FILM REVIEW: PLANES FIRE & RESCUE

A scene from Planes: Fire & Rescue.

Newcomer on the job

By John Esther

Before the opening credits roll in director Bobs Gannaway's Planes: Fire & Rescue, Disney dedicates the movie "To the courageous firefighters throughout the world who risk their lives to save the lives of others." It is a nice, well deserved gesture and it tells you immediately where the heart of this film beats. 

The follow up to last year's Planes, this animated feature follows the highs and lows -- literally and metaphorically -- of Dusty Crophopper (voice by Dane Cook), a plane who is about to fly into the winds of change.

Having just won another aerial race, Dusty is out training for an upcoming local race when his health comes crashing down. Told that he can never race again, Dusty goes out at night and pushes himself to the point of collapse, not only causing more harm to himself, but damage to his community at large. (Was he drunk on oil?)

In order to redeem himself and save his community, Dusty must get certified as an aerial firefighter. 

Up until this point, audiences may wonder where in the world Planes: Fire & Rescue is taking place. There are no humans in the story. Only cars, trucks, trains, planes, and other vehicles (basically Disney merchandise to be purchased) living in a world free of smog, pollution or oil spills. And these vehicles, except one mentioned in a side-of-the-mouth quip, seem to run on gas. Of course, they do speak American English. 

This otherworldly notion is dispersed when Dusty heads across the land to Yosemite, Earth. It is here Dusty will train under the tutelage of Blade (voice by Ed Harris) and with the help of friendly co-firefighters, including a forward-thinking female, Lil' Dipper (voice by Julie Bowen), who, along with Blade, Windlifter (voice by West Studi), are the most entertaining character in Planes: Fire & Rescue. 

No sooner has Dusty arrived a fire alarm is set off, sending the firefighting crew deep into the forest. Immediately the team sets out with brilliant precision: planes swoop in, pick up water and drop it on the fire, while utility vehicles descend in parachutes to the ground where they will do their work with the precision of machines, but with the personalities of toys similar to the ones given to them by imaginative children. It is a heroic coordination with no time to lose.  

To get, or amp, adults in this firefighting scene, the filmmakers set it to AC/DC's "Thunderstruck." As rocking and rolling as "Thunderstruck" may be, lyrically speaking, "Thunderstruck" has just about much correlation to the action taking place in the movie as Kajagoogoo's "Too Shy," Gang of Four's "Better him than Me" or Beyonce Knowles' "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)." If someone asked me, Kansas' "Fighting Fire with Fire," Ultravox's "One Small Day" or Muse's "Knights of Cydonia" would have been more germane, but nobody asked. Actually, Leftfield's "Open Up" comes to mind when considering such pedestrian pandering. Anyway, it is an emotionally charged, intellectually lethargic musical choice. Unfortunately, it is the best song you will hear in Planes: Fire & Rescue. Plus, Mark Mancina's score is worse than the individual songs.

During his initial entry into firefighting it becomes clear Dusty has a lot to learn and to explain to the real firefighters. His ego and his poor health are both a detriment and a danger to himself and the team. Yet he is too arrogant to defer to his betters. Naturally, I mean formulaically, the protagonist will have to jump through hoops of fire before he can become a hero. 

Not only do the government-run, taxpayer-supporting firefighters have the burden of training Dusty, they now have a bigger problem with Cad Spinner (voice by John Michael Higgens), a park superintendent acting more like real estate developer than a ranger. Driven by ambition, Cad diverts firefighter funds to his new restoration project. The Grand Fusel Lodge is about to open and the ambitious, avarice and authoritarian Cad wants to impress the visiting Secretary of the Interior (voice by Fred Willard). And if the forest burns before his retreat, that is just the cost of doing business. 

Now, it does not take a Maru (voice by Curtis Armstrong), to figure out and fix the conclusion of the movie. Co-screenwriters Gannaway and Jeffrey M. Howard are not going to tail and spin this elementary narrative into a tragedy. 

Nonetheless, for a film geared toward smaller children -- the MPAA gave the film a PG rating for "Action and Some Peril" -- Planes: Fire & Rescue is rather intense for younger viewers. Some of the action is fast and there are several scenes where the smoke lingers on, not knowing if our products, I mean protagonists, of the movie, have survived. As one young kid said aloud at the all-Media screening, "What happened? I don't like this movie"; perhaps expressing the sentiments of others. There was adult laughter in response. 

Since Disney insists on trying to please both children and parents in these family-friendly ventures, there are obviously some jokes, not the token flatulence ones of course, that will mean nothing to the kids. Lil' Dipper's high-jinks are for those whose hormones have already kicked in. The hybrid car joke about "never heard it coming" will be a "zoom" for the typical kid. And the "CHoPs" metanarrative in the movie, a pastiche of the TV series, CHiPs -- both featuring Erik Estrada -- puzzled the many a kinder eyes and ears during the aforementioned screening. 

This is not to suggest that storytelling for different audience ages (or, at least maturity) is a bad thing. Family members may leave the theater talking to other family members about what he or she took from the movie, which may offer different perspectives on the same text. (Yes, it is extremely doubtful Disney has such intellectual intentions. So called "family films" are geared toward the maximum possible ticket buyers.)

However, there is one thing everyone should be able to take from the film: firefighters do some very important and dangerous work. Even though the characters in Planes: Fire & Rescue are made of metal, that is clear at the movie's most elementary level. 

Planes: Fire & Rescue is available in 3D. 

FILM REVIEW: THE AVENGERS

A scene from The Avengers.

Comics con

By Don Simpson

The Avengers may not be a great film, but it is probably the best superhero film ever made -- which is not necessarily saying a lot.

Sure, there are a few exceptions, but even the best superhero films (X-Men, X2, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, The Dark Night) have had their fatal flaws. First and foremost, no superhero film to date has been able to maintain a strong and coherent narrative for the duration of the film. The significance of the story always plays second-fiddle to special effects, action sequences and costumes. That is just the nature of the beast. As film history informs us, superhero films are supposed to be straightforward stories of good versus evil. Sure, sometimes the definitions of good and bad are a little blurred, and good does not always prevail (at least not in the short term), but there is always a superhero (or team of superheroes) and a villain (or a group of villains), and battle they must. The villains are never all that complex; in most cases they just want to control the world or destroy it, other times they are just good old fashioned nut jobs.

The Avengers plot is not much better. If anything, the plots of X-Men and X2 are stronger. Oh, no! Thor’s (Chris Hemsworth) brother, Loki (Tom Hiddleston), wants to bring the world to its knees with an alien army! Who can save the world? The Avengers! So, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) rallies his team of misfits together...and the rest is history. Luckily for writer-director Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, Dollhouse), several of The Avengers origins stories have already been theatrically released so no backstory is necessary for the superheroes. Even the two Avengers who were deemed not worthy of origins stories -- Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) -- only get a couple lines of expository dialogue to explain their pasts.

So with a half-assed plot, and no character development, Whedon, one of the true masters of witty, snarky, self-referential dialogue, plays to his strengths and saturates the script with smart ass dialogue. In turn, there is no point in The Avengers where the film takes itself seriously -- which is not such a bad thing. Working with superheroes like Thor, who protects the world with his giant hammer (to quote Captain Hammer from Joss Whedon’s Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog: “the hammer is my penis”), or Captain America (Chris Evans), who protects the world with a shield (okay, I admit it, I’m lacking a sexual metaphor for this guy), what is to be taken seriously? Then, there is Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) who is as cocksure as superheroes come and the not-so-jolly green giant with severe anger management issues, The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo). Essentially, Whedon uses The Avengers as a playground to allow the Avengers free reign to mock each other, and he does this in such a way to be humorous but not piss off loyal fans of the source material.

Speaking of fans, if you are a fan of Whedon’s television work, the Avengers are culled directly from the Whedonverse. Whedon has made a career of developing characters who must come to terms with their superhuman powers. Then they are matched up against other superhuman characters. Then Whedon lets them fight (physically or verbally) out their differences until they begrudgingly join forces in an apocalyptic battle against a seemingly undefeatable enemy. In most cases, there is a higher power who is revealed to be playing puppet master, controlling the fate of the world (usually unbeknown to the protagonists).

On a side note, there is a much stronger Whedon screenplay currently in multiplexes that is far more worthy of your attention: Cabin in the Woods. Unlike The Avengers’ watered-down plot (which we can probably chalk up to Disney keeping Whedon on a short leash), the narrative complexities of Cabin in the Woods’ plot reaches nearly inexplicable levels. Cabin in the Woods proves that genre filmmaking can push the intellectual limits of the audience, whereas The Avengers is just another Hollywood joyride.