A Few Random Dispatches from the Movies

Not sure if it's because we're trapped in the late-winter doldrums, or what, but the last few weeks at the Harris household we've been watching more movies than usual; and this may be a result of the late-winter doldrums, too, but today I can think of nothing more profound for blog-fodder than to share some of my random impressions of what we've been watching.

Iron Man. This was better than many of the films I've seen in the super-hero genre, and the story of Tony Stark's redemption is not entirely without merit (even if it is a redemption-by-works-not-grace), but the idea that he created an arc-reactor-powered-battle suit out of spare parts while holed up in a cave somewhere in Afghanistan was such a big pill to swallow at the outset that my sympathy for the film was greatly diminished going forward. I'm as willing to suspend my disbelief as the next guy (usually more), but even science fiction has to set the terms of believability somewhere. But then again, lots of things blow up.

The Simpsons Movie. I stopped watching The Simpsons somewhere around Season 11, so maybe this film was just the final throes of a gradual decline that I've not been privy to, but I have to say I was pretty disappointed with this movie. I felt like all their best jokes had been told by the 25 minute mark, all their best characters were reduced to cameos and catch-phrases, and their best satire amounted to little more than obvious cheap shots at easy targets. Probably one of the biggest challenges in producing a film based on a long-running television franchise is to tell a real story that stands on its own merits while staying faithful to the series; this film, I think, did neither.

The Social Network. "Film of the Year" (Rolling Stone) seems a bit grandiose to me, but I really enjoyed this one, nonetheless. With the exception of the final exchange between Zuckerberg and the Junior Lawyer for the Defense, I appreciated how carefully they handled the (fictional) Zuckerberg as a dynamic and complex character. The lawyer's line in that final scene, "You're not an a**h*le, you're just trying too hard to be one" seemed a bit too preachy and transparent to me, as though the film didn't trust the audience to draw its own conclusions about Zuckerberg but had to force-feed us a verdict. Oh yeah, and as characters, the Winklevoss twins were almost embarrassingly flat and cliched.

The King's Speech. This was an inspiring and enjoyable movie, and Bertie was one of the most genuinely sympathetic characters I've seen in a long time: he's dynamic and complex and well-portrayed. The cinematography took creative risks that worked, and the way the film conveys the ominous uncertainty that must have overshadowed this period of history is effective. That said, it lost me (though not irredeemably) at two points: 1) Timothy Spall's Churchill seemed like he'd just stumbled out of a Monty Python sketch, or off the set of SNL (if SNL ever parodied historical British politicians, that is); 2) Bertie's "I have a voice!" assertion when Logue taunts him by sitting on St Edward's Chair seemed almost laughably contrived and transparent. This scene almost sank the movie for me. As with my critique of The Social Network above, it left me wondering: when did film-makers get the impression that audiences were so stupid that they had to club us over the head with the theme of their film at least once before the movie is done?