Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)

MAY 30, 2019

GENRE: MONSTER
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (4DX SCREENING)

My heart sank a bit when the ticket taker handed me a pair of 3D glasses for Godzilla: King of the Monsters, as I remember the 3D being such a drag on the first film and have gotten even less interested in the format in the five years since. This was a 4DX screening, which has motion seats and wind/water/lighting* effects to immerse you in the film, but my lone previous experience for it was IT, which was not 3D, so I just kind of had it in my head that all the shaking around would make the extra dimension a bit of overkill and thus they didn't bother with it. Thankfully, the conversion was far more successful this time - I wouldn't call it *necessary*, but I never once found myself distracted or annoyed by it, which is an achievement all on its own.

And that applies to the film as a whole: an improvement on the original. I actually liked the 2014 one quite a bit, despite its nothing of a lead character, but I know a lot of folks weren't into the serious approach and reduced monster action, so I worried this one would just be wall-to-wall destruction porn to appease the people who buy large sodas for 9 am screenings. But it's actually a nice balance of the two approaches - it does indeed have more monster action, but not so much that you become numb to it after awhile, and it still offers enough time with the human characters to give you something to connect to. And they've fixed that too - Aaron Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen are MIA and unmentioned, and in their place we have Kyle Chandler and Vera Farmiga, two of the best actors in their age group. Chandler's character is a bit like Johnson's in that he just seems to be good at whatever the scene requires, but somehow it goes down easier when it's someone with more screen charisma.

As for Farmiga, her character has created a device that can mimic the "voice" of the various creatures and keep them calm when necessary, and naturally some nefarious types want the device for their dastardly deeds. She's also Chandler's ex-wife; their marriage fell apart after they lost their young son during the first film's Godzilla attack (shades of Batman vs Superman, throwing Bruce Wayne into Man of Steel's climax to tie the new characters into the first film's events), and their surviving daughter is living with mom but trying to retain her relationship with her dad. Thankfully, it's not a Twister kinda thing where they are forced to reunite because of whatever spectacle is occurring and fall back in love during the process - in fact I think they only have two scenes together throughout the movie, and they're not particularly warm. It's more about how they (and the daughter, played by Millie Brown from Stranger Things) have each dealt with the tragedy - Chandler shuts down and hates the monsters, Farmiga wants to understand them, and the daughter just wants her family back.

The other major new character is an eco-terrorist played by Charles Dance, who I spent some time marveling that it's been 26 years since Last Action Hero and this esteemed actor is still showing up and seemingly having a blast playing villains in summer blockbusters. He believes the monsters should be allowed to run rampant and restore some balance to the world (but not wipe us out entirely; kind of Thanos-y in that regard), so it's a good kind of villain where you can almost see his point if you happened to read the news before you entered the theater. The rest of the humans are fine; a few return from the first film (including Ken Watanabe, yay!) and the others are basically filling out stock characters; the nerdy assistant (Thomas Middleditch), the soldier who seems to be present for every major battle (O'Shea Jackson Jr), the guy who spends the whole movie looking at monitors, giving ETAs and the like, and saying funny things (Bradley Whitford), etc. I couldn't tell you any of their names and in a couple months I won't remember which of them survived, but as they were mostly played by actors I like seeing, and never doing anything particularly stupid, I had no beef with any of them. Again, if it was wall to wall action I'd get bored, so spending a few minutes with these folks in between the fights was hardly an issue for me.

But yes, the fights! As the title suggests there are more monsters this time: Mothra, Rodan, and Ghidora all show up along with G himself, who gets more screentime as well. With most of the humans kind of on his side (or at least, not actively trying to kill him) he spends most of his scenes fighting the bad ones (Rodan and Ghidora) instead of knocking down jet fighters or whatever, and like the first film he only starts crumbling buildings in the finale - but not because the director cut away from it. Gareth Edwards has been replaced by Michael Dougherty (who also co-wrote) and the new director had the good idea to set the first few battles in isolated areas (Antarctica and a couple miles off the coast of Mexico) so that we could get our giant monster action fill without watching buildings get knocked over ad nauseum. So when all four monsters collide for the big action finale, it's also the first time they're doing so in a city (Boston, in fact!), treating us to the destruction we've been waiting for without getting blue balls by cutting away from it just before it happened.

Back to Dougherty, if you are coming into this movie as fan of his as opposed to a Godzilla one, fear not - his mark is intact! For obvious reasons it's more mainstream than Krampus or Trick r Treat, but he works in some dark humor (there's an ejector seat gag that had me laughing for a solid minute) and - yes! - a nod to John Carpenter, as the Antarctic post where one of the monsters was found is known simply as "Outpost 32", making it a neighbor to MacReady and the rest of the guys (he also retains his signature credit font, itself a modified version of Carpenter's usual one). Similar to Krampus, some folks might get restless waiting for the spectacle to start, but as with that film he makes it worth the wait, though to be fair I am *from* Boston so making it the center of all the climactic action may have given me a bit of a bias. Seeing Godzilla fire his iconic atomic breath past the equally iconic CITGO sign made me wish I flew back to watch it at the theater I used to frequent just a ways up from Fenway Park - the crowds there must have gone apeshit.

This is a good a place as any to mention the 4DX presentation, which was terrific and probably added to my overall enjoyment of the movie. For those unfamiliar, the seat shakes and tumbles along with the on-screen action, and environmental effects are also tossed in for good measure. So when Godzilla punches a monster in the water, your seat jolts with the impact as a little mist of water sprays your face and air blasts fly past your ears. It's a gimmick, yes, but an effective one, and I found myself laughing at this or that seat motion more than once. The only downside to it is if you're a snack eater/drinker - if you're caught off guard, you will spill your stuff, so keep both hands on your drink when sipping and a firm grasp on your bag of popcorn to prevent any disasters (I'd also avoid coffee if that's your go-to). There's one moment in particular where a monster makes an appearance out of nowhere, and the 4DX folks take full advantage of the opportunity, with the seat suddenly lurching after a period of stillness - never assume you'll be safe from spillage for a few minutes!

In fact I only have two real complaints about the narrative. One is that, as with the first film, it seems some character moments have been dropped for pacing or whatever. Jackson and Whitford's characters in particular seem to have had their introduction excised, because all of a sudden they're just there, when both are played by actors you'd expect to be given a more fitting debut in the narrative (Charles Dance definitely gets a good one, for the record). Chandler's character also seems particularly attached to Jackson's, another thing that doesn't seem to be properly established before it just IS, where they're risking their own lives to save the other when it seems like they barely knew the other one's name.

The other is that it spends a few too many moments reminding us that this is part of an ongoing "Monsterverse" that includes Skull Island; while Kong doesn't show up properly they do mention him/his home like a dozen times, and at one point stops cold to introduce us to Joe Morton as the grown-up version of Corey Hawkins' character from that film, a scene that is in no way necessary. More obnoxiously, the same scene introduces Ziyi Zhang as the twin sister of her other character (who is part of the main story, playing Watanabe's partner), a "Huh?" type development I assume will pay off in next year's Kong vs Godzilla. Skull Island was at least nice enough to confine the world building stuff to the post-credits, so I wish this one had followed suit or at least reigned it in a bit - it got grating after a while.

Some of my colleagues and friends go all in for the Pacific Rim movies (well, the first one at least) while finding these to be snooze, but I dunno - the Godzillas are just more interesting to me, despite their occasional hiccups. Even though the Pacific Rim films have a better reason to keep cutting to humans (since they control the giant robots that fight the monsters) I have never cared about any of those people or their scenes, something that's not the case here. Would I like it even more if they cut 10-15 minutes of dialogue out and replaced it with another big monster fight in the woods or desert (two unused locales that would also keep collateral damage to a minimum)? Perhaps - but I never found myself waiting for them to show up, either. The original Godzilla films always had plenty of human-only scenes too, so I'm unsure where this criticism comes from. Trust me - two straight hours of monster fighting would get dull after a while, and it's much better to make those scenes count when they appear.

What say you?

*They also do olfactory effects, but as I have no sense of smell I can't vouch for them. Feel free to let me know in the comments what Godzilla smells like.

Tweet

Read More

• Share

Tarantula! (1955)

APRIL 26, 2019

GENRE: MONSTER
SOURCE: BLU-RAY (OWN COLLECTION)

I frequently daydream about being born in the late '30s or early '40s, so that I'd be the right age to go see the 1950s monster movies (not to mention the revivals of the earlier Universal stuff!) when they were new... and not yet outdone by the stuff I DID grow up with, i.e. the '80s monster movies, some of which were superior versions of those films (i.e. The Thing, The Blob, etc). Because while still enjoyable to a degree, it's hard to really get excited about something like Tarantula! when I'm seeing it for the first time in 2019, 60+ years after it was made. Without the nostalgic factor to give it a boost, I can just take it for what it is: a rather slow paced giant spider movie with not enough destruction to make up for its long buildup.

Ironically, I never expect these older films to be fast paced, but the movie gave me a reason to be optimistic as it kicked off with a deformed man, clearly the result of something gone awry (i.e. the same experiment that would produce our giant spider), staggering around and dropping dead in the first few minutes. "Great!", I thought, figuring that meant our titular "hero" would be along shortly since we were joining a story in progress. But alas that wasn't really the case; another deformed scientist frees the (big but not GIANT) spider about 15 minutes later, and then it takes another 30-35 minutes for it to actually start attacking anything. And it's not even a full-on mayhem fest from that point even though there's less than 30 minutes left - there's quite a bit of yakety yak in between the spider scenes all the way until the bitter end, and we see more people running from the thing on the Blu-ray cover than actually see it in the movie.

Luckily the spider scenes are still fun, and it seems they went for a quality over quantity approach. Sure, the rear projection stuff doesn't always look amazing (especially on Blu-ray) and there's a funny mistake in the mattework that results in the spider's legs disappearing in one shot, but it holds up better than a lot of other FX shots of the era (and even some beyond it). It doesn't hurt that they used an actual spider instead of a scale puppet or something, so even though we are denied much up close and personal interaction with the characters there's still some genuine spectacle to enjoy, especially in the wider shots when the spider is menacing a hillside or something. Since I, like any sane human, have a natural tendency to want to stomp on or run away from a spider when it's in the vicinity, having a real one, as opposed to a fake looking puppet, really helps it play as intended even if the compositing isn't always great.

And director/co-writer Jack Arnold gets some mileage out of the slow transformation of poor Leo G. Carroll (not over a barrel, as I discovered), who is injected with the same serum that made the giant tarantula. But he doesn't become a giant Leo G. - he just turns into the same mutant thing that the guy at the beginning did, and his final form (courtesy of Bud Westmore, aka the guy who stole Millicent Patrick's credit for Creature From The Black Lagoon) is legit kind of unsettling, with a drooped eye and other facial disfigurements (the first victim's symptoms are chalked up to Acromegaly). Since we never saw the other guy normally, it's hard to tell the progression, but Leo starts the movie looking like, well, the guy from the Hitchcock movies and what not, and ends up looking like the Phantom of the Opera mixed with the Elephant Man.

As for the heroes, eh. John Agar is his usual amiable but forgettable self, and while I liked Mara Corday as "Steve" (Stephanie), she doesn't get all that much to do. Her and Agar don't fall in love, so there's something, but you could also remove them from the movie with almost minimal effect. In fact you could do it with *zero* effect when it comes to the climax - they just stand and watch as jet fighters (one piloted by an uncredited Clint Eastwood!) take on the monster. They're not even that close to the battle, so the risk of getting caught in the crossfire is nil - they might as well have just gone home early. My favorite character was probably the sheriff, because he was played by Creature's Nestor Paiva, a guy I always love to watch. He'd reteam with Agar on Revenge of the Creature (his Lucas was the only one who came back from the original) and Mole People, and it's easy to see why Universal kept pairing them up: the two have good chemistry here, starting off kind of antagonistic toward each other but becoming bros by the end.

Besides the trailer the only bonus feature on the Blu-ray is a commentary hosted by Tom Weaver, who also notes that the film pales compared to the likes of Them! and others of the era, though still has its charms. It's an odd track; he is by himself but frequently introduces separately recorded folks to offer their own insight, including someone who explains the history of the film's (mostly recycled) score for ten straight minutes before Weaver returns. It's a good way to get around the dryness that usually accompanies solo tracks, and it has a good mix of "guest stars" (Joe Dante even pops up at one point), and Weaver himself offers up some good info, such as a rundown of Arnold's various lies about the script (which he ultimately took sole credit for in later years, despite the two other credited writer's proven contributions) and how the scientists ended up looking like morons after a scene explaining their motives was deleted.

Without a 3D gimmick or franchise appeal, I'm not sure how this one can really find its place for modern fans. It's very much a product of its time, for better or worse, but there are better options for those who haven't ever seen one of the giant monster flicks of the era. Obviously if you're already a fan then it's an easy recommend - the transfer is terrific and the commentary track has plenty of good information for those who are curious about such things - but if my kid asked to see an ideal entry from this decade, I'd go with Them! or even The Deadly Mantis if I wanted him to have more fun with the experience and not walk away with the dreaded "it's old so it's boring" takeaway. Plus, in my house, Kingdom of the Spiders is the spider horror movie of choice, so it can't win there either. It's fine, just not one of the best of its time and made somewhat irrelevant over the six decades since.

What say you?

Tweet

Read More

• Share

The Meg (2018)

AUGUST 4, 2018

GENRE: MONSTER, PREDATOR
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (PREVIEW SCREENING)

For almost as long as we've had movie websites devoted to rumors and info about upcoming films, The Meg has been in development. It has been kicking around since 1997 at various studios starting with Disney, gone through any number of directors (including Jan de Bont and Eli Roth), and pretty much seemed like a movie that would never actually get made, like The Crow remake. But score one for persistence, as it's finally been made with director Jon "Where the hell is National Treasure 3" Turteltaub and a cast led by Jason Statham, in his first top-billed role for this type of big budget summer blockbuster (the costs are reportedly around $200m, and to think, Sony once refused to let him star in the $40m Ghosts of Mars because he wasn't a big enough draw). But only because the shark is unbilled.

The shark, of course, is the REAL draw here, and it's certainly an impressive sight. Due to the PG-13 rating we aren't always treated to the full view of its carnage, but the VFX wizards have put their full resources (and budget) into making sure it looks good when it makes its big appearances, so that you fully believe Statham could, at any moment, kick it in the face. And unlike the giant shark in Jurassic World and its sequel, it doesn't just pop up for two scenes (that get spoiled in the trailer anyway), there are a number of face-offs between it and Statham's crew throughout the movie, building to the big beach scene where it has a smorgasbord awaiting it. Again, it's PG-13, so don't get TOO excited (Piranha 3D it ain't), but it caused enough damage and racked up enough of a body count to satisfy me.

But to be fair, adventurous fun is the goal here, not blood and guts, and last I checked Jaws didn't have much of that sort of thing either. And unlike most shark movies, the heroes feel somewhat responsible for the thing's wrath of terror, as it was trapped under a layer of (science mumbo-jumbo) in the Mariana Trench, perfectly happy with the other fish that were down there, but then the scientists come along and put a hole in that layer to go explore. The Meg (short for Megalodon) attacks them and breaks through the hole, so it's on them to stop it before it reaches the mainland. Along with Statham (a rescue diver with the obligatory tragic past) there's the researchers who run the underwater station, the rich moron that paid for it all, a computer hacker (because of course there is), a security kinda guy... it's very Crichton-y with regards to its crew, and like the best Crichton novels it's not readily apparent who will live and who will die.

Except, of course, Statham, who has one too many close encounters with the shark that really should have been trusted to another character. The end of the film, when he goes on a potential suicide mission, has the necessary suspense, because maybe they WILL kill off their action icon hero (worth noting that this was in development at Disney around the same time as Armageddon). But early on, when they're just trying to put a tracker on it and things like that, there are two sequences in a row where Statham's pretty much the only one in immediate danger, and it doesn't quite work. Cliff Curtis is introduced as Statham's "old buddy" type and is seemingly the muscle for whatever problems usually arose before they unleashed a prehistoric shark, but for some reason I don't think he ever once goes in the water, which is a waste - he's exactly the kind of actor who could have this kind of glorified cameo role and die first, but also stick around until the climax and maybe get offed there.

But again: FUN! You don't WANT any of these folks to die, because they're all pretty charming and they have a good camaraderie. I wouldn't say I got sad when anyone died, but I never rooted for their demise either. Even the requisite asshole guy, a doctor who thought Statham was crazy when he claimed he saw the giant shark in the first place, has his merits and ultimately makes peace with Statham (it's more satisfying and believable than Dom Toretto forgiving him, at least). And the actors all seem to be fully aware what kind of movie they're in; they're not winking at the camera exactly, but there's a slight twinkle in their eye as they give their occasionally ridiculous dialogue the gravitas it needs - they're all more Sam Neill than Jeff Goldblum, in other words. And Statham gets to use his underutilized comedic chops on occasion, which seems to please him, and he also gets to make cute with the mandatory little kid, reminding me yet again that he's pretty much the only one of these "Expendable" action guys who hasn't made a kiddie flick ye (but keeps dipping his toes in with things like this and the baby sequence in F8).

The 3D is also quite fun, and worth the extra 3 bucks or whatever it is now. The conversion tech has come a long way in the past 8-9 years, so it's largely free of those weird errors that take away from the fun (like when someone's arm seems to grow 10 feet long because the conversion software screwed up), and there are just enough "in your face" gags to make audiences feel they got their money's worth without the movie becoming a chore in 2D (like chunks of Friday the 13th Part 3, which screened in 3D the night before at the same theater - they're doing a festival). Hell I even ducked at one "comin at ya!" moment, and I can't even remember the last time that happened (though to be fair I rarely bother with 3D anymore), and at times I regretted not waiting until this weekend to see the film in "4D", which adds water spray and motion seats to the deal. I know it's August and your summer blockbuster budget is probably depleted, but I assure you this is a movie designed to be engaged with in as silly a manner as possible.

The screening was paired with Jaws 3D, which was just as horribly dull as I thought it was in 2D (I ended up walking out; the old school 3D gives me a bit of a cross-eye and while it was worth it for Jason's hockey mask debut, it most certainly was not to watch a bunch of people walk around at Sea World), and Deep Blue Sea, which didn't need any kind of gimmick to be awesome. I still consider that the alpha and omega of shark movies that are not Jaws, but The Meg stacks up admirably with it, and as long as you can get past the PG-13 aspect (Deep Blue Sea was gloriously R-rated at times) I think if you're a fan of that one you'll have a good time with this. I don't know how well it'll hold up at home by yourself (and most likely in 2D), but with a packed crowd of people laughing and cheering at the right moments (nearly everything Winston Chao says had our audience howling) it's pretty much the last summer movie that will offer up those kind of popcorn thrills. Maybe it wasn't worth twenty years of development, but hey, at least they finally figured it out and made it work. Take THAT, Dark Tower movie!

What say you?

Tweet

Read More

• Share

Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation (2018)

JULY 14, 2018

GENRE: ANIMATED, MONSTER
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (REGULAR SCREENING)

My son Will turned 4 in May, and a few weeks later we dubbed him old enough to try taking him to a movie (Incredibles 2, for the record). He was mostly perfect - he forgot to use his whisper voice once or twice and got a little restless in the middle when it hit a long stretch without any action, but otherwise I was very impressed with how well he behaved, considering he rarely sits through an entire movie at home. So I felt comfortable taking him to see Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation, since it was about 30 minutes shorter and not as likely to be bogged down with plot (plus, even if it did, it'd be monsters talking instead of boring humans). And as an added bonus, I could finally see one of them without feeling like a creepy weirdo, watching a kids' movie by myself because it qualified enough as "horror" for me to write it up.

Which I guess makes this his first horror movie? He hasn't seen the others, far as I know, but he seemed to enjoy it. He liked Blobby, and was bizarrely fascinated about the Invisible Man - every time he appeared (via floating glasses) Will felt compelled to announce "He's invisible!" to everyone in earshot, prompting another reminder that he had to whisper (luckily some other kids around us were chatty too so it's not like he was the only disruption, but still. MY SON WILL RESPECT THE THEATER!). He told me later that he was scared at one point, but I'm not sure where because he didn't say so at the time, but it was a few days ago and he hasn't reported any nightmares, so woo! If you're worried about your own kids, I would say it's the least "scary" of the trio, thanks in part to the new setting - a sunny cruise ship as opposed to the dark hotel. There's a big squid monster near the end, and an opening chase on a train that's a bit relatively intense, but otherwise it's mostly just Dracula and his pals having fun on the ship and also Drac falling in love with the cruise director. If they can handle the others, they should be more than OK for this one (and if they haven't seen them this would be the easiest to recommend for their first attempt; in fact, it's the first one to not have "scary images" in its MPAA rating).

OK now that the parents guide is done with, what did I think? It was pretty fun; I liked the second one better though, as this took a step back with regards to giving the other monsters anything to do, which was my main issue with the first film. So once again the other guys - Frank, the Wolfman, Invisible Man, etc - are just kind of there for the most part, having very little to do with the main plot and also not getting any significant little subplots of their own. The only exception is Wayne (Steve Buscemi) and his wife, who have like a hundred little werewolf babies and discover the cruise has a daycare (it prompts the best joke for adults in the movie; when the daycare director says they get the kids back at the end of the day, Wayne mutters that it's "better than nothing"). I thought this would prompt a "life lesson" kinda thing about them going off on dates and such only to realize they missed the kids, but no - instead, the villain knocks them out a little while later and they're forgotten for the rest of the film. No one even notices they're gone, and they just kind of reappear at the end unceremoniously. It's like the writers forgot to follow up and didn't bother to fix it.

Speaking of the writers, it's kind of amusing that (in my opinion) the best of the three films - the 2nd one - is the only one that has a writing credit from Adam Sandler. That one DID give the other guys something to do, and had the most laughs, so for all the shit he takes from his critics it's interesting that these films could seemingly benefit from his writing talents. The plot this time around is pretty fun in theory - Van Helsing's granddaughter Ericka wants to live up to her family legacy and kill Dracula (and all the other monsters) but finds herself falling for him. Van Helsing is also around, but he's basically a monster too; a head on a robot thing (his body mangled from so many encounters with Dracula). But there's only so much they can do with just that, and the other subplots either die out like the aforementioned Wayne one, or just aren't all that interesting or funny, such as the ongoing gags concerning Drac's grandson bringing his giant "puppy" on board and passing him off as a monster named Bob.

So it just kind of gets by on the strength of its occasional setpieces, such as when Drac and Ericka have a sort of tango around various booby traps (most of which hit him anyway; he's immortal so it doesn't matter), or when the gang plays volleyball with a ball that can apparently feel pain and fear, screaming the entire time. I also quite liked the flight to the cruise, which was run by Gremlins, in a plane that was falling apart as it flew - can we get a spinoff movie about these things? Director Genndy Tartakovsky doesn't throw in as many sight gags as I seem to remember from the others, though it's still a trip to just let your eyes wander around the frame during the big crowd scenes and enjoy all the various monster designs, and the animation itself continues to improve. I caught some of the first movie on FX or one of those the other day, and it's kind of striking how much the designs have changed over the three films, as they look more cartoonish (in a good way) than their original incarnations. The script may not have been up to snuff, but the animators were bringing their A-game, at least.

Oh, if you're more of a fan of Andy Samberg than Sandler, don't even bother - Johnny is barely in it, and I doubt Samberg took more than 2-3 hours tops to record his lines, most of which come in the climax. Selena Gomez as Dracula's daughter Mavis gets a lot of screentime, but otherwise it's pretty much all just Sandler and Kathryn Hahn (Ericka), with some added occasional fun courtesy of the great Chris Parnell, who plays the fish that staff the cruise ship (he voices all of them). It's kind of a bummer that Sandler has assembled such a great cast (Mel Brooks also returns, for I think three lines) and wastes most of them, but I'm sure the kids won't care much. And there is nary a Rob Schneider or Nick Swardson in sight, so let's take the good with the bad.

But hey, all that matters in the end is if the kids have fun, as there's no law that they need to appeal to the adults (though it would be nice since we're the one buying the tickets and popcorn). I promised myself I wouldn't push my love of horror on my kid like some other parents do, and I'm already seeing signs that he's not naturally inclined to love it anyway (he seemed more into Incredibles, for sure). But if he wants to watch "Daddy movies" I'm glad there's gateway stuff like this that I can get him started with, familiarizing him with the various kinds of monsters and also showing him that they're not always scary. Plus, even if it wasn't up to the relative highs of the 2nd film (or maybe even the first), it held my attention and amused me, which is more than I can say about the likes of Cars or pretty much any Dreamworks movie I've seen, so there's something. And I can still hold out hope for the TV series I wanted it to be in the first place!

What say you?

Tweet

Read More

• Share

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018)

JUNE 22, 2018

GENRE: MONSTER
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (REGULAR SCREENING)

One of the movie sites posted an article the other day about the thing that made Jurassic Park so memorable while its sequels all failed to even come close to measuring up: there was no sense of wonder anymore, no reveal to behold. John Hammond didn't tell Alan and Ellie that he had genetically recreated dinosaurs on his island - he let them (and, in turn, us in the audience) discover them with their own two eyes. They can never again make us believe dinosaurs were back like they did in that one glorious scene in the first film, as Alan looks over a landscape straight out of a kid's jigsaw puzzle, with several (herbivorous) dino species walking around and doing their thing. As with the other sequels, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom has characters seeing the creatures for the first time and giving it the classic Spielbergian "People looking in awe" shot, but it's not as meaningful to us anymore - we need more than that to win us over with the followups, because these creatures are just as familiar to us as any other animal at this point.

Less familiar is the feeling of walking out of a Jurassic Park sequel and being satisfied, but I'm happy to report that Fallen Kingdom clears the very low bar set by its predecessor, improving on it in most ways and more or less hitting the same territory as Lost World in my book (I have come to discover peoples' rankings of this series vary wildly, so I should just quickly clarify that Lost World is the only sequel I kind of liked, with Jurassic World coming behind it, and I don't like much about JP3 at all). If I gave a shit about its two main characters (Chris Pratt's Owen and Bryce Dallas Howard's Claire, both returning from the first JW) I might elevate it as the unquestionable best sequel, but neither of them are even as interesting as Vince Vaughn's character there, let alone Jeff Goldblum's Malcolm, which handicaps its ability to really pop for me. Malcolm, by the way, returns for his first appearance since that film, though if you've seen trailers you've pretty much seen his entire role as he only appears in two quick scenes (actually the same scene split, I think? Unless he came back to the same room to tell the same people that they're wrong again) delivering a monologue from his chair. Any random asshole from InGen (or whatever they're called now) has about as much screentime, so if he is your main draw to see this I would advise just playing the new video game.

The new characters aren't much better, though I will say that the film as a whole at least has more of a focus this time, and - as long as you buy that they'd return to the island at all - the story and its characters at least make sense from scene to scene. Nothing in this movie is as stupid as in the first film when Claire suddenly remembers that the dinos have trackers *after* they thought the Indominous Rex had escaped from its pen and inadvertently let it out (runnerup dumb moment: the trackers can zap the dinos into submission if they get out of line, but no one bothers to use that fail-safe once they all start eating the guests), and that helps immensely - I never once rolled my eyes or got angry at decisions the movie was making. I mean it's got its fair share of unbelievable moments (Pratt outruns a volcano eruption!) but I got the idea that Colin Trevorrow and his writing partner Derek Connolly were putting more effort into the screenplay this time instead of just jumping around at random to whatever else they thought might look cool.

I did check my watch a few times though; this sucker is LONG (128 minutes, just shy of Lost World's record as longest entry) and I was really starting to feel it during the film's second half, which if you've seen the trailers by now you are probably aware takes place in a big mansion as opposed to the island. This is probably the biggest logic stretch in the movie; unless he was simply a big Resident Evil fan I don't know why the human villain wouldn't just set up a normal lab elsewhere instead of using the one in the basement levels in the mansion where his (non villain) boss lived, but if he did there'd be no other way to get a little kid in there (the boss' granddaughter), so I guess we have to just roll with it or else they would have to, for once, attempt to make one of these movies without a goddamn kid to keep saving. This sequence features more human villains than monsters and far too much time spent on a scene where yet another evil jerk auctions off a few of the dinos they grabbed off the island in the first half, so while it also has some of the best scary moments, it could have really used some tightening.

Speaking of the human baddies (another thing these movies can't seem to get away from, though hilariously the only exception is JP3 which is my least favorite, so maybe they're on to something), the movie hilariously casts Ted Levine as the commando guy in charge of the rescue mission, who tells Chris Pratt that he's got his back and is happy to let him lead the way instead of treating him as some underqualified punk. But it's Ted Levine, so of course he's gonna turn out to be an asshole, and thankfully the movie doesn't waste much more time trying to get us to think otherwise. The same can't be said for the other "surprise" traitor to the cause, as they let him look like a good guy for a half hour or so even though we KNOW he's bad news because he's so nice when introduced. Just once I'd like to see these types of characters introduced as villains to us before they con our heroes, so that we can squirm a bit during those scenes, rather than attempt to trick us - is literally anyone in the audience going to be surprised when the guy starts doing dastardly things? BD Wong's Dr. Wu shows up again too, though in a fairly limited capacity and not really doing anything outright evil, still just trying to make new dinosaurs and getting frustrated whenever he's questioned. Add in Toby Jones as the prickly company man running the auction and all the random goons who work for all of the above and you have a movie with far more human villains than a dinosaur movie should require.

Then again there are more dinos than usual, too. The first film had some more in the background and on displays and such, but ultimately focused on five types: not counting the Triceratops that never moved, we got T Rex, Raptor, Gallimimus, Brontosaurus, and Dilophasaurus. Here there are at least twice that many playing an active role in the proceedings, and they're well balanced - each one gets a kill and/or iconic kind of moment. The obligatory new one is the Indomiraptor, which is a raptor mixed with the Indominous Rex (which itself was made from raptor in the first place, but whatever), taking the size and basic appearance of the former. That's the one you see with the big ass claw hand terrorizing the little girl in the billboards and trailers, and he's a pretty good addition to the mix even if he's pretty much just another raptor. Our lone actual raptor this time is Blue, the one from Jurassic World that Owen trained and will usually not try to kill him when it has a chance. Thankfully it's not a full on "hero" - Owen and the others still have to be super cautious around it and the slightest distraction puts it back in "I'm just gonna kill everything" mode, but it's kind of fun to see the basic building blocks of a buddy movie between a guy and a dinosaur.

The bigger dinos don't get as much screentime, for obvious reasons since the second half takes place in a mansion and thus a T Rex or Brontosaurus couldn't exactly be wandering around. So we see them mainly during the first half's island scenes, including the occasional skirmish between beats while the humans just try to stay out of the way (alas, just like Goldblum, that giant sharkasaurus is barely seen outside of what the trailer showed us). There's a rather sad moment where the humans, having escaped the island and its volcano, watch as a howling brontosaurus (brachiosaurus? I can't tell these things apart) reaches the shore and finds itself with nowhere to run as it's consumed by lava - and if you assume it's the one that sneezed on Lex in the first film, it's an even bigger bummer. Accidental stomping aside, there are a number of these animals that pose no threat to humans, and this entry more than the others really tries to hammer home the idea that it is rather incredible to think about co-existing with them. It's just the raptors and T Rex types that make it an impossible situation, and the movie has a number of moments where it's just their "big dumb animal" ways that get people in trouble. For example, there's a bit where Toby Jones races into an elevator and gets the door shut just in time, and as the dino turns around to find other prey, he whacks the door open button with his tail, so he looks just as surprised as Jones when the door reopens and he gets another shot at eating him. I loved that little bit - it's a cause and effect of its size and being in an environment it was never meant to be in, not an intentional decision of intelligence, and it's the sort of thing we'd have to take into consideration even with an otherwise harmless Albertadromeus (the smallest herbivore species, from what I understand).

Another thing that this movie adds to the mix that was lacking from the previous one: actual direction! JA Bayona gives us a number of terrific visual moments: the aforementioned brontosaurus being consumed by lava is a knockout, as is the first appearance of the big shark (its only real appearance that wasn't spoiled in the ads). He finds ways to pull off smaller moments that will catch your eye as well; my favorite being a closeup of a child's horse toy with the silhouette of a similar shaped dinosaur on the wall behind it (I'm not doing it justice with my clumsy description, but when you see the movie you'll know what I mean). There's also a lengthy single take where Claire and one of the new characters (a tech nerd whose name escapes me) are trapped underwater in a Gyrosphere, showing their desperate attempts to find a way out before they drown - as dinosaurs drown all around them after escaping from the volcano (speaking of which, where the hell was this volcano in the other movies?). The back half of the movie is basically a home invasion film with dinosaurs, so it's got moments that recall the kitchen sequence in the first film, and Bayona knocks this stuff out of the park - it's just a shame nobody had me caring as much as I did about Lex, Tim, Alan, etc. There's a moment where I thought Pratt might actually get killed, but I wasn't really that concerned - it'd be more of a "Well that was ballsy" kind of moment as opposed to one that would genuinely make me sad. But if they killed Sam Neill off in one of these I might actually cry.

Ultimately, the best thing about the movie is that it makes an effort to have its own identity, as opposed to leaning so much on nostalgia like the last one (it even occasionally ribs that one a bit; when Claire is reintroduced, it's with a shot of her feet - NOT in heels this time). It barely even uses the iconic John Williams theme, and we are spared too much of that "hey look it's that mangled thing from the other movie" kind of nonsense that permeated the last movie. On a very basic level the movie is similar to Lost World (heroes go to the island for a rescue mission, deal with a lot of human assholes, then a dino escapes to the mainland), but the lengthy mansion section, larger real world connection (Peter Jason shows up as a senator tasked with deciding whether or not the animals should be spared; Claire works for a Greenpeace-y kind of organization trying to make sure they are preserved, rich assholes from around the world want to buy them for their own individual reasons), and one other plot point I won't spoil here set it apart from that film in ways Jurassic World never managed with regards to the original Jurassic Park. Hopefully, if their next one apes Jurassic Park III, they retain that film's one big strength (it's short) and embrace some of the more unusual ideas that they've been toying with in these newer entries. At this point, having a T Rex suddenly show up to inadvertently save our heroes' lives is kind of a boring moment, but if they stick with the things that weren't already perfected in the others, there's no reason this series can't finally live up to its potential. At least this is a good start in getting us there.

What say you?

P.S. Unless you actually want to read the credits, there's no reason to stick around for the post-credits scene. The end of the film proper (meaning, before the credits) has a number of shots of dinosaurs in various spots, and the post-credits scene is nothing more than another such shot, albeit with a more specific background than the others offer.

Tweet

Read More

• Share