"Takers"
Richard's Review: 3 stars
"Takers," a new crime drama starring rapper T.I. and disgraced singer Chris Brown as part of a high-tech band of thieves, aspires to reach the operatic heights of "The Godfather" but instead hurdles past that into the bullet-ridden over-the-top zone inhabited by the high style violence of "Scarface."
"We're takers gents," says Gordon Jennings, played by "The Wire's" Idris Elba. "That's what we do for a living -- we take." By take he means steal, and it is something he and his team -- Jake and Jesse Attica (Michael Ealy and Chris Brown), A.J. (Hayden Christensen) and John Rahway (Paul Walker) -- are very good at.
They arrange wild, but carefully planned robberies, bank the money and live well. When Ghost (rapper T.I.), an old member of the team, gets out of jail they decide to break their golden rule of taking a year off between jobs. Ghost devises a "foolproof" plan to rob an armoured car, a job which will net the bandits $30 to $40 million. Trouble is, they only have five days to plan the heist and a trigger-happy cop (Matt Dillon) is on their trail.
"Takers" looks great; like an expensive music video. Every frame feels carefully thought out, with interesting editing and nice set decoration. But all the visual flash can't disguise the stock characters, formulaic story and weak dialogue.
The bad guys are a breed we've seen before, and that's OK, this is a popcorn b-movie after all, but some are more convincing (thank you Idris Elba) than others (I'm looking at you Chris Brown and Hayden Christensen).
Elba lends some heft to the character of Gordon, but Chris Brown's best moment in the film is a long foot chase scene, where tellingly, he doesn't have any dialogue. Dillon is convincing enough as the troubled cop, but it is a part that, at this point in his career, he could play in his sleep.
Dialogue wise, save for the odd quotable line like "I'll put three holes in your head like a bowling ball," it sounds as though the script was run through the Cliché-A-Matic machine. We've heard and seen it all before -- the patented tough guy talk, the ill fated robbery, the unorthodox but driven cop. Many aspects of this movie will give you a distinct feeling of déjà vu, but director John Luessenhop approaches these truisms with such gusto that the movie can be almost forgiven.
The shoot-outs are wild -- the hotel room gun battle makes Al Pacino's fiery blow out at the end of "Scarface" look restrained -- and the action sequences are breathless, if occasionally a little hard to follow due to frenetic camerawork.
"Takers" is silly, but silly fun. A crowd pleaser that won't stay with you once you leave the theatre, but is a hoot while you're sitting in the dark.
"Flipped"
Richard's Review: 3 stars
In 1986 Rob Reiner made one of the all time great movies about being a kid. "Stand By Me" was an exercise in dark-edged nostalgia. Twenty years later he's revisiting the Eisenhower and Kennedy years but leaves the dark stuff behind.
"Flipped" is coming-of-age "Rashômon" filtered through "Leave it to Beaver" with a dash of "The Wonder Years" thrown in for good measure.
Set in 1960 the story begins when Bryce and his upwardly mobile family move in across the street from the Bakers and their daughter Juli (Madeline Carroll). It's love at first sight for six-year-old Julie, who flips for Bryce's "dazzling eyes." Of course Bryce wants nothing to do with her; she is, after all, a girl. Juli won't give up, however, pursuing -- some might say stalking -- him straight through till grade seven. Bryce does everything he can to dissuade her, until she finally gets the hint, and then, of course he develops a big time crush on her.
Told in a he-said-she-said structure, Juli and Bryce detail the day-to-day developments in their lives from their very different points of view. Much of the film's humor comes from the discrepancies in the way each of them perceive the way their relationship is going. The back-and-forth is a trick that should get old but somehow, because of the writing but more than that, because of the charm of the young cast, it works.
Reiner has cast extremely well, particularly in the case of Madeline Carroll who plays Juli. It's a tough role, one that requires the audience to believe that she is wise and articulate beyond her years. We've all seen precocious kids on screen before, but the thing that separates her performance from other annoying kids' performances is the work she does behind her eyes. You can see her working through the complexities of life, trying to figure out relationships and the way the world works. It's a remarkable and endearing performance that carries much of the movie.
The rest of the cast -- Anthony Edwards, Penelope Ann Miller, John Mahoney, Aidan Quinn and Rebecca De Mornay -- are effective but none feel irreplaceable in the way that Carroll does.
The he-said-she-said format won't be for everyone, but the characters, the gentle humor of the script, the performances and the soft nostalgic glow that Reiner dabs on every frame is very appealing.
"The Last Exorcism"
Richard's Review: 3 stars
One of the most used film chestnuts is the "one last job" cliché. As a plot device we've seen it in everything from "The Sting" to "The Wild Bunch" to "Sexy Beast" to "Inception." It usually involves a character's search for redemption; a release that can only come after doing their usual job/gig/illegal activity one more time.
Usually things don't work out as planned but rarely have the consequences been as Biblical as the climax of the aptly titled new thriller "The Last Exorcism."
Staged like a documentary, "The Last Exorcism" follows the exploits of Cotton Marcus (Patrick Fabian), a fundamentalist preacher and exorcist. I say exploits because Marcus makes a habit of exploiting the beliefs of his followers for money. He is, more or less, a God fearing man, but despite his fire and brimstone sermons, he doesn't buy into the existence of demons. He's like a slick salesman who doesn't really believe in his product.
He does however think the process of exorcism helps people who have faith. He's happy to take their money and business is good. "The Vatican gets the press," he says, "because they have ‘the movie'" but he is called on to do dozens of exorcisms a year.
After reading about a botched exorcism in which a young boy is killed, however, he decides to hang up his cross. He'll do the fabled one last job for the benefit of the documentary cameras but that's it. Of course, the demonic doings on the farm of Louis Sweetzer (Louis Herthum) in rural Louisiana test his faith -- or lack thereof -- more than he anticipated.
"The Last Exorcism" is part "Blair Witch Project" and part "Wicker Man" with a taste of "Rosemary's Baby" thrown in for good measure. Despite some gaping credulity gaps -- like a documentary crew who stays well past the point when any sane person would have run for the hills -- it's filled with enjoyably cheap and nasty b-movie thrills. By and large there are no special effects, just old school frights like eerie shadowy figures walking down hallways. The scares come from the situation, the characters and the layer of tension that director Daniel Stamm allows to build slowly as he nears the fiery climax.
As I said earlier, along the way credulity is stretched paper thin, and hardcore horror fans will likely see some of the twists coming, but Stamm compensates for that in the casting. One of the worst aspects of these "found footage" faux documentaries is the acting. Too often amateurish performances stand out like sore thumbs in these films, but with very few exceptions "The Last Exorcism" pulls it off acting-wise. Particularly strong are Patrick Fabian as the sardonic know-it-all preacher and Ashley Bell as the 16-year-old demon child. Fabian brings some unexpected charm and humor to the role and Bell impresses as she careens from innocent to evil in the blink of an eye.
"The Last Exorcism" isn't the most startling or original horror film to come along recently, but it is suitably creepy and should make you gobble your popcorn just a bit faster during the scary scenes.
