Talky KILLING THEM SOFTLY Gives Us A Lesson In Gangster Economics

Opening today in Raleigh and the Triangle area:

KILLING THEM SOFTLY (Dir. Andrew Dominik, 2012)

Although this film is based on the 1974 crime novel “Coogan’s Trade” by George V. Higgins, fans of The Sopranos are going to find its trappings familiar. Not only because it features Tony Soprano himself, James Gandolfini, and series regulars Vincent Curatola, and Max Casella, but because its scenario set-up about low level idiots that try to get ahead by robbing a mob protected card game is ground well trodden by David Chase’s iconic characters.

But director/screenwriter Andrew Dominik, re-united with his THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES star, Brad Pitt, has loftier goals that just staging a big screen Sopranos episode. Dominik sets the story in New Orleans in 2008, and we are taken back to the days of Obama getting elected during the country’s economic collapse via a string of television screens in the background always tuned to the news. The underlying implication is that the mafia is yet another American corporation whose business model is faltering in these tough times.

Pitt, with slicked back hair, shades, and goatee, plays an enforcer for the mob who’s brought in to track down the three low level idiots who thought it was a good idea to rob a high-stakes card game run by the fidgety stressed-out Ray Liotta. Liotta, is in real hot water with this theft, because he’s robbed the game before himself, and he’s going to take the blame for this one.

An often smirking Richard Jenkins, brings his Nathaniel Fisher (the all-knowing ghost dad on Six Feet Under) confidence in his part as Pitt’s contact, a jaded mob lawyer, who says matter-of-factly that “this is a business of relationships,” ever so slyly adding to the movie’s not-so-subtle set of themes.

Gandolfini shows up as a boozing burn-out of a hitman that Pitt seems to think he needs in order to pull off the job. Gandolfini and Pitt have a few intense and intimate scenes together; one on one exchanges in which you feel their history together both as these shady guys, and as actors who’ve worked together for 2 decades, starting with Tony Scott’s TRUE ROMANCE. 

Despite some vivid violence (this movie is where to go to see Liotta getting the shit beaten out of him), it’s a dialogue-driven film, all about the sit-downs. The power and thrust of the film’s thesis can be found in Pitt’s parked car consultations with Jenkins, Gandolfini’s meaty monologues, and the frightened babbling of Scoot McNairy’s Frankie (one of the idiots involved in the card heist), who steals the movie out from under the bigwigs when he’s onscreen with his perfectly unhinged performance.

As McNairy’s partner in crime and stupidity, Ben Mendelsohn (ANIMAL KINGDOM) is also effective as a seedy heroin addict you can’t believe anybody would trust to get them coffee, let alone pull off a dangerous job.

Pitt, who is one of 17 (!) different producers on this project, provides a solid performance, but it’s nothing we’ve never seen him do before. Still, the man’s particular brand of presence is never bland.

Sort of like a mash-up of GOODFELLAS and MARGIN CALL, KILLING THEM SOFTLY may be a bit too talky for its target audience. 

Because of its marketing, which highlights the stars, the stylishness and the one explosion, audiences are likely to think that it’s a different movie than it is - much like Anton Corbijn’s THE AMERICAN, which looked like a commercial George Clooney action flick, or Nicolas Winding Refn’s DRIVE, which looked like a commercial Ryan Gosling car chase thriller. Both turned out to be artsy cerebral takes on their genres, and while film buffs like me loved them, I knew many folks who were turned off.

This take on the gangster drama genre deserves an audience’s attention, even if the dry tone that Dominik creates, along with the immaculately shot framework (by cinematographer Grieg Fraser) surrounding some of the year’s most astonishing acting, ultimately makes more of an impression than any of the political points he’s attempting to make. 

More later...

Blu Ray Reviews: THE EXPENDABLES 2 & A Stallone 3-Fer

And now, what Film Babble Blog readers (all six of them) have been waiting for: A Stallone-centric post!

THE EXPENDABLES 2
(Dir. Simon West, 2012)

Sylvester Stallone and his army of aging action movie icons are back in this big noisy sequel that’s actually better than the first one. Don't get me wrong - it's a bad movie, but it's a much more gloriously stupid experience the second time out.

2010’s THE EXPENDABLES only had a grasp on half a formula, but the follow-up is full on formula and much more big dumb fun. 

It also tops the first one by having much more of Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Bruce Willis, who both just put in cameos in the original, and it has a lot more explosions - the first 10 minutes feels like it’s packed with more explosions than in Michael Bay’s entire career! There’s a lot more CGI-ed blood splatter too.

This time, Stallone along with Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, and Terry Crews, (Steve Austin doesn’t return, and sadly there’s no Mickey Rourke) are taking on Jean-Claude Van Damme as an evil arms dealer. 

There’s a new Expendable, the young Liam Hemsworth, but the second he starts talking about one last mission before he goes home to his girlfriend we know he’s going to die (my wife called it, and she was on her laptop not even really paying attention to the movie).

As if Stallone, along with co-writer Richard Wenk, knew that there was way too much testosterone on the screen, we’ve also got the addition of Chinese actress Yu Nan, as a CIA agent brought in by Willis. Nan is in charge of the movie’s MacGuffin, a computer that contains the location of tons of plutonium, but is it any surprise that the plot doesn’t matter?

It’s just an excuse to get all these guys together for a bunch of shoot-outs, stunts, quick-cut instances of hand to hand combat, and, yep, ginormous explosions all set in Foreign locales (Bulgaria, China).

The film really falters in its downtime when we are reminded that these guys aren’t great actors, something the horribly written dialogue immensely highlights. 

Willis, maybe the best actor here, is given what’s possibly the single worst line of 2012: “For all this male pattern badness I’ve got to put you in the deepest darkest hole at Gitmo.”

There’s more humor here than before too, albeit some is unintentional, like when Chuck Norris in what amounts to a cameo, throws a bad guy out a window yet still fires his machine gun at him. 

Also there’s a bunch of shout-outs to the principal’s previous roles - Schwarzenegger, who is told that he may be terminated, mocks Willis’ “Yippee Ki Yay” catchphrase from DIE HARD, Rambo is mentioned, and Norris’ nickname is “Lone Wolf.” That’s fine by me, these guys can self reference all they want, it only adds to the film’s awareness that it’s a colossal collection of action movie clichés, a thorough homage to the genre’s ‘80s heyday.

Stallone was right to hand over direction duties to Simon West. West (CON AIR, the first LAURA CROFT) is no wunderkind, but his handling of all this noisy spectacle, along with veteran action cinematographer Shelly Johnson, comes together much more cohesively than Stallone’s ham fisted helming of the first one.

My biggest complaint is that for a Blu ray of a new movie, the image is really grainy, grimy even, and out of focus at times, but I’ve read that it looked that way in theaters. Maybe that’s just keeping in line with how crappy visually the ‘80s action standards this movie apes were, but I doubt it was that intentional.

Special Features: By far the best of the bonus material is a half hour featurette called “Big Guns, Bigger Heroes,” which puts THE EXPENDABLES movies in their proper context by examining the rise of the action film genre in the Reagan era. Other features include an audio commentary by Simon West, featurettes entitled “Gods of War,” “On the Assault,” “Guns For Hire” (about real life government mercenaries for hire), a couple of minutes of deleted scenes, and a gag reel.

Bonus Blu ray review:

Released last August right when THE EXPENDABLES 2 hit theaters, was a 3 film collection of Stallone titles: RAMBO: FIRST BLOOD, COP LAND, and the lesser known LOCK UP.

I’m not usually a fan of those DVD or Blu ray deals that you see for sale in supermarkets or big- box stores that package random films together or in this case, three films by a well known actor, but if you’re a fan and are running out of shelf space, maybe they’re ideal. It doesn’t bode well that the Blu ray cover sports an image of Stallone with a mustache and shades that’s not from any of the films in the set (it’s from GET CARTER), but the movies aren’t bare boned like in other packages; they feature all the bonus materials that accompanied their DVD special editions.

Makes me wonder why they didn’t just package the first 3 Rambo movies together, but I digress. The first Rambo film, originally just titled FIRST BLOOD (Dir. Ted Kotcheff, 1982), holds up as Stallone as his sweaty best as a dead-eyed Vietnam vet taking on the entire police force of a small town in Washington, largely because the local hard-ass Sherriff (Brian Dennehey) is an asshole.

Dennehey thinks Stallone is just an aimless drifter, but a grizzled Colonel (Richard Crenna) corrects him: “You don't seem to want to accept the fact you're dealing with an expert in guerrilla warfare, with a man who's the best, with guns, with knives, with his bare hands.” So Rambo builds traps, destroys a lot of property with a machine gun, and blows up buildings (there were a lot more explosions than I remember when I saw it as a kid), but actually doesn’t kill anybody.

Stallone, who co-wrote, gives a crazed cried-out speech at the end, that plays the sympathy card for Vietnam vets who got a raw deal for what it’s worth, then a laughably dated power ballad (“It’s a Long Road,” written by Jerry Goldsmith, sung by Dan Hill, whoever that is) plays over the end credits. Great cornball stuff through and through that’s been satirized a zillion times yet still packs a whallop. Funny how the picture quality of the FIRST BLOOD Blu ray is a lot sharper than THE EXPENDABLES 2 Blu ray too.

Special features include the alternate ending in which Rambo dies, a half hour featurette (“Drawing First Blood”), and two commentaries – one by Stallone, the other by writer David Morrell.

An odd choice for this 3 Blu ray set, is James Mangold’s COP LAND (1997), which Stallone himself described as a more thoughtful film than he had been known for when he hosted SNL to promote the film’s release. It is, but despite its amazing cast, including Harvey Keitel, Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, Janeane Garofalo, Michael Rapaport, Robert Patrick, Peter Berg, Arthur Nascarella, and John Spencer, and cool premise (the town of Garrison, New Jersey is run by corrupt New York City cops who reside there), the movie isn’t fleshed out enough to really make an impact, and it comes off like second hand Scorsese.

Still, it’s one of Stallone’s best roles: Freddy Heflin, the schlubby (he gained a gut for this part) good guy Sheriff of Garrison, who’s pushed around by just about everybody, as he pines for Annabella Sciorra (married to one of the corrupt cops). I love that the guy falls asleep drunk on his beat up couch listening to Springsteen’s “The River.” For once, Stallone pulls off a performance of pained powerlessness with none of his trademark alpha-male-isms. It’s also cool to see De Niro and Keitel sparring in their last film together, along with almost every Sopranos bit player you can think of on the sidelines. Plus it has a great well paced bloody ending, so, hmm, maybe I'm selling this one short.

Special Features: Commentary with Stallone, Patrick, Mangold, and producer Cathy Konrad, a 15 minute featurette (“Cop Land: The Making of an Urban Western”), and deleted scenes.

Lastly, there’s John Flynn’s 1989 prison thriller, LOCK UP, which puts Stallone behind bars under the evil eye of Warden Donald Sutherland. This is the cheesiest of the Stallone offerings in this set, with a supremely cheesy score by extremely cheesy film composer Bill Conti. A skinny Tom Sizemore (it was his 3rd film) is on hand for comic relief as a fellow inmate, and Sutherland (mostly spending his role looking menacing out the window) has a great hammy speech (“This is Hell, and I’m going to give you the guided tour”), but this is a by-the-numbers rundown of prison movie clichés, that wears out its welcome really fast.

Special Features: Only a 6 minute “making of” featurette, the theatrical trailer, and a lame Stallone profile, but that’s just as well.

Okay! I think I’ve had as much as I can take of “The Itallian Stallion” for now.

More later…

Blu Ray Review: MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING

MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING 
(Dir. Joel Zwick, 2002)

Despite that I worked at a movie theater that showed the film for months, and later a video store when it was a hugely popular rental, I’ve never seen MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING, the 2002 hit rom com written by and starring Nia Vardalos.

It just didn’t look like my thing, not that I’m completely anti-rom com, but the story of a Greek woman who has to deal with her large unruly family in order to marry the man of her dreams, didn’t seem to be my kind of comedy.

I probably still wouldn’t be watching it if it wasn’t for the good people at HBO sending me the shiny new 10th Anniversary Edition (released Nov. 13th), which has the film making its first appearance on the Blu ray format.

In voice-over Vardolas tells us that “nice, sweet girls are supposed to do three things in life, marry Greek boys, make Greek Babies, and feed everyone until the day you die.”

After she goes through an ugly duck turns into a swan process involving, of course, getting rid of her thick glasses, frizzing up her hair, and putting on make-up, Vardolas meets the so non-Greek John Corbett, best known for playing Sarah Jessica Parker’s boyfriend Aidan on Sex in the City. They fall in love in a cutesy montage of them groping in Corbett’s car through a series of dates that she keeps secret from her family.

The big fat Greek family finds out about the budding romance, and Vardolas’ father (Michael Constantine) forbids them to see each other. That’s easily resolved, as is every possible conflict that comes along - Corbett converts to the Greek Orthodox faith so they can get married, the family adjusts, yadda yadda yadda. Much humor has been mined in the movies from the process of putting on a wedding (see Robert Altman’s A WEDDING - seriously go see it), but there’s little that’s funny here.

Each scene is all set-up, sprinkled with corny one-liners, like subpar Neil Simon, for a situation that never pays off.

Vardolas has a way with a wisecrack, and a running gag about how her father uses Windex to cure every ailment has its merits, but there’s not enough of a story for it to be interesting, as if Vardolas expected the wacky eccentricities of her various family members to be enough to carry the thin narrative.

Director Zwick is a veteran of tons of brightly lit silly sitcoms (from Mork & Mindy to Two and a Half Men), and it really shows. Decades of those shows can be felt in the obvious camerawork in which he just aims the camera and shoots. But then what am I saying? Nobody goes to see a rom com with any expectation of inventive cinematography!

Vardolas based the innocuous and thoroughly mediocre MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING on her real-life wedding to Ian Gomez who appears in the film as Corbett’s best man, so basically it’s a glorified home movie. 

Vardolas even calls it almost “a documentary about her people” on the commentary. That’s fine, and more power to you if you can get Tom Hanks and wife Rita Wilson to fund your movie and make you a star, but it doesn’t make the material any more entertaining than just about anybody’s wedding videos. My previous impulse about this movie was correct; it’s so not my thing.

Special Features: A 30 minute featurette, “A Look Back at MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING,” which includes interviews with Vardolas, Corbett, and Hanks (Hanks and wife Rita Wilson produced the film along with Gary Goetzman), the original 2002 commentary by Vardolas, Corbett, and Joel Zwick, and 5 minutes of boring, unfunny deleted scenes.

More later...