Review: Vacation

by Trevor Kirkendall
½★

Dear woman sitting next to me at the screening of “Vacation,”

You are the reason why I love going to the movies, even to the absurdly terrible films like “Vacation.” You see, while I was sitting in the theater hating – seriously hating – the movie, you were sitting next to me cackling at every ridiculous joke that came across the screen. From the legitimately funny situational jokes, to the slapstick scenes that made me shake my head and sigh in disgust. At least one of us was enjoying the film. And I enjoyed your role in the event that was my evening more so than I did any single frame of “Vacation.”

What I’m not saying is that your opinion of the movie is wrong and mine is right. Our opinions of movies are right in our own eyes, and our eyes only. You’ll go home and tell all your friends how hilarious it is, and I’ll be posting to the readers on my website that it’s in the running for worst film of the year. Your friends will choose to agree or disagree with you, and my readers will do the same. As a matter of fact, I’m quite certain people tend to disagree with my opinion more often than they agree with it, a fact that I’m more than okay with.

I found “Vacation” to be largely unfunny, contrary to the vocalization you were making throughout the film. Again, I’m so very glad you vocalized your enjoyment; had you not, I may have stood up from my seat and attempted to stick my head through the concrete wall.

Judging from the fact that you looked just slightly older than me, I’m going to guess your are aware that this movie is a reboot of the 1983 film of the same name from the late-and-great-and-inimitable Harold Ramis. But did you hear the group of high school kids behind us praising the film as the funniest thing they’ve ever seen? Do you think they know this is a reboot? I think the original film had far much more heart than this one, which made it much more enjoyable.

I thought Ed Helms playing the role of Rusty Griswold was a pretty solid choice. He’s a gifted comedian, and the things that make him a joy to watch were on full display throughout the film. But he seemed to phone it in. Only in one or two scenes did he come across looking like the son of Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase). Other than that, he might has well have been playing the role of Andy Bernard from his former TV series “The Office.” Numerous actors have portrayed the character as a kid, and they all brought with them a different take on it. But they all felt like the son of Clark in each outing. That’s not the case here. We only accept that he is Clark’s son because we’re told he’s Clark’s son.

Everything about this film looked like amateurs produced it. You would think that if someone was going to reboot a beloved franchise, they’d at least attempt to retain some of that same soul, but I found none of it. It was just one joke after the other, like is a comedian just standing there rambling without any segue. What’s lacking here is anything even remotely resembling a story. Sure, you could say the story is Rusty Griswold wanting to take his wife Debbie (Christina Applegate) and his two sons James and Kevin (Skyler Gisondo and Steele Stebbins) on an epic vacation to Walley World, just like he did as a kid with his family. That would be the plot of the film, all right, but there’s nothing else to it. Everything is just one poor joke after another, never building on anything that precedes it.

All these other characters are familiar stereotypes lacking any kind of growth and development as this sorry excuse for a story moves on. James is a dorky kid and Kevin is a foul mouthed little brother. Hearing the youngest son say phrases that were well above his age was funny the first couple of times, but quickly wore out its humor. The only time I found the film to have any ounce of legitimate humor was when Helms channeled his inner Chevy Chase. When he looked like the grown up son of Clark Griswold, the film was funny. Unfortunately, this only amounts to about two scenes throughout the entire film.

The thing about a movie like this is that it’s the product of years of market research and numerous test screenings. Which jokes play well to the masses? Which scenes get the biggest responses from the audience? I believe that a movie should just exist on its own without the need of test screenings. Either the film plays well, or it doesn’t. Instead, the final project is hacked-to-pieces mess that technically qualifies as a “motion picture” because a major studio financed it. There’s nothing artistic about this film at all.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” is probably what you’re thinking right now. “You just said ‘artistic’ about an R-rated comedy that first introduced itself with a red band trailer earlier this year. There’s nothing artistic about that!” Well, that’s true. I shouldn’t be going into a movie like “Vacation” expecting an Oscar-worthy experience. And I don’t. But I do expect everything released to be good. That’s not too much to ask. The basic pillars of storytelling need to be followed each and every time. I didn’t get that from this reboot of “Vacation” at all.

That responsibility sits square on the shoulders of the writer/directors John Francis Daley (an actor, primarily, as seen on the TV series “Bones”) and Jonathan M. Goldstein. How these two conned their way into writing and directing this abomination is beyond me. And they’ve somehow worked their way into writing the script for the upcoming Spider-Man reboot for Marvel. How did that happen? To you, they may have cranked out one of the funniest movies of the summer. Again, that’s completely your opinion. One you’re absolutely entitled to and that is perfectly okay. I’m not saying you’re wrong. But wouldn’t this have been even more memorable if there was a decent story tying all these funny jokes together? Would the jokes have had more of an impact if the characters were at least half way developed? The idea about focusing a “Vacation” story on the adult son of Clark Griswold is intriguing, but fails miserably. I wish we could talk a year from now and see if you remember any of the jokes or plot points in the film. Maybe you would. If you do, fantastic. If not, then that would prove my point.

Maybe I am getting too carried away here. After all, the vast majority of the moviegoers in the screening seemed to enjoy themselves. Especially you! I am in no way mocking your opinion here. Just stating what I saw in this film. This is probably not a great review of the film itself since a movie critic shouldn’t get so wrapped up with words “I” and “me," words which I have overused in this review. This was merely a way for me to express my opinion of the movie without being cruel or angry about it. In fact, when I think back to this movie, I’m going to remember your infectious laugh more than anything. So for that, I thank you. Take some comfort in knowing that your enjoyment made me enjoy the experience, which gives this film a bonus half-star rating.

I hope to see you again in another terrible movie sometime in the future.

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: Minions

by Trevor Kirkendall
★★★

It’s tough to successfully pull off a spinoff film of secondary characters from an already popular movie franchise. The cute and loveable Minions from the “Despicable Me” films seem like a prime candidate for their own standalone film since they’re arguably the most loved part of the films, especially with the kids. No kid walks around quoting Gru, but even full grown adults walk around quoting – or at least attempting to – quote the Minions. Their own film “Minions” does succeed at standing on its own, and there’s really no other word to describe the film other than cute.

“Minions” shows us where these little creatures came from. They’ve been on the planet since the dawn of time. If you’ve seen the trailer, they’ve already covered the entire back-story so let’s skip that part. The Minions find themselves without a boss to serve, and without a boss they don’t know what to do. One Minion, Kevin, gets the bright idea to go out searching for a new boss in order to save all the Minions. He is accompanied on his journey by two other Minions, Stuart and Bob. They set out and end up in New York in the late 1960s.

Once there, they set out to find a boss. They fall into the favor of the world’s greatest super villain Scarlett Overkill (Sandra Bullock) and her husband  Herb (Jon Hamm). Scarlett wants to be Queen of England and tasks the Minions with stealing the Queen’s crown. If they can get her the crown, she’ll reward them by allowing all the other Minions to come and work for her. If they fail, well, she’ll just have to destroy them. And since Minions are involved, we all know that shenanigans and hilarity ensue.

There isn’t a whole lot to say about “Minions” and I don’t take any real issue with anything in the film. It’s definitely a kid’s movie, first and foremost. Some movies, like the first two “Despicable Me” films, tend to be sprinkled with some adult humor to keep the parents laughing. That type of humor is missing from “Minions.” Director Pierre Coffin (creator of the Minions and “Despicable Me,” who also provides the voices for all the Minions) knows who in his audience loves the Minions and has made this film just for them.

A parent accompanying their kids to this film could find his or herself a little bored with the film, especially if they’re the type who finds the Minions annoying. But how can anyone hate the Minions? They’re the best part of “Despicable Me” and take center stage in this film. There’s just enough plot to move the story forward. It never falls victim to too much dead time or filler. It’s easy to follow so the adults to know what’s happening, but not so dense that the youngest viewers in the audience loose track or find themselves bored.

“Minions” doesn’t try to portray these guys any differently than in their early films. They’re the Minions. They have their own movie. And it’s pretty much exactly what you’d expect it to be. If you love them, there’s nothing to dislike here. It’s a much simpler and more lighthearted story than “Despicable Me,” but this one’s for the kids. All they want to do is laugh every time a Minion opens his mouth to say something. “Minions” is 90 minutes of just that.

Review: Inside Out

by Trevor Kirkendall

★★★★

“Inside Out” shows Pixar in a triumphant return to form. It’s one of the most original and innovative stories to ever come out of the studio, and it couldn’t come a better time. Pixar has had a long history of issuing original content to the cinemas, but after two mediocre sequels there were some questioning if they had lost some of their creative power. Those doubts seem to have been resolved, at least for now, because “Inside Out” could very well be the best film Pixar has ever done.

The concept revolves around those tiny little voices in your head. The film personifies five of the basic human emotions: Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust, and Sadness (voiced by Amy Poehler, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, Mindy Kaling, and Phyllis Smith respectively, making this one of the greatest voice casts ever assembled for an animated feature). Each emotion is responsible for bringing out that specific emotion from Riley (Kaitlyn Dias), the 11-year-old girl whose mind they inhabit.

Just like in all of Pixar’s films, all is right with the world until it isn’t. In this case, Riley and her parents move from their Midwestern home to San Francisco. This causes all the memories Riley has to be affected by Sadness, something Joy doesn’t want to see happen. But an accident within the emotions’ headquarters sends Joy and Sadness into the far away regions of Riley’s long-term memory storage leaving them unable to control her emotions. That leaves Fear, Anger, and Disgust to lead the way. With everything falling apart, Joy and Sadness have to race back to headquarters before Riley’s entire personality is altered.

This is a genius premise for a film, and the first logline released by Disney several years ago made it immediately intriguing. Not often do the promises of great ideas turn into great films. Pixar has really made themselves synonymous with quality filmmaking over the years despite a couple missteps along the way. They’ve really outdone themselves with “Inside Out.” It may very well go down as their best film. We’ll need to marinade on that one for a while before handing it that title, but it makes a very strong case.

For my money, Pixar’s finest film is “Up” which was directed by the great Pete Docter who also lends his leadership to “Inside Out.” It’s no wonder both of these films are among the studio’s best. Docter knows how to pull the best emotions out of his scripts as evident by full-grown adults weeping during the opening 10-minutes of “Up.” But here, he literally pulls emotions out of this script and makes them into classic Pixar characters (including the best Pixar character ever: Riley’s imaginary friend Bing Bong voiced by the incomparable Richard Kind). He brings them to life thanks to Pixar’s innate ability to make computer-drawn designs into life-like creations, but mostly because the screenplay is so well written that we’re able to immediately identify with them.

And this is where Docter is able to dig into the most creative corners of his own mind. This isn’t the first movie where Pixar has breathed life into inanimate objects, but it is the first time they’ve had to create characters – and an entire world, for that matter – out of something that does not exist at all. This is something we as filmgoers aren’t privileged to these days: the ability to be taken somewhere you’ve never seen before.

The level of detail in the animation is nothing new for Pixar and shouldn’t come to the surprise of anyone who has seen their movies in the past. Yet, they continue to improve their style with each new film. The film is edited together as if it were a live action film, which brings out a more film-like quality rather than that of a goofy cartoon. Combine that with the need to create an entire world from scratch makes this film much more unique than the studio’s previous efforts. Not just unique from its creative design and animation, but also from the story side since this world has its own set of rules it follows that we must learn. We’re not given to a huge opening sequence of exposition about the rules, but instead pick them up as we go along which makes the film enormously fun.

Without any emotional involvement within the story, “Inside Out” would have still be an enjoyable movie, but Docter didn’t want that to be the case. Apparently, he wanted tug at your heartstrings as hard as he possibly could until you left teardrops on the cinema floor. It’s shouldn’t be a surprise that a movie with emotions would be somewhat emotionally charged, but “Inside Out” is an astoundingly emotional film with a few very powerful sequences.

“Inside Out” is a massive success about the realities of getting older and working through life’s problems. It’s a stunning return to form for Pixar in all departments: story, animation, voices, and most importantly its ability to make you feel something other than just causal entertainment. It’s a film made with much more soul and passion than almost anything else we’ve seen so far this year. This will end up being one of the best films of 2015 without question.

Review: Jurassic World

by Trevor Kirkendall
★½

What made 1993’s “Jurassic Park” such a spectacle was the fact that no one had ever seen anything quite like it. “Jurassic Park” is largely credited with popularizing the move to computers for visual effects work. Nowadays, the practice of using CGI in films has become so widespread that it’s in just about every single Hollywood film whether you realize it or not. It’s not like it’s cheap or easy either. But it’s so commonplace these days that audiences have come to expect something bigger and better every time they see something. “Jurassic World” feels the need to up the ante, and boy is it dreadful.

“Jurassic World” is so bogged down with backstory on so many different characters that it becomes flat out boring. We have Zach and Gray (Nick Robinson and Ty Simpkins) who are headed to Jurassic World to spend a week with their aunt Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard), a workaholic operations manager at the park. We have the geneticists, lead by Dr. Henry Wu (B.D. Wong, the only holdover from the original), who have cooked up a new dinosaur from scratch. Claire, along with the park’s owner Masrani (Irrfan Khan) believe that kids are bored with regular dinosaurs and need something bigger and scarier to keep people coming back for more. Masrani is worried this new dinosaur, the Indominous Rex, isn’t too happy in the isolated paddock they’ve built for her. He asks Claire to consult with an animal trainer they have on the island named Owen (Chris Pratt) to analyze the paddock.

Owen trains Raptors and has gotten them to trust and respect him. His supervisor Hoskins (Vincent D’Onofrio) is in awe of this ability and wants to explore how far Owen can go with Raptors. But that’ll have to wait since Owen has to deal with the Indominous Rex paddock. But when he gets there, things go all wrong. And it’s not because he and Claire used to have a little fling going.

That’s all in the first act before the inciting incident even comes along. Did you pay for a human drama piece about romance, or a study of putting work before family? Or did you pay to see awesome looking dinosaurs run rampage through a theme park? 

I’m pretty certain a lot of these characters could have been cut down or combined. I’m also certain the romance side of the story could have been thrown out and no one would have missed it. Not once after watching “Jurassic Park” did anyone ever say, “I hope Dr. Grant and Dr. Sadler got together!” The characters in “Jurassic World” are overabundant in numbers, completely misused, and change their personalities for whatever the scene asks of them. This is Screenwriting 101 stuff being thrown out the window. Hell, this is basic story telling skills being tossed out!

Spielberg knew just how to keep a tight reign on his story. He knew you paid to see dinosaurs, so he got them on screen quick but still held out the anticipation for as long as possible. How breathtaking was it when you first saw the brachiosaurus on screen?

But everyone knows what dinosaurs look like on the big screen. So “Jurassic World” is at a disadvantage already. The filmmakers try to compensate by making up a dinosaur out of thin air and add pieces to it as they go along to make it seem like it’s indestructible and invincible. Why approach it like this? Because they can. Remember that memorable quote from the original by Jeff Goldblum? “You were so preoccupied that you could do it, you never stopped to think about if you should do it.” Same applies here. As a matter of fact, that quote could apply to about nine out of 10 studio pictures these days, but that’s a topic for another day.

Director Colin Trevorrow has one other film to his credit and that’s the indie film “Safety Not Guaranteed,” which is actually a very enjoyable film; one I would recommend everyone watch instead of watching “Jurassic World.” Trevorrow’s inexperience with big budget features is painfully obvious from the first scene in the film. There’s a lot of humor sprinkled throughout the film, which he does know how to handle. It’s well placed and well timed even if it’s uncomfortably corny, most of which delivered by his “Safety Not Guaranteed” star Jake Johnson.

Outside of that, Trevorrow has no grasp on the film. There’s no awe and childlike wonderment that accompanied the original. Instead, the first dinosaurs on screen just sort of appear; no fanfare and no awe. All the film's best shot are direct copies of shots Spielberg and cinematography Dean Cundey already crafted in the original. Even the brilliant composer Michael Giacchino is reduced to playing John Williams's famous musical themes at all the big moments. And even though Indominous Rex is the star of the film, she never really fills the screen quite the same way Spielberg’s T-Rex did. There’s no inspiration whatsoever. They're so drunk on nostalgia they forgot to make something new and original. It’s a completely flat film from beginning to the third act when we do get some dino vs. dino moments, which ends up actually being fun. Too little too late though.

Is “Jurassic World” a bad movie? Yes, it is sadly. As bad as the other two sequels? No, thanks a few fun moments in the latter half. Still, everyone on the creative and studio side is to blame for its shortcomings. Studio pictures are overrun with too many people concerned with playing to all major demographics across the planet. While “Jurassic Park” may have been targeted to teenage boys, “Jurassic World” will ideally (in the mind’s of executives) grab everybody since they’ve thrown in something everyone can hopefully empathize with. I’m sorry, but if a dinosaur bursts through the trees and starts chasing you, I’m pretty certain running is something everyone can empathize with. The first act of so many movies these days are filled with talk and talk and talk and talk to the point that summer movies are almost unwatchable. What happened to old screenwriting adage “show don’t tell?” I guess Trevorrow skipped that day of class. He and about 90% of all other Hollywood directors need to retake that part of the class again. Either that, or they could screen “Jurassic Park” again so they can remember exactly what a summer movie is supposed to look like.