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In the Heart of the Sea (2015)
In 1822, the men aboard the Essex, a whaling ship sailing from Nantucket, Massachusetts, encountered a beast unlike any they have ever seen. Captain Pollard (Benjamin Walker) and his first mate, Owen Chase (Chris Hemworth), were at odds throughout the voyage, that is until they encountered a 100-foot long white whale. The creature destroyed the Essex, forcing the crew to drift at sea and hope to find land, but the whale follows them as well. Tom Nickerson (Tom Holland as a young man, Brendan Gleeson as the older version) recounts this traumatic survival tale to author Herman Melville (Ben Whishaw), who is desperate to write this true story.
There’s an old-school throwback vibe to In the Heart of the Sea with its high seas adventure, but there’s just not enough attention to adventure, character, or even plot for this movie to really set sail properly. The first act feels so sluggishly long. It’s trying to set up life on a whaling vessel in the early 19th century but I didn’t feel like we got a coherent sense of life aboard the seas or how the various components worked. I didn’t know that whalers row out from the main ship, so there’s that. The opening act sets up the dull conflict between Chase and Pollard, which can be summarized as blunt upstart vs. unchecked privilege. The conflict doesn’t evolve from this dichotomy. Both men are boring in their unyielding simplicity. Hemsworth (Avengers: Age of Ultron) made a stronger impression in Rush, but a humorless movie role is not in his best interests as an actor. When the action does arrive, it can be genuinely thrilling. Director Ron Howard does a slick job of conveying the danger and destruction of the whale attack. Sadly, it’s over too soon and then the remainder of the movie is 45 minutes of a survival drama adrift in the ocean reminiscent of last year’s Unbroken. This period of isolation forces the characters to make some hard choices, yet we don’t feel the impact of those choices because the narrative, too, feels adrift. Implausibly, the giant whale has followed them for thousands of miles. Are whales really this vindictive? The documentary Blackfish makes me wonder but it still feels unbelievable. What was the whale waiting for? For the men’s spirits to be completely broken before it might attack again? We’re told this whale is a “demon” but who exactly are the bad guys in this story?
I believe another stopping point for this story is that the culture has moved beyond the acceptance of whaling as an honorable profession, to the point that I, and I assume others, was on Team Whale after witnessing a bloody hunt. It’s pretty gross, especially when they’re harvesting the whale body for the precious oil. Perhaps modern audiences, so far removed from hunting as an essential component of life have become more squeamish, or perhaps modern audiences just recognize something as barbaric when they see it. As a result, it’s hard to root for these guys. When the giant whale attacked it felt like retribution. My sympathies were more for the large mammal than the bipeds on ship. At the end of the film (some spoilers), the white-haired moneyed men of Big Whale Oil are worried what the truth will do to their industry. They want the surviving crewmen of the Essex to deny the existence of this gargantuan whale. This makes little sense to me other than awkwardly forcing a Big Business cover-up for relevancy. First off, whaling seems like a pretty unsafe working environment to begin with, especially considering voyages could last up to three years. Would the reality of one big bad whale destroy an industry? I doubt it since there is such money to be had. If anything it might rejuvenate the timber industry to reinforce the ships to make them more durable against larger whale attacks.
At first I thought a framing device was entirely superfluous; why do we need to watch Melville elicit this tale rather than simply just watching the tale itself? It seemed like a distraction, but as the movie progressed I understood that this framing device was its own sub-story and had its own complexity, namely the older Tom coming clean to the decisions that still haunt his soul. It’s an unburdening for both gentlemen, as Melville admits his deep fear that he is a mediocre writer (he’s no Nathaniel Hawthorne) and that he will be unable to tell this story as well as it truly deserves.
As these two men are allowing themselves to become more vulnerable and sharing their demons and doubts and worst fears, I started to realize that this framing device was weirdly more compelling than all the whale action. That’s because older Tom and Melville are the best drawn characters in the movie, which seems like a screenwriting mistake of sizable proportions. Obviously the nautical survival stuff should be the most compelling, and yet I as more taken with two men sitting by an oil lamp discussing their lives. Older Tom is infinitely more interesting than younger Tom; part of this is because young Tom hasn’t experienced the full effect of the events that shape older Tom, but most of this is from the very clear fact that young Tom is kind of a mute witness in this movie. He rarely speaks and is just kind of there, taking up space. There’s one personal harrowing moment when he’s thrust inside a hollowed out whale carcass to extract more blubber, but that’s the only personal perspective offered through young Tom. A question concerning the framing device: how is older Tom retelling events he had no participation or witness to? Another issue is that the characters on board the Essex are bereft of anything that would allow us to feel for them beyond simple human survival. Chase and Pollard are given one note to play and their eventual understanding and cooperation is fine but it feels like fleeting details in a story, lost to memory or disinterest.
From a purely technical aspect, this is one of the better Howard films. The cinematography by Anthony Dod Mantle (Slumdog Millionaire) is rich and often breath taking, with plenty of stunning aerial and underwater images. The whale attack sequence is harrowing and thrilling. Howard finds ways to imply the harsher aspects of this life without going overboard, maintaining that PG-13 rating. While the look of the film has an enhanced color palate thanks to the extra boost of CGI filters, I still appreciated the vibrancy of the on screen images. As I said with the similarly boosted Mad Max: Fury Road, I’d rather have vibrant and bright colors than a drab and washed-out color palate. Even as the movie drifts and the characters fail to grab you, at least the visuals are pretty. While sitting through the second half, I started to rethink my own prejudices concerning Howard as a filmmaker, a man who lacks a distinctive style but has a definite feel for how to tell a story. I’m not going to excuse him for The Grinch and other misfires, or his tendency to settle for maudlin in place of subtlety, but the man is a born filmmaker.
In the Heart of the Sea is an old school movie that feels too sluggish, too underdeveloped, and too free of characters for the audience to invest in. When the framing device scores the biggest emotional pull, you better start rethinking your rip-roaring high-seas adventure. Master and Commander this is not. As the inspiration for Moby Dick, I wish I had just watched a remake of Melville’s actual novel (now with extra chapters about rope!). If you ever wanted a movie that ends on a blurb by Nathaniel Hawthorne as a payoff for Melville’s artistic neurosis, then your wait is over. In the Heart of the Sea feels like a whale of a tale that is hard to believe, which ends up inspiring a far greater story, which made me yearn for just watching that superior tale. Sometimes the “truth” behind famous stories is less interesting.
Nate’s Grade: C+
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The Impossible (2012)
On December 26, 2004, an underwater earthquake triggered one of the deadliest tsunamis on record, devastating coastal cities along the Indian Ocean. Over 230,000 people are believed to have perished from the waves and resulting damage. The Impossible tells the harrowing and ultimately inspiring true-story of one family and their vacation from hell. We follow Marie (Naomi Watts) and Henry (Ewan McGregor) as well as their three sons, from oldest to youngest, Lucas (Tom Holland), Thomas (Samuel Joslin), and Simon (Oaklee Pendergast). They’re vacationing in Thailand for the holidays and then the tsunami hits, separating Marie and Lucas from the group. They are swept away by the punishing waves and Marie is badly hurt. Henry is desperately searching for his loved ones, Lucas is desperate to get his mother proper medical attention, and there are thousands just as desperate and just as in need.
It’s nigh impossible to watch this movie and be unmoved. It’s not very subtle when it comes to its themes and messages, but man is it ever effective. The family struggle could have easily descended into melodrama with a sappy, maudlin reunion, punctuated with swelling music to hit you over the head. It’s a fairly simple story with little to its plot. The family gets separated and then they desperately search for one another and, surprise, they reunite. It is after all based on a true story and they all lived, so there’s that. It’s the startling level of realism, the exceptional performances, and the poignant moments of human kindness and grace that suckered me in big time. I was an emotional wreck throughout this movie but in the best way possible. I cried at points, sure, but my tears and my emotions always felt genuinely earned. There’s no doubt that this is one manipulative movie. It knows what strings to pull, what buttons to push, and it does so with finesse. Last year I decried Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close for being overly manipulative and overdosing on false sentiment. However, with this movie, my investment was never in jeopardy. I was completely absorbed by the story and felt great empathy for the array of characters as they persevere. The horror of that 2004 tsunami is told in one small story, personalized, and giving an entry point for an audience to engage without feeling overwhelmed by the magnitude of destruction and death.
Let me go into further detail about that wall of destruction, given astonishing, terrifying realism. The recreation of the tsunami ranks up there as one of the most frightening sequences I’ve ever seen in film. It’s a solid ten minutes of chaos, and you will feel the frenzy of that chaos. You’re put in the middle, floating along with mother and son as they helplessly try and cling to one another. The scope of the disaster will leave you gasping. I know they must have used sets and water tanks but I’m left stupefied how it all came together to look so seamless. It sounds macabre to compliment the marvelous recreation of mayhem, but director Juan Antonio Bayona (The Orphanage) and his team have turned disaster into world-class drama. It’s not just the powerful waves as well, there’s the field of debris just under the surface to contend with. When the first wave hits Maria, we experience her complete disorientation. The sights and sounds are blurs, the water oppressive, and the debris sudden, jolting, unforgiving. It’s the closest any person would ever truly want to get in the middle of a tsunami.
The majority of the film is about the family coming back together, and while their reunion is indeed a tearjerker, I found the film littered with many small moments that just soared emotionally. When a disaster of this magnitude hits, I’m always struck by the wealth of human kindness and cooperation that emerges in response. There’s something deeply moving about helping your fellow man in need, even if you cannot understand his or her language. Maria is aided by the Thai locals who do not treat her differently because she’s a white woman. She is just another person in need.
Whenever disaster strikes, we think of the people who plunge into the middle as heroes, but simple acts can be just as comforting and thoughtful. There are small moments of kindness, like lending a stranger your cell phone to call home, that speak volumes. In that one instance, Henry is so distraught, the weight of everything hitting him as he tries to put it into words, and his call is abrupt and somewhat incomprehensible thanks to his rising emotions. Henry is urged to call back, not to leave it at that, to leave his relatives dangling with such precious little and the alarm in his voice. So he’s given the phone again, and in a more measured demeanor, Henry is able to talk about the situation and promise to find his wife. It’s such an everyday gesture made invaluable to Henry. There’s a woman talking to Thomas about the stars in the sky, how we don’t know which are dead but they continue to live on, and the subtext is a bit obvious but it’s still heartfelt. Then there’s Lucas’ mission of organizing the triage center, scouring the grounds looking for missing family members. He takes it upon himself to make a difference rather than sitting idle. It’s that human connection in the face of adversity that proves most uplifting.
Watts (J. Edgar) gives a performance of tremendous strength and fragility. The tenacity and resilience she has to keep pushing through is remarkable. She’s so strong but vulnerable at the same time, showing you the fine line she walks to stay above the fray for her child. She endures great physical trauma, a gnarly gash in her leg peeling off like tree bark. Then there’s the emotional burden of trying to be a mother to a child desperately in need of a sturdy parent. Watts could have readily played to the heights of the emotions, resorting to hysterics, but the quiet strength of her character makes her underplay the burdens she endures. She can’t simply just break down. You don’t get a true sense of the toll she has suffered until her life-and-death struggles at the very end.
The supporting team around Watts also deserves accolades. McGregor (Salmon Fishing in the Yemen) has several heartbreaking and heartwarming scenes, striving for hope. Lucas has to rise to maturity when his mother is wounded, protecting her, supporting her. Acting novice Holland rises to that challenge with great courage, though there are moments that still remind you he’s only a boy, like when he bashfully turns his back upon seeing his mother’s exposed breast. That awkward, indecisive moment where a young boy doesn’t know how to handle the sight, seeing his mother so exposed and vulnerable, is quite effective. The other actors who round out the family (Joslin and Pendergast) are quite superb as well. The family feels like a cohesive, loving unit, and every performance feels believable.
The Impossible is based upon the true experiences of a Spanish family, and yet the onscreen family we follow is white, so what gives? It’s not surprising for Hollywood to whitewash a story to appeal to a wider audience. Should we have any more sympathy for this family’s plight because they are white? Would we feel less if they were Spanish? I think the perils and victories would be the same regardless of language or ethnicity.
Watching the unflinching and stunning events in The Impossible, you will likely shed some tears, be they from horror, sadness, or happiness at the family’s reunion. While the ending is never in doubt, the movie has plenty of other potent and poignant small moments to keep your emotions safely stirred. It’s a visceral experience that will shock and exhilarate. There were moments where I felt like I had to cover my eyes. But The Impossible is not disaster porn, ogling over the suffering and endurance of the misfortunate. It’s as much about the response to tragedy as it is the wallop of that cruel tragedy in 2004. The perseverance, the open-hearted help of one’s fellow man, the strength of human connection, the long ripples of kindness, it all comes together to form one compelling, often moving, and quite memorable film experience. Add some formidable performances, top-notch direction, and tremendous technical achievement, and The Impossible is a rousing drama that speaks to the best of us even in the worst conditions (think of it as the antithesis of Ayn Rand’s philosophy). It may be manipulative, it may be somewhat straightforward, and it likely climaxes too soon, but when the results are this powerful and emotionally engaging, then I’m happy to have my buttons pushed.
Nate’s Grade: A-
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The Grey (2012)
I’ve always been fascinated with survival thriller/horror, where we think step-by-step with the characters through an unlikely scenario. I greatly enjoyed Frozen, a horror movie about three teens stranded on a ski lift, and Buried was in my top ten list for 2010. I enjoy the thought exercise and find the scenarios easily empathetic as long as people don’t make boneheaded decisions. Director Joe Carnahan has been paying his bills as of late with stylized, overdone, and generally overblown action movies like Smokin’ Aces and The A-Team. I would not have expected Carnahan to deliver anything that could be described as nuanced or meditative, but lo and behold The Grey is a survival thriller that’s as thoughtful and emotional as it is viscerally exhilarating. The Grey is the first great movie of 2012 and I’m astounded that it was released in January, the dumping ground for cinematic dreck.
We follow a group of grunts working on an oil pipeline way out in the northern Alaskan territory. They’re heading south for some R&R when their plane crashes due to electrical issues. Ottway (Liam Neeson) and seven other men are the lone survivors. While checking for supplies, they discover a pack of wolves feasting on some of the choicer corpses. Ottway is a wolf expert, hired by the oil company to patrol the grounds and hunt antagonistic wolves. He explains that wolves have a hunting radius of 300 miles and a kill radius of 30 within the den. It is uncertain where these men find themselves, so they bundle up and head south, hoping to escape the predators, find food and water, and discover a way to help.
The Grey is a harrowing, haunting, and intense thriller, masterfully played by Carnahan. The threat is real and brutal, enough that it convinces the men to leave the safety of the plane wreckage to possibly escape the wolf kill radius. We’re told that wolves are the only animal that will kill out of vengeance (look out Sarah Palin). The attacks are vicious and the violence is bloody and occasionally shocking, though it never seems gratuitous. The special effects and canine animatronics are seamlessly integrated. The sound design for this movie is exceptional, probably the best use of sound to fashion anxiety since 2007’s No Country for Old Men or even Spielberg’s War of the Worlds. The sounds of the wolf pack echo around the theater, completely keeping you off guard, disorienting the audience. Carnahan creates such a vivid picture of dread that we’re convinced that the wolves could sic at any moment. And when they do the editing becomes chaotic, mimicking the ferocity of the animals and depicting the frenzied fear of the attacked.
I was a terrible bundle of nerves throughout most of this movie. The plane crash is an exemplary sequence of terror, capturing the terrifying moments from Ottway’s limited point of view. The rest of the movie doesn’t get any less tense just because they’re on stable footing. There’s one scene where the wolves attack a guy who has fallen back from the group. Carnahan brilliantly captures the helpless reality by showing the men trying to race back in knee-high snow. They can only stomp so far while the man is ripped apart in the background. The action sequences, though to be fair they’re really more suspense pieces, are the most nerve-wracking I’ve endured since the brilliant Best Picture winner, The Hurt Locker. Of course these being life and death stakes, there is plenty of death, as the men are generally picked off one by one, though not all by the pack of wolves. The frigid elements are just as dangerous as the killer wolves. The men could just as easily freeze to death. The need for shelter and food is dire (the men even joke about the famous cannibalism from Alive). One of them is suffering just from his brain being unable to acclimate to the elevated attitude. That’s almost enviable considering the doom that constantly hangs over the other survivors.
Naturally there’s some friction between the survivors as far as the best course of action. Ottway has assumed Alpha dog status thanks to his expertise on wolves and the Arctic climate, but that does not mean that the rest of the men follow lockstep. Give the alarming situation, it will be in these men’s best interest to work together for survival. Some of the men chafe at being what to do but the movie doesn’t drags out this conflict, thankfully, because jockeying for power positions seems like an absurd waste of time. There are heavier issues at play. The impact of the movie would be blunted if the characters came across as one-dimensional; then we wouldn’t care about their fate. Carnahan and co-writer Ian Mackenzie Jeffers, based on Jeffers’ short story “Ghost Walker,” find creative ways to enrich and reveal the character of these lone men. They feel believable and their reactions to the implausible dangers seem plausible, keeping us invested. Ottway keeps flashing back to an image of his wife (Anne Openshaw) for strength, this angelic brunette telling him not to worry. It’s what he has to hold onto, though when we learn more about the context of this image it becomes even more meaningful. One character has had enough struggling and has no will power to continue. He argues that whatever life he may return to is no reward.
The thrills and scares are what are to be expected, but The Grey is also a much more thoughtful and intellectually stimulating picture than you may have hoped. Carnahan’s script covers a wide array of survival tactics without breaking from the reality of its premise. It’s just interesting to watch a group of men use their wits to make best use of their dwindling supplies and dire situation. It becomes a game that the audience plays, systematically judging every choice and assessing if we would follow suit. Beforehand, the men engage in a theological discussion regarding the existence of God, faith, the belief that there is a divine plan. The men are fighting for their survival but having an existential crisis all the same, trying to supply meaning to the horrific, find reasons to keep fighting. “We crashed going 400 miles per hour and we survived. That has to mean something,” one of them reasons. Or it all could just be very bad luck. Ottway at one point, an admitted non-believer in a higher power, bellows to the sky for something, anything. His desperation is effective and turns what could have been trite into a nice character moment. One of the men shares a memory of his daughter, who would wake him up by gently dangling her hair in his face. It’s a touching moment and when that same character meets an untimely end and is helped to the other side by a vision of that same daughter, it becomes profoundly moving (the quick snap to reality is a jarring point for grisly comparison). The Grey has plenty more on its mind than making an audience jump. It also wants to make the audience think and, in the end, feel genuine emotion.
The ending may rankle some who felt, especially with the advertising, that the film was going to be a two-hour Neeson ass-kicking vehicle, but for me it was fitting and the only way this story could have ended. Though let me advise all potential ticket-buyers to stay during the end credits for a small bit that offers a tad more resolution, though still leaves as much to be determined by the viewer. It’s not exactly ambiguous considering how things are left.
Neeson (Unknown, Clash of the Titans) has settled nicely into his newest incarnation as middle-aged ass-kicker, such an odd path for the man who famously portrayed Oskar Schindler. At some level, it’s below an actor of Neeson’s standards to be running through such genre frills, but it’s also a joy to see someone who can really, truly act give gravitas to his men of action. After he delivered his warning in Taken, I was completely on board and ready to watch this man bust some skulls. Beyond the physical challenges, the role really puts Neeson through an emotional wringer and the man gives a strong, stirring performance. You’d be glad to have this man in any predicament. The rest of the cast fill out their parts well, with Dermot Mulroney (The Family Stone) making the best use of his time onscreen to create a character.
The Grey is a startling movie; horrific, jolting, thrilling, moving, beautiful, philosophical, and extremely captivating. Carnahan has crafted an exciting movie that transcends genre. There were moments so tense that I was chewing on my knuckles. There were moments so intense I felt like I had to look away. And there were moments so poignant that tears welled up in my eyes. I look forward to watching this movie again and finding even more at work. No grey area here, this is one truly excellent movie.
Nate’s Grade: A
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Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2010)
Ever since the organic, years-in-the-making cult ascent of The Room, every blogger and journalist has been trying to scour the world of inept cinema to crown the next great worst movie of all time. We all want to be kingmakers of camp. In the summer of 2009, After Last Season mystified audiences and seemed like it could be an excellent camp candidate, until people actually saw the film and discovered that it was more painful awful than pleasurable awful. Then a few months ago a new contender emerged — Birdemic: Shock and Terror. The extremely low-budget ($10,000) film, curiously dubbed a “romantic thriller,” is the THIRD film from writer/director/former software engineer James Nguyen. The Sundance Film Festival rejected his aviary masterpiece in 2009 but that didn’t stop Nguyen. He took a van, decorated it with (fake) dead birds, drove around promoting the film with the aid of screeching eagle cries, enticing people to come inside and watch the movie (sounds like the first reel of a serial killer film to me). The magic mixture of romance and eco terror has captured the interest of major media outlets like The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, The Guardian, USA Today, BBC News, The Wall Street Journal, CBS News and ABC News, and the collective sugar-high rush to judgment says that Birdemic is “the worst film of all time.” Naturally, I had to see anything that vies for that hallowed honor.
For a movie citing the shock and terror of birds, it may be something of a shock that, short of a poorly rendered CGI dead bird on the beach, the first 40 minutes of this movie are absent the titular winged creatures. The first half of this movie is a mostly boring yet hugely personally eventful week for Rod (Alan Bagh) and Nathalie (Whitney Moore), our witless leads. Rod scores million dollar sales at his software company, which leads to Oracle buying the company for a billion dollars. He also successfully finds a venture capitalist to invest $10 million in his own solar panel startup. Nathalie, Rod’s high school classmate, is an underwear model. She goes from a photo shoot –in a one hour photo store in a strip mall!– to the cover of the Victoria’s Secret catalogue. They meet at a diner and then go on a series of dull dates, culminating in Rod responding to a goodnight kiss on the cheek with the request of going upstairs in her apartment (total misread of the signs). Regardless, Nathalie tells her mother that Rod is a special guy who’s not just interested in one thing, conveniently ignoring the end of the date. He meets mom and then after a night of hilariously, uncoordinated Caucasian dancing at a vacant bar, the two decide to consummate the relationship in the most romantic fashion possible — a seedy motel bedroom. And yes, they both have homes. It was at this point that I checked my watch and yelled, “Where the hell are the birds already?!”
It is after the off-screen lovemaking that the birdemic finally strikes. The next morning, for no discernable reason, birds turn into kamikaze agents and dive-bomb gas stations, cars, homes, and whatever else, causing explosions citywide. Rod and Nathalie team up with another motel pair, Ramsey (Adam Sessa) and Becky (Catherine Batcha), who conveniently have a stash of high-powered automatic weapons in their van. The gang fights their way to the van and then the rest of the movie turns into a series of mini-adventures finding victims and survivors of the birdemic.
I will give Mr. Nguyen his due. His clueless naiveté is endearing, which makes the movie much easier to appreciate. Plus, unlike the filmmakers behind After Last Season, Nguyen has at least a competent idea of how movies are supposed to work. He doesn’t have any visual talent but he at least knows how camera compositions are supposed to be established, how editing orients the audience, and how to construct a story that people can at minimum follow. This is not intended as backhanded compliments, just another reminder at how monstrously appalling After Last Season was. It’s gotten to the point that basic competency is considered a virtue. Nguyen knows basic cinematic rules and the visual vocabulary that goes with cameras. He doesn’t have the skill to do anything else. The film was shot on DV and yet it constantly has focus issues. Characters will be stationed at distances that render them blurry. If Nguyen had a focus limit, why have the actors routinely wander outside that safe zone and into the blurry reaches of nothingness? Then there will be moments where it is painfully obvious that the background is a green screen, but why was that necessary? Nguyen will have two characters sit down at a restaurant, and then the rest of the table conversation will be green screen. That has to be the weakest excuse for a green screen ever (“We couldn’t afford to shoot people sitting at a table for an extended period of time”).
The editing is frequently choppy, jumping around to disorient the viewer, breaking visual rules of geography, but the editing seems on a timed delay. Every new shot/scene seems to start three seconds later than it should. The worst offense in the whole movie is the sound quality. Clearly using only the built-in microphone from his camera, Nguyen allows great portions of his movie to be un-listenable. A day at the beach turns into listening to the wild howl while it obscures all dialogue.
Birdemic has all the requisite components that make up a delightfully bad movie: bad acting, bad dialogue, plot holes, bizarre directorial and script decisions, and extreme awkwardness. For an outbreak of killer birds, everybody seems so resolutely casual about this aviary apocalypse. There is no sense of urgency or danger; characters will stroll in their walks and frequently make outdoor pit stops. One female character is killed after she wanders needlessly far from the safety of the van to pee. They didn’t decide that an indoor bathroom would be safer? The gang also decides to wander through a crowded forest, a habitat that might, you know, attract birds. Then there’s the careless frolic on the beach, again needlessly far from the refuge of the van. Rod is held up by one motorist for gas (yes, society has broken down that far in hours, and yet you can watch hundreds of cars pass along the other half of the road, foolishly driving toward the birdemic and their doom). But then Rod leaves behind the full gas container and hops back into the van, escaping a not so imminent bird attack. They keep venturing to outdoor areas to escape an enemy that utilizes the sky. They even have a picnic! In short, these people are dumb.
But, to be fair, maybe they’re reacting with such relaxation because the birds are more laughable than intimidating. Nguyen recycles the same low-rent special effects of birds mysteriously levitating. They flap their wings but don’t ever seem to be moving. These CGI creatures look like early computer effects from the 1990s. These birds seem to explode on impact. I wouldn’t be too alarmed, either. When the gang leaves the motel, the bids hover and squawk, and some characters use coat hangers to swing away their non-moving antagonists. Ramsey doesn’t even try to fight them off after a few seconds. He just stand there while the birds fail to do anything. They keep appearing in swarms, though they seem to purposely be following our band of dumb characters. The second half of this movie mostly follows characters shooting and driving. You start to anticipate that the Duck Hunter dog is going to appear at some point and pick up the fallen carcasses and snicker. Avatar, this ain’t.
To call any of this acting would be a generous use of the term. Moore, as Nathalie, might actually be a plausible actress. She handles the material the best. Her onscreen love interest, on the other hand, is astoundingly bad. Bagh has mastered the aloof, dead-eyed stare, which he uses as his specialty. When Rod first meets Nathalie he gazes in one long unbroken stare, which communicates more “Did I leave the gas on?” then, “Is that the girl I sat behind in an English class and never talked to?” Bagh seems to have learned his lines phonetically because his line delivery is steeped in a singsong rhythm. The dialogue is mostly short exclamations that give no indication of character or plot. It’s hard to gauge the acting ability of clear non-actors in a trashy movie. It’s all a sliding scale.
Nguyen has been working on the story of Birdemic for five years. This labor of love was also Nguyen’s platform to make mankind think about its effect on the environment. Yes, the movie has all sorts of environmental messages squeezed in, where characters debate the ecological motivations of the bird attacks. A Tree Hugger (that’s his literal screen credit) theorizes that the birds are fighting back to protect Mother Nature, that’s why they seem to go after cars and gas stations. A doctor in Canada (we’re informed that the van leaves the country by watching it drive past an arrow pointing to the U.S. border written in sidewalk chalk) theorizes that the birds from Canada were infected with the notorious bird flu, and then it spread south. The doctor also gets the opportunity to declare man the most deadliest threat of them all, thus fulfilling a sci-fi disaster movie requirement. The TV news alerts about the peril of global warming, and even though the film is set in 2008, the characters see An Inconvenient Truth at the theaters (“An important movie!”). The environmental message doesn’t begin to approach cohesive commentary.
As I was watching, I got the weird impression that Nguyen had been commissioned to film a tourist video for the city of Half Moon Bay, California. Then somewhere along the line the promotional project was scuttled and Nguyen looked at his assembled footage and said, “Well, why not make the most of it?” Ladies and gentlemen, Birdemic: Shock and Terror is “the most of it.” There are numerous scenes that serve no purpose other than highlighting some of the offerings of Half Moon Bay, from the quaint local shops, to the lighthouse, to its beaches and natural beauty, truly Half Moon Bay is where you want to spend your next vacation. There are pointless scenes of extended driving. The first three minutes of this movie is watching Rod drive to the office from the scenic view of his dashboard. The opening sequence mirrors Manos: The Hands of Fate, which began with over 10 minutes of uninterrupted driving shots. The opening is even more mind numbing because Nguyen plays the same 55-second piece of music over and over. So the next time you’re driving through California, think about stopping in Half Moon Bay, home of the world-famous birdemic.
Now comes the inevitable, and somewhat subjective part, where the critic must place Birdemic upon the scale of Absolute Awful ranging worst of the worst (Manos: The Hands of Fate) to the best of the worst (The Room). The people behind Birdemic are trying to streamline the cult phenom process. It premiered in New York City in early 2010 and is already being funneled to many markets. It all feels a little too manufactured for my tastes, like the media is so eager to be ahead of the hipster curve. Birdemic is a perfectly enjoyable laugh-out-loud experience best had with a bunch of your friends and perhaps some adult beverages. It’s a fine piece of derisive entertainment thanks to the sincerity of Nguyen. But in the world of bad, The Room still reigns supreme. Whereas Birdemic has plenty of bad housed in 90 minutes, it’s pretty much the same bad decisions and limitations. I look forward to Nguyen’s next film, Peephole: The Perverted. You just can’t go wrong when a movie has a subtitle, “The Perverted.” He may not be Tommy Wiseau, but this man knows how to make some tasty trash.
Nate’s (Derisive Enjoyment) Grade: B+
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Disney Nature’s Earth (2009)
The kind folks at the newly established Disney Nature division want to make sure those who missed out on the stunning 2006 Discovery Channel/BBC miniseries Planet Earth get another chance. Earth is a re-edited, recycled version of the globe-trotting miniseries, cutting down 8 hours to a bladder-friendly 95 minutes. Disney has given the film a family-friendly narrative, following the exploits of three families; a mamma polar bear and her cubs, a whale and offspring, and an elephant and its little thundering toddlers (note to parents: the film doesn’t shy away from death but you won’t watch any onscreen kills). The footage is jaw-dropping and to witness it on the big screen is a must-see. The mini-series, and by extension the new movie, is a powerful advertisement for conservation without having to get on-message or preachy. The gorgeous images speak volumes. The filmmakers spent over 5 years compiling mass amounts of footage, and some cameramen sat in isolated and harsh conditions for a year in order to snap rare moments on film. While the film cannot rival the mini-series, it’s still a highly watchable experience with eye-popping visuals and, really, little else. It serves as a tasty appetizer for the larger main course, the immersive and riveting Planet Earth mini-series. But hey, there is something God-like about listening to James Earl Jones detail the particulars of life on this spinning blue orb. Earth is mostly spectacle but ho boy, is it first-rate spectacle.
Nate’s Grade: A-
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The Happening (2008)
M. Night Shyamalan is still reeling from the beating he took over 2006’s Lady in the Water, a colossal misguided attempt at a modern fairy tale. The man is trying to retain his cozy relationship with audiences that adored his earlier works like The Sixth Sense and Signs. Shyamaln’s latest, The Happening, isn’t going to dissuade the detractors. This man is a talented filmmaker and I think it’s finally time that he starts thinking of focusing on one creative job and one job only, either writing or directing.
There’s a pandemic sweeping across the Northeast United States. It first starts with disoriented speech, then moves to disoriented movement, and ends with people committing suicide. Nobody knows what is officially going on. High school science teacher Eliot Moore (Mark Wahlberg) tries to flee Philadelphia with his estranged wife, Alma (Zooey Deschanel). They travel out into the suburbs when their train stops. The conductor says that they’ve lost contact with everybody. Eliot eventually theorizes that what’s causing this pandemic isn’t terrorists, or the government testing some biological agent, but plants. Yes, plants. In their defense, the plants are releasing an airborne toxin that flips a neurological switch in human brains. Instead of self-preservation the brain is pushed toward immediate self-destruction.
The Happening is no Lady in the Water, thankfully. The premise is pretty interesting in a feature-length Twilight Zone kind of way. Shyamalan does know how to spin an interesting idea and watch social paranoia explode. The best moments of The Happening take place during its beginning where confusion and panic reign. Shyamalan then takes a page from 2005’s War of the Worlds and follows the perspective of a handful of normal folk as the experience an apocalyptic event. We even spend the third act hiding out in the home of a crazy person (the creepy Betty Buckley). Unfortunately, we in the audience feel no involvement with the poorly written main characters. Once again Shyamalan utilizes a horrific and unique encounter as the impetus for reconciling the pains in a marriage. At a scant 99 minutes, there isn’t much time set aside for building characterization. There is not a whiff of personal connection to this tale.
Shyamalan doesn’t seem to explore the psychological ramifications of his premise. Suicide is very traumatizing and it would have swept over the East Coast in waves; millions would be dead. Yet the characters and Shyamalan never seem to focus on this point. Perhaps they’re in shock but no one seems to actually react realistically to the possible end of the world. Normal people would be freaking out. I would be freaking out. The idea that the country goes back to normal after three months is preposterous. Would anyone want to live on the East Coast again after all that death? People would be finding bodies for many months after the “happening;” just look at the slow recovery of New Orleans. Never mind the hit the economy would take from millions of people expiring.
The ecological message can also be incessantly heavy-handed. Characters run past a sign for a housing development that advertises the slogan, “You deserve this.” Oh, gee, I get it. A TV host at the very end interviews a scientist theorizing that what happened was a warning from the environment to shape up and change our ways. The TV host is so incredulous that he actually says, “Well, I’d like to believe you doc, but maybe if it just happened somewhere else again, maybe then I could believe you.” You idiot, millions of people died and there are how many witnesses? I know exactly what message Shyamalan is trying to say (wake up, we can’t ignore the signs) but having a character denying the obvious is too ludicrous given what happens in the story.
But the story does invite further inquiries. How exactly do the plants communicate with each other? I can understand root structures but how does a bush talk to a tree unless they share root structures? Do plants speak different languages? Can a bush talk with a tree, and do French bushes speak differently than their English brethren? The plants seem to react to large numbers of people, but how do they know when there’s say enough folk running around to kill? Do they smell people? That toxin seems to not affect animals but I don’t see how that could be possible given that, as far as I know, animals inhale the air as well. Of course, if all surrounding animals and insects were to keel over then that would irrevocably harm the ecosystem and endanger the plants. This must be why the “happening” lasts a little over a day, coincidentally ending just when our protagonists are about to give up. And if Mother Nature, as a form of population control, triggers this toxin release then wouldn’t it stand to reason that some place like China or India would be hit first instead of the Northeast United States? Shouldn’t a science teacher know that still air would be filled with more toxins than when the wind blows? I’ll give Shyamalan this — he was able to make me fear a tree. There was one moment where a little girl was on a swing that was bolted into a tree limb and the constant creaking made me nervous that they would anger the tree.
Despite the flaws in storytelling, this narrative still could have worked as is if it just had a better director at the helm. Shyamalan lets everyone down on this one. Much of the marketing angle was how The Happening is Shyamalan’s first foray into R-rated material, but you can tell he doesn’t feel comfortable showing more than implying. One sequence follows a police officer’s gun as different individuals take turns shooting themselves in the head. Shyamalan shoots this sequence like the camera weighed 800 pounds, so the shot never rises above people’s feet. We see the gun fall on the ground, feet walk over to the gun, hands pick it up and lift it off screen, then a very unconvincing gunshot sound effect, then the process repeats. By not actually seeing the deadly aftermath Shyamalan risks the sequence becoming unintentionally funny and it almost happens. This directorial technique does not raise suspense, and in fact, Shyamalan botches most of the potential suspense in The Happening. Given the premise, Shyamalan doesn’t find too many sequences that make the audience squirm. A man wandering around in a lion’s cage is so fake and played in the wrong tone that it just becomes goofy even when his arms get ripped off. There’s only one protracted horror sequence that shows true gore, where a man lies down in the path of a giant lawnmower and we start to see the machine ride over him and whirl its blades. However, even this scene could have gone longer to fully draw out the shock and terror. Shyamalan just doesn’t have the temerity for R-rated material, and as a result the movie could have been a lot more terrifying had the man embraced the gruesome potential of a more mature rating.
Shyamalan’s visual storytelling is pretty rote. I kept thinking to myself how poor everything seemed to be looking. The cinematography is lackluster and the shot compositions are rather bland. Part of what makes a horror movie effective is clever visual setups that slowly leak tension like air from a balloon. Shyamalan’s idea of drawing out tension is to watch tress blow in the wind. After a while, when you realize this is the one trick Shyamalan has, it gets old and extremely boring. The Happening would have benefited from a stronger visual storyteller who could also goose the narrative with better-constructed scares. It’s disappointing because Shyamalan was able to elicit top-notch suspense in 2002’s Signs with simple sounds and the imagination. Now, when he’s given the chance to show terror he falls on his face.
Another dent to Shyamalan’s direction is the fact that the actors all give bad performances. Wahlberg and Deschanel have given great performances in other movies so I know they are capable of more, and the blame must lie at the feet of Shyamalan. They overact with gusto and always seem to never be fully immersed in the reality of the drama. Even Wahlberg’s first line delivery raises your eyebrow because it seems too amateurish and flat. Deschanel is even worse and whatever emotion she is playing in a scene is the wrong emotion. She’s whiny and overly childlike when she should be reflective and contemplative, she’s wide-eyed and weepy when she should be tender, and she’s bad with just about every line. Alma is a weak character and seems to turn everything back to an injustice against her, even when people are killing themselves en mass. Part of the actors’ woes is complicated by Shyamalan’s wooden dialogue, which includes gems like, “We’ve just got to stay ahead of the wind” (how exactly does one do that?) and, “We’re not going to stand around like uninvolved bystanders” (who says that?). The most shocking aspect of The Happening is that Shyamalan totally betrays the trust of his very competent actors.
M. Night Shyamalan would be best served in the future by focusing on one role. He could direct someone else’s material or he could write and have someone else direct. If he had gone the latter route I’m convinced that The Happening would have worked even with a flawed script. The movie is too timid to push the horror boundaries available to a mature rating, the suspense is minute, and Shyamalan completely leaves his actors hanging out to dry. There is some laugh out loud moments of unintentional hilarity (like when Wahlberg calmly says “Oh no” upon hearing suicidal gunshots), but the movie also has moments of intrigue amidst its heavy-handed environmental message. Statistically, if there were a killer toxin there would be those who would be genetically immune to it, much like the scenario in I Am Legend. I have to say that if I was fortunate enough to survive I would whisper some threatening words to some choice flora and then I would set lots and lots of fires out of revenge. Take that, you stinking vegetation!
Nate’s Grade: C
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The Ruins (2008)
Author Scott Smith is from Ohio, my home state, which makes me like him. What made me respect him was his adaptation of his own novel, A Simple Plan. The movie version was splendid and taut, well acted and riveting and disturbing. Smith even received an Oscar nomination for his screen adaptation. When Smith released The Ruins, his second book, in 2006 I was mildly intrigued but never got around to reading it. Something about tourists, and Mayan temples, and bad things, and it got plenty of good reviews. Then I saw that Hollywood was producing a film version and that Smith had written the screenplay himself. Well, I figured, I’m going to be in for a chilling treat. Let’s just say my opinion of Smith has been slightly diminished.
Four over privileged American tourists are enjoying their final hours of a vacation to Mexico. Jeff (Jonathan Tucker) is studying to be a doctor. His girlfriend Amy (Jenna Malone) is best friends with Stacy (Laura Ramsey), and the two pal around together. Stacy’s boyfriend Eric (X-Men’s Shawn Ashmore) is along for the ride and enjoying every sun-soaked, boozy second. Lounging around the hotel pool, the group comes across a German (Joe Anderson, Across the Universe) who has a map to a hidden Mayan ruin. It’s a bit off the beaten path but the group decides to witness some genuine history. They take a taxi 12 miles into the jungle, hoof the rest, and discover a not very well hidden path to a not very well hidden Mayan temple (seriously, you’re going to have to do better than a couple of palm leaves if you want to obscure the path and keep people out. Try a fence next time). As soon as they arrive so do a band of armed Mayans that really insist the tourists do not leave the site. The Mayans chase the tourists onto the ruins and then they set camp around the perimeter. The Americans are being kept quarantined. Why? Inside and atop the ruins are a deadly plant that has a powerful hunger.
For a horror movie filled with unremarkable and generally unlikable characters, I must say that they at least don’t do anything incredibly stupid as is accustomed to the genre. Once they are chased to the top of the ruins you, the audience, are now put in their shoes. Every choice they make seems decently reasoned and cautious, exploring their surroundings and testing their boundaries. The Ruins features cheesy killer plants, yes, but the more interesting element to me was the survival game. These characters are quarantined in a remote area with little water, armed guards, and a handful of useful tools. What will they do next? This scenario grabbed my interest, as I played out my own personal survival scenario step-by-step and it wasn’t too different from what befalls the characters onscreen. However, I’m surprised no one tried setting the freakin’ plants on fire. The eventual psychological meltdowns and increasingly grim outlook help The Ruins maintain some level of credible drama.
But I think in the end I just couldn’t get over the fact that the main culprit was killer fauna. I can accept carnivorous plants, but seeing them is a whole different matter. Somewhere from pages to screen a step was forgotten to make them believable. The ancient plant system inhabiting the ruins looks like an overgrown swatch of ivy and marijuana leaves, and the vines would slowly inch forward to retrieve fallen pieces of meat. It’s downright comical to see a stringy piece of a vine trying to discreetly drag a dead body away, and frankly that’s where the movie fails. I shouldn’t be giggling at the killer plants. The execution comes across as way too goofy and made me shudder that I could be watching Little Mayan Shop of Horrors. I’m also wary that this highly localized plant has evolved to the point that it can duplicate exact sound. It mimics a specific cell phone ring tone to lure our vacationers deeper inside the ruins. Now, how in the world would it know well enough to do that? I can’t imagine in its potentially thousands of years of existence that it was come across a significant amount of cell phones. How would it know that exact sound would effectively lure others? I did enjoy the notion that the indigenous birds and insects have wised up and learned generations ago not to go anywhere near the ruins. Let this be a lesson to you, backpackers of America, that when insects refuse to go somewhere then perhaps you should take note.
The Ruins should play out with a slow-burn sense of dread where the characters sadly realize with setback after setback that they are doomed; to be played right the plot needs to be methodical. Instead, Smith’s adaptation is more like a haunted house tale with crummy, obvious jump scares and lackluster spook setups. It seems like most of the film is intended to be a setup but the payoff is badly muffed, like seeing the stupid thin, twisty vines creeping out to sneak inside people’s open wounds. The Ruins has some fittingly disturbing scenes where something is moving and growing under the surfaces of people’s skin, but then you remember it’s just a plant vine and your mind starts racing with questions that illuminate how inane this whole situation comes across (How does a plant stem continue to grow inside a human body? What purpose does having an offshoot inside the prey serve? How does it penetrate open wounds without anyone noticing at all? Why should I be watching this?). I would have preferred if the under-the-skin creatures were some kind of insect or worm that had a symbiotic relationship with the plants. That would be cool and far creepier than stupid ivy vines.
From a gore standpoint, The Ruins has a few squirm-inducing moments. One character is badly injured and needs to have their legs amputated to survive. Oddly enough, this amputation sequence comes across as the most memorable part of a movie dealing with killer vegetation that can mimic cell phone ringtones and, later, lovemaking noises (now who goes out to have sex atop Mayan ruins?). The imprecise nature of the amputation is what makes it so gruesome. In one feel swoop, this character has to have leg bones crushed, then legs sliced off, and then have the stumps cauterized with a frying pan. And the only anesthetic is a bottle of Jack Daniels. Yikes. The amputation is played out with a deliberate pace and allows a satisfying buildup of nervous, queasy anticipation. Aside from that, there isn’t anything notable from the makeup department.
None of the characters approach anything closely resembling characterization, but the acting is a notch above what you might expect from a horror movie populated with expendable, good-looking twenty-somethings. Tucker makes for a capable lead and projects a cool and controlled persona, never rising to hysterics. When he does realize the inevitable he begins to crack and it’s more effective because of how stoic he was before. The actor who gets tested the most is Ramsey, and this isn’t because she started her career in the derided “reality TV documentary” The Real Cancun. Her character is put through an emotional wringer and she sells the distress and Stacy’s fraying mental state. I never once was tempted to laugh even as she sliced herself open and fished around her insides. Malone and Ashmore are stuck being in the stock roles of whiny girlfriend and horny carefree dude.
The Ruins is a horror movie that’s far from horrible but not scary or perverse or funny enough to be recommended. The setup of isolation in unfamiliar territory could definitely produce some chills and thrills, however, when you throw in a ridiculous carnivorous plant that looks as menacing as your mother’s flower bed, well then, things just fall apart. I’m sure The Ruins worked well on the page, since it demands the reader create their own version of what goes bump in the night. Too bad that when you see it fully realized on the big screen it comes across as stupid. I really expected a lot more from Smith than this. The Ruins doesn’t justify why it should be treated any different than cheap, straight-to-DVD cheesy horror flicks (If there are multiple horror movies about killer snowmen, then there has to be an entire sub-genre of killer plants). I know M. Night Shyamalan’s upcoming summer release The Happening also features plants turning on humans. Let’s hope the creative force that brought us Lady in the Water can do more with the subject.
Nate’s Grade: C
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Into the Wild (2007)
Undeniably well made, I just couldn’t emotionally connect with the main character, Christopher McCandless (Emile Hirch). Chris turns his back on his affluent parents and his bourgeois lifestyle and heads off into the wilderness to experience nature and find what has been missing in his life. Director/screen adaptor Sean Penn turns Chris into a Jesus-like figure that touches all those who he encounters on his cross-country tour that will meet its end in Alaska. I found the character treatment to be a tad naive and off-putting, and his lack of communication with his family, especially his younger sister who was in the same boat with him, seems especially cruel. And yet, the movie has its share of transcendent moments that bury themselves deep inside you, like when Chris befriends an 80-year-old widower (Oscar nominee Hal Holbrook) who is given new life. The closing moments, when Chris has accepted is fate, is profoundly moving and exceptionally performed, and this is coming from a guy that felt an emotional disconnect from the main character. Into the Wild is lovely to watch with top-notch cinematography, a fabulous score by Eddie Vedder, and fine acting by a diverse cast. I’m very impressed by what Penn has accomplished here. However, I admire the movie more than I can embrace it, and it all goes back to the character of Chris. He’s a mystery and both romantic and frustrating, which is kind of a fit summation for the movie.
Nate’s Grade: B
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Grizzly Man (2005)
Werner Herzog goes through hundreds of hours of the late Timothy Treadwell’s own footage of himself living amongst Alaskan grizzly bears. He lived every summer with the bears, his “friends,” for 13 years, until one bear killed him and his girlfriend (the deadly altercation’s audio was captured, though Herzog never plays it in the film). Treadwell was retreating from a human society and putting animals on equal pillars as human being, even predators he treated as “men in bear suits.” Treadwell never references his girlfriend, who can only be seen barely once or twice in his hours of footage. That would destroy his fantasy that he’s out there alone, living it up with these creatures. Grizzly Man is an absorbing character study into the working of a very troubled man. It’s interesting how he uses the camera an audience and means of catharsis. He bounces from point to point, brought to tears a bumblebee died mid-flight on a flower. He does different takes of his own nature footage. Herzog presents an altogether different point of view about nature, more cold and survival of the fittest and less cuddly. He brings a critical analysis to Treadwell’s idealized platitudes. The bears Treadwell was spending time with were on protected land, so there really wasn’t much need for his activism. He definitely had a martyr complex going. This critical perspective gives Grizzly Man depth, dueling views of nature playing it out in the documentary form. Weirdly, it seems like a lot of the interviewees in Grizzly Man treated their moments like they were auditioning for Hollywood. This would be a really interesting double feature with March of the Penguins. Treadwell wished for death because his cause would be even greater. Now there’s a movie that will reach millions. Be careful what you wish for.
Nate’s Grade: A-
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March of the Penguins (2005)
In the vein of 2003’s Winged Migration, comes the newest nature documentary, March of the Penguins. A French film crew spent several months in the Antarctic and documented the mating habits of the adult Emperor penguin. Originally the film was told from a first-person point of view with the penguins narrating their lives. There was supposedly even a song by the baby penguins chirping for food. Eegads. Thankfully, the American distributor dropped this Milo and Otis approach, wrote some brand new third-person narration and tapped Morgan Freeman to voice it. Now that?s a step in the right direction. The results are a dazzling family-friendly documentary about birds that seem out of this world.
At a certain age, the adult Emperor penguins will leave their fishing grounds and begin their long march. No one knows how they know when and where to go, but scores and scores of penguins will travel hundreds of miles to a fertile breeding ground where the ice will be thick enough.
Once they’ve reached this spot the males must choose a female companion and then make with that hot penguin love. If the conception is successful the mamma penguins must now pass the egg off to the males. To do this both birds must keep their toes together the whole time. It doesn’t take much exposure to the harsh Antarctic elements to freeze the egg and null the penguin’s efforts. If this exchange is successful, the mamma penguins must now march 70 miles to fill their bellies with fish. They’ve given up fifty percent of their body weight birthing the egg and are literally starving to death. It’s now the daddy penguin’s responsibility to hatch the egg and guard it from the frigid temperatures until their mate returns. This perilous process will repeat until the baby is strong enough to be left on its own.
Throughout the many months, we watch the penguins endure incredible hardships. They begin by walking (or by waddling) hundreds of miles and then bracing temperatures as bitter as 80 degrees below zero. While the males carry the egg, they will go as long as four months without eating. The community will huddle together for warmth against the elements, and they even cycle teams out so that every penguin gets a turn in the center. The daddy penguins can pick out the voice of their baby even though they haven’t heard their voice since birth. Penguins are freaking awesome.
It’s amazing how characteristically human the penguins can appear. It’s striking to see penguins show affection for each other, from rubbing their beaks to craning their heads and pushing their bodies together. In one remarkable scene, we see the fields of penguins after most of them have decided on a mate. As far as the eye can see there are penguins pressed together in twos declaring their monogamous affection.
But these flightless birds also display painful emotions. After one strong windstorm, a mother penguin searches for her baby and finds it sprawled against the ice and dead. She starts poking the body at first but then lets loose a wail of grief. It’s remarkable how much you can feel for grieving penguins. We’re also told that, though rare, some mama penguins that have lost their little one will try and steal a baby.
The biggest draw of March of the Penguins is the wonderful photography. Covering the majority of a year, we see the entire mating and birth cycle in surprisingly candid and beautifully realized detail. It’s easy to get lost staring at the gorgeous images, from the vast and desolate Antarctic landscapes, to the long lines of hundreds of marching adult penguins, to the irresistibly cute and fluffy baby penguins (they look like stuffed animals come to life). This is what separates March of the Penguins from every day, run-of-the-mill TV nature shows, though National Geographic did help produce. The high-quality cinematography, absorbing story, and sheer adorability of the penguins make this a movie that demands to be seen on the biggest screen possible.
March of the Penguins is also a perfect film for families. The plight of the penguins will be enough to ensure younger kiddies keep watching. The images will dazzle people of all ages and make you feel all warm and fuzzy, like a baby penguin. There’s great humor in watching these birds but there?s also great wonder. You’ll be surprised how often you may discover yourself narrating along; my favorite comment apparently was “Damn, that’s a whole lotta penguins.” What’s even more mysterious is that I didn’t care at all overhearing other people doing the same thing. March of the Penguins is an experience that also easily lends itself to viewer involvement, which makes it perfect for kids. There are some scarier moments when predators hit the scene but nothing that should be too traumatic.
March of the Penguins is a wonderful, heart warming, dazzling documentary that should charm audiences of all ages. You’d have to have a heart of stone not to be amused, impressed, or delighted by the penguins and their fuzzy brood. The photography is amazing in its scope and detail, and you?ll want to take a baby penguin home with you (just look at that picture! Look at it!) This is a lovely and enchanting summer entry that should pick up steam as it picks up additional screens. Catch those penguins now before they march out of your town.
Nate’s Grade: B+
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