A Dog's Way Home

First Hit: Although, at times, cute and pointedly created to pull the heartstrings, it was also boringly long and misguided.

Having a dog, I was looking forward to seeing this film about a dog finding its way back home.

It started cute enough with a group of cats and a mother dog living in an abandoned building across the street from Lucas (Jonah Hauer-King) and his mother Terri (Ashley Judd). The warning though is that the voice over begins and it will only get worse.

Terri is an Iraqi war veteran with PTSD and is a volunteer at a local VA hospital. Lucas works at the center and has been feeding the cats underneath the abandoned building. By feeding them, he’s keeping the cats alive, which also stops the tearing down of the abandoned homes by the owner.

The owner of the building gets stymied from building on the ramshackle lot because of the animals living on the premises. When animal control comes and thinks they’ve removed the animals, what they miss is a mother cat, some of her kittens, and a puppy who was still nursing from its mother.

The puppy, voice by Bryce Dallas Howard, is now being taken care of a mother cat who nurses it. At times it's funny to watch as the dog grows more massive than the momma cat. These dog and cat scenes are setups for later.

Lucas and his girlfriend Olivia (Alexandra Shipp) find the puppy and Lucas decides to keep it. Because the home Terri and Lucas live is doesn’t allow pets, they must be careful in raising the puppy, now named Bella.

Some of these scenes are cute, as were the scenes when Lucas sneaks Bella to his work because the house owner is coming to fix something in the home they rent. When Bella stumbles into a PTSD meeting of vets, of which Terri is one, the vets love Bella and Bella provides comfort as the soldiers speak about their war experiences.

The film sets up the premise of Bella finding her way home because a mean animal control officer is intent on capturing and euthanizing Bella. In the city of Denver, pit bulls are not allowed in public because they’ve been deemed as dangerous. Bella is suspected of being a pit bull although no one proves this. To keep Bella safe until he can find a new home Lucas sends Bella to live with Olivia’s family four-hundred miles away in New Mexico.

Just as Lucas travels to New Mexico to pick-up Bella, Bella was hearing her inner voice to go home, escapes and begins a long trip to find Lucas.

During this trip, Bella becomes friends with and protects a “large kitty” (it’s a cougar). During their travels together, they fight off wolves, get separated by cross-country snow skiers, and finally meet up again.

It’s during this segue of Bella’s trip home that I got bored. We spend at least 20 minutes with two men who take care of Bella and another dog, whose owner doesn’t want, only to have Bella leave and try to find Lucas and maybe “large kitty.”

This film is predictable, poorly constructed, and many scenes were only designed to make the audience feel something. This point, of making expressed emotional scenes, in itself, isn’t a bad thing, however when it’s this obvious, it a detriment to the film and demeaning to the watcher.

Hauer-King was poor. He seemed overly simple and not one who honestly thinks things through. His acting had no depth of character. Judd was outstanding as the PTSD mother. I loved her holding the wrist of the animal control officer – entirely in control of the situation. Shipp was steady as the girlfriend. She was believable in her scenes. Howard was nauseatingly childlike as the voice of Bella. As a puppy the voice was OK, and as Bella grew up, the voice didn’t change to reflect a maturing of the dog. Cathryn Michon wrote a very week script. Multiple scenes could have been shortened or removed (the whole segue with the gay men). W. Bruce Cameron did a poor job of directing this. The acts with the animal control officer were too overt and not realistic, nor were the scenes with “large kitty” and Bella on the ice.

Overall: Although the concept was good, the story was poorly constructed and overtly created for emotions.

Divergent

First Hit:  Not very believable, a little long, some good acting, therefore this film is all over the place.

The future looks grim if you think this film has any modicum of truth. If it is, then I’m not interested in being there.

Basically, the story is that one city, Chicago, is surrounded by a very high concrete wall topped by metal fencing that looks more like antennas. Is Chicago the only society left and how do we know? Society is made up of five different types of people. Really! Is it really possible to take 10’s of thousands of people have them predetermined and predisposed to fit into 5 or 6 personality types? No. These personality types are designed to fulfill certain societal roles.

The personality types (I won’t bother using the names they used as these words are as bad as the story) are:  People who govern. People who are brave. People who are peaceful. People who are intelligent. And, people who are truthful. Right, as if one is predisposed to truth, why can’t they be predisposed to also be peaceful? Oh, that’s where Divergents come into play.

The Divergents have no one predisposition. There is a “test” every young person takes which tells them what they are. Then after learning the results of their test, in a public presentation, each chooses a group to associate with. Although everyone can chose another role than the one they are predisposed, they don’t often pick something different.

However, once they chose a role they are stuck with it and cannot go back to their families or anywhere else. When someone fails the test, they are labeled a Divergent because they have no one predisposition and are considered a threat to society. Tris (Shailene Woodley) learns she is a Divergent but chooses to be in the brave group because they seem to have more fun and are active. As a recruit she excels at some things and struggles at others like fighting. She is mentored by Four (Theo James). Her mother Natalie (Ashley Judd) who is a govern (or is she?) tries to support her.

Her best friend is Christina (Zoe Kravitz) and her help each other pass the test to become a full fledge brave person. If one fails to pass their initiation test they become homeless. There is other stuff about a faction wanting to take over control of the government as led by Jeanine (Kate Winslet) as well but all this is part of an unclear story.

Woodley is very good and does her best with the role, but the whole thing is preposterous. James is good and the chemistry between him and Woodley is good. The downside of his acting or the screenplay is that his difference is telegraphed throughout the film. Kravitz was actually one of the best things about the film – I enjoyed the energy she brought to her role. Winslet was lost in this useless role. Judd was OK as Woodley’s mother and hid her secret well. Evan Daugherty and Vanessa Taylor wrote a poorly conceived script from a published book. Neil Burger directed this and given the script and story it was OK.

Overall: This was so poorly strung together that the result was; it was too long and unbelievable.

Olympus Has Fallen

First Hit:  Despite big holes in the plot and feasibility, it was entertaining enough.

It is hard for me to believe that a big, prop driven, slow plane such as the one that riddles Washington DC with Gatling gun bullets, could and would get as far as it did.

If our defense system consists of two jets (with follow-up planes as well) and they cannot figure out how to shoot down this big slow plane at the outset then… oh we wouldn’t have had a film. Anyway, the timeliness of this film about a North Korean dissident Kang (Rick Yune) trying to teach the US a lesson about the Korean Peninsula made me smile just a little.

The film sets the audience up by showing the close relationship between Mike Banning (Gerard Butler), President Asher (Aaron Eckhart), and his family (wife Margaret – Ashley Judd and son Connor – Finley Jacobsen). Through no fault of his own Mike gets excused from the protecting the President by protecting the President.

When the Korean’s storm the White House, Mike gets back into action and does what he can to save the President, his country, and to save his own life. Another hole in the story is that when the President is shot, and everyone knows there are no more bad guys, no-one rushes into the White House to assist the wounded President – they waited until Mike and Asher slowly made their way out of the rubble – all for drama.

Butler is OK at portraying the troubled agent – but it wasn’t a stretch at all. Eckhart was OK as the President doing the Presidential and honorable acts by letting his Secretary of Defense give up her code to keep her alive. Judd was fine in her small role. Yune is good as the dissident. Morgan Freeman was very good as Speaker Trumbull who ends up being the President in Charge. Angela Bassett as Secret Service Director Lynn Jacobs was good. Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt wrote a script that had an interesting concept but too filled with holes. Antoine Fuqua directed this with the idea of fantasy not reality.

Overall:  It might be something to watch on a rainy Sunday afternoon at home, but not worth the money to see in the theaters.

Bug

First Hit: Ashley Judd puts on an Oscar performance in this outstanding psychological thriller. It is not a horror film.

I don’t know who didn’t do their job: The person who named the film or the person in charge of promoting it.

Whoever did these things missed the boat. This was a first rate psychological thriller. To watch Ashley make the slow slide into the dark abyss of the mind was outstanding. I don’t think many people saw this film. I think the few people who were in the theater with me were expecting a horror film.

Why would I say this? Because I heard nervous laughs during the critical junctures when the film was making yet another step into the abyss. Believe me; this film reaches out and touches the effects of paranoia.

If any of you have ever spent time with someone who is deeply paranoid you will see the truths of this film.

Overall: As noted on my Web Page I like films that allow me to enter their world and this one invites you to do just this. Take a leap of faith and try it, I did and I am glad I did.