My 2017 In Movies, Part 2

There was a Part 1.  It is here.

I saw some more movies.

King Arthur: Legend Of The Sword: Why is it that people feel the need to re-imagine these old fable-ish legends with an “interesting twist”?  Robin Hood and King Arthur never seem to just get an actual movie that adheres to the basic stories we “know” (Excalibur notwithstanding).  This is not to say they’re bad movies, just… I’m spending so much time thinking about the “clever” ways they’ve made them “original” that I’m too distracted to fully care about what I’m actually seeing.  I dunno.  Weird complaint, I guess.

Anyway, ultimately, despite all that, Legend Of The Sword is pretty good.  Charlie Hunnam is still a marble-mouthed mound of man-meat, but he gets the job done.  There are some pretty good fight sequences… uh… some kind of fight on a pier between Artie’s dad and… OH!  right- Jude Law was in this thing, and he’s solid.  Some kind of Moses-like backstory for Arthur… or am I thinking that because he floats away on a river as a baby?  Whatever.  Anyway, he grows up and joins some freedom fighters, I think?  Oh, I dunno.  Stuff happens.  Really, it’s been months since I watched it and not a hell of a lot stuck in my memory beyond the fact that I (surprisingly) enjoyed it.  So, take this non-review and do with it what you will.

Alien: Covenant:  Prometheus sucked, OK?  Sucked petting zoo phallic baby alien-snake balls.  BUT it tried to do something.  Alien: Covenant doesn’t even do that.  It just re-tells the original Alien on some planet somewhere with some serious self-conscious allusions to Prometheus, but fails to move the story forward… which itself is OK, I guess, because… and I know this is something Ridley Scott simply doesn’t understand… this is a story that no one needs clarification on.  There are weird alien eggs that produce creepy alien spiders that lay gross alien embryos in your throat and after a few hours they burst out and kill everyone in the room.  DONE.  Keeping the “backstory” of the creature a mystery is what made Alien so very, very creepy.  Aliens added to the mythology by throwing in another step to the life cycle with the reveal of the queen, but still didn’t attempt to Darwin the thing with the origin of the species.  Because defining the boogeyman reduces the effect the Boogeyman has on you.  For examples of this, see: The Star Wars prequels, Rob Zombie’s Halloween, Wicked…

OK, that last one was a joke.  Sort of.

This was supposed to be about Alien: Covenant, though.  I guess the only thing left to say about it is that if Michael Fassbender can’t save your shitty movie, your shitty movie ain’t worth saving.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales: Full disclosure- I’m an unabashed lover of the Pirates movies.  This is partly due to personal Disney World nostalgia dating back to my early childhood, and partly because I truly believe they took an admittedly awkward concept (we’ve made rides out of movies, and that worked, so let’s try the opposite!) and created something quite fun and original.  And I have gladly defended the existence of these movies, as well as their quality.

Until now.

I need to be clear on something here- POTC: DMTNT (ugh) is not necessarily a bad movie.  It’s definitely got some things going for it (the two most prominent being Geoffrey Rush and Javier Bardem, two guys who are clearly incapable of phoning it in), but the good is definitely outweighed by the… bland.  It’s hard to pin down specifics, though.  A lot of the fault falls on the two new faces.  The young lovers.  The generic pretties, cast solely because they look good in period garb.  Almost complete wastes of space.  I mean, hell- if Legolas and Knightley could bring some character into those first three movies, these two have no excuse.  Also lacking?  The plot.  I’d get more specific here, but even though it’s been just under two months since I saw it, I literally can’t remember what it’s about.  Because, bland.  Something about that magic compass McGuffin that’s been around since Movie 1, I think.  And some secret cove where Javier Bardem gets ghostified.  Also also lacking?  The action.  Again, I really don’t remember specifics here, but I do very specifically remember thinking while the action sequences were unfolding that they were completely generic.  What happened to the days of three guys swordfighting on and in a giant, rolling water-wheel?  Where are the two swashbucklers trying to keep their footing in the rafters above a blacksmith’s forge?  Hell, even the fourth movie had that awesome escape from King George II’s palace and that crazy, bendy treetop sequence in the Spanish camp.  As Diamond Dave once said- where have all the good times gone?

Sigh.  Whatever.

Also, it should be noted that while I could be mistaken, I think Johnny Depp was in this movie.

Wonder Woman:The First Justice Leaguer: Yeah, this was the shot in the arm the DCverse needed.  Something a little less serious, a little more hopeful, and a lot more fun.  And yes, maybe they’re Marvel-izing themselves a bit (there sure is a lot of Captain America: The First Avenger going on here), but Man Of Steel, BvS, and Suicide Squad, like them or not (yes, yes, no) have (kind of unfairly) tarnished their image enough that something semi-drastic needed to be done.  So… steal from the best, I guess.

And it’s a joy to watch.  Gal Godot is wonderful.  It’s fun to see her take this basic “fish out of water” plot and turn it completely on its head, forcing Chris Pine (charming!) to bear the brunt of this awkward situation that Wonder Woman simply has no time for.  And it’s great to watch WW inspire the people around her with her poise and determination, especially Pine’s secretary, “Etta,” as well as his Howling Comman… uh… his band of fighter… friends (whew!  Close one!).

It ain’t perfect though.  Yes, the the island of Amazonian women stuff at the start of the movie is completely great (I actually lost my breath at Robin Wright diving off her horse and letting fly three arrows at once in slow motion.  That shot alone was worth the price of admission), the scene where WW leads Pine & Co. head-first across the battlefield with that crazy screaming guitar theme playing is pretty damned exciting, and the quiet bits manage to keep the momentum going without impressive action.  Buuuut… the not-Red-Skull underboss villain and his not-Arnim-Zola scientist sidekick are pretty underdeveloped, and the actual big bad, while a great presence as a “hiding in plain sight” secret villain throughout the movie, is ultimately reduced to a big, loud, explosion-y, shockwave-punchy, scenery-destroying, final boss-battle guy.  This doesn’t kill the movie at all, but it reduces it a little.  But hey, it’s a summer superhero action movie, so I guess I shouldn’t expect much more than that.

The Mummy: OK, so I liked The Mummy.  I mean, it’s not a movie I’ll champion, defend, or even watch again, but I was entertained enough.  Really, it’s a bit of a mess, but I kept waiting for it to embarrass itself and that never happened.  It came close, most noticeably with the shoehorned-in Dr. Jekyll thing (in which Russell Crowe briefly steps back into Virtuosity-level bad acting), but Tom Cruise was fine, Sofia Boutella was creepy, the story was acceptable, and the visuals were a lot more dark and gothic than I assumed they would be.  Ultimately, though, once again, they’ve made a remake of The Mummy that can’t decide whether it’s a horror flick or an action movie.  And while I think that worked (against all odds) for the first two Brendan Fraser Mummy joints, here it just shows a studio afraid to make people afraid.  Which is the whole point, right?

I was even looking forward to this whole Dark Universe thing, despite the fact that connected movie universes have, with the exception of Marvel, run their fucking course.  But since it has died on the vine, well… I guess The Mummy will just remain a somewhat likable big-budget studio film oddity.

Cars 3: I liked Cars for, among other things, its get over yourself/stop and smell the roses message.  I liked Cars 2 for, among other things, its irreverent, out-of-left-field superspy/pseudo-environmentalism wacky mashup story.  I know these are unpopular opinions, but fuck it.

I didn’t like Cars 3 because… what was this thing about?  I mean, I think it was about getting older and passing the baton and staying relevant by accepting that teaching the next generation is a viable use of your middle-aged time… but it was a little hard to tell while watching it because that message was buried amid the most bland storytelling and lazy visuals to date in a Pixar movie.  Yeah, The Good Dinosaur was a way worse flick.  But that train wreck of a movie gets some points for trying to do something.  This one… well, please forgive the expression, but this one just spins its wheels for 90 minutes.  A clear straight-to-video upgrade here.

Baby Driver: Now here’s a movie with cars I can get behind.  A fun little crime drama starring two charming young new(ish)comers surrounded by a seasoned cast of supporting roles, wrapped around a supercool, eclectic soundtrack, and directed by Britain’s most exciting filmmaking export.  What’s not to love?

…I mean, besides the conflicting emotions while watching Spacey’s scenes, I guess, buuuut we won’t get into that now…

Anyway, yeah, much like Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, this one’s Americanized Edgar Wright… but it’s not too jarring, and probably only noticeable at all to me because of my complete nerd-level love of his Cornetto Trilogy.

So… great movie.  See it.

Spider-Man: Homecoming: The two Amazing Spider-Man movies from a few years ago were like fast food.  They gave you a quick fix of something familiar, but ultimately they’re nothing but empty calories.  And the memories you have of them are like rotting bits of Kentucky McKing Tacoburger Supreme Happy Meals™ stuck between your teeth.  With a side of fries.

Spider-Man: Homecoming is the toothpick.

Or, wait- maybe it’s the dental floss.  NO- the mental floss!

Sorry.  Really, this was all an excuse to string the words “Kentucky McKing Tacoburger Supreme Happy Meals™” together.  With a side of fries.  Let’s move on.

Spider-Man: Homecoming is what you get when a responsible party takes the reigns and doesn’t try to outdo everyone else with flashy nonsense and mopey teen angst.  It’s still about a teenager going through teenage things, but guess what- some teenagers are actually happy.  I know, RIGHT?  Is Peter Parker confused?  Yes.  Is he awkwardly stumbling through this new, accidental double-life?  Sure.  Is he frustrated by his newfound Iron Father Figure’s advice about staying grounded being in direct conflict with his own yearning for bigger things?  Ayuh.  But still relatively happy.  And this is, of course, in direct juxtaposition with the film’s big bad bird, edged into a life of crime by bureaucracy, red tape, and a seriously short temper, reaching too far, too fast, oblivious to the collateral damage he’s causing in his wake.  And in the middle of all this- Tony Stark, in full-on “I just got my ass kicked by my friend in another movie and have some personal stuff to work through” mode, mentoring Spidey on doing the right thing, lest he become a super-powered asshole.

So yeah, there are layers to this movie, but it’s never a ruminative slog.  It’s a film that pulls of the impossible- it movie-fies a comic book character anew, for the third time in fifteen years, and never feels like a retread or a cash-in.

And it’s just so much FUN.

There will be more…