Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation

TriStar/Sony (2004)

Almost every other review out there will tell you that this movie sucked and sucked more and continued to suck long after that. But in all honesty, it's not THAT bad.

Sure there are many better movies out there. And there are many worse sci-fi (some that are so bad they're actually good), and there are some mediocre movies. This one falls in the "lower mediocre" catagory.

Starts in the heat of battle - that's always good. Then the small squadron gets trapped on the planet and pulls back to a destroyed base which offers some small defense against the bug monsters that're hellbent on slaughtering them.

So, what we have here is the long internal struggles, building tension against monster invasion movie. The twist is that the bugs have a way of infesting the humans with larvae, using them as hosts until they squiggle out as gruesome little buggies. Not the most original premise, but it pits the soldiers against each other in a "who's still human who's not" - which actually could have been played to much greater effect in the hands of better writing/directing etc.

Since so much sci-fi is suspension of disbelief anyway, the transmission of bug contents didn't throw me (mouth to mouth, unless the buggie just got impatient and rips itself free of the host's skull), but I didn't understand how some host bodies just fell apart like wet papiermache and others gained inhuman strength and durability. That's when I say, "Hey if you want me to suspend my disbelief you've got to at the very least give me a little consistency!"

All in all, though, it had plenty of action, including various bugsqushin' - it also had gore galore for you Saw freaks, it had some gratuitious nudity (apparently one host - only the attractive blonde one - had to disrobe completely to do her various "larva-transfer" - don't know why, the only thing I can think of is the director wanted to keep the attention of the teenage boys). It hadd characters to like, those to hate, those you hate until they redeem themselves two seconds before they get dismembered, and lastly, it had a tiny interesting twist:

When they confronted the host inside the General's body, the bug, speaking for all bugs, told the humans that the reason why the bugs hated them so much is that the humans have this mistaken belief that they are somehow individually valuable, as distinct, separate units. It's a dangerous idea, apparently, one that might topple the balance of the universe.

"And that," he says ominously, "cannot be allowed."

Basically, it breaks down like this: the first Starship Troopers was excellent, and should be a part of everybody's personal video library. #2 is a throwaway, you can ignore it if you wish, if you happen to watch it don't expect too much, but it's still not as bad as others will have you believe, and #3, well, I still haven't seen it yet.

Therefore, Trooper, all I can say is LONG LIVE THE FEDERATION.

TTFN
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Gangster No. 1

Malcolm McDowell, Paul Bettany, David Thewlis, Saffron Burroughs

2000, IFC Films.

To be honest, after Lay3rCake and Snatch, I was expecting a similar piece of entertaining British gangster film - and this film does deliver that, at least at the beginning.

McDowell is the old gangster in 1999, Paul Bettany is the gangster in the late 60's, where he emulates and betrays his mentor, the gangster Freddie Mays (Thewlis). Basically, what we have here is a truly chilling performance by Bettany as a complete psychopath, who's only goal is power and money and the only method he intends to employ in the pursuit of this is total gory bloodthirsty savage killing sprees. This man is a monster, pure and simple.

There's a scene in which Bettany killing another gangster, camera POV is you, the audience, and it's very effective, it shows what seems like an eternity to die, and reveals the truly helpless feeling that victims of such a crime must experience. Horrifying, but words can't describe it.

So, we have an effective performance of a madman. After he sets up Thewlis to go to jail for the crime I just described, Bettany/McDowell are free to take over the gang and the movie moves through the next three decades, where it goes off into fantasy land.

For instance, I find it truly hard to believe that any gangster of any caliber would have gotten away with such personal interactions in murder and even bank robbery! Bank robbery! Hands-on murder! True gangsters who have any staying power have others to do that for them. Like any decent manager or CEO, you delegate that kind of stuff. The people who revel in it are the people who die at early ages . . . .GangSTAS, not GangSTERS.

And then, the interminable ending, the eventual release of Thewlis from prison, and the showdown between the two that shows how Thewlis has matured and how McDowell has spent all this time emulating him because he wants to BE him, but can never find the internal peace and happiness that Thewlis has found through love.

Yes, it's understandable, and I'm glad they fleshed it out - McDowell's insanity stemming from the hatred of the man he wants to BE - but they belabored the point, overstated it, just as I'm overstating my commentary about it.

So, with that, McDowells final "Top of the World, Ma" dive off the building at the end just rang hollow.

Like the previous post, this movie was very very good up until they had to wrap it up. This all leaves me to ask,

Where did all the good endings go?



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Journey to the End of the Night

Scott Glenn, Brendan Fraser, Mos Def, Catalina Sandina Moreno

2006, Millenium Films

Pretty intense, and although my wife would be horribly emotionally scarred if she were ever to see a movie with Brendan Fraser being so completely nasty, I personally think it's refreshing to see an actor do more than the same character over and over again. And he plays it very very well.

Basic plot, father (Glenn)/son (Fraser) own a strip club in Sao Paolo - they lucked upon beaucoups of bucks from a Russian killed by his jealous wife, and now they are trying to sell the drugs to some Africans for enough money to retire - but son is trying to double-cross father. Father wants to leave the business and take wife (Sandina) and their young son to some nice tropical resort, with light and sun, and leave the nasty Sao Paolo streets behind, and leave the club to Fraser. Fraser, however, is the true father of the young boy (that was obvious from the beginning); however, don't think badly of Sandina - she plays a character who basically loves both men and at the end of the day is just trying to make it through this dark world.

Sao Paolo, as a character, is dark, tough, nasty, spiteful . . . kind of like L.A. In fact, this film probably could have been set in LA and had much of the same effect.

The only character for whom you can really have sympathy (basically you just feel pathetically sorry for the young child) is Mos Def, who plays a young African immigrant dishwasher who they use as the contact for the Africans. He is in WAY over his head, and is the single only character in this movie who has ANY morals whatsoever.

So, what you have is a decent movie, lots of intrigue, lots of grit, lots of people throwing things around and cutting each other, and it remains fairly intense up until

SPOILERS COMING! DON'T SAY YOU HAVEN'T BEEN WARNED!



Mos Def in a huge motorcycle chase through the nightstreets. The girl who had helped him out (which is a side plot - she dies, too - that's sad, but somehow a little pointless),

and then at the end, the big showdown between father and son, and then the transvestite man-whore whose face Fraser had sliced up in a fit of rage at the beginning of the movie shows up and blows him away! Now, that might have stood for Karma or Just Desserts or whatever you wanna callit, but then man-whore tries to kill Glenn and Sandina and Glenn kills him and it's just like a Shakespearean tragedy, but for some reason this final scene feels a little farcical.

Glenn dies by telling Mos Def to get wife and young boy to safety, and they all drive off into the sunrise, and all of this has taken place in the span of only one night (still my favourite plot scenario ever!) and

I just now remembered! They left the old blind Brazilian prophet sitting alone in the room with three dead bodies! They just drove off and left him there!

That's a bite.

I didn't mention the blind "seer" before, did I? He's a wonderful character. You feel for him too, because basically he knows all without seeing all, and even though the death scene was silly, here's a nice piece of dialogue:

Old Man (to Glenn): That question you asked before, about does your wife really love you? Do you want to know the answer?

Glenn (after a pause): Nah - not really. (Then he dies)



Ah, yeah! There's a smile!



All in all, not a bad movie - could have been done better. Personally, for everyone to get their desserts, I'd've had the man-whore kill Fraser, then Glenn kills man-whore, cops come to clean up and "liberate" the money from him, but he sells the club to another investor and takes off out of town anyway, with wife and young child, to start a new life tending bar in Aruba - it's not the retirement that he hoped for, but at least it's a more honest living.

But that's just me.


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