31 Days of Horror: Beetlejuice

Frankenweenie

Directed by Tim Burton.

2012. Rated PG, 87 minutes.

Cast:

Charlie Tahan

Catherine O’Hara

Martin Short

Martin Landau

Atticus Shaffer

Winona Ryder

Robert Capron

James Hiroyuki Liao

Conchata Ferrell

Tom Kenny

Victor Frankenstein (Tahan) doesn't have many friends other than Sparky, his dog. Victor’s father notices this and urges his son to get our there with the other kids. Specifically, he gets the boy to participate in a baseball game. Not wanting to be left out, Sparky chases the ball into the street and is killed when hit by a car. Inspired by what he learned in science class, Victor successfully resurrects the dog. Initially, this is unbeknownst to anyone else. When word gets out, all the kids want to bring something back to life in hopes of winning the upcoming science fair. Of course, things don’t go as well for them as they did for Victor.

The journey director Tim Burton takes us on is one steeped in nostalgia, paying homage to horror’s glorious past every step of the way. While Victor himself is a rather typical looking Burton creation, the rest of the kids look like classic monster movie characters. One kid resembles Igor, another Frankenstein’s monster, and so on. The science teacher is a dead ringer for the legendary Vincent Price. There are many instances we’ll note as inspired by those old pictures and the entire thing is shown in a traditional black and white.

Simply incorporating elements from great movies is not enough to make this film any good. Fortunately, Burton tells us a wonderful story. It functions as a tale about a boy and his dog and as a horror flick. In true Burton fashion, the boy is a loner and a bit of an outcast. This is displayed by a brilliant inversion of the way the director usually presents things. In movies such as Edward Scissorhands, Batman, and as recently as Dark Shadows, the protagonist is not only clearly different from those around him, but to us, also. Whether it’s a physical deformity, ghastly colored skin, or just running around in a costume, we saw something strange about them. Here, the hero looks more like us than anyone else in the movie. The other characters are the more gothic creations. Since they are the majority, Victor still comes across as the oddball. However, like other leads in the Burton canon, he’s an oddball by nature, not some stubborn contrarianism. He also has a good heart. Misguided as it may have been, he brought Sparky back to life out of love for the dog. He tries to stop others from doing similar things because he knows there is great potential danger. Victor is easy to root for.

Like the best of Burton, several genres convene seamlessly. Dark comedy and horror blend into a deliciously macabre family flick. Whether we’re laughing, noticing something lifted from an eighty year old movie or staring slack-jawed at all the mayhem of the finale, it doesn’t detract from the overall experience. It’s something the director was unsuccessful doing in the aforementioned Dark Shadows. There, his switches in mode are jarring and leave us wondering what we are supposed to be watching. In Frankenweenie, it all goes down smoothly.

Waiting for Guffman

Directed by Christopher Guest.
1996. Rated R, 84 minutes.
Cast:
Christopher Guest
Eugene Levy
Catherine O’Hara
Parker Posey
Fred Willard
Larry Miller
Don Lake
Bob Balaban
Deborah Theaker
David Cross

The 150th anniversary of Blaine, Missouri is fast approaching. To celebrate, the town is putting on a musical dramatizing their history. Corky (Guest) is a transplant from New York who is also an off Broadway director. Make that a way off Broadway director. He is tasked with bringing the production to life. Waiting for Guffman is a mockumentary about the trials and tribulations of Blaine’s most ambitious theatric endeavor.

Corky holds auditions amongst the townspeople anxious to show their chops to flesh out the cast. He finally settles on Dr. Pearl (Levy) the town dentist, Libby (Posey) the girl who works at Dairy Queen and local travel agents Mr. and Mrs. Albertson (Willard and O’Hara, respectively) who seem to have been in every play made in their hometown. The director finds a couple other players elsewhere. Together, this ensemble sets out to make Corky’s vision a reality. They uniformly work hard. There are occasionally spats, but ehy eventually become like family. Their bond is further galvanized by news that Mr. Guffman will be at their performance. He is a New York City theater critic who is coming to assess the troupe’s chances of taking their play to Broadway.

WfG is a movie that makes us laugh. It’s funny because through all of the goofiness everyone plays it perfectly straight. We don’t see them as actors going for laughter. We see them as earnest people unaware of just how funny they are. A perfect sample of this revolves around Corky’s sexuality. It’s painfully obvious to us he’s lying whenever he mentions having a wife. By itself this is only mildly amusing, not really worthy of a chuckle. When placed in conjunction with the fact most people in Blaine are completely oblivious to the possibility he might be gay it’s downright hilarious. The thought never crosses their minds. So when the play appears to be falling apart and Corky seems ready to quit, we double over in laughter when Mrs. Albertson speculates he’s having a hard time because he misses his wife whom she’s never met and never seems to be around. There is one character that suspects Corky’s secret. It’s a cameo appearance that eventually changes the course of the movie. Nope, I won’t spoil it.

There are lots of clever moments sprinkled throughout WfG that keep us giggling. The sheer absurdity of it all elevates the humor and a certain plot twist breaks our heart, temporarily. However, it’s also not so absurd that we couldn’t see it happening in real life. This is important because it gives the movie its charm. This is a fun excursion that takes a cerebral approach to comedy instead of slapstick, pratfalls or stringing together an incessant run of four-letter words. That means some may find it boring. Those not in need of such things will find plenty here to enjoy.

Killers

Directed by Robert Luketic.
2010. Rated PG-13, 93 minutes.
Cast:
Ashton Kutcher
Katherine Heigl
Tom Selleck
Catherine O’Hara
Rob Riggle
Alex Borstein
Lisa Ann Walter
Kevin Sussman
Katheryn Winnick
Martin Mull
Ariel Winter

Jen (Heigl) is trying to get over being dumped. To cope, she’s decided to go on vacation abroad with her parents. Not long after the plane lands, she meets pretty boy Spencer (Kutcher). Unbeknownst to her, he happens to be an assassin for some government organization, the blah blah blah as he puts it. Since the two fall head over heels for each other he quits his rather unique job for a chance at normalcy with her. Fast forward three years, the lovely young couple is now married and are very regular suburbanites. Since all of this happens in the first 15 minutes or so, something else has to happen. That something else is Spencer getting a message from his old boss who wants him to do another job. To make a long story short, Spencer suddenly finds himself with a $20 million bounty of his head and just about everyone trying to collect.

Killers does a nice job mixing the action-flick with the romantic comedy. The comedy portion depicts a young couple who’s relationship appears to have hit a plateau, at least in Jen’s eyes. There’s the usual bad advice from her friends, conflicts between her job and personal life, dad and hubby not getting along, etc. Not exactly groundbreaking stuff, but it’s handled decently. On the action side, the scenes are fun, mostly because the people coming after him are hardly your typical bunch of movie goons and henchmen. They’re seemingly normal, if somewhat annoying people. Kutcher’s character helps in this, also. Even though he still looks like an underwear model, his character isn’t quite the Superman that Tom Cruise is in Knight and Day. He gets knocked around plenty actually seems mortal.

On the other hand, Kutcher the actor is problematic. It’s not that he does a bad job. I’m not one of those Ashton haters who just has a disdain for everything he does. It’s just hard to believe that this guy was ever the stone-cold killer he’s made out to be. I hate to keep going back to Knight and Day, but they’re similar and came out about the same time, if I remember correctly. In that one, Cruise is easier to digest as a walking murder weapon. The Tom Cruise persona lends itself to that better. Let’s face it, most of us who don’t practice Scientology think he’s at least a little crazy. The tabloids would have you believe he keeps Katie Holmes chained to a wall in his dungeon. Cruise killing a bunch of people while flashing that winning smile is more believable. Kutcher comes off as the guy from Punk’d or as Demi Moore’s boy-toy. Not quite the same, is it?

A bigger problem than our hero is our villain. Once we find out who is behind all this, we’re not really surprised, yet somehow we also still don’t anything. What happened, and why, to bring us to the point at which we inevitably arrive is never really clear. Of course, this means there is really no solution. More or less, we abruptly get told “Happily ever after, the end.” Sure, that gets us out of the movie, but hardly completes the story.

Killers is actually fun in a non-threatening sort of way, despite all the violence. For the most part, when people die it’s a very 1950s style bloodless death and there are plenty of gags within the action. Heigl, as the damsel in distress/frantic wife is solid, though the chemistry between her and her co-star is lacking. Catherine O’Hara as Jen’s mom has a number of the film’s funnier moments. It won’t make you forget Die Hard, but it has its moments.

MY SCORE: 5/10

Away We Go

Directed by Sam Mendes.
2009. Rated R, 98 minutes.
Cast:
John Krasinski
Maya Rudolph
Carmen Ejogo
Jeff Daniels
Maggie Gyllenhaal
Catherine O'Hara
Allison Janney
Jim Gaffigan

Plot: Verona (Rudolph),who is six months pregnant, and her boyfriend Burt (Krasinski) travel to various locations in North America they have ties to in search of the perfect place to start their family.

The Good: In Verona and Burt, we have a couple that feels, more or less, real. They aren't glamourous or overly hip, they're just a couple regular thirtysomethings trying to make their way in the world. To that end, director Sam Mendes coaxes some very natural performances from his two stars. On the other hand, he also gets some great, and perfectly over the top work from his supporting cast. In particular, Maggie Gyllenhaal shines as the eccentric, and eccentrically named, LN. What happens is the bit players, and Burt, give us most of our laughs while Verona plays our "straight man" and the movie effectively revolves around her. This also helps reveal bits and pieces of our heroes.

The Bad: Some opportunities for comedy are lost because the movie rarely deals with Verona's pregnancy. Their is the running gag about keeping the baby's heart rate up, but nothing ever comes of it. Also, some of the supporting characters beg for bigger roles but are all quickly ushered off-screen as our heroes travel from one city to the next.

The Ugly: LN, breast-feeding, strollers and the "family bed." Wow.

Recommendation: This is a different sort of rom-com. Instead of the usual boy-meets-girl, this picks up where others leave off. It's smart, cute and funny. That said, fellas be warned: it's a full-blown chick-flick. It's a solid one, but a chick-flick, nonetheless.

The Opposite View: Richard Corliss, Time

What the Internet Says: 7.4/10 on imdb.com (2/8/10), 66% on rottentomatoes.com, 58/100 on metacritic.com

MY SCORE: 7/10