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Susan Granger’s review of “Machete” (20th Century Fox)
In his collaboration with Quentin Tarantino on “Grindhouse” (2007), Robert Rodriguez introduced a mock trailer for a fake movie called “Machete,” starring craggy-faced, veteran character actor Danny Trejo (“Desperado,” “Con Air”) as an intimidating Mexican day laborer. Now, in homage to violent, low-budget, ‘70s exploitation pictures, that ‘coming attraction’ has become a testosterone-fueled reality.
Although you can’t take it seriously, the minimalist plot revolves around Machete (Trejo), a badass ex-Mexican Federale who is seeking revenge against the vicious Mexican drug lord who killed his wife and daughter. Within the opening minutes, he’s lopped the heads and arms off a dozen gangsters guarding the kingpin Torrez (Steven Seagal). Left for dead, Machete recuperates and flees over-the-border to Austin, where he’s coerced under threat of deportation to accept $150,000 from double-crossing Booth (Jeff Fahey) to kill conservative, intolerant Texas Senator McLaughlin (Robert De Niro), who denounces illegal immigrants as “parasites” and enjoys driving with sadistic, rifle-wielding Von (Don Johnson), shooting unarmed Mexican they find sneaking into the country. But it’s a set-up and when he’s identified as the would-be assassin, Machete’s only allies are his brother (Cheech Marin), a less-than-pious priest, and Luz (Michelle Rodriguez), the proprietor of a taco truck and leader of ‘the Network,’ as the underground resistance is called. Then there’s scantily clad Sartana (Jessica Alba), a luscious Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Agent, and slutty April (Lindsay Lohan), Booth’s spoiled, drugged-up daughter. Mix ‘em all together and you get murder and mayhem.
Granted, writer/director Robert Rodriguez (“Sin City”/”Spy Kids”) and his co-director/longtime editor Ethan Maniquis are only junior-grade Quentin Tarantinos, but they assemble enough ludicrous, offensive, over-the-top, politically incorrect genre conventions – like bigoted hombres, naughty nurses and naked bodacious babes – to score as a well-done, late-summer diversion. And they’re already planning two sequels.
So for an intentionally junky, grade-B movie, on the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Machete” is a campy, slice-and-dice 7. And I don’t have to be a betting woman to suggest that men will like this R-rated guilty pleasure much more than women.
Susan Granger’s review of “Max Manus” (D Films)
Set in Scandinavia during World War II, this fictionalized biopic adventure begins in 1940 on a wintry field in Finland, where a brave, 25 year-old Norwegian, Max Manus (Aksel Hannie), is wounded while helping the Finns fight against the Russian invaders.
Returning to Norway, after the Royal family was abruptly banished by the Germans, Max helps further the Resistance by destroying draft registration records and distributing newspaper propaganda vilifying the collaborationist government, headed by Vidkun Quisling (that’s how the word “quisling,” signifying traitor, became part of our vocabulary). After eluding captors, Max and his freedom-fighter friends are trained in Scotland to become expert saboteurs and assigned to stealthily stick limpet mines on the hulls of the German supply ships docked in Oslo harbor.
One of the Free Norwegian Forces’ greatest victories was a daring commando raid involving the sinking of the cargo ship Donau outside Drobak in the winter of 1945, much to the consternation of the local head of the Gestapo, Siegfried Fehmer (Ken Duken of “Inglorious Basterds”). During the liberation, Max Manus became the personal protection officer for Crown Prince Olav upon his return to Oslo and for King Haakon VII, when the rest of the Royal family returned on June 7, 1945.
Written by the late Thomas Nordseth-Tiller and based on Manus’s own books, plus historical documentation, it’s photographed by Geir Hartly Andreassen and co-directed by Stockholm Film School graduates Espen Sandberg and Joachim Roenning, who made the direct-to-dvd “Bandidas” (2006), starring Penelope Cruz and Salma Hayek, and are credited with creating hundreds of award-winning commercials.
Curiously, the only other film about Norway’s Resistance is “Edge of Darkness” (1943), which starred Errol Flynn as a fearless fisherman who defied the German occupation. However, unlike that Hollywoodized adventure, this far-more-realistic treatment shows how Max Manus suffered serious consequences, both physically and mentally, that turned him into an alcoholic.
In Norwegian, German and English with English subtitles, on the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Max Manus” is an action-packed, enthralling 8. Understandably, it’s Norway’s most successful film so far.
Susan Granger’s review of “The American” (Focus Features)
Usually, when the only critics screening of a star-driven spy thriller is just two days before opening, it’s an indication that there’s a problem. And there is. This is not an action movie, and it’s certainly not a conventional thriller. Not that it isn’t intriguing. It is – if you’re into meditative, minimalist, non-commercial, European-style filmmaking.
Enigmatic Jack (George Clooney) is a master assassin. You never learn anything about his psychological motivation or social background, just that he’s a dour, taciturn loner, filled with melancholy inner turmoil, who often enjoys the company of beautiful women.
Jack’s grimly inexplicable story begins in desolate, snow-covered Dalarma, Sweden, where he’s being hunted. After reporting in to his handler, Pavel (Johan Leysen), he’s dispatched to picturesque Castel Del Monte, an ancient Abruzzo hill town in Italy, where he’s told to craft a custom-designed weapon for inscrutable Mathilde (Thekla Reuten), who is obviously a professional killer too. “You want the capacity of a machine gun with the range of a rifle?” he ascertains in order to acquire the required parts.
Between strenuous exercise sessions and methodically constructing this weapon in the privacy of his rented room, Jack bonds with a gregarious priest, Father Benedetto (Paolo Bonacelli), even though he concedes, “I don’t think God is interested in me,” and he takes up with Clara (Violante Placido), a prostitute at a nearby bordello.
Based on Martin Booth’s novel, “A Very Private Gentleman,” it’s been adapted for the screen by Rowan Joffe and directed by Netherlands-born Anton Corbjin, best known for the biopic “Control.” A former photographer, Corbjin’s erotic symbolism permeates the picture – like when Reuten sensuously assembles the gun that Clooney has fastidiously made. But there are several pretentiously disconcerting elements, including the almost deserted nature of Castel Del Monte. No one else ever walks on the quaint, cobblestone streets except these specific characters, along with another couple of killers-for-hire.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “The American” is a spare, self-consciously somber 6. It’s a visually captivating study in stillness but it’s not emotionally involving.
Susan Granger’s review of “Going the Distance” (Warner Bros.)
Given the vicarious nature of our gossip-riddled culture, it’s not surprising that on-screen pairings often ignite off-screen romances – or vice-versa, which seems to be the case here. Uma Thurman met Ethan Hawke during “Gattaca” and Angelina Jolie lured Brad Pitt from Jennifer Aniston while making “Mr. & Mrs. Smith,” yet by the time Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck made “Gigli,” their relationship had gone sour. So, while Hollywood sweetheart Drew Barrymore chose as her co-star genial Fairfield native Justin Long, best known as the “Mac Guy” in the Apple vs. PC commercials, concurrent with their intermittent off-screen involvement, their on-screen chemistry is non-existent.
While working as an intern on the New York Sentinel, 31 year-old Stanford journalism grad student Erin (Barrymore) hooks up with junior record-label exec Garrett (Long). When their summer fling turns into a full-fledged romance, they’re faced with a serious geographic problem: she’s in San Francisco, he’s in Manhattan. And airfare is so expensive that they cannot afford to fly cross-country with any regularity.
Novice screenwriter Geoff La Tulippe has come up with a relevant predicament, coupled with contemporary uncertainty, yet it deserves better treatment than descending into the kind of coarse vulgarity that characterizes a crude Judd Apatow comedy – like explicit phone sex, masturbation and having one lout conversing with friends while on the toilet with the door open. Filthy language spews out of Erin’s smartass mouth and the supporting characters are contrived caricatures, particularly Garrett’s boorish buddies, Dan (Charlie Day) and Box (Jason Sudeikis), and Erin’s disapproving, over-protective sister Corinne (Christina Applegate).
First-time feature-film director Nanette Burstein’s clumsy, forced pacing amplifies the long-distance dilemma by making minutes seem like hours. She also breaks believability by having Erin eschew a car seatbelt and placing a pivotal Erin/Garrett encounter in an airport departure lounge when only one of them is boarding a plane. Because of TSA rules, this has become totally implausible.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Going the Distance” falls short with a self-conscious, foul-mouthed 5. As a romantic comedy, it’s a disappointment.
Susan Granger’s review of “Takers” (Screen Gems)
Jimmy Buffett wrote a song called “Overkill” and that’s the word which best describes this high-powered yet formulaic heist movie that’s punctuated with shootouts and explosions, particularly a stylized machine-gun gangbang with Russian mobsters that decimates a Los Angeles hotel suite.
The action commences with a cleverly staged bank robbery, culminating with the slick hijacking of a TV news helicopter as a getaway vehicle which is then landed and exploded in Dodger Stadium. The GQ-attired, cool-as-cucumber, multi-racial thieves are led by Gordon Jennings (British Idris Elba of “The Wire”) and include strutting brothers Jake and Jesse Attica (Michael Ealy, Chris Brown) along with buddies John Rahway (Paul Walker) and hip A.J. (Hayden Christensen). Bewildered by the gang’s finesse and a discouraging lack of surveillance camera clues, hardworking L.A.P.D. detectives Jack Welles (Matt Dillon) and Eddie Hatcher (Jay Hernandez) are, nevertheless, determined to track the culprits down. The lawmen catch a break when a recently released ex-con Ghost (rapper-producer Tip “T.I.” Harris) approaches the Dom Perignon-sipping, Cuban cigar-puffing thieves in their posh penthouse hangout with a tantalizing offer they can’t refuse: to orchestrate a complicated multi-million-dollar armored-car takedown in just five days.
After all, as one character says, “We’re takers. That’s what we do. We take.”
Co-written and stylishly directed by John Luessenhop (“Lockdown”), this complicated caper was obviously inspired by action helmer Michael Mann’s “Heat,” along with countless Quentin Tarantino gangster epics. Unfortunately, however, the script unfolds as if it was assembled by a committee which – with four additional screenwriters (Peter Allen, Gabirel Casseus, Avery Duff) – it obviously was. Double-crosses and betrayals abound, along with laughable clichés, caricatured portrayals, and a riveting but exhausting street chase. The two talented females in the cast – Zoe Saldana (“Avatar”), as Jake’s fiancée, and Marianne Jean-Baptiste (“Secrets and Lies”), as Gordon’s drug-addicted sister – are given far too little to do. And as a perpectually-scowling divorced dad, Matt Dillon ill-advisedly totes his young daughter on a high-speed chase.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Takers” is a frenzied 4. Wait for the dvd.
Susan Granger’s review of “Piranha 3-D” (Dimension Films)
“No one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public.”
Social critic/journalist H.L. Mencken (1880-1956)
When many critics, including me, review a movie they take into consideration how well it accomplishes what it sets out to do. If it’s a B horror-flick, is it a real fright-fest? Do you cringe? Do you shriek? If the answer is yes – then it accomplishes what it’s meant to do, like “Snakes on a Plane.”
Every year, the population of the tiny, mythical Arizona town of Lake Victoria explodes from 5,000 to 50,000 for the bacchanal known as Spring Break. But, this year, there’s something more to worry about than vandalism and drunken teenagers. A sudden underwater earthquake sets free thousands of prehistoric flesh-eating piranhas that devour an inebriated fisherman (Richard Dreyfuss, wearing his rumpled “Jaws” costume and singing “Show Me the Way to Go Home”) who gets sucked into a whirlpool. Meanwhile, sleazy, depraved, Joe Francis-like “Girls Gone Wild” video chronicler, Derrick Jones (Jerry O’Connell), is egging on rowdy, obnoxious, bikini-clad babes, earning the stern disapproval of Sheriff Julie Forester (Elisabeth Shue), particularly when he engages her teenage son, Jake (Steven R. McQueen, grandson of the famed Steve), as a location scout to guide his yacht and totes along Jake’s crush, Kelly (“Gossip Girl” Jessica Szohr).
Inspired by a 1978 Roger Corman low-budget hit, which was written by John Sayles and directed by Joe Dante as an irreverent parody of Steven Spielberg’s “Jaws,” this screenplay was written by Peter Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg (“Sorority Row”) and directed by Alexandre Aja (“The Hills Have Eyes,” “High Tension”). Clumsily converted into 3-D, it’s chock full o’carnage and distracting digital deceits, including topless-and-bottomless full-frontal torsos. Christopher Lloyd does a cleverly crazed cameo as a marine-life expert assessing piranha risk and Ving Rhames scores as a tough deputy.
Not for the squeamish or faint-hearted, on the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Piranha 3-D” is a scary, sicko 6, spewing gallons-upon-gallons of R-rated graphic bloody gore. Not surprisingly, a succulent sequel is already in the works.
Susan Granger’s review of “Get Low” (Sony Classics)
Robert Duvall astonishes with the authenticity of his style, his skill and his overall knockout performance in this uniquely American folktale; it’s an actor’s showcase if there ever was one.
Set in East Tennessee in the Depression-era 1930s, Felix Bush (Duvall) was a prominent Southerner until he mysteriously disappeared into the backwoods 40 years ago and became an angry, eccentric hermit, living in a hand-hewn cabin and adjacent barn with a shotgun always at his side and only his beloved mule as company. Then, suddenly, he decides that he’d like to know – in advance – what people are going to say about him after he dies. He realizes that he has become a local legend, whispered about among the curious townsfolk. So Felix contacts the somewhat shady mortician, Frank Quinn (Bill Murray), and his eager young assistant, Buddy Robinson (Lucas Black), expressing his bizarre wish to “get low” and hold a mock “living funeral” to which anyone who has ever heard a story about him is invited as long as they’re willing to tell the tale in public. In addition, wily Felix proposes selling five-dollar tickets to a raffle that day for his 300 acres of virgin timberland. But what no one except widowed Mattie Darrow (Sissy Spacek) and an Illinois preacher named Charlie Jackson (Bill Cobbs) realizes is that dour, taciturn Felix’s conscience has been burdened with a shameful secret that he’s never revealed and he’s seeking redemption.
Co-written by Chris Provenzano (TV’s “Mad Men”) and C. Gaby Mitchell (“Blood Diamond”), who fictionalized the concept from a true 1938 incident, and directed as his first feature by Oscar-winning cinematographer/editor Aaron Schneider (“Two Soldiers”), this somewhat surreal, rural drama unfolds at its own leisurely, rather uneven and meandering pace, particularly in the beginning. Genuine to the last detail, including David Boyd’s photography and Jan A. Kaczmarek’s bluegrass music, it’s an excellent ensemble presentation and a subtle, yet compelling tour-de-force by Duvall.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Get Low” is an intriguing, unpredictable 9. It’s a slyly powerful, homespun fable.
Susan Granger’s review of “Mao’s Last Dancer” (Samuel Goldwyn Films)
Think “Billy Elliot” combined with “The Last Emperor” with a touch of “Rocky.” Only a master like Bruce Beresford could envision this sweeping, audacious adaptation of Chinese ballet dancer’s Li Cunxin’s memoirs with such emotional resonance.
Plucked from his peasant parents (Joan Chen, Wang Shuangbao) in an impoverished rural village in Shandong Province by Communist officials as part of Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution, 11 year-old Li is sent to Madame Mao’s ballet school in Beijing. Determined to bring pride to his family, perseverant Li embraces the strict, rigorous discipline and is granted the rare privilege of continuing his dance studies in the United States. Arriving in amazement in Texas as part of an exchange program, he experiences culture-shock but adjusts quickly, deeming his discoveries “fantastic,” adopting a different ideology, even falling in love with another dancer (Amanda Schull). Then to the horror of his host/guardian, Ben Stevenson (Bruce Greenwood), artistic director of the Houston Ballet, Li decides to defect, declaring his need to be “free,” enrolling an astute attorney (Kyle MacLachlan), and becoming embroiled in a political, emotional and ethical conflict that involves sacrificing all hope of ever seeing his family again.
Australian director Bruce Beresford’s films (“Breaker Morant,” “Tender Mercies,” “Crimes of the Heart,” “Driving Miss Daisy”) run an unmatchable gamut but what unites them is an unstoppable cinematic energy that’s at the heart of his understated, yet always vigorous style. Jan Sardi’s (“Shine”) complex, non-linear screenplay effortlessly shifts between Li’s life as a youngster and his present, his childhood experiences and adult dilemmas. Graeme Murphy’s dance sequences soar, and cinematographer Peter James drenches the screen in a torrent of resonating vivid images embodying the sights and sounds of China. As Li Cuxnin at different ages, Chi Cao (principal dancer at Birmingham Royal Ballet), Chengwo Guo (member of Australian Ballet Company) and Huang Wen Bin (aspiring Beijing gymnast) are sensational, as is Bruce Greenwood.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Mao’s Last Dancer” is an inspiring, enthralling 10. Great movies transport the audience – and this left me enriched and exhilarated.
Susan Granger’s review of “The Switch” (Miramax Films)
Although Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly gave this artificial-insemination comedy controversial publicity, it’s nevertheless a formulaic and utterly predictable romance.
This story begins in New York City seven years ago as Kassie (Jennifer Aniston) realizes her biological clock is ticking. Determined to be a mother despite her lack of a husband, she tells her neurotic best friend Wally (Jason Bateman) that she’s searching for the perfect sperm donor. When she decides on a handsome-yet-married man, Roland (Patrick Wilson), she throws an ‘insemination party’ and, unbeknownst to her, inebriated Wally surreptitiously substitutes his sperm for Roland’s in the bathroom. Then Kassie becomes pregnant and moves home to be with her family in Minnesota.
Seven years later, single mother Kassie is back in Manhattan with her precocious son, Sebastian (Thomas Robinson), whose dour resemblance to Bateman is unmistakable. Meanwhile, Roland is now divorced and courting Kassie. But Kassie has no idea that Wally is really Sebastian’s biological father. And what will happen when she finds out?
Based on Jeffrey Eugenides’ New Yorker short story called “Baster,” the cliché-riddled yet underwritten script is by Allen Loeb and directed by Josh Gordon and Will Speck (“Blades of Glory”), emerging as better than Jennifer Lopez’ “The Back-Up Plan,” yet paling beside the far funnier and more relevant “The Kids Are All Right” – all exploring somewhat the same concept. Credulity problem here is genetics. How could two blue-eyed, blond parents have a brown-eyed, dark-haired child?
While Jennifer Aniston displays her usual frantic perkiness, Jason Bateman specializes in melancholy prickliness, allowing moppet Thomas Robinson to steal every scene he’s in. Jeff Goldblum and Juliette Lewis are the main characters’ respective confidantes, and GMA’s Diane Sawyer makes a memorable cameo.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “The Switch” is a quirky, implausible 5. And since all of the genial, multimillionaire stars of TV’s ensemble “Friends” have attempted – and failed – at making a significant big screen impact, has anyone ever considered that, perhaps, they may, indeed, be smaller than life, rather than the opposite? Individually, they simply lack charisma.
Susan Granger’s review of “Nanny McPhee Returns” (Universal Pictures)
Rarely do sequels equal or exceed expectations but this comedy does, offering broad slapstick that’s guaranteed to elicit laughter from small children and their parents. Emma Thompson reprises the magical character she created in 2005’s “Nanny McPhee,” based on Christianna Brand’s “Nurse Matilda” books, not only starring but also writing the screenplay, as she did with the original.
Set during World War II, the family that the warty, uni-browed, snaggletoothed Mary Poppins-like Nanny visits this time is headed by a stressed-out mother who lives in the English countryside. While her soldier husband (Ewan McGregor) is off fighting, Mrs. Isabel Green (Maggie Gyllenhaal) and her three children – Norman (Asa Butterfield), Megsie (Lil Woods) and Vincent (Oscar Steer) – are struggling to survive. Their lives are further complicated by the arrival of two spoiled, precocious cousins – Cyril and Celia (Eros Vlahos, Rosie Taylor-Ritson) – who have been dispatched from London in a purple Rolls Royce to escape the bombing – and a scheming subplot attempt by their devious, despicable Uncle Phil (Rhys Ifans) to sell off their farm to pay off his gambling debts.
Nanny McPhee’s mission is to teach the tiny shrieking terrors five vital lessons that will leave the family “wanting” but not “needing” her services. And, curiously, as each virtuous message is learned, Nanny McPhee’s foreboding appearance becomes less ugly and scary. When it was released abroad earlier this year as “Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang,” the reference was to the bombs dropped by “enemy” planes on England during the Blitz.
Best known for her work on the Iraq-themed TV series “Generation Kill,” director Susannah White elicits fine performances from her entire cast, including sturdy supporting turns from Ralph Fiennes, Bill Bailey and Maggie Smith. The best scenes involve animals: flying piglets proficient at synchronized swimming, climbing trees and Scrabble, along with a pen-stealing baby elephant, flatulent black bird, barnyard mud and poo.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Nanny McPhee Returns” is an irreverent yet sweetly sentimental 7, a delightful late summer diversion.
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