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

The Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

“What are you … doing?” That’s what evil alien Ronan (Lee Pace) asks of Han Solo-type hero Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) toward the end of “Guardians of the Galaxy,” a funny, thrilling action film from Marvel Studios that is self-aware and comes packed with the kind of rock-heavy soundtrack not heard since 1980s heydays. “Footloose” is named-checked. “Cherry Bomb” is played. This is as fuck-it gonzo flippant as Marvel’s “Captain America 2” was dead serious against Bush/Obama NSA insanity. Earth-born Quill goes by Star-Lord, a thief who gets mixed up in a universe-stretching battle Skywalker-style after he nabs a device that looks like a baseball, joining other thieves and fighters –- including a walking tree (Vin Diesel) and his raccoon pal (Bradley Cooper) –- along the way. Director/writer James Gunn serves epic gut-busting comedy first, superhero tales second. “Why would you to save the galaxy?,” asks Rocket the Raccoon. “Because I live in the galaxy!,” is the genius reply. Everything about “Guardians” is perfect, right up to the credits stinger that winks at Marvel’s once abysmal track record of movie making. Pratt is fast becoming a major film star, having played lead voice in another 2014 favorite, “The Lego Movie.” A

The Lego Movie (2014)

Nearly a week after seeing “The Lego Movie” with my niece and nephew I’m still on a buzzy high of nostalgia for the hundreds of hours I spent playing with the famed building blocks as a child -- especially during those long Philly snow days –- and the endless clever wit and deft satire that filmmakers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (both of “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs”) bring to this 90-minute blast. 

Face it, this movie could have been a shallow toy ad hawking nonsense, I’m looking at you, “Smurfs.” In a playful trick, though, our story instead spoofs mass-commercialization, all those “The Matrix” knock-offs with the savior complex, “Nineteen Eighty Four,” and the legendary (and outright silly) debate between those who see Legos as high-art engineering tools and young children who just want to mess about and play and not worry about rules or constriction. 

(I will not touch the Fox News controversy over the plot and story. Some folks truly need to not make everything on earth a political target, a bit of scotch in a glass, buy a puppy, smoke some pot, the choices are wide and plenty.) 

Our hero is blank-slate construction worker Emmet (Chris Pratt) who gets swept up in a massive adventure as “The One,” the Neo-like hero who can save Lego humanity from its destruction and the walls that separate metropolises from western towns. 

The twist: Emmet really is just a guy, and a dork at that, perplexing and outright pissing off all the real “heroes” around him, Batman -– in a legendary vocal turn by Will Arnett, a squabbling Superman and Green Lantern (Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill, respectively), and a good lot of heroes from “Harry Potter,” “Lord of the Rings,” and -- most impressive “Star Wars,” all toys that have their own Lego worlds. 

This bit could fall into toy ad here, but it doesn’t: Gandolf and Dumbledore squabble, and Billy Dee Williams (!!) as Lando still is sleazy as ever. (The Millennium Falcon bit alone is worth the price of three admissions.) All these guys could be the hero, but it’s Emmet, following the sage advice of Moses/Morpheus do-gooder prophet Vitruvius (Morgan Freeman) who is finally – finally, we get to see this –- full of shit. 

The beginning is shaky, oddly sudden, and the end -- which smashes open the fourth- and fifth- and sixth-walls may be so daring and “out there,” I’m still wrapping my head around it, but I think I loved it. (I saw it coming, but man curve balls are thrown.) It sure as heck is different than anything I have seen come down the pike.

The visuals are amazing as every frame pops and my 11-year-old nephew reached out countless times to “grab” the screen and the plastic “toys” before him. Visual gags come fast, including entire Lego play sets from my youth, and even the cast knocks their own career, none better than Liam Neeson as a two-faced bad cop with a dangerous Irish accent and a squeaky clean voice on the other side. 

Inside jokes are fast as well: The Lego part numbers get a lot of play, a detail even I had forgotten about. An absolute delight and a real high mark from Warner Bros., especially after the rut of so-so CGI animated fare we have seen from normal kings of the block Pixar and Dreamworks. 

“Lego Movie” is amazing endless fun, and puts children center. It also is one of the rare films that excels at 3-D. See it, guys and gals, now. I plan to again. Without the niece and nephew. Just me and *my* 11-year-old self, the one buried deep inside. Still there. A