jürgen fauth’s muckworld

Robert Zemeckis’ high-tech “performance capture” adaptation of the Old English poem turns actors–Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, Robin Wright Penn, John Malkovich, Angelina Jolie–into rubbery action figures. Only Crispin Glover, covered in a disgusting, festering texture, manages to infuse some sort of twisted soul into his Grendel. I saw this in 3-D, which is sorta groovy if you’ve taken some preventive aspirin, but it also further increases the sense of artificiality. The action sequences have all the excitement of a video game cut scene.

Beowulf is only one of a slew of recent movies that wouldn’t have been possible without The Lord of the Rings, and Zemeckis lifts dozens of shots directly from Peter Jackson. Of course, Tolkien in turn would be unthinkable without the Anglo-Saxon poem — and so we come full circle.

Long ago, in the Age of Heroes, I wrote an essay about “hyperfiction” that used the cheap carnival effects of early 3-D movies as metaphor for the teething troubles of a new form. I was tickled to see that even at this late stage, 3-D still means “Poles in Your Face,” along with all manners of swords, naked torsos, dripping saliva, and flaming arrows. It’s true that Neil Gaiman’s script manages to put a somewhat interesting spin on the original epic, but first and foremost, Beowulf is self-satisfied spectacle. I’d rather play God of War. Opens Friday.

Beowulf. Robert Zemeckis, 2007. **

• 300
• Beowulf and Grendel
• Beowulf at Rotten Tomatoes
• Wikipedia
• The trailer:

Poor Goro. Could there be anything more thankless than taking over a project tailor-made for your genius father, a master of animation renowned for his grace and deep humanity, and attempt to match his best work? When it was announced that Goro Miyazaki, son of anime legend Hayao, was directing the adaptation of Ursula K. LeGuin’s Earthsea novels, you didn’t have to be Yubaba the Witch to know that it would end in tears.

Read the rest of my review of Tales from Earthsea at About.com.

Gedo senki. Goro Miyazaki, 2006. **

A computer-animation from Norway featuring a junkie elephant, a gang of rabid animal rights activists, hapless stoners, and the Lappish mafia on choppers, with the voices of Simon Pegg, Woody Harrelson, Samantha Morton, and Kyle MacLachlan? Sure, I’ll go see that. Too bad that everything that’s even remotely funny or interesting about Free Jimmy was contained in the previous sentence.

For an irreverent, free-wheeling comedy that wants to shock and amuse by breaking taboos and letting ‘er rip, the only shocking thing about Free Jimmy is that it’s almost entirely devoid of jokes. The mirthless CGI characters are uniformly ugly, and the voice talent is woefully underused. Samantha Morton, as an exaggerated cliché of the annoying vegan, only gets to mope and whine.

In the best sequence of the film, the tragically addicted elephant faces heroin withdrawal with the help of a friendly moose, but a few minutes later, he’s shot dead for one last misguided, cynical attempt at humor. A truly miserable time at the movies.

Free Jimmy. Christopher Nielsen, 2006. *

• The trailer

Just in case you somehow managed to avoid the longest-running TV sitcom in American history, do not worry: The Simpsons Movie is careful to include everybody in the fun. In the opening minutes, after Itchy and Scratchy have landed on the moon and everybody in the audience has been declared “a sucker” for paying good money to see what you can get for free on TV, the script introduces every character fresh.

Here’s Homer, the oaf, and Marge with the blue beehive. Earnest adolescent Lisa has a new cause and a new crush, baby Maggie knows how to fend for herself, and Bart–well, Bart should need as little introduction as the “evil corporate mascot” he impersonates with a black bra on his head. In the process, some of the essence that has gotten away from the characters over the years is restored: Lisa playing her saxophone, Bart riding his skateboard through town naked, Homer equal parts stupid, selfish and compassionate with a pet pig that rates its own theme song. Call it “Homer Begins,” call it “Casino Springfield”–you’re not required to know anything about the extended cosmology of the Simpsons to enjoy their movie.

But it helps. As far as I could tell, The Simpsons Movie is stuffed with enough in-jokes and references to past episodes to keep a dozen Internet forums humming for months.The supporting cast seems to include every character who’s ever appeared on the show, and many of them have lines. The animation–the familiar vast fields of flat, juicy color bounded by satisfyingly thick black lines–looks great on a movie screen. For this fair-weather fan, the laughter started during the studio logo (!) and didn’t end until far into the credits. (Make sure to stay for Maggie’s first word.)

The plot? Like most things Simpsons, it loses in the telling, so let’s just say that it’s appropriately large-scale for the movies, and each of the principal characters is tested to the breaking point — as it should be. Beyond that, it’s worth noting that the movie’s villain is the American government. Ruled by a president who’d rather “lead than read,” Springfield finds itself at the mercy of a corrupt official (voice of Albert Brooks) whose response to a natural disaster is even worse than FEMA’s. Clearly, somebody in the Simpson White House doesn’t care about yellow people.

Does The Simpsons Movie achieve the lofty heights of brilliance the show regularly scaled during its mid-nineties heyday? More than just the longest episode, is it also the Best. Episode. Ever? I’m pretty sure it’s not, and I don’t think it could have been. Try as they might, The Simpsons simply aren’t as vital now as they were during the Clinton years, when their whiplash wit, easygoing snarkiness, and compulsive pop referencing influenced an entire generation’s sense of humor. If anything, The Simpsons succeeded so completely that they faded into the fabric of our culture, and going to Springfield for an hour and a half feels a little bit like going home. No matter where you’ve been for the last 18 years, these are some very familiar characters with very familiar voices. Seeing them up on the big screen, it’s like we knew all along they had it in them to become movie stars.

The Simpsons Movie. David Silverman, 2007. ****

Kinky Boot-Beasts! Blue Meanies! Guy Lombardo! It’s all too much! Last seen around various hazy dorm rooms, Yellow Submarine has now become the favorite movie of a certain toddler of my acquaintance. It must be proof of something or other that the cheery high sixties psychedelia works equally well in both settings: iconic imagery, zany dialogue, “odyssey situations” and songs that will outlive us all. A Hard Day’s Night gets all the critical acclaim, but my day-glo heart belongs to Yellow Submarine. (The DVD happened to be the first I ever bought, and according to Wikipedia, it’s out of print and mildly collectible.)

Yellow Submarine. George Dunning, 1968. *****

All You Need Is Love:

Slightly above-average sci-fi anime that, as usual, steals liberally from Star Wars, Akira, Blade Runner, and whoever first came up with BattleMechs. Pacing could be tighter but storytelling is solid enough, and the 3-D computer animation is first rate eye candy. You could do worse for genre entertainment with a Paul Oakenfold soundtrack.

Appurushîdo. Shinji Aramaki, 2004. ***

The tell-all trailer:

Most of the recent computer-animated movies feel like endless remakes of Toy Story. This one, about the adventures of a bunch of mice in the London sewers, is produced by Aardman of Wallace & Gromit, and it’s more inventive and, for my money, funnier than your regular Pixar flick. We’ve all come to expect the winking references that are supposed to fly over the kids’ heads (like the cockroach reading Kafka) — but Flushed Away also has visual quotes from Akira. Voices by Hugh Jackman, Kate Winslet, Ian McKellen, Bill Nighy, and Jean Reno as “Le Frog.” Fun.

Flushed Away. David Bowers and Sam Fell, 2006. ***

• 75% on Rotten Tomatoes

Here at Muckworld Headquarters, there’s a manhunt on for the sneaky hackers who put Monster House on top of the Netflix queue. Our account must have been compromised–how else to explain that this Spielberg-produced CGI kids movie arrived on our doorstep? I suspect the voices of Steve Buscemi and Maggie Gyllenhaal had something to do with it. Either way, Monster House is sorta cute until the popcorn runs out, then it gets boring fast. Good thing it’s over before the lame sidekick characters can kill it altogether. Ho-hum.

Monster House. Gil Kenan, 2006. **

• Monster House on RottenTomatoes

  [tags]steve buscemi, kids, horror, halloween, cgi, animation, steven spielberg, maggie gyllenhaal, film, 2 stars[/tags]