Movie Review: Burlesque

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This week's movie was a little bit of an education. Heading into Burlesque, I'm expecting I'm gonna see *something*. I get in there and after the one minute shy of two hours length movie, I walk out not seeing *anything*; well, I didn't see anything that I wanted to see if you know what I mean. I wonder what happened. I hadn't checked my ticket to see the rating was PG-13 (sexual content including several suggestive dance routines, partial nudity, language and some thematic material) and not an R. I then looked up burlesque on Merriam-Webster online and found that burlesque is not strictly striptease, but "theatrical entertainment of a broadly humorous often earthy character consisting of short turns, comic skits, and sometimes striptease acts" and that it involves caricature and comic imitation. I did enjoy the movie, but once I got the definition of burlesque, the story made a whole lot more sense!

Watching Burlesque, I couldn't decide if I was watching Chicago, Moulin Rouge or Showgirls. Element from all of these releases ended up in this movie written and directed by Steve Antin. Ali (Christina Aguilera) leaves small town Iowa to follow her dream in Los Angeles. She starts looking for a job as a dancer. By accident she ends up visiting a lounge of the name Burlesque and is immediately enthralled by what she sees. She strikes up a quick conversation with the guyliner and bowler hat wearing bartender Jack (Cam Gigandet) and the two hit if off. He tells her to talk to Tess (Cher) the club owner. Both Tess and the stage manager Sean (Stanley Tucci) dismiss her. With determination in her eye, Ali using her Iowa waitressing skills picks up a tray and just starts waiting tables. She does it well and Jack gives her a job. Ali now has her foot in the door.

We are treated to the elaborate dance numbers through out. The girls, except for Tess, lip sync as they strut their stuff across the stage. Jack and Ali develop their friendship. Eventually Ali is given a chance to dance. When the boozy lead dancer Nikki (Kristen Bell) shows up late one night Ali is given her chance to lead. Nikki's mean girl act of pulling the vocal track to sabotage Ali backfires as Ali then belts out the song live, not Memorex and everyone is wowed! Tess decides to make Ali the headliner and redesigns the show around her using real vocals and not the lip sync. Karma Nikki, remember karma!

Marcus (Eric Dane) a developer who wants Tess' theater starts to date Ali. That's right, Tess is having problems behind the scenes and is trying to figure out how to save theater from bank foreclosure. So you can add in the element of theater rescue from most of the Muppet movies with the other plot lines. Ali's relationships between the regular guy bartender Jack and the powerful, loaded, know what he wants mogul Marcus is reminiscent of the love triangle of Moulin Rouge. That and their own rendition of Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend.

Within the story there's nothing really new. Lots of cliche's and standard formulas are used. What did surprise me is how upbeat the tone of the movie kept itself. It could have gone down some places of dirt, raunch or nastiness but it didn't. There could have been a lot of drug use, drunkenness, sex as a promotion tool, sex just for the purpose of getting it on. It took the higher road.

What sells the movie are the musical numbers. Two powerhouse voices of Aguilera and Cher combine to make the soundtrack something that I'm probably going to buy. Cher does the title song of Burlesque and a surprisingly powerful song called You Haven't Seen the Last of Me. This ballad will probably be nominated for a Best Song Oscar. Aguilera's song But I am a Good Girl is both an enjoyable listen and visually, very cute within the movie images. The dancing and the costumes along with the theater set up of the stage and the use of mirrors kept my eyes open and facing forward the entire time.





It's good to see Cher back on the big screen. She does a wonderful job as the been down in the trenches and golden hearted Tess. It seemed like every time she was on screen they used the soft glow filter! I don't know why that did that. She's 64 years old and still looks great. Aguilera does a respectable job for her first go in a feature length movie. She'll get better with more gigs. The standout performance for me was Tucci. He shows up on screen and you can't help but pay attention to him whether it's delivering a command to the dancers or a snarky but subtle response back to his boss.

At the end of the movie, there are no easter eggs. But, if you like what you see as the credits start to roll, stay in your seat and get treated to the light show.

The Movie Monkey

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Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1

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For those people who are into Harry Potter, the complete book series may be out, but with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (HP7.1) it signals the start of the end for the visual depiction of J.K. Rowling's epic saga. With the complexity of the 784 page book, Warner Brothers made the decision to split the final segment of the saga into two movies. Some will say it was greed that made the decision, but in all fairness, with all the detail that the books provided and the complexity of the plot, book seven earned the right for the approximately five hours of screen time that it will receive between the two films. It's a shame Warner Brothers couldn't have provided books four thru six the same treatment.

At the end of the last movie, Dumbledore has died, He Who Must Not Be Named is regaining complete power over the wizarding world and our trio of heroes, Harry, Ron and Hermione have been given a task to complete to try to defeat the Dark Lord. Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson, (Harry, Ron and Hermione) have grown up on the screen and developed their acting skills. They give us their best Harry Potter performances to date in this film.

David Yates who directed the previous two movies, Half-Blood Prince and Order of the Pheonix is at the reins once again. The editing was done differently this time really playing up the dark and sinister tone the book relays. I did have an issue with the tone that laid out via the color pallete. Overall it was extremely dark which was necessary to evoke and convey empathy for the feelings our characters are experiencing but visually it sometimes hid and obscured the detail of the finely laid out sets and costumes. This movie is far more intense and menacing than any of the previous ventures into the world of Harry Potter.

The movie moves quickly in its pacing. Each of the books is about a calendar year in length for the story line. At 146 minutes (2 hours and 26 minutes) we are taken on the journey from July just before Harry's 17th birthday until approximately February-March, the coldest part of winter and in the story, the lowest point when Lord Voldemort appears to have brought his magical powers to the strongest they could be. This is where the movie breaks for Part 2 which is expected to be released in July of 2011. Luckily for the length of this movie, my regular theater offered a coupon giving you a free small soda with a purchase of popcorn. The bad thing is that no matter what size of soda you bought, you were probably going to need to leave the theater for a few minutes to use the restroom.

Toward the latter part of the film when the tale of the name sake deathly hallows is told the film makers chose not to go live action. Instead the section from The Tales of Beedle the Bard used animation to give the origin story for the hallows with the whys and hows to great effect. The abstraction the animation provides is a wonder atmospheric backdrop for this crucial point of understanding to the entire series. I wouldn't be surprised if this ends up as a separate short on the DVD/Blu-ray release.

The final set of Harry Potter movies had originally been promoted as being released in 3D. Warner Brothers announced in early October that HP7.1 would not come in 3D because they didn't have time to do the conversion process properly. It was noticeable in the film where they would have used the 3D on several points to jump out into the audience. By keeping the film 2D, I think they made a wise choice rather than upset the fan base by shifting the release date.

The movie is rated PG-13 for some sequences of intense action violence, frightening images and brief sensuality. In some ways, I don't think it was intense enough. There were a couple of scenes that I was expecting from the book that had me with tears in my eyes and yet when they played cinematically they didn't carry the same power. I had fully steeled myself ready for the waterworks even bringing extra napkins from the concession stand but they sat on the seat next to me reaming unused. Does this mean it was a bad movie? No, in fact I expect it to break box office records. At the AMC theaters at City Walk in Universal Orlando Resort, home of the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in the Islands of Adventure Theme park all 20 theaters were to be used for the midnight showing of HP7.1. It was reported that on the midnight shows alone, the movie pulled in $24 million making it the 3rd highest grossing midnight opening after two of the Twilight movies. If they had the 3D surcharge, it would have been greater and maybe have taken the top spot.

The question was asked if you needed to have read the books to enjoy the movie. Based on what has been shown so far they have written the movie in such a way that no, you don't. You should have seen the previous movies to know the characters and they build on that foundation. Although there are some scenes where if you have the book knowledge you'll know more about the names of some of the characters who appear in a shot but as presented there is enough to suffice.

Some people will stay away from the movie this weekend to try to avoid the crowds and watch it later in the release week or over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Will the numbers be caused by the number of Harry Potter fans? Probably but it stands on its own as a well made and very enjoyable movie. Just make sure that you hit the restroom before the movie starts and when it is over, you might want to stay through the main portion of the credits to see a glimpse of one of the deathly hallows before you run to the restroom for a second time! Based on what was given to us in this movie, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 should be very exciting!

The Movie Monkey

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Movie Review: Skyline

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Sometimes a movie trailer shows promise and looks interesting. But then you go to the movie and realize the two are very different items. This is one of those times when you got sold a bill of good. Skyline was really flat lined.

The audience is dropped right into the middle of the action right as the movie begins. We meet Jarrod and Elaine (Eric Balfour and Scottie Thompson) who are staying with friends Terry and Candice (Donald Faison and Brittany Daniel). As they sleep, blue lights start falling from the night sky of Los Angeles. They are awoken by rumbling to discover people are being taken away by the blue lights. We are being invaded by aliens ala Independence Day. Creatures are coming out and taking people ala Cloverfield. We watch the military try to take out the alien ships like the military attacking Godzilla all to no avail.

Ho Hum. For the main players we are never given any reason to cheer for them and hope they live. Just like a typical slasher horror film, one by one by one they are taken out in a cliche manner. The acting is very wooden, the scenes are very choppy. The special effects of the ships could have been impressive, but as we look at some of the ships and creatures which appear to be part mechanical and part living organism, there are either heat or cloud or dust or some sort of distortion obscuring the intricacies. Certain plot details are shown but aren't given a pay off or are ignored or even worse, contradicted. They try to use a time line of events, but what for? It doesn't make sense.

When you discover what the aliens want and how they go about getting it you wonder how this could be happening. It doesn't make sense, repeating to emphasize the point and the ending is just horrible. It could be set up for a sequel I guess but hopefully, mercifully it won't happen. This movie wasn't given advanced screenings for review usually indicating you have a stinker on your hands. As I write this, on Rotten Tomatoes it has an 11% fresh rating.

The movie is rated PG-13 for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, some language, and brief sexual content with a running time of 92 minutes. My suggestion would be if you start heading towards the light of this movie, turn around and make a bee line away from Skyline.

The Movie Monkey

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Movie Review: Megamind

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Alright, I admit it. I don't like Will Ferrell and I went to see a Will Ferrell movie. Luckily it was only the voice of Will Farrell and not the man boy Will Ferrell that drives me nuts! But just like many of his man boys who had big or over inflated egos, so too was the ego of Megamind.

The story is a superhero story but at the same time, not. We get the origin story of a superhero and his archenemy as told from the archenemy point of view. It also calls into the question of nature vs nurture. Are superheros and archenemies automatically superheros and archenemies by birth or are they created because of their environments, their living conditions or the people that exerted influence on them. And then, the big "What If" question. What if the superhero was destroyed by the archenemy? What then. All questions brought to bear in this movie.

Brad Pitt voices Metroman who is the yin to Ferrell's Megamind's yang. Roxanne Ritchi voiced by Tina Fey was the constant target of Megamind for Metroman to rescue. But she's a reporter with spunk and a camera man, Hal (voiced by Jonah Hill) who has a crush on her too! He follows her like a little puppy dog but she doesn't get the clues that he likes her.

The last main character who didn't get recognition in the trailers was David Cross who played Tobias on Fox's Arrested Development and now plays Andy Weeks on Running Wilde. He plays Megamind's side kick, Minion. He's a fish that has his bowl attached to a body that looks like a mechanical ape with a ghost buster proton pack like attachment on his back. Weird stuff. And what is it about Minions with animated films lately. First you have the little yellow pills helping Gru in Despicable Me and now an adroit furry mechanized body with a fish brain. Very odd coincidence that they would use the same word in both movies!

Then a number of questions are begged: What sort of goals does a bad guy set when the good guy is no longer around? What if the good guy gets tired of it all and just wants to get away and chill for a while? Can the bad guy ever get the girl? Interesting hypotheses for a PG rated for action and some language computer animated film. And as we saw in The Social Network ladies, watch how you burn your guy because that unrequited affection may come back to bite you in the butt!

The universe of these superheros didn't collide with the superhero and villain universe from The Incredibles. Otherwise things would have looked a lot different for our heroes and villains. Edna Mode would have had a cow dahling. Fringe on Metroman's costume, puhleez, it was a hobo suit. AND everyone had capes! Edna would have read them the riot act! Too much of it Dahling...NO CAPES!

The 2D version looked fine. I can't see where the 3D would have been any super improvement. With the computer generated images, there were a couple of background details that I noticed like small waves of water washing over pavement or the way buildings were crumbling showing attention to some of the finer points. Ultimately, we want a movie that looks good and has a good plot too. We got a little of both in this 96 minute movie. Don't leave the theater right away when the credit start to run. There is an extra scene before the main credits roll and it's sort of cute in what it revealed.

The Movie Monkey

To subscribe to the audio podcast of the reviews via iTunes click here. Audio versions are released the following Wednesday.