First "Men in Black" Still Fresh and Original

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 19 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux


Men in Black (1997)
Running time: 98 minutes (1 hour, 38 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for language and sci-fi violence
DIRECTOR: Barry Sonnenfeld
WRITER: Ed Solomon, from a screenstory by Ed Solomon (based upon a comic book by Lowell Cunningham)
PRODUCERS: Laurie MacDonald and Walter F. Parkes
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Don Peterman (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Jim Miller
COMPOSER: Danny Elfman
Academy Award winner

SCI-FI/FANTASY/COMEDY/ACTION

Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Will Smith, Linda Fiorentino, Vincent D’Onofrio, Rip Torn, and Tony Shalhoub

The subject of this movie review is Men in Black, the 1997 science fiction comedy film directed by Barry Sonnenfeld. Starring Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones, it focuses on a secret organization that monitors and polices the alien population that secretly lives on Earth. Steven Spielberg is the executive producer of Men in Black, which is based on the comic book created by Lowell Cunningham) as his production company, Amblin Entertainment, is one of the studios that produced the film.

I don’t watch many movies twice; I watch even fewer thrice. Movies that earn multiple viewings really have to entertain me, and much to my surprise, Men in Black is one of those movies. It is certainly one of the few examples of science fiction and comedy blended to make a great film. From the opening strains of Danny Elfman’s score over the credits, I realized that I was in for something special, something that combined some of my favorite forms of entertainment: B movies, EC Comics, weird and pseudo science fiction, alien conspiracies, monsters, wry comedy and black humor.

In the world of this movie, a secret organization, the Men in Black (who identify themselves to civilians as INS agents) monitor and regulate the presence of alien visitors and other world immigrants on earth. When his partner “retires,” Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones) recruits a new partner, James Edwards (Will Smith), a brash young cop who showed excellent skill and much courage in the pursuit of an alien. After Edwards agrees to join, he must give up his identity; MiB literally erases everything that proved Edwards existed, and Edwards becomes Agent J.

Their first mission together is to find a dangerous alien “bug,” Edgar (Vincent D’ Onofrio) who seeks to possess a mysterious universe that is hidden somewhere in Manhattan, and, to keep him from getting it, a powerful race of aliens is ready to destroy the earth.

Director Barry Sonnenfeld was the perfect, though not the first, choice for this film. A former cinematographer (Raising Arizona, Misery), Sonnenfeld’s films always look gorgeous, and here he is abetted by MiB’s director of photography Don Peterman, who worked with Sonnenfeld on Addams Family Values and Get Shorty. Peterman captures the look and feel of low budget sci-fi film from the 1940’s and 50’s and the sparse look of such cult classics and The Brother from Another Planet and Buckaroo Banzai, while giving film a glossy, pretty look. Between director and photographer, they manage to make the film look like it belongs in the genres to which it aspires; this makes for a convincing and atmospheric film that feels right. At times, it is a sci-fi adventure, a detective story, a monster movie, and a horror film, but it never looks like an expensive, over produced Hollywood film, which it is.

The performances are excellent. Jones as Agent K is the consummate old veteran, and Linda Fiorentino as the morgue minder Dr. Laurel Weaver brings a wry and cynical sense of humor to the film. However, the actor who carries this film and sells it both as a wacky sci-fi film and as a funny movie is Will Smith.

Prejudiced science fiction and comic book fans often given short shrift to African American actors in genre films. The adventurous pasts and mysterious futures of sci-fi are often bereft of people of color, especially people of brown and darker hues. For years, racist fans blamed Richard Pryor for the poor quality of Superman III, when he was actually the film’s saving grace. In fact, when rumors placed Eddie Murphy in Star Trek IV, fans went into paroxysms of fear because black comedians can only ruin sci-fi films. “Look at Pryor in Superman III,” they cried through their white hoods. Of course, Star Trek films managed to suck eggs all on their own without a Negro jokester in sight.

Smith makes Men in Black. He’s our point of view. His reactions to his strange new environment sell the fantastical aspects of MiB as being actually both fantastic and weird. He’s the every man, albeit sexier and more personable than most, through which we follow the story. Despite the position of the actors’ names on the marquee, he’s the star and the lead. If you haven’t seen this wonderful and funny film, do so immediately.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1998 Academy Awards: 1 win: “Best Makeup” (Rick Baker and David LeRoy Anderson); 2 nominations: “Best Art Direction-Set Decoration” (Bo Welch-art director and Cheryl Carasik-set decorator), and “Best Music, Original Musical or Comedy Score” (Danny Elfman)

1998 BAFTA Awards: 1 nomination: “Best Special Effects” (Eric Brevig, Rick Baker, Rob Coleman, and Peter Chesney)

1998 Golden Globes, USA: 1 nomination: “Best Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical”

Review: Men in Black II

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 20 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux


Men in Black II (2002)
Running time: 88 minutes (1 hour, 28 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for sci-fi action violence and some provocative humor
DIRECTOR: Barry Sonnenfeld
WRITER: Robert Gordon and Barry Fanaro, from a story by Robert Gordon (based upon the comic book by Lowell Cunningham)
PRODUCERS: Laurie MacDonald and Walter F. Parkes
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Greg Gardiner (D.o.P.)
EDITORS: Richard Pearson and Steven Weisberg
COMPOSER: Danny Elfman

SCI-FI/FANTASY/COMEDY/ACTION

Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Will Smith, Rip Torn, Lara Flynn Boyle, Johnny Knoxville, Rosario Dawson, Tony Shalhoub, and Patrick Warburton

The subject of this movie review is Men in Black II, the 2002 science fiction comedy that is a sequel to the 1997 film, Men in Black. Both movies are based upon the comic book, Men in Black, created by Lowell Cunningham. As he was with the first film, Steven Spielberg is also the executive producer.

It was a long time in coming, and some thought it would be too expensive to make because of star salaries and production company profit participation, but Men in Black II finally arrived. Although not as fresh as the first film, MiBII is somewhat close to the original in that it is still imaginative and wacky, and Will Smith is still very funny.

When Serleena (Lara Flynn Boyle), a villain from MiB’s past threatens the planet, Agent J (Will Smith) has to convince former agent and his mentor Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones) to return to the agency. Complicating matters is the fact that Agent K is having a difficult time regaining his memory of his time as an MiB agent, and his memory is crucial to defeating Serleena. Meanwhile, Agent J has fallen for Laura Vasquez (Rosario Dawson), an attractive witness to a murder committed by Serleena.

One of the many things that I like about the original film was the cool opening scene, an homage to classic sci-fi B-movies. This film does something similar, but with a nod to those loopy, paranormal, conspiracy theory documentaries. The actors are all game, and with the help of some interesting cameos (including one by Michael Jackson) and some nice small roles, the film, for the most part, manages to keep us interested in what’s going to show up next on the screen. It’s a way of playing it safe, and keeping matters close to what audiences remember from the first film. Director Barry Sonnenfeld and his writers bring back all the atmospherics of the first, but add some sentimental and romantic elements. The romance actually works in a way of tying together the pasts of Agents J and K and also tightens the bond between the characters.

What this film does lack that the first one had is the intensity of the danger imposed by a rogue alien. While I found Serleena to be a viable threat as a villain, I thought that she lacked the kick of the Bug from the first film. The agents also spend a lot of time going from one location to another and each one just happens to be either the home of another alien or a secret storage bin for MiB paraphernalia and weaponry. I know that the filmmakers want to play up the idea that you never know what’s behind the façade, but each trip to another building just slows the film. The film never really kicks into high gear until its final fifteen minutes.

Still, it’s funny, and Will Smith carries the show, even through some dry moments. After the second time around, we can see that MiB is really the story of Agent J’s adventures in the organization and that Smith is very likely crucial to the success of any more Men in Black sequels. Although Men in Black II plays it rather safe, it is a pretty entertaining successor to an exceptional movie.

6 of 10
B

NOTES:
2003 Razzie Awards: 1 nomination: “Worst Supporting Actress” (Lara Flynn Boyle)

Review: "DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story" is Still Funny (Happy B'day, Ben Stiller)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 100 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story (2004)
Running time: 92 minutes (1 hour, 32 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for rude and sexual humor, and language
WRITER/DIRECTOR: Rawson Marshall Thurber
PRODUCERS: Stuart Cornfeld and Ben Stiller
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Jerzy Zielinski
EDITOR: Alan Baumgarten and Peter Teschner
COMPOSER: Theodore Shapiro

COMEDY/SPORTS with elements of romance

Starring: Vince Vaughn, Christine Taylor, Ben Stiller, Rip Torn, Justin Long, Stephen Root, Joel David Moore, Chris Williams, Alan Tudyk, Missi Pyle, Jamal E. Duff, Gary Cole, Jason Bateman, Al Kaplon, Curtis Armstrong, and Hank Azaria with (cameos) Lance Armstrong, Chuck Norris, and William Shatner

DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story is a 2004 sports comedy set in the world of competitive dodgeball. Ben Stiller is one of the film’s producers and is also one of the movie’s stars. DodgeBall follows an underdog dodgeball team and their rivalry with a powerhouse team from a big-budget gym.

A group of misfits band together and enter a dodgeball tournament in Las Vegas in order to save their cherished gym, Average Guy Gym. The gym owner, Peter La Fleur (Vince Vaughn), is not an ambitious guy, but he reluctantly joins his friends/customers to go after the $50,000 championship prize.

This prize money will save his gym from foreclosure, where upon it will end up in the hands of Global Gym and its owner, White Goodman (Ben Stiller). When Goodman learns that Peter’s friends will compete in the tournament and that Peter is also dating an attorney (Christine Taylor) he desires, Goodman assembles a killer team of hired muscle to compete in the Las Vegas tournament against Peter and his friends.

DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story is absolutely hilarious. It’s witty, sarcastic, lewd, crude, snarky, and unabashedly lowbrow, but ultimately it’s the kind of belly laugh comedy that doesn’t come around often enough. It’s not high art; it’s the love child of such films as Caddyshack and Revenge of the Nerds. Vince Vaughn, once destined to be a matinee idol, has turned out to be a funny comic actor who gets plenty of mileage out of dry wit and dead pan humor, and though he is warmer than he is hot in this film, he makes DodgeBall.

Anyone who can not take DodgeBall seriously and has the kind of sense of humor that finds a film like Dude, Where’s My Car? funny will like this.

6 of 10
B

NOTES:
2005 Razzie Awards: 1 nomination: “Worst Actor” (Ben Stiller)

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Review: "Yours, Mine & Ours" is a Fun Family Film

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 183 (of 2005) by Leroy Douresseaux

Yours, Mine & Ours (2005)
Opening date: Wednesday, November 23, 2005
Running time: 88 minutes (1 hour, 28 minutes)
MPAA – PG for some material may not be suitable for children
DIRECTOR: Raja Gosnell
WRITERS: Ron Burch & David Kidd (based upon the 1968 motion picture screenplay by Melville Shaveson and Mort Lachlan from a story by Madelyn Davis and Bob Carroll Jr.)
PRODUCERS: Robert Simons and Michael Nathanson
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Theo Van de Sande, ASC
EDITORS: Stephen A. Rotter and Bruce Green, A.C.E.

COMEDY/FAMILY with elements of romance

Starring: Dennis Quaid, Rene Russo, Rip Torn, Jerry O’Connell, David Koechner, and Linda Hunt

One evening, while he is in the middle of an unpleasant date, Frank Beardsley (Dennis Quaid), a widow, runs into his old high school sweetheart, Helen North (Rene Russo), and it’s as if the thirty years since they last saw each other never passed. Helen, a widow, also feels the attraction and can’t wait to meet Frank again, which they do at a high school reunion cruise. They rush into marriage, but they don’t tell their kids…

Frank has eight children: four-year old Ethan (Ty Panitz), six-year old twin boys Otter (Briger Palmer) and Ely (Brecken Palmer), eight-year old Kelly (Haley Ramm), 10-year old Harry (Dean Collins), 12-year old Michael (Tyler Patrick Jones), 16-year old Christina (Katija Pevec), and 17-year old William (Sean Faris).

Helen has 10 children – four she had with her late husband and six they adopted: four-year old Aldo (Nicholas Roget-King), eight-year old twins Marisa (Jessica Habib) and Bina (Jennifer Habib), nine-year old Lau (Andrew Vo), 10-year old Joni (Miranda Cosgrove), 11-year old Jimi (Lil’ JJ), 12-year old Mick (Slade Pearce), 14-year old Naoko (Miki Iskikawa), 16-year old Dylan (Drake Bell), and 17-year old Phoebe (Danielle Panabaker).

But maybe love can’t conquer all. The two families don’t mesh quite as easily as Frank and Helen had hoped. Frank, a Coast Guard Admiral, is a by-the-book disciplinarian, but the free-spirited Helen has no “book” and believes that the home is a place for free expression, not military style discipline. The children are always at odds. Helen’s brood aren’t pleased about moving or sharing rooms with a bunch of uptight strangers, and Frank’s offspring have nothing in common with the unruly and strange pack of kids their father’s new wife brings into their lives.

On the other hand, both sets of children realize that they have a common goal – breaking up their parents’ marriage, so they band together to create the kind of chaos that causes confusion between a couple with different parenting styles. As the kids succeed in their plot, they also realize that they really like each other in spite of their differences. Now, they have repair the bond between Helen and Frank that they broke, but are Helen and Frank still interested in being a couple.

The box office success of 2003’s Cheaper by the Dozen, the remake of a 1950’s film about a father managing a large pack of children, probably encouraged Paramount Pictures and MGM to remake another film about parents struggling to manage a large number of offspring. Thus, we have Yours, Mine & Ours, the remake of a 1968 film. This 2005 version of Yours, Mine & Ours isn’t as good as the Cheaper by the Dozen remake. For one thing, the acting by the leads playing the parents, Dennis Quaid and Rene Russo, two talented actors with a deft touch at comedy, waffles between listless and over done. Quaid has his moments when his talent shines through this murky material, but Russo delivers a surprisingly mediocre turn in a role she should sleepwalk through, or may be she did sleepwalk through it.

Also, 18 child and teen actors can’t get the screen time that even 12 can get, so none of young cast gets a chance to give his or her character personality. The script for the 2003 Cheaper by the Dozen gave the actors playing two of the older children (Tom Welling and Hilary Duff) a chance to bond with the parents (played by Steve Martin and Bonnie Hunt), which gave the comedy some emotional resonance. Here, the script lumps the older kids in completely with the younger ones. The film would have more dramatic resonance if the older ones could be seen as a bridge between what the parents want and what the kids want. This doesn’t happen until the very end, and it comes across as a tacked on happy ending.

Still, Yours, Mine & Ours has some truly funny moments. It’s a silly and fun family flick for parents with ‘tweens and younger. The adult actors give the film some credibility, and director Raja Gosnell (Big Momma’s House and the Scooby Doo movies) keeps the pace fast, only slowing down for some romantic scenes between Quaid and Russo. It’s all too fast for us to stop and examine the numerous cracks in this picture and just fast enough to keep the easy laughs coming. Yours, Mine & Ours is chock full of predictable moments, and the audience can see the punch line the moment any particular joke or gag begins, but it’s all still funny.

5 of 10
B-

Wednesday, December 21, 2005

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