Firewall

Posted on February 7, 2006 at 3:50 pm

B-

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for some intense sequences of violence, and for some language.
Profanity:	Some strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Some social drinking
Violence/ Scariness:	Intense peril and violence, shooting
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	2006
Date Released to DVD:	2006
Amazon.com ASIN:	B000F8DV1M

What can you do if you want to rob a bank and hotshot Harrison Ford has designed a foolproof security system? Well, firewalls may be unbreakable, but people are not. So, you tell him that if he doesn’t break into his own system, his family is dead.

Ford plays Jack Stanfield, computer security ace and loving husband and father. The bank he’s been protecting for 20 years is about to be merged, and he is suspicious of the new management (Terminator 2’s Robert Patrick) and intrigued by a possible new job offer. This distraction may explain why he’s not too suspicious when a belligerent bill collector shows up at his office, yelling about $95 thousand in gambling debts. But pretty soon some very mean guys are pointing guns at his family and wiring him for sound and pictures so they can track him when he leaves the house.

The thrills in this movie are strictly low-wattage. For a while it is fun to see Ford McGuyver his way around the security system with a fax machine, an iPod, GPS, and a cell phone, but it all disintigrates into a generic shoot-’em-up with nothing distinctive or surprising, except, perhaps, that after all these decades, Ford still knows how to act and do stunts at the same time. Virginia Madsen is wasted in the the “No, Jack, no!”/”Don’t you DARE touch my children!” role. Paul Bettany has a nicely cool vibe but his character, like the others, is underwritten, and the script’s twists won’t surprise anyone who’s ever seen a Harrison Ford movie, most of which are better than this one.

Parents should know that the movie has extreme peril and violence, including shooting, punching, explosions, and general slamming things into characters, some of whom are injured and killed. A child is in peril and nearly dies due to an allergic reaction. There is brief strong language, someone gives the finger, and there is some social drinking.

Families who see this film should talk about how to protect themselves from identify theft. They should talk about the way that some bank robbery movies get the audience on the side of the bank and others get the audience on the side of the thieves.

Families who enjoy this film will also enjoy Air Force One and Witness, also starring Ford. They might also like to watch some other bank robbery movies, including $, the original The Thomas Crown Affair, Bandits, The Desperate Hours and its 1990 remake, and Dog Day Afternoon (mature material).

Related Tags:

When a Stranger Calls

Posted on February 6, 2006 at 3:53 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for intense terror, violence and some language.
Profanity:	Breif strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Underage teens refer to drinking; character boasts about a â€œtequila problemâ€
Violence/ Scariness:	Constant peril, children threatened, characters killed, references to bloody off-screen deaths and to murder of children
Diversity Issues:	Minority characters in supporting roles, brave girl
Date Released to Theaters:	2006
Date Released to DVD:	2006
Amazon.com ASIN:	B000F6IOAM

“He is calling from within the house.” What a line! Since the original version of When a Stranger Calls came out in 1979, that sentence — packed with impending terror –has resonated with babysitters and played on their fears as they sit isolated in unfamiliar houses, responsible for their sleeping charges.

The original never lived up to the line but this new version does a fairly decent job of stretching the suspense through 83 minutes of near-constant peril. Why bother to introduce any original twists when you can make a solid, if predictable, junior grade thriller with the simple notion that you are not alone in a dark maze of a house?

The scene opens with a montage of kids playing at a carnival alongside a suburban house where a ghastly murder takes place in shadow play in the upper window. It is no surprise then that we are introduced to young Jill Johnson (Camilla Belle) running sprints in her school gym. Clearly, she will need her speed again before the movie ends. The plot moves along well and in mere minutes we learn why she is heading out on a babysitting gig instead of joining her friends at the lakeside bonfire that night.

She has gone over her cell phone minutes by nearly 14 hours, talking to her ex-boyfriend, and has racked up enough debt to make her parents take away her phone and car privileges. Also, she has to pay off the phone bill, hence the babysitting stint at the “Architecture Digest”-worthy modern manse of the Mandrakis family. The thrills start when the stranger calls, asking his troubling “Have you checked the children?” mantra and causing Jill to start jumping at shadows for the long night that follows.

Needless to say the rest of the movie plays with the dark corridors (the lights all work by motion detectors), that distracting cat, the wind in the trees outside, and of course with our fear of the dark. Do people do stupid things in this movie? Absolutely, but the movie rests on Jill’s shoulders quite comfortably, never seeming to ask too much of her fine if not outstanding acting performance. While this movie is far from a “stranger”, for some it will be a predictable and welcome call worth a few shivers but ultimately forgettable as soon as you get off the line.

Parents should know that there is near-constant peril and the movie will give bad dreams to even the bravest of babysitters. There are references to horrific murder and you see a man threatening the lives of children. Two characters die and a character is stalked in a dark house. One character refers to her “tequila problem” as the reason she kissed another girl’s boyfriend and teens kiss and drink by a bonfire with little apparent oversight. There is strong language to describe a character’s actions.

<P?
Families that see this movie might want to talk about the advice Jill’s father gives her about how acting responsibly is most important when it hurts or costs something. What does he mean in reference to the reason that Jill is being punished? What does it mean in the context of her decisions in the house? What does Jill do wisely and what would you do differently?

Families that enjoy this movie might want to watch the original with Carol Kane or get their shivers in more memorable spooky movies such as Gaslight or the original 13 Ghosts.

Thanks to guest critic AME.

Related Tags:

Horror Movies -- format Remake Thriller

Big Momma’s House 2

Posted on January 27, 2006 at 4:06 pm

C-

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for some sexual humor and a humorous drug reference.
Profanity:	Strong and crude language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drug reference
Violence/ Scariness:	Action peril and violence, shooting and punching
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	2006
Date Released to DVD:	2006
Amazon.com ASIN:	B000F1IQHI

The poster for this movie shows Martin Lawrence in fat-lady drag tugging at a wedgie. This is as funny as it gets.

A completely unnecessary sequel to a mildly amusing 2000 movie with Martin Lawrence as an FBI agent who goes undercover as an outspoken grandmother, this time has him under-undercover as nanny to a computer whiz named Fuller who may be involved with a program to hack into national security databases.

Malcolm’s now married to Sherry (Nia Long), who is expecting a baby, so he has taken a desk job because field work is too dangerous. (Though dressing up as the Safety Eagle for school assemblies has its own dangers; he accidentally sets himself on fire, mortifying his stepson.)

But he misses working on cases. So he tells the office he is taking leave and puts on Big Momma’s fatsuit, muumuu and gigantic lace thong to apply for a nanny position with Fuller’s dysfunctional family.

It’s a little The Pacifier and a little Bringing Down the House, as Malcolm solves the problems of the over-scheduled, under-loved Fuller children (sullen teen, neglected girl, two-year-old who doesn’t talk) while tracking down the bad guys, visiting a spa (ogling the pretty girls, melting the fat suit with a hot rock treatment, advising the other women that the secret to a happy marriage is “giving it up”), running in slo-mo down the beach with Bo Derek-style cornrows, wearing funny outfits and making funny faces. Well, they’re supposed to be funny, but so is the scene where Malcolm cheers up the depressed family dog by feeding him tequila. And so is the scene where Big Momma makes the little girl suddenly popular by teaching all her friends to move like pole dancers. And those aren’t funny, either.

In other words, it’s not just disappointingly lackluster, derivative, and lazy, it’s also out of touch and creepy.

Parents should know that the movie includes
crude humor, with jokes about dirty diapers, nudity, what teenaged boys want from girls,
thong underwear, “naked pictures of Billy D.,” and
some slang terms for body parts. It is supposed to be
endearing that Big Momma teaches a group of little
girls to sway their hips and thrust their pelvises
like strippers, with a mother happily bumping and grinding along. Big Momma gives the dog tequila.
Characters use some strong and crude language and
there are mild sexual references. The movie also
includes some violence, including shooting and
punching. Some viewers will be offended by the magical Negro concept of a non-white person whose role in the story is to bring authenticity and values to clueless white people, an inverse form of bigotry.

Families who see this movie should tal about why Malcolm
did not tell Sherry the truth. Why was his stepson ashamed of him? What was the most important lesson the Fuller family?

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy the original and Mrs. Doubtfire.

Underworld: Evolution

Posted on January 20, 2006 at 12:12 pm

F+

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for pervasive strong violence and gore, some sexuality/nudity and language.
Profanity:	Some strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Wine
Violence/ Scariness:	Extremely intense and graphic peril and violence, many characters killed
Diversity Issues:	A metaphorical theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	2006
Date Released to DVD:	2006
Amazon.com ASIN:	B000F6IOBG

“Is that the same guy that was just sucking the blood out of the dead horse?”

That was my question to the critic sitting next to me in the middle of the movie. I liked the first Underworld. I thought it was comic-book fun and enjoyed its punk-gothic attitude and flashy design. But this sequel is an incoherent mess covered in sticky, goopy blood without one interesting action scene or fresh stunt.

Once again, it’s about the centuries-old battle between the lycans (werewolves) and the vampires. It turns out it all goes back to two brothers, one bitten by a wolf, one bitten by a bat. Selene (Kate Beckinsale, looking very fine in her leather jumpsuit) and mutant/hybrid Michael (Scott Speedman, mostly looking confused) found out at the end of the last movie that Victor (Bill Nighy, whose brief appearance that is the movie’s only bright spot) had lied to her about, well, pretty much everything, and now it is up to them to, I don’t know find something or kill someone or somehow save the world or at least themselves with a bad guy who looks like an anatomical drawing of the muscular system who has wings that act as a sort of impaling truth serum.

The juxtaposition of portentious “my lords,” “so the legend is true” and “you are unwelcome in my presence”-type talk with computers and helicopters is mildly fun. It’s handly to have the kind of fingernails that can pierce a paint can lid, and it’s cute when Selene crisply tells a man who says he isn’t afraid of her, “We’re going to have to work on that.” But it’s all kind of murky and never makes you care enough to figure our whatever it is.

Parents should know that the movie is very violent. A head is sliced off, bodies are burned, and many, many people/creatures are shot, impaled, blown up, and otherwise maimed and killed. Characters use some strong language and there is nudity and explicit sexual situations including a decadent setting with a man and two women.

Families who see this movie might want to find out more about the origins of the legends of vampires and werewolves.

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy Blade and the original Underworld.

Munich

Posted on December 9, 2005 at 3:21 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for strong graphic violence, some sexual content, nudity and language.
Profanity:	Mild language for an R-rated film
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, smoking
Violence/ Scariness:	Extremely intense and graphic peril and violence, many characters killed, child in peril
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	2005
Date Released to DVD:	2006
Amazon.com ASIN:	B000F1IQN2

Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meier said, “I can forgive them for killing my children. I cannot forgive them for forcing my children to kill theirs.”

At the 1972 Olympic games in Munich, there was very little security because the Germans were hoping to counter memories of the Nazi-run 1936 Olympics in Berlin. In what later became known as the Black September attack, terrorists broke into the athletes’ living quarters and took members of the Israeli team hostage. They killed two of the team members and released a list of demands. They wanted the release of 234 Arab and German prisoners held in Israel and West Germany. And they demanded that three planes be fueled and made ready for takeoff. At the airport, a failed effort to rescue the hostages led to disaster. All of the hostages and five of the eight terrorists were dead. The three terrorists who were captured were released a few months later in an airplane hijacking that was later acknowledged to be engineered by the German authorities.

This movie is the story of what happened next.

And it is the story of what we face today. Thousands of years of history have given us no roadmap for responding to terrorism. All of the options are unthinkable.

Meier (Lynn Cohen), criticized for refusing to negotiate with the terrorists, authorizes an attack by air on guerrilla targets in Lebanon and Syria. And she directs that the organizers and perpetrators of the Black Sunday attack be hunted down and killed. Not captured, not tried in court. Killed.

The leader of this off-the-books venture is Avner Kauffman (Eric Bana), an officer in Mossad (the Israeli intelligence agency) with a wife who is seven months pregnant. Israel will have no official knowledge of their activities, but will support them with cash and resources.

Like a real-life Mission Impossible, Avner has a team of experts. One knows bombs. One knows how to forge documents. One “worries” — he’s the guy who makes sure they don’t leave any clues behind.

They have thousands of American dollars to give to those who can help them find their targets. And very quickly, they find their first target. He is not in hiding. In fact, he is due to appear at a promotional event for his new book, a translation of the Arabian Nights into Italian.

They follow him as he stops to pick up groceries and has a pleasant exchange with the shopkeeper. They confront him in the stairwell of his apartment building. They shoot him, and his blood mingles with the spilled milk from the shattered bottle.

Avner makes contact with Louis (Mathieu Amalric) a man who explains that he is “ideologically promiscuous” and will do anything except do business with any government. Avner assures him he is working for “rich Americans” and Louis begins to give him names and provide support for the operation. But how do you trust someone who is (apparently) honest about his untrustworthiness, especially when you’re lying to him? Louis (possibly a reference to the initially amoral Louis in Casablanca) makes no promises that he will protect Avner if another client is looking for him. But Louis has what Avner will not find from an upstanding citizen — the names and locations of the people Avner is looking for and the means to help Avner and his team kill them.

It would have been natural, even easy, for the Steven Spielberg of 20 years ago to make this into a sort of “Indiana Jones and the Terrorist Assassins” story, with Avner as something between a cowboy and a comic book hero specializing in do-it-yourself justice. Revenge is a narrative propulsion engine that always works well in movies and Spielberg is a master of pacing and storytelling. All of that is brilliantly applied here. But he does not let us get caught up in the good guys vs. the bad guys shoot-em-up. The first hit is not just excruciatingly tense; it is excruciatingly difficult. We want them to shoot, but we also don’t want them to.

Spielberg and screenwriter Tony Kushner (Angels in America) do not just show us all sides; they show Avner and his team all sides, and let the characters and the audience agonize over what they and we have become. In one scene, Louis has unintentionally (or intentionally) double-booked two teams of assassins into a room in an ironically-termed “safe house.” After an all-guns-drawn stand-off, Avner persuades the other group they are not there to hurt them, and everyone lies down to try to get some sleep. There’s a bit of a struggle over the radio until they find a station everyone can agree on — American R&B. Meanwhile, Avner and the leader of the other group talk about the future of Israel and Palestine. The next time they meet, talking is not on the agenda.

Spielberg is a master of point of view, making us care about and root for the movie’s “hero.” We happily root for the good guys when it’s three guys against a shark or some scientists and kids against the dinosaurs or Indiana Jones (or Schindler or the soldiers looking for Private Ryan) against the Nazis. Here, he uses that skill to tell Avner’s story, making it clear that he is the hero, and yet keep us off-balance as he and Kushner add layers of heart-wrenching detail and complexity.

Like most Spielberg movies, the theme of this story is home, and what makes it heartbreaking is the way each of the characters is just trying to do the best he can to protect his home and his family. What makes it even more heartbreaking is the way that all of them, in their own way, end up as exiles. Avner can no longer live in the land for which he sacrificed so much, including his time with his family and his peace of mind. Others lose the home they thought they had as a part of a culture committed to righteousness, not revenge.

Like Avner, we get numb to the killing. The first one is heart-breaking; after the fourth (or is it the fifth?), you’re just thinking about the logistics.

How do you kill a monster without becoming one yourself? How do you look in the eyes of a monster without seeing his humanity? The first of Avner’s targets explains that the Arabian Nights stories are enduring because of the power of narrative. Each of the characters in the story (as well as Spielberg, Kushner, and the real-life Avner who cooperated with a book about what happened) have a story to tell. The movie ends, but the story goes on.

Parents should know that this is an extremely violent movie with constant peril and many injuries and deaths and a child in peril. This is not a mindless Hollywood shoot-em-up; it is a real-life story and Spielberg and Kushner make you feel how agonizing each encounter really is. There are also explicit sexual situations (some nudity). The language is less strong than in most R-rated films; someone gives the finger.

Families who see this movie should talk about what the options are for preventing and responding to terrorist attacks. How does each of the people in this movie define the “home” he or she is protecting? How do each of them decide what the limits are — what they will and will not do? How do you decide what your own defition of home and limits are? Black September and the Israeli response (which they called “Wrath of God”) were both in large part intended to affect the public perception of the righteousness of the causes of their organizers. How effective were they? How do you decide who is in your “us” and who is in your “them?” What does Meier’s quotation mean?

Families who appreciate this movie should see the Oscar-winning documentary One Day in September about the capture and killing of the Israeli Olympic athletes, which makes clear the devastation of the loss of the Israeli team members and explores the ineptitude of the German officals and the callousness of the Olympic community. More information about the Black September attack and its aftermath can be found here, here, and here. A Woman Called Golda has Ingrid Bergman as Golda Meier, the Milwaukee schoolteacher who became the second Prime Minister of Israel.