"Green Zone"
Richard's Review: 3 stars
"Green Zone" starts with a bang. Or more rightly stated, a series of bangs. Set in Bagdad on the first night of the shock and awe campaign, the opening minutes are a harrowing portrait of what it must be like to be under massive fire. It's a frenetic beginning, shot in a wild cinema verite style, which will leave many in the audience wishing someone would buy director Paul Greengrass a tripod.
Matt Damon, reuniting with Greengrass after two Jason Bourne thrillers, is Army Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller. He's a good soldier who allows creeping doubt about the existence of Weapons of Mass Destruction to force him to go rouge. Breaking ranks from the Pentagon he aligns himself with a CIA Middle East expert Army Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller to try and ferret out the complicated truth. At odds with Miller is Clark Poundstone (Greg Kinnear), a freshly scrubbed Penatgon appointee who won't let the soldier's misgivings get in the way of his mission to bring democracy to Iraq.
Nobody shoots action like Greengrass. He breathed new life into the spy genre with the Bourne films, using handheld camera to put the viewer in the action. Shooting where most action directors fear to tread—in tight, claustrophobic spaces for example—he brings a breathless documentary feel to his films that has redefined how we watch action on screen. That's mostly a good thing, but for all the excitement that his whiplash camera style creates it occasionally leaves me hungry for an image or two that doesn't look as though the camera was attached to a yoyo. His gritty style works for the gritty material in "Green Zone" but despite the masterful editing I found Greengrass's propulsive approach overshadowed the story.
The action scenes are tense, but when the action stops, (which, frankly, isn't very often) even the dialogue scenes move with the velocity of a bullet shot from a gun. It's pedal to metal all the way with little regard to the nuances of storytelling.
Inspired by—it takes too many liberties with the text to be called "based on"—Rajiv Chandrasekaran's book "Imperial Life in the Emerald City" it is a straightforward story that dumbs down the story of Bush era Iraq policies to the level of a cut rate James Bond flick. The added political intrigue elevates things a tad but the addition of several characters right out of central casting makes one long for the days before every CIA operative character had a weary smile and a jaded heart.
Damon is comfortable mixing the game faced soldier with an earnest side and acquits himself well, particularly when in the actions scenes. By this time he and Greengrass must have a shorthand on set that allows them to blend character and action, and here it works.
The same can't be said for Brendan Gleeson as CIA veteran Martin Brown. Gleeson, a fine actor, doesn't have any action scenes, and seems to be an afterthought to the director who places such hoary old clichés as, "Don't be so naive," in his mouth. Ditto Amy Ryan as a Wall Street Journal writer. It seems if the characters aren't shooting a gun or in constant motion than Greengrass doesn't know exactly what to do with them.
There is no question that "Green Zone" is an adrenalized action film. Unfortunately it oversteps its reach when it tries to go highbrow with the political intrigue.
"Remember Me"
Richard's Review: 3 stars
"Remember Me" is teen heartthrob Robert Pattison's first adult role. This, despite the fact that his best known character "Twilight's" Edward Cullen, is well over 100 years old. Here he sinks his teeth into the part of a troubled twenty-one year old with daddy issues, a dead brother and a girlfriend he began dating on a dare.
When we first meet Tyler (Pattison), he's slumming it in NYC in a crappy apartment with a wrench for a doorknob and a job restocking shelves at The Strand bookstore. "I'm undecided," he says, "about everything." His father his wealthy, but since the suicide of his brother Michael their relationship has soured. One night after a bar brawl he is beaten and arrested by Neil Craig (Chris Cooper). In a strange twist of fate Craig's daughter is in one of Tyler's classes. They begin to date, at first based on his need to get back at the cop who beat him up, but soon he develops real feelings for her. Their relationship is complicated by Tyler's issues with his father, his issues with his rage and generally, his issues with everything. Then, just when everything seems to be on the upswing for the young couple, tragedy strikes.
Two "Twilights" worth of brooding lessons has been good training for Pattison, who has brooding down to a science in "Remember Me." As the tortured Tyler he's equal parts James Dean, alternative school attitude and thunder, but he does show more range here than he has in the "Twilight" movies. He is thoroughly credible for two thirds of the film, up until the film's closing moments when his angry young man schtick starts to get a little old. Until then, however, he displays enough chops to suggest he may have a career once he throws off the shackles of Edward Cullen and is allowed to grow as an actor.
His best work comes in the scenes opposite his younger sister Caroline ("Nurse Jackie's" Ruby Jerins). Jerins is a good natural performer—there's not an ounce of pretense in her—and their on screen time is filled with warmth and (occasionally) some badly needed levity.
"Remember Me" is a serious movie that begins with a murder and ends with a startling conclusion. In between there is the above mentioned brooding and some dramatic family dynamics at play, but it feels like there is a bit too much story for any one plot thread to be given the film's full attention. As a result it wanders more than it needs to. A little red pencil action on this script could have easily simplified the story for the better.
Not that any of that will matter. There are a couple of love scenes and a romantic story to keep the Robsessed Twihards interested and if only if only one tenth of his fan base shells out to see it, "Remember Me" will still be a hit.
"She's Out of My League"
Richard's Review: 2 stars plus 1/2 a star because he's so nice and another 1/2 star because he's so funny -- for a total of 3 stars
"She's Out of My League," the new romantic comedy starring Jay Baruchel as a 5 dating a 10, exists in a fictional movie universe where men lose the ability to speak in the presence of a beautiful woman and airport security guards are friendly and helpful.
Baruchel, a Canadian actor best known for his roles in "Tropic Thunder" and "Knocked Up," plays Kirk, a moodle—that's a man poodle—who lets women walk all over him. Single for two years, he still pines for his ex-girlfriend even though she has long since moved on. When Molly (Alice Eve), a pretty blonde party planner, leaves her i-phone at his security check point she is thoroughly charmed when he goes out of his way to return it and despite their differences they begin seeing one another. He's not the kind of guy she usually ends up with, but she responds to his sense of humor and honesty, until his insecurities drive a wedge between them.
The structure of "She's Out of My League" is pure rom com formula. Unlikely couple meets, falls in love, has conflict, cut to happily ever after. It's Lyle Lovett and Julia Roberts or King Kong and Naomi Watts, only without the happily ever after part. The rom com recipe only really cooks, however, when the cast is interesting and luckily "She's Out of My League" has charm to burn.
Alice Eve is genetically blessed enough to play the traditional blonde knock out Molly, but brings more to the role than curves and flowing hair. She takes a character that could have been smug and makes her likeable; bringing a sweetness that keeps the audience on side even when her relationship with Kirk gets rocky. If Amy Adams, normally a very likeable actress, had half the charm Eve oozes here then maybe her rom com, "Leap Year" from earlier this winter, wouldn't have been such a disaster.
Most of the heavy lifting, however, is left to unlikely leading man Baruchel. Baruchel, an Ottawa native, has been lurking around the edges of Hollywood success for the last few years. Memorable roles in big films like "Million Dollar Baby" and some frat pack comedies and lead roles in some cool Canadian films (like the upcoming "The Trotsky") have prepped him for his first lead in a studio picture. His low key charm and deadpan wit carry every scene he's in—and he's in almost every frame if the film. He's believable as slacker Kirk, sweet Kirk and boyfriend Kirk.
Not that "She's Out of My League" is all sweetness and light though. There are some crude jokes from the Apatow school of bathroom humor, some silly "guy" talk about relationships and a climax that goes on a bit too long, but any movie that uses Branson, Missouri as a metaphor for mediocrity and twists the rom com formula in such sweet ways is worth a look.
