New podcast at The Film Yap

We've got our new podcast up at The Film Yap!

This week's show is about animated movies that are made for adults, like "9," "Wizards" and "Persepolis."

http://www.thefilmyap.com/2009/09/09/adult-animation/

What I did with my settlement check

KARMA UPDATE: A few hours after I made this video, I received a letter in the mail from my mortgage company. It said my escrow was in overpayment, so I would be receiving a refund check that was nearly the same amount as the settlement check I donated.

I now believe in karma.

UPDATE, PART DEUX: A couple of other sources have linked to my post or given their own take, which you can read yourself:

Ruth's blog
Indy SPJ

Review: "9"

"9" is a cyberpunk fantasia disguised as an animated children's movie. It's also one of the boldest and most original films of 2009.

And along with "District 9," it's the second movie to come out in the last month based on a short film by an unknown director that was expanded to feature length with the support of an established filmmaker (and with the numeral 9 in the title, to boot). In this case, Tim Burton liked the 2005 Oscar-nominated short film by Shane Acker so much, he signed on as a producer for a full-size "9."

The world Acker has created -- along with screenwriter Pamela Pettler and an army of computer animators -- is a dystopian apocalypse, in which all of mankind has been wiped out by war. The only critters moving about are these funny-looking puppet creatures with big, mechanical eyes and a slapdash of zippers and buttons holding their burlap torsos together.

These are stitchpunks (though they're never named as such), the last remnant of humanity, created by a dying scientist with a terrible burden to bear.

Even though we're used to being dazzled by each new CG animation feature, the textures and tactile quality of "9" really jump out at you. Despite having no names, only numbers, the stitchpunks are readily distinguished from one another due to the animators' minute attention to detail.

As the story opens, 9 (voice of Elijah Wood), the newest of his kind, awakens in the dead scientist's laboratory. He finds a strange device, and takes it with him as he ventures out into the urban wasteland. (The setting seems to be WWII-era London, or what's left of it.)

There he encounters 2 (Martin Landau), an old tinkerer who fixes 9's voice transmitter so he can talk. But they're attacked by a fearsome mechanical feline that makes off with 2 and the scientist's totem.

In short order, 9 encounters the rest of his kind. 5 (John C. Reilly) is one-eyed and friendly, while 8 is a lumbering bully who barely speaks. There's also 6 (Crispin Glover, who also sings a song for the soundtrack), the half-crazed oracle; 3 and 4, the symbiotic twins who compile lost human knowledge; and 7 (Jennifer Connelly), the heroic knight-errant of the bunch.

Leading them, ostensibly, is 1 (Christopher Plummer), though he seems more interested in hiding from the threatening machines than challenging them.

I don't want to reveal more, since part of the film's delight is discovering the frightening implications of the movie's themes, and what they say about humanity.

If there's a criticism to be leveled, it's that the opening 20 minutes or so feels rushed, as if it was edited to introduce the action scenes as quickly as possible so younger audience members wouldn't grow bored. Although "9" is perfectly appropriate for older children (say, 7 and up), I am certain adults will find it most satisfying as a film-going experience.

After watching this movie, I was astonished to learn that it has been given a PG-13 rating by the Motion Picture Association of America. The mild depictions of violence are wholly undeserving of anything harsher than a PG.

Perhaps it's the dark tone and post-apocalyptic setting that negatively affected the ratings board. But these are also integral parts of what makes "9" the best animated film so far this year.

3.5 stars

DVD review: "Crank 2: High Voltage"

Imagine if you had a pair of 14-year-old boys who had never gone to school, never read a book, and they just stayed inside and watched TV and played video games, and that was all they knew of the world. "Crank 2: High Voltage" is the movie they would make.

This isn't to say that writing/directing duo Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, who launched their careers with the first "Crank," are developmentally stunted individuals. They just make movies for people who are.

Indeed, in wading through the healthy set of extras that come with the "Crank 2" special-edition DVD, Neveldine/Taylor (as they bill themselves) come across as a wise-cracking, hip and smart duo who are fully aware that they're making preposterous action flicks for the attention deficit disordered.

At one point in the feature-length commentary track, they state unequivocally that one of their major plot points -- having to do with rubbing bodies together to create friction -- is complete bunk. "If you really believed this, then thanks for your $10," one of them says.

Hey, when it comes to exploitation filmmaking, at least they're honest -- and entertaining.
Now, you might think that the fact that grim hitman Chev Chelios (Jason Statham) died at the end of the first "Crank" might be an impediment to a sequel. But that's an easy fix -- some Chinese mobsters snatch his body from where it fell out of a helicopter, take out his heart and stick in an artificial one.

Like the first movie, Chev needs regular jolts of electricity to keep his fake ticker going, so he's forever sticking his finger in electrical outlets, grabbing hold of transformers or getting zapped by jumper cables attached to his nipple and tongue.

His adversaries are an endless array of racist portrayals of minorities who fall down with the ease of video game bogeymen.

In addition to the commentary, there's a 50-minute making-of documentary, featurette of continuity errors, theatrical trailer and a digital copy of the film.

Movie: 1 star
Extras: 3.5 stars

Reeling Backward: "Robin and Marian"

Like "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp," which was the Reeling Backward feature a few weeks ago, "Robin and Marian" is about growing old. Rather than using an unknown protagonist, the 1976 film boldly chose one of the most familiar cinematic heroes, Robin Hood, for a meditation on death and dying.

In Robin's case, he's not so much afraid of death as dying without a purpose. In the final scene, Robin has defeated the Sheriff of Nottingham in personal combat, but Marian, the love of his life, has fatally poisoned him (and herself, too). At first he is enraged, but then understanding washes over him: "I'll never have another day like this again, will I?"

Sometimes you have to die to allow your legend to live on.

Robin and Marian were played by Sean Connery and Audrey Hepburn, who were ages 45 and 46, respectively. Connery had worked steadily, but was in between his glory days as James Bond and his resurgence that began with 1987's "The Untouchables." Hepburn hadn't made a movie in nine years, and would only have three more film roles, all small supporting performances.

The story opens 20 years after the heyday of Robin and his merry men. He left Marian and Sherwood Forest to follow King Richard the Lionheart on the Crusades. Unlike the usual portrayals of Richard as a good and noble ruler, here he's played by Richard Harris as a power-mad despot.

In the opening sequence, he orders Robin to storm a ruined castle defended only by an old man and some children. When he refuses, Robin is thrown into chains along with his faithful friend Little John (played by Nicol Williamson, who would go on to play Merlin in "Excalibur" a few years later). Unfortunately for Richard, the old man contemptuously throws an arrow at him and, in some kind of freak display of physics, pierces him through the neck. He dies of his wounds shortly thereafter. (This account is actually fairly similar to the actual way Richard the Lionheart died.)

Robin and John make their way back to Sherwood, and chance upon Will Scarlett (Denholm Elliott) and Friar Tuck (Ronnie Barker). From them he learns that Marian joined the nunnery, and is set to be jailed because Prince John (Ian Holm) is in a dispute with the Pope and has ordered the suspension of all religious services.

Robin "rescues" Marian, which is to say he forcibly stops her from turning herself into the Sheriff's men by conking her over the head. From there the film builds toward the big showdown with the Sheriff (Robert Shaw).

Director Richard Lester paints a picture of faded glory, with the explicit lesson that trying to hang onto your youth is bound to end in the disaster. Robin is deluded about his own diminished ability to in combat -- a fight against a handful of soldiers on the Nottingham battlements devolves into a pair of middle-aged men holding their sides and huffing with exhaustion.

There's a great scene where Marian tends to Robin's wounds, and as she removes his shirt she sighs and talks wistfully about how young and sweet his body used to be. Now it's a flabby stretch of years and scars. But Robin is defiant: "You think I'm old? Old and gray?!"

The big fight scene between the Sheriff and Robin is presented not as a triumphant battle royale, but a pathetic attempt by a has-been to hang onto his own myth of greatness. Even the Sheriff pleads with him to give up the pitiful display.

Made after Vietnam and Watergate, when the country was tired of war and deceit, "Robin and Marian" is a sobering document about clutching too desperately on the past. We were ready to look ahead.

3.5 stars

New this week

Things are a little slower. We're into the dregs of September, which tends to be one of the worst times for movie releases. An astonishing amount of stuff that is coming out isn't getting screened for critics -- never a good sign.

I will have a review of "9", an animated film coming out on Wednesday -- 9/9/09, don'cha know -- directed by Shane Acker and starring the voices of Elijah Wood, Jennifer Connelly and Christopher Plummer.

The DVD review will be "Crank: High Voltage."

I'll also have classical film reviews of "Robin and Marian" and "Asphalt Jungle." Several people have pointed out that the Reeling Backward has featured a lot more movies of a recent vintage lately, especially stuff from the 1970s and early '80s. I guess my viewing habits have just inclined that way lately.

Hilarious "Guild" video

Just had to post this excruciatingly funny music video from the folks behind "The Guild," a Web series centered around massive multiplayer online (MMO) games. I was a World of Warcraft player myself for nearly three years, so all the references are funny to me. Even if you don't get most of them, still pretty funny.

The singer there is Felicia Day, a super-talented actress who's mostly done Web stuff but has broken through into a few film and TV roles. Hope to see more of her.