88 Minutes

88 MINUTES (Jon Avnet, 2007)

Nine years after forensic psychiatrist Dr. Jack Gramm (Al Pacino) provided crucial testimony in the conviction of serial killer Jon Forster (Neal McDonough), the verdict begins to be called into question. In 88 MINUTES a murder replicating the methods of the old crimes suggests that perhaps Forster was wrongly imprisoned.

The timing is of extreme importance since the killing comes on the eve of Forster's scheduled execution. Clues at the new murder scene open the possibility that Gramm himself is the culprit. Meanwhile, a mysterious caller informs Gramm that he has two minutes shy of an hour and a half left to live and sends him running around Seattle to stay alive and solve the crime.

88 MINUTES is the sort of overblown thriller in which every action, no matter how insignificant, is pregnant with portent, yet it's a film of nothing but red herrings. Director Jon Avnet and screenwriter Gary Scott Thompson have concocted a silly mystery that gets more outrageous and laughable as the clock ticks down to the zero minute.

Again and again 88 MINUTES torpedoes suspicion regarding Gramm and loses internal consistency. Since multiple attempts to kill Gramm occur long before time is up, it's abundantly clear that he is not guilty of what has been set up and that the film's countdown device doesn't matter at all.

The decisions made in 88 MINUTES never make any sense. When the abusive former boyfriend of Gramm's teaching assistant Kim (Alicia Witt) appears with a gun at his front door, she tells her boss to open it because the guy wouldn't hurt her. Never mind that he used to beat her and is thought to be out to kill Gramm. Sure, come on in and make yourself at home!

Equally as implausible as the conspiracy to frame Gramm is how every woman in the the film throws herself at him as though the old professor is America's heartthrob. Leave it to the movies to make it so all females are rendered powerless by the unexplained pull of his erotic magnetism.

The portrayal of Gramm's irresistibility verges on parody. That farcical quality can also be read in 88 MINUTES' preposterous mystery. Unfortunately for the filmmakers, they didn't set out to make a comedy.

Grade: D

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan

BORAT: CULTURAL LEARNINGS OF AMERICA FOR MAKE BENEFIT GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN (Larry Charles, 2006)

Sacha Baron Cohen is fearless. In BORAT: CULTURAL LEARNINGS OF AMERICA FOR MAKE BENEFIT GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN, the British comedian makes fools of unsuspecting ordinary Americans (and some unordinary ones) while frequently putting his own wellbeing in danger. As Kazakh television reporter Borat Sagdiyev, Cohen shatters the customs of polite society. He makes horribly racist, sexist, and homophobic comments, but his broken English and guilelessness give him a pass (for awhile) with most he encounters. The character allows him to hold up a mirror to such ridiculous attitudes when his new acquaintances use the openings Borat gives them to express similar beliefs.

Ostensibly a road movie and a fake documentary that the other participants don’t know is fake, BORAT follows the enthusiastic reporter and his obese producer Azamat Bagatov (Ken Davitian) as they journey across the country. Their visit to America is supposed to be limited to New York City, but when Borat stumbles upon an old episode of BAYWATCH on his hotel room television, he switches their plans and sets out for Los Angeles so he can take Pamela Anderson as his wife. Along the way he talks with politicians, an antiques dealer, television anchors, fraternity brothers, and more as he takes the pulse of the United States, particularly the South.

At the risk of using hyperbole, BORAT is one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen. Cohen’s total commitment to the character and control is astonishing. I can’t imagine a more gut-busting and shocking scene than Borat and Azamat’s naked wrestling. Cohen and Davitian go for broke and at least twice manage to top what you expect can’t be topped. While Cohen’s acting may not typify what gets classified as outstanding acting, this is a great performance. In our daily lives we’d find Borat detestable, but on screen, even when being actively mean to undeserving folks, he’s completely likable.

Borat has no boundaries, and much of the humor comes from how he upsets the normal social balance. Whether trying to be friendly with New Yorkers on the subway or southern gentlemen and women at a dinner party, Borat tests the limits of what people will accept before they are offended.

Cohen’s playing the ultimate rube in the big city, but the joke’s on those he meets. On the positive side, BORAT reveals an America where people are happy to accept someone interested in learning about this nation. Although the butts of his jokes, many people are unfailingly polite until Borat exceeds their tolerance for being offended or having personal space invaded. A hotel worker gently corrects Borat when he begins unpacking his belongings in the elevator because he’s under the wrong impression that it is his room.

There’s no doubt that Cohen is pushing his subject’s buttons, and sometimes the results, while a riot, aren’t pretty. Borat highlights American ignorance, particularly when people excuse his most inflammatory words and actions as cultural difference. The more outrageous his statements or deeds, the more someone is willing to chalk it up to the Kazakh way. It doesn’t speak well of our education and beliefs about other cultures when Borat can get away with what he says and does.

Many of the funniest bits are Borat’s interactions with others, but this is a film packed with many less complex laughs. The chicken Borat packs in his luggage is one of the best recurring gags in the film. About the time we’ve forgotten about the animal, it squawks and delivers one of the funniest moments in a movie with wall-to-wall laughs.

Most film comedies, even the good ones, are safe and predictable. Even the “edgy” ones seem too self-conscious in their provocations. BORAT is the rare comedy that operates without a safety net. Cohen and director Larry Charles’ film provides constant laughter and surprises while daring the viewer to be rightfully offended. This is a bold film likely to elicit strong opinions. Put me down on the side of those cracking up even when it feels wrong to be laughing.

Grade: A

(Photos TM and © Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved.)

Gran Torino

GRAN TORINO (Clint Eastwood, 2008)

For supposedly his last time performing on screen, Clint Eastwood chooses to go out as the kind of tough, no-nonsense son of a gun that has defined his acting career. In GRAN TORINO Eastwood is newly widowed Walt Kowalski, a crusty Korean War veteran who doesn't suffer anyone or mince words, no matter how inappropriate they might be. Walt's an equal opportunity offender who's just as quick to tell off his own children and grandkids as he is to apply racist terms to the many immigrants who now live in his old Detroit neighborhood.

The retired auto worker's most cherished possession is a 1972 Gran Torino, so he doesn't take kindly to Thao Vang Lor (Bee Vang) a boy from the Hmong family next door, trying to steal it as part of a gang initiation ritual. Walt feels no affection for the Lors, but when gang members try to take Thao, he chases them away.

Thao's grateful sister Sue (Ahney Her) and mother insist that the teen work for Walt as a means of atoning for the attempted car theft. Although Walt is reluctant to accept the offer, he acknowledges that this is a chance to get the neighborhood cleaned up how he wants. Through his work ethic, Thao slowly wins over Walt and increases the senior citizen's protective instinct for foreigners who end up having more in common with him than his own flesh and blood.

Like a new driver learning to operate a manual transmission, director Eastwood's awkward shifting of tones makes the lurching GRAN TORINO a frustrating ride. Parts of GRAN TORINO are clearly supposed to be funny. Eastwood's cranky old man act lets him verbally knock around a baby-faced priest, utter a stream of slurs, and even snarl the oldster rallying cry "get off my lawn" to no-good thugs.

The beloved movie star relishes the chance to put everyone in their place, but Eastwood may be having too much fun as he sets up ridiculously easy targets to hit, such as Walt's etiquette-lacking kin. Even if GRAN TORINO doesn't abide Walt's outdated racist words, it sympathizes with him and makes his offensiveness a charming quirk even in moments when his antiquated attitude shouldn't be humorous.

Nevertheless, actions may matter more than words, particularly when considering those long set in their ways, even if the comedy of Walt's insults can be jarring next to the cross-cultural and generational drama examining Eastwood's prototypical stoic hero. At a time when people rush to unload their innermost thoughts to anyone and everyone, Walt is a relic who clings to and attempts to squash his deepest feelings. How Walt lives is the only statement he needs to make, although it means presenting an incomplete picture to others.

GRAN TORINO is most invigorating when Walt's ways and beliefs are challenged. The crosscutting of culture-spanning similarities provides a strong argument for building understanding, but Walt's softening attitude toward those he once detested is less impactful due to uniformly bad supporting performances. Water may be able to wear down rock, but it's a stretch that the charisma-challenged neighbors would sway Walt.

Grade: C+

Lovely by Surprise

LOVELY BY SURPRISE (Kirt Gunn, 2007)

Being able to point people toward an unfamiliar but good movie--an overlooked gem, perhaps one that never escaped the festival circuit--is one of the most enjoyable things I can do as a film critic. Yes, negative reviews can be fun to write from time to time, but I didn't start critiquing films so I could piss all over the creative efforts of others. I'd much rather be championing movies than thrashing them, especially because I'd rather see good movies than bad ones.

I'm in my tenth year of doing film criticism online, so by now I'm on enough publicists' lists to be offered a decent number of screeners for review. Because there's only so much time in the day to watch and write about films, I tend to be particular in what I'll request. Granted, there is no guarantee that I'll like what I'll see, but I pick films that I think will interest and appeal to me. Maybe I'll uncover one of those underseen treasures.

Which is all a roundabout way of leading me to the troublesome case of LOVELY BY SURPRISE. I responded affirmatively when asked if I'd like to get a copy for review. After all, the independent comedy/drama from writer-director Kirt Gunn won the New American Cinema Special Jury Prize at the 2007 Seattle International Film Festival. Online reviews aren't plentiful, but most that I've found are glowing. It seemed like the sort of film that fell between the cracks and could use my drop in the bucket of critical support. Sounds good. And then I watched the DVD.

LOVELY BY SURPRISE layers scenes featuring three distinct sets of characters whose paths gradually converge, although not always in expected ways. The film's hub is Marian (Carrie Preston), who is writing an ambitious novel in which actions in the real world affect the characters in the book. Stuck on how to advance the story, she goes to her former writing professor Jackson (Austin Pendleton) for advice. He assesses that Marian's novel contains no conflict. Jackson proposes that this non-dilemma dilemma can be neatly resolved by killing off one of the characters. The idea troubles her, but she agrees to give it a shot.

Marian's underwear-clad characters reside in a houseboat in the middle of a field but cannot leave the landlocked vessel. For subsistence the author provides them with boxed cereal within a spear's throw and a milkman's deliveries. The stout Humkin (Michael Chernus), the one in the baby blue briefs, wants to abandon ship, but his brother Mopekey (Dallas Roberts), he of the yellow underpants, is determined to keep him onboard. When Marian attempts to kill Humkin, she presents the opportunity he needs to jump ship and the written page.

Connecting the separate scenes of the writer and her creations is easy to do, but it's less certain how the moments with grieving car salesman Bob (Reg Rogers) and his daughter Mimi (Lena Lamer) fit into the puzzle. After his wife's death Bob has taken to waxing philosophical with customers and talking them out of new vehicle purchases. He can't stop talking, but Mimi has clammed up.

LOVELY BY SURPRISE'S aggressive quirkiness is off-putting from the get-go and the biggest barrier to engaging with the film. The silly names and affected behavior of Marian's characters are the most glaring examples of a movie trying too hard to be unconventional, but it's the comedic and dramatic tones, off by a smidgen throughout, that can make the film insufferable at times.

While the final scene makes the gist of the film undeniably clear, specific questions arising from the opaque narrative aren't resolved in a satisfying manner. Every little uncertainty doesn't need to be answered, but LOVELY BY SURPRISE doesn't give the impression that it is operating with a consistent internal logic. Whether the blame stems from the screenwriting or editing is hard to say, although it probably can be attributed to both.

LOVELY BY SURPRISE employs flourishes of David Lynch-like dreaminess minus the menace. The disconnected feel, coupled with the annoying eccentricities, establishes another blockade to entering the film. Existing at arm's-length may achieve the goal of exploring the mental investment in creative work and the toll that authorial honesty and writer's block can take, but it makes for a displeasing viewing experience.

Although LOVELY BY SURPRISE drowns in its own preciousness, clearly it boasts some talent in front of and behind the camera. Preston, last seen stealing a scene as the corporate travel agent Clive Owen dupes in DUPLICITY, does a fine job balancing the fragility and intensity Marian draws upon to devote herself fully to her writing. Rogers is strangely compelling as a character obviously failing to hold himself together yet still retaining a measure of persuasiveness.

Cinematographer Steve Yedlin, who also lensed Rian Johnson's BRICK and THE BROTHERS BLOOM, favors a soft, gloomy look with bursts of color that matches the film's emotional palette. Gunn displays an eye for interesting shot composition and maintains a good pace that keeps LOVELY BY SURPRISE watchable in spite of the irritations.

These positive qualities and the DIY effort to get the film seen are why I almost feel like I need to apologize for disliking LOVELY BY SURPRISE so strongly. Almost.

Grade: D+

(LOVELY BY SURPRISE is now available on DVD.)

My Sister's Keeper

MY SISTER'S KEEPER (Nick Cassavetes, 2009)

In MY SISTER'S KEEPER eleven-year-old Anna Fitzgerald (Abigail Breslin) will do and has done just about anything for her leukemia-afflicted teenage sister Kate (Sofia Vassilieva). Their parents Sara and Brian (Cameron Diaz and Jason Patric) conceived Anna with the plan that she would donate what Kate needed, be it umbilical cord blood or bone marrow, in the fight against cancer.

For all of her young life Anna has provided what Kate requires, although how much of a willing participant she's been is up for debate. As Kate takes a turn for the worse, the time comes for Anna to donate a kidney to keep her sibling alive. Within the family it's accepted--and expected--that Anna will again give part of herself to assist her older sister. Needless to say, Sara and Brian are shocked when their little girl sues them for medical emancipation.

Anna hires lawyer Campbell Alexander (Alec Baldwin) to help her win the right to make decisions about her own body. Prior medical procedures to benefit Kate have had complications and required hospital stays for Anna. A kidney donation would mean lifelong limitations on what activities she can participate in. It also doesn't guarantee Kate will be cured. Anna loves Kate and doesn't want her to die, but the coercive pressure her parents, especially her mother, have put on her has reached a breaking point.

Initially MY SISTER'S KEEPER looks to be a hot button drama about the ethics of donor children, but that sensitive subject is merely the hook for getting into a story about how a family can be torn apart when one member has a terminal illness. The nonlinear storytelling divides the narration among the Fitzgeralds, which allows the film to get a broader understanding of the choices that have led to this crisis and how each person has been affected. Not all of the characters are done justice--Brian and son Jesse (Evan Ellingson) mostly serve to push the action along--but the technique fills in gaps that would exist if it were told from a single perspective.

Based on Jodi Picoult's novel, MY SISTER'S KEEPER is an unrepentant tearjerker, and writer-director Nick Cassavetes and co-writer Jeremy Leven build a solid, albeit exposed infrastructure for facilitating the waterworks. (The screening I attended featured the most audience sniffling and sobbing I think I've ever heard at the movies.)

Sara's apparent inability to consider Anna's well-being and individuality might be interpreted as monstrous behavior--sometimes she loses sight that her youngest child is more than spare parts--although her backstory and Diaz's credible performance make such reactions seem like the natural fallout from years of ferocious caregiving. Sara has so much energy and love invested in Kate that she is blinded to what's happening around her and doesn't know when to let go. Sara may be difficult to like, but Diaz imparts her with conviction and thus makes the character's reasoning seem rational to her.

MY SISTER'S KEEPER might have earned its weepy moments if it had played fair with its central dilemma rather than putting forward a false choice. The film conveniently dodges the question of whether it is moral to have a child for the express purpose of catering to a sibling's medical needs. While MY SISTER'S KEEPER may be primarily concerned with family dynamics during stressful times, the ethical question it raises looms too large for a loophole to render it unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

If the controversial issue wasn't going to be addressed, it didn't need to be introduced. The basis for an emotionally powerful and messy film about love and loss is plainly evident, but the unresolved gimmick distracts from where attention should be directed.

Grade: C+

Whatever Works

WHATEVER WORKS (Woody Allen, 2009)

WHATEVER WORKS is Woody Allen's fortieth feature film as director. Once again he uses the cinematic forum to voice his ideas and fears about love and death while cracking some jokes along the way.

Boris Yellnikoff (Larry David), a classic version of the Allen protagonist, is a New York intellectual obsessed with his own mortality. Boris may be a string theorist whose genius almost snared him a Nobel Prize, but his true calling is as a professional neurotic. Boris often seems happier when he's miserable. Lord knows he tries to make lemons when life gives him lemonade. Boris dumps his rich, highly compatible wife and jumps out of a window intent to end it all. Since the universe has a twisted sense of humor, he survives and thus has something else to grumble about.

Moving on, Boris finds contentment living alone and following his routines--or as much contentment as an agitated misanthrope can have--but his life gets upended when he meets Melodie St. Ann Celestine (Evan Rachel Wood), a beauty pageant queen from Mississippi who has run away from home to make it in the Big Apple. With little more than a high school letterman's jacket to her name, Melodie needs a place to stay--temporarily, of course. He's resistant to having his space invaded but eventually agrees to let her crash for a night or two.

Then a funny thing happens. Boris discovers that he doesn't mind having Melodie around. She listens with rapt attention to his rants about people and accepts his theories and cultured tastes as her own.

On CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM David has refined an acerbic personality that turns out to be a perfect match for Boris and his acid-tinged worldview, an increasingly common character trait in Allen's movies. Bitterness has been creeping into the writer-director's work, so it helps that David, eminently comfortable in the Woody Allen role, brings an amused fatalism to the part that keeps this rather toxic-sounding man from becoming unlikable.

Boris kvetches about stupid people a lot, but David's body language tends to reflect an attitude of humored indifference. Allen also eases up on coming off like a crank when it becomes clear that Boris' intolerance and ritual bound behavior, such as his hand washing, are just secular versions of the religious dogma he rejects. Boris may not be a big stretch for David to play, but he makes a consistently funny curmudgeon.

Wood ends up being a better foil for David than expected and makes Melodie sufficiently convincing in the story, which is a pretty tall order. At first her airheaded, molasses-accented character seems like the worst of Allen's conception of non-New Yorkers, but Wood's bright-eyed, irony-free performance has charm and innocence to nicely offset the film's aged astringency. Allen continues to paint a target on his back by having another pretty young thing go gaga for an old man. The May/December romance in WHATEVER WORKS is pretty implausible. Thankfully it's the amusing collision of the brainy and the ditsy that matters more.

WHATEVER WORKS takes a serious downturn in the second half when the focus drifts from Boris. Melodie's mother Marietta (Patricia Clarkson) turns up at his door looking for her daughter, and later on her father John (Ed Begley Jr.) appears too. Not only do the awakenings of these southern conservatives to New York liberalism feel like Allen at his laziest, but also their arcs are just not that funny, interesting, or developed.

Due in part to the sheer volume of Allen's filmography, WHATEVER WORKS is bound to seem familiar, but he's found a winning formula, even if this film's title suggests a less than fastidious approach to getting it right.

Grade: B-

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs

ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS (Carlos Saldanha and Mike Thurmeier, 2009)

When sitcom characters start getting married and having children, the developments often indicate that the creative wells in the writers' rooms are running dry. These warning signs are all over the ICE AGE series, which has now yielded two sequels, with more likely to come as long as the box office receipts, not worthwhile untold stories, warrant them.

The original 2002 animated film was pleasant enough as it followed the comedic exploits of prehistoric creatures during the glacial period, but it didn't suggest untapped tales about these characters. 2006's subpar follow-up ICE AGE: THE MELTDOWN introduced a spouse for woolly mammoth Manny (Ray Romano). As ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS opens, Manny and his beloved Ellie (Queen Latifah) are waiting for the arrival of their first fuzzy bundle of joy, something which has the expectant pop in a tizzy to childproof the frozen landscape they call home.

The impending mammoth domesticity has other members of the multiple species herd feeling left out. Saber-toothed tiger Diego (Denis Leary) notices that he's losing his predatory edge and elects to strike out on his own. Sid the sloth (John Leguizamo) is mindful that he is experiencing some parental stirrings, but with no nearby female sloths to speak of, he must build a family by adopting three abandoned eggs he discovers underneath the ice.

When the eggs hatch, Sid becomes the dutiful caregiver to Tyrannosaurus rex triplets, but his happiness is shortlived when the displeased momma T. rex comes looking for her babies. She hauls off Sid and the kids to an underground land where some dinosaurs survived the global freeze. Loyal to a fault, Sid's friends venture on a rescue mission by journeying below the ice. There they fall under the leadership of the wily and possibly crazy weasel Buck (Simon Pegg).

Breaking up the main story is saber-toothed squirrel Scrat's never-ending pursuit of an acorn. The addition of the female Scratte for this third go-round presents competition and a love interest for the tireless forager. Scrat's wordless vignettes have been highlights of the previous ICE AGE films, and the nutty scenarios he gets into again are among the funniest parts of this one. Whether straining to be freed from the tar adhering him to a tree or bopping along in a bubble after that darn acorn, Scrat's scenes possess an unforced silliness missing in the primary story.

ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS needs injections of cartoon merriment and orneriness to cure the blandness afflicting the plot and characters. Buck has his humorously unhinged moments, and Sid's sweet goofiness earns a smile here and there. Otherwise a great affinity with those in the herd isn't developed.

The animation is solid and features a couple nice action setpieces that probably look neat in 3-D--I saw the 2-D version--but what lingers is the predictability and indistinctiveness of it all. ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS had to concoct an explanation for shoehorning the extinct reptiles into the timeline, so why limit the dinos' expressiveness to mere grunts and roars? It's just one of several signs that the film's modest creative hits and misses qualify it as an unremarkable, fitfully diverting effort than a mammoth letdown.

Grade: C

(Photo credit: Blue Sky Studios, TM and © Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved.)