Movie-rama
Mar. 25th, 2005 06:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
delgaSpoilers for Miss Congeniality: 2 and Constantine ahead.
Miss Congeniality 2
First off? Enrique Murciano is so very sweet. I adore him.
Now onto the movie itself. I will openly confess that I liked the first movie; yeh, it’s basic but it was funny and it was entertaining and mildly touching. The second movie just doesn’t have the same pizzazz (sp?) but even so, the second half had me laughing so it wasn’t so bad. The first half, frankly, had me bored. It was a weep-fest and Sandra Bullock was just annoying. The character was a goddamn robot. I loved Regina King; she was brilliant. I thought her character was he most consistently funny and it’s not even as though the character was always supposed to be. Yeh, ok, Gracie Hart is a klutz but Sam Fuller’s an agent who’s trying to do her job.
The end sequence was really well done. From the stupid Tina-Turner-drag deal to the underwater scene, the film really picked up pace. Poor Foreman! Dude, Elisabeth Rohm (yeh, she made a meagre appearance) doesn’t deserve you!
I guess I’d recommend it for a laugh; wait for it to come on TV, though. Don’t actively seek it out (like me).
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Constantine
Wow, this movie was peculiar. For the first half hour, I didn’t totally understand what it was about, regardless of the fact that I’d seen the trailer about three times this morning. So saying that, I do recommend that people go out and see it. You just won’t get the same effect if you see it at home.
I guess it’s a little hit-and-miss because it tries to be many things but it also tries not to be a lot of other things. As a result, the film seems somewhat aimless at points. Sometimes the story isn’t subtle, it’s oblique; at others it aims for suspense and misses. But the story itself (once you get there) is intriguing; we’ve all seen Buffy or League of Extraordinary Gentleman or, for fuck’s sake, Hellboy and Van Helsing types. We’ve all seen films about good vs. evil and the battle between heaven and hell. We all understand the fundamental elements of these movies, regardless of how well they’re done (Hellboy and Van Helsing are examples of when the story is weak; Buffy is an example of when it’s romanticised; the Angel finale is a fairly good example of what happens when the story is left to its own devices); we all understand the basic structure. We have the tortured, reluctant hero, the damned heroine, the bad guy, the evil minions and the prerequisite ‘Scooby gang’ (most of whom are death-doomed).
Constantine is different.
Yes, ok, demons, angels. Hell, heaven. The fight over a man’s soul. But there’s something else there that I’m not quite able to pinpoint. Maybe it’s the audacity to make Gabrielle one of the fallen; maybe it’s the idea that the highest force doesn’t care as much as everyone thinks. Maybe – just maybe - it’s the fact that Constantine’s battles are frightening in the sense of what he has relinquished. He’s not fighting for the greater good – fuck that! Constantine is a man, he’s very human. He’s fighting because he’s been cast out of heaven for committing suicide. John Constantine is doomed to eternal damnation and the demons want him. They want to shred him to pieces. Constantine is fighting for redemption – nothing else. Not a lost memory, not because he’s been chosen. He’s fighting out of selfishness and damn is that refreshing.
Keanu Reeves’ interaction with Tilda Swinton’s Gabriel is brilliantly executed; the very casting of Swinton is pure genius. She’s wonderful. Getting a woman to play Gabriel is fantastic too because it underscores that nature of the angelic, that form they hold. Brilliant. Rachel Weisz was an interesting choice; she has this dark, gypsy-esque beauty to her that reminds me of a less decadent Catherine Zeta-Jones. I liked the idea of her and the twin; this was so underused. Imagine the range of possibility! The same goes for the priest-guy who was killed (that’s my sore point; it was too circuitous). There was space for her character to have depth and whilst the first half made sense, she was redundant thereafter. So so glad that she wasn’t stuck to Constantine’s face. I loved the whole water imagery (personal bias, methinks); I loved the dream imagery at the beginning. Really raw. I’m absolutely fanatical about the bible idea; the second coming, not so much but I was also terribly fond of the idea that the devil and god were somewhat hands-off. I thought that was great, really, really great. The bugs? Didn’t care so much. The film was not frightening – it wasn’t supposed to be. It was supposed to be a little startling, I think, but it missed. A lot of the underlying humour linked in with the mytharc and that was sorely underused too.
Do you know what else was a nice touch? Balthazar. Sorely underused as an element though; imagine the power play there between him and Gabriel. That could have been so much stronger. I can only imagine how Swinton and Rossdale would have handled any interactions but I’m sure it would have been strong.
I do think people should go and see it; I actually want to see it again, this time with a pad of paper and a pencil so I can take notes. There is so much potential here for religious fiction that my head is exploding. The boundaries the story pushes are superb. I just wish it had gone that much further and pushed them. You had all this content about sin and the repercussions of suicide; all this potential Catholicism to delve into and the film completely bypassed it for the more mundane. (Imagine what they could have done with the Constantine-introduces-Angela-to-hell concept; what repercussions would that have had on him??)
One last thing: yay nicorette! I loved that; made me laugh out loud. I also think I found this more funny than I was supposed to but I have an obscure sense of humour.
Overall, the idea behind the film really caught my mind. It needed more delicate handling, I think but it's worthwhile all the same.
no subject
Date: 2005-03-27 07:14 am (UTC)Aw, me too! Even if he is such a dork in this flick.
Yeh, ok, I'll admit it. It was funny. In a five-year-old sort of way. Love the drag, baby!
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Wasn't it just?
Definitely.
You know I'm not usually into this sort of thing; I was not huge on the Buffy/Angel movement and I'm not a Charmed fan or Hellboy or whatever. I don't even like Count Dracula. But this is different because it's about all the things that really get to me (and you, as I know).
All the religious imagery is fantastic especially the sense of sin and the concept that sin isn't what you think it is. I love that. I adore it, in fact. I really think that's worth the while.
And anyway, Swinton as a man? Bring it on.
no subject
Date: 2005-03-27 07:16 am (UTC)*giggles*
But yeh, I agree with everything you said. I think it's my over-obsession with the concept of sin which made me like it so damn much and Swinton totally rocked my socks. .
The film was good but couldn't it have been so much better if they'd cut out the middleman bullshit?
no subject
Date: 2005-03-28 02:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-28 08:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-28 08:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-28 08:41 am (UTC)