Tag: Liev Schreiber

Isle of Dogs

Wes Anderson’s “Isle of Dogs,” his ninth film, may be his grimmest yet, but it’s perfectly at home with his best, most familiar work

If anything, Wes Anderson is very consistent. His films all share his brisk pacing, deadpan humor, diorama creativity and color, and precise attention to detail. And they’re all good.

This is even though each of his nine films is wildly different and ambitious in ways unique to each project. He’s put his quirky, fantastical stamp on coming-of-age romances, family dysfunction dramas, children’s fables and French New Wave cinema. You could make a case that any of Anderson’s films is the “Most Wes Anderson” film. I wrote as much about his previous film, The Grand Budapest Hotel, which found him globe hoping, going to dark places and using his dioramas to examine legacy and loss. That’s all true even though his other films have these qualities in spades, in their own ways.

So where does that leave Isle of Dogs, his second stop-motion animated film following the wonderful Fantastic Mr. Fox? It feels like Anderson at his ugliest, dabbling in washed out horizons, muted colors and grizzly characters, though you can find parallels in his past films. He’s fully embracing his Japanese influences from Akira Kurosawa and kabuki dance, though eagle-eyed viewers must’ve known he’s a fan. And it also feels like his most grim movie, with an immensely percussive score lending gravitas and stakes to an otherwise pleasant story about dogs. You know where this is going.

Isle of Dogs is exactly like all of Anderson’s films and none of them. It dazzles with animation and moods that Anderson has never dabbled in before, and yet it feels at home with his best work. Continue reading “Isle of Dogs”

Fading Gigolo

The thin premise of “Fading Gigolo” mines a surprising amount of depth and emotion, but it’s too distracted with its weird subplot and corny sex jokes.

It’s Woody Allen’s thing to be nebbishly uncomfortable, but he is so out of place in John Turturro’s comedy “Fading Gigolo” that even he can’t quite save it. Turturro’s script starts from a thin premise and manages to find a surprising amount of tenderness and emotion within, but it relies on plot contrivances and supporting players that simply don’t add up.

Allen plays Murray, and he comes to Turturro’s Fioravante with a simple idea: would you have a three-way for money? A “ménage”, he clarifies. This is one of those movies where old, fish-out-of-water men delicately giggle at every sexual word and idea as though they unexpectedly saw it in the Bible in Sunday School. And the bit gets tired fast when they start assuming their alter ego names Virgil and Danny Bongo.

They agree to do this on the basis of being strapped for cash, and the two of them together seem to have no trouble landing middle aged women in need of a pick-me-up. And that ultimately is what “Fading Gigolo” is about: providing women added confidence, care and attention.

Turturro does well to ensure there might be more behind each encounter than sex. In his first meeting with the wealthy and assertive Sharon Stone, there’s no sense that either would have any trouble performing, and yet Turturro finds the innocence in having two people experimenting and trying something new and potentially dangerous. They talk and timidly approach one another, suggesting this is like something out of high school, and the steady and calm Fioravante does something beautiful by sharing a slow dance with her first.

Continue reading “Fading Gigolo”

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

Remember the fight scene between Jack and Barbossa in “The Pirates of the Caribbean?” It goes on for several minutes until we learn that each of them is an undead pirate zombie that can’t be killed. I’ve never been able to defend that one scene, and for the same reason, I can’t defend a single moment of “X-Men Origins: Wolverine.”

Although it is intended to be a history lesson on a story most people already know enough about, “Wolverine” is a film without suspense or purpose. It is one action sequence after another, each more ludicrous than the last. And it is so because Wolverine is invincible; He is the hero of all heroes, with no weaknesses, no easy way to be killed, an unrivaled weapon and a guarantee of his survival.

Since the X-Men trilogy, Wolverine has not changed or gotten stronger, but his limits are stretched even beyond the ones established in the series. In the original series, Wolverine was passed out for several minutes after a gunshot to the head. Here, he gets stabbed numerous times consecutively, is hurled through walls, takes multiple bullet wounds and even recovers unscathed from a brief death after his adamantium injection. This is all done stylishly, but to no avail of course. Continue reading “X-Men Origins: Wolverine”