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10/15/2016

Unstoppable (2010) - T. Scott's mechanically exciting final movie

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This poster for Tony Scott's Unstoppable is similar in its fiery style to past posters for speed-themed action movies such as Speed (1994)

A series of mistakes make a huge train full of dangerous chemicals and fuel race along without steering towards a string of larger cities. A veteran railroad engineer and a newly begun same pick up the challenge; to try to derail a catastrophe about to happen!

For the train and/or mechanically interested in general, Unstoppable has sequences that cultivates that mechanical fascination that will make the diaphragm tighten in suspense. English master filmmaker Tony Scott (The Hunger (1983)), whose 17th and last movie this is, - before his tragic 2012 suicide, - creates a fundamental excitement that works, up to a point. - Because we never really believe that things will evolve as catastrophically as projected. And because leads Chris Pine (Star Trek Beyond (2016)) and Denzel Washington's (Flight (2012)) family sup-blots continue to be distant and uninteresting.

Mark Bomback (Live Free or Die Hard (2007)) has written the script, based on a real 2001 incident in Ohio, which has its stakes raised drastically for the film. Rosario Dawson (Death Proof (2007)) is good as a train yardmaster. Unstoppable feels thick, but Scott keeps it mostly on its tracks.

Related reviews:

Tony Scott: Stoker (2013) - Chan-wook Park's over-styled American debut revolts and bores in turns (producer)
Déjà Vu (2006) - T. Scott cuts a helluva suspense-cake!
Domino (2005) - T. Scott's bounty-hunter biopic a complete misfire, mega-flop

Days of Thunder (1990) or, Very Little Thunder

Watch an interview with Chris Pine for the movie here

Cost: 85 - 100 mil. $

Box office: 167.8 mil. $

= Big flop

[Unstoppable premiered October 26 (Westwood, LA) and runs 98 minutes. Negotiations with Washington for the film fell through once, as Fox wanted him to accept 16 instead of 20 mil. $. Scott was also asked to cut his salary from 9 to 6 mil. $. Filming took place from August - November 2009 in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, California and New York. Production was halted for one day in November, as part of the train accidentally derailed. As with Scott's previous film, the remake The Taking of Pelham 123 (2009), - also a big flop, and a little bit more mediocre, - Unstoppable is a run-amok train action movie with Washington as an everyday type of guy hero. The film opened #2, behind holdover hit Megamind, to a 22.6 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it stayed in the top 5 for a total of 5 weeks and grossed 81.5 mil. $ (48.6 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Japan with 12.8 mil. $ (7.6 %) and China with 9.8 mil. $ (5.8 %). The film was nominated for the Best Sound Editing Oscar, which it lost to Inception. Unstoppable is certified fresh at 87 % with a 6.9 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Unstoppable?

9/29/2016

Silicon Valley - season 2 (2015) - Critically deflated second run for beloved sitcom

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+ Worst Poster of the Year

Symptomatically for the second season of John Altschuler, Dave Krinsky and Mike Judge's Silicon Valley, its poster is much less poignant and funny than the preceding one

The second season of creators John Altschuler, Dave Krinsky (Blades of Glory (2007, both)) and Mike Judge's (Extract (2009)) Silicon Valley still focuses on the trials of San Francisco tech startup company Pied Piper upon winning an important industry prize at the conclusion of the first season.

The following episode run-through will contain SPOILERS:

1. Pied Piper's financier and CEO of Raviga Peter Gabriel dies a sudden death.

2. Things are going bad for Pied Piper, with their huge competitor Hooli suing them for copyright violation and their investor Raviga jumping ship. With none of the previously interested investors interested any longer, and facing a legal battle that could cost millions, Pied Piper's founder Richard (Thomas Middleditch (The Final Girls (2015))) decides to meet with Hooli CEO Gavin Belson (Matt Ross (The Aviator (2004))), who is interested in buying up Pied Piper.

3. Richard is about to accept the buy-up, when he is stopped by wealthy douche Russ (Chris Diamantopoulos (Empire State (2013))), who has another plan: To give Pied Piper a 5 mil. $ loan in exchange for a seat in its board. Richard agrees, and Belson finds his weapon against Richard; his past best friend and Pied Piper associate, 'Big Head' (Josh Brener (The Belko Experiment (2016))).

4. The company hires two additional programmers. One is hired with Ehrlich (T. J. Miller (Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014))), Pied Piper's loud-mouthed board member and 'incubator' (owner of the house they operate from) objecting, and that ends up disrupting it.

5. Richard suffers from severe night sweats, which he fears will develop into bedwetting, as moving the company has to be postponed, because Pied Piper needs its own servers, which fit into the garage. Jared (Zach Woods (The Good Wife (2013-16))), the peculiar company assistant, has his own strange sleep pattern; the guys' invalid neighbor becomes another problem for them; and at Hooli, Belson once again promotes unsuspecting 'Baghead'.

6. Hooli's attempt at live-streaming a wrestling match crashes, which inspires Pied Piper to try something similar, and succeed! But the energy drink Homicide turns out not to be the ideal partner for the venture. Another company called End Game turns out also (as Hooli) to have stolen Pied Piper's technology.

7. Our friends pursue End Game, who for the moment turn out to be more commercially minded than Pied Piper. Pied Piper's tough programmer Gilfoyle (Martin Starr (Freaks and Geeks (1999-00))) locates a way forward: A porn client. Meanwhile the less aggressive programmer Dinesh (Kumail Nanjiani (Goosebumps (2015))) still can't get a girl interested in him.

8. Richard is caught in a paranoid funk because of a vengeful bastard by the name of Seth, but it turns out to be irksome investor Russ who gets a piece of truth from him and as a result may leave Pied Piper. The company mistakenly deletes 9,000 hours of porn from their first client. - Ouch!

9. The copyrights trial becomes an arbitration trial instead, and Pied Piper hires a really funny, disbarred non-lawyer lawyer (Matt McCoy (The Newcomers (2000))), but the case boils down to whether or not Richard is willing to lie about having initially used a Hooli computer for his work on Pied Piper, - which he refuses to do.

10. While a falling accident and Manny Pacquiao suddenly make Pied Piper's 'condor-cam' spike in popularity, Richard wins the arbitration trial due to rotten contracts at Hooli, where Belson is targeted for firing, and 'Big Head' for another advancement... But the party for Pied Piper is over before it begins, as Raviga's new CEO, Laurie (Suzanne Cryer (Get the Gringo (2012))) buys Russ out of the company and removes Richard as its director.

The first episode of the second season is astoundingly bad, beginning with a severely unfunny opening at a baseball stadium. The sudden real-life death of Christopher Evan Welch (Our Idiot Brother (2011)), who portrayed Peter Gabriel, who is killed off in the season's beginning, obviously hangs over the production for its entire second run. It begins by being both written, acted and lit without much motivation and presence. The fun only returns slowly to Silicon Valley, especially through the performances of Woods and Nanjiani, but it remains miles from the heights of season 1. Miller, who plays the charismatic Ehrlich as a key part of the entire show's formula, attacks the part with less persuasion and spirit in season two but returns to form towards its end.

Of the new characters, Raviga's CEO is played by Cryer with an autistic routine that becomes old fast. Russ seems to have more potential, but is also an aggravating character. We get more of the show's racially stereotypically drawn, but not completely unfunny, Chinese character Jing-Yang (Jimmy O. Yang (Those Who Can't (2016, TV-series))).

The storylines go in circles in season 2, centering on money and the same few companies, - for some reason not dealing with such obvious elements as romance or actual sex, (the characters talk about it plenty though.) Season 2 of Silicon Valley is more nerdy, very rocky, but still with some fun, although despairingly less fun and poignant than in its towering first season.

Best episode:

9. Binding Arbitration - written by Dan O'Keefe (On the Lot (2007, TV-series), Altschuler, Krinsky and Judge, directed by Judge

The trial moves to arbitration, and Pied Piper hires an unorthodox lawyer. Miller as Ehrlich is finally seems to be back in top shape.

Mike Judge: 2015 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED IV]

2015 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]

2015 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]

2015 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]

Silicon Valley - season 1 (2014) - Judge and Co. introduce a hilarious tech-centric satirical sitcom

Beavis and Butt-Head Do America (1996) or, Uhh, Where's the TV?

A still from the terrible baseball-stadium set opening of the second season of John Altschuler, Dave Krinsky and Mike Judge's Silicon Valley

Richard drinks tequila shots with Russ in season 2 of John Altschuler, Dave Krinsky and Mike Judge's Silicon Valley

Watch a promo for the second season here

Cost: Unknown

Box office: None - TV only

= Unknown

[Silicon Valley - season 2 was first broadcast on HBO from April 12 to June 14 and spans 10 28-30 minute episodes, totaling approximately 290 minutes. It was shot in Los Angeles and Palo Alto, California. The viewer ratings were up slightly from the first season: from 1.72 mil. to 1.8 mil. on average. The season was nominated for a Golden Globe and 6 Emmys, winning two. - Ironically, the show grew in audience and recognition for its much inferior second season. Silicon Valley - season 2 is fresh at 100 % with an 8.3 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Silicon Valley - season 2?

Silicon Valley - season 1 (2014) - Judge and Co. introduce a hilarious tech-centric satirical sitcom

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+ Best New TV-Series of the Year

The amusingly photo-shopped, Steve Jobs-satirizing poster for the first season of John Altschuler, Dave Krinsky and Mike Judge's Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley is a satirical HBO sitcom about a struggling startup company in the tech world bubble that is San Francisco's Silicon Valley, created by John Altschuler, Dave Krinsky (The Goode Family (2009, TV-series, both)) and Mike Judge (Beavis and Butt-Head Do America (1996)), based on Judge's experiences working briefly in a Silicon Valley startup in 1987 and the general developments in the technological business.

The following episode run-through will contain SPOILERS:

1. Our hero Richard (Thomas Middleditch (Search Party (2014))) gets ridiculed at his job at tech giant Hooli for his Pied Piper website, but he also secures attention from a couple of big-shots, and suddenly he receives a 10 mil. $ offer. - Which he turns down, preferring a 200k $ offer that allows him to remain captain of the venture.

2. The executive who gave Richard the offer he accepted, Gregory (Christopher Evan Welch (Whatever Works (2009))) gives Richard 48 hours to write an elaborate business plan. Meanwhile, Jared (Zach Woods (Ghostbusters (2016))), an executive assistant at Hooli, changes teams and tries to clarify what roles the guys in Richard's home, who make up Pied Piper, play. Here Richard's best friend 'Big Head' (Josh Brener (Welcome to Happiness (2015))) comes up short, and Richard learns to be an asshole boss by insisting that the seemingly worthless component that is his best friend stays! But Big Head has already caught the drift and moved workplace to Hooli, - who have poached Richard's idea...

3. While Gregory meditates on the sesame seeds on Burger King buns, Richard fights to acquire the name Pied Piper from an agricultural business, although everyone in the company besides himself hate it. Ehrlich (T. J. Miller (Deadpool (2016))), the entrepreneur and self-proclaimed incubator of Pied Piper, who owns the house the guys work and live in, calls them all billionaires online and goes searching for a new name for them on a mushroom trip, returning with a Mexican boy, who he thinks is himself - from the future!

4. The issue of presenting the vision of the company becomes ever more pressing. Richard and Ehrlich attend Gregory's toga party, where rapper Flo Rida and rented party guests party, and Ehrlich manages to become a Pied Piper board member. That is later disputed, but as Richard experiences another panic attack, Ehrlich is graced back to the inside, - and vomited on.

5. Gavin Belson (Matt Ross (American Psycho (2000))), the in equal measures feared and worshiped CEO of Hooli experiences failing technologies during a call, while Richard and Co. find out that Pied Piper is still on track to a competition that Richard had signed into months ago. They decide to make the company's world launch at the event, 8 weeks away. Meanwhile Ehrlich has a Mexican graffiti artist create a logo, which unfortunately turns out wildly obscene.

6. Jared gets caught inside a self-driving car and lead into a container en route to Gregory's phony island! Richard hires a kid to help out with the company's immediate problems with the 'cloud'. - Unfortunately, the kid turns out to be unstable. Finally, sarcastic satanist programmer Gilfoyle's (Martin Starr (Hawaii Five-O (2010-16))) lets his girlfriend visit the house, which creates confusion and hilarity.

7. Time for the competitive conference: Jared's assistant role to Richard gets overtaken temporarily by Gregory's sweet, competent assistant Monica (Amanda Crew (Race (2016))), which makes him laughably miserable. Pied Piper's programmer with Indian ancestry, Dinesh's (Kumail Nanjiani (Life As We Know It (2010))) latent homosexuality flares up, as Ehrlich turns out to have previously had sex with one of the judges' ex-wife, which he now repeats with the judge's current wife.

8. The resulting attack from the judge during Pied Piper's presentation gets them directly into the finale. But a seemingly insurmountable problem presents itself as Hooli beats them to it, presenting a similar system that is simply a good deal better than Richard and the guys'. Every one are struck by the defeat, - Jared additionally hasn't slept for days, - when Ehrlich's grotesque suggestion inspires a new idea in Richard, which improves Pied Piper's compression rate significantly over-night, making them win the competition.

The first couple of minutes of Silicon Valley might elapse with some irritation with all the dopey characters but then ... the show turns out to be incredibly funny! All of the 8 episodes that make up the first season are hilarious, and the nerdy characters develop slightly, and definitely continue to show entertaining sides to themselves. - My favorite is Woods' character Jared, a hysterically awkward and sincere man.

The show hits the bull's eye in several directions. When a call goes terribly awry for the demi-God of Hooli, (episode 5) it reminds us of the many everyday experiences we all have with failing technologies, which we often ignore socially to seem more with the beat. The anxiety involved in our ever-expanding relation with technology is also probed for humorous effect, especially in the episode (#6) in which Jared essentially gets kidnapped by a highly 'intelligent' vehicle.

Silicon Valley is an unmatched, fresh and deeply funny sitcom. After its awesome first season, I couldn't wait to get more of it.