Dennis McDonald's MOVIE REVIEWS

This 1929 silent film by Metropolis director Fitz Lang is quite amazing. Technical detail (provided by technical expert Hermann Oberth) are surprisingly accurate regarding the actual trip, even though the existence of oxygen on the moon is portrayed.

Especially intriguing is the similarity of both story and physical production details to George Pal’s Destination Moon, a movie released in 1950. In both films industry groups fund the Lunar trip. In Lang’s film, however, we have a woman on board and a woman as part of the funding group; such details were absent from Destination Moon. (I attribute this detail to story-writer Thea von Harbou’s influence who was, I believe, married to Lang at the time).

Another interesting point of comparability between the two films is the use of animated sequences to explain space travel basics. Animation appears several times during Woman; in Destination Moon we have the famous Woody Woodpecker sequence explaining space travel basics.

Keep in mind this is a silent film. In the version I saw, streamed from Netflix through an X-Box Live connection, subtitles were sparse. Still, for historic reasons, I believe that anyone interested in science fiction and space travel should be familiar with this film.

Timur Bekmambetov's DAY WATCH

Dennis D. McDonald — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 00:24:17 +0000

Movie review by Dennis McDonald

How to begin to describe this amazing and entertaining film? I see elements from The Matrix, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, and Resident Evil. And vampires, of course. Throw in tons of unintelligible (for me) Russian cultural references and some of the weirdest (but fun) subtitling ever created and you have a very fun and action-packed ride.

I had no idea what I was getting into. I was checking through the “instant view” selections on Netflix available via X-Box Live and settled on this. Wow! You think Trinity and the office lobby scene was awesome in the first Matrix film? Wait till you see a major auto demolition courtesy of power cables treated like whips in the middle of a raging Moscow snowstorm. Or a vivid red sports car running sideways on the outside of an office building. Or the trio of amazing (!) female lead characters.

I know, that all doesn’t make much sense. No matter. Put your brain on hold and enjoy the ride. Day Watch is funny, weird, exciting and definitely NOT a typical “Hollywood” film.

Sam Raimi's DRAG ME TO HELL

Dennis D. McDonald — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 12:44:27 +0000

A Movie Review by Dennis D. McDonald

Sam Raimi’s DRAG ME TO HELL is fitfully entertaining. There are a few laughs as it wanders down well-worn horror movie paths. But it commits what I consider the unpardonable sin for a horror movie: it’s boring. Its characters are dull and uninteresting, the action sequences are run of the mill, and — this is a big one — the DVD extras are actually more interesting than the film itself. Rent something else.

Mamoru Hosoda's THE GIRL WO LEAPT THROUGH TIME

Dennis D. McDonald — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 05:07:11 +0000

A Movie Review by Dennis D. McDonald

At first I thought, “Uh-oh, this is another one of those interminable animes about Japanese high school kids dealing with adolescent angst.”

Boy, was I wrong. Instead, what we have here is an artful and beautifully crafted tale about friendship and the small and large dilemmas brought about by the ability to travel through time. At first our 17 year old heroine uses her new-found gift to perform silly pranks. Later she discovers more serious entanglements that can generate real emotional and physical trauma.

It’s a beautifully produced and well acted story. Voice talent is excellent and mouth movement is, unlike many other anime I’ve seen, well synchronized with the spoken Japanese. Dubbing is adequate and reflects subtlety when necessary. Street scenes of everyday Japan are very authentic looking with striking details providing a realistic backdrop for very natural character movement.

Most appreciated is the natural looking and sounding friendship among the three main characters. The director treats them with respect. As a result, a very real sense of camaraderie is portrayed without overt sentimentality or sexuality.

This reminded me a bit of the great Japanese TV series Lain but without the fantastic sci-fi and Internet concepts. Both have high artistic content, mature themes, and intelligence. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time adds sensitivity and emotional impact.

A Movie Review by Dennis D. McDonald

Ruben Fleischer's ZOMBIELAND

Dennis D. McDonald — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 11:33:22 +0000

A Movie Review by Dennis D. McDonald

Need to laugh? See this movie. The story: following a zombie plague that has destroyed civilization, two mismatched zombie killers drive cross-country to converge on a mythical zombie-free amusement park. Along the way they team up with a pair of young female scammers and search for The Last Twinkie.

There’s lots of blood and guts and zombie-splattering. It’s all good fun. There are plot twists, ironies, sight gags, first loves, big-time cameo star appearances, and great music. Woody Harrelson is perfect; this may be the best thing he’s ever done.

Movie Reviews Added Since January 1, 2009

Dennis D. McDonald — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 03:55:39 +0000

By Dennis D. McDonald

Here are the movie reviews I’ve added since January 1, 2009, starting with the most recent. Not all are new films and some reviews I’ve copied over from my old “No Frills Reviews” web site. I’ve marked with an asterisk (*) those I’ve seen in a movie theater. Of the movies I saw for the first time in 2009, I’ve marked my “top 5” with a plus (+) sign.

Henry Selick's CORALINE

Dennis D. McDonald — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 01:28:34 +0000

By Dennis D. McDonald

Don’t be misled. This is one scary movie. Heck, towards the end I was scared. I can’t imagine what an impressionable kid might think, espcially one that’s sensitive to the fear of losing a parent.

That said, I highly recommend this film for anyone enchanted by imagination, animation, beautiful design, and ultra-clever quirkiness that doesn’t aim for cheap sentimentality. Plus, the music is good. Check it out.

Marjane Satrapi & Vincent Paronnaud's PERSEPOLIS

Dennis D. McDonald — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 17:55:10 +0000

A movie review by Dennis D. McDonald

This animated tale about a young girl growing up in Iran during and after the Revolution as personal freedoms are inexorably removed is simultaneously touching and difficult to watch.

Drawn mostly in black and white, the film works on an emotional level that emphasizes relationships and freedom in ways that seem unthinkable for those who take such freedoms for granted.

Robert Baca & Josh Rizzo's WELCOME TO MACINTOSH

Dennis D. McDonald — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 04:55:22 +0000

By Dennis D. McDonald

This documentary is by no means a comprehensive history of Apple or even of the Macintosh computer. Instead, it’s a series of interviews — some recorded remotely — with people involved over the years with Apple. Many reviews complain about the absence of Woz and Jobs, but what came through for me was the humanity and experimentation behind the company and the fact that it has not had a 100% string of solid successes.

Most significant for me was that one of the interviewees said that “Apple is not a brand.” He doesn’t exactly say what Apple is, even though he does says it’s not a brand like a soft drink or an athletic shoe. I suppose that’s true. Apple makes computers, music players, telephones, and software, and it sells and distributes music. Because of people like Jobs it’s passionate about quality and innovation. The company is successful now but that hasn’t always been the case.

The documentary doesn’t really get into the later more successful Apple but concentrates more on the earlier computers, and that’s OK, especially if you have a fascination with history. We get a few peeks into the company as it was and I found that entertaining. After all, do we really need another high pressure corporate history? I liked the personal touch here, even though so much about Apple and the later Macintoshes is left out.

Viewed via an X-Box Live/Netflix streaming connection.

Chuck Patton's DEAD SPACE: DOWNFALL

Dennis D. McDonald — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 02:41:55 +0000

A movie review by Dennis D. McDonald

This animated horror/sci-fi adventure is a prequel to the DEAD SPACE video game. An artifact is unearthed on a remote mining colony planet, the artifact is retrieved to orbit by the main ship, then all hell breaks loose when something gets loose in the morgue and starts killing, dismembering, and reanimating corpses.

Zombies, blood and guts, endless corridors, alien infestations, abundant cursing, religious fanatics, and a tough-as-nails female security officer combine to raise this modestly animated adventure above (just barely) a run of the mill factory-generated anime adventure.

It’s oddly entertaining. No sooner did I say to Number One Son, “These guys really need a Light Saber to deal with these bulletproof zombies,” than a character appears with an electronic chain saw he uses to slice and dice the rapidly multiplying bad guys.

There’s a lot of blood, screaming, crunching bones, and dismemberment in this movie. Its’ my understanding that this level of blood and gore is pretty standard nowadays for video games. That’s too bad. But I found this movie at least minimally intriguing. It’s solidly rooted in the Alien/Predator genre with doses of House on Haunted Hill and John Carpenter thrown in for good measure.

I was also reminded at times of the over the top ending of Peter Jackson’s ridiculous blood fest Dead Alive. But there’s no humor in Dead Space: Downfall, which is a missed opportunity.

Are there any funny horror/sci-fi adventures that deal in buckets of blood and zombie re-animation that I could rent next?

Viewed via an X-Box Live/Netflix streaming connection.

Brian DePalma's MISSION TO MARS

Dennis D. McDonald — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 12:34:57 +0000

A movie review by Dennis D. McDonald

I rented MISSION TO MARS expecting a camp classic, a howler, a real dud.

Instead, I loved it. It was one of the first DVDs I’d seen in months that I immediately wanted to watch again. And this, from a movie commonly reviled, a flop, a real stinker.

Yes, the story is a pastiche of every common hard-SF space-flight plot device you can think of from 20th century SF novels and films. The friendly alien. Frantic efforts to repair a decompressing spacecraft damaged by micrometeorites. The doomed astronaut adrift in space with only his space suit to keep him company. DNA seeding of prehistoric earth. Spin-generated artificial gravity. Symbolic jewelry on a chain. A 3-D planetarium. We’ve seen it all before.

But we haven’t. Not with these production values. And not with this ballet-like pacing.

Yes, Kubrick broke the mold when he chose THE BEAUTIFUL BLUE DANUBE to accompany the shuttle/space station rendezvous in 2001. But the steady pacing of scenes in MISSION TO MARS is almost hypnotic. Watch the astronauts exit their doomed spacecraft. Compared to the transfer from the Russian spacecraft to the Discovery in 2010, the scenes in MISSION TO MARS are like poetry. And I dare you not to be moved by Tim Robbins’ actions as he drifts away just out of his wife’s reach as they orbit just above the red planet’s atmosphere.

I even loved the music. Totally unusual for a movie of this type, Somebody was really thinking, hey, this is gorgeous stuff we’re illustrating here, let’s not overwhelm with STAR WARS type paroxysms of marshal music.

Who is responsible for this? Brian DePalma, that’s who. It looks and sounds like he let his people create.

Yes, there a plot holes. But I loved the holographic alien and the DNA-earth-seeding sequence. I even loved the tear in her eye as she recreated the destruction of ancient Mars.

If I had to choose one scene that I will remember forever, it is the planetarium scene with the lift-off of hundreds of tiny ships from ancient Mars. This to me is a triumph of special effects in service of story and emotion, not just special effects servicing a visceral kick in the teeth.

When all is said and done, that’s probably why this movie failed. It’s more of a dreamer’s movie at a time in our culture when the crack of bone and splash of blood are expected.

Listen to the DVD commentary and you sense the incredible pride the technical people have in what they created here. It’s a pity it wasn’t more commercially successful, but at least we have this wonderful DVD.

Pierre Morel's TAKEN

Dennis D. McDonald — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 03:24:08 +0000

Review by Dennis McDonald

This movie is silly, prepostrous, and nonsensical. The plot has more holes than the strainer I use Sunday mornings to defrost frozen blueberries when I bake muffins.

I loved it.

Liam Neeson plays a retired government agent whose teenage daughter is kidnapped in Paris in anticipation of her being sold into slavery to a Middle Eastern sheik by a gang of Albanian thugs. He warns them by phone to free her or he will use his “special skills” to hunt them down and kill them.

Fortunately for viewers the kidnappers don’t free her, Neeson jumps on a plane to Paris, and the hunt — and rising body count — are on. Along the way we have car chases, shoot outs, brothels staffed by heroine addicted young women, explosions, government corruption in high places, and a hero knowledgeable about all weapons as well as emergency medical procedures.

Even though the film was mostly produced and directed in France it seems more American than French. Neeson does quite well as the super-agent; he really does make you suspend your disbelief through a judicious application of sincerity and seriousness. I hope he had fun making the film; he’s on screen for almost the entire time.

One bizarre thing about the film; it was rated PG-13 not R in the U.S. Even though I think the DVD edition I rented from Netflix contained the somewhat more violent version released in Europe, I’m amazed that a film so dedicated to nonstop violence doesn’t get an R rating. I guess there just wasn’t enough sex to upset the MPAA reviewers.

The Polish Brothers' NORTHFORK

Dennis D. McDonald — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 19:45:23 +0000

Another Movie Review by Dennis D. McDonald

This is a beautiful, entrancing, enigmatic, and mesmerizing movie about death. One death is the death of a child and his relationship with a kind minister and a group of angels (which only he can see, naturally). The other death is the death of a tiny Montana town in 1955 about to be engulfed by the backed up waters of a soon-to-be-opened hydro-electric dam.

We follow a team of black-suited government agents as they go from house to house trying to convince the few remaining residents to leave. Their adventures are dirge-like as they seek to meet their evacuee quotas. Meanwhile the young boy is dying. We flit back and forth between him (and his angels) and the adventures of the evacuators and evacuees.

The photography is gorgeous, the pacing is stately, the music is sparse. Landscapes and the occasional houses are stunning; what little color there is is used to great effect. The “wide open spaces” seen here are both beautiful and chilling.

The DVD’s extras are worthwhile. Most enlightening is Nick Nolte talking about how he channeled having witnessed the death of his own mother in the minister role.

Despite the somber, quiet nature of this film, the best word I can think of to describe it is “stunning,” and I mean that in a low-key, mature, and dramatic/thoughtful way. Don’t expect thunderbolts of emotion. Perhaps if you’ve recently experienced the death of a friend or loved one you’ll understand.

Postscript: immediately before I watched Northfork I watched the “extras” that accompany the director’s edition of Star Wars III Revenge of the Sith in which Lucas, McCallum, and Assembled Multitudes describe the hundreds of people and thousands of hours devoted to creating that film. The difference is scale, substance, and concept between “Sith” and Northfork could not be greater. As much as I have enjoyed Revenge of the Sith, though, Northfork is another example of how creativity, concept, and emotional involvement can win out over Big Hollywood any day.

Quentin Tarentino's INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS

Dennis D. McDonald — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 01:28:58 +0000

Another movie review by Dennis D. McDonald

This is some movie. It’s scary, emotionally draining, funny, exciting, tense, thoughtful, violent, whimsical, cruel, and in a few places, just plain weird.

It also has the most striking and emotionally draining opening sequence of any film I’ve seen since Saving Private Ryan. How you can watch the opening farmhouse scene without fidgeting, then squirming, then finally averting your eyes, is beyond me. Rolled up in that one lengthy sequence is one of the most shattering and horrifying depictions of the banality of evil and cruelty I think has ever been committed to film. It makes me want to reach out and slap the people I see on TV who so glibly refer to people they disagree with politically as “Nazis.”

Then there’s Brad Pitt. His character is totally open, forthright, and nuts, all at the same time. It’s an amazing performance. The standout, though, is Christoph Waltz. What could have become a caricature of a character is charming, self effacing, erudite, cultured — and terrifying.

The film is also beautiful. Color, composition, lighting — all contribute to a feel of realistic artifice that never lets you forget this is a Movie while at the same time providing glimpses of the underlying truths it is illustrating.