Listen Up Philip

Listen Up Philip - Dir. Alex Ross Perry (2014)

If you're one of those people who can't enjoy a movie with an unsympathetic protagonist, then go ahead and skip Listen Up Philip. Jason Schwartzman once again inhabits the skin of a smarmy hipster douchebag and turns the dial up to 11 in the latest comedy from writer/director Alex Ross Perry. Perry's previous film, The Color Wheel, took audiences on a road trip with a pair of intolerable siblings cut from the same annoying cloth.

In Listen Up Philip, Perry takes us on a journey through the obnoxious underbelly of literate intellectuals in New York City. Our focus is on author Philip Lewis Friedman, a textbook example of narcissism, pretension, and an inflated sense of self-importance. The movie opens with Philip meeting an ex-girlfriend at a quaint corner diner ostensibly to give her an inscribed copy of his second novel, Obidant. When she arrives a few minutes late, Philip berates the former flame for her lack of support and boasts how his life has turned out so much better. Emboldened by his ego trip, Philip calls up a college friend to give him a similar tongue lashing. The kicker? The poor guy is now in a wheelchair. Perry has emphatically established that Philip is nothing short of a world class dick.

Luckily, Perry realizes that Philip can only be taken in small doses. As such, the film is as much about the title character as it is about the damaged people left in his wake. In the second act, Listen Up Philip shifts focus to Philip's long-suffering girlfriend Ashley (Elisabeth Moss), a photographer whose career has been stunted by Philip's jealousy and insecurities. Out of the blue, Philip decides to continue his writing at the upstate cottage of his idol Ike Zimmerman (Jonathan Pryce), a prolific author based on Philip Roth. It turns out to be the best thing to happen to Ashley, who is freed from the suffocating nature of their toxic relationship.

On the flip side is the almost parasitic relationship between Philip and Zimmerman, a prickly misanthrope who is likely to be where Philip's future lies. Zimmerman leeches off Philip's youth in an attempt to jumpstart his own stagnant career while also attracting much younger women. At the same time, Zimmerman allows his already strained relationship with daughter, Melanie (Krysten Ritter), to crumble piece by piece.

With its focus on trendy bourgeois New Yorkers, Listen Up Philip feels like the type of film that could have sprung from the mind of Noah Baumbach, Whit Stillman or Woody Allen. Cinematographer Sean Price Williams utilizes a slightly jittery handheld approach that calls to mind Allen's Husbands and Wives or the early work of John Cassavetes. Perry adds to the literary feel with voiceover narration by Eric Bogosian. Narration is often used as a crutch by less confident filmmakers, a way to spell out what the audience should be able to infer. However, Perry weaves the narration seamlessly into the story to round it all out.

Jason Schwartzman is at his most unctuous best and it almost breaks your heart to think that this might be the fate of Max Fischer. If you can get past the loathsome personalities of the main characters, you'll find Listen Up Philip to be a sharply written comedy.

Rating: *** (*****)

G.I. Joe: Retaliation

G.I. Joe: Retaliation - Dir. Jon M. Chu (2013)

Any self-respecting child of the 80's who had the misfortune to catch G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, couldn't help but leave the theater with a foul taste in their mouth. Paramount's clumsy attempt at turning Hasbro's famed toy line into a live-action franchise played fast and loose with the mythology as it careened through a nonsensical plot riddled with idiotic dialogue. Rise of Cobra earned a little over $300 million worldwide, just barely turning a profit on its exorbitant $175 million budget. It was still enough to greenlight a sequel with the studio taking much of the criticism to heart. G.I. Joe: Retaliation serves as not only a sequel, but something of a reboot and catch-all apologia.

This time around, the Joe team consists of Duke (Channing Tatum), Roadblock (Dwayne Johnson), Flint (D.J. Cotrona), and Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki). After retrieving a nuclear warhead stolen from Pakistan, the Joes are the victim of an airstrike that kills the majority of the team, including Duke. The attack was ordered by the President (Jonathan Pryce), who is actually Zartan (Arnold Vosloo) in disguise. Zartan proceeds to turn the country against the Joes and orchestrates the escape of Cobra Commander from a high-tech underground prison with the help of Storm Shadow (Byung-hun Lee) and Cobra saboteur Firefly (Ray Stevenson). With the enemy now in the White House, Roadblock, Flint, and Lady Jaye seek the aid of the original Joe, General Joe Colton (Bruce Willis) to expose Cobra's Machiavellian plot. Meanwhile, Snake-Eyes (Ray Park) and his protégé Jinx (Elodie Yung) are dispatched to the Himalayas to hunt down Storm Shadow for the murder of their master.

Stephen Sommers and his brand of bland blockbuster filmmaking are gone. In his stead, Paramount has gone for an improbable choice in Jon M. Chu whose previous credits include Step Up 2: The Streets, Step Up 3D and Justin Bieber: Never Say Never as well as the Microsoft Surface commercials. His experience with directing elaborately choreographed sequences serve Chu well when it comes to Retaliation's numerous action scenes. By far, the best set piece where Snake-Eyes and Jinx clash swords with a cadre of red ninjas while swinging around snow-capped mountainsides. It feels like an entirely separate film within the film. Most of the other scenes involving shootouts or fistfights suffer from hyperactive camerawork. The Himalayan sequence is also the only section that benefits of the 3D post-conversion that shelved the picture from its original release date in August 2012. Despite rampant rumor mongering, Retaliation did not go through any extensive reshoots.

Another aspect Chu brings is a genuine love of the property to the point he used action figures to storyboard the action. The screenplay by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick (Zombieland and unproduced scripts for Deadpool and Venom) inject the sequel with more humor and faithfulness than its predecessor. The story skews much closer to the Marvel comics by Larry Hama, including an homage to the iconic "Silent Interlude" in issue #21. The Joes are more grounded as a Special Forces branch of the military rather than the cartoonish global peacekeeping force from Rise of Cobra. The vehicles in the film resemble the toys you might have collected, such as the HISS Tank, the AWE Striker, and the Water Moccasin. Cobra Commander has ditched the god-awful plastic mask for his classic chrome faceplate. Roadblock being a former chef and a hint of romance between Flint and Lady Jaye are thrown in for the die-hard fans.

While the story gains in reverence to the source material, it completely lacks in substance and coherence. The plot unfurls at lightning speed through the 90 minute runtime with no gravitas to any of the film's major moments. The convoluted backstory between Storm Shadow and Snake-Eyes is shoehorned into the standard Cobra threatens to blow up the world scheme. The entire city of London is destroyed with little bearing because we are ripped away to the next scene. At one point, Storm Shadow is imprisoned and the guards bafflingly bring along his swords, then leave them right out in the open. Nearly everyone from Rise of Cobra has been ditched with no mention at all to their fates. They aren't missed with the exception of Rachel Nichols as Scarlett. However, her role is supplanted by Adrianne Palicki's Lady Jaye though there is little done to differentiate the two. Developing fully dimensional characters is hardly a priority. It's clear a lot of that stuff was cut out during the hiatus.

Only Roadblock makes an impression thanks to the charisma of Dwayne Johnson, who has become the go-to guy to resurrect flailing franchises. Besides already looking like an action figure brought to life, Johnson has an easygoing charm that meshes well with the surprisingly funny Channing Tatum. The repartee between Roadblock and Duke are some of the most entertaining in the movie, which suffers following Tatum's departure. However, you can't blame Tatum for wanting to move on to bigger and better things now that he's starring in Steven Soderbergh productions. Jonathan Pryce, one of the few actors to return, gets a much meatier role with a dual performance as the disheveled president and the villainous Zartan. Pryce is clearly relishing the deliciously evil one-liners given to him ("They call it waterboarding, but I never get bored."). The same goes for Ray Stevenson and Walt Goggins as a somewhat sadistic warden. Don't expect to see the lively Bruce Willis seen in Moonrise Kingdom or Looper. As Gen. Colton, Willis can hardly muster up an emotion aside from mild bemusement. RZA wins the award for worst performance due to his wooden turn as the Blind Master.

Paramount still doesn't hit the mark the second time around. G.I. Joe: Retaliation won't be mistaken for high art, but the sequel accomplishes its modest goal of being mindless entertainment.

Rating: ** (*****)

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (2009) - Dir. Stephen Sommers

Paramount has had Hasbro’s two main toy properties in their development slate for years. Strangely enough, Transformers beat the Joes to the multiplexes. You’d think a movie about an elite team of soldiers would make a better live-action film than one about giant robots from outer space. In any event, Transformers, infused by an injection of Michael Bay powered explosions and visual effects, did gangbusters at the box office, fast tracking G.I. Joe. The Joe screenplay went through several hands including the first draft by David Elliot and Paul Lovett (Four Brothers), a draft from Skip Woods (Swordfish) which completely omitted Cobra, and a version by Stuart Beattie which combined both scripts. Fans of the franchise were obviously skeptical especially when producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura (concerned with overseas box office) announced that he would change G.I. Joe from an American military unit to an international task force based in Belgium. Also, for some reason, he had a massive hard-on for Action Man, a British knock-off of the original 12inch G.I. Joe dolls. He once envisioned the Joe film as a buddy picture between Duke and Action Man.

But, Paramount won some over with the casting of fan-favorite Ray Park as the silent ninja commando, Snake-Eyes, and bringing on Larry Hama as a creative consultant. Hama, a former Vietnam Vet and Marvel Comics writer, came up with the Joes vs. Cobra concept, wrote the entire run of Marvel’s G.I. Joe comic as well as all the file cards on the back of the toy packages. Joe devotees owe Hama a debt of gratitude as he convinced the filmmakers to cut a scene where Snake-Eyes would actually speak. Alas, that’s about the only good thing I can say about Rise of Cobra.

The film manages to cull material from the vast mythology of G.I. Joe while inventing their own plot points to flesh out their big budget production. It is essentially an origin story, not for the Joes (who are already in operation), but of Cobra, the ruthless terrorist organization bent on world domination.

Warning: Spoilers Ahead.

Rise of Cobra begins well enough in the 17th Century with Scottish Lord James McCullen punished by the French for selling weapons to both sides of combatants. Flash forward to "the not so distant future," where his descendent also named James McCullen (Christopher Eccleston) is now head of MARS Industries, a weapons manufacturer. Unlike Tony Stark, McCullen has no qualms about building devices of destruction. By the way, did we really need the "not so distant future" title? Because this movie would have been so hard to believe if we were told it took place today. But, I digress…

McCullen’s latest inventions are microscopic robots called Nano-Mites, which can devour anything made of metal. A team of American soldiers led by Duke (Channing Tatum) and Ripcord (Marlon Wayans) are tasked with transporting the Nano-Mites until they are ambushed by the Baroness (Sienna Miller). Duke and Ripcord are rescued by a G.I. Joe team consisting of Scarlett (Rachel Nichols), Heavy Duty (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje from Oz and Lost), and Breaker (Said Taghmaoui). The Joes no longer wear their own individualistic uniforms from the cartoon. Instead, they are clad in the same generic black body armor that everybody has worn since X-Men. Our heroes tag along with the Joes to their secret headquarters under the Sahara desert to meet their commanding officer, General Hawk (Dennis Quaid). Duke and Ripcord go through the usual cheesy training montage to become members of the Joe team. The bad guys attack Joe HQ and steal the nanotechnology, leading to a series of nonsensical action sequences through the streets of Paris to the Arctic Circle.

Little references are spread throughout as Easter eggs for long-time fans such as lines like "life-like hair and kung-fu grip" and "knowing is half the battle." Watch for some cameos too including Brendan Fraser as Sgt. Stone (don’t know why they didn’t just go with Flint). And was that Jinx I saw?

I will say this about Rise of Cobra, the B-story involving Snake-Eyes and Storm Shadow is one of the few shining lights in an otherwise idiotic production. Their rivalry, which began with the murder of their teacher the Hard Master, is captured rather accurately from the comics. Korean actor Lee Byung-hun is really cool as Storm Shadow and he and Ray Park put on some great fight scenes. At first glance, Snake-Eyes’ costume looks dead-on from the cartoon, but seeing it on the big screen and in action, it just looks off. Slacks and a molded bodysuit don’t quite work and neither does the mouth on his mask. I also didn’t like how they revamped Snake-Eyes from a wounded soldier to an abandoned orphan who took a vow of silence.

Of all the characters they managed to butcher, the one who took the brunt of the punishment is the Baroness. Cobra’s resident bespectacled femme fatale retains her skin-tight leather outfit, but ditches the ‘Moose and squirrel’ accent along with everything else that was even remotely interesting about her. Sienna Miller may look hot in the costume, but she’s completely vanilla in the role. This is, in no small way, due to the fact that they turned her from bad girl to good girl under mind control. She’s also given a clunky backstory as Duke’s jilted fiancée. Flashbacks revealing her history as well as that of Snake-Eyes and Storm Shadow are clumsily dropped into the middle of the action throughout the film. And don’t get me started on the abomination known as Rex/The Doctor/Cobra Commander. Once a megalomaniacal terrorist leader, he is transformed into a disfigured mad scientist who eventually hides his scarred visage with a mask made out of clear plastic. Rounding out the Cobra roster is Zartan (Arnold Vosloo) whose master of disguise skills consists entirely of putting on somebody else’s clothes.

On the Joes side, only Snake-Eyes manages to crawl out of the epic levels of sucktitude that drags down his comrades. Channing Tatum may be a good-looking, All-American man, but he’s a complete vacuum of charisma. His Duke isn’t the confident field leader of the Joes, but a rookie who leaps into action with a Mark Wahlberg-like blank expression on his face. Marlon Wayans fills the ubiquitous role of wacky black guy/comic relief sidekick and annoys everyone with his lame attempts at humor. He fell down…haha…how original. As Scarlett, Rachel Nichols is there for pure cheesecake. Her combat gear features molded boobies and she later changes into camouflage that is inexplicably zipped down to show off a generous amount of cleavage. Dennis Quaid’s attempt at the square-jawed alpha male is laughable and the other two guys (Breaker and Heavy Duty aka Not-Roadblock) are the token minorities.

Any attempts at emotional turmoil or character development are downright embarrassing. However, the main attraction is the action which is taken to ridiculous levels. These are the type of "toy-etic" levels not seen since Batman & Robin. The Paris sequence is like something about of Team America. I almost thought the film had veered into brilliant self-parody at this point until I realized Stephen Sommers isn’t that talented. Duke and Ripcord are strapped into Accelerator Suits that look like knock-offs from Halo and run rough shot through the Parisian streets. The Joes show no sign of concern for collateral damage or for the safety of any innocent civilians, dealing out just as much destruction as their adversaries. They rip right through a tram full of commuters, sending shards of glass flying in every direction. A pair of missiles is shot right at them. Do they try to stop them? Nope, they keep on running and the missiles continue on and probably killed a hundred people. The film’s climax features an underwater battle inspired by Thunderball, but owes more to The Phantom Menace in the sense that it’s nothing more than a series of random events and visual noise.

The special effects are absolutely horrendous and appear to be done by the same, inept artists who worked on Wolverine. The CGI is obvious to even the blind and don’t even look finished. Surprising, considering the film cost nearly $200 million.

I’m being awfully generous in my rating for this awful movie. It’s a loud, dumb action movie set to a shitty hip-hop soundtrack, but it’s not nearly as obnoxiously overblown or bloated as Revenge of the Fallen. At least, Rise of Cobra knows when to get in and get out. However, films like Iron Man have proven that big-budget blockbusters and intelligent storytelling don’t have to be mutually exclusive. Rise of Cobra chooses to appeal to the lowest common denominator in its efforts to be crowd pleasing to every demographic. The results embody the absolute worst elements of the summer blockbuster.

Rating: **