Movie Review: Star Wars: The Last Jedi

Star Wars: The Last Jedi **** ½ / *****

Directed by: Rian Johnson.

Written by: Rian Johnson based on characters created by George Lucas.

Starring: Daisy Ridley (Rey), Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker), Adam Driver (Kylo Ren), Oscar Isaac (Poe Dameron), John Boyega (Finn), Kelly Marie Tran (Rose Tico), Carrie Fisher (Leia), Andy Serkis (Supreme Leader Snoke), Domhnall Gleeson (General Hux), Laura Dern (Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo), Benicio Del Toro (DJ), Gwendoline Christie (Captain Phasma), Lupita Nyong'o (Maz Kanata), Peter Mayhew (Chewbacca), Anthony Daniels (C-3PO), Jimmy Vee (R2-D2).

 

JJ Abrams was the right choice to direct The Force Awakens, because the number one job that film had being the first Star Wars movies since the hated prequels (which I don’t hate, but let’s not get into that) was to get fans back on board with the franchise. If they hated it like they did the prequels, the new series was sunk – not financially of course, but in terms of having any real impact. And for the most part, Abrams delivered in spades – basically giving Star Wars fans everything they wanted from their old, beloved characters, and introducing great new characters t the universe as well. When the only real complaint some overgrown man babies had about the film was “Ew, a girl can’t be this good at being a Jedi”, you know you pretty much hit the nail on the head. But in order for the series to grow, to be something more than simply fan service – which can be satisfying and fun, but isn’t overly daring – you needed a different filmmaker to come in, and do something more with the series. And that is what Rian Johnson has done with The Last Jedi. I understand there are some fans who dislike some of the things Johnson did in this film – and unlike the whining over Rey being a girl, I actually get it this time. But I loved the direction Johnson took with this film, I loved the misdirection’s, and subversions of expectations, and even the tangents that ultimately prove fruitless in terms of the plot, because they are fruitful in other ways. The Last Jedi is the first Star Wars film since I was a child that actually, legitimately surprised me – and that was thrilling to experience in this franchise again.

 

The film pretty much picks up exactly where the last one left off – with the Resistance scattered a little bit, and the First Order in hot pursuit. Most of the Resistance is in one fleet, and they are trying to flee – but the First Order, led by General Hux (Domhnall Gleeson) isn’t letting them get away – and shocking, they’ve now developed the ability to track them even when they go through hyperspace. The Resistance cannot escape, and cannot destroy them – unless they come up with a miracle – which is what leads Finn (John Boyega) to team up with new character Rose (Kelly Marie Tran), to try and do just that. Meanwhile, Rey (Daisy Ridley) as made contact with Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) – but he doesn’t want anything to do with the Jedi. More dangerously, Rey is communicating with Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), becoming increasingly convinced that he can still be saved – although the risk is still there that she could turn herself.

 

That’s about all I’ll talk about the plot of the film. Like The Empire Strikes Back – the original middle chapter (and still, the best Star Wars film ever made), the film has multiple plot threads, and multiple locations, playing out simultaneously, and Rian Johnson has to juggle them all. For the most part, he succeeds, and if there’s a clunky transition or two, that’s to be expected. The film is probably too long – it does run two-and-a-half hours, but it’s hard to think of what you would cut (I know a lot of people will say trim back Finn and Rose’s adventure, but those people are wrong).

 

The film is not subtle about its themes of the past, and letting it go (perhaps this is really what fans don’t like – the idea of letting go of something from the childhoods that they have held sacred for years). But it’s not as simple as that. All the characters in the movie – both good and bad – want to build a new future, but they don’t all look at the past in the same way, Kylo Ren wants to burn it all to the ground – only from the ashes can something new be built. But Rey respects the past, wants to learn from it and move forward. Luke isn’t ready for that – he is mired in regret for the mistakes he has made in the past – with Kylo Ren, yes, but also in his abandoning of the Jedi in general. By the end of the film, the past has been mostly destroyed – this is a series about the new characters wholly now – and hopefully they’ve learned from the mistakes of the previous generation. (The film is also about how a group of strong, intelligent women try to get a bunch of idiot man children to grow up and listen, although they never do – perhaps that’s why some fans hate it?).

 

The film does contain everything you could want in a Star Wars film – there is a killer Light Saber battle that involves Rey, Kylo Ren, and others, which ranks among the best in the series, and more interesting world building, and special effects. There are also some new, mostly good characters – the best of which is Rose (who of course some fans hate, but that has nothing to do with the fact she’s a woman, don’t be silly), but I enjoyed Benicio Del Toro as well as a Thief. The film is also filled with humor for the first time in a long time for a Star Wars film (I don’t know if every writer who came along assumed they had to be as bad at writing dialogue as Lucas, which is why the films have lacked in jokes, but it was a welcome addition. It delivers everything you could want in a Star Wars film – and then some.

 

What I really liked about the film though – what makes it the best Star Wars film for me since Empire – is the fact that Johnson is deliberately undermining your expectations through. Abrams setup so many things in Force Awakens, and then had them play out precisely how you expect them to, precisely how they have precisely, and Johnson pretty much does the opposite. The setups are still there, but this time, it doesn’t turn out the way you think it would, or perhaps how you think it should. If that sticks in your craw, so be it – but for me, it made this film feel genuinely exciting. I didn’t know what was going to happen moment to moment, scene to scene, and that made the film more alive – and also ending up deepening everything else about the film. If we really are going to get one new Star Wars film a year for the foreseeable future (and given how much money Disney spent on the franchise, we’re going to), we need people to take some risks, take some chances – even if that means pissing off some fans.

Movie Review: Looper

Looper

Directed by: Rian Johnson.

Written by: Rian Johnson.

Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Joe), Bruce Willis (Old Joe), Emily Blunt (Sara), Paul Dano (Seth), Noah Segan (Kid Blue), Piper Perabo (Suzie), Jeff Daniels (Abe), Pierce Gagnon (Cid), Summer Qing (Old Joe's Wife), Tracie Thoms (Beatrix), Frank Brennan (Old Seth), Garret Dillahunt (Jesse).

There’s a scene in Looper where Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) sits down with his older self (Bruce Willis) in a diner and starts asking questions. Old Joe says “Let’s not start talking about time travel shit, or else we’ll end up diagraming everything out with straws”. That’s good advice, not just to Young Joe, but the audience watching Looper as well. I guarantee you that you won’t have to look very hard on the internet to find someone who will point out all the time travel contradictions in Looper – and to find others who disagree with them, and “prove” them wrong, only to have someone else correct them. This is true of pretty much every time travel movie ever made. But delving too deep into all that crap would, for me anyway, spoil the fun of Looper – which is a great time travel story. It sets up its own rules, and doesn’t really violate them in any way that became immediately apparent to me. Looper, like all time travel films, requires the audience to take a leap of faith for it to work at all. But if you take that leap, than Looper rewards you handsomely.

Joe is a Looper. What that means is that although it is 2044, he works for the mob from 2074. When they need someone killed, they send them back in time; Joe kills them and disposes of the body. Time travel is highly illegal in 2074, and hasn’t been invented yet in 2044, so eventually the mob will decide to end the contract with their loopers. The loopers have no idea when this will happen – they just know it will eventually. What happens when they end their contract is simple – they end up killing their future selves. Because everyone who gets sent back is bound and has a hood over their head, the loopers don’t know they’ve just killed their future selves until they go to the body to get their payment, which has been strapped to their victims – in place of the regular silver bars are gold ones. You’re now down being a looper, and know that in 30 years, you’ll be sent back in time and you’ll kill yourself. The profession, as Joe admits, doesn’t attract many forward thinkers. The consequences of NOT killing your future self are dire. But when Joe comes face to face with his future self – something is off. He isn’t bound, and has no hood on. Joe hesitates, and that’s all the time Old Joe needs to get away. I could explain more of the plot, but it would fruitless – and unfair to you, as one of the pleasures of the movie is the unexpected twists and turns it takes. Needless to say, Young Joe is being pursued by his employers as he pursues Old Joe – who is also pursued by Joe’s employers, and Joe himself. How Young Joe ends up on a farm, with Sara (Emily Blunt) and her young son, and what they mean, I’ll leave it for you to discover.

Looper is writer/director Rian Johnson’s third film – and his best to date. His debut Brick was an immensely entertaining high school noir, where all the characters talked like they were the stars of a 1940s classic noir. His follow-up with the caper comedy, The Brothers Bloom, in which Johnson seemed to be trying too hard to be Wes Anderson, instead of just being himself. Looper is his first film where he seems to be working on his own level – that isn’t as beholden to his influences as his previous films were. This is intelligent sci-fi, a movie that takes itself and its implications seriously. It is also a stylish action movie – with more violence, that at times is disturbingly realistic even when it seems outlandish. If his first two films showed promise, than Looper delivers on that promise.

The acting also helps a great deal. Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who has been with Johnson since the beginning, delivers an excellent performance as Young Joe – even under all the makeup and special effects applied to his face to make him look more like Bruce Willis. He may start the movie as a soulless killer and drug addict, but he transforms throughout the movie – into someone willing to see the big picture. As Old Joe, Bruce Willis is perfectly cast. Johnson doesn’t spend anywhere near as much time with Old Joe, so having an actor like Willis – who we are used to seeing as a kick ass action star, does some of the work for him – and Willis does the rest. Often, Willis sleepwalks through roles, but not here. Emily Blunt is also terrific as the young, single mother – devoted to her child. The supporting cast – Paul Dano as Gordon-Levitt’s sniveling friend and Jeff Daniels as the mob boss in particular – are also terrific fun.

The real star here though is Johnson – especially his screenplay, which is one of the more original works of the year. This is an intelligent sci-fi action movie – that tackles some interesting issues, while still managing to be a superb, mainstream entertainment.

Movie Review: The Brothers Bloom

The Brothers Bloom ***
Directed By: Rian Johnson.
Written By: Rian Johnson.
Starring: Rachel Weisz (Penelope Stamp), Adrien Brody (Bloom), Mark Ruffalo (Stephen), Rinko Kikuchi (Bang Bang), Robbie Coltrane (The Curator), Nora Zehetner (Rose), Maximilian Schell (Diamond Dog).

The Brothers Bloom is a highly enjoyable caper film from director Rian Johnson. Johnson’s first film was Brick, a high school noir where the characters talked like they were out of a Dashiell Hammett novel. That film was a complete original, and marked one of the best debut films of the decade. The Brothers Bloom is no less stylized than Brick was, but it is not nearly as original. Given a larger budget to do what he wants, Johnson seems to want to become a Wes Anderson clone. The resulting movie, while remaining very entertaining, isn’t quite up to the level that Johnson set for himself.

The movie is about two brothers. Bloom (Adrian Brody) and Stephen (Mark Ruffalo). Shunted around from foster home to foster home as children, they had to learn to look after themselves. Stephen started learning how to con people, and discovered he had knack for it. His plans are carefully plotted out to the smallest of details. Bloom discovers that he is good at being the heart - the one in the plan who has to win people over and make them trust him. But he has grown tired of living this life. He wants an “unwritten” life, so he quits. But Stephen is able to convince him to do “one final con”.

The mark is Penelope (Rachel Weisz), an eccentric heiress, whose family is all gone. She spends her time alone on her vast New Jersey estate, collecting hobbies. Essentially, what this means, is that she’s by herself, and teaches herself to do whatever catches her fancy. Stephen thinks this will make her an easy mark. All Bloom has to do is get her to fall for him, and they’ll be able to get $1 million from her. Bloom is able to do this, but finds himself falling for Penelope himself, much to Stephen’s chagrin.

The con requires the trio, along with the brothers assistant Bang Bang (Rinko Kikuchi) to go on a round the world odyssey. The details of the con are almost needlessly complex, and would take up the rest of this review if I tried to explain it. But it doesn’t really matter. The con itself is an excuse for the movie to set itself in gorgeous locations throughout the world, and Johnson makes good use of these locations. The film is gorgeous to look at.

What really makes the film work however are the performances. Rachel Weisz gives one of her best performances as Penelope, the almost hopelessly innocent, naïve mark. She is almost remarkably sweet, and rather unrealistically well adjusted, considering she has spent most of her life by herself (she reminds me of another Penelope, the one played by Christina Ricci last year). Weisz is all wide eyed charm, and it’s easy to see by Bloom falls for her. Brody for his part fits his role like a glove. As a veteran of Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited, he should, since this movie has some similarities. Brody seems most at ease with these types of quick witted comedies. Ruffalo is even better as Stephen, the brains behind the operation. Normally, I see Ruffalo in dramas, but he fits into this comedy quite well. But none of them are as good as Rinko Kikuchi as Bang Bang. You may remember Kikuchi for her great performance as the deaf girl in Babel, and while that performance required her dramatic chops, here she proves she could be even better at comedy. Bang Bang rarely speaks, and no one really knows anything about her, except that she’s good with explosives. Like Babel, she uses her remarkably expressive face. This is another great performance. I look forward to seeing her in future movies - maybe even ones where they allow her to speak.

Overall, I enjoyed The Brothers Bloom. It is a completely meaningless movie, one that doesn’t really have a greater purpose in mind, but does what it does remarkably well. If I am a little disappointed in the movie, it’s because this doesn’t represent a step forward for Johnson, but rather a step back. Why would a writer/director as obviously talented as Johnson, want to become a Wes Anderson clone? Anderson does what he does better than anyone else can. Johnson should stick to finding his own voice as a director. If he does, then I feel we’ll see even better films from him in the future.