zingy sharp angles. Playful touches start right at the beginning, with Oh fishing off the Dreamworks logo. The Slushious car, decked out with convenience store staples, is a hoot. And kids will enjoy seeing Oh learn about life on earth, something they know a little about.

Parents should know that this film has some potty humor, mild peril, and cartoon-style violence, and some sci-fi-style scary images.

Family discussion: When do you feel “sad-mad?” Why did Tip decide to be friends with Oh? What was the best thing about the Slushious car?

If you like this, try: “Monsters vs. Aliens” and “Megamind” and the book that inspired this film, The True Meaning of Smekday, by Adam Rex.

Chappie

Posted on March 5, 2015 at 5:59 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for violence, language and brief nudity
Profanity:	Constant very strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, drugs
Violence/ Scariness:	Intense and graphic violence, characters injured and killed
Diversity Issues:	Diverse characters
Date Released to Theaters:	March 6, 2015
Date Released to DVD:	June 15, 2015
Amazon.com ASIN:	B00UC9SOKW

So, basically, no one here saw “Terminator.” Or “Frankenstein.” But maybe they did see “Robocop?” Or “Short Circuit?”

Writer/director Neill Blomkamp likes sci-fi allegories of social and political conflicts, as we saw in “District 9” and “Elysium.” Here he imagines that a couple of years from now South Africa will replace most of its front-line police force with robots from a government contractor. Efficient and just about unstoppable, they bring the crime rate down substantially. They are trusted by the law-abiding population and feared by the criminals. The CEO of the contractor is Michelle Bradley (Sigourney Weaver), who has turned down requests from two of her staff. Deon Wilson (Dev Patel) wants to develop artificial intelligence to see if he can create a form of mechanical consciousness. Counter to his Athenian dreams of a holistic robot spirit that can create poetry and assess the merits of works of art, there is the Spartan, Vincent Moore (Hugh Jackman), whose pet project is a super-powerful weapon called Moose that is all brawn and no brain. It operates entirely under human control, through a helmet that reads its operator’s thoughts. One dreams of heart and brains, one believes in brawn and firepower.

Michelle reminds them that she is CEO of a publicly traded weapons corporation. Her job is to provide powerful but obedient robot foot soldiers to the police force, not to explore existential questions or create military-force destructive capacity.

In brief opening scene set a year before the events of the film, a journalist explains, “Historically, when we look at evolution, it’s not surprising that Chappie’s left turn happened.” So we know from the beginning that Chappie will be a major turning point in human history. Then we go back to see how he is created, as Deon takes a discarded robot with an unreplaceable fused battery that has just five days before it will run down and brings the not-so-failsafe guard key card from the office to his apartment (where of course he has created a cute little wall-eyed home robot with decorative red glasses). He revs up on Redbull and slams down some bangin’ code to, you know, play God.

Just to make it clear, he introduces himself to the robot, who will be dubbed Chappie, as his maker. And just to show you how human sentient consciousness, at least as conceived by human screenwriters, will inevitably be, Chappie’s relationship to his creator is more conflicted than his relationship to the couple he sees as his mommy and daddy. These underground, off the grid, self-styled gangsta characters share the names of the performers who play the roles, Ninja and Yo-Landi (rappers from Die Antwoord) and “America” (Jose Pablo Cantillo), who live in an abandoned building covered with graffiti.

Chappie is caught in a tug of war between the idealistic Deon, who sees him as having infinite possibilities beyond the capacities of humans, and the gangstas, who see him as the key to bigger and better ways to create mayhem and steal cars and money. Deon makes him promise never to commit a crime. But Ninja covers him in bling and promises him a new body before the battery dies.

Blomkamp’s ambition is admirable and the broad scope of his imagination is impressive. The action scenes are vividly staged and the special effects are superb. It is Chappie’s movement that makes him seem human as much as his curiosity and spirit. seeing him gently stroke a dog’s back is so endearing we barely stop to consider whether his “hands” have the sensory capacity to “feel” the softness of the fur or the warmth underneath. When a human character transitions to robot form, the fact that his voice transitions as well makes no sense as a matter of mechanics, but this is more allegory than science. Unfortunately, the fact that the robot is more human than the humans is, to put it in computing terms, a bug, not a feature.

Parents should know that this film has constant very strong language and intense and graphic violence with some disturbing images and many characters injured and killed, as well as drinking, drugs, and brief nudity.

Family discussion: If you had the chance to upload your consciousness to a robot, would you do it? Could robot police ever work? How did Chappie’s innocence affect the people around him?

If you like this, try: “District 9” and “Elysium,” from the same director

Jupiter Ascending

Posted on February 5, 2015 at 5:55 pm

“Jupiter Ascending” was released in early 2015 but it was originally scheduled for release in the summer of 2014. It does feel like a summer movie. Somehow warm weather makes us more in the mood for explosions and less in need of superfluities like plot, character, and dialogue that never feels snicker-worthy. It is not quite up to snuff for this time of year. The story feels like a mash-up of sci-fi/fantasy movies past (especially “Terminator” and “Star Wars”), with a little “Cinderella” and “Princess Bride” added in for romance and some rage against the one percent to add some political heft. It is often downright silly, even snicker-worthy. It is well over the quota for just-in-time saves, both in the falling and about-to-make-an-irrevocable-decision categories.

And yet, it is fun, especially on a big, big screen. And there are even a few moments that are shrewdly conceived and hit the mark. The Wachowskis (“The Matrix” trilogy, “Cloud Atlas,” “Speed Racer”) specialize in vast, colorful, grandly conceived new worlds and in this film they mean that literally. We visit several planets, and each is visually complex, sumptuous, and wildly imaginative, often dazzling. If you’re in the mood for eye candy, head for the box office. Don’t wait to see this one at home.

Mila Kunis plays Jupiter, an illegal alien (get it?) from Russia, working in Chicago as a maid and living with her extended family. “I hate my life,” she says when she has to get up at 4:45 am for another day of scrubbing toilets. But like Neo and Speed Racer, she is special. Not for a particular talent or quality of character but because of her very essence. Like infinite monkeys banging away on infinite typewriters until one of them randomly produces “Hamlet,” it seems that throughout the universe there are so many humans that every so often the random accumulation of cells produces a genetic mix identical to someone who has already lived. Jupiter, whose father was a British astronomer killed in a robbery, turns out to be identical to an intergalactic royal, which makes her a threat to three battling siblings in a dispute over their inheritance. Yes, this is a story about inheritance and real estate. We might as well be back at Downton Abbey or in “King Lear.” The particular piece of real estate they are so concerned about: Earth.

One of the noble siblings wants her captured. Another wants her killed. Just as assassins are about to take her out, Caine (Channing Tatum), a pointy-eared hunk arrives to carry her off like Richard Gere at the end of “An Officer and a Gentleman.” Except that this is the beginning, and he will have many more opportunities to lift her in his manly arms as things develop. He has some cool toys, too, especially some wonderful shoes that operate like a hoverboard crossed with ice skates, so that he glides through the air.

There are some clangers ahead, like the fact that Jupiter’s special genetic makeup is recognized by bees. But there is some fun stuff, too, especially an extended sequence through a delightfully steampunk series of bureaucratic offices that show that even the most highly evolved civilizations we can imagine still have not found a way around petty rules and red tape. In the rare category of both clangish and fun is Eddie Redmayne as Balem (the names are all faintly Latinate, “Hunger Games”-style). If Mount Everest were built on top of wherever over the top lives, he’d be on top of that. But I got a kick out of his full-on commitment to petulant decadence turned up to 11. And Gugu Mbatha-Raw shows that a spectacularly beautiful and talented woman can take a costume reminicient of John Candy in “Spaceballs” and make it work.

It’s long and messy and unforgivably silly in place, but somewhere under all the eye candy and under-written dialogue there are some interesting ideas about the true meaning of consumption and what, if we had all the time in the world, we would do with it. I wasn’t sorry to spend some of my limited time seeing Channing Tatum treat the air like a 3D ice rink.

Parents should know that this film has extended sci-fi/fantasy peril and violence, some graphic images including brief torture, characters injured and killed, rear nudity, some strong language, and drinking and sexual references.

Family discussion: If life requires consumption, how do we make responsible choices? How were the siblings different?

If you like this, try: “The Princess Bride,” “Looper,” “The Matrix,” and the “Star Wars” series

Trailer: Ex Machina

Posted on January 18, 2015 at 8:00 am

Imagine they were beta-testing Samantha in “Her,” or one of the replicants in “Blade Runner” and you were brought in to try out the latest model. That’s the idea behind “Ex Machina,” with two of today’s most fascinating actors, Oscar Isaac and Domhnall Gleeson. Opening in April 2015.

Trailer: Jurassic World with Christ Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard

Posted on November 25, 2014 at 3:53 pm