Tag Archives: Ellen Page

Super (2010)

Judges say: meh, it's not that bad. 6.5 for effort.
Judges say: meh, it’s not that bad. 6.5 for effort.

Now we come to Super, written and directed by James Gunn. A “dark comedy” apparently full of stunning, satirical insight. Or so you’d think if you believe what you read. I believe in using past experience as a guide. Some people might consider that an inexcusable bias…but some people need to check the tree in their own eye before they start bitching about the splinters in mine. And experience told me to stay the hell away from James Gunn after 2004’s Dawn of the Dead remake, which he wrote. No, I haven’t forgotten. Yes, I’m still holding that against him. Is that fair…? Probably not. But it’s not about what’s fair: it’s about what I want.

I wanted a cast of characters I could give a crap about, but Dawn of the Dead‘s bunch felt more like the subjects of someone’s half-assed social experiment. We were so far removed from them the script had to work overtime to characterize them through clunky, expository dialogue (the laziest kind of characterization around…apart from voice-over narration). So I went into Super with serious trepidation. I don’t watch The Office, so Rainn Wilson held no appeal for me. And sure, Ellen Page was in Inception…but before that, she played Shadowcat in X-Men: The Last Stand. Liv Tyler is…Liv Tyler. And Kevin Bacon is in serious danger of being typecast as The Villain.

Still, the things that annoyed me about Super have proved to be crowd-pleasing. So I once again get to be the asshole in the room who made the mistake of reading comic books back in the 1990s, when Super‘s pet issues were common storytelling currency and everybody took a whack at them (with a pipe wrench) sooner or later. I’ve seen this movie called “perhaps the definitive take on self-reflexive superheroes,” once again revealing film critic’s monumental ignorance of pretty much everything that doesn’t involve a current celebrity. Continue reading Super (2010)

X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)

Oh crap. I put in a Twilight movie by mistake.
Oh crap. I put in a Twilight movie by mistake.

Doc Psy’s Journal: May 26, 2006. Shitty movie in theaters this morning. Finger pints of meddling executives all over the remains. This entertainment industry is afraid of me. I have seen its true face. Its corporate boardrooms are blood-stained abattoirs where good ideas go to die, tortured by bean counters and business school graduates even more cynical than I am. If that’s possible.

The hatred I feel now’s been a long time coming. For two movies, I watched as fanboys and -girls the world over sang the praises of X-Men. They jumped for joy when X2 managed to avoid outright sucking. And then it happened. Bryan Singer jumped ship to do Superman Returns. Wouldn’t you? Yes, you would. You would abandon the franchise you’d spent half a decade building for the chance to do Superman. I don’t blame Singer for taking the opportunity to make that film. I blame him for the crappy film he eventually made . The rest of the blame is fitted for the shoulders of 20th Century Fox, the movie company that can’t pass a shark without jumping it. Continue reading X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)