Despicable Me 3
by George Wolf, MaddWolf.com
I’ll be honest, it took a little research before I remembered anything at all about Despicable Me 2 that wasn’t a minion.
And even when those little yellow scene-stealers got their own movie, the result was surprisingly mediocre.
The entire franchise has been memorable only for being so easily forgettable. So how’s part 3?
It’s fine.
Steve Carell returns as the voice of Gru, the super villain-turned good guy who’s now teamed up with wife Lucy (Kristen Wiig) for double the secret agent heroics. And, their three adopted daughters are back to say “fluffyyyyyyyyy!’ and other adorable things.
The family ties get more tangled when Gru meets his long lost twin brother Dru (also Carell), who convinces him to return to the dark side and steal a massive diamond from an 80s-obsessed baddie named Balthazar Bratt (South Park‘s Trey Parker).
The writing and directing teams are full of animation vets who have been at least some part of every film in this franchise, so it’s little wonder DM3 can’t find ways to revitalize the brand. It doesn’t really want to.
While all the films have been pleasantly amusing, part 3 may actually land the greatest number of solidly funny gags. The “minions in prison” sequence is an inspired hoot, and an 80s dance-off between Gru and Bratt keeps silly going long enough for a decent payoff.
But again, while the latest Despicable Me will satisfy the kids with its frenetic zaniness and give the parents some escapist smiles, it might raise a question once part 4 comes calling.
“Which one had the twin brother again?”
The Beguiled
by Hope Madden, MaddWolf.com
In a mist-laden Virginia woods, pre-adolescent Amy (Oona Laurence) mushroom picks her way to uncovering a wounded Union soldier. Sure he’s a bluebelly, but she can’t leave him there to die, can she?
Amy helps him back to Miss Farnsworth’s Seminary for Young Ladies, the isolated boarding school where she, Miss Farnsworth, one teacher and just a handful of pupils are waiting out the Civil War.
The Beguiled marks a return to critical favor for writer/director Sofia Coppola, who won best directing honor at this year’s Cannes Fest Festival for her adaptation of Thomas Cullinan’s novel.
Few frame delicate, ornate beauty quite like Coppola. She has found quite a palette with this film – the draping trees, columned porches, foggy woods, the tender grace of the school’s inhabitants.
The film is a study in restraint, and probably the most conventional film Coppola’s made. She abandons the sexual hysteria of Don Siegel’s pulpy 1971 adaptation, creating instead a chamber piece lush with decay and longing.
From his first words at the school – “Corporal John McBurney, 66th New York, grateful to be your prisoner,” – Colin Farrell’s wounded deserter is a likeable mystery. Is he earnest or manipulative? A good guy, or a wolf in the hen house?
Clint Eastwood’s performance (easily the best thing about Siegel’s version) was immediately creepy and scheming. Farrell’s slightly more of a blunt instrument. He’s less conniving, more primal –vulnerable and explosive, sometimes in the same breath.
He’s met his match, though, in Martha Farnsworth – Nicole Kidman. Coppola’s script is crisp, and no one delivers a passive aggressive barb quite as skillfully as Kidman.
Like her girls, Martha carries a lived-in weariness that weakens her to this attractive distraction from the war. But she is a survivor, an instinct she hopes to bring out in her charges as well.
The cast is uniformly wonderful – Kirstin Dunst, in particular. Coppola is fascinated by the internal power struggle as well as the morphing moral and emotional factors at work here. As patriotism battles Christian compulsions in the beginning, so competition for the Corporal’s attention evolves into fear.
The film makes a sharp turn with the inevitable explosion of impotent male dominance. As sudden as it seems, Coppola’s languid approach earlier in the film ensures that each character’s inner motivations and interpretations are clear – without the hackneyed flashback or interior monologue Siegel resorted to.
The result is a bewitching film – beautifully acted, gloriously filmed and haunting.
Baby Driver
by Hope Madden, MaddWolf.com
Start to finish, the soundtrack-driven heist flick Baby Driver has a bright, infectious charm – and you can dance to it.
It needs to be good, though. The third film in as many years about a mixtape, a rag-tag gang and a dead mom, this movie needs to bring something genuinely mesmerizing.
If there is one thing writer/director Edger Wright knows how to do, it’s propel a film’s action. That’s hardly his only talent, but few excel here quite the way he does. Scene to scene, set piece to set piece, he makes sure your eyes and your ears are aware that things are moving at a quick clip.
Never has this been more true than with Baby Driver.
Wright edits in time with his expertly curated mix tape, creating a rhythm that keeps his lead dancing, his film moving, and his audience engaged.
The beats offer more than a gimmick to ensure the flick dances along – the tunes getaway driver Baby (Ansel Elgort) has buzzing through his ear buds give rhythm to his impressive high speed antics.
Baby is the one constant in the teams Doc (Kevin Spacey) assembles to pull off his jobs. A reluctant participant making good on a debt, Baby keeps his distance from the crew – whether it’s the oily Buddy (Jon Hamm, marvelous as ever), his sketchy girlfriend Darling, (Eiza Gonzales), or the straight-up psycho, Bats (Jamie Foxx – glad to see you in something worthwhile again).
Of course, the tension comes in when Baby tries to leave the robbery biz behind, egged on by feelings for the cute waitress at his favorite diner (Lily James).
If you’ve ever seen a movie, you’ll know that getting out is never easy.
Wright’s agile camera keeps tempo with his killer playlist. Whether back-dropping romance at the laundry mat with gorgeous color and tongue-in-cheek visual call-backs, or boogying through back alleys, on-ramps and highways, Baby Driver is as tasty a feast for the eyes as it is the ears.
The game cast never drops a beat, playing characters with the right mix of goofiness and malice to be as fun or as terrifying as they need to be. For all its danceability, Wright’s film offers plenty of tension, too.
Like much of the filmmaker’s work, Baby Driver boasts a contagious pop mentality, intelligent wit and a sweet heart.
The House
by George Wolf, MaddWolf.com
It’s a simple formula, really: D = sO2.
A comedy’s desperation is equal to the speed at which the outtakes start rolling, squared. Which means The House is mighty desperate to send you home laughing.
There’s plenty of talent involved, but it’s a film held together with barest of threads, as if the prompt for writers Andrew Jay Cohen and Brendan O’Brien (from the very funny Neighbors films – so what gives?) was merely to round up some funny people and hope they do funny things.
Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler are certainly funny, and they star as Scott and Kate Johansen, who start to panic when their daughter Alex (a curiously bland Ryan Simpkins) is accepted to Bucknell University.
They can’t afford Bucknell University.
Teaming up with their crazy, Vegas-loving friend Frank (Jason Mantzoukas) the Johansens open a secret neighborhood casino, kicking off a wave of uninspired riffs on stuffy suburbanites acting all Sopranos-y.
Cohen, making his feature directing debut, leaves plenty of contrived loose ends behind in search of the next forced gag. Fred and Barney may have pulled off a similar premise for 23-minutes in an old Flintstones episode, but The House is built on a less than sturdy foundation.
The Bad Batch
by Hope Madden, MaddWolf.com
Three years ago, Ana Lily Amirpour dazzled moviegoers with her sleek and imaginative vampire fable A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night.
The film tells of a solitary female figure and the surprising impact of unlikely companionship. Amirpour called the film a “vampire western.”
If you haven’t seen the film (and you should, immediately), but you like the premise, then Amirpour’s follow up The Bad Batch might also appeal to you. It mines a similar vein, although the context is a bit more merciless.
The film’s provocative opening of mostly voiceover under credits introduces the concept of the “bad batch” – unwanteds. Drugs, immigration, petty crime – it’s never clear what this batch has been up to, but we know where they’re going. They’re headed to a quarantined expanse of arid Texas desert no longer considered part of These United States.
Once the images on screen take form, Amirpour creates an atmosphere of dystopian terror that the balance of the film never quite reaches again.
Newest resident Arlen (Suki Waterhouse – very impressive), realizes just how Mad Max this can get moments after gates are locked behind her. In a breathless and brutal piece of cinema, we are introduced to one of two communities thriving in this wasteland.
The Bridge People are hyper-bulked up, ultra-tanned cannibals represented by Miami Man (Jason Momoa). (They may not have access to steroids, but they’re certainly getting a lot of protein.)
The second community of Comfort offers a colorful, almost habitable environment led by charismatic leader The Dream (Keanu Reeves).
With these two communities, Amirpour moves very clearly into metaphorical territory, ideas she underscores nicely with strategic use of the American flag.
One version of America sees the vain, self-centered “winners” literally feeding on the weak. The second may seem more accepting, but it pushes religion, drugs and other “comforts” to encourage passivity.
It’s a clever but unwieldy storyline, and Amirpour has trouble concluding her tale.
She has a great cast, though. Joining Woodhouse, Momoa and Reeves are flashes of Jim Carrey, Giovanni Ribisi, Diego Luna and a host of the freakish and intriguing.
Amirpour has such a facility with creating mood and environment, and though the approach here is different than with her debut, she once again loads the soundtrack and screen with inspired images, sounds and idiosyncrasies.
Her opening sets such a high bar – one she fails to reach again – and her finale feels too conventional for this character and this world. They’re fairly slight criticisms, but with a filmmaker of such amazing talent, they can’t help but be a let-down.
