FINDING DORY: A Tangy Aftertaste

Other Reviews in this Series.

Directors: Andrew Stanton, Angus MacLane (co-director)
Writers: Andrew Stanton, Victoria Strause
Cast: Ellen DeGeneres, Albert Brooks, Hayden Rolence, Ed O'Neill, Kaitlin Olson, Ty Burrell, Diane Keaton, Idris Elba, Dominic West
Runtime: 97 mins.
2016

There was a lengthy, downright dynastic period of time during which the release of a new Pixar movie meant the release of a new guaranteed classic. We are firmly out of that period. Of the five films released before Finding Dory, only one could be considered great by any significant metric. So it became difficult to care about the impending Finding Nemo sequel, a feeling only exacerbated by: 1) Pixar's increasing reliance on cash-in sequels and prequels, and 2) Director Andrew Stanton's recent career dip with the catastrophic failure of John Carter, an incident that makes transparent Stanton's desire to jump on board with a guaranteed cash-in of his own.

Yet I tried to be hopeful about Finding Dory, even as it kept slipping off my radar. Surely Pixar has created enough cinematic magic to warrant a bit of good faith. Too bad Finding Dory does little enough to reward that faith.

IRON MAN 2: Empty Shellhead

In the weeks leading up to Marvel's next blockbuster juggernaut, Captain America: Civil War, we will be looking at every cinematic iteration of those two warring rapscallions, Captain America and Iron Man.

Other Reviews in this Series.

Director: Jon Favreau
Writer: Justin Theroux
Cast: Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Mickey Rourke, Sam Rockwell, Scarlett Johansson, Samuel L. Jackson, Clark Gregg, John Slattery, Gary Shandling, Paul Bettany
Runtime: 124 mins.
2010

Iron Man made a splash in the cultural landscape by being tight, fun, propulsive, and sleek. Iron Man 2 has the distinction of sharing none of those qualities. Instead it is nasty, morose, choppy, and kind of pointless. The sheer watchability of the cast is perhaps the one thing that prevents Iron Man 2 from being a total chore.

This film more than any other showcases the growing pains of Hollywood's first cinematic universe. With only Iron Man and the decent The Incredible Hulk under their belt, Marvel set out to capitalize on the promise of the famous Nick Fury post-credit coda. Unsurprisingly this meant cranking out a sequel to their 2008 smash hit with the same filmmaker at the helm. But this also meant rushing into the production and shoehorning in a cavalcade of shared universe elements that cripple any coherent narrative that may have existed otherwise.

STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS - May the Force Bewitch You

More Star Wars Reviews.

Director: J. J. Abrams
Writers: Lawrence Kasdan, J. J. Abrams, Michael Arndt
Cast: Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Adam Driver, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Domhnall Gleeson, Lupita Nyong'o, Andy Serkis, Peter Mayhew, Anthony Daniels, Mark Hamill
Runtime: 135 mins.
2015

Thus the tang of the prequels is washed from our mouths.

Sixteen years ago the whole world was anticipating the revival of the Star Wars franchise. The Phantom Menace was perhaps the most widely anticipated movie of all time. Star Wars fans had assumed for years that they would never have another new experience in their beloved fantasy world, yet here Lucas was returning to his old stomping grounds. He had a new story to tell, and his audience anticipated it with bated breath and open arms. Then the movie was released...

Many people walked out of that theater shellshocked, having realized from the moment of the opening crawl that something was very rotten in Denmark. Some people walked out thinking they had seen something good, already preparing their defenses via a psyche suffering from heavy cognitive dissonance. Few people walked out satisfied in any meaningful way.

The prequels wrapped up and Star Wars was dead yet again, leaving fans with a decades-spanning case of blue balls. It seemed impossible to conceive of being excited about another Star Wars revival after Lucas's last debacle--and yet, here we are, staring down the barrel of a Star Wars movie that has become the new most anticipated film of all time. This franchise is a titan that will not die.

The excitement did not spring up overnight, to be sure. A great deal of work was put into refurbishing the franchise's image by a great number of talented people (the marketing push for The Force Awakens has been one of the most skillful and massive advertising assaults ever). At the pinnacle of all this was J. J. Abrams, a man with an unparalleled love for Star Wars whose entire career seems to have built to this point. From the first bits of Star Wars information that came down the pipeline, Abrams and co. actively, if not explicitly, disavowed the prequels and promised a return to form. J. J. convinced us all that he understood why Star Wars became such a cultural phenomenon in the first place, and he reassured us that we were all in good hands.

All of that turned out to be true to a fault. The great failing of The Force Awakens is its unforgivable similarity to the original trilogy, A New Hope in particular. Yes, the movie is a return to form, but it accomplishes this by replicating large swathes of the originals. This goes deeper than winky and noddy homages to the original trilogy, though there are plenty of those. I'm talking about a lack of imagination on the structural level. Yet again a droid is secretly given documents of incredible importance. Yet again our characters walk into a shady cantina with aliens playing snappy music in the background. Yet again, and this is the most egregious example, our plot centers around the destruction of a massive planet-killing weapon.

QUANTUM OF SOLACE: Shaken Not Turd

Spectre, the 24th entry in this 53-year-old franchise, is soon upon us. As such I will be spending this week rehashing the Daniel Craig Bond movies in preparation. Quantum of Solace is the sequel to Casino Royale that everyone rapidly realized they never wanted.

Other Reviews in this Series.

Director: Marc Forster
Writers: Paul Haggis, Neal Purvis, Robert Wade
Cast: Daniel Craig, Olga Kurylenko, Mathieu Amalric, Judi Dench, Giancarlo Giannini, Gemma Arterton, Jeffrey Wright
Runtime: 106 mins.
2008

Quantum of Solace is not un-entertaining. This is one of the two compliments that I will give it. The other compliment is that Marc Forster has this directorial tic that I enjoy: he ends all of his action scenes with moments of stillness where the sound mixing bottoms out and lets you catch a breath. Unfortunately it is pleasant in part because the action scenes are not very good.

It's hard to put a finger on exactly what went wrong with Quantum, but every which way you look is a decision that seems at least a little bit wrongheaded. First and foremost, Quantum is as far as I'm aware the only James Bond film that functions as a direct sequel to its predecessor. As in, the story elements and character arcs are so dependent upon what's come before that a newbie walking into this movie would have nothing to latch onto but confusion and boredom. As easy as it is to blame the studios for this decision... well, we should probably blame the studios. Bond films have always absorbed and reappropriated current Hollywood trends, and this time around they bit the bait of serialization. In an era of sequels, and at the cusp of shared universes (Iron Man was also released in 2008), it only made sense for Bond to go after the unfinished business of Vesper Lynd's untimely death.

TOY STORY 2: Toy Be or Not Toy Be

Twenty years ago Pixar Animation Studios revolutionized cinema with the first full length completely computer-generated film. Two decades later and Pixar is still one of the most consistently groundbreaking studios in the business. Leading up to the release of their new film The Good Dinosaur, I will be going through Pixar's entire filmography at the rate of two movies a week. We've reached Pixar's first sequel, Toy Story 2, a film that fought through a trying developmental cycle to become one of the most adored sequels of all time.

Other Reviews in this Series.

Director: John Lasseter, Ash Brannon (co-director), Lee Unkrich (co-director)
Writers: Andrew Stanton, Rita Hsiao, Doug Chamberlin, Chris Webb, John Lasseter, Pete Docter, Ash Brannon
Cast: Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Joan Cusack, Kelsey Grammer, Don Rickles, Jim Varney, Wallace Shawn, John Ratzenberger, Annie Potts, Wayne Knight, Estelle Harris, John Morris, Laurie Metcalf, Joe Ranft, Andrew Stanton, Jeff Pidgeon
Runtime: 92 mins.
1999

Much like the original Toy Story, Toy Story 2 ended up being a much grander finished product than originally intended. Pixar began production of the film as a cheapie direct-to-video release, a model that Disney had begun to use with other films like The Return of Jafar. The production team and budget were limited, and they even stuck them in a building separate from the core Pixar staff, which was hard at work finishing up A Bug's Life. At a certain point, salaries and the cost of computer animation became too much to be financially viable for anything less than a theatrical release, and the work of the team thusfar was also just too good. Production ramped up, and Pixar faced an uphill battle of deadlines and exhausted animators.

The result was a film that became universally adored, for good reason. Toy Story 2 takes the beloved characters from the first movie and recreates them in a way that feels both familiar and progressive. They maintain their well-defined traits while showing that they have grown in the years since the events of the first movie. Mr. Potato Head now has a naggy loving life partner in Mrs. Potato Head. Buzz Lightyear has settled into a comfortable acceptance of what he can and cannot do. Woody gains a whole new cavalcade of friends who broaden his sense of identity.

THE LOST WORLD: Metasequelitis

Director: Steven Spielberg
Writer: David Koepp
Cast: Jeff Goldblum, Julianne Moore, Pete Postlethwaite, Arliss Howard, Vince Vaughn, Richard Schiff, Vanessa Lee Chester, Richard Attenborough
Runtime: 129 mins.
1997

Other reviews in this series:

Jurassic Park
Jurassic Park III
Jurassic World

It was as if Spielberg threw up his arms and yelled, "Alright, you want more dinosaurs? YOU'RE GETTING MORE GODDAMNED DINOSAURS."

I called Jurassic Park a metapromotional movie, and if that is the case, then The Lost World is certainly a self-reflexive sequel about sequels. The movie begins with John Hammond (an increasingly feeble Richard Attenborough) explaining to a cynical cranky Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) that Isla Nublar is not the only island with dinosaurs on it. There's another one called Isla Sorna, and the dinos there are flourishing in the wild. Having given up on his capitalist aspirations, Hammond simply wants Malcolm for a team intended to observe and document the animals in the wild: a team that includes photojournalist Nick Van Owen (Vince Vaughn), weapons expert Eddie Carr (Richard Schiff), and paleontologist Sarah Harding (Julianne Moore), who happens to be Malcolm's girlfriend... and also happens to be on the island already, without his knowledge. So he is strongarmed into returning to his worst nightmare.

Once the team arrives on the island, they find they are not alone. Nefarious corporation InGen has sent an enormous squad--led by big game hunter Roland Tembo (Pete Postlethwaite) and prissy businessman Peter Ludlow (Arliss Howard)--to pillage the island, capture dinosaurs, and transport them to San Diego. This plays out as an extended action sequence that involves many jeeps, many fancy guns, and many species of dinosaur being brutalized as our heroes watch through binoculars from an outcropping. The heroes function as an audience stand-in for the scene, watching the perverse spectacle play out in front of them with stricken looks on their faces. In this moment, Spielberg's metacommentary couldn't be clearer: You wanted a sequel because you loved the wonder and majesty of Jurassic Park, but the serialization of a self-contained story can only violate the wonder of the original. The spectacle is captured and caged by greedy capitalists, all for the benefit of a viewing audience.