"The A-Team"

Richard's Review: 3 1/2 stars

Near the end of "The A-Team," the big screen adaptation of the inexplicably popular 1980s television show, Col. John ‘Hannibal' Smith (Liam Neeson) intones through clenched teeth, "Overkill is underrated." That could be the mantra for the whole movie and not just its bombastic (emphasis there on the "bomb") climax. Overkill indeed. The explosion budget alone for "The A-Team" could probably fund ten other, less fiery movies.

In an echo of the original series, the movie follows the adventures of the Alpha Team -- A-Team for short -- four highly trained but unorthodox U.S. Army Special Forces soldiers framed for a crime involving the illegal importation of counterfeiting printer plates. Branded war criminals and sentenced to jail time, they hatch an elaborate escape, involving the CIA and branches of the military. Then, as federal fugitives-turned-mercenaries, seek their revenge on the men responsible for their imprisonment. Cue the explosions.

"The A-Team" is a testosterone fest that can't even be neutralized by the presence of the comely Jessica Biel. It is about boys and their toys -- which in this case happen to be rocket launchers, motorcycles and Mohawk haircuts. It's the first real action movie of the summer. Notice I didn't say first great action film of the summer. It's not great, but it is a fun summer popcorn flick jam packed with the kind of pedal to the metal action that makes guys go "Whoa!" every time something blows up in an extravagant mushroom cloud of flame and smoke.

The action sequences are rather spectacular. In one crazy scene the team "flies" a tank through the air. It's obviously a bit of CGI trickery, and as such has less real impact than say the stunts in "The Dark Knight" which were (mostly) done without the aid of computer imagery, but the sheer "wowness" of it all will make you gobble your popcorn a bit faster.

Of course all the action in the world doesn't mean much if the characters aren't interesting. Luckily the cast is, well, if not exactly Oscar caliber, enthusiastic in their renderings of the familiar television characters. As "Hannibal" Smith Liam Neeson is slumming it a bit, but is a solid presence and a believable hard man. Bradley Cooper as "Face," a specialist in that most oxymoronic of military oxymorons -- military intelligence -- brings the same kind of charm to the movie as he displayed in "The Hangover," and "District 9's" Sharlto Copley as "Howling Mad" Murdock seems to be having some off the hook fun. Ironically only UFC superstar Quinton "Rampage" Jackson as Bosco B.A. Baracus (the role Mr. T made famous) struggles to be heard above the clatter of the action, but don't tell him I said that. He's the only real-life bruiser in the bunch.

"The A-Team" is not just a remake of the television show but also an entertaining love letter to the cartoon violence, the wild action, the one-liners and cardboard characters of guy oriented 80s action movies.

"The Karate Kid"

Richard's Review: 3 1/2 stars

To anyone alive in the 1980s the Karate Kid legend is a familiar one. In this reboot, Jaden Smith (son of Will and Jada) stars in the role Ralph Macchio made a Reagan era icon. The story's been freshened by a move to Beijing but the filmmakers wisely kept the underdog coming-of-age tale front and center.

Smith plays Dre, a cocky 12-year-old recession victim. "There's nothing left for us in Detroit," says his mother (Taraji P. Henson) as the pack up and move so she can take a job at a Beijing car factory. There Dre is an outsider, experiencing clashes, both cultural and personal. Falling for a pretty classmate (Wenwen Han) he runs afoul of schoolyard bully Cheng (Zhenwei Wang) who opens up a forty ounce can of Bruce Lee on the newcomer. Alone and bruised Dre befriends maintenance man and kung fu master Mr. Han (Jackie Chan) who becomes the Yoda to Dre's Jedi. Han educates his pupil on the discipline of kung fu -- there's no actual karate in the movie! -- while Dre teaches his master a thing or two about real courage.

Smith is the film's centerpiece. He's clearly still a novice, but has inherited the best bits of his mother and father's collective gene pools (he got his mother's ears! Yay!) and has charisma to burn. He's not going to win an Academy Award for this one, but he capably carries a great deal of the movie on his 12-year-old back.

He's ably assisted by co-star Jackie Chan, who after the recent, and truly awful The Spy Next Door brings warmth and personality to Mr. Han. The elder martial arts star leaves most of the high kicking to his costars but somehow his old trick of tying people up with their own jackets in mid battle never gets old.

"The Karate Kid" is long, and it feels like it -- at 2 plus hours the simple story begins to feel slightly bloated in the minutes leading up to its crowd pleasing climax -- but reboot director Harald Zwart realizes he has a budding superstar in Jaden Smith and a likeable old pro in Jackie Chan and allows the characters and not the action to take center stage. It's the anti-Prince of Persia, a summer movie that relies on wits and personality rather than brawn for entertainment value.

"Shutter Island" on Blu Ray

Richard's Review: 3 1/2 stars

The last time Martin Scorsese went to Boston he had the biggest mainstream hit of his career and won an Oscar as Best Director. "The Departed's" change of scenery seemed to do him good so it shouldn't come as a surprise that his latest film is also set in the New England city, this time however, he isn't telling a tale of gangsters, but a story of the criminally insane -- "the bugsies" they call them -- on an piece of land in Boston harbor called Shutter Island.

Returning for his fourth outing with Scorsese Leonardo DiCaprio headlines the all star cast, playing Teddy Daniels, a US Marshall assigned to investigate the disappearance of a patient on the isolated Shutter Island asylum. Working with Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo), his new partner, he must keep a close grip on his own sanity. Is he insane or is he being driven insane?

I've kept the synopsis deliberately vague because there is so much going on in "Shutter Island," it is such a house of cards that revealing one detail too many could bring the whole thing down and spoil the experience of seeing it through fresh eyes. This will be a no spoiler zone, but that means being light on the details.

"Shutter Island" (adapted from a Dennis Lehane novel) is likely the most enigmatic movie Scorsese has ever made. It's a bold, risk-taking film, ripe with dramatic music, sweeping photography and unapologetically strange storytelling. It's a story of paranoia, a deeply psychological thriller that pays homage to Hitchcock films like "Vertigo" and "North By Northwest." Throw in a dollop of "The Snake Pit" and some Mario Bava you get an idea of the tone of the film.

He uses flashbacks, odd and deliberate lapses in continuity, weird camera tricks -- he runs the film backwards in one scene so it looks like smoke is flowing into, rather than out of DiCaprio's cigarette -- to create an atmosphere of creeping dread, one in which the viewer, and perhaps even the characters don't know what is real and what is not. Where many of his earlier films like "Raging Bull" and "Goodfellas" are about a state of existence, "Shutter Island" is all about a state of mind.

Anchoring the film is a fantastic performance from DiCaprio who by times seems to be channeling Jimmy Stewart. Not the "Philadelphia Story" Stewart but the edgy, post war Stewart of "Rope" and "Vertigo." His performance seems artificial, as though he has spent too much time watching film noirs, but watch for the subtleties, the way he suggests his character's hidden depths with interesting line readings and reactions. It's a brave performance and one that doesn't reveal itself entirely until the film's final moments, but it's one that will hold up to multiple viewings.

The movie, for all its boldness, however, may not. It is perhaps a bit too enigmatic for its own good, its twist ending is unconvincing and a bit of a letdown, (for once I was wishing for a little M. Night Shyamalan influence), but even Scorsese's missteps have more interesting filmmaking than most other films at the multiplex.

"Shutter Island" is a difficult movie that demands more than most audiences are probably willing to give these days. It's an art film disguised as a police drama and will probably leave the crowds who loved "The Departed" scratching their heads.