Video review: "Finding Dory"

If “Finding Nemo” was groundbreaking filmmaking, then the long-gestating sequel “Finding Dory” is cinematic comfort food. It’s not really necessary, and it certainly doesn’t match its predecessor, but we get a warm feeling just from having it around.

Set some time after the last adventure, the star here is Dory, the forgetful blue tang voiced by Ellen DeGeneres. We find out more about her backstory, such as the fact her funny/annoying short-term memory loss is not the result of some injurious experience, but something she grew up with as a little fishy.

My friend Ed Johnson-Ott of NUVO Newsweekly, a wonderful film critic and even better human being, correctly noted that this revelation irrevocably alters how we feel about Dory as a special-needs person, likening it to his own family.

“Dory is presented as what she is: an individual trying to work around her limitations. She assumes that most of those around her will help when they can, and most of the time she is right,” he wrote. “Individuals like Dory remind us that we are a community and, especially when one of us is a little more vulnerable, we need to behave like one.”

Dory, suddenly instilled with flashes of long-ago memories of her parents, determines to go on a quest to find them. Nebbishy clownfish Marlin (Albert Brooks) and son Nemo (Hayden Rolence) come along, too. They end up at the fictional Marine Life Institute, which first seems like a haven for injured sea life, but has a dark shadow just beneath the surface.

Many of the critters there display odd behavior as a result of their captivity. Some want to be free, but many others are complacent about their stable existence. One is Hank, a cranky octopus lovingly voiced by Ed O’Neill. He can change colors and mold his squishy body into all sorts of shapes, even operating human gizmos like a pro. He helps Dory and the gang, but only if they first scratch his back (so to speak).

A combination of slapstick antics and empathetic storytelling, “Finding Dory” will make us remember why we adored the original film so much, and fall a little bit more in love with Dory.

Bonus materials are extravagant, though you’ll have to buy the Blu-ray version for most of them. The DVD has only the short film “Piper” and a feature-length commentary track by director Andrew Stanton, co-director Angus MacLane and producer Lindsey Collins.

The Blu-ray adds nine deleted scenes and 10 making-of featurettes, touching on everything from creating Hank, the musical team, underwater explorations of real fish who inspired the onscreen ones, interviews with inhabitants of the Marine Life Institute, and more. Personal favorite: “Casual Carpool,” in which Stanton drives some of the key voice actors around.

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Review: "Finding Dory"

Of course it doesn’t hold a candle to “Finding Nemo,” but that’s a pretty darn bright flame to be held up against. We’re talking “best animated film ever” territory here.

“Finding Dory” isn’t that, but it is an agreeable and welcome follow-up to the 2003 hit from Disney/Pixar. Even more than the first “Toy Story” flicks, “Nemo” showed us the boundless possibilities of computer-based animation, in terms of technical accomplishment but especially emotional engagement.

Ellen DeGeneres brought incredible empathy to her voice performance as Dory, a forgetful blue tang who befriends worrywart clownfish Marlin while searching for his fishnapped son, Nemo. A story about reaching out beyond our limits while learning to let go of fears -- and children’s apron strings -- “Nemo” took us on an emotional journey as real as the cross-ocean trek of our gilled companions.

Now it’s Dory’s turn to go on a trip of discovery. Struggling with short-term memory loss her entire life, so she forgets new experiences minute by minute, she suddenly has dim flashbacks of her parents, and sets out to find them -- with her orange-and-white pals in tow, it goes without saying.

Albert Brooks is, of course, back as the voice of nebbishy Marlin, who’s grown a lot in the year since the last story took place, though he’s still overly protective of Nemo. (Hayden Rolence takes over the role of the tyke since original actor Alexander Gould is a twentysomething now.)

This movie, again written and directed by Andrew Stanton, focuses less on the trip than the destination: the (fictional) Marine Life Institute on the California coast. A sort of sea-life utopia with a dark undertow, it’s a place where injured fish are snatched up from the ocean, rehabilitated and returned to the sea -- unless they’re needed for an aquarium in Cleveland, that is.

The human workers are rather blasé about how they treat the critters, and some of the fishies have acquired off-kilter personalities during their confinement, such as a lonely giant oyster who’ll talk your ears (if you have them) off. Sigourney Weaver provides the soothing voice of the tourist park’s narrator, lulling us into a false sense of benevolence.

Among the new characters is Destiny (Kaitlin Olson), a nearsighted whale shark; Bailey (Ty Burrell), a beluga whale convinced his echolocation ability is on the fritz; and Fluke and Rudder (Idris Elba, Dominic West), a pair of lackadaisical sea lions, former residents of the marine institute who now serve as a sort of territorial Greek chorus.

Undoubtedly the film’s finest creation is Hank, a cantankerous octopus voiced by Ed O’Neill. A longtime captive of the marine center, Hank agrees to help Dory find her parents in return for a one-way ticket to a quiet life in a glass box. He can change his color and contort his slippery body to camouflage himself against virtually any object -- not to mention manipulate human tools with hilarious aplomb.

The movie’s a little too overly reliant on slapsticky action to carry the plot forward. I lost count of the number of times Dory & Co. jumped or were dunked from one body of water to another, from a sippy cup to child’s sand pail to a janitor’s mop bucket, without ill effects. You just have to roll with it.

(A former aquarium hobbyist, my brain kept screaming: “But those sudden changes in temperature, pH level and salinity would be deadly!”)

Despite the fact it’s nowhere near as accomplished as its predecessor, I wasn’t disappointed by “Finding Dory.” The second trip is rarely as exciting as the original excursion, but you can ride the current of warm feelings from the last time.

It felt nice to be back in good company, going on another adventure with the gang. Speaking of which: make sure to stay all the way through the credits.

Video review: "A Most Violent Year"

Young writer/director J.C. Chandor made the wonderful but little-seen “Margin Call” in 2011, then followed it up with the virtually wordless “All Is Lost” starring Robert Redford, earning a well-deserved Oscar nomination for screenplay in the process.

After such a dazzling career start, I was expecting great things out of his third feature film, “A Most Violent Year.” But while most other critics found this 1980s crime-and-punishment drama worthy, I was put off by its circuitous plotting and unrealized themes.

Oscar Isaac plays Abel Morales, owner of a heating oil business serving the New York City area. It’s an industry rife with corruption, grudges, protection money and outright thievery, and nobody keeps their hands entirely clean – including Abel. He’s about to buy a fuel terminal that will give him a huge leg up, but challenges abound.

His trucks are being routinely hijacked and the oil stolen. Meanwhile, the local district attorney (David Oyelowo) is breathing down his neck with pending charges, which causes the financing for his big deal to teeter. And his Lady MacBeth-ish wife (Jessica Chastain), the daughter of an infamous mobster, chastises Abel for refusing to fight fire with fire.

It’s a whole lot of intriguing, disparate elements that never really solidify into a coherent whole. Abel is presented as reluctant to use violence to get what he wants, but as he is the only person in his realm who thinks this way, it makes him seem hopelessly naïve and impotent. The wife character, meanwhile, feels like an amalgam of other tough molls we’ve seen in film noir pictures over the years.

Chandor avoided the “sophomore slump” that often affects promising filmmakers on their second outing. But given the heights of his fledgling career, his third effort registers as a major disappointment.

“A Most Violent Year” is being released with solid video extras, starting with a feature-length commentary track by Chandor and two of producers. There are also three making-of featurettes focusing on production, the original concept for the film and a conversation with Isaac and Chastain. Plus, deleted scenes and outtakes.

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Review: "This Is 40"

Judd Apatow knows how to create amusing scenes, but as a storyteller he’s hopeless.

The prolific and popular comedy writer/producer/director employs a familiar circle of actors who are encouraged to ad-lib their scenes prodigiously. These are then linked together in an editing process that employs all the restraint of Homer Simpson in a donut factory.

For a sketch comedy show, that’s a great M.O., but for making movies it’s the equivalent of diarrhea.
His last directorial effort, “Funny People,” had a terrific first 80 minutes and then flushed itself down the toilet with an indulgent, overlong visit with the main character’s ex-girlfriend, played by Apatow’s real-life wife, Leslie Mann.

His latest, “This Is 40,” moves Mann from the supporting role to the spotlight, with Paul Rudd playing her husband as the pair deal with twin monster-sized mid-life crises.

Its demise is not quite so systematic as “People,” since you can’t pinpoint an exact moment when the film runs off the rails. But gradually you come to realize you’re trapped watching a bunch of people you don’t like who stopped being funny a while ago.

Knowing Apatow’s estrangement from the concept of brevity, I resolved to go into “This Is 40” not fretting about its length, and just let the story come to me. Finally, when it seemed like it was reaching a point of natural denouement, I looked at my watch. Just over an hour had gone by – meaning I was still less than halfway through the film’s interminable 134 minutes.

Some of the film’s best moments come from the supporting characters, of which there are plenty, played by Apatow mainstays like Jason Segel as well as newcomers like Albert Brooks, Lena Dunham, Melissa McCarthy and Chris O’Dowd. (Many of the latter have appeared in projects Apatow produced.) They get to come on stage, have a nice moment of mirth or pathos, and then dance off. Brooks in particular shines.

The problem is the main characters, Debbie and Pete. They start out as quirky and end up as contemptible. When bad things begin to happen, I found myself cheering on the forces arrayed against them.

Example: their tween daughter gets caught in a nasty Facebook fight with a boy, and then Debbie confronts the online oppressor and browbeats him into crying. Later the boy’s mother (McCarthy) gives Pete a tongue-lashing, and he responds with a violent, misogynistic screed so black-hearted that I rooted for her to bury her fist deep in his sinuses.

For a pair of folks who are both about to turn 40, Pete and Debbie are remarkably juvenile emotionally. Their relationship feels like an ironic sparring between college chums that never progressed into any real emotional depth. Love is more conceptual than operational for them.

They’re indifferent parents at best, greeting their two daughters with harried looks of exasperation, as if having kids is the ultimate downer. Apatow offspring Maude and Iris play the kids, turning this movie into a championship-level nepotism jubilee. The Apatow young’uns are not bad performers, but their dad’s screenplay only provides them with one speed/volume at which to play: the older one is constantly hollering, the younger one always teasing.

The family is faced with some pretty dire financial problems, but it’s hard to summon much sympathy for them, since Debbie and Pete each seem to work about five hours a week. Meanwhile, they spend like bandits – expensive cars, weekend getaways, personal trainers, etc.

He runs a small record label that is unsuccessfully flogging a nostalgia rock act, and she owns a fashion boutique where she occasionally drops by to check in on her two warring employees (Megan Fox and Charlyne Yi), one of whom is stealing.

The humor is pretty raunchy, although as with other Apatow flicks sex is more discussed than performed. Many scenes end up feeling more icky than amusing – as when Pete goes spread-eagle and insists Debbie inspect a growth in his… um, nethers.

There are some funny moments in “This Is 40,” but what there is tends to be clustered toward the beginning. Until Apatow learns how to get a grasp on story structure, his movies will continue to wallow in self-indulgence.

1.5 stars out of four

Video review: "Drive"

Director Nicolas Winding Refn won the best director's trophy at last year's Cannes Film Festival for "Drive," and it's not hard to see why. It's a highly stylized take on the traditional heist movie, with a protagonist (Ryan Gosling) who is never named and barely speaks.

There is dialogue in "Drive," most notably from Albert Brooks playing a local mob kingpin whose chatty, congenial surface hides a razor-ship killer instinct.
But for the most part, this is a movie built on visuals, where long gazes and pulsing music substitute a distinct mood instead of the characters explaining to us what's happening.

The driver works as a mechanic in a broken-down car shop run by Shannon (Bryan Cranston), who's got a gimpy leg and a chip on his shoulder. Shannon sets him up doing car crashes for Hollywood movies. On his own, the driver has his own side gig: wheel man for robberies and such.

Things grow complicated with the arrival of Irene (Carey Mulligan), the new neighbor in his apartment building. She's got a young son, a husband in jail, and trouble written all over her.

For a guy whose entire existence is about carefully managing risk, having his carefully ordered world twisted inside-out plays hell on the driver. His placid demeanor begins to crack, as he finds himself thrown off his own map.

The film feels unstuck from time. Driver wears a gold scorpion jacket that could have come from the late '50s, and Brooks' character could have been a contemporary of Bugsy Siegal. The music and credit titles are out of the 1980s, and the cars range from the muscle era to contemporary.

With its sleek throwback atmosphere -- think "Miami Vice" put through a time-warp blender -- punctuated by moments of horrid violence, "Drive" is a crime drama in overdrive.

Video features are decent enough, though one feels the filmmakers never made an effort to find their high gear when it came to giving the goodies to its audience.

There are four making-of featurettes: "I Drive," "Under the Hood," "Driver and Irene" and "Cut to the Chase." There is also an interview with Refn and ... that's it.

Movie: 3.5 stars out of four
Extras: 2 stars

Review: "Drive"

"Drive" is a movie stuck out of time. For at least the first 30 minutes, I was convinced the story was set in the 1980s. The plethora of vintage cars, an '80s-ish soundtrack and the gold-on-white scorpion jacket worn by the main character seemed to spring forth from "Miami Vice" crossed with "Less Than Zero."
Even the titles are in neon-hued cursive.

But eventually the presence of cell phones and a late-model Mustang clue us in that the time is the present. Director Nicolas Winding Refn constructs a world in which eras meld into each other, so mobsters seemingly from the 1950s do not seem out of place.

Like "Valhalla Riding," Refn's last film, "Drive" is long on mood and sleek visuals, and the narrative seems merely a slender frame upon which to hang the director's highly stylized dressings. It's basically a tone poem set against the backdrop of a fairly standard crime-heist-gone-awry frame, punctuated by over-the-top violence that burst a carefully-cultivated bubble of serenity.

Ryan Gosling, as the never-named protagonist, utters very little dialogue. He's a mechanic who moonlights as a Hollywood stunt driver, and his other other job is wheelman for hire. He lays out his rules simply but with certainty: He will take his clients wherever they want to go and give them a five-minute window for whatever they need to do. He will carry no gun, and one tick on his watch after five minutes and he's gone.

The driver is very good behind the wheel of a car, of course, but we suspect there are others equally skilled. He also seems more than capable when a tussle is necessary, without knowing any fancy martial arts or hand-to-hand combat skills. No, the driver's main ability is to focus on whatever he's doing with a ferocious singularity, so that in that moment it is very hard for anyone to match against him.

Forty years ago, it's the sort of role Steve McQueen would've played.

Things seem to going well for the driver. He's got a good reputation on movie sets for getting the right crash shot without any wrinkles. And his boss at the garage, Shannon (Bryan Cranston), wants to set him up on the racing circuit with the backing of a benevolent local wiseguy named Bernie, played with chilling congeniality by funnyman Albert Brooks.

Then at his new apartment he bumps into neighbor Irene (Carey Mulligan), a single mother to young Benicio (Kaden Leos). Their courtship, if you can even call it that, is a series of long glances and shy exchanges of pleasantries. Somehow, with a few slow-mo shots and evocative performances by his two stars, director Refn manages to imply a depth of feeling that isn't written down on any page.

Then Irene's husband Standard (Oscar Isaac) is released from prison, setting up a series of debacles that put everything at risk.

The driver's smooth mien begins to crack, as his entire life is a series of highly calculated risks. But this new chaos is something new and troubling to him. It's something he can't control, and that unnerves him.

Hossein Amini wrote the script for "Drive," based on the book by James Sallis, unread by me. Somehow I suspect the text for this movie wouldn't have amounted to much without the sumptuous, occasionally distracting style of director Refn. It very much reminded me of the work of Michael Mann, whose visuals could overpower a bare-bones story.

(Refn won the best director award at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival.)

But this is the sort of film that says much more than the scant spoken words of its anti-hero. Like the scorpion totem he wears on his back, the driver cannot deny the hardened core of his nature. That allows him to accomplish things few men can, but the cost is exacted in doors that are forever closed to him.

3 stars out of four