Bruce Almighty 5/24/2003
What’s Good: While "Bruce Almighty" kindergarten-dumb philosophical notions of what man does when he is elevated to omnipotent status, it at least has a thesis... which is more than I can say for other dip shit 100+ million dollar opening, neo-noir Sci-fi sequel disappointments staring Keanu Reeves. And I'd vote for Freeman to be my president and, sure why not, a God too. What also falls into the "What's good" category: Catherine Bell's beautifully big bells (excuse me, am I not allowed a Mr. Skin moment?).
What's Not: An insipid comedy with as many laughs as the shark jumped "Friends." The film represents one big missed opportunity. Carrey bombs and the film takes it's premise to predictable and bland places (with an ethereally curtsy John Williams-esq barfy musical score in the background)
File Under Irony: I forgot my usual dorky little notepad and instead wrote my seething notes on this philosophically empty and spiritually conventional God loves all film on my battered copy of Andre's Gide's The Immoralist (which is like a more uplifting version of Camu's The Stranger novel).
Directed by Tom Shadyac
Plot Outline: A guy who complains about God too often is given almighty powers for 24 hours to teach him how difficult it is to run the world.

     Who would have guessed that in this dreary movie-going era, Jim Carrey would end up as funny as Adam Sandler. We all saw Carrey try to make his career all about being Tom Hanks by going from TV, to B-Comedy to winning an Oscar with limp-dick, lookie lookie at my charming pathos/emotionally uplifting dramas like "Man on the Moon" and the turgid "The Majestic" and we all saw Carrey fall on his talking ass. Now we all have to see a shameless Carrey crawling back into the spotlight, getting his feet all sullied on the comedic detritus that motion pictures have been wallowing in these past few years. Yes, Carrey is back doing lowbrow comedies, except he seems to have forgotten how to do good lowbrow, "Ace Ventura" humor and his comic persona these days are married under false pretences that he still thinks that we think he's funny-- yeah, about as funny as Robin Williams.
     In his recent, desperate, attempt to prove to American that he is still is that funny "In Living Color" everyman, Carrey plays a good natured but naive local news reporter and, not so surprisingly, he’s about as annoying as one. Carrey's character gets one too many shafts in life and blames God for all his shortcomings (what good Christian doesn't). He asks God to explain himself for the job it's (the film calls God "he" as if God has a sack) doing with the world and God, get this, answers him… ho, ho, ho. But before Dr. God’s special powers are endowed to Carrey's not so special Bruce, Carrey says the following: “God is a kid with a magnifying glass on an ant hill, and I’m an ant. He wants to burn off my feelers and make me squirm,” and the audience erupted with laughter because, you see, Carrey made his squinty rubber face and said sqqqqiiiirrrmmm instead of squirm. If you laughed at this line then, congrats, this is your film. Me, I was too busy scribbling down what astoundingly unfunny material I just heard as insurance to anyone who tells me they actually though this film was funny. No, I’m not going to deny someone’s sense of humor; what I will do, however, is sit them down and beg them to explain to me why that “uproarious” line about God being a kid on an ant hill blah, blah, blah made them laugh so hard that they gave "Bruce" 80 million dollars last weekend. Subsequently, the only answer I may understand is if they indeed saw “Bruce Almighty” high on a generic brand of rubber cement.   

     God, played by a calmly assured Morgan Freeman (who, like that dip shit God figure from “Matrix Reloaded” also looks like the KFC guy for some strange reason), takes a break from his autocratic, um I mean omnipresent leadership and, on a whim, hands over the reigns to a guy in need of some spiritual help named Bruce (you see that’s funny because Bruce is the least likely name one would figure to be a deity… ha). Bruce now has the power of God at his disposal. The film, up till now, deeply sucked what with it's inane banter between Bruce and his girlfriend (a ZERO interesting but 47% cute Jennifer Aniston who, with this film, just broke her streak by only having her nipples poking out through her top half the time) where she imparts fascinating movie girlfriend advice like "you have a lot of potential, Bruce." Still, what got me into the theater (besides the fact that the tickets were paid by somebody else) was the promise held in the nifty premise—from “Liar Liar” to “Dragon Fly” to "The Nutty Professor" all of Shadyac films have a literal amount of “magic” in them and this one seemed like it could gain comic momentum. The recaps read: Jim Carrey is God and I figured I was about to bear witness to one sleekly smart comedy, willing to go the distance and raise the metaphysical roof on us mo-fos. I figured wrong. I should have remembered that any movie about God directed by the guy who did "Patch Adams" would end up as comically vacuous as, well, "Patch Adams."

    In the early moments of Bruce’s reign, sure it makes sense that he treats the world as his own personal Sim Life game and fucks around, using his powers to look up hot chicks wearing PG-13 friendly granny underwear-- I would do the same except, you know, with NC-17 knickers. And sure, from a narrative standpoint, we get the iconic usage when Bruce gets the “inspired” idea to part the red sea… of tomato soup (so funny that I let everybody else laugh for me). I expected the film to start out like this but at least the film could have done is gone somewhere new by the end of the second act where it was well established that Bruce could do whatever he wanted. What we get instead is Jim Carrey doing his passé shtick, then sitting around all pussy whipped and trying to win back the affections of Jennifer Aniston, who exists to want Bruce to marry her because she still has ZERO personality. God has never been this pedestrian. And Aniston, the most patchy actresses of primetime TV turned one of the most dull actresses of the moves, turns in, yup, a ZERO range performance that can only be described as Rachael in a "mad cap" Jim Carrey movie (as opposed to the depressed Rachael persona we saw in “The Good Girl,” the kooky Rachael we saw in “Office Space” and how can anyone every forget the not even Golden Globe worthy supportive Rachael we saw in "Rock Star"). 
     So, yup, this Bruce guy has the power of God at his finger tips and all he cares about his annoying girlfriend’s nagging feelings and getting that all important raise at the local Buffalo news station. And, yup, the film has the power and budget to create any story it wants to and settles for an abysmal narrative where Carrey (still thinking he is a God of comedy when he looks to me more like the Jerry Lewis of comedy) learns a valuable lesion in being grateful for what life has to offer. Fuck, even Aladdin was more inventive with the godly power of a wish granted.  So of course I would have appreciated a power corrupts absolute scenario (you know what I’m thinking... evil willow from “Buffy” season six, oh yeah) or a film where Bruce sits down and really ponders the nature of higher beings or, hell, even a film where we learn this is all wishful thinking by a Mr. Limpet sort of soul but I’m practical, I know that a film with a premise like this and a star like Carrey won't be traveling to the same theologically fecund places that "Groundhog Day" did—well, it will but only in coach. What the film could have done, however, is exposed us something we’ve never seen before in a PG-13 comedy about God. The film could have had Bruce do extraordinary things (Bruce can "run the world" but never even leaves his dumpy hometown... and never even asks the man upstairs Britney Spears' breasts are real) but settles instead for TV safe, Capera inspired ideas where Bruce comes up with the idea of making a prayer database on Windows and makes his arch nemesis at the TV station fart on live TV.

     Ultimately, the film didn’t push the envelop on anything. Not on social news-room satire (hello, “Broadcast News” came out, like, twenty years ago, how about another good one). Not on raunchy/sex related comedies (If you think Bruce giving his chick a boob job and dogs using the toilet is funny or cutting edge notion then GO BACK TO THE 80’s) or even relationship comedies a la Woody Allen. The film also didn’t push the envelope on intellectual comedies that use religion as the forefront for theological discussions (like “Dogma” “The Commandments,” or the mostly serious "13 Conversations About One Thing" did). But forget pushing any envelops, what's most unforgivable about the film is that it didn’t make me laugh. You know you're sitting in a dreadful comedy when this idea comes to you "I wonder how much more funny Martin Lawrence could have made this movie."

     At one point towards the end of the film Shadyac actually tries to show us how quaintly philosophical his “little movie” is when Freeman's un-phased, too cool for the room God enlightens Bruce on the nature of mankind when he utters the sagely line “when does anyone have a clue about what they want?” All I could think was, “I do. A fantasy-themed comedy that’s funny... and smart.”

Bruce Almighty D  

Matrix Reloaded 5/17/2003
What’s Good: The scope of the film is larger. Great production design. I mean, great. Great musical score by Don Davis. Great cinematography. Great editing. One great action scene where Neo Battles Agent Smith. But the writing...
What's Not: A pretentious mish mash of confused philosophy and tedious, if cool looking, action.  Characters say things they think are profound "What happened here happened because it had to happen" and then shoot each other in slow motion. Also, some characters like the pale twins or Jada Pinkett Smith annoy more than they inspire.
 Maybe, just maybe: The film disappointed. But... perhaps the payoff will come in the third film. Perhaps "Reloaded" is one half of a huge 4+ hour action epic. Perhaps "Reloaded" and "Revolutions" are one big movie.  There is still hope for Zion.
Directed by Andy Wachowski Larry Wachowski
Plot Outline: Neo and the rebel leaders estimate that they have 72 hours until 250,000 probes discover Zion and destroy it and its inhabitants. During this, Neo must decide how he can save Trinity from a dark fate in his dreams.

    The emperor has no leather on!!! Hell, this film is not even wreathing pleather. While I anticipated summer to start of with an explosive “woah” it instead got started off with a resounding “doah.”

     With every optic fiver of this films being the Wachowski brothers seem to manically jumping up and down and proclaiming “look what we can do, look what we can say, look what we’re saying with what we’re doing” while failing to convince me that what they’re saying and doing are exercises in trickery. To set things up a bit the movie spends it’s opening sequences George Lucasing it up and sees the characters going, at long last, to the mythical Zion, a Ewok-ized place within the earth where the huddled masses await their Christ like savior, Neo, to bring them, well, salvation. Early on the people, in need of a pep talk, there is a scene where a shirtless Morph, all oiled up and mugging for the camera, declares to a bunch of slightly sullied, dred locked ravers, “Tonight. Let us make them remember that this is Zion and we are not afraid!!!” and I thought I was watching a cheese-ball Charlton Heston movie. Then, Neo and Trinity went off to make what looks like PG-13 love, slow motion style, and all the ravaged masses in Zion started to party like a couple of extesy-d out losers and I though I was watching a Ballies total fitness commercial staring Britney Spears doing her “I’m  A slave for you…” strip, er, I mean dance routine. The Wachowski's brothers way of developing Zion is to show that what remains of human kind is a culturally diverse (read: no white people are left) bunch of models. Okay. Then, while Neo and Trinity do their thing in soft close-ups while shooting gentle looks at each other, Neo, get this, pauses during the act. Trinity wonders “what’s wrong?” and he proceeds to talk about his FUCKING FEELINGS. At this point the plot went from "Star Wars" to "Mad Max Beyond Thunder Dome" to Britney Spears and now it was "The English Patient." At this point my expectations plummeted and all I could think was that "the Matrix used to be cool” and this, mind you, was before the scene with the twins.  

    The film has glairing flaws but amidst all the mechanical action there are meaty notions for any sophomoric philosopher to grab on to like that of control and man’s reliance over machines of his own making; “Those machines are keeping us alive while others are trying to kill us.” Scene after scene the concept of “what is control” is beat over our heads as we see the symbiotic relationship of man and metal coupled with the symbiotic relationship of man kicking metal ass.
Also included is a notion of Neo as a prophet. The film opens with a vision of Trinity dying. Neo wakes up in a cold sweat. He's, gasp, showing emotion over something. He's a prophet. Throughout the series we see how this newly awakened Christ figure goes from being resurrected in the first film to healing others in this film (next up... neo walks on water), and all this before he encounters a character named the Architect and... well, I won't tell you what he does but what I will say is that the Architect must stands for God (the architect, watchmaker, seer of seers… whatever you want to call it) and looks uncannily like Colonel Sanders the KFC guy. That's right, God slings chicken and Neo's got a mean case of the munchies.
     Also included in the film's discourse are notions of free will, destiny and oh, how's this for connotative levels of meaning... there's a profound(ly) dumb, kung-fu philosophy line “You don’t truly know someone till you fight the.” I laughed out loud thinking that the audience would join along, remembering along with me that “Battlefield Earth” had lines just like that but, no, I think they bought it. Most action movies are meaningless, granted, but why must this film try to be memorable. Now, this quote defines the entirety of the film experience for me. Is the film trying to say something weighty and reflective by acting all stoically Kung-fu cool or is it a knowingly campy, highly stylized car wreck, crushed by the weight of it’s ham-fisted pretensions? Look at my grade and you’ll see my answer.

    “Reloaded” makes yet another misstep. In a scene that, astoundingly, rips off the tedious political intrigue of the NEW “Star Wars” films, there is some sort of Zion senate and after Morpheus and co. come and go and get into some deep shit, the counsel makes a request that calls for two Captains from their already weak army of ships to help Morpheus’ Neberkenezer, held under siege by invading swarms of sentinel robots. After a long and nail biting lull where it looks like nobody will help out, a character proudly steps up and declares “Capt Sovna of the Rivahigny will answer the Captain’s call” and it hit me like one of Neo's led pipes. “The Matrix” is now “Star Trek.” THE MATRIX IS NOW IRREPARABLY DORKY. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Behold, a place where bungling fan boys have assimilated this modern myth like those invading sentinel robots and the Wachowski brothers are no longer projecting cool but interpreting what they think was once cool into the guise of an decidedly un-cool product. Folks, beware of false prophets. But how did this happen? Or, more to the point, how could this happen? How could this once neo-gothicly slick, postmodern action romp turn itself into a geek heaven? While the first film was so trendy in it’s graphically slow-mo violence that it provoked high school kids to commit murders (well, not that I’m saying that’s a good thing) this film may also prompt young ones to be violent, but not through idol worshiping mimicry but, rather, violent deeds in protest over being duped into seeing this faux-ponderous, mindlessly driven action drone. The answer to how Neo lost his groove, I'm afraid, is that "The Matrix" was never meant to be a trilogy. There's no way the Wachowski brothers had a film this convoluted and emotionally empty in mind. Far from that, the first "Matrix" said and showed us everything that needed to be say and said it so well that it threw the new "Star Wars" films off their game and set a new standard for science fiction. Logically, people were starving for good science fiction yarns and as the deluge of money flowed in, I imagine WB told the brothers to make shit up or risk loosing this lucrative franchise to some idiot like McG or Michael Bay. The result of making one great film is that we are now punished with the hastily sketched out worlds of "Reloaded" and "Revolutions." In Hollywood, greatness begets greed.

    Basically the film's problem is that it borrows too much mythology and fails to bottle an essence of its own. From “Ghost in the Shell” to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. From Return of The Jedi’s Ewok village to the metaphysically dazzling Dark City’s mechanically driven “world” where choice is also void from these slave’s lives. From the Bible to whatever else you want to throw in. In essence, the pastiche riddled adventure tries to say too much, tries to up the stakes too high (oh look, Neo fighting an army of Agent Smiths, not just one) and tries to reinvent an action-noir subgenre that it basically started (well, at least stole from anime and comic books) in 1999. The gimmick of the first film has worn off and is now rubbing it's own pale skinned hide raw. But what did you expect? After dozens of films have paid sub par homage's to you (from "Charlie's Angels" to "Scary Movie" to "Shrek," from the recently awful "The One" to the recently cool "Equilibrium"), how can the novelty that is "The Matrix" still hold water and dazzle us? It can't, really, but this film certainly tries. So now instead of, oh say, fifteen bullets being shot at Neo as the first movie showed, we now see, like, a hundred bullets being stopped by The One in mid air!!! Wow, thanks for the innovation.
    Of course there is a lot to consider here (I really should see the film again before I grade it) and despite my bitching I do respect the breath of the vision that creative team behind this film has added. The last thing this film is, is forgettable and give the filmmakers points for at least trying. I mean, an action film about free will is a damn brave subject matter to tackle for any film ("Choice is ours to make" the Zen Morpheus states. "No, choice is an illusion" an evil Frenchmen espouses before he chooses to give some blond chick an organism) but these evocative notions go poof faster than "Minority Report" when characters spout off pompously meaningless lines like “What happened here happened because it had to happen” or “We’re all here to do what we’re all here to do” I wonder if the film really cares about any of these ideas. Or could this just a matter of the Wachowski brothers exploiting ideas and, more accurately, investigating them on a surface level while never fully exploring anything below that fathomless ocean of subconscious philosophy? What we get instead of an all out insightful techno thriller is some verbose musings followed by ten minutes of expertly executed carnage followed by Neo, Morpheus and Trinity musing if they were meant to be raising slow motion hell at this exact place and at this exact time? The action goes on too long and the psychobabble philosophy chases it's tail by going in one too many dizzying circles. Both the senselessly gripping action and obstinate philosophy end up coming full circle, not to make meaning but, instead, to bite us in our befuddled asses. Fact is the sensory/intellectual overkill has us too confused to realize that what we have just watched adds up to little more than the artifice of substance. In conclusion, “Matrix Reloaded” is one long, showy and pretentious-mined masturbation session and I’m no longer looking forward to be splattered with the money shot that is “Matrix Revolutions.” I'm taking the red pill out of this ruined fantasy world.

-I do not really discuss the performances so, taking a cue from Travers' review of "X2" here's my review.
Reeves plays Neo as a blank faced prophet. The more he learns the more his personality retreats into his sanctimonious superego. While this stoic faced Christ figure has no emotion outside of a need to get laid and save his woman's life (at least in the first one he was allowed to show more feeling than the Agents) Reeves is perfect in the role of Neo-- unaffected by the world but still ready to fight for what he believes in... which, I don' t actually thinks he knows because his motto in this film is "I just wish I knew what I was supposed to do." Still, the dude makes flying around like Superman (so fast he actually goes to plad) in a black dress look like the coolest nimrod in the world. B
Morpheus, Firshburn's character gets the brunt of the film's poor writing attack. His character is supposed to be the insightful mentor/ prophet that that everybody else calls "crazy" but the actor ends up looking lost in the film's pooped out ideology. That scene where he gives a speech without his shirt on is Charlton Heaston bad. Also, Fishburn is supposed to be the leader so why is Neo always having to save his sorry ass? Also again, Morpheus once deep relationship with Neo is drowned out by too much plot and noise. C-
Trinity has never emerged as a full fledge character. She exists to save Neo by making "love" govern his life. Moss does a fine job with what she is given, she looks good in leather, but the film never really gets inside the psychology of this character. In an interview Moss said "Every once in a while I'll go, 'Wow! I'm like the girl hero, right?'" Um...  C+  
Agent Smith The mechanical affect of Hugo Weaving's character has always amused me. While in this film Smith is about as scary as an army of cloned Homers form "The Simpsons" Halloween special, Weaving's characters new status in life (estranged from the robots... at least I think) and new personality cloning method all but saves the film. The scene where Neo fights exponentially increasing amounts of Agent Smiths, bashing their mangled bodies across the land with his trusty metal  pole, reminded me of a beat-em-up video game but at least it was a really fun beat-em-up video game. A-  
Harry Lennox. Always cool. I look forward to seeing him in the third film.  B+  
Jada Pinkett Smith. Always annoying. Keep her away from the third one. D-
Everyone else. From the lame twin ghost robots to Monaca Belluci's fake breasts the remainder of the cast resorts to caricatures of varied levels of totally unconvincing weirdness. For every cool evil-doing French guy who gives chicks organisms we get a character like the computer hacker who sits in front of a computer and goes "yes" when Neo beats an Agent up and "ohhhhh" when it looks like Trinity might die. Truth be told, the cast hams up but never seems aware of how absolutely preposterous and down right silly this sodding material is. They think it's cool. D

X2: X-Men United 5/2/2003
What’s Good: The vanguard of modern comic book films.
What's Not: That's not saying much. Plus, that scene where Wolverine's head craps out a bullet had me, well, what emotions could one possibly applied to a scene like that?
Directed by Bryan Singer
Plot Outline: The X-Men band together to find a mutant assassin who has made an attempt on the President's life, while the Mutant Academy is attacked by military forces.

I think of X2 not as a rip roaring comic book franchise but, rather, as a superhero soap opera. The good news is that this version of x2 sees it’s character's personalities at their most polished (read: not as much exposition here as in the first) so as a result of a more confident script, director Brian Singer crafts a taut adventure by blending meaning, action, and, yikes, and a grip of those F-words: feelings. Characters weep, relationships hit road blocks, even the feral, Maxim reading, mutton chop wearin’ beast that is Wolverine gets in a catfight with a chick with long nails. And that's after the beast is caught up in a banal love triangle where he tries to “understand” Jean Grey’s (Famkee Jansen) feelings for another man, the certifiably pussy whipped Cyclopes. What the fuck is happening you ask? We saw that Spider Man twit looking for a job and getting cock blocked by his best friend, we will see the Hulk as a misunderstood romantic, and Daredevil, well, Daredevil is a complete sap with an expensive hair cut and the clean shaven glow of a pregnant woman. Hell, these days even Buffy has found herself to be dealing more with feelings and broken friendships than ass kicking. All that aside for a moment, the notion that superheroes are flawed agents of a spurious society works for me. I never like Superman because, well, he was a super man… flawless and, accordingly, as boring as a movie about Christopher Reeve reading a book. Now, tragic heroes in these dime-a-dozen modern superhero yarns that Hollywood has been exploiting (and running into the ground… just look at how many cheaply made superhero moves are on their way) can work for the better, as this daringly tedious melodramatic action film espouses, or work for the much, much worse as last year’s Spiderman proved when it send me to sleep and had me dreaming of a better movie. What I mean to say is that X2 works despite its harmful, cha-ching need to appeal to ALL demos... yes even the "Titanic" one.

Before I actually review the film let me be blunt. In the last ten years the X-Men movie franchise represents the best Hollywood incarnation of superheroes. Not only the best but the franchise that has a future. Mind you, this doesn’t mean I love “X-Men;” far from that. Fact is this film it’s merely slightly above mediocre when placed alongside the first "Batman" or "Unbreakable." But when you consider that "Batman" blew it, that Blade is too unreliable (and confident now) and Spider Man is more interested in tale and painting his crusty uncle's kitchen than seamless action, then the trials of these band of mutants looks pretty damn intriguing.   

With this film, written by David Hayter (yes, Solid Snake can kick ass with his silent pistol and write a mean tale on his downtime) there are still too many characters roaming the culturally ambiguous globe, everything that is being said here (about “mutant rights,” the nature of identity etc.) was said in the first film, and yet another strike ageist the film is it's the shameless pandering to the Lizzy McGuire demographic all but ruins this near excellent film but, luckily, "X2" is as impervious to unforgivably long running times, redundant speechifying and cheep melodrama as Logan’s exoskeleton is to bullets. I liked this film. A lot. I didn’t think I would, but here I am saying that I did. X2 had me hooked and it wasn’t the slickly mindless action that grabbed me but the notion of mutants as cultural Others, existing in a state of societal liminality and mad as hell about their outsider status-- a central conflict arises when scowling bureaucrats (down with whitie) try to sign a mutant registration act. Wolverine, Grey, Cyclops, Prof. Xavier, Mystique (isn’t that a porn star’s name?) Magneto, Rogue, Pyro etc. are all back and they’re all dealing with what it means to be “special” in a way that would make the creators of “American Beauty” proud. In one scene, a hideous on the outside/ puppy dog on the inside mutant asks a shape shifting mutant why, instead of looking like Blue Man Group with nipples, doesn’t she just remain in someone else’s image all the time? She proudly replied “because I shouldn’t have to.” And that line cuts to heart of this specially abled superhero movie.

Perhaps the films biggest problem, though, is the lopsided characters. For every Hugh Jackman there's a Halie Berry (One Oscar later and still painfully useless). For every scene of exquisite old man chemistry between Patrick Stewart's Professor Xavier and Ian McKellen there's a slew of tired sequences with Rogue, Pyro, and some pimply-pussified Ice teen that play out like a very special episode of "Dawson's Creek." And while all the actors seem to be approaching these characters from the right angle (one part camp, two parts sincere affect) there comes that time when the script has to make choices and character preferences and a plot (thin as it is here) must kick in and propel the story forward. What I mean to say is that if it's hard to develop one superhero in a movie like "Daredevil" then it's got to be a killer to develop an ensemble of them squirrelly fuckers and still have the audience following the drama. For what it's worth, "X2" juggles all these variables with an uncanny amount of energy and purpose considering all the constraints. Now let's hope Robert Altman takes on "X3: Mutant Park."      

Correct me if I’m wrong but the X-Men franchise (a comic book series of which I have not read a page) was rooted in veiled message making about the communist witch hunt. If that is true then today, the plight of the mutants takes on a whole new dynamic and speaks to a whole new generation of alienated young people who feel their government is not, as we were told in schools, 100% just. Authority figures are corrupt misers working for scared little ingrates that we call the public. In these films, the humans are portrayed as ignorant sheep (albeit ignorant sheep worth protecting) while the noble mutants (the good ones at least) are unsung assets to the world representing “the next step in human evolution” and would be celebrated members of the society if it were not for the bad mutants fucking shut up and ruining the party by, as the Beastie Boys once put it, sticking their dicks in the mashed potatoes. Indeed, the themes of this picture couldn’t have come at a better time. Each scene works on multitude of layers and this added level of meaning contributed to a film watching experience separate from most others. Don't quote me on this but amidst the empty but embarrassingly entertaining action sequences I think a though may have slipped in.

Identity and Confidence
What’s Good: Both film's inhabit great genres.
What's Not: Neither film advances those said genres.
Directed by James Mangold and James Foley
Plot Outline: Identity: When a nasty storm hits a hotel, ten strangers are stranded within and as they begin to know each other, they discover they are being killed off one by one. Confidence: Jake Vig (Burns) is a consummate grifter about to pull his biggest con yet, one set to avenge his friend's murder. But his last scam backfired, leaving him indebted to a mob boss (Hoffman) and his enforcer.

     Two films released last week, “Confidence” and “Identify,” share more in common then just their one word tittles. Both are directed by guys named James who are ensemble pros, James Foley (GlenGarry Glenross”) and James Mangold (“Cop Land,” “Girl Interrupted”). Both films also represent confident genre pictures that lean more towards the derivative than the groundbreaking. But the difference is that one film lovingly reconstructs the terra of psychological slasher horror. The other also proudly bowwows from the best but fails to carry over the magic from the cinematic victims from which it is stealing.   

Identity is a film that cheats but only because we let it. We want to be surprised a la "Six Sense" again and so we let film's fuck with us without playing by the rules. After watching this film I recalled "Adaptation" where Nick Cage's idiotic brother Donald (played by Nick Cage) devised a script where it is revealed, illogically, at the end that the hero and villain were actually the same person. A twist for the sake of a twist despite logic and reason. During "Adaptation" I laughed at the film's knowing wink at how stupendous irrational Hollywood thrillers can be. During this film I watched in horror. No, not because the film was scary but because of the scary realization that this is Donald's finished script.   
It was a dark and stormy night… yes, that cliché is in full tilt boogie with James Mangold’s joyfully unoriginal attempt to craft a psychological horror film for filmgoers who are starved for something real. Back to that cheats part. Once I sat through this film I can’t say I had a feeling that I had just watched a brilliantly executed twist of a denouement (like, oh, say “Fight Club”) but I was comfortably numb knowing that what I had just watched was a looping genre picture that’s doesn’t need to be original or inventive because, for horrors films these days, that's virtually impossible. In the last decade, because I know few horror films end brilliantly ("Six Sense" "Final Destination" are diamond's in the rough) all a horror film has to do to win me over is set up the premise well and give me competent actors. Because the casting of Cusack, Liotta, Peete, Molina, McGinley, and Pruitt Taylor Vince are such odd choices for horror films and because these are all such good actors  and because these are all such good actors that work amazingly well with each other (thanks to Mangold's talent with working with big casts) the film projects an air of quality and legitimacy even when it's goes all generic on us. 

     Regarding the film’s mystery, the friends I saw the film with, we all guess who the killer was yet we were still all wrong because, oddly enough, if you combined all of our on-the-spot assumptions (the kid did it, no the fat bald guy did it, no it’s Ray Liotta, no it’s really Cusack…) we were all actually correct. Bringing that to light got me thinking. “Identity” may not work as a logically constructed horror film but, damn it, it certainly works as an atmospheric who-dun-it. The audience (my self included… my friends included) were wrapped up in the murder-death-kill intrigue even when we weren’t warped up in the scare factor because, let’s face it, the film is too unoriginal to be scary. Cusack is the anchor of a film where a brand of Final Destinationian chance (or fate or, perhaps, some other kind of higher power) forces a number of different characters—all holding a secret—into a spooky hotel where, one by one (not just a Foo fighters album any more) they get picked off. They were all “brought here” for a reason… to die!!! HA HA  HA. With each gruesomely mangled body is a hotel room key left by the killer (who obviously saw “8 Little Indians”). The keys are counting down from ten. The numbers drop and characters as well as the audience are bruised by the tension. As the body count rises and the key numbering lowers characters the weird shit o meter goes off the charts as we are hit with the down right eerie feeling that these murderers couldn’t have been committed by a human. One character guesses Indian spirits but the real answer lies in an ending too outrageous to even try to explain.

     The film, like all great murder mysteries, acts on our claustrophobic phobias; as a rain trodden Cusack, an ex-cop who regains his confidence after a botched bout of heroics (he basically told a suicide victim that she had no reason to live and she listened to him), jumps back into detective mode the audience, watching from over his shoulders, try to solve the case with him but in retrospect I think many astute viewers will logically come to the conclusion that since the film isn’t playing fair with the details of the murders then why should spend mental energy trying to figure out who did what to whom. Many will be freaked out by the film’s answers and many will love the twist but by the distorted, insane Troll logic conclusion I felt the bitter sting of the audacious horror film cheat and, accordingly, was kept at a distance. Luckily, the distance was just far enough away to still have an enjoyable time. 

Now I move to yet another story that cheats. What we have here is "Confidence," yet another con film that has the genre right up there in the title (after "The Score" and "Heist" why didn't they just call the film "Con?"). Indeed, so many of these smart ass con films have come out in the last three years that I’m eagerly awaiting for Hollywood to give us “Not Another Con Movie.” The first question that comes to mind after I saw this futile two hour con game is: “Why make this?” "Confidence" is a self-assured picture that contains all the elements of a great con thrillerdom yet totally lacks the ability to surprise. Ed Burns, narrating the film as a, yawn, dead guy who’s been betrayed by, yawn, the hot femme fetal he thought he loved, is actor perfectly suited for the deadpan con man persona but in this film his usual brand of unforced charm is glaringly absent. That the actor has always been to coolly apathetic for the room, with those squinty eyes and raspy-cool voice goes without saying. But this time around I need substance behind the coolness. Simply put, the actor never tries too hard at anything but always makes it look like he does—that’s why I usually like him. Not a bad actor, just one that should stick to supporting, “Sidewalks of New York” or “Saving Private Ryan” material because his effortless wiles work wonders in an ensemble setting and destroy star roles (“Fifteen Minutes,” anyone?). And that’s the problem with the film. It’s effortless and Burns can’t carry the mechanics of the con to save his life. Speaking of saving lives, I guess a major problem is that nothing bad happens to the main characters. Everything goes off without a hitch and Burns’ self amused disposition just started to bother me. Can’t this guy at least pretend to be anxious? It felt like I was watching “Ocean’s 11,” only minus a few Oceans (except the investigator with a vendetta, played here by Garcia, who, after appearing in the great con thriller “Thing to do in Denver When You’re Dead” choose inexplicably to do two lame heist movies). And, hell, besides one death early on nobody (not even the heavy… an overacting, sex addicted, scenery chewing Dustin Hoffman and his dimensionless goons) meet their maker. Hey, con movies don’t need a high kill rate to get my juices flowing (I simply loved “House of Games” and loved “Sneakers” and “The Spanish Prisoner” even more, and perhaps loved the zero-kill “The Game” the most) but without that feeling that the house of cards can and will topple at any moment, I’m left feeling like all I’m watching director James Foley and his proud actors do is prove to us how cool they are. Soderbergh and the Cloonster already did that, I didn’t need to see it again.     

Being that I love this genre so much and respect event he most basic of heist/con flicks (take “Heist” for example… loved it) I take a bit of offence to con films that project style over ingenuity. Style is good but only when it enhances a convoluted and meticulously constructed plot as “Fresh” so brilliantly showed us in the nineties. The last great con film I saw, the Spanish “Nine Queens,” had the rules of the game down pat. Rent that or die. Unlike “Nine Queens” here is a film that wont go out on a limb because loves con movies as much as the genre’s fans. It seems as if this film feels that by proving its love for the genre, this affection alone will yield a good film. No so. The Reason: Instead of Confidence they should have titled it Conventional.

Identity: B-
Confidence: D+