REVIEW: Cowboys & Aliens

Cowboys & Aliens (2011): Dir. Jon Favreau. Written by: Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman, Damon Lindelof, Mark Fergus, and Hawk Ostby. Story by: Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby, and Steve Oedekerk. Based on the graphic novel Cowboys & Aliens by: Scott Mitchell Rosenberg. Starring: Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford, Olivia Wilde, Sam Rockwell, Paul Dano, Clancy Brown, Keith Carradine and Raoul Trujillo. Rated PG-13 (Western & sci-fi action and violence). Running time: 118 minutes.

2 stars (out of four)

In Cowboys & Aliens, the latest from director Jon Favreau, the cowboys are dusty and the aliens are slimy. Anyone expecting anything else has walked into the wrong theater. The film delivers everything promised in its title (the ampersand stands in for “rescuing citizens who have been abducted by”) in a genre mash-up that, unless you are familiar with the graphic novel on which it is based, is admittedly original.

The premise is ingeniously simple. Why do movie aliens always attack Earth in the present day? Surely their spaceships and weaponry have been advanced for centuries so why not invade our terrestrial world in say, the late 1800s, before the Second Industrial Revolution begins depleting our celestially sought after natural resources?

This playful anachronism allows for some nice moments. When a metallic wristband suddenly starts beeping on Daniel Craig’s wrist, watch Paul Dano’s baffled reaction to the, um, alien sound.

Unfortunately, the majority of Cowboys & Aliens is not as noteworthy as its perfectly silly title. The film opens on a man with no name (Daniel Craig) waking in the middle of the New Mexican desert. He has a name, presumably, but he has forgotten that piece of information as well as how the aforementioned wristband got clamped onto his arm. He stumbles into a nearby town and meets a host of Western archetypes: the hotheaded son (Paul Dano) of a wealthy cattle driver (Harrison Ford), a sheepish bartender (Sam Rockwell), preacher (Clancy Brown), sheriff (Keith Carradine) and a mysterious beauty (Olivia Wilde).

A few of these people recognize Craig’s rugged face from a wanted poster sketch, which lands him in the town jail though he cannot recall his crime. Soon enough, however, bright lights descend from the night sky offering him a chance at redemption (not to mention an opportunity to use that thing on his wrist). The town gets pretty thoroughly blown up and about half its small population snatched up and whisked away by the spaceships. The next day, the cowboys embark on a mission led by Craig and Ford to save their fellow citizens.

The movie is considerably heavier on cowboys than it is aliens, even finding room for an Apache tribe led by their chief, Black Knife (Raoul Trujillo), to help the cowboys. This might lead some to think of the aliens as an allegorical replacement for Native Americans, making the film a sort of “Cowboys and Indian Symbols,” but that would be pushing a lot of unwanted subtext on the film. Cowboys & Aliens is more straightforward than that and I appreciate that the film is modest enough to not try and be anything more than the title suggests.

On the other hand, it’s a shame that with a premise as clever as this, the movie isn’t a little better. Cowboys & Aliens lacks the wit and humor of Jon Favreau’s Iron Man films, which is odd since the subject matter here might have lent itself to self-aware kidding even more. Harrison Ford, a master at cashing in on a paycheck while having some fun too, does his best to make up for the film’s mostly sober tone. You can just barely catch a little glimmer in his eye that shows he knows when he’s saying a bad line and when he’s saying a good and cheesy one. Playing a rough and gruff curmudgeon, he is responsible for the film’s few laughs.

At about two hours, the movie is too long considering it offers only the bare minimum in the way of plot. There are a number of well put together action scenes and the movie doesn’t really do anything wrong but I kept expecting something more. Some extra twist or turn, perhaps. But nothing like that ever comes and the movie is content to trot along with modest ambitions for the entirety of its running time. There are many worse ways to spend two hours but I don’t expect children to be playing “Cowboys and Aliens” anytime soon.

- Steve Avigliano, 7/12/11

REVIEW: Conviction

Conviction (2010): Dir. Tony Goldwyn. Written by Pamela Gray, based on real events. Starring Hilary Swank, Sam Rockwell, Minnie Driver and Peter Gallagher. Rated R (language and some violent images). Running time: 107 minutes.

2 ½ stars (out of four)

** Note: This review freely discusses elements of the plot, which is based on a widely publicized true story. There’s little in my review that the trailer doesn’t also reveal.

The real-life achievement of Betty Anne Waters (played here by Hilary Swank) is without a doubt impressive. After her brother (played by Sam Rockwell) was wrongly convicted of murder, Waters got her GED, went to college and eventually passed the bar to become his lawyer. She did all this while supporting her two sons and working part-time at a local bar, knowing there was only a slim chance of reopening the case and exonerating her brother. Waters’s story is motivational to be sure, but the awe it inspires comes from her patience and dedication over an 18-year period, and to condense her accomplishment into a film less than two hours long is to reduce that power. There may not be a way to reasonably recreate what was no doubt a long, laborious process, but this limitation keeps the film from achieving anything more than Lifetime movie-quality drama.

The film is structured with these limitations in mind, spending minimal time on the early years of her story (in other words, the dull years that involved a lot of reading and studying for exams). We are introduced to Waters already in law school amongst students half her age. Her only friend there is fellow middle-aged law student Abra (Minnie Driver). Abra sympathizes with Waters’s cause and lends her help and good humor to the case whenever possible.

We learn from flashbacks that Waters’s brother Kenny is a reckless man prone to bar fights. The police in town all know him by name and he’s a natural first suspect for the murder having broken into the victim’s home as a child. This incident led to a troubled childhood and separation from his sister. Sam Rockwell does a wonderful job of making a believable character out of Kenny. Rockwell brings his usual humor and charisma to the role but adds emotional depth in the later scenes. Kenny is grateful for everything his sister does for him, but it pains him to see her wasting her life on what may end up a futile cause.

Hilary Swank lends a great deal of credibility to her role, making Waters a woman of faith and, yes, conviction. Her performance, along with Rockwell’s, elevates the film above made-for-TV-movie quality. Swank has played roles like this before, but she’s very good at them. Just reading Waters’s story in a newspaper, one might ask, “How could someone remain so dedicated for so long?” Swank, however, makes this dedication real, never overacting. We believe Waters’s love for her brother and so we believe her unflagging hope in his eventual release.

Despite the effective human story, the film has the inevitable structural problems that come from making a movie out of a real-life case. The legal system is inherently un-dramatic and the film loses steam near the end when Waters is a given a few extra legal hoops to jump through. The founder of the Innocence Project, Barry Scheck (Peter Gallagher), joins the cause late in the film and a few legal technicalities regarding DNA testing drags the film out another twenty minutes beyond what seems to be its natural endpoint.

There is also the sense that screenwriter Pamela Gray is picking and choosing what aspects of the original story to include. Waters’s husband, for example, drops out of the film entirely about halfway through following their divorce. Apparently examining the damaging effects that the case had on Waters’s marriage would have dampened the film’s inspirational tone. Additionally, a very interesting piece of information about a dirty cop comes up late in the film and is largely dismissed.

Before the end credits role, we’re treated to a photograph of the real Betty Anne and Kenny Waters. This trend of showing a picture of the real people is one that comes up in a lot of biopics, but why? What are we supposed to take away from seeing the real people after watching actors portray them? Is it meant as proof that the story really happened? Regardless, the photo functions as a way of reminding audiences that in spite of earnest efforts, some great stories just aren’t cinematic stories, and that the film version of Betty Anne Waters has nothing on the real one.

- Steve Avigliano, 11/09/10

REVIEW: Iron Man 2

Iron Man 2 (2010): Dir. Jon Favreau. Written by: Justin Theroux. Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Mickey Rourke, Scarlett Johansson, Sam Rockwell, and Samuel L. Jackson. Rated PG-13 (sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, and some language). Running time: 124 minutes.

3 stars (out of four)

Iron Man 2 is a sequel that takes everything that made the first enjoyable and, with freewheeling fun, revels in its own cartoonishness. This is a film where characters ask for music before they fight and Samuel L. Jackson is given an extended eye-patched cameo. Director Jon Favreau pushes the Iron Man universe into over-the-top territory, but we stay with him every step of the way because he does so with the cool confidence of Tony Stark himself.

The film picks up where the first left off, with Tony Stark revealing himself to the public as Iron Man and enjoying the increased media attention. News clippings in the opening titles inform us that Stark has used his Iron Man suit to end war in the Middle East, becoming an international icon. Stark hoards the suit for himself, however, resisting the U.S. government’s insistence that he turn over the technology, though his decision to do so seems to be as motivated by boastfulness as it is by political caution. These scenes are used more as plot devices than anything else, and the film largely abandons the first film’s tongue-in-cheek depiction of Stark’s all-American pro-gun stance. Still, Robert Downey Jr.’s charismatic performance owns the film. Even after learning that the chemicals that power his suit are slowly killing him, Stark is his usual cocky self, throwing himself a birthday bash and drunkenly using his suit for some pretty exciting party tricks.

Stark’s self-confidence comes into question when Ivan Vanko, a burly Russian played by Mickey Rourke, proves capable of recreating the arc reactor technology that makes the Iron Man suit so powerful. Vanko, whose father was an unsung co-developer of the arc reactor, seeks to take down the Stark family name by picking a fight with Stark at the Monaco Grand Prix car race, the first and most exciting action scene in the film. Vanko’s backstory and scheme are less important, however, than his size and attitude, and Rourke has a lot of fun grunting his way through his lines in a thick Russian accent, doing more grimacing than speaking.

Sam Rockwell, who plays the film’s secondary villain, a fast-talking rival weapons manufacturer named Justin Hammer, continues to prove himself one of Hollywood’s finest character actors, bringing his usual quirkiness and humor to the role. Hammer recruits Vanko to help build an Iron Man suit of his own, and the interplay between Rockwell and Rourke recall the strange relationship between Steve Buscemi and Peter Stormare’s characters in Fargo. Favreau uses their scenes to emphasize the film’s lighthearted tone, but remains focused on Stark, utilizing Rourke and Rockwell as colorful side characters.

The remaining characters in the film, however, lack the zest and charm of the main players. Gwyneth Paltrow is charming enough as Pepper Potts, but her character’s origins remain a disconcerting mystery to me. I was willing to accept her in the first film as the Moneypenny to Stark’s Bond, existing to serve the dual purpose of helping the hero and providing some sexual tension, but this becomes difficult to believe when Stark appoints her CEO of the company. She makes a fine assistant to be sure, but where are her business credentials? Don Cheadle is a serviceable replacement for Terrence Howard as sidekick James Rhodes, but there is little Cheadle can do though to change what was, and remains, a dull supporting character.

While many recent superhero films have pretensions of grand drama, Iron Man 2 succeeds because it embraces its comic book origins and allows itself to go over-the-top with larger-than-life characters, plenty of pyrotechnics and a self-aware wit. Late in the film, Stark remarks to Rhodes, “I thought you were out of one-liners,” poking fun at the film while sneaking in another laugh. Then there’s Samuel L. Jackson as the mysterious Nick Fury, whose role is apparently just a setup for the Avengers crossover movie that’s coming out in 2012. The tie-in might have come off as an annoying marketing scheme if Jackson wasn’t so much fun in the role. He brings his typical relish to his lines and almost veers into self-parody (one scene in a donut shop seems a deliberate reference to Pulp Fiction), but he manages to keep the audience in on the fun. Scarlett Johansson shows up too as Stark’s new assistant and undercover agent, Black Widow, who Wikipedia informs me, is another tie-in to the upcoming Avengers film. Johansson’s role here confirms my suspicions about her as an actress. Most of her scenes consist of Stark ogling her until the end when she gets to do some sexy fighting, but nothing in the way of real acting.

Iron Man 2, much like Stark himself, is all about style. There are plenty of inventive action sequences and explosions to fit the summer blockbuster bill, but enough winking at the camera to remind everyone that it’s all in the name of fun. Like its predecessor, the rather complicated plot gets reduced in the end to an action scene, which is the norm for most superhero movies, but keeps Iron Man from reaching the bar Christopher Nolan set with the new Batman films. Still, this is a worthy sequel that, by celebrating the over-the-top nature of its comic book origins, becomes every bit as entertaining as the first.

- Steve Avigliano, 5/12/10

REVIEW: Moon

Moon (2009): Dir. Duncan Jones. Written by: Duncan Jones, Nathan Parker. Starring: Sam Rockwell, Kevin Spacey (voice). Rated R (language). Running time: 97 min.

3 ½ stars (out of four)

Forty years after 2001 (not the year), there’s been a huge improvement in the personalities of our artificially intelligent companions. Gone are those pesky HAL 9000 models with their sinister plotting! Meet Gerty, a decidedly more amiable creation with the friendly voice of Kevin Spacey (apologies to the original Douglas Rain), whose only interest is to help you as best it can. Gerty’s look and polite syntax are of course a winking tribute to the former machine, giving a courteous nod to that grandfather of all science-fiction films, one of Moon’s main inspirations.

In the near future, the Moon is being used to harvest helium-3, Earth’s new primary source of energy. With the memory of an energy crisis still fresh in the public’s memory, a corporation called Lunar has built a mining station on the dark side of the moon that needs only one man to operate it in three-year shifts. Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) walks around his workstation that doubles as his living quarters with a familiarity born of repetition. Due to technical problems with the station’s transmission, he must send and receive recorded video messages to his wife and children, and there’s and occasional encouraging message from corporate. For the most part though, he has only Gerty to talk to, its small screen displaying various smiley faces depending on the tone it wishes to convey. With only two weeks left in his term, Sam’s routine is interrupted by an accident on a rover that knocks him unconscious. He awakens to find not only lapses in his memory, but second Sam Bell. Cue head spinning.

Sam Rockwell, who has been stealing scenes in quirky supporting roles for years, plays the role with energy and convincing humanity. Given the chance to stretch in a film featuring virtually no other actors, Rockwell brings humor to an otherwise foreboding film and captures the idiosyncrasies of man in prolonged isolation. With the help of seamless trick photography, we’re able to watch Rockwell interact with himself without ever doubting the credibility of his performance or the premise of the film.

Moon is science fiction built on suspense, mystery and imagination (as opposed to battling robots or the Starship Enterprise). Aside from the initial comparisons to Stanley Kubrick’s now classic philosophy-over-science film, Moon bears similarities to more recent science fiction, namely television’s Lost. The two share an affinity for mysteries that unravel backwards and hidden clues (there’s even a secret hatch here!), and I would be surprised if director Duncan Jones were not a fan of the series. The mark of other sci-fi influences is in the look of the film. The mining station lacks the sleek feel of an idealized future, but rather features more industrial technology first seen in films like Ridley Scott’s Alien (no surprise considering Alien’s set designer was hired to work on this film). Throw in a haunting musical score and it all adds up to a darker vision of our imminent space age. Behind the Lunar Corporation’s promise of a better tomorrow is man pushing buttons and talking himself (figuratively and literally) in a station that could use a few repairs.

The directorial debut of commercial director Duncan Jones, son of David Bowie (I’ll avoid the “Starman” jokes”), Moon is an exciting film that acknowledges those that came before it while paving its own thought-provoking mythology. By the time the end credits roll, there are a few loopholes left unanswered, but the film remains a superb example of the best science fiction has to offer. This is Ground Control to Jones’s career: 3…2…1…Lift off! (Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

- Steve Avigliano, 7/13/09