Unimonster's Screening Room: 300-- Rise of an Empire

Title:  300: Rise of an Empire

Date of Theatrical Release:  7 March, 2014

MPAA Rating:  R

 

Reviewer:  Unimonster

Seven years ago, I proclaimed Zack Snyder’s epic vision of Frank Miller’s graphic novel 300 the Movie of the Year for 2007.  It had everything that makes a movie great … well almost everything, unless you want to count Gerard Butler’s shaved pecs as breasts, which I don’t.  Rumors of a sequel began almost immediately, though I wasn't quite sure how such a feat would occur, with the Spartans lying slaughtered on the field of Thermopylae.  It took a while, but Zack Snyder, Kurt Johnstad, and Frank Miller finally figured out a way to revisit the Greco-Persian wars—by putting them to sea.  300: Rise of an Empire focuses on the battle of Salamis, fought in September, 480 BCE, roughly concurrent with the battle of Thermopylae.  The Athenian fleet, commanded in part by a general named Themistocles, decisively defeated the Persian fleet commanded by the Persian emperor Xerxes I, and Queen Artemisia of Caria, located on what is now the southwest coast of Turkey.

With Snyder busy with the directing chores on last summer’s blockbuster Man of Steel, Noam Murro was chosen to helm the project.  Murro, whose only feature prior to this was the 2008 film Smart People, had originally been named to direct the Bruce Willis action sequel A Good Day to Die Hard, but dropped out to take this assignment instead.  While he seemed an odd choice when announced, it’s hard to find fault with the decision, as the finished project will attest.  Working with a script penned by Snyder and Johnstad, the same team that brought 300 to the screen, Murro keeps the action flowing at a reasonable pace, though it does come across as a bit more ‘talky’ than its predecessor.

Leading the cast is Sullivan Stapleton, an Australian actor with a great deal of experience in television in his home country, though he has made occasional appearances in American productions, most recently 2013’s Gangster Squad.  He plays Themistocles as a man devoted to the ideal of a united Greece, with all the separate city-states banding together to resist the Persian onslaught.  Stapleton is very good as the Athenian general, convincing the viewer of his faith in a pan-Hellenic alliance.  I doubt that this will prove to be the breakout role for him that Leonidas was for Butler, but time will tell.  Opposite Stapleton is Eva Green, as the commander of Xerxes’ navy, Artemisia.  This is really her movie, and she commands every scene she appears in, as well as helping to provide the one thing that the first movie lacked—a healthy dose of female nudity.  Some familiar faces from the first movie appear—Lena Headey as the Spartan queen, Gorgo, David Wenham as Dilios, Andrew Tiernan as Ephialtes, and of course Rodrigo Santoro as Xerxes.  However, with the exception of Santoro’s Xerxes, this is not their movie, and they take up little screen time.

I took the Uni-Nephew with me to see this one on its opening weekend, and I must say both of us loved it.  We saw the 2D version, but I would say that had there been a 3D version starting at the same time, we would’ve opted for that; this is a movie that begs to be seen on the big screen, in three dimensions.  The effects were spectacular, the photography beautiful, and, just as the first did, it perfectly captures the mood and style of Miller’s graphic novels.  My recommendation is simple: if you loved the first film, you won’t be disappointed here.  But don’t wait for the home video release—get to the theater and see it, now … in 3D.

The Unimonster's Crypt Screening Room: SUCKER PUNCH

Title:  SUCKER PUNCH

 

Date of Theatrical Release:  25 March 2011

MPAA Rating:  PG-13

Since the first trailer was released at San Diego’s Comic-Con last July, this movie has been at the top of the Unimonster’s eagerly awaited list, thus there was no question that I would be comfortably ensconced in my local theater on opening night.  My expectations were high for Zack Snyder’s latest offering, after having been amazed by both 300 and THE WATCHMEN.  And I’m pleased to say that he exceeded those expectations.

First, let me say that I went into the film well aware both of what it was, and wasn’t.  If one chooses to see this movie expecting a tightly-plotted, cohesive story and great acting—well, they might be disappointed with what they get.  If the viewer, however, expects what Snyder is so obviously serving up, at least, based on every promo and trailer I’ve seen, then they’ll be more than happy with the movie.  And what might that be, one wonders?  What Snyder (who also wrote the screenplay, along with Steve Shibuya) is so capably offering his audience is a videogame—a visual feast that explodes in the mind like a light-storm.  It is a confection for the brain, one that requires very little thought devoted to following what plot there is—it’s best to just sit back and enjoy it.

The story follows a young woman referred to only as “Babydoll” (Emily Browning).  It begins with a silent sequence—only the musical score perfectly accompanies the action on-screen as her mother is dying—indeed, our first view of her mother is as the sheet is being drawn over her now lifeless body.  Both Babydoll and her younger sister are left in the dubious care of their stepfather (Gerard Plunkett), whom one is given cause to believe is responsible for the death of his wife.  These suspicions become more firm when we see the stepfather reading the mother’s will—everything, a vast fortune, is left to her daughters.  In a rage, the stepfather storms to Babydoll’s room, his intentions made clear when he sees her there in her pajamas.

She fights off his advances, leaving bloody scratches down the side of his face.  He then looks to her sister’s room and with an evil grin locks Babydoll in her room.  She climbs out the window, in the midst of a driving rainstorm, retrieves a pistol from a desk drawer, and confronts her stepfather just as he’s dragging her sister from her hiding place.  She fires, missing him, but her sister falls to the floor, dead.  She runs from the house to the nearby grave of her mother, where the police catch up to her.

Her stepfather commits her to a mental institution, where he secretly contracts with a corrupt orderly named Blue Jones (Oscar Isaac) to have his stepdaughter lobotomized.  While there’s no doctor on staff that will do the procedure, there is one that visits occasionally; he’ll be there in five days.  Five days, and Babydoll won’t even know her own name, much less anything that can hurt the old man.

The horror of her circumstance causes the girl to retreat into her own mind, creating an alternate reality that is the setting for much of the film.  Gone is the asylum, transformed into a nightclub-slash-brothel.  Babydoll has been sold to the owner, a man named Blue.  But she’s told she’ll be there only five days, at the end of which a mysterious “High Roller” will come for her.  She’s soon befriended by other girls there—Rocket, Amber, and Blondie (Jena Malone, Jamie Chung, and Vanessa Hudgens), who help her to understand what is expected of her in this place.  Only Rocket’s older sister, Sweet Pea (Abbie Cornish), is stand-offish towards the new addition, even after Babydoll rescues Rocket from being raped by the cook.

 

When the woman who trains and oversees the young ladies of the establishment, Madame Gorski (Carla Gugino), informs Babydoll that all the girls must dance for the customers, she discovers yet another reality within herself, one that might hold the key to her freedom.  As she begins to sway hypnotically to the music Gorski plays for her, she finds herself in the snow-covered courtyard of an ancient Japanese castle.  She enters the castle, and is greeted by an elderly wise man (Scott Glenn, with the best performance in the movie).  He tells her that, in order to gain her freedom, she must find five items—a map, fire, a knife, a key, and a fifth item, a mystery, one that only she can solve.  He gives her a Japanese Katana and a Colt 1911A1 pistol, to use in her quest for freedom.  As he closes the door on her, he adds, “Oh, and one more thing … Defend yourself.”

Stylistically, Snyder creates a uniquely hallucinatory landscape for his characters to inhabit, one that seamlessly blends diverse environments and the creatures that populate them into a visually orgiastic whole.  It is a world where the girls do battle, using both modern weapons and swords, in World War I trenches against the Steampunk-inspired reanimated corpses of dead German soldiers, and a B-25 bomber engages in air-to-air combat with an enraged mother dragon.  It makes no sense, but then, it doesn’t need to.  It’s the creation of a young girl’s tortured psyche, struggling to find a place where she is powerful enough to strike back against those who seek to harm her, and overcome her fate.

The grimness and despair of the brothel is offset by the fantasy worlds the girls escape into whenever Babydoll dances.  The CGI, which is usually the weakest link in films of this type, is spectacularly executed, helping the viewer with the necessary suspension of disbelief.  And the music is as much a part of creating these environments as is the imagery.  As Snyder has stated, “… music is the thing that launches them into these fantasy worlds.”

I loved this movie, because I got exactly what I had hoped it would be, what I said I expected four months ago.  “I don’t know what the full story is, or if there is a story.  From what I’ve seen so far, I can’t say I really care about a story.  This movie looks to be pure mind-candy, a psychedelic light-show for the eyes [2010 in Review, 1 January 2011].”  If you go into it expecting to see what Snyder is offering, then my bet is you’ll love it too.

The Unimonster's Crypt Screening Room: WANDERLOST

Title:  WANDERLOST

Date of Theatrical Release:  2009

MPAA Rating:  Unrated Festival Version

[Ed. note:  At the recent Famous Monsters Convention in Indianapolis (see my Convention write-up above), this film from director / co-writer / producer David Kabler was one of the features selected for screening.  Due to a prior commitment, I was unable to attend the screening, so the filmmaker was kind enough to provide the Crypt with a copy of the film for review.  I would like to express my sincere appreciation for this kindness, which allows me to bring this review to my readers.]

One of the advantages of low-budget, independent filmmaking is just that: it’s independent.  The filmmaker, freed from the restraints of corporate oversight and the need to balance artistic imagination with commercial appeal, is able to give free rein to that imagination, and bring his unique vision to the screen—within the limits of his resources, of course.

The end result is frequently an intensely personal film, one that reflects the artist’s own hopes and fears, dreams and nightmares.  And the consequence of this is that not everyone will enjoy the film, or feel that it has a personal message for them.  That’s not a negative—these films aren’t designed to appeal to the mass market.  But when such a film does connect with a viewer, then the filmmaker’s vision is fully realized.

WANDERLOST is a surreal, bizarre journey through a nightmare world, one characterized by a ruined and decaying urban landscape.  The central figure is a drifter, traveling across country by hopping railroad freight cars.  His existence by its very nature is a solitary one, and one gathers that that is by choice.  Through flashbacks, the viewer is made aware of the character’s painful childhood as the victim of repeated, ritualized abuse.

Frequent cutaways introduce the viewer to other characters, each of whom seem to exist in a world apart from the others.  One of these is a graffiti artist who we watch as he creates an image on a brick wall.  He says nothing, simply stands at the wall creating his art.

There’s very little more I can say to describe the plot of the movie; not for fear of divulging too much, but because, quite frankly, I’m not sure there is a plot.  The film is visually equivalent to free-form verse; a series of random vignettes connected tenuously by a thread of horrific imagery.  Filmed in Asheville, North Carolina, it’s very well done from a technical viewpoint, and the photography, by co-writer Daniel Judson, is excellent.  Artistically, it serves very well the bleak, blighted mood of the piece, as does the various urban locations.  Kabler did a superb job designing the production to emphasize the isolation and alienation of the lead character, and on an emotional level, the film is quite successful at evoking the desired responses from the audience.

However, I’m someone who prefers some degree of linear reality to films.  While I can appreciate the artistic vision behind the film, and the quality of the execution of that vision, that alone is not enough to entertain me.  I need a story.  I’m a writer—words are my medium.  They are, in the final analysis, what I relate to, what I understand the best.  If the story doesn’t captivate me, then the most beautifully filmed, professionally produced movie is nothing more than a beautiful failure.  I wish that I could say otherwise about WANDERLOST.  Unfortunately, I can’t.

But that is merely my personal opinion of the film.  And, as I stated before, that’s the advantage of Indie films, and one of the reasons I’m such a fan of the form.  It doesn’t need to appeal to the masses; it succeeds, or fails, on an individual basis.  It’s art, not commerce, and just because it failed with the Unimonster means nothing if it succeeds with you.

To the best of my knowledge, there’s yet to be a DVD release announced for the film, so the best option for finding it is to go direct to the source and contact Kabler through his web-site, http://www.WANDERLOSTfilm.com.  So do what I did, and judge this film for yourself.  You may share my opinion.  You may not.  But how will you know unless you try it?

Unimonster's Screening Room: GARGALESE — THE TICKLE MONSTER

Title: GARGALESE — THE TICKLE MONSTER

Date of Theatrical Release: N/A

MPAA Rating: Unrated


I don’t often discuss short subjects here, not because of a lack of interest in them, but because until recently there were so few of them worth mentioning. Though Horror is particularly well suited to exploration through the medium of the short film, until the development of the “YouTube” culture it was very difficult for filmmakers to market their short films to the audiences that would be the most appreciative of them. That is no longer an issue, and short Horror Films of every possible description now flood the internet.

One of these short films is from a team of filmmakers headed by Dean Millermon. GARGALESE — THE TICKLE MONSTER is many things—but ‘easy to describe’ is not among them. This 17-minute short (though Millermon states that the ‘finished’ release might come in at a 15-minute runtime) concerns an alien invader, described by some as a “tickle bear,” who crash-lands in suburban Illinois. This begins an enjoyable, humorous if not particularly logical, sequence of events which adds a whole new meaning to the term “die laughing.”

Directed by Millermon, who co-wrote the script with Ryan Guenther, and produced by Brian Kallies and Laura Szymber, this short film is a great example of a small group of people using their talents and abilities to overcome an obvious lack of funds. What’s more, they appear to be having a great time while doing so. Axiom Megamedia is the production company, and one would hope that we see more from them in the near future.

As Gargalese encounters various residents of Northern Illinois, it mutates through several forms, emerging from a fallen meteor in the shape of an eight-inch tall, toothsome, sharp-clawed “tickle bear” before a shotgun blast from farmer Mike (Dana Gasser) spurs a change into a larger, more dangerous creature. The alien’s efforts to return home leads him on a journey through greater Elgin, Illinois—and introduces him to a number of surprised, and very ticklish, humans. The movie also stars Megan Hincks as Brenda, a human unlike any other in Gargalese’s experience.

While GARGALESE — THE TICKLE MONSTER is very definitely a low-budget project, it’s a well-crafted one, and it benefits from the fact that the horror is firmly tongue-in-cheek. The film doesn’t take itself too seriously, which allows the audience to overlook the somewhat silly premise and play along. Millermon’s direction is good; everyone’s able to stay focused on their work, and the story progresses smoothly from point to point. The script is adequate; not great, but equal to the task.

The cast is surprisingly good, especially considering the independent, low-budget nature of the production. Particularly worthy of note are the three leads—Hincks, Dave Hunter as Brenda’s husband Ronnie, and Mack Perry as his uncle Glen. The two men soon find themselves confronting Gargalese, but when the alien encounters the very cute, redheaded Brenda… well, as the ex-husband of a redhead, all I can say is that we should have a brigade of redheads standing by in case of an alien invasion.

GARGALESE — THE TICKLE MONSTER is being screened at the Women in Horror film fest at Chicago’s historic Portage Theater on the first of May. For those not able to attend that festival, information on future screenings can be found at the movie’s Facebook fan page http://www.facebook.com/pages/Gargalese-The-Tickle-Monster/108685912506693?ref=ts. If you’re a fan of indie Horror or short subjects, then you owe it to yourself to find a way to see this movie.

Don’t let the Tickle Bear get YOU.