Fright Night (2011)

The horror movie genre is probably the most popular type of film to remake or update.  Why is that?  Well, what looks cool and scary in 1982 doesn't usually hold up after a decade or two, and foreign horror movies oftentimes throw in bizarre supernatural stuff that doesn't make sense to American audiences (Japan, I'm looking at you).  Personally, I don't mind remakes; my favorite movie of all time, The Maltese Falcon, was the third adaptation of the story in a ten-year span.  The important thing is for the remakes to take what works from the original and improve the rest.  I haven't seen Fright Night (1985) in about fifteen years, and I think it was heavily edited with commercials on VH1 or something; I remember the basic plot, but my overwhelming memory is of a fairly cheesy vampire movie with the guy from Planet of the Apes.  If there is a moderately famous 80s horror movie that is ripe for a quality remake, this is it.

Fright Night (2011) tells the story of former high school nerd and current cool kid, Charley (Anton Yelchin).  You can tell that he's a cool kid, because he has a hot girlfriend, Amy (Imogen Poots) and the guys he hangs out with are douchebags.  Charley wasn't always this cool, though; not even two years ago, he was making his own sci-fi/fantasy-inspired armor and goofing around with the school's biggest dork, Ed (the perpetually nerdy Christopher Mintz-Plasse).  When Ed comes to Charley with the news that a suspicious amount of their classmates have vanished, Charley blows him off.  After all, he's a cool kid.  When Ed elaborates, presenting an argument that the disappearances center around Charley's neighbor's house, Charley ignores him.  When Ed outright states that Charley's neighbor, Jerry (Colin Farrell), is a vampire, that's when things start to get interesting.  Because Jerry is a vampire, and he is responsible for all the disappearances.  What do you do when your next-door neighbor is a blood-sucking monster?

A sexy blood-sucking monster who...loves fruit?

Well, I suppose you would want to move out and maybe rent out your place to a stranger.  But what kind of a horror movie would that make?

Aside from the fact that the supposedly teenage actors are all in their twenties, I liked the cast.  Anton Yelchin is fine as the not-as-cool-as-he-pretends-to-be lead character; he's not amazing or anything, but his job is to stand in contrast to the bad guy, which he does pretty well.  It helps that Colin Farrell turned in a pretty awesome vampire performance.  I'm usually confused when vampires are portrayed as seductive and sexy --- and this is most vampire movies, not just the new wave of teen flicks --- but Farrell felt dangerous and sleazy every second he was on camera.  He's just that perfect blend of sex and violence; while not my favorite style of vampire (I prefer the monstrous Nosferatu-types), Farrell might be the best update to the classic Dracula vampire I have seen in a long while.

I love when evil personified just seems mildly annoyed

Imogen Poots was decent as Charley's girlfriend and it was nice to see her as more than just a damsel in distress, but some of her choices are a little odd.  I don't blame Poots' performance, it is just that her character didn't always make sense ("my boyfriend is acting bizarre...perhaps I should offer to take his virginity?").  On the plus side, I have been amusing myself by saying her last name out loud.

Whisper softly in his ear: "Poooooots"

Christopher Mintz-Plasse is as dorky as ever, so don't expect much new from him.  He's a fine nerd, and was a good casting choice, but you basically know what you're getting when he pops up in a movie.  Toni Collette was third-billed in the film and played Charley's mother, but she was a surprising non-entity in the story.  She was only okay (I guess) for the few scenes she had early in the movie, and then her character all but vanishes.  I did like David Tennant as the Criss Angel-ish vampire expert.  He wasn't a bad-ass or anything, but this is a story that is better with incompetent experts.  Oh, and you might recognize the eyebrows of one of the popular kids at school --- that's Dave Franco, little brother to James.  And, not surprisingly, Chris Sarandon makes a cameo as a nod to the original film.  Of course he does; what else is he busy doing now?

Is that the werewolf from Underworld?

I think what I liked best about Fright Night was the fact that it didn't waste my time.  A kid thinks his neighbor is a vampire, the audience realizes he's right, and there is no time wasted on him trying to convince his mother, girlfriend or the police. That is brilliant!  Instead of pussyfooting around for a half-hour, asking "Why won't anyone believe my insane theory?", we are instead treated to Jerry the Vampire immediately opting to attack Charley and his family.  No muss, no fuss.  And I loved the general attitude Jerry has; he doesn't care about having his secret revealed, he's a killing machine that solves his problems with murder.

...and he gets turned on by death.  Makes sense.

That means that this movie has a lot of action, something very few vampire movies can boast.  While I know that a lot of what I like came from the screenplay, I really liked the general attitude of the movie, and for that I credit director Craig Gillespie.  There is some pretty great atmosphere in Fright Night, and he balances it well with humor.  It never gets campy or stupid, even when some bits lean a little too much toward ridiculousness.  This isn't the work of an auteur, but it's competent and pretty smart.

There is one glaring flaw in Fright Night, though: the vampires.  While Colin Farrell is pretty great, the CGI used to make him and his vampire minions vamp out was awful.  The filmmakers toy with the notion of the vamps being literal monsters --- as in, only vaguely humanoid --- but they don't commit to it, and it is never important in the story.  Instead, we are given scenes with Colin Farrell's head bulging and cracking as he develops a Predator-style food hole for reasons I can't fathom.  The vampires are at their best when they are being seductive or surprisingly scary, not when they are doing a bad impression of Resident Evil creatures.  Oh, and the twist with David Tennant's character was pretty lame.  I would have preferred it if the world wasn't that small, after all.

Guns don't kill people.  Vampires do.  And guns...kill vampires...?

The lack of cool special effects, coupled with the presence of awful special effects, prevents Fright Night from being a modern classic, but it is still very entertaining.  If you are tired of romantic vampires or if you want to see how to successfully take the camp out of a story, this is a good place to start.  This is also a good place to get your "cool vampire" fix for the next few months.  Good vampire movies are rare, and even rarer when they include this much action.

How to Train Your Dragon

Vikings are awesome.  Fact.  If I had to pick between a viking, pirate or ninja, I would just wait five minutes, because the Viking would undoubtedly cut the other two in half with a battle axe and then fashion a helmet from their skulls.  Like I said: awesome.  And their religion is just as bad-ass, even from the bits and pieces historians have been able to assemble (Vikings didn't write...unless it was in the blood of their enemies).  For instance, their head god, Odin, poked out his own eye to gain godly wisdom and hung himself from a tree for nine days with a spear in his side to learn magic.  And then, on his day of rest, he created the ultimate viking, and the man that Biblical Adam is loosely based on, Chuck Norris.  And then Odin punched Chuck Norris in the stomach so hard that his testicles popped out of their protective spot inside the pelvis; that is why all men now have their most delicate body part dangling, undefended, in the wind.

What does that have to do with How to Train Your Dragon?  It has Vikings in it, duh.

How to Train Your Dragon is loosely based on a series of books on the life and times of a (probably fictional) Viking named Hiccup (voiced by Jay Baruchel).  As his name implies, Hiccup is not much of a viking; while the others are brawny and mostly simple, Hiccup is skinny and cerebral.  His village, Berk, is frequently attacked and raided for livestock by a variety of dragons.  As such, the Vikings of Berk make a big deal about killing dragons.  Desperate to prove himself to the town and Stoick (Gerard Butler), the village leader (and Hiccup's dad), Hiccup tries to invent tools that will help him kill a dragon.  One night, Hiccup uses one of his inventions to knock down a member of the most feared dragon species of them all, the Night Fury.  Nobody believes him, though, so Hiccup tracks the dragon down and finds it helpless, still caught in his net.  Now, if Hiccup was a standard Viking, he would have cut out the dragon's heart to prove his victory to others, but Hiccup feels bad and instead releases the creature.  Obviously, the dragon kills Hiccup because dragons are evil creatures and the rest of the movie is about Stoick seeking revenge for his lost song --- WHAAA?!?  The dragon lets Hiccup live?  That flies in the face of everything the Berkians know about dragons!  I wonder if the brainy Hiccup will try to learn more about this dragon and somehow find a way to prove himself to his father and the village?

The voice acting is decent all-around, with Jay Baruchel doing double duty as both a character and the narrator.  The rest of the cast played exactly who you would expect them to play in a movie.  Christopher Mintz-Plasse plays a (Viking) nerd who spouts off Dungeons and Dragons (get it?) -style data (Attack +2, Armor +1, etc.) about every known dragon whenever he opens his mouth.  America Ferrera plays the "girls kick ass" love interest and Jonah Hill plays an obnoxious kid that should shut up more often.  Gerard Butler plays the rough-and-tumble Viking leader/father and Craig Ferguson voices the one-armed and one-legged dragon-killing instructor for the kids.  That's right...the two adults are both Scottish, and none of the children are.  Do these Vikings grow into their accents?  Is a Scottish burr a reward for reaching manhood?  Startlingly, these questions are never addressed in this film.  Aside from the peculiarity of the accents, everybody does a decent job.  Mintz-Plasse's recurring joke of a character was kind of funny, but the only real standout in the voice-acting department was Craig Ferguson, who was funny and surprised me with how well he handled the more dramatic moments. 


This movie was directed and co-written by Chris Sanders and Dean DeBois, both former Disney people whose highest profile work was on Lilo and Stitch and its subsequent direct-to-DVD sequels.  As far as the directing goes, they do a pretty good job, I think.  There are no outstanding voice performances, but the animation looks great and the story is told well enough.  I don't know why they opted to make Scottish Vikings with American children, but I doubt that bugs anyone but me.  And anyone viewing the film in Nordic countries. 

I liked the movie as entertainment for a child, but it wasn't great, certainly not to the tune of the $500+ million it made in theaters.  Yes, it's a cute story and dragons are cool, but the story lacks an emotional punch.  This is not too surprising, since Dreamworks Animation usually makes funny but vapid kids movies, but Dragon is a little different.  There isn't nearly as much comedy as you might think in this movie, but it doesn't drag despite that lack.  The film also deals with several potentially heavy topics; there is a fractured father-son relationship, the notion of being a social outcast, the importance of standing up for personal values, the power of group-think mentalities, the place of animals in our culture (friends vs. pets vs. prey), among other issues.  Don't worry, though --- How to Train Your Dragon might bring up these issues, but it doesn't develop any of them.  You would think that the emotional core of the film would center around Hiccup and his dragon, but it bounces around to his love interest and one scene with his father.  Deep, this isn't.  Still, dragons are cool and the movie is about seeing the dragons breathe fire and fly.  I don't think this is a bad movie --- kids should certainly enjoy it --- and it is certainly watchable by adults, but it's a little simple for my tastes.  And it loses some points for making Vikings with Scotsmerican accents.

There is also an animated short that goes along with the DVD, called The Legend of the Boneknapper Dragon.  This follows Hiccup and his friends as they try to help their teacher (Craig Ferguson) find a legendary dragon that nobody but he believes in.  The mini-film is mostly just Craig Ferguson telling stories to the kids, with traditional animation helping.  I thought this short, while predictable and repetitive, was much more entertaining than the feature film and proves, once again, that Craig Ferguson is a funny guy when he is not reading monologue jokes.

Kick-Ass

I love it when a movie comes out and a supporting character gets all the attention.  Remember how horrible and racist Jar Jar was?  Or how awesome and tragic Heath Ledger was as the Joker?  Kick-Ass has a supporting role that overshadows the main character in a similar fashion.

Kick-Ass is yet another adaptation of a comic book, although it doesn't have a lot of the common problems and strengths of that movie sub-genre.  For one, this is a comic that just finished its run in February of 2010.  Two months later, and here's the movie.  This isn't a longtime fan favorite, either; it only has four issues, and their release was spread out over two years.  Clearly, this is a film that was developed in coordination with the comic, which makes the adaptation less of a concern for fanboys.  Sure, some things were changed for the big screen, but they were relatively minor and make it more palatable for movie audiences.  Also, with so little source material, there is not the typical question of what plot or characters will be featured in the film.  In that, I applaud this movie.  It's faithful to the source material, but is willing to change enough to appeal to a broader audience.

That said, this is not a movie for everyone.  It is extremely violent, both in an over-the-top fun way and a viciously brutal way.  Which type of violence just depends on whether a good guy or bad guy is getting hurt at that moment.  One aspect of this violence that a lot of critics have seized upon is that the best over-the-top stuff comes from a then eleven (now thirteen) year-old girl.  I don't necessarily blame you if you don't find the notion of a teenage assassin awesome, but you're missing out on a lot of fun.

This movie stars Aaron Johnson as a typical semi-nerdy kid that is neither too smart or too popular.  One day, he realizes that nobody has ever tried to be a super hero in the real world.  His friends (Evan Peters and perennial nerd Clark Duke) reason that it is because A) super powers don't exist and B) anybody trying to fight crime while wearing a costume is destined for a beat down.  Not one to listen to logic, Johnson's character orders a wetsuit online and presto...!  the crime fighter Kick-Ass is born.  His first time out, though, Kick-Ass gets his ass kicked.  Once out of the hospital, though, he keeps at it and is eventually filmed doing his good deeds and becomes a Youtube sensation.  That's all fine and good, but Kick-Ass is a small-scale vigilante; he'll try to find your cat or break up a beat down, but he doesn't have the brains or skills to attack crime on a larger scale.  Kick-Ass influences others, though, including some that are on his skill level (like Christopher Mintz-Plasse, AKA Red Mist) and some of whom are way, way, way more qualified to take the law into their own hands than him.  In the latter category are the father-daughter team of Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage) and Hit-Girl (Chloe Moretz).  The movie really hits its stride when Kick-Ass gets mixed up with these two and sees how scary and violent comic book-style violence is in the "real world."

For the first half of the movie, viewers are going to be primarily focused on Kick-Ass and his problems with girls and being taken seriously as a hero.  Most of the time, you're supposed to be laughing at him or, at least, sympathizing with him.  To his credit, Aaron Johnson does a good job in this role.  Unfortunately, the movie doesn't feel deep enough to make you care a lot about him.  On the bright side, these scenes are still entertaining, but they're basically cinematic fluff.  Yes, it's funny seeing an ordinary person act so bizarrely in ordinary circumstances, but there's not really any emotional repercussions for any of the actions taken.  For a story that shows how people would react to a real-life superhero, the main motivation for Kick-Ass in naivety and boredom, which seems like it would run out very quickly.

That might sound like I didn't enjoy the movie, but that's just a fundamental problem I have with the story at its core.  This movie is a lot of fun, and it's almost entirely due to Hit-Girl.  Sure, Christopher Mintz-Plasse is good as Red Mist and the other teen actors Clark Duke and Lyndsy Fonseca (both from Hot Tub Time Machine) are fine; in particular, I enjoyed Red Mist and Kick-Ass rocking out to Gnarls Barkley in Red Mist's Mistmobile.  It's not a huge moment, but it's a cute touch.  Fonseca is better than most teenage actresses here, but her role isn't too demanding.  Clark Duke successfully portrays a slightly chubby nerd.  Again.  Mark Strong plays the movie's villain and makes a pretty good bad guy.  I don't know exactly what it is about him, but he doesn't come across as very nice.

But this isn't their story.  Kick-Ass is all about how a normal guy like Kick-Ass compares with Hit-Girl, who has been trained since birth to fight crime and kill criminals.  Chloe Moretz is fantastic in this role.   I'd tell you some of the things that she does and says, but the surprise is half the fun.  She kills lots of people in a uber-stylish comic book fashion and is very entertaining in the process.  Nicolas Cage delivers an awkward performance as her father and mentor, but even his William Shatner-esque dialogue cadence doesn't detract from the film.  The film isn't all fun and laughs, though.  When Kick-Ass, Hit-Girl or Big Daddy gets hurt, it is graphic.  There is a torture scene, and that is both gruesome and uncomfortable.  The worst shots (in terms of being hard to watch, not quality) feature Hit-Girl getting punched and kicked in the face by a grown man. 

The brutality is used to show some consequences for the characters' choices, but this isn't meant to be a cautionary tale.  It is fun, dumb, and very, very violent.  Director and co-writer Matthew Vaughn does a great job with the action in this movie and delivers the humor well, too.  The only problem is with the story itself.  By opting against a psychological profile of would-be superheroes, this movie turns up the fun but leaves the potential for heart behind.  That's not a bad thing, mind you.  Sometimes, there's nothing wrong with enjoying an eleven year-old girl take on organized crime.