World War Z (2013)

Let the debate between the fast-moving zombie versus the traditional, slow-moving zombie commence...

To be honest with you, the whole fast-moving zombie thing has never really bugged me.  Since zombies aren't real, you can pretty much do anything you want with them.  It don't care either way, and there are great examples of either type being effective and terrifying.  That wasn't what worried me about World War Z.  I was more concerned with how bad the CG looked, and that it was PG-13, leading me to think the movie would be very tame and pedestrian.  I also heard fans of the book were upset with the changes made to the point where some have said the only thing the book and film have in common are the title.  I haven't read the book, so I won't be commenting on that part though.  Fortunately, World War Z wasn't as bad as I feared, but it misses the mark about as much as it hits.

We meet Gerry Lane (Brad Pitt) as he prepares for a regular day with the family.  Gerry's retired recently so he could spend more time with his wife (Mireille Enos) and kids.  Even though we don't see much of them, I liked this part as it did a good job of setting up the Lane's as a loving family, and gives you something to care about.  I am a little disappointed Mireille Enos wasn't given more to do though.  I'm a big fan of The Killing and thought World War Z might let a larger audience see what she can do, but most people are probably going to remember her as "Brad Pitt's wife from that zombie movie."

Shortly after, we see them sitting in traffic.  An explosion happens in the distance, and everyone's in a panic to escape what appears to be a rapidly growing wave of zombies attacking everything in their path.  They kind of reminded me of a Zerg swarm.  Gerry and his family narrowly escape the city and end up on a military vessel where we learn more about the zombie outbreak and how widespread it's become.

The military forces Gerry back into action, as he's the best as what he does.  What is he the best at, you ask?  Kicking ass?  Wrong!  Investigating stuff...for the UN!  Gerry goes from location to location in an effort to track down the source of the infection, or "Patient Zero".

What I liked about World War Z is that despite that most of the film to this point is pretty much exactly what you see in the trailer, it still managed to be very intense and thrilling.  WWZ wastes no time getting to the point.  We're barely five minutes into the film before the outbreak begins.  I also felt like the film was a realistic depiction of the early stages of a zombie invasion.  We see there's still a command structure and military force.  There's a pointed effort to find the cause and hopefully find a cure.  People make decisions that are much more pragmatic (there's a great example of this at the midway point), and you thankfully don't see a majority of the characters do stupid things once the shit hits the fan.  The cast does a good job of taking the material seriously, and the movie avoids any camp or silliness.

On the other hand I think striving for a PG-13 rating detracted from that realism.  When the outbreak happens, I'd expect to see people screaming and swearing their heads off, but I don't think I heard anyone swear.  Also, the movie is almost completely bloodless, which I find odd for a zombie film.  All points of impact are cut away from, and there are other times where you can see someone struggling against something that's off screen.  You can see gorier stuff each week on The Walking Dead.  Some might appreciate the lack of gore, but not seeing any blood when people are being bitten and hacked doesn't work for me.  I think the decisions director Marc Forster made at times seemed to be geared towards getting more people in the theater rather than making a zombie film strictly for fans of the genre. That isn't a bad thing necessarily, but it usually means you have to make some sacrifices, and I think those sacrifices hurt the film.

Finally, we get to the end, and it's very abrupt and unsatisfying.  I sat there thinking, "Really?  That's it?"  It felt like they didn't know how they wanted to end it.  I heard they did a large amount of reshoots to get us to the current ending, as well.  If this was the improved ending after all the reshoots, I can't imagine how bad the original ending was.  I'll be curious if there's an alternate cut when the Blu-Ray comes out.  For example, Matthew Fox has a bizarre cameo where you barely see his face on screen.  It makes he think he might have had a bigger role and was a casualty of all the reshoots.  I'm guessing having four writers didn't help with the ending (Matthew Michael Carnahan, Drew Goddard, Damon Lindelof, J. Michael Straczynski).  I've heard there may have even been more writers involved that weren't credited.  That helps explain why it's so uneven.

The special effects didn't help either.  While not as bad as what the trailer made it look like, there were still lots of times I felt the zombies looked artificial and rubbery.  Even when standing around they moved as if they suffered from Tourette's, twitching and chomping their teeth.  This caused a lot uncomfortable laughter at times.  I suppose it helped break the tension a bit though.

World War Z is a mainstream zombie film, but I think that's part of what holds it back.  While it manages to entertain and keep a high level of tension, the rating keeps this a tame affair.  It's a shame as there are some smart and realistic ideas in there, but the ending leaves you disappointed and wish there had been more.  I'm right on the border of rental and matinee on this one.  It's not a bad film, but it's really going to depend on how much you want to see it.

2.5 (out of 5) Death Stars

The Odd Life of Timothy Green (2012) - Movie Review

It's nice when the title of a movie doesn't mislead you. The Odd Life of Timothy Greenis an odd movie. Young Uncle Owen from the Star Wars prequels and Sydney from Alias...wait a second, I'm already getting off track. I'm starting over...

Jim (Joel Edgerton) and Cindy (Jennifer Garner) are a young couple living in a small town that is "The Pencil Capital of the World."  Jim works for the local pencil factory and Cindy works for the town's pencil museum.  As the entire town revolves around pencils, you know these guys see a lot of excitement and know how to party.  So, Jim and Cindy have been trying unsuccessfully for some time to have a kid.  However, the movie begins with them getting the bad news that it's just not going to happen.  Rather than adopt, they basically decide to get over it, but before doing that, they write down their wish list of what their child could have been.  They take these notes and bury it in a box in their garden, like you'd do with a dead hamster.  Can you imagine the outcome if they had flushed it down the toilet like a goldfish?

So magic happens, and they wake to find that a child, Timothy (CJ Adams), is now in their lives. The magic is never explained, and movie just basically asks you to 'shut up and go with it.' Not only did they never bother explaining the magic, they didn't even bother explaining to anyone how they have a kid now. "We adopted him, or something. Why are you asking so many questions? Are you a cop?"

Anyway, the magic, garden boy's obvious physical quirk is that he has leaves growing out of his ankles.  It's clear that Timothy knows something about the significance of these leaves, but leaves (haha...get it) everyone in the dark about it. From the first meeting, he addresses Jim and Cindy as mom and dad, and there doesn't seem to be any confusion on his part about his role or where he came from.  To protect him, he now has the tortured existence of having to wear socks everywhere.  However, they take comfort in the fact that he will always have a built in Halloween costume as Poison Ivy and will fit right in at toga parties when he reaches college.  Okay, maybe I made that part up.

One of the attributes they wished for him was to be honest to a fault, so he aways seems to know the right thing to say, giving him that 'wise beyond his years' trope.  As the same time, his knowledge seems to be completely limited to what they wrote on the cards, as he's extremely naive and lacks basic knowledge at times. When needed, the script will have capable of something he showed no aptitude for previously.  As with all magical children, he's here to solve everyone's problems, too. Throughout the film I got more of a vibe that he was an alien, rather than a magic child. There's a part that will give you a real Superman vibe.

Everything felt so forced.  Jim has this strained relationship with his father, Jodie Foster's dad from Contact (David Morse).  Jim goes on and on about how he wasn't a good dad, but the extent of his terrible parenting seemed to be that he never hung around for all of Jim's soccer games.  I can't say I entirely blame him, as I tend to find soccer boring and zone out, but it felt like Jim needed get over it.  He even admitted that he wasn't very good at soccer.  It just felt thrown in to add drama and really wasn't necessary at all to demonstrate any motivation about Jim's need to be a good parent.  I was able to buy a little easier into the relationship between Cindy and her sister (Rosmarie DeWitt) because it seemed more of a natural sibling rivalry of two people with different values.

It's not an issue with the performances.  I thought everyone was doing a good job and the leads had their charm.  I think Joel Edgerton might have been trying a little too hard, but that would have also been due to Peter Hedges direction.  The screenplay from Hedges, with story by Ahmet Zappa, is fairly predictable and is too cliched.  It really takes no chances at all.  There's musical number that got a good laugh from the crowd, but I thought was so cheesy I could barely watch it.  I'm a little surprised at this as Hedges has written or directed some much better films (Pieces of April, What's Eating Gilbert Grape, About a Boy).

Dianne Wiest plays the nasty boss of Cindy and I felt like her character was your typical mean old lady role.  I did like Ron Livingston as the pencil factory owner.  He plays a jerk boss, but I felt like he tried to milk some humor out of his part.  In another movie, it would have been more effective. Again, I'm not blaming any of the actors; their characters were all underwitten.

Timothy forms a relationship with Joni (Odeya Rush), and I think this the part of the movie I enjoyed the most.  I think if whole movie would have focused more on their friendship, like maybe a less quirky version of Moonrise Kingdom, it would have been a stronger film overall.  I think both kids had nice performances, and I think Odeya Rush is one to watch for in the future.

The ending was very abrupt and it sapped most of what emotion it should have had out of it.  I felt nothing from it, and was left wondering what the point was.  I don't mind a family drama, they can even be moving, but when the movie's ideas are so underdeveloped it's hard to get into it.  It's a shame because I liked the cast and it felt like were trying hard, but again, they weren't given much to do.

The Odd Life of Timothy Green is one of these sweet and harmless family dramas, but it's also very sappy and contrived.  Maybe I'm being too hard on a family film that's basically a kid's fairy tale, but it's just too simple and predictable.  There are too many missed opportunities to do better things with the characters or flesh them out in a more satisfying way.  This is suitable for everyone though, and is something you can watch with your kids without hating it.  I didn't hate the movie, but it just didn't work for me.  I did like the performances, but there wasn't enough to the story to really recommend.  It's a rental, and probably one your kids will watch over and over.

2.5 (out of 5) Death Stars