True Lies (1994)

I loved James Cameron’s “True Lies” when I saw it in a Philadelphia cinema 21 years ago with a friend. I cheered the openly tongue-in-cheek story and action as Arnold Schwarzenegger as a secret U.S. spy demolishes Middle Eastern terrorists in downtown Miami, the fanatics threatening to destroy the city with a stolen nuclear warhead. In a scene still spectacular Ahnuld flies a Harrier jet up against a skyscraper and kills a villain with a ride on a missile. But, damn, this is an ugly sexist film. See, I was a very naïve 20 year old in 1994. Now I cringe at the entire midsection which has Schwarzenegger’s Harry Tasker going rage as he suspects his dumb, hapless wife (Jamie Lee Curtis) of cheating on him; him, a guy who’s done nothing but lie to her for two decades. See, Cameron has our hero kidnap and then psychologically torture the woman until she admits in fact she has committed no sin against her husband. (If she had!?!) Cameron seems to know his writing is vile. Side characters offer admonishments, almost as sideline commentary. But it still smacks of, “Keep watching. Keep laughing!” Cameron’s worst film. _­C+

Jurassic World (2015) and Massive Film Round Up, Part III

Still catching up to significant and newish films watched… I open with current box office beast “Jurassic World” -– seen at a preview -– and then hit on older films. All quick. Run!

Jurassic World (2015) comes as close as any of the sequels to 1993 Spielberg classic “Jurassic Park” to capturing the sheer terror/joy of dinosaurs run amok in the modern world. Running the show here is indie darling Colin Trevorrow (“SafetyNot Guaranteed”) as director and one of four writers. Plot? Humans foolishly open an amusement park full of DNA-juiced dinosaurs who do what dinosaurs do. Hunt. Kill. Chris Pratt -– hot off “Guardians of the Galaxy” -– is the hero who knows what’s right. Kids get lost. People die. Dinosaurs roar loud. Our eyes fill. Our ears relent. It’s damn entertaining and smart with its knowing of the first film’s events as real and its place in Hollywood. Trevorrow knows how to sell action. But this “World” is Lost: It’s disgustingly sexist. Bryce Dallas Howard plays a Corporate Career Bitch who needs a man and a tragedy to crack her shell so she can swoon. Every other female is a basket case of tears and panic. Fuck that. Not after “Mad Max: Fury Road.” Trevorrow homages “Aliens” on screen, but it’s clear he never learned what made that film soar. There’s no Ripley here. Not by 65 million years. B

Bill Murray is at low-key best as a recluse who only thinks he wants to be a loner, until he learns – via a hand-written letter – that he is a father in director Jim Jarmusch’s epically cool Broken Flowers (2005). A-

Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965) ignores the plot of then-new BBC hit show about a time-traveling alien and makes the hero a doddering old human grandpa (Peter Cushing!) with an eye for gadgets. Result: Goofy silly 1960s fun with pop art sets and a Doctor who doesn’t do much but wink. Often. B

Dracula Untold (2014) serves an origin story we didn’t need with Luke Evans as the warlord count who goes to the dark side. Unmemorable and visually bland. Against “Bram Stoker’s Dracula,” it sucks. C

The ever-lovely Julia Louis-Dreyfus takes center stage in Enough Said (2013) as a woman who falls for her new BFF’s ex-husband. A romantic comedy that is purely adult, smart, and hilarious. ‘Nuf said. A-

Horrible Bosses 2 (2014) feels like an unnecessary sequel. The first installment was dirty, wonderfully funny. But Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, and Jason Sudekis had me laughing my ass off, constantly. B+

Clint Eastwood had two films in 2014: New war classic “American Sniper,” and musical-turned-movie Jersey Boys (2014), a flick that pops when the music is on, but flat lines everywhere else. Literally, when a college-age daughter succumbs off screen, one could think it was from boredom rather bad drugs. C+

The Maze Runner (2014) adapts a dystopian book about a teen boy trapped inside a closed-off world, surrounded by only boys. No adults. It feels very “Lord ofthe Flies,” and sure enough the fat nerd buys it. B

The less said about Johnny Depp and his mustache comedy bit in Mortedcai (2015), the better. Look at Gwyneth Paltrow’s face, she’s smiling so damn hard I kept thinking, “It’s CG!” Truly, honestly awful.  D-

Dickens novel turned musical Oliver! (1968) won Best Picture over not-nominated “Producers,” “2001,” and “Rosemary’s Baby.” Criminal? Yes. But the film -– overlong and overdone (the “Who Will Buy?” bit is asinine back lot studio shit) –- isn’t terrible. Jack Wild as Artful Dodger is amazingly gifted. When he’s on screen, my God, the film jumps. The kid playing Oliver? Dubbed. By a twentysomething woman. B-

Drama/comedy This is Where I Leave You (2014) has Jane Fonda as the mom of a rowdy lot. It’s funny, but when adult characters moan while sitting on the roof a huge house, I think, “White People Problems.” B-

I recently sat in awe of the “new” cut of Orson Welles’ Touch of Evil (1958). The drowned opener is back, as are missing scenes that make the plot of murder, drugs, and blackmail along the U.S.-Mexican border finally click. Charlton Heston’s half-Mexican cop is angrier. Welles’ fat, evil cop Hank Quinlan is more perverse, and he’s long been one of cinema’s worst pigs. This 1998 re-edit – made to Welles’ specifications that were studio steamrolled – makes an already dark film shock with new grit. See it. A

Sucker Punch (2011)

I saw two-thirds of “Sucker Punch” in a cinema back upon its release in March. The previews promised a kick-ass film of armed-to-the-teeth women taking down Orcs, massive samurai warriors and Nazi goons straight out of a 1970s Marvel Comics book. It looked like a feminist take on “300,” served up by the guy who brought Frank Miller’s graphic novel to life, Zack Snyder. He promised as much, this being his first original screenplay. The trailer’s pop-art bright images zinged.

Alas, the film itself was and is a dreadful, ugly-looking CGI bore, and a massive lie. It’s not feminist. It relishes in violence against women, and serves up its heroines in “fuck me” costumes of micro-skirts, high heels and fish-net everything, their very skin computer-polished clean and lifeless as their vacant personalities. I was indifferent when a storm knocked out power to the theater, scuttling the end. Yet I caught it on DVD this week. Pfft. I should have re-watched “Killers.”

The story: Emily Browning plays Baby Doll – that’s the actual character’s name for God’s sake – a 1960s orphan railroaded to a nuthouse for refusing step-daddy’s sexual advances. Facing a hellhole life that’s “One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest” by way of Guantanamo Bay heavy on the rape, she imagines herself as a dance-queen prisoner in a musical bordello, but in those dreams when forced to dance she enters a third dream state where she’s an ultimate Xbox warrior, swords, guns and knives at the ready. (All teenage girls imagine this life, right?) She has four friends along the way – parts of her own vapid personality? – and each may well represent a sex fantasy of Snyder’s, or that of his intended audience of lonely nerds. Like Asians? Here’s one. Like butchy girls? Here’s another. Etc. Etc.

The opening is a worthwhile short film, as Baby Doll (I hate writing that name) fights off her step-dad, and valiantly tries to safe her baby sister’s life. The sequence – scored to a new riff of “Sweet Dreams” – ends with our protagonist dropped off at the Lennox House (Get it?) for a lobotomy. That’s where all wit ends. CGI takes over as Snyder whips up giant dragons, exploding zeppelins, “Terminator” robots and pixelated mayhem, each scene more fake than the last, and as flat as his Baby Doll’s empty eyes. It’s all the dreams-within-dreams drama of “Inception” hooked to the razzle-dazzle of “Moulin Rouge!,” minus everything worthwhile, dragged through a “Maxim” editors’ sordid annual retreat, and mangled with a PG-13 rating. Run-on sentence.

This flick was put together by guys who think “smoking hot” is a character trait, and they piss on the wound with a monologue about girls finding the power within each other to fight oppression. Pfft. Snyder could have filmed Barbie dolls on strings and gotten the same result. It’s there in the lead character’s name. Baby Doll. That’s all women are to Snyder, who’s making the next “Superman” film, toys. Pro-feminist? Then “The Jazz Singer” is a Civil Rights film. Scott Glenn, looking as if he died a decade ago, is a yammering fortune cookie, while Carla Gugino plays the bordello dance instructor as if she were Rowan Atkinson in drag. The title fits. It’s what I got. D

Mad Dog and Glory (1993)

In “Mad Dog and Glory,” Robert De Niro plays a detective so meek and insecure his co-workers call him “Mad Dog” out of ironic jaunting. One night investigating a murder, Sad Puppy Wayne stumbles into a store robbery. Almost by accident he saves the life of a low-level gangster named Frank (Bill Murray). Not a little amused, Frank – who moonlights as a standup comic who might send thugs to kill you for not laughing -- thanks Wayne by loaning him a “present,” Gloria (a young Uma Thurman). Here’s where “Dog” shits. I get that this comedy gets its spark from the anti-type-casting, De Niro as a doormat, and Murray as the heavy, but did Thurman have to play a cup of sugar in high heels? Much ink was spilled about reshoots and script changes. Apparently Gloria was interesting at one point. Not here. She’s the fantasy girl of all loser-loners – she’ll fuck you blue just for being smart enough to wipe your shoes after coming home. Cruelly sexist, I hated this film with righteous, liberal, progressive anger. It is Murray who saves it from a lesser grade. C-