REVIEW: Dr. Strange

Marvel's strangest, loosest, and weirdest film to date, Dr. Strange, has arrived in time to reinvigorate the "Marvel Cinematic Universe."  While the character of Dr. Strange has been around since 1963, there seem to be far fewer fanboys to serve with this picture.  This is truly a one-and-done type of comic book movie requiring nearly zero familiarity with the minutia of the comic books.  For a casual filmgoer looking for spectacle, Marvel has really delivered.

Benedict Cumberbatch adopts a somewhat-odd American accent to play Dr. Stephen Strange, a brilliant-yet-prickly neurosurgeon whose hands are severely damaged following a car accident.  Strange alienates the only person who can stand him and squanders his fortune looking for a medical solution to save his battered hands and to allow him to return to life as he knew it.  In desperation, Strange (a logical, non-believer) travels to Nepal looking for a sacred temple which may hold the key to helping him heal.

Instead of medical salvation, he finds there a group of mystical monk-like warriors trained in magic who can access and harness an "infinite multiverse."  He travels through blacklight posters found on 1970s college dorm walls and through M.C. Escher-like kaleidoscope worlds of fantasy.  The visuals are stunning and there is just enough malarkey and gobbledegook to keep it all humming along quickly.  Don't think about it too much, just enjoy it.  Cumberbatch goes along for the ride and injects his wit and sarcasm in equal measure to keep the ride from becoming a drag.

The villain, played with very cool and moody eye make up by Mads Mikkelsen won't be a fan favorite and his plan, to allow the earth to be engulfed by a universe destroying dark force, is both forgettable and terrifically generic.  But Mikkelsen does his best to sell it.  With what he was given, he tries.  Certainly he succeeds where the villains from Thor: The Dark World or Iron Man 2 or most other Marvel entries have failed.  Tilda Swinton (the center of this film's white washing concerns) imbues her character, The Ancient One, with the right amount of wisdom and spry humor.  

The third act is one of the most successful of any Marvel movie.  It avoids the "too muchery" that has cursed most of the series.  The action is intense and satisfying, the music adds to the picture (a rarity for Marvel), and the tool which Strange uses to destroy the galactic threat is hilarious and one that we all can harness at will.  The obligatory (2!) post-credit scenes hint at Dr. Strange's involvement in the larger Marvel film franchise.  On its own this film is fun, thrilling, and brimming with spectacular imagery.  Once we take Strange and graft him into an Iron Man movie, I have doubts about whether that will work as well.  Check this solo picture out while you can.  See it on a big screen with great sound.

What works:

• The visuals and action.  Trippy, like Dali channeling the Matrix.
• The humor.
• The lack of connectivity to other Marvel movies.

What doesn't:

• Cumberbatch's accent.
• The villain, despite Mikkelsen's admirable efforts.

Brass Tacks:

Worth your time.  Grab some munchies, hit a bean bag chair, and drift off into the multiverse.  A-

REVIEW: Captain America: Civil War

Before reading this review, ask yourself: Have I seen all of the other Marvel films?  Am I confident that I remember who Hank Pym is?  Or Brock Rumlow?  Or do I remember what happened in Avengers: Age of Ultron (i.e. Avengers 2, or the "The Avengers Film Which Shall Not Be Named or Remembered" - our review here)?  Am I interested in sticking with the Marvel Cinematic Universe for the next several pictures featuring Black Panther, the Avengers, Ant-Man and The Wasp, or Sony's Spider-Man reboot?  If the answers to any of those questions was "no," you are likely to struggle with Captain America: Civil War.  There is a lot to like about the movie, but to casual viewers or newer fans this one may be a confusing, bloated mess.

Ok, so actually it will feel bloated to everyone.  This movie is huge.  And, to be fair, it is much closer to being Avengers Part Three than to Captain America Part Three.  Captain America provides some of the drive for the story but the whole team, and then some, is on display in this nearly two and a half hour picture.  

The story is straight-forward: the Avengers, after their exploits in the last several movies in which many innocent people have been killed, are asked to sign documents stating that they will no longer remain independent heroes.  They will, instead, report to the United Nations and be sent to respond to situations as the council sees fit.  Iron Man, overcome with guilt and after losing his girlfriend, thinks this is a sound idea.  Captain America, who found out that his bosses at S.H.I.E.L.D. were actually Hydra terrorists in his last movie, smells a rat.  The two divvy up the rest of their "enhanced" friends (remember, Fox owns the rights to the word "mutant" for the X-Men franchise) to take sides and end up walloping each other.  

Let's focus on what went well.  The action, especially fights featuring Chris Evans' Captain America or Sebastian Stan's Winter Soldier, is intense.  The up-close, hand-to-hand fighting recalls some of the better Bourne films ramped up to eleven.  Without lasers or a magical hammer to swat foes away like flies, these two super soldiers need to dish out knuckle sandwiches left and right and they make any object nearby a dangerous weapon.  In the scenes where these two are fighting either each other or in close quarters with others, this movie kicks serious ass.  Also, Chadwick Boseman's Black Panther and his portrayal of Prince-turned-King T'Challa are more than a glorified cameo or commercial for his 2018 solo film.  He delivers a nuanced performance and his fighting style, again close up and personal, delivers action.

I will also credit the filmmakers for combining so many styles and characters.  They took an extremely serious picture filled with major, life and death ideas and political stances, and somehow found room for Paul Rudd's Ant-Man who starred in Marvel's funniest and lightest movie.  On the other hand, the inclusion of Spider-Man in order to establish him and to set up Sony's reboot, is a blatant tack-on/corporate synergy-directed move (even though Spider-Man is handled fairly well here).  

The biggest problem on display with this picture is one that Marvel has faced for several years: The Villain Problem.  Other than Tom Hiddleston's Loki (the villain in Thor and Marvel's The Avengers), they cannot seem to flesh out a compelling villain.  This movie drives that point home by making the main villain such a wuss that his big plan is to get the Avengers to fight themselves.  They do, by the way, several times and to great CGI effect.  But when the good guys are fighting the good guys, the stakes are never very high.  Marvel would never let Captain America kill Iron Man or have The Scarlet Witch decapitate Black Widow.  As an audience member, you know that they'll kiss and make up in order to save the world in the next picture.  In fact, the villain problem is so severe here that Rumlow/Crossbones (Frank Grillo, so tough in the Winter Soldier) commits suicide in the first ten minutes and the main villain ALSO attempts suicide before the film is done.  Even they don't think they're doing a very good job as villains.  

Honestly - this is the villain.  I mean...

Characters in this film make wild leaps in logic, show up where they couldn't possibly know to show up (and do so in record time), they issue "shoot to kill" orders based upon a single grainy photograph, and vow murderous/vigilante revenge while at the summit designed to get the Avengers to allow themselves to be overseen by the U.N.  (Does no one grasp that a character on the anti-Avengers-vigilante side IS HIMSELF a vigilante?  Actually, there's never a scene of the U.N. asking team Iron Man to do anything at all so they're actually all vigilantes the whole time.  Ugh.)

Chris Evans' Steve Rogers grounds the argument and his confliction over splitting the team.  And his chemistry with Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, and Scarlett Johansson is impressive.  The relationships between those characters feel fleshed out and natural allowing for both genuine humor and real warmth.  Most other characters, specifically Paul Bettany's Vision, are a different story.  Why does Vision care?  And why does anyone care that Vision has signed the document allowing the Avengers to have government oversight.  Vision, as you will no doubt recall from Avengers: Age of Ultron, is a super-powered, computerized artificial intelligence which has been grafted into a vibranium body by a mystical and magical "infinity stone" which is embedded in his head (got all that?).  It's like your phone's Siri come to life by magic and we are supposed to care that he has signed a legal document.  He also dresses like a husband from Desperate Housewives Season One.  Also, the events in Sokovia (forever pronounced and thought of as "SUCK-ovia") from Avengers: Age of Ultron drive too much of this story.  That film was a dud and the whole Sokovia plotline so bad that it actively detracts from this picture to have to reference it so much.

What works:

• The action.  
• Chris Evans and the chemistry between him and his co-stars.
• The fight scenes between the heroes, while ultimately harmless, are done well and provide a cathartic thrill.  
• The humor is light and there's just enough of it to prevent the film from becoming bogged down into Batman Vs Superman territory.  

What doesn't:

• The villain problem.
• The reliance on "SUCK-ovia" 
• General bloating and swelling

Brass Tacks:  It's a definite improvement over Avengers: Age of Ultron but not as strong as Captain America: Winter Soldier.  Cap deserved better - and so do we. B+

Seriously, look at Vision.  Take him seriously dressed like that.  Why????

REVIEW: Guardians of the Galaxy

Reviewed by Danny Sarnowski

Let me start by saying I have no affinity, nor deep-seated childhood love for the Guardians of the Galaxy.  Be wary of anyone who claims that they do.  While there must be someone out there who has been buying and reading the comic books these characters are based upon for the last several decades, you don't know any of them.  Anyone who tells you that they have always loved these characters or has read all of the comics or that they almost got a tattoo of Groot the walking, fighting, barely-talking anthropomorphic tree is lying.  Also, as a disclaimer, while this movie is based upon comic characters and released by Marvel Studios, it is not a superhero movie.  It is, as writer-director James Gunn would call it, a space opera.  And while that term is incredibly annoying, it is closer to what you'll get with this movie than not.

I have enjoyed most of the movies released by Marvel Studios (you can read my review of their last release Captain America: The Winter Soldier here).  I have also recently watched Slither, James Gunn's directorial debut (The Spoiler Alert Podcast recently released the episode on that movie here).  So I came into this movie very interested in what one part Marvel and one part Gunn would add up to.  The trailers had sold me on a silly, loose, less-comic-book-canon-reliant space adventure.  The movie, which certainly has its issues, delivers just that.  

The story is pretty standard sci-fi MacGuffin fare.  A mysterious relic is being sought by some extremely sinister people which may or may not contain fantastic powers and planet-destroying energy.  We are introduced to a ragtag group of strangers who meet each other by happenstance and who, almost immediately, band together for various stated reasons to retrieve the item (the real reason, for all of them, is that they are secretly very good people.  Or plants.  Or genetically altered, gun-toting animals.)  Chris Pratt plays Peter Quill, a.k.a. Star Lord, a thief and rogue with a quick wit and an excess of charm.  Zoe Saldana plays Gamora, supposedly the deadliest woman in the galaxy.  Dave Bautista plays Drax the Destroyer, a large, tattooed, grief-stricken badass.  The team is completed by two CGI-created characters.  Bradley Cooper voices Rocket, a tortured soul in a raccoon's body while Vin Diesel voices Groot, the aforementioned tree.  (Also, can we admit that we have officially bottomed out in the celebrity stunt voice casting arena?  Diesel famously teased his participation in this movie and the opening credits give him a "featuring Vin Diesel" credit.  He says four words.  Four. Words.  Robin Williams as The Genie this ain't.)

The five of them band together, escape a space prison, and set about retrieving, then losing, then retrieving the MacGuffin.  It is desired by Thanos, the biggest, baddest, most powerful evil doer in the Universe.  Thanos is also the purple guy you may have seen if you stuck around through the very end credits of The Avengers.  Before Thanos can get it, it is stolen by Ronan The Accuser played with deep malice by Lee Pace.  Ronan is the kind of villain that is really, really evil and you know he is evil without really knowing or caring why he is so evil.  Just understand that he is really, really evil.  And scary.  But mainly evil.

The quintet of heroes put their personal problems and quarrels aside in order to band together to save an entire planet of innocent lives.  The movie devolves, as most Marvel movies seem to do, in its third act into a large CGI-created battle scene (see the last acts of Iron Man 2, Captain America: The First Avenger, The Avengers, Iron Man 3, Thor 2: The Dark World, and Captain America: The Winter Solider).  Much of this is noisier and busier and more generic than you need it to be.  The villain is dispatched in pretty underwhelming fashion and the day is saved.  So, the plot, set up, villains, and third act are all pretty standard sci-fi, comic book movie fare.  The characters themselves, and Gunn's tone?  Not at all.

The five heroes are, unlike the other Marvel heroes you've come to love, losers.  They are misfits and criminals.  This movie is like Goonies in space (complete with Josh Brolin!).  These outcasts and unloved space orhpans form an unlikely family and pool their damaged goods into one loud, raucous, unruly, silly team.  The chemistry is actually pretty good.  Pratt is very funny, as you'd expect, and has good heat with Saldana.  Bautista is wooden and stilted until you realize he is supposed to be wooden and stilted.  He is best in quiet scenes and tosses out some pretty funny throw away lines.  Cooper uses a strage accent with Rocket, which takes time to get past.  Once you do, you realize that the combination of his voice, the CGI-artistry, and the script help make Rocket the stand out character.  It is obvious that he is Gunn's favorite in the group.

The movie's tone is a double-edged sword.  This movie is funny.  It is silly.  The humor is ironic and jarring at times.  Unfortunately it also makes it difficult to really take the picture seriously.  The fate of entire planets, nay the Galaxy is on the line, but its hard to care because Bradley Cooper's character is making silly comments and teasing Groot.  There is a running joke that Rocket can understand Groot, which despite being used a few times made me laugh every time.  The use of 1970s/1980s pop music is also a bit jarring.  As are references to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Michael Jackson, and Kevin Bacon's portrayal in Footloose.  While explained in the story, it is so odd to have them included.  I had a good time seeing this movie but I am not as confident that this will be as mainstream a success as Marvel has enjoyed thus far.  

What worked:

• The pair of Rocket and Groot.  I thought I would like them the least but ended up digging them.
• Pratt as comedic adventurer.
• Visuals.  The movie is beautifully shot.  All of the visuals and effects are very well done.

What didn't work:

• The generic villains.  Karen Gillan's character is especially bland.  Disappointing for such a unique looking character played by a talented actress.
• Thanos.  I don't really get, nor do I care, who Thanos is.  I know he is the entry point to bring the Guardians into the broader Marvel universe and someday have a giant Guardians/Avengers crossover film.  But I just don't care.
• Michael Rooker is also in this film. 

Brass tacks:

• As a Marvel comic book franchise launching film:  C+
• As a silly, fun, space adventure: B+

PS - Don't bother sticking around through the end of the credits.  This movie boasts the worst post-credits tag in any Marvel movie.  Really.  Worse than Thor 2.

REVIEW: Captain America: The Winter Soldier

By Danny Sarnowski

Captain America: The Winter Soldier wants to be The Parallax View meets Three Days of the Condor meets a Marvel superhero film.  It does not achieve that feat, but it drives the superhero movie to new and exciting places.  The pace is more deliberate, the characters are given actual things to say, and it steps up the action thrillingly.  

The story finds Steve Rogers, a.k.a. Captain America, still finding his footing in the twenty first century.  He has survived the battle of New York in The Avengers and found a calling working for S.H.I.E.L.D.  While he does not approve of Director Fury's tactics, he believes he is doing good work - at least as the story opens.  A daring strike in the mid-day in Washington D.C. kicks off an adventure that leaves Cap wondering who he can trust and where his loyalties reside.

New characters are introduced, including Alexander Pierce the head of the World Security Council played by cinematic legend Robert Redford and Sam Wilson (a.k.a. Falcon) played by Anthony Mackie.  Much will be made about Redford's casting and the fact that the famously liberal actor/director/filmmaker/activist is playing against type as a shadowy, security-focused, Republican government official.  More should be made of the fact that he commits to the role as seriously as his other work.  Rather than chew the scenery like Anthony Hopkins or ham it up like Stellan Skarsgard in Thor, Redford treats the material with more respect.  And the respect is reciprocated.  Directors Anthony and Joe Russo, along with writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, give him material to work with.  Mackie is a welcome addition to the Marvel team and his easy rapport with Chris Evans makes him a believable sidekick for Cap.

The respect shown to Redford is also given to Samuel L. Jackson, who after six Marvel movies is finally given something interesting to say.  He isn't simply onscreen to be a "bad ass" and drive story exposition.  He also sits center stage at a harrowing action sequence and holds his own.  Scarlett Johansson has a few scenes which also allow her to make her character less of a caricature.  We also see her Black Widow flex a few of her "spy muscles" as opposed to just fighting the whole time.  Chris Evans captures the humility, warmth, and righteousness of Captain America and grounds him in ways I never thought possible while suffering through his performance as Johnny Storm in the dreadful Fanstastic Four movies.  

To all the haters who saw The Avengers and said "Captain America isn't really a superhero" I invite you to view Captain America: The Winter Soldier.  The creative team behind this picture have amped Steve up.  He's fast - really fast.  He jumps out of planes without a parachute, takes out boatloads of terrorists with his bare hands, and literally runs through walls.  It is clear from this outing that Captain America has fully thawed out and is ready for action.

The action in Captain America: The First Avenger was fairly weak.  Many of the battle scenes were told in montage or glossed over so we never got the satisfaction of watching Captain America really do much.  This movie allows the action to be much more visceral, urgent, and cruel.  While the movie doesn't have the intellectual weight of the 1970's political thrillers it emulates, it does portray the story more maturely.  The violence in this movie is more severe, the fight sequences brutal.  Hand-to-hand fighting with knives, close-in gun battles, and heavy artillery are brought to the table.  The action is head and shoulders above the other Marvel movies until late in the film when the inevitable, CGI-choked, death-from-above-chaos fills the movie's final act.  If only the Russos had trusted us to stay interested and to care about the outcome of the story without reverting to the cliches so typically found in superhero blockbusters.  

What worked:

• The tone of the film is darker, tighter, and a little smarter.
• The script allows for more dialogue and better acting from the capable cast.
• The humor, while spare, hits home.
• The fight scenes and general level of action.

What didn't work:

• The conspiracy is thin and everyone over the age of 11 will see the "twists" coming from a mile off.  Probably before you even hit the theater.
• A bit of mid-movie exposition featuring Toby Jones awkwardly reminds you that you are watching a comic book movie and dumbs things down a tad.
• The obligatory sensory-overload CGI battle that ends the film.  It just wasn't necessary.
• The violence may actually be a bit too much, especially for younger viewers.  I would stick pretty close to the PG-13 rating here.

Brass Tacks:

This is the Captain America movie that fans were looking for, though we needed The First Avenger to set up the character and ground him in his "man out of time" existence.  This film is a welcome step in the right direction for the Marvel movies.

As a paranoid, trust-no-one, 1970s political thriller: C+

As a more intelligent and fun superhero movie: A-