"Inception"

Reviewed by Lisa Schwarzbaum Jul 20, 2010

Lisa Schwarzbaum

Lisa Schwarzbaum is a film critic for EW

Beware the critic who claims the ability to analyze Inception authoritatively after one viewing. As engrossing and logic-resistant as the state of dreaming it seeks to replicate, Christopher Nolan's audacious new creation demands further study to fully absorb the multiple, simultaneous stories Nolan finagles into one narrative experience. First time around, the movie — part sci-fi fantasy, part gun-toting heist pic, part mindfreak, all filmmaker brio — is dazzling and buzzy. It's a rolling explosion of images as hypnotizing and sharply angled as any in a drawing by M.C. Escher or a state-of-the-biz videogame; the backwards splicing of Nolan's own Memento looks rudimentary by comparison. Only repeated exposure can clarify for each spectator not only what's going on, but also whether the emotional payoff deepens enough to warrant the arbitrary complexity of the game.

This much is clear: Leonardo DiCaprio plays Dom Cobb, a thief-for-hire in the corporate-espionage field who's able to mine info from a sleeping person's brain. Dom and a team of specialists, including a right-hand man (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), an architect (Ellen Page), and a "forger" (Tom Hardy) who can morph into another person's identity, have developed techniques to actually enter a subject's dream. And once on the premises, they can steal secrets. Demand for their services is great, and the team zips around the world. But Dom, a man with secrets of his own, wants to quit the business and return home to his kids. To do so, he takes on One Last Job, a mission with a twist: Rather than extracting an idea buried deep in a dreamer's subconscious, Dom must plant the seed of an idea that will, in waking life, take root — an experimental process called inception. Ken Watanabe plays the tycoon who hires Dom for the job, angling to undo a competitor. Cillian Murphy plays the mark, the heir to a rival business fortune. In a tall tale where every character's name is crafted to signify something to cultists, naming Murphy's character Robert Fischer is a sure sign that Nolan is setting up a gleefully rigged game of chess. Speaking of names, consider Dom's beautiful, haunting wife, played with tenderness and a wiry undercurrent of malice by Marion Cotillard: Her name is Mal. As in the Latin for evil.

One could discuss — or just gape at Inception's visual bravado, and the way the production team braids real locations (Paris, Tokyo, Morocco, snowy Canada) with perspective-shifting CG work into eye candy for MIT engineering students on Ecstasy. Page's architect messes around with the laws of physics, exploding a large chunk of "Paris" with kinetic delight. (As the newest member of the team, Page gets to explain stuff to the audience; for her pains, the actress is saddled with some awfully clunky expository declarations.) Gordon-Levitt wrangles sleeping dreamers into a configuration suitable for transport in a zero-gravity environment in a feat of cinematic choreography worthy of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Any scene featuring the forger named Eames (as in mathematically elegant furniture design?) is compelling because of the effortlessly magnetic Tom Hardy (he played the title prison thug in last year's Bronson). The influences of other filmmakers, other films including The Matrix, Blade Runner, and James Bond movies — peek out of every scene. But Nolan, the temporal origami master who made Insomnia, The Prestige, and those magical movies Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, handles his shout-outs lightly.

The reality that jostles the reverie is that, as brainiacally engaging as the movie is, Inception's emotions beat with a much fainter pulse. Nolan outfits Dom with an old-fashioned love of wife and children, and waking-life emotions of grief and guilt. But between DiCaprio's characteristic (and, don't get me wrong, often interesting) affect of broody complication, and the generic nature of Dom's longings, the heart is far less engaged than the head for most of the show. I like the movie's ambition so much that I wish that imbalance didn't matter — that the daredevil rush to the (infernally open-ended) conclusion was its own satisfying reward. I'm left to hope, and wonder whether repeated viewing will shift my perspective. You know, as in a dream.

I can't wait to go back. B+

Jolie wants more Salt

By WENN.com | Tuesday, July 13, 2010

The actress admits she thoroughly enjoyed playing the tough agent-on-the-run in Salt and hopes the film is a success when it hits cinemas later this month (Jul10), so she can come back for more.

She says, "I think if we can keep up the mystery and find another really great story, I'll be back.

"Salt is really fun in that she's got so much depth because of her childhood and her life and a lot of what she's gone through. She's nicely complex. I love the possibility of the different disguises and different personalities and accents. It's kind of like a playground for an actor, that kind of role."

Jolie bailed on the Tomb Raider franchise after two movies and refused to return for a planned Wanted sequel - because her character died in the first film.

She adds, "Being dead makes it difficult. The producers were working on how to bring me back to life, but I kind of feel like if I die in a movie I should die."

Review: Predators Delivers a Tough and Exciting Jungle Trek Read

July 12, 2010
by Jeremy Kirk

Nimrod Antal's Predators is easily, without question, the second best film in the science fiction franchise. That might not be saying much for a series that began with one of the most innovative action films of the 1980s and has since dumped its iconic, titular character into a fray of misguided sequels and spin-offs and blasphemous crossovers. As memorable and as exquisitely crafted as the Predator character is, the movies it has inhabited haven't been living up to expectations ever since we were introduced to the "futuristic" world of 1997 Los Angeles in Predator

2. With this new Predators, though, we get taken back to the basics.

Take a rag-tag group of warriors, drop them in the jungle, and have them attempt to survive the attack of an alien hunter who can disguise itself like a chameleon. This time around, though, those warriors aren't comrades in arms, but killers from varying parts of the world. Adrien Brody plays Royce, a mercenary who becomes the de facto leader of the group. In the film's opening moments, quite literally before the title card presents itself, we see him falling through the air unconscious. He comes to, and a parachute slows his fall just enough to keep him alive after hitting the jungle ground.

Royce and the rest of the group, made up of people like a Yakuza hitman, and IDF sniper, a member of a drug cartel, etc, find one another, and it becomes quite clear very quickly they are not in their element. They are on an alien world, and something has brought them to this jungle planet for the sole purpose of hunting them. The strangers in this strange land must become a team and use their respective skills if they are to survive.

This is where Predators finds its first set-back. Where the connection among the members of the team in John McTiernan's 1987 original was undeniable, here there isn't even an attempt at forming such a bond. Much of the cast is pure fodder for the picking-off-one-by-one nature of the film. It's a minor problem in the first half of the film when all they are doing is trekking through the jungle and attempting to sort out who or what is hunting them.

Produced by Robert Rodriguez and directed by Nimrod Antal, the film's first half is stylish and polished trading in the McTiernan grain and grit for slick CG skylines and the best landscapes Hawaii has to offer. It doesn't really matter that we don't know much about any of these characters, since the action hits quickly and hard and offers some of the best B-movie thrills seen in a while. The periodic references from the '87 original thrown in and the "tough" dialog and quips straight out of the '80s catalog help hold your interest, as well. It isn't until 20 minutes or so in that we even get our first glimpse at one of the Predators or before there is any indication (other than the opening title) this is even a Predator movie. This is to the film's advantage, Antal and Rodriguez don't hide the alien from us, but it's not splashed across the screen from the very opening, either.

It doesn't seem to hit us how little there is to care about anyone until the clunky second half when Laurence Fishburne pops up as Mr. Exposition. His character is the biggest problem found in Predators, not so much that he exists. He plays a soldier who has previously been brought as part of the hunt. He has learned to survive and, for some reason, feels it his duty to help these new arrivals. It is at this point, where Fishburne's character takes the group back to his save haven for some rest and explanation, that the film falls off the proverbial cliff. His exposition, while somewhat necessary for the exciting third act and gives some interesting back story to the Predator's world, is handled so lazily and disjointedly it sucks the excitement the first half built up right out of the picture.

We are offered some character development in this section of the film, though. It's too little too late for most of them, but Brody's Royce and Alice Braga as the IDF sniper are allowed to evolve. They aren't exactly layered, but when compared to the paper thin characters the other actors (Topher Grace, Walton Goggins, Danny Trejo, et al. included) play, a single note is better than hardly any at all.

Antal's direction, particularly of the action, is hit-or-miss. Some of the scenes are fast-paced, evenly edited and offer enough chic to keep you honed in. Other scenes, one very cool scene in particular where the Yakuza assassin breaks out his katana blade for some hand-to-hand, alien swordplay, are shoddily framed and paced with very little enthusiasm to be found. Much of the film's third act is exhilarating and almost wins back any action lover's attention that was lost in the catacombs of Fishburne's near narration. It goes out on a high note (quite literally when considering the film's closing credit song, which will make any fan of McTiernan's original grin from ear to ear), and you almost forget the slogging you had to go through the 30 minutes prior. Almost.

Predators is an up-down-up adventure that takes unfamiliar approaches to some quite familiar territory. A long way from the film that began it all, it never transcends the B-level sci-fi action it is filled with. It even includes the obligatory open end for the possibility of sequelitis setting in. Who survives the Predators of the story is not something that is to be revealed here, but know that if the audience and their engrossment is to survive Predators the film, there is some serious jungle that has to be waded through.

'Despicable Me' tallies astounding $60 million opening

By Nicole Sperling, EW.com

July 12, 2010 -- Updated 1841 GMT (0241 HKT)

(EW.com) -- Being mean has worked! For "Despicable Me" earned an estimated $60.1 million for the weekend, proving, yet again, that animated flicks are not just for kids.

And it, along with "Toy Story 3," will be two of summer's biggest success stories.

The other new wide release, "Predators" starring Adrian Brody, earned an estimated $25.3 million for the weekend -- above expectations and better than the majority of other "Predator" movies released over the last 23 years.

The performances of these two films plus the strong holds of "Toy Story," "Twilight Saga: Eclipse" and "Grown Ups" helped boost the box office up a remarkable 40 percent over last year at this time when Bruno opened to $30.6 million.

"Despicable Me" earned a solid A from audiences, according to exit pollster CinemaScore. The same cannot be said for "Predators," which only received a C+ from the exit pollster.

In contrast, "The Twilight Saga: Eclipse," which audiences love, lost 49 percent of its value the second weekend, better than "New Moon" did its third weekend in theaters. The film added $33.3 million to its coffers, for a second place finish. The David Slade-directed flick's total gross now stands at $237 million. (The film still trails "New Moon" by $18 million but with a better hold perhaps its staying power will outweigh its predecessor in the end.)

"Toy Story 3" nabbed the fourth slot, falling only 27 percent for the weekend despite the stiff competition from "Despicable Me." The film's total gross stands at $340 million, beating "Finding Nemo" and becoming Pixar's top-grossing film in the company's history.

Rounding out the top five is "The Last Airbender." The M. Night Shyamalan-directed flick lost 57 percent of its value, expected considering how well it opened last frame. The film, based on the popular Nickelodeon anime series, now has a gross of $100 million. The studio will wait to determine whether to green light a sequel til the international grosses begin rolling in, in the next month.

"Grown Ups" performed exceedingly well its third weekend in theaters. The Adam Sandler-starrer dropped only 14 percent for a weekend gross of $16.4 million. The film's total gross now stands at $111 million, marking Sandler's 11th film to cross the box office milestone in the past 12 years.

"Knight & Day" took spot seven, also with an incredible hold. The Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz-starrer earned $7.8 million, falling 25 percent for the weekend. The film's three-week gross totals close to $62 million.

Spot eight went to "The Karate Kid," the Sony picture that keeps on luring audiences. Falling only 29 percent its fifth weekend for another $5.7 million in box office, the movie's total gross stands at $164.6 million.

"The A-Team" landed in the ninth spot with $1.8 million added to its total cume of close to $74 million. "Cyrus" nabbed the tenth spot. The indie flick from Fox Searchlight grossed $1.3 million in 200 theaters -- its widest release yet. Starring Jonah Hill and John C. Reilly, "Cyrus's" total gross now stands at $3.5 million.

In limited release, "The Kids Are All Right" opened to $504,888 in only seven theaters for an average of $72,127. The well-reviewed flick from Lisa Cholodenko (Laurel Canyon) is prime Oscar bait and will expand in the coming weeks.