The Last Witch Hunter

Posted on October 22, 2015 at 5:47 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for sequences of fantasy violence and frightening images
Profanity:	A few bad words
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, fantasy drugs
Violence/ Scariness:	Extensive fantasy-style violence with many disturbing and grisly images
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	October 23, 2015

A witch would have to cast a spell over me to make me sit through this big, dumb, dull, dud again.

And that’s too bad, because I like Vin Diesel and I can easily be put in the mood for a good-stupid sword and sorcery epic. But not this one, which has a storyline we’ve seen before and dialog that sounds like it was written by people for whom English was not a first language, and probably not a second. It’s like a videogame, and not in a good way.

Diesel plays Kaulder, and we meet him 800 years ago, with long hair and a beard, he is part of a group determined to wipe out the witches who are responsible for the plague that has killed off many of their families, including Kaulder’s wife and daughter. “In her death lies our salvation.” “Let fear perish.” “You must go. You have to fight.” Not very memorable. Oh, let’s be real — it does not even qualify as dialog. It’s just talking.

With torches for light and swords, arrows, and axes for protection, they enter the witch’s cave. Things do not go very well and most of them are killed. Kaulder battles the witch, and as she dies, she curses him to live forever. We catch up with him in the present day, back to being the bald Vin Diesel we all know and love. He’s on an airplane being tossed around the sky by a fierce storm. He realizes that it is not only caused by magic but caused by someone who does not know she is causing it. A young witch with a backpack has carelessly tossed together ancient runes that should never be allowed to touch. (Kids!) “At least you didn’t get them wet,” he says, and we know that (1) the screenwriters have seen “Gremlins,” and (2) they’ll be wet before the end of the movie and the CGI folks will have a heck of a storm to kick up then.

The “Gremlin’s” idea is followed by a few borrowed from “Harry Potter,” “CSI,” and various other vastly superior sources, with some highly predictable twists and a sprinkling of semi-contemporary references. Well, the iPad reference is semi-contemporary. The use of the term “stewardess” and the assumption that they are all super-hot and excellent one-night-stand prospects is rather outmoded.

There are some pretty good special effects and some moderately good stunts, but Michael Caine is wasted as Kaulder’s human aide (about to retire, with Elijah Wood, also wasted, as his replacement). Rose Leslie has some nice moments as a young witch trying to make her way in New York, like she wandered off the set of “Girls.” Ultimately, the remixing of better (and just as bad) films becomes grating and by the time they set it up for a sequel, it is the audience is beginning to cursed for living long enough to sit through this film.

Translation: Sword and sorcery-style fantasy violence with some grisly and disturbing images including dead bodies, a few bad words and brief sexual references.

Family discussion: What would be the best and worst parts about living for 800 years? Why was it so hard for Kaulder to trust anyone?

If you like this, try: “Hansel and Gretel” and “Dragonslayer”

Tales of Halloween

Posted on October 16, 2015 at 5:25 pm

B-

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for strong bloody horror violence throughout, language and brief drug use
Profanity:	Very strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, brief drug use
Violence/ Scariness:	Extensive and grisly violence, characters injured and killed, many disturbing images
Diversity Issues:	Diverse characters
Date Released to Theaters:	October 16, 2015

True to its name, “Tales of Halloween” is a collection of ten short horror stories of the type that Boy Scouts might tell around a campfire late at night. That’s both its strength and weakness.

The movie begins on Halloween night in a small town, where a radio announcer (Adrienne Barbeau, legendary horror star making a meta point) introduces us to a series of spooky goings-on about town. What follows are ten short films by ten different directors about monsters, murderers, devils and demons. Most of the directors are veterans of the horror genre with a genuine affection for the medium. Neil Marshall (writer and director of the 2005 horror film, “The Descent”), Paul Solet (writer and director of the 2009 horror film “Grace”) and Lucky McKee (writer and director of the 2002 horror film “May”) all do their best with limited budgets. Director Darren Lynn Bousman creates an enjoyable story of a trick-or-treater who inadvertently plays a trick on the devil.

These stories are short on depth, plot and dialogue. They are long on the kind of revenge fantasies that appeal to adolescent boys. Parents who steal their kids’ Halloween candy late at night, mean baby sitters and neighborhood bullies all meet terrible fates (usually involving buckets of blood). Many of the tales are more “icky” or “gross” than serious horror stories. Some moments turn out to be more laughable than frightening. But there is a kind of cheerful innocence and simplicity to these stories that will endear them to their target audience. It will not help the film’s marketers that most of that audience will be to young to see a film that is rated R for “strong bloody horror violence throughout, language and brief drug use.”

In a 92 minute movie, there is not much time to develop each individual story. This film is not destined to become a Halloween classic but the eclectic combination of directors, actors and costume designers manages to produce some interesting moments. Some segments stand out for their low budget creativity or for unusual twists and turns. The attitude of the film is displayed in the closing credit, “No animals were harmed in the making of this film, but we sure did kill a lot of pumpkins.”

Parents should know that this is a very scary film with many disturbing images and a lot of violence, as well as drinking, drugs, and very strong language.

Family discussion: Which episode do you think was the scariest? Which villain was the most convincing? Is it important in horror to believe the victims deserved their fates?

If you like this, try: “Dead of Night”

NOTE: I am proud to disclose my conflict of interest — my daughter, Rachel Apatoff, designed the costumes for one of the segments, “The Weak and the Wicked,” clearly the highlight of the film!

Related Tags:

Horror Movies -- format Thriller

A Ballerina’s Tale

Posted on October 14, 2015 at 5:32 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Not rated
Profanity:	None
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Injury and recovery
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	October 16, 2015

“A Ballerina’s Tale” — the title suggests a fairy story, with sugar plums and a happily ever after ending. But this documentary about Misty Copeland is a story about the brutal hard work and resolve necessary to create those exquisitely graceful performances and make them look effortless. Like the Venus and Serena documentary about the superstar tennis champions, this is a story of an African-American pioneer in a world that has traditionally been white. While ballet does not offer a competition as definitive as a sporting event, like the Williamses Copeland has a level of ability, skill, and dedication that made it impossible to put her anywhere but front and center.

And, like the Williams sisters, Copeland is in a field where people in their 20’s and 30’s may be at the end of their careers. Furthermore, like the Williams sisters, Copeland faces an unexpected health crisis that put her ability to continue at risk. Just as she was given the chance for her first lead role, Copeland found that she had a severe stress fracture in her lower leg. She was 29 years old, and did not know if she would ever dance again.

This is a good movie about a subject and a person who deserve a great movie. The drama is compelling, although it is hard to see an ad campaign as the triumph it expects us to cheer. The best parts of the movie are Copeland’s performances, starting with home video footage at the beginning, going back to when she was in her teens. Her grace and stage presence are there from the beginning. We see her stand in her favorite spot in the practice room, admitting she is a perfectionist. We learn a little about the relatively recent but still-prevalent notion that a ballet dancer should be waiflike and prepubescent-looking and as indistinguishable as possible from the other dancers. Copeland has a strong, healthy body, curvier than the typical principal dancer. And she is black. The film’s most touching moments are when the previous generation’s African-American dancers become her mentors, and we see in their eyes, faces, and still-graceful gestures how much it means to them that she may be able to go farther than they did. If this is a fairy tale, they are the fairy godmothers.

Parents should know that this film has frank discussions of racial prejudice and an injury with brief graphic images.

Family discussion: What other fields are as demanding as ballet? What did Misty Copeland learn from the women who went before her?

If you like this, try: “First Position,” “Pina,” and “Ballet 422”

Big Stone Gap

Posted on October 8, 2015 at 5:51 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for brief suggestive material
Profanity:	Mild language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking and drunkeness
Violence/ Scariness:	Tense confrontations, sad death
Diversity Issues:	Ethnic diversity
Date Released to Theaters:	October 9, 2015

Even in small towns, big things can happen. Sometimes the most famous movie star in the world stops by and makes international headlines. And even bigger things happen, too — they just don’t get into the newspapers. Adriana Trigiani’s best-selling novels about her home town of Big Stone Gap, Virginia are loving tributes to the down-home values and adorably quirky characters she grew up with. Big things happen. There are sad losses and disappointments. But there is love and honor and generosity, too. In her first feature film as a director, Trigiani has assembled a superb cast, mixing top Hollywood and Broadway talent with some locals. Ashley Judd is at the center as a woman whose discovery of a secret about her past makes her think differently about her future.

It takes place in 1978. The woman is Ave Maria Mulligan, the owner of the local pharmacy. With a name like that, there has to be a story. When her beloved mother dies, she learns for the first time that her mother’s husband was not her father, as she thought. Her mother has left her a letter explaining that her father was a man she loved in Italy. Ave is determined to find her real father, though she has never traveled anywhere. She has great friends with colorful names and personalities, especially wisecracking Fleeta Mullins (Whoopi Goldberg) and starry-eyed bookmobile librarian Iva Lou Wade (Jenna Elfman). Then there’s Theodore Tipton (John Benjamin Hickey), the high school band and choral director who works with her on the town’s legendary annual “Trail of the Lonesome Pine” pageant and is Ave’s sort-of boyfriend and a handsome coal miner with the rare ordinary name of Jack (Patrick Wilson), who has a very possessive girlfriend (Jane Krakowski as Sweet Sue Tinsley).

It takes place in an eternally cozy past where coal mining is romantic because it creates electricity and there’s no mention of black lung disease. It’s corny cornpone, but unpretentious and it goes down easy, like sweet tea brewed by sunshine.

Parents should know that this film has some sexual references including potency, paternity, and a closeted gay character and non-explicit situations, drinking and drunkenness.

Family discussion: How is Ave Maria different from the people around her? Why did her mother keep the secret so long?

If you like this, try: the book series by Adriana Trigiani and the film “Win a Date with Tad Hamilton!”

Related Tags:

Comedy Movies -- format Romance

Stonewall

Posted on September 25, 2015 at 8:00 am

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for sexual content, language throughout, some violence and drug use
Profanity:	Very strong and crude language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, smoking, drugs
Violence/ Scariness:	Police brutality, riots, reference to murders
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	September 25, 2015

In 1969, when the federal government prohibited the firing of gays and lesbians, when it was illegal for them to congregate in a bar or even to have consensual sex, when police harassment and brutality was not only permitted but expected, a man threw a brick, shattered a window, and began four days of riots that galvanized the fight for GLBTQ equality. The window was in a bar called Stonewall, and its name lives on as the symbol of the moment that ignited a revolution.

The movie “Stonewall,” intended as history and tribute, instead throws a brick through the meaning and the moment, shattering both. This movie is more than bad and worse than disappointing. It is a tragic distortion of a vitally important story that insults the people it tries to honor and insults its audience as well. Director Roland Emmerich (known for movies with a lot of big explosions and stunts) and screenwriter Jon Robin Baitz so vastly underestimate their audience that they apparently believe cannot understand a movie about the GLBTQ community unless we have an all-American-style high school football hero from the heartland to identify with. How do you make a movie about the Stonewall uprising and so completely miss the point?

Our point of entry is handsome but bland Danny (Jeremy Irvine), a Hoosier who has a crush on the quarterback. He is Goldilocks to the three bears of his family, spread out to represent all points on the gay-friendliness spectrum: a taciturn father (also his football coach), a passive mother, and a devoted and free-thinking younger sister (Joey King). When his assignations with the quarterback are discovered, “faggot” is scrawled on his locker and he is shunned by everyone. He refuses to tell his father that it was a one-time thing and leaves for New York.

And so we shift from tone-deaf cliches about the Midwest to tone-deaf cliches about Christopher Street, with a group of adorably scruffy and flamboyant runaway Lost Boys who spend their time tricking and clubbing. Their leader is an Artful Dodger type known as Ray (Jonny Beauchamp). They sit on the stoop and talk about Judy Garland, alternately enjoying shocking decadence and longing for home. Around the edges of the story are the real-life characters who are far more interesting, or at least who were in real life.

This is a bad movie, purely from the standpoint of drama. It is poorly constructed, with cardboard characters and worst-of-the-year category clangers in dialog, provoking snicker and then outright snorts from the audience. “I’m too angry to love.” “These kids have nothing to lose.” But the monumental failure here is the disrespect for the real-life courageous souls who fought back nearly half a century ago and for the audience, who would relish a film that does them justice.

Parents should know that this film has explicit sexual references and situations, including predatory behavior, abuse, and prostitution, homophobic and bigoted insults, police brutality, and riots. Characters use very strong language, drink and smoke, and use drugs.

Family discussion: How was the gay rights movie like and not like other civil rights movements of the 20th century?

If you like this, try: “Longtime Companion.” “Pride,” and “Milk”