This Week In Tickets: 31 August 2009 to 6 September 2009

Is it just me, or...



... are movie start times moving earlier? There was going to be another ticket on Thursday (Captain Abu Raed), but it started at 6:50, and it's pretty tough for me to get to Kendall Square from Waltham in less than an hour and a half. So, the 5:30 bus means I miss the first few minutes of the movie. It seems like there are a lot more movies at Kendall Square starting before 7 - where the first evening shows used to cluster between 7 and 8, now it seems to be between 6:30 and 7:30.

Similarly, I didn't see more movies on the holiday weekend because I couldn't manage the early shows at the AMC theaters - everything I wanted to see seemed to start at 10:30am, and when you're trying to save money by seeing the $6 movies (and aren't really sure that there's much at the mainstream theaters you want to pay more than $6 for), that makes just sitting around the house seem like a decent alternative.

Hopefully, things start getting better soon. 9 starts this week, and I'm up for that.

Gake No Ue No Ponyo (Ponyo)

* * * * (out of four)
Seen 31 August 2009 at Coolidge Corner Theater #2 (First-run)

I haven't necessarily loved everything I've seen from animation grandmaster Hayao Miyazaki, but when he's on, as he is with Ponyo, then there's clearly a division between Miyazaki and everybody else. Ponyo turns out to be an example of everything that Miyazaki does well: It focuses on kids, a particular spot where Miyazaki excels (both in characterization and the way that they look); it has a strong environmental theme which doesn't seem preachy despite the fact that he is very direct about it; and it is filled with amazing imagery, both fantastical and coming from the natural world.

Take the opening sequence, which features jellyfish. Jellies are striking creatures, but their transparency makes them seem much more suitable for CGI than Miyazaki's classical cel-based animation. And yet, his simple designs for them are beautiful and immediately recognizable. His undersea vistas and fantastic creatures and machines are wonderful. And the way his environmental message is expressed is quite fascinating to me: He is clearly personifying it, and seeing something spiritual there, but he's also not equating nature and mysticism; there's bits of science in it, from how Ponyo's change from a fish to a human girl has this middle stage that looks, by turns, kind of froggy or like a fetus, both examples of moving from a liquid environment to the surface. When wild magic threatens to wipe humanity from the face of the earth, Miyazaki doesn't bring out fantasy creatures or claim that the world's natural state is just like it is, minus people, but brings out creatures from the Devonian and Cretaceous periods.

I must admit to also being impressed by the voice cast; as much as it might seem easy on the face of it to dub an animated film, it almost never seems right. The cast Disney/Pixar assembled for the English dub for the most part fits like a glove with the possible exception of Liam Neeson, who has one of the most recognizable voices and a ton of expository monologuing. Still, the vast majority seems to be a good approximation of what I imagine the original Japanese version sounds like.

Play the Game

* * ¾ (out of four)
Seen 1 September 2009 at Landmark Kendall Square #5 (First-run)

Play the Game is sort of an awkward, obvious movie. Watching it, you can catalog its faults pretty easily: The acting's not that great, the set-up is obvious at every level, Andy Griffith's character is written as ridiculously naive for a man of 80. The music choices are a little too on the nose (even if they do use one of my favorite tracks off Barenaked Ladies Are Me, "The Sound of Your Voice"). Writer/director Marc Fienberg really seems to be in over his head much of the time.

And yet, despite all that, it's tough not to like it. There is the occasional great line to be found - I loved Grandpa Joe saying that certain people at his retirement community "know a little too much about the Civil War". But most importantly, I think, is how the movie really can't bring itself to create a character of any consequence that the audience won't like. Paul Campbell's David really should start out a little more callow if the film is supposed to be about his personal growth, but there's something refreshing about a movie that is so upbeat that it sees the best in its characters.

Inglourious Basterds

* * * ½ (out of four)
Seen 6 September 2009 at Regal Fenway #12 (First-run)

If you like Tarantino, you'll probably like this; it's just full of Tarantino stuff. It's clearly made of other movies, it features a lot of long conversations that are more monologue than dialogue, a thoroughly self-aware foot fetish scene, nasty violence, and seemingly inappropriate humor. As I said last week, I wish I could love movies as much as he does; he can put them together better into something both derivative and original better than anybody.

It's a great cast... Christoph Waltz is fantastic as the Nazi colonel who serves as the primary adversary, and Melanie Laurent is similarly excellent. And Brad Pitt... The man can steal a scene with one word (especially if that word is "buongiorno!").

And I have to admit, the ending took me surprised. Spoilers ahead for why...


... Not so much that it ends with the entire Nazi brain trust being killed in a way that is in no way historically accurate. I mean, why not, if you're making a gung-ho WWII action movie? It's a work of fiction, we all know that, why not give it the ending we wish it could have?

Still, as soon as I heard Shoshana's plan, I figured he'd find another way out of it. I mean, really - it just doesn't seem like it would be in Tarantino's nature to incinerate all that nitrate film and blow up a movie theater. With all the scalpings, mutilations, murders, and other violence in the film, I wouldn't be surprised if that was the scene he found most horrifying to create.