Lincoln

Steven Spielberg and Daniel Day-Lewis working together on a film about one of the greatest Americans that ever lived?  Yeah, that sounds like a prestige picture.  Lincoln boasts not only (arguably) the best director and (unarguably) the best actor working in Hollywood right now, but one of the greatest supporting casts ever assembled for a simple (read: not epic) film.  Of the ten top-billed actors on Lincoln's IMDb page, there are a total of 16 Oscar nominations (with 6 wins) and 28 Golden Globe nominations (with 5 wins); only Bruce McGill has not been nominated for an Oscar or Globe.  If you wanted acting credibility, you got it in spades with Lincoln.  But does the movie live up to its pedigree?

Lincoln is a tad deceiving as a title; this isn't so much a biopic as it is a chronicle of President Abraham Lincoln's (Daniel Day-Lewis) struggle to get the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution passed while simultaneously ending the Civil War, the bloodiest war Earth had seen up to that point.  For those of you who are not history buffs (America, I'm looking at you), the 13th Amendment made slavery illegal in the United States.  Sure, Lincoln had freed all the slaves with his Emancipation Proclamation, but the legal grounds by which he did so were shaky, at best.  Lincoln wanted to ensure that his actions had some sort of long-lasting effect that would not be overturned in a court of appeals.  It's a pretty cool thing to be the guy who freed the slaves, but nobody wants to be the guy who freed the slaves only long enough for them to bleed in battle for him. 

Even a great hat can't distract from that, Mr. President

Unfortunately, his window of opportunity was closing fast.  The Confederacy was weakening.  It was only a matter of time before they were completely defeated.  But once the Confederate states rejoined the Union, the chances of passing an anti-slavery amendment would be nil.  Not only would there be pro-slavery Southerners voting, but much of the support for anti-slavery legislation was garnered from the belief that repealing slavery would end the war faster; with the war over, racism would win the day.  That left Lincoln with one chance.  Assuming everyone in his political party would vote for him (which was a stretch), the 13th Amendment was still a few votes shy of passing --- but there were several men in the opposing party that had lost their elections and were just waiting to be replaced.  If Lincoln's men could convince enough of these lame ducks --- and his own party --- to vote for the amendment, history could be made.  And, as luck would have it, there was one more date available for a Congressional vote before all the peace hits the fan!

"What will it take to get your vote?  A threesome is not off the table."

The acting in Lincoln is, not surprisingly, excellent.  Daniel Day-Lewis is THE thespian stud of our times, and he brought his A-game here.  Day-Lewis went against the traditional interpretation of the character by making him slouch, feel old, and speak with a soft tone, but he also managed to demand all of the attention in every scene he was in.  As luck would have it, that is practically every single scene in the film.  I think some of my favorite moments were the scenes where he relied on nonverbals.  This is a fairly talky character, so having the quiet moments as highlights is just a testament to Day-Lewis' acting prowess.

Example: right here, Lincoln was this close to killing everyone in a 30 foot radius

Leading the exemplary supporting cast was Tommy Lee Jones, who played a perennially cranky character.  Shock!  I love it when Jones gets a role that lends itself to his acerbic delivery, and this is easily one of his best.

Sally Field played Mrs. Mary Todd Lincoln, who is known historically for being a bit crazy.  Field managed that well enough, but I didn't think her role was anything special.

Buck up, Sally.  Sulking is not attractive in any time period.

Despite that, Field did a lot with the part and was surprisingly magnetic onscreen.  David Strathairn was good as the eternally exasperated William "I Heart Alaska" Seward.  He didn't really have much room to grow as a character, but served well as a mouthpiece to the logistics Lincoln was facing.  James Spader, John Hawkes, and Tim Blake Nelson played the three men tasked with drumming up support among the opposition; all three are fine actors, but I would have preferred it if Spader wasn't the one doing most of the work here.

Spader, realizing that this role has nothing to do with deviant sex acts

Hal Holbrook was fine as an obstacle for Lincoln to overcome, although I think this role was a little underdeveloped.  Speaking of which, Joseph Gordon-Levitt was a waste of space as Lincoln's eldest son.  One of these days, JGL will play a big role in a big movie --- it's inevitable, given his talent and the people he works with --- but the whiny, over-privileged son of the president is not that role.

"What if I tried pouting more?"

Rounding out the cast, Lee Pace was solid in the strawman role of "that really racist guy."  This is the first time I have seen Pace play an unlikable character, and he did so reasonably well.

Lincoln was the result of director Steven Spielberg teaming up with Tony Kushner, king of the difficult-subject-screenplay.  With regards to the direction, Spielberg nailed all the technical aspects.  Design, costumes, filling the cast with nary a bad actor, etc. --- Spielberg is too big of a director to accept anything but the best in these regards.  While he has never been the strongest director in terms of cinematography, Spielberg still managed to snag several memorable shots of an American icon.

He also handled the actors quite well.  Having a great cast obviously helps with that, but Day-Lewis, Jones, and Field were all deserving of their award nominations, and Spielberg was ultimately responsible for that. 

I think Kushner did a solid job with the plot and the dialogue.  Both Lincoln and Thaddeus Stevens (Tommy Lee Jones) had some fantastic lines, and transforming this political issue into an interesting story was an impressive feat.  Lincoln is missing something, though.  I want to say that it is something immaterial, like "heart," but I can do better than that.  This is a smart script, no doubt.  It is just not an emotional one.  American culture has reached a point where racism is justly vilified.  It definitely still exists, but racists are generally acknowledged as assholes, as they should be. 

"Amend that.  It should read 'total fucking assholes'"

This might have been a brave film as late as 1975, but in 2012, the subject matter isn't compelling enough on its own.  This needed an emotional anchor to twist the audience's stomach in knots while we waited for the inevitable, and that was lacking.  There were some attempts.  Thaddeus Stevens' change of policy was intriguing, but underdeveloped.  Abraham and Mary Todd shared a scene where they got to bare their souls, but it wasn't nearly enough to warm an otherwise cold story.

"You act like a little culture will kill you!"

The fault is not Kushner's alone, of course.  Lincoln has been Spielberg's baby for years, and he managed to put out a smart, well-acted and -directed film without that crucial element that makes you cry at the end.

I was expecting a lot from Lincoln, and only got most of what I hoped for.  This is technically a better film that Spielberg's last effort, War Horse, but that movie drew me in, despite my objections.  Lincoln is more cerebral, but leaves emotions at the door, and that turned out to ultimately be a mistake.  Even without something tugging at my heartstrings, it is hard to dismiss Daniel Day-Lewis reinventing an American icon.  With all the good and the not-quite-bad, Lincoln gets

The Amazing Spider-Man

Twenty-three years ago, the modern comic book movie genre was invented with Tim Burton's Batman.  Aside from the Batman franchise, though, not a whole lot good came out of the success of that first film over the next decade.  It wasn't until 2000's X-Men that we started to see that initial promise start to blossom; it wasn 2002's Spider-Man, however, that made the super-hero movie into the Summer juggernaut that it is today.  I will admit that I absolutely love the first Spider-Man.  It was fun, dramatic, campy, and had a great cast.  Not necessarily an all-star cast, but they fit the tone perfectly.  To this day, I can't hear the Lord's Prayer without adding "Finish it!" in a Green Goblin voice.  Spider-Man 2 is a better story with a less ridiculous villain; it is up to your personal tastes as to which movie is preferable.  Spider-Man 3, though, is utter crap.  However bad that last entry was, though --- "laughably bad" is too generous --- only five years have passed since its failure and this series reboot.  Well, let's be honest --- there was going to be a reboot no matter how good the third movie was.  The question remains, how necessary is this movie?


Okay, that's not a bad trailer.  It really grabs that portion of the audience who have always thought "Enough of this Spider-Fellow, what about his parents?" 

I have some bad news for all those audience members who were hooked by the mystery of the Parker Parents.  This movie doesn't answer any of the questions that trailer raises.  Sorry.  Instead, The Amazing Spider-Man introduces us to Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield), a slightly nerdy high schooler with a taste for skateboarding and photography.  Peter isn't the coolest kid around, but he's not unpopular, either.  He is, though, very bright.  When Peter accidentally finds a briefcase belonging to his mysterious late father, he uncovers some scientific papers detailing the possibilities of cross-species genetic bonding; in other words, Pete's dad was interested in splicing animal genes with human genes.  Looking into his father's research leads Peter to Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans), who was Richard Parker's one-armed research partner.  Unfortunately, Peter doesn't introduce himself right away; instead, he sneaks into Connors' research facility and gets bitten by a genetically enhanced spider.  Almost immediately, Peter realizes that he now has super spider-powers.

Including the ability to pick on handicapped jocks

After reading up on (and understanding) his father's research, Peter decides to share part of it with Dr. Connors.  This leads to a typical comic book situation: an otherwise very intelligent person opts to test an experimental treatment on themselves because it is too dangerous for others.

Yeah.  Astonishingly stupid.  I know.

Connors introduces a reptile gene splice to his system and he turns into a giant, intelligent Lizard because, you know, comic books.  Meanwhile, Peter has harnessed his super abilities to become a costumed vigilante.  Why?  Because that's what you do when you're a moody teenager and your actions indirectly lead to your Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen) dying.  I believe it was Ben's dying wish that Peter get shot at by the police while wearing spandex.

Note: Uncle Ben never actually liked Peter

While all this is happening, Peter is also getting himself awkwardly entangled in a teenage romance.  The smart, sexy, and apparently allergic to pants Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone) finds herself strangely drawn to the ridiculously awkward Peter, especially once his super-powers give him the confidence to be kind of a jerk.

Seriously, no pants, just skirts.  That's not a complaint.

In typical Parker luck, Gwen's dad (Denis Leary) happens to be a Captain on the NYPD and he is handling the case of the costumed vigilante, Spider-Man.  So, to recap: Peter gains super-powers by trespassing, indirectly leads to the death of his uncle, directly leads to Dr. Connors mutating himself, finds a girlfriend, and his girlfriend's dad is hunting down Pete's alter-ego. 

...which isn't hard if you don't wear a mask

The acting in The Amazing Spider-Man is surprisingly good.  I mean, yes, the caliber of actors is very solid here, but the performances are good, given the material.  As far as I can tell, this is the first real starring role for Andrew Garfield, and I really liked his take on Peter Parker.  His awkwardness around Gwen bordered on mild retardation, but aside from that I thought he was believable as A) a teen B) a smart teen and C) a smart teen who would throw on pajamas and fight crime.  Oddly, his best moments as Spider-Man came with his mask off.  And I liked that they didn't bulk Garfield up too much for this part; it was nice to see a lanky Spider-Man, in line with the whole "Puny Parker" lines from the 1960s comics.  Emma Stone definitely impressed me as Spidey's love interest.  It was nice to have a female lead in a superhero movie that wasn't vapid or whiny.  I would have liked to see more of Stone and Garfield together on-screen, because they have good chemistry, but the script kind of forces them into intimacy and that felt rushed.

Tending gaping chest wounds = sexxxy

Rhys Ifans was fine as Dr. Curt Connors.  He wasn't great, but he played up to the script well enough.  Unfortunately, that script didn't make him a particularly effective villain, for reasons I'll detail later.  Martin Sheen and Sally Field played Peter's Uncle Ben and Aunt May, respectively, and they were definitely solid.  I liked Sheen, but was surprised at how unimportant Field felt in the overall plot.  Denis Leary was okay as a hard-line cop, I guess; he was intimidating enough as Gwen's dad, but it's not like his role was all that demanding.  I was genuinely surprised to kind of like Chris Zylka as Pater's bully, Flash.  Zylka wasn't fantastic, but his character actually seemed human and multifaceted, and at least some of the credit belongs to the actor.  That's it for the important performances.  There were a couple of noteworthy/bewildering bit parts, though.  Irrfan Khan played a vaguely sinister henchman to an otherwise absent Norman Osborn, which is fine, but I would have preferred that he actually seemed mean instead of a bureaucratic jerk.  Campbell Scott shows up with Embeth Davidtz as Peter's parents and they don't do very much.  I kept expecting them to do more than look concerned in flashbacks, but no.

I was also waiting for Wesley Snipes to kill Edgar Friendly, but again, no.

This is only director Marc Webb's second feature film, after the too clever but charming 500 Days of Summer.  This is an interesting follow-up, to say the least.  A lot of focus in the advertising campaign for The Amazing Spider-Man was spent on the web-slinging scenes, specifically the point-of-view sequence.  That was justifiable, since those were both pretty cool.  Webb's biggest strength, though, was definitely the character work.  I thought Garfield's performance was very good and the relationships Peter forms in the film, while rushed, still felt genuine. 

In this case, genuine confusion

One of the things that I liked best about this movie was the script.  It wasn't fantastically witty or remarkably paced --- honestly, I think it tried to fit in a few things too many and there were too many cliches --- but I loved the overall feel of it.  In a lot of superhero movies, the hero stands up to the villain because...well, because nobody else can.  Here, it is because Peter feels responsible for the villain.  I also liked the shift toward a more tightly-knit Spider-Man universe (Spideyverse?), with everything appearing to tie into Norman Osborn.  Heck, I even liked the choice to not show Osborn in the film; the Green Goblin is the best Spider-Man villain and deserves to be built up to.  I was happy to see the story keep Peter in high school, because it makes his life that much more complicated.  I liked the little things that made Peter's invention of his web-shooters less improbable, too.

Not likely, but less unlikely

Basically, I liked the idea behind The Amazing Spider-Man.  It is significantly different than Sam Raimi's trilogy and actually deserves to exist and be appreciated.  They could have waited more than five years before rebooting the franchise, but this is still a fun and pleasant surprise.

Having said all that, this is still only my third-favorite Spider-Man movie.  My biggest problem is the villain, Dr. Connors/The Lizard.  Before the transformation, Dr. Connors was a pretty nice character with a very subtle undercurrent of something disturbing or desperate.  That undercurrent never really becomes more pronounced as the film goes on.  That would be fine, expect for the fact that he is the villain of the damn movie.  I didn't like the choice to make the Lizard persona highly intelligent; I honestly would have preferred The Lizard be more of a physical threat that Spider-Man had to outsmart.  I didn't like that The Lizard's evil plan was to transform normal humans into reptile people, which is bad because...um...it leads to sitcoms?

Actually, we don't see much of anything bad happening to the people who are transformed. If we saw reptile-people mindlessly tearing up Queens or serving as The Lizard's loyal army, I could see the threat.  The way it is presented in this movie is as an inconvenience; one minute, people are transforming, the next they are recovering from the transformation and being happy.  The film goes to such great lengths to establish Peter's sense of responsibility, but the personal threat The Lizard poses to him simply is not very compelling.  I also hated his lizard face.  Terrible design.

Bars can only improve The Lizard's appearance

And then there's the action.  While the web-swinging was fun, a lot of the action sequences --- particularly the ones with Peter Parker doing things out of costume --- were not that cool.  They added a little comic relief, sure, but they were oftentimes too over-the-top for my taste (anything with Peter and sports, I'm looking at you).  Another issue that ties into the action sequences is the inconsistent CGI effects.  As good as Spider-Man looked when traveling around the city, I was not very impressed by him in the battle sequences, particularly the final fight.  The scenes aren't bad, but they lacked the essential cool factor that fight scenes need.  I thought the fight scenes paled in comparison to some of the more creative small moments, like the cleverness of Spidey's web in the sewers.  I also saw this in 3D and I can assure you that the 3D is completely useless in this movie, save for the truly awful freeze-frame ending.

So how does Amazing compare to Raimi's Spider-Man?  It's not as good because it doesn't deliver the complete package.  Amazing has a better cast with an overarching story that promises to be better than that of the adjective-less trilogy and a Peter Parker that doesn't feel dated and stereotypical.  But Raimi's movie came out swinging and didn't hold back the best characters for a future installment.  The film, as a whole, is also less fun; I know for a fact that I have quoted Willem Dafoe dozens of times from that first film, but there is no single character that I loved this time around.  Still, The Amazing Spider-Man managed to make me not resent its existence and I enjoyed watching it.  Who knows?  With a proper villain, the next sequel might be the best Spidey film yet.

Oh, if you have any theories who the mystery man in the credits sequence was, leave a comment.  I own a few hundred Spider-Man comics, and even I can't make a convincing argument for any particular character.  What a waste of a teaser scene.