Tag: Stephen Lang

Peter Jackson‘s name is super attached to the project Mortal Engines, despite it not seeming like a project up his ally.

Okay, it is based on a book, and he has done quite a few movies based on books or other sources.

But it also looked like a CGI hellscape of a movie. Practical effects were Jackson’s bread and butter in the early 2000’s, outside of some monkey business. Sure, he Hobbited it that aspect up in the future, but there was some attempts to not make it one big green screen, right? Right?

Well, needless to say, this movie isn’t actually Peter Jackson’s baby. He isn’t the director. He is one producer and one writer of the screenplay. He is just a big name and probably involved himself very little in the project. Whew. That was a close one. Can’t have too many duds in a row, or else no one cares about your past.

This is our main character trying to find Robert De Niro‘s dignity for similar reasons.

Mortal Engines takes place some 200-300 years in the future. Instead of sleek future design, we had to go a bit dystopian, and a bit steam punk. Of course some resource concerns exist, and apparently that lead to bigger and badder weapons, which wiped out a lot of technology. Now that is a thing of the past. And instead of resorting back to a feudal farming society, they realized that having a farm is lame, and they needed to be more nomadic. And when you are a nomad but the Earth is too big to wander, you just gotta take your whole house with you. And city.

And uhh, we have cities with giant wheels now, moving across the landscape, in search of places to temporarily settle, to get more resources and then, move, or whatever. And the bigger the city, the more resources they need, so they can’t just like, sit still and gather up enough to move. So instead, they invest in bigger stronger wheels and straight up try to “Eat” smaller community city/town/buildings. They can convert the people into new workers and citizens, and tear up the building material to burn into fuel.

Okay, so this is terribly inefficient. These predator cities can’t possibly survive like this unless they are munching up settlements all of the time. And these settlements are sparse. There are some settlements that don’t move, but they are behind a large wall in a pass, separating let’s say Europe and Asia, with big boom makers, so they can’t get close. Or can they…

Anyways, most of this plot is world building, because that is really the most important aspect, trying to figure out what the hell is going on.

In terms of plot, we have Hester Shaw (Hera Hilmar) trying to kill famed London Energy Guru Thaddeus Valentine (Hugo Weaving). Why? Revenge. Sweet. Sexy. Revenge.

Also starring Colin Salmon, Jihae, Leila George, Patrick Malahide, Robert Sheehan, Ronan Raftery, and Stephen Lang.

“Excuse me, did you forget to drop me off in the 1960’s on your way to the future?”

Absolute garbage. That is a nice way of putting Mortal Engines. A CGI slugfest of nonsense.

Mortal Engines is what happens when you take all of the good to excellent parts of the last decade of teenage dystopian films, then throw them out the window, filling the gaps with terrible B- or C-movie plot, bad acting lines, no worries about making sense, and even more terrible plot lines. It is like the creators of Sharknado saw a book, bought its rights, and then realized Sharknado might be actually more plausible so didn’t try to make sure this movie made sense. It is what happens when you live in a green life, with a green house, green car, green girlfriend too, and then it is totally a good idea to have probably no real sets at all in your movie. It is what happens when you assume to be a success, you just need some ridiculous premise and it will make people thing you are edgy, fun, and new.

I can’t talk enough about how much of a dread this movie ended up being. At over two hours in length, it certainly had a never ending feeling and my mind certainly believed it was three hours plus. It had the nerve to both feel not fully fleshed out/rushed, and yet too long. At no point can people derive an emotional connection with these characters, as so much of the plot needs to be told in needlessly polished flashbacks from our main character. Thousands of people die in this movie, and there is barely ever a thought about them. Characters only show up at the perfect time because of poor writing, without any chance of appearing natural.

Mortal Engines has no redeeming qualities, and when you try to analyze aspects of the plot or story, it will either break apart or just completely get even more confusing. I assume this is a series, and more books/movies will maybe clear some things up. Unfortunately, that doesn’t work well with a standalone movie (Which had no sign of a sequel set up either).

And what in the flying fuck is up with the Shrike robot? I barely understand how they even exist, and just have to accept their near god level power. And it mostly implies it is a bad guy, despite clearly doing a good thing, until the very end when we are supposed to suddenly flip our switches and feel sad? The graphics and voice behind him were also, seemingly, left behind somewhere.

I spent most of the time with this movie trying to fight off sleep, and writing down lines that were delivered extra terrible/cheesy. That, and counting down the minutes until I could get out of the theater and try to put this movie behind me.

When you think of Hostiles, you think of a group of angry people. Knowing that this movie is set as a western, with cowboys and American Indians, it sort of brings Pocahontas to mind. I know, it wasn’t cowboys, but close enough. And famously in that movie we had the song Savages. Throughout history, generally Savage was used when the “white” side ran into natives in another land. But in this song, they both saw each other as savages! Equality because both sides were different and didn’t trust different things.

Except you know, the part where in Pocahontas, the white people were actual terrible invaders and the bad people and that was it. So they tried well, but still failed in that regard.

Anyway, I think of that song when I hear Hostiles (and probably also for the movie Savages). Going into it, I assumed that every side and every new character was probably a “hostile” individual, and that no one should be trusted or given a gun.

When everyone is this aggressive, you just need to have the gun out at all times.

Set in 1892, we find ourselves in the Western United States. The Civil War is over, but the Spanish-American war had not yet happened. Soldiers at this point didn’t have a lot of responsibilties. Mostly keeping the peace, in forts across the country.

Captain Joseph J. Blocker (Christian Bale) has been in the army for about 25 or more years at this point. He has seen and done a lot of things. He was at Wounded Knee not to much longer before. And he hates the Native Americans. He h as seen what they have done to “honest, Americans” and is disgusted by that fact. Hell, most of his career has involved killing them or rounding them up, but he also has only done what he is told.

And now he is being told to do something unthinkable. He has to return Chief Yellow Hawk (Wes Studi) and his family (Adam Beach, Q’orianka Kilcher, and more) to their homeland. He has been imprisoned for seven years and it has been long enough, especially since Yellow Hawk has the cancer. It has turned into a big deal for their government to send him home to die with his people and forgive past crimes, hell, even the president has signed off on it. The press are involved!

Blocker doesn’t wan this job. And it will be his last one before retirement. He has his crew (Jesse Plemons, Jonathan Majors, Rory Cochrane, Timothée Chalamet), he had his weapons and supplies, and he had a terrible mission.

And along the way he will also pick up Rosalie Quaid (Rosamund Pike) a very recent widow who lost her family and house to a group of Native American horse thieves, and (Ben Foster) a former soldier, turned prisoner for doing unthinkable crimes and trying to run, who needs delivery to a fort for a court marshal.

Also featuring others, like Stephen Lang, Peter Mullan, and Robyn Malcolm.

Shit, everyone gets a gun in this movie.

Hostiles is a film that is just a little bit over two hours, but one that feels much longer. The first scene grabs you and the film refuses to let go the entire time. It keeps your attention by gripping characters, extremely great acting, authentic everything, and slightly terrifying plot.

It doesn’t keep your interest like a modern cartoon, by flashing shit at you every few seconds. No, the scenes are long, detailed, and showcase real human emotion. Hard decisions don’t just come naturally, but they are often decided in between scenes. But in this film, we have to watch actors think through their moral issues and figure out what they need to do. And on its own, that might not seem too appealing, but it just shows the amount of attention to detail that went into this film.

Scott Cooper directed this film and I will be honest, I haven’t really enjoyed anything he has directed before. That is from Black Mass, Out of the Furnace, and Crazy Heart. All films that are known for one reason or another, some good, some not so good. But none of them really reached me.

Hostiles reached me something fierce. Bale has a good chance of getting nominated. Watching Pike play such an unhinged character gave me flashbacks to Gone Girl, she does such work here as well. All of the other side characters are clearly their own individuals. The film kept me guessing with just how scenes would play out. The characters are complex individuals, so their actions won’t always be obvious from earlier in the film.

Hostiles is just a great film on all fronts. The soundtrack, the acting, the story, the pacing, the cinematography, shit, even the costumes. Westerns are rare, but it seems like every western we get is basically gold at this point.

Don’t Breath. Don’t Even Breath. Breath and you’re dead. Wait, no, the opposite of all of that. Modifying a Doctor Who quote doesn’t really work in this context.

This is another film that I was almost happy to announce I knew nothing about going into it. But then I went and saw a regular movie in the theater and caught the last 20-30 seconds of the trailer. Damn, I was so close to not even having the slimmest plot outline.

But since that cat is out of the bag, the director of the film is Fede Alvarez who before now has only directed one feature film, the recent Evil Dead. Hey! That also had the same star as this one. And hey! Evil Dead was kind of awesome in a gory, never want to watch ever again way.

So paint me a little bit tickled, as I practice holding my breath like I am riding in a car through a tunnel, thinking I will get a wish out of it.

Holding your breath as an old man walks by is a sure way to get your wish of not smelling him.

Detroit kind of sucks. Not the sports teams, they are awesome of course. But the area is terrible, many properties are abandoned, and people just want to get out of there. Just watch the documentary Detropia, I reviewed it last week.

People like Rocky (Jane Levy) want to leave, but they are poor and in terrible abusive situations. That is why she turned to robbery. With her boyfriend, Money (Daniel Zovatto) and best friend Alex (Dylan Minnette) they break into rich people houses and take only items to sell to dealers on the streets. If they take too much money, it is a bigger crime and they want to be prepared if they get caught. It is easy for them, because Alex’s dad works for a security company, so Alex is able to break into his desk to steal house specific keys to deactivate the alarms.

Well, Money gets a hot tip from one of his guys on the street. There is an old man (Stephen Lang) who lives along, on a street that everyone has abandoned. No police presence, no nosy neighbors, just him and a dog. He was an Iraq war vet (The first one) and injured while there, but more importantly, he made bank when his daughter was killed in a car accident from some rich kid. So he is sitting on six figures and he potentially keeps it in his house. Oh and he is blind.

So yeah, Rocky, Alex, Money are pretty much assholes. They are going to steal from a lonely old man, blind, war vet. They are going to take that money and move out of the state, somewhere like California and make something with their lives. They just, you know, have to be the worst people ever.

I said worst people ever, not biggest pupils ever.

Alvarez has created something unique, yet familiar, scary, and morally out the window. At the same time, he created a movie that has 88 minute run time including credits and still feels incredibly too long.

And that is incredibly annoying because I was totally digging the story. Now, I hated the three young characters. Each one, regardless of their reasons for being in the house. They are all asshats for deciding to try and steal from him. But at the same time, they don’t make the Old Man to be a nice fellow either. It isn’t rooting for the bad guy, it is rooting for mutually assured destruction. I just wanted everyone to punish and get what is coming to them, while at the same time, mad the situation is even occurring in the first place. So yes, it toyed with my emotions and messed with my perception of right and wrong.

That added together could be a reason I just hated the ending. I can’t tell you exactly how long, but there was a shift about 10-15 minutes left in the film that I just wish didn’t exist in anyway. Too much is revealed, a side is chosen to be the “champion” of the film, and then it just drags on and on. There were two very appropriate places it could have ended before it got too full of itself. But it continued. Then characters continued to make terrible decisions. It became repetitive and I couldn’t wait for the end.

The cinematography was lovely, including a nice long house one take from the inside, the pitch dark scenes were wonderful, complete with large pupils, and Lang knocked it out of the park as the old man. The rest of the acting was pretty average.

This is about three fourths of a decently entertaining movie that doesn’t hold your hand and make things easy to watch. But at some point the filmmakers decide that they are bored with that and turn it into a more standard film with an almost goddamn happy ending, despite the many unhappy circumstances involved.

To continuing with my current “White theme” and “Irish theme“, I am now going to join both worlds. White Irish Drinkers. Mind blown, huh?

Besides, they already made White Russian Drinkers.

White Irish Drinkers is about two brothers, Nick Thurston and Geoffrey Wigdor (or Brian and Danny Leary). Danny is the older one, and a punk. But he is also abused! His dad, another Irish drinker, spends a lot of his paycheck on alcohol, and takes his anger out on Danny, not Brian.

Brian is a nicer kid, but he also only gets beaten up from his brother. Surprise! He is also a good artist. But he keeps it a secret from his parents, he doesn’t want to be called names or anything. This is the 70s! He should be working in the mill (or something) in Brooklyn. Whatever they have there.

The dad is Stephen Lang, from Avatar/Terra Nova. The mom is played by Karen Allen, and Leslie Murphy the love interest thing.

What is going on in Brooklyn? Brian works at a theater, and it turns out the ROLLING STONES are going to stop in to play a small concert. The owner of the theater knows the manager, and as a favor they are willing to make a stop. But, they can only advertise the day of, no advanced ticket sales, and what not. So in preparation, you know what is going to happen? The brothers are going to steal all that money, run away from home, and start a new life abuse free. What could go wrong (besides morality)?

Moustache-tic!

The movie was slow at parts, but all of it was building up for the final 20-30 minutes. I can say I did not expect the ending at all, and found myself agreeing with a lot of the characters. Well played indeed. The final final scene was a nice act of redemption, possibly unnecessary, but hey, everyone watching wanted it. Okay movie, definitely helps if you too are drinking during it. Get into that city living Irish stereotype mindset.