The Reel World

"Time travel has not been invented.  But thirty years from now, it will have been."

What I like most about writer and director Rian Johnson is his ability to tackle a genre that has been recycled and done to death and deliver a film that is fresh and unique.  His first film Brick reimagined film noir and his second feature outing The Brothers Bloom gave us a heist film that was smart, sweet and classy.  In his third feature outing he is setting out to deliver his most ambitious film but also his most accessible film. What makes Looper unique is that it’s not just a film about time travel and hit men, but the question about the value of one’s life against the lives of many others.

"You've broken the law and I am here to arrest you. I am fate with a badge and a gun protecting the prey from the predators, the good from the bad. We are the police."

David Ayer is no stranger to police dramas. You might say it's his favorite cinematic subject. Just look at his list of screenplays which include the likes of S.W.A.T. and Training Day and a director resume that includes Harsh Times. He's not afraid to delve into the darker nature of the police. He's at it again with End Of Watch which he both wrote and directed.

I'm a Minnesota Vikings football fan. Yes, I accept the condolences. However, I didn't say that to get sympathy, and I'm not yet in need of the services of the suicide hotline. After two games, I will keep the number on speed dial, just in case. A thousand years ago we had a star player who made the by now infamous statement that he plays when he wants to play. For a young athlete with an already troubled past, it didn't go over too well. But, over the last decade or so Clint Eastwood appears to be in that same mindset. He acts when he wants to. He's only appeared in three films in the last ten years. The difference is that Clint has earned the right to be picky about when he works. He isn't taking a paycheck when he isn't working, and when others depend on him to hit it out of the park he rarely misses the ball. Trouble With The Curve won't ever rival Eastwood's other roles for action, intensity, or even one-liners, but it's a solid performance in every way. For all of those Eastwood critics in the glory days who said he couldn't pull off a performance without the trappings of Dirty Harry or The Man With No Name, I suspect you're having a hearty meal eating those words after seeing Trouble With The Curve. It's perhaps his simplest role yet. It also happens to be a home run.

Gus (Eastwood) has been a scout for baseball's Atlanta Braves for 40 years. He's responsible for the team's greatest talents going back to Dusty Baker. Now he's in his 80's. New, younger blood has invaded the world of scouting, and they've brought along all of their latest computer toys to do the job. Gus won't adapt to that new technological world. He can tell a hitter's talent by the sound of the ball leaving the bat or the sound of the batter's hands as he gets ready to swing. That's a good thing, because Gus is losing his eyesight. He trips over tables and chairs (enter your own RNC joke here) and isn't the safest thing behind the wheel of his car. His old friend and head of scouting for the team is Pete (Goodman). He's still behind Gus, but the pressure is on. There are only three months left on Gus's contract, and the draft is approaching. Gus has one scouting trip to prove he's still got it, or he's going to be put out to pasture by owner Vince (Patrick).

If it were possible to buy stock in any Under-25 actress today, I’d pick Jennifer Lawrence first, Emma Stone would be a close second, and Kristen Stewart would be last. Lawrence has a pair of blockbuster movie franchises in her back pocket (The Hunger Games, X-Men), is a past Oscar nominee and is generating buzz for the upcoming Silver Linings Playbook. So if a studio were to have a Jennifer Lawrence film on its bench, September 2012 would probably look like some prime real estate.

Prime real estate and a murder-related discount are what attract Elissa (Lawrence) and her mom (Elisabeth Shue) to their new home in House at the End of the Street. Elissa becomes drawn to reclusive next door neighbor Ryan (Max Thieriot). Four years earlier, Ryan’s parents were murdered by his sister, who promptly disappeared. (That explains how Elissa and her mom got such a good price on their rental.) Ryan now lives in the house by himself, but a series of strange occurrences make it clear Ryan’s house hasn’t seen its last dead body.

I know what you’re thinking, and I was also incredibly disappointed to learn this film was not a biopic of Xena: Warrior Princess actress Lucy Lawless. (This hypothetical film would obviously star the ageless Kiwi because the actress still looks incredible.) Fortunately, Lawless makes up for its startling lack of Lawless by being one of the better films I’ve seen this year.

Inspired by true events, this Prohibition-era tale follows the Bondurant brothers, a trio of successful bootleggers in Franklin County, Virginia. Franklin County is considered “The Wettest County in the World”, which is also the title of the 2008 historical novel by Matt Bondurant on which this film is based. There are plenty of TV shows (Boardwalk Empire, Justified) and movies (The Untouchables, Once Upon a Time in America and, um, Idlewild) that have used the Prohibition era as a backdrop or bootleggers as a plot point. However, the only movie I can think of that prominently features rural moonshiners is 1958’s Thunder Road, starring Robert Mitchum.

For the most part writer/director David Koepp has seen only moderate success when in the director’s chair with the films Stir of Echoes and Secret Window.  I mention this simply because he is one of the most prolific writers of our time, and most movie goers have no idea who he is or even what a screenwriter actually does.  A quick glance at his writing resume some titles that jump out are Jurassic Park, Mission Impossible, Panic Room and Spider-man.  Koepp is pretty much your go to guy when a blockbuster film is in need of a writer.  Because of my geeky love for the films Koepp has helped write, I can’t help but get excited when I know he’s working on another project.  But somehow Premium Rush snuck up on me.

From the first frame of the film it wastes no time getting the action going as we watch Wilee (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) flying through the air in bullet time after his bike has collided with a car.  Quickly things begin to rewind taking us to the start of his hellish day.  Wilee is a rebellious former law student that showed a lot of promise but just never settled down to take the bar exam.  Right now he’s simply enjoying life as a message courier in New York City while struggling to make things right with his girlfriend, Vanessa (Dania Ramirez).

It did not surprise me at all to hear Dax Shepard admit in a recent interview that he loved Smokey And The Bandit. While there have been plenty of bad imitations, including a couple of misguided sequels, no one has really captured that special something that made Smokey And The Bandit comic gold. Now that's not to say that Hit And Run is a rip-off of Smokey And The Bandit. They are actually very different films. But there is an obvious homage element throughout that can't be ignored. The truth is, if you liked one, you're probably going to enjoy the other.

Charlie Bronson (Shepard) is living in a small rural town as part of the Witness Protection Program. He's been living with girlfriend Annie (Bell) who knows he's in the program but doesn't really know any of the details. He's "protected" by inept Marshall Randy (Arnold) who can't seem to contain those "accidental" discharges of his weapon or runaway incidents, not by a fugitive, but his own mini-van. They appear to have a good life together with a future until Annie is offered the job of a lifetime. She's offered a job to start the nation's first conflict resolution graduate program. But the job is in L.A., which is where Charlie's problems still live.

"Meet Norman. His parents don't get him. His sister doesn't like him. And the kids at school always pick on him. But he does have some friends. It's just that most of them aren't exactly alive."

The magic of stop-motion animation has been with us since pretty much filmmaking began. From the great master work of Willis O'Brien to the icon Ray Harryhausen, the process has brought some of the most imaginative films in history to life. Folks like Tim Burton have done wonders to keep the art form alive, as did Neil Gaiman with his Coraline from upstart Laika studios. The studio is back with another spooky stop-motion project. This time it's Chris Butler and Sam Fell directing Butler's script ParaNorman.

"War has rules, mud wrestling has rules - politics has no rules" - Ross Perot

When a political comedy starts out with a Ross Perot quote, you might start asking yourself if the comedy can be anywhere near as funny as the real thing. Of course, politics isn't very funny these days. You'd have to go back the 19th century to find a time when America was more divided or when the stakes were this serious. And we sure don't have Ross Perot to laugh at anymore. Sure, he's still out there somewhere, unless those black helicopters managed to finally get him. But elections just aren't the same without Elmer Fudd on the stump.

Going into this film, I considered the Bourne movies to be an extremely rare breed among film franchises: each sequel was better than the movie it followed. The fantastic Bourne Ultimatum even wrapped up the Matt Damon trilogy with an ending that dovetailed perfectly with the first shot of the series. So when I heard they wanted to make another Bourne film (uh-oh) without director Paul Greengrass (uh-oh!) or star Matt Damon (UH-OH!!!), I was, to put it mildly, skeptical. After all, how can you make a Bourne movie without Jason Bourne?

Well, it turns out you really don't.