THE CHRISTMAS CHRONICLES - Crimbo Binge-watch #10

Netflix' children's Christmas release is a rare reminder of just how charming Kurt Russell is.  This overlong rather mechanical film is only saved by his presence.  It takes a very dull 25 minutes for him to appear on screen as Santa, after which the movie ignites - although it could still have lost 15 mins from both pre and post Santa segments.  The director Clay Kaytis (THE ANGRY BIRDS MOVIE) should take note.  The premise has two kids who lost their fireman father and fight with each other staying up to video tape Santa coming down the chimney. They actually do catch him but also damage his sleigh. So become some "high-jinx" as they have to help him find transportation and his sack of presents to make all the christmas deliveries and save the spirit of Christmas. All that - including animated elves - is so much blah - but I very much enjoyed the idea of Santa telling grown ups what they really wanted for Christmas as kids, Kurt Russell doing a jailhouse rock number, and a fun cameo from Goldie Hawn. We need more of this couple on screen.

THE CHRISTMAS CHRONICLES has a running time of 104 minutes and was released this Christmas on Netflix. 

THE MUPPETS

The new muppet movie is, in the manner of THE BLUES BROTHERS, all about putting the band back together to play a benefit concert for a worthy cause - in this case, saving the old theatre from which the old beloved TV show used to be broadcast.  The movie drips with an earnest nostalgia for the days when kids TV was about gentle humour, song-and-dance acts, with a healthy dollop of liberal "rainbow" politics thrown in.  The Muppets was all about trying your best; accepting yourself for what you are; pulling together; and putting your friends first.  

It's obvious from the goofy smile on his face, that Jason Segel - the star and key instigator of the movie - totally buys into the Muppet ethos.  In a sense, he really is Walter, his character's muppet kid brother.  How sad then, that instead of trusting to that earnest charm, Segel and screenwriter Nick Stoller (GULLIVER'S TRAVELS) decided NOT to play it straight.  Rather, THE MUPPETS is a movie that constantly winks at the audience - it drips with post-modern ironic commentary on its core story and characters - knowingly pointing out through sight-gags and one-liners the hokiness of the genre.   

The result is a movie that wants us to believe that the world hasn't changed so much - that kids would still fall in love with the plain vanilla muppets franchise.  On the other hand, it clearly doesn't believe this to be the case, and feels it has to go for a post-modern snarky "SHREK" style of children's movie-making.  It rather smacks of trying to have it both ways. 

For all that, I still had a good time watching the flick. For sure, the first half is far too knowing - far too slow to build - far too reliant on commenting on its own montages and Chris Cooper saying "maniacal laugh" rather than actually laughing.  But by the time you get to the telethon and we focus on the old fashioned muppet vaudeville show, the movie settles down.  It's hard for anyone who grew up with the muppets not to enjoy seeing that famous intro, hearing the "rainbow connection" or just seeing Animal play the drums!  And yes, you do leave the cinema singing "Am I am man or a muppet".

That brings me to another point - the use of Brett McKenzie of FLIGHT OF THE CONCHORDS fame to write the songs.  I'm a huge fan of CONCHORDS but I found the use of McKenzie distracting.   Because as fun as it was to see Chris Cooper doing a rap pastiche; or Amy Adams doing a 70s disco pastiche; I just couldn't help but feel that it wasn't as fun as seeing McKenzie or Jermaine Clement doing the numbers. In particular, Clement should definitely have played the Cooper part. 

Anyway, all this griping is definitely not in the spirit of the muppets.  Problem is, neither was this film half the time.  Still, happy to see the old gang back on our screens. Let's hope the franchise gets reinvigorated - but hopefully on TV - it's proper and fitting format.

THE MUPPETS was released last year in the USA, Canada, India, Mexico, Brazil, Israel, Singapore, Kuwait, Chile and Estonia. It was released earlier this year in New Zealand, Slovenia, Panama, Argentina, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Germany, Hong Kong, Bulgaria and Poland.  IT goes on release on February 3rd in Italy, Spain and Portugal; on February 10th in the Netherlands, Denmark, Ireland and the UK; on February 17th in Belgium, Lithuania and Turkey; on March 16th in Sweden; on March 29th in Ukraine and on April 11th in France. 

THE BOOK OF ELI - Spoiler free review before release date notes, spoilers afterward

THE BOOK OF ELI is the latest flick from The Hughes Brothers, the directors behind the impressive DEAD PRESIDENTS and the piss-poor Alan Moore adaptation FROM HELL. ELI lies somewhere in between: it's visually imaginative and audacious in its premise, but it's so ludicrous in its execution as to undermine its credibility. The story has Denzel Washington play a lone man with kick-ass knife- skills walking a lonely highway in post-apocalyptic America. This basic set-up has some similarity with THE ROAD, leading some critics to draw comparisons. But that's just nonsense. Viggo Mortensen looks like he's been walking for years without a haircut or soap or a decent meal in THE ROAD. In THE BOOK OF ELI, all the lead characters sport a look that's more Hollister Hobo - pearly white teeth, skinny jeans, cool boots, latest-season sunglasses. Where THE ROAD is shot in a menacing sombre murky grey, THE BOOK OF ELI is sunbleached and de-saturated. It feels more like the Wild West than the end of the world as we know it. So, back to the story. Our lone man with mad kung-fu skills walks into a Wild West town, run by local fascist Carnegie, played by Gary Oldman. (We know he's a Fascist because he reads Mussolini, because the film is THAT subtle. Seriously, it wouldn't have surprised me if Carnegie were sending out biker gangs to find Unobtainium). Carnegie sends out illiterate biker gangs to hunt down a book - a book that Eli happens to be carrying - that he believes will give him the power to dominate mankind. And, in case you really can't guess what that book is, I'll say no more about it. Everything else about the town is pure movie cliché. There's a seedy bar where the out-of-towner kicks off a fight. There's a cute chick in distress (Mila Kunis) who looks like she has full access to a functioning hairdresser. There's even a general store full of goods that apparently isn't knocked off, despite the fact that it's only guarded by Tom Waits with one gun.

So, Eli realises he needs to get the hell out of dodge and the Hughes Brothers make a lame attempt to have him bond with the cute chick who insists on following him. We pause for a truly bizarre encounter with an old cannibal couple, played completely improbably by Michael Gambon and British comic gem, Frances de la Tour. I'm almost tempted to say that this movie is worth the price of admission for this crazy scene. But that would be a misjudgement.

Because in the final act, THE BOOK OF ELI wraps itself up in a manner so stupidly that you really shouldn't respect anything about the film at all. But, in case you are going to see it, stop reading here. Those of who have seen it, continue on, after the release date notes.

THE BOOK OF ELI is on release in the UK, US, Greece, Russia, Canada, Kazakhstan, France, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Estonia, Poland and Romania. It opens on February 3rd in Egypt; on Feb 10th in Belgium; on Feb 18th in Australia, Germany and New Zealand; on Feb 26th in Finland, Italy and Sweden. It opens in March in the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Singapore, Argentina, Brazil and on June 19th in Japan.

.....SPOILERS FOLLOW.....

Okay, so there are three major problems with the ending of this film. First, you know that even after Carnegie gets his hand on the book, he's not gonna be able to read it. (I was betting on it being in a foreign language). So there's no suspense. The second major problem with the film is the way in which the rug is pulled from under the audience with the revelation of Eli's blindness. This was just totally lame. A blind man simply would not be pulling off the manoeuvres he had pulled off throughout the movie, and I'm not buying the "divine protection" crap. The final problem is that, even if we buy the blindness and the surprise, what was the point? I mean, the world has been near-annihilated by an apparently religious war and we're meant to be all happy that religious books have survived? Don't get me wrong - I'm not anti-religion - indeed, I am a practising Catholic - but shouldn't someone in the movie at least QUESTION whether Eli is doing the right thing?

Ah well. The whole thing was frustratingly ill-conceived.

FOOL'S GOLD - when Matthew McConaughey's naked torso isn't enough

FOOL'S GOLD is a rather bland romantic-adventure-comedy along the lines of Matthew McConaughey's last vehicle SAHARA. This time, he's reunited with Kate Hudson of HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN 10 DAYS fame. The two are suitably bronzed and buff, and charm their way through a laughably under-written (but sadly not laugh-provoking) treasure hunt in the West Indies. McConaughey plays his typical slacker character and Hudson plays his History PhD(!) ex-wife. They team up to hunt for Spanish treasure, roping in Hudson's ueber-rich British boss (Donald Sutherland), his air-heard daughter (Alexis Dziena) and an inexplicably Ukrainian side-kick (the Scot, Ewan Bremner). The baddies are a bunch of goons including Theo Huxtable; led by Ray Winstone with a piss-poor Texan accent; and financed by a spoof gangster rapper called Bigg (sic) Bunny.

Director Andy Tennant (HITCH) fails to make this movie sparkle. It's a long way off the best of the genre - namely, Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner and Danny DeVito in ROMANCING THE STONE. And the after-school special sub-plot in which the bimbo daughter is lectured by Kate Hudson's character is entirely obnoxious. Studios should take note: as wonderful as Matthew McConaughey's naked torso is, it's nowhere near enough to sustain an audience's interest for 2 hours.

All in all, FOOL'S GOLD is one for DVD at best.

FOOL'S GOLD was released earlier this year in Australia, the US, Singapore, Mexico, Argentina, South Korea, Brazil, the Philippones, Thailand, Turkey, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Russia, Estonia, Iceland, Chile, Hungary, Israel, Panama and Egypt. It is currently on release in the UK, Poland and Slovakia. It opens later in April in the Czech Republic, Germany, Spain, Belgium, France and Norway. It opens on May 1st in the Netherlands, on June 14th in Japan and on June 20th in Finland.

MY SUPER EX-GIRLFRIEND - weak rom-com

MY SUPER EX-GIRLFRIEND is a flaccid romantic comedy starring Luke Wilson and Uma Thurman. I say flaccid because it's not really that funny, but it is quite sweet and would serve as a mindless Friday night date movie. The deal is that Luke Wilson plays a nice, if slightly nerdy, architect who picks up a nerdy looking chick (Thurman) on the tube. It turns out that she's actually wild in bed and, more to the point, a super-hero called G-GIRL. (No ribald sub-text there, then!) Problems arise when the nice guy dumps the neurotic super-hero and she turns into a bunny-(well, goldfish)boiler. But, as the genre requires, it all ends up with everyone happy and loved up in their gorgeous designer apartments. In other words, this is a movie for those kind of dates wherein what is happening on screen is not of primary concern.....One final thing to mention is that a lot of the marketing for this movie focuses on the fact that it is directed by the man who gave us the seminal 80s comedy classic, GHOSTBUSTERS. This is a misleading signal.

MY SUPER EX-GIRLFRIEND is already on release in Australia, Puerto Rico, the US and UK. It opens in France and Singapore on August 9th 2006; Argentina on August 17th and Egypt on August 30th. The movie opens in Estonia on September 1st; Greece and Portugal on September 14th; Belgium, Hungary and Finland on September 22nd and in the Netherlands on September 28th. It finally rolls into Germany on October 5th and Spain on October 20th.