The Couch Potato Report – April 7th, 2012
Inside this week’s Couch Potato Report, the book of pure evil returns, we’ll buy a zoo, and then head to Chinatown.
April has arrived, and so has SEASON TWO of a made-in-Winnipeg television series about a group of high school students who confront the actions of a dark, demonic, self guided book.
This is TODD AND THE BOOK OF PURE EVIL.
Todd Smith is a high school stoner headbanger who – along with his would be girlfriend Jenny, his best friend Curtis, and the geeky Hannah – search for The Book Of Pure Evil, which grants the usually dark and sinister wishes of those who hold it.
The odd, not always likeable characters and cheesy humour won’t appeal to everyone but TODD AND THE BOOK OF PURE EVIL is very entertaining at times.
SEASON TWO is never great, but I liked it. It never takes itself too seriously, and it is fun and very clever at times.
We all have our favourite filmmakers, people whose work we enjoy through their good and bad releases, and one of mine is Cameron Crowe, the man responsible for writing FAST TIMES AT RIDGMONT HIGH and writing and directing SAY ANYTHING, SINGLES, JERRY MAGUIRE, ALMOST FAMOUS and now, the family film WE BOUGHT A ZOO.
Matt Damon stars as a recent widower who is looking for a fresh start for his family, and so he quits his job and moves his young son and daughter out of the city to a new house…one that just happens to be attached to a rundown zoo.
Scarlett Johansson co-stars as the zookeeper, and – along with her and the ragtag and eclectic group of employees – Damon struggles to get the place open again, and to put his family, and his own life, back together.
At times, WE BOUGHT A ZOO is a little too predictable and the storylines wrap up a little too conveniently, plus – even though it is based on a true story – there are some things that happen that I just didn’t buy.
However, when the film needs a little something to save it from itself, and it does need that on several occasions, Cameron Crowe’s fantastic writing takes over and saves it.
I love Cameron Crowe’s words and his work, and I really enjoyed WE BOUGHT A ZOO. It isn’t one of his best, but I can still easily recommend it.
Another favourite filmmaker of mine, is Steven Spielberg. No matter what he puts his name on, I will happily watch it…good or bad…and his latest is certainly more bad than good.
WAR HORSE is about a horse named Joey, and when we first meet him he is proudly owned by a young man named Albert. These two are inseparable, until World War I begins and Joey is sold to the army.
After Joey goes off to war, the film wants to be an epic adventure…a tale of incredible loyalty, hope, and tenacity…but it isn’t. It’s just boring, which is why I tend to refer to the movie as SNORE HORSE.
You see, Joey, the horse, is written as a mythical beast in the movie, surviving against all odds, changing and inspiring everyone he meets until Joey, the horse, is miraculously reunited with his beloved Albert once again!!
But at two-and-a-half hours, I didn’t buy into the reunion, and I certainly didn’t feel changed or inspired at all!! In fact, I have seen the film twice now, and all I’ve ever felt was bored.
SNORE HORSE…I’m sorry, WAR HORSE, is based on a 1982 children’s novel, and it has also been adapted into a Tony Award winning Broadway play, but the movie version just doesn’t work.
Yes, as he showed us with SAVING PRIVATE RYAN, Spielberg knows how to direct scenes that take place during war, so there are some great cinematic and emotional moments, just nowhere near enough of them.
I will always watch Steven Spielberg’s work, but I do not recommend you watch his latest. WAR HORSE is not worthy of your time, and certainly not two and a half hours of it!!
Just skip it.
Here are a trio of new releases now that have no connection to each other. Oh sure, I could find a way to connect them all together…some tenuous connection that would allow me to weave a thread between them…but I won’t waste your time doing that…this week. Instead, 1, 2, 3, here they are.
One…the less than great fourth season of TORCHWOOD – MIRACLE DAY.
Torchwood is a British science fiction series that is a spin-off from the long-running science fiction programme Doctor Who.
It follows the exploits of a small team of alien-hunters who deal with global events involving all kinds of extraterrestrials and the main character is Captain Jack Harkness, an immortal former con-man from the distant future.
Well, prior to MIRACLE DAY, he was immortal.
The main plot of MIRACLE DAY is that suddenly no one on Earth can die, which causes all sorts of problems around the world.
The remaining members of the now disbanded TORCHWOOD team – Captain Jack and Gwen Cooper – are recruited to join forces with the C.I.A. to try and find a cure.
The first two series of TORCHWOOD were great, but the series lost its focus in series three – also known as CHILDREN OF EARTH – and it only occasionally finds its footing again in MIRACLE DAY.
I love Captain Jack and Gwen Cooper, so when the program features them and stays close to its roots, it really works. But when it goes away from being a British action series, and becomes too much of an American one, it becomes predictable and cliché. Plus, it goes on for too many episodes, which occasionally results in a storyline that has no sense of urgency to it.
Ultimately TORCHWOOD – MIRACLE DAY has more good than bad, so I can recommend it…but only to science fiction fans.
Number two of three is ANGELS CREST, a made-in-Calgary and along the Crowsnest Pass in Alberta drama about a father who leaves his three year old son alone, sleeping, in a truck, while he goes hunting.
The son goes missing, and that story is terrifying, but the main problem with ANGELS CREST is that there are too many other stories told in the film…there are too many characters in it.
Plus, they are movie characters – never real people, movie characters – who all have predictable story lines that you won’t care about…unless they revolve around the boy.
ANGELS CREST has a very good cast – including Oscar winner Mira Sorvino – but it is absolutely nothing special and thus, not worthy of your time.
And number three…and this is third on a list of three, I don’t give it a rating of three, well, unless it was three out of 100…I might give it a three then.
But I don’t give numerical ratings, I either recommend a film, or suggest you skip it…and I absolutely think that you – and even your kids – should skip the third ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS movie.
This mess is called CHIPWRECKED.
I grew up with these characters, and I still love them, but for some reason the producers of the modern era films have yet to make a good movie with them…and that is certainly true here!!
In CHIPWRECKED, Alvin, Simon, Theodore and their female friends the Chipettes are misbehaving aboard a cruise ship and soon find themselves marooned on a deserted island, all while Dave searched for them.
ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS – CHIPWRECKED isn’t fun, it certainly isn’t funny, and even the choices of the songs they sing doesn’t work. Plus, at one point, it isn’t even original as it “borrows” a storyline from THE RESCUERS.
I don’t think even little kids will find anything of value here.
This is an awful, useless film.
Finally this week, one of the greatest films ever made. A movie selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”
Brand new on blu-ray, is 1974’s Academy Award winning classic CHINATOWN.
Part mystery and part psychological drama CHINATOWN was directed by Roman Polanski from an Oscar winning screenplay by Robert Towne. It stars Jack Nicholson as a private detective in 1930’s Los Angeles who is investigating an adultery case involving Faye Dunaway, who becomes involved in a murder plot full of deceit, corruption and treachery that has something to do with water.
CHINATOWN looks fantastic in High Definition and the disc comes with a wealth of extras, but the main reason to search it out is the film itself. The scenery is amazing, the acting fantastic, and the story will keep you interested right up until the end.
It simply is, one of the greatest films ever made!
The classic 1974 film CHINATOWN, the useless third ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS movie CHIPWRECKED, the nothing special made-in-Alberta drama ANGELS CREST, the very good mini-series TORCHWOOD – MIRACLE DAY, Steven Spielberg’s boring WAR HORSE, Cameron’s Crowe’s enjoyable WE BOUGHT A ZOO and SEASON TWO of the good at times made-in Winnipeg series TODD AND THE BOOK OF PURE EVIL are all available now, either on disc or on demand.
Coming up inside the next Couch Potato Report
THE TRUTH ABOUT CATS AND DOGS, THE BOY IN BLUE, the Australian film SLEEPING BEAUTY, and three-time Academy Award winner Meryl Street stars as Margaret Thatcher in THE IRON LADY.
I’m Dan Reynish. I’ll have more on those, and some other releases, in seven days.
For now, that’s this week’s COUCH POTATO REPORT.
Enjoy the movies and I’ll see you back here again next time on The Couch!