Stars Chris Pine, Kevin Costner, Kiera Knightly and Kenneth Branagh Directed by Kenneth Branagh Tom Clancy’s hero, Jack Ryan, gets another reboot following the last appearance of the character in The Sum Of All Fears (2002), itself a reboot featuring Ben Afflack as the analyst hero. Before that, Harrison Ford essayed the role in two movies (Patriot Games (1992) and Clear And Present Danger (1994)), which was more of a realignment from the best and original that was The Hunt For Red October (1990) where Alec Baldwin first brought Ryan to the screen. In the previous movies, Ryan was more of an analyst, often seen behind the scenes from the major events and then trotted out towards the end simply because no one else knows more about the situation at hand than he does by that point. In those cases, it’s clear he’s not a field operative (although Harrison Ford might beg to differ) and usually out of his element once in the field. Baldwin, of course, did it best under the taut direction of John McTiernan. Ford did rein things in from his typical action man shenanigans, showing a more ‘brains than brawn’ approach in his movies while Afflack did his best with the material he got, given the global circumstances surrounding his movie. That put Jack Ryan into cinematic storage for a good decade as the world changed and such characters were evaluated as how they would fit into this strange new world. Just look at James Bond post 2001. In this new iteration, we get a full scale reboot and an update, kicking off the story with that fateful day in 2001 and Ryan (Chris Pine) is given a history over the next few years through an extended pre-title prologue before jumping to the present day for the rest of the movie. His original CIA mentor, James Greer, is replaced by Thomas Harper (Kevin Costner) who recruits him into the shadowy world of the CIA (guess that’s where the new title comes from) to be an analyst working in Wall Street. Of course, during the course of the story, Ryan goes from analyst to field operative, although the ease at which he does it seems a little convenient, especially more so by the time the action packed finale rolls around. The tensions that used to be built up by having people stand around a bunch of monitors waiting things out are so passé now. So, what we have is a Jack Ryan for a new world, brought to life by Chris Pine, possibly in it for an alternative potential franchise to carry by his lonesome? Pine does well enough with the role while running a gamut of emotional states, some more unusual than others. The ease at which he seems to slip his character between nervous and confident - particularly through a dinner scene with fiancé Cathy (Kiera Knightly) and the sinister Viktor Cherevin (an excellent Kenneth Branagh). It is also around this part of the movie that there might some story problems revolving around Cathy. A key plot point that might grate on some viewers, especially the ease at which she comes to terms with Ryan’s secret life. Somewhere in my head, it sot of makes sense, IF we had seen her mull over some of the other aspects from earlier in the show., For the sake of expediency, maybe they decided to skip over it. In a time where most movies seem to push themselves beyond the two hour mark, Shadow Recruit seem satisfied to go old school (in more ways than one) and get things done at a respectable 100 plus minutes. Yes, Branagh's direction is fairly old school, letting the characters tell the story and letting the situation and plot flow rather than clutter it with extra stuff. It’s also clear that he’s progressed as a director since Thor. Things seem less stagey than before, with his cinematographer Haris Zambarloukos utilising the locations on hand. It probably says something that only two visual effects company are listed in the credits - a summer movie has an average of six to eight these days. Still, Branagh relies on his stars quite a bit, and they do deliver solid performances. Kevin Costner is on something of a revival, finding these mentor roles to be quite rewarding (also see Man of Steel). Perhaps, only Knightly seems to be short-changed, more due to the story and plot. It might seem that her character is being set up for something with more potential, but that would probably also mean a major shift from the original concept of the character. I wouldn’t really know, tho, having only read the first book (Red October). Then again, this movie isn’t based on any of the Clancy books. In a period that is usually considered a dumping ground for movies that studios find hard to sell or market, Paramount Pictures may have a solid earner here. It’s decent and entertaining, solid enough action movie that would appeal to an average movie-goer. Fans of the character might complain for have taken Ryan quite far from the original source material, but Pine carries the character well enough that you wouldn’t mistake Ryan for Kirk. It does remain to be seen if a franchise will grow out of this. Rating: 3.5/5
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Last year, doing the recap of the movie I had seen, I called it a non-retrospective and ended up ranting about the types of films that were hitting the big screen. This year, not very much has changed and there were… disappointments. It’s also likely that my viewing habits had changed over the year, mainly due to a fiscal shortage. While I had to be picky about what movie to catch in the cinema, much of that choice was also taken out of my hands, mainly by how movies are distributed here in Penang, and Malaysia by default. Years back, there was one movie I really really really wanted to see in the cinema. There was the poster hanging on the cinema walls under the “Coming Soon” boxes. The trailer was screened in the cinema before several movies for months. Ultimately, it never arrived. At all. Serenity was lost. I did ask about why the cinema had promoted the movie with the poster and trailers, but never brought the movie in the end. I asked at different cinemas at the time, talked to the different managers. One said that the movie didn’t do well in Australia, so it wasn’t expected to do well here. Another said that they only show movies they were given by the distributor. Another said that they couldn’t promote the show in Malaysia, that there was no audience. One of the staff members just said that the movie must be bad, that’s why they don’t want to show it in Malaysia. Now, there would be some that would agree that Serenity isn’t that great a movie. It’s science fiction, it’s partially a western, it’s based on a short lived and little seen TV series. And for me, it was one of the best movies ever (that I bought the Australian Limited Edition DVD set, the US DVD and the Collector’s Edition DVD that came out later. I triple-dipped that sucker. Anyone wanna sponsor me the Blu-Ray edition?) I mean, c’mon, that space battle towards the end was big screen worthy! But, let’s get back on track. Locally, I’ve gotten to know the manager of my preferred cinema and he’s told me basically the same thing. He has no say in what movie comes to the cinema. He gets the film or the tape, and he decides how to schedule them on which screen. That’s it. The choice of film is made two levels above him - the head office of Golden Screen Cinemas in KL, and the distributors themselves who ultimately decide what to put on our screens. As far as I can determine, there may be two or three major companies, such as UIP (United International Pictures, I think they handle Universal and Paramount), whatever company is distributing for Disney, and maybe one other (handling Warners and Fox, and some independents). A couple of them may actually be under the control of a local government conglomerate, most likely Berjaya, they have their hands in monopolising everything. In the interest of making money, they would, of course, select the movies that are most likely to sell, easy to promote (action! violence! big stars!) the same way Hollywood would most likely push a movie. So, we get more of the action films, the horror films, cartoons for the kids, etc. The more drama oriented films - maybe even the romance and comedies to a lesser extent - are often side-stepped. I posted up to 46 reviews for movies I saw in the cinema over 2013 (and a few seen elsewhere, such as on disc or over ASTRO). By the way, first new movie of the year - which I decided to pass on - is Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones. The aforementioned fiscal factor also led to some movies being bypassed, most prominently Monsters University. Thing is, I didn’t really care for the characters, even in Monster Inc, which I felt was the low point of Pixar movies at the time (Cars II may actually take that spot now). The lack of solid dramas saw, more often, delayed releases (The Butler being one, 12 Years A Slave being the more current one) and usually in my least preferred cinema, i.e. it’s a hassle to get to it, the seats are awful and the last time I was there, the sound system still sucked. Made it easy for me to bypass and just wait for it to turn up on cable or borrow a disc off someone else. So in that light, it’s no point for me to do a “Best Of” list. There were movies I enjoyed watching this year, and the ones I enjoyed surely baffled others. Quite often, there were movies where I just like parts of instead of the whole. As much as I love The Croods - the opening ‘breakfast chase’ scene being one of the best animated sequences I had ever seen in 3D, the rest of the movie was not bad - it got middling ratings from critics across the board. Probably for not being a Pixar feature, or that it features Nicolas Cage. The Lone Ranger was a bit of a meandering mess, but I love the opening train sequence and the closing train sequence. They’re some of the best orchestrated chaotic action scenes put on screen this year. It’s the middle part that could have done with some trimming. There seems a need for these movies to hit a particular running time - an average film runs 130 - 140 minutes these days, even when they don’t need to. See The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug as a prime example. One of the slimmest movies of the year was also quite divisive for some. Gravity peaked just about the 90 minute mark with its fairly outrageous plot mechanics but undeniably amazing cinematography and choreography.
What else? I love the first half of Riddick, not so much the second half. Machete Kills had some insanely ingenious moments (like the “3D sequence”) and best use of Mel Gibson as a villain. Love the sword fights of The Wolverine while the rest of the movie could have tightened up a bit. The “Major Tom” moment for The Secret Life of Walter Mitty was the best use of a Bowie song in an impeccably realised sequence. Furious 6 was good for its insane action, stunts, physics defying mid-air catch and flying headbutt, but Fast 5 is still the best of the series. Chris Hemsworth was good in Thor: The Dark World, but he excelled in Rush. Pacific Rim was simply awesome, to the point that the likelihood of having a sequel by director delToro seems so slim. And, for me, discovery of the year was Detention for its audaciousness at flipping horror and science-fiction conventions. While I don’t often pick a “movie of the year”, it might be easy to note that Frozen ended up with the highest rating among the movies I reviewed. So there… let’s see what 2014 will bring around. I expect it’ll be a great year for science fiction. |
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