The Mechanic (2011) Review

The Mechanic, 2011
Reviewed by: Dan S.
Directed By: Simon West
Written By: Richard Wenk
Starring: Jason Statham, Ben Foster, Donald Sutherland
Language: English

Dropping the brooding existential themes and rich character development of its source material, The Mechanic ends up being a preposterous predictable tale of betryal and retribution. Clearly lacking in creative story ideas, the appeal of this film is in its shameless sleeze. The dialogue is needlessly profane, the characters are trashy with more than a few offensive stereotypes, the sex scenes are sweaty and nude, and the constant bloody violence is shockingly impactful. The fight scenes are most memorable; all being incredibly primitive and brutal with lots of painful enviroment interaction that will have you cringing. Even the gun play has more "umph" than usual, the bullets slamming into their targets like sledge hammers.

Unforunately, director Simon West is pretty unreliable when people aren't beating the crap out of each other or blowing their brains out. Working with a huge budget, he piles on the contemporary action cliches of loud music, fast editing, close ups, and shaky camera work....which wouldn't be bad if he wasn't so damn sloppy. Some high concept stunts and car trashing end up being forgettable blurs of color and sound. And sadly, Statham really can't be his lovable self in this one. Straddled with a more serious silent character, he can't wisecrack during the action and his few moments of thoughtful downtime involve him sitting around and looking dumb. Vertically challenged, chain smoking, over actor Ben Foster is bratty and annoying...as usual. Some great unintentional comedy as he struts around his house listening to an ipod, dancing and having some sort of fit. In a brief but memorable performance, the ancient wheelchair bound Donald Sutherland is surprisingly touching.

Rating: 3 Gernades out of 5

Centurion Review

Centurion, 2010
Reviewed by: Dan S.

Director: Neil Marshall

Written By: Neil Marshall
Starring: Michael Fassbender, Olga Kurylenko.

Language: English

Centurion is a quick and dirty historical chase movie featuring great looking costumes, brutal battlefield gore effects, and the very real grueling elements of Northern Scotland. These majestic but desolate ancient locations dominate the movie, often rendering the actors tiny ants in the distance. On the rare occasions we get intimate with the cast, the frostbite visible on their skin is no special effect and their shivering certainly isn't acting, this is some hardcore guerilla filmmaking from rising genre director Neil Marshall. Framed with complex jump editing and shaky camera work, the violent multi-weapon action that dominates the movie is hard hitting and authentic feeling.

As the central antagonist Olga Kurylenko's gives an intense silent performance, her startling stare conveying both rage and tragedy. Unforunately, the rest of the cast fails to make much of an impression with even some of the cliché stock characters blurring together. Leading man Michael Fassbender is terribly dry, and even with sporadic "stating the obvious" mood killing narration you can't really connect with the guy. While the film is exciting when it's rolling the narrative is lurching on fumes by the closing act, and the precious few slow scenes feel like painful abrupt stops rather than welcomed breathers. The unique spectacle of the movie is worth seeing but it isn't a very satisfying film experience overall.

Rating:

The Expendables Review

The Expendables, 2010

Reviewed By: Dan S.

Directed By: Sylvester Stallone

Written By: Sylvester Stallone and David Callaham

Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Eric Roberts, David Zayas, Terry Crews, Randy Couture, and Mickey Rourke.

Language: English

Keeping thiis mini-epic limited to cliché warehouses and exotic islands, writer/director Sylvester Stallone keeps The Expendables lean and lite while masterfully juggling a giant ensemble cast of convincing middle aged tough guys. While the focus is primarily on the amusing macho banter between Stallone and Statham, everyone is cast to their strengths and at least gets one moment to do their thing and do it well. In more limited roles, Rourke delivers a soulful rambling monologue like only he can while Bruce Willis drops a bunch of F bombs like only he can. As can be expected, Arnold's cameo is short but sweet. Lundgren gets a surprising amount of screen time in a memorable weird performance while Eric Roberts threatens to steal the movie as the arrogant wise cracking villain.

Much like the story, the action is brutish and simple. Don't expect too many complex emotional twists or turns, just the bad guys being dicks, and the heroes blowing them to pieces with large guns in retort. Of course Stallone uses every opportunity to pour on the gore, but it should be noted that while the violence is graphic it is not nearly as mean and nasty as the violence in his last Rambo outing; it's all in good fun this time out. There are also plenty of well staged fight sequences cast to the strengths of the performers; Li and Lundgren work a smart kung fu fight, Statham beats up a gang of obnoxious punks, UFC star Raynd Couture breaks limbs with mixed marital arts holds, while the aging Stallone gets his "ass kicked." Charisma Carpenter has a small well acted part but no 80s throwback nudity this time around.

Rating:

A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010) Review

A Nightmare On Elm Street, 2010

Reviewed by Dan S.

Directed by: Samuel Beyer

Written by: Wesley Strick and Eric Heisserer

Starring: Jackie Earle Haley

Much like its 1984 predecessor, “A Nightmare on Elm Street 2010” is the tale of four teens terrorized by a disfigured serial killer in their dreams. Cutting most of the memorable meat from Craven’s original narrative, screen writers Wesley Strick and Eric Heisserer’s version of the classic film dully unfolds as a series of predictable jump scares and unimaginative death scenes. In his feature film debut, veteran music video director Samuel Bayer’s vision of Freddy’s dream world is a lot like your average studio horror movie complete with the now standard digitized blue/green color scheme and sloppy hyperactive editing. His occasional CGI enhanced recreations of the franchise’s signature visuals only serve as a reminder of how much better executed the scenes were in the original film. The musical score is equaly uninspired, lots of cliches with a sporadic keyboard nod to the original theme

Prestigious, Oscar-nominated actor Jackie Earle Haley struggles to make any kind of lasting impression as Krueger. Buried behind convincing, but stoic make up, with a toneless, digitized voice. It is only during a very brief flash black sequence that the make up-free actor hints at the complex ambiguity he could have brought to the role. Speaking of wasted potential, cult favorite Clancy Brown has maybe two lines that he can’t do much with. Unfournately, the audience is forced to spend most of the movie's running time with an ensemble cast of forgettable pouty face teens as they struggle to remember if human Freddy touched them in their special areas or not when they were little...