Tomorrowland: A Cold And Bloated Mess

This review originally appeared on SFist.com.

Imagine a world filled with only geniuses, inventors, dreamers, and thinkers, who are allowed to be awesome and fulfill their potential without the constraints of societal laws or expectations. That is the world of Tomorrowland.

Now tell me: Who picks up their trash, does their laundry, builds their elevated highways, and makes their lattes? Oh right. They're all geniuses! I'm sure they'll figure it out.

Director Brad Bird has been accused of objectivism before, and he's denied there are Ayn Rand-inspired themes in his work. While one can definitely read some Randian influence into both The Incredibles and Ratatouille, (some people — and rats — are just better than others!), the films were charming, entertaining, and filled with enough heart that I could give it a pass. But Tomorrowland is such a meandering, cold, and bloated mess that you just can't escape its theme this time.

As a huge Disneyland fan, the opening of the movie had me filled with hope. Well, actually it's the second opening of the film. The first opening has George Clooney (Frank Walker) talking directly to the audience and then arguing with his costar (Britt Robertson), something that happens a few more times through the course of the film, and is absolutely unnecessary. In the second opening we see Clooney's character as a kid at the 1964 World's Fair, entering a jet pack into an inventions contest. While rebuffed by the contest judge (Hugh Laurie), a girl who appears to be Laurie's daughter (Raffey Cassidy, who gives the best performance in the film), takes a liking to young Frank, gives him a pin with a "T" on it, and has him follow her onto the It's a Small World ride.

I'll give the film this much: it understands Disneyland fandom. After all, It's a Small World really is right next door to Tomorrowland, and what little boy hasn't been forced to ride it hoping the entire time that the bottom would drop out and his boat would get to travel to a much cooler part of the park? That's basically what happens to Frank, as that magic pin gets him whisked away into a gleaming 1960's retro-future world filled with robots, rockets, and women in space age minis.

Unfortunately, the movie doesn't spend much time there. Instead we transition to present day, where Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) is a gifted teenager sad about the dismantling of NASA, doing all she can to make sure the launch pad doesn't get demolished. Her school lessons are filled with the doom and gloom of our horrible world, and Casey dares to ask "What can we do about it?" Of course, her mediocre teachers have no answer to that.

After finding a "T" pin in her possession, and discovering that touching it brings her into the gleaming world of Tomorrowland, but only temporarily, Casey goes on a quest to get to the bottom of it. When she meets her "recruiter," she directs Casey to Frank, now a middle-aged inventor living in seclusion. Seems he was banished from Tomorrowland years ago for building something, the end of the world is neigh, and Casey is the only person who can stop it. As long as they can get back to Tomorrowland.

While all of that sounds simple enough, the movie takes forever to get the plot moving, and once it does, it's still a muddled mess. What did Frank do that was so bad? Why is the villain a villain? What's to be gained from letting the world die? And is a future where all the world's awesome people get to live somewhere else, while us plebes have to stay on Earth doing our mediocre best really a future to aspire to?

But perhaps some good can come of the film. If its success means Disneyland will finally get off its butt and turn the actual Tomorrowland back into the gleaming model of futurism it once was, I hope it makes a billion dollars.

Welcome to Me

This review originally appeared on SFist.com.

Welcome to Me is like a Saturday Night Live movie based on a character that really shouldn't have a back story. Would Penelope, Kristen Wiig's recurring SNL character who is always one-upping people at parties, be funnier if you found out her backstory is that she has borderline personality disorder, is a virtual shut-in, and she's just stopped taking her meds? Because that's pretty much the set-up of this indie comedy that just screams indie comedy at every step.

Wiig's Alice Klieg lives in Palm Desert, and, due to her mental illness, has a limited life and very set routine. The TV is always on, either airing infomercials or old VHS tapes of Oprah shows that she knows by heart. She visits a therapist (Tim Robbins). She buys pudding and lotto tickets at the corner store. And most of what she says comes via prepared statements she pulls out of her fanny pack.

And then she wins the lottery.

What she chooses to do with that money is the bulk of the movie: She convinces a flailing public access station, run by two brothers (James Marsden and Wes Bentley) to produce a talk show starring her, about her, and air it two hours a day, five days a week. Of course her myopic worldview makes for some funny moments--her insistence that she always make an entrance in a swan boat; sitting and eating a meat cake for 10 minutes; rehashing past hurts with badly acted reenactments. But it also makes for some really disturbing ones, like her deciding she's going to neuter dogs, live and on the air for several episodes. (She was once a veterinary assistant.)

A person as self-centered and unwilling to address her illness as Alice would likely have estranged her family and friends long ago, but in the movie they have, inexplicably, stuck by her. They include an ex-husband, played by Alan Tudyk, and a best friend, played by Linda Cardellini. Her friends, for reasons never made clear, care about Alice as more than just the source of some of uneasy laughter. But we're never given any other reason to care.

True Story

This review originally appeared on the San Francisco Appeal.

In 2001, Michael Finkel, a journalist with the New York Times, was fired for partially fabricating a story about brutal working conditions and child slaves in the Ivory Coast coco trade. The same week, an American named Christian Longo was arrested in Mexico, where he had fled after his wife and three children had been found murdered in Oregon. When he was arrested, he had been using the alias, Michael Finkel, passing himself off as the journalist.

Seeing the potential for an interesting–to say the least–story, Finkel contacted Longo, and they began a lengthy correspondence that eventually resulted in the book True Story: Murder, Memoir, and Mea Culpa.

The movie version, perhaps better titled Kind of a True Story, stars Jonah Hill as Finkel, and James Franco as Longo. Right from the casting you can tell the filmmakers will be taking some liberties with how things played out, since there is no resemblance between the actors and their real life counterparts aside from the fact that they’re all men. (Also, imagine not looking anything like Jonah Hill and then finding out he’s playing you in a movie. Ouch!)

Such casting lead me to think the actors would be bringing something a little edgier to the film, but Hill and Franco play it very, very, straight, sometimes to the point of inertness, which can be a bit of a bore to sit through since a vast majority of the film is the two men talking to each other in a stark prison visitor’s cell.

Hill’s character is given a girlfriend, Jill, played by Felicity Jones, for reasons that are never completely clear, as she spends most of the movie just hovering around, silent, with a distressed look on her face. The best that can be said about her is at least she doesn’t fall into that most tired of cliches, the girlfriend or wife who is constantly yelling at her partner for being too obsessed with his work. (Instead, she takes it out on the object of his obsession.)

Still, despite its flaws, the movie manages to be engrossing, because it’s simply a hell of story. True crime is a hugely popular form of entertainment for a reason. Some of the liberties the film takes with the story are understandable–after all, watching a guy think and write does not make for terrific drama. But I still find it funny that this version of the story is the kind of thing that would have gotten Finkel fired all over again had he turned it in as fact.

Clean Yourself Up, Or Get Ribbed: Dame Edna's Glorious Goodbye: The Farewell Tour

This review originally appeared on the San Francisco Appeal.

Every time I go to the theater, I'm a little amazed by what people choose to wear. Theater tickets are, in general, not cheap, and it seems like paying that kind of money to go out would mean it's a special occasion. And aren't special occasions those times when one dresses up? But perhaps I have it all wrong. Maybe these folks had to sell their smartest outfits in order to pay for their theater tickets. It's a tragic tale straight out of O'Henry!

I bring this up because the attire of the audience is something Dame Edna will not let pass unnoticed, so if you decide to see the show, and have tickets in the first few rows, either clean yourself up, or be prepared for some vicious ribbing. (Dame Edna will insist she's only trying to be helpful.)

I will admit that while I have always been aware of Dame Edna, I have never before taken in an entire show, and am most aware of the character through various appearances on PBS and BBC America. I had no idea she's been around since the 1950s! That puts Edna, and her creator, Barry Humphries, in their 80's (or, as Dame Edna says, "approaching 60, but from the wrong direction"). That's a pretty astonishing run for character that came to life in a small Melbourne theater.

I imagine much of the show and shtick will be familiar to Edna's biggest fans, or "possums," but the video that opens the show, played within the stage's giant bedazzled spectacles, serves as a good introduction to those less familiar. Presented as a tongue-in-cheek version of an "E! True Hollywood Story," it includes vintage footage of Dame Edna, some testimony from celebs, (Hugh Jackman speaks of her years as an acting coach, and the traumatizing "private time" he had to endure after class), and other scandalous history.

Aside from videos, which begin and end the show, it's pretty much all Edna, with the occasional back-up dancers for the musical numbers, and a pianist who remains on stage the entire time. Her interactions with the audience are the primary focus, and while all of this seems quite spontaneous and improvised, have no doubt, it's well rehearsed.

She even manages to work the Bay Area into the show, with tales of her "disappointing daughter," her daughter's "partner," and their house full of pit bulls in Visitacion Valley, discussion of which causes Dame Edna to--in a rather alarming moment--have a very physical reaction. This bit is also the evening's only sour note, as it's a bit of a rant that has no satisfying conclusion.

At the show's end, after the audience has waved a virtual garden of Edna's gladiolas (organically raised in her own garden, using her own manure, of course), there's a surprise appearance by the man behind the woman, Barry Humphries himself. He gives a heartfelt thank you to the fans, and to San Francisco, assuring us all that this is, indeed, the end.

Followed by a plea that we all promise to come back for the next farewell.

Cinderella

This review originally appeared on the San Francisco Appeal.

If you're looking for a modernization or feminist updating of Cinderella, ala last year's Maleficent, look elsewhere. This is certainly not that. Instead, it's a pretty faithful remake of the 1950 animated Disney classic, though expanded a bit story wise since the original was barely over an hour long.

These expansions are, for the most part, welcome additions since it means the Prince (Richard Madden) gets to fall head over heels in love with Cinderella (Lily James) after two meetings and some conversations, instead of after one measly song and dance.

Also expanded on is the role of the Evil Stepmother, as well it should be, since she's played by the fantastic Cate Blanchett, and she deserves all the screen time she can get. There's a little bit of pathos given to the character, as her jealousy over Cinderella is given some explanation, and she's fully aware she's been saddled with two idiots for daughters. But for the most part, she's a seriously mean and nasty mother, albeit a fabulously dressed one. (Although, why she's dressed like a 1930's screen siren, while everyone else if prancing around in some approximation of 19th century garb is a little inexplicable. Fabulous, but inexplicable.)

Cinderella's sisters (Holliday Grainger and Sophie McShera), are Technicolor nightmares, better looking than their animated counterparts, but no more talented or charming. And Cindy's Fairy Godmother is not the elderly bippity boppity boo of the movie, at least, not for long, as she's played by Helena Bonham Carter, in full Glinda-esque mode. But, because this is Helena Bonham Carter, and she can't play anything perfectly straight these days, she caps off the glittery look with a huge set of glistening, white, fake teeth.

I'm not a mother to a young girl, so I can't really share in the agony some parents have with the princess-ization of so much of the pop culture aimed at girls. But I was a young girl once, and I loved my princess-based fairy tales, and frilly dresses, and happily ever afters, and came out of it relatively unscathed.

In fact, I think girls these days might have it even better in the princess department, since they have some excellent alternative princesses to choose from, (see: Frozen; Brave; Mulan; The Frog Prince; the aforementioned Maleficent and its version of Princess Aurora, et al), while children of my generation had standard waiting-for-their-prince-in-shiny-armor princesses, and not much else to choose from.

This Cinderella isn't breaking any new ground, but if you aren't opposed to classic tales beautifully filmed, well acted, and well told, then you can't get much better than this.

Even if it doesn't have any singing mice.