Water For Elephants

Director: Francis Lawrence
Writers: Richard LaGravenese, Sara Gruen (author)
Starring: Robert Pattinson, Reese Witherspoon, Christoph Waltz
Release Date: April 22, 2011
Length: 2 hours

Teen heartthrob Robert Pattinson takes on the lead role of Jacob Jankowski in the film adaptation of Sara Gruen’s bestselling circus novel, Water For Elephants, opposite Academy Award Winners Reese Witherspoon and Christoph Waltz. The elderly Jacob (Hal Holbrook)’s son has just forgotten to pick him up from his nursing home and take him across the street to the circus, where all the other residents are. Jacob decides he will go to the circus himself, even though he is not allowed with his age and condition. When the men working for the circus find Jacob, he realizes the circus is over and is invited inside by Charlie O’Brien (Paul Schneider), who is the owner of this circus. Jacob tells Charlie he worked on two different circuses when he was younger. Curious by Jacobs story, Charlie asks him to tell more and we go back in time to 1931, during the Great Depression when Jacob was twenty-three years old. During his final exams at Cornell Veterinary School, Jacob receives news that his parents have been killed in a car accident. When things couldn’t get any worse, he is told later that they were in major debt because they were giving people free services due to the draining Depression. This means all of their property belongs to the bank and Jacob has nothing left for him. Feeling lost, he freeloads onto a train that ends up being the traveling circus show, “The Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show On Earth!”. He is quickly taken to meet the owner of the show, the intimating and crazy August Rosenbluth (Christoph Waltz), to find work. August makes Jacob the new veterinarian of the show, since they are in need of one. August is also the animal trainer, so the two are prepared to see each other more often. Jacob meets the gorgeous and alluring Marlena (Reese Witherspoon), the wife of August, and the star of the entire show. When August impulsively purchases an elephant named Rosie, believing it will gain the show much more money, he tells Jacob and Marlena he wants an act with Marlena and Rosie ready as soon as possible. As the odd trio work closer and closer together, Jacob becomes more attracted to Marlena and he also discovers just how maniacal August is and what he must do to protect Marlena, Rosie and himself. Gruen’s wonderfully creative and unique novel told a beautiful love story with just an incredible setting. Every technicality having to do with the setting of a circus in the 1930s is translated stunningly onto film such as the extravagant costumes worn by Witherspoon and dingy clothes worn by Pattinson and the workingmen. The set design of an old circus simply made me smile and really brought Gruen’s imaginative story to life. The fantastic backdrop of this story is enough for anyone to see the film. Adapting a novel to the screen is an incredibly difficult job because if you lean too far away from the original story, you have an unfaithful revision, but if the film is too faithful, people who’ve read the novel will be bored from knowing everything that’s about too happen. Being one of those people, I have a skewed take on Water For Elephants that not everyone will agree with. The film was a scene-for-scene completely accurate depiction of the novel, which should be great for any fan that hasn’t just finished reading the book. Besides my slight annoyance, screenwriter Richard LaGravenese superbly wrote the story for the screen that made the film a somewhat cheesy, but intriguing romance in a difficult time. To bring his and Gruen’s words to life was an interesting handful of actors. The powerful Christoph Waltz who scared millions in his spin-chilling role as SS Colonel Hans Landa, aka "The Jew Hunter" and it seems he’s only continuing to be cast as the villainous character in The Green Hornet, Water For Elephants and this fall’s The Three Musketeers. Although it’s unfortunate that the incredibly talented Waltz is always being cast in the same role, it is what he does best. He similarly gives the same happy petrifying performance as August, but this time he delves further into a much deeper character. As August is a Jewish schizophrenic husband and boss of the circus, you see Waltz play more of a monstrous person as opposed to a monster. Robert Pattinson has always been a great interesting actor despite the films that brought him into fame. However he similarly always plays the same character, the brooder. Although he does carry Water For Elephants very well and his chemistry with Witherspoon is quite strong, as someone who watches many of his films, I’m getting pretty tired of his repetitive constant pout. Witherspoon gives an oddly subtle performance in Water For Elephants excluding a climactic scene between her and Waltz. Although she is gorgeous and wonderful to watch in the incredible circus acts, the audience doesn’t connect or sympathize greatly with her character. Maybe it’s what she intended for Marlena, or what director Francis Lawrence intended for the story, but it ended up generating little intrigue. Lawrence adapts an extraordinary novel into a lovely film that everyone can enjoy. Water For Elephants is nothing astonishing but certainly a pleasure to watch.

Scream 4

Director: Wes Craven
Writer: Kevin Williamson
Starring: Neve Campbell, Emma Roberts, Hayden Pannetiere
Length: 1 hour 51 minutes
Release Date: April 15, 2011

Legendary horror film director Wes Craven, returns to a franchise that many believe has been overdone. After 11 years since the last installment, the satirical slasher franchise Scream, comes back to the b screen with a whole new generation of naïve and evil teenagers. After finally recovering from her three sets of tragic murders of loved ones in her life, Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) has written a book about what she has suffered in a therapeutic way. She finally returns to her hometown that started the horrific experiences 10 years ago, Woodsboro, where she is promoting her book as a part of her tour. She stays with her aunt and cousin Jill (Emma Roberts), who jokes with her friends that Sidney, who she doesn’t know very well, is the angel of death. Unfortunately, two girls from Jill’s high school, Jenny Randall and Marnie Cooper were found stabbed to death at Jenny’s house, the day before. Soon after this, Sidney get’s a familiar call from her old friend Ghostface, warning her of coming events and the fun has just begun for them. With the help of her old friends Officer Dewey (David Arquette) and his cocky reporter wife Gail Weathers (Courtney Cox), Sidney strives to protect Jill and her friends before it’s too late but with a new generation of victims comes a new generation of tricks and tactics that Sidney won’t see coming. In this new installment of the series, traditions are of course kept from the original films, like having celebrity cameos at the beginning, discussing the clichés and annoyances of the horror genre, this time it being Anna Paquin and Kristen Bell. This film is not another add-on of the franchise that should have ended in 2000; it’s a completely original and unique film that carries the same funny mocking attitude of the old ones. Many outsiders of the Scream films don’t know that the movies are supposed to be jokes of other stupid horror films with clichés everywhere. In each scream film, a character outlines the rules and formulae of whatever the film is. In the first film, Randy gave you the standard rules, “Never say I’ll be back”, and “Never go up the stairs, when being chased by a killer”. Scream 2 gave you the formula of a sequel, “Everyone is a suspect” and “The killings are ten times bigger and bloodier”. The third reminded us that in a trilogy, “the past always come back to haunt you in the third film”. Now in the fourth, two film geeks Charlie (Rory Culkin) and Robbie (Erik Knudsen), among the friends of Jill, tell us there are new rules, the most important being “The unexpected is the new cliché”. Scream 4 keeps in tradition that the characters are the experts of horror movies but being human, never expect to be victims of a murderer. Screenwriter Kevin Williamson truly stays true to the fact that this is not only a new wave of kids, but a new wave of horror movies as well, with new rules and clichés. He also stays true to everything the film geeks warned and predicted at the beginning of the film. Williamson created a smart plot to make the story revolve around the teenagers while still making Sidney the main character, who’s really the most important. It is of course unrealistic that different people keep dressing up in the same outfit, trying to kill Sidney and her friends, but it’s The Hangover version of horror movies. It’s often pretty ridiculous and it’s unlikely this would happen four different times to her, but you love it for the sake of pure and comical entertainment. With his sharp writing and a terrific cast, Scream 4 is just as good, if not better than the very first Scream. Neve Cambpell returns to the pure and always good-hearted character of Sidney Prescott, who is always the innocent but now tough victim. Campbell is always a joy to watch as Sidney and has become quite good at exceeding the fun entertainment of Scream, that keeps the audience excited. The characters of Gail, played by Courtney Cox and her on and off-screen husband, Officer Dewey (David Arquette), have always been characters that the films could easily do without. This is only because their personalities and relationship just get’s repetitive and boring after four movies. Both always try to independently solve the murders and get into a fight because of it. However, they just end up helping each other and making up when one is injured by the killer in a fight before the climax. In addition to Campbell’s performance, the new kids are who really make the film. This is the very first time I have ever enjoyed watching the dull and lifeless Emma Roberts in a film, possibly because of the hilarious and quirky Hayden Panettiere as her best friend Kerby. Panettiere was the absorbing focus and scene-stealer of every moment she was on screen with her quirky and slightly sardonic wit while for the first time Roberts was actually intriguing.  Rory Culkin and Erik Knudsen were also quite amusing as the know-it-all movie buffs that teach everyone all the rules they need to know. Although a worrying trilogy is already in talks to be made from this film, Scream 4 is a smart, humorous exciting hell of thrill ride. If you’re a Scream fan, you will 100% be pleased by everything about this movie and if you are not, Scream 4 is still definitely worth your while.

Hanna

Director: Joe Wright

Writers: Seth Lochhead, David Farr

Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Eric Bana, Cate Blanchett

Length: 1 hour 51 minutes

Release Date: April 8, 2011

British director Joe Wright of Academy Award nominated period pieces, Pride And Prejudice and Atonement, does a complete 180 by directing the CIA action thriller, Hanna. Academy Award Nominee Saoirse Ronan, who Wright cast in Atonement, plays the title role of Hanna Heller, a very bright 16-year-old girl, who’s lived with her ex-CIA agent father, Erik (Eric Bana) her whole life in the Arctic Circle. Here, he has been training her to become the ultimate assassin, teaching her all the world’s languages and training her in combat. When Hanna passes one of her father’s hardest tests, Erik finally decides she’s ready. When he  leaves their cabin, Hanna sets off a transmitter he gave her, alerting the CIA of her presence. The tough and corrupt Agent Marissa Wiegler (Cate Blanchett) sends a team to capture Hanna and they bring her back to the CIA Moroccan Safe House. We learn now that Erik betrayed the CIA and knows a secret that cannot become public. Wiegler has been assigned to kill him and has been looking for Erik for years. Wiegler sends in a body-double of herself to talk to Hanna, and within two minutes, the woman is dead. Hanna skillfully escapes the safe house, believing she has finished the real Wiegler, who she was sent to kill. From here, we are taken on a fast-paced, unique and humorous journey of Hanna traveling to Berlin, where she will reconnect with her father. Hanna is however completely unaware of the people still trying to follow her. Screenwriters David Farr and Seth Lochhead create an unbelievable story that has all the elements a good action film needs. The most admiring things about Hanna is that the script is well-rounded, with hilarious British wit in the family she meets on the way to Berlin, continuous action-filled fun that has you on the edge of your seat and a touching poignant back-story to Hanna and her father that brings the realness of the film to life. It’s quite odd that Joe Wright took on this particular film to direct, but it’s even more peculiar how he nailed the action genre with it. With his rapid camerawork and detailed special effects, we can’t escape Hanna’s ride for an instant. The cinematography of Hanna was just beautifully spectacular, from showcasing the deserts and wild streets of Morocco to a charmingly creepy park in Berlin. The whole film has a delightfully eerie feeling, most especially with the constant children’s music playing during some of most frightening and bloodiest scenes in the film. The authentic music played throughout the film was composed by British electronic band, The Chemical Brothers. Their thrilling and unique music made this movie classify as a real action movie, even though it had so much more than that. The 16-year-old Saoirse Ronan continues to grow and grow as an incredible young actress from starting with a scene-stealing performance in Wright’s Atonement and a heartbreaking explored performance in Peter Jackson’s The Lovely Bones and now with a wonderfully unexplainable performance as Hanna. I say unexplainable because I cannot understand how Ronan managed to speak beautifully in multiple languages, be able to execute perfect action sequences and also manage to portray such an intriguing girl. Without giving anything away, Hanna is not a typical kind of human, so Ronan had to either learn or interpret how to be a mechanized, impossibly intelligent teenager that does not exist in our world. Her naivety to the outside world provides much humor in the film as well as an understanding of her character. This isn’t a cheesy depiction of a mermaid who doesn’t know what a fork is, but a depiction of the actual stress it can do to an outsider, while still being funny. Although the character of Hanna is almost impossible to relate to, Ronan makes her more human than ever with her relationship with her father and her resentment toward Marissa. She makes us understand her internal emotions on another level, never done before. There is no doubt Ronan is the complete star of the film, but she is accompanied by a fantastic cast of actors. Cate Blanchett is coldhearted and disgusting as Marissa Wiegler, without being obviously evil or crazy. The audience figures out from her subtle performance what a wicked heart Marissa holds. Eric Bana is great as Hanna’s sweet and loving father that worries this plan will not turn out well. British actor Tom Hollander, who played Mr. Collins in Wright’s Pride and Prejudice, is hilariously menacing as Marissa’s friend and undercover employee, Isaacs. The source of most humor in this film though, came from the British family Hanna meets on her way to Berlin, who help her out. The young superficial girl Sophie (Jessica Barden) who Hanna befriends is just hysterical and the contrast between her and Hanna is where the laughs come from. Her parents, played by Olivia Williams and Jason Flemyng are also quite funny and contribute to the ordinary road trip family that seems so bizarre to Hanna. There is a dark and almost disturbing underlying tone of this film that you feel throughout the whole story. It roots from the fact that Hanna is practically a child and here she is independently murdering the bad guys and traveling on her own to fulfill her purpose. Joe Wright directs one of the most enjoyable films and certainly the best action film of 2011, so far. I cannot wait to see more performances from Ronan, especially in Wright’s beautifully unique films, such as this year’s Hanna. 

Arthur

Director: Jason Winer
Writer: Peter Banyham
Starring: Russell Brand, Helen Mirren
Release Date: April 8, 2011
Length: 1 hour 50 minutes

Hot Comedian Russell Brand has just been gaining steam in his career with last year’s hilarious comedy Get Him To The Greek and supporting roles in Julie Taymor’s The Tempest and one of the best family films of the year, Despicable Me. Unfortunately his fame is bound to lead him to an unavoidable failure. In a remake of the 1981 comedy, Arthur, Brand hits his first speed bump. Arthur Bach is a British childish playboy set to inherit $950 million from his rich mother only if he marries the unendurable Susan Johnson (Jennifer Garner) to create a business partnership between his mother and Susan. For his whole life, Arthur has relied on his nanny Hobson (Helen Mirren) for everything, including escorting his one night stands out in the morning. Arthur would prefer to marry anyone but Susan, but when he falls in love with Brooklyn tour guide Naomi, he must figure out a way to get out of his marriage with out being cut off by his mother. It’s usually not the case that any remakes, let alone remakes of comedies go over well but Arthur truly proves it. It’s perfectly clear that this film was only made as a vehicle for Brand’s rising career, seeing that he fits perfectly into the role that was done thirty years ago by Dudley Moore. There is no way that there is any other reason this film would have been made if not for that slight connection. Screenwriter Peter Banyham (Borat) ends up creating an overdramatic romantic film that tries to be funny but almost never succeeds within the script. Arthur hits all the clichés as far as romcoms go, with the romance between Naomi and Brand and all the clichés of Brand’s derivative playboy persona, getting drunk all the time or having girls he doesn’t know leaving in the morning. In a cheesy comedy like this, there is a dramatic part at the end when they have to overcome their immaturity or sleaziness for someone they are close to and resolve the issue. Arthur is one of those films that have at least five of those serious plot turns . There is one after another that just cause me to question whether this is still even a comedy. It seems that about halfway through the film, Arthur’s life just keeps getting worse with more obstacles to find happiness. The romance between Naomi and Arthur is at first very cute, but eventually becomes repetitive and dull. You can see all of Brand’s best efforts as a comedian and improvisational actor to make this unfunny film better than it’s worth but he cannot even hide the banality of this movie from the audience.  You can also tell that every actor in this film is fantastic, but is unfortunately given terrible material with this film. The three talented actresses Helen Mirren, Jennifer Garner and Greta Gerwig truly deserve so much better than Arthur and so does the audience. The only times you might laugh during this film are during Brand’s clear moments of improv or an odd one-liner here or there. Go right ahead and spend your money elsewhere.

Daydream Nation

Director: Michael Goldbach
Writer: Michael Goldbach
Starring: Kat Dennings, Josh Lucas, Reece Thomspon
Release Date: April 15, 2011
Length:1 hour 28 minutes

The opening film for the Canada First program at TIFF, this year, was first time writer/director Michael Goldblach’s Daydream Nation, and what a dream it was. Starring the captivative Kat Dennings (Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist) and Josh Lucas, this film blends thrill, intensity, humor and romance all into one perfect combination. Seventeen year-old, Caroline Wexler (Kat Dennings) is moved to a small town, where everyone in her high school hates her for being an experienced smart individual from a big city. From Caroline’s perspective, all the boys in her high school are getting high all the time and all the girls are just drooling over them. Finding herself completely bored, Caroline makes it her mission to seduce her good-looking English teacher, Mr. Barry Anderson (Josh Lucas). When he eventually gives in to her, the pair develop a full secret relationship. At the same time, Thurston (Reece Thompson), a boy who goes to the same school falls in love with Caroline, who puts up with him to be nice. When Barry suggests that Caroline go out with someone her age so nobody will suspect their relationship, things in Caroline’s satisfying life start to turn on her, as she becomes seriously confused by what her relationship is with both these men. I wouldn’t be surprised if people walked out of this movie calling it a romantic comedy, a coming of age story, or even a thriller/horror movie. To me, it was all of those things combined thanks to the clever, inventive script from Michael Goldblach or the groundbreaking, hilarious, heartbreaking performance from Kat Dennings. Her character was written with such wit, grace and authenticity, and Dennings just nailed her performance to a T. Dennings made us love Caroline for the way she told people off and the confidence she had. She made us hate her, when she was being insensitive and cruel to people she thought less of. But, she mostly made us sympathize for Caroline toward the end of the film, and I was so shocked to find myself doing so. Dennings shared an intense, funny chemistry with Josh Lucas, who played her teacher, which made their relationship so interesting and easy to watch. What was great about these two characters was that the relationship between them was written and performed to make them seem just like two regular people in a relationship, who happen to be 15 years apart and one is the other’s teacher. There was no creepiness or oddity to their relationship. It just felt completely natural and real. Dennings and Reece Thompson, who plays Thurston, shared another great chemistry. This chemistry was a little less intense and a little more cute, but all the same, great to watch. Thompson alone was incredibly touching as Thurston, whom the audience repeatedly kept sympathizing towards and rooting for. The character itself was written so detailed, to make everyone understand him more as a person and not just the loser who likes Caroline. Surprisingly, one of my favourite aspects of the film was the creepy small town feel it had. The eeriness of the movie, made it that much more unique, so it wasn’t just another dramedy about a teenage girl. I clapped so hard at the end of the screening, my arms started to hurt. One of the best films at TIFF this year, Daydream Nation is so intriguing and so original, you won’t want it to end.