Style in a film is a very fine issue.  On one hand, it always helps to throw in some sparkle to keep the viewer’s attention, plus there’s the whole trying to add artistic merit issue.  But on the other hand, too much of a different feel in a film can alienate a viewer.  Unfortunately, Miami Vice isn’t just the latter, but the director takes it so far that it’s like a spit in the face of storytelling.

Miami Vice
1 & 1/2 Stars

I really wanted to like Miami Vice.  I was the only person in the realm of film critics that I knew who didn’t think it looked like a stinker.  I like Writer/Director Michael Mann, and I like that he took an approach with Miami Vice that few other directors would have the balls to, let alone the creativity.  But after both of the films hours (with change), it’ll wash over you how boring and ungripping the movie is.

The New Don Johnson?

Miami Vice‘s story is easy enough to understand on paper: Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx are detectives narcing it up in Central America hoping to catch a Drug Lord that killed some co-workers.  But on the case Farrell’s character falls for the enemy’s assistant (Gong Li.) 

Only it doesn’t come out that easily in the film.  The actors linger uneasily in the shots as they spew dialogue without any real verbalization, just dropping the lines.  It’s not a sign of bad acting, the characters are just too point-blank to carry any emotion in what few words they say; and because of that it’s difficult to tell what those words falling out of their mouths mean 90% of the time.

Another problem with this innate lack of feeling in the dialogue is the extreme difficulty it presents of relating to any of the characters.  I’m no man of publications such as US Weekly or OK!, But I can honestly say I care more about what the tabloids write-up on Farrell and Foxx than these characters.  Mann’s script just never decides to take a chunk out of character development, or even character creation.

Instead of delivering a fully-developed script, Mann decides instead to go for a visual flair that easily makes more of an impact on the final product than the any of the actors or the story.  But for what it’s worth, it’s damn cool. 

Mann used simplistic, hand-held digital cameras that give off more grain than Farrell’s unshaven face in the movie.  That, in addition to the shaky camera movement, make the film seem more authentic and believable, like just maybe that isn’t actually Jamie Foxx, it’s a real-life cop doing his real-life job on the real-life streets.  I don’t normally like the now-popular technique of shaky camera movement (enough of it on a big screen can upset by stomach,) but it’s used about as well as possible by Mann in Miami Vice.

The only problem is, the cinematography is too cool.  It’s like those iPod commercials: watching a black silhouette groove to the beat over a cornucopia of colors is a great way to spend 30 seconds, but if you had to watch it for over two hours it would become daunting.  The same goes for Miami Vice, the look is just too much and too different to allow the viewers to appreciate anything else in the film.

There are a couple of intense action sequences, and Mann should be commended for trying to do something different; but in the end Miami Vice is just grade-A style vomitted beyond appreciation over a few reels of film.  Too much of a good thing isn’t good.

A mockumentary about a band where the lead singer and lead guitarist are conjoined twins?  Not your average summer movie fare.  Despite its length and freakish unseemliness, there’s something there.  I didn’t exactly enjoy the film, but it hooked me on how it well was put together and made.  For fans of film, or just unusual types far off the mainstream, this flick might be just up your alley.  It’s a bizarrely fascinating story.

Brothers of the Head
3 Stars

Brothers of the Head is a different film.  It’s not something you actually enjoy, though it has many moments, performances, and aspects you can appreciate.  It’s hard to watch, but it’s so well made and so distinctly different it’s worth a look for those willing to take a chance on something this…different.

Not exactly Spinal Tap

A pair of conjoined twins (Harry Treadaway, Luke Treadaway) are found by a promoter with a dream of putting the pair in a rock band.  After months of training the group is put on stage and finds an audience with their punk rock sound and freakshow look.

The film is presented as a documentary taking place in present time with older actors playing roles of band members and managers.  Mixed with these are interviews with the author of their story Brian Aldiss (whose novel is the inspiration for the film), archival footage from the mid-1970’s including rehersals, fights, and tender moments, and scenes from a pathetically awful Hollywood film version of their story.

What’s most interesting is how seriously the film takes it’s subject and how well it disguises itself as a real documentary.  It comes off as so real that you find yourself wondering if there’s not some hiddent truth somewhere in these frames.  The music of the period, the look of the “archival footage,” and the casting of actors who so resemble their younger/older selves you’ll wonder what kind of film tricks were used. 

The best casting is for the role of Laura, the woman who came between the brothers and crashed the world down around them.  Tania Emery plays the younger version of Laura and Diane Kent plays Laura during present time.  It’s eerie how alike they seem.

The film does play heavily on the freakishness of the conjoined twins at at times is hard to watch.  Also there are points were the film seems to devolve into voyeurism.  That and the length (the story could have easily played out in a 45-60 minute short film) will leave you squirming.

It’s too long, it’s creepy, it’s uncomfortable, it’s bizarre, and yet…  In much the same way the film’s characters exploit the “can’t look away” freakishness of the pair, the film has takes advantage of a story that is so different by surrounding the world with good performances and excellent casting and behind the scenes moves to create something uniquely original.  In terms of look and style there’s much to appreciate for fans who enjoy studying films and how they are put togehter.  In terms of an enjoyable film expereince, it’s nowhere near as successful.  I’m modesly recommending it for the former, though if you’re looking for the later I’d suggest seeing whatever is playing in the adjoining theater.

There’s not another genre out there that’s as tailor-made by Studio Execs than the teenage comedy.  This might explain why they’re all the same: teenager sets out on a journey for sex, gets screwed a few times along the way (although not in the way that they hoping for) and finally realize that they should just had sex with their best friend.  In this respect of plot, John Tucker Must Die is a nothing more than a really, and I mean really does attempt to break the mold; but everything else in the movie from its clichéd and stereotyped characters and an ending that you won’t care about exposes its true nature: John Tucker Must Die is just another teenage comedy.

John Tucker Must Die
2 Stars

It just came to me when I was sitting in the theatre.  Our main character was having a heart-to-heart with her mother about boys, and I was enlightened as if it were a fact taught to me in U.S. History.  John Tucker Must Die is a nothing more than a really, and I mean really mediocre movie.  It’s not bad—in fact it can be down-right charming half the time.  But the rest of the running time lacks anything that wants to make you stake out your seat until it all fades to black.

Nobody likes being cheated on; not even when the cutest boy, like, ever is the one cheating on you.  So the obvious way to get back is to try to embarrass him in front of, like, the entire school.

John Tucker Must Die chronicles this exact story, where the cutest boy in the 12th grade is film namesake John Tucker (Jesse Metcalfe,) and his victims are the first ladies of their High School cliques- the lead Cheerleader, the new-age vegan and the smarty-pants that’s in every extra-curricular activity.  John, God bless him, somehow managed to date all three of them at the same time; but after the girls find out and get the ol’ heave-ho from their newly-appointed Ex, they decide that he needs a dose of his own medicine.

So they hatch a plot to make John fall head over heels for social nobody Kate (Brittany Snow,) who has a fair share of doubt in the concept of love.  Nothing else happens down the road that you can’t see happening—life lessons are learned and BFFs are made around every corner.

The film’s title promised what could have been an entertaining, black teenage comedy.  Think about it, had the girls taken no mercy as the movie’s name suggests, it would have boosted the film’s value to anyone who doesn’t think the best movies ever are Mean Girls or The Notebook.  They could have gone a lot further, and the idea of extreme revenge in a High School setting has potential, but the script just doesn’t take it there.

The film’s weakest spot is the character of John Tucker himself.  Metcalfe does as decent of a job as is required for the genre, but we never get a very solid idea of who he is—a hotshot asshole in it for the ass or a sensitive boy that hides in his perfect physique and charm.  He keeps switching masks depending on who’s opposite him in the scene, and we never get a final idea of what he is.  This writer would have prefered it if he were a jerk-extroardinaire that was easier to hate than a guy who drowns puppies, but we can’t all get what we want.

But John Tucker Must Die is a movie about young love, and the filmmakers don’t botch the charm of Snow’s character or the sometimes successful humor.  The genre is a weak spot, it makes sub-par stories fun just because everyone in the movie is having it.

John Tucker Must Die is just another teenage comedy.  It won’t knock the pants off of you, and you really shouldn’t go see it.  But if you somehow surf onto a channel showing it in the next few years on TV, it’d probably hold your attention.  Like, I guess.