The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (2013)

Jamie Campbell Bower and Lily Collins

© 2013 Constantin Film International GmbH and Unique Features (TMI) Inc.

There are two ways of looking at the latest YA would-be blockbuster adaptation: as a perfectly ordinary teen fantasy flick or as a truly dispiriting adaptation of one of the best kitchen sink fantasy series I've come across in a long time.

To be honest, I don't really want to get into the perfectly ordinary part of this convo. Aside from some super smart casting (I pretty much loved everyone in their roles, though Robert Sheehan as Simon is the standout), the movie starts to lose steam somewhere around Magnus' party and never really picks back up. The Mortal Cup becomes more and more of a MacGuffin (why do the vampires want it? And why would they kidnap Simon to get it?), so, by the time Jonathan Rhys Meyers and his insane hair/clothes/face come out of the puddle in the wall, you're just sort of over it.

I've been trying to puzzle out exactly what went wrong with this adaptation beyond the aforementioned Meyers and the completely baffling decision to reinvent his character from the ground up. I think I've finally put my finger on it: the movie pulls the book's punches.

[In honour of the return of Extra Hot Great!, spoilers ahead, fun ahoy!]

There's nothing more important than Valentine being Jace's dad. Not just as a reason to keep Jace and Clary apart (that's sort of secondary). It's that Jace's entire emotional arc over the course of all five of these novels is keyed into that one point. How he was raised and what that means for him -- the dichotomy between the man he was raised to be and the man he wants to be, and, yes, what that means for him and Clary, is tied up in one simple idea: Valentine as Jace's dad. Not as a trick suggested by Hodge (to what end?) or some sort of mental jiu-jitsu on Valentine's part. To look at the man who raised you and to realize what he is and to have to make difficult choices based not on pleasing him but on your own heart, that's the essence of growing up. And you can't really have a YA series where no one grows up.

The rest of it, I can sort of understand. Seraph blades are essentially angelic lightsabers. Bringing Alec and Isabelle to the Hotel Dumort allows for an action set-piece in the middle of the movie for the entire cast. Telling Luke's entire backstory would take forever (though the net result is that Luke ends up looking like a Jacobian interloper instead of a crucial component of Clary and Jocelyn's lives). Showing Jocelyn fighting and taking the potion serves the twin purposes of giving you a reason to care about her and justifying hiring Lena Headey for the role.

Of course, doing all that undoes the twin slaps of finding out that Jocelyn did this to herself and that she never wanted Clary to know anything about it. She's softened up, so Clary can have her cry at the end and tell her unconscious mom that she forgives her. Valentine's softened up from killing his whole family to maybe killing only two people. Hodge stays and fights (and dies?) instead of running the first chance he gets. Alec almost dies saving Clary's life instead of trying to impress Jace. So, while we're at it, why not let Clary keep the Mortal Cup instead of losing it to Valentine?

If you are going to mess something up, why not really, really mess it up?

Which brings me back to Valentine. If you are looking for a modern equivalent of the Valentine Morgenstern of the books, look no further than Vladimir Putin. He draws you in with a great deal personal charm and charisma, and you think it's so funny with his vigorous torso and bear staring. And then he starts taking away people's rights, and you realize he's a monster. Always has been, always will be. That's Valentine. Buttoned up cruelty. Not, you know, this:

The sad thing is that this movie is dying at the box office, which means it probably won't get the same chance The Hunger Games got to course correct. I was supposed to wrote a book vs film for that one, and I never quite got around to it. It wasn't even until the third time I saw the movie that I finally got what I didn't like about it: good is the enemy of great. Chasing a family friendly rating chases the greatness right out of that novel. You have to feel each death. What's more, you have to feel the way the entire system is rigged from start to finish, not just in the arena, but in every single district. The way Katniss wants to ask the rare senior in 12 how they managed to live so long. The way Rue describes how hard they work and how little they get in return, but at least they have music. It's all arenas all the way down.

I still don't think Mortal Instruments is as good, but it's still better than Twilight and that pile had hundreds of chances. Is it so wrong that I just want a chance to see the development of Jace, the greatest Shadowhunter the world has ever known? Jamie Campbell Bower's hair looks like it smells and his wardrobe is deplorable, but he does interesting things with his fingers that catch my attention despite myself. He deserves his chance to do a swan dive off the balcony instead of stupid faux-Valentine and his wet leather pants.

Besides, don't you want to see Clary tear that ship apart?

World War Z (2013)

Brad Pitt, Abigail Hargrove, and Mireille Enos

© Paramount Pictures

Turns out that if you are looking for an example of Hollywood's sexist attitude toward women, particularly in action movies, you need only cast your eyes back to last month's release of World War Z.

Poor Mireille Enos. By now everyone knows that the original ending of this movie was scrapped, and massive rewrites drastically changed its content. But since the other ending would have been pretty damn sexist, too, we might as well stick to what's made it to the screen.

So here's what we get: in exchange for keeping his family safe and fed, Gerry Lane (Brad Pitt) has to go back to work as a UN investigator to help put an end to the zombie apocalypse. While it's natural to not want to be separated in a time of crisis, his wife Karin (Enos) objects on the grounds that the job is too hard on Gerry.

I mean, women, am I right? Always nagging you to not go out there and save the world, thereby ensuring that your daughters can grow up without getting eaten by zombies. You know, if you can even survive that long. Because what about your feeeeelingsssssss?

Before you start to object that that is just one scene, it also includes her very passive-aggressively remarking that she will be the one to keep their family safe (because, again, ending the zombie apocalypse and provide them with safe passage until that end is totally the opposite of keeping one's family safe). And that would be the sum total of her scenes, unless you also want to count the time that she calls Gerry at the exact wrong moment, inciting a zombie attack. AmIrite?

By way of not-actually-achieving balance, the movie does feature another central, strong female character. She gets to occupy a role traditionally held by a man and by styled like a man as well. It kind of feels like a zero sum game.

I don't know. There's a fantastic opening sequence, where the whole world just goes crazy and you don't know why, and you run, run, run, trying to survive. But after that, the movie just deflates. Gerry flies around picking up clues (thanks, Michiel Huisman! Come back to Nashville soon!), and I'm sort of in love with the 10th man rule, but the resolution is so boring and abrupt that it's hard to believe it's happening, even as Peter Capaldi assures me it is.

It's just . . . alright, spoilers, you guys. If you had a pen and multiple pieces of paper, and you were about to inject yourself with a deadly virus because you have no play left but to test your theory that zombies don't bite the dying, and you wrote a message to hold up to the security camera, would you write, "Tell my family I love them"? Or would you write what you were taking and the dosage? Because it strikes me that a personal message is some page 2 stuff.

This whole movie is page 2 stuff.

Summer Jam 2013

I stole this from mouthonlinedotcom

In addition to being my fabulous brother's birthday (Happy birthday, John!), it's also the first day of summer, which means it's time to choose my summer jam.

Origin story: Amy and I once did a Saturday glass art course where we made table tops. The glass lady left some Galaxie station on in the background all day. Unlike the stations I listen to, this one only had so many songs, so the same ones popped up many times over the course of the day. At first, I didn't like Ben Lee's "Catch my disease." It's a pretty groody title, after all. Eight hours later, I was brainwashed. By the time it came on in the car on the way home, I declared it my summer jam.

So, what am I looking for in a summer jam? It's gotta be fun and upbeat and danceable. Danceable is a pretty flexible idea 'round these parts because it basically means that I boogie around my apartment while it's on. Summer jams get a very heavy rotation for the season and help me reset when needs be.
No depress-o feelings-y shizz allowed.

Here are some previous entries in the summer jam series:

Evern, "Do I Go"

Ida Maria, "I Like You So Much Better When You're Naked" (Not family-friendly, obvs)

The Gaslight Anthem, "Meet Me By The River's Edge"

The Gaslight Anthem, "Biloxi Parish"

Icona Pop, "I Love It"

They don't have to be new or even new to me. They just have to have that nebulous quality that tells me they are going to set the right tone for the season.

I'm not 100% yet, but here are the front runners so far:

Chuck Ragan ft Brian Fallon, "Meet You In The Middle"

The Gaslight Anthem, "Film Noir"

The Gaslight Anthem, "Handwritten"

Motion City Soundtrack, "Bad Idea"

Not that there's a pattern there or anything . . .

Anyway, I'll let y'all know when I finally get around to making a choice. Which one will I take, Rebecca Black?

Man of Steel (2013)

© Warner Bros Pictures

Word's out that I have some misgivings about the latest filmic Superman. So, before I get to those, let's hit on a couple of things I did like.

1. This movie is gorgeous. The moving, molten lead, art deco background that Jor El (Russell Crowe) conjures up to illustrate the history of Krypton is the most beautiful thing I have seen on screen this year.

2. I am in love with this score. I'm probably predisposed to like anything that leans on brass and electric guitar instead of just sawing away on violins (and I've been grooving on Hans Zimmer for as long as I've noticed scores), but it has that Beethoven's 5th quality that you want to go with a Superman movie: big percussive movements of isolation woven with a sense of hope.

3. Amy Adams could not be more splendidly suited to the role of Lois Lane. All her natural flinty perkiness is on full force, making her Lois whip-smart, capable, and compassionate. She didn't even have to dye her hair.

My problem, of course, is the biggest problem possible in a movie like this. It's the Man of Steel himself.

Man of Steel features Clark Kent at his most beatific and Superman at his most saintly. And that's a huge mistake.

Superman has always been and will always be a character that people struggle to write and interpret because he's forever on the cusp of being utterly boring. He's an angelic Boy Scout. He's always striving to do the right thing, and he generally succeeds because he's invincible. It makes him difficult to do correctly because why would you want to hang out with a guy like that for very long?

The answer isn't to gritty him up like this movie does with its near-midnight suit and burgundy cape. It's to find the tension that exists naturally within the character. It's to always ask which is the alter ego and which is the real self.

When Clark is 13, his father (Kevin Costner, perfection as a humble farmer with deep misgivings about his fellow man) tells him about how they found a baby in a field all those years ago. Clark wonders if he should reveal who he really is to the world, and, while Jonathan tells him that that his own decision to make, Clark at least owes it to himself (and the world) to figure out what his story is.

And what does Clark do with that information? Apparently nothing for 20 years. When we meet him, he's a 33 year-old with an assumed name and a job as a fisherman off the coast of Nova Scotia. He doesn't do anything to figure himself out until the exact information he needs falls into his lap.

And when he gets it . . . boy, when he gets it. A somnambulant hologram of a ghost appears and says, "Hey, I'm your father. Now put on my underoos and fly around because I sent you here to save the world." Who just accepts that at face value? He's never even flown before!

Not that any of this is a knock against Henry Cavill. He looks every inch the part. The Cavill is on full display (though there are, perhaps, some soy-induced issues up top), and I admit to swooning a little when that luscious chest hair peeked out of the top of the suit. And the movie had no less than three (3!) opportunities for him and his wolfish incisors to bellow "NOOOOOO" heavenward.

He's also, unfortunately, oddly sexless. When Supes and Lois started macking, I thought, "Oh, is he into her?"

I genuinely don't believe that Cavill got either the script or directorial support he needed to do anything other than exactly what he did. How can I be so certain? Because he showed more wit and spark in those final two scenes than he did for the length of the movie. If nothing else, I think Cavill knows who this character is that he's building.

Christian corner: Superman is often used as either a modern day Moses or Jesus, and this movie beats the Jesus drum hard. When Clark is considering turning himself over to Zod, he's literally framed by a stained glass window of Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. (I groaned aloud at that one). It doesn't make sense, though, because Jesus practiced what he preached: non-violence, even in the face of certain and terrifying death. Moses, on the other hand, was a a war-time hero. He offered people the hope that if they stuck it out through this dark and violent trial, they would find something better on the other side. As far as character allusions go, it's Moses all the way.

I also have problems with Zod, but those are character problems that go far further back with me than just this movie. I will say that that was nothing special from Michael Shannon. Remember when you told me that rock and roll was a bloodsport? I believed you.

The movie pays lip service to the idea that Superman is a beacon of hope. If they're smart, and they give Cavill the chance to show more of what he did in those last two scenes, then I'll have hope that this crew will do better next time.

Pretty Little Liars is back! (2010 - present)

Pretty Little Liars is back! Pretty Little Liars is back! Pretty Little Liars is back!

If you watch the show, you know that only Jacob has the words to describe something so balls-out crazypants. Since I am not Jacob Clifton, let me show you a photo.

That's how the Liars dress to go to the funeral of someone they don't even like.

Left to right, let's break it down:

Emily's dress maybe looks a little too casual, but it's otherwise fine until she turned around and revealed it was backless. Emily just does not give a fuck.

Spencer is, as always, dressed like the most high fashion Puritan you'll ever meet. This is easily the dress she will wear to school next Tuesday.

Aria . . . actually, this is one of them more sane outfits Aria has ever worn or will ever wear. She wears black and white clown pants to get coffee in the same episode.

Hanna's beachy hair and attire (tits out, legs out) is just so perfectly Hanna that I can hardly fault her. Plus she wore an insane headband that is also a hat and caused heart palpitations earlier in the ep.

Then there's some random perfume model (who I briefly and dearly hoped was Jason) and then . . .

JENNA. Now, there's nothing really notable about Jenna's ensemble except the fact that she is wearing sunglasses again, the better to protect us from her freaky-ass eyeballs. I must say I am relieved that Jenna is going blind again, which is kind of a terrible thing to say, but it gets worse. Why is she blind in the first place? The Liars blinded her in a fire, of course! Those are our heroes.

Or, as my bestie put it to me to convince me to start watching the show, "A girl literally slaps the sunglasses off a blind girl, and that first girl is in the right."

Show, don't ever change.

Now You See Me (2013)

Alright, Now You See Me, you got me.

I've seen The Prestige; I've been trained. When Morgan Freeman assured Michael Caine (who really ought to have known better) that this was all just a distraction for the main event, I thought I knew what he meant. So imagine my surprise when the prestige turned out to be . . .

[Spoiler-adjacent. I'm not going to talk about it any specifics, but I thought I'd give you the heads up anyway].

Bupkis.

Right up until the bubkis, I was into it. Not so much the maybe-flirtation between Jesse Eisenberg and Isla Fisher (who cares?). Not so much the twirling-whirling non-stop camera (though that in itself was a great distraction). Not so much the . . . did Mark Ruffalo have a fake tan in this? I don't think I can deal with a tanned buffalo, you guys.

Obviously I was into Mélanie Laurent because I love her, and I love how smart and funny she gets to be in this even though her character gets no explanation at any point. Just none, whatsoever. I wasn't even aware of her character being named at any point in the script.

And no one thinks, "faith can move mountains" is a French saying, right?

So that right up until. The movie moves along at an excellent clip, and all the performances are keyed at exactly the right level -- it's all levity and fun and exploration and adventure. Which is exactly what you want, so there's no faulting the movie there.

And then the bupkis. I don't know. I expect more from a prestige. It's odd because the movie does exactly what it tells you it's going to do, so it's a little unfair of me to feel let down by it. But I do. Randomly disappearing and reappearing on the same building, then going to the park just doesn't have the same ring to it.

Of course, that isn't the prestige, not exactly, but getting more exact would require 1) spoilers and 2) exposition, which this movie is seriously lacking. Which is something I never thought I'd write. But if you are going to make a point about how these guys are so good at magic that they are ready for the next level, you really ought to do a little more table setting to show that they actually are, you know, at the top of their game.

Ah, well. At least now I have the sight of Common miming a violin solo.

Wait, why is Henley always wearing gloves? No, no, I am not going to do this.

Shadowhunters, Downworlders, and Mundanes: The Mortal Instruments series (2007 - present)

 . . . and I'm back.

It's been so long since I blogged, so long since I wrote anything, really, that I should probably do a little table setting.

Eff it. It's a blog, you guys.

Thanks to every movie studio and their brother looking for the next Twilight, I now rate all young adult fiction aimed at the fairer sex on the following scale: Twilight (the pits) to Hunger Games (top of the charts).

Better than Twilight?

That setup's a little facetious because, really, how could anything be worse than Twilight?

In answer to my own question, yes, it is better than Twilight.

Here's how:

We've sort of been down this road before, so you might guess the main reason I like these books -- young Clary Fray is a woman of action. I've got a soft spot for brave little toasters.

We meet her standing in line at an all-ages club with her obviously-crushing bff Simon. Clary notices a cute boy in line, then again in the club. She thinks nothing of it when the cutie heads off to the supply closet with a beautiful girl. But Clary's wise to the tattooed teens following the couple with knives and dispatches Simon to get the bouncer. Still, her curiosity gets the better of her, so Clary slips into the closet to spy . . . the tattooed teens and the beautiful girl teaming up to gut the cutie right then and there.

Soon she's discovered, but Clary bravely insists that the police are on the way and the kids are going down. Of course, it doesn't help that the dead cutie's body disappears. The trio bounces, and Clary's forced to make up a lie when the bouncer finally arrives. 

The next day, Clary responds to a distress call from her mom. When she gets home, her mom is gone, and the apartment is torn up. Clary barely has time to register the loss when she's attacked by a demon. She manages to fight it off and even kill it but not without suffering a grievous wound.

That's the first three chapters. Just imagine how much more incident author Cassandra Clare packs into entire 400 page novels.

Don't get me wrong -- following kids with knives into a darkened, enclosed space is dumb. Running home when your mom tells you not to because it's not safe is a bad idea. Clary's mind is a bad idea circus at which the Starks are sitting ringside.

But they're her ideas. She's fiercely loyal and believably teenage, full of rumbling passions and angry fits that have no real source or direction. She's brave and more than a little reckless, but it comes from a good place.

Being better than Bella isn't much of a challenge, naturally, so Clare goes one further: she experiments with other viewpoints to actual success. Yes, it can be done!

It starts out small in the first book - just a page or two from a couple of different characters. Clare grows in confidence and style as she builds her spellbinding world. By book three, City of Glass, there are whole sections from other POVs that neither directly involve Clary nor comment on her. Yes, other characters with desires, motivations, and actions of their very own! It's pretty cool, actually. (Mostly 'cause I love Alec and Magnus).

Better than Hunger Games?

The series isn't finished yet (the sixth and final book comes out next year), so it's a little early to tell. I've just finished book three and am taking advantage of its natural conclusion before getting swept up again. (If it were an old-school TV season, it's the March break before the back nine).

That said, it's hard to imagine anything could have the bone-crushing impact of Katniss' climactic decision in The Mockingjay. (Trying to stay as spoiler-free in this one as I can).

Best guess: probably not. The stakes are equally high, but Clare's world of demons, vampires, werewolves, fairies, warlocks, and the half-angel, half-humans who police them, while rich, drops you in medias res and never really gives you a sense of what or who these people were before their lives blew apart. Suzanne Collins', however, absolutely nails the soul-crushing despair of living in District 12, and the world building of Catching Fire lends real gravity to the world destroying of The Mockingjay. Plus, no human alive nails the chapter-ending cliffhanger as well as she does. The Hunger Games would make THE BEST tv series.

The Movie

If you're looking for the next Twilight, you've got to have the movie. The Vampire Diaries is a killer tv show (even after the uneven fourth season, I'm still hooked), Beautiful Creatures slipped in and out of theatres in the dead of winter unnoticed, and The Hunger Games is another beast entirely.

To be honest, I've got my doubts here, too.

Not that I'm not glad to see Magnus, but remember those two action items way, way up there in this post that made me fall in love with Clary? Well, it looks like they botched both of them. And let me tell you, it's pretty hard to come back from botching the heroine.

If Clary doesn't save herself from that demon (or die trying), just who will she be to me? Because the world doesn't need another damsel in distress. It needs a hundred woman warriors, then a thousand more, and a million more after that. We shouldn't settle for anything less.