The Gospel according to Eli

I couldn't sleep last night for two reasons: 1) my cat was making up for the fact that I haven't seen her much this week by demanding non-stop attention for most of the overnight hours, and 2) I can't stop thinking about "Book of Eli," which I saw last night, and scenes from which will be running through my head for weeks to come. As much as I have loved and been transported by science fiction films from the past couple years ("Avatar," "Iron Man," "District Nine"), this film stirred me to my soul like nothing has since "The Fountain."

Science fiction schmience fiction. This is just the best damn movie I have seen in years. Like all great sci-fi, and unlike science-looking fantasy of the "Star Wars" family, the futuristic setting for "Eli" is just a vehicle to tell a story that couldn't be told in an era that has actually existed. Great science fiction requires a Ringworld, a killer robot from the future, or a ritual of hasta'akala to make its point. "Eli" requires a post-apocalyptic setting so Denzel Washington can carry the last Bible on Earth, and so his eponymous character can paraphrase and simplify Scripture in such an elegant way that one wonders why one never thought of it before. And so he can kill lots of bad guys with a kick-ass machete.

It's hard to talk in detail about the film without giving away plot points; not only do I not want to give away plot points, but I don't even want people to know what kind of plot points there are to give away. The film is unpredictable and strange in its script, its pacing, and its every conflict resolution, and it's best experienced if you don't know what's coming. And it can be viewed from a number of perspectives. To some, it's a post-apocalyptic action movie. To some, it's a survival drama. To me, it's the explicit, agonizing statement of faith and sacrifice that "The Passion of the Christ" should have been but wasn't. It's the simple statement that without faith, the world will fall apart. Without hope, the world will fall apart. Without love, the world will fall apart. With Denzel killing bad guys with a kick-ass machete.

I love Denzel Washington. I think he's the best American screen actor of his generation and each generation since. I love how he embodies suppression of the extremes of emotion, always about to burst, so that when he explodes with a catharsis we feel terrible for him because he can't ever go back to the man he was before. He is always a real, honest man thrust into unbelievable circumstances and forced to believe them. Never have I seen him like this, so calm yet tense, sure yet doubtful. He is the living embodiment of mission and of his character's definition of faith: "Faith is knowing something even if you don't know something." Gary Oldman's performance is one of the best of his storied career as well; in fact, not knowing the cast ahead of time I had to keep watching him for 10 minutes before I was settled it was him. (He has a wonderful "Fifth Element" moment near the end that I found priceless.) And, of all people, Mila Kunis keeps up with the both of them. Mila Kunis. Who knew.

Don't read reviews. Don't talk to friends who have seen it and have a history of blurting out spoilers. Just go see this remarkable movie. Then get back in line and buy another ticket to see it again. Because you're going to want to.

In brief...

A bunch of small things, none of which require a full blog entry.

G minus G.

I'm pretty sure Garfield Minus Garfield isn't very funny to me any more. There are too many moments that I recognize from my own life. Poor bipolar Jon. Maybe I'll get to a point when I can laugh my fool ass off at it again, but for now it's too close to a somewhat painful home.

Arena Football.

As I type this, the Philadelphia Soul (my team now that my old team went out of business) is leading the San Jose Saber Cats 44-27 in Arena Bowl XXII. If you're a sports fan and you've never been to an Arena League game, I highly recommend it. It's high-speed, high-scoring, high-skill, rock and roll football. I was in the house when the Albany Firebirds won the Arena Bowl in 2000, and it was one of the best sports experiences of my life. As a bonus, the Arena Bowl is in New Orleans this year.

Now it's 46-27. The Soul have "PHL" in big letters on the fronts of their jerseys.

The Dark Knight.

Overall, Dark Knight is magnificent. Go see it; it's an Iron Man / Spider-Man 2 / X-Men 2 level superhero movie. Heath Ledger is more amazing than you've heard he is.

No big spoilers here, but I had a couple significant beefs with the film. 1) There was no effort whatsoever to make Gotham not look like Chicago. Too many exteriors of the city features wide-open boulevards in a city that had been clearly designed in the previous film as cramped and claustrophobic--you know, like Gotham City. 2) The movie is about 20 minutes too long, in my humble opinion. In retrospect, the subplot with the Asian gangster ended up having much less of an impact on the story than it looked like it was going to, and could have been seriously compressed. Something needed to go; my attention was getting tired in the final act, and a good screenplay trim would have taken care of it.

Hellboy 2: The Golden Army.

This is a love it or hate it movie. I loved it. It looks like all of the cool stuff from Pan's Labyrinth all the time. The first time I saw it I thought the story was thin; the second time I changed my mind. The story isn't thin, the visuals are so dominating that everything else is thin by comparison. Even if you hate the story and the characters, it's just beautiful to watch, and the most delightfully imaginative movie I've seen since The Fellowship of the Ring.

Getting my first manicure and pedicure

was awesome. I will do it again. I probably won't get color on my toenails again unless I go with James Bond.

I would kill James Bond

for his place in Hell's Kitchen. Kill him dead.

James Ricks

came to see Henry IV, Part 2 last night. I was surprised by how thrilled I was to see him. You go, James Ricks. You are awesome. I hope my Hamlet cast and his Richard III cast can find a way to hang together. With those two scripts, we're going to need to lighten things up after rehearsal. It's going to be a great fall for Shakespearean tragedy in Richmond.

Wall-e

I can't believe I still haven't seen it. Liz is going to kick my ass.

Cyd Charisse: 1922-2008

From the New York Times:

Cyd Charisse Dies in Los Angeles at Age 86

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: June 18, 2008

Filed at 8:14 a.m. ET

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Cyd Charisse, the long-legged Texas beauty who danced with the Ballet Russe as a teenager and starred in MGM musicals with Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, has died. She was 86.

Charisse was admitted to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center on Monday after suffering an apparent heart attack, said her publicist, Gene Schwam. She died Tuesday.

Charisse appeared in dramatic films, but her fame came from the Technicolor musicals of the 1940s and 1950s.

Classically trained, she could dance anything, from a pas de deux in 1946's ''Ziegfeld Follies'' to the lowdown Mickey Spillane satire of 1956's ''The Band Wagon'' (with Astaire).

She also forged a popular song-and-dance partnership on television and in nightclub appearances with her husband, singer Tony Martin.

Her height was 5 feet, 6 inches, but in high heels and full-length stockings, she seemed serenely tall, and she moved with extraordinary grace. Her flawless beauty and jet-black hair contributed to an aura of perfection that Astaire described in his 1959 memoir, ''Steps in Time,'' as ''beautiful dynamite.''

Her name was Tula Ellice Finklea when she was born in Amarillo, Texas, on March 8, 1922. From her earliest years she was called Sid, because her older brother couldn't say ''sister.'' She was a sickly girl who started dancing lessons to build up her strength after a bout with polio.

Oh, sweet, sweet Cyd Charisse. Arguably the greatest dance in the history of the movie musical, and one of the sexiest women to ever grace the silver screen. Green dress. Singin' in the Rain. "Broadway melody." Yowza.

Charisse kind of fills the same category as Marni Nixon for me: just under a household name in movie musical history, but a singular talent that defined the genre, beloved by aficionados and performers alike. She didn't just sparkle, she somehow managed to draw focus and make the others on screen with her look better at the same time.

There is dancing in Heaven today.

Review: "Iron Man"

Iron Man
Starring: Rober Downey, Jr., Terence Howard, Jeff Bridges, Gwyneth Paltrow
Directed by: Jon Favreau
Written by: Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby, Art Marcum, Matt Holloway
Released by: Marvel Studios
Theatrical Release Date: 5/2/2008
Run Time: 126 min.
Rating: PG-13

It is truly a golden age for geeks right now.

Thanks mainly to the unreal successes of the Spider-Man, X-Men and Lord of the Rings film franchises, all the cool stuff I loved growing up and have rediscovered in my adult years has become mainstream Americana, loved by critics and public alike. It’s now just par for the course that the summer movie season would kick off with the screen adaptation of a B-plus-list superhero adventure.

But it’s not par for the course for me, not this time. Because this time it’s Iron Man, my favorite hero and my favorite fictional character of all time.

Of course, for every Spider-Man 2 there's a Punisher, for every Batman Begins there's an Elektra, for every X-Men 2 there's an X-Men 3. So I tend to go into these things with extremely low expectations; I assumed Transformers was going to be a glorious train wreck and was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the screenplay, the acting, and the storytelling.

But for Iron Man, I can't help myself. Tony Stark is, in my opinion, the most complex and interesting character in all of mainstream comics (only Batman is comparable), and the material is far more big-screen-friendly than even Spider-Man or X-Men. The last time I was this excited about a movie was The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. It’s not just that I really wanted Fellowship to be good, it’s that I knew it could and should be far beyond just "good." With source material and a director of this quality, it should be one of the great films of all time.

Just as with all three LotR films, Iron Man has met my high expectations and hopes and surpassed them. This isn't just a great superhero movie, the best since Spider-Man 2, it's just a great movie by any measure, with masterful acting, a fantastic screenplay, great twists and turns, and a plenty of BTUs (units of Blowing Things Up).

As with Spider-Man's Tobey Maguire, Iron Man is powered by its lead actor, Robert Downey, Jr. Downey surprised me in his portrayal of billionaire genius industrialist Tony Stark; I have always envisioned him as a more hard-edged, intense and direct individual than Downey and director Jon Favreau portray. It's a good thing they made this movie and not me. Downey's Stark is so brilliant he can be casual and sarcastic about it, which not only sets his moments of intensity in great contrast but makes for perhaps the funniest superhero we've yet seen. All of Stark's facets are on display in Downey's performance: his intelligence, his capriciousness, his addictive and obsessive nature, his reckless need for speed, and all of his self-loathing.

And Downey's might not even be the best performance of the bunch. When your supporting cast--for a superhero movie, mind you--involves Oscar nominees and winners like Jeff Bridges, Terence Howard, and Gwyneth Paltrow, you know this is a special project. Bridges stands out in particular; the film's portrayal of Obadiah Stane is not at all what I was expecting, and I barely recognized the bald, bearded Bridges in the part. Howard and Paltrow simply refuse to allow their characters to vanish into the background, and both cast Stark in sharp relief where he would be much less clear alone. It's great news that these actors have apparently signed on for the sequel, and I'm hoping to see other memorable Stark Industries employees like Bambi Arbogast, Abe Zimmer, and Marcy Pearson show up, as well.

There are great shout-outs to Iron Man fanboys like myself: the Ten Rings, Happy Hogan (played by Favreau, who I hope will make a longer appearance in IM2), Tony's Pacific mansion looking like his late-80s comic book digs (from the era when I was first reading the book), and a Stark-against-the-man vibe reminiscent of the seminal Armor Wars storyline of the same time period. Like the great tiny details in the other successful fanboy franchises we've seen succeed, these tell the discriminating geek audience member, "Yes, I love this as much as you do. If I cut something you love, I loved it too, and it hurt me too. trust me, your favorite hero is safe in my hands."

Iron Man also manages the difficult task of making social commentary without being preachy or coming down hard on one side of the political spectrum. Favreau wisely recognizes that we can pretty much all get behind the ideas that collateral damage, double-dealing, and war profiteering are bad things, and Stark's conversion from soulless arms dealer to defender of innocents is portrayed as a deeply personal one, not a political one.

Last week on Doctor Who, David Tennant's Doctor said something that has stuck with me ever since: "Not easy, is it? Being clever. You look at the world and you connect things, random things, and think, 'Why can’t anyone else see it?' The rest of the world is so slow. You’re on your own." In Downey and Favreau's Tony Stark, we see a man with vision so clear and intense that it hurts him; he has to dull it with alcohol, feed it with sexual and expensive thrills, and finally assuage it with actions so big they can only be described as superheroic. Like Batman, Iron Man is chased by personal demons he can never completely escape, but he can't live without perpetually striving against them. Iron Man is a lot more fun to come along for the ride with than Batman, though.

Do NOT leave the theater until after the closing credits. Best. Bonus scene. Ever.

EDIT: Saw it again last night. Still awesome. I'll see it another time or two before it's gone.

New "Iron Man" Trailer!

Freaking awesome.

Iron Man Trailer Is UP!

http://www.ironmanmovie.com/

Dude.

Seriously.



EDIT: I just watched it a second time and it almost made me cry with its pure awesomeness.

Iron Man Movie Updates

New main page from the official Iron Man movie site. And a new image.

From Marvel.com's Iron Man movie site, a shot of the cast.


Left to right: Terence Howard as James Rhodes, Gwyneth Paltrow as Virginia "Pepper" Potts, Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, and Jeff Bridges as Obadiah Stane. (See, you can tell that Stane is evil by the way he's steepling his fingers. Evil fingers.)


Reportedly also in the cast are Hillary Swank as an unknown character and Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury. Ultimates fans, go crazy. I'd like to take advantage of this opportunity to say that this is a hell of a cast for a comic book movie. You'd expect these names for a gritty crime thriller or period piece or something.


Marvel's site also has a really fun conversation between Downey and director Jon Favreau.


I am so jazzed about this that I'm adding an "Iron Man" label to my blog.

Review: "Transformers."

Michael Bay + giant alien robots? It's gotta suck, right?

Wrong. Wrongwrongwrongohsowrong.

After seeing Transformers this afternoon, I really can't understand what I ever saw in Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer or Pirates of the Caribbean 3. (Spider-Man 3 was still great.) The last time I felt this elated after a movie was The Fellowship of the Ring.

Transformers may be the best Summer blockbuster ever. If you think giant transforming alien robots are cool, guess what: they are. They are so very cool.

I was expecting train wreck. I was expecting to enjoy the nostalgia and the sheer whiz-bang of seeing frickin Optimus Prime on the big screen, but to give the story a pass. No need. The story is simple but fun, the action is unprecedented, there's actual human interest in an earnest and believable performance by Shia LeBeouf, and the movie is quite funny.

It's all about adults being reminded of childlike delight; thrills, chills, spills and 50-foot-tall robots. It feels like a triumph for my entire generation.

And Peter Cullen is still the voice of Optimus Prime. Perfect.

"Iron Man" Teaser Poster

Yeah, apparently this is old news, as in July 2006 old, but I didn't find it until yesterday. And I like to share.

Iron Man Revealed!

For a few months now, we've known about the ridiculously appropriate casting of Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, the Invincible Iron Man. Who else but Downey to play a neurotic, smarmy, sex-addicted, alcoholic, obsessive billionaire genius? Tony Stark is my favorite superhero because he can so easily turn unlikeable, and Downey is the perfect actor for the part.

Now (thanks to Jeff Cole, who sent me the links) we have images of the armor being used in the movie, and it's totally megacool. Check it:

This is the Mark I armor, the first design. In the comics, it was built out of junk and spare parts to keep Tony's injured heart beating and help him escape a Vietnamese military camp. I'm surprised at how faithful this design is to the original comic.


This is the Mark III design, the current model, and the one we should be seeing the most of in the film. It's nearly identical to the suit he's wearing in continuity today.

I am so very pleased.

Andrew's Top Ten Superhero Movies

I've been geeking it out bigtime lately, with the December releases of Superman Returns and Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut inspiring quite a lot of comic movie viewing. I thought "Why not create a pompous and self-satisfying list of Superhero Movies?" So here it is. This is my Top Ten, and it does not purport to be anything deeper than that. So read, enjoy, and discuss.

Here were my rules: the movies in question needed to be either based on comic books, have comic books based on them, or be unquestionably comic-inspired. Note that I haven't yet seen V for Vendetta, though it's sitting on my DVD shelf (thanks, Ichabod).

10. Darkman. Sam Raimi kicks off the list with this masterful, over-the-top Liam Neeson vehicle. Yes, long before Kinsey and Schindler's List, Neeson played Doctor Peyton Westlake, whose face and feelings were stolen by evil gangsters. Unable to feel pain, fueled by adrenaline, and prone to serious furniture-chewing, Darkman followed the original Batman film, faring much better than Judge Dredd in trying to establish a new superhero franchise (two made-for-cable movies starring The Mummy's Arnold Vosloo followed). Awesome visuals, a great new superhero character, Larry Drake and Frances McDormand, and one of the great chase scenes of all time (a helicopter chased by a guy swinging from a rope behind it). But it's Neeson's unashamed super-overacting that makes this film work; a masterpiece of melodramatic voice-acting necessitated by a series of face-obscuring masks. Take that, Shatner! If you're a fan of Spider-Man, see this one as soon as you can; it presages director Raimi's best mainstream work.

9. The Incredibles. Pixar's animated classic was a massive Fantastic Four ripoff, there's no doubt about it, but it's such a great film that I can't find it in my heart to take offense. How this film can be so family-friendly while simultaneously sophisticated is a marvel, though I suppose I shouldn't be surprised; it's directed by Brad Bird, who directed The Iron Giant, one of animation's best films ever. Believe it or not, The Incredibles covers more than a few of the same issues as adult works like Watchmen, Kingdom Come, and Squadron Supreme, and serves as a fairly good primer to the world of reading modern comics. All four principals are excellently developed, as is the villain, and Edna Mode (voiced by Bird) is one of my favorite film characters ever. The voice acting is topnotch, and Bird's combination of retro design and storytelling is part of what makes him one of the best directors in the history of animated film.

8. Daredevil: the Director's Cut. I think Karen and I were the only two people who even liked this film. Not liked, loved. I'm no big Ben Affleck fan, but I found this film to be superb, full of drama and pathos, and loaded with great acting performances. I love the visual style of the film, I love the score to pieces, and the representation of Daredevil's sonar-sense is one of my favorite movie effects of all time. Affleck's performance is more than credible, and Colin Farrell personifies Bullseye's brilliant mania. Jennifer Garner is strong as Elektra (at least this time). The soundtrack rocks (introducing us all to Evanescence) and is perfectly in line with the tone of the movie. The director's cut DVD is superior to the theatrical release, returning a cut subplot, fleshing out some characters, and making Elektra a bit less of a ho. It's possible that my love for this film is due to my having very limited knowledge of Daredevil; I've read very little.

7. Hellboy. Guillermo Del Toro is quite the Hollywood hero right now with Pan's Labyrinth, but I could have told you he's a visual storytelling genius years ago. There are visuals in this movie that will haunt me for the rest of my life; Kroenen in particular is one of the most viscerally disturbing things I've ever seen. Del Toro gets Hellboy's lunchpail approach to paranormal investigation just right; casting Ron Perlman as H.B. is nothing short of genius (Bruce Campbell would have been pretty funny, though). The movie deviates substantially from Mignola's comic, and answers questions Mignola still hasn't addressed in print form, but it was all done with his input, so it's all good. Del Toro has a great grasp on the look and feel of Hellboy, and it all comes out as a hell of a fun movie, the perfect mix of goofy and gory, frightening and fantastic. Also, anything with Jeffrey Tambor in it rules.

6. Spider-Man. I'm a huge fan of James Cameron, and was crushed when he gave up on this project, but now it's impossible to imagine anyone but Sam Raimi directing this. The Spider-Man franchise has become the unquestioned gold standard for modern superhero movies. Raimi builds the entire film around the inextricable links between the Peter Parker's personal life and hero life, just as Sten Lee did the original comic and Brian Michael Bendis does with Ultimate Spider-Man. Raimi gets it, the central issue that the Spider-Man mythos is much more about the man than the mask. We can all identify with Peter Parker, the awkward lonely outsider who feels unworthy to even ask the girl he desperately loves out on a date. Spider-Man makes the viewers feel like they should be heroes in their own lives, that power of any kind carries responsibility to use it for the betterment of all. The stupid plastic Green Goblin mask is more than compensated for by the upside-down-kiss-in-the-rain scene.

5. Batman Begins. Finally, we have a director who wants to tell a Batman story, not manipulate Batman into looking like something they want (Bat-Scissorhands? Rubber nipples? Come on, guys.). Finally, we have a Batman who has the physical and emotional presence to be plausible as Batman and Bruce Wayne, something neither Keaton, Kilmer, or Clooney could do. And finally, we have a story that understands the central truth of Batman, that (unlike Spidey) Batman is his real identity and Bruce Wayne is the mask. Christopher Nolan weaves a powerful origin story, one that justifies Batman's superhuman skill and drive while leaving very human vulnerabilities. Christian Bale is the perfect Batman, strong and confident, stoic and devilishly determined, but still a badly damaged child at his core. Using character templates from Frank Miller's Batman: Year One is a stroke of genius. Batman is DC's antihero hero, and he should be closer to the Punisher than Captain America. When Batman roars, "Do I look like a cop?" we think he just might let Flass drop, and we're a bit disturbed by how much we wanted him to. Perfect.

4. The Matrix. Here's the choice that you're going to scream about. Make no mistake, The Matrix is the most influential sci-fi movie since Star Wars. Look at nearly every single action movie since its 1999 release (including many of the films on this list) and you will see filmmakers finding ways to justify their heroes having mad martial arts skills. Look at the same movies and you'll see wire work, CGI, and camera moves taken straight from the Wachowski brothers' masterpiece. That would be enough to put The Matrix high on this list, but what makes this film stand out is the essential nature of all the whiz-bang. Like Star Wars, The Matrix is a story that would be impossible to tell effectively without every ounce of technology and choreography it used. It's that rarest of the rare: massive effects technology being used purely in service to story. The fact that it's whiz-bang amazing is almost secondary, or rather the effects are whiz-bang because it's a whiz-bang effects story. The characters and the acting are flat in places, though I want to go on record as saying I really like Keanu Revves' performance in all three films. But the film's cyberspace-superhero imagery is like nothing before, and no one has come close since.

3. X-Men 2. Bryan Singer channels Chris Claremont, then leaves us hanging. Not that I didn't love Superman Returns, but I sure would have liked to see Singer's Phoenix story, especially since the X-Men 3 Phoenix effect had absolutely no visual similarity to the one established in this film. But this story is awesome, epic and complex, full of twists and turns and unlikely alliances, and loaded with great action (something Singer isn't always great at). Singer knows something a lot of other comic book movie-makers don't: how to tell a story with a lot of characters. While Wolverine is unequivocally the star of all three X-Men films, the second has interesting storylines for all of the primary and secondary characters. And he even has the sense to get Cyclops, a chronically static character since the 1960s, out of the way for a while.

2. Superman: the Movie. Richard Donner's messianic ode set the stage for all the other films on this list. Come on, Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder? A complete delight, and a very tough act for Brandon Routh and Kate Bosworth to follow. Bosworth, in particular, was just doomed from the start. Some aspects of it look quite dated today--not the effects; I'm completely captivated by the flying, the heat vision, and the Kryptonian technology. But the cinematography and dialogue style are very 1977. All of this film's failures, and there are more than a few, are more than canceled out by John Williams' score, perhaps the most perfect fit in movie history. Only Superman could have that theme. The Salkinds have a long and storied history of creating B-movies, and they pretty much destroyed this franchise immediately after beginning it, but what a beginning.

1. Spider-Man 2. Simply the best of the best, just a magnificent film in every way imaginable. Sam Raimi appears on this list three times, and just seems to get better with every film. But this is the superhero magnum opus to date. No comics character has ever had his dual identities so dramatically tied together, and no superhero movie has ever dealt so touchingly with the personal consequences of having superpowers. As great as the first Spider-Man film is, this one is a huge step forward in every way, from supercool action to the delicate simplicity of a girl-next-door crush. Spider-Man 2 is a perfect movie. Fantastic acting from all of the leads, a great screenplay, and wonderful effects. The scene with the New York subway riders passing the unconscious Spidey back through the car is iconic, a moment of connection between the superhuman and the supremely human. Spider-Man 2 makes us look at the heroes in our lives and the hero in our own hearts.

Honorable mentions, either really good superhero films or great films that just aren't genre-specific enough:

Mystery Men. An unbelievably funny movie, only missing the list because I just couldn't bump anything. Thanks to Chris Anthony of Shakespeare Festival L.A. for reminding me of this gem.

Robocop. Better than a lot of the movies on this list, but more pure sci-fi than superhero film. Boy, Paul Verhoeven would be a great director for The Punisher or Deadpool.

Superman II. Both versions are great. Donner's is more pure, but I kind of miss the Lester comedy. Kneel before Zod!

Batman. Michael Keaton is just terrible casting. So, I still insist, is Jack Nicholson, who's too little Joker and too much "Just Jack."

Batman Returns. A very strong film, probably #11 or 12 on this list. Too many characters, though, and I get tired of every Tim Burton film looking and feeling like every other one. (Except Big Fish and Pee-Wee's Big Adventure.)

X-Men. Singer wisely treats the X-Men's story more like sci-fi and less like a comic book. He juggles all the characters far better in the second film.

X-Men 3. Phoenix is terrifying, and the action is among superhero movies' best ever. Could have used about 20 minutes more character development.

Aliens. If Ellen Ripley isn't a superhero, no one is. Game over, man.

Superman Returns. A very good movie, and a welcome return. But Superman having a child out of wedlock betrays a serious lack of character comprehension on Bryan Singer's part.

Hellboy Animated: Sword of Storms. The launch of a new series of straight-to-DVD Hellboy movies bodes well for the series.

So that's-a my book. Pretty good, eh Steve?

Let the complaining and arguing begin!

Movie Review: "Pan's Labyrinth"

Usually I restrict my movie reviews to 100 words, but in this case I needed to not be limited.

Here’s what I didn’t know about Pan’s Labyrinth (El Laberinto del Fauno) before seeing it:

1) It’s much less fantasy than it is a real-world story with horror elements, and the violence is brutal. This movie is not for the squeamish.

2) It’s entirely in Spanish with subtitles.

Now, neither of these things is a bad thing in and of itself. But the film is being marketed a certain way, and it’s really quite dramatically not the movie it’s being billed as.

Then again, I don’t know how you would sell this movie. Moviefone has it listed as "Drama, Fantasy, Crime and Mystery." (How vague is that?) Rotten Tomatoes calls it "Horror/Suspense." This movie really is that hard to categorize. Do you sell it as a brutal snapshot of post-Civil War Spain? Do you sell it as the story of a lonely little girl and her pregnant mother on an isolated rural military base? Do you sell it as a post-9/11 allegory of military fascism set against the backdrop of a mysterious stone labyrinth whose origins no one seems to know or care about?

Guillermo del Toro’s film is all of these things. It is also an absolute masterpiece, one of the most brilliantly-crafted films I’ve ever seen, and well deserving the twenty-two-minute standing ovation it received at Cannes.

Like The Fountain, Pan’s Labyrinth is a movie that’s best viewed with few preconceptions, the above details aside. Also like The Fountain, it’s a film that is clearly a project of passionate importance to its director. Del Toro weaves fantasy and horror, suspense and war story, fairy tale and psychological thriller expertly, playing each genre against the others for contrast and complement. Every brutal act and every bit of tenderness come through the screen like a surprise, and the appearance of fantasy creatures is a new thing every time it happens. The fact that the main character is a twelve-year-old girl makes the violence nothing short of obscene.

And what a girl she is. Ivana Baquero plays Ofelia with grace and sincerity seldom seen in adult actors. The last time I saw an actor this young create a performance this affecting was Natalie Portman in Leon (The Professional), and we all know how that career is going. Baquero’s performance, if anything, may be more immediate and honest than Portman’s. Ofelia is our lens, our guide through the terror of the real world and the wonder of the fantastic one. Scenes wherein she speaks to her unborn baby brother are particularly powerful.

Sergi Lopez, Maribel Verdu, and Ariadma Gil round out the principals of the “real world” cast, but discussing their roles in the story would be too spoilerish for this blog. Suffice it to say that all three inhabit their characters with epic passion that never seems at odds with the relative intimacy of the film’s setting. Lopez, in particular, creates a character who inspired, shall we say, vehement response from the audience I saw it with.

And ah, the visuals. Obviously, these are what they’re using to try to sell the film: The ancient, withered Faun, his finger bones protruding. The Pale Man, eyeballs in the palms of his hands. Both of these roles are played by Doug Jones (Hellboy’s Abe Sapien), a mime and physical actor of amazing skill, worth the price of admission for his performances alone. Holy cow, his fingers alone are worth it. But the fantastical elements of the film, while completely compelling, are a much less pervasive influence than you’d think; this is Ofelia’s story and the fantasy setting is the exception, not the rule. Like the violence and blood, the fantasy elements are there to reflect and contrast Ofelia, not to distract or mask anything.

Guillermo del Toro has always impressed me as a kind of Mexican Peter Jackson, a resemblance far beyond the husky frame and wild hair and beard. Both share an aesthetic rooted in horror, a love and respect for epic and myth, and that rare combination: ability to create a visual spectacle and skill at coaching actors (are you listening, George Lucas?). Del Toro, who already impressed the hell out of me with Hellboy, has taken a massive stride with this fearful, wonderful film.

So please, read the two pieces of information above before you go see this film. Had I known how violent Pan’s Labyrinth is, I probably would not have gone to see it. However, that would have been a terrible, terrible mistake.

Go See "The Fountain," and Do It Soon.

"If you're a movie lover who despairs that big-scale filmmaking today consists of little more than a self-cannibalizing system of cliches; if you are fed up with putatively ambitious movies that turn out to sorely lack not just vision but actual brains and actual heart as well, then you need, badly, to see The Fountain, soon, and under the most optimum viewing conditions available. It may well restore your faith in the idea that a movie can take you out of the mundane and into a place of wonderment."

Thus wrote Premiere magazine's Glenn Kenny, my new favorite person on Earth. Karen and I just got back from watching Darren Aronofsky's new film, and neither one of us can remember being rendered so completely speechless by a movie in our lives. The only things I've ever seen anything like it are 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Even those two films, masterpieces in their own right, pale in many respects in comparison to The Fountain.

You're not getting a review from me here, and I recommend you avoid reading any. Just go see this dazzling and demanding film, and see it now; it's already starting to disappear from theatres. If you wait to see it on video, you will dearly regret it.

EDIT: Having slept on it, I am even more convinced that The Fountain may be the most remarkable and beautiful film I've ever seen. Don't miss it.

EDIT: Two days later, I still can't stop thinking about it.