Cloud Atlas ★★

It's All Relative 

Written by Matt Giles

Edited by Erin Accomando

Some of the best science fiction is not without its flaws. Star Trek had its fair share of bad episodes ("Spock's Brain", anyone?) and bad movies (Star Trek V: The Final Frontier), as did The X-Files, Battlestar Galactica, and yes, Lost. Despite these missed opportunities, we remember these shows fondly (some more than others) and embrace the ideas and unique style that each of these shows added to the genre. The same cannot be said for Cloud Atlas, the epic science fiction odyssey rife with ideas and riddled with missed opportunities.

To understand the film, it's best to understand how it views time. It is not linear, as we all believe, but rather, vertical, or as I like to see it, circular. In other words, events that happened in our past and future are occurring parallel to what is happening now. The directors of the film, Lana & Andy Wachowski and Tom Tykwer, weave six stories together all at once to show us that all of these separate events are happening simultaneously, with each of the characters' choices impacting their past and future. The key players in each of these stories are the ones who have a birthmark resembling a comet, as they are the ones whose actions will dictate whether the next one hundred years will be peaceful or erupt in chaos.

The actors playing different characters in each story include Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent, Hugo Weaving, Jim Sturgess, Doona Bae, Susan Sarandon and Hugh Grant, all of whom do great work despite the execution on the part of the directors. The makeup and some of the accents (especially in futuristic story that features Hanks and Berry prominently) are too distracting, so much so that you begin to wonder if The Wachowskis and Tykwer didn't have enough faith in the abilities of the actors. I get it, reincarnation means sometimes the same soul inhabits a body looking entirely different than the prior body, but honestly, a cast like this deserves better.

For a film as grand as Cloud Atlas, the directors seem hard-pressed to find content that adequately fills the time. For much its three-hours the directors stretch each story (which could have been about ten to twenty minutes a piece) at the expense of the film. The cutting from one story to the next becomes jarring, taking the viewer out of the experience. It doesn't work, nor does the film need to be as long as it is. 

If you want a great movie that deals with life, death, time, space, and reincarnation, see 2001: A Space Odyssey. If you want a more Earthbound version of those ideas, see The Tree of Life. If you want a film that has many actors you love doing their best to elevate material unworthy of their talents, Cloud Atlas fits that description. But if you desire truly great science fiction, crack open a beer and watch some old Star Trek episodes. Even the bad ones are better than Cloud Atlas. 

Paranormal Activity 4 ★½

A Weak Entry To An Otherwise Successful Franchise

Written by Matt Giles
Edited by Erin Accomando

I'm a genuine fan of the Paranormal Activity series. There, I said it. The first film changed the approach to making horror movies with its simplicity and inventiveness, ushering in many lesser rip-offs and some worthy sequels. Of the now four films that total the series, I find myself favoring the odd-numbered ones over the evens. Paranormal Activity introduced us to Katie (Katie Featherston), her back-story, and the unseen monster known only as Toby. Paranormal Activity 3 remains the most brutal of the chapters, a prequel to the first two films that explains how everything started - a reveal that includes a cult of witches and demons, evil grandmas, and two very dead parents.

Paranormal Activity 4 brings us to the present, taking place five years after the events of the first two films and, as a result, is a direct sequel to Paranormal Activity 2. When we last saw Katie, she had murdered her boyfriend, her sister, and her brother-in-law, all in an effort to capture her sister's son, Hunter. As the firstborn son of Katie's lineage, he's important to the cult and to Toby, for reasons that Paranormal Activity 4, sadly, does not reveal. What it does is tell us what happened to Katie and Hunter after the events of the first two films, and it does so in a way many will not be suspecting. It also gives us the scares we're now accustomed to seeing while still using interesting techniques to achieve those moments - the second film introduced multiple cameras around the house, the third used the pivoting camera in the kitchen to great effect - this time using webcams and a Kinect that reveal figures in the background or one's that are otherwise invisible.

Where the film succeeds in technical creativity, it fails in story. There's nothing that makes us excited for what comes next, a strength that part three had going for it. It feels more like a sequel made only for commercial reasons, giving us the basic plot points we've come to expect, uninterested in adding the unexpected. Instead of adults, or little girls, we get Alex (Kathryn Newton), the (roughly) fourteen-year-old protagonist suspicious of the new guest in her parents home, Robbie (Brady Allen). As creepy kids go, he's up there with Samara and Damien, and to his credit I was especially frightened by his delivery of a certain foreboding line during the middle of the film, but he and Alex are two minor highlights of a bad movie.

The series seems as though it's headed down the path of asking more questions than it feels like answering, which is a shame for a group of films that could have a potential if the right story is generated. The first film could have stood by itself as a great horror film; it didn't need sequels. Paranormal Activity 3 brought some life into the storyline after the average Paranormal Activity 2, making the possibilities endless in the next chapter. Paranormal Activity 4 is a major disappointment and doesn't give me much hope for the inevitable sequel. I guess we'll find out next year.

Sinister ★★½

Cheap Thrills And Prolonged Mysteries Do Not Equal Genuine Scares

Written by Matt Giles
Edited by Erin Accomando

For a film that's been labeled "one of the scariest movies of the year," Sinister is surprisingly bland, offering a few jolting moments and some twisted home movies, making it a major disappointment especially during the month of Halloween.

Ethan Hawke plays Ellison Oswalt, a true-crime writer with a reputation for aggravating local police officers in his efforts to solve cases. He's moved his wife, Tracy, (Juliet Rylance) and two children, Trevor and Ashley (Michael Hall D'Addario and Clare Foley), into a house where every member of a family except a little girl named Stephanie was killed. (Sinister's opening Super 8 movie reveals that the family was hung from a tree, with an unseen figure causing their demise.) And because lying to one's wife is always a good idea, Ellison hides this minor detail from Tracy. As Ellison assembles the pieces of this tragedy - photos, crime reports and the like - he becomes increasingly obsessed with trying to find Stephanie. He hears noises coming from the attic, which eventually reveals a box full of Super 8 movies, each of them portraying another slaughter of another unlucky family. A child is missing from each family, leading to a pattern among all of the murders, adding to Ellison's disturbing desire to solve all of these cases at the expense of alienating his family.

The best parts of Sinister are these Super 8 snuff movies, inventive in their style, hauntingly disturbing, and well made. What takes away from the film is that it tries to be frightening when it's actually more interesting as a mystery. There are parts of the movie that drag, courtesy of screenwriters C. Robert Cargill and Scott Derrickson relishing in keeping the mystery going as long as they can, and the film suffers for it. Maybe it's because of the marketing and the opinions I heard from friends and family members saying that Sinister was terrifying, I'll grant you that. But in looking at the movie for what it is, it's just too slow and not at all scary.

The intriguing aspect to it, however, is its portrait of a writer struggling to remain relevant. Sinister gives us as surprisingly detailed look into Ellison's life of solving mysteries. Its success is in showing us that Ellison is quite good at his job, and if anyone can solve what has happened to these children, it's him. There are plenty of movies out there about writers and their process, but I think Sinister offers something new in it's portrayal of a writer's obsession, and how difficult it is to let go of that obsession even after a crime is solved. Hawke does an admirable job conveying that struggle, making him a rarity of typical horror films - a lead character we actually root for.

The other minor detail that Sinister has going for it is the two scenes that feature Vincent D'Onofrio as Professor Jonas, the expert in the occult who helps Ellison with his plight. If ever a film needs exposition, especially dealing with pagan deities, D'Onofrio is the man for the job. He shows up late in the story, but gives the film the juice it needs to finally wrap up. Too bad he's not enough to save the film from its own wearisome mystery.

Argo ★★★★

Proof That Ben Affleck Has Become A Great Filmmaker

Written by Matt Giles
Edited by Erin Accomando

I have to admit that I was one of the many Americans who doubted Ben Affleck's talents as a director. Having appeared in dozens of terrible movies and not bringing anything to some of the roles offered to him, I swore off all things Affleck related. That all changed when Affleck himself stated that he would only appear in films he felt his newborn daughter would be proud of, a promise that came to fruition in 2006 with his role in Hollywoodland. Since that time his career has shifted drastically, to the point that he's now directed three films, each one better than the last, all of them worthy of praise. The third of these films is Argo, a major achievement for Affleck as a filmmaker and one of the most thrilling films of the year.

Argo is the true story of C.I.A. agent Tony Mendez's (Affleck) rescue of six United States diplomats in Tehran during the Iran Hostage Crisis; a story that, up until President Clinton declassified it, was unknown to everyone. It's also a story that lends itself well to film, as the cover Mendez used to get these six people out was that each of them were part of the production crew for a fake science fiction film called Argo, thus allowing them to escape the country without question. There are some obvious deviations from the original story for cinematic purposes, particularly when Affleck adds layers of suspense to the film's third act, but it all works well and serves the heroic nature of Mendez's rescue.

What Affleck manages to accomplish skillfully is a tone throughout the film that is both dramatic and comical. Most of the drama unfolds from the true events of the story, which Affleck handles nicely, and the comedy comes out of everything related to the fake movie Mendez uses as a cover. Most of those scenes occur early in the film while Mendez is in Los Angeles. There, he meets up with John Chambers (John Goodman, a genuine delight in this film), a Hollywood makeup artist who has worked with the C.I.A. before and has the necessary connections to pull off the charade. One of those connections is Lester Siegel (a brilliant Alan Arkin, delivering the film's most quoted line), a producer who provides the needed media attention to sell the idea that Argo really is being made. Goodman and Arkin are so perfect in their roles that if there were a spinoff of just these two characters about the ins and outs of their lives in Hollywood, I wouldn't be opposed to it. They serve the story well and provide hilarious commentary on what it means to be "someone" in Los Angeles, which I'm sure every producer in America will appreciate.

The rest of the cast is a who's who of television: "Hey that's Bryan Cranston from Breaking Bad!"; "Oh my, it's Kyle Chandler from Friday Night Lights!"; "Better watch out, that guy is The Man in Black from Lost, Titus Welliver!"; "Whoa! Sydney Bristow's dad, Victor Garber is here?"; "They even have Željko Ivanek, who has been a bad guy in virtually every TV show I've ever seen!" The funniest bit of casting, however, goes to Richard Kind playing a bitter writer that faces off with Arkin for the rights to his script, giving us a true portrait of writers everywhere in America.

At times, the casting is a little bit distracting, but not so much that it hinders anything that's great about Argo. In fact, the only true detriment as far as casting is concerned is Mr. Affleck himself, who is so deadpan throughout the film that you have to wonder if he's really trying. I get that he's trying to be an emotionless C.I.A. agent who is estranged from his wife and son, but I don't think that Affleck has the necessary acting skills to make us feel sorry for him. It has been suggested that George Clooney, a producer on the film, would have made a better Mendez, and I agree. There's no humanity to Affleck's portrayal and you need a little of that to be invested in his story.

Despite the weaknesses of Affleck the actor, Affleck the director shines. This is a film worthy of all its praise because of Affleck's ability to tell a story in an entertaining, swiftly paced manner. He somehow manages to make everyone who watches it wonder if the six diplomats will make it out even though we already know the true story. It takes a very good director to pull that off, and happily Affleck is reinventing himself as one of Hollywood's top directors of entertaining thrillers. For those still skeptical about seeing anything Affleck is involved in, Argo gives you many reasons to be excited for what he does next.