by ·Comments Off on The Last Ten Minutes vol. 34: Michael Shannon edition

Fahrenheit 451 (2018, Ramin Bahrani)

Evil Philosopher Cop Michael Shannon is arresting Michael B. Jordan, who turns the table and burns some guy to death, racking up likes on a big screen (is this The Running Man?). Sofia “Climax” Boutella takes MBJ to the suburbs where he saves a starling (it’s a big year for cinematic starlings) then Shannon makes a big tormented face as he murders MBJ in a burning barn. I’m seeing him sing R.E.M. songs next week – here’s hoping he makes that same face during “Fall On Me.” I can’t be mad at a movie that ends on a murmuration.

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Superman (2025, James Gunn)

Backed up more than ten minutes so I wouldn’t miss Warboy Lex Luthor. Is this a cartoon? Soup fights an airborne army of boba fetts. There are other super-people around, and also the Bunk for some reason. It’s very snappy and JamesGunny and there’s a CG dog, and they glue the split-apart city back together then party with some second-rate heroes (incl Nathan Fillion). Lois is The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Soup is from We Own This City, it closes on an Iggy Pop song, and this overall looks good, it’s just that I’ve reached a certain age and you’re not gonna trick me into watching any more Superman movies.

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The Flash (2023, Andy Muschietti)

Backed up too far but this time by accident – HBO’s interface isn’t all that. Various Flashes and Supermen and Batmen are getting killed in a fiery time-loop by Evil CG Michael Shannon, pulling together the previous two movies into a Fahrenheit Multiverse. “We Need To Talk About” Ezra has a little argument with himself – Flash isn’t even fast in this, he just fights with glowy knives, and the villain is a version of himself who stayed awake during The Jaunt. Ah fuck, it’s Haunted Chris Reeve and CG Nic Cage, now I remember why people were mad. In the obligatory wrap-up, Ron Livingston is his dad, the girl from Hearts Beat Loud his love interest, and George Clooney as Batman would’ve been a good bit if they hadn’t awkwardly bungled it. Muschietti also directed It, which also nobody liked but they all watched anyway.

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Jonah Hex (2010, Jimmy Hayward)

How is this movie only 81 minutes? Civil War Thanos and his girl Jennifer Fox are taken captive by Evil Malkovich. I don’t see Michael Shannon, but he’s in this movie and there are also flamethrowers, making this part of the Fahrenheit Multiverse. I do see Lt. Cedric Daniels for some reason, then the movie starts flashbacking really hard until the bad guy explodes. The director is a former Pixar animator and musician who is friends with Tool and Primus and Mastodon, and the writers made Crank and Gamer, so this bomb was a bump in the road for a bunch of otherwise cool guys.

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The Lego Batman Movie (2017, Chris McKay)

I missed Will Arnett in Jonah Hex, so here’s his Christian Bale impression in a frenetic cartoon which is admittedly cool-looking (from a Robot Chicken guy). Nice shark-spray callback. It’s fun for everyone that the comic corporations get to make big expensive self-serious superhero movies and big expensive silly parodies of the same, less fun that something called The Lego Batman Movie tries to wrap up by getting weepy about family.

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Assassin’s Creed (2016, Justin Kurzel)

I also missed Michael Fassbender in Jonah Hex, so let’s check out his second-worst movie. Jeremy Irons is presented with a treasure chest while Marion Cotillard and Charlotte Rampling look on, wow this is a heavy cast for a video game movie. Irons is going to enslave mankind or whatever, seems very calm about it, while Omar is brandishing knives in the crowd. Fassbender arrives in a robe and joins the serious-whisper acting cavalcade then makes his move, assassin-wise. The whole thing feels like a real drag.

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Knox Goes Away (2023, Michael Keaton)

Speaking of assassins, I missed Michael Keaton in The Flash so here’s his aging-hitman thing. Oh wow, a shaggy Al Pacino rats on Keaton to some nerd cops who were talking about security footage anomalies. After a brain-damaged Keaton takes the place of his son Cyclops in prison, a closing montage of each major character looking meaningfully at different objects.

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Suicide Squad (2016, David Ayer)

Back into the superhero multiverse, this supposedly has Ezra “Flash” Miller, but hundredth-billed so I don’t expect to see him here. I expect to see supervillains teaming up to fight Gozer. Will Smith shows all his teeth in closeup then blows up the stargate to the demon dimension. The guy from John Woo’s Silent Night gets his wife back from the dead, or from the stone lion she was trapped inside, but the team of killers is no match for an angry Viola Davis, who sends them to prison until Jared Leto’s Michael Morbius breaks them out. I was gonna close with the latest Joaquin Phoenix Joker thing and Watchmen, but that’s quite enough of these things.

by ·Comments Off on Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (2017, James Gunn)

I forgot lots of important things and characters from the first movie (Michael Rooker and his whistle-controlled flying spear, Gamora’s psychotically evil sister Nebula), but they came back gradually. Also forgot that these are really good movies – funny and stylish, with exciting (and comprehensible) action. Chris Pratt discovers that his real father is a god-planet which takes the form of Kurt Russell, impregnating planets and women across the galaxy, and when he finally locates a son who carries some of his powers, he uses Star-Lord (like Magneto uses Rogue in X-Men 1) to amplify his energy and attempt to make all planets into parts of himself. Fortunately there’s the wiseass raccoon, the big loud warrior, the swordswoman, the baby cartoon tree, and now Rooker and Nebula and an empath named Mantis to stop him. No Benicio Del Toro, sadly, but we get cameos by Michelle Yeoh and Ving Rhames.

by ·Comments Off on Guardians of the Galaxy (2014, James Gunn)

It’s like all the humorous bickering of The Avengers mixed with the action of… The Avengers. So it’s like The Avengers, or maybe Firefly. But funnier, and with more rock songs. Katy and I don’t like the shot-too-close, over-edited action scenes, but otherwise had no complaints.

Heroes: Andy Dwyer, hulky Dave Bautista (Brass Body in Man With The Iron Fists), green Zoe Saldana (Avatar), talking raccoon Bradley Cooper (Midnight Meat Train) and kinda-talking tree Vin Diesel (The Iron Giant). Not heroes: Andy’s mercenary ex-partner Michael Rooker, Zoe’s evil-blue-robot sister Nebula, “the collector” Benicio Del Toro, super baddie Ronan (partnered with Thanos, a main Thor/Avengers baddie) and Ronan’s enforcer Djimon “Digital Monsters” Hounsou.

Supplementary good guys: president Glenn Close and cops John C Reilly and Peter Serafinowicz.

Introduced: something called “infinity stones” which I think power some of the other magic stuff in Avengers-world, and rumored superhuman backstory for Andy.

by ·Comments Off on Super (2011, James Gunn)

“Shut up, crime!”

Rainn Wilson plays sort of a comic-book version of Michael Douglas in Falling Down, pushed to the breaking point by a dissolving marriage and life’s constant irritations. He becomes superpowerless superhero Crimson Bolt, armed mainly with a pipe wrench, and sets out to defeat wife-snatching drug-dealer Kevin Bacon, plus people who butt in line at the movies.

An extremely dark comedy, hilarious and truly horrible, which manages to hold onto its heart through Rainn Wilson’s sheer lovability and the exceptional script. It’s possibly better than Gunn’s great Slither. Can’t compare it to other fake-superhero movies like Special, Defendor and Kick-Ass since I haven’t watched those, but now I’m afraid to. This one set the bar too high. Can you tell I’m excited?

by ·Comments Off on Slither (2006, James Gunn)

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I recognized Michael Rooker as monstrously morphing Grant Grant (the TV producer with the dirty handshake in Mallrats) but it took me forever to notice that good-cop lead actor Nathan Fillion was the guy from Serenity. Guess it might be time to watch those Firefly DVDs.

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Rooker gets an alien shot to the chest, impregnates a local girl with thousands of mind-controlling slugs, and morphs quickly into a room-sized ugly mess of alien. It’s up to Fillion, Rooker’s wife and a girl they pick up along the way to save the day. It’s a love story! Hilarious and wonderful throughout, gotta see again.

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Katy caught brief glimpses and seemed disturbed.

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2025: This holds up. I still haven’t watched those Firefly DVDs. Gunn followed up with Super, then has made exclusively superhero stuff. You don’t see Elizabeth Banks enough. “His arm was all bendy, mayor.” Forgot that the Zs share a consciousness and projectile-spit acid. Wondering if police receptionist Shelby (Pam from The Office US) is referencing Lucy from Twin Peaks, or if the whole concept is referencing Night of the Creeps. Our birds got very upset when Michael Rooker blew up.