MOVIE
REVIEWS
African
Cats
By John Mulderig
Catholic News Service
NEW YORK (CNS)
-- An impressive safari is as close as the nearest cineplex thanks to
the arrival of the nature documentary African Cats (Disneynature). Better
yet, the titular felines -- though, on occasion, they're ferocious to
one another -- prove "purrfectly" friendly to family audiences.
As actor Samuel L. Jackson narrates the story of a pride of lions and
a clan of cheetahs -- both of them living on the savannah in Kenya's Masai
Mara National Reserve -- their varied fortunes take on the interest of
a savage soap opera.
The lions are
threatened by the rivalry between their veteran but aging alpha male,
Fang, and Kali, the relatively youthful, thoroughly aggressive leader
of a neighbouring group of unmated males. Should Kali succeed in his conquest,
he will drive off Fang's existing offspring and replace them with new
young of his own.
For no-nonsense
single cheetah mom Sita and the pack of playful cubs over which she watches,
meanwhile, potential perils -- ranging from roaming bands of hyenas to
the aforementioned kings of the jungle -- seem to lurk everywhere.
Splendid landscape
footage of verdant hills and meandering waterways lends a sense of exotic
adventure to this screen outing. And remarkably detailed animal close-ups
-- in which each strand of fur seems, at times, distinctly visible --
create an unusual bond of intimacy with its personality-rich subjects.
Directors Keith
Scholey and Alastair Fothergill considerately spare youngsters the nitty-gritty
of predatory behaviour by discreetly cutting away at the climax of each
combat.
But the harsh
Darwinian dynamic that ruthlessly eliminates the weak -- however familiar
and sympathetic they may have become to viewers -- is not disguised. As
a result, sensitive tykes may not be the only ones who feel their heartstrings
being yanked as nature takes its necessary, but sometimes uncongenial,
course.
The Catholic News
Service classification is A-I -- general patronage. The Motion Picture
Association of America rating is G -- general audiences. All ages admitted
- - -
Mulderig is on the staff of Catholic News Service. More reviews are
available online at www.usccb.org/movies.
Fast Five
By Kurt Jensen
Catholic News Service
NEW YORK (CNS) -- No one watches the The Fast and the Furious franchise
for plot nuances and sparkling dialogue, and on that score, Fast Five
(Universal) is true to form.
Speeding cars,
crashes galore, soaring leaps, heavily muscled monosyllabic actors, gunplay,
explosions. You know the drill.
So what's new this time? There's an all-star cast, combining actors from
the previous four films; it's set in Rio de Janeiro; and the villains
are a corrupt Brazilian police chief (Joaquim de Almeida) and his henchmen,
who together operate a multimillion-dollar drug ring.
Other than that,
director Justin Lin and screenwriter Chris Morgan keep the pace pleasantly
and predictably speedy, with occasional comedic dialogue to indicate that
no one is taking the proceedings all that seriously. It's a theme-park
ride of a movie, with muscle cars.
As the engines
rev up, Brian O'Conner (Paul Walker), a former police officer, "rescues"
convicted thief Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) from the bus taking him to a
state prison. From there, the duo winds up south of the border -- way
south -- in the self-proclaimed "Marvellous City."
But where the
furious go, legal complications follow. Falsely accused in the death of
three U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency operatives, the merry band assembled
by Brian and Dom -- which includes Tej (Chris "Ludacris" Bridges),
Mia (Jordana Brewster), Roman (Tyrese Gibson) and Han (Sung Kang) -- plan
another mission they hope will achieve their freedom -- financially, at
least.
Their goal: Steal
millions in ill-gotten gains from the police boss, utilizing skills that
range from high-tech skullduggery to amazing driving techniques.
Hot on their trail,
however, is federal agent Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson), who has considerable
street-fighting abilities of his own.
Dom, by the way, is shown to be Catholic; he wears a cross and on one
occasion blesses himself. Needless to say, he's hardly a poster child
for the faith, but he does express a firm set of family values, and is
quite well-grounded, considering his chosen profession.
The film contains much gun and physical violence, a premarital pregnancy,
a few instances of profanity, frequent crude and crass language, and fleeting
sexual banter. The Catholic News Service classification is A-III -- adults.
The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 -- parents strongly
cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.
- - -
Jensen is a guest reviewer for Catholic News Service. More reviews
are available online at www.usccb.org/movies.
Water for Elephants
By Joseph McAleer
Catholic News Service
NEW YORK (CNS) -- Anyone
with dreams of running away to join the circus will think twice after
seeing Water for Elephants (Fox), which exposes the seamy side of life
under the big top.
Based on the eponymous novel by Sara Gruen, this lavish period drama,
while artfully conceived and well-acted, is nonetheless a violent film
that accepts -- and even glamorizes -- adultery, albeit within the context
of an extreme situation.
Jacob Jankowski (Robert Pattinson) is the proud son of Polish immigrant
parents who sacrifice everything during the Great Depression to finance
his study of veterinary medicine. But tragedy strikes, and Jacob's dreams
vanish. Suddenly all alone in the world, he sets out on foot to look for
work.
Jacob jumps a train and inadvertently lands in the midst of his future:
the Benzini Brothers' travelling circus. His knowledge of animals soon
draws the attention of the enterprise's owner, August (Christoph Waltz),
who needs a resident vet.
A fearsome, wicked megalomaniac who takes his anger out on innocent animals
-- and humans -- August is desperate to make ends meet while mounting
a serious challenge to the famous competition, Ringling Brothers.
For a spell, things are looking up -- until Jacob sets eyes on the star
of the show, Marlena (Reese Witherspoon), a blonde bombshell who regales
the crowds by doing somersaults on horseback. Marlena is double trouble,
however; not only is she married; her husband is none other than August.
Needless to say, forbidden love has its consequences and, fueled by August's
homicidal rage, "Water for Elephants" barrels along to a shocking
climax that is truly over the (big) top.
Directed by Francis Lawrence (I Am Legend), the movie immerses viewers
in a long-lost, and sometimes thrilling, world. And, though the proceedings
are operatic to the boiling point, the acting is first-rate; Pattinson's
trademark scowl and smouldering intensity -- honed in the Twilight films
-- are put to perfect use here.
The film contains intense violence, including murder and animal abuse,
non-graphic but implicitly condoned adultery, partial nudity, at least
one use of profanity and two crude terms. The Catholic News Service classification
is O -- morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating
is PG-13 -- parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate
for children under 13.
- - -
McAleer is a guest reviewer for Catholic News Service. More reviews
are available online at www.usccb.org/movies.
Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil
By Joseph McAleer
Catholic News Service
NEW YORK (CNS)
-- The same studio which brought us the best film of 2010, The King's
Speech, now presents what will likely prove one of the worst of 2011:
Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil (Weinstein).
Though objectionable
elements are few, and mostly consist of childish potty jokes, viewers
expecting Pixar-- or DreamWorks-style enchantment -- from this 3D animated
sequel to 2006's Hoodwinked! are in for a big disappointment: The script
is unoriginal, the production substandard, and the voices are as tired
as the frequently clumsy action sequences.
Once again, things
have gone awry in the fairy-tale world. Hansel and Gretel (voices of Bill
Hader and Amy Poehler) have been kidnapped, and the prime suspect is Verushka
the Witch (voice of Joan Cusack). This is clearly a job for the super-spies
of the Happily Ever After Agency, led by the long-legged frog Nicky Flippers
(voice of David Ogden Stiers).
A rescue mission is mounted, headed by Granny Puckett (voice of Glenn Close) and the Big Bad Wolf (voice of Patrick Warburton). Wolf is missing his partner, Red Riding Hood (voice of Hayden Panettiere), who is away receiving kung-fu training from the Sisters of the Hood -- not nuns with martial arts skills, happily, but a group of enlightened high-kicking ladies who also bake.
Without Red, the mission is a failure, and Granny is captured. Verushka
chains her to the stove, and demands that she whip up the world's biggest
weapon -- a chocolate truffle (of all things) that renders the eater invincible.
Granny, you see, is herself a Sister of the Hood and knows the recipe.
Red must be recalled to save the day. "Will the villains get their
just desserts?" she asks. Does anyone care?
Directed by newcomer Mike Disa, Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil is a pastiche,
freely stealing scenes and dialogue from films as varied as Kung Fu Panda
and Spider-Man at one end of the spectrum and Silence of the Lambs at
the other.
For no apparent reason, the script -- co-written by Disa with Cory Edwards,
Tony Leech and Todd Edwards -- also displays an animus toward the Food
Network and its celebrity chefs, with Verushka proclaiming, "Rachael
Ray is the devil!"
Theologians take note. Or not.
The film contains mildly rude bathroom humour and some very loud action
sequences. The Catholic News Service classification is A-II -- adults
and adolescents. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG
-- parental guidance suggested.
Madea's Big Happy Family
By Kurt Jensen
Catholic News Service
NEW YORK (CNS)
-- Tyler Perry's broadly drawn morality plays, which include the stage
version of Madea's Big Happy Family (Lionsgate), have proven so surefire
with their targeted audience as to be critic-proof.
In these earthy,
over-the-top crowd-pleasers, insults fly, family problems are solved,
children learn to defer to adults and short-tempered Madea (Perry in a
muumuu) occasionally slaps wrongdoers -- to wild audience cheers. But
there's a warm heart somewhere as well as a happy ending; the plays exist
in a sentimental universe of their own.
In motion picture
form, however, the flaws become more apparent, and they're not above criticism
-- nor should they be.
The problem is
not in the simple plot, in which Madea's appealingly gentle niece Shirley
(Loretta Devine) learns she has terminal cancer and tries to gather her
three adult children -- Tammy (Natalie Desselle Reid), Kimberly (Shannon
Kane) and Byron (Shad "Bow Wow" Moss) -- at her house to tell
them the bad news.
The grown siblings,
we discover, are all locked in dysfunctional relationships, sometimes
with insolent children, while recently released ex-con Byron is also dabbling
again in the drug dealing that landed him in jail.
The genuinely
troublesome parts of this adaptation -- which Perry both wrote and directed
-- consist of bug-eyed characterizations and comments that invoke not
so much old racial stereotypes, as newly minted ones of Perry's own creation.
These begin with Madea's pot-smoking sister Aunt Bam (Cassi Davis), who
supposedly has co-matriarch status with Madea as a moral force, but spends
the first half of the film in a literal haze.
There's a particularly
ugly comment, moreover, aimed by Madea at husband Joe (also Perry) when
she refers to him as a "silverback."
Worthy messages
about spouses respecting each other, children obeying adults and families
learning to function as a unit while buffeted by the stresses of modern
life get somewhat overshadowed by all this unsettling material.
Madea, to Tyler's
credit, is never as simplistic as the Atlanta milieu in which she's placed.
Although she has no particular religious precepts of her own -- she explains
that she knows God is angry at her -- she fully expects her relatives
to live up to the Christian faith they profess to have, and she manages
to produce a few fractured Biblical quotations along the way.
Such an off-kilter
but engaged approach to religion could yield some interesting results;
it's too bad they're largely lost in a flurry of slaps upside the head.
The film contains
marijuana use, some adult humour, fleeting crass language and slapstick
violence. The Catholic News Service classification is A-III -- adults.
The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 -- parents strongly
cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.
- -
Jensen is a guest reviewer for Catholic News Service. More reviews
are available online at www.usccb.org/movies.
There Be Dragons
By John Mulderig
Catholic News Service
NEW YORK (CNS)
-- What many people think they know about the Catholic spiritual movement
Opus Dei likely comes -- unfortunately -- from the slanderous misrepresentations
of it fobbed off on the public by author Dan Brown in his 2003 novel The
Da Vinci Code. Brown's fallacies, moreover, were only perpetuated by the
2006 screen version of his feverish fantasy, helmed by Ron Howard.
A healthy antidote to such sensationalized misconceptions -- a murderous albino monk, you say? -- comes with the release of There Be Dragons (Samuel Goldwyn), a generally powerful, partly fictionalized dramatization of passages in the life of Opus Dei's founder, St. Josemaria Escriva de Balaguer (1902-75), intensely yet appealingly portrayed by Charlie Cox.
As fictional Spanish-born reporter Robert Torres (Dougray Scott) investigates
Escriva's life, he's surprised to discover that his own father Manolo
(Wes Bentley) -- from whom Robert has long been estranged -- was the future
religious leader's childhood friend and seminary classmate.
With the tumult of the Spanish Civil War looming, however, the two men
took diametrically different paths.
Once ordained,
Escriva labored for the establishment of a community dedicated to achieving
personal sanctity through everyday work, an organization whose structure
-- unprecedented in the modern church -- would embrace women as well as
men, lay people as well as priests.
Having rejected
the faith in favour of a bitterly cynical materialism, meanwhile, Manolo
is shown pursuing a duplicitous role in the conflict engulfing his society.
Not the least
of the obstacles Escriva confronted in furthering his "Work of God"
(the English meaning of the Latin phrase "Opus Dei") was the
increasingly violent anti-clericalism of the Loyalist side in the Spanish
struggle.
Yet when these leftists begin desecrating churches and murdering priests in cold blood, Escriva remains evenhandedly neutral, sympathizing with his adversaries' motivations and aspirations and urging his handful of early followers to react with Christian forbearance.
This nuanced and charitable approach to the situation belies Escriva's
reputation, in some circles, as an unabashed devotee of Franco's fascist
vision.
The striking portrait of an anything-but-plaster saint that forms the
heart of writer-director Roland Joffe's hybrid tale grippingly conveys
its subject's struggle to discern his vocation and to live out the Christian
message of peace, even in the most trying circumstances.
But the impact of these fact-based biographical elements is blunted by
the fictive framework with which Joffe has chosen to surround them, a
storytelling device that turns out to be more burden than enhancement.
Thus, imaginary subplots such as the conflict between Robert and Manolo
never seem quite convincing, and only serve to distract from a primary
story which is both spiritually valuable and ably depicted.
The significance of that central chronicle is such, however, as to make
There Be Dragons probably acceptable for older teens.
The film contains occasionally bloody action violence, a few sexual references,
a couple of crude and a half-dozen crass terms. The Catholic News Service
classification is A-III -- adults. The Motion Picture Association of America
rating is PG-13 -- parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate
for children under 13.
Vito Bonafacci
By John Mulderig
Catholic News Service
NEW YORK (CNS) -- Were the Catholic Church to begin giving cinematic imprimaturs, few films would be better qualified to receive one than Vito Bonafacci (Cavu), writer-director John Martoccia's meditative -- and theologically impeccable -- exploration of Scripture-based doctrine and spirituality.
Paul Borghese plays the title character in this suburban-set Everyman
story. Though happily married to loving wife Laura (Tisha Tinsman) and
financially successful, Vito's relationship to the Catholic faith in which
he was raised has become tenuous. Indeed, by his own admission, except
for the occasional Christmas or Easter liturgy, or family funeral, he
hasn't set foot in church for 25 years.
But a nightmare during which Vito foresees his death and condemnation
to hell compels the outwardly content businessman to re-examine his life.
While not for the impatient, since it unfolds at a leisurely pace, the
drama thus set in motion features some eloquent poetic reflections from
Vito's deceased mother (Emelise Aleandri) -- who visits him during that
transformative dream -- as well as beautiful cinematography of the lush
landscape surrounding Vito's home.
The spiritual significance underlying everyday tasks is also highlighted
in scenes portraying the work of Vito's cook Marie (Carin Mei), his barber
(Ralph Squillace) and his gardener (Louis Vanaria), all of whom the protagonist
quizzes about their religious views.
If that latter turn of events seems somewhat unlikely, that's because
the dramatic elements of this story are on occasion -- it must be admitted
-- a bit shaky. The dialogue, too, sounds forced at times because it's
being made subordinate to the (undeniably worthy) points Martoccia's script
is designed to drive home.
Such tendentiousness leaves this restful cinematic retreat ill-equipped
to convert the deeply cynical or hard of heart. Evangelical Christians
willing to withstand the unabashed Romanism on display, by contrast, will
at least find the biblical basis for several core Catholic beliefs laid
out in onscreen quotations as Vito's journey toward conversion reaches
its climax.
Whatever its artistic limitations, Vito Bonafacci will certainly reinforce
faith in the devout and in those with yearnings for the sacred which may,
as yet, be rudimentary. Religious educators will also welcome the movie
as an apt and pleasant instrument in the catechetical instruction of teenagers
or adults.
The film contains a single mildly crass term as well as mature themes
and references. The Catholic News Service classification is A-II -- adults
and adolescents. Not rated by the Motion Picture Association of America.
Copyright (c) 2011 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic
Bishops
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