Movie reivew for a movie that’s been out for 2 months.

Posted by Jerry | Filed under Random

I didn’t like “Hugo” at all. Now, I’ve been disappointed by movies I was looking forward to (“Jurassic Park: The Lost World”, “Extract”), I’ve been disappointed by movies I had no expectations of (“The Town,” “Fanboys”), and I’ve been disappointed by movies I was actively planning to hate (both Michael Bay “Transformers” movies, um, well, anything Michael Bay-related), but it’s been a while since I’ve been so incensed by a movie that I felt the need to write about it. Not just write about, but spend time analyzing why I could hate a movie so much.

I love Martin Scorsese and I hear the book that “Hugo” is based on (“The Invention of Hugo Cabret”) is dynamite, so I’ll start my attack on the writer, John Logan. The only movie on his filmography that I didn’t out-and-out hate was “Rango,” which worked in spite of the script, not because of it. Well, that’s unfair. I also didn’t hate “The Aviator” or “Sweeny Todd,” but both of them were triumphs of either acting (the former) or the source material (the latter). The king daddy of Logan’s offenses is “Any Given Sunday,” which stands out as one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen. I remember sitting in the theatre and actually wanting to lift up the arm rest on the seat next to me, lie down and fall asleep. I remember specifically thinking, “Dear God, are they really going to take us through each game of the post-season without so much as a montage of multiple games? Can’t we just skip to the end?”

But at least “Any Given Sunday” had the benefit of being episodic. “Hugo” was bad and it rambled—I had no idea what was going to happen next and I could have cared less. Logic was nowhere to be found, and don’t you DARE say, “It’s a kids movie and kids movies don’t need logic.” Fuck you if you say that. EVERY movie needs logic, even if it’s an internal logic. You need rules if you are going to ask your audience to suspend their disbelief.

I am by no means a nitpicky audience. Actually, let me rephrase that. I am a nitpicky audience but I usually don’t hold it against the filmmaker. But “Hugo” was riddled with so many logical mistakes, inconsistencies, novice storytelling gimmicks (the creation of false tension in this movie was of particular frustration) that I have no choice but now have to also include Scorsese in my wrath. I had been giving this guy a wiiiiiide berth because of his genius up through “Goodfellas,” but now I’m going to have to release the pass I had given him on “The Aviator” and “Gangs of New York,” which were a triumph of acting and nothing more.

Ah, Marty. We’ll always have “The Departed.”

(sidebar)

John Logan movies I Hated:

Any Given Sunday

Gladiator

The Last Samurai

Star Trek: Nemesis

Wouldn’t Waste My Time:

Bats

Tornado!

Sinbad: The Legend of the Seven Seas

Movies Written By Logan I Was Looking Forward to But Am Now Terrified About:

Skyfall

Lincoln

Coriolanus

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Permalink | January 16th, 2012

3 Responses to “Movie reivew for a movie that’s been out for 2 months.”

  1. Anna Says:
    January 19th, 2012 at 4:17 pm

    all this from someone who cried like a baby at titanic! i’m a girl and i didn’t even like that movie – i also didn’t cry like a bi-atch. all of your movie recommendations from now on are tainted by your unnatural love of titanic. sorry.

  2. Ruby Says:
    February 1st, 2012 at 11:20 pm

    The blog is cool

  3. Shrikant Says:
    February 13th, 2012 at 6:21 am

    OK, so I’m going to put that on my “skip it” list, which is sooloo much longer than my “I want to see” list.

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