One Nice Movie

The Nice Guys

116 Minutes

R

5/27/16

 

 

A nice murder. That’ll cheer you up!

-Mrs. Hudson, Sherlock

 

We seem to be in a lull period in the summer movie season. Since the calendar first hit May, the only wide released summer movie to have gotten great reviews was Captain America: Civil War, which came out at the beginning of the month. Since then, Neighbors 2 got a decent score on Rotten Tomatoes, at 63%, but everything else (Money Monster, The Darkness, The Angry Birds Movie, etc.) have all gotten mixed to poor reviews. X-Men: Apocalypse and Alice Through the Looking Glass, which came out this Friday, have also gotten poor reviews, at 48% and 29%, respectively.

So it’s such a shame that, during this dull period where nothing good seems to have been released, a movie like The Nice Guys is getting overlooked. The movie will probably fail to make much money, if it even makes a profit. It opened last week, coming in 4^th place at the box office, and fell to 7^th place this weekend according to Box Office Mojo. With a budget of $50 million, it’s only grossed $21,733,672 so far. A lot of people seem to complain every year that movies suck now, that Hollywood isn’t making any good films, that everything is superhero movies now, blah blah blah. Then, when an actually good movie comes out, it doesn’t make money because those same people don’t see it.

The Nice Guys is set in Los Angeles in 1977, and serves as a throwback to the buddy cop movies and television shows of that era. The film does a remarkable job recreating the look and feel of the time period: crappy suits, strange hair, smog, gas lines, etc. If you’re a fan of movies like Beverly Hills Cop (which came out in 1984, but whatever, same idea), The Nice Guys is another fine entry in the genre that holds its own with the best of them.

One evening in smog-filled L.A., porn star Misty Mountains’ car crashes, leading to her death. But, two days later, Misty’s elderly aunt claims to have seen her alive in her house. She hires Holland March (Ryan Gosling), a divorced, drunken private detective to find out whether or not Misty is alive. A girl named Amelia Kutner (Margaret Qualley), who happens to resemble Misty and has a possible association with her, has also gone missing. Holland agrees to take the case, mostly because exploiting confused old people for money is pretty much all he can do with his life at this point.

But to add to the strangeness, Amelia is terrified of being followed, and is convinced that men are after her. To protect herself, she had hired enforcer Jackson Healy (Russell Crowe), a man described by Holland’s daughter Holly (Angourie Rice) as a guy whose job is to beat people up for money. Indeed, Jackson Healy does succeed in beating the crap out of Holland, thinking he’s the person who’s searching for the missing Amelia. It turns out, though, that there are other men after Amelia, and they almost succeed in capturing Jackson. After his escape, Jackson and Holland agree to combine their cases: try to figure out what’s going on with Amelia and Misty Mountains, and to find Amelia and protect her from whoever the heck is after her.

Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling might seem like an odd choice for a buddy cop comedy, but man do they pull it off. Both of them are already acting superstars, but it turns out they also have surprisingly great chemistry and comedic timing. Russell Crowe actually gained 52 pounds for the role, and the physical juxtaposition between tough, huge Jackson and super skinny/dweeby Holland enhances what was already an interesting contrast. Credit also has to be given to director/writer Shane Black, who gives these characters real depth. They’re the kind of guys who don’t exactly have the nicest careers, and while they aren’t on the same level of the scum of L.A., they’re dangling near it. But both of them realize that they are in a moment where, as Elizabeth Swann once told Jack Sparrow, they can do the right thing.

The true star of the movie, however, is Holly. She’s the heart and soul of the movie: the overly-eager daughter who wants to both prove herself and wants her father to be the person she once knew he was. The Kid-Who-Gets-Involved-In-The-Plot-Against-The-Protagonist’s-Wishes-To-Their-Annoyance-But-Ends-Up-Saving-The-Day is a cliché in movies that could have caused viewers to scoff in absurdity. But Holly is always believable. Angourie Rice, who is only 15 years old, does a remarkable job, and the fact that her performance is just as memorable as Crowe and Gosling is seriously impressive. There seem to be trend lately of teenage actresses giving great, star-making performances. I said earlier this year that Anya Taylor-Joy in The Witch was a breakout and would have a long career ahead of her if this performance is an indication. The same can be said of Angourie Rice.

As good as The Nice Guys is, it suffers from the same flaw a lot of other buddy cop comedies, and comedies in general, have. Watching the movie is like eating a great doughnut: you have a great time when you’re eating it, but it doesn’t fill you. When you finish, you wonder why, despite how good it is as you’re watching/eating, you don’t walk away with more of an impression than you did. It’s not that there’s anything particularly wrong or bad about it, it just doesn’t leave a lasting impression the way truly great films do.

Don’t misunderstand that complaint, however. I love doughnuts. The Nice Guys may not be a cinematic masterpiece, or even a great film, but it’s still a ridiculously fun one. It has great performances, some hilarious comic dialogue/scenes, an intriguing storyline that keeps the audience guessing, and does an excellent job recreating the 70s era. If you’re wanting something that’s actually good to see between now and Finding Dory, and you’ve already seen Civil War (which, let’s face it, if you haven’t seen it yet, what have you been doing with your life?) then The Nice Guys is a great way to tide you over until then.

 

TWO RANDOM OBSERVATIONS I HAD WATCHING THIS MOVIE:

1. Is every movie shooting in Georgia now? Both Captain America: Civil War and The Nice Guys were partially filmed in Georgia. It seems like Atlanta all of a sudden became this hot new spot to film recently. Maybe it always has been, and I just didn’t realize it until I started taking film classes, but it does seem like Georgia is on the map now for reasons other than being the state that gave us Jimmy Carter.

2. Turning to a different president from the 70s: Richard Nixon’s shadow still remains over America, and his presidency is still one of the most referenced ones I’ve seen in pop culture. I’m a presidential junkie, and am somewhat obsessed with the history of U.S. presidents, so I find it interesting how Nixon is still being referenced. Jackson Healy tells a story in the movie about a guy in California who gets in a car crash, and before he dies, he is taken out of his car by none other than Tricky Dick. It’s not central to the plot, but it’s interesting how a movie taking place in 1977 references Nixon, and has no mentions of Gerald Ford or Jimmy Carter. Earlier this year there was yet another movie about our 37^th president, Elvis & Nixon, which I didn’t see.Nixon may have been one of America’s least popular presidents post-Watergate, but it doesn’t seem like his popularity in pop culture is going to be diminished anytime soon.

The Zemo Strikes Back

Captain America: Civil War

147 Minutes

PG-13

5/06/16

 

 

 

What greater weapon is there than to turn an enemy to your cause? To use their own knowledge against them?

-Bastilla Shan, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

 

As I was writing this review, I realized something. Normally, when I write a review, whenever I say the name of a character for the first time, I put in parenthesis the actor’s name in bold. For example: Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill). I originally began this review by doing that. But then I realized about halfway through the review…dear god, this movie has at least a dozen characters worth mentioning. I decided to take a pass on this habit in this review, because I’m too lazy to go through and type up every actor’s name, and because it would also be redundant, since almost every character in this movie has already been in a previous Marvel movie. I mean, really, if you have to know that Captain America is played by Chris Evans or that Robert Downey Jr. is Iron Man, that’s kinda on you at this point. Moving on.

Captain America: Civil War begins with the Avengers, who are hunting down Crossbones and some mercenaries who are trying to steal a biological weapon in Lagos. The Avengers succeed, but Crossbones attempts to blow himself up rather than getting captured. Scarlett Witch stops him by hurling him in the air with her powers, which saves a lot of civilians. Unfortunately he is hurled close to a nearby building, blowing it up and killing civilians.

After the mission, former general-turned-Secretary of State Thaddeus Ross tells the Avengers that, as a result of Lagos and the mission in Sokovia from Avengers: Age of Ultron last year, The United Nations has decided to take action against them. They are planning to pass the Sokovia Accords, a measure that would put the Avengers under the control of a UN panel, which would have control over the team and would decide if/when the Avengers would be necessary.

As you could probably have guessed by now based on the title of the movie, the trailers, the posters, the commercials, etc., this divides the team into two groups. There’s Captain America on one side, arguing that this measure would mean the Avengers are little more than a UN body used by world governments to do whatever they want, without the team having any say in the matter at all. That’s assuming that the team would even be used in the first place, since the Avengers wouldn’t have the ability to fight without permission from the panel. Iron Man is on the other side, arguing that oversight is necessary to prevent the Avengers from being out of control, and would allow the team to get the approval of the non-superpowered world without any concerns about accountability. It would also prove that the Avengers are better than the villains they are fighting, because they can accept limitations and aren’t above the people who lack their abilities.

The breaking point occurs when Winter Soldier is seen photographed nearby a bomb explosion at a U.N. meeting in Vienna. Captain America believes that he can apprehend Winter Soldier and bring him in for questioning. The governments, however, plan to kill Winter Soldier. Captain America goes rogue, allied with Falcon, Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch, Ant-Man, and Winter Soldier. Iron Man teams up with War Machine, Vision, Black Widow, and the newly introduced Spider-Man (Tom Holland) and Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman) to capture them. The two sides then rally their armies and engage in a four year long conflict, ending when the pro-rebellion Confederate Superheroes of Captain America surrender to the forces of General Ulysses S. Stark at Appomattox.

At this point, you should know what to expect when you go see a Marvel Studios film. If you liked the previous Marvel films, you will like Civil War. It’s that simple. Civil War has all you’ve come to expect from Marvel Studios. The acting/casting is perfect. The characters are great. The action sequences kick ass. There’s the classic Marvel movie humor throughout. Stan Lee’s cameo is one of his best yet. Female moviegoers will think the actors are hot. Male moviegoers will think the actresses are hot. There’s a shot of Captain America’s biceps that’s going to become iconic. And Cap kisses Sharon Carter, a moment that will have all the girls in the theater fuming with jealousy and all the guys slowly clapping in appreciation, thinking “You did it, champ.”

The most underappreciated aspect of the movie, and one worth serious mention, I think, is Iron Man. Maybe it’s just my circle of friends, but most people seemed to be rooting for Captain America and declared themselves #TeamCap. Yet, ultimately, I think Iron Man is the most essential character, and the one who makes Civil War. Iron Man isn’t as likeable as he once was, and I think that’s part of the reason why #TeamCap seemed to be the dominant trend (the other reason is that Iron Man is on the anti-Captain America side, a side that’s always going to be a tough sell considering that the movie is titled Captain America: Civil War, not Iron Man: Civil War).

The fact that Iron Man isn’t what he once was is worth appreciating. It’s hard to believe, but the movie that started it all, the original Iron Man, is eight years old now. Gone is the cocky hotshot Tony Stark we knew and loved. Iron Man is now the team veteran who’s weary, battle-hardened, and concerned with limiting the power of himself and his teammates for the world’s safety. Robert Downey Jr. has brought so much to the Marvel universe and to Iron Man, and Civil War adds even more depth and growth to a character who’s already been around audiences for eight years. What an achievement that is.

Captain America: Civil War is the thirteenth Marvel film, and I would rank it high up on the tier list of those thirteen. But it doesn’t quite reach the greatness of what I consider to be the five best films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (Iron Man, The Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and Ant-Man). To begin with, there are quite a number of themes Civil War presents, such as Safety vs. Independence, the line between being a superhero and being a vigilante free from culpability, etc. But while these themes are there, they aren’t very fleshed out, and I don’t expect audiences to dwell on them much after leaving the theater. The main discussion you’ll be having after leaving Civil War will likely go something like this: “DAMN, THAT AIRPORT FIGHT WAS AWESOME!!!”

I saw Anthony Mackie describe the movie as Avengers 2.5, and that’s a perfect description. As excellent as Civil War is, I felt that it was more of a continuation of Age of Ultron, as well as a way to set up Spider-Man and Black Panther’s characters, as opposed to a stand-alone movie. There is an interesting dilemma for all future films in the Marvel universe: they must both serve as entertaining films in their own right, while simultaneously expanding the universe and setting up the next wave of films in the series. Civil War succeeds on both counts, but doesn’t succeed quite as seamlessly as some of the other Marvel movies, such as The Avengers.

Regardless of what you think of each Marvel Studios film individually, and I think everyone has different opinions about this (I’ve known a girl who thought Ant-Man was mediocre, two people who didn’t care much for Guardians of the Galaxy, etc.), I don’t think Marvel Studios has made an outright bad film. You might think some are better than the others, you might wish some ended up better than they were, but I don’t think it’s possible to walk away from any of the movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe saying “That sucked!” That achievement is downright incredible when you think about it.

I can’t think of anything in cinema history that can compare to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. If you had told me eight years ago that there would be thirteen films, all set in the same interconnected universe, with characters like Thor, the Guardians of the Galaxy, Ant-Man, etc. all having movies that were actually great, I would have said you were crazy. I never would have thought this was possible. Whatever minor quibbles I have about Captain America: Civil War, it’s still a reminder of just how stunning an achievement this universe is, and a reminder of how inferior almost all action movie blockbusters are in comparison.

 

One final note for those who have seen the movie already. Spider-Man references The Empire Strikes Back at one point. Later in the movie, Black Panther follows behind Captain America’s quinjet with his own jet, without Captain America realizing it. I swear that scene was a homage to Boba Fett following the Millenium Falcon in Empire. Was I the only person who thought this, or did other people think so too? Or is my Star Wars fanaticism at such a level that I can relate any movie scene to Star Wars?

Eden

The Jungle Book

105 Minutes

PG

4/30/16

 

Never Again Would Bird’s Song Be The Same

He would declare and could himself believe
That the birds there in all the garden round
From having heard the daylong voice of Eve
Had added to their own an oversound,
Her tone of meaning but without the words.
Admittedly an eloquence so soft
Could only have had an influence on birds
When call or laughter carried it aloft.
Be that as may be, she was in their song.
Moreover her voice upon their voices crossed
Had now persisted in the woods so long
That probably it never would be lost.
Never again would birds’ song be the same.
And to do that to birds was why she came.

-Robert Frost

Everyone has a list of movies that made their childhood. It’s a funny expression…movies can’t make our childhoods, as we would still have a childhood even if we saw no movies during it. Yet, it says something about the influence of film and television on our lives that we have the expression “___ made my childhood.” Would I be the same person I am today if it wasn’t for the movies on my list? I don’t know. It’s also an interesting phrase because we are probably exposed to many, many movies or tv shows as a kid, yet there are a select few that we feel “make” our childhood.

The original 1967 The Jungle Book is one of the movies on my list. I have an interesting relationship with it. As a child, I probably watched it dozens of times. It’s one of the first movies I can truly remember I loved. The only Walt Disney Animated Studios film I watched on an equal level, and loved on an equal level, was The Lion King. As a kid, you don’t appreciate what your favorite movies mean to you. You just watch them and are entertained by them.

As I think about this, and my childhood favorite movies, I don’t even know how to describe them and their impact. I told you I watched The Jungle Book dozens of times, I told you I loved it, I told you it meant something to me. But I can’t describe what exactly it meant. Attempting to elaborate on just how much the movie impacted my childhood is impossible because I don’t know my Child-Self anymore. I can only look back on it from the lens of adulthood, and this lens is not clear. Childhood seems like a distant, foggy memory to me, one that’s faded away almost entirely.

About three years ago, I volunteered to work at a local performing studio for young but not-too-young kids. I say “volunteered”, but truthfully I only did it because I was required to do volunteer hours for the Bright Futures scholarship (You’d think forcing unwilling people to do community service goes against the entire point of volunteering, but I digress). Not that I disliked the place, it was actually a fine experience, it’s just not the thing I would have sought out otherwise. Anyways, I was going to be one of the tech people working on the sounds, lights, that sort of thing.

The show they were doing was a kid’s production of The Jungle Book. At the time of volunteering, I had not seen The Jungle Book in years. To prepare myself (and also because it gave me an excuse to do so) I watched the movie again.

It was….different. It’s still a great movie, one I love, and one that I consider one of the best Disney animated films ever. But it wasn’t the movie I remembered. I was an adult now, and that sense of wonderment I got from watching it didn’t exist anymore. I had grown up, and could only view the movie from the lens of my grown-up eyes. The feelings I once had about the movie, the hazy childhood memories, were erased after I watched it again. Even though the movie was exactly the same, what it once was, what it once meant, could never be recaptured.

Worse, I worried that my memories of The Jungle Book would be tainted by my associating it with that children’s production. I worried that I would never be able to get that experience out of my head and that any time I watched the movie, I would think of the kids. It’s probably not a good idea to associate something you love with children’s theatre. Especially if you don’t like kids that much. Luckily for me, that was years ago, and seeing the remake has added a new dimension to the original as well as new memories. Seeing the remake also made me want to see the original again, which I think I will appreciate even more now that I no longer have the expectation of viewing it from my younger eyes, and can compare it to another film that is both very good, but not as good.

When I heard that they were doing a live-action remake of The Jungle Book, my reaction fell somewhere between “could be decent I suppose” to “blasphemous monstrosity designed to cash in on a sacred text”. I wasn’t that excited for it and figured if it got good reviews, I’d see it. If it didn’t, I have plenty of other movies to see and could dismiss it.

Well, it got great reviews, I saw it, and now I’m here. But now I have a dilemma as a reviewer. I’ve talked about the lens of my eyes, the evolution in how I’ve viewed a work of art, and what that work of art meant to me as a human being. That lens cannot be taken away from reviewing this version of The Jungle Book. This movie is a remake/reimagining, however you want to call it. I have such a history of the original, that every aspect of this film’s story will be compared and judged based on how I view the original. Any filmmaker attempting a remake or reimagining of a work must do so knowing that it will be compared and judged based on how it stacks up against the original work.

So how does The Jungle Book remake stake up? Quite well, actually. The voice acting cast is superb and for the most part perfectly cast (Christopher Walken is the only possible mistake. He’s always good, of course, but Walken’s performance as King Louie is a bit more Christopher Walken than King Louie to me). The visuals are stunning and beautiful. The 3D might actually be worth it, and Kaa’s hypnosis effect was mind-blowing to see in 3D. The actor who plays Mowgli, Neel Sethi, does an impressive job considering how most of what animals he interacts with were CGI. The wolves who adopted Mowgli have much more development here than in the original, which I think is a positive change.

Now that I’ve talked about the good, let me just list every single minor quibble I have with this version of The Jungle Book compared to the original….except for one quibble, which is not so little to me, which I will save until the end, because it relates to the movie’s ending.

THE CHANGES

-The elephants have no speaking parts in the film. There are elephants in it, but they do not talk whatsoever.

-The comic vultures do not appear at all.

-Kaa never interacts with Shere Khan.

-Shere Khan dies in this film, while in the original it is unknown whether he died or not.

-King Louie is not an orangutan. I did not know this when I watched it, and was confused as to why King Louie was so giant. To quote IMDB’s trivia section for The Jungle Book:

In The Jungle Book (1967), King Louie was an orangutan. In this film, he’s a gigantopithecus, an ancestor of the orangutan whose range is believed to have included parts of India. This change in species was made to make the film more fantastic and since orangutans are not native to India.

King Louie is a much more menacing figure here, in both stature and character.

Most of the changes I mentioned earlier were minor ones that I may disagree with, but that don’t have a large impact on the story as a whole. There is one major change however, and one that I think was a mistake to not include.

In the original film, Mowgli is being taken away from the jungle out of fear that Shere Khan will kill him. Mowgli doesn’t want to leave the jungle and doesn’t want to join the man-village. At the end of the movie, Baloo and Bagheera succeed in their quest. But what makes it a truly great ending, a truly perfect ending, is what causes Mowgli to go to the man-village. He sees a beautiful young girl, singing a song, collecting water for the village, and is enchanted. Instead of Mowgli leaving the jungle and joining humanity because he is forced to, he deliberately leaves out of his own free will, because he wants to.

As a child, you don’t appreciate that ending. As an adult, any straight single man like myself can relate to what Mowgli experiences when he discovers and is enchanted by a woman for the first time. I just re-watched that ending on Youtube as I typed this review. It’s an ending that makes me smile, chuckle, shake my head, and even feel a twinge of pain (you can’t have your heart broken by a woman in the jungle…)

The new Jungle Book doesn’t have this ending. The ending it has is fine. I realize some people are going to argue that “of course it can’t be EXACTLY the same, that’s why it’s a remake!” Normally, I can accept some changes for that reason, but not having Mowgli get seduced and leave the jungle is a significant change, because it removes a lot of symbolism and character growth from the story. This change is what prevents the remake from being truly great, despite all its accomplishments.

I realize, during this entire review, I have talked nothing at all about the plot of The Jungle Book. To be honest, I haven’t even talked about the movie itself that much except to comment on its changes from the original. Some people would say that this isn’t even a review, and that all I did was reminisce about my younger selves and talk about the differences between the original and the remake. But that assumption is incorrect.

Audiences who read reviews (the few who still do, anymore) are going to be reading a review asking themselves two questions: Is this movie good? Would I like it?

Despite my lack of specifics and minimal descriptions of the new The Jungle Book, by writing about my experience and growth, I have answered those two questions. I realized as I was writing this review, that a conventional review would be impossible. I wanted to write a normal review and instead ending up just wanting to write down into words what something meant to me. If the movie wasn’t good or wasn’t worth seeing in any form, it wouldn’t have had this impact of me. I keep coming back to its story. I keep trying to go back to the jungle.

I have now seen The Jungle Book as an animated movie, a children’s production, and as a live action movie. Each time, it changed slightly, but was still essentially the same. The story hadn’t changed outside of a few minor differences. What wasn’t the same was me. I had changed. I had left the wildness of childhood’s jungle to go into the man-village of adulthood. I can still look back, and see the jungle that contained my old life, my old self, when everything was wondrous and new and untainted by other human beings. But I can never go back there now.