Cindy Prascik's Reviews of Muppets Most Wanted & Divergent

Dearest Blog, having force-fed myself a Serious Grownup Movie last weekend, this week it was back to my usual fare with Muppets Most Wanted and Divergent.

Spoiler level here will be mild, nothing you wouldn't know or have guessed from the trailers.
Since my tolerance for little kids is marginally lower than my tolerance for teenagers, I got Muppets Most Wanted out of the way first.

Fresh off their reunion show and against Kermit's better judgment, a new manager (Ricky Gervais) convinces the Muppets to go on a world tour, but a sold-out European run and a unusually agreeable Kermit may not be the good news they seem.

Dear reader(s), though I try not to read anyone else's reviews before I've written mine, living online as I do, I can't help but see the occasional headline or comment. The general consensus on Muppets Most Wanted seems to be that it's good, but not as good as 2011's The Muppets. Guess I'm once again in the minority, for as much as I loved The Muppets, I think Muppets Most Wanted is even better.
Muppets Most Wanted picks up, literally, where The Muppets left off, lingering just long enough to earn a few laughs with some obvious-but-still-funny sequel jokes. Once it gets rolling, the caper is amusing and never drags, with musical numbers staged at the Siberian gulag providing the best comic moments.

As we've come to expect, Muppets Most Wanted is littered with cameos from celebs and pseudo-celebs, and I shan't name them lest I spoil it for those who want to be surprised. Since I imagine everyone knows who stars in the movie, I can say that Gervais, Tina Fey, and Ty Burrell are in top form, though I find it a little offensive that they enjoy billing over the folks who provide Muppet voices--the movie's real stars. If I have one complaint that isn't really a complaint, it's that a little too much of Muppets Most Wanted may be aimed over the heads of the young target audience; it's undoubtedly a "kids' movie," but I think the adults might actually enjoy it more.

Muppets Most Wanted runs 112 minutes and is rated PG for "some mild action."
Like its predecessors, Muppets Most Wanted is a terrific family film full of music, laughs, and thoroughly entertaining cameos.

Of a possible nine Weasleys, Muppets Most Wanted gets seven and a half.

Closing yesterday's docket was the young adult thriller Divergent.

Survivors of an apocalyptic event are divided into factions, based on their personality types. When a young girl discovers she's a Divergent--one of those who fit with no one type and who are considered a threat to the new world order--she struggles for survival within the faction she's chosen.

Dear Blog, I'm nothing if not painfully honest, so if I'm going to criticize something, I'm also going to admit when that criticism might just be due to the fact that said "something" isn't made with me in mind. Not saying it's impossible for someone outside the target audience to enjoy a movie (see: Muppets Most Wanted, above), but being almost 48 years old, I enjoyed Grudge Match a helluva lot more than I enjoyed Divergent, which may not be entirely Divergent's fault. Then again...

We'll get the obvious out of the way first: clearing the two-hour threshold by a good 20 minutes, Divergent is too damn long and easily could have been trimmed by 30 minutes without losing anything of consequence. Making the obligatory comparisons: the story is neither as good as The Hunger Games nor as painfully bad as Twilight. Shailene Woodley is no Jennifer Lawrence, either.

The supporting cast boasts some notable names--Ashley Judd, Kate Winslet, Mekhi Phifer, Maggie Q, and the always magnificent Ray Stevenson--but they seem to have neither the opportunity nor the inclination to distinguish the movie from the current glut of ho-hum young adult fiction. Divergent features broadly-drawn characters and insipid dialogue by the bucketful, and mistakes peripheral character deaths for heartbreaking plot twists.

By now, dear reader(s), you may be asking, "So why did you bother seeing this, anyway?" That question I can answer in two words: Theo James. Yep, I've been nursing a scorching crush ever since he had fatal sex with Lady Mary Crawley in the first season of Downton Abbey and I had to overturn heaven and earth to find out who he was. I hoped he'd be a big deal someday, and, if I wished it'd be in something better than this, well, he's young yet, eh? Divergent doesn't place any particular strain on his acting skills, but I can confidently say I would have been kinda bored with someone I liked less in the male lead. As it stands, James has enough screentime to make Divergent more than worth the price of admission.

Divergent clocks in at a bloated 139 minutes and is rated PG13 for "intense violence and action, thematic elements, and some sensuality."

A so-so movie that would have benefitted greatly from a shorter runtime, Divergent may have teens hanging on its every minute, but the rest of us are bound to find it considerably less thrilling.

Of a possible nine Weasleys, Divergent gets four and a half.

Until next time...

Oh, don't pretend like YOU wouldn't sit through a so-so movie for this!

Movie Reviews: WHITEOUT & THE INVENTION OF LYING

Tuesday, February 02, 2010
Movie Reviews: WHITEOUT & THE INVENTION OF LYING

ON DVD

WHITEOUT

A U.S. marshall tracking a vicious murderer through the Antarctic must locate the killer before the sun sets for six months, or risk being trapped in the dark with the madman for months on end in director Dominic Sena's adaptation of the graphic novel series by Greg Rucka. U.S. marshall Carrie Stetko (Kate Beckinsale) has been stationed at Antarctica's South Pole research base for two years, and now after turning in her resignation she's looking forward to finally going home. The last plane out leaves in just three days, and just after that ..Antarctica.. will not see the sun again for another 24 weeks. Then, just 72 hours before she is set to escape the coming darkness, a body is discovered in the ice -- prompting the first murder investigation ever to take place on the desolate Antarctic Circle continent. Little does Carrie realize that she's suddenly been thrust into a mystery over 60 years in the making, and that the killer is ready to strike again in order to protect a grim secret. Now, as the death toll starts to rise, loyalties shift, and a massive series of whiteouts blow bitter winds across the frozen landscape, the U.S. marshall who wanted nothing more than to escape the cold must work around the clock to catch a killer before the blinding white snow gives way to the deadly darkness of winter. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Cast: Kate Beckinsale, Gabriel Macht, Tom Skerritt, Columbus Short, Alex O'Loughlin.

Director Dominic Sena

Release Date: Sept. 11, 2009

Rated R for violence, grisly images, brief strong language and some nudity.

Runtime: 1 hr. 41 min.

Genres: Action, Thriller

REVIEW:

It’s never a good thing when the peak of a movie is a gratuitously long shot of Beckinsale disrobing as she gets ready for a shower. After watching the film, I am left with the feeling that there was more effort put into figuring out how to get Kate Beckinsale to show some skin in a movie that takes place entirely, sans a few flashbacks, in the South Pole. Mission accomplished, I guess. As for the rest of the movie, Dominic Sena delivers a woefully paint by the number murder mystery that seems like it was scripted by a computer programmed to churn out low level CSI plots. Everything about the story is terribly hackneyed and there is zero tension as every twist or turn is about as obvious as a little league soft ball pitch. Sena’s direction here is equally generic as he brings very little to the table doing nothing with the locale outside of pointing out that it’s really cold and windy. Kate Beckinsale bored most of the time and is just going through the motions; it’s not a terrible performance but nothing special either. Gabriel Macht is as stoic and mysterious as the script allows but like everything else here his work like his character is generic with a capital G. Tom Skerritt has a supporting role but mostly he just looks like he wishes he was elsewhere the entire time. The rest of the cast are mainly fodder for the killer especially when they have something to say which might be important. Whiteout is one of the strongest works in cinematic banality I’ve seen in a long while. It’s the type of film that plays in the background and you don’t really feel like you missing anything.

D

THE INVENTION OF LYING

Ricky Gervais directs himself in The Invention of Lying, a comedy in which everyone in the world tells the truth except for one misfit in the film industry, who after discovering the act of lying, milks it to become the world's most phenomenal performer. Matthew Robinson will co-direct from his own script, which he and Gervais collaborated on. Jennifer Garner, Rob Lowe, Jonah Hill, and Louis C.K. co-star in the Media Rights Capital production, with John Hodgman, Tina Fey, Christopher Guest, and Jeffrey Tambor rounding out the rest of the cast. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, All Movie Guide


Cast: Ricky Gervais, Jennifer Garner, Louis C.K., Rob Lowe, Jonah Hill.

Director: Ricky Gervais

Release Date: Oct 02, 2009

Rated PG-13 for language including some sexual material and a drug reference

Runtime:1 hr. 39 min.

Genres: Comedy, Romance


REVIEW:



The Invention of Lying is the type of film that leaves you scratching your head once you’ve finished watching it. The cast is a collection of comedic heavyweights who could carry a film on their own. It’s directed and co written by its star Ricky Gervais whom I consider a comedic genius. The movie’s conceit is interesting and initially funny but as the film goes on it loses traction fairly quickly. Gervais has an interesting idea to work with and there are decent amounts of laughs to be had but some of the concepts just aren’t executed to the fullest extent. A secondary issue is that the tone of the film is unclear throughout as it changes frequently and as the film nears its end it decides to play a little too nice and safe which comes off as artificial and hollow. Gervais himself is in fine form in his role as he delivers plenty of laughs through well timed delivery of lines and he even gets a moment stretch his drama muscle in a pivotal scene with surprising effectiveness. Jennifer Garner isn’t really asked to do too much outside of stare blankly and recite lines like she’s a 4 year old. Rob Lowe is adequate as Gervais counterpoint but doesn’t really leave much of an impression. The rest of the cast such as Louis C.K., Jonah Hill and Tina Fey are terrible underused with Fey showing up for what amounts to a short cameo. It’s hard to not walk away from The Invention of Lying without the slightest ting of disappointment. It’s a solid film that’s entertaining and contains some fairly interesting ideas, one that will probably infuriate religious folks, but the execution is sporadic and uneven, a real shame as it could have been something special with all the talent assembled.




C+