Making the Leap with A New "21 Jump Street"

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Wednesday, 14 March 2012 00:36

Written by Lloyd Carroll

21 Jump Street
directed by Phil Lord & Chris Miller
starring Jonah Hill & Channing Tatum

Married With Children and 21 Jump Street were two shows that helped put the fledgling Fox Broadcasting Corporation on the map when it started 25 years ago. Until then, the broadcast world was dominated by CBS, NBC and ABC although a few cable networks were starting to gain traction as more homes were willing to pay for both better reception and more programming choices.

The plot of the TV show, about a bunch of young cops who infiltrate a high school as current students, was basically lifted from the 1960s ABC classic, “The Mod Squad,” and it ran for five seasons on Fox. It made a huge star out of a previously unknown actor named Johnny Depp.

Nowadays it seems as if every television series that ran more than two years gets its own movie version. To its immense credit, the filmmakers blatantly acknowledge Hollywood’s creative laziness by having one of the characters, Deputy Chief Hardy (Nick Offerman of NBC’s “Parks & Recreation”), grouse on screen “Every piece of crap from the Eighties gets recycled.!”

Doug Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Craig Jenko (Channing Tatum) were both members of the same high school class who ran different circles. Doug was the quintessential nerd while Craig was the bully who enjoyed tormenting him on occasion. Seven years after graduation, they are partners in an unnamed city’s police department and are so little regarded by their superiors that their beat is riding a bicycle around a park.

After blowing their first arrest by failing to read a suspect his Miranda rights, Schmidt and Jenko are assigned to an undercover unit run out of—where else—21 Jump Street. The commander of the unit is Captain Dickson played by rapper/actor Ice Cube who is clearly having fun spoofing his angry persona. Dickson assigns our heroes to a high school where a dangerous and potentially lethal synthetic hallucinogen is being distributed. He makes it clear what is expected out of them and the consequences if they screw up in a very profane and hysterical manner.

In a clever twist, it turns out that in seven years a lot of the high school clique rules have changed. Here it is the ecologically conscious and more empathetic characters seem to run the show while the muscular jocks are the outsiders. It is Schmidt who finds himself the object of a very attractive girl’s affections while it’s Jenko who is forced to bond with members of the AP chemistry class in order to have friends.

There is little doubt that the filmmakers pad the screen time with endless car chases. That is the film’s most notable drawback but it’s a relatively minor one when it comes to overall enjoyment .

The good more than outweighs the bad. Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum may be Hollywood’s ultimate co-starring odd couple but they have a very believable chemistry. The supporting cast is spectacular with the always-welcome “Saturday Night Live” alum Chris Parnell, Comedy Central vet Rob Riggle, and the aforementioned Ice Cube and Nick Offerman pitching in. They are assisted by some terrific newcomers, Brie Larson and Dave Franco (the younger brother of actor James Franco.)

In a terrific nod to the TV series, most of the original cast: Richard Grieco, Peter DeLuise, Holly Robinson, and of course, Johnny Depp, have cameos here. I guess that Dustin Nguyen must have been busy. 21 Jump Street is great combo of laughs and action.

March '12 Digital Week II

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Sunday, 11 March 2012 07:00

Written by Kevin Filipski

Blu-rays of the Week
Disclosure and Striptease
(Warners)
Back in the mid 90s, Demi Moore tried to resuscitate a moribund career by starring in Andrew Bergman’s Showgirls-lite disaster, Striptease (1996), in which a sullen Moore sleepwalks through a risible melodrama about a single mom turned stripper.

Moore fares better in 1994’s Disclosure, Barry Levinson’s crackling adaptation of Michael Crichton’s hot-button bestseller about reverse sexual harassment, which co-stars Michael Douglas. Both movies look quite good on Blu-ray; no extras.

Elite Squad
(Flatiron)
From the maker of Bus 174 comes an equally taut cop drama which dismantles the  notion that kid gloves are the best way to deal with Brazil’s rampant crime wave.

Director Jose Padilha dives into the muck of police corruption and political inefficiency with  vividly shot and edited action sequences that showcase an unraveling society that makes ours look spotless. The Blu-ray looks spectacularly sharp; the lone extra is an hour-long making-of featurette.

Immortals
(Fox)
Tarsam Singh Dhandwar uses CGI to hide storytelling and character deficiencies in his unoriginal telling of ancient mythology, with fantastical episodes flying by so quickly that any initial excitement wears off and a pall takes over.

Also, the movie is so dark that it’s hard to discern just what’s going on, which takes away the luminousness of his Phaedra (a gorgeous Frieda Pinto) and the chiseled warriors (played by Henry Cavill and Stephen Dorff, among others). At least there’s Mickey Rourke’s hamminess as King Hyperion for occasional laughs. The hi-def image looks slightly artificial thanks to so many special effects. Extras include a making-of, deleted scenes, alternate opening and ending.

Jack and Jill
(Sony)
I’m no Adam Sandler fan, so two Sandlers--a “normal” Adam and one in drag--is too much to take in this would-be comedy. Playing twin brother and sister, Sandler is unfunny and unappealing as ever. Even with cameos by Norm Macdonald, David Spade, Christie Brinkley, Dana Carvey, Shaquille O’Neal and Johnny Depp and with an always likeable Katie Holmes as his wife, its 90 minutes are nearly unendurable.

The only reason to watch is Al Pacino’s over-the-top but amusing work as himself: his ranting on a cell phone onstage while playing Shakespeare is the best scene by far. The Blu-ray image is good; extras include featurettes, interviews, deleted scenes and bloopers.

Mandrill
(Magnet)
This fast-moving, flimsy Spanish thriller stars Marko Zaror as a hired killer as good with the ladies as he is knocking guns out of enemies’ hands with fancy footwork.

Despite the silliness, Zaror and Celine Reymond (as the beautiful daughter of his intended target) together have a frisky sex appeal that perks up a movie otherwise bent on endless routine showdowns between our antihero and the even badder guys. With an excellent Blu-ray transfer, the disc’s extras are making-of featurettes.

9-1/2 Weeks
(Warners)
Adrian Lyne’s 1986 study of a lonely art dealer degrading herself in a sexual relationship with a walled-off Wall Street broker isn’t nearly as naked psychologically as it is physically.

Lyne’s gauzy, Vaseline-lensed style doesn’t lend itself to gritty filmmaking, but thanks to Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke’s immersion in their characters and down-and-dirty, mid-80s Manhattan, the movie succeeds at showing the depths of sexual depravity. The image--with the perfect amount of grain--is very film-like.

Recoil
(Vivendi)
If you like Stone Cold Steve Austin, be warned that not only has he dropped the first half of his moniker, but he proves that his acting is also “stone cold.”

Although he’s amazingly stiff as a bounty hunter against an array of sleazy bad guys, the relentless action and colorful support by Danny Trejo as his wife and child’s killer and the bright, sexy Serinda Shaw as the woman he protects. The hi-def transfer is first-rate; extras include a making-of featurette, interviews and deleted scenes.

Scarlet Street
(Kino Classics)
One of his best American films, Fritz Lang’s 1945 character study stars the always reliable Edward G. Robinson as a company cashier embroiled in a dead-end love affair with a streetwalker (Joan Bennett at her alluring best).

Lang creates an unnerving atmosphere of undeniable dread and uncontrollable destiny on stage bound Manhattan streets. The movie, despite the flickers of age in the print, has an immediacy and vibrancy on Blu-ray; extras are commentary and photo gallery.

DVDs of the Week
Above Suspicion
(Acorn)
This commanding British TV series combines the talents of writer Lynda La Plante (Prime Suspect), director Gilles MacKinnon and outstanding acting by Ciaran Hinds and Kelly Reilly, who comes into her own as the novice detective who learns on the job.

The tension between Hinds and Reilly isn’t exclusively sexual, but their plausibly fraught relationship compels us to keep watching as the cases they’re working on become gorier and stranger. MacKinnon’s sharp direction holds the stories together as his actors create nuanced characters. Extras include on-set footage and interviews.

London River
(Cinema Libre)
This touching and intimate study of two parents desperately trying to uncover information about their missing children after the 2005 London bombings is distinguished by director Rachid Bouchareb’s refusal to sentimentalize, even as the story--Guernsey mom and African dad slowly come to an understanding after piecing together that her daughter and his son were in love--settles for inflated melodrama.

Great acting by Brenda Blethyn and Sotigui Kouyate contribute to making this modest soap opera a must-watch.

Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg
(Coviello)
At its Nuremberg “home,” Wagner’s lone comic opera--all 4-1/2 hours of it--gets a spacious staging by director D. Mouchtar-Samorai and an excellent musical performance by orchestra and chorus under the baton of Marcus Bosch.

In such a lengthy opera, stamina is all--it always is in Wagner--and the leads give it their best, despite the occasional vocal hiccup: Albert Pesendorfer (Hans Sachs), Jochen Kupfer (Beckmesser), Michael Putsch (Walther) and Michaela Maria Mayer (Eva) are superb singers all.

The Myth of the American Sleepover
(MPI/Sundance Selects)
David Robert Mitchell’s sometimes incisive glimpse at American teenagers, circa the 1970s, deals with a group of school kids dealing with one another on the last night before the school year begins.

It’s too bad Mitchell’s script starts to meander after awhile; the early, funny yet melancholy and intimate scenes succumb to wishful thinking by the end. Still, it’s well-acted by a cast of mostly unknown young performers, and so worth seeing.

Octubre and The Sky Turns
(New Yorker Video)
These distinctive films give a good impression of what revamped New Yorker Films has to offer. Peruvian directors Daniel and Diego Vega’s Octubre is a quietly droll character study with shades of Bresson and Jarmusch in its deadpan style; in The Sky Turns, Mercedes Alvarez eloquently records her impressions of the Spanish region she returns to after 35 years away, and finds her small village literally disappearing: only 14 people remain. 

Both films look striking in their transfers; bonuses include earlier short films (on both discs) and an interview with Daniel Vega (Octubre).

CDs of the Week

Penderecki: Sinfoniettas
(Naxos)
Polish master Krzysztof Penderecki, now age 78, has been through several stylistic changes in a lengthy career; this disc concentrates on his string music spanning 35 years,  from 1963’s baroque-influenced Three Pieces in Old Style to the modernist intensity of 1997’s Serenade.

In between, Sinfoniettas 1 & 2 (1992, 1994) are captivating orchestrations of chamber works, while the Capriccio for Oboe has a lightheartedness atypical of the usually overwrought composer. Antoni Wit conducts the fine Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra, and soloists Artur Pachlewski (clarinet) and Jean-Louis Capezzali (oboe) shine in the spotlight.

Rautavaara: Cello and Percussion Concertos
(Ondine)
The greatest living composer (he’s 83) is a vital Finnish modernist, and this disc premieres two recent compositions and a revised early work.

The moody, introspective but vibrant Cello Concerto No. 2 has a perfect advocate in soloist Truls Mork; the propulsive Percussion Concerto, titled Incantations, is played by another Rautavaara advocate, soloist Colin Currie. 1957’s Modificata, with an opening movement added in 2003, bridges his early 12-tone work and his later, staunchly post-romantic style. Conductor John Storgards ably leads the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra.

Zwicker: Death and the Maiden
(Musiques Suisses)
Obscure Swiss composer Alfons Karl Zwicker wrote this opera based on Ariel Dorfman’s play--and subsequent Roman Polanski movie--about an Argentine woman revisiting her earlier torture when the man who was behind it shows up on her and her husband’s doorstep.

Cleverly interpolating Schubert’s famous string quartet into his aggressively dissonant score, Zwicker never stoops to sentimentality but fails to find the drama underlying the material. The cast of three and choir perform exceptionally well.

Off-Broadway: Albee's "Lady"; O'Neill's "Horizon"; Headland's "Assistance"

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Wednesday, 07 March 2012 15:00

Written by Kevin Filipski

The Lady from Dubuque
Starring Jane Alexander, Catherine Curtin, Michael Hayden, Peter Francis James, Tricia Paoluccio, Laila Robins, Thomas Jay Ryan, C.J. Wilson
Written by Edward Albee; directed by David Esbjornson

Beyond the Horizon
Starring Rod Brogan, Patricia Conolly, Lucas Hall, Jonathan Judge-Russo, Aimee Laurence, Joanna Leister, Wrenn Schmidt, David Sitler, John Thomas Wait
Written by Eugene O'Neill; directed by Ciarán O'Reilly

Assistance
Starring Michael Esper, Sue Jean Kim, Virginia Kull, Lucas Near-Verbrugghe, Amy Rosoff, Bobby Steggert
Written by Leslye Headland; directed by Trip Cullum

Like most Edward Albee plays of the past 40 years, The Lady from Dubuque (which lasted a mere dozen performances on Broadway in 1980) is vulgar, trivial and oh so familiar: we meet six unpleasant people at a party in an upscale suburban house where getting drunk is the game. Well, one of the games: the play opens with these three couples playing “20 Questions” (with its insistent refrain, “who am I?”), as Albee sledgehammers home his play’s themes of loss of identity and fractured relationships, for starters.

As alcohol-induced insults fly, the evening’s hostess, Jo, takes shots at everyone, including her weak-willed husband Sam. But since Jo has a terminal disease, it’s apparently OK for her to be nasty to her guests and spouse. When the party finally breaks up, the others leave, Jo and Sam go upstairs to bed, and Act I ends with the arrival of two elegantly attired gate crashers: the title character--why she’s from Dubuque is simply so Albee can shoehorn in Harold Ross’s famous quip about New Yorker magazine not being for “the old lady in Dubuque”--and her black sidekick, Oscar.

Act II, the next morning, becomes even more vicious, as the new arrivals first stage an interminable conversation with Sam, who rightly (and repeatedly) asks, “who are you?”; after the other couples improbably return, Elizabeth--who insists she’s Jo’s mother-- comforts Jo while Sam (a properly ravaged Michael Hayden) is beaten down and tied up merely for trying to protect his dying wife from two strangers: even if no one believes him.

Albee was influenced by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’s book On Death and Dying, which  explained the five stages of death. Aside from naming the angel of death after the author, there’s very little Kubler-Ross here; but there’s a lot of Albee. The vulgarity, casual racism and sexism, shaky tonal shifts (here in the form of asides to the audience) and arbitrary character actions: Albee’s done it all before, from The Zoo Story and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf to A Delicate Balance and Seascape. Even Albee’s infamously bitchy dialogue, while occasionally amusing, palls quickly.

David Esbjornson directs spiffily on John Arnone’s sparkling set, while the cast makes Albee’s caricatures more intensely felt than they deserve. If Laila Robins evokes too well the shrillness and pain of Jo, she’s beautifully balanced by Jane Alexander’s masterly underplaying as the calm, cool Elizabeth. But neither they nor the others can save The Lady from Dubuque from stewing in its own vacuousness.

The creaky dramaturgy of Eugene O’Neill’s first full-length play, 1920’s Beyond the Horizon, never erases the dramatic power of a story that, though familiar, feels fresh thanks to its author’s seriousness and the Irish Rep’s respectful production.

Robert Mayo decides to join his uncle, Captain Scott, on a lengthy ocean voyage, leaving his parents’ Massachusetts farm: his less-bookish brother Andrew shoulders the bulk of the heavy work anyway. At the last minute, however, Robert and local gal Ruth admit their love for each other and agree to marry, so he decides to remain. Now it’s Andrew-- whose unspoken love for Ruth is now unattainable--agrees to leave with his uncle. When the play ends nine years later, this broken family will have been irrevocably changed.

O’Neill compensates for his overexplanatory dialogue (if audience members take drinks every time the play’s title is mentioned, a lot of people will be plastered) with skillfully depicted relationships and Ruth’s tragically downward spiral. The humanity marking O’Neill’s best plays is present; if his poetry is spotty, there are signs of the master he would become.

Under Ciaran O’Reilly’s intelligent direction, a warmhearted cast is led by Rod Brogan’s Andrew and Wrenn Schmidt’s Ruth, who perfectly--and powerfully--portray the ambivalence contained in O’Neill’s daring final lines.

In Leslye Headland’s Assistance, minions working for A Great Man (likely modeled on movie mogul Harvey Weinstein, once Headland’s boss) deal with his impossible demands and unthinking way of treating them. At first, it’s amusing to watch these breathless young men and women field countless phone calls and smooth over missed appointments and other blunders made trying to keep an unhappy boss happy.

Soon, however, the fun ends: not because Assistance turns serious (it doesn’t), but because Headland has nowhere to go. There are simply more instances of assistants trying--and failing--so in desperation, the playwright and her canny director Trip Cullman resort to diversions such as a few phone-call monologues and an absurdist dance finale that concludes by destroying the hated office (clever set design by David Korins).

While these two-dimensional office workers aren’t real people, Virginia Kull is able to pinpoint Nora's trajectory from eager novice to burned-out veteran in the space of a few scenes. Assistance would play much better if it was shorter--by an hour, at least.

The Lady from Dubuque
Previews began February 14, 2012; opened March 5; closes April 15
Signature Theatre, 480 West 42nd Street, New York, NY
http://signaturetheatre.org

Beyond the Horizon
Previews began February 15, 2012; opened February 26; closes April 8
Irish Rep, 132 West 22nd Street, New York, NY
http://irishrep.com

Assistance
Previews began February 3, 2012; opened February 28; closes March 11
Playwrights Horizons, 416 West 42nd Street, New York, NY
http://playwrightshorizons.org