Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer

Much like the first Fantastic Four movie, Rise of the Silver Surfer isn't aggressively terrible. It's just dull and doesn't seem to have its priorities in order. For a brief, 90 minute movie, way too much time is spent just dealing with these characters that I don't think anyone is that attached to. I don't mean the four themselves, I mean these actors' renditions of them. Michael Chiklis is hammy enough as The Thing and Chris Evans has a bit of charisma as Johnny Storm, but Jessica Alba is just totally out of place as someone like Sue, I still can't even remember the guy who plays Reed, and none of them have any real chemistry together. The movie's supposed to be about the biggest threat the world has ever seen in the form of a powerful presence that is coming to literally eat the planet, but it seems like half the movie is about how hard they can try to make us laugh with and like these characters. Ben's still with his blind girlfriend! The Human Torch is often outrageous! Uh oh, Reed and Sue's wedding was interrupted at the last possible second by a world changing destructive phenomenon!

There's just too much time dedicated to humor that falls flat and character drama no one cares about for the real issues to get their due attention, which leaves them feeling weightless and unimportant. It doesn't matter how much money you pour into animating your scary cloud Galactus (I actually don't have too much of an issue with this design decision because if they did what he really looks like it would come off as ludicrous), it still hardly registers as a threat. Of course Victor Von Doom is back and causing trouble, which does little other than add twenty minutes to a film that seemed to desperately need it. Of course they thought the Silver Surfer was important enough to put in the title so he must be important... and he sort of is I guess. He's the thing they chase after for pretty much the whole movie, and really the only thing keeping it from being totally lifeless. Doug Jones provides his body (seemingly pointlessly) and Larry Fishburne provides his voice (less pointlessly I suppose), and the whole film sort of rests on his shoulders. He's a somewhat interesting presence, although it's one that's handcuffed by some of the lazy plotting in the script that doesn't let him do a whole lot. Just like the first movie, there's a strange lack of action, with only a couple scenes that even approach being describable as exciting, and maybe one actual fight. If there's one thing I don't understand about these two movies its their total failure to actually have action in them. Lots of super hero movies seem to have this problem actually, even the good ones, but when you don't really have anything else, it's pretty disappointing when you can hardly even deliver on that front. So like its predecessor, this film is a well-meaning but disappointingly boring and unremarkable failure.

Hellboy II: The Golden Army

Guillermo del Toro's second stab at the Hellboy series isn't exactly a great film, but it's mostly enjoyable throughout and filled with the same visual inventiveness that was hinted at in smaller doses in Pan's Labyrinth. Whereas the first film felt basically like another super hero movie, albeit a bit of a quirky one, this movie is much more of a straight fantasy. From the background that's explained with stop motion puppets to the incredible makeup (Hellboy himself being among the least impressive) to some larger CG creatures, the movie looks astounding. It's not as technically correct as some bigger films, but just in terms of visual imagination and pulling it off in an interesting way, it's extremely successful and just fun to watch. Besides the special effects, the action scenes are pretty good too. They seem a bit sped up in places, but the villain has a cool style and whenever he's wrecking peoples' shit it's entertaining.

Not everything else about the movie is as good, though. The story actually has quite a few niggling problems. The main cast is solid, especially Ron Perlman as the titular character. He and Selma Blair are okay together, and it's nice that their relationship has advanced in a human way, but the problems they face are a bit too sitcom-esque at first. And Abe's character arc also comes off a bit hokey. Near the beginning Hellboy's existence is revealed to the world, and the negative reaction from the public seems forced and unnecessary to the story. It's really not a very subtle script, but the end result is generally pretty watchable. Doug Jones' dedication to getting into tons of makeup to play multiple parts is admirable as always, though. Seth MacFarlane makes a surprising appearance voicing a new, slightly goofy German character, that ends up being pretty likable. Hellboy II's the kind of movie that's best enjoyed when not taken completely seriously.

Pan's Labyrinth

I finally watched it, much later than I originally intended. I knew going in that it wasn't a pure fantasy film, with Ofelia's psychotic stepfather chasing down rebels after the Spanish Civil War playing a large part, but I didn't expect the balance to be tipped quite so far towards the period stuff. It wasn't a detriment to the film, with that aspect being as intriguing as the fantasy parts, it's just not what I thought I'd see. del Toro's done some big (if quirky) Hollywood action movies like Hellboy and the upcoming adaptation of The Hobbit, but he does a lot of work in his native Spanish like this, and the film is clearly a labor of love. It's completely unflinching, and no corners were cut to make it more accessible. Besides being filmed in Spanish with an unknown cast (outside of Mexico), the supernatural elements aren't played to be kid-friendly at all and the violence is starkly brutal.

You see it mostly in the "real" world, and mostly caused by Captain Vidal. There are some strange things to be seen, but he stands out as the most distinctive part. Watching him after a point is like watching a train wreck. I've heard people say the movie doesn't glorify violence, but it sure doesn't mind lingering on it, sometimes showing more than they probably have to. He doesn't cross the line of showing too much though, it's not what I'd call horror or anything. I did flinch quite a bit though. The violence does a tremendous job of characterizing the captain and showing why Ofelia needs her imagination just to get away.

Besides the mesmerizing visuals, which really are truly fantastic besides one weak CG-created creature, the story of the movie is quite good. Ofelia has some traits of an annoyingly dumb protagonist, messing things up which could have easily been avoided, but she's still sympathetic because of the gravity of the situation and how she ultimately deals with it. The plot isn't exactly complicated, but there's enough to it to stay interesting, and the script and direction are very good about letting you figure out what's happening instead of beating you over the head with it, and cluing you in on certain details with smart camera work instead of exposition. The ending is ambiguous, but in a way that I found interesting to think about. My biggest complaint is really that I just wanted to see more of the world, both inside the labyrinth and out. Along with Children of Men, it's a great film from 2006 by a Mexican director that I waited too long to see.