30 October 2004

I ♥ Huckabees

Largely an excuse to gather up a number of actors (flavors of the moment like Jude Law and Naomi Watts or faded icons like Lily Tomlin and Dustin Hoffman) and have them spout near gibberish (aided by the accented contribution of Isabelle Huppert) to no effect.

107 minutes.

18 October 2004

Team America World Police

The creators of South Park take on current events by postulating an anti-terrorist commando force based inside Mount Rushmore which leaps into action at the slightest provocation. That their varied forms of air transport have different maximum speeds is the least of their troubles, for Team America World Police—and most of the world around them except for a patriotic visit to the Lincoln Memorial and Vietnam Memorial—are all marionettes. Do you suppose that their most menacing foe is the set of turbaned visitors to Paris carrying a blinking, bleeping suitcase? Maybe the muttering gathering of Arabs in a Cairo tavern? Perhaps the dictator of North Korea, pressed for time as he juggles supplying terrorists with weapons of mass destruction and feeding Hans Blix to sharks? Of course not (the destruction of Parisian landmarks is fully justified by stopping those terrorists) the biggest threat to a stable society is the liberal viewpoint espoused by members of the Film Actors Guild as headed up by Alec Baldwin (no actor named in this movie made any contribution to it). Hmm… sounds about right. The conflict between puppets on strings having dramatic and sexual lives manages to last a good while, but the sexual language is pervasive. The songs as a whole don’t seem quite as funny as I remember from the South Park movie. The message reminds me of Battlestar Galactica, actually, which depicted liberals basically advocating a nuclear freeze in the face of an implacable, robotic enemy.

98 minutes.

10 October 2004

Shaun of the Dead

Reasonably droll to begin with as Shaun (Simon Pegg) shuffles through his daily routine as a sales drone at an appliance store in London, buffetted with complaints about his slacker flatmate Ed (Nick Frost) (a small-time dealer in weed who spends most of the day either playing first person shooter videogames or creating a ruckus at the local pub) and complaints from his girl Liz (Kate Ashfield) (who wants something better than joining Shaun and Ed at the pub and still hasn’t met Shaun’s parents). Eventually even Shaun notices that the rest of London is turning into the zed-word: zombies. Blood and mayhem ensue.

100 minutes.

The Forgotten

Brooklyn resident Terry Paretta (Julianne Moore) still pines for her son, Sam, eighteen months after his death in the crash of a small plane. When her evidence for Sam’s existence (albums, videotapes) begins to… change into versions which no longer include Sam, her already fragile grasp on reality begins to slip further. Some high-class talent in front of and behind the camera, and definitely a few jolts, but ultimately a washout.

92 minutes.

09 October 2004

Raise Your Voice

What I said. A script so lame it repeats the scene where our put-upon but artistically-inspired heroine Terry (Hilary Duff) works in a restaurant because a parent demands it. No surprises. At least I haven’t bought her albums, okay?

106 minutes.