Crappy Town: 5 things I hate about the new ABC series Happy Town

Wow.

1.  After two episodes, I can safely conclude that the most clever thing about ABC’s new series is the ironic title.  Happy Town?  Hardly.  The show leaves audiences a mix of bored, angry, sad and inexplicably chafed in hard to clean areas.  My understanding is that the working title was “Steven Weber on the set of Happy Town: I’m a celebrity get me Out of here.  No, seriously, if I can’t get out of this contract, I at least want to fire my agent.”

2.  The showmakers are aiming for the intriguing atmosphere of Twin Peaks and coming up with something closer to the functionally retarded feel of the Prison Break universe.

3.  Actually, even more so it reminds me of CBS’s also crappy Harper’s Island, but at least a shit ton of meaningful characters got stabbed, maimed, mutilated, crinkled and smeared around in that one. Outside of a molester-y guy taking a railroad spike to the forehead in the opening scene, the best shock Happy Town can muster is a chopped off hand, which leads to:

4.  When I was in elementary school, one of the kids in my class had his thumb and pinky chopped off.  They sewed them back on, but the limbs never grew.  They were like these dried out, curved, little hard nub-fingers that weren’t very flexible or useful.  In Happy Town, the Sherriff gets his entire hand chopped off and reattached, and it’s looking like that’s just going to work. OMFG. If that thing doesn’t look like a shriveled up monkey’s paw that would grant me 3 wishes next week, I’m outta here.

5.  Amy Acker is awesome.  She is funny and charismatic.  You wouldn’t realize these things in watching an episode of Shittsburgh, though.  She gets like 3 lines while her douchey husband cavemans around town hamfisting the fuck out of everything in his path.

So there you have it, and judging by the ratings, America agrees with me.

Ranking the New TV Shows: #16 – Lie To Me

The countdown continues with another piece o’ poo from Fox. “Lie to Me” is Fox’s “The Mentalist” imitation, hoping to ride the quirky procedural formula to similar ratings success. (To be fair, ABC did also come out with something of a “Mentalist” rip-off this spring in “Castle,” which is a little higher up in our rankings.)

The show: “Lie to Me”
Synopsis: Dr. Cal Lightman (Tim Roth) is an expert in facial micro-expressions and utilizing them to determine whether or not someone is lying. He and his team of fellow lie-ologists use their powers to fight crime.
Debuted: January 21, 2009 on Fox
Our take: The human lie detector idea is not a bad one. Toward the beginning of the episode, Lightman illustrates a point about facial expressions by showing real clips (such as Kato Kaelin at the O.J. trial) where people’s briefest facial expressions betray what they are saying and give a glimpse into what they really feel. I have to say – it was pretty impressive. From there, unfortunately, the show makes the mistake of getting a bit expository with its explanations of ticks and tells, though. In fact, it over explains pretty much everything, with characters needlessly recapping what someone has just explained to them. It also failed on a character and story level. The humor fell way flat, and the characters aside from Lightman were much more annoying than the quirky charm they must’ve been shooting for (something that “The Mentalist” does pretty well, I might add). In the end it comes across not so much as style over substance but lie detector jargon over both style and substance. I finished the pilot with no intention of going back for more.
What it would need to do to keep me watching: The fact that “The Shield” creator Shawn Ryan is taking over the reigns in season 2 is an excellent one. As I said, the basic premise is not bad. The flaws may be too severe to fix, though.

Trailer Trash: Weekend of 6/12/09 Trailers

Not a big week for new movies. Here they are, though, ranked in order of how much I’d like to see them (from most to least):

Moon

A thriller in space starring Sam Rockwell.  The basic premise, a guy stationed alone in space for 3 years, reminded me a ton of the George R.R. Martin scifi short story “The Second Kind of Loneliness,” which is one of my favorite pieces of short fiction in any genre. “Moon” currently sits at 100% fresh on rotten tomatoes (out of 13 reviews), but it’s a limited release, and I doubt it will be anywhere around here.

Food, Inc.

A documentary about the reality of food as an industry and how far it is from the images used to market food to us. This might be like the opposite of watching food porn like “Top Chef,” but I’m still curious.

Street Dreams

Rob Dyrdek (of MTV’s “Rob & Big“) wrote a movie. There’s about a 110% chance that it won’t be very good.

Blast!

A documentary about astrophysicists living fast and not dying young. I’d be shocked if this came around here. I’ll give pretty much any doc a chance, though, so I may find it on DVD down the road.

Tetro (opens June 11)

Francis Ford Copolla’s new movie. Will it be his first good movie in 30 years? Doubtful. At least with Vincent Gallo as the lead, it’s guaranteed to be moderately annoying.

The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3

Synopsis: John Travolta takes a bunch of hostages and many cars flip over. This is the third feature film adaptation of the novel by John Godey.

Imagine That

Eddie Murphy kids movie that reminds me of Jim Carrey’s “Liar Liar.”

The Burrowers: Digging Up Another Straight to DVD Gem

Add yet another movie to the long list of recent feature films inexplicably reduced to straight to DVD affairs.  J.T. Petty’s “The Burrowers” really saw no theatrical release outside of playing at a handful of film festivals last fall.

The movie combines an old West adventure with horror, drawing pretty equally from both genres.  The opening scene features a family being attacked by some unseen entity.  When Fergus Coffey (Karl Geary) arrives on the scene to find his fiancée among those missing, he quickly launches a search party.  Just like that, the movie takes to the road on horseback – cowboys riding through the prairie in search of missing folks and mysterious monsters.

TV Casualties Rating: out of 5

Run Time: 96 minutes

Directed by: J.T. Petty

Written by: J.T. Petty

Starring: Clancy Brown, Karl Geary, William Mapother

Theatrical Release: N/A

DVD Release: 04/21/09

Production Budget: $7 million

Domestic Gross: $0

Metacritic Score: N/A

Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 67%

The lush green atmosphere and Western sensibility really separate this from your average teen horror fare straight away.  Your run-of-the-mall horror movie rarely even pretends to care about its characters, and horror teens, in particular, are always disposable.  Often annoying already, their deaths are so meaningless that they may as well be bags of meat for a maniac to hack away at with an ax.  In this semi-proper Western universe populated more by adults than teens, though, the characters are treated with a little more reverence.  Consequently, the deaths still pack some surprise, still carry some weight with the audience.  Like “The Descent,” (though not quite as good) this is horror made for adults.

Fans of ABC’s “Lost” will recognize several faces here:  actors William Mapother, Doug Hutchison and Clancy Brown (our famously despised pick for Sandor Clegane) all play major roles in “The Burrowers” and had significant parts on the island as well.  (Fun fact:  Hutchison, AKA Horace the Dharma leader on “Lost,” got one of his big acting breaks as the super creepy Eugene Victor Tooms on “The X-Files.”)  The entire cast does a nice job pulling off the critical juxtaposition of the old West -  stuffy, formal, almost Victorian aspects of speech and mannerisms mixing with the rough and grimey demeanor of hardened men that work ranches all day.  As always, this combo is good for several laughs.

The movie does have its flaws, though – from the opening scene on, the audience stays one step (or more) ahead of the characters.  That certainly doesn’t help build suspense or an aura of mystery.  I also thought a fight scene toward the end went on way too long.  Even if we do sort of feel like we know what’s ultimately coming, though, some of the particulars of the details still make the end satisfying, and there are a few twists along the way as well.

Perhaps its biggest strength – “The Burrowers” shows some restraint in not letting us see the actual creatures too much, which I think usually works better than the alternative.  (This isn’t Freddy or Chuckie making wise cracks as they kill.  What might lurk in the shadows is always scariest.)  All told, it’s an effective and entertaining movie, especially considering its modest budget.  Just 900 and some odd votes on IMDB? Horror fans should seek this out on DVD.

More E3 Trailers: Beatles, Assassins, Zombies, Mario and more

Assassin’s Creed II:

It looks pretty much flawless. There’s no actual footage of gameplay, though. I wonder if it’ll be almost exactly like the first one.

Rock Band: The Beatles:

Sweet. This will basically be Rock Band with all good songs, unlike Rock Band 2 which opted for the no good songs approach. Dibs on George!

Left4Dead 2:

Time to kill zombies in the face. Again.

Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker:

By Peace Walker they mean quietly walk up behind a guy and choke him out.

Dante’s Inferno:

Hell actually looks pretty kickass. I can’t wait to impale some kind of demon.

Super Mario Galaxy 2:

Rejoice! More 3D Mario action!

The Education of Charlie Banks: Fred Durst directs?

At one point, Fred Durst did it all for the nookie. Those were simpler times. Now he, apparently, directs. In the quest to discover bodacious movies, it’s best to leave no stone unturned.  It was with a smirk and a heavy heart that I turned the Durst stone, but there was a pleasant, perhaps even bodacious, surprise underneath.

“The Education of Charlie Banks” introduces friends Charlie (Jesse Eisenberg,) Danny (Chris Marquette) and Mick (Jason Ritter) through a few scenes as kids in New York City in the 1970′s.  Charlie and Danny are fairly well off and headed for Ivy League schools.  Mick?  Not so much. He serves as the baddest guy in the neighborhood.  Nailing college girls is as close as he’ll get to a degree.  Here comes the central dramatic conflict:  Mick beats a couple of kids nearly to death, and Charlie rats him out before quickly recanting his statement.  The movie picks up in the 80′s at Brown University where Danny and Charlie are roommates.  Mick arrives unexpectedly to stay for a while, and, with his blue collar background, there’s a bit of “culture shock.” Perhaps more importantly – does Mick know that Charlie was the one that ratted him out?

TV Casualties Rating: out of 5

Run Time: 100 minutes

Directed by: Fred Durst

Written by: Peter Elkoff

Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Jason Ritter, Eva Amurri, Chris Marquette

Theatrical Release: 03/27/09

DVD Release: 06/30/09

Production Budget: N/A

Domestic Gross: $15,078

Metacritic Score: 50/100

Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 52%

Part coming of age story, part fish out of water story, the plot keeps it pretty simple.  The focus here is on characters, fully formed ones that grow and change.  A movie can get a long way by actually caring about its cast of players, by making them more than plot devices, and this one does. The core group of 6 or so actors often look like they’re having a lot of fun together, and the roles they play are fairly colorful without going completely over the top.  Conflicts arise and there are a few twists, some more predictable than others, but the script shines by being consistently generous with each and every character without seeming cheesy.   The movie remains thoroughly entertaining from start to finish.

The story, however, falls apart somewhat toward the end.  Thematically, there are many direct mentions of the class disparities and rich and poor, and the characters reference “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald quite a bit.  That considered, I felt like the writer lost his focus in terms of what he was really saying about Mick, being that he was the only poor character.  As a myth, or a hero’s journey, this was slightly less than satisfying, though I can respect that it doesn’t give easy answers, at least, or wrap things up with a neat, happy ending.  The pacing seems to sense this weakness in the final section, as the film wraps up really quickly.

Despite that flaw, “The Education of Charlie Banks” was well worth watching and deserves to find a bigger audience on DVD.  Durst seems like a natural behind the camera, as odd as that may seem.  Everything about the movie gives off a lot of energy and enthusiasm, and there are many playful, amusing shots and details throughout.  Most importantly, he gets great performances, cohesion and chemistry from the young cast.

One Week: Joshua Jackson’s Best Work Since D2

Regardless of the content of the movie itself, “One Week” may always be best known as the movie that used youtube comment quotes in its advertising campaign rather than quotes of legitimate critics. The blogosphere went apeshit, calling it, “A new low for the movie industry.” Now, as for the movie:

What would you do if you had one week to live? That’s the launching point of the Canadian movie “One Week.” The rhetorical question becomes a literal one in the opening scene when Ben Tyler (Joshua Jackson) is informed that he has stage four cancer. He’s young, but the disease is particularly aggressive – they’ve found cancerous cells in his bloodstream and spreading. Essentially, he could go at any time.

Cue the identity crisis punctuated with quirk. Ben’s first thought? This will be a good excuse to call off his upcoming wedding, an affair he seems lukewarm about. He’s also relieved that he basically won’t need to go to work anymore. On the way home he purchases a motorcycle on a whim, and it’s not long before he sets out on an open-ended journey with the vague destination of “West.”

TV Casualties Rating: out of 5

Run Time: 93 minutes

Directed by: Michael McGowan

Written by: Michael McGowan

Starring: Joshua Jackson, Liane Balaban

Theatrical Release: 03/06/09

DVD Release: 06/16/09

Production Budget: N/A

Domestic Gross: N/A

Metacritic Score: N/A

Rotten Tomatoes Rating: N/A

From that point, this becomes a roadtrip movie. Ben meets a series of characters on his criss-crossing path toward the Pacific. He gets more involved with some than others, but they each help him shape his thoughts on what’s left of his life. As episodic and formulaic as that may sound, most of it works well enough. Ben’s impending death gives him a crystal clear perspective, and the internal conflict that emerges pits passion vs. responsibility. The movie went places with this element of the story that I didn’t expect, and I’m not sure I agree with, personally, but it was messy and complicated and honest. It gave me something to think about.

The subdued voice of the narrator (Campbell Scott) tells much of the story here, which helps give a clear delivery to the deadpan humor throughout the movie. Jackson is fine as the lead, but Liane Balaban sort of steals the show as his fiance, Samantha, by being funnier than him in her handful or so of scenes. Her character won me over to the point that it really changed my interpretation of the end of the movie.

From the style of humor all the way to the story’s end, “One Week” is a mature film. Despite the focus on cancer and death, it avoids the pitfall of melodrama. In fact, it may be a little too clean considering the grave subject matter – it would be believable, maybe even normal, to see characters behaving irrationally in a scenario like this. Still, it was somewhat refreshing to see a movie show some emotional restraint and basically do the opposite of the “go too big with every scene” soap opera crap. To break this down in youtube comment terms, I wouldn’t say, “Best. Movie. Ever.” But I lol’d a few times.

The Shield, Season 7: All Things Must Pass

In 2002, a gritty cop drama called “The Shield” stormed out of nowhere, landing an Emmy and a pair of Golden Globes and putting FX on the map as the HBO of basic cable.  The future looked impossibly bright.  This would be “The Sopranos” of cop shows, with Michael Chiklis’ Vic Mackey playing the morally gray (bordering on pitch black) main character ala James Gandolfini’s Tony Soprano. (Chiklis even sported the Emmy and Golden Globe hardware to prove it with a clean sweep of the 2002-3 best actor awards.)  By the time the finale of its seventh and final season aired on November, 25, 2008, to an initial audience of just 1.9 million, however, it was plain to look back and see that the rookie season was the peak of the series, at least in terms of hype, awards and gushing critical praise.  (For the uninitiated, the first season is well worth picking up – it’s an adrenalin rush in television form.)

Even if the awards abruptly stopped flowing in and the show never gained footing with a huge audience (though it was always big by FX standards,) many devoted fans greatly appreciated the ride well after the first season. The plot rocketed along, burning bright and hot, following Mackey and the strike team along their path of murder, betrayal and greed.  From ripping off the Armenian money train, to Julien’s (Michael Jace) aversion therapy, to Detective Dutch Waggenbach (Jay Karnes) strangling a cat, to Police Captain and future Mayoral Candidate David Acevada (Benito Martinez) suffering a prison style mouth rape, to Shane Vendrell (Walton Goggins) dropping a grenade in fellow strike team member Curtis Lemanski’s (Kenny Johnson) lap, “The Shield” was loaded with the kinds of grit and dirt cop stories you couldn’t find in the squeaky clean worlds of “Law & Order” and “CSI.”  Season Seven faced the tall task of tying up a bunch of loose ends and bringing all of those stories to a close.

TV Casualties Rating:

Created by: Shawn Ryan

Starring: Michael Chiklis, Walton Goggins, CCH Pounder

Season Premiere: 09/02/08

DVD Release: 06/09/09

Nielsen Rating: 1.9 million viewers

Metacritic Score: 85/100

Picking up immediately after the sixth season, the final act continues to revolve around the conflict between Mackey and Vendrell in the wake of Lem’s murder by grenade.  They start out in a reluctant alliance that quickly explodes into a full out blood feud, leaving both men jobless and scrambling to avoid prison in different ways.  After walking the line for so many years and, with a lot of good luck, avoiding any real trouble, Mackey, Vendrell and their long time strike team partner Ronnie Gardocki (David Rees Snell) finally tumble over it into the land of no return.  Death or imprisonment looks extremely likely for all three from pretty early on.

Other characters, like Acevada, Julien, Danni (Catherine Dent), and to a lesser extent Dutch and Claudette (CCH Pounder,) see their stories take a backseat to the strike team.  This has been the case for the series since the first season or two, and looking back, I think it may have been a mistake.  The show did work best when the audience was truly invested in all of the characters as both police officers and people with personal lives.  The show veered from showing us many of those non-strike team characters outside of the office and lost a lot of variety, and maybe even humanity, for it.

In most other respects, in fact, the last season is more of the same – in a good way.  The show always centered around the intrigue of the web of strategy between opposing gangs, the cops and the semi-crooked strike team kind of playing all sides.  The twists and turns of those plot elements remain strong and as always are told at the breakneck pace of the pilot’s opening chase scene.  Pretty much the entire cast kicks ass here as usual, nailing both the funny scenes and the intense ones.  Goggins has to cover the most territory this year, and he rises to the challenge.  Chiklis, Karnes and Pounder are always awesome.

So does story of the strike team ultimately pay off?  Justice was never easy or simple in “The Shield.”  Nothing was ever quite black and white.  The story of Vic Mackey and the strike team climaxes with a lot of justice, though – some literal, some poetic and some rough.

Powder Blue: The Jessica Biel Stripper Movie

How does a movie starring Oscar winner Forest Whitaker, Jessica Biel, Lisa Kudrow, Patrick Swayze and Ray Liotta go straight to DVD?

That is apparently the case for “Powder Blue,” which hits the DVD shelves May 26th, roughly 20 months after filming wrapped and without ever seeing a legit theatrical release.  So what happened?  All we really have in way of explanation is the film itself.

“Powder Blue” weaves a web of several loosely connected storylines in the same style as “Crash” or “Magnolia.”  The holidays draw near, and four LA residents close in on personal crises as well.  Rose Johnny (Biel) strips to pay the medical bills of her comatose 7 year old son.  She also appears to have a coke problem, though to what extent remains unclear.  Somewhere across town, Charlie (Whitaker) offers strangers $50,000 cash to shoot him “in the heart.”  He’s desperate and in pain but, as the film quickly explains, is a religious man and can’t risk killing himself for fear of eternal hellfire.  Elsewhere, scrawny Qwerty Doolittle (Eddie Redmayne) receives a rejection on his loan as his father ran up some bad debt for their mortuary business.  He’s never had a real girlfriend, and when he attempts to attend a dating function, he passes out from nerves.  Jack Doheny (Liotta) is an ex-con dying of cancer. Allegedly, he’s “just passing through” town, though we know right away that something more is going on.

TV Casualties Rating:

Run Time: 106 minutes

Directed by: Timothy Linh Bui

Written by: Timothy Linh Bui

Starring: Jessica Biel, Forest Whitaker, Ray Liotta, Lisa Kudrow

Theatrical Release: 05/08/09

DVD Release: 05/26/09

Production Budget: N/A

Domestic Gross: N/A

Metacritic Score: N/A

Rotten Tomatoes Rating: N/A

This ambitious setup shows some promise.  Early on, a spark of energy catapults the action as the film jumps back and forth to the different strands of story.  At spots where the movie leans toward quirky rather than intense, it actually works really well.  Lisa Kudrow was especially funny as a neurotic waitress.  As the bigger picture comes into focus, and the direction of each story fully takes shape, unfortunately, that energy seems to drain away in a hurry – the spark extinguished by cold, blue snow.

“Powder Blue” doesn’t have deep enough characters to work as a character study, and it similarly fails to deliver a twisty or surprising enough plot to carry the film. There are unintentionally laughable lines of dialogue at crucial moments, and similar missteps of tone throughout the last half of the movie – some of the love scenes come off awkwardly, and some of the over the top “sad scenes” with swelling music seem to misjudge (by a lot) how connected (or not) the audience feels to certain characters and their predicaments.  There didn’t seem to be a clear storytelling vision behind this.  Despite the openly derivative elements, it doesn’t manipulate as well as “Crash” or give us the cast of rich characters like “Magnolia.”  It failed to rip off either one all that well.

The gravest sin?  The tragic elements here, like Rose’s drug problem and Charlie’s suicidal tendencies, while intriguing at first, stay on a very surface level.  The pain here is flat, superficial – a  mere plot device.  It doesn’t resonate.  I feel like writer/director Timothy Linh Bui couldn’t decide if he wanted the movie to be clever or pack an emotional haymaker, and as a result it does neither, ultimately trying to force each storyline into paying off with a sentimental cheesefest.

Oh well.  Years from now “Powder Blue” will simply be remembered as the “Jessica Biel stripper movie,” if it’s remembered at all.  She does splash hot candle wax all over her boobs… in case you were wondering.  That actually does sound like a lot of straight to DVD movies, now that I think about it.

Valkyrie: The Plot to Kill Hitler

“Valkyrie” is based on the true story of Operation Valkyrie: a well organized attempt by an arm of the German military to overthrow Hitler. The details of the conspiracy fascinate, particularly in how the months of planning and organization ultimately rest on the whim of a moved briefcase. In fact, it works against the film that the story is already so well known.

Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg (Tom Cruise) manipulates through back channels to undermine Hitler before he even joins up with the blossoming movement toward a coup. He feels it’s his duty to “sacred Germany” to stop the Fuhrer – to show, in dramatic fashion, that not all Germans are like their leader. He brings a sense of urgency to the group plotting against Hitler. His results-oriented single mindedness, that dogged determination of a soldier, counteracts the highfalutin politicians in the movement as they find various ways to sit on their hands. (One even suggests Stauffenberg’s proposed assassination of Hitler wouldn’t be honorable.) Stauffenberg makes the whole thing go. At a crucial moment later in the film, General Olbricht (Bill Nighy) hesitates at the thought of how great the cost will be if any piece of their plan doesn’t come off smoothly. Stauffenberg explains in an even voice why and how it must be done. The General launches into action immediately.

TV Casualties Rating:

Run Time: 120 minutes

Directed by: Bryan Singer

Written by: Christopher McQuarrie, Nathan Alexander

Starring: Tom Cruise, Bill Nighy, Kenneth Branagh, Tom Wilkinson

Theatrical Release: 12/25/08

DVD Release: 05/19/09

Production Budget: $75 million

Domestic Gross: $83 million

Metacritic Score: 56/100

Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 59%

The film opens with a rad bombing scene that costs Stauffenberg a hand and an eye – a sequence that sets the bar for production value very high. The rest of the film delivers on that promise. From scenes of whispered dialogue to sets torn apart by explosions, this is a flawless big budget production. The director’s eyes and ears reveal themselves to be just as keenly focused as his hands. With details like Stauffenberg’s glass eye periodically looking in the wrong direction, plane rides where the growl of the engine drowns all sound out, and sweeping overhead shots of the car as it weaves through a dense German forest – creativity and inspiration can be found in the myriad of little ways this movie reaches out to the audience.

The acting excels as well. Cruise impresses as the driven yet reserved Stauffenberg. Kenneth Branagh, Tom Wilkinson, Christian Berkel and Kevin McNally also deserve mention. Nighy may stand out the most. With facial expressions and a few gestures, he brings real fear and real pain – a wealth of humanity – to a role that could have easily come off purely functional and flat.

Which brings me to the film’s arguable flaw – the story is one of duty and duty alone, of standing up to do the right thing at great personal cost. It follows the details of the infamous true story faithfully, and aside from a handful of shots of Stauffenberg’s wife and children, makes little attempt to show us these characters as men beyond the military. The plot is strong enough that this could work if I didn’t already know many of the details of Stauffenberg’s story. Since I did, a little of the tension seeps out. The lack of any underlying drama to flesh the characters out serves as a detriment, at least for me. It’s meticulous. It’s intriguing. It’s not quite captivating on an emotional level.

Still, the story of Stauffenberg and Operation Valkyrie is an unbelievable one, and this film does it justice. It’s worth watching even if you already know many of those details. If not, “Valkyrie” will blow you away – unless someone moves the briefcase.

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