Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (Frank Miller & Robert Rodriguez, 2014)

4.5/10
Where does the time go? Sequel talk was fired up almost immediately after the first Sin City was a success. It seemed like a no brainer in the dawning time of the summer blockbuster franchise where multiple installments were not just hoped for but expected. Nine years later, we finally have a Sin City 2, and I have to think anyone waiting for it on tenterhooks would have to be disappointed. I really liked the first one (still do) but in watching A Dame to Kill For, it's hard not to feel like all the best material was crammed into the original, and what makes up A Dame to Kill For is the "B" material (or worse).
The problem for me is that the central yarn is a crashing bore. In the original all the stories were interesting so flitting between them was never dull. Here the bulk of the movie centers on Dwight and his dame. Dwight was an average character at best when he was played by Clive Owen in the first one. Josh Brolin sucks whatever little charisma Dwight had out of his portrayal completely, and it doesn't help that he has to deliver an endless stream of deadly serious but mostly corny monologues. Monologuing was in abundance in the first one but it's ratcheted up to a ridiculous degree in this one. No one can do anything without an accompanying voice over telling us exactly what they're doing, in some gritty and hard-boiled fashion.
Mickey Rourke is back as Marv but sounds more mush-mouthed than ever. That combined with his weirdly pudgy, makeup-caked face only made me think of how much better he was in the first one. Same goes for Jessica Alba, who can't cope with the heavier lifting she has to do here and frankly embarrasses herself in scenes that call for her to do much more than look pretty. Eva Green fares a little better in the femme fatale role and Rosario Dawson is what you'd expect.
Powers Boothe is good reprising his role as the villainous Senator Roark, and so is Joseph Gordon-Levitt in a new role. Their scenes together are by far the strength of the movie. Bruce Willis shows up but almost out of obligation more than anything else, as he adds absolutely nothing to the film.
The first Sin City was very over the top with its violence and noirish elements, but it was somehow a lot of fun too. This one looks great visually, but that's about where the fun stops. It's just too bogged down with uninteresting plots, poor acting, and lame monologues to come anywhere close to the good times of the original.

Guardians of the Galaxy (James Gunn, 2014)

7.5/10
There's very little not to like about this movie as popcorn summer fun which I guess explains it's near-universal acclaim. It doesn't re-invent moviemaking but it knows what it's supposed to do and goes out and does it. I thought it relied very heavily on the formula Joss Whedon had a lot of success with in The Avengers, with the gentle, easy-going camaraderie of the ensemble cast. It had a nice "eighties" feel to it (the soundtrack certainly helped) and it generally was enjoyable the whole way through.
My biggest complaint was about the final fight with Ronan. The movie skated by on glib humor but employing that same kind of humor in the big final fight with Ronan (Chris Pratt dancing to distract him) was extremely cringeworthy and only served to further undermine what was a pretty impotent villain to begin with. Even after absorbing the energy from the infinity whatsit, Ronan was still able to accomplish roughly jack all. Which made me wonder just how powerful this stone was in the first place.
Which sort of leads into my other complaint about these movies - the good guys are never in any real peril. I know nobody goes to a superhero movie to watch the superheroes die but you would figure with 4 or 5 or 6 of them teaming up eventually one of them would bite it at some point. Although I guess by their nature superheroes are more or less immortal, but I feel like that point is being acknowledged a bit too much up front. Almost as if the writers aren't even trying to hide that the good guys can't be killed, and so write ridiculous scenes where Chris Pratt dances in front of the big bad because what the hell, we all know he won't actually die anyway so why not have fun with it?
I mean, this Ronan guy is Thanos' right hand man or whatever who absorbed this crazy purple energy thingy and he can't even stomp out a raccoon? Well of course he can't, because then there won't be any raccoon toys to sell. And I'm sure, no doubt, the main cast is already locked into making Guardians of the Galaxy movies until 2038, so the characters are contractually obligated to survive.
And yeah, Groot "dies", but he's already on his way back barely even a scene later, ready to return for GotG2. It struck me that if the original Star Wars trilogy was made today, Obi-Wan would never have been allowed to die, or he would have already been back as a spirit in the very next scene.
Anyway this ranting makes me sound angrier than I really am, because taken at face value it's a fun movie, and I'm obviously overthinking it. It's just a trend I'm noticing in the few superhero movies I do go see these days.

Magic in the Moonlight (Woody Allen, 2014)

7/10
Woody Allen seems to be working at an "every other one is a great one" clip these days, with Midnight in Paris and Blue Jasmine paced by the immediately forgettable To Rome with Love and this newest one, Magic in the Moonlight. It's not as bad as To Rome with Love, but it definitely doesn't hit the highs of the other two. It just feels slight - a little slapdash, a bit of a lark. The plot feels like sitcom fodder, with Colin Firth playing the hardline skeptic to Emma Stone's mystic medium, but the pair have an easygoing chemistry. Firth is always watchable and as good as you'd expect from him and Stone brings her usual girl next door charm to a role that doesn't call for much more.
There are a few laughs, the settings are gorgeous and the music is fun and breezy. For a nice enough 2-hour escape or a good date night flick, you could do a lot worse.

Boyhood (Richard Linklater, 2014)

8.5/10
I saw Boyhood on Thursday but only got around to writing my review now, not out of any specific design but just because I wasn't immediately sure what I wanted to say about it (or how I felt about it). I figured when I knew, I'd write about it. So I was watching TV last night and an ad for Boyhood came on, it started with a picture of Mason's face as a boy all the way up until his to his adult self. And the feeling I got when I saw the ad was extremely unexpected - the jolt of recognition when his picture came up was like seeing a family member on the news, or something like that. Because Boyhood's realism is so effortless and sublime it was nearly impossible to think of Mason as being played by an actor - he was someone you pretty much actually watched grow up over the course of a movie.
As for the movie itself, I was thrilled that there wasn't any overarching storyline or that episodes from the past didn't magically crop up again in the future (except for one minor one that I let slide). The episodic format of the movie may have been necessary due to the sheer weight of trimming down 12 years of on-and-off filming in to a less-than-three hour movie but it felt like life itself more than anything else.
This isn't a movie I would revisit in any particular hurry but it was a wonderful experience to enjoy and certainly one of the most unique filmmaking ventures ever undertaken.

Dead Snow 2: Red vs. Dead (Tommy Wirkola, 2014)

7/10
The follow-up to 2009's Dead Snow, one of the best horror comedies I'd seen in a long time. This one picks up immediately following the events of the first one. Martin, the sole survivor, is fleeing from Colonel Herzog and his Nazi zombie horde. Herzog loses an arm in the chase, and through a series of events, it gets re-attached to Martin (who sawed his own off after being bitten in the original). And, of course, the zombie surgeon finds Martin's arm and attaches it to Herzog. Inextricably linked, Martin must stop Herzog, who has plans to build a zombie army and storm a small Norwegian town in the goal of fulfilling the last mission given to him by Hitler before Herzog's death. Meanwhile Martin assembles his own rag-tag horde, including three geeky members of the (apparently real) Zombie Squad group in the U.S. as well as using the resurrecting powers of Herzog's arm to reanimate a troop of Soviets slaughtered by Herzog to command in the final battle against him.
If you're familiar with Dead Snow, you can probably tell that the above plot summary is quite a bit more bloated than what made up the framework of the first one, which is really the problem with this sequel (and many sequels in general, honestly). The need to do something bigger and better also means a lot of downtime is required for plot exposition and dialogue, meaning the jokes and the kills don't come with quite the same pace that made the first one a lot more fun. That said, there's still a lot in here to entertain, and writer/director Tommy Wirkola still shows plenty of inventiveness with both his humor and his gore. It's just not quite as much fun on the second go-around.

Metalhead (Ragnar Bragason, 2013)

6/10
Metalhead is the story of a woman named Hera who, at 12 years old, witnessed the horrific, accidental death of her older brother on their family farm. She follows in his footsteps when she gets older as a diehard heavy metal fan, using the music as a coping device but still acting out, living as an outsider in an incredibly small Icelandic town with no real outlet for her grief and with almost no one else around to share her musical passion. The movie also focuses on her parents and both their own grief and the role they play in their daughter's life.
This was one of those movies where the premise was more interesting than the actual result. Hera is actually, for the most part, an incredibly irritating character. Her age is never revealed but her acting out comes across as absurdly childish and, in most instances, downright criminal. I couldn't help but feel the actress playing her just looked too old for the part - if it was a teenage girl acting out this way she would be easier to sympathize with, but the girl playing the adult Hera looked to be in her late 20's. You wanted to shake her and tell her to get her shit together instead of taking pity on her.
There's some light humor in the movie, but also some severely cringeworthy moments. Some of it felt like simple wish-fulfillment fantasy as written by a metalhead. The pacing in the film also feels off. It felt like it could have ended at least 5 times before it actually did. I will say though that I did enjoy the (actual) ending very much, and that probably saved it from getting a lower score out of me.

When Animals Dream (Jonas Alexander Arnby, 2014)

6.5/10
A few years ago Let the Right One In came along and kind of revolutionized what everyone expected from a "monster movie", the monsters in that case being vampires. After the success of that movie, there seems to have been a rush to humanize other classic movie monsters in the same vein. We Are What We Are "did for zombies what LTROI did for vampires" and now When Animals Dream purports to do the same for werewolves, although I'm sure I missed a whole bunch of imitators in between.
The thing is, I guess, When Animals Dream doesn't deviate from the formula enough. A pubescent girl is coming to terms with the fact that she's actually a werewolf, and the expected parallels are drawn between this fantasy concept and the realities of girls coming of age (bodily changes, bullying from peers, society and family expectations changing, etc). The mildly interesting caveat is that the villagers (it's always a small village) seem to be aware that werewolves have existed among them before and this leads to the film's main conflict.
I don't have many bad things to say about the movie. It's well made with a good amount of restraint. The special effects are well done and the photography is very nice to look at. And the acting is good across the board. But there just isn't enough new or exciting here. As I was exiting the theatre I immediately overheard two nearby conversations, one that started as "I liked Let the Right One in more but..." and another as "In Let the Right One In, they..." so the comparisons weren't apparent to only me.

Wetlands (David Wnendt, 2013)

7.5/10
Germany's Wetlands belongs in a small but, uh, esteemed category of movies along with Kids and Gummo as the type of movie where you just want to take a billion showers after watching it. Unlike those two movies, Wetlands' protagonist is a teenage girl, obsessed with being an unhygienic as humanly possible owing to a childhood trauma. After one of her more horrifying transgressions lands her in the hospital, she forms a friendship with a male nurse while attempting to engineer a reunion between her parents from her bed. At the same time we learn more about her past through flashbacks, being spared no sickly detail or disgusting bodily function along the way.
The reason why this movie stands out as more than just a throwaway gross-out affair is Carla Juri's performance in the lead, undoubtedly one of the best performances I'll see all year. She gives her body to the role in a way that is very rarely seen in movies (maybe for the better...) but has such a natural charm and vulnerability that it's near impossible not to be won over by her, regardless of what repulsive behavior she's engaging in.
Unlike Kids or Gummo, Wetlands is more of a twisted comedy, and improbably (and owing in large part to Juri) makes you cheer for its protagonist...all the while being grossed out by her. Not a movie I'll forget any time soon, at least.

Summer of Blood (Onur Tukel, 2014)

7/10
Summer of Blood is easy to describe - Woody Allen doing a vampire movie.
Writer/director/producer Onur Tukel stars in the central Woody role and shares a lot of his traits, particularly paranoia, aimlessness, and a fear of commitment. The movie is even set in New York, as if to hammer the point home. "Playing Woody" is a dicey game, but I have to admit, Tukel does a good job. The writing is crisp and funny and not without cringeworthy moments that are closer to what you might get from Larry David, Ricky Gervais or Louis C.K.. The acting is extremely natural (from Tukel and the supporting cast) and the conversations have a slapdash, quasi-improvised feel to them that feels authentic.
What drags the movie down a bit is that Tukel probably doesn't recede into the background as much as he should - he's in virtually every scene (almost always talking a mile a minute) and there's a lot of soapboxing in the movie that feels unwelcome at times. With all the dialogue spouted, his character inevitably grates and it makes a short movie (86 minutes) feel longer than it should. The ending is also a letdown. It felt like Tukel ran out of time or ideas and the movie departed with a lot less steam than it rode in on. Nevertheless if you're looking for a horror comedy that's a little bit more brainy than, say, Piranha 3D, Summer of Blood is a good one to check out.

Frank (Lenny Abrahamson, 2014)

8/10
I am usually averse to what I call "Sundance movies", those quirky little comedy/dramedies with characters just weird enough to be cloyingly likeable instead of interesting or challenging. Frank is very much a "Sundance movie". Its central buzz is behind the fact that it stars Michael Fassbender, who spends the entire movie under a bizarre papier mache head despite being the lead singer of a band.
The movie's main focus is on Jon, a geeky keyboard player who gets recruited into this band of weirdos. Jon is a would-be songwriter and is both in awe of and jealous of Frank's almost nonchalant musical genius. Much of the movie focuses on the band's isolation in an cottage in Dublin, cooped up together to seek musical inspiration to record the album that will (Frank believes) launch them to superstardom. Jon tracks the band's progress via updates on his Twitter, Youtube channel and blog, eventually gaining enough interest to get a small showing at the SXSW festival in America.
The movie has some good laughs, and the music is genuinely cool, although there's definitely a little fun being poked at the creative process of young, hip, indie musicians. The ending packs something of a startling emotional punch. I could see it coming across as a little forced for some, but it really worked for me. The movie slows down as the band heads to America and the story gets a little messy but it recovers nicely in the last 10 minutes or so. I wish, like most of these quirky/cute movies, it was a little more unafraid to take a stand or make a statement instead of just being kind of glib and irreverent at times, but there's still enough charm, humor and genuine heart to make it more likeable than most movies of its ilk.

Snowpiercer (Bong Joon-ho, 2013)

6/10
Snowpiercer is a frustrating mix of interesting ideas and tired, well-trodden ones. The concept of a train hurtling around the world on endless year-long round trips with the last survivors on earth trapped inside is a good one. The direction it takes, wherein the poor huddled masses rise up against their opulent opressors is an extremely boring one. We get the usual cliches - the have-nots are forced to sustain themselves on some gross substance, a child is abused, a limb is sacrificed, everybody's face is dirty...cinematic shorthand to make us cheer for Chris Evans and his team and boo whoever stands in his path to emancipation.
The movie is entertaining as they move through the train. And Bong Joon-ho certainly has a way with impressively cramped (but visually appealing) spaces. I didn't have many complaints with its action-movie middle. But, although I haven't read the source material, it feels like Bong was forced to cram too much into the beginning and the end, resulting in stilted character development. For too much of the movie I just didn't much care about Evans or his freedom fighters and their uprising. Maybe as a mini-series with a bit more background on the events leading up to the train takeover and the people involved I would have been moved to care a little more.
In the end I just found that I wanted to like Snowpiercer more than I did. At its best it was mildly interesting and entertaining, at its worst it was goofy, but mostly it was just kind of there.