Review: Jack and Jill

Originally Posted November 12th, 2011 

It’s getting easier to believe that Adam Sandler has been orchestrating some Andy Kaufman-esque prank over the last few years. After America’s tepid response to his more dramatic roles in films like Funny People, perhaps Sandler decided that the best revenge was to give the people exactly what they want: shallow, inoffensive fast-food comedies like Grown Ups and Just Go With It, that, despite all evidence pointing towards their mostly meritless existence, still gross over $100 million. The hope was that these films would make his comeback as a dramatic actor all the more incredible but with Jack and Jill, the most reprehensibly lazy cash-grab yet to bare the Happy Madison name, what little dignity Sandler had left is publicly flayed, and it’s entirely his own fault.

Then again, you didn’t really need me to tell you that did you? The concept of a movie where Sandler plays his own twin sister is parody, maybe deserving of a five minute SNL sketch, yet here we are, with a 90 minute film all about Sandler dealing with his identical twin sister over the holidays. According to the filmmakers, twins are just the wackiest thing in the world, and you’d better think so to if you want to wring any enjoyment out of non-stop gags about twin powers, secret languages and Sandler mirroring himself on screen. No seriously, that’s the joke, there’s two of him and he’s doing the same thing, but one of him’s a lady!

And what a lady he is. Sandler’s been criticized for his over-reliance on characters with silly voices, but either he’s not listening, or just doesn’t care, because Jill is like the muse from which all those stupid voices and characters have originated. Oh sure, she’s loud, abrasive, and in all likelihood, mentally disturbed; that’s kinda the point of her as a catalyst for mayhem. She jumps from oblivious to shrill to psychotic and back again, often within the same scene, but when the filmmakers try to turn our disdain around on us to make you feel sorry for her, it’s insanity. Endearment in the writer’s eyes is Jill’s inability to remember movie titles correctly, and having a pet macaw named Poopsie. This is a repugnant, loathsome creation, devoid of any ounce of sympathy and one that I can only pray is too absurd for real life.

Granted, Jack and Jill’s version of L.A. seems overrun with gross comic characterizations that are often more frightening than funny. This is a world where someone almost gets the crap kicked out of him because he’s an atheist; not because he’s belittling the beliefs of others, no, just being atheist is grounds enough to be violently threatened. But hey, you book John McEnroe, you get him to yell at someone, because that’s still funny, right? Then there’s Sandler’s daughter, who creepishly carries around a doll dressed as herself through the entire film, which gets stranger and stranger the longer the movie goes without someone commenting on it. That’s not a character trait, it’s just weird, and Katie Holmes as Sandler’s wife is the closest thing to a sane voice in the film, though her refusal to acknowledge the utter nonsense around her probably makes her just as complicit in it.

Finally, there’s Jack, who should theoretically be the one identifiable person in this freak show, but is instead the most unlikeable everyman of Sandler’s increasing catalogue of lifeless family men. While having to exist in the same universe as Jill might be an excuse for frustration, it doesn’t explain why Sandler though it would be clever to play Jack as a raging, manipulative asshole, made abundantly clear through his cruelty to all those around him, particularly his employees. Oh by the way, he’s an ad exec, which might be a meta-commentary on the absurd amount of product placement in the film, but it'll probably just top-off your hatred for Jack as a human being.

Sandler just seems pissed off whenever he’s not in drag, which I think is coming from a very real place (no, not like that). Here we see Sandler looking at himself, or rather, the shtick-peddler he has become, and you can sense his frustration, with Jill embodying the kinds of sell-out characters he’s resorted to making as an appeal to a common denominator that couldn’t be any lower if it were subterranean. You just know that Sandler isn’t happy with this project, and worse, he knows that you know, hell, everyone seems acutely aware that this will be the career nadir for dozens.

It’s like watching a death row inmate relive his past crimes; you can sense his regret, but if he can’t forgive himself, why should we? And if this is Sandler’s execution, at least all his friends came by to observe it. The celebrity cameos are relentless, with usual suspects David Spade and Nick Swardson joined by pop culture throw-aways like Shamwow Guy and Subway’s Jared. But it’s not just the hacks Sandler roped in; Johnny Depp and Norm MacDonald are both palpably embarrassed in brief cameos, but at least the fleeting thrill of seeing them onscreen is a nice diversion. The big gun really is Al “Yes I have an Oscar” Pacino, in what’s probably his most fearless role in years. Playing himself offers up myriad easy jokes about his great roles of old, and he’s still woefully underserved by the script, but god love him for putting so much damn effort into this. It’d be easy to compare Pacino’s career spiral to Sandler’s, but at least here, Pacino dives into the material earnestly, almost sacrificially, in an effort to inject something, anything, resembling fun into this disaster.

Spoilers be damned, I can’t think of a better way to sum up my thoughts on Jack and Jill than to paraphrase the closing dialogue of Jack and Pacino as they watch their atrocious, quote-destroying Dunkin’ Donuts collaboration, an ad that is supposed to be the film’s big triumph:

Sandler: So what’d you think?

Pacino: Burn it. Destroy every copy. No one can ever know that this existed.

It’s not hard to figure out what Pacino and Sandler are actually talking about, the only question is whether this admission is more funny or pathetic. I’d side with the latter. There’s little about Jack and Jill that you could describe as funny.

1 out of 5

Directed by Dennis Dugan

2011, USA

Review: The Darkest Hour

Originally Posted December 27th, 2011 

The Darkest Hour is a film recommendable to anyone looking to take their first crack at screenwriting, because it is, in so many ways, the result of writers hoping a cool concept will cover up their poor handling of every other aspect in storytelling. Although plenty of good movies have gotten away with a good idea hiding the weakness of mechanical nuts and bolts, The Darkest Hour consistently shows an amateur understanding of plot development, character depth, motivation, and everything in between. It buries any novelty in its premise with cliché, wooden dialogue and just plain stupidity.

The shortcomings of the script are apparent from word one. You've already lost me if the characters are introduced as being either so bland, or so obnoxious, that you think they're the prologue cannon fodder instead of the leads. When their iPhone App designed to help hot strangers stalk each other doesn't get the $10 million dollar investment they were promised in Russia, is that supposed to make them sympathetic? Not when they're inept enough to fly out to Moscow without an NDA (in the film's own parlance, "non-douchebag agreement"), and just accept that they have no legal recourse because, "it's Moscow."

Having had their dreams of being overnight millionaires tragically crushed, techie Ben (Max Minghella) and slacker-waiting-for-a-chance-to-prove-himself Sean (Emile Hirsch) take comfort in a club modelled after a Russian Standard ad (picking up a few fellow American gals along the way, of course), before the power goes out and a mysterious light pattern overtakes the Russian night sky. There's an out of focus orange aurora borealis shot as if on a completely different planet than the one the awed street dwellers are standing on, but as sparkly orbs of light descend from the sky, mild relief sets in, as we're finally getting to that nugget of promise from the trailers.

An alien invasion is by no means a very original plot, but the alien designs in The Darkest Hour — or lack thereof — are. Aside from a slight shimmer, the aliens are completely invisible, which is made all the more dangerous for the residents of Moscow when the extraterrestrials prove hostile and start stealing the city's electricity. Getting in close contact with one of these things turns people into bits of burnt newspaper, and the instant ash-ification of party-goers is enough to convince our heroes to lock themselves away in a restaurant supply room for a few days.

At this point, a few good ideas present themselves; the change in scenery alone earns The Darkest Hour some credit. There are only so many times you can see New York, L.A. and Chicago decimated before all such films start running together. A well-handled montage covering the few days the characters stay in isolation sets up a refreshing look at the after-effects of an alien invasion as opposed to the immediate ones. And despite how cheap it might sound, having an enemy that could literally be behind you at any moment sounds pretty terrifying.

Too bad when it comes to actually executing on these ideas, The Darkest Hour falls on its face repeatedly with blunt exposition and poor storytelling devices. The early alien encounters mostly exist to establish some rules about the invaders, which is made pretty apparent when characters spout a theory about the creatures only to have it conveniently proven in the exact same scene. Visually, the only Moscow you get to see comes from matte backgrounds and scene after scene of dull industrial back alleys that could use a good feather-dusting.

That the characters lack any personality is mostly forgivable given the dire circumstances, but that doesn't excuse their nonsensical motivations. How exactly would the U.S. embassy be the one safe zone amidst all this destruction? What does a militia group gain by protecting a group of random strangers? Why would you risk your life finding someone who understands a Russian radio signal when you're just as likely not to understand the translator? Granted, with an English-speaking population of around 5%, the Yank survivors practically win the lottery with the number of bilingual characters they encounter.

All of this would be thoroughly more bearable if the one cool thing The Darkest Hour brought to the table had been better developed. The transparency of the aliens is more threatening in theory than practice, as you know everyone is safe so long as we don't see a set-up for a shot of someone getting turned into dandruff, an effect that loses most of its impact by vaporization number four or five. As a means of giving spatial context, having the aliens set off electrical equipment around them is pretty clever but it means their presence is always loudly announced by car alarms and flickering lights. I feel nothing for these characters, the least you could do is make their demises unexpected in some way.

The film's back half is ridden with clichés, including: deus ex machina via military types, emotional speeches to convince people to do incredibly dumb things, deus ex via character reappearance, inconvenient weapon malfunctions, painfully obvious introduction of a plot device for completely unexplained use as a deus ex, and that's not even the half of it. It wasn't until the forced happy ending and sequel baiting moments before the credits that I just gave up and started revelling in The Darkest Hour's ineptitude. Look, we all think it's the easiest thing in the world to write a dumb action movie, but The Darkest Hour proves that even when we think they're at their worst, bad Hollywood blockbusters could be so, so much worse.

1 out of 5

Directed by Chris Gorak

2011, USA

Review: That's My Boy

At this point, can any Adam Sandler fan not be considered an apologist? Bring up Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison all you like, it's clear that the Sandler of the 21st century could not care less about what you think of him. After an affable and promising performance in Funny People didn't break bank at the box office, it's like he decided that dignity and success were mutually exclusive. This meant starring in three of the worst movies of the last two years, and becoming a record-setter at the Razzie awards (last year, he had twelve nominations…in ten categories). To borrow a lyric from Old Dirty Bastard, Jacques Costeau could never get this low.

Speaking of whom (ODB, not Jacques), what's supposed to entice audiences into seeing another Sandler movie, especially after the audio-visual enema that was last year's Jack and Jill, is that That's My Boy is a hard-R raunch fest. Why that would matter makes no sense, since his heyday was in PG-13 territory, so it's not like this is some grand return to glory. All the rating bump does is give him an excuse to drop F-bombs and talk at length about his dick length, but in a wacky voice. Yay.

Assuming an accent that sounds like a Bostonian gremlin attempting baby-talk, Sandler plays Donnie Berger, a washed-up party animal who faced, and quickly ran away from, responsibility, having been saddled with a son that resulted from having an affair with his 8th grade math teacher. You have to give writer David Caspe credit for boldness; can you remember the last mainstream comedy you saw that decided statutory rape was a comedic goldmine?

In the moment, they play with the idea that the barely pubescent Donnie can't put his money where his mouth is when Mrs. McGarricle (Eva Amurri Martino) returns his advances. But instead of giving the cocky kid exactly what he wants, only to have it ruin his life (which might create, you know, pathos), they take the low road and have said tryst turn him into a GOD. When Donnie and his teacher are discovered doing the nasty during an assembly, men, women and children give him a STANDING OVATION, like he's finally fulfilled a societal Edu-cus complex by boning the schoolmarm.

Like Jack and Jill before it, That's My Boy takes place in a warped, Twilight Zone-esque alternate dimension where people act like the utter insanity going on around them isn't just typical, but acceptable. Donnie becomes a rich and famous celebrity, not a tabloid target or a guest on Maury, because of his sexual conquest. Even once burnt-out and facing jail time over money owed to the IRS, he's treated as some kind of beer-swilling Adonis, with men saluting him and women dying to be with him. You keep waiting for the pullback to see that the whole movie is just the daydream of younger Donnie, but it never happens. This is a masturbatory fantasy parading around as reality.

When Donnie hits up his estranged son Han (Andy Samberg) for cash by crashing his classy, New Hampshire wedding, you'd think this might turn into a snobs vs. slobs battle, but instead of Donnie embarrassing his son in front of all the rich folks, Donnie drags everyone else down to his level. There are no comedic straight men in the Sandler-verse, everyone is just waiting to cut loose and join in on the loutish antics of any misogynistic boor who happens to appear. Even for broad comedy, the film doesn't understand that the reason you have snooty rich people act snooty is to create juxtaposition for the jokes. Why is it funny for Donnie to talk about how hot Grandma is if everyone just sorta agrees with him without even batting an eye?

There are no jokes here, just a string of embarrassingly lazy and only intermittently shocking gross-out gags. The ick factor will depend on how many shock comedies you've watched; Zack and Miri Make a Porno had a tremendously funny scene where a guy gets literally shit-faced, but it was an actual joke due to having a setup, and being based on characters that you cared at least a little bit about, on account of acting like human beings. That's My Boy is a series of random and repugnant actions strung together by some of the most egregious product placement you'll ever see. Sandler is almost never seen without a name-brand beer in his hands, with him turning the label toward camera before taking a swig becoming a leitmotif. The apex of sponsor whoring has to be a revival of the Budweiser "Wazaa" ads featuring the whole cast, that they actually have the gall to do twice.

It's a film so sad and vile, that they manage to make an extended cameo by Vanilla Ice somehow not the most desperate thing about it. In an interview, Samberg convincingly claimed that he believed the movie was hilarious, which means his views on comedy are in line with Sandler's, or that he's one hell of an actor. What humour the usually funny Samberg mustered just showed how much better he deserves, as a comedian and an actor. Besides, all were overshadowed by the guy in the back of my theater doing a performance piece by pretending to be someone who'd never heard a four-letter word or seen someone fall down before, squealing with breathless laster the whole time. Maybe this will be another classic from the Sand-man for some, but for everyone else, it's all but an atrocity. To bring back the Wu-Tang Clan one more time and borrow a few words from Dave Chappelle, a comedian who knew how to say no to money for the sake of his pride, That's My Boy is torture, straight torture son.

1 out of 5

Directed by Sean Anders

Written by David Caspe

2012, USA

Review: The Devil Inside

Originally posted January 11th, 2012

“The Vatican did not endorse this film, or aid in its completion.” So reads the opening text of The Devil Inside, a new horror movie that purports to record events surrounding the exorcism of a criminally insane woman locked in a Vatican mental hospital. The filmmakers intended this to be a provocative dig at the Catholic Church, knowing that the Vatican would have no reason to endorse the movie. That’s not just because it’s a faux-documentary that pretends to be based on fact when it certainly isn’t. No, it’s probably because the church giving the thumbs up would be mean they support a film that’s as insipidly dull and scare-free as The Devil Inside is.

With the aim of becoming the next Paranormal Activity squarely in the filmmaker’s sights, The Devil Inside plays like a checklist of that franchises least enjoyable elements. A bland cast of cannon fodder that ranges from forgettable to grating? Check. Hand-held camera direction that sways around aimlessly to give the impression of energy? You bet. An occasional scare from stuff jumping out at you? Actually, there are less of these cheap gotcha moments than you might expect, which would be commendable in a film that had a premise that was both terrifying and original. Sadly, The Devil Inside is neither.

What depth left in the exorcism genre not covered by The Exorcist has been pretty much mined by movies like The Last Exorcism and The Exorcism of Emily Rose, which created hooks out of the question of faith at the center of a rather violent ritual. The Devil Inside confuses awkward commentary on the Catholic Church with depth, and settles for being a painfully slow tour bus of the mildly grotesque. When it opens on a police tape of dead bodies, covered head to toe in blood, is the camera’s indulgent fixation on the film’s FX budget supposed to be scary? Disgusting, maybe, but that’s not the feeling the audience paid $15 for.

The Devil Inside’s only brush with novelty is the conceit that Vatican higher-ups refuse to recognize possession, so it falls to a couple loose cannon Fathers to help young Isabella (Fernanda Andrade) discover the source of her mother’s deadly mania. The priests also happen to be well-equipped medically, so the exorcism scenes have plenty of beeping equipment, so as to give the impression that the film has a pulse.

“No two exorcisms are the same” intones father Ben (Simon Quarterman) to Isabella, as he tries to convince her to stay on her feet and the audience to stay in their seats. Again, the writers fall hard on cliché and act like their set-pieces need to be assembled with complete adherence to the exorcism playbook. Victims violently contorting, shouting nonsense and sexual taunts, or exhibiting random bouts of superhuman strength are bare minimums of the genre, but for The Devil Inside,they’re lazy highpoints. You go in knowing that most of the cast is going to get the axe, but wanting them to die out of pure boredom is thoroughly unsatisfying.

Granted, stupidity is a pretty good way to work up audience bloodlust, something The Devil Inside has to spare. The documentarian recording all the supernatural craziness has the same separation anxiety from his camera all rubes in found-footage films do. Worse, the Vatican experts prove just as inept. One hopes that by their second exorcism, the priests would have figured out that a possessed person won’t have much trouble breaking out of restraints that look like repurposed gift-wrapping ribbons. And you’d think they’d know that the inverted cross that’s etched on their patient, while typically associated with modern Satanism, is actual a symbol of Saint Peter. You know, seeing as they’re TRAINED CATHOLIC PRIESTS.

Even the basic mechanics of the film’s structure bare the unmistakeable mark of incompetence on the part of the filmmakers. Early on, we see professional talking heads from experts in medical and religious fields, giving the impression we’re watching a documentary. That’s completely abandoned once the film picks up the found-footage style, one where the film can inexplicably cut around in the same scene, despite the presence of only one camera. Perhaps the characters thought their inane conversation about the validity of exorcism was worth shooting twice? And since actual dialogue seems beyond the writer’s grasp, we’re eventually treated to awkward camera-confessions straight out of The Real World: Vatican City.

It makes one wonder if found-footage films are more complicated to make then you’d think, or if director William Brent Bell learned absolutely nothing in the 5 years since directing the dreadful Stay Alive. At only 83 minutes, you might think the film’s bafflingly anti-climactic ending was an intentional act of mercy, but that would probably give the creators too much credit. So congratulations to all the other awful movies coming out in 2012; you’ve had one hell of a low-bar set by The Devil Inside.

1 out of 5