Ant-Man (2015)

Marvel’s other big 15 summer flick “The Avengers: Age of Ultron” was so dense with heroes and villains, watching it near required a flow chart even for a die-hard geek such as myself. So Marvel goes literally small with “Ant-Man,” the latest hero to hit the screen. 

Paul Rudd is Scott Lang, a Robin Hood ex-con recruited to take on the heroic identity of Ant-Man –- a hero who can shrink to the size of an ant, retain incredible strength, and control insects –- by a genius inventor/scientist (Michael Douglas) who once wore the suit. 

Aged out, Douglas’ Hank Pym (the same character also is The Beast in the X-Men films) needs Rudd’s Lang to steal vital tech from a greedy CEO (Corey Stoll) up to no good. That’s it. Not a city is destroyed. Just a building. And a house. 

And I’m thankful for that. The epic destruction climaxes can get tiring. And, thankfully, tongues are in cheek for much of the running time.A climatic fight involves a Thomas the Tank Engine being thrown about. From the eyes of a child, it’s a tiny toy falling off a track. To our hero, it’s a devastating near-death encounter. That scene kicks. 

Now the magnifying glass. Director Peyton Red infamously picked up the lead reins from geek-favorite Edgar Wright (“Shaun of the Dead”) after the latter quit, squashed by Marvel Corp. meddling. 

The cracks show. That Thomas daft bit is pure Wright. But when the main story stops hard to intro an Avengers sidebar, the movie flops. Anthony Mackie’s Falcon appears, Chris Evans’ Captain America gets name dropped. The whole plot of “Avengers 2” is discussed in a conversation so awkward Douglas squirms. He has no idea what he is mouthing off. 

Look, I dig Marvel, I love Marvel, and it wants a tie-in universe seamless and pure, and I want what Marvel wants. Just like the comic books where stories such as “Secret Wars” crossed a dozen or so titles. I get it. 

But, left alone and given free will, Wright’s movie may have been the biggest blast of Marvel fresh air since “Guardians of the Galaxy.” Wild daft fun; us not knowing what the hell might happen, or who might say what. That movie felt like a daring gamble.

This is flat boring, not a bet. Not a single surprise moment, Thomas engine aside. When hero Ant-Man can’t stop talking about how much he loves his little princess girl, who the hell is the bad guy going to go after? This is a screenplay beaten into submission. By committee. 

It doesn’t help that Stoll’s villain, who becomes the menacing Yellow Jacket, with the similar powers to Ant-Man, never once registers. He’s psycho from minute one, a barking madman who hardly seems capable of running a treadmill, much less a massive company. And how ever did he become a super villain? Where did he train? How? 

Enough bitching, what does work here is Rudd’s solid performance. He’s likable. He’s funny. But he looks like he can handle himself in a fight. Douglas is spry as well. He throws a punch. It looks good. 

Also –- and I hate to go happy on special effects when story suffers so -- but the shots of Ant-Man tiny against backgrounds that are macrophotography blown out is crazy fun. That Thomas train, or Ant-Man using a Lifesaver to save his life. (And young Michael Douglas is epic!) Reed and his VFX team knock it out of the ballpark. 

Kudos to the computer geeks and camera crews. But no matter how good the art was in the thousands of comic books I collected and read, the stories kept bringing back. And this story has nothing to sell. B-

Pixels (2015)

“Pixels” has a ridiculously great premise that vibes perfect 1980s action/comedy: Aliens attack Earth using as weapons massive “live” incarnations of Atari’s best video games: Pac-Man, Centipede, Tetris, etc. Damn the result. Look, Director Chris Columbus (“Harry Potter” 1 and 2) handles the big VFX scenes with polish: Pac-Man tearing through NYC is too cool and when a soldier is de-pixelated, it scares like classic “Doctor Who." But away from the action, Pixels dies. A dead-eyed Adam Sandler plays an ex-arcade-child-king now miserable, but still chummy with his dork childhood pal (boring Kevin James), now the worst U.S. president ever. Assholes, both. A big joke: Sandler insults a White House intern by calling him “Blue Lagoon.” Because the guy has curly blond hair. I sat blinking. How old is that joke? Sandler and James blunder their way into saving Earth. This Earth doesn't deserve it. The trailer promised a celebration of us 1980s gamers. The movie flogs us as infants incapable of adult decisions. Like hygiene. Or parenting. Fuck every person involved. Last miserable kick: The sexism astounds. When another arcade dork (Josh Gad) sees his dream woman come to life, she cannot speak. Only smile and obey. Offensive. C-

Trainwreck (2015)

It happens even before she appears on screen. Amy Schumer is a film star. The comedian stars and holds writing credit on “Trainwreck,” Judd Apatow’s latest film about adults who don’t have it together. We open in the mid-80s on a dad (Colin Quinn) in a garage telling his young daughters that he and mom are divorcing. Monogamy is impossible he says. “Would you want to play with one doll for the rest of your life?” “No!!” Boom! We flash-forward two decades to Amy as a thirtysomething, untangled, drinking a lot, and trying to get ahead at her job. A thousands films like this exist about men. Now comes one woman’s turn, and my God, people freak. Schumer is just freakin’ electric here: Taking no prisoners, caustically funny, demanding, and crushingly sweet as she deals with her dying father, and Quinn is spectacular in the latter role. Seriously, he needs an Oscar push. Yes, the story may be pedestrian as Amy lands a rich doc (Bill Hader) to athletes, as opposed to say an hourly wager, but “Trainwreck” kills all those damn rom-com clichés of perfect endings and meet-cutes and last minute dashes to reconcile. A-

The Expendables 3 (2014)

“The Expendables” brings back Sylvester Stallone and his action pals (Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jet Li, Jason Statham) for more grinding mayhem, this time against Mel Gibson as an arms dealer. After the improved sequel, “3” ought to be aces. It’s garbage. The film gets cut to a bloodless PG-13 to get the kids in, but it’s still far too violent for children, with hundreds of onscreen deaths. (Yet, “Boyhood” got an R!?!) But that’s nitpicking. The plot is shambles, bending backward to intro younger heroes, all of them a snore – especially Kellan Lutz from “Legend of Hercules.” The young lot get captured, forcing the older lot to stage a rescue mission. Why bother? Gibson proves again he’s wildcard actor, brimming with madness, but his role is a bust. Buying bad art for $3M is evil? Harrison Ford plays a spook subbing for Bruce Willis, who played “Agent Church” in parts 1 and 2, but quit this entry over pay. So Ford delivers the line, “Church is out of the picture,” and winks directly into the camera. I saw a tear in his eye. C-

The Terminator (1984)

The special effects in James Cameron’s “The Terminator” have aged terribly. Stop motion jitters. Robo Arnold Schwarzenegger head during the self-operation vibes snickering fake. But we can only blame (thank) James Cameron for the huge leap in special effects since then, including his remarkable “Abyss” (1989) and “Terminator 2” (1991). But this is still a crazy daring film that rest sci-fi standards. In grimy Los Angeles, two men –- Schwarzenegger and Michael Biehn -– appear naked inside a blue-like orb, lightning pops and crackles. Silent types, they quickly find or steel weapons and hunt after one woman, a waitress (Linda Hamilton) destined for greatness. Schwarzenegger to kill. Biehn to protect. Watching this recently, I thought back to the first time I saw “Terminator” how I had no idea what was happening, who was good, what Schwarzenegger was, and how the action would end, and I loved the VFX. Thirty-one years ago, wow. Cameron made his own career and christened Schwarzenegger a star, and that’s with a scene where he massacres several dozen LEOs. (Made today? Not a chance.) Cameron sells it. You know near every frame was fought over and after, beat into perfection of the time. Exhilarating. A

Jupiter Ascending (2015)

I have a love/hate thing with the Wachowski siblings Andy and Lana (ne Larry). “Matrix”? One of the best action films ever. Sequels? Crap. “Cloud Atlas”? An epic too messy to land, but I loved the struggle. Now comes “Jupiter Ascending,” a sci-fi jumble of storyboards turned into overdone CGI fireworks that never spark. The Wachowskis think they have something as profound as “Dune” on their hands. Reality: This is nothing more than a “Flash Gordon” retread, complete with the space-man hero (Channing Tatum) crashing through a cathedral ceiling to save the damsel (Mina Kunis) from marrying some wicked creep. And it’s not even funny. Tatum’s hero is a half-man/half-dog soldier, while Kunis plays a janitor who is the reincarnated clone of a dead space queen. When Tatum’s hero tells Jones she *owns* Earth, literally, our gal gawks and wonders if he *loves* her. Is she 14? Mentally afflicted? Sean Bean sulks about, bored. Eddie Redmayne -– hot off “Theory of Everything” –- fly spits everywhere, over-acting. Nonsensical, edited to ribbons -– continuity errors abound -– and insanely overly complicated, I should have taken the blue pill. D

Film Round Up, Part IV

Another quick dive through several films I've watched recently... 

Dreamworks’ How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014) –- clunky title aside -– smartly carries the story of a boy warrior (Jay Berchanal) and his pet dragon, the former coming of age and discovering a family secret even his own father did not know. If “Dragon” 1 was a wondrous adventure for the young set, this chapter is for pre-teens mature enough to know adventure often brings crushing hurt along with glory. B+

Kiss Me Deadly (1955) is the classically warped film noir with detective Mike Hammer tracking the ID of a woman he meets in the road, hours before she dies. This Hammer (Ralph Meeker) is too GQ clean -– I get it, Hayes Code -– but he can play cruel, within the Hayes Code. The famous leftward climactic turn is one of the great WTF movie moments, inspiring even “Pulp Fiction.” Quite a “Twilight Zone” trip. A-

Wrath of the Titans (2013) is a massive step-up from its predecessor, 2010’s “Clash of the Titans.” I gave that miserable CGI bore a C+, and was generous to do so. Somehow it begat a sequel, but -– shocker -– this chapter improves as Perseus (Sam Worthington) heads Down Under to the Underworld to save dad Zeus (Liam Neeson) from death. It’s still a CGI overload, dumb as hell (good guys fight demons with... fire?!!?), but it’s got a more humorous wink-wink vibe, and Neeson and Ralph Fiennes (as Hades) ham it up wonderfully. B