Never Sleep Naked In California

Some links before we get ourselves started. Norma reviewed this same film at her blog today. Parsnip had a Square Dog Friday.Eve wrote about cool versus hot. Lorelei had a medium encounter. Lynne featured ducks. And Ivy had a true or false question.

Today I have a movie review.

Let it not be said that the Hollywood sign doesn’t meet bad ends in disaster flicks. San Andreas roared into theatres this weekend, unleashing an epic sized earthquake in California (the sort of quake that’s going to happen sooner or later, of course, and you might want to stay away from there when it does). It’s a big disaster spectacle, with lots of destruction, special effects that work quite well, and actors turning up in the required stock roles that disaster films insist on having. There’ll always be a dirtbag who deserves what he’s going to get, a wise scientist trying to reason with belligerent people, and a hero with family issues. And while it takes liberties with science and has a few plotholes you could toss a collapsing freeway through, it’s a big bang of a summer film.

The hero of the tale is Ray Gaines (Dwayne Johnson), an L.A. fire department helicopter pilot; a much more useful skill set than being an accountant in a disaster film. An early scene establishes him as a capable and calm under pressure pilot during a rescue. His family dynamics give the film its human touch- his marriage to Emma (Carla Gugino) is over, and she’s involved with a developer, Daniel (Ioan Gruffudd). His daughter Blake (Alexandra Daddario) is up in San Francisco and not on the best of terms with him.

Of course, it doesn’t take long before the state is hammered by that long overdue quake. The fault line gets cranky along the length of the state, putting millions into jeopardy, causing massive destruction, and making life difficult for pampered celebrities in Beverly Hills (no big loss). Ray’s called into action (sometimes seeming to be the only emergency responder in sight) and is determined to find his daughter and bring her to safety. What turns the genre around is unexpected- his ex-wife chooses to join in his efforts. From there, the film unfolds on a large stage of destruction, peril, and people caught between living and dying.

The film comes from director Brad Peyton, whose work started with film shorts, and who had worked with Johnson before on the film Journey 2: The Mysterious Island. The story both deals with the larger scope of a massive quake and the personal story of people, as you might expect in disaster films, concentrating on the ordeals of this one family and generating empathy for them. Shot on location in Australia and California, the film brings in special effects in a big way, and yet centers itself in the humanity of that family.

And the special effects are well rendered indeed. Hollywood has seemed to have a thing for destroying itself in movies going back all the way to the Thirties, but the technology has caught up in a way that a magnitude quake of this size looks like it's being carried out on screen. Buildings are destroyed. Cities are leveled. One of the more spectacular sequences involves the Hoover Dam. The decimation of streetscapes appears quite real, more so then when you see the disaster films of the Seventies that dealt with quakes and other disasters. And yet at the same time, the film downplays the destruction- to fully convey the death toll of such a quake would end up in a film that wouldn't be a popcorn summer film, but would result in the audience throwing up and feeling nauseous. The effects do come across used right- it feels and sounds like the characters are in a massive quake (albeit with some scientific inaccuracies) and the dangers that presents both during and after are well rendered, if exaggerated.

The casting is nicely chosen. Ioan Gruffudd has played better men in films like Amazing Grace, King Arthur, and the Fantastic Four films, but here he's playing something else entirely. Daniel might seem superficially charming, successful as a developer, but there's a sleazeball and weasel under the surface, and that shows in the choices he makes and the actions he commits himself to. He's inherently selfish and underhanded, and that comes through Gruffudd's performance.

This is the first time I've seen Alexandra Daddario in anything, but I liked her as Blake. There's tension between the character and her father- given the family dynamics, that's to be expected. And yet when trouble strikes, she's not quite the sort who waits to be rescued. She shows herself to be entirely capable in and of herself. Her take on the character worked for me.

Paul Giamatti gets to be the Smartest Man In The Movie (a role often played these days by Michael Caine). He's the seismologist Lawrence Hayes, who has been part of a team working to understand and perhaps predict the behaviour of quakes. He's something of a narrative voice for the film, the wise sage who knows the sky's falling (unlike Chicken Little, who merely says the sky's falling) and only too late is his word heeded. Giamatti's one of those great character actors who elevates a movie just by being in it. Tied into his part of the story is a sympathetic and helpful journalist, Serena (Archie Panjabi, who's spent a lot of time on a show I've never seen, The Good Wife). This is the first I've seen of her in anything too, but she plays the character as calm under pressure. 

Carla Gugino has been in a great variety of film and television roles down through the years, and what I've seen her in, I've liked her work. During interviews for this film, she noted that she learned the hard way not to sleep naked in earthquake country. Her character Emma starts out in one place when we meet her in terms of relationship dynamics, and she plays to that, particularly in early interaction with her ex, Ray. And yet when the worst happens, she comes into her own and takes initiative, which I liked- another director would have been content to sideline the character and have her simply wish the hero good luck from some safe spot after being rescued. Instead Emma faces the danger, driven by a mother's instincts, and that shifts the dynamics and the way she and Ray relate to each other. They become partners in a shared cause, and in doing so mend the differences between them, and Gugino takes all of these elements into account in how she plays the character.

Dwayne Johnson is well cast as Ray. He's already got the tough guy aspect tied down in his work as an actor, but what I like here is that he conveys the professionalism, efficiency, and calm under pressure mentality you would expect out of a fire fighter and rescue pilot. The character is steadfast in the face of cataclysm, but also quite human too, both trying to do his job and also driven by family issues. I haven't seen everything he's done on film, though I did like him in last year's Hercules (which worked despite having one of the worst directors in the industry at the helm). He's likable on the big screen, and has the right kind of presence that we can relate to him.

San Andreas is not the kind of movie that wins Oscars (though it deserves it for the special effects work), but it's not the sort of movie that pretends to be. It's a thoroughly entertaining popcorn summer film, and while it might take liberties with seismology, it's a good reminder that one day a monster quake will hit the region. And perhaps do us all a favour and take Entertainment Tonight permanently off the air.

Stepping Into The Fields Of Normandy

"Soldiers, sailors, and airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force. You are about to embark on a great crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty loving people everywhere march with you." ~ General Dwight Eisenhower, 1944

Today is the seventieth anniversary of D-Day, the landing of American, British, and Canadian forces on five beaches in Normandy during World War Two, and the turning of the tide on the Western Front. I thought I would review one film that takes D-Day as part of its subject matter. I would also recommend you find The Longest Day, or Ike: Countdown To D-Day for a more recent examination of the lead up to the invasion from the point of view of the commanding general.

"I don't gripe to you, Reiben. I'm a captain. There's a chain of command. Gripes go up, not down. Always up. You gripe to me, I gripe to my superior officer, so on, so on, and so on. I don't gripe to you, I don't gripe in front of you. You should know that as a Ranger." ~ Captain Miller

"You wanna explain the math of this to me? I mean, where's the sense in risking the eight of us to save one guy?" ~ Private Reiben

"Why do I deserve to go? Why not any of these guys? They all fought just as hard as me." ~ Private Ryan

Saving Private Ryan is the 1998 war epic by director Steven Spielberg, following a squad of soldiers in the wake of the D-Day landings, as they set out on a mission into the French countryside. The film won Spielberg a Best Director Oscar, among several other Oscars and awards, and is a harrowing, graphic exploration of war at its most horrendous. While it tells a fictional story, the story carries an authenticity about the life of the soldier in the Second World War, exploring personalities of different men as they drive deeper into occupied territory.

The film starts and ends in Normandy five decades after the landing, with a veteran and his family walking through the military cemetery at Omaha Beach. We are then drawn into the bloody landing at Omaha Beach, following a number of soldiers off a landing craft as they storm the beach and German defenses. They're led by a captain, John Miller (Tom Hanks), and after men fall around them in the barrage against the landing, the squad breaches German defenses, achieving their objective. The first half hour of the film is a violent, brutally realistic view of the invasion from the boots on the ground viewpoint. That very same viewpoint will carry on through the rest of the film.

While Miller and his surviving Rangers catch their breath, the camera shows us a body on the beach. For the only time in the film, the story takes us across the ocean to the halls of power, where the identity of the body is brought to the attention of General Marshall, who learns three brothers have fallen in the line of duty in various theatres of war, and the fourth, a private who parachuted into Normandy, is unaccounted for. He insists that the private be found and brought back home. The mission is given to Miller, who picks the core of his squad to go with him. His right hand sergeant Horvath (Tom Sizemore), rounds up a sardonic private, Reiben (Edward Burns), a sharpshooter, Private Jackson (Barry Pepper), the medic, Wade (Giovanni Ribisi), and two more riflemen, Carpazo (Vin Diesel) and Mellish (Adam Goldberg). They've all faced battle together, and while they might bicker and annoy each other, they know they can count on each other. Miller also brings in a cartographer from the staff, Upham (Jeremy Davies), because he knows he needs someone who can speak French and German. And so the squad sets out from the beachhead in search of a lone private (Matt Damon), who has no idea his brothers are dead.

The story was written by Robert Rodat, who first drew inspiration for it after seeing a Civil War monument about the deaths of eight siblings in that war. Rodat transplants the essence of that into the Second World War, giving the soldiers a mission, one they question the sense of, but one that we can be sympathetic with. A family shattered by the loss of three sons makes for a compelling reason to go after the last son. And while it's a fictional story, it certainly rings true. The Sullivan brothers, for instance, all died during that war when their cruiser sank during the Battle of Guadalcanal. Rodat's script is intensely character based- as much as the story follows a narrative through the ruins of occupied Normandy, it's grounded in these eight men, all of whom are explored in detail and given depth, and in the young man they're out to find, who doesn't believe he has the right to go home.

Spielberg used the work of cinematographer Janusz Kaminski for this film, giving the tone of the film a gritty, devastated look, which perfectly fits Normandy at that time. They shot much of the film in Ireland and England, standing in for Normandy, but the setting looks like you might expect of France in the Second World War- ruined villages, damaged homes, destroyed countryside. The film has a washed out quality in the images, lending it a sense of time and place. Kaminski worked with Spielberg on Schindler's List, and that same tone of harsh realism permeates the entire film; his work would win the Oscar for Best Cinematography, and rightfully so. Colours feel muted, and the finished film has something of a newsreel sensibility to it, completely desaturated. The camerawork also adds to the sense of authenticity to the film- Spielberg chooses to film close and with tight angles, instead of at a distance. During the opening sequence, for example, it feels like the camera is the point of view of a soldier on the beach, including the carnage of war, the noise, and the bloodshed. It's intensely personal, this camerawork that really gives us that boots on the ground perspective. It was a wise decision. 

The sense of authenticity lends itself as well to the work of the crew. The uniforms take us back in time to the era, as do the weapons and vehicles. The same applies to civilian clothing and ordinary items- everything feels like it's drawn out of the past, as if we're walking through the carnage of Normandy in the days following D-Day. Attention to detail is, in a word, rendered with great care, and it really shows. The uniforms, for instance, feel lived in, and the actors look exhausted and drained, a testament, perhaps, to the fact that many of them were subjected to a rigorous boot camp to prepare for the film. The battle sequences have been acclaimed as realistic, and while violent, the purpose is to demonstrate the brutality and desperation of battle. In all that carnage, there never seems to be a gratuitous moment. As well, Spielberg's regular collaborator John Williams delivers one of his finest scores, one that is a stark contrast to much of his work. The music only shows itself in the quieter moments, rather than the epic sweep of battle. It gives the audience a moment to breath, and the music in and of itself gives a noble, stirring quality to the film.

There are a number of cameos scattered in various places. Dennis Farina turns up early on as Miller's superior, giving him the assignment. He doesn't like handing the mission to Miller, but stresses its importances. Paul Giamatti and Ted Danson turn up along the way as soldiers Miller and his squad meet on their way to finding Ryan. Giamatti's sergeant is a hardened sergeant among the paratroopers, playing the role as cynical. Danson, playing a fellow captain, learns of Miller's mission, urging him to find the private and get him home, and we sense he means it. All three actors play these roles with a sense of authority as they go along. Another cameo features an early performance by Nathan Fillion (Castle; if you haven't seen the series, you're missing a lot). He turns out to be the wrong Private Ryan, and serves as a brief red herring- the news that his brothers are dead is wrong, but you can understand his reaction. Harrison Young plays Ryan as an old man. When we first see him at the beginning, we don't know who he is, but he conveys the essence of a man who survived the war, and yet feels the sorrow and pain of knowing so many young men died and he got to live. When we catch up to him again at the end, Young's performance rings true to the performance of Damon, and comes across as one of the more poignant performances in the film.

Jeremy Davies occupies the role of Upham, playing him as an outsider. The character is perfectly happy as a staffer, and gets drawn into hazardous duty without really having a choice. He wasn't part of the invasion in the first place, and so hasn't seen battle. He finds himself trying to figure out how to fit in with the rest of the squad, all of whom have seen battle. He's an intellectual, and at one moment, a moral center for the story. At another moment, late in the film, he has an all too human reaction, freezing up in the midst of battle. It's a complicated character, which must make him compelling to play. Vin Diesel as Carpazo is perhaps the least developed of the core squad. Part of that has to do with his fate, and part of it has to do with the fact that Diesel's not that good an actor. He plays the part though as someone who can stay calm in the heat of battle, and yet wears his heart on his sleeve. Giovanni Ribisi plays the medic Wade, and we get to see more of him. He's ferociously angry at moments during the beach landing as his work gets undermined by hellishly accurate German riflefire. He's a young guy who, like so many other soldiers, misses being home. Adam Goldberg gives the character of Mellish a somewhat cynical air. Mellish talks a lot, is something of a wiseguy, and yet is very much aware of the German attitude towards his people. He taunts prisoners of war with the fact that he's Jewish. For him, the personal nature of the war has an added dimension.

Barry Pepper is one of those actors who, for the most part, tends to be interesting in whatever he's in (there are a couple of exceptions, but he's not to blame for disasters like Battlefield Earth and The Lone Ranger). He plays an exceptional marksman who quotes scripture while killing enemy targets, finds himself calm during battle, and suggests the war might end sooner if he was assigned to go after Hitler personally. It's not arrogance- the character simply knows how good he is with a rifle. Edward Burns is the sarcastic and cynical Reiben, plays him as a wiseguy who tends to talk back. Reiben is suspicious of the notion of wasting time going after one man, to the point of disgust when two of their own die, and yet acts protectively during the climactic battle for a private whose life he has held in disdain. Tom Sizemore embodies the sergeant Horvath just as you'd expect. He's a tough guy, feels like he's been in the army for most of his life, and carries himself like a soldier. He keeps the others in line, makes himself indispensible for Miller, and despite the tough exterior, can see the value of the mission.

Matt Damon hit it big before this movie was released with Good Will Hunting, but there's still a freshness in the performance despite being well known at that point. He plays the role as someone who's torn between his duty and the grief he feels for his brothers. He doesn't believe he deserves the right to go home, despite the fact that the order is coming down all the way from the top. He's quite defiant on the point that he must stay where he is until reinforcements can come up to the ruined town where he's posted. And at the same time, we see the agony of his grief moments later as he silently sits among his fellow paratroopers. And in the calm before the storm, we learn more about him, both in a story he tells that proves to be a darkly hilarious tale and in how Miller says that Ryan reminds him of so many students he taught down through the years. And the added touch, in that conversation, in which Ryan admits he can't visualize his brother's faces, rings true to anyone who's suffered a recent grave loss- the shock of the grief does that.

Hanks gives the central role of Miller the gravity and weight that it deserves. He leads his men forward into battle as a natural leader- despite the trembles he does his best to conceal. He manages the personalities of the men under his command. There is a weariness in the character that Hanks brings across, along with a quiet wisdom and an inner resourcefulness. There are moments of gallows humour in the character, but also the behaviour of a commander who knows he must show concern for his men. He feels the losses of fallen men intensely, though he can't show that to the men. And at a pivotal point when the mission seems to be at a  crisis, he is completely honest with his men, giving them insight into himself, and the audience a glimpse at the man inside. In doing that, he defuses the tension in the scene, and it's one of the most powerful scenes in the film.

Saving Private Ryan has established itself as a classic in the war genre, and a truly great film. It is both an epic and an intensely personal, character driven film that deals with the themes of the brotherhood of war, the meaning of courage, and the brutality of battle. It is harrowing and graphic, but it needs to be. It is a gritty, realistic look at the Second World War from the perspective of men on the ground, and is a masterpiece from the director. 

The Patented Parker Guilt Complex

Some links to see to before we get started. Yesterday was a Snippet Sunday, so Norma had a post at her page, and we had a joint blog for it as well. Late last week, Mark unveiled the cover for a new book, The No-Campfire Girls, and also has the book on Amazon as an ebook and in printed format. Check out those links for details. And have a peek at what Eve had to say about the aftermath of April writing challenges.

Now then, time for a movie review....

"You wanted to be the hero. Now you gotta pay the price." ~ Max Dillon

After a brief interlude set in the past, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 starts off with a bang, featuring our hero Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) chasing down a Russian named Aleksei (Paul Giamatti) involved in a heist. He happens to save the life of an engineer at OsCorp, Max Dillon (Jamie Foxx), while bringing down his quarry. Peter's been at the hero game for awhile, working as a photographer, dealing with a relationship with Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone), and feeling guilty over the death of her father (Denis Leary), what with the police captain showing up in visions warning him to stay away from Gwen.

As is usually the case in these matters, fate steps in as a childhood friend, Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan) returns to Manhattan to visit his dying father Norman (Chris Cooper). With the passing of the old man, Harry takes on the mantle of the company and quickly starts showing us an unpleasant side (it's an Osborn thing). Max, meanwhile, goes from socially awkward to something else entirely in an accident involving electric eels and ends up a powerhouse generating his own electricity. Thus sets the stage for Peter to swing into action, with lives at stake, more than one villain to tangle with, and his very blood being sought after. So, another day in the life of Peter Parker.

Director Marc Webb returns from the first film, bringing along a committee of four writers for the story, which at times feels like it's setting up the stage for the next movie (this happens, of course, when you're dealing with a franchise). Nonetheless, they turn back to the comics for inspiration, and that's a good source. Perhaps even more than Peter's driving motto "with great power comes great responsibility" is the character's sense of guilt. It starts with the death of his uncle, a death he could have prevented, the motivating factor for the rest of his life. The writers play that out in how Peter relates to his aunt May (Sally Field), and in the guilt he feels over the death of Captain Stacy, whose apparition lingers about like the ghost of Hamlet's father. They also take the dynamics of Peter's relationship with Gwen, and the friendship with Harry, from the comics, moving things in different directions. It's a bit convoluted at times- and I say that as a comics fan. The better moments of the film are not those sweeping special effect sequences, but the personal and the human. 

The special effects crews do well with their work. Where physical filming leaves off, they seamlessly weave in CGI as needed, and the combined effect does well, as it did in the first film, of giving us a wall crawler swinging his way through the streets of New York. More importantly, the way the new villains are rendered works. The primary villain in all of this is Electro, looking different from his comic book origins. The way he uses electricity is dynamic, and the special effects team render that well, giving him a look that's spooky. The crew also do much the same for the encore appearance of Aleksei, sporting a techno-armour that might make Iron Man think twice. Where the appearance of the Rhino in the comics just wouldn't work in the movies, rendering the character operating essentially a lumbering tank is a more inspired choice. And we get a Green Goblin out of the mix, with a character design that's more fitting and deranged than the two Goblins of the Sam Raimi trilogy. 

The cast is well suited to their roles. Sally Field returns as Aunt May, still younger than the ancient crone in the comics (letters of outrage can be sent to my idiot ex-brother-in-law). She's in mourning of course, and worries about her nephew, continuing to play the role with understated strength, wisdom, and patience. Cooper, one of my favourite actors, is a surprise in only making a brief appearance as Norman Osborn. Instead of playing the role as flat out crazy as Willem Dafoe did in the first Raimi film, he goes for reserved as a dying man, while hiding many secrets that will come out as time goes along. Colm Feore turns up as well. He's one of those character actors you've seen in countless films and series, and he plays an OsCorp executive here, with the gravity you'd expect from the actor. Marton Csokas, another character actor who appeared in The Lord Of The Rings trilogy, turns up playing a director of a high-security mental hospital. 

The trio of villains bring different strengths to their roles. Paul Giamatti is a terrific character actor whose turn here is brief, but book ends the start and end of the film. When we first meet him as Aleksei, he's a temper tantrum having a bad day when a heist goes wrong, something that we might expect out of the character as we know him from the comics. Giamatti can certainly convey anger and rage, and he does that in spades here, and at the end of the film when we see him in armour as an unexpected Rhino. DeHaan was new to me in this film. He plays Harry Osborn in different ways, which fits the character's history. There's a tormented side to him with a difficult history with his father. He seems most like himself when he meets Peter again and they're just relating to each other as friends. But he takes a different path, and DeHaan must convey his descent into darkness in a way that makes sense. He does so, and I'd like to see more out of him. Foxx is perhaps the biggest surprise among the new players. This is an actor who has hits and misses in his resume, but when he's good, he's very good. Performances in Ray or The Kingdom have established his credentials and his range. He starts out Max as a social misfit- smart enough to be an engineer, but oblivious and awkward in other ways. The accident that transforms him also unhinges him, and Foxx conveys that aspect well. The comics version of Electro has always been a formidable enemy, one that Peter had to use his mind to bring down. Foxx takes the character in some different directions, but brings across just how dangerous Electro can be in his performance.

The two leads are still in fine form as they were in the first film. Emma Stone plays Gwen they way the story writes her- smart, confident, assured. She's a young woman with her future ahead of her, who knows what she wants out of life, and can be resourceful and ingenious at times. And she also brings across the playful, caring side of the character. Her chemistry with Garfield feels real. Andrew Garfield continues to play the character of Peter as something of an outsider with a rebellious streak, a wise cracker who uses the sarcasm as a kind of mask. He tries to find balance in life between the thrills that his powers allow, and the responsibility that those powers have placed upon him. He copes with guilt over the past, struggles to find answers to questions he has about himself and others, 

The film is, of course, a summer popcorn movie of thrills that tend to leave the viewer dizzy at times (don't see this in 3D). There are casual references for the comics reader that hint at yet other future villains and characters, and at times it does feel like the filmmakers are offering up the staging ground for the next big film (they have announced sequels, and a spinoff featuring the villains). Its strongest moments lie in character dynamics and not the roller coaster of the action film, but it still entertains and thrills the audience. 

Though I'm still missing J. Jonah Jameson.