MacGruber

One of my favorite forms of comedy is out-of-place vulgarity or obscenity.  I don’t know why, but the unexpected intrusion of the gutter into the world of propriety gets me every time.  MACGRUBER loves vulgarity and obscenity, but it spends so much time with them that it never creates a proper world for them to upset.  MACGRUBER only offers vulgarity and obscenity.  It wears us down and wears us out, and it does so early in the film.  Since it has little else to offer, it becomes a slog to the credits, punctuated by the occasional chuckler but not much else.

The film, a feature – length version of a recurring “Saturday Night Live” sketch mocking “MacGuyver,” brings MacGruber out of retirement to foil Val Kilmer’s evil plan to blow up Washington, D.C. (which, since I live in the DC metropolitan area, I don’t find particularly amusing).  It’s a serviceable framework on which to hang an hour and a half’s worth of jokes, when the jokes are good (Note: one joke does stand out, a REAL GENIUS sight gag that made me chuckle.  But that’s about it.).  When the jokes are bad, it’s a groan-inducing, tiresomely hackneyed plot whose only twist is its lack of a twist.  Ouch.

MACGRUBER is one of the worst films I’ve seen this year.  Save your money.

Up in the Air

UP IN THE AIR hits close to home.  The film, about a guy (George Clooney) who spends so much time on the road that he becomes unmoored, strikes me as a personal, cautionary tale of what I could become.

I'm a professional pilot.  I’m writing this in a hotel room.  I know many of the TSA agents at airports in DC and New York, I have a system for getting through airport security in the minimum possible time, and I can move into or out of a hotel room in five minutes.  I use the express lanes at car rental counters and I scoff at Clooney’s Travel Pro rollerboard, knowing that real pros go with Luggage Works.  I’m not entirely like him, however.  I don’t pick up women in hotel bars: I watch movies and Skype my family.

And there it is: family.  I’ve still got one, unlike many people in my profession, because I work to keep those ties strong and because when I’m home, I’m completely home.  But there’s always more money to make, and I make that money by going away.  If I chase too much money, if I go away too often, I could unmoore just like Clooney.  And then where would I be?  Alone in one hotel room after another, mistaking professional courtesy for actual goodwill.

Yeah, UP IN THE AIR isn’t quite so much a feel-good movie.  It is, however, an excellent one.  First, it pulls off the superhuman feat of making us identify with George Clooney.  Second, it builds a compelling story around him and his dawning realization that being unmoored is not synonymous with freedom.  Third, it personalizes the massive downsizing that resulted from our recent (and ongoing) economic turmoil.

But for me, its greatest value is as a cautionary tale.  I don’t want to be like George Clooney.  How many movies can get a guy to say that?

Daybreakers

Hey, who put the science fiction in my horror movie?

DAYBREAKERS looks like a horror movie, with vampires, crossbows, and buckets of gore. In its heart, however, it’s a science fiction movie. Why? Because it does what good science fiction does: it uses its milieu to comment on an issue of the day.

DAYBREAKERS flips over THE OMEGA MAN and gives us vampire civilization. They’ve won, and the few remaining humans are hunted or farmed, but the supply is running low. That’s a problem, ‘cause vamps gotta eat and pig blood is running low, too. Scientists labor to create artificial blood, but the work is not going well. Now what?

Sound familiar? I think somebody took “blood for oil” and ran with it. Good for them.

Narratively, the film relies on a standard “fugitive” structure, using gun battles, close escapes, and a poorly fleshed out love interest to keep things moving along. It’s effective enough, and the performances are fine, and the film does maintain a good balance of action and horror. However, as with many science fiction stories, the ideas are more compelling than the plot. What will the world look like when the oil’s about to run out? How will we adapt? This is interesting stuff, packaged for the genre audience, and delivered well.

Nice.

Notorious

How can anyone watch NOTORIOUS and not fall in love?  Ingrid Bergman is luminous and tortured and vulnerable and brave.  Cary grant is stylish and capable and conflicted and cool.  In a film that could have gotten away with “These are currently the two most beautiful people in the world.  Darwin demands that they mate,” NOTORIOUS gives these characters actual stories and conflicts and reasons to get involved.  All that and a spy thriller that turns even the details of catering into nail-biting, suspenseful business.  This is as good as Alfred Hitchcock movies get – and Alfred Hitchcock movies get very good.

 

Begin with Bergman as Alicia Huberman, the notorious woman of the title.  Her father is a felon, convicted for treason shortly after WWII.  She’s a party girl, the kind who, decades later, would feature on tabloid covers and scandal websites.  But when the government recruits her to fly to Rio serve as a honey pot to ensnare Claude Rains, she’s up for the task.  Never mind that maybe she doesn’t want to party until the wheels come off.  Never mind that maybe she’s about finished with her postadolescent rebellion.  Never mind that she’s in love with her handler and her heart breaks a little more every minute that she works at her assignment.  She has a job and she’s going to do it, even though it will probably get her killed.

Go on to Grant, the handler.  He’s an intelligence man, worldly and cynical.  He’s so cool that he’s, well, he’s Cary Grant.  He recruits Bergman, he gets her to Rio, and he sets her up to meet Rains.  Never mind that he’s in love with his agent.  Never mind that it kills him to see her and her mark together.  Never mind that he won’t allow himself to believe in her best self.  And never mind that his heart is breaking every minute she works at her assignment.  She has a job and he’s going to see her through it, even though it will probably get her killed.

These two characters must be together, need to be together.  The film’s genius lies in its manipulation of audience antici … pation, separating them through their roles in life, their senses of duty, the real danger presented by Rains and his Nazi cohort.  I dare you to watch it and not have your heart break.  I dare you to watch it and not fall in love.