I finally got around to a couple more summer releases this
year, both films of which being complete opposites catering to two different
audiences. One a character driven journey with brutal thematic allegories, and
the other a bombastic sights and sounds extravaganza. So here are my thoughts
on both of them…
Snowpiercer:
If you’re feeling a bit worn out by the numerous sequels and
effects heavy blockbusters this season, you could pick a much worse summer movie than Bong
Joon-Ho’s Snowpiercer. Now, I use that term very loosely, because despite being
headlined by Captain America’s Chris Evans, Snowpiercer is a summer film solely
by its ironic release date. A very brutal film based on a French graphic novel,
the film uses various holocaust allegories as an aid to its storytelling, and
yet, it doesn’t do so tastelessly. The “world” of this train - practically an
ecosystem of its own - is well balanced between stylish and gritty, showcasing
the social divide between its various classes, and allowing us to absorb the
full devastation of those in the tail section. So it is…
The cast is uniformly terrific, including Chris Evans, Jamie
Bell, Octavia Spencer, and especially Tilda Swinton, the latter of which is a
riot every time she is on screen. Give credit to Joon-Ho for his superb direction
and careful handling of the various, great aspects in this film, from his cast
to his involving action sequences, none more harrowing than a terrific fight
sequence in a pitch-black tunnel. In spite of the film featuring several plot
threads that go absolutely nowhere and perhaps deliberately shaking up its own
pace near the end, Snowpiercer is a challenger of a film that offers a healthy
alternative to the less subtle, razzle-dazzle glut.
**** / *****
Transformers: Age of Extinction:
Speaking of razzle-dazzle glut lacking subtlety, Michael Bay
has returned to unleash his fourth entry in the Transformers series, Age of
Extinction, a movie so bloated that it gave me a headache. On one hand, Bay’s films are always technically excellent. The
visual effects by ILM are every bit as good as they always have been, Ethan Van der
Ryn and Erik Aadahl (fresh off their also fantastic work in Godzilla) provide
some of the greatest work of their careers, Mark Wahlberg and Stanley Tucci
turn in solid performances, the robot characters are very decent, and some of the
film’s action is great. However, that’s as far as my positives go.
One complaint I held against the other Transformers sequels
is that they were just the same movie as the first film all over again, and
while this film does change things quite a bit in structure, it still has flaws
aplenty. The editing is an assault on the senses (William Goldenberg, where did you go wrong?), most of the human characters
are dull and uninteresting (Nicola Peltz and her character’s boyfriend come to
mind), and Ehren Kruger is just as bad as ever when it comes to screenwriting,
including reducing
the Dinobots to a Deus Ex Machina, and –unlike Snowpiercer – holocaust allegories that are tasteless. Above all, though, is that the film’s pace
is a slog. This movie is nearly three hours long, and feels every minute of it.
This thing is loaded with so much pointless filler that you could have trimmed
almost an hour and lost nothing. The film ends (stops, is more like it) leaving
room for a Transformers 5, and I’m not too keen on that happening with how this
series steadily declines. I tried to give this movie the benefit of the doubt,
and it’s not technically as bad as Revenge of the Fallen (nothing here
infuriates or annoys me like Sam Witwicky’s mother did), but if Bay wants to
regain the good will he got from the first Transformers, he’d better pull
himself together. But with how much cash these movies rake in, that may never
happen.
*1/2 / *****
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