Nothing is too ridiculously amazing for 'Furious 7'

Dwayne Johnson takes aim at a helicopter with a machine gun in "Furious 7." Photo by Scott Garfield, © 2015 Universal Studios.

I can be a mighty tough critic from time to time, but the only things I really ask from a film is an entertaining viewing experience. It sounds like a simple requirement, and there are a plethora of avenues a film can take to get to that point. They can be well-acted, well-plotted dramas, intellectual gauntlets (see the works of Lynch, David and Herzog, Werner) or comedies that elicit a fair amount of laughs and guffaws.

That even stretches to encompass a film that's just pure fun, one that releases (or unleashes) the proverbial inner 10-year-old boy and makes audience members say “yeah” during a well-executed sequence. Considering how I often pretended to shift gears in my automatic Hyundai after watching “Furious 7,” I'd say the film delivered exactly what it wanted to the audience.

One thing I wanted as a viewer is pictured above. (Photo by Scott Garfield, © 2015 Universal Studios.)

The latest entry spawned by “The Fast & The Furious,” “Furious 7” brings back Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel), best friend Brian O'Connor (Paul Walker), longtime girlfriend Letty (Michelle Rodriguez), his sister Mia (Jordana Brewster), associates Roman (Tyrese Gibson) and Tej (Ludacris), and agent Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) for another globetrotting, car-filled adventure. This time, the crew/family (the latter word is repeated with great frequency) has to face off against Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham), the brother of the criminal busted in the sixth film. He's out for revenge and starts off by murdering Han (Sung Kang) and has aspirations to hunt down the family members one by one.

A mysterious agent named Mr. Nobody (Kurt Russell), however, intercedes and offers Diesel and his gang a way to strike back against Statham via a hacking device called the god's eye; that is, if he and the rest of the family can rescue the hacker (Nathalie Emmanuel) from the clutches of the evil Jakande (Djimon Hounsou). Balancing the action that results from this scenario are dramatic story lines involving Walker's attempts to cope with life as a father and Rodriguez's soul-searching quest to recover her memories lost as a result of an accident in film four.

Feel free to take a deep breath after that explanation of a plot that is labyrinthine at best. There is way too much going on for a film like this, and all the action results in a film that's fatter than it ought to be; chopping off about 10 minutes would make “Furious 7” a far less exhausting viewing experience. I could go on with complaints about the logic behind the script and the acting (not great, but the cast has a gained a comfortable camaraderie over the years) and all of that critical jazz, but people pay to see “Furious” films for two reasons: to check out some PG-13 eye candy and to watch ridiculously awesome things happen with cars. “Furious 7” certainly succeeds on both fronts, as those two-plus hours of celluloid are chock full of several gratuitous shots of women that linger on certain regions of the body and images of cars going fast and going places they do not belong. 

Put a top on that or something.

The first motivation is a largely puerile and definitely sexist, although it is balanced out slightly by Rodriguez's role as one of the toughest people in the world. The notoriously tough actress beats up MMA star Ronda Rousey this time around after taking out Gina Carano in the last film, and she decimates a fair number of men to boot. “Furious 7” also passes the Bechdel test, due in large part to having multiple women actually involved in the planning and execution of the family’s heist plans. They are eye candy, but they at least serve an important role in the execution of the ridiculous feats of awesome.

And dang if those feats aren't terrifically enthralling. Director James Wan and screenwriter Chris Morgan have cars falling out of airplanes, drive another valuable piece of machinery crash through three buildings, and even launch a car at a helicopter as a weapon, among other stunts. It feels like Wan and Morgan and the producers wrote down every stunt that came to their mind, then came up with ways to top them.

The best idea the filmmakers had was casting Statham as a Michael Myers-esque hunter fueled by vengeance. Morgan's introduction of the character is brilliant too; instead of telling the audience via exposition how terrifying the Statham is, “Furious 7” simply pans out to show Statham amble through the destruction he wrought just to see his brother (Luke Evans) in the hospital. It’s a terrific and surprisingly subtle bit of filmmaking for a series that rarely takes the subtle route.  

Besides revealing Statham's badassery, the sequence sets up the British bulldog as Diesel's doppelganger. Both are men who value family over everything else, willing to sacrifice material goods for the sake of protecting or honoring their own, but the difference between the two is where the value comes from; Statham's is rooted in blind obligation, while Diesel's is built upon trust and love. It's a clever little element that adds a modicum of intelligence to an otherwise brilliantly dumb movie, and it adds a little more danger to a lively franchise entry.

Review: Four out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: PG-13

Run time: 137 minutes

Genre: Action

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Target audience: Gearheads and “Furious” series followers.

Take the whole family?: It’s way too intense for the wee ones, but kiddos ages 10 and up should be OK if parents don't mind a little violence and a lot of bikini shots.

Theater or Netflix?: Theater is good for sure, but be wary of paying extra for an IMAX screening. It's cool to watch on the big, big screen, but no necessarily worth the extra expense.

Pour one out for Paul Walker: Walker never became an “A”-list actor, but he had a pair of quietly good performances in “Varsity Blues” and “Pleasantville” back in the day and was rock solid in his “Furious” films. If Vin Diesel  is the series' star and Dwayne Johnson the muscle, then Walker is the heart of the series, which he proves one last time in “Furious 7.”

Watch this as well?: Aside from the other entries in the franchise, “Death Proof” is a good companion piece, a thriller with some epic car chase scenes and stunts that also stars Kurt Russell. Also watch “The French Connection”: it's a much smarter film than anything “Furious” related and more plot heavy, yet it still indulges in action tropes and has one of the greatest car-chase sequences in film history.

                                         Totally worth the five-minute plus time expenditure.        

A feel good story that doesn't make you feel all that good

Al Pacino in a scene from "Danny Collins."

“Danny Collins” is a film at war with itself. On one side is a heartwarming comeback story about a hollow old man weighed down by drug use and avarice who is searching for one last touch of meaning in his life. On the opposing side is a tale about a broken man who attempts to validate his existence but can't overcome the lesser angels of his nature.

Writer/director Dan Fogelman tries to negotiate a metaphoric truce between the warring sides, and the accord results in a moderately funny film that lacks the bite to pull off the latter arc or a likable central performance to create the warm and fuzzies needed for the former.

“Danny Collins” opens in a cutesy enough fashion via a disclaimer that the film is “kind of based on a true story, a little bit.” It's worth a light-chuckle, and it fits the sense of humor found in the rest of the film, but the cute is snipped off shortly thereafter from a series of curses from a reporter (Nick Offerman) interviewing a shy young musician named Danny Collins. The scene, set in the 1970s, is an expositional moment meant to indicate the young singer's fear of fame and love for the work of John Lennon.

Bounce 40-plus years into the future and the titular Collins has morphed into a pudgy, coked-out, drunken showbiz hack played by Al Pacino. His lifestyle is wealthy but shallow, at least until his manager and only friend (Christopher Plummer) presents Pacino a letter written to the singer by Lennon himself after the interview. Lennon's message spurs an epiphany in the aging singer, one that prompts him to move to a hotel in New Jersey to connect with his long lost and (justifiably) resentful son (Bobby Cannavale), his daughter in law (Jennifer Garner) and hyperactive granddaughter (Giselle Eisenberg). Pacino also spends a bit of time macking on the hotel manager (Annette Bening) and writing his first new song in decades, the one that would give him artistic merit.

I'll start with the caveat that I liked “Danny Collins” well enough. It's nice to see Garner let loose a little bit, and I'm happy to see Cannavale and Offerman do their thing. And while the film isn't uproariously funny, Fogelman's script reveals a knack for solid comedic timing, making the overall viewing experience amiable and harmless enough. The film won't cause much consternation for the audience if they like movies that recycle plot points from “To Wong Foo Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar.”

I feel like I'm the only person who remembers this film.

That's “Danny Collins'” biggest problem though, as a film with Pacino in the lead doesn't work if it decides to go safe. Personally, I like the darker road “Danny Collins” could have taken, the one Fogelman hints at repeatedly with lines like this via Cannavale, “Who am I to ruin your happy ending?” The line, delivered with perfect bite by the actor, is targeted at those staid redemption stories in which a person waltzes back into someone's life as if nothing happened and tries to persuade the character and audience the interloper is the good guy. (“That's My Boy” tried that same gambit, and it still infuriates me.)

Adam Sandler, pictured impersonating a clown bop bag.

Fogelman veers ever so close to the interesting path, but he just can't force himself to commit to the darker and more honest story. He flees instead toward the light, to the traditional redemption story that has a (frustratingly simple and condescendingly written) happy ending designed to make the audience feel a little gushy inside.

I may prefer the sadder story, but the safer more saccharine version can work fine if the central figure is likable enough to earn redemption. Unfortunately, sweet has never been Pacino's forte. Rather, the man's most memorable roles have him as an outsider, isolated by his intellect, iciness or disdain for humanity, and he rarely if ever reintegrates back into a larger collective. Pacino, in other words, is not a warm, avuncular screen presence, which makes him the wrong person to carry a film like “Danny Collins.” Not that the bellowing ham receives any favors from Fogelman’s script; one of the tactics Pacino employs to get into his son's good graces is to use his granddaughter's condition, which is just all sorts of skeevy and discomfiting.

There are a series of additional problems with the script, along with the choice to have Pacino sing (I haven’t the slightest idea how one becomes a pop star with that voice), but they are significantly minor in comparison. If there's anything worth learning from “Danny Collins,” it's that filmmakers should take the risky path every now and then; otherwise, you get a blasé film that satisfies viewers only until they exit the theater.

Review: Two and a half out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: R

Run time: 106 minutes

Genre: Drama

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Target audience: People searching for a good Al Pacino performance, maybe? 

At least better than this.

Take the whole family?: There's enough illicit activity and curse words in this to justify the film’s solid “R” rating.

Theater or Netflix?: Stay home and save your money.

What does Lennon do for you? Not all that much. Then again, I have an issue with stories that use the magical words of a pop-culture figure to launch a quest of self discovery. It's lazy storytelling, and it launches the being into a league far higher than he or she deserves. John Lennon was great, but he wasn't a bloody messiah.

Watch this instead: If “Danny Collins” was a better film, it would be “Young Adult,” a film that gets nowhere near the respect it deserves.

Raging against the man, or whatever

Theo James and Shailene Woodley star in "Insurgent." Photo by Andrew Cooper

All I can think about as I write about “Insurgent” is Yogi Berra's refrain about how some things are “like déjà vu all over again.” It's not only because the film is a sequel — just about every beat this film follows has not just been done by another young adult franchise, but done better and with more vigor and smarts.

“Insurgent's” influences are easy to spot. There's “The Hunger Games,” of course, with the violent female protagonist (Shailene Woodley's Tris in this case) who enters the second film in the “Divergent” series haunted by recent battles and experiences (just like Katniss Everdeen). She's on the lam this time with boyfriend Four (proper-nine Theo James), sarcastic Peter (Miles Teller) and her brother Caleb (Ansel Elgort), trying to escape the clutches of the evil Jeanine (Kate Winslet) and her henchmen (Mekhi Phifer and Jai Courtney).

The foursome is pretty safe when the film opens, hanging out on Octavia Spencer's farm until Winslet's soldiers storm in to arrest the young renegades. Teller surrenders, while Elgort, Woodley and James flee and meet up with James' mother Evelyn (Naomi Watts), a rebel with intentions that are vague at best. Like Woodley and James, Watts' group is part of an unwanted faction of the society Winslet's Jeanine wants to eradicate, sort of like the group that rhymes with puggles and is in fact Muggles from “Harry Potter.” Technically, both series lift the concept from the Holocaust, but “Harry Potter” does it better.

A few other adventures and shenanigans related to light romance, heavy violence and impetuousness ensue until Woodley has to prove that she is the special, the one that can end the fighting against other Divergents. Essentially, she's a tougher Harry Potter, or a female Neo, or Emmet from “The LEGO Movie,” but much less awesome.

Also, no LEGO Batman.

I didn't get the chance to watch the first film prior to the “Insurgent” screening because I messed up my Netflix que, which turned out to be a sizable mistake. In lieu of guiding viewers into the “Divergent” universe, “Insurgent” opts to dive right in while relying on the viewer's familiarity with either the source material (the book series by Veronica Roth) or the previous film, making it a bit tricky to keep up with the action.

That's not a ding on the filmmakers; they're savvy enough to know the majority of the audience will have that familiarity going into it. A little research about the “Divergent” series afterward, however, did reinforce one reason for my confusion; the plot is ridiculously and unnecessarily complex and contains more moving parts than the writers could balance.

Instead of trimming a bit more from the book — never an easy task, but a necessity on occasion — the trio of writers (“Batman & Robin” scribe Akiva Goldsman, Brian Duffield and Mark Bomback) crammed as much of the source material in as they could. The result is a series of sequences with a tenuous narrative thread keeping the movie from falling apart completely; in other words, it lacks narrative cohesiveness or even a sense of rhythm.

“Insurgent” is absent of any sense of inventiveness or independence from the swarming horde of films aimed at young adults as well. It's almost proud to be a pastiche, happily rollicking in desultory tropes and embracing trite plot twists telegraphed from miles away. The series even hires a few ringers (Winslet, Watts and Spencer) to fill the adult roles and add a little class to the whole affair. They're all either underused or misused, but having them around at least lets viewers reflect on their better performances: “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” (or almost everything else she's done) for Winslet; Watt for her brilliant turn in “Mulholland Dr.,” and “Snowpiercer” for Spencer.

Things are even direr for the kids, the actors who supposedly carry the film. Aside from the smarmy Teller (who I pity already for what looks like a dismal “Fantastic Four” reboot), Elgort, James and Woodley fall flat in their respect roles. It's easy to see how good of an actress Woodley can be — she does have a few flashes of quality — but the depth of her talent is hidden by the chorus of goofy faces she wears during the action sequences.

Everything is taken so seriously in “Insurgent” too, even though the world depicted in it is rooted in stupidity. Who would think it's a good idea to segregate people based on one underlying personality trait? Why would you reestablish society in a less than fecund city like Chicago? Why would you name your villain Jeanine?

The name doesn't quite scream villainous.

Most importantly, why have people supported this franchise? As the filmmakers continually hint at, there are far more appealing options just waiting for you at home.

Review: One and a half out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: PG-13

Run time: 119 minutes

Genre: Sci-Fi

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Target audience: Preteens and teens itching for that first taste of revolution.

Take the whole family?: “Insurgent” is impressively hardcore for a young adult film; the bullets and booms make it apropos for audiences 13 and older.

Theater or Netflix?: Netflix so you can rent “Hunger Games” instead.

Is it in 3D?: Of course there's a 3D option to this film for aesthetic reasons I don't understand. Aside from a few scenes that look moderately interestingly, “Insurgent's” runtime is filled mostly with exposition or people running, neither of which make for a compelling use of a third dimension. Even the more visually impressive shots would work just fine in a regular format.

Watch this instead?: Pick your series: “Harry Potter,” “Hunger Games,” “The Matrix” (at least the first one) or “The LEGO Movie.” Also check out Terry Gilliam's “Brazil,” one of the weirdest depictions of a dystopian future.

Just try to guess the context.

All dressed up for nothing

Lily James in a scene from "Cinderella." Photo by Jonathan Olley, ©Disney Enterprises, Inc.

Disney's newest adaptation of “Cinderella” faced a tough hill to climb just during production based solely on the need to find a new way to present a rather well-told story, one the studio tackled quite successfully 65 years ago. The filmmakers had to find either an inventive way of retelling an old fable, or at least present the original in a captivating manner.

The 2015 “Cinderella” does neither, and aside from a few aesthetic delights and a chilling performance by Cate Blanchett, this film actually diminishes the impact of an already dry, bothersome story.

I'd do the plot recap here but, really, the story is so well trodden I'll just list the actors and the roles and let you put the plot together. Blanchett is Lady Tremaine, the evil stepmother; Lily James is Cinderella; Helena Bonham Carter pulls double duty as the narrator and Fairy Godmother; Richard Madden is Prince Charming (and is not Chris Pine); and the stepsisters are played by Holliday Grainger and Sophie McShera. James also has parents who die early on (Hayley Atwell and Ben Chaplin), and Madden has a loyal captain (Nonso Anozie), dying father/king (Derek Jacobi) and scheming uncle (Stellan Skarsgard) on his side.

Shenanigans occur and yadda yadda yadda there's a happily ever after to bookend the opening once upon a time, because a good fairytale can't end on a downer. Technically, they can and have done so in the past, including portions of “Into the Woods.” That film did the “Cinderella” story far more effectively, efficiently and with deeper roles for the titular girl (Anna Kendrick) and the dashing prince (who is indeed Chris Pine).

                                                                Well played, Kirk.

Not that this version of “Cinderella” lacks redeeming qualities;  after all, any film with Cate Blanchett has some value built into it. In this case, she adds some serious chills and iciness just through discomfiting glares and withering insults that cut deep into the soul. It's not quite the part she was born to play — “Blue Jasmine,” for my money, is Blanchett at her best — but she adds an honest bitterness to a film that's otherwise artificially sweetened.

A spoonful of that sugar belongs to Carter, who gets a rare moment to play a woman who isn't conniving, evil, haggard or a combination of all three. She's pretty fun as the Godmother, creating a modicum of chaos in her rather abbreviated bit of screen time while inserting a dab of liveliness to the proceedings. Carter does get to open up her pipes a bit with a performance of “Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo” during the end credits, and while she doesn't have the strongest voice, it’s another indicator that she’s actually having some fun.

Like this, but the complete opposite.

“Cinderella,” at the least, is a rather fetching film thanks to some terrific costuming. Stunning dresses during the ballroom scenes that dazzle the eye during every spin and bow, and it's easy to see the young girls in the audience marveling at what they see on screen and envisioning themselves in one of those gowns.

Everything else about “Cinderella” is a little underwhelming. Director Kenneth Branagh pushes the plot along sans excitement, thrills or enthusiasm, going through the motions to wrap up a film that’s already overly padded. He’s clearly wishing he could go back to his Shakespearean roots instead of directing lesser fluff, an idea I’m on board with too: With the exception of maybe “Thor,” Branagh has a habit of orchestrating blandness where liveliness should be.

Layers of sympathy go to Lily James, who suffers the most from a nondescript role that has her bow, clean, receive barbs from Blanchett, cry, sing, talk to animals (does that make her vegetarian?), look gorgeous in her gown, and tell herself to “have courage and be kind.” Not the most interesting to-do list, and very little of it involves any actual emoting, character development, or anything new to say about the character.

Filmmaking is a team sport with many influences, but I'll still call out credited screenwriter Chris Weitz for writing a barely one-note lead role for the actress. It's a rather strange script though, as “Cinderella” tries instead to add a hint of depth to the stepmother role to create something resembling motivation for her wickedness. Weitz never commits to it though, instead reverting back to the she's evil because she's a stepmother logic employed by the origin story, and he’s quite lucky Blanchett was there to make it work.

Where “Cinderella” truly suffers is the seven minutes before it starts, which features a new short featuring the “Frozen” characters. “Frozen Fever” is a funny and sweet continuation of the excellent animated film, as well as a reminder filmmakers can take a much-told fairytale and make it fresh and fun.

Plus, more Olaf! (©2015 Disney)

Review: Two out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: PG

Run time: 112 minutes

Genre: Fantasy

Ask Away

Target audience: Going to go with Disney fans searching for another Cinderella kick. Not like it's been less than three months since the character last appeared on screen in a Disney product or anything.

Take the whole family?: “Cinderella” is perfectly fine for children ages 6 and up; it'll be a little dull for kiddos any younger though.

Theater or Netflix?: Theater if only to watch that delightful “Frozen” short. Otherwise, stay at home and wait to rent it.

How does the 'Frozen' short stack up? “Frozen Fever” doesn't reach the same heights as other shorts like the studio's nearly perfect “Paperman,” but it is a delightful romp with a rather infectious song. Then again, I'll never complain about spending a few more minutes with Anna, Elsa, Sven, Kristoff and especially Olaf, who is really wonderful in his few minutes on screen.

Watch this instead?: Disney's animated “Cinderella” is just fine, and I'm on board with a “Frozen” screening any day of the week. You could also rent “Into the Woods” for a superior retelling of Cinderella that adds some of the more brutal parts of the original fairy tale.

Running hard and untrue

A scene from Disney's "McFarland, USA." Photo by Ron Phillips, ©Disney Enterprises, Inc.

I lament often about missed opportunities for movies with the dreaded “based on a true story” sticker slapped on them. Rarely does the cinematic version do justice to the real story, turning people into heroes or hideous men and women and reality into a cartoon.

So it is with Disney's “McFarland, USA,” a film rooted in recent running history that begins with a lie and ends with a truth uplifting enough to bring an audience to applause. That last bit is exactly what the filmmakers wanted, even if they took the least interesting route to get there.

“McFarland, USA” stars the moderately dependable Kevin Costner as Jim White, an out-of-luck teacher/football coach forced to uproot his family (Maria Bello and two blonde girls) to the small, migrant town of McFarland, Calif., for a teaching position. He's hired as an assistant for the school's team as well, but a spat with the head coach ends his tenure after one game.

Fortunately, the firing becomes a bit of kismet when Costner notices the students’ natural running talent and starts a cross country team. Building a team requires two things: Recruiting seven runners (Ramiro Rodriguez, Carlos Pratts, Johnny Ortiz, Rafael Martinez, Hector Duran, Sergio Avelar and Michael Aguero) to create a squad and learning about the sport of cross country team. A few mandatory trials, tribulations and shenanigans involving plucky underdogs and cultural assimilation ensue before the team qualifies for the state meet and has its sights set on a state title.

When I mentioned “McFarland, USA” begins with a lie, it wasn't a hyperbolic statement – the very first scene sets the film's actions seven years after White starts the cross country program in 1980 to make it appear as if all of the team's success occurred in just one season. Really, it took seven years to reach the apex of the sport, and even the big championship meet includes a few fibs (the place of McFarland's top runner, for example, is inflated). The team’s place is true enough though, give or take a dramatic flourish. 

Like this.

I'm usually more than fine with a few white lies in a fictional retelling (it's just a movie after all), but I take umbrage with the changes made here actually diminish a far more interesting story. As mentioned above, it took the real Jim White almost a decade to push the squad to a championship-caliber team — McFarland's squad won nine over 15 years across several divisions — and what he had to do to win those titles is inspirational. His teams succeeded despite challenges like drug use, jail time, pregnancies, field work, gang life, poor grades, and many, many other challenges that face a migrant farming community like McFarland.

The Disney-fied story of White's career elides over much of that (aside from manual labor) and produces a sanitized version of what should be a messy story that blends failure and hope. Even director Niki Caro can't help but make the dusty fields of a central California town appear cleaner than they are, reducing a town that should be covered in farm dust and grime into a slightly sandy version of Main Street, USA.

Like this, but with oranges.

Yet the clean version still kind of works. Caro and the slew of screenwriters (this one has four listed on IMDB) follow the Disney biopic script without deviation, but they do so with ease and a terrific flow to make two-plus hours fly by without pain. The running sequences are particularly well shot and capture the majesty and pain the sport induces.

Really, though, the key to whatever success “McFarland, USA” has is an absence of cynicism and the abundance of sweetness the filmmakers bring to it. McFarland's community is painted as a place where the people do their best to get by and place a cornucopia of food on the table for every meal, and the community support is vibrant and vital.

The cinematic McFarland is a warm place, littered with actors who can bring that sweetness right out; even the crusty Costner (about two decades too old for his part) loosens up a bit and appears to have a little fun. (Bello is, again, rendered helpless in a terribly underwritten role. Somebody please give her a better part than token housewife.)

All of the love the cast gives in “McFarland, USA” comes to fruition at the end, when Rodriguez's Danny Diaz comes out of nowhere to keep his team's championship hopes alive. That's the scene that spurs the audience's outburst, and the filmmakers earn that applause by treating the moment with triumph in lieu of treacle.

Review: Three out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: PG

Run time: 128 minutes

Genre: Drama

Ask Away

Target audience: Running fans and coaches in need of an inspirational flick to show their team before a game.

Take the whole family?: It might get a little boring for really little kids, but the content is mild enough and inoffensive.

Theater or Netflix?: Cool for a theater jaunt as long as it’s at a matinee price.

Best running film ever? Not quite, although it's definitely among the top films not including documentaries. Then again, the contenders for that title are minimal at best; the choices include a series of Steve Prefontaine bio films and the vastly overrated “Chariots of Fire.”

Watch this as well?: “Without Limits” is your best bet for fiction films, while “Spirit of the Marathon” is a strong documentary about running. The best option is to hit the page and grab a copy of “The Perfect Mile,” which documents the chase to break the four-minute mile in the 1950s and offers a brief introduction to the incomparable Emil Zatopek. 

AKA the Locomotive and embodiment of awesome.

Who needs chemistry, anyway?

Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan in a scene from "Fifty Shades of Grey." © 2015 Universal Studios and Focus Features.

One of my goals for the 2015 is to be a little kinder to some of the films I review. I already broke that promise to myself in the “The Boy Next Door” writeup, so I'm going to try again before the impending “Fifty Shades of Grey” destruction by saying Dakota Johnson does a very nice job as Anastasia Steele. She's chipper, perky and has a sense of humor in an otherwise dour movie, and she'd receive one of the “Good Job!” stickers I keep on my desk. Well done, Dakota!

Now that the lone positive is out of the way, let's dive right into the interminable pool of swamp muck that is “Fifty Shades of Grey.” It's a rather unsubtle film that takes itself far, far, far, far, far too seriously given the source material is a book based on “Twilight” fan fiction (author E.L. James wrote it under the pseudonym Snowqueens Icedragon; I have nothing to add to that) featuring the apparently unspeakable sexual activity known as BDSM. More on that in a bit though.

For people like me who found themselves impervious to Snowqueens Icedragon's siren call, “Fifty Shades of Grey's” stars the unexceptionally pretty Jamie Dornan as Christian Grey, a 27-year-old billionaire entrepreneur who sets his eyes on senior college student Anastasia Steele (Johnson). They flirt stiffly and disturbingly (Grey, like character inspirer Edward Cullen, has a habit of following his beloved around), dithering on and on about their respect feelings for each other. Dornan keeps acting creepy and stalker-ish, telling Johnson “I have to let you go,” and “You're here because I'm incapable of leaving you alone,” amid tidbits about how she wouldn't be able to walk for a week after they had sex.

It takes forever to get to the first direct mention of Dornan's proclivity for BDSM, and he spends a good chunk of the film convincing Johnson to sign an agreement to become his submissive. The contract is pretty detailed and covers everything from safety words to the tools used in the playroom (Dornan's term for his room). The dithering continues when Johnson can't quite commit herself to the arrangement before Dornan guides her into a few sessions, and they spend the rest of the film dating, brooding, engaging in sexual acts and getting into rather boring shenanigans that leaves the audience unsatisfied in many ways.

A few other characters pop in and out of the film — parents, friends, step parents, well wishers, a driver — but none of them matter when compared to the central couple, and any value derived from “Fifty Shades of Grey” depends on the lead’s connection. Unfortunately, the proverbial chemistry between Johnson — who, again, is quite good in a ridiculously thankless role — and the sack of handsome that is Dornan doesn't exist. Passionless is a kind way of describing their relationship; even the scenes when the two are wooing each other provides no reason hint of any emotional or sexual attraction. 

I'm not sure if the fault for that lack of desire rests on the actors' shoulders — they don't appear to like each other all that much in real life — or from some combination of James' original content and the adaptation by screenwriter Kelly Marcel (who wrote the mawkish “Saving Mr. Banks”). Logically it's going to be a blend of both, although it's worth pointing out how wildly the characters' moods, motivations and actions oscillate and how dire much of the dialogue is. I wish I could reprint the apex of awful dialogue, but it involves the film's title and a bit of profanity capped by a ludicrous line reading by Dornan. 

Not quite this ridiculous, but the same ballpark.

Underlying the problems contained within “Fifty Shades of Grey” two hours of stupid awfulness is the treatment of BDSM. This might fall back on James again (although Marcel and director Sam Taylor-Johnson double down on it), but the material treats the sexual activity as a shameful act too scary to talk about. That treatment of it might apply if this were, say, 1992 instead of 2015, where all it takes is a quick Google search to read about it without getting into the graphic nitty gritty. In other words, it's not that big of a deal, and a pretty minor sexual quirk in comparison to all the other crazy things on the Internet.

“Fifty Shades of Grey” though treats it like a grand societal taboo, even though way the BDSM acts are portrayed in the film are more akin to the work of Bettie Page than anything with a real bite to it. The filmmakers seem to titter about the concept as if they were 5 year olds hearing the word “butt” for the first time; it's kind of cute, but it really takes any sense of danger out of it.

Review : One and a half out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: R

Run time: 125 minutes

Genre: Drama

Ask Away

Target audience: Moms.

Take the whole family?: Yeah … no.

Theater or Netflix?: It’s not good enough to justify a theater trip, plus the people who want to watch it are better off doing so at home alongside a glass of wine.

A slow of a film is this? Holy hell is this film a slog, a really, really, really painfully long viewing process undone by seriousness and the constant waiting for something, anything of interest to happen. I felt like Milhouse when he watched the first Poochie episode, constantly wondering when the heck they're going to get to the dang fireworks factory.

Watch this instead? I could list a whole series of romantic films, from screwball comedies like “The Awful Truth” to children's fantasy films like “The Princess Bride,” that would induce more romantic feelings than this. But I know the appeal of “Fifty Shades of Grey” is its steaminess, so instead of dropping $10 on a theater trip, download the music video for Chris Isaak's “Wicked Game” – it sets the mood better in four minutes than “Fifty Shades” does in two hours.