(Aikomuksena oli kyllä listata päivän elokuva à la Elokuvia ja valokuvia -blogi, mutta meni myöhään.)

Kiltti tyttö

Jennifer Anistonin kykyjä esittelevänä elokuvana marrkinoitu The Good Girl oli pettymys. Jep, dialogi oli välillä erittäin pätevää mutta siihen se sitten melkin jäikin. Kieltämättä Anistonin deadpannaus, Reillyn idioottimeininki ja Gyllenhaalin teiniangstaus olivat huvittavia, mutta eivät silti erityisen hauskoja. Sitä paitsi juonentynkä oli kovin masentavan ennalta-arvattava, eikä rouva Pittin näyttelijäntaitojen skaala ainakaan tuntunut kovin vakuuttavalta.

UusArvosana: € € (vanhalla systeemillä € € €).

Daredevil

Sitten oli Daredevilin, kolmannen
isobudjettisen Marvel-filmatisoinnin, vuoro. Kuten arvata saattaa, tästä pläjäyksestä ei puuttunut nyrkinmätkettä, bittiefektin vinkunaa eikä Ben Affleckin naaman esittelyä. Mutta: dialogi oli aivan karmivaa, esimerkkinä vaikkapa DD:n I am not a bad guy -jollotus, hahmojenkehittely sai X-Men 2:n näyttämään syvälliseltä, juoni on käsittelemätöntä selluloosaa (kohtaus, jossa Murdock ja Elektra matsaavat kadulla ensitapaamisensa jälkeen, on naurettava vaikka itse Miller olisi sen kynäillyt) ja toimintaelokuvan raison d’être, eli näyttävät nahistelut, ovat varsin usein löppöä – joko täysin yliampuvaa CGI-kikkailua, silkkaa Matrix-lainaa tai sekavaa sohintaa. Ei tämä siis Ryhmä-X-kuvia peittoa, eikä edes Hämäriä, vaikken siitä niin erityisemmin tykännytkään. Hulkia odotellessa…

UusArvosana: € € (vanhalla systeemillä € € €).

Mainittakoon, että toisspäivää edeltävänä päivänä eilen katsoin Pentin kanssa Kathryn Bigelow’n (Strange Days, Myrskyn ratsastajat, K-19) Near Darkin, ja sitä ennen sain lopulta siirrettyä Trafficin katsottujen hyllyyn.

Puijaan, ei minulla oikeasti ole mitään katsottujen elokuvien hyllyä, vaan kaikki leffat ja levyt ovat iloisesti sekaisin.

Oh wow, we’ve all been bamboozled. I walked out of the theatre with mixed feelings. On the other hand I had thoroughly enjoyed the movie (but then, don’t we all love the movie-going experience as such?) but found myself feeling embarrassed for the actors more than once.

The cons were almost too numerous to list. The movie was flooded with horrible pseudo-philosophical babble. I’m sorry, but just first saying one song and then the exact opposite doesn’t mean it would be profound. Then there was the action, which was utterly and completely over the top this time, devoid of almost all interest. Take, for example, the scene where Neo confronts Agent Smith, battles him for a good while and then finally flies away. I mean, why didn’t he take to the skies immediately? Then there’s the rule bending. Basically most of the things we were told about the nature of the Matrix were toyed with in an unexcusable way (I feel like the crazed woman in Misery here). The film is almost entirely devoid of foreshadowing except for the final moments, which is unforgivable as the last two parts of the trilogy were planned and shot back to back. Where’s the sense in making a movie so self-sufficient it doesn’t even leave you wanting for more?

You know they say that you can always tell the difference between a real actor and a CGI construct. Well, in this case you can’t, so I guess the Wachowski’s should feel grateful for casting Keanu Reeves, a man so plastic in flesh that you really cannot tell the man from the machine. But it’s not like he’s a real person anyhow.

But as I said, I was truly and well entertained by the movie. Obviously this means that the flick had its moments. My favourites weren’t the few almost impossible CGI effects (Neo fighting a billion agents) but rather the totally impossible ones, like the moment in the highway chase when the camera apparently passes through an oncoming truck. And the plot has its moments as well, it’s just that the ideas are usually completely obfuscated by the thick dialogue. Extra credit has to be given for flashing an image of George Bush Snr near the end in an appropriate context. And in no case it’s a total turkey like Equilibrium, just that it doesn’t stand up to the promise of the original.

I guess my sense of delight at the movie can be at least partly explained by the Star Wars generation phenomenon. The people who were in their teens or early twenties when New Hope came out were forever altered by that experience, as it was like nothing they’d ever seen before. When the prequels started rolling out, the original fans kept praising them as well, even though it was quite clear to everyone else that George Lucas’s fable had long since lost its essence.

But then again it would be unfair to ask someone to create something new more than once in their lifetimes.

Rating: € € €

Note that this doesn’t mean I think the original Matrix movie was the best thing since sliced bread, I’m just pointing out the effect it had on the collective opinion concerning action movies.

Michael Moore’s Oscar-winning documentary Bowling for Columbine is a mixed bag. It has some great comic and tragic moments and a heart of gold. Still, as a documentary I find it to be a bit too flawed.

The greatest asset of the film is it’s sense of humour. Too often documentary makers forget the bright side of life and bruise the audience into submission with serious matters. Not so with Moore. My favourite is the metal detector commercial, where a teenage boy unloads all his weapons, starting with a miniscule pistol and ending with a rifle. Moore even manages to do irony at times, which is surprising given that his usual modus operandi is best described by the old maxim ”when you have a hammer, all problems look like nails”. At times Moore also manages to do tragedy well. The much-celebrated What A Wonderful World sequence is truly and well effective – no one in the whole theatre said anything during it.

Even though there are many things in favour of the film, it also has its liabilities and they are rather weighty. Documentaries don’t need to be all-encompassing objective examinations, but rather personal statements about the world. And the flick is rather long. It is clear that time permitting Moore could go on and on on the issue of guns and Americans and that’s part of the problem. There’s no real sense of closure, no real answers to the questions and that is quite problematic, as he spends most of the time asking everybody why Americans have so much gun crime. As my Finnish teacher used to say, don’t use a question as the subject unless you’re able to answer it.

What redeems much of the picture are Moore’s good intentions. Just showing what’s happening doesn’t suffice him; he actually wants to change the world. Admittedly it more often than not results in him harassing the small people, clerks and such, rather than the CEOs, but that is the nature of the PR game. No big bad boss is going to grant an interview to a loose cannon like Moore, especially when they know it ain’t good news he’s bringing. This is exemplified well by the time Moore tries to get an audience from Dick Clark, who couldn’t care less, and so closes the door on Moore and just drives away.

Rating: € € €