For eight years on television Adrian Grenier, Kevin Dillon, Kevin Connolly, Jerry Ferrara and Jeremy Piven provided a glamourized behind-the-scenes look at how Hollywood works.
In a scene at the end of the new “Entourage” film someone has the idea of turning the exploits of actor Vincent Chase, his best friend and manager Eric Murphy, half brother Johnny Drama and pal Turtle into a movie. “Sounds more like a TV show,” cracks Ari, the hotshot agent who made Vincent a superstar.
You know what? He’s right. It worked better as a TV show than it does as a movie.
The movie picks up just after the TV show ended. Chase (Grenier) is newly divorced and looking for a new film project. His former agent Ari (Piven) is now a studio head and has the perfect project for him, an updated version of the “Jekyll and Hyde” story. There’s a twist though. Chase has developed the Hollywood disease known as “Directoromyelitis Syndrome.” He’ll only agree to star in the film if he can also direct. A deal is struck, but when Chase lets the budget get away from him Ari must try and wrangle $15 million more from the film’s conservative Texan finaciers, billionaire Larsen McCredle (Billy Bob Thornton) and his son Travis (Haley Joel Osment). If they can’t get the money to finish the film it could be the end of the line for Vinnie, Ari and the guys.
“Entourage” the movie feels like binge watching three or four episodes of the television show. No attempt has been made to make the movie more cinematic than the show or to deepen the characters or situations. Chase is still the carefree superstar who thinks he can start all over again by moving back to his old neighbourhood in Queens if everything goes sour. Turtle remains a romantic wannabe while Johnny Drama is wracked by insecurity and E quietly tries to keep everything from spinning out of control.
If the name “Arrested Development” hadn’t already been taken by another show it would have been the perfect title for this bunch, who are more interested in meeting women and when they’re not meeting women, then talking about women than they are in behaving like actual living, breathing people. Perhaps their insipid behaviour is a comment on the vapid Hollywood lifestyle or maybe it is just vapid. I think suggesting a movie that uses a line like, “when one vagina closes, another one opens,” of any grand, high-minded purpose is overstating things by a mile.
All the glitz and glam in the world—the movie is a tribute to lifestyle porn—can cover the emptiness of the story, and even filling up screen time with an extensive array of cameos—everyone from Kelsey Grammer and Pharrell Williams to Liam Neeson and Andrew Dice Clay pop up for one line gags—does little more than turn the film into a celebrity “Where’s Waldo” exercise.
There is a sense of familiarity that comes along with watching the “Entourage” movie, like seeing old friends you haven’t hung out with for a while, but you can’t help but think that the film-within-the-film is more interesting than the movie you’re actually watching.
The advertising tagline for “Transformers: Age of Extinction” is “This is not war, it’s extinction,” which is catchy enough, I suppose, but having seen it I couldn’t help but think that “Cum on Feel the Noize,” a song lyric by either Slade or Quiet Riot, depending on your age, would have been more appropriate.
Michael Bay’s latest is eardrum shatteringly loud, guaranteed to leave you with ringing ears and a rumbling theatre seat. Visually, expect scorched eyes. Bay has made a movie for three of your five senses—only smell and taste are exempt—but will it entertain your brain while launching an all out assault on your senses?
Picking up four years after the invasion of Chicago seen in the last Transformers film, “Dark of the Moon,” the action begins when unemployed robotic engineer Cade Yeager (Mark Wahlberg) and daughter Tessa (Nicola Peltz) uncover deactivated Autobot, Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen) hidden under a pile of junk. Their discovery puts them in the crosshairs of CIA agent Harold Attinger (Kelsey Grammer) and tech tycoon Joshua Joyce (Stanley Tucci). The two are hatching a plan, fueled by equal parts paranoia and genius, to build man made second generation Transformers to seek out and destroy the Autobots. “A new era has begun,” says Attinger, “and the age of Transformers is over.”
Everybody loves spectacle. The Romans had the Coliseum and we have the “Transformers” movies. Like the gladiatorial shows of yore, in Michael Bay’s movies it doesn’t matter who lives or dies—the films don’t care about their human characters and neither do we—all that matters is the spectacle of the whole thing and at almost frenetic three hours “Age of Extinction” certainly delivers on that score. Like the old Roman emperors many moviegoers will give this movie a thumbs up simply because of the value per minute the film offers.
No one can accuse Bay of skimping on… well anything. “Age of Extinction” is a wide ranging action orgy that plays off of Bush era Homeland Security paranoia and also explains why dinosaurs became extinct. It comments on the ethics of unarmed warfare and blows up most of Hong Kong.
Bay doesn’t do anything by half measures but I found myself wishing the movie was about half as long as it is with half the bombast. It’s stylish—“Why run when you can run in slow motion,” Bay seems to be asking—not unlike a car commercial, but is excessive on almost every level. I don’t expect or want “My Dinner with Optimus Prime,” but in this case I think less would have been more.
Wahlberg brings loads of personality and humor with his over-protective father routine, Tucci is reliable as ever and Grammer is in full-on Dick Cheney mode but who cares? We’re not paying to see them, we’re paying to see Optimus Prime play bucking bronco with a giant dinobot.
Is “Transformers: Age of Extinction” a good movie? Not really. Does it deliver on its promise? Yes, but almost too much so. Either way I doubt Michael Bay much cares what the critics think. He’s built a joke into the movie suggesting that if you don’t like sequels you’re senile.
So says a character in “Legends of Oz: Dorothy’s Return,” a new family film that adds a chapter to L. Frank Baum’s “Wizard of Oz” series.
Where there are flying monkeys you can bet there’ll also be a Scarecrow (Dan Aykroyd), the Tin Man (Kelsey Grammer) and a Lion (as played by James Belushi he’s no longer cowardly and now suggests tearing his enemies “limb from limb.”) and, of course, witch killer Dorothy (Lea Michele) and her little dog Toto. All make appearances but this time around they’re up against a different foe—an evil Jester (Martin Short).
The movie begins several Oz years after Dorothy vanquished the Wicked Witch of the West. In her time, however, only hours have passed. When she wakes in her bed in Kansas the tornado from the original story has just laid waste to her town, but before you can say “Well, howdy, Miss Gulch,” the young girl is sucked up by a giant rainbow and transported to the world of Oz. “You guys,” she says, “dragging me into a giant rainbow really scared me!”
Trouble is, things aren’t so wonderful in Oz. The Emerald City is in turmoil at the hands of a power hungry Jester who is turning the citizenry into marionettes. Dorothy, with the help of new friends Wiser the Owl (Oliver Platt), Marshal Mallow (Hugh Dancy), China Princess (Megan Hilty) and Tugg the Tugboat (Patrick Stewart) must stop the Jester and rescue Scarecrow, the Tin Man and Lion before they are turned into puppets.
There are some good messages for kids in “The Legends of Oz: Dorothy’s Return” about working together—as heard in the clumsily rhymed “out it all together until the job is done, it should be easy, it should be fun”—and the importance of friendship. It’s just too bad they are wrapped up in a film so saccharine it would give the Wicked Witch of the West a sugar rush.
The flying monkeys are still kinda scary but the rest of the movie practically redefines the term “family friendly,” and not in all the best ways. It plays it safe to a fault throughout, smoothing over any edge until there is not much left but some poppy tunes (by Bryan Adams among others) and a story that relies on the goodwill of characters created several generations ago.
“The Legends of Oz: Dorothy’s Return” won’t give Pixar a run for their money and might be best saved for a rainy day rental.
