Lock, Stock,and Two Smoking Barrels (1998) **

There was a moment there at the turn of the century when director Guy Ritchie seemed poised to be the next Quentin Tarantino. He followed up his debut “Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels” with the insanely fast-moving, generally enjoyable “Snatch.” Somehow, though, Ritchie never turned into a Tarantino-esque film-god. I think that the problem is that his movies never felt as consequential as what Tarantino was doing. There was lots of fast-paced action, with speeded-up film shots, and cockney accents that required subtitles, but there was no heart.

“Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels” is a good case in point. The movie has several story lines filled with potentially interesting characters whose stories wind up intersecting. Ritchie never does anything with these scamps, however, other than to establish that they are lowlifes engaged in ripping off other lowlifes. He never made me care enough about any of them to care much what happens in the story.

The main characters, the ones we are theoretically supposed to root for, include Tom (Jason Flemyng), Soap (Dexter Fletcher), Eddy (Nick Moran), and Bacon (Jason Statham). These are low-level scumbags who hawk stolen wares and such. Eddy fancies himself a card player as well, and the boys pool their funds to get Eddy into a high-stakes poker game run by a gangster named Hatchet Harry (P.H. Moriarty). The game is a racket, as any idiot should have known. Harry not only cheats, he bullies Eddy into accepting credit in order to call a hand, which Eddy goes on to lose. Owing Harry a quarter-million pounds, Eddy leaves the game in a daze, and explains to his friends that Harry and his goons will be holding all of them responsible for the debt.

There's no way these guys can scrape up that kind of money on either side of the law, but when they overhear their neighbors planning a robbery, they hatch a plan to rob the robbers. Hijinks ensue.

There are several different groups of hoodlums, who are hard to tell apart at times, and much of the dialogue is unintelligible due to the thick, Cockney accents. The movie could still be quite good, however, if any of the characters had any sort of saving grace, which they don't. They are not only wicked, they are stupid. Fortunately, many of these assholes wind up killing each other off, which is about the only satisfaction the audience gets.

The problem with “Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels” as a debut for Guy Ritchie is that its failures are not due to low budget or cinematography. Those are weaknesses you would expect in a first-time director, and easily fixable on future projects. “Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels,” however suffers from a lack of heart, which I think is why Ritchie never lived up to his hyped potential.

2 stars out of 5

Re-Animator (1985) ***

I'm not sure it's possible to adapt an H.P. Lovecraft story to film without making a cult classic. I mean that in the sense of both words: The movie is likely to become a classic, but only for a certain cult of horror fans. As good as Lovecraft's stories are, there's a single-mindedness to them, an innocence, and an of-their-time element that may not translate well to a blockbuster film. As much as I love stories like “The Call of Cthulhu” and “At the Mountains of Madness,” it's hard to imagine a bunch of big-name actors making a straight movie version of them. To make a good film out of these tales, the filmmaker needs to be able to smile sheepishly at the audience and say, “We all know these stories take themselves too seriously, but we love them anyway, so let's just have a good time.” The 2005 movie “The Call of Cthulhu,” for example was made as a silent film, which somehow takes the over-earnest elements of the story and makes them work quite well.

1985's “Re-Animator” works by reveling in its 1980s campiness. We meet Dan Cain (Bruce Abbott), Miskatonic Medical School's “most promising medical student.” We never see Dan doing regular med student stuff like studying, sitting in lectures, or seeing patients with a big team of other students and medical residents. Instead, he has loads of time to wheel bodies down to the morgue and bang his girlfriend, Megan, who happens to be the Dean's daughter. Megan (Barbara Crampton) is '80s-hot, by which I mean she's adorable, but she wears high-waisted pants.

Dan gets a new roommate in the form of Herbert West (Jeffrey Combs), a medical student transferred in from Switzerland after his mentor died during a bizarre experiment. Herbert's secretive behavior vexes Dan and Megan until they discover, to their horror, that he is conducting experiments in re-animation. He has a green, glowing chemical that, when injected into the brainstem, can bring the dead back to life. The problem is that the re-animated being, whether a cat or a human, tends to be murderously insane. The answer, according to Herbert, is to find ever-fresher subjects. In Lovecraft's tale, this led the scientist to commit murder in order to have the freshest corpse possible, but the movie “Re-Animator” doesn't take it's protagonists down that road. They simply sneak into the morgue to experiment. Nonetheless, they run afoul of both Dean Halsey (Robert Sampson) and Professor Carl Hill (David Gale), who is jealous of Herbert's science and lusts after Dan's girlfriend.

“Re-Animator” looks like it was filmed on the same camera they used for the old “Incredible Hulk” series starring Bill Bixby, which means it looks dated even for 1985. Enough time has passed, however, that that cheesy, soft-focus look actually makes the film seem somewhat timeless. The movie doesn't have any of that knowing, 1990's snarkiness (think “Scream”). The actors play it straight, letting the plot and the decidedly non-CGI special effects provide the humor. With many cult-classic movies, it's hard to know what the filmmaker was thinking. Did they mean to make it campy, or is it a happy accident? With “Re-Animator,” it seems pretty clear the director, Stuart Gordon, followed the standard B-movie formula: throw in some titties, some gore, and some humor, and keep the overhead low. He just classed it up a bit by getting some decent actors.

My only complaint about “Re-Animator” is that it isn't really scary. It's gory, yes, but it neither startles nor instills dread. I seem to recall that “The Evil Dead” and “The Evil Dead 2”, similarly campy, low-budget gore-fests, managed to at least be startling. “Re-Animator” broadcasts every death well in advance, and there is never any doubt as to how the protagonists will react to a death. They're gonna get out that green stuff and start re-animating!

3 stars out of 5

Fifty Shades of Grey (2015) **

For years, the cable channel Cinemax has filled its late-night schedule with soft-porn offerings, inspiring the nickname “skinemax.” This is basically what you have in the “Fifty Shades of Grey” movie: a titty-flick, although with a bigger budget and probably better acting than most.

Dakota Johnson plays Anastasia Steele, a virginal college student studying English Lit and living in the social shadow of her vivacious, blond roommate. When the roommate is too sick to perform her journalism class interview with businessman Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan), she dispatches Anastasia to ask the questions for her. Anastasia and Grey wind up hitting it off, bonding over the banality of questions like “What is the secret to your success?” and “Are you gay?” Soon, Anastasia is being wooed by the crisply-dressed billionaire, who reveals his taste for sexual sadism and offers her a contract detailing what her role would be like as his submissive sex-slave.

First of all, let's hear it for those names: Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey. I haven't heard such awesome character names since Brock Landers and Chest Hardwell, from the movie “Boogie Nights.” If you can keep a straight face when these two characters introduce themselves, that's a good sign that this is the movie for you. If you can't keep the chuckles in, well, you can enjoy laughing your way through the unintentionally hilarious scenes of this film while you wait for them to get around to the kinky sex. They definitely take their time getting to it, spending time on helicopter and glider rides, and dragging out the nonsense about the contract forever. Once sexy-time finally arrives, the soft-core action is fairly good. Don't be expecting full-frontal nudity, but Anastasia spends a fair amount of time with her arms stretched over her head, wearing nothing but her panties, getting smacked with a riding crop.

The worst part about “Fifty Shades of Grey” (besides the self-loathing you will feel for watching it) is Jamie Dornan's acting. Dakota Johnson actually puts out some effort, and makes her character somewhat interesting despite the lame lines she has to recite. Dornan, on the other hand, plays Grey with absolutely zero personality, gazing at Anastasia with dead, shark eyes as he presents his contract to her like he's selling an insurance policy.

So should you rent “Fifty Shades of Grey?” Why not? It probably won't be the most miserable thing you do this week. Just know what you are signing up for: 30 minutes of soft-porn plus an hour and a half of laughable filler.

2 stars out of 5

The Imitation Game (2014) ***

Benedict Cumberbatch plays Alan Turing, the mathematics professor and electronics whiz who helped England crack Germany's Enigma code during WWII. “The Imitation Game” tells the story of how Turing and his team cracked the code. Jumping back and forth in time, the film also shows how Turing became interested in code-breaking as a nerdy, semi-autistic teen, and how in his later years he was convicted of indecency for being gay.

The story of Turing's persecution is certainly sad, but the movie is not a downer. I found “The Imitation Game” to be thoroughly enjoyable from start to finish. This is partly because Benedict Cumberbatch is such a compelling actor that it is simply impossible not to watch him. He gets assists here from an excellent supporting cast, including Keira Knightley as a fellow code-breaker, Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister on “Game of Thrones”) as the commanding officer, and Mark Strong as a shifty MI6 agent.

The code-breaking part of the story is exciting, with Turing's machine clicking and whirring, but the film doesn't do a good job of explaining the machine and how it works. Also, the brilliant insight that finally allows them to crack the code seems patently obvious, the kind of thing that any code-breaker would think of from the start. More interesting to me is that after the code is cracked, MI6 (England's intelligence service) puts the team to work using statistics to guide them in how to use all those de-coded messages. They can't simply start thwarting every German attack, of course, or the Nazis would quickly figure out that Enigma had been compromised. MI6 also uses the existence of a Soviet spy in the service to leak carefully chosen information to the Russians when it serves England's purposes. I found these insights into the layered intricacies of intelligence work fascinating, and wish they had explored them more.

Ultimately, “The Imitation Game” is a nicely-done, enjoyable film, but it does require you to turn your brain off a little, which is surprising given that it is about brilliant people doing brilliant things. Somehow all the mathematics doesn't translate onto the screen, and we are left with a movie about personalities. I get the feeling Turing would not have approved.

3 stars out of 5

9 to 5 (1980) ***

This is another of those cultural touchstone movies that I somehow failed to see back in the day. Thirty-five years later, I finally gave it a watch, and I have to say that it's pretty good. It's fairly predictable, and the humor is broad, but writer/director Collin Higgins (“Harold and Maude”) gives the movie something that makes it stand out from the other silly comedies of its time.

In the very first scene, “9 to 5” let's you know that it intends to be more than just a dumb comedy. Rather than immediately introducing the stars, Higgins shows a montage of a variety of women hustling through the streets of New York to get to their jobs. I found that poignant, like he was dedicating the film to all working women.

Then we meet Violet, a low-level supervisor at the Consolidated Company. She is smart and competent, but she can't break through the glass ceiling at Consolidated, because the men she trains keep getting promoted ahead of her. This includes Franklin Hart (Dabney Coleman), an egotistical, sexist jerk who takes credit for Violet's good ideas and sexually harasses his secretary, Doralee (Dolly Parton). Jane Fonda plays Judy, a recent divorcee new to the workforce. These women bear, as best they can, the indignities of working under Hart, but they share with each other their fantasies of doing him in. When one of these fantasies comes true, things get wacky.

“9 to 5” succeeds because it has a genuine social message packaged as comedy. The film got its start as a project of Jane Fonda's production company. The movie was originally to be a drama, but Fonda and her team found it too preachy, so they switched gears to comedy. The humor lightens up the mood surrounding serious issue like sexual harassment and equal pay for women. The movie gets in some biting satire, as when Doralee fantasizes about forcing Hart to endure the constant pawing and innuendo that he subjects her to. There's nothing like a little role reversal to show how messed-up a situation is.

The years have lent some bitter irony to this film. Violet manages to get a policy of equal pay for equal work instituted. The male executives mutter to themselves that that is a step too far and that they will have to reverse the policy. The joke was simple satire in 1980, but I'll bet the filmmakers didn't think that this would still be an issue 35 years later.

3 stars out of 5

Wall Street (1987) ****

“Greed, for lack of a better word, is Good.” These words, spoken by Michael Douglas's character Gordon Gekko, are some of the most famous words of the 1980's. What's amazing is that even now, when the quote has long since passed into the realm of parody, Douglas manages to make it sound plausible when you hear it in the context of the film. He delivers the line at a stockholder's meeting, where he is trying to win over the other stockholders for an important vote. He goes on to explain that greed, whether for money, for love, or for life, is the force driving mankind's advancements, and that it is the profit motive that will allow them to cut out the excess fat at the company they all own and turn it into a lean, successful business again. At this point in the film, we know Gekko is sleazy, but his argument seems to have some merit.

Later in the film, we see just how far Gekko's dishonesty goes, and that his form of greed is only a destructive force, not a creative one. As he explains to his protege, Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen), “I don't create anything...I just transfer wealth from others to myself.” Bud, a hungry,young broker hoping to emulate Gekko, has placed himself in orbit around the great man, helping Gekko engage in insider trading on a regular basis. In exchange, Gekko makes Bud rich and hooks him up with Darien (Daryl Hannah), the kind of high-class beauty that only rich men can afford. When Gekko finally stoops lower than even Bud will go, Bud is forced to choose between his fancy new life and his tattered conscience.

“Wall Street” has come to be considered a defining film of the 1980's, but the movie is really timeless. Michael Douglas and Charlie Sheen fit these roles perfectly. Martin Sheen (as Bud's working-class father) and Hal Holbrook (as a senior stockbroker) can be perhaps a bit preachy at times, but they serve their purpose as representatives of traditional, hard-working values in the face of Gekko's amoral, short-cut-taking greed. The only weak link in the film is Daryl Hannah, and I've read that Oliver Stone regretted casting her. Apparently, she couldn't reconcile herself to her character's amorality.

I'm always interested in why some movies age so well. “Wall Street” is about guys who wear slicked-back hair and dark suits all the time, a style which really doesn't change much over the decades. In fact, the only time this film looks dated at all is when Daryl Hannah rocks some big shoulder pads. What really makes the film timeless, though, is it's theme of greed and consequences. It's easy to see how this film plays well now, in the receding wake of the 2008 financial meltdown, caused as it was by the greed of Wall Street bankers. Audiences in 1987 had their own reasons to despise fat cats, with the headlines full of high unemployment, insider trading scandals, and failing Savings and Loans. The truth is, it isn't in the American nature to be embittered towards the rich. We are much more likely to want to emulate a rich man than to begrudge him his wealth. Our respect for Capitalism, however, is predicated on the image of a capitalist as someone who invests money in a worthy enterprise, then profits when that enterprise is successful. In this scenario, everyone wins, because the growth of that enterprise expands the total wealth of society. Guys like Gekko, though, make their living off of arbitrage and speculation, which are zero-sum games. For Gekko to win, someone else has to lose, and the total wealth is not increased. If a guy like Gekko gets a tip that you are headed to the store to buy milk, he'll swoop in ahead of you and buy up all the milk, then jack up the price when you arrive. He would never stoop to actually milking a cow. These Wall Street guys claim that their activities create liquidity in capital markets and make our economy run more efficiently. It seems, however, that the headlines of every era are full of stories about these guys lying and manipulating until, repeatedly, they manage to break the economy. That's why “Wall Street” has aged so well. It's a tightly-woven story about this form of greed, and there isn't a decade in the last century in which this story wouldn't resonate.

4 stars out of 5

La Notte (1961) ***

Like a less dramatic, more boring “Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe?,” Antonioni's “La Notte” explores the resentments and discontent of a dysfunctional marriage. Marcello Mastroianni plays Giovanni, a successful author, and Jeanne Moreau plays his wife Lidia. “La Notte” (Italian for “The Night”) begins with the couple visiting another author, a long-time friend who is dying in the hospital. At the hospital, Giovanni is accosted by a beautiful but crazy young woman who draws him into her room and seduces him, although the nurses burst in before consummation. He later confesses the experience to Lidia, who seems coldly unconcerned about the near-infidelity. Giovanni is worried by her reaction, as are we, because everyone knows that it's a bad sign if your lover doesn't care enough to get jealous.

Later, Giovanni glad-hands the public at a book reading, and Lidia slips away to wander around Rome, visiting old haunts. Later still, on Lidia's request, the two go out to a nightclub, where a couple put on an interesting, gymnastic strip show. This show is the coolest thing in the movie, but Giovanni and Lidia are bored and restless, and Lidia finally suggests they attend the party of an acquaintance, a wealthy industrialist. They party the night away, each pursuing a possible infidelity, before finally hashing out their deteriorating marriage in the light of the new dawn.

“La Notte” is considered an important film by critics, part of the great period of Italian film roughly corresponding to the French New Wave. Then, as now, the film was lauded for the subtlety of its storytelling. There is a lot of talking, but “La Notte” could probably work as a silent film, as so much of the movie consists of silent, beautifully photographed scenes of the characters walking or leaning up against walls. These scenes focus on the inner life of these characters, and we are often left to speculate on the content of their thoughts and emotions, with subtle clues from these two excellent actors.

All of this subtlety comes at a price, however. Without mincing words, I have to say that I was bored for much of the 2-hour run-time. The scenes are long and slow, and one wonders if Antonioni couldn't have edited it to a more watchable length while preserving the tone. You wait and wait for something big to happen, then finally realize that nothing will. It's a slog, a movie that feels like work.  Towards the end of the film, a character tells Giovanni and Lidia, "You two have worn me out tonight."  I understood how she felt at that point.

Plenty of film fans disagree with me, and I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone from seeing “La Notte.” It is quite thought-provoking, and Antonioni puts together some amazing-looking camera shots. I would not, however, suggest that someone watch this as their first experience of classic foreign cinema. For a film of the same period that explores similar emotional content, but in a more dynamic, entertaining way, I would recommend de Sicca's “Marriage Italian Style.”  For a movie with Marcello Mastroianni staying out all night exploring his existential angst, “La Dolce Vida” is an essential film, and much easier to watch than “La Notte.” For those who are as enthralled by Jeanne Moreau as I am, she is riveting in “La Notte,” but “The Lovers” or “Jules and Jim” are much more watchable introductions to her work.

3 stars out of 5

Three Kings (1999) ***

Somehow I had gotten it in my head that Spike Jonze directed this film. Maybe it's because the actor/director is so hilarious as the idiot, redneck character Conrad. “Three Kings” is, in fact, directed and partly written by David O. Russell (“Silver Linings Playbook,” “American Hustle”), and it is better than it has any right to be. On the one hand, Russell has written a highly implausible heist movie combined with a rather preachy morality tale, all set in the first Iraq War. On the other hand, the combined performances are so compelling that the movie somehow works.

Troy (Mark Wahlberg), Conrad (Jonze), and Chief Elgin (Ice Cube) are army reservists finishing up an almost action-free stint in Operation Desert Storm. While processing Iraqi POWs, they find a map that appears to lead to one of Saddam's secret bunkers full of stolen Kuwaiti gold. Before the guys can even process the possibilities, Special Forces Captain Archie Gates (George Clooney) has sniffed out the situation and muscled his way into it. This is just as well, as none of the other guys would have a chance of putting together a way to steal that loot. Under Archie's guidance, they find and steal the gold, relying on the reluctance of the defeated Iraqis to instigate hostilities with American soldiers.

During the heist, the men discover that with the fighting officially over, Iraqi forces are concentrating on suppressing those Iraqis who tried to rise up against Saddam during the brief war. They are rounding up and torturing rebels and starving out entire villages. Faced directly with this reality, the men have to chose between completing their heist as planned or intervening.

While Wahlberg and Clooney get top billing in this film, they are far from the most memorable characters. The interaction between Spike Jonze's moronic, racist Conrad and Ice Cube's Chief easily steals the show. Nora Dunn provides some excellent comic relief as a war reporter hustling for a story. Best of all, however, are the actors who portray the Iraqis. Cliff Curtis, who is actually of New Zealand Maori descent rather than Arab, is a magnetic presence as the rebel leader. Said Taghmaoui is unforgettable as an Iraqi officer who tortures Troy while calling him “my main man.” His “What's the problem with Michael Jackson” speech may be the best part of the movie.

Ultimately, “Three Kings” is about individuals making hard choices in the face of a hypocritical U.S. foreign policy and an uncaring military machine. The movie addresses a little-discussed aspect of America's Iraq wars. America encouraged Iraqi dissidents to rebel against Saddam, and they did so thinking we would be invading to back them up. When we stopped the war instead, they were left exposed to torture, disappearances, and execution. Is it any wonder that America has trouble finding reliable friends in Iraq now?

3 stars out of 5

My Summer of Love (2004) ***1/2

Life in small-town England is no idyll for teenaged Mona (Natalie Press.) With her single Mom dead, she has only her brother, an ex-con turned born-again Christian. He is too busy speaking in tongues with his prayer group to provide any meaningful guidance to her in her adolescence, including when her older, married boyfriend dumps her. Life takes a turn for the better when she meets the rich, alluring Tamsin (Emily Blunt.) Tamsin is home from boarding school, where she was expelled for “being a bad influence on people.” Despite their differing backgrounds, they are quite simpatico. Over the summer, the girls become close friends, then lovers.

“My Summer of Love” reminds me a bit of a more recent movie, “Blue is the Warmest Color,” although the sex scenes in “My Summer of Love” are not nearly as graphic. It's still quite sexy, and an excellent coming-of-age movie. The viewer gets swept along in the intensity of these teenaged girls' emotions. The camera work is mostly hand-held, and some viewers may find the film too talky. Honestly, I barely noticed the occasionally shaky camera; I was too busy enjoying the story and the two beautiful actresses.

3.5 stars out of 5

Tron: Legacy (2010) *

This is one that I can't truly review, because I could only stomach 15 minutes of it. I had mentioned wanting to see it in my review of “Oblivion” , because the movies share a director, Joseph Kosinski. I enjoyed “Oblivion,” so I had high hopes for “Tron: Legacy,” despite its dubious, belated-sequel status. Hopes = dashed!

The movie starts out with computer programmer Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges, reprising his role from the original “Tron”) telling his son, Sam, the story of how he entered the virtual world back in “Tron.” It's the lamest piece of movie exposition ever. Kevin goes on to disappear, leaving his software company in the control of money-grubbers who care nothing about his noble goal of making digital information free for the masses.

Skip ahead a decade, and we meet Flynn's rebellious son, Sam (Garrett Hedlund), who likes to speed around on his motorcycle and create mischief for the greedy board that runs his missing dad's company.

This is where I gave up. The movie is just one stock scene after another, a total turd. I'll give Kosinski credit for good cinematography, but a lame script is going to turn into a lame movie, no matter how well it is shot. I can't really remember whether the original “Tron” was any good, but I definitely wouldn't waste any time on the sequel.

1 star out of 5