On Being Pleasantly Surprised During Knight & Day

A superfluous title, check. Occasional smugness, check. A blatant vanity project for both stars, check. This is all true of James Mangold’s action comedy, Knight & Day, yet this remains an enjoyable two hours. The success of Knight & Day lies in its awareness of the genre and the character it is lampooning and that character is Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt from the Mission: Impossible trilogy (1996 – 2006).

The action is extravagantly ambitious, the globe trotting even more absurd than Quantum of Solace (2008) and the plot – involving the ultimate battery – a feature that shouldn’t be focused upon too closely. It could be argued that Knight & Day is a smug action comedy, in the same way that Ocean’s Eleven was criticised for the enjoyment the actors seemed to be having (although, as long as the audience are enjoying it too, surely this is no bad thing). And actors such as Tom Cruise are easy targets for such criticism, yet here, the film is instantly more watchable and entertaining when he is on screen. The chemistry between Cruise and Cameron Diaz is easy and the banter flows. The action is well choreographed and while this is hardly pushing any boundaries for action or comedy, Knight & Day’s energy and charm is rare.

On The Expendables

There is a popular saying to encourage brevity; if you have nothing nice to say, say nothing at all.

On the Lack of Bite in Salt

Fractured Russian US relations have proved prevalent material for film makers since the Cold War. At a time when Russian spies have been discovered living as US citizens and the US president attempts to improve relations between the two super powers, Salt is both prescient and unwelcome. Fortunately, for those Americans hoping to keep ties with Russia friendly, Salt is poor all over and immediately forgettable.

Even the presence of Angelia Jolie cannot prove enough distraction from this film’s lack of energy, but this is not for lack of trying. Director Phillip Noyce, who has directed sold thrillers, most notably The Quiet American (2002), struggles to inject excitement into the set pieces. The speed and style of the action attempts to emulate the Bourne Trilogy (2002 – 2007), but is a poor imitation that feels less like referencing and more like plagiarism. While on paper the characters may have been richly drawn, the direction offers them little chance to develop and the wooden manner in which the dialogue is delivered suggests the actors have little belief in the story. In short, Salt is lazy entertainment that lacks bite.

On Oneirism Explored in Inception

Abnormal states of consciousness? Controlled perceptions of unconsciousness’? Both? Through 150 minutes, Inception continually tests the boundaries of reality by weaving together a narrative involving a crack team of thieves specializing in a very specific form of theft. By inducing their mark into a heavy sleep, they infiltrate the dream to steal information buried in the subconscious. This involves a team with a very precise form of skills, including a dream architect. The title of Christopher Nolan's mind manipulating opus refers to the very rare and difficult job of not only stealing from a subconscious, but sowing the seeds of an idea that does not yet exist into the mind of the unwitting mark.

Yet it is not the dream world of the mark that provides the fascination here. In fact the mark's dream world seems to be comprised of elaborate and easily differentiated landmarks. It is Leonardo DiCaprio's Cobb, whose heartbreak and unwillingness to let go of his wife who committed suicide that provides Inception's most relatable and dream-like offerings. Dreams are not fluid, they do not make sense, they do not follow a structured narrative, yet when in a dream, none of this inconsistency is noticeable. Imagine, though, that within the fractured world of the dream, you held all the motor functions and awareness that you have while fully conscious. How would you deal with being faced with the reality of your subconscious? This is Cobb's, and by association with him, his team's challenge.

Within the landscape of someone else's dream, Cobb's hidden world comes seeping though and only when we are thrown completely into his mind does it all start falling into place. The notion of being plugged into a world like our own, but with the added benefit of being able to manipulate it is not as unique as may be initially thought. The Matrix (1999) is perhaps the most immediately memorable,but also Existenz (1999). And The Matrix and Inception share some common ground. Both have created wonderful, cinematic action scenes and brought originality to big budget mainstream cinema, as well as demanding of their audience more than a passive participation. Yet, where Inception is superior is in its full comprehension of its idea and how that idea is related clearly to the audience and in the depth of the emotion the film reaches.

Experiencing Inception feels distinctive simply because so few major summer releases challenge and offer us a world where we rarely go. Dreams are elusive concepts and Inception may be our best opportunity to view the nature of dreams while awake.

On the Greatest Trilogy in Toy Story 3

Film history dictates that there will always be one weak link to a trilogy; Return of the Jedi (1983), The Bourne Identity (2002), The Godfather Part 3 (1990), Return of the King (2003) and so on. Yet Pixar have been building their own film history and in addition to creating a string of critically and financially successful feature animation films and imbuing in animation a depth and emotion that many live action films cannot achieve, have now decided it’s time to create a great film trilogy.

Trilogies’ weaker acts usually come in the final third (although not always, see The Bourne Identity), whether it is through over ambition, too much money, hubris or simply, as in the case of The Matrix Revolutions (2003), the revelation that your story was only 180 minutes long. Yet Toy Story 3 acknowledges what made the first two so special (story and character) as well as introducing new characters without ever detracting from the principal, much loved toys. The introduction of Ken brings a great comedic element that an older audience will appreciate, while Lotso’s story of abandonment ensures Pixar’s dark elements remain.

The film mirrors the breakout/break-in structure of Toy Story 2 (1999), but never rests on its laurels by refusing to progress its characters. Woody, Buzz et al, like Andy have moved on since we left them reunited at the end of Toy Story 2. Desperate to be played with after years of neglect from a growing Andy, the toys devise a plan to grab his attention. The look of heartbreak on Woody’s face when Andy throws him back in the chest shows how hard these past years have been on the cowboy. And that’s just the first ten minutes.

By keeping the same great elements that make all Pixar films so successful and combining this with a story that can appeal across the age groups, in addition to a 3D effect that is maybe the most complementary to the story a film has been to date, Toy Story 3 is the perfect end to a trilogy; exciting, funny, able to stand alone and with a poignant, satisfying ending.

It’s now up to Christopher Nolan and the rest on the Batman team to try and do better.

On Hunting for a Good Predator Film

"Certainly there is no hunting like the hunting of man and those who have hunted armed men long enough and liked it, never really care for anything else thereafter". This ridiculous quote from a great author (Hemingway) remains, in Predators, a ridiculous quote, but now in a terrible film rather than in an otherwise impressive body of work. Being dropped from a plane unconscious and landing in an unknown, hostile environment as the latest prey for a team of alien predators is a good set-up, yet producer Robert Rodriguez and director Nimrod Antal have seemingly achieved the near impossible and created an action sci-fi without one pulse-raising moment.

The predator is a good alien invention but has never had a film worthy of its creation, unlike its peer and sometimes enemy, the alien of Alien (1979), Aliens (1986) and Alien 3 (1992) etc. The exception, it could be argued, is Predator (1987), yet since then the ultimate hunters, who offer, through their humanistic characteristics something recognizable, have never been allowed to develop in a manner which will allow them to be the feature of a predator film. Here, the predators barely feature and we are instead stuck with a frustrating group of stereotypes who utter cliched dialogue and meaningless quotes (see above) in an attempt to add gravitas to what is complete trash. Casting Adrien Brody against type is a good idea, as is Lawrence Fishburne's schizophrenic survivor, but both positives are negated by bad dialogue. Unfortunately, a sequel is a distinct possibility.

On Casey Affleck's Performance in The Killer Inside Me

Lou Ford is a complicated man. In addition to being a sheriff in a small, oil rich Texas town he’s also a sexually tortured psychopathic killer. Channelling his work in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford with hints of Travis Bickle and Down in the Valley’s Harlan, Casey Affleck produces an memorising performance as The Killer Inside Me’s protagonist. Over the space of three films (Jesse James, Gone, Baby Gone and now The Killer Inside Me) Affleck is increasingly proving himself to be one of America’s finest actors.

Here, Affleck must convey the external and internal emotions of man who is trusted by his fellow Texans while repressing a childhood of sexual deviancy and hiding a murderous present. This is achieved with what appears to be remarkable ease, although surely it isn’t. Affleck’s preternatural ingenuousness on film brings with it his skill in conveying an active mind behind calm, unnerving eyes. Psychopathic, sexually deviant killers are hard to indentify with; normal rules that apply to almost the entire population disappear in the presence of a warped mind. Yet, Ford is completely relatable; his sense of entitlement, developed through a hidden intelligence he feels uncomfortable revealing is a relatable frustration. As is the mollifying manner that other residents treat him with. Therefore Lou Ford becomes as real and as memorable as Robert Ford and the far more contemporary Patrick Kenzie. The reality of the performance (complimented by Winterbottom’s direction) makes the character all the more terrifying. Therefore, rather than the violence (which is shocking in its suddenness) becoming the focal point of the film it instead evolves as another disturbing layer of Lou Ford.

In less competent hands The Killer Inside Me could have become a misogynistic, exploitative experience, but with the skill behind and in front of the camera, it is instead an engrossing, ontological study of an unbalanced mind.