Moon (2009)

I have always been a champion of low-budget, smaller-scope, character-driven films, but sometimes those virtues are better in theory than in execution. At the end of the day, after all, a film is still meant to be entertainment. The problem with MOON, Duncan Jones' feature directorial debut, is that forgets to entertain.

Set on the moon (at least if you're interpreting the film literally -- you might read into it a different way and think that everything is all in the main character's head), astronaut Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is nearing the end of a three-year stint away from his wife and toddler daughter where he oversees a station run by Lunar Industries, a company that harvests clean energy for Earth by extracting helium-3 from the moon's surface. "Oversee" is the right word; though Bell will occasionally explore the landscape in a lunar all-terrain vehicle or repair something, he is more frequently seen as an isolated man whose skills are not needed, thanks to a fully-computerized and robotic system that does everything and leaves him only "Gerty," a Hal-like computer voiced by Kevin Spacey, to talk to. Bell spends more time watching 60s sitcoms and building a scale model city out of wood than he does doing anything that would look like his job.

It is Gerty's job to tend to Bell's every need, and as the story moves slowly along, the audience is made to wonder (as Bell is) whether or not Gerty's true task is to shield Bell from knowing something that he shouldn't. Live communication between the moon and Earth, for example, is "down." Communication is relegated to pre-taped video messages beamed in from home or, Bell assumes, shipped from his station back there. Then, just as it feels like the plot is about to flatline, Bell is injured in his vehicle outside of the station and wakes up in the infirmary to find that there is another of him. A clone. A younger and more fit version of himself.

Which Sam is real? Which is the clone? Are they both clones? These are questions Jones allows the audience to explore as the film wanders on. Indeed, the cerebral tactics employed by Jones mark the film's strongest attributes, notwithstanding a riveting performance by Sam Rockwell, who fantastically creates individual rhythms and nuances for two versions of the same character in a role that requires one actor to keep audiences engaged for an entire the film much the same as was required of Tom Hanks in "Cast Away." Rockwell, frankly, is the reason to watch the film.

The most noticeable film kinship to MOON is, of course, "2001: A Space Odyssey," a much-loved science fiction classic that no decent film snob is willing to admit is also quite boring. But I'm going to step out on this one and say that MOON IS BORING. Terribly so. One feels as if Jones forgot to aim lower than an audience member's head when making this film, as there is virtually no emotional engagement to speak of and, as previously mentioned, the film's only tense moments of plot are in deciphering and interpreting what is taking place, a solely brain-focused activity. The problem is, if you don't care about a character with your heart, you might not care what is going on with him, either.

I admire MOON for a number of things. I appreciate it's Ray Bradbury-esque plot and its organic use of CG effects. And I certainly admire Rockwell. But, if I'm not mistaken, the film is attempting to say something both about the isolation of the individual and the mighty corporation's whorish use of the individual. The first message is bread and butter to good science fiction, and the second message, if you ask me, is only attempted but not accomplished. I'd say "Wall-E," another recent sci-fi film, does a much better (if more in-your-face) job.

Movies should make us think. But they also have to do some entertaining. With little new to look at for 100 minutes but the same guy on the same set, and a flat-lined plot, MOON does one but not the other.

2.0 out of 4

Toy Story 3 (2010)

I've read an awful lot this summer about how it's been a terrible summer for movies. Indeed, the list of films I've wanted to see lately has been a short one, and nothing on it has sent me running to the theatre. But you can't be a parent and escape TOY STORY 3. And given Pixar's sterling track record for high-quality films that entertain kids but move adults on a whole different level, why would I want to miss the third film in this trilogy, anyway?

I'm glad I didn't. TOY STORY 3, I'll bet, is the answer to this summer's quality film crisis. Unroll the now-well-used banners for Pixar once again, because they never seem to truly falter. You can try to put the Pixar films in quality order all you want (and I've seen these lists starting to circulate), but the difference between the best Pixar film (usually listed as "The Incredibles" or "Wall-E") and the worst (typically "A Bug's Life," maybe because it was the first one?) is minor. It's a fight between 3, 3 1/2, and 4-star movies.

TOY STORY 3 is somewhat predictable as soon as you are given the plot point that Andy, the owner of the now-famous playthings, is headed to college. It's fairly obvious that this third chapter in the story will be about what happens to these toys when a boy grows up and moves on and has no real need for them anymore. And, sure enough, the plot provides the forks in the road you would imagine; either the toys are going to be stored in a box in the attic, thrown away or donated. TOY STORY 3 flirts with and then deeply explores the merits and drawbacks of these options.

Part of the Toy Story charm has always been the Homerian adventure that these toys go on when something goes wrong. Toys are smaller than people, naturally, and it takes a lot longer to cover human ground, especially when your feet are bonded to a plastic base, as is the case for the little green soldiers. Early on in TS3, in fact, the soldiers parachute out of Andy's window, smart enough to realize that they will be the first to go...trash. Not even a consideration for donation.

But what of the rest? Woody finds himself to be hand-picked by Andy for a box of items heading to college, presumably fated to be a bookshelf ornament to provide Andy's dorm room with a reminder of home. The other toys soon convince Buzz Lightyear, however, that being played with is the most important thing, and a new life in a day care center filled with play-ready children is the opportunity of a lifetime. Nothing, of course, ever goes as planned, and the daycare experience quickly morphs into the Dante's Inferno of childcare, complete with a bitter, jaded and dirt-worn purple stuffed bear deceivingly known for loving hugs.

I could say more about the plot, but because everyone knows these characters so well already and, as I mentioned before, the basic story trajectory is mostly what you'd expect going in, I don't want to say too much. Lest you think there are no surprises, the final act of the film throws some harrowing twists in and the jokes and bits in the film are funnier and more frequent than in the first two Toy Stories combined. At least a dozen times, I had my cheek in my hand and said to myself "this is brilliant!" or "how clever!"

TOY STORY 3 is now also becoming famous as a film that goes on a short list of movies that can make a grown man cry at the end. To that point I will simply say: GUILTY. I silently wept into the back of my 4-year-old son's t-shirt for the last 10 minutes of the movie, lamenting everything from growing old myself to missing the sheer power of the free-floating imagination of childhood to the thought of my own kids having to grow up.

What I'm not sure I was sad about at the end, though, was saying goodbye to these particular toys. I am smart enough to know that although the ending here is decisive, these are Disney characters, which means never having to say goodbye. But, as I've mentioned already, Pixar excels at working on multiple levels, so missing these particular toys when the third film ends stands as the simplest form of sadness, while adult-level grief can spiral off from there into nothing short of a crisis of aging and mortality.

TOY STORY 3 was a treat -- that rare film that is actually worth every penny you spent on it, and those pennies have really stacked up with today's movie prices. I must honestly tell you that, though I saw it in 3-D, this time I do not feel that the added dimension provided any extra thrills, as I strongly believe it did with "How To Train Your Dragon," the last great children's film I saw. Save yourself those three extra bucks.

The question rolling around in my mind now is: where does TOY STORY 3 fall among the Pixar line, and among the all-time greats in family film entertainment? The answer, right now, is that I'm not sure. A large part of me hesitates to place it above films like "Wall-E" and "The Incredibles," and maybe even "Up," because this film had the advantage of building off of a known entity rather than creating a whole new universe. And yet, how can something so old be so fresh?

What I feel more sure about at this moment is that TOY STORY 3 is quite possibly the greatest third film in a trilogy that I've ever seen. And that in itself is an accomplishment. Stay tuned for award season, when the voting critics will likely confirm this as the most-loved "3" of all-time, too.

4.0 out of 4

3 months...gone!

I always told myself that I was writing this blog for myself and that there's a lot of vanity in assuming that anyone would want to read someone else's blog. That any one of the millions of people keeping online journals of one form or another have thoughts so important to share, opinions that brilliant, that they'd be worth the time -- or missed when they're gone.

And yet here I am thinking to myself: "Gee...I can't go this long without a post or my readers will stop checking out my blog and find somewhere else to go."

This is, of course, delusional, considering that only a few people have formally signed up as followers of this blog. How many more of you there are, I don't know. Maybe none? Maybe many. But perhaps it's part of this game. Write for yourself, but under the delusion that many people are reading.

With that said, I apologize for disappointing anyone with a three month absence from reviewing films. Strangely enough, can you believe that I literally saw NO new films between then and now? Two of those months were spent in my crazy final weeks of my school year and the last I've spent catching up on a full DVR's worth of television shows. In the time I've been away, I've even picked up a new obsession: HBO's "True Blood."

But this is not a TV blog and, since I have kids, I finally had a reason to go to a movie again. I'm looking forward to bringing more frequent reviews for you, now that it's summer. I would suspect that the majority of what I'll review in the coming months will be DVD rentals and older things, as I don't always have the time to get to the theatre in the summer. But something is better than nothing.

Whoever you are. Thanks for reading. Always check back, even when it's been awhile. I'll always be doing this.

Keith