The Kingdom (2007)–*

America kicks some major ass, but when it does, it contributes to an unending cycle of violence. That’s the basic idea behind The Kingdom, a disturbingly stupid political action film from Friday Night Lights director Peter Berg. While it targets the zealous fans of 24 and Tom Clancy, The Kingdom grounds itself in a reality it knows nothing about. Instead of trying to be obvious entertainment like the above mentioned works, it attempts to be an film that says something. It fails.

In the wake of a major terrorist attack on an American Housing Complex in Saudia Arabia, FBI investigative team leader Ronald Fluery (Jamie Foxx) insists on putting American boots on the ground. The State Department and the Attorney General are adamantly against having a U.S. presence on Saudi soil, knowing it will rile the Muslim fundamentalists who launched the attack.

Fluery (the Wise) decides he knows better than his superiors, even with the clouded judgment from the death of a colleague in the bombing. He decides to blackmail the Saudi ambassador into letting his team investigate for five days. With the help of a justice-seeking Saudi, Sgt Haytham (Ali Suliman), Fluery and his team (again, with only five days) set out to take down everyone involved in the attack, up to and including the enigmatic ringleader Abu Hamza (think little Bin Laden).

The Kingdom is a terrible, sentimental action film with aspirations of being a legitimate political thriller. It’s offensive to the intelligence of any thinking person, and in many ways reminiscent of Crash. The main similarities? Both films are ignorant of their own intentions.

I hate The Kingdom because of the naïveté one must have in order to find the film either plausible or affecting. Berg’s use of tired cliches to show that the good Saudis are just like Americans—shots of Saudi families reading books together or a Saudi son helping his sick Saudi father—don’t just only drip with sentimentality; they are pickled in it.

More excruciating is watching the likes of Jamie Foxx and Chris Cooper, two talented, serious actors, contend with Jason Bateman and Jeremy Piven, two talented comedians. The comedy in this film is so inappropriate that I actually thank the terrorists for taking Bateman’s character hostage, if only to shut him up. Piven too seems out of place, playing the U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia like his Hollywood agent character from Entourage.

Far be it for me to actually want my political thrillers be treated more like Bourne Supremacy than Team America: World Police. Hell, I would have even taken 24. But no. We get nearly two hours of parody taken too seriously and culture clash not taken seriously enough. Is it any wonder why some people hate America?

The Kingdom, starring Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Garner, Chris Cooper and Jason Bateman, directed by Peter Berg, starts Friday, Sept. 28, 2007 in theaters everywhere.

Own 24 on DVD!

The Academy is set to party like it’s 2006. They invited Jon Stewart back to host the Oscars. Stewart is the logical choice because 2007 looks a lot like 2005 when it comes to politics and film converging. In the Valley of Elah, The Kingdom, No End In Sight, Charlie Wilson’s War, Lions for Lambs and Rendition are all heavy on the politics.

What’s the bad news? Stewart did preside over the infamous Crash win.

From The Oscar Folks:

Jon Stewart has been set to host the 80th Academy Awards® telecast, producer Gil Cates announced today. This will mark Stewart’s second stint as Oscar host.

“Jon was a terrific host for the 78th Awards,” said Cates. “He is smart, quick, funny, loves movies and is a great guy. What else could one ask for?”

Stewart has been host and executive producer of Comedy Central’s The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, winner of four consecutive Emmy® Awards for Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series, since 1999. The show has also been bestowed with two Peabody Awards. In 2004 Stewart and the writers of The Daily Show also authored America (The Book): A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction, which was awarded the Thurber Prize for American Humor and was a staple on The New York Times best seller list for 46 consecutive weeks.

“I’m thrilled to be asked to host the Academy Awards for the second time because, as they say, the third time’s a charm,” said Stewart.

Stewart has appeared in more than a dozen motion pictures. His television credits include a one-hour HBO comedy special, Jon Stewart: Unleavened, a recurring role as himself on HBO’s series-within-a-series, The Larry Sanders Show, as well as an upcoming appearance on The Simpsons. Stewart hosted the Grammy Awards in 2001 and 2002.

Academy Awards for outstanding film achievements of 2007 will be presented on Sunday, February 24, 2008, at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood &Highland Center®, and televised live by the ABC Television Network.

Warner Bros. is the only sane studio as it continues to support both HD formats. To that end they’ll likely have the biggest HD hit for the second year in a row with the release of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on DVD, HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. The discs hit stores on Dec. 11, 2007.

From the Warner Home Entertainment people:

From acclaimed director David Yates (BBC’s State of Play, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince), Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix brings back the ensemble cast including Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter series, December Boys), Emma Watson (Harry Potter series) and Rupert Grint (Harry Potter series, Driving Lessons) as well as two-time Academy Award Winner Maggie Smith (Gosford Park, A Room With A View, Harry Potter film series), Academy Award Winner Emma Thompson (Sense and Sensibility, Howards End), Academy Award Nominee Ralph Fiennes (Schindler’s List, The English Patient), Alan Rickman (Love Actually, Die Hard, Harry Potter film series), and Gary Oldman (Batman Begins, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire). Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix also introduces Academy Award Nominees Helena Bonham Carter (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride) and Imelda Staunton (Vera Drake, Freedom Writers).

Warner Bros. is also leveraging the power of the box set again with the release of Harry Potter 5. A Limited Edition Collectible DVD Set will also be available on Dec. 11 and features every Harry Potter film thus for in a 2-disc, standard-def version.

We Are Marshall (2006)–***1/2
DVD Review

Does a sports film have to transcend genre to be great? If you watch We Are Marshall you will know the answer is a definitive “no.”

Director McG’s football movie succeeds because it is about football. Sure, you have a film that deals with mourning and survivor’s guilt. At the core, though, is the decision to continue to play the game after a tragedy. I’m not a fan of that game, either. In spite of my own bias and in spite of an onslaught of sports film clichés, We Are Marshall achieves the status of being one of the greatest football films I’ve ever seen.

The film’s title comes from the team cry, “We Are Marshall!” It’s shouted in huddles. It’s shouted as a sign of camaraderie across the campus. It’s also shouted on Marshall University’s chartered airplane before it crashes. The tragic accident kills everyone on board, leaving four football players and an assistant coach (all grounded at the time of the flight) as the sole surviving members of the Marshall football team.

The town of Huntington, West Virginia is devastated, but the team co-captain Nate Ruffin (Anthony Mackie) urges the University to rebuild the program. And they do after Jack Lengyel (Matthew McConaughey) volunteers to be the head coach.

Rebuilding is a struggle, with University President Donald Dedmon (David Strathairn) petitioning the NCAA in person for his school to be allowed to play freshmen players. When the first game of the new season turns into a massacre, emotions from returning players begin to boil over. It’s then that Lengyel decides to show the team that it’s not whether you win or loose or even how you play the game, it’s just about playing the game.

I love it when McConaughey as Lengyel first gives that speech. He gives it to one guy, the surviving assistant coach, Red (Matthew Fox). It’s the only time that Lengyel steps ever so slightly away from football and coaches someone on survival.

McConaughey gives an invigorating and comically heartfelt performance as the coach who only knows football. It’s oddly reminiscent of the post-9/11 George W. Bush whose single-minded determination was refreshing in a complex time. His terribly hokey lines as the coach are often silly and sometimes insensitive, but McConaughey’s exaggerated drawl and uncomplicated effervescence inject liveliness into a character who must in turn inject life into a small town.

First time screenwriter Jamie Linden and director McG (yes, the Charlie’s Angels guy) do focus on moments that, like the characters, are strikingly superficial. Of course, that may be why McG was perfect for the job. A better director would have muddled the film, much like Oliver Stone did in World Trade Center. Sometimes simple is best, and the filmmakers here made a film that is simply great.

Extras:
The most notable extra on the DVD release is a featurette entitled “Legendary Coaches - How Coaches Overcome Adversity,” but even without any extras, the film is worth watching.

Death Proof (2007)–**
DVD Review

It seems that Quentin Tarantino finally missed with Death Proof. The prolific writer/director, whose nearly infallible career made some believe Christ had returned, stepped out of bounds with his half of Grindhouse, now a standalone film thanks to a DVD director’s cut release.

Of course there are some who still believe that his slasher/revenge film is just as great, maybe even greater, than his other work. To them I say, if Death Proof is a masterpiece, then Tarantino made one of the most unwatchable masterpieces in cinematic history.

The film is split into two parts with the first following crazed killer Stuntman Mike (Kurt Russell) as he stalks a group of unsuspecting ladies in Austin, Texas. How does Stuntman Mike attack his victims? With his reinforced, “death proof” stunt car. While Stuntman Mike succeeds with in taking out the first group of girls, that other clique in the second half (you know, the half without a grainy filter) doesn’t cave so easily. He tries to run them off the road, and they try to run him off right back. Only they have guns… and a lead pipe.

Yes, guns and a lead pipe and a fast car. You can tell Death Proof wasn’t an attempt to make a great film. Worse, the storylines aren’t even elevated by the fact that Tarantino is intentionally making a bad movie; they are just bad.

You may try to put Death Proof on the same level as the genre pictures that Tarantino has made in the past, but it’s hard to see anything resembling the effortless, avant garde masterpieces that he delivered consistently for years. The jump cuts designed to mimic a lost reel or missing frames don’t seem revolutionary, instead adding an artificial look to Tarantino’s weakest big budget attempt at low budget filmmaking.

Certain bad shots in the slasher half of the film seem do have an inspired quality about them, but Tarantino’s much beloved dialogue gets in the way of our ability to focus on the little successes. Still, the first half’s dialogue is better than the taxing chit chat in the second part of the film. The latter half is an hour of excruciating, uninteresting personal anecdotes without the coolness we’ve come to expect.

Yes, I did just use the word coolness, because if we can call Tarantino one thing, it’s cool. He’s earned a reputation for being hip among the critics and cinematic elitists. But among his circle of friends, Robert Rodriguez, Eli Roth and others, maybe he wasn’t cool enough. His movies weren’t the same as theirs. They were just too damn good. If nothing else, Death Proof can be looked at as a reason not to cave into peer pressure. Because, just as I said the first time I reviewed Grindhouse, if you set out to make a bad movie, that’s exactly what you are going to make.

Special Feature that aren’t worth writing home about but are listed nonetheless:

• Finding Quentin’s Gals
• The Guys Of Death Proof
• Kurt Russell As Stuntman Mike
• Introducing Zoe Bell
• Quentin’s Greatest Collaborator: Editor Sally Menke
• Double Dare Trailer
• International Poster Gallery

Call it a pipe dream. Call it insane. But could the Academy fall head over heals for Ratatouille? Brad Bird’s masterpiece is easily the best film to come out of Pixar since the company’s inception. It deserves an editing nod, as well as a screenplay nomination, if not a win in both categories.

Why not go further than that? Why not go for Best Picture?

I know what you are saying, “Animated films have their own category. The Academy won’t go for Best Picture.” Well, here’s an interesting tidbit: metacritic.com gives Ratatouille a 96/100. Any score higher than 85 is noteworthy, but Ratatouille has a score that bests The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. A 96 also gets the film the No. 6 spot on metacritic.com’s all time list.

It goes against conventional wisdom to believe that Ratatouille stands a chance outside of Best Animated Film race. If this entry serves no other purpose, I hope that it gets people talking about Ratatouille as the contender it should be. Even a simple Best Picture nomination would spice up Oscar night. Now, imagine how sweet victory would taste if Ratatouille were to become the first animated film to win Best Picture. Yeah…Real sweet.

Top 8 Chances
An original screenplay nomination is almost certain for the film, as it will likely win Best Animated Feature. Could Brad Bird get the director nomination, making him the first animated film director to get a nod? He certainly deserves it. He’d also get a nod as the producer if the film goes for Best Picture, in addition to the screenplay. Here’s hoping Bird walks away with an Oscar next February.

TheFilmChair.com 2007-2008 Oscar Charts

For everyone who thought The Phantom Menace was a stupid title, I give you Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. That according to Indy’s kid Shia LaBeouf. The Wiki on Crystal Skulls is kind of interesting. Didn’t know there was a kingdom.

Even Indy doesn’t like that idea. That or his heating pad is on too high.

Indy 4 hits theaters Memorial Day 2008.

3:10 to Yuma (2007)–***1/2
Quickie Review

Dan Evans is a defeated rancher who is days away from loosing his farm to a neighboring land owner. When he gets the opportunity to earn a quick $200 by escorting the murderous robber Ben Wade to a train headed for federal prison, the usually safe Evans takes a chance on the fool’s errand. A well-composed and dramatic western, 3:10 to Yuma proves to be the always solid James Mangold’s best film to date. All around great performances are highlighted by Christian Bale’s harrowing turn as the rancher, Evans. A thrill for classic western fans. Also starring Russell Crowe as Ben Wade with Ben Foster and Peter Fonda.

From the folks at Paramount Home Entertainment:

The armies of CYBERTRON invaded theaters with a juggernaut fury that shook the summer of 2007, but on October 16, 2007 fans of all ages will discover that there is far “More Than Meets The Eye” to the massive mechanical behemoths when Transformers arrives on Earth in spectacular DVD and HD DVD two-disc Special Edition sets as well as on a single disc from DreamWorks Pictures and Paramount Pictures; distributed by Paramount Home Entertainment.

Earning over $650 million at the global box office to date, the massive production exploded onto screens from the creative minds of director Michael Bay and executive producer Steven Spielberg, in association with Hasbro, taking audiences by storm and becoming the biggest original film of the year. The first live-action film based on the enduringly popular “robots in disguise”, Transformers features the ultimate battle between good and evil, as the peace-loving AUTOBOTS seek to protect humanity from the evil forces of the DECEPTICONS. The action-packed film stars a hot young cast of up-and-coming actors including Shia LaBeouf (Disturbia), Josh Duhamel (Las Vegas), Tyrese Gibson (Four Brothers) and Megan Fox (Hope &Faith), as well as seasoned performers such as Jon Voight (National Treasure) and John Turturro (The Good Shepherd). But the biggest stars are the Transformers robots themselves – including fan favorites OPTIMUS PRIME, MEGATRON, BUMBLEBEE, RATCHET, JAZZ and more – brought to life by revolutionary new VFX techniques developed by the innovative digital wizards at Industrial Light &Magic (ILM).

The Transformers Special Edition two-disc sets provide an incredible experience with an arsenal of bonus material that delivers excitement and fun for long-time fans, as well as for viewers who are new to the TRANSFORMERS universe. The extensive special features include commentary by Michael Bay and two multi-part in-depth documentaries exploring the human elements of the film as well as the phenomenal robot stars. Presented in multiple parts, “Our World” and “Their War” include segments with Steven Spielberg discussing his love for the franchise and the early concept for the movie, the extensive casting process, the training, consultants and real-world weapons provided by the military to lend authenticity to the film, the evolution of the robots from Hasbro’s iconic toy line to big-screen stars, the unique vehicles created for the movie, a discussion with ILM’s legendary digital artists and much more.

The discs go even further behind-the-scenes with early sketch concepts of the robots and an in-depth look at the making of the SKORPONOK attack from writing and conceptualization through the creation of the stunning visual effects.

Transformers Special Edition DVD bonus features include:

Disc 1:
· Feature film
· Commentary by Michael Bay

Disc 2:
· Our World
The Story Sparks - Steven Spielberg discusses his love for the franchise and early concept art for the film. Explores how the writers adapted the cartoon into a live-action movie and why Michael Bay is the perfect director for the film.
Human Allies - A look at how the actors were selected and their experiences on the set.
I Fight Giant Robots - An exploration of the military training that
Josh Duhamel and Tyrese Gibson underwent for their roles and the various stunts that the actors were asked to perform.
Battleground - A piece on the senior officials from the Department of Defense and Air Force who consulted on the film to give it authenticity and the key locations that the U.S. government provided access to.

· Their War
Rise of the Robots - Explores the interaction between Hasbro designers and Michael Bay to bring the toy line roaring to life.
AUTOBOTS Roll Out - Michael Bay discusses working with Chevy and its designers and the modifications that were made to the cars seen in the film.
DECEPTICONS Strike - The film’s military advisors discuss the “toys” they allowed the production to borrow: F-22 Raptors, Ospreys and A-10 Warthogs.

· More Than Meets The Eye
From Script to Sand: The SKORPONOK Desert Attack - An in-depth look at the making of this particularly epic and challenging scene from initial storyboarding through production and visual effects.
Concepts - Early sketch concepts of the robots.
Trailers

I wasn’t planning to write about the remake of a classic western, especially after the All The King’s Men fiasco last year. So what if the 2007 version of 3:10 to Yuma was directed by James Mangold, who has already delivered Oscars for Angelina Jolie and Reese Witherspoon. So what if it stars Russell Crowe, who, short of throwing a phone at a concierge, has had a brilliant history with the Academy. So what if Peter Fonda, the son of a Hollywood icon turned icon himself, has a significant supporting role. The movie is a remake, right?

Yeah, a remake, one with a better director than Delmer Daves and a better star than Glenn Ford. With the buzz that’s been a brewing, 3:10 to Yuma, which opens in theaters Friday, is bound to make some noise. Couple that with the recent success of early season contenders like The Departed, Mystic River, Little Miss Sunshineand The Constant Gardener, and 3:10 to Yuma could have the legs to last the season.

Top 8 Chances
Is the Academy ready to forgive Russell Crowe for phone throwing or for A Good Year? He’s certainly one of the best actors working today even if he isn’t the best star. The focus of the recent buzz, however, has been on the any-year-now Christian Bale, who should have been nominated for American Psycho.

What about Peter Fonda? Can the Easy Rider icon snag his Oscar from a film in the genre that has so inspired him. And how much longer can the Academy ignore James Mangold when he consistently puts out some of the best studio pictures? Right now, my predictions aren’t favorable, but if there’s money and prestige to be had, 3:10 to Yuma could ride into the Best Picture race.

TheFilmChair.com 2007-2008 Oscar Charts