Chew Toy Story

Year: 2016

Director: Yarrow Cheney & Chris Renaud

Cast: Louis C.K., Eric Stonestreet, Kevin Hart

Run Time: 1 hour 27 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG

I have a tenuous relationship with Illumination Entertainment. While I’m down to clown with some Minion mayhem from time to time, I’ve only truly liked one of their movies so far: Despicable Me. Its sequel would have joined the list were it not for the blatant racism and obsessive heteronormativity. And you couldn’t have paid me to go see Hop or The Lorax. I want to like this studio, I really do. I’m ready to see it thrive.

You see, there’s a sea change coming, and this will put Illumination on a path either to greatness or to ruin. We’re living in a post-Minions world. After the Despicable Me spinoff raked in over one billion dollars (that’s far from an exaggeration), these little yellow ragamuffins have become a bona fide cultural phenomenon. Illumination recognizes that they are sitting on what could be this generation’s Mickey Mouse, so they’re lassoing that bronco and seeing how far they can ride it. The Minions now inform the look and feel of the company’s entire output (including their studio logo, which highlights the “MIN  ION” in the company name), even appearing in a comic short preceding Illumination’s latest box office bulldozer, The Secret Life of Pets.

That’s the movie we’re here to talk about, and we shall. In one minute. The commitment to Minion style comedy and animation will make Illumination’s output a more coherent whole, which is definitely a good thing. But there’s an extremely high chance of them flying too close to the sun. What I’m seeing with Pets makes me extremely nervous. But only time will tell.

They’re already used up five of their nine lives, so they’ve got to be careful.

In The Secret Life of Pets, something in your home can secretly speak when you’re not looking! How novel! Those things in particular are pets, and our lead pet is Max (kid favorite Louis C. K.), a dog owned by Katie (Ellie Kemper). When Katie gets a second dog, the enormous mutt Duke (Eric Stonestreet), Max’s jealousy leads them into a fight while on a walk, which gets them captured by animal control. They embark on a long, arduous journey to get home, meeting a tribe of abandoned pets led by the sadistic bunny Snowball (Kevin Hart, who I’m pretty sure is contractually obligated to be in every movie ever made). Meanwhile, a rescue attempt is led by Gidget (Jenny Slate), a neighbor dog with a massive crush on Max.

Will our unlikely pair make it home, having discovered a newfound friendship along the way?!

What the f**k do YOU think?

The Secret Life of Pets relies entirely on one major human personality trait that I lack entirely: an affinity for the animal kingdom. If you’re what is colloquially known as a “dog person,” this movie will magnetically draw your attention and admiration. But it’s the Dane Cook of pet-based movies, observing animal behavior without finding anything to say about it. There could be a very interesting comedy here about how pets operate in a world that wasn’t built for them, but the screenplay seems content to relax in the “dogs sure do love to walk in circles before they lie down, don’t they?” register. This is a movie that required four distinct people to write it, and Lord knows what they did all day. It doesn’t require a Jane Goodall level of research to reach the conclusion that cats like to chase laser dots.

Then again, this movie is lazy in every way, shape, and form, including some ways, shapes, and forms that haven’t even been invented yet. Combining the premise of Toy Story with the plot of Homeward Bound and the characters of Flushed Away, this is a movie that could only have been marketed to children, because anyone over the age of six has already seen it a thousand times before. I understand that I am not in the major demographic for this film, and that’s fine. But if you’re looking for an animated animal movie with a lazy premise, why not go straight to the source and watch Finding Dory again? Don’t waste you or your child’s time with this unbecoming nonentity.

Come to think of it, does anybody with a kid actually read my blog, besides my parents? Hello out there!

I think I laughed twice at The Secret Life of Pets, which is honestly more than I expected, so kudos to them. Kevin Hart’s presence is such a massive roadblock to my personal sense of humor that I’m genuinely delighted I had any fun at all. 

This flick is all over the place, frantically darting down every avenue of comedy it can. The roster includes poop jokes, a pratfall interlude that slams the brakes on the plot so abruptly that you’re tossed from your seat, and deeply weird cribs  from classic films as varied as Grease, The Lost World, and freaking Some Like It Hot. So I was bound to like something in this schizophrenic fantasia of comedy stylings. Pets also carries out the Minions manifesto of being inexplicably violent for a kids’ movie, trotting out some incredibly unkind slapstick and even literally killing off a character in pursuit of a gag.

There’s a surprising amount of death coursing around the edges of this film, but it’s not treated in the gloopy tragic mien of Pixar. In fact, it’s barely acknowledged at all, because Pets ignores the arcs of nearly every major character in its feverish race toward the finish line. It’s such a cursory, tossed-off product trafficking in only the hoariest cof lichés that it’s vaguely insulting.

So… Welcome back, Illumination! Maybe stick to Minion movies. The Secret Life of Pets is exactly what happens when the sugar rush sophomoric humor of the Minions is undiluted by other tones, then stripped of the retro, stylistic sheen that has always surrounded them. It ain’t pretty, it ain’t memorable, it ain’t anything. I hope and pray that another Despicable Me is right around the corner, because the new age of Illumination is looking unpromisingly like the old age.

TL;DR: The Secret Life of Pets is a boring, lazy movie without much drive.

Rating: 5/10

Word Count: 1054

What Have I Done?

You might remember my spring cleaning period, where I unloaded a barrage of mini-reviews (well, if seven paragraphs still counts as "mini") to slough off the weight of just how many films I had seen that I still needed to review. You may remember this because it was literally a week ago. Well, guess what? Even though I still need to finish off my Chucky and Wes Craven marathons and tackle the current movies I've seen this month before the Halloween season comes crashing down in earnest, I went ahead and watched three more movies this week. I've made a huge mistake.

Whiplash

Year: 2014

Director: Damien Chazelle

Cast: Miles Teller, J. K. Simmons, Melissa Benoist

Run Time: 1 hour 47 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

A young drummer takes a class with an angry, abusive teacher in an attempt to push himself to be the best.

It’s not often that my interests intersect with the year’s Oscar noms (The House on Sorority Row was snubbed!), but just last year a miracle happened. The scrappy horror production company Blumhouse took a break from making piles of money to assist in the creation of Whiplash, which went on to sweep all the Academy Awards categories that nobody particularly cares about. Despite its minted status as an Oscar flick, it still has the stylistic trademarks of a Blumhouse production, and that’s what makes it a fascinating watch.

The limited sets, small cast, and stylistic experiments typical to low budget horror filmmaking are all reinterpreted to this new genre, which is admittedly a horror story in its own right. Centering primarily on Miles Teller’s ingénue Andrew and J. K. Simmons’ domineering professor Fletcher, these two become locked in an emotionally brutal and occasionally violent enterprise: turning Andrew into one of the greats. This brutishly simple story requires a lot of its audience, asking if the pursuit of fame and talent is truly worth the price one must pay.

The plot is straightforward as all hell, which allows director Damien Chazelle free range in visually portraying it. He doesn’t go institutionally crazy with that freedom, but he taps directly into the film’s adrenal gland, sending shock waves of pure electricity through the audience. I suppose it goes without saying that the cinematography and editing adhere to the beat of the music played in the film, but there’s so much more than that to chew on.

The yellow, underlit music room casts a sickly pall on all who inhabit its space, red blood splashes vividly onto stark white drums, and the rapid cuts abruptly stand stock still to emphasize intense moments. There is no act of cinematic upheaval more profoundly affecting in Whiplash than its fearless finale, an audacious sprint to the finish line that combines rapid whip-pans, whirlwind cutting, and oppressively extreme close-ups in a mesmerizing effort that instills the feeling that the action is happening so fast, the film can’t even keep up with itself. When it finally lets up the sense of release is so drastic that you’re forced to sit there a minute, processing in stunned awe.

It’s a cool film, with two unforgettable actors behind wheel. Miles Teller finally breaks free from his Zac Efron/Skylar Astin twentysomething hell to deliver a well-rounded character that portrays raw, open-faced ambition in a frankly alarming but thoroughly committed manner. His fire is matched with panache by J. K. Simmons’ powerful hurricane of a performance, swinging from stone-faced impenetrability to spittle-flying rage beast. It’s stunning, nuanced stuff that simultaneously humanizes the characters yet exposes their darkest flaws.

The best thing about this crackling, angry film is its awareness of how insulated its world is. After all the fighting, screaming, bleeding, crying, and chair throwing (that music room has the world’s most resilient walls – definitely call their contractor next time you need remodeling done), it’s still only jazz. Time and again, the film reminds the characters just how little everybody else in the world cares about jazz. It leaves you with a bittersweet taste and compels you to consider the consequences of the sacrifices people make for their art. It’s a daring, kinetic picture and more horrifying than half the Blumhouse stock. Check it out!

Rating: 8/10

House of Wax

Year: 2005

Director: Jaume Collet-Serra

Cast: Chad Michael Murray, Elisha Cuthbert, Jared Padalecki

Run Time: 1 hour 53 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

A group of college students on a road trip get stranded in a town with a house of wax run by two maniacal brothers who murder tourists and turn them into wax figures.

2005 was such a barren wasteland for horror that we ended up with House of Wax, a remake of a remake. But, although it’s hardy a cinematic triumph, House of Wax is intriguing for several reasons. First, it is a reinterpretation of a classic Vincent Price property in the immediate wake of the zeitgeist hit Saw. Second, it’s actually a pretty beautifully shot little movie despite its host of remake calling cards, like uselessly pretty actors, a nigh-on nonsensical plot, and drama that’s shallower than a dorm shower.

Let’s linger on that first one, shall we? Where the Vincent Price flick was of sanitized 1950’s vintage, the new House of Wax was born into a meaner epoch, smack dab in the middle of the rise of torture porn. As a result, there are obviously much more prolonged and miserable scenes of people being chained to giant metal contraptions and whatnot. Really, it comes with the territory. But the striking thing about House of Wax’s new grim perspective is the artistry put into rendering the gore as realistically as possible.

From close-up grue like superglued lips and peeling wax skin to the realistically bloody aftermath of punches and blows, House of Wax makes an art form of turning the stomach. And the biggest showstopper of the film transcends even the gooey carnage, abuilding made entirely of wax melting to the ground. It’s visually arresting stuff, and if I rated films solely on effects, House of Wax would be an unequivocal 10/10.

Unfortunately I rate films on a variety of criteria, and in nearly every other respect, House of Wax fails spectacularly. One of the film’s most notable deficits is the acting. Featuring a notorious performance by the self-indulgent heiress Paris Hilton, the stakes become ludicrously low as she fails to entirely convince that she isn’t already made of wax. Any performer in the world would look like Brando when compared to Little Miss Trust Fund, but by golly do her co-stars push to give her a run for her money.

To be fair, providing motivation for the mountain of dumb-ass white horror character decisions that comprise the plot (“Let’s wander into a closed house of wax! And take a ride from a stranger whose car is decorated with rodent carcasses And then go home and floss with a rusty chain saw!” At one point, a hapless teen literally runs into a wall.) would be a challenge for Stella Adler herself. But wet-behind-the-ears stars Elisha Cuthbert and Jared Padalecki flail to find any sort of purchase on the impenetrable blocks of dialogue and Chad Michael Murray’s strained attempts to portray an “edgy” and “hard” criminal type just one year after A Cinderella Story are flecked with flop sweat and patchy stubble.

The basic story structure starts off interesting, splitting up the core cast between widely disparate locations, but it devolves into an aimless piece that reliably and impressively fails to follow through on the tortured seedlings of themes it attempts to plant, like the idea of two sets of twins facing off (Cuthbert and Murray are ostensibly siblings, although her brunette weave – probably mandated to accentuate Hilton’s golden tresses – isn’t doing her any favors) or small town vs. city living.

Luckily, as I mentioned before, the film is kind of disproportionately gorgeous, with dizzying, roving camera shots that highlight the moody gothic lighting scheme. It’s unfair, really, because the quality cinematography (as well as the terrific gore) prevents me from unequivocally panning the film like I urgently desire to. The acting might be dramatic backwash, the killer might look suspiciously like Tommy Wiseau, and the plot might be risibly coherent – bordering on absurdism – but there’s just enough to make it a remotely pleasing remake. Yay!

Rating: 5/10

Obvious Child

Year: 2014

Director: Gillian Robespierre

Cast: Jenny Slate, Jake Lacy, Gaby Hoffman

Run Time: 1 hour 24 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

A heartbroken comedian sleeps with a cute stranger and discovers that she’s pregnant.

Whatever else it may be, Obvious Child is a charming film. It is also a romantic comedy, no matter how much its glowing reviews attempt to push and prod it into a  more agreeable shape. Along with that genre comes a bricklike tome of rules and conventions that the film does a great deal to subvert, but it can only do so much.

For a lot of the time, Obvious Child is astoundingly typical: a drunken montage of leaving voicemails on the ex’s phone, the sassy gay friend who can hardly keep from gagging on the arch dialogue jammed with ultrahip slang words that haven’t even been invented yet, a protagonist that spins world-shattering problems out of a situation that could easily be cleared up with a thirty-second conversation… It’s sweet, but you’ve had this dessert before. If it’s not Jenny Slate, it’s Julia Roberts, Katherine Heigl, Reese Witherspoon, Cameron Diaz, Meg Ryan, Marilyn Monroe.

But the thing is, it is Jenny Slate. And it is Gillian Robesspierre, directing and adapting a feature version of her 2009 short film. And where the film breaks from romantic comedy convention, it breaks hard and fast like an unleashed puppy. [MID-FILM SPOILERS ABOUND IN THE REMAINDER OF THIS REVIEW] Where Obvious Child could easily have been a female-centric Knocked Up riff, it bites down and takes the risk to discuss what that film was too terrified to contemplate: what if abortion really is the right decision in some cases?

Telling even a dopey, generic story with that backdrop is a bracingly fresh approach, and Obvious Child’s social impact is practically limitless. It juggles all the trials of that decision (weighing your options, deciding to tell the father, examining one’s own moral principles) in a raw, straightforward manner without dropping the cheery torches of humor and new love. 

I just wish it were a tad funnier, you know? It’s never unfunny, but a lot of the humor is far from groundbreaking. Thinking back, there’s only one line that legitimately stuck with me and a couple of the more vulgar scenarios tickled, but the bulk of the film is deliberately low key and indie chic. It’s as if they didn’t have the budget to cover the medical expenses of keeping people in stitches.

Luckily, Jenny Slate manages to keep it all together. Her performance is unequivocal proof that, in order to be a good comedian, you must be a deft storyteller. So much of the film requires her to wring humor from moments of genuine emotion and she fearlessly bares her soul for the good of the story, always keeping herself comfortably far from flying over the top and turning into an SNL sketch.

Her character takes “flawed protagonist” to an almost surreal level (and her best friend/foil Gaby Hoffman – who gladly drops everything and does Jenny’s job while she mopes in a box – is clearly a figure from high medieval fantasy), but she manages to cobble a likeable, effervescent presence from the wreckage. And when all is said and done, the films speeds by like a hamster on crack.

It’s a lopsided flick, but as a first directorial effort it’s spectacular. There are certainly kinks to work out, but Robespierre is a woman to watch out for. She has delivered a tight, silly, emotionally honest flick that goes for the jugular of typical social norms. It might not have you rolling on the floor, but it’s important, well crafted, and – most of all – just darn pleasant.

Rating: 7/10

Word Count: 2010