MAX PAYNE (2008) - John Moore

Video games. They don’t really make for good movies. Super Mario Brothers, Silent Hill, Resident Evil... the list doesn’t really read like a list of cinema greats. And now another addition to that list; Max Payne.

Max Payne is a cop on a revenge mission. His wife and baby are murdered and Payne spends his days going through cold case files, searching for clues as to who murdered his young family. While investigating their murder, Payne uncovers a drug ring that causes people to behave incredibly violent, or else causes them to have horrific hallucinations.

Well, Max Payne does the video game movie no favours what so ever. It’s pretty awful. Director John Moore has watched Sin City one time too many and really longs for Max Payne to be a film that could fit right in with Robert Rodriguez’ vision. The film just looks like a Sin City rip-off. The action sequences are surprisingly rare in an action film, and while it strives to be something more than a video game adaptation, it just ends up getting bogged down in it’s own desire to be more than it is.



Mark Wahlberg needs a good director to coax a good performance out of him. And unfortunately John Moore is not the man. Wahlberg mumbles and gurns his way throughout the entire film. Mila Kunis is woefully miscast as the femme fatale, who also only appears rarely throughout the film. And Chris Bridges’ wardrobe just makes him look like a comedy character rather than a gritty internal affairs cop.

Derivative, silly and woefully dull, Max Payne has little going for it. Avoid. Seriously.

3/10

THE HAPPENING (2008) - M. Night Shyamalan

M. Night Shyamalan hit the big time in 1999 with his third film, The Sixth Sense. It saw his career skyrocket from relative unknown to claims that he was the next Spielberg. However, since the release of The Sixth Sense, Shyamalan’s career has been on a steady decline. It hit an all-time low with 2006’s Lady In The Water, a film so utterly self-indulgent and ridiculous that many thought the director had committed career suicide. However, this year we get his follow up in The Happening. Is it a
return to form?

The Happening begins with an event in Central Park that defies explanation. People stop moving and then inexplicably commit suicide. In Pennsylvania, the faculty of a school is called together and told to go home due to a ‘terrorist attack.’ We then join Elliot Moore, a science teacher and his family as they get as far away from the large cities as possible. But as the film progresses, it becomes clear that what his happening is nothing to do with a terrorist attack, and may be something far more sinister and dangerous.



I dunno where to start with this film. The premise is interesting. People start dying and there’s no explanation as to why. But this has been done before. In many movies. The problem with The Happening is, it’s all premise, and no story. The opening twenty minutes or so do pique your interest. The mystery is set up and well, that’s pretty much it. After that, the film goes nowhere. And for a film that’s ninety minutes long, this is a detrimental thing. The script is utterly farcical. The dialogue is clunky at best, and laugh-out loud at worst. When characters aren’t standing around explaining things to each other and revealing exposition, they’re attempting to discuss relationships with each other that are never fully fleshed out. When we finally do find out what’s happening, eye brows are raised and belief flies out the window. In fact, the film would have been far more credible if it had accepted it’s B-Movie tendencies and had the trees actually start physically assaulting people. At least then Shyamalan could have stopped trying so hard to be grave and serious and could have had some fun.

The acting in the film is quite honestly, appalling. Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel, the two leads in the film are capable of far better performances. Yet here, they’re no better than amateurs. At times, I found myself staring in awe of how bad their acting was. Yet it’s not entirely their fault. The script they have to work with is very weak, leaving them with very little motivation and dialogue that just sounds awful. It’s never fully explained as to why we’re following these people or why we should care about their plight. Indeed, when Wahlberg starts spouting science, the film takes a turn into the comedic.



And there are plenty of comedic moments in the film. I don’t need a twist in a movie. In fact, sometimes a twist can be a bit of a cop-out. But it seems the twist in The Happening is that the comedic moments aren’t funny and the non-comedic moments are unintentionally hilarious. And it’s these moments that are the only reason to see The Happening. In one hilarious sequence, an old woman literally starts head-butting her way through a wall. While it’s supposed to be horrific and scary, the entire audience I was watching the film with were in convulsions of laughter. This really is a terrible, terrible film.

M. Night Shyamalan may not have committed career suicide with Lady In The Water, but The Happening does not in any way redeem him after that awful film. It seems that Shyamalan has run out of steam and now is more interested in promoting himself as the saviour of man-kind. Something he started in his last film. The closing moments of The Happening feature a ham-fisted attempt at a warning to the audience about environmental disaster. But it’s such a badly conceived moment that it actually made me want to set fire to a pile of tyres just to piss Shyamalan off. This is a bad film. Poorly scripted, appallingly acted, with a premise that is kind of ridiculous and no third act, there’s nothing really redeeming about it.


2/10

WE OWN THE NIGHT (2007) - James Gray

James Gray’s We Own The Night follows a long tradition of cop and criminal dramas. It’s heavily influenced by some great films such as The Godfather, but despite this, We Own The Night falls a little flat. It’s not a terrible film by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s just not remarkable either. Maybe I’ve set the bar a little high when it comes to movies, judging films as either incredibly brilliant or utterly terrible. Or maybe We Own The Night is just a very average film.

Taking place in New York in 1988, We Own The Night focuses on two brothers, one a cop, one a nightclub manager, and their father, also a cop. Joe Grusinsky has recently been appointed as the head of a taskforce charged with putting an end to the drug trade perpetrated by the Russian mafia. In order to do this, he needs his brother, Bobby Green’s help. Bobby has distanced himself from his family and ingratiated himself into the Russian community in New York. He’s a popular guy, and through his connections, he can be quite an asset to the police. However, Bobby is not willing to help his brother, unwilling to upset the status quo in his life. But as events unfold, and Joe closes in on the Russians, Bobby will be forced to choose a side in the war between the cops and the criminals.



The focus of We Own The Night is on Joaquin Phoenix as Bobby Green. He’s the catalyst for the film’s events and as such, the film pretty much rests on his shoulders. And Joaquin Phoenix does a fine job in the role. He’s a good actor, and as proved with Walk The Line, he can carry the film. However, the overall film is filled with some pretty contrived plot twists, lacklustre dialogue and clichéd characters. It’s this that brings the film down. Mark Whalberg, who plays Joe Grusinsky does a fine job with what he’s given, but it’s not much of a role. Robert Duvall and Eva Mendes round off the central cast, but both characters suffer from being unremarkable. We’ve seen these characters before. And we’ve seen them written better.

On the plus side, there is a very good car chase in the film. Shot during a torrential downpour, the tension is palpable as the gangsters close in on a number of the main characters during heavy traffic. It’s the only really memorable part of the film, and is quite good. The soundtrack is also filled with classic songs. It’s quite impressive that the Gray was able to get so many good songs to put into the film. It must have cost quite a bit in royalties. However, when the soundtrack is the best thing about a film, it pretty much sums up the weakness of the material.



As I’ve said, there’s nothing terrible about We Own The Night. It’s just not great by any degree. There are far better cop movies out there. And despite the best efforts of the cast, they can’t make a better film out of weak source material. A short review. But what else can you write about a film that is pretty forgettable once it’s over.


5/10