RED (2010)

Written by Jonah & Erich Hoeber



Directed by Robert Schwentke



Where & When: Arclight Cinemas, Hollywood, CA. October 25, 2010  7:45PM



The "Red" in the title of this action-comedy film, that is based on a comic-book series, cleverly stands for "Retired, Extremely Dangerous".and this is referencing a group of retired, older CIA agents. This film is all about people in their golden years and there is not a young hipster in sight.

We meet Frank Moses (Bruce Willis), a retired, mild-mannered, middle-aged man living a quiet life, in a quiet suburban neighborhood. He doesn't have much going on in his personal life, so he begins a telephone relationship with Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker), a sweet representative with his pension office in Kansas City.

One evening, a squad of armed gunmen surround Frank's home and litter it with hundreds of rounds of gunfire but Frank is able to escape and take them all down without a scratch. The reason is because Frank is a former Black-Op CIA agent.

Frank knows that his house has been tapped, so he rushes off to Missouri to rescue Sarah. When he arrives, she is not exactly welcoming, so Frank has to use a little force to get her to accompany him out of the city.

Frank drags Sarah along with him as they travel across the country rounding up other fellow, retired agents to help him figure out who is trying to kill him. First, he visits New Orleans to see his mentor, Joe Matheson (Morgan Freeman), who is dying of cancer and living in a nursing home, which the highlight of his day is checking out the ass of a young nurse.

Next, he finds Marvin Boggs (John Malkovich), who after a bad LSD trip is now paranoid and a conspiracy theorist but is still able to gather his thoughts together long enough when needed. Frank also gets help from Ivan (Brian Cox), a Cold War, Russian agent and Victoria (Helen Mirren), who appears to be a genteel, British lady but who is actually prepared for any trouble by having an assault weapon hidden in her flower arrangement. She also had an affair with Ivan years ago but that ended after she had to put a few bullets in him.

The retired agents all team up to try to unravel this elaborate plot involving a secret mission in Guatemala, a list of people involved in that mission who are now being killed, a wealthy man (Richard Dreyfuss, more hammy than usual) who was also on that mission but, for some mysterious reason, is not on the list, plus the U.S. Vice-President (Nip/Tuck's Julian McMahon) somehow mixed-up in all of this, in addition to a CIA Agent (Karl Urban) assigned to track down Frank and take him down.

It's all nonsense but it's entertaining nonsense, none the less. "Red" offers nothing necessarily fresh to the action genre beyond the heroes all being of the age to collect Social Security but that is enough to make it novel and invigorating because every move the agents make come from a well thought-out, seasoned perspective. What I find most interesting about "Red" is that it dares to celebrate maturity which is really unusual for today's Hollywood film since most seem to cater only to people who think the 1985 Sylvester Stallone action flick,"Rambo II" is a really old movie. Perhaps this may be a trend because Stallone rounded up fellow, aging action stars and risked breaking hips to make the summer hit, "The Expendables" and that worked out very well for him.

Audiences do like nostalgia so, with a classy cast of established actors involved, it does make "Red" hip and shakes up the routine of the typical action film, somewhat. Of course, most of these actors are slumming, but who doesn't want to see Oscar-winning, Dame Helen Mirren shooting a gun? The actors all help the film by adding their special brand of style and star quality to these proceedings plus they all seem to be genuinely having a good time, so what's the harm?

"Red" is your basic thrill ride that is spiced up just enough with good humor and top-notch actors to make this a satisfying and fun film for all ages.

THE SOCIAL NETWORK (2010)

Written by Aaron Sorkin


Directed by David Fincher


Where & When: Vista Theater, Los Angeles, CA. October 3, 2010



I have to admit that I am probably one of only a handful of people on the planet who is not on Facebook. I have flirted with the idea of joining over the years but I always just wind up finding something better to do.

When I first heard that they were actually going to make a film about the creators of the friend-collecting, time-wasting site, I thought that watching some techie-geeks sitting around talking about computers and the girls that won't pay them any attention wouldn't be all that exciting.

How very wrong I was.

I was not really all that familiar with the origin of Facebook, but the film, "The Social Network" reveals a very fascinating story, indeed. Most especially in the hands of the brilliant film maker, David Fincher of "Se7en" (1995) and "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" (2008) fame and the very talented writer of "The American President" (1995) and the television show, "The West Wing", Aaron Sorkin who together made one of the most interesting and best films of the year.

We first meet Mark Zuckerberg, wonderfully played by Jesse Eisenberg, who is a student at Harvard, in the middle of a conversation with his girlfriend, Erica Albright (Rooney Mara). This exchange perfectly shows his brilliant mind and anti-social behavior but also clearly explains why Erica is breaking up with him.

Upset about being dumped, Mark storms back to his dorm room and after a few beers, decides to enact a little revenge. After posting a blog that bad mouths Erica, Mark then easily hacks into the school's database and downloads the names and pictures of the students. With the help of Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield), who is probably Mark's only true friend, comes up with a web page called "Facemash" that puts two female students pictures together to vote on which one is more attractive which he sends out throughout the campus. It becomes so popular that it causes the school's network to crash.

Mark is put on academic probation after he is caught and is a pariah with the female students but his work catches the attention of three upperclassmen. The Winklevoss twins, Cameron and Tyler (these characters were created with a computer with Arnie Hammer as the face of both twins and Josh Pence as the body used for one of the twins) and Divya Narendra (Max Mingella) approach Mark about creating a program for them that would connect the students at Harvard and call it "The Harvard Connection". Mark agrees to do it.

Later, Mark tells Eduardo about his idea to create a social network where people can share personal information without the worry of an invasion of privacy and he wants Eduardo to put up the seed money. Eduardo agrees and it is called, "Thefacebook". The site becomes very popular, very quickly throughout the school. Divya gets wind of  Mark's deception and tells the Winklevoss twins that they need to sue him for stealing their idea.

Soon Thefacebook expands to other universities and Eduardo and Mark have different ideas on how to have the site grow. Eduardo's girlfriend, Chrissy (Brenda Song) arranges a meeting with Napster founder, Sean Parker (Justin Timberlake). Sean is a fast-talker and very charismatic but Eduardo is not charmed and doesn't trust him but Mark is captivated. Sean gives his opinion about how the site should be handled which is very similar to what Mark wants to do but no deal between them had been decided. Sean does give some free advice, which is to drop "the" from the name of their website.

While Eduardo seeks advertising support in New York, Mark moves their operation to Palo Alto, California where he rents a house to work out of. Sean Parker happens to run into Mark and in no time, Sean has moved in to the house and helps make business decisions. Later, Eduardo arrives in California and is upset to find that Sean is living in the house but Mark tells him that they now have an informal investor, thanks to Sean.

Eduardo is soon deceived when Mark allows Sean to arrange to reduce his shares in the company from one third to less than one tenth of one percent and have his name removed as a founder. It's not too long after this that during a party for Facebook, Sean is busted with some underage interns for possession of cocaine. Not surprisingly, Mark is sued separately by Eduardo and the Winklevoss twins for what each thinks he stole from them.

The film is based on the book, "The Accidental Billionaires" by Ben Mezrich and although there was no involvement by any of the actual participants on the film, I find it interesting that no one in this story has come forward to claim that anything in "The Social Network" is not fairly accurate. Mr. Sorkin has taken the facts from this story and made a very sharp and clever script by vividly creating a semi-fictional account of the events while objectively showing each person's side of it. This will be the script to beat during award season.

After years as a successful music video director, Mr. Fincher made his first feature film, "Alien 3" in 1992. The film was a complete disaster but it did show his potential and he was fortunately given another opportunity which he has gone on to make some brilliant movies that include some of my favorites like "Fight Club" (1999), "Panic Room" (2002) and "Zodiac" (2007). His eighth, "The Social Network" is another solid film that is fast-paced, thought-provoking and highly entertaining. He is currently working on the English language re-make of "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" and although I still don't think it's necessary, I am looking forward in seeing what he will do with the material.

A great cast of young actors has been assembled which includes a surprisingly effective job by Mr. Timberlake. I always feel a little resistance to musicians who decide to become actors because normally they tend to be too obviously out of their element but in the right hands, they can sometimes deliver a really great performance. I don't know if this means Mr.Timberlake has a long film career ahead of him but he most certainly can be proud of this moment.

I always saw the potential in Mr. Eisenberg in all the films he has done, most especially "The Squid and the Whale" (2005) but this film has really given him a great opportunity to shine. He skillfully is able to have Mr. Zuckerberg come across as ambitious and complicated but also manipulative and deceitful while still not seeming like such a awful guy. It's a great performance and all the Oscar talk is not just hype.

"The Social Network" is the rare film that speaks to the youth of the digital age in a smart and insightful way. It is a clear reflection of the beginning of the way our society now communicates with each other and because of the anonymous nature of it, people no longer feel the need to consider the moral consequences of what they say or do over the internet. The film shows how technology can be used to add quality to our lives but also how it can be used, if we are not careful, to be very destructive.

2010 FALL MOVIE PREVIEW

Today is Labor day, which means that the summer movie season is officially over. Yes, some of the films made a lot of money (thanks, largely in part, to the extra fees added on for the 3-D movies) but there still seemed to be a decline in quality and audience attendance which I'm sure there is some sort of connection.

This was not a good season at all with (as usual) way too many sequels ("Sex And The City 2"), remakes ("The Karate Kid") or movies based on a comic book ("Jonah Hex"), television show ("The A-Team") or video game ("The Prince Of Persia"). Don't let me even get started on all of the 3-D movies ("The Last Airbender") that left me feeling more ripped off than anything else. The few original films ("Grown-Ups", "Salt", "Knight & Day") that came out certainly didn't amount to much because they were lacking in imagination and stayed very predictably inside of the box but I will have to give some credit to "Inception" because although I didn't think it was completely successful, it was certainly nothing like you have ever seen before.

Only a handful of the films released overall were actually any good ("Winter's Bone"; "The Kids Are Alright"), a few were just so-so at best ("Inception";"Iron Man 2"; "Toy Story 3") and the rest just stank up the theaters (too many to mention).

I'm glad that the fall movie season is about to begin. I prefer this time of the year because you certainly get a better quality and more interesting collection of movies. Well. . . I'm optimistic anyway.

Here are a few of the films that I'm looking forward to seeing in the upcoming months (All U.S. release dates are subject to change):

"THE TOWN"

Release date: September 17, 2010

Ben Affleck's second feature film as a director is this action crime thriller in which he also stars along with Jeremy Renner, Jon Hamm, Rebecca Hall and Chris Cooper.



"WAITING FOR SUPERMAN"

Release date: September 24, 2010

This is the latest by Davis Guggenheim, director of the Oscar winning 2006 documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth" in which he follows several students as they are trying to get a decent education in the American public school system.



"WALL STREET: MONEY NEVER SLEEPS"

Release date: September 24, 2010

Michael Douglas returns as Gordon Gekko in this sequel to the 1987 Oliver Stone Film with a new apprentice, Shia LaBeouf. Mr. Stone is also back as director and even Charlie Sheen makes a cameo appearance.



"THE SOCIAL NETWORK"

Release date: October 1, 2010

David Fincher, the director of such films as "Fight Club" (1999) and "Zodiac" (2007) has taken on the story about the founders of Facebook, the networking website and their legal battle for control. Jesse Eisenberg leads an ensemble cast with a script by Aaron Sorkin.



"RED"

Release date: October 15, 2010

I know this film is based on a comic book series but it doesn't seem like your conventional action flick. Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman and Helen Mirren star as retired agents forced back in to combat.