Review: Ant-Man

by Trevor Kirkendall
★★★

We’re about to embark in a phase of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe that will make or break the studio’s ability to pull in hundreds of millions of dollars with each outing. This is a phase consisting of many of the studio’s lesser-known properties. We saw the studio’s success last summer with “Guardians of the Galaxy.” This summer brings us “Ant-Man.” Non-comic book readers such as myself will probably take one look at that title and think it’s nonsense. Despite it’s goofy sounding title, Marvel once again succeeds in producing a highly entertaining film.

Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) is a convicted felon being released from prison after a three-year stint. He wants to live an honest life now for the sake of his daughter, otherwise his ex-wife Maggie (Judy Greer) and her fiancé Paxton (Bobby Cannavale) may not let him anywhere near her. But it’s tough to find a job after being in prison. So he quickly turns back to being a burglar with the help of his goofy friend Luis (Michael Peña). They end up breaking into the home of Dr. Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) who has some kind of incredible shrinking suit hiding in a safe. When Scott puts it on, he’s shrunken down to the size of an ant.

Turns out, Pym would now like Scott’s help since he successfully stole the suit. Pym would like Scott to become what he calls the Ant-Man in order to prevent a copy of the shrinking technology from being sold by his former protégée Darren Cross (Corey Stoll). Pym thinks that selling this technology to governments could lead to chaos in the world. Pym and Scott along with Pym’s daughter Hope (Evangeline Lilly) plan a heist in order to break into the company and steal the technology from Cross.

There are probably folks out there who know who Ant-Man is, but there will be many more people in the audience who don’t. We do need an introduction, but there’s nothing more boring than a standard origin story. “Ant-Man” appears to have been conceived as a comical heist movie first, with the Scott Lang/Ant-Man character dropped in after the major plot points were already worked out. That’s what makes “Ant-Man” such a compelling film to watch. It’s a well thought out plot without seeming so heavy handed.

This does leave the film lacking in character development just slightly. It’s not that the characters in “Ant-Man” are boring or uninteresting, it’s that they’re too familiar. There are so many similarities between this film and some of Marvel’s earlier works where there’s barely a distinction between the films anymore. At times, “Ant-Man” seems very similar to the original “Iron Man” film. That’s not a horrible comparison since “Iron Man” is still probably one of Marvel’s finest offerings. But Marvel needs to look into diversifying their origin stories a little bit, especially with so many coming over the next several years.

Character aside, “Ant-Man” is loaded with a lot of sharp and witty humor thanks to the talented group of writers Edgar Wright and Joe Cornish with additional material from Adam McKay and Rudd. There are many parts of this film that have Wright’s DNA all over it (no surprise since he was initially hired to direct the film as well). Wright is one of the sharpest comedic minds in Hollywood today and it shows in his writing. McKay and Rudd added their own take on the material; most likely bringing the Scott Lang character into someone easier for Rudd to play. Rudd shines as Lang and he’s a perfect choice to play the part. That loveable every-man shtick he brings to all of his roles is largely left out for most of the picture, but he brings it out at all the right times. It’s a balanced performance from Rudd – one of the better offerings of his career, too.

Director Peyton Reed (“Yes Man”) is comfortably in control of the film despite having never worked in the action/sci-fi genre before. I don’t take any real issues with his handling of the film, but I can’t help but think how great this film could have been had Wright been sitting in the director’s chair. He left the project over creative differences with the studio, and he’s not the first person (nor will he be the last) to tell Marvel, “no.” But that leads me to wonder how in-control Reed is of this film, or if Kevin Feige is standing over his should dropping some not-so-subtle hints about what he and the studio would like to see.

Oh well. We can’t judge the film we wanted to see; we can only judge the film we did see, and Peyton Reed’s “Ant-Man” is a well-conceived heist film, filled with all the right amounts of witty humor. I had zero expectations for this and didn’t know what to expect, but it certainly is entertaining and a worthy addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Marvel seems to have found an origin story formula they like and they’re sticking to it. It’s working fine for now, but they need to expand their creative boundaries a little more moving forward. Otherwise, their forthcoming slate of features is going to get old real quick.

Review: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

By. Joe Moss
★★

Well, I can safely say that Peter Jackson's 2013 continuation of the beloved J.R.R. Tolkein classic "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" is far and away better than the first part, "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" released last year. The pace of this movie is on par with the Fellowship trilogy; the graphics and cinematography are amazing (as is expected from Peter Jackson's Wingnut Films company). What is not amazing...the length of the film once again deters from the plot and the overall enjoy-ability.

The plot picks up where the "Unexpected Journey" left off; albeit, with a slight delay. There is a short flashback sequence in the first ten minutes of the film showing Gandolf (Ian McKellen) and Thorin (Richard Armitage) meeting in the Prancing Pony in Bree. This flashback serves to remind the moviegoers about the purpose of the story (#1 of the unnecessary scenes in the movie) to rightfully regain Thorin his place among the dwarf-lords as the King under the Mountian. After this dalliance, Jackson immediately switches back to Bilbo and the group being chased through the mountains by the Orcs and a large shape-shifting bear. A horrible transitional sequence if I say so myself.

The troop of thirteen finally reaches Mirkwood, and Gandolf deaprts to fulfill an obligation to the Elf Queen, Lady Galadriel (Kate Blanchett). Bilbo and the Dwarfin troop are told to take the Elvin Road through the forest and "do not stray" from the path. We are immersed into the memorable interplay of the Moria spiders who are invading Mirkwood and finally re-introduced to a character from the Fellowship series--Legolas (Orlando Bloom) as well as the captain of the guard, Tauriel (Evangeline Lilly). The elfin actors arrive into the plot with commanding presence, skillful swordplay and deftness of the foot. The travelers/trespassers are taken into custody and brought forth to the king. After a hilarious escape sequence--and the second bit of action (thankful to keeping the audience awake) involving Orcs, elves, and half-drowning dwarfs--we arrive at the boarders of Mirkwood. To cross the lake, the troop enlists the help of a man, Bard (Luke Evans) to smuggle them through Lake-town to be closer to the Lonely Mountian (Erebor).

To not give too much more away, the troop finally arrives at the mountain, Bilbo manages to get into the Hidden Door of Erebor to attempt to steal the Arkenstone for Thorin from the sleeping dragon usurper. Thus ensues a great interplay between the other character who upstages the hobbit and dwarf main characters, Smaug (Benedict Cumberbatch in one of his two roles in the film). Smaug (surely an allusion to Smug) is full of himself and his self-assuredness is to be his ultimate downfall.....but this all seems anti-climatic at beast since it took so long for us to reach the point of the entire Hobbit story--the showdown between Bilbo, Thorin, Bard and Smaug.

Peter Jackson has truly taken a well-known story and tried to fill 6+ hours of film in a story that should have taken 3 hours at maximum to do it justice--maybe 4 if he wanted to make two parts or an "extended edition" as was done with Fellowship. He was truly overzealous to the point of ridiculous with the long drawn out marching sequences that worked in Fellowship, yet seem contrite in "The Hobbit." What allowed him to make three movies for the Fellowship was that it was THREE BOOKS and people expected him to do it justice. The Hobbit is only 300 pages in total length. For Jackson to make so long a film sequence is maddening. He is fluffing  the entire script with information from The Silmarillion (Tolkein's book on Elfish history), back-stories from the Fellowship, as well as from the Tolkein Reader set of short stories AND adding characters into the Hobbit who are not supposed to be there--remember Legolas and Tauriel...they are not even in the story--just adding drama. The whole "crossed-lovers"  interplay between Tauriel and the Dwarf, Kili (Aiden Turner) does not occur either and just serves to add unnecessary drama and time to the script.

Again, I would like to state that the scenery and the cinematography is gorgeous, but the sequences suffer from poor editing. I almost feel as though Jackson did not allow the editors (lead by Jabez Olssen who worked on all of the Fellowship) to perform their job properly. You end up with many poor transitions throughout the film, namely every time that Gandolf reappears in the plot almost seems as a jolt to the system. There is not the smoothness that we expect from a Peter Jackson film. Some of the minor characters from the book--especially Beorn the shape-shifter and Bolg the Orc--are given too much individual screen time that adds absolutely nothing to the plot as a whole.

Did I like this movie better than the first part? YES. Do I love this movie, sadly NO.