DVD Review: A Happening of Monumental Proportions (2017)

Now Available 

The consummate scene-stealer, in some ways it's fitting that – having built an impressive career playing flirty best friends or frenemies in romantic comedies, oddballs who give indie dramas moments of levity, or as in the case of TV's Arrested Development become viewer favorites on par with the main cast – Judy Greer's directorial debut would focus on memorable supporting characters.

From paramedics (Katie Holmes and Nat Faxon) who take a doughnut but leave a body to an HR rep (Kumail Nanjiani) who says, "I may not be a registered therapist but I am a registered friend," A Happening of Monumental Proportions is filled with enough eccentric characters and moments of genuinely amusing dialogue that we imagine Greer would’ve gravitated to even as a performer.

Unfortunately none of it makes much sense as actor Gary Lundy's screenwriting debut plays as though he took a series of half-finished short stories and character sketches and – after unsuccessfully trying to weave them together into a cohesive tapestry – just left it as is and moved on, which is when the film just arbitrarily stops.

Missing an overall plotline, save for what seems to be a main arc revolving around school officials’ attempts to hide the dead body of a groundskeeper from not only the students but (more importantly) the parents on Career Day, there's nothing very Monumental about this particular Happening.

With no real lead save for Common's affable widowed father Daniel who gets fired right before his Career Day presentation thanks to a series of increasingly convoluted events which are brought to life by an enviable cast, A Happening is driven by its supporting players. And although it has its moments, Lundy and Greer's attempt at Altmanesque dramedy is a forgettable mess.

More focused on building scenes than worrying about how they fit into the film overall, the film wastes far too much time on cameos such as the phallus obsessed cuckolded spouse of Jennifer Garner's Nadine, which is played with so much gusto that it will make you look at stoic John Wick actor Keanu Reeves in a whole new light.

To Greer's credit, in the tonally staccato feature moments like this aim for and every once in awhile stick their landing as comedic fodder. Yet far too often – as in the case of poor Reeves – they're so over-the-top that you wonder if they were the result of unrestrained improv.

And by throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks, Happening's storytellers miss the forest for the trees, looking past what could have been a much better movie involving the unlikely About a Boy style bond between Anders Holm's suicidal music teacher and a precocious new student that’s hidden in plain sight.

Of course, with so many loose threads, that's just one of many directions that the film (which was actually produced by About a Boy helmers Paul and Chris Weitz) could've gone. Still in the end you wish that – like kids figuring out what they want to be when they grow up on Career Day – the otherwise gifted Greer would've really taken the time to ask herself what she wanted the meandering Happening to be when it made its way from script to screen.

Text ©2018, Film Intuition, LLC; All Rights Reserved. http://www.filmintuition.com Unauthorized Reproduction or Publication Elsewhere is Strictly Prohibited and in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.  FTC Disclosure: Per standard professional practice, I may have received a review copy or screener link of this title in order to voluntarily decide to evaluate it for my readers, which had no impact whatsoever on whether or not it received a favorable or unfavorable critique. Cookies Notice: This site incorporates tools (including advertiser partners and widgets) that use cookies and may collect some personal information in order to display ads tailored to you etc. Please be advised that neither Film Intuition nor its site owner has any access to this data beyond general site statistics (geographical region etc.) as your privacy is our main concern.

Blu-ray Review: 47 Ronin (2013)

Now Available to Own   

  Photo Slideshow   

Infusing what should’ve been a straightforward samurai film based on one of Japan’s most celebrated historical legends with unnecessary supernatural elements (better suited to Universal’s Mummy franchise spin-off The Scorpion King) morphs what could’ve been a surefire epic success for the studio into one of Hollywood’s biggest genre-blended flops since Disney gambled on John Carter.

Using everything in their arsenal to try to make the film work on a level beyond mere 3D spectacle, not even Oscar nominated screenwriter Hossein Amini’s rewrites to the script penned by Cellular turned Fast and Furious scribe Chris Morgan could salvage this sprawling, awkward combination of rousing martial arts epic period picture and fantastical B-movie.

One of the best examples of why filmmaking by committee is a disastrous approach – because 47 Ronin aimed to provide something for everyone it failed to connect with anyone.

Whether it was in ordering reshoots to add more 3D wow or play up the forbidden love between Keanu Reeves’s cruelly mistreated half-British, half-Japanese half-breed and the daughter of the good-natured Japanese lord who took him in as an abandoned orphan, sadly nothing could keep Ronin from falling apart.

All in all, it’s an expensive reminder of just how important it is to have a solid script in place before you hire a single soul, let alone award a greenlight.

Barely held together as it is by its rather ludicrous interpretation of the eponymous legend filtered through a decidedly revisionist version of feudal Japan (as reimagined by the Dungeons and Dragons generation), 47 Ronin comes across as a bizarre hodgepodge of paint-by-genre filmmaking – adding a dash of witchcraft here, romance there and so on for its roughly two hour running time.

Ultimately relying on spectacle over substance from start to finish, while this tale of shapeshifting spell-casting samurai, demons and shogun (oh my!) is bewitching in its visual approach by commercial director turned feature filmmaker Carl Rinsch, it flows together as strangely as ads in any primetime television commercial break.

Although the art direction, costuming and makeup is exquisite, this choppily edited and weirdly constructed wannabe epic in search of an epic storyline merely pays lip service to its subject matter.

As such Ronin can only skate by on mindless eye candy for so long before you realize that in the end, Rinsch might have been better off chucking the film altogether in favor of one seriously badass Super Bowl commercial.

And while Universal was right to hire a commercial director to helm what in the end amounts to a work that’s been packaged and presented like a hot new product, unfortunately there’s nothing in Ronin that’s remotely worth buying… even if you can figure out exactly what it is they were trying to sell.
   

Text ©2014, Film Intuition, LLC; All Rights Reserved. http://www.filmintuition.com Unauthorized Reproduction or Publication Elsewhere is Strictly Prohibited and in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.  FTC Disclosure: Per standard professional practice, I may have received a review copy of this title in order to evaluate it for my readers, which had no impact whatsoever on whether or not it received a favorable or unfavorable critique.

Blu-ray Review: Man of Tai Chi (2013)

Now Available to Own 
   


Photo Slideshow
   

They say a writer’s work is never finished and in theory they may be right. With every new draft or read-through comes another irresistible opportunity to tinker with a phrase, tweak the scene order, remove a character altogether or insert a whole new passage that opens up a world of possibilities. But at the same time, there’s a fine line between something that’s been edited well and over-written as both readers and writers are painfully aware.

With the blending of words on a page and a camera, film scripts -- when performed -- play like notes on a page and a piano. Film, like music can be mellifluous in language, harmonious in editing and dissonant in direction, depending upon how heavily it’s performed by the person playing the keys.

And unfortunately, there’s little rhythm – let alone discernible music in the directorial debut of Keanu Reeves as five long years of tinkering with the composition of Michael G. Cooney’s script has resulted in something that feels as wooden as a grand piano but with none of the power or impact.

 

From the constant changes in tempo that never quite evolve into sequences which hold us in their sway to the scarce yet staccato-like lines of dialogue that strike an all too familiar chord, we’re presented with something we’ve experienced many times before – executed at a much greater level in other "Once Upon a Time in Asia" martial arts opuses of heroes and villains.

While Reeves’ aim is undoubtedly true in a work that derived inspiration from a stuntman friend of the actor’s – Tiger Chen (who plays a fictionalized version of himself) –  the film never manages to invest the audience in the storyline on any level.

Emotionally icy, Man of Tai Chi keeps viewers as removed from the action as the villainous businessman that Keanu Reeves embodies onscreen who often appears seated in front of a television – a spectator in his own right– looking down on the gladiators he’s hired who fight for him and live or die for his amusement alone.

 

Yet far from a comment on voyeurism, the script begins traditionally enough, presenting itself like a standard genre thriller that John Woo would’ve gravitated to in the late ‘80s as a vehicle for Chow Yun-Fat in its tale of a man “on the inside” who gains access to villains and feeds information to his fellow officers.

However, it never follows through on its intriguing introduction to a female police officer whose informant has been placed in harm’s way while trying to find out the true nature of businessman Reeves’ role in the underground fight scene.

 

Relegating its police story to mere subplot, Cooney’s decision to ignore the typical genre paradigm would’ve been much more exciting had he built up a compelling enough storyline to take its place but he has nothing to offer viewers that we haven't seen before. He opts for simplicity instead, letting events unfold slowly but with all the surprise of beer commercial.

While simplicity can be refreshing, in Cooney and Reeves’s hands it does its star a disservice, leaving it up to Chen – or to be more accurate the physicality of his fights choreographed by Matrix and Crouching Tiger craftsman Yuen Woo-ping –  to entertain us for its 105 minute running time.

A throwback to Bruce Lee films of the 1970s, Man of Tai Chi relies on character based action from start to finish. A true underdog in the Rocky tradition that easily endears him to the audience, Chen, who works as a Beijing deliveryman, is as dedicated to his master as he is his own parents, working with the elder on his own fusion of Tai Chi with fight style martial arts.

 

Lured into Reeves’ lair by the vague promise of a job, Chen is placed in a windowless room and pushed to fight (unknowingly for the cameras) in a brutal defensive audition as opposed to a formal interview.

Having easily beaten his opponent and impressed the voyeuristic villain looking for a new gladiator, Chen finds himself caught between two very different worlds as he begins to realize what’s really going on behind the spectacle of televised fights staged by Reeves.

Unfortunately as likable as Tiger Chen is in the film, Reeves leaves us all revved up by Chen’s talent with nowhere for the actor (and character) to go except through its paint-by-numbers plot points until a final confrontation brings our hero face to face and fist to fist with Reeves’ villain.

With everyone and everything else onscreen relegated to window dressing, Man’s flaws become even greater once you strip away the external and focus on the foundation itself, which is fairly easy to do in the film’s forgettable second half where there’s little else to hold our interest after the novelty of the great fight sequences begin to wear off.

Though an obvious must-see for fight fans as even in one of Yuen Woo-ping’s lesser offerings like The Forbidden Kingdom, the action choreographer’s creativity under pressure manages to elevate even the weakest of works, unfortunately there’s little left to recommend Man on any other level.

Perhaps most disturbingly as a fan of Reeves in other films, it’s painful to admit that one of the biggest problems in Reeves’ directorial debut is Reeves himself.

Whether his shockingly bad turn is proof that he benefits from collaboration and does his best work under another’s direction or evidence of the tremendous stress he was under and was unable to switch off all over the other hats he was wearing during production is anyone’s guess.

Likewise, while it’s hard to imagine that he actually intended to turn in such an unbelievably campy performance (because then we'd be facing a much greater problem of taste) -- ultimately in what he essentially fashioned as a two-handed work in its simplicity, it’s his hand that drops the ball passed to him by Chen.

 

Uttering Cooney’s clichéd lines like a comic book character in need of a thought bubble or caption while occupying his space onscreen compulsively clad in “bad guy black,” the only thing missing from Reeves is a mustache to twirl or a white cat to pet to complete the full “I’ll get you next time, Gadget,” Saturday morning cartoon effect.

Given a stunning transfer to high definition Blu-ray with DTS-HD 5.1 surround sound, the Blu-ray which boasts Reeves and Chen feature commentary is light on bonus features, save for one single behind-the-scenes inclusion on “The Making of Man of Tai Chi.

 

Particularly inadequate when compared to the other Ping efforts, Keanu Reeves’s labor of love, which was labored over far too long in the script process is also a labor to view.

Likewise, being released around the same time as vastly superior films which focus on the man who trained Bruce Lee makes Man’s simplistic approach as a film that may have been ideal fodder for Bruce Lee if made forty years earlier even more disappointing by comparison.

Moving from its initial, simple melody into something wooden and off-key, Reeves and Cooney take what could’ve been a classic throwback to Bruce Lee and serve up chaotic Tai Chi cacophony until eventually we see beyond what it is and instead what it should be.

Text ©2013, Film Intuition, LLC; All Rights Reserved. http://www.filmintuition.com Unauthorized Reproduction or Publication Elsewhere is Strictly Prohibited and in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.  FTC Disclosure: Per standard professional practice, I may have received a review copy of this title in order to evaluate it for my readers, which had no impact whatsoever on whether or not it received a favorable or unfavorable critique.

New on DVD & Blu-ray for the Week of 4/5/09

Jen's Pick of the Week:

Doubt

Bookmark this on Delicious

Print Page

2010: The Year We Make Contact (Blu-ray)



Above the Law (Blu-ray)



American History X (Blu-ray)



Bedtime Stories



Britney: For the Record



Cleopatra: Universal Backlot Edition-- 75th Anniversary Edition



Collateral Damage (Blu-ray)



The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008)



Disney Animation Collection 1: Mickey & Beanstalk



Disney Animation Collection 2: Three Little Pigs



Disney Animation Collection 3: Prince and the Pauper



Donkey Punch



Doubt



House



I.O.U.S.A.



No Country for Old Men (Blu-ray Collector's Edition)



Not Easily Broken



One Missed Call: Final



Point of No Return (Blu-ray)



Pre Code Hollywood: The Collection



Scooby Doo & the Samurai Sword



Swamp Devil



The Tale of Despereaux



Tango & Cash (Blu-ray)



TCM Spotlight: Doris Day Collection



The Wedding Singer (Blu-ray)



Yes Man



Yo Gabba Gabba! New Friends

New on DVD & Blu-ray for the Week of 3/29/09

Jen's Pick of the Week:

Tell No One

Bookmark this on Delicious

Print Page

American in Paris (Blu-ray)



Autopsy



Blu-ray Combo: Chronicles of Riddick & Pitch Black



The Broken



The Butterfly Effect: Revelations



Come Hell or High Water



Crows Zero



Danton (Criterion Collection)



Dennis Miller: The HBO Specials



Dragonquest



Dying Breed



From Within



Gigi (Blu-ray)



Ghosts of Mars (Blu-ray)



Go Diego Go! Rainforest Fiesta



The Great Depression



Hannah Montana: Keeping It Real



Ichi the Killer (Blu-ray)



In Plain Sight: Season 1



Jet Li: The One (Blu-ray)



Marley & Me



The Matrix: 10th Anniversary Edition (Blu-ray)



Ogre



The Other End of the Line



Perkins' 14



Pokemon: Giratina & The Sky Warrior



Ricky Gervais: Out of England - The Stand-Up Special



Schoolhouse Rock: Earth



Seven Pounds



Shakespeare's An Age of Kings



Shigurui: Death Frenzy



Slaughter



Slumdog Millionaire



South Pacific (Blu-ray)



Special



Spectacular!



Stomp! Shout! Scream



Tell No One



Timecrimes



'Tis Autumn: The Search for Jackie Paris



Voices



Way of War (Blu-ray)

The Lake House

Director: Alejandro Agresti

Working from a script by the Pultizer Prize winning playwright of Proof, David Auburn, Argentine director Alejandro Agresti was charged with the task of not only helming the remake of the foreign fantastical romance Il Mare but also overseeing the first cinematic reunion of Speed stars Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock. With references and allusions to Hitchcock’s Notorious and Jane Austen’s Persuasion, the film centers around the magical story of two people living in two different years (2006 and 2004) who manage to cross the time barriers by interacting via a mailbox on the lake house property in which they’ve both resided. Sandra Bullock plays Kate, a hardworking doctor in ’06 who, as the film begins, leaves a note to the new tenant of the property with a polite request to forward her mail. Architect Alex (Keanu Reeves) gets her welcome note as he moves in eighteen months earlier and thus begins one of the most creatively yet somehow emotionally icy romances to grace the screen last year. Although admittedly a bit of a disappointment, the film receives ample support from a clever screenplay, a wonderful soundtrack (see two selections below), and excellent international supporting players like Christopher Plummer, Willeke van Ammelrooy (Antonia’s Line) and Shohreh Aghdashloo (The House of Sand and Fog). While viewers definitely stay engaged to the film, we’re always held at a bit of a distance due to the gloomy cinematography and somewhat sleepy performances by its usually excellent two leads with otherwise superb natural chemistry. Expected to be a major smash, The Lake House was the first film simultaneously released on DVD, HD DVD, and Blu-Ray, although a bit of a warning for die-hard romantics—while the wholly earned happy ending will put a smile on your face, a film that begins with a death on Valentine’s Day makes it sort of an unsuccessful offering for “date night.” Note to fans of Speed: paying homage to Reeves’s character in their earlier film together, the onscreen dog in the film was named Jack by Sandra Bullock.

Soundtrack Selections from iTunes

"Time Has Told Me" by Nick Drake

"This Never Happened Before" by Paul McCartney