Franchisicide: Vol. 2, Book Two

What a strange thing it is to ignore a bad screenplay, and not just out of a desire to enjoy the positive elements of a film, but out of the body's natural defense mechanism against sensory overload.

But I'm a critic (amateur as I am), and even when my eyes have turned to yogurt in my skull, my instincts pick up on things that my smoothie-brain never could. Sort of like when the hunter realizes that the gazelle saw him come into the forest, and now has him in the crosshairs of his rifle. Yes, Mr. Verbinski, I shall now call you GORE VERBINSKI: CRITIC HUNTER.

That's right, I know your game, and just as I would never end up a trophy above a gazelle's mantle, I won't fall victim to your trap. You've fashioned a pretty movie, Mr. Verbinski, but a film is only as strong as its screenplay, and while you've spent several truckloads of leprechaun foreskins to try and disguise that, you had one fatal flaw in your dastardly plan: the fucking scene with the natives on that goddamn island. Aside from not being interesting, or funny, or in any way riveting or rousing or, fuck, even diverting, it was completely and totally unnecessary. This is a summer blockbuster that's two and a half hours. I don't have any problem with that, but if there are pages of your screenplay that can be used to warm your child's cabbage water, by all fucking means.

Johnny Depp is considerably less interesting in this film because the part was written for him, instead of being a role written for whoever they could find that Johnny Depp took and turned on its head. There's no replicating that. Depp, of course, isn't bad. He's very good, but he's nothing like he was in the first film. Orlando Bloom is about as bad as he was the first time around, and Knightley is roughly as bad. Thankfully, Bill Nighy manages to show up even Depp as the delightfully evil CGI sea devil Davy Jones. It's all in the physicality and voice as he uses a tongue that would only be silver to pirates to try and steal souls and wrestle people into debt.

And at the same time, we have Gore Verbinski, who, in the last film, seemed content to guide along the massive production, taking the reigns and creating a film that's a powerhouse of action, excitement and wonder. Some scenes are so good that they recall the wonder that people used to associate with the word "Hollywood". I'll try not to oversell the film, though. My point is that instead of staging action setpieces, the film manages to do more. It transports and transfixes. The oceanic setting does far more for this film than it did for the first film, and it's always clear that we're looking at a world of magic and mythology. Similarly, instead of just being mindless eye-candy, the action setpieces seem intent to actually rouse and excite us. That means that, aside from the classic Hollywood swashbuckling, there are exciting non-fight setpieces. One of which is a marvelous scene of the Kraken (an ancient pirate myth) destroying a ship as Will Turner (Bloom) tries to escape.

But the best scenes in the film take place on Davy Jones' ship, The Flying Dutchman. Some of the most extraordinary production design and CGI work have gone into turning that ship into a floating pirate's version of Hell, with its barnacle-encrusted crew slaving away for all eternity.

But the film still has a myriad of problems, and as much as those things do to make up for them, they can only hope to counter-balance them. The performances (aside from Nighy) are universally underwhelming, the script is poorly written, it's nowhere near as funny as the first film, it's very sad to watch Depp not quite live up to his own work and there's that FUCKING SCENE ON THAT ISLAND.

That scene is about as exciting as an immunity challenge on an episode of Survivor, and the action takes a woefully misguided turn towards the silly.

I have to say, though, I enjoyed this film, although for different reasons, as much as I enjoyed the first film. It isn't great, but I didn't expect it to be. It's certainly a lot of fun, especially if you get really drunk and pass out for the scenes on that goddamn island.

Franchisacide: Vol. 2, Book One

I think I should preface this. This is sort of a difficult review to write. Since everyone has seen this movie, and seen it many times, every observation I make is going to be repetitive. But since I just spent two and a half hours watching this film, I feel like I should at least try and make that time count for something. Here's how I'll justify this to myself: America caught Pirate Fever(!) when this film came out, so much so that the sequels broke all kinds of records. But the overwhelming position on the sequels was that they couldn't begin to live up to the mythological greatness of the first film. So with a lifetime of disappointment sapping the youthful enthusiasm of yore from my eyes between my first viewing and my most recent viewing, I present you a revised perspective on one of America's least durable film franchises.

Let's start with the obvious stuff and get that out of the way. The fact that it took this film to make Johnny Depp a household name is about as alien to me as the mystery of Daniel Day-Lewis's strangely hypnotic hunchback. If Ed Wood had made him the star it should have made him, we could have had an extra ten years of Johnny Depp doing crazy shit and getting Oscar nominations for it. Thank you, filmgoing public, for only allowing us to see Johnny Depp at the tail-end of his peek.

And make no mistake about it: this is the Johnny Depp show. This film exists only to showcase his considerable, nay, monumentous, talent. It's a shame that there had to be other actors in this film, though, because most of them are pretty bad in their own right, but even the ones doing good work look like eight-year-olds trying to purchase alcohol compared to Johnny Depp.

For one, no one seems to have a handle on this accent they're weilding. They all come off as having just watched a lot of Masterpiece Theater in preperation for their roles, and they're confused when confronted with scenes that require them to do more than look windswept and swing swords around. Shit, they even look confused in those scenes. No one looks like they remember where they are. Even Johnny Depp looks confused, although he plays it to his advantage.

It must be nice to be Orlando Bloom. On the days that you don't feel like working, you can send a paper figure (probably fashioned from your deposit slips) taped to a Popsicle stick and not even your looking-windswept scenes will suffer.

Keira Knightly is similarly afflicted, although not quite as badly. Whereas Bloom is a terrible actor confronted with a virtually unplayable role, Knightly is simply an okay actor confronted with a virtually unplayable role.

About the only other actor that stacks up to Depp is Geoffery Rush, but even he can't hold a candle to Depp. He really is just that good. It's one of the great performances of recent Hollywood filmmaking, and it's the only reason that this film developed any kind of positive reputation.

Sure, the whole film is competent, but it's difficult to run a production this monumental and allow it to develop any personality of its own. I appreciate that Gore Verbinski tried, and there are times when this film becomes the rollicking good adventure yarn that you hope it will be, but it's never exactly sustained. All the best scenes end too fast and the worst scenes go on too long. Some of the fights are silly, but without the visual flair that allows someone like, oh, I don't know...Sam Raimi to operate that way.

As a whole, the film is nothing special. It's Johnny Depp's unpredictable and original vision that elevates this movie beyond typical Hollywood filmmaking, aside from being the first pirate movie worth seeing in god knows how long (I'm a big Crimson Pirate fan).

Drag Me to Hell

I have this nasty habit of hyperbole, but I think I'll just throw my inhibitions out the window for one second and declare that, by the power of Grayskull, Drag Me to Hell has the GREATEST ENDING OF ANY HORROR MOVIE EVER. I wish I could go into it, but I really don't want to spoil such a fantastic ending for all you dirty, confused little proles that need my recommendation before you see this film.

Now, you know that little cult that floats around Sam Raimi? The one that laments Bruce Campbell's position on the F-list of actors? The one that considers Evil Dead 2 one of the greatest horror films of all time? The one that considers Evil Dead 2 one of the greatest comedy films of all time? I'm one of those guys. Except, unlike the rest of those guys, I love the Spider-Man films. And unlike those guys, I love Spider-Man 3. And I happen to be the only person on the face of the Earth that likes Spider-Man 3.

There's no commercial director that possesses the creative energy necessary to push the action genre to its limit like Sam Raimi. The man could make Spider-Man films for the rest of his career and every one would be better than the last, but no one seems to appreciate the artistry of these films.

But that's neither here nor there. Perhaps I shall review all the Spider-Man films at some point and return to that discussion. For now, my point is that I'm a huge Sam Raimi fan.

While many Raimi fans seem to think that he's a sell-out for not doing horror films his whole career, the only thing that WOULD make him a sell-out is if he did horror films his whole career. It's easy to get good at one thing and do that forever, but it's a great deal harder to tackle so many different genres and styles, including making the most expensive film ever made (at that point), all with varying degrees of success.

But after the (undeserved) critical failure of Spider-Man 3, it was time for Mr. Raimi to show his devotees that he's still got it, that making big-budget action films hadn't sucked his soul out and replaced it with robotic endoskeleton powered by a coal engine modified to be fueled by money. And now that Raimi has shut up all the howling fanboys, he can go back to doing whatever the hell he wants to do.

Look at me, seven paragraphs in and I haven't even started reviewing the actual film. Sometimes I get carried away when I start talking about Sam Raimi.

Drag Me to Hell, aside from having a great title, is one hell of a horror film. At least on par with (if not better than) Evil Dead and Evil Dead 2.

It concerns kindly young Christine Brown (Alison Lohman), a loan officer who makes the mistake of trying to be aggressive in the workplace and ends up being cursed by a surprisingly robust old lady. For three days, she will be haunted and tormented by a demon, and on the third day she will be dragged away by the demon to burn in hell for all of eternity.

Like the Evil Dead films, its atmosphere isn't about creeping out the audience or making the gore-hounds ovaries explode. It's more rousing. The feeling that accompanies this film is the feeling you associate with seeing a great action film rather than the feeling you associate with, say Alien or The Shining or Mulholland Dr.. Raimi's name for this kind of film, a "spook-a-blast" is more than accurate, and really underlines having spent the last seven years making action films, especially in the pacing. I can't think of many horror films that have scenes that can be described as "horror setpieces".

It's a simple, old-fashioned story of an innocent young woman cursed by something otherworldly that she lacks the resources or fortitude to combat, and it's all there for Sam Raimi to let loose all the little things he's come up with since the last time he made a horror film. The film essentially plays as a greatest hits of Sam Raimi's brain, which must be at least partially robotic.

In fact, I'm having a hard time imagining what the pitch meeting must have been like for this. I imagine Sam Raimi said something like "You know how much fun it is to see Bruce Campbell get the shit beaten out of him by demons? What if it was Alison Lohman getting the shit beaten out of her by demons?", at which point the executives gave him several briefcases filled with uncut diamonds and moon rocks.

Let me repeat something that I think is important. This film has the GREATEST ENDING IN HORROR MOVIE HISTORY. If you have no great love for horror films, see it just for the brilliant, balls-to-the-walls ending.

Satan bless you, Sam Raimi.

9/10