The War of the Worlds (1953): Produced by George Pal; directed by Byron Haskin; based on the novel by H.G. Wells; [Cast and Crew]: For all its flaws, this adaptation of H.G. Wells' seminal novel of alien invasion is far superior to the Spielberg/Cruise film of a few years back.
Producer George Pal was a great devotee of science fiction and fantasy, from the earlier Destination: Moon (1950) through The 7 Faces of Dr. Lao (1964) all the way to his final production, Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze (1975).
Visual effects technology circa 1953 pretty much ensured that the Martian ships would fly rather than walk as tripods, though they do have (mostly) invisible electromagnetic 'legs' that can be seen in a couple of scenes. The focus of action moved from turn-of-the-century England to the Western United States, with the invasion going on world-wide just as in the original.
The movie does an impressive job of ratcheting up the fear as the Martians shrug off all attempts to stop them and stomp all over humanity, and specifically the American war machine. The cast is solid. We even have Gene Barry as a scientist-hero and his love interest has an advanced degree in mathematics. Compare this to Tom Cruise as a lunkhead, deadbeat Dad and one weeps for humanity.
Scenes of a rioting Los Angeles, followed by a burning, depopulated LA, still work really well, as do most of the shots of those pesky Martians incinerating soldiers and weapons and even a trio of ordinary Americans waving a flag of peace. Burn, puny humans, burn!
The design of the aliens themselves is also superior to that in the Spielberg movie, though not faithful to Wells' octopus-like blancmanges. As in Spielberg's movie, the Martians' vampirism has been eliminated (yes, I know the Martians use people for fertilizer in the Cruise movie, but that's still not vampirism). This is a shame. Wells' novel was also an allegory of colonialism, with vampirism as a pretty transparent metaphor for what Europe was doing to all the non-European people of the Earth. Recommended.
A Star Is Born (2018): Directed by and starring Bradley Cooper: [Cast and Crew]: Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga do a solid job of resurrecting this Hollywood chestnut in its fourth iteration. It's not the sort of movie I seek out, but I enjoyed it. And the songs by both Cooper's and Gaga's characters are excellent. An unrecognizable Andrew Dice Clay does nice work as Gaga's character's father. Sam Elliot is a hoot as always. Recommended.
Bohemian Rhapsody (2018): [Cast and Crew]: Mostly fictional band biography of Queen (and specifically Freddie Mercury) has an awfully familiar, homophobic sub-text which sometimes becomes blatant enough to just be text. Remember kids: gay sex is bad and gay men should just hold hands. Also, all the evidence suggests that Mercury actually was bisexual given his choice of partners throughout his life. Oh, well. Mr. Robot's Rami Malek is excellent as Mercury -- he and Freddie both deserved a better movie. Also, how the Hell does a Queen biopic leave out the Flash Gordon soundtrack? Weird. Not recommended.
Spider-Man: Far from Home (2019): CAST AND CREDITS: The first post-Avengers: Endgame Marvel movie quickly skates over the ramifications of that movie's ending, which I think will soon be one of those 'Now let us never speak of those five years again!' things in upcoming Marvel joints.
Tom Holland makes a good Peter Parker. Marvel has wisely emphasized Peter's mechanical and problem-solving genius, a welcome nod to Peter's status as a very clever fellow in the classic Steve Ditko/Stan Lee comics of the 1960's. Hey, that guy beat the Sandman with a goddam vacuum cleaner!!!
Pretty much all the actors are charming, and Jake Gyllenhaal's Mysterio is a hoot. Even the tweaking of Mysterio's origin is funny yet convincing, though I sort of miss the idea of a character who was a visual and special effects movie guy. Maybe because he could have teamed up with Joe Simon and Jack Kirby's Stuntman.
The whole thing plays like one of those Roger Moore James Bond movies where everything stays pretty light and jokey while Bond travels from country to country destroying priceless artifacts and occasionally landmarks. Recommended.
The Girl in the Spider's Web (2018): CAST AND CREDITS: The first adaptation of the post-Stieg Larsson Lisbeth Salander novels is a competent, surprisingly bland thriller. Salander, played with competence but little spark by Claire Foy, is now basically Batman or The Equalizer, but with more hacking skills and lesbian sex. Would I have cast Stephen Merchant as a computer whiz? Mmm. No. He's fine, but I kept expecting Ricky Gervais to wander in at any minute. Which would probably have spiced things up! Lightly recommended as a time-filler.
Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019): CAST AND CREDITS: Technically the third (!) film in a trilogy of Godzilla (2014) and Kong: Skull Island (2017) sees Godzilla once again playing hero against an invasive super-monster from outer space, the monster originally known as Ghidorah the Three-Headed Monster in the old Toho Studios kaiju movies.
I had a lot of fun. The tone remains fairly light throughout, striking a nice balance between the grimmer Godzilla (2014) and the light-as-hell Kong: Skull Island. The human characters are paper thin but generally not all that annoying. Mothra and Rodan also play major roles, while the movie also teases a King Kong/Godzilla buddy movie should a fourth film get made. Recommended.
The Front Runner (2018): adapted by Matt Bai, Jay Carson, and Jason Reitman from the book All the Truth Is Out by Matt Bai; directed by Jason Reitman; starring Hugh Jackman (Gary Hart), Vera Farmiga (Lee Hart), J.K. Simmons (Hart Campaign Manager Bill Dixon), Alfred Molina (Ben Bradlee), Mamoudou Athie (AJ Parker), and Sara Paxton (Donna Rice):
Solid, enjoyable tour through The Fall of Gary Hart during the early Presidential campaigning season of 1987. Hugh Jackman is perfectly fine as the charismatic Hart, the Democratic Front Runner when we begin in 1987. His polling numbers suggested that he could beat presumptive Republican candidate George H.W. Bush. Well, we all know how that turned out.
Hart would become the first Presidential candidate whose campaign would be derailed by the sort of tabloid gossip previously, mostly, absent from Presidential campaigns. After him, the deluge! The accusations made against Hart now seem quaint in the Age of Trump. Well, quaint if one is a Republican. Democrats still savage their candidates over these and lesser outrages. The Republicans don't care.
The film-makers streamline the story of Hart somewhat, omitting a later, unsuccessful return to the Democratic race after his initial withdrawal. The story nonetheless still resonates, balancing the seeming puerility of the causes of Hart's political demise with characters who question Hart's decision-making abilities, his truthfulness, his ability to navigate political adversity, and the larger questions of male privilege and the inequality of power in certain 'relationships.'
In all, The Front Runner presents a sea change in how the media would cover politics and politicians. There's no small irony that Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee (played here by Alfred Molina) finally decides to go with the story, given that Bradlee spent the entire JFK Administration alternately covering up for, and partying with, JFK and friends. Recommended.
Searching (2018): written and directed by Aneesh Changanty with Sev Ohanian; starring John Cho (David Kim), Michelle La (Margot Kim), and Debra Messing (Detective Vick): Tight, innovative thriller plays out entirely on the computer screen through various applications and feeds. It works on a TV screen without causing eyestrain because the camera does zoom in on relevant material, unlike the Unfriended movies, which are best watched on a computer screen from 18 inches away.
John Cho plays a widower who discovers one day that he doesn't know what his teen-aged daughter has been doing in the months since her mother died. Cho's quest to find his daughter will play out on Facebook and in chat rooms, vlog posts and email and texts. Debra Messing plays the police detective assigned to the case, already more than 24 hours old by the time Cho realizes his daughter is missing.
Searching works in part because it remains intimately focused on Cho's grief and anger. It's also extremely clever in displaying all the ways we are watched in our day-to-day life, voluntarily and involuntarily. The film-makers also do a nice job of creating a twisty plot that plays fair with the audience with its investigative plot. All the evidence of what happened is there -- you just have to watch carefully. All this and several distinctively Hitchcockian tropes deployed in a thoroughly modern manner. Recommended.
