Technology that is loyal to puppies

ROBOCOP 3 (1993)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Paul Verhoeven's original, dazzling "Robocop" was a superviolent action marvel of a movie, perhaps one of the earliest antecedents of Christopher Nolan's own "Dark Knight" trilogy two and a half decades later. It was entertaining, tough as nails and had a satirical view of the future. The 1990 sequel was a disaster, sacrificing humor and any level of satire for far more graphic violence and little of what made Robocop tick. Fred Dekker takes on the directing reigns for number three, and the results are mixed, dour and diluted at best.

The near-bankrupt city of Detroit is about to become Delta City, which means revamping old neighborhoods and forcing people to evacuate to camps. A resistance group has formed and wants to fight back against the New Rehabs, an elite police unit created by OCP (Omni Consumer Products). There is some business here about a lost child (who is a whiz with hacking into computers and robots) who loses his parents during the liquidation of citizens. Robocop (now played by Robert Burke) develops emotions and deliberately fights back against the OCP (who created him in the first place) by joining the resistance!

There is some untapped potential here, especially with dramatizing how corporations can own everything and assume all citizens will do their bidding. In fact, some of this quite prescient in 2014. Alas, the idea is prescient but the execution is ill-defined. The filmmakers never spend much time with the resistance group (how can you curtail CCH Pounder's character, easily the most interesting character in the entire movie?) and spend even less time with Robocop, particularly his emotions that come to the surface (for newbies, he was once a cop named Murphy). Nancy Allen, reprising her role as Murphys' cop partner for the third time, is in it for a paycheck when she exits rather early in the proceedings. Mostly we get scenes of a Japanese businessman (Mako) who may or may not be evil - he sends ninja androids to counter any opposition and they both eventually go mano-a-mano with Robocop. One of these ninja androids smokes! Little color or variety is allowed for the resistance group - when we see them at work preparing to fight the cops, it isn't long before an action scene develops that comes out of nowhere. The filmmakers never take a moment to invest in this motley crew.

"Robocop 3" is busy with many characters and subplots (Rip Torn comes off best as a OCP President) but it never develops them into a coherent screenplay and logic is thrown out the window early on. Co-written by Dekker and Dark Knight comic-book writer Frank Miller (his contributions are clearly truncated), the PG-13 sensibility is to draw a younger crowd to the chrome metal hero. Only problem is he, and the rest of the characters, are reduced to scrap metal parts in search of a movie.

The Real Fantastic Four

THE INCREDIBLES (2004)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Originally reviewed in 2004)

Maybe it is really high praise but "The Incredibles" is the best superhero movie I've seen in a while, a high-octane, comically dazzling, jazzy, relentlessly funny, grab-the-arms-of-your-seat type adventure. As pure entertainment, it sets a whole new standard to any comic-book or animated movie I've seen. It is so damn good that I could have sat down for another viewing.

Craig T. Nelson is the voice behind Bob Parr, the patriarch of an amazing family, who works a monotonous job at an insurance agency (he gives his rejected clients tips on how not to be rejected in the future). Bob was not always so bored with his work, he used to be a superhero known as Mr. Incredible. The problem is that Mr. Incredible faced one too many lawsuits from saving people who did not want to be saved. Therefore, Bob and his family had to constantly relocate thanks to a superhero relocation program. Bob's wife is Helen, also known as Elastigirl (voiced by Holly Hunter), who hopes Bob can make something of his life beyond superheroic duties. They have three children, the kind that would give parents nightmares. There is Dash (voiced by Spencer Fox), the fast-as-the-speed-of-light runner in the family who loves to play pranks with his teenage sister, Violet (voiced by Sarah Vowell). Violet's specialty is that she can turn invisible except for her clothes. There is also the newborn baby who has trouble mimicking her mother's eating habits (oh, yes, he has superhuman abilities but they are best left undiscussed here).

Naturally, it doesn't take long before Bob Parr is asked to reprise his superhero duties by some secret agency. The trouble is that Bob is overweight and can't fit into his spandex suit. So the Edith Head of superhero costume fitters, Edna Mode (voiced by writer-director Brad Bird), designs a spanking new suit for the hero and off he goes to save the world. Unfortunately, the agency may have an ulterior motive when it is discovered that it is run by Bob's archnemesis, Syndrome (voiced by Jason Lee), wants to destroy Mr. Incredible and uncover his identity. Now that Bob is in trouble, the family will have to band together and save him. Yes, there is more than a passing nod here to The Fantastic Four.

"The Incredibles" is rich in character details and nuances, showing the kind of depth in superheroes you rarely see in this genre. Brad Bird (writer and director of the underappreciated "Iron Giant") is not interested in mere wall-to-wall action, he personifies his superheroes with wit and intelligence in equal spades. Bird also clutters his narrative with plenty of visual gags, bright one-liners and action scenes of real exuberance at every turn (One action scene with floating bikes in a forest is as hair-raising as a similar one in "Return of the Jedi"). This is also the first animated film from Pixar to exclude talking animals or amphibians, focusing in squarely on the humans and it is an outstanding job. Thanks to the voices, these characters seem more alive than any Hollywood film with real humans. What is remarkable is that Bird also focuses on his heroes' vulnerability so that we can see ourselves in Bob's mundane job and his anger (though very few of us are capable of lifting a car over our heads) or Helen's hope that her family can adjust to suburbia without using their superpowers.

Kudos must also go to Bird's attention to the children and their own eccentricities. It is fun seeing Dash and Violet dash around violently in the dining room, or seeing how Violet always covers her face with her long black hair. She also hopes that she'll be noticed by a cute boy in school. It is also fun at seeing how eager Dash is to run at lightning speeds. There is one miraculously funny scene where Dash is shown on a videotape to have possibly placed a tack on his teacher's chair, but the kid is so fast that he disappears from his chair for less than a nanosecond.

At a breakneck speed of 120 minutes, "The Incredibles" is rollicking good fun from start to finish. It is consistently funny and comically charged with a high-wire intensity that is unusual to find in an animated film. It is as exciting and thrilling as any "Star Wars" or "Indiana Jones" flick, and far superior to any Marvel, D.C. or other type of comic-book movie I've seen. I know there is a "Fantastic Four" movie coming in 2005 but it won't come close to the grandeur, humanity, excitement or drollery of "The Incredibles."

Director needs some Clobberin' Time

FANTASTIC FOUR (2005)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
(Originally reviewed in 2006)

When I saw the original "X-Men," I remember thinking that it was a full-blown comic-book come to life with effects galore and amazing, tactile super powers displayed with verve. "Fantastic Four" could've been another example of that - it has effects galore and plenty of amazing super powers displayed with everything money can buy. But it is solely an example of special-effects capabilities without human interest.

We have the introduction of the Fantastic Four team that includes brainy scientist, Dr. Reed Richards (Ioan Gruffudd), who becomes Elastic Man; his on/off again love interest, Sue Storm (Jessica Alba), who becomes the Invisible Girl; Ben Grimm, Reed's best friend, who metamorphoses into a walking rock formation called the Thing; and finally Sue's brother, Johnny Storm (Chris Evans), who becomes the Human Torch. Their powers are inadvertently obtained by a cosmic ray explosion while on a mission at a space station. Also on board this mission is the arrogant, evil Dr. Victor Von Doom (Julian McMahon), who has his DNA fundamentally changed as well, becoming the evil-as-evil-can-be Dr. Doom with an electrical charge all over his body.

Some of this is sort of fun. I enjoy seeing Johnny Boy using his powers when skiing (and making himself a jacuzzi atop a snowy peak) or trying to stop a heat-seeking missile; Reed Richards extending his fingers through a crevice or grabbing toilet paper from an adjoining room while sitting in the john; and the Thing lifting a fire truck that is hanging from a bridge. In terms of effects and wondrous new ways for Invisible Girl to develop a force shield or undressing so she can walk around invisible, this movie has ample to offer (and, yes, we get to hear the famous lines like "It's Clobberin' Time" or "Flame On!"). In terms of a credible story or three-dimensional characters, the movie stops short and focuses on one chaotic situation after another. We get shards of humanity about the Thing losing his fiancee because of his affinity for giant pebbles, and there is a substandard love story between Richards and Sue Storm. But Dr. Doom is so inherently evil that we never understand his motives - does he want to be the supervillain Dr. Doom because Richards has whisked away the woman Doom wanted to marry, namely Sue Storm? It seems Doom's biggest concern overall is that his interview on Larry King Live is abruptly cancelled. Hardly characteristic of a Marvel supervillain.

There is energy and bounce to the action scenes but "Fantastic Four" assumes that it is enough to see the fantastic super powers on display and nothing more. The similar "The Incredibles" already did it with more humanity and character interest a year earlier. After seeing Marvel Comics' cinematic adaptations like "Hulk" and the Spider-Man movies that set a whole new standard of character first, action second (isn't that why we like comic-books?), "Fantastic Four" falls very, very short. The Thing should've clobbered the director for lack of character development.

Shangri-La adventure deserves entombment

THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR (2008)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

There is something peculiar about Brendan Fraser. In some movies, like the underrated "Blast From the Past," he is nothing short of stupendous and full of an inspired manic energy. In "The Mummy" series, he is so boring and insipid, words I've used far too many times, that it is a shock anyone considered casting him. Heck, Fraser looks the part of a 40's stock leading man with an oversized head and has got the goods to deliver a wickedly inspired performance, but he never cuts loose. Not once, not in the entire "Mummy" series. And this latest snoozefest, "Tomb of the Dragon Emperor," has about as much to do with mummies as Indiana Jones has to do with cockroaches.

Fraser is the Rick O'Connell character, an Egyptologist who spends his days fishing, bored out of his numbskull because he so glories the days of shooting mummies and experiencing high adventure. And his wife, Evelyn (now played by a less spirited Maria Bello, replacing Rachel Weisz), is yearning for those days as well, especially after writing two bestselling books. And they live with a butler in a mansion right out of Bruce Wayne country. Yawn. But their son, Alex (Luke Ford), is spirited and has high adventure on his mind. The plot has to do with an accidentally revived 4,000 year-old Chinese emperor (Jet Li) who can command all the elements to start an avalanche but has a little problem fighting Yetis (a furry pack of giant Abonimable Snowmans that look about as real as the werewolf in "Van Helsing"). Rick and Evelyn decide to help their son fight the evil emperor and the entire Terracotta army, which takes them to Shangri-La. Also in accompaniment is an immortal Chinese woman and her mother, but the less said about them, the better.

I wish I enjoyed this movie but, alas, like the previous "Mummy" films, there is no sense of jeopardy, wit, adventure or anything on the level of awe. Fraser has seen these special-effected skeleton armies and mummified remains come to life so often, it seems he is yawning just looking at them (this is dully reflected in his dialogue to boot). Same with Maria Bello. They could care less and the urgency is lost. Jet Li is mostly animated in this film, which means anyone could've played this role, and Michelle Yeoh as a sorceress somehow maintains a straight face but her one shared moment with Li is short-shrifted for more CGI, less humanity. To make things worse, the movie is frantically cut from so many angles, particularly during the action scenes, that all sense of spatial continuity is lost (seriously, how many different angles does an explosion need to be seen from?) This "Mummy" film deserves entombment.

Another 2 hours with a parched Im-Ho-Tep

THE MUMMY RETURNS (2001)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Originally reviewed in 2001)

I have been vilified by people on the Internet and offline for my intense dislike of movies like the remake of "House on Haunted Hill" and the remake of "The Mummy," not to mention "The Matrix." None of these movies, in my mind, offered much in the way of story or plot or ideas, though "The Matrix" was far more ambitious than the other two. The problem is also the depths to which ILM computer designers will focus on the latest in state-of-the-art special effects sans story or plot or character definition. Casting decent actors like Rachel Weisz and Brendan Fraser in an overproduced mess like "The Mummy Returns" shows me that Hollywood has gone to sleep and raked in the big bucks. And the audiences continue to attend.

"The Mummy Returns" brings back Brendan Fraser as Rick, the resourceful Egyptologist who is now married to Evelyn (Rachel Weisz), the librarian from the first film. They also have a curious 8-year-old son (Freddie Boath), who is adept at using a slingshot. Also along for the ride is the dryly British brother-in-law Jonathan (John Hannah) who knows how to milk the appropriate quip when necessary. The story-hanging-on-a-thread involves some evil Egyptologists who want to bring back the dreaded Im-Ho-Tep (Arnold Vosoloo) to fight the dreaded Scorpion King (WWF star The Rock) at some sort of ancient pyramid. If I understood correctly (and I imagine I did not), the destruction of the Scorpion King is necessary for Im-Ho-Tep to rule the world and begin the second Armageddon, or something like that. By the end of the film, it turns out that the Scorpion King is also evil, but I could be wrong.

Stories like this typically make little sense but somehow they were cohesive in the Indiana Jones series. In fact, it is no surprise that like its predecessor, "The Mummy Returns" is a hodgepodge of horror cliches and the Indiana Jones flicks. Any semblance here of Boris Karloff and Christopher Lee from the old "Mummy" films is in-name only. Neither Vosoloo nor the Rock elicit much personality or villainy (I also noticed Vosoloo is photographed only from the chest up. This does not allow for much in the way of body language). It doesn't help that Rick's one line about seeing Im-Ho-Tep's resurrection results in the line, "Two years ago, this would have surprised me."

Fraser and Weisz seem to going through the motions (and have zilch in terms of chemistry). Only the 8-year-old son (nicely played by Freddie Boath) and the dry humor of John Hannah show some inkling of human beings existing in the world of this movie. Hannah has a classic line when he reacts to a sage's cliched line of "It is written..." by asking, "Where is it written?" The movie needed more of Hannah, or maybe he should have replaced the stoic Fraser.

"The Mummy Returns" is a template for special-effects galore but it is also a frighteningly inhuman movie where the main characters merely react to the roaring mummies and shoot them until they evaporate into thin air. The movie is a recap of the original but with even less emphasis on anyone who is not a dog-creature. By the end, we feel sympathy for one character, Im-Ho-Tep, as his reincarnated love refuses to save him. It is leftover evidence from the 90's when the audience feels more pity for the villains than they do for the heroes.

Parched Im-Ho-Tep will give you a headache

THE MUMMY (1999)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Originally reviewed in 1999)

The trouble with remakes is that unless you haven't seen their forefathers, you'll think you are not witnessing cinematic artistry at its lowest. I cannot advise someone retouching a classic, understated horror classic like "The Mummy" (1932) which starred the incomparable Boris Karloff, or one of its best remakes with Christopher Lee in 1959. This overheated 90's version of the Mummy attempts to throw everything into the mix including the kitchen sink. As a result, it sacrifices its original storyline entirely, and what we have is a Mummy for the Indiana Jones mindset - one of the film's many unforgiving faults.

The film begins promisingly with the Egyptian prince, ImHoTep, punished for having an adulterous affair with the pharaoh's daughter. His tongue is cut, and he is consequently buried in bandages in a tomb full of scrappy, ugly scarabs (beetle-like bugs). We flash forward thousands of years later where ImHoTep's tomb is uncovered by a team of explorers seeking the Book of the Dead (If I recall correctly, there is more than one version in the catacombs!). One of the explorers is an ambitious Egyptologist (Rachel Weiz), who has trouble preventing bookcases from toppling at the Museum of Antiquities!

Once the Book of Dead is discovered and the forbidden sayings are uttered, all hell breaks loose as ImHoTep rises from the dead and slowly regenerates his human form. His objective is to bring back his beloved from the dead after commanding all the thunderstorms and sandstorms in his wrath - all in the name of love.

"The Mummy" tries to be a fusion of Indiana Jones and horror cliches, and attempts to tell a tragic love story as well. None work or blend easily. For one, casting Brendan Fraser as a bland, stock Indiana Jones hero who's barely shocked or scared by the Mummy is not wise - he does not have the integrity or fierceness of Harrison Ford. Rachel Weiz is too cute and shrilly as the female lead - she is more appropriate for a screwball comedy than a film of this type.

Arnold Vosoloo is the mean Egyptian mummy but his cold smile and angry eyes are overshadowed by the whirlwind special-effects - this mummy does not even wear bandages! He just evaporates and blows like a twister from one place to another. Where is the sense of menace and succinct body language of Boris Karloff? Whatever sense of loss emanated from ImHoTep's love affair is trampled by an exceeding number of special-effects and histrionic action sequences. But wait a doggone minute: Is this a horror film or an action picture?

"The Mummy" is a mindless blockbuster...but there are no delicious quips, no sense of adventure, and no peril. Some of it may be considered serviceable fun for young minds and there are some spellbinding sequences (the face-like formations on the sand are fabulous). But it's a joyless enterprise - more of a promo for extraordinary digital special-effects like "The Matrix" than a movie. All you'll receive from this parched Mummy is a headache.

Episode V: The best sequel ever made

THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK (1980)

An appreciation by Jerry Saravia

In 1980 when I first saw "The Empire Strikes Back," I knew the secret, the big revelation by Darth Vader. I am not sure if I read the comic adaptation first or what the heck happened, but I knew the most famous line in "Star Wars" history - the one that led creator George Lucas to backtrack and make those reviled prequels years later. And when I told my parents the secret prior to the screening (don't know what I was thinking but I was a wild-eyed nine-year-old), they did not believe it. So as I watched "Empire" and the scene came up, I was still rather astonished and it was Mark Hamill's screams as the young Jedi apprentice Luke Skywalker that made the scene gripping, emotional and somewhat provocative. Gripping, emotional, provocative - these are not words which usually describe a Star Wars film. "The Empire Strikes Back" is an astonishing marvel of a movie, a masterful, exciting and illuminating film that soars above any other "Star Wars" film and most other sci-fi fantasy flicks. 

So much has been written about "The Empire Strikes Back" that there is not a lot more to say. It trounces Lucas' original "Star Wars" film by at least 12 parsecs. There is more action, imagination to spare, a love story that brews, more expert villainy, more fascinating creatures, a few bounty hunters, and a lot more mysticism and philosophy regarding the Force. The action is superbly tight and focused in bright, colorful spurts, such as the giant AT-AT walkers that shoot at our Rebel forces, the Millennium Falcon swerving left and right to avoid collision with an asteroid field and the final lightsaber battle between Luke and Darth Vader.

Imagination is on overload in this film, from the discovery of a green little Muppet called Yoda (one of the finest performances in the film by Frank Oz) who tutors Luke into becoming a full-fledged Jedi, to Luke's possible if not eventual fate in a cave, to the Imperial Droids sent to the Hoth system (an ice planet) where the Rebels are hiding, to the carbon freezing chamber that leads to Han Solo's unlucky predicament, to a city in the Clouds where the engineering to keep it maintained is something only George Lucas would understand (or the series' introduction of the smoother-than-thou Lando Calrissian, played by Billy Dee Williams), to a massively ugly creature hidden in an asteroid or some rocky formation in space that may be a nod to "Jaws."

The love story that brews occurs between scoundrel Han Solo (Harrison Ford, in top form before he turned in a lazy performance in "Return of the Jedi") and feisty Princess Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher) who likes "nice men" - they both give the film an added touch of humanity. I'd guess that everyone will shed a tear for the final scene between Leia and Han - yep, you know he loves her in this universe. It is unshakable and it could draw a drift between Luke and Leia (of course, "Return of the Jedi" reveals their true relationship).
The villainy grows when we first see the sight of the Emperor, Lord Vader's higher command, who wants Luke annihilated. There are a few more admirals under Vader's command, some clumsier in their battle strategies than others. There is the cryptic Boba Fett (Jeremy Bulloch), a bounty hunter who wants to capture Solo and bring him back to Jabba the Hutt. Finally, what makes "Empire Strikes Back" rise above all others of its ilk is Yoda's lessons on how to focus, concentrate and not be driven by passion, anger. Never give up trying - do or do not, there is no try. I think there is more to take away from these powerful philosophies than almost anything else that you can find in the world of science-fiction fantasy.

"The Empire Strikes Back" does something that, at the time of the film's release, was considered a no-no. There is no ending - it is a cliffhanger for the eventual conclusion of "Return of the Jedi" (this has become more commonplace in franchises of late). The 1983 conclusion should've developed more of what "Empire" set in motion, instead of just Luke and Darth Vader's meeting of the lightsaber minds that yields two more startling revelations (if you have the seen film, you'll know what I mean). If only "Return" focused as much on Solo and Leia (maybe in "Star Wars: Episode VII") rather than making do with a thinly cutesy romance where they cavort with teddy bears. But, hey, that is a different movie. As for "Empire," I shouldn't leave out the wonderful return of Chewbacca (as much a yeller as ever, but how does Solo understand every grunt and yelp as an actual language?) or the droids C3P0 and R2D2, who proves a savior in the end. "The Empire Strikes Back" is more solemn, memorable, wittier and earth-shakingly entertaining and intense than any other chapter in the saga. It is not just a Star Wars chapter - it is one of the grandest, most thrilling, adventurous and romantic space operas ever made.