Posts Tagged ‘Ruben Fleischer’

UNCHARTED: 2 STARS. “a Where’s Waldo-style role for Mark Wahlberg.”

Movies based on videogames are either entertaining or eye-rolling. An interactive videogame that works at home on your PlayStation may not offer the same dopamine rush when translated to the one-way interactivity of the big screen. For every “Detective Pikachu” that hits the mark there’s a dozen “BloodRaynes” or “Mortal Kombat: Annihilations.”

“Uncharted,” a prequel to the wildly successful PlayStation series starring Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg, and now playing in theatres, is the latest entry in the videogame sweepstakes.

Holland plays Nathan Drake, who, unlike Spider-Man, the actor’s other cinematic alter-ego, uses his sticky fingers to steal stuff, not scale the outside of tall buildings. Either way, both characters are adventurers who live outside the margins. In Drake’s case, it comes naturally. He’s a direct descendant of 16th century pirate Sir Francis Drake.

By day Nathan is a bartender in New York, by night he’s a thief. Day and night, he hopes to reunite with his long-lost treasure-hunting brother Sam who he hasn’t seen since he was ten years old. Big brother hit the road, with a promise to return, leaving behind memories and some cryptic clues to the location of $5 billion worth of Spanish explorer Ferdinand Magellan’s lost gold. “The gold isn’t gone,” he said, “it’s lost and if it is lost, it can be found.”

When fast-talking slickster Victor ‘Sully’ Sullivan (Mark Wahlberg) asks Nathan to help track down the lost treasure, he agrees, hoping to find the gold and information on his missing brother. “There’s only one rule,” says Sully of their dangerous mission. “Don’t get caught.”

The pair, along with fortune hunter Chloe (Sophia Ali), travel the world in search of two crosses that serve as a key to the mystery, all the while trying to stay one or two steps ahead of ruthless rich guy Moncada (Antonio Banderas), who has a personal connection to the gold, and his team of mercenaries.

“Uncharted” mixes and matches the adventure elements of “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” “Tomb Raider” and “National Treasure” into a generic action movie that loses its way early on. Not even the combined charisma of its stars, Holland and Wahlberg, can put it back on track.

Both play thinly sketched versions of characters we’ve seen before and better. When he’s on-screen Wahlberg plays a riff on his trademarked sarcastic smart alecky character but this is a Where’s Waldo style role for him. He disappears for long sections as Holland takes center stage.

Holland plays Nathan as a cocky young man with a special set of skills. Sound familiar? It’s like watching Peter Parker do parkour without the webs but with an unnatural gift for figuring out puzzles that have confounded others for centuries. He’s fun on screen but he’s not doing anything here that feels new.

Together they banter in playful dialogue that often has the all the charm of an in-gown toenail.

Then there are the action scenes. The movie opens with a frenetic fight scene, heavy on the CGI, that sees Nathan flying through the air, battling bad guys. It’s high-flying action, but don’t worry if you are five minutes late getting to the cinema, the scene is repeated later in the movie. The large-scale action scenes are loud, frenzied but often feel like leftovers from Pierce Brosnan era 007. They fill the screen, but the movie’s flippant, light tone ensures there is very little jeopardy involved for any of the main characters.

“Uncharted” does have a pretty good villain, and no, it’s not Banderas who does little other than speak in a low whisper. Tati Gabrielle as the ruthless killer and schemer Braddock brings some spark to her scenes, but not enough to kickstart this inert action flick.

VENOM: 2 STARS. “Enjoyable? Depends on your level of fandom.”

“Venom,” the first film in the brand-spanking-new Sony Marvel Universe, gives us not one but two Tom Hardy performances. In a dual role the Oscar nominee plays Eddie Brock, an investigative reporter with an aw-shucks accent and the title character, an amorphous sentient alien who requires a host, usually human, to bond with for its survival. It’s kind of an anti-superhero Jekyll and Hyde situation where Ed and Venom are a hybrid, two beings in one body.

If you are still reading and processing this, you might enjoy “Venom.” If not, you’ve probably already purchased tickets for “A Star is Born.”

When we first meet Brock he’s the host of a popular television show. When he is assigned to interview genius inventor Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed), he goes off script, asking some difficult and embarrassing questions. His rogue behaviour costs him everything, his job, his girlfriend (Michelle Williams) and his house. To get revenge he breaks into Drake’s facility with an eye toward exposing Drake’s evil doings. Instead he ends up merged with the extraterrestrial symbiote Venom, becoming a toothy creature with a tongue that would make Gene Simmons envious.

Bestowed with superhuman strength and power, he must learn how to manage his not only his new gifts but also his rage. “The way I see it we can do what we want,” Venom says to his host.

“Venom’s” advertising tagline, “The world has enough Superheroes,” refers to the titular character’s anti-hero status but could also be a comment on the surplus of comic book characters seen on screens in recent years. So, is Venom one superhero too many? Maybe, depending on your level of fandom.

Comic book heads may complain about the absence of Spider-Man, the symbiote’s original host, and other deviations from the canon. But, on the flip side, the body-horror aspect of Venom’s metamorphosis coupled with the inherent humour of Eddie and Venom’s interactions are brought to vivid life by Hardy’s commitment.

Structurally, for fans, “Venom” offers something different from the Marvel formula. By the time Hardy is flailing around in a restaurant lobster tank there will be no mistaking this for anything that came before it.

Casual viewers may not be as interested. The first half, the origin story, gloomily drags on leading up to the Eddie’s transformation. Then it’s followed by a series of darkly lit chase scenes as Drake’s baddies try and stop Venom.

The there are the women. In the “Wonder Woman” world we live in it’s a disappointment that Williams, as Eddie’s girlfriend, and Jenny Slate, as a scientist working for Drake’s Life Foundation, are underwritten, acting as placeholders more than actual characters.

“Venom” has its moments, but it’s hard to tell whether we’re laughing with or at the movie. It feels unintentionally funny, as if all the actors except for Hardy understood they were acting in a generic comic book movie. He’s a hoot, the movie isn’t.

CTV NEWS: Are Lady Gaga’s ‘Little Monsters’ trashing the ‘Venom’ movie online?

From CTVnews.ca: “Despite being two completely different genres appealing to very different moviegoers, Lady Gaga’s fans are reportedly trashing Sony Pictures’ ‘Venom’ supervillain film online because it’s opening on the same day as the pop star’s own romantic drama ‘A Star Is Born.'” Read the whole article HERE!

Watch the CTV News report HERE!