Jumanji: The Next Level (3/5 Stars)

I had written in my review of Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle that it was the type of movie that you had to take a step back and shake yourself into realizing it was a great film. Jumanji: The Next Movie is the same concept, with the same actors, and the same director, but it is not a great film. Again, one has to take a step back and contemplate what exactly is the different since there is so much in common.

The most obvious difference is the disappearance of the original writers: Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers. I sung their praises before so I will not dwell on their greatness here. Notice instead how this movie lacks the sheer efficiency and ingenious character development of the first movie. In particular, the game itself was more fully realized (and more obviously a video game) in the first movie. Here, the video game’s plot is not so clearly constructed. It is hardly to imagine the various scenes as video game levels. Still, this movie has a few good ideas and does its best to exploit them to their most enjoyable.

The best idea of this sequel, and a further confirmation into what made the first movie work so well, is to fully lean in on the actors doing impressions of other actors. Regardless of what the plot is doing, I always find this interesting. This sequel introduces two more real-life characters: Uncle Eddie played by Danny Devito and his ex-business partner Milo Walker played by Danny Glover. When the real people are sucked into the game this time, Danny Devito inhabits of Dr. Smolder Bravestone, played by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Likewise Danny Glover inhabits Moose Finbar, played by Kevin Hart. Both are fun impressions. I would give Kevin Hart the upper hand on his though. (Favorite line: “Did…I just kill Eddie…by talking…too slow…just like…he always said I would).

Dr. Shelly Oberon, played by Jack Black, who was the avatar of the mean girl in the first film, is now the avatar of Fridge, the black football player. So Jack Black's impression this time around is a complete 180. This is one of those things that might seem controversial but much like Robert Downey Jr.’s performance in Tropic Thunder has inexplicably not raised eyebrows. Also joining the cast is Awkwafina as another avatar player character in the video game. Near the end she  switches places and becomes the avatar of Danny Devito. She does a great job (dare I say better job than The Rock) in acting like an old short fat outspoken Italian man.

The acting shenanigans are the most interesting part of this movie. So much so, that the action sequences, though packed with special effects, feel like they are get in the way of the performances. In the original movie there was more of a balance (or at least the action sequences seemed to be more intertwined with the character development). What is also lacking from the original movie is any particularly interesting development in the original four teenage characters. The pathos of this movie belongs entirely to the characters of Danny Devito and Danny Glover who have had some bad blood in their previous business break-up and are seeking away to heal old bonds. In effect, this makes them the main characters as they have the more emotional territory to cover. Unlike the first movie, there is not enough for all the characters to do, less balance between the character plots and the character's skills/weaknesses do not pay off as well.

Overall, Jumanji: The Next Level is a decently good movie. It is what a sequel should be in a way: the same, but more of it. I got enough of exactly what I was looking for.

Avengers: End Game (5/5 Stars)

A victory lap is the perfect description of Avengers: Endgame. It is a good enough story on its own, but is not afraid to tack on much earned nostalgia. If Lord of the Rings: Return of the King garnered a Best Picture Oscar in part because it was the culmination of a gorgeously executed triology, I don't see why the same logic wouldn't apply to Avengers: Endgame which is the perfect culmination of ten years and twenty-two movies of Marvel storytelling

Leaving off where Avengers: Infinity War and Ant-Man and the Wasp ended, half the life in the universe has been snapped out of existence by Thanos and his Inifinity Guantlet. The Avengers not snapped out of existence conveniently include the original assembly: Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Black Widow, The Hulk, and Hawkeye. Captain Marvel shows up almost immediately after and they all get in a spaceship and track down Thanos. Unfortunately by the time they get to him, he has already destroyed the Infinity Stones. It's over. What happened cannot be fixed.

Then the movie jumps five years. It is a ballsy move and cements a feeling of reality over the events of Avengers: Infinity War. Usually comic book movies don't have dramatically acted scenes, but this one contains a particularly good bit of acting by Robert Downey Jr, as Tony Stark/Tony Stark, who excoriates Chris Evans, Steve Rogers/Captain America, decision several movies ago in Captain America: Civil War which broke up the Avengers and made Thanos harder to stop.

There is a catch of course as there must be. It comes in the form of Ant-Man who was stuck in the quantum realm when the Snappening happened and comes back five years later. (There is an emotional scene where Paul Rudd, Scott Lang/Ant-Man, finds his name on a memorial for those who died during the Snappening and when he reunites with his daughter.) Scott shows up at the Avengers headquarters with an idea that has to do with time-travel through the quantum realm. Much exposition is needed in this movie and quite a bit of it is people explaining things to Ant-Man who hasn't been around in the last five years. Most of it is quite funny.

Alot of this is quite funny. Some characters' arcs are rather dramatic like Iron Man, Captain America, Hawkeye, and Black Widow. But other characters are firmly in the camp of comic relief. Two characters that have completely hit their stride are Hulk, who is now Professor Hulk, a big, green and unangry Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo). Then there is Thor. What happened to him over the past five years is the stuff of comedic legends.

The question here isn't if Avengers: Endgame will reverse the outcome of Infinity War. We know it must simply due to sheer amount of marketable product that was snapped out of existence. The question is whether how this is accomplished is too predictable or too confusing. It isn't predictable and it generally makes sense (in a comic book science sort of way). A few times in the movie I was sitting there wondering how they were going to accomplish what they had set out to do and then how they did was quite satisfying.

Without giving away too much of the plot, the Avengers actually visit previous movies. Three in particular: The Avengers, The Dark World, and The Guardians of the Galaxy. The team splits up into groups to go back in time and retrieve what they need from those films. It is always when you have many full formed characters and then mix and match teams so people who have not really met or interacted before are doing so for the first time. Thor's interactions with the Guardians of the Galaxy is great in particular. Captain American fights himself and that is satisfying too. There is a lot of good stuff all over the place here. One particular moment, where Captain America finds himself standing alone in front of an evil army, and the moment right after, garnered cheers from the audience that I was in. I felt like cheering too. I really like these guys.

Following the example of other great culmination of movies, the last hour of Avengers: End Game has a lot of goodbyes in it. I believe the movie earned these moments. I look forward to the next twenty films.

The Avengers: Infinity War (5/5 Stars)

The last time a movie franchise achieved something akin to what Avengers: Infinity War accomplishes had to be The Lord of the Rings. That epic multi-Oscar winning movie was itself the third installment of a cohesive and perfectly realized trilogy of movies based on revered source material. Avengers: Infinity War leap-frogs that accomplishment. This movie is the culmination not of a trilogy but a universe of interconnected movies that spans nineteen films. Perhaps the HBO series Game of Thrones is the closest thing, but that TV series is still not of the same scale nor found in so many variations as the Marvel franchises that have climaxed into Infinity War. No, there really is nothing quite like Avengers: Infinity War in the history of movies.

Avengers: Infinity War has seventeen credited writers. It has two directors, Anthony and Joe Russo. It tells a story that attempts to involve all of Marvel’s outstanding franchises. These include:

Iron Man: Robert Downey Jr. (Tony Stark/Iron Man); Gwyneth Paltrow (Pepper Pots); Don Cheadle (James Rhodes/War Machine), Samuel L. Jackson (himself)

Thor: Chris Hemsworth (Thor); Tom Hiddleston (Loki); Idris Elba (Heimdall); Mark Ruffalo (Bruce Banner/Hulk); Peter Dinkalge (Eitri)

Captain America: Chris Evans (Steve Rogers/Captain America); Scarlett Johansson (Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow); Paul Bettany (Vision); Elizabeth Olsen (Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch); Anthony Mackie (Sam Wilson/Falcon); Sebastian Stan (Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier)

Guardians of the Galaxy: Chris Pratt (Peter Quill/Star-Lord); Zoe Saldana (Gamora); Karen Gillan (Nebula); Pom Klementieff (Mantis); Dave Bautista (Drax); Vin Diesel (Groot); Bradley Cooper (Rocket); Josh Brolin (Thanos)

Dr. Strange: Benedict Cumberbatch (Doctor Strange); Benedict Wong (Wong)

Spider-Man: Tom Holland (Peter Parker/Spider-Man)

Black Panther: Chadwick Boseman (T’Challa/Black Panther); Danai Gurira (Okoye); Letitia Wright (Shuri)

Any of these franchises can and have carried a great movie on their own. (In particular, since 2013 Marvel has made a stretch of great movies including Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain America: Civil War, Dr. Strange, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Thor:Ragnarok, and Black Panther). So one of the great obstacles Infinity War had to overcome is how to fit all the above in the same movie giving each and every character their own moment to shine. Amazingly, this is done. All of the above share this movie in equal heft and have their own moments to shine. I’m not sure how seventeen writers and two directors go about doing something like that, but its time to start handing out Oscars.

What may to be the hardest thing to accomplish is how consistently funny the movie is. I say this because there are two big things fighting against it. The first is that the main villain, Thanos (played by Josh Brolin) is trying and succeeding throughout the movie to kill off half of the universe. It is heavy stuff and is taken quite seriously, not least by Thanos. Two important characters from the Thor franchise, Loki and Heimdall, die in the first fifteen minutes. Another important character from the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise dies at the half-way point. At the end, well, it seems like half the characters die. I won’t tell you which half, that would be a spoiler. The second is that this is an action-heavy blockbuster and huge spectacles and jokes generally do not generally complement each other. A good example of blockbuster spectacles and laughs working is the first Ghostbusters movie. A good example of blockbuster spectacles and laughs not working is the Ghostbusters remake. But in Infinity Wars, every joke lands. Dr. Strange is funny, Thor is funny, Star-Lord and Drax are funny, Spider-man is funny. Some characters are generally funnier than others. For instance Captain America and Black Panther were never particularly humorous, but almost everyone has their moments. There is also the added pleasure of seeing various characters interacting for the first time. At one point Thor meets up with the Guardians of the Galaxy. Bruce Banner has a scientific conversation with Shuri in Wakaanda. Dr. Strange and Tony Stark have this dialogue upon meeting.

Tony Stark: Nice cape. What's your job, again?

Dr. Strange: Protecting your reality, douchebag.

Infinity War is supposedly only the first of a two part movie, the other coming out next year. In that case, it is hard to judge the overall story at this point. But really, given how well this movie did what it set out to do, how could it be bad? Marvel is at its peak and the movies it has been making deserve to start getting serious recognition and not just for special effects. I expect Black Panther will run away with a serious amount of Oscars next year. Perhaps the year after Infinity War 2 will take the ultimate prize. As far as I’m concerned, Marvel has already earned it. At this moment, They are the best in the business.

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (5/5 Stars)

One has to step back and shake oneself into believing that “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle” is one of the year’s best films. After all, the movie itself does not make this kind of demand on its audience. It is marketed and feels like a good time family comedy that aims only to please, not enlighten. But when a movie accomplishes what it sets out to do so well, it is important sometimes to try to deconstruct how it does what it does. There are many levels to “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle” and they interact with each other seamlessly to an extent that puts this movie on par with such other great comedies like “Hott Fuzz” and “Tropic Thunder”.

“Jumanji” was written by Erik Sommers and Chris McKenna, both alumni of the TV show “Community”. In particular, it was Chris McKenna who was credited for writing the Emmy nominated episode “Remedial Chaos Theory”. That brilliant episode, and “Community” in general, works in much the same way as “Jumanji”. Here, like in “Community”, the characters are deliberately stock characters. We have four high-schoolers, a nerd named Spencer, a jock known as Fridge, a mean girl named Bethany, and a sarcastic girl named Martha. They find themselves for various reasons in detention, a plot set-up that seems to deliberately recall “The Breakfast Club”. Detention involves cleaning out the school’s basement, wherein the four find a video game named “Jumanji”. Using the plot conceit of a previous “Jumanji” movie from 1995, itself based on an early 1980s board game, the game comes to life as the kids are playing it. In the 1995 version, the game came into the real world. In the 2017 version, the four are sucked into the game.

While in the game the four stock high-schoolers are transformed into archetypical video game avatars that they unwittingly chose before playing the game. The nerd is transformed into Dr. Smolder Bravestone, played by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and strong, courageous, and intelligent archeaologist (think “Indiana Jones” type). The jock is transformed into Franklin “Mouse” Finbar, played by Kevin Hart, a side-kick and zoologist. The mean girl accidentally chooses the Avatar “Shelly” Oberon, curvy genius, thinking it to be beautiful woman and not a fat middle-aged man, played by Jack Black, who excels in cartography and other sciences. And finally the sarcastic girl is transformed into Ruby Roundhouse, played by Karen Gillan (the blue robot in “Guardians of the Galaxy”), a scantily-clad femme fatale (think “Lara Croft”) who excels at Karate, Tai Chi, and Dance Fighting.

The video game they inhabit also has its rules. They have to work together with their character’s strengths and weaknesses to find their way through various levels, solve mysteries, and beat bosses in order to win the game and leave. Anyone who has ever played an old Nintendo game will immediately recognize the set-up. One of the cleverer ways this is played out is through a character named Nigel Billingsley, played by Rhys Darby, who serves as an explanatory character that, because of his programming, can only say certain things in response to certain things. This is annoying to the characters and funny to us.

Like “Community”, “Jumanji” uses cliches as a launchpad, not a crutch. By using tropes, it constructs a base of familiarity which it then exploits by developing the story through realistic character choices. We can predict how a stereotypical jock will react in a situation and we can predict how a stereotypical sidekick will react in a situation, but we are less familiar with how a stereotypical jock trapped in the body of a stereotypical sidekick will react. “Jumanji” presents eight familiar characters within four characters and stays true to all of them. Brevity is the soul of wit, and the rate of information thrown at the audience is amusingly efficient.

And how it does this is not just an achievement in writing, but in casting and acting. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is so good at playing a sensitive teenager that the shear believably of it is in and of itself amusing. Kevin Hart, a diminutive comedian who excels at large in-your-face comedy, seemingly didn’t have to change his personality at all in order to believably play the jock in the side-kick role, which in turn itself is a humorous take on his style of comedy comedy. But the best example of the possibilities of combining teenagers with video game avatar is Jack Black’s impersonation of a self-absorbed teenage girl. Not only is it pitch-perfect going one way, Jack Black sounding exactly like a teenage girl, it is pitch-perfect going the other way, a self-absorbed teenage girl inexplicably possessing larger-than-life intelligence. Remember that the teenagers now inhabit the special powers of their avatars. The Jack Black avatar Sheldon "Shelly" Oberon is a curvy genius. This does not make Bethany less self-absorbed, but it does make her especially articulate about her behavior in a way that is almost never seen with this particular stock character trope. This is a great example of how using otherworldly premises with their own special rules of reality can help develop the character of a real person in a way that regular drama cannot. Upon finding herself sucked inside a video game, Bethany complains about not having her phone anymore. The sarcastic girl chides her for being so self-absorbed. Jack Black’s response is so exceedingly reasonable and well thought out you wonder why nobody else is complaining about their phones being missing. Jack Black’s acting in this movie is worthy of an Oscar nomination. There is absolutely no chance of that happening because it is unthinkable that this type of role would result in such a thing. However, I would put this performance alongside Steve Martin’s in “All of Me” as a performance so unexpectedly good, one has to take a moment to realize just how underrated it is.

Finally the movie has great teamwork. There is not a character here that does not have a good role and the movie, directed by Jake Kasdan, seamlessly gives everyone something to do. Even the sarcastic girl who was transformed into the usually thankless role of the femme fatale, has her own touching developments. There is this one particular scene where Martha and Spencer within the bodies of smoking hot Karen Gillan and Dwayne Johnson act in the age-old awkward teenager “I like you” exchange. It is just something special. It is so recognizable, but as it is coming out of middle-aged movie stars, it is also very funny. This movie is something special and can be shown to anyone anywhere.  

The Guardians of the Galaxy (4/5 Stars)

Our Hero, the Awesome Chris Pratt, lands his intergalactic spaceship on a desperate and dangerous alien landscape. He steps into a derelict and cavernous ancient cathedral overgrown with dangerous fauna. Chris Pratt puts on his Walkman and plays his “Awesome Mix Tape #1.” The song, played loud and funky is “Come and Get Your Love,” by Redbone. And to this tune, the opening credits of our movie come on the screen as Chris Pratt dances and shuffles through the many dangers of his archeological mission. That’s when I knew I was watching something new, something interesting, and most importantly something undeniably fun. And you know what, it was.  

Until now, I have not heard of the Marvel comic “Guardians of the Galaxy.” Apparently it is rather recent comic without much of a fan base. There are no recognizable characters. The team consists of a Firefly-esque band of misfits that have come together to do fun outlaw stuff, mostly salvage jobs. The leader is Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), a human who was abducted by aliens when he was a just a little kid in 1988. This particular back-story is a boon to people like me who are somewhat turned off by the complete arbitrariness of most way into the future science fiction. The most obvious perk of the story happening basically in current day even if we never see Earth is the soundtrack. It comes from the Walkman containing his Awesome Mix tape that young Peter was carrying when he was abducted. It has got Marvin Gaye, David Bowie, and even Blue Swede. These songs reflect good taste on the part of Peter’s mother who made the tape for him before she died of cancer. I was surprised and delighted that “Cherry Bomb” by The Runaways got an extended play over one of those getting-for-battle montages. It’s a killer song. Then there is the marvelous pair of digital creations Rocket Raccoon and Groot. They are originally a pair of bounty hunters. Rocket Raccoon is the product of a mad scientist who turned a raccoon into a living, breathing, sarcastic as all hell, and complete with a snarly Napoleaonic complex. Bradley Cooper voices Rocket Raccoon. Admittedly, I could not recognize him in the voice. Groot is, I guess, an Ent, a walking tree. Vin Diesel voices him in what can be safely be said is an underwritten role. All Groot can say is “I am Groot.” Although, he is a bit like Chewbacca in that apparently the Raccoon can interpret his connotations perfectly. These two characters are not muppet sideshows. They are so well conceived and artistically put together that after awhile I realized that I had forgotten that I wasn’t simply watching actual actors. We are at a point in movie technology where these characters are alive. It is an extraordinary to watch and given the progress I would think this might be the last time I comment on how well it is done. From now on, perhaps I’m going to judge these performances just how I would judge a human performance. On a very basic level what has been have achieved is a blurring of the distinction between the two. Joining the party late is the Pro Wrestler Dave Bautista as Drax. He does a very convincing job of being big and dumb and completely incapable of grasping metaphors. Finally there is Zoe Saldana painted dark green this time as a fierce warrior of some sort. She is the serious one of the bunch because you know she’s a woman.

The plot of this story is arbitrary and absurd and quite frankly really comparable to some truly awful movies like John Carter of Mars and the like. There are bunches of people with weird names in weirdly named places you’ve never heard of and they are trying to get this weapon that is going to kill everybody unless Peter Quill and the gang get it first. Motivations come and go easily for the people and not much makes sense in that annoying Science Fiction way you know where because it takes place in a far off place you don’t have to worry about making any of the technology realistic or plausible. But guess what? I did not care. I just did not care. Because what this movie does good it does awesomely great and I could forgive all the absurdity because the movie never really asked me to take it all that seriously. What it asked me to do was have fun and then it provided great music, good jokes, quirky characters, but above all abosolutely stunning things to look at.

The design of this movie is truly Oscar worthy effort. It is hard to assess who is exactly responsible for what. When you look up the crew on IMDB you are faced with the fact that hundreds of people have worked on the movie. But here are couple of names of the people in charge: Charles Wood of Production Design, Ray Chan of Art Direction, Alexandra Byrne of Costume Design, and whoever was in charge of makeup. There has not been a movie so vibrant and fun to look at since “The Fifth Element.” This movie makes use of a comic color palette. The prison jumpsuits are bright yellow. Several characters are of light blue and hot pink and orange hue.  My favorite design has to be the makeup of a character named Nebula (Karen Gillan). Now that is a sexy blue robot (I think she is a robot, maybe). If the makeup and hairstyling of this movie doesn’t win an Oscar I have no idea what I’m talking about. At one point I was looking forward to seeing new characters being introduced just to see what they looked like. What was better about Benecio Del Toro’s part in this movie? His performance or his white suit and hair?

This movie was directed by James Gunn and partially written by him too. I have not seen anything else he has done but given the size of these blockbusters, it is hard to say (and probably shouldn’t be said) that this is his movie. This is a corporate movie and as a corporate movie it has certain plusses and minuses. It does not, cannot have the personal touch that small movies have. But it does have the ability to apply lots of money for the employment of hundreds of artisans and designers. “Guardians of the Galaxy,” is a persuasive argument that summer tent-pole blockbusters can be worth the money spent to make it not just profit-wise but also in artistic merit. Yes, corporate movies can be quirky, original, and fun too. Attidude is all, i.e. the courage to play “Hooked on a Feeling” by Blue Swede in a science fiction movie and have faith that the audience is going to like it enough to ignore how the whole setup is completely absurd. Such courage in very expensive projects is rare but take a look, it exists.