I Finally Saw GLADIATOR So I Could Be Properly Disappointed By GLADIATOR II

GLADIATOR II (Dir. Ridley Scott, 2024)

Nearly a quarter of a century after Ridley Scott’s historical epic GLADIATOR ruled the box office, and swept the Oscars, comes this highly anticipated sequel, opening everywhere today. But it wasn’t highly anticipated by me as, despite all the hoopla, I never got around to seeing the original until earlier this week. When I got an invite to an advance screening of GLADIATOR II, I decided it was time to catch up. I found it on a streaming platform (Paramount Plus), and finally got to see what all the fuss was about.

 

I can’t say that the 2000 GLADIATOR will make any dent in any of my mental lists of greatest movies, but I could see why it was an award-winning crowd pleaser. Highly enjoyable was its star-making turn by Russell Crowe coming up against Joaquin Phoenix in another break-through performance in a richly shot ancient Roman revenge adventure enhanced by a stunning Hans Zimmer score. It didn’t matter that it was a pretentious presentation with weak dialogue, and obvious plotting, it worked as overblown epic entertainment, and I’m glad to have now caught up with it. 

 

Sadly, all the elements that made the first film so successful are sorely lacking in Scott’s GLADIATOR II, which opens with an animated sequence laying out the basic story points of the original, which, because of the many call-backs, I’ll call GI for the rest of the review. I really don’t think it’s a spoiler to say the sequel concerns the son of Russell Crowe’s Maximus, but an actor I was previously unfamiliar with, Paul Mescal plays the lead, Lucius, who was played as a kid in GI by Spencer Treat Clark. The only folks from GI to reprise their roles are Connie Nielsen as Lucius’ mother, Lucilla; and Sir Derek Jacobi as a much more minor Senator character, Senator Something.

 

As the film follows the story beats of GI – big opening battle, hero’s wife gets killed, slave becomes lauded gladiator, colossal Colosseum fights, family drama, and final showdown – we get the new characters, Marcus Acacius (Pedro Pascal), a Roman general who is married to Lucilla, and appears to be inwardly tortured; and, more interestingly, Macrinus (Denzel Washington), who at first, seems to be simply rehashing the blustery former slave turned wealthy merchant part Oliver Reed played in GI, but he turns out to be the film’s central baddie here.

 

Since sequels are programmed to attempt to top the original’s highlights, the Colosseum set pieces are even more over the top with scary CGI baboon, rhinos, and most ridiculously sharks when they fill the venue with water to restage a naval battle with two warships facing off. Now historical record does show that the Romans did have outlandish events like this, but that the water in the Colosseum wasn’t deep enough for sharks. Since this was one of the movie’s most engrossing scenes, I’m going to let it go. It's hard to complain about unnecessary CGI sharks when the entire affair is unnecessary.

 

Anyway, as the lead Lucius, Mescal just doesn’t have anywhere near the gravitas or the charisma of Crowe’s Maximus; and as the antagonist, Washington has swagger aplenty, but his role is underwritten, giving the audience little to grab onto. Same could be said for Pascal, who brings what he can to his worried warrior persona, but again, like every other player here, doesn’t have much pull. 

 

Despite that it shares the same cinematographer with GI, John Mathieson, the look of GII is far less spectacular. Gone is the crisp panoramic imagery, replaced by a washed out less engrossing landscape for which us to go through a lesser telling of the same story. GI had memorable movie moments – Maximus yelling “Are you not entertained?” at the crowd, Phoenix’s Commodus sneering, “It vexes me. I’m terribly vexed” -  but I can’t remember a single line from GII just two days after seeing it. And unlike Zimmer’s work on GI, I can’t recall any of Harry Gregson-Williams’ score either!

 

So this uninspired sequel is director Scott’s third collaboration with screenwriter David Scarpa after the mixed bags that were ALL THE MONEY IN THE WORLD (2017), and NAPOLEON (2023), and apparently the third time isn’t the charm. I doubt GII will leave much a mark on pop culture after it gets chewed up and spitted out this weekend, but since I’ve been wrong about the masses not wanting big, flashy empty machismo before, I won’t be surprised if it hits big. 

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MEGALOPOLIS: A Weird, Pretentious Blend Of Bad Acting And Beautiful Imagery

Now playing at every megalopolex from here to New Rome:

MEGALOPOLIS (Dir. Francis Ford Coppola, 2024)

It’s been three days since I took in a screening of the legendary filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola’s highly anticipated, and highly dreaded big, ambitious epic MEGALOPOLIS, and I’m still processing the damn thing. I’ll just jump in – it takes place in New Rome, which is New York City in a world in which the Roman Empire never ended, and concerns a visionary architect, Cesar Catilina, portrayed by Adam Driver.

With the backdrop of skyscrapers that shine like gold, under an endless yellow sky, Cesar aims to rebuild the city into some glorious shape-shifting utopia out of some magical substance called Megalon, but he’s opposed by Mayor Frank Cicero (Breaking Bad’s Giancarlo Esposito), but lo and behold, the mayor’s daughter Julia (Nathalie Emmanuel) falls in love with Cesar. 

 

On the flashy sidelines in what seems like endless partying is the scene stealing Aubrey Plaza as a blonde, gold-digging news anchor named Wow Platinum (she said on The Daily Show that she “watched a lot of Fox News to research my role as a corrupt journalist”), an actor that Coppola remarked was cast because he was “cancelled,” Jon Vought as Cesar’s uncle Hamilton Crassus (crass name for a crass character), Dustin Hoffman as Crassus’s confidant Nush “The Fixer” Berman, Crassus’s son Clodio (Shia LaBeouf, who just gets creepier with age), and Clodio’s sister Cladia (SNL’s Chloe Fineman who called he character a “coke whore” on Late Night with Seth Myers). 

 

Lawrence Fishburne, whose third ever film credit was as a 17-year old Larry Fishburne in Coppola’s 1979 vietnam masterpiece APOCALYPSE NOW, grandly narrates, and plays Cesar’s assistant and chauffeur. Another member of the cast with major history with the director is his sister, Talia Shire (THE GODFATHER, and ROCKY series), as Cesar’s mother, but she isn’t given much to do. Neither does Jason Schwartzman as one of the Mayor’s men, he’s Coppola’s nephew so it was nice he was invited.

 

Oh, and somehow Driver’s Cesar has the ability to stop time, simply by yelling “Time, stop!” Now this is a compelling used element, and amazingly shot by Coppola veteran, cinematographer Mihai Mălaimare Jr., and the movie surrounding it is gorgeous-looking, but it is never explained, and doesn’t make any sense in the narrative, but I’m not sure if it’s supposed to. Like many things that litter the screen in this strange story, I’m not sure what it’s supposed to be saying.

 

But if you let it wash over you, there’s a lot of lush imagery and stunning set pieces to get lost in. One such mesmerizing sequence involves Grace VanderWaal as Vesta Sweetwater, a Vestal Virgin pop star, is harmonizing with an army of multiple versions of herself hanging from the ceiling of the coliseum, and I’m watching thinking, I don’t know what any of this means, but it looks fantastic!

 

After a 9/11-style disaster involving a fallen satellite, the building of the new Megalon-enhanced paradise goes forward, while LaBeouf crazily tries to f*** with Cesar’s reign as hard as he tried to f*** with the fourth Indiana Jones movie, and Plaza’s Wow Platinum (love that name) gets caught up in her own web of manipulations.

 

Unfortunately so much of the acting in this overblown opus is stilted, awkward, and unconvincing. Driver fares the best as his protagonist has an intense gravitas to him (even breathing a little bit of new life into Shakespeare’s done-to-death “To be or not to be” soliloquy), but Cesar is a broadly drawn magazine image for a character, and there never feels like there’s a back story or much depth to the guy. Coppola’s camera obviously adores Emmanuel as Cesar’s love interest, but her dialogue all seems like she’s narrating the film to herself, and it’s a bad thing when her blankness at times recalls Sophia Coppola’s miscast turn in GODFATHER PART III.

Plaza’s Wow Platinum (again, primo moniker) is definitely the most engaging persona here as she’s so unlike any other character the great deadpan actress has played, and feels like she’s in a much more interesting movie than everyone else.

Now, as for the movie’s meaning and/or message, it is obviously Coppola’s attempt at an allegory about how the crumbling of society in our modern times is historically embedded, but I’m not sure how the abstract architectural adventures of Cesar really makes any purposeful point. I may someday though.

 

But at this time, I can’t in good faith recommend MEGALOPOLIS. It struck me as a pretentious, badly acted, poorly paced, messy, cringingly weird, but eye-poppingly beautiful piece of catastrophic cinema made from what I bet is one of the nuttiest screenplays ever (written by Coppola himself with no help!). It does say something that I would watch it again as I feel like I may get something out of another viewing, but I really don’t think casual non-film geek movie-goers will connect to this perplexing passion project, and make it a hit. I’ll be very surprised if it does well at the box office this weekend.

 

I will say it would probably make a good double feature with the new re-release of CALIGULA: THE ULTIMATE CUT, as MEGALOPOLIS often plays like that decadent yet prestigious porno (produced by Penthouse Bob Guccione’s no less), but without the mass orgies. 

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The Best Of Film Babble Blog (A Self Indulgent 20th Anniversary/Birthday Post)

Film Babble Blog has been AWOL since my DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE review last July as things have been hectically busy lately, but I’m back to make a self-indulgent post on my Birthday. I’ve been meaning to do something to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of this blog (first post was March 12, 2004) all year, and I finally came up with compiling a list of my Top 10 favorite posts.

 

Among the movie reviews have been assorted articles, lists, and interviews and this what I consider the cream of the crop. By the way, the pic at the top is from Baz Luhrmann’s 2013 adaptation of THE GREAT GATSBY (I just wanted to have a lavish big screen party scene image, the movie isn’t even mentioned in any of these posts).

So let’s get right to ‘em (click on the highlighted titles to read the posts):

 

1. In Memorium: My Dearly Departed Cat Squiggy (September 14, 2014)

Of course, #1 would be honoring my first adoptive cat, Squiggy, who passed away 10 years ago (Sept. 12, 2014). This remembrance might be too icky for some who are not cat or pet people, but I think most folks will appreciate the sentiment. Squiggy lives!

 

2. William H. Macy Chats With Film Babble Blog About His New Film KRYSTAL (April 12, 2018)

Over the course of Film Babble Blog’s first two decades, I didn’t do many interviews, but I couldn’t pass up the chance to talk to the great William H. Macy. He was promoting his second film as director, the odd Rosario Dawson vehicle KRYSTAL, and it was an insightful, fun phone chat with the acclaimed actor. 

3. Ingmar Bergman: The Woody Allen Angle (July 31, 2007)

 

When the iconic Swedish filmmaker Igmar Bergman passed ion 2007, instead of doing a standard obit, I decided to do a deep dive on his influence on the films of Woody Allen. Now Allen is a controversial figure these days, but this film geek’s noting the many elements whether they be thematic, technical, personal, or personnel that Woody Allen has borrowed from the movie master still holds up to me.

 

4. Apocalypse Then (September 11, 2021)

My 20th Anniversary recollections of the week of the tragic events of 9/11, which started off with a Birthday viewing of the then new APOCALYPSE NOW REDUX is one of my favorite pieces as it captures my what my world felt like during that sad, shocking time when it felt like the world stopped.

 

5. That Time Orson Welles Ended His Career (And Life) On An Episode of Moonlighting (December 30, 2023)

I was reminded of the legendary filmmaker’s final moments in front of a camera when Hulu started streaming the hit ABC series, Moonlighting, late last year and I exercise-bike binged it. It’s an interesting tale of how fortunately the late, great CITIZEN KANE actor/writer/director had one last gasp meaning that his ridiculous voice turn in the 1985 animated TRANSFORMERS wasn’t his last credit. The Film Babble Blog favorite Welles was also featured in the posts, A Birthday Tribute To Orson Welles With 10 Welles Wannabes (May 5, 2008), and Classic Cinematic Cameo: Orson Welles in THE MUPPET MOVIE (MAY 6, 2022). 

 

6. That Time THE BODYGUARD Soundtrack Saved Nick Lowe’s Ass (August 12, 2021)

An amusing look back at a happy happening involving the great British singer/songwriter benefiting greatly by the use of one of his classics (albeit a cover) on the best-selling soundtrack of the Whitney Houston/Kevin Costner hit, THE BODYGUARD. 

7. The Legacy Of Mrs. James Bond 007 (September 10, 2020)

Much like the Bergman post, I was wanting to pay tribute to a legendary figure who had passed (in this case Diana Rigg), but through an specific angle that most obits mentioned but didn’t fully investigate. Another post in this same vein is: How James Bond Was Indiana Jones’ Father Long Before Sean Connery Played Indiana Jones’ Father (October 31, 2020)

 

The final posts are lists, which I’ve done a lot of over the years. A few of these were featured on the Internet Movie Database when they used to update a “Hit List” on their main webpage. That got my page a lot of action back in the day, which I miss now.

 

8. 20 Great Modern Movie Cameos (6/5/07)

9. 10 Definitive Films-Within-Films (7/4/07)

10. 10 Movie Soundtracks That Think Outside Of The Box Office (9/01/09)

So there you go. Hope you enjoyed this trip down Film Babble Blog’s memory lane.

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The Self-Satisfied DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE Has Laughs Aplenty But Is Slightly Less Than Specturb

Now playing at every multiplex in the multiverse:

DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE
(Dir. Shawn Levy, 2024)

Here it is – the long-awaited MCU entry #34 in which the merc with the mouth meets Mutate #9601 in the balls-out bromance for the ages. That is, the iconic characters, the ironic Deadpool, and the angry Wolverine - portrayed respectively by Ryan Reynolds, and Hugh Jackman - team up for what’s being billed as a “multiversal meta comedy,” and as the only Marvel movie being released in 2024, it has a lot riding on it.

 

This is something this heavily self-referential, and self-satirical sure-to-be summer blockbuster calls attention to a lot. Deadpool even snarks, “The multiverse? It’s just been miss after miss after miss…” at one point as the super twosome get deeper into their adventure, which I’m gonna to try to describe without too much detail. Also, I’m not gonna spoil all the cameos and supposed surprises in store for those that are way into this sort of thing.

 

This is because it’s a purposely convoluted maze of scenarios involving Deadpool’s dying timeline, which he has to try to save via Wolverine as he’s the timeline’s anchor being, but, of course, he died at the end of LOGAN. No matter, our wise-cracking ant-hero locates, through a wacky montage, a Logan variant, who he presents to Mr. Paradox (Succession’s Matthew Macfadyen seemingly channeling Tim Curry, or maybe Richard E. Grant), but he’s deemed the “worst Wolverine” so they are cast into the Void, where most of the movie plays out.

 

The Void is a funny visual concept as it’s a ginormous desert wasteland littered with the relics of disintegrated timelines (the weathered 20th Century Fox logo is half buried in the sand), and it’s the setting for Deadpool and Wolverine’s big brawl, which is deftly choregraphed, but lacking stakes as they both are regenerative creatures and can withstand major gashes and stabs.

 

From there the movie takes its cues from such inspirations as PLANES, TRAINS, AND AUTOMOBILES, MIDNIGHT RUN, and 48 HOURS to give us the gruff buddy road trip through encounters with Professor X’s twin sister, Cassandra Nova (Emma Corrin) in her lair that happens to be in the suit and skeleton of Ant-Man’s corpse (“Paul Rudd finally aged,” Deadpool quips); and dozens and dozens of Deadpool variants, which our titular duo battle in a highly stylized slo-mo sequence set to Madonna’s “Like a Prayer.” 

 

This is to all stop the destruction of all timelines by Mr. Paradox, or maybe the MCU themselves as this movie seems to be admitting through all the witty asides that the franchise has been majorly stumbling since all that Infinity stone hullabaloo ended with Iron Man dying ‘n all. 

 

It’s true that the MCU has suffered through some subpar entries as of late, and this film shows it’s fun to dance on the graves of the franchise failures, but a lot of the inside jokes, and quick quips didn’t land with me as hard as some of the other folks at the press screening I attended. Maybe I should have boned up by watching previous X-MEN and DEADPOOL movies. 

 

But that’s just the thing – according to the many lists of “what to watch before you see DEADPOOL 3,” that have recently appeared online, there are like ten movies to see before you can get every reference or call-back in this movie. This is one of the reasons there’s been such Marvel malaise of late; with all the interlocking movies, and series – only the hardcore can keep up and properly appreciate these multi-layered efforts.

 

Lately, I’ve been trying to get a new portmanteau going: specturb – a combination of spectacular, and superb. As in “the INSIDE OUT sequel is simply specturb” (which it is). As much as I think fans will dig DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE, and will largely find it hilarious, I found it slightly less than specturb. It lives from laugh to laugh, but its self-satisfied sense of self-satire made me smirk more than actually chuckle.

 

However, for its entertainment value (it’s fun sized!), especially on the scale of post ENDGAME MCU, this is a winner overall, and I bet this weekend’s audiences will eat up Reynolds and Jackman’s not-so-odd coupling, and will ask for seconds.

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Anxiety Steals The Show From The Emotional Ensemble In INSIDE OUT 2

Now playing at a multiplex near us all:

INSIDE OUT 2 (Dir. Kelsey Mann, 2024)

 

While it’s easy to be cynical about Pixar churning out yet another sequel of one of their biggest hits, it’s actually been five years since they’ve put out one, which was TOY STORY 4, (that franchise’s LIGHTYEAR was an odd spin-off not a sequel). 

 

With the last several offerings by the Disney-owned animation studio being far from the insta-classics of old, I’m glad to report that this second INSIDE OUT is a worthy, and very funny follow-up that is a very welcome offering for this cinematic summer season.

 

The 2015 original INSIDE OUT, which matched its huge critical acclaim with big box office (and deservedly won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature), is one of Pixar’s finest, so it’s great to see Amy Poehler back heading the emotional ensemble as Joy, Phyllis Smith as Sadness, and Lewis Black as Anger while Tony Hale, and Liza Lapira fill in for Bill Hader, and Mindy Kaling as Fear and Disgust respectively.

 

Then there’s the addition of four new characters that invade their turf in the headquarters of the conscious mind of the 13-year old Riley (voiced by Kensington Tallman, replacing Kaitlyn Dias from the first film), after the puberty alarm sounds. This new crew is led by Maya Hawke as Anxiety, Ayo Edebiri as Envy, Adèle Exarchopoulos as Ennui (“boredom” in French), and Paul Walter Hauser as Embarrassment, who wears a big hoodie in order to hide his big pink noggin in.

 

Diane Lane, and Kyle MacLachlan also reprise their parts as Riley’s parents, but they have very little screentime as the story revolves around the budding young girl going to hockey camp, and her relationships with her team mates. Hawke’s Anxiety pushes the old emotions aside (literally bottling them into a big glass jar), and casts them into a dark vault in the outer realm of Riley’s psyche so that she can take over the console and influence the girl’s thoughts with negativity. 

 

This is so that Riley will leave her friends behind so that she can join the popular girls (led by former Nickelodeon star Lilimar as Riley’s idol, Valentina “Val” Ortiz) in her desired hockey team, the Fire Hawks (a name that Black’s Anger says he can really get behind). So like the first film, the premise concerns a journey through the terrain of Riley’s mind to try and put things back in order, and, sure, it treads some of the same narrative ground, but the laughs, and heartfelt moments along the way help make it far better than a stale retread.

 

Among the amusing highlights is the appearances of a 2D retro cartoon character from Riley’s childhood named Bloofy (Ron Funches), a pixelated video game avatar called Lance Slashblade (Yong Yea) whose ineffectual method of rolling himself as a ball towards the advancing police-like mind workers sure made for a few crowd-pleasing visual gags, and Riley’s first experience with sarcasm, hilariously aided, of course, by Ennui. 

 

Of course, there’s no way a sequel to INSIDE OUT could have the same fresh feel of the first one, but screenwriters Meg LeFauve (co-writer of the original), and Dave Holstein bring enough punch to this project to make it a winning combination of humor and pathos bathed in bright primary colors, and it also helps that the animation is even sharper and more eye engaging in this entry, while still retaining the look and feel of the innerspace of the first installment. 

 

While Poehler still enthusiastically rules as Joy, and Black’s Anger and Smith’s Sadness prove there’s a lot more mileage to get out of their clever comic personas (Hale and Lipira put in good turns as well, but they’re more sideline to the three leads), it’s Hawke’s frantic, dizzying performance as Anxiety that really steals the show. Hawke’s high energy take on the fuzzy fretful foe for Joy makes for a sympathetic antagonist, and adds another layer to the zippy proceedings.

 

Maybe like Richard Linklater’s BEFORE trilogy, they should do an INSIDE OUT sequel in another nine years (and unlike that series, the characters don’t have to age), as the near decade gap here appears to work in this film’s favor.

INSIDE OUT 2, the solid directorial debut of long-time Pixar creative, Kelsey Mann, made me laugh, and tear up a bit, as while it played a lot of the same beats as its predecessor, it successfully pulled the same right heartstrings too. So those dismissive of sequels should take note that Pixar’s track record for well worthwhile franchise efforts has again proven to be pretty damn strong.

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The BAD BOYS Are Back After The Slap

Opening today at multiplexes near us all:

BAD BOYS: RIDE OR DIE

(Dir. Adil & Bilall, 2024)

With only four years between entries, this movie marks the shortest gap between sequels for the BAD BOYS action comedy franchise that began in 1995 (the longest was the 17 years between BAD BOYS II in 2003, and BAD BOYS FOR LIFE in 2020). But what’s obviously more significant is that this fourth film in the series is the first big Will Smith movie, a contender to be a summer blockbuster no less, since the slap that was heard around the world.

And, yes, that slap is referenced in this glossy, glorified, over-stylized production that re-unites the 55-year old Smith, and the 59-year old Martin Lawrence to play the bickering buddy cops, Detectives Mike Lowrey, and Marcus Burnett. We catch up with them in the high octane (it’s all high octane) opening sequence of the tuxedoed duo racing through the sunny streets of Miami to get to the church for Mike’s wedding (to his physical therapist, Christine played by series newcomer Melanie Liburd), and thwarting a convenience store robbery on the way (Marcus had to stop for a ginger ale, Skittles, and a hot dog).

From there it’s on to Marcus paying for his comic gluttony by having a heart attack on the dance floor at the reception, and, after a near death dream sequence, comes to at the hospital that he’s invincible because his slain superior, Captain Conrad Howard (Joe Pantoliano) appeared to him beyond the grave to tell him it’s not his time yet.

Pantoliano’s Captain Howard, who was killed in the previous entry, has been framed as being involved with the drug cartels, so it’s up to Vice City’s finest to clear his name, but they end up on the run themselves as fugitives with $5 million bounties on their heads.

Mike’s son, Armando Aretas (Jacob Scipio), comes into play as he can identify the movie’s villain, James McGrath (Eric Dane), a former U.S. soldier turned cartel boss that the screenwriters, Chris Bremner and Will Beall, don’t flesh out to be that memorable of a character.

Every beat of every shoot-out, chase (both foot or automobile), and hand-to-hand combat scene has been done to death before, but the fast pace, and disregard for any realism makes it flow entertainingly if not thoughtfully. I hope that much of Lawrence and Smith’s banter was improvised because riffs about Marcus having encountered Mike in a former life as a donkey really don’t feel work-shopped and honed.

One scene features our hip, black, wise-cracking heroes having a run-in with rednecks on their trailer trash property (a Confederate flag can be prominently seen hanging in the doorway of their mobile home), and it’s a lazy piece of comedy with Marcus and Mike trying to fake knowing a Reba McEntire song at gunpoint. Still, the audience at the screening I saw laughed plenty – especially when the cops stole and roared off in the rednecks’ pick-up truck with a country version of “Bad Boys,” by McEntire blares on the soundtrack. I’m not making this up.

The climax at an abandoned alligator-themed amusement park is also standard stuff, with the threat of a 16-foot, 900-pound albino alligator named Duke, and Marcus making Jurassic Park jokes. Along for the ride on Mike and Marcus’s team is Vanessa Hudgens, and Alexander Ludwig as weapons and tech experts of the Advanced Miami Metro Operations (AMMO) headed by Paola Núñez (also Mike’s ex-girlfriend, returning from BAD BOYS FOR LIFE), and Ioan Gruffudd as a Miami mayoral candidate, who everybody can tell is corrupt from his first moment onscreen.

But what about the famous sucker punch that Smith landed on Chris Rock at the Oscars two years ago? Well, Smith, whose premise this time is he’s dealing with trauma that freezes him in action, gets slapped himself during a spell by Lawrence who scolds him as a “bad boy.” Again, I’m not making this up.

Belgian directing duo Adill and Bilall continue the competent job of aping Michael Bay’s glitzy music video/TV commercial aesthetics - the packaging of every Jerry Bruckheimer production - that they did on the third installment, with shots made by always swooping cameras to insure that the audience never gets bored. And that did indeed work as boredom was not a beef of mine here.

Lawrence and Smith can still bring the crude charm, and chemistry, but with only a handful of funny, laugh out loud gags, BAD BOYS: RIDE OR DIE is a predictably empty, and noisy experience at its worst, and simple dumb fun at its best. I can’t deny that it was a crowd-pleaser at the showing I attended (I even heard someone say, “That’s the best one yet!” at the end), but whether paying moviegoers will give it the same love will be to be seen, as we’re living in times of a lot of high-profile theatrical flops these days.

Fans of the franchise will undoubtedly dig it as it contains around the same quality of the others (maybe not BAD BOYS II though as that’s arguably the worst of the series), and folks just looking for a good diversion on the big screen will find enough amusement enough, but I can’t hail it as a must see. So watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do when they come for you? Wait for streaming.

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THE BEACH BOYS Doc Makes Its Disney+ Debut, But Does It Offer Anything New?

THE BEACH BOYS (Dir. Frank Marshall, Thom Zimny, 2024)

There have been plenty of Beach Boys, and Brian Wilson documentaries before so fans that know their story backwards and forwards may wonder whether what this film, which debuts today on Disney+, brings new to the table. 

 

Well, famed producer/filmmaker Frank Marshall, and Thom Zimmy (best known for a handful of acclaimed Bruce Springsteen doc projects) give us loads of never-seen before photos, lots of previously unshown footage, and a bunch of brand-new interviews with the principles (Wilson, Mike Love, Al Jardine, David Marks, and Bruce Johnston) so that’s what.

 

But with this wealth of material, it’s surprising that the program’s length is less than two hours (1h 53m, to be exact), as one might reasonably expect an epic three-hour (or even two part) event. This means that THE BEACH BOYS is heavy on the early years (1961-1969), going into detail about their beginnings in as a Four Freshman-inspired garage singing act from Hawthorne, California, giving focus to the creation of their sound, and their run of chart-topping singles, and speeds through their later career in the last thirty minutes.

 

However, despite this doc’s uneven presentation, it contains a very entertaining exploration of how a band that was defined by the surf ‘n sun Californian dream (so much so that their first three records had the word “surf” in their titles), came of age in the mid ‘60s rock era with the Beatles as their rivals/later friends, and went through various re-births via the two then concurrent incarnations of the band.

 

As Brian Wilson refrained from the road to conjure up studio genius with the aid of The Wrecking Crew, “The Beach Boys effectively became two groups, the touring group and the recording group,” Love reflects as the doc gets into edgier territory with the ground-breaking Pet Sounds sessions, and the shelving of the ambitious Smile album. 

 

The main arc (or arcs) concerns how the band goes from being cool to embarrassingly unhip to cool over and over again, but, as it skips over huge chunks of their output in the ‘70s, ‘80s, and even the ‘90s, it doesn’t feature how the touring and recording versions of the group later became two camps.

 

Firstly, the long-running Mike Love-led hits-centric outfit that largely performs at state fairs and casinos under the banner of the Beach Boys (Love has the exclusive license of the name), and the Brian Wilson-fronted pop orchestra that has played loftier venues, recreating Pet Sounds, and Smile in full, as well as a ton of fan favorites with Jardine, and later BB member, Blondie Chaplain (who is also featured in a new interview in the doc).

 

There are many, many elements from the band’s canon that are either glossed over, or skipped completely while the most attention is paid to Wilson toiling over the mixing console conjuring up his eccentric brand of melodic magic with almost a half an hour spent on Pet Sounds and SMiLE, and the ending’s declaration of its sacred place in musical history.

 

Not that I’m complaining as those are amazing works, and BB enthusiasts will dig the insights and delight in all the footage finally seeing the light of day here, but there really is too much that’s left out of this treatment. The stories around their later day attempts to recapture the band’s glory days would be nice, and I believe necessary to have been included, for example their 50th Anniversary album, That’s Why God Made the Radio, which re-united all the principles in 2011 for a surprisingly solid effort, but isn’t even mentioned here.

 

Keep in mind, these are the quibbles of a fan who has grown up with not just the BB catalogue, but with the narrative behind the music, and would probably still have issues with a three-four hour version. Overall, whatever it lacks, THE BEACH BOYS is a highly recommended watch for what it has, and I was impressed that when it was wrapping up, it had gone its entire running length with no instance of “Kokomo,” the unbearably cheesy 1988 single that was the band’s last top 20 hit. 

 

But I had thought too soon, as when the black screen credits starting rolling, “Kokomo” kicked in. Sigh. I’m not usually a fan of medleys, but there’s an early ‘80s single, officially sanctioned by Capitol Records, “Beach Boys Medley,” made up of bits from eight smashes from their ‘60s heyday, that would’ve worked so much better, especially as this doc is more about those times than any others.

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THE PLANET OF THE APES Gets A Solid Franchise Extender In KINGDOM

Opening today at a monkey-infested multiplex near us all:

KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
(Dir. Wes Ball, 2024)

Since it’s been a minute since we’ve visited the PLANET OF THE APES (which we all know is really future earth) – the last film was 2017’s WAR OF THE PLANET OF THE APES – I had to refresh my memory with YouTube recap videos as I couldn’t quite remember where they had left off. 

 

This is the fourth entry in the POTA reboot series that started in 2011, when James Franco was still a thing, and it begins with the funeral of Caesar, the lead chimpanzee from the first trilogy, and then we flash forward, as a caption tells us “several generations later” (no reason to be specific about a particular year), to a clan of apes who live in towers made out of branches and logs right outside of some (again not specified) ruins of a city.

 

Our new protagonist is Noa (affably voiced and motion captured by Owen Teague), a noble chimp who we first meet in a stunning action sequence at the top of a green, tree covered rotting building (a “hard climb” the apes call it) stealing an eagle’s egg and almost having a hard fall because of it. 

 

Back home, where Noa’s father, Koro (Neil Sandilands), leads as a master of falconry; the abrupt appearance of a human woman (a stoic Freya Allen) gets the egg broken in a scuffle, and Noa travels back into the city to get another where he comes upon an evil clan led by the wonderfully scary villain bonobo ape, Proximus Caesar, who has co-opted and misconstrued what the original smart monkey, Caesar was all  about. “For Caesar!” Kevin Durand’s Proximus declares as he kills Koro in a powerful fight scene as the village burns.

 

Resembling many action adventure movies (including the recent THE CREATOR and CIVIL WAR), the film becomes a road trip scenario to rescue Noa’s clan, in which our determined ape is joined by the woman (who finally speaks saying her name is Mae), and an elder, incredibly intelligent orangutan name Raka (Peter Macon) who teaches Noa about books and astrology (there’s a stirring scene set in an observatory where Noa sees something that startles him through the lens of a ginormous telescope that they don’t let us see).

 

Noa, Raka, and Mae find that Proximus has built a settlement with scores of ape prisoners around a human-built bunker in the cliffs on the seashore. Proximus, who uses his ape slaves to daily try to destroy the impenetrable door to the bunker, asks Noa what he sees when he looks at what he calls his “kingdom,” “stolen clans” is our down-but-not-out hairy hero’s reply.

 

Another human, Trevathan (the always trusty William H. Macy), as our antagonist’s opportunistic history teacher, tries to dissuade Mae’s plans to get to what’s in the bunker before Proximus, saying “it’s already their world!” but with Noa’s smarts, and unflappable motivation to save his clan, there’s no stopping the determined duo.

 

In a world cluttered with big action franchises, KINGDOM is a surprisingly solid series entry with a compelling narrative in which very little is a hard climb to tackle. Its gliding, and intensely detailed visuals, provided by cinematographer Gyula Pados, keep the eyes popping, with the characters given just the right amount of heft to keep us emotionally interested. There’s also some nicely placed humor of the human-bashing sort including Noa and Raka ridiculing Mae’s smell during some down-time.

 

Taking this in, and looking back at the three films (RISE, DAWN, and WAR) that proceeded it, I have to say that this is one of the stronger sci-fi series going these days. Since the original classic 1968 POTA, there has been four sequels in the ‘70s, a really weird (and bad) stand-alone Tim Burton version in 2001 (with an ending that makes absolutely no sense), and now this effective reboot series with four more films (there were also live action and animated TV series, but let’s stick to the big screen) so I really wasn’t expecting anything but another attempt to keep the series afloat here.

 

But when there’s a creative team (and a sharp screenwriter in Josh Frieman) bringing primo passion and power to such a project, a fresh direction for these old APES can actually happen. And it’ll most likely happen again and again (of course, until the series becomes unprofitable), but for now the bottom of this barrel of monkeys is very far from being scraped dry.

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The Intense Impact of A24’s CIVIL WAR Comes From Its All-Too-Real Feel

Opening today at a multiplex near us all:

CIVIL WAR (Dir. Alex Garland, 2024)

Alex Garland’s fourth film as director (and eighth as screenwriter), after an impressive run that includes EX MACHINA, ANNIHILATION, and MEN; is the fillmmaker’s most intense, and impactful work yet in its depiction of a lawless, ravaged country that has been torn apart by the destructive divisions that we’re all very aware, and frightened of right now. 

 

Yes, it’s a familiar dystopian future scenario, but without sci-fi tinges as it appears to happen in the very near future under the reign of a nameless fascist three-term president played by Nick Offerman (who will always be Ron Swanson from Parks & Recreation to me). 

 

The film follows Kirsten Dunst as a tough as nails war photographer (it’s mentioned that her coverage of the Antifa Massacre broke her career), Wagner Moura as her journalist friend, Stephen McKinley Henderson as an elder New York Times reporter, and Cailee Spaeny as a young aspiring photojournalist, as they travel from the Big Apple to Washington DC to get an interview with the president because as Moura says, “it’s the last story out there.”

 

Driving in a white SUV through threatening territory, the ragtag crew encounter violence in the form of open country, and urban shoot-outs; and a militia group headed by a grim, camouflaged Jesse Plemmons (Dunst’s real-life husband) who interrogates our protagonists standing over a mass grave of bloody bodies in the movie’s scariest, edgiest scene.

 

The raw look of the film adds to its authenticity as cinematographer Rob Hardy, who had worked on Garland’s previous films, aims to illustrate what the photographer characters capture on their cameras with gritty still shots effectively being presented throughout. CIVIL WAR itself was shot on a new camera, the digital handheld DJI Ronin 4D, which self stabilizes, decreasing vertical shake.

 

While I was left with some questions about the crumbling nation Garland presents, CIVIL WAR is a compellingly executed narrative about a road trip from hell that culminates in a fiery, bombastic White House climax that will stick in your head for days. Its grounded by the sharp performances of Dunst, in a distinctively different role than she’s ever played before, and Spaeny, whose investment here made me forget pretty quickly that her breakthrough roles was portraying Elvis Presley’s all-too-young wife in Sofia Coppola’s PRISCILLA last year.

 

With his latest offering for what’s arguably American’s hippest film production company, A24, Garland again gives us a thoughtful, fearless, and abrasive take on compromised, and cornered human nature. It’s also a tribute to journalism, and the crucial place the press have in our democracy. Dunst and her fellow scrappy newshounds never spout out any opinions about anything that went down or lament where they are currently in all the chaos; they just do their jobs without bias, only wanting the best in-the-moment documentation. 

However, my cynicism at times made me think these people wouldn’t get as far as they did in these treacherous badlands with a vehicle with the large letters denoting “PRESS” on its front doors.

CIVIL WAR can be a disturbing, and often jarring, experience, but what makes it really scary is how real it feels as it’s a harsh warning about what really could be coming in our future considering, well, everything.

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That Time The Travelling Wilburys Stole A Line From An ‘80s Melanie Griffith Movie

That’s right, the rock supergroup made up of Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne, and Tom Petty (Roy Orbison was a member, but passed after their first record’s release) lifted a line (and twisted it), from Mike Nichols’ 1988 Melanie Griffith comedy WORKING GIRL, and it’s a doozy.

At a party scene, Griffith’s ambitious Tess McGill schmoozes with a colleague she’s just met, played by Harrison Ford at his ‘80s prime, and says (after a few tequila shots):

 

“I’ve got a head for business, and a bod for sin. Is there anything wrong with that?”

Cut to the first single off of the Travelling Wilburys second album in 1990, jokingly entitled Vol. 3, “She’s My Baby,” featuring this couplet that comically reverses the line:

 

“She’s got a body for business, got a head for sin/She knocks me over like a bowling pin”

The line is sung by George Harrison on the single (the same version of which kicks off the record), but there is a demo of the song that has Dylan singing the entire song so it’s safe to assume that he’s the one that had the idea to co-opt Griffith’s line, which came from WORKING GIRL screenwriter Kevin Wade. 

 

Lynne said in a Rolling Stone interview at the time of Vol. 3, the band heavily relied on Dylan for their lyrics: “We all throw in ideas and words, but when you’ve got a lyricist like Bob Dylan — well, what are you gonna do?” So it’s highly likely that it was Dylan, who has a history of quoting without credit from movies, Civil War-era poetry, and even an episode of Star Trek, that thought it was a line worth stealing, and toying with.

 

Dylan didn’t have to have seen the movie either to have been exposed to the dialogue; it was featured in the trailer, and in TV spots that ran throughout the film’s successful release in late December 1988 through the next year, in which it was nominated for six Oscars (it only won one, Carly Simon for her song “Let the River Run”).

 

So I’ll again quote His Bobness, “Steal a little and they throw you in jail/steal a lot and they make you king,” and leave you with the rousing video from the song in question - “She’s My Baby”:

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