#2,087: Interstellar

The Kid Brother - ★★★½☆ 
A lot of my viewing experience with silent comedies is with Buster Keaton, so I was not expecting the sheer volume of acting Harold Lloyd does, all over this movie. So much acting! I think a lot of movies like this (including other Lloyds, like The Freshman,) show the hero as put-upon, reacting to crazy circumstances and overwhelming odds, but in The Kid Brother, although Lloyd's character is nominally the underdog, he seems incredibly clever. He's always one step ahead and so much of the humor here is about the sleights of perception he pulls on other characters and the audience. Another movie would have made a whole scene out of outsmarting a guard dog, but clever Harold Hickory's got that one in the bag. I also thought it was interesting that there is almost no set dressing in this movie. If an object is in the scene, it's almost certainly a prop, waiting on its mark to support another gag.

The Freshman - ★★★☆☆
In contrast to The Kid Brother, this felt a lot more like what I've come to expect from a silent comedy: the low status hero, the structuring to accommodate what's mostly a series of sketches - where it differs from, say, a Keaton, is that it's pretty wordy for a silent movie. There are stunts and sight gags and physical jokes, but Lloyd doesn't really compete on physicality, so he makes up for it with the sheer volume of jokes of all sorts. The Freshman isn't so jaw-dropping as Sherlock Jr, but it packs in more laugh-out-loud moments.
     
Feast - ★★★★★
Pretty great! Right up there with Partly Cloudy as a lovely, funny, and touching short film.

Big Hero 6 - ★★★☆☆
I didn't like this as much as I expected to. I still liked it, just, less than my twitter feed did. It seemed like there were a lot of setups that didn't bother with payoffs, and the supporting cast was pretty thin. (Does TJ Miller ever play another character?) I thought it was interesting that Hiro makes everyone's supersuits and doesn't give himself the biggest best and baddest.

The Q&A after my screening had one of the writers talking about how a superhero movie is only as good as its villains are bad, but this movie isn't really driven by its villain. The bad guy here is doing his own thing and mostly can't be bothered with or isn't aware of our heroes. I think the writer was correct, but not in the way that he meant.
     
Interstellar - ★★★★★
I bought my IMAX ticket out of something like obligation - the ads looked lousy, but it's Nolan, and shot in IMAX, so I went - and it turned out to really work for me.

The Filmically Perfect podcast used to say that a perfect movie defines the world it inhabits, and then sustains that world, and on those fronts, Interstellar delivers. I think a lot of the folks that walked out unhappy have been upset that the movie did not live up to ideals it never actually promised us. Sure, there's more science explained in here than in Star Wars, but it's no surprise the reviewers sticking it with the 'hard sci-fi' label are tearing it down for not actually being hard sci-fi. I wouldn't even give this a regular 'sci-fi' shelving. Ideally, I'd label this as a movie in the 'weird fiction' genre, but since we're a century too late for that, my second choice would be 'horror-fantasy.' Even though we're in space a lot (and that's a big plus: if you're going to make a movie about being in space, actually be in space!), I think Interstellar has just taken a place among my favorite lovecraftian horror movies. I really liked the sanity-blasting effects of the adventure upon the investigators. We also see man's infinitesimally small place and stature among the stars, and an ending that fits right in with every other movie in this narrow genre.

I can award a few demerits for the first act, where Cooper gets saddled with all those lines they wanted in the trailer, but there's even something a little bit satisfying to me about how easily he finds himself on the ship's crew. An adventure had to begin, otherwise it's not going to be much of a movie. As a technical aside, I thought there were some moments that were just amazing visually, regardless of whether or not that's the IMAX talking. I don't know what the audio problem folks are complaining about actually is, but it was kind of nice to hear the whirring of the projector in some of the film's silent moments.

#2,082: Oblivion

The Score - ★★½☆☆
I was surprised to see how recent this movie is. It feels dated the way a genre classic can sometimes feel dated – although it does a lot of what it does well, the films that came after reused and built upon its foundations, leaving modern audiences expecting more layers – except this isn't a genre-defining classic. It feels too easy. Like the last act is missing.

The Most Dangerous Game - ★★★★☆
A classic story told in a way that may feel dated today, but is still pretty fun and effective. Refreshing to see plot points that would be soaked in irony today played with some authenticity.

The Orphanage - ★★★★★
This movie is just full of things that I like.

For one, the trading game they play. I always like when adventure game-like elements turn up in a movie. For another, this movie has a spectacular bus hit.

Best of all, although I don't think of myself as a hardcore skeptic, the skeptic part of me loves that there's a movie like this one, a horror movie, and maybe a ghost story, where there's nothing supernatural going on.

I'd forgotten a lot of the opening to the movie, and how Simon says all these things that seem ominous in a scary movie, but probably aren't that weird for an imaginative kid to say. It's great how often the filmmakers are just screwing around with the audience, using the language of movies to insinuate things that aren't there. We get the benefit of Laura's confused, desperate, maybe drug-addled perspective.

Oblivion - ★★☆☆☆
I don't know what this film was really about. It seems like there were several more interesting stories going on just off-camera at any time. The exposition to plot ratio is enormous. This feels like Cruise's first try at satisfying the sci-fi, video gamey itch that didn't get scratched until Edge of Tomorrow

The best way to get extras for your movie

My pal Etta Devine, an independent filmmaker, writes a regular column about–of all things–independent filmmaking, and I just noticed that I'm name-checked in the most recent installment. Click through to read her one weird trick for getting a bunch of extras to show up, or scroll down for an excerpt of the set I performed while her crew set up the camera equipment, or just marvel to yourself at this infinite loop of internet we've created by linking to each other's things where we link to each other.

Dogs and cats, acting together!

It's truly the end of days. Last days of 2014 anyhow.

Here's another promo for the Antaeus Theater Company, written and directed by Diani & Devine and starring a bunch of actor and their pets, including but not limited to the wonderful sounding Robert Pine, and 24's President Logan, Gregory Itzin.

And edited by me!

#2,080: Steamboat Bill, Jr.

Whiplash - ★★★★★
Just a few days after watching Gone Girl. What a week! Some intriguing editorial decisions that make me want to watch it again. Little bit of fridge logic towards the end, but I love when someone in a movie is good at something, so any nitpicks are more than made up for.
     
Todd Barry: The Crowd Work Tour - ★★½☆☆
Fun, but a little bit unsatisfying. The collection of scenes don't carry the rhythm of a live set, and I hope the interstitials are in-jokes. In some ways, this kind of thing is subject to the same troubles as filming improv scenes. I think that I think this should be a touring act, but it probably shouldn't be a movie.

Sherlock, Jr. - ★★★★☆
From the stunts to the match cuts to the writing of jokes that hold up, this is fantastic work.

Steamboat Bill, Jr. - ★★★☆☆
A little bit slower, a little bit less fun than Sherlock Jr. More emphasis on narrative, and yet it all feels like a prelude to the storm setpiece this movie was probably built around. To be fair, the storm and rescues that follow are terrific, and worth watching for. Also, the accompaniment was a little bit too clever in the version I watched.