FILM REVIEW OF ''OCEAN'S EIGHT" (2018)

A glossy, polished, female revenge fantasy, crime caper, Gary Ross's "Ocean's Eight," (*** OUT OF ****) starring Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, Anne Hathaway, and Rihanna, amounts to the gender flip-side of Steven Soderbergh's male-oriented heist trilogy "Ocean's Eleven, Twelve, and Thirteen." Comparably, "Ocean's Eight" follows on the high heels of 2016's "Ghostbusters," with Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, and Leslie Jones, that gave gals the starring roles in the remake of the 1984 Bill Murray classic. Predictably, "Ocean's Eight" shares some similarities with Soderbergh's extravagant, predictable, and often madcap epics. "Ocean's Eight," however, isn't as hopelessly fanciful as Soderbergh's "Oceans," but it unfolds in the same land of imaginary Hollywood realism. As Danny Ocean's younger sister Debbie, Sandra Bullock is fashionably appareled throughout this sumptuous PG-13 saga as are her comely conspirators. Like brother Danny, Debbie recruits top-flight talent. If you're afraid the authorities may nab and pack them off to prison, banish that thought. The police are virtually invisible in this elaborate 'mission impossible' theft. Indeed, our heroine flies so low beneath her parole officer's radar that we never see either him or her surprise our heroine with an unscheduled inspection. Make no mistake, "Hunger Games" helmer Gary Ross has made a palatable, attractive, and mildly suspenseful thriller that will probably hold your attention throughout its 11o-minute running time. The flaw in this sophisticated heist caper is our dames walk away without a hair out of place. Inevitably, they encounter some complications in "Ocean's Eight," but they never resort to physical violence. Furthermore, nobody either catches a bullet or dies.



Like the "Ocean's Eleven" (2001) remake, "Ocean's Eight" opens with a contrite Debbie reassuring the authorities at Nichols Women's Prison in New Jersey that she will avoid contact with all former criminal accomplices and family if she gets paroled. "If I were to be released," she sighs, "I would just want the simple life. I just want to hold down a job, make some friends, you know, pay my bills." No sooner has Debbie stepped out of stir than she steals everything in sight that she needs to wallow in the lap of luxury at a swanky motel during her first night out of prison. If you remember "Ocean's Eleven," Danny told his jailors the exact same lies. Debbie's brazen scam at the perfume counter later seems amateurish, but the movie makes it appear smoothly plausible. Meanwhile, she learns that her estranged brother, Danny Ocean, has died. For the record, George Clooney played Danny Ocean in Soderbergh's "Oceans" trilogy. Specifics are never revealed about Danny's demise. Nevertheless, Debbie visits the mausoleum where her older brother has been buried to pay her respects. She toasts Danny's passage with a martini but doesn't shed a tear. Conveniently, one of Danny's closest associates, Reuben Tishkoff (Elliot Gould of "MASH"), shows up on behalf of the fellows but fails to persuade Debbie to cease and desist. Is Danny really dead or is he in hiding? Knowing Danny, Danny is probably holed up someplace. More importantly, this bombshell revelation means no "Oceans 14!" Reportedly, Soderbergh has said in public that he has no plans for another "Ocean's" escapade.



In "Ocean's Eight," Debbie has engineered the whole shebang down to the smallest detail. All of her accomplices will walk away with cool double-digit millions and never have to ever commit another crime. Debbie has no problem recruiting her former partner-in-crime, Lou (Cate Blanchett of "Thor: Ragnarok"), to join her and outlines her audacious plan to rob 'the most exclusive party in America,' the Metropolitan Museum of Art's annual Gala, in New York City. Like Danny, Debbie assembles an A-Team of experts from every field to execute her fool-proof plan. Reluctantly, Lou accommodates Debbie. Together, they enlist an out-of-fashion, fashion designer, Rose Weil (Helena Bonham Carter of "); an Indian jewelry-maker Amita (Mindy Kaling of "A Wrinkle in Time"), an African-American computer hacker, Nine Ball (Rihanna of "Battleship"); a white suburban housewife fence, Tammy (Sarah Paulson of "Serenity"); and an Asian-American pickpocket, Constance (Awkwafina of "Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising"), to pull off this crime of the century. When Amita asks Debbie how long the latter took to concoct her bold scheme, Debbie replies specifically "five years, eight months, and twelve days." As it turns out, this is the length of time that Debbie spent in prison for a crime she didn't commit, all owing to a treacherous art dealer, Claude Becker (Richard Armitage of "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey"), who double-crossed and framed her. Not only does Debbie savor the prospect of exacting vengeance on Becker, but she also tells her cohorts they are committing this grand crime for all those little girls aspiring to be career criminals.



Principally, Debbie and her partners dupe an arrogant but glamorous movie starlet, Daphne Kluger (Anne Hathaway of "Love & Other Drugs"), into serving as their innocent accomplice. They hoodwink Kluger into hiring Rose Weil to dress her for the gala. Rose insists Daphne wear the legendary Toussaint, a world-renowned, six-pound, Cartier diamond necklace that has been locked up in an underground vault for the last fifty years. Initially, the Cartier people refuse to let the Toussaint, a bauble valued at $150 million, see the light of day. Reluctantly, they agree, and two seasoned security experts safeguard the necklace. Meanwhile, Tammy infiltrates the company coordinating the gala and works from within, acquiring all kinds of invaluable information. Nine Ball hacks into the security system to pinpoint the arrangement of all surveillance cameras. Inevitably, Debbie and company must separate Daphne from the Toussaint. This sequence with poor Daphne crouched over a toilet hurling her guts out is simply sidesplitting. Although he doesn't drum up white-knuckled, nail-biting suspense designed to keep you teetering on the edge of your seat, director Gary Ross never lets the momentum lag for a moment with a charismatic cast and splendid cinematography. An ideal gals' night out opus, "Ocean's Eight" qualifies as above-average with its cornucopia of humor compensating for its conspicuous scarcity of suspense.

FILM REVIEW OF ''JOHN WICK: CHAPTER TWO" (2017)

Hollywood makes out two types of sequels.  First, those sequels that aren’t as good as their forerunners.  Second, those sequels that surpass their predecessors. Basically, sequels are either better or worse than what spawned them.  “John Wick: Chapter 2” (***1/2 OUT OF ****) belongs to the second category.   Stunt double Chad Stahelski and scenarist Derek Kolstad respectively return as director and writer for the bullet-riddled bloodbath “John Wick 2,” and Keanu Reeves reprises his role as the invincible, sharp-shooting assassin who doesn’t aim to please.  No, Wick’s new pet pooch doesn’t die in this installment.  Moreover, no other animals are harmed.  Anybody who saw the original “John Wick” knows the villains spoke in awe about John Wick’s lethal use of pencils.  Appropriately enough, Stahelski stages a pencil scene for the sequel, and you will have an entirely new respect for yellow number two pencils.  We’ll have to see if something like this doesn’t ultimately winds up as merchandise to advertise the franchise.  This unbreakable pencil preserves its point throughout a slam-bang combat encounter that would shatter a regular pencil.  Audaciously preposterous, hopelessly predictable, but thoroughly captivating nonsense, “John Wick 2” pushes everything to the limit except the number of lines uttered by Keanu Reeves.  Tired of gun shy, shoot’em ups that confine their mortality rates to single digits? “John Wick 2” boasts a triple-digit body count with an alarming number of head shots.  Typically, our bruised and battered hero pumps two slugs into an adversary’s torso and then polishes them off with one in the noggin.  When he exhausts his ammo, he resorts to battlefield salvage and appropriates another man’s weapon so he can keep on killing. Meaning, if you require discretion in the depiction of violence, you may have complaints about this exciting, atmospheric, and elegantly lensed action thriller with lots of colorfully illuminated settings.  Incidentally, “John Wick 2” reunites Reeves and “Matrix” co-star Laurence Fishburne for a couple of scenes. Were it little more than the original, “John Wick 2” wouldn’t be as memorable, but it is something more with some imaginative tweaks that its predecessor lacked.

“John Wick: Chapter 2” picks up where the previous epic ended.  Since Wick has acquired a new dog, he searches now for the car that his enemies stole, and the film opens with an over-the-top, car-smashing, body-crashing encounter in a rival mobster’s garage with our hero relying on wits, fists, and martial arts.  Like a respectable sequel, “John Wick 2” reminds us what was at stake in the first film as well as the character of our hero.  A relative of the mobsters who shot Wick’s puppy dog and then beat him senseless, Abram (Peter Stormare of “22 Jump Street”) is preparing to clear out since he fears Wick is coming after him next.  While Wick dispatches Abram’s army of thugs and mechanics, Abram’s eyes bulge with abject terror, and Stormare gives a great performance by his reactions to the arrival of his adversary.  When they finally meet after our hero has cleared a gauntlet of killers, Wick pours Abram a drink and proposes peace with a toast.  The two gulp their liquor and forge an armistice.  Abram bids Wick a happy retirement.  Naturally, however, nothing of the sort is going to happen either for Wick or the audience.  In a bit of backstory, we learn that John Wick indebted himself to a treacherous, high-ranking mobster, Santino D'Antonio (Riccardo Scamarcio of “Loose Cannons”), with a blood oath marker so he could retire and live peacefully with his wife Helen.  Now, after wrapping up his revenge, Wick discovers to his chagrin that Santino is calling in that marker!  Although Wick is in no position to refuse an assignment from Santino, he refuses to accommodate Santino because he is weary of all the shooting and killing.  A disappointed Santino leaves Wick’s house and then shoulders an awesome incendiary weapon and fire-bombs our hero’s house, blasting Wick off the premises but not killing his dog.  Resigned to his fate, Wick sits down with Santino and agrees to carry out one final mission.  The evil Santino wants the seat on an international crime council that his late father willed to his older sister, Gianna D'Antonio (Claudia Gerini of “Deceit”), and he stipulates that our hero must ice her.  Off to Rome flies Wick where he acquires an arsenal that James Bond would envy, a dark tailor-made, bullet-proof suit, and the blueprints to infiltrate Gianna’s inner sanctum and surprise her.  What Wick doesn’t plan for adequately is Gianna’s steadfast bodyguard Cassian (Common of “American Gangster”), and these two titans tangle in a blood and guts tango that ends abruptly after they crash into the sacred Continental Hotel in Rome, run by Julius (Franco Nero of “Django”), where mobsters must cease and desist because it represents the equivalent of a gangland church that grants amnesty.  At this point, Wick realizes that the scheming Santino has double-crossed him.  Santino points out he wouldn’t be much of a brother if he didn’t avenge the murder of his sister.  When his own gunmen cannot liquidate Wick, Santino offers a $7-million-dollar bounty, and hitmen from every corner of the globe swarm after our resilient hero.

Aside from Keanu Reeves’ typically stoic performance, “John Wick: Chapter Two” features a sturdy cast, with Ian McShane reprising his role as Winston, the manager of the New York City Continental Hotel--where mobsters are prohibited from fighting with their adversaries, and Lance Reddick as the accommodating desk clerk Charon.  John Leguizamo appears briefly as the body shop repairman who helped Wick locate his Mustang, and Bridget Moynahan appears in a flashback as Wick’s late wife Helen.  Director Chad Stahelski, who once earned his living as Keanu Reeve’s stunt double, need never look back.  Slated to helm the new “Highlander” reboot, Stahelski keeps things thumping throughout this two-hour plus neo-noir thriller.  The hall of mirrors scene where Wick stalks Santino rivals the original scene in Orson Welles’ iconic thriller “The Lady from Shanghai” (1947).  

FILM REVIEW OF ''THE LAST WITCH HUNTER" (2015)

“The Last Witch Hunter” (* OUT OF ****) casts spells that are far from inspired and mediocre at best.  “Dungeons & Dragons” aficionado Vin Diesel toplines this ponderous, PG-13 rated pabulum as an 800-year old protagonist who struggles with the help of the Catholic Church to preserve a precarious peace between witches and mankind.  Not only does Diesel appear incredibly miscast as an immortal “Highlander” type medieval warrior careening around contemporary New York City in a sports car, but also this witchy washy yarn doesn’t surpass superior witchcraft fantasies such as “Snow White and The Huntsman” (2012) and “Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters” (2013).  The chief problem with this lavishly-produced, CGI-laden extravaganza is that it takes itself far too seriously.  Apart from its dire shortage of humor, this dreary potboiler suffers from a dearth of quotable dialogue, banal adversaries, and second-rate supporting characters.  Gifted thespians like Oscar-winner Michael Caine and Elijah Wood shrivel in lackluster roles as our hero’s sidekicks who are designated as ‘Dolans.’  “Sahara” director Breck Eisner and three scenarists, Cory Goodman of “Priest” along with Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless of “Dracula Untold,” have conjured up a synthetic storyline that generates neither charisma nor spectacle.  Actually, they appear to have imitated the sensational Wesley Snipes’ vampire saga “Blade” right down to its rebirth of an ancient blood demon.  Similarly, “The Last Witch Hunter” should have bristled with non-stop momentum, violently outlandish combat sequences, and a coherently contrived mythology.  Instead, it degenerates into a dreary mumbo-jumbo melodrama.  The most ambitious CGI scene pits our hero against a clumsy beast known as ‘the Sentinel,’ and he destroys behemoth with a sword as if he were a bullfighter straddling it.  This unruly creature resembles a huge tiger that appears as it if were assembled from wicker and features a jet engine afterburner for its gullet.  Our hero’s chief adversary is a hideous Witch Queen swarming with creepy crawlies who looks like she has spent too many centuries in a mud bath.  Moreover, she boasts none of the imaginative flamboyance of Charlize Theron’s enchantress in “Snow White and the Huntsman.” 

“The Last Witch Hunter” unfolds during the chilly Middle Ages.  A group of stalwart souls armed with swords trudge through snow-swept, mountainous terrain to storm an eerie cluster of haunted trees.  A despicable looking dame known as the Witch Queen (Julie Engelbrecht of the TV mini-series “The Strain”) inhabits this stronghold raging with fire and brimstone.  Predictably, she isn’t glad to see these bearded gate-crashers with their religious iconography.  This homicidal hag with her hatred for mankind has already decimated humanity with a black plague and incurred our hero’s wrath.  The Witch Queen’s pestilence exterminated our hero’s wife and daughter, and his happier times with them are recounted in several flashbacks.  When Kaulder (Vin Diesel with dwarfish dreadlocks) and the Witch Queen tangle, our fearless witch hunter skewers her with his flaming sword and finishes her off.  Ironically, Kaulder survives this trial by combat, but his survival becomes a tribulation.  “I curse you,” howls the wounded witch.  “You’ll never know peace. You will never die.”

 

Afterward, “The Last Witch Hunter” shifts its setting from the 13^th century to the 21st century.  Our brawny, shaven-headed hero with neither dwarfish facial fuzz nor noggin fur prowls a passenger jet as it encounters foul weather.  Actually, an ignorant young witch has smuggled a dangerous collection of runes aboard the aircraft, and she is to blame for the increment weather.  Naturally, our erudite hero invokes his age-old wisdom and defuses these volatile artifacts.  Nothing about this scene creates either suspense or excitement.  As his own personal reward, Kaulder seduces a nubile stewardess before he sits down for the last time with his 36^th Dolan (Michael Caine of “The Dark Knight”), a revered Catholic cleric who has spent the last 50 years chronicling our protagonist’s escapades for posterity.  Incidentally, Dolans are members of a covert Axe and Cross society within the Catholic Church.  Like Kaulder, they have devoted themselves to maintaining an uneasy truce between humans and witches.  In “The Last Witch Hunter,” witches walk the earth with mankind, just as vampires did in “Blade,” but few people know about their phantasmagorical presence.  Kaulder and the clerics act as intermediaries who work alongside the crafty Witch Counsel to keep these necromancers in line.  Kaulder captures witches who illegally practice black magic, and the Witch Counsel entomb them in a maze of caves.

 

The 36^th Dolan is poised to retire, and the 37^th Dolan (Elijah Wood of “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy) prepares to replace him.  Although he saved the 37^th Dolan from a coven of witches, Kaulder doesn’t immediately recognize this newcomer.  Meantime, dramatic complications occur when the 36^th Dolan appears to have been murdered under mysterious circumstances by a shape-shifting sorcerer.  Kaulder discovers black magic at the scene of the crime and suspects that his ancient adversary, the Witch Queen, may have been playing possum all those years.  Along the way, Kaulder recruits a ‘good’ witch Chloe (Rose Leslie from “Game of Thrones”) to help him sort out the mystery.  Chloe’s claim to fame is her ability to cavort in dreams.  Happily, she rescues Kaulder from one disastrous dream after another when the Witch Queen’s evil cronies attack him on several occasions.  Our hero believes the solution to his quandary lies within his “Matrix” like dreams.

Ultimately, “The Last Witch Hunter” is largely incomprehensible gobbledygook.  Eisner and his scribes have enormous problems mapping out their complex witchcraft mythology.  They sprinkle bread crumbs of information about these conjurers throughout the muddled melodramatics, but seldom does anything about them come across as palatable.  Two surprises occur during these sluggish shenanigans, but neither are genuine revelations if you have paid attention to the formulaic plot.  The villains don’t stand out from the background, and the Witch Queen is stuck in the mud from the start.  Eisner orchestrates several big-budget action scenes, but these emerge as sloppy exercises.  Altogether, “The Last Witch Hunter” qualifies as hex-rated rubbish.

FILM REVIEW OF ''SURVIVOR" (2014)

"Ninja Assassin" director James McTeigue's "Survivor" (***1/2 OUT OF ****) qualifies as a tense, London-based, international-terrorist thriller about a wrongly accused American Foreign Service Officer sought for murdering a colleague, while a lethal assassin pursues her to finish his execution.  Milla Jovovich plays the heroine, but she isn't in full kick butt "Resident Evil" mode, wielding weapons and mixed martial arts. Instead, she is simply exemplary at her job, rides a motorcycle with style, speaks several languages, and knows how to stay one step ahead of her fleet-footed adversaries.  Nevertheless, while this makes her an efficient, no-nonsense protagonist, nothing about her character is terribly interesting. In a splendid example of casting against the grain, former 007 star Pierce Brosnan exudes menace as an evil assassin who refuses to quit. Brosnan's hit-man is nicknamed 'the Watchmaker,' and he is both smart and resourceful.  One of 'the Watchmaker's smartest efforts occurs when he takes a short-cut to catch up with our heroine as she scrambles down a staircase.  The Watchmaker spots a series of lights attached by a cable dangling in the stairway well.  Improbably, he leaps onto it and shoots out the lights as he slides down the cable.  Of course, he doesn't get her, but it is a really cool move of his part. This scene is reminiscent of Matt Damon in "The Bourne Identity" when he used a man's body to drop from several floors in a stairway well to reach the bottom.  A solid supporting cast, with James D'Arcy and Angela Bassett in minor roles, backs up Jovovich and Brosnan.  At the core of this outlandish but briskly-paced thriller is a terrorist's ambitious plan to use the New Year's Eve ceremonies in Times Square as the setting to detonate a bomb.  McTeigue maintains palatable tension throughout this above-average nail-biter despite a minor lapse in credibility that occurs about three-fourths of the way through his 96-minute, PG-13 melodrama.

Passport visa clearance is a hot issue at the American Embassy in London where Kate works, and she has the final say on who gets a passport.  Nonetheless, a fellow Embassy employee, Bill Talbot (Robert Forster of "Jackie Brown"), wants her to lighten up with regard to a physician, Emile Balan (Roger Rees of "The Prestige"), who wants to attend a conference in the U.S.  Warning signs come up that alert Kate Abbott (Milla Jovovich of "The Fifth Element") and she has second thoughts.  During the prologue, two American helicopter pilots are shot down over Kandahar Province, Afghanistan, and the villainous natives let one of the pilots live while they doused the other with gasoline and immolate him. Now, Bill Talbot is struggling to get Kate out of the picture, but the villains have his son, believed dead, in custody and are blackmailing him. Indeed, he is desperate enough that the villains hire a ruthless assassin, Nash (Pierce Brosnan of "Die Another Day") to blow up the Embassy staff, including Abbott, who is attending Bill's birthday party at a fashionable British restaurant. Ironically enough, the Embassy staff are going to be served pressed duck. Our heroine escapes by the skin of her teeth because nobody remembered to bring Bill's birthday present. She leaves the restaurant and enters a shop across the street about the same time that Nash triggers the bomb. Imagine Nash's surprise when he spots Abbott in the street looking battered and worse for the wear from the experience. He whips out an automatic pistol with a silencer attached to it and pursues her.

Naturally, since Kate is the protagonist and the protagonist must survive, Nash's accuracy with his weapon is compromised enough that she escapes.  Later, adhering to protocol, she encounters Bill at a rendezvous safe zone in a public park. Shocked at her presence, Bill pulls out an automatic pistol and tries to kill Kate. The two struggle over Bill’s weapon, and Bill winds up accidentally shooting himself in the stomach. Following all the classic tropes since "North by Northwest," Kate ends up with the pistol in her fist. Moreover, Bill staggers into public view, and sightseers snap photos and lens videos of the dumbstruck Kate several steps behind the mortally wounded Talbot with the pistol conspicuously held in her hand. Of course, she denies her guilt but then takes flight. Now, the video has gone viral, and Kate's superior, Sam Parker (Dylan McDermott of "In the Line of Fire"), is trying to reach her before British authorities with shoot-on-site orders can catch her. Indeed, the troubled U.S. Ambassador, Maureen Crane (Angela Bassett of “Waiting to Exhale”) contacts British security expert Paul Anderson (James D’Arcy) and grants him clearance to kill Abbott. The first half-hour goes by really rapidly despite its formulaic shenanigans, and McTeigue generates an air of urgency as Kate takes it on the lam and Nash resolves to liquidate her. Kate enjoys extraordinary luck eluding the authorities and Nash is the kind of assassin who likes to tie up as many loose ends as possible. Incredibly, she manages to impersonate a tourist and gets back to the United States in time to barely take down Nash. The finale atop a Big Apple skyscraper with Jovovich battling it out with Brosnan will have you on the edge of your seat holding your breath. Not only does "Survivor" live up to its generic title but it also is a terrific little thriller.

FILM REVIEW OF ''NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM" (2006)

Children that haven't seen the Robin Williams fantasy "Jumanji" (1995) may enjoy the supernatural shenanigans in the new Ben Stiller comedy fantasy "Night at the Museum" more than their elders. Like the "Jumanji" inspired space epic "Zathura" (2005), "Night At the Museum" plunges average everyday mortals—usually a single father and his children (numbers vary)--into paranormal peril, but the principals don't play games in this variation on a theme. As entertaining and imaginative as both "Jumanji" and "Zathura," "Night at the Museum" (***1/2 OUT OF ****) resembles one of its best computer-generated special effects—the rambunctious skeleton dinosaur that prefers to play fetch with one of its own bones like a dog. Meaning, "Night at the Museum" qualifies as bare-bones buffoonery that shuns literal logic for outlandish laughs. This 108 minute nonsense relies on lowest common denominator comedy with a PG rating. Ben Stiller makes himself appear suitably ridiculous as a divorced dad who wants to impress his impressionable young son. Stiller's on-again, off-again co-star Owen Wilson, best known for "Wedding Crashers," has a small role—literally speaking--but gets in a few jibes at Stiller's expense. Wilson plays a pint-sized cowpoke in a railroad diorama who clashes with an empire-building Roman centurion (Steve Coogan of "Around the World in 80 Days") from another diorama. The two constantly clash with each until our sincere, underdog hero convinces them to stop fighting each other and help him with the animals. Classic TV comedian Dick Van Dyke and classic screen comedian Mickey Rooney steal a couple of scenes from Stiller as villains forged in the "Home Alone" mold.  Although it relies lavishly on its special effects to compensate for its skeletal storyline and its superficial characters, "Night at the Museum" boasts more than enough breakneck adventure. Stiller gravitates between two gals, his ex-wife Erica (Kim Raver of TV's "24") and an attractive museum docent Rebecca (Carla Gugino of "Snake Eyes"), but the movie gives these relationships short shrift. The father and son relationship at the heart of the drama doesn't fare any better, serving largely as a plot device to advance the action. Unlike both "Jumanji" and "Zathura," "Night at the Museum" also contains armies of  Lilliputian soldiers along the lines of Jonathan Swift's "Gulliver's Travels." Clearly, "Pink Panther" director Shawn Levy and co-scenarists Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon of TV's "Reno: 911" had their work cut out for them. They fleshed out Croatian artist Milan Trenc's 32-page illustrated novel, published back in 1993 by Barrons, and targeted primarily at pre-schoolers. Undoubtedly, Levy and company added the farcical scene where a small monkey urinates contemptuously on our hapless hero.

Brooklyn born Larry Daley (Ben Stiller of "Meet the Parents") is a deadbeat dad in search of a job. Larry is one of those crack-pot inventors who conjure up their ideas a little too late to capitalize on them. He explains to an unsympathetic job counselor, Debbie (his real-life mother Anne Meara), that his finger-snapping lights failed because most people found it far easier to clap rather than snap. While the "clapper" lights proved to be a success, Larry's "snapper" lights sank out of sight. Fearful that his ten-year old son Nick Daley (newcomer Jake Cherry) will be ashamed of him, Larry agrees to take a lowly job as a night watchman at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. Of course, it doesn't help matters in Larry's eyes that his ex-wife's new boyfriend (Paul Rudd of "The 40-Year Old Virgin") has convinced Nick to follow in his footsteps as a Wall Street bond trader. The current day watchman, Cecil (Dick Van Dyke of TV's "Diagnosis Murder"), tells Larry that the museum plans to down-size security, and Larry will end up doing the work of three guards. Mickey Rooney of the venerable "Andy Hardy" movies and Bill Cobbs of "New Jack City" play the other two veteran guards. Cecil, Gus, and Reginald will retire from the museum since attendance is severely down. What they neglect to tell Larry is that the animals-on-display, the full-sized replicas of historical figures, and the finger-sized soldiers in the dioramas come alive at night. The next day Cecil enlightens Larry. According to Cecil, an ancient Egyptian artifact on the premises radiates an inexplicable power that brings these displays to life. If any of the museum pieces try to escape, they suffer the unhappy fate of being turned into powder at the first light of day. Otherwise, everything in the museum returns to normal. Craftily, Cecil, Gus, and Reginald have plans for that relic and Larry will be their unwitting fall guy. Virtually everything that can go awry in Larry's life occurs on the second night on his job, but the movie makers play it all for Keystone Kops style slapstick.

Despite the monkey that anoints our hero with a golden shower, "Night at the Museum" is about as family-friendly as a PG-rated movie can get. Although the violence is unmistakably synthetic, some youngsters may cringe at the rampaging T-Rex. The special effects wizards have again broken new ground in computer-generated animation, but the animals
themselves lack personality. Again, the T-Rex skeleton earns some laughs for behaving like a colossal canine. Robin Williams wears a period Rough Riders' army outfit throughout as former president Teddy Roosevelt, but he is as spontaneous as ever. Smitten by a pretty Indian maiden in a Lewis and Clark display, Teddy is too shy to talk to her until Larry coaxes him out of his shell. Chiefly, Levy and his scribes poke fun at Stiller as he struggles to outfox the obnoxious animals or befriend the historical figures. Nevertheless, everything is handled
with such imagination that it is no wonder this lightweight lark coined over $574 million worldwide. Don't leave the theater before the end credits conclude because you'll miss an important facet of the finale. If you enjoy "Night at the Museum," you should also check out "Jumanji" and "Zathura." "Zathura" to see how much better these movies are by comparison.

FILM REVIEW OF "TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES" (2014)

Believe it or not, I saw the original “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” movie when it appeared in theaters back in 1990, and I enjoyed it for the harmless guilty pleasure that it provided.  The exploits of a quartet of anthropomorphic chelonian crime-fighters was as entertaining as its eponymous characters were bizarre.  Bandanna-clad vigilantes armed with an arsenal of feudal Japanese weaponry; these nimble turtles talked, walked, and displayed a predilection for pizza.  Creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird never imagined their mutated box turtles with the names of Renaissance painters would become a comic book sensation and would remain in print for 26 years from 1984 to 2010.  Eastman and Laird said they drew inspiration from the works of Frank Miller and Jack Kirby.  Specifically, Eastman and Laird sought to skewer not only “The New Mutants” and “Daredevil” at Marvel, but also the eccentric Canadian comic “Cerebus the Aardvark” as well as Frank Miller’s “Ronin” at DC Comics.  The Ninja Turtles have since metamorphosed into a social phenomenon, with three animated television series and a short-lived live-action series debuting a fifth turtle, a female called "Venus de Milo" skilled in the supernatural art of shinobi.  Four “TMNT” films followed from 1990 to 2007.  The first three movies were live-action while the fourth film “TMNT” (2007) was animated opus.  Almost 25 years after the original “Turtles” movie came out; Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon have rebooted “The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” with bombastic “Transformers” director Michael Bay as producer and “Wrath of the Titans” director Jonathan Liebesman calling the shots.  No matter what you’ve heard about this latest adaptation, the new “Ninja Turtles” movie sticks pretty much to the basics.  Casey Jones, the human vigilante with a hockey stick who served as a romantic interest for news reporter April O’Neil, has been jettisoned by “Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol” scenarists Josh Appelbaum & André Nemec and “Divergent” scripter Evan Daugherty.  Happily, while the characters have undergone some significant changes, “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” (**** OUT OF ****) emerges as a derivative but exhilarating rollercoaster of a joyride that should satisfy most of the vintage fans.  

Unlike the 1990 version, this “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” reboot revises the characters.  Channel 6 news reporter April O’Neil (Megan Fox of “Jennifer’s Body”) is more than a television journalist covering a widespread crime wave engulfing New York City.  April is now the daughter of one of the scientists who toiled on Project Renaissance.  April’s father and his partner Eric Sacks (William Fichtner of “The Lone Ranger”) were conducting experiments on four turtles and a rodent to devise a new mutagen strain for its medicinal qualities.  Unfortunately, O’Neil’s father perished in a mysterious fire in their laboratory while Sacks managed to survive.  Neither April’s deceased father nor Eric Sacks knew about April’s role in rescuing the rodent Splinter and the turtles from the conflagration.  She turned them loose in the sewer.   Years later April finds herself struggling with a story about the Foot Clan, an underworld syndicate run by a notorious Asian criminal called Shredder.  Unlike the original “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” movie, Shredder doesn’t use runaway adolescents to execute his evil designs.  Instead, he commands an army of deadly adult ninjas packing automatic weapons with orders to kill.  After Shredder discovers that the Ninja Turtles survived the fire, he orders his second-in-command, Karai (Minae Noji of “The Last Run”), to take hostages.  Shredder hopes the vigilante turtles will try to rescue the hostages and fall into his trap.  Naturally, Raphael (Alan Ritchson), Michelangelo (Noel Fisher), Leonardo (Pete Ploszek) and Donatello (Jeremy Howard) show up to save the hostages held at gunpoint in a subway station.  Shredder explodes with rage when the Turtles not only thwart his plan but also leave his minions trussed up like turkeys for the police.  Meantime, April shadows the Turtles and tries to photograph them, but they frustrate her efforts and delete the pictures from her cell phone.  Eventually, the Turtles escort her to their lair where Master Splinter (Danny Woodburn) reveals that she alone rescued them from the fire.  When April takes her outlandish tale to her boss, Bernadette Thompson (Whoopi Goldberg of “Ghosts of Mississippi”), she loses her job.  Basically, April finds herself back at square one with nobody to help her than her father’s old partner affluent billionaire Eric Sacks.  

“Battle Los Angeles” director Jonathan Liebesman generates madcap momentum throughout the PG-rated film’s agile 101 minutes.  The new Ninja Turtles are even more differentiated than their predecessors.  Standing six feet tall, they resemble the Marvel Comics character the Hulk.  They still crave pizza, but their abilities have been ramped up far and away beyond what they could achieve before this outrageous reboot.  For example, Donatello has been transformed into a nerdy computer hacker.  Furthermore, the Turtles’ leader Splinter sports a longer tale which he deploys as if it were a bullwhip.  Shredder resembles a samurai version of Darth Vader from “Star Wars.”  He has special devices attached to his wrists that enable him to sling dozens of deadly knives. The knives behave like boomerangs so he can retrieve them if they miss their targets.  Truly, Shredder here emerges as a stronger, more contentious villain who puts the lives of our heroes in jeopardy until the last minute.  Interestingly enough, unlike most fantasy thrillers that create massive destruction but almost no collateral damage, innocent bystanders suffer from the falling debris in one scene.  Liebesman lenses the action so his cameras are constantly whirling around the various characters.  The most gripping scene occurs when our heroes are in an 18-wheeler that plunges down the snow-swept mountain.  This adrenaline-laced scene alone makes the classic chase in “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” look like a spin on a tricycle!  People who suffer from motion sickness may find this scene a challenge to handle.  You don’t have to be a kid to appreciate this muscular, slam-bang, over-the-top actioneer with incomparable computer generated imagery and hilarious shenanigans to spare.