FILM REVIEW: PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN IV

Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.

Slow ride

By Allan Heifetz

Truth be told, I’m not a fan of the first three installments of Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. They always left me wanting less -- less characters, less CGI spectacle and less of a convoluted and confusing story. These movies, inspired by an amusement park ride, bludgeon you over the head with swashbuckling until you just want to close your eyes and experience something close to nothingness.

At any rate, I was sort of looking forward to Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which comes four years after the third and most hated chapter, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End. This time there is no Orlando Bloom (Will) or Kiera Knightley (Elizabeth) mucking up the works; Johnny Depp’s “delightful” Captain Jack Sparrow is now front and center and ready to give us a good time.

After pulling off the daring rescue of his pal, Gibbs (Kevin McNally), from a London jail, Jack runs into Angelica (Penelope Cruz), an old flame turned adventurer who happens to be the daughter of the infamous Blackbeard (Ian McShane). Against his will, Jack ends up on Blackbeard’s ship and is forced to guide the scary captain and his daughter to the fabled Fountain of Youth. At the same time, Jack's old rival, Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush), is sailing to the fountain as well, having snagged the job of captain on a royal expedition to plunder the fountain’s powers. Oh yeah, the Spaniards have a ship in the race, too (just one of many story elements that could have been easily ripped out of the movie). On their way Blackbeard and crew must find some ancient chalices and snag a mermaid’s tear to help them activate the fountain.

What I like most about the Pirates of the Caribbean movies is the makeup; a real sense of griminess and decrepitude permeates every scene. Everyone has horribly decaying teeth and is covered in soot. I could barely pay attention to the story for imagining just how ungodly these characters must smell. No toothbrushes? No showers? No vitamin C? Dear lord, can’t we just kill them all and let god brush their teeth? Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides coasts along on sheer spectacle for a good long while before that inevitable fatigue hits us. In the meantime there are some great set pieces, breathtaking crane shots of awesome looking ships and a pretty cool scene in which Jack's crew falls victim to a school of seductive and super vicious killer mermaids.

Running for a total of 136 minutes, Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides makes us wait two hours to get to the Fountain of Youth only to do absolutely nothing with the idea of a mythical magical fountain. Nobody ages rapidly and disintegrates in front of your eyes; nobody drinks too much from the fountain and turns into a baby or anything. Imagine if, at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Dr. René Belloq (Paul Freeman) opens the ark to find nothing but sand and then…that’s it. No screaming ghosts and no melting faces. That’s sort of what the finale of Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides is like.

Depp’s charm is palpable in Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides, but after two hours of Jack cracking wise, messing shit up and acting like a goof you sort of want him to stop the shenanigans, get angry and be a real hero. I prefer an action hero like an Indiana Jones who is serious, troubled, super-focused and will crack a joke only when cornered. Jack is too silly and unreliable to really get behind. All he does is stumble into tedious sword fights and swing on things. I hate to say it, but isn’t sword fighting in general fairly dull to watch? It’s especially dull in Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides since the film’s violence is completely sterilized and bloodless. After any given large scale sword fight you’re never sure whether everyone was killed or nobody was killed. Since nothing is at stake, you are never fully involved in the action. You know what Indy does to swordsmen? ‘Nuff said.

Cruz’s Angelica has all the gravitas of lovely Spanish wallpaper. She made me pine for the enchanting and smashed-in face of Knightley. Cruz was super shrill, annoying and hard to understand in Blow (2001) -- the first film she appeared in with Depp and in Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides -- and she continues from there. Clearly Jack and Angelica are supposed to have Indy/Marion Ravenwood (Harrison Ford/Karen Allen) like chemistry, but Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides has no classic reunion scene like the one in Raiders of the Lost Ark where Indy walks into Marion’s Tibetan tavern after all those years only to get punched in the jaw. Jack and Angelica run into each other, spew a lot of awkward exposition about their past and continue to bitch back and forth until the end. We don’t care about their love. McShane’s Blackbeard is quite frightening at first, but over the course of this endless movie he loses his presence. It would have helped if we knew why he had supernatural powers and if we got to see a bit of his back story.

Of course Keith Richards pops in for a meaningless cameo as Jack‘s pirate dad. What a horrible relationship this father and son have. Senior surprises Junior. Junior says “Hi, Dad.” Senior gives Junior some quick warnings in a pub and then vanishes into thin air when Junior isn’t looking. Wouldn’t a hug have been better?

Directed by Rob Marshall (Chicago; Nine), and credited to nine different writers, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides doesn’t really improve on the previous films and, unless the next one gets an R rating, costs two million to make and is directed by Neill Blomkamp (District 9), I don’t have much hope for the franchise.

Oh, and of course the 3D glasses made everything a little darker and therefore had me wishing I could watch it in 2D. Idea: why not boost the brightness on the entire film one stop so the glasses will make the picture normal? Genius.

LA COMEDY SHORTS FILM FESTIVAL 2011: WRAP-UP

A scene from Elephant Larry Presents the Wow.

Ha!

By Allan Heifetz

In this age of Funny or Die and YouTube there can be only two kinds of comedy short: ones that can go viral and ones that will die alone. If your recent funny video has had the latter experience-- just like the one I recently made (more on that later), there's will always be a short film festival like the L.A. Comedy Shorts Film Festival that will show it if it's halfway decent.

I was only able to attend for one day (April 8) and had to miss the star studded events of the next two days. I started my day at the festival with two panel discussions about how to make money by producing comedy for the web. The panelists all seemed like such caring nurturers, ready to throw money and time at your silliest ideas. Execs like Lindsay Goffman, Manager of Comedy and Drama Development at FreMantle, and Walter Newman from Cartoon Network/Adult Swim, talked a lot about how they're dying for new comedic talent and constantly trolling the web for the latest thing. So, I gathered in the end that the only hard part of becoming a web comedy sensation is getting people to watch your shit. What a shocker.

I recently put up a funny video on Funny or Die, but I somehow doubt Will Ferrell or Adam McKay has caught it. My poor video just hangs there, ignored by the comedy intelligentsia, friends and family. What went wrong? Well first off, I don't have any friends or connections and I dont Twitter.

Anyway, it was a bit jarring that after so much web and "viral" talk from the panels that most of the short films screened that day were completely web unfriendly, especially the ones over two minutes long. Attending a short film festival can be an awkward experience. You have the two-minute films competing against the 25-minute ones. You must suffer through every unnecessary credit sequence in silence and then give a final courtesy clap afterwards. The Downtown Independent Theater had a sweet, big screen projection system, but this didn't do the many TV parody videos any service since they belong on a TV and not blown up huge so we can see every pixel.

I do love me some commercial parody shit and I was glad to see the anarchic and surreal parodic stylings of Tim and Eric featured in so many entries. Films like VCR to Cash, It's Elementary! Gardening with Marty Chang and especially the 20-minute entertainment show/infomercial, Elephant Larry Presents The Wow, managed to be super sharp with tons of psychotic energy to burn.

Many short comedy films are made by bored actors who are inspired to pool their talents, call in some favors and shoot pieces that provide a showcase for themselves and their pals. The actor-based short can be a mixed bag; the performances are often strong but the actual ideas behind it all are usually less than original. Films like Hip, Conversations a Bench, Genius Improv School, Withstand One Night, A Date With Diana and Try Hard all boasted funny and winning performances but the concepts all lacked spark. Only the two minute, L.A.-specific, Undocumented Worker: The Audition managed to be well acted, funny, adorable and fresh at the same time.

So at least now I know how to market my next funny video. I just have to get a handful of famous people to see it and Twitter about it to a million close friends.

Until then... a Comedy Short and my Ewok song parody.

DVD REVIEW: BLACK SWAN

Nina (Natalie Portman) in Black Swan.

White out

By Allan Heifetz

The rock star called Pink in Pink Floyd’s The Wall had a great many reasons to go completely bazonkers. His soldier dad died when Pink was little, his mom smothered him, his wife left him, the drugs, the drink, the Nazi-flavored paranoia, etc. All of these nasty ingredients combine in the end to smash Pink’s sanity. Nina, the meek ballerina of Black Swan, is also a sensitive artist with a large handful of issues that threaten her mind and eventually her life. She lives in near seclusion with her creepy and resentful mother (Barbara Hershey) and dances for a prestigious NYC company that runs her ragged physically and emotionally. Her scary director, Thomas (Vincent Cassel, playing the President of Sexual Harassment in the Workplace), demands perfection from her as well as 24-hour-access to her emaciated booty.

Nina has a brief moment of elation when she wins the coveted lead role in Swan Lake in which she must dance as both the white and the black swan. Her triumph is snuffed out after word is spread that she’s sleeping with the director. Nina becomes an outcast as Thomas continues to bully her into melding with her inner Black Swan in order to unleash the sexual, amoral and dark spirit inside. Alas, Nina is severely blocked sexually and can’t even successfully masturbate. Lily (Mila Kunis), a pretty, sexually open and popular dancer, tries to befriend Nina, but Nina’s delusion and paranoia quickly snuffs out that relationship. Nina is soon convinced that Lily is out to steal her role and destroy her. Nina’s hallucinations ramp up as she spirals down the crazy hole. Which side will seize control in the end; the white or the black? Always bet on black.

Black Swan is truly a rare bird; an extremely bleak story about ballet that somehow became very popular with filmgoers. Even though Natalie Portman put people in seats with her super-tortured and Oscar-winning performance, it’s Darren Aronofsky’s playfulness and technique with a camera that makes this horror story watchable and even fun. This is a horror movie where even the jump scares are artistic and breathtaking and the CGI effects are subtle. Black Swan feels like a little sister to Repulsion (1965), director Roman Polanski’s ode to isolation and sexual psychosis. If Repulsion is the ultimate “Girl descends slowly into madness” movie, then Black Swan just might be the Princess ballerina of the sub-genre that I might have just made up.

As far as DVD extras, there is an interesting, 30-minute behind-the-scenes documentary that leaves you wanting more. Unfortunately, that’s it.

The Blu-Ray extras reportedly offer the above documentary, plus three other behind-the-scenes pieces.

FILM FEATURE: BASIC CABLE MOVIES

Elizabeth Bennet (Keira Knightly) in Pride & Prejudice.

Reel zzzzzzzz bad

By Allan Heifetz

As my wife lay sick in bed the other day watching the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice with Kiera Knightley on the E! channel, it hit me that since we already owned the movie on DVD I could just get it from the shelf, pop the disc in for her and she could watch the movie properly. “Properly” in this sense means with no ads, no scenes ripped out for time restraints and presented in the right aspect ratio. Of course, sick wifey told me not to bother since she was barely awake anyhow. Besides, the whole ordeal of walking over to the DVD shelf, getting the movie and putting it in the machine all smacks of commitment. By watching a movie on basic cable you are saying to the world “I can change the channel at any time, I’m free to roam, I’m not married to this.”

When I’m channel flipping and happen to catch myself watching a basic cable hatchet-job presentation of a film that I already own, I feel dirty and ashamed. It’s like I’ve taken my Hellboy II DVD’s ugly and slow sister out for a romantic evening while the real Hellboy II looks on from atop her dusty shelf. She cries, for I have cheated on her ample 2-discs.

Ever since the dawn of TV, the obvious choice for filling endless hours of programming time has been movies. Upon buying a movie a network is then free to remove chunks of it, get rid of dialogue with dubbing, bleeping or silence, crop the picture and so on. The film is thus used like caulking goo to sloppily fill in those gaping holes between ad breaks.

In days gone by the picture and sound quality of our televisions was so poor and the screens were so tiny that one felt lucky to be watching a movie no matter the quality. But now, even in this age of ever-increasing access to pristine quality picture and sound and with so much uncut material at your fingertips through services like Tivo, On Demand and Netflix, most people still adopt the “whatever’s on” stance and watch what is put before them. Freedom from choice can be liberating. I bet that even most self-described “movie buffs” would happily sit through an ad injected, heavily cut, cropped, panned, scanned, blurred and dubbed movie that’s jacked up even more with banner ads and network logos fighting for screen space. These are the kind of movie fans that don’t get angry when they see a cropped two shot that successfully cuts both actors out of frame. These people manage to block out all the troublesome questions that arise while watching a movie on broadcast TV or basic cable, such as why was that word bleeped out? Why was that scene deleted? This line of questioning opens up a Pandora’s box of serious issues; once you go down that road there is nothing waiting for you at the end but confusion and anger. Don’t let’s start.

After her recovery, the wife let me know that E! had actually torn out the final scene of Pride and Prejudice. Oh, just the final scene? The scene in which we finally get to see newlyweds Elisabeth Bennett and Mr. Darcy make out? The scene you’ve been waiting to see all through the fucking movie? Sure, go ahead and toss it. It’s just not necessary. We saw that they got married, right? Isn’t that enough? I imagine the cut had to be made to make room for just one more Jerseylicious promo. Let’s use logic here, if you start out with Pride and Prejudice and whittle the shit out of it, what you are left with is something other/less than Pride and Prejudice. A Pride and Prejudice, perhaps.

I, for one, am taking the high road and pledging never to watch a crop chop dubby again. From here on out I will be referring to edited-for-TV films as “crop chop dubbys.” Nor will I ever watch an edited-for-TV episode of a freaking TV show like The Sopranos (thanks, A&E).

The American Movie Classics channel is pretty damned lucky when you think about it. A never ending wave of respect and admiration has been heaped upon the network for their daring original programming (Breaking Bad, Mad Men, The Walking Dead). The greatness of these shows effectively masks the fact that AMC is a true basic cable bottom feeder. AMC does nothing but show heavily cut movies of varying quality complete with commercials. AMC wants to be a haven for movie lovers but wouldn’t real movie lovers rather watch a movie than watch an AMC facsimile of one?

Would a true fan of Goodfellas put up with the crop choppy version of it? Would a true action lover watch Predator with the violence ripped out and the macho cussin’ completely neutered? Would a true Dirty Harry fan watch “Dirty Harry Week” on AMC?

You have no idea how long I waited to see the bad guy in Sudden Impact get impaled on the horn of that merry-go-round unicorn. It never happened. I cried myself to sleep. AMC might offer a stupid “Top 5 Reasons Why Dirty Harry is Totally Awesome” bit at the end of a commercial break but it doesn’t make up for the fact that they are peddling a bogus product.

The G4 network has been struggling for almost a decade now to form some sort of cohesive identity in which to attract its coveted demo of males aged 18 - 34. Starting off as a channel dedicated to all things video games, they soon realized that the gaming community is too busy playing video games to actually watch TV about playing video games. Nowadays their snazzy looking bumpers and station IDs try desperately to present the channel as a haven for hip young males obsessed with geek culture and gadgets. Alas, the truth is G4 would air Golden Girls or Mama’s Family reruns in a heartbeat if they knew it would turn a profit. If G4 is so god damned cutting edge and cool then why is all their programming so heavily self-censored? This is a channel that covers the porn industry regularly and features porn-related programming yet god forbid someone say “shit” or “ass” or show anything resembling nudity. Do you get the feeling that there are two opposing forces at work here?

When G4 puts a movie on they call the presentation “Movies That Don’t Suck.” The “Movies That Don’t Suck” opening title sequence is pretty awesome; it perfectly mimics the old “Movie of the Week” title sequences from the 70’s and 80’s. The music is wonderfully tinny and there’s even a classic “IN COLOR” logo at the bottom. Then the movie starts and it’s all downhill from there. Even if the movie did indeed not suck in the slightest in its original form, you can depend on G4 to make your viewing experience suck as hard as a bag o’ dicks. It seems they can only afford horrible quality prints of films that have been crop chop dubby’d to within an inch of their lives. Add in an ad break every six minutes and more ugly screen text than a Japanese game show (There’s the G4 network logo, the Movies That Don’t Suck logo and worst of all, the name of the movie you are watching in the left hand corner, just in case you’re too tired to press the info button on your remote) and you have a colossal waste of time that is an insult to us, the time-wasting TV watchers.

You wouldn’t think there would be a network out there with more serious identity issues than G4 but you really must hand the basic cable desperation award to the Reelz Channel. Even after the world has rejected them, they soldier on, staying afloat any way they can. You see, the Reelz Channel was supposed to be “TV about Movies.” While other networks like E! suck on the film industry’s teat for only, say, 70 percent of their programming, Reelz stepped up as the network willing to get on their knees and go the full 110 percent with mind numbing junkets, behind-the-scenes puffery and endless run-off from the Hollywood hype spigot. A handful of entertainment news-style shows were produced, all complete with shitty virtual backgrounds to save money on couches. Reelz even managed to snag super critic Leonard Maltin, former At The Movies star Richard Roeper and L.A.’s least favorite entertainment reporter, Sam Rubin, to perform hosting duties.

Alas, Reelz overestimated people’s appetite for promotional materials. In the years since the launch of Reelz, I doubt any of these shows have even showed up on a ratings list. So it’s on to Plan B: a full frontal, financially mandatory lobotomy. Now this channel dedicated to movies offers one hour blocks of Becker, Cheers, News Radio, Ally McBeal and Brothers and Sisters (Wow, two Calista Flockhart shows? Shouldn’t Reelz change their name to Flockhartz? Or Ally McReelz?).

When it comes time to fill up a two to three hour hole in their schedule, Reelz returns to the cinema for inspiration. By “cinema” I of course mean crop chop dubby’s of truly awful movies that only succeed in mocking further the channel’s original mission statement. Remember the Razzie Award winner for Worst Picture of 1993, Shining Through? Reelz Gotz it! Love Bette Midler movies? Go die. Or rather, tune in for Reelz’ umpteenth showing of For the Boys. And so, sans raison-detre, Reelz now drifts, zombified, floating through the nether-regions of the cable universe, searching for meaning. Lights on, nobody’s home. The once wacky “Z” on the end now stands for Zzzzzzzzzzz.

But wait! Have you seen the trades? Reelz is all over the headlines! In a huge effort to heighten its’ presence, Reelz has bought the troubled and controversial new mini-series The Kennedy’s, which proved to be too biographically questionable for any legitimate network to air. With this Hail Mary pass perhaps Reelz will finally have its fifteen minutes and be able to say “Fuck you, AMC! Who’s the shitty movie channel with exciting original programming now?!”