Air (2023)

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on April 27, 2023.

(M) ★★★★

Director: Ben Affleck.

Cast: Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Jason Bateman, Marlon Wayans, Chris Messina, Chris Tucker, Viola Davis, Matthew Maher, Julius Tennon.

"It looks blue now, but get it away from these blue lights and... it's still blue."

Air answers two very important questions: "Can you make an entire film about a shoe?" and "Can you make a film about Michael Jordan without really having Michael Jordan in it?".

In the hands of director Affleck, the answer is a resounding "yes" to both questions. So the next round of questions becomes "Why make an entire film about a shoe?" and "Why make a film about Michael Jordan without really having Michael Jordan in it?".

To put it simply, the shoe in question is more than just a shoe. Not since Cinderella has a shoe played a more pivotal role in something. This is a shoe that made the '80s - it changed an industry, shaped a sport, warped popular culture, and helped make a man into an icon before he became a legend.

Air is the story of Nike's efforts to court and sign then-NBA rookie Michael Jordan. While you can file this in the "I Know How It Ends" basket alongside Titanic, this Moneyball-like drama milks every ounce of tension, humour and pathos out of its tale of The Little Shoe Company That Could.

Affleck takes Jordan out of this film as much as possible to focus on everyone else who helped create the must-have fashion accessory of the '80s. While it could be distracting, it's a smart directorial choice, helping keep Damon's basketball guru Sonny Vaccaro front and centre, while also subtly playing into the mythic nature of His Airness.

Damon's great as the unlikely hero, and well supported by his buddy Affleck, Bateman, the rarely seen Tucker, a sweary Messina, and a scene-stealing Davis as the quietly spoken Mrs Deloris Jordan. The cast can't be faulted, even if their characters are sketched thin. It's tempting to remark "it's just a shoe" repeatedly throughout the film, but that's because the protagonists' motivations are somewhat obscure and the stakes seem sadly low. Are they doing this because it's their job? It's not like Nike will go under if they don't sign Jordan and make a shoe for him - it's just that history will be different.

Yet the script keeps your interest, dragging you along to the inevitable. Because in the end it's about history - it's about a weird moment in our popular culture where a group of oddly dedicated men chased a dream and re-shaped our reality. And that's Air - it's about the inevitability of history and making dreams reality. Jordan was always going to be a phenomenon, and a sport star was always going to transcend their sport in a way that altered pop culture. Air celebrates the team who were smart enough to see history's wave before it broke, and then surfed it all the way to the bank.

A bangin' '80s soundtrack and some somewhat gratuitous prop placement ("Hey look it's that game/cereal/ad from the '80s") help sell the vibe of it all. And that vibe is about fun. If there are two things that the '80s were really all about, it was having a good time and making a metric fuckton of money. In that sense, Air is the perfect '80s movie.

Inspired by The Last Dance, Air serves as a perfect entrée to that acclaimed Netflix doco series. But best of all, Affleck has done a Moneyball/The Big Short; he's taken something esoteric and niche and made it enjoyable light entertainment for the world at large. 

The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023)

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on April 13, 2023.

(PG) ★★★

Director: Aaron Horvath & Michael Jelenic.

Cast: (voices of) Chris Pratt, Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Day, Jack Black, Keegan-Michael Key, Seth Rogen, Fred Armisen, Sebastian Maniscalco, Kevin Michael Richardson, Charles Martinet.

Tripping. Fucking. Balls.

Let's get the voice thing out of the way. If you want to get pissed off about this movie purely because Chris Pratt doesn't sound like Mario from the games ie. a bad Italian stereotype, then I guess it's your right to get pissed off about stupid shit. 

The film actually addresses the voice thing with some amount of wit and reverence at the start of the film by including the voice, and cameoing OG Mario voice actor Charles Martinet (who's American of French descent by the way) in not one, but two roles. You could argue about why didn't they a) hire an Italian or b) get Pratt to do "the Mario voice" for the whole movie, but seriously who gives a shit? What matters is whether the movie is any good or not.

So if you're gonna get pissed off about Pratt and the voice, fill your boots. There are plenty of legitimate things for you to be annoyed about in this film. Or you could take heart in the fact this is a fairly decent Mario movie that admires and celebrates its source material (including the voice in it's own way), and is kinda fun.

As you'd hope, the movie is the story of two down-on-their luck Brooklyn plumbers, Mario (Pratt) and Luigi (Day), who find themselves accidentally whisked away to mystical lands. Luigi ends up in the Dark Lands captured by the evil Bowser (Black), who is set on marrying Princess Peach (Taylor-Joy) so he take over the Mushroom Kingdom. Meanwhile Mario ends up in the Mushroom King and teams up with Peach to try to save Luigi and the world.

"Predictable" is the key word for this film, but that's not always a bad thing. It's predictable that the film would be a wishlist of stuff from the history of the Mario games - the characters, the villain, the music, the item boxes, the warp pipes; it's all here. And that's great. It's fan service, but it's to be expected, and it kinda works.

The story that is used to weld all these Easter eggs together is equally predictable, bordering on lazy in places, but again, not in a totally bad way. The film does the acceptable bare minimum in terms of its hero's journey and keeping the plot movie in a compelling way. Is it amazing and will it have you hanging on the edge of your seat? Absolutely not. Does it have power-up item boxes scattered throughout for reasons that don't make logical sense? You betcha. So, you know, fan service, but stretched to try and make the movie work.

In fact, the most obvious way to demonstrate how predictable and safe this film is can be found in the musical choices. Are there any more over-used songs in movies (especially family movies) than Can I Kick It?, No Sleep 'Til Brooklyn, Holding Out For A Hero, Mr Blue Sky, Thunderstruck, Take On Me, and Battle Without Honour Or Humanity?

But hey - it's ok for kids movies to be predictable and safe with 2D characters in a 3D world, I guess. Is this going to blow you away like a Pixar film or The Mitchells Vs The Machines (which also uses Battle Without Honour Or Humanity, yes I know) or Into The Spiderverse? No.

But it's bright and loud and shiny and fun in the way a lot of middle-of-the-road family animated movies are these days. It also happens to have the added cache of being recognisable to millions of people of all ages who will be stoked at the references, especially the musical ones (shout-out for the DK Rap getting a guernsey). 

The Super Mario Bros. Movie treats its source material with respect, and has fun while doing it. And that's more than a lot of other video game movies.

Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on April 13, 2023.

(M) ★★★

Director: Jonathan Goldstein & John Francis Daley.

Cast: Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Justice Smith, Sophia Lillis, Hugh Grant, Regé-Jean Page, Chloe Coleman, Daisy Head, Jason Wong.

"Thunderdome? Why do they call it a 'thunderdome'?"

I love D&D. I currently have a level 15 bard/fighter lost in Undermountain, and a level eight halfling cleric deep in the jungles of Chult. This is a very nerdy way of saying I feel uniquely placed among film reviewers to critique this movie.

Firstly, if you're a fellow roleplayer who knows their Waterdeep from their Baldur's Gate, add another star to that rating above. For the rest of the world, be satisfied that this is some solid three-star fun that is a welcome big-budget addition to the genre of cinematic fantasy.

Secondly, what Honour Among Thieves does right is give D&D fans not what they want, but what they need. They want a film that abides by the nitty-gritty of the rules of the game, references certain adventure paths, namedrops certain characters and cities, and features cameos from particular podcasts.

But what they need is a proper movie, with relatable characters facing high stakes in a lived-in world, and who undertake an inner journey of growth as they dungeon-crawl their way to the MacGuffin.

The film does most of that. The characters could be sketched a bit more thoroughly, but D&D: Honour Among Thieves is generally great entertainment. It won't test your brain, but it certainly does the Dungeons & Dragons brand no harm (unlike previous films).

Like all good D&D games, the film centres on an adventuring party - a charming bard (Pine), his barbarian bestie (Rodriguez), an accident-prone sorcerer (Smith), and a tiefling druid (Lillis) - taking part in a mythic quest. Each has their own reasons for joining, but the future of the realm is also at stake.

The film's biggest strength is its cast. Pine and Rodriguez are a fine pairing, while Grant's recent diversion into playing charismatic blowhard baddies (see also Paddington 2) is employed to great effect again here. Smith and Page are also excellent in memorable roles, while Lillis does okay in the most underwritten role in the film.

However, there's a kind of "but" with a lot of the film. The writing is fine, but the group dialogue never quite zings like, say, a Guardians Of The Galaxy. The pacing is dextrous, but it lacks a strong thematic core. And as good as Grant is, the other big bad is largely forgettable. It's like when the little old shopkeeper in your campaign offers you a magical item - there's always a catch.

But by and large, this is a fun adventure. It treats its source material with reverence while also having a laugh with it, and it keeps its eyes on the prize without worrying about planning the next campaign.

Hardcore fans will have their gripes (mine is that the bard has no powers, but at least they didn't make him a horny meme). However the fact this is joyful, re-watchable fun should warm the hearts of roleplayers who have had to settle with sub-par straight-to-DVD abominations in the past. The story, its machinations, and its characters have the vibe of those concocted at tables around the world and the big budget sequences are what we all have imagined, except writ large on the big screen.

The only real disappointment - that there's no meta-end credits sequence revealing four players and a DM sitting around a table rolling dice, having played out the whole movie. 

Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on March 30, 2023.

(M) ★★★★

Director: Guillermo del Toro.

Cast: (voices of) Gregory Mann, David Bradley, Ewan McGregor, Christoph Waltz, Ron Perlman, Burn Gorman, Finn Wolfhard, Cate Blanchett, Tim Blake Nelson, Tilda Swinton, John Turturro.

"Sign this, and Netflix owns your soul."

The Wall Street Journal says there are over 50 adaptions of Carlo Collodi's 1883 serial The Adventures of Pinocchio. There a version where Pinocchio goes into space. There's Roberto Benigni's ill-fated take where the boy-puppet is played by the then-50-year-old Benigni. There's even a porn version (hint: it's not his nose that grows).

By and large the original story, which is dark and strange, has proven eminently adaptable due to its core moral of "be good and you will be rewarded". It's a simple karmic idea with a hint of magic and fantasy that works in a range of settings, including war-time Italy, such as in this masterfully animated take from iconic director Guillermo del Toro. 

Just as Disney's acclaimed 1940 version cherry-picks from Collodi's story, so too does del Toro's. Pinocchio (voiced by Mann) is crafted by Geppetto (Bradley) after the woodworker's son Carlo was killed in a WWII bombing raid. Initially bad-behaved and ill-mannered, Pinocchio runs away to a circus to make money for Geppetto and no longer be a "burden" on the old man. But Geppetto, who is joined by raconteur insect Sebastian J Cricket (McGregor), is desperate to find Pinocchio and bring him home. 

It's hard to think of a director better suited to working in the world of stop-motion animation than del Toro. Even his lesser films such as Pacific Rim and Crimson Peak are visually stylish, but working in the stop-and-go minutiae of this kind of process seems to give the Mexican director the perfect opportunity to paint masterpieces on the screen. The models and sets put together by his team are works of art themselves. And in the service of this intriguing story, with exquisite lighting and great voice performances, it's top-shelf stuff.

The source material is also well suited to del Toro. His passion for a war-time backdrop (see also The Devil's Backbone and Pan's Labyrinth) works well, but it's the strangeness of the original material that is most fitting. He revels in the darkness of the story and takes it to odd new places, including a fascist boys camp with a cameo from Mussolini. 

One thing it falters with is the moral at the heart of Collodi's tale. While Walt Disney's classic gave us Jiminy Cricket as Pinocchio's conscience, del Toro's version separates puppet from cricket, leaving the morality lesson to be a little foggier and ill-defined. It becomes more of a series of unfortunate events, as opposed to an inner journey to goodness, but is no less entrancing for this - just perhaps less impactful.

We reached peak Pinocchio last year, with three new versions released. This is the only one to bother watching. It's a wonderful take on an old story, with a hint of darkness, and some truly masterful animation.

The problem with Poker Face

(M) ★★★

Creator: Rian Johnson.

Cast: Natasha Lyonne, Benjamin Bratt.

Is that a plant growing out of the corner pocket of the pool table?

Crime stories, whether it be on the page or the screen, rely on mystery - who did it, how did they do it, why did they do it. We watch or read these stories to find out the answers to these questions. That’s the tension that drives the narrative and keeps us engaged, often because it puts us in the shoes of the detective/CSI unit/crime-solving old lady. We can even play a game of trying to figure out the answers before the protagonist does. It's half the fun, right?

Poker Face is different. Almost every episode starts by showing us who did it, how they did it, and why they did it. With these typically essential questions answered, its central mystery becomes the equivalent of “how will the protagonist find out it was Colonel Mustard in the living room with the lead pipe?”.

It’s a bold ploy, because by erasing the majority of the mystery, it wipes out the bulk of the tension. Some episodes leave a question or two to be revealed - usually the “why did they do it?”, and the minimal anxiety of how our heroine will get to the bottom of it before she gets killed too. But for the most part, we’re left watching Charlie Cale (Lyonne) use her superpower (she can always tell when people are lying) to solve a puzzle we already know the answer to.

Thankfully Lyonne is fantastic and makes Charlie great company and her superpower is intriguing. Or perhaps, more accurately, its intriguing to see how the writers either write around her superpower (the key trick is for people to answer her questions with a question) or plant the most odd and inane lies to trip up the colourful collection of killers they've created.

But you can’t help but wonder if the bold approach undermines the potential of the show. I’d love to see a re-edit of several episodes that removes the first 20 minutes and puts us in Charlie’s shoes rather than waiting for her to figure out what we already know. Would it be more entertaining? Potentially. There would certainly be more tension in most of the episodes.

Poker Face is at its best when it manages to preserve some of that tension by giving us an actual mystery to solve - episodes 9 and 10 do this best, though it feels like there are more nail-biting ways to unravel those episodes too.

The show has proven popular enough to be picked up for a second season. I'd like to hope that's because of Lyonne, the fascinating rogues gallery and the wit of the writing, rather than the possibility people are enjoying not having to figure out the whodunnit, the motive and the opportunity. Like they're too lazy, boring or stupid to bother with being confused or to not know the answer. Imagine if we reached a point in society where people decided they wanted their mysteries served up without any actual mystery in them. I really hope that's not why people are watching Poker Face.

65

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on March 16, 2023.

(M) ★★

Director:  Scott Beck and Bryan Woods.

Cast: Adam Driver, Ariana Greenblatt, Chloe Coleman, Nika King.

"I mean, yeah, I could walk on the dry bits, but that wouldn't look as cool, would it?"

Let's start with the obvious - 65 is a terrible name for this film. Just about anything else would be better. Adam Driver Vs The Dino-creatures would be better, and that's the dumbest name I can think of, yet it's still preferable to 65. I think more people would go see a movie called Adam Driver Vs The Dino-creatures than a movie called 65. Tell me I'm wrong.

What about Day Of The Dinosaurs? Dino Planet? Cretaceous World? The Lost Planet? No Way Home? Off World? Dinosaurs In Space? Cretaceous Crashlanding? Seriously, anything would have been better than 65.

Even 65 Million Years Ago would be better, although that particular title, as well as the film's promotional material, posters, trailers, tagline, and weird title screen 20 MINUTES INTO THE MOVIE deprive us of what could have been a great Planet Of The Apes-style twist. That twist - "It was Earth all along!" - surely would have attracted people to see this movie. Or at least attracted more people to see this movie than are currently seeing this movie (at last count it had made $22m worldwide against a budget (after tax rebates) of $45m).

The plot, in case you haven't figured it out from my ramblings, follows resourceful deep-space pilot Mills (Driver) and lone surviving passenger/plucky child Koa (Greenblatt) as they try to survive life on Earth 65 million years ago following a spaceship crash.

With man-eating dinosaurs at every turn, Mills and Koa must cross dangerous terrain to reach the other half of their ship, which contains an escape pod that will get them home. 

As at least one YouTube commenter noted, it's great to see a dino movie that's not part of the Jurassic Park franchise. And 65 isn't great, but at least it gets us back to dinosaurs being threatening and scary creatures - not trainable anti-heroes.

Its core premise is strong - Adam Driver vs The Dino-creatures - and those are the best bits, but the film is ultimately disappointing. There are some solid jump scares, the dinosaurs look excellent and dangerous, and the edge-of-your-seat elements are good, but the film falls down in just about every other department, including a sadly mis-cast Driver.

He is undeniably a great actor, and leverages every bit of his immense talent to try and save 65, but Driver's Mills comes across as uncharismatic and sullen. Moments where he tries to add depth are quickly brushed away in the editing, leaving his performance feeling unconvincing and out-of-place. The film really needed a hero to get behind, and Mills isn't it. His relationship with the kid falls flat, and the accumulation of close scrapes and narrow escapes can't get us to care more than a perfunctory amount.

An unnecessary introduction gets the film off to a slow start, and I know this shouldn't matter, but I can't recall another film that buries its title card so deep into a movie. It has to be at least 15 minutes in, although maybe the laboured beginning just made it feel that long. Also the title card is weird because it's not just the title but also tells us OMG THEY'RE ON EARTH 65 MILLION YEARS AGO.

65 is as disappointing and oddly misfiring as its title. Yeah, the dinosaurs are cool, but that's about it.

Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on March 2, 2023.

(M) ★★★

Director: Peyton Reed.

Cast: Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Jonathan Majors, Kathryn Newton, Michelle Pfeiffer, Michael Douglas, Katy O'Brian, Bill Murray, Corey Stoll. 

"You're right - we're not in Kansas anymore. My guess is Utah."

After such a great run, it’s been tough watching the MCU faltering. 

Obviously "faltering" is relative. While I enjoyed Black Widow and Eternals, they were ultimately disappointing, and though I loved Thor: Love & Thunder and Dr Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness, I can accept the criticisms aimed at them, and at the very least acknowledge they're not as good as their respective characters' previous films, despite my enjoyment of them.

That leaves Spider-man: No Way Home, Shang Chi and Wakanda Forever as the only genuinely great films in the past seven releases (and I'm leaving TV out of this discussion for the sake of simplicity).

Even taking into account this up-and-down strike rate, Quantumania is the best example so far of the cracks appearing in the foundations.

Again, having said that, it's not terrible. There are far worse superhero movies out there, and even worse MCU films. Quantumania is mildly enjoyable, though I wouldn't be rushing to rewatch it like I would with Spider-man: No Way Home, Shang Chi and Wakanda Forever, or even Thor: Love & Thunder and Dr Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness.

(Even leaving aside my own critiques, four of the last seven MCU films are among the bottom seven MCU films by Rotten Tomatoes ratings, with the bottom three coming from the last six movies.)

Much like Eternals, Quantumania is an attempt to restart and move onto the next big thing in the MCU. But its eyes are too focused on the horizon, and not looking at the pot-holes directly in front of it.

Having helped save the world in Avengers: Endgame, Scott Lang AKA Ant-Man (Rudd) is living the good life. He's written a book, he's shacked up with Hope van Dyne AKA The Wasp (Lilly), and he's getting to spend quality time with his daughter Cassie (Newton).

Cassie's inquisitive and vaguely rebellious nature sees her following in "grandad" Hank Pym's (Douglas') footsteps and investigating the potential of the Quantum Realm. But something investigates back, dragging the Pym-Lang-van Dyne clan into the universe beneath our own, and threatening to unleash a horrific danger from Janet van Dyne's (Pfeiffer's) past.

Quantumania is very intent on setting up Kang (Majors) as its next Big Bad, and it does so effectively. But its the only character that gets any kind of development or journey throughout the film. Our heroes have no arcs and no relationships beyond a very basic parent-offspring level of interaction. 

The plot itself isn’t bad - its basically of the "we're not in Kansas anymore" variety, except Dorothy and her friends have to stop the Wizard of Oz from leaving Oz too. But without any meaningful character progression or development, it’s just a series of hollow events surrounded by an almost overwhelming level of CG.

It does look amazing, to be fair. Reed leans into the idea that the Quantum Realm doesn't look like anything we've ever seen before, so it's suitably and impressively alien and otherworldly. It's also populated by empty vessels - characters serving as plot points - but at least these ones are occasionally amusing, with Dastmalchian's Veb a highlight.

But only Kang is truly interesting, because Majors and the script seem interested in him. He keeps his cards close to his chest, but he has levels to him, as well as drives and flaws. He's the highlight of the film, and at least his promised presence across the rest of the franchise bodes well.

Rudd's force of personality also makes it hard to hate this film. Ant-Man remains a reluctant yet awesome hero, which is largely due to Rudd, and that shouldn't be forgotten.

But here he's surrounded by an almost-deafening sound and light show that lacks the wit and whimsy of his MCU debut. Quantumania swings big, but forgets the small stuff, to its own detriment.