Late-Ish 2013 Retrospective: Top 15 Male Performances

More 2013 retrospective goodness just to remind you that 2013 happened and 2013 was great! Don't really need to waste a whole lot of time explaining this, so here are my favourite male performances from last year...

Honourable Mentions: Bradley Cooper - American Hustle, Bradley Cooper - The Place Beyond the Pines, Ryan Gosling - The Place Beyond the Pines, Dane DeHaan - The Place Beyond the Pines, Joaquin Phoenix - Her, Steve Coogan - Philomena, Dane DeHaan - Kill Your Darlings, James Gandolfini - Enough Said, Miles Teller - The Spectacular Now, Matthew McConaughey - Dallas Buyers Club, Hugh Jackman - Prisoners, Daniel Bruhl - Rush, Michael B. Jordan - Fruitvale Station, Michael Douglas - Behind the Candelabra, Matt Damon - Behind the Candelabra, Leonardo DiCaprio - The Great Gatsby, James Franco - Spring Breakers, Jude Law - Side Effects, Jonah Bobo - Disconnect.

15. Dwayne Johnson as Paul Doyle in Pain & Gain
Let me preface this by saying that Dwayne Johnson may be my least favourite working actor. That's probably because I can't stand the fact that every single movie he is in, whether it is a cinema release or a straight-to-DVD release, will always rent in truckloads. Sad thing is that they're all exactly the same. I surprisingly dug Pain & Gain a lot against all odds (the Johnson/Mark Wahlberg/Michael Bay factor), but I was most surprised by Johnson's performance. He was obviously taking the piss out of his usual macho beef-cake persona, and in an alternate universe, he would be the perfect buff brother of Jordan Belfort who was nowhere near as smart as him.

14. Jake Gyllenhaal as Detective Loki in Prisoners
We never really know a lot about Detective Loki. We're just offered insights into his existence. I think that's what I admire most about any film who can do it right: a script which only offers insights into a character's existence instead of an outpouring of their life, and an actor who can build that existence into something truly believable. Gyllenhaal hits all the right notes, even when the film isn't necessarily concerned with him. It's all in the scene where he eats this Thanksgiving dinner at a diner alone.

Baby, You're a Rich Man: The Wolf of Wall Street and Pain & Gain

In the family of movies observing and exploring the American Dream and excess and money and power, you could see The Wolf of Wall Street and Pain & Gain as this: the two brothers, one wearing a suit and making lots of money (no matter how illegal that might be), the other being a little brother pumped up on steroids, jealous of his big brother's wealthy life, so goes on to find a way to make money, fast. Add to that, The Wolf of Wall Street is made by "greatest American director ever" Martin Scorsese, and Pain & Gain is made by "butt of every American director joke" Michael Bay. They seem like they're at opposite ends of the spectrum. And while The Wolf of Wall Street is infinitely better than Pain & Gain, there's nothing that really causes me to write off Pain & Gain.

Just to preface this post: each of these films deal with the American Dream. Each of these films have been mistaken for glorifying it. Which of course, you can't ignore when big name stars like Leonardo DiCaprio and Dwayne Johnson are in these movies living the rich life. But I'd be hard pressed to find another film in 2013 - save for Gravity and Captain Phillips - which left me with a sick stomach.

Let's Talk About Baseball...With Brad Pitt.

Film: Moneyball
Year: 2011
Director: Bennett Miller
Written by: Steven Zallian and Aaron Sorkin
Starring: Brad Pitt, Jonah Hill, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Robin Wright, Chris Pratt, Stephen Bishop, Brent Jennings, Kerris Dorsey.
Running time: 133 min. 

"It's hard not to get romantic about baseball." - those words are some which are stowed away in a planet far away from me. I don't know the first thing about baseball, apart from the fact that when a ball comes at you, you should try and hit it. There's something about running around all of these bases, too. But that's as far as my knowledge - or interest - goes. Like Senna, Moneyball had to do the monumental task of winning me over, despite the sporty trimmings and the lack of familiarity. Unlike Senna, Moneyball couldn't hit the ball right out of the park for me (see, I learnt something), but it hit it far enough. Even if I couldn't quite get romantic about baseball, I had quite a good time watching people talk romantically about a sport from another planet that I don't inhabit.

DVD - Megamind

or: Anti-heroes saving the day.

One word to sum it up: Delightful.

Along with Jennifer Aniston romantic comedies, films about artificial insemination, Iraq war dramas and claustrophobically-themed thrillers, movies which have the anti-hero becoming the hero have been a particular trend-setter in Hollywood these days. We saw it in The Social Network. We saw it in Despicable Me. The next movie to adopt an unlikeable character as the lead is Megamind, one of the lesser animated movies from 2010. In a year filled with such amazing animated efforts like Toy Story 3, How to Train Your Dragon and Tangled, Megamind was somewhat forgotten, and it was no where near as good as those three, but it's still another example of why animated movies rule the roost.

Super-villain Megamind (Will Ferrell) has defeated his good-guy nemesis Metro Man (Brad Pitt), and has found that life is tedious since he no longer has anyone to fight. So instead, Megamind creates a new foe, in the form of Titan (Jonah Hill). Titan has a different idea, though. He uses his new powers to destroy the world instead of be a hero like Metro Man was. So Megamind, now faced with the wrath of this powerful new villain, he has to save the world himself instead of destroy it, and get the girl (Tina Fey), who thinks that he is someone else.

There is absolutely nothing new about Megamind. If I were to compare this to anything else, I would say that this is exactly like Despicable Me without the cute kids and with a love interest. It even has a 'minion', so that comparison is hard to avoid. That's not to say that this is a bad movie. Like most other animated movies, this movie has a delightful cast, wonderful visuals and a few great laughs. The vocal cast is brilliant. I love Will Ferrell when he is voicing animated characters more than I enjoy his actual acting, as his over-the-top dramatic vocal work is actually quite funny and well suited to this. Tina Fey, the funny woman she is, also does beautiful voice work as the heroine. Brad Pitt's role was surprisingly small, but I did quite enjoy his performance. His character was a stand-out, too.

Being originally made in 3D, the visuals were of course great. I did feel that the visuals were similar to those in Monsters vs. Aliens, which highlights further that this movie has regurgitated a lot of material from it's far better predecessors. As would be expected of a kid's movie, the laughs were particularly large, even though many could be restricted to an older audience. If one has seen a lot of animated movies, especially those from Pixar, they might feel a little underwhelmed by the result of this film. It is forgettable, but it's quite an enjoyable watch, and one that should by no means be ignored. If you've seen Despicable Me, chances are you'll enjoy watching an exact copy of that one.

THE VERDICT: Megamind is much like any other animated film, in the way that it doesn't add anything unique and it's still extremely enjoyable.

What I hoped for:

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
What I got: (just)

Reviews Round Up: Black Death, The Switch, Cyrus, The Poker House (post #500!)

Can you believe it? I'm at post number 500 already. I believe 100 posts ago it was Christmas Day. Anyhoo, here are some quick paragraph long reviews on what I have seen in the past week:

Black Death

Yeah, while America has just got this in limited release at the theatres, we in NZ have had this on DVD since November. It was sitting in the preview drawer so I decided to give it a spin, and surprisingly, I liked it. The film is pretty much set in the times when the bubonic plague was just starting, and through word of mouth it is revealed that there is a village with a woman who has the power to bring people back to life. A group of men decide to search for this village, but when they come to it, there's something more sinister about the place. This movie was pretty gruesome (I mean, one guy in the film literally gets ripped in half), and it sure held a few surprises. It wasn't at all perfect, but it was surprisingly interesting in many places. It was also extremely religious and more gothic horror than I expected. Maybe I should stop doubting the quality of films in that preview drawer.

What I expected:

What I got:

The Switch

One of the most popular kind of movie out there at the moment is the good old Jennifer Aniston comedy. Just after that another popular movie type is one about artificial insemination. Jennifer Aniston+Artificial insemination=POPULARITY! Not even. I thought that having Jason Bateman in this movie would make this LOL-worthy but lordy, I don't think I even laughed. This movie was so bland and too over dramatic. I still think Jason Bateman has credibility, though. As for the Aniston...well, this movie was better than such outings as The Bounty Hunter and Love Happens. Just one more thing: what were Patrick Wilson and Juliette Lewis doing in such a film? This movie had such a killer cast, and I must admit, Lewis was pretty funny (just not laughable funny) and definitely made a stand out. The end really pissed me off. Like, I could have pretty much guessed that from the very beginning.

What I hoped for:

What I got:

Cyrus

I kinda didn't feel Cyrus. I quite liked the movie, but it felt really slight. Like it felt as if I was going to forget it straight after the credits rolled. I don't like that feeling. However, I do remember it for the slightly strange relationship between mother and son Jonah Hill and Marisa Tomei. Jeez, that was beautifully played out by those two actors. John C. Reilly was brilliant and as confused as I was about these two, and I genuinely liked the way the characters interacted with each other. But several times during the movie I felt like switching it off and going to sleep (funny thing was, I finished watching this at 10.30pm-ish, and didn't end up getting to sleep until 12.30am). That's not saying it was a bad movie. It was just that the movie wasn't as witty or as electric as I had hoped it would be. The performances really got me through.

What I hoped for:

What I got:

The Poker House

Heard of The Poker House? I'm impressed. Haven't? Well, it stars Jennifer Lawrence, who recently got Oscar nominated for her performance in Winter's Bone, Selma Blair as her junkie mother and Chloe Moretz, who, of course, was Hit-Girl in Kick-Ass and is a part of the young taking over Hollywood. Basically, this was a precursor to Moretz and Lawrence's rise to stardom in 2010. Lawrence, particularly, was amazing. Here she plays a 14 year old who is living in a world of sex, drugs and near poverty, feeling like she ain't good enough for anything. Her performance is so heart breaking that it literally lifts the movie from the same old same old mould it has come from. It is based on the life experiences of actress Lori Petty, who wrote and directed the film quite well. I was surprised by this movie, as I thought it would just be an average thriller that came straight out of the preview drawer. Again, I should expect more from these movies. This one was brilliant.

What I hoped for:

What I got:

DVD--Get Him to the Greek

or: 2010's The Hangover wannabe.

One word to sum it up: Disappointing.

Russell Brand and Jonah Hill are undoubtedly two of the funniest comedy go-to guys in showbiz these days. While watching Get Him to the Greek, I couldn't help but look back to the days where Jonah was just that fat guy from Superbad and Russell was just the weird long-haired guy from St. Trinians. They sure have come a long way since then, but one thing has remained: they're still as funny as ever in raunchy comedies. However, while their comedic talents shone through in Get Him to the Greek, there was almost that feeling of deja vu. You know, this movie was trying to be The Hangover.

In light of the music industry going downhill thanks to downloads and economic problems, a record company is dying for new ideas. Aaron Green (Jonah Hill), an intern, suggests that rockstar Aldous Snow (Russell Brand) should do a 10 year anniversary show at the Greek theatre. Only problem is, Aaron is given the task of getting Aldous to L.A. within 72 hours. It's on this journey where Aaron realizes how much trouble one out-of-control rockstar can cause for an innocent being.

I'll admit, there were laughs-a-plenty in Get Him to the Greek. The film owes a huge debt to Russell Brand who takes great pleasure in making fun of the stereotypes that musicians are put into. Another outrageously funny star in this movie is Rose Byrne, who certainly plays against type as Jackie Q, a character which seems to be made to take a stab at popstars like Katy Perry: an oversexualized self-obsessed singer of less-than-wholesome songs. When Get Him to the Greek tries to be a satire of the music industry, it works, and ha me in hysterics. The unfortunate thing was that I didn't find many of the other parts funny or merely interesting, and the threesome scene definitely put me off it.

Don't get me wrong, I have seen many R-rated comedies and they are one of my favourite genres of film. However, the raunchiness in Get Him to the Greek is lacklustre and too try-hard. Most of the movie is try-hard, as it wants to be a comedy like The Hangover, but the lulls in the script and it's stunning case of deja vu prevent this from being as fun as it should have been. That said, the movie is a great injection of laughter into the early part of 2010 when good comedies were few and far between. Get Him to the Greek isn't completely satisfying, but will have you laughing your ass off. It's an easy watch, and fans of it's predecessor, Forgetting Sarah Marshall (it's a spin-off from that, as Aldous Snow is in that movie too), will definitely find a hit in this. But it's just not funny enough.


THE VERDICT: Works as a spoof of the music industry, but unfortunately, Get Him to the Greek is trying too hard to be like all of the other R-rated comedies. Shame is, it comes out exactly like the others, and that case of deja vu makes it a whole lot less funny.

6/10