* ½

STARRING: Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, Taylor Lautner, Ashley Greene, Peter Facinelli, Elizabeth Reaser, Kellan Lutz, Nikki Reed, Jackson Rathbone, Edi Gathegi, Rachelle Lafevre, Billy Burke, Charlie Bewley, Jamie Campbell Bower, Daniel Cudmore, Christopher Heyerdahl, Dakota Fanning, Cameron Bright, Noot Seer, Michael Sheen, Graham Greene, Tinsel Korey

2009, 130 Minutes, Directed by: Chris Weitz

Watching Twilight Saga: New Moon is a bit like having your own real-life sulky teenager living under your roof . . .

As you might gather from the above description, New Moon isn’t particularly fun. Like a real angsty teenager the movie is oh-so serious and humourless (expect for one scene involving a Triple Date from Hell which boasted some lame attempts at obvious humor). There is so much teenage angst piling up in New Moon that you need a jetpack to stay above it all!

This is still one of the silliest movie franchises out there and one which is totally critic proof. People will still go see it even if there are verifiable reports that watching it makes your eyes bleed. New Moon will make a killing at the box office and maybe I would have liked it if I were several decades younger and didn’t have a penis. But unlike the Harry Potter movies, the so-called Twilight Saga has very little to offer anyone outside the franchise’s core target demographic namely hormonally imbalanced teenager girls in this case. Like Mamma Mia! men who get dragged into cinemas to see it by their wives and girlfriends will be nonplussed as to the movie’s appeal. (Hint: it’s all about actor Robert Pattinson.)

New Moon kicks off where the previous movie ended: Bella (Kristen Stewart) is still dating Edward Cullen (Pattinson), the hundredsomethinger vampire trapped in a hunky teenager body. Their relationship is of course an impossibility because of the age difference. Bella will grow older while Edward will pull a Dorian Gray and have the same pinupable face that made the first movie so huge. Then Bella will find out what it is like to be Demi Moore and constantly date younger men.

The other problem is that Edward is a vampire. One that, er, sparkles in sunlight sure, but for him it is a bit like dating his food. He might as well be dating a slice of salami, or a pepperoni pizza. (No American Pie jokes please; that movie may also be directed by Chris Weitz, but that’s disgusting, okay?) The obvious solution for Bella is to either (a) move on or (b) become a vampire herself, something which Edward is unwilling to do.

Of course the whole “becoming a vampire” thing is an in-your-face metaphor for “Bella losing her virginity.” This makes the two Twilight movies the two most painful movies about a chick wanting to pop her cherry audiences have ever been made to sit through in the history of cinema. Edward’s sister wants to “do it” for Bella, but Bella says no, she wants Edward to “do it”. Edward says no, they should wait a bit longer, which is definite proof that he isn’t really a teenager boy.

(Don’t buy the virginity metaphor thing? Consider the following: author Stephanie Meyer belongs to the religiously conservative Mormon group. The books are huge with 14-year-old girls. The biggest issue for 14-year-old girls are when, and with whom, they are going to lose her virginity. The rest of us know that losing one’s virginity is probably the most underwhelming five minutes in one’s entire life.)

"So much homoerotic subtext that it makes those locker room scenes in Top Gun look positively wholesome!"

After one of Edward’s eccentric family members tries to, er, “eat” Bella at a birthday party Edward decides that it is probably best that they all pack up and leave town. Yup, Bella gets dumped. Now, Robert Pattinson may be this century’s Leonardo diCaprio and every tween out there has a poster of him, but most of us just get over failed teenaged relationships within a few months – three, tops. Not Bella. Edward’s departure is her cue to endlessly sit in her room all day and feel sorry for herself, as if she wasn’t morose and glum enough to start with!

Enter Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner) who has spent a lot – and we mean a LOT - of time in the gym in-between movies. “Wow,” says Bella. “You’re really buff, Jacob. What are you, like, sixteen?” Actual dialogue, folks. The athletic and life-loving Jacob decides that what he needs is a miserable, spirit-crushing girlfriend who sucks the very life from the room she is in like a veritable black hole.

Jacob is the resident beefcake. Like Kirk in the original Star Trek he uses every lame excuse to take off his shirt and show off his buff new physique. One scene in which he takes off his shirt to wipe some blood from Bella’s forehead had the audience I was in laughing out aloud. Sometimes Jacob doesn’t even need an excuse to take off his shirt and walks around in only a pair of underwear in the pouring rain in any case.

Jacob is running with wolves you see. He’s hanging around with some equally buffed Calvin Klein ad types in the woods, all of which has so much homoerotic subtext to it that it makes those locker room scenes in Top Gun look positively wholesome in comparison. Jacob is also, yup, a werewolf. (We’re not giving anything away here. New Moon’s biggest problem is its marketing. The trailers give away most of the plot, which just leaves the audience to tiredly sit in their seats and connect all the various dots.)

But these werewolves do not have to wait for the next full moon and can practically transform at will. Oh, and they don’t kill people. They just hunt vampires. Yup, New Moon is more of the same, and if you think that dreamy vampires that glitter and vampires playing baseball were ridiculous, then wait till you get a load of New Moon. In addition to the underwear models masquerading as werewolves, we also have a vampire council called the Voltari (which sounds like a suppository to be honest) consisting of some rather poncy types who sit on their thrones all day long in Rome.

Anyway, to fast-forward here (you’d wish the movie had a fast-forward button): a love triangle develops with Jacob and Edward wanting the same girl (Bella). Why is a bit of a mystery as Bella just sits around most of the movie whining and moping. While one shouldn’t make fun of teenage crushes that go wrong – after all, they are painfully real at the time – one never buys Bella and Edward’s relationship. Both of them simply come across as shallow. There is no reason why they should be dating except that Edward is, like, really dreamy and the screenplay requires it. It just never convinces and because three-quarters of the movie is about Bella brooding and pouting it is really like having an insufferable teenager living under one’s roof. One simply wants to shake Bella by the shoulders to god damn snap out of it as the movie drags on and on with no clear end in sight.

In fact the only sympathetic character in sight is Bella’s dad (Billy Burke, here relegated to an even more thankless role than in the previous movie) who clearly loves his daughter but has to put up with all this shit. Poor guy.

More than three-quarters into the movie a plot of sorts finally kicks in.

Edward can’t take being separated from his sulky girlfriend anymore and hanging around in exotic locales like Rio de Janeiro, so he wants to commit suicide instead. Thus he travels to Rome where he asks the Voltari to kill him. The Voltari, no doubt afraid of getting blood on their poncy outfits, refuses. So Edward decides to break a vampire law and, er, reveal himself to the humans. (All of this is in the trailer too.) So Bella has to travel to Rome to stop Edward from making a public spectacle of himself (see? it’s already beginning to sound like a real marriage).

The whole Voltari subplot is so anticlimactic that it feels almost like an afterthought. As if the writers decided that “dudes, nothing’s happening here except for that chick sitting in her room all day feeling sorry for herself. We better do something now!” But it’s too little, too late. New Moon is dead dull for the simple reason that we are not emotionally invested in Bella and Edward as a couple. In fact one wishes that someone would prescribe some Prozac for Bella and get it all done with. (And why travel all the way to Rome to commit suicide in any case? Why not just make some derogatory remarks about werepenis sizes to Jacob and his crowd’s face?)

Clocking in at 130 minutes New Moon has more teenage angst that any reasonable adult should be allowed to endure.

The problem is the source material. A horror movie with no blood in it? A romance with no sex it in it? It’s as if Ned Flanders tried his hand at writing a bestseller. No-one over the age of fourteen should take any of this stuff seriously. The problem is however that the movie never transcends the material at hand. The previous film had some nice scenery shots, but New Moon is about as visually appealing as dishwater. The movie looks flat and dull.

The special effects are awful too. Not just those crummy-looking werewolves, but check out those CG scenes of people jumping off a cliff. Really lousy, and it made us miss the days in which they had real stuntmen jump off real cliffs. Sigh. With such cheap special effects one has to wonder what they spent the rumoured $90 million budget on. (Probably gym memberships for the cast.)

So in short: New Moon is silly, overlong, too serious and humourless with some bad acting (the closing scene in which actress Stewart literally gasped elicited loads of unintentional chuckles). It is simply too long and drags on forever. In some ways the movie’s most corny moments (check out Bella and Edward jogging in the woods in slow-motion!) are hilariously funny, which makes it this year’s funniest movie in many ways. But then again, it’s not supposed to be a comedy. (We haven’t seen 2012 yet by the way.)

To cash in on the movie's blockbuster release we have a lot of 2012-related stuff.

First you can check out the trailer, pics as well as links to the brilliant YouTube parodies here:

http://www.scifimoviepage.com/upcoming/previews/2012.html

Then read scifimoviepage.com reviewer Brian Orndorf's review:

http://www.scifimoviepage.com/2012.html

(There's a lotta silly going on he says in his review, but the movie is too long at 158 minutes!)

Still, not sure what the whole 2012 hullabaloo is about?

Then read our article about it below in which we ask such penetrating questions like "if the ancient Mayans were so clever then why didn't they have air-conditioning?"

http://www.scifimoviepage.com/upcoming/previews/2012-dvd.html

Finally read about the movie that will thankfully never get made: Michael Bay's 2012: The War for Souls, based on the novel by Whitley Strieber. How bad would this movie have been? So bad it would have made Battlefield Earth look like Citizen Kane in comparison!

http://www.scifimoviepage.com/upcoming/previews/2012_war_for_souls.html

Finally, if you're not in the mood for the movies this weekend but still feel like some global disaster action, how about reading Stephen Baxter's Flood - which is a bit like Roland Emmerich getting Arthur C. Clarke to write a screenplay for him!

See:

http://www.fantastiquezine.com/comics-a-books/mencomicsbookbookreview/234-flood-bookreview.html

And if you believe we hate Roland Ememrich on principle, then check out our glowing review of the new StarGate - 15th Anniversary Edition BLU-RAY here:

http://www.scifimoviepage.com/dvd/stargate-15th_anniv_bluray.html

* ½ (by Brian Orndorf)

STARRING: Cameron Diaz, Frank Langella, James Marsden

2009, 115 Minutes, Directed by: Richard Kelly

Well, it was fun while it lasted. The wonderfully wacky world of writer/director Richard Kelly drives off a cliff with The Box, the filmmaker’s self-proclaimed shot at a broadly commercial film . . .

Interestingly enough, there’s nothing at all commercial about the enigmatic picture, which meticulously traces over the same lines of surrealism, spirituality, and otherworldly interference that marked Kelly’s previous features, the cult smash Donnie Darko and the underrated brain-smasher, Southland Tales.

I would never doubt Kelly’s conviction and personal belief that he’s challenging himself, but The Box doesn’t lie. It’s the same old set of eye-crossing ambiguities, only this time there’s something of a budget and a smudged pass at cinematic normalcy.

In Virginia circa 1976, Arthur (James Marsden) and Norma Lewis (Cameron Diaz) are under pressure to keep up with their bills, with Arthur failing to secure a desired astronaut position at NASA. Into their life comes Arlington Steward (Frank Langella), a disfigured man who arrives with a box and careful instructions. Inside the box is a red button and, if pressed, a stranger will die, with one million dollars left to the couple as a reward. Leave the button be and Steward takes the box away, never to be heard from again. Weighing their options, Arthur attempts to investigate Steward, only to find the spooky dealmaker’s associates watching him from everywhere. Norma also digs for answers, finding Steward’s origins might not be as plainly malicious as previously thought.

"Operatic nose bleeds and liquid doorways to the afterlife . . ."

I respect Kelly as an intelligent fellow who could probably solve a Rubik’s Cube in four moves. His intellect and insatiable itch for the unknown made Darko and Southland into distinctive treasures, but his imagination shows a considerable reduction of tread while navigating the winding road of The Box. Adapting the Richard Matheson short story Button, Button for the big screen (after a previous stop on an episode of The Twilight Zone), Kelly allows the source material a chance to only eat up a fraction of the screenplay. This is a crying shame, as Matheson’s contributions are the only convincing suspense acrobatics of the picture.

A sci-fi morality tale, The Box presents an assertive “would you?” dilemma into the minds of the audience. Knowing someone would perish, be it baby or bum, would you take the fat cash and slap the red button? Or would the guilt, the sheer unknown elements of the situation, be enough to ruin your life, leaving refusal the only choice?

Box sincerely addresses these questions, and Kelly understands how to squeeze the Lewis pickle for the optimum amount of dread. Shot with an impressive HD-powered ‘70’s glaze and captured with convincing special effects, Kelly opens The Box with stupendous promise. It’s a clean machine of suspense and ethical debate, assertively displaying hesitant heroes, a ghoulish villain, and a devious offer perfectly arranged to feed post-screening debates for years to come.

And then Kelly begins sprinkling nonsense over the whole magnificent effort . . .

Once Arthur and Norma make their choice, there’s nowhere for The Box to go. Kelly, understanding the limitations of the short story adaptation challenge, pulls a bootlegger’s turn with his script, moving away from tentative reality to pure sci-fi. We’re talking operatic nose bleeds, liquid doorways to the afterlife (a Kelly staple), and a grandiose threat from unspecified origins. Kelly looks to the skies to embellish Box past the raw materials.

While there’s a fascinating pull in the early going, hope is drained the longer Kelly stretches the mystery. At nearly two hours, the feature runs completely out of steam by the conclusion, making horrific dilemmas of life and death feel like amateurish stalling. Box bites off way more than it can possibly chew, and the flavor is overwhelmingly stale.

It’s difficult to label The Box as simply incomprehensible. The worst offense of the film is the manner in which it pushes the viewer away, unable to clarify itself to a degree where it feels more like a puzzle and less like a diary reading. The feature willingly runs off the rails, and normally that sort of fearless sense of adventure is welcome. Heck, it’s benefited Kelly on two previous occasions, but The Box is no party. Perhaps its secrets are not effortlessly interpreted, but they’re easily telegraphed.

Somebody get Richard Kelly a Katherine Heigl romantic comedy stat, or else we might have yet another talented filmmaker unable to wiggle free from his own pretension.
 

* ½ (by Brian Orndorf)

STARRING: Milla Jovovich, Corey Johnson, Alisha Seaton, Daphne Alexander

2009, 98 Minutes, Directed by: Olatunde Osunsanmi

The Fourth Kind is being sold to the public on the wings of a gimmick . . .

This is not a first for Hollywood, joining the likes of White Noise and The Haunting in Connecticut, which used marketing angles based upon the suggestion of truth to sell an exhaustively fictional multiplex event. However, Fourth Kind is far more aggressive, flat-out daring the audience to believe this alien abduction tale. It’s the kind of chutzpah that all but promises a scintillating, skin-crawling motion picture, but The Fourth Kind is actually quite stunningly ineffective for all the hot air it generates.

Please bear with me here, as the concept is a little convoluted. Fourth Kind posits the idea that director Olatunde Osunsami is assembling footage to investigate the strange case of Psychiatrist Abigail Tyler, who, while living in Nome, Alaska, was witness to alien visitations through her patients. Using video footage that documented the alien possessions and assorted otherworldly happenings, Osunsami fills in the gaps of the proof through a dramatic recreation shot with actress Milla Jovovich as Abigail. Blending the real and the Hollywood, The Fourth Kind seeks to develop a thorough portrait of mysterious Nome incidents, presenting evidence of a horrific alien event that places the burden of belief on you, the viewer.

As passionate a hoax as it may be, Fourth Kind is still a hoax. Even if the whole story turned out to be horrifying fact, I still wouldn’t believe it. Thanks to Osunsami’s limited assets as a filmmaker, Fourth Kind is a dreary, uneventful ride that fails to conjure a convincing argument for authenticity.

" . . . comes across as an amateurish prank created by someone itching to be clever!"

The mix of video and film is clever enough to lend Fourth Kind an arresting identity. The film is eager to play mind games with the audience, selling Abigail’s torment through interview footage of the shattered woman as she recounts her ordeal to Osunsami. Trouble is, reality just can’t be manufactured, and it’s difficult to believe anything the film is pushing due to the irritating artificiality of the performances. Had the film stayed in glossy recreation mode, it might’ve encouraged a deeper sense of fear and mystery.

Furiously juggling videotape documentation with film overwhelms Osunsami’s skill level, as the director attempts to tighten the vise through painfully clichéd filmmaking moves, the most torturous one being a ridiculous usage of jittery handheld camerawork to suggest intensity. There’s also a bizarre attempt to keep the film’s employment of split screen lively by moving the divider back and forth, manufacturing energy where the film has none.

As for this collection of hard evidence, it’s also a bit of a cheat. The video sequences are appropriately hollow and atmospheric, yet the electromagnetic energy of the alien presence just happens to fuzz out the money shots. Osunsami relies on transcription of Sumerian language outbursts and volume shocks to help cook the tension, and it results in a few stunning moments of visitation, but nothing that’s able to sustain an entire feature film or win over mounting doubt. The rest of the picture is ineffective suspense brought on by vicious overacting (Will Patton as the skeptical sheriff is particularly grating) and a tepid story that doesn’t develop beyond VHS parlor tricks.

For The Fourth Kind to work as intended, it simply must convince the audience that the camcorder footage is authentic. I never felt comfortable believing Abigail, and most of the picture comes across as an amateurish prank created by someone itching to be clever, without the aptitude to accurately sell a complex hoax to the viewing audience. Attempting shock value and extraterrestrial disturbance to generate a cult smash, The Fourth Kind will likely tire audiences before it ever has a chance to swindle them.

Stargate 15th Anniversary Edition [Blu-ray] (1994)

Actors: Kurt Russell, James Spader, Alexis Cruz, Viveca Lindfors, Mili Avital
Director: Roland Emmerich
Writers: Roland Emmerich, Dean Devlin
Producers: Dean Devlin, Joel B. Michaels, Mario Kassar, Oliver Eberle, Peter Winther
Format: AC-3, Color, Dolby, DTS Surround Sound, Dubbed, Subtitled, Widescreen
Language: English
Subtitles: English, Spanish
Aspect Ratio: 2.40:1
Number of discs: 1
Studio: Lions Gate
DVD Release Date: October 27, 2009
Run Time: 130 minutes 

Movie: * * * ½ (by Brian Orndorf)
Disc: * * * ½ 

Today, when one thinks of director Roland Emmerich, images of flaming cities, hysterical acting, ubiquitous marketing, and paper-thin plots spring immediately to mind. Back in 1994, Emmerich was only in the process of building his name, creating movies such as Moon 44 and Universal Soldier - minor league genre scrappers that showed more technical prowess and entertainment value than anyone was expecting. Then came Stargate, a film financed outside of the Hollywood system and saddled with ill-fitting blockbuster aspirations for a feature with very little pre-release buzz or sellable premise. Ending up a sleeper hit of the autumn season, Stargate overcame the odds because, well, it’s a delightful, exciting, distinct adventure film crafted by Emmerich with what would be his very last of welcome tentative touches.

Daniel Jackson (James Spader), a gauche Egyptologist, has been summoned to a secret military base for reasons not immediately made clear. Casually deciphering hieroglyphic codes top minds have been unable to crack, Jackson is allowed access to the Stargate, a massive circular structure able to access vast reaches of the galaxy via wormholes, if dialed correctly. Teamed up with gruff Colonel Jack O’Neil (Kurt Russell) and a small band of grunts, Jackson passes through the Stargate, arriving on a strange planet ruled by the merciless god, Ra (Jaye Davidson). Endearing himself to the local slaves, Jackson seeks to comprehend this intriguing new land, finding a native (Mili Avital) willing to assist his efforts. However, O’Neil has his orders, ready to blow the planet to pieces once the Stargate is reopened to prevent Ra’s wrath from reaching Earth.

Stewed in the juices of classic 1980s sci-fi thrill rides and, to a certain homemade extent, Lawrence of Arabia, Stargate is such a completely oddball film at first glance. Here, James Spader is hired to be one of the heroes, gender-bending Jaye Davidson is the epitome of evil, and the spastic blend of lasers and pyramids takes some time to adjust to. I prefer to see the material as a unique thumbprint for Emmerich and his partner-in-crime, producer/writer Dean Devlin. Made just before the massively successful Independence Day started to bend their antennae, Stargate runs on a full tank of gallant enthusiasm, showcasing two hungry Hollywood dreamers allowed to make an epic with a semi-epic budget. Emmerich and Devlin weren’t going to blow this rare opportunity. The flop sweat courses through the film’s veins.

Stargate, with its contrast between classic Egyptian iconography and Star Wars high adventure, is quite an ingenious bit of hokum. Cleverly written as a thick-skulled summer movie, the film is fully aware of itself, looking to gift the viewer a rollicking experience of explosions, extreme alien encounters, and sun-caked melodrama, using the polar opposite cinematic postures of Spader (stealing the film with his nerdy idiosyncrasy) and Russell to wonderful effect. It’s a story of heroes and villains, with Emmerich using the alien landscape superbly, not only through stunning cinematography, but also to develop an enticing haze of mystery around Ra, who deploys vibrating energy bursts to torture his enemies, controlling the land through illiteracy and an army of boomstick-wielding warriors. The Crayola-outlined characters help the filmmakers attain cart-wheeling Saturday-matinee standards, where Stargate is most comfortable and effective.

However, as colorfully illustrated a world as it is, Emmerich and Devlin don’t milk the possibilities with an expected forcefulness. Once secure in alien territory, it’s not all gun fights and scripted sass. The filmmakers pull back some to incorporate the community of slaves, giving Jackson a love interest and O’Neil a payoff to his domestic misery. Scenes of bonding and community acceptance slow the film down some, keeping matters from the blazing fun of the desert or inside Ra’s perilous pyramids. The subplots have a purpose, just not a tempo.

THE DISC: This BD also includes the Extended Cut of the film, which runs nine minutes longer than the Theatrical Cut. Introducing Ra and the remnants of his power early on in the picture (along with little scraps of additional material scattered throughout the film), the Extended Cut just doesn’t hold the same sense of mystery. However, it’s nice to have both versions for easy comparison.

The VC-1 encoded image (2.40:1 aspect ratio) on the Stargate BD is actually quite impressive. This is the best the film has ever looked on a home entertainment format, recreating the theatrical experience through the preservation of the film’s luxurious cinematography - a task previous image transfers found quite troubling. The film’s sheen of smoke and sun is maintained without much in the way of EE issues, permitting penetrating colors and superb black levels, contributing to a darker, fuller image. Detail is consistent, great with interior matters of life and death. Skin tones look proper as well. Stargate was a never a clear, pop worthy picture to begin with, and this BD preserves the special saturated look of the film. It’s a bold and welcome step up from earlier visual opportunities.

The 7.1 DTS-HD sound mix is pretty extraordinary here, with a deep bass boom prevalent from the opening credits, continuing on throughout the feature presentation. Dialogue is easy to discern against the intense sci-fi backdrop, but the rest of the mix is wonderfully active, with surround activity top notch during outdoor and battle sequences. David Arnold’s brilliant score (seriously, one of the best of the 1990s) is handed extraordinary life here, crisply and confidently joining the rest of the elements when need be, or overpowering the experience when called upon. Rich, deep, rumbly, and soaring, the mix elevates the viewing experience, blasting through with dynamic range and power. A French 2.0 track is also available.

English SDH, English, and Spanish subtitles are offered.

A feature-length audio commentary with Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin is ported over from previous Stargate releases and provides a splendid mix of hard facts and amusing mischief. Two charming guys who clearly love their film, the pair submits an informational chat over the Extended Cut only, providing insight for the new additions while basking in the legacy of their first major moneymaker. It’s well worth the time for those who haven’t already enjoyed it.

Stargate: History Made (22:30) collects three featurettes under one roof. Spotlighting new interviews with select cast (sadly, no Spader or Russell) and crew, the mini-documentary explores the creation of the film, from concept to shooting, singling out the efforts of the special effects crew and the Egyptology experts. The event ends with a discussion of franchise fandom, which exploded with the arrival of the television spin-off.

Is There a Stargate? (12:11) attempts to merge historical facts with sci-fi speculation. A bit of a reach, but an interesting discussion regardless. Passionate interviews with experts help to sell the argument.

The Making of Stargate (23:33) is a straightforward BTS featurette, again tracing the film’s path to the big screen. Produced for earlier Stargate DVDs, the information here is repeated throughout the BD experience.

Gag Reel (3:15) isn’t so much flubs and giggles, but an elaborately produced single-take summation of life on the hectic set of the film. It’s odd, and not really gag reel worthy, but still appealing.

Master of the Stargate is an interactive trivia game, offered during the film. Up to four players can give this challenge a shot, though the time between questions is maddening.

Picture-in-Picture Stargate Ultimate Knowledge is a trivia track that runs during the movie, providing everything that needs to be known about the film.

A terrific theatrical trailer is included.

WORTH IT? Matters pick up considerably for the grand finale, where Jackson and O’Neil hope to outwit Ra and keep Earth safe from a possible second visit. It’s a wild capper on a dynamite sci-fi odyssey. Back in 1994, Stargate was a huge question mark, leaving it a rare opportunity to impress without suffocating expectation. The film has matured wonderfully, sustaining as a curious genre exercise in blockbuster yearn marked by surprising buoyancy, madly entertaining performances, and a fertile cinematic imagination behind the camera not yet corrupted by massive box office success.

Star Trek (1-Disc Edition) [DVD] [2009]

Actors: Chris Pine, Bruce Greenwood, Ben Cross, Winona Ryder, Zachary Quinto
Director: J.J. Abrams
Format: AC-3, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
Language: French (Dolby Digital 5.1 ES Matrix), Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1 ES Matrix)
Subtitles: English, French, Spanish
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Number of discs: 1
Studio: Paramount
DVD Release Date: November 17, 2009
Run Time: 127 minutes

Special Features

    * Commentary by director J.J. Abrams, writers Robert Orci and Alex Kurtzman, producer Damon Lindelof and executive producer Bryan Burk.
    * A New Vision: J.J. Abrams’ vision was not only to create a Star Trek that was a bigger, more action-packed spectacle, but also to make the spectacle feel real. Every aspect of production, from unique locations to the use of classic Hollywood camera tricks was guided by this overall objective.
    * Gag Reel: Bloopers featuring the entire principal cast.

Movie: * * *
Disc: * * * 

Ironically this “new” Trek feels a lot more like “old” Trek on DVD than it did in the cinemas . . .

Maybe it is because by now one has gotten over the shock of what director J.J. Abrams and his team were trying to accomplish. But we think it is because of the DVD image transfer, which is too sharp, too clean – almost antiseptic, as if it has been digitally scrubbed clean.

Is this 2009 Star Trek reboot let down by an image transfer that is paradoxically too perfect?

You decide. After all the director went to great lengths to make the movie look real and naturalistic, not just through the use of sets that looked “used”, but also camera imperfections such as jerky camera movements, excessive flares and specks (or “chintz”) on the lens. All of this is somehow negated by an image that is sterilely perfect with hardly any grain. (A television show such as Battlestar Galactica attains its grittiness by occasionally using film stock that is deliberately grainy.)

Suddenly a lot of the sets such as the bridge of new Enterprise and other spaceship interiors feel as sterile as they did in the old Star Trek movies again. (Yeah, we know it’s weird to complain about image quality being too good, I know.)

This aside, this vanilla one-disc edition of Star Trek isn’t bad at all as far as this sort of thing goes. There is a short “making of” featurette titled A New Vision, which is part obligatory wankfest with a lot of talking heads going “J.J. Abrams is soooo GREAT!!” It is however also a fascinating look at how some old-fashioned film-making tricks were used. These tricks include an Enterprise lift that goes nowhere, a five-year-old in a costume used to make a cave set look bigger than it actually is and (our favourite) how the camera is shaken to create that jittery effect during action sequences such as the skydiving jump.

Director J.J. Abrams and his writers also cavalierly admit in the featurette how they wanted to make Star Trek more like Star Wars. They even joke (we hope!) about how much one of them still don’t like Star Trek. (In the audio commentary one realises how much Abrams and his generation are truly the children of Spielberg and Lucas as they explain how movies such as Raiders of the Lost Ark, Star Wars and so on “inspired” certain scenes in this new Trek.)

Check the featurette before listening to the audio commentary by director J.J. Abrams, writers Robert Orci and Alex Kurtzman, producer Damon Lindelof and executive producer Bryan Burk.

It is a chatty, informal commentary mercifully without those dreaded stretches of silences that plague some director’s commentaries when the director has run out of things to say. It also avoids the audio commentary trap of the director describing the onscreen action also because he or she has nothing left to say. It is jokey, but not too jokey either and you’ll spot new things in the movie such as the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it fact that Scotty (Simon Pegg) keeps a tribble as a pet and a flagpole that should be casting a shadow but isn’t.

Useless trivia fact we learned: actor Zachary Quinto (young Spock) can’t make the Vulcan “Live Long and Prosper” salute with his right hand and they had to glue his fingers together for one scene.

Unfortunately there are no deleted scenes included on this edition of Star Trek (one supposes one must check out the two-disc edition or Blu-Ray for them) even though they are referred to throughout the commentary. All of which is a pity because some of the scenes sound fascinating. A whole back story was for instance removed in which the villain Nero (Eric Bana) and his Romulan crew were taken prisoner by some Klingons from whom they had to escape. So see, they didn’t just spend 25 years playing card games whilst waiting for older Spock to appear from that black hole!

The gag reels are actually fun to watch and it seems as if the actors and crew had a fun time on the set.

WORTH IT? If the economic recession has put a crimp in your style, then this one-disc edition won’t make you feel as if you wasted your money and you don’t really need to splurge on the more expensive editions out there. (Those deleted scenes are sorely missed though.) If you’re a more hardcore movie buff type who checks out every single featurette on a disc, then don’t bother with this version.

RECOMMENDATION: It’s Star Trek for people who don’t really like Star Trek. Ironically though rewatching it on the small screen somehow diminishes the movie’s blockbuster credentials and breakneck pacing. Now one can focus on just slickly produced it is, but also how well the actors performed with the rather limited time at their disposal. Suddenly this Trek feels a little bit more like, well, Star Trek . . .

http://www.scifimoviepage.com/art_avatar.html

I know a little window on one's PC screen isn't that impressive, but I saw that 20-minute preview they had at a 3D cinema and must admit it had me hooked.

But I have to wonder: the film cost $200 million - is it going to make its money back and what will it mean for future science fiction epics if it doesn't?

Untitled Alien Prequel (2011)

Starring: TBA
Director: Ridley Scott
U.S. Opening Date: 2011

THEY SAY

Back in 2004 director Scott told Empire magazine that “we have an idea for a fifth one, all about the Jockey. He wasn’t an Alien; he was another race. They use Alien eggs to overrun planets, then kill the Aliens with an antidote and take the worlds for themselves. Bacteriological warfare.”

(The giant so-called “Space Jockey” was briefly glimpsed during the early scenes of the first Alien movie where the spaceship crew investigates a distress signal and comes across an alien derelict spaceship. See the pic here.)

Since then the project was pretty quiet until 31 July 2009 when it was announced that Ridley Scott, who had proposed video artist Carl Erik Rinsch (who also happens to be his daughter’s boyfriend!) as director to revive the Alien franchise for Fox, is apparently going to direct the long-rumoured Alien prequel himself.

Screenwriter Jon Spaihts is writing the script for this prequel to the original 1979 movie, which coincidentally is also celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.

Scott Free, Ridley and Tony Scott’s company, will produce the film.

WE SAY

Since the announcement of the Alien prequel earlier this year things have been quiet and Ridley Scott’s name has been attached to a non-genre TV series – the point being that Scott has been going through science fiction and other projects (The Forever War, Brave New World) like Quagmire in Family Guy goes through Kleenex tissues!

So will an Alien prequel get made? Probably. After all, it’s still one of 20th Century Fox’s more marketable franchises.

To be honest we would rather have seen Scott direct a movie version of The Forever War, a bona fide science fiction classic novel by Joe Haldeman, but then again maybe again Alien vs. Predator: Requiem just left a bad taste in our mouth . . .

If another Alien movie does get made, then we can only agree with Sigourney Weaver who said that “I wasn’t too thrilled with the whole Alien vs. Predator thing – they soiled the nest. So I hope they do a good job again. The fact that Ridley is directing is great.”

* * (by Brian Orndorf)

VOICES OF: Nicolas Cage, Charlize Theron, Donald Sutherland, Bill Nighy, Nathan Lane, Eugene Levy, Freddie Highmore, Kristen Bell, Matt Lucas

2009, 94 Minutes, Directed by: David Bowers

Adapted from the celebrated, long-standing manga series, Astro Boy aims to make a big dent on the big screen with this CG-animated spectacular.

Boasting glossy visuals, red-hot action, and a sparkling cast of voices, the film is ready to please, but the end product is perhaps a step too bizarre and cartoony to leave a lasting, awe-inspiring impression. It’s a great character and an impetuous movie, but with all the attention placed on keeping the animation energetic and the actors satisfied, someone forgot to straighten out the erratic tone of the picture.

In Metro City, a metropolis hovering high above a polluted Earth, Dr. Tenma (voiced by Nicolas Cage) is preparing to experiment with a pure energy source intended to enhance the city’s overflowing robot population.

When wicked President Stone (Donald Sutherland) assumes control of the energy, an accident occurs, killing Tenma’s son (Freddie Highmore). Racked with grief, Tenma decides to use the special power to fuel a robot replica of his beloved child, but the boy’s artificiality only deepens the doctor’s depression. Cast down to Earth, the boy, rechristened Astro by a gang of pre-teen salvagers and their makeshift guardian, Hamegg (Nathan Lane), grows to love treatment as a human, but when Stone rises up again to claim power, Astro must embrace his robotic roots to save humanity.

"The death of a child, mockery of illiteracy and Communist robots!"

Astro Boy comes from Imagi Animation Studios, who last gave the world the wonderful TMNT CG update. If there are any absolutes about this film, it’s the striking animation. Granted, Imagi doesn’t have the budget or the manpower to compete with Pixar and DreamWorks just yet, but their minimal-coin work on Astro Boy is nicely futuristic and clean, with expressive body language and outstanding kinetic energy for the action sequences. The picture is fun to watch, and director David Bowers (Flushed Away) builds a few exhilarating sequences to show off the CG work, the highlights being the flying excursions where our hero learns of his rocket-feet gifts.

While Bowers can assemble superhero wonderment, managing the numerous moods of Astro Boy proves to be an impossible task. Here’s a film that opens with the death of a child, yet insists it’s this wide-eyed, banana-peel cartoon, ushering in a series of wacky characters and slapstick to offset the potential emotional starkness of the material. The additions are poorly selected, ranging from a group of communist robots intent on leading a synthetic uprising to the squad of “surface” kids Astro befriends, who live in a semi-Dickensian wonderland under Hamegg, with one of the group admitting illiteracy. Of course, in the grand tradition of good taste, this leaves Bowers with no choice but to make fun of their inability to write.

Astro Boy settles into a routine of the awesome and the awful quickly, though it’s disappointing to see the bad decisions win out in the end. The President Stone character is a prime example of the lousy screenwriting. A Bush-era, war-crazy baddie who’s on a fear-mongering crusade to secure re-election, Bowers turns the menace away from horror to comedy, trying to lighten up the picture by urging Sutherland to ham it up (always a rotten idea), making obvious and spastic jokes when a nice coating of subtlety might’ve brought the film interesting dimensions. By nudging the picture into primary colors, Astro Boy loses a shot at an intriguing personality. A little sustained darkness never hurt anyone.

A colorful voice cast (including Bill Nighy, Charlize Theron, Kristen Bell, David Alan Grier, and Eugene Levy) offers something to savor while the film struggles to find its footing, but this update of a classic animated character lands with a thud. A promise of a sequel at the end of the film (where our now shirtless boy-hero tears off into the sky) remains an unlikely prospect, but if there must be further Astro adventures, let’s hope the filmmakers stick to heroic feats of strength and aerial ballet over awful stabs at comedy.

Life on Mars: The Complete Series

Actors: Jason O'Mara, Harvey Keitel, Michael Imperioli, Gretchen Mol, Jonathan Murphy
Format: Box set, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Language: English
Region: 1 (U.S. and Canada only)
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
Number of discs: 4
Studio: ABC Studios
DVD Release Date: September 29, 2009

Bonus features:

    * To Mars and Back – Viewers journey to “Mars” with Sam Tyler the cast and producers to see where the “Mars” concept originated and if viewers can figure out where it’s headed.
    * Sunrise to Sunset with Jason O’Mara – An exhilarating and exhausting day experiencing
    * Jason O’Mara’s Life on Mars.
    * Flashback: Lee Majors Goes to Mars — Lee Majors steps back in the past on the Life on mars set with cast and crew.
    * Spaced Out: Bloopers from the Set
    * Deleted Scenes 

Movie: * * ½ (by Rob Vaux)
Disc: * * * 

Gimmick-based shows are all the rage these days, with the success of Lost launching a plethora of high-concept imitations. The problem is that without more thought invested into traditional components (such as character and story), the big hook tends to fall apart. The American remake of Life on Mars avoids that trap, but just barely and thanks largely to a singularly inspired piece of casting. The rest of it relies too heavily on the "hey neat-o" factor to escape also-ran status.

Fans of the British original on which this series is based understand the set-up, and the new version wastes no time diving in. In pursuit of a serial killer in 2008, NYPD Detective Sam Tyler (Jason O'Mara) gets hit by a car and wakes up in 1973, sporting period-appropriate clothing and a tailor-made job at his old precinct. But times have changed (or rather, changed back) and present-day norms no longer apply in the sun-dappled days of Watergate and Vietnam. Sam must adjust to a world where police brutality is SOP, a woman's place is still in the kitchen, and paperwork means using actual paper. The precinct also has a female cop (Gretchen Mol) - fighting for a spot in the boys' club and giving Sam a reason to champion women's lib - while the remaining detectives treat him with a combination of bafflement and condescension. In between hunting down 1973's most wanted, he searches desperately for the answers to what happened to him, hoping they'll lead him back to his old life.

The science fiction elements ostensibly add a new twist to the old cop show clichés, with vanishing robots and mysterious messages on the TV set reminding Sam that he doesn't belong here. At their best, they lend an admirable sense of whimsy to the proceedings, coloring life-on-the-street verité with tongue-in-cheek humor. O'Mara makes for an appealing presence, though his character is defined more by his era than any legitimate personality of his own. The cases he pursues have a certain cleverness to them, while his overarching dilemma remains just intriguing enough to remind us that it exists.

Too often, however, Life on Mars takes the easy way out, reducing its hero to periodic rants about how much better things are in the future and making glib comparisons between various bits of fashion, technology and overall zeitgeist. He lectures cheerfully corrupt detectives about suspects' rights, marvels at the existence of vinyl records, and takes advice from his hippy next-door neighbor (Tanya Fischer) about finding his way home. The results hold life, but never quite come together, their observations just a tad too forced for comfort. The show runners provide a big curve ball by introducing Sam to his younger self (Caleb Wallace) - along with his corrupt father (Dean Winters) and enabling mother (Jennifer Ferrin) - but even that fails to generate any appreciable enthusiasm. So too does the season / series finale provide an answer to his dilemma more angering than enlightening: a "what were they thinking" head slapper which renders the entire series utterly irrelevant.

The saving grace comes in the presence of Harvey Keitel as Tyler's gruff lieutenant. He can play such roles in his sleep, and the twinkle-eyed fun he brings to the proceedings strikes an ideal balance of tough-guy machismo and knowing self-mockery. If it weren't for him, Life on Mars would be utterly disposable. He elevates it from mundane trickery to something worth watching, if only casually. Which isn't to say the show is bad, only that enough better shows exist to drop it off your must-see list. The British version is superior by all accounts, which may add further strike marks against this incarnation. Certainly, Life on Mars makes a decent break from the routine, but it can't capitalize on its unique properties well enough to stand above the pack.

THE DISC: 17 episodes are on 4 discs - constituting the show's only season - along with several short documentaries and deleted scenes. It's standard boiler-plate material with a minimum of extras thrown in to keep serious fans happy.

WORTH IT? Too many better options exist to make it a must-own, though fans of the original may enjoy it just to compare how American sensibilities differ from those of the British. The self-contained nature of the show has something to recommend it as well, especially for those tired of watching good television go bad by not pulling the plug at the right time.

RECOMMENDATION: A passable stand-by, but if you didn't catch it the first time around, you're not missing anything earth-shattering.