Puntabulous

AKA An excuse to write about movies I have recently seen

1. Funniest deleted scene - Pink Panther

As much of a Steve Martin fan as I am, I had heard such bad things about the remake of the Pink Panther I put off seeing it. To my delight, it was funny and surprisingly sentimental. It was directed by Shawn Levy (Cheaper by the Dozen, Night at the Museum) who has a history of infusing comedies with that warm and fuzzy feeling. Steve Martin becomes his own unique and appealing Inspector Clouseau. His accent and pathetic attempts to say “I want to buy a hamburger” alone is hilarious. Jean Reno is a perfect straight man partner for him. An unexpected cameo by Jason Statham and some laugh out loud moments (try keeping a straight face when they dance in that “camouflage”) also make it worth watching. But the award I would give it however would be funniest deleted scene. It’s two parts where Clouseau accidentally makes the molding of the arch in Kevin Kline’s office fall down. The second time it falls to the floor, he declares “This is where it wants to be.” It reminds me of my favorite line from Twins when Arnold says upon tripping a pedestrian “The pavement was his enemy.” Ok, so neither of those moments reads as funny as they are. Go ahead and judge for yourself. It may not be as awesome as the new Get Smart but I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.

2. Most Unnecessary Camerawork - Sleuth

For me, Kenneth Branagh is the greatest living director on the planet. Michael Caine is one of the greatest actors on the planet. And Jude Law is so gorgeous, I could watch him all day long. What could possibly go wrong with the remake of Sleuth? Camerawork. Angles from above, angles from below, angles from below the waist, angle in on a single eye, angles in mirrors. Ken, Ken, Ken what were you thinking? You didn’t have to do anything (except write a better ending) to make these two actors in one house more interesting.

3. Creepiest, Cheesiest special effect - Solstice

Solstice is a fairly good direct to DVD horror movie from the makers of The Blair Witch Project. It’s about a girl who goes to a cabin with a group of friends and starts seeing what she believes is her sister who recently committed suicide. It has a likable cast (including Shawn Ashmore of Smallville), interesting mystery and one of the cheesiest special fx I’ve seen outside of Scifi Channel. Basically it was a black shadow (shaped like a Pacman ghost?) with glowing eyes. The weird thing is how much it creeped me out. The only thing I could think of was that it was closer to things I’ve thought I’ve seen when I was kid. Things from my child’s imagination that terrified me. I never saw a little girl with inexplicably unwashed hair over her face or a boy saying “Redrum! Redrum!”. In the dark of the basement or shed it was the shadows that scared me. The ones that seemed to turn to look at me. Was it really low budget and cheesy? Yes. Laughable? Pretty much. Creepy? Definitely.

4. Most self indulgent annoying performance - Julia Roberts in Oceans 12

Oceans 11 & 13 were entertaining but 12 should be skipped for a muddled plot and most of all for an incredibly annoying scene with Julia Roberts playing a character who is playing - Julia Roberts. It’s something that’s been done before such as in the otherwise superb show Due South which referred to Leslie Neilson’s character as looking like Leslie Neilson. But never have I seen it done for as long or as self indulgently as Julia Roberts’ performance. First there are unheard whispers about who this character looks like and should pretend to be in order to further their diamond heist. She coyly protests, “Oh no! I don’t look a thing like her!” They insist “Oh yes - it will work!” Reluctantly she agrees to pretend to be - surprise! Julia Roberts! The “joke” goes even further when she runs into Bruce Willis playing himself, mistaking her for Yes! Julia Roberts! Not only did it completely take me out of the movie, it aggravated the heck out of me. If I had been eating popcorn I would have thrown it at the screen.

5. American version better than Asian Version - The Eye

Often when the American movie machine gets a hold of an already well done foreign movie, it grinds it down til it’s a poor imitation of the original. Not so with the American version of The Eye. I saw the Asian version one day on IFC and enjoyed it. It was a ghost story in which the main character receives a donor pair of eyes and begins seeing dead people. It wasn’t jump out of your seat scary as much as sinisterly atmospheric. My only problem was the ending left me a little confused. Like most Asian horror movies, it was purposely abstract. The American version starred the immensely watchable Jessica Alba. The apparitions in it weren’t as frightening but the story was more understandable and the ending ultimately more satisfying. It was actually very touching and made me teary, something few horror movies do.

6. & 7. The “Get me the Hell out of this car” award:

There are many many great chase scenes and now with computer fx things can be done that couldn’t before. Some work, some don’t. The best still remain the ones that are actually done live. Lately they have developed new cameras that they can place inside cars during the chases and crashes. It really makes you feel like you are in the car with the driver. Two movies have used this technique to effectively unsettling results. The first is The Bourne Supremacy, the middle movie in the Bourne trilogy. There is a long car chase down narrow streets and across a 12 lane highway! For most of the chase, you feel like you are in the car with Matt Damon, shifting his gears, looking in his mirrors etc. By the time you hit the huge climax in a tunnel, you feel like you’re as beat up as his borrowed taxi-cab.

The other movie is We Own the Night, a gritty crime drama with Mark Walhberg and Joaquin Phoenix playing brothers on opposite sides of the law. There is a shocking car chase that takes place at night - in the pouring rain, shown totally from Joaquin’s point of view in his car. It’s unique and very disturbing. Neither of these descriptions do them justice, you have to rent them, experience them and then I bet you too will be saying “Get me the Hell Out of This Car!”

8. The “Get Me the Hell Out of this Movie” award:

As I’ve said before, I love scary movies. I love to be scared in scary movies. But once in a while comes a scene where the only thing keeping me in the seat is the death grip I have on the arm rests. The first time it happened to me was in Platoon when they were beating the villagers with their guns. I squirmed in my seat and kept looking at the exit as if I could will myself out of the theatre. The entire movie had been excruciatingly realistic, painful to watch and that particular scene was the worst. I wanted to stay because I felt it was an important movie, one I could learn from. It wasn’t a movie made to entertain.

That’s why I decided to give the award instead to a movie that was meant to entertain, The Descent, a horror movie about cave divers getting lost and encountering monsters. The one funny thing about the movie was that the monsters weren’t nearly as scary as the teeny tiny caves that they were trying to get through. For someone who is very claustrophobic (me me me) the scene in which one of the women gets stuck in a deep dark narrow tunnel was nauseating. Other movies not for the phobically inclined include Arachnophobia (spiders! Yick!) and the middle segment of Cat’s Eye with Robert Hays on a dizzingly high ledge.

9. Best DVD Revelation - Cloverfield

Cloverfield is one of my favorite movies of the year, containing one of my favorite monsters. I know many people couldn’t take the home video aspect, but for me that made it even more engrossing. I felt like I was actually there. I was certain that it would lose it’s effect on the small screen but happily it didn’t. I was just as absorbed. I was also able to stop, pause, slow mo- the scenes with the monster getting a better look and appreciation for it. The most interesting part for me though was the behind the scenes featurette which not only gave me a much better view of the entire monster, it revealed intriguing plot points that could easily be missed or didn’t make it into the movie at all. I won’t give it all away except for one tiny thing. It’s a baby! The humongous monster is only a infant and it’s rampaging the city is merely the actions of a poor scared baby monster crying out for it’s mommy! The creature fx people said they did this because they believed nothing could be worse than what a frightened trapped animal could do. Now I think it’s cute! Don’t you?

10. “Why don’t they have this feature on all DVDs?” award goes to Planet Terror

DVDs contain all kinds of special features: , director’s cuts, behind the scenes, commentaries, interviews and so on. A unique but kind of cute option on the Cabin Fever DVD, is called “Chick Vision”. With this feature activated, a pair of hands covers the screen during the scary extremely gory moments so you don’t have to cover your own eyes. It’s a cute if sexistly titled gimmick. The Return to House on Haunted Hill and Final Destination 3 both have little questions appear during the movie giving you different options such as being able to choose who lives or dies. It’s like a live version of those old “Choose your own adventure” books. This could be a very cool feature if only it was put in better movies.

But the award for “Why don’t they have that on all DVDs” definitely goes to Planet Terror because one of the audio tracks is an audience watching the movie along with you, recreating the excitement that one feels when you see a great movie with a large audience. Planet Terror is the perfect movie for this because it is made in the 70’s tradition with B movie gore thrown in (and over and around and..) It’s a great action-dark comedy-zombie movie. All the gasps, squeals and “ewwwww”s heard during the opening scene involving balls (not the bouncy kind) made it all the more funny and let you know right away what the tone of the movie is. People laughed at the appropriate parts and you can hear them scream or jump at the scares. Best of all - in the final action scene you can hear all the huge cheers, whooping and clapping when Rose McGowan turns her “disability” (lost leg) into her power (machine gun), she kicks major ass to save the day. The scene completely rocks and the ability to be able to share that experience over and over with an audience while in my own home is truly awesome.