Review: Sunshine

Starring: Cillian Murphy, Rose Byrne, Cliff Curtis, Chris Evans, Troy Garity, Hiroyuki Sanada, Michelle Yeoh
Director: Danny Boyle
Producer: Andrew Macdonald
Release Date: July 20, 2007
Running time: 108 min
MPAA Rating: R
Distributors: Fox Searchlight Pictures




“Only dream I ever have... is the surface of the sun... everytime I shut my eyes... it's always the same.”

The Skinny:
50 years into the future, the Sun is burning out, causing the Earth to enter an ice age. The crew of the spacecraft, Icarus II, is sent to basically re-ignite the Sun.

The Review:
That Danny Boyle can sure make a mean movie. Not only can he make a great movie, but he doesn’t stick with one type of movie. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but to cover so many different genres like he has in such a short amount of time (just over a decade) and have them all be as relevant as they are, that is just plain impressive. Shallow Grave, Trainspotting, The Beach, 28 Days Later, Millions; even if you sprinkle a few bombs in there, these five movies alone make for one hell of a resume. Well you can add this one to that list.

Sunshine takes place 50 years into the future. The year is 2057 and the Sun is burning out, causing the Earth to enter an ice age. As Earth’s last ditch effort, the Icarus II and its crew of eight are dispatched to plant a bomb that will basically re-ignite the sun, thus saving humankind. The films explanation of this is far more technically superior than I have just done, but that is the basic idea. While passing the planet Mercury, the crew discovers the distress beacon of Icarus I (the first attempt at such a mission). Since all of Earth’s nuclear materials have been mined for the two Icarus ships, this is the last shot. It has been seven years since contact with Icarus I was lost. The crews physicist Robert Capa (Cillian Murphy) is burdened with the decision to either continue on course to complete their mission, or attempt to find and meet up with Icarus I to acquire another potential payload, essentially giving them two possible chances. Calculating their theoretical success, he decides the best course of action is to attempt a rendezvous with the Icarus I. The crew is split on this decision and the tension builds from here. There are a lot of other things that happen during the mission, and I don’t want to give anything away, but there are deaths and the film gets increasingly ominous as it progresses and there is a curveball in the last 30 minutes that will come out of nowhere and without warning. It worked - for me at least.

According to IMDb.com, there are only 9 people credited as starring in the movie (with the exception of the three people in the last shot), and there was barely any marketing for the movie, so all of the money in the budget must’ve went to the effects. And it shows. This is a beautifully shot film. The scenes outside the Icarus were so expansive; it gave you a real feeling of contrast by illustrating the sheer scope of the project. Good science fiction movies like this one will make you think. It is science fiction, so there has to be a certain suspension of disbelief when watching, but it has to be remotely believable. After seeing this movie, I had a discussion about the movie with the friend who saw it with me. He brought up a good point. A lot of thought went into writing the movie to make the science behind it sound real and technical without trying to make the audience feel stupid for not being able to keep up.

And how about that writing? This is a movie set in space with a lot of tension and weird shit that happens along the way, so obvious comparisons will be (and have been) drawn to Alien and Event Horizon and 2001; all very, very good films that any movie would love to be compared to. What works most for me is that there isn’t a lot of wasted time in the movie. The setup took a bit to get going, but once it did, they really were quite efficient at telling the story and pacing it in such a way that there isn’t a lot of down time. As far as the ending goes, I have read a lot of complaints about the last 30 minutes of the movie (I wont spoil anything, so keep reading). I agree it comes from out of nowhere and kind of threw me for a loop, but in the end, I think it added to the whole list of things the remaining crew had to worry about - like they really needed any more - and it worked. It almost didn’t, but it worked. That’s what I like most about Boyle’s films; the fact that they are a little off-kilter. He takes ordinary conventions used in movies and kicks them a little off balance to make them his own. Whether it is a tale of heroin addicts, zombies, child’s morality, or scientists trying to save the world, there is a certain familiarity in the themes represented in his work: greed, indulgence, and the human response to overwhelming situations. Sunshine fits the bill on all counts. And I can’t wait to see what he does next.

The Rub:
A very good, almost brilliant movie. The beginning was a bit slow going, and the ending worked - barely - even if it came from left field. A beautifully shot movie that is definitely one to see in the theatre. And there’s the rub.

*** out of ****

Review: Hot Rod

Starring: Andy Samberg, Isla Fisher, Jorma Taccone, Bill Hader, Danny R. McBride, Sissy Spacek, Ian McShane
Director: Akiva Shaffer
Producer: John Goldwyn, Lorne Michaels
Release Date: August 3, 2007
Running time: 88 min
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Distributors: Paramount Pictures

“I used to be legit. I was too legit. I was too legit to quit. But now I'm not legit. I'm unlegit. And for that, I must quit.”

The Skinny:
A (very) amateur stuntman attempts a stunt where he jumps 15 buses on his moped. He hopes to raise enough money to get his step-father a heart transplant, so he can be health enough again to “uncork the ass-beating of a lifetime” on him and finally gain his respect.

The Review:
Saturday Night Live is a machine. Like any machine that has been running for 32 years, it doesn’t always work, and the quality can be inconsistent, but for better or worse, it has become quite the institution. I stopped watching ages ago, but they sure keep grinding it out don’t they? We’ve seen sketches turned into feature-length movies; from the good (Blues Brothers, Wayne’s World), to the bad (Night at the Roxbury, Superstar) to the utterly atrocious (It’s Pat, Ladies Man). In the infancy of their careers, we’ve had the pleasure of seeing some real talent come from the halls of 30 Rock, and on to more fruitful ventures. On the other side of that coin, we’ve also seen some of the most inexplicable displays of ‘talent’ attempt to cash in on their resume and fail miserably. So when movies like this come along, I typically take them with a grain of salt. In this case, I think my tepid expectation may have actually added to my enjoyment of the movie.

The premise sounds like yet another SNL sketch forced to feature length. The movie opens with Rod Kimble (Andy Samberg), an amateur stuntman who believes his real father to have been a famous stuntman who worked with Evil Knievel, and his crew spending their days setting up a series of jumps for Rod to attempt on his moped. His crew consists of Dave (Bill Hader), the mechanic, Rico (Danny R. McBride), the ramp builder, and Kevin (Jorma Taccone), the step-brother and videographer. In the beginning, Rod attempts to jump a mail truck positioned between two makeshift wooden ramps. Before he starts, he asks his crew if they had time to reinforce the ramp. They respond, obviously, that no, they didn’t have time. He tries it anyway and flies smack into the top of the truck and the landing ramp. Undeterred by this failure, he promotes a stunt the very next day where he plans to jump the local pool. This also fails. Spectacularly.

On the home front, Rod arrives home daily to suit up for a series of gladiator-type battles with his step-father Frank (Ian McShane) in an attempt to win his respect. His step-brother Kevin tries to stop him but Rod says, “You’re his real son, so he automatically loves you. I have to earn it.” So off he goes to get his ass handed to him again. After the failed pool jump, Rod returns home to learn that Frank is in need of a heart transplant that will cost $50,000 out of pocket. This angers Rod. Not so much because of the severity of the situation, but that he will never get the chance to beat Frank in hand-to-hand combat. After going to his “happy place” (a very hilarious scene with Rod in the forest apparently training and “air punching out his aggression”) he decides that he will set up a stunt wherein he will attempt to jump 15 buses and promote the event with all the proceeds going to pay for Frank’s operation. So he can keep him alive, bring him back to full strength, and try his hand at, well, beating him to death.

Let me go on record as saying with the right projects, Andy Samberg has the potential to have a long and prosperous film career. In lesser hands, this movie could have been a disaster, but what makes it work is the honesty of Rod’s character. Rod is a man happy with simple pleasures, but he is not stupid. Samberg wisely chose not to play it up for cheesiness or cheap laughs. Yes, there are cheesy moments and cheap laughs abound, but there is sincerity in the character that makes it work. The supporting cast is also played to just the right tone as well. There isn’t a Stifler-type character that is trying to break out and be noticed. Everyone just does their part, and does it well while staying mindful of the structure of the film. My favorite parts of the movie are between Rod and Frank. Whether they are fighting or Rod is trying to talk to him to get a glimpse of the respect he almost painfully desires, it always turns into Rod finding various ways to threaten Frank’s life. Even as he lies on his death bed. Another wise move by the filmmakers was not to overdo the emotion and weigh down the picture with sappy sentiment. Again, it plays to just the right tone. And the 80’s-style soundtrack that fills the movie is just icing on the cake.

The Rub:
This movie is much funnier than I expected. A fairly textbook comedy that works because it cares about the characters. It is cheesy but sincere, over-the-top, but not overplayed, and a great vehicle to, what hopes to be, a promising career from star Andy Samberg. And there’s the rub.

*** out of ****

Review: The Bourne Ultimatum

Starring: Matt Damon, Julia Stiles, David Strathairn, Scott Glenn, Albert Finney, Joan Allen
Director: Paul Greengrass
Producer: Patrick Crowley, Frank Marshall, Paul L. Sandberg, Doug Liman
Release Date: August 3, 2007
Running time: 111 min
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Distributors: Universal Pictures

“If you were in your office right now we'd be having this conversation face-to-face.” (zing!)

The Skinny:
The final chapter in the Bourne trilogy. Hopefully.

The Review:
Every now and then I have this dream. In it, I am my current age and I wake up and find myself in the halls of my high school (of which I am 13 years removed). I continue to make my way through the hallways making my way towards my locker. Everyone around me is how I remember them in high school and they don’t even notice that I am in my early thirties. The only thing running through my mind is an increasing feeling of anxiety as I get closer to my locker because I can’t remember my combination. For some reason I think that if I can’t figure it out or have to go to the principal’s office to get it, they’ll figure out how old I am and that I am not supposed to be there. But every time I get to the locker, I get the combination right. It doesn’t seem familiar to me as I am trying the lock, but I get it open first try - every time. Weird, but true. I have no clue what it means, if anything, but as I sat down to write this review that dream popped into my head and ended up being the best way to summarize how I felt watching the movie.

The movie picks up right where the last one left off. Literally. After the car crash in Moscow at the end of Supremacy, we rejoin Bourne as he evades police then goes to Paris to tell Marie’s brother that she is dead. During this time, he reads an article about himself in the Guardian Newspaper and heads to London to track down the writer, Rimon Ross, and find out who his source is. He meets up with Ross at Waterloo station and learns of Blackbriar, formerly Treadstone (the top-secret CIA program that basically ‘created’ Jason Bourne). During this meeting, Bourne gives a clinic on surveillance evasion by guiding Ross via cell phone through/around numerous cameras and CIA converging on the station. He finds out the source, gets away from an asset (Blackbriar assassin) sent to kill him and Ross, and he’s off to Madrid to track down his source. And so on and so forth.

This movie is essentially two hours of Bourne running. Away from CIA trying to kill him and towards what he hopes are answers about his identity. In the end, that is pretty much what the whole trilogy is about - Bourne trying to find out who he is and kicking everyone’s ass that gets in his way. The action in this movie doesn’t disappoint. There are two scenes in particular that stick out in my mind. There is a car chase scene is pretty intense. I haven’t seen many that look this seamless or exciting, even if it was a bit long and overdone. I had the same complaint about the chase scenes in Supremacy. How many shots do we need from inside the car where we see an incoming car smash into Bourne’s vehicle and watch his head shake back and forth? Impressive the first few times I saw it, but overused. Like that friend of yours that still quotes Old School - it was funny the first hundred times we heard it, but, we get it, let’s move on.

The real tour de force of the movie was the sequence in Tangier where Bourne is tracking Desh, an asset sent to kill his source, then him and Nicky (a CIA agent and former Treadstone contact who offers to help Bourne). There is about a 10-15 minute stretch where there is virtually no dialogue; just straight action and a chase on foot. We see Bourne hopping from building to building tracking Desh before he has a chance to kill Nicky with intermittent cuts back and forth between Bourne, Nicky, and Desh. The climax of the sequence is the confrontation between Desh and Bourne that is hands down, the best fight sequence of the trilogy. The most impressive part is, like I said, there is no dialogue at all and the suspense is basically created out of thin air through the editing and camera work. It works on all levels and I wished there had been more direction like this in the movie. I would recommend the movie solely on the integrity of this sequence alone. Absolutely amazing filmmaking.

I liked Identity, and loved Supremacy but Ultimatum, sadly, sort of let me down. I wouldn’t go so far as to say this is a bad movie, by any stretch of the imagination. Supremacy was so far and above Identity that I guess I was spoiled into thinking this would be an improvement to the same degree. Instead it felt more like The Bourne Supremacy, Part II. There is a scene in the movie that is directly taken from the end of Supremacy (where Bourne is calling Landy and tells her to “Get some sleep. You look tired”). Wait, what? Didn’t we already see that once? If it was an attempt to be clever by tying the two films together, it didn’t work. Clever for the sake of clever is weak, tired writing. And if that last scene in Supremacy was supposed to prelude to Ultimatum, the jump into the middle of its sequel didn’t make any sense to me. Again, clever for the sake of clever kind of feels like cheating. The ultimate answer to the question of the series, ‘Who is Jason Bourne?’ was, well, sufficient, if not a little awkward and a bit forced. I don’t know what ending I would have accepted more, but the solution presented didn’t work all that much for me, but it’ll do. Just like in my dream, I was anxious of what was to coming but in the end, there weren't too many things to get worked up about because I'd been there before. Many times.

The Rub:
I really wanted to like this movie more than I did. By no means is it a bad movie; it just feels too much like we’ve been down this road before. A tidy ‘end’ to a very good trilogy that I didn’t expect much from when it first started. And there’s the rub.

** 1/2 out of ****