The Raid: Redemption (Serbuan maut)

First Hit:  The focus of this film is great martial arts fighting – nothing more and nothing less - and in this realm it is great.

"The Raid: Redemption" is a flimsy story about a building being run by a criminal who leases rooms out to drug manufacturers, drug dealers, crooks and other poor unfortunates and the police decide to take the building back for the community.

There is an understory about one of the police raid leaders being connected in some way to the leader of the building (payoffs), but this is downplayed.

The choreography in most of the fight scenes is top-notch – some of the best I’ve ever seen on film. Even though there is a touching moment at the beginning of the film where Rama (Iko Uwais) is saying goodbye to his pregnant wife, and she tells him to be safe and come home soon, nothing else in this film is about life outside of the fight.

Therefore, be warned - if you want more than great staged fight scenes see something else.

Iko Uwais is the star of this and his abilities are amazing. His serene inner place and physical abilities were nothing short of sublime. Yanyan Ruhian as Mad Dog is equally amazing in his physical abilities. Gareth Evans wrote and directed this film.

Overall:  Although the dialogue is not really important, the martial arts choreography is A+.

Gone

First Hit:  Despite a thin plot line, Amanda Seyfried brought intensity to this role which was worth watching.

There isn’t quite enough backdrop and history to give a good historical framework and picture of Jill (Seyfried) but the film tries to fill in the blanks by giving storylines and flashbacks to give the audience some sense of why she is the way she is.

We see her at the beginning being very cautious which is supposed to identify that she’s been down this road before and will do anything to keep it from happening again. What we learn is that she was dumped in a dirt hole in a vast national park near Portland and was able to escape but not before finding out that there were others before her who were in and died in this hole. She thinks he’s after her and her sister.

The police however, don’t believe a word of what she says so they don’t help her when her sister goes missing. The police, in this film, are portrayed as nincompoops and I hope aren’t reflective of detectives at the Portland Police Department. They even added a new detective to this case, Peter Hood (played by Wes Bentley), who was weird enough to make the audience think he is the killer.

There was no reason for this and the film would have been fine without this character. The woman police officer (Officer Ash – played by Erin Carufel), who was supposed to be a voice of reason was portrayed stupidly.

The lead detective Powers (played by Daniel Sunjata) was so un-police like that I truly wondered why he was there at all.

Despite the very thin way this film was written, Seyfried made it work watching and was the only reason to watch this film.

Seyfried is very good at holding this character’s traits of fear, strength, drive, and resolve to finding and eliminating the man who once captured her throughout this film. Carufel was mostly useless. Sunjata looked good but from a police officer’s ability to deduce and be inquisitive he lacked everything that would make him a detective. Bentley had no reason to be in the film. Allison Burnett wrote a very weak script. Heitor Dhalia didn’t get anything much from the characters except Seyfried which tells me she did this on her own.

Overall: Maybe worth a rainy boring Sunday afternoon view.

Act of Valor

First Hit:  I could barely sit through this extremely poorly acted vapid film spinning tales that killing for America's version of what is right is admirable.

After the first 2 minutes of dialog, I picked up my water bottle and said to myself, am I willing to do something I’ve never done before – walk out of a film?

My personal practice is, no matter how bad a film is, try to find something in it by which I can hang my hat and stay. I stayed but in the end, probably would have had a better time doing something else.

This is one of the few films, which had nothing of good to note. Not even the technology they were using to locate their next victims was interesting.

The acting was all bad. There wasn’t one good acting scene in this film.

The dialogue was stilted and filled with obvious emotional hooks that were stale beyond belief, and a rampant concept that killing for and dying for America was good, made me sad. Yes, I know I’m not of the majority, but killing, regardless of the reason and who is doing it, is wrong. And making a film that promotes the best killers in our armed forces shows just how unkind, un-thoughtful, and narrow minded we can be.

This isn’t to say I condone any acts of terrorism by any group; I don’t. What I don’t like is that we make our acts honorable and picture theirs as not. Their reality is, they picture their acts as honorable and ours as not.

Who gains in this mindset – no one. Who survives and lives in this mindset – no one. It made me less hopeful for the future to hear some of the audience clap at the end.

The ending scene which promotes how great it will be for a dead man’s new baby coming into the world to never know his dad because he will know that his dead dad died honorably is stupidly mindless.

Having a dead dad will not do a lot of good when the boy needs to learn about right and wrong and how to make these decisions wisely.

None of the acting and actors were any good. Kurt Johnstad wrote a insipid script. Mike McCoy and Scott Waugh directed a uneven lifeless mess.

Overall: Nothing about this film is worthy of a watch.

Rampart

First Hit: Outstanding acting performance by Woody Harrelson in a non-glorious role and story.

Set in 1999, love the cell phone and antenna, this story is about a renegade cop from the Rampart Division of the LAPD.

This division was going through extremely tough times from internal mismanagement, theft, and public scrutiny of their police practices. Dave Brown (Harrelson) smokes all the time, never eats, drinks too much and numbs himself with drugs.

His family includes two ex-wives Catherine and Barbara (Anne Heche and Cynthia Nixon respectively) and two daughters, one from each. They all live together while Dave lives in a small apartment unattached from the house the others live in. This is his family and he thinks he’s responsible for everyone in this family.

His police department moniker is Date Rape Dave for his hand in killing what was perceived as a date rapist.

The opening scene, where he is speaking with two other cops from Rampart Division at a parking lot food stand, sets up Dave perfectly. He thinks he’s king of the hill, all knowing, in-charge and operating almost as an independent contractor. At one point he is driving in his car and is hit broadside. He gets out of the car, seemingly to find out what is going on and the driver of the other car abruptly opens his door and hits Dave. Then the perpetrator starts running away. Dave catches him and is filmed beating him almost to death.

This makes all the news stations and becomes yet another PR nightmare for LAPD. Dave is smart, won’t retire and doesn’t back down from his departments’ investigative team.

They are after him. It is clear that they can make him part of the Rampart problem and they can make him the focus of other problems as well. His family wants him gone because they cannot stand the public scrutiny and all things are stacking up against him.

There are some shots here in this film I found fascinating, specifically; when Dave and LAPD department heads and Dave’s lawyer all are talking in an office and the camera just goes in a circular clockwise motion from person to person. This was extremely effective in relaying the tenseness of the discussion and the circles we can create in conversations and the way conversations can go round and round.

The scenes, dialogue and references to actual issues of the time created a well focused film.

Dave’s belief that he is the guardian of our time and LA is profound and extremely well done by Harrelson.

Harrelson shows why he is an amazing actor. Look at his resume from "Natural Born Killers" to "Zombieland" to "Friends with Benefits" to "The People vs. Larry Flynt" to "White Men Can’t Jump", he has a wide range and each time the audience knows he is invested in the part. Heche is great as one of Brown’s wives, the one who is more emotional about the relationship. Nixon is good as the other, more centered, wife. Brie Larson as Helen, one of the daughters is very strong is reflecting the life she has. Sigourney Weaver as Joan Confrey and part of the LAPD team investigating Brown is powerful in her role and a great addition to this film. Robin Wright as Linda Fentress is an attorney who tricks Brown into sex and information is great. Ned Beatty as Hartshorn a former police officer is downright great as a puppeteer pulling the strings. James Ellroy and Oren Moverman wrote a very strong script. Moverman really nailed this script and the characterization of this real life character.

Overall:  This film is dark, has little joy, but is relentless in providing a strong and clear picture of a man digging deeper into his own hole.

The OSCARS and Other Notes

It is that time of season again and although this year wasn't an especially great year for films, a couple of interesting and outstanding "out of the box films" caught my eye: "The Artist", The Tree of Life" and "Melancholia".

On the other side of the coin, I'm grateful that the Harry Potter series has ended as they became painful to watch. And the Sherlock Holmes film was also very bad.

Some performances I would have like to have been honored but weren't would include: Michael Fassbender in "Shame", Kirsten Dunst in "Melancholia", Charlize Theron in "Young Adult", Carey Mulligan  in "Shame" (cannot give enough credit for her singing "New York, New York" as though she was standing on the edge of a cliff ready to fall at any moment), Christoph Waltz in "Carnage", and Albert Brooks in "Drive". 

Given the selected honorees by the academy, here are my picks for some of the categories:

• Best Picture: "The Artist"

• Actor in a Leading Role: Jean Dujardin in "The Artist"

• Actor in a Supporting Role: Christopher Plummer in "The Beginners"

• Actress in a Leading Role: Michelle Williams in "My Week with Marilyn"

• Actress in a Supporting Role: Octavia Spencer in "The Help"

• Cinematography: "The Tree of Life" Emmanuel Lubezki

• Directing: Michel Hazanavicius for "The Artist"

• Film Editing: "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall

• Adapted Screenplay: "The Descendants" Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash

• Original Screenplay: "Margin Call" J.C. Chandor

To all of you: Thank you for coming to my site and reading my reviews. The number of views has grown tremendously over this past year. There are now over 550 reviewed films and it is fun for me to post and read your comments.

May this new year bring on better films with new ideas tested and old ones enhanced. I know I'll be there in the 5th or 6th row center ready to suspend belief into someone else's story.

May you

Be Well...

Michael