Review: The Hangover Part II

The wolfpack takes a trip they’ve by and large taken before.

Probably since the moment of its official announcement, the hype and anticipation surrounding The Hangover Part II speculated that the sequel to the 2009 monster hit comedy couldn’t avoid a presumed – and expected – sophomore stumble. Much of that first film’s success, really, grew out of its out-of-left-field surprise : with its pairing of journeyman comics Ed Helms and Zack Galifianakis with then-unproven leading man Bradley Cooper, and a concept that seemed to owe more to Las Vegas tourism commercials than organic inspiration, the film’s raunchy escapism and bromantic camaraderie was, if not exactly fresh, a modern take on the “boys will be boys” comedic trope. Enjoying a playing field more or less left to itself in the no-fun zone of the summer 2009 movie season, the original grossed close to half a billion dollars worldwide.

Jump ahead two years to this sequel, whose guiding maxim seems to run something along the lines of “nothing succeeds like success.” But can it succeed? Well no, maybe of course not, but then it doesn’t often try very hard. The budget is more than doubled, the jokes are raunchier and there are more genitalia on display, but audiences will likely find a depressing amount of sameness anyway. If you liked the first, you’ll like this one, but not as much and perhaps even in spite of yourself.

Changing the environs from Vegas to the more picturesque – but perhaps no less heady – setting of Bangkok, this second adventure has the gang decamping for Thailand to celebrate the marriage of “wolfpack” member Stu (Ed Helms) to a woman of Thai descent (Jamie Chung.) Buddies Phil (Cooper) and Doug (Justin Bartha) are onboard as groomsmen, and the gang reluctantly invites Doug’s brother-in-law Alan (Galifianakis), as before, at the urging of Doug’s wife (Sasha Barrese.) The marriage is far from ideal almost at once. The bride’s father (Nirit Sirijanya) disapproves of Stu, comparing him to rice porridge, and Alan takes an immediate, competitive dislike to her brother Teddy (Mason Lee.)

Stu’s plans for a low-key, beachside campfire bachelor party take a turn for the disastrous – the movie has to happen somehow – and the gang wakes up the next morning in a Bangkok hotel room with, naturally, no memory of the previous night. Teddy is missing, though one of his fingers is recovered from a glass of water, and bumbling criminal Chow (Ken Jeong) is naked and unconscious on the hotel room floor.

Panicked but determined to find Teddy, the group reenters the sun-drenched, sun-bleached Bangkok streets hoping to find him before the wedding ceremony that evening. Their search gets them entangled with a corrupt businessman (Paul Giamatti, completely wasted here), a hermaphrodite strip bar/brothel, and Russian gangsters who want the obnoxious, cigarette-smoking monkey the wolfpack found in their room.

Even before the search really begins, anyone paying attention can spot the crippling loyalty to the original’s bag of tricks: the seamy morning-after locales, the replacement of Teddy for Doug as missing person, the use of Chow as manic comic foil; Teddy’s final rescue comes not as a result of the group’s diligence but as a brainstorm that reveals his hiding place all along. That’s fine by itself, but the innovation this time around seems largely based on amping the shock value of the first: as the original had frontal nudity, this one displays transsexual body parts. Stu has sex with a man instead of a woman. People are shot instead of beaten up.

In time the devotion becoming slavish, then almost compulsive, except the jokes fall flat – nothing’s as funny the second time – and there aren’t enough of them to make the repetition besides the point, as in similarly comedy sequels like Airplane II and all the iterations of National Lampoon’s Vacation. Director Todd Philips, working with two screenwriters who didn’t participate in the first, keep the jokes at the same pitch as the predecessor. But without the element of surprise – with the expectation of getting shocked – the shock value deflates, like a punch you know is coming and then doesn’t sting as much as a result.

The performances are similarly uniform, and not in a way that’s always endearing. Cooper can coast by on looks and charm – that’s all the role asks of him, really – but Helms, Galifianakis, and Jeong have a harder time keeping their respective schticks fresh. We’ve groused before that Galifianakis was already on his way to becoming what Steve Zahn was in the 90s: a talented, oddball comic actor whose welcome was squandered on inferior projects. But his weirdo routine is starting to show its age already, particularly in the malice Alan shows for Teddy and his childlike devotion to the monkey. Helms and Jeong, meanwhile, go through R-rated motions of the characters they play on NBC Thursday nights.

There’s an old piece of conventional wisdom that sequels will typically reap sixty percent of the box office as their hit predecessors. Why shouldn’t the same formula apply to audience satisfaction? The Hangover Part II is sixty percent as entertaining as the first, the rest lost to limp shock value and diminished inspiration. If you can settle for that, you won’t have a bad time.

- Michael Kabel

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Our June 2010 Movie Guide

Some of the biggest releases of the year’s biggest movie month, and our over/under analysis about them. 

The month of June, maybe more than any other, represents excitement for the future. It’s the first month of summer vacation, the first true month of the summer season, and the favorite time to get married. It’s also, of course, the biggest month of the movie year, in which the studios roll out some of their biggest releases, the better to take advantage of the seasonal movie crowd. Actually going to the movies in the summertime is as much of an American tradition as habit; we look forward to going to the movies in June because that’s when the biggest movies come out. 

June 2010 promises some truly big films, even though each comes with its own problems and reasons for skepticism. The following seven are a random sampling, not meant to show the entirety of any release schedule so much as what’s already got our attention. 

We say that about some of our ex-girlfriends.

Splice (June 4) – The creepy, slick advertisements for this genetic engineering-gone-wrong thriller show us just enough of the lab-created hybrid creature to get our attention, even if the poster gives its apparance pretty much completely away. More enticing for us is the casting of Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley (our college crush after her surly turn in Go, way back when) as the scientists bringing the monstrously exotic Dren to life. Ramping up the chic horror factor, the film’s directed by Vincenzo Natali, who made a stir sometime back with his low-budget mindfuck Cube, while Guillermo Del Toro serves as executive producer. 

We hope the film will be: exactly what Natali has claimed, an intelligent look at the consequences of a rapidly emerging science. We’re afraid it will be: Vacuous, over-stylized fluff, much like Del Toro’s own Hellboy II: The Golden Army. Watch the embedding-proof trailer on YouTube here. 

Get Him To The Greek (June 4) – A record company intern (Jonah Hill) struggles to get a washed-up, debauched rock star (Russell Brand) from London to Los Angeles’ Greek Theatre in seventy-two hours. Awkward, but hilarious, hijinks presumably ensue. Brand reprises the role he played in 2008′s Forgetting Sarah Marshall; Hill, who also appeared in that film, does not; Nicholas Stoller directed both. 

We hope the film will be: A pleasantly surprising, deft satire of the music industry that’s more about character than vulgar gaggery; a modern-day My Favorite Year, though that seems like a long shot.  We’re afraid it will be:  Shrill mugging from two actors too quick to fall back on familiar shtick. Overall, we’re expecting this summer’s Year One.  Watch the embedding-proof trailer on YouTube here. 

The A-Team (June 11) – An elite group of soldiers looks to clear their name with the U.S. military after getting framed for a crime they didn’t commit. This adaptation of the beloved 80s television series, co-written and directed by budding action auteur Joe Carnahan (Smokin’ Aces), updates the group’s tour of duty from Vietnam to the Iraq War. Liam Neeson plays team leader Hannibal Smith, with Bradley Cooper as Face, Rampage Jackson as B.A. Baracus and Sharlto Copley as Howling Mad Murdock. Jessica Biel and Patrick Wilson co-star. 

We hope the film will be: A throwback to the action films of the TV series’ decade, which relied on elaborate stuntwork and a blistering pace to wow audiences. Its inspiration was big, dumb, well-executed fun; the movie should live up to that unpretentious tradition. We’re afraid it will be: something that doesn’t. 

 

Toy Story 3 (June 18) – When their owner leaves home for college, Woody (Tom Hanks), Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) and the gang are shipped off to a daycare center, where they must survive a whole roomful of rambunctious kids. Pixar mainstay Lee Unkrich returns to direct, with a screenplay by Michael Arndt (Little Miss Sunshine). 

We hope the film will be: Even half as entertaining as the first two installments of the franchise. Still, we’re skeptical. Pixar hit their first true misfire with last year’s Up, and if the trailer below is any indication this time around the emphasis is on sentimentality and slapstick noise over true whimsy and smarts. We’re afraid it will be: an indication that Up‘s mawkishness and mean-spirited violence were only the beginning of a trend for the formerly infallible studio. 

 

That the poster takes pains to hide Hex's scars is a bad sign.

Jonah Hex (June 18) – Wild West drifter and sometime bounty hunter Jonah Hex (Josh Brolin) is offered a deal that he can’t refuse: in exchange for clemency from the multiple warrants on his head, the U.S. Army wants him to kill the terrorist (John Malkovich) planning to unleash an army of undead upon the Earth. Megan Fox co-stars as Hex’s prostitute love interest and sidekick. Warner Bros has the same sequel hopes that have become standard operating procedure for comic book movies. 

We hope the film will be: At least somewhat faithful to Hex’s DC Comics adventures in the 70s, but we doubt it: the original Hex was a pretty transparent Man With No Name/Outlaw Josie Wales… ahem, “homage” who proudly wore his Confederate Army uniform and killed without hesitation. The zombie aspect to the plot is also pretty disappointing. We’re afraid it will be: Another misbegotten comic-to-screen-adaptation that went off the rails when they changed too much about the subject matter. Judging by the trailer, they changed everything that wasn’t nailed to the ground. 

 

Cyrus (June 25, limited) – A recently divorced man (John C. Reilly) romances a lovely, lonely single mother (Marisa Tomei), only to encounter resistance from her teenaged son. Mumblecore auteurs Jay and Mark Duplass make their (by and large) mainstream crossover, including their trademark frenetic camerawork and reliance on improvised dialogue. Catherine Keener co-stars. 

We hope the film will be: another smart character showcase for Reilly and Tomei, who besides their higher-profile roles have been creating quieter but much more substantial work in smaller pictures for going on two decades. We’re afraid it will be: yet more hipster piffle along the lines of Greenberg.  The trailer alone reminds us of any number of other works, ranging from films including Punch-Drunk Love, Step-Brothers and The 40 Year Old Virgin to at leat one plot thread from probably every family melodrama ever put on television. Still, a film like this is all about performance, and we can see the chemistry between the two stars already. 

 

Knight and Day (June 25) – When a secret agent (Cruise) crosses paths with a hapless civilian (Diaz), he’s forced to drag her into the hunt for a battery that may contain the source of unlimited energy. An international chase ensues, putting them at odds and in alliances with any number of competing groups. 

We hope the film will be: another throwback. These kinds of big-star, big-stunt spectacles used to be the norm for summer movie seasons, back in the 90s heyday of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Mel Gibson. Nothing wrong with that; after all, you shouldn’t need a comic book collection to want to go to the movies. 

We’re afraid it will be: an effort by two fading stars to shore up their careers with a proven formula (see also Killers, the Heigl-Kutcher variation on this same theme arriving June 4.) Director James Mangold’s last effort, the Russell Crowe vehicle 3:10 To Yuma, was deplorable largely because of its dependence on threadbare plot tropes. 

We’ll be back later this week. Thank you for reading.

- Michael Kabel

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Dog Days of Movie Summer

New and recent releases to check out in the heat of August.

August is practically halfway over – already, with only a few weeks left until Labor Day and the “official” end of the summer movie season. We’ve said several times before that the summer of 2009 wasn’t exactly one for the memory books, though now we see it has the potential to end strong. Several films are out now and several more are still come this month, and some of them even look promising.

Here’s the rundown of most of  the major openings, as well as an independent we think might have some potential. All release dates are for American markets, so some may not be accurate for international audiences.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (opened August 7): A week after its opening, the consensus of those who’ve seen this toy movie comes down to something like, “It wasn’t as bad as it could’ve been.” You know movies collectively are in a funk when the best thing said about a week’s tentpole opening is that it wasn’t the crap people were expecting. And people were expecting crap - there was heavy expectation for months that it would emerge as the grand flop of the summer.

In the unlikely event you don’t already know (and knowing is half the battle), the movie’s about a squad of government soldiers attempting to stop a terrorist group, and it’s based on a groundbreaking line of Hasbro toys from the 1980s. Dennis Quaid, Sienna Miller, and Channing Tatum star.

Julie & Julia (opened August 7): Lonely housewife and white collar drone Julie Powell (Amy Adams) tries to make all the recipes in Julia Child’s (Meryl Streep) memoir/cookbook My Life In France in a single year. Based on the chick lit bestseller (itself the first book based on a blog) and directed by Nora Ephron (You’ve Got Mail), the film is half Powell’s story and half biography of Child’s rise to becoming arguably the most famous chef in history. It’s a woman’s film, though it’s almost certainly better than last summer’s Streep offering, Mamma Mia! Stanley Tucci (Big Night), who we wish made more movies, plays Child’s husband.

Our full preview includes the trailer and a more in-depth plot summary and analysis.

The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard (opens August 14): With the exception of the dark horse The Hangover, most male-oriented comedies flopped hard this summer. Land of the Lost and Year One were deservedly dead on arrival, Funny People had naysayers announcing the end of the Apatow Dynasty, and Bruno came and went pretty fast. Meanwhile traditional female-centric romcoms like The Ugly Truth and especially The Proposal might as well have had licenses to print money.

But the guys’ comedies get one more chance with The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard, the directing debut of Chappelle’s Show writer Neal Brennan. Jeremy Piven plays a used car uber-salesman hired to clear out a lot of 200 cars over the Fourth of July weekend. Abetting him are Ving Rhames, David Koechner, and Kathryn Hahn. The Hangover‘s Ed Helms, Jordana Spiro, and James Brolin also appear.

Our full preview includes the hilarious trailer and some ideas about why this might be the role Piven was born to play.

District 9 (opens August 14): A thriller in the vein of Species and Alien Nation, first-time feature director Neill Blomkamp’s gritty story imagines a world where aliens have lived in a kind of apartheid among the people of South Africa for decades. When a human inspector (Sharlto Copley) assumes some of the aliens’ DNA, the ruthless international corporation running their ghetto chases him through their sprawling encampment.

Peter Jackson directed the film, which only took shape after the long-ballyhooed film translation of the Halo video game fell apart. Not to second guess, but some images from the film’s TV spots suggest it’ll carry the glum meanstreak that resurfaced in Jackson’s work about two thirds of the way through Return of the King and helped make King Kong almost unwatchable. We hope not, because the film’s setup is fascinating, and there’s always room for another good science fiction film on our viewing schedules.

We’ve got a a preview of this one, too, that includes more background on Blomkamp as well as the film’s setup.

The Time Traveler’s Wife (opens August 14): A woman (Rachel McAdams) spends her life loving a man (Eric Bana) who, thanks to a rare genetic anomaly, compulsively travels through time. Based on the bestselling novel by Audrey Niffenegger and directed by Robert Schwentke (Flightplan), the film’s emphasis apparently rests on the romance side of the story.

Bana and McAdams should by all rights be bigger stars than they currently are, but this sort of sci-fi tinged melodrama doesn’t seem likely to push them up to the A-list. Early reviews have been mixed and often seemingly skewed to how much individual critics cared for the source novel.

We just compiled our list of favorite time travel romances earlier this week.

Inglourious Basterds (opens August 21): Universal’s marketing the living shit out of this on television, so is a synopsis really necessary? Writer-director Quentin Tarantino has said the film is his masterpiece, though what that could mean after the cinematic lip-syncing of Kill Bill and Grindhouse is anyone’s guess. As with so much of his recent work, it’s based on a cult film from the 1970s and reportedly continues his withdrawal from cinematic realism (which was never exactly his strong suit anyway.) History buffs will likely be less than pleased to know he’s changed the ending to World War II.

We imagine Tarantino’s fans (and we imagine there are less of them than in years past) will cheer while most everyone else remains indifferent. And yet, for all that we still love Jackie Brown.

Big Fan (opens limited release August 28): A parking lot attendant (Patton Oswalt) who’s also a New York Giants megafan struggles to cope with getting beat down by his favorite player. Kevin Corrigan and Michael Rapaport co-star, while Robert D. Siegel (The Wrestler) writes and makes his directing debut.

Actually, the script was one of The Wrestler’s biggest problems (we didn’t like the film), suffering from the same pretentious airlessness that’s also creeping into the edges of the trailer below. Still, Oswalt is exactly the actor to tackle a part like this, while Corrigan and Rapaport are the go-to guys for playing working-class Atlantic Northeast.

Monday we’ll have our review of The season 3 premiere of Mad Men. Have a good weekend.

- Michael Kabel

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Miscellaneous Debris, April 2009 Edition

Our semi-regular compendium of movie, TV and DVD news of general interest.

The summer movie season is just around the corner

Something we didn’t realize when this blog started up a year ago: it takes more time to research and keep up with what’s forthcoming than it does just watching and reviewing films. That makes us think sometimes that we should narrow our focus. But where’ s the fun in that? Trailers, after all, are the only good reason (besides good seats) to get into the theatre early.

Every month or so we make a list of items and news stories that maybe don’t warrant a full blog post of their own. Some excite us, some bore us, one or two irritate or even piss us off a bit. But they’re all worth mentioning at least for their conversational value.

1. Though there’s not much going on by way of new releases lately, the good news is that the summer movie season starts three weeks early this year, with the release of X-Men Origins: Wolverine on May 1, followed by Star Trek just a week later and Terminator: Salvation only two weeks after that. That’s three blockbusters before Memorial Day, traditionally the kickoff of the summer blockbuster avalance.

He also once played Orson Welles

2. Speaking of the Wolverine movie, we can see both sides of the flap about its illicit appearance online this week, but on the other hand it’s not that hard to predict some things about it. Based on what we know, we can assure viewers that 1. Hugh Jackman will give a very good (but not great) performance, 2. Ryan Reynolds will have all the best lines and 3. Liev Shreiber will act circles around everyone else. And the ending will remain open for a sequel.

3. Rescue Me, FX’s series about a New York City Fire Department crew and the families that love but often fall victim to their angst, premiered this week after an eighteen-month hiatus. The episode was entertaining but not quite exceptional, about as good as the show ever was during its uneven first season. Still, it had the fesity energy that later seasons lacked, abetted in no small part by charismatic performances from Robert John Burke as an alcoholic ex-priest falling off the wagon and a show-stopping turn by Michael J. Fox as a new boyfriend for Janet Gavin (Andrea Roth), the oft-separated wife of main character Tommy Gavin (Denis Leary).

4. Recent news stories show that movie theatre attendance has risen significantly since last October, when the worldwide economy more or less went to Hell in a bucket. To quote the Propellerheads and Shirley Bassey, it’s all just a little bit of history repeating: the movie business has traditionally thrived during hard times, and no wonder. People looking for diversions from their circumstances have lots of time to kill, and movies are nothing if not an escape. With a summer loaded with science fiction and action franchises just around the corner, Hollywood could be in for a banner year.

5. Some of the most vivid examples of films that both reflected and capitalized on the nation’s Depression-era restlessness got a DVD release this week with Universal’s Pre-Code Hollywood Collection box set. Turner Classic Movies has already released several similar box sets celebrating Hollywood before the sanitizing Hays Code, though we’re tempted to get this newer package just for its films’ lurid titles: The Cheat, Torch Singer, Hot Saturday, Murder At The Vanities, Search For Beauty, and (our favorite), Merrily We Go To Hell. The various films include performances by Fredric March, Tallulah Bankhead and Cary Grant.

6. From the “lurching into self-parody” desk comes news of Sam Raimi’s latest, which if nothing else boasts a title that would right in with the aforementioned set: Drag Me To Hell dusts off the “gypsy curse” conceit for a thriller about a loan officer (Matchstick Men‘s Alison Lohman) stalked by bad juju after foreclosing on an old woman’s mortgage. The stunningly cheesy trailer below seems to include its entire first act. Now, wait and see if somebody doesn’t trot out the old “zeitgeist” and “cultural barometer” arguments to validate the film’s existence. It opens nationwide May 29.

Really, Life On Mars creators? Really?

7.  Two shows that fought continuous battles for survival came to a conclusion over the last couple of weeks, with at least one serving its definite coda. Life, a hypnotically offbeat cop drama starring the singular Damian Lewis, aired its second season finale (and likely series conclusion) that efficiently wrapped up (almost) all its open plots and subplots while bringing closure to Lewis’ tortured Detective Charlie Crews. By total contrast, a week before ABC’s Life On Mars aired a series finale that packed an explanation for its time-lost Detective Sam Tyler (Jason O’Mara) so out-of-left-field, so contrived, that the show’s creators might just as well have walked on camera and given their audience the finger. Look for details in articles with names like “Worst Show Finales” in the years to come.

8.  There’s a logic that goes you can remake a film only if the original wasn’t very good. But what about films we love for their weaknesses? A remake of 1981′s Bullfinch’s Mythology-via-Star Wars cult classic Clash of the Titans is up for remaking, this one reportedly co-starring no less than Liam Neeson as Greek god patriarch Zeus and Ralph Fiennes as his villainous brother Hades. Sam Worthington (Terminator: Salvation) will star as the heroic Perseus, and Alexa Davalos (Defiance) plays his true love Andromeda. The film is slated for release next March.

9. If you’re not already familiar with DC Comics’ long-running hero Green Lantern, get ready to hear a lot more about him over the next twenty months. The comics company plans a massive summer crossover, ominously titled The Blackest Night, about Green Lantern Hal Jordan and the far-ranging Green Lantern Corps (a kind of interstellar police force) waging a “war of light” against the reanimated dead heroes of the DC Universe (And that body count is a lot higher than you’d think). July sees the release of Green Lantern: First Flight, a straight-to DVD animated feature film about Jordan’s recruitment into the Corps, with voice talent by Law & Order: SVU‘s Christopher Meloni and Battlestar Galactica‘s Tricia Helfer. Finally, a live-action feature directed by Martin Campbell (Casino Royale) is slated for a December 2010 release.

10. Finally, something that actually rates at least one blog posting of its own. A couple of weeks ago we ran a long article hoping for, among other actors, a career rebirth for Michael Keaton. May 1 sees the limited release of The Merry Gentleman, a moody neo-noir with religious overtones that marks the errant leading man’s directorial debut. Keaton also stars as Frank Logan, a contract hitman who moonlights as a tailor while contemplating suicide. He becomes involved in a low-heat romance with Kate Frazier (No Country For Old Men‘s Kelly MacDonald), a woman fleeing her abusive husband (Bobby Cannavale, The Ten) and pursued by a cop with bad intentions. The trailer’s evocative atmosphere and deliberate tempo look promising for fans of such films (like us), as well as its premise, which reminds us an odd bit – in a good way – of John Dahl’s dark comedy You Kill Me. 

We’ll be back next week with previews of some of those summer blockbusters. Have a good weekend.

- Michael Kabel
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Star Trek: Great Trekspectations

Seven cool things about the Star Trek universe we hope to see in the new movie.

The long-awaited new “reboot” of the Star Trek franchise opens in just 30 days (Update: Read our review of the new film here) and the previews growing ever more pervasive on television and online have just begun to reveal the new film’s rollicking story. We expect that’ll continue up until its opening, but in the meantime – being somewhat neophyte Trekkers ourselves – we’ve come up with a list of people, places, and things we’d like to see shown or at least visually referenced. Each one, we think, could ramp up the cool factor even further.

The following list isn’t in any particular order, and we apologize in advance for any gaps in our knowledge. These are ideas and concepts we’ve come across over the years, and we’ve taken what we could from Memory Alpha, the Star Trek wiki, to fill in the blanks. Also, what’s below doesn’t necessarily include everything from the semi- and non-canonical expanded universe of Trek novels, video games, comic books, cartoons, and role playing games. We’ve barely dipped a toe into that ocean.

Romulan birds-of-prey in formation

The Battle of Cheron and the defeat of the Romulan Star Empire: The Romulans (like Mr. Spock’s Vulcans, but craftier and far more malicious) are the bad guys of the new film, but in Star Trek continuity Earth and its allies fought a long and mutually devastating war with their vast Star Empire a century before. Little is known about this conflict’s climactic battle except that the defeat was a humiliating loss for the Romulans and directly led to the formation of the Unied Federation of Planets.

If other franchises like Star Wars and Battlestar: Galactica have anything on Star Trek, it’s a well-known space battle. Showing such an event as a Midway-in-space-style slugfest would fix that once and for all.

Robert April, the Enterprise‘s “first” captain: When Gene Roddenberry wrote the first Star Trek treatment for MGM in 1964, the ship was called the Yorktown and was captained by Robert April, a part reportedly meant for Jack Lord or Lloyd Bridges, among others. Over the years a number of canonical and non-canonical sources have incorporated and fleshed out April’s character, establishing his British heritage and giving him a more militaristic bearing than his successors Christopher Pike (played in the new movie by Bruce Greenwood) and James T. Kirk (Chris Pine). Seeing this earliest of Star Trek creations, possibly in his later career as an ambassador, would make a great tribute to the mid-20th Century bravado of the original series.

The legacy of Star Trek: Enterprise: Probably the least-loved of the six series, Enterprise was nevertheless exciting and remarkably well-acted TV sci-fi. Especially in its second two seasons, when its storylines and tone took smarter but markedly darker turns, the prequel series offered multi-episode arcs that settled a lot of long-running fan debates while also fixing inconsistencies in the overarching Trek timeline and universe. And it managed all that while still remaining the most action-oriented Trek yet.

Honestly, we expect this black sheep of the Trek franchises to get short shrift in the movie, but it deserves some kind of acknowledgement for its efforts to explain the backstory of every series set after it.

Gary Mitchell, Captain Kirk’s best friend: The pilot to the original series featured helmsman (and possible First Officer) Lieutenant Commander Gary Mitchell, Kirk’s buddy from their days at Starfleet Academy and as wily an officer as Kirk himself. Driven mad from psychic powers gained on a world at the edge of known space, he attempted to kill Kirk and the Enterprise’s crew before meeting his own death at Kirk’s hands. Mitchell was played by Gary Lockwood, who two years later starred as the astronaut murdered by the HAL-9000 computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

There’s no mention of  a Lockwood character in IMDB’s listing of the new film’s cast, which is kind of a shame. Introducing a character that died in the series’ first episode would have lent a grim in-joke to the crew’s “first” adventure, if indeed the new film works as a prequel to the 1960′s series.

Andorians, the warlike anti-Vulcans: Blue-skinned inhabitants of a frozen moon that orbits a ringed gas giant, Andorians are fiery-tempered warriors who pride themselves on letting emotions guide their decisions. The historical enemies of the dispassionate Vulcans (who live on a world of deserts and volcanoes), they were among Earth’s strongest allies in the war with the Romulans and then later a founding member of the Federation.

They’re also among the most prominent aliens in the Trek galaxy, appearing in all its three time periods. It almost wouldn’t be the same without one or two of them manning a station aboard the Enterprise or filling in the ranks at Starfleet Command. And speaking of cool alien races…

Caitians, the Federation’s cat-people: One of two feline-derived species in the expanded, non-canon universe, Caitians were also briefly glimpsed in the gallery shown at the end of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. Various stories and sourcebooks published over the last two decades describe them, somewhat ironically, as a peaceful, vegetarian, and spiritual people who value loyalty above all else.

An interplanetary civilization like the Federation can’t have too many aliens interacting with humans. And cat-people are cool by definition.

A map of the Neutral Zone from the original series

The Neutral Zone, the no-man’s land between Federation and Romulan space: Part of the bitter peace created at the end of the Earth-Romulan War, the Neutral Zone was established as a no-fly zone between the two warring powers. That didn’t stop both sides from heavily fortifying their boundaries, with the new Federation building massive stellar fortresses out of hollowed-out asteroids towed into formation for that purpose.

Actually, of everything on this list we give the Neutral Zone the best odds of making an appearance. Not for nothing, but the Zone and the Romulan Star Empire were introduced in the episode ”Balance of Terror,” considered by many (including series creator Gene Roddenberry) to be among the best of the original series.

Star Trek opens nationwide May 7, with international release dates varying through that week.

- Michael Kabel

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Miscellaneous Debris: March Edition

Our version of the old Movietone newsreels, but in blog form.

The green tint is the pollen.

Spring is just around the corner, and for those of living in the South that means soupy thick fogs of oak pollen and warmer temperatures occasionally punctuated by slick, sweaty rain. Lucky for us more movies start debuting, and that the theatres showing them are climate controlled. Seriously, if we lived somewhere with better weather we’d probably be doing something else (probably something outdoors.)

March means the downhill homestretch towards the summer movie season, with some distant beeps already popping on the radar for April and especially May. There’s a new Star Trek trailer airing before Watchmen, for example, and a fresh trailer for X-Men Origins: Wolverine is beginning to circle around online. Besides the geek culture stuff, April sees the release of Adventureland for the undergrad crowd and Gigantic for their hipster dorm mates. Grown-ups get State of Play with Russell Crowe and Ben Affleck as well as the long-delayed The Soloist with Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx.

The following items are just a roundup of some topics of interest, movies and news that either don’t merit a full blog post or will bear further previewing and reviewing as more information becomes available. But they’re all things worth talking about right now.

Who watches The Horsemen?

1. Our senses of pity and fair play alike compel us to mention that the movies The Horsemen, 12, Phoebe In Wonderland, and Tokyo! also open this weekend. Probably the coming-of-age Sundance favorite Phoebe In Wonderland and 12, a Russian version of 12 Angry Men, offer the most divergent counter-programming for those not looking for super-heroics. All four movies open “in limited release,” here meaning the arthouses of the larger cities even more so than that phrase usually does.

2. If and when you get tired of hearing about the genius of the original Watchmen graphic novel, Comic Book Resources.com offers an excellent critique and evaluation of the 1986 comics series by veteran comics writer Steven Grant. It’s a note of clarity and scholarship that’s both fair and balanced, to use the cliche. Definitely worth reading.

Man out of time: O'Mara

3. America’s long war of attrition against quality network television scored another victory this week with ABC’s cancellation of Life On Mars. An upstart show that realized its considerable potential by leaps and bounds with each passing episode, the atmospheric time travel mystery-drama never developed an audience despite repeated chances from the network. The show’s creators will be able to wrap up is outstanding plotlines, however, presumably revealing just exactly why main character Sam Tyler (Jason O’Mara) finds himself trapped in an often-hellish vision of New York City circa 1973.

4. While we’re on the subject of good television, AMC’s weird, addictive original Breaking Bad debuts its second season this Sunday night. Overshadowed by the elegant glare of AMC’s  Mad Men juggernaut, this grimly sharp drama about a dying high school chemistry teacher (Emmy winner Bryan Cranston) manufacturing and dealing drugs to support his family consistently went in unexpected directions its entire first season. Small wonder, considering it was created by Vince Gilligan, the mad intellect who helped create some of The X-Files’ most memorable episodes.

He's the main character, folks.

5. Is it better to burn out than fade away? Besides Life On Mars, several other shows including Life, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, and Pushing Daisies are all either cancelled or hearing bells toll for their renewal chances. Watching the slow deaths of other longer-running episodics, such as the ones we’ve come to call Name That Cylon and The Adventures of Ben Linus, Super Genius almost make us feel relieved these good shows will wrap before their creative half-lifes expire.

6. Pixar’s summer-debuting Up has a premise that’s ingenious in its simple whimsy and a trailer promising the same wonder-inspiring visuals as so many of the animation maestros’ other productions. Still, it seems at least initially doomed to become a footnote after last year’s masterpiece Wall*E, an approximate Barry Lyndon to that film’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. Though such a dismissal is probably unfair, after Wall*E anyone would deserve a victory lap. And given Up‘s septuagenarian protagonist – a dead ringer for Andy Rooney, to boot – it’s now fairly obvious that the animators aren’t even keeping up the pretense of making children’s films anymore.

Up opens nationwide May 29th.

Flavor Flav does not appear in this movie.

7. Looking farther into the summer, July 1st sees the release of Public Enemies, probably the biggest event of the year for crime movie junkies as well as anyone enamored of white-hot leading men Johnny Depp and Christian Bale. Based on the true-life pursuit of gangster John Dillinger (Depp) by FBI agent Melvin Purvis (Bale), the film’s also directed by crime auteur Michael Mann, meaning lots of structure and veracity in detailing Dillinger’s mythic crime career. Depp looks dashing as all Hell in the production photos that have leaked so far, but Bale has a talent for stealing films from his more celebrated co-stars (Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Colin Farrell), and a supporting cast that includes Marion Cotillard, Billy Crudup and Giovanni Ribisi only sweetens the potential. Consider us stoked.

8. We’ve fired some stiff shots at The Office in blog posts past, but the show’s creative staff really needs to stop making such gripes so plentiful. In particular this season’s saturation with Dwight – a character that in the most versatile of performer’s hands would still only merit small doses - is slowly draining the show of the ensemble charm that was beginning to draw comparisons to classic TV like WKRP In Cincinnati and Cheers. Someone suggested that the creators are building Dwight up for a catastrophic fall. We hope that’s the case, because we miss the warmth and slice-of-life sweetness of earlier seasons. And we miss Amy Ryan a lot, too.

9. Sometimes the library of Blu-Ray titles reminds us of a HBO programming schedule circa 1984. Recent releases on the still-not-quite-America’s-format-of-choice medium include Escape From New York, The French Connection, Amadeus, and Gandhi. But overall Blu-Ray seems at times spasmodically self-sabotaging. Amid the marketing of tons of modern cinema drivel, there’s still no word on such all time classics like Citizen Kane or Lawrence of Arabia, or even modern favorites like Schindler’s List and The Return of the King getting the big blue upgrade. The release timeline will likely (and we hope) follow the same paradoxical model as traditional DVD over the last decade: as the format becomes more mainstream, films of less general appeal will see their release. In the meantime, it wouldn’t hurt studios to release some high-profile classics in Blu-Ray now, at a loss, as a sign of good faith to more serious movie collectors.

We’ll return Monday with our review of – what else – Watchmen. Have a good time this weekend at the movies or anywhere else you find yourself.

- Michael Kabel
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Five Likely Events In The Iron Man Sequel

With Iron Man‘s $102 million dollar opening weekend – as much as 40% higher than some industry expectations – a sequel seems like a foregone conclusion. In fact, reports indicate that bigwigs at Paramount Pictures and Viacom are already tentatively scheduling its debut for the end of April, 2010 – just two years away.

We loved the current film, and since we think it’s never too early to speculate on what a sequel might entail, here are our five best guesses and hopes for Iron Man 2. As a caveat, some spoilers of the current movie are probably unavoidable.

1. Tony Stark’s descent into alcoholism

A pivotal storyline in the Marvel comic books and a minor turning point for the medium itself, Stark’s battle with alcoholism affected his own book as well as his role in Marvel’s group title The Avengers for years to come. The Iron Man sequel might show Stark battling addiction while attempting to keep up the pace of his armored identity and running his company single-handedly. And heaven knows Robert Downey, Jr. is just the actor to play that part well.

 

2. The debut of James Rhodes as War Machine

With Stark left homeless and destitute after losing control of his drinking, the role of Iron Man fell to his personal pilot James Rhodes. After a time in the Iron Man armor itself, Rhodes eventually begins his own career using a more heavily armed version of the basic armor: the Variable Threat Response Battle Suit, or War Machine.

The current movie essentially advertises Rhodes (Terrence Howard) armoring up at a later date, so expect the two Iron Men to work together against a common enemy while continuing their bromantic friendship.

3. Armor for every occasion

Most of what forms the backbone of Iron Man’s mythos (including the events listed above) was created during creators David Michelinie’s and Boby Layton’s long tenure on the comic. Another of their innovations included Stark building a range of Iron Man armors suitable for any occasion. Some of the most famous include the Silver Centurion armor (pictured at right) an all-black stealth suit, and even a heavily padded model built for use against the Hulk.

Target and Wal-Mart already offer Silver Centurion and War Machine variant figures as in-store exclusives. Adding more kinds of armor means more merchandising possibilities – music to any studio chief’s ears.

4. More S.H.I.E.L.D. – and more Nick Fury

The noble super-spies of S.H.I.E.L.D. are the hidden movers in the Marvel Universe, and Iron Man’s association and collaboration with them is long and complicated. He’s even the agency’s director in current storylines. The extra scene at the end of Iron Man all but insures a larger presence in the sequel, including more of Samuel L. Jackson as S.H.I.E.L.D. honcho Nick Fury. Story elements might also springboard the film version of a hero with even closer agency ties – Captain America.

 

 5. The debut of Iron Man’s arch nemesis, The Mandarin

The seeds of this Chinese warlord and criminal mastermind’s appearance are subtly set up in the current film. In comics’ continuity, the Mandarin uses ten rings that each bestow a different super power. In the movie, the Ten Rings are the terrorist group that kidnaps Stark; their leader Raza is shown twisting a ring around one finger while watching Stark via closed-circuit television.

Ken Watanabe was such a convincing stalking horse Ras Al Ghul in Batman Begins that we’ll nominate him to play the true villain of Iron Man 2. With Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges) presumably dead  – if in fact he’s gone. The Dude abides, after all – the sequel is a perfect time to introduce a greater threat to Stark Enterprises and S.H.I.E.L.D. alike, one that’s international in scope and a match for Stark’s intelligence and drive.

- Michael Kabel

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