Moneyball

The only thing that seems odder than pairing up Brad Pitt and baseball is pairing up Brad Pitt with Jonah Hill. Well, both of those combinations appear in Moneyball, the story of Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane, played by Pitt, and his attempt to compete with wealthier teams. With the help of Hill’s character, they build a team of cheaper players, who excel at less recognized aspects of the game. Throughout the film, there is an underlying tension that keeps the audience interested in what could be considered a boring aspect of front office baseball. For sports fans, the film is sure to be a springboard for many hours of Wikipedia research on the Moneyball concept and the real life people portrayed in the film.

While some events were altered for dramatic effect, the reality of the process the A’s used after the 2002 season is an impressive underdog story. The pacing is so perfect that one would hardly notice you’re watching men sit around and talk about baseball statistics. Sure there are other things that happen, but the numbers are central. Pitt’s portrayal of Beane is understated and believable. I find that more impressive with Pitt than other actors because he’s so famous. If the audience can forget his red carpet status for the duration of a movie, then he’s done a good job.

The film has a similar feel to The Social Network in how interesting it is while dealing with potentially boring subject matter. That shouldn’t come as much of a surprise since Aaron Sorkin was one of Moneyball’s writers and won the Oscar for his work on The Social Network. The non-baseball scenes, which include Beane’s interactions with his daughter, are very well done and give context to the world these sports execs are living in. These father-daughter moments are as simple as browsing a music store. But their just another example of how Moneyball makes the most typical conversation insightful and interesting. (9.1 out of 10)

Warrior

While some may see Warrior as a way for Tom Hardy to build up his street cred before The Dark Knight Rises, it’s actually a pretty gritty look at an estranged family tied together by mixed martial arts. The similarities to last year’s Oscar nominee, The Fighter may be too much for the general movie-going public to get behind, but Warrior has a longer leash due to its fictional premise.

Hardy plays a Marine who returns to his native Pittsburgh and picks up fighting after years away from it. He employees his once abusive father (Nick Nolte) as his trainer, but never forgives him for the past offenses. Meanwhile, on the other side of Pennsylvania, Nolte’s other son (Joel Edgerton) is a school teacher who returns to MMA in an attempt to win enough money to keep his house, which is facing foreclosure and to provide for his wife (Jennifer Morrison) and two daughters.

With the exception of the fight announcers, who don’t really count, the acting in the film is near flawless. Nolte provides the most depth as he is able to range from the most subtle nervous tick all the way to over the top theatrics. The sympathy the audience feels for the character is truly a measure of this performance. It’s quite painful to watch the way he is treated. That doesn’t mean Edgerton and Hardy’s characters are unlikeable, it’s quite the contrary. They just have good reason to be so brutal. But both the leads do very well with the unyielding script. Picking who does better is almost like predicting the winner of their fight in the movie, it could go either way.

Even the supporting characters go above and beyond. Kevin Dunn, who plays Edgerton’s principle, is so convincing while watching his colleague’s fight on TV, the audience can feel the nerves he has. Then there’s Morrison, who I feared would provide a cheesy reproduction of the Adrian moment from Rocky. The writer never gives in to that temptation though, even when we want it to. She does quite well.

So I think it’s quite clear this is a character (and actor) driven film. There is also a lot of actual fighting though. While I personally have no problem with that, I can understand why some would. In addition, I know it’s fun to use the gritty hand held camera look that Warrior often employs, however the slow inconsistent focusing really brings the audience out of the story. But that can’t take away from the movies impact as a good, sad, inspiring, happy movie. It’s just chock full of adjectives. (9.0 out of 10)

Drive

In another instance of lazy titling, Drive stars Ryan Gosling as a stuntman/ criminal getaway driver for hire. At least that’s what was being sold as the film’s most important aspect. The character does work as both of those things, but the audience hardly ever sees it. The Driver, his name is never revealed, begins to fall for his neighbor, a mother, whose husband is in jail (Carey Mulligan) and finds himself in a web of danger after a heist gone wrong. So that’s a summary of the action. The rest of the movie is Gosling staring off into space or waiting an unnaturally long time to respond when others are speaking to him.

Drive is as slow a movie as I’ve seen this year. The plot crawls along, yet somehow the relationships feel rushed. The film was promoted as a heist, or big budget action movie, but it’s more of an emotional look at the mind of a singular character followed by some very gory violence. He only participates in two robberies and gets behind the wheel of a racecar once. Most of the titular driving is a profile shot of Gosling with an expression that only changes slightly no matter what the situation. After about the 15^th occurrence of this shot, it becomes apparent that this says something important about the mental awareness and personality of the character.

I completely understand why this would disappoint the masses, who want to see something more in line with Sylvester Stallone’s Driven from 2001. Drive is more for a fan of European movies to see alone on a Tuesday rather than a group of college students in a packed theater on Friday night. I am a big supporter of blockbuster action movies, but there is still a place for movies like Drive in the American box-office. Since it was promoted as something completely different than what it is, it’s hard to judge the movie independently. By action standards, it’s boring. By dramatic standards, it’s pretty powerful. Too bad the production company thought it was necessary to mislead the public. (7.5 out of 10)

Contagion

Contagion is a sci-fi film about a disease outbreak, which kills a lot of people. With all the talk about how this movie is too close to home and too realistic, I say nay. It is true that there is a very real feel to it and the star-studded cast does well throughout, but I think it’s pretty clear that the likelihood of a disease like the one breaking out is on par with the one in Rise of the Planet of the Apes. It’s just not going to happen. Call me naïve or overly optimistic, but even if it did happen three out of four people would survive. Those are some good odds. (Should I throw in a “just kidding” here to let it be known that I do understand the severity of a quarter of the world’s population dying?)

Balancing a number storylines, the film shows the epidemic from the view of many different kinds of people, which is often intriguing. I can’t say that the famous actors are completely necessary though. Matt Damon and Laurence Fishburne star in the film and the other top billed actors essentially make cameos. Though the tough part is that individual story arcs tend to fall by the wayside when the character they are coupled with dies. I guess the debate with a money concerned public official becomes irrelevant when the character is living out their remaining hours on a hockey rink among other dying people. That image pretty much sets the tone for how depressing this gets.

Visually, the movie is strong, switching tones and looks between the many cities. So there is never any confusion as to where the audience is at any given moment. It’s odd to have a scientific thriller like this, which seems so grand in scale and never crosses into the realm of unrealistic fiction. The movie is actually very good. The disaster scenario imagery that commonly accompanies zombie movies plays for an intense setting and an interesting dynamic. But don’t worry if you think all the characters die. Just like in the movie, only one fourth bite the dust. (8.5 out of 10)

Our Idiot Brother

Our Idiot Brother is the story of a kind hearted, but misguided guy, played by Paul Rudd, who tries to reconnect with his family after a stint in jail. The title is a bit misleading because the character isn’t stupid; he just tries to look for the best in people while being somewhat gullible. He gets arrested for selling pot to a uniformed police officer. But the cop tricks him after pleading for some because he was having a tough week. It’s a dumb move, but not as dumb as it sounds out of context.

Once he is released (for good behavior of course) he cycles through living with his mother and three sisters, moving out as each gets fed up with him. Emily Mortimer, Zooey Deschanel, and Elizabeth Banks play the sisters. Then Adam Scott, Rashida Jones, Kathryn Hahn and others are thrown in there to make sure every scene has a familiar face. So there’s definitely no denying the star power on display in the film.

The movie was promoted as a typical Apatow-esque comedy, which doesn’t seems like it would be stretch considering the cast, but it’s actually quite different. Bordering an indie feel, Rudd actually plays a fairly complex character. It wouldn’t be much of a stretch either to say this is the actor’s best performance to date.

There are even moments in the middle of Idiot Brother where I found myself thinking I really liked this movie, but the final third is just a bit too messy plot wise. In one swift montage everything’s resolved from the brink of disaster. It just doesn’t fit the rest of the story. The rise in fame of Scott and Jones leads me to want more screen time for their characters, but with the four siblings in the fray there’s hardly time. And what about the jokes? They’re pretty good too. But I guess that’s why the movie wasn’t pushed as an indie; the jokes aren’t existential…or pretentious. (8.8 out of 10)

30 Minutes or Less

When you look at the names that make up the star-studded cast of 30 Minutes or Less, it makes you think back to how recently they were unknown. Jesse Eisenberg was quite obscure before his Oscar nomination and the same goes for Aziz Ansari with his role on Parks and Recreation. But now they are well known actors. The main problem here is that 30 Minutes or Less is not a film with widespread appeal.

The R rated comedy is about a pizza delivery boy (Eisenberg) who is kidnapped by two idiots (Danny McBride and Nick Swardson) and forced to wear a bomb and rob a bank. The idiots need money to hire a hit man to kill McBride’s character’s rich father. So the pizza boy enlists the help of his friend (Ansari) and desperately tries to rob the bank without messing up enough for the idiots to set off his bomb vest. The concept itself isn’t very funny.

So in order for this movie to be successful, these potential scary concepts need to be funny. But they all aren’t. During the kidnapping, McBride and Swardson where ape masks, not funny enough. The masks are more appropriate for Ben Affleck’s gang in The Town than it is an immature comedy. Luckily individual moments save the movie. There is obviously a lot of adlibbing between McBride and Swardson, which provides unexpected exchanges that are quite funny. Ansari also has his moments bringing on the laughs; however Eisenberg gives a flat, almost boring performance. I think he was funnier in The Social Network and that’s not supposed to be a comedy.

A negative review doesn’t necessarily mean a movie like 30 Minutes or Less is bad. In fact, with a few more viewings, I’m sure there are plenty of quotable moments. But ultimately, the plot is the weakest aspect, which is never a good thing. Then there is the fact that it only runs 80 minutes. On the one hand, that is quite short. On the other, that means the movie doesn’t drag. Well either way, 30 Minutes is only for fans of this genre. (7.0 out of 10)

Conan the Barbarian

If I had to list out all of my picks for Hollywood reboots I have no idea how far down Conan the Barbarian would be. Let’s just say, it would be really far down. But someone wanted to give it a shot, so here we are. The movie stars Jason Momoa as the titular character, who is on a life long journey to track down the men who destroyed his village and killed his father (Ron Perlman). The clichéd storyline is only overshadowed by the awful dialogue, or lack thereof in many cases.

Momoa’s performance, mainly his speaking parts, would fit better in a WWE wrestling ring than a big budget movie, and even there it would be tough to believe. The guy is jacked and obviously capable of handling large-scale fight scenes filled with complicated choreography, but he reads his lines like a kindergarten production of Clash of the Titans. Stephen Lang who plays the bad guy in a slight sidestep from the military madman he seems to play in everything else (Avatar), is fairly adequate. He seesaws between accents, but the audience grows to hate him so he does his job.

The unbelievable number of fight scenes smothers any chance for the film to have a positive result. Some of them are impressive and compelling, but the constant brawling really takes the urgency out of the picture and the movie can be described as one brutal stabbing after another. Fights with people made of sand and an acrobatic slugfest over a bottomless ravine are the only two that stand out.

As far as franchise potential goes, Conan the Barbarian has virtually none. The R rating allows for messier deaths and randomly placed, bare-chested women, but it does nothing to help the movie. A PG-13 take with more personality might have actually brought some people to the theater. I understand that Barbarians aren’t exactly perceived as happy-go-lucky, but who wants to watch a movie about a murderous brute that can hardly string two sentences together? Not me, I don’t watch Meryl Streep movies. (5.7 out of 10)

The Help

The Help is a film about a young writer (Emma Stone) in Mississippi during the rise of the Civil Rights Movement. Annoyed with how her fellow citizens treat the African-American maids they employee to raise their children and take care of their houses, she decides to interview some of the targeted women and write a book about what it’s like to be them. One of the film’s best successes are the attention to detail in the set and costume design. From the view of someone born in New York in the 80’s, everything looks pretty authentic. Maybe those more familiar with the locale would disagree.

Stone shows her versatility once again with an engaging performance. But the script only asks for the character to act as a tool for the women she is writing about. Both Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer provide the brunt of the emotional exchanges that occur in the film. The complementing personalities of their characters do well to keep the movie fresh scene after scene. Davis is more the patient and quiet type, trying to keep her head down and Spencer is the self-described “sass-talker.” The plot makes it perfectly clear how dangerous an action it is for these women to speak about their white employers at this time, but with how dislikeable Bryce Dallas Howard’s character is, most viewers would agree the risk is worth it. Howard plays a smiley racist who preaches about the dangers of sharing bathrooms with blacks, and how disposable they are. But don’t worry she gets hers in the end.

The movie runs a bit too long. While it remains engaging throughout, the sheer amount of storylines and sub-plots could do with some cutting down. This length is possibly an attempt to remain true to the book used as the source material, but it’s too much. The film culminates with some powerful scenes and wraps up a bit too neatly. If only things did work out as perfectly for women who experienced these sorts of troubles. But as an outsider, I can guess that they didn’t. The Help and some of its prevailing actors will likely get some award season buzz, which is justified. (8.2 out of 10)